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C-^ 


FUKSKNTK!) in’ 







f 












The civil service chroniclE 

\\ 


" Patronage is a two-edged sword which cuts both ways. * No dependence is to be placed on the allegiance of soldiers of fortune. * <' Their 8<wvlce is 
mercenary. The people wnom they pretend to represent consist merely of a knot, greater or smaller, of aspirants to office, useful chiefly 

in the dirty work of smothering the popular voice in primary elections and nominating conventions.if£fV.Ky C. LEA. 


VoL. I, No. 1. 


INDIANAPOLIS, MARCH, 1889. teems feruK"” 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Publication office. No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indi¬ 
anapolis, Ind., where subscriptions and adveriise- 
meuts will be received. Address all correspondence 
to THE CIVIL SERVICE ( HRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana. 


“The reform of the civil service auspicious¬ 
ly begun under a republican administration, 
should be completed by the further extension 
of the reform system, already established by 
law, to all the grades of the service to which 
it is applicable. The spirit and purpose of 
reform should be observed in all executive ap¬ 
pointments, and all laws at variance with the 
object of existing reform legislation should be 
repealed, to the end that the dangers to free 
institutions, which lurk in the power of official 
patronage, may be wisely and effectively 
avoided.”— Republican National Platform, 1888 . 

“The law should have the aid of a friendly 
interpretation, and be faithfully and vigorously 
enforced. All appointments under it should 
be absolutely free from partisan considerations 
and influence.” — From President Harrison’s 
Letter of Acceptance. 

“ Heads of departments, bureaus, and all 
other public officers having any duty in con 
nection therewith, will be expected to enforce 
the civil service law fully and without 
evasion.”— From President Harrison’s Inaugural 
Address. 


The object of the Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle is to promote civil service reform, and, 
incidentally, other things pertaining to bet¬ 
ter administration. No one can look over the 
state of Indiana and say that the field is not 
wide. And so long as in the country at 
large over 100,000 federal offices are still 
used as mere spoil with which to reward 
personal and party service, the voice of 
protest must be raised. We ask the sup 
port of those who are interested in these 
subjects. The conductors of this paper do 
not believe that a party organization or a 
party name is a thing to be worshiped, but 
that a party is simply an instrument, and, 
like any other instrument, may wear out* 

Those who receive this paper are ear¬ 
nestly urged to subscribe for it, if they have 
not already done so. The price is so low 
as to be within the means of every one de¬ 
siring to help the cause of good govern¬ 
ment. The paper is not to make money. 
It must depend for support upon those who 
sympathize with its objects. We expect, 
however, to get a good many subscribers 
who do not sympathize with its objects. 
We think we can make it interesting to 
them, as they will find a certain kind of 
truth told here that will not be in the pa¬ 
pers of their ordinary reading. 


For four years Indiana has been a great 
agitating ground for civil service reform. 
It is admitted throughout the country that 
this agitation has materially advanced the 
cause. To repeat what is not disputed, the 
Indiana managers of the affairs of the late 
administration viewed the law and the re¬ 
form as so much dirt, and, without the 
slightest regard to solemn promises, they 
proceeded accordingly. But from the be¬ 
ginning to the end they found this path beset 
with very ugly thorns. They must to-day, 
in the fires of defeat, look back over their 
course with small satisfaction. Whether 
they will now recognize, what is becoming 
daily more patent, that the spoils system is 
doomed, remains to be seen. Meanwhile 
the struggle in this state affords many val¬ 
uable lessons which the new administra¬ 
tion, for obvious reasons, ought to know by 
heart. We shall notice these lessons from 
time to time. 

The agitation against the misuse of the 
law has made many facts of administration 
clear. These are so staring that no execu¬ 
tive desiring to enforce the law can ignore 
them. The first is the secrecy which now 
veils the execution of this law. It is a 
cloak for fraud. With a knavish politician 
or a tool of knavish politicians for a post¬ 
master, and a knavish politician in control 
of the local board and local examinations, 
the thing is easy. Of what use is it for the 
public to know that an ignorant favorite of 
the postmaster, who reads with difficulty 
and writes with more difficulty, has not 
passed, since the rules permit the above- 
mentioned knaves to cut off the public 
with the cool statement that he has passed. 
Make the favorite’s examination paper a 
public record, so that his neighbors can see 
whether or not it is in his h|nd-writing, 
and whether or not it is such a paper as he 
could possibly have made out, and one em¬ 
inently practicable means of cheating the 
law will be cut off. 

A SECOND staring fact is that the present 
system of local boards seems arranged to 
enable the bead of an office, if so disposed, 
to manipulate the law. At present the 
board is formed from employes of the office 
after consultation with the head of the of¬ 
fice, who has also the power to dismiss 
these employes at any time. The mere 
statement of the plan shows its innate 
worthlessness. A civil service commission 


afraid to do its duty adds to the difficulties 
In 1885 a commissioner came to Indianapo¬ 
lis and allowed Postmaster Jones to select 
the local board. Thirty minutes’ inquiry 
would have developed the fact that the 
choice was unfit. Yet through four years 
the commission was evidently too timid to 
correct its mistake. 

A THIRD radical change, if promises of 
enforcement of the law are to be kept,' will 
be in choosing heads of offices who are, 
friendly to the law. Putting men who are 
mere politicians and nothing else, and who 
have only the views of mere politicians, to 
enforcing this law is very like turning 
thieves into a bank. The average party 
politician has no stubborn opinions up'm 
any subject except that his partisans should 
have the offices. He is, therefore, unalter¬ 
ably opposed to any law that seeks to re¬ 
duce the transaction of public business to a 
business basis, and which therefore cuts oft 
the use of subordinate places as spoils. To 
evade this law is not regarded as dishonor¬ 
able among mere politicians. It is passed 
off by calling it “ politics.” When the dem¬ 
ocrats, four years ago, were laying their 
plans a local manager significantly said : 
“ There is no penalty for not enforcing that 
law.” The machinery of the law was di¬ 
rectly or indirectly guided by petty poli¬ 
ticians to whom civil service reform, or 
“civil service,” as they call it, was ^ great 
joke. It can not be said that theil man¬ 
agement has resulted in much pr )fit to 
themselves or to their party. 1 

Now the republicans can make the same 
mistake or they can profit by the exa nple. 
Let us have the utmost publicity. I 3t all 
the examination papers, all record^ and 
all lists of those who have passed be )pen 
to the public. Every community like fair' 
play, and when a competitor has fairly von 
the first place on the list he will have at 
his back the demand of his neighbors that 
he shall have the first appointment. There 
is more hope for civil service reform in 
this one change than in any other that can 
be made. Then let the machinery of the 
law, including the appointing power under 
it, be put into the hands of men who would 
consider it a dishonor to cheat the law, and 
the republican party is hardly aware of the 
moral and numerical strength which will 
rally to it. We may add that the worst pos¬ 
sible headof an office is the respectable cit 

































1 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 



r 


izen who is ignorant of the law and who 
acts upon the theory that he can carrj" out 
the law and give the members of his party 
the preference. 

In the line of his duty, some eighteen 
months ago, Henry Cook was obliged to 
jump into the canal to save himself from a 
falling wall. The shock and exposure 
brought on an illness from which he never 
recovered and which will probably prove 
fatal. He has no means of support. The 
lire department has many other men who 
quietly perform the duty at hand and risk 
their lives for the people of this city. They 
do not stop to inquire the politics of thft 
man whose factory is burning, but the 
people are less generous. They permit 
these men who are willing to peril their 
lives for the sake of earning small wages^ 
until they become crippled or broken 
down, to face each day the possibility of 
removal because their politics do not suit 
a dozen petty politicians of this city. 
Thirteen democrats at present are al- 
allowed the privilege of earning their daily 
bread in an occupation requiring qualities 
we have been accustomed to honor in the 
soldier; but their chief, who declined to 
dismiss them because they were democrats, 
after thirty years of honorable service in 
the fire department of Indianapolis, was 
removed for that reason and against the 
wish of ninety-nine hundredths of the peo¬ 
ple of this city. This is what is called 
“practical civil service.” 

WiLU McKinney, of Indianapolis, called 
upon Postmaster-General Wanamaker this 
afternoon, in company with Colonel W. W. 
Dudley. “Mac” wants to succeed Gwynn as 
superintendent of the railway mail service at 
Cincinnati. Colonel Dudley remained with 
Mr. Wanamaker for some time, and after¬ 
wards informed McKinney that the appoint¬ 
ment was as good as made, and that he (Mc¬ 
Kinney) would be the man.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to the Indianapolis News. 

VV. W. Dudley is under the charge of 
writing a letter which, if true, makes him 
morally, at least, a fit subject for the state 
prison. He seems afraid to meet this 
charge, and acts as though it were true. 
Under the circumstances, the postmaster- 
general of the United States would appear 
much better showing Dudley the door than 
counseling with him over appointments to 
office. 

The conference of civil service reform¬ 
ers which was held at Baltimore February 
23, was probably the most important meet¬ 
ing of the kind ever held in this country. 
The large number in attendance from all 
parts of the country, the high character of 
the men, and their unmistakable earnest¬ 
ness demonstrate the strong and increased 
hold this reform has in this country 
i ; "Jting w . % isJciiUarly suila- 

■J.’*- ’•'» p.ac- Maryland 


reformers, with great persistence and 
ability brought Senator Gorman and his 
party so near to defeat that a republican 
congressman has stated that if it were not 
for the approaching division of spoils, the 
republicans would carry Maryland at the 
next election. Full accounts of the meet¬ 
ings may be found in the Civil Service Re¬ 
former, of Baltimore, and in the Civil Service 
Record, of Boston, for March. Among those 
attending the conference were Charles J. 
Bonaparte, John C. Rose, Joseph Packard, 
Jr..Thomas B. Mackall, of Baltimore; The¬ 
odore Roosevelt, Rev. A. Mackay Smith, 
and E. L Godkin, of New A'ork; Ethan 
Allen Doty and William Potts, of Brook¬ 
lyn; Henry A. Richmond, of Buffalo; He¬ 
bert Welsh, Joseph Parrish, Rev. J. An¬ 
drews Harris, Stuart Wood and James G. 
Francis, of Philadelphia; Robert N. Top- 
pan, Morrill Wyman, Jr., and Richard H. 
Dana, of Cambridge; Arthur Hobart and 
Henry H. Sprague, of Boston; J. N. Swan, 
of Paxton, Ill.; Charles Claflin Allen, of 
St. Louis; Prof. J. A. Woodburn, of Bloom¬ 
ington; William D. Foulke, of Richmond; 
and Lucius B. Swift, of Indianapolis. 


THE INDIANAPOLIS POSTOFFICE. 

Since the comments in another column, 

relating to the appointment of heads of 

offices in the classified service were in type. 
President Harrison has nominated Mr. 
William Wallace to succeed Postmaster 
Jones in this city. We note the following 
utterances of Mr. Wallace, made after his 
nomination : 

“ What will your policy be in regard to the 
changes in the service?” 

“The civil service law, as I understand it, 
was designed to put efficient men into office. 
Other things being equal, good republicans 
will be given preference when possible. If I 
thought I was to have no choice in the per¬ 
sonnel of my subordinates I should not accept 
the office. It would be unjust to hold me re¬ 
sponsible for acts of men in the appointment 
of whom I had no choice or option.”— Indian¬ 
apolis News interview, March I4. 

“ Do you propose to make a clean sweep ? ” 

“ I intend to obey the civil service laws. Of 
course, nothing in the law prevents the post¬ 
master from discharging every employe. The 
civil service law provides how the employe 
shall get in and the postmaster decides how he 
shall get out. I am frank to say that republi¬ 
cans will be given the preference whenever a 
vacancy is to be filled.”— Indianapolis Sentinel 
interview, March 15 . 

“The public may as well know from the be¬ 
ginning,” said Mr. Wallace, “that as a life¬ 
long republican, I will always give republi¬ 
cans preference in my appointments, other 
things being equal. The colored people shall 
not be ignored either. There are certainly a 
'number of positions which they shall have.” 

Indianapolis News interview, March 15 . 

There are fully one hundred places at the 
disposal of the Indianapolis postmaster. Mr. 
Wallace has not only said that he will give 
republicans preference in his appointments, 
but that he will not ignore the colored people. 
—Indiampolis Journal, Mai'ch 15 , 


It is stating it very mildly to say that 
this is discouraging. Years of agitation re¬ 
sulted in the enactment of a civil service 
law. The fundamental principle of the law 
in view of the agitation and of the law it¬ 
self can not honestly be mistaken. It is 
that certain positions of a clerical nature 
shall be thrown open to competition. The 1 
competition is to know no distinction of | 
color, politics, religion or rank. To put a 
man at the head of an office which is with¬ 
in this competition, and to put him under 
oath that he will faithfully perform the du¬ 
ties of that office, is to put him into a posi¬ 
tion that he may abuse, as a judge may 
abuse his position on the bench. But every 
principle of honor requires that he should 
deal with contestants in this field of open 
and fair competition exactly as an upright 
judge deals with the contestants before 
him. The law invites citizens to compete 
for these places, and there goes with this 
invitation an implied promise of the people 
of the United States who enacted this law 
that competitors shall be treated with the 
most scrupulous fairness. 

If actual words repeatedly spoken are to 
taken as true, Mr. Wallace proposes to 
trick this law. He says, “ Nothing in the 
law prevents the postmaster from dis¬ 
charging every employe.” The President 
has the power to pardon every federal 
criminal out of prison. That is vastly dif¬ 
ferent from his right to exercise that power, 
and if he should exercise it he would be 
impeached and removed from office. Very 
properly the power of dismissal is left with 
the postmaster at Indianapolis. But if he 
dismisses an employe in the classified ser¬ 
vice, except for good cause, he violates his 
oath of office and tricks the law. Good 
cause is drunkenness, or dishonesty, or in¬ 
efficiency or similar faults. It is not good 
cause to dismiss a man because he is a re¬ 
publican or a democrat, or because his 
place is wanted for some one else. 

Mr. Wallace also says: “ The public may 
as well know from the beginning that as a 
life-long republican I will always give re¬ 
publicans the preference in my appoint¬ 
ments, other things being equal.” If Mr. 
Wallace has a vacancy to fill in the classi¬ 
fied service, three names will be handed to 
him by the local examining board from 
which to make his appointment. If he 
gives one of these the preference because 
he is a republican, or if he allows party be¬ 
longing to color or in any manner to influ¬ 
ence his appointment, he will violate his 
oath of office, and he will evade the law. 

To repeat, here is a law which opens 
public employment to the children of the 
poorest, the most obscure and the least in¬ 
fluential on equal terms with the most pow¬ 
erful. Its success depends upon honorable 
dealing by executive officers. Now comes 
Mr. Wallace, an old and respected citizen. 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


3 


and serves notice upon the people of this 
state that it will be practically useless for 
any but republicans to compete. The ques¬ 
tion is suggested of what use he has made 
of his powers of observation during the 
past four years. He ought lO know that 
no other one thing except the acts of Sen 
ator Gorman in Maryland made President 
Cleveland so much trouble or did him and 
his party so much harm throughout the 
country as the conduct of the Indianapolis 
postothce, which was run on a line exactly 
parallel with that now proposed by Mr.Wal 
lace. General Harrison was familiar with 
the facts of the former conduct of this of¬ 
fice. He did not believe that the law was 
enforced. Pie did not believe that a man 
could be rightfully dismissed from the 
classified service without cause. With these 
things in mind he said in his letter of ac¬ 
ceptance, “ The law should have the aid of 
a friendly interpretation and be faithfully and 
vigorously enforced.” And in his inaugural 
aduress President Harrison said : “Heads 
of departments, bureaus, and all other public 
officers, having any duty'^nnected therewith, 
will be expected to enforce the civd service law 
fully and without evasion.” 

In this community President Hnrrison’s 
word for thirty years has not been held 
lightly. We do not believe that he means 
this word to be held lightly, and it is 
most unfortunate that Mr. Wallace either 
thoughtlessly or deliberately has so regard¬ 
ed it. It is not too much to say that he 
has done a damage almost irreparable. No 
matter how repair is attempted, every act 
will have attached to it a suspicion that he 
is carrying out his declared intentions. By 
careless words he has by a long period put 
off the day when the people will believe 
that competitors are fairly dealt with, and 
will compete accordingly. 


THE SCRAMBLE FOR OFFICE. 

No better illustration could be given of 
the utterly vicious character of the present 
system of making appointments outside 
the classified service than the disgraceful 
scramble for office which has prevailed 
since the election, and particularly since 
the inauguration of General Harrison. 
The democrats of four years ago, after 
twenty-four years exclusion from power, 
made no more unseemly struggle for the 
loaves and fishes than republicans are do¬ 
ing now. Every man who conceives that 
his inability to earn a living elsewhere en¬ 
titles him to “ recognition ” at the hands of 
the party is circulating his petitions, his 
requests for letters, and making untiring 
solicitations and personal appeals to the 
President and the heads of departments. 
The most persistent applicant secures the 
greatest number of letters and signatures. 
Responsible men, not only in politics but in 


business life, will sign their names to pal¬ 
pable falsehoods in respect to the qualifica¬ 
tions of an applicant who presents his pe¬ 
tition in person. They will recommend 
men as fit whom they know are not fit; 
they will declare that applicants are “able 
lawyers” and “men of responsibility and 
integrity,” to whom they would not confide 
a case before a justice of the peace, and 
whom they know to be utterly irresponsi¬ 
ble and would not trust for a dollar. Some¬ 
times these very men write letters dis¬ 
avowing the testimonials which they have 
signed and declaring they “ did not mean 
it,” but more frequently they remain 
silent, and the administration, misled 
through these false certificates of character, 
is certain to appoint many men who will 
bring upon it nothing but discredit and 
disgrace. 

An illustration came to our knowledge a 
few days ago. A man who has been the 
laughing stock of the community in which 
he resides, a man without skill, without 
ability, without integrity, received the sig¬ 
natures of the best business men in one of 
the most important cities of this state, to a 
petition which stated that he was a man of 
integrity, a lawyer of great ability, emi¬ 
nently qualified for the position in every 
respect and that he ought to receive it as 
a reward for services to the republican 
party. There is not a man whose name is 
signed to the petition who would not blush 
to have his signature exposed. The men 
who certified to the qualifications of this 
applicant, every one of them, knew that 
they were perpetrating what, in the very 
best view of it, would be a huge joke upon 
the administration. The position asked 
for was one requiring the highest qualifica¬ 
tions. The appointment of the man would 
bring disgrace upon the American name 
among the people where his duties were to 
be performed. Yet, nobody was deterred 
by any such considerations. The applicant 
went around personally asking for signa¬ 
tures. The men whom he solicited “ did 
not like to refuse.” This is happening ev¬ 
erywhere. How can General Harrison 
tell, while such a practice is all but uni¬ 
versal, who are worthy of appointment and 
who are not ? There is not a man promi¬ 
nent in public life in the republican party 
who is not receiving every day letters ask¬ 
ing lor his indorsement. Sometimes the 
men are worthy, but more often they are 
men whose only claims upon the office are 
their necessities or desires. Good and bad 
are thrown indiscriminately together. The 
signature to the petition and the letter of 
recommendation are given to all. Nobody 
has the independence to refuse. This evil 
comes from the frailty of human nature, 
from an indisposition to disoblige a friend. 
Sometimes the application will be from 
one in favor of whom some personal obli¬ 


gation is incurred; and there is notone 
man in a hundred who will refuse to li¬ 
quidate it in this manner at the expense of 
the public. 

There are no places more likely to be 
filled by men not qualified to fill them than 
the foreign service, especially the consular 
service. There are no places through which 
the American name is brought into greater 
disgrace than by these. Has not the time 
at last come when the necessities of the case 
demand that no man shall be appointed 
who can not show by some sort of test his 
ability to discharge the duties of this office? 
Ought a man to be sent to fill a business 
position in a foreign country who can not 
speak its language, who scarcely knows in 
what part of the world the place is situated 
to which he is accredited, who has no 
knowledge whatever of the duties which 
he is required to perform ? These disqual¬ 
ifications could be detected by half an hour’s 
examination. 

There is not a civilized country in the 
world that does not demand for its repre¬ 
sentatives higher qualifications for posi¬ 
tions like these than is demanded by the 
American republic. 

The time has come for us to make a 
change. Even if the party in power were 
entitled to all these offices, there still ought 
to be some plan by which each party can 
keep its “own dunces out.” It is time that 
some sort of examination should be pre¬ 
scribed for the consular service. 

EXAMINATION QUESTIONS. 

If this paper were published twice a day 
and 365 days in the year, and each issue 
carefully explained just what the examina¬ 
tions for entranee to various places in the 
classified eivil service consist of, there 
would still be heard the venerable jokes 
about requiring from applicants a knowl¬ 
edge of obscure African lakes, rivers and 
mountains. Still it is well not to weary, 
but to show the facts. To begin with, the 
questions are of the most simple and ele¬ 
mentary sort: “ Multiply 34i by loj.” The 
writing, spelling, composition, punctua¬ 
tion and grammar are incidentally shown 
by requiring the applicant to “copy a 
printed statement,” by “writing down from 
memory the substance of matter orally 
communicated,’’ by “writing a letter to 
some official, giving an account of the 
schools attended and the studies pursued 
by the applicant.” These are samples of 
the questions asked of applicants for deri- 
cal service. For instance, if Mr. Thomas 
Markey of this city had wanted a clerical 
position instead of being a candidate for 
the insane hospital board (his candidature 
was successful), the fact that he wrote that 
he had to address the “nights of labor” 
would undoubtedly have been a disadvan¬ 
tage. But had he, under the present 










4 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


“scholars’ test,” desired a position in the 
fire or police department, or as foreman of 
laborers, in Boston, he might have had to 
answer in writing, or in certain cases his 
answers would have been taken down by 
a stenographer, such of the following 
as pertained to his department. Ten 
questions in city information: The loca¬ 
tions of public buildings, bridges, fire en¬ 
gine houses, etc. “ How are the following- 
named officers elected: mayor, aldermen, 
councilmen?” “Where does the water 
come from that is used in this city for fire 
and other purposes?” Eight questions 
relating to general work. The use of 
tools, reading grade stakes, tallying, etc. 
Twelve questions relating to the different 
kinds of sewers, the preparation and use of 
cement and other materials and trench 
work. This is enough to show that the ex¬ 
amination system, as it now is, is simple, flex¬ 
ible and confined to the work a man asks to be 
put at. It even puts in a United States mail 
carrier of this city who takes a half holiday 
in recognition of Washington’s birthday 
under the impression that Washington was 
an Irishman. 


THE PROMISES. 

What have we a right to expect from the 
republican party? At a recent meeting of 
our Indiana association we had occasion to 
examine, somewhat in detail, the precise mean¬ 
ing of the declarations of that party in regard 
to civil service reform. I desire at the outset 
to recapitulate in a few brief words the con¬ 
clusions to which we were led. That party 
acquired power upon certain definite promises 
embodied in the national platform. This is 
the language: “The men who abandoned the 
republican party in 1884 and continued to 
adhere to the democratic party, have deserted 
not only the cause of honest government, of 
sound finance, of freedom, of purity of the 
ballot, but especially have they deserted the 
cause of reform in the civil service. We will 
not fail to keep our pledges because they have 
broken theirs, or because their candidate has 
broken his.” 

The platform is made not simply a declara¬ 
tion of policy, but a definite “ pledge ” (that is 
the word), which it would be impossible for 
an administration, acquiring power upon the 
strength of it, not to regard. 

The platform goes on : “ We therefore repeat 
our declaration of 1884, to wit: The reform of 
the civil service auspiciously begun under a 
republican administration, should be com¬ 
pleted by the further extension of the reform 
system, already established by law, to all the 
grades of the service to which it is applicable. 
The spirit and purpose of reform should be 
observed in all executive appointments, and 
all laws at variance with the object of exist¬ 
ing reform legislation should be repealed, to 
the end that the dangers to free institutions, 
which lurk in the power of official patronage, 
may be wisely and effectively avoided.” 

General Harrison tells us in his letter of ac¬ 
ceptance, that in regard to every subject em¬ 
braced in the platform, he is in entire agree¬ 
ment with the declaration of the convention. 
He is therefore in agreement with this pledge, 
and has made his own promise. 

Now, what is the meaning of these words? 
They are capable of pretty definite construc¬ 
tion. 

“The reform should be extended to all grades 


of the service to which it is applicable. By | 
whom must the extension be made? Un-j 
doubtedly by that branch of the government I 
which is now invested with control over ex- j 
ecutive appointments. j 

It is the President, and not congress, to whom 1 
we must look for the redemption of this pledge. 
The promise can not be fulfilled by a mere ap¬ 
proval of reform legislation. The affirmative 
act of extending the system must be done by 
the President, in whose hands the power re¬ 
sides. * » * * * 

The President has the right to extend the 
rules, and General Harrison has given his 
promise that they shall be extended to all 
grades to which they are applicable. 

The next question is: To what grades of the 
service is the reform system applicable; this, 
also, as to many of these places is capable of 
definite ascertainment. The civil service act 
itself enumerates grades to which it is appli¬ 
cable, and to which it has not yet been ex¬ 
tended. The sixth section makes it the duty 
of the postmaster general to classify the public 
service at each post-office where there are fifty 
persons employed. “And thereafter, on the 
direction of the President, to arrange in like 
classes the persons employed in connection 
with any other post-office.” 

Under this section there have been brought 
into the classified service some thirty-seven 
post-offices. The statute recognizes others to 
which it should be extended. There is no 
reason why it can not beextended to all offices 
where there is a free delivery of letters. There 
is as much reason for its application there as 
to the larger places. The duties are substan¬ 
tially the same ; the positions are non-politi¬ 
cal. There is no court in Christendom that, in 
construing the promise, would deny that the 
system was applicable to such places. By the 
terms of the act, it is the duty of the President 
to direct this extension. Such extension he 
has, therefore, definitely agreed to make. 

Similar provisions are contained in the act 
regarding the employes of collectors, naval 
officers, surveyors and appraisers in the cus¬ 
toms service, and the platform applies to all 
these places where the rules are not yet ex¬ 
tended. 

The promise to extend the reform to all 
places to which it is applicable certainly in¬ 
cludes those grades to which civil service reg¬ 
ulations have been successfully applied else¬ 
where. In such cases experience has shown 
that the system is applicable. The platform 
was made with reference to this fact. The 
men who drafted the platform, and the con¬ 
vention which adopted it, knew that similar 
provisions had been successfully applied to 
grades of the service in Massachusetts, New 
York and elsewhere, to which they had not 
yet been extended by the federal act, and in 
promising, the reform should be extended to 
all grades to which it is applicable, they cer¬ 
tainly included these. Let me oflTer an illus¬ 
tration : The experience of Massachusetts has 
shown that it is desirable that the labor serv¬ 
ice should be placed under the rules. By 
this means the country will avoid the uu 
wholesome spectacle of vast numbers of men 
employed in navy yards and elsewhere, just 
before election, in order to secure votes and 
political support. 

By the federal act, laborers need not be 
classified, but there is nothing which forbids 
such classification. The President has the 
power to make it. It ought to be made, and 
the platform has substantially promised that 
it shall be. 

The civil service commissioners, without re¬ 
gard to party, have brought to the attention 
of the President other branches of the service 
to which the rules may be applied. Among 
these were the emjiloyes of the railway mail 
service, and many places in the Indian bureau, 
in the labor bureau, in the war department 


and in the department of agriculture. Some 
of these recommendations have been adopted, 
and the outgoing administration has done no 
act more important than the inclusion of the 
railway mail service within the rules. We 
believe that we have not only the promise of 
the President elect that the extension made 
shall be maintained, but also that the law 
shall be applied to those places to which it is 
not yet extended, but where the unbiased 
judgment of those best qualified to determine 
shall declare that this is applicable. 

These are some of the places to which it can 
be definitely affirmed that the republican 
party has promised an extension of the reform. 
In respect to a much wider range of non-polit¬ 
ical offices, such as consulships and fourth-class 
post masterships, where the ground is more de¬ 
batable, as to these, we may hopefully await 
the ripening influences of time and a more 
progressive public sentiment. But the prom¬ 
ise does not stop at the extension of the rules. 
“The spirit and purpose of reform should be 
observed in all executive appointments.” 

That “spirit and purpose” is, that in non¬ 
political offices, men are not to be appointed, 
rejected or discharged on account of political 
services or opinions, but on account of their 
fitness to perform the duties of office, and that 
they are not to use their official places for po¬ 
litical purposes. 

The President-elect in his letter of accept¬ 
ance, shows that this is his understanding. 
He says, “In appointments to every grade and 
department, fitness and not party service 
should be the essential and discriminating 
test, andjidelity and efficiency the only sure 
tenure of office.” 

We believe, therefore, that the spectacle 
will not be repeated of the appointment^ of 
new and untried men to positions for which 
they have shown no qualifications, on account 
of the aid given by them to the party or its 
candidate during the campaign. It will be 
impossible, for instance, that such a position 
as a consulship, a place requiring business 
ability, and a knowledge of the language and 
usages of the country where the duties are to 
be performed, shall be filled by a man with¬ 
out business qualifications, ignorant of both 
language and usages, because such person has 
been an effective campaign speaker, or useful 
in the organization of the party in power. 
Fitness is to be the essential and discriminat¬ 
ing test. 

But, more than this, the President-elect 
says: “Only the interest of the public service 
should suggest removals from office.” This 
means a great deal. It means that the clamor 
of aspirants and local political sentiment shall 
not accomplish the removal of that demo¬ 
cratic official who has faithfully performed 
his duty. » * 

General Harrison says: “The law should 
have the aid of a friendly interpretation, and 
be faithfully and vigorously enforced.” This 
can not be done, if men who are not in favor 
of it, men who, like Postmaster Aquilla Jones, 
say that they despise it, if such as these are 
appointed to carry it out. If spoilsmen are 
to be chosen for the service of the government, 
we must insist, as a vital matter, that they 
be excluded from places which involve the se¬ 
lection of employes under the civil service act. 
General Harrison says: “All appointments 
under this law should be absolutely free from 
partisan considerations,” but this can never 
be if those clothed with the power of making 
such appointments are themselves warped by 
the prejudices of the spoils system— From an 
Address Delivered at the Conjerence of Civil Servic.e 
Rejoimers at Baltimore, Febiuary 2S, 1889- by 
William Dudley Foulke. 


Since its annual meeting, the last of Janu¬ 
ary, the Indiana Civil Service Reform Asso¬ 
ciation has gained over sixty new members. 




















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


5 


Indianapolis, Nov. 28, 1888. 

To the Editor of the Civil Service Record : 

I have your request for a statement of what 
I think civil service reform associations ought 
to do to help on this reform under the next 
administration. We have before us the un¬ 
pleasant fact that, in less than four years, over 
one hundred thousand federal employes have 
been put out and their places taken by new 
lands. No civil service reformer believed 
tnat it would or could be done. Nevertheless, 
it has been done. Further, in those places 
where anything like a thorough investigation 
has been had, the civil service law has been 
tricked. It is useless to charge trickery in 
those places not investigated ; it is also useless 
to ask the average mind not to believe that, 
with stray exceptions, it exists. At any rate, 
it is safe to say that no progress has been made 
toward inspiring confidence that it is worth 
while for any one to compete who is not in 
political accord with the administration! 
and that the efficiency of the service has been 
greatly damaged, and damaged most where the 
rioting in spoils has been greatest. Civil ser¬ 
vice reformers may have that melancholy con¬ 
solation. If the service had shown improve¬ 
ment or no deterioration, this reform would 
have an up-hill road indeed. 

By far the most important constitutional 
duty of the President is the management of the 
civil service. President Harrison will have to 
undertake this management with one hundred 
thousand democrats under him who largely 
got their places as spoils, and with great offices 
as illustrations that the civil service law can be 
so “ managed” that the sweep can be made 
just as clean there as anywhere else. Yet these 
things are neither an example to be followed, 
nor shall they be an excuse for their repetition ; 
they are only a warning, a calamity to be 
avoided. 

General Harrison has not been prolific in 
promises of civil service reform ; indeed, there 
has been a silence about the subject that seems 
studied. This does not in the least lessen his 
du.ty, nor should it lessen the demand that he 
perform that duty. He should be held to just 
the same performance as if he had covered his 
door yard with promises. The President has 
no right under the constitution to use the fed¬ 
eral service as a party spoil, or to permit it to 
so used by congressmen or other persons. It 
such a right is in the constitution, or if it was 
in the intention of the makers of that instru¬ 
ment, it would be well for some one to point 
it out. Again, the platform upon which Gen¬ 
eral Harrison was elected binds him ; and it 
is not to be expected that he will seek to avoid 
this obligation. It is explicit, it has no un¬ 
certain meaning, and there is no escape from 
it. It leaves no room for the spoils system 
during his administration. He is not a man 
who will like to leave a basis of truth for the 
charge that he has violated the promises made 
by his party and himself in the platform 
Further, in his letter of acceptance, he said 
that the civil service law should be carried 
out by friendly hands. He must have writ¬ 
ten advisedly. He is familiar with the law 
and with the scandalous abuse of it in his own 
city; and it will be strange, indeed, if the 
machine is now made to run the other way, 
and similar effects produced for theotherside. 

No amount of other promises could add 
anything to the duty which the constitution, 
the platform and his letter of acceptance will 
put upon the new President. If this duly is 
performed, congressmen will attend to legisla 
tion and not to dividing offices, editors will 
not be subsidized by the score with offices, con¬ 
trollers of patronage will have no occupation, 
and there will be no clean sweep. If this duly 
is done. President Harrison will without delay 
extend the civil service law to the railway mail 
service, the Indian service, the navy yards, the 


free delivery cities, and “to all grades of the 
service to which it is applicable.” If he is to 
observe “the spirit and purpose of the reform 
* ■» «- jjj gjj executive appointments,” pro¬ 
motions will be the rule in those appointments. 
In fact, the use of the public offices as spoil 
will be ended. This is the position which the 
republican party and its candidate took de¬ 
liberately and in writing. This is a brief 
statement of the duty of General Harrison, to 
be performed as he knows how, if he makes up 
his mind to it. 

President Cleveland’s party, however, broke 
him down in this respect. The republican 
party machine has exactly the same intent 
with regard to General Harrison. Quay and 
•Vlahone and Ingalls mean to rival Gorman 
and Voorhees and Vest; and General Harri¬ 
son, as sure as his inauguration comes, will 
have to face the issue presented to him by 
these men and their likes. There will be no 
half-way about it; he will conquer them, or 
they will conquer him. The result can not be 
told ; but, in the presence of such capable, de¬ 
termined and hungry enemies, the civil service 
reform associations should prepare to contest 
every inch of the ground from the start. 

These men are relying upon the admission 
of new states and upon breaking the solid 
south to keep up the republican party. Gen 
eral Harrison is also quoted as relying upon 
these and other possible sources of strength. 
President Cleveland had analogous hopes for 
his party ; but it would have paid him and his 
party better if he had kept his promises in re¬ 
gard to the civil service. History is trying to 
repeat itself. Republican spoilsmen want the 
offices, whatever the consequences. 

The attack is not likely to be made openly. 
The “clean sweepers” have met with little 
public encouragement, and few like to declare 
openly for it. If they succeed in bringing 
about a condition of vagueness and apparant 
uncertainty of intention about removals and 
how far they are to go, the signs will be dan¬ 
gerous. Under the guise of “ weeding the ser¬ 
vice,” weeds will be found as long as demo¬ 
crats last. The plan will be to find cause for 
removal until another clean sweep has been 
made. Such a course should be stubbornly 
resisted at every step, and the responsibility 
fixed. On the other hand, if President Har¬ 
rison takes the country into his confidence, 
and lays down a well-defined, carefully ma¬ 
tured plan as to how he proposes to manage 
the civil service, and if this plan makes possi¬ 
ble reasonable progress in this reform, he 
should have the support of civil service re¬ 
formers so long as he executes his plan with¬ 
out vacillation. 

The same method of working by the associ¬ 
ations will be adapted to either case. The re¬ 
cent election in Maryland shows what reform¬ 
ers can accomplish by a relentless publication 
of the facts which mark the daily progress of 
the spoils system in full swing. A publica¬ 
tion of the facts which mark the civil service 
management of the new administration will 
be an act of the strictest justice. If the ad¬ 
ministration conquers the spoilsmen, this pub¬ 
lication will be a crown of glory for it; if it 
is ruled by the spoilsmen, there can be no 
complaint because its acts are brought to the 
daylight. I should say that this is the most 
important work to be done, and each associa¬ 
tion should commence it systematically in its 
own community. For instance, the execution 
of the civil service law should be watched, 
what office-holders do in politics should be 
noted, and every case of unjust removal or 
improper appointment, with all pertinent 
facts,should be made a record. Public atten¬ 
tion should be called to these and other mat¬ 
ters noted in like manner, and from time to 
time they should be embodied into reports to 
be widely circulated. If this work is well 
done, it will greatly strengthen the hands of a 


President bent upon administrative reform; 
and no administration bent upon a clean sweep 
can stand such a fire. To do this in the best 
manner will require some money, and there 
ought to be some way taken to raise it. 

it is also imperative to do much in other 
directions. While associations should keep 
their records, their persuasive powers should 
never rest, but should be used to encourage 
good works. For instance, the republican 
congress should be asked to keep the platform 
promise by repealing the four-years’ tenure 
act. The extension ol the civil service law by 
the President should be steadily urged until 
it covers all of the service to which it is appli¬ 
cable. A system of local boards, independent 
of local appointing officers, should be asked 
for. In places like Indianapolis, secrecy is a 
cover for trickery ; and it would be better if 
the examination papers and the eligible list 
were public records. The demand that rea¬ 
sons shall be given for removals should be 
persisted in. The bill making it a penal of¬ 
fense for congressmen to interfere with ap¬ 
pointments should be urged with all the force 
that can be brought to bear. A systematic 
agitation of the principles of this reform, be¬ 
tween this time and the inauguration, would 
find ready listeners. The republican spoils¬ 
men are now attacking these principles with 
great glibness; the question of a clean sweep 
in the federal service is before us, and public 
attention is attracted to administrative con¬ 
cerns. Lucius B. Swift. 

From the Civil Service Record, December, 1888. 


The Washington Post, edited by Frank Hat¬ 
ton, who was Postmaster-General under Ar¬ 
thur, says of the raid of office-seekers upon 
Harrison : “ We were forewarned in the winter 
and spring of 1885 of the grand army of in¬ 
vasion that was to descend upon Mr. Cleve¬ 
land, with their aid and counsel and hungry 
clamor for a share in the spoils from which 
for a quarter of a century they had been barred 
out; but the rush and scramble at that mem¬ 
orable period was no more than a Sunday- 
school pic nic to the jam that, after only four 
years’ seclusion from the flesh-pots, is already 
setting in upon Indianapolis, and threatening 
to overwhelm the President-elect with pleas 
for patronage little short of the highwayman’s 
in brutality.” 


Postmaster Jones sat in his comfortable office in 
the federal building at 11 o’clock and remarked that 
a large element of relief will dilute his regret at giv¬ 
ing up the office. 

“We have made some mistakes.’’ he said reflec¬ 
tively, “ some mistakes ; but I have done the best I 
could all the time. The newspapers have not been 
very charitable toward me.’’ 

“How many republicans remain in the offlee from 
the last administration ? ’’ 

“ I do not know exactly. There are several, how¬ 
ever.’’ 

“A letter-carrier said he thought there are eight 
carriers who are republicans.’’ 

“ Yes. 1 think that is right, except two of the 
eight didn’t vote the way your informant thinks. 
Two voted the democratic ticket. Then there are 
two or three men in the office who before the election 
talked loud about voting the democratic ti<-ket, but 
I happen to know they did not do it. One or two 
republicans did vote with the democrats though, 
and two or three did not vote at all. A few of the 
boys have republican tendencies, but their wives are 
strong democrats, so I concluded to let them stay.” 

‘‘Are any of the carriers intending to resign soon?” 

“Yes, some of them are. Four have already re¬ 
signed and will quit next Saturday. Last Saturday 
I employed three new carriers, all republicans, and 
two of them, I think, ex soldiers. I never fought in 
anybody's war, but I guess my sympathy for the sol¬ 
diers is equal to that of other men. I don’t want to 
hamper the new postmaster, and so concluded to 
employ republicans.” 

“■ Who are tlie new appointments?” 

“ I don’t know. 'I hree men were needed, and the 
first three names on the list of those who had passed 
the civil service examination were republicans, and 
1 just ordered them to be employed.”—iMdtanapoh* 
News Interview, March 15 








6 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

“ Large districts or parcels of land were 
alloted by the conquering generals to the 
superior officers of the army, and by them 
dealt out again in smaller parcels or allot¬ 
ments to the inferior officers and most de¬ 
serving soldiers. * * The condition of 
holding the lands thus given was that the 
possessor should do service faithfully both 
at home and in the wars, to him by whom 
they were given,” and, on breach of this 
condition, “by not performing the stipu¬ 
lated service, or by deserting hislord in bat¬ 
tle,” the lands reverted to the lord. The vas 
sal, upon investiture, took an oath of fealty 
to the lord, and in addition did homage, 
“openly and humbly kneeling, being un¬ 
girt, uncovered and holding up his hands, 
both together, between those of his lord, 
who sate before him, and there professing 
that he did become his man from that day 
forth, of life and limb and earthly honor, 
and then he received a kiss from his lord.” 
Services were free and base. Free service 
was to pay a sum of money, or serve under 
the lord in war. Base service was to plow 
the lord’s land, to make his hedge or carry 
out his dung.— Blackslone. 

Senator Quay left yesterday for Florida, to 
be absent until the latter part of February. 
He desired the press to announce that he 
would oppose the appointment to office of any 
man who applied to him for assistance prior to 
March 4.— Washington Dispatch to the Indian¬ 
apolis liews, January 29. 

Washington, January 16.—The subject of 
patronage is giving the republican congress¬ 
men much concern. The largest boxes that 
are now to be seen upon their desks are label¬ 
led “Application for Office.” Many of them 
greatly regret that the reformed civil service 
system does not apply to all offices within the 
gift of the President. Some of these have no 
special devotion to the reform, but fear that 
the privilege of making suggestions to the 
President, which some of them are already 
beginning to characterize as “ nominations,” 
may also bring with it certain political re¬ 
sponsibilities which they do not care to assume. 
One of the Illinois congressmen says that he 
has been advised that the following course 
will be pursued by the senators from that state 
in thedistriluition of patronage, after March 4. 
As to the offices in Cook county. Senators Cul- 
lom and Farwell will call the three republican 
representatives from Chicago into conference, 
and hear their suggestions. As to the offices 
in the other congressional districts, the several 
republican representatives in the different 
judicial districts will be convened in confer¬ 
ence. It is ascertained already that every 
congressman in the northern Illinois district 
has a candidate for United States marshal. 
The gentleman who furnishes this information 
says that the representatives have not been 
informed that their wishes will be respected 
by the senators in making recommendations, 
or that the nominations for the offices shall be 
put to a vote of the delegation, or those inter¬ 
ested in them. Some of the representatives 
indicate that they shall make independent 
recommendations to the President as to the 
offi'-es in their respective districts. 

The democrats have watched the case of 
General Newberry, nominated to be postmaster 
of Chicago, with much interest, because it 


might be regarded as a precedent as to con¬ 
firmations to offices the terms of which ex¬ 
tend beyond March 4. The circumstaiues 
under which General Newberry was confirmed 
yesterday will, however, hardly constitute a 
piecedent. He was confirmed after an execu¬ 
tive session of only five minutes, and in ac¬ 
cordance with an understanding which was 
arrived at with-Senator Farwell that Newberry 
shall resign the office promptly in March. 
Senator Sawyer, the chairman of the post-office 
committee, is disposed to do exactly what the 
republican senators from any particular lo¬ 
cality desire him to do, unless they wish him 
to do an injustice. The representation which 
Senator Farwell made to him secured the fa¬ 
vorable report from the committee, and after 
that the confirmation was a mere matter of 
form .—Special Dispatch to Evenmg Post. 

WA.SHINGTON, March 1. —General Browne 
is receiving so many applications every day 
for post-offices and other official positions 
that he is compelled to content himself with 
simply classifying and filing them, and attend¬ 
ing to the applications in their various forms 
without answering them, as has been his cus¬ 
tom. It has for some time required the entire 
time of a stenographer to answer his letters, 
and now the General finds the volume so great 
that it will be impossible to answer those who 
simply send applications for office. His cor¬ 
respondents may rest assured, however, that 
their applications will receive the same 
prompt attention that they would if the ap 
plicants were notified of the receipt of their 
requests .—Special to the Indianapolis Journal. 

Washington, March 5. —Office seekers are 
doing themselves violence and the admin¬ 
istration an uujustice in rushing upon the 
President and his cabinet officers, and upon 
the friends of these men, just at this time. 
Their importunities are not in season. There 
will be three or four cabinet meetings held 
before appointments are made. The first 
selections will be of the assistants to the cab¬ 
inet officers, then will come the heads of bu¬ 
reaus and the chiefs of divisions. All this 
will be done before appointments are made to 
offices located throughout the country, except 
where emergencies arise—that is, to fill va¬ 
cancies already existing, or to succeed officers 
who are considered incompetent or unfit for 
the places they occupy. 

Applicants will not be given any advantage 
in j)usbing their claims just at this time. 
Senators and representatives in congress are 
overwhelmed with applications, and thousands 
of aspirants to political positions are here al¬ 
ready, personally urging their merits. This is 
not only unnecessary, but it is distasteful, be¬ 
cause the condition of affairs is not such as to 
warrant action. These statements are not to 
be construed that the present administration 
intends to protect democrats in office to the dis¬ 
paragement of repul)licans, nor should they 
be construed to mean that the general service 
of the government will not need to be reor¬ 
ganized. It is simply to indicate that there 
should not be a great haste on the part of of¬ 
fice-seekers, and that the time for importuni¬ 
ties will not come for two or three weeks.— 
Special to the Indianapolis Journal. 

AVashington, March 6. —Thousands of of¬ 
fice-seekers are here working for places in the 
government service throughout the country, 
while hundreds of thousands have sent their 
applications to men in congress, notwithstand¬ 
ing the fact that appointments outside of the 
managerial positions in the departments will 
not be made under some weeks, except in a few 
instances .—Special to the Indianapolis Journal. 

Washington, March 7.—Every hour or two 
during all of to-day a messenger entered Pri¬ 


vate Secretary Halford’s room, and, throwing 
his long arms around a great pile of applica¬ 
tions for office, lugged them into an adjoining 
joom, where they were piled upon a dtsk for 
classification and pigeon-holing. Several bun¬ 
dles of these papers were received between 9 
and 6 o’clock. The stream of office-seekers 
was continuous from the moment the outer 
doors were opened until they were closed.— 
Special to the Indianapolis Journal. 

The Indiana republicans in Washington 
have been holding meetings for the last two 
or three days, and have been engaged in the 
serious matter of distributing the patronage 
of the administration.— Special,Cincinnati Com¬ 
mercial-Gazette, March 7. 

The demand for office, which began long 
before President Harrison was inaugurated, 
is now a scramble. Almost every man who 
carried a torch or escorted a delegation of 
visitors during the campaign, is making a 
pull for an office .—Indianapolis News, hid., 
March 7. 


Senator Manderson, of Nebraska, says the 
list of applicants from that state would be “a 
directory of the state .”—Evening Post, March 8. 

Senator Ingaels says that all the offices in 
the gift of the administration would be in¬ 
sufficient to satisfy the demands of the candi¬ 
dates from Kansas .—Evening Post, March 8. 

The present rush of office-seekers in Wash¬ 
ington is not a healthy nor a hopeful sign, nor 
a gratifying sight. It is not in accordance 
with the better sentiment of the Republican 
party, and we have no doubt it is a disagree¬ 
able experience to the President and his exec¬ 
utive assistants. — Indianapolis Journcd, Rep., 
March 8. 


The two broad tables occupied by the Pres¬ 
ident’s stenographers were completely covered 
with letters fresh from office-seeking consti¬ 
tuents, and the work of classifying applica¬ 
tion, has been thorounbly begun .—Indianapolis 
Journal, Washington Dispatch, March 8. 

Washington, March 8. — Representative 
Cannon did some good, solid work this morn¬ 
ing in behalf of .James Clark, of Mattoon, Ill. 
Mr. Clark wants to be second Auditor, and 
Mr. Cannon sees no reason why he should not 
secure the appointmetit. The Illinois delega¬ 
tion has indorsed Mr. Clark in a most thor¬ 
ough and decided manner, and they are satis¬ 
fied that his chances are as good as any one 
else’s. One of the Illinois senators was ex¬ 
tremely frank with the President on the ques¬ 
tion of state patronage. When it was sug¬ 
gested that the delegation give the President a 
list of what they wanted, the senator said : 
“ W ould it not be better, Mr. President, if you 
were to give us a list of what you think we 
ought to have?” 

Congres.sman Bynum returned from AVash- 
ington Tuesday. He is in good health and 
spirits, and takes a sanguine view of the polit¬ 
ical future. He says that W’ashington has 
never seen such a rush of hungry place-seekers 
as now crowd the city, and that the new Pres¬ 
ident will find himself unable to satisfy one- 
twelfth of the greedy patriots who are besieg¬ 
ing him, even if he makes a clean sweep.— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, March 8. 

Every republican member of Congress, sen¬ 
ator and member-elect is suffering from a visi¬ 
tation of a good portion of the male popula¬ 
tion of bis district. They get scarcely time 
enough to eat their meals, are hustled out of 
bed at an early hour, and it is late at night, 
usually, before they retire. Several have been 























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


7 


obliged to follow the example of Mr. Wade, of 
Missouri, and change their quarters, keeping 
their new address secret. On Wednesday 
morning the constituents of Mr. Wade began 
to ring his front-door bell at a quarter of 6. 
When he rose, at half past 8, the parlor was 
full of people with petitions to be signed and 
with requests that he accompany them to the 
White House or to some of the departments. 
His breakfast hour, his lunch hour and the 
time for dinner passed without his having 
time to eat. The next day he moved, and 
since then no one has been able to discover his 
habitation. — Indianapolis Journal Washington 
Dispatch, March 9. 


While the majority of Indianians have re¬ 
turned home, there are still a large number 
here, vigorously pushing their claims for posi¬ 
tions. It is almost certain that John C. New 
will go to Austria and ex-Governor Porter to 
Rome. J. N. Huston, chairman of the Indi¬ 
ana republican state committee, has gone 
home to arrange his business to accept the po¬ 
sition of treasurer of the United States. Dan 
Ransdell, of Indianapolis, who lost an arm 
while serving in General Harrison’s regiment, 
will be marshal of the District of Columbia. 
It is said that Mr. Huston will have charge of 
the appointment of postmasters and railway 
mail clerks in the Indiana districts represented 
by democratic congressmen, and that Sergeant 
McKinney, of Indianapolis, will be superin¬ 
tendent of the railway postal service for the 
fifth division, which embraces the states of 
Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana and Tennessee. C. 
Bradford, of Indianapolis, is making a vigor¬ 
ous fight for commissioner of patents, but it is 
understood that office will go to Iowa. Col. 
Dudley is doing his best to secure positions for 
Indianians. He does not desire any position 
at the hands of the administration. He is 
building up a valuable business as an attor¬ 
ney, and proposes to stick to it.— Commercial- 
Gazette Washington Special, March 9. 


Washingtox, March 11. —General Browne, 
to-day, presented the application of Col. W. 
A. Cullen, of Eushville, for the position of 
Utah Commissioner ; Gen. Silas Colgrove, of 
Winchester, Deputy Commissioner of Pen¬ 
sions; D. C. Binkley, of Wayne county, for 
Third Auditor of the Treasury ; Mr. Charles 
W. Stivers, editor of the Herald, at Liberty, is 
largely indorsed for the same position. His 
papers are also in the hands of the President. 

L. H. Mitchell, of Henry county, has had his 
application for Second Comptroller of the 
Treasury filed. 

It is not probable that a new postmaster will 
be appointed at Muncie till the present com¬ 
mission expires. It will be the policy of the 
administration, in cases of that character, to 
permit the incumbent to serve out his time, 
unless good and sufficient reasons are given 
showing why he should be removed. 

General Browne has recommended the ap¬ 
pointment of the following fourth-class post¬ 
masters for the sixth congressional district: 

Edward R. Pugh, Windsor; Lewis L. Per- 
dieu, Cowan ; William R. Fizer,'Rural; James 
W. Hannan, New Corner ; Isaac N. Chenoweth, 
Middleton; William K. Boyd,Moorland ; John 

M. Neff, Eaton ; Alonzo Geyer, Arlington ; T. 
M. Goff, DeSoto ; F. W. Owens, Clark ; Norman 
E. Black, Selma ; Leo M. Harlan, Whitewater; 
Nancy Pierce, Modoc; Edward C. Charles, 
Carthage; Philip K. May, Wilkinson ; W. H. 
O. Goldsmith, New Salem ; Noah McCormick, 
Cadiz; J. F. Camplin, Lewisville; Addison 
St. Myer, Williamsburg; Fielder E. Olvey, 
Economy; Emanuel Zimmerman, Emmets- 
ville; Lindley M. Thornburg, Farmland; 
Leonidas R. Allison, Greensboro ; C. C. Coffin, 
Kennards; Charles S. Unthank, Webster; 
Austin K. Smith, Milroy ; Elizabeth Zuenger, 


Falmouth; Ira E. Snodgrass, Reed.— Special 
to the Indianapolis Joiurnal. 

Greencastle, March 12.— There are an 
even half dozen candidates for the postoffice 
in this city, and all are equally confident of 
securing the prize. The names include L. P. 
Chapin, J, McD. Hays, Joseph B. Sellers, Jon¬ 
athan Birch, A. A. Smith, of the Times, and 
Mrs. Jeannette Preston Lane. It has been de¬ 
cided by the candidates to hold no election. 
Chairman Huston, of the slate committee, 
having advised against it in a circular ad¬ 
dressed to all aspirants in this state. The 
candidates, therefore, have concluded to rely 
upon petitions and letters from their friends. 
The commission of the retiring postmaster 
will expire on the 27th inst.— Special to the 
Indianapolis News. 

The impression has become general that 
Mr. New will control the distribution of pat¬ 
ronage in Indiana, and in consequence he is 
besieged continually by office-seekers. A 
dozen may be seen about his office during any 
half hour of the day. 

The unexpected appointment of S. N. Cham¬ 
bers as district attorney is said to be due 
mainly to his intimate association with Gen¬ 
eral Harrison as an opposing counsel in the 
trial of the Wise will case at Sullivan during 
the six weeks preceding the nomination at 
(Jhicago. He impressed General Harrison at 
that time as possessing uncommon ability as 
a lawyer, and as Chambers was one of the 
most devoted supporters of Harrison, he was 
kept in mind for a good appointment.— Indi- 
anapolis News, March 13. 


Washington, March 14.—The Illinois del¬ 
egation captured nothing but the Danish mis 
sion in the first charge, but they are going to 
make another, and are girding themselves for 
the struggle. If they don’t get something bet¬ 
ter, then they will believe their failure is due 
to the fact that Illinois supported Gresham at 
the Chicago convention. They are asserting 
this with some positiveness now, but Cullom 
warns them to hold their tongues and try 
again.— Specicd to the Indianapolis Journal. 

Washington, March 14.—General Browne 
jilaced before Secretary Blaine, to-day, recom¬ 
mendations for a number of appointments to 
to consular positions. Among them were Dr. 
George W. Thompson and George W. Patchell, 
of Union City, for consuls to Toronto, Canada, 
and Hong Kong, China, respectively ; Dr. 
Hamilton, of Connersville, consul to South 
America, and Thos. B. Reddin, New Castle, a 
European mission.— Special to the Indianapolis 
Journal. 


THE ANNUAL MEETING. 

The following extracts are from the ad¬ 
dresses delivered at the annual meeting 
of the Indiana Civil Service Reform Asso¬ 
ciation, January 23,1889: 

Now, it is not necessary for me to say to the 
members of this association that this partisan 
method of appointing officials is unbusiness¬ 
like and prejudicial to the interests of the 
people. I shall not call it the “ spoils system,” 
or its advocates “spoilsmen”; for, while it is 
true that a painfully large number of office- 
seekers do think much more of their own 
private gain than of the public weal, it is 
equally true that many persons of honesty and 
intelligence are as much opposed to the system 
of civil service examinations as others are to 
the system of party control. “Spoils” is an 
offensive word when used by the opponents of 
the latter system ; and I doubt whether we 
can so easily convert its adherents to our views 


by calling them names and casting doubts 
upon their honesty of purpose as by temper¬ 
ate and rational argument. I would say, then, 
to the advocates of rotation in office, that I 
believe the system is contrary to business 
principles, and is therefore not the system by 
which the affairs of the nation may be most 
economically and efficiently administered. 
Let me illustrate. If I wish to have a pair of 
shoes made, what kind of man do I employ to 
make them? If I have a choice between two 
men, one of whom is a trained shoe-maker, but 
happens to differ with me on the tariff’, the 
other a tailor, who, though ignorant of the 
cobbler’s art, belongs to my political party; 
which of the two should I select ? Is not the 
answer to such a question self-evident ? Or, 
suppose I were ill, and in urgent need of med¬ 
ical attendance; should I call in a skilled 
physician, in spite of his differing with me in 
politics, or an indifferent lawyei who belonged 
to my own party? To ask the question is to 
answer it. And again^—I ask the business 
men in this audience: Would you deposit 
your money in a bank, the president, directors, 
cashier and tellers of which were ejected every 
four years and replaced by men unacquainted 
with the business of banking? Would you 
buy stock in a railway company, or risk your 
lives on its trains, if every four years a new 
president of the company were to discharge all 
the engineers, firemen, hrakemen, switchmen, 
conductors and train dispatchers, and replace 
them by his own political partisans, without 
regard to their kno a ledge of the steam-engine? 

The answer to all these questions being so 
exceedingly plain, why is it that the Ameri¬ 
can people, who, surely, have never been ac¬ 
cused of a lack of common sense and practical 
sagacity, should cling so tenaciously to a sys¬ 
tem that is RJipractical and fjiefficient to the 
last degree? Is it because the people regard 
the government of sixty millions of men a 
simple matter—a matter simpler than the 
making of a pair of shoes, the conduct of a 
bank, or the management of a railway ? Par¬ 
adoxical as it may seem, I believe there is 
such a belief among the people. Vague and 
undefined as it is, there does exist a general 
feeling that, while a question of law or of 
medicine, of shoe-making or of carpentering, 
of painting or of music, does require special 
knowledge and training, a question of politics, 
on the contrary, requires no training at all, 
but can be settled off-hand by any male indi¬ 
vidual that has reached the age of twenty-one. 
—From the Address of Prof. B. H. Dabney of In¬ 
diana University. 


The executive must, of necessity leave to 
others what the constitution and the law con¬ 
templated should be done by himself. What 
more natural course, under the circumstances, 
can be conceived than to appoint men recom¬ 
mended by the representatives in congress 
who are in political sympathy with the ad¬ 
ministration ? And when we consider the 
weakness of human nature, what can be more 
natural than that the senator or representative 
should seek to reward his friends and strengthen 
h's hold upon his own place by recommending 
men for appointment who have been or can be 
most useful to himself? The good of the pub¬ 
lic service is lost sight of in the scramble for 
office, or for recommendation to office. Claims 
for party service, or, worse yet, for personal 
service, are apt to outweigh every other con¬ 
sideration. Nor are the men engaged in the 
scramble so much to be blamed. It is the in¬ 
evitable result of a vicious custom, which 
not only serves the corrupt purposes of bad 
men, but which serves the bad purpose of 
corrupting good men. If not remedied it will 
continue to corrupt more good men, until it 
shatters the foundations of our government. 

But I apprehend no such result. The re¬ 
form has already begun and the support of 













8 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


reform laws has already been given it by con¬ 
gress and by some state legislatures. So far 
these laws have adopted but one plan as a 
substitute for the vicious system fostered by 
custom in the absence of any fixed rules. 
This plan contemplates competitive examina¬ 
tions among all applicants for position in 
certain classes of the civil service. Such an 
examination conducted under rules framed by 
a commission whose members are appointed for 
their known sympathy for the cause of re¬ 
form, may or may not be productive of the 
best possible results. Human invention has 
never yet attained perfection, and a better 
system than that of competitive examinations 
may be suggested ; but in the absence of any¬ 
thing better, w'e claim for the system of com¬ 
petitive examinations a fair, impartial and 
honest trial. This, owing to the rancor of 
party spirit and the clamor of spoilsmen, the 
system has never had. We claim this trial 
because the busy working population of the 
country, engrossed by private cares, have found 
by experience that they in their capacity of 
electors have no means of competing with 
those who make a business of politics, and be¬ 
cause the vast machinery of government can 
not be managed in detail by any executive, 
however able; and finally because it brings to 
the aid of the executive a system. No other 
system prevails, unle.ss a vicious custom may 
be called a system. None other is offered, and 
without system is chaos. 

The only objections to the honest trial of 
the reform come, as in all other reforms, from 
those who are most injured by the prevailing 
evil. The men who manipulate conventions, 
or who upon election days manage the distri¬ 
bution of assessments to the blocks of five, or 
the men who profit by their labors, or who 
hope to do so, thus ruining their manhood, 
stifling their honor, destroying their liberty, 
and wrecking the institutions of their govern¬ 
ment, are the first to sneer at any proposed 
reform of their methods. For it is a reform 
even of these methods. Take away the hope 
of reward for party service and much of the 
rancor and bitterness of party spirit will also 
disappear. And were it not for a bitter party 
spirit prevailing, honest men would look with 
horror upon methods which they now behold 
with more or less equanimity, tempered with 
the knowledge whether it is one party or the 
other which is to profit by a j)artioular bit of 
rascality. Good men, not caring of engage in 
these methods nor to profit by them, are led 
into a feeling of hostility to the reform of 
them by the outcry made by the so-called 
practical politicians. Is there anything in 
this outcry? 

The worst that has been said of the proposed 
reform is that it creates a class of office hold¬ 
ers, and is, therefore, hostile to American cus¬ 
toms. Suppose it does, by a system of com¬ 
petitive examinations, choose the best among 
all applicants, and retain them during good 
behavior. Is it less American to have the 
public service filled by aclassof well-behaved, 
competent employes, than it is to have it filled 
by a class who have political influence, based 
upon services rendered to some boss of prima¬ 
ries? If it is, then God save the mark! But 
in a country of free schools, where education 
is free to every man’s child, rich or poor, an 
examination based upon educational qualifi¬ 
cations, open to all comers, for the filling of 
all vacancies, can never create a class. It is 
only under such conditions that the son of the 
mechanic can successfully compete with the 
son of the millionaire, or that the modest, 
able and honest man can compete successfully 
with the bold, unscrupulous trickster. In fact, 
it is intended to abolish a class which has 
proudly designated its members “ practical 
politicians.” And the outcry made by them 
at the small measure of success already at¬ 
tained by the reform leads us to hope that 


further progress in the same course will lead 
to ultimate and complete success. This is the 
irrepressible conflict, the old war never ending 
between progress and reaction .—From the Ad¬ 
dress of A, A. McKain, of Indianapolis. 

There is no political corruption that does 
not demand the spoils system as its condition. 
It subverts the will of the nation’s founders. 
It is a stumbling block to self-government. It 
is the incarnation of venal selfishness, whose 
end is destruction. It breeds the seeds of 
weakness and disintegration. * •» * But the 
reform movement must be one in party lines ; 
that is to say, the republican reformer mu.«t 
remain in republican ranks, and the demo¬ 
cratic reformer must remain in democratic 
ranks. In the mad rush for office, the friend 
of reform must stand firm just where he is. 
Let him refuse to be carried along with the 
crowd. A few sturdy men may often avert a 
panic, and a few sturdy patriots may in this 
case avert danger to their nation. Emerson 
commends the man that has strength to turn 
and face his party. 

But if he goes off and founds a new party 
with the few of his belief, he consents to the 
elimination of his own influence. It is the 
spirit of the pious man that withdraws to the 
cloister, because the world is so evil. It indi 
cates either this instability of courage, or a 
consciousness of superior goodness. It means 
the voluntary choosing of the weakest fighting 
ground. It emasculates effort. It shoots 
overhead, short or wide, any way so as not to 
hit the mark. The third party, in the major¬ 
ity of instances, is merely giving aw'ay the 
case, as the lawyers say. There may be re¬ 
forms that succeed through third parties, but 
they do not include the civil service cause.— 
From the Address of C. M. Lane, Editor, Richmond 
Sunday RerjisUr. 


The first condition which determines what 
the teachers in all grades of schools can do to¬ 
wards laying bare the ugly features of the 
spoils system is a thorough knowledge of the 
civil service question. This is illuminated 
from two sources. The one is acquaintance 
with our history and the workings of our gov¬ 
ernment. The other, acquaintance with the 
history of the civil service in this country, 
England, Germany and other countries of 
Europe. • * » As far as my acquaintance 
with school histories goes, not a single one 
contains even a hint at the system of federal 
appointments * * and not a word about 
the beginnings of civil service reform which 
have tnken place in the last twenty years. * * 
The early Romans put betrayers of public 
trusts to death, and a lapse of 2200 years does 
not at all disprove that this or some othersevere 
fate can be safely foregone in this country. * * 
We may as well accept the fact that we are 
under the same laws that govern older and 
more populous countries. What is hurtful to 
them is dangerous to us. * * * Our atten¬ 
tion should rest on the fact that those features 
of our constitution and laws which were most 
severely modeled after old-world examples 
and most slowly modified away from these 
types have been most satisfactory and most 
efficient. * * 

On him [the teacher] devolves in part the 
assertion of a right of which the consumma¬ 
tion is most devoutly to be wished—the asser¬ 
tion of the right of the scholar to take part in 
politics. The campaign of 1884 emphasized a 
fact which is properly to be considered one of 
the anomalies of our political system. Os¬ 
tensibly our political institutions are founded 
on a basis of intelligence and education. But 
among nations laying claim to culture and 
high civilization we stand out in bold con¬ 
trast in the little consideration we accord to 
the man of letters in the management of our 
political affairs. * * In 1884 the partisan 


press of one side was filled with epithets and 
denunciations, mostly aimed at the liberal 
scholar and man of letters in politics. He 
was a “political dude,” a “Miss Nancy,” a 
“Howadji,” a “holier-than-thou” and politi¬ 
cal pharisee. English was not fluent enough 
to furnish billingsgate with which to smirch 
his name; the long forgotten jabber of a de¬ 
funct Indian tribe was resurrected to call him 
a “mugwump.” * ® But the tide is again 
on the rise. The same political party which 
delved into archaeology to find terms of re¬ 
proach in 1884, in 1888, chastened by a defeat 
to, which these scholarly voters had undoubt¬ 
edly contributed no small share, used the 
terms “ mugwump,” “dude,” and “pharisee ” 
withdiminished zest and zeal,quickened by the 
inward consciousness that the power of the in¬ 
dependent voter had been greatly underesti¬ 
mated. As thescholar’s end of the beam begins 
slowly to ascend, the so-called “ practical ” de¬ 
tractor’s end—the end weighed down by those 
who scoff’at any considerations, except those of 
immediate personal reward - begins to descend 
toward the Avemus of the more crass and bold 
of the class—the state’s prison. In Ohio, in 
Illinois, and in our own commonwealth a few 
of the most practical of the direct benefit school 
of statesmen and publicists—those who wish to 
stretch out their hands and grasp the apples of 
success and rewards, without being troubled 
hy the formalities of law were condemned by 
juries of their fellow-citizens to retire from 
active handling of the political reins to the 
privacy of prison life, or to an enforced sur¬ 
render of their leadership. 

The unscrupulous chevaliers d’industne who 
keep up party fences and haul sand for con¬ 
gressional and other candidates have only 
learned the alphabetof the scholar’s influence. 
* * It is the duty of the upper fourth of 
political society to assert itself and demand 
that it be not deprived of its vote and its 
proper influence. Of this fourth the teacher 
is a considerable strand. Among his secondary 
duties none stand higher than that which de¬ 
mands that he make himself felt as a factor 
in politics. The teacher can not safely join 
the scramble for office. But a judicious and 
dignified exercise of political functions in no 
wise detracts from his office and raises him to 
his true position as a factor in public affairs. 
—From the Address of Prof. S. S. Parr, of DePauw 
University. 

The democratic party is again master of 
the situation. It has absolute control of both 
branches of the state legislature. Victory 
brings power, and power brings responsibility 
to the people who conferred it. The eyes of 
the people are upon it. Will their representa¬ 
tives harken to the popular demand for re¬ 
form, or perpetuate the system that has given 
rise to it ? Will they give ns the wise and 
beneficent conception of a democrat, whose 
bill entitles him to the plaudits of his country¬ 
men, for the government of our state institu¬ 
tions? Will they give us non-partisan boards 
of control ? Will they substitute the merit 
system for the spoils system ? Vv ill they lift 
our state institutions out of the political mire? 
Will they use their power for the benefit of 
humanity or the aggrandizement of party? 
Will they relieve the burdens of the tax-payer, 
now that the maintenance of the state’s de¬ 
pendents of all classes, including the inmates 
of our jails and poor-houses, involves an an¬ 
nual expenditure of nearly two millions of dol¬ 
lars? Will they belie the accusation of itsop- 
ponents that the democratic party is a spoils 
t)arty, and by the wise and beneficent laws 
they enart, prove to the world that it is ani¬ 
mated by the highest statesmanship and a 
philanthropy that shields the humblest of 
God’s children.—F?om the Address of Howard 
Briggs, Editor, Putnam Democrat, 












The civil service chronicle. 


“ My brief experience at Washington has led me often to utter the wish, with an emphasis I do not often use, that I might be forever relieved of any connection 
with the distribution of public patronage. 1 covet for myself the free and unpurchased support of my fellow-citizens, and long to be able to give my time and 
energy solely to those public aftairsthat legitimately relate to the honorable trusts which you have committed to me."—Senator Benjamin Harrison. 


VoL. I, No. 2. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
•St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind., where subscrip¬ 
tions and advertisemenIs will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indicina. 


“The reform of the civil service, auspiciously 
begun under a republican administration, 
should be completed by the further extension 
of the reform system, already established by 
law, to all grades of the service to which it is 
applicable. The spirit and purpose of the re¬ 
form should be observed in all executive ap 
pointments, and all laws at variance with the 
object of existing reform legislation should be 
repealed, to the end that the dangers to free institu¬ 
tions, which lurk in the power of official patronage, 
may be wisely and effectively avoided.”— 
Republican National Platform, 1S8S. 

“The law should have the aid of a friendly 
interpretation, and be faithfully and vigor 
Qusly enforced. All appointments under it should 
be absolutely free from partisan considerations and 
influence."—Frotn President Harrison’s Letter of 
Acceptance. 

“ Heads of departments, bureaus, and all 
other public officers having any duty in con¬ 
nection therewith, will be expected to enforce 
the civil service law fully and without eva¬ 
sion.”— From President Harrison’s Inaugural Ad¬ 
dress. 


No reform in the civil service will be valu¬ 
able that does not release members of congress 
from the care and the embarrassment of ap¬ 
pointments ; and no boon so great could be 
conferred upon senators and representatives as 
to relieve them from the worry, the annoyance, 
and the responsibility which time and habii 
have fixed upon them in connection with the 
dispensing of patronage, all of which belongs, 
under the constitution, to the executive. On 
the other hand, the evil of which President 
[William Henry] Harrison spoke—the em¬ 
ployment of the patronage by the executive to 
influence legislation—is far the greatest abuse 
to which the civil service has ever been per¬ 
verted. To separate the two great depart¬ 
ments of the government, to keep each within 
its own sphere, will be an immeasurable ad¬ 
vantage, and will enhance the character and 
dignity of both. A non-political service will 
be secured when congress shall be left to its 
legitimate functions, when the President shall 
not interfere therewith by the use of patron¬ 
age, and when the responsibility of appoint¬ 
ments shall rest solely with the department to 
which the organic law of the republic assigns 
it.— Twenty Years of Congress, vol. II., p. 6.51 .— 
.James G. Blaine. 


Those who receive this paper are ear¬ 
nestly urged to subscribe for it, if they 
have not already done so. The price is so 
low as to be within the means of every one 
desiring to help the cause of good govern¬ 
ment. The paper is not to make money. 
It mustdepend for support upon those who 
sympathize with its objects. 


INDIANAPOLIS, APRIL, 1889. 


The President did but his plain duty in 
removing United States Marshal Hawkins, 
of this district. The latter appointed a 
great number of deputies at the last elec¬ 
tion, and these made such widespread and 
and apparently concerted arrests of repub¬ 
licans for no reasons or for frivolous rea¬ 
sons, that it can only be put down as a de¬ 
liberate plan to scare voters. No such 
official outrage has been committed in In¬ 
diana since the war. That it went wide of 
the mark does not excuse it. 


Not even the democrats claim that the 
removal of Postmaster Jones was unde¬ 
served. Assistant-postmaster Dodd’s fare¬ 
well address was to characterize the list of 
eligibles, examined under him as a member 
of the local board, as “a regular set of 
yaps,” and advise that none of them be 
appointed. 

Before he gave up his office. Postmaster 
Jones performed one act of official death¬ 
bed repentance that deserves notice. An¬ 
drew J. Wells had served as a soldier 
through the Mexican war and again 
through the rebellion, four years. For his 
conduct at Shiloh he was promoted to be 
a lieutenant. Afterwards, for nineteen 
years and one month he was a letter carrier 
of this post-office, working for thousands of 
people,and to their satisfaction, and during 
that time he was once tardy two minutes. 
To make a place for a partisan. Postmaster 
Jones discharged him, and since that time 
it has been impossible to fit himself into a 
place in the community where he could 
support his family. It was one of a group 
of cases here, which illustrates the spoils 
system in all its arrogance and calloused 
selfishness. It ought to be a relief to Mr. 
Jones that before leaving his office he had 
(he local civil service board certify Wells 
back for re-instatement under the rules, 
and re-instated him. 


We are informed by the president of the 
Indiana Civil Service Reform Association 
that thirty-five new members have been 
received since our last issue. It is to be 
hoped that every one who believes in the 
principles of this association will join it. 
There are no dues or charges. 


PdSTMASTER WALLACE has repeatedly 
and emphatically declared that he means 


50 cents per annum. 
5 cents per copy. 


to enforce the civil service law in letter 
and spirit. He is a lawyer and knows what 
this means. He has taken his stand so 
firmly as to the classified service and has 
kept it against such heavy pressure for the 
sixteen days he has been postmaster that 
there is no reason to expect him to depart 
from it. When once it is understood that 
there is no underground road, that all stand 
the same chance in competition and that 
no one, whatever his politics, will be dis¬ 
missed without cause, there will be no 
further trouble. Mr. Wallace may have 
the satisfaction of knowing that, excepting 
hungry place-hunters, this community will 
sustain him in making his office an exclu¬ 
sively business institution. 

His reinstatement of Mr. Thompson as 
assistant postmaster, Mr. Craft as head of 
the carriers, and Mr. Welling as stamp 
clerk, are excellent appointments and free 
from politics. He has [changed all of the 
heads of divisions, but the only one, Mr. 
Johnson, the head of the money-order 
office, who might have deserved to be kept, 
did not want to stay. Since the above was 
written comes the fact that Carrier Ward 
has been removed for cause and Frank 
Rogers, an Irish democrat, first on the eligible 
list, has been appointed to the vacancy. And 
later still comes the Indianapolis Journal 
with the following: 

The first man appointed to a clerkship in the post- 
office department at Washington, when the civil 
service law took effect in July, 1883, was a democrat. 
The first letter-carrier appointed in Indianapolis, 
under the present administration, to succeecl one 
removed for cause, is a democrat. This is an honest 
construction and enforcement of the law. If en¬ 
forced and observed in that spirit for a few years we 
shall have a nou partisan civil service based on the 
idea of the survival of the fittest and in which hon¬ 
esty, intelligence and efficiency will be the guarantee 
of retention and promotion, instead of party service 
and political influence. It is only a question of time 
when the civil service will have to be established 
and maintained on that basis. The business inter¬ 
ests of the country and the successful administration 
of the government, if not its very preservation, will 
demand it. It is as fair for one party as for the other, 
and when the working force of the public service 
gets to be about equally divided between the parties 
and composed of honest and efficient men, neither 
party will feel like reviving the barbarous custom of 
“sweeping removals” for political cause alone. 


If a man is to be appointed upon the rec¬ 
ommendation of overwhelming numbers 
of people best able to judge, the President 
will have to keep Mr. Oberly as Indian 
commissioner. The Indian Rights Associ¬ 
ation, hundreds strong, headed by Mr. Her¬ 
bert Welsh, have asked for this reappoint¬ 
ment, and hundreds of their friends have 
joined them. It is true that Mr. Oberly was 
an Illinois politician. It is also true that he 
has, while in office, gradually sloughed oft’ 























10 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CIIRONICT.E. 


his politics and has become thoroughly con’ 
verted to the principles of civil service re¬ 
form. The evidence is too strong for this 
to be longer denied. He has become fa¬ 
miliar with Indian affairs, and stands ready 
to carry out the civil service law if the 
President will but extend it to that service. 
He has the entire confidence of the men 
who for years have devoted their time and 
money to .the welfare of the Indians. 
Surely President Harrison will not refuse 
this powerfully supported request. 

President Cleveland made an order^ 
as the civil service law provides, ordering 
the railway mail service to be classified, 
and fixing March 15 as the date after which 
the entrance to the service should be by 
competition. This action was final. The 
law' provides for only one act of the Pres- 
dent in this direction, and when that is 
done the service acted upon is as much in 
the classified service as is the Indianapolis 
post-oflfice. A President, having exercised 
the one pow'er left him by the law, may no 
more postpone the date than President 
Arthur could have postponed the date of the 
taking effect of the Pendleton act beyond 
the sixty days therein specified. President 
Harrison put off the date named by Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland to May 1. It is said that the 
civil service commission reported that it 
could not get ready by March 15, yet the 
commission, with two of its three places va¬ 
cant, has not been filled up, while days and 
weeks have been spent in making appoint¬ 
ments to places that were neither vacant nor 
in urgent need of being made vacant Fur¬ 
ther, the time is being used in turning 
democrats out of the railway mail service 
and putting republicans in their places 
with steadily increasing rapidity. One of 
these changes here resulted in the appoint¬ 
ment of a negro politician named Bagby, 
of unsavory reputation, a matter so urgent 
that it w'as done by telegraph. 

The postponement was not necessary. 
This service has already a system of checks 
and examinations that would have rapidly 
weeded out the incompetent men. To 
take their places were hundreds of men of 
the highest skill, who had been dismissed 
because of their politics, and who could 
have been reinstated under the civil serv¬ 
ice rules or a slight modification of them. 
Not only was the setting aside of President 
Cleveland’s order not w'arranted by the 
law, but so far as changes are made in the 
meantime on the plan of the spoils sys 
tern, they are distinctively an act of bad 
faith. 

It is to be hoped that the President and 
the civil service commission will heed the 
the very general desire that the lists of 
those who have passed examination for ap¬ 


pointment in the classified service shall be 
made public. This desire found unani¬ 
mous expression in one of the resolutions 
of the Baltimore conference, and no one 
anywhere advocates a continuance of the 
secrecy which never had anything to jus¬ 
tify it. For thousands of years the public 
has enjoyed watching competitive contests, 
whether physical or intellectual. Further, 
there is no other umpire that can so absol¬ 
utely guarantee fair play. When a vacancy 
occurs in the Indianapolis post-office, this 
city will be interested in know'ing who 
stands at the top of the list, and who next. 
And, if the top man is not taken, the people 
irrespective of party will demand an excel¬ 
lent reason for it. 

The new marshal of Indiana, W. L. Dun¬ 
lap says: “ My office is not governed by 
civil-service rules, and of course I will not 
only give preference to republicans, but 
will appoint no one from any other political 
party.” He has since completed his clean 
sweep. His predecessor had eight depu¬ 
ties, all democrats; he has turned them 
out and put in eight republicans. This is 
Marshal Dunlap. Delegate Dunlap in the 
republican national convention said in the 
platform: “ The spirit and purpose of the 
reform (civil service reform) should be ob 
served in all executive appointments.” And 
he with his fellow-delegates emphasized 
this by saying of certain misguided people, 

“ we will not fail to keep our pledges be¬ 
cause they have broken theirs.” 

REASONABLE EXPECTATIONS. 

We have been told that we ought to be rea¬ 
sonable in our expectations of what the pres¬ 
ent administration should accomplish in 
way of civil service reform,and that to expect 
more would render us liable to be charged 
with captious faultfinding. Let us havea fair 
understanding. The Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle is not for the purpose of making it 
appear that any administration, federal or 
state, is a success or a failure. It is pub¬ 
lished solely to advance the cause of better 
administration. It happens that the con¬ 
trol of it were strongly in favor of the elec¬ 
tion of President Harrison, and along with 
that goes a feeling of personal respect and 
and a wish that he might lay up for him¬ 
self treasure in history by turning his hand 
to the only great work now within reach 
of a President —the complete re organiza¬ 
tion of the federal service and the re-build¬ 
ing of the whole system of appointments 
upon an absolutely new foundation. This 
involves shutting the door once and for all 
in the face of any and every congressman 
coming for patronage. It involves leaving 
clerical positions to be filled by impartial 
tests. It involves having fourth-class post¬ 
masters, for instance, appointed after a re¬ 
port by the head of a neighboring large 


office or by an inspector. And it involves 
the complete disappearance, as political 
factors of weighers, gaugers, collectors, 
postmasters and the whole host of federal 
office-holders except a small number of 
the higher grade. We do not under-esti¬ 
mate the consequences of such an under¬ 
taking. It might be that President Har¬ 
rison’s party would refuse him a re-nom¬ 
ination, though we do not befieve it. It 
might be that if re-nominated he would be 
defeated at the election by those whom he 
had refused to quarter upon the people; 
that also we do not believe. But if defeat 
in either case was sure to follow, the occa¬ 
sion demands the sacrifice. The tempor¬ 
ary loss would be the ignoble triumph of 
a comparatively small section of people. 
The permanent gain would be the im¬ 
perishable fact of having been right in a 
great struggle. The opposite has in it no 
certainty of avoiding disaster. The course 
of President Cleveland with the civil ser¬ 
vice is a sign-board that may be read miles 
away. 

But the President does not feel an irre¬ 
sistible call to undertake this work. He 
doubtless does not regard it of equal im¬ 
portance with other matters. We think he 
is mistaken, but he is not inconsistent with 
his past course. He may bring about a 
decided advancement in civil service re¬ 
form in the coming four years. If he does, 
his party will point to it and boast of it 
and it will have its due weight with all 
good citizens. We canjnot shape our course 
by that. The spoils system is the spoils 
system under whatever President it exists 
and it is none the less to be opposed because 
it appears under President Harrison in¬ 
stead of President Cleveland. We regard 
the use of public office as party spoil as a 
colossal evil. It is the greatest evil in any 
manner connected with federal or state 
government. There is no other evil that 
in any manner approaches it in viciousness 
and in actual damage done. In the federal 
service there are now about 142,000 places. 
The thirty-five men quarreling over the 
collectorship of customs of this city, until 
the appointing power is bewildered, is a 
fair example of what is now going on over 
the whole country. These numberless cir¬ 
cles of wrangling factions pour in upon the 
President, and we have the present dis¬ 
graceful spectacle. Those who protest are 
not a handful; the protest is almost universal. 
The other side of the question is the des¬ 
potism in the arbitrary removal of over 
100,000 place holders, and in putting into 
their places a like number of partisans. 
This is “the danger to free institutions 
which lurks in the power of official patron¬ 
age,” referred to in the republican plat¬ 
form. This danger is to be fought on 
every hand, in season and out of season. 
And the struggle can not be regulated by 



















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


11 


what it is thought reasonable to expect of 
President Harrison. For instance, he 
chooses to let congressmen distribute spoils. 
We regard this as without warrant in the 
constitution, and subversive of the objects 
of the constitution. Beyond all this we 
regard it as the key to the defences of the 
federal spoils system. The public business 
will never be done upon business principles 
while congressmen practice, in their re¬ 
spective territories, feudalism adapted to 
modern times. We mean to bring the 
facts of this American feudalism to the 
notice of the people to the fullest extent 
in our power. And if in persistently in- 
'sisting that the facts shall be faced we hurt, 
now the Under-lord, now the Over lord, 
now the Lord-Paramount, and now all to¬ 
gether, it will be their fault for causing the 
facts to exist. 


EXAMINATIONS. 

A teacher who is in thorough sympathy 
with the need for ending the system of tax¬ 
ing the ent're people in order to provide 
asylums for favorites is in doubt about the 
wisdom of the present plan of “com¬ 
petitive examinations.” He says : “ I ana 
a teacher, and therefore supposed to be 
wedded to the examination system, but 
the supposition in my case is an incorrect 
one. My observation is that the system is 
pernicious. I venture the assertion that 
the teachers holding the highest grade of 
license in Indiana to-day are not the most 
successful teachers.” 

This opinion is founded on two wrong 
suppositions ; first, that the examinations 
to the classified civil service are like those 
in schools, and second, that the work done 
by the public employe is of the same 
character as that required of a good 
teacher. The tests required of applicants 
to the police force, the fire department, the 
health department, the park department, 
the sewer department, the prisons, the hos¬ 
pitals of those cities under this system 
are not entirely, nor in any considerable 
degree, literary tests. In some of these 
not the slightest literary test is exacted, 
and yet they are competitive examinations. 

The competitive examinations for police¬ 
men are for strength, for running, for en¬ 
durance. These qualities rank first, and, 
in grading, are so counted. Then come 
tests for his knowledge of the city, and of 
the laws, and of his wit in meeting emer¬ 
gencies peculiar to his work, and these 
have a certain proportion in making up 
his final standing, and, incidentally, his 
ability to read and write and compose sen¬ 
tences has to be tested. These, in the 
final estimate, are counted least. The ex¬ 
aminations in schools and for teachers are 
entirely literary tests. The examinations 
for entrance to the civil service are exam¬ 


inations bearing upon the work to be done, 
and are, therefore, only incidentally liter¬ 
ary, and, in many cases, the literary test 
has been entirely excluded. It must not 
be forgotten, though it generally is, that 
any and all of these examinations only ad¬ 
mit the successful applicant to a chance for 
a trial. As to comparing the work, we 
think we have only to suggest to this 
teacher that every day and every hour in 
the day if he is a successful teacher, he has 
todoorignal thinking, to be a creator as 
a writer is a creator, while the public em¬ 
ploye as a rule has nothing but routine 
work to do—to make his hand quicker 
and his eye more true. 


THE CIVIL SERVICE AND PUBLIC 
TEACHERS. 

To do the public business well and 
cheaply, and to avoid the serious disturb¬ 
ance to the business of the country involved 
in changing 100,000 employes and hiring 
100,000 others, are the phases of civil service 
reform that concern taxpayers. Whatever 
touches the pockets of the people, always 
commands the first attention; but that it is, 
therefore, of most relative importance does 
not at all follow. Happily there are two 
professions, the minister and the school 
teacher, who aim to view questions first as 
they afiect the moral well-being of the 
community. They have a pressing and 
peculiar part in the abolition of the spoils 
system. 

The moral degradation of slavery was 
palpable. It could not be blinked. The 
moral degradation of the spoils system is 
not less. Like slavery, it walks hand in 
hand with brutality, suffering and treach¬ 
ery ; but like a dry-rot, it works under the 
surface. 

Consider the suffering experienced by 
the families dependent upon the 100,000 
government employes, who work under 
the apprehension that each day may be the 
last of certain employment and the begin¬ 
ning of the search for new. Consider the 
helplessness of thousands of the most capa¬ 
ble and conscientious wage-workers when 
compelled to seek new employment after 
years of routine in a certain line. It is 
not surprising that, in the face of this, men 
yield to the temptation to do “base service” 
for the man who controls their living in 
this way. It is now as it was when cities 
were to be sacked for the loot; all that is 
brutal and base in men is supreme under 
the knowledge that places are for spoil. 
The past four years have afforded a melan¬ 
choly spectacle of men eyeing greedily 
their neighbors, and pressing, and lying, 
and fighting for their places in the govern¬ 
ment service. The coarse callousness to 
suffering that goes with any degree of 
following that mediaeval maxim, “to the 


victors belong the spoils,” must exclude it 
from the practices of a civilized people. 
It goes along with mutilating and scalping 
the enemy. 

But the suffering involved in this system 
is not the worst thing about it. The treach¬ 
ery, the cowardice, the servility, the dis¬ 
honesty connected with holding office un¬ 
der it, or seeking office under it, lead to a 
moral paresis. The people of this country 
would not tolerate the baseness of the sys¬ 
tem for one moment were they compelled 
to see it. But the otherwise excellent men, 
who pass through these bogs on the way 
to the consummation of their ambition, 
are not fond of describing in public places 
the filth that sticks to them. Whose duty 
is it to do this unpleasant and unpopular 
work? We must look first of all to the 
minister and to the school teacher to so 
clear their vision of party bias and party 
passion as to see the facts. It is their duty 
to cut away the sophistry and the juggling 
with words with which spoilsmen seek to 
hide the facts from an indolent people. 
The principles of this reform, the practical 
workings of it when tried, they must know 
and must tell. All this has been shown 
by Professor Moncrief in another column, 
and it must convince the clergy of Indiana 
that their duty does not end with silent 
hope for the abolition of the spoils system. 

But now, when the principles have been 
explained and the belief frankly stated, 
the duty of the minister and of the school 
teacher ends. When the practical applica¬ 
tion of these principles comes and the mat¬ 
ter is brought for decision before the tribu¬ 
nal of public opinion, it remains for these 
men to decide whether they will watch the 
contest from afar or go down into the battle. 
Each man must decide whether his personal 
tastes or his peculiar place in the commu¬ 
nity make it best for him to enter into a 
struggle where the passions of men are so 
fierce and unbridled. This work has to be 
done by somebody; but volunteers are 
generally to be found, and in this, as in 
other memorable struggles, there are dif¬ 
ferent uses for different men. It has seemed 
necessary for the civil service reform asso¬ 
ciation of this state, during its brief exis¬ 
tence, to war not a little ; but it has room 
for the men of peace ; it understands their 
position and it asks for their co-operation. 


There is, we believe, but one rule in this matter, 
and that is for the classified service to be held up to 
the law without a single exception, and whenever a 
man is discharged from it the cause to be made 
known, and moreover that cause to be so palpable as 
to make an end of argument. 

This from the Indianapolis News is an 
example of the clearness and steadiness 
with which for years it has maintained the 
sound construction of the civil service law 
and pointed out the ways in which alone it 
can be made of effect. 















12 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


THE HISTORY OF A RAILWAY 
MAIL CLERK. 

The way of the well-doer is at least some¬ 
times hard. W. H. Craft had been employed 
in the railway mail service as a substitute for 
two years when President Cleveland came in. 
A substitute has no regular run, but has to 
depend upon temporarily getting the places of 
regular clerks who for some reason do not go 
out. Craft was a republican, but had no po¬ 
litical influence, and got no promotion. It is 
admitted on all hands that he became a skilled 
and efficient railway mail clerk. In 1885, 
under the new regime, he was not employed 
for seven months, but finally the chief clerk 
at Indianapolis asked him to take work again, 
saying that many men had been discharged 
and the service was weak. He went back and 
took the work of a substitute. He has run on 
the Pittsburgh and St. Louis, the Chicago and 
Cincinnati, and other heavy lines running 
through Indianapolis, and has filled every po¬ 
sition from third man down. In 1888 he had 
three examinations, standing 99.21, 99.29 and 
99.45. In one examination he threw 1,376 
cards into 149 boxes, and made 11 errors. In 
another he threw 700 cards into 127 boxes, 
and made 5 errors. In another he threw 1,971 
cards into 150 boxes, and made 11 errors. 
Running upon so many different lines, he 
learned an unusual number of schemes. Yet, 
in spite of his undoubted efficiency, new men 
came into the service and were by dozens ap 
pointed over him. He had anything but a 
steady job. Having a family to support, he 
hunted work ravenously, and what with kee])- 
ing up the runs he secured and looking out 
for a new one to follow, and trying to col¬ 
lect what he had earned, he alternated 
between excessive overwork and anxiety 
for want of work. The chief clerk favored 
him as much as he could. Once when the 
state supreme court, the state executive de¬ 
partments, the United States post-office de¬ 
partment, and the congressman from this dis" 
trict, astonished the country by the appoint¬ 
ment as transfer clerk at the union station of 
a man who had been twice in state prison and 
had been eleven times in jail as a violator of 
the law, a vacancy occurred in that position 
until the authorities could recover from the 
shock, and Craft was appointed as acting clerk, 
working from 6 A. m. to 6 p. m. He was there 
a month and ten days. To see a republican in 
that position threw the local democracy into 
convulsions, and Craft had to be removed. 
The chief clerk told him that he could con¬ 
tinue on the road as a substitute where he 
would not be seen. 

There are interesting facts in his experience. 
He ran for months for one clerk, who, in ad¬ 
dition to being a railway mail clerk, had 
a cigar business and much political work for 
his congressman to attend to. The cigar man 
drew the full pay, which was so much a day, 
Sundays and all, paid Craft the week-day 
wages and kept for himself the wages for Sun¬ 
days, amounting to about $10 a month. This 
was the rent to the lord of the fee, who in 


thirteen months himself took his run only 135 
days. In another case Craft ran many weeks 
for a regular clerk who was less generous. In 
this service there is a run and then a lay-off 
for rest. This clerk, who had done no work, 
drew the whole pay and handed over to Craft 
the per diem for the actual run and himself 
pocketed the per diem for the lay-off. There 
were other experiences; some more pleasing 
and some meaner. Some paid him readily, 
some afftr repeated duns and some not at all. 
Craft was in no position to dictate terms. The 
general result was that in order to make, fair 
wages Craft was obliged to run all the time. 
At last it seemed as if a full appointment was 
certain, and his name was sent to Cincinnati 
at the request of Superintendent Gwin, but 
nothing came of it, and Craft is still a substi¬ 
tute. Thus the spoils system works out its 
meanness and injustice. 


POSTMASTER PEARSON. 

The refusal of the President to re-appoint 
Postmaster Pearson to the New York post- 
office is an important event. The latter be¬ 
came postmaster in 1881, succeeding Mr .Tames 
promoted to be postmaster general, and who 
had since 1873 been laying tlie foundation for 
the total breaking-up of the practice of using 
the positions in the office to pay personal and 
party debts. This work was entirely com¬ 
pleted by Mr. Pearson. Few people are aware 
of the greatness of this office as a business in¬ 
stitution. There are 2,276 employes. These 
handle annually 3,700,000 pouches, deliver 
locally 355,000,000 letters, do $85,000,000 
money order business, and receive and deliver 
6,400,000 registered letters in packagts. The 
office has an income of $5,100,000 and $3,200,- 
000 receipts over expenditur(s. This is the 
coming and going mail of all the world. The 
statement of these facts is a demonstration 
that there is here no room for anything but 
the sternest business principles, and such is 
the condition of the office as Mr. Pearson 
walks out of it. He has made it as free from 
politics of every kind and nature as Broadway 
is free from weeds. Before the passage of the 
civil service law, he had the competitive sys¬ 
tem in force. Since the passage of that law 
there have been a few leading positions which 
he might have filled with reference to politics^ 
but he has declined to do so. In every case 
of such a vacancy he has promoted a skilled 
man from the ranks of the classified service. 
He has held his men to their duty, and when¬ 
ever an employe deteriorated in his work, 
competition put him in a lower grade and put 
a more skilled or a more faithful man in his 
place. He was the one postmaster who gave 
the law the “ benefit of a friendly interpreta¬ 
tion ” to its fullest extent. As a result he 
had incomparably the best post-office service 
in this country. 

In doing this work obstacles have been put 
in his way in a manner to stir the indignation 
of every fair man. His office became of the 
greatest use to the public but it was absolutely 
worthless to the party machine, and the party 


machine has followed him with remorseless 
hatred. It believed that he was the one man 
who stood in the way of enormous spoil to 
itself, and through change of parties and ad¬ 
ministrations it pursued its end of displacing 
him by one of its own. In President Arthur’s 
time the postoffice department had an investi¬ 
gation made, of which Mr. Pearson was kept 
absolutely ignorant. Upon this, secret charges 
were filed that he was connected with some 
local dispatch companies. These charges were 
referred to Attorney-General Brewster, who, 
without inquiring for the other side of the 
case, recommended Mr. Pearson’s dismissal. 
Three months later Postmaster-General 
Gresham wrote to Mr. Pearson a personal 
letter that such charges had been made and 
had been turned over to the district attorney 
in New York. Mr. Pearson’s refutation was 
complete, and he showed that, more than a year 
before, he had three times written to the de¬ 
partment urging it to break up these dispatch 
companies, but received no encouragement. 
These charges were on file when Mr. Cleveland 
became President and were made by the new 
machine to do the best duty possible, but with¬ 
out avail. And Mr. Pearson, in answer to an 
enormous demand of the business men of New 
York, was re appointed. Of this the New York 
Tribune said, April 1, 1885: 

“ The re-appointment of Postmaster Pearson gives 
general satisfaction to those citizens who care for 
efficiency in that branch of the civil service here. It 
satisfies the public, because it is a good thing in 
itself: because Mr. Pearson is one of many republi¬ 
can officials who have proved so conspicuously fit 
that their removal, on whatever ground, and irre¬ 
spective of the personal merit of any who may be se¬ 
lected in their stead, would be a positive detriment 
to the public service. Such an appointment is, of 
course, to be commended most heartily as a good 
thing in itself. * * * In itself this appointment is 
admirable Mr. Pearson’s unquestioned and 

superior fitness renders his retention in office the 
clear duty of a President who means to improve and 
not to degrade the public service. 

The machine, though temporarily baffled, 
was nevertheless tireless. It found a willing 
ally in the new post-office department, whose 
course is*a record of petty meanness. This 
office netted the government over three mil¬ 
lions, yet the most urgent requests for reason¬ 
able allowances to pay employes were met 
with niggardly paring, or with silence, or 
with a short refusal. In one case it was fully 
granted with directions to raise the money by 
dismissing employes and cutting down sal¬ 
aries. Mr. Pearson required the work of the 
office to be done, and the department succeeded 
in its apparent plan of making his employes 
complain of him. His requirement that a 
man should do his duty crowded out of the 
service those who could not do the work and 
those who wanted sinecures. These banded 
together at the instigation of the local party 
machine and made up another attacking col¬ 
umn, and these too were encouraged by the 
department at Washington. They failed in 
their object. Mr. Pearson could not be har¬ 
ried into resigning, and that party machine 
was compelled to pass off the stage and leave 
him in office. Its spirit never dies. The 
weapons against Mr. Pearson instantly passed 
ihto other hands. 

The new men had expected to make the at¬ 
tack on the ground that in 1884 Mr. Pearson 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


13 


kept republican employes away from the polls 
and defeated Mr. Blaine. This was passed 
from mouth to mouth all over the country, 
but it was found out that it could be demon¬ 
strated to be a falsehood and it had to be 
dropped. The public does not know what the 
motive power was that at last succeeded in 
displacing him. It does know that the good 
of the service had nothing to do with it. He 
had been in the post-office business from boy¬ 
hood. He was by nature fitted for it. He 
had great energy and executive ability. He 
was in every respect a trained officer. He 
was a manly and fearless man, and he per¬ 
formed the duties of his office in a manly and 
fearless manner. No new man can for a long 
time do anything but look on while his sub¬ 
ordinates perform their duties and teach him 
his. Such a change is not for the good of the 
service. The new man, Van Cott, emphasizes 
this view. He apparently has a life-lease on 
office, for he has held office for years ; but he 
is ignorant of the post office business, and his 
office-holding lias not been because he was a 
skilled and efficient officer, but because he 
had done party work, for which he must be 
provided a place. 

There is probably no other single act by 
which President Harrison could have damaged 
himself and his party so much throughout the 
country. The thousands of men who voted 
for him and who regret this act are silent men, 
but they are men with long memories. It is 
one of the things that will bear heavily in the 
scale when the account is taken at the end of 
this administration. The time has gone by 
when such a course is wise considered even as 
a party measure. In making his office stand 
out for years as a great business institution, in 
the midst of the general riot of the spoils sys¬ 
tem, Mr. Pearson has rendered a distinguished 
service to the country. His present reward 
has not been generous. On the other hand 
the “workers” have w, n a victory, but it 
is like the victory of the elephants of Pyrrhus 

THE INDIANAPOLIS FIRE DE¬ 
PARTMENT. 

Some time ago the chief of the Indianapolis 
fire department was supplanted by a new man 
under circumstances that seemed inexplicable 
to the people of the city. We think it is fair, 
both to those who brought this about and to 
the people, that the facts of the matter should 
be impartially stated, and we have been at 
some trouble to gather them. 

Joseph H. Webster is 56 years old, and en¬ 
tered the fire department of Indianapolis in 
1860 as a stoker, working in that position four 
years. Then, for ten years, he was driver of 
the hook and ladder truck, of which he then, 
in 1874, became foreman. In 1876 he was 
elected assistant engineer by the council, and 
held that place for two years, until the office 
was abolished, and he then served again as 
foreman until 1882. He was then elected 
chief engineer by the council, and was steadily 
re elected until January 1, 1^89. Although 
a republican, the vote at every re-election was 


unanimous. He has, in fact, never had any 
other business but that of fireman. The fire 
department has not been run on a strictly 
partisan basis. A majority of the employes, 
both under republican and democratic city 
administrations, have been republicans. There 
are now some democrats in the service who 
have been there for twelve or fifteen years. 
Under the law, the chief engineer has the sole 
authority to appoint and remove firemen, and 
not only individual councilmen, but the 
council itself is entirely powerless in the 
matter. 

The logical order of the facts is, that in 
1885 P. C. Trusler, then a councilman, asked 
Mr. Webster to dismiss a fireman named Gar- 
ver from No. 13 on the ground that Garver 
was “a disturbing element.” The fly in the 
ointment seemed to be the fact that Garver was 
the only democrat at that station, and, to ac¬ 
commodate Trusler, Garver was transferred 
to another station. In January, 1888, there 
were sixteen democrats in the department. 
Up to that time no one had asked for the dis¬ 
charge of a man avowedly because of his pol¬ 
itics. In that month Mr. Trusler again en¬ 
tered the council and was the first to make 
such a request. He began by calling for the 
dismissal of Michael Slaven because he was a 
demociat. In the way of easing Trusler off 
it was suggested that charges had been filed 
against Slaven and that he might go out on 
those. The matter ended by Slaven resigning. 
At the same time Truster asked Mr. Webster 
for the dismissal, for the same reason, of Oscar 
Ray, an excellent fireman, who had been a 
substitute at No. 6 for about two years. The 
demand was yielded to and Ray was dis¬ 
charged by the chief without cause. 

Some two weeks later, Mr. Webster being 
at home sick, the acting chief, Davis, came to 
his house and said that Trusler had inquired 
if the chief had discharged John S. Burkhart, 
a substitute for years at No. 1, who had begun 
in the fire department by running errands 
when a small boy. He was a good fireman 
and was a democrat. The following Sunday 
Councilman Thalman, having called on him, 
the chief protested against Trusler’s working 
the democrats out of the department, and Mr- 
Thalman agreed with him and promised that 
he would see the other men and that it should 
be stopped. This was early in 1888. In Feb¬ 
ruary the chief was sent for at headquarters 
and found there Councilmen Trusler and 
Finch, and Alderman Connett. These men 
brought up the subject of discharging the rest 
of the democrats, and Connett wanted to know 
if Thomas Quinn, foreman of No. 1, could 
not be removed at once. The chief asked 
them to go to the council and get an order to 
him to “reorganize” the fire department on a 
republican basis, and he promised that it 
should be done in thirty days or thirty min¬ 
utes as they should order. He told them that 
he would not otherwise take the responsibility. 
They made no reply to this proposition, and 
soon after the meeting broke up. After this 
the fire committee of the council, while Mr. 


Webster remained in office, never again met 
at the fire headquarters as had been their cus¬ 
tom. 

The Presidential campaign came on, and it 
was unsafe while that lasted to attempt to 
crowd experienced firemen out of their places 
because of their politics. After the election^ 
it being settled that the chief could not be 
moved from his resolution, measures began to 
be taken to supplant him. About a week be¬ 
fore the time for the election of the chief for 
the ensuing year. Councilman Darnell came 
to headquarters, took Mr. Webster aside and 
told him that they had “got” him, but that if 
he would agree to let one democrat go each 
month he could be sure of a re election. The 
chief refused, and at the election which fol¬ 
lowed every republican voted against him 
and secured his defeat. 

This is a brief outline of the course which 
led to Mr. Webster’s displacement. There has 
been some attempt to give other reasons by* 
whispering from mouth to mouth, but these 
reasons are either known to be false or those 
who give them are ashamed to speak them 
aloud. The people of the city were practi¬ 
cally unanimous for his retention. The entire 
insurance interest and a great amount of 
property interest openly protested, but with¬ 
out effect. This fire department employs 
eighty-two men, with a pay-roll of over $60,- 
000 annually, and uses fifty horses. The head 
of it had had twenty nine years’ experience, 
obtained from holding positions on his merit, 
and was universally admitted to be admir¬ 
ably adapted to his place. The evidence 
leads to the inevitable conclusion that he was 
deprived of his place because he would not, 
in answer to the pressure of a few local poli¬ 
ticians, turn out of the fire department a few 
democrats who were tried and experienced 
firemen, and against whom nothing could be 
urged. 

THIS PAPER. 

With 100,000 federal offices which may be 
used to reward personal or party service, the 
question of civil service is certainly a great one 
and interests every citizen. The Chkonicle, 
at 50 cents per annum, ought to have a large 
circulation .—Indiana School Journal. 

Editorially its contents are pointed and 
forcible .—Indianapolis News. 

The Indiana civil service reformers show a 
disposition to measure the new administration 
by the same standard they applied to the last 
one .—Ind ianapolis Sent in el. 

We have not seen a more able exponent of 
civil service reform views than this journal is 
likely to be .—Neio Albany Evening Tribune. 

Its appearance at this juncture, when a 
greedy army of spoilsmen has the national 
capital in a state of siege, is peculiarly oppor¬ 
tune. We wish the CrviL Service Chroniole 
success .—Indianapolis Sentinel. 

The Chronicle is devoted to a reform that 
challenges the support of all good republicans 
and democrats. — Putnam Democrat. 











14 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

“ Larg’e districts or jMrcels of land were 
allotted l»y tlie coiKjiieriiig: generals to the 
superior ollicers of the anny, and hy them 
dealt out again in smaller parcels or allot¬ 
ments to the inferior ollicers and most de¬ 
serving soldiers. * * The condition of 
holding the lands thus given was that the 
possessor should do service faithfully, both 
at home and in the wars, to him by whom 
they were given,” and, on breach of this 
condition, “by not performing the stipu¬ 
lated service, or by deserting his lord in 
battle,” the lands reverted to the lord. 
The vassal, upon investiture, took an oath 
of fealty to the lord, and in addition did 
homage, “ openly and humbly kneeling, 
being ungirt, uncovered and holding up 
his hands, both together, between those of 
his lord, who sate before him, and there 
profes'ing that he did become his MTN 
from that day forth, of life and limb and 
earthly honor, and then he received a kiss 
from his lord.” Services were free and 
base. Free service was to pay a sum of 
money, or serve under the lord in war. 
IJase service was to plow,tlie lord’s laud, 
to make his hedge or carry out his dung.— 
Blackstone. 

—The following delegates to the last na¬ 
tional republican convention have been ap¬ 
pointed to office: 

E. H. Terrell, of Texas, minister to Bel¬ 
gium. “ He was the only delegate from his 
state that was for Harrison all the time. He 
made one of the speeches seconding General 
Harrison’s nomination, and did good work 
among the southern delegates at the conven¬ 
tion.” 

W. L. Dunlap, United States marshal of In¬ 
diana. 

Smiley N. Chambers, United States district 
attorney for Indiana. 

John B. Cockrum, deputy United States dis¬ 
trict attorney for Indiana. 

Albert G. Porter, of Indiana, minister to 
Italy. 

E. W. Halford, of Indiana, private secre¬ 
tary. 

James N. Huston, of Indiana, treasurer of 
the United States. 

—The following appointments of newspaper 
editors have been made: 

Whitelaw Reed, editor of the New York 
Tribune, minister to France. 

John C. New, editor of the Indianapolis 
Journal, consul at London. 

Murat Halstead, editor of the Cincinnati 
Commercial-Gazette, minister to Germany. [Re¬ 
jected by the senate.] 

Allen Thorndike Rice, editor of the North 
American Rex'iew, minister to Russia. 

John Hicks, editor of the Oshkosh North¬ 
western, minister to Peru. 

Ellis H. Roberts, editor of the Utica Herald, 
assistant-treasurer at New York. 

W. W.Junkin, editor of the Fairfield [Iowa] 
Ledger, Indian inspector. 

James S. Clarkson, first assistant postmaster- 
general, editor of the /own State Register and 
chairman of the republican state committee. 

Robert P. Porter, editor of the New York 
Press, to be superintendent of census. 

—The Iowa State Register says: ‘‘The congrat¬ 
ulations of Iowa papers will be extended to 
Mr. \V. W. Junkin, of the Fairfield Ledger, 


who was yesterday appointed an Indian in¬ 
spector. The position is a pleasant one, and will 
not coftnpel him to give up his connection with the 
paper with which he has been so long identified. As 
a hard-working republican and a newspaper 
man whose service to the party reaches over 
more than a generation, Mr. Junkin amply 
deserves the recognition that has come to 
him.” 

[ —Senator Farwell has been put to great 

trouble and annoyance in the matter of the 
Chicago offices. He had to go all the way 
from Washington to Chicago to choose his 
men. He has determined that Col. Sexton is 
most advantageous for the postoffice, and one 
Chrismamer for the collectorship. It is ex¬ 
pected that in time Sexton will learn from his 
subordinates something of the Chicago post- 
office business, and that in the same manner 
Chrismamer will look on while the work of 
the second largest revenue district in the 
country is being in some manner got through 
with. 

—Congressmen are ready to divide the in¬ 
ternal revenue collectorships, but it is an¬ 
nounced that they can not allot these places 
until after May 1st. 

—The new superintendent of the railway 
mail service innocently arrogated to himself 
the appointment of John A. Montgomery to 
be superintendent of mails in the Chicago post- 
office. Senator Farwell, the lord of the fee, 
asserts his rights, as follows: 

“ I am not objecting to Mr. Montgomery 
personally at all. I think he is a man that is 
in every way fitted for the position and will 
give satisfaction in it; but I don’t like the 
way the appointment was made. I think I 
should be consulted about matters relating 
to appointments at my own home. What 1 
complain of is that the appointment was made 
without my knowing anything about it. I 
have nothing to say about Mr. Montgomery. 
He is as well recommended for the place as 
any man could be, but I think the incom¬ 
ing postmaster should also be consulted as 
well as me.” 

“It is reported that the postmaster-general 
did not know anything about the appoint¬ 
ment.” 

“ I don’t suppose he did.” 

“Is it likely that Mr. Montgomery will be 
allowed to retain the position?” 

“I do not know anything about that. The 
matter has been taken out of my hands and I 
have nothing further to say about it and 
don’t propose to. He will make a good offi¬ 
cer. All I object to is the manner of his ap¬ 
pointment. I don’t believe any insult was in¬ 
tended. I think it is due to the inadvertence 
of this new man.” 

“ Have you decided anything about the post¬ 
mastership? ” 

“No. I came home for the purpose of 
trying to select the proper man for the post- 
office and for superintendent of mails, and 
have had the matter under consideration, but 
so far I have been unable to decide about the 
thing. I may make up my mind some time 
next week.” 

“ You are reported to have said that the pres¬ 
ent incumbents in the minor positions will be 
allowed to serve out their terms?” 

“ That is my opinion. I think each of the 
other office-holders will be allowed to remain 
his four years. In my opinion that will be the 
policy of the administration.” 

“It has been reported that the same differ¬ 
ence is likely to arise between President Har¬ 
rison and senators in regard to patronage as 
divided the late Senator Conkling and Presi¬ 
dent Garfield.” 

“Oh, I think there is not much danger of 
that. I see there has been a little trouble 
about the postmaster at Philadelphia, but 


there has been no trouble with the Illinois 
senators. I think the President proposes to 
treat us fairly. I have no doubt about it.” 

—Postmaster - General Wanamaker issued 
the following order: “Hereafter and until 
further notice all clerks in the post-office de¬ 
partment at who.se desks papers relating to 
appointmenis to office or claims against the 
departments are filed will not disclose the con¬ 
tents thereof to, nor permit an inspection by, 
any person except on the written order of the 
postmaster-general, the first assistant postmas¬ 
ter general, the chief clerk of the department, 
or the chief clerk to the first assistant postmas¬ 
ter general. Where a chairman of a state 
committee or person by him duly authorized 
applies for information, the clerk may dis¬ 
close the.names of the applicants for the office 
inquired about, but further information 
should not be given.” 

—More than 140 congressmen recommended 
for commissioner of Indian affairs Roderick 
R. Butler, of Tennessee. In the 42d congress 
the vote to expel Butler for selling a cadet¬ 
ship for $900 stood 102 to 68, two-thirds being 
necessary. He was then unanimously cen¬ 
sured by a yea and nay vote. 

—First Assistant Postmaster-General Clark¬ 
son’s paper, the loiva State Register, says of the 
offices within his appointment, that “to change 
these post-offices, amounting to nearly 64,000 
in number, from .democratic to republican 
hands, and increase the credit and reputation 
of the party in doing it, will require an un¬ 
usual knowledge of men and politics. * * ♦ 
the President insisted upon his services at 
Washington on account especially of his 
knowledge of politics and of the workers in 
the campaign, and the obligations of the party 
towards such men.” 

—General Browne, who leaves for his home 
at Winchester, to-morrow, made the rounds of 
the White House and the executive depart¬ 
ments a couple of times to-day. On each trip 
he started out with arms full of applications 
for office. The General has worked like a 
slave during the past month to satisfy his 
office seeking constituents, and he is yet at it 
during every hour of daylight.— Indianapolis 
Journal, April J. 

—On March 21, Congressman Browne, of 
the sixth Indiana district, filed the name of 
his seventy first man for appointment in the 
railway mail service. Some say that he can 
only claim the fealty of seven railway mail 
clerks, and that as he already has four “ hold¬ 
overs” he is only entitled to three more. On 
March 25, having handed in a batch of names 
for fourth-class post-offices, it was announced 
that he would then come home, from which 
place he would “hereafter conduct his busi¬ 
ness.” He granted several small holdings 
March 30. 

—Congressman Owen, of the tenth Indiana 
district, has ordered and is superintending a 
large number of changes of fourth-class post¬ 
masters in his territory. 

—Congressman Posey, of the first Indiana 
district, is in Washington allotting fourth- 
class postmasterships. 

—St. Louis, Mo., March 23, 1889.—To the 
President, Washington, D. C.: Dear Sir— 
We have the honor to submit to your favora¬ 
ble consideration, and in accordance with your 
suggestion to Mr. F. G. Niedringhaus, the follow¬ 
ing named citizens of Missouri for appoint¬ 
ments abroad : Charles E. Pearce of St. Louis, 
minister to Mexico; S. H. Boyd of Spring- 
field, minister to Venezuela; Hon. Chauncey 
I. Filley of St. Louis, consul at Liveipool, or 
something equally as good; George Bain of St. 
Louis, consul at Glasgow, Scotland ; Mr. Rich¬ 
ard Bartholdt, consul at Frankfort-on-the- 










rilK CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


15 


Main ; Dr. H. M. Starkloff, consul-general at 
Brussels; Frederick Scliroeder of St. Joseph, 
consul at Hamburg; J. II. Kaeser of St. Louis, 
consul at St. Galleu, Switzerland ; P. P. Do- 
bozy of Kansas City, consul at Rome; John 
R. Musick of Kirksville, minister-resident and 
consul-general to Siam; George H. Wallace 
of Fayette, consul-general at Melbourne; 
Samuel Hays or Charles R. Pope, St. Louis, 
consul at Montreal; Benjamin Horton, consul 
at Pesth, or any other small continental con¬ 
sulate; Albert Bjrg-*ss (colored), minister to 
Liberia; C. H. Tandy (colored), consul to 
Honolulu. Yours respectfully, 

W. H. Wade, M. C., 

» Thirteenth District of Missouri. 

W. M. Kinsey, M. C., 

Tenth District of Missouri. 

F. G. Niedringhaus, M. C., 

Eighth District of Missouri. 

- Nathan Frank, M. C , 

Ninth District of Missouri. 

—Illinois congressmen emphatically refuse 
to have the office of minister to England given 
to Robert Lincoln deducted from their share. 
They say it must be charged up to the Presi¬ 
dent’s share. 

—Congressmen Sherman, Butterworth, Cald¬ 
well and Morey remained in Washington to 
see to the division of spoils for Ohio. It is 
claimed that Ohio does not get her share. 

—Great fault is found with the Kansas con¬ 
gressmen, Ingalls and others. They are ac¬ 
cused of giving the places to “ old-timers,” 
and of not giving “young blood” due recog¬ 
nition, and according to the Hon. W. P. Hack¬ 
ney, in the Topeka Capilal-Commonwealth, these 
Kansas over-lords are even in danger of losing 
their holdings: “ Our senators and representa¬ 
tives are either imbeciles or nincompoops, and 
I suspicion them of being both. The only 
way to get anything from them is to give 
them h—I, and then they will get the office in 
order to keep them quiet. Oh, we have a daisy 
outfit, you bet. What a grand lot of shovel- 
ers on the street they would make! and that 
is about their size. But I digress, and beg 
pardon of the street-shoveler. What Kansas 
needs is a new deal all round in both senate 
and house— broad, liberal-minded, and unselfish 
statesmen who have some conception of the magnitude 
of their position arid the very high honor the people 
have conferred upon them. These fellows are not 
and do not.” 

—As has already been stated, the Pennsyl¬ 
vania senators will appropriate to themselves 
the disposition of all the leading federal of¬ 
fices in the state and all offices in democratic 
districts, leaving to the congressmen only the 
fourth-class postmasterships and appointments 
to the railway mail service. There will be 
few exceptions to this rule.— Philadelphia Press. 

The question whether Pennsylvania is given 
over by General Harrison to a Gorman system, 
and is to be the Maryland and Botany Bay of 
this administration, is made sharp and plain 
by sudden developments concerning the post- 
office of Philadelphia. Mr. Wanamaker, it 
seems, offered this appointment to his friend, 
Mr. John Field, an energetic, intelligent mer¬ 
chant, a republican, and a man very compe¬ 
tent for the duties of the place. But the fact 
of the offer became known and at once the po¬ 
litical machine was put in motion to stop it. 
Senator Quay was amazed to hear that Mr. 
Wanamaker had plans of his own—for this 
one, it is alleged, had not been communicated 
to the senator—and made haste to file his own 
recommendation of that highly approved Phil¬ 
adelphian, ex-Sheriff’ Leeds. Mr. Field, how¬ 
ever, after some hesitation, has decided to ac¬ 
cept the appointment, and has so notified the 
postmaster-general. 

In thisshape the matter rests at this writing. 


It is reported on one hand that Mr. Wana¬ 
maker has been compelled by Mr. Quay to give 
lip his purpose of appointing Mr. Field, and 
that he will break his promise to that gentle¬ 
man; on the other hand, it is declared that 
Mr. Quay, in the course of a two or three hour 
interview, on Tuesday night, could obtain no 
such concession. Doubtless any person of or 
dinary capacity would say that the postmas 
ter general would of course select himself the 
postmaster of the city in which he lives, and 
that the attempt of a person living on the 
Ohio line—even if he be a member of the 
United Slates senate—to dragoon him con¬ 
cerning the matter would be a most gross and 
impudent proceeding.— The American (Rep.) 
March 30. 


PROF. MONCRIEF ON MINISTERS 
AND THE CIVIL SERVICE. 

To the Civil Service Chronicle: 

I have been asked briefly to discuss the de¬ 
sirability of ministers lending active assistance 
to the civil service reform movement. It 
seems best to begin with a general view of the 
political situation. 

It is evident that the agonies of a presiden¬ 
tial campaign, with its accompaniments, are 
fast becoming too great to be endured. These 
agonies are not only those temporary agonies 
which pass away as soon as the administration 
comes in and the spoils are distributed, but 
also the agonies of the disappointed “workers,” 
the agonies of those who have been ousted for 
“ offensive partisanship,” and the agonies of 
the thoughtful and patriotic citizen who sees 
clearly that something must speedily be done 
or democracy will again prove a failure—and 
that, too, on a more gigantic scale than the 
world has yet seen. 

Now, apart from the “ ins ” and the “ outs,” 
why did we have such intense excitement in 
the masses during our last campaign? The 
cause was not patriotism, for all intelligent 
people knew that the commonwealth would 
neither stand nor fall with either of our great 
parties. The cause was not principle, for it 
was evident that while there were real issues, 
they were so exaggerated as to be very like 
party shibboleths. But, positively, we find 
the zeal without knowledge of the*honest but 
deluded masses who had been led to believe 
that their physical, moral, and almost spirit¬ 
ual existence depended On the results of the 
election. These good people thought they 
were patriotic and devoted to principle; they 
were in fact dupes. And this leads us to the 
real cause which appears in the last analysis 
—the selfish interest of party leaders who 
hoped for material gain in the spoils of vic¬ 
tory. These men, with their myriads of hench¬ 
men of all grades and characters, were able to 
work the people into a frenzy of excitement, 
and politics became a shrewd scheme by which 
demagogues sought to gain their own selfish 
ends at the expense of the rest of us; and most 
of us fell into line, grew enthusiastic in de¬ 
pleting the exchequer, degrading the morality 
of citizenship, and giv.ing our commonwealth 
a telling impetus towards dissolution. 


Now it is confidently believed that the remo¬ 
val of thecivil service from party politics would 
go far towards reducing this political mad¬ 
ness to a normal political enthusiasm—and to 
the same extent we should have healthy polit¬ 
ical action. 

Now, has the Christian minister any part in 
the accomplishment of so great a work? It 
ajipears to me that he has, and the following 
are some of the reasons: 1st. He is a citizen, 
hence he has a citizen’s rights and a citizen’s 
obligations. It follows, then, that he has 
more than a passive interest in all that per¬ 
tains to citizenship. 

2d. He is a leader of men. If he be true 
to his noble calling, his influence is far-reach¬ 
ing. He is not out of the world, but he is in 
the world, and he must be in perpetual con¬ 
tact with the things of the world ; he is sim¬ 
ply commanded to keep himself unspotted 
from the world. He is at liberty, then, to the 
full extent of his ability and opportunity, to 
aid in the world’s great movements to higher 
and better things. Such a minister, if he can 
not become profoundly learned in political 
science, will at least keep along with the best 
conclusions of that science, and so become an 
indispensable co-worker of the true statesman. 

3. The minister will thus widen his in¬ 
fluence with certain classes of citizens. Our 
age demands almost omniscence of a min¬ 
ister. If he can not enter intelligently and 
sympathetically into the st^cular ideas of his 
parishioners he soon gets the reputation for 
lacking common sense, and at the same in¬ 
stant is shorn of much of his strength. 

4. In the nature of the case the minister 
must ever be unqualifiedly opposed to immoral 
tendencies as well as immoral acts. We have 
seen that a most prolific source of immorality 
is in the spoils system. .\.nd we may add that 
things have grown rapidly worse, until our 
last campaign startled all thoughtful citizens. 
To illustrate the state of political immorality 
take bribery. Since the election I have talked 
with many leaders and with many of the rank 
and file in both our great parties. They all 
admit it—most of them deplore it. This is 
not new to any one. Everybody knows it. What 
confidence can members of churches who have 
engaged in this business have in each other? 
What equipment have they for aggressive 
Christian work ? What do those who make 
no profession of Christianity think of such 
Christians? And just here I wish to make 
certain quotations from a great man. They 
are from Lieber’s Political Ethics—a book 
that I am just now re reading with great care 
and great profit. The book was written in 
1837-8. Those who are acquainted with Dr. 
Lieber’s life know that he was not simply a 
learned theorist, but a man of wide and va¬ 
ried experience. Discussing honesty in poli¬ 
tics, he says : “ Thousands go every Sunday 
to church, and willingly admit everything 
that may be brought forth on the solemn ob¬ 
ligation of truth, and yet are ready on Mon¬ 
day to asperse in^ public articles the charac- 








10 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ter of a fellow-citizen knowingly with false 
accusations, or with charges the truth of which 
they know that they have not taken sufficient 
care to ascertain.”* 

Again: “So soon as covetousness becomes 
general in a civilized nation, so soon as dis¬ 
honesty is a general crime, so soon as public 
places are considered by common consent as 
fair opportunities to enrich their holders wil¬ 
ling to wink at each other’s embezzlements, 
so soon as parties consider themselves by their 
success entitled to the spoils of the public—so 
soon there is a deadly cancer in the vitals of 
that society, and hardly anything but severe 
changes and revolutions can save it. Justice 
will be sold, bribes become common, public 
opinion become vicious, veracity will be dis¬ 
regarded, patriotism be derided, every mem¬ 
ory of greatness or nobleness be disgraced, op¬ 
pression in every degree become general, and 
the moral tone of society at large, which must 
always remain the first spring from which 
prosperity flows, will vanish.”t 

Dr. Lieber then illustrates from the history 
of England, France, Italy, Rome, Athens. If 
he were living now would he venture to proph¬ 
esy? 

Then, in view of patent facts in our present 
politics, in view of the solemn warning of the 
political philosopher, can the tJhristian min¬ 
ister be at peace with his conscience except by 
giving his energetic support to the cause of a 
reform that promises to remove so many of 
the causes of the present state of things ? 

5. Students of church history know that 
since the Reformation there has been a very 
marked development of the ethical tide of 
Christianity. In some cases this idea has been 
carried out too exclusively, but upon the 
whole we welcome the later development. 
There can be no doubt as to the agreement of 
Christian ethics and the ethics of civil service 
reform. And in this ethical development of 
Christianity the Christian minister finds a 
basis upon which to stand while supporting 
the great reformatory movements of his day. 

6. When the minister takes up the cause of 
civil service reform, he does not at the same 
time become a party politician. The best men 
in all parties are its truest friends. Th'e Chi¬ 
cago platform was not uncertain in its sound. 
President Harrison in his letter of acceptance 
was equally clear. The best elements in the 
democratic party and in the prohibitionist 
party are in perfect accord with the republican 
party and President Harrison on the subject 
of civil service reform. 

Wise and good men may differ on the 
tariff and other questions of policy, but the 
matter of civil service reform is no longer de¬ 
batable ; the wisest and best statesmen of the 
civilized world have returned a unanimous 
opinion in its favor, and it now remains for 
us all to unite in bringing about its realiza¬ 
tion in the United States. 

J. W. Moncrief. 

Frankein College, March 27, 1889. 

'('Polit. Eth. Vol. I., p. 414. 

tPolit. Eth., pp. 464-5. 


THE SIEGE. 

—President Harrison said, in March, “ I 
have been overrun with office-seekers since I 
arrived in Washington, and instead of having 
time to devote to the consideration and selec¬ 
tion of foreign ministers and other important 
officials, I have actually spent it all in listen¬ 
ing to the statements of delegations and in the 
purely clerical labor incident to the proper 
classification and arrangement of applications 
for office.” 

—Secretary Windom said, in March, “I have 
not had five minutes’ talk with the President 
in a week, except at cabinet meetings. It is 
difficult to find the occasion. There are only 
twenty-four hours in the day, and some of 
them must, of necessity, be given to sleep. We 
shall not have time to do anything unless these 
people go home and give us an opportunity lo 
attend to the public business.” 

—On April 3, 1,500 persons came up the ele¬ 
vator to call upon Secretary Windom, and 
most of them gained an audience. A promi¬ 
nent under official said: “This thing ought 
to stop. Mr. Windom, as a matter of fact, has 
as yet had no time to attend to the govern¬ 
ment business. His time has been wholly oc¬ 
cupied in hearing statements about appoint¬ 
ments to office.” 

—April 2 President Harrison received over 
100 office seekers, each accompanied by con¬ 
gressmen. After it was over he said that for 
the life of him he could not remember what 
any one of them wanted. 

—Some thirty men, including seven office 
holders, went from Buffalo to Washington 
April 9, and took post in the Arlington hotel. 
From there they marched to the door of the 
White House, and after a parley were admit¬ 
ted by tbe door-keepers and appeared before 
the President. Speaking with one voice 
through one of their number, they demanded 
that Editor Morgan should be given the place of 
collector of customs at Buffalo. There was no 
evidence that the good of the service needed a 
new collector, or that the President was hunt¬ 
ing for one. There was ev'erywhere prevalent 
the fact that Morgan must have a place. 

—According to the Indianapolis JournaVs 
Washington correspondent, congressmen have 
ordered out so many democratic postmasters 
that the department is much behindhand in 
making out commissions for the new hench¬ 
men. The postmaster-general says that he 
must have new clerks to do this work or it 
will have to be delayed somewhat while he 
and his present clerks go back to the work 
pertaining to carrying mails, for which they 
were appoijited and for which the post-office 
department was organized. On the division 
of spoils the entire force works three and one- 
half hours extra daily. 

—There are on an average six applicants 
for each of the 57,000 post-offices, great and 
small, the larger having more than 100 each. 
At the post-office department each state has a 
great case of pigeon-holes equal to the number 
of its counties, with extra ones for its larger 
post offices. A large force of clerks is con¬ 
stantly employed, and the entire force works 
extra hours morning and night in sorting and 
briefing applications and putting them into 
these pigeon-holes. We don’t know whether 
this is “ practical politics” or “ practical civil 
service.” 

—There are 40 applicants for the Manches¬ 
ter consulate, and for Birmingham 230. 

—Under the constitution and laws the sec¬ 
retary of the treasury is appointed to attend to 
the business of his department. It was hardly 
contemplated one hundretl years ago that such 
a notice as the following, posted conspicu¬ 


ously by Secretary Windom, would be neces¬ 
sary ; 

“ The secretary of the treasury reserves the 
time from 10 to 11:30 o’clock A. m. for receiv¬ 
ing senators and members of the house of rep¬ 
resentatives. Other persons desiring to see 
him upon matters relating to official patron¬ 
age will please call between 11:30 a. m. and 1 
p. M. The secretary requests that he may be 
excused from receiving visitors after 1 p. M., 
in order that he may be able to devote a part 
of the day to the consideration of the current 
business of the department.” 

—“Once in five minutes,” says the Chicago 
Tribune, the head of some democratic post¬ 
master drops into the basket.” 

—So far President Harrison has made 374 
nominations where President Cleveland made 
171. 


By the 1st of Maya good many incompetents 
who thought they had secured life leases on 
their positions can be weeded out of the mail 
service and their places filled by men who 
know the geography of the country and can 
read writing .—Indianapolis Journal, March 14- 


The official guillotine appears to work 
smoothly and with great rapidity. 

The eye of the executioner seems to be fixed 
on Indiana, and democrats are momentarily 
retiring from public service. 

Mr. Wanamaker’s official guillotine appears 
to be working very smoothly .—Indianapolis 
Journal, April 13. 

CORRESPONDENCE. 

—From Lawrence county. “So far as this 
community is concerned, I think that about 
ninety per cent, are seeking Indian agencies, 
post officesor some other facile and luxurious 
method of serving the government.” 

—From Fort Wayne. “ Now is the time to 
renew work in the civil service reform cause. 
Many good names can be secured here by the 
aid of a little personal effort.” 

—We are permitted to quote the follow¬ 
ing: “In returning the constitution of the 
Indiana Civil Service Reform Association 
with my signature attached, I beg to say that 
so long as the association stands by and lives 
up to the declaration of Mr. Foulke in his 
late address, that it will measure Mr. Harri¬ 
son by the very same standard that it applied 
to Mr. Cleveland, so long will I aid the asso¬ 
ciation in its efforts to make its objects ob¬ 
tain.” 

—Also the following from Vincennes : “ It 

has occurred to me that the association 
might devise ways to assist and strengthen the 
President in the carrying out of the sentiments 
of his inaugural. He ought to be protected 
from his friends—the Indiana cormorants. 
We will hope and labor that the cause may be 
advanced during the current term.” 

—A clergyman writes: “Civil service re¬ 
form is absolutely essential to the well being 
of our government. The recent assault upon 
the President is enough to disgust decent peo¬ 
ple and make one want to take a Gatling gun 
and blaze away at the politicians and hungry 
office-seekers.” 

—A university professor writes: “ The spoils 
grabbers seem to be flaring and blaring, like 
an old-fashioned tallow dip, with the largest 
blaze just before they go out.” 


Henry A. Richmond, of Buffalo, delivered 
an address upon civil service reform before the 
Young Men’s Association of that city, which 
was published in the Buffalo Express March 24. 
Mr. Richmond was one of the civil service 
commissioners of New York and has an ex¬ 
tended knowledge of the subject both in theory 
and in practice, and his address shows it. 













The civil service chronicle. 


“ Washington teaches us to-day this great lesson, that those who would associate their names with events that shall outlive a century, can only do so by high 

consecration to duty.’’—President Harrison at the Centennial of the United States. 


VoL. I, Xo. 3. 


INDIANAPOLIS, MAY, 1889. 


TERMS : 


50 cents per annum. 
5 cents per copy. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind., where subscrip- 
tion.s and advefiisements will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana. 

There is no part of the means placed m the 
hands of the Executive which might be used 
with greater effect, for unhallxnved purposes, than 
the control of the public press. We have learned, 
too, from our own as well as the experience of other 
countries, that golden shackles, by whomsoever or by 
ivhatever pretense imposed, are as fatal to it as the 
iron bonds of despotism. * * * * 

It was the beautiful remark of a distin¬ 
guished English writer that “in the Roman 
Senate, Octavius had a party, and Antony a 
party, but the Commonwealth had none.” 
Yet the senate continued to meet in the 
Temple of Liberty, and talk of the beauty and 
sacredness of the Commonwealth, and gaze at 
the statues of the elder Brutus and of the 
Curtii and the Decii. And the people as 
sembled in the forum, not, as in ihe days of 
Camillus and the Scipios, to cast their free 
votes for annual magistrates or pass upon the 
acts of the senate, but to receive from the hands of 
the leaders their share of the spoils.—President 
llVn, Henry Harrison’s Inaugural Address, Con¬ 
gressional Globe, vol. 7, pp. 234-5. 

Some fifty or sixty editors of leading journals 
have been appointed to office by the present E.tecu- 
tive [Jackson.] * * But the ground of 

complaint is that the aiding, by ihe press, of the 
election of an individaal, is rewarded, by that same 
individual, vnih a gift of moneyed offices. ]\Ien 
are turned out of office, and others put in, 
and receive salaries from the public treasury, 
on the ground, either openly avowed or 
falsely denied, that they have rendered service 
in the election of the very individual who makes this 
removal and makes this appointment. Every man, 
sir, must see that this is a vital stab at the 
purity of the press. It not only assails its 
independence, by addressing sinister motives 
to it, but it furnishes from the public treasury 
the means of exciting these motives. It ex¬ 
tends the executive power over the press in a 
most daring manner.— Daniel Webster’s address 
to the Massachusetts Whigs in 1832, 


The danger, then, consists merely in this: 
The President can displace from office a man 
whose merits require that he should be con¬ 
tinued in it. What will be the motives which 
the President can feel for such abuse of his 
power, and the restraints that operate to pre¬ 
vent it? In the first place, he will be im¬ 
peachable by this house, before the senate, 
for such an act of maladministration ; for I 
contend that the wanton removal of meritorious offi¬ 
cers would subject him to impeachment and removal 
from his own high trust, * * * Can we sup¬ 

pose a President, elected lor four years only, 
dependent upon the popular voice, impeach¬ 
able by the legislature, little, if at all, distin¬ 
guished for wealth, personal talents, or influ¬ 
ence from the head of the department himself; 
I say, will he bid defiance to all these consid¬ 
erations, and wantonly dismiss a meritorious 
and virtuous officer? Such an abuse of power 
exceeds my conception.—Congressman James Mad¬ 
ison, June, 1789. 


We again ask friends of civil service 
reform to subscribe for the Chronicle, re¬ 
minding them that this is not an enter¬ 
prise for pecuniary profit. We can not 
employ a canvasser and must trust that 
those who want to see the cause succeed 
will take the trouble to put fifty cents in 
stamps into an envelope and mail it. We 
have a long list, of names in this state to 
whom this paper can be profitably sent. 
We have received and are anxious to re¬ 
ceive more subscriptions to enable us to 
mail the Chronicle to this list. 

The President has at last appointed the 
civil service commission, and the great ex¬ 
cellence of his appointments helps to make 
up for the lateness of their appearance. 
Theodore Roosevelt is entirely a republi¬ 
can,but he is also entirely an outspoken civil 
service reformer And the same may be 
said of Mr. Thompson mutatis mutandis. 
Both of these gentlemen will appre¬ 
ciate the dignity of their office and the 
great work of reform to be done in 
the civil service. They will maintain 
their rights and the rights of the law 
and will not attempt to shape the course 
of the commission in a way to mollify the 
the Ingallses and the Farwells. The mat 
ters which need their instant attention are 
the letting in of daylight upon all the oper¬ 
ations of the law and the establishment of 
the complete independence of local 
boards. 


We have seen the original letter from j 
the post-office department requesting the ] 
resignation of R. S. Stuart, an inspector, 
on the ground of lack of money. This 
being refused, he was removed. We have 
also seen that other inspectors in the same 
line were at the same time appointed. Ob¬ 
viously the statement as to lack of money 
was false. There is passing from mouth 
to mouth among republicans talk that 
Stuart was unduly officious, particularly so 
with Governor Hovey’s mail during the 
campaign. It is also said that he inter¬ 
ested himself in the defense of Sim Coy. 
Very well; if there is a cause for his dis¬ 
missal let it be stated. It is unbecoming 
in a great government to have a cause and 
substitute a falsehood. 

The Indiana Civil Service Reform As¬ 
sociation has gained twenty-five new mem¬ 
bers since our last issue. 


Senator Sherman and Senator Quay 
or what in this American feudalism is the 
exact equivalent, Ohio and Pennsylvania, 
are at war. The cause is best stated in 
Pennsylvania’s own words: 

‘ Senator Sherman is a receiver of stolen 
goods. There was an agreement made be¬ 
tween Pennsylvania and Ohio to divide 
the internal revenue appointments. Ohio 
was to have the deputy commissionership 
of internal revenue, which they got, with 
the understanding that Pennsylvania was 
to keep hands off’, and that Pennsylvania 
was to have the solicitorship of internal 
revenue. I had picked out B. Frank Gilke- 
son, of Bristol, Bucks county, for the place 
and supposed there would be no interfer¬ 
ence, but when I went away Ohio went in 
for the solicitorship, too.” 

“The Percy owt off Northombarlande, 

And a vowe to God mayd he, 

That lie wold hunte in the niountayns 
Off Chyviat within days thre, 

In the manger of doughtS Douglas 
And all that ever with him be. 

“The fattiste hartes in all Cheviat 
He sayd he wold kill and cary them away; 

‘Be my feth,’ sayd the donghet6 Douglas agayn, 

‘I wyll let that hontyng if that I may.’ 

“At last the Douglas and the Percy met, 

Lyk to Captayns of myght and of mayne; 

They swapte togethar tyll they both swat 
With swordes that wear of fyn myllan.” 

It seems to be undisputed that a man 
named Paul Vandervoort was chief clerk 
in the railway mail service in 1883, was re¬ 
peatedly warned to mend his ways, treated 
the warning with contempt, declared that 
he had a “pull” which would amply protect 
him, was absent from his post 265 out of 
310 working days, was in that year and for 
that reason discharged, and has now been 
appointed superintendent of mails at 
Omaha. The Omaha Bee [rep.] says it was 
done at the solicitation of the Nebraska 
congressmen, and adds: “It is certainly 
unfortunate that the state has thus been 
humiliated before the country.” Under the 
President’s plan of allowing congressmen 
to dictate appointments many scalawags 
work into the service; but it is inconceiva¬ 
ble that the President, knowing as he now 
does the facts, will allow this particular 
scalawag to stay there. 

It is proposed to erect a monument to 
the late Henry G. Pearson. It is as fitting 
to commemorate a civil servant, who has 
shown to an extraordinary degree traits 
admired by all men, and has fallen in his 
prime, as it is to commemorate great sol¬ 
diers who have fallen on the field of battle. 
Subscriptions may be sent to William 
Potts Esq., 35 Liberty street. New York. 























18 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


There is disappointment because Presi¬ 
dent Harrison did not say more fit¬ 
ting things at New York. The cause is 
plain enough. He names it “public duties 
of a very exacting character.” His work 
has not been public duties. Since he was 
inaugurated he has performed few neces¬ 
sary public duties. He has allowed his 
time and his energies to be drawn upon 
without cessation, and with a power 
absolutely absorbing by a class of persons 
who have but the single object of quarter¬ 
ing themselves upon the treasury. To 
attempt to satisfy them is not a public 
duty. And no living man can look up 
after two months’ steady attention to this 
work and go from Washington to New 
York with it all the time on his mind and 
make a speech at the one hundredth anni¬ 
versary of this government, that will not 
disappoint his friends. The occasion is an 
exalted one and calls for exalted and noble 
sentiments. But giving out patronage to 
party friends and favorites is demeaning to 
the character, and it deadens the sense to 
those patriotic and just principles of gov¬ 
ernment, which must, if a government is 
to live, from time to time be clearly 
grasped and boldly stated by the leaders of 
the people. 


“ It [“ mugwump civil service ”] has es¬ 
tablished rules and examinations that prac¬ 
tically debar men of experience and sense 

* * * it can be used as a cloak for favor¬ 
itism to shut out those who deserve recog¬ 
nition for services rendered the party. 

* * * It stimulates public lying. 

* * * It is not in harmony with our 

form of goverment. * * * It is there¬ 
fore the duty of an administration * * 
to be represented * * not by political 
opponents nor political eunuchs.” * * 

— Tom Plait, one of the New York aristocracy 
of office-hold^s, in Frank Leslie’s Weekly. 

"A rogue ne’er felt the halter draw 
With good opinion of the law.” 

James Barton, the historian, encourages 
the Chronicle with money and with sym¬ 
pathy. We are permitted to quote from his 
letter of April 20: 

“The spectacle afforded at present by 
those at Washington, who are turning out 

f ^ost-masters so fast, is most pitiful and 
amentable. What a satire upon them 
the inaugural celebration at New York! 
To think that what Washington began so 
simply and so nobly should have ended in 
this! There is only one class whom it 
does not sicken—the professional politi¬ 
cians, and they are the public enemy, as 
much so as Louis Napoleon was when he 
got astride of fair France, as much so as 
Nero was when he fiddled while Rome 
was burning.” 

It was a happy thought for Mr. Barton 
the other night at a dinner where civil 
service reform was a subject for male¬ 
diction to pronounce the spoils system “ not 
the system of Louis XIV., but the system 
of Mme. de Bompadour.” • 


Marshall C. Woods has been appointed 
box-clerk in the Indianapolis post-office. 
The place was given to him as spoil, and 
this has caused remark, for the place was 
supposed to be within the civil service 
rules. It was under those rules until 
1888, when Bostmaster General Dickinson, 
evidently desiring to keep the law within 
the narrowest limits, wrote around to dif¬ 
ferent post-offices suggesting there were 
places that might be exempted from ex¬ 
amination. Bostmaster Jones naturally 
met the suggestion with alacrity, and be¬ 
tween the two, the box clerk, the weigh¬ 
ing clerk and all the money-order clerks, 
were taken out from under the rules. 
The pretense is, that they handle money, 
and that the postmaster, being liable for 
them on his official bond, should have the 
right to select those whom he can trust. For 
instance, Marshall C. Woods now and then 
collects a little money for box-rent and 
carries it to the cashier, and Bostmaster 
Wallace by appointing him impliedly de¬ 
clares that he has made a careful selection, 
and that Woods is more to be relied upon 
than the clerks who come in under the 
competitive examination. And the same 
is true of the man who collects pound-rate 
postage in the back part of the post-office 
and carries it a few feet to the cashier. Tn 
state the case is to prove that these exemp¬ 
tions were never made except by deadly 
enemies of the law, and one of the first acts 
of the Bresident should be to put them 
under the rules again. A very small bond 
from each will make the postmaster abso¬ 
lutely secure. And while the Bresident is 
about it, he would do well to abolish the 
nonsensical exemption of the “heads” of 
departments in such post-offices, on the 
ground that they are “ confidential ” posi¬ 
tions. Such places should be filled by pro¬ 
motion from the ranks after competition 
and not by ward-workers who leave noth¬ 
ing undone to bring the law into disrepute. 

The post-office authorities here have 
asked for and obtained a special examina¬ 
tion for clerks and carriers, to be held in 
Indianapolis on May 22. The last exami¬ 
nation was in February, and the next 
regular examination would be in August. 
There is no lack of names upon the eligible 
list. Why should a special examination be 
asked for, and why did Mr. Lyman, then 
composing the commission, grant it? 
This is exactly the course pursued by Bost- 
master Jones and the civil service commis¬ 
sion four years ago. Are we to have a rep¬ 
etition of results, also ? This office did not 
need any special examination, and the fact 
that one is to be held is a strong indication 
that there is a set of republicans “ demand¬ 
ing*’ places, and that something is to be done 
to favor them. This is not the enforce¬ 
ment of the civil service law nor are these 


steps taken by those who want to put that 
law upon a solid basis. We do not know 
what the authorities intend, but we do 
know that persons who are to be examined 
are very confident that there is to be an 
underground republican way of getting 
in. The new local board does not inspire 
confidence. All concerned had better 
think twice before bringing about a state 
of affairs, where, after an examination at 
an irregular time, and upon practically no 
public notice, only democrats are dis¬ 
missed and only republicans are appointed. 


Among the appointments made by 
Bostmaster Wallace the reinstatement 
of E. H. Moore as a distributing clerk is 
reported. Moore was discharged less than 
a year ago, and he could only get back in¬ 
to the service by the postmaster request¬ 
ing the local civil service board to certify 
him again for appointment, and then ap¬ 
pointing him. The Indianapolis Sentinel 
says that Moore was discharged by Jones 
“ for running a gambling house for which 
he was arrested, taken to jail and subse¬ 
quently fined. His resort was in the Tal¬ 
bott and New block, and at the time of the 
arrest a whole outfit of gambling appara¬ 
tus was found in the place.” This charge 
made some two weeks ago has not been 
denied. When Moore was discharged by 
Jones, the civil service reformers did not 
take up the case because they believed 
upon investigation that the dismissal was 
just. It would now be interesting to know 
firet, how the local board came to certify 
this name for reappointment, when they 
can lawfully only certify those who have 
left the service without fault; and second, 
what is going to be done about it. No 
greater proof is wanting of the necessity of 
making local boards independent. Does 
anyone suppose that a board composed of 
John R. Wilson, Noble C. Butler and W. 
B. Fishback would have made the certifi¬ 
cate? 


No system of civil service reform that 
contemplates breaking up the use of pub¬ 
lic offices to pay personal and party debts 
can for a moment yield that presidential 
postmasters, heads of divisions, chiefs of bu¬ 
reaus and such officers are as a matter of 
course to be changed every four years. 
These places are to be for the rank and file, 
and are to be the reward of skill and effi¬ 
ciency, and are to be won by competition. 
The officers themselves are to be officers not 
of a town or city, but of a service making 
their duties a specialty, always with the un¬ 
derstanding that there is no limit to the 
power of dismissal. Nothing short of this 
end will be civil service reform, and the ob¬ 
ject is not to be given up because there are 
flying around cant phrases about the good 
of the service and life-leases and keeping 
the offices near to the people, and an 
aristocracy of office-holders. To reasonable 



to be found in the CivU Service Record for 
April. 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


19 


BILLY PATTERSON. 

The post-office department has selected 
Billy Patterson to be superintendent of 
mails at the Indianapolis post office. He 
has for a long time kept a livery stable in 
Court street with moderate success. He is 
a genial man who is fairly intelligent in the 
livery business. He has been helping to 
run elections in Marion County for many 
years and has several times been secretary 
of the republican county committee. His 
success in that field has been only indiffer¬ 
ent and the republican majority has 
steadily dwindled under the manage¬ 
ment of himself and his fellow-workers. 
As superintendent of mails he is supposed 
to know at any given moment by what 
route the mail then made up can quickest 
reach its destination. This involves an 
exact and extended knowledge of railway 
time-tables and railway mail routes 
throughout a large portion of the United 
States. Further, he is supposed to period 
ically examine the distributors of the In¬ 
dianapolis post-office upon their quickness 
and accuracy as distributors and upon the 
schemes of places and railways, with which 
they must be entirely familiar in order to 
'-perform their duties. He has other duties, 
but these two instances are fair examples. 
Where Billy Patterson is known it causes 
a smile to suggest that he is qualified for 
the place. He is not qualified and his ap¬ 
pointment is a disgraceful use of public 
office snd the public treasury to give a 
hardly successful “ worker ” some money. 
It is all the more disgraceful because there 
were at the least twenty men hereabouts 
qualified by a training of years in mail 
service, and wanting employment, who 
could have been appointed. This is a trav¬ 
esty upon the republican doctrine that 
fitness is the only discriminating test of 
appointment and every day that Patterson 
remains elevated before the people will 
give it additional and rasping emphasis. 

THE CENSUS BUREAU AND CIVIL 
SERVICE REFORM. 

“The reform should be extended to all 
grades of the service to which it is applica¬ 
ble” So says the republican platform, and 
accompanies the declaration with the 
words, “we will not fail to keep our 
pledges.” 

“I am in entire accord with the declara¬ 
tions of the convention.” “Some extensions 
of the classified list are practicable and 
desirable.” “It will be my sincere purpose 
if elected, to advance the reform.” So says 
General Harrison in his letter of accep¬ 
tance. The time is not far off when it will 
appear whether or not President Harrison 
intends to make good his own promise and 
the pledge of the party to extend this re¬ 


form. There is no branch of the service 
in which skill can be better demonstrated 
by civil service i ules than in the census 
bureau. There is no place which ought to 
be kept freer from even the suspicion of 
partisan influence. This is a kind of work 
to which civil service reform has already 
been successfully applied elsewhere. Ex¬ 
perience has shown that it is practicable. 

The census commissioner himself is re¬ 
ported by the Indianapolis Journal as say¬ 
ing : “ I propose to be governed by the 
following considerations : 1st. Those who 
have had experience in the last census will 
have the preference, and 2d. Those who 
have passed the civil service examination. 
For others I propose to have an examina¬ 
tion and make appointments based upon 
the results of such examination.” The 
commissioner then recognizes the neces¬ 
sity for trained men, whose ability shall 
be demonstrated by examination and 
actual trial, a principle which forms the 
ground work of civil service reform. 

But scarcely is this declaration made 
when we learn that: “ There continues to 
be strife over the question of extending the 
civil service law to embrace the census 
bureau. The proposition is unpopular in 
all branches of the public service, except 
in the building where the civil service 
commissioners are located. Secretary 
Noble said to-day, that he did not know 
whether the census bureau would be in¬ 
cluded in the civil service or not; that he 
was naturally loath to see that amount of 
patronage thrown away. He had not re¬ 
ferred the question to the President, and 
did not believe Superintendent Porter 
would do so. Secretary Noble said he in¬ 
tended to go right ahead and make ap¬ 
pointments for the census bureau without 
any regard to the civil service law, unless 
he was requested to stop. He believed that 
the appointments now being made were 
based upon the very best principle—that 
of fitness—and that there was no necessity 
for the civil service law supervening. The 
civil service commission announced that 
it can supply all the positions of the cen¬ 
sus bureau from almost any one of the 
series, as there are thousands more eligi- 
bles than there are places.” 

Now this matter is of the utmost impor¬ 
tance. According to the Journal there are 
175 supervisors, 1,200 to 1,600 clerks and 
over 40,000 enumerators to be appointed. 
To make these places dependent in any 
degree upon patronage is to give direct 
encouragement to political debauchery. 
The appointments are not all to be made 
immediately, but the time to extend the 
rules is the present time, before the scram¬ 
ble begins and before the maximum of 
“ pressure ” is applied on behalf of the old 
system. There is no better place than this to 
test the character of this administration as 
a promise-keeper or a promise-breaker. 
Will the reform be extenaed to the census 
bureau ? 


PAYING THE WORKERS. 

Who will do the party work with no 
spoil? A man who has worked many sea¬ 
sons for his party and has never been paid 
out of its loaves and fishes, who believes in 
the necessity of party organization and 
feels a pride in what his own party has ac¬ 
complished in that line, would come out 
squarely for a reform that would manage 
the public business for the public, if he 
were not concerned for the future of party 
organization. He asks who will do the 
party work if there are no offices for the 
workers. This organization, reaching into 
every school district, must be had, and 
when once you fill the clerical places with 
men hired only for their fitness and re¬ 
tained for the same reason, they wilt con¬ 
cern themselves chiefly with doing well the 
work for which they are hired. 

It is hard to say what people will do 
until they are given a chance to try. If it is 
permitted to look outside of our own coun¬ 
try to England, it is seen that parties are 
sharply defined, campaigns stubbornly 
contested and as much party organization 
had as its greatest admirer could ask for 
and no dearth of party workers, and all 
this in a land without the spoil of offices 
for division. There are two remedies, 
should it prove upon trial that our people 
have become so dead to patriotism, so in¬ 
different to great principles at issue as to 
refuse needed funds for legitimate cam¬ 
paign purposes, to decline to hear speeches 
or to attend meetings or to shape a plan 
of campaign unless they were paid. We 
may return to the present system; or we 
may adopt a recent suggestion, hire two 
men for every office; one congressman to 
study great questions and make wise laws 
his counterpart to organize out of public 
officials a body of men, who, as Senator In¬ 
galls eloquently said, will ride for him, fight 
for him,and arise for him and receive their 
pay out of the public purse; one railway 
mail clerk to distribute letters and papers 
and to feel that his tenure depends upon the 
quality of his work and his moral character 
and his counterpart to run for his congress¬ 
man, to get the caucus packed for him, 
and to do the other malodorous labor 
described by Blackstone; to have one 
postmaster who understands that both 
political parties are taxed to pay his 
wages, that both have letters to send and 
to receive, and that both have eyes to see 
and senses to be tickled by the most skill¬ 
ful and courteous service, his mate to be 
the editor of the town paper, the chairman 
of the county committee, and the post¬ 
master and his work to further, not the best 
interests of the country, nor of his entire 
party, but the ends of his own lord. This 
plan may, at first thought, seem a useless 
waste of public funds, but in fact it would 
be less costly than the present system. 








20 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


SUSPENDING JUDGMENT. 

During the month the President has 
said that he ought not to be judged too 
soon; that dividing offices is not the sole 
business of a President, and that judg¬ 
ment should be suspended until his action 
on matters not pertaining to the civil ser¬ 
vice can be seen. 

The President clearly has a wrong 
conception of the relative weight of his 
constitutional duties. He is a treaty 
maker but only to a small extent does this 
call for his attention. He conducts our 
business with other nations; but only 
rarely does this absorb him. His great 
constitutional duty is with federal offices 
and federal officers. It is his duty to carry 
out the laws, and to enable him to do this 
he is made superintendent of a body of 
civil employes numbering about 142,000. 
This is a number six times greater than 
that under any private employer in this 
country. To fill the vacancies that would 
naturally occur in an ordinary business 
course and to keep these employes up to 
their work is the one duty of the Presi¬ 
dent compared with which all other duties 
are insignificant. The President is there¬ 
fore mistaken in thinking that there is a 
field outside of the civil service in which 
he will do great things. If he lets politi¬ 
cians make him believe that his chief work 
is to trade employes instead of putting 
employes at work and keeping them at it, 
he ought not to expect judgment to be sus¬ 
pended. Further, the people care nothing 
for office-seekers. They sign their peti¬ 
tions to get rid of them, but they hardly 
give a passing thought to a disappointed 
office-seeker. It is only the office-seekers 
who are in earnest, and they are very much 
in earnest. Men are apt to be so when they 
think there is within reach a good living 
and little work. They are apt to get ex¬ 
cited, and desperate, and unscrupulous, and 
threatening, and when disappointed, as 
most of them must be, they very likely 
will not vote the party ticket, or at least 
not work at the next election. Now, this 
office-seeking demonstration may have 
blinded the President so that he can not 
see how contemptuously the people regard 
the whole business. 


HENRY G. PEARSON. 

Postmaster Pearson died in April under 
circumstances that have caused wide and 
increasing, rather than decreasing, remark. 
It is admitted on every hand that his death 
w'as caused by long and incessant 
work and care which came to him in 
the line of his duty as postmaster 
of New York city. Gradually also, it has 
come to light that the act of his re-appoint¬ 
ment by President Cleveland was the sum 


total of virtue due the late administration 
in connection with this post-office. There 
is an old saying of Andrew Jackson’s, 
“John Marshall has made his decision, now 
let him enforce it.” This was the spirit of 
William F. Vilas and Don M. Dickinson as 
postmasters-general,toward the man whom 
public sentiment had forced the President 
to re-appoint. To them he had got the of¬ 
fice and now he might run it. Through 
four years they looked on while the best 
postmaster in the country struggled Avith 
his means of work twenty per cent, short, 
and they answered his appeals for help 
with curt refusal or brutal cynicism. They 
hoped to see him break down and make 
room for one of their kind, but they were 
disappointed. He did the work as it had 
never been done before, although it 
brought upon him the enmity of a large 
section of his over-worked employes, and 
cost him his peace of mind and his life. 
Under no circumstances is Mr. Cleveland 
to be allowed to escape his responsibility 
in this matter. This post-office should 
have been his greatest pride and should 
have had from time to time his personal 
attention. He now seems to have thrown 
the commission as he would throw a bone 
to a dog, and then turned his attention to 
distributing 100,000 other places to men of 
a more congenial stripe. 

It would seem that President Harrison 
in making appointments with that care, 
without which he has no right to make 
them, must have noted the excellence of 
this post-office, and that nowhere could he 
obtain for it a man by many times so skill¬ 
ful and competent as Mr. Pearson. Fur¬ 
ther, the magnificent working of this office 
had been brought about by the most rigid 
enforcement of those reform principles for 
which the platform and letter of acceptance 
upon which General Harrison was elected 
are noted. Now why did President Har¬ 
rison refuse to reappoint Mr. Pearson, and 
second, why did he choose in his stead Van 
Cott, a man who has lived by politics and 
whose life has been a steady example of 
what is not civil service reform ? General 
Harrison is a brave man, and he is also 
an honest man; these questions out of 
the mouths of men just as brave and hon¬ 
est, will be put to him until he will admit 
to himself that in this case fidelity and 
efficiency were not the sure tenure of 
office, nor was fitness and not party service 
the essential and discriminating test of ap¬ 
pointment. 


THE BRUTAL THOUGH FRANK AND 
BOLD SPOILS SYSTEM. 

President Harrison, in 1886, alluded in 
the senate to the spoils system as “ brutal,” 
but if practiced he wanted to see it boldly 
and frankly done rather than tricked out 


in reform disguise. For two months there 
has gone on at Washington so unblushing 
a boldness in exhibiting the spoils system 
in all its savage nakedness that it would 
make a patriot almost despair, if the signs 
were not at hand that the evil had got to 
the point of working its own cure. 

There is a large class of easy going and 
optimistic people in this country who find 
it more convenient to believe, as long as 
they can, that all goes well with the repub¬ 
lic, and that no cessation from pleasure¬ 
seeking, or money-seeking is necessary 
from them. They have been for years 
easity irritated at the growing‘conviction 
that the time was near when their Puritan 
consciences would rise up in all their 
might and compel a recognition of the 
fact that all was not well with the republic 
when 100,000 offices, costing $80,000,000 
of money, were used by the victorious 
party to perpetuate its power, and that in 
this lay a power menacing the free institu¬ 
tions of the country. The President and 
his party may wreck themselves, but not 
the reform of the civil service, should the 
instances of the lust for carnage pile up so 
thick and so fast that there is no respite 
from the horrid spectacle. 

There are thousands who feel a personal 
humiliation in the fact that the Chief Mag¬ 
istrate of this country one day worships 
with all the solemn and grateful associa¬ 
tions connected with an august anniver¬ 
sary, in the pew occupied a century ago by 
Washington,and on the next returns to his 
patient hearing of the unseemly demands 
of a band of office beggars. But the hope¬ 
ful sign is that all over the country banked 
fires of patriotism have burst out and hun¬ 
dreds, where a few weeks ago there was 
one, feel that it is worth while for a time to 
abandon personal ease and go out and rid 
the land of a danger more menacing and 
insidious than any foreign foe. It is a 
notable sign that the religious press has so 
largely pointed out the cruel significance 
of the acts connected with Mr. Pearson’s 
death and his fidelity to a high duty at 
great personal sacrifice. It is a yet more 
notable sign that in the same church in 
which Washington, before his inaugural, 
heard religious services, a bishop of to-day 
with noble and calm, but unmistakable lan¬ 
guage, reminds his audience how impos¬ 
sible it is to imagine that Washington 
could tolerate the sack of the country now 
in process. Nothing has more surely indi¬ 
cated, than have the wide spread commen¬ 
dations of this sermon, what a rock to stand 
upon has any President who will look to 
the people for approval and support in again 
obeying the constitution and doing the 
greatest public duty. When the churches 
and the religious press will, even in the 
most moderate way, chronicle the passing 
facts of the spoils system, its extinction is 
near at hand. A system that tramples ruth¬ 
lessly on ever precept of humanity must 
fall. 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


21 


THE RAILWAY MAIL SERVICE. 

After President Cleveland had performed 
the only act the civil service law left to be 
performed, and had put the railway mail 
service under the law, President Harrison 
put off the date of taking effect six weeks. 
As we said last month we believe this act 
not warranted by law. It does not help 
the unlawfulness to say that Commissioner 
Lyman recommended it. The civil ser¬ 
vice commission was and had been crip¬ 
pled for many months. To make this 
commission efficient was the most pressing 
duty upon the President from the time of 
his inauguration; yet two months went by 
before this duty was performed. The 
commision was left composed of one man 
to get ready as best it could. Now the 
least to be expected was that the service 
would be let alone. Instead, here is Con¬ 
gressman Owen, just returned from Wash¬ 
ington, having worked out 13 democratic 
railway mail clerks, and worked in a like 
number of his henchmen. This is a typi¬ 
cal case; from all over the country comes 
the same story. Towards the end of the 
six weeks Assistant Postmaster-general 
Clarkson, a political buccaneer, and Super¬ 
intendent Bell, apparently a mere tool of 
this political buccaneer, redoubled their 
efforts in turning out democrats and put¬ 
ting in republicans, and for sheer lack of 
time, they neither sent out the dismissals 
and appointments nor even kept tally. 
And although the law is pretended to be 
in force, these papers, made out by hun¬ 
dreds in the last hours before May 1, are 
now being put into effect. This is a trick 
worthy of the palmiest of the Gormans 
and the Vilases. The object of these 
changes is apparent in the following: 

Post-office Department, 

Office Gen’l Sup’t R’y Mail Service, 
Washington, April 13th, 1889. 

3ir. J. T. Loving, Richmond, Va.: 

Sir —Superintendent Vickery has re¬ 
ferred to this office your letter of the 11th 
inst., asking the reasons for your retire¬ 
ment from the service, and in reply would 
th&i the action was taken in consequence 
oj no fault on your part, or for reasons affecting 
in any luay your character or standing as a 
citizen. 

The reasons for your retirement were of a 
political nature. 

Very respectfully, 

J. L. Bell, 

General Superintendent. 

Some of the men turned out were as good 
. men as were in the mail service. The dis- 
c»’iminating test in appointments is shown 
in such appointments as the negro politi¬ 
cian Bagby, mentioned last month, and 
Billy Patterson and Paul Vandervoort 
spoken of in another column. There has 
been a six weeks’ loot of the railway mail 
service. It was not believable that Presi 
dent Harrison would allow it. There is 
laid upon him a burden from which noth¬ 
ing but heroic treatment can relieve him. 
He should revoke every appointment made 
to this service since March 15, and should 
restore the service as it stood on that day 
and then should let the law and the rules, 
and the civil service commission do their 
work. 


I AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

“ Large districts or parcels of land were 
allotted by the conquering generals to the 
superior ollicers of the army, and by them 
dealt out again in smaller parcels or allot¬ 
ments to the inferior officers and most de¬ 
serving soldiers. * * The condition of 
holding the lands thus given was that Ihe 
possessor should do service faithfully, both 
at home and in the wars, to him by whom 
they were given,” and, on breach of this 
condition, “ by not performing the stipu¬ 
lated service, or by deserting his lord in 
battle,” the lands reverted to the lord. 
Tlie vassal, upon investiture, took an oath 
of fealty to the lord, and in addition did 
homage, “ openly and humbly kneeling, 
being ungirt, uncovered and holding up 
his hands, both together, betw'een those of 
his lord, who sate before him, and there 
professing that he did become his MAN 
from that day forth, of life and limb and 
earthly honor, and then he received a kiss 
from his lord.” Services were free and 
base. Free service was to pay a sum of 
money, or serve under the lord in war. 
Base service was to plow the lord’s land, 
to make his liedge or carry out his dung.— 
Blackstone. 

—May 3. The President appointed his 
brother. Carter B. Harrison, United States 
marshal for the middle district of Tennessee. 
It is stated that there was no other candidate. 
Query: Would any office-seeker be a candi¬ 
date against a President’s brother? 

—May 10. The President appointed his 
brother-in-law, John N. Scott, superintendent 
of construction of the Port Townsend (W. T.) 
custom house. 

—May 15. The President appointed Alvin 
Saunders, father-in-law of the President’s son, 
to be member of board of registration and 
election in Utah. Salary $5,000. 

—Congressman Owen’s raid : 

April 27—Representative Owen arrived 
from Logansport this morning and went 
directly to the post-office department to secure 
some fourth-class postmasterships. He has so 
far had thirty-six postmasters appointed in 
his district. 

April 29—He camped in the corridors of 
the post office department, and put a watch 
upon the office of the general superintendent 
of the railway mail service. In his pockets 
he carried various papers intended to procure 
democratic scalps and put into position sev¬ 
eral republicans. He has remained steadily 
on duty, with the exception of the twenty-four 
hours covering Sunday. 

May 3—Representative Owen left Washing¬ 
ton to-night for his home at Logansport. He 
came here to secure a number of changes in 
the railway mail service in his district, and 
met with extraordinary success. He secured 
the removal of thirteen democrats and the ap¬ 
pointment of as many republicans to fill their 
places. This is one more appointment in this 
service than has been secured by any one man 
in congress. The clerks about the office of the 
superintendent of the railway mail service are 
now referring to Mr. Owen as “the Hoosier 
hustler.”— Washington Despatches to the Indian¬ 
apolis Journal. 

—One of the most difficult and delicate du¬ 
ties falling to the lot of congressmen in the 


interior of the state is the selection of suita¬ 
ble candidates for post-offices in their districts. 
With half a dozen applicants for each place, 
every one of whom is supported by a per¬ 
sonal friend of the congressman who imagines 
that the office rightly belongs to him, the 
ordeal of selection is one from which any man 
might shrink.— Philadelphia Press, April 15. 

—The papers announced that Huginin was 
appointed postmaster at Newport, Minnesota. 
A citizen wrote to Senator Davis remonstrat¬ 
ing. He replied that Representative Snider 
had control of the matter. Snider was seen 
and said that Davis had been interfering, that 
when he left Washington, it was understood 
that Durand would be appointed. Snider 
“ then took the matter in hand,” and Durand 
has been appointed. It seems that Huginin 
was a client of Senator Davis. 

—“ I feel to-night,” said Senator Cullum 
“ as though Asa Matthews would and should 
get the First Comptrollership of the Treasury.” 
—Chicago Tribune, April 25. 

—The first comptrollership is one of the most 
responsible positions in the department service. 
All warrants issued by the secretary of the 
treasury whether intended to cover public 
revenues into the treasury or to authorize pay¬ 
ments of money from the treasury require the 
signature of the first comptroller. All ac¬ 
counts examined by the first and fifth auditor 
and by the commissioner of the general land 
office are re-examined, revised, and certified 
to by the first auditor, who also superintends 
the receiving of all debts due the United 
States. The requisitions issued in payment of 
drafts for salaries and expenses of ministers 
and consuls abroad must be certified to by him, 
as also the requisitions of marshals, collectors 
of internal revenue, secretaries of territories, 
and other disbursing officers for advances of 
public funds. His power is autocratic, so 
much so in fact that if he refuses to order the 
payment of any claim or honor the warrant of 
even the secretary of the treasury there is no 
higher power to whom an appeal can be made. 
The President of the United States can not 
compel him to pay a claim, and the only 
means by which an obstinate first comptroller 
can be brought to time is by peremptory re¬ 
moval from office. That is what happened lo 
Judge Durham, Mr. Matthew’s predecessor, 
who was removed two weeks ago because he 
would not allow Johnny Davenport’s claim of 
$3,000 for extraordinary election expenses in¬ 
curred during the last campaign. 

Mr. Matthews owes his appointment chiefly 
to the energetic manner in which Senator Cul- 
lom pushed his candidacy, though he was also 
indorsed by Senator Farwell and almost the 
entire Illinois delegation.— Chicago Times Spe¬ 
cial, May 10th. 

—Commissioner of Internal Revenue Ma¬ 
son will very shortly have twenty special 
agents of internal revenue to appoint. These 
offices are very much sought by congressmen 
for active working friends. It appears, how¬ 
ever, that of the twenty there are only nine 
to be distributed among the forty senators 
and 106 republican representatives. Mr. Ma¬ 
son states that there are four republican 
hold-overs, who will be reappointed; four 
who were dismissed by Mr. Miller, but who 
will be reinstated, and that others have al- 
rea.dy been promised to high official person¬ 
ages, so that there remain only nine for the 
rest of the world. There is an equally active 
scramble for the twenty-eight positions of 
special agents of the treasury, which are to be 
divided among the forty-two states. It is un¬ 
derstood that the New York delegation has 
demanded, and been promised, at least six, if 
not eight, of the special treasury agents.— In¬ 
dianapolis Journal Washington Special, April 25. 






22 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—The fight between the Maine senators and 
Tom Reed is not waging very briskly, because 
it is generally agreed that no changes will be 
made in the important offices at Portland 
until the terms of the incumbents expire. 
The war has been declared, however, and no 
one pretends to conceal it. Mr. Reed insists 
that he has a right to name the federal offi¬ 
cers in his district. The senators maintain 
that the collectorship of customs, the sur- 
veyorship and the collectorship of internal 
revenue belong to the state at large and 
should be filled on their recommendation. 
The senators have already scored two vic¬ 
tories—one in the appointment of W. H. 
Bigelow as division superintendent of the 
railway mail service, the other in the appoint¬ 
ment of E. E. Pond as general appraiser. Mr. 
Reed had rival candidates in both cases, and 
in both, to use the language of the heelers, he 
was “ turned down.” For the collectorship of 
customs he is supporting by far the better 
man, Weston F. Milliken ; but the candidate 
of the senators, Fred N. Dow, is the practical 
politician, and will probably win. How this 
local quarrel will effect Mr. Reed’s chances 
for the speakership remains to be developed^ 
—Springfield Republican, April 25. 

—“ During the last few days the pressure for 
appointments in the railway mail service has 
been unparalleled. The clerkships have been 
allotted by congressional districts, being as¬ 
signed according to the number of miles of 
mail route in each district. This rule was en¬ 
forced under the Cleveland administration, 
and has been deviated from thus far under 
Harrison in only a few instances. One result 
of this arrangement has been that some con¬ 
gressmen, to whom, perhaps, eight or ten 
places were assigned,have been besieged by from 
50 to 100 applicants, and this pressure has, in 
turn, been transferred to the division superin¬ 
tendents .”—Evening Post Washington Dispatch, 
April 29. 

—Clarkson has removed fourth-class post¬ 
masters at the rate of from 150 to 200 each 
day. 

DESIRE TO MEET PARTY ABLE TO SECURE 
Federal appointment for competent person ; with 
such a liberal arrangement will be made ; communi¬ 
cations stiictly confidential. Address “J. S.,”Post- 
oflice Box 2938, New York.—New York Tribune Adver¬ 
tisement. 

—“Senator Quay, when he went home to 
Beaver after his tiff with Senator Sherman 
over the internal revenue solicitorship, left a 
number of matters unsettled in Washington. 
He left still hanging in the air all the princi¬ 
pal federal offices in Philadelphia, except the 
post-office. His conference with Postmaster- 
general Wanamaker on Tuesday resulted in a 
thorough understanding between them as to 
the appointment of John Field. It is not 
likely, however, that the new postmaster will 
be appointed for some time. That was as far 
as the conference between Senator Quay and 
the postmaster-general went. Mr. Wanamaker 
is not undertaking to name the collector of the 
port, the collector of internal revenue, the 
pension agent, or the naval officer.”— Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to the Philadelphia Press [Rep.] 

—Says the Ameiican [rep.], “Since 1881 the 
hand at Harrisburg has been that of Mr. 
Quay. It is his ‘orders’ which direct the 
course of the legislature. He organizes it, 
senate and house. He dictates the choice of 
its presiding officers, and supervises the ‘slate’ 
by which the minor officers are selected. He 
revises the lists of the committees, in order 
that their action on legislation shall be sub¬ 
servient and not independent. To prevent the 
possibility that their own conscience and 
judgment might sway the members, and meas¬ 
ures might be adopted contrary to his plans 
and interests, the whole system of legislative 


procedure is ‘set up’ from the beginning, and 
the whole machinery of the party is employed 
to make this secure and effective,—machinery 
to which Mr. Harrison added a driving-wheel 
for the present session when he constructed 
his cabinet as Mr. Quay demanded.” 

—Vice-Pre.sident’s Chamber, 
Washington, D. C., March 1, 1889. 
Mr. Herbert Welsh, Cor, Sec’y, etc., 1305 Arch 
Street, Philadelphia, Pa.: 

Dear Sir —In reply to yours of 25th ult., 
asking an expre.ssion of opinion relative to 
the retention in office of Indian Commissioner 
Oberly, I would say that, if my wishes could 
prevail, Mr. Oberly would be removed on the 
4th of March, and his place supplied by a 
competent and conscientious republican. 

Very respectfully yours, 

J. J. Ingalls. 

—“ There are thousands of men in my state 
whom I have never seen, yet who make my 
cause their own, who defend my acts and my 
words, who would fight for me, who would 
sacrifice rest and spend money for me, who 
would get up at midnight and ride a horse 
forty miles to set at work influences in my 
behalf. Well, I am a very immoral politi¬ 
cian— I want to give these men some of the 
things we have won.”— Letter of Senator Ingalls 
to the Independent, 

—It is related of Senator Ingalls that he 
called on the President and asked for a cer¬ 
tain appointment. The President replied: 
“The man whom Mr. Cleveland found in 
that office was permitted to serve out his 
time. I do not see that I can do less than 
Mr. Cleveland did.” The Kansas senator re¬ 
plied : “ Well, Mr. President, you know where 
Mr. Cleveland is now.” The President made 
no reply.— Chicago Times, May 13. 

—If Postmaster Carpenter’s removal had 
been accompanied with a fair, frank, and ex¬ 
plicit avowal that it was made because he was 
a democrat, and that the place was wanted for 
a republican, the operation would have com¬ 
manded a certain respect. This would have 
been the case, also, if the public had been 
plainly told that the removal was made for 
the purpose of giving an office to the gentle¬ 
man who has recently been appointed post¬ 
master. » * * We heard a good deal about 
civil service reform in the last presidential 
campaign. Over and over again the republican 
party pledged itself to the strict observance of 
its principles. Can that party afford to allow 
this removal, made in this way, to go on record 
as a redemption of its pledge?— New Bedford 
Mercury [Rep.] Only the interest of the public 
serviceshould suggest removals from office.— 
[^Letter of Acceptance.'] 

—Postmaster Sexton, of Chicago, says: 

“Senator Farwell, the republican congress¬ 
man from this district, and myself will meet 
at Senator Farwell’s office to-morrow, and then 
we will decide upon the changes to be made in 
the post-office. They will be few in number, 
however. Who will lose their heads I haven’t 
yet determined. I haven’t any settled policy to 
pursue, and if an employe’s work is satisfac¬ 
tory, no matter if he be a democrat, it will go 
a great way in his favor.” 

“Are you or Senator Farwell making ap¬ 
pointments?” 

“Well,” slowly, “I, the postmaster, will 
make all selections, but, of course, I want Sen¬ 
ator Farwell to be satisfied with the men I ap¬ 
point. I want that they should satisfy the 
republican congressmen, also.” 

Col. Sexton has had trouble with the men 
employed in his foundry because he would not 
permit labor leaders to interfere with his rela¬ 
tions with his employes. In the public ser¬ 
vice his aim is to “satisfy” Senator Farwell 
and the republican congressmen. 


Later: The appointments were determined 
at a conference of Congressmen Taylor, Mason, 
Adams and Farwell, Postmaster Sexton being 
also present. It is charged that Congressman 
Adams got the lion’s share. 

—Congressman Payson, of Illinois, says : 

“ As to the fourth-class post-offices I am get¬ 
ting all that I ask for, and I have asked for a 
good many. There is some deliberation shown 
in making these appointments, but they are 
ultimately made, and without a great deal of 
delay.” 

—With regard to the Boston collectorship, 
the Massachusetts senators support Beard, an 
“old school” politician, while tne representa¬ 
tives support Burden, “ who did very efficient 
service in securing the Massachusetts delega¬ 
tion at the Chicago convention for Harrison.” 
The grave question has arisen whether this is 
a senatorial office, and the President is re¬ 
ported as saying that there are two sides to the 
question. 

—Why he [Postmaster VanCott] has been 
selected by the Platt politicians and forced 
upon the administration, unless it is because 
he will be an easy man to manage, is not 
known to the public.— Philadelphia American 
[Rep.] 

—Congressman Frank telegraphed as fol¬ 
lows regarding Collector Barnum and Ap¬ 
praiser Harrigan: 

“ Washington, April 18,1889. 

“ Hem. F. G, Niedringhaus, St Louis: 

“ Call on Harrigan and Barnum and ask 
for their resignations, to take effect on May 1. 
The President wants it. If they don’t resign 
they will be removed on Saturday. Bring 
their resignations with you. 

Nathan Frank.” 

—The administration has been moving 
much more rapidly in Missouri than in Illi¬ 
nois in regard to the federal offices, and one 
man, not a congressmsn, has had more success 
than all the congressmen from that state. 
That man is the famous “ Dick ” Kerens, who 
is a partner of “ Steve” Elkins in so many en¬ 
terprises. Kerens secured a contribution of 
$25,000 for the national campaign fund, al¬ 
though he did not contribute liberally to the 
state fund—a fact which the congressmen 
have used against him here, but not with 
much success. Kerens is understood to have 
influence both with the President and with 
Secretary Blaine. At all events, he spent 
some time here, and secured the appointment 
of a United States marshal and of a sub¬ 
treasurer in St. Louis, and he supposed he had 
secured the appointment of Isaac Sturgeon as 
collector of internal revenue In fact, it is 
reported that the order had been given to 
make out the commission of Sturgeon when 
Secretary Windom directed that the commis¬ 
sion be withheld. The reason assigned is 
that one of the republican congressmen from 
Missouri arrived here and suggested that the 
congressmen were entitled to some considera¬ 
tion, and that the whole patronage of the ad¬ 
ministration ought not to be placed under the 
control of one man. So confident was Kerens 
that he was to have his own way about the 
collectorship that he had taken the train for 
home, supposing that the case was concluded. 
This is the story which the Missouri men tell 
as to the offices in that state.— Evening Post, 
April 16. 

-—Congressman Niedringhaus, of St. Louis, 
writes as follows : “ Owing to the increased 
controversy arising from the present system 
of indorsements for federal appointments in 
Democratic districts, the republican representa¬ 
tives of Missouri, on the advice of the department at 
Washington, have concluded that the whole 
matter in said districts must be referred 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


23 


solely to the respective republican candi¬ 
dates for congress, whose decision will be 
considered final as far as any indorsements 
are concerned.” 

In the exercise of the foregoing power De¬ 
feated Candidate A. C. Eubanks, of the second 
Missouri district, writes as follows : 

Milan, Mo., March 26,1889.— Dear Sir:— 
“I herewith hand you a full and complete in¬ 
dorsement for P. M., which I think will make 
all right for the P. O. I address you at 
Moberly, as you requested. In thinking 
about the matter we were talking about 
last night, an office like your P, O. ought 
to afford me $25—say $15 now and $10 more 
when you get your commission. This would 
help repay me for expense and time, etc. If 
there is anything further Lean do for you, let 
me know and I will serve you. It may be¬ 
come necessary to oust the present P. M. If 
so, I will aid you if necessary. 

“Very respectfully, A. C. Eubanks.” 

And Defeated Candidate Love, of the third 
district, talks thus to a republican campaign 
committee: 

“I desire to give you gentlemen notice that 
the time-honored custom of the party, and I 
never heard of any other precedent or practice, 
has been that the republican candidate who is 
elected or defeated, controls the patronage of 
the district. It will, therefore, be my pleasure 
as well as duty, as established by precedent, to 
receive all applications for local offices in the 
district and to present them to the President 
or the proper department at Washington. Of 
course it will be understood that there will be some 
expense attached to this proceeding, and applicants 
will be expected to contribute to this expenses 

“As to the establishing of an office broker¬ 
age against which slurring insinuations are 
made (!!!) it is unreasonable to suppose that a person 
can personally superintend the presentation of appli¬ 
cations for ofice without expense, and I have recent¬ 
ly heard from a reliable gentleman that the 
state committee proposed to open up just such 
an office in Washington. I give you all notice 
now [this in presence of a part of the commit¬ 
tee and about fifteen or twenty applicants for 
office] that anyone who comes to me for an in¬ 
dorsement to be presented to the state commit¬ 
tee or through any other channel you will 
please excuse me. I shall indorse no such ap* 
plicant.” 

—There was a general shaking up of the 
Darke county, Ohio, postmasters to-day. The 
Hon. .John Devore, of Greenville, one of the 
most influential and energetic republicans in the 
western part of the state, who was a Harrison and 
Morton elector for the fourth district, was at the 
post-office department this morning, and se¬ 
cured a number of democratic scalps, and com¬ 
missions for republican friends. [Here follow 
eighteen names of fourth-class postmasters.]— 
Special dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, May 2d. 


The New York Civil Service Reform As¬ 
sociation has held its annual election of 
officers. An address on the present ten¬ 
dencies of the new administration toward 
civil service reform from the President, 
George William Curtis, and a memorial of 
Mr. Pearson by Dorman B. Eaton, were 
read. The proceedings will be printed 
and the Chronicle will undertake to fur¬ 
nish copies to those who may send their 
address. The Cambridge and Philadelphia 
association have recently met to pass reso¬ 
lutions condemning the failure to reap¬ 
point Mr. Pearson. The Milwaukee asso¬ 
ciation has held its annual election of offi¬ 
cers, and every civil service reformer can 


do no better than to urge as did Mr. J. E. 
Follett, in his address: 

“That intelligent democrats who desire to enter 
the public service will not fail of preparing them¬ 
selves for, and attending the examinations simply 
for the reason that during the next four years the 
examinations will be held under what may appear 
to be republican surroundings.” 


—If on the accession of any new President 
enough pressure be made he can “ with bare- 
fac’d power sweep” every such officer from hfs 
place. And there is always danger that an 
overwhelming pressure will be brought to 
bear on him. The 409 senators, representa¬ 
tives, and delegates in congress have pre-aud¬ 
ience with the President. He can not see and 
talk with everybody. But these hundreds 
of congressmen he must admit and hear; 
and if they, day after day, from month 
to month, incessantly argue, plead for, and de¬ 
mand indiscriminate change, then a break is 
liable finally to be made. Now, what the 
civil service requires, and what the best senti¬ 
ment of the country wants, is that a barrier be 
interposed to protect the President from this 
pressure, and which at the same time will tend 
to establish the civil service on a non-partisan 
basis.— Administraiive Reform by General G, 0. 
Andrews. 


THE SCHOOLS AND THE REFORM 
OF THE CIVIL SERVICE. 

The will of the people as expressed in their 
laws is brazenly ignored by those whose sworn 
duty it is to enforce that will, and the derelict 
officers are quietly re-elected to repeat their 
offense. The offices that belong to the people 
are used as private property to debauch the 
public conscience and to defeat the popular 
will. At the threshhold of the second cen¬ 
tury of our national life we are thus con¬ 
fronted with more intricate political, finan¬ 
cial, and social problems than ever before, and 
the demand upon the intelligence of our citi¬ 
zens is correspondingly greater and more im¬ 
perative. We must educate our masters or 
we must let them run the ship of state upon 
the rocks and learn wisdom from disaster. 
“But,” it may be said, “that is just what we 
are doing.” It is readily admitted that just 
so far as the work in our schools is productive 
of real power to think clearly, and of right 
habits of investigation, just so far it equips 
the future citizen with the power to decide in¬ 
telligently the important questions that as a 
citizen he must aid in deciding; but just so 
far as that work encourages a stupid reliance 
upon authority and a readiness to be satisfied 
with less than a clear understanding of what¬ 
ever subject the mind addresses itself to, just 
so far the school is aiding to prepare victims 
for the demagogue and tools for the unscrupu¬ 
lous politician. And it is an open question 
to-day which class of citizens is most largely 
recruited from the scholars that pass in and 
out at the doors of our schools. 

There is not a subject taught in our com¬ 
mon schools, except history and civil govern¬ 
ment, that has the slightest direct bearing 
upon the civil duties of a citizen; not one 
other that has a tendency to direct the stu¬ 
dent’s attention towards those duties, to ac¬ 
quaint him with their nature or impress him 
with their gravity. * * » * 


Civil service reform has been ably discussed 
by thoughtful men for twenty years and, 
though the cause has made great progress, it 
has not yet progressed so far but that our 
newly-elected President is compelled to say 
that he has been constrained to defer the con¬ 
sideration of momentous public business to 
the importunate demands of place-hunters. 

It certainly falls within the province of the 
schools to explain, in the proper place, what 
the civil service is, the motive of the duties to 
be performed by the subordinate employes 
of the government, to read from the reports of 
committees, and from the speeches of reverend 
senators, descriptions of the abuses to be cor¬ 
rected, and methods by which correction may 
be applied, and to explain the present civil 
service law. Who can doubt that if every 
school in the country had done its whole duty 
in this particular for the last fifteen years the 
progress of civil service reform would have 
been materially advanced. 

[From the address of C. T. Lane, Principal of the 
Fort Wayne High School, before the Northern Indi- 
diana Association of Teachers and Superintendents.] 

It seems to me, then, that it is profitable for 
all citizens and especially teachers to consider 
some of the elements which form a good citi¬ 
zen. The teachers of the common schools in 
particular have a very great responsibility at 
this point, for they are preparing pupils to 
become citizens, i. e., rulers, in other words they 
are doing what Plato would have done for his 
ruling cl ass. 

Matthew Arnold justly criticizes us for our 
unceasing boastfulness and our disposition to 
rely upon some overruling Providence to care 
for and develop this part of the Anglo-Saxon 
race, as if this race were the chosen of God, 
and therefore we need do nothing—we need 
not work out our own salvation. Is it not 
time to discard the belief that “ God cares for 
children, fools and the United States,” and try 
to develop by our own power a high degree 
of civilization and citizenship? 

The first element requisite for good citizen¬ 
ship seems to me to be a knowledge of the 
spirit ot our institutions, and of our constitution. 
The average voter knows, perhaps, that the 
colonies broke away from kingly rule and es¬ 
tablished a free government; his knowledge 
goes no farther; he thinks that a government 
has been established in which he can hold an 
office if his party be victorious. You may 
think this a low view, but is it not true? Does 
not every-day observation attest its truth? Do 
not the hordes now marching “On to Washing¬ 
ton” prove it? That most candid and friendly 
critic. Dr. Bryce, in his “American Common¬ 
wealth,” one of the few books on the United 
States destined to live, remarks what most of 
our own disinterested thinkeas, as well as for¬ 
eigners, have noticed, namely, that hunger for 
offices is the dominant political idea. Bryce 
himself, in long observation, never succeeded 
in obtaining from any one prominent in poli¬ 
tics a distinct answer defining the differences 
between our political parties. By an interest 
in, and knowledge of, the spirit of our institu¬ 
tions, then, I do not mean an intense desire for 











24 


THE CTVrr. SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


'party success. Is not there something above 
that? Did the revolutionary fathers make 
their sacrifices that their descendants might 
hold a paltry clerkship? If they did, I for one 
can no longer revere their memory and visit 
their shrines. 

* » » » * » * 

I maintain also that this education should 
include the ability to think on common polit- 
cal aflTairs and ordinary questions of morality 
and the public welfare. To think is quite an 
uncommon habit. It is a necessary element 
in the education of a good citizen. A good cit¬ 
izen does not wish to be backed by a party cau¬ 
cus. His education, his self-respect, his moral¬ 
ity should be above that. If he be taught to 
think for himself the party caucus and poli¬ 
tician and party organ can’t make him their 
submissive dupe. It is far better to be the 
subject of a monarch than the slave of the 
modern American caucus and politician. 

•Sf » ■* 

At present the civil service of the country 
is prostituted to the dictates of the notorious 
doctrine: “ To the victors belong the spoils.” 
That public office is a public trust, and not a 
party benefit, is spurned by our politicians. 

Office is looked upon as a reward for party 
service, and to be worked for all there is in it, 
regardless of the people’s interest. It is the 
absolute duty of a good citizen to throttle this 
doctrine and choke the life out of it. 

[From the address of Profes.sor Demarchus C. 
Brown, of Butler University, to the Southern Indi¬ 
ana Association of Teachers and Superintendents.] 


THE SIEGE. 


—All applicants will be treated with con¬ 
sideration.— President Harrison’s Inaugural Ad¬ 
dress. 

—Brooklyn has a spoils committee which 
has endeavored to decide who shall be quar¬ 
tered, upon pretense of employment, at the 
navy yard. At one conference Mike Dady, 
one of the chiefest of the Brooklyn aristo¬ 
cracy of officeholders, “ figured up that there 
are fifty-four important places in the navy 
yard to be had, and suggested that each of the 
twenty-six wards have two, and that the other 
two go to the county towns. In cases where 
a ward is divided between two factions he 
would have each recognized.” 

—Says Senator Quay of the office-seekers: 
“ The half concerning them has never been 
told. Why, they actually commenced com¬ 
ing to my house before breakfast, and kept it 
up in a steady stream until midnight. In¬ 
deed, I believe that many of them are insane 
on the question of getting an office, and do not 
realize what they are doing. On account of 
being chairman of the national committee I 
was bothered more in this way than any of 
the other senators. I had people come to me 
whom I had never seen or heard of before, 
and never expect to see again. The large 
number of them are not representative mem¬ 
bers of the party, but rather the scum. There 
were more office-seekers this time than ever 
before.” 

—An army of Ohio republicans are awaiting 
command from Governor Foraker, who is ex¬ 
pected to arrive here to-night, to move upon 
the White House. At their head is ex-Mayor 
Amor Smith, of Cincinnati, who wants to be 
be collector of customs. There are here at his 


back Representatives Butterworth, Caldwell, 
Morey and others. A big fight is waging over 
this position, as well as over the position of 
collector of internal revenue for the southern 
district. Morey is pushing J. W. Clements, of 
Hamilton, while the other faction of con¬ 
gressmen want Col. E. D. McClung.— Special 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, May 2. 

—Last month we published the order of the 
Missouri office barons, naming Chauncey I. 
Filley for the office of “Consul at Liverpool 
or something equally as good.” The Houg- 
Kong consulship was tendered, but Filley 
will have none of it. It is the St. Louis post- 
office or nothing. He says: 

“ There is no pecuniary consideration that 
would make Hong-Kong, at my time of life 
and circumstances, a home even temporarily 
to my wife and myself. And if pleasant and 
agreeable recognition is what is intended, or 
is deserved, something at home or not a 
month’s journey therefrom would better fit 
the fitness of things. I make no complaint 
that every appointment so far made is of an 
Old Silk, and all that are now for ihe.city fed¬ 
eral positions agreed upon are of the same 
stripe, including the bulk of those agreed 
upon for the consular positions. It is neither 
politic nor good politics for the past or for 
the future. * * * 

“When Col. Richard C. Keren’s candidate 
for the post-office—the Arka'nsaio Travelei '— 
Frederick W. Schuarte, Sharty for short, is 
appointed and receives his commission for 
postmaster at St. Louis may I be here to see. 
There will be harmony, big H, then. It was 
so easy for those who did the work throughout 
the state to have been mixed up with those 
already recognized who did so little, to show 
the purpose of general recognition instead of 
the complete one-sided affair, and to aid in¬ 
stead of depress republican interests.” 

Filley has heretofore been known to history 
as the following shows : Says Senator Vest, of 
the Arthur administration : “It came within 
our personal knowledge that the patronage of 
the state of Missouri as to railway postal clerks 
was divided—one-half of it, the eastern half, 
going to Chauncey I. Filley, and the western 
half to Col. R. T. Van Horn. There was a 
factional fight in the republican party within 
the state, and in order to bring about that 
placid and ecstatic condition of political feel¬ 
ing that was necessary to the success of the 
party, there was a line drawn through the 
middle of the state from the Iowa to the 
Arkansas line, and one-half of the patronage 
was given to Mr. Filley and one-half was 
given to Col. Van Horn, and that instruction 
from the postmaster-general to the appointing 
clerk of the post-office department was put in 
writing. The result was that men were put 
in office utterly incompetent, and there were 
thirty-four of them in office when Cleveland’s 
administration came into existence.” 

—Says General Boynton in the Cincinnati 
Commercial-Gazette: “In the first place, the 
pressure has been something terrific. Since 
the days of Andrew Johnson there has been 
nothing to equal it. In the second place, in 
far too many instances the congressmen and 
state delegates have not dealt courageously or 
honestly with the President. The same has 
been true of party leaders of whom he had a 
right to expect better things. Representatives 
of this class have recommended and, in num¬ 
erous cases, urged men of most unsavory 
record upon him.” 

—The guards and messengers at the White 
House were doubled to day to keep the Presi¬ 
dent from being overrun and crushed by the 
office-seekers. The crowd was enormous and 
entirely filled the reception and secretary’s 
rooms. An old White House attache informed 
your correspondent this evening that nothing 


like it was ever seen before. It was impossible 
to keep the greedy throng out, and many of 
them were rude and persistent in their effort 
to interview the President. — Washington 
Special. 

—The President broke off negotiations with 
office-seekers in time to pick up his hat and 
catch the train for New York where he at¬ 
tended the one hundreth anniversary of the 
government under the constitution. He re¬ 
turned at the earliest moment, his train mak¬ 
ing an exceptionally quick run. The nego¬ 
tiations were at once taken up where they 
were broken off and “ appeals of office-seekers ” 
had a continuous hearing of three hours and 
a half. 

—May 1, the new chief clerk Brocket dis¬ 
missed five watchmen of the treasury and put 
in five republicans. 

—Washington, May 1.—There was no ces¬ 
sation in the activity around Assistant Post¬ 
master-general Clarkson’s room. He contin¬ 
ued to receive delegations, examine applica¬ 
tions, and write the cheerful word “ appoint ” 
or shake his head in refusal. There was a 
great deal more writing than head shaking, 
however.— Indianapolis Journal Washington Dis¬ 
patch. 

—For 210 consulships more than 4,00C ap¬ 
plications have been filed at the state depart¬ 
ment. 

—The President appointed W H. White- 
man to the supreme bench of New Mexico. 
The Swiss consul charged Whiteman with the 
conversion of $1,500, the money of Swiss heirs. 
Whiteman said the money was dejiosited for 
the heirs in bank at Albuquerque. This was 
found to be untrue and the senate did not con¬ 
firm the nomination. Whiteman then said 
that he had the money in his safe. The 
government arranged for the safe to be opened 
in the presence of witnesses and if $1,500 was 
found in it, Whiteman was to be appointed. 
He has since been appointed.— St. Louis Re¬ 
public. 

— Washington, April 26.—The name of ex- 
Postmaster-general Creswell of Maryland has 
been formally presented to the President for 
consideration in connection with the vacancy 
on the United States supreme bench. The 
office is treated by Mr. Creswell’s friends as 
one to besought after, and a regular campaign 
is to be conducted for it. He is supported by 
representatives of both parties in his circuit. 
—Special DispatchJ.o the Evening Post. 

“ There is nothing I should like better than 
to do something for you Sam, but I am afraid 
you greatly overestimate my influence. Your 
old friend Reed has placed his pension in my 
hands, and I am working away at it to get it 
soon. Perhaps there is no one in the country 
who has done so much for General Harrison 
during the last twenty years as I have, but 
because our democratic friends down in In¬ 
dianapolis have started the hue and cry on me. 
Brother Ben. does not seem to feel that he can 
afford to recognize me as an acquaintance, and 
consequently I don’t take dinner at the White 
House as might be expected. I have not been 
inside the Vv hite House since Cleveland’s in¬ 
auguration, a little over four years ago, but I 
will see if something can be done a little later 
on and tell you what to do. If you should 
not hear from me again, Sam, for the next two 
months don’t be alarmed, for there will be just 
asgood chances two months hence—and a little 
better—as there are now.” 

“ Give my kind regards to all the boys at 
Anderson, and remember me always as your 
friend. AV. W. Dudley.” 

—Letter to S. D. VanPelt, April 15, 1839. 










The civil service chronicle. 


“ If ever this free people, if this government itself is ever utterly demoralized, it will come from this wriggle and struggle for office .”—Abraham Lincoln. 


VoL. I, No. 4. 


INDIANAPOLIS, JUNE, 1889.' terms 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, lud., where subscrip¬ 
tions and advertisements will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indiariapolis, Indiana. 


“ Practical men with their eyes open are 
aware that patronage is a disintergrating 
force, and the distribution of the offices al¬ 
most always makes trouble within the party.” 
New York Tribune. 


“ My opinion is, however, that the party in 
power is weakened by patronage. The wrath 
of the disappointed more than offsets the work 
of the men who are favored with place. Seri¬ 
ously, I think the patronage question is the 
rock that is most likely to wreck the adminis¬ 
tration of to-day .”—Senator Washburn. 


“ It would be an astonishing spectacle, and 
one everybody would contemn, if at every 
change of directors in a great railroad or 
manufacturing corporation all the station 
agents, engineers, line-men and operators 
should be dismissed in order to make places 
for successors whose political or other opin¬ 
ions were supposed to be like those of the new 
board of directors. The business of the gov¬ 
ernment is of common interest to every one of 
its citizens, and to be successful must be con¬ 
ducted upon the same principles and by the 
same general methods that are found to be 
wise and adequate in private affairs; and in 
these the man would be thought demented who 
should maiutain that the views of the station 
agents or engineers or factory workmen on the 
subject of protection or woman suffrage, or 
any other of the questions of public considera¬ 
tion, make them any more or less fitted for or 
entitled to employment .”—Senator Edmunds, 
The Forum for June, 1889. 


“ In my opinion there must be a change 
wrought in the prevailing custom of senators 
and representatives pressi..g the chief execu¬ 
tive of this country for offices. It is all wrong 
and contrary to the letter and spirit of the 
constitution. The men who framed that in¬ 
strument never expected or intended that con¬ 
gressmen should try to bring pressure to bear 
upon the President for the purpose of inducing 
him to make appointments in their favor.”— 
Senator Sherman in April, 1889. 


This paper is published about the 20th of 
each month. 


The Indiana civil service reform associa- 
tionhas gained twenty-five new members since 
our last issue. 


Through the generosity of a friend the In¬ 
diana civil service reform association can 
furnish upon application the recent address of 
Charles J. Bonaparte, president of the civil 
service reform association of Maryland, al¬ 
luded to elsewhere. 


Comment at length will be found else¬ 
where, but in brief the civil service com¬ 
mission found at Indianapolis that Post¬ 
master Wallace had violated the law in 
three appointments. It published the pres¬ 
ent eligible list, and directed that all 
future lists be posted up. It also directed 
that when the local board certifies three 
names to the postmaster, from which 
to fill a vacancy, these names shall at the 
same time be made public. The people 
then can watch the postmaster’s action, 
and the community will require a good 
reason if the top man is not taken. The 
commission also added Wm. P. Fishback, 
Esq., to the local board, and admonished 
Postmaster Wallace and his officers round¬ 
ly. With publicity and with Mr. Fishback 
on the local board, whose fairness and im¬ 
partiality will never be questioned, the 
merit system has been put in fighting trim 
such as it never had before. The commis¬ 
sion also flatly refused the special examin¬ 
ation asked for, and, as was said last month, 
granted but afterwards revoked. They 
justly held that those now on the eligible 
list were entitled to a chance for a trial, 
and should not be deprived of it by a spe¬ 
cial examination. They also announced 
with unmistakable emphasis that this law 
and its advantages were for all citizens 
alike, and they wanted it to be distinctly 
understood that they desired democrats to 
come forward for examination. They guar¬ 
antee to them absolutely fair treatment. 
It is to be hoped, therefore, that every 
democrat in Indiana who desires employ¬ 
ment in this post-office will appear and 
compete at the August examination. 


Attorney-General Miller has been in 
Indianapolis, and while here he said : 

“ In all the appointments made or to be 
made under this administration the two re¬ 
quisites are that the prize-winner shall be, 
first, a good man; second, a good republi¬ 
can.” 

Thus the administration flounders along 
to inevitable destruction in its wholly un¬ 
constitutional eflbrts to turn over to its 
partisans the tens of thousands of places 
which have no reason for existence except 
to bring about the transaction of the peo¬ 
ple’s business upon the same principles as 
other business is transacted, and without 
regard to party. 


Senators Farwell and Cullom in con¬ 
cert {coming out of the White House): 

“When I came hither, I was lord high constable, 
And duke of Buckingham; now, poor Edward 
Bohun.” 

Are we to have a repetition of the course 
pursued with Higgins, Thomas, Dowling 
and others under the last administration ? 
The triturating power of such cases upon 
the strength of an administration would 
seem to have been demonstrated for all 
time. Yet it appears that the present ad¬ 
ministration is not satisfied, for it still re¬ 
tains Paul Vandervoort, formerly dismissed 
for having been absent from his duties 
two-thirds of a year, and Bagby, a negro, 
reinstated in the railway mail service by 
telegraph with a court record for bastardy 
in 1886, and other insufferably objection¬ 
able appointees. The cause of civil service 
reform is not hurt by these things but 
rather strengthened, because outraged pub¬ 
lic decency turns to it for relief, but the 
President and his party will learn when too 
late that refusal to correct a mistake has 
great grinding force. 

When evidence was so easily accessible 
to show that Moore was a gambler and a 
keeper of a gambling place and had been 
discharged for that reason, the people have 
a right to inquire sharply why Postmaster 
Wallace and his assistant, Thompson, at 
this late day appeared before the commis¬ 
sion as his defenders. The former said 
that when reinstating Moore he had relied 
upon information derived from ex-Post- 
master Wildman, an uncle of Moore by 
marriage, and D. W. Elliott, clerk in the 
post-office and cousin of Moore by mar¬ 
riage. Whether it was these influences 
or some other powerful force that in¬ 
spired this defense, the act is deserving 
of unqualified public censure. It is not 
an excuse to say that Postmaster Wal¬ 
lace was misled. He has no right to be 
misled. As to Thompson, the sooner his 
connection with this office is severed, the 
better it will be. 


The father of Isabella De la Hunt was post¬ 
master at Cannelton, and she was his dep¬ 
uty, and afterwards, on recommendation 
of Senator Harrison, she was appointed 
postmaster by President Arthur. She was 
the widow of a democrat who died of 
wounds received in the service. President 
























26 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Cleveland removed her, under his infamous 
system of secret charges, for oflfensive par¬ 
tisanship, and gave the place to a democratic 
politician and editor. For this Senator 
Harrison justly held him up to public in¬ 
dignation in the following words: 

“ If there was in all this country one person, 
who by reason of her sex, who by reason of 
her widowhood, who by reason of the sacrifice 
she made in giving the arm on which she 
leaned to her country’s service, was entitled to 
be kept in office, was entitled to have her 
reputation guarded jealously and by all men 
who represented the government, it was Mrs. 
Isabella De la Hunt.” 

Mrs. De la Hunt applied direct to Presi¬ 
dent Harrison for reappointment, but Con¬ 
gressman Posey had other plans, and gave 
the place to a henchman. Naturally there 
has been wide comment and a questioning 
of the sincerity of Senator Harrison. Clark¬ 
son comes to his aid by stating that the 
President, supposing this fourth-class office 
to be a presidential office, was expecting to 
name Mrs. De la Hunt, but in the mean¬ 
time he, by order of Posey, filled it. It 
would have been better to leave this 
transaction without explanation, to carry 
“its own pathos and its own indignation.” 
We now have attached to it Clarkson, not 
only as a very offensive wholesale violator 
of party promises, but as a very contempti¬ 
ble liar. All friends of President Harrison 
must feel deeply the humiliating position 
into which he has been placed, but what 
else can he expect when he thus allots pub¬ 
lic offices to his under-lords and they grow 
fat on spoil? Both Clarkson and Posey 
undoubtedly knew his personal connection 
with this office, but no risk of humiliating 
him carried even this small place past the 
snap of their greedy jaws. 

Up bobs an objector to competitive tests 
because they exclude all but young men 
just out of college. Then comes an exam¬ 
ination at Bloomington, Ill., with 183 com¬ 
petitors composed mostly of middle-aged 
men. That objection disposed of, another 
is found that most of the competitors in a 
recent examination were school teachers, 
and while school teachers pass a high ex¬ 
amination, in practice they make poor 
clerks, being conceited and unapt. Then 
the examination for postal and depart¬ 
mental service comes and goes, and we 
next hear that the school teachers went out 
of the test in considerable excitement and 
anxiety. So the objections are raised and 
dropped. Now as to the school teachers, 
they belong, it is true, to an unpopular 
profession, considered from a political 
standpoint, but nevertheless, being citizens 
of a country democratic in form, they have 
a right to a chance to compete. If success¬ 
ful in that test, they have a right to a 
chance for six months’ probation. If in 
that practical test in which their errors are 


checked, their quickness and endurance 
are noted, they fall behind, they should be 
dropped. They themselves would fully ap¬ 
prove of the right of the fittest to survive. 
If they are retained in the service, when 
better men might be found, the fault lies 
not upon competitive tests but upon the 
negligent or dishonest officials over them. 


PUTTING THE LAW IN THE HANDS 
OF ITS FRIENDS. 

It must be said that the appearance of 
Postmaster Wallace and of his leading of¬ 
ficers before the civil service commission 
at Indianapolis was not reassuring. We 
believe it is the fact that he was appointed 
at the request of his brother. General Lew 
Wallace, on the ground that the latter “ did 
not w'ant anything for himself,” but asked 
that bis brother be made postmaster at In¬ 
dianapolis, and that this appointment was 
made not for any fitness for the position, 
but because of the services which General 
Wallace had rendered General Harrison at 
the Chicago convention and elsewhere. 
Postmaster Wallace’s honest statement to 
the commission, that when he began he 
knew nothing of the post-office business 
and that he knew but little now, is a blis¬ 
tering comment upon this method of deal¬ 
ing out public offices. He is esteemed by 
his fellow-citizens, and he is a man who 
wishes to do right, and whose feelings no 
one can hurt without pain. But, having 
accepted this public position, he must be 
held to its responsibilities. No one who 
sat through the investigation can say that 
Mr. Wallace has had much to do with the 
management of his office. He has proba¬ 
bly been deceived by his subordinates. 
That, however, does not excuse him. His 
comparative weakness in the presence of 
his principal subordinates was clear. There 
is another fact also which is now plain—nei¬ 
ther Mr. Wallace nor these subordinates 
have any interest in the advancement of 
civil service reform or in the success of the 
civil service law. Their declaration that 
they would enforce the law in letter and 
spirit are the declarations of men who 
mean to fulfill no more than the strictest 
construction of the bond calls for. Mr. 
Wallace is sixty-three years old. He will 
never care for nor learn the principles un¬ 
der which the use of public place as spoil 
must be broken down. He is a strong 
partisan. The folly of appointing a parti¬ 
san of his age, ignorant of the post-office 
business, and expecting him to embrace 
the principles of the reform law, and ad¬ 
minister that law with the impartiality of 
a judge, is now apparent. 

Putting Wheat and Tousey into the office 
was clearly an attempt to keep vacancies 
open until an examination could be held. 
The desperate effort of Assistant Postmaster 


Thompson to secure a special examination 
has no rational explanation except that there 
are a crowd of favorites to be gotten upon 
the eligible list to be ready for proposed or 
unavoidable vacancies, and for the six new 
carrierships to be filled July 1. If these con¬ 
clusions are not true, why does not this of¬ 
fice exhaust its present eligible list ? Post¬ 
master Wallace and his assistant, and all the 
members of the local board except Mr. Lane, 
who was not present, declared to the com¬ 
mission that they did not know a single one 
of those on that list. Then how do they 
know that they would not make excellent 
clerks and carriers ? A man with fair in¬ 
tentions to the law would give every one of 
these strangers who had by competition 
got his name on the eligible list, a chance 
for a trial before clamoring for a special 
examination. The Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle has been slow to find fault with this 
office, but this is not the management that 
General Harrison promised. 


MR. BONAPARTE’S STANDARD. 

Mr. Bonaparte’s simple and admirable 
statement of what a President, as an honest 
man, is bound to do, and of the standards 
by which he is to be judged, indirectly 
shows why many civil service reform asso¬ 
ciations that formerly did useful work, to¬ 
day seem unable to add to their numbers 
or to sustain the courage and vigor of 
their old members. On every side the 
feeling has never before been so emphatic 
that the spoils system, as cruel and feudal, 
must give way, but it is true, with some 
important exceptions, that this feeling is 
more aggressive outside the old associa¬ 
tions. This is because strength has been 
diverted and the main issue lost in de¬ 
fending and explaining a chief magistrate 
and a party, instead of applying to a jiresi- 
dent, as does Mr. Bonaparte, the straight¬ 
forward judgment that would be applied to 
any other man in the ordinary walks of 
life. What interest have w'e in comparing 
the relative capacity of the guillotine in 
two different administrations ? Is not the 
only question that concerns us whether, 
at the end of an administration,it has done 
its perfect work and created a great army 
of office-holders, paid by the entire people, 
to be used by the party in power to per¬ 
petuate its own power ? What matter is it 
to us if men and newspapers are judging a 
President by a standard they refused to ap¬ 
ply to his predecessor, if they are now 
chronicling facts they before suppressed or 
strove to explain away ? What do we care 
whether one man has advanced this reform 
more than his predecessors, or whether his 
successor is doing no worse than he did ? 
What right have we to excuse or palliate 
on the ground that a president has done as 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


27 


well as we have a right to expect, and 
tacitly grant that it is proper to bound his 
efforts to do what he ought by his personal 
ambition or by party interest? Is it not 
time for us to return to the simpler and 
purer code that a president is bound by 
the same moral laws that govern other 
men in business and social relations ? Is 
it not time to admit that many of the so- 
called difficulties of his situation would at 
once disappear if he followed the plain 
path of rectitude and abided the conse¬ 
quences, good or ill, as the rest of us are 
bound to do ? 

We take it for granted that the man who 
wants to pose as a moral citizen, while he 
can not resist the emoluments arising from 
his connection with receivers of stolen 
goods, has entanglements that tax his brain 
and nerves, and that his course is apt to be 
inconsistent and suspicious. Why should 
it be otherwise in political life ? Is it 
worth our while to quibble over what was 
the intended purport of promises and 
pledges when it is plain what a man might 
do and ought to do? This sort of action 
delights all our enemies, for it keeps this 
question within party, or at least personal^ 
lines, it admits a standard gauged by polit¬ 
ical expediency, and it continues as an “is¬ 
sue” the question of whether the vindica¬ 
tion of an opinion of a president is more 
important than the reform itself. Must 
we not admit that this reform is of more 
vital interest than any president or any 
party ? 

Mr. Bonaparte’s standard is the only one 
suited to the nineteenth century, our gov¬ 
ernment and the American people. There 
are interesting examples of leaders of men 
who have achieved a worthy end by a tor¬ 
tuous and dissembling course, but they 
had a lifetime as a stage of action. But in 
this country the man who is president and 
his party have precisely four years in which 
to achieve greatness and work out a policy, 
and he will succeed best who boldly advo¬ 
cates an uncompromising rectitude and 
calmly awaits the consequences, whether 
he be a president or a looker-on of a pres¬ 
ident’s operations. 


THE SACRIFICE TO THE SPOILS- 
GOD. 

President Harrison has made great sacri¬ 
fices to the god of spoil. No stronger state- 
mentof determination to wholly forsake this 
god could have been put into language than 
is found in the platform and in the letter of 
acceptance upon which General Harrison 
was elected. Whatever his reasons, we 
may note that he has, to a startling extent, 
made propitiatory offerings at this altar. 
At the dictation of Quay he threw the huge 
post-office department to Wanamaker. 
After months of consultation with the Tom 


Platts of his party, he completed his cabi¬ 
net without putting a man in it who had 
ever been known as anything but a spoils¬ 
man, and to this he added Tanner, Bell 
and the unspeakable Clarkson. Virginia 
was tossed to Mahone, Pennsylvania to 
Quay, New York to Platt, and other smaller 
districts to less powerful ravagers. But to 
the spoils-god all this was mere preparation 
for the slaughter of something substantial; 
and the slaughter came. Pearson went 
down against the protest of the entire re¬ 
form sentiment of the country. The for¬ 
eign ministers were dispatched at a blow. 
Presidential postmasters are going by 
hundreds. Clarkson brings down his vic¬ 
tims at the rate of a thousand a week, 
while under Tanner the pension boards 
walk the plank in a body. The railway 
mail service was for six weeks thrown open 
to the common pillage of congressmen. 
Oberly was sacrificed, in spite of the deter¬ 
mined effort to save him by a large com¬ 
bination of numbers and influence devoted 
to the Indian, and marshals, district-attor¬ 
neys, collectors, messengers, laborers and 
all manner of officers, innocent and guilty 
alike, have been led to the common sham¬ 
bles. 

The President knows the meaning of 
language as well as any man. He will not 
read the platform and letter of acceptance 
and say that his acts have been in accord¬ 
ance with them. Nor will he say that he 
has put in charge of offices within the civil 
service law men who were genuinely 
friendly to the law afe he promised. But he 
will argue that his deviation was necessary 
to keep an all powerful god from devour¬ 
ing everything. We may as well look the 
matter in the face. From present indica¬ 
tions, the President, under this fear, will 
continue his sacrifice until he has turned 
over something above a hundred thousand 
offices to his party. He could not possibly 
go faster than he is now going. What will 
be his reward ? Instead of appeasing the 
god he has made him ten times angrier 
than ever. Congressmen hate the Presi¬ 
dent, and there is scarcely a spoilsman in 
Indiana who does not curse him roundly. 
The republicans in this state are weaker 
by ten thousand votes than they were on 
the day of the inauguration. We believe 
this to be generally true of all the repub¬ 
lican states. The apparent intention is to 
complete the work quickly and leave a 
long time before the next presidential elec¬ 
tion for wounds to heal. There will doubtless 
be in 1892 a united and enthusiastic party 
machine resting upon official spoil. Some 
disappointed office seekers may forget 
their grievances and join in with hope for 
the future. But it should not be forgotten 
that the turn of the next election will be 
given by a class of men who will hold any 


President or party responsible for failure 
to perform promises, and that this class is 
already larger by many thousands than it 
was 1888. In his fear of the Ingallses, the 
Mahones, the Platts and the Quays the 
President may undervalue the strength of 
this class, but it is time to give the warn¬ 
ing. 


THE INDIANAPOLIS POST-OFFICE 
INVESTIGATION. 

The civil service commission overhauled 
the Indianapolis post-office thoroughly June 
18. They discovered the astonishing fact that 
•J. C. Wheat and William E. Tousey, both 
discharged some years ago, had been put back 
into places which can only be filled from the 
eligible list, and that the former had been 
there six weeks and the latter eight. Tousey 
is an active ward politician. In spite of the 
protests of the managers of the post-office they 
will hardly expect it to be believed that this 
flagrant breach of the law was innocent. In¬ 
stant dismissal was ordered. Several other 
matters connected with this office had been 
complained of in the public prints, notably 
in the Indianapolis Sentinel. Of these cases 
Marshall C. Woods and Charles Rouzier were 
occupying places excepted from examination, 
and which could be and had been treated as 
spoil, and with which the commission could 
not interfere. Bagby and Billy Patterson are 
in the railway mail service and not under 
Postmaster Wallace. R. B. Mundelle, dis¬ 
missed by Postmaster Jones, charged with 
kicking a special delivery boy, for which he 
was afterwards fined one dollar, had been 
reinstated within the one year limit by 
Postmaster Wallace. The commission went 
into the merits of the case, and the facts 
seemed to be that the delivery boys had a frog 
which they were tossing about the office, and 
in doing this were getting in the way of the 
clerks. Mundelle, after repeated warnings, 
took one by the collar and, aiding his effort 
with his knee, put the boy out of his working 
place. He is a clerk of the highest efficiency, 
and the commission found his reinstatement 
justifiable. 

The carrier Hamlin, appointed substitute 
by Postmaster Jones, and lately given a full 
appointment by Postmaster Wallace, was 
charged with having a court record for seduc¬ 
tion. This matter was not within the power 
of the commission, Hamlin never having been 
dismissed for cause. Postmaster Wallace told 
the commission that he had no doubt that the 
charge against Hamlin was true, but that he 
did not know of it when he appointed him. 
He did not explain why he had not instantly 
dismissed Hamlin upon learning of it, or why 
he was still keeping him. 

The most notable case of the day was the re¬ 
instatement by Wallace of Charles F. Moore, to 
which we called attention last month and asked 
what was going to be done about it. A private 
inquiry at ths post-office elicited the answer 
that it was a “ put up job ” on Moore and that he 








28 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


had been the victim of a conspiracy of dem¬ 
ocrats to secure his discharge. No public ex¬ 
planation of this kind was made, and the reason 
seemed altogether incredible, for under Post¬ 
master Jones vacancies were made without the 
trouble of conspiring. The charge being pub¬ 
licly repeated, the Civil Service Chronicle 
employed a detective and took other means to 
ascertain the facts. To one thus familiar with 
the facts, it was a curious study to see the offi¬ 
cers of the post-office attempt to satisfy the 
commission that when arrested Moore was on¬ 
ly engaged “ in a little game of five-cent-ante 
with friends,” and that he was not, and had 
never been, a gambler. Postmaster Wallace’s 
attempts in this direction were so lame that 
Assistant-Postmaster Thompson was obliged 
to take the lead. He boldly repeated the ste¬ 
reotyped story that Moore was a very fine 
clerk whose place was wanted, who was not, 
and never had been, a gambler, but who was 
watched and canght in a ‘‘little friendly game 
of five-cent-ante.” Mr. Thompson further 
stated that Moore finally went to Postmaster 
.Tones and told him that he could not endure 
to be hounded by politicians and he would 
therefore resign. A little later both Moore 
and ex-Postmaster Jones came into the room, 
and when asked by the commission denied, 
with open-eyed surprise at the question, any 
such talk with each other, or any such reason 
for Moore’s resigning; all this to the visible 
discomfiture of Mr. Thompson. Moore made 
no defense whatever, but said he resigned be¬ 
cause he was forced to, having been “ caught 
gambling and arrested.” 

If Postmaster Wallace had at any time made 
the investigation which was always his reason¬ 
able duty, and which, after the public charge, 
was his imperative duty, he would have found 
in a couple of hours that for a period of years 
Moore had been a frequenter of gambling 
places and a gambler; that he had once been 
arrested with thirteen others in Tobe Howe’s 
gambling place, when $700 were put up as se¬ 
curity for the appearance of the whole party 
in court; that for a considerable period he 
had been having a gambling room next to the 
post-ofllce, which was known to the police; 
that every night for five nights this gambling 
was watched, and finally a warrant against 
room 23 was issued in ignorance of who was 
there, and was placed in the hands of Captain 
Colbert to serve; that, accompanied by a sin¬ 
gle policeman, he went to the room'; that 
seeing a man whom they knew come away, 
they gave the usual knock, and in answer to 
“ Who’s there ?” gave the name of the man 
they had seen leave; that a man opened the 
door slightly and was knocked down by the 
push of the officers against it; that Moore took 
the cash and put it into his pocket and was 
prevented from locking up the checks; that a 
confession of gambling was made on the spot; 
that the officers found there the usual outfit 
of a gambling-room, including a poker table 
with an opening for the “rake-ofT” for the 
keeper of the room and twenty packs of cards 
.and four hundred chips, articles which are not 


found elsewhere, even among those having “ a 
friendly game of five-cent-ante;” that the offi¬ 
cers arrested in the room seven persons, includ¬ 
ing Moore; that the charge against Moore was 
for keeping a gambling-place and gambling, 
and against the others for gambling; that Moore 
put up $40 as security, and afterwards put up 
straw-bail and withdrew the $40; that the 
whole crowd pleaded guilty and were fined, 
Moore being fined $5 and costs, amounting to 
$19.40, which he has never paid by reason of 
his straw bail; that he had been warned about 
six months before, by Postmaster Jones, that 
he mast stop having gambling in his rooms, 
and had promised to do so; that when he was 
arrested Postmaster Jones allowed him to re¬ 
sign, but forced him to do so by reason of his 
above career; that recently half a dozen per¬ 
sons had been to Captain Colbert to ask him 
to say that the arrest was a “set-up job.” 

The witnesses to show the above facts were 
at the call of the commission, but before all 
these facts were brought out the commission 
declined to hear other witnesses, solely because 
they had heard enough to come to the conclu¬ 
sion that Moore’s reinstatement was wrong. 
They publicly announced this finding and di¬ 
rected Postmaster Wallace to sever Moore’s 
connection with the office at once. For this 
conclusion they had heard abundant evidence. 

Mr. Thompson made an amusing attempt 
to argue that Wheat and Tousey were employed 
as substitutes, and that for such employment 
the postmaster had a right to go out on the 
street and pick up men and keep them for 
months, but had no right to take substitutes 
from the eligible list. An appeal to the Pres¬ 
ident is threatened, but he will hardly sustain 
this view of the law. The work of the com¬ 
mission at Indianapolis can not be too highly 
commended, and the fearlessness of Mr. Eoose- 
velt, coupled with his long and brilliant ex¬ 
perience in dealing with unwilling and crooked 
executive officers, mahes it plain that the Pres¬ 
ident has found a man. 


THE DRAG UPON THE REMNANT. 

In the days of slavery the remnant strove to 
convince the rest that it was a curse. The ir¬ 
resistible power of amoral idea worked. Since 
then another slave system, the spoils system, 
has stealthily grown great and menacing, and 
again the remnant protests. Their progress 
has been slow but irresistible. It was lately 
quickened by a great occasion and a great 
man. Like the solemn tones of a cathedral 
bell in the midst of a hushed and expectant 
people. Bishop Potter’s warning and appeal 
made the popular heart vibrate and awoke the 
conscience of a multitude. He hastened the 
end of an unrighteous and aristocratic politi¬ 
cal system. But as in all similar struggles in 
history there are with us deprecators whose 
general attitude is that there is no danger and 
that things will of themselves come out all 
right. 

A clergyman of this city performed this 
office on memorial day. Those ancient spo¬ 


radic examples of baseness, Arnold, Lee and 
Burr, seemed to him a fit offset to the present 
epidemic of spoils against which Bishop Pot¬ 
ter warned us. Barring the usual lapses of 
“human nature” things political are in his 
opinion going not only as well as in Wash¬ 
ington’s day, but he goes on to say: 

“ I do not argue these questions, however. 
If a Jeremiah comes with his lamentations, 
through his tears beholding our perils and t)ur 
sins indeed, but unable to discern the radiant 
promise of our times, I would not strive to 
answer him. Does he say that this is a ‘mer¬ 
chantable’ generation? that the high ideas 
which marked and ennobled the birth of the 
republic have disappeared from the closing 
period of our first century ? Rather than argue 
I would simply wait. Let the weeks roll on. 
Let April skies give place to flowery May.” 

The fact that the Tweed, whisky and star 
route rings and various election criminals 
have been brought to justice is an indication 
to him that Bishop Potter’s censures were out 
of place and his warnings jeremiads. He for¬ 
got to mention that those crimes and criminals 
were not punished by simply waiting and let¬ 
ting the weeks roll on and April skies give 
place to flowery May. He forgot to recall the 
men who did the sapping and mining at per¬ 
sonal risk and sacrifice. He omitted the fact 
of how secret and far-reaching and invincible 
seemed the forces to be overcome, how impreg¬ 
nable were the criminals behind breastworks 
of good men who protested that nothing was 
wrong, that the agitation was a device of light¬ 
headed or bad hearted men. In. short, he 
omitted all mention of the deprecators of those 
days who preached the gospel of waiting and 
letting the weeks roll on, and who anxiously 
scanned the horizon of the past for signs that 
the present needed no attention. It seems in¬ 
credible that a public teacher should rejoice 
in the destruction of that crop of dragon’s 
teeth and be loath to recognize the new prod¬ 
uct. But this stubborn reluctance to study the 
present, this readiness for superficial criticism 
upon the grave conclusions of another, this 
alertness to check a noble impulse for reform, 
and to lull an aroused public conscience, by 
men intrenched in high personal character, act 
as a brake upon this progress to-day ; it is not 
spoilsmen fighting for life, but these uncon¬ 
scious and untroubled enemies of our camp. 
They can not stay the final doom of the spoils 
system. They can not influence the patriotic 
men who have felt its malign influence. But 
they can delay and harry and burden the 
workers in the field bearing the heat and bur¬ 
den of the day, and they have the physical 
power to ignore that wise and just command 
“NeeA ye the truth.” No man would feel a 
greater repugnance than this clergyman for 
this system could he be forced to follow the 
filthy trail of the serpent in the story of 
Mahone’s triumph in Virginia, of Quay’s 
succession in Pennsylvania, of Gorman’s re¬ 
duction of Maryland, of a city like New York 
prostrate under the heel of a robber gang, of 
the base control of another city by the man 
known as the “blind white devil of San Fran¬ 
cisco.” These are random instances of “ the 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


29 


dangers that menace free institutions” stated 
in the republican platform in 1888, and which 
were in the mind of Bishop Potter. 

Why do good men seem to be deliberately j 
blind and deaf to certain present evils? It is 
not for this paper to Judge. It may be the 
demon of party s])irit that occasionally lodges 
and disports itself in sacred precincts. What¬ 
ever the cause, it for a time is more batlling 
and discouraging than evil itself. 

The civil service commission overhauled 
the New York custom house and found an¬ 
other place where the civil service law has 
been steadily cheated. One man got an ap¬ 
pointment who did not write his examination 
paper. There was a system of getting exam¬ 
ination questions to which the password “Ter¬ 
ry,” “Terry,” seemed the open sesame. Ex¬ 
aminations had been held with the same set of 
questions three days in succession. The local 
board had about the character and aims of our 
city fire committee that wanted to turn demo¬ 
crats out of the fire department. The commis¬ 
sion next went to Troy, where they found the 
civil service law carried out on abont the same 
principle as the tissue ballot system reported 
to us from the South. Under Cleveland the 
democrats literally held the fort, and now the 
republicans were in complete and hostile pos¬ 
session. There was no reliable record of any¬ 
thing, and the entire outfit seemed to be a few 
old examination papers tied up with a string. 
The republicans had just held a special ex¬ 
amination, in which it had been understood 
and acted upon that none but republicans, and 
republicans of a particular faction, need com¬ 
pete. The commission took a hand at a clean 
sweep. They annulled the special examina¬ 
tion and quashed both the democratic and re. 
publican lists of eligibles. The postmaster re¬ 
luctantly admitted that he might appoint a 
democrat in case he could not find a republi¬ 
can. 


The following is the present list of eligibles 
of the Indianapolis post-office: 



CLERKS. 


Jesse C. Smith. 


John G. Edmunds. 

..87 

Henry Arbison. 


John Laughlin. 

..86 

VV. H. Kastner. 


Sammie Barrett.. 

..86 

Chas. B. Fawkner. 

....87 

Clarence H. Marpin...., 

..86 

Herbert Spellman. 

....84 

Bartholomew O’Leary. 

..85 

Frank M. Northway... 

...79 

J. W. Newton. 


John W. Frietzsche.... 

....77 

R. J. Abriet. 

..83 

Patrick J. Gorman. 

....70 

Calvin Hollwell. 

..83 

Wm. Fricker. 

....83 

Hugh A. Cummings. 

..82 

James W. Hobbs. 


John L. Etter. 

..78 

Henry M. DeWitt. 

....81 

Thadd. E. York. 



,...81 

Lemuel F. Apple. 

..76 

Don D. Wells. 

....79 

Henry S. George. 

..74 

Chas. Humphrey Evan.s. 79 

Thomas Judd. 

.72 

Chas. W. Fenton. 

....78 



MAIL CAREIRS. 


Chas. Faulkner. 

...72 

Barney Aldering. 

,.72 

Alex, E. Manning. 

,...71 

Wm. F. Stieff. 

.76 

Albert Bowers. 

...75 

Mike H. Connell. 

,.74 

John P. Lyendecker... 

,...74 

Elmer E. Bird. 

.73 

Sidney J. Gibson. 

...73 

W. W. McEldowny. 

.70 


...81 

Henry Barrett. 

.73 

Riley T. White. 


Robert Felton. 



—The treasury department has made exten¬ 
sive removals of laborers to make place for 
the horde of minor place-seekers. 


WANTON REMOVALS. 

Tlie danger, then, consists merely in this; 
The President can displace from oflice a 
man wliose merits re(|iiire that he should 
he continued in it. Wliat will he the mo- 
tires whicli the Presitlent can feel for such 
abuse of his power, and tlie restraints that 
operate to prevent it ? In the first place, 
he will he impeachable by this house, be¬ 
fore the senate, for such an act of malad¬ 
ministration ; for I contend that the 
ivanton removal of meritorious of¬ 
ficers would subject him to im¬ 
peachment and removal from his 
otvn high trust. * * » Can we sup¬ 
pose a President, elected for four years 
only, dependent upon the popular voice, 
impeachable by the legislature, little, if 
at .all, distinguished for wealth, personal 
talents, or influence from the head of the 
department himself; I say, will he bid de¬ 
fiance to all these considerations, and wan¬ 
tonly dismiss a meritorious and virtuous 
officer I isuch an abuse of power 
exceeds my conception .— Cmgremnam 
James Madison. June, 17S9. 

—June 18, thirty-nine presidential post¬ 
masters were appointed ; of these sixteen were 
to fill vacancies caused by removal. 

—On the 22d of May, two months and seven 
days after the railway mail service, by order 
of President Cleveland, was embraced by the 
civil service law, sixteen clerks running out of 
Louisville, Ky., were discharged because they 
were democrats. 

—Out of forty-three presidential postmasters 
appointed during the week ending with June 
(), nineteen were to fill vacancies caused by re¬ 
moval. Out of seventeen appointed June 11, 
nine succeeded postmasters removed without 
cause. 

—Two hundred and seventy-six dismissals 
from the railway mail service reached the su¬ 
perintendent of tlie tenth division at St. Paul 
in one batch. The first man out had made the 
best record of any clerk in Dakota. Of the 
new men, the train conductor found one drunk 
on the floor of the car surrounded by the debns 
of his mail. 

—The postmaster at .Jersey City remained 
in oflice until the end of his term, three years, 
under President Cleveland. President Harri¬ 
son has removed the democratic successor 
without cause, who has been in office only one 
year, and has given the place to a politician. 

—Postmaster Clark, of Jacksonville, Flor¬ 
ida, has been removed by President Harrison, 
one year before the end of his term. He has 
made an excellent record, and was much liked 
by the people. He retained many republicans 
in office, notably several colored men. 

—“Sol” Hirsch is spoken of as the Tom Platt 
of Oregon. The President has appointed him 
as minister to Turkey to susceed Mr. Oscar 
Straus, who performed his duties in such a 
manner that missionaries, societies, colleges, 
and practically the whole missionary influ¬ 
ence of the Christian Church in this country 
interested in Turkey asked for his retention. 

—Mrs. Mary L. Clay has been postmaster at 
Huntsville, Ala., for two years. The Presi¬ 
dent has removed her. The Huntsville Inde¬ 
pendent, the leading republican newspaper of 
Alabama, says that, “in the discharge of her 
duties as postmistress she has been faithful, 
polite, accommodating and efficient.” A spe¬ 
cial agent made an adverse report, but when 
Mrs. Clay asked for the charges and the name 
of the author she obtained neither. 

—At Bridgeport, Conn., the republican post¬ 
master served out his term under Cleveland, 


which lasted a year and eight months. Presi¬ 
dent Harrison has put out the democratic 
postmaster nineteen months before his time. 
His appointee, who is the former republican 
incumbent, addresses a clerk as follows: 

“Young man, I have noticed your work, and 
I can s.ay you do your work admirably, and 
much better than I expected. In fact, your 
duties were never better performed, and if you 
were with us in politics you would not leave 
this office, at least as long as I have anything 
to do with it. But as you were not with us 
lagt fall, the paj)ers are made out and signed 
for your successor.” 

—At New Bedford (Mass.) a republican 
postmaster held over till 1887, when Carpen¬ 
ter, a democrat, was appointed. A month 
after the inauguration the latter’s removal 
was announced, on the ground of inefficiency. 
Wanamaker said that the representations of 
inefficiency were made by Pay Director Thorn¬ 
ton of the navy, April 2, indorsed by Congress¬ 
man Randall, April 4. No hearing was given, 
nor were further inquiries made. Mr. Holmes, 
a member of the Bedford republican city com¬ 
mittee, went to Washington seeking an ex¬ 
planation. Wanamaker, hard pushed, sug¬ 
gested that Mr. Holmes make a written protest 
against the issue of the commission. This was 
done, and May 7 Wanamaker wrote him as 
follows: 

“ I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your esteemed 
letter, and say that on further consultation with your 
representative in congress, the department has issued a 
commission to the postmaster at New Bedford, Mass.” 

The people of New Bedford of all shades of 
opinion were satisfied with their postmaster, 
and desired that he should serve out his term. 
Thornton was rarely in New Bedford, and his 
only business with the office was to receive an 
occasional letter. In a final letter to Wana¬ 
maker, Mr. Holmes says: 

As a republican who has witnessed this whole 
transaction, I ought to and do feel humiliated. It is 
a revelation as to the conduct of the administration 
of my own party. Its platform and the letter of ac¬ 
ceptance of President Harrison distinctly promised 
that should not be done which I have seen done here 
with my own eyes. Nor is that even fairly stating it. 
Not only has an honest and efficient public officer 
been dismissed from the service on a charge of in¬ 
competency, but turned out of office under a cloud 
and denied even the opportunity of proving the 
utter falsity of such charge. 

The New Bedford office, though an important one, 
is only one of many. It is improbable that what has 
been done here would alone have much effect upon 
the welfare of the party at large, but if the administra¬ 
tion is pursuing all over this country the course it has pur¬ 
sued in this locality, the republican party will be defeated 
in the next election, and deservedly. 

— President Cleveland left the Norwich, 
Conn., postmaster in office sixteen months, 
making his whole term four years and two 
months. President Harrison, without any 
cause w'hatever, has removed President Cleve¬ 
land’s appointee, whose term had fourteen 
months to run, who had given satisfaction to 
the public and who had not made a clean 
sweep. His successor, within twenty-four 
hours, dismissed every democratic employe 
but one. After this an election came on and 
for the first time in the history of the town 
the democrats carried it, beating the repub¬ 
licans on every hand with the single excep¬ 
tion of the sheriff. Election history of Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland’s term is beginning to repeat 
itself. 



















































30 


THE civil. SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—The present administration found at the 
head of the assay office at Boise City, Idaho, 
Henry F. Wild. He was not a politician hut 
voted as a republican, and he was an engineer 
and metallurgist of European and American 
education, with eight years’ practical expe¬ 
rience before he took this office. His term 
was not limited and his removal e.xcept for 
cause was, therefore, unconstitutional. He 
had conducted the office with remarkable abil¬ 
ity and success, relying solely upon business 
principles, and had in consequence made but 
one removal among hissubordinates. Within 
three years the deposits increased ninefold, 
while the expenses were proportionately de¬ 
creased one and one-half per cent. The gov¬ 
ernor of Idaho officially complimented the 
management of the office. President Harrison 
removed Mr. Wild and appointed Cunning¬ 
ham assayer. The latter “ is not by education 
or experience, even of the most limited kind, 
acquainted with mining, a.ssaying, metallurgy 
or any kindred subject.” He has made a 
clean sweep with a single exception. His 
new chief clerk is one Pride, a local politi 
cian, for whom Cunningham had clerked. 
After Mr. Wild had given up the office on an 
order from Washington, Secretary Windom 
wrote him: “ Your resignation ^ is hereby 
accepted. * *” Mr. Wild had never resigned. 
Toe government’s last act appears to be court¬ 
eous ; in fact it is sneaking hypocrisy of a very 
odious kind. Stirring the waters brings up 
the head shark. Delegate Du Boissays: “I 
acted in this matter for the best interests of 
the party, according to my own judgment, after 
careful consideration. 

—In Bell’s zeal “for the good of the service” 
in Massachusetts, he reinstated one clerk ap 
pointed by the democrats and discharged by 
them for incompetency. In Illinois he dis¬ 
charged a clerk who had been in the service 
since President Lincoln’s time, and who is said 
to have been worth to the people all that a 
competent man can become by years of train¬ 
ing and experience. 

—The Lockport Journal points with pride to 
the fact that of the thirty federal offices in 
Niagara county about twenty have already 
been filled with republicans by the present ad¬ 
ministration. 

RELIGIOUS COMMENT. 

—Referring to Bishop Potter, the Chicago 
Standard (Baptist) says: “What’s the use of 
beating about the bush in this matter? There 
is a power of truth in these words. The peo¬ 
ple of the country ought in some way to 
rescue the President from the power of the poli¬ 
ticians. Patronage has got to be altogether 
bigger than the President, and the purpose, 
peace and dignity of the latter are in danger 
of utter obscuration and overthrow.” 

—Mr. Pearson died without the solace of 
feeling that those in whose interest he labored 
appreciated his sacrifice. But he was appre¬ 
ciated. His unselfish labor has not been in 
vain. The time is coming when he will learn 
that he fought a good light and won a durable 
crown.— Christian Leader. 

—Make tenure of office to depend on char¬ 
acter and fitness, and no small part of the 
load will be lifted from the President’s shoul¬ 
ders.—7%e Morning Star {Baptist). 

—In the Baltimore GivU Sei-vice Reformer for 
June is an article by the Rev. Wm. Kirkus, a 
prominent clergyman of the Protestant Epis¬ 
copal Church. It shows the connection be¬ 
tween religion and politics, and it makes clear 
that the duty of the Christian minister is to 
take part officially n\ the work of purifying our 
political methods. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

“ Large districts or i)arcels of laud were 
allotted hy the conquering generals to the 
snj)erior ollicers of tiie army, and hy them 
dealt out again in smaller parcels or allot¬ 
ments to the inferior officers and most de¬ 
serving soldiers. ® * The condition of 
holding tlie lands thus given was that (he 
possessor should do service faithfully, both 
at liome and in the wars, to him hy wliom 
tliey were given,” and, on breach of tliis 
condilioii, “by not performing the slipu- 
lated service, or by deserting his lord in 
battle,” tlie lands reverted to tlie lord. 
Tlie vassal, upon investiture, took an oath 
of fealty to tlie lord, and in addition did 
homage, “ openly and humbly kneeling, 
being unglrt, uncovered and iiolding up 
his hands, botii together, between those of 
ills lord, who sate before him, and there 
professing that he did become his MAN 
from that day forth, of life and limb and 
eartiily honor, and tlien he received a kiss 
from his lord.” Services uere free and 
base. Free service was to pay a sum of 
money, or serve under the lord in war. 
Base service was to plow tlie lord’s land, 
to make his hedge or carry out his dung.— 
Blackstone. 

—L. W. Habercorn, a newspaper correspond¬ 
ent, active in the last campaign, has been ap¬ 
pointed fifth auditor of the treasury. 

—Lincoln H. Beyerle has l)een made post¬ 
master at Goshen, Ind. He is editor of the 
Goshen Times. 

—Alexander Reed, editor Appleton [Wis.] 
Post, has been appointed consul at Dublin. 

—The President has appointed James B. 
Stone, editor Detroit Tribune, collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue, first Michigan district. 

—Albert B. White, one of the proprietors 
of the Parkersburg State Journal, has been ap¬ 
pointed collector of internal revenue for West 
Virginia. 

—Senator Spooner, of W’isconsin, has had his 
brother, Roger Spooner, made consul at Prague. 
Salary $3,000. 

—Congressman Owen, of Logansport, has 
been in Washington again. He said that his 
business was to see that the men who work in 
the trenches should be “recognized.” 

—A. K. Sills, of Indiana, has been appointed 
special swamp land agent. Emoluments $2,500. 
Sills was a Harrison delegate to the Chicago 
convention. 

—Donald Mcljean has been appointed the 
new general appraiser at the port of New York. 
He is an active politician, and is a leader of 
the republican party in the twenty-third as¬ 
sembly district. He was a delegate to the last 
three republican national conventions. 

—Charles P. Hitch has been appointed mar¬ 
shall of the southern district of Illinois and 
John R. Mizerof the northern district of Flor¬ 
ida. The latter is chairman of the Florida 
republican state committee. Both were active 
Harrison workers at the Chicago convention. 

—Special to the Indianapolis Journal: The 
President says that he intends to recognize and 
please as many of his personal and party 
friends in Indiana as possible, and that he 
will not cease appointing them until the offices 
are exhausted. 


—May 21, Senator Cullom had 70 fourth- 
class postmasters appointed in Illinois demo¬ 
cratic congressional districts, and a large 
number of examining pension boards. 

—It is said that Congressmen Lodge, of 
Massachusetts, and Cannon, of Illinois, are 
leading court favorites. They get all they 
want and promise of more. 

—The two senators from Minnesota are at 
war over the s|)oils of that state. Each has a 
distinct set of henchmen among whom he in¬ 
sists they shall be divided. Quay and Wana- 
maker have also had a most unpleasant con¬ 
test over the Philadelphia spoils. 

—Matthews was elected delegate from Da¬ 
kota and then that territory was admitted as 
two states. “Mr. Matthews, despite the fact 
that he will never occupy the seat of delegate 
from Dakota, demanded his prerogatives, and 
making a firm stand, was granted the exclu¬ 
sive right to dictate all the appointments in 
his territory.” 

—The Indianapolis Journal says : 

“It is not true in fact, either, that the most 
conspicuous ‘workers’ are the most effective in 
their aid to a party. These are in many cases 
mere hirelings, after all. They may serve 
conspicuously during a campaign, but they do 
it for the loaves and fishes in hand. To claim 
additional remuneration in the form of a fat 
office is pure insolence; and yet such is often 
the ca.se. Such friends are the most danger¬ 
ous of enemies.” 

—We think the statement is a mistake that 
President Harrison has appointed his father- 
in-law to an office. The appointment was to 
his brother-in-law, .John N. Scott, of this city. 
This, with Frank McKee, his son-in-law’s 
brother, to be deputy collector of customs in 
Port Townsend, and his brother to be marshal 
in Tennessee, and his son’s father-in-law to a 
$5,000 Utah position and Lieut. Parker, a 
nephew-in-law, naval attache to the Samoan 
commission in Berlin, and D. W. McClung, a 
cousin in-law, to be collector of internal rev¬ 
enue in the first Ohio district, and Isaac Scott, 
a cousin-in law, to be naval officer at New Or¬ 
leans, and Wm. Haines, of Springfield, Ill., a 
cousin of his son’s wife, to be law clerk in the 
postoffice department, we believe are the sum 
of his family appointments. There is another 
brother in-law here who, as we are told, was 
offered a place in our ijostoffice hut declined 
it on the ground that something better ought 
to be done for him. 

— Congressman Dalzell found his recom¬ 
mendation of a postmaster hung up by a tele¬ 
gram from Qu^y ordering it. Then says Dal¬ 
zell ; 

“ Mr. Postmaster-General, am I to be con¬ 
sulted with reference to appointments in my 
district, or is Senator Quay ?” 

“The Postmaster replied : ‘ When it comes 

to that issue I shall in all cases in this district 
defer to the wishes of Senator Q^uay.’ ” 

—Other proofs of Quay’s overlordship in 
Pennsylvania are the complete disappearance 
of Senator Cameron as a spoils distributor, and 
Quay’s success with the Lord Paramount over 
McManes and Fitler in securing Martin as 
collector of internal revenue. His war with 
Ohio, mentioned last month, has been averted 
by the Lord Paramount making Pennsylva¬ 
nia’s henchman, Gilkeson, .second comptroller 
of the treasury. 

—Under President Cleveland Congressman 
Matson,of Indiana, appointed Horace G. Doug- 








rHE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


31 


lass, editor of the Plainfield Progress, postmaster 
at that town. In 1886 he had embezzled the 
postottice funds, and when an inspector ap¬ 
peared, Douglass left town and was not heard 
of again until last November, when he re¬ 
turned and appeared in court for punishment. 
May 18 he pleaded guilty. He had charge of 
Congressman Matson’s campaign in Hendricks 
county for renomination and he says that he 
used the money in Matson’s interest and was 
given to understand tiiat he would have to 
furnish money to retain the postoflice. This 
is a proper addendum to the account of Mat¬ 
son’s exploiting his office-holders to secure his 
renomination given in document No. 2 of the 
Indiana Civil Service Reform Association 
published in 1886. 

, —Two Virginia parties, Mahone and anti- 
Mahone, have been contending in Washington 
ovi r the spoils of that state, one party visiting 
tin President and then the other. At the time 
of che anti-Mahoue visit, 150 strong, Mahone 
stood on the corner and jeered. He is un¬ 
doubtedly victorious, the Lord Paramount hav¬ 
ing made him practically the ruler of Virginia. 
The following quotation from an address on 
American Feudalism shows that he has sim¬ 
ply come to his own again : 

The state of Virginia was owing a debt. It was 
not beyond her ability to pay, and it was to be sup- 
• posed that a large majority of her citizens would 
have found it honorable to meet an honest obliga¬ 
tion. The majority, however, did not, and of these 
William P. Mahone became the leader. He had been 
a democrat and had served in ihe Confederate army. 
His faction.prevailed. The debt of Virginia was “re¬ 
adjusted” In other words, the creditors were robbed 
of part of their just dues. Mahone became a .senator 
of the United States. He caused his faction to drop 
the name “coalition” and call it.self “ republican,” 
although there had been since the war a regular re¬ 
publican organization in Virginia. He had the true 
feudal instinct. His fellow republican congressmen 
sunk to insignificance beside him, glad of such mor¬ 
sels as he tossed to them. For several years preced¬ 
ing March, 188.5, he ordered every federal appoint¬ 
ment and removal made in or from Virginia In 
1882 Land Commissioner McFarland sent for a clerk 
“ credited to Virginia,” and said to him, “ I am sorry 
to have to say that your place is wanted.” To the 
clerk’s question why, the commissioner replied, “ I 
do not know why. You are faithful, competent and 
satisfactory, and 1 am willing to give you an endorse¬ 
ment to that effect. But Senator Mahone wants the 
place for a friend. You will have to surrender it, 
for I am powerless in this matter.” 

In 1S82 Mahone assessed Virginia place-holders five 
per cent. This was in addition to Congressman Hub- 
bell’s a.sse.ssmont of two per cent. In 1883 it had be¬ 
came unlawful to assess them, and he enrolled them 
in the “Virginia Campaign Association,” and dodged 
the law by assessing them as members of that insti¬ 
tution. Congressman Gorman’s postmaster. Brown, 
of Baltimore, lately classified the political contribu¬ 
tors in his postoflice, as “ thinking-men,” and the 
non-contributors as “weaker-minded.” Mahone had 
no “weak-minded” place-holders; all “contrib¬ 
uted.” 

In 1883, the old republican party, being in favor of 
paying honest debts, still held up its head in Norfolk 
county, and nominated a county ticket. Mahone 
was not that kind of a republican, and with money 
raised by asses.sing federal salaries, he sent a swarm 
of federal place-holders into Norfolk county, and 
compassed the defeat of debt-paying republicanism. 

In 1884, Commander Evans, who had been in the 
navy twenty-three years, with twelve years’ service 
at .sea, was superintendent of the fifth light-house 
district. He dismissed a notoriously incompetent 
negro who had been appointed by Mahone. Manly 
honesty and business principles were not to be al¬ 
lowed to stand in the way of Mahone, and with bru¬ 
tal indifference the old commander was put on half 
pay and waiting orders. It is said that in this ca.se 
the secretary of the navy of the United States hesi 
Aated four weeks before obeying Mahone’s order. I 
Ijoulfl go on indefinitely telling how Mahone ruled 
tmd^equired service like a baron of old, but this, 
ivbm 6x-Attorney-General MeVeagh, as early its 1882, 
W.tn be enough: “Look at the awful humiliation 
through which Mahone and his associates are drag¬ 
ging the state of Virginia. Every citizen must be 
asliamed of the spectacle. The administration is 
prostituting the national treasury to enable a certain 
portion of the people of Virginia to force another 
portion to repudiate her debt.” 


—May 17. Senator Culloiu has told the 
President that this revenue district is in his 
congressional district, with headquarters at 
Springfield, his home. The President ex¬ 
pressed surprise at the information. Cullom 
feels humiliated and will not surrender his 
prerogative. He says that the appointment is 
a violation of precedents and a disregard of 
senatorial courtesy, and he will prevent it if 
he can. Farwell says it is a blow between 
Cu Horn’s eyes. 

May 19. Farwell says that he is tired of 
shilly-shallying. 

May 20. The Illinois senators have de¬ 
termined to make common cause for their sen¬ 
atorial prerogative in the Willcox matter. 
They have recommended Calhoun for the office. 
They say that there is a principle involved. 
Cullom says that the appointment is a snub to 
him. 

May 21. Cullom and Farwell formally de¬ 
mand of the President that the commission of 
Willcox be withheld on the ground that they 
were not consulted. Cullom says, if refused it 
will be a challenge. Farwell says the situa¬ 
tion is a gauntlet thrown to Cullom by the 
President. 

May 22. The President has decided to 
stand by Congressman Cannon and will keep 
Willcox. Senators Farwell and Cullom are 
very sore. Farwell reports his interview with 
the President as follows: 

“I just told the President in so many words,” 
said Senator Farwell, “that he had treated 
Senator Cullom very shabbily. The fact of the 
matter is we thought there would be plenty of 
time to name our choice for certain offices, as 
we believed there would be no removals until 
the end of the fiscal year. We therefore de¬ 
layed making recommendations, intending to 
take our time in making up a slate and at the 
same time giving the President a rest. The 
first thing we knew Congressman Cannon 
stepped in and recommended a man for the 
Springfield collectorship on his own hook, and 
the President unhesitatingly appointed him 
without consulting or even advising with Mr. 
Cullom. 

“ I call that a shabby trick, and when I 
called on Mr. Harrison the other day I told 
him so very plainly. I told him he had bet¬ 
ter go down into southern Illinois and appoint 
a postmaster for Chicago. 

“ Why, you once wrote a letter,” I said, “ to 
President Arthur when you were senator from 
Indiana, demanding that he recognize your 
right of controlling the patronage in your dis¬ 
trict. Now I want to know if you propose to 
recognize those same rights in Illinois’s sen¬ 
ators while you are the chief executive? I 
think I rather got the best of him on that 
propo.«ition, but he wouldn’t promise to re¬ 
consider his appointment, though.” 

“ Did he absolutely refuse to reconsider it?” 

“No; he didn’t do that, either, and it’s 
hard to say whether he will or not. You may 
depend upon it, though, that I will be on the 
lookout hereafter, and I won’t let anything get 
away if I can help it,” and the wily senator 
winked knowingly in a way that said plainer 
than words that he could help it and that he 
would keep his weather eye on the President’s 
actions as long as there is an office in the state 
of Illinois to be filled. 

Senator Farwell says the letter Mr. Harrison 
wrote to President Arthur on the occasion was 
a scorcher in its way. “I didn’t have a copy 
of it,” said he, “but when I recalled the cir¬ 


cumstance the President rememl)ered it and 
it somewhat staggered him. He didn’t expect 
to have the question brought so near home as 
that, I guess.” 

“ How about the Chicago offices?” 

“ Oh, they’re all right. I don’t think the 
President will make any more such breaks. I 
think he will recognize the same rights in me 
now that he claimed himself from President 
Arthur several years ago. Of course, one never 
knows what is going to happen, but I think 
everything is all right. Senator Cullom will 
be all right, too, hereafter, if he asserts his 
rights.” 

—Congressman Banks received the follow¬ 
ing: 

March 23, 1889. 

State House, Boston —My Dear General: I wonder 
if you know what splendid service J. J. McGarthy, of 
Charlestown, did in your behalf last fall? I hap¬ 
pened to be personally familiar with his early efforts, 
and 1 am told by those who watched the develop¬ 
ment of the canvass that he maintained with untir¬ 
ing zeal and admirable judgment his earnest and 
successful endeavor. He did the governor the same 
good turn, and the governor appreciates it fully. I 
sincerely hope he will sticceed in his wish to obtain 
the office he seeks, and I am sure you will load his 
hosts of friends in their effort. 

Yours faithfully, G. II. Campbell. 

To General N. P. Banks. 

This he enclosed to the other Massachusetts 
congressmen with the following : 

Waltham, Mass., March 25, 1889. 
Hon. George F. Hoar and Hon. Henry L. Dawes: 

Dear Sirs—It is understood, I know not on what 
grounds, that there is to be an informal conference 
of members-elect on the disposition of minor offices 
in the several congressional districts at the close of 
the session. I have not taken much interest in such 
matters, but there is one point to which I wish to 
ask your attention and one candidate worthy of spe¬ 
cial attention. Mr. Jeremiah J. McCarthy of Boston is 
mentioned for the office of collector of internal reve¬ 
nue. There is not in Ma.ssachusetts, I think, a more 
remarkable man. He is 38 years of age and has been 
trained in the political contests of Massachusetts 
since his boyhood. As simple as a child in manner, 
he is astute, courageous and vigilaut at all times and 
under all circumstances. He has personal acquaint¬ 
ance with all active party men who have participated 
in the contests of the last fifteen or twenty years in 
Middlesex, Suffolk and Essex counties. 

As a working man he has been diligent and provi¬ 
dent: saving for himself quite a handsome property, 
which gives him the confidence of men of wealth and 
the respect and esteem of laborers of every calling 
and caste. His standing among his fellow-citizens is 
on the bed-rock basis of life-long association and 
confidence. His influence with all classes is by con¬ 
cession rather than contest, and he regains his ground 
instantly by superior instinct, intelligence and in¬ 
tegrity. I observed and felt this in the late very re¬ 
markable contest in the fifth congressional district 
which had been carried by democrats and was re¬ 
gained by republicans in 1884. 

In 1888 we had in the fifth district nothing to begin 
with, and all our resources, except your own mag¬ 
nificent orations, were well nigh exhausted before the 
contest began. McCarthy enthused everybody with 
his energy and courage. He carried light in his eyes. 
I would not say this, though I know its truth, if there 
were not another and better illustration of his power, 
upon the testimony of other reliable wltnessess. In 
the last hours of a recent .session of the legislature 
he was enabled by such qualities as I have described, 
after an important measure had passed both houses, 
to render an important service to the state. It was 
an instance of unequalled personal power rarely 
witnessed, which his excellency the governor and 
other influential citizens were prompt to recognize 
and honor. 

I inclose a letter, written by one who could not be 
mistaken in regard to Mr. McCarthy’s influence in the 
case cited, and which recognizes and acknowledges 
his power. 

It is for these reasons that Mr. McCarthy has been 
generally designated by those who know his (jualities 
and character for the oflice of collector of internal 
revenue. It is an important office. But it is not de¬ 
sired for its patronage. It will be an easy and cer¬ 
tainly a pleasant duty to secure to the several con¬ 
gressional districts their rclat ve political and per¬ 
sonal interests, and infuse a vigorous spirit of pros- 
elytism in the political organizations of state and 
nation. His appointment would be a just recogni¬ 
tion of a true American citizen of Irish descent, who 
from his first participation in political affairs has 
maintained friendly relations with all classes of Irish 
citizens, and vigorously supported, without variation 
or reserve, the measures, principles and nominations 
of the republican party. Upon these considerations 
I most earnestly commend his appointment to the 
favor and support of the congressional delegation of 
Massachusetts. 

I have the honor to remain, gentlemen, most res¬ 
pectfully, N. P. Banks. 











32 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—As we stated last month Defeated Candi¬ 
date Love, of Missouri, proposed to distribute 
the spoils of his district upon the following 
terms: 

“Of course it will be understood that there will be 
some expense attached to this proceeding, and ap¬ 
plicants will be expected to contribute to tliLs ex¬ 
pense.” 

To the average mind this seemed the propo¬ 
sition of a rascal, but he was equal to the oc¬ 
casion. He had the government of the United 
States send to each member of the congressional 
committee of his district the following letter : 

Washington, D. C., May 24, 1889. 

To -: 

Dear Sir: Do you know of your own knowledge, 
or do you believe ou testimony which you are will¬ 
ing to produce, that James Love, late republican 
candidate for Congress in the third district of Mis¬ 
souri, ever exacted or received a pecuniary or other 
valuable consideration for services rendered or to be 
rendered applicants for office, or that he ever in any 
way made such remuneration a condition upon which 
his indorsement of applicants could be obtained? In 
your reply to this will you inclose the answers to the 
same question of all persons in your vicinity whom 
you know to have applied to Mr. Love for his in¬ 
dorsement, whether successful or not? 

J. S. Cl.ARKSON, 

First A.ssistant Postmaster-General. 

Clarkson does not publish the evidence 
brought out, but doubtless he found no one 
who knew of his own knowledge that Love 
had “ exacted or received ” money. Here is 
the finding of this unique court: 

“ It gives me pleasure," said Clarkson, “ to declare 
you innocent of any charge affecting your honor, and 
to restore you to that position of influence in your 
party to which your services entitle you.” 

The evidence could not have been unani¬ 
mous, for the chairman of Love’s congressional 
committee has published a strong protest, in 
which he charges Love with “disgracing his 
supporters.” He also called a meeting of the 
committee to express its wish “ as between 
home rule and boss rule.” It does not avail 
anything; Clarkson stands by Love. 

—Congressman Quackenbush, of New York, 
has had (lilbert H. Stevens made postmaster 
at Shushan. In 1883 Stevens, being under in¬ 
dictment, wrote the following by way of set¬ 
tlement, coupled with the payment of five 
hundred dollars : 

Inconsequence of my having in the night time of 
October 10,1882, broken into and entered the dwell¬ 
ing-house of X. W. Collins, in the village of Shushan, 
N. Y., in the absence of said Collins, and again hav¬ 
ing attempted to break and enter said house on the 
29th of October in the night time, being at said time 
intoxicated, and not knowing what I was doing; this 
conduct having led to stories injurious to and re¬ 
flecting upon the reputation for virtue of Johanna 
Powers, who was there employed as a domestic, I 
write this to certify that so far as I know said Johanna 
is a virtuous girl, and it is but an act of justice to her 
that I should say so. Neither myself or others to my 
knowledge have Iiad criminal intimacy with her, and 
any statements made by me to the contrary are un¬ 
true. G. H. Stevens. 

Witness: Charges Hughes. 

Dated June 7, 1883. 

—The President has appointed George P. 
Fisher of Delaware to be first auditor of the 
treasury. He was formerly district attorney 
for the District of Columbia, and of him, June 
23, 1876, the New York Tribune said : 

The district attorney’s office in Washington was for 
a long while, under Judge Fisher, the chief bulwark 
of the District ring. There were hatched the con¬ 
spiracies to convict innocent citizens of felony, the 
plots to get rid of witnesses, the schemes to take bur 
glars out of jail. Crimes of the most dastardly char¬ 
acter were committed under the sheltering eaves of 
that scandalous establishment. Theft, and riot, and 
bribery, and perjury received there encouragement 
and protection. 

A gentleman and his wife had been ap¬ 
pointed teachersin the Indian School at Yakim, 
Oregon. The appointments were excellent, 
and the appointees closed their school at 
Portsmouth, Virginia, and were on their way 
to Oregon when their appointments were can¬ 


celled by Secretary Noble. This was done at 
the bidding of Senator Mitchell who wrote to 
Noble denouncing the plan of sending “car¬ 
pet baggers” from other states and announc¬ 
ing the fact of the selection of persons for all 
the places in Oregon and that these parties 
had been informed of their selection. 

If this paper has any readers who do not 
see the Civil Service Record, published at 
Boston, and the Oi.vil Service Re/omer, pub¬ 
lished at Baltimore, we urge them to examine 
those papers. Their common field is the civil 
service, but their scope and contents are quite 
different. Both may be had for the sum of 
$1.50. The Civil Sei-vice Record has a circula¬ 
tion of over 4,000, and. as the oldest publica¬ 
tion of this sort and as the representative of 
two powerful associations has great influence. 
The Civil Service Reformer is more local in its 
scope, but is of such remarkable literary ex¬ 
cellence that it may be read with pleasure 
without reference to its principles, which are 
of the plain and straightforward sort. The 
Civil Service Chronicle is the youngest 
and feeblest of the three, but it is meeting 
with an unexpecled support and sympathy 
that indicate a deep interest in the cause it 
advocates. The executive committee of the 
Buffalo Association voted to appropriate fifty 
dollars for the Civil Service Chronicle for 
subscriptions to persons to be indicated by them 
on the ground that it was adapted for pros¬ 
elyting and converting, and a subscriber from 
Scottsburgh, New York, writes : 

“ I am glad that a journal devoted to civil service 
reform has been started in your state which has been 
especially cursed by the spoils system, as exemplifle<l 
equally in the practice of both the republican and 
democratic parties. Thank God there is reason to 
believe that a movement is at length inaugurated 
that will in no long time bring redemption to our 
entire country from a state of things disgraceful to 
republican institutions and threatening their very 
existence.” 


The Buffalo civil service reform associa¬ 
tion has just held its eighth annual meeting. 
It is encouraging to note the presence of the 
Rt. Rev. Bishop Ryan and his remarks full of 
unmistakable sympathy. 


In reference to the progress that has been 
made in extending the scope of civil service 
reform, I would say that in 1883, when the 
national civil service law went into effect, 
-what is known as the classified service—and 
by that I mean that portion of the national 
service that is subject to civil service rules— 
included seven executive departments at 
Washington, eleven custom districts, and 
twenty-three post-offices, in each of which 
there were as many as fifty employes. Since 
that time the classified service has been ex¬ 
tended to cover more than 13,000 additional 
positions, the total nnmber of persons in the 
national service now affected by civil service 
rules being 27,597. There have been 44,169 
persons examined, of whom 15,821, or 35 per 
cent., failed, and 28,648, or about 65 per cent., 
succeeded in passing the examination. Of the 
latter, 11,236, or a little over 39 per cent, of 
the successful candidate^, received appoint¬ 
ments. In New York state the law, which at 
first only applied to certain state appoint¬ 
ments, has been extended so as to include the 
greater part of those in the cities, exclusive of 
laborers. The total number under civil ser¬ 
vice rules amounts to 15,480. 


In Massachusetts, laws which were pas.sed 
about the same time the New York law was 
passed, also include local service in the cities, , 
and also provide for the registration of labor- j 
ers. The total number of persons under the 
civil service reform laws of Massachusetts is 
about 6,000. * » * * * * 

Let us take another case. The bureau of 
printing and engraving in Washington had, 
like some other departments, suffered sadly 
from the spoils system. Fortunately for the 
public service, in 1885 Mr. E. C. Graves was 
promoted to the position of head of the bureau, 
where he still remains. Mr. Graves has been 
for many years connected with the treasury 
department, and is recognized as being one of 
the most valuable public officials in Washing¬ 
ton. He had been one of the earliest advo¬ 
cates of civil service reform and was a firm 
believer in the doctrine that the public offices 
should be conducted for the benefit of the 
Iiublic. 

He took the same course pursued by Post¬ 
masters James and Pearson, and although civil 
service reform rules were not yet applied to j 
the office, nevertheless he at once applied them ] 
on his own responsibility. Worthless em¬ 
ployees were at once discharged, regardless of i 
the influence back of them, and unnecessary 
offices were abolished. The result speaks for i 
itself. During the three years ending in 1885 
it required 1,166 employees to produee 91,754,- 
351 sheets of work at a eost of $3,047,483.75. I 
In the three years ending June 30, 1888, it 
only required 874 employees to produce 97,- I 
348,687 sheets at a cost of $2,506,681.5"’. The 1 
bureau is now placed under civil service rules, 
and will never again be a political charitable 
institution. ****** 

'riie objection that the questions asked are 
often farcical is simply uaitrue. Whenever 
this charge is heard a demand should always 
be made that the objector show a copy of the | 
examination paper in which these farcical j 
questions occurred. He can always get one 
by asking for it. An objection has also been j 
made that the youth who is just out of school, 
and in consequence has the school training 
fresh in mind, will pass a much better exam¬ 
ination than the man in whom a few years of 
active experience in the world has caused 
some of the details of the studies to be forgot¬ 
ten. The statistics show that this is not the 
case. The average of the successful candi¬ 
dates are in the neighborhood of 30 years of 
age. *■ * * * It seems to me, therefore, 

that the charge that the civil service reform 
system tends to create an aristocracy can hard¬ 
ly stand investigation. On the contrary, I be¬ 
lieve that the spoils system has actually cre¬ 
ated a privileged class strongly resembling the 
feudal lords of the middle ages, whose re¬ 
tainers agreed to serve faithfully both at home 
and at the wars. As an illustration, permit 
me to quote a leading senator from one of 
the western states, who, in avowing his hostil¬ 
ity to civil service reform, stated : “ There are 
thousands of men in my state whom I have 
never seen, who make my cause their own, 
who defend my words, who would fight for me, 
who would sacrifice their time and spend their 
money for me, ivho would get uji at midnight 
and ride a horse forty miles to set at work in¬ 
fluences in my behalf. Well, I am a politician, 
and I want to give these men of things that we 
have won.” A little analysis of the senator’s 
position presents the fact that according to his 
theory no person, even of his own •parly, ought to 
hold a government oflSce in his state except 
those who are his own supporters. If this is 
not the feudal system, where would you find 
it? And yet they denounce civil service re¬ 
form as tending toward aristocracy!— From 
the address of Hewry A. Richmond befen-e theYouny 
Men’s Association of Buffalo, March 19, 1880, 















The civil service chronicle. 


“ Were the ends of professed spoilsmen attained, he [the President] and we should have no country left, or, at least, no country which an honorable man could 
own without shame. We can have no truce or parley with these enemies to righteousne.ss ; of them every patriot should say, as did the 
• Itsalmist: ‘ Do not I hate them that hate thee? Yea, Lord, I hate them with a perfect hatred .’”—Charles J. Bonaparte. 


VoL. I, No. 5. 


INDIANAPOLIS, JULY, 1889. 


TERMS : <( 


50 cents per annum. 
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For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication oflice. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind., where subscrip¬ 
tions and adveriisements will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana. 

758 postmasters were appointed in In¬ 
diana from March 4 to July 20 inclusive. 

Sixth Auditor Coulter’s interpretation 
of republican promises has been set out in 
another column. It now appears that Mr. 
Roosevelt ha« again shown liis steadiness 
of nerve and purpose by going to the sec¬ 
retary of the treasury and, temporarily, at 
least, convinced that officer that common 
honesty is a thing that a party can not 
well ignore, and Coulter’s proceedings 
have been, for the present, at 'pped. 

Assistant Postmaster Thompson has 
been running about asking people to rec¬ 
ommend Mr. W. A. Van Buren for appoint¬ 
ment to the local civil service board. The 
indications are that Thompson has set out 
to work republicans into this post-office, 
and the fact that he wants a man on the 
local board is an all-sufficient reason why 
the appointment should not be made. The 
local board has had enough of politicians; 
it needs, and needs badly, men who are 
friendly to the law. It was supposed that 
one such had been obtained in Mr. Fish- 
back, but there seems to be some hitch in 
his appointment. The civil service com¬ 
mission should take notice that the local 
board as at present constituted will never 
have the confidence of the people. The 
commission is undoubtedly in earnest in 
saying that democrats should come for¬ 
ward for examination, but it should set up 
machinery here that will make people 
know that they will receive absolutely im¬ 
partial treatment. The friends of the merit 
system may well cry out, “ when will there 
be one officer in this post-office who cares 
for that system, and would like to see it 
succeed ? ” This needs but a single illus¬ 
tration. When the commission was here 
Mr. Thompson, in his begging for a special 
examination, said that they would soon 
have to make appointments which would 
exhaust the present eligible list of carriers 
in two days. He was speaking in the pres¬ 
ence of Postmaster Wallace. The plain de¬ 
ceit, as well as the falsity of their profes¬ 
sions of fairne.s8 to competitors, is demon¬ 
strated by the fact that they refuse to make 
a single appointment from the eligible list 


of clerks or carriers until after the August 
examination. The only conceivable reason 
is that the list is made up largelj’ of demo¬ 
crats. The proper way to bring the acts of 
these men into consonance with their oaths 
would be to refuse any examination until 
the present eligible list is exhausted. 

Postmaster Wallace has in his employ 
a man named Hamlin, who has been fre¬ 
quently and justly mentioned as possess¬ 
ing a disgraceful court record. Mr. Wal¬ 
lace found him a substitute and promoted 
him while ignorant of this record. Weeks 
ago, however, the Sentinel published the 
facts, and from that moment it would seem 
there was but the one duty of dismissal 
Instead, the postmaster writes a letter to 
the papers, and says, in effect, that the man 
is a product of the civil service law The 
proper estimate of the postmaster’s sincer¬ 
ity can be given by stating that if Hamlin 
were a democrat he would have been in 
stantly dismissed. As his father is the 
most active republican political leader and 
manager in his township, Hamlin is kept, 
and for no other reason. The civil service 
law puts no limit upon removals for cause. 

It is true that Hauihii came in under 
the merit system, but inquiry develops that 
no one certified to his good character, and 
that such certificates are no longer re¬ 
quired. As the matter now stands all kinds 
of bad characters may get upon the eligi¬ 
ble list, and it would not seem that tlie post¬ 
master need be told that he ought to make 
inquiries in that direction when selecting 
men. The requirement was abolished be¬ 
cause it was found that the certificates were 
usually made by influential politicians like 
Quay, and were looked upon as a menace. 
The requirement was nevertheless a good 
one. The mistake was that the civil service 
commission kept secret the names of the 
menwhosigned the certificates. Men who 
know that they can notact in the dark, and 
that the public will call them to account, 
will not sign certificates for the Hamlins. 

The President has appointed D. M. Rans 
dell, of this city, marshal of the District of 
Columbia. Ransdell was a soldier in Gen¬ 
eral Harrison’s regiment and lost an arm 
in the service. He was undoubtedly a 
good soldier. He is affable in manner, and 
is adroit in politics. He is one of the re¬ 
publican state committee. Once he had no 


property to speak of, but he has become 
rich holding office. Out of the emoluments 
of office he buys houses and lands, and has 
rich store besides. He belongs with those 
who no longer attract or even hold votes to 
the republican party, but who drive away 
votes. He is one of the Indiana aristoc¬ 
racy of office-holders, and if such an aris¬ 
tocracy is to be fostered he may as well be 
favored as any other. 

Tousey, whom the civil service commis¬ 
sion ordered dismissed because Postmaster 
Wallace had improperly reinstated him, is 
beloved by the boys who run the local ma¬ 
chine. He carries one of the loud trump¬ 
ets, and his fellows mournfully see that if 
he could not hold a place in our post-office, 
law or no law, none of them could, and they 
are very sore in consequence. They go 
about the streets saying that “ no business 
man in the world would have turned out 
Tousey, who was experienced in the duties 
he was performing, and put in a clerk with 
much less experience.” Treating this as 
an honest argument, it is undoubtedly true 
that, under the merit system, where the 
places are obtained by competition, and 
where the higher places are filled by com¬ 
petitive promotion from lower grades, it 
will be now and then possible to fill a place 
with a former employe of the service tem¬ 
porarily better than it can be filled by 
transfer, or from among the substitutes, or 
from the eligible list. Such cases will be 
rare, and they belong to the inseparable 
small evils that always go with great im¬ 
provements in system. 

Having treated this criticism as though 
made in good faith, the actual facts may be 
dealt with. The post-office managers are 
getting along without filling Tousey’s place 
at all; so much for their protestations that 
they could not spare him. Let us apply the 
business man’s view to other appointments 
made in this office. Take the somewhat 
well known case of Mr. W. O. Patterson, 
who was made superintendent of mails. In 
some six weeks he has learned one-half of 
the Indiana scheme so that he can “ throw ” 
it. At this rate, in the course of about two 
years he will, at public expense, become 
fairly qualified to perform the duties of the 
place into which he has been put. There 
is a man working under Patterson, Mr. 
Mundelle, who wanted the place. He had 
had years of experience in this very depart- 

























34 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


inent, and, in the various schemes that Pat¬ 
terson must learn, Mundellecan “ throw” as 
high as three thousand pieces an hour. He 
was in other respects also exceptionally 
well qualified for the place. Now, not only 
would no business man in the world have 
chosen Patterson instead of Mundelle, but 
no appointing officer bent even upon mod¬ 
erate efficiency, would have done so. But, 
if the appointing power was controlled by 
“ pulls,” the choice of Patterson was inevi¬ 
table, and such was the case. 

The business-man testis very useful,and 
we may carry the study further. In this 
post-office, when the new postmaster came 
in, a new head of the registry department 
was appointed in the person of Dr. Wood¬ 
ard, a dentist, whose appointment could 
have no possible connection with fitness 
for his duties, and the only explanation 
that has been found for it is that be sang 
in a campaign glee club in 1888. There 
was also in this case another man who 
wanted the place. This was Oscar N. Wil¬ 
mington, who had served four years as a 
soldier in an Indiana regiment, having en¬ 
listed as a private and been discharged as 
a lieutenant, and who had already had four 
years of experience in this very registry 
department, working thirteen hours a day, 
Sundays and all. He is a republican who 
was dismissed by Postmaster Jones, and 
has been very properly reinstated by Post¬ 
master Wallace. Not only is he excel¬ 
lently well qualified to be the head of this 
department, but his appointment to that 
place would have been peculiarly appro¬ 
priate. It will take Dr. Woodard’s subor¬ 
dinates, one of whom is Wilmington, a 
long time to teach him the duties of his 
place. Again, it must be said, that an ap¬ 
pointing officer, looking only to the good 
of the service, and to every other kind of 
appropriateness, would have chosen Wil¬ 
mington, and that, as between the two, no 
business man in the world would have 
taken Woodard. We might carry these 
reflections further, as for instance in the 
case of Marshall C. Woods, appointed box 
clerk. With so many experienced men 
in and out of the office to choose from, no 
business man anywhere would have se¬ 
lected for this place a man ignorant of its 
duties. And the appointment of Woods 
did not even have the spoils excuse of pay¬ 
ing him for work in the last campaign; he 
was paid for those services at the time. 

It is to be regretted that these things 
have to be told, but they are indispensable 
illustrations to show that the business-man 
argument is a very unsafe one to use 
against the merit system around here. 


Every friend of the President should 
warn him that he can not safely refuse to 
correct mistakes; nor can he safely allow 


the head of an office to so refuse. No ex¬ 
planation whatever is attempted of ap¬ 
pointments like those of Vandervoort, 
Fisher and Bagby. Past experience has 
shown that, though the government is 
silent, such appointments are not allowed 
to be forgotten. Their number may be 
small, when compared with the whole, and 
the men themselves unimportant, but it is 
unthinkable that the President will know¬ 
ingly and deliberately keep even a small 
class of such officers. The question con- 
constantly arises, what power is controlling 
the President that he does not dare to pu¬ 
rify the service ? To these cases we must 
apparently now add another, that of Harry 
McFarland, whose appointment to some 
place in the government printing office at 
Washington has filled the respectable peo¬ 
ple of this city with shame and indigna¬ 
tion. He has a past not pleasant to touch, 
but if the facts are necessary to make a 
protest effectual, either to rid the people’s 
employ of such a man or to make the gov¬ 
ernment carry the deserved responsibility 
of it, the facts shall be forthcoming. 


The enforcement of the civil service 
laws has found a new friend in General 
Sickles, of the New York commission. We 
say it has found a friend because the mere 
fact that an officer has sworn to enforce 
these laws goes for nothing. He may even 
profess that he is going to perform his 
duty in letter and spirit, and at the same 
time be planning to evade it. It is only 
when he acts that we can tell where he 
stands. Some time ago the mayors of 
cities of New York were called together to 
give an account of their proceedings under 
the law of that state. The following ac¬ 
count from the New York Herald is of in¬ 
terest: 

“All cursed in a chorus in the corridors, 
but put on a contrite countenance and 
pleaded ignorance of the law before the 
commission. Mayor Oliver, of Lockport, 
however, proved a Tartar, and roused the 
wrath of General Sickles to boiling point 
before the close of the admonitory session. 
General Sickles fairly gasped for breath at 
the mayor’s audacity. ‘ What is this all 
about, anyhow ?’ asked Mr. Oliver, after he 
had answered a few of the questions. ‘ We 
want to know whether you propose to 
carry out the law or not,’ replied General 
Sickles. ‘ No, I don’t,” answered Mayor 
Oliver, briskly. ‘ It’s no good anyhow; 
it’s a fraud from beginning to end. It only 
keeps a man from putting in somebody he 
wants and makes him put in somebodv he 
don’t want. We don’t want it, we don’t 
need it, and we won’t have it unless we 
are forced to.’ ‘ What’s that?’ roared Gen¬ 
eral Sickles. ‘Don’t you know you took 
an oath to enforce the laws of the state ? ’ 
‘ Not that law,’ responded the mayor. 
‘ There ought not to be any such law on 
the books. It’s a nuisance, no matter how 
you look at it.’ ‘I don’t want your ideas 
but your intentions in respect to this law,’ 


interrupted General Sickles. ‘You have 
violated the statute giving preference to 
veterans.’ ‘They are first-class suckers, 
and I won’t give them a place any way,’ 
broke in Mayor Oliver. In a few minutes 
which followed this outburst General 
Sickles laid down the law" to the belliger¬ 
ent ruler of Lockport in a manner that 
fairly frightened the audience which had 
gathered during the interim. Finally, 
pausing for breath, he concluded: ‘If I 
were not a state officer I would knock you 
over the head with my crutch, you igno¬ 
rant, impudent ass.’ The crutch passed 
unpleasantly near the mayor's head as the 
general waved it in his wrath, and the 
Lockport brave made his escape hastily, 
and the meeting adjourned. ’ 

General Sickles is a democrat, and is 
president of the New York commission, 
and this incident shows that there is a 
growing contempt and indignation among 
the people at large with the political office¬ 
holders who trick to get around a law 
that “keeps a man from putting in some¬ 
body he wants, and makes him put in 
somebody he don’t want.” 


The late Simon Cameron can not be well 
spoken of. This paper can not give the 
space which the facts deserve, but there 
have been few citizens who have been 
greater enemies of their countr}\ He was 
not a statesman, yet he held a state in his 
grip. The reason that he thus held Penn¬ 
sylvania for many years was not that the 
people regarded him as skilled in law-mak¬ 
ing and in public administration, for he 
had no special faculty in that direction. 
He got and kept his hold because he un¬ 
derstood how to manipulate primaries and 
conventions, and how to distribute public 
offices among minor party managers and 
workers so as to secure for the price paid 
the greatest amount of personal service to 
himself. He had no noble ambition ; he 
simply wanted to control “ patronage.” By 
a bargain in convention he gave the votes 
of Pennsylvania to the nomination of Lin¬ 
coln and got in return the secretaryship of 
war. The country was in an agony of 
struggle, yet, to Cameron, political conven¬ 
tions and army contracts were one, and 
Mr. Lincoln dismissed him. Neither his 
disgraceful conduct nor the disgrace of his 
punishment hurt his power. He ruled 
Pennsylvania ‘like a feudal chief until he 
got tired and turned the state over to his 
son, Don Cameron. He is an example that 
shows that neither good repute nor evil 
repute can shake the po'^er of a skilled 
manipulator who controls a party machine. 
Don Cameron has for some reason lost the 
control his father handed down to him, and 
Pennsylvania is now ruled by Quay, who, 
if people like to live under modernized 
feudalism, is a thorough ruler who will see 
to it that no public office in that state is 
given to any one who will not work night 
and day to help Quay’s personal fortunes. 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


35 


THE DISCRIMINATING TEST. 

Since our last issue John O. Cravens has 
been appointed collector of internal rev¬ 
enue for this district. He has under him 
some fifty government officers. Quoting 
his own words, he says in an interview in 
the Indianapolis Neivs [July 10], that to se¬ 
cure an appointment from him a man 
must show “ that he is an unwavering, ac¬ 
tive republican. The mere fact that a 
man may have always voted the ticket is 
not nearly enough. He must have been 
an active party worker.” With such a 
brazen-faced breaker of party promises it 
is useless to reason. If he were asked to 
reconcile his test with President Harrison’s 
dogma, that '• fitness, and not party service, 
should be the sole discriminating test of 
appointment,’ he would, doubtless, laugh 
at the greenness of a question implying 
- that such a declaration was ever intended 
to be acted upon. But is the President go¬ 
ing to allow himself and his words to be 
openly discredited by a man whom he has 
put into a profitable place ? It can be 
said that he ought not, but not that he will 
not. After allowing the congressmen and 
Clarkson to loot the fourth-class post-offices 
at the rate of a thousand a week, and tak¬ 
ing into account the great number of other 
changes, it becomes apparent that a clean 
sweep is intended and is being made as 
fast as possible, and that, with rare excep¬ 
tions, the places are being given to party 
workers, because they are party workers. 
This means that President Harrison will 
not keep his own and his party’s promises. 
It means also that he will give a colossal 
indorsement to a plain violation of the 
constitution. Where does Collector Crav¬ 
ens get any right to require that his ap¬ 
pointees shall have been working republi¬ 
cans ? Where does any appointing officer, 
from the President down, get any right to 
require that the men whom he selects to 
work for the whole people, for pay from 
the whole people, shall be republicans ? 

This was the test openly laid down by 
Attorney-General Miller, and referred to 
by us last month. There is not a line or a 
syllable in the constitution, nor in any law, 
that justifies such a discrimination. Such 
a discrimination is simply the exercise of 
the despotic power which absolute rulers, 
like the Czar, exercise to the fullest extent, 
and which lesser kings and rulers of all 
grades have always clung to and practiced 
as much as possible. It can not be ad¬ 
mitted for a moment that that power was 
transplanted to this country by our con¬ 
stitution. The only test that can be ad¬ 
mitted to be found in the appointing 
power vested by the constitution is the 
business test—the test of fitness for the 
business to be done, without regard to the 
beliefs of the appointee. This was Madison’s 


view of the scope of the appointing power, 
and it is the view that will be adopted and 
acted upon by the country, and when that 
happens these men now in the pay of the 
whole people, but who are giving their 
whole time to proscribing one-half of the 
people for political belief from more than 
one hundred thousand places in which to 
earn a living, will appear small indeed. It 
is no answer to say that they are following 
the practice. A bad custom can not make 
a law. 

THE COMING STRUGGLE BETWEEN 

FEUDALISM AND DEMOCRACY. 

It is republican congressmen who now 
feel the pressure of the civil service law, 
and who justly recognize the fact that 
either the law or their right to give places 
to their personal supporters must give 
way. A few have lately been outspoken. 
Congressman Browne, of Indiana, opposes 
the law because “ it is expensive, * * in 
its examinations it applies wholly unnec¬ 
essary tests, * * it is a cumbersome piece 
of political patchwork. * * When a va¬ 
cancy occurs the senator or representative * 
* should -nominaie a person to be appointed.” 
Congressman Perkins, of Kansas, says that 
the “entire system of competitive examina¬ 
tions is a farce, and discriminates against 
the bone and sinew of the west in favor of 
the college-bred chap of the east.” Con¬ 
gressman Cannon, of Illinois, says : “ I 

think it is an infernal nuisance. 1 have 
found it to he in my way very materially in 
many instances, and I would rather like to 
get it out of my way.” Congressman Tay¬ 
lor, of Ohio, opposes it for these reasons: 
“ Where are the republicans who fought 
the great political battle and won the mar¬ 
velous victory of 1888? Out in the cold.” 
Congressman Hauk, of Tennessee, opposes 
it because “it is un-American, and not in 
harmony with the constitution and the 
theory on which the United States govern¬ 
ment is founded.” Further, it is “ imprac¬ 
ticable, * * and this attempt at an 

office-holding aristocracy must come to an 
end.” 

It would be an easy matter to answer 
all the objections of these gentlemen that 
go to the merits. The saving by this sys¬ 
tem in the New York post-office has more, 
than paid the cost of the machinery of the 
law for the entire country. The charge 
that it applies unnecessary tests is not true, 
and can not be sustained by Congressman 
Browne. Over and over again it has been 
shown that college applicants have com¬ 
paratively poor success, and that the great 
bulk of successful competitors are from 
the public schools. The system does not, 
therefore, discriminate against the west 
because here are the best public schools. 
It is not un-American, because it is the 
most democratic method of distributing 


public employment that has ever been 
used—the method of fair, open competi¬ 
tion, with the prize to the best man. Fi¬ 
nally, the only aristocracy in this country 
is formed by a system of modern feudal¬ 
ism, which these congressmen have helped 
to build up, and are now endeavoring to 
fasten permanently upon the country. 

But, in fact, when talking to congress¬ 
men, no trouble need be taken to answer 
their objections. They are not urged in 
good faith, and the congressmen themselves 
care nothing about them. The real ob¬ 
jection is found in Congressman Cannon’s 
declaration, “I have found it to be in my 
way,” and in Congressman Taylor’s declar¬ 
ation, that his henchmen are “ out in the 
cold.” This is the root of the whole mat¬ 
ter. Congressmen care nothing for effi¬ 
ciency in the service. That is not their 
discriminating test when making appoint¬ 
ments. They work desperately to keep in 
the Higginses, the Dowlings, the Vander- 
voorts, the Bagbys and the McFarlands. 
The only question is, shall they give up 
putting their personal followers into the 
pay of the public and let these places be 
filled on business principles, and shall these 
congressmen get their nominations from 
the people or from the fourth class post¬ 
masters? 

If they do give it up, by force or other¬ 
wise, undoubtedly some of them will dis¬ 
appear from public life. They keep them¬ 
selves in place solely by the efforts of their 
followers whom they have quartered upon 
the people, and without this support they 
must fall. An Indiana congressman, who 
had served three terms, said that so long 
as he could choose the fourth-class post¬ 
masters of his district he could keep him¬ 
self in perpetual nomination. Probably it 
is not worth while to reason with the great 
bulk of congressmen, and show them that 
if they gained their places because they 
represented principles which ought to be 
followed in legislation they would be much 
better satisfied with themselves and much 
more respected by the people. Probably 
the only argument which will have effect 
will be the one which produces fear. 
Doubtless congressmen will attempt to 
block or repeal the law establishing the 
merit system. Civil service reformers need 
not shrink from the contest which that 
will bring on. There w'ill be but one end 
to this struggle. The use of public office 
as spoil to permanently engraft upon our 
government the principles of despotism 
and feudalism, and thus put the country 
irrevocably under the heel of theMahones, 
the Gormans,'the Quays, the Platts and the 
Cannons, will not succeed. It is not settled 
that the republican party has the progres¬ 
sive strength left to break up this evil. It 
is on its final trial. A repeal of the civil 
service law would have an effect not unlike 
the repeal of the Missouri Compromise. 















36 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


THE WORK OF THE CIVIL SERVICE 
COMMISSION. 

Last month was given an extended account 
of the work of the civil service commission in 
the New York custom house, and in the Troy 
and Indianapolis post-offices. Since then the 
commission has further justified the good 
opinion of it held by the country. At Grand 
Rapids they received seven affidavits charging 
a chief clerk of the railway mail service with 
having collected or attempted to collect money 
of government employes contrary to law, as was 
done in the pension office here. These affida¬ 
vits, however, were denied, and the commis¬ 
sion took the only practicable course of recom¬ 
mending to the postmaster-general to prosecute 
the chief clerk if prima facie guilty; if not, 
then to prosecute the seven false swearers. 
The commission should have authority to call 
and swear witnesses, so that their investiga¬ 
tions may in all cases he thorough and com¬ 
plete. 


Collector Geer, of Port Huron, publicly ex¬ 
pressed himself that “ to the victors belonged 
the spoils,” and then asked for a special exam¬ 
ination. The present civil service commis¬ 
sion, having ordinary wits, had no trouble in 
putting two and two together, and refused the 
examination and blocked Mr. Geer’s plan of 
getting a lot of favorites on the eligible list. 
He has been, however, temporarily equal to 
the occasion. First he got permission to in¬ 
crease his force, and then he reduced the pay 
of his employes so as to take almost the entire 
force from under the civil service law. He 
is now in the process of dismissing one man to 
make room for two of his favorites, and put¬ 
ting them in under the spoils system. Here 
is President Harrison’s opportunity, and his 
action will be watched with interest. The 
only honest way to deal with Geer is to turn 
him out. 


The other important investigation made is 
that of the Milwaukee post-office. The first 
report of the commission was seriously adverse 
to the postmaster. Later the commission made 
a second and fuller report of the same tenor. 
To these Postmaster Paul has replied in 
various and vigorous ways. We have care¬ 
fully read the statements and reports. Mr. 
Paul held the view that the service should be 
equalized between the parties. Any effort to 
carry out this view was unlawful. When he 
took the office the employes were all repub¬ 
lican ; now not half are republicans. This 
does not happen without special assistance. 
He was forbidden to have any knowledge of 
the eligible list; yet he had one eligible list 
in his office, and does not deny that he always 
had access to all of them. It does not matter 
that he cut the one from a newspaper ; he 
knew that he had no right to examine it or to 
take any notice of it. He says that he was 
permitted by the previous commission to 
transfer names, for instance, from the eligible 
list of clerks to the carriers, and these names 


were to be certified for places as carriers. 
This could have but the one meaning, that the 
transfer was always to be made by the local 
board and in every case from the top of the list; 
but it seems that the postmaster selected any 
name that he chose for such transfer. He denies 
that he compelled the re-marking of a paper, 
but not that he expressed gieat dissatisfaction 
with the marking. What right had he to know 
anything about examination papers which were 
then and are now kept secret? It is true that 
he has just published, with many expletives 
and repetitions, a general denial of all the 
statements in the report of the commission, 
but that is not the way to meet specific cases. 
A few instances have been given, but the 
report, signed by every member of the com¬ 
mission, makes the most explicit and damag¬ 
ing findings of the worst sort of trickery. It 
must be borne in mind that this office has been 
pretty thoroughly investigated. In July, 1888, 
the secretary of the commission was sent to 
investigate, and made an unfavorable report. 
In September, 1888, the chief examiner was 
sent to make a full inquiry, and reported gross 
and repeated violations of the law ; and now 
the whole commission finds to the same effect. 
Mr. Paul’s frankness may be questioned. For 
instance, he has repeatedly stated that he was 
not permitted to know the testimony, yet the 
report of the three commissioners states that 
Shiddy and Johnson testified in Mr. Paul’s 
presence. These were the main witnesses. It 
is now reported that Mr. Paul is being sup¬ 
ported by a republican congressman. Doubt¬ 
less the latter is looking to the time when his 
henchman will succeed Mr. Paul, and he does 
not want any precedent against manipulating 
the law. 

—Civil Service Commissioner Roosevelt has 
received a letter signed by the President and 
other members of the board of officers of the 
Brookline Civil Service Reform Association, 
of Brookline, Mass., congratulating him upon 
his appointment as civil service commissioner 
and upon the earnestness with which he has 
taken hold of his duties. The letter concludes 
as follows : 

“ The republicans in this town—a thousand 
in number—are almost unanimously civil 
service reformers and believe sincerely in a 
non-partisan civil service, with admission to 
and continuance in office depending upon as¬ 
certained ability. We write this letter be¬ 
cause it would appear from the tone of a por¬ 
tion of the public press that some of the 
‘spoilsmen’of our own party are inclined to 
evade the pledges of the Chicago platform, 
and to go backward rather than forward in 
reforming our public service—and that it may 
encourage and strengthen you to know that 
organizations of friends in your own party are 
noting and commending your good work.” 

Fire Chief Shay, at his own request, after 
thirty-five years of active fire service in New 
York City, was recently retired on a pension of 
|2,500 a year because of disabilities received 
in the service. Ex-Chief Webster, of the In¬ 
dianapolis fire department, after twenty-nine 
years of active service, was kicked out against 
the protests of the chief business men of the 


city because he had declined to dismiss the 
dozen democrats in the service at the command 
of Councilmen Trusler and Connett. Mean¬ 
while personal followers of these councilmen 
are being appointed instead of experienced 
substitutes awaiting regular employment, and 
Trusler is already pondering how to behead 
the man he put into AVebster’s place because 
he has not proved pliant. There is not a fire¬ 
men in the city but feels that his place de¬ 
pends entirely upon the personal favor of 
three or four men, nevertheless, he goes on 
about his duty. Meanwhile we allow Fire¬ 
man Davis to break his arm to save our 
property, and Politician Trusler, if so dis¬ 
posed, to dismiss him from the service to pick 
up a new trade and a living if he can. But 
for firemen and their families to live by the 
favor of Trusler, a sort of local Robespierre 
infinitesimally reduced, is “ American, anti- 
Chinese and democratic,” and they should be 
content and proud of their country and 
especially of their city. 

Last month was given an instance of a 
congressman countermanding two excellent 
appointments to the Indian service, although 
the appointees had closed their business and 
were on their way to their duties. The reason 
for this flagrant instance of despotism was 
that the person appointed did not live in the 
state where the Indians and the congressmen 
were located. This office-baron coolly informed 
the government that persons had been selected 
for all the places and notified of their selec¬ 
tion. It is now proposed that all government 
places among the Indians, many of which re¬ 
quire the greatest skill and tact, shall be filled 
from the sparse population of the state where the 
reservation is. The Indians are helpless,and the 
spoils system has no mercy for them. As long 
as we are to have the spoils system, it is fit and 
becoming that that system, worked by con¬ 
gressmen ferocious for patronage, should prey 
upon these defenseless wards. 

Pkesipent Harrison’.s grandfather. Presi¬ 
dent Harrison, said : “ There is no part of the 
means placed in the hands of the executive 
which might be used with greater effect, for 
unhallowed porposes, than the control of the pub¬ 
lic press. We have learned, too, from our own as 
well as the experience of other countries, that golden 
shackles, by whotnsoever or by whatever pretense im¬ 
posed, are as fatal to it as the iron bonds of des¬ 
potism. ® * * * ■*” 

The President has shocked large numbers of 
citizens by appointing an unusual number of 
editors of great papers to important positions. 
It is doubtless true that those papers are muz¬ 
zled papers from this time forth, but while 
this manifestation of the feoffing spirit is 
more conspicuous and offensive, the danger 
to free institutions is really less than with the 
practice of giving the country editor the 
postmastership or some similar position. In 
this position, under the direction of his con¬ 
gressman, and as his “man,” he runs the pri¬ 
maries and conventions; he is absolutely dic¬ 
tator of the political use of his paper, and 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


37 


with his paper and his office, he is unusually 
wanting in tact if he can not construct a ma¬ 
chine with no creaking to ever reach the pub¬ 
lic ear. The danger in a democratic govern¬ 
ment of giving the censorship and power of 
the press into the hands of a great body of 
place-holders controlled, and holding at the 
pleasure of a powerful oligarchy, was apparent 
from a careful report on the federal civil ser¬ 
vice of Indiana made in 1886. At that time 
thirty-four editors had already received places, 
the bulk being postmasters. In the congress¬ 
ional nominations of that year they were 
prominent objects. In Lowry’s district the 
editor and postmaster worked for his con¬ 
gressman. In Matson’s district the editor 
and postmaster worked for Matson. In Hol¬ 
man’s district the collector of internal revenue 
and editor “set the pins,” worked and had his 
force at work for Holman’s re-nomination and 
election. These congressmen were all bitterly 
opposed, and could not have ridden down the 
opposition of their districts without a subsi¬ 
dized press and an aristocracy of office holders 
whose existence depended upon their personal 
service. 

The postmaster at Decatur removed his 
newspaper office into the same building as 
the post-office, and was secretary of the county 
committee. A petition was presented for the re¬ 
moval of the editor-postmaster at Mt. Vernon 
because “he had used his position to dictate 
the political action of his party associates 
and to throttle their freedom of action within 
party lines.” The editor-postmaster at Good- 
land was charged with getting his predecessor 
removed on a false charge. The editor-post¬ 
master at Cannelton was active in all meet¬ 
ings and caucuses and was a prominent figure 
in a factional contest. The editor-postmaster 
at Boonville was active in “setting-up” War¬ 
rick county for a congressional nominee. The 
postmaster at Paoli was described in the state 
gazetteer as lawyer, postmaster and editor. 
These editor-postmasters gave their allegiance 
not to the President, but to their congressmen, 
and after the defeats of 1886 caused mainly 
by their disregard of his pledges, they did 
what they could to further break him down. 

And now President Harrison is promised a 
like experience. He has appointed a news¬ 
paper man internal revenue collector, one 
White, of West Virginia, whose paper says, 
just before he takes his oath of office : 

“ He [Mr. White] is as anxious as any republican 
to get the changes made as speedily as consistent 
witli good service, being a devoted believer in the 
doctrine that to the victors belong the spoils; and, 
at the earliest practicable date, every democratic 
appointee in the office, from the humble and, poorly- 
paid apple-jack gaugers to the well-paid store keepers 
and clerks, will be succeeded by Simon-pure all-wool 
and yard-wide republicans.” 

This is such coarse disregard not only of 
the pledges of the republican platform but of 
General Harrison’s own promises, that, as an 
honorable man, to submit to it must be intol¬ 
erable. 

Whether President Harrison, under the dic¬ 
tation of congressmen, is appointing to office 
editors of small party papers on a wide scale 


is not yet known; if he is, it is the most 
adroit way that has been found of setting up 
an aristocratic and exclusive government of 
congressmen, under the guise of democracy. 

THE AMERICAN, DEMOCRATIC AND 
ANTI-CHINESE SYSTEM. 

—Public Printer Palmer learned to-day 
what it is to have control of 2,500 positions, 
and to have about 10,000 persons, who want 
to fill them, actively engaged in seeking him. 
His immense establishment was thronged all 
morning and afternoon by office seekers, and 
his desk was heaped up with applications in 
written form, while he was dizzy listening to 
verbal statements as to the qualities of appli¬ 
cants.—-ihdiaTiapo/is Journal Dispatch. 

—Senator Farwell arrived from New York 
this morning and found over 2,000 letters 
stacked up on his office desk. The first thing 
he did was to send for four stenographers, and 
by working until midnight he thought he 
would succeed in getting most of the corres¬ 
pondence oft’ his hands. To-morrow he will 
st.art out to fix up a few more places for his 
constituents.— Chicago Times. 

—Senator Farwell, of Illinois, says: “I 
have never seen or heard anything in my life 
like this hunger for office. It is something I 
can not comprehend. I wonder if it has al¬ 
ways been so? I am getting along in years, as 
you see, but if I were younger and thought I 
should have to face what I have in the last 
few weeks, I give you my word there is not 
enough honor, money or anything else to keep 
me in the United States Senate. There is 
nothing that a man can think of that he won’t 
say or won’t promise to get an office. I was 
never as sick of anything in my life.” 

—During his first two months in office 
Clarkson answered over 100,000 letters and 
had “not less than 15,000 personal interviews 
with senators, congressmen and office-seekers.” 
Giving out his fifty odd thousand post-offices 
by order of congressmen is only part of his 
work. His great influence with the President 
leads those wanting other offices to seek his 
help. Office-seekers follow him home, and 
keep him up until after midnight. 

—Senator Cullom, of Illinois, says: 

“ I have never b€*en so pressed and harra.ssed 
in my life as I have been since March 4th. If 
I had to go through all of this again, I almost 
think that the rewards of political life would 
scarcely be adequate compensation. You can 
have no idea of the persistence of these office- 
seekers, or of the embarrassing complications 
connected with the quest of one’s constituents 
for place. The mere matter of letters is enough 
to stagger one. Why, they come by hundreds, 
and one is constantly occupied in keeping up 
with the current correspondence. Each letter 
involves two or three more, as each requires an 
answer, and an answer generally callsfor a visit 
to the White House, or to the departments; and 
so the time goes. And, with all this watchful¬ 
ness and attention to the interests of one’s con¬ 
stituents, there remains the grim reflection that, 
whatever you may do, you will, perhaps, dis¬ 
please more persons than you can please.” 

—The Washington Star says: 

Secretary Windom is probably the most 
crowded man in the cabinet. Day after day 
the office-seekers and their friends swarm in 
upon him, and his room frequently conttuns 
forty or more men waiting for a word in his 
ear. The result has been to delay the natural 
advance of public business—including the sat¬ 
isfying of the hungry—to a considerable ex¬ 
tent, and the secretary is in the habit of telling 


those who grumble at the slow grinding of the 
mill that “ if they don’t give the jury a chance 
to retire, they will never get a verdict.” Sat¬ 
urday was a little too much for the secretary’s 
patience, and he has given intimation that he 
will hereafter deny himself to all callers on 
Tuesday of each week until further notice, in 
order to give proper attention to important 
matters pending before the department. 


—Washington, June 24.—There was a con¬ 
ference held at the White House to-day, which 
will have a great deal of influence in future 
appointments for Indiana, as well as of Indi- 
anians for federal offices generally. Early 
this morning Mr. 1). M. Ransdell, of Indian¬ 
apolis, who arrived in this city yesterday, 
called upon Attorney-General Miller and was 
closeted with him for about an hour. He then 
went to the White House, accompanied by Col. 
W.T. Durbin, of Anderson, and was shortly 
followed by Mr. Miller. These men, in com¬ 
pany with Private Secretary Halford, entered 
the latter’s office and remained in consultation 
nearly an hour. It is said to-night that the 
subjects considered were the collectorship or 
internal revenue and several other minor offi¬ 
ces for Indiana, including the pension board 
of Indianapolis.—Npectaf to the Indianapolis 
Journal. 


—The Franklin Star says that while United 
States Marshal Dunlap was in that city yester¬ 
day, he asked Postmaster Brown to resign and 
thereby relieve the strain as to who will be his 
successor. 

—The Evansville Journal says : “ Mr. Smi¬ 
ley Chambers, United States District Attorney, 
has acted very injudiciously, to say the least, 
in the Vincennes post office matter.” Then 
it proceeds to condemn him for his “perfidy 
and superserviceableness in meddling in a 
matter that he ought to have allowed to take 
its course. There was no occasion,” it says, 
“ for Chambers to go on sundry pilgrimages 
to Indianapolis and Washington in order to 
prejudice the authorities against Adams, from 
motives of personal spite.” The Journal con¬ 
tinues : 

He should have let bygones l)e bygones in the in. 
terest of party harmony. He had .gotten all or more 
than he himself deserved. He had attained a posi¬ 
tion to which fifty other Indiana republicans had 
better claim. There was a great surprise when he 
was appointed U. S. district attorney. 

—Collector Cooper at Philadelphia, formal¬ 
ly took possession of his office July 15. A 
dispatch to the New York Times says: 

Later on a number of people called to pay their 
-respects to the new official. Among others were 
Congressman Smedley Darlington and State Senator 
Harlan of Chester county, both of whom were 
closeted with tlie collector in his private office for 
quite a while ; ex-Surveyor of the Port George Le- 
land, J. F. Weirick, private secretary to Congress¬ 
man Kelley ; Representative Horatio P. Connell, E. 
C. Knight, Senator George Handy Smith, Mercantile 
Appraiser Harry Hunter, and a number of lesser 
lights, all of whom shook the new olffcial warmly by 
the hand. 

Was this a spontaneous congratulatory 
gathering of the })eople, or was it the vultures 
for the prey? 















38 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—The anti-Chinese svstem now seems to be 
fully applied to Virginia. After a long 
struggle Mahone, hy careful manipulation, 
assisted by the republican national committee 
and seemingly by the President, has put his 
enemies under his feet. He will now rule 
Virginia for the federal government. Once 
before the republican party put the state of 
Virginia into his grip, and no person was 
appointed or removed without his order. We 
may expect to see this repeated, and, we be¬ 
lieve, with similar disastrous results. 

— WASHtNGTON, June 27. - Two of the ap¬ 
pointments which were agreed upon the other 
day were announced this afternoon. John 
O. Cravens is appointed collector of internal 
revenue for the Sixth Indiana district. Il is 
understood that this appointment was made with the 
full approval of all parties interested in the distri¬ 
bution of Indiana patronage, and that the same 
is true of the appointment of Mr. Philip M. 
Hildebrand to be surveyor of customs of the 
port of Indianapolis.— Special to Indianapolis 
Journal. 

—Senator Higgins, of Delaware, appointed 
a postmaster at Bridgeville, Sussex county. 
He consulted one henchman in that county, 
but though five-sixths of the citizens, regard¬ 
less of politics, protested, and the local repub¬ 
lican club denounced their over-lord, he is ob¬ 
durate. Later he gave to the brother-in-law of 
this henchman the position of commercial 
agent at Nottingham, England ; then he ap¬ 
pointed ex-Judge George P. Fisher first 
auditor of the treasury, and the Morning News 
(Rep.) says: 

“ It is unfair and hurtful to the republicans of this 
state to be exhibited before the country with a vul¬ 
nerable candidate for a high and responsible finan 
cial office,” and “that the republican party outside 
of the state, including the President himself, should 
be placed on defensive through an error of judgment 
in Delaware is a mortification which no rebuke 
can cure, and which must, therefore, be endured in 
silence.” 

Then he appointed Horace Greely Knowles, 
consul at Bordeaux. To make room for this 
young follower, an old soldier who left one leg 
on the field of battle, and carries two rebel 
bullets, is recalled from a post where he had 
rendered years of faithful service. Of this 
appointment, the same republican paper says; 

“ A man ought at least to be able to earn a thous¬ 
and dollars a year at home, where he is known, 
before receiving some six thousand or seven 
thousand dollars a year under the government.” 

—The following extract is a vivid picture 
of a familiar scene. The “reportorial ” artist 
is describing the return of the collector of the 
port and his private secretary to the custom 
house to attend to the public business, a place 
with which politics have no more proper con¬ 
cern than with a bank, a school or a hospital: 

“ Both had run away to get a rest from the 
demands of the hungry republicans. Both 
got back to the custom house at about the 
same time yesterday. There never was such 
a scene there as that which was before them. 
District leaders from New York, Brooklyn, 
and Jersey City, and scores of lieutenants from 
up the state, were waiting for them. They 
choked the iron-railed stone stairway leading 
to the collector’s office. Clumps of the boys 
were in all the anterooms leading to the col¬ 
lector’s office. In the big room where Collector 


Magone had his desk, more boys filled the 
chairs and lounges. The collector and his 
private secretary were almost paralyzed. Col¬ 
onel Erhardt fled to the inner office, and Mr. 
Hunt, resigned and apprehensive, went to his 
desk right among the hungry. Those in the 
outside corridors crowded in, and until sun¬ 
down the demands of the faithful were heard. 
It was a continued shout for j)laces, and long 
before the afternoon was over, the collector 
and his secretary were wilted. The demands 
were for the pLaces of the democratic messen¬ 
gers, ushers and laborers. For every place 
there was a score of new applicants. There 
are just so many places, and as each hour goes 
by the number of applicants increases, until 
Collector Erhardt scarcely knows whether he 
is afoot or on horseback. Just before leaving 
the custom house he ordered that the corri¬ 
dors and entrances be placarded with this : 

“‘The collector will have to ask the indul¬ 
gence of those seeking employment for two 
weeks. 

Official business will prevent his grant 
ing personal interviews until that time. 

Applications may be directed to W. S. 
Robinson and given to the messenger.’ ” 

This is a pleasant and creditable way of 
transacting the public business. It is called 
the American way, and is described as essen¬ 
tial to the preservation of our institutions. 
Anything else is aristocratic, and belongs to 
effete monarchies. This is simple, demo¬ 
cratic, effective and economical.— Harper's 
Weekly. 

—Mr. Quay’s agent, Mr. Andrews, nominally 
chairman of the republican state committee, 
has issued a call (without a meeting of the 
committee), for the Pennsylvania convention 
to assemble at Harrisburg on August 7. 
There is really no business to be done. One 
candidate is to be named—state treasurer; 
but as he has been designated by the Quay 
agents, for many weeks past, in the person 
of Mr. H. K. Boyer, speaker of the lower 
house of the legislature, the nomination by 
the convention is superfluous formality.— The 
American (Rep.). 

—The situation there is a terrible commen¬ 
tary on the spoils system (the anti-Chinese, 
American and democratic system). I nearly 
got into trouble among the throngs down 
thereon offices intent. It is very unpleasant. 
June has been very cool, and I ventured to 
say that perhaps their chilly prospects had 
affected the weather. It was a risky remark. 
There never was such a situation in the his¬ 
tory of the whole world. There are 4,000 ap¬ 
plicants for 150 consulates, and I believe 
that this proportion will be maintained. If 
not increased, through all the departments. 
The President, the members of the cabinet, 
the heads of bureaus, and the representatives 
are overrun, and the public business is almost 
at a stand still.— Chauncey M. Depew, recent 
interview. 


The Civil Service Reform Association of 
Missouri has held its annual meeting, and the 
eighth annual report was read. It commends 
the President for his appointment of a civil 
service commission, and it censures him for 
the riot of spoils that has displaced 11,000 
fourth-class postmasters in less than three 
months. It is an encouraging sign that civil 
service reformers are everywhere showing less 
tendency to conceal and excuse the short¬ 
comings of the presidential office, by whom¬ 
ever filled. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

“ Large districts or parcels of Liiid were 
allotted hy the conquering generals to the 
superior officers of the army, and hy them 
dealt out again in smaller parcels or allot¬ 
ments to the inferior officers and most de¬ 
serving soldiers. * * The condition of 
holding the lands thus given was that the 
possessor should do service faithfully, both 
at home and in the wars, to him hy whom 
they were given,” and, on breach of this 
condition, “ hy not performing the stipu¬ 
lated service, or hy deserting his lord in 
battle,” the lands reverted to the lord. 
The vassal, upon inve.stiture, took an oath 
of fealty to the lord, and in addition did 
homage, “ openly and hiimhly kneeling, 
being uiigirt, uncovered and holding up 
his hands, both together, between those of 
his lord, who sate before him, and there 
profe.ssing that he did become his MAN 
from that day forth, of life and limb and 
earthly honor, and then he received a kiss 
from his lord.” Services were free and 
base. Free service was to pay a sum of 
money, or serve under the lord in war. 
Base service v^as to plow the lord’s land, 
to make his hedge or carry out his dung.— 
Blackstone. 

—R A. Haynes, a cousin of Russell Harri¬ 
son’s wife, has been appointed law clerk of the 
post office department. Salary $2,500. 

—Mr. Spalding, a brother-in-law of Private 
Secretary Halford, has been appointed post¬ 
master at Champaign, Ill. 

—John Hughson, Pullman car porter and 
rescuer of the Avife of the President’s private 
secretary at Johnstown, has been appointed as 
skilled laborer in the treasury, at a compensa¬ 
tion of $720 per annum, upon the recommenda¬ 
tion of the private secretary. 

—A friend of Rus.sell Harrison’s business 
partner has been appointed postal stamp agent 
at New York, salary $2,500. Visionary peo¬ 
ple probably expected that Mr. Pearson’s plan 
of promoting one of his hundreds of trained 
men would be followed. 

—Pension Commissioner Tanner has ap¬ 
pointed his daughter, just out of school, as his 
private secretary. 

—Indian Commissioner Morgan has ap¬ 
pointed his wife as his private secretary. Sal¬ 
ary, $1,200 a year. 

—Commissioner of Indian Schools Dorches¬ 
ter has had a special office created for the 
benefit of his wife. Salary, $6 a day. 

—The postmaster at Augusta, Me., has been 
removed to make a place for “Joe” Manley. 
The sole object for Manley’s existence is, and 
has been for years, the glorification of Secre¬ 
tary Blaine. This is his pay. 

—Senator Gorman, who is literally a curse 
to the state of Maryland, has appointed a 
postmaster at Laurel, Md. Although a demo¬ 
crat, and although a republican had been 
named, Gorman claimed the place as his and 
Wanamaker allowed it. Thus modern feudal¬ 
ism is nourished and grows strong. 

—Congressman Smith has appointed Dan 
Hogan collector of internal revenue for the 
Cairo, Ill., district. 

—Mahone has appointed John G. Watts 
marshal of the western district of Virginia. 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


39 


—Quay has appointed Tliomas V. Cooper, | 
state senator and ex-chairinan of the republi¬ 
can state committee, collector for the port of 
Philadelphia. Regarding this appointment 
the American [rep], in a few words, shows the 
grip of Quay upon the state of Pennsylvania : 

“ Upon this ground it is that Mr. Cooper is selected. 
He must be furnished with a place. He will serve 
Mr. Quay. The President, therefore, is pres.sed to 
appoint him. And the President consents. He de¬ 
clines the advice of the citizens of Philadelphia, who 
have in mind the efficiency of the public service, 
while he yields to the demand of Mr. Quay, who has 
in mind his own present schemes and the further 
operations which are to grow out of them.” 

—Congressman Cannon has had the salaries 
of certain democratic clerks in Washington 
reduced, as follows: 

Charles H. Rickets, of Charleston, Ill., from $1,600 
to $1,400: T. T. Horan, of Mattoon, 111., from $1,600 to 
$1,200: W. Durbin, of Champaign, Ill., from $1,400 to 
$1,200; Wm. H. Smyzer, of Champaign, Ill., chief of di¬ 
vision, from $2,000 t<> $1,600; Wm. Carmer, of Douglas 
county. Ill., from $1,400 to $1,200. 

It seems that Cannon claims that in 1884 
these clerks opposed him, and by reason of the 
civil service law, he tvas obliged to modify 
his order for dismissal to the above. 

—Jerry McCarthy, Congressman Banks’s 
nominee for the internal revenue collector- 
ship, and qualified for the office “ by a train¬ 
ing in the political contests in Massachusetts 
since his boyhood ” and by being “as simple 
as a child in manner,” had the misfortune to 
find Congressman Lodge’s man preferred by 
the administration. 

—Washington, June 27.—Hon. W. D. 
Owen, of Logansport, left for his home to-day. 
Mr. Owenis entirely satisfied with what fie 
fias accomplisfied during fiis sfiort stay in 
Wasfiington, and goes away liappy. 

—Cfiarles H. Litcfiman, a labor-worker in 
the last campaign, lias been paid by a special 
agency of the treasury. 

— Horace A. Taylor, editor and proprietor 
of the Hudson [Wis.] Star and Times, and ex¬ 
chairman of the state republican committee, 
has been appointed commissioner of rail¬ 
roads. 

—O. T. Porter of Vlbany, Oregon, editor of 
a republican paper, has been appointed mar¬ 
shal for the district of Alaska. 

—H. M. Cooper, member of the republican 
state central committee, has been appointed 
collector of internal revenue for the district 
of Arkansas. 

—John Money, chairman of the Tennessee 
delegation to the national republican conven¬ 
tion of 1888, has been appointed minister resi¬ 
dent to Paraguay and Uruguay. 

—Clark.son has been doing his work of 
removing fourth-class postmasters under the 
orders of congressmen at the rate of one 
every three minutes. 

—Clarkson appointed L. D. Levan post¬ 
master at Wilson, N. Y., although a statement 
had been filed in the department showing that 
Levan had been indicted and fined for keep¬ 
ing a disorderly house, 

—The postmaster at Hollowell, Me., having 
been removed on charges, his friends believing 
the charges to be forged, asked to see them, 
but were refused by the postoffice department. 

—The new assistant district attorney of 
West Virginia is defending a suit for embez 
/dement in a former public office. The prin¬ 
cipal deputy marshal is indicted for bribery, 
the superintendent of public buildings in 
Charleston is indicted for bribery, and another 
federal appointee, Ray, has admitted that he 
attempted to bribe a member of the legislature. 


—Henry E Sharpe h.is been appointed post" 
master at Lead Hill, Ark. He was convicted 
in the United States Court at Springfield, Ill., 
of sending obscene matter through the mails. 
He has come out with a defense as follows; 

If any one can prove that durine: tlie last seven 
years my life has not been strictly moral, or that at 
any time in those seven years I have related smutty 
jokes,or indulged in any obscene or impropei conver¬ 
sation, or that I have gambled, or been intoxicated, 
or committed any dishonest act, I will give him my 
horse, sulky, harness, cow, and calf; all of which are 
unencumbered by any lien whatever. 

It ajipears that within the last seven years 
he assaulted his wife and threw her down 
stairs, and has been more than once a prisoner 
in the .Jefferson Market Police Court, New 
York City. 

— The President has appointed Robert 
Smalls in face of his well-known record and of 

strong protest, to a federal office in South 
Carolina. Here is an extract from his record : 

Josephus Woodruff, then clerk of the senate, testi¬ 
fied that, in consideration of Smalls’ vote to support 
a joint resolution api)ropriating $200,000 to pay the 
claim of the Republican Printing Company, he gave 
Smalls a check for $5,000, payable to cash or bearer. 
L. W. Zealy, cashier of the South Carolina Bank aftd 
Trust Company, testified that Journai A, 437, showed 
that Smalls indorsed and presented said check on 
the .same day, Jan. 18, 1872, and that it was placed to 
his credit. 

The records of the court will show that for this of¬ 
fense Smalls was tried before a republican judge and 
a jury, the majority of whom were republicans and 
of his own race, and was found guilty, sentenced to 
two years in the penitentiary, and su)jse(iuently 
pardoned by Gov. Hampton. 


OPPOSED TO AMERICAN FEUDAL¬ 
ISM. 

—“My only object—and I ihink you un¬ 
derstand it—is to secure fit men for responsi¬ 
ble places without admitting the right of sen¬ 
ators and representatives to control appoint¬ 
ments for which the President and the 
secretary, as his presumed adviser, must be 
responsible. Unless this principle can be 
practically established, I feel that I can not 
be useful to you or to the country in my pres¬ 
ent position .”—Secretary Chase to Lincoln. 

—In the first place patronage is thoroughly 
un-American. It is a system handed down to 
us from the worst days of English politics, 
and it befits a corrupt monarchy, not an en¬ 
lightened republic. There is nothing Ameri¬ 
can in a system which fills offices by favorit¬ 
ism, friendship, obligation and influence. 
The American theory is to give to every man a 
fair field and no favor; while patronage goes 
entirely by favor and gives no field at all. 
The great error hitherto has been in arguing 
as if the purpose of the change was to im¬ 
prove the public service, when we have had 
for years a good civil service, so good that it 
may well be doubted wdiether any change of 
system would very greatly improve it. The 
true and the terrible evil of patronage is in 
the effect upon politics generally, and upon 
public life and public men. It takes the 
power of appointments from the heads of 
departments who are fit to make them and 
places it in the hands of senators and con- 
gre.ssmen, who in the nature of things can 
know but little about them. Senators and 
members of congiess are elected to their great 
offices—for they are great offices of high trust—by 
the whole people, and their proper duty is to attend 
to the business of the whole people and not to the 
wants and importunities of the fev).—Congressman 
Henry Cabot Lodge at Lowell, July 4, 1SS9. 

—I think that at present there are more 
congressmen who keep in power, not because 


they can render good service to the country, 
but because they know how to manipulate 
fourth-class post-offices; and when you see a 
congressman from a country district denounc¬ 
ing the civil-service reform law, you may be 
sure that that man devotes his time to ped¬ 
dling patronage and not his talents and ener¬ 
gies to the service of the republic.— Theodme 
Roosevelt. 


WANTON REMOVALS. 

The danger, tlieii, consists merely in this: 
The President can displace from office a 
man whose merits require that he should 
he continued in it. What will be the mo- 
tires which the Presitlent can feel for such 
abuse of his power, and the restraints that 
operate to prevent H i In the first place, 
he will be impeachable by this house, be¬ 
fore the senate, for such an act of malad¬ 
ministration; for I contend that the 
wanton removal of meritorious of¬ 
ficers would subject him to im¬ 
peachment and removal from his 
own high trust. * * * Can we sup¬ 
pose a President, elected for four years 
only, dependent upon the popular voice, 
impeachable by the legislature, little, if 
at all, distinguished for wealth, personal 
talents, or inlluence from the head of the 
department himself; I say, will he bid de¬ 
fiance to all these considerations, and wan¬ 
tonly dismiss a meritorious and virtuous 
officer i much an abuse of poiver 
exceeds my conception. —Congressmam 
James Madison. June, 1789. 

—The sixth auditor of the treasury. 
Coulter, has removed his deputy and the 
eleven chiefs of division to make places for 
republicans. Coulter says “That’s what we 
are here for, and it is about time that the 
men who did the horn blowing during the last 
campaign should have something to show for 
their labor.” The places are worth from 
$2,000 upward. 

—Miss Moony, postmaster at Maspeth, L. 
I., has been removed and the place given to a 
man named Smith. Practically all the pa¬ 
trons of the office wanted Miss Moony retain¬ 
ed, and three hundred, including nearly every 
voter in the district, petitioned for it, but the 
local politicians were opposed and the change 
was made. The papers which brought about 
the change are kept secret by the department* 

—President Cleveland removed Postmaster 
Hankness of Albert Lea, Minn., for cause 
upon petition and appointed Mr. Stacy, who 
has .served two years. He was a soldier, is 
poor and has made a good postmaster, hut 
Congre.ssman Dnnnell and apparently the 
government also cared nothing for these mat¬ 
ters and removed Stacy and appointed Hank¬ 
ness. 

—The postmaster at Vineland, N. J., was 
removed on the charge of being short in his 
accounts. VVannamaker, however, kept all 
the papers secret. Thereupon a committee of 
prominent republicans, headed by ex-Mayor 
Mason, made a thorough investigation and 
reported ; “ We have examined Postmaster 

Brewer’s accounts, and find them correct, said 
accounts showing that the amounts due the 
government have been sent promptly at the 
time they became due and payable.” Dr. 
Brewer is. of course, a democrat. 

—James P. Smith, postmaster at Lehighton, 
Pa., has been removed to make place for a re¬ 
publican. The new appointee himself re¬ 
marked, during his canvass for the office, that 
“ he could .see nothing derogatory to Smith,” 
but if there was to be a change, he wanted it. 
















40 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


A GREAT MORAL QUESTION. 

This paper has hitherto had occasion to 
notice the humane work of the Indian Rights’ 
Association. Mr Herbert Welsh, whose devo¬ 
tion to that cause needs no public mention, 
has become convinced that any permanent 
progress in his peculiar work is blocked by 
the spoils system. This is the conclusion of 
most other patriotic citizens who have tried 
to do practical work in any direction having 
for its object the honor and well-beingof their 
country. To men having had the opportuni¬ 
ties of Mr. Welsh, for accurate knowledge of 
the practical works of the spoils method, it is 
its immorality that is the essential evil. It is 
that its yoke-fellow is always some manifesta¬ 
tion of brutality, ingratitude, deceit or treach¬ 
ery that makes the system repugnant to all 
religious and moral creeds. The feeling is 
becoming a conviction that clergymen of all 
churches and moral teachers of all sorts, must 
not .shirk the issue or fall behind in the actual 
work : it can not longer be put aside as a ques¬ 
tion of politics, it is a question of morals. It 
was this that induced Mr. Welsh to consult 
widely, especially with clergymen of all faiths, 
whether on the national thanksgiving day a 
sermon might not be appropriately preached 
on the evils of the spoils system. The approval 
of the plan has been remarkably spontaneous 
and hearty. That to preach this sermon is 
not to condemn any party, any man or set of 
men ; that it is not in any sense a comparison 
of any periods, is plain from the following cir¬ 
cular, which we print in full: 

APPEAL TO THE CLERGY TO PREACH ON CIVIL 

SERVICE REFORM ON THANKSGIVING DAY, 

NEXT ENSUING, ADVOCATING IT “ SO FAR 

AS IT INVOLVES FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES 

OF RIGHTEOUSNESS.” 

No public question .seems to us of more vital or 
more pressing importance than that of reform in the 
civil service. It is distinctively a question of public 
morality and of Ihe national character and integrity, 
contemplating the arrest of the corruption which 
now most plainly threatens that character and the 
honesty of the government. The chief source of 
this corruption is the practice of treating the enor¬ 
mous emoluments of the public .service in all its 
ramifications and details, including the smallest 
places and employments, as the prize of the success¬ 
ful party at an election. This is an abuse and an evil 
for which no party can be justly held responsible, 
but which has become a tradition of all parties, and 
with the rapid increase of the patronage the de¬ 
moralizing consequences are already startling. It 
turns the patronage of the government, 
designed solely for the public convenience, 
into a vast bribery fund. It breeds general corrup¬ 
tion by teaching the citizen to expect payment for dis¬ 
charge of a duty incumbent upon every voter, and 
it tends to transform an election from a popular ver¬ 
dict upon differing public policies into a desperate 
struggle for the emoluments of place. 

The disastrous effect of this corrupting system not 
only upon tlie politics and the public service, but 
upon the standards of public duty and official con¬ 
duct, upon the .self-respect of the people and a pure 
public spirit, can not be too seriously stated or too 
carefully considered. The greatest American states¬ 
men of all parties, the most eminent jurists, the 
most patriotic and devoted divines, and political 
students and observers of all countries have pointed 
out the nature and consequences of this evil, the cor¬ 
rection of which is a necessity transcending in im¬ 
portance all merely party aims and political policies 
of administration. Already public opinion has 


manifested itself so strongly that admirable national 
and state laws of limited application have been en¬ 
acted, and their honest enforcement is conceded to 
be of the greatest public benefit. But in such a 
movement nothing should be considered done while 
anything remains to do. Every patriot in every 
pursuit or profession, and especially every leader 
and guide of the public mind, may well assist in 
the beneficent work. 

The moral appeal which shall instruct, inspire, 
and strengthen public opinion to complete the good 
work, it seems to us would come from the pulpit 
with peculiar power. Believing that it is its office 
to apply eternal principles of religion and morals to 
human conduct, and to aid nations as well as indi¬ 
viduals to walk in the right way, holding that 
George Ma.son of Virginia spoke a terrible truth 
which history confirms, in saying that Providence 
punishes national sins by national calamities, we 
appeal to the pulpit to demand of the public con- 
.science that specific and acknowledged evils affect¬ 
ing the highest public welfare shall be redressed by 
simply, obvious and adequate means. In respect¬ 
fully suggesting, therefore, that on Tlianksgiving 
day, or such other day as may seem to you fitting 
you should devote a sermon to the consideration 
tion of this subject, we confidently invite your earn¬ 
est co-operation in a Christian endeavor to (juicken 
the conscience of the people and to lead tlie nation 
toj;ighteousness. 

Among those who have already allowed 
their names to be given as favoring this plan, 
are : 

The Rev. Howard Crosby of New York, the Rev. 
James McCosh, ex-president of Princeton College; 
the Rev. Francis L. Patton, president of Princeton 
College ; the Rev. James O. Murray, Dean of Prince¬ 
ton College; the Rev. John T. Duffield, of the 
College of New Jersey; the Rev. W. Henry Green, 
the Rev. Charles A. Aiken, the Rev. Benjamin B. 
Warfield, tlie Rev. C. Wistar Hodge, professors in 
Princeton Theological Seminary; the Rev. Charles 
Wood of Germantown, Philadelphia; the Right Rev. 
Thomas M. Clark, bishop of Rhode Island; the 
Right Rev. O. W. Whitaker, bishop of Pennsylvania ; 
the Right Rev. Leighton Coleman, bishop of Dela¬ 
ware ; the Right Rev. Henry B. Whipple, bishop of 
Minnesota ; the Right Rev. W. H. A. Bissell, bishop 
of Vermont; the Right Rev. F. D. Huntington, bishop 
of Central New York; the Right Rev. Charles T. 
Quintard, bishop of Tennessee; the Right Rev. Dan¬ 
iel S. Tuttle, bishop of Missouri; the Right Rev. John 
Scarborough, bishop of New Jersey; the Right Rev. 
W. E. McLaren, bishop of Chicago; the Right Rev. T. 
U. Dudley, bishop of Kentucky; the Right Rev. 
George F. Seymour, bishop of Springfield, Ill.; the 
Right Rev. Cortland Whitehead,bi.shop of Pittsburg; 
the Right Rev. Francis M. Whittle, bishop of Vir¬ 
ginia ; the Right Rev. David U. Knickerbacker 
bishop of Indiana; The Rev. S. McConnell of Phil¬ 
adelphia, the Rev. Phillips Brooks of Boston, the 
Rev. Thomas F. Davies of Philadelphia, the Rev. 
Charles H. Hibbard of Germantown, the Rev. 
J. De Wolf Perry of Germantown, the Rev. W. N. 
McVickar of Philadelphia, the Right Rev. John 
F. Spaulding, Bishop of Colorado: the Rev. James 
Morrow of Philadelphia, the Rev. J. Andrews Harris 
of Philadelphia, the Rev. George Dana Boardman of 
Philadelphia, the Right Rev. John F. Hurst, bishop 
Methodist Episcopal Church, Washington, D. C.; the 
Rev. George P. Fisher, professor of Yale College; the 
Right Rev. J. S. Johnson, bishop of Texas; the Rev, 
William Ely of Philadelphia. 

Bishop Huntington wrote in response to the 
request made of him : 

“ The measure you propose for bringing to 
the attention and the conscience of the people of 
the country the righteous reform in which you 
are engaged not only commends itself to my 
judgment, but it falls in with convictions 
which have long been vital and strong in my 
mind. Supreme above all political questions 
in the nation is the question between right 
and wrong, integrity and corruption, honor 
and greediness, in the national character. 


Who shall deal with it if not the ministers of 
Christ, the Master of society and King of men? 
What have jirophets and teachers to do, if 
not to proclaim the principles of that Master, 
and so to serve the kingdom of that King?” 

The Rt. Rev. Bishop Whitehead, of Penn¬ 
sylvania, in a recent interview, said : 

“ I have replied to the circular saying that I 
would be perfectly willing to exert my influence 
to have the question of civil service reform 
brought before the public in the manner sug¬ 
gested. I am very sure that the movement 
will receive widespread support throughout 
the country, and very probably the majority 
of the preachers will elect to take the que.stion 
as their subject on Thanksgiving day. I can 
not, of course, lay my commands on minis¬ 
ters of my church to speak on that or any 
subject, but I shall certainly use my in¬ 
fluence as far as possible in furtherance of the 
movement. Ministers of my church do not 
preach on Thanksgiving day, but no doubt 
those of other denominations, the Methodists 
and Presbyterians, will speak on the question 
before their congregations. 

“ It is a matter which may be very fairly 
treated from the pulpit, as it is entirely of a 
non-partisan nature, and one which appeals to 
the good citizenship of every member of the 
community. We are all of us interested in 
the question of civil service reform for the 
reason that our individual as well as our 
national prosperity depends on the class of 
men who as office holders carry on the admin¬ 
istration of our national affairs. So it is neces¬ 
sary to point out that if righteous-principled 
and capable men are elected to office, a pure and 
trustworthy administration may be looked for 
in return, and that if men of opposite charac¬ 
ter are placed there, it is not easy to foresee 
what must be the result. We don’t desire that 
every Tom, Dick and Harry that comes along 
seeking office should be elected because he has 
sufficient influence to place him there. The 
question is one on which the public should be 
thoroughly informed, and when such men as 
Bishop Huntington, of central New York, 
interest themselves in it, it will be sure to ob¬ 
tain very general attention. 

“I have not had an opportunity of forming 
an intelligent opinion as to the particular 
manner in which the question should be 
treated, but since the reform leaders promise 
to distribute a quantity of literature through¬ 
out the country, dealing fully with the matter, 
and that as Thanksgiving day is still some 
way off, ample time will be afforded every¬ 
body to familiarize themselves with the 
question.” 

Whether every clergyman in this state or 
whether a handful preach this sermon, good 
has already been accomplished by the sug¬ 
gestion, but it would be unfortunate to miss 
a noble opportunity. And those ministers of 
the gospel who will investigate an evil that 
is no less deadly because it loves darkness and 
privacy, who will have the courage to say 
that the spoils system is a slave system bru¬ 
talizing to those in power, and debasing to all 
who work under it, they will 6nd in unex¬ 
pected quarters sympathy and approval. We 
should not allow Mr. Welsh to bear all the 
burden of the working out of this plan. A 
very little labor on the part of those who ap¬ 
prove might surely be given. The clergy¬ 
men who will preach a sermon on this topic, 
the layman who will speak to clergymen 
of their acquaintance might sen 1 their names 
to this paper that further communication 
may be had. 







The civil Service chronicle. 


“ Of all the evils which beset public life and which de.stroy the usefulness of parties and of public men the greatest beyond all doubt is the evil of patronage.” 

—Congressman Henry Cabot Lodge—Plymouth Address. 


VoL. I, No. 6. INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST, 1889. terms : ^ fcen't8®per''copy.'*“ 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind., where subscrip¬ 
tions and advertisements will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana. 

“ Practical men with their eyes open are 
aware that patronage is a clisintergraling 
force, and the distribution of the offices al¬ 
most always makes trouble within the party.” 
New York Tribune. 

We hoped to publish the questions used 
here in the civil service examination 
August 6, but we could not get them in 
time. They will appear next month, with 
the rules for marking. 


During the month the administration 
has continued its process of making a clean 
sweep at a good pace for summer vaca¬ 
tion time, Clarkson now boasting of 15,- 
000 changes in the post-offices. The plain¬ 
est sign of the blindness of the admin¬ 
istration to its own promises and to the 
greatly increased sentiment of the country 
against the use of the offices as bribes, is 
shown in the rehabilitation of Mahone in 
Virginia. He has no possible hope of car¬ 
rying that state except by buying it with 
the enormous booty of the aggregate fed¬ 
eral offices which pertain to Virginia. His 
triumph would be the triumph of the 
wicked, and every good citizen should hope 
for his total defeat. 


District Attorney Chambers has an 
assistant named Cockrum who declares 
that the prosecution against Dudley had no 
foundation in fact. Nothing has com¬ 
mended President Harrison so much to the 
country as his refusal to have anything to 
do with Dudley. This refusal was because 
by an overwhelming aqd irresistible weight 
of evidence, it was, and is, clear that 
Dudley wrote what is known as the “ blocks 
of five ” letter, saying, in effect, that money 
w’ould be furnished to buy voters in Indi¬ 
ana, and advising that those purchased be 
taken to the polls in fives. No honest cit¬ 
izen can view Dudley with anything but a 
true citizen’s hatred for a professional cor- 
ruptor of public morals. It is very exas¬ 
perating to all such to see one of the pub¬ 
lic prosecutors stand out, brazen-faced, as 
the defender of such a man. A proper 
sense of the proprieties in his superiors 
would lead at once to the relegation of 
Cockrum to private life. 


President Harrison was in Indianapo¬ 
lis on the occasion of the laying of the cor¬ 
ner-stone of the monument to Indiana sol¬ 
diers. He was received respectfully, but 
in no sense enthusiastically. The reason 
is that he has simply been engaged in a 
business which does not arouse the approval 
of the people. It is a good sign that it does 
not. At the centennial celebration in New 
York he said that “exacting public duties” 
had prevented him from preparing a suit¬ 
able speech, and here, the other day, he 
gave lack of time as the reason why he had 
not prepared for the occasion. He has 
been President now for about five months, 
and during that time the whole world 
knows that he has had the one occupation 
of making vacancies by turning men and 
women out of public offices and putting 
other persons into their places, and that 
these other persons have been given the 
places to reward them for personal or party 
services. There has been nothing in his ca¬ 
reer as President to break the monotony of 
this work, and it is a matter for congratu¬ 
lation the people are not enthusiastic over 
it. 


Collector Cravens, of this district, has 
made a good start in his work of putting 
one set of men out of employment and 
putting in another, without cause; and he 
is keeping well to his word that no man 
shall, through him, work for the people, 
unless “ he is an unwavering, active repub¬ 
lican” and “an active party worker.” It 
is natural to expect that President Harri¬ 
son will restrain this officer who pours con¬ 
tempt upon him and his promises in his 
own home. It certainly can not be believed 
that a small politician can thus impudently 
trample upon the promises of the republi¬ 
can platform and letter of acceptance with 
no damaging result. The republicans 
should keep in mind that, sooner or later, 
they will have to face all the facts. In 1886, 
after' President Cleveland had been in 
office one year, a careful investigation was 
made to discover how his acts, in Indiana, 
squared with his promises. The results 
were put into a report which attracted 
attention and did its work over the 
whole country. The same kind of investi¬ 
gation is promised, next year, of the acts of 
the present admistration. This will be 
eminently fair and, in fact, it is the only 
consistent course. The report based upon 


the coming investigation will also do its 
work. If the facts have not kept pace with 
the promises, the administration will have 
to shoulder the burden. And beyond all 
this, in 1892, there will be a more search¬ 
ing examination of President Harrison’s 
management of the civil service than any 
president has ever yet had. These things 
should make the republicans move with 
caution, but, if history repeats itself, they 
will, in their turn, regard all this as of no 
consequence. 

The Indiana Civil Service Reform Asso¬ 
ciation has, since the annual meeting the 
last of January, had #57 new members, 
coming from sixty different towns in the 
state. The high character of the men, the 
diverse localities from which they come 
and the varied occupations and professions 
represented are most encouraging for the 
future of the Association and for the merit 
system in this state. Among the acces¬ 
sions are represented the Catholic, Episco¬ 
palian, Presbyterian, Baptist and Christian 
clergy, which means that this ques¬ 
tion is at last being considered in its true 
phase, as a moral and not as a political 
question. There is an unusual chance for 
spreading knowledge of the merit system 
in Indiana if the Association had funds at 
its command. Every member of the Asso¬ 
ciation should be provided with some of 
the popular tracts defending the system of 
competitive tests, so that if inclined he 
might have at hand arguments and facts 
for judicious distribution; further, this is 
the time to arouse discussion and to get a 
scrutiny into the practical workings of the 
spoils system by a series of prizes offered 
to the various colleges and high-schools of 
the state. The actual workings of con¬ 
gressional patronage, the inhumanity of 
the spoils system, the democracy of secur¬ 
ing places through competition might, 
with excellent results, be the subjects of 
prize essays. Especially should every effort 
be made to convince the teachers of Amer¬ 
ican history throughout Indiana that, al¬ 
though the text-books may omit all notice of 
the rise and progress and workings of the 
spoils system, it has, nevertheless, a place in 
the history of the country that should not be 
ignored. To print and circulate the needed 
pamphlets among the teachers of the state 
would require a considerable outlay. 




















42 


THE CrVIIv SERVICE CIIRONIOEE. 


The Civil Service Chronicle is not 
the paper of any particular person, nor is 
it “ controlled by republicans who voted 
for General Harrison as a civil service 
reformer.” It belongs to the friends of 
the merit system in Indiana and through¬ 
out the west and over the whole country. 
It means to advocate that system without 
any regard to the persons or party whom 
such advocacy may help or hurt. As has 
been said before, it has no money-making 
object; the editorial work upon it is done 
without charge or compensation except the 
ample reward of knowing that the greatest 
question now requiring the attention of 
the American people is making an advance 
such as it has never made before, and that 
the Civil Service Chronicle is aiding in 
that advance. It is true that the paper is ac¬ 
tively controlled by those who voted against 
the re-election of President Cleveland, who 
had made his record in the management 
of the federal civil service, and in favor of 
the election of General Harrison, who had 
his record yet to niake. He is making it 
now, and at the proper time he will be 
judged upon it by all friends of the merit 
system. When that time comes, the Civil 
Service Chronicle will try to judge him 
fairly. In the meantime, its highest duty 
is to point out the facts which illustrate 
the moral and physical rottenness of that 
enemy of government by the people, the 
spoils system, the system of using hun¬ 
dreds of thousands of state and federal 
offices to pay personal and party debts. 


At the request of Postmaster Van Cott 
the civil service commission has designated 
the places in the New York post-office 
which are exempted from examination. 
These number 30, to about 2,200 employes, 
while the Indianapolis office has some 16 
exempted places to about 100 employes. 
There is a great deal of humbug and “ pol¬ 
itics ” about the necessity of having ex¬ 
empted places. It is claimed that they are 
“confidential” places, but the acts of the 
appointing officer show that this is usually 
a mere pretense. An inspection of the 
acts of most appointing officers shows that 
he fills these “ confidential ” places purely 
on the principles of the spoils system. Any 
officer who is really in favor of the merit 
system will follow the example of Post¬ 
master Pearson, and will hold these places 
for the benefit of the rank and file in his 
office. If Mr. Pearson had a vacancy in 
the headship of a division, he did not hunt 
through the city of New York for a man 
who had done for his party a good deal of 
campaign work, but he remembered the 
good of the service and the deserts of the 
2,200 men under him, many of whom had 
had years of experience, and he threw the 
vacancy open to the subordinate who, upon 
strict business tests, showed himself best 
fitted for it. 


It is reported that the President has re¬ 
fused the request of the civil service com¬ 
mission that the places of clerks of the 
census bureau be thrown open to free com¬ 
petition. He has apparently with delibe¬ 
ration rejected anotlier unusual opportun¬ 
ity to advance good government and build 
up the merit system. That the present 
commission should ask it is conclusive of 
its practicability. The reason given by the 
President that the employment is of lim¬ 
ited duration, is another way of saying that 
in his opinion congressmen, who serve no 
interest but their own, will make better 
selections than would be made by compe¬ 
tition ; and the saying is not true. The 
other objection of the President is that 
congress did not intend that these places 
should be put under the civil service rules. 
He will not claim to find non-intention 
anywhere in the law. But it is true that, 
when it was going through congress, the 
talk among congressmen, as individuals, 
was that whichever party was success¬ 
ful in 1888, should have these places as 
spoil. President Harrison knows of this 
talk and is apparently governed by it. 
Nevertheless, it was simply the unofficial 
talk of a pack of political pirates masquer¬ 
ading under the name of congressmen. 


The Reform Club of New York is spend¬ 
ing $1,200 a month and soon expects to 
spend $3,000 a month disseminating its 
views in relation to the tariff. This amount 
of effort is worth the attention of civil ser¬ 
vice reformers. The merit system is in 
the field against the spoils system, and the 
complete overthrow of the latter is abso¬ 
lutely certain as soon as the people under¬ 
stand the facts about both systems. These 
facts can be spread only as rapidly as the 
means of doing so will warrant, and for 
this purpose money is much needed. The 
friends of the merit system are so well or¬ 
ganized that the smallest amount of money 
can be made to count, and if any one feels 
that he would like to contribute and have 
the assurance that his money would be 
well spent, he need not hesitate. Any one 
may at any time learn what was done with 
his contribution. There must be many 
people in the west who would like to help 
the merit system, but who are not actively 
engaged in its behalf. Contributions for 
the Indiana Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion should be sent to Noble C, Butler, In¬ 
dianapolis; and for the use of the National 
League of Civil Service Reform Associa- 
ations to William Potts, 35 Liberty street. 
New York City. 


We publish in full a letter from Mr. 
Welsh to the Boston Tramcript on the treat¬ 
ment of the Indians by the present admin¬ 
istration. It must be remembered that 


Mr. Welsh understands entirely what he 
is talking about, and that, as secretary of 
the Indian Rights Association, he is giving 
years of time to the welfare of the Indians. 
He is, therefore, disinterested. The man 
who ordered the dismissal of the teachers 
from Virginia was Congressman Mitchell, 
and he and his likes are allowed to rule in 
this matter of the Indians. They care noth¬ 
ing for the Indians. They care only for 
quartering upon the public treasury cer¬ 
tain people who will help them most to 
re-election. Their view of the Indians is 
like that of the army contractors who fur¬ 
nished shoddy clothing and wormy food to 
the soldiers when the best effort of every 
honest man seemed necessary to prevent 
the overthrow of the nation. The Indians 
are to them simply a thing from which 
personal benefit is to be wrung if possible. 


THE EXAMINATION. 

The examination held here, August 6, 
for places in this post-office, may be made 
to mark an era in the progress of the merit 
system in this state. Almost at the last 
moment, the civil service commission add¬ 
ed Noble C. Butler and William P. Fish- 
back to the local board; the former is the 
clerk and the latter is the master in chan¬ 
cery of the United States courts for Indi¬ 
ana. These two citizens are well known 
throughout Indiana as not caring to work 
republicans or democrats, as such, into or 
out of minor public offices. They are in 
favor of the enforcement of the civil serv¬ 
ice law, and they want to see the merit sys¬ 
tem embodied in that law put into success¬ 
ful operation. Because the republicans are 
in power they do not want the democrats, 
the labor men, the greenbackers, the pro¬ 
hibitionists, or any other non-republicans 
to stay away from examinations; on the 
other hand, they want them to come for¬ 
ward and compete as the law provides they 
may do, and to all such their names are an 
ample guaranty of fair play. It may be 
said, also, that their convictions are accom¬ 
panied by an entfre fullness of courage; in 
homely language, they are not afraid of 
any one. The recent examination was 
conducted in accordance with these views 
and qualifications; and that with the ex¬ 
amination of papers required six days of 
hard work, without compensation. If dem¬ 
ocrats did not compete and get upon the 
eligible list it is their own fault, and it will 
be their own fault if they do not do so in 
the future. 

And now the successful contestants hav¬ 
ing obtained their respective places on this 
list by fair competition, the merit system 
in this post-office has reached a decisive 
point. When vacancies occur and three 
names are certified to Postmaster Wallace 
from which to make his selection, are the 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


43 


selections to be decided by “pulls” and a 
dozen other back-door influences, or will 
the man who has honorably won the high¬ 
est place be given his earned reward, un¬ 
less there is a good business reason for 
taking the next lower? This, of course, 
depends upon the postmaster. If he per¬ 
forms his sworn duty he will not dismiss a 
man without good cause, and he will not 
hunt for causes nor call things causes 
against one set of men and not against an¬ 
other. He will, when making selections 
to fill vacancies, put out of his mind all 
questions of politics, or friendship,‘or so¬ 
cial, or other outside influences, and will 
sacredly respect the rights which those on 
the eligible list have obtained, and will 
give freely the best of reasons if the high¬ 
est man is not appointed. The public is 
an interested spectator and will watch the 
action of the postmaster in every case with 
keen interest and with ready crit'cism for 
any unfairness. Messrs. Fishback and 
Butler are entitled to the thanks of the 
public for daj's of hard,disinterested work 
without compensation, and for having con¬ 
sented to be the means of breaking down 
the tradition that the local board must be 
appointed to please the head of the office 
and from those under his control. It is 
fair to say, however, that Mr. Butler was 
appointed and consented to serve after the 
special solicitation of Postmaster Wallace. 


THE MAJORITY AND THE SPOILS 
SYSTEM. 

Senator Hoar writes to the CivU Service 
Record for August as follows : 

I think you do not allow for the fact that a very 
large majority of the American people are not yet 
convinced of the soundness of the principle which 
lies at the bottom of what is called civil service re¬ 
form. They think that it is better to have the party 
in power appoint men who have shown aetivity and 
zeal in its service to executive positions, to hold the 
party responsible for them, and that in that way we 
shall get, on the whole, a more honest, zealous, and 
eflicient service than by selecting public agents in 
any other way. 

We deny the last statement. The Ameri¬ 
can people have never believed that it was 
better to have the party in power fill the 
offices with men who have shown activity 
and zeal in the service of that party. The 
majority did not believe this during the 
first forty years when it was not done; nor 
did they believe it when Andrew Jackson 
did it; nor did they believe it while all the 
presidents since Andrew Jackson have done 
it; nor do they believe it while the Clark¬ 
sons and Wanamakers of the administra¬ 
tion are attempting to do it to-day. There 
has never been a time when the average 
American citizen, and the great majority 
are the average, has not condemned the 
spoils system, as applied by Jackson and 
his successors. To say anything else is to 
say that the American citizen’s intelligence 


became so dulled that he lost his grasp of 
sound principles of government after see¬ 
ing those principles practiced for forty 
years. We are ready for the question, why 
do the people allow the practice of giving 
out the offices as rewards to party workers 
to continue ? Why do the Russian people 
allow the crimes, described by George Ken- 
nan, committed by the organization which 
calls itself the Russian government, to con¬ 
tinue ? Does any one believe that a ma¬ 
jority of the Russian people are in favor of 
such continuance ? Or why do the people 
of Continental Europe permit themselves 
to be burdened to the utmost of their en¬ 
durance by standing armies ? Does any 
one believe that the majority, with an un¬ 
trammeled choice, would not at once sweep 
away the whole system ? These things 
continue because the government machines 
so skilfully unite and handle the minority 
that the majority are kept under ; and it is 
often only after years of agitation and pro¬ 
test, and sometimes rebellion, that a small 
part of improvements which a 4 )eople be¬ 
lieve in can be obtained. 

In exactly the same manner the people 
of the United States are kept to a spoils 
system which they condemn. We speak 
with deliberation; the number who are in 
favor of using the 142,000 offices of the 
United States to give to active party work¬ 
ers, possibly to a new set every four years, 
is confined to the party machines and to 
those who are looking for ward to an office. 
They do not comprise one-sixtieth of the 
people. 

Why, then, does the practice continue ? 
Certainly, there is no lack of promises; a 
glance at the platforms and letters of ac¬ 
ceptance upon which Cleveland and Har¬ 
rison were elected, shows that. These doc¬ 
uments were bawled from one end of the 
country to the other. But the election 
over, the president installed, the party ma¬ 
chine lays its grip upon him. In walk the 
Gormans, the Vests, the Vporheeses, the 
Quays, the Mahones, the Hiscocks, and the 
Ingallses and scare the president off the 
platform upon which he was elected and 
upon which he is bound by every principle 
of honor to stand. Then the Platts, the 
Hattons, and a small crowd of congressmen 
who can not possibly maintain their hold 
upon public life without spoils to distrib¬ 
ute, set up a cry that the present is the 
only genuine American-democratic-anti- 
Chinese system, and that the effects will be 
baneful if congressmen are not allowed to 
continue to pay those who manage pri¬ 
maries for them, out of the iDublic treasury. 
Then people like Senator Hoar, who are in 
favor of the merit system, come forward 
and say that the great majority of the peo¬ 
ple like these political bosses and want, for 
instance, Ingalls to arrange it so that those 


who ride fifty miles exclusively to help his 
personal fortunes, shall be paid for this 
service by a salary out of the public treas¬ 
ury. This is the circle in which we are 
now traveling. 

It is true that, while the American peo¬ 
ple want some escape from the looting sys¬ 
tem under which they are now governed, 
they are not entirely clear as to the best 
escape. It is only a question of time, how¬ 
ever. The merit system, which, in clerical 
positions, puts public employment up to 
be competed for and to be gained by the 
most deserving, wherever it becomes 
known, makes its way as the fairest and 
most democratic method of distributing 
public work that has ever been discovered. 
As Senator Hoar says, the majority are not 
yet in favor of it; but the sole reason is 
that they are not familiar with it. With 
the final success of this will go the gather¬ 
ing of the smaller offices, like the fourth- 
class post-offices, into divisions where ap¬ 
pointment and tenure shall be governed 
by the same principles that govern them 
in every other business. The men who 
now live upon the spoil of office will then 
have to go out into the world and earn 
their living upon the merit system there. 


THE TREASURY DOOR SWINGS 
BACK. 

The Civil Service Chronicle has already 
noticed the maliciousness akin to devilish¬ 
ness with which republican and democratic 
administrations attempted to break down the 
late Postmaster Pearson, carrying this to the 
extent of allowing a bill of three dollars for 
repairing desks, only after an exhaustive 
struggle, and of delaying for four months fill¬ 
ing orders for blanks, of which millions were 
used in a year. The Christian Union thus sets 
it out: 

“ We give on another page an inside view of the 
pathetic experience of a man in the employ of the 
United-States Government, whose only fault was 
his fidelity to the people whom he had been ap¬ 
pointed to serve, and who was obstructed at every 
point of his service because of his loyalty. He was 
refused proper supplies ; was given insufficient and 
imperfect material for his work; was denied suffi¬ 
cient force for his work ; was treated habitually as 
a suspect; was compelled in frequent instances to 
payout of his none too large salary the money which 
was morally due from the department. Finally, 
when eight years of this sort of treatment—half of it 
under a republican, half of it under a democratic 
administration—had brought him to a sick bed that 
proved his bed of death, he was dropped from the 
service altogether to make room for a professional 
politician, whose appeal for means to do the postal 
work of a great city will probably not fall on ears as 
inattentive. And Mr. Pearson’s whole fault was, we 
repeat, that he would devote his energies and those 
of his subordinates to the service of the public in the 
department which had been intrusted to him, and 
would not allow either his own or their energies to be 
diverted from that service to building up a political 
machine and paying for political services that either 
had been rendered him or were expected by him in 
the future. We leave the story to carry its own 
moral; moralizing on it would be an insult to the 
intelligence and conscience of our readers.” 
















44 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


It was a fitting end of this treatment that 
Mr. Pearson should be turned out of his place, 
without thanks, or gr&titude, or appreciation 
from his superiors. Mr. Van Cott is put into 
his place at the dictation of Platt, and in¬ 
stantly the energies of the administration are 
quickened. A commission is sent to look 
through Postmaster Van Cott’s office and see 
what he needs, and its report is made. There 
is no complaint now of lack of appropriations, 
but, at once, Postmaster-General Wanamaker 
allows an additional $78,000, and directs the 
employment of 102 new men. If these 102 
new men and this money had been allowed to 
Mr. Pearson, his men would not have com¬ 
plained of overwork, the labor element would 
not have interfered, and President Harrison 
would not have had the excuse of refusing to 
keep him because he overworked his men. 

TYPICAL OPPOSITION. 

The Central Labor Union of Buffalo was re¬ 
cently addressed by Mr. Loomis and Mr. Shep¬ 
ard of the Buffalo Civil Service Reform Asso¬ 
ciation. As is always the case where the de¬ 
mocracy and the practicability of the merit sys¬ 
tem are explained, great interest was aroused 
and many questions were asked, and the dis¬ 
cussion was carried into the other labor organ¬ 
izations throughout the city. The equal 
chance for all is the principle which makes 
the merit system appeal to the judgment and 
gain the approval of men who compete in the 
general labor market. The only surprising 
thing is that labor organizations do not de¬ 
mand that the government labor market shall 
be taken out of the field of favoritism and 
“pulls” and brought within the general labor 
field. A marked accompaniment to this in¬ 
terest in Buffalo was a long discussion in the 
public prints, especially between Mr. Loomis 
and the Buffalo Evening News. This is the first 
instance we have seen of a paper attempting to 
go at length into an argument against the merit 
system; and the attempt is a very lame one. 
The arguments of the News are statements 
that it is the “ Mongolian system.” That it is 
“ the un-American, Chinese competitive sys¬ 
tem,” and is the twin sister of the “ un-Ameri¬ 
can, Australian system of balloting.” That it 
is “emasculating the civil-service.” That the 
interference “of non-partisan nonsense” with 
the civil service impairs party organization. 
That the examination questions are not “prac¬ 
tical.” That Mr. Loomis is “ Mandarin Loo 
Mis,” and so on. The facts to support these 
statements were entirely wanting. 

Very unwillingly, it was obliged to yield 
to the demand of Mr. Loomis, and publish the 
questions used in the April examination for 
positions on the Buffalo police force, which 
each applicant had had an opportunity to 
study for a week previous to his examination, 
and which were; 

1. When may a patrolman leave his post ? 2. When 
and under what circumstances may a patrolman ab¬ 
sent himself from duty? 3. What is a felony? 4. 
What is the duty of a patrolman in regard to houses 
of disorder and ill fame? 5. Is petit larceny to be 


regarded as a felony? 6. When is a patrolman 
empowered to arrest without a warrant ? 7. To 

whom may a patrolman communicate police infor¬ 
mation or information respecting orders? 8. State 
three different reasons for which a patrolman may be 
reprimanded or dismissed from the force. 9. What 
is a patrolman’s duty when requested by an accuser 
to arrest another person ? 10. May a patrolman en¬ 
ter a dwelling-house in pursuit of an offender, and, 
if so, under what conditions? 

To these questions the News opposed the fol¬ 
lowing mighty argument: 

“ It is certainly a proper thing to instruct a patrol¬ 
man in regard to his duties, though the more business¬ 
like method would be to do so after he has been ap¬ 
pointed.” 

Apparently not satisfied with this argument, 
the News goes on : 

“ Now if Mr. Loomis really wishes to put the mat¬ 
ter fairly, let him take the examination papers for 
places in the federal department.” 

To this Mr. Loomis replies that he knows 
of no federal questions of the kind mentioned 
by the News, and suggests that the News pub¬ 
lish those upon which it has based its state¬ 
ments. This the News does not do and never 
will. 


THE NEW INDIAN COMMISSION¬ 
ER. 

Indian Commissioner Morgan’s talk has a 
very healthy sound. He says: 

“ I have never been an active politician, 
have never solicited or held public office until 
now. In company with others I asked for the 
retention of Mr. Oberly as commissioner of 
Indian affairs.” 

Having entered upon his duties he proceed¬ 
ed to re-appoint Indian agents who recom¬ 
mended very largely for his approval their 
present subordinates. He says : 

“ These approvals are made with the distinct 
understanding (1) that the parties named are 
thoroughly competent to fill the positions for 
which they are nominated, and that they will 
be zealous and faithful in the performance of 
their duties ; (2) that their tenure of office is 
permanent so long as they remain competent 
and efficient ; and (3) that the office reserves 
the right to remove—for cause only—any em¬ 
ploye upon sufficient evidence of unfitness 
for the position held.” 

He has also re-issued a circular prepared 
by Commissioner Oberly : 

“ No superintendent or other school 
employe shall be suspended by an agent with¬ 
out authority first obtained from the commis¬ 
sioner, except when, in his opinion, the moral 
welfare or the discipline of the school im¬ 
peratively demand the immediate suspension 
of an employe, in which case the agent may 
suspend such employe and select a competent 
person to temporarily perform his duties. 
Every such suspension must be immediately 
reported by the agent to the commissioner, 
with a specific statement of his reasons for the 
action.” 

Inquiring into the fitness of the present 
farmers, he says: 

It is not the desire of this office to make any un¬ 
necessary clianges in the force of farmers, nor to un¬ 
necessarily disturb those wlio are competent and 
faithful. On the other hand, the quality of service 
rendered is a paramount consideration, and the good 
of the Indians must be regarded as outweighing any 
personal interests in favor of the farmers. 

He also states that he will appoint no per¬ 


son as a teacher in the Indian schools who 
would not be able to secure a similar position 
in the best white schools where he resides. 

The National League of Civil Service Re¬ 
form Associations will hold its annual meeting 
in Philadelphia October 1st and 2d. There is 
a prospect of a large meeting, larger than was 
ever before held by the League. It is to be 
hoped that Indiana will have a large repre¬ 
sentation taken from different sections of the 
state. 


Mr. William Potts, secretary of the Na¬ 
tional League, has compiled the decisions and 
opinions on the construction of the civil ser¬ 
vice laws of the United States and of New 
York, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. The 
compilation is printed by James B. Lyon, of 
Albany, and is valuable to students of the sub¬ 
ject and to all officers in any manner con¬ 
nected with the administration of civil service 
laws. 


The Indianapolis Jourmd says “ the ap¬ 
pointment of ex-Governor Warmoth as col¬ 
lector at New Orleans probably indicates his 
purpose to engage again in active politics, and 
that means republican activity in Louisiana.” 

If, as the Journal also says, Warmoth is very 
wealthy, why does he need the bribe of an of¬ 
fice to stimulate his flagging energies? 


Postmaster Paul of Milwaukee sent in his 
resignation, and Postmaster-General Wana¬ 
maker accepted it, after telling Paul that the 
administration had determined to remove him. 
This is a clear snub to republican Congressman 
Van Schaick, who was backing Paul on the 
ground that to investigate this post-office with¬ 
out this congressman’s permission was an in¬ 
fringement of “ prerogative.” 


Postmaster-General Wanamaker says 
that he is tired to death of receiving delega¬ 
tions favoring this or that man for postmaster, 
and that he is anxious to get down to real 
business and improve the service. In about 
six months he has changed about one-fourth 
of the employes under him. At this rate he 
will be ready for real business in about a year 
and a half. His real business for his remain¬ 
ing two years will then consist in trying to 
keep his new hands as far as possible from 
wrecking the public business. 


—The attorney-general has decided that 
when three names are certified to an appoint¬ 
ing officer, and one is a soldier, the soldier 
must be appointed, other things being equal. 
But he also decided that the appointing officer 
may still judge of the relative capacity and 
personal fitness of^ the soldier. Ordinarily a 
person is entitled to but three certifications, 
but the President has just approved a rule that 
each name on the eligible list shall be certi¬ 
fied three times exclusive of certifications with 
the names of soldiers entitled to a preference. 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


45 


We have a large class of political leaders, 
great and small, in Indiana who, under the 
name of rotation in office, believe in seizing 
every place of public employment into which 
they can work a partisan, exactly as the bar¬ 
barians seized the lands of the Romans and 
the Gauls. These leaders never tire of eulogiz¬ 
ing Thomas Jefferson. lie lived a good while 
ago, and they evidently believe him a safe 
man to talk about. Their attention is ear¬ 
nestly called to an extract in another column 
from Jefferson’s letter to Madison regarding 
the four-year-law, which he characterizes as 
“the late mischievous law, vacating every 
four years nearly all the executive offices of 
the government.” 

Senator Blair, of New Hampshire, says: 

“ Civil service reform, forsooth ! It is a humbug. 
Has the government business been advanced since 
the application of this principle for the filling of 
offices? Have we heard of any great improvements 
which have tiiken place in the direction of public 
affairs since this competitive system was inau¬ 
gurated? I defy any one to show me one single 
instance where benefit has resulted. The law should 
be blotted from the statute books.” 

This is a fair instance of the argument by 
which the opponents of the merit system think 
they demolish it. Senator Blair had better 
examine the history of the New York post- 
office for the last twelve years, or the bureau 
of engraving and printing while under E. O. 
Graves, or the Indianapolis post-office while 
Aquilla Jones was surreptitiously following 
the system dear to the Blairs. 

L. D. Le Van was appointed postmaster 
at Wilson, New York. It then appeared that 
he had been convicted of keeping a disorderly 
house, and he accordingly was removed. It 
turns out that the only foundation for the 
charge was card-playing in his shop when he 
was not present, and that the charge was 
brought in spite by one of the players. It is 
also a fact that Mr. Le Van is a man of good 
standing in Wilson, and was a creditable ap¬ 
pointment. It also turns out that this very 
mean trick was played upon him by republi¬ 
cans of the Crowley faction, who wanted of¬ 
fices for themselves, and who hunted up the 
court records and carried the story to Wash¬ 
ington as a genuine proof of Mr. Le Van’s real 
character. This is a fine illustration of the 
anti-Chinese system, and we commend it to 
the clergymen who will discuss the spoils 
system on Thanksgiving Day. 

The Boston Herald says that the result of 
President Harrison’s management of the civil 
service “ is to be the perpetuation of the spoils 
system. ♦ * * President Harrison has set¬ 

tled it. He has fixed his own policy to be 
that of proscription of all his opponents in 
office. He has made it impossible for his op¬ 
ponents to have a policy more liberal on their 
side.” 

It is well that this hedging for the democrats 
is begun early. They will have plenty of time 
to ponder the matter. They will have to de¬ 
cide whether they can get back into office 


with the understanding that they are to per¬ 
petuate the spoils system. An affirmative de¬ 
cision will indicate a belief that the people 
will ratify the displacement of over 140,000 
office-holders by new hands every four years 
at the dictation of men like Quay, Gorman, Ma- 
hone. Vest, Hiscock, Voorhees, Platt and so 
on. 

WANTON REMOVALS. 

■» _ 

The danger, then, consists merely in this: The 
President can displace from office a man whose 
merits require that he should be continued in it- 
What will be the motives which the President can 
feel for such abuse of his power, and the restraints 
that operate to prevent it? In the first place, he 
will be impeachable by this house, before the senate, 
for such an act of maladministration; for I contend 
that the wanton removal of meritorious officers would 
subject him to impeachment and removal from his own 
high trust. « o Can we suppose a President, 
elected for four years only, dependent upon the pop¬ 
ular voice, impeachable by the legislature, little, if 
at all, distinguished for wealth, personal talents, or 
influence from the head of the department himself; 
I say, will he bid defiance to all these considerations, 
and wantonly dismiss a meritorious and virtuous 
officer? Such an abuse of power exceeds my conception. 
—Congressman James Madison, June, 1789. 

—August 17, the President appointed thir¬ 
ty-nine postmasters. One was at the end of a 
term, twenty-five were upon removal, and 
thirteen upon resignation, voluntary or forced. 

—In the first five months of his term Presi¬ 
dent Harrison has made 13,000 changes in 
fourth-class postmasters, against 4,000 made 
by Cleveland in the corresponding time. Har¬ 
rison has also made 1,059 presidential appoint¬ 
ments to President Cleveland’s 854. 

—Five hundred and sixty-three new post¬ 
masters have been appointed in Iowa since 
Clarkson was made assistant postmaster gen¬ 
eral, and he publishes their names in his 
paper, the Des Moines Register. There can be 
no complaint of the shortness of this measure 
of his contempt of those who expected his 
party promises to be kept. 

—H. C. Smith, a colored lawyer, by competi¬ 
tion secured a place on the eligible list at 
Nashville, Tenn., and July 22, 1884, was ap¬ 
pointed clerk in the office of the sixth auditor 
of the treasury. He was forced to resign July 
14, this year, by Auditor Coulter, the man 
who said that the horn-blowers should have 
the places. In answer to Smith, Coulter said : 
“ We want your place. You see the old sol¬ 
diers are clamoring for places, and we can’t 
put them off any longer.” 

—Postmaster James A. McKenna, of Long 
Island City (N. Y.), has been removed after 
having been in office twenty-eight months. A 
petition signed by 221 republicans and a large 
number of others was presented for his reten¬ 
tion, and one signed by 410 republicans and 
all the clergy of the city was ready for pre¬ 
sentation. The board of aldermen passed a 
resolution to the same effect, and the banks 
and business men generally were opposed to 
his removal. Pie had been an unusually good 
officer, as the facts connected with his office 
show. No cause for removal was assigned; 
an inexperienced politician has taken his 
place. 

—President Harrison’s postmaster, Godfrey, 


at New Albany, discharged all of the letter 
carriers with these words : 

“Gentlemen, there are no charges against 
your official conduct. You have done your 
work well, performed to my entire satisfaction 
every duty required. You are gentlemen, and 
I wish you well and hope you will have suc¬ 
cess in life ; but you know, boys,you are dem¬ 
ocrats.” 

To this the Indianapolis News says: 

“The New Albany post office is not under 
the civil service law, and hence no law was 
violated by this barbarous deed, but the in¬ 
stincts of fair play, the promptings of common 
sense, considerations for the public service, 
and the whole spreading spirit of the time are 
affronted by such a ruthless act. It is a plea 
for the extension of the civil service such as 
President Harrison said he would favor.” 


THE AMERICAN-DEMOCRATIC AN¬ 
TI-CHINESE-SYSTEM. 

—There are 49 applicants for the collector- 
ship of customs at El Paso, Texas. 

—Alderman Gove, of Boston, says: “A can¬ 
didate’s qualifications should be those stated 
by Zach Chandler—first, is he competent for 
the place? and. second, is he a d—d good re¬ 
publican ? ” 

—Some fifty republican leaders selected 
Higgins out of seventeen candidates for post¬ 
master at Fort Wayne and by resolution in¬ 
formed the President. Then some seventy old 
soldiers met and nominated Dougall. Then 
some fifty old soldiers met and indorsed Hig¬ 
gins. And thus the “ good of the service ” is 
being wrought out. 

—The American anti-Chinese system in 
Brooklyn : It was the duty of Politician But¬ 
ler to visit the navy yard, find out the vacan¬ 
cies that may be filled, report them to chair¬ 
man Birkett of the republican general com¬ 
mittee, who then made the appointments by 
selecting persons from the various ward asso¬ 
ciations. Politician Watkins carried the list 
of the elect, but, wishing to get in a caulker 
from his own ward, he asked Butler not to tell 
Birkett of a vacancy. Butler demurred, and 
they came to blows, but without decisive re¬ 
sult. 

—In 1884, Blaine carried Michigan by 3,308, 
the republicans electing five congressmen and 
the democrats six. The democrats distributed 
spoils until 1886, and the republicans then 
carried the state by 7,432, electing six con¬ 
gressmen and the democrats five. Don Dick¬ 
inson then gave the democrats the balance of 
the federal spoils and, in 1888, the republicans 
carried the state by 22,918, electing nine con¬ 
gressmen to the democrats two. 

—Hugh Cullom was in the employ of the 
city of New York, at two dollars a day, and, 
as he stated to his grand army post, was twice 
“assessed” and paid, but the third assessment 
he refused to pay, and was discharged. He 
was unable to get work elsewhere, and com¬ 
mitted suicide. The New York Times justly 
says that under the merit system of hiring 
laborers in force in Massachu-setts, Cullom 
would not have been discharged, and the city 
of New York would not have been the agent 
of driving him to kill himself. 

—Supervisor George Green of the twenty- 
second ward, Brooklyn, is insane. The reason 
given is that “during the last six months he 













4G 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


has had his first experience at providing places 
for the hundreds of men in his ward who 
placed him in public life. Since Harrison 
was elected Mr. Green has had no rest. Day 
and night the place-hunters have flocked to 
his office or his house, importuning him for 
his assistance. He was the member of the ex¬ 
ecutive committee of the republican general 
committee from his ward, and so had to attend 
meetings almost nightly. A month ago he 
broke down. It was reported that he had gone 
away, but he really was kept in close confine¬ 
ment at his home. His physicians held a con¬ 
sultation yesterday and decided that he must 
go away for six months or he will become vio¬ 
lently insane.” 

Nevertheless the twenty-second ward asso¬ 
ciation does not propose to lose its grip. It 
“met on Thursday night, and after considering 
Mr. Green’s condition, appointed John Sutton, 
Henry Bristow, and Major Thomas Bell a com¬ 
mittee to look out for the interests of the ward 
in patronage matters until Mr. Green’s succes¬ 
sor can be elected.” 

—Mr. William Barnes of the Albany Journal 
came over to see the President before he left 
here for Deer Park, this morning. Mr. Barnes 
was anxious to settle the muddle which has 
arisen in the division of federal patronage for 
Albany. He has succeeded in settling the 
post-office contest, and it is announced to-night 
that Col. Werner has been agreed upon as 
postmaster, and that his appointment will be 
made early next week. Up to the present time 
the Barnes and Draper factions have been un¬ 
able to reach an agreement in the matter of 
the surveyorship for the Albany district. Mr. 
Draper is backing for the place his law part¬ 
ner, Alden Chester, while Mr. Barnes desires 
to secure the position for John M. Bailey, ex¬ 
member of congress, ex-collector of internal 
revenue, and ex consul. The Draper people 
think that Bailey has enough “exes” before 
his name, and they say that it is time that 
some other man had a chance at the patronage 
trough. It is thought that Chester stands the 
better chance for appointment. Mr. Clark¬ 
son is anxious to get the Syracuse post- 
-office out of the way, but he has not been 
able to settle the matter yet. The present in¬ 
cumbent is Editor Northrop of the Syracuse 
Courier. He has a warm personal friend in 
the person of Congressman Belden, and as his 
term does not expire for more than a year Mr. 
Belden does not seem to be in a hurry to rec¬ 
ommend his successor. Senator Hiscock wants 
Mr. Carroll E. Smith of the J.wr)iai appointed, 
and he wants the change made at once. Mr. 
Clarkson would like to oblige the senator, but 
as the republican representative is generally 
recognised where there is one, he finds it diffi¬ 
cult to furnish a reason for the appointment 
of Mr. Smith without Mr. Belden’s recom¬ 
mendation. Mr. Smith will be appointed 
eventually, in all probability, but it is not 
probable that Senator Hiscock will be able to 
bring about the change just yet .—Dispatch to 
New York IHines, Aug. IS. 

—Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote to a friend as 
follows: 

Sai.em, March 5, 1849. 

I am informed that there is to be a strong effort 
among the politicians here to remove me from office, 
and that my successor is already marked out. I do 
not think that this ought to be done ; for I was not 
appointed to office as a reward for political services, 
nor have I acted as a politician since. A large por- 
tion of the local democratic party look coldly on me, 
for not having used the influence of my position to 
obtain the removal of whigs—which I might have 
done, but which I in no case did. Neither was my 
appointment made at the expense of a whig ; for my 


predecessor was appointed by Tyler in his latter days, 
and called himself a democrat. Nor can any charge 
of inattention to duty, or other official misconduct, 
he brought against me; or, if so, I could easily re¬ 
fute it. There is, therefore, no ground for disturbing 
me, except on the most truculent party system. All 
this, however, will be of little avail with the slang- 
whangers—the vote disturbers—the Jack Cades who 
assume to decide upon these matters, after a political 
triumph. 

Salem, June 8,1849. 

I am turned out of oflice ! 

There is no use in lamentation. It now remains to 
consider what I shall do next. The emoluments of 
the office have been so moderate that I have not 
been able to do anything more than support my 
family, and pay some few debts that I have con¬ 
tracted. If you could do anything in the way of pro¬ 
curing me some stated literary employment, in con¬ 
nection with a newspaper, or as corrector of the press 
to some printing establishment, etc., it could not 
come at a better time. Perhaps Epes Sargent, who is 
a friend of mine, would know of something. I shall 
not stand upon my dignity; that must fake care of 
itself. Perhaps there may be some subordinate oflice 
connected with the Boston Athenseum. Do not think 
anything too humble to be mentioned to me. 


ANSWERING A FOOL ACCORDING 
TO HIS FOLLY. 

Theodore Roosevelt says in the New York 
Herald: 

“ The other day I was passing by one of 
the large Washington hotels and overheard a 
prominent politician, a member of congre.ss, 
declaiming in stentorian tones against the 
civil service law and winding up the speech 
with the frantic interrogation to his hearers 
as to what they thought of asking a letter 
carrier how many rings there were to Saturn. 

I do not believe in betting and realize thor¬ 
oughly that a bet is the fool’s argument. Nev¬ 
ertheless, there are occasions when it is neces¬ 
sary to ‘answer a fool according to his folly,’ 
and I deemed this to be one of them. I could 
not resist speaking and saying that I had un¬ 
avoidably overheard what was being said and 
that I was willing to w'agerflOO to $10 at that 
moment that neither the speaker nor any one 
else could give an instance where a letter car¬ 
rier had been asked such a question as that 
about the rings of Saturn. At first the orator 
vociferously insisted that his statement was 
perfectly true, though he declined to back it 
up by betting, even when the odds were raised 
to tv/enty to one. Finally he stated that he 
had said what he did on the authority of a 
friend whom he knew was well informed, and 
then further admitted that it was not a letter 
carrier, perhaps, after all. 

“ I had almost precisely the same experience 
when I was last in Indianapolis, where one 
rather loud-mouthed gentleman insisted that 
the candidates at the recent examination for 
the railway mail service had been asked the 
distance from the earth to Mars. He was only 
reduced to silence by the same final argument 
of a bet at any odds he chose to make. These 
two instances are simply examples of the reck¬ 
less and persistent untruths that are contin¬ 
ually uttered about the civil service examin¬ 
ations.” 


ANTI-AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

—“It [the four years tenure] saps the con¬ 
stitutional and salutary functions of the Presi¬ 
dent, and introduces a principle of intrigue 
and corruption which will soon leaven the 
mass not only of senators, but of citizens. It 
is more baneful than the attempt, which failed 
in the beginning of the government, to make 
all officers irremovable but with the consent of 
the senate. This places, every four years, all 
appointments under their power, and even 
obliges them to act on any one nomination. 
It will keep in constant excitement all the 
hungry cormorants of office; render them, as well 
as those in place, sycophants to their senators; en¬ 
gage these in eternal intrigue to turn out one and 
put in another, in cabals to swap work, and make of 
them (i. e., the senators) what all executive diree- 
tories become, mere sinks of corruption and faction.^' 
—Thomas Jefferson to Janus Madison. 

—“ My brief experience at Washington has 
led me often to utter the wish, with an em¬ 
phasis I do not often use, that I might be for¬ 
ever relieved of any connection with the dis¬ 
tribution of public patronage. I covet for 
myself the free and unpurchased support of my 
fellow-citizens, and long to be able to give my 
time and energy solely to those public affairs 
that legitimately relate to the honorable trusts which 
you have committed to me .”—Senator Benjamin 
Harrison. 

—The public will never be made to believe 
that the appointment of a relative is made on 
the ground of merit alone, uninfluenced by 
family views ; nor can they ever see with ap¬ 
probation offices, the disposal of which they 
entrust to their presidents for public pur¬ 
poses, divided out as family property.— 
Thomas Jefferson. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM, 

“ Large districts or parcels of land were allotted by 
the conquering generals to the superior officers of 
the army, and by them dealt out again in smaller 
parcels or allotments to the inferior officers and most 
deserving soldiers. * The condition of holding 
the lands thus given was that the possessor should 
do service faithfully, both at home and in the wars, 
to him by whom they were given,” and, on breach 
of this condition, “ by not performing the stipulated 
service, or by deserting his lord in battle,” the lands 
reverted to the lord. The vassal, upon investiture, 
took an oath of fealty to the lord, and in addition 
did homage,‘‘openly and humbly kneeling, being 
ungirt, uncovered and holding np his hands, both 
together, between those of his lord, who sate before 
him, and there professing that he did become his 
MAN from that day forth, of life and limb and 
earthly honor, and then he received a kiss from his 
lord.” Services were free and base. Free service 
was to pay a sum of money, or serve under the lord 
in war. Base service was to plow the lord’s land, to 
make his hedge oa carry out his dung.— Blackstone. 

—Congressman Posey, of the first Indiana 
district, has appointed Stokes Bennett post¬ 
master at Evansville. Bennett was chairman 
of the republican county committee. 

—E. J. Marsh, editor of the Portland Com¬ 
mercial, has been made postmaster at Portland, 
Ind., in place of Lourie, removed. 

—William Monaghan, chairman of the re¬ 
publican state committee of Ohio, has been 
appointed consul to Chatham, Ontario. 

—Editor Goss, of the Barnstable Patriot, 
has been made collector of that port. 

—Editor John Mahen, of the Muscatine 
Journal, has been made postmaster at that 
place. 

—Delegate Rentfro, a Harrison man at the 
last national convention, has been appointed 
collector of customs at Galveston. 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


47 


—Charles Hedges has been appointed chief 
of the postal division of the sixth auditor’s 
office. Salary $2,000 a year. He was the agent 
of the Associated Press at Indianapolis during 
the campaign of 1888, and is charged, on good 
authority, with having used his position un¬ 
fairly to help the republicans. 

—Marion Strong, a negro who can neither 
read nor write, has been appointed postmaster 
at Delmar, Alabama. 

■—It is said that Congressman Gest has ap¬ 
pointed such a postmaster at Plymouth, Ill., 
that it “has already caused a revolt of 150 
staunch republicans.” 

—Congressman Sawyer is reported to have 
said that he had been offered $1,000 for his 
influence in behalf of a candidate for the 
Batavia (N. Y.) post office. 

—Sixth - Auditor Coulter, of Ohio, is re¬ 
ported by the Dayton Journal (rep.) as saying : 

“I have a list of all the democrats iti my offlcCrand 
every one of them must go before the Ohio election 
comes off, civil service or no civil service.” 

—John R. Lynch, coloretl, fourth auditor of 
the treasury, has been to Mississippi to preside 
over a political meeting, and W. B. Gibb, the 
new postmaster of Jackson, acted as secretary 
of it. 

—The President wanted to appoint W. P. 
Nixon, editor of the Ocean, collector of 

customs at Chicago, but, to his regret, he felt 
that he could not ignore the congressional 
recommendations of State Senator Campbell. 

—Congressman Cheadle, of Indiana, ap- 
'pointed Frybarger postmaster at Noblesville. 
The latter did not live in Noblesville, and 
Cheadle’s henchmen in that place rebelled. 
He, therefore, set aside Frybarger and has ap¬ 
pointed Nathan Royer. 

—Congressman Delano, of New York, has 
been hard at work changing post offices. He 
says: “ There are 190 fourth-class post-offices 
in my district, and 140 of them are now run by 
republicans. The others pay so little that there 
is no demand for a change. I am pretty well 
satisfied with the administration.” 

—The postoffice department was to-day noti- 
ified of the nomination by Congressman Van 
Schaick of W. A. Nowell to be postmaster at 
Wilwaukee, vice Paul, resigned. Owing to 
the absence from the city of President Harrison 
and Postmaster-General Wanamaker no action 
will be taken in the case for several days. 
There is not the slightest doubt, however, of 
Mr. Nowell’s appointment.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch, August 6. 

—Judge Settle, of North Carolina, has a 
twejity-seven thousand dollar “pull,” as fol¬ 
lows : 

Thomas Settle, son of Judge Settle, solicitor; Tyro 
Glenn, brother-in-law of Judge Settle, United States 
marshal ; Douglas Settle, son of Judge Settle, cadet 
at West Point; B. C. Sharpe, son-in law of Judge Set¬ 
tle, general storekeeper; Oliver H. Docker, brother- 
in-law of Judge Settle, consul general at Kio de 
Janeiro; Mrs. Hellen, sister-in-law of Judge Settle, 
stamp clerk at Winston. 

—Congressman Hall (Rep.) of Minnesota 
denounces the civil service law as “ un-Ameri¬ 
can,” and says “ to the victor belong the 
spoils,” and “ the sooner we get rid of the civil 
service sham the better for all concerned, and 
any proposition looking to the accomplish¬ 
ment of such an end will receive my hearty 
support.” 


—“ I have been treated with the utmost 
courtesy by Mr. Harrison and the heads of the 
departments. In almost every instance my re¬ 
quests have been complied with, and I have 
secured more patronage for my district than 
it ever possessed before. Not only is this the 
case in my own district, but in other districts, 
not represented by republicans, my advice in 
the matter of appointments has been followed 
almost without exception. What do I think 
of the civil service law ? At the risk of being 
called a southern republican spoilsman I con¬ 
sider it a transparent fraud. Young men in 
my district—and it is a district prolific in 
bright and brainy young fellows—have to 
travel over two hundred miles to attend a civil 
service examination. Several have been on 
the so called eligible list for several years, and 
will be on it I suppose till the ‘ last syllable of 
recorded time ’ without holding office. I con¬ 
sider the heads of departments just as com¬ 
petent to select their subordinates as a civil 
service mugwumpian commission. I shall vote 
for an absolute and unconditional repeal of 
the law.”— Congressman Ewart, of North Car¬ 
olina. 

—Congressman Henderson, of Illinois, re¬ 
moved the postmaster at Woodhull and put 
his man into the place. The Grand Army 
post of that town thus recognizes and de¬ 
nounces the power of this office baron : 

“Whereas, Congressman Thos. J. Henderson, of 
the Seventh Illinois District, has rejected the appli¬ 
cation of a worthy and competent soldier for the po¬ 
sition of postmaster at Woodhull, Ill., who had the 
indorsement of the members of this post and other 
ex-soldiers of the community, * and has 

caused the appointment of a man who was neither a 
soldier nor the son of a soldier, and no more deserving 
than many other eqrta’ly good and capable reptiblicans of 
this community. *■' * * 

“ Whereas, To'make room for this civilian, he has 
caused the removal from office of Comrade J. A. Wid- 
ney of this post, who has been an efficient postmas¬ 
ter, and who, in the administration of the office, has 
given general satisfaction, etc. 

“ Resolved, That in the name of 200 patrons of the 
Woodhull postoffice, including the soldiers, we do 
most earnestly, not as soldiers only, but as citizens, 
protest against such action of our congressman,which 
seems to us to be an unjust discrimination in favor 
of a civilian.” 

—The distractions caused iu Pennsylvania 
by the distribution of the federal “spoils,”— 
or rather the effort to distribute them—are 
noticed in many direction. The Philadelphia 
and Allegheny quarrels have been scarcely 
more earnest than those in several other coun¬ 
ties. Thus, in Berks there is a general revolt 
against the dictation of a Mr.. High, who pro¬ 
fesses to represent the President’s authority in 
that bailiwick; and in Lehigh county a strong 
protest has been made against two individuals 
who claim the right to say who shall and who 
shall not be appointed. In Lancaster county 
the naming of a collector of internal revenue is 
“ accorded” to Senator Cameron, and he would 
like to get the job off his hands, but the dis¬ 
putes among his friends over a half-dozen as¬ 
pirants are so vehement that he hesitates to 
designate any one. At Reading, a postmaster 
is to be named, in order to turn a democrat 
out, but the fight is so bitter that no decision 
has yet been reached, and factioffa! feeling is 
rampant. And there are a dozen or so quar¬ 
rels over smaller post-offices in the close and 
doubtful seventh congressional district, where 
the republican member-elect finds the “ pat¬ 
ronage” a wearing and distracting burden, 
and may well doubt whether its disposal has 
not made him more enemies than friends. 

Similar instances abound from one end of 
the state to the other. They illustrate how 
much injury was done the republican cause, 


in Pennsylvania, when the President took the 
amazing step of delivering it over to the con¬ 
trol and bestowal of Mr. Quay. That step 
signified a low level of political action, and it 
is on a low level indeed that federal affairs in 
Pennsylvania now stand.— The American, Au¬ 
gust n. 

—About the first of the month Congressman 
Brower, a republican of North Carolina, gave 
out that he would be a candidate for speaker 
of the house, and that he would be supported 
by some fellow-members from the south. This 
would prevent the republicans from organiz¬ 
ing the house, and was a startling proposal. 
Brower gravely asserted that this duty was 
forced upon him by the fear that otherwise the 
internal revenue laws would not be repealed. 
Through his friends, however, he adroitly lets 
the real reason be known, as follows : 

“Mr. Brower makes no concealment of the fact that 
his ground of complaint against the administration 
is that he has been ignored in the distribution of 
federal patronage in his state. There are two internal 
revenue districts in North Carolina, parts of which 
are included in his congressional district. He had 
candidates for both of these offices. All of his recom¬ 
mendations to the collectors themselves were disre¬ 
garded, and now he says that the deputies appointed 
by the new collectors are not only opposed to him, 
but arc endeavoring to organize a movement in his 
congressional district to defeat his renomination. 
They are, it appears, working for another federal ap¬ 
pointee of the Harrison administration.” 

Now comes the President of the United 
States, holding in his hand 142,000 offices, the 
duties of which are paid for by the people^ 
and uses some of them with the following ef¬ 
fect, shown by this from the Boston Post of 
August 5: 

BROWER IN HIGH SPIRITS. 

Congressman Brower, the revolting North Carolina 
republican, was in high spirits last night. His slate 
for the presidential post-offices in his district, an¬ 
nounced in the Post of Saturday, was accepted by 
the President just as it was presented to him by 
Postmaster-General Wanamaker, and the appoint¬ 
ments were announced. Judge Settle’s widow is set 
a.side for one of Mr. Brower’s friends at Greensboro, 
and the leading republican worker at Reidsville has 
to give way to another personal friend of Mr. Brower. 
At Salem and Winston, also, Mr. Brower’s candidates 
are preferred. In every case the democratic post¬ 
master was removed without fault or cause, except 
that he stood in the way of a republican deal. What 
the effect will be upon Mr. Brower’s canvass for the 
speakership remains to be seen, but it is more than 
likely that, having found “ kicking” so profitable, 
he will continne it for a time at least, with a view of 
getting something more. 

And by this from the Indianapolis Journal: 

END OF THE “REVOLT.” 

Washington, August 13.—The bottom has dropped 
out of Congressman John M. Brower’s little boom 
for the speakership, and it is likely that his candi. 
dacy will not be heard of again. Mr. Brower’s ob¬ 
ject has been to secure recognition in the appoint¬ 
ment of postmasters at Greensboro, Winston and 
Reidville, N. C. Wiihin a few days his wishes have 
been satisfied, and his friends say he is now out of 
the race for presiding officer of the house. 

Thus a modern baron brought the Lord 
Paramount to time. 


HERBERT WELSH ON HOME RULE 
IN THE INDIAN SERVICE. 

From the Boston Transcript. 

To the Editor of the Transcript: I rejoice to 
find that the friends of the Indians in Boston have 
















48 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


I 


spoken on the subject of the so-called “home rule ” 
policy of appointment for Indian reservations, and 
that the press of the city has given such publicity to 
their protests. I believe that no more daligerous 
system of appointment could be adopted, and I 
trust that you will give me the opportunity to point 
out the danger of this new method by a single illus¬ 
tration. 

Mr. Oberly, the ex-Indian commissioner, recently 
appointed, upon the basis of information obtained 
from a recognized authority on education, a gentle¬ 
man and his wife as teachers in the Umatila School, 
Oregon. Let it be noted that these persons were re¬ 
publicans. They closed their affairs in Virginia, 
whence they came, bought their tickets for their dis¬ 
tant home across the continent and started on their 
way, relying upon the good faith of the authorities 
who had given them their commission. An indig¬ 
nant protest was sent from politicians in Oregon 
against this violation of the home rule plank in the 
republican platform, accompanied with the demand 
that “carpet-baggers” should not be sent into the 
state. It was claimed by these gentlemen that al¬ 
ready Oregonians had been chosen for posts in this 
school, and that, moreover, they had been notified 
by the politicians of the state that they were so se¬ 
lected. Upon this protest .Secretary Noble cancelled 
these appointments and virtually admitted the right 
of these gentlemen to usurp the powers committed 
to the President by the constitution. 

I know of no persons so far who have been ap¬ 
pointed to Indian agencies, under the present ad¬ 
ministration, excepting in accordance with this 
home rule principle. I know that many Indian 
agents at least have been so appointed. Let it be 
clearly understood that this policy discriminates not 
only against citizens who are not of the Republican 
party, but discriminates by its very nature against 
those Republicans who of all others should be ap¬ 
pointed to positions on Indian reservations. Exper¬ 
ienced, trained and tried men, by the confes.sion of 
Secretary Noble himself, will be thrown out under 
this system, and men in many instances selected by 
territorial politicians will be accepted. Already 
under this system an agent was appointed at a west¬ 
ern agency whose reputation among the Indians and 
among competent judges of our own people was bad. 
So obnoxious was this man to the Indians over whom 
he served that they have come on to Washington to 
protest against his retention. 

An expeiienced and successful republican who 
had served seven years at the Rosebud Agency, Dak., 
was suggested for reappointment at that place by 
Bishop Hare and myself. His merits were fully ad¬ 
mitted by Secretary Noble, but his son, a young and 
inexperienced man, and whom we have good reason 
to believe is not suited for such a post, received the 
appointment upon the ground that he had been seven 
years a resident of Dakota. 

This policy is a distinct announcement upon the 
part of the administration that it waives the right to 
select as agents and employes for the civilization of 
the Indians from the great mass of virtue, intelli¬ 
gence and training in the United States, and that it 
will adopt the policy of choosing such employes 
only from a very limited class of people, who by the 
force of circumstances, are in many instances avow¬ 
edly hostile to the Indians. 

The appointment of a republican school teacher, a 
man trained and equipped for his work, an abolition¬ 
ist of former days, who was recommended by such 
men as Edward Everett Hale and Lyman Abbott, 
was directed by Commissioner Oberly, as superin¬ 
tendent of the Indian boarding-school at the San 
Carlos agency, but up to date failed to receive his 
appointment, presumably for the reason that the In¬ 
dian school force in Arizona must be selected from 
Arizona itself, where naturally, and from the force 
of circumstances, the popular prejudice against the 
Indians is intense, and where, from the fact that the 
population is largely engaged in the mining and cat¬ 
tle industries, the number of trained teachers to 
select from must be at a minimum. 

I ask whether this theory, so-called home rule, as 
applied to the Indian service upon the reservations, 
is not the reductio ad absurdum of the spoils theory of 
appointment ? And will not these members of the 


republican party who believe in the application of 
wisdom and justice to the solution of this problem 
enter their protest against the continuance of such a 
theory as this in the management of Indian affairs ? 

Respectfully, Herbert AVel.sh. 


THE THANKSGIVING DAY SER¬ 
MON. 

The People’s Cause, published at 330 Pearl 
street, New York, contains in its August num¬ 
ber many replies from clergymen approving 
the suggestion of Mr. Herbert Welsh that the 
Thanksgiving sermons this year should be to 
set forth the moral objections to the spoils 
system. 

This paper is permitted to publish the fol¬ 
lowing : 

Believing, as I do, that there is a moral side 
to this great question of civil service reform, 
and that it deserves the serious consideration 
and attention of the American people, it seems 
to me entirely appropriate as a theme for a 
national thanksgiving discourse. On Thanks¬ 
giving Daj' matters that concern the present 
welfare of the people should be discussed and 
generally are discussed by the pulpit. I there¬ 
fore heartily approve of the sugggsstion. 

O. M. Hughes, 

Pastor of First Presbyterian Church. 

Richmond, Indiana. 


Owing to limited space this month, the 
Civil Servicb Chronicle is unable to print 
the many letters of approval received by Mr. 
Welsh, but the following are additional names 
favoring the plan : 

Rev. Phillip Brooks, Boston; Rev. Robert Collyer, 
Chicago; Rev. J. Andrews Harris, D. D., Chestnut 
Hill, Philadelphia; Rev. William Ely, Philadelphia; 
Rev. Robert Collyer, D. D., New York; Rev. Lever- 
ett Bradley, Philadelphia ; Rev. M. E. Gates, D. D., 
president Rutgers College, New Brunswick, N. J.; 
Rev. ,1. IC. Murphy, Germantown, Philadelphiaj Rt. 
Rev. Hugh M. Thompson, D. D., bishop of Mississip¬ 
pi ; Gen. S. C. Armstrong, Hampton, Va.; Prof. J, B. 
Thayer, of Harvard College, Cambridge, Mass.; John 
Jay, of New York ; Rt. Rev. H. W. Warren, D. D., 
Denver, Col., bishop M. E. Church; Rt. Rev. L. R. 
Brewer, D. D., Bishop of Montana; Rev. J.T. Gracey, 
D. D., International Miss. Union, Buffalo, N. Y.; Rev, 
William Kirkus, of Baltimore, Md.; Rev. John Cotton 
Brooks, of Springfield, Mass.; Rev. C. C. Everett, D. 
D., of Cambridge, Mass ; Daniel C, Gilman, president 
Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md.; Rev. 
Teunis S. Hamlen, D. D., Washington, D. C.; Rev. 
Herrick Johnson, D. D., of Chicago, Ill.; Rev. H. L. 
Wayland, D. D., of Philadelphia, editor National Bap¬ 
tist; Rev. George Williamson Smith, D. D., president 
Trinity College; Rev. Wm. Preston Johnson, LL. D.. 
president Tulane University, New Orleans; Rev. Ly¬ 
man Abbott, D. D., editor Christian Union, NewYork ; 
Rev. C. W. Park, Birmingham, Conn.; Rt. Rev. Thos. 
Bowman, D. D., St. Louis, Mo., bishop M. E. Church ; 
Rev. Morgan Dix, D. D., rector Trinity Church, New 
York; Prof. Charles W. Shields, D. D., of Prineeton 
College, N. J.; Rev. F. A. Farley, D. D., Brooklyn, N. 
Y.; Rev. J. W. Chadwick, Brooklyn, N. Y.; Rev. J. H. 
Allen, editor Unitarian Review, Cambridge, Mass.; 
Rt. Rev. W. F. Mallalieu, D. D., New Orleans, La., 
bishop M. E. Church; C. K. Adams, president Cor¬ 
nell University, Ithaca, N. Y.; Rev. Charles Gordon 
Ames, Boston, Mas.“.; Rt. Rev. I. W. Joyce, D. D , 
Chattanooga, Tenn., bishop M. E. Church ; Rt. Rev. 
Ingraham Kip, D. D., bishop of California; Rev. W. 
C. Gannett, Rochester, N. Y.; Rev. T. L. Eliot, Port¬ 
land, Oregon; Rt. Rev. Wm. Stevens Perry, D. D., 
bishop of Iowa, Davenport, Iowa; Rev. Henry M. 
Ladd, Cleveland, Ohio; Rt. Rev. S. M. Merrill, D. D., 
Chicago, Ill., bishop M. E. Church; Rev. William R. 
Richards, Plainfield, N. J.; Rev. T. T. Munger, New 
Haven, Conn.; Rev. Forest F. Emerson, Newport, R. 


I.; Rev. Wallace Radcliffe, D. D., Detroit, Mich.: 
Rev. Washington Gladden, Columbus, Ohio; Rev. 
T. J. Brown, Utica, N. Y.; Rev. Henry M. Storrs, D. 
D., Orange, N. J.; Rev. J. Henry Brittain, Baltimore, 
Md.; Rev. D. J. Burrell, Minneapolis, Minn.; Rev. 
Henry Van Dyke, Westhampton, N. Y.; Rev. J. V. 
Stratton, Andover, Mass.; Rev. John DeAVitt, D. D.’ 
Chicago. 


THE ELIGIBLE LIST, 


At the examination, held August 6th, for 
positions in the Indianapolis post-office, out 
of 130 examined for places as carriers 68 
passed ; out of 60 examined for places as 
clerks 37 passed. 

The following is the eligible list as it now 
stands in this office. Those marked with a 
star were examined in Fehruary. A success¬ 
ful contestant retains his place on the list one 
year. When Postmaster Wallace has a va¬ 
cancy to fill the local board certifies to him 
the highest three names and from these he 
must make his choice. The two not chosen 
are entitled to two more certifications, but if 
not then chosen they are no longer on the 
list. Nothing but the soundest business reason 
warrants a postmaster in omitting to take the 
men as they stand on the list. The next reg¬ 
ular examination occurs in Fehruary, 1890. 


CLERKS. 


Lee S. Nicholson.92 

Arthur M. Potts.91 

Walter P. Hanna.91 

Chas. H. Baughman.90 

A. B. Combs.90 

James W. Hobbs*.89 

AValter L. Dynes.89 

AA'm. S. Lockman.89 

Eugene M. Wilson.88 

Joel Armstrong.88 

John E. Clinton.88 

Raphael Van Wie.88 

John F. Brasier.83 

Allison Mundell.83 

William E. Tousey.83 

Hugh A. Cummings*.82 

James H. Malcolm.82 

Henry M. DeWitt*.81 

J. C. Brown*.81 

AA'illiam E. Avery.80 

Don D. AVells*.79 

Charles H. Evans*.79 

Harry E. Negley.79 

William H. Doll.79 

Charles AV. Fenton*.78 

John L. Etter*.78 

AVilliam T. Pfaff..78 

Thad E. York*.77 

Charles Pott.77 


John G. Edmunds*.87 

Frank L. Rumford.87 

John Laughlin*.86 

Samnie Barrett*.86 

Clarence H. Morpen*...86 
Bartholomew 0’Leary...8.5 

Charles O. AA’illiams.85 

Royal C. Hammer.84 

Jesse B. Brown.84 

J. W. Newlon*.83 

R. H. Obriet*.83 

Calvin Hollwell*.83 

AVilliam G. Tallentire...77 

James R. East.77 

Michael L. Jefferson.77 

Lemuel F. Apple*.76 

Crawford Thomas.76 

Thomas Hembl.76 

Henry S. George*.74 

Jonathan A. Guyman...74 

Wm. B. Culbertson.74 

George B. Bowers.74 

Thomas Judd*.72 

John F. Ford.72 

Edward Nell.72 

Elwood Crone.71 

Allen C. Simms.70 

John B. Connett.70 


CARRIERS. 


Charles P. Sample..94 

Lawrence A. Newby.91 

Frank L. Stillwell.91 

Gustav Scheuedel.90 

Benj. J. Lautz.90 

Walter N. Leonard.89 

Ulysses G. Smithson.88 

Melville C. Alexander. ...86 

Jefferson D. Porter.86 

Alfred A. Taylor.85 

Oliver J. Kidd.85 

Frank J Smith.85 

Wm. Dawson, Jr.85 

Albert M. Magley.84 

Robert H. Jones.84 

Wm. E. Privett.84 

Frank J. Gilland.79 

Charles L. Young.79 

Charles U. Hoover.78 

William C. Long.77 

Abram B. Tharp.77 

George L. Davis.77 

William E. Jones.77 

Harry E. AA’eaver.77 

Geo. H. Stieglemeyer.76 

Ira McK. Bales.75 

Charles H. Sterling.75 

Thomas E. Kenworthy ..75 

Robert Senour.74 

Earl H. Bryant.74 

George L. McLain.74 

Henry Barrett*.73 

Riley T. AVhite*.73 

AValter W. Sotherland.73 

AA'illiam T. MeVey.73 

Charles E. Kerne'r.73 


Stanton T. Jones.8;i 

John H. Reardon.83 

Albert E. Braydon.83 

James R. Fry.82 

AVm. Schaub.81 

Hugh Johnson.81 

Charles Meador.81 

Abram L. Turnham.81 

Edwin D. Duvall.80 

Charles O. Lombard....?.80 

Otto F. Pfafllin.80 

Robert H. Taylor.80 

Wm. H. Richter.80 

Elmer E. Denny.80 

Albert G. Richwein.80 

AVillis S. Baughman.80 

Auslem Hobbs.72 

George Knight.72 

Andrew Auch.72 

Charles G. Pugh.72 

Edward A. Kiefer.72 

Benjamin Roberts.71 

Francis A. Preston.71 

George M. Duncan.71 

Jacob Sonenberger.71 

Howard AVhite.71 

Oscar Abbott.71 

John Sellers.7i 

Robert Felton*.70 

Albert L. Kerr.70 

Oscar AV. Bush.70 

John W. Bales.70 

Oscar P. Hoover.70 

John L. Evans.70 

Charles C. Stapp.70 






































































































































The civil Service Chronicle. 


For Sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapoiis. Published monthly. Publieation office, 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind., where 

subscriptions and advertisements will be received. 


VoL. I, No. 7. INDIANAPOLIS, SEPTEMBEK, 1889. terms :<( 


POLITICAL DICERS. 

Congressman Hall [Rep.], of Minnesota 
—The sooner we get rid of the civil service 
sham the better. 

Congressman Ewart [Rep.], of North Caro¬ 
lina—I shall vote for an absolute and uncon¬ 
ditional repeal of the law. 

Congressman Blair [Rep.], of New Hamp¬ 
shire—Civil service reform, forsooth. It is a 
humbug. 

Congressman Ingalls [Rep.], of Kansas— I 
want to give the men ivho make my cause their own 
some of the things we have won. 

Congressman Houk [Rep.], of Tennessee 
—If alive when Congress meets will intro¬ 
duce a bill to repeal it. 

Congressman Shearman [Rep.], of New 
York—To the victors belong the spoils. 

Congressman Evans [Rep.], of Tennessee 
—The civil service law is a humbug. 

Congressman Cannon [Rep.], of Illinois—I 
think it is an infernal nuisance. 

Congressman Browne [Rep.], of Indiana 
—It is a cumbersome piece of political patch- 
work. 

Congressman Perkins [Rep.], of Kansas 
—The entire system is a farce. 

Congressman Taylor [Rep.], of Ohio—The 
republicans who won the victory in 1888 are 
out in the cold. 

AuGUfT 29. — The Pennsylvania Republi¬ 
can Association met in Washington, and Mr. 
S. R. Stratton, president of the association, 
spoke as follows: 

“The reason why I have referred to our party ma¬ 
chinery at all is because I am constantly reminded 
on the street and elsewhere of the fact that ‘ we have 
met the enemy and we are theirs,’ that the spoils of 
victory are in the hands of the enemy to an alarming 
extent, that the stUl sow drinks the official swill, 
and that these still sows are a part and parcel of the 
democratic herd, bequethed as a legacy to the repub¬ 
lican party by his late eminent highness Grover the 
first and last. This pork is fat enough to kill, and it 
ought to be disposed of while the political knife is 
sharp and the water hot, so as to give place to a few 
of the lean and hungry republican shoats who have 
been rooting and digging for the last four years in 
hopes to get a whack at Uncle Sam’s crib before the 
corn is all gone.’’ 

August 28.—The federation of republican 
clubs of the third Maryland congressional 
district gave vent to its pent up feelings as fol¬ 
lows : 

"Resolved, That we, as republicans, pledge ourselves 
not to support any one for office, either national, 
state, or city, who is in favor of the present odious 
civil service or its application in the distribution of 
public patronage, whereby the majority of appoint¬ 
ments are awarded to young men fresh from schools 
and colleges, while active, intelligent, educated and 
deserving men of our own party are barred out on 
account of age or have failed to answer foolish ques-1 


tions not pertinent to the service in which they are 
seeking employment. We believe that the present 
civil service law is a relic of European governments, 
is injurious to party success, and not at all appro¬ 
priate to a republican form of government, and 
therefore should be repealed.’’ 

Later the Tippecanoe Club of Baltimore 
thus joined in the cry : 

“ Whereas, Injustice is done to many good and 
worthy citizens of this state and county by the exist¬ 
ence of a law known as the civil service law. 

“ Where.as, Such a law is known to debar men in 
the prime of life, although capable, from holding 
office in the service of the government. 

“ Whereas, Questions not pertaining to the quali¬ 
fications necessary to fill government positions are 
asked by the civil service examiners, and we doubt 
if the civil service commissioners could pass the ex¬ 
amination now required for a one-thousand-dollar 
clerkship, 

“ Resolved, By Tippecanoe Republican Club of Bal¬ 
timore, that civil service, as now administered, is 
farcical and a fraud on the people. We believe the 
party or people aspiring for political honors and ad¬ 
vocating civil service will be relegated to private life 
at all coming elections. The law was conceived by 
the democratic party during the prosperity of the 
republican party. We believe it was concocted 
through jealousy, and not for the benefit of the 
American citizen who wields the power of the ballot. 

“ Resolved, That a eopy of these resolutions be for¬ 
warded to our representatives in congress, and that 
we urge them to do their utmost to repeal the civil 
service law.” 

In Philadelphia, Tuesday evening, Mr. Quay’s 
agent, Martin, who was lately appointed collector of 
internal revenue, and who has since rapidly organ¬ 
ized his office as a partisan machine, appeared as a 
new assailant of the reformed system. He offered, at 
the annual meeting of the Anti-Cobden Club, a 
republican organization, a resolution instructing the 
club’s delegates to the state convention of repub¬ 
lican clubs, which will meet in Pitt.sburg on the 24th 
instant, to urge the adoption by the convention of 
a resolution demanding the repeal of the civil ser¬ 
vice law. The resolution was adopted, and the ball 
is thus set in motion for a systematic attack upon 
the law by the united strength of the Pennsylvania 
republican clubs.—T/te American [Rep.], September 14. 

The latest resolution is from the republi¬ 
can “boys” of the sixth assembly district of 
New York City, with the original orthography: 

“ Resolved, That we express through the press our 
oposition to civil service as it now exists, opoiating to 
the benifit of the political oponants of the republican 
party.” 

Let it be once understood that no republican who 
desires a clerical appointment is to be considered in 
the distribution of federal clerkships, and the party 
will disintegrate at once. Not that the ordinary 
voter is a republican or democrat for office only, but 
because human nature is so organized that the re¬ 
wards for party service stimulate to action.—Daj/<o» 
Journal [Eep.]. 

Our mugwump contemporaries have been plunged 
into grief by Assistant Postmaster-General Clark¬ 
son’s statement that he has scalped 15,000 demo¬ 
cratic postmasters up to date. Nevertheless we do 
not see that their woe has any restraining effect upon 
the energetic Clarkson. He is too busily engaged in 
enforcing the wholesome policy of reform.—P/t£fa- 
delphia Press [J2cp.]. 


It (civil service reform) is a sort of reform that 
nobody is crying for, and if the common people 
could be given a chance to vote on it in any State in 
the Union—or in the Union as a whole—it would be 
snowed under so deeply it would never be heard of 
again. The people are tired of the sham.—Ham’s- 
burg Telegraph IRep.l. 

Pennsylvania and Iowa republicans have already 
refrained from endorsing civil service reform. The 
fearful abuse that the Pendleton law received at the 
hands of the Cleveland administration and the asin¬ 
ine performances of young Teddy Roosevelt have 
filled republicans with disgust. Civil service reform 
can not command the support of a corporal’s guard 
of republicans in New York, as well as in Pennsyl¬ 
vania and Iowa.— Albany Journal [Pep.]. 

Fifteen thousand fourth-class postmasters have 
been removed to date, and Mr. Clarkson remains in 
Washington with his coat off and his shirt-sleeves 
rolled up. Go it, Clarkson! Out with the whole 
55,000 by Jan. 1. The people voted a change of post¬ 
masters last fall. Secure competent men and good 
republicans ; and you can’t turn out the democrats 
too rapidly.— Albany Journal [Rep.]. 

If Commissioner Roosevelt keeps up that sort of 
talk much longer, there is danger that he will make 
somebody believe he means it. He is very much in 
the position of the frontiersman who aimed his gun 
to kill if it was a deer and miss if it was a calf. It 
is all right to make the mugwumps believe him just 
as Cleveland did; but ij he causes the working repub- 
llican'S to put much faith in his pretentions, he may cause 
the administration to see that it has picked up the poker 
by the hot end, and something must be dropped. — Bing¬ 
hamton Republican [Rep.]. 

The Cincinnaii Commercial Gazette (Rep.) says, 
“We are glad to hear it” of a statement that Presi¬ 
dent Harrison is turning out postmasters fifty times 
as fast as did President Jackson. 

The whole thing is a snare and a sham. It is, in 
theory, obnoxious to the American people. It has 
in no manner resulted in bettering the government 
service. Neither political party is honest about its 
enforcement. The republicans were for it when the 
democrats were in power. They are not for it now, 
but the democrats are.—Washington Post [Frank Hat¬ 
ton’s paper]. 

Neither political party cares a continental about 
this humbug, civil service reform. The genius o 
our institutions is opposed to the whole scheme, and 
some day people will find this out. Heretofore the 
mugwumps have had everything their own way. It 
is characteristic of the American people, when there 
is a fad or furor, to take things for granted. Whether 
through indifference, or laziness, or cowardice, they 
don’t investigate. But the time comes when they 
consider the reason of things, and when fakirs and 
imposters are subjected to the inquisition of public 
scrutiny. The Lymans and Curtises and Schurzes 
will not always have full sway for their civil service 
tomfoolery.— Evansville [Ind.] Journal [R^.]. 

It is suspected that during the lifetime of the fifty- 
first congress there will arise a man to lead, and 
enough men to follow, to repeal the law (the civil 
service law) which protects the enemy and hampers 
the administration.—Burlinplon Hawkeye [Rep.]. 

So there will be one bureau (the census bureau) to 
which competent persons can apply for employment 
without having to pass an examination on the rings 
of Saturn, the age of Julius Cajsar, or the distance of 
the moon from the earth.—Towa State Register [Clark, 
son’s paper]. 















50 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


This is the case exactly. Humbug is the one word 
that describes it, and repeal is the one practical 
remedy for it. Not only this, but it is and has been 
from the start an unpopular humbug. It was 
brought out by such nice people, and was so nicely 
stuffed and painted that it had some standing for a 
while in the circles reserved for professional philan¬ 
thropists and statesmen, but there has never been a 
day when ten per cent, of the voters of the country 
would have approved it at the polls, and it has now 
become such a bald and rickety affair that it only 
needs a leader with the courage of his convictions, 
like Senator Blair, to pass an act in congress which 
will send it to the scrap-heap. And when it is there, 
good citizens will wonder how it ever came about 
that they allowed themselves to be wheedled and 
bullied into tolerating it so Manchester [A’’, if.] 

Mirror [ffep.]. 

ARE THESE DICERS’ OATHS? 

Any system of the civil service under which the 
subordinate positions of the government are con¬ 
sidered rewards for mere party zeal is fatally de¬ 
moralizing, and we therefore favor a reform of the 
system by laws which shall abolish the evils of pat¬ 
ronage and make honesty, eflicieney, and fidelity the 
essential qualifications for public positions, without 
practically creating a life tenure of of&ce.—Republi¬ 
can National Platform, 1872. 

Under the constitution the President and heads of 
departments are to make nominations for office; the 
senate is to advise and consent to appointments, and 
the house of representatives is to accuse and prose¬ 
cute faithless officers. The best interest of the public 
service demands that these distinctions be respected; 
that senators and representatives who may be judges 
and accusers should not dictate appointments to of¬ 
fice. The invariable rule in appointments should 
have reference to the honesty, fidelity, and capacity 
of the appointees, giving to the party in power those 
places where harmony and vigor of administration 
require its policy to be represented, but permitting 
all others to be filled by persons selected with sole 
reference to the efficiency of the public service, and 
the right of all citizens to share in the honor of ren¬ 
dering faithful service to the country.—Republican 
National Platform, 1876. 

The republican party, adhering to the principles 
affirmed by its last national convention of respect 
for the constitutional rules governing appointments 
to office, adopts the declaration of President Hayes 
that the reform of the civil service .should be thor¬ 
ough, radical and complete. To this end it demands 
the co-operation of the legislative with the exec¬ 
utive departments of the government, and that 
congress shall so legislate that fitness, ascertained 
by proper practical tests, shall admit to ihe public 
service .—Republican National Platform, 1880. 

The reform of the civil service, auspiciously begun 
under republican administration, should be com¬ 
pleted by the further extension of the reform sys¬ 
tem already established by law to all the grades of 
the service to which it is applicable. The spirit and 
purpose of the reform should be observed in all 
executive appointments, and all laws at variance 
with the objects of existing reform legislation should 
be repealed, to the end that the dangers to free in¬ 
stitutions which lurk in the power of official patron¬ 
age may be wisely and effectively avoided.—iJepub- 
lican National Platform, 1884. 

The men who abandoned the republican party in 
1884 and continue to adhere to the democratic party 
have deserted not only the cause of honest govern¬ 
ment, of sound finance, of freedom and purity of 
the ballot, but especially have deserted the cause of 
reform in the civil service. We will not fail to keep 
our pledges because they have broken theirs, or be¬ 
cause their candidate has broken his. We therefore 
repeat our declaration of 1884, to wit: “ The reform 
of the civil service, auspiciously begun under the 
republican administration, shoiild be completed by 
the further extension of the reform system, already 
established by law, to all grades of the service to 
which it is applicable. The spirit and purpose of 


the reform should be observed in all executive ap¬ 
pointments, and all laws at variance with the object 
of existing reform legislation should be repealed, to 
the end that the dangers to free institutions which 
lurk in the power of official patronage may he wise¬ 
ly and effectually avoided.”—JZepwWican National 
Platform. 1888. 

That we are heartily in favor of such a reform of the 
civil service as shall make appointments to public 
office dependent upon fitness and character, and al¬ 
low removals for cause only.—New Jersey and Maryland 
Republican Platforms, 1871. 

We rejoice at the brightening prospects of a 
thorough reform of the civil service. For the Presi¬ 
dent’s efforts and pledges in this matter, we tender 
him onr cordial thanks, and therein we pledge him 
an enthusiastic unwavering support.—Connecticut 
Republican Platform, 1872. 

We are in favor of the adoption of a thorough sys¬ 
tem of civil service reform, and we indorse heartily 
the action of President Grant in selecting commis¬ 
sioners under the action of the recent so-called civil 
service &ct.—Ohio Republican Platform, 1871. 

That we indorse * >:< his recommendations of 

<! s< civil service reform, and prompt execution 
of the power conferred by congress to inaugurate 
this reform .—Georgia Republican Platform, 1872. 

The republican party * is the only party that 
questioned the dogma that “ to the victors belong 
the spoils of the vanquished,” and endeavored to 
introduce reforms of in the civil service, so that hon¬ 
esty, capacity, and faithful attention to official du¬ 
ties might be a better recommendation to office than 
partisan service, and whose President has proclaimed 
this new rule of action to the nation.—JWtnois Repub¬ 
lican Platform, 1872. 

The administration of President Grant, as illustra¬ 
ted by his * * efforts to reform the civil service and 
purify the same * [entitle] it to the confidence and 
support of every patriot.—Mancso/a Republican Plat¬ 
form., 1872. 

It [the administration] has inaugurated and made 
zealous endeavors to secure a practical and efficient 
civil service reiorm.—Missouri Republican Platform, 
1872. 

We are heartily in favor of such a reformation in 
the civil service that good character and ability shall 
be the chief recommendations to office, and not po¬ 
litical service rendered or to be rendered.-JVew Jer¬ 
sey Republican Platform, 1872. 

That the success of the present national adminis¬ 
tration in * * reforming and improving the civil ser¬ 
vice * ^ has been such as to command the approbation of 
the great majority of the American people, and justly en¬ 
title it the confidence and commendation of every 
true republican.—New Hampshire Republican Plat¬ 
form, 1872. 

That the civil service ought to be reformed. * <= 
And in his [the President’s] efforts to reform the 
civil service we recognize a laudable desire to pro¬ 
mote its efficiency and purity.—Wew York Republican 
Platform, 1872. 

We favor * * civil service reform as proposed by 
the President.- West Virginia Republican Platform,l&72. 

That good administration and freedom from temp¬ 
tation to official dishonesty can be best secured by 
such an organization of the civil service as shall in¬ 
sure a competent body of civil officers, who shall be 
undisturbed by the changes and temptations of active pol¬ 
itics.— Connecticut Republican Platform, 1874. 

In conducting the civil service, officers should 
be selected because of their qualification, integrity 
and moral character, and the patronage of the gov¬ 
ernment should be so disposed in the matter of faith¬ 
fulness and economy that it shall not he brought in con¬ 
flict with the freedom of elections.—Indiana Republican 
Platform, 1876. 

The republicans of Ohio re-affirm their unfal¬ 
tering confidence in Rutherford B. Hayes as a states¬ 
man, patriot and republican, and cordially approve 
and support his efforts for the * establishment 
of its civil service upon a basis of purity and effi¬ 
ciency.—0/iio Republican Platform, 1877. 


That the work of reforming and improving the 
civil service, which the republican party has under¬ 
taken, and to which it alone stands committed, 
ought to be persistently and resolutely carried for¬ 
ward. We fully indorse the utterances of the Cin¬ 
cinnati platform, and of the letter of acceptance of 
President Hayes on this subject, that nominations to 
office ought to be made upon the sole responsibility 
of the executive department, without the dictation 
or control of members of congress; that honesty, 
capacity and fidelity constitute the only claim and 
qualification for office ; that partisan service should 
not be expected or desired from public officers, who 
should give their whole service to the government 
and the people, and that the term of office should 
depend upon untarnished personal character and 
the satisfactory performance of official duties, and 
not upon political changes; and we cordially sustain 
and approve the policy and action of the President 
in conducting his administra tion in fulfillment of his 
distinct pledge upon these principles. Recognizing 
that the work of correcting the abuses that have 
crept into the civil service is only begun, and that 
much remains to be accomplished in Mas.sachusetts 
as well as elsewhere, in order to show convincingly 
that the principle of civil service reform is accepted 
as an enduring principle, and not a temporary 
method of administration, we call upon all depart¬ 
ments of the goverment to give the President their 
cordial and effective support in making the reform 
thorough, radical and complete. That the order pro¬ 
mulgated by the President for the purpose of res¬ 
training the executive officers of the government 
from exercising an undue and improper influence 
upon the action of the people in the selection of can¬ 
didates for office, and in the management of political 
affairs, it is in accordance with the principle and 
practices established by the founders of the govern¬ 
ment. We heartily endorse the order as the first and 
most important step toward a practical reform of the 
civil service, and we assure the President of our cor¬ 
dial support ill its enforcement.—Jfassac7iMse«s Repub¬ 
lican Platform, 1877. 

No official or office-holder should be subject to polit¬ 
ical or partisan assessment, or to interference in any¬ 
way with his political rights or action, and plain 
laivs should forbid and punish all attempts to make 
or enforce such assessments or to control or to 
abridge in any respect the absolute freedom in polit¬ 
ical action which in this country belongs to all voters 
alike. In connection with this subject we recur 
with satisfaction to that portion of the letter of ac¬ 
ceptance of Mr. Hayes wherein he declares that the 
founders of our government meant that the officer 
should be .secure in his tenure as long as his per¬ 
sonal character remained untarnished and the per¬ 
formance of his duty satisfactory. In furtherance 
of this view wejcommend as worthy of considera¬ 
tion legislation making officers secure in a limited 
fixed tenure, and subject to removal only as officers 
under state laws are removable in this state, and 
charges to be regularly and openly preferred and ad¬ 
judged.—A’ew York Republican Platform, 1877. 

We demand a just and wholesome reform of the civil 
service as against the democratic “spoils” system.— 
Delaware Republican Platform, 1882. 

Such a practical reform of the civil service as shall 
relieve the executive from the pressure of hordes of 
office-seekers as shall, by providing some intelligent 
method for appointments to office, enable our repre- 
seniatiyes in this branch of the national congress 
to turn their attention to matters of national concern. 
—Illinois Republican Platform, 1882. 

The California republican platform, 1884, demands 
civil service reform. 

The republican party inaugurated civil service re¬ 
form and enacted the present civil service law. It 
will faithfully maintain it and cheerfully aid in any 
needed amendments to give it full force.—/otaa Re¬ 
publican Platform, 1884. 

The Minnesota republican platform, 1884, rejoices 
at the improvements in the civil service under the 
present law, as now administered, and insists on its 
continuance in the nation and its extension to the 
states and cities. 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


51 


We give to the civil service act passed by a repub¬ 
lican congress our hearty and continued approval, 
and in accordance with our last national platform 
we demand the extension of the principles of that 
act to all the business ofhces of the government, and 
the repeal of the four-years’ tenure law.—Afassa- 
chuselts Republican Platform, 1885. 

We condemn the hypocrisy of the democratic party 
in pledging itself, before election, to civil service re¬ 
form, and after election denouncing, through its 
press and its leaders, the civil service act as uncon¬ 
stitutional, while the national administration re¬ 
moves tried and faithful public servants and re¬ 
places them with persons whose only recommenda¬ 
tion is active, and in some instances, disreputable 
political work. We denounce the hypocritical pre¬ 
tenses under which faithful republican officers are 
removed on the plea of offensive partisanship, while 
such men as Higgins, Thomas, Throop, Chase, Pills- 
bury, Aquilla Jones, and others, some of whose 
names appear upon the prison records of the coun¬ 
try, and whose recommendation is political parti¬ 
sanship, are appointed in their places. While re¬ 
moving elsewhere on the ground of offensive parti¬ 
sanship republicans who edit newspapers, the 
national administration continues in a high judicial 
office in the city of New York a prominent demo¬ 
cratic appointee who publicly announced himself 
as having assumed, since his appointment, the con¬ 
trol of an avowedly partisan journal. We believe it 
is the duty of Ihe republican majority of the senate to 
oppose the confirmation of any person appointed in vio¬ 
lation of the letter and spirit of the civil service act.— 
New York Republican Platform, 1885. 

We favor a thorough and honest enforcement of 
the civil service law, and the extension of its princi¬ 
ples to the state administration whenever it can be 
made practicable, to the end that the corruption and 
flagrant abuses that exist in the mismanagement of 
our public institutions may be done away with, and 
they be liberated from partisan control.— Indiana 
Republican Platform, 1886. 

It [the democratic administration] promised civil 
service reform, but has made that phrase odious by 
not only removing but attempting to blacken the 
characters of thousands of our best citizens, many 
of them old soldiers, who have been removed from 
official positions upon the cowardly subterfuge of 
“offensive partisanship.’’— O/u’o Republican Plat¬ 
form, 1886. 

No purpose [with the democratic party] to pro¬ 
mote a practical civil service reform. While 

conspicuous among the many short-comings of this 
administration are numberless appointees who have 
proved faithless and incompetent; the postal service 
disorganized, and its efficiency Impaired, and the 
public business in other departments delayed and 
obstructed. The principle of the national and 

state civil service reform laws has our hearty ap¬ 
proval. These laws should be executed in the spirit 
in which they were enacted and accepted by the 
people, and be advanced and made permanent. 
—New York Republican Platform, 1887. 

That we unequivocally condemn the use of pat¬ 
ronage to promote personal political ends, and re¬ 
quire that all offices bestowsd within the party shall 
be upon the sole basis of fitness. That competent 
and faithful ofllcers should not be removed except 
for cause. That the non-elective minor offices should 
be filled in accordance with rules established by law. 
That the ascertained popular will shall be faith¬ 
fully carried out in state and national conventions 
and by those holding office by the favor of the party. 
That public office constitutes a high trust to be ad¬ 
ministered solely for the people whose interests shall 
be paramount to tho.se of persons and parties, and 
that it should be invariably conducted with the same 
efficiency, economy and integrity as are expected in 
the execution of private trusts.—Pennsylvania Repub¬ 
lican Platform, 1882. 

We commend every effort to inaugurate thorough 
and correct civil service reform in all the depart¬ 
ments of the national and state administrations. 
Pennsylvania Republican Platform, 1883. 


We commend every effort to sustain and promote 
thorough civil service reform in all departments of the 
national and state governments.—PeJtnsyfvania Re¬ 
publican Platform, 1884. 

We at the same time invite public attention to the 
acts of the present democratic national and state ad¬ 
ministrations; to the unjust war of the former upon 
offensive partisans; to the hypocritical avoidance 
of pledges touching the eivil service; to its star- 
chamber proceedings against republicans, for who.se 
removal no public reason can be given.— Pennsyl¬ 
vania Republican Platform, 1885. 

We arraign the democratic party and the present 
national administration for the general imbecility 
ill dealing with all great national questions. The 
only energy they have exhibited has been in the 
displacement of experienced officers without cause 
and in direct violation of their civil service pledges. 
The national administration seems to have no policy 
beyond expediency and no principle beyond the es¬ 
tablishment of its succession.— Pennsylvania Repub¬ 
lican Platform, 1887. 

We as a party, as rapidly as practicable, enacted 
iegislation looking to a pure business administration 
of government and a system of civil service in defer¬ 
ence to a strong recognized public sentiment against 
abuses of the spoils system. A democratic Presi¬ 
dent was elected largely on the issue of civil 
service reform, upon pledges which guaranteed an 
immediate remedy of existing abuses. These pledges 
have been notoriously violated, removals from office 
have been made without cause in a more sweeping 
manner than at any other period in our history of 
American political parties, and federal patronage 
has been boldly and constantly used for partisan 
purposes.— Pennsylvania Republican Platform, 1888. 

The annual meeting of the National 
League of Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tions will take place as announced, in Phil¬ 
adelphia, October 1 and 2. Any member of 
the Indiana Association if present is en¬ 
titled to take part in the meeting. 


The new postmaster at Albany, N. Y., 
Gen. Warner, is a friend of the civil service 
law; and, as he is also no coward, the law 
will be enforced. We are glad to see even 
one friend of the law put at the head of an 
office. 


By the courtesy of the civil service com¬ 
mission the questions used in the examina¬ 
tion for clerks and carriers, held here Au¬ 
gust 6, together with the rules upon which 
the answers were marked, are published in 
this number. Now is the time to single 
out the questions calling for the distance 
of Mars from the sun. 


The Civil Service Chronicle may with 
propriety call attention to the history of 
tho dismissal of Mr. Webster from the head 
of the fire department, published in its 
April number. The coming city election 
is the proper time to consider such mat¬ 
ters and give them their due weight. 
There is no question as to where the re¬ 
sponsibility for this outrage upon the tax¬ 
payers and upon a faithful officer belongs. 


In view of the wild talk now being in¬ 
dulged in by prominent republican leaders 


and papers against the civil service law, we 
have thought it best to publish a reminder 
in the shape of some portion of the prom¬ 
ises made in platforms of that party. It 
would be interesting^ if some enterprising 
reporter would ask Ingalls, for instance, 
the exact status of these^ promises which 
being in national platforms,are,prjma/acfe, 
binding upon him. He is a ready and wil¬ 
ling talker, and curiousjpeople would be 
glad to know his opinion. 


Collector Cravens, who said that be¬ 
fore any one should work for the people 
under him, he must not only have always 
voted the republican ticket, but he must 
have been an active party worker, writes 
to the papers to say that, up to August 23, 
he bad found work for forty-four men. 
This means that he had turned' forty-four 
men out of employment for no reason but 
to make places for forty-four active repub¬ 
lican party workers. Will President Har¬ 
rison say that the party platform and his 
letter of acceptance have in this case been 
carried out ? If they have not, will he punish 
Cravens ? The latter has some eight or ten 
more places. 


The St. Louis Republic knows how to 
fight the battle of good administration. It 
is rendering a valuable service to the coun¬ 
try in putting its hand heavily upon the 
exact evils with which administration is 
now corrupted. The practices in Missouri 
growing out of the infamous rule of letting 
defeated or elected candidates for congress 
distribute offices may be cited as an ex¬ 
ample. The facts connected with these 
practices the Republic brings out with mer¬ 
ciless precision. There is the greatest 
need for a paper to do the same work in 
Virginia. 


It is stated that the late Commissioner 
of Pensions Tanner asked a passing visitor 
“ if he wanted to see the wheels go round.” 
Thereupon he proceeded to the details of 
an official decapitation. Such devilish enjoy¬ 
ment in inflicting suffering seemed hardly 
credible, but later reports appear to confirm 
the account. Now his own decapitation 
has come, and though deserved, it is pain¬ 
ful to think of the pain and disappoint¬ 
ment he has brought upon himself and his 
family. His salary was $5,000, his pension 
$864, his daughter as clerk got $1,800; his 
allowances for coachman, horses, and the 
like, were estimated at about $1,200 more. 
Yet this man could exult in wilfully de¬ 
priving a clerk of a chance for a living. 


A PEW days since Secretary Windom 
had to appoint a chief of the miscellaneous 
division of his office. The appointment 
lay between the acting chief, who would 



















52 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


thereby be promoted, and an outsider. The 
sole objection to the acting chief was that 
he “ had lost his political identity.” That 
means that he had attended to his duties 
instead of neglecting them to become a 
party worker m Iowa, where his home was. 
He was simply competent and had earned 
promotion from the ranks as a soldier 
earns it, by doing his work well. 
Secretary Windom is reported to have 
said : " This is a republican administra¬ 
tion, and, all things being equal, we want 
active republicans to fill the ofl&ces.” He 
appointed S. N. Hartshorn, who had 
“ been a local leader in Ohio politics, and 
had been of great service to Major McKinley 
in conventions and campaigns” 


General John Pope has emerged from 
the involuntary oblivion into which Gen¬ 
eral Lee sent him twenty-seven years ago, 
to make, in the last North American Review, 
the original suggestion that congressmen 
in their respective territories should be 
allowed to appoint the federal office-hold¬ 
ers. He also lays down the principle that 
the successful issue of a method of admin¬ 
istration in a foreign country is conclusive 
proof that that plan would not work here. 
It must be true, then, that the main prin¬ 
ciples of the constitution, having been 
taken from the English constitution, ought 
to be expunged. It might be well for 
General Pope to read something of modern 
administrative literature. He would learn 
that in Massachusetts and New York there 
is a competitive system in highly success¬ 
ful operation, and that such a system has 
become firmly rooted in the federal ser¬ 
vice. 


Frank Hatton, a pretended republican 
and-ex office-holder, and now editor of the 
Washington Post, has been occupying him¬ 
self lately with trying to induce his party 
and the President and cabinet to break the 
long list of their pledges for the reform of 
the civil service; but especially has he de¬ 
voted himself to the abuse of Mr. Roose¬ 
velt. Hatton’s last exploit was to print a 
fac-simile of the civil service commission¬ 
er’s handwriting and inquire to what clerk¬ 
ship he would succeed had he to pass an 
examination. Mr. Roosevelt has not ap¬ 
plied for any position as policeman, or tea 
inspector, or engineer, or gardener, or 
boiler inspector, or foremanship of sewers, 
or stenographer, or copyist, or clerk, or 
carrier. If he had, he would expect to sub¬ 
ject himself to a test for the position de¬ 
sired. What he has undertaken is the test 
of answering spoilsmen like Frank Hatton, 
of holding up the law to a lot of bullying 
congressmen, and of looking into the acts 
of certain public officials, who are trying 
secretly to break the law and their officia^ 


oaths. It is the general opinion that he i^ 
passing an excellent examination and will 
be marked high. 

NAVAL OFFICER BURT. 

The removal of Naval Officer Burt is such 
as to very nearly indicate that the Presi¬ 
dent means to insult the reform sentiment 
of the country and the men who originated 
and have struggled to maintain the reform 
system. Col. Burt has been twenty years 
in the public service. He was formerly in 
the naval office in New York, and was re¬ 
moved by President Arthur to make room 
for a politician, but was restored by Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland. He has always been a 
friend of the merit system, and employed 
that system before it was embodied in the 
civil service law. His office was a perpet¬ 
ual and complete proof that the system was 
the best that has yet been devised to gov¬ 
ern the employment of public servants. 
He, like Pearson and Graves, was its fear¬ 
less and outspoken friend against all 
comers. Beyond this. Col. Burt was a 
trained officer, skilled in the complicated 
duties of his office, with executive ability of 
a high order, entirely conscientious in the 
performance of his duty, and knowing no 
party in connection with his office. How 
he voted we do not know. He had a right 
to vote as he wanted to, and the people had 
a right to his services. 

Now, before the end of his term, he is 
dismissed by President Harrison, and the 
first information he receives of his dismis¬ 
sal is when he reads it in the morning pa¬ 
per. His efficiency and honesty challenge 
criticism. In what other employment in 
the world would a man with twenty years 
faithful service behind him be treated like 
a delinquent or a public enemy ? The 
manner of his dismissal looks like the 
gratification of a petty spite against the 
men who do not choose to bow their necks 
to Platt. 

Three officers, Pearson, Graves, and Burt, 
had won a national reputation by the suc¬ 
cess with which they applied the merit 
system. All of these. President Harrison 
has now forced out of place and he has suc¬ 
ceeded them with men who knew nothing 
of the working of the law and who have 
never been known as its friends. He was 
in not the least governed by business prin¬ 
ciples; the new men will not in years be as 
good as the old. These changes were made 
because men of the stripe of Platt, the worst 
public enemies this country has, ordered 
it. It is an additional proof that President 
Harrison is working along certain set lines. 
He has undoubtedly given heads of offices 
within the civil service law to understand 
that the law must be enforced. Beyond 
this he evidently expects to control the 
country through sub-distributors of the 


hundred thousand unclassified offices. If 
a state produces a dozen office-barons, as in 
Missouri, he will unite with them, but 
where one man like Platt in New York, 
Quay in Pennsylvania, or Mahone in Vir¬ 
ginia has got his heel on the necks of all 
the rest. President Harrison will boldly 
and before all the country unite with him 
to the end that by a joint use of the public 
offices, they may control elections. It was 
supposed that the republicans had learned 
their lesson and would never again try to 
rule the country by bosses. To see the 
resurrection by President Harrison of men 
like Platt, Warmouth and Mahone is a sur¬ 
prising and humiliating spectacle. 


THE ATTEMPT TO SUBJUGATE VIR¬ 
GINIA TO MAHONE. 

The present Mahone movement in Vir¬ 
ginia can not be too carefully studied, nor can 
the causes which keep it going be too care¬ 
fully marked. During his term as a senator, 
Mahone was a nonentity, except that he devel¬ 
oped a ravenous and vindictive appetite for 
spoil. He ruled the distribution of offices in 
Virginia. Other republican leadex’s did not 
like to be ruled, and a strong opposition 
developed, led by Wise, Post, Brady, Carver, 
Groner, and others. The quarrel was carried 
to the Chicago convention, where Mahone 
was beaten. Since President Harrison was 
inaugurated each faction has importuned 
him in turn, and when his opponents went 
Mahone stood on the corner and jeered. Later 
an attempt was made to bring about a com¬ 
promise, and Quay, Clarkson and Dudley, of 
the national committee, managed the nego¬ 
tiations. This was a crowd congenial to Ma¬ 
hone, and over their signatures they announced 
that peace had been made. The five-thousand 
dollar Norfolk collectorship was given to 
James D. Brady, a very active Mahone oppo¬ 
nent, and he “heartily concurred” in the 
peace. Mahone held his state convention, 
and never was a convention held that more 
servilely waited to learn the will of one man 
and then do it. Mahone had himself nomin¬ 
ated for governor. John M. Langston, a 
negro, who was a republican candidate for 
congress in 1888, and whom Mahone caused 
to be defeated, has published a letter announc¬ 
ing his surrender. His reward will appear 
later. Perhaps Mahone will have the House 
seat him. Beyond those actually bought, the 
compromise seems not to have reached, and 
some could not be bought. C. A. Heermans, 
having been offered a district attorneyship, 
wrote: 

“ From the public prints and from private 
sources I learn that this appointment and its 
confirmation was and is at the sufference of 
William Mahone. 

“ There is an irrepressible conflict in the re¬ 
publican party of Virginia that must be set¬ 
tled before I accept office under such condi¬ 
tions, nor should any patriotic republican 
accept such at the expense of his manhood. 
Home rule vs. centralized power, the people 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


^3 


vs. bossism, liberty vs. tyranny—these are 
questions not only of vital importance to the 
republican party of Virginia, but to the 
whole people. Whenever a party so far for¬ 
gets itself as to sacrifice its principles for a 
mess of pottage—whenever it sacrifices 
the will of the people to a personal tyrant— 
whenever it surrenders the rights of the peo¬ 
ple to one man, then it becomes the duty of 
the masses to rebuke the men who forget they 
are servants and assume the role of masters.” 

The Valley the leading republican 

paper of Virginia, also says : 

“We do not question the sincerity of the 
New York Tribune in its appeal to the repub¬ 
licans of Virginia to support Mahone. VVere 
its premise correct there would be some force 
in its appeal. But when it assumes that he 
represents “civil liberty,” and that in the “pre¬ 
liminaries to the present convention he made 
concessions,” our able cotemporary is resting 
unber a delusion. Mahone represents nothing 
but the most odious phase of machine politics 
—of boss despotism. His concessions are on 
the surface. In the practical work of the 
preliminaries the old vindictive methods were 
used more relentlessly than ever before. For 
this reason those who did not believe in those 
methods refrained from participating in the 
primaries or the convention, reserving to 
themselves the right to be felt where the ma¬ 
chine can not work—at the ballot box. 

“We would suggest to the republican press of 
the north to keep their hands out of this con¬ 
test in Virginia. They know nothing about 
the internal workings of Mahone’s machine. 
If they did they would not have a word of 
protest to enter against those republicans who 
do not mean to be governed by it. It is a 
fight against the most cruel and relentless po¬ 
litical despotism ever known in this country. 
It is a struggle to emancipate the party from 
the clutch of the most unreasonable and selfish 
leader that was ever entrusted with power. It 
is a contest to break the force of an influence, 
which, if successful, will wreck the republican 
party of the country—an influence that has 
been condemned by the republican voters of 
the nation whenever called to pass upon it— 
an influence that came near breaking up the 
Chicago convention in 1880; which nerved 
the arm of a lunatic to slay a president— 
which defeated the republican party in 1884, 
and which was repudiated by the party in the 
nomination of Harrison, as well as by the re¬ 
publicans of New York and Pennsylvania in 
1882.” 

The success of Mahone at the coming elec¬ 
tion means the subjugation of Virginia to him 
and the delivery of another state into the grip 
of a boss. President Harrison has turned over 
to Mahone the Virginia “ patronage.” The 
whole scheme is a piece of political morality 
worthy of Italy in the middle ages. 


THE PUBLICITY OF THE ELIGIBLE 
LISTS. 

Ex-Coramissioner Oberly has published the 
opinion that making the eligible lists public 
is the end of the competelive system. This is 
a strange conclusion. Under the rule of se¬ 
cret eligible lists, the Baltimore post-office, 
within forty miles of the office of the civil ser¬ 
vice commission, and employing several hun¬ 
dred men, got out all but less than twenty-five 
and got democrats into their places. When 
Postmaster Brown succeeded PostmasterVeasy, 
he turned out some two hundred of these demo¬ 
crats and put a like number of other demo¬ 


crats into their places. The Baltimore custom 
house performed a similar feat. In Philadel¬ 
phia Harrity turned the old employes out of 
the post-office by hundreds , and not only were 
democrats worked into their places, but the 
rule of ward apportionment and giving pi aces to 
ward workers worked smoothly. In Indiana¬ 
polis for four years democrats only were ap¬ 
pointed, until just before the expiration of the 
late postmaster’s term when two or three re¬ 
publicans were put in. The advantages of a 
secret list have found a late illustration in the 
Milwaukee post-office. We hazard the state¬ 
ment that the offices where the eligible list has 
been kept from the knowledge of the appoint¬ 
ing officer are exceedingly rare. 

The appointing officer and the party manag¬ 
ers knew how the list stood, but the people did 
not know. The pressure that Mr. Oberly so 
so fears did its secret and effectual work un¬ 
checked by public opinion. As an influential 
Indianapolis politician who had one son in 
the post office and wanted to get a second into 
his place remarked, “We watched the list un¬ 
til the second could be certified and then had 
the first one resign and the second one ap¬ 
pointed in his place.” 

Now the eligible list is printed in all the 
papers. Anything like a public competition 
has for thousands of years been a matter of 
public interest, and it is so in this case. Every 
appointment made is noted in the public press 
together with his position on the list. Doubt¬ 
less “ pressure ” tries its hand, but public opin¬ 
ion will not permit it to avail. It will not be 
long before no appointing officer will dare to 
commit an injustice. Instead of being a 
damage to the competitive feature, making 
the lists public is the most beneficial step that 
has ever been taken in the administration of 
the law. It will bring members of all parties 
to the competition, and will drive out favorit¬ 
ism in making appointments. Still more 
publicity is needed. The examination papers 
should be open to public inspection, and the 
practice of requiring certificates of character 
ought to be resumed, but the names of the 
persons who certify should be accessible to 
the public. 


I In the summer of 1888 Corporal Tanner 
stopped at Indianapolis on his way to take 
part in a campaign in some state farther west. 
He made a speech here, and so impressed the 
j republican managers with his value as a cam¬ 
paign speaker that they urged every argument 
to induce him to remain in Indiana. Tanner 
steadily refused under plea of his prior en¬ 
gagement, and it was not until General Har¬ 
rison personally requested it that he consented 
to remain. He made many speeches in the 
state. There is no doubt but that Tanner 
rendered President Harrison a real service in 
aiding to unite the soldiers against President 
Cleveland. President Harrison understood 
this and paid Tanner for it with the pension 
office. He was utterly unfitted for the place. 
This must have impressed itself upon any one 
taking the proper steps to find out about a man 


whose appointment to office is contemplated. 
He has had to be forced out, and he must 
therefore have done serious damage. Presi¬ 
dent Harrison is entitled to the melancholy 
credit of compelling Tanner to leave after his 
remaining had become a scandal. The irre¬ 
pressible inquiry again comes up. How long 
are the offices to be used to pay personal and 
party debts?- 

The Indianapolis Journal of August 15, has 
an interestfng notice of the Dean Pump Works 
of this city. These works were founded and 
built up to their present large size by five 
brothers, themselves skilled workmen. The 
proprietors take great pride in their workmen _ 
One of them, pointing to a long line of men 
said : “Nearly every man there owns the 
house he lives in.” Then the Journal goes on : 

“There is a system of advancement in the 
Dean establishment. A boy who comes in to 
learn the trade, is given every opportunity to 
do so, and his success lies in his own hands. If 
he is capable and can keep up with the pro¬ 
cession there is advancement for him. If he 
is not capable he is dropped” 

It is hard to see why rotation in office should 
not be applied to these works, and why if the 
democrats carry the coming city election the 
Deans should not weed out all the republicans 
and put none but democrats on guard, and why 
Markey and one or two other south-side dem¬ 
ocrats should not control this patronage. 

Collector Cravens, with the fifty odd gaugers, 
weighers and clerks under him, has about com¬ 
pleted a similar work and it is impossible to 
say, if it is good for the internal revenue office 
it would be bad for the Dean establishment. 


The reinstated republican railway mail 
clerks are reported as saying that the incom¬ 
petence of the democratic incumbents is the 
cause of the complaints of the inefficiency of 
the service, and that they should “ go.” If 
this is true, these republican clerks are using 
the same tricks to force men out of the service 
because of political opinions that were used 
against them. If we follow the line of argu¬ 
ment of the Boston Herald, the fact that fel¬ 
low-workmen four years ago by underhanded 
methods forced republicans out in large num¬ 
bers, would make it impossible for them to do 
otherwise with the democrats; all the same, 
such talk comes with bad grace from men who 
could themselves never have got back into the 
service except with some congressman’s collar 
about their necks, had there not been a steady 
protest against their political proscription. 
The deranged condition of the mail service in 
certain sections of the country is because there 
has not yet been time to rally from the recent 
republican loot and to recover the efficiency it 
had gained since the preceding democratic 
loot. Congressmen injected their untrained 
men in great numbers into the service, and 
former employes were reinstated, good and 
bad, regardless of their records. Democratic 
incumbents were dismissed in the same man¬ 
ner. There are incompetent men in the serv¬ 
ice, doubtless, but they are not confined to one 
party. 













54 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Congressman Flood of the Elmira [N. Y.] 
district, and Corporal Tanner had a serious 
difference regarding the spoil of the pension 
board, and Corporal Tanner felt obliged to 
describe that Congressman’s mental equip¬ 
ment as follows: 

“ When Congressman Flood first came into 
my office my impression of him was that if 
his brains were blown through a crane’s bill 
into a mosquito’s eye the mosquito wouldn’t 
wink. Flood got two of his friends appointed 
on the medical board, and I don’t suppose he 
is a bit thankful.” 

Mr. Flood is reported to have visited Deer 
Park and threatened the President with his 
resignation if the commissioner were not dis¬ 
missed. Flood appears to be a doughty chief¬ 
tain with a firm grasp on the spoil in his 
domain. Boss Platt and Principal Henchman 
J. Sloat Fassett undertook to name the post¬ 
master for Elmira, but Flood, when the Pres¬ 
ident hesitated, threatened to resign if he 
were not permitted to name his own post¬ 
master. Then he proceeded to appoint his 
brother to the place. 

The first experiment of the administration 
in using the offices to affect southern elections 
was in the third Lousiana district. It has 
come to a disastrous and therefore for the 
country a happy end. The democrats elected 
the congressman by 5,000 majority ; this was 
nearly double their previous majority. 

The administration has removed Sharpe, 
the postmaster at Lead Hill, Ark., and Con¬ 
gressman Quackenbush’s man, Stevens, post¬ 
master at Shushan, N. Y., whose careers we 
noted in July. This would seem to indicate 
that the balance of the list will be reached— 
Bagby, McFarlane, Vandervoort, and so on. 

WANTON REMOVALS. 

The danger, then, consists merely in this: The 
President can displace from office a man whose 
merits require that he should be continued in it. 
What will be the motives which the President can 
feel for such abuse of his power, and the restraints 
that operate to prevent it? In the first place, he 
will be impeachable by this house, before the senate, 
for such an act of maladministration ; for I contend 
that the wanton removal of meritorious officers would 
subject him to impeachment and removal from his own 
high trust. '' * Can we suppose a President, 

elected for four years only, dependent upon the pop¬ 
ular voice, impeachable by the legislature, little, if 
at all, distinguished for wealth, personal talents, or 
influence from the head of the department himself; 
I say, will he bid defiance to all these considerations, 
and wantonly dismiss a meritorious and virtuous 
officer? Such an abuse of power exceeds my conception. 
—Congressman Jimes Madison, June, 1789. 

—September 2.—Corporal Tanner removed 
fifty-nine democratic medical examiners and 
appointed republicans. 

—August 31 twenty-seven presidential post¬ 
masters were appointed ; of these, seventeen 
were removed, presumably because they were 
democrats. 

—The New York Cotton Exchange have pe¬ 
titioned the President to take a business view 
of the matter and to retain the competent con¬ 
sul, F. F. Dufals, at Havre. 


—The President has removed Postmaster 
W. R. Curran, of Hoboken, whose four years 
would have expired Aug. 1, 1890. There 
seems to have been no reason whatever for the 
removal except to make place for a republican 
politician. His office ranked high and had 
shown great improvement under him. There 
was no complaint. His place had been fought 
over for months by three factions, and when 
at last these became harmonized the spoil was 
thrown to them. 

—Three separate petitions, from the ship¬ 
masters who visit the port of Rio de Janeiro, 
from the American residents and from the 
merchants who have trade relations with the 
United States, were sent to the President ask¬ 
ing for the retention of Consul-General Arm¬ 
strong, but he was removed. The Rio News, 
published at Rio de Janeiro, says: 

“Were such a thing to be done in private 
life, it would be condemned in unmeasured 
terms; but when done by a partisan govern¬ 
ment in whose eyes good service and efficiency, 
the risk of life and health, all count for noth¬ 
ing, and in whose creed the public offices of 
the nation are looked upon as the legitimate 
spoils of a party, it must forsooth be permit¬ 
ted without a murmur. We have read much 
in some of our exchanges of the religious char¬ 
acter of the President and of the high purposes 
of his government; if this one act is a fair 
sample of these, then perhaps something less 
pretentious will do just as well.” 

—Clarkson appeared in the matter of the 
Cannelton, Indiana, post-office as a very brazen 
and awkward prevaricator. He made a sim¬ 
ilar unfortunate appearance when he attempt¬ 
ed to explain the dismissal of Mr. McKenna, 
postmaster at Long Island City, noted last 
month. According to the New York Tribune 
dispatch he stated that one or two anonymous 
letters protesting against the removal had 
been received, but nothing that could be traced 
to a definite source. Charles Benner, a repub¬ 
lican and corporation attorney, April 4 and 
June 19, sent letters to the President protest¬ 
ing, and received acknowledgments from the 
President’s private secretary stating they had 
been handed to the postmaster-general. The 
letter of June 19 contained a petition for Mc¬ 
Kenna’s retention, signed by 221 republicans, 
59 democrats, 16 independents, 90 whose pol¬ 
itics were not stated, and 5 prohibitionists. 
The letter also stated that other petitions were 
in circulation. June 11, Bishop Southgate, 
June 13, Mr. Cooper, rector of the Church of 
the Redeemer, and June 26, Mr. Geddes, pas¬ 
tor of the Presbyterian church, wrote letters 
protesting against the removal of this faithful 
public servant. Meanwhile it is asked that 
Richenstein’s appointment be reconsidered on 
the ground of unfitness, and petitions bearing 
over 1,500 signatures have been drawn up ask¬ 
ing Mr. McKenna’s retention. 

—P. C. MacCourt, of the liquidating divis¬ 
ion in the New York custom house, received 
notice of his dismissal by Secretary Wiudom, 
no cause being stated. He thereupon appealed 
to the President in the following letter: 

“As an Irish-American citizen—the race to which 
you owe yonr election in this city and state—I appeal 
to you as the executive of the nation to protect me 
under the civil service law from arbitrary dismissal 
by your secretary of the treasury. Yesterday Mr. 
Windom sent me a printed form dismissing me from 
the treasury department, I being classified nnder the 
civil service, and therefore, I submit, not to be dis¬ 
missed without cause. 

"I have been for four years an emploj^e of the Uni¬ 
ted States government, two of these years doing cler¬ 
ical work at $70 per month in the assessment division, 
revenue department, for which my republican friends 


doing clerical work, received double the salary. In 
this office there were twenty-six clerks, I being the 
one democratic appointee, and during the two years 
not one of those twenty-five republicans was removed 
under Mr. Cleveland’s administration. 

“I therefore appeal to yon, Mr. President, as the 
head executive of the government, to protect me in 
my rights, and to request your secretary to have me 
placed on the roll of this custom house, where I have 
been in the liquidating division for the last nine 
months, and refer to my record as to how 1 have dis¬ 
charged my duty.’’ 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM, 

“ Large districts or parcels of land were allotted by 
the conquering generals to the superior officers of 
the army, and by them dealt out again in smaller 
parcels or allotments to the inferior officers and most 
deserving soldiers. * The condition of holding 
the lands thus given was that the possessor should 
do service faithfully, both at home and in the wars, 
to him by whom they were given,’’ and, on breach 
of this condition, “ by not performing the stipulated 
service, or by deserting his lord in battle,’’ the lands 
reverted to the lord. The vas.sal, upon investiture, 
took an oath of fealty to the lord, and in addition 
did homage, “openly and humbly kneeling, being 
ungirt, uneovered and holding up his hands, both 
together, between those of his lord, who sate before 
him, and there profe.ssing that he did become his 
MAN from that day forth, of life and limb and 
earthly honor, and then he received a kiss from his 
lord.’’ Services were free and base. Free service 
was to pay a sum of money, or serve under the lord 
in war. Base service was to plow the lord’s land, to 
make his hedge oj carry out his dung.— Blackstone. 

—Congressman Hank [Tenn.] still breathes 
threatenings against the civil service law, and 
he says, if alive when congress meets, he will 
introduce a bill to repeal it. 

—They don’t want to remove anybody in 
some of the departments for purely political 
reasons. I have no time for this pandering to 
a lot of political dudes and mugwumps. 
Thank goodness, we have none of that breed 
down our vr ay. —Congressman Darlington 
[ Perm.]. 

—We are pretty well satisfied with the ad¬ 
ministration. Take New York in comparison 
with the other states and we have not much to 
complain of as to appointments. The presi¬ 
dential post offices come slow, but matters ap¬ 
pear all right. I have in my district not a 
fourth-class postoffice worth $200 a year—not 
an office that anyone wants—that had not been 
filled under Mr. Cleveland’s administration. 
The first fourth-class post-office filled in my 
district was filled on July 30th. On July 30th 
pf this year every one of these offices I had a 
candidate for—all above $200 per year—was 
filled. I believe in civil service reform within 
the party and not out of it. In other words, 
“to the victors belong the spoils.” In making 
appointments, however, such victors should be 
chosen as are most competent to fill the of¬ 
fices .—Congressman Shearman [N. F.]. 

—“It (the civil service law) is a humbug. 
It ought to be materially modified or re¬ 
pealed. I couldn’t pass a civil service ex¬ 
amination to-day. It is wrong in principle 
I don’t want anyone to tell whom I may em¬ 
ploy in my business. When I hire a man I 
want to see his face. I don’t care whether or 
not he knows the distance from Mars to the 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


55 


sun. I want to know if he can do the work I 
want done. The way to find out is to put him 
at it, and if he can’t do it put him aside.”— 
Congressman Evans [Tknn.]. 

—Congressman Thompson (O.) says that 
Ohio republicans in the departments at Wash¬ 
ington must go home and vote. The state 
committee has a full list, and all who fail will 
be “ remembered.” 

—Senator Plumb says that there have been 
four times as many changes made in the post- 
offices in Kansas by President Harrison as 
were made by President Cleveland in the 
same length of time, and that in his congres¬ 
sional district there is not a democratic postmaster 
left. 

—What may be seen in the state at large 
may be met with in less degree in our own 
county. The bright young man who attempts 
to get a foothold in j)olitical life without sellmg 
himself body and soul to the political boss finds his 
way exceedingly difficult and well nigh inac¬ 
cessible.— The Kennett Advance \_Rep., Chester 
Co., Pa.]. 

— Deer Park, Md., Aug. 28. —Clarksou 
spent the day with the President. Congress¬ 
man Owen called. Thirty postmasters were 
appointed. 

—Washington, Sept. 14.—Representative 
Cheadle was on the train which carried the 
President to Deer Park this morning. Mr. 
Cheadle is expected to return here the first 
, of next week. It is probable that he is work¬ 
ing for some offices for constituents, who, he 
says, have not been taken care of as he would 
like.— Special to the Indianapolis Journal. 

—In 1888 Joseph D. Upton was the republi¬ 
can candidate for congress in the sixth Mis¬ 
souri district, and was, of course, defeated. 
In the gradual development of our American 
feudalism, however, defeated and successful 
candidates have come to share the spoil. In 
the exercise of his “ prerogative ” as congress¬ 
man, Van Schaick calls it. Defeated Candidate 
Upton has been dividing the offices in his dis¬ 
trict among his henchmen. He has 234 post- 
offices alone. He has proceeded in a business¬ 
like way, as the following affidavits show. 
They were taken in Henry county. Mo., Au¬ 
gust 28, 1889, and the affiants seem to be 
entirely reliable and financially responsible. 
This is secondary evidence, but under all the 
circumstances it commands belief; 

Personally appeared before me, James 1). Lindsay, 
a notary public in and for said Henry county, J. L. 
Shelton, who, being duly sworn under his oath says: 
That he is personally acquainted with James H. Trol- 
linger, now postmaster at Palo Pinto, in Benton 
county. Mo.; that on or about the 20th day of July, 
1889, he had a conversation at Windsor, Mo., with 
the said James H. Trollinger, in which said Trol- 
linger told this affiant the manner in which he ob¬ 
tained the post-office at Palo Pinto, saying that he, 
Trollinger, had not thought of applying for such 
post-office until some man at Warsaw, Mo., suggested 
that he might as well get the post office as anybody, 
and that he ought to circulate a petition ; the said 
Trollinger did circulate a petition and got about 
forty names thereon ; that one H. W. Fristoe, one of 
his opponents for such post-office, had a petition with 
over one hundred names thereon; that he, said Trol¬ 
linger, sent his petition to the post-office department, 
and heard nothing from it for some_time; that after¬ 


wards he received a letter telling him to be at War¬ 
saw, Mo., on a certain day ; that he went on the day 
named, and then and there met fifteen or twenty 
other applicants for post-offices; that he, said Trol¬ 
linger, was there asked how much the post-office at 
Palo Pinto paid; that he replied it paid from $60 to$80 
per annum ; that thereupon the man who had made 
the inquiry told him, said Trollinger, to pay 86 now; 
that the said Trollinger then and there paid $6 ; that 
the applicant for the post oflice at Warsaw gave $2-'j, 
and that all the applicants for post-offices paid some¬ 
thing, he, the said Trollinger, saying to affiant that 
the amounts thus paid “ made a big roll; a heap too 
big to pay expenses; ” that said Trollinger further 
told affiant that the money thus paid was for Joseph 
B. Upton, and further said that for a long time he, 
said Trollinger, thought his $6 was gone, but that 
after awhile his commission came, but that he ex¬ 
pected he would have to pay some more hereafter. 

Before me, a notary public, in and for Henry 
county aforesaid, came A. C. Clark, who, being duly 
sworn, under his oath says; That he is acquainted 
with James H. Trollinger, now postmaster at Palo 
Pinto, in Benton County, Mo.; that on or about the 
22d day of July, 1889, he had a conversation with said 
Trollinger, in which said Trollinger told this affiant 
how he obtained the postmastership at Palo Pinto ; 
he, the said Trollinger, saying that he obtained the 
appointment as postmaster at Palo Pinto through 
the influence of Joseph B. Upton; that he paid $6 
for the office, and knew that the said Upton got the 
money ; and that the other applicants for post-office.« 
in Benton county paid in proportion to the proceeds 
of the offices they applied for, and that this money 
so paid was to pay Upton’s expenses to Washington 
City. And further, deponent says that he resides 
jiear the city of Windsor, and in Henry county, 
Missouri, and that the conversation above narrated 
occurred at said city of Windsor, and further depo¬ 
nent saith not. 

Before me, James D. Lindsay, a notary public for 
said Henry county, came George J. Shelton, person¬ 
ally known to me, who, being first duly sworn, under 
his oath says: That he re>ides at the city of Wind¬ 
sor, in the county aforesaid ; that he is acquainted 
with James H. Trollinger, now postmaster at Palo 
Pinto, in Benton county. Mo.: that on or about the 
22d day of July, 1889, he had a conversation with 
said Trollinger at the city of Windsor, in which said 
Trollinger told affiant then and there how he ob¬ 
tained the postmastership at Palo Pinto; he, said 
Trollinger, saying that the appointment cost him $6; 
that Joseph B. Upton notified him, the applicant for 
the Warsaw post-office, and others, to meet him 
(Upton) at Warsaw, Benton county. Missouri, on a 
certain day ; that Upton asse.ssed them all according 
to the amount of .salary attached to the offices; that 
the Warsaw post-office applicant paid $25, and further 
affiant saith not. 

—June 24.—Sixth Auditor Coulter informed 
Chiefs of Division Hardson, Cunningham, 
Peetrey, Dougherty, Ellis, Farron, Howell, 
Leach and Johnson, that their resignations 
were desired. Then Coulter declared that the 
horn-blowers of the last campaign must have 
places, and that every one of the democrats in 
his office must go before the Ohio election, 
civil service or no civil service. The next is 
the following; 

Washington, July 24.— Civil Service Com¬ 
missioner Roosevelt said to-day that charges 
have been brought against both the pension 
office and the sixth auditor’s office that men 
have been discharged because they were dem¬ 
ocrats. 

The horn-blowers took charge as follows; 

Washington, August 31. — An unusual 
scene has been enacted in the sixth auditor’s 
office this week. The money order branch of 
the office is badly in arrears with its work, 
and in order to bring it up to date and close 
the businees of the fiscal year, Sixth Auditor 


Coulter ordered the entire force of the office 
to drop everything else during this week and 
lend a hand with this business. Last night the 
entire force, about 440 clerks, save those who 
are absent on leave, were at the office from six 
to nine o’clock. 

—The corruption and attempted corruption 
of the franchise by means of post-office and 
other “ spoils ” go on in all directions. We 
have the word of a trustworthy local newspa¬ 
per in Chester county—a county, by the way 
which joins to the distinction of exceptional 
intelligence and prosperity the less creditable 
one of being dominated by cast-iron partisan¬ 
ship—that at three post-offices of some im¬ 
portance in the southern section of the coun¬ 
ty, there are seventeen anxious and hopeful 
applicants for the place of postmaster, all of 
the seventeen being fed on hope by the congressman 
of the district, pending a political contest in which 
he is interested. At West Grove five applicants 
are thus “ on the string,” and at Oxford and 
Kennett Square six each. Primarily the scan¬ 
dal and the shame of this business lies at the 
door of the postma.ster-general and the Presi¬ 
dent, who put the “patronage” in the congress¬ 
man’s hands.— The American [Rep.], Aug. 24. 

—The President appointed Theodore B. 
Willis naval officer of the port of New York, 
Ernest Nathan collector of internal revenue 
of the Brooklyn district, and George W. Lyon 
surveyor of the port. Of these appointments 
the New York Tribune says: “The appoint¬ 
ments of Mr. Lyon and Mr. Willis, which 
directly affect this city, are excellent, and the 
selection of Mr. Willis as naval officer will be 
especially gratifying to the republicans of 
Brooklyn, who, under his direction as chairman of 
the campaign committee, did such capital toork for 
the cause led by Gen. Harrison a year ago. Mr. 
Nathan has also established his claims to special 
consideration at the hands of his party.'' 

—TheSt. Louis Republic states that Clarkson 
removed Peter Keith, an old soldier, the demo¬ 
cratic postmaster at Strawberry Point, la., and 
appointed Keith’s predecessor, a man seventy 
years old, who has always taken a great inter¬ 
est in working up subscriptions for Clarkson’s 
paper, having obtained recently 132 subscrip¬ 
tions. There were two old soldiers candidates 
for the place when Keith’s term expired. The 
Clayton county veterans passed resolutions 
denouncing Clarkson’s action, and a protest 
was sent to Wanamaker. 

—^Birkett whose office as distributor of places 
in the Brooklyn navy yard was described last 
month, says, “there will be a clean sweep no 
matter what anybody else says. Our boys 
will all get what they want.” Birkett a few days 
since saw the secretary of the navy in New 
York and took him sharply to task because 
Congressman Wallace has appointed 200 of his 
henchmen to places in the yard. This is a tremen¬ 
dous infringement on Birkett’s prerogative as 
chairman of the republican general commit¬ 
tee. 

—Henry Rokestraw was appointed post¬ 
master at Cheraw, S. C. He went to a neigh¬ 
boring town, and became intoxicated and 
disorderly, was arrested and fined ten dollars 
and sent to jail because he could not pay. 
Wanamaker was telegraphed that his recent¬ 
ly-appointed postmaster at Cheraw was in the 
guard-house drunk, and what should be done 
about it. No reply was received. 

—The repnblicwns of Eureka Springs, Ark.‘ 
held a mass meeting recently to denounce the 
appointment of T. W. True as postmaster at 
that place. They put the responsibility of the 
appointment upon that notorious republican 
Powell Clayton, and stated that he “ has 
prostituted his high privilege as aispenser 
of federal patronage, and has thereby ruined re¬ 
publican success in this state.” 















56 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—Orders have been prepared by Secretary 
Tracy for repairing, at the Norfolk navy 
yard, the war vessels Brooklyn, Alliance, 
Pensacola and Amphitrite. This looks like 
the old and corrupt trick of putting a large 
number of men under pay, and thus purchas¬ 
ing their votes at Mahone’s approaching elec¬ 
tion. 

—The husband of J. Ellen Foster has been 
appointed general agent of the department of 
justice. Another debt paid out of the common 
treasury. Salary, $2,500. 

—At a critical moment during the Chicago 
convention an actor named Pope from St. 
Louis, recited Sheridan’s Ride. He has since 
received the consulship at Toronto. 

—E. A. Dimmick has been made consul at 
Barbadoes. His wife is a niece of Gail Ham¬ 
ilton, the relative and eulogist of Mr. Blaine. 

—Robert A. Mosely, Jr., has been appointed 
collector of internal revenue of the Alabama 
district. He is chairman of the republican 
state committee. 

—Louis Weinsteil has been appointed col¬ 
lector of the fourth Iowa district. He is ed¬ 
itor of the Burlington Hawheye. 

—Quay’s henchman, Comptroller Gilkeson, 
who, it will be remembered, nearly brought 
on war between Quay and Sherman, has re¬ 
quested the resignation of W. P. Montague^ 
head of a division. Of him the Boston Post 
says: 

“ Mr. Montague, who was one of yesterday’ 
victims, is an accomplished young lawyer 
from Chelsea, Mass, who is so far from being 
a partisan that he never served on a political 
committee in his life. Comptroller Butler 
had great confidence in Mr. Montague, and 
relied much upon his assistance in preparing 
the data for some of his most important de¬ 
cisions. Mr. Montague is a democrat of the 
best type, and a decided civil service reformer.” 

THE THANKSGIVING SERMON. 

The Indianapolis Journal recently said : 

“ Herbert Welsh, the civil service enthusi¬ 
ast, who has addressed a circular to the min¬ 
isters of the country, asking them to preach 
next Thanksgiving Day on the subject of civil 
service reform, is said to be meeting with in¬ 
different success, so far as may be judged by 
responses received. This disinclination of 
the clergy to join in Mr. Welsh’s scheme by 
no means Indicates a lack of sympathy with 
the reform in question, but does indicate a 
belief that there are other topics of more im¬ 
portance demanding attention of the pulpit. 
To uphold civil service reform ideas is not 
necessarily a proof of virtue, nor opposition 
to it a sin, and while so many unquestionable 
virtues remain to be taught, and so many sins 
to be denounced, it really seems that the pul¬ 
pit has enough to do without taking up mat¬ 
ters of political policy. The teachings that 
make men honest citizens insure the proper 
conduct of the civil service without special 
religious instruction in that line.” 

Those who have seen the long list of dis¬ 
tinguished clergymen of all denominations 
who have responded need not be told that the 
Journal has been misled asj^o the interest man¬ 
ifested, but the apparent effort to belittle the 
importance of this question and to put it out¬ 
side moral issues is 'the more surprising for 
only last November the Journal said : “They 
must be accomplished if our civil service is to 
be saved from becoming the mere prey of 


spoilsmen and a perpetual source of corruption 
and danger to the government. 

Whether the discussion of this question 
pertains to morals may be judged when the 
republican national platform in 1872 charac¬ 
terized the spoils system as “ fatally demoral¬ 
izing.” And again in 1884 and 1888 de¬ 
manded that all laws at variance with the 
object of existing reform legislation should 
be repealed, to the end that the dangers to free in- 
stitutions tvhich lurk in the 'power of official patron¬ 
age may be wisely and effectually avoided.” 

Were any further evidence needed, Abraham 
Lincoln, schooled to a nation’s peril, gave warn¬ 
ing that “ if ever this free people, this govern¬ 
ment itself, is ever utterly demoralized, it will 
come from this wriggle and struggle for 
office.” It has been only of late years that 
the facts to show the baseness of the spoils 
system have been accessible to the public. 
The details of this despotism were for years 
smothered. Papers were subsidized, social 
and business relations were threatened, and 
the victims were trained to silence. If cruel¬ 
ty, treachery, meanness and lying are im¬ 
moral, then a system that can not exist without 
them is also immoral, and is a question ap¬ 
propriate for pulpit discussion. It is un¬ 
doubtedly true that many conscientious cler¬ 
gymen will not feel called upon to follow Mr. 
Welsh’s suggestion. They do not yet fully 
realize what is involved in the placing of 
thousands of favorites into public places. 
When men and women are proscribed from 
public employment in a free country in the 
nineteenth century because of political opin¬ 
ions, when offices are given as bribes, when 
the air is thick with details of broken prom¬ 
ises and treachery, when, by unlawful and 
disgraceful assistance, an unscrupulous man 
like Mahoue is given Virginia, Q'l^y, Penn¬ 
sylvania, and Platt, New York, it is time for 
those charged with the oversight of the spir¬ 
itual and moral well-being of others to protest 
against the corrupting power of political 
patronage. 


We are permitted to print the following let¬ 
ter from Rev. R. V. Hunter, pastor of the 
Seventh Presbyterian church of this city : 

“ I am in full sympathy with your idea of a 
non-partisan sermon to be preached on the 
coming Thanksgiving. I believe that it 
should be preached for many reasons. The 
people need a fair presentation of national 
issues, and this they can not get from partisan 
papers or speakers. The best citizen is the 
one who loves his country more than party. 
There are evils in all parties. There is, like¬ 
wise good in all parties. What we need is to 
know the good and to applaud it. Likewise 
to know the evil and condemn it. Anything 
that will contribute to better government, to 
more enlightened political conscience, will be 
in place on that day.” 

QUESTIONS 

Used in the Examination for Clerks and Car¬ 
riers held at Indianapolis, August 6, 1889, 
with the Rules for Marking. 

CLERK EXAMINATION. 

First Subject—Orthograriiy. 

N. B.—Capitals should be used only where requir¬ 
ed by the rules of orthography. 


1. Write, in the spaces below, the abbreviations 
for the names which will be given by the examiner. 
(The following were given:) 

1 November; 2 Oregon ; 3 Department; 4 North¬ 
east ; 5Secretary; 6Treasurer; 7 Justice of the Peace; 
8 Arizona Territory ; 9 Major ; 10 Place. 

2. Spelling, as dictated by the examiner. (The 
following were dictated:) 

1 Irregular; 2 Schedule ; 3 Issuing; 4 Foreign; 5 
Receive; 6 Permissible; 7 Correspondence; 8 Par¬ 
cels; 9 Accompanying; 10 Transmissible ; 11 Classi¬ 
fication; 12 Initials; 13 Equivalent; 14 Remittance; 
15 Merchandise; 16 Superintendent; 17 Wrap¬ 
ping; 18 Register; 19 Envelope; 20 Subscription. 

Second Subject—Penmanship. 

N. B.—The marks on penmanship will be deter¬ 
mined by legibility, neatnessjand general appearance, 
and by correctness and uniformity in the formation 
of words, letters, and punctuation marks in the sec¬ 
ond exercise of the third subject—writing from plain 
copy—and in the exercise of the fourth subject—let¬ 
ter-writing. 

Third Subject—Copying. 

First Exercise — Writing from Dictation. 

N. B.—Spelling, use of capitals, punctuation, and 
all omissions and mistakes will be taken into consid¬ 
eration in marking the exercises of this subject. 

One of the examiners will dictate an exercise of not 
less than ten lines so distinctly that all the persons be¬ 
ing examined can hear him. The pa.ssage will first be 
read for information, and then be dictated in phrases 
of five or six words, at the rate of from fifteen to 
twenty-five words per minute. If from any cause the 
competitor miss a word, he should not pause, but 
leave a blank space and go on with the next words he 
hears. Three minutes will be allowed after the dic¬ 
tation for punctuation and correction. The follow¬ 
ing was dictated; 

“ The secretary shall make minntes of the proceed¬ 
ings of the comniissien and record them in a book to 
be kept for that purpose and to be entitled “Record 
of Proceedings.’’ He shall have charge of the secre¬ 
tary’s division of the commission, and shall have 
custody of and be responsible for the safe-keeping of 
the books, records, papers, and other property there¬ 
of. He shall enter upon the registers of eligibles the 
names of persons eligible to places in the classified 
departmental service, «.nd, by direction of the com¬ 
mission, upon proper requisition therefor, make cer¬ 
tification thereof. He shall perform such other du¬ 
ties as the commission may direct.” 

Second Exercise— Writing from Plain Copy. 

N. B.—Spelling, use of capitals, punctuation, and 
all omissions and mistakes will be taken into con¬ 
sideration in marking the exercises of this subject. 

Copy the following precisely, punctuating and 
capitalizing as in the copy: 

The grade of each competitor shall be expressed by 
the whole number nearest the general average at¬ 
tained by him, and the grade of each eligible shall 
be noted upon the register of eligibles in connection 
with his name. When two or more eligibles are of 
the same grade, preference in certification shall be 
determined by the order in which their application 
papers were filed. 

No person who has passed an examination shall 
while eligible on the regl.ster supplied by such exam; 
ination,be re-examined, unless he shall furnish ev¬ 
idence satisfactory to the commission that at the 
time of his examination he was, because of illness or 
for other good cause, incapable of doing hi ms elf jus¬ 
tice in said examination. 

Fourth Subject—Letter Writing, 

N. B.—This exercise is designed chiefly to test the 
competitor’s skill in simple English composition, 
knowledge of the rules of punctuation, and concep¬ 
tion of the proper form of a letter. 

In marking the letter, its errors in form and ad¬ 
dress, in spelling, capitals, punctuation, syntax and 
style, and its adherence to the subject will be con¬ 
sidered. The handwriting in this exercise will help 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


57 


to (Jetermiue the ratiilg on “penmanship,” which is 
the second subject, but will not be taken into con¬ 
sideration in ascertaining the “marks” of the letter. 

Write a letter giving a brief account of your educa¬ 
tion, including the names and locations of the 
schools attended by you, and a description of the 
course of study pursued by you. 

The competitor must avoid allusion to his political 
or religious opinions or affiliations. The letter must 
contain not less than 125 words, must be addressed 
as follows: “To the United States Civil Service Com¬ 
mission, Washington, D. C.,” and must be dated at 
the place where the examination is held. The ex¬ 
amination number, and not the name of the competitor, 
must be used for a signature to the letter. 

Fifth Subject—Arithmetic. 

1. Add the following: 

1.426.387 
20,785,598 

6.818.388 
40,327,846 

3,428,920 

282,111 

9,237,116 

2. From 334,785 subtract 22,312, and multiply the 
difference by 235. Give work in full. 

3. Multiply the following: 

fXIXfXI 

Give work in full. 

4. Add i+f+f+1 

Give work in full. 

5. The employes at a certain office authorized the 
retention of one-tenth of their salaries for a benefi¬ 
ciary fund. The force consisted of six clerks at 
$1.33>^ each per month, nine clerks at $83>^ each, five 
copyists at $75 each, and three messengers at $70 
each. What was the amount retained per year for 
the beneficiary fund ? Give work in full. 

6. If six stampers can stamp 259,200 letters in one 
day of eight hours, how many can one stamper 
stamp in a minute? Give work in full. 

7. The mail received at an office on a certain day 
weighed 5,000 lbs., one-fifth of which were letters 
averaging one-half oz. each, two-fifths newspapers 
averaging 2 oz. each, and the remainder packages 
averaging 4 oz. each. How many pieces were there 
in the mail ? Give work in full. 

8. What will it cost to pave with brick a court¬ 
yard 48 feet in length by 30 feet in width, and aside- 
walk 72 feet long and 4 feet wide at 50 cents per 
square yard ? Give work in full. 

9. A merchant purchased stamps and stamped en¬ 
velopes in quantities and of denominations as fol¬ 
lows. What was the cost of each denomination and 
what was the total cost? 

300 two-cent stamps. 5 . 

90 three-cent “ . 

120 four-cent “ . 

37 five cent “ . 

20 ten-cent “ . 

350 stamped envelopes at $2.16 per 

hundred. 

Total. «. 

10. Multiply 265.5 by 4.04 and from the product 
subtract 32.75. Give work in full. 

Sixth Subject—Geography. 

1. Name in their order from east to west the States 
which border on the Gulf of Mexico. 

2. Name the two important rivers which form por¬ 
tions of the boundary lines of each of the following- 
named states: West Virginia, Illinois. 

3. What State forms the whole or the principal 
part of the northern boundary of each of the follow¬ 
ing-named states: Arkansas, Pennsylvania, North 
Carolina, Kansas, Illinois. 

4. Name the principal city of each of the following- 
named States: Kentucky, Louisiana, California, 
Michigan, Illinois. 

6. Name five states of the Union on the Atlantic 
Ocean northeast of the state of Delaware. 

6. On what river is each of the following-named 
cities situated, and of what state is each the capital. 
Albany, Harrisburg, Augusta, Nashville, Baton 
Rouge. 


7. In what .state is each of the following-named 
cities: Erie, Sandusky, Wheeling, Memphis, Los 
Angeles, Dubuque, Pittsfield, Lowell, Dayton, 
Macon. 

8. Name five of the most important cities on the 
Mississippi river north of the mouth of the Ohio 
river, and name the state in which each city named 
in situated. 

9. Name five of the most important cities (or towns 
if there be not five cities) in this state, and give the 
name of the county in which each city named is 
situated. 

10. Name five of the principal railroad centers in 
the United States and give the name of the state in 
which each is situated. 

CARRIER EXAMINATION. 

FIR.ST Subject—Orthography. 

N. B.—Capitals should be used only where required 
by the rules of orthography. 

1. Write in the spaces below, the abbreviations 
for the names which will be given by the examiner, 
(The following were given:) 

California, Georgia, Doctor, Colorado, New Orleans, 
Attorney, Delaware, Pennsylvania, Captain, Pro¬ 
fessor. 

2. Spelling, as indicated by the examiner. (The 
following were indicated:) 

1 Mileage; 2 Allowable; 3 Cancelling ; 4 Manage¬ 
ment; 5 Miscellaneous: 6 Authorize; 7 Route; 8 
Official; 9 Territory; 10 Amendment; 11 Discon¬ 
tinue; 12 Guide ; 13 Separating; 14 Conveyance; 15 
Defacing, 16 Weekly ; 17 Daily; 18 Privilege; 19 Ad¬ 
dressed ; 20 Handling. 

Second Subject—Penmanship. 

N. B.—The mark on penmanship will be deter¬ 
mined by legibility, neatness and general appearance, 
and by correctness and uniformity in the formation 
of words, letters, and punctuation marks in the 
second and third exercises of the third subject. 

Third Subject—Copying. 

First Exercise—Writing from Dictation. 

(Same directions as in clerk examination, but the 
following exercise was dictated :) 

To the Congress; I herewith transmit the fifth 
report of the civil service commission, covering the 
year which ended June 30,1888. 

The cause of civil service reform, which in a great 
degree is intrusted to the commission, I regard as so 
firmly established and its value so fully demon¬ 
strated that I should deem it more gratifying than 
useful if at this late day in the session of congress 1 
was permitted to enlarge upon its importance and 
present condition. 

A peru.sal of the report herewith submitted will 
furnish information of the progress which has been 
made during the year to which it relates, in the ex¬ 
tension of the operation of this reform, and in the 
improvement of its methods and rules. 

Second Exercise — Writing from plain copy. 

N. B.—Spelling, use of capitals, punctuation, and 
all omissions and mistakes will be taken into con¬ 
sideration in marking the exercises of this subject. 

Copy the following precisely: 

6. The grade of each competitor shall be expressed 
by the whole number nearest the general average 
attained by him, and the grade of each eligible shall 
be noted upon the register of eligibles in connection 
with his name. When two or more eligibles are of 
the same grade, preference in certification shall be 
determined by the order in which their application 
papers were filed. 

7. Immediately after the general averages in an 
examination shall have been ascertained, each com¬ 
petitor shall be notified that he has passed or has 
failed to pass. 

Third Exercise— Writing from plain copy in labularform. 

Copy the following precisely; use capitals and 
punctuate as in the copy. 

Jan. 18. Peter Sullivan. 74 Madison st. MailLet- 
ter. Removed. 

Feb. 16. Adams & Smith. 39 Grant pi. Foreign 
Letter. No such number. 


Sept. 25. Mrs. Alice H. Ripley. 164 St. Mary’s st. 
Local Letter. Deceased. 

Nov. 7. Miss Sarah Hobbs. 47J4 Maiden Lane. 
Mail Package. Not known. 

Dec. 23. Weeks, Knowles & Co. No. 7 Jones’ alley. 
Local Postal Card. Dissolved. 

Fourth Subject—Arithmetic. 

1. Express in sign and figures four hundred and 
fifty-six thousand three hundred and seventy-seven 
dollars and ten cents. 

2. Express in words the following: 6 mi., 30 rd., 
4 yd., 1 ft., 10 in. 

3. Express in words the following ; 1,001,640. 

4. A carrier receives $900 for a year of 300 working 
days. If he serves as carrier 273 working days how 
much will he have earned in that time? 

Give work in full. 

5. Divide 10.59 by 3, and to the quotient add 280.1, 

Give work in full. 

6. Add the following, placing the sum at the bot¬ 
tom : 

5,783,792.91 

359,312,175.75 

11.545.666.66 

7,919,287,554.55 

651,815.25 

999,520.45 

4,786,452,361.38 

29,236,111,522.63 

75,775,016.19 

90,471,236.738.05 

7. The fee for a money order exceeding $5 and not 
exceeding $10 is 8 cents. A man sends away by mail 
in separate letters 5 money orders for $7 each and 2 
for $9 each. How much does he expend including 
money order fees and the postage on the letters? 

Give work in full. 

8. A carrier having a legacy of $500 adds to it the 
savings of 5 years and buys a house worth $1,600. 
He has saved each year 11-50 of his salary. What Is 
his salary? 

Give work in full. 

9. A earrier making a delivery trip is absent from 
the office 2% hours. It takes him 15 minutes to reach 
the beginning of his route, and while making his de¬ 
livery he walks a distance of lOOfeetevery 3 minutes 
Allowing 15 minutes for his return to the office after 
his delivery is finished, how many squares are there 
in his delivery trip proper, there being 500 feet to the 
square? 

Give work infxdl. 

10. A carrier makes 4 trips daily, delivering 68 let¬ 
ters, 53 papers, 21 postal cards, and 7 packages each 
trip. How many pieces of mail matter does he de¬ 
liver in a year of 300 working days? 

Give work in full. 

Fifth Subject—Geography. 

1. Name the principal river of the United States 
which flows into each of the following named bodies 
of water : Long Island Sound, Penobscot Bay, Gulf 
of Mexico, Chesapeake Bay, Pacific Ocean. 

2. In what state and on what river is each of the 
following named cities: Louisville, Albany, Hart¬ 
ford, Dubuque, Kansas City. 

3. Name five of the states which border in part on 
the great lakes. 

4. Name two states of the Union which commence 
with the letter A, two which commence with the 
letter W, and one which commences with the letter 
R, and give the name of the capital of each state 
named. 

5. Name two states which border on the Missouri 
river, two which border on the Connecticut river, 
and one which borders on the Delaware river. 

Sixth Subject—Knowledge of the Locality of 
the Post-Office Delivery. 

1. Name ten cities or important towns in the State 
and give the name of the county in which each is 
situated. 

2. Name five of the principal hotels in this city 
and state how far (how many blocks or squares) 
each one is situated from the building in which this 
examination is held. 

3. Name five of the most important business 
streets of this city which cross the street on which 
this building (the building where this examination 
is held) fronts, and name one of the most promi- 

































58 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


nent business establishments on each of the five 
streets named. 

4. Name two of the principal lines of street rail¬ 
way in this city and give the names of the principal 
streets through which each line passes. 

5. Name and locate five of the principal public 
school buildings in this city. 

RULES OF MARKING ABOVE PAPERS. 

[A perfect answer is marked 100,and below are given 
the deductions to be made for the respective errors.] 
Orthography. 

From 100 deduct— 


For each error in orthography. 5 

For each error in capitalization. 1 

Copying—Writing from Dictation. 

In this exercise no word or date shall be abbreviated 

For each error in orthography. 1 

For each word omitted. 2 

For each word inserted or added. 2 

For each word substituted. 1 

Word or words have been written. 

For each transposition. 1 

For each abbreviation. 1 

For each error in capitalization. 1 

For each failure to use the period at the end 
of a sentence, and for each grossly im¬ 
proper use of a punctuation mark. 1 

For irregularity in left-hand margin. 1 

Copying— Writing from Plain Copy or from Rough Draft. 

From 100 deduct— 

For each error in orthography. 5 

For each word or figure omitted. 6 

For each word inserted or added. 5 

For each word or figure substituted. 5 

For each transposition. 5 

For each abbreviation not in the copy. 5 

For each failure to capitalize according to 

copy. 5 

For each failure to punctuate according to 

copy. 5 

For each failure to paragraph according to 

copy. 5 

For irregularity in left-hand margin. 6 

For each omission of the hyphen in dividing 
a word at end of line. 1 

Penmanship. 


Mark penmanship on letter (or in copyist’s exam- 
ation on copy of rough draft) according to its value 
on a scale of 100. 

Mark penmanship on exercise in copying from 
plain copy according to its value on a scale of 100. 

Divide the sum of the marks on letter and copying 
by 2. The quotient will be the mark on penmanship. 


Arithmetic. 

Notation and Numeration. 

For each improper use of the sign 8, £, or 
other denomination of quantity, or for the 

substitution of one for the other. 25 

For omission of the decimal point, when a 

decimal is required. 75 

For error in denomination of decimal; for 

each place, not exceeding three. 25 

For an intended decimal expressed as a com¬ 
mon (or vulgar) fraction. 25 

For a clearly indicated decimal expressed as a 

common (or vulgar) fraction. 50 

For each numeration point placed to the 

right of the decimal point. 5 

For each use of the comma where the decimal 

point should be used. 5 

For each use of the period where the comma 

should be used. 5 

For each figure substituted. 10 

For each figure inserted. 10 

For each figure prefixed or sufiaxed. 10 

For each figure omitted. 10 

For incorrect pointing. 10 

For writing cents and mills as a decimal part 
of a dollar when an amount of United States 
money is required to be expressed in words 10 

Fundamental Rules. 

For each error in computation. 10 


For omission of the decimal point in answer 
in which its use is required, or for express¬ 
ing answer as a decimal when it should be 

expressed as a whole number. 50 

For errors in pointing off decimals for one 

place. 25 

For two places. 30 

For three places. 3i 

For four places. 40 

For five places. 45 

For six places. 50 

For use of the comma where the decimal 
point should be used. 5 


Fractions and Problems. 

Above charges for fundamental rules apply 
also to fractions and problems. 


For wrong process producing incorrect result 100 
For complex statement, right result being 

produced. 10 

For complex process or method, right result 

being produced. 10 

If, when “ work ” or “ operation in full ” is 
required, the correct answer is given, but 

no “work” is shown.1. 75 

For fractions in answer not reduced to lowest 
terms, or answer in denominate numbers 
not expressed in the several denominations, 

beginning with the highest. 20 

In denominate numbers, for errors in quan¬ 
tity of one denomination contained in a 
unit of a higher denomination, according 


to the gravity of the error.10 to 35 

If part of work is correct and part incorrect, 
or if problem is incomplete, credit in pro¬ 


portion to correct work done. 

For omitting days of grace in problems in 
bank discount, or in other problems when 

specified. 25 

If, when “work” or “operation in full” is re¬ 
quired, the correct answer is given, and 
the process is clearly indicated, but not 

written in full. 15 

If no attempt is made to answer. 100 

For failure to indicate the answer in prob¬ 
lems by the letters: Ans., or otherwise. 5 


For each failure to use the sign 8 or £. or any 
other monetary or commercial sign, or any 
sign by which the relations of quantities are 
expressed, when the use of such is required 
in the statement or solution of a problem... 5 
Elements of the English Language. 

Each error in a sentence given for correction shall 
be valued at the amount that would be produced by 
dividing 100 by the sum of the errors contained in 
the sentence. If, in correcting a sentence, errors are 
made in the answer that are not in the sentence 
given for correction, these errors shall be added to 
the errors of the sentence to be corrected, and each 
error shall be valued at the amount resulting from a 
division of 100 by this sum. The sum of the error 
values credited for errors corrected in the answer 
will be the mark of the answer. 

Any exercise in this subject (letter-writing ex¬ 
cepted) which does not present a definite number of 
points, so that it may be marked under definite 
rules, will be marked in the discretion of th'e exam¬ 
iners upon the following considerations; (1) Whether 
the answer covers the question ; (2) whether it is ac¬ 
curate : (3) whether it is unambiguous ; (4) as to the 
degree of information and capacity it exhibits. In 
the discretion of the examiners. 

LETTER-W RITING. 

In marking the letter, form, style, and matter will 
each be marked on a scale of 100, and the sum 
of these marks will be divided by 3. 

In marking the letter, the errors below mentioned 
shall be charged to form, as follows : 

Form. 

From 100 deduct— 


Omission of date line. 10 

Omission of name of place or date, in date 

line. 5 

Omission of address. 10 

Omission of name of person or place in ad¬ 
dress. 5 


For each incompletely written (1) name of 
place in date line or address; (2) date or ad- 


(3) subscription. 5 

For each error in spelling. 3 

For each error in division of words. 3 

For each error in syntax. 3 

For irregular left-hand margin. 3 

For repetition of address. 5 

For signing name instead of examination 

number. 5 

For each word omitted or repeated. 1 

For each error in punctuation and in the use 
of capitals. 1 


No definite directions can be given for marking the 
style and matter of the letter, and the judgment 
of the examiners must therefore determine the 
value of each. 

Geography, History, and Government. 

In marking these subjects, each answer shall be 
marked, in the discretion of the examiners, accord¬ 
ing to its value on a scale of 100. 

When the question requires in the answer a speci¬ 
fied number of states, countries, persons, places, lo¬ 
cations, or things, the quotient arising from the 
division of 100 by the number of states, countries, 
etc., required shall be the credit to be given for each 
state, country, etc., correctly named; if a greater 
number is given in the answer than is required, the 
additional number of states, countries, etc., shall be 
added to the number required by the question, and 
the quotient arising from the division of 100 by the 
number thus obtained shall be the credit to be given 
for each state, country, etc., correctly named. 
General Provisions. 

1. Any error not covered by the forgoing rules 
will be marked in the discretion of the examiners. 

2. The examiners, having satisfactory evidence 
that an answer has been borrowed or otherwise im¬ 
properly obtained, the question will be marked 0. 
and the examination papers, with the evidence, re¬ 
ferred to the commission. 

3. The examination papers of every competitor 
must be marked by the board of examiners, and 
each examiner shall initial every paper marked by 
him. Should a review by another examiner be nec¬ 
essary, he shall also initial every paper reviewed by 
him. Each examiner who marks a subject shall 
mark and initial with pencil or ink of different color 
than that of the pencil or ink used by any other ex¬ 
aminer marking the same subject. 

4. All errors noted must be indicated by under¬ 
lining or otherwi.se. The charge for each error must, 
when practicable, be noted on the margin of the 
sheet. 

5. In finding the average of the marks on any sub¬ 
ject by dividing the sum of the credits by the num¬ 
ber of questions, the unanswered questions must be 
counted in obtaining the divisor. 

Rules Governing Capitalization. 

The following words should begin with capital 
letters: 

1. The first word of every distinct sentence. 

2. Proper names and titles of honor or ofllce ; as, 
George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham 
Lincoln, General Grant, President Cleveland, Gov¬ 
ernor Marcy, Lord Tennyson, Sir Walter Scott, the 
Ohio, Fourteenth street. 

Note.— The name of any object personified may 
be used as a proper name, and shonld then begin 
with a capital letter ; as, “ Come, gentle Spring.” 

3. Adjectives derived from proper names; as, 
American, European, African. 

4. The appellations of the Deity; as, God, the Al¬ 
mighty, the Supreme Being, the Most High. 

5. The first word of every line of poetry, 

6. The first word of a direct quotation, when the 
quotation forms a complete sentence; as, “Christ 
says, ‘ My yoke is easy.’ ” 

7. Every name and principal word in the titles of 
books; as, “ Pope’s Essay on Man.” 

8. The pronoun I and the interjection O are writ¬ 
ten in capitals. 

Note.—O ther words of particular importance may 
begin with capital letters. 












































































The civil service Chronicle. 


We believe it is the duty of the republican majority of the senate to oppose the confirmation of any person appointed in violation of the letter and spirit of 

the civil service act.—iV«w York Republican Platform, 1885. 


VoL. I, No. 8. INDIANAPOLIS, OCTOBER, 1889. terms fee*tsVefcopr^ 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind., where subscrip¬ 
tions and adveriisements will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE ( HRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana. 


The question of the civil service involves 
every other question in our politics. With a 
proper administration of the government serv¬ 
ice there would be fewer disturbing questions. 
The present system of giving office as a reward 
for unscrupulous political work exaggerates 
every evil and increases every cause of dis¬ 
turbance. If the government is to be admin¬ 
istered on the blocks-of-five plan, it is idle to 
expect that any real reform can be accom¬ 
plished in any direction. 1/ we do not change 
our civil service methods we will have a thoroughly 
estublushed despotism of, by and for the worst rascals 
in the country. — St. Louis Republic [JJem.]. 

Nearly the entire space of this paper has 
been given this month to the proceedings 
of the annual meeting of the* National 
League. The address of Mr. Curtis, being 
from him, does not need any praise; but it 
seems to understate the value of certain 
acts of President Harrison, and the effect 
is to leave the present administration with¬ 
out any credit regarding civil service re¬ 
form. We can not concur in this general 
conclusion. For instance, the appointment 
of the present civil service commission was 
an act of tremendous importance, and dis¬ 
played not only a purpose to have the law 
enforced, but entire knowledge of the way 
to go about it. The civil service commis¬ 
sion is the backbone of the merit system 
so far as that system has been applied to 
the civil service. The appointment of the 
present commission, and especially of Mr. 
Roosevelt, has given that system an ex¬ 
ceedingly rigid backbone. The effect is 
seen on all hands, as, for instance, in the 
Indianapolis post-office. We have now 
what has always been needed, a commis¬ 
sion that can not be cowed by the threats 
of congressmen whose hurts and out¬ 
cries are the best evidence of its efficiency. 
The recent outbreaks against the law are 
conclusive proofs that a new and serious 
barrier to working in henchmen in spite 
of the law has been encountered. The ap¬ 
pointment here and there of the head of 
an office who earnestly favors the merit 
system can not be compared in importance 
to the selection of an “admirable civil ser¬ 
vice commission.” The one affects but one 
office, the other all the offices in the classi¬ 
fied service, and acts both as a prod and as 
a brake upon the President himself, 


Mr. Bonaparte’s paper upon “Civil Ser¬ 
vice Reform as a Moral Question” has 
about it a nobility of sentiment and a clear¬ 
ness and ability of statement entirely wor¬ 
thy of its author. The discussion is com¬ 
paratively new, but he may be said to have 
reduced the question to a demonstration. 
His declaration," that to promise or confer 
public office as a bait or reward for per¬ 
sonal or party service is always and every¬ 
where immoral; that it is a breach of trust 
and a form of bribery,” is an everlasting 
truth. It has not guided government in the 
past, but it will be believed and adopted by 
the American people, and on this truth the 
spoils system will be broken to pieces. 


The Indianapolis city election was held 
October 1, and resulted in the complete 
defeat of the republicans. The election 
had no national significance, whatever, ex¬ 
cept as the occasional mysterious appear 
ance of a Washington office-holder aroused 
criticism sufficient to show that that method 
of manipulating elections can no longer be 
safely tried. One important lesson was 
taught. The removal of Mr. Webster from 
his place as chief of the fire department 
some months ago by the republicans be¬ 
cause he would not dismiss the dozen or 
so of democrats in that department hurt 
them more than a single act often hurts a 
party. hundreds of republicans 

kept that outrage in mind until election 
day and cast their votes to punish the 
party that did it. It was a salutary lesson 
and shows great progress in the breaking 
up of the spoils system in this community. 
There were other causes, as, for instance, 
the grip of the gas company upon the city, 
and the pardon of Coy by the republican 
machine, and its apparent desire to see 
him re-elected to the city council. 


General M. D. Manson was collector of 
the Terre Haute district in this state. He 
had served his country honorably in Mex¬ 
ico and during the rebellion. He is highly 
respected as a citizen, and as a public offi¬ 
cer his efficiency and fairness have never 
been questioned. If the principles of civil 
service reform were to be applied to any 
executive appointment, this would seem to 
have been the one. But President Harri¬ 
son wrote the following letter: 


’ Executive Mansion, I 

Washington, Sept. 4, 1889. > 
Dear General— When I was at Indianapolis I en¬ 
deavored to have a conference with you, but the de¬ 
mands upon your time and mine seemed to prevent 
you from responding to my request. 

Mr. Ransdell Informed me that you had said to 
him that you would address me a letter relieving me 
of a possible embarrassment connected with a change 
in the collector’s office held by you, and I have been 
expecting to hear from you. I do not wish to make 
any official request or suggestion to you, but a change 
can not much longer be deferred, and my desire has 
been that it might be made in a way as agreeable to 
you as possible. This is the object of this personal 
note.. Please inform me of your purpose. 

Very respectfully yours, 

Benjamin Harrison. 

As a consequence General Manson re¬ 
signed. The President appears at his 
littlest in this transaction, and few presi¬ 
dents have done littler things. He is the 
president of sixty millions of people, and 
yet he carries about in his mind, on the 
most solemn occasion, the edging of an 
efficient officer out of his place. He writes 
a letter that makes his best friends in In¬ 
diana ashamed, and to add to this, appears 
at his elbow that efficient agent of slyness 
“ Dan ” Ransdell! 


The President has appointed J. P. 
Throop, of Paoli, in place of General Man- 
son. The Indianapolis Journals dispatch 
says: 

“Mr. Throop was indorsed for the position 
by such well-known republicans of the state 
as Representative Posey, the state officers. Dis¬ 
trict Attorney Chambers, Third Auditor Hart, 
B. Wilson Smith and Messrs Durbin, Dudley, 
Huston, Ransdell, Heilman, Irwin, Brackston, 
Mowry, the DePauws and Harry Adams, and 
his appointment is considered by republicans 
here as an excellent one. He is described as 
“a republican hustler from way back.” 

Throop had been chairman of his party’s 
county committee thirteen years. The 
Indiana official class selected a man 
fitted by training and inclination for the 
effort to perpetuate their power by the sys¬ 
tem of official bribes and punishments. 
No country, civilized or uncivilized, can 
show a finer instance of a government of 
court favorites, by court favorites, and for 
court favorites. 


Jeremiah O’Donnell entered the government ser¬ 
vice as store-keeper October 4, just one week prior to 
his arrest for jury-bribing. He was recommended by 
such well-known men as Senator C. B. Parwell, Cor¬ 
oner H. L. Hertz, State Senator John Monahan, James 
L. Monaghan, representative from the fifth district; 
Billy Lorimer, John P. Cavanaugh, Joseph E. Bid- 























60 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


will, J. B. Taylor, Representative J. W. Kroll, P. J. 
Corboy, and Senator Garrity from the fifth district. 

Collector Stone said yesterday that he had not 
heard of the man or seen him until he came to work 
a week ago last Friday. “ He had the necessary papers 
from prominent republicans," said Mr. Stone, "and de¬ 
sired that his bond be made out immediately so as not to 
keep his bondsmen waiting." 

When Senator Farwell was called upon yesterday 
he remembered the name 0 Donnell very well. “ 1 
believe,” he said, “I’ve got his papers here. But I 
did not suspect that the O'Dounell whom I recom¬ 
mended was the fellow arrested for bribery. I am 
surprised beyond measure. Such a crime I think is 
about as bad as murder. You know how such app'^int- 
ments are made. The fellows down in Lawler’s district 
brought in his app'ication. There were so many good 
names attached to it that I sent it to Collector Stone with 
out looking into it." 

This is a fair illustration of the way fed¬ 
eral appointments are made. It is hard to 
see how any president can witness the 
thousands of such cases which pass under 
his eye and not feel the enormity of his 
own dereliction in permitting such a pros 
titution of the trust which the people have 
committed to him. The duty to bring 
about a revolution in this whole matter 
and recover and exercise his constitutional 
authority, it would seem must cry out upon 
him day and night. 

Following back the thread, collector 
Stone has a man put upon him of whom he 
knows nothing: he is ordered by Senator 
Farwell to give the man a place and obeys. 
Farwell knows nothing of the man except 
that he came from the “ fellows ” in Law¬ 
ler’s district. The “ fellows ” in return will 
keep an eye out toward Farweh’s contin¬ 
uance in office; such is the bribe and such 
is the service. Meantime, the cant that an 
officer “ who is responsible for his office, 
should have the selection of his subordin¬ 
ates,” goes on. 

At the dinner of the Bay State Club in 
Boston, October 12, President Eliot, of Har¬ 
vard Universitj', said: 

“Have we not seen the public service degen¬ 
erating more and more, and treated more and 
more as private property under successive re¬ 
publican administrations—the last of the se¬ 
ries being the worst of all in this respect? 
[Great applause.] And have we not seen the 
single democratic administration of the twen¬ 
ty-eight years past the best of all American ad¬ 
ministrations during that period in this re¬ 
spect? [Tremendous applause.] No intelli¬ 
gent man will place any reliance upon the pro¬ 
fessions of a party when its public perform¬ 
ances incessantly contradict them. [Applause.] 
We must rely upon the public acts of the men 
who represent the respective parties. Can any 
civil service reformer hesitate for a moment 
between the administrations of Cleveland and 
of Harrison on that issue? [Applause ] One 
honestly promoted the reform, and the other 
has betrayed it.” 

A man who talks like that in face of the 
repeatedly published and undisputed facts 
is not to be reasoned with. Such partisan 
idolatry is only to be contrasted with the 
motherly prejudice with which Senator 
Hoar gathers the republican party under 
his wing. 


CIVIL SERVICE REFORM AS A 
MORAL QUESTION.* 

On May 16, 1887, a well-known gentleman, 
who then delivered by request a very interest¬ 
ing address at the annual meeting of the Civil 
Service Reform Asssociation of Maryland, 
criticised with some severity the sentiments 
of a writer in the last preceding number of 
the Civil Service Reformer. “ To this .... 
writer,” he said, “the principle of civil service 
reform may seem to be one of high morality : 
it has not to the majority of the people of this 
country appeared to be that so much as to be 
a principle of wise and intelligent administra¬ 
tion.” The writer thus censured happened to 
be myself, and I take advantage of your cour¬ 
teous invitation to defend the view thus justly 
ascribed to me. I do this not because the 
merit of my own opinion is a matter of any 
public interest, but because the question in¬ 
volved seems to me of great and practical im¬ 
portance. When I admit my belief that “ the 
principle of civil service reform ” is “ one of 
high morality,” I mean that all men who have 
sufficiently reflected and are sufficiently in¬ 
formed to entertain an intelligent opinion 
must and do think alike on the subject; that 
no one who has any claim at all to public at¬ 
tention really doubts that “ the principle of 
civil service reform” is just and beneficent: if 
he says that he doubts this, he tells an un¬ 
truth; if he violates this “principle” inoffi¬ 
cial conduct, he does so, just as he may com¬ 
mit theft or adultery, knowing that he does 
wrong. 

I concede that there may be room for honest 
and enlightened difference of opinion as to the 
practical application of the principle; the 
merits of competitive examinations or fixity 
of official tenure are subjects of fair debate ; 
we may approve of requiring stated reasons 
for removal or abolishing four-year terms 
without thereby pronouncing ignorant or in¬ 
sincere everyone who thinks otherwise; but 
these questions of policy have nothing to do 
with the principle of civil service reform. An 
honorable and patriotic man may reasonably 
doubt (as many doubt) whether the Australian 
ballot system is suited to American institu¬ 
tions, but a man who promotes or excuses any 
form of cheating at elections is simply a scoun¬ 
drel ; a good citizen may justifiably question 
(as many question) whether prohibition is 
either expedient or practicable, but one who 
regards with complacency or indifference the 
evils of intemperance must be an enemy to 
mankind. So one or another means to secure 
an efficient public service may or may not 
commend itself to every one’s judgment, but I, 
at least, can not imagine a good man who has 
thought on the subject, and who knows enough 
about it to think to any purpose, and who yet 
fails to see that to promise or confer public 
office as a bait or reward for personal or party 
service is always and everywhere immoral; 

A paper read at the annual meeting of the Na¬ 
tional Civil Service Reform League, at Philadelphia, 
October 2,1889, by Charles J. Bonaparte. 


that it is a breach of trust and a form of brib¬ 
ery. 

Some confusion of ideas as to this may, per¬ 
haps, be due to an argument often used by 
reformers. Unquestionably, no one in his 
senses would think of managing his own busi¬ 
ness as the people’s business is still managed 
in great part, and was managed universally 
before the reform legislation of recent years. 
A man who filled up his store or factory with 
workmen chosen because they agreed with him 
as to the tariff or state’s rights, and changed 
whenever their places were needed for more 
effective political workers, would probably 
get into a strait-jacket even before he got into 
bankruptcy. But to a moralist there would 
be a vast difference between his behavior and 
similar conduct on the part of a president or 
governor or mayor. After all, he would be 
but doing as he chose with his own ; unless he 
endangered the rights of his creditors or the 
confort of his family, the worst to be said of 
him would be that he was a fool for his pains, 
[f, during his absence, however, his trusted 
manager or foreman were to deal thus with his 
interests, the most charitable critic would 
recognize in the latter something worse than 
a fool. His conduct might not be a crime, 
while the larceny or embezzlement of his 
employer’s goods would be; but this is only 
because for so unlikely a form of moral 
obliquity no law has made provision; it 
would be equally abhorrent to right-thinking 
men, equally dangerous to society. And this 
is precisely the conduct of every public officer 
who creates a vacancy or makes an appoint¬ 
ment for personal or partisan gain. A presi¬ 
dent who deprives the country of an upright 
and competent postmaster or naval officer to 
meet the views or advance the ends of selfish 
and unscrupulous political intriguers is no 
less blameworthy than one who should give 
them the public moneys; he may be, indeed, 
less keenly conscious of his guilt, if he has 
lived long years in a moral atmosphere poi¬ 
soned by the malaria of “ spoils ” politics, but 
while he has any conscience or honor left he 
will feel ashamed of what he does. 

The question is equally clear if regarded in 
another aspect. All thoughtful and patriotic 
men agree that bribery, more or less direct and 
more or less open, in connection with elections 
is a great and growing evil, although it is no 
less evident that this evil can be much more 
readily recognized and denounced than reme¬ 
died. But it is a perfectly legitimate and log¬ 
ical outcome of the spoils system in politics, 
and can not be consistently condemned by any 
one who approves of using appointments to 
influence political action or reward partisan 
service. Whether a “worker” is paid by a 
check or hy a sinecure—whether a man’s vote 
is bought for five dollars or for the chance to 
dawdle a fortnight at street sweeping, can 
make no difference as to the right or wrong of 
the matter; or rather, while the man bribed 
is equally guilty, whatever the form of his 
reward, it is surely more odious and more 
noxious to bribe with what is the people’s than 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


61 


with what is one’s own, to purchase suffrages 
or influence at the taxpayers’ cost, than to pay 
for these out of the corrupter’s pocket. 

It will be readily understood that, in my 
view, to establish the principle of civil service 
reform, or, in other words, to thoroughly erad¬ 
icate from our politics the doctrine that offices 
are spoils, is a work which interests good citi¬ 
zens almost^beyond any other. Compare it, 
for example, with the movement for tarifl' 
reform, with which it is often classed. I en¬ 
tertain certain very definite views as to the 
relative merits of free trade and protection, 
and I believe that everyone who thinks other¬ 
wise is mistaken; but I must, in common 
sense and candor, recognize the fact that many 
intelligent and conscientious men, of whom 
some have devoted far more time and thought 
to the subject than I have, do think otherwise. 
Motives on either side, are, indeed, freely im¬ 
pugned in discussion, and, no doubt, many 
protectionists have a more or less conscious 
bias from self-interest, while free traders some¬ 
times approach the subject rather as students 
than as statesmen; but, after all, the question 
is one regarding which the purest and wisest 
men here and elsewhere have not agreed, and 
do not agree, and while this is true, it is not a 
moral question, as I use the words. I shall 
always vote against a party professing my 
views as to the tariff if I believe that in so 
doing I shall, on the whole, promote the cause 
of honest government and pure politics. 

In saying this, I do not overlook the fact 
that moral considerations afiect the expedi¬ 
ency of tariff reform. The most earnest pro- 
tionist, if sensible and candid, will admit that 
a tarifl' not solely for revenue is a prolific 
source of corruption and intrigue in the 
national legislature, and that this constitutes 
a strong argument for free trade. But this 
argument may not be to all minds decisive ; 
protective imposts are in theory laid for the 
public good, and a conscientious man may 
uphold them, as many do, without denying 
their liability to grave abuse. There is the 
same distinction between approving them and 
approving the spoils system that there is be¬ 
tween licensing saloons and licensing brothels : 
the former may be often nests of vice and 
crime, but they are not, whilst the latter are, 
mala in se. 

In dealing with questions really political, 
charity and forbearance in argument, a read¬ 
iness to accommodate differences by compro¬ 
mise, and the pursuit of practical good at the 
expense of theory or sentiment, mark the wor¬ 
thy citizen of a free state. He assumes his 
adversary’s sincerity, and expects from him 
the same consideration ; he recognizes in those 
against whom he contends, not his enemies, 
aiming to injure his and their common coun¬ 
try, but his and its friends, seeking its welfare 
as earnestly as he does, though not, to his 
mind, so wisely. But when there arises, as I 
believe there has arisen here, a true question 
of morals; when the task allotted to friends of 
good government is not to convince mistaken 
fellow-citizens of their error, but to shame or 


frighten faithless public servants into doing 
what these know to be their duty and to rouse 
a sluggish or careless people to a sense of 
wrong and danger ; when, in strictness of 
speech, there is need, not for argument, since 
no one truly disputes what we maintain, but 
for an effective appeal to public opinion 
against insolent persistence in wrong-doing, 
then our bearing should fit the season. We 
can make no bargain with iniquity ; we ask, 
and ask only, that public trustees shall do their 
duty; not the half, or any other fraction, but 
the whole of their duty; not that they do it 
here and there, or now and then, but that they 
do it everywhere and always, and we can and 
will be satisfied with no less. To tell us, in 
extenuation of this unfit appointment or that 
unjust removal, that elsewhere the guilty offi-‘ 
cer has done what he ought to have done here* 
is no more to the point than obedience to the 
eighth commandment would justify a breach 
of the seventh. And in dealing with such an 
officer, we must see to it that he knows what 
we think of him. Believe me, such as he are 
not to be gained over to righteousness by soft 
words or tender silence or diplomacy in any 
form. They will never love us, do what we 
may; but they will and do shrink from hear¬ 
ing us tell them what in truth they are. No 
spoilsman, however hardened, is really indif¬ 
ferent when he hears, “ You are faithless to 
your trust and false to your oath of office; 
your motives are unworthy, your excuses mere 
sophistry; and, however much you may stu¬ 
pefy your conscience or deceive your neigh¬ 
bors, you know in your heart that you are not 
an honest man.” 


GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS. 

[An address before the National Civil Service Re¬ 
form League, at the annual meeting in Philadelphia, 
October 1, 1889. 

Since our last annual meeting, the second 
party change in the administration of the na¬ 
tional government since the formation of the 
league has occurred. Seven months of the 
new administration have passed, and as friends 
of civil servi -e reform our questions to-day are 
obvious and simple. What was the declara¬ 
tion of the successful party upon the subject of 
reform ? What were the pleiiges of its candi¬ 
dates? Have those pleiiges been fulfilled, and 
what are the prospects of reform ? Four years 
ago, in speaking of President Cleveland, then 
recently elected and inaugurated, I said that 
he‘‘was not committed to the prosecution of 
reform as the candidate of a party which se¬ 
riously desired it or promised it.” Certain'y, 
I can not say this of President Harrison. The 
promises of the successful party last year were 
as ardent as they were detailed and absolute. 
They left nothing unexpressed. The pure pur¬ 
pose of reform was depicted in the platform 
with a touch as glowing as that of the poet in 
his epitaph upon a highly respectable lady : 

“ Yea, Venu.s, Pallas, Diana, aud the graces. 

Compared with her should all have lost their 
places.” 

The irrepressible platform pledged the party to 
many things, but to nothing with such re¬ 
duplicated and reiterated ze^l as to reform in 
the civil service; and, having done this in 
the most precise and positive words, it pledged 
the party with especial fervor to keep its 
pledges. Indeed sucdi was the frenzy of fidel¬ 


ity that less excited friends of the good cause 
were fain to say : 

" Choose a firm cloud before it fall, and in it 

Caich, ere she change, the Cynthia of this minute.” 

To the ardor of the platform the protesta¬ 
tions of the President, as a candidate, fitly and 
fully respond. He declared that it would be 
his sincere purpose, if elected, to advance re¬ 
form, He said that fitness and not party ser¬ 
vice should be the essential test in appoint¬ 
ment, that fidelity and efficiency should be the 
only sure tenure of office, and that only the 
interest of the public service should suggest 
removals from office. The significance of these 
words is unmistakable. Naturally and fairly 
interpreted, they forecast an executive action 
absolutely incompatible with the practice 
known as the spoils system. The country had 
precisely the same assurance from the suc¬ 
cessful party of a policy of honest reform in 
the civil service that it had of an administra¬ 
tion favorable to the policy of protection; 
and, that no doubt might arise from political 
differences between the executive and the leg¬ 
islative branches of the government, the result 
of the election showed that the executive and 
the legislature would be in entire political 
accord. 

When a great representative body of Amer¬ 
ican citizens voluntarily and solemnly pro¬ 
claim that they hold certain views upon the 
tariff, or upon the system of public pensions, 
or upon the internal revenue, which they 
invite their fellow-citizens to support by voting 
for their candidates, they can not be suj>posed 
to trifle with popular government and with 
their own honor by deliberately hanging out 
false lights. In a republic where the govern¬ 
ment is administered by party, if the party 
pledges of an authorized convention prove to 
be tricks and lies, the party justly forfeits 
public confi lence, and every member of it is 
vicariously dishonored. When its authorized 
re presentatives, in order to secure for the party 
the control of the administration, declare that 
the spirit and purpose of civil service reform 
should be observed in all executive appoint¬ 
ments, and that all laws at variance with the 
object of existing reform should be repealed, 
there is no doubt of the meaning of the words 
nor of the impression which they are meant to 
convey. The declaration is a voluntary, defi¬ 
nite, and solemn engagement with the country; 
and those who, in consequence of such an 
engagement, are entrusted with the adminis¬ 
tration of the government are bound in honor 
to fulfill it or to show adequate reason for 
their inability to discharge their obligations. 
If they sneer at declarations which by their 
acceptance of office have become their own as 
absurd, if they chuckle over violations of their 
own pledges, if they choose to figure officially 
as statesmen forsworn, they do not discredit 
or injure the cause to which they eagerly pro¬ 
fessed fidelity, nor do they show it to be un¬ 
wise, untimely, or impracticable. The dis¬ 
credit, the shame, the dishonor, fall elsewhere 
than upon the cause of reform. 

THE PROMISE. 

President Harrison thus entered upon his 
administration as the choice of a party which 
expressly claims the honor of beginning re¬ 
form in the civil service, and has vehemently 
promised to complete it. Not content with 
requiring that the existing law should be ex¬ 
tended to all grades of the service to which it 
is applicable, the party went entirely beyond 
these grades, and affirmed that “ the spirit and 
purpose of the reform should be observed in 
all executive appointments.” Tins, however, 
was not a pledge to any extraordinary action. 
It was merely a declaration that, if the party 
were successful at the polls, the administra¬ 
tion would do its plain constitutional duty; 
for such it is. Whether the convention had 












62 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


said anything upon the question or had re¬ 
mained silent, the executive duty would have 
been the same. For the executive is morally 
bound, as Mr. Bonaparte, president of the 
Reform Association of Maryland, said in his 
admirable annual address last May, to dis¬ 
charge all his duties upon acknowledged prin¬ 
ciples of equity and regard for the public 
interest and economy. 

It is the duty of every administration, in 
obedience to such principles, not to remove 
honest and efficient public servants whose du¬ 
ties are in no sense political, but which remain 
the same whatever public policy the country 
may have approved at the election. The rea¬ 
son is not that they have any vested right in 
office, but that the country has the right to 
the most efficient and devoted official service, 
which is impracticable when office is regarded, 
not as a public trust, but as party spoils. No¬ 
body is so foolish as to assert the right of any 
public agent to his place. There are always 
equally honest and capable and fit persons 
who, with the same experience, might be as 
serviceable and efficient. The simple and con¬ 
clusive argument against change is not vested 
right: it is that there is no good reason affect¬ 
ing the public interest which in the case of 
satisfactory officers requires change. Arbi¬ 
trary removal for causes not connected with 
the service is as pernicious to public as it is to 
private business. To make such removals, 
therefore, is contrary to public policy, whiiffi 
the administration is morally bound to respect 

But more than this. Mr. Madison, who was 
a wise interpreter of the Constitution which 
he largely moulded, said that an executive 
who should make such removals ought to be 
impeached. The assistant postmaster-general 
is reported to have stated that about fifteen 
thousand fourth class postmasters, more than 
one-quarter of the whole number of such offi 
cers, were displaced during the first five months 
of this administration, But the change in 
every instance, when not due to death or res 
ignation, or to some reason connected with the 
service, is, according to Mr. Madison, an un¬ 
constitutional act. If a postmaster has ffien 
removed because of his religious belief, or his 
philosophical or scientific theories, or his 
views of a tariff, or of the question of the seal 
fisheries in the Behring Sea, or of a sub-treas 
ury, or a United States bank, his removal has 
been not only a violation of the deliberate and 
repeated pledges of the party of administration 
an 1 of the executive, but it is an act which, in 
the case of a great business company, would 
lead to the dismissal of the agent who had 
abused his power, and in the case of a Presi 
dent, Mr. Madison says, should subject him to 
impeachment. 

Undoubtedly, the President has the power 
of removal. That was the decision of the first 
great constitutional debate in congress. But, 
like all executive power, it may be abused and 
exercised in an unconstitutional spirit. Re¬ 
moval, made arbitrarily or from an unworthy 
motive, can not be justified by the mere fact 
that the power of removal exists. In the last 
angry days of the slavery controversy, when 
Mr. Douglass argued that the people of a ter¬ 
ritory, meaning a majority of male white 
adults, had the right to establish slavery if 
they should choose to do so, the conclusive 
answer was that they had no moral right to 
choose to do a wrong, for a wrong slavery was 
adjudged to be by the common conscience of 
mankind. All power is to be exercised rea¬ 
sonably, not arbitrarily, and in case of the 
President it is to be exercised in accordance 
with the constitutional intent’on and with the 
announcement previously made to the country 
of the- principles by which, and in the spirit 
in which, it will be exercised, and which the 
country has approved. 

How, then, have the pledges of the success¬ 


ful party and candidate been fulfilled? Have 
fidelity and efficiency proved to be the sure 
tenure of office? Has fitness and not party 
service been the essential test in determining 
appointments? Has the interest of the public 
service alone dictated removals from of¬ 
fice? Has the great pledge of the platform 
that the spirit and purpose of reform should 
be observed in all executive appointments 
been honorably fulfilled? Or have such ap¬ 
pointments generally been made precisely as. 
they would have been made had there been no 
platform promises, no pledges of the candi¬ 
date, and no public interest in civil service 
reform? 

It is not an answer to these questions, it is 
only an evasion of them, to say that reform is 
not favored by a majority of the people. The 
only way in which the views of a majority of 
the people can be known is by the result of an 
election. If the election of last year showed 
that the country was in favor of protection, it 
showed, by precisely the same demonstration, 
that it is in favor of civil service reform. If 
there be any relation between party platforms, 
the pledges of candidates, and the results of an 
election, the country in electing Mr. Harrison 
declared for civil service reform. For, if an 
election can not be held to be a popular ap¬ 
proval of the platform and the personal 
pledges of candidates, who shall decide how 
much of them, and in what sense and degree 
any of them, have been approved? In any 
event, whatever doubt may rest upon the views 
of the majority of the people in regard to re¬ 
form, there can be no doubt of the views and 
purposes and pledges of one citizen. There 
may be some question of the extent and degree 
of the sympathy of others. But, if the sira 
plest statement which the English language 
permits, if the plainest engagement to pursue 
a certain course of conduct, if the most sol¬ 
emn pledges uttered before God and the coun¬ 
try have any meaning, there is no doubt what¬ 
ever of the opinions and intentions upon this 
subject of the President of the United States. 

Nor is it any answer to the questions to say 
that the President can not outrun public 
opinion nor proceed faster than his party will 
permit. When a party has made no distinct 
or intelligible declaration upon a question in¬ 
volving his action, the President may plausi¬ 
bly plead that his party has not declared its 
views, and that he must conform his conduct 
to a course which he believes the party would 
support. But when his party, in the act of 
nominating him, distinctly states its views 
and prescribes the rule of his action, he can 
no longer offer that plea. It is open to another, 
but not to him. His party engages to support 
him. His duty is to follow the course which 
his party proclaim.s, which he prefers, and 
which the country by his election, has ap¬ 
proved. He can not plead that the party 
chiefs, secretaries, senators, representatives, 
local leaders, newspapers and committees are 
cruelly coercing him to violate the party 
promise and his own pledge, without conced¬ 
ing that the party platform was a trick, and 
that the party sought power under false pre¬ 
tences. Still less can an honorable president 
offer this plea when his party in nominating 
him has prescribed his course, because, when 
the same plea was urged for a president whose 
party had purposely made no such definite 
declaration, it was denounced as a futile and 
desperate excuse for sham and fraud, for 
monstrous hypocrisy and contemptible char¬ 
latanry. 

Our question, however, is not whether one 
president violates pledges more or less fre¬ 
quently than another. Still less is it a ques¬ 
tion of the comparative sagacity of the friends 
of reform in their party action. We meet not 
to explain or justify such action, not to de¬ 
fame or exalt any administration, but, as 


friends of reform, and unmindful of party 
sympathies, to measure fairly and accurately 
the situation. Our question is whether the 
great pledge of the party of administration, 
that the spirit and purpose of reform should 
be observed in all executive appointments, has 
been fulfilled. If the pledge has been kept, 
our meeting must be one of unmixed congrat¬ 
ulation. If it has been reasonably fulfilled, 
we must all rejoice. If the administration 
party, by the conduct of its executive, cabinet, 
senators, representatives and recognized lead¬ 
ers, by the general tone of its press and of its 
adherents, proves that the platform was a just 
statement of the actual reform spirit and pur¬ 
pose of the party, there is not an honest friend 
of reform who will not gladly confess any 
error of judgment in political action, while he 
intones triumphantly the Gloria in excelsis. 

THE AXSWER. 

What then is the answer? What is the 
spirit of the party and the conduct of the ex¬ 
ecutive? The answer, of course, involves great 
detail, and can be only generally indicated. 
Let us look at the signs ot party feeling. 

A few weeks ago, a hilarious administration 
party organ at the capital ot New York, one 
of the most influential and representative 
party journals, exclaimed : "Fifteen thousand 
fourth-class postmaters have been removed to 
date, and Mr. Clarkson remains in Washing¬ 
ton with his coat off and his shirt sleeves 
rolled up. Go it, Clarkson! Out with the 
whole fifty-five thousand by January Ist.” It 
adds, with natural enthusiasm, that civil ser¬ 
vice reform can not command the support of 
a corporal’s guard of republicans in New York, 
In Missouri, the chief party organ thinks Mr. 
Clarkson’s labors, although laudable, yet 
rather deliberate in the direction of true re¬ 
form, and is confident that, “when the dog 
days areover and cool weather sets in. Colonel 
Clarkson will greatly accelerate his speed.” 
The leading rural organ in the state of Indi¬ 
ana asserts plainly, “ Neither political party 
cares a continental about this humbug civil 
service reform.” In New Hampshire, the chief 
administration organ, arraigning reform as 
“a stuffed and painted and unpopular hum¬ 
bug,” and “a bald and rickety affair that bul¬ 
lies and wheedles good citizens,” inexorably 
condemns it “to the scrap heap.” In West 
Virginia, a zealous organ believes devotedly 
that the spoils belong to the victor; and the 
editor, having secured his part of the booty, 
announces that at the earliest practical date 
every democratic appointee in the office en¬ 
trusted to him, “from the humble and poorly 
paid apple-jack gaugers to the well-paid store¬ 
keeper and clerks, will be succeded by simon- 
pure-all-wool-and yard-wide republicans.” In 
Pennsylvania, an administration journal of 
importance declares that “the people are tired 
of the sham of reform, and would gladly snow 
it under with their votes.” In Ohio, a similar 
representative administration organ warmly 
commends an officer who disregards the hum¬ 
bug. In Iowa, the Washington correspondent 
of a journal of the same character says that 
no administration member of congress that he 
meets favors the law, and announces that “ it 
will be repealed as it ought to be ; ” while one 
of the chief journals in Central New York 
holds, nothwithstanding the express words of 
the platform, that the President is not bound 
to go beyond the law and enforce the spirit of 
reform. Another, commending the refusal of 
the President to place the clerks of the census 
bureau under the rules of the civil service, de¬ 
clares its belief that the decision will be sat¬ 
isfactory to the party. 

This is the tone of the larger part of the 
press of the administration party. No jeer is 
too contemptuous for reform, no epithet is too 
acrid. No platform of the opposition was ever 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


63 


denounced by party fury with greater scorn 
than that with which a representative body of 
the administration press now spurns its own. 
Naturally, this uniformity of tone in the party 
journals throughout the Union is echoed by 
party assemblies. The federation of republican 
clubs in the third Maryland district, represent¬ 
ing twenty-three associations, pledge them¬ 
selves not to support for any office a cindidate 
who honestly adheres to the national republican 
declaration upon reform. The central com¬ 
mittee of the District of Columbia denounces 
“ the cowardly, treacherous policy that to the 
defeated belong the spoils” The republican 
central committees in two New York counties 
denounce as un-American and unfair the civil 
service law which the republican platform 
pledges the party to extend ; and state conven¬ 
tions of the administration party in three of 
the great states which it controls, Pennsyl¬ 
vania, Iowa and Ohio, which formerly loudly 
declared for reform, are this year silent. Three 
members of the cabinet decline to profess their 
adherence to the most emphatic declaration of 
the party platform; and one laughingly re¬ 
marks that he does not think he has appointed 
many democrats to office so far. Eminent 
senators and representatives of the party sneer 
with warmth at the cant of reform and dog 
the President for patronage. One representa¬ 
tive announces that he will “test the sentiment 
of the house on the sham civil service law,” 
alleging that “nine tenths of the members 
know that the law is a fraud, and say so in 
private;” and the energetic representative 
proposes “ to smoke them out and put them on 
record.” 

These are facts wholly without precedent in 
our political history. To find a parallel, we 
must appeal to imagination, and suppose some 
secretary in Jacksou’s cabinet publicly laugh¬ 
ing at the party platform, and democratic 
clubs and committees and a powerful part of 
^the party press eagerly sustaining the United 
States bank and insisting that true democracy 
and the genius of American institutions de¬ 
mand its recharter and permanence. Or we 
must try to figure republican senators and rep¬ 
resentatives of the last generation arguing the 
justice and humanity of the fugitive slave 
law, and the republican press and local com¬ 
mittees asserting the right of slave holders to 
take slaves into the territories, and declaring 
'the freedom of the territories as demanded by 
the party platform to be unconstitutional and 
un-American. The republican platform of 
thirty years ago did not declare against the 
extension of slavery into the territories more 
forcibly and absolutely than the platform of 
last year declared for reform of the civil ser¬ 
vice. Such an attitude of party leaders and 
of the party press in former years toward the 
platform of their own party would have been 
that which the larger part of the administra¬ 
tion press and of the boldest and most aggres¬ 
sive administration leaders to-day hold. 

While this is the sentiment of the party as 
revealed in all the ordinary methods, what is 
the executive action? Does that conform to 
the platform promise and the President’s 
pledge? The knowledge of every citizen in his 
own community answers. The daily record of 
the newspapers for seven months answers. The 
general political proscription; the policy 
which President Harrison when a senator de¬ 
fined as “the frank and bold, if brutal, meth¬ 
od of turning men and women out simply for 
political opinion;” the clean sweep which is 
proceeding in the post-office, the alarm which 
pervades every branch of the service, the open, 
flagrant contempt for public opinion, for pri¬ 
vate information, and for the party promise, 
which was shown in the appointment of 'he 
late commissioner of pensions; the_ executive 
refusal to include the census service in the 
rules and the removal of public officers con¬ 


spicuously fitted for their posts by character, 
ability, and experience, who have absolutely 
and confessedly disregarded politics in their 
devotion to official duty and the public ser¬ 
vice,—all these facts, and such as these, an¬ 
swer the question. How has the executive ac¬ 
tion conformed to the party promise and the 
President’s pledge? 

There are two signal illustrations of the 
manner in which those pledges have been 
kj?pt. The fundamental principle of reform 
or of reasonable conduct of the public service 
requires the retention and reappointment of 
public officers in important places who are 
especially fitted for their trusts by personal 
character and proved ability, by long service 
and great experience; who are in no sense ac¬ 
tive politicians, and who are exclusively and 
most efficiently devoted to their official duties. 
When the administration came into power 
upon a platform of reform, it found two such 
officers in the city of New York—the post¬ 
master and the naval officer. Both of them 
had what is almost impossible under a spoils 
system, pride and enthusiasm in the public 
service, in which both of them were knights 
without fear and without reproach. The ad¬ 
ministration could have given no such practi 
cal proof of its regard for reform as their re¬ 
tention in office. One of them, the jjostmas- 
ter, was summarily dismissed at the expira¬ 
tion of his term, nor can any reason connected 
with the public interest be assigned as the 
cause of his dismissal. The other, the naval 
officer, was displaced before the end of his 
term without a word, or a sign, or a reason 
alleged. The ablest and most serviceable of 
experienced public officers are dismissed like 
messenger boys. There is no other civilizet' 
government which pursues iu its public ser¬ 
vice such a course which the President has 
truly described as brutal, and which he has 
cho-<en to pursue. 

There is no pretence that the public interest, 
or the principles of reform, or the professions 
of the party, or the pledges of the President, re¬ 
quired their dismissal. The President,speak¬ 
ing for the party, had made the four pledges 
which 1 have mentioned, and every one of 
them was violated by these dismissals. It is 
not pretended that there was any reason for 
the executive action, except the desire to re¬ 
ward party service, which, whether a sound 
reason or not, the President had publicly dis¬ 
claimed as a proper motive for appointment 
or cause for removal. The dismissal in the 
case of the naval officer was delayed only un¬ 
til the factions of the party which had pro¬ 
claimed that the public service should not be 
made party plunder, could agree upon a sat¬ 
isfactory distribution of the spoils. The re¬ 
sult is that the two public offices, one of them 
by far the largest and most important of its 
kind in the country, which were in themselves 
conclusive illustrations of the practical value 
of reform to the public welfare, have been de¬ 
graded again into prizes of partisan activity 
by the administration of a party which so¬ 
licited support upon the plea that reform of 
the civil service, auspiciously begun under 
its guidance, should be further extended 
wherever it was applicable. The genius of 
Shakespeare, which embraces all experience 
and gives us words for every emergency, in 
the passionate scene between Hamlet and his 
mother depicts him as accusing her of con¬ 
duct which “calls virtue hypocrite,” and 
makes her vows “ as false as dicers’ oaths.” 

Do I conceal or distort the significance of 
the situation ? It must be judged, of course, 
as a whole. Certainly, every act of the ad¬ 
ministration is not a violation of the party 
declarations. Every removal is not unjustifi 
able, nor is every appointment unnecessary. 
But, whenever a change is made, the essential 
question, according to the principles of reform 


and the party pledge, is not whether party pol¬ 
iticians demand a change, but whether there 
are legitimate reasons for it. It is not enough 
that the appointment of a postmaster or a 
naval officer shall be acceptable to the party 
machine of which he is a screw: the vital 
question is whether the interests of the public 
service and the express engagements of the 
party with the country require that a perfect¬ 
ly competent and satisfactory officer shall be 
dismissed. This question is not answered by 
saying that his successor is personally honest 
and intelligent. If all the public officers 
were changed every week, the supply of hon¬ 
est and intelligent successors would not be ex¬ 
hausted. The appointment of a good officer 
is no excuse for the needless and arbitrary re¬ 
moval of another good officer. This league 
justly held that the course in regard to the 
civil service pursued in Massachusetts by the 
late administration was no excuse for the 
course pursued in Maryland. It is true that 
Rome was not built in a day, and that a great 
reform can not be accomplished at once. That 
is a sound general proposition. But no exec¬ 
utive bent upon reform in the civil service 
would urge as an excuse for displacing an en¬ 
tirely capable office that he desired to reward 
a serviceable partisan with his place. Upon 
those terms Rome would not only never have 
been built, but the first stone would never 
have been laid. 

NO MITIGATION 

The President has selected an admirable 
civil service commission. Every member of 
it is a sincere believer in the necessity and 
the practicability of reform; and its vigilance 
and vigor are the bed earnest of its effective 
service. He has refused, also, to extend the 
time appointed for including the railway mail 
service within the rules, and he has author¬ 
ized the publication of the eligible lists. Be¬ 
sides these few executive acts, the significance 
of which is destroyed by the general executive 
course, there is little that shows any effective 
party regard for the resounding promises of 
the platform. The new administration sen¬ 
ators and representatives who have professed 
to favor reform, and who lashed with stinging 
rhetoric the failures and inconsistencies of the 
late administration, now, when their convic¬ 
tion and courage find a fitting opportunity, 
are passive and silent. They see the general 
violation of pledges by which the party 
pledged them. They see the principles which 
they declare ought to control the power of ap¬ 
pointment and removal openly disregarded. 
They see the abuses running riot, and appar¬ 
ently with their connivance, which they have 
themselves denounced. Yet, instead of frank¬ 
ly refusing to do what they joined in declar¬ 
ing should not be done, instead of indignant 
protest in the name of their party and of hon¬ 
est politics which should alarm those who 
make merchandi.se of the party faith and of 
the public service, they wait feebly that it is 
doubtful if the country really wants reform, 
that the pressure of trading politicians is very 
strong, and that there are many other impor¬ 
tant questions; and the Massachusetts conven¬ 
tion, in face of the familiar and flagrant facts, 
congratulates the President upon the practical 
wisdom and honest purpose with which he has 
dealt with the complicated and difficult 
matter of appointments—praise which was as 
justly due to the first great presidential spoils¬ 
man, Andrew Jackson, as it is to his latest 
successor. 

There is, indeed, a firm and strong protest 
in a portion of the party press against the 
abandonment of the platform. But these pa¬ 
pers, like the leaders, do not condemn the con¬ 
stant contempt for reform shown by the ad¬ 
ministration. They commend the personal 
character of those who are appointed to office, 
without stating frankly that it is not the ap- 









64 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


pointment but the removal which truly iudi- 
cales the spirit aud drift of the admiuistra- 
tion. They speak iu no tone of challenge and 
command and conscious power to arrest the 
executive and the party chiefs of every degree 
in the reckless repudiation of good faith with 
the country. Unwilling to own that the plat¬ 
form promise and the executive pledge are of 
those professions 

“ That palter with us in a double sense ; 

That keep the word of promise to our ear, 

And break it to our hope,” 

they serve only like stakes planted in a current 
to show the swiftness of the stream. One of 
them only, so far as I know, and that a repub¬ 
lican journal in Philadelphia, with an inde¬ 
pendence worthy of an American newspaper, 
with whatever party in sympathy, says of the 
administration what must he accepted as a 
just verdict: “The administration, in almost 
every one of its acts since it was inaugurated, 
on the 4ih of March last, has scouted and flout¬ 
ed civil service reform and trampled under 
foot its own promises to respect it. It has 
turned it out of doors and barred the doors 
against it. That is the truth about the mat¬ 
ter, in brief; and the administration and its 
organs could do no better, wiser thing, than to 
frankly confess that, having found civil ser¬ 
vice reform to interfere with its plans, it whis¬ 
tled it down the wind as remorselessly as it 
would dismiss an objectionable tramp.” 

So say you, Mr. Foreman, so say we all, gen¬ 
tlemen of the jury. There was never a more 
comprehensive and significant declaration of 
reform made in a party platform than that 
under which the present administration came- 
into power. But no party ever broke faith 
with itself and with the country more com¬ 
pletely. It is not, however, a new situation. 
During the nine years of the existence of the 
league, whatever may have been the profession, 
reform has not been the practice of either 
party. Nevertheless, it has advanced steadily 
and surely in the face of party contempt and 
wrath and denunciation. 

“ Yet, Freedom ! yet thy banner, torn, but flying, 

Streams like a thunder-storm against the wind.” 

Last year, I recounted in detail the actual 
achievements of reform in the laws and in 
practice. They mark the rising tide of public 
sentiment. “ With public sentiment,” said 
Mr. Lincoln, “nothing can fail; without pub¬ 
lic sentiment, nothing can succeed.” The se¬ 
vere standards by which executive conduct in 
regard to the civil service is tested by intelli¬ 
gent and independent citizens wbo believe that 
honesty is the best political policy; tbe im¬ 
pressive and startling contrast ofFered in the 
centennial year of the constitution between 
the tone and the course of the first and later 
administrations; the deepening sense of shame 
that alone among the great powers of Christen¬ 
dom we degrade our own public service—all 
show unmistakably how profoundly the public 
conscience is stirred. The great spectacle of 
the moment is a great object lesson. The ar¬ 
gument for reform is steadily driven home by 
wanton party prostitution of the public ser¬ 
vice. Happily, there is a conservative and 
patriotic public intelligence which is the sure 
and invincible bulwark of popular institu¬ 
tions, because it saves popular impulse from 
its own exf'esses. When that intelligence fails, 
the republic ends. But that it is not failing 
our rrcent history shows. It has already ex¬ 
torted from party a profession of reform. It 
will presently compel a policy of reform, un¬ 
less, as Goldwin Smith suggests, party can be 
maintained only by corruption and the bribery 
of place. But that is not yet the American 
faith. We do not believe that popular gov¬ 
ernment is possible only when dishonest. But, 
on the contrary, although taught by recent 
and startling experience that corruption is to¬ 
day the chief peril of the republic, and believ¬ 


ing that nothing more certainly stimulates it 
than the practice of converting the vast sum 
of the salaries of the civil service into a 
bribery fund at every national election, we 
have seen the awakening and the advance of 
the spirit of reform. As with all progress 
worth fighting for, the contest is stubborn aud 
resolute. Delays and defeats are inevitable, 
but temporary. The advance is sure. The 
thunders of the church did not persuade Gali¬ 
leo that the earth did not move; and the roar 
of the party machine and the gross violation 
of public pledges by the President, the post¬ 
master general, by senators and representativs 
in congress, by party- committees and local 
leaders, all of which we have heard and seen 
before, do not convince us that the reform 
sentiment of the country is not stronger every 
day. 

THE TIDE-WATERS AND THE PRESIDENT’S 
POLICY. 

The familiar plea by which the partisan 
prostitution of the civil service is defended is 
that the admisitration should be entrusted to 
the friends of the national policy which has 
been approved at the polls. This is true of 
every post in the administration of which the 
duties are in any degree affected by the elec¬ 
tion. But it is true no farther, and it is true of 
but a very small number of places. The sub 
ordinate executive agents, as such, have no 
political duties. They are sworn simply to 
administer the law. If they are honest, their 
political views can not injuriously affect their 
diligence and devotion to their duties. If they 
are dishonest, their political views can not 
qualify them for public employment. Those 
who raise the cry that the government, mean¬ 
ing the civil service, ough to be in the hands 
of its friends shall not esca{)e by refusing to 
say what they mean. If the cry does not 
mean that a postmaster would be more honest, 
energetic, and efficient in the handling and 
distribution of the mail because of his polit¬ 
ical views, it has no legimate meaning what¬ 
ever. It is merely a black flag flown at a 
masthead. It means only that we have cap¬ 
tured the administration, and not content with 
enacting and executing the laws, which is our 
true end as a party, we make prize of the vast 
emoluments of the civil service to distribute 
among our followers as booty. 

But this cry is fatal for those who raise it; 
for it is the confession that a partisan service 
is so corrupting that it unfits men for honest 
and eminent public duty. It leaves theoham- 
pions of spoils conten ding for a system which 
they admit to be demoralizing. It asserts 
that a public servant who is faithful and ca¬ 
pable under an administration which favors 
a national bank, for instance, will become 
dishonest or inefficient under one which pre¬ 
fers a sub-treasury, becau.se, if he remain hon¬ 
est and efficient under the new administra¬ 
tion, then, as his views do not affect his con¬ 
duct, the public interest does not demand a 
change. Whoever alleges that an American 
citizen, whatever his political views may be, 
will do his sworn duty less efficiently, or even 
connive at the violation of laws which he is 
sworn to obey, because his party has not made 
the laws, accuses him of being a fool or a 
knave. To assert this of the great body of 
public officers is to brand American citizens 
as rascals. Yet this is the assumption of the 
theory that every non-political employe in the 
public service should change with a party 
change of administration. Why should such 
public officers be expected to regard their 
oaths more strictly, or to do their duty more 
faithfully, because they agree with the politi¬ 
cal views of the president, than the employes 
of a great private corporation because they 
agree with the religious views of the superin¬ 
tendent? 


I will take an illustration familiar to all of 
us. The late postmaster of New York was a 
republican. But when a democratic admin¬ 
istration came into power, he was reappointed 
postmaster. Did that administration betray 
its trust and wrongfully imperil the public 
service by retaining an important officer, who, 
not holding the political views of the Presi¬ 
dent, under the theory we are considering, 
would be passive, careless, and inefficient in 
the discharge of his duties? In fact and by 
the record, did this difference of political 
view in the least degree affect the energy, the 
devotion, the ability of this man, who served 
his country as faithfully and at a sacrifice as 
great as any hero of the war? Did he flout 
his oath, did he connive at inefficiency and 
sloth and delay and misconduct in the postal 
service, in order to discredit the party with 
whose political views he did not agree? Had 
he no honor as a man? Had he no pride in 
the good name of the American government? 
Was he so poor a creature as to derange the 
business convenience of the metropolis of the 
continent, despite his oath, his honor, and his 
fame, because he was a republican and the 
President a democrat? 

To ask the question is to answer it. Mr. 
Pearson was the same upright, faithful and 
honorable officer under democratic ascendan¬ 
cy that he had been under republican adminis¬ 
tration. Yet, warm as my regard for the man, 
and high as was my admiration of the public 
officer, I do not think that he was singular in 
this honarable fidelity to his trust. Americans 
are not the scoundrels that the common spoils 
theory assumes. What Mr. Peanson was, in 
honesty and fidelity, thegreat multitudeof pub¬ 
lic officers and employes would be, if selected 
and retained as he was for his fitness, and not 
for his opinions. It is one of the worst evils 
of the spoils system that it tends to corrupt 
this honesty and to destroy this fidelity by 
making personal favor and political opinion, 
not proved fitness, both the condition of ap¬ 
pointment and of the official tenure. There¬ 
fore it is that the removal of every such officer 
solely that his office may be degraded to a re¬ 
ward for partisan activity is a gross public 
wrong, a deadly blow to political morality, to 
the self respect of honest public servants, and 
to the American name. 

The successful party in the election of last 
year pledged itself to promote civil service re¬ 
form, “to the end that the dangers to free in¬ 
stitutions which lurk in the power of offi'dal 
patronage may be wisely and effectually avoid¬ 
ed.” It was not the power of patronage, but a 
great, humane, j)atriotic purpose that created 
the party which made that declaration. Did 
the complete control of the patronage of the 
government for a quarter of a century, a pa¬ 
tronage enormously increased and extended, 
and bestowed solely upon partisans, strengthen 
the party in public confidence, or elevate its 
leadership, or secure its ascendency? Is it 
not true that, with the great increase of pa¬ 
tronage, political corruption has greatly and 
consequently increased within the party and 
throughout the country ? Is it less true that 
the determination no longer to treat the vast 
sums paid in public business salaries as a 
fund to reward partisan service would be the 
first serious check to the corruption which 
now threatens our political life? Thirteen 
years ago one of the most eminent of republi¬ 
can leaders said in the senate—and if it was 
true then is it less true now ?—“ I have heard 
the taunt from friendliest lips that, when the 
United States presented herself in the east 
to take part with the civilized world in gen¬ 
erous competition in the arts of life, the only 
product of her institutions in which she sur- 
pas.sed all others beyond question was her cor¬ 
ruption.” When, three years hence, we wel¬ 
come that world upon our western shores to 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


65 


another competition of proficiency in those 
arts, shall we be content with industrial su¬ 
periority and material splendor? While our 
inventive genius, our daring enterprise, our 
swift civilization of a continent, may stir the 
wonder of the world, shall it not be our proud¬ 
est boast that, as the material miracle has 
been wrought under popular government, our 
greatest achievement is the moral miracle of 
the constant purification of that government 
by the virtue and intelligence of the people ? 


THE THANKSGIVING DAY SERMON. 


The progress of this movement continues to 
be encouraging. It is not possible to note this 
month more than the following: 


% 


Resolved, That in accordance with a sugges¬ 
tion made by Mr. Herbert Welsh, on behalf 
of the National Civil Service League, the 
ministers belonging to the Pacific Unitarian 
conference are requested to take for the sub¬ 
ject of their sermons at the approaching 
Thanksgiving Day service “ The Reform of the 
National Civil Service,” or to devote at least 
a portion of their discourse to it, believing, as 
we do, that it is a theme of vital importance 
to our country, and should enlist the warm 
support of our pastors and people. 


An appeal has been issued to the ministers 
of the United States, urging them to unite on 
^Thanksgiving Day, or such other day as may 
^seem suitable or convenient, iu the presenta- 
ition of the subject of civil service reform. 

In general, a pastor can scarcely be too care¬ 
ful with regard to the public expression of his 
views on such matters as may invite the heat 
of discussion, or engender rivalries between 
those of differing positions, classes or political 
views. He is and must be first, last and all the 
time a religious leader. Ilis one object,to which 
all others must be’ subordinated, should be to 
help men in their soul experiences to lead 
the life of Christ. As pastor he must know no 
republican or democrat, no employer or em¬ 
ployed, no public official or private servant. 
His people are all individual souls, to be 
helped by him in their individual life with 
God. At the same time he is a citizen, and 
not only may but must have personal opin¬ 
ions on public affairs which must guide his 
public action. How to be unwavering in the 
one, and at the same time true to the other, is 
often a matter of great difficulty, and needs 
the most careful tact and judgment. It is as 
essential that a man be a Christian at the polls 
as in his home, yet to emphasize the requisites 
for Christians voting, and not to imply that 
they are coincident with the preacher’s own 
political preferences, is no easy matter. The 
result has been too often that preachers re¬ 
fused to take up in the pulpit the great ques¬ 
tions of government, and there are multitudes 
to whom the ideas of Christianity and politics 
are as far removed as possible from each 
other. This extreme is just as wrong as the 
other. While it is none of the business of 
the pulpit to discuss party politics, it is the 
bounden duty of the pulpit to present as fully 
and clearly as possible the principles that 
should control party politics. 

The question of civil service reform, how¬ 
ever, is in no sense a party question. It is one 
that involves the comfort and the rights of 
every community. It embraces in its scope 
the principles that should underlie all govern¬ 
ment in its local relations, in that it empha¬ 
sizes the “service” element, brings out most 
forcibly the truth that public office is a pub¬ 
lic trust, that the public official should be as 
impartial, as unbiased in his public action, 
as the preacher himself in his church duties. 
The Homiletic Review for October. 


THE REPUBLICAN PRESS ON CIVIL 
SERVICE REFORM. 

[For want of space a considerable number go over to 
next issue.] 

General Harrison has spoken in no uncertain terms 
of his purpose to promote and perfect the great re¬ 
form. Between cringing on the one hand and trick¬ 
ery on the other, tlie present administrators of the 
civil-service law and rules have lost public confi¬ 
dence. By the elimination of those non-progressive 
agents of reform, and the appointment of men hon¬ 
estly in sympathy with the principles involved, such 
progress may be made under the new President that 
retrocession will be impossible hereafter. With edu¬ 
cated, alert, and jaithjul men in every branch of the 
civil service, it may one day become and be deemed as 
honorable to serve in that as in the naval or military serv¬ 
ice —Frank Leslie's [ifep.], December 1,1888. 

Of course many removals will be made—many 
ought to be made for the good of the government— 
but anything like a clean sweep will react upon the party 
and jeopardize its welfare.—Baltimore American [J?ep.] 
November 27, 1888. 

The cause of civil service reform has not yet made 
such progress but that there are seme republicans 
who openly avow their approval of the doctrine that 
“ to the victors belong the spoils,” and who unhesi¬ 
tatingly advocate a clean sweep of all democrats in 
oBice. It was this very doctrine and practice that 
created a necessity for civil service reform. The 
movement did not come any too soon, and, if held 
to its original purpose, it can not be too earnestly 
prosecuted for the welfare of the country. The fact 
that it has been made more or less odious by hypo¬ 
critical professions and Pecksniffian pretenses is not 
the fault of the movement itself. The movement is 
essentially right. It aims to reduce the business ad¬ 
ministration of the government to business princi¬ 
ples, to place it on a stable basis, to remove the 
minor offices from the field of mere political spoils, 
and to make merit and efficiency ruling principles 
in appointments and promotions. It is impossible 
to deny the justice of a movement that aims at 
these ends. All good citizens and both parties alike 
are interested in their accomplishment. They must 
be accomplished if our civil service is to be saved from be 
coming the mereprey of spoilsmen and a perpetual source 
of corruption and danger to the government. No govern¬ 
ment can be permanently maintained on a basis that 
openly defies business principles which are founded in the 
common sense of mankind. Civil service reform in its 
true sense—that is, in the sense of introducing an 
element of stability into the civil service and con¬ 
ducting it on a basis of merit and efficiency, rather 
than of mere political spoils—civil service reform in 
this sense has come to stay, and will move forward 
rather than backward. The republican clean sweep¬ 
ers should not be unreasonable in their demands on 
the next administration. The democrats made that 
mistake four years ago, and republicans should pro¬ 
fit by their example. The more unreasonable the 
demands and expectations in this regard the greater 
the liability to disappointment, and of its proving a 
.source of party w'eakness. Those who make it forget 
that the republican party is fully committed by its plat¬ 
form pledges to civil service reform, and that General 
Harrison has declared himself in full sympathy with it ; 
they forget that the clean-sweeping business was one of the 
main counts in the indictment against the democratic 
party, and the consequent demoralization of the public 
service one of the principal causes of its defeat.—Indian¬ 
apolis Journal [ftep.], November 'IZ, 1888. 

The curse of offiee-seekiiig appears in two ways— 
it prevents a President, senator or congressman 
from exercising any possible statesmanship, and it 
leads to the election of men to those positions who 
have no ability for statesmanship even if they 
should have,time for its use.—Omaha Republican [J2<p.] 

Shrew'd political managers will see after awhile 
that the doctrines of civil service reform are as ben¬ 
eficial to the discipline of party as they are to the 
efficiency of the government service. — Louisville 
Commercial [Rep ] 

The republican party is thoroughly committed to 


the advocacy of this reform, and we do not believe 
that there is any possibility of the repeal of the law. 
The efforts in that direction by a few politicians and 
public men are viasted.—Philadelphia Press [Rep.l 

The pressure for office is well nigh intolerable, 
even with the protection at present afforded by the 
law, and the only way out of the diffieulty is to en¬ 
large the scope of the competitive system to keep 
pace with the growth of the civil service, or, better 
still, to gain upon it.—Aew York Tribune [Ucp.] 

General Hairison, as is well known, has devoted all his 
waking hours, even at the risk of seriously endangering 
his health, to listening to office-brokers and office seekers. 
So long as they are encouraged they will make their 
periodical onslaughts, but once the President puts 
his foot down and stops it there will be an end of the 
miserable business, and he need not fear that the 
people will not endorse and applaud him in taking 
any step which will relieve him from this unseemly 
and disgraceful occupation of his time, and give him 
the opportunity to attend to public business and to 
devote to it the leisurely care and consideration 
which it needs.—C/tfea^/o Tribune [Rep ]. 

We believe the mass of the republican party is in 
favor of strengthening the civil service laws rather 
than relaxing them or trying to get around them. 
New York Prm[I?ep.]. 

The Lowell [Mass.] Courier [Rep.] tells Senator 
Blair of New Hampshire that in denouncing civil 
service reform he ‘‘is not a republican in good and 
regular standing.” The Courier explains that “the 
reform of the civil service is a republican tenet” It 
has been formally seth forth in every republican 
platform since 1876, and whatever there is of law or 
practice of the reform is of republican origin. The re¬ 
publican party can not disclaim the doctrine without 
inconsistency, nor can it ignore it without disgrace. 

Patronage kills off more Congressmen than it helps, 

* « « Even with the President himself, the rec¬ 
ognition of his services and abilities as a statesman 
and national executive officer are almost lost track of 
in the continual uproar for and against his manner 
of dispensing the official patronage. Cleveland’s 
failure to please his party in handling the official 
patronage was more responsible for his defeat than 
his course upon national questions of statecraft and 
governmental affairs.— Cincinati Commercial Gazette 
[Rep.l. 

Not until the whole rank and file of the host of 
office-holders are brought fully under the civil serv¬ 
ice regulations can the main w'ork of the reform re¬ 
ally be said to have been accomplished.—Bos<o»i 
Journal [Uq).] 

Judging from the declarations of those people, the 
principle of civil service reform has been abandoned, 
and, like the old Roman augurs, even the coryphmi 
of the reform movement are laughing in their 
sleeves at it as if it were a good joke. But they are 
mistaken. If there were such abandonment of the 
civil service reform principle, it would not be diffi¬ 
cult to secure a repeal of the law by congress, but 
this can not be done and will not be done.—Sf. Paul 
Pioneer Press [Rep.] 

The republicans are battling with that element of 
weakness, the patronage, and are getting the worst 
of it. The scramble for offices is disgusting, dis¬ 
heartening; the antagonism of men who last fall 
professed the most disinterested zeal for the party, 
but are now squabbling over the division of the 
political spoils, are making glad the enemy.— Brook¬ 
lyn Times (Rep.) 

And here comes the Philadelphia Press to assert 
that “the republican party is not going back on its 
civil service reform pledges to please anybody, much 
less disappointed politicians.” Whata whack that is 
at Ingalls, Blair, ex-Senator Platt, the New York lead¬ 
er, and others, who would fain have the republican 
party follow the course of the old whig party respect¬ 
ing slavery. That organization would resolve against 
its extension before election, and afterwards turn 
round and join in any compromise that would 
strengthen the institution nationally. The natural 
result was that the whig party fell by the wayside.— 
Boston Transcript [i?ep.]. 
















66 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


The Buffalo Express [Rep.] is not a believer “in 
the system which makes the senators and represent¬ 
atives assistant presidents in so far as the patronage 
of their districts is concerned.’’ The Express s&ys 
that the system “ has been tried and found wanting. 
The scandals it gave rise to under former adminis¬ 
trations weakened the republican party by creating 
factions and faction-chiefs, and by driving from the 
entire organization some of its best members. Its 
only good result was the passage of the national 
civil service law.’’ 

Certain republican members of congress who have 
not obtained all the offices they want vent their dis¬ 
content by flings at the civil service law, and demo¬ 
cratic papers eagerly pick up their remarks as evi¬ 
dence that republican support of the reform is di¬ 
minishing. But a handful of discontented congress¬ 
men do not represent the party. The reform is here 
to stay.—Boston Journal [Rep.]. 

The Milwaukee Sentinel [Rep.] says that it is not 
“disposed to commend Mr. Clarkson’s activity with 
the cleaver.’’ 

That the faith of the republican party is pledged 
to promote the best good of the civil service of the 
country.—Joioa Republican Platform, 1874. 

THE MEETING OF THE NATIONAL 
LEAGUE. 

The National League of civil service reform 
associations held its annual meeting in Phila¬ 
delphia, October 1 and 2. The resolutions 
adopted were as follows: 

First. The National Civil Service Reform League 
gladly recoguizes the steady advance of the reform 
sentiment in the public mind, and the good results 
already happily achieved in legislation. 

Second. The national convention of the party now 
administering the government made the following 
declaration: 

“The men who abandoned the republican party 
in 1884, and continue to adhere to the democratic par¬ 
ty, have deserted not only the cause of honest gov¬ 
ernment, of sound finance, of freedom and purity of 
the ballot, but especially have deserted the cause of re¬ 
form in the civil service. We will not fail to keep our 
pledges because they have broken theirs, or because 
their candidate has broken his. We, therefore, re¬ 
peat our declaration of 1884, to wit: ‘ The reform of 
the civil service, auspiciously begun under the re¬ 
publican administration, should be completed by 
the further extension of the reform system, already 
established by law, to all grades of the service to 
which it is applicable. The spirit and purpose of the 
reform should be observed in all executive appointments, 
and all laws at variance with the object of existing 
reform legislation should be repealed, to the end that 
the dangers to free institutions which lurk in the power 
of official patronage may be wisely and effectually 
avoided.’’’ 

The president elected upon that platform declared 
in his letter of acceptance: “In appointments to 
every grade and department, fitness and not party ser¬ 
vice should be the essential and discriminating test, 
and fidelity and efliciency the only sure tenure of 
office. Only the interest of the public service should 
suggest removals from office.” 

Third. It is the duty of the league to consider 
how these solemn pledges have been fulfilled. The 
personal character, ability and experience, and the 
unquestionable and fearless devotion to reform of 
the members of the civil service commission ap¬ 
pointed by the administration and the support ac¬ 
corded to them by the President deserve the heartiest 
commendation. The administration of the reform 
law has been improved by regulations making the 
eligible lists public, and permitting the appointment 
upon local boards of members whose tenure in the 
service is independent of the heads of the respective 
clas,sifled offices. 

Fourth. The execution of the law, however, is se¬ 
riously endangered by the appointment, with few 
exceptions, as heads of offices within the classified 
service, of men who are not in sympathy with the 
law or its purposes, but who are in many cases its 


open or secret enemies. A brief necessary delay in 
the preparation of eligible lists by the civil service 
commission was improved to sweep out of the rail¬ 
way mail service hundreds of employes, regardless 
of efficiency, and into these vacancies were hurried 
hundreds of partisans of the administration, with 
but a subordinate regard for their fitness. In the 
civil service generally, the President seems in great 
measure to have abdicated his constitutional power 
of appointment, by placing the appointments at the 
disposal of partisan leaders, thus enabling them to 
debauch constituencies and control elections. Thus 
the pledge of the President, that fitness and not party 
service should be the sole discriminating test of ap¬ 
pointment, is disregarded. 

Fifth. An equally flagrant violation of pledges is 
the removal of,thousands of public ofificers, especially 
in the postal service, for mere partisan reasons, and 
especially of some trained by years of faithful ser¬ 
vice, and universally recognized to be peculiarly 
fitted for their several positions, and whose only 
fault was their unwillingness to seek the favor of in¬ 
fluential politicians by subordinating to their inter¬ 
ests those of the country. Against these excesses of 
the spoils system, whereby its injustice and cruelty 
are strikingly illustrated, the league records its un¬ 
qualified protest. 

The league also expresses its regret at the refusal 
of the President to extend the civil service examina¬ 
tions to the census bureau, inasmuch as the proper 
discharge of the duties of that bureau imperatively 
demands entire freedom from partisan spirit. 

Sixth. The league renews its earnest declaration of 
the wisdom of the repeal of the four years laws, 
which are the fruitful source of political removals. 
When the power of removal is unrestricted, it is of 
the highest importance that every officer should be 
held to the responsibility which accompanies au¬ 
thority, and that every incentive to the arbitrary ex¬ 
ercise of authority should be destroyed. To stimu¬ 
late the official sense of this responsibility, the league 
recommends to its constituent associations the widest 
publication of the details of removals, that the pub¬ 
lic may be fully informed of any ease in which its 
service may be made subservient to personal and 
partisan objects. 

Seventh. The league renews its recommendation 
that public officers entrusted with power of appoint¬ 
ment and removal should be required by law or ex¬ 
ecutive order to place upon public record all appoint¬ 
ments, removals and resignations, and the reason for 
every removal made by them; and appointing offi¬ 
cers, when in their discretion they do not select those 
rated highest upon the eligible list presented to them, 
should be required in each case to file their reasons 
for such action. 

While fully recognizing that the absolute power of 
removal must be vested in the appointing power sub¬ 
ject only to a sound discretion, the league holds that 
the system of making removals upon secret charges 
of specified acts proffered by unknown accusers, with 
out opportunities for explanation or denial, is inquis- 
torial in its character, unjust in its results, and, like 
the spoils system itself, repugnant to the spirit of 
American institutions. 

Eighth. The league warmly approves the appeal 
to the clergy of the United States to commend to the 
people the moral aspect of the question of reform. 
The promotion of public honesty, and the stay of in¬ 
creasing corruption, are not political or partisian 
questions; they are coiicerns of the truest patriotism 
and the pulpit in the discharge of its office of apply¬ 
ing eternal principles of morality to human conduct, 
and aiding nations as well as individuals to walk in 
in the right way, may well demand of the public 
conscience that specific and acknowledged evils 
affecting the highest public welfare shall be speedily 
and effecively redressed. 

WORK MAPPED OUT. 

A special committee of the league advocated 
the following plan of agitation, which was 
adopted : 

The report from the special “Committee on Work,” 
as named by Mr. Wheeler, was then read by that 


gentleman. It outlines a plan of procedure, and is 
as follows: i 

Reso ved, That the several associations constituting 
the league be requested, without delay, to take ap¬ 
propriate action to secure adequate appropriations 
for the civil service commission ; to promote the con¬ 
firmation by the senate of the commissioners lately 
appointed, and to guard against legislation hostile to 
merit system, and as means to these ends that each 
of said associations prepare and circulate suitable 
petitions ; appoint delegations to visit Washington, 
present these petitions to congress, and obtain pub¬ 
lic hearings before committees of that body; hold 
public meetings at which addresses on the topics 
above indicated may be delivered, resolutions 
adopted and committees appointed to lay these reso¬ 
lutions before congress; interrogate senators and 
representatives from its state before the meeting of 
congress (whenever this course seems to be advisable) 
as to their respective sentiments on the foregoing 
subjects, and make judicious representations to them 
caleulated to induce favorable oflficial action on their 
part; promote public expressions of opinion by 
noted citizens and the press, advocating the adoption 
by congress and the President of a policy in accord¬ 
ance with the principals of civil service reform; col¬ 
lect and transmit to the secretary of the league, and 
to journals friendly to the cause of reform, the facts 
respecting removals from office, and the working of I 
the reformed system whenever it is in force, and that • 
the secretary of the league communicate such facts jj 
to the several associations. 1 

Resolved, That the secretary of the league trans¬ 
mit the foregoing resolution to the secretaries of the 
several associations, with a letter urging its prompt 
consideration, and that the president of the league 
address to the presidents of the several associations 
a circular letter suitable for publication, impressing 
upon them the importance of the action therein ad¬ 
vised. 

Resolved, That the executive committee of the 
league co-operate with the several local associations j 
in organizing the agitation proposed in the first res¬ 
olution, and assist them in obtaining well known ’ 
speakers for their meetings, and proper introductions ^ 
for their delegations and committees in the nat onal 
capital, and that it cause to be prepared maps, with 
appropriate quotations and statistics, for exhibition 
at public meetings. 

Resolved, That the several monthly papers pub¬ 
lished in the interest of civ'il service reform be re- : 
quested to have at least one article in each issue, be- * 
tween December and June next, devoted to the sub¬ 
ject of congressional action relative to the reform, 
and to send marked copies of each issue to the per¬ 
sons whose names shall be furnished them by the 
executive committee of the league, the actual cost of 
publishing such additional numbers to be defrayed 
by the league, and that the several associations be 
requested to promote the circulation of these papers, 
especially among those who are not members of such 
associations. 

Resolved, That the executive committee be author¬ 
ized, in their discretion, to undertake a thorough in¬ 
vestigation of the working of the civil service law 
under the present administration, and for this pur¬ 
pose to secure, if they shall think lit, one or more 
suitable representatives, who shall further, if ap¬ 
proved by the committee, present the cause of civil ^ 
service reform to popular audiences in different parts 
of the country and aid in the organization of associa¬ 
tions in union with the league, and also obtain infor¬ 
mation as to proposed legislation at Washington; 
correspond with the executive committee and local 
as.sociations, .see that petitions and resolutions are 
duly presented and delegations and committees re¬ 
ceived, and generally promote, by all proper means, 
the objects-of the league. 

Resolved, That, to meet the expenses of the action 
which the executive committee is hereby authorized ! 
to take, the treasurer of the league request the treas¬ 
urers of all the affiliated societies to send him the ' 
names of persons in their judgment able and willing 
to contribute toward such expenses, and then send 
to all persons thus suggested a circular setting forth 
the importance of the propo.sed work, and asking 
their assistance in paying for it. 











The civil service chronicle. 


To promise or confer public office as a bait or reward for personal or party service is always and everywhere immoral; 
it is a breach of trust and a form of bribery.— Charles J. Bonaparte. 


INDIANAPOLIS, NOVEMBER, 1889. 


VoL. I, No. 9. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind., where subscrip¬ 
tions and advertisements will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana. 


“ Patronage has been the great drawback 
of my life. If it had not been for patronage I 
would have been nominated for president of 
the United States. You can put it down as a 
rule that when you make half a friend by 
some appointment, you will make from twenty 
to forty enemies. For instance, take the Co¬ 
lumbus postoffice. There are eight applicants, 
and each one is strongly recommended. The 
one to be appointed will probably consider he 
is entitled to it anyway, and the other seven 
will each form a nucleus for a mass of dissen¬ 
sion .”—Senator Sherman. 

The Civil Service Chronicle will be 
glad to receive copies or reports of those 
sermons preached on Thanksgiving Day 
that touch upon civil service reform. It 
is especially desired to know of those 
preached in this state. 


The admirable address of Mr. Henry A. 
Richmond, of Buffalo, N. Y., before the 
Young Men’s Christian Association of that 
city, has been printed. Mr. Richmond was 
one of the civil service commissioners of 
that state, and he therefore speaks with au¬ 
thority. The Indiana Civil Service Reform 
Association has a limited number of copies 
for distribution. 

During the Indiana campaign of 1888 
James N. Huston was chairman of the re¬ 
publican state committee. Soon after his 
inauguration President Harrison having 
been elected upon a platform which said 
“ the spirit and purpose of the reform 
should be observed in all executive ap¬ 
pointments,” made the head of the repub¬ 
lican machine. United States treasurer. 
Mr. Huston accepted the place and pro¬ 
ceeded to Washington. His duties as 
treasurer, however, seemed secondary and 
announcements began to appear that he 
was holding gatherings to determine the 
distribution of offices in Indiana. For a 
time it was believed that he was the lord 
of the Indiana manor, and his rooms be¬ 
came as popular as the office of George 
Law’s subscription books. He was turned 
out of one boarding house because the 
crowds seeking his favor swamped the 
operations of the house. Having moved to 
a hotel the rush continued for a while and 
then suddenly died away. It came out that 1 


.Mr. Huston was desirous of having “ head¬ 
quarters” in Washington where all persons 
desiring a federal office relating to Indiana 
should apply and receive or be refused office 
by him. President Harrison, for reasons 
of his own, declined to sanction this plan 
which caused a coldness on the part of 
Huston. It was not known until lately 
how the matter was arranged. For this 
later knowledge we are indebted to the 
Indianapolis News which got the facts from 
L. T. Michener, who has succeeded Mr* 
Huston as chairman of the republican state 
committee, and who says: 

“When I became chairman of the state central 
committee, the assignment of such fourth-class post- 
offices as remained in democratic hands in democratic 
congressional districts was put into my hands. I found 
most of the postoffiices in these districts already provided 
with republican postmasters when I came in. Before I 
was given control of them, their assignment was in 
Mr. Huston’s hands. If my recommendations of 
applicants have conflicted with those of Mr. Huston, 
and been given precedence over them, I am not 
aware of it.” 

The fourth class postmasters have im¬ 
portant duties to perform and they are 
more intimately associated with the great 
mass of the people than any other class of 
federal officers. They have no possible rea¬ 
son for existence as officers except to per¬ 
form those duties efficiently and courteous¬ 
ly. Mr. Michener as chairman of the state 
committee, is actively engaged in putting 
the republican machine in order for the 
campaign next year. With the consent of 
President Harrison he is using the fourth 
class post-offices to strengthen this machine* 
and as part of it, to help carry the election 
at that time. These men will be expected 
to see to primaries and conventions in the 
interest of the man who appoints them. 
They will be expected to contribute money 
and work in the campaign for the nominees 
of a party although they are paid by all the 
people. This is the personal and party 
service which they will render for the 
offices that are now being given them. This 
is the M ihone business over again, and the 
Mahone business has come to be a very 
dangerous business. 

It is called the American system. This 
“ is keeping the offices near to the people.” 
A system like that described in Mr. Dana’s 
article in another column, which would 
make these officers dependent only upon 
their efficiency and character and leave 
them to reasonably and fully exercise their 


rriTTJMQ • J 50 cents per annum. 
A JiixtOJo • 1 5 cents per copy. 


political rights, is un-American, aristro- 
cratic, savors of monarchy, forms a privi¬ 
leged class, and is attended with many 
other evils. Appointing to office according 
to the order of a chairman of a political 
committee is an insulting and offensive 
piece of despotism. To permit it is not 
only to violate the plain promises upon 
which President Harrison was elected but 
it is to make a corrupt use of the appoint¬ 
ing power. 

The result of the election in Virginia 
more than met the repeatedly expressed 
hope of the Civil Service Chronicle. 
The spoils system was used by the repub¬ 
licans in its most efficient development. 
No man in the country except Gorman can 
handle public offices and bring the emol¬ 
uments connected with them to bear up¬ 
on an election better than Mahone. Presi¬ 
dent Harrison was very deliberate about 
it; he knew Mahone and his methods; he 
had other advice and plenty of it from 
Virginia republicans, but he decided to 
put the federal service connected with Vir¬ 
ginia into the hands of the head of the 
machine. He risked the whole case upon 
putting the spoils theory into complete 
practice and he constituted Mahone in ef¬ 
fect a feudal chief. The latter relentlessly 
used all the power thus given. The Valley 
a Republican paper, says, that the 
only question in the campaign was Mahone 
and Mahone methods. He was beaten by 
42,000 majority,and the result must gladden 
the heart of every good citizen. 

The elections in other states afford 
ground for similar satisfaction. In Iowa 
Clarkson had carried on his operation of 
dividing the offices to the greatest extent. 
In subsidizing the press, in rewarding 
friends and punishing enemies, and in a 
wholesale political proscription, he had 
given the spoils system its fill. He had 
impudently and boastfully tabulated his 
work and published it, columns long, in 
his paper. He had been made an assistant 
postmaster-general because of his supposed 
capacity to divide offices rapidly and with 
the least friction among the workers, re¬ 
fusing the weak and unimportant, making 
small gifts to others, placating the danger¬ 
ous and insatiable with larger bribes, and 
distributing "plums” to administration 
favorites. He did his best, and the result 
is that the democrats have carried Iowa for 

























68 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the first time since the republican party 
was formed, in 1854. 

New York has been managed upon the 
principles of Plattism, and a studied em¬ 
phasis was given to those principles by the 
displacement of such officers as Pearson 
and Burt. That state was full of republi¬ 
cans like Sherman S. Rogers, whose advice 
would have elevated the party, but instead 
the resurrection and domination of Platt, 
a sly machine worker, was preferred by 
President Harrison. 

In Ohio the key-note of the campaign 
was given by Congressman Grosvenor in a 
speech abusive and contemptuous of civil 
service reform. Congressman Cooper, who 
as chairman of the nominating convention 
made a strong speech in the line of repub¬ 
lican reform promises, was retired from 
the active list in the campaign. The head 
of the ticket, Foraker, characterizes ciyil 
service reform in private as “ all rot.” 
Here, too, the party had the full control 
and benefit of the federal patronage. Yet 
in Ohio and New York the republicans on 
election day were helpless. 


President Harrison entered upon his 
office with the determination that he would 
enforce the civil service law. He may or 
may not have had it in mind that he would 
notin his acts give the words of the plat¬ 
form and of his letter of acceptance the 
meaning which those words clearly have. 
He may or may not then have determined to 
give all the offices, over 100,000 aside from 
the few to which admission must be gained 
by examination, to personal and party 
favorites. If he had so determined, his 
course would have been what it has been. 
The machinery of our government can 
never be made to work faster in turning 
one set of office-holders out and putting in 
another. In this work the administration 
has proceeded without rest or relaxation. 
It has done no other work. 

If the offices are necessary to keep a 
party together and to enable it to carry 
elections. President Harrison may have the 
consolation of knowing that he has done the 
best he could toward imparting that 
strength. Many bitter criticisms are made 
against him by the party workers, but un¬ 
justly. With only occasional exceptions 
workers got the places. Ransdall, who was 
made marshal of the District of Columbia, 
was certainly “a worker” if ever there was 
one in Indiana, yet no appointment the 
President has made has created so much 
dissatisfaction here. It is true Mr. Hilde¬ 
brand, who was made collector of customs 
here, had not been a party worker, but all 
his deputies were, and his is an exceptional 
case. These are fair instances, yet all over 
the country appear such criticisms as this 
of Congressman Frank, of Missouri, who 


says that “the President has disorganized 
the party by his appointments. The men 
who zealously labor for party success are 
not to be studiously ignored.” The Presi¬ 
dent must feel that party machines at least 
are ungrateful. He has sacrificed every¬ 
thing upon the altar of the party workers, 
and now they turn and rend him. 


It is not likely that the President values 
the advice of men outside of his party ma¬ 
chine. He has not yet given any sign of 
changing his course; in fact the signs are 
that something like a Mahone attempt is to 
be made in Indiana next year. Neverthe¬ 
less the administration ought to try to 
save the respect of somebody. The Presi¬ 
dent ought to be willing to hear reason. 
He knows that the republican party was 
in power for twenty-four years and that the 
offices by means of the party work of the 
incumbents, and of assessments and of 
ruthless proscription of any independence 
of party lines were large factors in keeping 
the republicans in. But equally powerful 
was the theory that the democratic party 
would wreck the country. With the elec¬ 
tion of Mr. Cleveland the spell was broken. 
A party can no longer keep control of the 
country by slave drivers’ whips in the hands 
of the Gormans and the Mahones however 
much that party may strengthen their arras 
by federal patronage. The public mind is 
turned toward administrative reform, and 
a party in power must not be or appear to 
be besotted. Apparently President Harri¬ 
son had not read the signs of the times. 

He tried the spoils plan with all his 
strength, and he has failed. If he keeps on 
he will fritter away his opportunity to ren¬ 
der a great service to his country. He can 
not make or unmake laws, but in the three 
years and a half yet remaining he can de¬ 
stroy the spoils system. This is the only 
field in which he can make himself rank 
among our greater presidents. We know 
the objections; his party will fall off from 
him. It will not fall off more than it has 
now. He will be at war w’ith the modern 
barons who pose as congressmen; that is 
true, and speed the day. He will not be 
renominated; that may be true, but what 
of a renomination followed by. defeat? 
The demand of the time is that he disre¬ 
gard objections and be fearless of the con¬ 
sequences. With a statesman’s plan, exe¬ 
cuted with a statesman’s boldness, he would 
accomplish what is now utterly wanting. 
He would stir and rouse the patriotism of 
the people, who will gather about a strong 
man fighting on the right side. 


The road is plain to any one who will 
see it. Let the President demand of con¬ 
gress an appropriation sufficient for widely 
extended operations of the civil service 


commission. Let him bring every clerical 
position in the federal service within the 
civil service law. Let him make rules that 
the non-technical labor service of the coun¬ 
try shall be hired according to the system 
of the Boston labor service. Let him throw 
the fourth-class post-offices into divisions 
on lines similar to the railway mail service 
and operated upon the plan elaborated by 
Mr. Richard H. Dana. Let him provide a 
system of filling the larger post-offices by 
competition among subordinates in a group 
of offices. These are paths along which 
the President may pursue a brilliant 
course. Braced by remembering “ the 
dangers to free institutions that lurk in 
official patronage,” he should, by his con¬ 
stitutional fiat and at whatever cost, once 
and forever cut off congressmen from that 
patronage. It is true that like the nobles 
with a king granting privileges to the peo¬ 
ple, our oligarchy of spoils dividers would 
attempt to wreck the President, but in the 
end the wreckers would be wrecked. 


Mr. Henry C. Lea, of Philadelphia, is a 
far-sighted and powerful advocate of civil 
service reform. He was a republican, but 
voted for Mr. Cleveland in 1884 and did all 
he could to defeat him in 1888 on the 
ground of betrayal of this reform. In 1889, 
although presidents and parties may sacri¬ 
fice their principles, Mr. Lea does not de¬ 
part from his, as the following extract from 
his letter in the Philadelphia Times of Oc¬ 
tober 15, shows: 

Believing that republicanism represents the higher 
and nobler interests of the community, lam anxious 
for its success so long as it fairly upholds those in¬ 
terests. When it proves false to them it is false to it¬ 
self. It can then be brought to a sense of its duty- 
only by defeat, and its truest friends are those who 
will not hesitate to rebuke it in the only way made 
practicable under our system. If it is to remain in 
power, it can hope for supremacy only by deserv¬ 
ing it. 

Unfortunately the President seems to have mis- 
understood wholly the les.son taught by the last elec¬ 
tion. He has abused the appointing power to place 
the party in New York under the domination of Tom 
Plattism, in Pennsylvania under Quayism, in Vir- 
ginia under Mahoneism. He has degraded it and 
himself in obedience to a short-sighted opportunism 
which seeks to utilize the baser element of the party 
at the expense of the principles to which it and he 
alike are pledged. Unless his course can be arrested 
it needs no prophet to foretell that by the end of his 
administration he will have sunk the party so low in 
the estimation of its honest members that even the 
phenomenal capacity for blundering of the democ¬ 
racy will, in all human probability, not save it. If 
it would teach him wisdom, the most wholesome 
thing for the parly this year would be defeat in New 
York, Pennsylvania and Ohio. 

Mr. Lea is following the only course by 
which an administrative evil can be rooted 
out—dealing with the man who is now do¬ 
ing the evil. As he wrote in 1888, “ when 
a farmer nails a chicken hawk to his barn 
door he not only gets rid of a plunderer, 
bnt he gives a wholesome warning to its 
fellows.” 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


69 


CONGRESSMAN LODGE ON THE DI¬ 
VISION OF SPOIL. 

Mr. Henry Cabot Lodge, now a con¬ 
gressman from Massachusetts, has written 
a letter to the Civil Service Record elab¬ 
orating some ideas expressed by him be¬ 
fore the Middlesex Club recently. He 
describes himself as a “strong party man,” 
which seems to mean that he is a republi¬ 
can first and a civil service reformer next. 
He says that President Cleveland is not to 
be criticised because he made a clean 
sweep outside of the classified service, but 
for saying that he would not do it. “ All 
these cries ” about the “ spirit of the re¬ 
form” and “wholesale removals” are 
understood by the American people as de¬ 
pending on party feeling. The republi¬ 
cans look upon the civil service reform 
associations as democratic clubs in disguise 
and “ do not value their utterances at all.” 
The present spoils system is “ thoroughly 
vicious” in its effects upon “the entire 
Jpublic life of the United States.” The only 
tway to get rid of it is by law backed by 
'public opinion. Mr. Lodge also tells us 
[that Mr. Cleveland made a clean sweep of 
[the 300 employes of the Charlestown Navy 
'yard, and now he says “ the patronage of 
the yard has fallen largely into my hands.” 
Also, “ if I have not administered it well or 
judiciously, I am open to fair criticism, as 
was my predecessor on the other side; but 
neither is he nor am I open to criticism 
for the fact that we administered it.” 

In this naivete he is only to be compared 
to Reuben Davis, who has recently written 
his life of broils and fights, and of whom 
the Nation recently said, “ the author has 
not a suspicion that he is not a strictly 
moral and religious man.” Mr. Lodge 
superintends the expulsion of 300 la¬ 
boring men, many of them support¬ 
ing families, from their places without a 
reason in the world except that they do not 
belong to his party, and that the places 
are wanted for party favorites. For this he 
is not to be criticised. It is useless to ask 
Mr. Lodge the meaning of that sentence in 
General Harrison’s letter of acceptance 
which reads, “ Only the interest of the pub¬ 
lic service should suggest removals from 
office.” Equally useless would it be to ask 
him the meaning of that part of the repub¬ 
lican platform which reads, “ The spirit and 
purpose of the reform should be observed 
in all executive appointments.” It is use¬ 
less also to reason with a man who in his 
own words thus grades his political moral¬ 
ity. We can, however, tell him some plain 
facts: Following Mr. Josiah Quincy, be¬ 
cause many drunkards will have drink, Mr. 
Lodge is not justified in keeping a doggery. 
As to the law which Mr. Lodge wants, the 
power of appointment is found in the con¬ 
stitution, and in that instrument there is 


not the slightest authority for using the 300 
places in the Charlestown navy yard as Mr. 
Lodge has used them. Apparently we do 
need a law to put congressmen in jail for 
law-breaking. Finally we quote to Mr. 
Lodge the words of Mr. Bonaparte : “To 
promise or confer public office as a bait or 
reward for personal or party service is al¬ 
ways and everywhere immoral; it is a 
breach of trust and a form of bribery.” 
And we assure him that that statement is 
an absolute truth, and that while he and 
many others are with the President en¬ 
gaged in violating that truth by using over 
100,000 public offices to pay for such ser¬ 
vice, they are to be and will be criticised, 
and the criticism ought to be proclaimed 
from the house-tops. 


REMOVALS IN THE FIRE DEPART¬ 
MENT. 

Trusler and Thalman, two members of the 
common council of this city, are taking the 
lead in putting through that body an ordi¬ 
nance providing that no fireman shall be dis¬ 
missed until charges are filed against him and 
he has a hearing, and both branches of the city 
legislature dismiss him hy a two-thirds vote 
in each body. All the republican members 
seem to be aiding in this business, and the 
party journals offer no objection. It is given 
out that the object of the ordinance is to keep 
politics out of the fire department. Doubtless 
this is meant as a joke, in view of the fact that 
early this year these same republicans, led by 
Trusler, displaced Mr. Webster from his place 
as chief of that department because he would 
not dismiss the dozen democrats out of the 82 
employes of that department. The restoration 
of this officer was one plank of the democratic 
platform in the late city election, and if any¬ 
thing was decided, it was that the people 
wanted him restored, and with his restoration 
the banishment of politics from the depart¬ 
ment. By reason of that election the republi¬ 
cans are soon to lose control of the city gov¬ 
ernment, and now they propose to fly in the 
face of the expressed will of the city by legis¬ 
lating, not to keep politics out of this depart¬ 
ment, but to keep politics in in the worst form. 
The reported declaration of Thalman, “ We 
must take care of our friends,” contains the 
whole matter—the object is to prevent remov¬ 
als except with the consent of the republican 
minority. 

Let it be admitted that the democrats would 
do the same thing. The duty of a party is not 
to be gauged by that. The judgment must be 
upon whether a majority does the right 
thing for the public business. Civil service 
reformers are accused of favoring perpetual 
office-holding. The most extreme have never 
favored such inflexible permanence as this 
ordinance proposes. Under this a fireman 
may be disobedient, and for every reason 
worthless; yet he has only to have a “pull” 
upon one-third of the councilmen or aldermen 
and he is safe. Trusler and Thalman will be 


part of that third, and they will take care of 
their “ friends.” 

Now, those who have studied this question 
most are a unit upon the principle that, to 
secure efficiency, the power of removal must 
be left in the head of each department, and 
must be untrammelled. Beyond this they 
simply ask that, as no removal is made with¬ 
out a motive, the removing officer shall make 
a written record of the cause and that such 
record shall be public. The public then may 
judge whether a removal is for cause, as, for 
instance, drunkenness, or whether it is an abuse 
of power, as would be a removal to make room 
for a partisan. Although this is the doctrine 
of the “ civil service theorists,” its practical 
sense will appeal to every one. They rely upon 
public opinion alone to prevent improper re¬ 
movals, and this reliance will not fail. It is 
only when things can be kept secret that ward 
politicians control heads of departments. No 
such officer will ever write in a public record 
“ Removed because he was a democrat and 
Trusler had a man who worked three weeks 
for him in the last city campaign and whom he 
had to provide for.” Even the Truslers would 
be ashamed to have such a public*record. We 
have reached the point where a man’s fellow- 
citizens will take up his cause when he is un¬ 
justly dismissed. The case of Mr. Webster, the 
motive of whose dismissal was well known, is 
ample proof. 

Placed side hy side, each system proves the 
motive which prompts its adoption. The one 
means a department head, with power to bring 
and keep his men up to the highest efficiency; 
this is for the public benefit. The other means 
a department powerless to enforce discipline 
without the consent of a minority made up in 
part of men who have already shown that 
they will sacrifice the public welfare for a petty 
partisan gain. The fire department is of vast 
importance to this city, and it should be gov¬ 
erned by the strictest business rules, with con¬ 
centrated authority and absolutely free from 
partisan influence. When men seek to put 
upon it a drag like this ordinance, they cease 
to be public trustees and become public pests. 
Doubtless we shall always have with us the 
Truslers and Thalmans, but there is hope that 
sometime the public will require fitness in a 
public officer, and this will effectually keep 
them out of public office. 


MR. WANAMAKER IN POLITICS. 

At a recent meeting of postmasters in Wash¬ 
ington, Postmaster General Wanamaker is re¬ 
ported to have said : 

There is necessity for a radical reform in the 
railway mail .service. It matters not to me if 
a man can talk all day about cube and square 
root, theorems, and geometry, and climatic ef¬ 
fects in Africa and Asia, so long as he does not 
thoroughly know the section of the country 
through which his postal car may be running. 
1 would sooner have a postal clerk who knows 
every nook and corner in his district than 
some theorist who could tell all about zones and 
geographical centers remote from his own 
country; and I shall recommend to congress 
















70 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


that the civil service examinations be modified 
to this extent. 

This has been denied, but whether he said 
it or not it is consonant with his career as 
postmaster general. In other ways the belief 
has spread that he means harm to the merit 
system. Lists of questions have been put to 
individuals over the country, couched in a 
form which indicates that the answers are 
wanted to enable some one to make an attack 
upon the merit system. From all indications 
those answers are wanted for Mr. Wanamaker. 
It is also reported that he will attempt to in¬ 
fluence congress to accomplish his end. Mr. 
Wanamaker belongs to the class of rich men 
wholly ignorant of what is peculiarly known 
as politics, who are often chosen as a re.spect- 
able cat’s-paw when the party bosses want “ to 
pander to the moral sentiment of the commu¬ 
nity.” Flattered by the distinction the man 
thus chosen readily quiets his conscience and 
adapts himself to the new requirements that 
while a Sunday-school is run upon one set of 
principles, politics have to be run upon another. 
The result is that acting upon this practical ten¬ 
et in this ne^wspherehegenerally out-Quays the 
Quays. His newly rounded character is now 
upon the level of the plantation negro who 
worships lustily in the evening meeting and 
steals chickens on the way home. 

In this case Mr. Wanamaker was first se¬ 
lected to raise money for the campaign. He 
collected a large sum, and with arguments 
which look queer when placed beside the prin¬ 
ciples which are supposed to guide a religious 
man, he attempted to raise another large sum 
and failed. Next he was made postmaster- 
general, and under him hundreds of railway 
mail clerks have been dismissed in plain vio¬ 
lation of promises, and deprived of means 
of supporting their families, and in the same 
manner some 30,000 fourth-class postmasters 
have been dismissed without cause, and to 
make room for 30,000 political mercenaries 
trained to uphold the Quays. 

On one day in the week he exhorts a large 
Sunday-school to acts of Christian charity, 
kindness and tolerance, and on the other six 
days he affords an object lesson on an enor¬ 
mous scale of sly intolerance, cruelty, and 
meanness that would be shocking in a barba¬ 
rian. 


THE MARYLAND ELECTION. 

In the recent election another effort was 
made in Maryland to break the grip by which 
Senator Gorman holds the state. There is no 
other case of modern feudalism in the country 
which compares with this. Year after year 
the attempt has been made to break up his 
machine. It would have been accomplished 
in 1887 if President Cleveland had not sus¬ 
tained Gorman by giving him control of the 
federal patronage. The surrender of Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland to Gorman, and of President 
Harrison to Mahone, are and always will be 
two very black spots upon the presidential of¬ 
fice. The recent result shows that the long- 
continued and determined efforts of some of 


the best democrats in Maryland to free their 
state from Gorman’s control is having its ef¬ 
fect. In the meantime they may rest assured 
that their work is not without appreciation. 
We quote from a private letter from a corre¬ 
spondent exceptionally well informed in rela¬ 
tion to the election: 

I do not think that the party workers 
who passed the anti-civil service reform reso¬ 
lutions, as a rule, knifed the fusion ticket. 
So far as I could see, the great majority of 
them supported the movement with a fair de¬ 
gree of earnestness. 

Of course the issues upon which the fusion 
leaders made the fight were away above the 
heads of the “ boys ”. But as the ‘‘spoils ” of 
the republican victory of 1888 are in Mary¬ 
land as yet for the most part uudisiributed, 
the “ heelers” as a rule seemed to think that 
their best policy was to work hard for the 
ticket which the republican party had offi¬ 
cially endorsed. While tliis however is, I 
believe, true, it is also true that some republi¬ 
can votes were given to the ring ticket, and 
that a great many more republican votes were 
not polled at all. 

There are in Baltimore, and I suppose almost 
everywhere else, a certain number of party 
men who are always stupidly and bitterly op¬ 
posed to any fusion with any persons belonging 
to the other party. They will not vote for a 
ticket which is the result of such a fusion. 
Then whenever the ring’s control of the city 
and state is threatened, it fights a good deal 
harder than it does when only the president or 
a member of congress is at stake. It buys 
republican votes, white and black, probably 
more of the former than of the latter. It pulls 
all the wires that control of the courts and 
police force give it over people engaged in 
liquor selling andother stillmore questionable 
pursuits, a minority of whom are republicans. 
It is probable that in this canvass, from these 
several causes, the regular democrats received 
the votes of at least 1,500 republicans, while 
perhaps 2,000 more deliberately refused to 
vote. The ring began their preparation for 
the campaign by raiding the registration lists. 
By striking off all the republicans, for whose 
striking ott’they had color of excuse, and by 
leaving on all the democrats they were not 
actually compelled to strike off, they managed 
to get off the lists at least 2,000 more republi¬ 
cans than democrats. On election day repeat¬ 
ers were extensively employed throughout the 
city, and in many parts of the city workers for 
the fusion ticket were assaulted and beaten by 
the democratic roughs. In some precincts 
the judges of election were changed on the 
night before the election when it was too late 
to protest against the new appointees. In some 
precincts the fusion watchers were excluded 
from the polling rooms. This violence and 
fraud must have been worth at least 3,000 
votes to the ring. 

Mr. Cleveland’s plurality last year in Balti¬ 
more was 5,000. As above stated, the registra¬ 
tion lists were manipulated so as to cause the 
republicans a net loss of 2,000 votes, 1,500 re¬ 
publicans, making a change of 3,000 votes, 
voted the democratic ticket, 2,000 more did 
not vote at all, and fraud and violence counted 
for 3,000 more votes. If we add to Cleveland’s 
plurality of 5,000, the republican net loss in 
registration 2,000,1,500 republicans voting the 
democratic ticket 3,000, republicans who did 
not vote 2,000, ring gain by fraud 3,000, the 
majority the ring would have had, had no 
democrats voted against them, would have 
been 15,000. But their actual majority was 
only 3,000, so that 6,000 democrats, counting 
12,000 on a division, must have voted the fu¬ 
sion ticket. 

The ring, then, by the exertion of its every 
resource, and by the perpetration of every kind 


of election rascality, returned itself a majority 
of 3,000 votes in the city, but for the first time 
since the ^'a^ it failed to return a solid demo¬ 
cratic delegation to the legislature. One of 
the three legislative districts of the city re¬ 
turns a solid republican delegation of six. 
Year after year, as the fights keep on, one part 
of the state or city after another slips from the 
control of the dominant party. 

We are by no means discouraged and in¬ 
tend to keep up the fight as persistently as 
ever. 


The Old Dominion Republican League, 
made up chiefly of office-holders, is one of 
those organizations that exist in Washington 
solely to raise money to help party leaders 
carry state elections. This body took meas¬ 
ures to help Mahone carry Virginia, and its 
committee got out a circular asking for money 
for this purpose and mailed it to government 
employes in government buildings. Three 
members of the committee were office-holders. 
Mr. Thompson, of the civil service commis¬ 
sion, first heard of it, and promptly took steps 
to bring violators of the law to account. Cer¬ 
tain newspaper correspondents began to tele¬ 
graph out from Washington that Mr. Thomp¬ 
son’s “ reconstruction was not thorough,” but 
Mr. Roosevelt at this juncture returned and 
seconded Mr. Thompson with his well-known 
vigor. Probably Mr. Roosevelt will now have 
to be “ reconstructed.” The law declares that 
no ofiice-holder shall anywhere solicit money 
of another office-holder, and that no person 
shall solicit money of an office-holder in a 
government building. For office-holders to 
send a circular asking money of other office¬ 
holders, and for this committee to send such a 
circular into a government building to office¬ 
holders seem clear violations of the law. The 
matter will be brought to the attention of the 
grand jury. Nobody is deceived by the pre¬ 
tense that the clerks in Washington wanted to 
contribute to Mahone. They were in constant 
terror lest Mahone should ^et them out of 
their places. There has been enough talk 
about this matter of assessments, and when 
three men go upon a committee and get out 
what is in effect an assessment circular, they 
know what they are doing. There are two 
men in Washington who have a duty to perform 
in this matter which they can not shirk upon 
the grand jury. These are Secretary Noble 
and President Harrison. They have no right 
to keep in the government service these three 
deliberate violators of the law. 


How easy it would be to protect government 
employes and stop this blackmailing if their 
superiors really wanted to do it. The urgent 
invitation by the present civil service com¬ 
mission to alt persons to come forward and 
compete for employment, and the bold assur¬ 
ance that all would be treated fairly, has for 
the first time inspired general confidence in 
the working of the law. So in this case, a gov¬ 
ernment clerk is asked for money by campaign 
managers not because he is able to pay it, 
for he is no more able than the average 
citizen, but because he can be frightened into 
paying it by an implied threat. If the Presi- 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


71 


dent is anxious to stop this business, let him 
give notice that while any government em¬ 
ploye is free to contribute to any object he 
chooses, he is also absolutely free to refuse to 
contribute to any party purpose and he shall 
be safe in such refusal and that the law pro¬ 
tecting him from the vengeance of party bosses 
for refusal to pay money shall not be evaded. 

When Mr. Saltonstall became collector of 
the Boston custom house in 1885 there were 
334 employes. Of these 222 now remain. Of 
the 119 who were separated from the service, 
34 were removed by the department to re¬ 
duce the force, and 7 of these have been rein¬ 
stated by the collector; 17 resigned, 14 died, 
7 weredropped as private warehouses went out 
of bond, and 47 were removed for cause. There 
were no removals for political reasons. The 
collector has never found any difficulty in 
giving reasons for removals. After the first 
onslaught for places by the party workers had 
been successfully resisted, the “pressure” fell 
off and soon ceased. Collector Saltonstall’s 
administration of the merit system has con¬ 
quered criticism and now has the approval of 
his critics. It is an object lesson in civil ser¬ 
vice reform, and as is always the case under 
this system, with less force he has done more 
work. This comes from putting at the head 
of an office a friend of the law and a man who 
is not afraid of politicians. We ask Congress¬ 
men Hoar, Dawes and Lodge why Collector 
Saltonstall should not be retained ? 

Generam Raum is reported in the Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal to have said ; 

“I find that the clerks are willing to cheer¬ 
fully accede to any demand that I may make 
upon them if it affects their retention in office. 
They are all glad to buckle down to business 
and do everything that is required, and are 
perfectly contented if only permitted to re¬ 
main. Very many of them have been expect¬ 
ing to be forcibly retired, and they seem to be 
more anxious to stay than I ever supposed an 
employe could be. Ever since the rerating 
agitation, and the statement that a number of 
the employes who had to do with the reratings 
would be discharged, trepidation and fear 
have reigned throughout the office.” 

Here is competent evidence that democratic 
and republican clerks, for the sake of a chance 
to support their families, are willing to aid 
the man responsible for the office with all 
their might. It is precisely what happens in 
private employment. A Methodist workman 
feels an interest in the success of his Baptist 
employer, although they hold diverse relig¬ 
ious views, and his employer does not feel that 
to carry out the “policy” of his business his 
employe must be a Baptist. 

AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

Service.s were free and base. Free ser¬ 
vice was to pay a siiiii of money, or serve 
under the lord in war. Base service was 
to plow the lord’s land, to make his hedge 
or carry out his dung.— Blackstone. 

—The editor of the Rahway [N. J.] Advocate 
has been made postmaster of that town. 

—William Smyth, senior editor of the Owego 


[N. Y.] Times has been appointed postmaster 
in place of Frederick O. Cable, removed. The 
Times is the home organ of Tom Platt. 

—J. W. Watrous, editor of the Sunday Tele¬ 
graph, has been appointed collector of the port 
of Milwaukee. He “was indorsed by the en¬ 
tire congressional delegation of Wisconsin.” 
It is also stated that “ the patronage of the 
office is large, including eighteen or twenty 
employes.” The commission of the former 
collector did not expire until May 17, 1890, 
but he did not resign, and he was, therefore, re¬ 
moved without cause. 

—According to the Boston Traveler, Postmast- 
Lawshe of Xenia, Indiana, runs a paper with 
er a patent inside which it is fair to presume he 
does not read before publishing. In a recent 
issue two columns of the patent side were de¬ 
voted to criticism of the administration. The 
postmaster has asked mercy by affidavits filed 
with the department. 

—The republican postmaster at Syracuse, 
New York, served out his term, three years, 
under President Cleveland, and then the editor 
of the Syracuse Courier was appointed. Presi¬ 
dent Harrison has now removed him and ap¬ 
pointed Carroll E. Smith, editor of the Syra¬ 
cuse Journal. In making this appointment Sen¬ 
ator Hiscock overruled Congresman Belden of 
the Syracuse district, although the latter made 
a hard struggle. Senator Hiscock has the 
President’s ear and confidence, and in combi- 
bination with Tom Platt he is irresistible 
when any spoil is to be divided in that state. 
Anything which throws light upon the history 
of such a man is always of interest, especially 
if it comes from a reliable source. Since Post¬ 
master Smith, who has been the editor of the 
Journal all along, is Hiscock’s man what he 
says in that paper must be very reliable. 

Carroll E. Smith, Nov. 2, 1872. 

Hiscock is a notoriously bad, unscrupulous and 
DANGEROUS MAN, who sceks to get a seat in Congress 
for the sole purpose of introducing there the same cor¬ 
rupt AND ABO.MINARLE PRACTICES WHICH HE, AS A 
RING ATTORNEY, has successfully praciiced at Al¬ 
bany. 

Carroll E. Smith, Oct. 26, 1872. 

Mr. Hiscock is an accomplished politician in the 
LOWEST SENSE OF THE TERM. But when he strives 
to occupy the higher place in politics he fails ut¬ 
terly—for he LACKS .MORAL APPRECI.ATION OF PRINCI¬ 
PLE. 

Carroll E. Smith, Nov. 1, 1872. 

Republicans of honor and principle owe Hiscock 
nothing but execration and opposition to the bit 

TER END. 

Carroll E. Smith, Oct. 20, 1872. 

By that record [the official record of the canal in¬ 
vestigation], he appears to have had a prominent 
part in at least one of those gigantic swindles by 
which the state has been robbed of immense sums 
OF MONEY. The weight of proof is that 25 

per cent, was the share of the Hiscocks in this opera¬ 
tion— a COOL ten-thousand-dollar transaction. 
These investigations must suffice for the public to 
make up their minds as to the worth and integrity 
of the man who will thuspaf large sums of money in 
his pocket which he and everybody knows were wrong¬ 
fully TAKEN FRO.M THE STATE TREASURY. It IS COOl 
and deliberate plundering of the people. Mr. Frank 
Hiscock has provoked this exposure by his lofty and 
unwarranted pretensions to the character of a re¬ 
former. 

Carroll E. Smith, Oct. 30, 1872. 

Like the criminal fleeing from justice, Hiscock and his 
apologists see an officer of the law in every bush ! 

No MAN IN THE STATE OF NEW YORK HAS A DEEPER 
RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE SCHEMES OF JOBBERY AND 
WRONG UPON THE TREASURY THAN THIS MAN. 


A man who, skilled in the crooked ways of th 
law and in appliances for evading the conditions of 
solemn agreements, can first frame a law for relief, 
then “ get it through ” the legislature, then control 
the representative of the canal board taking testi¬ 
mony in the case, then secure a full report for the 
full amount of excessive damages named in the law, 
and finally pocket a quarter or fifth of that award— 
is one who prostitutes great abilitiesto the basest 
AND MOST MERCENARY PURPOSES, perpetrates a tlagraut 
outrage against the people, and becomes infinitely a 
greater offender against the public and is incompara¬ 
bly a more dangerous man than those who, on their 
own resources and responsibility, drive a sharp bar¬ 
gain and make all they can out of it in whatever 
ways the experience and .shrewdness of public con¬ 
tractors have taught them. 

—C. J. Hovey, a son of Governor Hovey, 
has been appointed postmaster at Mount Ver¬ 
non, Ind. 

—J. C. De Gress has been appointed post¬ 
master at Austin, Texas. He is chairman of 
the republican state committee. 

—M. P. Curran has been removed from the 
place of assistant appraiser in the Boston cus¬ 
tom house without cause to make room for L. 
A. Dodge, a relative of Abigail Dodge, a 
member of Secretary Blaine’s family. 

—Mr. W. T. Durbin, of Anderson, who is a 
member of the republican state central com¬ 
mittee, visited the departments to-day before 
his departure for New York, and as a result 
of his labors some appointments will be made 
from Madison and Hancock counties.— Special 
to Indianapolis Journal., Oct. 11. 

—Washington, Nov. 13.—The railroad men 
of Indiana will this week get substantial rec¬ 
ognition in the appointment of Augustus D. 
Shaw to be deputy third auditor of the treas¬ 
ury. Mr. Shaw is one of the bread-winners in 
the ranks, and is indorsed by railroad em¬ 
ployes all over the state. He was one of the or¬ 
ganizers and active promoters of the raihvay tvorkers 
that did such excellent service for the republican par¬ 
ly in the state last year.—Special to the Indianapo¬ 
lis Journal. 

—Governor Foraker was not without weap¬ 
ons, although they did not seem to be of avail. 
He made up the board of public affairs in 
Cincinnati. This board appoints 1,400 muni¬ 
cipal office-holders,lets all|contracts forjpublic 
works, and has a pay-roll of $800,000 a year. 
The 1,400 appointees are personal or party 
favorites of Foraker. 

—Congressman Wm.Pitt Kellogg, of Louis¬ 
iana, has been “ignored” by the present ad¬ 
ministration. He did not want anything him¬ 
self, but he wanted to dictate the disposal of the 
patronage in Louisiana. Harrison chose to make 
Congressman Coleman the dispenser of the spoils, 
and Kellogg has ceased to admire the Harri¬ 
son administration.— Special to St Louis Rep^ib- 
lic, Nov. 11. 

—Ex-representative Gofi', of West Virginia, 
makes frequent visits to the capital, and al¬ 
ways goes away with the scalps of some demo¬ 
cratic office-holders. In fact, he has so much 
influence with the administration that repub¬ 
licans from his state say Boss Steve Elkins and 
the minor bosses who train with him have be¬ 
come dissatisfied with him and are laying their 
plans to secure a larger share of the distribu¬ 
tion of patronage. Goff must “ tote fair,” they 
say, or prepare for trouble from the wealthy 
syndicate of politicians headed by Elkins.— 
Special to New York Times. 

— Mr. D. I. Throckmorton, of Lafayette, Ind., 
is among the arrivals here to-day. He is a 
candidate for postmaster of that town, and his 
friends think he will be appointed. It is un¬ 
derstood, however, that congressman Cheadle, 
who resides in Lafayette, prefers the appoint- 












72 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


meut of au ex-soKlier, who was a messmate 
with Cheadle in the army; but, as the former 
is said to be a saloon-keeper, the President 
will not consider the recommendation. The 
congressman, therefore, has signified a willingness to 
compromise on Throckmorton .— Washington Spe¬ 
cial Cincinnati Enquirer. 

—The Concord postmastership is the subject 
of a bitter fight. Lysauder Carroll, the last 
republican incumbent, is a candidate and has 
a host of competitors, and in this case Senator 
Chandler seems to have over reached him¬ 
self. Mr. Carroll went to Washington in the 
early days of the administration, and Senator 
Chandler materially assisted in getting prom¬ 
inent signers for him. But now up steps Sen¬ 
ator Corning, one of Chandler’s strongest sup¬ 
porters in the legislature, and asks for the 
place, refusing to accept the dictum of “ too 
young,” and he is only one of several who have 
special claims on Senator Chandler. 

—Census Superintendent Porter has com¬ 
pleted a list of places which will be assigned 
to Pennsylvania in census work. The entire 
personnel of the seiwice in the state, superintendent, 
supervisors, and enumerators, will be appointedupon 
the recommendation of Senators Cameron, and Quay 
in conference in the republican districts with their 
representatives in congress. With this view a 
schedule for organization for the collection of 
statistical data has been prepared for the use 
of the senators. A great mass of applications 
of persons for the different places in the state 
have been accumulating in the census office 
for the past four months, none of which have 
been opened, but will be referred in bulk to 
the senators. As this is the rule which has 
been adopted, it is useless for persons desirous of 
positions in Pennsylvania under the census bureau 
applying^to the authorities here.—Special to Phila¬ 
delphia Inquirer. 

—Most of the Brooklyn politicians who have 
been here hunting for spoils for the last day 
or two went home to-night. They were joined 
this morning by Representative Wallace, and 
they ought not to complain of the result of 
their visit. With Mr. Wallace’s help they se¬ 
cured the appointment of Joseph C. Fuller to 
be one of the special inspectors in the custom 
house, and they say they are promised that 
Granville W. Harmon shall be made an assis¬ 
tant appraiser; that William C. Booth shall 
be superintendent of the federal building in 
Brooklyn, and that “Mike” Dady shall fill a 
similar office in New York. Messrs. Wallace 
and Woodruff and their companions do not 
claim that they were promised the speedy out- 
seting of Postmaster Hendrix they have been 
so anxiously seeking, but they insist upon it 
that Brooklyn will have a republican post¬ 
master before many days have passed.— Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to New York Times. 

—Postmaster Murray, of Johnstown, New 
York, was appointed by President Cleveland 
in February, 1887. His work as postmaster is 
spoken of in the highest terms. The free de¬ 
livery system has just been added, and some 
carriers being needed, the post-office depart¬ 
ment required Murray to confer with the con¬ 
gressman, who sent him to the republican 
county committee. This committee named 
four republicans, refusing the postmaster’s re¬ 
quest that two of the four should be demo¬ 
crats. Murray sent the names of two republi¬ 
cans and two democrats to Washington. The 
department requested him to withdraw the 
names and comply with the orders of the 
county committee. Murray refused, and the 
department repeated its directions, to which 
Murray replied : 


United States Post-office, i 
Johnstown, N. Y., Sept. 18,1889. j 
Hon. Thomas Marche, Acting Superintendent Free De¬ 
livery Str vice, Washington, D. C.: 

Sir: Yours of the 16th inst. at hand. For rea¬ 
sons stated in my letter to your office of 12th inst., 
strengthened by public opinion in this village and 
community, I feel it would be a violation of my .sense 
of duty and a disregard of the wishes of the patrons 
of this office to nominate for carriers some of the 
names mentioned in your letter of the 9th inst. I do 
not recede from my position stated in my letter of 
the 12tli inst. The more the character and qualifica¬ 
tions of the candidates for carriers are examined the 
more I am convinced that the candidates nominated 
by me should be appointed. Having in view the 
success of the service, I respectfully decline to nomi¬ 
nate the persons mentioned in your letter, and ask 
the appointment of the ones nominated by me. 

M. D. Murray, Postmaster. 

—In the division of the patronage last mring the 
the Lincoln postoffice fell to Congressman Connell, of 
Omaha. All the candidates for the place ex¬ 
cept one have cultivated his acquaintance in 
the hope of capturing the plum. This one, the 
Hon. Charles H. Gere, of the Journal, made 
his fight in another quarter when it became 
reasonably certain that the Hon. Ed. P. Rog- 
gen stood highest in the estimation of the con¬ 
gressman. Gere laid siege to Senators Man- 
derson and Paddock and asked for a new deal. 
It is now currently reported that the senators 
have agreed to force Gere’s appointment, they 
threatening to prevent the confirmation of any 
other appointment. It is even said they have 
tendered the place to Gere over Connell’s 
shoulders. Connell was seen this evening and 
exjiressed his doubts concerning the rumor. 
There is a bitter feeling between the Roggen and 
Gere factions in this city .—Special to Chicago 
Times, Oct 16. 

—The senate will be reorganized just before 
time for it to convene in December. The intro¬ 
duction of eight new sen;»tors from the four new 
states will make the reorganization quite in¬ 
teresting, and will bring about an almost com 
plete rearrangement of office-holders. Many 
of the old men, who have been held in inferior 
positions, will undoubtedly be asked to give 
way to new men, that the new senators 
may be given their share of the patronage. It 
is understood that the present sergeant-at-arms is 
calculat ing to give to each of the new republican sen¬ 
ators one position worth from $1,SOO to $1,500 a 
year. This the new senators will not consent 
to, as there are many of the old senators who 
are given patronage under the sergeant-at- 
arms and under the secretary of the senate ag¬ 
gregating away up in the thousands, some of 
them having twice as much patronage as their 
own salaries aggregate. The demands of the 
new senators will undoubtedly cause a great 
deal of chagrin, and very rightly will dispose 
of a number of barnacles who have been bob¬ 
bing along on the old ship of state for a good 
many years .—Special to Indianapolis Journal, 
Oct. 32. 

—Mr. Brosius, the new member from Lan¬ 
caster (who, though he never has sat in the 
house at all, has been elbow deep in office 
handling since the day his official term began), 
is criticised by his factional opponents for 
not getting the democrats out more rapidly. 
The Examiner, remarking that it doesn’t care 
particularly “who is postmaster at May, 
Huber, Buck or Chestnut Level, if he be 
an honest, competent man,” spurs up Mr. 
Brosius concerning the larger and more desir¬ 
able places, Lancaster, Columbia, Manheim, 
Strasbiirg, New Holland, Litiiz, Marietta, and 
all the big boroughs—which, it says, “ mean 
something else.” As to these, the Examiner 
insists, “the rascals”—meaning the demo¬ 
cratic incumbents—“should be turned out as 
soon as possible.” 


—Now note the reply of the New Era, Mr. 
Brosius’s defender. It sets out to show that he 
has done everything a reasonable spoils-seeker 
could ask. At Ephrata, a “ big borough,” a 
republican was appointed in June, the demo¬ 
crat who preceded having only had five 
months in the place. At Manheim a republi¬ 
can was appointed three days earlier than at 
Ephrata. At New Holland the change was 
made two months ago. At Strausburg the 
present incumbent is a woman, “ and there is 
no applicant for her place.” At Columbia, 
Marietta, Mount Joy and Lititz the incum¬ 
bents were appointed in 1885, 1886 and 1888, 
and so can not be ousted, except by preferring 
charges, “ as was the case with the change at 
Ephrata.” 

Certainly this shows pretty fairly for Mr. 
Brosius. What more could he do unless he 
manufactured au applicant for the lady’s 
place at Strausburg, or invented some charges 
against the officers at Columbia and the other 
three boroughs? But the New Era clinches 
the nail at the close of its article. The facts 
in the foregoing statement, it triumphantly 
adds, “ are still further strengthened by the 
additional one that Mr. Brosius has sent on to 
Washington the name of a person to fill the last 
fourth-class post-office in this coimtry yet held by a 
democrat, f 01 - which there is an applicant. — Phila¬ 
delphia American [J?ep.]. 

-■-The question whether the “patronage” of 
Berks county should be “distributed” by Mr. 
High, an agent alleged to have been designated 
for the work by the United States senators 
from Pennsylvania, has actually split the re¬ 
publican organization in that county, and two 
conventions were held on Saturday, two sets 
of candidates named, and two delegations ap¬ 
pointed to attend next year’s state convention. 
The High faction claim that their leader has 
in his hands the distinct and unmistakable 
power-of-attorney to parcel out the places— 
the post-office at Reading being most impor¬ 
tant —and that to look sourly upon him is not mere¬ 
ly to affront the administration and fioul the senator's, 
but to forfeit the chance of any appointment. This 
seems, it is true, rather a sweeping claim, but 
who shall say where the powers of a local boss 
begin and end, under the spoils regime? A 
like designation is said to have been made in 
Lebanon, as was mentioned last week, and in 
Lehigh a bitter local fight took place over the 
matter .some weeks ago. In Carbon the case 
is much the same as in Berks, a split having 
also occurred there, and two sets of delegates 
chosen. 

Is this sort of thing good for the party that 
develops it? A dispatch from Reading to the 
Philadelphia Pi-esssays of the fight over High’s 
assumptions, that “there has never been so 
much bitterness in any political contest in this 
county, and it is being carried into personal 
and business matters to an extent never before 
known.” 

The Dispatch, of Reading, a calm and con¬ 
templative party journal, remarks that “ there 
is scarcely a county in the commonwealth 
where are not mutterings of discontent that 
break out in some places into the most em¬ 
phatic kind of protests.” It speaks at some 
length of the situation in Lancaster, and says 
that in Lebanon county also “the republicans 
are very much dsssatisfied with the way in 
which patronage is dispensed there. It has 
been a common rumor upon the streets of Lebanon, 
for some time, that the people of that city are to have 
no say whatever as to who shall be the postmaster of 
that place, but that an attorney of Harrisbxirg is to 
name the successful man—that man his oivn brother." 
—Philadelphia American [Rep.]. 

—S. B Ginn, of Henrico county, Va., re¬ 
fused a §900 post-office rather than agree to 
pay one per cent, assessment and have his 
deputy named by Mahone. 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


73 


THE CIVIL SERVICE LAW. 

Representative Chandler, of Georgia, 
[Dem.]—“The internal revenue and civil 
service laws naust be abolished. One is a 
pernicious burden; the other a fraud.” 

Congressman Reagan [Texas) says: 

I fear that if the civil-service law is to be 
carried out, and there are many valuable rea¬ 
sons suggested for its existence, it will end in 
retirement for the balance of their lives of 
people who may have grown old in the serv¬ 
ice. This would be such an innovation upon 
the character of our government that I think 
it will overbalance all the good that can come 
out of the law. 

Congressman Payson says: 

I think there is a growing feeling through¬ 
out the country that there is st necessity for 
some radical changes in the experience we are 
having under the civil service laws. Whether 
the laws themselves need radical amendment 
or the practice under them by the commission 
needs changing by express provision of law, 
and whether either would be effective, I am not 
prepared to say, because, to be candid, I am 
not at all an admirer of the system as I have 
seen it administered. I have had occasion to 
say more than once that I thought the rail¬ 
way mail service in the Arthur administration 
the best civil service in the world. Its em¬ 
ployes were the energetic, brainy young men 
of the country, recommended by the members 
of congress and appointed permanently if they 
proved efficient after a probationary service. 
I see now very little except pedantry and book¬ 
learning. Questions are asked of candidates 
for letter carriers that members of congress— 
yes, indeed, members of the commission—could 
not answer. We are, as the commission is 
now working, simply creating a vast list of 
“eligibles,” not one in 1,000 of whom scarcely 
will ever be called on for service ; keeping up 
an expensive bureau which will constantly be 
enlarging its claims and jurisdiction, and with 
little practical good, in my judgment. There 
is too much sentiment and too little business 
in it, and I have no doubt this matter will be 
earnestly canvassed during the session. If 
carried on as begun it will eventually result 
in an office holding class and a civil pension 
list. To this I know there is strong opposi¬ 
tion. It may be that a reform among the re¬ 
formers will meet the public demand, but I 
doubt it. But the whole matter will be thor¬ 
oughly canvassed I have no doubt. 

Congressman Cutchins of Mississippi does 
not look for the repeal of the civil service 
law. 

Congressman Dolph [Oregon] says: 

The civil service law will be amended, but 
will not be repealed. 

Congressman Hitt [Ill ] says: 

As for the civil-service law, too many sen¬ 
ators and congressmen of both parties are 
pledged in its support to allow of its repeal. 
To be sure, it is not apt to be extended at all, 
but if anything is done it will only be in the 
line of an amendment to supply some want. 

Congressman Simmonds [Conn.] says of the 
civil-service law: 

Undoubtedly there is a decided opposition 
to the law among the workers of both parties, 
but speaking entirely from a partisan point of 
view, I think patronage is a positive evil. I 
have no slurs to cast upon a man who seeks 
office. I think any man may have an !honor- 
able ambition to hold an office, and that he 
has a perfect right to seek it; but the posses¬ 
sion of patronage is a positive injury to a par¬ 
ty, and I think the civil-service law should be 
maintained and extended as far and as rapid- 
Iv as it can be of benefit to the public service. 


ANTI-AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

The Louisville Cummercial [Rep.] says that 
all classes of officers, without exception, are 
being allowed in Kentucky to serve out their 
terms. 

The Lewiston [Me.] Journal, Congressman 
Dingley’s paper, says that all the democrats 
holding four-year offices are being allowed, 
with few exceptions, to serve out their terms, 
while Mr. Cleveland made many removals of 
republicans holding four-year offices in Maine. 

That changes have not been made more rap¬ 
idly in this district is probably due to the fact 
that Congressman Hitt devotes more attention 
to intellectual problems that pertain to his po¬ 
sition than he does to importuning the presi¬ 
dent to disregard his pledges and those of the 
Chicago platform, by which he is bound not to 
make wholesale removals in the business ser¬ 
vice of the country merely for political rea¬ 
sons.— Rockport [///.] Register [i?ep.]. 

Congressman Milliken, of Maine, says: 
“Only three men in my district have been su¬ 
perseded by appointees of the present adminis¬ 
tration, and they were for cause. I have not 
asked the removal of any man whose term has 
not expired, and I don’t intend to unless there 
is very great need for it in the interest of the 
service. The repvblicans of my disUicl, so far as 
1 know, don’t desire their remoml.” 

Congressman Moore is the editor of the 
Nashua [N. H.] Telegraph, and he invited the 
republicans of Nashua to choose a man for 
postmaster. Thereupon the Mirror, another 
republican paper, declared that the man who 
spends the most money and does the most work for 
his party and to promote the candidacy of a con¬ 
gressman should everywhere be appointed post¬ 
master.” 

To this congressman Moore’s paper replied: 

“A more scandalous and pestiferous doctrine 
was never uttered by anybody outside of a 
mad-house ; carried to its logical results, it 
would reduce our government to a system of 
gigantic favoritism, intrigue, and jobbery.” 

And the editor further adds, that if he owes 
any persons anything for helping him to get 
elected to congress, he will pay the claims out 
of his own money, but he “will not steal the 
public offices, that are public trusts, with 
which to pay them.” 


THE THANKSGIVING DAY SERMON. 

The clergy of this city have been the 
subject of mistaken criticism in relation to the 
plan formulated by Mr. Herbert Welsh, look¬ 
ing to inducing clergymen everywhere to some 
time preach a sermon upon civil service reform 
advocating it “so far as it involves fundamental 
principles of righteousness.” Some weeks ago 
the Indianapolis Sentinel published interviews 
with a few of them whose remarks showed 
that they had not seen the appeal. Those in¬ 
terviewed did not seem inclined to preach such 
a sermon upon Thanksgiving day. With a 
single exception all were in favor of breaking 
up the spoils system. Father Gavisk, Catholic, 
says of the reform, “ I would be heartily in 
favor of it and would like to see it established 
in this country.” Dr. Cleveland, Methodist, 
says, “ I heartily believe in the principles of 
civil service reform and that their adoption 


by the great political parties would bring an 
almost incalculable blessing to the country.” 
Mr. Haines, Presbyterian, says, “ I am in favor 
of ihe civil service reform movement. I hope 
it will speed and grow.” Dr. McLeod, Pres¬ 
byterian, is in favor of it but wanted to begin 
“by getting all the bad men out and putting 
the good men in and then keeping them there.” 
Dr. Jenckes, Episcopalian, says of the reform, 
“It has to come sometime, but the adoption 
will probably be gradual ;” and he believes 
that the present administration or the next 
one “ will bring out civil service in good 
shape” without his intervention. Most of 
these gentlemen seem to think that in touch¬ 
ing upon this subject in a sermon they would 
be carrying politics into the pulpit against the 
rule that church attendants have the right to 
presume that their political feelings will not 
be hurt. We are sure that upon reflection 
they will not hold to this impression. The use 
of more than 200,000 state and federal oflSces 
to pay personal and party debts is a gigantic 
system of bribery, and it is therefore immoral. 

Mr. Lucas, Christian, says : “ I used to be 

quite a civil service reformer myself, but the 
more I studied the subject the more I became 
convinced that it is a humbug and impractic¬ 
able and of no use in a republican govern¬ 
ment.” Also, “ to say that some offices are 
political and others are not is an easy way of 
covering up the hypocricy of the so-called 
civil service reformers.” There is much more, 
including the statement that “all offices and 
positions in this country are political,” and 
that “ the men who are at present making the 
greatest cry and running the civil service com¬ 
mission of the country are greater politicians 
than many of those whom they oppose.” It is a 
matter for congratulation that Postmaster 
Wallace of this city does not propose to put his 
pastor’s principles into effect in the post- 
office. 

Twenty-seven bishops of the Episcopal 
church have approved the suggestion that 
the clergy preach a sermon upon the moral 
aspects of civil service reform. In addition 
the house of bishops in the pastoral letter show 
that for them there is a duty in this matter to 
which they will not close their eyes, and that 
in performing this duty they are dealing with 
a fundamental evil which can not be passed 
by on the ground that it is “ politics.” We 
quote the following: 

“And while the church of God—the king¬ 
dom not of this world—does not undertake to 
wage the warfare of the partisan, it is never¬ 
theless charged with the duty of establishing 
and maintaining principles which shall find 
expression in the political as well as in the 
social and family life. Official place in mor¬ 
als and in politics is not the prize won by a 
vulgar selfishness, nor the refuge of patronized 
incompetence, nor yot the barter price prom¬ 
ised and paid for political influence, but the 
place in which a righteous man may serve his 
fellow-men and advance the reputable inter¬ 
ests of his country. The emoluments of office 
are derived from a fund contributed to the 
state by the loyal obedience and patient toil 
of the industrious masses. To say the very 
least, it should be distributed so as to secure 















74 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the most efficient and economical conduct of 
public affairs. Tlie honors of office are the 
legitimate rewards bestowed by popular con¬ 
fidence upon upright citizenship. It must be 
an evil day for our country when both emolu¬ 
ments and honors are made the prey of a par¬ 
tisan activity which often discards all honesty 
in its methods and renounces all shame in its 
corrupt and corrupting success.” 


—We do not believe in introducing politics 
into the pulpit, but the time has come when 
Christian ministers and Christian men must 
lift up their voices in solemn and indignant 
protest against the rule of the political spoils¬ 
man .—Ckurleslon News and Courier [Demi. 

IS CIVIL SERVICE REFORM SIMPLY 
A QUESTION OF POLITICS? 

—B. S. Clayton has been appointed post¬ 
master at Columbia, S. C. in place of Wade 
Hampton Gibbes removed. Senator Wade 
Hampton, whose word will be credited, writes 
to Wanamaker under date of November 9, 
1889, as follows: 

“ Perhaps you may remember, if your mem¬ 
ory is not treacherous, your assurance to me 
a few days ago that Mr. Gibbes should not be 
removed until the expiration of his term in 
Februrary next. Not only did you do this, 
but you voluntarily assured me that inasmuch 
as Columbia was my post-office, you would, 
when the successor to Mr. Gibbes was to be ap¬ 
pointed, consult me. 

“It is a matter of small importance to me 
who takes the place of Mr. Gibbes, but as I in¬ 
formed him in passing through Columbia, of 
the promise you had made, you may perhaps 
understand how your action has placed me in 
a false position. But it is fortunate for me 
that Mr. Gibbes will know that I at least told 
him the truth, though T was grievously de¬ 
ceived in believing what was said to me. I 
shall know better in future what reliance to 
place on statements emanating from the same 
source.” 


The New York Evening Post of November 
13 gives the following, through its correspond¬ 
ence, which it believes reliable: “The post¬ 
master at Lawrenceville, Va., has filled the 
office for many years to the satisfaction of the 
entire community. Hearing that Mahone was 
to remove him to make room for a ‘ drunken 
illiterate,’ a lady who receives through the 
post office large sums of money as gifts for 
charitable and educational work among the 
negroes, and whose efforts in this direction 
have given her a national reputation, went to 
Washington to find means to avert the disaster. 
Wanamaker promised her, and in her presence 
gave the order to Clarkson that no removal 
should be made. Some weeks later the re¬ 
moval was made and the ‘ drunken illiterate ’ 
appointed, who has since had to resign.” 

TAKING THE POST-OFFICES OUT 
OF POLITICS.* 

President Harrison in his inaugural address, 
said : “ The civil list is so large that a personal 
knowledge of any large number of applicants 
is impossible. The President must rely upon 
the representation of others.” This is perfectly 
true, and in no branch of the service more true 
than among the postmasters. The question is 
who are those “ot/iers” upon whose “ represen¬ 
tations ” the President m ust rely ? The propo¬ 
sition is frequently put as if the members of 

*From the paper by Richard H. Dana, of Bo.ston, 
read at the meeting of the Civil Service Reform 
League Philadelphia, October 1. 1889. Reprinted 
from the Philadelphia Ameriean, October 19. 


congress belonging to the President’s own 
pary were the only persons on whom he could 
rely, and yet we all know they are the very 
persons most interested in turning the post- 
offices into electioneering machines, and the 
least to be trusted from purely business con¬ 
siderations. 

Far from having to resort to the unconsti¬ 
tutional method of relying on the legislative 
branch for executive appointments, the admin¬ 
istration has at hand, in the post-office depart¬ 
ment itself, a body of men, who, by the scope 
of theii duties, are the very persons upon whose 
representations a president can rely for infor¬ 
mation regarding postmasters. These are the 
post-office inspectors. They are now selected 
under civil service rules and usually by pro¬ 
motion from other parts of the service. They 
are a picked lot of men, trained in the postal 
service, knowing the wants of the service, and 
having continually to examine into the con¬ 
duct of the various offices, and report on the 
need of new post-offices, the discontinuance of 
old ones, etc. 

When a vacancy occurs in any of the smaller 
post-offices, an inspector can be detailed to 
visit the locality, see the applicants, and make 
inquiries regarding their character and ex¬ 
perience. For the sake of fairness and regu¬ 
larity the applicants should be made to fill out 
certain blank forms in their own handwriting, 
and on a basis of all this information the 
inspector would make his report, just as a 
road agent of an express company makes his 
report on the relativ'e merits of several candi¬ 
dates for local agencies. The higher post- 
offices, say all above the fourth class—that is, 
all with salaries above $1,000 a year—could 
be filled by promotion either from the classified 
service or from among the postmasters of rela¬ 
tively lower grades, promotions to he based on 
the efficiency with which they have performed 
their duties. There are already complete sta¬ 
tistics kept regarding the management of all 
the [)ost-offices, and these could be used for 
this purpose. For greater convenience, the 
country should be divided into postal districts, 
as is done in England for the postal depart¬ 
ment there, and in this country for the great 
express compaies. Indeed this division into 
postal districts is greatly needed for many 
other purposes. Each district requires some 
general manager who can know its wants, see 
to expediting the mails, etc., as can never be 
done properly from Washington alone. Such 
a system as this would doubtless work well in 
the hands of an administration friendly to it, 
provided there was not too great an opposition 
from congressmen. Any system, however, 
which loe propose will, in all probability, be 
left to the mercies of an indifferent or possible 
hostile administration, and will lie open to 
attacks from local politicians. If the appoint 
ments of all the fourth-class postmasters are 
left in the hands of the inspectors, there is a 
danger that the pressure, which no postmaster- 
general has yet been able to withstand, will 
simply be transferred from him to the inspect¬ 
ors. Though they are appointed under civil 
service rules, iv would not be impossible to 
intimidate the weaker ones, and either remove 
' I he stronger ones or put them on other branches 
ork. We do not want to find ourselves in 

^ I'ositionof having urged the adoption of a 
^ . a which will allow the spoilsmen, when 
criticised, to turn around and say : “ We have 

made these appointments which you complain 
of on the reports of your civil service inspect¬ 
ors. What more do you want?” 

It seems well, therefore, that any system we 
propose should be as strongly fortified from 
attack as possible. Two very efficient means 
of fortification occur to one. The first is to 
incorporate into our system some re^ilation 
of removals. Let any bill we propose state 
clearly that there are to be no removals be¬ 


cause of political opinions. With that as the 
fundamental rule give every man a hearing 
who wants it, and have no removals except on 
the written reports of inspectors who conduct 
these hearings. Suspensions can be made, in 
extreme cases, awaiting the reports. The hear¬ 
ings, too, need not be conducted with the for¬ 
mality of judicial proceedings, and a well- 
grounded suspicion, not satisfactorily explain¬ 
ed away, may be sufficient cause for removal. 
There is nothing unpractical or unbusiness¬ 
like in this regulation of removals. Mr. Adams 
told me lately that in the Adams express com¬ 
pany they give “ the meanest man a hearing” 
before removal, and if he thinks he has been 
treated unfairly at a road agent’s hearing, he 
is given another hearing by an assistant man¬ 
ager. According to the last official report, 
that for the year ending June 30, 1888, out of 
the 1,244 removals of postmasters, 663—that 
is, more than one-half--had been made on the 
recommendation of post-office inspectors. Why 
should there be any removals except on such 
reports, unless, indeed, a hearing be waived by 
the postmaster himself? How quickly many 
of the so-called reasons for removal, trumped 
up by politicians, would vanish into air if 
there was to be a hearing on them conducted 
by a trained and competent government in¬ 
spector ? 

The second method of fortifying this system 
of reform would be by eliminating as far as 
practicable the personal element of choice left 
to the inspectors. I know no better method 
than a system of competitive examinations; 
if it were not too cumbersome, it would be well 
to apply the examination system to all the 
forrth-class postmasters. A great majority of 
these postmasters, however, have a very small 
salary, so small :is not to be worth having, as 
a republican congressman from New York 
state said the other day, on boasting that he 
had got every postmaster in his district 
changed whose office was worth having. 

Of the 67,376 postmasters, 2,.502 are above 
the fourth-class and their aggregate of salaries 
is $4,202,800. The aggregate salary of the 
54,874 fourth-class postmasters, is only $8,386,- 
968, or just about an average of only $153 a 
year apiece. As far as I have been able to 
estimate it, there are less than 6,000 having 
$500 or more a year; the average salary of the 
remainder being about $90 a year. The chief 
pressure that would be brought to bear upon 
the inspectors would be for these 6,000 places, 
and if they could be included within the 
classified civil service, the inspectors might be 
able to resist the weaker pressure that would 
be brought to bear for the large number of 
smaller places, many of them hardly worth 
the holding. 

These 6,000 with fair salaries, with chances 
of promotion and security against removal 
without a hearing, would probably average a 
tenure of not less than ten years. That would 
give 600 post masterships to be filled each year 
by examinations. If the country were divided 
into 12 districts, that would give 50 for each 
district. Now in Massachusetts alone, the 
civil service commission held no less than 172 
examinations last year, all conducted by the 
chief examiner, and 73 of these were held in 
cities outside of Boston. Under the United 
States commission for the year ending June 
30, 1888, there were held no less than 450 
examinations. The examinations for post¬ 
master of this grade would all be of the same 
general character and easy to devise, while no 
small part of the examinations just mentioned 
were for a great variety of positions, requir¬ 
ing many different kinds of test. A good deal 
of the machinery of local examining boards 
could be made use of and perhaps the post- 
office inspectors might conduct the examina¬ 
tions in distant towns. Furnishing good 
securities on the postmasters’ bonds, as already 



















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


75 


required by the law, is of itself a guarantee 
of character, worth more than a usual letter 
of recommendation, as no person with prop¬ 
erty wants to go on the official bond of a dis- 
■ honest or inefficient man. 

The system I should propose would be sum¬ 
med up as follows: Removals never for po¬ 
litical opinions, and only after a hearing, and 
I on a written report of an inspector, who is 
himself selected under the civil service law. 
Appointments to all the postmasterships, with 
^ a salary above $1,000 as rewards for executive 
; ability shown in the postal service, made either 
i from among other postmasters who may apply 
for a promotion, or from the classified postal 
service—a system that has been in successful 
operation in England for many years. Ap¬ 
pointment to all with a salary between $500 
and $1,000 by competitive examinations. And 
I « as to the still lower grades on the reports of 
4 . inspectors, regulated in such a way as to se- 
;7 cure the greatest possible uniformity and fair¬ 
ness. And for convenience in all of this, a 
sub-division of the country into suitable pos¬ 
tal districts. 

Why is not the reclaiming of the postmasters 
f from the patronage system the next great work 
|. for the league to take in hand? Let us 
I ^ unite on some measure, as we united on the 
Eaton bill, afterwards called the Pendleton 
bill, and press for its adoption, and I believe 
we can get it adopted. If some of us have 
thought that our efforts since 1883 have been 
too diffuse, why is not this the very concen- 
|j tration we need ? 


AFTER THE ELECTIONS. 

It is not the question of a few post-offices. I freely 
say to my colleague that tlie republican party would 
I be stronger in Indiana if you put every republican 
out of office, and I think the democratic party would 
I* be weaker in precisely the same proportion that you 
III put democrats in .—Senator Benjamin Harrison, March 

f* ^ 26 , 1886 . 

! —It is high time that all those connected with 

I this administration who have a real regard for 
n civil service reform, and all republicans every- 
1? where who would be sorry to see their party 
^ committed to the foolish and fatal policy of a re¬ 
turn to the spoils system, should speak out boldly 
yt and emphatically. There is not the slightest 
^ danger that the civil service law will be re¬ 
pealed or the reform move in any other direc 
tion than forward. But th&re is danger more or 
less that the party position may be misrepresented 
and the affections of the voters alienated to some ex¬ 
tent by the utterances of a few spoilsmen, whose 
|! boldness increases with their disappointment 
J at finding that they can not make free and 
complete loot cf all the government offices. 
— St. Paul Pioneer Press [Pep.], before the elections. 

j —Mr. Harrison is responsible only in as far 
i as he has not found it practicable to put a 
j stern and final veto on the projects of the 
i spoilsmen. But he is responsible in a larger 

I measure for the conduct of the post-office de 
partraent; because the record which Mr. 
Clarkson is making there is a distinct injury 
to the party. It does not greatly matter to 
the public or greatly affect the service whether 
the postmaster at some cross-roads is republi- 
[ can or democrat. But it does affect the party in 
the eyes of the people to know that removals in the 
postal .service have been made at the rate of about 
I 20,000 in six months. We speak plaMy, and 

( speak as republicans, anxmis for the future of the 

I party; and we say most emphatically that this is 
neither civil service reform nor good politics. There 
I are some signs already of discontent with it. Local 
\ elections here and there, notably that in Indianapo¬ 
lis, evidence the growing discontent that follows as a 
constant Nemesis on the footsteps of the party that, 
in these days, fails to come up to the height of its 
own aspiration and disappoints public hope and 


expectation, — St, Paul Pioneer P-ess [Rep.], before 
the elections. 

—“The truth is,” says (he Pittsburg Dis- 
patch [Rep.], after discussing the causes of 
Tuesday’s overwhelming defeat of the repub¬ 
lican party, “that the republican success of 
last year, in connection with the reverses of 
this year, show, if anything, that the party is 
stronger without patronage than with it.” 

—I am greatly surprised at the outcome of 
the Ohio campaign. A heavy defection in 
Hamilton and Franklin counties was to be 
expected, but I certainly expected to see Gov. 
Foraker pull through by a decreased majority. 
Now, what has lost the fight? In the first 
place, I noticed a sullen spirit among Ohio 
republicans. They were heavy and apathetic. 
They were displeased ivith the administration. The 
offices were distributed without proper consideration, 
and those who got offices were not app'eciative .— 
Gen. Geo. A. Sheridan, who was in Ohio through 
the campaign. 

—“ Did the distribution of official patron¬ 
age have anything to do with the result in 
Ohio?” 

“Naturally; not in the way of bad ap¬ 
pointments, because there have been none; 
but there were nearly two hundred thousand 
applicants for places in the service of the gov¬ 
ernment from Ohio. Most of those applicants 
wanted post-offices. Congressman J. D. Tay¬ 
lor had two thousand applicants in his dis¬ 
trict. Now most of these people have had to 
be disappointed, and that made them indiffer¬ 
ent to republican success this year.”— F. B. 
Loomis, a newspaper correspondent, who was in Ohio 
all through the campaign. 

—Some persons are disposed to hold the ad¬ 
ministration responsible for the loss of the re¬ 
publican state ticket in New York. The same 
individuals declare that had the President 
been more generous in the distribution of offi¬ 
ces, victory would certainly have perched on 
the republican banner. Take the Twenty-first 
Assembly District in New York city, for ex¬ 
ample. Warner Miller a year ago carried it 
by a majority of about 1,500. Yesterday the 
republican state ticket got a plurality of 
scarcely one-tenth of that figure. Ernest H. 
Crosby, as a candidate for assembly until last 
year, was accustomed to receive from 1,000 to 
1,500 majority. Lewis, Crosby’s successor, gets 
less than 150. President Harrison has appointed 
more men to office from this district than from any 
other in the state. The collector of the port, the 
surveyor, the United States district attorney, 
the minister to France, the minister to Aus¬ 
tria, the judge to the court of arbitration at 
Cairo, a United States commissioner for the 
Union Pacific railroad, and at least a dozen 
more appointments of greater or less import 
ance, have been awarded to the Twenty-first. 
Yet her showing on election day was nearly as 
bad as the districts in which the republicans 
made little or no effort to win, and yet barely 
succeeded. What is true of the Twenty-first is 
also true of other districts which have been 
treated liberally, so far as patronage is con¬ 
cerned.— Philadelphia Enquirer’s Washington Gor- 
respondence. 

— The distribution of this patronage, ii 
spective of any other issue involved, tend^ 
create unpopularity for the administratio'iff? 
The congressman or senator through whose 
influence an appointment is secured is strength¬ 
ened by the support of the office-holder, and 
this is felt in the district conventions, but the 
party at large loses votes. There are about 150 
consulates at the disposal of the President. 
There were 2,000 applications for these posi¬ 
tions. At the New York custom-house there 
are 1,500 places, of which about one-third may 
be available for party rewards. There were 
25,000 men who wanted these 500 places. 


Take the pbstmastership in a country 
village. It is an important post, but it is 
generally held by a storekeeper, to whom cus¬ 
tom is drawn by the appointment. Here are 
six storekeepers in a place, all working to get 
the benefit of the extra trading that goes to 
the postmaster. The man who gets the apoint- 
ment works hard for the congressman who 
secured it for him, but the five other men are 
disappointed, and either neglect to vote for the 
party at the next election or vote for the op¬ 
posite side. Where one vote is secured for the 
distribution of patronage, three—yes, five — 
votes are driven away.— Chauncey t)epew in 
New York Tribune. 

—It will take hard work for the republican 
party to recover the ground which it lost on 
Tuesday. The administration will have to 
help in this work. One thing that it can do 
is to drop all such crazy folly as the Mahone 
business. Another thing that it can do is to 
fill the vacancy on the bench of the supreme 
court by appointing a man whose fitness no 
one can question. This is a perfectly easy 
thing to do. Another thing is to pay some at¬ 
tention to the public sentiment of a state out¬ 
side of the political machine of that state. 
Another thing is to stop appointing republi¬ 
can editors to office. The appointment of ed¬ 
itors is very complimentary, but when they 
are foolish enough to accept it takes away 
from the party its most effective advocates, and 
muzzles the paper from which the appoint¬ 
ment is made. Another thing is to keep an 
eye single for the public good, and allow all 
officers who are doing their work properly to 
serve out their terms without molestation. Mr. 
Hayes’s saying that he who serves his country 
best serves his party best, is a very good one 
to apply in this emergency, no matter what 
the, men who are after something may think 
about it.— Wilmington Morning News [Rep.]. 

—To his friends who called on Wednesday 
President Harrison is understood to have said 
that no administration could in its first year 
successfully withstand the assaults of the office- 
seekers. Later on he believed the political 
horizon would brighten and better conditions 
prevail. 

If the President is correctly represented, 
here we have an acknowledgment that the 
republican vote only can be brought out when 
office-seekers are interested in the contest. If 
they are indifferent, there is no one to bring 
out voters, and the republican candidates ac¬ 
cordingly suffer. The obvious meaning of 
this is, when the machine is out of gear, the 
republican party gets into trouble. It is 
doubtful, however, if the inactivity of party 
workers altogether explains republican de¬ 
fection. With anything but approval the 
people have watched the proceedings of the 
national administration. President Harrison 
complains that he has been unable to appease 
office-seekers, and that their resentment 
brought disaster to the republican party. 
Many voters believe that too much time and 
attention have been bestowed on the office¬ 
seeking class. They desire to see this admin¬ 
istration address itself to work of greater mo- 
lOaent, but do not seem to consider that down 
ij the present time it has had but little oppor- 
,'unity to show affirmatively what it can do.— 
:Albany Express [Rep.}. 

—Republicans of the “ rural districts” did 
their duty nobly. The city did damnably. 
The returns show that only about 60 per cent, 
of the republican vote of 1888 in this city 
showed up at the polls, while Tammany 
drummed up and dragged out by systematic 
work nearly eighty per cent, of their vote. 
Equal republican activity and vigilance here 
would have given us a complete victory in 
this state. Dissatisfaction and disappointment 
ovei' the distribution of the favors of the administra- 












76 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


lion may have contributed somewhat to the apathetic 
feeling and lack of interest. The rum power and 
its ally, the prohibitionists, can each claim 
their share of the credit. They both did their 
worst.— Tom Platt, Head Distributor of .New 
York Patronage. 

—“ Civil service reform had nothing to do 
with the defeat of the republicans in Virginia, 
Ohio and New York,” says the Boston Tran¬ 
script [Rep.] “ The old system of patronage, 
in which the government honors all the drafts 
drawn on it by a certain recognized ‘ king 
maker,’ did.” 

—The St. Louis Globe-Democrat, [Rep.] is 
convinced that there is no political efficacy in 
spoils. Speaking of the recent Republican 
defeat in the capital of Indiana, it says: “The 
Indianapolis episode this year, like the Mary¬ 
land and Indiana incidents of a year or two 
ago, furnishes one more proof that federal 
patronage, in ordinary circumstances, brings 
weakness instead of strength to the party dis¬ 
pensing it.” 

—The Philadelphia North American [Rep.] 
does not conceal the significance of this week’s 
elections. “The North American," it says, 
“ can not commit the folly of underestimating 
what has just occured, and it sees very clearly 
that the republican party must show courage, 
honesty, and clean-handed leadership to win 
success hearafter. Its power was broken by a too 
great belief that in those qualities it had degenerated, 
and its power was regained largely because it was 
supposed that it had profited by that rebuke to cast 
off the leaders and the methods which had weakened 
it." 

—The elections furnish an excellent com¬ 
ment on Mr. Harrison’s statement, made while 
he still Avas a senator, that a great party is 
weakened rather than strengthened by the pos¬ 
session of the federal “patronage.” An Eng¬ 
lish statesman once said that every place he 
bestowed made three enemies and one ingrate. 
Mr. Clarkson has been very busy for eight 
months past in securing to the i)arty the kind 
of influence which is supposed to attend the 
possession of the offices. He certainly did not 
neglect his own state in doing so. Iowa has 
seen as thorough an application of the spoils 
theory in the matter of its post offices as has 
any state of the Union. We hope he is pleased 
with the result. His “ Pyrrhic victories,” if 
carried a little farther, would put an end to 
the republican party. They have been won 
not only in Iowa but in Massachusetts, in New 
York, in New Jersey, in Virginia, and in 
Ohio. In all these states the party was dis 
tinctly stronger before he began to sign com¬ 
missions upon the reqnsition of the congress¬ 
men. And if the democrats could have 
stopped their quarreling, and pulled them¬ 
selves together, there might have been an ap¬ 
proach to the same showing in Pennsylvania. 
The truth is that the failure of the adminis¬ 
tration to come up to the expectation of the 
better self of the party in the matter of the 
civil service, is disheartening the party every¬ 
where. Brooklyn may be taken as an exam¬ 
ple. The republicans had a good case there. 
The state and city tickets on the other side 
were bad. The registration was heaviest in 
the parts of the city where the republican 
strength lies. The canvass was as vigorous as 
could be expected in an off year. Two years 
ago Mr. Chapin had a plurality of 882. This 
year it is nearly ten times as great. The dem¬ 
ocratic state ticket has a plurality of close 
upon eleven thousand, and a district hereto¬ 
fore republican elects a democrat to the legis¬ 
lature.— Philadelphia American [jRep.]. 

—The failure of the administration to meet 
expectations in the enforcement of the civil 
service law has also alienated from the repub¬ 
lican party many of those adherents of civil 


service principles who voted with the party 
last year. The loss may not have been large, 
but it was something. The administration 
has undoubtedly been a disappointment to all 
who hoped for and expected something more 
than a change of politicians in the offices. 
The distribution of spoils and the waste of 
public money stand out most conspicuously as 
the distinguishing characteristics of the new 
administration in its brief reign. It is not a 
record that the people could be expected to 
endorse, and they have not availed themselves 
of the small opportunity afforded them for 
giving what, if there had been a sweeping re¬ 
publican victory, would have been construed 
as an endorsement. The general result we 
believe, indicates that the trend of sentiment 
is against the kind of politics exemplified in 
republican management of public affairs.— 
Indianapolis News \_Ind.\ 

—We are of the opinion that while other 
issues, such as the tariff, the liquor qestion, 
and pension profligacy, have contributed to 
the republican losses this year, the chief cause 
has been disgust among decent people at the 
sack of the civil service by the Harrison ad¬ 
ministration, combined with the rage of office- 
seekers who have not got what they asked for, 
or “ something equally as good.” It is need¬ 
less to lecount particular examples, but no 
man who has kept his ears open this year to 
the conversation that may be heard on the 
cars, or at watering-places, clubs, counting- 
rooms, or w'herever educated people are gath¬ 
ered together, can have failed to discover pro¬ 
found and pervading disappointment with Mr. 
Harrison and his policy. Since his policy up 
to this time has been nothing but a spoils pol¬ 
icy of the worst type, there has been nothing 
else to find fault with. He has done nothing 
but cut and slash among the office-holders, 
and now he has received a pretty severe re¬ 
buke. If this had been a congressional elec¬ 
tion he would be confronted with a hostile 
majority in the house.— New York Evening 
Post [/nd.]. 


THE STATE PRESS. 

—Men who are after the “spoils,” and who succeed 
in getting what they seek, as a general thing are not 
nearly as efficient officers as men would be who had 
been selected simply because of their fitness and 
qualifications for their work. In the very nature of 
things it must be so. “Spoilsmen” have no heart 
for the duties of the particular position they may fill. 
Their sole purpose in seeking it was the “spoils,” 
and the “spoils” is all they care for. Patriotism, 
desire for the public good, conscientious discharge 
of duty, are the last things they think of. With 
them, public office is not a public trust, but rather 
a foothold whereby they mean to get as much as 
possible from the public with the least possible re¬ 
turn for the “spoils” so won. “Spoils,” “spoils,” 
"spoils.” Down with the whole system. Let civil 
service reform, in theory and practice, win the 
place it ought to fill in a government like ours.— 
Steuben [Did.] Republican [i?ep.]. 

—There is a great deal of kicking against the civi 
.service law, and many disappointed applicants are 
venting their spleen against the administration, as if 
the President were responsible for the existence of 
the law, or deserving of censure for its enforcement. 
The civil service law is all right, and if it can only be 
kept on the statute books, with such amendments as 
may be needed to perfect it and extend its scope, it 
will in a few years work out its own salvation. It is 
hard on the spoilmen, of course, but few of that class are 
realli competent to discharge the responsibilities of office 
and oughe not to be appointed.—Indiana New Castle 
Courier [Rep.]. 

—The spoils system of appointing men to place 
solely on account of politics has been tried long and 
often and has proved a failure. It is a relic of bar¬ 
barism and will have to go along with many other 


bad customs. It will not answer in this enlightened 
age, which is an age of business sense, progress mio 
steady advance in civilized methods. The principles 
of the law will eventually be applied to every de¬ 
partment of the federal service. The time will come 
when the people will no more tolerate the removal 
or appointment of clerks on account of their opin¬ 
ions than they will now tolerate ostracism of the 
same for their religious views. In other words, we 
are slowly progressing from the methods of barbar¬ 
ism to the methods of an enlightened civilization.— 
Indiana ShelbyviUe Republican [i?ep..] 

—Frank Hatton, a political cow'boy, is running the 
Washington Post, to cater to the spoilsmen in the 
dominant party. Hatton is a republican for spoils, 
not for any principle the party cherishes. His politi¬ 
cal methods are of the same order as the frontier 
bully, swagger and general brutishness included. 
Hatton has neither the courage to oppose civil serv¬ 
ice reform in conventions and campaigns, nor the 
honor to regard the pledges there given.— Indiana 
Richmond Sunday Register [Rep.] 

—That the spoils system has assumed an alarming 
tendency there can be no douht, and the necessity 
for remedying the evil is apparent. What the reme¬ 
dy shall consist of is still debatable. In the case of 
local appointments, such as for postmasters, for in¬ 
stance, the most satisfactory results are usually ob¬ 
tained by effecting recommendations on the result 
of popular elections, but even this plan is open to 
serious objections. Real and permanent reform can 
only come through the education of the masses to 
cease looking upon “ public office as a private snap,” 
and the senators and representatives in congress should 
be first to encourage that idea instead of continuing the 
custom of standing out as conspicuous adherents of the 
spoils system in its most offensive phases.—Indiana La¬ 
fayette Courier [Rep.]. 

—The Democrat is a friend of civil service reform. 
It prefers the merit system to the spoils system. In 
common with thousands of good republicans and 
equally good democrats, it believes that busines.« 
principles should obtain in the administration of the 
government. In no other way can corruption, prof- 
llgac'-’ and inefficiency be rooted out of the public 
service. Every political party has resolved in favor 
of the reform. Every republican president, save 
Abraham Lincoln and Benjamin Harrison, urged its 
adoption upon congress. The present executive 
voted for the civil service law. Both by his repeated 
declarations and the pledges that led to its restora¬ 
tion to power, the republican party stands commit¬ 
ted to a faithful observance of the law both in letter 
and spirit.—Dwfiana Putnam Democrat [Rep.]. 

—Politicians ought not to be blamed for trying to 
get rid of it, for it is greatly in their way. But the 
reason why the average voter should oppose civil 
service reform is not clear. The masses of the people 
have no hope of getting the offices, and in fact do 
not aspire to them. Good government is all they 
have to hope for, and all they have a right to expect. 
Why then should they wrangle over the offices, when 
their only real interest is to have good public ser¬ 
vants? That an aspirant to public office should 
prove his efficiency for it by submitting to an exam¬ 
ination is entirely practical and reasonable. That 
the ablest man should carry the prize will strike any 
man as being proper and sensible. 

That the distribution of the offices as party rewards 
is liable to abuse is within the knowledge of any 
man. The extension of the merit system would be 
the most effective electoral reform ever thought of. 
The scrambling for offices is the primary cause for all 
the bribery and corruption which occur at every 
election. We can conceive of no reason why a sin¬ 
cere democrat or republican should be opposed to 
the merit system. It is eminently fair and demo¬ 
cratic, as it gives the offices to the ablest aspirants.— 
Indianapolis Catholic Record. 


-Four-fifths of the republican journals of charac¬ 
ter and infiuence in the United States are honestly 
in favor of a reform of the civil service on the general 
line of principle advocated by Mr. Curtis and his as¬ 
sociates.— Bulletin [Rep.]. 












I 


The Civil service Chronicle. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapolis. Published monthly. Publication oflSce, No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, 

' Ind., where subscriptions and advertisements will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 

' , — 

' VoL. I, No. 10. INDIANAPOLIS, DECEMBER, 1889. terms :<( fcenWcopy."” 



I f “ Now, tills doctrine, wliich proposes to give the spoils to the victors, has been imputed mostly to one of our political parties, 
I* and, as some suppose, has been avowed by that party. . . . We shall see, perhaps, how fiir the opposing party will abjure this 
doctrine of the spoils, and whether it is not yet to be the universal doctrine of politics in the laud. If so, then shall we have a 
' scene in this laud never before exhibited on earth, one which would destroy the integrity and sink the morality of a nation of 
h angels. . . . Only conceive such a lure held out to this great people, and all the little offices of the Government thus set up 
I for the price of the victory, without regard to merit or anything but party services, and you have a spectacle of baseness and ra¬ 
pacity such as was never seen before. No preaching of the Gospel in our laud, no parental discipline, no schools, not all the ma* 
’ chinery of virtue together, can long be a match for the corrupting power of our political strifes actuated by such a law as this. 
It would make us a nation of apostates at the foot of Sinai.”—From a Sermon by Rev. Horace BushneU, in I84O. 


I . “ ^ 

A-T the recent dinner of the Cambridge 
[T^and Boston Civil Service Reform Associa- 
■■ition James Russell Lowell said ; 


H Mr. Clarkson's recent reverses appear 

■ to have thrown him into a state of irrita- 

■ tion and mental confusion. His organ at 
Des Moines says: 

“ The civil service commission is the greatest hum- 
' bug principle that has ever been forced upon the 
I people of the United States. It is a species of feudal 
' aristocracy that should have no encouragement in a 
republic.” 

A commission which superintends open 
^ competition for public employment can 
I hardly be hurt by Clarkson’s paper calling 
it names. 


The executive committee of the Nation¬ 
al Civil Service Reform League, in pursu¬ 
ance of the instructions of the annual 
meeting of the League in Philadelphia, 
has appointed a committee to examine into 
the management of the federal civil serv¬ 
ice. The committee consists of W. D. 
Foulke, chairman, of Indiana; Sherman S. 
Rogers, of New York; Charles J. Bona¬ 
parte, of Maryland; Richard H. Dana, of 
Massachusetts, and Wayne MaeVeagh, of 
Pennsylvania. In a general way the inves¬ 
tigation will be like that made in Indiana 
in 1886, but it will extend over the whole 
country, and will be so thorough in its col¬ 
lection of facts that its work will be of 
great historical value, and will deal the 
staggering spoils system the hardest blow 
it has ever had. That system can not sur¬ 
vive the publication of the facts. Four 
members of the committee voted for Gen¬ 
eral Harrison. The committee is a strik¬ 
ingly able one, and will be so regarded by 
the country. To a man it is impartial and 
fearless, and it will not blink the facts. 

The sixth report of the civil service 
commission, covering the time from July 1, 
1888, to June 30,1889, has been published. 
No one can read it, and every one ought to 
read it, without being convinced that a 
great advance has been made in the ad¬ 
ministration of the law. It can be obtained 
by application to the commission. We have 
room for but a single extract. How many 
years have Indiana reformers fought for 
the recognition of the principle there 
stated. 

“But any sweeping and wholesale removals of 
large numbers of employes in the classified service 
for causes not in each case fully specified, certainly 
create a very strong presumption that they are made 
for political, and therefore improper, reasons, and 
the commission holds that if in any department or 
office a very large proportion of the employes is 
changed, the burden of proof .should be considered 
to rest on the officer making the change to show that 
his conduct was proper, and the failure on his part 
to establish the necessity for these changes ought to 
be held to warrant his dismissal.” 


Congressman Cheadle, from Indiana, 
has introduced a bill to repeal the civil 
service law. It is fitting that he should do 
this. For months he has been on the road 
to Washington or back to Frankfort, his 
whole soul and mind bent upon obtaining 
offices, whether by bullying, extortion, per¬ 
suasion or guile. He has had Broils, In¬ 
trigues, Conspiracies, Revolts, Tumults and 
Dissensions without number among his 
henchmen and his tributary Towns and 
Hamlets. The League investigating com¬ 
mittee can do no better than to commence 
with Cheadle’s Territory. 


We print that portion of the President’s 
message which relates to the civil service. 
It must be said that he shows a clear ap¬ 
preciation of the purpose of the law, and 
that he knows when the law is honestly 
executed. He also understands that no 
progress can be made without an honest 
and vigorous enforcement of the act. His 
statement that incumbency, impartiality, 
moderation, fidelity to public duty, and a 
good attainment in the discharge of it, 
make a conclusive argument for retention 
in office can hardly be improved upon. 
There is nothing in his suggestion that 
heads of departments keep records of faith¬ 
fulness and efficiency so long as he employs 
Clarksons and Ransdells, and makes feudal 
lords of the Quays and the Platts. After read¬ 
ing this message, the question is constantly 
suggested, why does a president who writes 
so well permit hundreds of railway mail 
clerks to be turned out without cause, and 
why does he permit Clarkson to turn out 
30,000 fourth-class postmasters in nine 
months for no reason whatever, except on 
the principle that a pirate strips his prey, 
and why does a president write such an 
indescribable letter as President Harrison 
wrote to General Manson, and so on 
through a long list ? Further, why does 
the President say that the duty of appoint- 


Mr. John Q. Donnell, of Kingston, in 
this State, has recently delivered a series of 
lectures on practical economics before the 
senior and junior classes of Hanover Col¬ 
lege. One lecture was upon civil service 
reform. If we are not mistaken this is the 
first time that the students of this college 
have had a lecture upon this subject. 


“ When I was in Spain I could not help 
"thinking that the decay of that noble country, 
fwith every element of greatness in it, due, no 
doubt, to many other causes, was due mainly 
to a civil service precisely like our own, but 
which had gone further in the inevitable road 
in which ours is going.” 


The Civil Service Record for December 
contains a full account of the recent meet¬ 
ing of the Boston and Cambridge Civil 
Service Reform Associations. Mr. Roose¬ 
velt was the guest of the evening, and the 
following extract should surely, coming 
from him, carry great weight: 

“ To me the spoils system is, in its essence, 
brutal and degrading, and I do not see how 
any man can see its workings and not feel as 
I do. In Washington any man who keeps his 
eyes open must see around him, continually 
going on, things that make his heart bleed. 
There are wrongs that have gone on for years, 
that are still going on, that should arouse 
every manly instinct in a man to make him 
protest against them.” 



























78 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ment “ is devolved by the constitution or 
by the law,” and then allow congressmen 
to bully him to a wholesale practice of re¬ 
movals and appointments not warranted by 
the constitution or the law, and to his own 
“actual distress?” Why dues he not stop 
the practice? Does he not believe what he 
writes, or is he a weak man who can not 
carry out his principles, or is he afraid 
that he will not be renominated ? What¬ 
ever the reason is, the message leaves the 
country in darkness as to any remedy. 


“A PATRIOTIC INTEREST IN THE 
ELECTIONS." 

There has been another Dudley episode in 
this city caused by his appearance here. A 
warrant was sworn out for him, but the United 
States commissioner, after making it, did not 
deliver it to the marshal because of the dis¬ 
trict attorney, Smiley N. Chambers, who says: 

“ I exercised the prerogative in this case that 
I would exercise in any other case of like 
character, and decided that the warrant he not 
issued upon this affidavit.” 

With the legal aspects of the case we have 
nothing to do. The judges have decided in 
effect that Dudley has not committed a pun¬ 
ishable crime, and that ends the matter. But 
there are other aspects worthy of comment. 
That Dudley wrote the letter which has be¬ 
come famous there now seems to be no manner 
of doubt. When it was first published a few 
days before the election, it was a time for for¬ 
geries, and there were marks about it not con¬ 
sonant with Dudley’s reputation for “fine 
work.” For instance, the injunction to divide 
the floaters into blocks of five seemed impos¬ 
sible to come from Dudley, because every one 
posted in floater rules knew that a party- 
worker never “ voted ” more than one, or at 
most two floaters. The rule given in the 
printed directions used in Shelby county in 
1884 was, “ do not count the ‘ floaters ’ as 
‘doubtful,’ because the ‘doubtful’ voter is 
not the man who votes for a consideration. * 
* * You must appoint at least one man for 
every two floaters.” 

Subsequent events, however, fix upon Dud¬ 
ley the letter, which is as follows: 

“ New York, Oct. 24th, 1888. 

“ Dear Sir— I hope you have kept copies of the 
lists sent me. Such information is very valuable and 
can be used to great advantage. It has enabled me 
to demonstrate to friends here that with proper as¬ 
sistance Indiana is surely republican for governor 
and president, and has resulted, as I hoped it would, 
in securing for Indiana the aid nece.ssary. Your 
committee will certainly receive from Chairman 
Huston the assistance necessary to hold our floaters 
and doubtful voters, and gain enough of the other 
kind to give Harrison and Morton 10,000 plurality. 
New York is now safe beyond peradventure for the 
republican presidential ticket; Connecticut like¬ 
wise. In short every northern state, except possibly 
New Jersey, though we still hope to carry that Slate. 
Harrison’s majority in the electoral college will not 
be less than 100. Make our friends in each precinct 
wake up to the fact that only boodle and fraudulent 
votes and false counting of returns can beat us in the 
slate. Write each of our precinct correspondents, 
1st. To find out who has democratic boodle, and 
steer the democratic workers to them, and make 


them pay big prices for their own men. 2d. Scan 
the election officers closely, and make sure to have 
no man on the board whose integrity is even ques¬ 
tionable, and insist on republicans watching every 
movement of the election officers. 3d. See that our 
workers know every voter entitled to a vote, and let 
no one else even ofler to vote. 4th. Divide the float¬ 
ers into blocks of five, and put a trusted man with 
necessary funds in charge of these five, and make 
him responsible that none get away, and that all 
vote our ticket. 5th. Make a personal appeal to your 
best business men to pledge themselves to devote the 
entire day, Nov. 6th, to work at the polls, i. e, to be 
present at the polls with tickets. They will be as¬ 
tonished to see how utterly dumbfounded the ordi¬ 
nary Democratic election bummer will be. and how 
quickly he will disappear. The result willfully jus¬ 
tify the sacrifice of time and comfort, and will be a 
source of satisfaction afterwards to those who help 
in this way. Lay great stress on this last matter. It 
will pay. 

“ There will be no doubt of your receiving the nec¬ 
essary assistance through the national, state and 
county committees,—only see that it is husbanded 
and made to produce results. I rely on you to advise 
your precinct correspondents, and urge them to un¬ 
remitting and constant efTorts from now till the polls 
close and the result is announced officially. We will 
fight for a fair election here if necessary. The rebel 
crew can’t steal this election from us as they did in 
1884, without some one getting hurt. Let every re¬ 
publican do his w'hole duty, and the country will 
pass into republican hands, never to leave it, I trust. 
Thanking you again for your efforts to assist me in 
my work, I remain. Yours sincerely, 

“ W. W. Dudley. 

“ Please wire me result in principal precincts and 
county." 

The man who wrote that letter believed in 
the principles there stated. Some of those 
principles are literally subversive of free gov¬ 
ernment, and when they run their logical 
course, they take a country, through corrup¬ 
tion and anarchy, to the rule of the strongest 
leader, and to despotism. The man who writes 
such a letter ought to be a political and social 
outcast. He ought to be as much under the 
ban as Benedict Arnold. Yet Dudley comes 
to Indianapolis and dines with the chairman 
of the republican state committee. He is 
called upon and congratulated by men who 
pass for respectable citizens. He is escorted 
by the United States m.arshal into the federal 
court room, and, without invitation, is con¬ 
ducted upon the bench and impudently forces 
the federal judge to shake hands with him 
There has never been more convincing proof 
of how the ways of recent politics have rotted 
the public conscience. We have, however, one 
other proof in District-Attorney Chambers, 
which would, if needed, complete the demon¬ 
stration. In an interview in the Indianapolis 
Journal, December 13, he said : 

“ I wish, also, to state that I have read the letters 
printed in the press, purporting to be written by the 
Colonel, and, in my opinion, unattended by any ex¬ 
traneous evidence, they do not advise bribery, as ap¬ 
pertaining to the election of 1888. The letters, con¬ 
strued in the light of the knowledge that we all pos¬ 
sess of how elections in Indiana are conducted by 
both parties, have nothing in them of a criminal char¬ 
acter, but, upon the other hand, when so construed, 
are honorable, and indicate simply a patriotic inter¬ 
est in the elections.” 

Several readings are necessary to make sure 
that one sees that statement aright. There is 
no one in Indiana who does not know that a 
floater is a man who requires and receives pay 


for his vote; that the bargain is made with 
him before hand ; that he is accompanied to 
the polls by the party worker to whom has 
been assigned the task of “voting” him; 
that before approaching the polls the worker 
has put the party ticket into the floater’s 
hands and does not lose sight of it until it is 
dropped into the ballot-box ; that some where 
within reach is the man who “handles” the 
money of the precinct; and that after the 
voting, the worker reports to the precinct 
boodle man and he pays the floater the stipu¬ 
lated price. The floaters come from every 
grade and class, not excepting the pecuniarily 
well to do. They are utterly dead to patriot¬ 
ism and to any concern whatever in the pub¬ 
lic welfare. This public debauchery has been 
carried on by party managers until there 
are in Indiana, according to the poll-book 
makers, from 20,000 to 30,000 floaters. They 
are well known to the committees of each 
precinct. Their number varies from 42 out 
of 260 voters in the township where Abraham 
Lincoln’s mother lies buried, to 450 in Monroe 
county, in which is located Indiana Uni¬ 
versity, and 800 in Shelby county, the home 
of the late Vice-President Hendricks. It is 
but just to Indiana to say that this system is 
identical with that prevailing to an equal ex¬ 
tent in New York, Rhode Island and else¬ 
where. 

What now shall be said of a district attor¬ 
ney who reads “your committee will certainly 
receive from Chairman Huston the assistance 
necessary to hold our floaters and doubtful 
voters and gain enough of the other kind 
[democratic floaters] to give Harrison and 
Morton 10,000 plurality * * » Divide 

the floaters into blocks of five and put a trust¬ 
ed man with necessary funds in charge of 
thesefiveand see that none of them get away,” 
and after reading says that such injunctions 
are “honorable and indicate simply a patriotic 
interest in the elections.” Bad as politicians 
have been charged to be, Mr. Chambers has 
voluntarily given an instance of political 
corruption which startles, and the more so con¬ 
sidering his office. The people of Indiana 
would indeed be to be despaired of,if they could 
face such sodden immorality indifferently. 

INDIAN COMMISSIONER MORGAN. 

There is opposition to the confirmation of 
Indian Commissioner Morgan. This opposi¬ 
tion comes first from the senators who have 
not succeeded in getting their fill of spoil. 
The following letter shows the unceasing as¬ 
saults, of these senatorial freebooters upon the 
hapless wards of this country : 

“ Greenwood, South Dakota, Nov. 26,1889. 

“Mr. Herbert Welsh, 1.305, Arch St., Philadelphia: 

“ My Dear Mr. Welsh —Last Sunday there appear¬ 
ed a man here armed with a letter from Senator 
Moody, of South Dakota. It stated that he could not 
get for him the land office for which he had asked, 
but that if he would like it, he thought it possible to 
get the Yankton agency for him, and that that was the 
only agency in South Dakota which could be had, as 
all the rest of the agents were to be retained in con¬ 
sideration of the help which they had given the 
Sioux commission. This man, Foster, came from 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


79 


Redfield, near Huron, where he is a farmer with a 
I large family, whether with or without qualities for 
Such a position I do not know. He did not intimate 
whether he would accept the offer of the position. 

. He brought with him a man whom he proposed to 
make clerk if he did. 

! “Now I know nothing whatever about this man per- 
• sonally. He may be just the right material for an 
I excellent agent, or he may not. That is neither here 
I nor there. 1 write to you again to appeal to the Iu- 
' dian Rights Association to bring their influence to 
bear to save us from the change of agents here, and 
j the risk of it. Major heavy has not completed a year 
' here yet, but he is the best and most acceptable agent, 
both to whites and In iians, that we have had here 
for twelve years. He is doing a good work here, and 
he commands the respect and love of all. He seems 
" to have the confidence of the Indian office. They do 
. most everything he asks, and I doubt not the com- 
‘ missioner does not desire to make a change. But, 
alas, these wretched politicians and spoils seekers ! 
Help us. and ward them off if it be possible. 

The agent himself will make no effort for himself. 
He says he can not ask for favors from republicans, 
although he would like to stay and see something of 
the working out of his efforts and his plans, 
f Sincerely yours, Joseph \V. Cook. 

? ^ There is also opposition to General Morgan 
t from the officials of the Catholic church. It 
is claimed that he is hostile to the contract or 
denominational schools in which this church 
has large interests. Opposition on this ground 
is a matter of difference of opinion, and is 
strictly legitimate ; but it is also claimed that 
General Morgan and Mr. Dorchester have dis- 
I criminated in their removals against the em¬ 
ployes of the Catholic faith. Unfortunately 
Mr. Dorchester’s strong feeling against the 
Catholic church lends color to the accusation. 
Both General Morgan and Mr. Dorchester 
deny that any removal has been made on ac¬ 
count of religion, or that the Catholic em¬ 
ployes have been removed in greater numbers 
than those of other denominations. Mr. 
Herbert Welsh also says that he has made a 
careful investigation and does not find this 
charge sustained. 

There is in these days of spoils intrigue and 
treachery, but one* way to meet such charges 
and it is to follow the plan of Mr. Roosevelt— 
publicity—and to state to all the people the 
reasons for each removal. General Morgan 
has done this to a few, and while his motives 
for protecting incumbents from scandal are 
praiseworthy, it is not the true way to meet a 
, charge publicly made though weakened by be¬ 
ing general. Secret removals, secret reasons, 
secret charges, are all poisonous outgrowths of 
the spoils system that flourishes and grows 
mighty in the darkness and becomes in the 
light of day, a dwindling, contemptible thing 
which nobody fears. 


Senators Farwell and Cullom continue to 
amuse the country with the cheerful alacrity 
with which they pursue small spoil under a 
multitude of rebuffs. Senator Farwell has 
had an honor conferred upon him here in the 
President’s home. A few months ago a collec¬ 
tion of persons organized themselves as the 
tin-horn club. Some few had places in the 
city government which were soon to slip away 
from them. Every member deemed himself a 
party worker, and every one wanted an office. 


I It was as strong an organization as could be 
I made in this city of the much-heard of men 
who are claimed to “keep up” a party and 
who must be paid for their services. The 
tin-horn club wrote to various eminent 
persons for a photograph and received 
liberal responses. It rented fine quarters, 
and having thus adorned it walls it 
proceeded to resolve against civil service re¬ 
form. It secured speakers, but, somehow, when 
the speakers came, there were so few present 
that the speech was put off. Finally one mem¬ 
ber got a small deputyship, and the club soon 
after, probably from jealousy, expelled him. 
Then the funds began to run short, and 
one night, the story goes, a man put the 
“ truck ” from those fine quarters into his 
wheelbarrow and dumped it in the back room 
of an obscure quarter. But a single meeting 
was held in the humble room. Some six mem¬ 
bers gathered together and as a sort of funeral 
ob-sequy deliberated upon a new name. The 
name of Oliver P. Morton was summarily re¬ 
jected. But the inspiration came at last, and 
the name Farwell Club was chosen, on the 
ground that Senator Farwell is the only man 
who has the “sand” to oppose the civil ser¬ 
vice law. 

Austin H. Brown, of this city, was chief of 
the horse claim division in the third auditor’s 
office, a place of great responsibility. He was 
originally appointed to reward him for party 
services, but he had become competent, was 
liked and was respected by the people of In¬ 
diana, and his integrity was beyond question. 

Not long since one Thomas Ryan came, it 
is reliably said, with a note from the Presi¬ 
dent directing that he be made chief of this 
division, which was done. Ryan had been 
made a government agent in Alaska by Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland and then removed for cause 
upon evidence which is now on file in Wash¬ 
ington, and to which the administration re¬ 
fuses access. After his dismissal in 1886, Ry¬ 
an turned republican and was active for the 
election of General Harrison. This is his re¬ 
ward. The members of the tin-horn-Far- 
well club are crazed because President Harri¬ 
son has picked out a worker of only a few 
months and ignored them who have carried 
torches and transparencies longer. 

The Indianapolis Journal has allowed itself 
to be taken in by Senator Gorman. Under 
date of December 2, it quotes him as follows: 

“I never pay any attention to the small ap¬ 
pointments, but there was one case in Balti¬ 
more, some time ago, that attracted my atten¬ 
tion. A very bright young man, of splendid 
physique, and perfectly familiar with every 
street and number in the city, submitted him¬ 
self for examination for a position as letter- 
carrier. He could read and write, and had 
been attending night-school, and was in every 
way fitted for a letter-carrier, but he failed 
when asked the most direct route from Balti¬ 
more to China. He said he had never been in 
China, nor did he expect to go there, and he 
only wanted to be a letter-carrier.” 

Then the Journal goes on to say that Mr, 
Roosevelt is an enthusiastic young man who 


means well, but is hasty. Also that although 
Gorman is no friend of the reform, his testi¬ 
mony is not less worthy of attention. Also 
that Mr. Roosevelt and other advocates of the 
system should remedy such defects and not 
berate the critics. Now comes Mr. Roosevelt 
with an open' letter and mortifies the Journal 
by showing that no such question was ever 
asked an applicant for a carriership since ex¬ 
aminations began. Gorman is not dashed. 
Confronted with the proofs of his falsehood, he 
jauntily replies that he believes it to be true, 
and is content to let Mr. Roosevelt undertake 
to convince the people that the examinations 
are practical. The Journal should know that 
Gorman and his likes do not start such lies for 
civil service reform papers like the Journal to 
copy. He expects civil service reformers to 
know him too well. His purpose is to furnish 
a stock from time to time for the use of bour¬ 
bon spoils papers like the Cincinnati Commer¬ 
cial-Gazette, which must occasionally have a 
change. 

Frank Hatton’s Washington Post, a co¬ 
worker and preceptor of the Commercial Ga¬ 
zette in this matter has taken itself in by an 
interview with General James R. Carnahan, 
of this city. The Post probably did not know 
that an interview with Carnahan,while itdoubt- 
less flattered him, would not carry great 
weight with either the spoilsmen or the civil 
service reformers. Needing some new stories 
it therefore puts into his mouth, statements 
which make him and the Post appear ridiculous. 
These statements can be understood from the 
answer made to them by a civil service com¬ 
missioner : 

He says, or implies, that in an examination 
for admission to the naval academy our com¬ 
mission, among other questions, caused to be 
asked the location of Bitter mountain. As a 
matter of fact, we never do nor have examined 
any one for admission to the naval academy. 
Again, he says a man examined as a copyist 
was asked the names and areas of the five great 
lakes. We never have and never do examine a 
copyist in geography, and we never ask such a 
question as that about areas of any applicant 
whatever. Then, he states that a certain coun¬ 
try school-master passed almost perfectly every 
branch of a mail-carrier’s examination, and 
when appointed made a failure, because he 
knew nothing of the streets or local geography 
of the city. As a matter of fact, a third of 
the marks, or thereabouts, in a mail-carrier’s 
examination are given precisely on the subject 
of streets and local geography of the city, so 
that the General’s statement must be in¬ 
correct. If the General has been correctly re¬ 
ported, I would suggest that he learn not only 
the places for which we examine applicants, 
but also the questions we ask them, before in¬ 
dulging in further criticism. 

George H. Pendleton died in Brussels No¬ 
vember 24. The cause of civil service reform 
is under lasting obligations to him for intro¬ 
ducing and managing the bill which became 
the present civil service law. He had what 
few congressmen had or have, an intelligent 
conception of the way in which it was expect¬ 
ed to break up the use of the federal service as 
spoil. The bill was drawn by Dorman B. 
Eaton, and Mr. Pendleton was its steady and 













80 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


efficient advocate until he secured its passage, 
during which he was dogged in Ohio by his 
party after the following manner, taken from 
the Butler County Democrat: “Senator Dan 
Voorhees polished off the Pendleton snivel 
service hog-wash in a style just too beautiful.” 
It is a just compliment to say that the law in 
honest hands answers its purpose admirably, 
and six years’ experience has not shown the 
need of radical amendment. There is no 
doubt that Mr. Pendleton’s advocacy of this 
reform made it possible by bribery to defeat 
his re-election to the senate. But that advo¬ 
cacy will give him a permanent place in the 
history of his country, and his place will be 
the higher when, in the future, history looks 
back upon the breaking up of the spoils sys¬ 
tem and rates it, as it will rate it, second only 
to the destruction of slavery. 

In sending him abroad. President Cleveland 
rid Gorman, Voorhees and other looters of the 
civil service of a powerful opponent, of which 
another, though less conspicuous, example 
was in the appointment of Rufus Magee, of 
Indiana, to Sweden and Norway. 

Mr. W. D. Foulke addressed the Common¬ 
wealth Club of New York City, December 16, 
on “ Present Political Problems.” No one 
doubts Mr. Foulke’s republicanism, nor the 
sincerity of his regard for President Harrison, 
and such candid and just criticism any party 
or any president should heed. The worst en¬ 
emies of any administration are those friends 
whose personal admiration blinds them and 
whose standard of comparison varies. We 
quote as follows from the report in the New 
York Evening Post: 

A certain circular letter marked “confiden¬ 
tial ” was sent by one Marshall Cushing (who 
has since been appointed private secretary to 
Postmaster-General Wanamaker) to a number 
of civil service reformers, and one copy came 
to me. As the correspondence has been al¬ 
ready published on several occasions, I do not 
suppose there is anything very secret about it, 
at the present time, but even if it were other¬ 
wise, I do not recognize the right of a public 
officer to make me the mask of concealing his 
insincerity, without my consent. The writer 
says : “ I have undertaken some investiga¬ 

tions of the present civil service system for a 
cabinet officer,” and he asks a number of ques¬ 
tions. Why are the law and the commission 
subject to so much criticism ? Is not a civil 
pension list a logical result of the system? 
Are not the commissioners merely providing 
themselves with employment? Will not the 
efficiency of the departments be hereafter in¬ 
terfered with by the old age of clerks who can 
not be removed ? And then follows the re¬ 
markable interrogatory, “ Why should not 
both parties discard all their insincere pro¬ 
fessions for the law and have the patriotism to 
go back to the old system under which it was 
inquired simply whether a man was honest, 
capable, and faithful to the constitution?” 

The questions asked have already been very 
fully answered by Mr. Charles J. Bonaparte 
and Mr. Lucius B. Swift. I shall not repeat 
these answers, but I want to say a word with 
regard to this last question. I believe this is 
the first time in our history where an investi¬ 
gation made on behalf of a cabinet officer is 
based upon the assumption that the professions 
of his own party contained in the very plat¬ 
form upon which he came into power were in¬ 


sincere and unpatriotic. If Mr. Wanamaker 
is willing to declare this to the world, one of 
two things is true—either the party which he 
represents is, in fact, insincere, or he has no 
right to represent it and remain one of the in¬ 
struments of carrying out its policy in regard 
to the matters in which he assumes that it did 
not mean what it said. So long as such a man 
remains at the head of the post-office depart¬ 
ment the administration of President Harri¬ 
son is not a civil-service-reform administra¬ 
tion, and he has not kept, and can not keep, 
the promise that “ the spirit and purpose of 
reform shall be observed for all executive de¬ 
partments.” For he has put at the head of 
the greatest of departments of the government, 
to carry out this spirit and purpose, a man whO’ 
assumes that the declaration of his party 
and his own chief were insincere and unpatri¬ 
otic professions. 

We had a few years ago some little trouble 
in Indiana in reference to one Aquilla Jones, 
the postmaster at Indianapolis, who, when ap¬ 
pointed to the place, said of the civil service 
law, “I despise it,” and who consistently main¬ 
tained his opinion by a constant course of 
evasion and violation of the statute. We 
thought then that the initial fault lay with 
the President in appointing such a man That 
he could not expect the law and its provisions 
to be observed when he put such instruments 
there to do the work. But if this were true in 
a subordinate and unimportant office, how 
much more is it the case when a cabinet offi¬ 
cer, whose work it is to carry out the policy of 
the administration, declares that the princi¬ 
ples professed by his own party in its platform 
are nothing but a mockery and a sham. Men 
do not gather grapes from thorns nor figs from 
thistles, nor can the President carry out the 
principles of civil service reform to which he 
pledged his adherence in his letter accepting 
the nomination by means of a cabinet minis¬ 
ter who assumes that this pledge was an in¬ 
sincere and unpatriotic profession. 

There is one thing of which the politicians 
of the country may be welt assured, that 
whether or not the people favor civil service 
reform, they will not continue to have confi¬ 
dence in the party which knowingly, with its 
eyes open, fails to perform its solemn promises 
to the country. There is something more im¬ 
moral in this than even in the spoils system. 
The republican party has been successful 
in the past because it has been true to 
its great promises and plans — emancipa¬ 
tion, the preservation of the Union, enfran¬ 
chisement, payment of the national debt. 
These became embodied as fixed .facts in the 
history of our country. The party was as 
good as its word. But if at the last conven¬ 
tion it has in most solemn manner made a dis¬ 
tinct pledge to the people, and if it fails to 
keep that promise now, the people will know 
just the value of every pledge hereafter made. 


Daniel M. Eansdell, at present marshal of 
the District of Columbia, has an added im¬ 
portance because of his undoubted intimacy 
and influence with the President. When in 
Indianapolis soon after his appointment 
Ransdell said, according to the Indianapolis 
News: “I am very thankful that my office 
does not come under the civil service rules. I 
shall have no hesitancy about making places 
for just as many republicans as possible.” 
With this preliminary statement, this officer, 
appointed by a President who said that only 
the interest of the public service should sug¬ 
gest removals from office, and that fitness, and 
not party service, should be the essential and 
discriminating test of appointment, set about 


his work. He “controlled ” thirty-five places. 
He turned officers out with the remark, “I 
recognize that these gentlemen have been good 
and efficient officers.” Among his appointees 
he has made his brother-in-law, John R. Leon¬ 
ard, a deputy. Another is his brother, Edward 
S. Ransdell, who was formerly a letter-carrier 
of tbe Indianapolis post-office, who stole let¬ 
ters, was convicted in the federal court and 
then pardoned by President Arthur, the latter 
being induced thereto by influence brought to 
bear by Marshal Ransdell. Thus Marshal 
Ransdell is exemplifying his idea of the pur¬ 
poses of the government service. He owns 
these thirty-five places. He may give them to 
whom he wishes, without any regard to public 
feeling or to public decency. They are simply 
spoil to be divided. It may be said that his 
brother has repented. That is very likely the 
case, and if President Harrison, or any other 
friend of Marshal Ransdell, saw fit to aid him 
in an attempt to recover his foot-hold by giv¬ 
ing him employment, the act would be praise¬ 
worthy, but no one has any right to quarter 
him upon the people. And the offense is 
doubly aggravated by the dismissal of an ef¬ 
ficient officer to make room for him. And so 
the injunction of the platform that “ the spirit 
and purpose of the reform should be observed 
in all executive appointments,” is carried out 
by this favorite of the administration. 

THE PRESIDENT ON THE CIVIL 
SERVICE. 

On the 4th of March last the civil service commis¬ 
sion had but a single member. The vacancies were 
filled on the 7th day of May, and since then the com¬ 
missioners have been industriously, though with an 
inadeqate force, engaged in executing the law. They 
were assured by me that a cordial support would be 
given them in the faithful and impartial enforce¬ 
ment of the statute and rules and regulations adopt¬ 
ed in aid of it. Heretofore the book of eligibles has 
been closed to every one, except as certifications 
were made upon the requisition of the appointing 
officers. This secrecy was the source of much suspi¬ 
cion and of many charges of favdriti.sm in the admin- 
tration of the law. What is secret Is always suspect¬ 
ed; what is open can be judged. The commission, 
with the full approval of all its members, has now 
opened the list of eligibles to the public. The eligi¬ 
ble lists for the classified post-office and custom 
houses are now publicly posted in the respective of¬ 
fices, as are also the certifications for appointments. 
The purpose of the civil service law was absolutely 
to exclude any other consideration in connection 
with appointments under it than that of merit as 
tested by the examinations. 

The business proceeds upon the theory that both 
the examining boards and the appointing officers are 
absolutely ignorant as to the political views and as¬ 
sociations of all persons on the civil service lists. It 
is not too much to say, however, that some recent 
congressional investigations have somewhat shaken 
confidence in the impartiality of the selections for 
appointments. The reform of the civil service will 
make no safe or satisfactory advance until the pres¬ 
ent law and its administration are established in the 
confidence of the people. It will be my pleasure, as 
it is my duty, to see that the law is executed with 
flrmne.ss and impartiality. If some of its provisions 
have been fraudulently evaded by appointing offi¬ 
cers, our resentment should not suggest the repeal of 
the law, but reform in its administration. We should 
have one view of the matter, and hold it with a sin¬ 
cerity that is not affected by the consideration that 
the party to which we belong is for the time in power. 

My predecessor, on the 4th day of January, 1889, by 
an executive order to take effect March 15, brought 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


81 


the railway mail service under the operation of the 
civil service law. Provision was made that the order 
should take effect sooner in any state where an eli¬ 
gible list was sooner obtained. On the 11th day of 
March, Mr. Lyman, then the only member of the 
commission, reported to me in writing that it would 
not be possible to have the list of eligibles ready be¬ 
fore May 1, and requested that the taking effect of 
the order be postponed until that time, which was 
done, subject to the same provision contained in the 
original order as to states in which an eligible list 
was sooner obtained. 

Asa result of the revision of the rules of the new 
classification, and of the inclusion of the railway 
mail service, the work of the commission has been 
greatly increased, and the present clerical force is 
found to be inadequate. I recommend that the ad¬ 
ditional clerks asked by the commission be appropri¬ 
ated for. The duty of appointment is devolved by 
the constitution or by the law, and the appointing 
officers are properly held to a high responsibility in 
its exercise. The growth of the country and the con¬ 
sequent increase of the civil list have magnified this 
function of the executive disproportionally. It can 
not be denied, however, that the labor connected 
with this necessary work is increased, often to the 
point of actual distress, by the sudden and excessive 
demands that are made upon an incoming adminis¬ 
tration for removals and appointments. But, on the 
other hand, it is not true that incumbency is a con¬ 
clusive argument for a continuance in office. Im¬ 
partiality, moderation, fidelity to public duty, and 
a good attainment in the discharge of it must be 
added before the argument is complete. When those 
heading an administrative oflice so conduct them¬ 
selves as to convince just political opponents that no 
party consideration or bias affects in any way the 
discharge of their public duties, we can more easily 
stay the demand for removals. 

I am satisfied that both in and out of the classified 
service great benefit would accrue from the adoption 
of some system by which the officer would receive 
the distinction and benefit that in all private em¬ 
ployments come from exceptional faithfulness and 
efficiency in the performance of duty. I have sug¬ 
gested to the heads of the executive departments 
that they consider whether a record might not be 
kept in each bureau of all those elements that are 
covered by the terms “faithfulness” and “efficien¬ 
cy,” and a rating made showing the relative merits 
of the clerks of each class, this rating to be regarded 
as a test of merit in making promotions. I have also 
suggested to the postmaster general that he adopt 
some plan by which he can, upon the basis of the re¬ 
ports to the department and of frequent inspections, 
indicate the relative merit of postmasters of each 
class. They will be appropriately indicated in the 
official register and in the report of the department. 
That a great stimulus would thus be given to the 
whole service, I do not doubt, and such a record 
would be the best defense against inconsiderate re 
movals from office.— President’s Message, Dec. 3, 1889. 


SECRETARY WINDOM ON THE 
CIVIL SERVICE. 

Under the old plan appointments were usually 
made to please some one under political or other ob¬ 
ligations to the appointee, and the question of fitness 
was not always the controlling one. The temptation 
to make removals only to provide places for others 
was always present and constantly being urged by 
strong influences, and this restless and feverish con¬ 
dition of departmental life did much to distract and 
disturb the even current of routine work. Under 
instrumentalities which are now used to secure selec¬ 
tions for clerical places, the department has some as¬ 
surance of mental capacity, and also of moral worth : 
the character of the candidate is ascertained before 
examination. The manifold duties of the depart¬ 
ment require the closest application on the part of 
the secretary and his assistants, and the freedom from 
importunity now enjoyed for appointments to places 
that are within the classified service, and the saving 
of valuable time heretofore devoted to the distribu¬ 
tion of minor patronage, are of very great advantage, 
and enable these officers to devote more thought to 


the important questions of administration ccii'.tantly 
arising. The clerks received from the civil service 
commission usually adapt themselves readily to th® 
duties they are called upon to perform, and rank 
among the most efficient in the department.—A jnmaJ 
Report, 1889. 

A PAID PRESS. 

Senator Benjamin Harrison, in the senate 
March 26, 1886: 

“I find in looking over the list of appoint¬ 
ments in Indiana that sixteen democratic news¬ 
paper proprietors and editors have been ap¬ 
pointed to office. * * * If I could believe 

that in appointing these men Mr. Cleveland 
meant that they should pursue a perfectly in¬ 
offensive course politically, that these news¬ 
papers should not irritate the feelings of re¬ 
publicans, should not publish charges against 
republican candidates for office, should say 
nothing offensive to the republicans—if I 
believed he meant by these appointments sin¬ 
cerely to put these sixteen democratic news¬ 
papers under those bonds, I should have brighter 
hopes than I have now of carrying Indiana next 
time. Bui it will not he so. Here are these six¬ 
teen editors, two of the three collectors of in¬ 
ternal revenue in Indiana, and the others hold¬ 
ing influential post-offices ; and Mr. Cleveland 
knows, and every honest democrat knows, that 
those sixteen newspapers will be fulminating 
with all the force and vigor and power and 
partisanship they can against the republican 
party. I am not complaining of that; but if 
a man is to be put out, as my old soldier, Mr. 
Bain, of Martinsville, who marched with the 
regiment which I had the honor to command 
in the war, was put out, because he was the 
editor and proprietor of a republican news¬ 
paper, and the editor of the democratic news¬ 
paper in the same town was put in his place— 
if that is good reason for turning a republican 
out, the same history, the same services to the 
democratic party, ought not to be good reason 
for putting the other in.” 


Under President Harrison in the state of 
New York, the editors of the New York Trib¬ 
une, the New York Press, the Utica Herald, 
the Buffalo Commercial Advertiser, the Owego 
Times and the Syracuse Journal have received 
important offices. 

And in Iowa there is already the govern¬ 
ment press, or, what is the same, a Clarkson- 
Allison press—as follows: 

Iowa State Register —Its editor appointed 
first assistant postmaster general. 

Burlington Hawkeye—Its editor appointed to 
the office of collector of internal revenue. 

Muscatine Journal —Its editor appointed 
postmaster. 

Fairfield Ledger —Its editor given an office 
in the interior department. 

Keokuk Gate City — Its editor appointed 
commissioner of education. 

Marshalltown Times — Republican —Its edi¬ 
tor appointed postmaster. 

President William Henry Harrison in 
1841: 

There is no part of the means placed in the 
hands of the executive which might be used with 
greater effect, for unhallowed pui-poses, than the 
control of the public press. 


Daniel Webster in 1832: 

But rembember, sir, that these are the attri¬ 
butes of a free press only. And is a press that 


is purchased or pensioned more free than a 
press that is fettered? Can the people look for 
truths to partial sources, whether rendered 
partial through fear or through favor? Why 
shall not a manacled press be trusted with the 
maintenance and defense of popular rights? 
Because it is supposed to be under the influ¬ 
ence of a power which may prove greater than 
the love of truth. Such a press may screen 
abuses in government or be silent. It may 
fear to speak. And may it not fear to speak, 
too, when its conductors, if they speak in any 
but one way, may lose their means of liveli¬ 
hood ? Is dependence on government for bread 
no temptation to screen its abuses? W'ill the 
press always speak the truth, when the truth, 
if spoken, may be the means of silencing it for 
the future? Is the truth in no danger, is the 
watchman under no temptation, when he can 
neither proclaim the approach of national 
evils, nor seem to decry them, without the 
loss of his place ? 

Mr. President, an open attempt to secure the aid 
and friendship of the public press, by bestowing the 
emoluments of office on its active conductors, seems 
to me, of everything we have witnessed, to be the most 
reprehensible. It degrades both the government 
and the press. As far as its natural effect ex¬ 
tends, it turns the palladium of liberty into an 
engine of party. It brings the agency, activ¬ 
ity, energy, and patronage of government all 
to bear, with united force, on the means of 
general intelligence and on the adoption or re¬ 
jection of political opinions. 


The Buffalo Commercial Advertiser [fettered] 
says of the appointment of the editor of the 
Syracuse Jaurnal in 1889: 

Mr. Smith has rendered long, faithful serv¬ 
ice as a hard w’orker in the republican ranks, 
and as the editor of one of the most influential 
journals in the service of the party. He has al- 
ivays been ready to do the bidding of the republican 
party, and has done so promptly, courageously, 
efficiently, and unselfishly. 

THE CLERGY AND THE CIVIL 
SERVICE. 

In Geneva, N. Y., Rev. H. W. Nelson, Jr., of 
Trinity Church, said: 

“ To treat office as the prize of the successful party 
at an election is a tremendous source of corruption, 
and it turns the patronage of the government, de¬ 
signed solely for the public convenience, into a vast 
bribery fund. It teaches the citizen to expect pay¬ 
ment for discharging a duty incumbent upon every 
voter. It tends to transform an election from a pop¬ 
ular verdict upon differing public policies into a 
desperate struggle for the emoluments of place. For 
whether a worker is paid by a check or by an office, 
makes no difference as to the right or the wrong of 
the matter; or rather, while the man bribed is 
equally guilty, whatever the form of his reward, it 
is surely more odious and more noxious to bribe 
with what is the people’s than with what is one’s 
own; to purchase suffrages or influence at the 
taxpayer’s cost than to pay for these out of the cor¬ 
rupter’s pocket.” 

Rev. Dr. Newman Smyth preached on “Sci¬ 
entific Patriotism ” in the Centre Congrega¬ 
tional Church in New Haven : 

“ Looked at from the point of view of the social 
scientist, the spoils system has no reason for its ex¬ 
istence save greed. It owns no higher law than sor¬ 
did success, and holds no better promise for the 
future than the wreck and ruin of free institutions. 
Yet even under this weight of condemnation the 
spoils system might remain nndestroyed were it not 
for the further fact that, looked at from the point of 
view even of political leaders as different adminis¬ 
trations in turn come into power, tha spoils system 
begins to be felt more and more heavily as a mill- 













82 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


stone about the neck of tlie party in office, threaten¬ 
ing, if it can not be broken off, to cast the adminis¬ 
tration into the depths of the Salt Lake. The spoils 
system is proving to be bad politics as well as bad 
statesmanship. 

“This reform moves slowly, yet with steady and 
sure advance. In 1865 the first bill by which it was 
proposed to cut off some of the evils of our civil ser¬ 
vice was received by Congress with scorn. Yet, fif¬ 
teen years later, the Pendleton bill was passed, and 
to-day some 27,000 inferior officers of the government 
can eat their Thanksgiving dinner in peace. The 
day is hastening when the whole Babylonish system 
of spoils shall be fallen.” 

In New York Rev. Morgan Dix, rector of 
Trinity parish, said; 

“The practice of making public office the reward 
of political .service that is the evil against which we 
are called to protest. I am glad to add my voice to 
those which will be raised to day throughout the 
land on this subject. Our House of Bishops has al¬ 
ready spoken on this scandal of our system of gov¬ 
ernment in their pastoral letter. 

“There is a wide distinction between political 
office and public office. He who accepts a ‘political’ 
office is bound to promote the views of his chiefs; it 
is his duty to aid in carrying out the policy of the 
administration ; he serves, first, the party in power. 
But the holder of a ‘ public’ office has no necessary 
relation to politics and party. He serves the public, 
and the man who serves them best is he whose acts 
have no political reference. Cabinet ministers, and 
a few other prominent officials, must be, of course, in 
perfect accord with the head of the government. 
But it is not necessary to the public that the great 
army of the servants of a nation should have any 
personal partisan duty outside the line of their 
business.” 

Rev. Robert Collyer, of the Church of the 
Messiah, resigned liis pulpit to Mr. Dormon 
B. Eaton, who said : 

“ It is a great mistake to assume, as so many repvib- 
licans do, that civil service reform has no support 
among the democrats, and that its fate depends upon 
the republicans alone. The civil service bill in both 
houses of congress was introduced by democrats— 
by Mr. Pendleton, of Ohio, in the senate, and by Mr. 
Willis, of Kentucky, in the house. The effective sup¬ 
port which Mr. Pendleton, now just deceased, gave 
to that bill is one of his highest claims upon the 
grateful memory of his countrymen. 

“ President Cleveland faithfully sustained the e-x- 
aminations while president, and three members of 
his cabinet, Messrs. Bayard, Endicott aud Whitney, 
gave them a more friendly support than they have 
received from any of President Harrison’s cabinet. 

“The passage of the civil service reform law of the 
state of New York was vigorously promoted and was 
signed by a democratic governor, Mr. Cleveland. It 
has been since executed, though in a way by no 
means satisfactory, by another democratic governor, 
Mr. Hill. The president of the New York state com¬ 
mission is also a democrat, and is showing a zeal for 
the reform which Governor Hill doubtless would 
like to check a little. The New York law has been 
well executed by two democratic mayors in the city 
of New York, Mr. Grace and Mr. Hewitt. In the tri¬ 
umphant and salutary administration of the civil s r- 
vice law of Massachusetts, Mayor O’Brien, of Boston, 
an Irishman, a catholic and a democrat, has had a 
most creditable part. 

“In no city of the country have civil service laws 
and rules been better administered than in the city 
of Brooklyn, under its democratic mayor, Mr. 
Chapin. If Mayor Grant expects to run an even race 
for honors in his party with that young statesman he 
will need very soon to imitate more nearly the ex¬ 
ample of Mayor Chapin in promoting the cause of 
civil service reform. 

“If, therefore, the republican partisans, patronage 
mongers, and bosses who have been so successful in 
making war on their President and discrediting his 
administration shall attempt to stave off the reform 


by refusing adequate appropriations in this congress, 
we may be sure, I think, that democratic votes will 
prevent it. But, if the majority of the republican 
parly really wish to reject the reform as too much 
for tlieir patriotism, the democrats, I am sure, will 
be ready to take it up and go with it before the peo¬ 
ple in the next presidential election. Civil service 
refoim wili cau.se radical changes in the parties and 
politics of the country, if, indeed, it does not create 
a new party.” 

In Brooklyn, Rev. John W. Chadwick, pas¬ 
tor of the Second Unitarian Church, said: 

“The worst operation of the spoils system is the dis¬ 
honoring of the whole order of government in men’s 
eyes. Government never can be regarded as noble 
and august under a spoils system. To have it under¬ 
stood that sharpness, that management, that trickery 
and fraud, that running with the machine, are the 
appointed ways of political advancement, is a sure 
way of making government contemptible, even in 
the eyes of those who are mixed up in all these 
things. To make it noble and august it must be un¬ 
derstood that public office is a recognition of ability 
and character. If the spoils system had no other 
condemnation it would have one all sufficient in its 
responsibility for the birth and existence of the po¬ 
litical boss. Without the spoils system his occupa¬ 
tion would be gone. As it is, he stands between the 
people and the government, promising offices with 
one hand, asking for votes with the other, and cor¬ 
rupting both alike. ‘ By their fruits ye shall know 
them.’ 

“The fruit of the spoils system is the political boss, 
the most poisonous growth ever fattened in the sun. 
We shall never deal with them effectually until we 
cut up by the roots the monstrous growth upon 
which they feed.” 

* 

In Syracuse Bishop Huntington preached 
on Christian Politics, using the text: 

" II came to pass when Samuel was old he made his 
sons judges over Israel, * And his sons walked not 
in his ways bul turned aside after lucre and took bribes 
and pei verted judgment. Then all the elders of Israel 
gathered themselves together and said” 

“ Now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.” 
I Sam. viii, 1-5. 

“ He that walketh righteously and speaketh uprightly 
he that despiseth the gain of oppressions, that shaketh his 
hands from holding of bribes—he shall dwell on high; 
his place of defense shall be the munitions of rocks.” 
Isaiah xxxiii, 15, 16. 

“About two months ago, after some preparatory 
personal correspondence, forty-six citizens, in dift'er- 
ent parts of the country, put their names to a request 
that ministers of religion in their several places 
should, on this day of thanksgiving, appeal to the 
conscience of the people in behalf of high principles 
and a purified practice in the civil service of the re¬ 
public, in all its branches. Within a short time sev¬ 
eral hundred men declared in writing their hearty 
concurrence in this invitation. They represent 
nearly all denominations of Christians and Jews, 
strong institutions of education and enterprise, and 
are leaders of learned professions and practical in¬ 
dustry, men of enterprise and men of thought. Such 
a call creates no new obligation. It carries no other 
than a moral authority. With me it has weight not 
only in the character and judgment of the petition¬ 
ers, but for the following reasons: A movement at 
once so general, so spontaneous, and so direct in its 
object, is an evidence first that there is a* perilous 
wrong working in the life of the nation, and then 
that it is in the power and the will of the people to 
set it right. Reform implies abuse. Here the abuse 
hurts the health and damages the welfare of the 
whole political body. It is treachery to a social cov¬ 
enant. It is a violation of a sacred trust. It is the 
enslavement of the common interest of the many to 
the self interest of the few. In a free government 
this is disloyalty. Everywhere it is dishonor. In 
officers, who are republican servants, it is a fraud. 
Most significantly this is now acknowledged in the 
platform of each of the great parties, no one of 
them daring to face an eleetion without that cer¬ 


tificate of honesty. So much the deeper is the guilt 
if under these plausible pretentions there is a crafty 
hope that after that fair confession of faith some one 
of a dozen ways may be found to discard the creed 
with a jest, and turn reform into contempt. Rightly, 
therefore, it seems to me, at a great national festival, 
when all eyes look upward, when all hearts in the 
wide land are supposed to be lifted from the heritage 
and the stewardship to the righteous Giver and Lord, 
do we ask light and instruction from God’s word, 
while we adore him for his mercy. Why congratu¬ 
late our.selves on a government of which we are loos¬ 
ening and unsettling the foundations? Will he ac¬ 
cept us when we thank him for our laws if we break 
his own ? To what purpose are our sacrifices of 
praise in his church unless while we worship at his 
altars we renew our pledges of obedience to his 
commandments?” 

In St. Louis, Bishop Tuttle preached at 
Christ Church Cathedral, saying: 

“ It may sound manly to say ‘to the victor belong 
the spoils,’ as if manifestly a determination to abide 
the consequences of a square fight, but the manliness 
goes clear out when considering that the spoils are 
the public money and the motherland’s dower of 
ownership.” 

Rev. S. J. Nichols, of the Second Presbyte¬ 
rian Church, said : 

“ It would be be well to cast about for a few rea¬ 
sons why this debauchery of public sentiment pre¬ 
vails. I believe they could be summed up in the 
spoils system. A system that places partisan service 
above the public good, which makes character of the 
least ac^’QUiit, which has done more within the past 
few years to corrupt the fountain head of govern¬ 
ment and undermine our freedom. It has supplant¬ 
ed the rights of the people with chicanery and fraud ; 
it has stood in the way of the efficiency of the civil 
service, and made ita laughing-stock for thenations; 
it has dethroned the respectable citizen and elevated 
the political boss; has metamorphosed the primary 
into a den of infamy and has desecrated the sanctity 
of the ballot-box; it has placed a premium upon all 
forms of rascality and fraud, and has well nigh de¬ 
stroyed political integrity. The doors of office swing 
open to the political fine-worker, who enters to plun¬ 
der instead of serve the people.” 

Rev. M. Rhodes, in St. Mark’s Evangelical 
Lutheran Church, said : 

“Political assessments came next before the speak¬ 
er’s consideration. It is argued that an office is the 
political gift of a party, and that candidates seeking 
office at the hands of the party should be willing to 
pay for it. It is a plausible argument, but it makes 
a lottery scheme of politics, with money as the prin¬ 
cipal factor in winning the prize. It is under such 
condiiions that iu March, 1888, an open and direct 
bid of 81,500 for the consulship at Guttenberg, Switz¬ 
erland, was made. It is bound to have a demoraliz¬ 
ing effect. It is a bribe paid to stifle conscience, 
judgment and manhood.” 

Dr. Holland, rector of St. George’s Episcopal 
Church, said : 

“The United States is not a democracy—it is a 
monarchy with far more despotic power vested in its 
sovereign than is vested in the Queen of England. 
We call our ruler a president, and instead of having 
a life tenure in the title hereditary in his family he 
is only elected for four years—not by the people, but 
by a set of men, chosen by another set of men whose 
American soubriquet is most appropriate. They are 
bo.sses.” 

Dr. John Snyder, pastor of the Church of 
the Messiah, preached on civil service reform. 
* -s 

In Chicago the Union Park Congregational, 
the First Congregational, and St. Paul’s Re¬ 
formed Episcopal Church united. Dr. Noble, 
of the Union Park Congregational Church, 
preached on political parties and municipal 
government. 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


83 


In St. Mark’s Protestant Episcopal Church 
the pastor, Rev. Wm. White Wilson, on the 
ethics of civil service reform. 

Rev. T. P. Prudden, of the Leavitt Street 
Congregational Church, said : 

“This present manner of dealing in offices is brib¬ 
ery. A candidate says in effect to men : ‘Work for 
me, and if I am elected I wili get you this or that 
position.’ And the bribe runs all the way from a 
foreign mission to managing an elevator in a govern¬ 
ment building. What difference does it make 
whether the bribe is in money or something else ? 
The bribery in our civil service is especially bad, be¬ 
cause it prevents a free and full expression of opin¬ 
ion at election. It is especially bad bribery because 
it maintains an army of politicians who control con¬ 
ventions and laugh at conscience in politics. It is 
especially bad bribery because it is bribery with 
some one else’s property. It is misappropriating 
funds to bribe with. But the immorality of our 
present civil service is further evident because it 
tends to corrupt men. It really puts into a man’s 
hands a fund of offices for him to use as a bribery 
fund.’’ 

Rev. J. C. Learned, of the Church of the 
Unity, preached on the moral side of poli¬ 
tics. 

“The speaker began his address by referring to the 
granting of the Magna Charta in an article of which 
the king promised not to appoint auv ‘justices, con¬ 
stables, sheriffs or bailiffs but such as knew the law 
of the realm and meant truly to observe it.’ 

“It has been said,’’ continued the speaker,“that this 
ancient provision is the gist of civil service reform, 
which is only an attempt in modern times to restrain 
the encroachments of arbitrary power for selfish or 
partisan purposes, to limit such disposition as still 
survives even under republican form of govern¬ 
ment.’’ 

A 

Sermons were also preached by Rev. W. H. 
Kaufman, Heber City, Utah, by Rev. Dr. 
Hickok, pastor of the Brick Presbyterian 
Church, and Rev. Wm. Richmond, rector of 
All Saints Church, in East Orange, N. J. In 
New Brunswick, N. J., Rev. S. S. Weatherby, 
of Pitman Church, Rev. Dr. W. J. McKnight, 
of the First Presbyterian Church, Rev. M. V. 
McDuffie, of the Remsen Avenue Church, and 
Rev. H. C. Applegarth, of the First Baptist 
Church, preached on the spoils system. Mr. 
Applegarth said : 

“ I can see how there may be differences of 
opinion as to how this evil shall be suppressed, 
just as there may be differences of opinion as 
to how the liquor traffic is to be suppressed or 
controlled, but I can not see how any one can 
stand up and say that the system ought not to 
be abolished, one way or the other, unless he 
is crazy or a veritable scoundrel and rogue.” 


THE STATE REPUBLICAN PRESS. 


—Repeal [of the civil service law] would be a stu¬ 
pid blunder.—SoM</i Beiid Times. 

—There is hardly a republican criticism of the ad¬ 
ministration but that would have been avoided if 
there had been no offices to distribute.—iapranpe 
Standard. 

—If republicans don’t mean what they say in their 
platforms, they are dishonest. They put civil ser¬ 
vice into their platform of principles and now they 
must stand by it. President Harrison has nowhere 
else to look to. He must be guided by the principles 
upon which he fought and succeeded.— Winchester 
Herald. 

—The action of certain Indianapolis republicans 
in naming a republican club the Farwell club, be¬ 
cause Senator Farwell proposes to introduce a bill in 
the senate to repeal the civil-service law will scarcely 


meet with the approval of repuhlicans throughout 
the state. The republican policy is fixed and certain 
on the civil-service law, and a few disgruntled politi¬ 
cians can not change it.—Columbus Republican. 

—The more we see of the wild rush forofflee under 
the government—the disappointments, the valuable 
time wasted, and finally the demoralization that 
generally follows one who has once held an office— 
the more we are inclined to believe in a civil service 
law honestly carried out.—Afar ion Chronicle. 

—A newly organized republican club at Indian¬ 
apolis has dubbed itself the “Farwell club,” because 
the senator of that name is opposed to the civil ser¬ 
vice law. There is no accounting for tastes, and this 
is only equaled by that other cluh down in the 
southern part of the state which burned up its cam¬ 
paign paraphernalia because the President didn’t 
appoint one of its members postmaster.—Porter 
County Vidette. 

—It is the offices; and yet how slow we are to learn 
that the distribution of the offices is sure to weaken 
the party that has it to do. It is impossible to please. 
The .sourness and the soreness that was felt towards 
Cleveland was all on account of office hunger, and it 
is precisely so in the case of President Harrison. It 
is impossible to satisfy all the hungry ones, and it is 
not practicable always, at least it is not always done, 
to appoint the very best man for a particular office. 
And then there are two kicks, and the kickers are 
much more numerous than the happy ones who draw 
the prizes. Shall not an editor, for instance who is 
an applicant for a good, solid office and gets left, lift 
up his voice and—weep ?— New Albany Tribune. 

—There is a growing independent element in the 
country which is less and less interested in partisan 
politics from year to year. It is a blessing that this 
is so. The party managers have not near the grip 
they had a few years ago, and machine methods are 
constantly declining in popularity and power. Peo¬ 
ple have come to the conclusion that government is 
not for the office-holders, but for the wise and hon¬ 
est management of the people’s business, which is 
too often miserably mismanaged.—Terre Haute Mail. 

—The patriotism that puts patronage above prin¬ 
ciple, and threatens death and damnation to every 
one engaged in the distribution of a few offices con¬ 
trary to its will and wish, is the source and support 
of civil service reform. The plain people who are 
not office-seekers, disgusted with these exhibitions of 
selfish arrogance, will consent to almost any policy 
which promises to abate them, and so the kickers de¬ 
crease their chances of getting their noses in the 
public trough.—Lofiransporf Journal. 

—The Tribune will be glad to see President Harri¬ 
son take strong ground in his message in favor of im¬ 
proved methods in the civil service, especially in the 
vital matter of appointment to office. And having 
spoken in behalf of it, we shall be glad to see him 
push it all along the line. The defects in the law 
should be promptly remedied by congress, and then 
let its operations be enlarged and extended. Such 
disgusting performances as that which occurred at 
Jeffersonville will soon bring thinking people to a 
rigid demand for more rigid laws on this subject.— 
New Albany Tribune. 

—It is confidently expected that President Harrison 
will rub a liberal allowance of salt into the discharg¬ 
ing wounds of dis.sapointed office-seekers, next Mon¬ 
day, by renewing his pledges to civil service reform 
which gives the opportunity to remark that the Pres¬ 
ident’s determination to be a man of his word, and 
of a few words, will prove a God-send to the govern¬ 
ment service, whatever misfortune he may risk indi¬ 
vidual! y.—Kendallville Standard. 

—Senators and representatives have no more claim 
to dictate appointments than the man in the moon, 
except so far as custom goes, and if there is anything 
in the petty plea set up by Senator Farwell by a jug¬ 
gling of the language of the constitution, democratic 
members of congress have*the same legal right to 
say who shall or shall not be office holders in their 
respective districts as the President of the United 
States. The practice has grown to be a great evil, 
and if the present head of the administration suc¬ 


ceeds in taking some of the conceit out of the patron 
age brokers, and thereby correcting a most flagrant 
abnse, the result will be appreciated by large propor¬ 
tion of the people who cling to the old-fashioned no¬ 
tion that a statesman’s duties consists of something 
more than office-begging.—La/oj/effe Courier. 


The New York Evening Post, of Decem¬ 
ber 9, contains a valuable interview with 
Mr. Deland, a government employe of 
eighteen years, on the practical working 
of the merit system. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

Services were free and base. Free ser¬ 
vice was to pay a sum of money, or serve 
under the lord in war. Base service was 
to plow' the lord’s land, to make his hedge 
or carry out his dung. — Blackstone. 

—Samuel A. Kercheval has been appointed 
examiner in the department of justice. His 
duty is to examine the records of attorneys, 
marshals,clerks and commissioners. Kerche¬ 
val was chairman of the Spencer county re¬ 
publican committee during the campaign. 
After the election, according to the Chicago 
Times, in the bar-room of the New-Denison 
hotel of this city, Kercheval made the follow¬ 
ing statement, which has never been denied : 

“ Of course, it was an expensive campaign—the 
most expensive the state has ever known. The prices 
of votes averaged over $20 each, and in some cases we 
had to pay as high as $10 and $50. But we got them, 
and we carried the state. In Spencer county we had 
a great many ‘ floaters,’ and it was an open question 
whether we or the democrats could buy them. We 
got most of them.” 

“How could you be sure that a vote which you had 
paid for would be really delivered ?” 

“ Nothing simpler. If you buy dry goods you get 
the package when you give the money. We went on 
the same principle. We had one man stationed at 
the polling places who was able to see the ballot from 
the time it left his hands until the time it went into 
the box. Now, suppose a floater is secured by a 
worker. Say you are a worker and this gentleman is 
the voter, and this gentleman here is the guard at the 
polls. Now, you agree with this man to pay him $20 
for a straight republican vote. You steer him up to 
the guard at the polls and call his attention to him. 
The guard gives him a ballot folded and reidy to 
put into the judge’s hands. The voter takes it, and 
if he votes as he has contracted to do, without look¬ 
ing at it or ‘monkeying’ with it in any way—and the 
guard can see whether he does or not, for he is never 
more than three feet away from.the ballot box—then 
he (the guard) signals back to you that the man is 
all right, and you take him off and give him his 
money. He has to trust you that far, although I 
have seen cases in this election when the ‘ floater ’ 
would not trust the worker, but insisted on having 
one hand on the money whiie he put in the ballot.” 

“ How.is the money paid afterward ? ” 

“ Well, down in our part of the country we took a 
room which had been used as a gambling hell. The 
door had one of those little openings to it in the cen¬ 
ter from which you could see out, but you could not 
see in. When a worker had got a vote, he wrote on 
a little piece of blue paper the amount of money to 
which the voter was entitled, and the voter poked 
his hand through the hole with that bit of card-board 
in it. The paper was taken off by a young man in¬ 
side, examined and verified, and, if it was all right, 
the money—$10. $20, $50, as the case might be—was 
placed in the still open hand. The man outside .saw 
nothing; neither did the man inside. It was ali 
done quietly and cff.clually, and nobody was the 
wiser.” 




















84 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—It is reported that John C. Houk, son of 
Representative Ilouk, of Tennessee, and at 
present in the employ of the census bureau, is 
to be assistant doorkeeper of the house. Mr. 
Houk, it will be remembered, despises the 
civil service law as un-American and un-dem- 
ocratic. Mr. Houk does not wish his son to 
be subjected to the test of open competition. 
It is better to get into a place because he is 
the son of a feudal baron. 

—Washington, Nov. 29.—President Harri¬ 
son this afternoon appointed the following 
United States consuls: 

Hiram S. Dunlap, of Illinois, to Breslau, 
Germany. Mr. Dunlap is ediior of the Cham¬ 
paign Gazette. 

William E. Gardner, of Wisconsin, to Rot¬ 
terdam. Mr. Gardner has been for several years 
connected with the Evening Wisconsin, Milwaukee. 

John B. Osborne, of Pennsylvania, to Ghent, 
where a vacancy exists. Mr.Osborne is a son of 
the congresman from Wilkes Barre. 

—Col. C. S. Forbes, of the Boston Journal, 
and F. N. Whitney, of the Burlington Clipper, 
have been appointed deputy collectors of in¬ 
ternal revenue for the district of New Hamp¬ 
shire. 

—Senator Moody, of South Dakota, seems 
to have surprised even old stagers at office¬ 
grabbing by appointing his son a page in 
the senate. 

—Wm. A. McDowell,of Lafayette, has passed 
a successful examination for a position in the 
census office, and, upon the recommendation of 
Congressman Cheadle, will soon receive an appoint¬ 
ment. 

—Dudley W. Fleming,of Warren county, has 
been appointed, upon the recommendation of Mr. 
Cheadle, to a position in the government print¬ 
ing office. —SpeckU to the Indianapolis Jouinal 
Dec. 5. 

—A postmaster at Lafayette is expected to be 
named this week. It is undecided yet who 
will get the position. B. Wilson Smith and 
Messrs. Throckmorton and Creigmyer are 
mentioned prominently. The latter has received 
the indorsement of Congressman Cheadle. 

—“The people in my locality,” said W. T. 
Durbin, of Anderson, “are beginning to realize 
that this is purely and strictly a republican 
administration. The party in Madison and 
Shelby counties is harmonious, and in Han¬ 
cock the outlook is very bright. As to Presi¬ 
dent Harrison’s message, I have heard nothing 
but praise.” 

Mr. Durbin means that so far as his domain 
extends this is a Durbin administration, and 
that he has dispensed the patronage to the sat¬ 
isfaction of Mr. Durbin and Mr. Durbin’s Fav¬ 
orites. 

—A hundred and ten prominent republi¬ 
cans, headed by Gen. Adam E. King, from 
Baltimore, came over to-day and called upon 
the postmaster-general for the purpose of mak¬ 
ing a recommendation for the appointment of 
a postmaster at Baltimore. After they pre¬ 
sented their candidate the postmaster-general 
looked the delegation in the face and smil¬ 


ingly inquired : “ Are there any more citizens 
left in Baltimore ? ” 

“ Yes,” replied Gen. King, “ there are a few 
women and children left over there.” 

Mr. Stockbridge, the newly elected repre¬ 
sentative of congress from Baltimore, has 
recommended the appointment of another man 
than the one urged by this delegation. Mr. 
King told the postmaster-general that they de¬ 
sire it understood the man recently elected to 
congress in Baltimore was not authorized to 
speak for 500,000 patrons of the Baltimore 
office in the selection of a postmaster, and that 
they desired to take issue with Mr. Stock- 
bridge’s recommendations. 

“Well,” said Mr. Wanamaker, “you have 
elected Mr. Stockbridge to represent you in 
congress, and I shall take it for granted that 
you have, by his election, decided it to be 
known that he is your authorized representa¬ 
tive, and it is the policy here to recognize the 
recommendations of republican congressmen 
in the selection of federal officers in their 
districts.”— Special to the Indianapolis Journal, 
Nov. 25. 

—The delay in the confirmation of Maj. Cra¬ 
vens, internal revenue collector for this dis¬ 
trict, has caused the friends of the appointee to 
resent what appears to them to be unwarranted 
interference on the part of Messrs. Browne, 
Cheadle and Owen, republican congressmen 
from this state. These gentlemen (since there 
is no republican senator from Indiana) have 
assumed to control the patronage. 

The collector of revenue has fifty-eight ap¬ 
pointments to make, including storekeepers, 
gaugers and deputies. The deputies are ap¬ 
pointed by the collector, and are responsible 
to him only. The other appointees are named 
by the secretary of the treasury, upon the 
recommendation of the collector. The ap¬ 
pointment of ten of these has been “hung up ” 
because the congressmen named will not con¬ 
sent to the recommendations made by the col¬ 
lector, and the collector will not name the men 
whom the congressmen are trying to hoist into 
place. The congressmen have even gone so 
far, it is asserted, as to resist the confirmation 
of Cravens, on the ground that he is “ a back 
member,” and only agree to “ let up ” in con¬ 
sideration of the concessions desired. 

On the other hand, the friends of the col¬ 
lector say time will shame the congressmen 
out of their position. They are particularly 
severe on Congressman Tom Browne. “ It is 
understood that this is his last term,” said one 
of them, to-day, and I don't see what right he 
has to interfere. He will have no further need for 
his friends’ political support.—Indianapolis Neivs, 
December 18. 

—Frank H. Challis, editor of the Manches¬ 
ter, N. H., Daily Press (Rep.), was a candidate 
for the deputy collectorship for his district, 
but another man was appointed on Tuesday. 
Challis, therefore, says in his paper: “ With 
the election of a republican president the ed¬ 
itor was insane enough to think there was go¬ 
ing to be an administration of the government 
of which a young republican might be proud, 
and of which it might be an honor to be, even 
in a small way, a part. He therefore foolishly 
allowed himself to become a candidate for the 
office. But the editor himself is eminently 
satisfied (he does not say pleased) with the 
outcome. He is glad that he is not to be 
placed in a position which might seem in any 
degree to demand a cordial support of the ad¬ 
ministration of the cheapest pattern of the 
genus homo that ever was wafted into the pres¬ 
idential chair.” 

—Joel Hyatt, of Indiana, who was superin¬ 
tendent of the clerk’s document room, house 
of representatives, during the past three con¬ 
gresses, has been superceded by a Pennsylva¬ 
nia republican. Mr. Hyatt was one of the 


most intelligent and popular officials under 
the late administration. This position was 
promised General Browne for one of his con¬ 
stituents at Muncie, but Pennsylvania seems 
to fall heir to about all the good places under 
Mr. McPherson, who is a Pennsylvanian, He 
has already given to his state the positions of 
chief clerk, assistant disbursing clerk, station¬ 
ery clerk, index clerk and clerk to the docu¬ 
ment room. Besides these, the state comes in 
for the lion’s share of committee clerks, chair¬ 
manships and positions under the door-keeper, 
sergeant-at-arms and postmaster. — (^eciaf to 
the Indianapolis Journal, Dec. 13, 

—The new postmaster, of Kansas City, has 
made the son of the President’s brother [a 
democrat] his deputy. 

—The President, through Marshal Ransdell, 
has given A. D. Shaw a $2,000 place as chief 
of a division in Washington. Shaw was pres¬ 
ident of the railroad men’s club here in the 
campaign. Other members, however, say that 
it will take more than this appointment to re¬ 
ward the club for their services. 

—The appointment of Eugene G. Hay to be 
district attorney for Minnesota, made to-day, 
ends a controversy that has been going on for 
some time. Mr. Hay was indorsed by Senator 
Washburn and opposed by Senator Davis, who 
had another candidate. Mr. Hay has lived 
in Minnesota only a few years. He was for 
many years a resident of Indiana, and is a 
warm personal friend of President Harrison.— 
Indianapolis Journal, Dec. 17. 

—Maj. Kinney, one of the editors of The 
Courant, wishes to be postmaster, and he is 
backed by Senator Hawley, the editor-in- 
chief, who is said to have secured from the 
President the promise of Kinney’s appoint¬ 
ment. Leading merchants and other eminent 
republican citizens are also in favor of him. 
On the other hand, the rank and file of the 
republican party of the city are opposed to 
Kinney and in favor of a merchant named A. 
B. Gillette, who is an active member of the 
young republican wing of the party, and is 
backed by the republican city committee and 
its chairman, Mr. McGovern. Maj. Kinney 
supposed he had the inside track till yesterday, 
when McGovern issued a call for the republi¬ 
cans of the city to assemble in one of the public 
halls on Saturday next and decide by ballot 
between the two candidates. This has created 
consternation in the editorial camp, for it is 
feared that McGovern, as the leader of the 
machine, can get out his men in far greater 
numbers than the Kinney faction can get out 
theirs, and can thus show a large popular 
majority in favor of Gillette.— New York Eve¬ 
ning lost. 

—Primarily the national administration 
and President Harrison have not been accep¬ 
table to the republicans so far as the distribu¬ 
tion of patronage is concerned, and the Ohio 
republicans have not received what they con¬ 
sider their full share.— Interview with Judge 
Thurman. 

—The people demand immeasurably more 
from the republican party than they do from 
the democratic party. The second can retain 
its voters by doing comparatively well ; the 
first can keep its hold upon its followers only 
by doing positively weU.—Philadelphia Press 
[iJep.], since the elections. 

—This is a question of the greatest interest to 
workingmen, inasmuch as the reform looks to the 
placing of all men on an equal footing for chances of 
appointment to the public service, irrespective of the 
power of iniluence or favor. Those who oppose it 
seek to delude the masses with the false cry that it 
is a scheme for placing the aristocrats and college- 
bred in control of the offices, to the exclusion of the 
common people, because an educational test of merit 
is required as an evidence of fitness. This is simply 
a shallow pretence, or worse, a bare-faced misrepre ■ 
seiit&tion.—Buffalo Sunday Truth [Labor]. 












The civil Service chronicle. 


No matter what a person’s position, whether king on his throne, or judge on the bench, or only village postmaster, to disregard the principles Which should 
naturally and justly govern his conduct, whether to advance his own selfish interests or those of some party he has associated himself with—this is 
immoral; and no obligations to his party, no traditions of the past, can make it otherwise than immoral.—Rev. Joseph May, November 28,1889. 


VoL. I, No. 11. INDIANAPOLIS, JANUARY, 1890. teems : ^ fee®tfpefcSpy.”” 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Indiana, where subscrip¬ 
tions and advertisements will be received. 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana 

Probably if the letter books of all the congressmen 
in the country were published a bloiv ivould be struck 
at the spoils system from which it would never recover. 
The people of the country, irrespective of party, would 
be shocked to find for what mean and paltry reasons 
good men and women are discharged, how unwoi'thy 
are the agents to'whom, in great measure, the federal 
patronage is committed, and how poorly their own 
interests are eonsulted in the choice of officeholders .— 
Boston Post [Z)ewi.] January, 11. 


Mr. Oliver T. Morton has written an 
article upon “ Some Popular Objections to 
Civil Service Reform,” which will appear 
in the Atlantic Monthly in March and 
April. 


A strange report comes from Philadel¬ 
phia to the effect that Quay’s Collector 
Cooper appoints men as laborers and then 
promotes them to clerkships within the 
classified service. It is also said that Mr. 
Roosevelt has investigated this and pro¬ 
nounced it true. The Philadelphia asso¬ 
ciation ought to make open and continu 
ous war upon this cheating and illegal 
practice. It hardly seems possible that 
President Harri.son will wait to have his 
elbow jogged before he will correct such a 
clumsy fraud. 


Our barons are disturbed, and are show¬ 
ing their hands—a bad thing to come to in 
this country. They are proposing bills to 
put the some 150,000 federal places into 
congressional districts to be divided for 
their benefit, but at less personal trouble 
and risk than they now have. General 
Rosecrans has a bill called a civil service 
reform bill, which proposes to have the 
places lotted out to congressmen, and for 
each congressman, when a vacancy in his 
bailiwick occurs, to select five of his hench¬ 
men and to put these under an examina¬ 
tion for the final test. 


The Farwell club is no more. Senator 
Farwell felt that it was more than even he 
could carry, and wrote them a letter refus¬ 
ing to have the club named after him, 
whereupon it expired.^ Its effects were 
gathered in a heap and sold to William 


Pritchard for $36.41 for debt. This is a 
very instructive life and death. The tin- 
horn-Farwell club was composed exclu¬ 
sively of that class constantly spoken of as 
the active party workers, the men who 
keep up the party, the men who get out the 
voters on election day, the torch bearers^ 
the men who ride forty miles at night for 
the Ingallses, the boys with cold toes, the 
wheel-horses, the members who must be 
taken in out of the cold, and finally and 
above all, the men who must be fed with 
spoil or party ruin is inevitable. In this 
view, when banded together, they should 
have been irresistible. In fact they were 
the contempt and the subject of ridicule of 
every class. They got no spoil. They 
whined and threatened, and went to pieces- 
As individuals they breathe vengeance, but 
if the republicans had only them to fear, it 
would not need to dread the future. 


A GOOD deal of space is given in this 
number to illustrate the operation by 
which those characterized by a president 
of a republican club as “ lean and hungry 
republican shoats,” crowd each other at the 
official trough. The information is given 
as it has been reported from time to time 
in the public prints, and in certain cases 
allowance will have to be made for partisan 
bias. In the main, however, any one con¬ 
versant with the operations in this state 
will recognize that the statements under¬ 
color the true situation rather than the op¬ 
posite. It is also recognized on every hand 
that the process has honey-combed the re¬ 
publican party strength. This is what cer¬ 
tain congressmen describe as keeping the 
offices near to the people. 


Mr. Henry A. Richmond, of Buffalo, 
New York, one of the first civil service 
commissioners under the law of that state, 
has placed in the hands of the editor of 
the Civil Service Chronicle fifty dollars 
to be used to further civil service reform 
in Indiana. Believing that the destruction 
of the spoils system only depends upon the 
publication of the facts, it has been deter¬ 
mined to otter the above sum as a prize for 
the best statement of the facts of the use 
of the federal offices as spoil in any given 
district. For instance, a concise account 
of the efforts of Congresmen Cheadle and 
Owen in this behalf, in their respective 
districts, would be very instructive. A 


sample question might be: Why was the 
editor of the Delphi Journal given an office ? 
Young men in college and out of college, 
and all others who are interested in such 
investigations, will be especially urged to 
compete. 


The annual meeting of the Indiana Civil 
Service Reform Association will be held in 
March or April. As the time approaches 
the project of holding it in Fort Wayne is 
being discussed. Many prominent men in 
that city have become identified with the 
Association, and have taken an active in¬ 
terest in its work. It is true, also, that 
cities like Fort Wayne, Richmond and 
Terre Haute should have the civil service 
law applied to their local federal offices; 
this object, agitation at home would tend 
to hasten. 

A CRITIC’S INCENTIVE. 

If the committee to investigate the civil ser¬ 
vice, of which Mr. Foulke is chairman, should 
do nothing more than to prepare a list of the 
newspapers that have been subsidized by of¬ 
fice, it would be an impressive object-lesson. 
We know that a congressman receives the sup¬ 
port of a county paper, and later gives its ed¬ 
itor an office ; but, all the same, it is difficult 
to rid the mind of the fiction that a newspa¬ 
per reflects public opinion. Not till the lists 
of the subsidized newspaper editors and the 
office holders, made of the political commit¬ 
teemen, are printed, shall we realize the grip 
of a political machine and the tremendous 
agencies it employs to stifle public opinion. 
An instance of this has recently occurred 
at Delphi, this state. The republican pa¬ 
per, week after week, attacked the civil- 
service law and the merit system with bitter 
hostility. So far the editor may have been 
wrong, but honest, though all the old lies 
against the merit system were repeated with a 
gusto that forbade correction. But it later 
appeared that the animus of these phillipics 
was an office wanted that had not come. Then 
the editor discarded generalities and made his 
wishes known in a way that must have caused 
his worthy congressman to shake with appre¬ 
hension. Space must limit the the quotation : 

If, when John C. New, of the Jour7ioi, asked for the 
London consulship, he had been informed that 
Cleveland’s appointee would be retained, what a 
blue tinge the air would have taken on. And how 
Dan Ransdell and W. 11. H. Miller and Porter and 
Huston and all the rest of them would have howled 
in agony if civil service sloi> had been doled out to 
them. Under these circumstances would the In. 
dianapolis Journal be feeding the pampered, weak- 





























86 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


minded, scrofulous child on choice bonbons? No 
indeed. The Indianapolis Journal would have been 
a center from which greased lightning would have 
darted in all directions. The Journal ought to know 
that it is of infinitely more importance to satisfy the 
working republicans in the out counties on this poin* 
than the prominent politicians of that paper and in In 
dianapolis. For the out counties give the republican ma 
j orities. ,j 

We can see that President Harrison is merely exe¬ 
cuting the law as it now is. This is all right. But 
unless the present congress relieves him of the law 
by wiping it out of existence they will show to the 
country that they lack the courage of their convic¬ 
tions, that they are not in harmony with the repub¬ 
lican sentiment of the country. 

Let Congressman Cheadle go ahead. Let him force 
his bill to a vote. We want to see the names of the 
cowards who are tarred with the same stick that has 
made the names of Roosevelt, Curtis, et al., odorifer¬ 
ous to a purgative extent. 

Mr. Eicketts got his office forthwith. 


THE LOOT OF THE INDIAN SERVICE 

It would seem to be a simple matter for an 
association known to be entirely non-partisan 
and composed of men of the highest standing 
to have its word regarding evils investigated 
by it accepted by a President. But so dense is 
the officialism at Washington that the Indian 
Rights Association labored nearly four years 
before they succeeded in really making any 
headway in impressing President Cleveland 
with the gravity of the evil that had gone on. 
Every one else knew of the shameful wrong and 
scandal resulting from giving the places in 
the Indian service as spoil. At the close of 
his administration, the appointment of Mr. 
Oberly doubtless foreshadowed a reform in 
this service. During President Harrison’s 
candidacy and after his election, every effort 
was made to induce him to subject this service 
to no risk, but to at once put it under the com¬ 
petitive system. General Harrison showed 
entire familiarity with the abuses that had 
gone on in this service, but he was reluctant 
to say that the competitive system was the best 
practicable system. Why has President Har¬ 
rison also apparently given this service over to 
the clutch of congressional spoilsmen? Last 
month the Civil Service Chronicle printed a 
letter from an entirely trustworthy source, 
stating that Senator Moody had sent over a 
henchman to spy out the Yankton agency to 
see whether it would suit him. A protest was 
made against removing the best agent the 
Yankton Indians had had for twelve years, 
but to no purpose. Since protests do not avail, 
it is the duty of the Indian Rights Association 
to appeal to public opinion and to give a par¬ 
ticular account of every instance where a con¬ 
gressman attempts to remove a competent 
employe in order to put some man who has made 
“his hedge” or carried out “his dung” into a 
place. Mr. Welsh may be sure that if he will 
give his fellow citizens the facts, they will not 
be indifferent. Nor can the responsibility of 
the President end with the appointment of 
General Morgan. Has he said to him, these 
places are not congressional or other spoil, do 
your duty and I will do mine. If a recent in¬ 
terview with General Morgan is correct, he 
has already reluctantly come to admit that 


these congressional barons, if they so insist, 
must be obeyed, and places made as they 
dictate, to be filled as they will. 


THE CLERGY AND CIVIL SERVICE 
REFORM. 

The Civil Service Record for January prints a 
list, as the names have casually come to the 
knowledge of the editor, of the clergymen who 
have already preached or will in the near 
future preach a sermon on civil service reform. 
It is a noteworthy list of two hundred or 
more. Many of these sermons will be printed 
and circulated, the more the better. Those 
clergymen who have tried to maintain that 
this question was only a political one, and 
thus not for pulpit discussion, can not hold 
their ground in the face of the sermons, treat¬ 
ing it as a grave moral question. That the 
list of the Record by no means indicates the 
number of sermons actually preached, but not 
reported, may be illustrated by Richmond, in 
this state. There Rev. I. M. Hughes, Rev. 
Alexander Gilchrist, Rev. J. W. Stone and 
Rev. A. W. Lamport, preached upon this ques¬ 
tion. In Indianapolis,Eev. John Hilliard Ran¬ 
ger, of Christ church, will shortly preach upon 
it. Rev. E. R. Johnson of Crawfordsville, in 
his sermon said ; “To-day nearly, if not quite, 
250,000 offices of the civil .service are like so 
many distinct sums of money used as political 
capital in the hands of the wire-workers in 
both parties in order to secure the election of 
their candidates. In this way the offices of 
the country have become the stronghold of the 
party in power, and the party out of power 
makes strenuous efforts to become possessed of 
them.” This is brave talk in Indiana, but we 
are informed that this sermon was fully en¬ 
dorsed by Mr. Johnson’s congregation, and that 
the question of civil service reform is to be 
further discussed by the ministerial associa¬ 
tion of Crawfordsville. All this is most en¬ 
couraging. 

CONGRESS AND THE CIVIL SER¬ 
VICE. 

The confirmation of Mr. Roosevelt and Mr. 
Thompson as civil service commissioners 
marks a decisive advance of the merit system. 
They came upon the commission at a time 
when it was in sore need of a fearless attitude, 
and it can not be said that they have been 
me.k. With Mr. Roosevelt as the chief 
spokesman the commission has allowed no di¬ 
rect attack to go unnoticed. It has given 
blow for blow, and very generally its critics 
are badly disfigured. The commission also 
has understood the duties laid upon it by the 
law and has not been backward in perform¬ 
ance. Office after office accustomed to obey 
the law so far as party exigency permitted 
was brought up with a round turn. The com¬ 
mission proclaimed everywhere that demo¬ 
crats and all non-republicans and republicans 
would have exactly the same treatment when 
competing. It overhauled local boards and 
had it understood that these boards are not 
local party machines. It did not hesitate 


to beard Mahone when his henchmen under¬ 
took to unlawfully collect money. The result 
is that the law is being enforced in a manner 
never known before, and it necessarily follows 
that this enforcement will not in the future be 
less rigid, but more so. That the senate, made 
up almost entirely of partisans, now confirms 
these appointments indicates that even par¬ 
tisans have come to recognize the inevitable— 
that the merit system is thoroughly rooted in 
the federal service. 

Another indication of this decisive advance 
is the constitution of the committee on the 
civil service by Speaker Reed. The members 
are, Lehlbach of New Jersey, Bayne of Penn¬ 
sylvania, Butterworth of Ohio, Hopkins of Ill¬ 
inois, Greenhalge of Masschusetts, Sanford of 
New York, Lind of Minnesota, Stephenson of 
Michigan, Dargan of South Carolina, Stone of 
Missouri, Alderson of West Virginia, Andrew 
of Masschusetts, Boatner of Louisiana. 

The formation of this committee proves that 
the merit system is to be built up. Let con¬ 
gress now give the little sum of S53,000 asked 
by the commission and that system will make 
progress that will please its friends and con¬ 
vince its enemies. It will relieve congressmen 
of the greatest burden they now carry—the 
importunities of place hunters. Once relieved of 
these importunities the very congressmen who 
are now struggling to retain the distribution 
of offices, will turn and thank the civil service 
reformers. It is doubtful if upon self-exam¬ 
ination any congressman who is now an out 
spoken spoilsman would find that he had any 
other motive than fear of his party workers at 
home. This is an ignoble fear and to a large ex¬ 
tent unnecessary. The fate of theFarwell club 
in Indianapolis proves that the men who do 
party work only for party spoil are the weak¬ 
est of enemies. Any congressman has but to 
fight them openly and take the people into his 
confidence to put them to rout. 


THE PRESIDENT’S OPPORTUNITY. 

It is not true that incumbency is a conclusive ar¬ 
gument for a continuance in office. Impartiality, moder¬ 
ation, flidcUty to public duty, and a good attainment in 
the discharge of it must be added before the argument is 
complete. When those heading an administrative office 
so conduct themselves as to convince just political oppo¬ 
nents that no party consideration or bias affects in any 
way the discharge of their public duties, we can more 
easily stay the demand for removals.—Rmide?i<’s 
Messsage, December, 1889. 

The President can find in the postmasters 
at Springfield and Quincy, Mass., public serv¬ 
ants who have not only shown all the qualifi¬ 
cations he would exact for retention, but whose 
retention is demanded by public opinion in 
the communities in which they have labored. 
Mr. Spear, the democrat appointed postmaster 
at Quincy by President Cleveland, is past 
middle life, an old resident and a successful 
business man. He has administered the office 
to the satisfaction of citizens of all classes. 
The republican, whom Congressman Morse 
intends to have appointed, is the chairman of 
the republican ward and city committee, and 
at present without any regular business. In 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


87 


Massachusetts a congressman feels constrained 
to appear to defer somewhat to public opinion, 
and Congressman Morse therefore suggested a 
caucus to determine the wishes of the republi¬ 
can pAtrons of the office. Later the republican 
city committee, hearing that the caucus was to 
be conducted on the plan of the Australian bal¬ 
lot system, objected, and Mr. Morse saw fit to 
withdraw his offer. Instead, he sent some cir¬ 
culars around and asked that the preference 
be indicated by letter to him. Nothing be¬ 
comes an aristocratic government by congress¬ 
men like secrecy! Nevertheless, a caucus was 
held, and out of 150 votes Mr. Spear received 
100. Mr. Morse explained the situation by 
saying, “The republicans are indifferent, and 
do not care who is postmaster so long as he is 
a good man.” This is simply the congres¬ 
sional way of saying that the republican tax¬ 
payers do not approve of turning out a good 
man. 

The President can now decide between a 
public servant who has not allowed “party 
consideration or bias ” to in any way affect 
the discharge of his public duties, and a re¬ 
publican chairman of a political committee 
whose whole experience unfits him to become 
the public official indicated by the President. 

The case of Postmaster Rice is much strong¬ 
er. He is all and more than the President 
asks for. At the end of four years there are 
more republican than democratic subordi¬ 
nates employed under this democratic post¬ 
master. Over two hundred and seventy-five 
republican patr 9 ns of the office were willing 
publicly to petition for his retention. Four¬ 
teen republican papers, including the Boston 
Journal, the Boston TranscHpt, the Haverhill 
Gazette, the Palmer Journal, the Brattleborn 
Pluenix commend the efforts of the Springfield 
Republican to retain the services of such a man. 
The President has always expressed a tender¬ 
ness for the veterans of the civil war. What 
ruler, except in the United States, would even 
consider the brutal discharge [the four years 
tenure is nothing except an opportunity for 
evasion] of an employe of the highest efficiency 
and popularity, a veteran with this record, 
which we copy from the Republican: 

John L. Rice enlisted April 19, 1861, in the 
2d New Hampshire regiment. It was the very 
day when the first Union soldiers, men of the 
Massachusetts 6th, were slain in the streets of 
Baltimore. In the first battle of Bull Run, in 
the final struggle for the Henry hill, just be¬ 
fore ihe stampede of the Federal army. Rice 
fell with a musket ball through the lungs. He 
was borne off' by his comrades toward Sudley 
church, which had been taken for a hospital, 
but being sharply pursued, and thinking him 
dead, they left him under a fence. There 
he lav two days, unconscious, and was found 
by a Virginian and his wife who had been tak¬ 
ing care of the wounded men in Sudley church, 
they cleansed his festering wounds, tended 
and fed him, until the end of ten days he could 
be moved. He was taken to Manassas Junc¬ 
tion, placed on board a freight car, and con¬ 
veyed with other prisoners to Richmond. 
In Libby prison, 14 days after the battle. Rice 
for the first time had his wound properly 
dressed. Meantime, he had been reported 
dead, and his friends at home had held funer¬ 
al services. In Libby he remained six months 


when he was exchanged, and immediately re¬ 
joined his regiment, although for several 
months he was unable to carry more than his 
musket and ammunition. He served in its 
ranks, through all its battles on the Peninsula 
and in Pope’s Bull Run campaign, at South 
Mountain and at Antietam. On the field of 
Antietam the governor of New Hampshire 
found him doing guard duty and promoted 
him to a captaincy. Capt. Rice was among 
the troops detailed to accompany Gen. Banks 
when he went to Louisiana to relieve Gen. 
Butler. 

There ought to be no objection to a thorough 
investigation of the operations of the civil ser¬ 
vice commission and no friend of the merit 
system will make any. Somethings are, how¬ 
ever, clear without any investigation. One is 
that no relative of any member of the commis¬ 
sion should be in its employ. After the years 
of public scandal of appointing officers giving 
offices to relatives, for the civil service com¬ 
mission to have such a case is per se improper. 


In the same line, also. Senator Edmunds cuts 
a poor figure in the matter of the proposed 
Dudley investigation. That he could read 
Dudley’s letter and not get up and heartily 
second the investigation is a grave disappoint¬ 
ment to many who have for years believed 
that Senator Edmunds would never be afraid 
to hunt for the truth and face it. This mat¬ 
ter can not be allowed to rest here. Dudley 
wrote that letter;* unimpeachable witnesses 
have sworn to his signature. The district at¬ 
torney of Indiana illegally prevented his ar¬ 
rest and pronounced his letter honorable and 
patriotic, and still, by sufferance of President 
Harrison, unbearably disgraces his office by 
occupancy. These facts make a situation 
which can not be ignored. The administra¬ 
tion and its party will have to learn the lesson 
that discovered scoundrels must become dis¬ 
carded and discountenanced scoundrels. Not 
withstanding all that has occurred, it is not 
by any means certain that with a prosecutor 
who meant to do his duty Dudley could not 
yet be sent to prison. 

A remarkable and disgraceful struggle be¬ 
tween Congressman Dalzell and Congressman 
Quay over the Pittsburgh post-office has recent¬ 
ly come to a close in the triumph of Quay. 
Complete statements of each side are given in 
another column. Their frankness is truly as¬ 
tonishing. Dalzell says, “ The President *■ * 
seems to think that precedent could not stand 
against the demand of the chairman of the 
national committee. ^ * It is a wrong 
against the representative of my district.” 
Quay says, “The President is the absolute 
arbiter of all federal patronage. » * *. 

The fact is that the city organization of Pitts¬ 
burgh has, until very recently, been exceed¬ 
ingly hostile to me, and the Pittsburgh post- 
office embraces about three hundred appoint¬ 
ments, which to put it mildly, I decline to 
have placed in the hands of my adversaries. 
*■ * The President * * could not under 

the circumstances well avoid complying with 
my wishes.” Will President Harrison read 


the constitution of the United States and say 
that he is not disgraced by this transaction? 
Not only his oath of office, but his manhood is 
trampled upon and dragged in the dirt. 


The Maryland opponents of American feud¬ 
alism and of Mr. Gorman as its striking ex¬ 
ample, have now been for several years giving 
Senator Gorman Pyrrhus-like victories. There 
are signs that these assaults have told on even 
Senator Gorman’s nerves, and that his hand has 
lost somewhat of its cunning. A ballot-reform 
bill would be inconvenient for the carrying 
out of his political methods, but a ballot-re¬ 
form bill had been promised. He therefore 
prepared a crafty speech, which was intended 
only for the ears of the county weekly papers, 
and which was to give them the keynote of 
opposition to the Australian system, and to 
undo the chance of passing any bill. But 
Mr. Gorman’s speech got into print, and the 
outcome was such a burst of public disap¬ 
proval that he felt obliged to announce that 
he would explain more fully his opinions 
about ballot reform. There are bad days 
ahead for the Maryland boss. 


Delegate E. M. Clements of Petersburg, has 
introduced into the Virginia legislature a bill 
providing for non-partisan boards of fire and 
police commissioners in cities, who shall after 
e.xamination of applicants, without reference 
to political opinion, nominate men for posi¬ 
tions in those departments. The common 
council has the confirmation of the nomina¬ 
tion. The term of office in the departments 
named is six years, one third going out each 
year. This is not a complete merit .system, 
but it is a step and it will be a very consider¬ 
able step in a state that has been ridden by 
Mahoneism. 

In connection with this bill the Petersburg 
Progress gives some interesting facts about the 
government of that city. In 1869 a military 
order put out the democrats and filled their 
places with republicans. Early in 1870 under 
the new constitution the democrats came in 
and turned out all the republicans. In May, 
1870, after a city election, the republicans got 
control and turned out all the democrats. In 
1874 the democrats in turn put out all the ’ 
republicans. In 1882 Mahone coalitionists 
got control and swept out the democrats. In 
1888 the city council again became demo¬ 
cratic and made the last clean sweep. After 
the rotation of 1882, a large fire occured from 
lack of a known convenient supply of water. 
Within one hundred feet of the burning build¬ 
ing was a reservoir with abundance of water, 
but so complete had been the application of 
the rule of “giving some else a chance” that 
not a person connected with the fire depart¬ 
ment knew of this cistern. It was as com¬ 
pletely lost as a buried city. 


Two of the three recent post-office appointees 
from the top of the eligible list are stated to 
be democrats. 

















88 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The appointment by the President of John 
B. Harlow as postmaster of St. Louis is not 
only a creditable act, in that it gives a large 
city a good postmaster, but the promotion of a 
faithful and efficient clerk to be the head of 
an office is the very essence of the merit sys¬ 
tem. A curious injustice of the spoils system 
has been the custom of going out to select an 
inexperienced man to be the head of a depart¬ 
ment, and to consume months in teaching him 
his duties, and to ignore the men whose 
fidelity and efficiency had earned them the 
right of promotion. The civil service law has 
thus largely been in the hands of its enemies. 
The men who have entered the service under 
the merit system, trained to the belief that 
their chief duty was to do the best work pos¬ 
sible, have been superintended by working 
politicians, trained in the belief that the of¬ 
fice was to be made the backbone of the par¬ 
ty’s strength. This has been a constant menace 
and peril to the law, and to the men who have 
entered the service under the law. Every 
time the President promotes a worthy federal 
employe he strengthens the principles of the 
merit system the country over. 


Census Superintendent Porter, according to 
the Indianapolis Journal, says : “ It will simply 
be impossible to see any more applicants for 
clerical positions. My whole time has nearly 
been consumed in talking with applicants. 
The business of the office has been neglected.” 
The responsibility for this condition of things 
is upon the President. Long ago the civil serv¬ 
ice commission not only offered to furnish the 
clerks for the census bureau under the system 
of open competition, which permitted tests 
that would have supplied the best class of men, 
but urged upon the President the adoption of 
this course. He refused with deliberation, 
and it is no injustice to him to say that he re¬ 
fused with the sole object of giving his party 
the benefit of the use of these places as spoil. 
The result was, of course, inevitable. A su¬ 
perintendent of the census, who has in hand a 
work which would tax to the utmost the capa¬ 
bilities of the ablest specialist, if absolutely 
free for that work alone, has his whole time 
consumed in “ talking with applicants,” and 
in trying to find quarters at the expense of the 
people for multitudes of congressional hench¬ 
men. 


The attention of the esteemed civil service 
reform league of Indiana is invited to the fact 
that the postmaster at Fort Wayne has just 
been elected a member of the republican cen¬ 
tral committee of Allen county. Mr. Cleve¬ 
land didn’t permit federal office-holders to be¬ 
come members of political committees, but he 
wasn’t a good enough civil service man for the 
Indiana reformers, so they helped elect Har 
rison, who has no objection whatever to federal 
office-holders acting in this capacity. The In¬ 
diana reformers are what Sam Weller would 
call a “rum lot,” sure enough .—Indianapolis 
Sentinel. 

There is no more gratifying sign of the in¬ 
crease of public sentiment against the use of 
public offices as personal or party spoil than is 


afforded by the Sentinel under its new manage¬ 
ment. This management evidently has not 
read the back numbers of that paper. If it 
had, it would find that Mr. Cleveland’s post¬ 
master Kaough, at Fort Wayne, was one of the 
most pestiferous party workers during his 
whole term of office. As chief marshal of the 
federal office-holders in the service of Congress¬ 
man Lowry, he led his party to disaster in the 
twelfth district in 1886. He was one of the 
large class of brazen insulters and contemners 
in Indiana of Mr. Cleveland’s orders and de¬ 
clared principles. In a friendly way, we ad¬ 
vise the Sentinel to avoid comparisons like 
this. Those who lived here at the time were 
long suffering and are full of facts. Ugly as 
those facts are,they do not in any manner ex¬ 
cuse President Harrison, and it is a vicious 
impropriety to allow the postmaster at Fort 
Wayne to be a member of a republican county 
committee. 

THE AMERICAN-DEMOCRATIC AN¬ 
TI-CHINESE-SYSTEM. 

This pork is fat enough to kill, and it 
ought to be disposed of while the political 
k)nl^ is sharp and the water hot, so as to 
give place to a few of the lean and hungry 
republican shoats who have been rooting 
and digging for the last four years in hopes 
to get a whack at Uncle Sam’s crib before 
the corn is all gone. — S. ft. Stratton, President 
of the Pennsylvania Republican Association in 
Washington, Aug. 29, 1SS9. 

—Jeffersonville— The republicans of this city are 
indignant over the appointment of Major A. M. Luke 
as postmaster. He, like all other appointees here 
held office for years when Cleveland came in. The 
Lincoln League last night burned all campaign out¬ 
fits and Harrison’s pictures, as expressive of its dis¬ 
like.—Special to IndianayoHs News. 

—Sullivan— The republican wrangle for postmaster 
at Sullivan yesterday culminated in a mass meeting, 
and E. P. Lacey, deputy postmaster at Sullivan in 
Garfield’s time, was named as the choice. J. P- 
Clugage, editor of the Union, who is also an aspir¬ 
ant, refused to go into this meeting. 

—Berne— After a bitter wrangle John N. Sullivan, 
an old soldier, was appointed postmaster at Berne, 
and he moved the post oflSce into a drug store owned 
by a democrat. This added additional fuel to the ill- 
feeling already existing, and the di.sgruntled repub¬ 
licans were successful in getting Sullivan’s appoint¬ 
ment revoked, and a township committeeman named 
Wagoner appointed. The latter refuses to qualify, 
and the tangle is greater than ever.—Indianapolis 
News. 

—Logansport— It is stated that the postotfice tight 
in Logansport has been settled, and that Congress 
man W. D. Owen will recommend the appointment oj 
Daniel W. Tomlinson, chairman of the Republican 
county central committee.—Indianapolis Journal. 

—Muncie— We made a gain of 480 for Harrisoin 
showing the second largest gain of any county in the 
state. Yet we have not secured a single appoint¬ 
ment. Marion county lost 1,100 and the annual sal¬ 
aries of the citizens who have been appointed from 
Indianapolis will aggregate $200,000. If this is good 
politics, we don’t know anything about politics 
Probably this accounts for the indifference up our 
way.— Intel view in Indianapolis News, 
—Monroeville— Monroeville republicans are so 
determinedly opposed to Hugh Stewart, recently ap¬ 
pointed postmaster, that a boycott has been organ¬ 
ized against the office, and citizens have arranged for 
a pony express, and send their mail to a little town 


across the Ohio line to be loiwaided.—Indianapolis 
Netvs. 

—The Monroeville postotfice war continues. U. S. 
Marshall Blair was there last week for the purpose of 
looking into the affair, and found that the majority 
of the people would have nothing at all to do with 
the postotfice, mailed their letters upon passing 
trains, and purchased their stamps at Fort Wayne. 
—Indianapolis News. 

—The squabble over the Monroeville r ost-office has 
been settled by the resignation of Hugh Stewart, 
who takes a place in one of the departments at 
Washington, while George Webster succeeds him as 
postmaster. Captain J. B. Davis, another applicant, 
has been appointed government agent for the Sioux 
Indians. The situation is still further ameliorated in 
Allen county by making Robert A. Liggett, of Fort 
Wayne, revenue guager for that district, vice Edward 
R. Sweet, remoyed.—Indianapolis News. 

—Kokomo.— Almost the last act of President Ar¬ 
thur was to nominate Colonel Milt. Garrigus, of Ko¬ 
komo, as collector of that revenue district, but Gen¬ 
eral Harrison was a member of the senate committee, 
investigating certain charges which had been pre¬ 
ferred, and Garrigus was not confirmed through his 
efforts. In the last campaign Garrigus was chairman 
of the Howard county central committee, and he in¬ 
creased the republican majority. After Harrison’s 
inauguration he filed an application to be appointed 
postmaster of Kokomo, but his friends have been 
notified by Harrison that he can not be appointed, 
because of the old accusation, which has been with¬ 
drawn from the senate, and of which the only copy 
is in possession of one man, who has notified the 
President that no one save himself can produce the 
charge against Garrigus, and that it is his property. 
President Harrison, however, is determined not to 
appoint Garrigus, although Congressman Cheadle is 
making a personal fight for him, and in consequence, there 
is great hubbub in this section of the state.—Special to In¬ 
dianapolis News, June 8, 1889. 

—WiNAMAC— A correspondent of the Indianapolis 
Sentinel states that Congressman Owen recommended 
the editor of the Winamac Republican for postmaster, 
but that the President refused, on the ground that 
there were too many old soldiers who had been neg¬ 
lected. However, he was told that any compromise 
which might be reached whereby Editor Atchison 
could receive a portion of the salary from any of the 
soldier candidates, the appointment would be made 
in harmony with the compromise. Mr. Owen so in¬ 
formed the committee, who made the proposition to 
each of the soldier candidates for the position that if 
he would pay Atchison $200 per year out of the sal¬ 
ary, that his appointment would be made forthwith. 
E. N. Hughes, George Douglass and Johnny James, 
all honest and highly respected citizens, were the 
soldier candidates, but they concluded that they 
would take the ‘‘entire swine” or none. Another 
soldier was then approached, who accepted the terms 
made by the committee, and he being the highest 
and best bidder, at the recommendation of Congress¬ 
man Owen and by order of Chief Harrison, the post- 
office was ‘‘ knocked off” to him.—Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel. 

—Franklin— Our city is all torn up over the new 
postmaster. Certainly the slick six here got in their 
work. As against either of his leading opponents, 
Richardson or McLaughlin, he could not have got 
one vote in ten. I have heard prominent republi¬ 
cans denounce his appointment most emphatically. 
There was a call published to the old soldiers to meet 
Saturday, and, if possible, to defeat this very nomi¬ 
nation. which was telegraphed to Washington, and 
the appointment hastened to head off any expression 
from them.—LeMer to Indianapolis Sentinel. 

—Portland —It had a soldier democratic post¬ 
master with nearly three years time yet to serve in 
office. He was removed and a republican appointed. 
Postmaster Lowrie was the most popular official who 
has ever served in the office, and a man in needy 
circumstances He was given the “ razzle-dazzle.” 
There were six republican candidates—Levi L. Gil¬ 
pin, a gallant soldier; Nimrod Headington, a gallant 
soldier; Thomas Bosworth, a gallant soldier; Theo¬ 
dore Baily, a gallant soldier; Mr. Buck, a gallant 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


89 


soldier (every one has a good soldier record), and 
Elias J. Marsh, a civilian and a crank. Marsh was 
appointed. There is no more unpopular man in hi 
own party. The kicking ismighiy among the repub_ 
lican cohorts. It was totally unexpected here that 
Marsh would get the appointment. His candidacy 
was laughed at, but Congressman Browne, of Win¬ 
chester, was enlisted in his behalf and the appoint¬ 
ment, it seems, was easily ob'ained.—letter in In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel. 

—Greenfield— Word has reached this city that 
Mr. Isaac Davis has been appointed postmaster of 
Greenfield vice N. P. Howard, jr., removed. This 
change has been looked for for some time past, as it 
was known to be the choice of Col. Richard Alex¬ 
ander Black, the boss of the republican graveyard. 
It will require several days to file the necessaiy pa¬ 
pers to enable Mr. Davis to enjoy the possession of 
the prize. The appointment is not sa'isfactory to a 
large number of republicans, esjeciatly our friend^ 
Mr. Montgomery, editor of the Greenfield Republicaii. 
—Hancock Democrat. 

—Columbus— Republicans, twelve or fifteen in 
number, who want the post-office, with their friends 
held a convention last night to try to settle on a 
man to be recommended for the Columbus post, 
office. When the time arrived, three or four aspir. 
ants, with their followers, bolted and swore they 
would not abide by the decision reached. The 
wrangle was kept up until a late hour, when the 
choiee fell on Amos Hartman, a groceryman. There 
is great dissatisfaetion, and the party is torn up in 
consequence.— Indianapolis Sentinel. 

—The Reelsville post-office was a bone of conten¬ 
tion until the appointment of G. L. Elliott was made 
a week or two since. Mr. Elliott no sooner got pos¬ 
session of the office than “an influence” was 
brought to bear on the powers that be by which 
his removal was efiected, and the offiee was given to 
Mr. J. P. Gaskin. We are not advised as to the 
causes leading to the change.—Putnam Democrat 
Jan. 8, 1890. 

—Indianapolis — The appointment of Nicholas 
Ensley as pension agent at this point has stirred up 
trouble for the administration. President Harrison’s 
old regiment, the seventieth, is sizzling hot. When 
the regiment met here to attend Harrison’s inaugu¬ 
ration in a body, there were 145 members from all 
parts of the country. Before starting to the union 
station the regiment held a meeting and passed a 
series of resolutions indorsing Colonel Merrill and 
asking President Harrison to appoint him to an of¬ 
fice, as a compliment to the regiment and a reward 
for his services in Harrison’s behalf. These resolutions 
were intrusted to Captain P. S. Carson, of Southport, 
and Lieutenant Hadley, of Logansport, who pre¬ 
sented them to the President. No request was made 
for any particular office. The President is believed 
to have promised to look after Colonel Merrill at the 
proper time. He was suggested for the post office, but 
didn’t get it; then for collector of internal revenue, 
and that appointment went el.sewhere. The collec- 
torship of customs also went fleeting. 

“ There was nothing left for us, then,” said a prom¬ 
inent member of the regiment, “ except the pension 
agency, and we felt assured that Colonel Merrill 
would get that. Harrison has gone back on us and 
we are disappointed. We are unable to understand 
the President’s treatment of his old regiment. The 
boys had their hearts set on having Colonel Merrill 
rewarded. It looks to us very much like that por¬ 
tion of our regiment which has always been in office 
has absorbed all the pap there is for the regiment, 
and that it is not worth while for anybody to apply 
who ha.sn’tthe Slick Six’s ears. We have nothing 
against Ensley, but here was a chance to stir up en¬ 
thusiasm by a capital appointment, but it isn’t made, 
aud we don’t understand it.”— Indianapolis News. 

—Russellville— The appointment of J. W. Harvey 
as postmaster at this place is not sati.sfactory at all to a 
majority of the republicans here. Uriah Brown, the 
present postmaster, was appointed under the demo¬ 
cratic administration on the resignation of the form¬ 
er postmaster, on a republican petition signed by 
fifty of the most prominent republicans here, and 
since the present administration went in, another 


petition signed by more than one hundred repub¬ 
licans was forwarded. Also a personal letter from 
Ira J. Chase was sent to the postmaster general rec¬ 
ommending him. All the republicans except a^ew 
hustlers, the most of them applicants for the office, 
were .satisfied. Mr. Brown is a stanch republican; 
has lived here for thirty years ; is one of the best cit- 
zens, and not able to work and make a living. There 
is not a single person here that can say a word of 
harm of him. Harvey is a physician, has plenty to 
live on, has only lived here three or four years, and 
wants the office for some one else. Simplybecau.se 
Mr. Brown was appointed by a democrat he must be 
removed by his own party and against his party’s 
wishes.—Indianapolis Sentinel Special, June 12, 1889. 

—Clay City — Petitions are being prepared in 
which a vigorous protest will be made against what 
is claimed to be an outrage upon the people of this 
place and neighborhood. Brown is a republican 
without guile, and has given universal satisfaction. 
Mrs. Wilbur, it is asserted, is unable to read and 
write, and the office is an important one. She is 
the widow of Joseph Wilbur, who, while intoxicated 
and returning from a republican rally last fall, fell 
from the cars and was killed. He was one of the re¬ 
publican committeemen of this township at the 
time.—Indianapolis Sentinel. 

—Cumberland — The applicants were Edward 
Bonge, a postmaster under a former republican ad¬ 
ministration ; Lewis Wasting wanted it because his 
father had been a soldier in Harrison’s regiment; 
Samuel P. Davis wanted it because he was a soldier 
and a member of the Cumberlund G. A. R. post. 
Bonge and Wasting both circulated petitions, which 
were sent to the department. Bonge finally secured 
the appointment and the old soldiers were knocked 
out.—Indianapolis Sentinel. 

—Noblesville —The greatest dissatisfaction seems 
to exist up in Congressman Cheadle’s district, where 
both the Congressman and the President are being 
severely criticised on account of a good many un¬ 
satisfactory appointments. Congressman Cheadle 
and a good many of his constituents were around 
the hotel yesterday afternoon and last night, and it 
was quite evident from their actions that there was 
not a unity of feeling 

State Senator Boyd, of Noblesville, is one of Chea¬ 
dle’s constituents who has become thoroughly dis¬ 
gusted with the congressman’s appointments. Chea¬ 
dle, it seems, recommended Jake Frybarger for post¬ 
master at Noblesville, although Boyd and nearly all 
the patrons of the office wanted another man. Fry¬ 
barger is not even a resident of the township in 
which Noblesville is situated, and does not get his 
mail at that office. At Westfield, where two old 
soldiers were candidates for the postoffice, Cheadle 
gave the place to the widow of a democrat, and at 
Windfall, where nearly a unanimous vote was cast 
fora man named Swoveland for postmaster, he gave 
the place to a man who wasn’t thought of for the 
place.— Indianapolis News. 

—Congressman Cheadle has withdrawn the name 
of Jacob Frybarger, whom he had selected as post¬ 
master at Noblesville, and Nathan Royer, a resident 
of the place, has been recommended.— Indianapolis 
News. 

—Mitchell— Another of the predictions made in 
these dispatches regarding the appointment of an 
Indiana postmaster has bean verified. Wood, the 
original purchaser, has been made postmaster at 
Mitchell. Soon after the meeting of the chairmen of 
republican county committees of Indiana, at Indian, 
apolis, to eonfer with Harrison and the state bosses 
in September, 1888, when, it will be remembered, 
the county chairmen were authorized to auction off 
the post-offices in their counties in order to raise some 
needed ready money. Wood bid $250 for the Mitchell 
post-office, and it was knocked down to him. By 
some mistake—it is to be presumed it was a mis¬ 
take—the county committee at the same time ac¬ 
cepted a bid of $300 from a patriot named Hobbs for 
the same post-office at Mitchell that had been knock¬ 
ed down to Wood. 

After the election a dispute arose between Wood 
and Hobbs over the office. Both had receipts show¬ 
ing that they had paid their good cash for the office. 


The fight became hot and embarrassed the bosses 
greatly. To add to the embarrassment the local 
grand army post put forward a wounded veteran for 
the office, who was a very capable man. Because of 
the fight the democratic incumbent has been con¬ 
tinued in the service up to this time. Harrison was 
appealed to personally, and told the Mitchell breth¬ 
ren that they would have to fix matters amicably 
among thems Ives before he took action. It was 
finally arranged that Wood was to pay to Hobbs the 
$300 he put up for the office during the campaign. 
The office, therefore, has cost Wood $550—he bid $250 
himself originally, and had to give Hobbs, the other 
bidder, the money he put up, and which was fraud¬ 
ulently or mistakenly accepted by the county chair¬ 
man. 

W'ood’s name was sent to the senate a few days 
ago.— Dispatch to St. Louis Republic, Jan. 17,1890. 

—Greencastle— Perhaps the most interesting post- 
mastership contest now in progress in Indiana is to 
be found at Greencastle. The following list is sup, 
posed to contain the name of the next postmaster, 
together with the names of his defeated opponents : 
James McD. Hays, a merchant; Major Jonathan 
Burch, an attorney; Captain L. P. Chapin, a mer¬ 
chant; Private J. B. Sellers, of Putnamville; Mrs. 
Jeannette Preston; A. A. Smith, editor of the Times. 
—Indianapolis News. 

—The office being of the presidential class, and 
President Harrison’s experience with it in times 
past being somewhat educational, it would be 
strange if he were not disposed to profit by that ex¬ 
perience. While a member of the Senate, he was re¬ 
quired by a custom “ more honored in the breach 
than the observance” to recommend the appoint¬ 
ment of a postmaster for Greencastle by President 
Arthur. There was a long and bitter contest over 
the succession, which finally terminated in the re¬ 
appointment of Postmaster Langsdale. The senator 
was beseiged with letters, petitions, remonstrances, 
charges and countercharges, and visiting delegations 
with duly accredited spokesmen waited upon him 
at Washington and Indianapolis to lay their griev¬ 
ances before him. It is charged, and the President 
is doubtless led to believe, that the same influences 
are at work in the present contest.—Puhiam Democrat 

The two candidates are A. A. Smith, editor of the 
Times, and James McD. Hays, a merchant. The lat¬ 
ter represents the faction which stood by George J. 
Langsdale, now president of the state soldiers’ mon¬ 
ument association, when he was a citizen of Green¬ 
castle, being the postmaster and editor of the Green¬ 
castle Banner, and after he had aroused against 
himself the ire of about half the republicans of 
Putnam county because of his domineering meth¬ 
ods, notwithstanding he was one of the brightest 
political writers and best political workers among 
the republicans in the state. Mr. Smith’s paper 
was started in the interest of the anti-Laugsdale 
faction. 

—It has been several months since President Har. 
rison appointed a postmaster for Greencastle, but 
many old soldiers of the town, and a good many other 
citizens,ha?e not yet forgiven him for the way he went 
counter to the desire of the patrons of the office in 
making the appointment, Jonathan Birch, a maimed 
soldier,was indorsed for the position by three-fourths 
of the patrons of the office, and had the support 
of the old soldiers in Putnam county. 

A leading Greencastle republican, who was in the 
city yesterday, tells this story of how Mr. Harrison 
treated Mr. Birch and his supporters; “Just before 
the time of the old postmaster had expired Alpheus 
Birch, the woolen goods manufacturer, went to 
Washington at the request of the old soldiers in the 
interest of his brother. After he had stated to the 
President the object of his visit, the President be¬ 
came irritated and demanded to know what was the 
matter with the people of Greencastle, that they 
were all the time quarreling about who should be 
postmaster. Mr. Birch said that if there was any 
quarrel his brother and his friends were not respon¬ 
sible for it. He saw the President would not give 
him a hearing, and he withdrew from the room. 
The friends of Major Birch were mad when they heard 




















90 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


of the incident. In a few days the appointment of 
one of the civilian candidates was announced 
(Langsdale’s man, Hays, was appointed). He will 
probably make a good postmaster, but his appoint¬ 
ment was unpopular.”—Jndjaviajjoh's News. 


—Hamjiond—C ongressman Owen’s postmaster does 
not give satisfaction to the editor of the Daily Tri¬ 
bune, the republican organ. It says: 

The salary that is paid to the postmaster at Ham¬ 
mond is enough to secure the services of a qualified 
officer, who would be willing to give to its duties 
his personal supervision ; but this is not done by the 
present inciimbent, nor has he pretended to do so 
since receiving his appointment, subscribing to the 
oath of office, and drawing the salary; but he farms 
out the office to persons whose chief aim seems to be: 
To discriminate between the patrons of the post- 
office: to deliver mail to unauthorized persons; to 
disobey the special orders of the higher officials of 
the postoffice department; to intercept and delay 
mail matter which has been deposited for transmis¬ 
sion to other destinations ; to withhold mail matter 
from delivery to the persons addressed, sometimes as 
long as six and eight hours after its arrival; and to 
study to make the service as vexatious as they can 
for persons against whom they harbor petty mali¬ 
cious spite—in short, the postoffice at Hammond is in 
the hands of those who appear to strive to administer 
the duties in a manner so outrageous as to make the 
service welluigh contemptible to the public. Mean¬ 
time the public service which he undertakes and is 
sworn to discharge, and for which he is paid a liberal 
salary to perform, goes to the dogs, and “ you be 
d—d.” =1' « «• 

It is singular, even strange, indeed, that President 
Harrison is so partial in the disposition of public 
benefits. Perhaps, however, the cause may be “a 
little owen,” to use a backwoods vernacular, to the 
misrepresentation returned to Washington from the 
tenth congressional district. Time enough has 
elapsed for this slipshod manner of treating the 
public service to be discontinued, and for salutary 
reforms to be introduced and enforced in accord¬ 
ance with the spirit and design of the law. Some¬ 
thing different is required by a city of six thousand 
inhabitants and a numerous transient shifting pop¬ 
ulation, from the rural, back-country, fourth-class 
post-office service. 

AMERICAN FEUDALISM, 

Services were free and base. Free ser¬ 
vice was to pay a sum of money, or serve 
under the lord in war. Base service was 
to plow the lord’s land, to make his hedge 
or carry out his dung. — Blackstone. 

The appointment of William W. Johnson 
as postmaster at Baltimore terminates a bitter 
struggle for that place extending over mouths. 
Large delegations of Baltimoreans, number¬ 
ing, in some instances, as high as fifty, have 
visited the White House by appointment and 
submitted arguments for and against Johnson. 
* * The appointment, therefore, may serve 
as an indication of the material Mr. Harrison 
has a liking for. In the first place the Presi¬ 
dent rejected a thorough going business man 
and selected a very active politician. Mr. 
Johnson organized the republican league clubs in 
Maryland, and is president of the largest one in 
Baltimore. He ivas v, member of the Maryland 
republican central committee for four years, and as 
its treasurer handled the campaign fund in 1884. 
—Springfield Republican. 

—Victor L. Ricketts, editor of the Delphi 
Journal, was some days ago appointed clerk to 
the house committee on immigration and 


navigation, of which Mr. Owen is chairman. 
Mr. Ricketts, who is one of the leading repub¬ 
lican w’orkers in his district, has not yet ar¬ 
rived to enter upon his official duties, but is 
soon expected.— Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal. 

—While the case against one Chairs, a dem¬ 
ocrat of Leon countv, Florida, was being tried 
in the United States court at Jacksonville yes¬ 
terday, C. C. Kirk, a deputy United States 
marshal, was put on the stand and reluctantly 
produced the following letter : 

Jacksonville, Fla., July 5,1889. 

C. C. Kirk, Esq., Deland, Fla.: 

Sir— You will at once confer with Mr. Bielby and 
make out a list of fifty or sixty names of true and 
tried republicans from your county registration list 
for jurors in the United States court and forward the 
same to Mr. P. Walters, clerk of the United States 
court, and it is necessary to have them at once, as 
you can see. Please acknowledge this. 

I am, yours truly, 

John R. Mizell, U. 8. Marshal. 

P. S.—Please get the names of parties as near the 
steamboat and railroad stations as possible. 

The law provides that the names of jurors 
shall be selected without regard to political 
affiliations. Judge Swayne, however, would 
not admit the letter in evidence. 

—The district attorney for the southern dis¬ 
trict of Iowa has made W. C. Howell, Mrs. 
Harrison’s cousin, his assistant. 

—A small fourth-class post-office in the town 
of Winters, Yolo county, California, was held 
by a poor widow, Mrs. L. W. McKinley. On 
the slender salary she supported herself, two 
children, and an aged father and mother. 

Her appointment under President Cleveland 
was non-political. The office had been pre¬ 
viously held by Mr. Moody, a distant relative 
of ex-President Hayes. Mr. Moody resigned 
on the change of administration in 1885, and 
his successor defaulted and was removed. On 
the petition of the people of the town, Mrs. Mc¬ 
Kinley was made postmistress and gave satis¬ 
faction to the department and the people, as ap¬ 
peared by the favorable report of the post-office 
inspectors and by a long petition for her reten¬ 
tion. The third district, in which this post- 
office is situated, is represented by Hon. Joseph 
McKenna, who before his election had ex¬ 
pressed his satisfaction with the efficiency of 
this lady as postmistress. After election came 
the payment of private political debts, and 
this poor widow had to be sacrificed to the 
political ambition of this brave representa¬ 
tive. 

The only breath of dissatisfaction that has 
reached her is the vague insinuation at the 
end of the following letter, addressed to her in 
reply to a request for reasons for her removal: 

SUISUN, Cal., May 14,18S9. 

Dear Mad A ME— Received your letter. Engagements 
and absence have prevented answering sooner. With 
change of administration there is usually a change of 
officers appointed by the successful political party, and 
there is no blame necessarily implied by the removal. Of 
course there is more reluctance to remove a lady 
than a gentleman. You say I expressed this reluc¬ 
tance. Very likely; but there is some discontent of 
you into which I think I ought to inquire. 

Respectfully, J. McKenn , 

To Mrs. McKinley. 


Notice the insinuation is that, after he has 
caused her removal, he is going to look into 
“some discontent of her.” This is but one in¬ 
stance of thousands like it. Nor do we for 
this particular case lay any special blame on 
the President, apart from his allowing a meth¬ 
od to continue which is sure to work such in¬ 
justice to individuals as well as to corrupt 
politics.— Civil Service Record for January. 

—Philadelphia, December 19.—A Washing¬ 
ton dispatch to the Press gives the following 
statement of Representative Dalzell about the 
appointment of Mr. McKean to be postmaster 
at Pittsburgh: 

I have long expected the appointment to be 
made. Mr. Wanamaker, at my first interview 
with him, openly announced himself on the 
side of Mr. Quay, as against me. The Presi¬ 
dent, conceding the force of precedent, seemed 
to think that precedent could not stand against 
the demands of the chairman of the national 
committee. 

I think the appointment an unfortunate one 
for many reasons, which I do not care to par¬ 
ticularize; not because Mr. McKean is the 
man, but for other reasons. Mr. McKean has 
known all along that my feeling for him per¬ 
sonally is of the kindest character, and that 
my fight against him involved, in my honest 
judgment, a principle for which I was morally 
bound to contend. Those who know me know 
that personally I care not at all for patronage, 
and that the dispensation of it is the most dis¬ 
agreeable part of my duties. The appoint¬ 
ment does not change my opinion in the least. 
I stand now where I stood before it was made. 

It is a wrong against the representative of 
my district. It is an indefensible violation of 
republican precedent. It is a wrong done at 
the dictation of a selfish grinding bossism, as 
to which the self-respect of the people of Penn¬ 
sylvania will sooner or later (I think very 
soon) vindicate itself. Every wrong brings its 
own fruits. This one will prove no exception 
to the rule. I am glad that the suspense is 
over; I can now dismiss the subject from my 
mind and attend to what I consider the legiti¬ 
mate duties of a representative to try and leg¬ 
islate wisely for the country. 

Senator Quay was^hown Mr. Dalzell’s state¬ 
ment. He read it over carefully, and then 
dictated the following reply : 

In the first place the President is the abso¬ 
lute arbiter of all federal patronage. In the 
second place, in all presidential appointments 
the constitution gives the senate the right to 
advise and consent. Nowhere in the consti¬ 
tution or in written or unwritten law is there 
a single word requiring the President to con¬ 
sult representatives about presidential ap¬ 
pointments ; but in the nature of things the 
President can not be acquainted with the per¬ 
sonal character or political standing of appli¬ 
cants, and he must, therefore, consult some 
one, it may be a congressman, or it may be a 
personal friend living in the district. 

As to the Pittsburgh postoffice, no precedent 
has ever been established as to whether the 
senator or the representative should be recog¬ 
nized in relation to that office, for the reason 
that heretofore the people controlling the pol¬ 
itics of Allegheny county and sending its rep¬ 
resentatives to congress have always been in 
accord with the senator from western Penn¬ 
sylvania. The appointment of Mr. McKean 
does not violate, but establishes a precedent. 

As to Mr. McKean, the circumstances at¬ 
tending my advocacy of his claim to appoint¬ 
ment are briefly these : Gentlemen favorable 
to Mr. McKean waited on me in relation to 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


91 


his candidacy. I told them that I wished to 
know before committing myself whether the 
appointment of Mr, McKean would be satis¬ 
factory to Mr. Dalzell, Mr. Henry S Paul, 
president of the Americus Club of Pittsburgh, 
and Mr. McKean subsequently informed me 
that they had waited upon Mr. Dalzell, and 
that he had said that the appointment of Mr. 
McKean would be entirely satisfactory if he 
were sustained by the sentiment of the busi¬ 
ness people of Pittsburgh. If I am in error in 
this statement either of these gentlemen can 
correct me. Neither of them is unfriendly to 
Dalzell. I then said to Mr. Paul that I would 
do what I could to secure the appointment of 
Mr. McKean. There is no absolute difference 
between Mr. Dalzell and myself in relation to 
Allegheny county politics. What difference 
there is lies under and beyond him, as all men 
familliar with the politics of western Pennsyl¬ 
vania well understand. 

Promptly after the announcement of Mr. 
McKean’s candidacy Mr. Ford was produced 
as a candidate. He is president of the select 
council in Pittsburgh, and is in absolute ac¬ 
cord with the gentlemen who returned Mr. 
Dalzell to congress, and who, as everybody 
knows in western Pennsylvania, are my oppo¬ 
nents. I have no more objection to Mr. Ford 
than Mr. Dalzell seems to have to Mr. 
McKean, Mr. Ford is a former resident of 
Beaver county, where he has hitherto often 
assisted me in county conventions, but he was 
at least no better qualified for the postmaster¬ 
ship than Mr. McKean, and he did not have 
the business backing which Mr. McKean pro¬ 
duced, and I saw no reason, when Mr. Ford’s 
candidacy was announced, to change my posi¬ 
tion. 

The Jacl is that the city organization of Pittsburgh 
has until very recently been exceedingly hostile to me) 
and the Pittsburgh post-office embraces about SOO ap¬ 
pointments, which, to put it mildly, I decline to have 
placed in the ha7ids of my adversaries if I can pre ■ 
vent such a result. Therefore, I adhered very 
persistently to my original agreement to sus¬ 
tain Mr. McKean, and the President, though 
very anxious to gratify Mr. Dalzell, for whom 
he has a high esteem, could not, under all the 
circumstances, well avoid complying with my 
wishes 

The appointment is not antagonistic to Mr. 
ETalzell. If the gentlemen on whom he is now 
relying should combine to bowl him out of 
public life, he can make the Pittsburgh post- 
office his bulwark if he desires to do so. I re¬ 
gard Mr. Dalzell as a brilliant, accomplished, 
and scholarly gentleman, a thorough lawyer, 
and one of the most valued representatives we 
have at present in congress, and I exceedingly 
regret that any bitterness has arisen between 
us over this question. 

I note what Mr. Dalzell says in his state¬ 
ment about bossism in Pennsylvania. The 
truth is that there is less bossism in Pennsyl¬ 
vania at the present day than there has been 
at anytime in the last half century, and I 
think Mr. Dalzell brainy enough to know this. 
He is yet very young in politics, but it is my 
belief that before the brilliant future which 
now seems opening before him is con¬ 
cluded he will discover that it is not wise to 
allow political differences to interfere with 
personal relations. 


ENCOURAGING SIGNS. 

—Postmaster Sperry, of New Haven, de¬ 
clares himself a believer in civil service re¬ 
form, and says the law shall be strictly en¬ 
forced in his office. 


—Representative Simond, of Connecticut, 
has secured the postmaster-general’s indorse¬ 
ment for the reappointment of Postmaster 
Montgomery at Bristol. This postmaster is a 
democrat. Mr. Simonds proposes also to have 
the postmaster at Canton, Conn., kept in office, 
and he announces that he will not consent to 
the removal of any fourth-class postmaster in 
his district until he has served four years. 

—Representative Greenhalge, of Massachu¬ 
setts, will recommend the reappointment of 
Postmaster Bancroft, the democratic incumb¬ 
ent, at Concord. Mr. Bancroft was a brave 
soldier in the war, and has the indorsement of 
the grand army people as well as of Judge 
Hoar and other prominent republicans. Some 
of the workers are very angry, but Mr. Green¬ 
halge is willing to brave their opposition for 
the sake of standing by a worthy veteran. 

—Iowa furnishes a fresh illustration of the 
way in which the spoils system forces the best 
sort of men out of public life. Judge Reed, 
who had served with ability on the supreme 
bench of the state, was elected last year to the 
lower branch of congress. He already an¬ 
nounces that “he will not run for congress 
again because of the discontent he made in 
distributing the offices, and his own discontent 
with the work of a congressman.”— New York 
Evening Post. 


WANTON REMOVALS. 

For I contend that the wanton removal of meritorious 
officers would subject him {the President) to impeachment 
and removal from his own high trust. Such an abuse of 
power exceeds my conception.—Congressman James Mad¬ 
ison, June, 1789. 

—The statement originally madein thesedis- 
patches, several weeks ago, that First Assist¬ 
ant Postmaster-General Clark.son contemplat¬ 
ed resigning, was verified to-day. Mr. Clark¬ 
son, in conversation with your correspond¬ 
ent, said that he had originally taken the 
office under the strongest importunities, and 
that he had accepted it then under the condi¬ 
tion that he would not be asked to hold it 
more than a year. When he accepted the office 
he did so only for the purpose of ridding the party of 
democratic postmasters, so far as it lay in his poicer. 
He hopes to be through with this before very long,nod 
then he will return to the more congenial 
field of journalism. He regards the time that 
he has spent in the office as the most instruc¬ 
tive year of his life. He says he has learned 
more of the politics of every county and state 
in the union in the ten months that he has 
been in office than the rest of his life put to¬ 
gether. There is not a county in the states but that 
has had its leading republicans here before him fight¬ 
ing out their local battles, and he knows now the ex ■ 
act standing and exact work of every republican poli¬ 
tician in the country.—Dispatch to the Indianapolis 
Journal, Jan. 6. 

—A number of fourth-class postmasters were 
agreed upon to-day for Washington county, 
and they are expected to be appointed to-mor¬ 
row. Nearly, if not quite all the democrats 
holding the fort in that county will be dis¬ 
lodged by these appointments.— Dispatch to 
the Indianapolis Journal, Nov. 11. 


—The Fostoria (Ohio) post-office matter is 
settled and off the hooks. Nobody at the post¬ 


office department seems inclined to talk about 
it, and the air of mystery with which it is sur¬ 
rounded justifies the inference that there is 
something about the affair which will not bear 
scrutiny. Levi Wooster, the democratic hold¬ 
over postmaster, as may be remembered, re¬ 
fused to give Ex-Governor Foster unlimited 
authority to select four letter-carriers for him, 
although he had received orders from the de¬ 
partment headquarters to do so, as the sole 
condition on which the town was to be given 
a free delivery. The controversy between the 
postmaster and his superiors in Washington 
waxed warm. He declared his willingness to 
appoint two republicans and two democrats, 
but he saw no reason why he should appoint 
all republicans and turn over their choice to 
an outsider at that. The department got the 
better of him by a process which has beeu 
steadily and most successfully employed since 
the present administration came in, w’henever 
an obstinate office-holder was to be brought to 
terms. A detective of the department, po¬ 
litely known as a special agent, was sent to 
Fostoria with orders to find some flaw in Mr. 
Wooster’s record. It is a familiar principle 
of postal management that there is no post¬ 
master so honest and clever as to have entirely 
disarmed his enemies of a cause for censure. 
It may not be a great one, but there is invari¬ 
ably something—a letter gone astray through 
momentary carelessness, or a few technical er¬ 
rors in making up an official return, perhaps 
—that will form a groundwork for attack. 
The agent did his work well in Mr. Wooster’s 
case, as nearly as can be ascertained,- and, 
having contrived to bring some kind of a 
charge against him, practically gave him his 
choice between yielding his point and quitting 
the service. Mr. Wooster preferred staying in 
to going out, and the patronage plum was 
tossed into Mr. Foster’s basket. 

That Foster has made effective use of it for 
the purposes of the campaign just closed there 
is no room for doubt in the mind of any one 
who knows him. The case was effectively sum¬ 
marized by one of the department officers, who 
remarked to-da>: “Yes, the Fostoria business 
is amicably settled. We put the special agent 
on the postmaster, and that fetched him.”— 
Dispatch to the New York Evening Post, Nov. 6. 


—Another post office outrage, on a par with 
that recently committed at Fostoria, Ohio, has 
just beeu perpetrated at Flushing, L. I., in the 
removal of postmaster Carpenter. The post¬ 
master-general some months ago authorized 
the free delivery system at Flushing. This was 
preparatory to the late election, and postmas¬ 
ter Carpenter, being in a district represented 
by a democratic congressman, Covert, was or¬ 
dered to report to Mr. Baldwin, chairman of 
the Queen’s county republican committee, to 
have his four letter-carriers selected for him 
with reference to the needs of the party at the 
polls. This he refused to do, and was put on 
the black list at once and turned over to the 
tender mercies of an inspector. It seems to 
have taken the inspector all the fall to scrape 
together enough so-called charges to make a 
report on. But at last something was got 
which would pass muster. Yesterday off'eame 
Carpenter’s head. 

Your correspondent applied politely to first- 
assistant Clarkson, who has had charge of the 
case and knew all about it, to be informed 
what Carpenter’s offense was. Clarkson, in his 
characteristically boorish way, snapped out a 
refusal, and threw responsibility forthe w’hole 
matter on the postmaster-general, who was not 
in his office. As Clarkson was third in a line 
of officials, who declined to have anything to 
say on the subject, the public may draw their 
OW’D conclusions as to the weight of the accusa¬ 
tions which form the basis for the removal.— 
Dispatch to New Ywk Evening Post, Nov. 22. 















92 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


CURRENT ITEMS. 

The civil service reform association of 
Philadelphia has presented a memorial to 
President Harrison protesting against Senator 
Paddock’s bill to withdraw the railway mail 
service from the operations of the civil service 
act. This association has also printed for 
general distribution some 20,000 copies of a 
tract prepared by Mr. Henry C. Lea, giving 
the pledges of the republican party and the 
President upon civil service reform, and Sena¬ 
tor Farwell’s cowardly plan of killing the law 
by taking away its machinery. 

The Massachusetts association urges the 
President to extend the operations of the law 
to offices having twenty five employes. Con¬ 
gress is urged to grant the $53,000 asked by 
the civil service commission necessary to carry 
on the work of the commission. 

The association of Missouri has issued its 
eighth annual report. This association pro¬ 
poses to print a compilation of extracts from 
the Thanksgiving Day sermons for general cir¬ 
culation and by so doing to endeavor to increase 
its membership. The association also asks the 
President to put a check upon his headsman 
in his work of official decapitation in the 
post-office department. 

The report of the civil service commission 
of the state of New York states that no com¬ 
plaint has been received that the examina¬ 
tions have not been fair tests, and that the tes¬ 
timony has been uniform that the persons se¬ 
lected from the eligible lists have been effi¬ 
cient. 

Again, the statistics of the report of the civil 
service commission of the state of Massachu¬ 
setts prove that the competitive system benefits 
those who have had the common^fechool edu¬ 
cation rather than the college graduates. Out 
of 1,483 examined 1,016 passed the examina¬ 
tions. Of this number 989 had a common 
school education and 27 had attended college. 

CORRESPONDENCE. 

To the Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle : 

It seems to me something further can be 
said by way of answer to one of the questions 
of the disingenuous letter of Mr Wanamaker’s 
private secretary about the civil service law. 

He asks “Why are the laws and the com¬ 
mission subject to so much criticism?” Be¬ 
cause the professional politician knows that 
his power largely depends on the spoils system, 
and consequently he and all his henchmen, 
his organs and those blind partisans who are 
his ready dupes, have combined to oppose, 
abuse and criticise that law, the extension of 
which would tend to overthrow machine poli¬ 
tics. Was any serious criticism of the civil 
service law,or any opposition to a reform of the 
civil service ever heard, except from a profes¬ 
sional or from a partisan, who is always— 
sometimes unconsciously—the tool of the pro¬ 
fessional? 

For many years our political parties have 
had no reason for continued existence, except 
that furnished by the spoils of office. Since 


the disappearance of real difference on ques¬ 
tions of governmental policy, the professional 
politicians, to whom belong the spoils, have 
only kept their respective parties alive by the 
aid of blind party spirit, and what the parti¬ 
san says against the civil service law is but 
the echo of the fear of his master, the profes¬ 
sional. 

Who are the authors of some of the recent 
criticism of the civil service law and the com¬ 
mission? The Cincinnati Commercial Gazette, 
Frank Hatton’s Washington Post and Clarkson’s 
Iowa State Register are good examples of the 
newspapers, and A. P. Gorman, C. B. Farwell 
and J. B. Cheadle of the individuals. The 
men are all products of the spoils system and 
naturally attack its enemy. The newspapers 
are organs, and mainly live by partisan poli¬ 
tics. 

A thorough reform of the civil service would 
limit if not destroy the usefulness of the party 
organs. These organs approved the candidacy 
of Blaine ; they applauded the Murchison 
letter; they have never denounced W. W 
Dudley’s election methods nor that appointee 
of President Harrison, who forgot his oath of 
office and said that to “divide floaters into 
block of five and put a trusted man with 
necessary funds in charge of this five, and 
make him responsible that none get away and 
that all vote our ticket,” indicates “simply a 
patriotic interest in the elections.” Surely 
criticism from such sources as these could not 
disturb any honest inquirer. 

No man e’er felt the halter draw 

With good opinion of the law. 

Chas. B. Wilby. 

Cincinnati, Jan. 3, 1890. 


THE REPUBLICAN PRESS. 

They are the opinions which will prevail, which 
will control the legislation and administration of 
the future, which wili compel the extension of the 
reform principle to other branches of the public 
service, and make a much closer adherence to its 
letter and spirit than is now practiced the obvious 
and necessary course of every president and other 
official who has the power of appointment.— Worces¬ 
ter Spy [iJep.] 

—When the higher offices of the public service— 
the postmasterships and collectorships in our large 
cities—shall also cease to be the rewards of party ac¬ 
tivity, the public will have confidence in the impar¬ 
tial administration of the civil service law, and not 
till then.— Philadelphia Record. 

—The civil service law will not be repealed at the 
coming session of congress, as the mugwumps pro¬ 
fess to fear. That is what they would like, but the 
republicans are too wise to gratify such a desire.— 
St. Louis Globe-Democral [ifep.]. 

—The wrath of the office-seekers, who repudiate 
the republican platform, and “ want no Chinese 
civil service,” is oue of the most encouraging testi¬ 
monials to the sincerity of this administration that 
can be obtained.—Ptteburp Dispatch [/2ep.]. 

—Civil service reform has come to stay and to grow, 
and the corruptionists, boodlersand manipulators of 
practical politics v?ho oppose it may as well bear the 
fact in mind and remember that they are not mas¬ 
ters, and that they can be servants only by obeying 
those who are masters,—New York Press. 

—A remark of the Buffalo Commercial [Rep.], [one 
of whose editors has received an oflice], about “amus¬ 
ing phases of the civil service humbug,” leads the 
Syracuse Standard [Rep.] to say that “ the Commer¬ 
cial and other republican papers of its way of talking 
did not discourse in that manner during the latest 
or the preceding presidential campaign. Let us be 
honest and consistent, brethren of the republican 
press.” 


—The petty clerkships covered by the civil service 
law are not connected with the party organization, 
for the federal service can not be looked upon in the 
light of a party machine, and, in any event, the in¬ 
cumbents of these places can exercise little more in¬ 
fluence upon the administration or on politics than 
do Kansas grasshoppers upon the government of 
Nova Scotia. So long as their work is well done, un¬ 
der the direction of responsible superiors, it matters 
not, either to the administration or the party, 
whether they are republicans, democrats, or prohib¬ 
itionists.— Cincinnati Times Star [Rep.]. 

—Spoilsmen Should “Get Together.”— There 
seems to be an incongruity between the state 
merits of various classes of spoilsmen concerning 
the civil service law, which breaks the force of all 
of them.— Washington Star [Rep.]. 

—The principle that merit, and not the mere com¬ 
plexion of a clerk’s politics, shall determine the 
character of his tenure of public office, tends to give 
to the government better service for the money which 
it pays in salaries, tends to relieve the lot of the gov- 
errrmerit employe of some of its featirres of harrass- 
irig and demoralizing uncertainty, and terrds to con¬ 
vert a rrumerousand intelligent elemeirt of the capi¬ 
tal’s population from transitory guests into property- 
ownirrg, reasonably permanent citizens.— IKos/impfon 
Star [/?ep.]. 

—No one could describe the utter weakness of 
the spoils system more accurately than the secretary 
has in these few terse sentences. No word need be 
added to them to prove the imperative necessity of 
the reform law and the great value of the work which 
the commission is doing. As we have already inti¬ 
mated, Secretary Windom’s opinions deserve atten¬ 
tion because they are in the nature of expert testi¬ 
mony, and his hearty approval of the law, together 
with the powerful reasons he gives for approving it, 
far outweigh the clamor of the disappointed office- 
seekers and the twaddle of the spoilsmen who attack 
the law and the commission.— Cleveland Leader 
[Rep.]. 

—Honesty in politics. 

Civil service reform.— Part of the Cedar Rapids 
[Iowa] Gazette Platform [Rep.]. 

—It is not presumed that professional political 
workers will be in favor of a law which opens the 
public service to all the people on a fair competition 
of qualification for specific duties. They prefer that 
the old regime when favoritism reigned should re¬ 
turn. The reform law sets up a simple test of merit 
instead of favor, and allows an equal chance to all 
whether they have infiueiiiial political friends or 
not. It is proper in this connection to remind the 
federation of republican clubs in Maryland that the 
highe.st republican authority—the national conven¬ 
tion of the party-has repeatedly declared in favor 
of the reform law ; and that President Harrison, in 
letters and addresses, is fully committed to the prin¬ 
ciples of this reiorm. — Rockport [/H.] Register [Pep.]. 

—The Toledo (O.) Blade [Rep.] thinks the number 
of congressmen opposed to the civil service law very 
small. “ The spoilsmen must go,” it says. 

—No one who has watched the party press during 
the past six months can doubt that the sentiment in 
favor of this reform is constantly growing. A few 
republican papers, following a few republican con¬ 
gressmen, have denounced the law and called for its 
repeal. But instead of exerting any influence against 
it they have simply succeeded in calling out the real 
opinion of the party on the subject.—Philadelphia 
Press. 

—Valuable testimony as to the good effect of the 
civil service law, even in Maryland, is furnished by 
the Hagerstown Herald, a republican weekly. The 
Herald takes up and condemns the recent action of 
the republican clubs of the third congressional dis¬ 
trict of Maryland in calling for a repeal of the civil 
service law, declaring that “if the republican parly 
should go before the country on the platform which 
these Baltimore politicians have laid down, it would 
be beaten out of sight ” In arguing for the superior¬ 
ity of the merit system to the spoils policy, the Her¬ 
ald makes the following statement as to the operation 
of the former in Maryland under Mr. Cleveland, 
which is of value as the testimony of a political op¬ 
ponent! “ Without the civil service law the demo¬ 
cratic heelers in Baltimore would have held high 
carnival in the federal offices. With it we have had 
an honest management of the public business, and 
only in a few instances has the public sense of de¬ 
cency been shocked by the appointment of notorious 
rascals to responsible positions. If there had been 
no civil service law, so fair and moderate a man as 
ex-Gov. Groome would not have been made collector 
of the port, and certainly a very different class of 
men would have forced their way into all the subor¬ 
dinate places.”—J^Vomf/ie New York Evening Post. 










The civil Service Chronicle. 


I 


{ 

r' 





4 


“ The common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it. It 
serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration .Farewell Address, 


VoL. I, No. 12. INDIANAPOLIS, FEBRUARY, 1890. terms 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Indiana, where subscrip¬ 
tions and advertisements will be received. 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana 


The Civil Service Chronicle begins its 
second year with the next issue. It will 
be of material assistance if its subscribers 
will promptly renew, as it can not afford 
to hire a collector. It aims to gather into 
compact shape the current facts in regard 
to the civil service, especially for those who 
desire to keep well informed, but who are 
otherwise too much engaged to get for 
themselves these widely distributed facts. 
The paper aims also to aid as far as it is 
possible in the effort to add to the list of 
believers m the merit system. Much has 
been accomplished the past year by send¬ 
ing the paper to lists of college and other 
libraries, to teachers, ministers and others 
throughout the state. To any who desire 
to subscribe for this purpose, we may say 
that the field is large and that a careful 
selection will be made. 


President Harrison is reported to have 
said: 

“ If I take the advice of Massachusetts 
senators and representatives in making ap¬ 
pointments in that state you have no right 
to blame me. If they do not represent 
public opinion among you, you should 
send men here who do.” 

Senators and representatives are not 
elected to advise the President as to ap¬ 
pointments ; they are elected as law mak¬ 
ers. With the exception of a small num¬ 
ber of his personal supporters, the people 
in voting for a congressman do not think 
of, or have reference to his capability as an 
office-broker ; when they think of him as 
such their feeling is disagreeable and not 
to his credit. The need of the times is a 
President who will break up this congres¬ 
sional usurpation. President Harrison’s 
predecessor talked in this way to Maryland 
democrats and then gave Gorman the full 
swing of the federal patronage which he 
used to keep those same democrats under. 


The signatures to the petition started in 
Massachusetts asking for a fit appropria¬ 
tion for the work of the civil service com¬ 
mission is a remarkable one. In order to 


show the significance of the names their 
political position has been indicated. It 
has often seemed that civil service reform¬ 
ers in Boston and elsewhere underestima¬ 
ted the strength of the reform sentiment 
in Indiana among the people at large ; that 
they were unable to realize that the politi¬ 
cal leaders did not in fact represent the 
desire among the rank and file of both 
parties to be done with the spoils system. 
But when it comes to the matter of active 
politicians favoring the reform, this list 
shows that we are far behind Massachusetts. 


The Massachusetts legislature has passed 
the following resolution with one dissent¬ 
ing vote : 

Our senators and representatives are 
hereby requested to favor such legislation 
as will extend the provisions of the United 
States civil service law to all persons em¬ 
ployed in the navy yards of the United 
States. 


Attention is called to the office broker¬ 
age in Missouri, set forth in another col¬ 
umn. These facts have been brought to 
light by the St. Louis Republic, and are 
believed to be authentic. It is much to be 
desired that the Civil Service Reform As¬ 
sociation of that state should take the mat¬ 
ter up and print the facts over their own 
name. They would then convince a class 
of people who feel justified in refusing to 
be convinced now because those facts have 
been unearthed by a party paper. The 
congressmen implicated have been pecu¬ 
liarly brazen and venal; but to sell an office 
for a small sum of ready cash does not 
dift'er in principle from sales by Quay and 
others for influence and for hire as a ser¬ 
vile laborer. 

In an examination for firemen in the 
Brooklyn, New York, fire department was 
the following question : 

“ If you had a strong fire, and your 
steam was inclined to raise, what would 
you do?” The New York Sun (spoils) 
ridicules and condemns this question as 
not being up to a proper literary standard. 
The question was probably framed by a 
practical engineer who made use of the 
common colloquialism of his craft. How 
about the people like the Sun, who are 
always complaining that the questions are 
literary to an extent that none but the col¬ 
iege-bred can answer them ? | 


It is seriously “ charged ” against the 
civil service commission that there are 
now on the eligible list names of enough 
persons to supply clerks to the depart¬ 
ments for several years. Civil service re¬ 
formers have never been that hard pushed 
that they were compelled to urge as an 
objection to the spoils system that each 
congressman, by encouraging applications 
and making promises in regard to offices, 
had made a longer eligible list than he 
could use up if he were a congressman a 
hundred years. The competitive system 
need not fear a comparison. Under the 
spoils system place-hunters by hundreds 
go hundreds of miles to Washington. They 
stay there for weeks and months literally 
stopping the operations of the government. 
They are pests in Washington and are ob¬ 
jects of derision at home. They go through 
a descending scale of living, beginning 
with the most extravagant hotel and end¬ 
ing with the place that sells “ board by the 
day, week or meal.” At best they become 
penniless beggars for a place; and yet they 
persist and some few succeed. This is the 
competition of the spoils system, and the 
eligible list never starts new. On the other 
hand, the applicant under the merit sys¬ 
tem, who has successfully competed at an 
examination near his own home, sees his 
name on the eligible list and goes about 
his daily business. He is proud of the 
fact, he talks about it, and if he applies for 
private employment, his successful compe¬ 
tition is his strongest point, and is the one 
he urges the most. It helps him materi¬ 
ally and it is an advantage in seeking other 
work, and not a disadvantage to him to be 
on that list; and the same is true of every 
other person on it, even though there may 
be enough to supply the departments for 
years. Importunity for place is useless, 
and they do not importune. If the year 
passes without appointment that is the end 
of the list and of their present chance. 
Justice to the new crop that wants public 
employment demands a new competi¬ 
tion. No one can say that this is not an 
educational process of great value to the 
country, and which will render a great 
number of persons better fitted for public 
and private employment. And not the 
least of its advantages is its upbuilding of 
manhood in place of the cringing and hu¬ 
miliation which accompany ordinary office 
seeking. 























94 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


After Mr. Pearson and Colonel Burt, it is 
perhaps not worth while to express sur¬ 
prise at the removal of Collector Salton- 
stall, which took place after the following 
correspondence: 

I. 

Treasury Department, ) 
Washington, January 17, 1890. j 
The Hon. L. SallonstaU, Collector of Customs, Boston, 
Mass.: 

My Dear Sir: The President is ready to make a 
change in the collectorship at Boston, hut would be 
glad to do so in a way that would be most agreeable 
to you. Very truly yours, 

W. WiNDoM Secretary. 

II. 

Custom House, Office of the Collector, I 
Boston. January 20,1890. J 
The Hon. William Windom, Secretary of Treasury: 

My Dear Sir : I have this day received your let¬ 
ter of the 17th inst. informing me that “the Presi¬ 
dent is ready to make a change in the collectorship 
at Boston, and would he glad to do so in a way that 
would be most agreeable to you.” In reply, I beg to 
say that, placing entire confidence in the declaration 
of the President concerning tenure of office, I am 
prepared to serve the term of four years for which I 
was commissioned on the 5th of May, 1886, unless 
removed by the authority of the President for such 
cause as he has announced to be controlling in such 
cases. If such cause exists, I respectfully request to 
be informed of the same. 

In the conduct of this ofllce I have endeavored to 
perform its important duties with fidelity to the gov¬ 
ernment, in a manner satisfactory to the merchants 
of Boston, and to conform to the spirit as well as the 
letter of the civil service laws. I therefore can not 
stultify myself by any act which would imply the 
consciousness of dereliction on my part, and prefer 
to leave the decision of this matter in the hands of 
the President, to whom I forward a copy of this letter. 
I beg to assure you that I communicate this my con¬ 
clusion with entire respect for the President and for 
yourself, and hoping that it may not be misunder¬ 
stood, I am, very truly yours, 

Lverett Saltonstall, Collector. 

III. 

Custom House, Office of the Collector, 1 
Boston, Jan. 20, 1890. J 
To the Hon. Benjamin Harrison, President: 

My Dear Sir— I herewith inclose a copy of my let¬ 
ter of this date to Secretary Windom, in answer to 
his letter informing me that you were ready to make 
a change in the collectorship at this port. I take this 
course, deeming it proper that you should be in¬ 
formed without delay of my views as to the tenure 
of the office which I have the honor to hold, and am, 
with great respect, very truly yours, 

Lverett Saltonstall, Collector. 

No criticism is made upon Mr.Saltonstall, 
as an officer. He has carried out to the 
fullest extent the civil service reform prin¬ 
ciples of the republican platform. The 
Indianapolis Journal says that Mr. Salton¬ 
stall has been sick for six months and there¬ 
fore was removed. The Boston Journal says 
that the collector is called upon at dinners 
to respond for the President and asks us 
to “ imagine a gentleman who had defied 
the President occupying such a position; ” 
by “ defied ” it is meant that Mr. Salton¬ 
stall is a democrat. Senator Hoar says 
that the office is akin to a cabinet position 
and that the collector ought to be a protec¬ 
tionist; also that a free trader “can not 
interpret our protective tariff.” In the 
variety of reasons the real one becomes 
apparent. The place was wanted as partj' 
spoil and it was so taken, and the President 


has added another to his broken promises. 
The removal was brought about by Senators 
Hoar and Dawes, whose greedy pursuit of 
this place marks distinctly the decline of 
Massachusetts republican statesmen. Sen¬ 
ator Hoar will hardly expect his excuse to 
be treated soberly. The law and the rules of 
the department regulate the duties of a 
collector. With these as his guide one 
honest and capable officer produces the 
same results as another. There is no way 
to honestly “interpretour protective tariff” 
except according to law. Any other way 
is a system of tips and winks; and this 
shows thai Senator Hoar can not mean 
what he says. It is a satisfaction to know 
that the course of the administration is re¬ 
probated by such republican papers as the 
Boston Advertiser, the Boston Traveller and 
the Boston Transcript. 


PRESIDENT HARRISON’S FIRST 
YEAR. 

In a few days President Harrison will 
complete the first year of his term. With 
this number the Civil Service Chronicle 
also ends its first year. It has been well 
known that those in control of the paper 
actively favored the election of General 
Harrison; but in commencing this publi¬ 
cation, they laid down the principle that 
the standard of criticism which, in other 
fields, they had before applied to the man¬ 
agement of the civil service should not be 
changed; President Harrison should be 
judged by the same rules by which they 
had judged his predecessor. And now at 
the end of the year they feel that they have 
kept to the mark. It would have been easy 
to say that the President has a hard row to 
hoe, that those at a distance can not realize 
the pressure upon him, that he can only 
reform the civil service as fast as public 
sentiment will support him, that he means 
well, but he is deceived by those around 
him, that he can accomplish nothing with¬ 
out his party, and if he goes faster than 
he can carry his party, he will sit down 
between two stools, and so on; but it has 
seemed better to say that he is the Presi¬ 
dent, and he is to be held to his constitu¬ 
tional responsibility without evasion or ex¬ 
cuse. And this course has met with an 
approbation both personal and in the 
public prints from all parts of the country 
that will always be an unalloyed gratifica¬ 
tion. 

President Harrison closes his first year, 
leaving behind him some acts of which 
history will never be proud. He has a set¬ 
tled policy of keeping appointees after their 
unworthiness has become notorious. In 
this way he bids fair to make cases like 
those of McFarlane, Bagby and Chambers, 
in Indiana, rival those of Tompkins and 


Dowling under the late administration. 
His putting the federal patronage in Vir¬ 
ginia into the hands of Mahone was an as¬ 
sault upon the rights of half of the people 
of that state, and its disastrous results do 
not seem to have taught him any lesson. 
His failure to dismiss the office-holders 
who attempted to collect money for Ma¬ 
hone does not indicate a determination to 
execute that part of the law. His removal 
of Pearson, Burt, Graves and Saltonstall in¬ 
dicate a spirit of putting his heel upon 
the neck of the reform sentiment of the 
country. His allowing the railway mail 
service to be looted while the eligible lists 
were being prepared, and the manner in 
which it was done were peculiarly in 
broken faith. His sweep of the fourth- 
class postmasters by Clarkson, his turning 
the census bureau over to be common 
spoil, his advance in the same direc¬ 
tion with the Indian service, his sub¬ 
sidizing the press, his grudging reten¬ 
tion of some democrats to the end of their 
terms, his greedy removal of others, like 
General Manson, his turning whole states 
over to men like Platt and Quay, his ap¬ 
pointment of relatives to office, and his 
general use of the 100,000 places in the un¬ 
classified service to pay personal and party 
debts, unmistakably mark him as a man 
who believes in such use of a great public 
trust. That he has a constitutional right 
to so use it, he would not himself claim. 
Like other presidents, he has frittered 
away the golden opportunity of breaking 
up the spoils system. Yet he has not built 
himself up in other directions. He has re¬ 
fused to work in his one peculiar field, 
and no others are or will be open to him, 
except in a limited and routine extent. If 
he goes to the end as he has started, he will 
have been a common-place president whose 
term has had its full share of vicious ad¬ 
ministration. 

There is one branch of this subject that 
must be treated by itself. President Har¬ 
rison said that he would enforce the civil 
service law and, leaving out the Mahone 
assessments, he has done so. To begin at 
home, if a democrat in Indiana, examined 
by the Indianapolis local board, does not 
get upon the eligible list, it is his own fault. 
It may be stated with absolute certainty 
that any person coming before this board 
for examination will be treated exactly ac¬ 
cording to his merits, and will get the place 
on the list that he earns in open competi¬ 
tion. And it may be added that if he se¬ 
cures a place upon the eligible list of the 
Indianapolis post-office, he will be appoint¬ 
ed when his name comes to the top of the 
list. That office employs a large propor¬ 
tion of democrats, yet no one is dismissed 
without cause. We are glad to say this 
because we have been a severe critic of 
this post-office and we desire to give full 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


95 


credit to the present course of its manage¬ 
ment. 

And elsewhere, and so far as we can 
learri, everywhere the law is honestly en¬ 
forced. When the post-offices in Philadel¬ 
phia, Baltimore, Chica^^o, Milwaukee and 
elsewhere are remembered, the revolution 
which has taken place becomes apparent. 
Possibly with a less courageous and less 
able man than Mr. Roosevelt in his place 
on the civil service commission, the result 
might have been different; but the Presi¬ 
dent is to be given the credit due for a wise 
selection of a civil service commission and 
for then sustaining it. The result is that 
the merit system is vindicating itself on 
■ every hand. Never before did it overthrow 
so many enemies and so easily, and the 
general summing up must be that never 
has it made such rapid progress as during 
the past year. To such an extent does it 
now meet public approval that no party 
can safely go into a presidential campaign 
ignoring this subject, however much that 
party may be agitating some other ques¬ 
tion. 


Gr' ROYAL DISFAVOR. 

The President has again disregarded the 
wishes of Senator Farwell, and has appointed 
Mr. Clark collector of the port of Chicago. 
Goaded by his repeated defeats and by the un¬ 
friendly, not to say jeering, criticisms of the 
press, Senator Farwell has written the follow¬ 
ing letter: 

To the Editor of the Chicago Tnbune : 

In your issue of the 24th, in the editorial 
' columns, you have an article headed “ What 
the Constitution Says,” and indulge in some 
criticism upon the demands of the senators in 
regard to appointments, quoting the article of 
the constitution which refers to that subject. 
I fully agree with you in your definition of 
that clause , but the President is empowered 
and compelled by this to appoint postmasters 
having salaries of $1,000 and upward and 
thousands of other officers—in fact, all officers 
of the United States but those below that 
grade—and if he acts intelligently in making 
these appointments he must consult with per¬ 
sons whom he knows and who know the per¬ 
sons to be appointed. As far as I am concerned 
I claim that the people have the right to se¬ 
lect the officers they want, and inasmuch as 
they can not all come to Washington to make 
known their wishes it is but natural that their 
representatives should speak for them in this 
matter as well as in all other matters. Indeed, 
the circumstances of the case render it imper¬ 
ative that the President shall consult—if he 
do his duty—with these representatives; and 
the only complaint I make against the present 
occupant of the White House in regard to ap¬ 
pointments in Illinois is that he prefers to con¬ 
sult persons other than the people’s chosen rep¬ 
resentatives. The congressmen and senators 
of one neighboring western state, whose dele¬ 
gation in the late nominating convention in 
Chicago swung first into line for him, have no 
trouble whatsoever in convincing the Presi¬ 
dent that their nominees are proper persons 
to fill the offices in that state. _ On the con¬ 
trary, the representatives of Illinois who did 
not support the present incumbent of the 
White House in the nominating convention. 


have found it impossible to convince the Pres¬ 
ident that they are qualified to select anybody 
for official position in the state. I know ©f 
no other reason than this why we, as well as 
other United States senators, are not consulted 
in regard to important appointments. 

The appointment of the collector of internal 
revenue at Springfield was made with the 
knowledge that it was against the wishes of 
the two senators. The President’s refusal to 
appoint Mr. Campbell was an expression of 
that want of confidence in me above referred 
to, and impelled him to consult with private 
citizens. By this action the President has 
notified us that he does not wish to further 
consult with us in regard to Illinois appoint¬ 
ments, and that he will rely upon other 
sources of information than the representa¬ 
tives of the people. C. B, Farwell. 

Washington, Jan. 27. 

To make his record complete it is necessary 
to add some remarks of Senator Farwell in 
various newspaper interviews which are ap¬ 
parently authentic: 

“ I believe,” he says, “ that this is a govern¬ 
ment of the people, by the people, and for the 
people. In the Chicago collectorship case the 
people wanted Mr. Campbell, the white-headed 
boy of the republican party of Illinois. I 
have nothing to say against Mr. Clark. I 
could no doubt, have defeated the confirma¬ 
tion, but it would have availed nothing; it 
would have resulted in punishing a worthy 
citizen ; that is all. The President’s nomina¬ 
tion of Mr. Clark was a very astonishing and 
unusual proceeding, and in making it he 
wholly ignored the wishes of the Illinois dele¬ 
gation, and acted in a very strange manner 
toward them. He did not even consult any 
one of them 

Mr. Campbell was chairman of our cam¬ 
paign committee, and devoted months of his 
time and his whole energies for the election of 
Mr. Harrison. Mr. Clark did not do this. 
But, then, this is Mr. Harrison’s way of reward¬ 
ing political friends. I regret that he enter¬ 
tains such notions, for it results in a destruc¬ 
tion of the party to which he and I belong. 
It seems to me that it is the duty of those 
holding important official positions to try and 
carry out the will of the people, but in this 
matter Mr. Harrison has wholly Ignored them, 
and, so far as I remember, this is the first in¬ 
stance in which the wishes of an entire delega¬ 
tion in congress from any state have been so 
completely disregarded.” 

We have given space to this because when 
senators have ceased to exist as office-brokers 
the record will be curious and valuable. It 
marks the last stage of congressional usurpa¬ 
tion of the appointing power. Only recently 
have congressmen become so calloused as to 
go into the public prints and claim office dis¬ 
tribution as a right. It is fitting that the 
claim should be made by a man who could 
not stay in public life an hour on his merits 
as a statesman. In refusing him offices, the 
President knocks every prop from under him. 
The “people” whom Senator Farwell repre¬ 
sents are the Illinois party machine. His 
party comprises about half of the people of 
the state, and the machine does not include 
one fiftieth of this half. Congressmen are not 
chosen to distribute offices, but to make laws. 
So far as they interfere with the distribution 
of offices they are a common nuisance. They 
are the worst advisers a president can have, 
for with rare exceptions they distribute places 
according to the power and will of the re¬ 


cipients to help their renomination and re- 
election. 

The President, however, can not be given 
any credit. It is no virtue in him to pull 
down Farwell and Cullom, giving them no 
spoil, while he builds up Quay and makes 
him virtually dictator of the distribution of 
federal offices in Pennsylvania. A peculiar 
emphasis is given to this impropriety by the 
fact that he puts the latter state under the 
heel of Quay, in face of the steady and indig¬ 
nant protests, not of independents, like Henry 
C. Lea, but of men whose republicanism is un¬ 
impeachable, like Wharton Barker, who rep¬ 
resent a large body of people in that state. 


“WORDS, MERE IDLE WORDS.” 


The Indianian-Republican is published at 
Warsaw in this state, and General Reuben 
Williams has long been its editor. In a re¬ 
cent issue of his paper General Williams says 
he advocated General Harrison as a suitable 
candidate for governor in 1868, but the re¬ 
publican press did not respond. In 1872 and 
1876 he again urged the same point. In 1885, 
in a column and a half article, he presented 
General Harrison’s name for the presidency, 
and kept it up until after the latter’s nom- 
ication and election. The rest of the story 
can only be told in the Indianian-Republican’s 
own words: 

After the election was over and victory 
achieved, those who knew how warmly we had 
advocated the President’s claims, insisted that 
we should become an applicant for some posi¬ 
tion under an administration for which our 
paper had fought for so valiantly; and yet, 
fully aware of the intrigues and disappoint¬ 
ments so frequently occurring in politics, we 
hesitated, until, in reply to a dispatch of con¬ 
gratulations we sent the Pesident the next 
morning after the election, we received the 
following reply: 

INDIANAPOMS, Ind., Nov. 28, 1888. 
Oen. Reub. Williams, Warsaw, Ind.: 

My Dear General —I know that you will under¬ 
stand that my long delay In acknowledging your 
kind telegram of congratulations is not to be at¬ 
tributed to any lack of appreciation of your cor¬ 
dial and constant friendship. I know how unselfishly 
you have supported me, and value very highly the 
many evidences you have given me of your confi¬ 
dence. I shall be glad to see you at an> time. Very 
truly yours, Benjamin Harrison. 

The letter deceived us, and we at once made 
application for the state pension agency, stat¬ 
ing in the original application that we had 
neither time nor money to fritter away in 
making an unsuccessful race, and that a hint 
that such would be the case would prevent us 
from making one at all. Every individual to 
whom we showed the above letter, construing 
it, under the circumstances of the long sup¬ 
port of this paper of Mr. Harrison, as an invi¬ 
tation to become a candidate for something, 
and it was this interpretation by our friends 
that finally induced us to ask Mr. Harrison 
for the place, we selecting that special posi¬ 
tion for the reason that it permitted us to re¬ 
main within the borders of the state. We be¬ 
lieved, too, that thirty-four years of as faith¬ 
ful service as any man ever gave his party, en¬ 
titled us to some consideration at his hands, 
to say nothing of the twenty years of personal 
loyalty to the individual just elected to the 
highest position within the gift of the people. 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


9<i 


and we are free to say that under these cir¬ 
cumstances we felt our defeat most keenly. 
The press of the state was practically unani¬ 
mous in our favor, and certainly no one who 
ever obtained a position under the government 
was ever more enthusiastically or emphati¬ 
cally indorsed by leading republicans from 
every section of Indiana in private letters, 
while petitions in large numbers were also 
forwarded. It was a blunder of our own. 
During the thirty-four years of political serv¬ 
ice we have given our party, we have seen so 
much of intrigue, of insincerity, of double- 
meaning phrases, that we ought to have con¬ 
sidered the above letter at its proper value. 
With our experience we should have interpre¬ 
ted its contents at what it really was—words, 
mere idle words. It was our blunder, and we 
exonerate Mr. Harrison wholly. We should 
have known better than to have expected any¬ 
thing ! 

So far as is possible sympathy ought to be 
extended to General Williams. Coming down 
to the level on which he and the President 
stand, he makes a very fair showing of 
“claims;” thirty-four years of party service, 
and at least twenty-two years of personal ser¬ 
vice in repeated nominations of General Har¬ 
rison for public office and in urging his inter¬ 
est in column-and-a-half editorials clearly en¬ 
title General Williams to “recognition.” By 
that is not meant a nod or a hand-shake, but a 
payment for the thirty-four years of party ser¬ 
vice and the twenty-two years of personal ser¬ 
vice in nominations and in column-and-a-half 
editorials, by handing over a good solid office 
like the pension office of this city, worth thou¬ 
sands of dollars a year in cash. 

After all his experience, however. General 
Williams and Solomon have come to the same 
conclusion. All things are “ words, mere idle 
words.” We now invite him to a higher level 
and ask him to recognize the fact that the 
President has no right to give out public offices 
to pay Huston, Ransdell, Leonard, Hornaday, 
Bagby, McFarlane, Chambers, Dunlap, Ens- 
ley, nor even General Williams himself. All 
offices except the highest should be given upon 
a system of merit and promotion solely for 
business reasons and without any regard to 
personal and party service. This is the prac¬ 
tice that is going to prevail in the state and 
national service, and General Williams can 
render his state and country a substantial ben¬ 
efit by helping to establish it. 


SECRET CHARGES. 

As soon as removals began to be freely made 
during President Cleveland’s administration 
apparently without cau.se, civil service re¬ 
formers began to complain and to question. 
They were met with various charges on file 
against these office-holders, and there seemed 
to be fair ground why they we'e not entitled 
to any special consideration at the hands of 
the administration or of reformers. It took a 
considerable time to realize how easily a post 
office inspector, though he be a republican un¬ 
der a democratic administration or a democrat 
under a republican administration, learns to 


feel that his own tenure will be longer by not 
kicking against the pricks, and that his duty 
to his superior officers is to aid rather than to 
oppose their desire for removals “ for cause.” 
This evil has thriven. Mr. Vilas’s men knew 
what w'as wanted, and Mr. Wanamaker’s men 
likewise. General Harrison was very out¬ 
spoken regarding the impropriety of secret 
charges during the preceding administration. 
In a letter to the democratic postmaster at 
Mt. Vernon, dated December 19, 1885, he 
said: 

The course pursued by the postmaster-gen¬ 
eral in removing republicans upon secret 
charges, embarrasses us, and may possibly em¬ 
barrass some of his' nominees, for I shall not 
feel free to consent to the removal of any effi¬ 
cient public officer upon charges, until he has 
been advised of their character and has had 
an opportunity—which I shall certainly ex¬ 
tend to you—to meet and refute them. 

But President Harrison has put no stop to 
secret charges. Faithful public servants are 
still harrassed by false accusations made by 
those who feel that though they may not suc¬ 
ceed, they will not be known. 

Mr. English, the democratic postmaster at 
New Haven, was removed by President Harri¬ 
son at the end of four years of service, though 
he had been efficient and had enforced the 
civil service law in the teeth of the local dem¬ 
ocratic machine hungering for spoil. Out of 
the twenty-three clerks whom he found in the 
office, nearly one-half remained at the end of 
the four years. Of the twenty-three letter- 
carriers, ten were left. Of the whole forty-six, 
fifteen were removed, and, according to the 
postmaster’s statement, every one of these for 
causes quite disconnected with politics. Twice 
during the four years the New Haven Civil 
Service Reform Association investigated the 
office, and each time it commended in the 
highest terms the postmaster’s record. He re¬ 
fused to allow, during the last presidential 
campaign, certain democratic managers to “go 
through ” his office, and he told them, more¬ 
over, that they had no business to ask for such 
contributions at all. 

For months after the incoming administra¬ 
tion reports were rife of “charges” against Mr. 
English. Last summer he was informed by 
the post-office department that he was charged 
with allowing party contributions to be col¬ 
lected in his office. He went at once to Wash¬ 
ington and asked Mr. Wanamaker to see 
the charges. The postmaster-general drew a 
bulky bundle from a pigeon hole and informed 
Mr. English briefly of the charges, but he re¬ 
fused to show the papers or to give the names 
of the accusers. It does not seem too harsh 
to infer that Mr. Wanamaker believed the 
charges to have been trumped up by local re¬ 
publican politicians, and that he sanctioned 
their course as one of the peculiar nece-ssities 
of politics to an extent that he deliberately 
shielded them from exposure and from the 
odium of their fellow-townsmen. 


The Indianapolis Journal, for January 27, 
has a careful statement of the nature of the 




examinations for department clerkships, let¬ 
ter-carriers and clerks in the railway mail- 
service, and gives samples of the questions 
asked. 


The February Oivil Service Recmd (Boston) 
contains illustrations of tests for penmanship 
required of applicants for the highest class of 
clerkships, and gives various examples with 
the marks and the reasons for the diflferent 
gradings. 


Richardson, a member of the Maryland leg¬ 
islature, has offered a resolution in the house 
of delegates instructing the Maryland repre¬ 
sentatives in congress to vote for the repeal of 
“that obnoxious, unconstitutional, undemo¬ 
cratic and unrepublican measure, known as 
the so-called civil service law, which strikes at 
the fundamental principles of free government, 
which disfranchises three-fourths of the Amer¬ 
ican people from the right of holding public 
office.” 


—The Kokomo Dispatch, of January 16, says 
that Daniel Webster Martin, recently appoint¬ 
ed postmaster at Oakford [Fairfield Station, 
Ind.] was formerly postmaster there, but was 
superseded in April, 1887, by J. W^ Croussore. 
That when the official envelope containing 
Croussore’s appointment came, Martin laid it 
away, and for the next five months, until Au¬ 
gust 27, told Croussore repeatedly that there 
was nothing for him. That a second official 
package, registered, was treated in the same 
way, until January 6, 1888, when Martin re¬ 
turned both letters to Washington indorsed, 
“No such person getting mail at this office.” 
That some weeks later Martin was trapped by 
an inspector and a decoy letter directed to 
Croussore and denied to him in the presence of 
the inspector. If these statements are true, it 
would be interesting to know what particular 
“ influence ” secured the reappointment. 


The effect of the first session to-day of the house 
committee on reform in the civil service was to make 
the most favorable impression for the commission. 
Mr. Roosevelt made a speech which was a strong ar¬ 
gument in favor of the most searching investigation, 
and Commissioner Thompson spoke equally forcibly. 

When Frank Hatton was called on he was evident¬ 
ly very nervous, his voice being beyond his control. 
His disavowal of any personal animus in his pursuit 
of the commission, his suggestion that the commis¬ 
sion be reorganized under a single head, and that 
head be Mr. Roosevelt and his fears lest the witnesses 
he will produce may suffer some damage from telling 
the truth, caused a general smile.—Special Dispatch 
to New York EveningPost, January 20. 

It is not surprising to see Hatton and his 
paper beginning to sing small. Politicians 
are trained to a warfare, always under cover. 
They make charges secretly, and they answer 
them secretly. Met in their underground 
fights they are adepts in all manner of knifing 
and are dangerous foes. But when they oc¬ 
casionally meet a man like Mr. Roosevelt who 
has nothing to fear and who insists that the 
fight shall be open and public, they dwindle 
into the most contemptible of opponents. 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


97 


CATHOLICS AND CITIZENSHIP. 

[From au address delivered before the Catholic 
Club of Baltimore, Wednesday, February 5,1890, by 
Charles J. Bonaparte.] 

In an address of welcome to the prelates of 
the Third Plenary Council some five years ago 
I said, speaking of the presidential contest of 
1884, then just concluded : “The Catholic 
Church has no politics : she knows nothing of 
candidates or platforms, of administrations or 
policies, of tariffs or currencies ; she is mute 
on every question as to which honest men may 
honestly differ, and no more tells her children 
what ticket they shall vote than what food 
they shall eat or what clothes they shall wear. 
But as she demands that they shall eat with 
temperance, that they shall dress with decency, 
so she requires of them to vote with an un¬ 
clouded judgment, with an undrugged con¬ 
science, with the good of the country as their 
motive, with the fear of God before their eyes.” 

I avail myself of your very flattering invi¬ 
tation for this evening to recur to this subject 
and point out why and how the church, as one 
and the first of those forces which in modern 
society “make for righteousness,” can and of 
right should affect the nation’s political life. 
Macaulay claimed that to say of Charles I “He 
was a good man, but a bad king,” involved a 
contradiction in terms. No one who violated 
in the discharge of public duties the principles 
of morality and honor could, he urged, be rea¬ 
sonably and justly thought of as “ a good 
man.” If this be true of an English king, it 
is no less true of an American citizen. His 
conduct as a citizen can not be ignored in any 
fair estimate of his character. 

When, however, men were told that for ev- 
[ery idle word or wantonness of wrath they 
[should one day strictly answer, no exception 
[was made for words spoken at a primary. The 
[decalogue contains no clause suspending its 
^operation while ballots are counted or votes 
.returned or appointments sought. A Chris- 
[tian can not draw a sponge over his record as 
fa member of civil society; that record will 
avail to fix his destiny, and if it does, it con¬ 
cerns the church. p]ven if she would, she can 
not limit her mission, can not escape dealing 
with evils by closing her eyes to their exist¬ 
ence. Doubtless it is a delicate task to deal 
with those evils. Her serpent wisdom must 
endow with prudence and tact those who speak 
in her name. Zeal not according to knowl¬ 
edge, however well meant, may here be read¬ 
ily harmful, but all this amounts to saying 
that the work must be done wisely, not that it 
should be left undone. For be well assured 
that if this field is given up to the enemy, his 
tares will spread to those adjacent. You can 
not abandon a heart to sordid passions in the 
forum and hope that it will be pure and hon¬ 
orable and generous at the fireside. Burke 
has well said, “There never yet was long a cor¬ 
rupt government of a virtuous people.” The 
church, then, must help good men to purify 
and elevate politics. But how shall the help 
be given? Not, I need hardly say, by partici¬ 
pation in political struggles. Her kingdom is 


not of this world, she covets not the things of 
Ciesar, and her ministers, while entitled to the 
unobtrusive exercise of their rights as citizens, 
and, indeed, in my opinion, bound in con¬ 
science to thus exercise these rights, can not 
be too rigidly or sternly forbidden to display 
any partisan activity. She can promote hon¬ 
est government, pure politics, sound and lofty 
public spirit, by teaching through the words 
and acts of her representatives that she be¬ 
lieves in and prizes these things and does not 
hold them mere phantoms: by making those 
who fight for them feel that in spirit and sym¬ 
pathy she is on their side, and those who fight 
against them know that she counts as her ene¬ 
mies enemies to their country’s welfare. When 
we read that mediaeval barons bestowed on 
churches and monasteries wealth acquired as 
the spoil of a life devoted to rapine and blood¬ 
shed, we can be charitable to the imperfect 
manners of a barbarous age; but there is 
room for no such indulgence if the material 
interests of any enterprise, however laudable 
in itself, are advanced through agencies which 
imply a condonation for intrigue and corrup¬ 
tion and suggest indifference to wrong-doing. 
The courage of consistency is the first virtue 
of a moralist. He will never lead others who 
is afraid to show by his life that he believes 
what he teaches. 

“Those love truth best who to themselves are true. 
And what they dare to dream of dare to do.” 


MR. ROOSEVELT ON POLITICAL AS¬ 
SESSMENTS. 

In a recent report on political assessments 
in New York, Commissioner Roosevelt says: 

“ Experience in a number of investigations 
of this sort has convinced me that the talk 
often heard about the injustice of not allow¬ 
ing clerks to make ‘voluntary contributions,’ 
which the law in nowise prevents, is all non¬ 
sense. Government employes do not, as a 
rule, contribute simply from a desire to help 
the political cause in which they believe. 
The so-called ‘ voluntary contributions ’ are, 
nine times out of ten, made from some per¬ 
sonal motives, that is, either in the hope of 
being retained in office, or else with the object 
of gaining some advantage over the other 
clerks. In other words, the employes are co¬ 
erced into making them, for fear that their 
positions will be jeopardized if they fail to do 
so. It is probably safe to say that 90 per 
cent, of the money collected for political pur¬ 
poses from minor governmental employes rep¬ 
resents so much blackmail. This particular 
species of robbery is mean enough at best, and 
one of its meanest features is the fact that the 
men most apt to contribute money, the men 
most susceptible to pressure, are those of oppo¬ 
site political faith to the dominant party. 
Those who agree in politics with the party in 
control feel some assurance of protection if 
they refuse to be coerced into parting with 
their money ; but the unfortunates of opposite 
political faith feel they have no power behind 
the throne on which to rely, are nervously 
afraid of giving offence, and yield helplessly 


when threatened. The amount paid is not ab¬ 
solutely very great in any individual case, 
but to a poor clerk just able to get along, the 
loss of 3 per cent, of his salary may mean just 
the difference between having and not having 
a winter overcoat for himself, a warm dress 
for his wife, or a Christmas tree for his chil¬ 
dren. Such a forced payment is a piece of 
cruel injustice and iniquity. 

“Another fact to be remembered is that very 
much of the money so collected is never turned 
into the party campaign chests at all, being 
kept for their own private uses by the jackals 
who have collected it. If the head of the 
office is determined to have his subordinates 
contribute, the latter soon know it, and the 
fact that they must pay becomes common talk 
among them. In some offices the system of 
making political assessments has obtained 
steadily for so many years that many of the 
clerks have come to regard it as part of the 
established order of nature, against which 
they do not think of rebelling, but, whatever 
their own politics, regularly pay their contri¬ 
butions into the compaign chest of the domi¬ 
nant party ; as one of them expressed it, ‘ They 
feel that the desk, not the man at it, owes just 
so much to the party in power.’ Many politi¬ 
cians take this view as a matter of course. 
One of the witnesses in the present case, a 
strong republican, who was holding office un¬ 
der the last administration, testifies that he 
was advised to contribute to the democratic 
campaign by one of his friends, a New York 
republican district leader, as being the only 
thing to do if he wished to keep his place.” 

The result of his inquiries seems to show 
that in the naval office under Colonel Burt 
this disgraceful practice was broken up. But 
under Collector Magone there was widespread 
effort to collect money. There was, however, 
no active coercion. In the surveyor’s office, 
under Mr. Beattie, the contributions were 
levied generally. Both democrats and repub¬ 
licans gave to the democratic fund. By means 
of covert threats even the most unwilling were 
forced to pay. Some who refused at first were 
made very uncomfortable by being removed 
from their posts to others less agreeable. After 
payment they were sent back. 

CORRESPONDENCE. 

To the Editor of The Civil Service Chronicle: 

In the current number of your entertaining 
publication I notice your offer of fifty dollars, 
given you by an admirer to “use in furthering 
the cause of civil service reform in Indiana,” as 
a reward for the “best statemeht of facts of the 
use of federal offices as spoil in any district.” 
You aid those ambitious to secure the prize by 
giving this sample question : “Why was the 
editor of the Delphi Journal given an office? ” 

Assuming the statement you require must be 
in answer to the query, I base my claim to the 
fifty dollars upon the following explanation : 
The Delphi Journal is a republican newspaper 
published in one or more of the important 
towns in the tenth congressional district. That 
district, one politically doubtful, is now repre- 



















98 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


seated in congress by a preacher politician 
named Owen, whose chief ambition at the 
present writing is to bring about his renomin¬ 
ation and re-election. As the district is un¬ 
comfortably “close,” a kicking newspaper 
might be able to create dissensions disastrous 
to the congressman’s ambition. The Delphi 
Journal is of this variety, was a very rank 
Gresham organ previous to the nomination of 
Mr. Harrison, and was compelled to indulge 
in a number of feats of retromingency before 
it became finally and firmly adjusted to the 
situation. It was, therefore, excellent policy 
in Mr. Owen, by the use of the patronage al- 
loted him by the President for that purpose, 
to secure the influence of the Journal in his 
own behalf, and, by so doiijg, spike another 
of the annoying Gresham guns. 

Further, the Delphi Journal oflBce was only 
recently purchased by the present proprietors, 
the purchase-money being advanced and se¬ 
cured by a number of local republicans who 
are, therefore, personally interested in the 
financial success of the paper. Ordinarily the 
prospects for this success would be clouded 
with doubts, but, through the aid of the 
editor’s salary as a federal employe, the future 
is made to look perceptibly brighter, and, as 
the young editor’s application for appoint¬ 
ment was doubtless “ backed ” by these same 
interested local republicans, it is safe to as¬ 
sume that their interest in Mr. Owen’s re-elec¬ 
tion has at least been revived. 

Carroll county, in which the city of Delphi 
18 situated, is a “close” county which has 
twice given a small republican majority, 
whereas, formerly it was good for at least a 
hundred the other way. Was it not, there¬ 
fore, proper that something handsome should 
be done for the boys who converted a majority 
for Cleveland and a democratic congressman 
into one for Harrison and Owen? 

I think the sagacious editor of the Chronicle 
will sustain me in the proposition that similar 
tactics in each of the towns in the tenth dis¬ 
trict would summarily dissipate any doubts 
as to the chances for Mr. Owen’s renomina¬ 
tion, and this would be demonstrated by the 
modern law that, though Mr. Owen is incon¬ 
sequential in congress, indifferent to political 
principles, ignorant as to the tariff, silent con¬ 
cerning silver coinage, deaf to civil service or 
other reform, a “dummy,” in fact, as a rep¬ 
resentative of the people, he is a success be¬ 
cause he “gets there.” 

A personal acquaintance with the men and 
the circumstances, and a consistent regard for 
my own hereafter, prompts me to insist that 
there is no other reason why the editor of the 
Delphi Journal should have been given an 
office. D. A. Fawcett. 

La Grange, Ind,, Feb. 3, 1890. 

To the Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle: 

I have read with interest an article pub¬ 
lished in the Chronicle for January, enti¬ 
tled “The Loot of the Indian Service.” Will 
you kindly grant me space in your columns for 
a few words in connection with this subject? 


As secretary of the Indian Rights Associa¬ 
tion I have endeavored, so far as my power 
and opportunities permitted, to direct _my 
course upon the lines of policy adopted by our 
society. That policy is one of impartial in¬ 
vestigation into the condition of the Indian 
service, and an honest and frank statement of 
the facts concerning it, and the recommenda¬ 
tions for such a reform of the abuses as in our 
judgment is called for by these facts. I 
called attention last summer, through various 
prominent newspapers, to a development of 
the spoils system known as the “ Home Rule” 
policy of appointment, which the President 
and secretary of the interior were applying to 
the Indian service. By this policy the ap¬ 
pointment of Indian agents for the various 
western reservations was to be placed in the 
hands of local politicians in the states and 
territories in which these reservations were 
located, thus removing the power from where 
it belonged—the executive at Washington. I 
protested against this policy as applied to the 
Indian service as false in principle and likely 
to be disastrous in practice, claiming that it 
was an absurdity to call that a “ Home Rule ” 
policy which restricted the selection of the 
managers of Indian affairs to localities often 
notoriously hostile to Indian interests. This 
protest, as might be supposed, had no influence 
upon the subsequent action of the President 
and the secretary of the interior. The re¬ 
moval of Agent Levy at the Yankton reserva¬ 
tion, referred to in your article, is an illustra¬ 
tion of the evil effects of the policy. An 
exceptionally excellent agent who had gained 
the confidence of both Indians and whites at 
a reservation which had suffered the blight of 
incompetent administration of the past, is re¬ 
moved to gratify a senatorial demand. In 
this instance a sound principle of administra¬ 
tion, viz., the retention of a competent and 
faithful officer, is deliberately violated in 
favor of a vicious principle of administration. 

I know another agency at which the ques¬ 
tion of the removal of the Indians located 
there, against the best interest of the Indians 
and in order to gratify the desire of neighbor¬ 
ing whites to possess their lands, is being agi¬ 
tated. The agent at this reservation and an¬ 
other employe there were chosen under the 
“Home Rule” policy. Both these men freely 
admitted that they had accepted their posi¬ 
tions with a view to securing lands on the res¬ 
ervation when it should be thrown open to 
settlement. How far men accepting their 
posts through such motives could be expected 
to take an impartial view of the question at 
issue, or in other ways to serve the best inter¬ 
ests of the Indians, may readily be inferred. 

A letter reached me this morning inform¬ 
ing me of another instance where this same 
disastrous policy was to be put into operation, 
and the removal of a good agent was to be se¬ 
cured under its dictation. The “Home Rule” 
policy is but a phase of the spoils system, and 
as such is essentially vicious. You and your 
readers may rest assured that there will be no 
hesitation on my part in publishing whatever 


facts come to my knowledge showing the evils 
connected with Indian administration. Though 
our society in this matter can hope to be lit¬ 
tle more than a voice crying in the wilderness, 
we can at least have the satisfaction of ren¬ 
dering our testimony to evils which are so 
strongly entrenched that only a distant and 
brighter future is likely to see them corrected. 

In closing, I should like to make one point 
clear concerning General Morgan, the present 
Indian commissioner. He is not responsible 
for the “Home Rule” policy of appointment, 
nor has he anything to do with the selection 
of Indian agents. These appointments are in 
the hands of the President and the secretary 
of the interior. I have had close experience 
with General Morgan’s management of Indian 
affairs and I have never known him to make 
an appointment on any but sound reasons. 
Indeed, he has excited the wrath of some sen¬ 
ators in his own party on account of his re¬ 
fusal to act at their dictation in making par¬ 
tisan appointments to offices within the range 
of the commissioner’s jurisdiction. Gen. Mor¬ 
gan is wholly in sympathy with the manage¬ 
ment of Indian affairs upon reform principles 
and for this reason should receive the earnest 
support of reformers. His confirmation is now 
hanging in the senate on account of his fidel¬ 
ity to the principles for which reformers have 
fought. The violence of the assault made up¬ 
on him—I say it after a careful examination 
of the facts—is the highest tribute to his cour¬ 
age and faithfulness as a public officer. 

-Respectfully, Herbert Welsh. 

Philadelphia, January 29. 


The ideal citizen is always a disturbing in¬ 
fluence in his own political fold. He is in the 
position of the missionary to a congregation 
of southern negroes, who persisted in preach¬ 
ing against theft, covetousness, and other vio¬ 
lations of the ten commandments, while his 
hearers were longing only to hear of the won¬ 
ders described in the book of Revelations and 
to exult in anticipation of rambling through 
the golden streets and stately mansions of the 
great hereafter. “Pahson,” said one emotion¬ 
al and tearful brother, “ef you don’ quit talk¬ 
in’ ’bout stealin’ chickens an’ bein’ fon’ of 
other men’s wives, you’ll knock all de ’ligious 
stuffin’ out ob dis meetin ’.”—From Address on 
The Ideal Citizen, by John Habberton. 


Speaking of civil service reform, Mr. Cleve¬ 
land said it was quite apparent that many of 
the politicians of both parties would be de¬ 
lighted if they could smother it out of exist¬ 
ence by withholding the necessary appropria¬ 
tions for its maintenance. Of course, they 
would not have the courage to kill it directly. 
There was little fear they would succeed even 
by indirection, for the principle had too firm 
a hold upon the country to be destroyed, and 
he looked for the time when its scope would 
be enlarged and its benefits extended.— Balti- 
more Sun, February 12. 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


99 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

Services were free and base. Free ser- 
viee was to pay a sum of money, or serve 
under the lord in war. Base service was 
to plow the lord’s land, to make his hedge 
or carry out his dung. — Blackstone. 

—The Civiii Service Chronicle for May, 
1889, printed the letter of A. C. Eubanks, of 
Missouri, a defeated candidate for congress, in 
which he said : 

In thinking about the matter we were talk¬ 
ing about last night, I concluded that an 
office like your P. O. ought to afford me $25— 
say $15 now and $10 when you get your com¬ 
mission. 

The St. Louis Republic also has photo¬ 
graphs of other letters, one of February 8, 
1889, in which he said : 

I was the republican candidate for congress, 
and hence by custom am measurably entitled 
to have the patronage to somewhat reimburse 
me for labor and expense incurred in the cam¬ 
paign, which was considerable. 

And in an offer to sell an office to one C. F. 
Davis, he said : 

Your district being but partly in this, you 
can suggest about what would be right in the 
premises, and if you have other recommend¬ 
ations you would wish to call my attention 
to you will do so. 

The Civil Service Chronicle for Septem¬ 
ber, 1889, printed affidavits showing that 
Joseph D. Upton, a defeated candidate for con¬ 
gress, had been given the patronage of his dis¬ 
trict, about 234 post offices alone, and had pro¬ 
ceeded to realize upon them, selling the War¬ 
saw office for $25, and that various applicants 
for other offices were commanded by Upton to 
meet him on a certain day at Warsaw, where 
he “ assessed them all according to the amount 
of salary attached to the offices.” 

The Civil Service Chronicle for May, 
1889, also printed portions of a speech to a 
campaign committee by James Love, another 
defeated camlidate for congress, in which he 
said that he should control the patronage of 
his district and that he would receive all ap¬ 
plications for local offices and present them to 
the President or the proper department at 
Washington, and further, “Of course, it will 
be understood that there will be some expense 
attached to the proceedings, and applicants 
will fee expected to contribute to this expense.” 

This open talk causing a scandal, Clarkson 
proceeded to “investigate” the facts which, so 
far as made public, we printed in June, 1889. 
Clarkson declared Love innocent of any“charge 
affecting your honor.” 

The St Louis Republic, later had the follow¬ 
ing affidavit which we have delayed printing 
to see whether it would be denied or taken 
notice of by the administration. 

Kingston, Mo., Sept. 12, 1889.—Wm. J. Ward, of 
Pattonsburg, Daviess county, Mo., deposeth and on 
oath states; That he was an applicant for the Pat¬ 
tonsburg post-office, an<i that in the forepart of May, 
1889, he made a visit to Liberty, Clay county. Mo., 
for the purpose of soliciting the indorsement of James 
Love, late defeated republican candidate for con¬ 
gress, called at his home between 1 and 2 o’clock, on 
the date of his arrival at Liberty, was introduced by 
one Martin, presented Indorsements for Love’s con¬ 


sideration. Mr. Love produceil>]clipping from the 
St. Louis Olobe Democrat, which contained the ttaie- 
merit that the department had made ruling requiring in¬ 
dorsement of the defeated candidate for congress, and he 
stated that no one would be appointed to office without his 
indorsement. After an inspection of the indorsements 
he said that he*was going to Washington, said that the 
congressional committee had made considerable fuss 
over the speech that he had made at Gallatin, but that 
it would have no effect, as his relations with the 
department had been established, and nothing the 
committee could do would serve to disturb them. 
After some other conversation with Mr. Love, I 
left bis home and did not see him until the next 
day. In the morning I met him on the north side of 
the court-house yard. He spoke to me, and after we 
had conversed a short time Mr. Love said: “ Ward, 

I understand that you are a man of considerable 
means.” I told him that I was only in moderate 
circumstances, and had had some reverses in finan¬ 
cial aftairs, and was not worth very much. In 
speaking of his Washington trip, said he would be 
to considerable expense. I told him that I was will¬ 
ing, if he made my case a personal matter, to con¬ 
tribute a portion to said expense, but that under no 
circumstances would I pay him for his indorsement. 
He said that he did not think there was anything 
wrong for a man paying for a favor, and that, in in 
dorsing applicants’ petitions, he was doing such a 
favor as would secure the appointment. I told him 
tha,t I thought it was wrong to pay anything for an 
indorsement. I then left him, and was well satisfied 
with the conversation that I had that I would not 
succeed in securinghis indorsement, as I was unwill¬ 
ing to pay anything, and he was unwilling to indorse 
unless I did. 

The report as above detailed is substantially cor¬ 
rect in every particular. 

Wm. J. Ward. 

County of Caldwell, K„ 

State of Missouri. j • 

Sworn and subscribed to, before me, a Notary 
Public, tbis 12tb day of September, 1889. 

[Seal] Joseph Myers, 

Notary Public. 

That the administration has not rebuked 
this office brokerage would appear from the 
following facts given in the St. Louis Republic, 
December 11: 

In the fourth congressional district Mr. H. 
R. W. Hartwig was the defeated republican 
candidate in the general election in 1888. The 
elected democratic member subsequently died, 
and a special election was held, at which Mr. 
F. M. Postgate was the republican nominee. 
The quarrel between these two for recognition 
has given us some of the facts, and the knowl¬ 
edge of these has led to further investigation. 
Mr. Hartwig finding Mr. Postgate in posses¬ 
sion of the spoils during his absence, on his 
return wrote President Harri.son a letter, say¬ 
ing : 

I passed through a long and exciting canvass, my¬ 
self bearing all the expenses, amounting to a sum 
exceeding $20,000, used for local, state, and national 
purposes. . . . Taking into account the work done 
and the great sacrifices for the party made by me and 
my friends, it would be rankest injustice to ignore 
my claims for recognition—an act without precedent 
and calculated to destroy confidence in our party in¬ 
tegrity, discourage party workers, and disintegrate 
party organization and effectiveness. 

Respectfully, H. R. W. Hartwig, 

Late Republican Candidate, Fourth District, Missouri. 

—President Harrison has appointed John C. 
Kinney postmaster at Hartford, Conn. The 
Neto York Times says : “ The contest over this 
place has been long and earnest between Sen¬ 
ator Hawley and ‘ Pat ’ McGovern. The 
latter is the boss of the practical ward heelers 
of the party in Hartford, and he insisted that 
one of his lieutenants should be postmaster. 


He wanted the men who did the party’s work 
at the polls to be recognized, and long ago he 
announced that if he did not have his way he 
would transfer his force to the democratic 
side. Mr. Hawley insisted upon his right, as 
a senator, to nafiae the postmaster in his own 
city, and he selected Mr. Kinney, a young 
man employed upon the senator’s newspaper, 
who is said to control nobody’s vote but his 
own. Mr. Hawley’s claim has been allowed, 
and the party workers in Hartford will have 
a chance in the near future to vote as they 
please.” 

—House op Representatives, U. S. I 
Washington, D. C., Feb. 8,1890. / 

Captain Edward F. Phinney, South Farmington. 

Mass.: 

Dear Sir —You are well aware of the con¬ 
test which I have had over the post-office in 
your town. I consider it settled, and your ap¬ 
pointment has been made and sent to you. It 
gives me pleasure to congratulate you on hav¬ 
ing received it, and I think after the citizens 
consider it fully they will decide that my ac¬ 
tion was judicious. It is a satisfaction to me 
that, after looking over the ground with a 
great deal of care and doing justice to the 
claims of others, I have had the pleasure of 
indorsing an old soldier who has an honorable 
record in the service of his country. I feel 
that it is only a few years that we may recog¬ 
nize the veterans; they soon will pass off’ the 
stage; and, as you well know, whenever my 
judgment will permit me to do so, giving 
careful consideration to the claims of others, 
my preference is to recognize the members of 
the Grand Army of the Republic. I wish to 
say also that your conduct during this contest 
has been very dignified. You presented to 
me your petitions without reflecting upon any 
of your competitors, and left the matter to me 
to decide upon the merits of your claims. I 
have no doubt of your success in the office, 
and I feel interested that it shall be equal to 
any other in the district in prompt attention 
to business and in the courteous .and careful 
attention to the demands of those who do busi¬ 
ness with it. Very truly yours, 

John W. Candler, M. C., 
Massachusetts Ninth District. 

—Ten days ago Robert I. Patterson was ap¬ 
pointed postmaster here. O. J. Sturgis, editor 
of the Republican Standard, had been led to 
believe that he was to have the place, and had 
been indorsed by Senator Quay. Next day 
Sturgis charged in his paper that Patterson’s 
success was due to the interference of Henry C. 
Frick, the millionaire coke manufacturer and 
partner of Andrew Carnegie. Frick, he 
charged, is a friend of Postmaster-General 
Wanamaker and buys goods from his store. 
The statement was also made that Frick had 
contributed $20,000 to the republican cam¬ 
paign fund. 

Now Sturgis comes forward with another 
story. He says in his paper: “ The first post- 
office appointment made in Fayette county 
under the new administration was at Brad¬ 
ford. Very shortly after the inauguration 
Congressman Ray recommended J. H. Flenni- 
ken, and First Assistant Postmaster-General 
Clarkson appointed him. Mr. H. C. Frick 
thereupon protested to Postmaster General 
Wanamaker, who at once recalled the ap¬ 
pointment. Mr. Ray declined thus to be 
stripped of his prerogative by a private citi¬ 
zen living outside the district, and insisted on 
the appointment. Merchant Wanamaker re¬ 
fused to offend Merchant Frick with his 
twenty stores in the coke region, and so the 
matter hangs fire to-day—the office still in the 
hands of a democrat. What is the use to send 
representatives to Washington if they are to 
be overriden by outside interference?”— Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times from Uniontown, Pa., 
February 9. 










100 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—Congressman Morse this evening filed the 
following dispatch at the Western Union tele¬ 
graph office: 

“ Warren W. Adams, Quincy, Mass.—Upon 
my recommendation to the postmaster-general 
you are nominated by the President of the 
United States and confirmed as postmaster of 
Quincy by the senate to-day.” 

This is the end of the efforts of the citizens 
of Quincy to secure the retention of their com¬ 
petent postmaster, Mr. Speare. A popular 
vote, taken before the party screws were put 
upon the voters, would have given Mr. Speare 
a majority of the republicans. Mr. Adams 
has been a hard worker in the party ranks, and 
begets his reward. President Harrison made 
some declarations once about fitness and not 
party service being a tenure of office. There 
are a few people in Washington who remember 
them .—Boston Post, Januai-y 31, 1890. 

—The President to-day ended a long con¬ 
test for the postmastership at this place by ap¬ 
pointing Capt. W. Underwood to the position. 
Underwood was months ago selected by Con¬ 
gressman Ray, but Secretary Blaine recom¬ 
mended his cousin, Samuel Ewing, for the 
place, and the matter has been held in abey¬ 
ance ever since. Meanwhile another cousin 
of the .secretary. Col. William Ewing, has en¬ 
tered the lists for collector of the port at Pitts¬ 
burgh, a soft berth, which Senator Quay had 
picked out for his neighbor, John F. Drapo of 
Beaver. Col. Ewing is also said to have the 
indorsement of his distinguished relative at 
the capital. 

For some weeks it has been common rumor 
that the President was willing to accept one of 
these cousins, but drew the line on a double 
dose. As the aspirant for postmaster has fal¬ 
len by the wayside, it is thought the other 
cousin will get the collectorship .—Dispatch 
to New York Times from Washington, Penn., Feb 
ruary 13. 

—Charles Emory Smith, of Pennsylvania, 
editor of the Philadelphia Press, has been ap¬ 
pointed envoy extraordinary and minister 
plenipotentiary to Russia. 

ENCOURAGING SIGNS. 

— Congressman Bayne, of Pennsylvania, 
thinks that it would be a good thing if the 
appointment of postmasters of certain grades 
were regulated by the laws of the civil service 
commission. 

—Congressman Moore, of New Hampshire, 
recommended the reappointment of the dem¬ 
ocratic postmaster at Franklin Falls. He was 
selected at a caucus by a vote of 178 to 38 be¬ 
cause he had been an efficient officer. 

—Congressman Charles H. Turner, of New 
York, has at his disposal a cadetship in the 
naval academy at Annapolis. Instead of fol¬ 
lowing the usual practice of handing this place 
out to pay for personal service, or of letting a 
few of his personal followers compete for it, 
he has already asked the youth of his district 
to compete for the place. 

— Congressman Greenhalge has formally 
recommended the reappointment of Postmaster 
Buttrick at Concord. 

The Boston Post says: “He served with credit 
in the United States navy, and is a direct de¬ 
scendant of the Major Buttrick who led the 
Concord farmers in their assault upon the 
British troops. Mr. Buttrick has performed 
his duties to the satisfaction of the whole town, 
and, though a democrat, he is supported by the 
leading republicans of the place, including so 
staunch a party man as Judge Hoar.” 


—Congressman Morse says that unless the 
situation changes heshall recommend the reap¬ 
pointment of Postmaster Harlow at Whitman. 
Mr. Harlow is a democrat, and his term ex¬ 
pires in March, but he has given such satis¬ 
faction that he has the indorsement of the re¬ 
publican town committee and nearly all the 
republican voters. Mr. Charles H. Edson, who 
is in tow'n to day, had a talk with Mr. Morse, 
and assured him that Mr. Harlow’s appoint¬ 
ment would satisfy everybody .—Boston Post, 
January 39. 

—Secretary Tracy’s recommendation of Capt. 
Folger to succeed Commodore Sicard as chief 
of the bureau of ordnance is strictly in the line 
of civil-service reform. There is no abler 
young officer in the navy than Capt. Folger, 
and his specialty has been ordnance. His 
record as superintendent of the gun factory at 
the Washington navy yard has been admir¬ 
able from a technical point of view, and he 
has especially distinguished him.self by serving 
under two administrations, and allowing the 
adherents of neither to run his factory as a 
political machine. 

The republican bummers of the district 
have done their best for the last six months to 
drive him out of his place, because he would 
not let them dictate his appointments. But, 
instead of getting him sent to sea, or put on 
inferior duty they have succeeded merely in 
hastening his promotion .—Dispatch to New York 
Evenvig Post, Jan. 34. 

—The interest which has centered in the 
choice of postmaster for Newtonville has been 
intense and outspoken. With remarkable 
unanimity the republicans in a village caucus 
held last September, voted for the reappoint¬ 
ment of J. B. Turner, a democrat, who was 
appointed to the position when President 
Cleveland was at the helm. Mr. Turner has 
made a faithful official. He has introduced 
better business methods into the management 
of the office, has systematized the work, been 
accommodating and thoroughly efficient, and 
has thus given satisfaction to both republicans 
and democrats. The caucus did not seem to 
settle the matter satisfactorily to the oppo¬ 
nents of Mr. Turner, so it was finally decided 
to hold another; and Congressman Chandler, 
in a letter to C. B. Coffin, chairman of the 
Newton republican ward and city committee, 
stated that he shall recommend for the place 
the nominee of the caucus. A call was issued 
and the polls were open at a vacant store in 
the village from 4 to 9 p. m. to-day. 

The vote was taken by the Australian bal¬ 
lot system, six booths being set up, each of 
the three candidates being allowed two tellers. 

It was a quiet but interesting afternoon, and 
as the hour for closing approached the room 
was a place of attraction for quite a number 
of citizens. The names were plainly printed 
in alphabetical order. There were 240 ballots 
cast, as follows: C. A. Burgess had 25, E. S. 
Cotton 43, J. B. Turner 172. The result was 
greeted with applause, and will without ques¬ 
tion be final. The office is first-class, carrying 
a salary of $2,100 beshles the rent and an al¬ 
lowance of about $900, which pays the salaries 
of the two clerks .—Springfield Republican, Feb¬ 
ruary 3. 

—Postmaster Childs will remain in place for 
another four years. Such was the verdict of 
the people at this afternoon’s caucus, called by 
the congressmen of the state to decide upon 
whom their benediction should fall. The vote 
has been counted, and Frederick W. Childs, 
the present incumbent, who was appointed by 
President Cleveland in 1886, wins by a vote of 
467 against 401 for George A. Hines. Mr. 
Hines was the nominee of the republican man¬ 
agers, led by Col. George W. Hooker, who de¬ 


manded the office as spoils for the victors. 
The home of Mr. Childs this evening is be¬ 
sieged by the people offering congratulations 
to the successful candidate. In one town in 
the United States to-night principle rather 
than bossism holds sway. 

This struggle between the people of Brattle- 
boro and the republican politicians has at¬ 
tracted wide attention. Given the most effi¬ 
cient, brightest and most enterprising post¬ 
master the town has ever had, the busine.ss 
men and citizens generally, as early as last 
spring, determined to interpret literally the re¬ 
publican national platform and demand his 
reappointment, even though he be a democrat. 
Dea and Col. Estey of the Estey organ works 
were foremost in this crusade for reform, and, 
with others equally interested, had circulated 
the petition for Mr. Childs, which was signed 
by four-fifths of the republican voters. Col. 
George W. Hooker then came forward and, 
without impugning Mr. Childs’s executive 
ability, popularity or brilliant success, de¬ 
clared that he must not succeed himself be¬ 
cause he was not a republican. Not even a 
charge of offensive partisanship was laid at 
Mr Childs’s door. The most that the ex-ser- 
geant-at-arms has said was that no govern¬ 
ment salary should swell democratic cam¬ 
paign funds while a republican administration 
was in power. But in Mr. Childs’s case not 
even that objection holds, since he not only 
has never contributed to democratic funds but 
has a letter from Don M. Dickinson, the last 
democratic postmaster-general, informing him 
that to so contribute is a crime, and that fail¬ 
ure to respond to any request from democratic 
committees would in no way jeopard his ten¬ 
ure of office. That letter was written during 
the heat of the last presidential campaign. 

A remarkable feature of the contest has been 
the enthusiasm with which the best class of 
the republican party has rallied to Mr. 
Childs’s support. That they have worked for 
him as for one of their own political belief is 
very clear. Why they have done so was con¬ 
cisely stated by Col. Julius Estey this after¬ 
noon : First, because Mr. Childs’s retention is 
required on good business grounds; second, 
because such retention will give practical ap¬ 
plication to orthodox republican doctrines.— 
Special Dispatch to the Springjield Republican, 
Feb. 1. 

—The Brooklyn Times prints the following 
letter from the republican assemblyman-elect 
for the second district of Queens county to the 
republican postmaster of Long Island City : 

William Richensteen, Esq.: Dear Sir —James 
Purcell informs me that he is an applicant for 
appointment as letter carrier, and states that 
you have promised to appoint him if Mr. C. W. 
Hallett and I will join in a letter asking you to 
make the appointment and designate in such 
letter the particular carrier now in position 
whom we would like to have removed to make 
room for him (Purcell). 

Mr. Purcell is a republican and voted and 
worked for my election to the legislature last 
fall. It is alleged that all the present car¬ 
riers are “ democrats and consequently unde¬ 
serving of consideration at the hands of re¬ 
publicans, and ought therefore to be summa¬ 
rily removed.” 

1 do not believe that a man ought to be ap¬ 
pointed to office because he voted for me, nor 
do I believe that one ought to be removed 
from office because of having voted against me. 

I have reason to believe that several of these 
democratic letter carriers voted for me at the 
same time Purcell did, although they have 
not confessed to me that they did so. Othei-s 
no doubt, voted against me. ’ 

I have no means of knowing (without ask¬ 
ing) who voted for me and who against. 

If the claim of position is based upon the 
votes cast at the recent election, and the decis- 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


101 


ion in the premises is left to me, I must con¬ 
fess my inability to select the carrier for re¬ 
moval to make room for Purcell, and there¬ 
fore decline the honor of designating a victim 
for sacrifice in the interest of reform. 

If there exist other than partisan reasons 
for the removal of any carrier I am not 
aware of them. 

I have enough confidence in your judgment 
to believe you will make no removals without 
good cause, and enough faith in your repub¬ 
licanism to believe that in filling vacancies 
you will not refuse an appointment to an oth¬ 
erwise good man because he is also a repub¬ 
lican. 

I was once a republican postmaster, and 
tried to be a good one. I asked a democratic 
president to allow me to retain office under 
him to the end of my term, and the request 
was granted. 

Under all these circumstances it is perhaps 
unfortunate for Mr. Purcell that I should be 
made the arbiter of his fate in connection 
with the office he seeks, and this I regret, 
for there is good reason to believe he would 
make an efficient carrier. 

This long letter is prompted more by a be¬ 
lief that you want to share with your friends 
the responsibility of deciding embarrassing 
-questions of this kind, than that you seri- 
[ ously think I will select a man from among 
your subordinates for removal for no better 
reason than to provide a place for a man 
who voted the same ticket that you and I 
did. Very respectfully yours, 

Henky C. Johnson. 

Astoria, L. /., Dec. 11,18S9. 

WANTON REMOVALS. 

For I contend that the wanton removal of meritorious 
officers would subject him {the President) to impeachment 
and removal from his own high trust. Such an abuse of 
power exceeds my conception.—Congressman James Mad¬ 
ison, June, 1789. 

—John A. Pyle, appointed postmaster at 
West Chester, Pa., by President Cleveland, has 
been removed. A letter to the New York 
Times says (January 19): 

Now, Postmaster Pyle is complimented on 
all sides by republicans, prohibitionists and 
democrats for the many reforms he has intro¬ 
duced for the convenience of the public. He 
has brought the office up to a very high 
standard, and it has been visited on numerous 
occasions by postmasters of other localities to 
gain information. There has never been a 
word of complaint against Postmaster Pyle or 
his assistants. Every patron of the office, ex¬ 
cepting the office-seeking politicians, is satis¬ 
fied with his management. 

But Mr. Pyle is a democrat, and not even an 
“offensive partisan.” He never fails to vote 
the democratic ticket, but beyond that he does 
no ward work except upon himself. 

—After fifteen years of continuous duty in 
the Scranton post-office and four years in the 
railway mail service, A. H. Hartley, who h,as 
recently been acting as superintendent of mails 
in this city, has been summarily dismissed with¬ 
out cause, for the reason that, although a re¬ 
publican in politics, he has not been in 
harmony with the local machine. The Scran¬ 
ton Truth, ot this evening’s issue, calls the at¬ 
tention of Postmaster-general Wanamaker to 
the case, and asks if this is the sort of civil 
service reform the people may expect under 
the Harrison administration. 

Hartley was appointed to a position in the 
Scranton post-office in 1871 by Postmaster 
Slocum. He became a. most efficient clerk and 
soon mastered the details of the office. In the 
discharge of his duty some years ago he in¬ 
curred the displeasure of Congressman Scran¬ 
ton, who was then postmaster of this city, and 
he has not been in favor with the local bosses 


ever since. His conduct was commended by 
the highest officials of the post-office depart¬ 
ment, however, and when the whirligig of 
politics precipitated his dismissal he obtained 
a responsible position in the railway mail 
service, where his ability was soon recognized 
and approved. When President Cleveland 
was elected Mr. Hartley was again offered an 
important position in the Scrantan post-office 
under Postmaster Connolly and he accepted. 
It was thought that the guillotine would be 
applied to him as soon as Postmaster Jones 
came into office by the grace of Congressman 
Scranton, and there was some disappointment 
because this did not occur forthwith, but it 
finally came to pass when everybody supposed 
that Hartley’s experience and knowledge of 
post-office affairs were sufficient to cancel the 
old grudge and make him a fixture. 

The business men of Scranton, who have 
reason to appreciate Hartley’s valuable serv¬ 
ices in the post-office, are indignant over his 
summary dismissal, which is a direct violation 
of the letter and spirit of the civil service law, 
and many wonder whether Postmaster-Gen¬ 
eral Wanamaker would treat one of his faith- 
and efficient employes in that manner after 
nineteen years of devoted service .—Dispatch to 
New York Times, January 14. 


SPOILSMEN’S METHODS. 

Frank Hatton’s Post charged Commissioner 
Roosevelt with having used a spoilsman’s 
methods to secure a place in the census bu¬ 
reau for a friend. “Opposition was made to 
the appointment of Roosevelt’s man. Trades 
and dickers were necessary. Roosevelt made 
them. The Wisconsin man was appointed and 
charged to the District of Columbia.” 

Mr. Roosevelt in answer said : 

“ I had no intention of noticing that attack till it 
could be made a subject of official investigation. 
Then 1 could have got the true story out under oath, 
and shown how unblushingly false some of these 
statements are. It is a fact that I have interested 
myself in i)rocuring the appointment of a man from 
Wisconsin to a place in the census bureau, and with 
that the truth of the article begins and ends. I not 
only do not deny that part of the story, but I want 
to state here and now that I have nothing to regret, 
but shall take a precisely similar course whenever 
similar circumstances arise. When we went to Mii- 
w ukee to investigate the charges against Postmaster 
Paul, the principal, and, indeed, the vital witness 
for the government was a man named Shidy, who 
had been in the civil service about twenty years. He 
had begun life as a physician, but night work threat¬ 
ened to wreck his health, and he had to give up his 
practice and take a place far less profitable, but with 
easier hours, iu the public employ. He had a family 
to support, and was dependent upon his salary; so 
at the last moment he came to the Commission and 
pleaded to be excused from testifying, on the ground 
that his evidence would surely cost him his posi¬ 
tion. We refused to let him off, but T pledged him 
my word that he should be protected in telling the 
truth. It was as he predicted. Mr. Paul lost no 
time in driving him out of office. The commission 
did its utmost to keep him in his place, and when 
that failed I got the postmaster-general to write a 
letter recommending him to a position in the census 
bureau. There was not a ‘ trade ’ or a ‘ dicker ’ of 
any ki|id. Superintendent Porter consented to ap¬ 
point him if he could pa.ss the neces.sary examin¬ 
ation, and when the appointment was linally made 
out, Mr. Lyman went in person to Secretary Noble, 
exi)lained the circumstances, and asked in the name 
of the commission that it might be confirmed. Now 
you see just what that assault in the Post has back 
of it. 

“ How about the assignment of this Wisconsin 
man to the quota of the District of Columbia? ” 

“1 know nothing about that. When Postmaster 

•sf*- 


Paul heard that we were getting this place for Shidy, 
he did all in his power to block our efforts. From 
various quarters came protests, to which Superin¬ 
tendent Porter paid no attention, having given me 
his promise. Among the rest, the Wisconsin senators 
inquired into the case ; but I assured them that I did 
not want to interfere in any way with their pregog- 
ative; I wished Shidy charged to the commission’s 
account—not to theirs. Mr. Porter said thathe should 
be appointed, not from Wisconsin’s quota, but from 
the ‘general list.’ Whether matters are in such con¬ 
dition that the general-list appointments are all from 
the District, I’m sure I don’t know. Now, as I said 
in the beginning, I have nothing to conceal or take 
back. I shoulder the entire responsibility, and am 
ready to do the same thing over again when a wit¬ 
ness for the government is persecuted because he 
does his duty and tells the truth. It is the govern^ 
ment’s business to protect its witnesses from foui 
play. If it doesn’t stand by them, the time is not 
far distant when it won’t be able to command the 
services of a witness, except one who is moved by 
feelings of revenge or by some other impulse equally 
damaging to the value of his testimony.” 

When Mr. Roosevelt’s remarks were repeated to 
Commissioner Thompson, and he was asked if the 
commission were ready as a whole to stand by them, 
he answered: “Yes, though Mr. Roosevelt is wil¬ 
ling to accept all responsibility, this affair was really 
the commission’s joint act throughout. Shidy is an 
educated man, and there is no reason why he should 
not make an efficient clerk in his new place. I fully 
approved of Mr. Roosevelt’s conduct. Indeed, the 
commission discussed every stage of the proceeding. 
But there is one part of the story which Mr. Roose¬ 
velt has not told you, and which I think ought to be 
told, in justice to him. In the same letter in which 
Shidy was notified to come on and submit to an ex¬ 
amination for admission to the census bureau, Mr. 
Roosevelt wrote that he must not let money consid¬ 
erations stand in his way; and that, if he should 
fail in the examination, the entire expenses of his 
trip from Milwaukee and back would be paid out of 
Mr. Roosevelt’s own pocket. That Involved, of 
course, a possible expenditure of $75 to $100; but it 
is my colleague’s notion of the way to keep faith 
with a man to whom he has given his personal 
word.” 

The brutality of the spoils system is well 
known, and there has rarely been a more per¬ 
fect illustration ol it. 


AN INSTANCE OF THE MERIT 
SYSTEM. 

The Eastern Dispensary in New York city 
has for years carried on an invaluable work 
among the poor of the city. During the year 
1889, it treated 61,228 patients 106,748 times. 
As an illustration of how invariably the 
merit system benefits the many while the 
spoils system aids a.limited, privileged class, 
we quote from the account of the New York 
Evening Post Jan. ‘29: 

“It is, perhaps, the only institution of its kind iu 
the country where civil service principles are abso¬ 
lutely applied in the selection of physicians. Form¬ 
erly the physicians were selected in the ordinary 
way, and the influence of friends always decided the 
matter where there was a question as to the appoint¬ 
ment of one or another applicant. The employes 
gave such time and attention to the work of the dis¬ 
pensary as they could consistently with their other 
interests, attending upon alternate days and receiv¬ 
ing no compensation. Three years ago the trustees 
adopted an entirely new course ; when vacancies oc¬ 
curred, advertisements were inserted in the medical 
journals, public examinations were held under the 
direction of some of the most prominent physicians 
in the city, the applicants were graded strictly on 
the merits of their examination, and the appoint¬ 
ments were given in every instance to the man having 
the highest rank. Care was taken, of course, to 













102 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ascertain that the physicians appointed were men of 
proper character. The physicians were required to 
attend at the dispensary a certain number of hours 
each day, and were paid a small salary. This system 
has been strictly followed, and with most excellent 
result. Much good work was done under the old 
system, but the new one has been found so much 
better that no one connected with the management 
of the dispensary would think of returning to the 
old method of appointment. Much of the increase 
in the work done by the dispensary has been due to 
this new method of appointing physicians, giving 
them compensation, and requiring their attendance 
at regular hours every day. Even the very poor 
people, many of whom are by no means intelligent, 
but often quite the reverse, highly appreciate the 
superior character and skill of the physicians ap¬ 
pointed by this civil service method, and the ad¬ 
vantages of being able without fail to secure first- 
rate medical attendance at certain hours each day. 


THE CLERGY AND THE CIVIL 
SERVICE. 

Thii spoils system must be destroyed, or the liberty of 
the American citizen will become a fiction. I am not an 
alarmist, nor am I a pessimist; but I believe that this 
system will sooner or later subvert our republican institu. 
lions, unless it is itself abolished. And I very much 
doubt whether any other great reform or any considerable 
progress in any other direction will or can be made until 
elections and official life are freed from the baleful in- 
fiuence of patronage.—Rev. J. H. Grooker, in Problems 
in American Society, page 190. 

Rev. Sydney Strong having delivered an 
address on the spoils system on Thanksgiving, 
Day at Mt. Vernon, Ohio, says : “ I am glad 
that my eyes are opened. I think I opened 
the eyes of a few others. The fact is our par¬ 
tisan press and politicians keep the eyes of the 
people closed.” 

Most undoubtedly it is because the average 
citizen allows himself to be fooled and hood¬ 
winked into thinking that the undeniable 
abuses will be corrected by the politicians; in 
other words, that this is a political question to 
be settled by the regular party machinery. 
Never was there a more disastrous blunder. 
The interest of the machine politicians on both 
sides is exactly identical, and it is inevitably 
and radically opposed to the interest of the 
people and the government. Do you still ex¬ 
pect, after witnessing for years how the 
civil service reform plank is inserted in every 
party platform of both parties, as one of our 
great politicians forcibly but inelegantly said, 
“not to stand on, but to spit upon,” do you still 
expect, after seeing how each administration 
differs from its predecessor only in the degree of 
shamelessness with which it betrays its pre¬ 
election pledges, do you still expect the poli¬ 
ticians of their own free will to disgorge the 
control of more than $60,000,000 a year—which 
they have appropriated in common from the 
public,aud shamelessly speak of as their“spotZs.?” 
Then either you must be an extremely unso¬ 
phisticated person, or else you marvelously un¬ 
derestimate the power of a machine politician 
and the ease with which he can agree with his 
brother wire-puller of the opposite party. Why 
should it be hard for a democratic spoilsman 
to agree with a republican spoilsman to hold 
on to the spoils from which both get their liv¬ 
ing, at all hazards, and “divvy up” after elec¬ 
tion as best they can? Surely, New Yorkers 


do not need to be told of the notorious bargain 
entered into by the party bosses of opposite 
sides in the metropolis, by which a certain por¬ 
tion of the offices were allotted in advance 
to the heelers nominated by each ring, and the 
election was a mere farce to amuse the people, 
who might just as well have had no vote at 
all .—From the sermon of Rev. Benj. Wimer Ba¬ 
con, Oswego, N. Y., November S7, 1889. 

PETITION TO CONGRESS FOR LAR¬ 
GER APPROPRIATIONS FOR THE 

CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION. 

The following petition for larger appropria¬ 
tions for executing the civil service law has 
been started by the Massachusetts Civil Serv¬ 
ice Reform League : 

To the Honorable, the Senate and House of Repre¬ 
sentatives of the United States: 

Whereas, The President of the United 
States in his last message to congress, speak¬ 
ing of the work of the civil service commis¬ 
sion, says: “As a result of the revision of the 
rules, of the new classification, and of the in¬ 
clusion of the railway mail service, the work 
of the commission has been greatly increased, 
and the present clerical force is found to be 
inadequate. I recommend that the additional 
clerks asked by the commission be appropri¬ 
ated for”; and 

Whereas, The civil service commissioners 
charged with the execution of the law, in their 
report, just published, say (pp. 4, 5): “The 
sum of money at present appropriated for the 
expenses of the commission is altogether in¬ 
sufficient for the purpose, in spite of the most 
rigid economy.Therefore, the require¬ 

ments to enable the commission efficiently to 
discharge merely its present duties will be 
about $18,000 over and above the sum appro¬ 
priated this year, or a total appropriation of 
$53,000. To extend the system as it ought to 
be extended, the appropriation would need to 
be proportionately larger,”—therefore 

We, the undersigned, citizens of Massachu¬ 
setts, believing that the great importance of 
the work of the United States civil service 
commission demands ample appropriations 
from congress, earnestly petition your honor¬ 
able bodies to appropriate not only the sum 
of fifty-three thousand dollars asked for by 
the commission for its present work, but also 
the additional sum needed for such extension 
of the system under the present law as the 
commission recommend, and, with the Presi¬ 
dent’s approval, may be able to make. 

The following gentlemen, among many hun¬ 
dred others, have already signed it: 

Gov. J. Q. A. Brackett [Present Governor of Massa¬ 
chusetts]. 

Hon. George D. Robinson [Ex-Governor of Massa¬ 
chusetts]. 

Hon. Alexander H. Rice [Ex-Governor of Massachu¬ 
setts]. 

Hon. Patrick A. Collins [Ex-Congressman, demo¬ 
crat]. 

J. O. Burdett [Chairman republican State Commit¬ 
tee]. 

Wm. D. Sohier [Leading democrat in State Legis¬ 
lature]. 

J. Otis Wardwell [Leading republican in State Leg¬ 
islature]. 

Hon. George G. Crocker [Ex-President of State Sen¬ 
ate]. 


Hon. Hugh O’Brien [Ex-Mayor of Boston, demo¬ 
crat]. 

Hon. Alanson W. Beard [Ex-Collector of Boston 
and present Collector], 

Hon. Jonathan A. Lane [President of Boston Mer¬ 
chants’ Association, republican]. 

Hon. A. P. Martin [Ex-Mayor of Boston, demo 
crat]. 

Hon. Robert Howard [Prominent Advocate of la¬ 
boring men]. 

Charles Theodore Russell [Leading democrat]. 

Hon. Thomas N. Hart [Mayor of Boston, republi¬ 
can]. 

Hon. John E. Fitzgerald [Ex-Revenue Collector, 
democrat]. 

Hon. A. E. Pillsbury [Ex-President of State Senate, 
republican]. 

Hon. Wm. E. Russell [Ex-Mayor of Cambridge, 
democratic candidate for governor]. 

Hon. John D. Long [Ex-Governor of Massachu¬ 
setts]. 

Hon. Leopold Morse [Ex-Congressman, democrat]. 

Hon. Wm. Claflin [Ex-Governor of Ma.s.sachusetts]. 

Nathan Matthews, Jr. [Chairman Democratic State 
Committee]. 

Josiah Quincy [Secretary of Democratic State Com¬ 
mittee]. 

Hon. Henry H. Sprague [President of Senate]. 

Hon. Leverett Saltonstall [Ex Collector of the port 
of Boston]. 

Hon. W. W. Crapo [Ex-Congressman, republican]. 

Thomas Wentworth Higginson. 

Hon. E. S. Converse. 

Hon. Henry L. Parker. 

Hon. Edw. J. Donavan. 

Hon. Henry L. Pierce [Ex-Congressman]. 

Hon. George M Towle. 

Hon, Wm. E. Barrett [Speaker of the House]. 

John Boyle O’Reilly [I.eading Irish democrat and 
Editor of the Pilot]. 

The seventh annual report of the executive 
committee of the Indian Rights Association 
[Philadelphia, 1305 Arch street] is a docu¬ 
ment that ought to be read by all citi¬ 
zens. It is a depressing and shameful re¬ 
cord of the efforts made to secure the common¬ 
est principles of fair and decent treatment to 
a helpless people. The report says : 

“A prominent feature in the work of the 
association during the past five years has been 
an effort to prevail upon the government to in¬ 
troduce the merit system into the Indian ser¬ 
vice. It has been shown in numerous publi¬ 
cations and reports hitherto issued that it is 
impossible to conduct a satisfactory and effi¬ 
cient Indian service upon a system of appoint¬ 
ment which violates every sound principle of 
administration ; which makes appointment to 
office the reward of party service rather than 
of merit, and which dictates removals not for 
misconduct or inefficiency, but for partisan 
reasons. Abundant illustrations of the fruits 
of this pernicious system, as practiced by the 
Indian bureau during the greater part of Pres¬ 
ident Cleveland’s administration, were col¬ 
lected and published by the association. This 
vigorous and impartial action was followed by 
excellent results, since the ofi'ending commis¬ 
sioner and assistant commissioner toward the 
close of the last administration retired from of¬ 
fice under the incessant fire of criticism which 
their course had brought upon them.” 

And yet in the face of this President Harri¬ 
son is deaf to the appeal to put this service 
under the merit system, and he has inaugu¬ 
rated a so-called “home rule” policy against 
which, thus far, the Indian Rights Associa¬ 
tion has protested to no purpose. We quote 
from the report: 

“ The ‘home rule’ policy is the legitimate 
offspring of the spoils system. It removes the 
power of appointment from the federal an - 
thority in Washington, where it belongs, and 
places it in the hands of local politicians in 
the territories, by whom it has been usurped. 

Having chosen his course with the experi¬ 
ence of the preceding administration before 
him. President Harrison must challenge the 
criticism which does and will follow. 










The Civil service chronicle. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapolis. Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, 
lad., where subscriptions and advertisements will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianqpolis, Indiana. 


VoL. I, No. 13. INDIANAPOLIS, MARCH, 1890. teems : ^ 


Last year at this time you gave us all the 
keynote of reform for the year, and whatever 
may have occurred since then that note has 
not flattened upon our lips. If it was hopeful 
then, it is not elegiac now, for the note of 
the reformer is always cheerful and in 
the major key, and in view of the steady ad¬ 
vance of the good cause, it rises naturally and 
involuntarily into a triumphant strain. I 
should think it a happy year for reform if it 
had done nothing more for us than to give us 
the present national commission—whatever 
may halt or falter, that marches on. It 
offers us the stimulating spectacle of an ag¬ 
gressive contest for reform. It is not apolo¬ 
getic, nor hesitating, hut its attitude is well 
represented by one of the commissioners, whose 
hold mien and crisp and conclusive dealings 
with the enemy remind me of Sir Philip Syd¬ 
ney’s advice to his brother Robert, then upon 
his travels: ‘‘If you hear of any good wars, 
go to them at once.” If there be any better 
war at present than that in which we are all 
soldiers, I have not heard of it; and if there 
be any better fighting th:- n General Roose¬ 
velt’s, it is yet to be discovered. When I en¬ 
listed I certainly did not expect to be wafted 
to success on flowery beds of ease. But neither 
did I suppose that, against tradition and prej¬ 
udice, and ignorance and honest doubt, and 
party spirit and falsehood, and wrath and rid¬ 
icule, and the huge organized political ma¬ 
chine, the demand for reform in the civil 
service would make such rapid and prodigi¬ 
ous progress as to become within a very few 
years one of the two or three chief practical 
questions of politics. I am sure we all agree 
that fighting in this cause is, as virtue issaid to 
be, its own exceeding great reward. A genuine 
American likes nothing better than to attack 
monstrous public abuses, save that when, as 
in this case, the country begins to ask about 
them, it will ask more and more loudly and 
imperiously, until it answers itself by cor¬ 
recting them .”—Letter of George William Curtis 
to the Maryland Association. 

The investigation of the civil service 
commission by a congressional committee 
seems to have exhausted the ammunition 
of Hatton and those who are secretly sup¬ 
porting him. It is better, however, to de¬ 
fer extended comment until the committee 
has finished its work and made its report. 
It ought to be understood that the friends 
of the merit system are in favor of a 
thorough investigation, not only of the acts 
of the commission but of the workings of 
the law. They challenge the spoilsmen to 
make their very best showing. So far 
their case is a fiasco. Slight errors of judg¬ 
ment on the part of the commission ap 
pear, as for instance, the retention of a rel¬ 
ative of Mr. Lyman’s in their employ, a 
mistake, no matter how fit the man. This 
fault belongs upon Mr. Lyman’s shoulders. 
He had settled the matter before his two 
colleagues became members of the com¬ 


mission. They heard of the charge that 
this relative had improperly handed out 
examination questions, but they found that 
it had been investigated and the matter 
settled by the previous commission, and 
they very naturally did not reopen it. 
Mr. Lyman’s re-appointment as commis¬ 
sioner was unfortunate. He is not equal 
to such a position. He had always been a 
clerk, and is filled with the technicalities 
of the clerical mind. His acquiescence 
under President Cleveland, in a misuse of 
the law by the heads of offices, proved 
him to lack entirely those fighting quali¬ 
ties which were absolutely necessary. The 
misdoings of the Milwaukee postmaster 
were known to him before the election of 
1888, but he ignored them. If he had any 
duty, it was to denounce to the President 
the delinquencies of such a postmaster. 
The man fit to be a civil service com¬ 
missioner is one who is not afraid to do 
his duty at the risk of losing his place. 
No blame can be attributed to President 
Harrison for this appointment, as it was 
urged by the great bulk of the civil service 
reformers. 

When the commission was investigating 
the Milwaukee post-office, one member of 
the local board named Shidy told them 
that under the direction of Postmaster 
Paul he had manipulated the examination 
records so that Paul’s favorites could ap¬ 
pear at the top of the list, and that appoint¬ 
ments had been made in accordance with 
this manipulation. He did not want to 
testify to this, and held up to the commis¬ 
sion his certain loss of place and the cer¬ 
tain destitution of his family which would 
follow. The commission promised to pro¬ 
tect him. He testified, and was for that 
dismissed by Paul. Mr. Roosevelt ex¬ 
plained the circumstances to Superintend¬ 
ent Porter, and the latter agreed that Shi¬ 
dy might try for a place in the census bu¬ 
reau. Mr. Roosevelt then personally guar¬ 
anteed Shidy’s expenses to Washington, 
where the latter came, and having passed 
the examination received a clerkship from 
Mr. Porter. He was pursued by Paul and 
the whole body of the Wisconsin spoilsmen 
as a traitor to the spoils cause. In the con- 
grfssional investigation Shidy testified the 
other day: 

If the superintendent of the census wants false re¬ 
ports he knows that matter. I am his servant. He 
can direct me in all matters. In regard to post-office 


affairs, Mr. Paul was my superior officer and directed 
me. In regard to the civil service commission mat¬ 
ter he ought not to have been my superior or to have 
directed me in any way, but, unfortunately, it was 
impossible to separate the two I’s. 

This is the spoils system in its highest 
development. The New York Times has 
already pointed out that Shidy is its natu¬ 
ral product. The fear of losing his place 
and of beggaring his family makes him 
manipulate records at the order of a post¬ 
master. The same fear makes him beg to 
be excused from telling the facts. And so 
long has he been accustomed to seeing 
public affairs manipulated for the benefit 
of the Pauls and the Hattons, the Clarksons 
and the Wanamakers, that he declares the 
correct principle to be that a clerk must 
trick laws and records at the bidding of his 
official superior. 

Postmaster General Wanamaker has ta¬ 
ken a hand in the investigation, and his 
course is well described in a recent press 
letter by Mr. Foulke. It seems that Mr. 
Roosevelt obtained Wanamaker’s consent 
to get Shidy a place in the census bureau. 
Wanamaker now comes upon the stand, 
smooth and smug, and says that Mr. Roose¬ 
velt never told him of Shidy’s misdoings, 
or he would not have consented, but would 
have warned any head of department 
against appointing him. As Mr. Foulke 
says, he evidently makes his evidence as 
strong as possible; he has no hesitation or 
doubts of memory. By an unfortunate slip, 
however, Wanamaker admitted that he had 
at the time read the commission’s report 
of the Milwaukee investigation. That re¬ 
port contained the following: 

“We examined the secretary of the board, Hamil¬ 
ton Shidy, and the chairman, J. B. Johnson. Shidy 
is admitted by all to have done the work of the board. 

# << <• Shidy testified that he was compelled by the 
postmaster to give the latter free access to the list of 
eligibles, although such access was at that time 
strictly forbidden, and he further testified that the 
postmaster, knowing those that were eligible as well 
as their standing, appointed whomsoever he chose, 
and then forced him [Shidy] to torture the list of eli¬ 
gibles and certification book, so as to produce a cer¬ 
tification which should bear the appointee’s name.” 

# # <C « * * 

“As for Shidy, he, equally with his colleagues, 
Johnson and Fahsel, was certainly guilty of grave 
misconduct in permitting the board to become the 
tool of Mr. Paul, but he did it under fear of losing 
his place if he rebelled, bAng wholly in the power 
of Mr. Paul, and, unlike his colleagues, who were 
equally guilty with himself, he had the manliness to 
come forward and tell what had occurred when the 
chance was given him. It is manifestly unjust to 
visit him with any punishment not also inflicted on 
Johnson and Fahsel.” 

“Shidy and Johnson testified before us, in Mr. 
























104 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Paul’s presence, that on one occasion he examined 
the papers of an applicant, which papers they had 
already marked, and forced them, against their own 
judgment, to re-mark them, giving them a lower 
grade. * Mr. Shidy testified that Mr. Paul 

made his appointment first, and then forced him 
[Shidy] to gerrymander the list of eligibles, so as to 
produce a stuffed certification which should contain 
the name of the already appointed man.” 

By some curious manipulation of his 
conscience Mr, Wanamaker, without 
qualms, retains Johnson in the employ of 
the post-office department. After Wana- 
maker’s profession of ignorance of Shidy’s 
conduct, the commission brought out a 
copy of his letter to Paul on receipt of the 
latter’s resignation, which said : 

“ Before its receipt the civil service commission 
had submitted a report of an examination of your 
office, upon which I should have taken action before 
this but for your request for delay in order that you 
might submit a statement in your own behalf. After 
the examination by the civil-service commission, a 
post-office inspector was sent to examine your office 
and his report has been submitted to me. Upon these 
reports your removal from office has been deter¬ 
mined on.” 

The report of the commission upon the 
Milwaukee post-office was full of references 
to Shidy’s conduct, and for Wanamaker to 
say that he had read that report and did 
not know of Shidy’s misdoings, and was 
misled by Mr. Roosevelt into consenting to 
Shidy’s employment in the census bureau 
is to the ordinary mind incomprehensible 
and had better be left to Senator Hampton 
to characterize. The evidence is very 
strong in support of Mr. Foulke’s opinion, 
that this proceeding is an attempt, mainly 
instigated and supported by high adminis¬ 
trative officers to break down Mr, Roose¬ 
velt. The result will be that he will be 
stronger than he was before. 

In another column is set forth a portion 
of the public career of Quay, whose hands 
have been further strengthened by the 
handling of the vast patronage of Pennsyl¬ 
vania. In this case the following letter 
shows of how little avail are the protests of 
influential citizens when once an office 
baron gets his feet on the neck of the peo¬ 
ple : 

February 18, 1889. 

General Benjamin Harrison: 

My Dear Sir—I have your letter of February 12. 

. . . . You must be sure that I, who have so long 
urged your election as President, do not now wish 
your administration to fail. I am therefore com¬ 
pelled to address you a further protest concerning 
the course which it is evident you have decided upon 
taking.Senator Quay’s status in Pennsyl¬ 

vania is repugnant to the men whose support you 
need. He has been and is a "machine” organizer 
and manager. His control of the politics of this state 
is already causing serious discontent. Yet you choose 
him and the agent whom he designates, and you 
practically decline to hear the voice of remonstrance 
raised by men of high character and influential po¬ 
sition in Pennsylvania alTairs.You are 

therefore not merely taking a negative step, you are 
taking one of positive weakness, and sure evil conse¬ 
quences. You are depriving yourself of support 
which you ought to have, and you are making your 
administration the ally of those influences and prac¬ 
tices in politics against which the republican party 
has more than once revolted. I am sorry this should 


be the case, and I can not therefore let the time pass 
of frankly telling you the truth. 

I am, dear sir, very truly your friend, 

Wharton Barker. 

The Civil Service Chronicle will be 
glad to receive information upon the fol¬ 
lowing points: 

The name of any newspaper editor or 
owner who has or may receive a federal 
appointment, and the name of the office. 

The names of all members of political 
committees or delegates given a federal 
appointment, and the name of the office. 

The names of all federal office-holders 
who are members of any political commit¬ 
tee or who act as delegates, naming the 
committee or the convention. 

Statements regarding any political ac¬ 
tivity in primaries, conventions or politi¬ 
cal work done for any nominees by federal 
office-holders. 

These accounts should be as explicit as 
possible. 

David Essex Porter, a son of Admiral 
Porter, has been arrested in Washington 
on a charge of obtaining $1,900 in money 
and goods from a colored man, F. W. John¬ 
son, for securing an office for Johnson, but 
which the latter never got. Porter admits 
that he received the above property and 
also other sums from other persons, but 
says it was for expenses incurred in trying 
to get them offices. There are some excel¬ 
lent people in Indiana who avoid the civil 
service reform agitators as jarring upon 
the evenness of their day and as jostlers of 
“the past.” We ask their attention to the 
above specimens of dangerous degenera¬ 
tion, and suggest that these good people 
quicken their activities. Major Porter is 
said to have a brilliant military record and 
powerful social and political influence in 
Washington, where he resides. 

The Civil Service Chronicle desires 
to call the attention of the commercial club 
of this city to a series of articles in the 
Civil Service Record (Boston) on competitive 
tests applied to the Boston police force. 
And further, the primary evil in the man¬ 
agement of our city affairs is the spoils 
system. Thousands of dollars are spent 
every year upon the streets, and yet we 
have no clean streets. The first reason is 
that the men who receive the wages are 
not hired because they are good workmen, 
but because they have influence with some 
councilman. The Indianapolis News last 
year stated that Councilman Darnall had 
thirty men in the city employ. That 
means that they were employed not for 
their capacity to do work, but because Mr. 
Darnall wanted them employed. The 
commercial club should destroy this sys¬ 
tem, root and branch, and compel the sub¬ 
stitution of the system of the Boston la¬ 


bor service, and this should be thoroughly 
tried before any additional direct taxation 
is proposed. Let us get the worth of the 
money we do spend before we add to the : 
sum. This is one step in a revolution which 
ought to take place in our city^govern- \ 
ment. ( 


A POLITICAL CENSUS. 

Superintendent Porter goes bravely on with 
the work of allotting the positions connected 
with the census, as spoils. He has taken to 
writing to postmasters for information 
as to the character of persons about to 
be employed. There has been no better 
chance lately for one local partisan to 
give another a lift. It is probably a pleas¬ 
ant fiction of Porter’s to seem to inquire into 
the fitness of his employes. As a matter 
of fact he de.scribes himself “as waist-deep in 
congressmen,” and these really make the ap¬ 
pointments. Each state is divided into dis¬ 
tricts, with a supervisor at the head of each, 
and each district has a large number of enu¬ 
merators. In addition there are other offices, 
such as gathering the statistics of mortgage 
indebtedness. In Massachusetts this last posi¬ 
tion has been allotted to Senators Dawes and 
Hoar, as their share of census spoil; the bal¬ 
ance goes to the other congressmen. The allot¬ 
ment is now well under way, and is of interest. 
In the Rockford, Illinois, district, two weeks 
ago, the supervisor had 700 applications for 
265 places, and was just sending out in one 
mail 101 letters in relation to them. In In¬ 
diana there are six districts, and the super¬ 
visor of the first district is Francis Scholtz, of 
Evansville, described as “a prominent German 
republican.” In the second district is Am¬ 
brose E. Nowlin, “clerk of the Dearborn 
county republican committee.” In the third 
district the appointee is Sid Conger, for whom 
Wanamaker recently named a post-office, and 
of whom it is said “there is no more popular 
and earnest republican anywhere.” In the 
fourth district is Wilson Soale, described as 
“one of the most active young republicans in 
the state.” The qualifications of the ap¬ 
pointee in the fifth district, Charles Harley, 
we are unable to state, except that he is a re¬ 
publican. In the sixth district is S. S. Be- 
shore, described “as an active republican.” 
In this connection we get this bit of informa¬ 
tion from the Indianapolis Journal: 

Mr. Wilson H. Soale, census supervisor for the 
Terre Haute district, has referred the appointment 
of census enumerators to the chairmen of the several 
county committees of his district, and these in turn 
are referring them to the chairmen of the diflferent 
township committees. That seems a queer way of 
getting official subordinates to perform an important 
executive work. 

There is nothing queer about it except that 
some one let out the secret. The entire census 
establishment, including all its positions and 
the great sum appropriated to it, was as delib¬ 
erately turned over to be divided among party 
workers as any pirate ever divided the cargo 
of a ship among those who had helped to cap¬ 
ture it. It is time now for Senator Hoar to 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


105 


come forward and argue that these are politi¬ 
cal offices, and that the enumerators in their 
townships will have to respond to the presi¬ 
dential toasts at feasts. The result of the pres¬ 
ent process may be that we shall have a polit¬ 
ical census, in which on all economic questions 
affecting party doctrine no one will have any 
confidence. This is the logical end of the 
practice advocated by Senator Hoar when he 
says, in the Boston Journal of February 25: 
“ I still think, as I have always thought, that 
the collectors of our principal ports should be 
men in political harmony with the adminis¬ 
tration, with whom the President and the sec¬ 
retary of the treasury may, whenever they find 
it necessary, establish the most confidential re¬ 
lations. I think this is specially true under 
an administration one of whose chief duties is 
the framing, reforming, construing, and ad¬ 
ministering a tariff. 

A DOUBLE INSTANCE. 

I. 

“ Only the Interests of the Public Service 

should Suggest Removals from Office.” 

Mr. Saltonstall’s fellow-citizens desired to 
give him a dinner as a manifestation of their 
esteem, and in their letter to him, among oth¬ 
er things, they said : 

“ We have seen that during your tenure of oflice, 
the administration of the custom house has been, for 
the first time in a generation, free from partisan in¬ 
fluence: that it has been conducted upon business 
principles, by business methods, and by men trained 
in those principles and methods; that it h'ls been 
just and considerate to importers and entirely faith¬ 
ful to the government.” 

In the Civil Service Record for March is 
the letter of Mr. Dorman B. Eaton to the Bos¬ 
ton Journal taking up Senator Hoar’s excuse 
for pressing the removal of Collector Salton- 
stall on the ground that the collectorship is a 
“political” office, and Senator Hoar’s reply, 
which contains this astonishing statement in 
support of his opinion that the collectorship 
is a political office : 

“I have been familiar with the leading friends and 
promoters of the policy of divorcing the civil service 
of the country from politics here in Washington since 
I served with Mr. Jenckes of Rhode Island in 1869, 
and was intimate with him and his plan. I believe 
that this has been the opinion of all of them without 
exception. I never heard, in private speech or pub¬ 
lic debate, an intimation to the contrary.” 

Mr. Eaton is well known as an urbane but 
dangerous adversary. After demolishing Sen¬ 
ator Hoar on the above entirely incorrect 
statement, he proceeds to the assertion that 
that the collector must be in political harmo¬ 
ny with the President, and closes as follows: 

The simple answer is that the collector is in no 
.sense a political officer, that he has no right to have 
any party secrets or party aims regarding the tariff, 
that he is as much bound as any judge in Ma.ssachu- 
setts to administer the tariff laws openly and hon¬ 
estly in the common interests of the people, regard¬ 
less of party. He is no more a political officer than 
the superintendent of the public schools, the chief 
of police or the judges of the supreme court are po¬ 
litical officers. It is no part of his duty to speak for 
the President. He discredits his office in the exact 
degree that he interferes with party management, or 
attempts to use his official influence for party pur¬ 


poses. I believe the time is not remote when this | 
view will be as universally accepted in this country 
as it was before Jackson’s time, and now is in Great 
Britain. When Massachusetts took the lead in the 
general struggle for independence, all the collectors 
under George III, if not some of the judges, were 
political officers. I hope and believe Massachusetts 
will add to her glories by taking the lead in bringing 
in the triumph of those principles in public admin¬ 
istration which will cause it to be utterly immaterial, 
in the estimation of her people, what are the party 
politics of the collector of Boston. Who can fail to 
see the great gain of making the collectorship of Bos¬ 
ton a reward to be won in fair competition by the 
highest merit in the customs administration, rather 
than a prize to be contended and bargained for 
through a long period in the lottery cf party by the 
rival leaders and politicians of the state—a contest in 
whicli the issues are as false and needless as they are 
perplexing and demoralizing. To repeal the four 
years’ term and to take the collectorships, both of 
customs and internal revenue, tens of tliousands of 
post-offices and many other miscellaneous offices of 
a purely business nature out of party contests and no 
longer allow them to be the subject of degrading in¬ 
trigues, corrupt bargains and alarming bribery,would 
be an era in our politics which would enable presi¬ 
dents to discharge their proper functions instead of 
spending months on removals, open the way for the 
senate to regain its old dignity, and exalt republican 
government not only in our own eyes, but in the es¬ 
timation of the w'hole civilized world. 

This whole unfortunate matter is fitly sum¬ 
med u p by Harpers' Weekly: 

The whole country is indebted to Mr. Saltonstall 
for the demonstration that the collectorship of Bos¬ 
ton is not, as Senator Hoar calls it, a political 
office, and for showing that the principles of the 
conduct of the public service which the republican 
platform of 1838 warmly commends with a demand 
for their general application, are not only practic¬ 
able, but productive of the best results. The Presi¬ 
dent, also, although consenting to make spoils of 
the office, in deference to the alleged persistence Of 
Senators Hoar and Dawes, must yet feel grateful to 
the officer who has illustrated to the satisfaction of 
all men the wisdom of the President’s declaration 
that “fidelity and efficiency should be the essential 
test in appointment, and that only the interest of 
the public service should suggest removals from 
office.” 

The removal of Mr. Saltonstall by the author of 
this truthful remark has had the good effect of illus¬ 
trating conspicuously to the country the truth of 
another remark by the same author, in which he 
describes such acts as Mr. Saltonstall’s removal as 
“the frank and bold, if brutal, method of turning 
men and women out simply for political opinion.’’ 
The platform of Mr. McKinley bitterly reproached 
misguided citizens who thought it possible that a 
republican President could be capable of such con¬ 
duct. 

ir. 

” Fitness and Not Party Service should be 

the Essential and Discriminating Test.” 

When the President, last August, nominated 
ex-Gov. Warmouth, the Indianapolis Journal 
said : “The appointment of ex Governor War- 
mouth as collector at New Orleans, probably 
indicates his purpose to engage again in active 
politics, and that means republican activity 
in Louisiana.” Warmouth has just been con¬ 
firmed after a determined opposition,in which 
his whole history was brought out. The Civ¬ 
il Service Chronicle gives a few facts. The 
New York Tribune said of him, December 28, 
1874, “That his administration as governor 
was corrupt and bad, is unfortunately true.” 
And again, July 12, 1877, “Most of the Louis¬ 
iana gang were brought into prominence be¬ 
cause they were great rascals.” Warmouth 


was governor of Louisiana between 1868 and 
1872, when he was impeached by the legisla¬ 
ture for offering a bribe. He afterwards went 
from the republican to the democratic party, 
and, in 1877, back again. In December, 1874, 
Warmouth and an editor named Byerly had, 
on Warmouth’s challenge, arranged to fight a 
duel. Before it came off they met on the 
street, and Byerly struck Warmouth with a 
cane. Warmouth said, “ He struck me three 
times with the stick, when I clinched with 
him, in the meantime taking a knife out of my 
pocket. With my arms around his shoulders, 
I got my hands together and opened the knife. 
Just then I felt Byerly falling on me. Soon 
after we fell a policemen took the knife out of 
my hands, and some of the crowd pulled By¬ 
erly off. I understand Byerly has been cut, and 
I am accused of doing the cutting.” In closing 
this account the New York Evening Post says^ 
“Byerly had been ‘cut’ in six places in the ab¬ 
domen, twice before he fell, one wound being 
six inches deep, and died in a few hours.” 
The Civil Service Chronicle says there is a 
vast difference between Leverett Saltonstall 
and H. C. Warmouth 


THE RISE OF AN AMERICAN BARON. 

The following account of Matthew S. Quay 
is condensed from the New York World, of 
February 10. He was originally a lawyer in 
Beaver (Pa.), but appears to have had no prac¬ 
tice to speak of, and early turned his attention 
to all kinds of public offices. The account 
runs that in 1867, being a member of the state 
legislature when Simon Cameron and Governor 
Curtin were candidates for the United States 
senatorship. Quay was the Curtin candidate 
for speaker, and it was generally reported that 
he received $13,000 for his work for Curtin. 
In the midst of the contest Quay gave up his 
speakership candidacy, joined the Cameron 
forces against Curtin and nominated his own 
opponent for speaker. The charge was openly 
made that he received $20,000 for deserting 
to Cameron. When Quay entered the legisla¬ 
ture he was poor, but soon after he began the 
erection of a building in Beaver costing $13,- 
000. This, and other things, attracted atten¬ 
tion, and the Pittsburgh Commercial commented 
upon Quay’s malfeasance. He sued the Com¬ 
mercial before a Pittsburgh alderman as ex¬ 
amining magistrate, and the World gives an 
amusing extract from the cross-examination 
of Quay, where, aided by the magistrate, he 
avoided answering every question which tended 
to elicit information as to where he got his 
money. After a veritable Dogberry session, 
the Commercial was held for the upper court and 
then Quay dropped the matter. Later a friend 
of Quay’s bought the Commercial and it has 
ever since been an organ in whose sight Quay 
can do no wrong. 

Quay became secretary of the common¬ 
wealth, and had now got, in certain fields, 
the control of the government of Pennsylva¬ 
nia, which, with occasional intervals, he has 
held ever since. He had the legislature pass 
a bill establishing the office of recorder for 













106 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Philadelphia, and then had himself appointed 
to the place which paid over $40,000 a year. 
He lacked two votes of getting the recordership 
bill passed, and he secured one by a bribe of 
$5,000. In 1878 he removed to Philadelphia 
and entered upon his office. 

Liking Harrisburg better. Quay in 1879 
again had himself appointed secretary of the 
commonwealth In that year a bill was in¬ 
troduced to indemnify for the damages caused 
by the Pittsburgh rioters. The grand jury in¬ 
dicted certain persons, among them Emil Pe- 
troff and William H. Kemble, for bribery in 
connection with this bill. Petroff was con¬ 
victed and Kemble and others plead guilty. 
They were sentenced to the penitentiary, but 
somehow were extremely unconcerned. The 
bill which they had attempted to bribe 
through was Quay’s pet scheme, and the ex¬ 
cellent grounds for their unconcern soon be¬ 
came apparent. The board of pardons was 
made up of state officers, including Quay. He 
got them together and had them recommend 
the pardon of Kemble and Petroff, and then 
had the governor pardon them. Kemble be¬ 
came and is now the president of the People’s 
Bank, Philadelphia, an institution noted as a 
depository of state funds, which it gets through 
the friendship of Quay. 

Another similar instance is given in the ca.se 
of A. F. Lynch, charged with forgery. Quay 
declared that he would secure his release if 
convicted. Lynch was convicted and sen¬ 
tenced, and then Quay, through the pardoning 
board, set him at liberty. 

Quay had a crony in J. Blake Walters 
cashier of the state treasury. The account, 
runs that he and Walters and another state 
official speculated in stocks in the New York 
market until they had lost $260,000 of the 
state’s money, which Walters had taken out 
of the treasury. There was about to be a 
change of treasurers, and an accounting must 
be had. Quay was considering ways of sui¬ 
cide when the matter came to the ears of Don 
Cameron, who, to save the reputation of the 
republican party, paid over $100,000 toward 
making up the deficit. Quay gave his notes, 
and one for $25,000 has not yet been paid. 
For a time after this transaction Quay kept 
in the background. Yet the astounding fact 
appears that in 1885 he had himself nominat¬ 
ed for state treasurer, and he was elected. He 
entered upon the office in May, 1886, and held 
it until he caused the legislature to elect him 
a United States senator in 1887, which office 
he now holds. 

The account of the World can be supple¬ 
mented by saying that at the Chicago conven¬ 
tion, which resulted in the nomination of Gen¬ 
eral Harrison, Quay’s first question to every 
proposed combination of delegates was, “ How 
is that going to benefit me? I must have con¬ 
trol of the federal patronage of Pennsylvania.” 
He was not a part of the combination which 
finally made the nomination, but he has, 
nevertheless, gained his object. His control 
of the federal patronage of Pennsylvania has 
been absolute. From small beginning as a 


ward worker in Beaver, he has gradually en¬ 
larged his field, until he has to-day, without 
exaggeration, absorbed the legislative and ex¬ 
ecutive powers of the state, as much as 
Julius Caesar, although apparently only 
princeps senalus absorbed the powers of the Ko- 
man government. Quay is to-day only ap¬ 
parently a senator from Pennsylvania, yet he 
actually possesses an aggregation of federal 
and state governmental powers wholly at va¬ 
riance with republican government, and dan¬ 
gerous to the country, and the World is per¬ 
forming a public service in holding him up 
where the whole country can see him as he is. 

ANNALS OF “ PRACTICAL POLI¬ 
TICS.” 

It will be better to begin this account by 
describing briefly the chief characters who 
will figure in it. 

Albert Daggett, commonly called “Al,” ap¬ 
peared in Brooklyn about 1870. He “ went 
into politics,” and in 1875 was elected sheriff 
of Kings county, after an extraordinary fac¬ 
tory to factory and house to house canvass. 
In 1884 and 1885 he was a member of the state 
senate. Between times he has been a manager 
of local campaigns, using money lavishly, 
with a reputation for using it corruptly. He 
was what is known as “execution proof.” 
After the late inauguration he s" cured the gov¬ 
ernment contract for furnishing postal cards. 
He had probably never seen a card factory, 
but he made a shift by some process of re-let- 
ting, and is now furnishing the country with 
postal cards under a steady charge of under 
size and poor quality. Being thus on his feet 
again, he turned to “politics” with new zest. 

Michael J. Dady is also a Brooklyn politi¬ 
cian. Of him the New York Tribune in 1882 
said: 

Mr. Dady is a contractor who devotes all his spare 
time and energy to Brooklyn ward politics. He has 
been a democrat and a republican by turns, and has 
always adapted his principles to suit the demands of 
the occasion. He was at one time superintendent of 
sewers in Brooklyn, and while holding that oflBce 
was temporarily embarra.ssed by having five indict¬ 
ments found against him for felony and conspiracy. 
He extricated himself, however, by turning state’s 
evidence, securing his own safety by convicting his 
companions in crime. He has recently returned to 
the allegiance of Mr. North, from whom he had sep¬ 
arated politically while the stalwarts’ chances for 
oflice were poor, and he has received his reward. He 
showed his appreciation of the service in which he 
had been appointed by driving at once to the navy 
yard, on Tuesday, and giving notice that a clean 
sweep in favor of the stalwarts was soon to be made.” 

Franklin Woodruft’ was chairman of the 
Kings county republican committee, and in 
addition held for a brief period the position 
of “ patronage dispenser,” having already, in 
in 1889, spent three months in Washington 
performing the duties of that position without 
the title ; but in a month he was forced out of 
his office, and when asked if he would take 
further part in the distribution of patronage, 
said, “ Not much. I have all I want of such 
dirty business, and more, too. They gave me 
that office against my desire, and then put me 
out in a very indecent manner. I’ll have no 
more of it.” 


Theodore B. Willis is naval officer at New 
York, having succeeded Col. Burt. He was 
chairman of the Kings county campaign com¬ 
mittee in 1888, and is described as having done 
“Herculean work for the party.” James W, 
Birkett is a member of the state senate from 
Brooklyn, and treasurer of the county com¬ 
mittee. Greenleaf A. Smith is boss of the six¬ 
teenth ward in Brooklyn. 

The object in life of these men and their as¬ 
sociates is to be able to distribute to them¬ 
selves and their friends the public offices which 
fall, or can be made to fall, to inhabitants of 
Kings county (N. Y.). In order to get and 
keep this power, they have to fight for places 
in the party machine. These places are chair¬ 
manships of county, ward or other commit¬ 
tees, places of bosses of wards, controllers of 
votes, and so on. 

Franklin Woodruff desired a re-election to 
the chairmanship of the county committee 
and was opposed by one Baldwin. Daggett 
“supported” the latter, and, votes being scarce, 
he cast about to meet the demand. He went 
to Greenleaf A. Smith, and, by a preponder¬ 
ance of evidence, bought nine votes of the six¬ 
teenth ward delegation, for Baldwin, paying 
Smith therefore $3,166.66 by giving him Sen¬ 
ator Birkett’s check on the committee funds 
for $416.66, and his own eleven notes, indorsed 
by Senator Birkett, for $2,750. The conven¬ 
tion was held, Naval-Officer Willis and United 
States District Attorney Johnson being active 
spirits, and Woodruff was, with their help, re¬ 
elected, Willis casting the first vote for him. 
Afterwards the opposing factions criminated 
and recriminated in writing and from these 
sources the impartial historian may get much 
light. 

Daggett says: “This campaign was inaugurated 
and carried to a successful termination by Franklin 
Woodruff, Theodore B. Willis, and Israel F. Fischer. 
It embraced bribery, forgery, the prostitution of the 
patronage of the government, lying, trickery, and 
every wicked device known or practiced by the worst 
specimen of pot-house politics.” 

He cites interviews in the public prints 
where these men claim to have secured places 
for over a dozen Baldwin delegates who after¬ 
wards voted for Woodruff. To this Naval- 
Officer Willis answers: 

“ The statement is an unvarnished lie. I never 
sought to bribe any delegate. 

It is true that at that time I, with Mr. Fischer at 
the request of that organization, went to Washington 
to look after the status of certain recommendations 
that had been made some time previous by ward or¬ 
ganizations ; that they believed they had been over¬ 
looked in the excitement pertaining to the carrying 
on of the fall election; and, as a result, these omis¬ 
sions were corrected by the appointments being 
made. They were in the main minor positions, and 
at any other time would have attracted little if any 
attention.” 

It seems that Naval-Officer Willis, before 
the convention occurred, heard of the sale of 
votes by Smith, and with one Gilluly went to 
Smith’s house on Sunday evening and found 
there Smith and his friend Buchman. Hav¬ 
ing been assured by Smith that the report 
was true, the talk, according to Willis, ran as 
follows: 

“ ‘Well,’ I said, ‘what are you to receive? Are you 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


107 


to be given a position ? ’ ‘ No,’ he replied ; ‘ they 
haven’t given me a plaee, hut they have given me 
what is better to me just now than a place. The fact 
is, I would rather have the “stuff,” ’ meaning cash. 
This was said in a very emphatic manner, and he 
continued, ‘It will do me more good ; I can utilize it* 
if I choose, in business.’ 

“Silence came over the group upon thiscold-blood- 
_ ed statement being made, and for a moment we were 
at a loss for words or thoughts with which to con¬ 
tinue the conversation. While we were thus silenced 
Mr. Buchman, to relieve the painfulness of the situ¬ 
ation, wheeled around on the piano stool, opened 
the lid of a music-box on the piano, and started it 
going. As the melodious strains floated out on the 
air of the room, Mr. Smith said : ‘ Why do you want 
music?’ ‘Well,’ said Buchman, ‘it seemed to be get¬ 
ting so gloomy I thought some good music would 
have a cheering effect.’ Then turning to me he said: 

‘ Mr. Willis, do you play the piano?’ Whereupon 
Smith said ; ‘ You had better stop the music and let 
us talk business.’ The music was stopped. 

“Mr. Gilluly said; ‘Has this thing gone so far that 
it is iron-clad?’ 

“Smith replied: ‘I don’t know as it has, but I 
suppose the Baldwin people consider the transaction 
closed. I wish that I had seen your people last 
night.’ 

“ ‘When was the business closed?’ said I. ‘Yester¬ 
day,’ he replied.” 

“ ‘Smith, would you not rather have money for 
the notes than to retain them ?’ 

“ ‘Of course,’ he answered, ‘I would prefer cash to 
the notes.’ 

“Gilluly said: ‘Suppose we can have the notes 
cashed for you; of course you will allow a good dis¬ 
count for so doing ?’ 

“ ‘Oh, yes,’ said Smith, ‘I will take 82,500 cash for 
the notes, their face value being something like 
$2,800. I would be willing to throw off $300 or $400 
for cash.’ 

“I said; ‘I should think $2,000 would be a very 
good sum for that amount of notes that might be 
' ■ repudiated, and so be worthless.’ 

“Hessid: ‘No, $2,000 would not satisfy me. But 
1 would split the difference and take $2,250 for the 
notes and the check.’ 

“I said: ‘We are not in a position to cash notes or 
check.’ Then Mr. Gilluly said; ‘Would you object 
to calling at the sheriff’s office to-morrow morn- 
; ingat9:30?’ 

“He replied: ‘No, I do not object. 1 and Buchman 
i will come down to the sheriff’s office at the time you 
have named.’ 

’ “We bade him good night and departed.” 

, Greenleaf A. Smith describes this meeting 
as follows: 

I, “The said Willis then opened the conversation by 

i saying to deponent: ‘Mr. Smith, I understand you 
are for Baldwin,’ to which deponent replied : ‘Yes, 
that’s so.’ Then Willis asked deponent if it was true 
that there were nine votes for Baldwin among de- 

■ ponent's friends, to which deponent said, ‘Yes.’ 
Then said Willis asked deponent how much ne would 
take to swing those nine votes of the sixteenth ward 

■ delegation for Woodruff, to which deponent replied 
! that he would take $3,000. Then Willis said that was 
' too high a figure; then deponent said he would take 

$2,500, to which said Willis replied : ‘Is that the very 
lowest you will take?’ and deponent then asked: 
‘Well, what are you willing to give?’ and said Gilluly 
then offered deponent $2,000, which sum deponent 
refused. That after a little lull in the conversation 
deponent said he would split the difference and take 
82,250, to which Willis and Gilluly replied that was 
satisfactory, and told deponent to call at the sheriff’s 
office next morning at 9:30 o’clock and the matter 
would then be arranged and he would get the money. 
That the .said Willis then said to deponent: That in 
this transaction or transactions of this kind he gen¬ 
erally had nothing to do, but he had other people 
behind him who would fix it up,” 

There was a meeting at the sheriff’s office, 
followed by one at night at Woodruff’s house, 


where the notes and check were produced and 
handed to him. Naval-Officer Willis goes on : 

“Then Mr. Woodruff said, addressing his remarks 
to Smith and Buchman: ‘Well, gentlemen, do .vou 
say these notes and cheeks which you have given 
were given you by Mr. Daggett?’ 

“ ‘Yes, sir,’ they replied. 

“ ‘And for what purpose? Let us understand this 
thing clearly,’ continued Mr. Woodruff. 

“ ‘Well,’ said Smith, ‘for nine votes of the sixteenth 
ward delegation for David A. Baldwin, for chairman 
of the.general committee.’ 

“ ‘Well, now, what is your proposition to me?’ 
said Woodruff. 

“ ‘Well, for $2,250,’ replied Smith, ‘I will send the 
notes and check back to Daggett, and I will hold the 
nine votes for you, and you will find a letter in the 
envelope which I have prepared to day, thinking I 
might have use for it, and in which I explain to Mr. 
Daggett why I send the cheek and notes back to 
him.” 

The letter was as follows: 

January 13,1890. 

Albert Daggett, Esq.; 

Dear Sir: After consultation with a number of 
delegates which I was to deliver, I find it impossible 
to do so, consequently, as I can not come up to my 
part of the agreement, it is not just that I should 
keep you to yours. 

Therefore, inclosed you will find the check and 
notes which are returned. 

Respectfully, G. A. Smith. 

Smith’s version of the meeting at Woodrufl’s 
is as follows : 

“Woodruff asked if deponent had been given a 
place by Daggett. That said Woodruff then asked de¬ 
ponent whether he had any objection to produce the 
papers he had received from Mr. Daggett and whether 
he had any objection to showing them to him. That 
deponent said he had no objection, and produced 
them; thereupon said Woodruff a.sked whether de¬ 
ponent would sell said papers or notes, and deponent 
said he would not sell them under any consideration. 
That said Woodruff then had said papers in his hands 
and pretended to examine them, during which time 
said Willis and Gilluly came into the room, and 
thereupon said Woedruff and Willis left the room 
for a minute, and upon their return said Woodruff 
opened the door and asked deponent and Buchman 
to step into the back room. Deponent there saw 
Sheriff Rhinehart, and then, in the presence of said 
Rhinehart, Willis, Gilluly and Buchman, the said 
Woodruff said that he would keep those papers, and 
if either Senator Daggett or Senator Birkett wanted 
them they would have to come for them. That de¬ 
ponent then and since strenuously demanded the 
return of said papers from said Woodruff, but said 
Woodruff has refused to deliver them to deponent. 
That among said papers so purloined from deponent 
by said Woodruff was a letter written by deponent 
addressed to Mr. Albert Daggett, but not yet sent to 
said Daggett or delivered to him, telling said Daggett 
that the deponent was unable to deliver the nine 
votes from the sixteenth ward to Baldwin. This let¬ 
ter deponent intended to send upon the strength of 
the cash offer made by said Willis and Gilluly for 
said votes as above stated, as advised by Buchman 
in the morning.” 

Having gained possession of the papers 
Woodruff appears to have sought interviews, 
as Daggett says: 

He sent three messengers after Birkett, and agreed 
to meet him under a gas lamp on Remsen street. 
Birkett went there and found “Mike” Dady, who 
said that Woodruff’s friends would not let him come 
for fear he would be “slugged.” Dady told Birkett 
that the exposure would ruin the latter and drive 
him out of the senate, but Birkett did not beg for 
mercy. He did agree to go to Woodruff’s house 
with me, and he went. The interview took place in 
the presence of Woodruff and Willis, but Major 
Hobbs and others were in the house. 

Nothing came of the interview except 
threats and counter threats, and the rest of 


the time before the convention seems to have 
been occupied in “mutual checkmating,” 
finally resulting in the defeat of Baldwin. 

The business in which Naval-Officer Willis 
occupies his time can not fail to attract atten¬ 
tion, and this will cause it to be re-called that 
his predecessor, Silas W. Burt, had been in the 
civil service twenty years, and during all that 
time had been known as a faithful and skilled 
officer, devoted to his duties. He had never 
given the government, or the people, or his 
friends any cause to feel that he had even the 
slightest connection with crooked people or 
crooked transactions, or that he in any man¬ 
ner used his public office or his influence as a 
public officer for purposes not connected with 
the transaction of public business, much less 
to force the election of a chairman of a polit¬ 
ical committee. It is inconceivable that he 
should have had to make a public apology 
like that of Willis, for connection with dis¬ 
graceful and dishonest transactions. At the 
end of his years of service he was turned into 
the street, without notice or thanks, to make 
room for Willis, who was given the place be¬ 
cause he had been chairman of a campaign 
committee and had done “ Herculean work 
for the party” in the last presidential cam¬ 
paign. 

There was recently held in this city a com¬ 
petitive examination for the vacancies in the 
staff of physicians for the city hospital and 
city dispensary. It is credited with having 
been the most rigid medical examination ever 
held here. There were five sessions extending 
over a period of three days. Thus the merit 
system makes its way. 

Miss Sweet succeeded to the pension agency 
at Chicago upon the death of her father. Gen¬ 
eral Sweet. She held the office one term. Then 
Mrs. Mulligan, the widow of General Mulli¬ 
gan, applied for the position. She had the sup¬ 
port, says the New York Post, of nearly every 
influential man in Chicago of both parties and 
of the republican senators and representatives 
from Illinois, but Mr. Schurz, then secretary 
of the interior, insisted that a faithful and effi¬ 
cient officer should be retained, and Miss Sweet 
was re-appointed. Pension Commsssioner Black 
attempted to remove her, but on account of the 
uproar she was allowed to finish her term. 
Then President Cleveland appointed Mrs. Mul¬ 
ligan. She, too, has proved faithful and effi¬ 
cient. A long leap downward has now been 
taken by President Harrison in the appoint¬ 
ment of Col. Ike Clements, described as an ac¬ 
tive republican worker and stumper for many 
years in his end of the state, a busy adherent 
of Senator Cullom and useful to the republi¬ 
can State-house clique. 

The house of representatives has passed a 
bill providing for the appointment of thirty 
new examiners for the pension office. The 
bill provides that the appointments shall be 
made without the intervention of the civil 
service commission, although the commission 
stood ready to furnish the men. A more vi- 















108 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


cious blow could hardly have been dealt the 
merit system. Mr. Bynum of this district 
voted for it, as did also a number of congress¬ 
men who pose as civil service reformers, and 
the latter have since been busy making lame 
excuses. The moving cause in this is the 
enmity of Commissioner Kaum to anything 
which interferes with distributing places to 
his favorites as plums. The bill has not yet 
passed the senate: if it should, after the pub¬ 
lic disapproval which has been expressed, it 
will appear like a deliberate beginning to 
undermine the merit system as now estab¬ 
lished in the service. If President Harrison 
should sign such a bill he would become a 
party to a flagrant breach of faith. 

The annual meeting of the Indiana Civil 
Service Reform Association will be held at 
Fort Wayne in April. The proceedings will 
consist of an afternoon business meeting open 
to members of the Association, and an evening 
meeting open to the public. The evening 
meeting will be held in the hall of the Young 
Men’s Christian Association, and the address 
will be by Mr. Charles J. Bonaparte, president 
of the Maryland Association. There will be 
an introductory address by Mr. Lucius B. 
Swift, president of the Indiana Association. 
The Association is much favored in securing 
Mr. Bonaparte. He is a strikingly brilliant 
and able speaker. The date will be announced 
in the newspapers. 

The ofiicers of the Association are as fol¬ 
lows : 

Lucius B. Swift, Indianapolis, President. 

Charles B. Lane, Richmond, Secretary. 

Arthur A. McKain, Indianapolis, Treasurer. 

EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE. 

Hilton U. Brown, Indianapolis. 

Noble C. Butler, Indianapolis. 

Orrln B. Clark, Bloomington. 

William Dudley Foulke, Richmond. 

John H. Jacobs, Fort Wayne. 

Charles B. Lane, Richmond. 

Chester T. Lane, Fort Wayne. 

Thomas F. Leech, J udson. 

Charles S. Lewis, Indianapolis. 

Arthur A. McKaiu, Indianapolis. 

Albert E. Metzger, Indianapolis. 

John W. Moncrief, Franklin. 

Rollo B. Oglesbee, Plymouth. 

David A. Owen, Franklin. 

Lucius B. Swift, Indianapolis. 

Henry W. Williams, Fort Wayne. 

The Bloomington branch of the Indiana 
association will hold a public meeting about 
March 26th, which will be addressed by Mr. 
Theodore Roosevelt. In both the State Uni¬ 
versity and Franklin College there is a very 
healthy activity in favor of civil service re¬ 
form, and Mr. Roosevelt’s speech will not 
tend to diminish this. 

AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

Services were free and base. Free ser¬ 
vice was to pay a sum of money, or serve 
under the lord in war. Base service was 
to plow the lord’s land, to make his liedge 
or carry out his dung.— Blackstone. 

—Col. Edwin A. McAlpin, who was one of 
the presidential electors in the last campaign, has 
been appointed by the President postmaster of 
Sing Sing, New York. 


—Harris A. Barrow was, March 12, ap¬ 
pointed deputy naval officer, by Naval Officer 
Willis. Barrow is secretary of the Kings county 
republican committee. He has always been an 
applicant for office. 

—Collector Erhardt’s deputies, John. H. 
Gunning and Dennis Shea are active members 
of party committees. 

—Ed Conway is a deputy in United States 
Marshal Dunlap’s office, and, at the same time, 
one of the city committeemen of the seven¬ 
teenth ward. 

—The caucus of the republicans of Brattle- 
boro, Vermont, to determine whether Post¬ 
master Childs, the democratic incumbent, 
should be re-appointed under the manage¬ 
ment of the republican committee, opened 
at 3 P. M. The party workers applied the 
party whip. The voting was not secret so 
that every one voting for the retention of the 
democratic postmaster ran the risk of losing 
favor with the machine. Colonel Taylor, the 
special treasury agent, was most active. The only 
government official in the place who did not 
take any part in the canvass, but who attended 
to the duties of the office, was Postmaster 
Childs. 

—So it fell out that at the primary election 
held at Hildebrandt’s hall, in Second avenue, 
on Tuesday evening, there was a large force of 
custom-house employes on hand to help Mr. 
Frank Raymond accomplish his patriotic de¬ 
signs, and not a few of these fit and faithful 
public servants were chosen as officers and 
members of the republican district committee, 
and as delegates to the county committee. 
Mr. Donald McLean, the general appraiser, 
was chosen president of the district committee, 
and Mr. Thomas W. Robertson, the chief 
clerk in the general appraiser’s office, at a 
salary of |2,500, was elected secretary. Mr. 
McLean and Mr. Robertson were also made 
delegates to the county committee. Among 
the other delegates chosen were the follow¬ 
ing: James B. Kilsheimer, law clerk in Mr. 
McLean’s office, salary $1,900; Peter Stieb, 
messenger, $340; John W. Love, opener and 
packer, $3.75 per day, and Henry C. Robin¬ 
son, John Ellard, and Samuel Wallace, ic- 
spectors of customs. Kilsheimer and Robert¬ 
son also appear as inspectors of election. 

There were elected as members of the re¬ 
publican district committee, Daniel Leech, 
confidential clerk in the general appraiser’s 
office, salary $2,200; Louis Spatz and Morti¬ 
mer C. Lee, inspectors of customs; John 
Reilly, opener and packer, $3 per day, was 
made sergeant at arms. 

The customs inspectors on this list are 
appointees of the collector and surveyor; the 
others were appointed by General Appraiser 
McLean without civil service examination. 
—New York Times, January 17, 

—Schmidt and Nowland, custom-house dep¬ 
uties of this city, were delegates to the repub¬ 
lican township convention, March 1. The for¬ 
mer put the successful candidate in nomina¬ 
tion. 

The public will never be made to believe 
that the appointment of a relative is made 
on the ground of merit alone, uninfluenced 
by ftunily views; nor can they ever see 
with approbation offices, the disposal of 
which they entrust to their presidents for 
public purposes, divided out as family 
property.— Thomas Jefferson. 

—Robert G. Blaine, brother of Secretary 
Blaine, who has for some years held the office 
of curator of the department of agriculture, 
has been appointed by Secretary Rusk super¬ 


intendent of quarantine stations, under the 
bureau of animal industry. 

—James G. Blaine, Jr., has been appointed 
clerk of the house committee of foreign aff airs, 
at a salary of $2,190. 

—S. V. Morris has been appointed chief 
clerk in the paymaster’s office at St. Paul. He 
is a brother-in-law of the President, and at 
one time could have had a place in tli e In¬ 
dianapolis post-office, but it is reported that 
he felt that “Ben ought to do something better 
for him.” 

—Pension Agent Ensley, of this state, has 
appointed his son, O. P. Ensley, chief clerk in 
the pension office to succeed .Joseph L. Riley. 
The appointee has been bookkeeper for Eckert 
& Co., carriage manufacturers at Auburn, for 
several years. 

—Postmaster Van Cott, of New York, has 
appointed his son cashier of the post-office. 

—Congressman Elijah Adams Morse, who 
points to his middle name as evidence that he 
is connected with the John Adams family, has 
got his (Morse’s) nephew appointed a page in 
the house of representatives. 

—There is no part of the means placed in 
the bands of the executive which might be 
used with greater effect, for unhallowed 
purposes, than the control of the public 
press. We have learned, too, from our 
own as well as tlie experience of other 
countries, that golden shackles, by whom¬ 
soever or by whatever pretense imposed, 
are as fatal to it as the iron bonds of des¬ 
potism. 

President William Henry Harrison 

—C. H. Gere, the editor of the Journal, has 
been appointed postmaster at Lincoln, Neb. 
It is now interesting to quote the following 
from the November (1889) issue of the Civil 
Service Chronicle : 

In the division of tlie patronage last spring the 
Lincoln post-office fell to Congressman Connell, of 
Omaha. All the candidates for the place except one 
have cultivated his acquaintance in the hope of cap¬ 
turing the plum. This one, the Hon. Charles H. 
Gere, of the Joiirnal, made his fight in another quar¬ 
ter, when it became reasonably certain that the Hon. 
Ed. P. Roggen stood highest in the estimation of the 
congressmen. Gere laid siege to Senators Manderson 
and Paddock and asked for a new deal. It is now 
currently reported that the senators have agreed to force 
Gere's appointment, they threatening to prevent the con¬ 
firmation of any other appointment. 

—Another editor has an office. It is Charles 
E. Fitch of the Rochester Democrat and Chron¬ 
icle, who was appointed by President Harrison 
this week to the collectorship of the twenty- 
eighth internal revenue district, with head¬ 
quarters at Buffalo. The office is the most 
important and lucrative at the disposal of the 
administration in western New York, and a 
pretty fight has been waged to secure the plum. 

—The State Journal, the official organ of the 
state and of the republican party of Wiscon¬ 
sin, was sold to Horace A. Taylor, of Hud¬ 
son, Wis., formerly candidate for governor, 
then anti railroad champion in the state 
senate, and now holding a federal office at 
Washington. 

—J. P. Clugage, editor of the Union, has 
been appointed postmaster at Sullivan, this 
state. 

—Collector Beard has made Gen. John L. 
Swift, of the Boston Traveller, his third deputy. 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


109 


I 

CONGRESSMAN HITT AND “THE 
LEAN AND HUNGRY REPUBLI¬ 
CAN SHOATS.” 


[Compiled from the Rockford Register (Ills.), from 
November, 1889, to March, 1890] 

I. 

The Rochelle post-office fight is now on. There 
are some who may be inclined to ask, “ Has it ever 
been off?” So conspicuous and hot and prolonged 
have been the struggles for the possession of that 
post-office that many people have gained the impres¬ 
sion that the battle rages there perennially. 

‘‘There’s never been but one post-office fight in 
this town,” a Rochelle man said the other day, ‘‘and 
that’s been going on ever since the office was first 
established down to the present time, without any 
indication of ever terminating.” 

The present fight is one of unusual interest, for out 
of it there is to be, unless all signs fail, a struggle for 
a position much higher than that of postmaster of 
Rochelle. Congressman Hitt is in danger of removal 
from the house of representatives as well as is Post¬ 
master Furlong, the democratic incumbent, from the 
Rochelle post-office, as a result of the trouble which 
has arisen. Official patronage has frequently caused 
political death, and in this instance it has attacked 
. Congressman Hitt. It has called forth the first out- 
, spoken opposition to his return to congress. 

'j-J ’■ 1 think Mr. Hitt is serving his last term,” said an 
Ogle county republican, recently, to a Register repre¬ 
sentative. The speaker is one of the best political 
workers in that county, and is at present holding an 
official position. 

‘‘He has made himself unpopular in some places 
by not acting promptly enough in regard to post-office 
changes. I do not mean that he has not sought to 
have democrats ousted, but that he has apparently 
been afraid to select a postmaster where there have 
been more than one. His listlessness in pushing the 
claims of those seeking appointments has turned 
^ many against him. 

■ ‘‘ The Rochelle post-office fight has led to war be- 
'ing declared on him. As usual, there were half a- 
dozen candidates for postmaster. Hartong, the drug¬ 
gist is endorsed by Hitt. Nick Walters is the choice 
of the workers. The objections to Hartong are that 
he has resided there but a few years, that it is not 
known how he voted four years ago, and that he is 
not the choice of the people there, but seems to have 
gained Hitt s endorsement through the influence oj 
Senator Farwell and Congressman Hopkins. If there is 
anything that will stir up Rochelle it is to have out¬ 
siders attempt to dictate who shall be postmaster. 
That has been done before, notably in the case of 
Gardner and his successor, the present incumbent, 
and the people there want no more of it. Wallers on 
the other hand was born and raised there, was a sol¬ 
dier, is extremely popular, and has been a hard 
worker for the party. There has never been any 
question as to how he voted four years ago. A pro¬ 
test against Hortong’s appointment was sent to Hitt. 
Among others who signed it were Joseph Parker, 
chairman of the town committee, and G. W. Clark 
and Colonel May, the two last named having been 
candidates for the office. They virtually endorsed 
Walters, thereby carrying out Hitt’s suggestion that 
they get together and decide upon a man. 

“ Mr. Hitt acknowledged the receipt of the protest, 
and in a letter to Mr. Parker said he recognized the 
high standing and character of its twenty signers. 
They are, in fact, about the most politically influ¬ 
ential twenty in Rochelle^ and it is almost certain thaty 
under conditions as they exist in that town, they will be 
easily able to control the next congressional caucus. It 
is believed yet that Hartong will be appointed, but 
whether he is or not the feeling is that they have 
had enough of Hitt. They are indisposed to accept 
conciliation, and inclined to spurn any advances in 
that direction from the congressman. 

III. 

‘‘There is a sort of young men’s movement over 
Ogle county, and the anti-Hitt twenty of Rochelle are 
in with the controlling nng. This made Deloss Baxter, 


Jr., mayor of Rochelle and state’s attorney of the county; 
Frank Bacon mayor of Oregon, and Bishop sheriff of 
Ogle county. Speaking of Bisliop reminds me of his 
candidacy for the United States marshalship, and 
the trouble Ilitt will have in that connection. Bish¬ 
op’s friends say that they have no confidence in Hitt, 
and that while pretending to be woiking for the 
sheriff he has really done little to aid him. They 
propose to get back at Hitt for this. But the Bacon 
and Bishop crowd of Oregon and the anti-Hitt crowd 
of Rochelle, together with all their influential ramifi¬ 
cations, can carry the county against Hitt. The po¬ 
sitions that the leaders now hold show their power. 

‘‘And the feeling against Hitt is not confined to the 
Oregon and Rochelle elements, extensive as their in¬ 
fluence is, but there is dissatisfaction all over the 
county. This is noticeable at Polo. 

‘‘There are men, and prominrnt ones, too, in Ro¬ 
chelle who say that they believe that Otis was really 
promised the post-office in that fight by Hitt, and 
that the latter broke his promise, as Otis claimed, and 
these are not men who felt friendly to Otis, either. 

IV. 

‘‘As 1 look at it, Hitt’is a goner. I am reliably in' 
formed that the feeling which exists in Ogle county 
can be found all over the district. I know that there 
are towns in Jo Daviess that are dead against him 
on account of post-office fights. There’s Apple River 
as an example. He certainly hasn’t strengthened 
himself in any post office appointment. Wliere 
there was a fight he has held back until both sides 
have got down on him, and where there was no fight 
neither the postmaster appointed nor his friends con¬ 
sider that they are indebted to Hitt. Do you suppose 
that Smith Atkins feels that he owes Hitt anything? 
Certainly not. Take it up at your city. Is Tom 
Lawler under any obligations to Hitt? Not much. 
If anything, Hitt should feel thankful to Lawler that 
he possessed such strength and had such a grip as to 
permit Hitt to escape being harrassed by any other 
candidate and his friends. In such cases as that of 
Atkins and Lawler the appointees know that they 
owe nothing to Hitt. They know that he was only 
too glad to find such smooth sailing. Now, if Har¬ 
tong should be appointed he would certainly be un¬ 
der obligations to Hitt, as he has backed him against 
the wishes of the majority of the people of Rochelle. 

‘‘Outside of the post office appointments Hitt has 
done nothing for the seekers of patronage. While 
other congressmen secured.places for scores of work¬ 
ers, Hitt has seemed to think that no one in his dis¬ 
trict wanted anything. The workers are the people, 
and they have decided that they want a man in 
congress who will do something for them. But as 1 
said in the first place. Ogle county is the battle 
ground. If Hitt has a fight here he is beaten, and 
you can depend upon it he will have a fight. He can 
not be renominated.” 

V. 

There were four candidates for the Lanark post- 
office in Carroll county, viz.: L. G. Burrows, editor of 
the Lanark Gazette; Joseph Yeager, an old settler, who 
made a close run for the office once before; Maj. G. A. 
Root; and Rev. H. D. Dennis, the latter now removed 
to Rockford as pastor of the Christian church, de¬ 
scribed in the Freeport Dmocraf as “an eloquent and 
polished orator, a gentleman popular with the 
people, and one who has rendered service to his party 
by making speeches during many campaigns.” 

The first three candidates finally combined against 
Mr. Dennis, and on the recommendation of Mr. Hitt 
the appointment was given to Maj. Root. 

Again our member finds misery in umpiring the 
distribution of the spoils. When, after a long contest, 
he finally refused to recommend Mr. E. L. Otis for 
the Rochelle post-office, the latter charged with em¬ 
phasis that a straight, unequivocal pledge was vio¬ 
lated, and to this day there are numerous persons in 
Rochelle (who were not partisans of Mr. Otis) who 
insist that Mr. Hitt broke a plain agreement to give 
Otis the Rochelle office. 

Now we have another like chapter, with Lanark as 
the scene, and Rev, H. D. Dennis, the new pastor of 
the Christian church of this city, framing the indict¬ 
ment against Mr. Hitt. The reverend gentleman 
was interviewed by the Freeport Democrat regarding 


the matter and from that paper we clip the follow¬ 
ing. 

“Rev. H. D. Dennis was not in the best of humor 
when the newspaperman called upon him. In fact 
he expressed a decided contempt for Congressman 
Hitt, and the methods he claimed were employed in 
securing the appointment of Maj. Root. He said: 

“ ‘All 1 have to say is that I have been greatly 
deceived by Mr. Hitt, and I have taken occasion to 
make him acquainted with that fact. I have no 
confidence whatever in him,' continutd the gentle¬ 
man, ‘and I will soon give the public a statement of 
the case. Until I hear from him I do not desire to 
say much This I will .say: I was led to believe 
from what he had said to me that I was to receive 
the appointment.’ ” 

“Several days ago Mr. Hitt sent me a brief of the 
recommendation he had sent in for Major Root, and 
then it was learned that the combine had certainly 
been made. When my friends learned the state of 
affairs, seventy letters from patrons of the office, 
many of them parties who had signed the petitions 
of Burrows and Yeager, were sent to the department 
protesting against the appointment of Major Root. 
But it was rushed through, and the nomination was 
confirmed, although I had assurance from Senator 
Cullom that there would be plenty of lime left to en¬ 
ter a remonstrance before the confirmation would 
take place. I believe if a vote was taken 1 would se¬ 
cure a large majority of the patrons of the office over 
Root. 

“I believe now that Mr. Hitt had all along intended 
to secure the appointment of Major Root. It is the 
worst kind of deception.” 

“ Mr. Dennis is a gentleman who can understand 
the English language, and he certainly had assurance 
that he would be the next postmaster, or else he 
would have gone to Rockford long ago, where he has 
accepted a call to become the pastor of the Christian 
Church,” said a gentleman who is a well-known Car- 
roll county republican. 

Among the prominent backers of Mr. Dennis are 
Representative Bray and e.x Representative Emanuel 
Stover. It is said that at least Mr. Bray will make a 
determined fight against Hitt, and he will use his in¬ 
fluence to secure an anti-Hitt delegation from Car- 
roll county. 

It is very evident if something is not done to satis¬ 
fy Mr. Dennis, that both his voice and his vote will 
be against Mr. Hitt, 

In a letter to one of the other candidates, Decem¬ 
ber 29, Mr. Hitt makes the following statement, 
whieh, it will be observed, raises the issue of verac¬ 
ity between him and Mr. Dennis: 

“ I have never yet in contested cases thought it 
proper to express even an opinion before the time of 
action, as it is to be presumed always that the whole 
case, as then presented, will be considered and passed 
upon fairly. I think you know me well enough to 
believe that I will take great pains to do the fairest 
thing possible in the case, and what I believe will be 
most satisfactory to the republicans of Lanark.” 

VI. 

Mr. Hitt has been acting as referee in an interest¬ 
ing post-office fight in Apple River, Jo Daviess coun¬ 
ty. The strife between the two candidates, Messrs. 
Serviss and Lamont, has raged with such bitterness 
that the department has decided not to appoint 
either, and it is said that Mr. Hitt has been directed 
to present a new name. This will naturally earn for 
him the enmity of the friends of both, who probably 
include the total population. 

VII. 

The Oregon Reporter renews its vows of allegiance 
to Mr. Hitt, declaring that, although the latter made 
a blunder in appointing Frank Tice to the Mt. Morris 
post-office, it will forgive him this time and hope for 
better things in the future. It insists, however, that 
Mr. Tice should divert the emoluments of the office 
to some “young republican worker,” to be appointed 
as deputy. Mr. Tice, as a member of the “old politi¬ 
cal ring,” is not entitled to any share in the spoils at 
this time, according to the Reporter. 

The Oregon Independent takes its contemporary to 
task, as follows: 

“Why should the Reporter censure Hon. R. R. Hitt 
for appointing Hon. Frank Tice to be postmaster at 
this place? Has he not appointed his friend Jewett 
in Oregon ? Is not Mr. Jewett the choice of the ‘boss 
delegate,’ the ‘ boss of boss ’ of the immortal sixteen 
who resurrected Mr. Hitt to the position he now 
holds? Then, if consistent, why does.the Reporter 
kick, unless to be inconsistent? ” 

















no 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


VIII. 

All Ogle county politician, who seems to have been 
sent to Washington to ascertain the cause of the de¬ 
lay in the expected liring of the democratic incum¬ 
bent from the Rochelle post-office, has made his 
report in the form of a letter, which appears in the 
last issue of the Rochelle Herald. He states that on 
his arrival in Washington he called on Mr. Hitt, and 
considerations which call for a change in the Ro¬ 
chelle office were presented. Thereupon Hitt called 
upon Clarkson and received the assurance that he 
was ready and anxious to dispose of the Rochelle 
appointment at once. Mr. Wanamaker was then 
seen, and gave assurance that his views were in ac¬ 
cord with those of Clarkson. The story of Hitt’s 
further efforts and encounter with a rank snub from 
the President is told in the Herald letter,‘from which 
we quote: 

“ Elated by such frank confessions, Mr. Hilt then 
called upon the President and presented the case. 
He called Mr. Harrison’s attention to the majorities 
from the northern districts that saved the state of 
Illinois from democratic rulers. He called his at¬ 
tention to the indifference expressed by leading re¬ 
publican papers of the district, and to the opinions 
of the republican war horses who openly acknowl¬ 
edged danger, to which Mr. Harrison made this re¬ 
ply: 'All this does not affect me one particle.' You 
can imagine the feelings of Mr. Hitt at the outcome 
of this interview. The interests of the republicans 
of Rochelle does not affect Mr. Harrison ‘one par¬ 
ticle.’ The interests of the party in this district are 
of no concern to him. The election of democrats is 
nothing to him. And this is the man w-e worked to 
elect President. I ask the voters of Rochelle, why 
then blame Mr. Hitt? He has taken this particular 
case of Rochelle to the highest official, and has been 
promptly sat down upon. No explanation even is 
offered why the affairs of Northern Illinois are no- 
of interest to the President. At the particular intert 
view above referred to Mr. Hitt did not champion 
the cause of any particular candidate ; he urged the 
appointment of a republican postmaster—a choice 
from the list of applicants. ‘ No, sir,’ was the reply, 

‘ your interests do not affect me one particle,’ ” 

The editor of the Herald becomes philosophic un¬ 
der the visitations of disappointment and despair. 
When he advocated the election of General Harrison 
he supposed that the old Jacksonian doctrine that 
the spoils belong to the victors would govern the ad¬ 
ministration, in spite of the pledges of platform and 
candidates against partisan changes or removals not 
dictated by the interests of the public service. He 
finds now that he was the victim of a huge confi¬ 
dence scheme. The mingling of sorrow, disappoint¬ 
ment and resignation is seen in the following editor¬ 
ial expression clipped from the Herald: 

“It seems that the republicans fished out a mug¬ 
wump when they selected Benjamin Harrison for 
president. Cleveland gave us a good democratic 
postmaster, and we have made up our mind that we 
can stand him because we have got to during Harri¬ 
son’s administration, as his term does not expire 
until 1892.’’ 

IX. 

[Extract from a letter to the Rochelle Herald.] 

Oregon, III., March 3, 1890.—Now friend Morris, 1 
know, and you know, there is a deep feeling of hos¬ 
tility to the actions of our congressman regarding 
the way he has acted towards your people regarding 
your post-office matter. Not alone at your place but 
at many other points throughout the district; and 
not post-offices alone, but I speak of them as that be¬ 
ing your official trouble. 1 am credibly informed, 
and know there is no mistake about it, Mr. Hitt told 
some of your candidates he would require no peti. 
tions, that petitions were of little value, that any¬ 
body would sign a petition, etc.; saying to them, I 
will call on your people, take the case up, and de. 
cide on the party for the office. They all tell me he 
called, but whenever post office was mentioned he 
was “ off,’’ and his only reply was, Mr. So So has the 
best petition. The old party workers, those to whom in 
a great measure he owed his promotion, scarcely received 
a passing notice; and when their names were suggested 


by their friends, the reply was, "Can’t recommend, too 
many down on them; can’t do it, Mr. —;—.’’ Now I 
would simply ask, where can you find an active po¬ 
litical w-orker anywhere who has not political ene¬ 
mies? A man without enemies generally amounts 
to but little. 

I am informed Mr. Hitt told the people of Rochelle 
they must decide upon one man, or a change coidd 
not be made. I understand all the old workers in the 
party got together and recommended a party, nearly all 
the aspirants signed the recommend. He also said 
to the people of Rochelle mouths ago, “Agree on a 
man and he will be appointed in ten days.’’ 

Now, Morris, from all I can learn in Ogle, Jo 
Daviess, Carroll and Stephenson counties, there is 
something rotten in Denmark. If our congres.sman 
has no higher regard for the interests of his district 
than laboring to repair fei ces at the expense of his 
friends, those who have labored for years, is it not 
time to call a halt ? As for Benjamin, he is a played- 
out nag already. In 1892 he will be consigned to a 
political grave from which there will be no resur¬ 
rection. 

What’s the matter with Charley Works? He’s all 
right. Republican. 

X. 

The Rochelle Herald has come to the unwilling 
conclusion that there is a determined opposition to 
Mr. Hitt in Ogle county, and it undertakes to find its 
origin, and traces it to dissatisfaction with his 
course regarding “spoils” distribution. It says he 
has discharged his duties in congress with fidelity to 
the district and to the republican party. The Herald 
thus continues: 

“If this question was put to those now in opposi¬ 
tion to name their grievance we believe there could 
not a single person be found but that would say he 
discharged every duty. Office is the one great 
stumbling block which he has now to overcome, and 
that is making rapid strides to defeat him. Were we 
convinced that he is disregarding the wishes of his 
constituents then we should be ready to oppose his 
re-nomination as are the ones who are now out on 
the war path. We believe that he is trying to suit all as 
pirants for office in this district, but when we take 
into consideration the numerous candidates out for 
certain offices in the district, and many for the same 
office in every village, we discover how difficult is 
the attempt to please all. If he has promised any 
man that he would stand by him until he secured or 
lost the position, he does wrong in deserting him. 
Among the many conversations we have had with 
him we have never discovered him acknowledging 
any promises further than we would see that they 
had a fair show at Washington. If we did not ad¬ 
mire his faithful care of the republican party of this 
district in congress, then we might be found among 
the kickers.” 

XI. 

The Chicago News correspondent discusses the ap¬ 
pointment affairs of this section as follows: 

“Both the senators and nearly all the representa¬ 
tives from northern Illinois have recommended 
James I. Neff of Freeport for a.ssistant treasurer, but 
he is not indorsed by Representative Hitt, in whose 
district he lives. The latter made a vigorous effort 
to secure the appointment of Mr. Avery, of Galena, 
as United States marshal, and is committed to him 
for any office that he can secure. While Mr. Avery 
is not an active candidate for the sub-treasurership, 
still he would accept the appointment, and as long 
as he stands in that position, with Mr. Hitt pledged 
to support him, the latter can not say anything in 
favor of Neff. The case is thus complicated, and 
there is no telling what the President will do.” 

XII. 

There bids fair to be a bitter factional fight in the 
.sixth district w-hen the republicans are called upon 
to nominate some one to succeed Robert R. Hitt as 
their representative in congress. Mr. Hitt will have 
to answer to the charge of being an unsuccessful, un¬ 
trustworthy distributor of political spoils. Uuful- 
fillment of promises and bad faith in general are 
charged against him. The appointment of James G. 
Blaine, Jr., to the position of secretary of the foreign 
affairs committee, which was made by Mr. Hitt, was 
particularly unpopular in the district. Mr. Hitt’s 


constituents argue that he should have given the 
plum to some capable young man of his own dis¬ 
trict.—Galena Dispatch to Chicago News. 

XIII. 

There has always been a latent hostility to Mr. 
Hitt down there and his course as an almoner of 
official spoils has not mollified the old opposition. 
He has in fact been peculiarly unfortunate in his re¬ 
lations with office-seekers. The necessity of disap¬ 
pointing some aspirant has not been the sum of his 
troubles. The issue of veracity regarding promises 
arose, and the tenacity with which unfavorable 
opinions regarding his course in such matters are 
held was illustrated a few days ago, when, in con¬ 
versation with a county official, he asserted to the 
writer his emphatic belief that “Hitt did give Otis a 
fair and square promise of the Rochelle postoffice.” 
Mr. Hitt positively denies that he made such promise 
to Mr. Otis, but, unfortunately for him, he has not 
been able to extinguish the belief that he did, and 
many Rochelle residents, not particularly friendly 
to Otis, take the latter’s side in the veracity issue 
against Mr. Hitt. 

There are noticeable elements of opposition to that 
gentleman in nearly every county of the district. 
The Galena Gazette, edited by J. B. Brown (Gen. 
Grant’s old friend) is decidedly hostile. There have 
been unfavorable comments, by the editors of such 
republican papers as the Oregon Reporter, Polo Press, 
Rochelle Herald, and Rochelle Regider, all published 
ill Ogle comity.—Rockford Register. 


THE VERDICT. 

From Moorfield Storey, Boston, Mass.: 

“Its collections of telling facts and quota¬ 
tions are so arranged as to make them unan¬ 
swerable arguments. I know no equally val¬ 
uable collection of materials for argument, 
and I wish to thank you for my share of the 
benefit.” 

From Hon. Dorman B. Eaton : 

“ The Chronicle is an admirable and use¬ 
ful paper.” 

From Gen. W. A. Aikin, Norwich, Conn : 

“Your review of the first year of the admin¬ 
istration is very fair and good. The only 
thing to do is to ‘ keep peggin’ away.’ It’s 
coming very slow, but dead sure.” 

“With congratulations for your first year’s 
work, I am. Yours truly, 

“ Wm. E. Cushing, Cleveland, O.” 

“You have fulfilled your promise. 

“ J. E. Follett, Milwaukee, Wis.” 

“ I wish to congratulate you on the gallant 
and effective fight you are making for civil 
service reform. 

“ Zeph Brown, Providence, R. I.” 
From Professor H. S. White, Cornell Univeisity; 

“Your racy paper is too good reading to 
miss.” 

“ It is with eminent satisfaction that a New 
Englander greets the appearance in a different 
section of the country of still another paper 
devoted exclusively to the advancement of the 
reform. 

“ Albert Matthews, Boston, Mass.” 
From John H. Magee, Scottsbnrg, N. Y.: 

“ I can not sufficiently express the great ad¬ 
miration I feel for the single-handed fight you 
are making for the good in your state, and can 
only bid you God-speed. 

Unselfish labor finds little recompense out¬ 
wardly, but then does it not bring a sweet con¬ 
tent to the soul? 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapolis. Publi.shed monthly. Publication oilice, No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, 
Ind., where subscriptions and advertisements will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


VoL. I, No. 14. 


INDIANAPOLIS, APRIL, 1890. 


TERMS :{ 


50 cents per annam. 
5 cents per copy. 


The Civil Service Chronicle desires facts re¬ 
garding the so called “ resignations" of fourth- 
class postmasters ; who has requested these res 
ignations, by uhat agencies have these been 
effected, and in what instances have resigna 
tions been pmctically forced to prevent loss on 
the post-office furniture by disposing of U to the 
would-be successor in office. 


The Civil Service Chronicle desires informa¬ 
tion of all cases where the man at the top of the 
eligible lists for positions in the railway mad 
service has not been chosen. 


The Civil Service Chronicle will be glad to 
receive information upon thefullounng points: 

The name of any newspaper editor or owner 
who has or may receive a federal appointment, 
and the name of the office. 

The names of all members of political com¬ 
mittees or delegates given a federal appoint¬ 
ment, and the name of the office. 

The names of all federal office holders who 
are members of any political committee or tvho 
act as delegates, naming the committee or the 
convention.- 

Statements regarding any political activity in 
primaries, conventions or politiced work done 
for any nominees by federal office-holders. 

Owing to pressing professional engage¬ 
ments of Mr. Bonaparte it is still impossible 
to fix the exact date of the annual meeting of 
the State Civil Service Reform Association, to 
be held in Fort Wayne. 


The letter of Mr. Henry C. Lea to the Pres¬ 
ident is but the outward expression of a wide¬ 
spread indignation which among a large class 
has been smouldering and gathering force. 
The matter is not, as the Indianapolis Journal 
seems to think, an attempt to hold the Presi 
dent for the election of Quay to the senate or 
for his getting the Pennsylvania republican 
machine under his absolute control. The point 
is that the President is giving the distribution 
of the federal offices of thatstate into the hands 
of a man who stands silent when charged by a 
financially responsible newspaper with being 
a briber, a political corruptionist of the worst 
kind, and a colossal thief. The President is 
thus enabling Quay to distribute among his 
friends some millions a year and thus perpet 
uate his own power. 

And when Quay says that the President can 
not avoid complying with his wishes, and 
when the President says, as he does according 
to the Philadelphia Inquirer, that on account 
of his obligations to Quay he can not decline 
any request the latter may make, both of them 
put into words the President’s humiliating 
position. 


There is a striking analogy between this 
case and President Cleveland’s subjection to 
Gorman. The latter was also the ruling spirit 
of his national party committee which man¬ 
aged the successful campaign. President 
Cleveland was also warned against Gorman 
by democrats whose word was not to be disputed. 
Yet to the end of that presidential term Gor¬ 
man, by having control of the federal offices, 
practically deprived Maryland of free gov¬ 
ernment. This was one of the potent influ¬ 
ences which led to the defeat of Mr. Cleveland. 
Quay’snearly absolute influence is shown by the 
fact that only two Philadelphia daily papers, 
the Times and the lelegraph, dare publish Mr* 
Lea’s letter. If continued in control of the 
offices, his hand will for .some time be higher 
than ever. Gorman’s was to the very end, and 
even during the elections after Mr. Cleveland’s 
renomination. Deprived of his patronage 
after he has nearly made Maryland a republi¬ 
can state, Gorman can now probably be driven 
out of public life, and the people of Pennsyl¬ 
vania will sooner or later bring down Quay. 
The President by continuing him in control 
of the patronage may delay the day and they 
may both fall together. 

The records of the charity organization so¬ 
ciety of this city cover about 8,000 cases of 
individuals who have applied to the township 
embracing Indianapolis for relief. Most of 
these still apply from time to time. This great 
number have been traced back by the society 
from three to five generations, and with excep¬ 
tions have been found to coinefrom four hun¬ 
dred and thirty-seven original families. They 
monopolize the crime and the pauperism of 
this city, and their wits are devoted to getting 
supplies from the township. The necessity at 
once becomes apparent of having the township 
trustee’s office equipped with clerks who know 
these people personally, and the office now has 
one such man in Mr. Frank Wright. He 
has for years visited them, talked with them, 
made up records of them and traced their 
lineage and migrations until he has obtained 
a mass of information that is priceless to the 
people of this city. Such a man is indispen¬ 
sable ; his information can not be transmitted 
to another, nor could another acquire it in 
years, and without heavy cost to the people. 
This is a matter far above a party, and not¬ 
withstanding that there are a hundred appli¬ 
cants for the place, to remove Mr. Wright 
would not only do him an injustice but would 
inflict upon the interests of the city a severe 
injury. All but a few politicians will com¬ 
mend the new trustee, Mr. Gold, in refusing 
to take such a step. 


We reprint, from the Atlantic Monthly, part 
of Mr. Morton’s article, “ Some Popular Ob¬ 
jections to Civil Service Reform.” This is, 
without exception, the ablest article upon the 
merit system which has lately appeared ; and 
this is true both in style and matter. In In¬ 
diana, especially, it will be given added at¬ 
tention, and have added weight from the fact 
that it comes from a son of the late Governor 
Morton. To destroy, in this country, the idea 
and practice of using its hundreds of thousands 
of offices for private or party benefit is a work 
for which no man is too strong. It is peculi¬ 
arly fitting that as the father stepped into the 
breach in Indiana in the greatest crisis of his 
day, the son should now attack the present 
greatest evil of American civil government. 

Mr. Dorman B. Eaton should reprint in 
pamphlet form his recent valuable letters in 
answer to Senator Hoar’s assertion that collec- 
torships are political offices; the letter to Sen¬ 
ator Allison showing the insidious attack upon 
the merit system by the vote to exclude cer¬ 
tain pension examiners from the test of com¬ 
petition ; and the letter showing the effect of 
civil service reform in Australia. They are 
just what is needed for distribution, and they 
should be put into those sections where little 
reform literature has been distributed. It is 
a great mistake to relax the efforts to arouse 
an aggressive feeling for civil service reform 
in the states where there has been no organi¬ 
zation. W’hy do not civil service reformers 
seize upon Iowa as the tariff reformers have 
done ? 

A.S an illustration of how widely distributed 
is.the wish to see the spoils system ended, we 
are permitted to quote from a recent letter of 
Rev. W. H. Kaufman, of Heber, Utah, to the 
Civil Service Chronicle : “I am constantly 
surprised at the enthusiasm of the people for 
this reform and that they are so responsive to 
appeals for independence of partisanship in the 
civil service appointments.” And this paper 
has twenty-one subscribers in Utah. 

THE TOWNSHIP ELECTIONS. 

The recent township elections seem to have 
been a surprise to the republicans, especially 
in Indiana. If ordinary prudence guided an 
administration the total defeat which followed 
the open and unstinted use of the federal 
patronage to secure the election of Mahone in 
Virginia, would have taught its lesson. The 
administration, however, kept steadily on in 
the impossible endeavor to strengthen its party 
by distributing spoil. In Indiana it could 
not possibly have made the distribution any 




























112 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


faster, and before the election the clean sweep 
was practically complete, only scattering 
places being left. This distribution also has 
been preeminently in the hands of the men 
who ought to know where to place the offices 
to do the party the most good. The President 
has used his extensive personal knowledge of 
the workers. The three republican congress¬ 
men have devoted themselves to the task. 
Finally the chairman of the republican state 
committee, who of all men ought to know 
how to strengthen his party with patronage, 
has, in the distribution of the bulk of the 
minor offices, been practically dictator. Chair¬ 
man Huston attended to this until he was suc¬ 
ceeded by Chairman Michener, and the abso¬ 
lute power of the latter can not be better illus¬ 
trated than by the following correspondence : 

Columbus, Ind., April 1,1889. 
First Assistant Postmaster General, Washington, D. C.: 

Sir—I hope you will not overlook what I wrote you 
conceruing the postmaster at Freedom, Owen county, 
Indiana. He is a one-legged soldier who has done 
his duty in the office, and I hope you will not re¬ 
move him. Respectfully yours. 

Geo. W. Cooper, M. C., 
Fifth Indiana District. 

Columbus, Ind., May 16,1889. 
Postmastei'-General, Washington, D. C.: 

Dear 8ir— I wrote you some time ago asking that 
the present incumbent of the post-office at Freedom, 
Ind., he not removed, giving as a reason that he Avas 
a crippled soldier, and that he was doing good serv¬ 
ice to the public. While the heads of our boys have 
been rolling off all around, I believe he still holds 
his place, and this encourages me to present one 
more case equally as meritorious. Mr. L. H. Gamble, 
at Brooklyn, Ind., is a soldier. He served honorably 
through the war. Two of his brothers gave up their 
lives in the service—one at Brownsville, Tex., and 
the other at New Orleans, La. Mr. G.’s case is a hard 
one. He came out of the service without a scratch, 
but had the misfortune to lose his arm by an accident 
since, but he draws no pension. 

Will you not please make an exception in this case? 
I am sure that while it may be a disappointment to 
the applicant for the place, the patrons of the office, 
without regard to politics, will fully sustain you. 

Please do not forget or overlook what I wrote you 
regarding Mr. W. J. Suffall at Freedom. 

Respectfully, George W. Cooper, M. C. 

Columbus, Ind., May 16,1889. 
Hon. H. C. Duncan, Bloomington, Ind.: 

Dear Clay— There are two postmasters in this dis¬ 
trict who ought not to be removed, viz.: W. J. Suffall 
at Freedom, Owen county, and L. H. Gamble at 
Brooklyn, Morgan county. They are both crippled 
soldiers. Mr. Suffall lost a leg, Mr. Gamble an arm. 
Mr. Gamble’s case is particulaily hard. He served 
through the war. Two of his brothers lost their lives 
—one at New Orleans, La., the other at Brownsville, 
Tex.; but Mr. Gamble lost his arm by an accident 
since he came out of the service, and so gets no pen¬ 
sion. Now, Clay, I understand the applicants for 
both these places were never in the army. I have 
written the postmaster-general asking that these gen¬ 
tlemen be allowed to retain their places. Will you 
not aid me ? I am informed that a word from you 
will settle the matter. I hope you will allow these 
poor fellows to hold their places. No complaint is 
made of their services. Please write the department 
and let me know what you have done. 

Fraternally yours, George W. Cooper. 

Hon. John Wanamaker: 

Sir—M r. Cooper is the present representative in 
congress from this district, and my opponent. I 
Avould take it a favor that this matter be carefully 
examined before removals are made at the places 
named. I knoAV nothing personally of the men, and 
know that Mr. Cooper would not misrepresent mat¬ 
ters. We made a strong fight in Indiana on the sol¬ 


dier question, and we can not afford to wage war 
against the sons of the democratic household of faith. 

Yours, etc., H. C. Duncan. 

Bloomington, Ind., May 27, ’89. 

Office of Attorney General, \ 
Indianapolis, Ind. J 
W. W. Hart, Washington, D. C.; 

My Dear Hart— We have decided that Frank Watts 
should he appointed postmaster at Freedom, Owen 
county. 

Please have it attended to at once. You may put 
this on file as a recommendation. 

Yours truly, L. T. Michener. 

The change was made at Michener’s direc¬ 
tion. The new offices created for the census 
were filled as far as possible and always by 
republican wheel-horses. Numerous office¬ 
holders, including Treasurer Huston and 
Third Auditor Hart, came from Washington 
to give the party the added strength of offi¬ 
cialism. The usual influence of the Indiana 
republican club of office-holders at Washing¬ 
ton was at work. The Far well club had run 
its anti-civil service reform career. Congress¬ 
man Cheadle had introduced a bill to repeal 
the civil service law, and when unanimous 
consent was asked to amend a bill so as to 
have the medical examiners therein provided 
for appointed under the civil service law, as 
such examiners now are, Cheadle promptly 
objected. Congressman Browne had declared 
himself opposed to the civil service law. In 
short, not only the theory but the practice of 
the spoils system had with the republican 
party full swing, except in the classified 
service, which in Indiana embraces compara¬ 
tively few places. And yet the republicans 
have sufiered a decisive defeat. Never in In¬ 
diana has that party been in a more complete 
state of collapse. 

It is indeed fortunate that such unbridled 
profession and practice of the spoils system 
can be followed by such party weakness. That 
it powerfully contributed to this weakness 
there is no question. The soldiers were in a 
state of open exasperation because more was 
not given to them. All the workers except 
those who got places struck for the non-pay¬ 
ment of wages. Thousands of citizens looked 
at the appointments of the Eansdells, the Mc- 
Farlanes and the Bagbys and observed the ad¬ 
ministration under the control of Quayism 
and Plattism, and did not vote or voted with 
the democrats. Happily for such strikers and 
for such lethargy there is no remedy ; it is im¬ 
possible for a president to divide the federal 
offices as spoil and produce any other result. 


AN OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT 
HARRISON. 

To the President: 

Sir— No graver scandal has darkened our 
political history than the charges brought 
against Senator Quay by the New York Wwld 
in its issues of February 10th and March 3d. 
It would be useless here to recapitulate them 
further than to say that, with full details of 
names, and places, and dates, the PForW asserts 
him to be a man whose political career has 
been a succession of flagrantly dishonest acts, 
including the temporary abstraction from the 


state treasury of $260,000 in one instance, and 
of $400,000 in another. 

No such accusations, involving iniquity so 
varied and so continuous, and supported by 
such an array of minute detail, have ever be¬ 
fore, I believe, been brought against a politi¬ 
cian so conspicuous. If they are true, Senator 
Quay ought to be in the penitentiary. If they 
are false, he is a cruelly libelled man ; his ac¬ 
cuser is a journal of the highest financial stand¬ 
ing, and no jury of his countrymen would re¬ 
fuse him exemplary damages that would put 
him beyond all future reach of want. Vindi¬ 
cation and profit both await him as an incen¬ 
tive to prove his innocence, but, although two 
months have elapsed since the gravest of the 
charges were made public, neither solicitude 
for his character nor desire of gain has prompt¬ 
ed him to break silence. It is his own fault 
if the public should regard him as acquiescing 
in the truth of the charges. 

It is true that the crimes alleged against 
Senator Quay are connected only with his 
career as a Pennsylvania boss, but your close 
connection with him has rendered the scandal 
national. You were duly warned in advance 
from a friendly source of the dangers of such 
an alliance, yet by accepting his man, Mr. 
Wanamaker, as a member of your cabinet, you 
assumed responsibility for both of them. In 
pursuance of this alliance, you have enlarged 
Mr. Quay’s importance by virtually giving 
him control of the federal patronage in Penn¬ 
sylvania, thus rendering him the dictator of 
the republican party in the state. He boasted 
of your subserviency to him when, in explain¬ 
ing his triumph over Representative Dalzell 
in the struggle for the Pittsburgh post office, 
he publicly said that “ the President, though 
very anxious to gratify Mr. Dalzell, for whom 
he had a high esteem, could not, under all the 
circumstances, well avoid complying with my 
wishes.” Even Mr. Quay’s remarkable silence 
under the accusations of the World, does not 
seem to have lessened his influence over you. 
He signalized his return from Florida a week 
or two since by capturing the Pittsburgh sur- 
veyorshipof customs against candidates urged 
respectively by Secretary Blaine and Repre¬ 
sentative Dalzell. Indeed, his power would 
seem to be as great in Washington as in this 
state, for the party organs now tell us that he 
has been endeavoring to buy off a superfluous 
candidate for the governorship with an assist¬ 
ant secretaryship of war. In thus entering 
into a political partnership with Mr. Quay, 
you must share the losses as well as the gains 
of the venture. It is not Pennsylvania alone, 
nor even the republican party only, that has 
a right to protest; every citizen of the land 
must feel humiliation at the smirch thus in¬ 
flicted on the chief magistracy of the nation. 

As a republican by conviction, ardently de¬ 
siring the success of the party so long as it de¬ 
serves success, let me request you, Mr. Presi¬ 
dent, to take a calm survey of the situation 
and render to yourself an account of your stew¬ 
ardship. Thirteen months ago you entered 
upon the duties of the highest office which the 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


113 


world has to bestow ; your party was supreme 
iu the control of both houses of congress and 
of the executive; everything promised a pros¬ 
perous and useful administration, in which 
you, by simply adhering to the pledges under 
which you were elected, might earn another 
term from the confidence and gratitude of the 
people. The only cloud upon the political 
horizon was your acceptance of a postmaster- 
general at Mr, Quay’s dictation, ostensibly as 
a reward for certain services performed dur¬ 
ing the canvass. That cloud, then no larger 
than a man’s hand, has spread till it covers 
the firmament. Look back now and reflect 
upon your work. You have sedulously de¬ 
voted yourself to the distribution of “ patron¬ 
ageyou have turned out nearly forty thous¬ 
and Democratic office-holders, and in this ig 
noble business you have filled vacancies thus 
made by giving “ recognition ” to the worst ele¬ 
ments in the party. You have thus degraded 
it to the lowest level, till it no longer deserves 
or enjoys the public confidence, and its inter¬ 
est, as well as that of the nation, demands its 
purification by defeat. You have earned for it 
the denunciation of the Hebrew prophet ; 

“The heads thereof judge for reward, and 
the priests thereof teach for hire, and the pro¬ 
phets thereof divine for money ; yet will they 
lean upon the Lord and say. Is not the Lord 
among us? none evil can come among us. 
Therefore shall Zion for your sake be plowed 
as afield, and Jerusalem shall become heaps.” 

But it needs no prophet to foretell the re¬ 
sult. The elections of last November were a 
warning that the people would not tolerate 
your methods. You have refused to heed the 
lesson, and the elections of next November will 
emphasize it. The narrow republican major¬ 
ity in the lower house will be swept away, and 
your path for the latter half of your adminis¬ 
tration will be a path of thorns. You have 
rewarded the magnificent majority of 80,000 
given to you by Pennsylvania by riveting upon 
her the chains of Quayism ; you need not won¬ 
der that disaffection is spreading rapidly 
throughout her borders in a manner that may 
render even her allegiance doubtful. The out¬ 
look for 1892 is even darker. Were the presi¬ 
dential election to take place tomorrow, there 
could scarce be doubt of democratic success. 
Let me counsel you, Mr. President, as a friend, 
to reflect that this has been your work in one 
short year of misused power. 

If this retrospection should bring with it re¬ 
pentance and amendment, you still have be¬ 
fore you three years which may be fruitful for 
good. Bear in mind that “ faithful are the 
wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy 
are deceitful.” Discard the advisers who are 
luring you to your downfall. Recognize that 
the truest political expediency lies in the ap¬ 
plication of conscience to public affairs, and 
that you can serve your party best by stimu¬ 
lating the nobler aspirations of the nation 
rather than by pandering to the baser appe¬ 
tites of spoilsmen. Cease to expect to gather 
figs of thistles, or to touch pitch without de¬ 
filement. Apply to your public duties the 
high standard of morality to which you ad¬ 


here in your private life. Remember that evil 
can give birth only to evil, and that you, as 
chief magistrate of sixty-five millions of free¬ 
men, have on your soul a charge for which 
you must reckon to posterity and to God. 

I am, Mr. President, your obedient servant, 

Henry Charles Lea. 

Philadelphia, April 8, 1890. 


CONGRESS AND PATRONAGE. 


To the Executive Committee of the National Civil Serv¬ 
ice Reform League: 

Gentlemen— Your special committee appointed 
to inquire into the condition of the federal civil serv¬ 
ice and the operation of the reform law would re¬ 
spectfully report— 

That on the 15th of February, 1890, your committee 
had its first meeting, in Philadelphia, and outlined 
its general plan of work. 

Among other things it was determined to make in¬ 
quiries, at as early a period as possible, in regard to 
the system of congressional patronage, and ascertain 
to what extent appointments to oflSce were still con¬ 
trolled by members of congress, and to what degree 
this patronage interfered with their proper legisla¬ 
tive duties. In regard to this branch of their inves¬ 
tigation your committee is now prepared to make its 
report. 

The chaiiman of your committee, on its behalf, 
addressed to each of the republican members of the 
house of representatives the following questions: 

How many offices are there in your district or else¬ 
where where the appointments depend upon you ? 

How many applications for office have you received 
during the past year? 

What is the average amount of correspondence 
which each of these applications requires on your 
part ? 

What amount of time, either your own or of your 
secretary or clerk, is required, as nearly as you can 
judge, for conducting this correspondence and for 
attending to appointments? 

Have any elections been held in your district to de¬ 
termine who the appointees should be; and if so, in 
how many instances, where, and for what positions? 

To these questions a number of responses were re¬ 
turned with the statement that the writers had not 
the data at hand to answer these inquiries, but some 
twenty-four answers were received, giving more or 
less completely the information asked for. A sum¬ 
mary of these answers is as follows: To the ques¬ 
tion “How many offices are there in your district 
or elsewhere where the appointments depend upon 
you?” the following answers have been received: 

1. About one hundred and twenty post-offices in 
the district I represent. 

2. One hundred and seventy-nine post-offices and 
about thirty other places; also one hundred and 
eight census enumerators, with an endless number 
of applicants. 

3. About one hundred and forty. 

4. About two hundred. 

5. A hundred and twenty. 

6. A hundred and forty-six post-offices in the dis¬ 
trict, and under the rule I am expected to recom¬ 
mend a postmaster for each. 

7. The federal offices are deemed of so much im¬ 
portance that the senator and all the party represent¬ 
atives from the state insist upon making recommend¬ 
ations for appointments, and no appointment, there¬ 
fore, depends upon me alone. 

8. Two hundred post-offices and probably three or 
four others. 

9. No answer. 

10. There are two hundred and fifty offices in my 
district where the appointments depend upon my¬ 
self. 

11. Nearly fifty. 

12. About one hundred and twenty. 

13 Probably three hundred or three hundred and 
fifty. 

14. About six hundred and fifty, in which the two 
senators often unite. 

15. No answer. 

16. About eight hundred. 

17. Six hundred. 

18. None but the post-offices; but a very general 
impression prevails that 1 can control others, which 
calls for many letters of reply. 

19. About two hundred and fifty. 

20. Can not say. 

21. Not given. 

22. Perhaps one hundred and twenty-five. 

23. Ten or fifteen fourth-class postmasters. 

24. Perhaps two hundred. 

An average of the above (omitting numbers 7, 9,15, 
18, 20 and 21, in which numerical estimates are not 


given) would give about two hundred and fifty ap¬ 
pointments depending upon each of these congress¬ 
men. 

To the question “ How many applications for office 
have you received during the past year ? ” the follow¬ 
ing answers were received: 

1. I can not give you the exact number, but I am 
quite sure the number of written applications must 
be at least eight or nine thousand, to say nothing of 
the verbal requests. 

2. About three hundred, in addition to home post- 
offices ; five thousand applications for them. 

3. About five hundred. 

4. About one thousand. 

5. Sixty. 

6. There are one hundred and forty-six post-offices 
in my district, and under the lule 1 am expected to 
recommend a postmaster for each. I think there has 
been, so far at least, on an average, five applicants 
for each vacancy. During the first year of the present 
administration 1 was called on to recommend for 
office to the appointing power two hundred and 
forty-six applicants, exclusive of applicants for the 
position of postmaster. (This would make nine 
hundred and seventy-six in all.) 

7. About two thousand. 

8. Not far from one thousand. 

9. Can not tell; hundreds, if not thousands. 

10. There have been about fifteen hundred appli¬ 
cations for office received by me during the past year. 
In addition to the applications of those who want 
office for themselves, numerous letters and petitions 
are received, in nearly every case urging claims of 
those who are applicants. 

11. About four hundred. 

12. Impossible to tell; hundreds, perhaps one 
thousand. 

13. I think I can modestly say two thousand. Where 
there are ten candidates for the office, each man 
thinks he is the one most entitled to it; and it is gen¬ 
erally quite easy to disappoint nine of them. 

14. Approximately, about five hundred. 

15. The number of applications for office during 
the past year is something over eight hundred, as ap¬ 
pears on my docket, yet there are only eleven fourth- 
class post-offices in the district and ten presidential 
offices. The applications for these have been practi¬ 
cally nothing. The great mass of applications are 
for positions in the unclassified service in the custom 
house, and every branch of the government service, 
and in the navy yard. 

16. About two thousand ; not less. 

17. About two thousand. 

18. About two hundred. 

19. Could not guess; hundreds. 

20. Something less than a million. 

21. It is impossible for me to say how many appli¬ 
cations for office I have received during the past 
twelve months, but they have been almost inumer- 
able, and it has been impossible for me to favor a 
tenth of those who desire positions, and the most of 
the applicants I know to be worthy and deserving 
men, whom I would be glad to aid if it were possible 
for me to do so. 

Taking an average of the above (omitting numbers 
9, 19, 20 and 21), the number of applications made 
was something over 1700 to each member. 

To the interrogatories “ What is the average amount 
of correspondence which each of these applicationg 
requires on your part, and what amount of time, 
either of your own or of your secretary or clerk, is 
required, as nearly as you can judge, for conducting 
this correspondence and for attending to appoint¬ 
ments?” your committee have received the follow¬ 
ing answers: 

1. During the past year more than three-quarters 
of my time in the day was given to attending to ap¬ 
pointments, and late every evening (except Sunday) 
was given to my correspondence, with the valuable 
assistance of a stenographer, and even then I found 
it impossible to answer more than half or two-thirds 
of my correspondence. 

2. The amount of time is about one full day iu 
each week. 

3. About half the time of one man. 

4. The probable average amount of correspond¬ 
ence is about five letters for each application, requir¬ 
ing about one-fourth, po.ssibly one-third, of my entire 
time. 

5. The average amount of correspondence is about 
six letters each ; about two hours’ time. 

6. I think that attention to the demands of those 
applications consumes one-fourth of my working 
time. 

7. About half my time. Perhaps two letters each. 

8. Could give no light upon it; but quite a bur¬ 
densome correspondence. 

9. One-third of time of self and clerk. Several let¬ 
ters each; some of them fifty or a hundred. 

10. These applications will require, on an average, 
two letters each. I should think that at least two 
hours a day have been required for conducting this 
correspondence and attending to appointments. 

11. Nearly two hours daily during last summer; 
not so much now, and I can not easily give an esti¬ 
mate. 

12. The average amount of correspondence which 
each of these applications requires is rarely less than 
two or three, sometimes ten. I have had cases of 












114 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


twenty. The amount of lime required is more than 
any branch of my public duties since November, 
1888. 

13. Probably five letters each, all around. All the 
time 1 could get. 

14. About four letters to each applicant. About 
one-tenth of my time. 

15. A low estimate of the average amount of cor¬ 

respondence which each of these applications re¬ 
quires on my part would be five in each case, or be¬ 
tween four and five thousand letters in all. If it 
were not for the distribution of these offices, it would 
be easy for me to conduct my official correspondence 
personally, but, as it is, a secretary is required, and 
the burden of the office greatly increased. I 

16. Eight to fifteen letters each ; eight to ten hours 
per day. 

17. An average of three letters each; one-half of 

my time. j 

18. About two letters each; about one hour each 
day. 

19. About a dozen letters, on the average, to each; 
half of my time. 

20. One prolonged and continuous correspond- I 
ence; the constant and entire time of both myself j 
and secretary would not suffice. 

21. I think that during the last twelve months the 
lives of most of the republican members of congress 
have been made miserable by the post-office contro¬ 
versies in their congressional districts. 

22. Each place filled on my recommendation has 
required probably twelve letters written. 

2;-t. Do not know what amount of time, but a good 
part of it. 

It is not au extravagant estimate from the above 
answers to say that more than one-third of the entire 
time of these congressmen (time which should prop¬ 
erly be devoted to their legislative duties) is con¬ 
sumed in the distribution of offices. 

The condition of affairs in this respect does not 
seem to have changed very greatly from the time 
when General Garfield, in his speech at Williams 
College, said : “One-third of the working hours of 
senators and representatives is hardly suflTicient to 
meet the demands made upon them in reference to 
appointments for office.’’ The number of places 
withdrawn from congressional patronage by the civil 
service law has been about 29,000, but this has been 
counterbalanced by the growth of the service. 

Your committee then proceeded to inquire more 
particularly into the extent to which this patronage 
interfered with the proper performance of the legis¬ 
lative duties which the constitution imposes upon 
members of congress. Your committee examined 
the records of congress, for the purpose of deter¬ 
mining the relative number of measures which re¬ 
main unconsidered at the end of each session from 
lack of time to give them proper Consideration- 
Taking the last congress as an illustration, your com¬ 
mittee found that the number of bills and joint reso¬ 
lutions introduced was 17,078, to wit: House bills, 
12,664; resolutions, 269; senate bills, 4,000; resolu¬ 
tions, 145. Out of this total number of 17,078, your 
committee ascertained that the bills and resolutions 
passed were only 1,824, or a little more than ten per 
cent., leaving a balance of 15,254 measures intro- j 
duced but not adopted. This, however, does not i 
furnish a just criterion of the measures which con- | 
gress was unable to consider, since some of these | 
measures were passed upon adversely. Your com- j 
mittee, therefore, examined the indexes of the last j 
congressional record of both sessions, and found ' 
that, out of the 17,078 measures introduced, more | 
than 11,000 were referred to committees and never j 
reported by the committees to which they were re- ' 
ferred; that about 1,400 were introduced and re- j 
ported by these committees, but never reached final | 
consideration in the respective houses in which they | 
were originally introduced; that something more 
than 1,000 passed the house in which they were in¬ 
troduced, but never reached final consideration in 
the other branch of congress, while less than 3,500 
were finally acted upon. Your committee included 
in the measures finally disposed of all bills and reso¬ 
lutions approved by the President: all which became 
laws without his approval; all which passed both 
houses and were examined and approved, even 
though they finally failed to become laws through 
lack of proper stibmission to the executive; all; 
measures which were vetoed by the President 
whether afterwards considered by congress or not; 
and all measures which were withdrawn, laid on the 
table, or indefinitely postponed in either house. It 
js evident, however, that many of these measures, 
including bills which were laid on the table (from 


which they might be taken at any lime), were not 
intended to be definitely rejected. 

Why is it that the committees to which this pro¬ 
posed legislation is referred have no time to sort out 
the good from the bad ; no time to consider more 
than a small fraction of the measures submitted to 
them? Why is it that so many bills reported fail to 
receive consideration in the respective houses of con¬ 
gress? Why is it that so many measures which final¬ 
ly pass are ill-digested and carelessly drawn and re¬ 
quire expensive litigation toconstrue theirmeaning? 
It is not hard to find an answer when it is known 
that more than one third of the working hours of the 
members belonging to the party which is responsible 
for the legislation of the country is devoted to busi¬ 
ness entirely foreign to that legislation. 

The system itself is inherently vicious. The union 
in a single person or body of men of different func¬ 
tions of government, which are distinct in their na¬ 
ture, is evidence of a low form of political organism. 
In a large community with complicated interests it is 
only where these functions are definitely distributed 
that we can expect to see them properly ]ierformed. 
It is just as inconsistent with good government for 
the legislators to appoint the officers who are to ad¬ 
minister the laws as it would be for a j udge to under¬ 
take personally the execution of the process which he 
issues, or as it would be for these lawmakers them¬ 
selves to act as judges in administering and applying 
their own laws It is only where the legislative, ex¬ 
ecutive and judicial departments are kept distinct 
that we can expect efficient work from any of them. 
An encroachment by any of these departments upon 
the duties of the other is a manifest usurpation. The 
federal constitution has carefully distributed to each 
its own powers and duties. The duty of congress is 
CO make the laws. The senate, as the adviser of the 
president, has a qualified right to pass upon his nom¬ 
inations for certain offices; but to the house of repre¬ 
sentatives no such right is given in any form, and 
yet we find members of both houses, in violation of 
the purposes of the constitution, controlling appoint¬ 
ments in every bianch of the public service, and de 
manding that their constituents and political friends 
shall receive situations, often as a reward for person¬ 
al and political favors, and not on account of any 
qualifications for public office. So it has been com 
mon to find these appointees active in conventions, 
caucuses and primaries, working for the iutere.sts of 
the particular congressman to whom they owe their 
appointments, and often without regard for the pub¬ 
lic welfare; and it is for this work, or with the hope 
of securing it in the future, that the appointment is 
often given as the reward or the incentive. 

It is sometimes urged against civil service reform 
that the head of each department and bureau ought 
to have the selection of his own subordinates; but 
under the patronage system he has no such selection 
at all. The men selected are chosen, not on account 
of the knowledge of their fitness possessed by the ap¬ 
pointing officer, but because they are recommended 
by a certain representative or senator. The head of 
the department or bureau feels little responsibility 
for their acts. It often happens that he is not at lib¬ 
erty to discharge an inefficient man, lest he may 
offend the congressman whose influence secured the 
appointment of that man. The congressman, on the 
other hand, does not feel the responsibility for these 
appointments, for he is not nominally nor legally the 
appointing officer. In many cases it is not known 
on whose recommendation the appointment is made. 
This system “ invades the independence of the exec¬ 
utive and makes him less responsible for the charac¬ 
ter of his appointments. It impairs the efficiency of 
the legislator by diverting him from his proper 
sphere of duties and involving him in the intrigues 
of the aspirants for office.” (Jas. A. Garfield, At 
lantic Monthly, July, 1877.) 

But not only does the patronage system impair the 
efficiency of the service, it actually weakens the 
party in power. As was said in one of the answers 
to the above questions, “ where ten men apply for an 
affice, it is easy to disappoint nine of them.” The 
experience of the last administration, as well as of 
the present one up to this time, clearly shows that 
this irregular and unconstitutional mode of dis¬ 
tributing public offices serves only to cripple the 


members who make the appointments and the polit¬ 
ical party under which it is done. Members of con¬ 
gress realize this embarrassment when they order an 
election or caucus among the voters of their own 
party in the respective neighborhoods where i)OSt- 
offices are to be filled. The efl’ort in such cases is 
undoubtedly to cast from themselves the responsi¬ 
bility of making a choice, which is quite sure to en¬ 
gender dissension. 

Such an expedient is not only unjust in itself, but 
it rarely affords the relief sought. It is manifestly 
unfair to make an appointment for postmaster in a 
certain town depend upon the votes of one political 
party only. These may be an actual minority among 
the patrons of that office. The service to be per¬ 
formed is public service, paid for without reference 
to the political affiliations of the patrons, and if the 
choice is to be made by the suffrages of those who 
are interested, it is not just that any should be dis¬ 
franchised. The result of these elections often adds 
to the confusion and embarrassment which patron¬ 
age entails, as your committee has learned in the 
course of its inquiries. 

To our question, “Have any elections been held in 
your district to determine who the appointee should 
be; and if so, in how many instances, where, and 
for what positions?” the following answers have 
been received from congressmen in whose districts 
such elections have been held : 

4. In two Instances, for postmasters, resulting in 
both cases in difficulty and dissatisfaction. 

6. Elections have been held in eight pjaces in my 
congressional district for the selection of postmasters. 
No elections have been had for the purpose of desig¬ 
nating any other appointment. 

8. One election, to determine who should be the 
post-office appointee; we let all parties vote and con¬ 
fined it to one town ; would not hold another elec¬ 
tion for that purpose under any consideration. 

9. One election was held, so far, for postmaster, 
which was unsatisfactory on account of small attend¬ 
ance. There will be another on March 27ih for post¬ 
master. 

11. In a few instances elections by petitions for the 
position of postmaster. 

12. One last year for postmaster. The result in¬ 
creased strife. 

13. None. At the solicitation of candidates] and 
others I called three post-office elections, and I got 
into hot water. '1 he very persons who had asked for 
elections protested most'loudly against them, ano I 
then appointed the postmasters, or recommended 
them myself. 

15. In case of every presidential post-office in the 
district where there has been a vacancy since the 4ih 
of March, 18>9, a caucus of republican voters has 
been held to recommend the candidate for the office. 
These caucuses have been largely attend, and the re¬ 
sult in every instance has been perfectly satisfactory, 
both in the character of the candidates elected, who 
have been, without exception, excellent men, and 
entirely removing the disputes and factious quarrels 
which arise from such appointments. 

16. Two for postmasters. 

17. Two for post-offices. 

18. None. One was held without my knowledge, 
in which voters were excluded who had a right to be 
heard, and I paid no attention to the election. 

21. I had a few post-office elections in my congres¬ 
sional district, but, as there is no law regulating such 
elections, they have resulted in bitterness and strife, 
and did more to engender animosities and ill-will 
between the patrons of the office than any other 
method I could have adopted for settling po.st-office 
contentions, hence I have not favnred them, and 
henceforth shall discourage them where I can. 

22. Yes; I settled perhaps twenty post-office con¬ 
tests by a caucus of republican electors. It worked 
fairly well. 

24. In one instance elected a postmaster. 

The other answers state that no eleciions were 
held. 

An amusing account of an election held in his 
district was given in an interview with one of the 
representatives. He .said : “ I have held one election 
only under this administration, and that had a most 
disastrous result. It resulted in several men losing 
their characters, one or two were ttirned out of 
church, and all was turmoil and confusion. Car¬ 
riages were hired to bring voters fourteen miles dis¬ 
tant, and citizens of another state voted. The doors 
of the polling places were broken in. Democrats 
were allowed to vote. There were no safeguards 
about the polls. No oaths were required, and there 
was no respect for the election. The judges certified 
the election of one man, but sent a statement with 
the certification that the election was carried by 
fraud, the same name appearing upon both papers. 
The consequence was, I went outside for the post 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


115 


master, and chose a man wlio had not voted and 
took no part in the fight. He moved into town and 
took the office (worth not more than $150 per year); 
but they would have torn the election nominee to 
pieces if I had recommended him. I look upon 
the c elections as a party disaster.’ ’ 

Other members, as well as some of the above, have 
expressed their opinion of the patronage system in 
no favorable terms. One says; “This patronage 
busine.ss is a great nuisance.” Another: “I gave 
two hours a day to candidates for office all last sum¬ 
mer, throwing open a room to them six days out of 
the week. Of course it was an imposition, but I do 
not want to be put in the attitude of complaining of 
my constituents so long as the system exists.” An¬ 
other says that he regards appointments by congress¬ 
men as injurious to the best performance of their 
legitimate duties; but while the system exists, it is 
not possible for members of congress to avoid the re" 
sponsibility, and their duty is to make the best pos¬ 
sible use of the patronage which custom imposes 
upon them. 

Another objection to the patronage system is the 
secrecy by which it is surrounded. Recommenda¬ 
tions and petitions, which are signed upon solicita¬ 
tion and which mean nothing; charges and counter¬ 
charges preferred in the dark ; political iiiHuence, 
which is often really exerted in favor of one man 
while it appears to be exerted in favor of another; 
intrigues and defamation of character—all these 
things are only incidents to a system which pro¬ 
duces and nourishes them. 

Another consequence of this system of congres 
sional patronage has been the distribution of offices 
in many congressional districts by the defeated can¬ 
didates for Congress belonging to the party in power. 
This Irresponsible and illegal apportionment of pat¬ 
ronage has led to many scandals. In Misso iri there 
are a number of instances in which these distribu¬ 
tors of patronage have collected considerable sums of 
money from the men seekingtheirrecommendations. 
These “ donations or free gifts ” (as they have been 
called by the recipient.s of them) are ostensibly made 
to cover “the expense attached to the proceedings” of 
recommending them, but it is evident that transac¬ 
tions of this character are essentially corrupt. 

The object of your committee in laying these facts 
before the public is rather to expose the infirmities 
of the patronage system than to criticise the action of 
individual congressmen or of the parly in power. 
These evils have existed under both political parlies, 
and so long as the present system exists, it is difficult 
for any individual congressman to refuse to exercise 
that patronage which universal custom has thrust 
upon him, often without his consent or desire. The 
remedy lies in the adoption of general laws which 
shall remove these offices from congressional inter 
ference. In this connection we desire to call to the 
attention of the league the provisions of a bill re¬ 
cently introduced into the house of representatives 
by the Hon. Henry Cabot Lodge, of Massachusetts, 
in respect to fourth-class postmasterships, offices 
which at present constitute the bulk of those subject 
to congressional patronage. This bill provides that 
the United Slates shall be divided by the postmaster 
general into postal districts, and that he shall desig¬ 
nate for each district a post office inspector to act as 
examiner. (As these inspectors are now appointed in 
pnrsuracce of the civil service law, there is reason to 
believe that they will not be greatly subject to polit¬ 
ical influence.) The bill provides that whenever a 
fourth-class postmaster is to be appointed the inspec¬ 
tor for the district shall post notices in conspicuous 
places in the vicinity, stating the place where the 
post office is situated, the compen-sation, the amount 
of bond, the place where application papers may 
be obtained, and to which they must be returned, 
and any other proper information. At least fourteen 
days' time is to be given for returning the application 
papers. The inspector must furnish all applicatits 
with blank forms of certificates, in which the appli¬ 
cant, in his own handwriting, shall state upon oath, 
his name, residence, post-office address, citizenship, 
time and place of birth, education, health and phys¬ 
ical capacity for service, previous employment in 
the military or naval service, business and residence 
for the previous five years, whether convicted or un¬ 


der indictment for any crime, and if so, what, and 
the particular building where the applicant proposes 
to establish the post-office, and whether in connec¬ 
tion with any other business. The candidate shall 
furnisli a sworn certificate, signed by three reputable 
citizens, declaring their belief that he is a suitable 
person. No other recommendation shall be offered. 
No certificate shall be signed by any person liolding 
office in the federal or state government. No appli¬ 
cation shall ca'l for or furnisli any information con¬ 
cerning the politics of the applicant.. At the expira¬ 
tion of the time for receiving application papers the 
Inspector shall post a list of the applications in the vi¬ 
cinity, and visit the place and make such inquiries as 
shall enable him to form an intelligent judgment on 
the qualification of the respective applicants. He shall 
then send to the postmaster-general all the applica¬ 
tion papers, together with the report, in whicli he 
shall grade the applicants in the order of their rela¬ 
tive fitness, according to his inquiries, and giving tlie 
reasons. These papers are to be preserved for five 
years, and upon them the postmaster-general shall 
appoint one of the candidates whoso names are re 
ported and designated as fit to be appointed ; but if 
heshall select any other than the one graded highest, 
he shall place his reasons upon record, and these shall 
be open to public inspection. No appointment shall 
be absolute until the appointee has served one year 
on probation. The postmaster-general shall not ap¬ 
point upon political grounds, nor the inspector rec¬ 
ommend any candidate upon such grounds. 

This bill is an entirely new measure and is largely 
tentative in its character, but it is progressive, it 
affords to the atlministration a means of appointing 
fourth-class postmasters without the necessity of 
consulting members of congress, and it will help to 
remove this great mass of small offices from political 
control and restore to members of congress the dig¬ 
nity which ought to belong to the law makers of the 
country. It will help to abolish a system of patron¬ 
age which leads to endless contentions and bicker¬ 
ings in almost every community in the United States, 
which paralyzes the legislative power of congress, 
and which holds these small prizes up as a reward 
for the lowest forms of p ditical activity. 

We would respectfully urge tlie league to take 
every measure possible to promote tlie favorable 
consideration and adoption of this or some otlier 
measure which seeks to substitute general rules for 
the individual discretion and self-interest of mem¬ 
bers of congress and their political supporters. If 
the fourth-class post-offices can be removed from the 
field of political strife, the reform of the federal 
civil service will be more than half accomplished. 

(Mr. MaeVeagh, being absent on account of illne.ss, 
is unable to sign this report before its presentation to 
the executive committee.) 

Wm. D. Foulke, Chairmaji. 

Chas. J. Bonaparti;. 

Richard H. Dana. 

Sherman S. Rooers. 

Washmgton, D. C., April 8, 1890. 


SOME POPULAR OBJECTIONS TO 
CIVIL SERVICE REFORM • 


I. 

“ You gentlemen never weary of telling us that we 
are fallen on degenerate days; that during the first 
forty years of our government, before we lap.sed from 
onr sinless state, officials were removed only for 
cause, and incumbents held on good behavior; in 
other words, that civil service reform prevailed in 
all its purity. Now, it is philosophical generaliza¬ 
tion, founded on broad experience, that revolutions 
do not go backwards. Heed it, gentlemen, heed it! 
The revolution of 1820-29 is an accomplished fact. It 
is here to stay, for then did the people come into 
their own. The present status has endured for half 
a century; civil service reform is aneient history. 
You are chasing moonbeams.” 

’■•‘Such of these objections as are taken from the 
records of congre.'-s are indicated by marginal ref- 
eieuces and are quoted literally. The others—which 
reffect current lay discus>ion of the newspaper and 
the street—are repeated substantially, but not form¬ 
ally. 


The fatalist entrenches him.self in platitude, and 
warns reason beyond speaking distance. With him, 
what is mtist forever be ; what has been and is not 
will never be. And thus is the controversy closed. 

He forgets that much that is done remains to be 
undone; that political progress is mostly negative, 
consisting mainly in the repeal of bad laws or in the 
abolition of evil customs. In this sense history is re¬ 
versed every day, and the process will continue so 
long as legislation is experimental and legislators are 
supine. It is true that some things in political his¬ 
tory may be regarded as settled. But this can be 
predicted only of those changes which are based 
upon the immutable principles of right. The intro¬ 
duction of the spoils system into the administrative 
hr rich of the American government is not of these. 
That system is at war with eiinality, freedom, justice, 
and a wise economy, and is already a doomed thing 
fighting extinction. Its establishment was in no 
sense a popular revolution, but was the work of a 
self-willed man of stubborn and tyrannical nature, 
who had enemies to punish and debts to pay. He 
overrode a vehement opposition, disregarding the 
protest and sage predietion of the great statesmen of 
his lime. He wielded a power that was arbitrary ; 
his caprice was law, his rule was reign. If he wished 
to do a thing, it was enough toat it seemed good to 
him to do it. His idea of government was a per¬ 
sonal one solely. Every public official was a private 
servitor, who must take the oath of allegienee and 
do homage to his chief. In his view, no man could 
honestly disagree with him. He was always right; 
his opponents were hopelessly and eriminally wrong. 
Here was a fit man to establish the spoils system, to 
explore the constitution for latent executive powers, 
to attach to the person of the president the high pre¬ 
rogatives of a monarch. That the king is the foun¬ 
tain of honor, office, and privilege is the theory of 
the English state ; that the civil service of the United 
States is a perquisite of the presidency was the theory 
of (ieneral Jackson. 

It is needless to say that the American common¬ 
wealth was not founded upon any such doctrine. 
Jackson’s interpretation of the constitution was a 
gross perversion of the intent and meaning of that 
instrument. This was to be a government of laws, 
not of men ; and so far as the prescience of its fram¬ 
ers availed it was made so. 'J he liberties of the peo¬ 
ple were not to be left to individual scruple, but 
were secured by specific inhibitions upon the govern¬ 
mental agencies. Three departments were oiganized 
severally to make, execute, and interpret the laws, 
and each was to act as a check upon the other. tVith 
the adoption of the first ten amendments to the con¬ 
stitution, it was thought that every avenue of attack 
upon popular rights had been closed. But the power 
of construction is gieater than that of legislation. 
The intention of the lawgiver is determined, not by 
himself, but by some other who construes the law ; 
and with that other interpretation is purely a sub¬ 
jective matter. Madison held that “the wanton re¬ 
moval of meritorious officers” was an impeachable 
offense. But Jackson swore to defend and protect 
the constitution as he understood it, ancl not as Mad¬ 
ison, one of its framers, conceived it. Regarding the 
right of removal the instrument itself is wholly 
silent, except as it provides impeachment for high 
crimes and misdemeanors. When, therefore. Jack- 
son organized the civil service into a gigantic polit¬ 
ical machine, proscribing office-holders because of 
his personal enmity to them or because of their po¬ 
litical affiliations, it can not be .said that he violated 
any specific provision of the constitution. That such 
action was an usurpation of authority and a wanton 
betrayal of trust needs no verbal empha.sis. With 
equal propriety and moral ju.stification, he might 
have used those other co-ordinate branches of the ex¬ 
ecutive department, the army and navy, to perpetu¬ 
ate himself and his party in power. This he did not 
attempt to do. Perhaps he did not need their aid. 
At any rate, after securing his own re election, and 
after naming his successor, his ambition rested—for¬ 
tunately for the country. But what he did, he did 
thoroughly. The system of political brigandage in¬ 
augurated by him has subsisted even unto this day. 
But it is now upon the verge of dissolution. Its end 
is written and sealed. This last is the work of those 















116 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


who are grown weary of the spoliation of office—of 
those who are jealous of the encroachments of the 
executive, and who would tie the hands of that func¬ 
tionary for all time to come. With them it is not a 
question whether a clerk holds his office for four 
years or for fifteen years. They are determined that 
the great army of the civil service shall not be used 
by any man or by any set of men for purposes of per¬ 
sonal or partisan aggrandizement; that the freedom 
of elections shall not be as.sailed by an intriguing, 
corrupt, and organized force ; that presidential con¬ 
tests shall not be tumults threatening anarchy. 
Hereafter there will be no “prizes of victory," no car¬ 
nival of spoil. Place-holders will attend to the busi¬ 
ness for which they are paid to attend ; fitness will 
be the essential of appointment, not the accident and 
the incident. This is the popular revolution that is 
moving forward irresistably, that is coming to stay. 
Already has a law been enacted which, though par¬ 
tial in its effects, is capable of large extension by the 
president alone, without further action on the part 
of congress. This measure leaves the power of re¬ 
moval for all except partisan reasons untouched. 
By regulating the method of appointment, it takes 
away the temptation to the abuse of that discretion. 
It IS not a revival of a faded statute, nor has it i's 
counterpart in early legislation. It is a new order¬ 
ing of things; practically a reversal of procedure. 
Although, during the first forty years of the republic, 
there was no statutory restriction upon the manner 
of appointment and removal, nevertheless the power 
of removal was controlled by an unwritten law which 
depended for its enforcement upon mental sanc¬ 
tions. But this was a frail dyke with which to with¬ 
stand the pressure of a hungry and inflowing sea, 
and it was only a question of time until it should be 
swept away. That congress did not strengthen it by 
positive legislation is to be deplored. But the omis¬ 
sion is explicable. At the time of the formation of 
our government no law was deemed necessary. The 
civil service numbered but a thousand persons; to¬ 
day it numbers two hundred thousand, and not 
many decades hence it will increase to a half mil¬ 
lion. Again, congress had absolute faith in the ex¬ 
ecutive. All presidents would be Washingtons, pa¬ 
tient and moderate, patriotic rather than partisan. 
So highly was the first president esteemed that that 
body waived its consent to the removal of those offi¬ 
cers whose appointment required their approval. Of 
course they did not contemplate the capricious exer¬ 
cise of this power; the causeless removal of an offi¬ 
cial being to them an unthinkable proposition. But 
events outran prevision, and in the course of years 
not only did a Jackson appear, but congress itself 
ceased to desire to protect the service. Such legisla¬ 
tive changes as were made subserved a private and 
not a pul)lic interest. The Immense patronage which 
was controlled by the chief executive, either direct* 
ly by commission, or indirectly through the heads of 
departments, came to be administered for the ben¬ 
efit, not of himself alone, but of the representative 
politicians as well. This step was gained partly 
through a recognition by the president of the emi¬ 
nent utility of sub allotment for personal purposes, 
and partly, in the failure of that persuasion, through 
the e.xercise of such coercive power as could be wield¬ 
ed by the senate in confirmation, and by both houses 
in the passage of acts regulating the term and tenure 
of office. Gradually, out of the chaotic scramble for 
spoil, there was evolved a system of distribution 
which was founded upon hoary precedent, and 
which, in nice precision and in perfect on of detail, 
lacked nothing of a scientific character. The whole 
country was staked out into districts, as many in 
number as there were congressmen. After a con¬ 
quest, the enemy were driven from their holdings 
and the victors took possession of the glebe. But the 
estates thus granted we:e made conditional upon the 
performing of certain services or upon the rendering 
of certain tribute. Each tenant held of some feudal 
superior, and all held, mediately or immediately, of 
the lord paramount, the president. The governmen¬ 
tal offices scattered everywhere were so many baro¬ 
nial strongholds, and were filled with retainers who 
were chosen for their fighting qualities. The chief 
duty of these men was to check uprisings and to keep 


the people in subjection. Their places depended 
upon the faithful discharge of it. In other words, 
the civil service was a graded vassalage of a militant 
character. All offices were the private property of 
the head of the state, and were dispensed by roya] 
favor. What is this but feudalism in new clothes, 
or, rather, the garbed skeleton thereof? By some 
fantastic jugglery, this mocking semblance of a dead 
and buried past has become a stalking figure in a 
new and progressive civilization. Verily has a revo¬ 
lution gone backwards, if it be not promptly rele¬ 
gated to the gla.ss case of antiquities, there to remain 
as a curiosity for posterity to stare at. 

The spoils sjstem should have perished a quarter 
of a century ago, in the cataclysm which destroyed 
that other relic of feudalism, slavery. For they were 
twin evils, and were ever unfailing allies; and when 
the time shall come towiite the history of public 
opinion in America during the nineteenth century, 
they will be classed together, John Morley suggest¬ 
ively says of the “peculiar institution,” “Nobody 
has yet traced out the full effect upon the national 
character of the Americans of all those years of con¬ 
scious complicity in slavery, after the immorality 
and iniquity of slavery had become clear to the inner 
conscience of the very men who ignobly sanctioned 
the mobbing of the abolitionists.”* 

Adherence to the letter of a contract which was “a 
covenant with death and an agreement with hell ” 
was due partly to an unfaltering instinct of union. 
But many were influened by motives less worthy. Be¬ 
fore the war the fidelity of most northern politicians 
to the south was a degrading sycophancy. Eager and 
grateful for the crumbs which fell from the southern 
table, and despairing-of obtaining those crumbs 
elsewhere, they suffered themselves to become the 
supple tools of the slave power. These “Swis.s guards 
of slavery fighting for pay” were a race of place-hunt¬ 
ers, with whom office was the end, not the means, 
and whose statesmanship, like that of the Augustan 
senate, consisted in justifying personal flattery by 
speculative principles of servitude. They steadily 
prostituted principle to preferment, and came near 
involving this country in irretrievable ruin. 

But the age of compromise—the era of “bigotry 
w'ith a doubt” and of “persecution without a creed” 
—was succeeded by the age of blood and iron. The 
war was an ethical education ; like a great storm, it 
purified the air. After it was over the people began 
to see more clearly and more truly; they learned to 
view things “in the visual angle of the absolute prin¬ 
ciple.” 

Before this keener vision the spoils system, a long- 
established practice claiming charter by prescription, 
has been called upon to justify itself. Until recently, 
the people of this country supposed that traffic in 
place, the unceasing clamor for office, the sack and 
pillage of the government by the dominant party, 
were a necessary part of democratic institutions. 
Many politicians, with selfish purposes to subserve, 
were interested in enforcing this view. To the prin¬ 
ciple that the majority must rule they added the cor¬ 
ollary that all the offices are essential to that rule. 
They further inculcated the idea that every national 
election is a battle of enemies, instead of an amicable 
contest cf friends, whose interests are the same, and 
“ who disagree not except in opinion.” 

It must be confessed that during the rebellion, 
when the north was divided between the war party 
and the peace party, there was some foundation for 
this doctrine. He who was not with you was against 
you. But the intense partisanism engendered by 
that strife is relaxing into an amiable toleration. 
Happily, party fealty is not always to be a test of pa* 
triotism. The government is not the property of fac¬ 
tion, and the minority have rights which must be re¬ 
spected. “ Vse victis” is no longer the slogan of the 
fight. If civil service reform has not made that pro¬ 
gress which idealists expect,—conquering all on the 
instant,—let it be remembered that the growth of 
moral movements is necessarily slow, especially in a 
democracy, where, it is scarcely hyperbole to say, the 
last man must be convinced. It is none the less sure, 
however; for “ one man in the right l>ecomes a ma- 


* Critical Miscellanies, Harriet Martineau, page 268. 


joiity,” and the American people mean to do light 
when they know where the right lies. 

11 . 

“ I believe this commission to be undemocratic. I 
believe it favors certain voters in this country at the 
expense of other voters, and I know that if the rul¬ 
ings of the civil service commission were applied to 
the members of this house not seven eighths of the 
members would ever reach the floor again. [Laugh¬ 
ter.] Now, sir, believing this to be undemocratic, 
and believing that it is in violation of the funda¬ 
mental principles of the government, I move to strike 
out the whole section, and hope that it will be agreed 
to.” t 

To apply the rules of the merit system to the mem¬ 
bers of eongress would be a cruelty indeed, and is 
altogether a harrowing suggestion. But it is beside 
the point. If civil service reform be undemocratic, 
and if it violate the fundamental principles of our 
government, the motion made in the house of repre- 
sentaves to strike out the appropriation to the com¬ 
mission should have prevailed. As a matter of fact, 
it was overwhelmingly defeated by a vote of twenty- 
five to one hundred and thirty-eight. This would 
appear to be decisive. It is evident, however, from 
the discussion that preceded the calling of the yeas 
and nays, that the scope and object of civil service 
reform are still profoundly misunderstood by .some 
congressmen, and infertntially by their constituen¬ 
cies. A restatement may therefore serve a useful 
purpose: 

The doctrine of ci\il service reform as applied to 
the subordinate, clerical, or purely ministerial offices 
of the government is based upon the following self- 
evident propositions : that offices are created to fulfill 
certain necessary functions involved in the routine 
of government, and not to give some men a place ; 
that offices are supported by non-partisan taxation; 
that taxation is an evil, and therefore it is essential 
that the public service shall be as efficient and eco¬ 
nomical as possible ; that offices are public and not 
private property, and administration is a trust, not 
an ownership ; that in a republic something less ar¬ 
bitrary than favoritism shall govern appointment 
and removal; that men shall be appointed solely on 
the ground of merit; and not in payment of personal 
debt: that an examination is the fairest means of as¬ 
certaining the qualifications of an appointee, because 
it insures that a clerk shall know how to write, a 
book-keeper how to keep books, and a gauger how to 
gauge ; that such examination shall be competitive 
and open to all, not being confined to the members 
of any one political party; that a class system is op¬ 
posed to the spirit of our institutions, and therefore 
offices should not be invested property of ward-work¬ 
ers and political henchmen, to the total and absolute 
exclusion of the great body of the common people ; 
that an office-holder is a citizen of the United States, 
and is entitled to all the rights and privileges attach¬ 
ing to such citizenship; that neither the president 
nor any other executive officer has the right to pro¬ 
scribe such office-holder, remove him from place, or 
threaten his subsistence on account of his polities; 
that such a brutal procedure is un-American; that 
tenure of office should not be dependent upon the 
degradation of manhood and the prostitution of po¬ 
litical opinion ; that the practice of the president and 
his cabinet in changing two hundred thousand office¬ 
holders at will, for causes unconnected with good ad¬ 
ministration, is dangerous and despotic, and should 
be restrained; that under the present system these 
office-holders constitute a great standing army of 
paid servitors, ever ready to do the bidding of their 
patrons, to the perverMon of the public will, and are 
a menace to good government; that political as¬ 
sessments, if paid unwillingly, are an extortion and 
a direct theft from the office-holder, and, if paid 
willingly, are generally a brokerage commission for 
appointment, or a bribe to the appointing power for 
continuance in place; that if salaries are so large 
that assessments can be endured without inconven¬ 
ience, such salaries should be cut down to a saving 
of the people’s money; that promises of appointment 


t Mr. Cummings, Proceedings of the House of Rep¬ 
resentatives, December 19, 1888. 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


117 


to office made, whether definitely or indefinitely, 
w'ork a coruption of public opinion ; that the enor¬ 
mous bribe of two hundred thousand offices, offered 
as a reward for party work, tends to obscure the real 
issues of politics, encourages the sacrifice of princi¬ 
ple to selfish personal gain, and induces a laxity of 
political morals; that a “ clean sweep ” of the offices 
demoralizes the public service, and is the direct and 
indirect source of great financial loss ; that skill in 
the manipulation of a caucus and in the packing of a 
primary is not presumptive evidence of capacity for 
the performance of official duties; that the constitu¬ 
tion of the United States contemplates the election of 
a congressman as a legislator, and not as a patronage- 
monger; that such patronage is a burden to every 
honest, conscientious and able congressman, compels 
the neglect of his proper duties, creates petty fac¬ 
tional disputes and wrangles among his constituents, 
and often defeats the re-election of a trustworthy 
servant of honorable record; that the statesman is 
thus rapidly becoming an extinct species, being suc¬ 
ceeded by the politician, and the consequent loss in- 
flcted on the people through crude and unwise legis- 
lation is incalculable; that the fear of losing the spoils 
of office is paralyzing the legislative branch of the 
government, makes cowards of political parties, and 
is the enemy of progress; that the retention of the 
vast patronage of two hundred thousand offices is be¬ 
coming of more concern than the triumph of princi¬ 
ple ; that the mania for place-hunting is increasing; 
that the clamor of spoilsmen compels the creation 
of sinecures, thereby increasing the taxes; and finally 
that all the evils here before enumerated are grow¬ 
ing with the multiplication of offices, and will ulti¬ 
mately, unless checked by a comprehensive and de¬ 
cisive enactment, undermine and overthrow the in¬ 
stitutions of our country. 

Such is an imperfect outline of the doctrine of civil 
service reform and of the abuses it is designed to 
remedy. By this showing, is it not the spoils system 
which is ‘‘ undemocratic,” and which ‘‘favors cer¬ 
tain voters of this country at the expense of other 
voters”? What, to repeat, can be less democratic, 
less American, than persecution for opinions’s sake? 
Yet this is the very essence of the spoils system, its 
guiding spirit and its crowning infamy. If this as¬ 
sertion need further explication, it may be found in 
a recital of what takes place in this country when 
one party succeeds another in the control of the gov¬ 
ernment. The newly elected president goes (by 
deputy) through all the departments, and may be 
supposed to interview each clerk in a conversation of 
which the following is typical: 

President. Whom did you vote for at the last elec¬ 
tion ? 

Clerk. That does not concern you. I am an Am 
erican citizen, and have the right to vote for whom¬ 
soever I please, without being subjected afterwards 
to a governmental imiuisiliou by you or any other 
man. 

President. I a.sked the question in conformity with 
a time-honored practice, and shall insist upon an 
answer. 

Clerk. Very well; I will answer the question, not 
because of your menaces, but because I do not hold 
my political opinions covertly. I voted for your op¬ 
ponent. 

President. Then you must vacate this office. 

Clerk. If you can show that I have not performed 
inv duties properly, or that I have neglected them 
for politics or any other reasons, I am willing to go. 

President. I have not looked into that, it is im¬ 
material, any way. I want your place for some one 
else. 

Clerk. For one of your partisan “.ivorkers,” per¬ 
haps, whose qualifications you have also not looked 
into? 

President. Possibly. 

Clerk. By what right do you proscribe me, then ? 
You are merely a trustee ; these offices do not belong 
to you. 

President. You are the victim of an illusion. These 
offices do belong to me. They are my personal 
patronage and plunder, to do with whatsoever I will. 
If you refuse to resign, I will remove you. 

Clerk. Very well; I will yield the place as I would 


my purse to a highwayman who puts a pistol to my 
head. Nevertheless, I denounce your action as an 
outrage upon my rights as an American citizen. 

If this conversation does not often take place ac¬ 
tually as reported, its substance is at least tacitly un¬ 
derstood. Generally the clerk stifles his protest and 
resigns, quietly submitting to a system that is an 
heritage of barbarism. Proscription of minor office¬ 
holders on account of political opinion is as com¬ 
pletely indefensible as proscription on account of re¬ 
ligious belief. It has no proper place in the United 
States. It is an anachronism, and belongs to the age 
of the crusades against the Catholics and the Jews, 

III. 

“Civil service reform is an Englisli importation^ 
upon which, unfortunately, there is no tariff. We 
broke with England and with her monarchical in¬ 
stitutions a century ago, and set up a government of 
our own—a democratic government. It supplies our 
needs, and stands as an example to mankind. Ser 
vile imitation of foreign polities is unworthy of our 
pride of race or nation.” 

Anglophobia is in the American blood. A com¬ 
mon law, language, literature, and religion do not 
of necessity constitute the ties of sentiment. Al¬ 
though the American people are the heirs of all the 
ages, they do not like to be reminded of their obli¬ 
gations, nor to acknowledge an ancestry. Tliey will 
not claim kinship even with Shakespeare. To them 
their history knows no perspective; in the dis. 
covery of a new and virgin world was the beginning 
of things. England is the traditional enemy, and 
all the pretty speeches made over London dinner- 
tables do not alter this fact in the least. This preju¬ 
dice seems to be enduring, and any appeal made to 
it by politicians is generally successful. 

Happily in the present case, the retort is com¬ 
plete. The spoils system, with the stamp of feudal¬ 
ism upon it, was imported into this country from 
England, where it had obtained in the modern form 
for one hundred and forty years. It pervaded all 
departments of the English state, the army, the navy, 
and the church, as well as the civil service, attaining 
a growth which it has never known here. Offices 
were openly bought and sold, the purchaser acquir¬ 
ing a proprietary interest therein. There, as here, 
patronage was the active coefficient of corrupt elec¬ 
tions. Rotten boroughs were exposed for sale in the 
market, and members of parliament were bribed to 
the support of the crown by sinecures, pensions, 
and money. At the time our government was 
founded, the spoils system was flourishing luxuri¬ 
antly in England, and George III found it a most 
serviceable instrument in enforcing his policy of 
persecution against the thirteen colonies. It is a 
pity that those gentlemen who claim the spoils sys¬ 
tem as peculiarly “American” should have forgot¬ 
ten this. It embarrasses their argument. Per contra, 
the merit system is a democratic institution, and its 
practical application to our civil service was coeval 
with the beginning of our government. That Eng¬ 
land should have been before us in embodying it in 
the form of law proves nothing more than the im¬ 
mense progress which has been made in that country 
towards popular institutions. 

IV. 

“The executive power of Great Britain is heredi¬ 
tary, and changes only at the death of the monarch. 
The administration, however, changes at will, and 
may change every week. Therefore, the idea of life 
tenure for executive officers is consistent with an 
executive for life. Therefore, an official class of 
lifelong tenure is consistent with monarchical and 
aristocratic government, which is peculiarly a gov¬ 
ernment of classes. But it is not consistent with a 
democratic government and a short-lived executive 
where no class is recognized by law and all men are 
equal.” 

It happens, unfortunately for the consistency of 
this argument, that in England, under the modern 
system of parliamentary government, the adminis¬ 
tration is the executive. The executive powers of 
the crown are obsolete, having passed to the prime 

» Senator Vance, Cong. Rec., vol. xxii. Part III., p. 
‘2949. 


minister and his cabinet. But these officials “ change 
at will;” they “may change every week.” Conse¬ 
quently, tenure on good behavior—miscalled life 
tenure—is consistent with democratic government 
and a short-lived executive. If civil service reform 
is not adapted to the United States, where the presi¬ 
dent holds for four years, a fortiori, it is not adapted 
to England, where the tenure of the premier—the 
real executive—is the shortest and most precarious 
imaginable. Indeed, what we call civil service re¬ 
form is the very life of parliamentary government. 
If, with every change of the ministry, a “ clean 
sweep” of the officers should be made, the English 
civil seivice would soon be in a state of anarchy. 
Under snch a system, rapid alternation in party con¬ 
trol would totally disorganize the administrative 
machinery of the government, and would be a per¬ 
petual threat against the existence of the empire 
itself—a thing of course not to be tolerated. The 
situation in England was logically reducible to this: 
Either the spoils system must be abolished, or some 
one party must be continued in power indefinitely 
which would mean the destruction of popular gov¬ 
ernment. There could be no he.sitation in choosing. 
The new democracy achieved a victory over feudal- 
istic privilege that was complete and final. 

Even apart from any political principle, the re. 
form has vindicated itself. When the administra¬ 
tive departments ceased to be asylums for decayed 
gentry, and were thrown open to public competi¬ 
tion, there was an improvement in the morale and 
efficiency of the service. Reorganization upon the 
basis of the meritsystem was extended even to India, 
where the duties of officials are of a most delicate 
and complicated character, involving, as they do 
tactful relations with and control over two hundred 
millions of aliens. 

But it has come to pass that civil service reform, 
which was denounced in England as “democratic,” 
is opposed in the United States as representing ex¬ 
actly the opposite tendencies. “ Aristocracy,” “ bu¬ 
reaucracy,” and “insolence of office” are expres¬ 
sions as familiar as they are misleading. They de¬ 
serve a brief consideration. 

Aristocracy means the permanent exaltation cf a 
few individual names. It implies great .social dig¬ 
nity and distinction, and generally is based upon an 
hereditary succession of title and land. An aristoc¬ 
racy of department clerks and mail-carriers is an 
absurdity. However worthy such persons may be, 
they will have no more sr eial distinction than clerks 
in business houses, whose tenure is the same as theirs. 
They possess neither title nor wealth, and are con¬ 
demned to a routine of labor. The effect of service 
in a great government machine is to sink individ¬ 
uality, not to exalt it. The tens of thousands of 
school-teachers who are in the pay of every state do 
not constitute an aristocracy. In fact, they are rarely 
in the public view, and this for the reason that they 
are not “ in politics.” Fortunately, the spoils sys¬ 
tem has not been applied to our public schools. If, 
however, it were the practice to dismiss all the re¬ 
publican school-teachers whenever a democratic gov¬ 
ernor was elected, and viceversa, we should, wiiliout 
doubt, be feelingly assured that any other tenure 
would seriously imperil our institutions. 

Bureaucracy is another chimera. It can not exist 
where the heads of administration are constantly 
changing, where admission to the civil service is 
open to all, and where the removal of the unfit serv¬ 
ant is expeditious and easy. 

Insolence of office is an a priori argument. It has 
been pertinently said, in answer to it, that, at the 
time tenure on good behavior was superseded by 
Crawford’s four-year law and by Jackson’s regime, 
it was never urged by the innovators as a reason for 
the change that the manners of office holders were 
contemptuous and overbearing. The objection is an 
after-thought. Of the insolence of bureaucracy and 
of the arrogance of aristocracy the American people 
have had no experience under any official tenure, 
and are not likely to have. 

A civil service becomes formidable to the liberties 
of a people only when it .seeks to perpetuate itself by 
Interfering with elections. Inasmuch as this purpose 
(to override the public will and to create a bureau 




















118 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


oracy) is the very vice of the American spoils system, 
speculation as to what may be, nndcr civil service 
reform, can be profitably postponed to an observa¬ 
tion of what is. 

The countless minor oflices of the United Slates 
are tiiled by a distinct cla.ss known as “professional 
])oliticians.’’ Tlicsc men live by politics, receiving 
place as reward for political work. Their control 
of public office is monopolistic. Mr. Bryce estimates 
their number at two hundred thousand, but this is 
probably an underestimate. They constitute a guild, 
although they are not organized under formal art¬ 
icles of association. With them office-getting (or 
keeping in office) is an industry, and the fees and 
emoluments are accepted as payment for partisan 
services rather than for the exercise of official func¬ 
tions. The influence which the office-holders wield 
is altogether out of proportion to their numbers or 
to their inteliectual attainments. But they possess 
this advantage over ali other classes—they are uni¬ 
fied and organized. They make the management 
of primaries and conventions the serious business 
of their lives, and ac(iuire a skill and experience 
in “wire-pulling” which ordinary citizens can not 
hope to cope with. The politics of the country is 
In the hands of these men. The people elect, but 
can not nominate, being reduced to a choice of can¬ 
didates selected by the politicians of opposing par¬ 
ties. These -politicians dictate nominations, high 
and low, and afterwards foreclose a lien upon pub¬ 
lic place which they claim to have earned. All 
others, those who can not show a certificate of this 
character, are excluded. The spoils system has been 
compared with a fairly conducted lottery, in which 
every one has an eipial chance. Ifut the analogy 
is loose. In all lotteries the prizes are limited to 
ticket-holders, and in the American political lot¬ 
tery the ticket-holders are few. The farmer, the 
shopkeeper, and the laborer generally have not the 
remotest chance of prefennent, unless they can pro¬ 
duce evidence of partisan woik more or less tech¬ 
nical or questionable. Of course the number who 
can ofl'er such credentials is comparatively small. 
To begin with, all the members of the defeated po¬ 
litical party (who, under our electoral system, con¬ 
stitute, as often as not, more than one half of the 
people) are rigidly debarred. Secondly, only that 
small contingent of the dominant party who have 
been of practical use to the candidates in conven¬ 
tion and elsewhere, and who posses.ses the advant¬ 
age of a personal scqnaintance with one or more 
of them, receive any consideration whatever. The 
idea, therefore, that the offices are in the hands of 
the people is the shallowest of delusions. They are 
sold to the few for a jirice which the many are un. 
willing and are unable to pay. It is needless to say 
that, in this barter and sale of public place, the 
proper transaction of government business is lost 
sight of. Competency does not appoint an applicant, 
and can not save an incumbent. Other motives of 
a mercenary or selfish character control in both 
cases. Office brokerage is a shameless and conspicu¬ 
ous fact, as the newspapers and the congre.ssional 
debates daily attest. It is the great object of civil 
service reform to restore these oflices to the people, 
and to overthrow the bastard aristocracy who have 
despoiled them. Those good citizens who are ap¬ 
prehensive of government by “official caste” need 
not strain their eyes to the future. They should 
look about them. 

V. 

“The political disqualification of office-holders is 
an invasion of their rights as American citizens.” 

Civil service reform, as embodied in the Pendle¬ 
ton Act of 188;!, does not deny to an office-holder 
any rights which properly belong to him as a citi¬ 
zen of the United States ; on the contrary, it restores 
to him those rights of which he has been deprived. 
It protects him against partisan discrimination by 
the appointing power: it protects his salary from 
assessment by his official superiors; it protects him 
against removal for refusing to render any political 
service. It restores to him the right to think for 
himself, and to register his opinion at the ballot- 
box, free from the espionage of the informer. In 
this wise the law protects him. But civil service 


reform, in its gross and scope, within the statute and 
without, looks to the protection of the jieople also. 
There are certain things which a citizen as a place¬ 
holder may not do. He may not use hisofiicial in¬ 
fluence to coerce the political actions of his neighbor, 
to-wit: he may not neglect the duties of his office to 
do a henchman’s w ork ; he may not pack primaries, 
manipulate conventions, collect and disbur.se elec¬ 
tion funds, corrupt the ballot box, or tamper with 
the returns. Some of these things arc forbidden by 
the federal and state criminal law; others not. But 
whether or not, any and all of them are grave 
breaches of his duty, both as a citizen and ns an 
oflice-holder. Yet these are the things which, in 
varying kind and degree, many officials notoriously 
are doing. Is it neces.sary to characterize such par 
tisan activity as a monstrous evil in a country where 
the triumph of right is a iiuestion of majority, or 
to justify the executive orders which have been 
Issued to suppress it? 

In England, more tlian a century ago, the inter¬ 
ference of office-holders in elections assumed such 
proportions that the whole body of subordinates in 
the executive department were forbidden by law 
to vote for members of parliament. In 18G8, after 
the introduction of the merit system, this law was 
repealed, as being an unnecessary restriction. If a 
man procures an appointment on his deserts, and 
not through political influences, tlie obligations of 
appointee to patron do not exist, and the tempta¬ 
tion to indulge in corrupt election practices disap¬ 
pears. The American doctrine of the relation of the 
office-holder to the body politic was set forth (albeit 
iittle to the immediate purpose) by President Cleve¬ 
land in an executive order issued .Inly 14, 1886. In 
it he said: 

“Individual interest and activity in |>olitical af. 
fairs are by no means condemned. Office-holders 
are neither disfranchised nor forbidden the exercise 
of jiolitical privileges, but their privileges are not en¬ 
larged, nor is their duty to party increased to perni-. 
cions activity, by office holding. A just discrimina 
tion in this regard between the things a citizen may 
properly do and the purposes for which a public of¬ 
fice should not be used is easy, in the light of a cor¬ 
rect appreciation of the relation between the jieople 
and those entrusted with official place, and the con¬ 
sideration of the necessity, under our form of govern¬ 
ment, of Jiolitical action free from official coercion.” 

VI. 

“ Is a competitive examination the best or any test 
for official competency or efficiency ? May not a man 
be eminently competent for official preferment, and 
not at all competent for a competitive examina¬ 
tion?’”:' 

Tne system of competitive examination may not be 
perfectly adapted to ascertaining the comparative fit¬ 
ness of candidates for place; but it is the best that 
has been suggested, and it is infinitely better than a 
system in which fitness is not considered at all. 

It accomplishes, within the sphere to which it has 
been limited, the chief object of civil service reform, 
namely, the removal of the ministerial offices from 
tlie domain of partisan politics. It tends also to in¬ 
crease the efficiency and to decrease the cost of the 
civil service—an imjiortant though secondary consid¬ 
eration. There are some kinds of ollicers who can 
not well be chosen by competition: the fourlh-cla.ss 
postmasters, lor instance, who live in sparsely settled 
districts, and who may be appointed by one of sev¬ 
eral feasible plans that have been suggested, and the 
higher grade of officers, such as chiefs of bureaus, 
who.se competency would be better assured if they 
obtained their positions by promotion, ba.sed upon 
worth, fidelity, and long ex lerience. As to the in¬ 
termediate offices, the system of competitive exam¬ 
ination works satisfactorily. The official duties are 
clearly defined, and it is an easy matter to test the 
qualifications of applicants. If it be urged that busi¬ 
ness men do not select their employes by this meth¬ 
od, it may be replied that they always make search¬ 
ing verbal Inquiries into the capacity of applicants, 
and that, in some instances, where large numbers of 
men are employed, written questions arc submitted. 

’^'Senator Call, Cong. Kec., vol. xiv. Part I. p. 498. j 


In fact, competition, in some form, is the unwritten 
law of the commercial world, it being a needful guar- [ 
antee of the best service. 

It is, of course, po.ssible that a man may be “emi¬ 
nently competent for official preferment, and not at 
all competent for a competitive examination;” but 
the chances are greatly against it, if the examination 
be “ practical,” as the law says it shall be. The civil 
.service commi.ssion have performed their duty in 
this matter judiciously. That part of the examina¬ 
tion which is intended to test the general fitness of 
applicants will not greatly tax the mental resources 
of anyone po.s.sessing a common school education, 
unless expert s. rvices are reijuired. Tlie standard 
set is low rather than high. Sir G. O. Trevelyan says 
that the opening of tlie English civil and military 
services to comjietition, in its influence upon nation¬ 
al education, was equivalent to a hundred thousand 
scholarships and exhibitions of the most valuable 
kind. Whatever may be the influence of the system 
of federal examinations upon the education of the 
American people, there can not be two opinions as 
to the effect of that system upon the national charac¬ 
ter. It is needless to point out that a public contest ’ 
of merit, inio which any one may enter without fear 
or solicitation, induces high endeavor, and conserves j 
manhood. On the other hand, it is equally patent 
that where offices go by favor thrift follows fawning. • 
Women seeking an honest career are reduced to im¬ 
portuning, mayhap subjected to insult; young men 
are transformed into mendicants and sycophants; 
and the position of all applicants does not differ ma¬ 
terially from that of the Elizabethan courtier, whose 
ignominy Spenser, in travail of spirit, has described 
.so vividly .• ' 

“ Full little knowest thou, that hast not tride. 

What hell it is in suing long to bide: 

To loose good days, that might be better spent; 

To waste long nights in pensive discontent; 1 

To speed to day, to be put back to morrow; J 

To feed on hope, to pine with feare and sorrow; 

To fret thy soul with crosses and with cares; 

To eate thy heart through comfortless dispaires; 

To fawne, to crouche, to wait, to ride, to ronne. 

To spend, to give, to want, to be undonne.” 

— Oliver T. Morton, in the Atlantic Monthly, April 


Congressman Ray contributes the follow¬ 
ing interview to the Washington Penny Press: 
“Senator Quay gets evi rything he goes after 
He is very willing to sign the applications of 
office-seekers, but he has a special method of 
indicating the man whom he wants appointed. 
lie will sign the papers of a dozen men who want ; 
the same place, but he will make a personal visit to j 
a department for the man of his choice. Some time 
ago I went to the agricultural department to 
get a friend a place, and urged upon Secretary | 
Rusk the fact that my man was warmly in- | 
dorsed by Senator Quay. But the secretary I 
told me, ‘Bless your soul. I’ve already ap- 
pointed a man for that place, and he was j 
especially endorsed personally by the senator.’ ? 
So you see Senator Quay has several degrees 
of indorsement, and the departments under¬ 
stand how to regard his name on a document.” 


John A. Sample, the present democratic 
postmaster of this city, has sent his resigna¬ 
tion to the President. A number of worthy re¬ 
publican citizens are applicants for the office, 
and as a compromise. Congressman Browne has 
consented to allow the citizens to hold an election, by 
which means to choose from among the appli¬ 
cants the one to be appointed. The election 
will be held in the near future. Postmaster 
Sample’s term did not expire until December 
next. Knightstown Special to Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, March 5. 


















The Civil Service chronicle. 


“ VVh«t is needed is a Christian conscience vital and real enough to damn 
iniquity even when it would be more convenient to have it taken up into glory. 
So that if you are a democrat and hear a democrat lie, you will be prepared to 
brand it as a lie then and there. If you are a republican and know a man is 
a bribe giver, you will be prepared to brand him as a bribe giver, even though he 
V)e a republican and worth a good deal to his party.”— Rev. Charles H. Parkhust. 


“ The purification of politics is an iridescent dream. The decalogue and 
the golden rule have no place in a political campaign. The object is success. 
To defeat the antagonist and expel the party in power is the puri) 08 e. This 
modern cant about the corruption of politics is fatiguing in the extreme. It 
proceeds from the tea custard and syllabub dilettanteism, the frivolous and 
desultory sentimentalism of epicenes.—Senator Pigals. 


VoL. I, No. 15. 


INDIANAPOLIS, MAY, 1890. 


’T'E'DM’Q . J 50 cents per annnm. 
Xiiilvlim • 5 cents per copy. 


fT 

I 




For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Indiana, where subscrip¬ 
tions and adveriisements will be received. 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

■ Indianapolis, Indiana 


The Civil Service Chronicle desires facts regard¬ 
ing) the so-called '^resignations'’ of fourth elms 
posbna.ders; who has reguested these resignations, 
bj) what agencies have these been effected, and in 
rvhal instances have resignations been practically 
forced .0 prevent loss on the post-office furniture by 
disposing of it to the ivould-be successor in office. 

The Civil Service Chronicle desires infoimation 
of all cases where the man at the top of the eligible 
lists for positions in the railway mail service has 
i not been chosen. 

The Civil Service Chronicle will be glad to receive 
information upon the following points: 

The name of any nexvspaper editor or owner who 
has or may receive a federal appointment, and the 
name of the office. 

The names of all members of political committees 
or delegates given a federal appointment, and the 
name of the office. 

The names of all federal office-holders who are 
members of any political committee or who act as 
delegates, naming the committee or the convention. 

Statements regarding any political activity in 
primaries, conventions or political work done for 
any nominees by federal offiee-holders. 

The civil service commissioners have sum¬ 
med up their case before the congressional in¬ 
vestigating committee. We have not received 
Mr. Thompson’s argument, hut it is spoken of 
as a remarkably eloquent defense of the merit 
system. Mr. Roosevelt answered the accusers 
point by point and conclusively. Whatever 
the report of the committee may be, it is a fact 
that the attack upon the commission was 
made and carried on because the commissoin 
enforced the law. 

The conclusion of Mr. Oliver T. Morton’s 
article in the Atlantic upon “Some Popular 
Objections to Civil Service Reform,” appeared 
in the May number and fully sustained the 
character of the first part. The Indiana civil 
service reform association should divide this 
article into tracts and send them broadcast 
over the state. What friend of the association 
will furnish the means? 

The annual meeting of the Indiana civil 
service reform association was held at Fort 
Wayne, May 16. The business meeting in the 
afternoon adopted the resolutions published, 
elsewhere. In the evening the address of Mr- 
Bonaparte, which the Chronicle also pub¬ 
lishes, was delivered to a large and clo.sely in¬ 
terested audience. Both meetings were, in 
size and interest, the most successful ever held. 
Fort Wayne is perhaps the best instance of the 
notable progress made during the last year. 


The individuals in favor of civil service re¬ 
form became united in the association, and 
having taken upon themselves the arrange¬ 
ments for the annual meeting, they were strong 
enough to make it, as we have said, the best 
ever held. The same organization has been 
accomplished in other parts of Indiana, and it 
may be put down as a sure sign of the growth 
of the reform sentiment. 

The most important struggle yet had in re¬ 
gard to the merit system since the passage of 
the Pendleton act, and which has been going 
on in the house the entire session, reached its 
climax in the debate over the appropriation 
for the commission. The spoilsmen put forth 
their full strength, and were completely routed 
by a vote of 120 to 61. It is doubtful if they 
can again muster so many votes. The debate 
indicated the growing feeling among party 
managers that the merit system will have to 
be shouldered and advocated as a party meas¬ 
ure. It was well known that Mr. Lodge would 
give it his best efforts, but when Mr. McKin¬ 
ley, the republican leader of the house, stood 
up and claimed the civil service law as a re¬ 
publican measure, and declared that it was 
good and wholesome for the whole country, 
and that no party will have the courage to re- 
l>€al it, he gave proof that republican party 
management, whether from virtue or nece.ssity, 
is actually taking its stand upon the princi¬ 
ples of the merit system instead of confining 
itself largely to platform expressions. It will 
be remembered that when, some four years 
ago. Senator Harrison was criticising Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland’s shortcomings with the civil 
service, he expressly reserved his own opinion 
of the system. It is fair to state the claim 
that many leading democrats were anxious to 
speak in favor of the merit system, but could 
not obtain recognition. This may indicate 
the beginning of a race by both parties to get, 
in fact as well as in words, upon civil service 
reform ground. Our Indiana congressmen 
allowed Cheadle to make a sorry appearance 
for himself and the state. 


The Norfolk republican club, of Boston, has 
“ banquetted ” Clarkson. It was stated that 
this proceeding was intended to give an “ im¬ 
petus” to the campaign in that state. The 
scattered fragments of the tin-horn Farwell 
club might try the cohesive properties of a 
meal to Clarkson. If this worked well they 
might change their name to the tin-horn 
Clarkson club, and buy some more furniture 
and rent another room. Clarkson could give 
this club enough impetus to keep the constable 
off from their efiects for at least three months. 


Now IS the time for civil service reformers 
in Ohio to be.stir themselves. They are there 
in plenty. It only needs a little patience and 
enthusiasm to find one another out and to 
effect an organization. Ohio politics have 
been graded quite as low as the Indiana arti¬ 
cle, and it has been the fashion to say neither 
state wanted anything different. The fact is 
that the bulk of the people of both states have 
but little sympathy with spoils politics, but 
the intense partisanship common to both 
has been a hindrance to any reform that might 
require a reproof to the party in power. It 
is true that we have outstripped our neighbor, 
but surety now, after the stand taken by Con¬ 
gressmen Butterworth and McKinley, those 
who realize the dangers of the spoils system 
should for a time forsake ease and fight ac¬ 
tively for a good principle. It ought to be 
matter for encouragement not to have a spokes¬ 
man like our Cheadle. 

When the Civil Service Record, the first paper 
printed entirely for the dissemination of facts 
regarding the civil service and the reform of 
that service, was started in 1880 it was a paper 
of four pages. A look at its early issues shows 
how thoroughly its editors had searched for 
current news and how meagre the field was. 
The daily papers did not think it worth while 
to chronicle the quarrels and contests and 
happenings going on among the spoilsmen big 
and little. What is the place to-day of all 
facts relating to the civil service? There is 
no other topic the year through that occupies 
an equal space in the public prints. It was 
not that the facts did not exist, but it had not 
been discovered that under the surface of the 
ordinary political currents which ran in the 
shape of high sounding doctrines and plat¬ 
forms was a seething mass of corruption, 
engendered solely by the anxiety to get office 
and draw pay from the public treasury; and 
that this corruption had spread until, in the 
shape of political assessments, vote buying, 
perjury, mercilessness, and degradation of po¬ 
litical character, it had gone far to kill out 
patriotism and stifle patriotic efforts, and had 
led the people in many localities to submit 
themselves, almost without protest, to the rule 
of Quays and Gormans--a rule which has no 
other foundation and no other development 
than the feudalism of the Middle Ages. Now 
all is changed ; the cover has been torn away 
and all the reform papers in the country can 
not find space for the facts which prove the 
ruin to which the spoils system, unless broken 
up, will lead us; and this publication of the 
facts is remorselessly grinding that system to 
pieces. 

























120 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Mr. Rooskvelt, upon his return to Wash¬ 
ington from his western trip, made a favorable 
report regarding the enforcement of the law in 
this post-office. The following, from the re- 
{)ort, is of interest: 

The civil service board at Indianapolis has 
evidently been doing its duty well; and a spe¬ 
cial meed of praise belongs to Messrs. Fishback 
and Butler, who are outside of the post-office 
department, and who nevertheless have done 
valuable service as members of the board with 
no other motive than a disinterested desire to 
perform a public duty. We were able to ap¬ 
point Messrs. Butler and Fishback because 
they were in the service of the government, 
though really outsiders as regards the special 
work to be performed. The faithfulness with 
which thev have done their duty and the good 
effect it &as had upon the outside public to 
know that two gentlemen of their character 
and standing were officiating as examiners, 
emphasizes the recommendation^ that we have 
made in our annual report to the effect that 
our local boards should contain members not 
in the government service at all who could not 
j)OSsibly be coerced by any official in the per¬ 
formance of their public duty. This would 
tend greatly to increase the public confidence 
in the fairness of the examinations. They are 
as a rule i>erfectly fair now; and the chief 
thing to do is to get the public to believe that 
this is the case. I am confident, however, that 
this belief is growing day by day. 

The people of this city now have an oppor¬ 
tunity to note the warped views which prevail 
as to what constitutes a good fireman. There 
are twelve vacancies in the fire department, 
and the chief, Mr. Dougherty, thinks that 
seven democrats and five republicans are 
necessary. Now comes Councilman Hicklin 
and says that the people want a non-partisan 
fire department, and he therefore proposes 
that eighteen democrats shall be appointed, 
although this would make it necessary to dis¬ 
pense with some experienced firemen, while 
but three of the eighteen proposed have had 
any experience. Hicklin proposes to continue 
turning out experienced men and appointing 
democrats until the parties are balanced, and 
then he says we shall have a non-partisan fire 
department. The people will sometime put an 
end to this trifling with their vital interests. 
The law puts the nomination of men to fill va¬ 
cancies upon Mr. Dougherty. If he wants to 
do his duty to the people of this city, let him 
call upon Messrs. Butler and Fishback of the 
federal examining board, and we venture to 
say that they will make up for him a 
series of tests for candidates for the position of 
fireman based upon the tests long in use in 
New York, Brooklyn and Boston. We ven¬ 
ture also to say that those gentlemen, with the 
necessary teachers of gymnastics, and physi¬ 
cians, will, without charge, act as an examin¬ 
ing board for him. These preliminaries set¬ 
tled, let Mr. Dougherty advertise that he has 
twelve vacancies to be competed for, and that 
the competition is open to all comers. When 
the board has held its examination and made 
out its graded list, let Mr. Dougherty nomi¬ 
nate the highest twelve and let us see if the 
council will refuse to confirm them because 
their party or factional stripe does“not hap¬ 
pen to suit. The citizens who own the prop¬ 


erty in this city care nothing about the politi¬ 
cal beliefs of the firemen, but they do want 
firemen of the best physical and other attain¬ 
ments that can be obtained for that busine.ss; 
and in the effort to get such men they may 
well pray to be delivered from the Hicklins 
of all parties. There is one way to get them; 
and that is by competition open to all before 
an impartial board. 

RESOLUTIONS 

Passed at the Annual Meeting of the In¬ 
diana Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion, May i6. 

The Indiana civil service reform association 
believes that the purpose of public office of wha^^ 
ever kind is of such a nature as to absolutely 
exclude the use of such office in any manner as 
personal or party spoil; and any such use 
may justly be considered as a violation of 
the trust undertaken by the acceptance of the 
office. 

2. We desire to express our full apprecia¬ 
tion of the present civil service commission 
whose fearless and efficient performance of its 
duties has secured the enforcement of the 
civil service law and has gained many victo¬ 
ries for the merit system. 

3. A great improvement, however, in one de¬ 
partment makes it not the less our duty to point 
out great evils in the rest of the civil service, 
comprising more than 100,000 places; nor is 
it any excuse to say that the present is follow¬ 
ing in the steps of proceeding adminis¬ 
trations. 

4. In general this vast number of public 
offices with annual emoluments of many mil¬ 
lions are being parcelled out by the President 
to congressmen who in turn divide them among 
their most active personal followers. This is 
feudalism, and being such it is undemocratic 
and un-American and is in direct contiadic- 
tion of the letter and the spirit of the constitu¬ 
tion. It is a direct violation of the promi¬ 
ses of the platform upon which the adminis¬ 
tration was elected. As one of the many scan¬ 
dalous and humiliating results of this system 
we note the boasted displacement of more than 
30,000 postmasters in a single year, and the 
proposed displacement of 10,000 more. 

5. We thank our western congressmen, Mc¬ 
Kinley and Butterworth, and those who joined 
with them, for their able and successful as 
sistance in beating back the recent attack 
upon the civil service law. This, and other 
attacks upon the merit system, we regret to 
say, were fostered and encouraged by the dis¬ 
tribution of offices by the Administration until 
the appetite for spoils, always insatiable, be¬ 
came too sharp to be controlled. 

6. We respectfully request the President to 
bring all cities having free delivery, within 
the operation of the civil service law at an 
early day. And we earnestly insist that the 
present practice with the unclassified service 
cannot continue. The offices cannot remain 
in part spoil and in part competitive. 

Believing that the merit system must over¬ 
come its opponent, we ask the President and 
congress to take such measures as will soon 


bring the operations of the government to an 
exclusively business basis. Toward this end 
we ask a careful consideration of the bid in¬ 
troduced by Mr. Lodge to regulate the ap¬ 
pointment of fourth-class postmasters. 

GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS. 

[Address before the New York Association, May 8.] 

It is very droll that a practice which was 
gaily satirized in Steele’s Taller nearly two 
centuries ago as an absurdity in the local life 
of London should be gravely defended as a 
proper and characteristic policy for the great¬ 
est and most intelligent of republics. A friend 
of the Taller's describes certain solicitations 
for employment. “ Mr. Jobn Taplish, having 
served all offices and being reduced, desires 
your vote for singing clerk of the parish.” 
Another “has had ten children, all whom his 
wife has suckled herself, therefore humbly 
desires to be a schoolmaster.” In this country 
if Mr. John Taplish, who is reduced in cir 
cumstances, or the worthy father of ten chil¬ 
dren, will both add to those qualifications for 
public employment a* willingness to get up at 
any hour of the night and ride thirty miles 
upon the private biisiness of a senator of the 
United States, we have the senator’s own au¬ 
thority for saying that he should consider it a 
service which ought to be paid for out of the 
public treasury. 

The humor of this proposition, which would 
certainly haveseemed to Dick Steele to require 
another bottle for its adequate celebration, is 
greatly heightened by its grave advocacy as a 
peculiarly American proceeding. But as the 
distinction of America is self-reliance and 
fair play, it might be supposed that a system 
which makes 2 )ublic agents of private servants, 
which fills the public employment by personal 
servility and not by proved merit, which prac¬ 
tically excludes nine-tenths of the people from 
all opportunity of such employment and effects 
a general corruption of politics by patronage, 
would be considered especially un-American. 

DEMOCRATIC STRAWS. 

Harrison is the last president who will 
ever use the deputy president and patronage 
boss system to distribute the offices as prizes to 
the scalawags who do the “ dirty work ” of the 
campaign. Members of congress will be com¬ 
pelled to resign as deputy presidents. They 
can not be congressmen and patronage bosses 
both. Some of them will be convinced of that 
before the year is out, but in the mean time 
they may accept or reject as they please the 
assurance that the decent people of the 
country are heartily sick of patronage brokers 
and patronage bossism.— Si. Louis Republic, 
April 26, 1890. 


“ I feel the deepest interest in the movement 
which looks to the success of civil service re^ 
form, and would make any reasonable sacri¬ 
fice to promote its progress. The unfair as¬ 
saults which have been made upon it will 
prove abortive if its friends will persevere in 
their advocacy and good work. It may be my 
duty to have something to say in the senate, if 
the enemies of the reform should endeavor to 
cripple the vfork."—Senator Buller, of South Caro¬ 
lina. 
















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


121 





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4 

I 

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1 

I 

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i 

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AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

The vassal, upon investiture, took an 
oath of fealty to the lord, and in addition 
did homage, “ openly and humbly kneeling, 
being unigrt, uncovered and holding up 
liis hands, both together, between tliose of 
his lord, who sate before him, and there 
professing that he did becomes his MAN 
from tliat day forth, of life and limb and 
eartly honor, and then he received a kiss 
from his lord.” 


—An intensely bitter fight has been raging 
for some lime among the republicans at Stan- 
berry, Mo., over the postmastership of that 
place, in view of the fact that the term of the 
democratic incumbent expires on the 29th of 
this month. A few days since the name of 
Vinson T. Williams, the editor of the Stan- 
berry Herald, was sent to the senate as the suc¬ 
cessor of Postmaster Dunn. The confirmation 
followed swiftly, being made on Friday last, 
but on Monday A1 Tomblin, of Staiiberry, and 
one of the leading republicans of the city, ap¬ 
peared here to contest the selection of Wil¬ 
liams, and at his request the confirmation of 
Williams was reconsidered .so as to give him 
an opportunity to present the case to the Pres¬ 
ident. To-day the President issued an order 
recalling Williams’s name, which makes the 
case interesting, as many republicans of that 
vicinity have wired the President in Wil¬ 
liams’s hehalf, among them C. 0. Patton, a 
llan'iso)i elector for the third congressional district, 
and A. R. Stockton, th*: chairman of the republican 
county central committee .— Washington Dispatch to 
St. Louis Republic, March 14. 

—He [the President] found, for instance, that 
the national committee, hoping to win the 
election without Indiana, was disposed to in¬ 
sist that Indiana should pay its own way and 
secure the electoral vote of the state for its 
not very favorite son. Platt, Quay, Clarkson, 
and Dudley were believed to be willing that 
Harrison should be beaten in his own state 
if they could elect him in other states and so 
put him in the White House with a black 
eye. Then it was that a conference of the In¬ 
diana leaders was called at the Denison 
House in Indianapolis to hear the candidate’s 
appeal for help. The leaders were implored 
to raise money. The chairmen of county 
committees were at the conference addressed 
by Harrison. After the candidate, with tears 
in his eyes, had personally told the workers 
about the refusal of the national committee 
to furnish any funds, Huston, New, Michener, 
and other members of the state committee saw 
them privately. The chairmen were assured 
that if they would raise the needed money, 
and get out the vote of their counties so as to 
carry the state, they should control the pat¬ 
ronage of their counties when the President 
had been safely landed. 

In Daviess county a half dozen formed a 
pool, raised $100 apiece, and bid off the post- 
office at Washington to M. L. D. Sefrits, pro¬ 
prietor of the Washington Gazette,ih.e arrange¬ 
ment being that the pool men were to be rec¬ 
ompensed out of the proceeds of the office 
after it had been given to the winner.— Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to New York Times, NatK 19. 

—The ring’s candidate for postmaster had not 
been a soldier, and up came the Grand Army 
Post with one W. P. Ellis, an old soldier, as an 
applicant, and the war began. The Grand 
.\rmy veterans made it very hot for the ad¬ 
ministration. They demanded the fulfillment 
of the promises made during the campaign to 
the soldiers, and threatened vengeance in that 
locality if one of their number was turned 
down for a civilian. The contest raged for a 
considerable time and finally Ellis won, and 


now the members of the ring who put up the 
funds have nothing to show for it, and a feel¬ 
ing as though they possessed the proper anat¬ 
omy if some person with a No. 10 brogan 
would volunteer to do the kicking. 

Mr. Sefrit’s organ, the Washington Gazette, 
recently raised the howl. It said : 

Before the Chicago convention the party organizers 
were all right. They were begged to interest the peo¬ 
ple in the candidate that the state managers had de¬ 
cided upon. They were implored to manufacture a 
sentiment which would send the Indiana delegates 
to Chicago, practically a unit for General Harrison. 
How well this was accomplished we all know. After 
the Indiana man had been chosen by the great con¬ 
vention, further responsibilities of the gravest char¬ 
acter fell upon the “workers.” They cheerfully and 
nnhesiiatingly accepted the burden and nnstintingly 
devoted their time, influence and money to the in¬ 
terests of the party’s nominee. 

Daviess county republicans have been miserably 
treated, and there is no county in the state that 
showed better work for the national ticket last year. 
Yet the organization here was unable to secure the 
appointment of a postmasterat a village in the north 
part of the county for a man that the whole neigh¬ 
borhood wanted in the office, and who was a soldier, 
a reputable gentleman and a good-working republl 
can. Some hidden influence defeated the wish of 
the whole community, and the persons interested 
were not even given the satisfaction of knowing how 
it was done.— Washington Dispatch to St. Louis Repuh- 
ic, Nov. 18. 

—Pl,att has arranged for taking the census 
of his state. Superintendent Porter had rec¬ 
ommended a man named Doremus, whose 
services in the taking of the last census fitted 
him for the position of general superintendent 
of the 1,000 men necessary for the work in 
New York City. Platt, however, caused his 
henchman to be named by the President. The 
New York Times, March 31, gives the follow¬ 
ing description : 

. An illustration of how this little scheme of Platt’s 
works was furnished in the twenty-third assembly 
district Friday evening. Frank Raymond is the re¬ 
publican boss there. In response to instructions 
from Mr. Murray (or Platt) he had the stuffy little 
republican headquarters at 2250 Third avenue packed 
with such of his henchmen as desired to be appoint¬ 
ed to do this census work. The crowd was not a 
pretty one. It smoked, was profane, and shed to¬ 
bacco juice profusely. 

These patriots were in exact proportion to the 
number of census enumerators to be appointed. All 
had filled out applications in advance. Raymond 
was there, ani, taking the applications, he seated 
himself at a table on a platform where his portly 
form could be admired by his as.sembled satellites. 
Raymond had beside him a couple of workers who 
examined the republican enlistment roll of the dis¬ 
trict and checked off the names as the appointments 
were made. 

The process was very simple. Raymond would 
call off a name. The man who was its proud posses¬ 
sor would go to the platform. Then Boss Raymond 
would .say: 

“Are you on the roll ?” 

The question was purely a perfunctory one, for 
Raymond well knew that every name he.called was 
on the roll. Then he would ask: 

“ What district would you like?” 

The applicant would choose a district, which, if it 
,had not already been selected, would be assigned to 
him. .Some of the names were not responded to in 
person, but by men who were supposed to hold some 
sort of proxies. These men would inform Raymond 
that the absentees could not possibly attend, but “it 
was all right.” 

Thus one hundred or more men were appointed, 
and the meeting was adjourned to neighboring beer 
dispensaries. Many of the appointees were respect¬ 
able-looking, but the majority were henchmen of the 


most approved type. If the one thousand men to be 
appointed in this city are to be of the same general 
variety, the citizens of New York will do well to cau¬ 
tion their wives and daughters not to get frightened 
if, on answering the door during the time that the 
census is being taken, they encounter rough-looking 
men. 

The capability for the work that these appointees 
po.ssess, at least in the majority of cases, is very 
much in doubt. The spirit with which they will en¬ 
ter into it was shown in at least one instance last 
evening. A i>erson known as “Joe” approached an¬ 
other whom he addressed as “Pete,” and said: 

“ Hello, Pete 1 Youse don’t want this job, do ye ? ” 

“ Well, yer can bet I wants the coin in it,” was the 
reply. 

“ But have yez got the time to do it ? ” 

“ Well, I don’t waste no time on it, see ? If I can’t 
do it nights I don’t do it at all, but it’s a cinch, a 
perfect snap.” 

Both Pete and Joe were appointed to districts. 

—The adherents of the Woodruff-Willis [na¬ 
val officer] faction in the Kings county repub¬ 
lican general committee undertook last night 
to begin the fight for control of the third con¬ 
gressional district. They succeeded in draw¬ 
ing out an adverse vote of nearly two to one. 
The test came up soon after the general com¬ 
mittee met in the Athenaeum on Atlantic 
avenue, when Secretary Barrow read a peti¬ 
tion from about two hundred residents of the 
twenty-third ward, asking for a re-enrollment. 

This ward is now controlled by Ernst Nathan, 
and he thought the fight of last night so impor tant 
that he attended in person, and from a seat in the 
gallery directed his subordinates. He recognized 
that a re-enrollment might mean the loss of 
his control in the ward, which in turn would 
signify the defeat of Congressman Wallace’s 
demand for a renomination and the selection 
of Robert D. Benedict. 

The petition called out a number of speeches 
and propositions, which finally dwindled down 
to a motion that the whole matter be referred 
to the delegates of the ward affected. This 
meant a decided triumph for Nathan, and 
through him for Wallace. It was adopted by 
a vote of 114 to 58. It is safe to say that 
Wallace will get the full vote of the twenty- 
third ward.— New York Times, May I 4 . 

—The two republican factions held six con¬ 
ventions in this city to-night. It was the cul¬ 
mination of the contest which began on Mon¬ 
day. 

The “ ins,” led by Postmaster W. W. Johnson, 
and other recent appointees, and the “ outs,” by 
William Henderson and other leaders who did not 
get offices, held separate primaries on Monday, each 
claiming to be the lawful organization. There 
were carriages for voters, and workers were 
out in full force. In some wards each faction 
returned a vote several times larger than the 
combined vote of both, and each claimed that 
its delegates were elected. Last night the city 
convention was opened by Postmaster Johnson. 
The Henderson faction was not given repre¬ 
sentation, and it went off and held a conven¬ 
tion of its own. To-night each faction held a 
separate conventions in the three legislative 
districts and adopted resolutions against the 
other. —New York Times, May 7, Baltimore Dis¬ 
patch. 


—A red-hot post-oflice fight is on at Clear 
Lake. To adjust matters Congressman Sweeney 
has consented to an election, and is to appoint the 
one receiving the greatest number of votes.— 
Dispatch from Mason City, loua, March 11. 

—I am wholly unacquainted with the duties of the 
office, and do not know when I shall take hold. It 
is not a civil-service office, and will probably be 
more or less under the control of politics.—Intemiew 
with Collector Mamer in Chicago Times. 























Extracts from the Debates in the House of 


ANTI-FEUOAI.ISM. 


Mr. Lodge [Mass. Rep].—Now, Mr. Chairman, what 
is really un-American and un-republican are the 
favoritism and the nepotism of the patronage system, 
which mtist be destroyed by some such means as 
this law if by no other way. I think it is un-Ameri¬ 
can to see the representatives of the American people 
hunting up and down the corridors of the depart¬ 
ment to obtain an office for some friend. * It is 
this which is not American, nor anythingelse thatis 
respectable or decent or manly, this practice which 
compels the great officers of the government to give 
hours and days when anew administration comes in 
to personal appeals and political appeals and every¬ 
thing of that sort, and which makes senators and 
represenatives wait hour after hour in the hope of 
picking up a clerkship or messengership for some¬ 
body. 

Mr. Chairman, the patronage and spoils system is 
an un-American system. It is a system that was 
practiced by Sir Robert Walpole one hundred and 
fifty years ago, and carried by him to the highest 
point of perfection. It was the system by which the 
French monarchy sucked the life blood of the people 
of France. There is nothing American about it. There 
is nothing American or republican in anything which 
is all favoritism and personal influence. What is 
American is fair play and an open field. I do not 
mean to say that the system that we have substituted 
Ls perfect. 1 have no doubt it has many imperfec¬ 
tions—most things have. But it is Infinitely better, 
in my opinion, than the system which it has replaced. 
We hear in private on every side complaints from 
gentlemen who belong to the party in power of the 
way in which their time is taken up, and of the 
quarrels with which their districts are filled on ac¬ 
count of the distribution of offices. Patronage never 
benefited any man or any party. 

As I said in the last congress, your side of the 
house had the patronage in the last election and 
there is no evidence that it helped you very much. 
We had it in the election before. There is no evi¬ 
dence that It helped us then. We have had it since 
the last election. How much has it helped us since 
that time? [Laughter.] We have been distributing 
the patronage of office with a free hand. How much 
good has it done? Talk about humbug and fraud 1 
I will tell you, Mr. Chairman, where the humbug 
and fraud come in. They come in in the party con¬ 
ventions which meet and resolve one thing, mean¬ 
ing another. Gentlemen go there and never lift 
their voices against those fair-seeming resolutions; 
they do not strike them down in the party conven¬ 
tions or protest against them then and there like hon¬ 
est men. They take them to the people of the United 
States to build upon and to ask votes upon, because 
they know that down at the bottom the masses of 
the people, without going into any great detail as to 
how it is done, approve civil sendee reform and dis¬ 
like to have these revolutions in office. They know 
that the people dislike to have the offices made the 
sjjoil of parly victory. 

The people are not greedy for changes in office, and 
the clamor in your ears is that of a few and not of the 
many. * * I accepted my party platform in good faith. 
I accepted that pledge about the civil-service law, as 
I did others. I do not think it is a sham or a fraud 
for a party to undertake to uphold that which it has 
solemnly pledged itself to uphold. [Applause.] 

Mr. Chairman, the President of the United States, 
in his message, asked increased appropriations for 
the purpose of carrying out the civil-service law. 
The gentleman who has stood twice at the head of the 
democratic ticket as their candidate for the presidency 
said in a speech in Boston not three months ago that in 
his judgement the civil-service law was all that stood be¬ 
tween the civil-service of the government and political 
degradation. Those are the opinions of the the two 
leaders of the two great parties. The platforms of 
tho.se parties are before you. The fair and honest 
tiling to do is not to stand here and bicker as to who 


has lived nearest to the law, but to try and make 
that law better if possible, to try and put these offices 
on some better footing, upon somethingmore Ameri¬ 
can than a system of back-stairs influence and po¬ 
litical intrigue. 

One other point. The argument is made over and 
over again with reference to what is done with the 
offices which are not under the law but which are 
filled by patronage, as if that had anything to do 
with civil service reform. It has nothing in the 
world to do with it. As to the offices that are filled 
by political patronage, whether their occupants are 
turned out and men of a different political faith take 
their places in one year or in three years makes no 
difference. It is going to be done on a change of 
parties. We all know it is going to be done. You 
did it. We have done it. You can not help it nor 
can we, for we are bound hand and foot by a vicious 
system. The only way is to take offices and by law 
put them out of the reach of patronage. When you 
talk about the people who are excluded from office by the 
civil service law, I answer that one in three of the list of 
eligibles reaches appointment. Now compare that with 
the old method. 

Before the railway mail service went under the civil 
service law I had sixty applicants from my district for 
clerkships. Neither I nor any other congressman could 
have gotten over five of those places. That is one in twelve. 
The number of people who get office does not^de- 
dend on the method by which they are selected. It 
depends on the proportion between the number of 
places and the number of applicants. With the law 
you reduce somewhat the number of applicants. 
With patronage you multiply them. Under the law 
you cause less of the waiting that maketh the heart 
sick. You are fairer at least to the people who come 
here seeking offices, and you have a system which, 
whatever may be its defects, is, in my judgment, 
more manly, more honest, more, respectable, and 
more American than hanging about and begging for 
offices as a personal favor from those who for the 
moment are supposed to hold them in their gift. 
[Applause.] 




Mr. Henderson [Iowa, Kep.]—Mr. Chairman, civil 
service has come to this government to stay [ap¬ 
plause], and the political party that deserts it will 
not stay, and ought not to. [Applause.] » i 

say to my as.soclates on this side of the house, that I 
helped to make the platform in 1888. I believed in 
it then. I believe in it now, and I am here to act 
upon my convictions. Upon that platform we car¬ 
ried the country in 1888. 

We carried the best thought and sentiment of the 
country, and I say to my associates, do not now in 
this indirect way desert that great standard of prin. 
ciples and turn your backs upon the people of this 
country who put you into power and responsibility 
in the weighty issues of that great campaign. I do 
not want to go back to the old spoils system. I want to get 
further away from it. I want the lawmaker to be able to 
make laws and to equip himself for doing so, and not to 
become a mere lackey for the spoils system. In the name 
of progress, now that we have advanced the standard, 
let us keep hold of it, stand under it, fight for it, and 
perfect a law which was born of much thought, of 
much conflict, and which, whatever any political 
party may desire, the people of this country will 
never desert. [Applause.] v * « 


PRO 


Mr. I’erkiiis [Kansas, Rep.]—i believe that the 
administration in poiver ought to stand by the 
men who have conferred honors on it and made 
it possible for it to administer' the affairs 
of this great nation. I would not have it rewanl 
those who are unworthy or who have been guilty of 
unlawful or corrupt practices; but I know there are 
rnen who have been active day after day in working 
in the interestsof their party, who are just as honest, 
just as faithful, just as efficient and capable toper- 
form the duties that might be assigned to them 
in the service of the government as the men who pass 
civil-service e.xaminations, and who are without po¬ 
litical convictions. 

* IC* # 

Mr. Cheadle [Indiana, Rep.]—Mr. Chairman, I am 
in favor of striking out this section because I am op¬ 
posed to the whole theory of the civil service reform 
law. It is un-American in all its provisions. Its 
purpose is to build up a class of office holders for life 
who will be exempt from all the burdensand obliga¬ 
tions of citizenship. * * 

Mr. Tracey. Did you not promise to sustain the 
Civil service law ? 

Mr. Cheadle. I may have made a quasi promise, but 
I did not consider it an essential factor of my political 
faith. I want to tell my friend from New York [Mr. 
Tracey] that I believe this is a government of the 
people, and I am opposed to class legislation, and 
because this civil service law is class legislation I am 
opposed to it, and the people that I have the honor 
to represent here are just as much opposed to it as I 
am. 

[The spirit and purpose of the reform should be ob¬ 
served in all executive appointments, and all laws at 
variance with the objects of existing reform legisla¬ 
tion should be repealed, to the end that the dangers to 
free institutions which lurk in the power of official patron¬ 
age may be wisely and effectively avoided.—Republican 
Platform, 1884.] 

[The men who abandoned the republican party in 
1884 and continue to adhere to the democratic party 
have deserted not only the cause of honest goverm 
ment, of sound finances, of freedom and purity of the 
ballot, but especially have de.serted the cause of re¬ 
form in the civil service. We will not fail to keep our 
pledges because they have broken theirs or because their 
candidate has broken his. We therefore repeat our dec¬ 
laration of 1884, to wit: “The reform of civil service, 
auspiciously begun under the republican adminis¬ 
tration, should be completed by the further exten¬ 
sion of the reform system already established by law 
to all the grades of the service to which it is applica¬ 
ble. The spirit and purpose of the reform shotUd be ob¬ 
served in all executive appointments, and all laws at va. 
riancewith the object of existing reform leg isolation shmdd 
be repealed, to the end that the dangers to free institutions 
which lurk in the power of official paironage may be wise¬ 
ly and effectively avoided.”—Republican Platform, 1887.] 

v V « 

Mr. Spinola [New York, Tam. Dem.]—This scheme 
has proved to be infamous. That is what I mean to 
say, and the longer it continues the more obnoxious 
does it become to the people. As 1 told you before, 
the reaons are that it is absolutely un-American, and 
it is absulutely in conflict with the principles upon 
which our government is founded. It creates a class 
in this country, and will ultimately lead to a burden 
upon our posterity by the creation of a civil-ser¬ 
vice pension-list. You can not avoid it. They will 
tell you that whenever a man has served the gov¬ 
ernment his whole life he ought to be put upon the 
pension-roll to be taken care of in his old age. 
















Representatives, April 23, 25 and 26, 1890 


FBUDALIS9I. 


ANXI-FEFDABISM. 


Mr. tirosrenor [Ohio, RepJ.—The republican plat¬ 
form adopted at Chicago in 1888 did not approve and 
indorse the present civil service law and this faulty 
system of administration, nor did it promise to stand 
by the present civil service commission. It is the 
general principle of civil service and the purifica¬ 
tion of the civil service that that platform speaks 
about. * 

Mr. Clements.—I only want to ask the gentleman 
from Ohio what civil-service system it is that the pir- 
ty at Chicago was in favor of ? 

Mr. Grosvenor.—To turn Vie democratic party out of 
poxoer and put the republican party in. [Great ap¬ 
plause.] 

I do not believe that under the system of govern¬ 
ment under which we live there ought to be a power 
subordinate, or collateral, perhaps, is a better word, 
to the responsible administration of the government, 
that shall be permitted to have anything to do with 
the control of appointments, or the establishment of 
a system of civil service in the country, or the pro¬ 
motion of a class of individuals to be favored by a 
permanent occupancy of the places under the gov¬ 
ernment. [Renewed applause.] That is my view of 
this whole business; and Mr. Chairman, I have no 
time to elaborate upon the principle underlying my 
views. I believe that the present organization of the 
civil service commission is faulty, feeble in adminis¬ 
tration, unworthy of the high place that it occupies 
in this government, and I couple together the effect 
of its administration and the administration itself 
<> <■ 

{Under the constitution the president and heads of de¬ 
partments are to make nominations for office; the senate 
is to advise and consent to appointments, and the house of 
representatives is to accuse and prosecute faithless officers 
The best interest of the public service demands that these 
distinctions be respected; that senators and representa¬ 
tives who may be judges and accusers should not dictate 
appointments to office.—Republican platform, 1876.] 

[The republican party, adhering to the principles 
affirmed by its last national convention of respect for the 
constitutional rules governing appointments to office, 
adopts the declaration of President Hayes.—Republican 
platform, 1880.] 

V. # « I am told that there are to day on the elig¬ 
ible list persons who have had an examination be¬ 
fore this commission in various portions of this 
country, young men and young women who are cer¬ 
tified to be eligible to office, sufticient to fill the 
places for twenty-five years to come under the reason¬ 
able expectations of accidents and casualties of 
death and resignation ; and yet hundreds of men 
and women in my congressional district and all over 
the country are being inveigled and cajoled or urged to 
go to Columbus, to Parkersburgh, Cincinnati, or elsewhere 
and spend their money and time to be examined before 
this commission when there is not one chance in a 
thousand that one of them will get a position, and 
all of which is known to the commission when it 
.sends out its invitations. 

Take my district. It is a district with plenty of 
schools and colleges. My constituents, as a rule, are 
educated people; people of refinement and charac¬ 
ter. A large number—I do not know how many—have 
applied, been examined, and pas.sed successfully for 
high positions under this system, and yet outside of 
two or three who have found their way into the postal 
service under the restrictions and limitations as to 
geographic location, which aided them, I have not 
been informed of one who has found a place in the 
classified service from my congressional district. I 
know that my district far excels in education the' 
districts which have produced at least two of the 
civil service commission. 1 know that ten thousand 
of my people are better educated than the people of 
their districts are in like numbers, and yet after 
having been marked up to the highest grades they 
have been allowed to go on until they have lapsed, 
and so far as I know not one clerical position has been 
assigned to my congressional district. 


Mr. Moore [Rep., N. H.]—1 believe thoroughly, in 
the first place, that every element of patronage, no 
matter how high or how low, should be eliminated 
from connection with the American house of repre¬ 
sentatives. I believe, secondly, that the constitution 
does not warrant, that it never did warrant, and that 
it never was contemplated that representatives in 
congress should have any connection whatever with 
the patronage of the government. I challenge any 
man on this floor to point out to me one .single word 
uttered in any of the conventions that discussed the 
original constitution, whether it be the convention 
that sat in Philadelphia or whether it be the conven¬ 
tions that sat in the several states, where any speaker 
ever suggested, directly or remotely, that the Ameri¬ 
can house of representatives should have any con¬ 
nection with patronage. * 

There has grown up in this country a perversion of 
the constitution by which a connection has been es¬ 
tablished between the law-makers and appoint 
ments. This Is wholly outside of and in direct viola¬ 
tion of the plain letter, spirit, and genius of the con¬ 
stitution itself. * * 

The assaults made on the civil service law, and 
especially on the civil service commission, are with¬ 
out parallel in our history. The law has been de¬ 
rided and held up to public contempt, by politicians 
and journalists, in and out of sea.son, and the com 
mission has been pursued, maligned, and persecuted 
in the very capital of the nation, in a manner and 
to an extent that have been a scandal and a disgrace 
to journalism and justice. 

The civil service law has now been upon the stat¬ 
ute books for nearly seven years. Its work can be 
measured and weighed, and the friends of the law 
only ask that it shall thus be treated. The follow¬ 
ing statement shows the work achieved by the law 
and its execution for the six years ending June 30, 
1889: 

THE CIVIL SERVICE. 

Statistics of examinations, failures and appointments. 


Number examined in six years.53,301 

Number failed.22,603 

Per cent, of failure. 35.1 

Passed.40,626 

Appointed.15,017 

Per cent, appointed to these that passed. 37. 

The past year. 

Number examined.19,132 

Number failed. 7,082 

Number passed.11,978 

Number appointed. 3,781 

Per cent, appointed to those that v>assed. 31.6 


SPECIALISTS EXAMINED AND APPOINTED THE PAST 
YEAR. 

14 patent examiners.All appointed. 

10 pension examiners.All appointed.* 

11 stenographers and type writers.All appointed. 

6 stenographers. 5 appointed. 

26 type-writers.17appointed. 

91 special pension examiners.43 appointed. 

The average of all appointments is as 2 to 5 of ex¬ 
aminations. 

Of those who pass the probationary term, 98 per 
cent, are retained in the service. 

educational QUAIIFICATIONS OF APPLICANTS FOR 
THREE YEARS. 


Public schools.18,476 

Colleges. 3 029 

Business colleges. 1,164 


It was stated by the distinguished representative 
of the fifteenth Ohio district. General Grosvenor, in 
his remarks on Wednesday, that he knew of no per¬ 
son who had secured an appointment in the classi¬ 
fied service from his district. The misleading and 
astonishing character of this statement must go with 
the fact that the commission have made eight such ap¬ 
pointments, aside from four appointments in the railway 
maU service. As there are twenty-one congressional dis¬ 
tricts in Ohio the absolute fact is that the fifteenth 
Ohio district has had more than its proportion of the 
113 fo which the state is entitled. 

So ns to Minnesota. The distinguished gentleman 
from that state, Mr. Dunnell, said he knew of but 
one appointment to the classified service from his 
state. The absolute fact is that under the operation of 
the law Vie enterprising youth of Minnesota have secured 
twenty-six appointments in the, classified service, only two 
less than her quota. * * * 


Mr. Greenlialge [Ma.ss., Rep.]—1 stand here as a 
civil service reformer, if 1 am only one of a dozen in 
this house. I did not expect to be called upon to de¬ 
fend this principle, in which I believe there is life 
and energy and immortality. I did not expect to be 
called upon by my republican a.ssociales on this floor 
to defend what I supposed had been written into the 
political law of the republican party. I did not ex¬ 
pect to hear these attacks from the other side when I 
remembered that the same political principle had 
been written into Jheir platform. 

Why, Mr. Chairman, are we to stand here as mere 
hypocrites and humbugs? Are we to listen quietly 
to these statements that when we write a declaration 
into a party platform we do not mean it, but that we 
consider it is put in for “ buncombe’’? I cer¬ 

tainly do not believe it of the republican party; I 
have faith that every word about civil service reform 
was honest and true, yet we have gentlemen sitting 
here who say these declarations were meant simply 
for “buncombe,” for sound, for show. Now, Mr. 
Chairman, let me tell you why that dcctarntion was 2}ut 
there in both platforms. They put it there because the pol¬ 
iticians who attended these conventions heard the voice of 
the American people demanding that it should be ])ut 
there! These sagacious gentlemen, these practical 
politicians, never put anything in those platforms 
unless it means business; unless it is going to count; 
unless it is the sentiment which will do the most 
good with the voting population of the country. I 
say, Mr. Chairman, it is encouraging to hear on this 
floor; not direct and manly attacks upon this princi¬ 
ple—it is encouraging to hear only attacks upon the 
manner in which the principle has been carried out 
and applied. I like to hear the charges and the 
countercharges hurled from side to side—crimina¬ 
tions as to the manner in which the principle was 
violated under the last adminstration. 

I like to hear the charges of violations of this prin¬ 
ciple under the present administration. It means 
the health, ihe welfare, and the salvation of the law. 
All we have to do with the matter to day, Mr. Chair¬ 
man, is to say this: “ The principle of civil service 
reform has been written into the political law of both 
parties; it has been written upon the statute books 
of the United States.” 

V # 

Mr. Hill [Illinois, Rep.]—Noone who has seen, even 
froni a distance, even with this civil service law on 
the statute book, the tremendous pressure for office 
upon this and the preceding administration, can for 
a moment doubt that some method of relieving each 
incoming administration from that pressure should 
be provided. 

This is not the occasion, nor have I now the time, 
to point out the evils of such a system, but, Mr. 
Chairman, I hope to see the time when great political 
parties will be organized and run, and when polit¬ 
ical campaigns will be fought and won, on great 
principles, questions of policy afl'ecling the well¬ 
being of people at home and abroad, and not for the 
purpose of dividing the spoils of office. 

Mr. Chairman, political patronage is an element of 
weakness, and not of strength, to a party. All ex¬ 
perience shows this. Every member on this floor 
knows that as a fact. The history of this as well as 
the preceding administration demonstrates its truth. 
Look at it, sir. Reflect for a moment upon the re¬ 
verses which overtook the Cleveland administration 
four years ago, and which have now overtaken this 
administration at the polls. 

What does it mean? Simply.this. That five out 
of every six, yes, nine out of ten, candidates for office 
are disappointed and show their resentment by stay¬ 
ing away from the polls. 

The republican party is now experiencing the ruin¬ 
ous effects of that appetite for office. It is, as I said, 
an element of weakness and not of strength, and will 
ruin any party that tolerates or encourages the sys¬ 
tem. « * * 





































Extracts from the Debates in the House of 


ANTI-FKMUALISJW. 


Mr. Cutrlieon [Mich., Rep.] Tiic question before 
ns is, shall we abolish the civil service commission 
and return to tlie old system of appointments fArojtp/i. 
the influence of members af congress, or shall we con¬ 
tinue in its i>resent or some modified form the civil 
service commission ? 

Mr. ('hairman, I am opposed to this motion. I am 
opposed to it at the present time, and in its present 
form ; and I am opposed to the abolition of the civil 
service commission at any time or in any form. 
Mr. Chairman, I do not mean to be understood by 
that to say the present system is not to be criticised 
or that it can not be improved ; but I do mean to be 
understood that the appointments to office should be con¬ 
tinued in the executive departments of this government, 
and ought not now or ever to be again remitUdlo the con¬ 
trol of senators and members of congress, who are the 
legislative department. There is an ancient instrument, 
not yet forgotten or entirely obsolete, called the constitu¬ 
tion of the United States. * <= <■ 

In brief, the constitution of the United States pro¬ 
vides that appointment to office is an executive func¬ 
tion ; that it is not a legislative function; that it 
belongs to the president and to the heads of depart¬ 
ments: and that it does not belong to senators and 
members of congress. I am opposed to this indirect 
nuliification of this provision of the constitution of 
the United States; I am opposed to this proposition 
to give to senators and members of congress the 
powers that belong solely and legitimately to the 
president of the United States and the heads of the 
departments. I am oppo.sed to it, first, because it is 
unconstitutional; because it is an attempted nullifi¬ 
cation of that ancient instrument. I am opposed to 
it, in the second place, because it interferes with the 
proper and orderly discharge of the duties of mem¬ 
bers of congress. We arc a legislative body, and we 
have no business with the appointments. We have 
no cau.se to meddle in this matter of filling the sub¬ 
ordinate places in the government. 

Our business is here, to make laws; and it is the 
function of the president and heads of the depart¬ 
ments to fill the offices in the executive departments 
and to execute the law. I am thankful to be able to 
say that since I hare been a member of congress, now 
nearly eight years, I have never yet secured the appoint¬ 
ment of a clerk in any department of this government. It 
doe.snot belong to me and I do not covet it. Neither do 
I believe in the benefit of having the appointment of 
fourth-class postmasters. It has always injured the mem¬ 
ber who does it. Almost invariably there are from 
two to half a dozen candidates. But one of them can 
have the place, and the others are dissatisfied. I 
would gladly see the law so modified that it would 
extend to the appointment of all executive offices, 
so that representatives should not be called upon 
to recommend or advise appointments. Now, be¬ 
cause these men and women arc appointed to office 
by the advice or influence of members of congress 
they cease to look to the faithful and proper per¬ 
formance of their duties that the law imposes upon 
them, but look to their “congressional influence’’ for 
retaining their places. How often have we heard 
that expression in W’ashington“Congressional in¬ 
fluence !’’ 1 have heard it here over and over again 
until I am nauseated with the word. 

Congressional influence! What ought congres¬ 
sional influence have to do with keeping a man or a 
woman in some clerkship in one of these depart¬ 
ments ? Nothing I The tenure of ottice ought to de¬ 
pend upon the faithful dischargeof the duties which 
the law imposes upon^the incumbent, and not upon 
congressional or other official influence. [Ap¬ 
plause.] 

<< <■ * 

Mr. Biitterwortli [Ohio, rep.]—Mr. Chairman, I 
want to endorse every word that my honored col¬ 
league [Mr. McKinley] has said in this behalf. The 
civil service .system which is a.ssailed is not of recent 
origin. It is the result of a healthy evolution. It 
has come to stay and grow. 


Sir, the. campaign of 1882 was won by the democracy be¬ 
cause we were charged, and it was believed, that we were 
fllling the offices, not with free and intelligent men, but 
with mere political retainers. “Monarchical!” There is 
nothing that smacks of “monarchical ’’ forms so much as 
the “spoils” system, under which a man stands here, not 
the representative of the people, but the especial represent 
ative of retainers who go at his beck and nod—political 
“ bummers ’’ who become stronger than the free intelligent 
citizens who stand by his side. In other words, we expect 
to return to our places, not upheld 61 / the virtue and intel- 
ligenee of the constituents we represent, but by gathei mg 
together retainers and packing the conventions with all 
that that implies. 

We can, as my colleague here suggests, trust the 
republican boys and girls of this country to win their 
way by merit. If not, our government is a failure 
altcgether. 

One gentleman says that we knew nothing of cor¬ 
ruption under the old system. Why, he hius forgot 
ten the history of his own country. Has he read the 
Covode investigation, under the administration of 
James Buchanan, showing that there was hardly a 
congressional district, there was not a navy-yard, in 
fact there was not a pi ce in the country where there 
was not a hast of mere political retainers, not employ¬ 
ed to discharge any duty in which the people were 
interested, but appointed simply for political ser¬ 
vice ? And at that time the land was filled with men 
who served no other mission upon earth tljan to be 
the mere political pimps of men who were a political 
power in the nation. 

Sir, we went out of power on that issue. 
We are in power to-day because we prompty passed 
this civil-sei vice law. My colleague has well said that 
that law is here to stay, and stay it will. 

* ji? i;* 

Mr. McKinley [Ohio, Rep.]—Mr. Chairman, if the 
republican party of this country is pledged to any 
one thing more than another it is to the maintenance 
of the civil service law and its efficient execution- 
not only that, but to its enlargement and its further 
application to the public service. 

The law that stands upon our statute books to day 
was put there by republican votes. It was a republi¬ 
can measure. Every national platform of the repub 
lican party since its enactment has declared not only 
in favor of its continuance in full vigor, but iu favor 
of its enlargement so as to apply more generally to 
the public service. And this, Mr. Chairman, is not 
alone the declaration and purpose of the republican 
party, but it is iu accordance with its highest and best 
sentiment—ay, more, it is sustained by the best senti¬ 
ment of the whole country, republican and democrat¬ 
ic alike. And there is nota man on this floor who does 
not know that no party in this country, democratic 
or republican, will have the courage to wipe it from 
the statute book or amend it save in the direction of 
its improvement. 

Look at our .situation to-day. When this party of 
ours has control of all the branches of the govern¬ 
ment it is proposed to annul this law by withholding 
appropriations for its execution, when for four years 
under a democratic administration nobody on this 
side of the house had the temerity to rise in his place 
and make a motion similar to the one now pending 
for the nullification of this law. We thought it 
was good then, good enough for a democratic ad¬ 
ministration ; and I say to my republican associates, 
it is enough for a republican administration; 
it is good and wholesome for the whole country. If 
the law is not administered in letter and spirit im¬ 
partially, the President can and will supply the rem¬ 
edy. Mr. Chairman, the republican party must take 
no backward step. The merit system is here, and it 
is here to stay, and we may just as well understand 
and accept it now, and give our attention to correct¬ 
ing the abuses, if any exist, and improving the law 
wherever it can be done to the advantage of the 
public service. 


PRO 


Mr. Loiik [Tenn., Rep.]—I do not believe in this 
“flfih wheel to the wagon ;’’ bxU this commission is in¬ 
consistent with the teachings of American institutions, 
unrepresentative of anybody except the gentlemen 
who presume they are sanctified politically and have 
aright to pa.ss on ihe rights of everybody else. 

Mr. McMillin. Did you vote for the civil service 
bill heretofore? 

Mr. Houk. I think possibly I did. [Laughter.] 

Mr. McMillin. I merely wanted to refresh my 
friend’s memory in that connection, for I think he 
did vote for it. [Laughter.] 

Mr. Houk. If he had taken the trouble to look at 
what I previously said at that time, the gentleman 
would have found that I did not want to allow any¬ 
body to be any bigger hypocrite than I was, for I 
considered there was much hypocrisy on the part of 
the professional civil service reformers. [Laughter.] 
They ought to see that the boys who carry 
the torches, who hand out the tickets, who go out 
into the highways and hedges and compel the voters 
to come in, should have the places and have the 
courage to say so. The people of this country will 
never .sanction a policy that authorizes a public man 
to say, “I am elected to congress,’’ “I am in the 
White Hou.se,’’ or “ 1 am in the cabinet; I have got a 
good posiiion, but you boys who rallied round the 
polls and sent me and others into these high places, 
you may stand back ; there is nothing for you unless 
the civil .service commission prescribes it for you.’’ 
[Laughter.] 

[Any system of thecivil service underwhich the subordi¬ 
nate positions of the government are considered rewards 
for mere party zeal is fatally demoralizing.—Sejniblican 
I Platform, 1872 ] 

<= <1 <■ 


Mr. Coleman [La., Rep.]—Mr. Chairman, I am in 
favor of the motion to strike out. I am opposed to 
“ civil service reform,’’ and feeling that way I feej 
justified in striking at it whenever I can and 
wherever I can, for the purpose of helping to kill it 
if I can. 


* * * 


Mr. Diinnel [Minn., Rep.]—It can not be said for 
I the republican party that it has iu all respects ob- 
! served the spirit of the civil service law. 

We are treating fourth class postmasters very much 
as Cleveland treated them. I am aware that these 
j offices are not within the civil service law. * * 

[ We have been having examinations for places in the 
various departments now going on for a number of 
years past. Young men and women in Minnesota 
! have gone to St. Paul, to Des Moines, and to Chicago 
to be examined for these places, but from all of the.se 
examinations but one young man has been appointed 
from my congressional district under the civil service sys¬ 
tem. 

The.se young people have spent hundreds of dollars 
to little avail, for hardly a man has been appointed. 
It has been to them a delusion and a snare. 

Mr. Chairman, let me ask you whether the postal 
service is any better to-day than it was six years ago. 
No man can say that it is. It is no better than it was 
j two years ago. [Applause on the democratic side.] 
It will be no better two years hence than it is now. 

1 The young men who now get in are not better than the 
I young men the members of congress took from the farms 
and the workshops, intelligentyoungmen, and brought 
into the mail service in the years gone by. There is 
a man in one of the departments here to-day that I 
I put there nineteen years ago, who stands exceeding- 
' ly high in that department. I took him from the 
jfarm; he was an upright, earnest young man. He 
could not have passed, perhaps, the civil .service ex. 
' amination ; he could not tell you when the next eclipse of 
the sun would occur. [Laughter.] 















iPEXJiD^Lzsn^vd:. 

Representatives, April 23, 25 and 26, 1890 


FEUOALISM, 


ANXI-FEOUAEISIH. 


Mr. [Cal., Dein.]—Sir, Thomas Jefferson was 

the author of the doctrine that to the victors belong 
the spoils. [Cries of “ Jackson! ” “ Jackson! ”] 

Mr. Biggs. No, sir; Jefferson was the author of 
the doctrine that to the victors belong the spoils. If 
any one denies it I wiil send my authority to the 
clerk’s desk and have it read. Thomas Jefferson was 
the author of that doctrine, but General Jackson and 
Governor Marcy gave it a more defined and wider 
application. That is what the liistorian says, and I 
challenge any man, republican or democrat, to deny 
it. [T.aughter.] I am that kind of a civil service re¬ 
former. [I>aughter.] I will tell you what is the fact: 
I never visited that civil service reform office but 
what I felt as if there was something in the atmos' 
phere thatinspired a desire in me to steal something. 
[Laughter.] 

Those are the facts. I tell you this civil service was 
conceived in sin and brought forth in iniquity. 
[Renewed laughtt r.] Who was the father of it? George 
Pendleton was the father, George Curtis was the 
granny, Dorman Eaton was the nurse and clout, 
washer of this infamous bill. [Laughter.] Tell it not 
in Gath, publish it not in Ihe streets of Askelon! If 
there ever was a corrnpt measure, a measure that is 
demoralizing, and that has received the condemna 
tion of the American people, it is this iniquitous, 
accursed, civil service reform law. [Great laughter.] 
Sir, I have had one hundred to two hundred men in 
my employ, and I insist that I was a more competent 
judge of their qualifications than any civil service 
reform commission ever could be. [Laughter.] 

[Here the hammer fell.] 

Mr. Biggs. I ask for about two minutes more. 

The Chairman. Is there objection to the request of 
the gentleman from California, that he be allowed to 
proceed ? 

There was no objection. 

Mr. Biggs. Mr. Chairman, I am going to support 
this bill, but I ask this house, republicans and dem¬ 
ocrats, to come to the front and wipe out the appro¬ 
priation made necessary by this odious, iniquitous 
law. Ihe idea of having three men sit up thereat the 
city hall and pass upon the qualiflcations of people seek¬ 
ing office! What do they dot I will tell you. 1 sent a 
lady friend of mine there, a native daughter of the golden 
west. I sent her there and they promised to give her a 
position. She stood S7 high on the roll in her examina¬ 
tion. They kept her here eleven months and twenty days 
and gave her no position at all. [Great laughter.] 

I will tell you a little incident that occurred be¬ 
tween Mr. Cleveland and myself. I have got time 
have I not? [Laughter.] [Cries of “Yes.” “yes!” 
“Go on !”] I was here in Washington before I was a 
member of congress, and as I had been a presiden¬ 
tial elector, Mr. Cleveland sent me a note requesting 
me to call and see him. I went and called on him. 
He met me very cordially. There were some one 
hundred or two hundred gentlemen there waiting, 
and I said, “ I will not trespass on your time, Mr. 
President.” “Oh,” said he, “you have corneas far 
as any other gentleman, and you have a right to be 
heard.” 

Mr. Spinola. And that was about all he did for 
you ? [Laughter.] 

Mr. Biggs. I will tell you about that Says I, 
“ Mr. President, I want no office.” 

Mr. Henderson, of Iowa. That was a great relief. 

Mr. Biggs. Says I, “Mr. President, I want no 
office, nobody tnrned out or put in, but,” said I, 
“ I differ with you, Mr. President, upon the civil 
service reform question. I admit that itisthelaw, 
it was in the platform on which you were elected, and in 
your letter of acceptance also; hut you have a right to 
coiisiTuc it ill your own wetyy “ Major Biggs/* the 
President replied, “ what would you do if you were 
in my place?” “Well,” said I, “Mr. President, it 
is infinitely better to obey a bad law than to violate 
it • hut if I were in your place Iivould put avery liberal 
co'nslruction on that law." [Great laughter.] I went a 
Utile further than that, and I said to him: " If 1 were 
in a w(it€r melon potch I uould yH oil the best melons I 
could.” [Laughter.] 


Mr. McComas [Md. Rep].—The republican parly 
has never been able to break its pledges without 
paying the penalty. This is a cowardly attempt to 
nullify the existing Uw. Why do I say it is coward¬ 
ly? The republican party are not ordinarily nulli- 
tiers. If we face something as a party, we march 
forward, take our ground and stand upon it. But 
this back-door way of attacking the civil service 
commission now established by law by attempting 
to starve it out is dishonorable and unworthy of a 
great party that won a glorious victory on a dozen 
pledges, in the front of which it puts its solemnly 
repeated pledge that it would stand by this reform 
when the democratic party failed to stand by its 
pledge for civil service reform. 

What is the result of this proposition ? For seven 
years under the existing law and by its invitation 
you have sent a hundred thousand men and women 
and young gir Is from'the farms and villages up to the 
cities of the country where you have held your ex¬ 
aminations ; and they have been placed on the eligi¬ 
ble list—one hundred thousand of them last year- 
many of them poor. They are hoping that you 
meant what you said when they went to be exam¬ 
ined. They found that'22 per cent, of those examined 
had been placed on the rolls of government employment 
last year, and they thought that they had one chance 
out of four this year of appointment if you should 
keep your pledge. They are relying on your honor, 
your i)arty’s honor, to give them the opportunity 
which was promised them under the law. =•' * * 

I now say, Mr. Chairman, that we as the republi¬ 
can party, on that distinct and unequivocal pledge, 
the most distinct and explicit that ever was made by 
any party, would stultify our party and humiliate 
oyrselves if we dared to attempt in any such manner 
to sneakingly try to evade the responsibility of the 
law. [Applause.] We dare not. This system has 
come to stay, and ours it is to faithfully administer 
it. 

Over and above the clamor here, over and al>ove 
the desire for office that many men have, over and 
above the natural desire I have in common with 
other men in behalf of the aspirations of men who 
are good and true, I say when it comes to forfeiting 
my honor and that of my party I would rather leave 
public life and be a decent private citizen than to 
surrender that over and despoil my party and its 
pledges made twice in the terms I read. I had rather 
go home and preserve my self respect than to under¬ 
take to repudiate those pledges by accepting the 
proposition made here and vote out of this bill an 
appropriation which we are in honor bound to sus¬ 
tain. [Applause. I 

Mr. Tracey [New York, Dem.]—Mr. Chairman, 1 
wish to allude to the President of the United States 
only in respectfnl terms, and I am well aware that 
human endurance is sorely tried by constant appeals 
for places which can only be supplied by removals, 
and I make some excuse for the executive not 
havinglived up to his professions; but his failure to 
do so has been a great mistake, and that he has failed 
is most distinctly showui in the numerous cases where 
he has removed worthy officials before the expira¬ 
tion of their terms, such instances of removal being 
by his direct personal act. In my own district two 
presidential postmasters were removed in this man¬ 
ner, entirely without cause, so far as I am informed. 

The president should be credited with having 
made two admirable appointments to the commis¬ 
sion. Messrs. Roosevelt and Thompson are gentle¬ 
men of the highest character, who, with their 
colleague, will, I am sure, carry out the requirements 
of the law without fear or favor; but, Mr. Chairman, 
what will it avail to have made these men commis¬ 
sioners if the postmaster-general, his first assistant, 
and the superintendent of the railway mail service 
are to be allowed to conspire to violate both the spirit 
and the letter of the law ? It has been done in the 


district which I have llic honor to represent, where 
e.xcellent railway mall clerks have been removed and 
men illegally appointed in their places. 

Mr. Chairman, the President, in looking back up¬ 
on the first year of his administration must realize 
that members of his cabinet and subordinate officers 
have either forced or induced him to act contrary to 
the line of duty his promises as a candidate called 
for; and he may well question whether these persons 
have been unselfish friends. His predecessor, and 
opponent, to my mind, had earnestly endeavored, 
under much more trying circumstances, to elevate 
the civil serv ice, and as a consequence had alienated 
a portion of his party, while at the same time losing 
the support of many former friends, who were at¬ 
tracted by the unexpected proffer made by the pres¬ 
ent executive to take even a more advanced stand for 
civil service reform than w'as demanded by the most 
enthnsia.stic advocates of its cause. 

Indeed, many hold to the opinion that in the states of 
New York and Indiana this course attracted a sufficient 
number of voters to the republican ticket to account for its 
success in both those states. 

The cause of good government is dear to us all. and 
laws which have been enacted to benefit the people 
should not be obstructed by a refusal on our part to 
give the necessary amounts for enforcing them, nor 
by short-sighted political tricksters trying to evade 
their requirements. 

I believe, Mr. Chairman, if any change be made in 
this appropriation for the civil service it should be 
an increase, and that congress should encourage and 
direct the commissioners to carry out the law and 
assist them in eftbrts to secure punishment for all who 
violate it, even if lieads of departments or cabinet 
officers are made to suffer. Let those officials, 
whether in this city or in any part of the country, 
who sneer at the law, not forget that severe penalties, 
includir g fine and imprisonment, may be inflicted 
upon those who transgress, and that the president of 
the United States, after all, may not have the desire, 
if he has the power, to shield them from the conse¬ 
quences of wrong-doing. 

The friends of reform owe a great debt of 
gratitude to its enemies in congress for re¬ 
cently establishing this fact still more plainly. 
If any man doubted the hold of reform upon 
public opinion the doubt was removed by the 
late debate in the house of representatives 
upon the appropriation for the civil service 
commission. The pricking of the bubble of 
reform, the overthrow of lunar politics and 
sentimental quackery were duly announced as 
about to occur. The field was chosen, the 
charge was sounded, but more ludicrous 
skirmishing was never seen. “ I have led my 
ragamuffins where they were peppered,” rue¬ 
fully exclaimed the perspiring Falstaft’, and 
surely never were recruits more sorely pep¬ 
pered than the spoilsmen in the house. They 
were first overwhelmed by the weight of abil¬ 
ity and political standing, then crushed by the 
vote of two to one. The good cause was 
maintained, not doubtfully and with hesita¬ 
tion, not apologetically and reluctantly, but 
aggressively and without reservation. The 
argument was placed where it belongs, upon 
the public and party advantage of reform. 
Its advocates gladly professed their faith in it 
as truly American and reasonable. They 
spoke as patriots and honest men, conscious of 
a host of patriotic and honest men behind 
them .—(Jeorge William Curtis. 























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


12() 


—'I'liere is no i)ai t of (lie moans placed in 
llie hands of tlie exeentive nliicli niig:ht he 
used with greater etlect, for unhallowed 
purposes, than the control of the public 
l>ress. Vie have learned, too, from our 
own as well as the experience of other 
countries, tlnit golden shackles, by whom¬ 
soever or by whatever pretense imposed, 
are as fatal to it as the iron bonds of des¬ 
potism.— President William Henry Har¬ 
rison. 

—Col. J. A. Watrous, proprietor and editor of the 
Milwaukee Sunday Telegraph, was made collector of 
customs at Milwaukee. 

—Gen. Miehael Kerwin,editor and proprietor of 
the Tablet, was made collector of internal revenue 
for the second district of New York. 

—David F. Ritchie, editor of the republican paper 
at Saratoga Springs, New York, was appointed post¬ 
master. [It is stated that the Vice-President re¬ 
quested llie appointment of a friend, but qualified 
his request that anybody would do but Editor 
Ritchie. Editor Ritchie has fought Congressman 
Sanford’s battles and Over Lord Sanford met and 
unhorsed his adversary, though a vice-president.] 

—John A. Place, editor of the Oswego [ N. Y.] 
Times, has been appointed postmaster at that town. 
[A correspondent writes explanatory of the appoint¬ 
ment : “A peculiarly obnoxious case has just occur¬ 
red in Oswego, N. Y. On expiration of term of P. 
M. Barry, it being known that both Alonzo H. Fail¬ 
ing and John A. Place, both of this city, were being 
urged for the position, letters were sent by all the 
clergymen of Oswego and many of the most promi¬ 
nent citizens, representing the pre eminent fitness of 
Mr. Failing. On the other hand, strong protests were 
sent in against the unfitness, on moral grounds, of 
Mr. Place. No candid person in Oswego will deny 
that the respectable people of Oswego entertained 
the strongest preference for Mr.. Failing, Neverthe¬ 
less Place has received the office, with no other 
(lualifleation than that of being editorof the “Times,". 
thick and thin republican organ. As a thorough¬ 
going spoilsman, he announces a “clean sweep,” 
which is begun by the appointment of his own 
daughter to the position of assistant postmaster.] 

—Alonzo A. Smith, editorof the Ogdensburg [N.Y.] 
Republican andJournal, and chairman of the repub¬ 
lican county committee, has been made postmaster 
of the town. Mr. Baird was removed to make the 
place. 

—F. L. Dodge, editor and proprietor of the Hanford 
[Cal.] Sentinel, has been made postmaster of Hanford. 
The place was made by the removal of the incum¬ 
bent. 

—F. L. Meacham, of the Plainview [Minn.] News, 
has been made postmaster of the town. 

—Alvah Eastman, of the Anoka [Minn.] Herald, 
has been appointed special agent of the internal rev¬ 
enue department, at eight dollars per day and trav¬ 
eling expenses. 

—J. H. Iludder, Aurora [Ill.] Beacon, has been 
made postmaster. 

—Smith D. Adkins, Freeport [111.] Joantaf, has been 
made postmaster. 

—E. S. Fletcher, Morris [Ill.] Herald, has been made 
postmaster. 

—H. J. Dunlop, Champaign [Ill.] Gazette, has been 
made consul to Breslau. 

—M. M. Lewis, Lena [Ill.] Star, has been made post¬ 
master. 

—John F. Dewey, Aurora [Ill.] News, has been 
made marine deputy, Chicago custom house. 

—E. N. Stevens, local editor of the Paxton [Ill.] 
Record, has been made postmaster. 

—E. A. Nattinger, of the Ottawa [Ill.] Times, has 
been made postmaster. 


—Capt. Frank Mahin, editorof the Clinton [Iowa] 
Herald, has just been appointed postmaster. 

—S. A. Marine, editorof the Vinton [Iowa] Observer, 
has been appointed pension agent for Iowa and Ne¬ 
braska. 

—Editor Baldwin, of the Ellis [Kan.] Headlight, has 
secured a position in the government printing office 
at Washington. 

—H. A. Perkins, of the Olathe [Kan.] Mirror, has 
been appointed postmaster. 

—O. II. Bronson, of the North Star, at New Rich¬ 
land, Kan., has been appointed postmaster. 

—D. W. Irwin, of the Akron [Col.] Pioneer-Press, 
has been appointed postmaster. 

—Ed Charles, editor of the Carthage [Ind.] Record 
has been made postmaster. 

—Isaac Jeuklnson, editor of the Richmond [Ind.] 
Palladium, has been appointed postmaster. 

—Thad Butler, editor of the Huntington Herald, 
was appointed postmaster in November last. [Mr. 
Butler has just resigned from his federal position on 
the ground that he can not with satisfaction to him¬ 
self hold the two positions at the same time.] 

—W. F. Vogt, publisher of Spence's People's Paper, 
has just been appointed postmaster at Covington, 
Ind. 

—L. M. Noyer, editor and publisher of the Echo, 
has been made postmaster at Akron, Ind. 

—J. P. Prickett, editor and publisher of the New 
Era, has been made postmaster at Albion, Ind. 

—L. H. Beyerle, editor of the Goshen Times, has 
been made postmaster at Goshen, I«d. 

—W. E. Knight, editor of the Monitor, has been 
made postmaster at Grand View. 

—C. E. Newton, editor of the Herald, has been 
made postmaster at Kawanna, Ind. 

—John H. Rerick, editor of the La Grange [Ind.J 
Standard, has been made postmaster of that town. • 

—M. L. Enyart, editor of the Monitor, has been 
made postmaster at Macy, Ind. 

—G. W. Fountain, editor of the Gazette, has been 
made postmaster at New Carlisle. 

—J. P. Carr, editor of the Tribune, has been made 
postmaster at Oxford, Ind. 

—C. B. Caddy, editor of the Republican, has been 
made postmaster at Pendleton, Ind. 

—J. W. Siders, editor of the Republican, has been 
made postmaster at Plymouth, Ind. 

—E. J. Marsh, editor of the Commercial, has been 
made postmaster at Portland, Ind. 

—J. H. Cluggage, editor of the Union, has been 
made postmaster at Sullivan, Ind. 

—A. L. Lawshe, editor of the Journal, has been 
made postmaster at Xenia, Ind. 

—Col. G. G. Benedict, editor of the Burlington 
[Vermont] Free Press has been appointed collector of 
that district. 

—F. C. Smith, editor of the St. Albans [Vermont] 
Sentry, has been appointed deputy collector at St. 
Albans. 

—A. H. Butterfield, editor of the North Troy [Ver¬ 
mont] Palladium, has been given a federal job. 

—F. N. Whitney, editor of the Burlington [Ver¬ 
mont] Clipper has been made deputy internal rev¬ 
enue collector. 

—Col. C. S. Forbes, Vermont correspondent of the 
Boston Journal, has been made deputy internal rev¬ 
enue collector. 

—Joseph A. Ernst, editor of the St. Geneneive [Mo.] 
Herald, was made postmaster of that town. 


—Louis Kimmell, of Lafayette, was to-day 
appointed deputy United States marshal, un¬ 
der Marshal Ransdell, for the District of Co¬ 
lumbia. Mr. Kimmel is a representative Ger- 
m,an, was editor of a German newspaper at 
Lafayette, and for three terms was mayor of 
Lafayette. The position pays $2,000 a year.— 
j Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, March IS, 


THE SCOPE AND DIFFICULTIES OF 
CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 

[An address by Charles J. Bonaparte, delivered at the 

annual meeting of the Indiana Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association at Fort Wayne, May 16 ] 

In any enterprise it is a condition of success to 
know what we want: mistakes, disapfointments 
and discouragement are inevitable if the results re¬ 
ally sought are imperfectly understood. I believe 
that many, perhaps most, civil service reformers err 
in that they underestimate the magnitude of their 
undertaking; they recognize this to be the destruc¬ 
tion of the "spoils” system of politics, but they fail 
to appreciate how this system has become interwoven 
with almost every phase of our national life. Some 
of them said, probably a majority thought, when 
their agitation first took definite shape through the 
foimation of local associations and of the national 
league that when a statute such as they wished had 
been enacted by congress, their work w'ould be vir¬ 
tually done; the law thus obtained would work au¬ 
tomatically and its benefits be so obvious that simi¬ 
lar legislation by states and municipalities would 
follow as a matter of course. I need not pause to 
point out their error; seven years of experienee 
have done this so clearly that no one, however pre¬ 
disposed to optimism, certainly no one living either 
in Indiana or Maryland, can now' believe that this 
law has power (any more than any law which the 
wit of man ever devised) to work “automatically,” 
or that our politicians admire and would extend the 
effects of its practical w'orking. But that such should 
have been, as it unquestionably was, the expecta¬ 
tion of many earnest reformers proves them to have 
very inadequately appreciated how complete a rev¬ 
olution their success would work, not merely in the 
dispatch of our public business, but in the entire 
machinery of our politics, proved indeed that they 
failed to realize what are the political institutions 
under which we live. 

This failure is neither so surprising nor so blame¬ 
worthy as it might seem at first sight; even intelli¬ 
gent and well informed Americans have some excuse 
for not knowing who are 

THEIR TRUE RULERS. 

No doubt it is a trite saying that the English con¬ 
stitution was not made but grew. VVe all know that 
agencies and customs, unmentioned in the written 
law', gradually became their instruments of govern¬ 
ment and invariable rules for public men, .so that, 
by a striking anomaly, the mutual relations of the 
law-making bodies are determined by a mere tacit 
understanding and general acquiescence, and the 
constitution of the country, which has been here 
solemnly declared “the supreme law of the land,” 
does not there rise to the dignity of a law at all. But 
it is not so easy to realize that we also entrust the 
substance of political power to extra-legal forces, and 
only its form to those recognized in the statute-book; 
that here not less than in our mother country, and 
notwiihstanding our numerous and frequently va¬ 
ried written constitutions, political institutions of 
over mastering weight and importance have grown 
up amongst us, of which no trace can be found in 
these and which, as in England, have reduced the 
nominal sovereign to a dignified nonentity. 

A ready illustration of this is at hand. It can 
hardly be doubted that the president of the United 
States for the term succeeding the present will be 
nominated at either the next republican or the next 
democratic national convention. Their organization 
and proceedings, the characters, sentiments, aims, 
de.sires, prejudices of the delegates chosen to form 
them, will be facts of the greatest weight in deter¬ 
mining who shall next occupy the White House. Yet 
a foreigner, knowing us only through a study of our 
constitution, would not suspect this; he would find 
nothing in our laws suggesting the power or even the 
existence of either of these bodies, or the importance 
to the country of their selection and conduct. On 
the contrary, he would attach consequence to the 
composition of a totally different body, one so shad¬ 
owy in its powers, so inechanical in its duties, that 
most of us forget its very being. Of the millions of 
voters who cast their ballots in November, 1892, I 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


127 


doubt if one in a hundred will even read ihe names 
of the figure-heads printed on them as electors, much 
less reflect that the men so named, if elected, have 
the right conferred, and even the duty imposed, up¬ 
on them by the constitution of each one exercising 
his personal, unbiased judgment in recording his 
vote for president. Yet this independent judgment 
in the electoral college was certainly contemplated 
by the framers of our constitution and was exercised, 
to a greater or less extent, in the earlier elections 
held under it: since its adoption nominating conven¬ 
tions have developed as new organs in our body po¬ 
litic, and there has been what naturalists call a 
“correlated atrophy” of the organ whose functions 
they have usurped. 

To answer the question: By what institutions are 
we now practically governed ? we must first under¬ 
stand its meaning. When we say that Russia or Tur¬ 
key is “ governed ” by the czar or the sultan, we do 
not mean that his will directly controls or his wishes 
immediately affect every act of the public adminis¬ 
tration : the most despotic monarch must act through 
agents, and the test of his dominion is not the extent 
to which he retains or delegates his powers, but 
whether he remains the sole source of oflicial life. 
The man or organization that creates and destroys 
the depositaries of power is the true sovereign, how¬ 
ever indirectly he or it may govern, and to know who 
are our present rulers, we must discover by whom are 
presidents, and governors, and mayors, and congress¬ 
men, and assemblymen and aldermen, made and un* 
made. 

The question thus slated, the answer is easy. The 
United States are now governed 

BY TWO IMMENSE CORPORATIONS, 
calling themselves respectively the republican and 
the democratic parties, having each a general organ¬ 
ization for national, and divisions and sub-divisions 
for sUite and municipal purposes, and whose activity 
extends to the remotest portions of our territory and 
to the humblest manifestations of our public life. 
Although they assume the name of “parties’” the 
term misleads; for they differ essentially from polit¬ 
ical parties in all other enlightened countries, and 
from those known here before the present generation. 
Here formerly and elsewhere now, parties were and 
are organizations of men entertaining similar views 
on questions of public policy, and combining to ob. 
tain practical acceptance for their views. Of course, 
legislative and some executive oflflees were always and 
are everywhere the immediate prizes of political con¬ 
tests, for through their possession only can practical 
effect be given to the principles of the victorious par¬ 
ty. Moreover, in all times and in all countries un¬ 
principled men will be found who mask the schemes 
of self-interest under an affectation of patriotism; 
and those placed in positions of public trust will 
sometimes abuse their patronage for partisan or per¬ 
sonal advantage. But everywhere else, and, until 
these days, here, offices have been, avowedly, at least, 
a means only ; the end of a party, the reason of its 
life, has been to promote or defeat some measure 
more or less definite, of legislation or administration, 
and the use of ministerial offices to reward parti.san 
services, has been, for all statesmen but those of our 
day and country, a form of bribery practiced, no 
doubt, but never defended and but little, if at all, 
le.ss odious than the simple purchase of votes or influ¬ 
ence for money. 

But for our parties to obtain the principal execu¬ 
tive oftices, and through them those in their gift, is 
the whole end and reason of existence; far from 
wishing the offices to carry out a policy, tliey fear 
above all things to advocate an intelligible policy^ 
lest it may cost them the offices. 

The (piestion vastly exceeding any other in im¬ 
portance to our national parties, indeed the only 
question which truly interests them at all, is whether 
after the 4th of March, 1893, a democratic president 
shall distribute many thousands of federal offices to 
democrats, or a republican president shill reserve 
them for republicans. As a national organization 
the one party has no other aim than to seek these 
ollices, the other, no purpose but to keep them ; for 
analogous rea.sons do they exist and contend in every 
state and division of a state throughout the Union. 


An American political party is kept up for purposes 
as strictly interested as a railroad or life insurance 
company; the sentiments of its platform mean no 
more than the devotion to the public to be found in 
a prospectus of the former, or the longing to care for 
the widow and orphan professed in the circulars of 
the latter: they are advertisements and nothing 
more. The very men who prepare them look with 
undisguised contempt upon any one who takes them 
more seriously: a politician of to-day can hardly 
conceive of a party with other ends than to secure 
support at public expense for as many as possible of 
its members; that citizens should combine for any 
other purpose seems to him absurd and visionary. 

The whole purpose of our parties, being 

TO OBTAIN AND DISTRIBUTE OFFICES, 

they are correspondingly organized. Their leaders 
are prominent office-holders or those who will be¬ 
come such if the party succeed; their active mem¬ 
bers are the incumbents of petty offices, or such as 
hope to dispossess them; their revenues are derived 
from assessments on official salaries supplemented 
by the investments of capitalists having contracts to 
obtain or taxes to evade. Every public office, how¬ 
ever responsible, or however humble, that of chief 
justice of the supreme court or that of a village lamp¬ 
lighter, is for our politicians simply current coin to 
excite and reward partisan activity. An association 
of this character po.ssesses a permanence and cohesion 
which no ordinary party could acquire; such a party 
dissolves when the end for which it was formed has 
been attained or become clearly unattainable; and 
one result or the other will ordinarily be reached 
before many years. But as the object of these as¬ 
sociations is one never to be irrevocably effected, 
there is no reason why they should not endure for 
all time. So long as the only distinction between re- 
• publicans and democrats is that the former hold some 
offices which the latter covet, and the latter hold some 
which the former covet, the present parties may last 
as long as we allow offices to be bestowed for party 
reasons. There will never come a time, while 
both human nature and our institutions remain the 
same, when those who wish for places need finally 
despair of ousting those who have them. 

Moreover, although no ruling power can wholly 
escape the influence of public opinion, qur political 
corporations are singularly free from it. However 
unpopular outside of, or even within, the party or¬ 
ganization, may be the candidate finally chosen, he 
can count upon the regular party workers. Politi¬ 
cians support him, not from respect or affection, bu^ 
from self-interest; he may not be the man they 
would like to see in the place to which he aspires, 
but, if he is the regular nominee, no one else can do 
the work they must have done; only he will be 
bound to put or keep them in office, and keep or put 
their opponents out. Formerly a commonplace but 
effective check was imposed on parties by the neces¬ 
sity of appealing to the public for their campaign 
funds; the popularity of their nominee was fairly 
measured by the readiness and liberaiity with 
which his wealthier supporters subscribed, and a 
candidate thoroughly distasteful to the more intelli¬ 
gent classes of the community must have been rich 
enough to dispense with pecuniary assistance. But 
political managers have no longer this fear before 
their eyes; office-holders and office-seekers subscribe 
with what would be amazing liberality, considering 
their means, were the sums given really gifts; they 
are, however, simply investments. The givers know 
that if their party goes or stays out, they all certain 
ly go or stay out of pubiic employment with it; if it 
stays, or comes in, each of them has the chance, at 
least, to stay or come in also. The worst man of 
their party may give or leave them the means of 
earning their living; the best man of the other is 
sure to do neither. 

These two powerful corporations have reduced 
the legal sovereign of the country, that is to say, the 
people of the United States, to a condition of 

MAJFSTIC IMPOTENCE, 

closely, resembling that of the titular ruler of Great 
Britain. Queen Victoria has nominally all and more 
than the powers of Queen Elizabeth ; but she can ex¬ 


ercise these powers only through her ministers, and 
these are chosen virtually, though indirectly, by the 
house of commons. She is treated with such out 
ward deference as to conceal the contrast between 
her legal and her practical authority, and she is not 
quite a nullity in the government; she would be held 
justified in refusing a minister on reasonable grounds 
offensive to her. But the ruler of England is the 
leader of the commons; sustained by them, he owes 
the crown a little formality of manner and a little 
hypocrisy of language. So the American people has 
never in form abdicated its sovereignty, but its nom¬ 
inal servants are the creatures of one or other polit¬ 
ical party. It may be sated with’ fulsome adulation, 
but it retains only the shadow of power. The mass 
of our citizens come to the polls, not to choose their 
rulers, but at most, to record a preference between 
nominees of two usurping monopolies, selected by 
each to do its own work, and with scarcely a thought 
of their fitness for the work, of the people. Only in 
those extreme cases, when the glaring, monstrous 
impropriety of candidacies makes them insults to 
the dignity of the nation, will the latter sometimes 
really exercise its right of choice. As a rule every 
successful candidate is conscious that he owes his 
position, not to the confidence of his fellow-citizens, 
but the favor of an office-seeking organization, that 
to it he must above all give satisfaction as a place- 
jobber, and may then safely devote to his legitimate 
duties the leavings of his time and the dregs of his 
energy. 

What I have said may be met by the objection, 
that the two great national parties taken together 
embrace, for practical purposes, the entire electo¬ 
rate ; therefore the one successful at the polls is 
shown to include a majority of the voters, and their 
elaborate organization amounts, after all, only to a 
mechanism whereby this majority first a.scertains its 
own will, then imposes it upon the people. This 
view is plausible and is adopted, more or less con¬ 
sciously, by most of those who think, write or speak 
concerning our institutions; but reflection will show 
it to be radically erroneous ; for, although every 
man who votes the republican or the democratic 
ticket may be called pro hoc vice a member of the re¬ 
publican or democratic party, he is not such in a 
sense which ensures that the party’s candidate has 
received his actual or constructive assent. The es¬ 
tablished practice of both parties is to choose their 
candidates, directly or indirectly, through what are 
called “primaries,” in other words, elections at 
which the right of suffrage is confined to those more 
or less expressly pledged to support the nominee 
of the party. The governing bodies of either party 
are chosen in the same manner; and regarding our 
parties as corporations, even their nominal member¬ 
ship must be confined to those attending the prima¬ 
ries, by no means ali, or even a majority of those who 
usually vote their repective tickets. 

But this is not all: our great industrial corpora¬ 
tions are virtually governed by a very small fraction 
of their nominal membership. As an illustration, 
the Pennsylvania railroad company is technically 
composed of every owner of its stock; but when we 
hear that it promotes this scheme or discourages 
that, does any suppose that all, or a majority, or even 
a considerable number of its stockholders have ever 
been consulted about the matter? For purposes of 
action and influence the Pennsylvania railroad 
means certain well-known gentlemen whose names 
can be told on the fingers of one hand. In like 
manner our vast political corporations are ruled 
each by a small inner circle of men whose stake in 
its operations is sutficient to have them make its 
control the business of their lives. When the or¬ 
dinary voter enters the primary, he finds invariably 
his choice narrowed to two or three candidates. 
How these have come to be all that have the slight¬ 
est chance of election, he does not know; the result 
has been brought about by infiuences in which he 
has had no part, and whose nature he generally very 
imperfectly understands; but he knows, or will soon 
learn by experience, that unless his vote is cast for 
some one of these two or three, it will have no more 
bearing on the nomination than if he had staid at 
home. The nominee of a primary in ninety-nine 
cases out of a hundred owes his success toaprevi- 










128 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


ous uomiiidtion by some man or clique of men who 
make politics a trade: he is the creature of a “boss” 
or a “ring.” There is nothing really mysterious in 
this; some one must make it his business to control 
any association, or to direct any corporate work; 
and the more unwieldy the assemblage the more im¬ 
perative is the need of expert guidance. Profes¬ 
sional politicians are indispensable in any popular 
government; we are peculiar only in having a hun¬ 
dred-fold more of them, and those of a vastly lower 
type than other nations. We have in our midst sev¬ 
eral hundred thousand persons who obtain their 
livelihood by Influencing the nomination of party 
candidates; we may not admire their aims or their 
methods, but no one can deny or need wonder that 
they succeed. 

OUR LAWS ARK .MADE AND ENFORCED 

by men who owe their official life to our professional 
politicians; these constitute, for practical purposes, 
the two great corporations we call parties, and if the 
source of power is the true sovereign, the American 
people has virtually abdicated in favor of this partic¬ 
ular class of its citizens. As formerly in Venice, an 
oligarchy has grown up insensibly among us, and its 
rule is such as should be expected from the charac¬ 
teristics of the ruling class. 

A glance at these will repay our attention. The 
typical American politician earns his living by hold¬ 
ing a public office (usually of subordinate importance 
and purely ministerial function.s) in return for past 
or expected party work. He is liable at any moment 
to be thrown out of employment for no other fault 
than being less useful to his party, or faction, or spe¬ 
cial patron than some one else who wants his place, 
and his chance of promotion depends on his ability 
to supplant in like manner somebody else; in no le¬ 
gitimate way can he ensure himself and his family a 
continued subsistence, much less make a provision 
for the future: that he should be usually dishonest 
is a logical sequence of his conditions of life. He 
passes his time in an atmosphere of intrigue and dis¬ 
simulation, concealing or exaggerating his senti¬ 
ments, amplifying his importance, striving to arouse 
hopes and fears he know's to be groundless, and to 
gain a confidence he will be strongly tempted to 
abuse: it is therefore a law of his being to deceive in 
words and actions. He is regarded by the commun¬ 
ity, and especially by the classes who usually fix its 
standards of thought and conduct, much as usurers 
were in the Middle Ages, feared and occasionally 
courted for their power, but hated and despised. 
Although fortunes are no doubt made in it, politics, 
regarded as a way to make money, is a poor trade: 
the proportion of really prosperous politicians is very 
small compared with the vast number for whom a 
needy and anxious life ends in a dishonored and 
miserable old age. It has consequently few attrac¬ 
tions for men of character and ability, and such men, 
with rare exceptions, shun it: it is recruited from 
the failures and outcasts of all honorable professions, 
those too dull, indolent or vicious to hold their own 
in any field of worthy competition. Its lowest stra¬ 
tum is made up, in no small measure, of habitual 
criminals: we may truly say that our Botany Bay is 
the political arena; we reform, or further debauch, 
our convicts by making them otir rulers. 

Among so many thousands a certain number of 
men of ability will, of course, be found, but I be¬ 
lieve the impression that politicians are generally 
acute and ingenious, though untrustworthy, is 
wholly groundless; the vast majority of them are 
men of the most moderate natural abilities, and the 
most limited acquirements. Your President has on 
several occasions pointed out very clearly that the 
relations between the prominent and ordinary mem¬ 
bers of the calling resemble those between the rob¬ 
ber barons and their men at arms: the "bosses” 
are noted for skill in obtaining plunder, and liberal¬ 
ity in its distribution among their followers; while 
the latter believe in their patron's star, that is to say, 
feel confidence in his continued ability to find them 
places, they adhere to him with unscrupulous fidel¬ 
ity, but he will be deserted in an instant if another 
jiroves, or is thought, better able to reward efifective 
service at the people’s cost. 


With little exaggeration it may be said that 

WE HAVE MADE OUR RULERS 

that class of the community which is universally 
and unhesitatingly pronounced the.most unworthy 
of confidence in any of the relations of private life: 
it is dlfificult to find a term to correctly represent 
this unique type of government: I have suggested 
for it “kakistocracy” at the risk of a charge of 
peudantry. That the public business is carried on 
at all tolerably under it, and that the country’s pros¬ 
perity is unchecked, forcibly illustrates the immense 
advantages of our national position : to some extent, 
however, it is due to certain characteristics of our 
politicians, which in some measure neutralize their 
more baneful qualities. They are greedy and 
shameless, but seldom bold, and cowardice with the 
bulk of them is some substitute for conscience. I 
have alluded to the comparatively small influence 
considering the perfect freedom of speech and great 
intellectual activity of our people, exerted by the 
sentiment of the educated and reflecting classes on 
the administration, but, devoid as these classes are 
of direct political power, it argues great timidity in 
our politicians that public opinion has any weight 
with them whatever: that they are ever bullied or 
scolded into temporarily decent behavior. Moreover, 
a thoroughly corrupt and self-seeking class is by na¬ 
ture conservative. The American politician has in 
his mind no dangerously vague visions of general 
improvement for mankind; he has the perfectly 
definite and common-place intention to advance his 
own interest, and no mirage of the irtiagination lures 
him into perilous paths in this pursuit. He is not 
naturally a demagogue ; when he attempts the role, 
he is clumsy and unsuccessful, because trans¬ 
parently insincere. To inflame and play on passions 
and prejudices of class or race or creed is, in truth, 
greater work than he is fit for; the practice of vulgar 
frauds and petty intrigues does not train men to be 
real popular leaders in mischief. The reflection that 
our tyrants are too contemptible to oppress us, may 
not tend to our self complacency, but the fact does 
much to make their yoke endurable. 

Through the reform we advocate and not other¬ 
wise that yoke will be thrown off; thus and thus 
only will the country be freed from the domination 
of its most degraded and dangerous class and be 
made worthy of its greatness and its past. The 
remedy is right before us. No one can fail to find 
who troubles himself to seek it, or hesitate to apply 
it if he recognize the gravity of the evil. The nation 
has made its civil service a breeding place for in¬ 
numerable petty parasites, and these poison its po¬ 
litical life with their noisome presence; restore the 
service to its proper functions and they will die out 
like the antediluvian animals for want of an envi¬ 
ronment in which they can live. But precisely be¬ 
cause the effects of the reform will be so far reach¬ 
ing and so beneficent it encounters the implacable 
hostility of all professional politicians. The thorough 
going practical application of its principles to the 
conduct of public business would make them starve 
or change their calling, and neither prospect is 
pleasant. 

“ No thief ere felt the halter draw 

With'good opinion of the law.” 

And our “ statesmen ” are no exception to this 
general rule of their kind. Nor must we disguise 
from ourselves that professional politicians are not 
its only enemies. In his speech at Pittsbugh, Mr. 
Clark.sou recently predicted that if the claim of the 
mugwump that the people favored civil service re¬ 
form could be “ submitted to the people themselves ” 
it “ would be rejected by ten millions of votes.” 

.MR. CLARKSON DISPLAYS 

at least one mark of a prophet, the last election in 
Iowa shows that he has little honor in his own coun¬ 
try, nevertheless I consider him very ill qualified to 
predict what would or would not happen in the con¬ 
tingency suggested ; but I have no doubt that a good 
many votes would be cast against “ the claim of the 
mugwnmp,” or, in other words, against honesty and 
morality in public life, by people who would be 
secretly ashamed of themselves for doing s6. It is 
not that they are -misled by the arguments or 


wretched apologies for arguments that have been 
used against civil service reform ; had any man, sin¬ 
cerely desiring the country’s good, been led by these 
to doubt its wisdom, the practical working of the 
Pendleton bill must have dispelled his misgivings 
Under it the public service has not been filled up with 
book-worns or valetudinarians, nor have letter car¬ 
riers and custom-house inspectors become brutal in 
their manners or lordly in their bearing towards the 
ordinary citizen. College graduates have not monop¬ 
olized the petty offices, nor have we seen a peerage 
of departmental clerks created, or our liberties 
otherwi.se endangered by the introduction of com¬ 
petitive examinations. What some politicians called 
the “ English pension system,” possibly because it 
had nothing in the world to do with England, and 
nothing in the world to do with pensions, has been 
established without creating a bureaucracy or un¬ 
dermining the constitution; in brief, all the silly 
pretexts and affected fears invented as excuses for 
resisting the reform have been proven groundless 
and absurd. But, as a matter of fact, the demon¬ 
stration was needless; no one to whom any one 
would think for a moment of listening on such a 
topic really believed them ; they were repeated, it is 
true, by some who ought to have known and did 
know better, but such men used them only to blind 
their fellow citizens, perhaps to blind their own con¬ 
sciences, to the real motives of their hostility to re¬ 
form. When it was practically, although only par¬ 
tially, applied, civil service reform produced none of 
tire evils they pretended to expect from it, but as no 
one had expected these evils in fact, this proved only 
their own insincerity which needed no proof. Nor 
has the demonstration in anywise disarmed the hos¬ 
tility of its enemies: on the contrary, it is because 
they understand it better than many persons like 
civil service reform less. They have learned from per 
sonal experience that it may be a serious hindrance 
to obtaining public employment for themselves or 
billeting relatives or friends or dependants upon the 
government, and some who once saw its theoretical 
merits no longer think it “ practical ” or “ suited to 
our institutions.” 

THE REAL STUMBLING BLOCK TO REFORM 
is not ignorance, but the torpor of the national con¬ 
science. We do not feel our ignominy. The average 
American is so accustomed to having politicians re¬ 
duce him to a choice between two almost equally 
distasteful candidates : to voting for one to show his 
disgu ,t with the other, or staying at home and grum¬ 
bling to show his disgust with both, that he looks on 
this impudent usurpation as a part of the order of 
nature: let him feel that his submission to it is un¬ 
worthy of himself, and a source of loss and peril to 
the commonwealth, and its overthrow is at hand. 
Let us then , abjure the cowardly optimi.sm which 
ignores evils it is too lazy to correct; the ostrich 
wisdom which hides from itself the enemy with 
which it fears to strive. No good or worthy thing 
was ever done through self-deception: to redeem 
our manhood, we must recognize our degradation. 

“ Yon shall Know the truth, and the truth shall make 
you free ” We should expect and court the enmity 
of those who live by the abuses which for three gen¬ 
erations have now grown with our growth and 
strengthened with our strength : what bad men cor¬ 
dially detest must contain in it some element of 
active good. It is well for civil service reform to be 
hated by Tammany Hall as it was well for England 
to be hated by Barere. We would spare Americans 
from being asham3d of their government, would 
rescue the noblest work of our polity from it,s basest 
hands; would extirpate national vices which make 
us a political Sodom among Christian peoples : with 
such a goal before us we can well fight on with a 
calm confidence that any apostacy, any temporary 
reverse, any seeming injustice of public opinion are 
bnt inevitable incidents of so momentous a struggle 
but fitting preludes to so glorious a victory. 


The State Civil Service Reform Association 
has a limited number of copies of Mr. Bona¬ 
parte’s address for distribution. 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


'Washington, In 1789. 

“As the Coiislilutioiial Convention was about to organize when success seemed hopeless and despair suggested fatal compromise Washington said ; ‘If to please 
the people we oiler what wo ourselves disapprove how cau we afterward defend our work ? Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair— 
the event is in the hands of God.’ There sj)oke the good genius of America. If any words were to be inscribed upon this arch, these words of Washington would 
be apples of gold in pictures of silver. What he said to the convention he says to us. It is the voice of the heroic spirit which in council and in the field has 
made and alone will perserve our America. It is the voice that will speak from this memorial arch to all coming generations of Americans. Whatever may 
betide, whatever war, foreign or domestic, may threaten, whatever specious sophistry may as.sail the political conscience of the country or bribery of place or 
money corrupt its political action, above the roar of the mob and the insidious clamor of the demagogue, the voice of Washington will still be the voice of 
American patriotism and of manly honor—‘ Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair—the event is in the hands of God ! ’ ’’— George If’tif- 
iam Curtis, at the Laying of the Corner-stone of the Washington Arch, May, 1890. 

Ingalls, in 1890. 

“ The purification of politics is an iridescent dream. The decalogue and the golden rule have no place in a political campaign. The object is success. To 
defeat the antagonist and expel the party in [lower is the purpose. This modern cant about the corruption of polities is fatiguing in the extreme. It proceeds 
from the tea-custard and syllabub dilettanteism, the frivolous and desultory sentimentali.sm of c\Ac,mas.—Senator Ingalls. 


VoL. I, No. 16. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication ofiice. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Indiana, where subscrip¬ 
tions and advertisements will be received. 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana. 

The Civil Service Chronicle desires facts 
re}?ardiiig the so-called “resignations” 
of fourth-class postmasters; who has re¬ 
quested these resignations, hy wlnit agen¬ 
cies have these been elfected, and Hi what 
instances have resignations been practical¬ 
ly forced to prevent loss on the post-ollice 
furniture by disposing of it to the woiild- 
be successor in ollice. 


The Civil Service Chronicle desires in¬ 
formation of all cases where the man at 
the top of the eligible lists for positions in 
the railway mail service has not been 
chosen. 

The Civil Service Chronicle will be glad 
to receive information upon the following 
points: 

The name of any newspaper editor or 
owner who has or may receive a federal 
appointment, and the name of the ollice. 

The names of all members of political 
committees or delegates given a federal 
appointment, and the name of the ollice. 

The names of all federal ollice-holders 
wiio ar«^ members of any political commit¬ 
tee or who act as delegates, naming the 
committee or the convention. 

Statements regarding any [[olitical ac¬ 
tivity in primaries, conventions or politi¬ 
cal work done for any nominees by federal 
ollice-holders. 

One of the reasons given by Senator 
Hoar why Collector Saltonstall should be 
immediately succeeded by Beard was that 
the collector had to represent the Adminis¬ 
tration at dinners. Collector Beard made 
his maiden appearance in this capacity at 
the Clarkson dinner. His enthusiasm for 
Clarkson and for Clarkson’s ideas was al¬ 
most hilarious, and its only check seemed 
to be that the collector’s conscience was 
once or twice pricked by the recollection 
that his office is within the civil service 
law. 


INDIANAPOLIS, JUNE, 1890. 

Since the writing in another column, 
further facts about the census in this city 
have come to light. As is well known tile 
appointments were made upon Pension 
Commissioner Rauni’s principle, which is, 
“ When I appoint a man I want to look 
him in the face and form my own judg¬ 
ment of him.” In this manner “ Sid ” 
Conger, a defeated republican candidate, 
was appointed. He had a friend here in 
Mr. Merrill Moores, who is not in any 
manner connected with the government 
service nor with the census, but who is a 
member of the republican county com¬ 
mittee and a very active republican poli¬ 
tician. Conger seems to have left it to 
him to do the looking in the face. This 
was the true Clarkson idea; no examina¬ 
tion by theorists like' Mr. Fishback and 
Mr. Butler of the federal local board, but 
the unbiased judgment of a party com¬ 
mitteeman. The result, however, was the 
choice of a sorry crowd of republican 
workers, whose work has exasperated the 
people of the city as much as if Falstatf 
had come with his recruits to take the 
census. In the Sentinel of June 19, 
Mr. Moores says “some of those I 
recommended have turned out most mis¬ 
erable failures. When Mr. Conger was 
first appointed supervisor, a great many 
people knowing him and me to be intimate 
friends besieged me for recommendations 
as enumerators. After they had received 
their appointments, they bothered me for 
instructions, and now since they are at 
work and have found out they won’t get 
their money before the middle of July at 
the earliest, they have importuned me to 
loan them money.” We wish Mr. Moores 
well out of the hands of his apparently im¬ 
pecunious crowd. A spice is added to the 
situation by Conger’s suggestion that the 
Commercial Club hire a horse and buggy 
to act as a courier between omitted inhab¬ 
itants and Moores’s henchmen. 

Congressman Cheadle was defeated for 
renomination. Indiana and the country 
can well spare him from the list of con¬ 
gressmen. In the recent debate in the 


50 cents per annum. 

5 cents per copy. 

house, referring to the party promises to 
sustain the civil service law, he said: “ I 
may have made a quasi promise, but I did 
not consider it an essential factor of my 
political faith.” The departure of such a 
man from the public eye can not be re¬ 
gretted. He is not known to the people of 
Indiana excejit as a demander of patronage- 
at the end of his congressional career this is 
the only work that sticks to him and marks 
him. He must now feel the exceeding short¬ 
ness of his reward. He did not get the pa¬ 
tronage he demanded, and probably this ac¬ 
counts for his defeat. La Follette was the 
Administration candidate, and by a happy 
coincidence they were killed ot! together. 
It is whispered that the Lord Paramount 
resented the imperious style of the Under 
Lord and withheld favors from him accord¬ 
ingly. 


The President was present at the dedi¬ 
cation of the monument to Garfield, the 
most conspicuous victim of the spoils sys¬ 
tem. The feuds of two great patronage 
bosses broke out afresh over Garfield’s al¬ 
lotment of their spoil, and a poor crazed 
creature, because his portion was not forth¬ 
coming, assassinated the man who seemed 
responsible. What an opportunity for the 
occupant of the most commanding posi¬ 
tion in the United States. An appeal from 
him to his fellow-citizens against the mob 
now about him, howling and wrangling 
for sjtoil, would have been responded to 
with an overwhelming pati’iotisra. The 
St. Louis Republic well said : 

standing under the figure of the murdered Pres¬ 
ident and reiterating his own pledge to make fltne.ss 
the essential and discriminating test, Mr. Harri.son 
might have thrilled the whole country with his de¬ 
nunciation of the corrupt system which assas.sinated 
an American President. 

But President Harrison had only this 
lesson to point out as he stood at the tomb 
of Garfield: 

The cruel circumstances attending his death had 
but one amelioration—that space of life was given 
him to teach from his dying bed a great lesson of 
patience and forbearance. His mortal part will find 
honorable rest here, but the lessons of his life and 
death will continue to be instructive and inspiring 
incidents in American history. 


































THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ino 


Mr. L. M. Blackford, at the head of 
the Episcopal high school of Virginia, has 
in the Virginia Seminary Magazine for 
June, an excellent article upon “ The Mor¬ 
als of Civil Service Reform,” from which 
an extract is given elsewhere. He calls 
attention to the first systematic effort to 
enlist the moral and religious sense of the 
country in behalf of civil service reform 
by Mr. Welsh. That was a year ago, and 
it serves as a standard of measurement for 
the great stride made in a short time. 
That marked the beginning of a careful 
examination of the spoils system as a 
moral question by people in general. It 
convinced great numbers of the clergy that, 
disagreeable as was the duty, they could 
not longer be silent under the steady low¬ 
ering of the standard of conduct in politi¬ 
cal matters. The consequence has been a 
distinct and unmistakable revival of the 
popular conscience, a disgust, with the 
coarse immorality of the sentiments of 
Senator Ingalls, the multiplication all over 
the country of sermons dealing boldly and 
eloquently with various moral aspects of 
present phases of politics, and the firm 
avowal of many clergymen that they have 
rights and duties as to the management of 
the country they live in, not to be evaded 
because of their sacred calling. 

When Bishop Potter, Rev. Heber New¬ 
ton and Rev. Father Ducey join in a call 
for a citizens’ movement for the purifica¬ 
tion of municipal politics by non-partisan 
nominations in New York City, civil ser¬ 
vice reformers do not feel “fretful,” as Mr. 
Clarkson, who must have been momentar¬ 
ily startled by his own shadow, said in 
Boston, They will give careful attention 
to him, and when he says “ that everything 
that we have that is noble in our govern¬ 
ment and sweet and splendid in our social 
life is largely the result of partisanship,” 
they will hasten to furnish as facts for 
illustration biographies of the Tammany 
toughs now ruling New York, details of 
the way a boss like Quay subjugates a 
state, how a senator like Pettigrew can 
arrogantly flaunt his right to use the 
Indian service of his own domain sis he 
pleases, and by cumulative facts the coun¬ 
try over show the significance of a fettered 
press and illustrate how an office holding 
class rules primaries and conventions. 


PENSION-COMMISSIONER RAUM. 

The character of Pension-Commissioner 
Raum as a public officer is at last rounded 
to completion, and may be reviewed from all 
quarters. He had left office when the merit 
system was little more than talk, and it is 
doubtful 'if he had then ever given it a seri¬ 
ous thought. He came back into office after 
the system had in a few places become thor¬ 
oughly rooted and had been vindicated by trial. 


In some degree it was applied to the iiension 
office. Mr. Raum had evidently learned noth¬ 
ing in his vacation years, and evidently re¬ 
garded the civil service law as troublesome 
but not seriously so. Wanting thirty medical 
examiners, he got Congressman Banks to in¬ 
troduce a resolution authorizing their ap¬ 
pointment as spoil. It passed the house with¬ 
out difficulty, and for a time seemed a most 
dangerous attack. All of the other medical 
examiners were appointed after competition 
and these thirty could have been furnished 
by the civil service commission immediately. 
If these places, however, should be deliber¬ 
ately classed by congress as spoils, the same 
influences might remove other places by 
wholesale from the operation of the civil serv¬ 
ice law. A word from President Harrison to 
Raum would have secured the withdrawal of 
the resolution, which was in direct violation 
of republican promises, but it was not spoken. 
It is sufficient to say of this resolution that it 
is now pending in the senate, which body it 
will never pass. 

When the resolution was introduced in 
February, Raum was interviewed by the New 
York Evening Post to the following effect: 

“Where is the trouble with that plan? As it is 
now we get our medical examiners through the civil 
service commission, but the commission have no fa¬ 
cilities for conducting such technical examinations. 
We have to send them a detail of our surgeons to do 
that work. Now, what is the difference, in practical 
effect, whether we conduct the examinations under 
our own departmental jurisdiction or take those men 
whom the commission examines through the agency 
of our departmental examiuers?’’ 

“ It prevents a dangerous personal discrimination, 
does it not?” 

“It prevents me from knowing what kind of men I 
am going to get.” The commissioner spoke with 
more than his usual warmth. “When I appoint a 
man, I want to look him in the face and form my 
own judgment of him. When 1 buy a horse, I look 
at its teeth and its t.ail, and feci its coat; it doesn’t, 
satisfy me to take somebody else’s statement that the 
animal is brown, or gray, or black, and stands so 
many hands high. It is the .same way with the men 
who are to serve under me. I don’t care to choose a 
man from the bare statement that he has made an 
average of 76, or 83, or 91 per cent.” 

Commissioner Raum looked his own son, 
Green B. Raum, Jr., in the face and formed a 
judgment of him. He did not require him 
to make an average of 76, or 88 or 91 per 
cent., but he lumped him off and decided that 
a suitable place must be made for this sou, 
and so he created a new division known as 
the appointment division, and put Green B. 
Raum, Jr., at the head of it with the title 
assistant chief clerk. This done. Commis¬ 
sioner Raum again looked his son in the face 
and formed a second judgment of him with¬ 
out requiring any per cent. As the result of 
this, he removed a woman clerk out of the 
chief clerk’s room, where she had been mak¬ 
ing some fifteen dollars a month in notary 
fees, and put this son in the way of turning an 
honest penny with his notary’s seal. The 
Journal correspondent, under date of June 11, 
says: “When visitors to the office have in¬ 
quired for a notary they havte u.sually been 
sent to him, and he is doing a considerable 


portion of the business that the woman did 
formerly.” 

There is another son, John Raum, who has 
begun the pension claim business since his 
father became commissioner. In the pension 
office there are a thousand chances for sly 
favoritism, and we make bold to say that no 
man with a fine sense of honor would ever 
hold the office of commissioner and allow his 
son to prosecute claims for pensions before 
him. The mere relationship as a “draw” to 
business would put money into the Raum 
pocket. 

Of the same improper nature is the fact that 
George E. Lemon, a claim agent, who prose¬ 
cutes claims for pensions in immense numbers 
before Raum, should indorse the latter’s note 
for $25,000. Lemon employs hundreds of 
clerks, and stimulates business by publishing 
a paper in Washington, which appears under 
the guise of the soldiers’ welfare. Its one cry 
is more pensions, and few agencies have done 
more to destroy patriotism. That Commis¬ 
sioner Raum should have any connection 
whatever with such a man, and of all things 
should be under obligations to him, and still 
further, an obligation of such magnitude, is 
without excuse; it is the embodiment of the 
spoils idea, and it is such a demonstration of 
Raum’s unfitness for his position that the Pres¬ 
ident ought not to overlook it. 

In other words, I believe that the United States 
government is a political, and not a business, organ¬ 
ization. The interest of the average man in politics 
must be kept alive to make a republic succeed .— 
Clarkson, in Boston. 

The degradation of spoils politics has a 
fresh illustration in the case of Charles E. 
McChesney, the Indian agent at Cheyenne 
River Agency (8. D.). If the word of such 
men as Bishop Hare, Herbert Welsh, and the 
army officers who have the best means of 
knowing is to be taken, McChesney is an up¬ 
right man, and a competent and honest agent. 
On account of impending land questions at 
this agency, he can be ill-spared. However, 
his place was “ wanted,” and charges were 
made against him of drunkenness and improper 
conduct with women. Of these charges he 
was promptly and overwhelmingly cleared. 
The following letter is indicative of the spirit 
of the clearing: 

To the Right Reverend W. H. Hare, D.D., Bishop of 

South Dakota: 

Sir : The information that you gave me last night 
that Dr. Chas. E. McChesney, the Indian agent at 
Cheyenne Indian Agency, S. D., was accused at 
Washington, D. C., with drunkenness, and had been 
seen drunk at the village of Pierre, al.so that he was 
an immoral man with the squaws at the agency, has 
filled me with amusement and indignation. I can 
not understand how any one could be so vile and un¬ 
principled as to make so unjust charges against a 
man that I have known for about three years, and 
have always found him to be a temperate and good 
man, a faithful and honest Indian agent. 

Some unprincipled politician, who either wants 
the place for himself or one of his friends, must have 
hatched up the complaint out of whole cloth, think¬ 
ing it would never come to the ears of the doctor or 
his friends. If they want his place why not sail un- 









THE CIVIL - SERVICE ^CHRONICLE. 


131 


I 




\ 


f 

i 

> 

( 




I. 


der true colors, and say the doctor is a democrat, 
for that is all that can possibly be said against him. 
I am, and always have been a “black repnblican,” 
bnt do not believe that a good and faithful public 
servant should be put out of office simply because 
he dilVers with me in politics. 

You can use this letter in any way that you think 
will stamp the charges of drunkenness and immor¬ 
ality as an infamous lie. 

Very truly, your friend, 

A. B. MacGowan, 

U. S. Indian Service, Capl. 12th U. S. Infy. 
Rosehekg Agency, S. D., May 3,1890. 

Baffled in their efforts, the hidden gang, to 
whom libel and slander are apparently ready 
and natural weapons, announced through 
Senator Pettigrew that Dr. McChesney will 
hold until the end of his term, August 2. 
McChesney is reported to have thwarted Sen¬ 
ator Pettigrew's brother in the latter’s effort 
to get hold of some Indian lands. It will be 
interesting to see whether this agent is re¬ 
moved at the end of his term, and if so, it 
will he pertinent to inquire why ; and further, 
if so, it will be interesting to observe whether 
Pettigrew names the new man. 


A CONTRAST. 

President Cleveland appointed Mr. Hendrix 
in the place of the worthy but notoriously in¬ 
capable republican incumbent of the Brooklyn 
post-office. Mr. Hendrix, upon the high au¬ 
thority of ex-Postmaster-General James and 
Postmaster General Wanamaker, has made this 
office of very great efficiency. He would have 
liked to keep his place, and would have con¬ 
tinued to devise improvements. But for 
months past the President has been giving 
time and reflection to the problem of putting 
in a republican politician. It is a pity for the 
future students’of American institutions that 
this paper has not space to quote the daily dis¬ 
patches describing the struggles of the several 
Brooklyn factions, all equally vulgar and sel¬ 
fish, to whom the President of the United 
States has bent a respectful ear. The outcome 
was the appointment of Col. Baird, a promi¬ 
nent business man and politician. He knew 
nothing of running a post-office, and it was 
not his intention to give the office his personal 
attention. When he failed to secure a private 
secretary to whom he could delegate the busi¬ 
ness functions [he presumably giving personal 
attention to the pol itical functions], he declined 
the appointment. Meanwhile the President 
will resume the hunt for some one to take the 
place of the present admirable postmaster 
There is the faint hope that the limit of his 
endurance may have been reached and that he 
may appoint the very capable republican as¬ 
sistant postmaster, who co-operated with Post¬ 
master Hendrix to make the office of such no¬ 
table excellence. This would be a pacific and 
statesmanlike end of a fight now threatening 
extensive ruptures in several directions. 


In St. Louis the President ended a disgrace¬ 
ful struggle by promoting Major Harlow, who 
had by many years of efficiency and faithful¬ 
ness worked his way up in the public service. 
His long experience at once was felt in vari¬ 


ous improvements, as indicated in the follow¬ 
ing report of a subordinate : 

When you assumed the duties of postuia.ster there 
were 79 red boxes collected from in the evening. 
Under your directions the number has been in¬ 
creased to 331, making an increase of 252 boxes em¬ 
braced in the following territory. <■>!•<' 

In addition to the improvement in the collection 
fully as much has been accomplished in the deliv¬ 
ery service. When you assumed control of the St. 
Louis post-office there was only one delivery west of 
Kings highway and Manchester road to Delmar av¬ 
enue; east on Delmar avenue to Walton avenue: 
north on Walton avenue to Easton avenue; west on 
Easton avenue to Kings highway; north on Kings 
highway to Natural Bridge road; south on line of 
city limits to Pernod road; northeast on Pernod road 
to old Manchester road. Two deliveries are now 
made in the territory above described. * 

This increase in deliveries and collections has been 
done without the addition of a single man or cent 
to the government. In this work you have been 
ably assisted by Mr. John Grogan, superintendent 
city delivery; James Deveraux, assi.stant superin¬ 
tendent; Mr. E. P. Fox, superintendent Station C; 
R. M. Johnson, superintendent Station D; Peter 
Gundlah, superintendent Station A. Alsoby the wil¬ 
lingness and pride both carriers and collectors display in 
try ing to build up the service. 

Major Harlow, intent upon his duty of 
making the St. Louis post-office the best he 
can make it, finds no difficulty in securing the 
faithful assistance of the many democratic 
employes under him. Yet Clarkson goes down 
to Boston to complain that men such as these, 
who give all their time and energies to mak¬ 
ing a better post-office, and cut oft’ all service 
to the Quays, Tom Plaits, Claytons and Filleys, 
are so wanting in patriotism as to be a menace 
to the country. 


CLARKSON IN BOSTON. 

Assistant Postmaster General Clarkson has 
been in Boston making a speech largely upon 
civil service reform to the Norfolk Club, a re¬ 
publican organization. Clarkson has done the 
Administration more harm than almost all the 
partisan office-holders under it. Public criti¬ 
cism has evidently made him understand this, 
and he is sore in consequence. His appear¬ 
ance before the Norfolk Club is much like 
that of a prize fighter advocating the merits 
of prize fighting to a collection of theological 
students. Some of his arguments have a fa¬ 
miliar sound. For instance: 

When the government called on these men 
to save its life, it did not ask them how far 
the weather was below zero and the space be¬ 
tween the stars [laughter and applause], nor 
require them to calculate the width and slant 
of the shadow of a tree at four o’clock in the 
afternoon. [Laughter.] 

He appears to have hoodwinked the people 
of Boston. Out West he is known as a tricky 
politician, who goes by the name of “ Rhet. 
Clarkson.” No one would think of taking him 
seriously when posing as a disinterested dis¬ 
cusser of a public question. He touched very 
lightly his own exploits. Indeed, he sang 
much smaller than when, some months ago, he 
had the impudence to boastingly publish in 
his paper in Iowa, the list of the multitude of 
changes of office-holders he had at that date 
brought about. Perhaps the defeat of his 
party, which followed soon after in that State, 


for the first time since the republican party 
was organized, had toned him down. He 
smarts under the strictures of the Indiana Civil 
Service Reform Association, and claims that 
his work among the fourth-class postmasters, 
which has justly earned for him the title of 
Headsman Clarkson, more than half of it con¬ 
sisted in filling vacancies caused by “resigna¬ 
tions.” We beg leave to inform Mr. Clarkson 
that the Indiana Civil Service Reform Associ¬ 
ation knows that old trick. The cros.s-roads 
postmaster has a case of pigeon holes and a lot 
of traps connected with the office. The new 
man is settled upon by the congressman. Then 
a quiet intimation is conveyed to the incum¬ 
bent that if he will resign without a fus.s, he 
will get so much in cash for his pigeon holes 
and his traps ; but, if he waits to be removed, 
he will find no purchaser. He is wise in his 
day, and prefers cash to seeing dead stock of 
this kind stored under his shed. Having, with 
a steady countenance, disposed of a large block 
of his cases by classing them as “ resignations,” 
Clarkson would now, doubtless, like us to be¬ 
lieve that all his removals were for cause. 

A POLITICAL MACHINE AS A CEN¬ 
SUS-TAKER. 

As the Civil Service Chronicle has often 
repeated. President Harrison was urged to 
have the appointment of the employes of the 
census bureau made under the competitive 
system, but with deliberation he turned over 
the places to his party as spoil. The country 
was full of young men thoroughly competent, 
who would have taken a pride in doing this 
work well, and who would have gladly com¬ 
peted, but it was deemed better to let the party 
bosses use the places for their behoof. As a 
natural result of this decision. Superintend¬ 
ent Porter described himself as “ waist deep 
in congressmen.” The manner of appoint¬ 
ment may be further illustrated by the case of 
Wilson H. Soale, supervisor of the Terre 
Haute district, who referred the appointment 
of enumerators to the chairmen of the county 
committees of his district, and these in turn 
referred them to the chairmen of the township 
committees. The supervisor of the fourth 
district of North Carolina, before getting his 
appointment, made the following pledge : 

This is to certify that if I am appointed supervis¬ 
or of the eleventh census for the fourth district of 
North Carolina, that the republicans of each county 
in my district shall have the patronage, and that I 
will lend my influence to that party. This Dec. 10, 
1889. W. E. Webb. 

Witness: W. H. Pulley. 

L. W. McKinney writes to the St. Louis Re- 
pnblic, under date of June 7, saying that the 
postmaster at Moberly, Missouri, was having 
the enumerators poll their districts in addi¬ 
tion to taking the census, instructing them to 
do the work “ on the quiet; ” this postmaster 
took a natural view of the duties of appointees 
under such a system. The fitting results seem 
to be coming on. On such high authority as 
the Indianapolis Journal of June 15, the facts 
seem to be that well over the country “ the 
work has been unreasonably dela)'ed by the 
inefficiency of the enumerators, and many per- 















132 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


sons are known to have l)een missed * ® *. 
The tronhle grows out of the inexperience of 
enumerators and slipshod, unfaithful perform¬ 
ance of duty on their part.” In Indianapolis, 
the whole community, headed by the Commer¬ 
cial Club, is at tliis writing about to turn out 
en vuisse to get itself enumerated by these par¬ 
ty pensioners upon the public treasury. How 
it works to use these offices first to pay party 
workers, and second to take the census, is best 
shown by quoting again from the Jmirnal, 
which, speaking of carelessness and, we add, 
utter incapacity and unfitness, says: 

A case of this kind was reported liy a citizen on 
Ka.st Walnut street. The enumerator called at his 
house yesterday morning, and was mot by the Wal- 
nnt-street resident's wife, who informed him she was 
ready to answer any questions the law reiinired. The 
enumerator, .seating him.self on the step of the front 
porch, took out his portfolio, and, placing his ink- 
bottle on the floor beside him, began. At the head 
of the list he wrote the family name and after it the 
w'ords, “ St. Clair street.” Upon being told that he 
had made a mistake in the name of the street he re¬ 
placed the sheet in his portfolio and, taking out a 
second, made a fresh start. This time he succeeded 
in getting the name of the street correct, and pro¬ 
ceeded with hisque.stiouing. The name of the lady’s 
husband was given, and his oecnpation, when the 
enumerator inquired, “How many children have 
you ?” 

“Two,” was the reply. 

“Oh, well, then,” he said, “I’ll come haek again 
and complete the list.” 

With this remark he prepared to leave. Seizing 
his book and paper in one hand, he grasped the open 
ink-bottle in the other, and, witliout replacing the 
stopper, put the bottle into his coat pocket. As he 
walked down to the gate he left a trail of ink that 
furnished the lady of the hou.se two hours’ good 
work in removing. 

This, it seems from the complaints that are coming 
in, is only one ca.se out of many. In a home on 
North New .letsey street the enumerator asked no 
questions concerning diseases that might he prev¬ 
alent in the family and escaped all notice of a mute 
daughter, whose age and nativity he only a.sked for. 
M. II. Spades reports that the Windsor block, on 
Illinois street, which contains at least two hun¬ 
dred rooms, has not yet been visited. 

Failure of the enumerators to properly observe 
their instructions, as well as the repeated urging of 
Supervisor Conger to have them do what they were 
told to do to the letter, is further shown by inquiries 
that were made in this oflice. Out of forty com¬ 
positors who were at the cases last night twenty had 
been ml.s.sed. One of them also said that he knew of 
four families on his block who had been overlooked. 


FACTS TO ILLUMINE CLARKSON’S 
BOSTON SPEECH. 

A confession, they say, is good for the soul 
and I will tell of one committed unanimously 
hy the commission about six months ago, for 
which I was perhaps chiefly to blame. You 
know we are frequently told that this or that 
office has special needs. The head of the office 
speaks of the latitude allowed his predecessor. 
He claims that he requires men with a peculiar 
fitness not possessed by men upon the eligible 
list, and must have such men for the good of the 
office. A new incumbent of a particular New 
York office asked that two of the places under 
him—he only had six—betaken from the class¬ 
ified list. He must have men of fitne.ss, and if 
he had to take “ boys fre.sh from school,” a 
phrase often heard, they would not fill the bill. 
It was a fact which we knew that the best pos¬ 
sible men could not be filled from the list, and 
we granted the request. Two officers of a re¬ 
publican as.sociation of a New York assembly 


district got the places, and ten days afterward, 
at a primary election in the district, that as¬ 
sociation was victorious. We could have given 
two men eminently better fitted than those 
chosen. I doubt if we can undo this mistake, 
but I guarantee the four other officers will be 
kept under classification with an iron hand.— 
From the Adrtresta of Theodore Roonerell before the 
CivU Service Reform Aeeoei(dion of .Maryland, Feb. 
£1, 1890. 


Having succeeded to the right, title and 
interest in the post-office at New Castle, Dr. 
W. F. Shelley hopes the ohl patrrns will con¬ 
tinue their favors as to his j)redecessor, and 
that many new ones may be added. The bim- 
ness in new to him and hin ansintantn, and all go 
home very tired at night, hnl nhorlly he hopes to 
have the rnn of the esUddishment well in hand, and 
be able to give his old customers in the dental line 
such attention as they may require. —New Castle 
Courier. 


The nomination of David Lake to be United 
State marshal is looked upon as a plan by 
which (V)ngre,ssman Wallace hopes to be re¬ 
nominated next fall. 

For years “ Ran ” Ijake has been one of the 
most active democratic political ward workers in 
Brooklyn, lie mis “ boss ” of the Fighth ward, and 
was in the good gracesof the ring. Several times 
he was elected supervisor, ami for two terms 
he sat in the county auditor's oflice. It was 
while he was there that all the fraudulent bills 
for county work, for passing which the super¬ 
visors have recently been indicted, were au¬ 
dited, and it was on the strength of Lake’s 
guarantee that they were paid. 

When .lohn Y. McKane was expelled from 
the democratic party for treachery he ordered 
Lake to follow him out, and, although the lat¬ 
ter then held the office of auditor, to which 
democratic votes had elected him, he obeyed 
the order. When the next election came 
around he saw he would be out of a job, so he 
made a deal by which the republicans nomi¬ 
nated him for supervisor at large. The re¬ 
sult showed that he was about the weakest man 
on the ticket. 

John Y. McKane, report says, has been boast¬ 
ing that he demanded and oi)tained Lake’s 
nomination in return for his services in casting 
the vote of Gravesend for Harrison. He thinks 
he and Lake, if they can get a little patronage 
to dispense, can entice about 3,000 democrats 
from the support of the local machine and so 
convert Brooklyn into a del)atable city. —New 
York Times, March 17. 


Ill Lake’s own ward, the Eighth, this feeling 
is most intense, for that ward had a candidate 
for the office in the person of Robert W. Field¬ 
ing, a life-long republican, who had been 
formally indorsed by the entire party organiza¬ 
tion. 

Chairman Woodruff and all his followers 
had gone to the capital in person and urged 
Fiehling’s appointment. That he was basely be¬ 
trayed Mr. Fielding boldly asserts, and he says he 
proposes to .see if half a dozen men like Woodruff and 
Naval Officer Willis can sell out a man who had 
been backed up by the entire Kings County Repub¬ 
lican General Committee. “They added insult 
to injury,” said Fielding yesterday, “by shelv¬ 
ing me and taking in my place a democrat 
from my own ward, a man whom I have had 
to fight politically for over a dozen years. Here 
I have been struggling to hold our party vote in 
this democratic district for a decade, and have 
had to buck against the great power of this 
fellow, Lake, backed by ‘ Boss ’ McLaughlin, 
and yet when a chance of reward comes I am 
told to step aside .so that the man who beat us 
on so many occasions may be put forward. It 
was a shameful political swindle.”— New York 
Times, March 10. 


The appointment to-day of John F. Scan- 
tan to be special treasury agent at Chicago 
was due rather to J. N. Huston and other In¬ 
diana politicians than to Illinois influences. 
He was indorsed by Senator Farwell before 
th^ appointment of the col lector of customs 
and by prominent party men in Chicago, but 
steady pressure for Mr. Scanlan came from the In¬ 
diana men who were grateful to him for services in 
two presidential campaigns. Mr. Scanlan begins 
as one of the three a.ssistants of J. J. Crowley, 
chief of the Chicago division of special agents 
and a hold-over democrat. As soo7i as he shall 
have gained experience in the difficult duties of a 
treasury agent, he irill probably be appointed chief 
of the division. His salary is |!3,000 a year.— 
Washington Dispatch, March 12. 


There i.s no |mrt of the ineniis placed in 
the liandsofllie executive wliicli niiglit he 
used with greater effect, for unhallowed 
purposes, Ilian flie control of the piihlie 
pre.ss. We have learned, too, from our 
own as well as the experience of other 
countries, t hat golden sliackles, hy whom¬ 
soever or hy whatever pretense imposed, 
are as fatal to it as the iron homls of d<’s- 
potism. —I’kesident Wiijaam Henry Hak- 

RI.SON. 

—The announcement this afternoon that 
President Harri.son had named Alexander Von 
Landberg, editor of the Union, the German 
repuhlican organ, for internal revenue col¬ 
lector for the twenty first district, was fol¬ 
lowed by the firing of cannon by enthusiastic 
Germans who believe that it was Representa¬ 
tive Belden’s influence and sanction that de¬ 
cided the ajipointment. 

The naming of Mr. Von Landberg will, in 
a measure, heal the breach between the His- 
cock and Belden factions. It is a victory for 
Mr. Belden in every sense of the word. It 
has been evident since Mr. Belden’s appoint¬ 
ment to the chairmanship of the congre.'-sional 
committee that to insure success in the col- 
lectorship matter Mr. Hi.scock must select one 
of several candidates whom Mr. Belden would 
agree to accept. It having been made public, 
last night, that the representative had com¬ 
mitted him.self to Mr. Von Landberg, Hiscock 
fell back upon the German editor as his third 
candidate. James M. Gilbert was the first 
Cfliarles E. Ide the second, and finally Mr. 
Von Landberg. Senator Hiscock gets no 
credit among the German republican element 
for the naming of their countryman for the 
lucrative place. 

A great deal of patronage follows the ap- 
j)ointment which will be under Mr. Belden’s 
control, and it amounts to a great deal in this 
district. There is now no doubt hut what 
Mr. Belden will have the naming of the can¬ 
didates on the republican side for the assem¬ 
bly this i&\\.—Syracuse Dispatch to the New Vmk 
Times, June G. 

—Although Chauncey I. Filley could not 
pull him.self through in his contest for the post¬ 
mastership at St. Louis, he manages to stock 
the fourtli-cla.ss offices throughout the .state 
with his friends. He i-ecently succeeded in having 
Ij. M. Spirely, editor of the Kingston Times, made 
postmaster at Kingston, Caldwell county. John A. 
Cannon was recommended forthisoffice by all 
the republican officials of Caldwell county, 
and by a majority of the republicans of the 
town. Cannon was originally appointed, but 
Filley succeeded in getting Clarkson to “hold 
him up,” and finally induced Clarkson to ap¬ 
point Spirely. It is understood that the 
Kingston republicans are imlignant, but Filley 
has his man in oflice. As long as the“old bluin’’ 
can stock the fourth-class offices there is no doubt of 
his ability to maintain his grip on. the machine .— 
Washington Dispatch to Sl. Louis Republic, Jan. 
17. 













S. QTJ^^T, 

Uiiilod Slates Senator and Cliairinan of the National Republican Coniinittee, Silent Under the Oharj^e of Einhezzleiiient 

hy Rejuitable Newspapers. 


The Ways and Means of the Snhjngation of a State by a Modern Ollice Raron. 


The Chrmiicle-Telegraph (re[)ul)lican) pub¬ 
lishes a long dispatch from Indiana, Penn., 
which throws some light upon the methods 
being pursued by Senator Quay’s friends to se¬ 
cure the delegation from that county for State 
Senator Delamaler for governor. The dispatch 
says: 

“The republicans of Indiana have discovered 
that Chairman Andrews of the state commit¬ 
tee, acting for Delama ter, has captured tem¬ 
porarily the Indiana republican county com¬ 
mittee, and is trying to seize the Indiana del¬ 
egation to the state convention, as he did that 
of Cambria. In December last Chairman An¬ 
drews saw County Chairman Langham. Mr. 
Langham was ordered to immediately create 
a Delamater boom in Indiana through the 
county committee members. Gossips say that 
he was amply provided with funds to pay the 
expenses of this campaign. Delamater ‘hus¬ 
tlers’ were set to work in every township. Not 
only was this accomplished with as much 
haste as possil)le, hut the county press was also 
secured. Within a ehort lime after Chairman 
Langham's liait to Piltrlmrgh several county papers 
published editoriaLs lauding Mr. Delamater. The 
Indiana Messenger toas offered the same thing and 
refused to print it, although the editor was informed 
by one of the Delamater managers that the other pa¬ 
pers had ‘ made a good thing out of it.' ”— Pitts¬ 
burgh Dispatch to New York Times, Feb. 26. 

* •» * 

No man ever entered upon the canvass for a 
nomination with more of the party machinery 
in harmony with his aspirations. Mr. Dela¬ 
mater has all the power and influence of the 
chairman of the national republican com¬ 
mittee, Colonel Quay, and of the chairman 
of the republican state committee, the Hon. 
William H. Andrews, who expects to suc¬ 
ceed Mr. Delamater, in the state senate. Both 
the United States senators from Pennsylvania 
are with him, as is Postmaster General Wan- 
amaker and all, save five, of the republi¬ 
can congressmen from this state. Add to 
the.se the thousands of postma.sters in Penn¬ 
sylvania, and the other thousands of census 
enumerators, and it will not be difficult to 
understand where Mr. Delamater gets his 
strength which he admittedly shows in every 
republican county convention that is held. 

It is no .secret that city and cross-roads postmas¬ 
ters and the great army of census takers in this 
state are being appointed, first, with a view to their 
political usefulness to Mr. Quay and Lis mpporters, 
and after that with regard to their fitness. This is 
true of all save Allegheny county, where con¬ 
gressman John Dalzell of the Twenty-second 
District made such a determined fight that Su- 
|)erintenden( Porter created a special census 
district, and the nomination of George T. Oli¬ 
ver to he supervisor was pushed through the 
senate in spite of the the written jjrotests of 


Senators Cameron and (^uay and Congressmen 
Bayne and Ray. 

Along with the power of the party machin¬ 
ery and party spoils, thus so graciously 
placed at the disposal of candidate Delama¬ 
ter, goes the control of nine out of every ten 
of the republican newspapers in the state, 
from the dignified Philadelphia Press anti In- 
(juirer and the Pittsburgh Commercial-Gazette 
down to the most oh.scure little journal in the 
backwoods towns of the Pennsylvania lumber 
regions. From editor Charles Fmory Smith, 
who is given the Russian mission at !fl2,500 
a year, on through the list iu every one of 
the sixty-seven counties of the commonwealth 
the newspaper people are kept singing the 
Delamater .song through promises and places 
political.— MeudviUe Dispatch to New York Times, 
March 16. 

» ■* -s 

The Chronicle-Telegraph (rep.) to <lay makes 
more charges of corrupt practices against W. 
II. Andrews, chairman of the republican state 
committee, and George W. Delamater, (Quay’s 
candidate for governor. It says; 

“In addition to the purcha.se of Cambria 
and other counties, it is now stated on good 
authority that the most open, shame-faced 
bribery was resorted to in .left’erson, and Chair¬ 
man Andrews, it is asserted, rode over that 
county, .accompanied hy the county chairman, 
and pul out the cash freely among the pur¬ 
chasable element.”— Pittsburgh Dispatch to New 
York Times, April 6. 

* * * 

Ten letter-carriers in the Pittsburgh post- 
office, which comes within the civil service 
law, have received this notice, dated April 12; 

“ You are hereby notified that your services 
will no longer be required as a carrier at the 
Pittsburg post-office after April 15. Respect¬ 
fully, James S. McKean, 

Postmaster.” 

Mr. McKean is tlie new republican post- 
ter and friend of Senator Quay. The dis¬ 
missed carriers are all democrats and have 
been in the service for some time. As the 
dismissals were apparently without cause, and 
clearly in violation of the civil service law, 
John C.avanaugh, one of the discharged car¬ 
riers, appeared before the postmaster and de¬ 
manded to know the why and wherefore. 

“I know nothing about it,” replied Mr. 
McKean. “ The orders came from Washing¬ 
ton and I am only carrying them out, as I am 
in duty hound to do.” 

lie did not say whether Mr. Quay or Mr. 
Wanamaker had sent the order. Mr. Cav¬ 
anaugh insisted upom' having something in 
explanation, and asked if charges had been 
made against him for any cause, but the post¬ 
master declared that he knew nothing what¬ 
ever as to the reasons for the discharges. There 
are some who suspect that the post-office influ¬ 


ence is to be used in securing delegates from 
Pittsburgh favorable to the candidacy of 
Quay’s friend Delamater for governor.— Pitts¬ 
burgh Dispatch to New York Times, April 14 . 

* 

The Republican, the most w’idely circulated 
paper in Schuylkill county, to-day prints the 
following savage attack upon Senator Quay’s 
candidate for governor ; 

“ George W. Delamater has been a selfish 
traitor to his party, and he has given proof of 
his fealty to the Standard Oil Comjiany. The 
story of his course on the anti-discrimination 
hill of 1887 is almost as had as that of his 
conduct on the Billingsley bill. The republi¬ 
can state convention of 1880 pledged the party 
to the p.assage of an anti-di.scrimination bill. 
Sul)sequently, on firet and second readings, 
this bill was supported by Delamater. On the 
night of March 10, 1887, Senators Delamater, 
Watres and McFarland were noticed in close 
consultation with Senators Wolverton, Ross, 
Ilemininger and other democratic leaders. 
Later in the night Delamater was accused of 
contemplating treachery to his party, and he 
confessed it. He said that eight republican 
senators, under the lead of himself and 
Watres, had agreed to vote with the democrats 
and defeat the anti-discrimination hill. 

“ When asked the rea.son he replied that he 
had been ignored by Senators Rey burn, George 
Handy Smith, Penrose, Rulan, Cooper, Mew- 
myer, Scott, Alexander, and other republican 
leaders. He declared that he intended to make 
him.self a leader even if he had to break up 
the party in the senate on an important stale 
measure. A member familiar with Delama- 
ter’s connections suggested that perhaps there 
was some way to reach him through the Stand¬ 
ard Oil Company. The lobby representative of 
the Standard said that Delamater was acting 
foolishly, and that he would fix the thing up. 
He did so. 

“A caucus of republican senators was in ses¬ 
sion when it was announced that Delamater 
was outside and wanted to see the leaders. 
These gentlemen were told by Delamater that 
he would vote for the anti-discrimination hill, 
provided they would promise that henceforth 
he should be regarded as one of the republi¬ 
can leaders and he consulted on all measures 
and questions of policy, and that the men to 
whom he talked should agree to oppose the 
Billingsley hill and help him defeat it. This 
was agreed to. Mr. Delmater voted for the 
anti-discrimination bill on the same day, de¬ 
serting Waters and the men to whom he had 
pledged himself the night before. The Stand¬ 
ard had influence enough to bring Delamater 
to terms when all other efforts failed.— Poits- 
ville Dispatch to New Yivk Times, April 22. 

^ » -* -» 

Detroit, Mich., May 7. —The following let¬ 
ter, addressed to a leading republican of De- 



















134 


TILE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


troit, was received yesterday and explains 
itself. Inclosed were a number of handsome 
certificates, suggestive of the most artistic 
hank paper, <lecorated with a neat ten dollar 
mark and having a coupon attached. The 
nse to which they are to be applied appears in 
the “ confidential ” communication. The let¬ 
ter is as follows: 

Washington, I>. C., April 30, 1800. 

My Dear Sir; Tlie republican national 
committee has established permanent head¬ 
quarters in this city, in order that the party’s 
interests throughout the nation may not be 
lost sight of between presidential elections. 
We have found many opportunities since the 
close of the campaign of 1888 to aid in 
strengthening the party organization in various 
sections of the country. * * 

I send you herewith a number of certifi¬ 
cates which illustrate this plan. I trust you 
may be able at an early day to place them 
with some of the zealous repiiblieans of your 
neighborhood. Please fill up the coupons 
with full name and addres.s, cut them ofi’, and 
return them to us with the !?I0 for each. All 
checks, money orders, etc., should be made 
payable to F. W. Leach, assistant secretary, 
who has charge of this branch of the work. 
A record will be kept of all the subscribers, who will 
be known as registered cnntrilmtors to the republican 
national committee. [It is stated that govern¬ 
ment employes are receiving intimations to 
buy a coui)on.] 

Believing you to be deeply interested in re¬ 
publican success and influential in the coun¬ 
cils of the party, I very earnestly ask you to 
assist us. If we can not invoke the aid and 
CO- operation of republicans of your standing 
and activity, upon whom can we depend? If 
you conclude that you can not help us, kindly 
return the certificates, in order that we may 
place them elsewhere. In such events, please 
name some one who, in your opinion, will be 
likely to aid us in the manner indicated. 
With the hope that your convenience may per¬ 
mit you to accord us an early response, I am^ 
very truly, yours, M. S. Quay. 

On the 4th of April, ex-State Senator Lewis 
Emery, in a speech in the opera house in Brad¬ 
ford, charged Senator Delamater (Quay’s can¬ 
didate for governor) with perjwy in taking the 
oath of office and stating that he had not used cor- 
nipt means to gain his election ; with accepting a 
bribe to the amount of $05,000 to defeat the Bill- 
ingsly bill, and with forging the names of a confer¬ 
ence committee of the legislature, which had never 
been appointed, to a report in the interest of the 
Standard Oil Company. Senator Emefry made the 
charges specifically, and challenged prosecution or 
arrest. Senxdor Delamater said, in response to the 
challenge, “ / wUl cany Emery's men county for 
ym'crnor. That is my answer." — Ne%v York Times, 
May 10. 

* » * 

The managing editor of the Pittsburgh Chron¬ 
icle Telegraph (rep.) to day telegraphs his paper 
as follows, from Meadville, Pa.: “ State Chair¬ 
man W. H. Andrews, is trying to get into the 
state senate, and his canvass is being con¬ 


ducted in his usual style, through political 
boodlers. Andrews has said he is willing to 
spend $20,000 to get the state senatorship, and 
he is in a fair way to do it now. 

“ In this highly laudable mi.ssionary work 
the rej)ublican state chairman is ably assisted 
by his two brothers, who live on the crumbs 
that fall when the state chairman makes a 
grab. There is one big wave of disgust sweep¬ 
ing over the county at the methods of these 
three men. Charles Andrews does the township 
distribution of cash prize and W. E. Andrews 
helps distribute part of the time and also runs 
a funny little ‘patent-outside’ daily paper 
in Meadville. This paper has so little weight 
that the state chairman does not depend upon 
it. La.st week he bought a semi-weekly, ed¬ 
ited by a man named Keisinger, ami filled it 
full of puffs for himself and denunciations of 
everybody else. Reisingerfor months has abused 
Andrews in a most vigor mis manner, hut in consid- 
eratimi of a promise of the Meadville post-office and 
a couple of hundred dollars he sold out his entire 
stock of vituperation and hattery. 

“Chairman Andrews is running a boodle 
campaign on the platform, ’If you don’t elect 
me, W. L. Scott will be sent to the United 
States senate.’ Some people say that there is 
more danger from Scott with Andrews in the 
senate than out of it. 

“ Candidate Andrews three weeks ago sent 
for Messrs. Brown and Potter, candidates for 
the legislative nomination. The senatorial 
candidate produced a written agreement for 
the legislative candidates to sign. It was set 
forth in this that Andrews and his brother 
would agree to stop fighting Brown and Pot¬ 
ter and support them if they would agree to 
vote for any candidate for United States sena¬ 
tor whom W. II. Andrews would name. 
Brown and Potter indignantly refused to enter 
into any agreement, and the chairman threat¬ 
ened all sorts of things. Does this mean that 
Andrews intends to get members of the next 
legislature in shape so as to sell them to Scott 
or some other boodler? It certainly looks 
like it.”— Pittsburgh Dispatch to New York Times, 
June 2. 

* -» * 

The Chronicle-Telegraph (republican and an¬ 
ti Delamater) on Wednesday printed a three- 
column dispatch from Bradford tending to 
show that the Standard Oil Company and the 
democracy have joined forces to secure a De¬ 
lamater delegation from McKean county to 
the republican state convention. The dispatch 
is signed by Parker L. Walter, the managing 
editor of the Chronicle-Telegraph, who boldly 
charges that “open bribery and wholesale cor¬ 
ruption ” are being resorted to by the friends 
of Senator Delamater, both to secure a delega¬ 
tion favorable to him and to crush the ambi¬ 
tious spirit of ex State Senator Lewis Emery, 
Jr., who has attacked Mr. Delamater and now 
seeks congressional honors. 

The writer says that immediately after Em¬ 
ery’s now famous speech, “Chairman Andrews 
decided to carry the delegates of McKean 
county for Delamater at any cost.” To this 


end “he devoted himself to forming the federal office¬ 
holders into battall ions, at the same time openly 
and flagrantly purchasing the influence of men 
here and there who up to this time were out¬ 
spoken in the cause of Secretary of the Com¬ 
monwealth Stone. The main body of the 
army was composed of employes of the United 
Pipe lines and workmen in every branch of 
ihe oil business who could be influenced by 
the Standard and democratic politicians.” 

The disj)atch continues: “In all his curi¬ 
ously indecent political career chairman An¬ 
drews has never been more shameless in open 
bribery than in this contest in McKean. 
Money has been scattered into every nook in 
the county, and where money would not do 
federal offices, promises of patronage or threats 
have been used by Anthony Bannon, the 
Delamater-Andrews representative in Mc¬ 
Kean.” The writer says Bannon gave Benja¬ 
min Thornton and P. II. Friel money to use in 
Delamater’s interest, and acting for Bannon. 
Eu.ssell McAllister gave money to a colored 
man named Rutherford and to B. D. Pait. 
The dispatch says: “A man named Bickford 
was disabled while working for the United 
Pipe lines. He is a Delamater-Watson dele¬ 
gate, and says that if elected he has the prom¬ 
ise of general superintendent Daniel O’Day 
that he will have back pay for the time he has 
been unable to work, and will in future draw 
a pension from the Standard. O. M. Coe, of 
Tarport, was a warm Stone and Emery man. 
He was made census enumeratm', and is now work- 
ing for Delamater, and Watson Davis, postmaster 
of Kane, is working as a Delamater delegate, as is 
the editor of the Eldred Eagle, who is a candidate 
for census enumerator. Komitz, postmaster at La¬ 
fayette Corners; Beaunmit, postmaster at Alton, 
and Kerns, postmaster at Smethport, are far Dela¬ 
mater. Promises of work for drillers and other 
oil men are offered in the name of the Stand¬ 
ard in return for Delamater-Watson support.” 
—Pittsburgh Dispatch to New York Times, May G. 

■» * 

All the recent contests for the election of 
delegates have been unfavorable to Mr. Dela¬ 
mater, his defeat in Chester county at the pri¬ 
maries on Saturday last, by the Hastings 
forces, being particularly disastrous. But it is 
announced that Mr. Quay—who will go into 
the state convention as a substitute delegate— 
intends to .secure Mr. Delamater’s nomination, 
and we have no doubt this statement will 
prove true, unless between this and the 25th 
Mr. (^uay should have still more evidence of 
the certainty of a “Folger disaster” to fol¬ 
low such a course, and so be driven to a safer 
policy. 

The Washington correspondents all assure 
us that the convention will be easily in Mr. 
(Quay’s control. The correspondent of the 
Philadtlphia Ledger, quoting “a republican 
who is prominent in the councils of the party 
in Pennsylvania,” and who believes General 
Hastings will get the nomination, states that 
this prominent republican said : “Of one thing 
ymi may be certain, and that is, the convention will 
be controlled by Mr. Quay.” And the corre¬ 
spondent of the Press, saying that there is a 
variety of opinion as to what will be done, de¬ 
clares that “all agree, hmvevcr, that the conven¬ 
tion will be beyond all dispute in the hands of 
Quay’s friends, and that the power as well as the 
responsibility of making the ticket will be his.” 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


135 


Among tlie luiiiiber of respectable citizens 
who have signed the letter to Mr. Delamater 
there must be many, we have no doubt, who 
are ignorant of the relation which he holds 
to Mr. Quay’s political operations, and of the 
contract with that individual on which his 
candidacy rests. They must be unaware, 
also, we should presume, of the charges which 
have been brought against this aspirant for 
the governorship, in connection with his elec¬ 
tion to the state senate in 1880. Mr. Lewis 
Emery, Jr., recently state senator from Mc¬ 
Kean county, in a })ublic speech at Bradford 
over two months ago, exhibited documents 
which he said were proof that Mr. Delamater 
had secured his election by means of bribery, 
and then had bribed persons to silence who 
were about to disclose the facts. It followed, 
of course, that in taking the oath of office, on 
assuming a seat in the senate he had sworn 
falsely that he had not used any corrupt means 
to secure election. These charges Mr. Emery 
declared he ivas ready to sustain in court if Mr. 
Delamater would bring suit against him for slander, 
and up to the present time the latter gentleman has 
not either brought such a suit, or even, made a distinct 
denial of the impeachment. The Philadelphia 
Press, several weeks ago, called on him to 
make a denial, and assured him that his fail¬ 
ure to do so would be a serious injury to his 
standing, but Mr. Delamater has nevertheless 
maintained silence. 

The efforts of Mr. Quay to help the candi¬ 
dacy of Mr. Wallace, and so diminish the risk 
of running Mr. Delamater, have become very 
generally perceptible now, even to the ordi¬ 
nary observer, and the daily journals have 
contained many interesting details pointing 
out the why and wherefore of the case. Appar¬ 
ently, the democratic masses’hare perceived the in¬ 
terest which the republican boss has in giving them 
a candidate, and the result of several recent 
county contests has been in tbe direction of 
another than Mr. Wallace. Blair county, in 
which a snaj) judgment had been taken, and 
the choice of the voters reversed (after the 
fashion of Mr. Delamater’s work in Cambria), 
has been corrected by a county convention, in 
wbich the Wallace men found themselves an 
insignificant faction, and in Cambria, which 
they had counted on with the greatest confi¬ 
dence, they were also in a minority. Both 
these counties elected delegates for Mr. Patti- 
son. In Chester county the feeling for Mr. 
Pattison was so strong as to be practically 
unanimous. 

The delegates chosen to the convention are 
not, like those who met at Harrisburg last 
year, simply a party of Mr. Quay’s political 
followers, told off for this business. On the 
contrary a majority of them have been elected 
upon an understanding more or less positive 
that they would oppose the nomination—of 
Mr. Delamater—which it was well known Mr. 
Quay desired to have made. * *' * 

It follows, therefore, that if Mr. Quay is to 
have the complete control which is ascribed 
to him ; if he is to have power to nominate 


Mr. Delamater or to defeat him, it must be be¬ 
cause he will be able to use in his own inter¬ 
ests delegates who have been chosen for a dif¬ 
ferent purpose. It must be that he can employ 
some })ersuasive to induce them to desert the 
candidates for whom they have been chosen, 
and to support a candidate whom they were 
particularly expected to oppose. * * * 

What is the power that Mr. Quay is thought to 
huvef Why should a majority of the republican 
conventum of Pennsylrunia, assembling under cir¬ 
cumstances which especially call for personal indepen 
dence and political courage, be regarded us certain 
to seivilely follow whatever orders Mr. Quay may 
issue ? Obmously enough, this inlluence conies from 
the supposed gift to him of the federal patronage of 
Pennsylvania. * * Is it, then, Mr. Harrison’s 

purpose to further this business? Does he 
mean still to back Mr. Quay in Pennsylvania? 
Will he assure Mr. Quay that whatever prom¬ 
ises he may make of federal appointments will 
be faithfully carried out at Washington? 

We desire to say to the President that every 
further step he takes in company with Mr. 
Quay and his following will be another step 
on the road to political disaster.— 2'he Ameri 
can, June I 4 . 


Executive Mniision, Wjishingtoii, I). C., 
July 14, ISSG.—To the Heads of Depart' 
lueiits ill the Service of the (leiieral (»ov- 
eruineut: I deem this a proper time to 
especially warn all subordinates in the 
several departments and all ollice-holders 
under the general government against tlie 
use of their otlicial positions in attempts 
to control political movements in their 
localities. 

Office-holders are tlie agents of the peo¬ 
ple, not their masters. Not only is their 
time and labor due to the government, but 
they should scrupously avoid in their polit¬ 
ical action, as well as in the discharge of 
their official duty, offending by a display 
of obtrusive ]>artisanshi|) their neighbors 
who have relations with them as public 
officials. 

They should also constantly remember 
that their parly friends from whom they 
have received jircferment have not in¬ 
vested them with the power of arbitrarily 
managing their political affairs. They have 
no right, as office-holders, to dictate the 
political action of their parly associates, 
or to throttle freedom of action within 
party Hues by methods and jiractices which 
prevent every useful and Justiliable pur- 
l>ose of party organization. 

The inlluence of the federal ollicc-hold- 
ers should not be felt in the manipulation 
of political primary meetings and nomi¬ 
nating conventions. The use by these of- 
licials of their positions to compass their 
selection as delegates to political conven¬ 
tions is indecent and unfair, and proper 
regard for the [irojirieties and require¬ 
ments of official jilace will also prevent 
their assuming the active conduct of polit¬ 
ical campaigns. 


Individual interests and activity in jiolit- 
ical affairs are by no means comiemned. 
Office-holders are neither disfranchised 
nor forbidden the exercise of political 
privileges, nor is their duty to the parly 
increased to pernicious activity by office¬ 
holding. A just discrimination in this re¬ 
gard between the things a citizen may 
properly do and the purpose for which a 
public officer should not be used is easy iu 
the light of a coi’rect appreciation of the 
relation between the people and those in¬ 
trusted with official place, and a consider¬ 
ation of the necessity under our form of 
government of political action free from 
political coercion. 

You are requested to communicate the 
substance of these views to those for whose 
guidance they are intended.—(Jrover 
Cleveland. 

Approved by Poslmaster General Wana- 

maker, April 25, 1890. 

—The republican state convention met in 
Augusta (Me.) June 12. The chairman was the 
postmaster of Augusta. A dispatch to the 
New York Times slates that nearly all the fed¬ 
eral office-holders of the state were present as 
delegates. 

—Formal complaint has been made to Post¬ 
master-General Wanamaker that the post- 
offices in the twenty-third congressional dis¬ 
trict are being used to further the nomination 
of Col. Thomas M. Bayne for an eighth term 
in congress. Col. Bayne’s competitor is George 
Shiras, a young lawyer, who is pushing the 
veteran pretty hard. The letter of complaint 
says: 

The postmaster of Allegheny, the assistant post¬ 
master, the subordinates already appointed, and 
those assured of position are standing as primary 
delegates for the present congressional incumbent. 
Iu every borough and township the postmasters are 
either delegates or have expressly stated that they 
are responsible for the eleeiion of delegates favor¬ 
able to the renomination of the incumbent. So bit¬ 
ter has the feeling become tliat tlie parly is in serious 
danger of disruption, simply and solely by rea.son of 
federal dictation. Personal friends of Mr. Shiras, as 
they daily witness the aggressive and offensive ac¬ 
tivity of Postmaster Gilliland, of Allegheny, and his 
subordinates are overcome with distrust iu regard to 
the safety and wisdom of using the post ollice for 
even the most ordinary purposes. Wiih the incum¬ 
bent using the post office as his private headquarters 
the mistrust of this so called public institution is 
not exactly without reason.—Pif/s&?rrp/i Dispatch to 
New York Times, May '25. 

—Naval Officer Willis professed great .vurpi-ise at 
the mention of Collins’ name. “/ left Washington 
last night,” he said, “ and I had talked a great deal 
about this subject, but there was no Collins in it .”— 
Brooklyn post office fight. May IG. 

—Secretary Tracy favors Wm. G. Taylor 
because his selection would help Kobert 1). 
Benedict in bis desire to become Congressman 
Wallace’s successor. All the news that comes 
from Washington is favorable to Mr. Taylor, 
but his closest friends do not care to stale pos¬ 
itively that be will be. selected. Naval Officer 
Willis, who has been working hard for Mr. Taylor, 
thinks that the selection will be made within a 
few days, but he declined yesterday to say 
whether Taylor would get the prize or not.— 
New York Times, May 26. 

















136 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


— Mr. Hill’s poslmasler here, Geo. F. Bucher, 
has beat about the county, and he says the county 
delegation will be instructed for Hitt. The 
towns of Wysox, York, Rock Creek, Shannon, 
Savanna, Washington, Woodland and Free¬ 
dom will send Ilitt delegates to the county 
convention, and this, he insists, will insure 
the county for Hitt. What Mr. Rucher con¬ 
siders a test of the Hitt sentiment was made in 
Lanark this spring. Levi T. Bray, member 
of the last state assembly, ran for supervisor 
of Lanark and was badly beaten. Bray was 
the principal backerof H. I). Dennis, applicant 
for the post-ofKce at Lanark. The post-office 
was given to Maj. Geo. A. Root, in conse¬ 
quence of which Bray is against Hitt. Post¬ 
master Bucher says it was Hitt’s friends who 
snowed Bray under for supervisor.— Leila' to 
Chicayo Herald from Carroll on Congressman Hill’s 
renomination, May 23. 

— The ■poslmasler, A. W. Harlong, has started 
out to see tvhal he can do for his boss through the 
county. The soreheads here say they will see 
to it that an anti-Hitt delegation goes from 
their town to the county convention. They 
may and they may not be able to do this.— 
Letter to Chicago Herald from Rochelle on Con¬ 
gressman’s Hill’s renomination. May 20. 

At the annual meeting of the Maryland 
Civil Service Reform Association, held May 
27, among others, the following resolutions 
were passed : 

Resolved, That llie disposal of federal patronage 
through congressmen and senators is a grave abuse, 
subversive of the constitutional distinction between 
the executive and legi.slative departments of thegov- 
cinnient; and we especially protest against and de- 
pU)re the course of ITesident Harrison in submitting 
his appointments in Tennsylvania to the dictation of 
a man who makes no defense when charged by re¬ 
sponsible citizens and newspapers with participation 
in the criminal mi-appropriation of public money. 

Resolved, That the use of public ollice for the pur¬ 
pose of paying partisan and personal political debts 
is immoral, and it is to be classed with the misuse 
and misappropriation of all other public property. 

The Civil Service Reform Association, of 
Missouri, held its ninth annual meeting June 
7. From the excellent report of Mr. Charles 
Chitlin Allen, of the executive committee, we 
(jiiote: 

The administration of the classified service under 
the maiiageraenl of the j>resent civil service com- 
mi-ssion has been admirable. The commission itself, 
led by Mr. Roo.sevelt, has showu an energy and ac¬ 
tivity ii the performance of the duties, hitherto un¬ 
equaled. Its supervision of the service, its quick¬ 
ness to investigate all reported abuses and to correct 
them when proved, and its improvement in the prac¬ 
tical character of examinations, have placed the re¬ 
form system uuou a firmer footing than it has ever 
held. 

In the non cla-ssified service all is chaos. Whole¬ 
sale removals and ai)pointments constitute a con¬ 
glomerate mass, in which it is impo-ssible to discrim¬ 
inate between the deserved and the undeserved. 


The civil service reform association of New¬ 
ton, Mass., whose president is Rev. Henry Lam¬ 
bert, is an object lesson to various other sec¬ 
tions of the country. It has a membership of 
several hundred, and it is thoroughly alive to 
its duty. Mr. Clarkson’s recent crafty pro¬ 
testation of the patriotism and Americanism 
inherent in spoilsmen was an irritant that 
provoked an effective demolition at the hands 
of Charles Theodore Russell, Jr., the late 
democratic candidate for governor. 


RECENT EXAMPLES OF THE MERIT 
SYSTEM. 

Gen. James M. Warner, postmaster at 
Albany, New York, has been enforcing the 
civil service law. He found among the clerks 
and carriers twelve men who had remained 
through the administration of Dr. O’Leary 
from the itrevious rejiublican administration. 
At the end of the first two years of Dr. 
O’Leary’s term there were twenty-nine repub¬ 
licans. Gen. Warner has now in the force 
under him not to exceed thirty democrats. 
This made the spoilsmen beside themselvts 
and the republican general committee of 
Albany county passed resolutions asking for 
his removal. When they found the post¬ 
master calmly going about his business in the 
teeth of their resolutions, they got panic- 
stricken and failed to forward them. 

The appointment of Mr. Ryan as superin¬ 
tendent of the New England division of the 
railway mail service was in accordance with 
•Mr. Bigelow’s dying wish that his capable as¬ 
sistant should be his successor. Spencer W. 
Shepardson, chief clerk of the various lines 
in tlie first division, has been appointed to the 
position made vacant by the promotion of Mr. 
Ryan. The latter has been in the railway 
mail service about twenty one years, during 
twelve years of which he fias been chief clerk 
of the first division. Mr. Shepardson has 
been in the service over seventeen years. 


W. H. Lamb has been ajjpointed superin¬ 
tendent of mails at St. Louis. Mr. Lamb is 
at present engaged in the office of the division 
superintendent of the railway mail service at 
this place, and is among the oldest employes 
of the postal department now stationed in St. 
Louis. He entered the service in the far 
western country seventeen years ago as a route 
agent, and was regularly promoted to second 
clerk, and then clerk in charge of a car, which 
position he held until 1882, when he resigned 
to accept his luesent situation in the local su¬ 
perintendent’s office. The place to which Mr. 
Lamb has just been appointed is the one so 
long filled by Maj. J. B. Harlow, prior to his 
selection as postmaster last January. 

William P. Campbell, of Illinois, has been 
appointed assistant general superintendent of 
the railway mail service, under the law re¬ 
cently passed creating that office, and Mr. Al¬ 
exander Grant, of Michigan, has been ap¬ 
pointed chief clerk to the general superin¬ 
tendent of the railway mail service. Both 
Mr. Campbell and Mr. Grant have for many 
years occupied prominent positions in this 
service, and are regarded as men of excep¬ 
tional ability and fitness for the positions to 
which they have been apfwinted. Mr. Camp¬ 
bell has been longest in the service, and was 
directly in the line of promotion for the posi¬ 
tion to which he has been appointed. 

THE MORALS OF CIVIL SERVICE 
REFORM. 

The first objection to the spoils system is that 
under it the offices are little better than a vast 
aggregation of bribes for party workers, and 
that they thus constitute a huge corruption 
fund, tbe dispensing of which belongs to the 
party for the time being in the ascendant. 
“ The promise of an office, whether express or 
implied, as an inducement to a man to vote or 
work in an election, is as real a bribe as so 
many dollars in hand paid ; with this distinc¬ 
tion, however, that it is a much worse form of 
bribery. It is so for two reasons : it is a prom¬ 
ise to pay what does not belong to him who 
promises, and its effect, when fulfilled, is, or 


may be, to put a corrupt matt into the service 
of his country.” The federal civil service costs 
the country in salaries altogether $00,000,000. 
Of this compensation the recipients of about 
one-half come now happily under the reform 
law, but $30,000,000 remain attached to offices 
not so jirotected. Who can estimate the evil 
to the bribe-giver and the bribe-taker thus 
rendered possible? And, further :^when it be¬ 
came recognized that a congressman might pay 
those who worked for his election by places 
under government, and there were not enough 
such places to go around (as there never 
are), the next step was to make places, 
i. put upon the pay-rolls of a bureau or de- 
jtartment more names and employ more per¬ 
sons than were necessary to do the work in 
order to satisfy increased demands. At one 
period since tlie war there were more than 
1 ,r>00 such in the treasury department alone. 
Two-thirds of those employed in the bureau 
of printing and engraving at this time were 
found by a congressional committee of inves¬ 
tigation to be supertluous, and the annual ap¬ 
propriation was, in consequence, reduced with¬ 
out interfering with its efficiency, from eight 
to two hundred thousand dollars. This bu¬ 
reau has now long been under civil service 
rules, and is one of the purest and best or¬ 
dered in Washington. 

Another objection to the patronage system is 
its grievous injuslice. It is an inheritance from 
the days of feudalism, and an abuse which 
they set about reforming in the mother 
country about the time it was first rooting 
itself here. When the great reform laws, be¬ 
ginning in 1882, gradually admitted the mass 
of the English people to suffrage, they quickly 
began to .show their appreciation of exclusive 
|)rivilege and to reorganize their civil service, 
though radical change dates only from 1853. 
Now the son of the peer and the son of the [teas- 
ant, irrespective of politics, has an equal 
chance to gain admission to the service of his 
country. ® * How dillerent,except in the clas¬ 
sified service, is the case with us! We delude 
ourselves with the idea that here all men are 
free and equal, and that we have eliminated 
old abuses, whereas we tolerate some of the 
gravest that ever existed. One of these is the 
practical exclusion, sometimes for a long term 
of years, from a chance to earn a living in 
public employment of one-half our population ; 
that is, all, however worthy, who do not hap¬ 
pen to belong to the same party as the Presi¬ 
dent ; and, indeed, all of that party who can 
not command inlluonce with the appointing 
power. * * 

The last evil of the spoils sy.stem which we 
have room to particularize is its heartlessness. 
Men who would shrink from taking the bread 
out of the mouth of the widow and orphan, 
or of depriving a man with dependent family 
of his only means of support, in any other 
way, will do their utmost on a change of ad¬ 
ministration to get, and will even make merry 
over getting a postmastership the loss of 
which amounts to this, and that, too, when 
the office is really not needed. “ One of the 
winning party is bound to have it,” it is said, 
“ why should not I be the man ?” Such is the 
brutalizing tendency of the system, and it is 
the system far more than the individual in 
such a case that is to be blamed. Justice, de¬ 
cency and humanity alike are set at naught by 
the inexorable spirit of spoils-mongering. A 
poor widow in California last year out of the 
salary of a fourth class post-office supported 
herself, two children, and an aged father and 
mother. She gave entire satisfaction to the 
peoide, and was assured before his election of 
the favor of the congressmen. When elected, 
bowever, the place was necessary to assist in 
paying his political debts, and she was, with 
scant ceremony, dismissed.—L. M. Blackford, 
in the Virginia Seminary Magazine for June. ’ 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


For siile at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Penusylvania St , Indianapolis. Published monthly. Publication ollicc, No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, 
Ind., where sul>scriptions and advertisements will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


Voii. I, No. 17. 


INDIANAPOLIS, JULY, 1890. 


T'E'RMC! • J ^ cents per annum, 
jlo • 5 cents per copy. 


August 1, the Battle Ground Camp 
Meeting Association, at Battle Ground, 
will be addressed in the forenoon by the 
various political candidates of that section, 
and in the afternoon by the Rev. A. C. 
Van Anda, of Indianapolis, on “ Purity 
of the Ballot,” and by Lucius B. Swift, of 
Indianapolis, on civil service reform. 

At the recent republican convention of 
this county the chairman, Mr. C. W. Fair¬ 
banks, said: 

The republican party of Marion county rarely has 
had a better opportunity to render signal service to 
itself and to the people. There is a demand that the 
vast allairs of this county shall be managed on a 
strictly business basis and that they shall not be pros¬ 
tituted to |)i-omoting the interests of any imlitical 
party. They shall be conducted according to the 
most conservative and economical methods to the 
end that the best service shall be rendered at the 
least cost. 

This sounds exceedingly well, but it is 
still a question how far these ideas would 
lire vail in case of reimblican success. The 
republicans, through a republican super¬ 
intendent, now control the fire department 
of the city, and the chief has the nomina¬ 
tion of men for appointment. There are 
twelve vacancies, and he can not agree 
with the council as to what men shall have 
them. Some time ago this paper suggest¬ 
ed a X)lan by which he could throw open 
these vacancies to competition, but up 
comes the Indianapolis Jnurnid, which has 
for years been, on pajier, a supporter of the 
merit system, and says that the proposal is 
not feasible in practice. It is entirely feas¬ 
ible in practice and practice has so proved 
it. The Journal knows this well enough, 
but there are twelve places in the fire de 
partment which hungry workers want. 

Both parties have this year an opportu¬ 
nity to i)rove the sincerity of their profes¬ 
sions, many times expressed, of opposition 
to the spoils system. Our state civil serv¬ 
ice, by reason of the increase in the num¬ 
ber of state institutions, has become large. 
It is with rare exceptions used as party 
spoil. We have four large institutions for 
the insane, two prisons, a home for feeble¬ 
minded children, a soldiers’ orphan home, 
an institute for the deaf and dumb, a school 
for the blind, and so on. It is a disgrace 
that party politics sliould control the ad¬ 
ministration of these institutions. The 
taxes do not furnish money sufficient to 


keep the state government going. Before 
increasing the levy would it not be well to 
try the transaction of the state business 
upon a business basis? Here is a great 
work for either jiarty to undertake. Be¬ 
fore a voter votes for a candidate for the 
general assembly, he should find out how 
the candidate stands on this matter. 


The readers of the Chronicle will be 
interested to learn that Congressman Hitt’s 
postmasters pulled him through, and that 
Charlie Works so feelingly alluded to in 
the various letters and reported interviews 
with the workers printed in the Chronicle 
some months since, was the man to nom¬ 
inate him. Congressman Hitt is far above 
the average congressman. His instincts 
are toward a state of aflairs where a man 
will not be debauched himself, nor de¬ 
bauch his constituents by elections secured 
by spoil. 


Senator John S. Wirt, a democrat of 
Maryland, spoke recently to the Alumni 
of St. John’s College upon “The Relation 
of the Alumni of St. John’s as Men of Lib¬ 
eral Education to the Civil Service Reform 
Movement.” The address is an admirable 
one and is printed in the Civil Service lie- 
former for July. A single extract will show 
that there was no vagueness nor uncer¬ 
tainty in what he said, nor any belittling 
of the evil: 

“I know of no single cause in our history which 
lias eontributeil more to dwarf the mental and moral 
stature of our public men, and more encouraged 
venality and .servility in lho.se engaged in the pub¬ 
lic service, while it has lowered the whole moral 
tone of the nation. To make the skillful and cor¬ 
rupt maniimlation of patronage almost the sole 
(lualification for political station must, with occa¬ 
sional exceptions, produce a class of public men 
who are neither disposed nor able to deal with pub¬ 
lic quest ions with a view to the iiermanent interests 
of the country. 


The BuiFdlo civil service reform associa¬ 
tion held its annual meeting June 25, and 
received ninety-nine new members. This 
association is remarkable in two respects. 
It has the public hearty sympathy and 
co-operation of the labor associations of the 
city, and of several of the most prominent 
of the Catholic clergymen. Father 
Cronin’s speech is reported to have been 
particularly brilliant, and it was repeated¬ 
ly applauded enthusiastically. 


PosTMA.STER Johnson, of Baltimore, has 
made numerous removals of clerks and 
carriers, and charges have been filed with 
the civil service commission. Mr. John 
C. Rose was appointed supervisor of the 
census for Baltimore. This enabled the 
civil service commission to put him on the 
local examining board. There is now the 
opportunity to look into Postmaster 
Johnson’s methods. The system of having 
a local board made up of a postmaster’s 
employes, but who are supposed to act in 
entire independence of him, is an anom¬ 
aly and vicious in its effects. In view of 
Postmaster Johnson’s apparent attempt to 
construct a political and personal machine 
it is well that Mr. Roosevelt has again 
stepped in to foil the attempt by a notice 
in the Baltimore Sun, inviting demo¬ 
crats to compete and assuring all of 
fair treatment. While Mr. Rose is a mem¬ 
ber of the local board the operations of the 
law will be conducted with absolute fair¬ 
ness. He is an experienced and skillful 
hand at ballling Baltimore law breakers. 


DR. JENCKES AND THE MUGWUMP. 

Rev. Joseph S. Jenckes, of St. Paul’s Epis¬ 
copal church of this city, recently closed a 
criticism of Bishop Potter with the remark 
that he (Potter) was a mugwump, and that he 
(Jenckes) respected republicans and demo¬ 
crats, but that politically he could have no 
respect for a mugwump. A mugwump is a 
man who believes he can get certain princi¬ 
ples worked into laws, or certain laws, al¬ 
ready enacted, enforced, or better administra¬ 
tion by public officers by voting direct for the 
men who are for the time being most likely to 
accomplish one or all of these objects rather 
than by wearing the collar of a party ma¬ 
chine, which is in these times kept together, 
not by princii)les but by nothing but the sj)oil 
of office, and which intends, except under 
great pre.ssure, to put forward to be voted for 
uo man who can, if elected, interfere with its 
daily loot. His freedom permits him often to 
render the public a valuable service by voting 
against a tainted candidate. 

Even his range of choice is often too narrow 
for the making up of a respectable ticket. 

The coming election in Pennsylvania affords 
a great field of operations for voters of this 
class. The present dictator of that state is 
Senator Quay. The result of republican suc¬ 
cess would be to extend his power. He ha.s 































138 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


been charged by respectable people of great 
financial responsibility with having taken 
some hundreds of thousands of dollars from 
the treasury of the state and used it in j)rivale 
speculation. He does not deny the charge, 
and those who make it say that they are ready 
to prove it. His candidate for governor, l)el- 
amater, is also charged with the crime of 
bribery, which his accuser offers to i)rove in 
court. Other charges of a grave nature are 
made against both of these men. Both are si¬ 
lent. We should like to ask Dr. Jenckeswhat 
he would advise a citizen of Pennsylvania to 
do under the circumstances? Ought he to read 
the charges, and if so, ought he to give them 
any weight? If he became convinced they 
were true, ought he to vote to sustain Quay, 
and if not, ought he to vote to defeat the Quay 
regime, even though by so doing lie should be 
classed as a mugwump? Will Dr. Jenckes 
say that a man may put his conscience into 
the keejiing of another and that since 
President Harrison and Mr. Wanamaker do 
not denounce Quay and Delamater, he may 
therefore excuse himself from investigation? 

If we have misunderstood his meaning, what 
does Dr. Jenckes mean by saying that politi¬ 
cally he has no respect for a mugwump? 


THE AMERICAN OFFICIAL CLASS. 

A BRIEF BIOGRAPHY. 

Eugene Saulcy, of this city, is an interesting 
example of the present spoils system which 
seeks to perfietuate itself by crying out that 
any other system would give rise to an office¬ 
holding class. He first appears in the city 
directory in 1873 as a laborer. In 1874 he 
was not enrolled, but in 1875 he was put down 
as barkeeper for C. McGroarty. In 1870 and 
1877 he does not appear. In 1878 he appears 
as bartender for Harry McFarland, the pres¬ 
ent notorious emidoye of the printing office at 
Washington. In 1879 Saulcy ajipears as bar¬ 
tender. In 1880 he was turnkey at the cen¬ 
tral i)olice station. In 1881 he held the same 
place. In 1882 he was clerk to the chief of 
police. In 1883 he held the same place. In 
1884, 1885 and 1886 he was city assessor. In 
1887 he is called a clerk, and was in fact in 
the assessor’s office. In 1888 he was clerk in 
the assessor’s office. In 1889 he had no occu¬ 
pation. He was then waiting for a federal 
position. This did not come, and he again 
took a place as clerk in the assessor’s office at, 
we understand, two dollars a day. Later he 
became a deputy in the office of the collector 
of internal revenue, in which office he still 
holds a place with emoluments amounting to 
about $1,200 a year. 

The question was put to an ex chairman of 
the republican county committee, why Saulcy 
always had a “ place,” and the answer came 
instantly, “ Because he is the best organizer 
in Marion county.” In this answer is the ex¬ 
planation of the use to which a vast number 
of state and federal officers are put. Saulcy 
has been all these years literally a party- 
worker. At the primaries, as a delegate to 


conventions, as committee man, as secretary 
of the county committee, and in other similar 
capacities, he has plied liis trade. The places 
he has held were his pay. Ilis pay has not 
always been prompt. For instance, the place 
he now holds was only vacated and turned 
over to him after an earnest and almost threat¬ 
ening demand by a large crowd of those who 
had a high esteem for Saulcy’s abilities as a 
party-worker, and on this ground the place 
was demanded and given. He is a perfect 
specimen of our large American official class 
who owe and acknowledge no allegiance ex¬ 
cept to the ))arty machine. 


PENNSYLVANIA. 

The coming election in Penn.sylvania is a 
matter of grave concern. It is Mahone and 
Virginia over again, but on a larger scale and 
of greater importance. It is not necessary to 
repeat that (^uay now holds the government 
x)f Pennsylvania, both state and national, 
firmly by the throat; he keeps his hold by 
means already fully set out in these columns. 
He does not, and »an not, deny that he stole 
large amounts of money from the treasury of 
his state, and he is in the ordinary acceptation 
of the term, a thief. The fact that he has 
since been chosen to high offices does not in 
the least take away the stain of his crime, nor 
the disgrace of the respectable people of his 
state who now support him. If he succeeds 
in the coming election the stain will remain 
and the disgrace will be doubled. The cor¬ 
ruption which the spoils system has worked 
among the people of Pennsylvania, is power¬ 
fully illustrated by the fact that a great body 
of honest people who believe in sending 
thieves to prison, propose to smother their 
honest principles and do what they can to 
help (iuay through, notwithstanding his 
crime. President Harrison is in the attitude of 
working side by side with (^uay, and with them 
Postmaster-General Wanamaker. They have 
turned the federal service in Pennsylvania 
over to (^uay. As with Mahone in Virginia, 
every good citizen ought to hope that they 
will here also meet with a stinging, over¬ 
whelming and disgraceful defeat. It is not 
sure that they will; but it is sure they can not 
afford to win. For to do so, would be the tri¬ 
umph of the wicked. Henry C. Lea thus 
warns his party : 

Fellow republicans, a vindication truly is needed 
at the coming election, but it i.s not the vindication 
of tainted i)oliticians who dare not vindicate them¬ 
selves. You are called upon to vindicate your own 
tnanhood, to vindicate the lionesty of your own 
party, to vindicate the honor of your own state. 
You are called upon show that you do not wear the 
collar of .Mr. Quay; that your votes are not to be 
bought and .sold by the manipulation of patronage, 
and that you are not to be driven to the polls like 
cattle to make good the bargains of your bos.ses. 
You are called upon to teach a lesson to your self, 
eonstituted masters, and to show the country at 
large that the grand old party may still be trusted 
to manage the aflairs of the nation. If Pennsylva¬ 
nia, the stronghold of republicanism, the typical 
republican state, tamely ac<iuiesces in the de¬ 
bauched domination of tinayisin and proclaims 
that Messrs. Quay and Delamater are its trusted and 


honored leaders, what chance, think you, will the 
republican party have wlien it asks the support of 
the sober second thought of the country in 1892? 
Rebellion against usurped domination of sucli lead¬ 
ers is the truest fidelity to party and the highest 
duly of patrioti.sm. 


VIEWS OF DEMOCRATIC LEADERS. 

The position ami great inffiience of tlie Si. 
Louvi Republic makes its utterances on any 
subject im|)ortant. It reads clearly the signs 
of the times, and in what it says of civil ser¬ 
vice reform we give it credit, not only for 
clear sight, but for an earnest desire to see a 
great benefit conferred upon the country. It 
said, June 24, 1890: 

The Pendleton law was a first step—a short one. 
Its enforcement is but the beginning, not the end to 
be reached by the reform of the civil service. The 
reform itself must be imshed until no party can re¬ 
ward its scavenger woikcrs with ollice and salary at 
the expense of the people. Tlie system under which 
the President acts as the head of a District of Col¬ 
umbia bureau of bossism and patronage brokerage, 
with an agent in every congressional district and 
sub agents in every county, all operating together 
for the control of state politics, must be abolished, 
and the federal civil service restored and restricted 
to its proper function of serving as an agency for 
tramsacting the common business of the people of 
the several states. 

There is no obscurity about this from any stand- 
I)oint possible for the democratic i)arty. It is clear. 
There is a great work to be done, and the democratic 
party must do it. It is impossible that the pre.sent 
system should continue. Under it the federal ollices 
are farmed out to senators, to members of congre.ss, 
to defeated candidates, to state and county commit¬ 
teemen, to anyone who can make any sort of show 
of title to be a patronage boss. The President trades 
in the federal oflices to secure power over congress. 
The senators and congressmen of the party in jmwer 
trade in them to control politics in their states and 
districts. The committeemen and minor bosses 
trade in them for every conceivable purpose of cor¬ 
ruption, from controlling a primary to outright sale 
for cash—as The Hcpublic h&a repeatedly demonstrat¬ 
ed in the last two years. This will go on until the 
system which makes such corruption inevitable is 
radically changed for the better. 

No democrat can refuse to co operate in the move¬ 
ment to bring that about. No democrat can believe 
tliat it is well for his party, his state, or his country, 
that an adminisQation ring in the District of Colum¬ 
bia should thus be allowed to draw on the federal 
treasury for the purimse of controlling state ))oIitics 
and dictating to the states what attitude tliey shall 
assume in national all'airs. 

On tlie same date Judge Nildack, now and 
always a democrat, addressed the Hendric ks 
Club, of this city, on tlie same suhject. Judge 
Niblack has recently concluded a period of 
twelve years on the supreme hench of this 
state. Before that he was, several terms, a 
member of congress, where he voted against 
the Pendleton act, because he thought the 
country not ready for it. He now says that 
civil service reform is engrossing the attention 
of the country and must be .settled one way or 
another; that when an office-seeker cannot 
obtain his ends he generally abuses the civil 
service law, and therein receives plenty of aid 
and comfort from his congressman; that the 
time has come when there should be a system 
of equality in the distribution of the offices; 
it is not right that they should be given out 
as the perquisites of congressmen. In times 
past, no matter how competent the clerk, he 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


139 


was discharged just as soon as the term of his ^ 
“influence” expired, to make way for the 
protege of his congressman’s successor—a 
gross injustice. The clerks absolutely trans¬ 
act Ihe business of the various departments, 
and the country hardly realizes the impor¬ 
tance of having these competent men. Judge 
Nil)lack also says that the peo|)le have no 
conception of the numerical strength of the 
place-hunters who are wholly unqualified for 
the places they want. We quote from the 
Sentinel report: 

“A stock man,” saidhe, ‘‘once came to me and 
asked for my signattirc to a petition for his appoint¬ 
ment ns an Indian agent. I a.sked him what quali¬ 
fication he had for the position, and he replied; 

‘ Well, I have been so used to dealing in cattle that 
I can look at a cow and tell yon just what she is 
thinking about; so, I guess, I can handle Indians.’ ” 
‘‘ Well,” said the judge, with a laugh, “ I signed his 
petition, but he didn’t get the place.” 

We conclude that Judge Niblack would not 
now sign such a petition, and we may add 
that he has also said that, in the matter of 
the merit system, it is useless for his party to 
kick against the pricks. Wo hope he will use 
his undoubted influence to bring his party to 
stop the use of the public institutions of this 
.state as party spoil, and that he will labor 
with his fellow democratic leaders to holdly 
make the merit system a tenet of that party. 

SECOND REPORT 

Of the Special Committee of the National 
Civil Service Reform League. 

PATENT OFFICE. 

The patent office is a bureau quite unique 
in its character. Having to deal with the 
claims of inventors, it reaches nearly every 
manufacturing interest in the country; and 
there is a great body of mechanics and skilled 
artis.'ins who are concerned in its proper ad¬ 
ministration and keenly watchful of its pro¬ 
ceedings. The posse.ssion of a patent is often 
the only hope which a mechanic can cling to 
for a permanent betterment in his condition. 
The duties of most of the higher officials in 
the patent oflice are largely judicial in char¬ 
acter. Though appeals arc allowed from their 
decisions, yet a large numher are not appealed 
from, and are therefore final; and for the per¬ 
formance of these judicial duties there is need 
of freedom from partisan polHics and a rea¬ 
sonable degree of security of tenure during 
honesty .and efficiency, and a hope of promo¬ 
tion for special ability. There is even less 
re ison why these offices should be “political” 
th in that the United States district or circuit 
judges should be “political,” though in such 
|)osi'ions as those of the patent office changes 
shonld be allowed where it is clear the effi- 
cien. y of the office is to be thereby increased; 
and, on the other hand, no political influence 
should shelter incompetent or dishonest men 
from r-moval. 

The head of the office is a commissioner, 
havit.g a.ssociated with him an assi.stant com¬ 
missioner; a law clerk, who aiils in the judi¬ 
cial labors; a chief clerk, who is the principal 
administrative officer of the bureau; a finance 


clerk, in whose charge are the revenues of the 
office; a librarian; an examining corps, con¬ 
sisting of about one hundred and eighty per¬ 
sons, who investigate the claims of applicants, 
to determine what is new and patentable in 
their inventions; and about three hundred 
and sixty other employes, clerks, copyists, 
draughtsmen, laborers and messengers, dis¬ 
tributed chiefly among four principal divi.s- 
ions. The first of these divisions, which is 
under the supervision of the chief clerk, re¬ 
ceives, registers and distrihutes all applica¬ 
tions for patents, and has charge of interfer¬ 
ence and appeal records and the general 
corresjiondence of the office, as well as of the 
models and .scientific library, and attends to 
the financial duties of the office; the second, or 
“issue and gazette division,” prepares patents 
for delivery, and issues the Officinl Gazette and 
other official publications; the third, or 
“draughtsman’s division,” has chairge of the 
drawings, printed patents, photo-lithographic 
copies, and rejected and abandoned applica¬ 
tions; and the fourth, or “assignment divis¬ 
ion,” registers the transfers of patents, attends 
to the making of manuscript copies, preserves 
files of caveats, etc. Each of the last three 
divisions is under the control of a chief of 
division. The revenues of the patent office 
average about $^1,000 to the working day, and 
represent fees jiaid for patents, for the registry 
of a.ssignments, the purch.a.se of patent publi¬ 
cations and copies of specifications of Ameri¬ 
can and foreign patents, and of American ap¬ 
plications for patents, and of manuscript de¬ 
cisions of the judicial officers of the patent 
office. Between the commissioner of patents 
and the examining corps there exists an inter¬ 
mediate tribunal, known as the board of ex¬ 
aminers in chief, composed of three members 
appointed by the President, which entertains 
appeals from the adverse decisions made by 
the principal examiners; and from the ad¬ 
verse decisions of this board an appeal lies to 
the commissioner in person. Aside from these 
proceedings a vast number of interlocutory 
appeals arise, which concern the methods of 
jn-.actice under the rules; and the.se are taken 
from the principal examiners directly to the 
commissioner in person. It will be perceived 
that the office of commissioner unites duties 
which are administrative and judicial, .and 
demands, not merely a good lawyer, familiar 
with science and mechanics and with the ap¬ 
plication of legal jirinciples, but at the same 
time a man of unusual executive capacity. 

The beginning of the present administration 
found this whole bureau in the control of 
spoilsmen, as far as the civil service law would 
allow it to be. They were in pos.session, both 
above and below the classified list, of nearly 
all the offices on which they could lay their 
hands. It would be no injustice to Mr. Mont¬ 
gomery, the first commissioner appointed by 
President Cleveland, to say that he entered the 
office without any experience in matters of 
patent law, and knew next to nothing of the 
practice and needs of the office. Me appoint¬ 
ed his brother as his confidential clerk, to dis¬ 


tribute the offices of the bureau among some 
of the more influential congressmen. Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland appointed as assistant commis¬ 
sioner, presumably upon political influence, 
.the brother of a democratic senator, who had 
.served in Congress and had been chairman of 
the committee on patents. He was not a law¬ 
yer, and w.as without experience in the duties 
of such an office. 

The appointment of the law clerk by the 
commi.ssioner was al.so purely a matter of pat¬ 
ronage. This was a position for which, dur¬ 
ing many years previous, the appointment had 
been made from members of the examining 
corps, detailed by {versonal selection of the 
commissioner. The duties of law clerk are 
not defined by law. He is an a.ssistant to the 
commissioner; .and, although he can not ren¬ 
der decisions finally, he acts as a sort of ref¬ 
eree, who advises the commissioner on matters 
of fact ami questions of practice which the 
latter officer can not find time to examine in 
detail. It often happens that an efficient law 
clerk will pre})are decisions which are after¬ 
wards signed by the commissioner upon in¬ 
spection and .approval. When cases go to the 
courts on appeal, the law clerk is the repre¬ 
sentative of the patent office. The variety and 
character of the work and the dignity of the 
place aroused the ambition of all those mem¬ 
bers of the lower examining corps who had 
some legal training, and made them eager to 
fit themselves in law and perform their duties 
well, in the hope that they might sometime he 
selected for this position. This incentive had 
developed a splendid a^pril de corjie among these 
men, who were thus encouraged to engage in 
the study, of patent law. 

This position of law clerk had been held 
successively by men who have attained prom¬ 
inence at the patent bar. Only one exception 
had been made to the rule of appointing to 
this office by promotion from the lower posi¬ 
tions in the examining corps. On that occa¬ 
sion the law clerk was cho.sen from outside the 
office; and it was the cau.se of much discour¬ 
agement among the examiners, who thus saw 
their own hopes of promotion taken away. 
This was the only exception until the admin¬ 
istration of Commissioner Montgomery, who 
appointed the law clerk from outside and upon 
political grounds. This new law clerk was 
entirely inexperienced in the duties of the 
place, and could make no pretensions to be¬ 
ing well qualified to perform them. This was 
a disastrous blow to the ambition of the ex¬ 
aminers, who sought this promotion as a re¬ 
ward for the faithful performance of their 
duty. Another jdace which had been held 
up as the prize of efficiency under former 
commissioners was that of examiner of inter¬ 
ferences, a .sort of court of first instance where 
trials are had by conflicting claimants upon 
proofs regularly introduced. This was also 
filled from the corps of examiners before Mr. 
Montgomery became commi.ssioner. Under 
him, however, the new ex.aminer was appoint¬ 
ed from outside the office. Up to the time of 
his appointment he knew little about the 










140 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


working of the patent office, and was not 
greatly experienced in patent law; but he has 
doubtless acquired considerable experience 
during his service. He remains in office. 

Commissioner Montgomery also reduced 
two out of the three chiefs of divisions to 
$1,800 clerkships, and filled the places of these 
chiefs by men from the outside, politicians of 
influence, but without experience, the men re¬ 
duced doing the bulk of the work. One of 
the new appointees brought considerable scan¬ 
dal upon the office. He also still holds his 
position. 

Another remarkable practice was begun un¬ 
der Commissioner Montgomery. The offices of 
fourth assistant examiners (whose duties 
properly related exclusively to the examina¬ 
tion of patents) were in many instances filled 
by clerks who were still retained at their cler¬ 
ical work, and did no duty at all as assistant 
examiners, although they were classified as 
such. At one time there were no fewer than 
twenty of these clerks who had thus been 
transferred to fourth assistant examinerships, 
the duties of which position they did not per¬ 
form. This weakened perceptibly the exam¬ 
ining corps and impaired the efficiency of the 
office. Your committee was for sometime at 
a loss to understand any motive for this trans¬ 
fer, as both these clerkships and examiner- 
ships were embraced in the classified service, 
and so could not be filled with political favor¬ 
ites; but your committee afterwards learned 
that the clerk.ships vacated by this transfer 
were filled by promotion from a lower grade, 
that the ranks from which these places were 
recruited were in their turn filled by a special 
examination for examiner’s clerks, and that a 
number of persons appointed without com¬ 
petitive examination as ‘‘skilled laborers” 
had been detailed for duty as examiners’ 
clerks, and had thus acquired a knowledge of 
the duties of that office, which gave them pe¬ 
culiar advantages for passing the special ex¬ 
amination for it. Thus, by making a jmliti- 
cal favorite first a “ skilled laborer” and 
then giving him a “special” examination, 
he could obtain a clerkship from which polit¬ 
ical favorites were usually barred by open 
competitive examinations. The.se irregulari¬ 
ties and perversions of the law could not but 
be followed by disastrous results. 

The work of the patent office under these 
conditions steadily declined in efficiency. The 
examining corps had been under the control 
of the comj)etitive system for a number of 
years, and it was mostly beyond the reach of 
|)olitical influence. Tlie principal examiners, 
of whom there were twenty-eight, were offi¬ 
cials whoso salaries ranged above that fixed 
by the classified service; but the commis¬ 
sioner doubtless recognized that to remove 
these men of long training to make place for 
politicians would cause inextrical)le confu¬ 
sion, and that without tliem the bureau would 
be helpless and unable to perform its func¬ 
tions. Hence they were retained. 

President Cleveland saw his way clear to 
transfer Commissioner Montgomery into a 


diflTerent field ; and he appointed as his suc¬ 
cessor llenton J. Hall, of Iowa, who had also 
served in congress and was a lawyer known to 
be of some ability and character in his own 
state, but not specially acquainted with patent 
law or the needs of the patent office. He de¬ 
voted his energies mainly to j)re.serving the 
remnants of good servicse against further in¬ 
undations, and he gained the resi)ect of all 
who knew him in the office. He was sur¬ 
rounded, however, by many incompetents, who 
had been inducted into office during the ad¬ 
ministration of his predece.ssor, and whom he 
did not discharge. He found it necessary to 
resort frequently to the practice of letting out 
a considerable portion of the judicial func¬ 
tions of the office to commissions specially 
created from time to time from among the 
older and more experienced men of the exam¬ 
ining corps. These men, whose official duties 
required all their time, were obliged to take 
up details which ought to have been within 
the ea.sy reach of the assistant commissioner 
and law clerk ;»bnt, while these latter were 
retained, there seemed to be no other way of 
doing the public business than that of calling 
in these examining officers to perform the du¬ 
ties of their superiors. A change for the worse 
was made during the administration of Com¬ 
missioner Hall, when, in .July, 1887, Schuyler 
W. Duryee was displaced from the office of 
chief clerk, anil a succes.sor was ajijiointed for 
political rea.sons who was without experience, 
and therefore largely dependent upon his sub¬ 
ordinates. 

The appointment of the present commis¬ 
sioner by President Harrison was made in 
pursuance of sound business principles. There 
were several candidates for appointment,some 
of them retired congressmen, and many of 
them with strong political backing; hut the 
President resisted this influence, and de¬ 
clared that, if the patent bar would unite 
in a recommendation, he would appoint the 
man they recommended. The present com¬ 
missioner, Mr. Charles H. Mitchell, was sug¬ 
gested. He was a patent lawyer of extensive 
experience and recognized standing, with a 
large income from his profession; and his 
acceptance of the office involved considerable 
pecuniary sacrifice. As soon as it was ascer¬ 
tained that he would accept, the leading pat¬ 
ent lawyers of the country endeavored to se- 
sure his appointment. He had their almost 
unanimous support as thoroughly well qual¬ 
ified for the position. This commissioner 
.seems to be independent of political in¬ 
fluences, and has inaugurated valu¬ 
able reforms. The Pre.sident appointed to the 
office of a.ssistant commissioner, in place of 
Mr. Vance, Robert J. Fisher, who had been a 
member of the board of examiners in chief, 
and who had been a competing applicant for 
the commi.ssionership. This appointment was 
strictly in the line of civil service reform 
principles. The office was next in grade above 
that which he had filled; and he was well 
qualified for it, had been in the service about 
twelve years, and had gone through the vari¬ 


ous grades from lowest assistant examiner up 
to the j)lace he then occupied, and he had 
filled every grade worthily and satisfactorily. 
He was familiar with the husine.ss of the of¬ 
fice and the personnel oi the corps. The f’rt s 
ident, on the advice of the commissioner, next 
promoted, to the vacancy made by the ]>ro- 
rnotion of Mr. Fisher, Mr. Solon W. Stocking, 
who liad also begun at the lowest grades and 
had been in the office about seventeen years, a 
tried examiner of proved ability, upon whon) 
the democratic commissioners during their 
terms had greatly relied. Mr. Stocking had 
entered the examining corps by competitive 
examination, which had been applied to the 
examining corps for many years continuously 
[irevious to the passage of the Pendleton 
bill, and had risen through each grade 
in the same way, and is himself a 
typical fruit of the competitive sys¬ 
tem. Although an ardent republican, 
he had given to the democratic head of the 
office his best .service. He had come in under 
civil service rules, and considered public duty 
as paramount to mere i)arty claims. The 
commi.ssioner also reappointed as his chief 
clerk Mr. Schuyler W. Duryee, who came in 
from the treasury department in 1883—had 
been chief clerk during the administration of 
President Arthur (but had been dis[)laced 
during the administration of Commissioner 
Hall), and was a man of excellent executive 
capacity. The commissioner also changed the 
law clerk, superseding him by Mr. Frothing- 
ham, a change for the better; although, as 
Mr. Frothingham was appointed to the jilace 
from the outside, this change has not restond 
to the corps of examiners the incentive to 
faithful and efficient work which had for¬ 
merly been inspired by the hope of promotion 
to this office from their own ranks. It is true 
that the office of law clerk is somewhal confi¬ 
dential in its nature and the occupant should 
be in touch with the bar and outside world, 
and it may hajipen that the right sort of jier- 
son may not always he found within the ranks 
of the examining corps. In such a ca.se, it 
might be proper to make au exception from 
the salutary method of jiromotion ; but it 
must also be rememhereil that special train¬ 
ing and a knowledge of the office are re¬ 
quired, and these can rarely be found outside 
of the office itself,—that promotion to the 
office of law clerk is the only promotion lie- 
sides that to the office of examiner of inter¬ 
ferences to which the examining corps can 
look,—that the good an established system of 
promotion does to the whole force is greater 
in its total result than the individual gain 
likely to be had by making an exception to 
the rule, and that one exception is likely to 
be followed by discouragement and uncer¬ 
tainty. Adding to this the fact that long ex- 
jierience in the department has shown admir¬ 
able law clerks can he found among the , 
e.xamining corps, which ,at jiresent is cer¬ 
tainly not below the average, yonr committee 
think it was a mistake not to revive the ad¬ 
vantages gained by the former .system of pro¬ 
motion within the office. 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


141 


Your oommitlee are glad to report from in¬ 
formation in their possession, derived, as they 
l)elieve, from trustworthy and non-political 
sources, that there has been a decided im¬ 
provement in the efficiency of the office since 
the appointment of the present commissioner. 

The system of competitive examinations, as 
applied to the Patent Office, had l)een begun 
nnder the civil service commission and 
rules, estal)lishe<l by General Grant in 1871- 
72; .and, though these rules were in operation 
for a short time only, “the system of com¬ 
petitive examinations, once established,” to 
quote from a letter written ns by a former 
commissioner of patents, and representing the 
opinions of several of the leading commis¬ 
sioners from 1872 to 1885, “so approved itself 
that succeeding commissioners clung to it.” 
“Experience had shown that the office ob¬ 
tained better‘raw material’ nnder open com¬ 
petition, and that promotion in grade for ap¬ 
proved fitness in like competition relieved the 
commissioner from a tremendous amount of 
importunate buttoidioling, and was accepted 
by the corps as a fair and square test;” that 
the members of the corps “were thus secure in 
zealous efforts to study and work for their 
own advance;” and “the efficiency and atprit 
de corpse of the appointees were thus constantly 
improving. These examinations, as contin¬ 
ued by the commissioner of patents, a])plied 
only to the variotis grades of the examining 
corps; while, nnder the Pendleton law (1884), 
the examinations have been extended to the 
positionsof clerks, draughtsmen, skilled labor¬ 
ers, and others. 

The following tables show the positions in 
the unclassified and classified service of the 
patent office, with the salaries: 

POSITIONS IN THE PATENT OFFICE NOT WITHIN THE 
CIVIC SEIIVICE IHH.ES. 


Commissioner. 8r>,(i00 

Assistant commissioner. 3,000 

Chief Clerk. 2,2r>0 

Law clerk. 2,000 

3 Examiners in chief.$3,000 each, 0,000 

Examiner of interferences. 2,500 

Financial clerk. 2,000 

3 Chiefs of divisions. 2,000 “ 6,000 

Messenger and property clerk. 1,000 

4,5 Laborers. 000 “ 27,000 

40 Laborers. 4.S0 “ 10,200 

15 Me.ssengcr boys. 360 “ 5,400 


1 Draughtsmen . 

.(,’. 

1,000 each 

4,000 

25 Permanent clerks. 


1,000 “ 

25,000 

5 Model attendants. 

.N.C. 

1,000 “ 

5,000 

10 Model attendants. 

.N.C. 

800 “ 

8,000 

60 Copyists. 

.C. 

000 " 

51,000 

4 Copyists. 


720 “ 

2,.S,S0 

02 Skilled laborers.... 

.N.C. 

720 “ 

66.240 

468 Total. 


$,- 

73,720 

In the history of 

tliis office, 

we see not 

only 


how beneficial the civil service system has 
been in giving increased efficiency in this im¬ 
portant office, to the great advantage of the 
general public, but also how it is possible, 
notwitbstanding the civil service law, for a 
head of a bureau who is not in sympathy with 
the purposes of that law to go very far toward 
demoralizing the bureau. This was done by 
filling the places above and below those cov¬ 
ered by the law with political favorites, and 
by making exceptions to the rules and “back¬ 
door entrances” to the classified .service; and, 
lastly, we see how it was mainly the good 
effects of the civil service rules acting upon 
those places to which it applied thatsaved the 
demoralization from being complete. 

The contrast between the two .systems, as 
affecting the efficiency of an office, is .striking. 
The spoils system means giving the offices for 
partisan purposes to those who feel it a favor 
to receive the appointments. The reform 
system seeks to establish permanent adminis¬ 
trative methods for guarding business princi¬ 
ples in office, against political interference. 
The.se methods consist of open competitive 
tests made to suit the special duties to be per¬ 
formed, practical trial in office during a pro¬ 
bationary period before final appointment, 
tilling the higher grades by promotion, and at 
the heads of the bureaus to put such persons 
as confer a favor upon the public by accept¬ 
ing the position rather than such as consider 
the office as a favor to themselves in return 
for political influence or work. 

(Mr. MacVeagh, on account of illness, is 
unable to examine this report before its 
publication.) 

Wm. D. Eoulke, t'-hairman. 

Charles J. Bonaparte. 

IvioiiARO 11. Dana. 

Sherman S. Hooers. 

.June 80, 1800. 

A MANACLED PRESS, 

Daniel Webster in 1832. 


113 Total . $84,3.50 


POSITIONS WITHIN THE 

civil. 

SEP.VICE 

RULES. 

:;0 Principal examiners.... 

..N.C.-: 

..$2,400 each, $72,000 

32 First assistant exam. 

.C.L... 

.. l,.S 0 O 

‘‘ 

.57,600 

:I 6 Second assistant exam. 

.C.L.... 

.. 1,600 


.57,600 

41 Third lessistant exam.. 

.C.L... 

.. 1,-100 


.57,400 

50 Fourth assistant exam..C. 

.. 1,200 

t« 

60,000 

1 Librarian. 

.N.C... 

.. 2,000 

4 ( 

2,000 

3 Ass’tchiefsofdivisions.!;. 

.. 1,800 

** 

5,100 

3 Clerks of class four. 

.C. 

.. 1,.800 

i 4 

5, KM) 

1 Machinist. 

.C. 

.. 1,600 

4 4 

1,600 

5 Clerks of class three. 

.C. 

., 1,600 

44 

8,000 

12 Clerks of class two. 

.C. 

.. 1,100 

i 4 

16,.S00 

.50 Clerks of class one. 

.C. 

.. 1,200 

** 

60,000 

1 Skilled laborer. 

.C. 

.. 1,200 


1,200 

3 Skilled draughlsmen .. 

c. 

.. 1,200 


3,600 


* C. indicates the positions are gained only by open 
competition. N.C. indicates the positions are gained 
hy appointment, subject to a non-competitive exam¬ 
ination. U.L. indicates the positions are gained by 
a competitive examination, limited to the grade lie- 
low. 


And is a press that is piircha.sed or 
pensioned more free Ilian a press 
that is feiteretl ! Can the people look for 
truths to partial sources, ivhether ren¬ 
dered partial through fear or through 
favor f Why shall not a manacled press lu^ 
trusted with the maiiitenanee and defense 
of popular rights? Heeause it is supimsetl 
to he under tlie inHiienceof a power which 
may prove greater than the love of truth. 
Such a press may screen abuses in govern¬ 
ment or be silent. It may fear to speak. 
Ami may it not fear to speak, too, when its 
conductors, if they speak in any but one 
way, may lose their means of livelihood ! 
Is dejiendeiice on government for bread no 
temptation to screen its abuses? Will the 
press always speak the truth, when the 
truth, if siioken, may be the means of si¬ 
lencing it for tJie future? Is the truth in 
no danger, is the watchman under no 
temptation, when he can neither proclaim 


the approach of national evils, nor seem to 
decry ihem, without the loss of his place? 

Mr. President,an open attempt to secure 
the aid and friendship of the jHiblic press, 
hy be.stowing the emoluments of ollice on 
its active conductors, seems to me, of 
everything we have witnessed, to be the 
most reprehensible. It degrades both the 
government and the jiress. 

-Ezra M. Wilson, editor of li e drya.s, li,i.s been 
made postmaster at Ad in, Hal. 

—Samuel F. Smith, editor of the Corijsf VidcHe, 
has been made postmaster at Encinitas, f:al. 

—S. A. Drummond, of the Antelope Valley Timm, 
has been made postmaster at Lancaster, Cal. 

—C. Frost Liggett, of the Chiff, has been made 
postmaster at Chivington, Col. 

—George E. Miles, editor of the Citrus County Slav, 
has been made postmaster at Manufield, Fla. 

— Harvey .1. Cooper, editor of the Journal, has been 
made postmaster at Tampa, Fla. 

—Walter Colyer, editor of the Journal, has been 
made postmaster at Albion, Ill. 

—Danels E. Donley, of the Budget, has been made 
postmaster at llaylis. Ill. 

—R. M. Pritchett, editor of the Herald, has heen 
made postmaster at Dana, Ill. 

—Wm. H. Jewell, editor of the Nnm, has been made 
postmaster at Danville, Ill. 

—Johnson Potter, editor of the Bentinel, has been 
made postmaster at Davis, 111. 

—John M. Rrecn, editor of the Home Times, has 
been made postma.ster at Flanagan, III. 

—II. Reed, editor of the Southern Illinois Journal, 
has been made postmaster at Flora, Ill. 

— D. W. Hartman, editor of the Issue, has been 
made postmaster at Genoa, Ill. 

—Charles W. Warner, editor of the Chronicle, has 
liecn ma<le postmaster at Hoopeston, III. 

—R. F. Lawson, editor of the Express, has been 
made i>ostmaster at Kinmundy, Ill. 

—Volney Weaver, editor of the Times, has been 
made postmaster at Loda, 111. 

—J. Van Slyke, cilitor of the Plain Dealer, has been 
made postmaster at McHenry, 111. 

—B. C. Lansdon, editor of the News, has been made 
postmaster at Nebo, Ill. 

—Thomas R. Hancock, editor of the News, has been 
made postmaster at Neoga, 111. 

—W. R. Parks, editor of the Observer, has been 
made postmaster at Petersburg, Ill. 

—J. S. Barnnm, editor of the Telephone, has been 
made iiosi master at Princeville, Ill. file also i.ssnes 
for .Vita, Dunlap and Monica, III] 

—C. A. Wilcox, of the Whig, has been made post¬ 
master at Quincy, HI. 

—George W. Harper, editor of the Argus, has been 
postmaster at Robinson, Ill. 

—C. A. Hebbard, editor of the Times, has been 
made postmaster at Roseville, 111. 

—C. S. Brydia, editor of the Gazelle, has been made 
postmaster at Sannemin, 111. 

— .1. A. Mace, editor of the Independent Gazelle, line 
been made ])oslmaster at Saybrook, 111. 

—J. Mastin, editor of the Express, has been mads 
postmaster at Shannon, Ill. 

—S. Lovejoy Taylor, editor of the Plain Dealer, 
has been made postmaster at Sparta, 111. 

—John T. Conner, editor of the Express, has been 
made postmaster at Toledo, 111. 

—E. B. (diapin, editor of the Herald, has been 
made po.stmaster at Tolona, 111. 

—A. C. Hotchki.ss. of the Dallas Co. News, has been 
made postmaster at Adel, Iowa, 

—J. B. Ilnngerford, of the//crahf, has been made 
postmaster at Carroll, Iowa. 

—J. C. Harwood, editor of the Wright county Moni¬ 
tor, has been made postmaster at Clarion, Iowa. 



































142 


TME CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—W. H. Webster, editor of the Iieptd>licaii, lias lieen 
made postmaster at Cresco, Iowa. 

—Fred W. Brown, editor of the Recorder, lias been 
maile iKistmaster at Dysart, Iowa. 

—Almond W. Utter, of the Palo Alto ReporUr, hius 
been made postmaster at Emmet.sbnrK, Iowa. 

—.1. T. Notson, of the Itemizer, has been made jiost- 
inaster at Farragnl, Iowa. 

—F. M. Smock, of the Alta, has been made postmas¬ 
ter at Keota, Iowa. 

—A. F. Sell reckon gast, of the Enfilc, was appointed 
census enumerator for the town of Keota. 

-Ilowarih, of the Richland (Iowa) Clnrion., 

was appointed census enumerator. 

[This correspondent says: “ I think there is scarce¬ 
ly a newspaper man, I mean reimblican, who lias 
not been rewarded in some way.”] 

—Ueorge Van Ilonten, editor of the Time Tahir has 
been made postmaster at Lenox, Iowa. 

—(diaries II. Austin, editor of the Tribune, has 
been made postmaster atLineville, Iowa. 

—George I. Long, of the Journal, has been made 
postmaster at Manson, Iowa. 

—C. 1). Lyon, editor of the Motor, has been made 
postmaster at Milo, Iowa. 

—John Vandermost, editor of the Mirror, has been 
made postmaster at Monroe, Iowa. 

—David Vail, editor of the Star, has been made 
postmaster at New Sharon, Iowa. 

—George K. Moore, editor of the Advertiser, has 
been made postmaster at Nora Springs, Iowa. 

—C. J. Burke, editor of the Recorder, has been 
made postmaster at Oliii, Iowa. 

—Willis C. Hills, of the Exponent, ha.s been made 
postmaster at Smithland, Iowa. 

— A. L. Wood, editor of the Telegram, has been 
made postmaster at St. Charles, Iowa. 

—Frank T. Piper, editor of the Mail, has been 
made postmaster at Sheldon, Iowa. 

—O. B. Peterson, editor of the News, has been made 
postmaster at Story City, Iowa. 

—C. J. Wonser, editor of the Herald, has been made 
postmaster at Tama, Iowa. 

—W. A. Tyrrell, editor of the Republican, has been 
made postmaster at Waverly, Iowa. 

—Martha ,I. Cowman, wife of W. P. Cowman, edi 
tor of the Vindicator, has been made postmaster at 
Casey, Iowa. 

—C. B. Hunt, editor of the Transcript, has been 
made xiostmaster at Greenfield, Iowa. 

—M. A. Rany, editor of the Observer, has been made 
postmaster at Fontanelle, Iowa. 

—W. P. Moulton, editor of the Locomotive, has lieeii 
made postmaster at Stuart, Iowa. 


“THE SOLE DISCRIMINATING 
TEST.” 

There is a good deal of complaint among the ofli- 
cers at the navy yard at the slow work being done 
on the Pensacola’s bottom. That vessel went into 
dry dock a month ago and repairs were at once be¬ 
gun, but at this time she is far from completed, and 
will probably be in dock for some time to come. It 
was said yesterday by the men supposed to be at 
work on her that they were delayed because of a 
lack of nails. The real truth about the matter, 
however, is that the work on the Pensacola and in 
other parts of the navy yard is controlled by ‘‘bosses” 
appointed by Brooklyn politicians. These men draw 
their pay by the day and work just about as they 
please. 

The ollicers of the yard are practically powerless 
in wliatever supervisory capacity they may be 
placed. Frequently they have remonstrated with 
the “bosses” of the gangs at work, but always in 
vain. Several times they have threatened to have 
tlie indolent men discharged, and in one or two in¬ 
stances their threats have been carried out, but with 


very few exceptions tlie dl-scharged men have re¬ 
stored themselves to their old imsitions through 
political inlinence of a kind that is outrageously 
exercised in Brooklyn under this administration. 
It can hardly be expected that beneficiaries of such 
a system of political iiatronage will prove to be 
workmen of the class reiiuired to superintend the 
complicated ami oftentimes dillicult work incident 
to an active navy yard. 

Not long ago a number of republican laborers in 
Brooklyn, who aspire to the easy-going perennial 
jobs of their more fortunate brethren, appeared at 
the navy yard with applications indorsed by Senator 
Birkctt. They were armc<1 with other and equally 
formidable recommendations, and the way .seemed 
clear to an immediate occupancy of all the vacan¬ 
cies in the yard. 'I'liey wore met, however, by the 
foreman, who, according to their rejiort, is an insur¬ 
mountable obstacle in the way of partisan )mtron- 
ago. Be told the hopeful applicants that cnougli 
republicans in tiieir wards had been given positions, 
and that as far as navy yard berths were concerned, 
those wards were irrevocably boycotted. 

This resulted in a mass meetingof tlie disgruntled, 
which found vent in a formal protest that was sent 
to Washington. After complaining of the unjust 
discrimination exercised by the foreman, the protest 
stated many of the men who had been given jobs were 
t hose who had formally lived in remote poitions of 
the city, but whrl had moved into the wards contigu¬ 
ous to the navy yard in order to insure the recogni¬ 
tion that had been heretofore denied them. 

This remonstrance appears to have found a listen¬ 
er, for it received immediate response in the shape 
of a letter from the Hon. Benjamin F. Tracy, .secre¬ 
tary of the navy. This letter was received at the 
navy yard Tuesday. It contained a large number of 
blank forms, which are to be distributed among the 
employes in every <lepartment of the navy yard, 
calling for each man’s name, age, street number, 
ward, rating, pay, date of appointment, by whom 
appointed, and by whom recommended. The blanks 
also re<iuire the residence of tlie workman previous 
to the date of liis aiipointmcnt. 

All of these papers, when tilled out, will be exam¬ 
ined ami checked oil by the ollicers of the several 
ilepartmcnts and then forwanled to Washington for 
sncli u.se as this administration, in playing the game 
of politics, may see fit to make of them.—N'ciu York 
Tillies, July 11. 


Naval ollicers in port declare that the alleged 
workmen now employed are the most incompetent 
and worthless that could be selected, that work is 
delayed and shirked, and that the condition of alfairs 
is deplorable in the extreme. 'The basis for this de¬ 
moralization lies in the fact that the lieutenants of 
Thomas C. I’latt, the boas of the republican party, 
and of Secretary of the Navy Benjamin F. Tracy 
have had a falling out, and that in the .senllle for su¬ 
periority the public welfaresutrers. 

The facts, so far as learned, indicate that Secretary 
Tpacy has drawn tlie line at last, and i'nsisted that 
hereafter every person who applies fora job shall 
place the name of his backer in his recommenda¬ 
tion. Tlie seventeenth ward seems to be the object 
of universal envy. There reside both William C. 
Wallace and Mr. Robert 1). Benedict. The latter was 
defrauded out of the congressional nomination two 
years ago, and he is determined to obtain it this fall. 
Both of these gentlemen are powers in their district. 
Congre&sman Wallace is supported by 'riiomas C. 
Platt, John A. Nicholls, Senator Birkett, who boasts 
of having obbiined more places for his henchmen 
than any other man, Ernst Nathan, and the rest of 
the gang that in the past have made Brooklyn poli¬ 
tics notorious and infamous. Mr. Benedict is backed 
by the rcsjiectable element of his party. His friends 
have not fared .so well, .so far as patronage is con¬ 
cerned, as their opponents. An ofiiceron duty in 
the yard said: 

“This factional fight between these Brooklyn poli¬ 
ticians is proving disastrous to our work here and 
to our men. If a gang of men are at work aboard 
ship the officers have no control whatever over them, 
tut on the contrary are regaled by conversations 


wliich are carrieil on between them for lioursata 
time,to the utter disregard and neglect of the work 
in hand. Of course we are not suppo.sed to know 
who is responsible for this state of allalrs. That is 
not onr businc.ss. All that concerns us is to have the 
work performed in as short a time as is consistent 
with thoroughnc.ss. You can’t find that here. The 
workmen do as they please. And \vork that ought 
to be performed in an honror two is nsnally stretche<l 
out to two or three days.” 

Brooklyn politicians predict that this breach at the 
navy yard is only a prelude to a more .serious breach 
between Secretary Tracy and I’latt. Receutly the 
secretary heard that the twenty-third ward, which is 
bossed by Platt’s faithful henchman, Ernst Nathan, 
had been favored in the matter of appointments to 
the detriment of the thirteenth, whose leader is Wil¬ 
liam H. Lcaycraft, wlio is committed to the fortunes 
of Mr. Benedict. The secretary wrote an autograph 
letter to tlie olficer wlio has had charge of the dis¬ 
bursing of some of the federal patronage and Wanted 
to know how it was that one ward had been'more 
generously rewarded than the other. This was fol¬ 
lowed by a second letter re<iucsting that all appli¬ 
cants shall have the names of their backers indorsed 
on the back of their recommendations. 

“ Work in the navy yard nowadays is a farce,” said 
a Brooklyn contractor yesterday. “If yon raked the 
yard fore and aft yon would be rewarded by finding 
men unfit and incompetent, lazy and worthleas. 
The Harrison administration is responsible for much 
that is censurable, but this business at the yard is 
simply outrageous. Why an investigation is not or¬ 
dered or reform instituted is inexplicable. Of 
course, none of the naval officers stationed there 
can speak for publication, out of a mistaken sense of 
etiquette and loyalty to their chief, the secretary, 
but there is not an olficer stationed in the yard, from 
the commandant to the junior, who is not aware of 
the demoralization that exists and the absolute dis-. 
regard of responsibility that firevails. They laugh 
over it among themselves, but no one will speak for 
publication for obvious reasons. It is the .system 
that is wrong. It is wrong for any boss such ns 
Platt or for any of his heelers to imagine that the 
navy yard patronage is tlieir personal properly, to be 
awarded to their shooters who are unable from tlicir 
incompetence and laziness to obtain work anywhere 
else. It Ims been a common remark ui) to within a 
fortnight that Mr. Platt’s heelers had the bulk of 
the patronage, but since then it is understood that 
Secretary Tracy had stepped in and the Platt men 
have not carried their heads quite .so high.”—Wcic 
York Times, July 12. 


Orders that arrived at the navy yard on Wednes¬ 
day removing Foreman Arthur Boyle from his 
position in charge of the construction of the new 
crui.ser. No. 7, and appointing John O’Rourke, an 
experienceil shipbuilder, formerly in the employ of 
John Roach, to the position were made public yes. 
terday. The news was a tremendous snrpri.se to the 
republicans of the twentieth ward, Brooklyn, for 
Boyle is the republican lieutenant there of Mr. Win. 
H. Beard and United States District Attorney Jesse 
.Johnson. So great a rumpus did the removal cause that 
Mr. Johnson left for Washington yesterday to see if the 
mailer could not be arranged. 

This, however, is not at all jirobablc, as Foreman 
Boyle was removed for neglect of duty. He was in 
the habit of going to the yard wearing a silk hat, his 
best clothes, and patent-leather shoos, and rarely 
remained on duty more than three or four hours a 
day.. This kind of “sojering” did notatall snitsuch 
an old sea dog as Admiral Braine, and after a few 
kindly warnings he let the axe fall. 

As foreman, Mr. Boyle had the authority to hire 
his own men, and the faithful of the twentieth 
ward were well provided for with places. He is now 
reduced to the position of a quartorman under Fore¬ 
man O’Rourke, but he declines to accept the situa¬ 
tion, and has told Mr. Johnson that if the latter wants 
the support of the republicans of the twentieth ward he 
must straighten the matter out right away.—Nciv York 
Times, July 20. 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


143 


Office-Holders Defending their Possessions. 

Allotmeiit.s thus acquired, mutually engaged such as accepted them to defend them; and as they all sprang from the same right of conquest, no part 
could subsist independent of the whole ; wherefore all givers !is well as receivers were mutually bound to defend each other’s possessions. # * * Every 

receiver of lauds, or feudatory, was therefore bound when called u[>on by his benefactor, or immediate lord of his feud or fee, to do all in his power to defend 
him. Such benefactor or lord was likewise subordinate to and under the command of his imme<liate benefactor and superior; and so upwards to the prince or 
general himself; and the several lords were also reciprocally bound, in their respective gradations, to protect the possessions they had given. Thus the feudal 
connectii>n was established, a proper military subjection was naturally introduced and an army of feudatories was always ready enlisted and mutually prepared 
to muster. . . — lUackslone. 


(Mlice-Iufltlers lire llie }i??eiits of Ihe i>eo- 
|ile, not llieir luasteris. Not only is their 
lime and labor due lo tlie jifovernnient, but 
they slionltl sernimlonsly avoid in their po- 
iilieal aetion, as well as in the discharge 
of their ollicial duly, oll'ending by a display 
of obtrusive parti.sanship their neighbors 
who have relations with them as imhlie 
ollieials. 

They should also eons<anlly remeinher 
that their party friends from whom tliey 
have reeeivi’d ]irefei ment have not in¬ 
vested them with the power of arbitrarily 
managing their politieal alfairs. They have 
no right, as olliee-holders, to dietate the 
liolitieal aetion of their jiarty associates, 
or to throttle freedom of action within 
party lines by met hods and practices which 
prevent every nsefnl and jnstiliable pnr- 
|M>se of ]iarty organi/ation. 

The inIIlienee of the federal oHlcc-hold- 
ers should not be felt in the manipnlatiou 
of political primary meetings and nomi¬ 
nating conventions. The use by these of- 
llcials of their positions to compass their 
selection as delegates to political conven¬ 
tions is indecent and unfair, and proper 
regard for the proprieties and require¬ 
ments of ollicial place will also prevent 
their assuming the active conduct of polit¬ 
ical campaigns.— rnsuleiit Cleveland, July 
14, 1886. 

Approved by Poslmaster-Geueral Wana- 
uiaker, April 25, 181)0. 


— Gen. Atkins, postmaster at Freeport, went 
to Springfield as a delegate to the republican 
state convention.-/ioc/i/brd [/// ] Register, July 4- 

—Dan. Hogan, made collector of internal 
revenue at Chicago becau.se he was a powerful 
ward boss, was at the republican state conven¬ 
tion at Si)ringlield, .June 23. 

—The lion. J. 13. Smith, of Hillsborough, 
had a long conference yesterday with Senator 
Chandler, Naval Officer Oarrier, and other parly 
manayera, and it is practically settled that Mr, 
Tuttle has withdrawn and that Mr. Smith 
shall receive the republican gubernatorial 
nomination.—Apecia/ to lioeton Advertiser, from 
Concord, N. H , July 10. 

—The meeting of the republican state com¬ 
mittee to-night seemed more like a meeting of 
otlice-holders than anything else. There were 
present Gov. Goodell and members of his 
council. President of the Senate laggart. 
Speaker Upton, United States Senator Chan¬ 
dler, Pension Ayent Cheney, Treasury Ayent 
Aaron Young, Naval Officer Cuirier, Internal 
Revenue Collector French, Secretary of State 
Thompson, Book Commissioner Lyford, Rail¬ 


road Commissioner Putney, Mayor Humphrey, 
and Postmaster Robinson of this city, ex-Govern- 
or Cheney, Postmaster Piper, Senator Means, 
Judge of Police Court Hunt, of Manchester, 
and some others.— DisjHitch from Concord, N. II., 
July 1. 

— United iSlales Attorneys Reynolds and Neal, 
of the eastern aiul western districts, and 
United /Stales Marshals Tracy and Buchanan, 
and Ai>praiser Metcalfe, of the port of St. 
Louis, met with the Missouri state rejmblican 
committee, July 8. 

— United Slates District Atlomey Walter Lyon, 
who was permanent chairman of the republican stale 
convention, SHid to a reporter to-day : 

“ 1 never was pledged to .VIontooth, and it 
was well known that / was a Delamuter man. 
1 came out as a delegate for him, and hal 1 
so desired could have been instructed by the 
convention which sent me for Delamater. 
Had there been the least chance for Mon- 
tooth’s nomination I would have stuck to him. 
1 knew there was no chance from the start, and 
I didn’t propose to have the Allegheny coun¬ 
ty delegation sit in the convention with their 
thumbs in their mouths and take no part in 
the nomination for governor. Some of the 
Allegheny county delegation desired to have 
the delegation remain solid for Montooth, so 
that when it came home it could be said that 
(Juay was not able to influence a man in the 
delegation. It was intended to hurt Quay by 
this means, and when the delegation came 
home it expected to have a good laugh over 
Quay’s failure to inlluence the Allegheny 
county delegation. I didn’t propose to be a 
()arty to any such scheme. If 1 had been 
asked by any one to stick to Montooth, in view 
of the fact that I knew it was hopeless, I 
should have declared that Montooth was never 
in the light, although some of his people 
actually persuaded him he was. 

“ Those who understood the situation knew 
better. What little fight there seemed to be 
was between Delamater and Hastings, but it 
hardly deserved the name of fight. Delama¬ 
ter could have been nominated on the first 
ballot had it been deemed advisable. A re¬ 
gard for Mayor Filler, of Philadelphia, was 
the only thing that prevented this. All the 
delegates needed to nominate Delamater could 
have been obtained from the Philadelphia 
delegation. In order to prevent him from 
kicking it was deemed best to let the Phila¬ 
delphia delegation go lo Hastings on the first 
ballot; that is, as many as desired, and lo 
nominate Delamater on the second. We 
wanted to let Filler down as easy as possible, 
and so only took--just enough to nominate 
Delamater from Philadelphia .”—New York 
'limes, June 28. 

—Complaint has been made here to the 
President and the secretary of the treasury, 
sustained by ample proof, that ex-Gov. War- 
mouth, the collector of the port of New Or- 
lean.s, is using all the power of his great ollice 
in favor of the rechartering of the Louisiana 
lottery company. A few days ago Warmouth 
sent an employe of his office to East Louisiana, 


where there is an election contest, the lottery 
(piestion being the issue. Warmonlb’s custom 
house employe was named George S. Swayzee, 
and his busine.ss was to distribute lottery cir¬ 
culars.— Washington Dispatch to St. Louis Re¬ 
public, June 18. 

—T. G. Lawler, Congressman Hilt’s post¬ 
master at Rockford, was a delegate present at 
the convention that nominated Congressman 
Hitt. 

—“The republican state convention met 
here to-day,” says a dispatch from Montgom¬ 
ery last evening. “There were only thirty 
white men in the convention, most of whom 
are federal office-holders in Alabama .—New 
York Evening Post, June 5. 

— 'The Auburn Advertiser {rep.) the organ of 
.lohn K. Knapp, chairman of the republican state 
committee and postmaster at ylafittm, announcis 
that Platt’s candidacy for the United Slates 
senate “may now be considered public, avowed 
and active. He will go back, if he can, to the 
seat from which the appointment of Senator 
Robertson hurried him in 1881.” 

—The interest in the third congressional 
battle is centred just now, anil will be for .some 
time, ill the twenty-third ward, where Inter¬ 
nal Revenue C(/llector Nathan has a growing 
opposition to fight. 

The cause of the dissatisfaction is the high-handed 
way in which Nathan i-uns the ward. He could not 
affect more absolute ownership if it were an old 
family pocket borough, and tlie thousands of new 
residents who are making the twenty-third 
one of the biggest wards in town object to 
wearing Nathan’s collar. They lay claim to 
a sufficient number of adherents to beat Na¬ 
than, but complain that by all sorts of hocus pocus 
he prevents them from yetting the names <f their 
friends on the roll book of the association. Nathan's 
object, of course, is lo keep these people out until 
after he elects his delegates lo the apjivoachivy con¬ 
ventions in the third congressional and the ninth 
and eleventh assembly districts, all three of which he 
has practically owned for the last four years. 

The strong attempt now being made by 
Robert D. Benedict, backed by Secretary 
Tracy, to dislodge Nathan, backed by T'hos. 
C. Platt, from at least one of these republican 
strongholds, the third congressional, is what 
makes this fight in the twenty third ward in¬ 
teresting to the general public. 

Nathan is claiming to have won a signifi¬ 
cant victory for Congressman Wallace in the 
appointment of Michael Malone as master 
Vilumber on the new federal building. Malone 
is ex-Judge Rooney’s man and a big figure in 
the Home and Country Protective Brother¬ 
hood of Workingmen. Nathan is trying to 
get the backing of tbe brotherhood in the Wal¬ 
lace-Benedict fight .—New York Times, July IS. 














144^ 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONlCI>E 


—The Harrison administration received a 
set-hack here to day, for, at a meetinj? of the 
repnl)lican state central committee in this (dty, 
the control of the parly machinery passed into 
tlie liands of ihe anti-ailministration men. 

After the election of last fall the repnl)lican 
party in this city, which has always heen no¬ 
ted for its factional fights, split into two fac¬ 
tions, and the feeling between them has been 
very bitter. So intense was this feeling tliat 
last May, when the city had to elect members 
to the state central committee, two .sets of pri¬ 
maries were held, and May fi two re|)nblic.an 
conventions were held in each legislative dis¬ 
trict in the city, and two sets of men were 
chosen members from lialtimore of the state 
central committee, the first meeting of which 
was hehl to day. 

One of thci^e factions is called Ihe Johnson faction, 
is headed by Postmaster Williavi W. Johnson, and 
includes nearly all the office, holders in the city. 
Many federal officials, though caring nothing 
for the postmaster, suj)ported him to day be¬ 
cause they wanted all the administration men 
together, and they wanted to show the Presi- 
<lent that the Maryland rejuiblicane were all 
for him. Congressman Sidney E. Mudd, to 
whom they gave a seat, ousting Parnes Comp¬ 
ton, championed Johnson’s cau.se to-day in 
thecommittee as a i)roxy from Charles county. 

The Henderson faction, or the antis, is head¬ 
ed by W'dliam T. Henderson, a local boss, who 
7 vanted the place that W. W Johnson, nmu holds — 
the postmaster ship. His cause to-day was champi¬ 
oned by Thomas //. Hodson of Somerset cminty, 
7 vho wanted the district attorneyship and did not get 
it .— Dispatch, from llaltimore to N. Y. Times, July 
17. 

—A well informed correspondent writes to 
the CivinSuKViCK Chkonici.e: 

“That the spirit of the civil servii^e law is 
being violated in Indiana is perfectly well 
known to any one who pays the slightest at¬ 
tention to the working of the rei)ublican ma¬ 
chine. Michener, attorney general and can¬ 
didate for the United States senate, has the 
control of the federal patronage in Indiana- 
He is chairman of the state central commit¬ 
tee. A state central committee was elected 
last January. At the various district conven¬ 
tions the federal office-holders, j)articularly 
the postmasters, were very prominent. In one 
district, the third, in which the administra¬ 
tion, through Michener, was very anxious to 
win. Postmaster Ridland,of Scottsburgh, a re¬ 
cent a{)pointee, was compelled to change the 
vote of his county from the man of his choice 
to Michener’s candidate. Postmaster God¬ 
frey, of New Albany, was a delegate to that 
convention and worked actively for Carter, 
the Michener candidate, for committeeman. 
Put for the official pressure brought to bear in 
that convention Carter would not have re¬ 
ceived one-third the vote. In the ninth con¬ 
gressional district contest for the nomination 
Mr. La Follctte, superintendent of public in¬ 
struction, was backed by Chairman Michener 
and all the patronage. P. Wilson Smith, 
postmaster at La Fayette, was particularly 
active in Mr. La Follette’s behalf. Postal 
clerk Hack helped out, but in si>ite of all. 
La Follette was beaten. Several post-office in¬ 
spectors were, it is said, traveling over the 
ninth district for La Follette. Right here in 
Indianapolis the federal officers are an active 
part of the machine. Postmaster Wallace, 
United States Marshal Dunlap and Collector 


Hildebrand take no open part in the manipu¬ 
lation, but they have good trusty subordinates 
who do. Deputy Postmaster Wallace is a del¬ 
egate to all conventions. Deputy Unitetl 
States Marshal Conway is a delegate to all 
conventions, and is a member of the county 
central committee. Fred vSehmidt, in the 
office of Collector Hildebrand, is the same. 
The same officer has as his deputy Eugene 
Saulcy, a hustler from away back, who is a 
member of the county committee.” 


CLARKSON vs. DANA. 

“ .SUBSIDIZED ” EDITOKS. 

A neat and epigrammatic little story, in 
which Assistant Postmaster General CMarkson 
figures as the hero, and Editor R. H. Dana of 
Poston as the victim, was recently going the 
rounds of the New York press. It runs as 
follows:— 

There is a periodical published in Poston 
and devoted to civil service reform, whose 
editor is Richard Henry Dana. When J. S. 
Clarkson was in Poston a week ago, he was in¬ 
troduced to ^r. Dana. Indeed, the Poston 
mugwumps paid quite as much court to the 
first assistant postmaster general as if he was 
not the axe-wielder for the decajiitation of 
50,000 official heads. At the head of his edi¬ 
torial page, Mr. Dana prints in each number 
of his journal a list of editors appointed by 
President Harrison to office, under the head¬ 
ing of “ Subsidized Editors.” Mr. Clarkson 
has seen this list, and in course of conversa¬ 
tion he asked Mr. Dana this quiet and some¬ 
what leading question :— 

“Would you accept a federal position, Mr. 
Dana, provided it should be ofrere<l you by 
the President, and should be a high and re- 
sj)onsible one,—say, civil service commission¬ 
er?” 

With the idea that Mr. Clarkson might be 
jnitting out a feeler for the administration, 
Mr. Dana responded emphatically, 

“ Yes,'I think I would.” 

“ In that event,” continued Mr. Clarkson, 
with satire in his tone, “ woubl you continue 
to print in your paper a list of subsidized edi¬ 
tors, with your own name in the list?” 

Mr. Dana’s reply has not yet reached the 
first assistant postmaster-general. 

The only defect noticeable in the narrative 
is the defect often found in good stories; 
namely, the defect that it has been ingenious¬ 
ly invented, but does not happen to be true. 
Mr. Dana never met Mr. Clarkson in Poston. 
The Boston editor did not respond emphati¬ 
cally, “Yes, I think I would,” nor did the 
first assistant postmaster-general continue the 
conversation with a satirical rejoinder. All 
that happened in this connection was simply 
this,—that Mr. Clarkson wrote to Mr. Dana, 
and that Mr. Dana sent a re})ly which has 
reached the first assistant postmaster-general. 
The correspondence is as follows:— 

OeEICE of THE FiHST ASSISTANT POST¬ 
MASTER- G ENEK A E. 

Washington, I). C., April 25, 1890. 

My Dear Sir, . . . Since you were here, I 
have seen a copy of your paper. I have read it 
with interest. I was particularly interested 
in the last leaf of it, where you print a list of 
“Subsidized Editors.” I see I am in the list. 

I did not know before that I was subsidized. 
I would like to know what good cause is 
served by keeping a list like this before the 
public. I presume, if the President would 


tender you a jiosition on the civil .service com¬ 
mission, you would accept it. If you should, 
I would like to know if you would print your 
own name in this list of subsidized editors; 
and, if not, why not ? 

Very truly yours, 

(Signed) J. S. Clarkson. 

Poston, A[)ril 29, 1890. 

My Dear Sir, —I have your letter of .\pril 
25, with the enclosure of an official statement 
regarding changes among postmasters. . . . 

As to “Subsidized Piditors,” you may remem¬ 
ber that in 1888 Mr. George William Curtis, 
in hissurnmaryof Cleveland’s administration, 
accu.sed Mr. ( leveland of having subsidized 
the press with the federal patronage ; and this 
paj)er made the same accusation, and Presi- 
ilent Harrison appears to have been doing the 
same thing to about the same extent. We 
shall probably have a more complete list 
formed, covering both Cleveland and Har¬ 
rison’s administration, by next autumn. The 
facts on which the peoi>le found their opinion 
of governments are almost wholly got through 
the press. We all admit the suj)|)ression of 
facts by government control, such as we see 
in Piurope to-day, is subversive of the rights 
of the people. Here and there an editor may 
be found fair-minded enough to give Ihe facts, 
both favorable and unfavorable, to an admin¬ 
istration under which he holds office; but his 
jiosition as a government subordinate would 
then be an awkward one. We have again 
and again seen the effect of jiatronige on the 
ordinary editor. It closes his mouth, his 
ears, and his eyes to any criticisms 
of his administration or fair treat¬ 
ment of his opponents. The public are the 
losers in such cases, just as much as if the 
government controlled or subsidized the [iress. 

I could not edit this paper indej)endently and 
fearlessly and yet hold my position, ]>rovided 
I got one, under the government, without act¬ 
ing in a way that would be unbecoming a 
subordinate. An editor like yourself, of a 
strictly party paper, may be able to perform 
both duties at once, but few succeed in this. 

Very truly yours, R, H. Dana. 

To Hon. J. S. Clarkson, 

First Assistant Postmaster-General, Washing¬ 
ton, D. C. 

For the cause of reform it makes very little 
difference whether Mr. Clarkson, as he tells 
the story, or Mr. Dana, as the correspondence 
shows, had the last word. It is of the great¬ 
est importance, however, that the public 
should be aroused to the evil of this phase of 
the s[)oils system. 

In the days of ancient Greece, the orators 
did the work now done by the press; and 
Philip of Macedon, in order to bring the free 
Greek states under his sway, subsidized all 
the orators with money or office, excepting 
Demosthenes. Even the warnings of Demos¬ 
thenes were not enough to save his country, 
which, though able to withstand the Macedo¬ 
nian jihalanx, yielded to the persuasions of 
the subsidized orators. 

Since publishing our last list of “subsi¬ 
dized editors,” we have had some forty-six 
new cases brought to our attention, and, besides 
these, the special committee of the national 
league has a long list of editors appointed by 
Presidents Harrison and Cleveland as presi¬ 
dential postmasters. It is bad enough to use 
the offices to control the caucuses and conven¬ 
tions in favor of this or that man or clique, 
but to use the offices for the purpose of pay¬ 
ing editors to keep the facts hidden from the 
people and to write up rose-colored accounts 
of the doings of an administration seems 
worse.— Civil Service Becord, July, 1S!)0. 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapolis. Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, 
Ind., where subscriptions and advertisements will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


VOL. I, No. 18. 


INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST, 1890. terms :<( f centsVefcopy."“ 


THE CONSPICaOUS DANGER. 


For one, I believe in that conscience and that vis¬ 
ion [of the great body of the people] to-day as pro¬ 
foundly as I believe in the better instincts of hu¬ 
manity everywhere. That they may be temporarily 
blinded and confused, we have perhaps as painful 
evidence of late as any which the history of the 
republic has given us. But that they have not lost 
their power, there are abundant and cheering signs. 
What now, 1 ask you, in such an emergency, is your 
duty and mine? The republic at this moment is 
confronted by three conspicuous dangers. 

A policy of favoritism which makes partisan service 
the substantial basis for political preferment, and a 
fine disdain for the element of personal fitness, 
whatever the place or task, which exacts only so 
much competency as can rescue the place holder 
from absolute disgrace ; this has come to be the war 
cry which treats every office of trust as so much 
spoil, and every political contest as simply a scram¬ 
ble for personal emolument. That such a view of 
the service of the government should be held by 
some Tuscan bandit escaped out of his trans-Alpine 


fastnesses to prey upon our unsuspecting institu¬ 
tions, would not be occasion for surprise. But that 
it has come to be the deliberate conviction of men 
in high place among us, and that this new gospel of 
unscrupulous sclf-seekirg is openly proclaimed as 
the only spell powerful enough to maintain a healthy 
and active interest in our political institutions—that, 
in other words, theje is no instinct of patriotism 
strong enough to consirain a man to active partici¬ 
pation in the political life of the nation unless there 
dangles before him, all the while, the po.ssible prize 
which he may snatch out of the sordid and shame¬ 
less strife—this certainly is a teaching which may 
well make all honest people flush with keen and 
indignant shame! For, in close touch with it, 
there stands plainly enough the inevitable corollary 
that no man who serves the state only from such 
motives will scruple to sacrifice X'ublic interests to 
private ends, whenever he can .safely do so. Once 
grant that civic place is a private placer, out of which 
you and I must first snatch that which shall com¬ 
pensate ourselves for the discomfort and degradation 


involved in scrambling for it, and it is difficult to 
see how the sequence, which puts self or one’s party 
first and one’s country last, does not hold all the way 
through. And, Indeed, that no higher sense of civic 
obligation than this is widely prevalent is indicated 
by the painful fact (to which one finds it difficult to 
allude with becoming delicacy and reserve) that 
great parties and great personages are able in this 
matter to affirm, on platforms and in official pronun- 
ciamentos, and with such unctuous solemnity, a vir¬ 
tue which, in practice, they find it no less easy with 
open and brazen impunity to doubt and disregard. 
Such a situation, gentlemen, disguise or dispute it 
as men may, never can be belittled or ignored as a 
mere partisan issue. It is an issue of morals, it is a 
question of common honesty, for men in civic power 
are simply the servants of the state, and the public 
service is a public trust, abuse or perversion or mal¬ 
feasance in which is not a less, but a greater, crime 
than unfaithfulness to a private trust.—From Bishop 
Potter's Phi Beta Oration, at Harxard, June 26,1890. 


The Civil Service Chronicle is now 
well into its second year. As has been be¬ 
fore stated no one but the printer is paid 
anything for services. In the light of a 
multitude of assurances it is believed that 
the paper is liked and has its field. We 
are anxious to extend its circulation, and 
in view of the large amount of work given 
freely to each issue, it is not too much to 
ask the friends of civil service reform to do 
their share by getting new subscribers. 
Subscribers must also bear in mind that it 
is not well to spend money in a system of 
collecting subscriptions, and that if each 
one will send his own he will thereby 
further co-operate. 


The paper on civil service reform, an¬ 
nounced last month, was read at the Bat¬ 
tle Ground camp meeting, August 1, the 
subject being"The Gift of Offices.” Note¬ 
worthy matters are the interest with which 
general audiences listen to this class of dis¬ 
cussions and the lack of specific informa¬ 
tion which prevails among the clergymen. 
The latter is undoubtedly due to their very 
general determination to avoid politics, 
and it is harmful to them and to the coun¬ 
try. When Senator Ingalls says that the 
ten commandments can not be applied to 
a political campaign, it is time for clergy¬ 
men not only to know of his statement, but 
to declare against it. 

The annual meeting of the National 
Civil Service Reform League will be held 


October 1 and 2, in Boston. This is a league 
of the civil service reform associations of 
the country. Any member of any asso¬ 
ciation is entitled to take part and vote in 
its general deliberations. The location of 
the meeting, and the number of eminent 
men in Massachusetts who are members of 
local associations, will make the occasion 
one of great interest and enjoyment. There 
is no pleasanter season of the year for 
travel, and it is to be hoped that Indiana 
members who have never attended will 
find it in their way to be in Boston 
at that time. The headquarters will be at 
the Parker House. 


When a party platform is the work of 
the little inside ring of party workers the 
omission of an important question like the 
reform of the civil service is not significant^ 
but the omission of all reference to this in 
the platform of the state convention of 
democrats of Delaware, held August 12, 
seems studied, and can not be passed by, 
in that Mr. Bayard, a member of Mr. 
Cleveland’s cabinet, and one supposed to 
be antagonistic to the spoils system, drafted 
the platform in great detail and read it, 
and later made an earnest speech in its 
favor. 

Elsewhere in this number will be found 
a long and interesting history of the use of 
the navy yards as spoil and of the laws re¬ 
lating to such use, founded in part on the 
recent speech of Congressman Cummings. 


The law is explicit that no man shall be 
discharged from the navy yards for political 
opinion, and that the hiring of employes 
shall be based upon capacity alone. Since 
1876 the law has required a certificate of 
necessity from the secretary of the navy if 
men are to be hired in a navy yard sixty 
days preceding a presidential or congres¬ 
sional election. It is safe to say that since 
the law was passed there has been no real 
necessity for such a certificate. The certi¬ 
ficates which have been made were for the 
purpose of filling the yards with men just 
preceding elections, so that their wages 
might act as a bribe for their votes. It is 
a humiliating and disgraceful spectacle to 
see presidents and secretaries lending 
themselves to this business. The un¬ 
doubted facts as to Secretary Whitney’s 
acts are given. Secretary Tracy is now 
engaged in the same business. There is 
nothing about repairing old wooden ves¬ 
sels up at the Kittery yard which can not 
wait until after the election. It is an at¬ 
tempt to put voters under government pay 
and thus bribe them to vote for the re- 
election of Congressman Reed, whose last 
majority was 1,616, regardless of the talk 
of the republican platform about “the dan¬ 
gers to free institutions which lurk in the 
power of official patronage.” 

Since March, 1889, republican congress¬ 
men of the Cheadle-Grosvenor-Houk type 
have met with many grievous defeats, but 
no other has so many elements of satis- 




















146 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


faction as the last encounter before the 
congressional investigating committee. 
Mr. Roosevelt had challenged Grosvenor 
and Houk to meet him before the com¬ 
mittee and make good their charges 
against the merit system, but they dis¬ 
creetly remained away. Last Friday, at 
the close of the investigation, Mr. Roose¬ 
velt told the committee that he should 
leave the next day for his Dakota ranch, 
and he bought his ticket for the trip. 
Promptly Saturday morning came Houk 
and Grosvenor and asked to be heard. 
The Washington dispatch of the New 
York Times, August 24, best describes 
their humiliating overthrow: 

Just as they were about to begin, Roosevelt came 
in. He had given up his ticket as soon as he had 
heard that Grosvenor had asked to be heard by the 
committee, and there he was to talk. And he had a 
great time of it. 

Grosvenor whined most pitifully. When he had 
said that the platform of the republican party in the 
last campaign was ‘‘Turn the democrats out and 
put republicans in,” he was oniy joking. He be¬ 
lieved in the merit system. Gradually he withdrew 
all the damaging things that he had said, and when 
Mr. Roosevelt pushed him loo closely about the 
assertions he had made on the floor of the house, he 
fell back on his constitutional privilege, declined to 
be questioned for what he had said on the floor, and 
left the committee room. 

Houk, who had been rather more careless than 
Grosvenor in making his charges, ran away while 
Grosvenor was undergoing his "skinning” at the 
hands of Roo.sevelt, and he has not intimated any 
desire to be heard at any other time. So ridiculous 
did the business appear to the members of the com¬ 
mittee of both parties that they laughed at the ex¬ 
pense of the men who had made the assertions that 
had been the basis of the investigation, and it 
seemed probable that the inquiry would only result 
in strengthening the reform that it was intended to 
injure. 

At the recent exanaination held in this city 
for clerks and carriers in the post-office, a negro 
stood at the head of the eligible list with a 
standing of 96 per cent. That his own man¬ 
liness has increased many per cent, by win¬ 
ning a place through merit, no one will deny. 
But the effect upon him is little beside the 
object lesson to all others of his race here. It 
quickens the tendency to go to school; it in¬ 
creases self-respect and ambition, and these 
feelings take possession of many impression¬ 
able and easy-going people, and are often the 
basis of a change of character. But while 
this winning of spurs by merit is being en¬ 
acted here, in St. Louis a mass meeting of 
negro politicians and spoilsmen is being held 
to denounce Internal Revenue Collector Wen- 
neker to Secretary Wiudom, because spoil for 
the colored men has not been forthcoming in 
sufficient quantities. A committee of three 
waited upon the unhappy Wenneker, and 
their report is printed in the St. Louis Re¬ 
public, of August 12, from which the follow¬ 
ing is an extract: 

St. Louis, Mo., August 11,1890. 
To the colored dlizens of St. Louis, Mo., in mass meet¬ 
ing, greeting : 

Gentlemen— We, your committee, having been 
appointed last Wednesday evening, August 6, by 
you to represent your interests and wait upon Mr. 


Charles F. Wenneker, collector of internal revenue, 
and ascertain his position and intentions as a repub¬ 
lican official towards the negro population of the 
city, beg leave to submit the following report: 

First.—Mr. Wenneker says he is very friendly di.s- 
posed toward our people and has always been, and 
that he has always intended to make a representa¬ 
tive appointment from among the negroes in his 
office. 

Second.—Mr. Wenneker says he does not wish it 
to be understood that, while he inteuds and will 
make an appointment of a representative negro to 
the SI,200 clerical position which Prof. Murray re¬ 
fused to accept, he has been forced to make it, or 
that we negroes compelled him to make the same. 

Third.—He will make said appointment about 
September 1. 

Fourth.—That there arc several other minor posi¬ 
tions outside of the city paying from 82 to 83 per 
day, such as store-keepers, for which he would gladly 
and willingly consider applications of any negro in 
the city who feels like applying for the same, and 
who would like to brave such inconveniences. 

Fifth.—Mr. Wenneker asks the colored citizens to 
be patient and quiet with him and he will prove to 
them that he is their friend, and that he will give 
them an equal show with a white man, as he fully 
knows that there are ^uite a large number of ne¬ 
groes in the city capable of filling any position equal 
to any white man. 

Sixth.—He says he waited quite a while all day 
Saturday for the committee, and was sorry that ill¬ 
ness prevented his meeting the committee on Fri¬ 
day. and that he had been waiting all the (this day) 
morning to receive the committee and set himself 
right with the people. The committee had made a 
favorable impression upon him and had taken a 
great burden of anxiety and weight from his shoul¬ 
ders. 


CENTERTOWNSHIPTRUSTEE’S OF¬ 
FICE. 

Township Trustee Gold, whose town.ship em¬ 
braces the city of Indianapolis, has removed 
all of the employes of the office except one, a 
woman, and has put in Frederick Vogt, a mol- 
der, Charles McCreery, an advertising agent, 
Thomas L. Duffy, a laborer, and Joseph Keis- 
burg, whose name we can not find in the di¬ 
rectory. Considering the importance of the 
work which the law permits the township 
trustee to do, Mr. Gold ought to have had 
excellent reasons for taking this step, especially 
when the township by it loses the services of 
such skilled and faithful men as Smith King 
and Frank Wright. Mr. King had had long 
experience with the office, and had built up a 
reputation for an independent and honest per¬ 
formance of his duties. We are informed that 
Mr. Gold had promised before election to re¬ 
tain Mr. Wright, and if so he ought to have 
some trouble with his conscience. At any 
rate, Wright’s removal is entirely indefensi¬ 
ble. He had been in the office about four 
years, and acted in the capacity of visitor, or 
investigator of claims for relief. Having been 
formerly a newspaper reporter, he was well 
trained for the work and acquired a reputa¬ 
tion far beyond any one else. It must be re¬ 
membered that within a few years ten thous¬ 
and different persons have applied for relief at 
this office, a very large class of whom have 
a skill in deception that has become a 
fine art. Mr. Wright had come to know 
personally the great bulk of these cases. He 
could intuitively detect a fraud. He had 
a map on which was drawn the genealogical 


lines of generations of paupers. If an appli¬ 
cant for relief fitted into that map, a Hood of 
light was thrown upon the best method of 
treatment. He worked for the paltry sum 
of fifteen dollars a week. He is said, upon 
good authority, to have saved the city ten 
thousand dollars a year. He simply can not 
be replaced, whatever excuses Mr. Gold may 
make for not keeping him. Joseph Keisburg 
has been put at his work. We do Mr. Gold no 
injustice in saying that the sole reason for 
making these changes was to pay somebody 
out of the public treasury for having done 
party work and probably personal work for 
Mr. Gold. His election was urged on the 
ground that he was a high minded and honor¬ 
able business man. We ask him to consider 
the morality of his acts. 

To fully understand the importance of this 
matter it should be known that the county 
commissioners have general charge of the 
poor of the county, while the township trus¬ 
tee is the overseer of the poor in his township. 
We have a system of relief by sending pau¬ 
pers to the county poor-house. We have also 
another system called out-door relief whereby 
the township trustee is given absolute discre¬ 
tion as to supporting people in their homes. 
A better plan for breeding paupers, robbing 
the people and corrupting politics could not 
be devised. It is a well recognized fact that 
Indiana township trustees’ offices are pauper 
breeding institutions. If the trustee happens 
to be running for a nomination, he distributes 
relief to help him in that. Local leaders of his 
party have crowds who are fed at public ex¬ 
pense. The people are helpless so long as the 
law remains on the statute books, except as 
men like Smith King and Frank Wright ap¬ 
ply the principles of common honesty to this 
work. It is impossible for the people to fol¬ 
low the work of a township trustee. Practi¬ 
cally it is secret and without any system of 
checks and balances. Th's makes it doubly 
exasperating when a new trustee steps into his 
office and turns out of it the only men who 
can possibly be of any service to the people. 
Mr. Gold may or may not intend to run his 
office as a part of his party machine in the 
coming election. Every citizen ought to be 
on the watch for this, and if this office is so 
run it ought to cost Mr. Gold’s party dear. 

THE NAVY YARDS AND SPOILS. 

Congressman Amos J. Cummings has ren¬ 
dered the country an important service by a 
speech delivered in the house, August 6, upon 
the present increase of employes at the Kit- 
tery (Portsmouth) navy yard. Section 1546 
of the revised statutes, passed March 2, 1867, 
says: 

No officer or employe of the government shall 
require or request any working man in any navy 
yard to contribute or pay any money for political 
purposes, nor shall any working man be removed or dis-. 
charged for 'political opinion. 

Section 1544 of the revised statutes, passed 
July 23,1872, says : 

Laborers shall be employed in the several navy 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


147 


yards by the proper officers in charge with reference 
to skill and efficiency, and without regard to other 
considerations. 

The Kittery yard lies opposite Portsmouth, 
N. II., and is in the first congressional dis¬ 
trict of Maine. In 1872 Maine held her state 
election in September, and the presidential 
election followed in November. In Septem¬ 
ber there were 1,318 employes in the Kittery 
yard; in October there were 1,424 employes; 
in December, less than a month after the elec¬ 
tion, there were G19 employes. In the fol¬ 
lowing year, says .Mr. Cummings, 1873, an 
important state election was held in Maine. 
New Hampshire also had an election pending 
and she was not forgotten, as the following 
telegram referring to the Kittery yard shows: 

TELEGR.\M. 

Washington, D. C., February 21,1873. 
Commodore J. C. Howell, Comviandant Navy Yard: 

As the Monongahela is wanted, you may employ 
forty men on her in addition to the present force. 
Give N. H. a large share. I. IIanscom, 

Chief of the Bureau of Construction and Repair. 

[A true copy.] H. A. Mitcheli., 

First Clerk to Commandant. 

In consequence, this yard had in September 
1,213 employes, but in November after the 
election there were only 914. In the Decem¬ 
ber following there were only 260. 

In 1874 elections for congressmen were 
pending in two Massachusetts districts, and 
the following telegrams relating to the Char¬ 
lestown navy yard were sent: 

(PRIVATE.) Boston, Mass., Oct. 23,1874. 

My Dear Commodore—I wish you would approve 
requisitions for men to be employed as they may be 
made until the first of November. Some fifty addi¬ 
tional men have been allowed from the Chelsea 
district, and I suppose some more will be required 
from Gooch’s district. The administration desire 
the success of Gooch and Frost. 

Yours respectfully, I. IIanscom. 

Commodore E. T. Nichols, U. S. N. Commandant. 

In 1875 the Whitthorne congressional com¬ 
mittee overhauled the navy-yard manage¬ 
ment, and Mr. Cummings gives some very 
pointed extracts from the testimony taken. 
We make quotations relating to the Kittery 
yard, beginning with the examination of Con¬ 
structor Webb: 

Q. Do you know of a meeting in the office of the 
commandant of the Kittery yard in which polili 
cians of New Hampshire and Maine were present? 

A. I was so informed by Commodore Pennock. 

Q. Did you see a list that was furnished at that 
meeting? 

A. I was furnished with a list by the commodore, 
which was addressed to him by the committee. 

Q. That was a list of men to be taken on for work? 

A. A list of men to be employed. 

Q. Did it come to you in the first instance? 

A. It did. 

Q. What did you do? 

A. I sent it back with word that it must be ad¬ 
dressed to the commanding officer of the yard. 

Q. Did it subsequently come to yon through the 
commandant? 

A. It did. 

Q. Did you exercise any discretion at all, or just 
take the men on in obedience to the order? 

A. I considered that I was not allowed any dis¬ 
cretion in the matter, but simply took the men and 
operated them to the best advantage. 

(i. While you were at Kittery, did you note the 
fact that while elections were pending in Maine 
laborers and mechanics were employed from that 
state in exce.ss of those from New Hampshire, and 


when an election in New Hampshire was pending 
you took on men from that state in excess of those 
from Maine? 

A. Such was the case. 

A man named Weeks had been discharged 
for stealing, but Comptroller Broadhead re¬ 
quested that he be re-employed, which was 
done on the following order from George M. 
Robeson, secretary of the navy : 

Commodore Pennock will employ this man at 
request of comptroller. G. M. R. 

The following is from Commodore How¬ 
ell’s testimony: 

Q. Docs an election tend to dimiui.sh or to in¬ 
crease the number of laborers in the yard? 

A. In my experience I have found it rather to in¬ 
crease ihem. 

Q. Is that a fact at the Portsmouth navy yard ? 

A. It was, upon occasion. 

Q. What occasion was that? 

A. Upon my word, I don’t know. It was some 
election there in 1873 and ’74, probably. I recollect 
that a number of men were taken on just before the 
election ; I have forgotten exactly how many. I also 
recollect that forty of them voted the democratic 
ticket the next day. There was a mistake appa¬ 
rently. 

Q. Do you remember in what proportion they 
were taken on at that time? 

A. I think one hundred men were taken on. 

Q. How long before the election ? 

A. Three or four days. 

(J. Under what kind of order were they taken on ; 
the recommendation of any committee or any out¬ 
side parties: and if so, whose? 

A. I foiget. There was an order of some sort, of 
course, or they would not have been taken on; 
whether it came from the chief of the bureau of 
construction or not, I do not know. Those orders 
generally did come from him. 

(1. Was it to take on a specific number of men ? 

A. I think the order was worded somewhat in this 
way: “One hundred men will be required to work 
on’’ some .ship or other, “and you are authorized 
to take them on.’’ The men were taken on, and, as 
I said, forty of them voted the other way. They 
worked honestly and faithfully while they were 
there. 

Q. How many days were they kept in the yard ? 

A. I .should say about ten or twelve or fourteen 
days. 

Commander Fairfax, of the Kittery yard, 
testified : 

Q. What are those abuses? 

A. The unnece.s.sary number of men employed 
prior to elections. 

Q. Is that a matter within your own personal ob¬ 
servation ? 

A. Yes, sir; at the Kittery navy yard. I was there 
two years, and have witnessed the constant interfer¬ 
ence on the part of Mr. Hanscom in discharging and 
employing men. He often took on worthle.ss men 
instead of good men. 

Commodore Bryson, of the Kittery yard, 
was examined, thus: 

Q. Have you any written communications from 
the secretary of the navy or chief of the bureau on 
the subject of the employment of hands, or any 
orders to employ certain men ? 

A. Yes, sir ; I have. 

Q. I suppose such ordei's are liable to come along 
at any time? 

A. At any time. 

Q. Certain men are named? 

A. Certain men are named, and we take them on. 
As military men we obey williont question. 

Q. These men are latoring men in the yard — 
blacksmiths, shipwrights and all that sort of thing? 

A. Yes, sir ; in the various departments. 

Q. Tnat is, men are taken on without any requisi¬ 
tion from your departments here, under peremi)tory 
orders from W'ashington ? 


A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do those orders comprehend more than one 
name, or frequently a number of names? 

A. Freiiuently a number of names. 

Captain Young, of the Kittery yard, was 
another witness: 

Q. Has it been customary for the department, for 
political reasons, to remove skillful mechanics and 
others, and put in unskillful ones, that they may 
serve political ends by it? 

A. That has been done, but I can npt say that it is 
purely for political ends? 

Q. Have you had skillful laborers removed and 
unskillful ones put in their places? 

A. O, yes, sir. 

Q. And you have to submit to it? 

A. Yes, sir; we have to submit. 

Q. You do not feel that you could safely say to the 
department at Washington: “This is detrimental 
to the public service? ’’ 

A. An officer would incur the risk of getting into 
bad odor if he did, and might be detached from the 
yard. 

Q. I say you do not feel safe in doing it? 

A. No, sir; we do not feel safe. 

To cure one evil shown by this investiga¬ 
tion, the following law was made June 30,1876 : 

And no Increase of the force at any navy yard 
shall be made at any time within sixty day s next be¬ 
fore any election to take place for president of the 
United Slates or members of congress, except when 
the secretary of the navy shall certify that the needs 
of the public service make such increase necessary 
at that time, which certificate shall be immediately 
published when made. 

Mr. Cummings is mistaken in saying that 
there was no complaint under President Cleve¬ 
land. In 1885 Secretary Whitney interfered, 
as follows: 

Navy Department, Washington, April 2,1885. 

Sir : You will please discharge Nelson Proctor, 
foreman laborer, and C. P. Reuttler, rodman in the 
department of yards and docks, and J. H. Downing 
and Samuel Wigg, writers in the commandant’s 
office, at the yard under your command. 

This discharge is made necessary by reason of the 
limited amount of money remaining of the appro¬ 
priation from which they are paid. 

Very respectfully, 

• W. C. WHITNEY, 

Secretary of the Navy. 

Commodore W'. K. Mayo, U. S. N., 

Commandant Navy Yard, Norfolk, Va. 

Commandants Office United Stati-s Navy Yard, 
Norfolk, Va., April 13, 1885. 

Sir : I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt 
to-day of the department’s letter of the 11th instant, 
asking whether there are any persons in any of the 
departments of this yard whose services can be dis¬ 
pensed with, etc. Also letter of the same date in¬ 
closing for my consideration certain applications for 
appointment and employment at this yard. 

Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 

W. T. TRUXTUN, 
Commodore, Commandant. 

HoN. W. C. Whitney, 

Secretary of the Navy, Navy Department, Washing¬ 
ton, D. C. 

In 1886, the following certificate was pub¬ 
lished in the Times of Portsmouth: 

[Certificate.] 

Navy Department, Washington, D. C., 
September 15,1880. 

In pursuance of the act of June 30,1876,1 hereby 
certify that the needs of the- public service make it 
necessary to increase the force in the navy yard at 
Portsmouth, N. H.,as follows: One hundred and 
twenty-six men in the department of the construc¬ 
tion and repair and twenty men in the department 
of steam engineering. D. B. HARMONY, 

Acting Secretary of the Navy. 

We have not the number of the employes of 











148 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


this yard in the months succeeding this cer¬ 
tificate, hut in its number for March, 1889, 
the Civil Service Record of lloston, after a care¬ 
ful investigation, gave a statement of what it 
had found of the management of the Brook¬ 
lyn navy yard by Secretary Whitney. Know¬ 
ing the carefulness of the Recoi'd, we feel 
warranted in saying that its report is true. 
Further, these same facts, in substance, were 
laid before President Cleveland, under date of 
July 20, 1888, but received no notice except a 
prompt reference to Secretary Whitney, who 
thus tried himself. We quote from the Record: 

Never witliin recent years have the civil em¬ 
ployes of the navy yard, the clerks, mechanics, and 
laborers, been of so poor a quality, and never has so 
little work been performed for the enormous amount 
of money paid them. Although, when Mr. Whitney 
took office four years ago, the force in the navy yard, 
clerks, laborers, and mechanics, was on the whole 
excellent. 

On October 19.1885, Mr. Whitney issued a general 
order addressed to the foremen in the respective navy 
yards, stating that the appointment of workmen and 
laborers would thereafter be entrusted to them, that 
no political consideration should govern their selec¬ 
tion, and that the duty of the appointing power 
would be to disregard every consideration except 
the efficiency of the men as workmen. Brave words, 
indeed! but, unfortunately, this manife.sto was soon 
followed by a visit from a confidential messenger of 
Mr. Whitney’s, who confided to the different heads 
of departments the secretary’s message to the effect 
that this general order did not really mean anything, 
but that, when workmen were required, application 
should be made to one of three persons, represent- 
respectively Tammany Hall, the County Democracy, 
and the Brooklyn Democracy. As rapidly as possi¬ 
ble the former workmen were discharged, and their 
places filled by these democratic procurers with nom- 
nees of the ward politicians, among whom the rum¬ 
selling element was prominent and influential. The 
consequence was that rum-drinkers who could be re¬ 
lied upon to spend a large portion of the money, re¬ 
ceived from the government, in the rum shops soon 
filled the yard. Shipwrights, joiners, blacksmiths, 
and machinists, the best of their kind, who had 
been employed in the yard for years, were summa¬ 
rily turned oft’ for no fault, and their places were 
filled with a lazy, inefficient, and drunken set of 
heelers for the various democratic bosses, the fore¬ 
men themselves were terrorized, knowing that they 
held their places at the pleasure, not of the officers 
of the yard, but of the gang of ward politicians, 
who ruled them with a rod of iron, and whose hum¬ 
ble servants they were, with but one or two excep¬ 
tions. 

For two or three weeks before the recent presiden¬ 
tial election, the yard was thronged with men em¬ 
ployed to do nothing but vote the democratic ticket. 
Bribery was shamlessly resorted to, by giving men 
who did not work and never intended to work from 
five to twenty days’ pay. Men’s wages were charged 
to ships which they never .saw, the result being that 
the money appropriated for the repair and outfit of 
ships was used to carry the election instead of being 
legitimately expended in a proper manner. 

The clerical appointments in the yard fared no 
better. An inquiry into the competency, industry, 
sobriety, and trustworthiness of the clerks in the 
various departments would bring to light some re 
markable and disgraceful facts. The patronage of 
filling these places was apparently exacted of Mr. 
Whitney by the democratic magnates of New York 
and Brooklyn, and was held like any other piece of 
personal property by coroners, sheriffs, fire commis¬ 
sioners, and police justices. Representations to the 
navy department by the officers of the yard of the 
utter unfitness of these appointees, of their absence 
without leave, of their habitual drunkenness, met 
with no attention whatever. Honest and capable 
men,.who had proved themselves trustworthy, were 
summarily dismissed by orders signed by the secre¬ 


tary of the navy, and their plac.ss filled by igno 
rant, drunken loafers. It is not too much to say 
that not one-third of the present clerical force of 
the navy yard would hold their places were the 
most elementary examination as to fitness ordered. 

Bad as this state of afiairs is, there is another most 
serious aspect of it to those who have at heart the 
honor and uprightness of the American naval offi¬ 
cer. Such conditions are, of course, known and 
acquiesced in by the officers who superintend these 
worthless employes. They, however, are painfully 
aware that it only requires the order of the secre¬ 
tary, if they remonstrate, to turn them out of their 
rent-free houses, and by placing them on “waiting 
orders” to reduce their income by a sum of from 
$700 to 81,000. It is much to be feared that in many 
cases ofticers have been obliged to signify their will¬ 
ingness to please the secretary in all such appoint¬ 
ments before they could succeed in being ordered to 
congenial duty there as well as elsewhere. 

Coming down to the present, Secretary 
Tracy recently published the following cer¬ 
tificate in the Portsmouth Daily Chronicle: 

/ 

CERTIKICATE. 

July 23,1890, 

In compliance with the act of congress approved 
June 30, 1876, I hereby certify that the needs of the 
public service make it necessary to increase at this 
time tlie force employed at the navy yard, Ports¬ 
mouth, N. H., for the purpose of reconstructing 
buildings numbered 45 and 46, destroyed by fire in 
January last; of completing the gunnery ship Lan¬ 
caster; of making necessary repairs and alterations 
of the training ship Monongahela; increasing the 
water supply; completing the hydrant system, and 
constructing a ferry-boat, the appropriation for 
which objects becomes available at the beginning of 
the current month. B. F. Tracy, 

Secretary of the Navy. 

A state and congressional election occurs in 
Maine next month, and a congressional elec¬ 
tion is pending in New Hampshire. The sen¬ 
ate naval committee this year recom¬ 
mended against an appropriation to recon¬ 
struct the burned buildings. The Lancaster 
is a wooden sailing ship, built in 1858, of 
which the secretary of the navy in 1875 re¬ 
ported : “Rotten at Portsmouth. Probable 
cost of repairs, $750,000. Not worth it.” Of 
the Monongahela, also a wooden sailing ship, 
built in 1862, he also said fifteen years ago: 
“ In service. Tolerable condition. Speed, 
10^ knots.” 

Since the above was in type some additional 
facts have appeared about the Kittery yard. 
It seems that the $50,000 were finally allowed 
for the rebuilding of the burned buildings. 
This appropriation became available July 1, 
and Secretary Tracy’s public certificate reached 
the yard July 24. Since that date fifty-six 
men have been taken on. Congressman 
Reed’s political boss at Kittery is one Dr. 
Wentworth, and he regards this addition of 
fifty-six men as mere mockery, when a con¬ 
gressional election, September 8, has to be 
prepared for. Nothing short of hundreds 
will do. But Commodore Skerritt, the com¬ 
mandant, stands in the way. There are no 
materials to work with, and Skerritt says he 
will not have men standing idle about the 
yard, and there is a deadlock. This is all the 
harder to bear for Reed’s henchmen, because 
after September 8, by baronial rules, the yard 
goes to New Hampshire to be filled under the 
direction of Bill Chandler. 


A MANACLED PRESS. 

Daniel Webster in 1832. 

And i.s a press tliat is imrcliased or ptui- 
sioned more free tliaii a press that is fet¬ 
tered.' Can the people look for tnitlrs to 
partial sources, ivliether rendered partial 
through fear or tlirough favor? Why 
sliall not a manacled ]>ress he trusted vvilh 
the maintenance and defense of popular 
rights I Because it is supposed to he un¬ 
der the influence of a power whiclt may 
prove greater than the love of truth. 
Such a press may screen abuses in gov¬ 
ernment or be silent. It may fear to 
to speak. And may it not fear to speak, 
too, when its conductors, if they speak in 
any but one way, may lose their means of 
livelihood I Is dependence on government 
for bread no temptation to screen its 
abuses ? Will the press always speak the 
truth, when the truth, if spoken, may be 
the means of silencing it for the future ? 
Is the truth in no danger, is the watch¬ 
man under no temptation, when he can 
neither proclaim the approach of national 
evils, nor seem to decry them, without the 
loss of his place ? 

Mr. President, an open attempt to secure 
the aid and friendship of the public press, 
by be.stowing the emoluments of ofiice on 
its active conductors, seems to me, of ev¬ 
erything we have witnessed, to be the 
most reprehensible. It degrades both the 
government and the press. As far as its 
natural effect extends, it turns the pallad¬ 
ium of liberty into an engine of party. It 
brings the agency, activity, energy, and 
patronage of government all to bear, with 
united force, on the means of general intel¬ 
ligence, and on the adoption or rejection of 
political opinions. 


President William Henry Harrison in 1841. 

There is no part of the means placed in 
the hands of the executive which might be 
used with greater effect, for unhallowed 
purposes, than the control of the public 
press. 

—F. E. Learned, son of the editor of the Argus, is 
postmaster at Benson, Ill. The editor is deputy post¬ 
master. 

—Chester A. Wilcox, of the Whig, is postmastei at 
Quincy, Ill. 

[This correspondent writes that “ The republicans 
have made a clean sweep in the federal offices here. 
The postmaster removed two Union veterans; both 
very capable men ; and the collector of internal rev¬ 
enue removed Edward Cleveland, a one-legged vet¬ 
eran, because of his democracy, from his position as 
stamp clerk.”] 

-Dallam, of the Bulletin, Warsaw, Ill., is 

deputy United States revenue collector. 

—Sarah P. Lacey, wife of A. H. Lacey, editor of the 
Wet Mountain Tribune, is postmaster at Westcliffe, 
Col. 

—Myron A. Rhea, of the Journal, is postmaster at 
Altoona, Kan. 

—A. K. Stoufer, of the Neios, is postmaster at Arka- 
lon, Kan. 

—J. D. Greason, of the Republican Citizen, is post¬ 
master at Atwood, Kan. 

—U. Feustemaker, of the Herald, is postmaster at 
Augustine, Kan. 

—C. A. McMullin, of the Echo, Is postmaster at 
Benedict, Kan. 

—W. R. Davis, of the Republican, is postmaster at 
Canton, Kan. 

—R. S. Playford, of the Carbondalian, is postmaster 
at Carbondale, Kan. 

Geo. W. Loman, of the Record, is postmaster at 
Chase, Kan. 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


149 


—J. G. Smith, of the Herald, is postmaster at Cun¬ 
ningham, Kan. 

—W. II. Melrose, of the Star, is postmaster at Esk¬ 
ridge, Kan. 

—A. M. EnglLsh, of the ^Vewi.s, is postmaster at Fon¬ 
tana, Kan. 

—L. C. Headley, of the Herald, is postmaster at 
Gaylord, Kan. 

—John II Tait, of the Sherman County Dark Horse, 
is postmaster at Goodland, Kan. 

—J. W. Bliss, of the Journal, is postmaster at Green- 
leaf, Kan. 

—A. Tansel, of the Clipper, is postmaster at Had- 
dam, Kan. 

—E. H. Rathbone, of the Courant, is postmaster at 
Herndon, Kan. 

—M. G. Woodmansee, of the Enterprise, is postmas¬ 
ter at Holy rood, Kan. 

—Geo. Burroughs, of the Herald, is postmaster at 
Hope, Kan. 

—F. Gray, of the Times, is postmaster at Ivanhoe, 
Kan. 

—James Burton, of the Kansan, is postmaster at 
Jamestown, Kan. 

—J. A. Webster, of the Journal, is postmaster at 
John.son, Kan. 

—E. C. Lane, of the Jourrial, is postmaster at La 
Cyge, Kan. 

—R. H. Cadwallader, of the Herald, is postmaster 
at Louisburg, Kan. 

—R. H. Chase, of the Gazelle, is postmaster at Lu- 
dell, Kan. 

—J. R. Sedgwick, of the Times, is postmaster at Mc¬ 
Donald, Kan. 

—G. C. Armstrong, of the Republican, is postmaster 
at Moline, Kan. 

—C. Borin, of the Eye, is postmaster at Oberlin, 
Kan. 

—F. H. Roberts, of the Independent, is postmaster 
at Oskaloo.sa, Kan. 

—John B. Kessler, of the Herald, is postmaster at 
Ottawa, Kan. 

—M. L. Hart, of the Chic/tain, is postmaster at Ra¬ 
venna, Kan. 

—N. D. Adams, of the Scott county Neivs, is post¬ 
master at Scott, Kan. 

—Dwight Beach, of the Hews, is postmaster at Val¬ 
ley Center. 

—H. C. Robinson, of the Republican, is postmaster 
at Washington, Kan. 

—G. G. Grimes, of the Times, is postmaster at 
Balrdstown, O. 

—W. C. Scott, of the Gazette, is postmaster ai Dal¬ 
ton, O. 

—F. S. Pursell, of the Republican GazeHc, is post¬ 
master at Logan, O. 

—C. B. Murdock, of the Messenger, is postmaster at 
Middlefleld, O. 

—F. M. Carl, of the Independent, is postmaster at 
Narvarre, O. 

—E. B. Lewis, of the Plain Talk, is postmaster at 
New Holland, O. 

—C. W. Horn, of the Dealer, is postmaster at Plain 
City, O. 

—J. C. HarrLson, father of Herbert Harri.son, of the 
Times, is postmaster at Smithfleld, O. 

—Annie B.Hale.wife of James R. Hale, of the Blade, 
Is postmaster at Spring Valley, O. The editor is as¬ 
sistant postmaster. 

—H. E, Harris, of the Herald, is postmaster at 
Utica, O. 

—H. R. Snyder, of the Republican, is postmaster at 
Waverly, O. 

—John Spidle, of the Review, is postmaster at Wil- 
mot, O. 

—Jno. Maywood, of the Huron Tribune, is postmas¬ 
ter at Bad Axe, Mich. 


—Eugene Foster, of the Gladwin county Record, is 
postmaster at Gladwin, Mich. 

-^B. J. Lowrey, of the Record, is postmaster at How¬ 
ard City, Mich. 

—E. O. Shaw, of the Republican, is postmaster at 
New'aygo, Mich. 

—F. D. Larke, of the Advance, is postmaster at Rog¬ 
ers City, Mich. 

—Fred. Wade, of the Commercial, is postmaster at 
Sangatnek, Mich. 

—E. W. Wheeler, of the Pioneer, is postmaster at 
Sherman, Mich. 

—D. J. Easton, of the Register, is postmaster at Un¬ 
ion City, Mich. 

—C. A. Baldwin, of the Commercial, is postmaster 
at Vicksburg, Mich. 

—A. C. Laurence, of the Sentinel, is postmaster at 
Evansville, Minn. 

—Jacob Brynildsen, of the Transcript-Democrat, is 
postmaster at Graceville, Minn. 

—John A. Henry, of the Argus, is postmaster at 
Jonesville, Minn. 

—Selah S. King, of the Journal, is postmaster at 
Jasper, Minn. 

—Geo. B. Mair, of the Courier, is postmaster at Cal¬ 
loway, Neb. 

—E. W. Buser, of the Neivs Boy, is postmaster at 
Dawson, Neb. 

—A. W. Mayfield, of the Echo, is postmaster at 
Elmwood, Neb. 

—James P. Gandy, of the Pioneer-Republican, is 
postmaster at Gandy, Neb. 

—S. R. Rhodes, of the Review, is postma.ster at 
Gresham. Neb. 

—D. P. Davis, father of W. H. Davis, of the Herald, 
is postmaster at Harrison, Neb. 

—J. F. Paradis, of the Guide, is postmaster at Ilem- 
ingford. Neb. 

—M. A. Hammell, of the Enquirer, is postmaster at 
Mullen, Neb. 

—E. T. Best, of the Leader, is postmaster at Niligh, 
Neb. 

—Aug. E. Hassler, of the Republiean, is postmaster 
at Pawnee City, Neb. 

—H. G. Cross, of the Press, is postmaster at Peters¬ 
burg, Neb. 

—J. B. Sharob, of the Call, is postma.ster at Pierce, 
Neb. 

—J. L. Stevens, of the Gazette, is postmaster at 
Plainview, Neb. 

—B. F. Thomas, of the Union, is postmaster at Wy- 
more. Neb. 

—W. E. Robison, of the Telegram, is postmaster at 
Beallsville, Pa. 

—John B. Patrick, of the Republican Gazette, is post- 
master at Clarion, Pa. 

—Emma D. Wiley, wife of R. T. Wiley, of the Her¬ 
ald, is postmaster at Elizabeth, Pa. 

—C. B. Gould, of the Press, is postmaster at Empo¬ 
rium, Pa. 

—H. B. Moyer, of the Courier, is postmaster at Free- 
burgh. Pa. 

—N. M. Cheney, of the Republican, is postmaster at 
LaPorte, Pa. 

—Jesse M. Vail, of the Advertiser, is postmaster at 
New Milford, Pa. 

—George W. Littlejohn, of the Independeni, is post 
master at Grayson, Ky. 

-Hopley, of the Journal, is postmaster at 

Bucyrus, Ohio. 

[For more than a score of years it has happened 
that once in six years Ohio has elected a democratic 
legislature. By a singular coincidence this has al¬ 
ways occurred when a United States senator was to 
be elected to succeed Senator Sherman’s colleague. 
Of late years there has been a growing belief that 
this was because Senator Sherman so willed it, and 
that he purposely caused the republicans to lo.se the 


legislature in order that he should have a demo, 
cratic colleague and thus have undivided control of 
the federal patronage of the state. With this rumor 
has grown a strong anti-Sherman feeling in many 
parts of the state, and it looks now as if “ Uncle 
John” would have to do some shrewnl fence fixing 
if he wishes to succeed him.self in 1893. 

As an indication of the bitterness that is felt 
against him in many quarters, the resolutions re¬ 
cently adopted by the republican county conven¬ 
tion of Crawford county, at Bucyrus, are an amusing 
illustration. The feeling of indignation was wrought 
up to the required pitch by the fight over the Bucyrus 
post-office, in which Senator Sherman disregarded the 
wishes oj most of the working republicans of the county, 
who had indorsed M. K. Fidton, and secured the appoint¬ 
ment of Editor Hopley of the Bucyrus Journal. Where¬ 
upon the republicans in their eounty convention 
adopted with a thunder of yeas the followingcaustic 
resolutions: 

Whereas, The Right Hon. John Sherman, our be¬ 
loved senator, has assumed the prerogative of de¬ 
ciding upon the appointment of local government 
officials against the expressed will of the republicans 
who do the work and pay the expenses of each cam¬ 
paign without reward; and, <• 

Fecoad—That our beloved and courteous senator be 
directed, if he sees fit to do so. to cast the entire vote 
of Crawford county or the state as a unit, which will 
be the first unit ballot ever secured in his native 
slate by the distinguished statesman. 

Fifth—That we favor and indorse a Federal Civil 
Service Reform bill that will give at all times but 
one republican senator from Ohio, and bequeath to 
said senator sole autocratic powers and the exclusive 
farming out of the local offices of the state to main¬ 
tain sole senatorial autonomy. 

Finally—That we tender our apologies to Senator 
Sherman for attempting to interfere or exercise in¬ 
fluence in the selection of local officers.-Cfcrcfand 
Dispatch to New York Times, July 21.] 

[“I find in looking over the list of appointments 
in Indiana that sixteen democratic newspaper pro¬ 
prietors and editors have been appointed to office. 
* * * If I could believe that in appointing these 
men Mr. Cleveland meant that they should pursue 
a perfectly inoffensive course politically, that these 
newspapers should not irritate the feelings of repub¬ 
licans, should not publish charges against republi¬ 
can candidates for office, should say nothing offen¬ 
sive to the republican.s—if I believed he meant by 
these appointments sincerely to put these sixteen 
democratic newspapers under those bonds, I should 
have brighter hopes than I have now of carrying Indiana 
neat lime. But it will not be so. Here are these sixteen 
edii ars, two of the three collectors of internal reve- 
nin in Indiana, and the others holding influential 
posi-offices; and Mr. Cleveland knows, and every 
hoi est democratic knows, that those sixteen news¬ 
papers will be fulminating with all the force and 
vigor and power and partisanship they can against 
the republican paTty.”—Senator Benjamin Harrison in 
187G.] 


CLARKSON’S “RESIGNATIONS.” 

J. Mustard was to-day appointed fourth- 
class postmaster at Glen Hall, Tippecanoe 
county, vice J. M. Stepp, resigned.— Indian- 
opolii Journal, Aug. 14. 

John Stepp, groceryman and postmaster at 
Glenn Hall, sold out to Mr. Snyder, condi¬ 
tioned that Mrs. Snyder was appointed post¬ 
mistress, but Congressman Cheadle recom¬ 
mended James Mustard. The majority of the 
community favor Mrs. Snyder, and there is 
war .—Indianapolis New.s, Aug. 13. 












150 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Office-Holders Defending their Possessions. 

Allotments thus acquired, mutually engaged such as accepted them to defend them; and as they all sprang from the same right of conquest, no part 
could subsist independent of the whole; wherefore all givers as well as receivers were mutually bound to defend each other’s possessions. « Every 

receiver of lands, or feudatory, was therefore bound when called upon by his benefactor, or immediate lord of his feud or fee, to do all in his power to defend 
him. Such benefactor or lord was likewise subordinate to and under the command of his immediate benefactor and superior; and so upwards to the prince or 
general himself; and the several lords were also reciprocally bound, in their respective gradations, to protect the possessions they had given. Thus the feudal 
connection was established, a proper military subjection was naturally introduced and an army of feudatories was always ready enlisted and mutually i)repared 
to muster. . . —Blackstone. 


—The St.Louis Republic of August 16gives by 
wards the men who make up the Filley ma¬ 
chine and who now control the republican 
party in that city. There is no more useful 
work a paper can do, because it drives home 
by the graphic method to every citizen the 
unpleasant consciousness (hat he is, as a rule, 
the agent to execute the orders of a small and 
despotic oligarchy, the chief of whom are an 
office-holding class, federal, state, county and 
city. The following is an illustrative list 
taken from the Republic: 

First ward-. Second ward-. Third ward, 

George Weber, employed by Collector Ziegenhein. 
Fourth ward, Philip Sauf, father of the deputy sher¬ 
iff. Fifili ward, Charles Proll, of Collector Ziegen- 
hein’s office. Sixth ward, Peter Gnndloch, postmas¬ 
ter at Station A. Seventh ward, John Herrold, store¬ 
keeper in Collector Wenneker's office, and Theodore 

Horman, marriage license clerk. Eighth ward-. 

Ninth ward, Henry Becker, deputy in Ziegcnheiii’s 
office, Collector Ziegenhein, Wm. L. Price, deputy 
city marshal, Gustave Wiirzburger, saloon license 
clerk, Leo Hartmann, storekeeper for Collector Wen- 

ncker. Tenth ward-. Eleventh ward, Coroner’s 

Clerk Paschall, Deputy City Marshal Theo. Cast, Dep¬ 
uty Coroner John Weis, Fred. Gerber, ehief clerk of 
tax department in collector’s office. Twelfth ward, 
T, W. H. Wiesehan, clerk in Collector Wenneker’s of¬ 
fice. Thirteenth ward-. Fourteenth ward, Jo¬ 

seph Brown, clerk in Hobbs’s office. Fifteeiiih ward. 
Deputy Sheriff Frank Meis. Sixteenth ward. Collec¬ 
tor Wenneker, August Gundlach and George Krcch- 
man, each of whom has a high-salaried position un¬ 
der Wenneker, and Deputy City Collector Henry C. 
Meyer. Seventeenth ward, E. D. Chamberlain, of the 
collector’s office. Deputy Sheriff H. J. Heitsmeyer, 
C. T. Ridgway, janitor in city hall. Eighteenth 

ward-. Nineteenth ward. Deputy Sheriff J. J. 

Kirby, V. J. Matthews, deputy city collector, W. H- 
Stevens, clerk in the custom house, and Charles 
Hotchkiss, clerk in Surveyor Metcalf’s office. Twen¬ 
tieth ward-. Twenty-first rvard, Herman Line- 

burger, deputy in Collector Zeigenhein’s office. 
Twenty-second ward, Archie Carr, special agent of 
the Interior Department, Chas. Arnold, deputy city 
collector, Tom Vermillion, clerk in Hobbs’s office. 
Twenty-third ward, Richard Schmester, employed 
in post-office, and Deputy Sheriff Dick Wallincott. 
Twenty-fourth ward. Deputy Sheriff Billy Pohlman- 
and Commodore Smith, of Hobbs’s office. Twenty, 
fifth ward, John F. Doerbanra from the post office. 
Twenty-sixth ward, George Schubert, clerk in the 
collector's office. Deputy Sheriff Bill Jackson. Twen¬ 
ty-seventh ward, Deputy Collector Christ Guenther. 
Twenty-eighth ward, Gus Vogel, a federal office¬ 
holder. 

Filley gets these men places where they are sup¬ 
ported at public expense, and he lights with all 
his might when the place of the least important even 
is threatened. In return, they work for Filley. His 
power and his willingness to give favors are dwelt 
on, his instructions as to what primaries and cau¬ 
cuses are expected to develop are carried out, and 
so long as Filley can control patronage,they neither 
acknowledge allegiance, nor feel obligation to any 
other. 

—The Picayune (democratic) has the follow¬ 
ing dispatch from Dallas, Tex.: It is learned 
from good authority that when the State 


republican convention assembles at San An¬ 
tonio, on September 3, the white republicans 
will be headed by men of southern birth and 
will make a fight to dethrone Wright Cuney, col¬ 
lector of customs at the port ef Galveston, and 
build up a white republican party in Texas. 
-—New Orleans Dispatch, August 10. 

—The democratic committee of the eighth 
congressional district had a lively time at 
their meeting at the Hendricks Association 
rooms last night. Politicians claim that the 
meeting resulted in a clean defeat for John J. 
O’Neill, but the ^x-congressman will admit 
nothing of the sort. 

Mr. O’Neill, when asked after the meeting 
what he thought of the $3,00U assessment, couhl 
scarcely voice his indignation, “ It issimply an 
outrage,” he declared, “fc make an assessment of 
that kind before the primaries have been held, and to 
insist upon a candidate putting up the money before 
being allowed to go before the people. It is simply 
a scheme to freeze me out by placing the as¬ 
sessment at a figure they think I can not pay. 
Their plea is, that they ivanl the money to affect a 
precinct.organization. I believe in precinct or¬ 
ganization, but not until after the primaries 
have been held.— St. Louis Republic, July 31. 

—Editor and Internal Kevenue Collector 
Alexander Von Landberg to-day removed a 
large number of deputies in the office and 
filled their places with the friends of Senator His 
cock. Among the deputies removed was Wm. 
E. Iloyt of Fayetteville, brother-in-law of Ex- 
President Cleveland. Mr. Iloyt has been a 
most competent and faithful official. 

Collector Von Landberg has also determined 
to appoint Charles lliscock, brother of the sen¬ 
ator, a deputy in place of L. D. Mowry. 11 iscock’s 
appointment is to date from Sept. 1. There 
is great indignation among working republi¬ 
cans at Hiscock’s appointment and Collector 
Von Landberg applied to some influential 
repulicans to help him out of the scrape by 
urging Senator Hiscock not to insist upon his 
brother’s appointment. This they refused to 
do, and the senator was obdurate .—New York 
Times. 

—A full meeting of the republican state 
committee was held last evening. Chairman, 
Postmaster Manley presided. Chairman Man- 
ley said that it was the unanimous vote of the 
committee that the campaign be very short, 
and that the public speaking would be confined 
to the last two weeks of the campaign.— 
Press Dispatch, August 13. 

—Internal Revenue Collector Ernst Nathan 
has several men at work getting up a Brooklyn 
citizens’ movement, the object of which is to 
renominate Congressman William C. Wallace. 
—New York Times, July 11. 

—Collector Erhardt has appointed Wm. G. 
Deane head of the customs cab service at a 
salary of $1,500 a year. He succeeds W. A. 
Ducy, who was appointed by Mr. Magone. 
Mr. Deane is the son of the republican leader of the 
ninth district. 

Nathan C. Clarkson was to day appointed 
postmaster at Hamilton, Caldwell county. Mo. 
Nearly all the leading I'epublicans of Caldwell 
county, and most of the prominent citizens of 


Hamilton, had indorsed for this place Wm. 
B. Walker, a prominent republican of Ham¬ 
ilton. 

There is only one rea.son why Walker should 
not be appointed, and why Clarkson should be 
appointed. Clarkson is a cousin of John S. 
Clarkson.— St. Louis Republic, June 5. 

—The nomination of John Pentreath to suc¬ 
ceed Miss Lilian C. Keyes, as postmaster at 
Yonkers, also made to-day, is due to the in¬ 
fluence of Speaker JIusled and James TBood, the 
defeated candidate for congress in the fourteenth 
district.—June 19. 

—The republican county committee of 
Schuyler county had a meeting and adopt¬ 
ed resolutions protesting against the ap¬ 
pointment of Peter Conroy as postmaster at 
Watkins, alleging that Conroy is a democrat. 
Conroy is Congressman Flood's man, and Senator 
Hiscock is vigorously opposing the confirma¬ 
tion of the nomination in the senate, which 
has accasioned considerable ill feeling be¬ 
tween him and Flood. 

-—President Harrison has the opportunity 
to select a new man for internal revenue col¬ 
lector in the Fifth North Carolina district. 
The nomination of John B. Eaves for that office 
wasrejected by the senate. Eaves was appointed 
a few days more than a year ago. His nomina¬ 
tion was sent to the senate early in December. 
Ever since his appointment strong efforts have 
been made by republicans not in sympathy 
with the Settle-Mott faction and the old Sher¬ 
man “machine” and by the democrats of the 
state to prevent his confirmation. It was de¬ 
clared that Eaves was a mere figurehead for 
ex-Collector J. J. Mott, and that there was a 
deed by which the men appointed to subordinate 
places had to pay so much cash to cover Eaves's ex¬ 
penses in securing the collectorship, while a certain 
percentage of all salaries was collected by the ring 
which obtained from President Harnson control of 
the federal patronage in North Carolina. Accusa¬ 
tions were also made affecting the personal fit¬ 
ness for office of the col lector .—New York Times. 

THE OFFICE-HOLDING CLASS. 

—The appointment of Henry II. Fay as 
postmaster at Newport, R. I., was made upon 
the recommendation of the two senaterrs, ivith the ap¬ 
proval of the representatives. Mr. Fay has been in 
the legislature and held many other public offices. 

—The appointment of Herbert G. Briggs to 
be postmaster of Portland created no surprise 
in this city to-night, for it has been expected 
for the past three months that Mr. Briggs was 
to receive the appointment when it was made. 
Mr. Briggs is a native of Auburn in this state, 
and is about thirty-seven years of age. He 
has been very prominent as a ward politician and 
has held several mincyr offices. He has been an al¬ 
derman and is to-day one of the park commissioners. 
He has been chairman of the republican city com¬ 
mittee and is a strong personal friend of Speaker 
Reed, and it is due to the latter's infiuence that Mr. 
Briggs received the appointment.—Portland, Me., 
July 10. 

—The nomination of Ex-Postmaster Blunt, 
of Haverhill, to be surveyor at the custom’ 
house was a cruel blow to the Hohart men.— 
Boston Post, Aug. 11. 




















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


151 


n>v4:^TTHEW S_ 

United States Senator and Cliainnan of tlie Nationsl Itepubliean Conimitlee, Silent under the Charge of Embezzlement 

by Reputable Newspapers. 


The IVays and Means of the Subjugation of a State by a Modern Oflice Baron. 


For once Senator Quay has been beaten at 
bis own game of buying votes. Maj. Mc¬ 
Dowell, who was nominated by the republi¬ 
cans for congress in the twenty-fifth district by 
the votes of four purchased delegates (three 
quoted at $(>50 each, and one dirt cheap at 
$250) has resolved to maintain a discreet 
policy of silence. “I have secured the nomi¬ 
nation, and that ends it,” says the Major, “ I 
shall pay no attention to anything that may 
come out. I shall not withdraw, nor shall I 
agree to a new convention.” So he informs 
the Pittsburgh Commercial Ga3e</e,Quay’s organ. 

William D. Wallace, of New Castle, who is 
supposed to have conducted the negotiations 
that converted four Townsend conferees into 
voters for McDowell, says also in an interview 
in the Commercial Gazette: “Mr. Quay, the 
leader of the republican party, has established 
the precedent of answering no charges. I am 
willing to abide by the decision of the voters, 
and I will patiently await the result. People 
with stolen goods in their pockets are not in a 
position to cry thief.” 

This delicate reference to receivers of stolen 
goods refers to the fact that two years ago 
Congressman Townsend’s friends bought away 
from Oscar L. Jackson the one vote that nom¬ 
inated Townsend. 

The Post this morning says editorially: 
“ There is a great joke in this whole business. 
In 1888 a vote from Lawrence county was 
bought up to defeat Jackson of Lawrence. In 
1890 four votes from Beaver county were 
purchased to defeat Townsend of Beaver. The 
necessity of the policy of silence is apparent. 
It has become one of the fundamental beliefs 
and practices of the republican party of Quay- 
sylvania. Four disciples of the political 
methods of Boss Quay in his own county of 
Beaver have confessed they accepted bribes as 
the price of their vote for a congressional 
candidate. They were elected, pledged, and 
instructed to vote for Congressman Charles C. 
Townsend, and did so for awhile; but when 
negotiations were completed, and the fitting 
moment arrived on the 109th ballot, they 
flopped with the money in their pockets and 
voted for and nominated McDowell for con¬ 
gress. The primary election law of this state 
subjects these self-confessed receivers of bribes 
to fine and imprisonment. We are glad to see 
that the Pittsburgh Commercial Gazette has 
awakened to the enormity of bribery and em- 
bez7.1ement, and parades its virtue by insisting 
that Mr. Quay’s district attorney in Beaver 
county and Mr. Quay’s county committee 
shall bring Mr. Quay’s bribed heelers into 
court at “ the earliest practicable moment.” 


The twenty-fifth district includes the coun¬ 
ties of Beaver, Butler, Mercer and Lawrence. 
Beaver county’s action in calling a meeting of 
the county committee to take action in the 
matter was followed yesterday by Butler coun¬ 
ty. A meeting of the republican county com¬ 
mittee has been called for July 23, the object 
being to discuss and take action on the bribery. 
If anything were wanting to complete the 
proof of the bribery of congressional delegates 
at New Castle, it was obtained yesterday. 
Thomas Downing, the Townsend conferee, who 
is charged by the other three boodlers with 
having conducted the negotiations for the sale 
of their votes, made a full confession to the 
Philadelphia Press correspondent, and signed 
it in the presence of witnesses.— Special Dis¬ 
patch to the New York Evening Post, July 15. 

The facts have been unearthed by republi¬ 
can journals like the Philadelphia Press and 
Pittsburgh Commercial Gazette, and appear well 
substantiated in every detail. The affidavit 
of Tate is explicit, even to his own degrada¬ 
tion. This disciple of Quay ism says : 

“I went into Wallace’s office. Downing re¬ 
marking that he wanted to see another party. 
While I was talking to Wallace Downing re¬ 
turned. Then Wallace said, ‘ I’ve got the cash 
right here,’ and he produced four envelopes, 
in each of which he said there was $300. I 
then and there promised to vote for McDowell. 
Previous to that time I had made no promise 
to vote for McDowell. Wallace wanted to 
know if we would change our votes from 
Townsend to McDowell on the first ballot af- 

.4 

ter assembling. ‘ Do it on the first ballot and 
be done with it,’ were his words. I objected, 
and said that it ought to be done on the second 
or third ballot. He said, ‘All right; I’ll have 
it fixed on the third ballot.’ In consideration 
of this promise of Mr. Wallace I voted for Mr. 
McDowell that night. After we got to Beaver 
Falls Downing handed me an enveloj)e in 
which there was .$645. After we came out of 
the convention hall Shaffer told me that he 
had the money.” 

Our inquiries were more than ordinarily 
useful in Pennsylvania, owing to the muzzled 
condition of the republican press in that state, 
the like of which, we think, has never been 
seen in a free community, unless we call the 
southern states during the days of slavery free 
communities. Our correspondent found some 
ministers who had neve)' heard of the charges against 
Quay, owing to their confining their newspaper 
reading to two newspapers, one of them, we 
regret to say, a journal which we greatly re¬ 
spect— The Ledger. It is of the highest impor¬ 


tance that the lid should be taken oft’ such 
minds as these, and a little of the light of con¬ 
temporaneous history be allowed to shoot in. 
—New York Evening Post. 

To the Hon. Matthew S. Quay : 

Dear Sir —The charges of embezzlement 
while state treasurer of Pennsylvania brought 
against you by the New York World, Evening 
Post, Nation, Puck, and other papers of respon¬ 
sibility, have so far met neither reply nor de¬ 
nial at your hands. It is and has been very 
irritating to many earnest republicans to have 
you ignore these grave accusations, made most 
pointed and emphatic in last week’s Puck, 
which undoubtedly you have seen. You are 
there depicted i^ a felon’s garb, plainly called 
a felon, holding the whip, and compelling the 
respectable leaders of the “ Grand Old Party ” 
to march at the command of a felon overseer. 

As you perhaps shun suit for libel against 
any or all of your accusers on account of the 
great expense therein involved, it has been 
suggested by some of those republicans who 
are indirectly smarting under these accusa¬ 
tions, to raise a fund of sufficient amount to 
institute and push suits for civil and criminal 
libel against your open accusers. 

Please let me know if this plan of vindicat¬ 
ing your honor as chairman of the republican 
national committee and United States senator 
meets with your approval, and oblige yours, 
respectfully, Rudolph Blankenburg. 

Philadelphia, Tuesday, Aug. 5, ISOO. 

[Mr. Quay still maintains his iiolicy of si¬ 
lence.] 

The legislature of 1879, which assembled 
January 7, and adjourned June 6, of the same 
year, was a notable one in the annals of Penn¬ 
sylvania. Governor Hoyt was entirely under 
the power of Quay, and the latter was abso¬ 
lute monarch of the situation at Harrisburg. 
The bill of indemnity for the damage by the 
Pittsburg rioters would place $2,000,000 at 
Quay’s disposal to divide among his gang of 
followers, bribe members of the legislature 
and fatten his own purse. 

Of course so monstrous a scheme could not 
be run through the legislature rough-shod. 
The comment on the action of Quay in creat¬ 
ing the office of recorder of Philadelphia for 
his individual benefit had been widespread, 
and the newly elected members were not all in 
accord with the eminent statesman’s methods. 
Certain of their number were at Harrisburg 
for other reasons than merely those of senti¬ 
ment, and among them was Emil Petroff, 
member of the house of representatives. 
The bill was introduced in the house, and the 
















152 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


workers for the bill were as active as cats in 
their efforts to obtain votes. One of the prin¬ 
cipal manipulators was Willunn H. Kemble, 
at present the highly respectable president of 
the People’s Bank, on Fourth street, at Phila¬ 
delphia. Under (Quay’s able counsel, the 
highly respectable Kemble was detected as 
among the corrupters, and Emil Petroffand 
others were likewise found in the same boat 
of criminality. 

The grand jury of Dauphin county, in¬ 
dicted the bribers. Under the new constitu¬ 
tion the legislature and the state’s business 
were guarded in a measure against the old 
loosenessof past days and you could no longer 
openly perpetrate frauds upon the people. 
Openly? Isay. Important distinction. The 
difference was simply that the frauds had to 
be covertly enacted. In the old days bribers 
would do their work while the member sat at 
his desk in session. The lobby carried out 
the task they had undertaken with a tithe of 
circumspection in later times. 

Petroff was tried for bribery. Matt Carpen¬ 
ter, of Wisconsin, the great Jeremiah Black 
and F. B. Gowen, afterwards president of the 
Reading railway, were the prosecuting coun¬ 
sel. Gowen was after higher game than Petroff 
and he would have driven it to the wall had 
not Quay and his friends been too smart for 
him. Ry reason of Quay’s grip on the state 
government he was in a position, as will be 
shown, to protect his friends. When Petroff 
was convicted, and the eminent lawyers of the 
prosecution had sharpened their wits for the 
run for bigger rascals, Kemble et. al. aston¬ 
ished every one by pleading guilty. By so 
doing the dangers of an examination in open 
court were averted. The conspirators were 
greatly alarmed by Petroff’s trial. They 
knew that with Kemble before the bar of jus¬ 
tice, the outpouring of iniquity would be tre¬ 
mendous. Kemble is the author of the famous 
epigram which indicates his morality : “Ad¬ 
dition, Division and Silence.” And well he 
understood how to apply his political creed, 
as his worldly prosperity to-day will demon¬ 
strate. 

Kemble smiled jauntily after he had been 
sentenced to the state penitentiary by the 
court. Some of his unsophisticated friends 
were alarmed, but he reassured them. “ Don’t 
fear,” he said. “ I will prove another Samson 
and pull the temple down over their heads ” 
—referring to Quay and other members of the 
gang—“ unless they fix things for me.” 

When the excitement over the conviction of 
Petroff’ and the self-acknowledged criminality 
of Kemble diminished a little. Statesman 
Quay displayed his hand. The state board 
of pardons was a machine which was practi¬ 
cally in his power, and he proceeded to use it 
in behalf of his followers who were at the 
gates of the state prison. The board of par¬ 
dons consists by law of the secretary of the 
commonwealth, then held by Statesman Quay ; 
the lieutenant-governor, then C. W. Stone; 
the attorney-general, then F. W. Palmer, and 


the secretary of internal affairs, then A. K. 
Doble. Quay caused the board to be assem¬ 
bled in extra session and without ado pro¬ 
ceeded to pardon the scoundrels. It is alleged 
that Attorney-General Palmer and Licut.- 
Gov. Stone objected seriously to the scheme, 
but, as in another abuse of power, the superior 
will of Quay dominated and Petroff and Kem¬ 
ble were whitewashed for their misdeeds by a 
vote of the board, which recommended to the 
governor their pardon. Gov. Hoyt, as Quay’s 
henchman, of course carried out his part and 
the culprits were free to again conspire against 
the state. 

An odd bit of history leaked out about this 
time. Samuel Butler, of Delaware county, 
was the state treasurer elect. His bond, as 
required, was a large one. Butler was, as far 
as is known, an honest man. Certainly his 
antecedents weref above criticism, and that 
Quay should have allowed such a person to 
obtain the office of treasurer was a subject of 
criticism on the part of some of the members 
of the gang. Butler secured a number of 
good names as bondsmen in his home county, 
and then the document went to Philadelphia 
and Harrisburg. Notwithstanding the fact 
that Kemble was a convicted felon, his name 
was placed on the bond of the treasurer of the 
state he had only recently conspired to indi¬ 
rectly rob. The bond was held in secret at 
Harrisburg. When any one asked for the 
names of the bondsmen the list was handed 
out with Kemble’s name omitted. 

A storm of indignation swept over Pennsyl¬ 
vania owing to the pardoning board scandal- 
Quay’s conduct was discussed by respectable 
people, and he was strongly condemned. Pres¬ 
byterian synods passed resolutions against the 
shameless pardoning board, and in a state 
where a healthy public sentiment prevailed 
Statesman Quay’s career would have ended 
then and there. Had the people been aware 
of his greater rascality, which had then been 
perpetrated, the storm would have burst in a 
manner that would have been disastrous to 
the unprincipled boss .—New York World, Feb¬ 
ruary 10. 


United States Senator Quay and William H. 
Kemble sat together this afternoon on the 
porch of Mr. Kemble’s handsome country 
residence, near Glen Side, Montgomery coun¬ 
ty. The two were engaged in earnest conver¬ 
sation. Mr. Kemble more frequently being 
the listener than the talker. 

The senator’s visit to Mr. Kemble was not 
generally known in the city, and the two had 
nearly the entire day to themselves. Colonel 
(^uay told the Times’s correspondent he had 
simply taken a quiet run to the country to 
spend the day with Mr. Kemble. When asked 
if "his visit was purely social, he replied yes. 
The senator said, with a smile, “I am resting 
here for the day, having a quiet time, as you 
see. I expect to leave this evening, and will 
go straight through, without stopping in Phil¬ 
adelphia .”—Neiv York Times, Aug. 10. 


REPORTS ON THE CIVIL SERVICE' 

The Civil Service Record, which has been 
printing a series of facsimile and wood cut 
illustrations of the examinations in the dif¬ 
ferent departments of the civil service, con¬ 
tains in its August number an especially val¬ 
uable one illustrative of the labor service. 

Mr. Theodore L. De Land, chief clerk of the 
treasury department, and member of the board 
of examiners, has written an excellent report 
illustrative of the examinations in the treas¬ 
ury department. 

The report of the civil service commission 
of Brooklyn for 1889 has been printed. Among 
the samples of examination questions the fol¬ 
lowing are to determine the “intelligence” [rat¬ 
ing 13 out of 100] of candidates for park po¬ 
licemen : 

1. State briefly what you understand to be the du¬ 
ties of the place for which you apply, park police¬ 
man or doorman, as the case may be. 

2. About What is the population of New York 
City? 

3. What other large cities are there in New York 
State? 

-1. Give the boundaries of Long Island. 

5. Name as many .savings banks in Brooklyn as you 
can. 

6. What are the different kinds of pavements used 
in the city of Brooklyn, between the curbstones? 

7. What are the daily newspapers published in 
Brooklyn? 

8. Enumerate the bridges in the city of Brooklyn, 
telling at what streets they are, and over what streams 
of water. 

9. Enumeiate the parks in Brooklyn, telling where 
they are and about how large they are. 

10. Give the names of: 

(a.) The present president of the United States. 

(?;.) The present governor of the state of New York. 

(c.) The present mayor of Brooklyn. 

[d.) The present commissioner of police. 

(e.) The present president of the park commission. 

The seventh annual report of the civil ser¬ 
vice commission of the state of New York has 
been printed. A competitive examination for 
instructors of pupil assistants in the state li¬ 
brary was held last March. Seven candidates 
were examined on cataloguing, classification, 
card cataloguing, library training, library 
binding and library economy. The highest 
average was 96.85 and the lowest 87.7. At the 
same time an examination for court interjjre- 
ter was held, and these were examined in dic¬ 
tation, handwriting, spelling, English to Ger¬ 
man, French, Hungarian, Spanish and Italian. 
The report also contains samples of the exam¬ 
ination questions. 

The sixth annual report of the civil service 
commissioners of Massachusetts says that “ in 
nearly one-half the subordinate offices of Mas¬ 
sachusetts and her cities, the people have for 
their public servants persons who have passed 
the examinations, been certified from the top 
of the eligible lists, and, so far as the commis¬ 
sioners know, have been appointed to office 
without regard to political or religious belief 
or influence.” This report also contains many 
sample examination questions. 

These reports should be in every college li¬ 
brary in the state. 









The civil service Chronicle. 


For sale at Wylie's News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapolis. Published monthly. Publication oflice. No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, 
Ind., where subscriptions and advertisements will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


Voii. I, No. 19. 


INDIANAPOLIS, SEPTEMBER 


, JLOtJU. 


The annual meeting of the National 
Civil Service Reform League will be held 
in Boston, Oct. 1 and 2. The annual ad¬ 
dress will be delivered by the president, 
George William Curtis, at Tremont Tem¬ 
ple, at 8 o’clock on the evening of Oct. 1. 
The first general business session of the 
league will be held at 10 o’clock A. m. in 
Meionaon Hall, on Tremont street. 

The business at this session will be the 
election of a president and the reading of 
the following papers: “Examination in 
Character essential to a Complete Competi¬ 
tion,” by Edward M. Shepard ; “ The Rela¬ 
tion of Civil Service Reform to other Re¬ 
forms,” by Charles J. Bonaparte, and “All 
other Reforms should be subordinated to 
Civil Service Reform,” by Lucius B. Swift. 
The second general business session will be 
held at the same place at 2 o’clock p. m. the 
same day. This session will be devoted to 
the hearing and consideration of reports 
and resolutions. At 6:30 p. m., Oct. 2, the 
members of the Massachusetts Civil Service 
Reform League will give a dinner at the 
Parker house to members of the National 
League. 

Some forty federal office holders were 
helping to run the republican state conven¬ 
tion held in this city, September 10. Con¬ 
spicuous among these were Postmasters 
Higgins, of Fort Wayne, Smith, of 
La Fayette, Greiner, of Terre Haute, Ben¬ 
nett, of Evansville, Crockett, of South Bend, 
Tomlinson, of Logansport; and Postmaster 
De Motte, of Valparaiso, read the platform 
to the convention. The excuse can not be 
made that if these office-holders had not 
got up the primaries and conventions, 
there would have been no party organiza¬ 
tion, no primaries and conventions, and no 
delegates to the state convention. Every 
meeting would have been held just the 
same, the same number of delegates would 
have come together, and the zeal would 
have been in no manner less. A con¬ 
vention managed by office holders is not a 
party convention. It is the lordship of a fac¬ 
tion, paid out of the public treasury and 
having means and leisure, over the rest of 
the party and in the service of some lord 
paramount. At this convention, without 
the interference of office-holders no at¬ 
tempt would have been made to make it a 
Harrison convention—an attempt which 
failed. Such an attempt ought to fail. A 


president has no business to allow office¬ 
holders to appear in party meetings to see 
that he is properly puffed. He should 
stand before the country on his own mer¬ 
its and not upon the true or false praises 
which a gang of office-holders may get into 
a platform. Possibly he might not secure 
a renomination, but he has no right to use 
office holders to secure a renomination. 

The latest attempt to get money out of 
government clerks appears in a circular by 
one W. W. Curry, a pension-claim man, 
who writes as agent for the Indiana state 
republican committee. The circular is 
very insulting in its insinuations, and no 
self respecting clerk will contribute any¬ 
thing in answer to such a demand. There 
is no need of much money to run a cam¬ 
paign. Every attempt to get it out of gov¬ 
ernment employes ought to be denounced 
and fought, because these attempts are 
plain declarations that the employes must 
thus pay for their places. 

Congressman Grosvenor, of Ohio, hav¬ 
ing failed of renomination, bids fair to fol¬ 
low Cheadle of this state into private life. 
Of Grosvenor, also, it may be said, that he 
retires noted for nothing except a frantic 
opposition to the civil service law. He set 
his heart upon this work, and evidently 
thought he was going to have an easy road 
to travel. His efforts have been a complete 
failure, and he is apparently very sore. 

Secretary Tracy returned a rather 
curt answer to the house inquiry regarding 
the employment of men in the Kittery yard 
just before election, in which he says that 
public work shall not be interrupted nor 
shall he be deterred from the performance 
of his duty by unfounded suspicions. This 
is all very well, but two things are undoubt¬ 
edly true. One is that the outcry unques¬ 
tionably warded off the disgrace of seeing 
the Kittery yard tilled with voters to help 
Congressman Reed’s election, of which 
every one including Reed himself was in 
doubt. The other thing is that Secretary 
Tracy’s expression of injured innocence 
would be much more appropriate if it 
were not a fact that he has allowed the 
Brooklyn navy-yard to be looted by the 
fighting factions of Brooklyn ward politics. 
According to the Boston Post, the order 
sending the Chicago for repairs to the 
Charlestown yard, in the district where 


Congressman Lodge’s campaign is going 
on has been revoked. But the Norfolk yard 
is in full blast with a thousand men work¬ 
ing at ante-election repairs to the advan¬ 
tage of Congressman Bowden, who the 
white republicans claim puts on too many 
negroes. Undoubtedly “ local option ’ has 
something to do with deciding what yards 
it is safe to “ work.” 

Republican opposition to Quay has be¬ 
come organized in Pennsylvania and will 
do what it can against him in the cam¬ 
paign. This is the duty of every republi¬ 
can who recognizes the impassable gulf be¬ 
tween Quay and common, ordinary hones¬ 
ty. And each man should perform this 
duty with all his might, without any regard 
to the result of the election. Those leaders 
who hesitate to again take up such a strug¬ 
gle because once they defeated Cameron 
and got Quay, and now feel that a defeat of 
Boss Quay will simply raise up Boss Mc¬ 
Gee, are falterers by the way. Defeat in 
detail is one of the powerful forces that 
will in time free this boss-ridden country, 
and restore its political self-respect. 

President Harrison has promoted 
Henry Sherwood to succeed Mr. Ross as 
postmaster at Washington, Mr. Ross hav¬ 
ing been appointed by the President to an 
other position. Mr. Sherwood has been 
twenty-eight years in the military and civ¬ 
il service of the country. For twelve years 
he was in the postal service, for four years 
he was postmaster of the house of repre¬ 
sentatives. For eight years he has been 
assistant postmaster in the Washington 
post-office. He was retained by Mr Ross, 
who was the democratic incumbent under 
Mr. Cleveland. This is as it should be, a 
competent and conscientious public serv¬ 
ant is promoted according to his merit. 

The Civil Service Chronicle in its recent 
issues has been printing a list of persons con¬ 
nected with newspapers who have received fed¬ 
eral positions—mostly postmasterships. The 
list is a very incomplete one ; some states are 
omitted altogether. No state has been inves¬ 
tigated thoroughly, and those who have re¬ 
ceived or whose family has received federal 
positions other than postmasterships were 
not investigated at all. But the list as it is 
ought to surprise and alarm people. There^ 
could be no better work for some important and f 
powerful newspaper than to print a revised ^ 






















154 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


and complete list, for it would show as by 
no other method that this country has, as a 
rule, government by the people only in name 
and government by bosses in fact. Were 
these newspaper office holders as they run for 
their congressman or other boss, in uniform, 
distinguished by a Quay button or an Ingalls 
rosette, then their number and activity and 
power would be realized. As it is, the village 
paper and the village postoffice, although con¬ 
spicuous parts of the local machine and a 
steady irritant to a part of the inhabitants, 
seem isolated cases and the editor himself too 
harmless a fellow to provoke rebellion. But 
print lists covering the entire country, then 
the consequences of being able to control 
a great number of country papers, of bringing 
forward or holding back facts, of exaggerat¬ 
ing or belittling political news, become appar¬ 
ent. No wonder that Mr. Clarkson in an out¬ 
break of irritation wrote Mr. Dana, “ I would 
like to know what good cause is served by 
keeping a list like this before the public.” 

These papers are manacled, and of the harm 
and danger nothing can be added to Daniel 
Webster’s eloquent statement. But even he 
did not foresee the usual condition of the news¬ 
paper office-holder of to-day. Daniel Webster 
characterized the effect of the gift of office in 
silencing the paper; he did not conceive the 
possibility of the scandal caused by continued 
political activity on the part of the office-hold¬ 
er and of making his paper his chief weap¬ 
on for controling caucuses and county 
and district conventions. It is so grave a scan¬ 
dal, and will in time arouse such widespread 
indignation that no wonder Mr. Clarkson dep¬ 
recates publicity. 

It is not only republican editors who have 
been subsidized. It is instructive to note the 
great number of democratic editors who have 
been allowed to hold on to their offices. On 
every ground of offensive partisanship, if any 
office-holders were to go, these should have 
been the first. But shrewd Mr. Clarkson 
spiked his enemies’ guns far more effectually 
by his process. Another significant thing was 
the gift of office to such great numbers of so 
called “independent” papers. Again Mr. 
Clarkson had mastered well the meaning of 
that happy statement of President William 
Henry Harrison, that with “golden fetters” on, 
how much less troublesome an “ independent” 
paper would be. 

OFFICE-HOLDING STRABISMUS. 

Elsewhere is printed an extract from the 
speech of District Attorney Chambers, deliv¬ 
ered before a republican club of this city, and 
which the Indianapolis Journal says will prove 
an “effective campaign document.” Few things 
have happened to disgrace the administration 
so much. No matter whether a government is 
run on the spoils system or on any other sys¬ 
tem, the gross impropriety of a speech by any 
public officer in such a spirit and tone must 
be apparent to any one. Let us take a single 
instance. Mr. Chambers says that democratic 


committees have at times issued “corrupt cir¬ 
culars inviting and urging bribery.” He 
quotes from a Morgan county circular, “Those 
who have to be bought are not doubtful but 
are floats.” Again, from a Decatur county 
circular: “Get the float well in hand.” There 
can be no possible question but that Mr. 
Chambers means by the word “float” or “float¬ 
er” a man who is paid for his vote. Turning 
to the Dudley letter, it is written, “Your com¬ 
mittee will certainly receive from Chairman 
Huston the assistance necessary to hold our 
floaters. * * Divide the floaters in blocks 

of five and put a trusted man with necessary 
funds in charge of these five.” Of the two 
versions of that letter, which differed in no 
essential respect. Chambers said, in the Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal of December 13, 1889, that 
they “have nothing in them of a criminal 
character, but, upon the other hand, * are 
honorable, and indicate simply a patriotic in¬ 
terest in the elections.” We should like to 
have Mr. Chambers, in writing, over his own 
signature, explain himself. AVill he make it 
clear that money paid to a “ float” by demo¬ 
crats is bribery, and money paid to “ floaters 
in blocks of five” by republicans is not brib¬ 
ery, but indicates “simply a patriotic interest 
in the elections.” He can not do this, for he 
knows that the Dudley letter means bribery. 
He appears to be verifying Dr. Johnson’s defi¬ 
nition that patriotism is the last refuge of a 
scoundrel, and he affords to the people of In¬ 
diana the spectacle of a public prosecuting 
officer, paid out of the common treasury, ex¬ 
cusing bribery in his own party while joining 
in a campaign cry, for bribery, against the 
opposite party. Such an officer does not de¬ 
serve the respect of the public or of his neigh¬ 
bors. The Columbia Club, which prides it¬ 
self upon its “clean politics,” ought to petition 
the President to remove Chambers from office. 

CLARKSONISM. 

Clarkson has gone out of office at last, and 
there is uncertainty as to what he will do next. 
He says he has nothing to apologize for, though 
no one expects or is calling for an apology. 
It is the President who ought to make an apoD 
ogy, if he can. He has allowed Clarkson to 
give the country an example of the spoils sys¬ 
tem such as has never been known before. 
Through Clarkson’s agency thirty odd thou¬ 
sand post-offices have been absorbed as spoil 
in eighteen months. President Harrison can 
never show that this is not a defiant disregard 
of the platform upon which he was elected, 
and which said : “ The spirit and purpose of 

the reform should be observed in all executive 
appointments.” When the President places 
the partisan seizure of these thirty-odd thou¬ 
sand post-offices by the side of this platform 
promise, he will have to keep silent. 

The Maryland republican clubs sent a dele¬ 
gation to Clarkson to thank him for his op¬ 
position to the civil service law. The Indian¬ 
apolis News of September 13, treats the matter 
fully. It says: 

It is worth while noting this spectacle: A repre¬ 


sentative body of citizens thanks a man for his op¬ 
position to the law of the country while he was an 
official of that country sworn to execute its laws. 
There is a spectacle demoralizing enough, surely. 
Mr. Clarkson’s notion of a reformed civil service as 
explained was that he would make the examinations 
departmental, conducted by those under whom the 
clerks would have to work, and would always select 
all clerks in sympathy with the party in power. He 
added that he believed this to be a representative 
government based on party responsibility, and that 
no party in power could escape this responsibility 
if it tried ; therefore, he believed that any adminis¬ 
tration, state, national or county, was entitled to have 
all places under it filled by its friends, or those 
anxious for its .success and not its failure. 

It is not worth while controverting the fallacy that 
the routine work of the public affairs; the keeping 
of books and writing of letters; the scrubbing of 
floors and cleaning of spitoons, can have no possible 
influence upon a policy or principle of govern¬ 
mental administration. The theory that a clerk or 
scrub woman is going to obstruct the public service 
in order to di.scrodit the political party charged with 
administration, springs from the spoils idea that the 
public service is the prize of victory to be fought for 
by the people, divided into two armies, each absolved 
from any consideration of the other, the victor war¬ 
ranted in taking this service as his earned reward, as 
the victorious prize fighter takes the purse that has 
been “hung up” to spend in treating his backers 
and heelers. It is needless to say that the public 
service in every attribute of its exercise and all the 
justification of its being is as much the possession of 
the defeated party as it is of the victorious party. 
That in every contemplation which does not degrade 
public administration to the level of brigandage, 
the “victor” is entitled only to its direction along 
certain lines of policy, and that this applies only to 
administration—not to substance. That the service 
is not a visible mass of loot, to be portioned out 
among retainers by a feudal lord entering upon a 
conquered domain, but that it is the possession of 
the whole people, created and maintained by them 
for their benefit, aud that control of it means control, 
not ownership. 


MINISTERS AND POLITICS. 

There is everywhere a part of the clergy 
who maintain that their work in the church 
is to inculcate the broad principles of the 
brotherhood of man and the saving, elevating 
power of Christianity, but it is not to apply 
those principles to matters of conduct. There 
is now and then a preacher of such largeness 
of mind and eloquence of tongue that he can 
move the hearts of men and women to seek for 
noble living by these general truths and by no 
special application to matters of conduct. But 
men in the pulpit with these gifts are rare, 
and were they more common, would we be 
willing to spare the men who have shown the 
relation of religion to conduct? Could we 
spare the ministers whose denunciations of 
slavery still make the heart beat faster? 

But suppose a church has for years heard 
from the pulpit the sermons declaring “the 
fatherhood of God and the truths only related 
to that,” and yet its members are callous to 
the immorality of buying a public office by 
the gift of money or place, or who excuse it 
on the ground that a politician must be ex¬ 
pected to have a different code of morals. 
What is to be said of the results of such 
preaching? Surely it has been a dishearten¬ 
ing failure. Clergymen can not allow them¬ 
selves to be blind to this. If they find, for in¬ 
stance, that a large number of their intelligent 
















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


155 


church members are lethargic over the pur¬ 
chase of votes by money or office, their duty is 
plain to change their method of the present¬ 
ment of the principles of Christianity and to 
apply them to matters of political conduct. It 
need not be stated that they should not be 
partisan, that their horizon should be large, 
and that they should be just and temperate in 
expression. 

The work now being undertaken by clergy¬ 
men in New York illustrates this view. In 
spite of their teachings there has grown strong 
a most corrupt political organization ; it robs 
the people, it cheats justice, and its corrupting 
influence is all-pervading. Those clergymen 
now see a chance to bring their influence as 
clergymen to bear on a great plague spot, and 
it is encouraging to note how heartily their 
attempt is co-operated with by the young men 
of their churches. 


WORKINGMEN AND DISMISSALS. 

Of late years one of the characteristics of 
attempted settlement of strikes has been that 
the workingmen stipulate that there shall be 
no dismissal without cause. In some cases 
they have proposed that each man shall first 
be granted a hearing before a board composed, 
in part, of his fellow-workmen. The recent 
railroad strike in New York was based upon 
the assertion that certain workmen had been 
dismissed without any apparent business rea¬ 
son. Yet labor organizations stand by with¬ 
out protest and see successive presidents dis¬ 
miss more than a hundred thousand wage- 
earners without any reason whatever except 
to find places for favorites. For instance, 
President Cleveland in this manner turned the 
hundreds of employes out of the Brooklyn 
navy yard and put in his favorites, and now 
President Harrison has turned these out and 
put in his favorites. Under such a system of 
course a large share of government work falls 
to sycophants, heelers, and hangers-on. Hon¬ 
est and industrious labor gets little benefit 
from this colossal employer of labor. It is 
the inexplicable enigma of the present move¬ 
ment of workingmen to better themselves that, 
year after year, they let this richest of labor 
prizes go without even an attempt to secure it. 
This undoubtedly proceeds from a mistaken 
idea that government labor has something pe¬ 
culiar about it. It has not; public bookkeep¬ 
ing and carpentering are just the same as pri¬ 
vate bookkeeping and carpentering, and to 
hire either done upon the principle of favor¬ 
itism is a detriment to honest labor. Govern¬ 
ment labor should be brought into the general 
labor field. To secure this only a few simple 
rules are necessary. Let the workingmen’s 
principle of no dismissal without cause be en¬ 
forced in the government service. To avoid 
favoritism in appointment, the places requir¬ 
ing skilled labor should be filled by open com¬ 
petition. Unskilled laborers, in selecting 
whom there now exist the greatest scandals, 
should be chosen on the plan of the Boston 
labor system—which has met with unanimous 


approval. If these rules were observed both 
in the states and with the federal government, 
fully 200,000 places which are now practically 
of no benefit to workingmen would be brought 
where they and their children could secure 
permanent employment at good wages, not 
exactly in the same way but upon the same 
principles by which they now secure employ¬ 
ment of private employers. Why do they sit 
still and see this field go to waste year after 
year ? 

A MANACLED PRESS. 

Daniel Webster in 1832. 

And is a press that is purcliased or pen¬ 
sioned more free than a press that is fet¬ 
tered I Can the people look for truths to 
partial sources, whether rendered partial 
through fear or through favor J Why 
shall not a manacled press be trusted with 
the maintenance and defense of popular 
rights ! Because it is supposed to be un¬ 
der the inlliience of a power wliich may 
prove greater than the love of truth. 
Such a press may screen abuses iii gov¬ 
ernment or be silent. It may fear to 
speak. And may it not fear to speak, 
too, when its conductors, if they speak in 
any but one way, may lose their means of 
livelihood 1 Is dependence on government 
for bread no temi)tation to screen its 
abuses! Will the press always speak the 
truth, when the truth, if spoken, may be 
the means of silencing it for the future ! 
Is the truth iii no danger, is the watch¬ 
man under no temptation, when he can 
neither proclaim the approach of national 
evils, nor seem to decry them, without the 
loss of his place! 

Mr. President, an open attempt to secure 
the aid and friendship of the public press, 
by bestowing the emoluments of office on 
its active conductors, seems to me, of ev¬ 
erything we have witnessed, to be tlie 
most reprehensible. It degrades both the 
government and the press. As far as its 
natural effect extends, it turns the palla¬ 
dium of liberty into an engine of party. It 
brings the agency, activity, energy, and 
patronage of government all to bear, with 
united force, on the means of general intel¬ 
ligence, and on the adoption or rejection of 
political opinions. 

President William Henry Harrison in 1841. 

There is no part of tlie means placed in 
the hands of the executive which might be 
used with greater elfect, for unhallowed 
purposes, than the control of tlie public 
press. 

—Henry L. Spooner, of the Courier, is postmaster 
at Brookfield, N. Y. 

—Nathan J. Milliken, of the Ontario County Times, 
is postmaster at Canandaigua, N. Y. 

—Wm. J. Glenn, of the Patriot, is postmaster at 
Cuba, N. Y. 

—Frederick Bennett, of tlie Patriot and Gazette, is 
postmaster at Fulton, N. Y. 

—L. H. Brown, of the Herald, is postmaster at Ham- 
mondsport, N. Y. 

—C. M. Cartwright, of the Phcrnix, is postmaster at 
Hunter, N. Y. 

—J. M. Williams, of the Register, is postmaster at 
Phoenix, N. Y. 

—A. W. Lansing, of the Sentinel, is postmaster at 
Plattsburgh, N. Y. 

—L. R. Muzzy, of the Democrat, is postmaster at 
Pulaski, N. Y. 


—A. L. Riuewalt, of the Amherst Bee, is postmaster 
at Williauisville, N. Y. 

—Fred De K. Griffen, of the Central Dakotian, is 
postmaster at Bangor, S. Dak. 

—Edward L. Bales, of the Courier, is postmaster at 
Bloomington, S. Dak. 

—John W. Banbury, of the Dakota X)aj/hV;/i<, is post¬ 
master at Britton, S. Dak. 

—Wm. B. Tapley, of the Advocate, is postmaster at 
Frankfort, S. Dak. 

—H. O. Besaneon, of the Star, is postmaster at Har¬ 
old, S. Dak. 

—John W. Jones, of the Advocate, is postmaster at 
Oelrichs, S. Dak. 

—Orin A. Cheney, of the Country Home, is postmas¬ 
ter at Pitrodie, S. Dak. 

—Spencer L. Sage, of the South Dakota State Jour¬ 
nal, is imstmaster at St. Lawrence. S. D. 

—Peter W. Emmert, of the Unakean, is postmaster 
at Erwin, Tenn. 

—John Schrader, Jr., of the Lawrence Union, is 
postmaster at Lawrenceburg, Tenu. 

—Wm. R. Keyes, of the Tennes.see Tomahawk, is 
po.stmaster at Mountain City, Tenn. 

—Frank H. Dunning, of the Dispatch, is postmaster 
at Sunbright, Tenn. 

—John R. McLain, of the Review, is postmaster at 
Della Plain, Texas. 

—L. C. Chambers, of the Vindicator, is postmaster 
Liberty, Texas. 

—W. L. Golson, of the Iron City News, is postmaster 
at Llano, Texas. 

—David K. Simonds, of the Journal, is postmaster 
at Manchester, Vermont. 

—L. E. Kellogg, of tlie Big Bend Empire, is post¬ 
master at Waterville, W’a.shington. 

—J. R. Greenawalt, of the McDowell Progress, is 
postmaster at Elkhorn, W'. Va. 

—Henry W. Deen, of the Herald, is postmaster at 
Jackson Court House, Va. 

—Marion F. Hall, of the Republican, is postmaster 
at Phillippi, W. V'a. 

—P. Lipscoinn, son of Jeff. Lipscomb of the Tucker 
County Pioneer, is postma.ster at St, George, W. Va. 

—Edwin II. Flinn, of the Roane County Record, is 
postmaster at Spencer, W. Va. 

—John W. Jones, of the Register, is postmaster at 
Barucveld, Wis. 

—C. G. Bell, of the Press, is postmaster at Bayfield, 
Wis. 

—Will C. Thomas, of the Blade, is postmaster at 
Osseo, Wis. 

—Edwin R. Beebe, of the Republic, is postmaster at 
Princeton, Wis. 

—M. E. Kenealy, of the Alaskan, is postmaster at 
Sitka, Alaska. 

—James J. Chatham, of the Herald, is postmaster at 
Nogales, Arizona. 

—Wm. E. Wheeler, of the Idaho Register, is post¬ 
master at Eagle Park, Idaho. 

—D. Bacon, of the Progress, is postmaster at Nampa, 
Idaho. 

-.Tames Casebee, of the Mail, is postmaster at Ca.s- 
per, Wyoming. 

—Isaac C. Wynn, of the Fremont Clipper, is post¬ 
master at Lander, Wyoming. 

[“I find, in looking over the list of appointments 
in Indiana, that sixteen democratic newspaper pro¬ 
prietors and editors have been appointed to office. 
* « -•> If I could believe that in appointing these 
men Mr. Cleveland meant that they should pursue a 
perfectly inoffensive course politically, that these 
newspapers should not irritate the feelings of repub¬ 
licans, .should not publish charges against republi¬ 
can candidates for office, should say nothing offen¬ 
sive to the republicans—if I believed he meant by 
these appointments siucerely to put these sixteen 
democratic newspapers under those bonds, I should 















156 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


havebrigkter hopes than I have now of carrying Indiana 
next time. But it •will not he so. Here are these six¬ 
teen editors, two of the three collectors of internal 
revenue in Indiana, and the others holding influen¬ 
tial post-offices; and Mr. Cleveland knows, and every 
honest democrat knows, that those sixteen news¬ 
papers will be fulminating with all the force and 
vigor and power and partisanship they can against 
the republican party .”—Senator Benjamin Harrison 
in 1886. 

PRINCIPLES OF THE PARTIES. 

We reaffirm the declaration of the national 
republican convention with reference to civil 
service reform, and we commend the efforts of 
the national administration to secure the best 
result of the wise provision of the existing law 
on this subject.— Illinois Republican Platfoimi, 
June, 1890. 


6. The silence of M. S. Quay under the 
charges which have been made against him 
through the public press can only be inter¬ 
preted as a confession of his guilt, and his re¬ 
tention of a seat in the U. S. senate, while re¬ 
fusing to demand a legal investigation of 
these charges, is a national scandal. We ac¬ 
cept the issue of Quayism as now tendered by 
the republican state committee and conven¬ 
tion. 

7. We arraign the republican party * * * 
for its open disregard of the provisions of the 
civil service law, which the President of its 
choice was solemnly pledged to support.— 
Pennsylvania Democratic Platform, July, JS90. 

For the chairman of our national commit¬ 
tee, Mr. Quay, we feel a lasting sense of grati¬ 
tude for his matchless bearing in the last pres¬ 
idential campaign, and commend his bearing 
under the slanders which his successjxd leadership 
of our party has purchased for him. As a citizen, 
a member of the general assembly, as secretary 
of the commonwealth under two successive 
administrations, as state treasurer by the 
overwhelming suffrages of his fellow-citizens, 
and as senator of the United States, he has 
won and retains our respect and confidence.— 
As Originally Presented in Pennsylvania State Con¬ 
vention, June, 1890, 

For the chairman of our national commit¬ 
tee, M. S. Quay, we feel a lasting sense of 
gratitude for his matchless services in the last 
presidential campaign. As a citizen, a member 
of the general assembly, as secretary of the 
commonwealth under two successive adminis¬ 
trations, as state treasurer by the overwhelming 
suffrage of his fellow-citizens, and as senator of 
the United States he has won and retains our 
respect and confidence.—As Passed by the Con¬ 
vention, June, 1890. 

We denounce the administration of Ben¬ 
jamin Harrison for its deliberate abandon¬ 
ment of civil service reform; for its use of 
cabinet positions and other high stations in 
payment of financial campaign debts; for 
treating public patronage as a family ap¬ 
pendage, instead of a public trust, and quar¬ 
tering a host of relatives, by blood and by 
marriage, upon the national treasury ; for dis¬ 
missing honest and competent public servants, 
in violation of solemn pledges, because of 


their political opinions, and filling their places 
with men devoid of character or capacity, and 
whose only title to preferment rested upon dis¬ 
reputable partisan work.— Indiana Slate Demo¬ 
cratic Platform, August, 1890. 

—Among the resolutions adopted at a meet¬ 
ing of representative republicans of Wayne 
county held at Lyons a few days ago, and 
carefully excluded from the columns of the 
republican newspapers of the county and 
elsewhere, are the following : 

“jResofied, That we condemn and denounce 
any attempt to build up or strengthen a per¬ 
sonal following by assuming to parcel out in 
advance public offices, which are the gift of 
the people, and should be conferred, held, and 
administered solely in the interest of the peo¬ 
ple at large. 

'•'Resolved, That we insist upon the largest in¬ 
dividual frtedom of thought, speech and ac¬ 
tion without dictation or interference; upon 
the free, fair, untrammeled, and unbought ex¬ 
pressions of caucuses. 

“Resolved, That w'e insist that no mao, or set 
of men, shall be permitted to make the repub¬ 
lican party subservient to their own personal 
aggrandizement, or to dictate nominations, or 
to ostracise republicans who refuse to surren¬ 
der their manhood and bow in submission to 
their will.— Evening I'ost, August 2. 


The great increase in state expenses and the 
creation of an army of needless officers, paid 
out of the state treasury to perform republican 
party service, show that the same disposition 
to impose on the people and squander their 
money for party gain still prevails in Madison 
as in Washington.— Wisconsin State Democratic 
Platform, August, 1890. 


The present administration came into power 
as a result of a deliberate agreement that it 
would reward the vast army of political 
jobbers and speculators which for four years 
had been held at bay by opening to them 
the federal treasury for miscellaneous pillage. 
Its sanctimonious professions in favor of civil 
service reform have been followed by yie'most 
flagrant exhibitions of official spoliation ever 
witnessed. — New Hampshire Stale Democratic 
Platfomn, September, 1890. 

We indorse the administration of Benjamin 
Harrison and the able statesmen selected as 
his co-laborers and advisers, as being wise, 
vigorous and patriotic. It has kept the pledges 
made to the people. * * 

We demand that our benevolent institu¬ 
tions be placed above the level of partisan 
politics, and that they be controlled by boards 
composed of members of different political 
parties, appointed by the governor, to the end 
that the cost of their maintenance may be re¬ 
duced, and the helpless and unfortunate wards 
of the state may not be made the victims of 
unfit appointments dictated by the caucus and 
made as a reward for party services.— Indiana 
State Republican Platform, September, 1890. 


EXTRACTS FROM THE ADDRESS OF 
THE LINCOLN INDEPENDENT RE¬ 
PUBLICAN COMMITTEE OF PEN- 
SYLVANIA. 

*•**»*»» 

The platform of the republican party in 
Pennsylvania indorses wdthout qualification 
or reserve, the junior senator of this state, 
Matthew S. Quay, a man w'hose very name 
has entered the political vocabulary as a term 
of political domination and corruption; a 


man whose way to political eminence has 
been won by no distinguished service to the 
nation or the state, either by the conception or 
the execution of a single great or beneficent 
public measure, but solely by chicanery and 
political corruption, by the creation of an 
immense army of servile followers through 
bribes of public office and by the skillful dis¬ 
tribution of public patronage. This man has 
so successfully increased his own power that 
he is to-day among the most influential, if he 
is not indeed the most influential, of republi¬ 
cans, and in his own state his personal will 
has virtually usurped the will of the people. 
He is at least popularly understood to have 
controlled the last republican state conven¬ 
tion and to have imposed upon it a candidate 
of his own selection. But to crown his own 
dishonor and the shame of the common¬ 
wealth, he stands for months silent under pub¬ 
lic, repeated and specific accusations of the 
greatest official misconduct, of having taken 
from the treasury of the state large sums of 
money with the knowledge of its official guar¬ 
dian. In this man the republican party plat¬ 
form expresses entire confidence, and it calls 
upon the citizens of Pennsylvania to indorse 
both him and it by the election of Mr. Dela- 
mater as governor of the state. 

* S- « « sjs ♦ ♦ 

Are the men who saw the republican party 
begotten, through the eloquence, the stateman- 
ship, the lofty public morality of Sumner, the 
political genius, the all-embracing humanity 
and self-sacrifice of Lincoln, through the 
great and popular hatred of Avrong and op¬ 
pression, through the great and first awaken¬ 
ing of a national heart and a national con¬ 
science, dead, that they should accept such a 
lame and impotent, such a disgraceful conclu¬ 
sion to a great party history as this? Indeed, 
all keen sense of public honor and of justice 
must have fled the state if its citizens will 
tolerate this disgrace. It was unswerving de¬ 
votion to principle as opposed to greed, to 
selfish expediency, to every low inducement, 
that made the republican party and its found¬ 
ers great. If we honor them and approve 
their political policy we can not be false to 
their example. 


CONGRESSMAN KENNEDY ON MAT¬ 
THEW S. QUAY, IN THE HOUSE, 
SEPTEMBER 4, 1890. 

Some time since I stood up in my place on 
this floor and denounced a senator from my 
native state because, when charged with cor¬ 
ruption and branded with infamy, he did not 
arise in his seat and demand an investigation 
and inquiry that should establish the purity 
of his actions and his personal honor. One 
other, occupying the high place in the coun¬ 
sels of the party to which I belong, has suf¬ 
fered himself, month in and month out, to be 
charged with crimes and misdemeanors for 
which, if guilty, he should have been con¬ 
demned under the laws of his state and have 
had meted out to him the fullest measure of 
its punishment. 

This man is a republican. Shall I now re¬ 
main silent? Is it just and honest to remain 
in my seat silent because one who is accused 


























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


157 


m 


of crimes and refuses to seek for vindication 
is a republican and that republican the recog¬ 
nized leader of my party ? Neither decency 
nor honor would permit me to do so. I do 
not know whether the charges made against 
the chairman of the national republican com¬ 
mittee are true or false, but I do know that 
they have been made by journals of character 
and standing again and again, and I do know 
that in the face of these charges Mat Quay has 
remained silent, and has neither sought nor 
attempted to seek opportunity to vindicate 
^ himself of them. I do know that, as a great 
I ^ republican leader, he owed it to the great par- 
!'/i who.se head he was either to brand them 
as infamies or to prove their falsity, or he 
\ owed it to that party to stand aside from its 
leadership. 

He has done neither, and for this I de- 
j nounce him. The republican party can not 
afford to follow the lead of a branded crimi- 
; nal. He has failed to justify himself, and 

I though opportunity and ample time have been 
i; ft given him, he remains silent. His silence un- 

* der such circumstances is the confession of 
guilt. An honorable man does not long dally 
when his honor is assailed. He has delayed 
too long to justify the belief in his innocence, 
and he stands, a convicted criminal before 
the bar of public opinion. Under such 
circumstances he should be driven from the 
head of a party whose very life his presence 
.. U imperils. The republican party has done 
enough for its pretended leader. Let him be 
■ relegated to the rear. It is no longer a ques¬ 
tion of his vindication ; it is now a question of 
. the life of the party itself. 

i THE ARISTOCRATIC SYSTEM. 

t - 

' ■' English statisticians have displayed much individ¬ 
ual interest in the complicated mechanism and ex¬ 
tensive scope of our census-taking, but they have 
not been inspired thereby to alter their own census 
scheme, which is simplicity itself. The enumeration 
will be begun and finished on a single day—Sunday, 
April 5. In striking contrast with the American 
method, nothing is here attempted beyond the bare 
counting, with a few elementary facts as to age and 
sex, and whether married or single. To do this work 
Ih re ivill 6e 40 000 enumerators in England and Wales. 
All of these will be appointed by the local registrar.^ of 
, births and deaths, and nothing coidd be stranger to A mer¬ 

ican notions than that so much as a hint of political influ¬ 
ence being used or desired will never be heard of. The 
higher clerks who are to tabulate the returns will be chosen 
by public competition, the terms of ivhich will shortly be 
issued by the civil service commission. No suggestion of 

II partisanshij) will enter the whole arrangement from top to 
II bottom. Perhaps that is the reason for Mr. Giffen’s 

confidence that the census will be absolutely com¬ 
plete and trustworthy.—X<o;jdo7i Letter to New York 
Times, Sept. 7. 


THE DEMOCRATIC SYSTEM. 

A sample of Porter’s methods is afforded by the 
system adopted to take the census of this city. Here 
is the metropolis of the nation, a vast aggregation of 
people from all parts of the world, speaking all sorts 
of languages, living in all kinds of crowded build¬ 
ings. The task of taking the census in New York 
was beset by the utmost difficulties, and required 
the services of the very highest type of enumerators 
that could be secured. What type did we have? 
The method adopted by Mr. Porter’s representative 
in this city was to send out to the “Jakes” and ‘ ‘Bar¬ 
neys” and ’“Mikes” who “run the machine” in the 
various districts this circular: 

Dear Sir—You will please forward to this office 
the list of applicants that the republican organiza 
tion of your district desires to have named as census- 
enumerators. This list must be sent here on or be¬ 
fore April 1. Yours, C. H. Murray. 

Comment upon such a performance would be a 
waste of space. Is it any wonder that the count of 
New York returned by enumerators thus selected by 
the republican machine falls fully 100,000 short of 
the number to which the city is entitled by every 
test that has applied to all previous censuses ?—New 
York Evening Post, Sept. 12. 


BARONS AT WAR, 

“I know of no such division,” said he, “in 
the state, and I am surprised that any one 
should misunderstand the very plain state¬ 
ment and purport of my protest. It was sim¬ 
ply and clearly a denunciation of a systematic 
attempt of one of the Maine senators to con¬ 
trol the politics of the state by the use of pa¬ 
tronage, by seeking to dictate the most im¬ 
portant federal appointments in the city of his 
residence, and the fact that the same thing had 
been attempted in my own district induced me 
to call a halt in the work of setting up a po¬ 
litical dictatorship in Maine. I have known 
of no instance in which any of the representa¬ 
tives from Maine has sought to interfere with 
the rights or privileges of the senators, but I 
regard the invasion of Portland and Bangor, 
to control the selection of public offices, as in¬ 
defensible and mischievous. * * * 

“ It is a significant fact,” said Mr. Boutelle, 
“that when Mr. Reed was believed to have a 
desperate fight on his hands for re-election, the 
most important offices in his district, and, in 
some respects, the most important federal office 
in Maine, the collectorship of Portland, was 
occupied by one of the leading democrats of 
the state, whose term expired months ago, 
because the senators would not consent to the 
appointment of a man regarded by Mr. Reed 
as friendly to himself. It is certainly diffi¬ 
cult to reconcile this with any theory that the 
senators were zealously desirous of strengthen¬ 
ing the speaker in the greatest contest of his 
political life.” 

“ You complain of similar treatment in your 
own district?” 

“I have been perfectly frank about that. On 
the same ground upon which I dispute the 
right of the senators to thrust upon Mr. Reed 
a hostile collector, I regard the appointment 
of a supervisor of the census in my city with¬ 
out consulting me as a gross political indigni¬ 
ty. The supervisor had the selection of enum¬ 
erators iu every town in my district, and, 
while there was no reason why he should be 
hostile to me, yet the fact of the selection of 
so important an official in my own town with¬ 
out reg'-'f- to my wishes was significant. In 
fact, when the appointment was announced in 
the morning paper, and it was naturally sup¬ 
posed to have been made by the congressman 
from the district, the democratic evening pa¬ 
per, in commenting upon it, said its reporters 
had talked with a large number of prominent 
republicans, all of whom were surprised at 
Mr. Boutelle’s selection.” 

“What was Mr. Hale’s motive?” 

“The obvious motive seems to be to hamper 
and embarrass me in my congressional dis¬ 
trict, and, so far as he may have been success¬ 
ful, I think I may justly construe the gratify¬ 
ing support of my constituents as a rebuke to 
that sort of interference. In other words, my 
complaint has been and is that the powers 
granted by the people of Maine for public 
purposes have been unfairly diverted to the 
advantage of individuals, in derogation of the 
rights of others. I believe that in Maine, as 
elsewhere, public men should stand upon their 
merits and be judged by the service they may 
render to the public.”— New York Times, Sept. 
l5, Interview with Repi'esentative Boutelle. 

THE UNAMERICAN SYSTEM. 

Examples from a Recent Examination under 
the Merit System in Baltimore. 

1st Exercise.—Writing from Dictation. 

N. B.—Spelling, use of capitals, punctuation, and 
all omi.ssions and mistakes will be taken into con¬ 
sideration in marking the exercises of this subject. 

Penmanship will not be marked on this exercise. 

One of the examiners will dictate an exercise of 
not less than ten lines so distinctly that all persons 
being examined can hear him. The passage will 
first be read for information, and then be dictated in 


phrases of five or six words, at the rate of from fif¬ 
teen to twenty five words per minute, if from any 
cause the competitor miss a word, he should not 
pause, but leave a blank space and go on wiih the 
next words he hears. Three minutes will be al¬ 
lowed after the dictation for punctuation and cor¬ 
rection. 

Specimen papers. 

Pereons failing to pass an examination may, 
after six months from the date of their fail¬ 
ure, file new applications, and be re-examined. 

No person who has passed an examination, 
shall, while eligible on the register supplied 
by such examination, be re-examined. 

Re-examinations, other than as specified 
above, can be had, only by special permission 
of the Commission, and such permission will 
be given only in very exceptional cases, where 
special reason exists on account of sickness, 
and then only upon affidavit of the facts. 

Every appointment is made for a probation¬ 
ary, period of six months, at the full salary 
attached to the position, at the end of which 
time, if the conduct and capacity of the per¬ 
son appointed have been found satisfactory, 
the appointment is made absolute. 

Mark 100. 

Persons Failing to Pass an examination 
May ater Six Month, ater Date of there fail¬ 
ure May File New Application and be Re ex- 
amined while elegeble supplied by such Ex¬ 
aminations be Re-examined. Reexamination 
Specified above can be had oly by Special Per- 
mition and such permition will be given oly 
in very Exceptionled Cases oly where Special 
reasons exist on account of sickness and then 
aply upon Affedavid) of the facts every ap¬ 
point is made for a probation period of Six 
Months at the full sallery. 

if the Conduect and capasity of the person 
appointed have bein foun satisfactory the ap¬ 
pointment is made absalut. 

Mark 0. 


ENCOURAGING SIGNS. 

_ K 

Plainfield republicans are signing a petition 
to be forwarded to Washington asking that 
the postmaster, E. R. Pope, be “influenced” to 
discharge the clerks and carriers left in office 
by the democratic administration, and to sub¬ 
stitute in their places “deserving” republicans. 
Postmaster Pope has held his present office 
only a fetv months. Already he has had 124 
applicants for positions under him. He has 
made no changes, but the resignation of one 
man has enabled him to make his son first as¬ 
sistant postmaster. Because of this alleged 
family favoritism there has been considerable 
fault-finding. Some of the applicants for posi¬ 
tions are men who were removed four years 
ago to make room for democrats. Mr. Pope says 
that he will not imitate the mistakes of pred¬ 
ecessors, but will adhere to civil service rules 
altogether. The existing staff of clerks and 
carriers is deemed very efficient. The women 
of Plainfield, who have the most frequent 
dealings with them, are especially ardent in 
praising their work. The housewives are just 
beginning to learn of the petition their hus¬ 
bands are signing, and threaten to prepare an 
opposition document. The men have already 
secured 600 signatures.— New York Evening Post, 
Aug. 12. 


—The nomination of John Kirkpatrick for 
postmaster at South Hadley Falls, sent to the 
senate to-day, was recommended by Congress¬ 
man Wallace. Mr. Kirkpatrick is a democrat 
and a veteran of the war, but there were no 
other candidates and his reappointment was 
recommended hy both republicans and demo¬ 
crats of the town. He was appointed during 
the last administration when the office was 
fourth-class. It has just been raised to the 
presidential grade, and a nomination by the 
President was necessary.— Boston Post, May 9. 















158 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Office-Holders Defending their Possessions. 

Allotments thns acquired, mutually engaged such as accepted them to defend them; and as they all sprang from the same right of conquest, no part 
could subsist independent of the whole ; wherefore all givers as well as receivers were mutually bound to defend each other’s possessions. Every 

receiver of lands, or feudatory, was therefore bound when called upon by his benefactor, or immediate lord of his feud or fee, to do all in his power to defend 
him. Such benefactor or lord was likewise subordinate to and under the command of his immediate benefactor and superior; a«id so upwards to the prince or 
general himself; and the several lords were also reciprocally bound, in their respective gradations, to protect the possessions they had given. Thus the feudal 
connection was established, a proper military subjection was naturally introduced and an army of feudatories was always ready enlisted and mutually prepared 
to muster. . . —Blacksto7ie. 


Fort Wayne, Ind., Sept. 6,1890. 

—Dear Sir : Those favoring the candidacy of our 
fellow citizen, Mr. George W. Pixley, for treasurer of 
state, have gratifying a.ssurances that his nomination 
can be secured by a prompt and tangible evidence 
that such is our de.sire. You are hereby invited and 
requested to go to the state convention, at Indian¬ 
apolis, to forward his candidacy. The fare for the 
round trip will not exceed 83.00. Please signify at 
once toC. R. Higgins whether you accept this invita¬ 
tion. As many as can should go Monday afternoon. 

A. A. Chapin. 

D. N. Foster. 

N. R. Leonaru. 

Wm. Geake. 

II. C. Hanna. 

.1. B. Harper. 

A. H. Dougall. 

P. Dickinson. 

C. R. Higgins. 

[Mr. C. R. Higgins is the republican post¬ 
master at Fort Wayne.] 

—PostmasterC. R. Higgins, of Fort Wayne, 
was among the civil service reformers who 
were hustling at the Denison last evening.— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, Sept. 10. 

—The postmasters from Fort Wayne, Terre 
Haute,iFvansville, Lafayette, South Bend and 
Logansport were conspicuous men in the con 
vention hall yesterday. There were not less 
than forty of the.se federal officers present, and 
five of them presented an unusual scene— 
drinking together at the Denison bar. —-From 
the Re/port of the Indiana State Republican Con¬ 
vention in the Indianapolis Sentinel, September 11. 

—The republicansof Warrick county met in 
mass convention in Boonville, Saturday, Sept. 
G, and nominated the following county ticket 

* J. B. Cockrum, assistant district-attorney 
of Indianapolis, came down and took an active 
part in the convention. He told Ihe boys 
here how things were worked at Ipdianapo- 
lis, and how this convention must act. They 
made John chairman of the committee on res¬ 
olutions, and let him write them to suit him¬ 
self, and to flatter the bosses at Washington 
and Indianapolis.— Boonville Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, Sept. S. 

—District Attorney Chambers’s speech at the Col¬ 
umbia Club, to-night, will be devoted to democratic 
iniquities and election methods. He will have for his 
text that portion of the democratic platform that al¬ 
leges all political evils against the opponents of that 
party and claims for it all political purity. Mr. 
Chambers will detail many instances of democratic 
bribery, not those of mere assertion, but those that 
have been established by evidence. He has given 
great care to this speech, and it will be made up 
of facts obtained from nearly every county in the 
state.—Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 5,1890. 

*«>.■> 

The speech of Hon. Smiley N. Chambers, delivered 
last night before the Columbia Club, will be found 
elsewhere in this paper. It abounds in indisputable 
facts concerning democratic rascality, and gives in 
detail some of the political infamies committed by 
that party in Indiana. These crimes have been fre¬ 
quent and' flagrant, and the party committing them 
should be deprived of power by an outraged people. 
The speech is strong in statement, and will prove an 
effective campaign document.—Tndianapolh Journal, 
Stpl. 6, 1890. 


All these years there has been a democratic major¬ 
ity in the legislative department. It is a disgrace to 
the state, a reflection upon the ability of the people 
to manage their own affairs, and should and doubt¬ 
less will be repudiated by the people at the polls. 
You may investigate the affairs of the cities of the 
state where democracy prevails and there will be 
found incompetency, defalcation, and disregard of 
public rights, as in affairs of the state. ^ From 
that time [1876] to the present the corrupt use of mon¬ 
ey has been more or less indulged by the democratic 
party in every location in Indiana, until everywhere 
and on all hands it has become a well-recognized fact 
that the use of money has been limited only by the 
amount that could be procured. This has brought 
its legitimate results to the people of the state of In¬ 
diana, so that corruption has not been confined to 
national politics, but has spread into state, county 
and township elections, ramifying and pervading 
every corner of the state. Taught in the use of mon¬ 
ey, democratic leaders in Indiana have resorted to 
every device known to ingenuity to deceive the 
voter, to tyrannize him, to corrupt him, to thwart 
the will of the people, legitimately expressed, at the 
ballot-box. 

Another feature is the corruption of the demo¬ 
cratic press. On all hands we find the .same spirit 
which we have heretofore characterized prevailing 
so that there is no respect for law, nor for the ad¬ 
ministration of law, where the same comes in con¬ 
flict with democratic success. 

As a result, the most ignoble methods were re¬ 
sorted to by democratic leadens [in 1888]; ingenuity, 
skill and device were all used in originating meth¬ 
ods for disturbing and confusing republicans, and 
breaking up their solid ranks, and for encouraging 
democracy, and drawing into its ranks all the ragged 
edges of society. The amount of money brought 
into the state from New York and the b^er states 
of the South, has never been told, but undoubtedly 
it far exceeded anything that had ever occurred be¬ 
fore. Democraev was in charge of the state and fed¬ 
eral offices within the state, and the rank and file 
were led to believe that they would be protected in 
everything that was done for the success of the 
p irty, no difference what its character, nor who was 
the author of it. Supported by the stale central 
committee, the central committees of the various 
counties issued corrupt circulars, inviting and 
urging bribery, intimidation, and every other 
means for the accomplishment of the defeat of 
the republican ticket. As a sample of that which 
was issued in many counties, I give you one issued 
by the chairman of the democratic county commit¬ 
tee of Morgan.” Make the doubtful list 

as small as po.sslble and mark every one who has to 
have money as a ‘float.’ Those who have to be 
bought are not doubtful, but are ‘ floats.’ Let no 
one escape. Your prompt attention in this matter 
will aid materially in the efficiency of our efforts. 

‘‘ Respectfully, 

‘‘N. A. Whittaker, Chairman.” 

The date of this letter is September 7, near two 
months before the election, and discloses a conspir¬ 
acy, formed early in the campaign, to carry the elec¬ 
tion by fraud and corruption. I have before me a 
copy of a letter sent out by the chairman and secre¬ 
tary of the Decatur county central committee. It 
was sent from the office of the democratic central 
committee. In it is found the following advice; 

‘‘ For the plan of organization we suggest the fol¬ 
lowing : Select with care such men as are safe c .un- 
selors, and can be trusted. Meet frequently at each 
other’s homes, and canva.ss all matters pertinent to 


the coming election. Canvass all doubtful voters. 
Get the float well in hand. Let it be well under¬ 
stood before the election day arrives what each man 
is to do. Select men to look after all doubtful and 
floating voters.” 

Imagine the good citizens of Decatur getting to¬ 
gether in their homes surrounded by their wives 
and boys, devising ways and means to buy votes, 
to debauch the ballot-box and destroy the morals of 
the people. Yet, such is the advice of the demo¬ 
cratic management of Decatur county. A similar 
letter was sent out by the chairman of the Shelby 
county democratic committee, and largely acted 
upon by the democrats of that county. As a result 
of these circulars, it is not surprising that local lead¬ 
ers in the different localities should fiave been led 
into excesses, into corruption and intimidation un¬ 
paralleled in the state of Indiana, and which, it is 
hoped, will never be repeated.—E.cfracfs from Ihe 
Speech of District Attorney Smiley N. Chambers, before 
the Columbia Club, September 5. 1890. 

[This is from a United States district at¬ 
torney appointed by President Harrison to 
prosecute for all the people of Indiana offenses 
against the law whether committed by repub¬ 
licans or democrats. This same prosecuting 
officer said, in December, 1889, regarding his 
suppression of the warrant for Dudley’s arrest: 
“ I exercised the prerogative iii.this case that 
I would exercise in any other of like charac¬ 
ter, and decided that the warrant be not issued 
upon this affidavit.” 

And after reading in Dudley’s circular : 
“Your committee will certainly receive frotp 
Chairman Huston the assistance necessary to 
hold our floaters. * Find out who has democratic 
boodle and steer the democratic workers to 
them, and make them pay big prices for their own 
men. Divide the floaters in blocks of five and 
put a trusted man with necessary funds in charge 
of these five, and make him responsible that 
none get away and that all vote our ticket,” 
this same United States district attorney said 
in an interview in the Indianapolis Journal 
of December 13 : 

” I wish also, to state that I have read the letters 
printed in the press, purporting to be written by the 
colonel, and, in my opinion, unattended by any ex¬ 
traneous evidence, they do not advise bribery, as ap¬ 
pertaining to the election of 1888. The letters, con¬ 
strued in the light of the knowledge that we all possess of 
how elections in Didiana are conducted by both parties 
have nothing in them of a criminal character, but, upon 
the other hand, when so construed, are honorable, and 
indicate simply a patriotic interest in the elections.’’] 

—Three days ago N. W. Cuney, the colored coffeefor 
of the port of Oalveslon, and the dispenser of federal pa¬ 
tronage in that slate, made a speech here in which he 
vilely abused certain leaders of the white republi¬ 
cans by calling them ‘‘flee dogs” and ‘‘northern 
dough-faces.” To day they have made out papers 
and forwarded them to VVashington charging him 
with offensive partisanship.—y/oit.sfon Dispatch to the 
St. Louis Republic, August 28. 

* 

The republican state convention will meet in 
this city next Wednesday, the :5d prox., and, if all 
signs are not wofully misleading, it will be the liveli- 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


159 


est assemblage of the kind ever held in San Antonio. 

■’ N. W. Cuney, President Harrison’s black collector of 
I customs at Galveston, is the acknowledged leader of 
j the colored faction, as he is also the most influential 
dispenser of federal patronage in this state under the 
(f present administration. The leader of the white 
.' faction is yet to be developed. 

Hon. Webster Flanagan is coming down here as 
peacemaker, with a hope of playing the role of the 
monkey who acted as arbitrator between the two 
cats quarrelling over a hunk of cheese and marching 
off with the gubernatorial prize. That is “what he 
will be here for,” so the wiseacres say. 

In view of the fierce contention between the “Lily 
* Whites” and the blacks, there is hardly room for 
doubt that the convention will split. The whites, 
most of them, will, by preconcerted movement, arise 
in the convention as one man if Cuney and his col¬ 
ored supporters get control of the organization of the 
assemblage, march out of the hall and take them¬ 
selves to Mission Garden, in another part of the city, 
and proceed to nominate a ticket independent of the 
blacks. Local republicans to-day made arrange¬ 
ments for renting the Mission Garden for convention 
purposes, and they make no bones of declaring their 
. intention of assembling there with the whites from 
other parts of the state if the Cuney crowd does not 
allow them to have their way in the regular conven¬ 
tion. 

Two republican Bexar county conventions were 
held in this city to-day. The colored cohorts, with 
quite a sprinkling of whites, met at Turner hall with 
a total attendance of 140, and the “Lily Whites” 
assembled at the Mission Garden 65 strong, with 
only one negro present, and he was employed as jan¬ 
itor. Postmaster Johnson, Assistant United States Dis¬ 
trict Attorney Terrell, brother of Harrison’s minister 
to Belgium, and Hon. George Paschal, state district 
attorney, were the most conspicuous whites at the 
colored convention and were elected delegates to the 
state convention. Col. Jim Newcomb, postmaster 
under Arthur; Judge A. P. Tugwell, ex-collector 
customs at Eagle Pass, and John A Bolton, second in 
command of the G. A. R, in Texas, were the leaders 
of the “ Lily Whites ” and head their delegation to 
the state convention. They declare that they are going 
to have Postmaster Johnson and Collector Cuney removed 
from office for offensive partisanship, and likewise that 
they will occupy seats in the state convention or 
burst up the whole affair.—Son Anforeio Dispatch to 
St. Louis Republic, Aug. 30. 

i'.i n* 

The republican state convention delegates are 
beginning to arrive already, and A. W. Cnney, 
the colored collector of the port of Galveston, is on 
the ground preparing plans for the campaign, a?id 
was in consultation with the federal administration lead¬ 
ers this morning. At this conference it was under 
stood that it was to be war to the knife and the knife 
4 to the hilt against the Lily White League. A. B. 
Reutfle, collector of the port at Brownsville, who is an as¬ 
pirant to the congressional seat of the seventh district oc 
cupied by Mr. Crain, will arrive this evening with a dele¬ 
gation of hvelve.—San Antonio Dispatch to St. Louis Re¬ 
public, Sept. 1. 

«= 

The republican state convention was called to or¬ 
der at noon by Executive Committee Chairman De¬ 
gress, of Austin. There were something near 500 
delegates present, forty percent, of whom were black 
as Erebus. 

Wright, of J^amar county, was put up by the “Lily 
Whites” for temporary chairman, and Cuney and his 
colored following pitted R. B. Hawley, of Galveston, 
against the Lamar man. The Cuney people won and 
will perhaps continue to win throughout the conven¬ 
tion. 

When the convention reassembled this evening at 
five o’clock none of the committees wore ready to re¬ 
port, and adjournment was taken until nine o’clock 
to-morrow morning. Before adjournment the Hon. 
Webster Flanagan delivered an add/ess. He pleaded 
for harmony, and said as a republican he knew no 
white nor black. Harri.son, he said, was the best 
president since Washington ; he had expelled from pub¬ 
lic office mote rascals than any of his predecessors. The 


speaker had been a candidate for office under Harrison 
and had been disappointed, but felt no bitterness toward 
the administration, as he recognized that there were not 
enough offices to go around.—San Antonio Dispatch to St. 
Louis Republic, Sept. 3. 

t.*t t‘,i 

The republican slate convention was rapped to 
order this morning promptly at 10 o’clock by tem¬ 
porary chairman Hawley. There were not more 
than half the delegates present and those who were 
there had red eyes and a tired look. They had been 
wrangling in committees with closed doors nearly 
all night and scores of them had had no sleep. 

Every man closed up like a clam when questioned 
as to the details of the committee proceedings further 
than to announce with joyful gladness that the 
“ Lily Whites ” had been sat upon and mashed so 
flat that even the traditional pancake aiipcaredmas- 
todonic in comparison. This was the work of the 
committee on credentials. Every white contesting 
delegation was forbidden seats in the convention. 

Cuney and his blacks are here for harmony, and they 
swear they will have it at any cost—or to put it in 
the language of an ebony statesman from the cane- 
brakes of the Brazos Bottom : “ Dis here am a fight 
between de dog and de coon dis season, and de coon 
from Galveston done got de enemy in de water whah 
he want him.” 

D. C. Kolp, of Wichita, was chosen permanent sec¬ 
retary, with S. C. McCoy, of Galveston, and J. H, 
Stuart, of Robinson, as assistant seeretaries. McCoy 
is a mulatto, and one of Cunty's main henchman in the 
Galveston Custom House. 

The gubernatorial stock of the Hon. Webster Flan¬ 
agan took a big jump to-day. It is, however, gener¬ 
ally conceded that Judge Bell can have the nomina¬ 
tion if he wants it, but his friends say he will notac- 
cept it, and Flanagan very openly and bluntly de¬ 
clares himself. He says he is extremely anxious to 
secure the nomination, even at great personal sacri¬ 
fice, in order to meet Hogg on the stumj) all over 
Texas. Osterhout, of Bell, is also still quite popular, 
while Rector, of Travis, has a large and big lunged 
following. The proceedings on the whole to-day 
were featureless, except for much noise. 

The convention reassembled to-night at eight 
o’clock. The only business transacted was the ap¬ 
pointment of the committee on platform and resolu¬ 
tions, composed of one member from each senatorial 
district. Hon. R. B. Rentfrow, collector of customs at 
Brownsville, is chairman of the committee. Cuney is 
not on it.— San Antonio Disgalch to St. Louis Republic, 
September 4. 

The republican state convention adjourned sine 
die this afternoon. The Cuney wing of the party re¬ 
turn home flushed with victory save the bare nomination 
of Web Flanagan for governor. They won everything 
else and they lost that by only a hair's breadth. Flana¬ 
gan’s only opponent was C. W. Ogden of this city, 
who received only forty six votes less than the suc¬ 
cessful candidate. The only fight in the convention 
was over the selection of a chairman of the state ex¬ 
ecutive committee. Cuney wanted to get Degress out 
and Degress was determined to stay in. After a 
short, .sharp and decisive battle, Cuney put in Lock 
McDaniel, of Grimes county, by a very close vote.— 
San Antonio Dispatch to St. Louis Republic, September b. 

—The negro state convention assembled here to¬ 
day. Sixty counties are represented by 200 delegates. 
They are the most intelligent men of the negro race. 
Speeches have been made by nearly every leading 
man, and the burden and strength of their addresses 
have been the unequal division of the federal patron¬ 
age and the discrimination against the negroes in 
this respect by the white leadeis of the republican 
party. 

The revolt against the white leaders of the repub¬ 
lican party is full and complete, and the federal pat¬ 
ronage throughout the state must be redistributed 
or there will be dire disaster, politically, w'herever 
the negroes number many voters. The republican 
state convention meets in this city on Thursday next, 
and most of the delegates to this convention are del¬ 
egates to the republican state convention, and they 
are instructed to enforce the position of this conven¬ 
tion in that body. 


A committee will be appointed to wait upon the 
President and the cabinet officers and present the 
resolutions to them, and insist that the federal offi¬ 
cers throughout the state at once reconstruct their 
forces and give the negroes their full share of the offi¬ 
ces under their control.—Raleigh, N. C., Dispatch to 
New York Times, Aug. 26’ 

=',! * 

The republican state convention met here to-day 
and eighty counties were represented. Gieat inter¬ 
est was taken in the convention because it was ex¬ 
pected that it would be the scene of a bitter fight be¬ 
tween the contending factions as represented by J. 
B. Eaves on the one side and Dr. J. J. Mott on the 
other. Eaves was rejected by the senate for collector of 
the fifth district through the influence of Mott. The 
President, Secretary Wiudom and Commissioner Ma¬ 
son, of the internal revenue bureau, are all known to 
be supporters of Eaves, and they are said to feel 
greatly outraged at his rejection. Some one or all of 
these gentlemen have given Eaves to understand 
that if he could obtain an indorsement from the state 
convention his name would be sent to the senate by 
the President for collectorof the fifth district. 

Proceeding upon this assurance, Mr. Eaves organized 
his forces all over the state and then called the state com¬ 
mittee together onjhe SOth of July and issued the call for 
the convention to be held to day. This only gave thirty 
days’ notice in which to elect the delegates by ninety- 
seven counties. As soon as Dr. Mott and his friends 
ascertained the plan of battle, and that Eaves was 
seeking an indorsement from the convention, they 
did all they could to rally their forces in order to 
control the convention. Collector White, fourth inter¬ 
nal revenue district, put all his deputies and storekeepers 
and gaugers in moving order, and, of course. Eaves did 
the same, and theresidtis that a very large number of 
the delegates are feeler al office-holders. 

The same scene has been presented to-day as was 
presented before Cleveland’s election, when every 
convention was controlled by the internal revenue 
officers. Everything was at white heat when to-day 
it was announced that the contending factious had 
usurped the functions of the convention' and had 
settled their difliculties, and that there would be no 
fight. The arrangement agreed on is this: Eaves is to 
be re elected chairman of the state committee, and in con¬ 
sideration therefor he is to indorse some gentleman from 
the ninth congressional district for collector to succeed 
himself. 

It now turns out that Eaves has played a very 
shrewd game. He intends to go to Washington and 
press the President to renominate him to the senate 
for collector. Eaves says that Ransom and Vance 
will not oppose his confixmaWon, that he haspid two 
negroes in his office, and has promised to put in as many 
more as may be demanded of him, and that Senator 
Blair will not therefore oppose his confirmation ashe 
did before. It is understood that Jeter C. Pritchard, 
of Madison county, will be recommended for col¬ 
lector by Eaves after Eaves has failed to be re¬ 
nominated to the senate. Congressman Ewart is for 
Pritchard. The whole convention has been subor¬ 
dinated to the questions of federal patronage.— 
Raleigh, N. C., Dispatch to New York Times, Aug. 28. 

* 

The last effort of Collector J. B. Eaves in the conven¬ 
tion last night was the introduction by his henchman, W. 
E. Henderson, colored, a clerk in his office, of a resolution 
requesting the President to reappoint Eaves collector. 
This was an attempt to nullify the bargain of the night 
previous, and brought a storm of objections. It appeared 
at one time as if there would be a genuine row, but J. C. 
Pritchard, who is to be Eaves’s successor by virtue of 
Eaves’s indorsement, went to Eaves and told him that he 
would fight that resolution and rvould expose the bargain 
and trade between Mott, Eaves and Pritchard. This 
frightened Eaves, and the resolution was withdrawn. 

T. N. Cooper and G. H. Brown are disgusted with 
Eaves, as both feel that they have been sold out by 
him. Both expected to have the recommendation of 
Eaves for collector, and the fact that Pritchard is to 
have Eaves’s support is greatly disappointing to 
them. Cooper is furious over the fact that Congress¬ 
man Ewart has indorsed Pritchard. 

The general expression to day as to the result of 








160 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the conventions of the week is that the republican 
parly has been seriously injured. The domination 
of the revenue ollicers and the open and notorious 
fact that nothing but public plunder in the shape of 
olUces moved the convention has created general 
disgust.—Kaieif/fi, iV. C., Dispatch to N. Y. Times, Au- 
gust 29. 

—Mr. Orcntt, the new collector of internal 
revenue, says the Boston Post, enters actively 
into the factional contest of the republicans of 
the sixth Mid<lle.sex senatorial district as a 
delegate to the convention. 

—Mr. Currier, the new naval officer, still 
acts as secretary of the republican state com¬ 
mittee of New Hampshire, and lately served 
in that capacity at a meeting of the man 
agers with Senator Chandler in Boston. 

—Senator Higgins, of Delaware, is at pres¬ 
ent engaged, if reports to trustworthy newspa¬ 
pers are correct, in packing caucuses and oth¬ 
erwise preparing the way for a republican 
gubernatorial nomination in accordance with 
his own inclinations. The rank and file of 
the party have other views. The chief feature 
of the canvass is the pernicious activity of the 
federal office holders. Internal revenue col¬ 
lectors, United Slates marshals, post-office em- 
j)loyes and others are earnestly engaged in 
turning the crank of the Higgins machine.— 
Boston Post, Sept. 2. 

—Early this morning the office holders of the 
fifteenth congressional district began to assem¬ 
ble around the court house. Among them 
were James H. Clark, of Mattoon; Bank Ex¬ 
aminer Capt. J. Swisher, Paris; Census Super- 
visor Charles P. Sitch, Paris; United Slates Mar¬ 
shal J. C. Glenn, Mattoon; Member State Board 
of Eciualization Jake Bell, Paris, formerly 
postmaster; Geo. A. Rice, of Ridge Farm, post- 
office inspector; C. H. Kiemle, St. Joseph, collector 
of statistics for the census; Dr. I. S. Wilcox, Cham¬ 
paign, revenue collector, and concerning whom it 
is whispered around here that he was con¬ 
firmed by the senate; W. R. Jewell, Danville, 
postmaster, and many country poslmastei's. 

'The object of the gathering was the republi¬ 
can convention for the fifteenth congressional 
district. The delegates were selected by Con¬ 
gressman Cannon and his brother “Bill,” and 
they took care that the majority of the dele¬ 
gates should be either office-holders or rela¬ 
tives of office-holders.— Danville Dispatch to St. 
Louis Republic, Aug. 28. 

—“Agent for the Indiana Republican State Co.m- 
MITTEE. Room No. 7, 631 F street, N. W., Wa.shing- 
TON, D, C., Aug. 15, 1890.— Dear Sir: Having been 
designated by the republican state committee of In¬ 
diana to receive and forward sucli funds as the re¬ 
publicans of Washinglon may see proper to con¬ 
tribute towards defraying the campaign expenses of 
the present year, I respectfully ask your considera¬ 
tion to the following suggestions: 

“ First, as intelligent citizens, you are well aware 
that to organize a party and conduct a campaign re¬ 
quires money. With the most patriotic devotion and 
self-sacrificing labor on the part of committees and 
candidates, there are still unavoidable expenses which 
must be met by the rank and file who desire party 
success All parties expect to and do rai.se money by 
the voluntary contributions of their members. There 
arc two classes who are always ready to cry out against 
such contributions—those whose meanness seeks an excuse 
Jor refusing to aid in securing the success of the party 
of which they are the beneficiaries and those whose 
consciousness of their own corruptness make them 
able to charge corrupt motives on others. I 
feel sure that you do not belong to either of these 
classes, and will feel willing to bear your sh’are of the 
burdens and necessary expenses. 

“ Second—as republicans you mu.st desire the suc¬ 
cess of the party, and especially that we retain control 
of the next congress in order to complete necessary 
legislative work. A single congress is not enough in 
which to harmonize opinions, mature laws to protect 
the equal rights of all citizens, and determine what 


is best to be done for the vast and varied material iii' 


“ the boss ” 


more actively.— St. Louis Republic, 


tcrests of this great country. Since the successful in¬ 
troduction of the shot gun,’ ‘tissue liallot’ and 
‘counting out industries’ into the democratic policy 
in the south, we have not had two successive repub¬ 
lican congresses because of the large number of stolen 
.seats the other party has held. As we have special 
interest in the success of President Harrison's ad¬ 
ministration, a duty devolves on ns to do our utmost 
to obtain a republican majority in the next house. 

“ Third—As Indiana repul)licans, yon know the 
<le.sperate political meth.ods of the democracy of our 
state, and the infamous means to which they have 
resorted to hold it. In open and flagrant violation of 
the constitution of the state they have passed an 
election law intended to deprive republicans of just 
and e(inal reprc.sentation in congre.ss and the legisla¬ 
ture; they have shamefully prostituted the public 
and charitable in.stitutions of the state to the mean¬ 
est party uses, and they have doubled the state debt 
as a result of their mismanagement. 

“You are, therefore, confidently appealfd toby 
your fellow republicans of the state, to assist them in 
the present campaign with so much of the sinews of tear 
as you can afford. This will enable them, by thor- 
ougli organization and a free use of the means of infor¬ 
mation, to make a successful appeal to the people of 
the state. Two years ago we wrested from the dem¬ 
ocrats the executive and the judicial department.s, 
and this year we should win the legislature. This wiil 
give us the senator, to whom we are justly entitled; 
will secure to us a fair apportionment under the new 
census, and will enable us to remedy the abuses of 
the last ten years of democratic misrule. 

“To those republicans who are in oflice allow me 
to say: You have the same right to contribute to the 
campaign funds of your party as if you were not in 
office. No one has a right to assess or to coerce you 
into giving; but no one has a right to prohibit you. 
You can not be solicited at your places of official duty, 
but outside these you can confer and contribute as 
you please. The civil service laws are designed to 
protect you in the free exercise of your rights—not to 
convert you into political eunuchs. Any civil ser¬ 
vice commissioner, superior officer or fellow employe 
who attempts to hinder your giving will be himself 
in violation of the law. I address you, therefore, as 
free men, as republicans, desirous of aiding your 
party in all proper and lawful ways. 

“ Thatall Indiana republicans, in and outof office, 
who wi.sh to aid the state committee by their contri¬ 
butions may have the opportunity of so doing, I have 
the honor to ann ounce that I wilt be at my office during 
business hours and will remain therefrom 4 to 6 o'clock on 
the following days: August HI and September 1, lb and 
30. Come and see me as above. 

“ Very truly your.s, w. W. Curry.” 

The St. Louis Republic, whicli prints the 
above, adds that Curry is an old machine 
worker whose office adjoins Dudley’s, and that 
tlie circular has been mailed to every Indiana 
republican employed in the government ser¬ 
vice. The dates above given are the days on 
which the department employes are paid their 
salaries. 

—Nic Karr has been made head dog catcher 
by Marshal Thomas. He made a hot fight for 
the place when the marshal went into office, 
but Thomas wanted him to take the honor of the of 
ficial title and divide the emoluments with John 
Loesch, who looked after the marshal’s interests in 
the seventh ward during the campaign. Karr re¬ 
fused to accept it with that condition, and 
Loesch was appointed. But Loesch and Karr 
have worked together. They joined hands in 
an effort to induce the municipal assembly to 
give them $5,000 for destroying dogs this year. 
They failed. The appropriation was reduced 
to $3,000. and now Karr is put in charge of 
the dog-killing department of the marshal’s 
office. Loesch has recently been quite con¬ 
spicuous in the fights in his ward, and he may 
get something “equally as good,” but the 
chances are against him, unless he cultivates 


Sept. 4. 

—The appointment of “ Jim ” Asay, of Ogle 
county, to a position in the Indian service is 
generally credited to Mr. Hitt, and it testifies 
to the fact that patronage is an injury rather 
than a benefit to our congressmen. The ap¬ 
pointee is exceedingly obnoxious. If spoils 
principles were to control in a department of 
the public service from which they should be 
rigorously excluded, Asay should still be ex¬ 
cluded. Pie has not been a working and rep¬ 
resentative Ogle county republican. It is even 
asserted by some that he is a democrat, but 
whatever his politics he does not have that 
standing in the county which warrants his se¬ 
lection by Mr. Hitt as the recipient of official 
favors. He is remembered in connection with 
legal proceedings in the circuit court at Ore¬ 
gon in which a young woman from Chicago 
was complainant. In course of the trial his 
conduct was shown in a light far from com¬ 
mendable, and Judge Cartwright rendered de¬ 
cision for the complainant. He is perhaps 
popular in a certain limited circle where his 
convivial habits commend him, but the people 
of Ogle county are generally not of the class 
who admire men of Asay’s stamp. Many feel 
indignant that such a man should be preferred 
for official place and obtain it through the 
favor of Mr. Hitt.— Rockford (III.) Register, 
Aug. 22. 

—That was an extraordinary illustration of 
the spoils system which was described by cur 
Washington correspondent yesterday. A let¬ 
ter-carrier in a western city, with an excellent 
record, was requested to resign his place, which 
he naturally refused to do. The republican 
congressman who had sought to get rid of the 
carrier, because he was a democrat and the 
place was wanted for a republican “worker,” 
then induced the post-office department to is¬ 
sue an order for his removal. But the carrier 
would not give up the fight, and he sent to 
Washington letters of remonstrance from many 
of the leading citizens on his route, who de¬ 
clared him well qualified, efficient, and faith¬ 
ful. The congressman then made the plea 
that he wanted the place for a veteran of the 
civil war, whereupon the carrier produced 
a petition for his retention signed by 600 old 
soldiers whose mail he had been carrying for 
years. Nevertheless, the order for his removal 
was not revoked, and the papers for the ap¬ 
pointment of his successor had been made out, 
when his wife appeared in Washington in his 
behalf. “She visited the department, learned 
the exact state of things in regard to her hus¬ 
band, and at last accounts was chasing the ob¬ 
durate member of congress around the city, 
resolved to convert him with the testimonials 
she carried with her.” The congressman has 
already spent probably one hundred dollars’ 
worth of the time which the government pays 
him for devoting to the public interests in 
this disgusting squabble over a petty office, 
which pays the incumbent only about $2.50 a 
day, and the end is not yet! -New York Even¬ 
ing Post, Aug. 29. 

—Boss Quay took an active part in the 
“freezing out” of Sergeant-at Arms Canaday, 
although he did not succeed in putting in his 
man Bailey. Canaday does not retire until 
July 1. This morning the sergeant-at-arms 
discharged George H. Mann, a page, who had 
been appointed at Quay’s dictation, and filled the 
place thus provided by puttiug in a Montana boy at 
the request of Mr. Sanders. 

Quay was mad, and within ten minutes af¬ 
ter the senate met he introduced a resolution 
directing the sergeant-at-arms to make no 
changes in his force without the consent of the 
senate. The resolution was laid over until 
to morrow. ‘Meanwhile Quay’s page is out 
and Sander’s page is in. and Canaday is still 
sergeant-at-arms.—Wew York Times, June 19. 








The civil service chronicle. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapolis. Published monthly. Pnblieation ofllce. No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, 
Ind., where subscriptions and advertisements will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


VoL. I, No. 20. INDIANAPOLIS, OCTOBER, 1890. terms : ^ feen^p^rT^opyr' 


Indianapolis, September 5,1890. 

My Dear Sir— For about a year and a half we have 
been sending the Civil Service Chronicle to the 
public library. I observed yesterday that it is not 
on your printed list of periodicals. Our object in 
sending it is to have it in the usual way brought to 
the notice of those who frequent the library in the 
hope that some of them may be led to read it. 

If there is any reason why it should not be placed 
on the printed list we shall be obliged if you will in¬ 
form us of it. Respectfully, 

Lucius B. Swift, 

For the Civil Service Chronicle. 

Mr. Charles Evans. Librarian. 

Public Library, September 6,1890. 

Dear Sir— It has been the intention for some time 
to revise the list of periodicals and print a new re¬ 
vised list, containing all periodicals now currently 
received. This will be done as soon as possible. 
The fact that this was to be done was the sole reason 
why the Chronicle has not been added. The 
omission was one of several, and I am obliged to you 
for calling my personal attention to the matter. 

Yours, very truly, 

Charles Evans, Librarian. 

Lucius B. Swift, Esq. 

The list referred to is a printed one of peri¬ 
odicals with additions of names of new papers 
from time to time inserted in writing and 
tacked up in the reading-room of the library. 
While the question when the Civil Service 
Chronicle shall go upon the list is being de¬ 
cided, any one wishing to see this paper can 
get it in the reading-room by asking for it. 


The National League of Civil Service Re¬ 
form Associations held its annual meeting in 
Boston, October 1st and 2d. In this con¬ 
genial atmosphere the League could but get 
and it got a large hearing. The speech of 
Mr. Curtis, in Tremont Temple, was listened 
to by a large and appreciative audience, and 
was admirably adapted to the occasion. This 
speech and the papers read and the resolutions 
will be found elsewhere in this paper. The 
resolutions justly and fairly point out what the 
administration has failed to do according to 
promise. In speaking of the civil service 
commission the resolutions could not be ex¬ 
pected to distinguish individuals. But both 
in the meetings and at the dinner, where two 
hundred guests were present, the mention of 
Mr. Roosevelt’s name was always applauded. 
It is well, known that Mr. Thompson is an 
equally fearless upholder of the law against 
its enemies and is in accord with Mr. Roose¬ 
velt, but being a democrat he is not under a 
republican administration, and in the present 
condition of the reform, so effective a spokes¬ 
man. If the next administration should be of 
his party we may hope that he will be the com¬ 
missioner militant to beat off the Grosvenors, 
Houks, Ewarts and Hattons. 


The men who live by campaigns and elec¬ 
tions are trying in every way they dare to 
scare money out of the department clerks in 
Washington. Among others. Congressman 
Grosvenor’s brother is particularly bold. Re¬ 
ferring to these attempts, Mr. Roosevelt says: 

Any government employe who is directly or indi¬ 
rectly concerned in soliciting or receiving money for 
campaign purposes from any other government em¬ 
ploye, whether he does so on his own account or 
through a club or association which acts as his 
agent, renders himself liable to prosecution, and 
whenever we get any evidence against such offend¬ 
ers, we will immediately lay his case before the 
proper authorities. No government employe need 
pay a cent unless he wishes to, and we will welcome 
information from any one as to any effort being 
made, no matter how indirectly, to force him to 
subscribe for political purposes. 

The country and the clerks now know that 
this is no sham protection which is offered 
against political pirates. Prosecutions of vio¬ 
lators of the law are not so certain, thanks to 
President Harrison’s prosecutors, but with Mr. 
Roosevelt ready and certain to make open 
war, no officer will dismiss a clerk for re¬ 
fusing to contribute. Nothing like this atti¬ 
tude of the commission, of which Mr. Roose¬ 
velt is the spokesman, so well shows the prog¬ 
ress and gathering strength of the merit 
system. 

The Pennsylvania campaign presents a sight 
that gratifies every one who is tired of being 
ruled by bosses, not to say rascals. A great 
body of Pennsylvania republicans refuse to 
vote for Quay’s man Delamater, and are act¬ 
ively working for his opponent Pattison, 
whom the democrats elected governor of the 
state in 1882. Quay has carried the golden- 
rule maxim of Ingalls too far, and a large 
number of ministers are aroused against him. 
A meeting which packed the Academy of Mu¬ 
sic ill Philadelphia was held October 20, to 
give public expression to the protest. There 
is no question but that the revolt is widespread 
and embraces many thousands of the best re¬ 
publicans in Pennsylvania. Whatever the 
result, the agitation will add to the number of 
independent voters and will bring into activ¬ 
ity against boss rule a large number of new 
men. There is a majority of 80,000 to over¬ 
come. There would be no hesitation in say¬ 
ing that this would be done were it not for the 
means possible with Quay. As Mr. Bonaparte 
says, if we had not seen Gorman under like 
circumstances make the figures in Maryland 
foot up right for his side, we should feel sure 
of Quay’s defeat now. It may again be re¬ 
marked for the benefit of President Harrison 
and Mr. Wanamaker that Quay does not and 
can not deny that he stole money from the 


Pennsylvania treasury; and that he could not 
remain in public life if deprived of the federal 
patronage. The latter the Lincoln republi¬ 
cans have already told the President in a for¬ 
mal communication. 

Mr. Robert Lincoln has interfered in the 
Pennsylvania matter by writing a letter say¬ 
ing that the anli-Quay republicans have no 
right to use his father’s name and call them¬ 
selves Lincoln republicans. It was hoped that 
this letter was a forgery, as it smacked too 
much of a man of few wits defending a knave. 
As the New York Evening Post says, Mr. Lin¬ 
coln can not in this manner write his father 
up, but he can very decidedly write himself 
down. Mr. Herbert Welsh thus puts him to 
shame: 

“You further say that you can not agree ‘in the 
soundness of a position which is based on an assump¬ 
tion of representing the opinions of Republican 
leaders who can no longer speak for themselves.’ 
Your father, my dear sir, be it said in all .sincerity 
and reverence, was one of that goodly company of 
martyrs and of prophets, who, ‘being dead, yet 
speak.’ You do him less honor than we to suppose 
the contrary. Neither the lapse of years nor the de¬ 
basement of the name which his speech and acts 
made glorious can silence his words in the heart of 
the American people. Neither the words nor the 
counsels of Abraham Lincoln are of private or family 
interpretation. They are the common property 
of the nation.” 

The Buffalo common council thought it 
was a ■ oiger man” than the law and it ap¬ 
pointed some street and health inspectors in 
entire disregard of the New York civil service 
law. Mr. Sherman S. Rogers, representing the 
Buffalo Civil Service Reform Association, 
promptly took the common council into court, 
and has won a succession of victories in the 
special term, in the general term, and now in 
the court of appeals. The payment of salaries 
to the persons improperly appointed is en¬ 
joined. In its opinion handed down October 
7, the court of appeals says of the merit sys¬ 
tem : 

“ If the system were to be carried out to its fullest 
extent by appropriate legislation, and if the laws 
thus enacted were to be enforced bona fide and with 
cordial heartiness by the men to whose hands it 
would necessarily be confided, it has been confi¬ 
dently predicted that the improvements in our en¬ 
tire civil service would be such that no unprejudiced 
citizen would ever give his consent to return 
to the old order of things. * That the former 
system was bad, very bad indeed, is a fact re¬ 
garding which it is almost impossible to dispute. 
=;< <• ■> That the results, if the legislation be fairly 
carried .out, will be immeasureably superior to 
those obtained under the old system, is a pre¬ 
diction most confidently made by those whose 
knowledge upon the subject is the greatest. It is 
somewhat difficult to imagine a worse than the old 
system of appointments to civil office. That a letter- 
carrier should lose his position because his views 
upon the question of the tariff were not in accord¬ 
ance with the ruling powers seems to be the very 
height of absurdity.” 
















162 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ALL GIVERS AS WELL AS RECEIVERS WERE 
MUTUALLY BOUND TO DEFEND EACH OTHER’S 
POSSESSIONS.—Blatkstone. 


The middle ages in Europe had its local despots, 
its robber barons, who seized the control of its cities 
and provinces, levied tribute on citizens and toll 
from passers-by. At present dungeons and daggers 
are discarded from the use of the successors of these 
early tyrants. But not the less really is the power 
used and we made the prey and the sport of a class 
as infamous in the sight of any true man as any rob¬ 
ber-baron of the fifteenth or sixteenth century. The 
weapons they use now are vastly more potent tlian 
prison or sword. They are organization and money. 
The very form of our institutions makes them potent, 
and to the whole extent that our institutions are de¬ 
signed for the discharge of duty by virtuous citizens 
are they adapted to serve the purposes of vile dem¬ 
agogues, when the respectable class become neglect¬ 
ful of public duty and unvigilant as to the condition 
of the state, and permit themselves to be betrayed 
by appeals to their own selfish interests and carried 
away by cheap party cries to prefer anything to the 
pure welfare of the state and the honest administra¬ 
tion of government .—From the Sermon of Itev. Jof^eph 
May on the present situation in Pennsylvania. 


—About two hundred republicans will go to 
Indiana from Washington to vote. Twenty-jive 
have already gone.—Indianapolis Journal, Get. 16. 

—At Fort Wayne the postmaster and his 
chief deputy headed the petition for federal 
supervisors.— Indianapolis Sentinel, October 22. 

—Thomas V. Cooper, who holds a federal 
appointment in Philadelphia has been selected 
by Senator Cameron to conduct his campaign. 

—Mr. Thomas Ryan, of the treasury de¬ 
partment at Washington, is home to vote. As 
an Irish-American he is an enthusiastic sup¬ 
porter of the McKinley tariff law.— Indianap¬ 
olis Journal, Oct. 15. 

—Hon. Smiley Chambers [United States dis¬ 
trict attorney] delivered a splendid address be¬ 
fore a large audience at the opera house this 
evening. He dwelt at length upon the Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel and its anarchistic utterances 
and tendencies, and stated a fact not generally 
known—that the editor of the Sentinel had cir¬ 
culated in Fort Wayne a petition for the par¬ 
don of the Chicago anarchists after they had 
been convicted.— Marion Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Journal, Oct. 15. 

—Mr. Hinton was followed by Hon. J. B. 
Cockrum [assistant U. S. district attorney], of 
Indianapolis, in a masterly presentation of 
state issues, giving a thorough discussion of 
the iniquities of the democratic party that 
have passed directly under his notice as an 
officer of the United States court.— Rushville 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 17. 

—District Attorney Chambers has written to 
the state central committee that he and Mr. 
Trusler, republican candidate for secretary of 
state, had two grand meetings at Marion and 
one at Kokomo. “Our meetings have been 
well attended and very enthusiastic,” he writes. 
—Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 17. 

—The Hon. John B. Cockrum delivered a 
telling speech to a large and enthusiastic audi¬ 
ence at the court-house in this city last night. 
* * He also dealt with the infamous violation 
of election laws by the democratic party, and 
the extravagant and dishonest manner in 
which the affairs of the state institutions of 
this state have been mismanaged at the hands 
of the democratic legislature.— Noblesville Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 12. 


—This is about the time when all the In- 
dianians employed in the government depart¬ 
ments at Washington come home for a vaca¬ 
tion. The Indianapolis contingent has begun 
to arrive. Gus Shaw, who is influential with 
railroad men, has been here several weeks get¬ 
ting the “boys” into line The first of next 
week all the Indianapolis republicans who 
have positions at the capitol are expected 
here.— Indianapolis News, October 17. 

—Here in Georgia the federal district attor¬ 
ney for the northern district is a candidate for 
congress and actively canvassing. The collec¬ 
tor of internal revenue for the state is a can¬ 
didate for congress in the fourth district, and 
the postmaster of Rome in the seventh.— New 
York Times, Oct. 23. 

—Congressman Bowden jumped into the 
town this morning from Washington, where 
he has been hard at work to seat Langston. He 
was suirounded with politicians at the custom house 
this morning. Many of his henchmen were 
after money to use at to night’s precinct meet¬ 
ings, but not one cent was given up to-day.— 
Richmond Times, Sept. 25. 

—There was a throng of politicians at the 
Tremont House last night. It was the night 
before the republican convention, and the 
boomers were at it for all they were worth. 
There were a great many old war horses on the 
ground, and they lookod as happy as could be. 
They were in their element. Among these was 
Collector Alanson W. Beard of the port of 
Boston. Then there were Internal Revenue 
Collector Frank E. Orcutt of Melrose, Post¬ 
master Odell of Beverly, Postmaster W. W. 
Adams of Quincy, Major Cook, auditor at the 
custom house; Assistant Secretary Pilgrim, 
an inspector at the custom house, detailed for 
duty in the office of Mr. Beard.— Boston Post, 
Sept. 17, 

—When the delegates were finally seated, 
Mr. Towner, his brother and the rest of his 
party sat alone on two long wooden benches. 
Near by sat Mr. Fish between Prof. George C. 
Smith, of the Drew Female College, and Under 
Sheriff J. AV. Hazen. Mr. Fish’s success in 
placing his friends was illustrated by the fact 
that there were not five square feet of floor in 
the room that were not trodden by the feet of 
office holders. There was Ilemy Mahlie, an ap 
praiser of land for the new acqueduct; Oeorge Hine, 
the supenisor of Brewsters; County Clerk Weeks, Wil¬ 
lard F. Agor, the postmaster of Mahopac Falls; 
John Bennett, the coroner and postmaster of Kent; 
Abram J.-Miller, the district attorney; Dam In¬ 
spector Yale, Deputy Shcrif Day, Tax Clerk and 
Constable Shove, Justice of the Peace Barnes, As¬ 
sessor Baxter, besides a cloud of highway commis¬ 
sioners and an army of smaller office-holders.—New 
York Sun, Oct. 7. 

—W. H. Collier, a reputable colored man, 
chairman of the republican executive com¬ 
mittee of Marion county, says that George I. 
Cunningham, United Slates marshal, attempted to 
bribe him by offering him a position in the Charles¬ 
ton custom house if he would desert Brayton. 
Collier declined. He was afterward beset by 
various emissaries, and finally, just before the 
convention met, Thomas Miller, who is con¬ 
testing Congressman Elliott’s seat, urged him 
to drop Brayton, offering him a government 
job either at Washington or Charleston, to¬ 
gether with $300 in money. Collier says that 
the delegates were bought like cattle. He de¬ 
clares that if his statements are questioned he 
will bring forward still more damaging facts 
and will substantiate them by witnesses. 

He says that one of Webster's employes in the in¬ 
ternal revenue service told him that he was obliged 
to vote for Webster in order to keep his position .— 
Columbia, S. C., Dispatch to New York Times, Sept. 


NOTES. 

The Baltimore Sun, of October 22, prints 
the address of Mr. John Hemsley Johnson be¬ 
fore the tax-payers’ association, on “The Merit 
System of Appointing City Officials.” 


The Civil Seiwice Record, for October, has the 
speeches in full made at the dinner given by the 
various associations in Massachusetts upon the 
occasion of the meeting of the National 
League. They read as well as they sounded. 


The Civil Service Record, for September, 
prints Mr. Roosevelt’s statement before the 
congressional committee investigating the 
civil service. It also publishes the appear¬ 
ance of Congressman Grosvenor before the 
committee and his statement and final dis¬ 
comfiture by Mr. Roosevelt. The whole ar¬ 
ticle is of great interest and value. 

The October Civil Service Reformer contains 
a very clever editorial on the significance of a 
so-called request for voluntary subscriptions 
recently received by the employes of the in¬ 
ternal revenue service in Baltimore. The 
money raised was to be exclusively used for 
the benefit of the canvass of the Hon. Sidney 
E. Mudd in the fifth congressional district, 
stated Senator Coffin who “ held up” the em¬ 
ployes. They knew that Senator Coffin was 
the personal and political friend of the col¬ 
lector, and that Mudd, who seeks re-election, 
had largely contributed to the collector’s ap¬ 
pointment, and, as Mr. Quay would say, under 
all the circumstances Senator Coffin’s request 
could hardly be disregarded. 


THIRD REPORT OF THE INVES¬ 
TIGATING COMMITTEE OF THE 
NATIONAL CIVIL SERVICE 
REFORM LEAGUE. 

Presidential Postmasters. 

To the Executive Committee of the National Civil 

Service Reform League : 

Your special committee, appointed to in¬ 
quire into the condition of the federal service 
and the operation of the reform law, has com¬ 
pleted its investigation of removals and res¬ 
ignations of presidential postmasters during 
the first year of the present administration. 

It gave us satisfaction to note in our last 
report the improved condition of the patent 
office and the adherence to civil service prin¬ 
ciples in its management. AVe are not able to 
discover the same adherence to business meth¬ 
ods in respect to the changes made among 
presidential postmasters. In investigating 
these changes, we have attempted to ascer¬ 
tain : 

1. Their number. 

2. The motive, whether made for political 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


163 


reasons or to promote the efficiency of the 
service. 

Our first effort was to ascertain what 
changes had been made. For the purpose of 
obtaining official information, our chairman 
opened a correspondence with the officers of 
the post-office department, which is fully set 
forth in the following letter addressed by him 
to the President on March 27, 1890, and in 
the letters therein referred to and annexed to 
this report: 

Washington, D. C., March 17, 1890. 
Hon: Benjamin Harrison, President of the United 

States: 

Dear Sir— On February 20,1 wrote to Mr. J. Lowrie 
Bell, general superintendent of the railway mail serv¬ 
ice, asking him howl could secure copies of the daily 
bulletin of the orders affecting the postal service, 
and obtain access to past flies of this daily bulletin. 
On February 21, he answered that it could only be 
furnished for ofllcial purposes; that the file was 
kept at his office ; and that, if I would call and show 
why I should examine it, I would, if proper, be al¬ 
lowed to do so. On February 22, I answered, say¬ 
ing that a special committee was recently appointed 
by the National Civil Service Reform League to in¬ 
quire into the present condition of the civil service 
with reference to this reform, and that I was placed 
in charge of this work in Washington, that a list of 
appointments and removals of postmasters was nec¬ 
essary, and asking whether I might be allowed to 
look over these past flies and take copies of such 
portions as might seem necessary, or whether such 
inspection would be inadmissible. On March 1, I 
received an answer from Postmaster-General Wana- 
maker, that the department was governed by a well- 
established precedent, which denied to the public 
the privilege of inspecting papers in appointment 
cases for many sound reasons, in furtherance of 
which such papers had invariably been deemed 
privileged and confidential with the department. It 
will be observed that I asked nothing more than to 
inspect past files of the daily bulletin in the office 
of the general superintendent of the railway mail 
service, and that I am told that such papers have 
invariably been deemed privileged and coufidential. 

Thinking there must be some misapprehension on 
the part of the postmaster-general, I wrote him on 
March 6 that the files I desired to look over were the 
flies of the daily bulletin containing lists of appoint¬ 
ments and men removed, and not any other files, 
and that I understood these were given to the public 
press, and did not see how they could be deemed 
confidential. I stated that all I desired to see was a 
record of the removals and appointments, and not of 
any other files or papers relating in any other man¬ 
ner to such removals and appointments. To this I 
received an answer from the postmaster-general, 
dated March 11, politely requesting me to call upon 
him at my earliest convenience. On the afternoon 
of March 14 I accordingly called upon the postmas¬ 
ter general, but he declined to permit an inspection 
of these files of the daily bulletin, telling me I had 
no business to see them. 

On April 26,1889, Mr. William Potts, secretary of 
the league, asked Mr. Wanamaker for information as 
to the names of postmasters who have died, resigned, 
or been removed since the incoming of the present 
administration, and the names of those who have 
been appointed during the same period, and also 
their offices. Mr. Wanamaker replied May 10 that 
the information asked was furnished daily through 
the press in announcing the appointments made, 
and that the changes were furni.shed in manifold to 
the representatives of the pre.ss, embracing the name 
of the oflBce and the former official, the cause of the 
change, whether from resignation, death, improve¬ 
ment of the service, or removal, and the name of the 
new appointee. Mr. Wanamaker said that it would 
be impossible for the working force of the depart¬ 
ment to furnish the special information sought, and 
that it would be a violation of the regulations to ad¬ 
mit outsiders to perform any work in connection 
with the official and legal papers of the department. 


On June 18,1889, Mr. J. Hemsley Johnson, the edi¬ 
tor of the Civil Service ^Reformer, a newspaper pub¬ 
lished in Baltimore, wrote a letter to the postmaster- 
general asking for the total number of removals in 
the railway mail service between March 4 and June 
1, 1889. Mr. Wanamaker answered that there was a 
daily statement given to the public pre.ss of all the 
changes made, and added the following: “As we 
understand it, your paper has thus far given scarcely 
anything but misrepresentations by way of alleged 
facts to the people in discussing this question. We 
are very much gratified to see this change in your 
disposition, and a desire to deal frankly and fairly, 
and to come to first sources to gain official facts be¬ 
fore taking up official discussion. Therefore, if you 
are ready to begin the discussion on the basis of truth 
and candor, and willing to correct the false state 
ments heretofore made in your journal, and to say 
frankly to the public that said previous information 
was wrong, and that you henceforth intend to dis¬ 
cuss matters connected with the postal service intel¬ 
ligently and fairly, on actual official data, we should 
be glad to furnish you with any information at our 
command.” 

I enclose copies of this correspondence for your 
inspection. 

Without considering now whether the record of 
removals and appointments is not so far a public 
record as to entitle any citizen to its inspection at 
such reasonable hours as may be consistent with 
the business of the department, permit me to say 
that the refusals to allow it ought to be more con¬ 
sistent. Mr. Wanamaker refuses to allow me to 
look over the files of appointments and removals be¬ 
cause such papers have invariably been deemed 
privileged and confidential, and yet he tells Mr. 
Potts and the editor of the Reformer that they are 
furnished daily to the public press. He says to Mr. 
Potts that it would be impossible for the force of the 
office to furnish the special information, and a vio¬ 
lation of the regulations to admit outsiders to obtain 
it; and yet he says to the editor of the Reformer Chat, 
if the latter will retract certain unspecified state¬ 
ments made iii that journal,-and say that the Re¬ 
former intends to discuss matters connected with the 
postal service on actual official data, he will be glad 
to furnish that paper with any information at his com¬ 
mand. 

I think you will see that these statements are not 
consistent, and before publishing this correspond¬ 
ence I respectfully submit it for such consideration 
as it may seem to you to deserve. 

Very respectfully, 

Wii. Dudley Foulke. 

Executive Mansion, l 
Washington, March 19, 1890. j 
Ho 71. Wm. D. Foulke, Washington, D. C.: 

My Dear Mr.Foulke— The President directs 
me to acknowledge the receipt of your letter 
of the 17th inst., with the accompanying copies 
of correspondence. Very truly yours, 

E. W. Halford, Private Secretary. 

Your committee is of the opinion that the 
lists of postmasters removed and appointed 
ought to be a public record,—that any person 
dealing with the department should have the 
right to know who is the lawfully commis¬ 
sioned officer, when he was appointed, and 
when his term would expire, and ought not to 
be required to establish a special interest be¬ 
fore being permitted to inspect this list, any 
more than if it were the record of a court of 
justice or of a legislative body. If the post¬ 
master-general has^the discreti^nar^yri^ht to 
refuse such inspl^ion, '^le'^exercise of this 
right can not fail to incur the distrust of those 
who believe that the public service should be 
administered with such publicity as not to 
shrink from examination. 

The past numbers of the daily bulletin is¬ 
sued to the press had become scattered and 


lost before your committee was appointed ; and 
it is impossible thus to obtain a complete offi¬ 
cial list of the changes made, especially in re¬ 
lation to fourth-class post-offices. The results 
of our inquiries will perhaps show why the 
postmaster-general considered it necessary to 
refuse acce.ss to this information. The mere 
number of such removals (which the depart¬ 
ment offered to furnish) would of itself throw 
no light upon the motives for which they were 
made; and without the names of the offices, of 
the men removed, and of the new appointees, 
it would be manifestly impossible for us to ob¬ 
tain information of value. We have, how¬ 
ever, been able to obtain this information so 
far as the changes in presidential post-offices 
are concerned, in other ways; and, if it is not 
derived wholly from the postmaster-general’s 
own list, it is because he declined to furnish 
it. 

A partial enumeration of the changes in 
presidential offices, those made between March 
4 and July 1, 1889, had been already given in 
the report of the postmaster-general for 1889. 
It is as follows (see p. 19): 


By deaths. 24 

By resignations. 176 

By expirations. . 105 

By offices becoming presidential.119 

By removals for various reasons. 136 

Total. 560 


And the report says of these removals, “ 55 
were removed upon inspectors’ and other offi¬ 
cial reports, 23 others had served over four 
years, 22 others had an average service of 
nearly four years, and the remaining 36 were 
removed to secure better service.” This re¬ 
port reveals a curious system resorted to in the 
post-office department to explain removals. 
In the first place, changes made by resigna¬ 
tions and by expirations of terms are excluded 
before these removals are counted. Then we 
are told that among the men removed 23 had 
served over four years (although the term for 
which they were commissioned had not ex¬ 
pired), and “22 others had an average service 
of nearly four years.” This is certainly a pe¬ 
culiar reason for the removal of an efficient 
postmaster before the expiration of his term. 

If A, B, C and D are four unexceptionable 
postmasters, and A has been in office two 
years, and B, C and D have been in three 
years and eleven months, this will give an 
average term of “nearly four years”; but it 
is a rather poor reason for the removal of 
even. B, C and D, to say nothing of A, who 
has served only two years, and whose average 
is thus extended by this involuntary com¬ 
panionship. There is no claim that these men 
are removed for improper conduct, nor even 
to secure a better service ; for those classes are 
specially mentioned. According to ihe post¬ 
master-general’s report, each of these removals 
appears to be without other reason than the 
iniquity of serving an average term with 
some other unknown person of “nearly four 
years.” 

But the statements in this report go further; 
“55 were removed upon inspectors’ and other 
official reports; while the remaining 36 were 
















164 


THE CI\1L SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


removed to secure a better service.” It thus 
appears th^it as to this remainder there were 
no official reports in reference to the good of 
the service; and’the information upon this 
point must have come from unofficial sources. 
We shall examine hereafter somewhat in de¬ 
tail the character of such information and 
the way in which these removals were made. 

The nominations to presidential post-offices 
are sent by the President to the senate, and 
appear scattered through the records of con¬ 
gress. An examination of these records has 
enabled us to ascertain the changes in these 
offices with substantial accuracy. The changes 
in presidential offices made during the first 
year, as given by Mr. Clarkson, first assistant 
postmaster-general, are as follows : 

1. On deaths. 48 

2. On resignations.. 

3. On expirations. 

4. On offices becoming presidential. -^7 

5. Removals: 

A. On inspectors’ and other government 

officials’ reports. 298 

B. Upon expiration of four years’ ser¬ 

vice and second commission not yet 
expired. 201 

C. Upon undoubted evidences of mis¬ 
management, without reports. 114 613 

Total. 1,783 

The entire number of presidential^postmast- 
ers, according to the report of the postmaster- 
general on July 1, 1889, was 2,6G2 (see p. 12.) 
Two hundred and twenty-seven offices became 
presidential between March 4,1889, and March 
4, 1890, according to Mr. Clarkson’s statement 
above. Of these, 119 had become presidential 
on July 1, 1889, according to the postmaster- 
general’s report above referred to. One 
hundred and eight offices therefore became 
presidential after July 1, 1889, and before 
March 4, 1890, making the total number of 
presidential offices on March 4, 1890, 2,270. It 
is thus shown that over 64 per cent, of these offi¬ 
cers were changed during the first year of the present 
administration. The statement made by the 
post-office department, however, indicates that 
only 613 of such changes, or about 23 percent., 
have been made by the removal of the incum¬ 
bents, and that the remaining changes have 
been upon deaths, resignations, expirations of 
terms, and upon the respective offices becom¬ 
ing presidential. It will be noticed that the 
number of changes owing to the death of the 
incumbent is only 48. The changes on ac¬ 
count of the offices becoming presidential are 
in their nature very similar to removals, since 
there would appear to be no better reason why 
an efficient fourth-class postmaster should be 
displaced when the business of his office increas¬ 
es so as to make it presidential, than why the 
same change should be made if the office had 
always been presidential. If such change is 
made for political * reasons merely, it is 
equally a violation of the promise that “fidel¬ 
ity and efficiency” should be “ the only sure 
tenure of office.” 

We determined, however, in view of the 
graver evils resulting from changes made dur¬ 
ing the incumbents’ four years’ term to con¬ 
fine our attention to the more important cases 
of resignations and removals, and to ascer¬ 
tain,— 


1. Whether the alleged resignations were 
voluntary or were made under pressure for 
political reasons; and 

2. Whether the removals were, as alleged in 
the above statements of the postmaster-general 
and first assistant postmaster-general, made 
upon official reports and upon other undoubted 
evidences of mismanagement and “ for the 
good of the service,” or whether these terms 
were used as a cloak to cover removals made 
for political reasons. 

Your committee, therefore, addressed to 
each postmaster removed or resigned, as well 
as to his successor, a communication calling 
for the facts regarding the change. The fol¬ 
lowing was addressed to the postmaster re¬ 
moved or resigned: 

Dear Sir —We understand that you were displaced 

rom the office of-on the-day of-. 

Would you bo willing to state to this committee the 
circumstances of this change? 

Isf. Were any causes assigned for it? if so, wha^ 
were they, and by whom assigned? If you resignedf 
was your resignation requested or suggested? if so, 
by whom? If in writing, will you kindly inclose a 
copy ? 

2d. By whom were you succeeded ? 

3d. To what political party do you belong? To 
what party does your successor belong? 

4th. What political services did you render while 
in office? What position, if any, did you hold in 
your party organization? Were you connected with 
any newspaper? if so, give its name. 

5th. What political services, if any, did your suc¬ 
cessor render in the last campaign or previously’ 
What position, if any, did he hold in the party or. 
ganization to which he belonged ? Was he connect’ 
ed with any newspaper? if so, give the name of such 
paper. 

6th. Do you know upon whose recommendation or 
influence, if any, you were displaced or your succes¬ 
sor appointed? 

7th. Give any facts known to you regarding the 
motive or reasons for your displacement and his ap¬ 
pointment. 

8th. When did your term of office expire? 

9th. Please state as specifically as possible any facts 
you know regarding the efficiency of the administra¬ 
tion of the office before and since your removal. 

10th. Who was your predecessor, and how long 
had he held office? 

11th. When were you appointed? 

When the answer to such communication 
was received, we embodied the substance of 
such answer in a letter to the new appointee, 
with the request that if in any respect the in¬ 
formation was incorrect, or he desired to add 
any other facts in reference to the change, he 
would communicate the same to your commit¬ 
tee. In all cases where the postmaster re¬ 
moved or resigned did not answer our inquir¬ 
ies, the appointee was addressed in the follow¬ 
ing letter: 

Dear Sir— We understand you were appointed to 
the office of on the day of , in the 
place of 

Previous to your appointment had you any ex¬ 
perience in the duties of the office? If so, what was 
it? 

What political claims, if any, had you upon the 
office? 

Did you take part in the last campaign ? What po 
sltlon did you hold in the party organization, if any? 
Are you a member of the republiean party? Were 
you connected with any newspaper (if so, what was 
it ? and in what capacity ?) 

Upon whose recommendation or Influence was the 
appointment made? What were the circumstances 
which led to your appointment? 


When did your predecessor’s term of office ter¬ 
minate? 

In thus getting information from both 
sides, and giving both postmasters a chance 
to be heard, we believed that we would arrive 
at the truth as nearly as it was possible to do 
so by written correspondence. The answers to 
these communications were filed, tabulated 
and classified; and from these answers we are 
enabled to report, it is believed, with substan¬ 
tial accuracy in regard to the system pursued. 
We made these inquiries in 927 cases, 574 
being removals and 353 resignations. We 
have received answers in 558 cases (a little 
more than 60 per cent, of the whole number 
concerning which inquiry was made), giving 
more or less fully the information asked for. 
In 321 of these cases the answers came from 
the postmasters removed or resigned, in 90 
cases from the successors only, and in 147 
cases from both. Shortly after we commenced 
addressing inquiries to the new appointees. 
First Assistant Postmaster-General Clarkson, 
in an interview sent through the associated 
press to all the leading papers in the country, 
said: 

We are receiving letters from newly appointed 
postmasters who have been addressed in this way. 
The inquiries sent out, in every instance that I have 
seen, show that the case has been pre judged and 
the change made assumed to be wrong. It is evi¬ 
dently an effort to get statements from removed and 
disappointed officials for political use, and some of 
the letters show an intention to try to induce the 
new postmaster to make statements of defence where 
no defence is needed. The postmasters seem to re¬ 
alize that they have reports to make only to their su¬ 
perior officers. No political capital can be made out 
of these changes. The President has made no re¬ 
movals except for cause—for delinquency in official 
duties, inefficiency of service, or violation of law. 
He has refused to make any changes for partisan rea¬ 
sons. Changes made for cause have been on the re¬ 
ports of inspectors, showing a demand for the change 
in the interest of the public seivice. 

It is hardly necessary to say that if the first 
assistant postmaster-general had desired to 
convey to these appointees an intimation that 
they were not to answer these inquiries, or, if 
they did answer, what the tenor of the answer 
should be, he could not well have used words 
more aptly chosen for the purpose. 

RESIGNATIONS. 

We received answers in 143 cases to our 
inquiries as to resignations. In 95 of these 
it appeared that such resignations were volun¬ 
tary, and in 48 cases that they were not vol¬ 
untary, but were requested by the congress¬ 
man of the district or by other influential 
parties, who were believed to have the dis¬ 
posal of the office in their hands. In some 
cases inducements were offered in the shape of 
a postponement of the time for the change or 
an offer by the proposed successor to pay a 
good price for the fixtures of the office when 
the appointment should be made; and some¬ 
times the resignation was procured by threats 
of immediate removal. Among the instances 
of such resignations, we would call attention 
to the following letters from J. P. Dolliver, 
M. C., to Patrick Cane, postmaster at Fort 
Dodge, la., written ten days after the inau¬ 
guration of President Harrison: 





















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


105 


House of Representatives, United States, 
Washington, D. C., March M, 188'.). 

Mr. P. Cain, Fort Dodge, la.: 

Dear Sir— Will you have the kindness to forward 
to me, to be filed in the department, your resigna¬ 
tion as postmaster at Fort Dodge, to take effect on 
the appointment of your successor ? 

Very truly, J. P. Doluver. 

P. S.—If this is done, your successor will not be 
named till July 1. J. P. D. 

House OF Representatives United States, 
Washington, D. C., April 4,1889. 
Mr. P. Cain, Fort Dodge, loua: 

Dear Sir— Your letter enclosing your resignation 
as postmaster at Fort Dodge, to take effect July 1, is 
received. I thank you for the promptness and will¬ 
ingness with which you have decided to lay down 
the cares of an office on the change of administra¬ 
tion. 

Hoping you may be as successful in your future 
political moves as you have been in the pa.st, 

I am yours very truly, J. P. Dolliver. 

The following letter from M. S. Brewer, 
M. C., to Charles Cowan, postmaster at Ovid, 
Mich., speaks for itself; 

House of Represent.atives of the United States, 
Pontiac, .\pril 18, 1889. 
Charles Cowan, Esq., Ovid, Michigan: 

My Dear Sir— Your letter of the 17th duly re¬ 
ceived, and contents noted. My dear fellow, you 
last fall were a very “offensive partisan;” in fact, 
it was the worst case of that fatal malady that I had 
knowledge of in this district. I feel it my duty to 
have a change made in postmaster at your place as 
soon as convenient. There will be many cases in 
presidential offices where I shall feel perfectly willing 
to let the applicants hold their time out; but in your 
case you seemed to stake your political or rather 
your official life on the result of the election, and the 
tide of fortune moved against you. I have no per¬ 
sonal or revengeful feeling in the matter, but deem 
it my duty to do what I can to make the change 
suggested. I am in no great hurry about the matter, 
and do not wish to oppress you in any way. Permit 
me to suggest that, if you will place your resignation 
in my hands to takeeffectat the close of the present 
quarter, the 30th of June, I will arrange it that you 
can hold on till then. I simply make this suggestion 
for your consideration. I shall start for Washington 
to-morrow night, and would be glad to know about 
the matter before leaving. 

I am truly yours, M. S. Brewer. 

P. S.—This will be kept confidential, should you 
wish it. 


(The italics in all the letters in this report 
are ours.) The postmaster resigned. 

The following is the correspondence between 
George W. Andrews, former postmaster at 
Murphysboro, Ill., and George W. Smith, 
M.C.; 

1922 H Street, N. W., 
Washington, D. C., May 20,1889. 
Hon. George W. Andrews, Murphysboro, 111.: 

Friend Andrews —So far, I believe, your conduct 
and mine has been in keeping wiHi the friendly re¬ 
lations existing between us. Circumstances now are 
such that I am compelled to act a little earlier than 
anticipated in reference to the post-office at Mur- 
physboro. Your conduct toward me has been man 
ly, gentlemanly, and honorable. The favor will not 
be forgotten. By your voluntary resignation* placed 
confidentially in my hands, you placed me in a po¬ 
sition to favor a political opponent and a personal 
friend. I have carefully guarded your future as I 
would wish you to guard mine. Matters have arisen, 
personal to myself, which absolutely demand imme 
diate action on my part. Those matters I can not 
make public. I desire to have the appointment of a 
postmaster at Murphysboro at once. In the nature 
of things, you know it will be several days after an 
appointment is made before the office could possibly 
change hands. On receipt of this wire me at my ex 


pense O. K., and I will at once settle the matter. Do 
not ask the reasons for such a request, as you can as 
a politician readily account for it in various ways. 
Your record will be clear. Treat this communica¬ 
tion in the same manner you would wish such a one 
from yourself to me treated. Wire immediately on 
receipt of this. On receipt of such dispatch I will 
understand that your resignation already sent me, 
which by its terms was to take effect July 30, is, by 
your con.seui, to lake effect immediately. 

It is raining very hard here. In fact, it rains about 
one-half the time. With kindest rfgards, believe 
me, very truly. Your friend, 

George W. Smith. 

Copy of telegram. 

May 23, 1889. 

To G. W. S.MITH, 

1922 H Street, N. W., 

Washington, D. C. 

You have my permission to 0. K. it, if desired. 

C. W. Andrews. 

J. P. Gaspar, postmaster at Kingsley, Iowa, 
resigned on January 30,1890. The circum¬ 
stances leading to his resignation are clearly 
shown iu the correspondence between him and 
I. S. Strnble, M. C., of which he has sent ns 
the following copy; 

Le Mars, Ia., Aug. 26,1889. 
Peter Gaspar, Esq., Kingsley, la.: 

Dear Sir— Within the last eight or ten days such 
movements have been made in relation to the Kings¬ 
ley post office as convinces me that it will be wise 
for you to look the inevitable in the face and pre¬ 
pare for a change. If you see proper to tender your 
resignation quietly, I will forward the same without 
recommendation, thus leaving you to be the appar¬ 
ent mover iu the case, and willingly surrender the 
office yo^(. have so acceptably filled during your term. 

One other potent feature in the case is the fact, ns 
I am advised, that the parlies in whose store the 
office has been and is now kept, are defendants in 
a case brought by one of the highest authorities in 
the state to enjoin them from selling liquors unlaw¬ 
fully. This, as you see, gives me good ground to 
recommend your removal. I prefer, however, that 
you should resign, if you desire to do so, rather than 
to recommend your removal. Let me hear from you 
by return mail, and believe me. 

Yours very truly, 

I. S. Struble. 

Of this Mr. Gaspar writes ns; 

My reply to Struble was, ia substance, that I 
would like to know the cause of my proposed re 
moval (in justice to myself), and would rest the case 
(on my part) with the republican patrons of this 
office. 

Here is Mr. Struble’s second letter ; 

Le Mars, Ia., Aug. 31,1889. 

P. Gaspar, Esq. : 

Dear Sir— Replying to your favor of the 28lh inst 
will say that as yet I am not prepared to advise you 
upon what ground your removal may be recom¬ 
mended. It has not been decided to recommend 
but action in that direction is quite probable at au 
early date. 

Am strongly of the opinion that it would be better 
all round, and just -as well for you upou any sub¬ 
stantial point, if you tender your resignation rather 
than have charges preferred against you, as I am in¬ 
formed there will be soon. Yours truly, 

I. S. Struble. 

Copy of letter written to one John Me¬ 
in tosli ; 

Le Mars, Ia., August 30,1889. 
Joh7i McIntosh, Esq., Kingsley, la : 

Dear Sir— I am in receipt of yours of the 28th inst., 
replying to which I will say that it only adds to my 
embarrassment, already sufficient by reason of hav¬ 
ing to choose between republican applicants for post- 
office, to be informed that some of my republican 
friends in and about Kingsley are desirous of having 
the present postmaster retained, and especially if 
such friends will allow themselves to become to any 
considerable extent concerned in the matter. The 


line on which I have acted is this—to make no move 
myself with a view to having democratic post office 
incumbents displaced by republicans until such time 
as the republican patrons of the office should them¬ 
selves lead off in attempts to have a removal and a 
new appointment, or four years from appointment 
had expired. This has been my position in relation 
to the Kingsley office; and I have kept quiet about 
it until a number of republicans became active in 
the matter, and evinced a strong desire that a change 
might occur. 

My opinion, after some experience about these 
post-office matters, is that, when republican patrons 
to any considerable extent begin to act relative to a 
change, the sooner thereafter the ease can be dis¬ 
posed of, on a basis of the expression of the republi¬ 
can patrons, the better for the party and community; 
and so I feel now in relation to the Kingsley case. 
The sooner a new man is appointed there, the sooner 
the community will recover from the agitation and 
possible excitement in relation to the appointment 
of the most important official of the town. I wish 
the republican patrons of the Kingsley post-office, 
however they may appreciate Mr. Gaspar, might 
take a .sensible view of the situation, and come as 
near as possible uniting in the thought of au early 
disposition of the case in the interest of the party 
and the peace of the community in that part of the 
country. It is my understanding that substantial 
charges will be preferred against Mr. Gaspar, and, 
if such shall be sent to me, I will, according to my 
uniform custom in such cases, consider them, and 
make snch indorsement thereon as may at the time 
seem right. If no formal charges are preferred, I shall, 
within a comparatively short time, decide between the ap¬ 
plicants, and recommend the one who, in my opinion, has 
the greatest weight of republican sentiment in his support, 
not being governed by number merely. This is my 
feeling now, supported, as it is, by the strong belief, 
based, as I have indicated, on some experience, that 
the most satisfactory way out of a post-office contro¬ 
versy is as early a decision in the case as can intelli¬ 
gently be reached upon consultation with the repub¬ 
lican patrons. Shall be pleased to hear from you on 
this or any other subject at any time or to meet you 
personally. Yours truly, 1. S. Struble. 

James S. Catherwood, former postmaster at 
Hoopeston, Ill., writes that “ Joseph G. Can¬ 
non (M. C.) was here looking for a cause to 
remove me. I tendered my resignation on 
condition that they would buy the fixtures.” 
Charles W. Warner, the new appointee, writes; 
“Catherwood, knowing he had only six months 
to serve, was anxious to sell his outfit to some 
responsible republican successor. Mr. Can¬ 
non (M, C.) called an election. There were 
six candidates. I received one hundred and 
fifty-eight out of three hundred and ninety- 
one votes. Catherwood thereupon resigned, 
and I was appointed.” 

Another method is shown by a letter from 
Mr. Frank C. Morse, the postmaster appointed 
by the present administration at Colfax,Wash. 
He says; 

The history of the matter is this; Mr. Berry was 
sheriff of the county and a candidate for re-election. 
Being defeated at the polls, he circulated a petition 
asking his appointment as postmaster. Five days 
before his term of office expired, Mr. Berry started to 
Washington with his petition, taking the resignation 
of Mr. La Rue (the former postmaster) with him. 
How he obtained this resignation I do not know; 
but I was afterwards shown a copy of a contract 
made between Mr. Berry and Mr. La Rue, in which 
Mr. Berry agreed to pay Mr. La Rue 81,000 for the of¬ 
fice fixtures incase Mr. Berry should be appointed 
pastmasler, and I have always believed this pro. 
cured the resignation. All this occurred before I 
had taken any steps toward securing the appoint¬ 
ment. In fact, I knew nothing of Mr. La Rue’s in¬ 
tended resignation ; nor did I know that Mr. Berry 


















166 


THE CIVIL 8ERVICK CHROXICLE. 


had started for Washington until he was gone some 
four days, the whole matter being kept as secret as 
possible. As soon as it was learned that Mr. La Rue 
had resigned, Mr. Fullerton and others of my friends 
circulated a potiiion asking for my appointment. 
Mr. Fullerton procured a second resignation from 
Mr. La Rue; and my petition, Mr. La Rue’s resigna¬ 
tion, and a copy of the contract above mentioned, 
were sent to Mr. Allen [John B. Allen, then M. C.], 
and my appointment as postmaster followed in due 
course of time. 

W. N. Hensley, formerly postmaster at Co¬ 
lumbus, Neb., and now county judge of Platt 
county, informs us that he was told on various 
occasions by the leaders of the republican 
party that he would be removed first in May, 
1889,and again in July, and finally by the confi¬ 
dential political advisers of Mr. Dorsey (the 
republican congressman of the district), that 
his removal would be ordered about tlie first 
of September, and that charges would be pre¬ 
ferred against him. He says that, upon re¬ 
quest, he was permitted to see such charges, 
and found same to be that be was appointed 
to the office for political services rendered his 
party, and for no other reason. These charges 
were signed by the man who became his suc¬ 
cessor and a few others. He says, “I was led 
to believe that my removal was only a question 
of a very short time, unless I resigned.” 

The statement made by Carl Kramer, the 
present postmaster, is: “ Mr. Hensley re¬ 
signed because he knew he could get a better 
price for his fixtures then than at the end of his term, 
and mainly because he wanted to enter at 
once the race for county judge.” Mr. Kramer 
does not deny or qualify the statement as to 

the charges made by him for his predecessor’s 
removal. 

Mr. W. T. McGinness, postmaster at Min- 
den. Neb., says: “Why I resigned was be¬ 
cause W. D. Hart (my successor), had every¬ 
thing his own way. It was ‘ take so much, 
and resign at once, or I will not take your out¬ 
fit.’ I was too poor a man not to accept.” A 
letter of inquiry from the committee to Mr. 
Hart failed to elicit an answer. 

From such instances as the above, the con¬ 
clusion is obvious that many of these so-called 
resignations were not such in fact, but that 
the changes thus made were, in spirit and 
essence, removals for political purposes. 

Respectfully submitted, 

Wm. D. Foulke, Chairman. 

Chas J. Bonaparte. 

Richard H. Dana. 

Wayne MacVeagh. 

Sherman S. Roger.s. 


GEO. WM. CURTIS TO THE LEAGUE* 


I salute the city in which we are assembled. 
Founded upon Puritan principles by Puritan cour¬ 
age, foremost in the great controversy of the colonies 
with the crown and of the Union with slavery, from 
the Arbella to the tea-ships, from John Winthrop to 
John Albion Andrew, from Sir Henry Vane to Ralph 
Waldo Emerson, her voice has been the voice of pro¬ 
gressive liberty and her history the story of advanc¬ 
ing civilization. No good American cause but Bos¬ 
ton has been its champion. Here James Otis thun¬ 
dered against the writs of assistance and Samuel Ad¬ 
ams defied the king. Through the.se streets Joseph 
Warren hkstened to Bunker Hill, and from yonder 
common marched the first Union regiment of the 
civil war. Here Adam.s and Quincy pleaded, and 

*The address of the president at the annual meet¬ 
ing of the National Civil Service Reform League, Bos¬ 
ton, October 1,1890. 


Channing taught, and Garrison demanded immedi¬ 
ate emancipation. Here, as the mighty debate that 
shook the Union deepened, Sumner besouglit Web¬ 
ster to heed the cliangiug aspects of the time and add 
to his great title. Defender of the Constitution, the 
greater name. Defender of Humanity. Here, when 
Webster declined the call, his party fell, the party 
which liad been the organized political force of the 
conscience and intelligence of New England. To tlie 
moral firmness and practical wisdom of tlie lineal 
successors of the revolutionary whigs, the conscience 
whigs of Boston and Massachusetts, the beneficent 
national results of the last half of the closing century 
in this country are largely due. 

Boston, therefore, as the American nursery of po¬ 
litical reform and of the fundamental American 
principle that good morals and good politics are in¬ 
separable, has seen all the vicissitudes of early re¬ 
form and of uncompromising reformers. Here tliey 
liave pas.sed through all the maladies incident to in¬ 
fancy in reforms as in manhood. They have taken 
all the degrees of obloquy, ridicule, wrath, scorn, 
persecution and .social ostracism. But reforms and 
reformers have survived. Hostility has changed to 
homage, ridicule has become respect, anger is admi¬ 
ration now, and tlie hatred of an hour is transfigured 
into endless gratitude. 

Indeed some of our fellow-citizens are of opinion 
that reform in this country has done its work so 
thoroughly that nothing remains to do—that we are 
.so great, free, intelligent and prosperous a people 
that it is absolutely Pharisaic and unpatriotic to try 
to point out specks upon the sun, and that for every 
little American infelicity we ought to be consoled by 
the misery of foreigners, the military rigors of Ger¬ 
many, or the Siberian terrors of Russia. There 
is an amusing readiness to suspect in all criticism 
of ourselves a lurking preference of other lands, 
which is much like supposing that a demand for 
clean streets in Boston implies a secret belief that 
the streets of New York are cleaner. 

Undoubtedly we are a very great, a very free, a very 
intelligent and avery prosperous nation. Our friends, 
the other great nations over the sea, declare that we 
are always boisterously .saying so; that we are per¬ 
petually and offensively crowing our Yankee-doodle- 
doo, and are unnecessarily fond of playing Jack 
Horner, putting in our thumb and pulling out our 
plumb and vociferating that we are a very great and 
good boy. Undoubtedly our critics state the case 
fairly. We are constantly proclaiming that unde¬ 
niable truth, and the best book that was ever written 
about us, Mr. Bryce’s American Commonwealth, 
says distinctly in the very ear of our elder brother 
Bull, “He is a very remar’-able boy.’’ Our older 
European friends who complain that we are vain¬ 
glorious forget that they, too, celebrate their own su¬ 
periority. The Frenchman who does not proclaim 
the glory of France, the Briton who does not loudly 
sing that Brittania rules the waves and much of the 
shore, is not a typical Frenchman or Englishman.. 
Thackeray says in one of his early papers, medi¬ 
tating in Paris upon an impressive historical picture 
commemorating an act of French heroism, which 
never occurred, “ Thus the great truth is handed 
down from father to son, that a Briton, a French¬ 
man, an Ashantee, a Hohenzollernsigmariugenite is 
superior to all the rest of the world, and by this truth 
the dullards of the respective nations swear, and by 
it statesmen govern.” 

GOOD AMERICANS AND BAD. 

Undoubtedly we are a great, intelligent, and pros¬ 
perous nation, but it does not follow that there are 
not immense abuses in our political methods, dan¬ 
gerous tendencies in our public life, and charlatans, 
demagogues and rogues among our public men. 
Those who acknowledge it, who propose to reform 
dangerous tendencies, and who pitilessly expose 
rogues of every degree, are not bad Americans, but 
good Americans; they are not pessimists, but patriots. 
Because we are the youngest born and best beloved, 
the very Benjamin of Liberty; because we have 
done much shall we scornfully deny that there is 
anything more to do? Mr. Choate tells a story of a 
good old federalist—perhaps he mentions another 
party name—who was reproached for refusing to 
support, let us say, the Alien and Sedition bill 


“ What! ” remonstrated his friends, “have you de¬ 
serted, have you apostatized, have you lost your 
pride and abandoned your principles, are you no 
longer a federalist?” “Abandoned my principles,” 
heanswereil, “ I am a better federalist than ever, but 
I don’t see why, because I am a true-blue federalist, 

I should be a darned fool all the time.” We are 
justly proud that we are .Vmericans, but one chief 
source of our pride ought to be the fact that we see 
our faults clearly, speak of them plainly and ur¬ 
gently appeal to each other to reform them, in per¬ 
fect confidence that the sons will not shame the 
fathers by dread of heroic self-correction. 

Justly prond of our country we may be, but no 
sensible American is proud of a disposition in con¬ 
gress to make merchandise of patriotism, or to offer 
under any pretense to buy with money the votes of 
large classes of citizens, or to tolerate without rebuke 
conduct intolerable among genclemen and honor¬ 
able men. No patriotic American is proud of the 
control of a state by lottery gamblers, nor of the ter¬ 
rorized suppression of voters nor of their coercion by 
employers. No self-respecting American is proud of 
elections in doubtful states carried by “ soap ” or by 
buying mules or by marshalling voters in blocks of 
five, nor of national legislation palpably in the in¬ 
terest of owners of commodities and of classes of 
citizens. He is not proud when, seeing in the great 
cities of other countries municipal order, cleanli¬ 
ness and economy, he sees the local government of 
of the greatest city in his own country under the 
control of its ignorance, venality and vice, and not of 
its intelligence, industry and public spirit; nor is 
his American pride consoled by the remark that the 
city has just such a government as it chooses and de¬ 
serves. He is not proud when he sees reputable and 
upright Americans, from some fancied political ne¬ 
cessity, acquiescing in the parly leadership of those 
who have no answer for the most damaging and 
detailed personal accusations of a kind and 
under circumstances unprecedented in our his¬ 
tory. He is not proud when he sees a de¬ 
grading and demoralizing system of appoint¬ 
ments and removals in the public service such as 
might be supposed to prevail in Costa Rica or Hon¬ 
duras, in Turkey or the Asian provinces of Russia, 
extolled as especially American. He is not proud 
when a senator of the United States says in his place 
upon occasion of the impeachment of a high public 
officer, that he has heard the taunt from foreigners 
that the only product of our institutions in which 
we surpass all other nations beyond question is our 
corruption. Nor is he proud when he is told that 
in a republic his only choice of action is symbolized 
by Thaddeus Stevens’s reported question in a con¬ 
tested election case in the house, “ Well, then, 
which is oitr damned rascal?” Every American, I 
repeat, is justly proud of being an American, but he 
is not proud of such things as these. What he is 
justly proud of is the American willingness to ac¬ 
knowledge such abuses when they exist and the 
American determination to correct them. 

I am not saying that other times were better than 
ours. Public abuses and par-y spirit and patriotic 
despondency are as old as political society. Eighty 
years ago William Wirt .said he sought in vain for a 
man fit for the presidency or for great responsibility. 
Chancellor Livingston died in 1813, but not until he 
had said that more talent and learning were de¬ 
manded in congress. I doubt if any member of con¬ 
gress now is of the chancellor’s opinion, and if we 
should venture to regret the national shame and dis¬ 
grace of certain scenes in the capitol, there would be 
a prompt chorus to reply that congress is as good as it 
ever was. Perhaps it is, but I never heard that it was 
any consolation to a drowning man to be told that 
one of his ancestors was hung. If an observer were 
disposed to wish that some things were different in 
congress, he might not feel that he was answered 
satisfactorily by being told that Chancellor Liv¬ 
ingston wished the same thing eighty years ago. I 
am not now extolling the earlier day nor praising 
the superior virtue of our fathers. But it is not a 
noble people which excuses its own faults by expos¬ 
ing its fathers’ shame. Happily time idealizes the 
past as distance softens the sharp outlines of reced- 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 



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ing mountains, and it is always well to measure our¬ 
selves, if not with our actual historic ancestors, then 
with what our filial and patriotic reverence believes 
them to have been. The heroes who traced their de¬ 
scent from gods were spurred by a divine emulation. 
It will do us in New York no harm when we come to 
nominate a governor to remember that John Jay and 
DeWitt Clinton have been governors of New York, 
nor are we Americans less likely to select a fitting 
man for the Presidency, if we recall that Washington 
and the .\damses, Jefferson, Madison and Abraham 
Lincoln have been our Presidents. 

CORRUPTION AT HOME AND ABROAD. 

Again, because I mention things which are dis¬ 
graceful and dangerous in our own country, I am 
not saying that other countries are more illustrative 
of a higher public welfare and private happiness 
than ours. For my.self, I have seen Naples, but I 
prefer New York. I know no place in which I 
would rather live than thoplacc in which I do live. 
But I do not therefore think Tammany Hall the gate 
of heaven. When we acknowledge and decry an 
evil tendency in our time and among ourselves, we 
do not deny its existence elsewhere at other times. 
In this country we are largely men of English stock. 
Our political traditions, usages and spirit are mainly 
English. Now every man in any land who speaks the 
English tongue and is sprung of English blood, is, or 
ought to be, honestly proud of his great lineage of 
constitutional liberty and if be be worthy of it he does 
not deplore his political origin. But enriched by other 
blood and under other friendly conditions we have 
grafted the Englisli stock, as we believe, with a 
fresher life, until on the American continent it 
spread into a wider sweep of hospitable shade and 
towers more loftily toward an equal heaven. Y'et 
there is an American puerility which scoffs at the 
healthy and vigorous American exposure and rebuke 
of American evils and dangers, as due to overween¬ 
ing admiration and envy of what our fathers truly 
and fondly called the mother-country. But I con¬ 
fess that it strikes me differently. 

There are just reasons for American admiration of 
England, but superior political virtue is not one of 
them. Lord Chatham paid a famous tribute to the 
continental congress, and the most upright modern 
statesman of France, Guizot, agreed with him that no 
nation had ever such a group of able and high- 
minded public men to guide its first steps as the 
people of the American republic. The force of that 
impulse has not yet expired. It is the spirit of those 
men, not of their British opponents, which stimu¬ 
lates the American protest against political corrup¬ 
tion. When I hear of buying and selling votes, of 
the recklessness of party spirit, of jobs and bribery, 
of the prostitution and degradation of the public 
service, of political corruption and charlatanry, I do 
not recall the men of the continental congress and 
the constitutional convention, but I remember Wal¬ 
pole and Newcastle, and George the Third’s agents 
turning parliament into a market, and Edmund 
Burke’s denunciations of the rotten boroughs and 
his trumpet-call for reform, and the more recent and 
amusing melodrama of Lord Jingo BeaconsHeld, and 
to my English critic who assures me of his poignant 
grief at seeing in my country what I also behold, I 
can only reply, “So English you know.” And to the 
shallow, swaggering American who decries the pro¬ 
test as a feeble imitation of British fashion, I say, 
read the history of your own country and try to un¬ 
derstand American manhood! 

WHO ARE THE PESSIMISTS? 

But then I must honestly add that grappling vigor¬ 
ously with domestic abuses of every kind and effect¬ 
ively correcting them, is, also, " so English, you 
know,” and in nothing more than In this disposition 
do we Americans illustrate the tradition of our race 
and prove our descent from the champion of consti¬ 
tutional liberty. Whether other times and countries 
were better or worse than ours, our pride in America 
would be a paltry emotion if it did not lift us to 
scorn such things os I have mentioned and highly to 
resolve that in our time and in our country they shall 
cease to be. Like the cruel abuse of prisoners and 
the insane, like the noisome filth of cities and the 
unpitied wretchedness of poverty, if they were to be 


expected in the eighteenth century, they are dis 
graceful in the nineteenth. If they were good 
enough for Europe and the colonies, they are too 
bad for America and the United States. If they were 
good enough for our fathers, they are not good 
enough for their sons. 

No .American, it seems to me, is so unworthy the 
name as he who attempts to extenuate or defend any 
national abuse, who denies or tries to hide it, or who 
derides as pessimists and Pharisees those who indig¬ 
nantly disown it and raise the cry of reform. If a 
man proposes the redress of any public wrong he is 
asked severely whether he considers himself so much 
wiser and better than other men that he must dis¬ 
turb the existing order and pose as a saint? If he 
denounces an evil, he is exhorted to beware of spirit¬ 
ual pride. If he points out a dangerous public tend¬ 
ency or censures the action of a party, he is advised 
to cultivate good humor, to look on the bright side, 
to remember that the world is a very good world, at 
least the best going, and very much better than it 
was a hundred years ago. 

Undoubtedly it is, but would it have been better if 
everybody had then insisted that it was the best of 
all possible worlds, and that we must not despond if 
sometimes a cloud gathered in the sky, or a Benedict 
Arnold appeared in the patriot army, or even a Judas 
Iscariot among the chosen twelve? Christ, I think, 
did not doubt the beloved disciple nor the coming of 
his kingdom, although he knew and said that the be¬ 
trayer sat with him at table. I believe we do not 
read that Washington either thought it wiser that 
Arnold’s treachery should be denied or belittled, or 
that he or any other patriot despaired, although the 
treason was so grave. Julius Caesar, or Marlborough, 
or Frederick, would hardly be called great generals 
if they had rebuked the .soldier who reported that 
their lines were beginning to break. When the sea 
is pouring into the ship through an open seam ev¬ 
erybody is aware of it. But it is then too late. It is 
the watch who reports the first starting of the seam 
who saves the ship. 

It is an ill sign when honorable public men find in 
exposure and denunciation of public abuses evi¬ 
dence of the Pharisaic disposition and a tendency in 
the critic to think himself holier than other men. 
Was Martin Luther, cheerfully defending his faith 
against the princes of Christendom, a Pharisee? Were 
the English Puritans, iconoclasts in church and state 
but saviors of liberty, pessimists? Were Patrick 
Henry demanding liberty or death, and Wendell 
Phillips in thenightof slavery murmuring the music 
of the morning, birds of ill omen? Was Abraham 
Lincoln saying of the American Union, a house di¬ 
vided against itself can not stand, assuming to bo 
holier than other Americans? To win a cheap cheer 
1 have known even intelligent men to sneer at the 
scholar in politics. But in a republic founded upon 
the common school such a sneer seems to me to show 
a momentary loss of common sense. It implies that 
the political opinions of educated men are unimpor¬ 
tant and that ignorance is a safer counsellor of the 
republic. If the gentleman who in this very hall last 
stooped to that sneer had asked himself what would 
have been the fortune of this state and this country 
without its educated leadership from Samuel Adams 
to Charles Sumner, both sons of Massachusetts, both 
scholars in politics from Harvard College, he might 
have spared his country, his party, and himself, the 
essential recreancy to America and to manhood 
which lies in a sneer at education. To the cant 
about the Pharasaism of reform there is one short 
and final answer. The man who tells the truth is a 
holier man than the liar. The man who does not 
steal is a better man than the thief. The senator 
from Massachusets declaring that politics are moral 
principles applied to public affairs, is a truer patriot 
and a nobler American than the senator from Kan¬ 
sas declaring that the decalogue and the golden rule 
have no place in a political campaign. 

CORRUPTION IN BOTH THE PARTIES. 

Our plea for civil service reform rests upon the act¬ 
ual situation. Other public questions than that of 
political corruption engage the public mind, but none 
takes precedence of it in importance. We say of it 
what Dunning said of the power of the Crown, it has 


1<)7 


increased, is increasing, and ought to be diminished. 
Under our government reform can be accomplished 
only by party administration. Yet the chief obstruc¬ 
tion is ihe fact that the evil is common to both par¬ 
ties. No intelligent man would seriously allege, 
whatever partisan orators and newspapers may as. 
sume, that buying votes or prostituting the whole 
power of the public patronage in every form of ap¬ 
pointment and removal, of salaries, of contracts, of 
judicial references, of lucrative opportunities, are 
practices confined to one party, or that what is 
known as the machine of one party is better than 
that of the other. The old democratic Plaquemine 
frauds in Louisiana were like the old whig pipe-lay¬ 
ing frauds in New A'ork. The modern republican 
“soap ” and “ fat-frying,” and the money raised fOr 
secret campaign funds of which no account is ever 
rendered, belong to the same system of corruption 
as the modern democratic mule buyings and money 
barrels, and 'rammany sales of judicial nominations. 
These things are not distinctively republican or dem¬ 
ocratic. They are the common crimes of parties, the 
common disgrace of the national name, the common 
danger of American institutions, the common re¬ 
proach of American citizenship, and it is the com. 
moil duty of that citizenship to arrest and correct 
them. Reform of the civil service is one of the plain¬ 
est, most direct, and most effective methods of cor¬ 
rection because it reaches the great fundamental 
corruption fund, the enormous wages of public em¬ 
ployes and the vast opportunities of public contracts, 
because it disbands the organized office-holders, the 
political janizaries of the republic, all constituting a 
system of coercion and bribery universally practiced, 
with the authority of long tradition an<l of national 
acquiescence. 

The government itself in this way sanctions cor¬ 
ruption. It leads the w'ay in public demoralization 
and on the greatest scale tempts to the commission of 
crimes which its own laws punish. By treating the 
emoluments of public employment as rew’ards for the 
discharge of the common duties of citizens, the 
party of administration, whatever it may be, cor¬ 
rupts the motives of political action, promotes cheat¬ 
ing and violence at the polls, and resorts to an in. 
sidious form of the bribery which the laws condemn. 
If a man may properly sell his vote for five hundred 
dollars in the guise of a public oflice, or fifty thou¬ 
sand dollars in the form of a job, he may as properly 
sell it for five dollars in cash. When a party prac¬ 
tically promises a general sack of the public salary 
fund in the event of its success, it appeals to the most 
venal motives, and invites votes not by faith in its 
purpo.se to advance the public welfare, but by hope 
of individual pecuniary gain. Partisan prostitution 
of the public service is radical treachery to popular 
government, because it makes private interest and 
not public welfare the motive of political action. If, 
as shrewd observers hold, the most obvious change 
in American character within the century is the de¬ 
cline of public spirit, one of its most fruitful causes 
is the spoils system, and to the same source—the ex¬ 
pectation of reward for the discharge of the public 
duty which rests upon every citizen—may be traced 
the distorted and demoralized public sentiment 
which largely prevails in regard to military pensions 
and reckless public expenditure. To argue that the 
common duty of American citizenship in peace or 
war will not be discharged without bribery of place 
or money is to acknowledge that honest and efficient 
government is not in itself the highest and only le¬ 
gitimate reward, and to admit that corruption has 
already done its fatal work. There can be no more 
hopeless pessimism than this, and no greater treach¬ 
ery to the fundamental American principle. When 
government itself puts a price upon public spirit it 
degrades and demoralizes the national character and 
every relation of life, inviting the people to measure 
all action by the standard of money. But when the 
government which does this is itself the people, it is 
plain that they can confront no greater peril nor con¬ 
sider any question more momentous. 

THE PERFORMANCE OF THE ADMINISTRATION. 

In the interest of reform it is the annual duty of 
the Iieague to test the performance of the adminis¬ 
tration by the principles of reform, and I can best 












168 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


discharge this duty this year by considering a «ines- 
lioii which is fretiuently and strongly urged upon iny 
attention. Itist4us: Is the conviction of the neces 
sity of reform so general, is public opinion upon the 
subject so ripe, that the friends of reform may wisely 
abandon a separate movemeut and merge their ac¬ 
tion in that of .some existing party? In other words, 
is there already a political party whicli is actually a 
party of reform ? If there be such a party, I invoke 
the inquisitive shade of Flanagan and ask what are 
we here for? As reformers the League is composed 
of protectionists, advocates of a revenue tariff, pro¬ 
hibitionists and independents, republicans, demo¬ 
crats and mugwumps. In answering the question, 
therefore, I shall bear this fact in mind, however 
plainly I may speak. 

The republican party has unquestionably declared 
itself in the strongest manner to be a party of civil 
service eform. At the same time and with equal 
force it announced that it was a party of protection, 
and it also demanded effective legislation to secure 
the integrity and purity of elections. These were the 
three cardinal declarations of the platform, and one 
of them was especially addressed to civil service re¬ 
formers. Has the course of events during the year 
and since our last meeting justified the assertion of 
eminent republicans that all honest and practical 
reformers ought to adhere to a party which has 
proved its fidelity to reform? If it has done .so there 
can be but one answer. But has it done so ? 

In accordance with its declaration of protection the 
republican congress rapidly matured a tariff at 
which, as many republicans think, even Henry Clay 
would have blushed, and in its eagerness to fulfill 
its pledge, hardly stopping for debate, it passed the 
tariff bill in the house, and the delay in the senate 
led to protests and complications which seemed to 
threaten a serious breach in the party. The party 
platform alsodemadded a free vote and a fair count, 
and to secure them the party leaders prepared a bill 
which with the same ardor was swept through the 
house, and again irritated party journals chafed at 
the slow senate, and, like the galleries of tiie French 
convention of ’9.'?, imperatively demanded the pass¬ 
age of the bill. With all this zeal and eager haste not 
to break its pledged faith with the country and to 
carry out the promised policy of protection and of 
free elections, we might naturally expect the party 
to have shown e<iual zeal in fulfilling its other great 
promise of civil service reform. A revised tariff, an 
election bill and civil service reform were the three 
great party promises. They were the three distinct 
pledges, as I think every honest republican will 
agree, upon which the party appealed to the coun¬ 
try. If, with Mr. Lincoln, it had said one war at a 
time and this time the war is for protection, there 
could have been no question or misunderstanding. 
But it did not say so. While, however, it was con¬ 
tent with merely making the promises of a protective 
tariff and an election law, it did not pledge itself to 
keep them. But the promise of civil service reform 
it expressly proclaimed that it would not fail to 
keep. 

THE BREADTH OF THE PROMISES. 

What was this promise? Was it only to enforce a 
law already on the statute book which is confessedly 
but a tentative beginning of reform? It was very 
much more. The platform affirmed that reform 
ought to be completed by extension to all grades of 
the service to which it is applicable, that the spirit 
and purpo.se of reform should be observed to all 
executive appointments, and that all laws at vari¬ 
ance with existing reform legislation should be re¬ 
pealed. This was the promise. The candidate ac¬ 
cepted it and reiterated the pledge. Upon this com¬ 
prehensive and unequivocal declaration and upon 
that for protection and for an election law the party 
went to the country. The country at the election 
adopted the platform as the policy of the adminis¬ 
tration. It authorized a revision of the tariff, the 
enactment of an election law, the extension of the 
reformed system to every grade of the public service 
to which it is applicable, appointments and remov¬ 
als according to the spirit and purpose of reform, 
and repeal all laws at variance with reform legisla. 
tion. It is now a year and seven months since the 


party with this authorization came into complete 
control of every branch of the government, and we 
have the highest assurance that every promise has 
been fulfilled and every pledge redeemed. 

On the 26th of August, Mr. McKinley, the distin¬ 
guished leader of the House of Representatives, said 
in Ohio, “ I do not recall any legislative body which 
has so thoroughly kept the pledges of the party elect¬ 
ing it as the present majority in the House of Rep¬ 
resentatives.” In commenting the next day with 
admiration upon the speech, the New York Tribune 
said, “The House,at least, has thoroughly kept the 
pledges of the republican party.” On the 4th of 
September, at Portland, in Maine, the speaker of the j 
house declared amid the enthusiastic acclamation of i 
his audience. “ We have achieved all that the party 
promised and more. Most platforms are but glitter¬ 
ing generalities good enough for the campaign, but 
our last platform has been treated by the house of 
representatives like a deed of trust.” The speaker 
and the leader did not mean that the house alone ; 
has been faithful, because that would imply the rec- i 
reancy of the executive and the senate and im- \ 
peach the good faith of the party before the country. | 
The evident intention is to claim proudly that the i 
party has thoroughly redeemed, or is in course of re- 1 
deeming, its pledges; that a revi.sed tariff bill has! 
been practically passed ; that a national election law 
is in progress; that congress is extending the re¬ 
formed system wherever it is applicable; that ap¬ 
pointments and removals have been made according 
to the principles of reform, and that all laws at vari¬ 
ance with them arc in course of repeal. Lest us test 
the accuracy of this unqualified assertion by the j 
facts in regard to the pledge of reform in the civil 
service. 

WHAT ARE THE FACTS? j 

To how many grades of the service to which it is } 
applicable has the reform system been extended? 
Not one. How far has the spirit and purpose of re¬ 
form been observed in all executive appointments ? 
There are about 3,600 postmasters appointed by the 
President. All of them but four hundred have been 
changed. There are more than 60,000 fourth class | 
postmasters appointed by the postmaster general, j 
Almost half of the whole number and much the j 
larger part of those in desirable offices have been 
changed within the nineteen months of the admin¬ 
istration, the largest record of changes, I believe, 
ever made within the same time. It was promised 
that the spirit and purpose of reform should be ob¬ 
served. That spirit and purpose demand the reten¬ 
tion of public officers of the highest efficiency in 
places which are not political. How many such offi¬ 
cers like Mr. Pearson, late postmaster of New York, 
and Mr. Saltonstall, late collector of Boston, have 
been retained? In place of such officers, how many 
successors have been appointed primarily for fitness 
and not for politics? Every community can answer. i 
The platform declared that all laws at variance with 
the object of reform legislation should be repealed. 
The power to repeal was given by the election. Chief 
among these laws and chiefly intended by those 
who drew the declaration were the laws which pre- ; 
scribe official terms of four years, one of the earliest 
and greatest victories of the spoils system. This dec¬ 
laration in favor of the repeat was drawn six years 
ago. It has been solemnly published in the same 
words by two successive conventions. During the 
six years how many of these laws have been re¬ 
pealed? How many party conventions or party 
journals have demanded their repeal? How many 
republican members of congress have proposed to 
repeal them or any other laws which facilitate cor¬ 
ruption by patronage? So far as I am aware, not 
one. 

The party administration declared that all these 
things were to be done, to the end that the dangers 
to free institutions which lurk in the power of offi¬ 
cial patronage may be wisely and effectually 
avoided. Is it to avoid those dangers that the post- 
office department has been administered in a more 
partisan spirit than ever before; that the postmaster- 
general has declared that he should not think of 
appointing a democrat if he could find a fit republi¬ 
can ; that the assistant postmaster-general laughed 


to scorn one of the chief party pledges under which 
he became a public officer, and was enthusiastically 
congratulated upon his contempt of the pledge by 
an organized association of members of the party, 
and that the whole postal service of the country has 
been reconstructed for party purposes? Senator His- 
cock, of New York, to spur the senate to action 
upon the tariff, said that not to pass the tariff bill 
would be not only a violation of the most solemn 
party pledges, but it would be perfidy to a direct 
trust imposed upon congress by the voters in 1888. 
How was this trust impo.sed but by the result of the 
election? And how does the election impose the 
fulfillment of one promise and not another? How 
is the declaration in favor of civil .service reform a 
less solemn pledge of the party, ora less direct trust 
imposed by the election upon congress, and how is 
it less perfidy for the President, the house and the 
postmaster-general and his assistant, deliberately to 
violate one solemn pled^ of the platform than for 
the senate to disregard another? 

THE REPUBLICAN PARTY NOT THE PARTY OF REFORM. 

Why should not reasonable and intelligent men 
tell the truth frankly ? The year has demonstrated 
incontestably that while the republican party, abso¬ 
lutely dominant in the administration, is a 
party of protection, it is not a party of civil 
service reform. Its careful and elaborate tariff 
declarations were sincere. They were intended to 
be the substance of the platform, because the repub - 
lican leaders thought that Mr. Cleveland had thrown 
away the chance of the democratic party by his mes 
sage of 1887, and they were sure that upon the issue 
of protection they could carry the country. But the 
republican platform declaration of 1884 upon civil 
service reform was reiterated in the same words in 
1888, not as a cardinal article of party faith 
like the non-extension of slavery in 1860, or the 
unconditional prosecution of the war in 1864, 
or the measares of reconstruction in 1868 and 
1872, but both as a t:ibe and a lure for inde¬ 
pendent voters. No sincere republican, I think^ 
would say that the party and the platform in 1888 
meant civil service reform in the same .sense that 
they meant protection, or that they had meant the 
restriction of slavery in 1860. The political devasta¬ 
tion of the post-office and other offices, which has 
been accomplished within nineteen months would 
have been as impossible under a reform administra¬ 
tion as the reduction of the tariff to a revenue basis 
under a protection administration. It is undeniable 
that in pa.ssing a tariff bill the republican party has 
kept its promise. It is equally undeniable that in 
the general partisan pillage of the civil .service, the 
republican party has broken its promise. 

CREDIT FOR WHAT HAS BEEN DONE. 

This is not to say that nothing has been done, nor 
that the reform law has been either grossly violated 
or generally disregarded. It is only saying that the 
party can not honestly claim the confidence of civil 
service reformers. The law indeed, might have been 
repealed, as republican representatives in congress 
and republican journals have desired. But it is stili 
a law. The commission might have been paralyzed, 
but it remains efficient and alert. Mr. Commis¬ 
sioner Roosevelt, whose fidelity and zeal can not be 
questioned, assures us that ninety-two per cent, of 
employes who were appointed in the classified serv¬ 
ice under the late democratic administration still 
hold their places, and that the law has been fairly 
enforced. Congress, also, after some republican op¬ 
position, has granted the commission five additional 
clerks, with salaries amounting to 86,600. The 
prompt protest of the League and of the friends of 
reform prevented the nullification of the rules by 
congress in the appointment of additional medical 
pension examiners, and some postmasters, upon ur¬ 
gent local requests, have been retained. McKinley, 
also, in the house, when arguing for the appropria¬ 
tion for the five clerks, declared that if his party is 
pledged to one thing more than another, it is to the 
civil service reform law, which, he added, “ Is sus¬ 
tained by the best sentiment of the country, repub¬ 
licans and democrats alike.” He was seconded by 
Mr. Henry Cabot Lodge, who stated with force and lu¬ 
cidity the principles of reform. The New York Tri- 


















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


169 




K 

% 


bune, also the Philadelphia Press, Telegraph, Ledger 
a,nd American, the Chicago 7nier-Ocea/i, the Boston 
Journal and Worcester Spy, and other leading repub¬ 
lican organs, vigorously advocated reform. 

These are all very agreeable and very significant 
facts, for they show the steady rise of public opinion. 
But what I have stated is the total fulfillment dur¬ 
ing the year of the great promise of reform. There 
has been no increase of appropriation except for the 
five clerks, and congress has not yet acted upon any 
other of the recommendations made in the last re¬ 
port of the commission. There has been no pretence 
that the service has not been treated as spoils; there 
has been no repeal of the four years’ laws or attempt 
to repeal them; there has been no enlargement of 
the classified service by executive or legislative ac¬ 
tion since the 30th of June, 1889. The number of 
persons embraced in the elassified service is larger, 
perhaps, by three thousand than it was a year ago, 
but this is due wholly to the growth of the service 
previously classified, which now includes probably 
about 32,000 places. If this were the manner in 
which the republican promise of tariff revision and 
of an election law had been fulfilled, would the 
speaker of the house and the leader of its majority 
have celebrated with so joyful a hallelujah the 
thorough fulfillment of every party pledge and the 
sacred observance of the party promises ? If private 
trustees had so executed a deed of trust would they 
have been proudly eager to call public attention to 
their performance ? 

The leader of the house and the republican jour¬ 
nals which advocate reform in the abstract would 
hardly admit that the reform declarations of Mr. 
Cleveland and his secretary of the treasnry, Mr 
Fairchild, the appointment of Mr. Pearson, the fair 
enforcement of the reform law, and many other ex¬ 
cellent acts of the late administration, with the 
strong support of many friendly papers, proved the 
democratic party to be a party of reform. They 
would be wholly justified. No intelligent man 
would venture such an assertion and certainly such 
facts do not prove it. But they prove it quite as 
much as some excellent appointments of President 
Harrison, and the fair enforcement of the reform 
law, and the frank declarations of Mr. McKinley, 
and Mr. Lodge, and the admirable articles of cer¬ 
tain newspapers, prove the republican to be a party 
of reform. Of what avail, as such proof, are the words 
of Mr. McKinley against the contemptuous words 
and despoiling deeds of Mr. Clarkson ? But is Mr. 
Clarkson denounced and repudiated by the repub¬ 
lican press, by republican conventions, by republican 
orators? Mr. Butter worth in the house doubts for 
one brilliant moment the wisdom of certain details 
of the tariff bill; Mr. Plumb, in the senate prefers a 
lower tax on crockery; Mr. Halstead in the press 
doubts the timeliness and expediency of the election 
bill; Mr. Blaine himself is unable to see in the tariff 
bill visions of greedy foreign markets opening to 
the American farmer—and instantly the party heav¬ 
ens darken, in newspaper ofiices thunder of warn- 
inggrowls and the lightning of denunciation flashes, 
the lurid air resounds with the explosion of dreadful 
epithets, “ renegade,” “ apostate,” “traitor,” “as¬ 
sistant democrat.” The whole party is in an up¬ 
roar : the hesitating heretics are warned to remem¬ 
ber the solemn promises of the platform, the awful 


mandate of the country, and to pause shuddering 
but repentant upon the brink—which, when the 
vote is taken, they wisely do. 

' IS CLARKSON THE REPRESENTATIVE OF HIS PARTY? 

But if one platform pledge be so vital and its least 
neglect or infringement so fatal, why not another? 
' If Mr. Plumb be condemned as a deputy democrat, 
' and Mr. Halstead branded as an apostate, and even 
Mr. Blaine rock in the doldrums of party doubt, not 
because of rejection or scorn of any party pledge, but 
merely because of difference of view as to the degree 
or method of applying an accepted party principle, 
why should Mr. Clarkson be feasted and cheered by 
fellow republicans after contemptuously rejecting a 
professed party principle, ruthlessly violating a party 
pledge, and at every cross-roads in the Union gaily 
posting his party as a liar ? The reason is not that 
Mr. McKinley and Mr. Lodge and the party papers 


which I mentioned are playing false, but simply that 
they are playing. Republican organs called the re¬ 
publican tariff dissenters and republicans who would 
defer the passage of the election bill Benedict Ar¬ 
nolds, because the party is aggressively a party of 
high protection and of a national election law. But 
they do not call Mr. Clarkson Judas Iscariot because 
the party leaders generally, and their captains of 
hundreds and lieutenants of fifties, scorn civil serv¬ 
ice reform, and heartily approve and applaud Mr. 
Clarkson’s course. 

I said, three years ago, that, however worthy of re¬ 
spect and confidence for many reasons the demo¬ 
cratic administration might be, this League did not 
regard it “ as in any strict sense of the words a civil 
service reform administration.” So I say now of its 
successor. It would be a great misfortune for the 
cause of reform if it were supposed that the League 
held certain excellent executive appointments, and 
the unqualified declarations of the leader of the 
house, and the strong expressions of some leading 
republican journals, and the retention of ninety-two 
per cent, of the employes in the classified service, 
which was equally true of the last administration, 
gratifying and encouraging as such signs undoubted¬ 
ly are, to be a fulfillment of the republican pledge to 
observe the spirit and purpose of reform in all exec¬ 
utive appointments, and to correct the dangerous 
evils of patronage. If it be said that the spirit and 
purpose of reform is a phrase of doubtful meaning, 
it is certainly a phrase no more doubtful than the 
American spirit and the spirit of liberty. However 
doubtful it may be, it is certain that it does not 
mean a practical clean sweep of the service, except 
that part included within the law. I ask any candid 
republican how many republican conventions this 
year, except in Massachusetts, have even remem¬ 
bered to mention reform, or how soon reform is 
likely to be achieved by the party at its present rate 
of progress? I ask him whether that party would 
ever have stayed the territorial devastation of slavery, 
have aroused the glorious enthusiasm of the Ameri¬ 
can people, or have consumed our national sin in 
the fervid glow of patriotism, if it had been no more 
the party of liberty than it is of civil service reform ? 
At the close of the war for the Union, when the con¬ 
stitutional amendment abolishing slavery was adopt¬ 
ed, Mr. Garrison, president of the American anti¬ 
slavery society, declared that its object was accom¬ 
plished, and proposed that the society be dissolved. 
When the republican party is in the act of making 
its pledge of civil service reform, like its pledges of 
protection and of an election law, an actual per 
formance, if I am then still president of the League, 
I shall gladly entertain a motion for its dissolution. 

HOPE FOR THE FUTURE. 

But if I admit that the country is divided practi¬ 
cally into two parties and that reform is not the 
present serious purpose of either of them, do I 
not concede a general and hopeless public indiffer¬ 
ence upon the subject ? I answer that I concede only 
what is true of every reform at the beginning. “ The 
first thing,” said Alexander Hamilton, “ in all great 
operations of such a government as ours is to secure 
the opinion of the people.” Reformers make opin¬ 
ion, and opinion makes parties. First the abolition¬ 
ists, then the republicans. Seven years ago the re 
form law was passed in a spasm of congressional 
terror from the reverse of the election. It did not 
represent mature public conviction, but it did show 
congressional consciousness of the drift of public 
opinion. This year the whole weight and character 
of the house refused to repeal the law, while its 
leader affirmed that the best sentiment of the coun¬ 
try demanded reform. The house and the leader, 
indeed, were content with the affirmation and did 
not try to satisfy the demand. But so far opinion 
has ripened. The reformer who would despond be¬ 
cause no party has yet adopted reform, would de¬ 
spair of day because the sun does not rise at dawn. 

The opinions of thoughtful men, the convictions 
of the fireside and of the private citizens, affect very 
slowly party action. The American feels that he can 
act effectively only with a party, and it is one of the 
chief evils of the spoils system that reckless abuse of 
patronage, the most lavish and acknowledged cor¬ 


ruption, have made party despotism so absolute that 
the conscience and intelligence of the conn try are 
largely enslaved by unprincipled ignorance and in¬ 
solent cunning. Even public men are shy of their 
own consciences lest they should obstruct their own 
advancement. Like Lord Melbourne they are afraid 
that “ this damned morality will ruin everything.” 
Honest and patriotic citizens wince at the methods 
by which often candidates are nominated and hang 
their heads as they reluctantly vote for them, follow¬ 
ing ignoble leaders and strengthening public wrongs. 
Young men with the generous political ambition of 
their race burning to reach that lofty prize, the noble 
leadership of men, find to their dismay that the hard 
condition is bowing down to the hat of Gesler and 
losing their self-respect. 

Civil service reform has the future because it 
means crushing this machine, overthrowing this tyr¬ 
anny, recovering political independence, and eman¬ 
cipating American citizenship. It means parties 
that stand for conviction, for self-respect in the pub¬ 
lic service, for political morality and honest govern¬ 
ment. It is not yet established for the same reason 
that slavery was not destroyed at once when its enor¬ 
mity was perceived and acknowledged. Like politi¬ 
cal corruption, slavery was entrenched in tradition, 
interest, ignorance, prejudice, possession, and only 
gradually did conviction ripen into purpose and pri¬ 
vate wish tower into indomitable public will. It was 
a dark shadow in which long and shamefully the 
country walked, its conscience wounded, its name 
disgraced. But the Union emerged in the clear light 
of liberty, and there is no American who would turn 
backward to the evil day. The same conscience, the 
same intelligence that at last overthrew slavery, now 
proposes with the same undismayed persistence to 
stay political corruption, and every sign shows that, 
like our brothers of the last generation, we, too, are 
walking toward the light. 


THE RELATION OF CIVIL SERVICE 
REFORM TO OTHER REFORMS.* 


For the past ten years our government has been 
and it still is engaged in a costly but indispensable 
work, that of restoring the national defences by sea 
and land, grown dangerously obsolete, through the 
progress of military and maritime industries since 
the close of our civil war. The experience of this 
great undertaking has slmwn that a sufficient and 
appropriate plant must be first provided to afford a 
reasonable prospect of success in any form of me¬ 
chanical construction on a large scale. To build 
good steamships and cast good guns we must have 
suitable shipyards and foundries: attempts to obtain 
the product without furnishing proper tools in the 
first instance have invariably resulted in disappoint¬ 
ment: an inadequate plant means an imperfect out¬ 
put, short-lived at best, and of limited and uncertain 
efficiency while it lasts. That we should seek to 
make something first and to get the means of mak¬ 
ing it afterwards is a priori illogical: the same meth¬ 
od has been proved by trial at once wasteful and in¬ 
effective. 

It is the function of civil service reform to provide 
for all other reforms, whether legislative or adminis¬ 
trative, in our polity, the necessary plant for their 
work. They can become realities only through the 
instrumentality of public men fit to mould them in 
a shape for lasting and practical utility, and our pol¬ 
itics for a generation’s space before the growth of 
civil service reform had supplied no public men of 
this type, and can now supply only here and there 
one of them, a fruitful and promising but as yet in¬ 
finitesimal leaven for the lump in which it is hidden. 
To suppose that the politicians who make up the 
great bulk of either house of congress will or can deal 
worthily with the problems presented by our tariff, 
our eurrency, our pension system—to ask that they 
and their humbler fellows in state legi.slatures and 
city councils should furnish remedies or even palli¬ 
atives for public evils arising from the liquor traffic 
or from labor disputes is, to my mind, as irrational 

A paper read at the annual meeting of the Nation¬ 
al Civil Service Reform League at Boston, October 2, 
1890, by Charles J. Bonaparte. 











170 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


as to expect figs from thistles; to try to get such work 
out of such workmen is as if Secretary Tracy should 
order another Maine built on the same stocks and 
with the same materials that might furnish forth an 
old seventy-four. 

This incapacity does not, however, arise from the 
undoubted fact that most of our public men are in¬ 
tellectually, or for want of education, incapable of 
understanding the merits or appreciating the impor¬ 
tance of these questions. A very limited acquaint¬ 
ance with our legislative bodies leads me to think 
that these treat roost satisfactorily the topics about 
which their members know and care the least, sinee 
they are then open to the influence of volunteer ex¬ 
perts. When there is neither 'money” nor “polities” 
in a proposed measure, the average American politi¬ 
cian is a very fair legislator, provided that reputable 
citizens will take the trouble to tell him just what he 
should do. He is usually timid and patient, anxious 
(when it costs him nothing) to conciliate public opin¬ 
ion and accustomed to being bored : he repeats so 
constantly the party shibboleth that he may have 
half persuaded himself he believes that, but beyond 
it he has few prejudices and no opinions. He is 
therefore a good subject for judicious guidance, and, 
since he considers all enthusiasm as factitious and 
all professions as insincere as he knows his own to 
be, he is protected from the contagion of a visionary 
fanaticism. But in measures relating to the questions 
I have mentioned he finds always either “money” or 
“politics” or both, and in such case he is utterly want 
ing: wherever there may be some one able and wil¬ 
ling to buy him, his sale depends only upon the 
amount and form of the price offered, and e.x necessi¬ 
tate rei a would-be purchaser is found as soon as his 
public action begins to touch the pockets of wealthy 
or influential persons or classes, long accustomed to 
control legislation by systematic corruption. As an 
illustration, take the question of tariff reform. 
Whether the tariff should be based upon principles 
of free trade or of protection—that is to say, whether 
its aim should be primarily to produce the greatest 
revenue w’hile imposing the least burden on those 
taxed, or to make some or all branches of productive 
industry in the country more profitable to those pur¬ 
suing them—it is neither my province nor my pur¬ 
pose to discuss. Whichever principles we adopt, their 
application in modifying our present laws involves 
the sacrifice or advancement of powerful interests— 
powerful, because able to dispose of much money or 
many votes. A change in the laws can not at once 
meet the view of both producers and consumers of 
the article affected; it must inevitably injure pe¬ 
cuniarily one class or the other as individuals, al. 
though, of course, if wisely conceived, it may benefit 
both as members of the community. And although 
mere consumers make up usually a mass too amor- 
photis and unwieldy to be conscious of its interests 
or able to defend them, inasmuch as the finished 
product of one industry constitutes, in numberless 
instances the raw material of another, a bitter strife 
and a keen competition for legislative favor be 
tween different groups of producers must attend any 
attempt to change, whether in one direction or the 
other, the existing provisions of our revenue laws, 
be these, as a matter of fact, wise or unwise, salu¬ 
tary or the reverse. The task demands real states¬ 
manship and of no mean order; a veritable Ser- 
bonlan bog of intrique and bribery will be created if 
those who grapple with it have any but the highest 
standard of morality and honor. What, then, is 
their standard? It has been within a few months 
fairly enough defined by one of themselves. 

“The purification of politics,” says a senator of 
the United States, “is an iridescent dream. The 
decalogue and the golden rule have no place in a po¬ 
litical campaign. The object is success. To defeat 
the antagonist and expel the party in power is the 
purpose. The modern cant about the corruption of 
politics is fatiguing in the extreme. It proceeds 
from the tea-custard and syllabub dilettanteism, the 
frivolous and desultory sentimentalism of epicenes.” 
There is certainly nothing obscure or equivocal 
about this language; it expresses a theory of ethics 
which all can understand, and with which the world 
is unhappily familiar. Mutalis mutandis it might be 


echoed and is acted upon by every unfaithful ser¬ 
vant or trustee, every dishonest trader, every ha¬ 
bitual swindler, every common thief. All of these 
hold practically that “ the decalogue and the golden 
rule have no place in ” their trade, all consider that 
for them “ the object” and the only object “ is suc¬ 
cess,” all find “ cant” about their own corruption 
“fatiguing in the extreme,” although I doubt wheth¬ 
er either they or the senator object to this because it 
is insipid ; it “ fatigues ” them because they know it 
is true. The man who uttered these words may not 
be a wholly normal specimen of professional poli¬ 
ticians ; comparatively few of these would publicly 
admit that in any field of thought or action they had 
just as much and j ust as little conscience as a brute ; 
perhaps the majority would try to persuade them¬ 
selves that they had more. It is unusual to find one 
to whom the sentiments natural to a man oi integrity 
and honor have become so unfamiliar that he can 
not even see the practical advantage of counterfeit¬ 
ing them, who is not a hypocrite only becau-se his 
utter want of sympathy with rectitude prevents his 
understanding that the simulation of rectitude may 
pay. But the words, themselves, if exceptionally 
candid, none the less describe with substantial truth 
the code of morals recognized more or less con¬ 
sciously by our politicians and logically resulting 
from the conditions of their business. When out of 
office “ to...expel the party in power is the purpose” 
of their labors, not as a means, be it remembered, 
but as an end ; not that they may thus gain some¬ 
thing great for the country or for humanity, 
but that each one of them may gain some¬ 
thing little for himself. “The object is success, 
to defeat the antagonist,” but only that the victors 
may seize and enjoy his place; the u.se they will 
make of it is a wholly secondary consideration, or 
rather this is not considered at all; it goes without 
saying that they will use power when they have 
gained it, only to retain their hold on it as long as 
possible and to make all they can for themselves 
out of it meantime. And in their efforts to attain 
this end. efforts as purely selfish as the struggle of a 
carnivorous animal for his prey, moral restraints are 
unknown, and the promptings of patriotism, of 
charity, of self-respect, have no place. Any regard 
for the decalogue or the golden rule seems to them 
“ dilettanteism ” and “ sentimentalism ; ” for “ prac¬ 
tical ” men these are 

“ Words, mere words.” 

In plain English, then, the profession of politics, as 
understood by a spoilsman, is an essentially im¬ 
moral profession, like the profession of a gambler or 
a confidence man. An honest man may enter it, 
but he must, sooner or later, cease either to be honest 
or to be a politician. 

It is surely needless to speculate how those to 
whom one or another change in the tariff may mean 
wealth or ruin will treat men such as these. The 
saying is not of yesterday : 

“ In quorum manibus iniquitales sunt dextera corum 
repleta est muneribus. ’ ’ 

It will be more to the purpose if I point out that the 
character of our public men and the inducements 
wherewith alone they can be approached with rea¬ 
sonable hope of success by those seeking favors at 
their hands, explain the curious phenomenon, so 
often noted and lamented by tariff reformers, that 
they seem to have no idea of proportion in dealing 
with our industries, and often sacrifice one of them 
to advance the interests of another, although the 
latter may be utterly insignificant, both in amount 
of capital and in number of laborers employed, when 
compared with the former. Supposing legislative 
action inspired by a thought of the public good, such 
a course is, on any conceivable theory of political 
economy, inexplicable, but supposing such action to 
be inspired simply by some form of bribery, director 
indirect, is intelligible enough. Two or three men 
can corrupt more promptly and secretly, and with 
less risk of subsequent indiscretion and consequently 
more effectively and safely, than a score or a hun¬ 
dred can. A single capitalist, having nobody else to 
inform or consult as to his course, and able to tell 
with almost mathematical accuracy what profits will 
accrue to him from a given law when made, and how 


much he can therefore afford to Invest in the requi¬ 
site law making machinery, will have great advant¬ 
ages in his competition with a multitude of manu¬ 
facturers scattered throughout the country and un¬ 
accustomed to act in concert, of whom each will 
usually seek to throw on others the burden of de¬ 
fending their common interest, and among whom 
there is danger, proportioned to their number, of 
finding some “ epicene ” too much affected by “ tea- 
custard and syllabub" views of ethics to perceive 
the necessity of indulgence or even of discreet 
silence regarding the peculiar methods of modern 
American statesmanship. 

I have used the tariff as an apt illustration, but 
what I have said applies with equal truth to our 
pension system or our currency, or any other subject 
of national concern in which there is room for gain 
or loss to individual interests. Conflicting theories 
about bimetallism or a single standard do not im¬ 
pede a rational solution for the silver question ; the 
wealth and influence of our “ silver kings ” do; we 
should hear little enough about “ dependent pen¬ 
sions” or “service pensions” if the would-be pen¬ 
sioners were few in numbers or had no votes. For 
I need hardly say that whether a man is bribed to 
vote against what in his best judgment he believes 
to be the public interest by so much cash in his ovvn 
pocJcet or by the payment or promise or hope of cash 
for the party treasury, or by the expectancy of 
thus getting offices or votes or help of any kind for 
himself or others, makes no manner of difference as 
to the moral question. A politicion may as well, 
so far as his self-respect or his public utility is affect¬ 
ed, be owned by a rich man or a rich corporation as 
by the Farmers’ Alliance or the Knights of Labor or 
the Grand Army of the Republic; he is a bale of the 
same goods, whatever may be his trade-mark. 

To nd our country thoroughly and once for all of 
these dangerious and noxious counterfeits of states¬ 
men, and thus make room for the genuine article, 
which we produced in good measure a hundred 
years ago, we have only to do away with the inci¬ 
dents of public life which have arisen within those 
hundred years and made it no fit career for honor¬ 
able men. Washington, Jefferson, and Adams, 
Patrick Henry and Alexander Hamilton grew up 
from another political soil from that which nour¬ 
ished the senator I have quoted ; if we would have 
again among our rulers “epicenes” and “dilet¬ 
tanti” such as these we must “ thoroughly purge ” 
our meadows of that which has choked out the good 
wheat and give them over to lares and cockle. We 
must do away with the swinish scuffie for support at 
the taxpayers’ cost which has become all that “ poll 
tics” mean to the mass of our public men, and 
make a political campaign once more something in 
which the decalogue and the golden rule have a 
place. When we have done this—in other words, 
when we have practically applied the essential 
principles of civil service reform throughout our fed¬ 
eral, stateand municipal governments, we shall have 
again, as we had once, under the same conditions, 
men in public life able to consider in proposed 
changes of law more than the hopes they may 
arouse of personal or party gain. And when we have 
thus deserved such rulers and, by deserving them, 
obtained them, we may hope for those reforms 
which only their rule can give us. To ask that civil 
service reform wait while we reform the tariff or the 
currency, or anything else, is to ask that a surgeon 
cut out the tumor first and sharpen his knife after¬ 
wards, that a shipwright wait for his dockvard and 
meantime build his ship. 


ALL OTHER REFORMS SHOULD BE 
SUBORDINATED TO CIVIL SERV¬ 
ICE REFORM.* 


Our civil government, slate and national, has de¬ 
veloped into a huge boss system. The country is 
districted for boss purposes. The district of a boss is 
limited only by his limitations as a manipulator- 
With Quay and Gorman the district is a state; with 
the late John J. O’Brien, it w'as a single assembly 
district of New York; with Collector Nathan, it is the 
twenty-third ward of Brooklyn. No one will do vio¬ 
lence to credulity by pretending that the bosses have 
any genuine political principles. A year ago, at the 
meeting of the League, it was said that “ to promise 
or confer public office as a bait or reward for person¬ 
al or party service is always and everywhere immor¬ 
al; it is a breach of trust and a form of bribery.” 
The truth of that statement can never be shaken. 


<'A paper read by Lucius B. Swift before the Na¬ 
tional Civil Service Reform League in Boston, Octo¬ 
ber 2, 1890. 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


171 




1 

i 



t 





Yet it Is by that immorality and by that bribery 
that the bosses thrive and increase in power and 
rule this nation. It is not necessary before this 
audience to show that their heel-marks cover the 
country, I only say that, well as we know them, we 
do not grasp the magnitude of a system whose out 
croppings extend from the appointment of Meade as 
police justice in New York City, to Clarkson manip¬ 
ulating his 30,000 postmasters a year; and whose field 
reaches from the dog catcher to the governor, and 
from the elevator-boy to the President. If an execu¬ 
tive or legislative office-holder is not a boss or the 
agent of a bo.ss, he is a rare exception. In general 
there is spread over the country a tough network of 
township, city, county,state and national office-hold¬ 
ers, standing to each other as principal or agent, 
master or man, boss or worker. Along with such 
civil government as we have, goes this vast exploita¬ 
tion of the offices for spoil. These are the ins, ready 
to catch at any issue, and say or do anything that 
will leave them masters of the offices. And, as has 
been stated many times, man for man and side by 
side with these are the outs, ready to catch at any is¬ 
sue and say or do anything that will in turn make 
them masters of the offices. The bribery is plain and 
simple, from the township trustee of the township 
embracing Indianapolis, paying with clerkships the 
small party hustlers who assisted him to election, to 
the resident paying with marshalships and post-of¬ 
fices the men who voted for him in the nominating 
convention. 

Our 65,000,000 of people have seen this going on at 
their very doors, until even the ehildren knew with¬ 
out being told that if Smith succeeds, Jones, who has 
worked day and night for Smith’s nomination and 
election, will get from Smith a clerkship. They 
know that this is to be Jones’s pay and that he works 
for this contingent fee. At every four corners in our 
forty-two stales the people for two generations have 
' seen such bribes paid with state and federal offices. 

I have said that we do not grasp the magnitude of 
the boss system; neither is it necessary for me to ex¬ 
plain to you its strength ; and yet, we do not realize 
its strength. In the twenty-odd years’ struggle to up 
root this system, some progress has been made. Nev¬ 
ertheless, it remains generally true that to retain or 
get the offices is the present object of our parties, in 
every field of operation; and the desire for this ob¬ 
ject is, with spasmodic exceptions, the regulator of 
American legislation, of American executive govern¬ 
ment, of the formulated opinions of American par¬ 
ties and public men, and of the exercise of political 
power. This is its strength. 

HOW THE PEOPLE ARE FOOLED. 

The bosses know, first, that they live by the offices, 
and second, that if the people once realize the evils 
of patronage they will lake away the offices. The 
skill of the machine is therefore directed to diverting 
the attention of the people from this division and en¬ 
joyment of spoils. To this end, i.ssues true or false 
are urged forward. For many years southern out¬ 
rages, an issue which never did and never was in¬ 
tended to lead to any practicable measure, blinded 
the majority and enabled the republican machine to 
keep the offices. In Pennsylvania, to-day. Quay 
raises jeopardized protection like a wall close to 
the eyes of republicans to blind them to the crim¬ 
inal evil of himself as a man and of his literally feu¬ 
dal rulership of his state. For years the people of the 
state of Maryland, in a manner disgraceful to them¬ 
selves, have permitted Gorman to keep his heel on 
their necks, solely by his control of the offices; and 
in every campaign when they might have over 
thrown him, he has blinded them by the cry that 
such a result would lead to national party disaster. 

When a machine has fixed upon an issue as one 
which will enable it to succeed, it does not permit 
dissent. Mr. Randall is a notable instance. But to 
most party bosses an issue has only its expedient 
side, and when taken up by their party machine it 
never staggers those who may have been for years on 


the opposite side. 

Some years ago Senator Voorhees made many 
speeches to show that the record of his party was 
misrepresented upon the tariff quest ion—that it was 
and had been protection. Now Mr. Voorhees makes 


speeches proposing to hang the men who are profit¬ 
ing by protection. Again, Senator Gorman, the over- 
lord of overlords, two years ago was a protectionist. 
To-day he is a tariff reformer. No one will ask us to 
believe that the merits of the tariff question had any¬ 
thing to do with this change of heart. Mr. Gormon 
read in the signs of the times that his party machine 
was against him, and that he must bring about this 
change if he would continue as the absolute party 
controller of offices in Maryland. 

Thus, occasionally adjusting themselves to what 
they consider a minor demand, the bosses remain 
the controllers of the govermental spirit of the coun¬ 
try, and they guide it skilfully away from acts which 
would undermine the only foundation upon which 
they stand or can stand—the use of the offices as 
spoil. If they think justice will hurt their party 
chances, they stop the course of justice. For in¬ 
stance, the guilt of Mahone’s campaign fund clerks 
is clear and the evidence is ready. But they are not 
punished because the party bosses have the notion 
(a mistaken notion, to be sure), that punishment 
would weaken election chances. The eleventh hour 
indictment just decided upon proves my argument. 

THE STEERING PROCESS. 

They can not control the rise of discussion, but 
their skill, to a degree often consummate, is dis¬ 
played in a steering process that permits a discussion 
to come to a beneficent end, or anchors it or wrecks 
it, according as it is necessary to avoid defeat at the 
polls, with the consequent loss of the offices. In our 
legislatures, if good legislation will help them, they 
pander that much to the moral sentiment of the peo¬ 
ple. Any legislation which endangers them is 
blocked at any stage they desire. We have a late 
illustration. The bill to regulate elections was on 
the highroad to final passage. Ata word from Quay, 
professed principles went to the winds and the bill 
was meekly laid aside. 

While the bosses control the switches and brakes 
of the legislative road, it is useless to hope for legis¬ 
lation based upon business and patriotic principles. 
This is shown by the recent course and present con 
dition of the tariff question. The prominent idea 
and discussion connected with the early adminis¬ 
tration of President Cleveland was in relation to the 
civil service. The antagonism of his party machine 
to the civil .service reform views and acts of Mr. 
Cleveland was fully expressed in the Indianapolis 
Sentinel in November, 1886, which said: “The un- 
American policy he has pursued in dealing with 
the party and the partisans that elected him to office 
is the direct cause of the apathy of the party in so 
many sections of the country. He has done all he 
could to destroy the party organiz ition. He has 
chilled the honorable ambition of young men and 
grievously abused the old leaders. Mr. Cleveland 
must either prove himself a democrat in the remain¬ 
ing years of his administration or prepare to meet 
emphatic repudiation by his party.’’ 

With this threatening attitude the bosses of his 
party confronted Mr. Cleveland until he brought 
forward the tariff issue, upon which the bulk of 
them seemed willing to uni.te, and he took the first 
step by a message to congress devoted exclusively to 
that subject. To thus state this great change, and at 
the same time to say that defeat was expected upon 
the tariff issue, is an incongruity. 

The second step to divert meddlesome attention 
from the division of spoil was the Mills bill, a step 
guided by the unseen power of the bosses. The in¬ 
tention was to frame a bill upon which they could 
carry the country, and the result may be called a 
measure with free trade leanings for republican 
communities and proteclive leanings for democratic 
communities. It was a fortunate thing for civil ser¬ 
vice reform that this attempt to shelve it was pun¬ 
ished by defeat. Any other result would have left 
this cause discredited, too weak even for the con¬ 
tempt of the bos.ses, and alive only in the half dozen 
places where “ local option ’’ might permit the law to 
be enforced. 

The republican machine, in its turn, has elaborated 
a tariff bill such, and no other, as it believes will help 
its election chances. The tables are turned. We have 


protection for republican districts, and free trade for 
democratic districts. 

If it were not so serious, all this would be laughable 
as the play of children or fools. In fact, it is a mock¬ 
ery of government. It is but stating the commonest 
principle of government to say that any legislation 
touching our present tariff should be the result of the 
unbiased investigation and report of skilled men. 
Yet such statement only emphasizes the chimerical 
quality of the hope of such legislation under the boss 
system. And the same is true generally. The enact¬ 
ment of our public laws is advocated with the halt¬ 
ing advocacy caused by the skeleton in the party 
closet—the fear of losing the spoil of office. Those 
interested in all questions which relate to the cur¬ 
rency, to taxation, to the regulation of the liquor 
traffic, to our great Indian trust, or which cluster 
around the cause of labor, or any other subject aris¬ 
ing with a progressive people, have found, and will 
find that the measure of relief granted is gauged by 
its supposed effect upon the continued power of the 
Quays and the Gormans over the spoil of office. 

THE PREY OF THE BOSSES. 

With their power well in hand as they have had it 
for years, the bosses prey upon all they help or can 
harm. Formerly the Indianapolis post-office paid 
$1,200. In 1888 the pension office in that city was 
called upon for $600, part of which was collected in 
violation of law. In that year the Indiana republi¬ 
can candidate for reporter of the supreme court paid 
$2,250. The candidates for the judgesh ips of the cou rts 
sitting at Indianapolis are each regularly assessed 
$500 upon a salary of $2,500. In larger cities and 
offices all over the country these figures are many 
times multiplied, and when these sums are again 
multiplied by the number of state and national 
offices which still pay assessments, the lesult shows 
a startling sum of money to be devoted to the per¬ 
petuation of the buccaneering power which extorts 
it. Great moneyed interests can be helped or hurt 
by boss legislation. Jay Gould gave his check for 
$50,000 to the late John J. O’Brien to the use of the 
O’Brien machine, and Mr. Wanamaker, then a new 
recruit to the machine, suggested that the Northern 
Pacific Railway should help the campaign of 1888 
with $100,000. 

With the money thus gathered, the bosses in the 
struggle for the offices leave their mark in the shape 
of 20,000 floaters in Indiana, and in like proportion 
in Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York and other 
states. 

Our boss system of officeholders, with its para¬ 
mount boss and a graded line of under-bosses, has 
thus become a quasi-feudal system, without the ro¬ 
mance or the courtesy or the honor of feudalism. It 
is the footpad in armor. It uses various interests for 
its own ends and lets itself for hire to various inter¬ 
ests. Destroy it and leave every reform and every 
interest standing alone, and spontaneous discussion, 
followed by the untrammeled action of the people, 
will reward every agitation with that result to which 
the civilization of the country entitles it. 

Therefore I say that the destruction of the spoils 
system ought to regulate individual political effort. 
Not that other reforms may not have sympathy and 
support. But in every case there comes a time when 
the roads part. Then there can be no compromise, 
no hesitation. The pursuit of these bloodsuckers 
upon all our civil government should be relentless. 
To cease this attack at any point and unite with this 
common enemy with the hope of benefiting some 
other object is to strengthen the common enemy and 
fill him with joy. Such deviation prolongs the un¬ 
equal struggle on our hands and does not accomplish 
its object. 

Our cause has suffered and is in danger of suffering 
from such deviation in a single case only; but thai 
is a case of such magnitude as to cause concern and 
call for protest. I refer to the number of thinking 
and distinguished men who are entirely with us in 
opinion, but who would now lay aside civil service 
reform on behalf of, or would now subordinate it to 
effort for a modification or abolition of, the tariff'. 
They are certainly mistaken. It was useless that they 
joined their clean-handed effort with such efforts as 
the use of the offices to break down the refractory 
protectionist Congre.ssman Randall, and with the 
wholesale subsidy of the western press, and with the 
use of the pension bureau asapolitical machine, and 
with the use of the civil service as a trip-hammer to 
help one-half of the people strike the other. The 
means do not justify the end. Civil service reform 
wars against such weapons, no matter in what hand 
or cause. 

Deviation from it now but helps to raise up more 
bosses and strengthen the boss system. The con¬ 
gressman from the Indianapolis district is a typical 
instance. He has ability, and in trying circum¬ 
stances he has displayed the highest skill in un¬ 
scrupulous manipulation of the offices. He is the 
enemy of the merit system. His issue is tariff mod¬ 
ification. To follow him upon that issue is to help 














172 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


liuild up a man who might become to Indiana w'hat 
Platt is to New York, Mahone to Virginia, Quay to 
Pennsylvania and Gorman to Maryland. The thought 
is intolerable. And yet I submit that the advocacy 
of tariff modification, as it is now offered, gives no 
.satisfactory reward and actually helps the bosses to 
obscure civil service reform and extend their own 
rule. And the poison of office—exploitation for 
spoil—is left with incieased virulence to course its 
way through every hamlet, town and ci y in all the 
stales of this Union. It ruins public morals. It is 
the destroyer of nations. No man can look at our 
national, state and city governments and deny that 
it is the crying evil of our time. The call to destroy 
it rings in the ears of every man who loves his coun¬ 
try. Our faces should be always towards it, and our 
hands should be always against it. 


NOTES OF THE DISCUSSION. 


[From the Boston Journal and the Bostjn Post.] 

At the conclusion of the reading of Mr. Swift’s 
paper, Mr. R. Francis Wood, of Philadelphia, moved 
that Mr. Bonaparte’s and Mr. Swift’s papers be 
printed. Mr. Everett P. Wheeler, of New York, 
moved as an amendment that the papers be printed 
separately, and Mr. Wood accepted the amendment. 
He must take exceptions to some of Mr. Swift’s state¬ 
ments, and did not think that they should be sent 
forth entire as expressing the views of the league, 
lie must take exception to the statements made 
therein, which he thought was in error, that Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland’s tariff message was put forth in re¬ 
sponse to the demands of the party bosses. Secretary 
Fairchild had told him, the speaker, that what led 
to the writing of the message, and the equally notice¬ 
able report of the secretary of the treasury, vvhich ac¬ 
companied it, was their absolute conviction of the 
necessity of the immediate presentation of that ques¬ 
tion to the country. Mr. Wheeler vigorously de¬ 
nounced the use of money in elections, and in the 
bribery of committees and legislators. The league 
should aim to do away with this evil as heartily as it 
did to abolish the evil of party patronage. The 
league should not confine its work to one branch of 
reform. 

Winslow Warren, Esq., of Boston, said that while 
he agreed with much that Mr. Bonaparte and Mr. 
Swift had said, he could not agree with it all. He 
could not agree with Mr. Bonaparte in his laudation 
of the political methods of Hamilton and others of 
the old leaders in comparison with those of the 
leaders of to-day. Neither could he agree with Mr. 
Swift that the Mills bill or the McKinley bill, 
abominable as he thought the latter, was devised for 
the purpose of shelving, or meant the shelving, of 
civil service reform. We should be averse to having 
all the views expressed in those papers go forth as an 
official expression of the views of the league. 

Col. Charles R. Codman, of Boston, said that if he 
had understood Mr. Swift aright he had declared 
that civil service reform was of such transcendent 
importance that the members of the league must 
abandon all the other great reforms of the day. 

Mr. Swift interrupted at this point to say that his 
position had evidently been misunderstood. His 
position was that when civil service reformers came 
to a point where the road parted between an advo¬ 
cacy of civil service reform and any other reform, 
they should choose the former. 

Col. Codman resuming, said that if the league 
should take the position that civil service reform was 
of transcendent importance, the only consistent 
course for its members to take would be to form a 
third political party and be civil service reformers, 
first, last, and all the time, as the prohibitionists 
were prohibitionists first, last and all the time. 

Mr. Wheeler moved that the whole matter of print¬ 
ing the papers be referred to the executive commit¬ 
tee, with instructions to print, and authority to pre¬ 
pare the papers, with the statement that the league 
did not indorse them. 

President Curtis thought such action would be es¬ 
tablishing a most unfortunate precedent; it tvould 
look as though the league were putting forth a dis¬ 
claimer. He did not believe that the league, in 
printing his own annual addresses before it in its 
proceedings, deliberately adopted in advance all the 
views embodied in it. If he did think so, he should 


certainly feel very much constrained in the prepar¬ 
ation of those addresses, 

Sherman S. Rogers, Esq., of Buffalo, hoped Mr. 
Wheeler’s motion would not prevail. The mere 
printing of the papers did not place upon them the 
league’s imprimatur. He was not quite sure how 
far he should follow Mr. Swift, but he thought very 
far, even so far as to hold that civil service reform 
was of paramount importance. 

Richard H. Dana, Esq., moved as an amendment 
that the papers be printed so that the members of 
the league might have an opportunity to consider 
the opinions of the authors therein so ably ex¬ 
pressed. 

Mr. Bonaparte said that he should feel the same 
embarrassment as the president if his oaper were 
to be taken as an official expression of the views of 
the league. 

Henry J. Richmond, Esq., of Buffalo, supported 
Mr. Dana’s amendment. 

President Curtis interrupted to ask why, if the 
president’s address were not to be prefaced with the 
statement that the league was not responsible for the 
view's in it, the paper read by any member of the 
League should be so prefaced 

Mr. Richmond replied that there was a great dif¬ 
ference between the president and an humble pri¬ 
vate in the ranks like himself. He suggested that 
hereafter the annual printed proceedings be pref¬ 
aced with the statement that the league must not 
be held responsible for the views therein contained. 
Mr. Wheeler and Mr. Dana both accepted this 
amendment. 

Mr. George Fred Williams, of Dedham, said he 
should be very much opposed to having Mr. Swift’s 
views, or some of them, go forth to the world as 
those of the league or his own. Mr. Swift’s state¬ 
ment in regard to Mr. Cleveland’s object in putting 
forth his tariff message was to shelve civil service 
reform. That, he understood, was merely Mr. Swift’s 
inference. But he, the speaker, knew it was wholly 
false. 

Mr. Myers moved as an amendment that the ad- 
dre.sses be printed and that the question of prefixing 
them with any explanation be referred to the execu¬ 
tive committee, with full power to deal with it as 
they deemed fit. This amendment was accepted by 
Messrs. Wheeler and Dana, but was lost. 

Mr. Wheeler said the printing of the papers with¬ 
out some such explanation as indicated would cause 
grave trouble in New York. 

President Curtis said that certainly no man in his 
senses would accept Mr. Swift’s statement as to the 
origin of Mr. Cleveland’s tariff message as being the 
view of the league. 

The result of the long discussion was the adoption 
of the following motion: That the executive com¬ 
mittee be directed, in preparing papers for publica¬ 
tion hereafter, to prefix a note or statement to them 
to the general effect that the league is not responsi¬ 
ble for the views therein expressed. 


THE RESOLUTIONS. 


[The committee on resolutions were George Wil¬ 
liam Curtis, Charles J. Bonaparte, Edward Carey, 
Henry H. Sprague and Lucius B. Swift.] 

The National Civil Service Reform League, in com¬ 
mon with all citizens who desire the overthrow of 
the great and perilous evil known as the spoils sys¬ 
tem, congratulates the country that the attempt to 
nullify the reform law during the present session of 
congress was decisively defeated in the house of rep 
resentatives; that the law was defended by distin¬ 
guished and able members of both political parties, 
and that the leader of the majority of the house de 
dared thsit his party was pledged to nothing more 
than to civil service reform, which, he said truly, 
was sustained by the best opinion of both parties, re¬ 
publicans and democrats alike. 

The League gladly recognizes the fact that about 
thirty-two thousand places in the public service are 
now filled upon free and fair competition by merit 
alone; while Commissioner Roosevelt gives public 
assurance that 92 per cent, of clerks so appointed 
under the late administration have been retained 
under the present administration. 

The League records with satisfaction the wholesome 
precedents of the action of the attorney-general of 
the United States in sustaining, after long contro¬ 
versy, the civil service commission, and in causing 
the revocation of appointments made in defiance of 
the reform law ; and the indictment, although after 
long delay, by the grand jury of the district of 
Columbia of the president and treasurer of a politi¬ 
cal club in Washington for soliciting political con¬ 
tributions from government emploves. With equal 
satisfaction, the league recalls the success of the 
friends of reform in frustrating an attempt in con¬ 
gress to evade the reform law by securing the ap¬ 


pointment of pension examiners without the pre¬ 
scribed examination. 

The league regards the complete, forcible and com¬ 
prehensive explanation and defence of the princi¬ 
ples, operation and results of reform which was made 
by the national civil service commission before the 
committee of investigation of the house of representa¬ 
tives, as a great and timely public service, for which 
the commission is entitled to public gratitude. It 
again congratulates ihe country upon the admirable 
choice of civil service commissioners made by the 
present administration; a selection the merit of which 
has been demonstrated by the ability and efficiency 
with which they have performed the duties of their 
office; and the league mentions with pleasure, as a 
sign of the progress of public opinion, the unquali¬ 
fied advocacy of the principles of reform by many of 
the leading journals of both national parties in the 
country. 

Whilst according to the national administration 
the amplest credit for whatever advance may have 
been made in the practical application of civil service 
reform to the conduct of public business, it is never¬ 
theless our duty to again remind the country of the 
pledges made by the successful party at the last pres¬ 
idential election, and to note how far these pledges 
have been kept. 

The pledges of the party of administration were, 
first, that reform of the civil service, already au¬ 
spiciously begun, should be completed by further 
extension of the reformed system to all grades of the 
service to which it is applicable; second, that the 
spirit and purpose of reform should be observed in 
all executive appointments; third, that all laws at 
variance with the object of existing reform legisla¬ 
tion should be repealed. 

These pledges have been disregarded; the reformed 
system has not been extended; not only have not the 
spirit and purpose of reform been observed in all ex¬ 
ecutive appointments, but they have neen often and 
gravely violated ; that laws at variance with reform 
legislation have not been repealed, nor has there 
been any proposition for their repeal. 

Against this practical contempt of pledges the 
league reeords its unqualified protest. 

The arbitrary removal of postmasters for no other 
cause than their political opinions or party affilia¬ 
tions, resulting in a parti.san devastation of an im¬ 
portant branch of the public service, is a breach of 
faith with the country and a grave offense against 
pure politics and the interests of an efficient public 
service. 

The league holds that the important duty of tak¬ 
ing the census should have been committed to offi¬ 
cers selected because of their fitness, and with no re¬ 
gard to political or partisan considerations, and it 
sees in the general dissatisfaction throughout the 
country with the results of the census a logical con¬ 
sequence of disregard of these principles. 

While holding that the power of removal should 
be vested in appointing officers subject only to a 
sound discretion, the league also holds that no op¬ 
portunity for changing the public service which is 
not political, for partisan reasons should be permit¬ 
ted. It therefore urges all friends of reform to press 
upon public attention and on congress the repeal of 
the laws pre.seribiug fixed terms of office, which 
were designed to facilitate partisan charges without 
the odium of express and positive removal. 

Places which are not political and which are filled 
by appointment should be vacated, except by death 
or resignation, only by the deliberate act of responsi¬ 
ble appointing officers, after fair opportunity of ex¬ 
planation or denial of charges, and, in order that 
such officers may be held strictly to their responsi¬ 
bility, the widest publicity should be given to re¬ 
movals, and such officers should be required by law 
publicly to record the reason for removals made by 
their authority. 

The experience of Boston and Cambridge has 
proved the entire practicability of extending the sys¬ 
tem of selection by merit to the labor service of those 
cities, and in view of the renewal of our coast de¬ 
fenses and of the reconstruction of our navy, the 
league recommends the application of the same sys¬ 
tem to the selection of laborers in the national 
navy yards, and the extension of the examinations to 
all other positions in the navy yards to which they 
are applicable, and it renews its recommendation 
for a similar extension of the merit system to the 
Indian service. 

As a measure of relief from one of the worst and 
most widely diffused abuses of the spoils system, the 
league approves the principles and object of the bill 
introduced in congress during the present session 
to regulate the appointment of fourth-class post¬ 
masters, by causing their selection to be made upon 
business principles and without regard to political 
interests and opinions. 

The league reaffirms its unswerving fidelity to the 
American and democratic principle of the equal 
right of every citizen to seek and to compete on 
equal terms for appointment to office without the 
necessity of asking aid from party friends or politi¬ 
cal leaders 

The practicability and benefit of civil service re¬ 
form have been amply and conclusively demonstra¬ 
ted, and as the nece.ssity of reform was never more 
urgent, the league declares that, in the interest of 
honest government, of the freedom and purity of the 
ballot and of the overthrow of political corruption, 
it will prosecute with unflagging energy its appeal 
to that matured opinion of the American people 
which steadily and happily reforms every abuse that 
menaces the welfare of the republic. 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapolis. Published monthly. Publieation office. No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, 
Ind., where subscriptions and advertisements will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


VoL. I, No. 21. 


INDIANAPOLIS, NOVEMBER, 1890. 


TERMS : ■{ 


50 cents perannum. 
5 cents per copy. 


God give us men ! a time like this demands 
Strong minds, great hearts, true faith and ready 
hands; 

Men whom the lust of office can not kill: 

Men whom the spoils of office can not buy ; 

Men who possess opinion and a will; 

2 Men who have honor, men who will not lie ; 

‘Men who can stand before a demagogue 

And damn his treacherous flatterings without 
winking; 

Tall men, sun-crowned, who live above the fog, 

In public duty and private thinking. 

The election in Massachusetts will greatly 
strengthen congress in the matter of sincere be¬ 
lievers in civil service reform, a large num¬ 
ber of its new members from that state having 
been for years open advocates of the reform 
We may now expect aggressive movement and 
that the democratic house will be powerfully 
urged to pass the bill regulating the appoint 
ment of fourth class post-masters, and to re¬ 
peal the four years’ tenure act, and to give the 
civil service commission liberal financial sup¬ 
port. 

The result of the recent election in Penn¬ 
sylvania is the most magnificent victory that 
has been gained since the beginning of the 
struggle to break down the spoils system. 
That system had reached its final develop¬ 
ment in that state. The situation of affairs 
with Quay and the government of Pennsyl¬ 
vania was not widely different from the situ¬ 
ation after Rome had conferred the tribuni- 
tion power upon its boss for the time being. 
This was to a great extent realized in Penn¬ 
sylvania, and Quay’s inability to answer to 
the charge of embezzlement merely brought 
the matter to a focus. The reformers, with a 
boldness that can not be too highly com¬ 
mended, undertook to convince the people of 
Pennsylvania that they must decide whether 
they would rule themselves or be ruled by 
one man because he controlled the federal 
and state patronage. This issue was never 
departed from, and upon it the reformers ac¬ 
complished the almost incredible feat of 
changing 80,000 majority to 17,000 the other 
way. Surely after this it may everywhere be 
felt that in a righteous cause no majority is 
too great to be overcome. After Mahone and 
Quay one wonders where the administration 
will next use the patronage to carry an elec¬ 
tion. To have rendered the least help to the 
result in Pennsylvania will always be a satis¬ 
faction. The names of the great leaders in 
the movement will always be held in grateful 
remembrance, and not the least satisfactory 
part of the result is the high grade of intelli¬ 
gence shown by the people of the state in 
grasping and mastering the situation. 


The effort to redeem New York from Tam¬ 
many failed disastrously. The facts of the 
corrupting influences of this organization were 
widely spread, and there appeared to be 
against it strong and irresistible elements. 
But there were too many like Mr. Astor whose 
reply to a request for help was: “ Regret, am 
free from all political interests.” The only 
depressing thing about such a failure is 
that the burden of really patriotic, unsel¬ 
fish citizens becomes greater. These have to 
carry a weight of timid and selfish people 
who quickly seize upon any excuse to stop a 
troublesome and disagreeable contest. But 
the municipal league does not intend to quit 
the good war, and probably in spite of him¬ 
self Mr. Astor and his kind will enjoy in the 
future the pleasant results of their work. 
Above all things it is to be hoped that those 
patriotic clergymen who believe that the 
decalogue has a place in New York City 
government will not be dismayed, but will 
keep on helping. 

Mr. Foulke ought to be a shining exam¬ 
ple to citizens like Mr. Astor, that is, on the 
supposition that they are interested enough to 
know what Mr. Foulke is doing. He is a 
thoroughly equipped guard for the civil serv¬ 
ice reformers of the country. He stops at 
Washington, where the spoilsmen are thickest 
and noisiest, and he keeps track of what they 
are doing and promptly calls attention to 
them when they are operating any little 
schemes for the division of spoil. The Civil 
Service Reformer for November has a report of 
an interview he had with Postmaster-General 
Wanamaker, which the latter must find un¬ 
pleasant reading. Mr. Porter has recently 
found Mr. Foulke a tough adversary to tackle 
regarding his political census. What Mr. 
Foulke has done as chairman of the commit¬ 
tee to investigate the operations of the civil 
service is well known to readers of this paper. 


The Indiana Civil Service Refo’np A.ssocia- 
tion is in need of funds for the distribution of 
documents and for carrying on a correspond¬ 
ence over the state. There has long been the 
plan of preparing an especial appeal to the 
clergy of the state to lend their aid in the effort 
against the spoils system, but to print and 
mail such an address would require several 
hundred.dollars. If those who believe in the 
objects of the Association, would assist in in¬ 
creasing its membership, they would thereby 
materially increase its power of usefulness. 
.As an instance, the other day six people in New 
! Albany were suggested as in sympathy with 


civil service reform. At the first request three 
joined the state association. A slight individ¬ 
ual effort by members over the state would add 
hundreds to the membership. 

CAUSES OF DEFEAT. 

Within the field of this paper there were 
powerful elements which contributed to the 
results of the recent elections. The course of 
the administration made the reform element 
indifferent or hostile. This was the only 
source from which it could expect strength 
outside of its regular partisans. This was the 
most effective aid to President Cleveland when 
he was elected, and four years later nearly its 
whole strength was given with enthusiasm and 
success to President Harrison. The outrage¬ 
ous treatment of Postmaster Pearson followed, 
to be supplemented later by the turning out 
of Col. Burt, Mr. Graves, Collecter Saltonstall 
and others of the same stamp. The adminis¬ 
tration turned in to help Mahone put Virginia 
under his heel. A reasonable request to pro¬ 
vide for a non-partisan selection of census 
employes was refused and that important work 
was put into the hands of 60,000 party 
hacks, who have taken a census which has 
not and never will have the confidence of 
the country. Headsman Clarkson was al¬ 
lowed and encouraged to remove postmas¬ 
ters at the rate of thirty thousand a year. 
The Indian service has been disgrace¬ 
fully used as spoil and the Indian Rights 
.Association, which has a better knowledge 
of the needs of the Indians than the admin¬ 
istration itself, has been treated by the admin¬ 
istration with insult and contempt. Officers 
have been removed upon secret charges with¬ 
out being allowed to know the charges. The 
boss system was encouraged on every hand. 
In Indiana it was Michener, chairman of the 
state republican committee; in Texas it was 
men like the negro eollector Cuney; in New 
York it was Tom Platt. The crowning dis¬ 
grace was Quay, in Pennsylvania, controlling 
every federal office, and who led two cabinet 
officers, Wanamaker and Blaine, by the nose 
into the state to make speeches for him. As¬ 
sessments of office-holders went unpunished 
and unchecked. The MeFarlands, the Bag- 
bys and the Ransdells, though wholly un¬ 
worthy, were kept in the service. Office-hold¬ 
ers were encouraged to interfere in the cam¬ 
paign. Commissioner Raum, who is believed 
by the great majority of the people to have 
compromised himself with pension attorneys 
until he is unfit to retain his office, was sent 
out, in apparent willful defiance of public 
opinion to make campaign speeches. The 























174 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


increased majority of Congressman Cooper is 
a fitting answer, and is in part due to this 
very thing. Tlie Indiana district attorney 
was permitted to remain in office after he liad 
publicly declared that Dudley’s proposed plan 
for taking care of the floaters evinced only a 
patriotic interest in the elections. If the ad¬ 
ministration can do any worse it has two years 
yet in which to do it. If it means to do any 
better it has no time to lose. 


The President has divided spoil as it was 
never divided before. Never before has so 
much been given out for personal or party 
service in the same length of time. Yet the 
seekers of spoil are not his friends. They dis¬ 
like him and they hope he will not be re¬ 
nominated. The chief duty of the President 
is to manage the civil service, and always ex¬ 
cepting the work which comes within the 
field of the civil service commission, it must 
be said that President Harrison has been so 
far a failure. When he looks at his feats with 
Mahone and Quay and the rest, he must ad¬ 
mit this to himself. President Cleveland was 
a very similar failure, and when elections in 
1886 indicated to him the tone of the people, 
he did not heed it but got farther away from 
the whole subject of civil service reform. 
Will President Harrison do likewise or will 
he now bring himself to realize that his one 
great work is to get the spoils system out of the 
civil service. If he would give his next two 
years to an unrelenting fight against the 
spoils system, he would at least go out of office 
at the end of his term with the respect of the 
people. 


CLARIFIED VIEWS. j 

The writer has been turning over the pages 
of the Civil Service Record from 1886 to 1888, 
and his conclusion is that no where has civil 
service reform advanced more than among 
civil service reformers. Examine the report 
of the civil service commission on the Phila¬ 
delphia post-office, where upon finding that 
there are no applicants for examination, ex¬ 
cept among those of the postmaster’s own poli¬ 
tics, the commission, like a Greek chorus, help¬ 
lessly says : “Partisan prejudice, created by 
a partisan press for party purposes, keeps 
democrats out of the civil service examinations 
when the republican party is in power and keeps 
i-epublicans out when the democratic party is 
in power,” and further, “ When the law shall 
have been accepted in good faith by both the great 
political parlies, and appointing officers shall all, by 
official word and act, declare their determination to 
execute it faithfully, there will be no longer ques¬ 
tion of the unpartisan operation of examina¬ 
tions for the classified civil service.” 

Such helplessness seems to day absurd. 
Judged by the inquiry sent out by Mr. Cush¬ 
ing for Mr. Wanamaker, asking : 

Why should not both parties discard all their in¬ 
sincere professions for the law, and have the patriot¬ 
ism to go back to the old system ? 

tbe,law has not yet been accepted in “good 
f.aitb.” Bpt a commission with Mr, Roose¬ 


velt and Mr. Thompson on it does not have to 
wait for a change of heart with the Wanna- 
makers and Clarksons. A request through 
the public press for applicants to come forward 
forward for examination without reference to 
politics, and the promise of fair treatment 
brings the applicants of all political opin¬ 
ions. When the southern states do not have 
the quota of appointments to which they are 
entitled, because they have not furnished 
enough applicants for the eligible lists, this 
difficulty is solved in the same downright 
and simple fashion. Southern editors and 
congressmen are urged to use their influence 
to induce people from these states to try the 
examination. The request is successful. 

A timid, irresolute commission is always a 
contingency, but the great body of believers 
in civil service reform the country over, will 
not again acquiesce in the notion that the 
spirit of the reform law can not be secured 
until the politicians are converted, and that 
the civil service commission has no sphere but 
to record what they see and hear, and be 
humbugged and bullied by politicians. 


Again, examine an address before the Mas 
sachusetts reform club in April, 1887, by Dr_ 
William Everett, a sincere friend of civil serv¬ 
ice reform. It reads to-day like some of those 
curious whig documents before the war on the 
slave question. Dr. Everett spoke for a large 
number of civil service reformers, when he 
said, “We must stop weighing the President 
in a perpetual pair of scales, and weighing him 
against every new appointment to see whether 
he goes up or down, or hangs in equilibrio, 
* * * It is not my intention to de¬ 
fend all the President’s appointments. * 

What I look to is that, while some civil serv¬ 
ice reformers feel disappointed, and are an¬ 
swering “ no ” to my question, “ whether the 
cause has received all the co-operation from 
Mr. Cleveland that we had a right to expect,” 
the spoilsmen all over the country, of both 
parties, feel much more disappointed; and 
they are grumbling all the time that he has 
done so much for us, while some of us are 
whining, shall I say, because he has done so 
little. * Moreover, there is no doubt 

he gives his own personal attention to ap¬ 
pointments more than any President has done 
for years. * * But if on the other hand, 

you do trust President Cleveland, you must 
trust him entirely. You must see him re¬ 
move and appoint according to his best judg¬ 
ment, without threatening to withhold your 
trust if the next removal and the next ap¬ 
pointment do not suit you.” 

Dr. Everett, in his recent spirited campaign 
in Massachusetts, did not follow his own pre¬ 
scription, and it is well for the progress of 
civil service reform that the fog of 1887 has 
lifted about him. Nor was any such advice given 
by those who believe that with all his short¬ 
comings President Harrison has done for civil 
service reform more than did his predecessor 
in this, that he has given the country the best 
civil service commission it has ever had, which 


is not disputed, and that for the first time, 
through the influence of this commission, there 
have been comparatively few dismissals trace¬ 
able to politics from the competitive service, 
and many applicants of all politics have come 
for examination and received appointments in 
it. But no one, because of this, says to-day 
that therefore we must trust the President 
“entirely.” No one disputes the unpopularity 
of the present executive with the spoilsmen, 
nor that their rumblings and grumblings ex¬ 
ceed those of the civil service reformers. The 
New York Times of November 21 contains the 
following in its report of a meeting of a repub¬ 
lican county committee to discipline somebody 
for the paucity of patronage : 

The claim has been made repeatedly that too many 
democrats were kept in office at the custom house, 
the post-office, and elsewhere. With some men it 
has been the popnlar thing to “ growl ” at Collector 
Erhardt because he did not appoint more republi¬ 
cans to. office. When Mr. Erhardt’s friends pointed 
out that the civil service laws were in the way, the 
hungry hosts only grew hungrier still and cried 
louder for office than ever. 

But nobody is found to repeat Dr. Everett’s 
sophistry that therefore the President is doing 
all he can and more than we should expect 
for reform. Again, no one disputes that Pres¬ 
ident Harrison has gone into the matter of 
giving his personal consideration to appoint¬ 
ments to a degree greater even than his prede¬ 
cessor, and that his health has suffered, but no 
one now regards that as any palliative for using 
public offices to pay personal or party debts. 

These are some of the many encouraging 
signs of the chill and refreshing breeze that 
has, in the last four years, relieved us of much 
cant as to how much political morality is due 
from a public man; and it is well to acknowl¬ 
edge our debt in this respect to Senator Ingalls. 
The shock of his bold declaration that the 
decalogue has no place in politics was the thing 
that brought home to many honest people the 
fact that unconsciously they had been judging 
men in public life by a different code from 
that applied to other people and in which the 
decalogue did not have the place of honor. 

One thing is certain, whoever the next presi¬ 
dent, he will not be judged according to Dr. 
Everett’S standard of 1887. He will not be 
trusted entirely. Nor will he be judged by 
what he finds it convenient as a politician to 
do to redeem the country from spoils and 
bosses. He will be judged by what he ac¬ 
tually does for civil service reform, measured 
by what remains to be done. Civil service re¬ 
formers, for the first time, in fighting Quay, 
learned the meaning of taking the public en¬ 
tirely into their confidence, making all their 
protests public and permitting no private ex¬ 
planations and excuses from a chief executive 
who may secretly have sympathized with 
them, while at the same time he was unwilling 
to brave the consequences of the vengeance of 
a great boss. Whoever the next president, he 
must expect every appointment and every dis¬ 
missal to be examined by the facts at hand in 
the various communities; he will not, un¬ 
criticised,“ remove and appoint according to 


















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


175 


his best Judgment.” He will not be treated as 
an all-wise, all-beneficent dictator, but as a 
president subject, from the very fact of having 
been successful in getting elected, to many en¬ 
tangling alliances, and as, therefore, a proper 
subject for vigilant watchfulness. If he hob¬ 
nobs with Quays and Gormans, or if he wears 
the imperial robes while they parcel out the 
spoils of conquest, the wrath of his fellow-citi¬ 
zens will fall upon him in the same increasing 
proportion that it fell upon President Harri¬ 
son’s for his alliance with Quay, over what 
fell upon President Cleveland for his alliance 
with Gorman. 

FOURTH REPORT 
Of the Special Committee of the National 
Civil Service Reform League. 

REMOVALS UPON SECRET CHARGES. 

To the Executive Committee of the National Civil 
Service Reform League: 

Your special committee appointed to in¬ 
quire into the condition of the federal service 
and the operation of the reform law, would re¬ 
spectfully submit the following report as to 
the system of removals of presidential post¬ 
masters upon secret charges: 

Out of 356 answers received to our questions 
whether or not any cause for removal was given 
to the man removed, it appeared that in only 
47 cases was such cause assigned, in 10 cases 
the matter was disputed, and in 299 cases it 
appeared, from uneontradicted statements, that 
the incumbent was removed without any cause 
being given for his removal. In a very large 
number of cases he solicited information from 
the post-office department as to the charaeter 
of the charges; but this information was al¬ 
most invariably refused. If he ever learned 
what the charges were, he learned it by private 
inquiry from other sources, generally from 
heresay and rumor merely. In many instances 
the new appointee, in answer to our inquiry as 
to the causes of the removal, while declining i 
to state these causes himself, refers us to writ¬ 
ten charges on file in the department. As Mr. 
Wanamaker tells us that “ all papers in ap¬ 
pointment cases have invariably been deemed j 
privileged and confidential with the depart- j 
ment,” and as the postmasters themselves are 
refused access to the charges upon which they | 
are removed, but little can be done to lift the ' 
veil which conceals these secret accusations. 

The following instances are submitted. 

William Wilson writes in regard to his re¬ 
moval from the post-office at Chadron, Neb.: 

I immediately wrote President Harrison that I only 
asked the privilege and right of an American citi¬ 
zen—that is, to defend myself; that, if there were 
any charges against me, I would like to have an op¬ 
portunity to answer them. In reply I received the 
following (copy): 

"Ur. William Wilson, Chadron, Neb.: 

“Dear Sir —The President directs me to acknowl¬ 
edge the receipt of your letter, and to inform you 
that it has been referred to the Hon. Postmaster-Gen¬ 
eral, to whom all further communications upon the 
subject should be addressed. 

" Very respectfully yours, 

“Elijah W. Halford, Private Secretary.” 


I was never able to hear from the Hon. Postmaster- 
General or any one else. 

J as. A. McKenna, postmaster at Long Island 
City, N. Y., was removed and no cause stated. 
On Sept. 6,1889, he wrote to the first assistant 
postmaster-general as follows: 

United States Post-office. I 

Long Island City,Queens Co.,State of New York. >- 
September 6,1889. J 
Hon. J. S. Clarkson, First Assistant Postmaster-General, 

Washington, D. C.: 

De.vr Sir —In the New York Tribune of August 27 
there is quoted an interview with you. in which you 
are made to .say that “the department was incon¬ 
stant receipt of complaints against Postmaster Mc¬ 
Kenna, some of them being of a serious character, 
and clearly proving careless management of the 
office. 

Inasmuch as the President has seen fit to remove 
me from my position as postmaster of Long Island 
City, these charges will be a serious injury and 
drawback to me in any business I may now be 
obliged to take up, and, as I am not conscious of any 
dereliction of duty, I respectfully request that I may 
be allowed toin.spect the charges referred to, or may 
be allowed to have a copy thereof, in order that I 
may submit an answer to the same, not hoping for 
retention in office, but to clear my future from a 
cloud that might otherwise restover it. I have never 
heard of any charges against me, except sis stated in 
the above interview ; and I assume it is not the in¬ 
tention or desire of the President to have me leave 
my office under unfounded charges. 

Very respectfully, 

Jas. a. McKenna, 
Postmaster L. 1. City. 

The only answer he ever received to his 
communication was the letter of which the 
following copy was sent to us: 

Post-office Department. 1 

Office of the I 

First Assistant Postmaster-General, f 

Washington, Sept. 7,1889. J 

Dear Sir— In the absence of the First Asfsistant 
Postmaster-General, I have the honor to acknowledge 
your letter of the 6th inst., which will receive his at¬ 
tention on his return, in about a week. 

Respectfully yours, 

Coker Clarkson, Private Secretary. 
Jas. a. McKenna, E.sq., Postmaster, Long Island 

City, N. Y. 

Elijah Ratnour, former postmaster, of 

Weeping Water, Neb., wrote to the assistant 
postmaster-general, asking the cause of his 
removal, of which he had not been informed. 
The following is sent to us by him as a copy 
of the answer received : 

Yours of Nov. 23,1889, received, asking the cause of 
your removal. When your successor receives his 
commission, turn the office over to him without fur¬ 
ther notice. Yours truly, 

J. S. Clarkson, First Assistant P. G. 

Mr. Butler, his successor, informs us that 
the causes assigned for Mr. Ratnour’s removal 
“ are on file with the President.” 

Jacob Van Riper was postmaster at Ruther¬ 
ford, N. J. He was removed, and wrote to the 
President asking what charges, if any, had 
been preferred against him. The receipt of 
his letter was acknowledged by the President’s 
private secretary on July 10, 1889, and he was 
informed that it had been referred to the post¬ 
master-general. He obtained no further in¬ 
formation as to the cause of his removal. 

Henry S. Farnum was removed from the 
post-office at Uxbridge, Mass., on November 
20, 1889, as he understood, upon the report of 
Inspector Stoddard, and his successor, Crysis 
T. Scott, was appointed by recommendation of 
Congressman Walker. Judge A. A. Putnam 


wrote to the postmaster-general as follows: 
“ I do very respectfully request of the depart¬ 
ment that Mr. Farnum be permitted to know’ 
for what specific cause or causes his removal 
from office was recommended, and, to the end 
that justice be done him, and the state of facts 
bearing upon the matter of his removal be 
made apparent to the people of this town, he 
should be permitted to meet whatever charges 
may have been made impugning his integrity 
or competency.” No information was fur¬ 
nished. 

D. W. Pratt, postmaster at Farmington, Me., 
removed Dec. 18, 1889, writes: “I wrote the 
Postmaster-General last December, asking him 
what law I had violated. He acknowledged 
the receipt of my letter, but has never an¬ 
swered it.” 

Harry C. Evans was removed as postmaster 
at Bloomfield, la., and when Congressman 
Walter J. Hays inquired on his behalf the 
reasons for the removal, an answer is returned 
of which Mr. Evans sends us the following 
copy: 

Post-offtce Department, 

Office of the First Assistant Postmaster-General, 
Washington, D. C., Feb. 3,1890. 

My Dear Sir— In response to your letter of Janu¬ 
ary 30, asking to be advised “wbat, if any, charges 
were made against H. C. Evans, late postmaster at 
Bloomfield, la., as basis of his removal,” I would say 
that the change was made on statements of reliable 
people in Bloomfield for the improvement of the pos¬ 
tal service. It seemed a pretty clear case; and I 
would be glad to send you the statements, except that 
they were made by private citizens and in a confidential 
manner. The fact that Mr. A. H. Fortune, previous 
postmaster in the same city, was removed by Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland before the expiration of his term, no 
doubt had something to do with the eagerness of the 
republicans in Bloomfield to replace Mr. Evans with 
a republican postmaster. I know personally the per¬ 
sons making the complaints, and was satisfied of the 
truth of their statements; and I presume it was large¬ 
ly on my a.ssurance as to the sufficiency of these 
statements that the almost invariable rule adopted 
by the present administration of sending an inspec¬ 
tor to verify such statements was not followed in this 
case. Very truly yours, 

J. S. Clarkson, F. A. Postmaster-General. 

Hon. Walter I. Hayes, M. C., Washington, D. C. 

A. H. W. Carpenter, postmaster at New Bed¬ 
ford, Mass., addressed to the postmaster-gen¬ 
eral the following letter: 

New Bedford, Mass., April 26,1889. 

Sir— Having learned through Mr L. Le B. Holmes 
that I have been removed from the office of postmas¬ 
ter upon charges of incompetency and inefficiency, 
made by Pay Director Gilbeit E. Thornton, United 
States Navy, and indorsed by Hon. Charles 8. Ran¬ 
dall, and realizing that there is no just ground for 
such a charge, I would most respectfully ask that the 
post-office department make a thorough investiga¬ 
tion of the ca.se, that I may have an opportunity to 
exonerate myself. Very respectfully, 

A. W. Carpenter. 

Hon. Jno. Wanamaker, P. M. G., Washington, D. C. 

But he failed to obtain this opportunity. 
He writes to your committee as follows in re¬ 
spect to his knowledge of the cause of his 
removal: 

One day Mr. Gilbert E. Thornton, pay director in 
the navy, called at the post-office and demanded 
that his letters should be given to him as soon as the 
mail arrived in the morning, i. e., that the mail 
should be gone through with, and his letters given 
to him before the other patrons of the office were 
served. Now the morning mail brings to this office 















176 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


from two thousand to four thousand letters daily, 
and 1 have known it to go as high as fifty-five hun- 
.dred. 

There are usually'from fifty to sixty people in the 
lobby upon the arrival of the morning mail, waiting 
for their letters to be boxed. I told Mr. Thornton I 
could not go through the mail and select his letters 
before serving the rest of the patrons, but that as 
soon as the mail reached the office it would he dis¬ 
tributed as quickly as it was possible to do it, and 
that then he should have his mail. 

Mr. L. LeB. Holmes, of the law firm of Stetson 
& Green, of this city, called upon the postmaster- 
general, who told him I was removed upon charges 
of Incompetency preferred by an officer of the navy, 
indorsed by Charles S. Randall, representative in 
congress from this district. He declined to let Mr. 
Holmes see the charges, but I learned afterwards 
that the charge made by Mr. Thornton was Ineffl* 
ciency in not handling his mail properly when he 
was in New Bedford, the same being government 
business. I know of no other charges that were 
brought against me. 

Mr. L. Le B. Holmes who was a member of the re¬ 
publican city committee of New Bedford, wrote as 
follows to the postmaster-general in rekpect to his re¬ 
refusal to investigate this removal: “ The investi¬ 

gation asked for would have fully shown all that I 
represented to you, and the groundlessness of the 
charges against Mr. Carpenter. 

Yet the investigation requested was not granted, 
obviously because the department did not regard it 
important to ascertain the truth or falsity of the 
charges upon which it had removed Mr. Carpenter. 

As a republican who has witnessed the whole trans. 
action, I ought to and do feel humiliated. It is a rev¬ 
elation as to the conduct of the administration of my 
own party. 

Its platform and the letter of acceptance of Presi¬ 
dent Harrison distinctly promised that should not 
be done which I have seen done here with my own 
eyes. Nor is that even fairly stating it. Not only 
has an honest and efficient public otficer been dis¬ 
missed from the service on a charge of incompetcncy 
but he has been turned out of office under a cloud, 
and denied even the opportunity of proving the 
utter falsity of such a charge. 

If this is the spirit of civil service reform, civil 
service reform should be denounced by all honest 
men. The old way of removing an official because 
he was not of our party was more honest and de¬ 
cent. 

A letter addressed to the new postmaster, 
and answered by him, failed to elicit any 
other or different statement of the facts con¬ 
cerning this removal. 

William H. Greenhow, removed from the 
office of postmaster at Hornellsville, N. Y., ad¬ 
dressed the post-office department on the 3d of 
December, 1889, asking if any charges had 
been filed against his management of the office. 
He received the following answer: 

Washington, D. C., Dec. 0,1889. 

Sir— Yours of the 3d inst. relative to charges against 
the management of the post-office at Hornellsville, 
Steuben county, N. Y., and requesting a copy of 
same, has been received and placed upon the files of 
this office. In reply, I beg to inform you that it is 
not the custom of the department to furnish post 
masters with copies of charges against them, except 
in cases provided by section 25, page 727, of the “Offi¬ 
cial Postal Guide” for 1889. 

Very respectfully, J. S. Clarkson, 

F. A. Postmaster General. 

[The section referred to is found among “Sugges¬ 
tions to the Public on Postal Subjects,” and contains 
the following: “Copies of papers on the files of the 
department will not be furnished on the application 
of individuals, except in cases where a suit is com 
menced and pending, involving the substance of the 
paper or document itself, and then only on the cer 
tificate of counsel showing that such papers or 
documents are material as evidence in the tiial or 
preparation for trial of the cause, and stating wherein 
such materiality consists, with such other proof of 
materiality as may be required by the postmaster- 
general.”] 


It will thus be seen that by the rules of the 
department, as interpreted by Mr. Clarkson, 
no copies of charges can be furnished to the 
men whose removal is contemplated or per¬ 
haps already made. 

The following letter is from the postmaster- 
general in regard to the cause of the removal 
of Mr. Langham as postmaster at Hawley: 

Office of the Postmastek-Genf.ual, \ 
Washington, D. C., Feb. 1, 1890. j 

Sir—I n reply to your letter of the 29th ultimo, I 
have to advise you that, according to the best in¬ 
formation received at the department, a change in 
the office of postmaster at Hawley, Pa., was made in 
the interest of better mail service. 

Very respectfully, 

John Wanamaker, Postmaster General. 

Mr. P. j. Langham, Hawley, Pa. 

James DeLaney was removed as postmaster 
at Orlando, Fla.; and if any charges were 
made against his administration, he was una¬ 
ble to find out what they were. His successor, 
Mr. Ingram Fletcher, writes: “ There were 
charges preferred against Mr. DeLaney by 
certain republicans; but what they were I 
know not, as I never saw them. Mr. Charles 
E. Ferguson and I believe in civil service re¬ 
form; and, feeling like most every other citi¬ 
zen, that Mr. DeLaney had made an efficient 
officer, we asked that he be retained until his 
time expired, unless he had violated some 
postal law. Mr. Ferguson asked to see the 
charges, but they were not shown to him.” 

Mr. H. E. Bundy was removed from the 
post-office at Oneonta, N. Y., no notice being 
given to him of any charges preferred, and he 
knew of none until his removal from office. 

Mr. George E. Bachelder, the post office in¬ 
spector, who had inspected his office only a 
few weeks before the removal, writes to him 
a letter of which he sends us the following 
copy: 

Post-Office Department, 'i 
Office of Post-Office Inspector, J- 
Albany, N. Y.,. June 2, 1889. J 
Mr. H. E. Bundy, Oneonta, N. F.: 

Friend Bundy—I am surprised that there is a 
change in postmaster at your post-office. Supposed 
you would stay as long as any one differing from the 
present administration. 

You have my best wishes for success In whatever 
you venture, as I am sure, from the executive ability 
shown by you in the management of the post-office, 
you are entitled to success in any business that you 
undertake. Yours respectfully, 

George E. Bachelder, P. O. I. 

The tendency of political intrigues for ap¬ 
pointments and removals to perpetuate them¬ 
selves can not be better illustrated than by the 
case of the post-office at Wyoming, Ill. In 
this case the incumbent was removed, and no 
cause assigned, so far as he knew. This fact 
being communicated to Augustus G. Ham¬ 
mond, his successor, Mr. Hammond answers 
that the cause was the manner in which Mr. 
Thomas secured his own appointment, being 
the result of a political intrigue. Now, if 
this proceeding is to be used in like manner 
against Mr. Hammond upon the next change 
of administration, it is pretty evident that the 
removals upon charges and counter-charges 
could go on indefinitely, and this quite with¬ 
out reference to the fact whether the officehad 
been administered efficiently or not. 

Mr. J. H. Middleton, former postmaster at 


West Hoboken, N. J., slates that no cause was 
assigned for his removal: 

My successor was asked to make a charge, but an¬ 
swered, no charge could be made against me, as I 
ran the office to the satisfaction of the people. 

To this his successor, Julius Klumpp, an¬ 
swered : 

I did not use my influence to have the said gentle¬ 
man removed, or was asked to prefer charges, or that 
I .said no charges could be made, as he ran the effice 
to the .satisfaction of the people. How could I say 
such a thing? Because we are aware, and the good 
book says, mankind is not infallible, consequently 
charges could always be made if required. 

Your committee can not too strongly ex¬ 
press its reprobation of the continuance of 
this system of removals upon secret charges 
by unknown accusers without opportunity for 
defence, explanation, or denial. It is inqui¬ 
sitional in its character, and totally incon¬ 
sistent with republican institutions and with 
our present civilization. It encourages false¬ 
hood and slander, which are thus protected by 
the veil of official secrecy, and the confi.scation 
of the office for the benefit of the informer com¬ 
pletes the injustice. No efficient civil service 
can be procured until such a system is utterly 
overthrown. It leads to the appointment of the 
men who are the most unfit to carry on the 
business of the government, the slanderer and 
maligner receiving the place as a reward for 
his evil doings. This system could easily be 
abolished if the inspector or the department, 
previous to the removal, should be required 
to acquaint the officer accused with the nature 
of the charge against him and hear what he 
had to say. If such a vast number of re¬ 
movals were not made for purely political 
reasons, this .would not be by any means an 
impossible or even a difficult task. It is only 
because the energies of the department and of 
the inspectors are exhausted in an improper and 
immoral effort to turn men out without cause 
for political reasons that they might find it 
difficult to give the necessary time to an in¬ 
vestigation of charges, where publicity would 
be some guarantee that they were honestly 
made. 

It would be just as absurd to expect a judge 
to decide a case properly when he heard nothing 
but the plaintiff’s statement as to expect remov¬ 
als to be properly made under such a system as 
this. Your committee is of the opinion that 
there is no evil in the spoils system as in¬ 
herently wicked as this, whereby both the 
livelihood and reputation of innocent men 
are liable to be overthrown by secret and false 
accusations. 

In connection with these removals upon 
secret charges, it may be well to recall the ex¬ 
pressions made by Mr. Harrison in the senate 
upon this subject in his speech of March 26, 
1886, as reported in the Gongressionat, Record, 
vol. 7, No. 3, page 2,790, et seq. In reference 
to executive nominations then pending in the 
senate, he said: 

Let me say now that, if the prompt and just 
demand which was made in many cases by 
the incumbentsof theseoffices, when they were 
suspended under charges, to be advised of the 
character of those charges and to have an op- 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


177 


portuuity, however little it might influence the 
mind of the executive, to place on file their 
ample refutation of the slanders and lies that 
had crept into the departments against them— 
if that dei* and had been allowed, 1 must be¬ 
lieve that most of the cases that are held up 
before the senate would have been withdrawn 
or have gone through. . . . 

In many of these cases it leaked out in the 
community where the officer resided that 
charges had been filed against him. Some 
base fellows had been used for that unholy 
office, and, being advised that charges had 
been sent, the appeal was made to heads of the 
different departments, and, I believe, in many 
cases to the President himself, to be advised of 
the character of the charges made. . . . Here 
was an accusation, a hearing, a sentence and 
an execution without the accused being ad¬ 
vised of the character of the charges against 
him. . . . 

What is it these people ask? An honorable 
discharge after honorable service. That is all. 
They ask that they may go out of the offices, 
to the duties of which they have devoted them¬ 
selves with conscientious fidelity, with an hon¬ 
orable discharge. . . . 

As I shall show presently, democratic news¬ 
papers and many democratic congressmen do 
not approve of the policy that stimulates and 
invites charges against the characters of men 
and women and hides these charges from the 
light of day. That is the issue; and, great as 
the constitutional questions involved here 
may be, it is practically a greater question 
whether tlis government in its civil service 
shall be administered as in the Star Chamber, 
where accusations may be lodged and heard 
and decided without the knowledge of the man 
whose interests are to be affected and whose 
character is to be blackened. . . .Will you 
unite here in support of a proposition which 
denies to a republican removed knowledge of 
the charges filed against him in a public de¬ 
partment of this government? . . . My col¬ 
league (Mr. Voorhees) arraigned the senate 
because, he said, we were condemning the 
attorney-general unheard. . . . What does he 
think, then, of these trials that have been go¬ 
ing on from day to day in the secrecy of the 
postmaster-general’s office, with closed doors? 
These charges, by the thousand, are piled upon 
his table, and he assorts them over, and, with¬ 
out letting the persons accused know or have 
any intimation that they are accused at all, 
he deprives them of office and, so far as such 
judgment can, of their good reputation. . . . 

My colleague said yesterday that the first 
feeling of the masses was for fair play. . . . 
Does he think this is fair play? In every 
Anglo-Saxon heart, and especially in the 
western heart, among the frontiersmen, who 
always believed in a fair fight, there is that 
imbedded sense of justice and fair play which 
resents and denounces these nnfair methods. 

Mr. Harrison quotes with approval the fol¬ 
lowing extract from the Freeman, an inde 
pendent paper at Indianapolis : 

A place is wanted for a camp-follower. Of 
course, it must be forthcoming. But Vilas 
has said that no one will be removed unless 
charges be preferred. So some conviet or gut- 
ter-.snipe is hired to blacken the character of 
the man who is unfortunate enough to hold 
the coveted place. When he is bounced, he 
tries to find out what is the reason for it; and 
he is told that he can not be allowed to see the 
charges or to be faced by his accuser. He 
goes out under a cloud of suspicion. We say 
this is outrageous. It is one of the fundamen¬ 
tal rules of Anglo-Saxon liberty that every 
man shall be entitled to a fair trial. And 
this swearing away the character of American 
citizens can not be apologized for by the warm¬ 
est friend of the administration. 


Mr. Harrison then refers to the case of the 
postmaster at Shelbyville, as follows: 

Last summer he was suspended from office. 
It was understood through the town that some 
charges had been presented against him. The 
men who made them did not disclose them¬ 
selves, and he could gather at home no inti¬ 
mation as to their character. Whether they 
affected his personal integrity, whether they 
charged a mal-administration of the office, or 
whether he was simply charged with being a 
republican, he could not tell. He sat down 
and addressed the postmaster-general a letter, 
asking, in the most respectful way, to be ad¬ 
vised of the character of the charges against 
him. He got no answer. Need I add that? 
Who did get an answer? Failing to get an 
answer from the postmaster-general, he ad¬ 
dressed me this letter [here Mr. Harrison 
quotes the letter, asking for a copy of the 
charges preferred against him, and says]: Up¬ 
on that letter I wrote, on the 9th day of July, 
1885, this indorsement: “Respectfully re¬ 
ferred to the Honorable Postmaster-General. 
I hope you will not deny the request of Mr. 
Bone to be advised of the character of any 
charges filed against him, and to have an op¬ 
portunity to meet them. The slip he encloses 
from the democratic newspaper shows how 
good an ofiBcer he has made; and his good 
civil record, with a long, gallant service in 
the war for the union, entitles him, I think, to 
a favorable consideration of his request,” and 
adds : Not only this soldier’s appeal to know', 
but my appeal in his behalf, went unanswered 
from the post-office, and remain unanswered to 
this day. I want to know if there is a demo¬ 
cratic senator here who approves of that sort 
of treatment of a citizen. I w'ant to know if 
there is one who, much more, approves of that 
sort of treatment of a man who for four years 
fought for his country in the hour of its press¬ 
ing danger. If the democratic party means to 
unite upon this issue and in defense of these 
practices, then I welcome the issue. 

Mr. Harrison then cites the case of Isabelle 
Dela Hunt, somewhat similar in character, as 
well as a number of others, and says: 

I do lift up a hearty prayer that we may never 
have a President who will not pursue and compel 
his cabinet officers to pursue a civil service policy 
pure and simple upon a Just basis, allowing men 
accused to be heard, and deciding against them 
only upon competent proof and fairly, either 
have that kind of a civil service, or, for God’s 
sake let us have that other frank and bold, if 
brutal, method of turning men and women out 
simply for political opinion. Let us have one 
or the other. They will not mingle. It was 
the conflict of these currents—the President 
on one side, endeavoring to be responsive to 
his self-imposed pledges, and the pressure of 
his party on the other—that has driven those 
who were at the heads of the departments, in 
the attempt to preserve and maintain the Pres¬ 
ident’s professions and at the same time to 
give to the hungry who were demanding to be 
fed,—it was an attempt to reconcile the irre¬ 
concilable that has brought this wretched 
condition of things in which men and women 
are condemned without a hearing. Let us 
have one or the other, pure and simple. 

It seems incredible that the administration 
of the man who uttered these words should 
perpetuate this system of removals upon secret 
charges. Yet such is the fact. 

Your committee concur most heartily with 
the expressions quoted above. They furnish 
the best standard of criticism possible of the 
system of removals which is still practiced in 
the post-office department. It can never be 
unjust to the President to judge him by his 


own standard of duty, by his own conceptions 
of justice and fair play. The fittest condem¬ 
nation of his own acts is found in his own 
words. Nor will it do to shift the responsibil¬ 
ity from the chief executive to the heads of 
these departments. Mr. Harrison has told us 
why it can not be so evaded : “ I do lift up a 
hearty prayer that we may never have a Pres¬ 
ident who will not either pursue or compel his 
cabinet officers to pursue a civil service policy 
pure and simple, . . . or,” etc. It is not the 
postmaster-general and his first assistant who, 
in the last analysis, is responsible. It is the 
President, who appointed Wanamaker and 
Clarkson, and who permitted these things to 
be. Respectfully submitted, 

Wm. Dudley Foulke, Chairman. 

Chas. J. Bonaparte. 

Richard H. Dana. 

Wayne MacVeagh. 

Sherman S. Rogers. 

THE CAUSE. 

The President will do well to heed a 
staunch republican paper like the Minneapolis 
Journal, which warns him thus : 

“ The President appears to have been captured by 
the looting element from the time he got comforta¬ 
bly seated in the white house. His appointees for 
postmaster-general and assistant-postmaster were 
extremely hostile to the reform, and they have ig¬ 
nored the law and defled it ever since they went 
into office. The administration has made a com¬ 
plete failure of itself so far as the civil service reform 
pledges are concerned. This failure is to be deeply 
regretted. Every such failure hurts the republican 
party. It has declared for civil service reform. It 
must place an administration in power which is 
brave enough to execute that reform.” 

In 1888 the people of the United States 
trusted us with their political power. Now, 
the first power was the power to appoint post¬ 
masters and all the various officers of this 
great government of ours; and that power, 
instead of being a strength to any party, is a 
weakness to any party, and upon that basis 
nearly all the public men who fall in public 
life by the w'ayside fall by the exercise of pat¬ 
ronage. I say to you now, if I had the power 
I would not allow a member of congress to 
recommend any man for any office whatever. 
I would take from your political agents all 
the power that is vested in them by custom— 
not by law; I would take from them all that 
power, and I would not even allow a member 
of congress to recommend postmasters, because 
it is an element of weakness; it weakens the 
member of the house and senate, and it makes 
a cause of constant trouble and quarrel, and 
I think the time will soon come, and the re¬ 
publican party will be the agent in that great 
reform, when a law will be passed separating 
entirely the appointing power from the law¬ 
making power.— Senator Sherman at Pittsburgh, 
October, 1S90, 

Mr. Leonidas F. Houk, of Tennessee, is one 
of the most aggressive republican opponents 
of reform in the civil service, and in the de¬ 
bate of last winter upon the appropriation for 
the commission, he made one of the most ve- 









178 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


hement speeches in denunciation of the re¬ 
formed system. He held in substance that the 
entire public service should be regarded as the 
lawful plunder of the victorious party. 

Mr. Houck’s majority two years ago was 
more than 13,000. This year he has been re¬ 
elected by about 5,000 majority, and in re¬ 
sponse to the question, what had cause! the 
republican disaster, he said that it was not 
the McKinley bill, which was “ an element of 
strength instead of weakness,” and is the kind 
of bill which the republican party will never 
abandon, nor was it the force bill, nor any¬ 
thing that congress has done, but, he said, ac¬ 
cording to the report, the defeat ‘‘ is princi¬ 
pally attributable to the matter of offices and 
dissatisfaction at the distribution of patron¬ 
age, a dissatisfaction that always follows a 
change of administration from one party to 
another.” 

Of course the dissatisfaction which defeats 
an administration party is within the party, 
not in the opposition party. Mr. Honk there¬ 
fore holds that it was republican disgust, not 
the repudiation of republican policy by the 
country, which led to defeat. His remark 
implies that if the administration, by its dis¬ 
tribution of spoils, had not disgusted republi¬ 
cans so that they angrily voted against them¬ 
selves, they would have carried the election. 
In other words, the effort to strengthen the 
party by spoils has overwhelmed it with the 
greatest dis.aster in its annals. There could 
not be a stronger argument for civil se.vice 
reform than this statement of a bitter enemy. 
— Harper’s Weekly, Nov. 22. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

Allotments thus acquired, mutually engaged such as 
accepted them to depend them; and as they alt sprang 
from the same right of conquest, no part could subsist 
independent of the whole; wherefore all givers as well as 
receivers were mutually boimd to defend each other's 
possessions. Every receiver of lands, or feuda¬ 

tory, was therefore bound when called upon by his bene¬ 
factor, or immediate lord of his feud or fee, to do atl in 
his power to defend him. Such benefactor or lord was 
likewise subordinate to and under the command of his 
immediate benefactor and superior; and so upwards to 
the prince or general himself; and the several lords were 
also reciprocally bound, in. their respective gradations, to 
protect the possessions they had given. Thus the feudal 
connection was established, a proper military subjection 
was naturally introduced and an army of feudatories 
was always ready enlisted and mutually prepared to mus¬ 
ter. . . —Blackstone. 

—A collector of internal revenue for the first 
New York district, which includes the city of 
Brooklyn, has always been known to exercise 
an enormous political influence. He is in a 
position to hold a rod of iron over the head of 
every liquor dealer or cigar manufacturer or 
retailer whom he may for any reason desire to 
injure. Through this influence the liquor 
dealers especially have been forced to contrib¬ 
ute both time and money to local politics. 

No w they are being forced to elect William 
C. Wallace to congress in the third district. 
Positive proof of this became public yesterday, 
together with a letter signed by Ernst Nathan, 
the United States internal revenue collector, 
copies of which had been sent to every liquor 
dealer and cigar manufacturer in town. Na¬ 
than is the man who recently showed himself 


to be the local republican “boss,” and in that 
capacity forced the renomination of Wallace 
for congress and dictated the nomination of 
every other candidate on the republican gen¬ 
eral ticket. 

During the past week it became evident 
that Mr. William J. Coombs, the democratic 
candidate for congress in the third district, 
was making a great fight. It has been known 
for several days that Nathan tried to get up 
a deal by which votes for Courtney should be 
given for votes for Wallace. This was re¬ 
fused, the democrats claiming that they could 
win without any trading. This led Nathan to 
resort to the influence of his office, and he had 
letters like the following printed : 

Brooklyn, Oct. 25.1890. 

Dear Sir— The Hon. William C. Wallace having 
been renominated for member of congress for the 
third district, comprising the seventh, thirteenth, 
nineteenth, twentieth, twenty-first and twenty-third 
wards, and being very much interested in his re- 
election, I would deem it a personal favor if you 
will interest yourself among your friends by advo¬ 
cating his election. Respectfully yours, 

Ernst Nathan. 

This was regarded as likely to be thrown 
into the waste basket, so two days later Nathan 
had the following official stamp placet! in the 
left-hand corner of each letter: 

“Ernst Nathan, Collector Internal Revenue. 
Oct. 27,1890. First District, Brooklyn, N. Y.” 

Then he sent these “ orders ”—for that’s the 
light in which they have been regarded by 
those who received them—to the liquor deal¬ 
ers and cigarmakers. One man who received 
the above took it to the managers of Mr. 
Coombs’s canvass and complained about being 
intimidated in such a manner. 

“This is nothing but intimidation,” he said, 
“ and it will force many men to vote for Wal¬ 
lace. This fellow, Nathan, could cause us 
much annoyance by hauling us up on every 
sligh infraction of the law. His deputies gave 
an example of what could be done recently 
when they extorted bribes from liquor dealers 
when the stamps on empty beer barrels were 
found to have been torn off. There are many 
other ways in which Nathan can put us to 
trouble and expense, and this circular means 
that he will do it if we vote against Wallace.” 

A Times reporter saw Collector Nathan yes¬ 
terday and obtained from him a confession 
that the above letter had been sent out; “but,” 
said Nathan, “I sent copies only to my per¬ 
sonal friends.” 

“ Then why was your official stamp placed 
in one corner two days after th,j letters were 
printed ?” 

“That was merely to identify the letter; to 
show where it came from. You see, some of 
the people might have forgotten me.” 

“ But did you not say the letters were sent 
only to personal friends and were intended to 
be from Ernst Nathan and not from the Uni¬ 
ted States collector of internal revenue?” 

“ Oh, certainly,” responded Nathan ; “but, 
you see, people may have forgotten me.” 

“Have you not many personal friends 
among liquor dealers and cigarmakers, Mr. 
Nathan ?” 

“ Yes. I am a manufacturer of cigars my¬ 
self.” 

“ Well, did not some of these circulars get 
to at least a few of those personal friends?” 

“ Perhaps they did,” was the reply, “ but I 
don’t know.”— Neio York Times, Nov. 2. 

—Mr. Samuel Stratton, who is president of 
the Union of State Republican Associations, 
announces that the associations each have a 
roster which shows every man, woman and 
child in the service in Washington.- It is the 
intention to send every republican voter home 
for election day, and to accept subscriptions 
for campaign purposes. The clubs, Mr. Strat¬ 


ton says, are picking up in membership very 
rapidly. He said : 

“During the Cleveland administration they 
got timid and left us, but are coming back in 
swarms now. At present the Illinois, Ohio, 
Kansas, Indiana, Michigan, Pennsylvania and 
New York people are well organized, and Con- 
nectient, Maryland, the Carolinas, Virginia, 
the District of Columbia and Tennessee are 
falling into line. We now have a total mem¬ 
bership of about fourteen hundred. During 
the Cleveland administration not a single one 
of these clubs kept up its organization. They 
were afraid to take an active part in politics, 
hut recent republican successes, and especially 
Reed’s boom, have entered their bones, and 
they now want to crawl under the canvas. 
The mugwumps, interlopers and half-breed 
fellows are bracing up and declaring them¬ 
selves.”— Boston Post, Sept. 16. 





—There is one office-holder in Washington B 
who believes thoroughly in the spoils system, f 
His name is Daniel Grosvenor. He is a broth- a 
er of the Ohio congressman who came out sec- S 
ond-best in a skirmish with Civil Service Com- B 
missioner Roosevelt a few months ago. He n 
held office in the treasury department under * 
former republican administrations, and when B 
President Cleveland came in he was allowed 9 
to remain; hut about three years ago he re- * ■ 
ceived his dismissal for a breach of discipline, » 
and practiced as an attorney till President 
Harrison was inaugurated, when he soon found 
his way back to his old place. 

Mr. Grosvenor is one of the most notable 
members of the Ohio republican association, 
and made a flamboyant speech at a private 
meeting the other evening, the gist of which 
has leaked into the local prints. When asked 
by your correspondent whether he had been 
correctly reported, he answered : 

“I have not seen the accounts, and, as I do 
not crave newspaper notoriety, I have certain¬ 
ly not authorized any of them.” 

“ You are represented as finding fault with 
the slow way in which the money has come in 
from the government employes for campaign 
purposes.” 

“ Well, I did say that. I have no hesitancy 
in stating anywhere that I am far from satis¬ 
fied with the rate at which campaign contri¬ 
butions have been offered. What else do they 
accuse me of ? ” 

“You are quoted as urging a more efficient 
method of collecting money from the clerks.” 

“ I am, eh? Well, I did say something of 
that sort, too. I remember saying that, in my 
opinion, any man who wouldn’t put up his 
money for the support of the party that gives 
him his bread and butter ought to be turned 
out of his place. And that is just exactly 
what I do think.” 

“ But there is a hint given of some plan you 
have devised whereby the civil service law 
can be evaded.” 

“Yes, I proposed such a plan, and there 
were plenty of those present who approved it. 

But some of them, toward the close of the 
meeting, got frightened and went back on the 
whole thing.” 

“And the details of your plan were-” 

“Ah, my friend, I am not giving them away 
to the enemy,” and Mr. Grosvenor chuckled. 
“No, sir, it may be adopted yet, so you 
needn’t try to get me to expose it.' I’ll .simply 
say that it is a very good one and ought to 
have been taken up. ' Is there anything else ? 

No? Good-day.” 

From other sources it is learned that Gros- 
venor’s plan was to have every clerk notified 
by the state association to call at the city post- 
office and get a letter which he would find ad¬ 
dressed to him there. The letter would be, of 
course, the dunning circular from his club. It 
is held by Grosvenor that the post-office is not 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


179 


a “ government office ” in the sense intended 
by the law against soliciting political sub¬ 
scriptions, and hence that no prosecution could 
follow such a device. The question at once 
suggests itself, why it would not be a more di¬ 
rect and easy process to send the circular to 
each clerk at his residence, where the law 
could not reach it? The answer is, that in 
case of recent changes of residence, or owing 
to some other hindrance, the circulars might 
go astray. If a clerk is notified personally at 
his desk by an officer of his club that a letter 
is in the post-office for him,and he does not call 
for it, that “spots” him at once as “disloyal.” 
If he does call for it and does not respond 
with a gift of cash, he goes upon the black 
list unless he can give a satisfactory explana¬ 
tion. 

Samuel R. Strattan, the “ high-cockalorum ” 
of the state republican clubs in Washington, 
is out in an interview this morning in which 
he says of the clerks who are going home to 
vote: “ I issued at least 100 certificates to day 
to clerks who wished to avail themselves of 
the half-fare rates. The railroads at first 
wanted to limit the tickets to four days before 
and four days after the election. This, how¬ 
ever, would not have allowed the clerks to go 
home and work for the party before election 
day. So a larger limit was fixed. Quite a 
number of the department clerks and officials 
have already gone home, and are making 
speeches for the party. R. 2'heophilus, assistant 
disbursing officer of the house, who is a Welshman, 
has gone to talk republicanism to the Welsh people 
in Representative Bayne’s district. C. W. Filer, 
chief of the war and navy division in the pension 
office, and secretary of the Connecticut republican as¬ 
sociation, is making good use of his leave by helping 
the republicans in his state. A number of govern¬ 
ment printing office employes have gone home to talk 
and vote. I shall leave on Saturday, and am already 
booked for speeches in Pennsylvania towns.” 

Strattan has a clerkship at the capitol, 
and is on the pay-roll of congress.— Dispatch 
to New York Evening Post, Oct. 23. 

—The control of this matter, according to 
the Washington Post, is under the direction of 
Samuel R. Stratton, president of the “ union 
of republican state associations.” Mr. Strat¬ 
ton is a federal office-holder from Pennsyl¬ 
vania. He is described in an interview to day 
as being enthusiastic over the prospects of re¬ 
publican success. He said : 

“ The outloole is good so far as we people In Wash¬ 
ington are concerned, and remember now that I 
speak for the organizations within the radius of our 
union of state republican associations. There was 
never greater activity and energy put forth in getting 
every qualified voter home for the November elec¬ 
tion.” 

“Have you lists prepared from your own state of 
the voters employed in the various departments, 
and are the state organizations similarly provided ?’’ 

“ Yes, we have a roster showing every man,woman 
and child from the state of Pennsylvania employed 
in the government service. To-night this roster 
will be overhauled, and the faithful will be checked 
with a blue mark. The doubtful men and pretenders, 
and the fellows who hide behind the civil service will be 
checked in red. ’ ’ 

“ The unfaithful will be known ?” 

Kvery man. He will be marked. I ought not 
to give this away, but there are a few of our people 
who have lost their legal residence in the states, who 
have been formed into a sort of vigilance committee 
to keep watch on the stragglers and report them 
after election.” 

“Are all the associations on the alert in this par¬ 
ticular? ” 

“ So far as I know, no guilty man will be allowed 
to escape, and the appointing power of the government 
will be obliged to take cognizance of this report after the 
election is over." 

This, in other words, is a brutally frank 


admission that government employes who do 
not contribute both their time and money to 
the interests of the republican party will be 
reported to the appointing power in the differ¬ 
ent departments with a view to securing their 
dismissal. The “ bosses ” estimate that of the 
employes who will thus be dragooned into 
going borne, 600 belong to New York, 200 to 
Massachusetts, 1,500 to Maryland, 200 to In¬ 
diana, GOO to Pennsylvania, 30 to Wisconsin, 
80 to Ohio, 150 to Illinois, 70 to Connecticut, 
50 to Micliigan, 80 to North Carolina, 30 to 
Iowa, 500 to Virginia, 100 to New Hamp.shire, 
30 to Delaware, 30 to Rhode Island, and 30 to 
Kansa— Boston Post, Oct. 20. 

—When Representative Willard Howland 
of Chelsea, was conducting a campaign for the 
nomination as secretary of the commonwealth 
on the republican ticket, one of his newspaper 
organs charged that the custom house was 
backing Colonel William M. Olin, and beyond 
that claimed that custom house influence was 
attempting to control the policy of the party 
in the state as in years past under republican 
administrations. Officials in the custom house 
are certainly engaging in politics this year as 
they never did under Collector Saltonstall 
during the administration of President Cleve¬ 
land. Upon the stump for the republican 
tickets in the state this fall have been heard 
Collector Alanson W. Beard and Deputy Col¬ 
lector John L. Swift, while Inspector of Cus¬ 
toms Edward Fitzwilliams has given a large 
part of his time since the campaign opened to 
speaking at rallies throughout the state. Upon 
the list of republican speakers displayed at 
the republican state committee headquarters 
on School street, there also appears the name of 
Special Agent of the Treasury Department 
Charles H. Litchman. Naval Officer Frank 
D. Currier, of New Hampshire, is secretary of 
the republican state committee of that state 
and is now on the stump there. He is very 
little at the naval office owing to the press of 
campaign work. Internal Revenue Collector 
Frank E. Orcutt has taken a lively interest in 
the present compaign, with Melrose politics 
especially, and was in the state convention. 
Dr. E. G. Frothingham, of Haverhill, is ex 
aminer of drugs at the custom house and also 
chairman of the republican city committee of 
Haverhill. At a republican rally there last 
week he called the meeting to order, and is 
doing very active work in the politics of his 
city and state. Two other active politicians 
are Messenger Flanagan, of the collector’s de¬ 
partment, and Night Inspector J. J. McCarthy. 
Both of these men are taking an active part 
in the politics of their localities, and the 
former is said to be absent from his post a 
large share of the time. “ Under President 
Cleveland,” said a custom house official last 
night, “not a federal officer in Massachusetts 
went on the stump. More than that, no fed¬ 
eral officers took any part in politics, except 
to vote as they thought right, and no influence 
was brought to bear to cause them to vote. 
To-day every United States official in the state 
of republican proclivities is being used for po¬ 
litical purposes to the neglect of official duties. 
Under Collector Saltonstall some of the offi¬ 
cers asked permission to take part in politics, 
but he declined to give it. He circulated the 
order of President Cleveland prohibiting fed¬ 
eral officials from taking part in politics, 
through all the divisions, and the clerks read 
it and indorsed it on the back as having read 
it. Consequently the printed copies of the 
order contained the signatures of all the men, 
so that they could not, if brought to task for 
going into politics other than to vote, plead 
that they did not know about the order. There 
was never any cause for complaint against 
anybody, however, on the score of violating 
Mr. Cleveland’s order.”— Boston Post, Nov. S. 


—The Republican can not support the claims 
of Joseph G. Cannon this year, because they are 
adverse to the best interests of the republican 
party in the district. Jir. Cannon is the candi¬ 
date this year, not by the free and untrammeled voice 
of the republican party of the district, but by the 
crafty manipulation of a well organized factional 
Cannon machine, which has controlled the nomina¬ 
ting conventions of the district for more than a dozt n 
years past. 

This factional machine is fostered by a per¬ 
petual district committee, selected biennially 
by delegates picked, usually, by the commit¬ 
teeman himself in his county convention. 
Chas. P. Hitch, whose federal office-holding 
under the influence of Mr. Cannon makes him, 
except for voting purposes, a non-resident of 
the district, is now, and has for the past ten 
years, been the committeeman from Edgar 
county; Postmaster Weaver rej)resents Coles; 
ex-Postinaster Wright, Cliampaigii; Post- 
office Inspector Dice, Vermillion, and L. L. 
Parker, Douglas county. These constitute the 
present committee. Thus this committee is, 
and has been, selfishly Cannonized for years. 
Republicans who do not favor the life-term 
policy of Mr. Cannon have not a representa¬ 
tive or a friend in this committee. Why are 
non-officeholding republicans studiously kept 
off' the congressional committee? Nor is this 
kind of selection of committeemen confined to 
the congressional committee. It runs on 
through to the smallest committee. Every¬ 
thing is Cannonized in the fifteenth district. 
Every aspirant for any office, little or big, is 
closely scrutinized by machine bosses, and un¬ 
less he willingly subscribes fealty to the fac¬ 
tional machine, he is a marked subject and os¬ 
tracised at once and in every way. —Paris [///.] 
Republican on Congressman Cannon. 

—Jo. Cannon accounts for the opposition of 
some half dozen republican papers in his dis¬ 
trict by declaring that the editors are disap¬ 
pointed aspirants for post-offices.— Rockford 
[111.] Register, Oct. 24. 

■—The Ohio men who hold office in Wash¬ 
ington are the latest sufferers from the repub¬ 
lican campaign assessments. Each clerk and 
government employe from Ohio received to¬ 
day a notice from the executive commit¬ 
tee of the republican state committee that 
William Mayse had been authorized to re¬ 
ceive subscriptions from Ohio men, and that 
as the committee was in need of money, it 
was expected that the contributions would 
be liberal. Mr. Mayse, who is a note broker 
of Ninth street, is treasurer of the Ohio state 
association. 

The notice informs the clerks that Mayse 
will keep, for the state committee, a complete 
record of their contributions, a copy of which 
will be furnished to the association. It was, 
of course, unnecessary to tell the clerks what 
use would be made of this record. They un¬ 
derstood perfectly well that it is a threat to 
punish any one who fails to appear upon it as 
a contributor.— Dispatch to New York Times, 
Oct. 20. 

—The men who are managing William 
Kramer’s campaign for sheriff were disturbed 
yesterday by a well authenticated rumor to 
the effect that Nathan [internal revenue 
collector] and Nichols were preparing to 
sell out their man in the wards compris¬ 
ing the third congressional district in or¬ 
der to save Wallace. This story has been 
circulated among democrats for several days, 
but it was not until yesterday that the Kramer 
people put any faith in it. Then they started 
an investigation, which, it is said, opened 
their eyes. They learne<l of several instances 
of trading on the part of republicans, and 
then hurried to Nathan with their proofs. He 
denied all knowledge of such a thing, and 










180 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


said it would be the height of folly to knife 
the only German on the republican ticket. 
He promised to investigate the matter and put 
a stop to all deals. Kramer, according to his 
managers, is not going to sit down and put en¬ 
tire faith in Nathan’s promise.— New York 
Times, Oct. 29. 

—The republicans at this end of the state 
have been crying to Blaine, and he would not 
hear them. A special messenger was sent to 
Chicago in the person of Revenue Collector 
Warmcastle, to plead with the secretary of state 
to make one speech in Pittsburgh.— Pittsburgh 
Dispatch to New York Times, Oct. 29. 

—Internal Revenue Commissioner John W. 
Mason thought he would assist in the defeat 
of Representative Wm. L. Wilson, of West 
Virginia. 'Mr. M. F. Hall is a prominent re¬ 
publican in Mr. Wilson’s district, and the edi¬ 
tor of the Phillippi Republican. Mr. .J. E. 
Hall is a well-known democrat of Phillippi, 
and a warm friend of Mr. Wilson. Commis¬ 
sioner Mason thought he could give the re¬ 
publican editor a “pointer or two ” for use 
agaiust Wilson, and wrote about it to Mr. 
Hall. Unfortunately, however, Mr. Mason 
addressed his letter to Mr. J. E. Hall, instead 
of Mr. M. F. Hall, and now his little scheme 
to injure Mr. Wilson in the second district is 
expose!.— Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, Oct. 29. 

—One of the two battle grounds in the state 
is the sixth, or what is known locally as the 
Newark district. The administration pressure 
that forced Lehlbach into retirement bred 
heart-burnings and disagreements and so dis¬ 
affected the German element that it was be¬ 
lieved that the district could not be saved 
again to the republicans. They gave the nom¬ 
ination Mr. Lehlbach was not permitted to have 
to Elias M. Condit. The Times has heretofore 
told of the contest between Gen. Sewell and 
the Essex republicans over the distribution of 
the federal patronage. One of the bitterest of 
recent struggles was over the revenue collect- 
orship. The Newark republicans wanted a 
Newark man appointed because he was to 
succeed a Newark man, and because it is in 
Newark that most of the revenue of the dis¬ 
trict is collected. Gen. Sewell induced Presi¬ 
dent Harrison to give the place to an ex sen- 
ator from the Hunterdon wilderness. There 
was another breech between them and Sewell 
over the United States district attorneyship, 
and the Newark reput)licans were discomfited 
again. Then Judge Fort wanted to be solic¬ 
itor general, and he failed to get it. Wayne 
Parker wanted two or three things. He re¬ 
ceived in place of them an offer of something 
he did not want.— New Jersey Dispatch to New 
York Times, Oct. 6. 

—One of the most active of the republican 
managers in the work of raising money from 
government clerks and employes during the 
campaign just closed, was the notorious W. W. 
Dudley, of “ blocks of five ” fame. His latest 
effort in that line was in the interest of repub¬ 
lican candidates here and there, who needed 
“boodle” in their districts. Dudley’s plan was 
simple enough. In the ca.se of a South Caro¬ 
lina candidate, for example, he wrote a per¬ 
sonal letter to the clerks from that state, say¬ 
ing that he had himself subscribed $100 for 
use in Mr. Blank’s district, and calling upon 
the clerks to give liberally to help the repub¬ 
licans to win. Dudley was careful to send 
letters to the house addre.ssesof the clerks, and 
so keep himself just outside of the penalties of 
the civil service law, which forbids any im¬ 
portuning of clerks for political contributions 
in their offices. If Dudley really contributed 
$100 to the campaign fund of each of the can¬ 
didates for whom he has asked money from 
others, he will have a snug little bill of ex¬ 


penses for the republican congressional com¬ 
mittee to foot.— Washington Dispatch to Netv 
York Times, Nm'. 4. 

—The arrangement now is for President Har¬ 
rison to leave Washington for this city Sun¬ 
day night. He will arrive here Monday night j 
and return to Washington Tuesday afternoon 
or night. Attorney-General Miller and Pri¬ 
vate Secretary Halford will accompany the 
President. With the exception of the Presi¬ 
dent, Mr. Miller and Mr. Halford, nearly all 
the Indianapolis men holding government 
|)ositions at Washington are here to vote. 
Several came in last evening, among them the Presi- 
dends barber.—Indianapolis Netvs, Nov. 1. 

—According to the officers of the various 
state associations, who have been very active in 
the work of driving voters home, not less than 
5,000 government employes will be absent 
from their posts next Tuesday for the purpose 
of voting in their respective congressional dis¬ 
tricts.. — Washington Dispatch to Netv York 
Times, Oct. 29. 

—Congressman Sherman, of New York, se¬ 
cured appointment of country postmasters by the 
score, but in the majority of cases he thereby 
provoked lasting enmities. It appears to have 
been his ambition to build up a personal ma¬ 
chine as an annex to the “ gang,” and, as is 
usual in such cases, the unworthy received 
his favor. But the climax came a year ago. 
The whole county of Oneida was intensely ex¬ 
cited over the impending struggle for the dis¬ 
trict attorneyship. The “ gang,” which is 
largely reinforced by gamblers and other law¬ 
breakers, set out to capture the office of public 
prosecutor. Sherman threw his whole influence 
for one Van Auken, who had been a tool of the 
‘flang.” By means of his postmasters and other 
official retainers he was enabled to control the county 
convention and nominate Van Auken. The bet¬ 
ter element of the party fought Van Auken 
in the convention, where much bad blood was 
displayed. Their candidate was .losiah Perry, 
an able and reputable lawyer. Then followed 
one of the most exciting contests in the his¬ 
tory of this storm center of state politics. The 
democrats renominated district attorney Thos. 
S. Jones, who was the mortal enemy of the 
“gang.” The result was that Sherman’s can¬ 
didate was snowed under by 2,300 plurality in 
a county that had given Harrison 1,932.— 
Rome\N. K.! Dispatch to New York Times, Oc¬ 
tober IS. 

—When the new ballot law left the hands of 
of the governor, the employes in the several 
state departments breathed easy. They felt 
that it exempted them from further political 
assessment. This belief was strengthened 
when it was learned that there was to be no 
contest over the court of appeals judgeship. 
When the 1st of October had passed and no 
notification had been given of any assessment, 
the clerks and others felt certain that they 
were to escape. Then, without warning, noti¬ 
fication was given the employes in nearly all 
the departments that an assessment of 2^4 per 
cent, on yearly salaries was needed imme¬ 
diately. 

The order was reluctantly obeyed, but there 
was no dodging it, and portions of the month’s 
salaries were assigned over to Controller Wem- 
ple and State Treasurer Danforth. Clerks 
were assessed $30 to $40, and orderlies and 
messengers $10 to $15. The corruption fund 
amounted to several thousand dollars.— Dis¬ 
patch from Albany to New York Times, Oct. 17, 

.—Headquarters of the Central Repub¬ 
lican Executive Committee, Dr. M. Ur- 
wiTZ, Secretary, Houston, Tex.: Fellow-Re¬ 
publicans —Our patience is exhausted, and 
we can not any longer endure the shame, dis¬ 
grace and humiliation brought upon the re¬ 


publicans in Texas by the audacity, arrogance, 
corruption and treacheiw of the negro leaders 
and their followers. They have taken fwcible 
possession of our primaries and ruled our conven¬ 
tions with relentless tyranny, and have driven 
many of the best and most patriotic white re¬ 
publicans out of the party ranks. They have 
demoralized and disorganized the republican 
party of our state. They have laughed de¬ 
cency to scorn and branded patriotism with 
ignomy. They have bartered their citizen¬ 
ship away in open market and have sold their 
votes to the highest bidder at every election. 
Republicanism in Texas has become a stigma 
upon American citizenslii[), a reproach to our 
<;ivilization and a curse to our country.— Cir¬ 
cular Referring to Collector Cuney [ Galvesionl, St. 
Louis Republic, Sept. l7. 

THE REST OF THE PLATFORMS. 

We condemn it for its deliberate abandon¬ 
ment of civil service reform, for its use of cab¬ 
inet and other official positions to pay finan¬ 
cial campaign debts.— Michigan Slate Demo¬ 
cratic Platform, September, 1890. 


We again pledge the republican party in 
this state to the fullest sympathy with the let¬ 
ter and spirit of every reform which would pre¬ 
vent the bestowal of public offices to secure 
))olitical support, and trust that the principle 
of the civil service law will be extended 
throughout the post-office department, and 
that the president, under the authority already 
given him, will extend it wherever practica¬ 
ble. And we call upon our representatives in 
congress to support the civil service commis¬ 
sion by such appropriations as may be re¬ 
quired for its greatest efficiency. 

We congratulate the administration on its 
national civil service commission, which has 
executed and defended the civil service law 
with courage and vigor. The very successful 
application of the principles of that reform to 
the employment of laborers in the city of Bos¬ 
ton suggests a method of regulating the em¬ 
ployment of laborers in the navy yards and 
other public establishments, which would pre¬ 
vent all charges of suspicions of abuse, and we 
urge the consideration of this upon the Presi¬ 
dent and congress.— Massachusetts State Republi¬ 
can Platform, Sept., 1890. 


We condemn the administration for its 
open and defiant repudiation of the letter and 
the spirit of the civil service laws, for making 
wholesale removals and appointments for 
purely partisan purposes, and for permitting 
ihe active interference of federal officeholders 
in Massachusetts politics, an interference in 
striking contrast with the course of the hold¬ 
ers of the same offices under the democratic 
administration. —Massachusetts State Democratic 
Platform, Sept., 1890. 

We arraign the present republican ad¬ 
ministration, not only for its gross and willful 
violation of its pretensions in favor of civil 
service reform by the removal of competent 
and faithful officers before the expiration of 
their terms, but for the appointment to office 
of notoriously incompetent, disreputable and 
corrupt men, and for its reward of unscrupu¬ 
lous partisans because of their corrupt con¬ 
nection with the elections of 1888, in con¬ 
tributing large sums of money to poison 
tiie ballot and debauch electors. 

We denounce it for prostituting the census 
bureau to secure partisan information , to 
the neglect of a correct and complete cen¬ 
sus in all sections of the county. —Indiana 
Democratic Congressional Convention, Terre Haute, 
July 22. 













The civil service chronicle. 


IVe have still to convince them [the independent voters] that democracy means something more than mere management for party success 
and a partisan distribution of benefits after success. This can only be done by insisting that in the conduct of our party principles touching the 
public welfare shall be placed above spoils, and this is the sentiment of the masses of the democratic party to-day. — Ex-President Cleveland to 
Young Mens Democratic Club, Canton, Ohio, December, 1890. 


VoL. I, No. 22. 


INDIANAPOLIS, DECEMBER, 1890. 


TERMS:^ 


50 cents perannnm. 
5 cents per copy. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication oflice, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind., where subscriptions 
and advertisementswill be received. Address 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

_ Indianapolis, Indiana. 

3 

An organization in Washington calling itself 
the Indiana Republican Club, and apparently 
headed by one W. W. Curry, met December 0, 
and resolved that the exigencies of the hour 
call for the appointment of “tried and true 
republicans in place of democrats holding po¬ 
sitions outside of civil service scope.” The 
brazen quality of this resolution is almost be¬ 
yond comprehension. About everything in 
Indiana “outside of civil service scope” has 
been handed over, and throughout the country 
post-offices have been given to “ tried and true 
republicans” at the rate of over thirty thou¬ 
sand a year, and other offices at the same rate. 
The Washington special sending the above 
resolution to the Indianapolis Jowmct/of De¬ 
cember 8, also says: “ The President has stood 
by the party workers, and in a way that elicits 
the endorsement of all members of the jiarty 
here and wherever the conditions are known.” 
And yet, upon the heels of this, comes the 
worst defeat the republican party has ever 
known. 


The truth is, Washington clubs have be¬ 
come a source of dislike to the people. They 
are largely made up of office-holders, some of 
whom are forced in by the others who are the 
most offensive type of politicians. In addi¬ 
tion, there is a crowd, such as claim agents, 
whose business somehow goes better if their 
party is in office. Almost all are obscure per¬ 
sons. For instance, away from his neighbor¬ 
hood about all that is Known of W.W. Curry 
is that he is from somewhere in Indiana, and 
that he was one of those who, by the suffer¬ 
ance of President Harrison, were engaged in 
bleeding government employes just before the 
late election. The Indiana Republican Club 
has but one conviction upon the subject of its 
resolution, and that is that receiving a living 
off the government as spoil is a good thing 
and must be kept up, and the way to keep it 
up is to have as much of it as possible. 

This is all there is of it. This club could 
not change two hundred votes in Indiana. Its 
actions in campaigns impress the people as an 
attempt of a ring of office-holders and hangers 
on to control the state from Washington. The 
appearance here of the Ransdell-McFarland 
crowd from Washington before the late elec¬ 
tion affected the republican party adversely a 
hundred-fold more than it did favorably. 


These are not the times for office-holders to in¬ 
terfere in campaigns. When the time comes 
that they can write and speak and give money 
to a political cause without affecting their 
own tenure, they will do it from a belief in 
principles, and it will, within the fair limits 
of discussion and within the efficient perform¬ 
ance, of their duties, be a harmless and proper 
exercise of their rights as citizens. 

The system upon which labor is obtained 
liy this city is wasteful and extravagant. It is 
a system of personal and political favoritism ; 
and any public work of any kind which is 
done by the rule of favoritism is done at a 
needless expense. It is, besides, a corruptor 
of public morals, for it teaches laborers to 
rely, not upon their own merits as workmen 
and as citizens, but upon the power of a polit¬ 
ical Ho.s8. It is time that this species of boss 
government was done away with. The Boston 
labor system accomplishes this by providing 
registers upon which laborers, without regard 
to color, politics, religion, or political or per¬ 
sonal influence, may get their names in the 
order of application and in turn may get em¬ 
ployment. It is sufficient to say that crimi¬ 
nals and bad citizens can not get their names 
upon these registers. 

Chas. E. Vandever, a republican of Terre 
Haute, was appointed by President Cleveland 
agent of the Navajo Indians. There is the 
highest authority for saying that his record 
as agent was excellent. He was dismissed not 
long since and the Indian Rights Association, 
much disappointed by reason of its great sat¬ 
isfaction with Vandever’s work, tried to as¬ 
certain the cause. The department of the in¬ 
terior replied that “the department does not 
feel at liberty to disclose the contents of pri¬ 
vate files, whatever their nature.” It is not 
surprising that a secretary who has played a 
trick with the public service should sneak be¬ 
hind the shelter that the evidence of his trick 
is“ private files.” It is not aside the mark to 
say that Vandever was dismissed because some 
party boss wanted his place for a henchman. 
This proceeding is in line with Secretary No¬ 
ble’s career. 

“Gene” Higgins appears to have lost some of that 
serenity for which he was well known as a Demo¬ 
cratic office-holder. He was here yesterday on a 
visit of some sort, and at a well-known saloon he fell 
in with another ex-office holder named Gallagher. 
An animated controversy that was begun in the sa¬ 
loon was continued with him on the sidew'alk, and 
finally led to a bout between Gallagher and Higgins, 
when Gallagher pressed Higgins hard and presently 
thumped him with so much vigor that “ Gene’s ” 
blood besprinkled the sidewalk. 


Spectators of the affray say that Higgins drew a 
glittering weapon after he was struck, but did not 
get a chance to defend himself with it, and that a 
companion named Lathrop, from California, when 
Higgins was knocked down, drew a preposterously 
large “gun” from his pocket, to the dismay of the 
throng that was studying the fighting qualities of 
Higgins and Gallagher. The controversy is under¬ 
stood to have been about an election matter.— 
Washington Dispatch to New York Times, Dec. 3. 

This is the henchman whom Senator Gor¬ 
man compelled President Cleveland to retain 
in office against the protest of respectable 
democrats, though the President knew per¬ 
fectly well that the scandal of his yielding to 
such compulsion would stain his whole ad¬ 
ministration. 

In the same manner President Harrison, as 
a resident of Indianapolis, must be entirely 
familiar with the history of McFarland, em¬ 
ployed in the government printing office, an 
appointment so disgraceful that the seasoned 
politicians even felt squeamish. It is in¬ 
stances like these that disclose the real char¬ 
acter of a government by feudal chiefs. Hig¬ 
gins and McFarland are obscure men of un¬ 
savory character. Such are likely to slip 
into public place, but why is it that a presi¬ 
dent can not, or does not, turn them into the 
street when decent people demand it? They 
are somebody’s henchmen, and no interference 
will be tolerated with the lowliest of their 
hirelings. 

The Indianapolis Journal of December 8, has 
a special from its Washington correspondent 
containing an interview with a man who, he 
says, is “ti republican representative from the 
west, and his name is a household word 
throughout a broad expanse of the country.” 
The representative said: 

“Don’t publish my name, but say to the world that 
in politics we find the ba.sest and most general in¬ 
gratitude to be encountered anywhere. I can respect 
the person who stands his neighbor up in the dark at 
night and robs him; he gains that which will bring 
him happiness. I can have patience with the one who 
kills his fellow; he has an excuse. But the man who 
accepts of his friend's assistance in a campaign and 
fails to appreciate it, or the civilian who gets a place 
at the hands of his congressman and then turns his 
back in indifference is worse than the thief or the 
murderer, for he has no excuse except ingratitude. 
I never was so much Impressed as in the recent cam¬ 
paign with the fact that only those who stand by 
their friends through thick and thin can ever suc¬ 
ceed. It is this ingratitude that upsets confidence 
and gives defeat. I did very much for some men in 
ray district who never stirred a peg in the recent con¬ 
test, and on the other hand I presume there are some 
of my constituents who think I am the most ungrate¬ 
ful man on earth. Public men have to keep on inti¬ 
mate terms with those who make them. If we let a 
little indifference arise we soon become separated. 
Men who are elected to office should never grow to 
believe they are better than their party or the 
fellows who helped them when they were in need of 




















182 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


friends most. There was a heap of ‘evening up’ in 
the recent contest, and the result is many heartaches 
on both sides of the issues.” 

The debauching influence of the spoils sys¬ 
tem is here proved in a most startling manner 
and by conclusive evidence. This congress¬ 
man who, like the great bulk of his fellows, 
has abandoned his constitutional duties or 
performs them but perfunctorily, and has be¬ 
come a divider of spoil, gives it as his moral 
condition that he has respect for a thief or a 
murderer, but that worse than these is the 
man who. has received an office through a 
usurpation by his congressman and then refuses 
to work for the latter’s re-election—in other 
words who refuses the feudal service which 
calls upon him politically '‘to plow the lord’s 
land, to make his hedge, or carry out his 
dung.” 


THE POLITICAL CENSUS. 


‘‘Some of those I recommended have turned out 
most miserable failures. When Mr. Conger was first 
appointed supervisor, a great many people knowing 
him and me to be intimate friends besieged me for 
recommendations as enumerators. After they had 
received their appointments, they bothered me for 
instructions, and now since they are at work and 
have found out they won’t get their money before 
the middle of July at the earliest, they have impor¬ 
tuned me to loan them money.” 

Is not the case in Indiana typical of the 
operation of the census bureau throughout the 
country ? The affirmative is the truthful an¬ 
swer to every one of these questions. It is no 
wonder that a census taken in such a manner 
should be doubted on every hand. The mis¬ 
chief is done and can never be rectified. The 
present duty is to see to it that those who with 
cool insolence in the face of protest used the 
census bureau as a political machine do not 
soon hear the last of it. The load is heavy, 
but they will have to carry it. 


were starved, and according to General How¬ 
ard hostilities were begun by white men. 
Doubtless the administration is proud of its 
military maneuvers and of its attempt to seize 
Sitting Bull under the guise of a parley, 
which attempt resulted in his being killed. 
Strange things sometimes stir up pride. Ilis 
killing was no better than murder—not on the 
part of the Indian police nor of the troops— 
but on the part of the administration. He 
was not a marauding and murdering Indian. 
He was trying to maintain the rights of his 
people, and he did it in the same spirit in 
which John Hampden refused to pay taxes. 
His death may cow the Indians for a time, 
but their wrongs will remain, and will cry 
out. The root of these wrongs is in the boss 
system, which at this most critical time, at the 
most critical points in the Indian country, 
such as the Pine Kidge and the Cheyenne 
River agencies, gives us new and inexperi¬ 
enced agents and other employes who know 
nothing of the Indians and how to deal with 
them. President Harrison could have stopped 
this long ago, but he apparently proposes to 
perpetuate the system by which, and by which 
alone, the government is and can be kept a 
cheat and a swindler for the benefit of politi¬ 
cal bosses and private greed. 

The Bloomington branch of the State Civil 
Service Reform Association has elected Prof. 
J. W. Jenks, of Indiana University, president, 
and C. M. Hubbard, of Indiana University 
secretary. It is the intention to have a public 
address again this year. The last one was 
given by Theodore Roosevelt. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

Allotments thus acquired, mutually engaged such as 
accepted them to defend them; and as they all sprang 
from the same right of conquest, no part could subsist 
independent of the whole; wherefore all givers as well as 
receivers were mutually bound to defend each other’s pos¬ 
sessions. *** Every receiver of lands, or feudatory, was 
therefore bound, when called upon by his benefactor, or 
immediate lord of his feud or fee, to do all in his power 
to defend him. Such benefactor or lord was likewise 
subordinate to and under the command of his immediate 
benefactor and superior; and so upwards to the p) ince 
or general himself; and the several lords were also recip¬ 
rocally bound, in their respective gradations, to protect 
the possessions they had given. Thus the feudal connec¬ 
tion was established, a proper military subjection was 
naturally inti oduced and an army of feudatories luas 
always ready enlisted and mutually prepared to muster. 
—Blackstone. 


—All that is left of the Kings county repub¬ 
lican general committee met last night in the 
Athenaeum, on Atlantic avenue, Brooklyn, and 
tried to ascertain what had happened. Frank¬ 
lin Woodruff presided and found all the dis¬ 
credited “bosses”—Israel F. Fischer, David A. 
Baldwin, Naval Officer Willis and William J. 
Buttling—in front of him. 

As soon as the meeting had been organized, 
Fischer, who has been running the navy yard pat¬ 
ronage since Harrison’s election, and who was 
mainly responsible for “Billy” Watson’s nom¬ 
ination in the twelfth assembly district, sent 
up a cry for reorganization. He had been 
talking to three or four friends, he said, and 
had about concluded that reform was neces¬ 
sary, whereat there was much derisive laugh¬ 
ter, the significance of which Fischer didn’t 


The Indianapolis Journal of December 8, has 
an editorial headed “ No Partisanism in the 
Census,” and quoting from Census Superintend¬ 
ent Porter’s late article in the North American 
Review to the same end. The quotation says^ 
“in no case have chiefs or experts been select¬ 
ed because of their political faith.” To this 
the Joitraal adds: “The supervisors were se¬ 
lected with reference to their fitness for the 
work, some of them being democrats, and the 
enumerators were appointed on the recommend¬ 
ation of the supervisors.” There is some sat¬ 
isfaction in seeing those who made spoil of the 
census bureau smart under criticism, and it is 
not surprising that they should be prone to 
forget the facts. Editorials and articles in 
reviews can not save them. It is not neces¬ 
sary to go out of Indiana to confound both Mr. 
Porter and the Journal. The Civil Service 
Chronicle for March and June, 1890, covers 
the ground. In recapitulation, did not Mr. 
Porter describe himself as “ waist-deep in con¬ 
gressmen ” after spoil? Was not every super¬ 
visor in Indiana a republican party worker? 
In the Terre Haute district did not the super¬ 
visor refer the appointment of enumerators to 
the chairmen of the several county committees 
of his district, and did not the Indianapolis 
Journal say: 

Mr. Wilson H. Soale, census supervisor for the Ter¬ 
re Haute district, has referred the appointment of 
census enumerators to the chairmen of the several 
county committees of his district, and these in turn 
are referring them to the chairmen of the different 
township committees. That seems a queer way of 
getting official subordinates to perform an important 
executive work. 

Who is Sid Conger, the supervisor of the 
Indianapolis district? Is he not a poultry 
raiser of Flat Rock, a smart republican poli¬ 
tician, and a defeated republican candidate 
for office? Did not Conger leave the choice of 
enumerators for (his city to Merrill Moores, 
who was in no manner connected with the pub¬ 
lic service, but who was a member of the repub¬ 
lican county committee and who is said on 
good authority to deal in slum politics? Did 
not Moores say in the Indianapolis Sentinel of 
June 19: » 


“A CENTURY OF DISHONOR.” 

The people of the United States have little 
to be proud of in their dealings with the Indi¬ 
ans, and (hey have much that will forever be 
a disgrace. We can boast of our physical 
greatness as a nation, but we are put to shame 
by the removal of the Cherokees from Geor¬ 
gia. We have succeeded in killing Sit¬ 
ting Bull, against whom there was a wide¬ 
spread animosity for causing the death of 
Custer; yet the battle which led to Custer’s 
death was brought on by a plain violation of 
a treaty by us. In its course with the Indians 
our government has from the beginning been 
a swindler and a promise-breaker. Sitting 
Bull knew us; he rated us at our true value 
and declined to be cajoled or swindled. If he 
and his men had lived in Canada under the 
honorable treatment of the Canadian govern¬ 
ment hostile acts would never have proceeded 
from them. 

Our treatment of the Indians has not been 
without protest from our side. The American 
people are not inhuman, and if we had not 
been ruled by bosses the wrong would long 
ago have been righted. Nor have efforts been 
lacking. President Grant called in philan¬ 
thropic people and a great show of ju.stice was 
made. But when contractors and Indian 
agents robbed. Grant refused to anger his party 
machine by removing the politicians who held 
the oflfices and his efforts came to nothing. 
The most powerful, systematic and beneficial 
attempt to help the Indians that has been 
made is that of the Indian Rights Association; 
and this attempt is handicapped and its noblest 
efforts repeatedly brought to nothing, for no 
reason but that party bosses must have places for 
henchmen. The most infamous practice is the 
latest and goes by the name of “home rule.” 
It means, for instance, “Dakota loot for Dako¬ 
ta looters.” Under this rule President Harri¬ 
son’s bosses worked until under inexperienced 
and worthless agents the griefs of the Indians 
broke out, not in hostilities,but in their form of 
protest. 

According to General Miles the Indians 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


183 


appear to appreciate at all. He went on to 
oiler a resolution for the appointment of a com¬ 
mittee of fifteen to consider the subject of a 
re-organization, and report in two weeks. 

Then Col. John Wesley Jones, the same who 
was bought off' by Congressman Wallace’s 
backers in the third congressional district, 
arose with a mass of printed resolutions in his 
hand. These documents consisted of demands 
on the part of some unknown “independent 
citizens’ and workingmen’s reform” for a whole 
lot of things. Internecine warfare must cease, 
said the resolutions, and there must be a re¬ 
enrollment of republicans all over the county. 
The general committee must be reorganized, 
reduced in numbers, and its members must be 
elected for one year only. Col. Jones also de¬ 
manded that no one be compelled to acknowl¬ 
edge a ward “boss,” and that in the future all 
dirty linen be washed in private and not 
handed over to the reporters for their inspec¬ 
tion. These were about all the reforms Col. 
Jones could think of. 

But Hugo Hirsch thought the proposed 
committee should have power to discipline as 
well as to re-organize, and he made a long 
speech denouncing republicans who had knifed 
their candidates. He referred to young Tim¬ 
othy L. Woodruff who had supported Mr. 
Boody for congress, and demanded that men 
like him be expelled. 

Then it was David A. Baldwin’s turn. He 
was disgusted, he said. He had been a wheel 
horse for thirty years and didn’t propose to do 
such work any more. 

“ We have too many bosses,” he cried, and 
the crowd yelled. “ We should have the power 
to discipline and bounce traitors.” 

Mr. Baldwin’s expressed opposition to doing 
any more wheel-horse duty led Chairman 
Woodruff to ask him if he would serve on this 
re-organization committee, and Baldwin said 
he would not. 

“ Perhape you would like to drive,” suggest¬ 
ed some one in a loud tone ; but Baldwin paid 
no attention to him. 

William H.N. Cadmus raised a cheer when 
he attacked Mr. Fischer’s committee of fifteen 
as a close corporation. It should consist of 
one member from each ward and town, Mr. 
Cadmus said, thirty in a)l, and then he went 
on to show how Mr. Fischer and his assembly 
district needed re-organization. His complaint 
was that Mr. Fischer and his pals in a ward 
that gave a democratic majority had forced 
Watson on the district, thereby throwing 
away one republican assemblyman and possi 
bly a United States senator. The crowd hoot¬ 
ed and yelled at Fischer, and the old faction 
feeling got so hot that several gentlemen in¬ 
duced Cadmus to sit down. His plea for a big 
committee had to be taken up, however, and 
it was made part of the original motion. 

“Billy” Buttling, one of the “boys” from 
the fifth ward, seized this opportunity of put¬ 
ting in a word for a straight out party ma¬ 
chine built on the lines of the democratic one. 

“ What’s the the use of re-organizing?” he 
asked, in ungrammatical but very forcible 
language. ''You will see the same old faces back 
here another year. What we want to do is to take 
care of the ward workers, the men that stand by us 
when we are out of power. Now, in 'my svard there 
‘were seventeen navy yard employes parading around 
on election day with democratic badges on their 
coats. There are 120 men from my tvard got jobs 
in the yard, and only thirty of them are'republicans. 
What sort of way is that to carry on business f The 
boys ain’t got no show at all. A re-organization 
of this committee won’t help them, but if we 
would give some of those who knife us the 
the grand bounce the boys would like it.”— 
New York Evening Post, Dec. 17. 


—The closing of Delamater’s bank, with 
$100,000 of state money and $45,000 of county 


money and $3,500 of school district money 
among its liabilities, comes at a critical mo¬ 
ment for the republican party of Pennsylvania. 
Among the causes of the failure the Tribune’s 
special from Pittsburgh mentions the heavy 
campaign expenses of the late candidate for 
governor thus; 

It is the current opinion here tliat Senator Dela¬ 
mater’s recent campaign for governor had not a little 
to do with his financial reverses. The canvass for 
the nomination lasted six months, and is known to 
have cost enormously, while alter the convention 
Mr. Delamater’s expenses were largely increased. 
He spent much money upon marching clubs and in 
aid of all manner of organizations, charitable and 
otherwise, paid a liberal sum to the state committee, 
and frequently answered the call lor funds where 
they were most needed to affect the election. Some 
politicians estimate that the fight cost the senator 
8150,000, but that is perhaps 850,000 too high.—iVew 
York Evening Post, Dec. 17. 

—A prominent republican office-holder stat¬ 
ed here last night that since he has held a 
government appointment, the period not cov¬ 
ering twelve months yet, he has paid three 
contributions for political purposes. Not only 
the government office-holders, but the judges 
and officers of the minor and municipal courts 
in the state, whose places will be affected by 
the results of next Tuesday’s state election, are 
being assessed, or, in the parlance of the hour 
in political circles, “asked to contribute” to 
the campaign fund. It is actually asserted 
that the common pleas court in New Haven, 
of which the chairman of the state central 
committee is the clerk, has been apportioned 
$1,000 for the political fund that is to be 
brought into service between now and election 
night. The common pleas courts throughout 
the state are presided over by republican 
judges and officered by republican workers. 
The judges of most of the municipal courts, 
whose successors must be appointed by the in¬ 
coming legislature, are dependent upon poli¬ 
tics for their retention on the bench.— Hartford 
Dispatch to New Yofrk Times, Oct. 28. 

—The President’s southern campaign,opened 
by the notorious Mizell,will be watched with 
interest here. There is proof that it is to be a 
thorough one. The place-holders and the 
place-hunters are to be organized everywhere 
for the control of state delegations to the next 
national convention. The President is to be 
lauded as the leader, who held on his way in 
spite of the discouragements of a disastrous 
defeat, and as battling more strongly than any 
other man in the party for the bill designed to 
bring the south again under national repub¬ 
lican control. Thatsortof talk, supplemented 
by material things in the shape of fat offices 
here and there, will, in the opinion of the 
President’s friends, soon make the whole re¬ 
publican south not only rise up and call him 
blessed, but wildly demand his renomination 
at the hands of the party at large.— New York 
World, December 15, 1890. 

—For collector of the port of Wilming¬ 
ton, N. C., the President nominated, by direc¬ 
tion of Congressman Cheatham, James H. 
Young, a negro. Young resides in Kaleigh. 
He attended a ward meeting there just befo're the 
late election, was elected a delegate to the county 
convention, and that tody made him secretary 
of the county committee and delegate to the repub¬ 
lican state convention. Notwithstanding all this, 
he went over to Wilmington and registered 
and voted at the late election. Kunnell, an¬ 
other negro, also wants the office, and his fac¬ 
tion, armed with the above facts, are making 
it lively for Young on the ground that he 
ought to be sent to prison—New York Times, 
December IS. 

—Politicians regard the trouble as but a 
natural outcome of the rivalry between the 
Platt and anti-Platt factions. Col. Erhardl 


[collector] is supposed to take care of the anti- 
Platt people, while Lyon [surveyor of the port] 
is expected, on a modified scale, to protect the 
Platt patriots, in which policy he enjoys the 
support of the federal administration. Col. 
Erhardt’s friends express the most exuberant 
admiration for his policy in making places for 
republican workers. In the nineteen months 
he has held the office he has made more re¬ 
movals than Collectors Hedden and Magone 
made in the four years of their occupancy. 
In the unclassified berths, which are exempt 
from civil service laws, not a democrat, his 
friends proudly boast, draws salary to-day.— 
New York Times, Dec. 17. 

—At a recent election a candidate failed to 
pay a cent of his assessment. He continually 
promised to pay and as persistently failed to 
do so. Finally, about four or five days before 
election the delinquent candidate received a 
communication from the state committee, 
which informed him that unless his assessment 
was paid at once, an accident would happen 
which would be of peculiar interest to him. 
The accident, it was intimated, would be that 
in some of the counties this candidate’s name 
would not appear upon the ballots. J'he as- 
.sessment was paid within forty-eight hours.— 
Indianapolis News, Oct. 3. 

—The politicians are wondering why Quar- 
terman Arthur Boyle of the navy yard is not 
removed. He is a per diem man, but he was 
away for two days last week electioneering for 
Congressman Wallace, and did not report for 
duty on either occasion. He did not answer 
the roll-call as others have to do.— New York 
Times, Oct. 5. 

—Senators Quay and Cameron conferred 
with state party leaders at the Continental 
Hotel in Philadelphia, December 12. They 
were anxious to strengthen the lines of battle. 
The internal revenue collector, David Martin, was 
the first one summoned, and the three had a 
private conference. Three others were sum¬ 
moned. It was argued that nothing should 
be done which would lead to the belief that 
bossism was still rampant. It was also agreed 
that the houses of the state legislature should 
be allowed to choose their own officers.— From 
Philadelphia Dispatch New York Times, Dec. 13. 

—And the party is likewise the aforesaid post¬ 
master, at the present writing. He has the 
credit of wielding a tremendous influence in 
his capacity of professor general of local poli¬ 
tics.— Richmond, Ind., Sunday Register [iJep.] on 
Richmond’s Postmaster-Editor, Nov 23. 

—From away up in the Adirondack region 
comes a New York republican assemblyman 
who says of the election that “that census did 
the business; for every one of the enumerators 
appointed in each census district, ten workers 
were disappointed and resolved to get even 
with the local boss who had control of the appoint¬ 
ments, wherever the census officials were lo¬ 
cated there was a center of discord and a 
horde of disappointed republicans.”— Spring- 
field Republican, Nov. 28. 

TAMMANY HALL. 

A Quasi-Feudalism Without the Romance 
or Courtesy or Honor of Feudalism. 

Tammany Hall has begun its annual levy 
of campaign assessments. Within a week ev¬ 
ery police captain who desires to avoid con¬ 
flict with the “powers that be” will have sub¬ 
scribed $25; every police sergeant and rounds- 












184 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


man $15, and every police patrolman $10. 
Foremen of fire department companies will 
have paid $25 each if they desire to retain 
their places, assistant foremen $15 each, and 
firemen and truckmen $10 each. The clerks 
and other helpers in the various departments 
of the city government will have paid various 
sums from $5 up, according to the amount of 
their annual salaries. Heads of departments 
will not be exempt from the levy. It is said 
that no one is exempt from the Tammany cam¬ 
paign levies save the “Big Four” and a chosen 
few of the district leaders .—New York Evening 
Post, Oct. IS. 


Our estimated table of Tammany “ assess¬ 
ments,” as enlarged by yesterday’s filed state¬ 
ments of candidates’ expenditures, reads as 


follows: . 

Mayor. 8-1,000 

District attorney. 4,000 

SheriflF. 4,000 

County clerk. 5,000 

Comptroller. 2,500 

President of the board of aldermen. 2,000 

Superior court judge. 10,000 

City court judge, two candidates. 8,000 

Coroner (not yet filed). 2,000 

Civil justices, two candidates. 4,000 

Congressmen, six candidates. 6,000 

Assemblymen, twenty-four candidates. 7,500 

Aldermen, twenty-four candidates. 3,500 


Total.862,500 


The price which judge McAdampaid for the 
superior court nomination emphasizi:s the well- 
known fact that Tammany has for years ob¬ 
tained a higher price for its judicial nomina¬ 
tions than for almost any other within its con¬ 
trol. The long term and the high salary which 
pertain to the more important judge.ships are 
considered sufficient reason for this. It has 
happened frequently in the past that as much 
as $25,000 has been paid for a superior or su¬ 
preme court nomination.— Nev) York Evening 
Post, Nov. 14- 


The importance to Bourke Cockran of May¬ 
or Grant’s re-election can scarcely be overes¬ 
timated. Nobody except himself knows how 
many sources of income he has because of his 
“ pull” with the mayor, but everybody knows 
they are numerous and valuable. It came out 
during the investigation of the bherifi'’s office, 
for example, that each of the thirteen deputy 
sheriffs had to pay $35 a month out of his pay 
of about $3,000 a year to Cockran as a “ re¬ 
taining fee” for Cockran’s services in advising 
him about the levying of blackmail. Cock¬ 
ran’s income from this source alone was, there¬ 
fore, about $6,000 a year. It has since been 
shown that he had one of his relatives put on 
the pay roll in the register’s office, with little 
to do and a salary of $1,300 a year, though he 
had been in this country only two months, 
and never had been naturalized. These two 
revelations were mere accidental glimpses of 
the almost countless streams which flow in 
more or less circuitous channels between the 
city treasury and the pockets of the custos.— 
New York Evening Post, Nov. 1. 


“I am not surprised that a man like Grant 
can be elected mayor of New York when there 
are people in the city who would make an al¬ 
derman of ‘Jake’ Kunzenmann,” said a resi¬ 
dent of the fourteenth assembly district to a 
reporter for The Evening Post last evening. 
Kunzenmann is the fellow described in The 
Evening Post .some days ago as the leader of the 
Voorhis democracy in the fourteenth, whose 
influence in behalf of that Tammany auxiliary 
was secured, as is alleged, by giving him the 
privilege of naming five policemen, whose ap¬ 
pointment was to be secured (so he said) by 
Mr. Voorhis, the police commissioner. Knn- 


zenmann boasted that every “ cop,” which is 
the slang name for a policeman, was worth 
$100 or $150 to him. 

“ Kunzenmann,” continued the fourteenth 
district man, “ran for alderman as an inde¬ 
pendent democrat, and was elected. Of course 
the decent people were up in arms against him, 
and every eflbrt was made to prevent his elec¬ 
tion. No pains were spared to recall to the 
people’s minds that he was one of the worst 
men this city had ever sent to Albany. One 
document that was liberally distributed was a 
circular showing that while a member of the 
assembly he had accepted bribes from both 
sides in the gas bill controversy, and that he 
had afterwards admitted it. This circular did 
not seem to bother Kunzenmann at all, but on 
the contrary seemed to please him. He went 
so far as to have 1,500 copies of it printed and 
distributed through the district. I asked him 
why he had done that, and he replied: 

‘“Why, it makes me solid with the people. 
That’s the kind of a man they like .’”—New 
York Post, Nov. S. 


Mayor Grant this morning, in fulfilment of 
two political bargains, appointed I’atrick 
(commonly called “ Baddy”) Divver, a rum- 
seller, and the Tammany leader in the second 
assembly district, and John J. Ryan, an un- 
deriaker in the fourth assembly district, po¬ 
lice justices. We quote irom The Evening 
Post’s “New Tammany Pamphlet:” 

“Patrick Divver, commonly called ‘Paddy,’ 
is the Tammany leader in the second assem¬ 
bly district. He is the keeper of a sailor’s 
boarding-house, and is the proprietor, or has 
interests in, several liquor saloons. He is an 
ex-member of the board of aldermen, a race¬ 
track frequenter, and the friend and confidant 
of gamblers. He is on terms of intimacy with 
‘Johnny’ Matthews and ‘Jake’ Shipsey, two 
members of the sporting and gambling fra¬ 
ternity, whose particular methods of gaining 
a livelihood are not unknown to the frequent¬ 
ers of Paddy Divver’s and other rum shops on 
Park Row, where they are generally to be 
found.” 

Up to within a few months of the late elec 
tion Divver was known to be at odds with the 
mayor, presumably because the mayor would 
not make him an excise commissioner, and 
the presumption was generally accepted to be 
correct. Divver and his friends were threat¬ 
ening all kinds of vengeful acts, the most seri¬ 
ous of which was to “bolt” from the Tam 
many organization and carry the whole 
Tammany committee in the second assembly 
district with them. That alarmed the mayor 
and the other members of the “ big four,” and 
they at once set to work to make their peace 
with Divver. Just before the election Divver 
“fell into line” for Grant, and it was rumored 
that he took an active part in making Tam¬ 
many’s peace with the gambling fraternity, in 
which he has many friends. It was then said 
that Divver had been promised a police jus¬ 
ticeship. This story was denied at the time, 
but it now turns out to have been true. 

After making the appointments this morn¬ 
ing, the mayor gave out the usual statement 
that they had been made at the recommenda¬ 
tion of a number of good tax payers. Div¬ 
ver’s appointment was said to have been recom¬ 
mended by fifty citizens, among whom re¬ 
corder Smyth and J. Edward Simmons were 
mentioned .—New York Evening Post, Dec. 17. 

Mayor Grant to-day made public some of a 
large number of written indorsements, which 
he received, of the candidacy of Patrick Div¬ 
ver, Tammany rumseller, for the police jus¬ 
ticeship. Here are some of them: 

J. Edward Simmons, president of the Fourth 
National Bank—I am informed that Mr. P. 
Divver is a candidate for the appointment of 


police justice. I have known Mr. Divver for 
many years and it gives me pleasure to com¬ 
mend him to your favorable consideration. I 
think he will discharge the duties of the office 
in an acceptable and efficient manner. 

F. B. Thurber—I take pleasure in indorsing 
the recommendation of Hon. Patrick Divver 
for the position of police justice. Mr. Divver 
has an intimate acquaintance with the masses 
of the people, and possesses their confidence in 
a remarkable degree. This is not a position 
that requires an intimate knowledge of the 
general law, but simply a knowledge of the 
laws which apply to the administration of the 
police department and the administration of 
criminal justice. I believe he would make an 
excellent police justice. 

David ^IcCIure—During the years that I 
have known Mr. Divver he has been a reputa¬ 
ble gentleman, and has merited universal re¬ 
spect. 

Recorder Frederick Smyth—I have known 
Mr. Divver personally for many years and be¬ 
lieve him to be in every way well qualified to 
discharge the duties of the office to which he 
desires to be appointed. My long experience 
as a judge of the court of general sessions of 
this city convinces me of the propriety of plac¬ 
ing men in the office of police justice of integ¬ 
rity, good common sense, and who are familiar 
with the peculiar population of which the city 
is made up. 

State Senator William L. Brown (Tam.)— 
He (Mr. Divver) has a kindly heart, a quality 
much needed in the discharge of the functions 
of a police justice. I am sure his appointment 
would meet with general approval from your 
friends, of whom I am not among the least or 
unconcerned. 

Joseph J. O’Donohue—There is nothing that 
has given me more pleasure during my entire 
business life than to recommend as one of the 
police justices Pat Divver. I have known him 
personally for many years, and could not say 
enough for him. I know him to be honest 
and, in my opinion, fully capable to fill the 
position .—New York Evening Post, Dec. 18. 

The mayor's choice of Divver for police jus¬ 
tice is universally condemned by the press of 
the city. The Herald says: “He is (he tough¬ 
est kind of raw material to make a police jus¬ 
tice of. * * « Tlie interests of New York 
be hanged. His honor has all he can do to 
look after the interests of Tammany.” The 
Tribune says: “Here is a vulgar, illiterate gin- 
mill keeper, by his very profession a breeder 
of vice and a maker of criminals, as ignorant 
of the law as a kangaroo, whose saloons are 
the hanging-out places of gamblers and sharp¬ 
ers, elevated to the bench of that court where¬ 
in all the virtue and charity and wisdom of 
which man is capable would often be severely 
tested. Could anything be more shameful or 
more disgusting?” The World, which sup¬ 
ported mayor Grant for re-election, says: 
“These appointments are unfit to be made. 
Divver is a saloon keeper, a politician of a 
small and unworthy sort, an ex-alderman,and 
the friend and associate of men of defective 
reputation.” Even the Sun does not venture 
to commend Divver’s appointment, which 
shows that it must be a shockingly bad one.— 
Neiv York Times, Dec. IS. 


THE CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION. 

The seventh report of the federal civil ser¬ 
vice commission, covering the year from July 
1, 1889, has appeared under date of November 
20. It effectively devotes a large share of space 
to evasion and violation of the law under the 
power of removal. The tables of changes made 
in certain offices do not permit a comparison of 
removals in the classified service between cor- 




























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


185 


i-esponding years under Cleveland and Harri 
son, as has been claimed in some quarters 
They do, however, show conclusively, that in 
the departments at Washington there has been, 
since the law went in force, but little disposi. 
tion to remove those who obtained places un¬ 
der it, the average of such removals being in 
the first year of an administration, the time of 
the greatest temptation, only eight per cent. 
This proves that a man who has obtained hig 
place in open competition has a moral power 
that beats back the hungriest office-seekers. 

The tables fearlessly place the spoils system 
and the merit system side by side. We copy 
the percentage'of removals per annum under 
both systems in thirteen post-offices during the 

first months of President Harrison’s adminis¬ 
tration : 

Classified Unclassified 

Service. Service. 



Months. 

Per Cent. 

Per Cent. 

Indianapolis, Ind... 

12 

14 

75 

Denver, Colo. 

12 

19 

50 

New York, N. Y. 

12 

8 

... 

Jersey Citv, N. J. 

12 

19 

48 

Chicago, Ill. 

12 

7 

70 

Milwaukee, Wis. 

10 

3 

48 

Philadelphia, Pa. 

8 

11 

28 

Newark, N. J. 

9 

7 

68 

Syracuse, N. Y. 

7 . 

28 

90 

Albany, N. Y. 

8 

28 

90 

Pittsburgh, Pa. 

5 

22 

90 

Kansas City, Mo. 

7 

8 

50 

New Haven, Conn.. 

5 

15 

50 


Of these figures the commission pertinently 
says; 

Taking the first table given above and comparing 
the percentages of removals in the classified service 
in each post-office with the number of removals made 
in the unclassified and excepted places, the differ¬ 
ence is astonishing. In one case the percentage 
ranges from 3 to 28; in the other, from 46 to over 
90; and the average is about seven times as great 
among those employ es not protected by the law as it 
is among those who are protected by the law. It 
would be difficult to advance any argument which 
would show more conclusively the good effect that 
the law has in preventing in the classified service 
clean sweeps and removals for political purposes. 
The interests of the public service demand changes 
to the extent of only 10 or 15 per cent, among those 
who have entered through the examinations, 
whereas 50 or 80 per cent, of those who have not thus 
entered are removed during the year succeeding any 
change of administration. The conclusion is irresist¬ 
ible either that where the law does not apply ap¬ 
pointing officers put into excepted and unclassified 
places incompetent persons, or else that their sue" 
cessors remove from these places men who are com¬ 
petent, arid who are therefore removed for reasons 
unconnected with the good of the service. These 
figures show either that, outside of the classified ser. 
vice, poorer grades of appointments are made, or else 
that there are large numbers of removals of perfectly 
good men who are sacrificed simply for party or per 
sonal considerations. Probably both of these con¬ 
clusions would be just. 

It may be added that this comparison holds 
good, almost without an exception, throughout 
the federal service. 

The report shows that during the year the 
commission examined 22,956 persons, of whom 
13,811 passed. There were appointed during 
the year, from the eligible lists, 5,415 persons, 
the proportion of appointees being about one 
to two and a half. The spoils system makes a 
poor show next to these figures. President 


Harrison could give only one out of thirty- 
five the office of collector of customs of this 
city. Mr. Blaine said there were more than 
5,000 applications for 200 consulships, so that 
if all the places were filled only one in twenty- 
five could be appointed. Recently there were 
fifty applicants for a janitorship in the court¬ 
house of this county. In the first year of 
President Cleveland and of President Harrison 
there were more than 100 applicants for each 
place in Washington that could be vacated as 
spoil, and these applicants, in droves, trav¬ 
eled hundreds of miles to Washington, and 
at their own expense for days and weeks 
ranged from the dearest down to the cheap¬ 
est board, and at last came home humil¬ 
iated and penniless. The number of appli¬ 
cants for each bit of spoil and the amount 
of bitter quarreling over it, if known to the 
public, would be the most astonishing and 
humiliating fact connected with our civil 
government. On the other hand, the com¬ 
petitors under the merit system go to a con¬ 
venient point for examination and then return 
home. If an appointment follows, the ap¬ 
pointee is beholden to no one, and he may en¬ 
ter upon his duties his own man. If he gets 
no appointment he has not humiliated him¬ 
self. 

It it proper to close these remarks by ask¬ 
ing Mr. Wanamaker what, in the light of this 
report, becomes of the suggestion of his present 
private secretary on his behalf that the com¬ 
mission had, more than a year ago, examined 
enough persons to fill appointments for ten 
years, and were open to the charge of simply 
providing themselves with employment by 
holding'further examinations? To the ordinary 
mind it would seem that fairness and decency 
call for an apology from Mr. Wanamaker, and 
a confession that both himself and his secre¬ 
tary were wholly ignorant of the workings of 
the merit system, which they had with an as¬ 
surance bred solely in conceit, entered into a 
plot to discredit. 


EXTRACTS 

From the Reporc of the Civil Service Com¬ 
mission for the year ending July i, 1889. 

* 

From Julyl, 1889, to July 30, 1890, 3,751 applicants 
were examined for the departmental service at Wash¬ 
ington, of whom 2,117 passed and 1,634 failed to pass. 
For the customs service 3,552 were examined, 1,746 
passed and 1.806 failed; for the'postal service 11,190 
were examined, 6,801 passed and 4,389 failed to pass; 
for the railway mail service 4,463 were examined, 
3,129 passed and 1,334 failed to pass. The whole 
number examined for the four branches of the classi¬ 
fied service was 22,956, of whom 13,811 passed ana 
9,145 failed to pass. Compared with the previous 
year this shows an increase of 3,896 in the whole 
number examined, an increase of 1,833 in the whole 
number who passed, aud an increase of 2,063 in the 
whole number who failed to pass. The whole num¬ 
ber appointed in the year covered by this report is as 
follows: Departmental service, 534 ; custom service, 
375: postal service, 3,106; and railway mail service. 
1,400; total, 5,415; an increase of 1,634 over the pre¬ 
vious year. 

>.•« Ji» tic <C 

When President Arthur classified the departmental 
service it included, as above stated, some 6,000 per¬ 


sons. In his time 378 persons entered the service by 
examination. When President Cleveland came in he 
therefore found over 5,600 employes in the depart¬ 
ments who had been appointed prior to the classifi¬ 
cation of the service, and less than 400 who had en¬ 
tered through the examinations. Under President 
Cleveland the'classified service was extended so as to 
take in somewhat less than 2,000 additional persons, 
and 1,109 entered through the examinations. De¬ 
ducting those who had been removed, there were at 
the beginning of the present administration in the 
classified service of about 8,000 people some 1,275 who 
had entered through the examinations, somewhat 
less than 2,000 who had been included in the classi¬ 
fied service during the administration of President 
Cleveland, and somewhat less than 5,000 of those 
who had been in the service originally when it was 
classified by President Arthur. Everyyear, of course, 
sees a greater proportion of persons in the service 
who have entered through the examinations, and 
every year, therefore, sees a greater proportion of the 
government clerks at Washington whose appoint¬ 
ments have been made wholly without regard to po¬ 
litical considerations. 

*■>*<■*!> i;c <1 

The commission takes this opportunity to reiterate, 
however, its belief that in all cases where a removal 
is made the appointing officer should give the ac¬ 
cused man a chance to be heard in his own defense, 
and should be required to file in writing a full state¬ 
ment of his reasons for making the removal, such 
statement to be made public if the accused so de¬ 
sires it. In the event of a very large number of re¬ 
movals being made in an office this fact should be 
considered presumptive evidence that they weie 
made for political reasons, and to overcome this pre¬ 
sumption the officer making them should be able to 
give specifically and in detail the reasons for each 
j-emoval made. 

The commission respectfully points out the need 
of legislation by congress which will give it com¬ 
plete control of the central board of examiners, and 
which will allow the payment of small sums to the 
local boards and their appointment from within or 
without the government service. There should be a 
board of twenty examiners at Washington, selected 
under the rules governing the classified service and 
under the control of the commission. These exam¬ 
iners would be able to mark all the papers in every 
examination, local or otherwise, and thus secure a 
perfectly uniform system of marking and prevent 
any suspicion of carelessness or bad faith on the part 
of the local boards. 

At present the central board at Washington con¬ 
sists nominally of ten men detailed from the vari¬ 
ous departments, and they thus owe a divided alle¬ 
giance to the commission and to the departments. 
Being lent to the commission, they are lost to the 
sight of the promoting power, and are often passed 
over in promotions in consequence, while the com¬ 
mission itself has, of course, no power to promote 
them. This works an injustice to the examiners 
themselves, and often makes the best among them 
unwilling to be detailed to the commission. More¬ 
over the commission is obliged to depend entirely 
upon the good will of the departments forfurni.shing 
the examiners. The departments are, of course, re¬ 
quired to do so by law, but there is no way of en¬ 
forcing the requisitions. Thus, during the last fiscal 
year, very nearly half of the commission’s work has 
been done for the post-office department, yet, until 
very recently, the post-office department has been 
represented on the central board by but one man, 
and the commission, therefore, had to take up the 
time of men detailed from other departments to do 
work not from the departments from which they 
were detailed, but for the post-office department 
from which no detailcould be obtained. Finally the 
commission was forced to notify the post-office de¬ 
partment that it would be impossible any longer to 
mark the railway mail papers unless an adequate 
force was detailed. Ten examiners in all are now 
detailed. It would cause no increase of expenditure 
at all to have these examiners estimated for as em¬ 
ployes of the civil service commission instead of as 
employes of the different departments from which 























186 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


they come. This would put them completely under 
control of the commission. 

This transfer could be made at once in the appro¬ 
priation bill, and it would c^iuse no increased ex¬ 
pense whatever. But there should also be ten addi¬ 
tional clerks at an average salary of SI,400 or 81,600 to 
do the work of marking papers now marked by the 
local boards. This would secure a much greater 
uniformity and accuracy in marking of the appli¬ 
cants for the local offices than can be obtained at 
present. A sum of say 86,000 is needed in order that 
the members of the local boards may be paid some¬ 
thing for their services, which even aside from mark¬ 
ing papers are often arduous and always responsible, 
and the law should permit these members to be ap¬ 
pointed from within or without the government 
service. The net increase of appropriation would be 
only some 821,04)0 by this arrangement, with the re¬ 
sult of very greatly increasing the efficiency of the 
commission. 

>:« s:s >:« 

The commission has fortunately been able to make 
an experiment of its theory that good would result 
from putting on the local boards men unconnected 
with the offices for which those boards conduct ex¬ 
aminations. and therefore free from all possibility 
of influence on the part of the local appointing offi¬ 
cer. In Indianapolis and Baltimore the commission 
found citiifens who were in the public service owing 
to their oonnection with the federal court or census 
bureau, but who had no connection with the local 
post-offices, and who were independent gentlemen 
of position and of high standing in the community. 
Messrs. Fishback and Butler, of Indianapolis, and 
Mr. Rose, of Baltimore, consented to .serve on the 
postal boards in their respective cities, Mr. Rose at 
the time being connected with the census bureau, 
and Messrs. Butler and Fishback, with the United 
States court. The presence on the boards of these 
gentlemen brought about excellent results in con¬ 
vincing outsiders that the workings of the boards 
were absolutely non-partisan, and beyond all sus¬ 
picion of improper influence. The commission al¬ 
ready had thorough confidence in the integrity of 
both the Indianapolis and the Baltimore boards, but 
recognizes the fact that every means should be taken 
to insure public confidence in the working of the 
system, and hailed the chance of putting on these 
boards men of high standing in their respective com¬ 
munities, who did not make their living in the gov¬ 
ernment service, and were entirely independent of 
government position. The result has been most sat¬ 
isfactory, and thanks are due Messrs. Fishback, But¬ 
ler and Rose for their disinterested public service. 

The most wholesome efTect has been produced in 
many offices and departments by the prosecution or 
removal of delinquents in accordance with sugges¬ 
tions made to the proper departments by the com¬ 
mission after the investigation of cases of alleged 
misconduct. In o'.her instances, where the law was 
being disregarded through mere ignorance, all that 
was necessary was to call the attention of the ap¬ 
pointing officer, and of the board and of the com¬ 
munity as well, vividly to what the law was, and 
great changes for the better ensued. Thus, the com- 
mi.ssion at its first visit to the Indianapolis post-office 
after the change of administration, was forced to ex¬ 
press dissatisfaction with some features of the ob¬ 
servance of the law in that office. It gives the com¬ 
mission great pleasure to say that at present the In¬ 
dianapolis post-office is one in which the law is being 
observed most rigidly in letter and spirit. Any can¬ 
didate for position of clerk or letter-carrier in that 
office, whether democrat or republican, or neither, 
is examined, marked, certified, and appointed abso¬ 
lutely without regard to his political belief, and is 
retained as long as by good conduct he merits reten¬ 
tion, and of this the commission is satisfied by careful 
personal investigation. As is generally the case with 
an office where the civil-service law is being rigidly 
observed, the Indianapolis post-office is also remark¬ 
able for the efficiency and integrity with which the 
public business is executed therein. 

jjt sjt sjt * 

The commission’s decision to make public the eli¬ 


gible lists has worked admirably, and has given th® 
greatest satisfaction. After an examination, the 
names of the persons examined are not disclosed un¬ 
til the markings are completed, the boards and indi¬ 
viduals doing the marking being completely igno¬ 
rant of whose papers they are examining. This is 
done to prevent all possibility of favoritism; but 
once the markings are completed, the papers are 
open to inspection by any proper person, and the 
whole proceedings in the case of every individual 
candidate can be followed out from beginning to 
end. It is thus almost impossible for any fraud to 
be committed without imminent and immediate 
risk of detection. There are occasionally cases of 
cheating, or attempt at cheating, among the candi¬ 
dates themselves at examination time, but as far as 
is known, during the year covered by this report, 
there has not been a single accusation of fraud 
against any governmental employe connected with 
the civil service examinations which has proved- to 
have the slightest foundation in fact. 

FIFTH REPORT 

Of the Special Committee of the National 
Civil Service Reform League. 

POLITICAL CHANGES IN PRESIDENTIAL POST- 
OFFICES. 

To the Executive Committee of the National Civil 
Service Reform League: 

Your special committee appointed to in¬ 
quire into the condition of the federal service 
and the operation of the reform law would re¬ 
spectfully report as follows in regard to the 
political character of the changes made in 
presidential post-offices: 

Our questions in regard to the politics of 
the postmasters removed and those appointed 
elicited the following results: Out of 437 
answers received in which the information was 
given upon this point, it appears that in 427 
cases the postmaster removed or resigned was 
a democrat, in 1 case a prohibitionist, in 1 an 
independent, and in 2 cases, the incumbents 
being women, it was stated that they belonged 
to no political party. There were 3 resigna¬ 
tions and 3 removals of republicans. From 
513 answers received regarding the politics of 
the postmasters appointed, it appeared that 
510 were republicans,! was a Knight of Labor, 
1 an independent, and 1 a democrat. The 
democrat was Samuel P. Burris, of Talladega, 
Ala., of whom his predecessor writes : “ I was 
removed because I was a democrat, and not in 
sympathy with the administration. It was 
believed that my successor, being a protec¬ 
tionist, was in sympathy with the administra¬ 
tion and would support it.” The uniformity 
with which democrats were removed and re¬ 
publicans appointed shows pretty clearly that 
political motives were not absent in the 
making of these changes. It appeared in 
some cases that quite full inquiries were made 
as to the political faith of candidates for ap¬ 
pointment before their commissions were 
issued. Thus, C. A. Gildea was postmaster 
at Bracketsville, Tex., and on Sept. 16, 1889, 
he resigned. Not long afterward, Robert C. 
Ballantyne was appointed ; but a protest was 
filed against this appointment on the ground 
that Ballantyne was a democrat. An in¬ 
spector who came to investigate a mail robbery 
was engaged for two or three days inquiring 
about Ballantyne’s politics, questioning a 


large number of persons, among others the old 
postmaster. Mr. Gildea denied his right to 
make these inquiries. The inspector told 
Gildea that it was reported that Ballantyne 
was a democrat, and that, as an agent would 
have to be sent out to investigate, he would 
attend to it himself and save the expense. 
After some months’ delay, Mr. Ballantyne’s 
political orthodoxy was vindicated, and he 
received the appointment. The employment 
of post-office inspectors to do this sort of polit¬ 
ical work at government expense carries with 
it its own criticism. These facts are furnished 
by the concurring statements of the postmaster 
resigned and the one appointed. 

Out of 423 answers to our questions regard¬ 
ing the political services rendered by the 
former incumbent of the office, it appeared 
that in '83 cases such services were rendered, 
16 cases were disputed, and in 324 cases the 
answers showed that no political services had 
been rendered while in office. We are in¬ 
clined to believe, however, that the proportion 
of the old postmasters who did political work 
was very much larger than would appear from 
these figures. 

To our inquiries as to the political services 
rendered by the new appointees in the last 
campaign and elsewhere we received 496 
answers. In 155 cases it was stated that no 
services were rendered, 6 cases were disputed, 
while in 335 cases, a little over 63 per cent., 
the new appointees were active in party work. 
The positions held in the party organization 
were as follows: officers and members of state, 
congressional, county and township commit¬ 
tees, delegates to national, state and congres¬ 
sional conventions, candidates for various 
offices, officers of republican clubs, campaign 
speakers, county “leaders,” distributers of 
tickets, etc. Chairman and secretaries of 
county committees and delegates to congres¬ 
sional conventions are quite prominent. 

Some of thenevv appointees state quite fully 
the political services rendered by them. Thus, 
E. B. Fletcher, the new appointee at Morris, 
Ill., writes: 

I took part in the last campaign, as I have in every 
campaign, since the first election of U. S. Grant for 
president in 1868; was an alternate delegate to the 
last national convention ; was vice-president of the 
state republican leag\ie; was chairman of congres¬ 
sional committee; was member of county central 
committee; was private secretary to lieutenant gov¬ 
ernor. I am now', and ever have been since casting 
my first vote in 1868, a member of the republican 
party. I am now, and have been for fifteen years, 
connected with the Morris Herald, a wide-aw-ake, 
progressive republican newspaper, as one of its pub¬ 
lishers and editors. 

Robert J. Rogers, appointed by the Presi¬ 
dent at Searcy, Ark., states ; 

I am chairman of the county republican commit¬ 
tee, and have been for fifteen years, and have repre¬ 
sented the county in nearly every state convention ; 
and I have taken part in every campaign from Gen 
Grant down to the present. I owned some stock in 
the only republican paper ever published in this 
place. The reason they are getting up a howl against 
me is because I am a republican. 

C. C. Bush, the appointee at Reading, Cal., 
has sent to your committee, neatly bound and 
in book form, a printed copy of the papers 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


187 


61ed on his application. After the preface 
and table of contents appears the original pe¬ 
tition from the patrons of the office and others, 
stating, among other things, the various offices 
which Mr. Bush had held, such as delegate 
from California to the national convention of 
1884, alternate elector, and an active worker 
in the campaign of 1888. It is signed by the 
judge of the superior court, chairman and sec¬ 
retary and other members of the republican 
county committee, editor of the republican 
Free Press, county clerk, under-sheriff, sheriff, 
city attorney, marshal, and others, and is sup¬ 
plemented by a petition of democrats that, 
when a change of political complexion of post¬ 
master at Redding is made, they desire the ap¬ 
pointment of C. C. Bush. This is signed by 
the secretary and treasurer of the democratic 
county committee, by the mayor, city treasurer 
and others. Then follows a petition signed by 
all of the republican members of the legisla¬ 
ture of California. Then follows a certificate 
by republicans of Tahama county that Judge 
Bush was an active, untiring republican worker 
in the campaign of 1888, and rendered efficient 
services. Then followed letters from ex-Gov- 
ernor Low, General W. H. Dimond, chairman 
of the repifblican state central committee, Hon. 
A. P. Williams, ex-Senator George A. Knight, 
Hon. M. M. Estee, chairman of the national 
republican convention of 1888, Charles F. 
Crocker, delegate to the republican national 
conventions of 1884 and 1888, two members of 
the republican county committee, ex-govern- 
ors, members of congress, and other republi¬ 
can politicians, concluding with a letter from 
Hon. J. D. De Haven, M. C., from the first 
congressional district. This is believed to be 
a fair sample of “a strong petition” for the 
appointment of postmaster. 

Adolph Zadek, postmaster at Corsicana,Tex., 
writes: 

I held every position from precinct chairman to 
chairman of the republican state executive commit¬ 
tee ; was a delegate at large from this state in 1876 to 
the national republican convention held at Cincin¬ 
nati, Ohio. I am at present chairman of my senatorial 
district. I published in this city, in 1872, a republi¬ 
can newspaper, was proprietor of same, and spent for 
that honor 52,000 out of my personal means and for the 
love of the republican party. The paper was called 
the Progressive Age. I was an applicant, for the first 
time, under this administration for the consulate at 
Hamburg. You can find my papers on file in the 
state department. I am personally known to the Hon. 
Secretary of State. Being a southern republican, I 
did not receive the appointment I thought I fully 
deserved for services rendered to the country and the 
party that saved the union. Colonel J. C. Degress, 
and other leading republicans of this state, wishing 
to see me recognized by this administration, request¬ 
ed me to make my application for this office. So I 
applied for same, and received my appointment. . . 

The following correspondence shows a con¬ 
gressman’s views on the claims of “party ser¬ 
vice ”: — 

The Rising Sun Stove Polish P.lctory and Black 

Lead Works. 

Elijah A. Morse, Propr. Abner L. Morse, Agt. 

Albert E. Morse, Supt. 

Canton, Mass., March 2:1,1889. 
Mr. Wm. Burius, Plymouth, Mass.: 

Dear Sir— Enclosed find a letter accompanying the 
petitions of Avery,Whiting and Harlow, by which you 
will see I paid you and your assistant a compliment. 


Your petition was received yesterday, and forwarded 
to day. Your friends waked up to late in the matter. I 
doubt very much if the President would appoint you, 
or any other democrat, to a presidential office in the 
face of the clean sweep which the Cleveland admin¬ 
istration made of republicans. From all I can learn, 
you will retire from the office with the good wishes 
of the people of Plymouth. Will you be kind enough 
to show this to your assistant? 

Respectfully yours, 

Elijah A. Morse. 

Address Morse Bros., Canton, Mass., U. S. A. 

Canton, Mass., March 18,1889. 
Gen. Benjamin Harrison, President of the United Slates; 

De.ar Sir— The commission of the present demo¬ 
cratic postmaster in Plymouth, Mass., in my district, 
expires the last day of -March. I hand you herewith 
three petitions sent me by my constituents in that 
place—one for the appointment of Winslow W. Avery, 
one for the appointment of Henry 0. Whiting, and 
one for the appointment of Heiiry Harlow. These 
several petitions are numerously signed by the busi¬ 
ness men and first citizens of Plymouth. Should you 
do me the honor to desire my opinion I say frankly 
it is difficult to decide between the three candidates. 
Either of them is well indorsed, and all are well qual¬ 
ified for the position. While Mr. Avery has the largest 
number of signers to his petition, Mr. Whiting has at 
least an equal indorsement from the business men of 
Plymouth: and, while Mr. Harlow has a smajler in¬ 
dorsement than either of the other two, he has among 
his indorsers the Plymouth Cordage Company, which 
is one of the,largest establishments and manufac¬ 
tories of its kind in the world, and, of course, large 
patrons of the mail. 

In your inaugural address, you stated that hon¬ 
orable party service would not be a bar to political 
preferment. Mr. Avery, the first gentleman named, 
is one of the editors of the Old Colony Memorial, an 
ably edited paper, having a large circulation in 
Plymouth county, and for twenty-five years that pa¬ 
per has been a stanch, honorable and able defender 
of the republican party, and to its influence is due, 
in a measure, the large republican majority given in 
Plymouth county for the last twenty-five years. So 
that, if I am asked to decide between these three can¬ 
didates on the ground of honorable and patriotic 
party service, I should give my preference to Mr. 
Avery. 

I learn from my constituents that the present dem¬ 
ocratic postmaster, whose term is now expiring, has 
faithfully discharged the duties of his office; and his 
assistant—whom I hope will be retained by his suc¬ 
cessor—is an affable, pleasant and courteous gentle¬ 
man, universally popular in Plymouth. 

Elijah A. Morse. 

FOUR years’ service. 

One ground for the removal of postmasters 
is given thus, in the statement furnished by 
Mr. Clarkson : “ Upon expiration of four years’ 
service, and second commission not yet ex¬ 
pired,” and he states there were 201 removais 
on this account. It wiii be observed that in 
these cases the commission of the postmaster 
had not expired. Such cases generaliy occur 
where the appointment was made in the first 
piace to a fourth-class office which became 
presidentiai during the administration of Mr. 
Cieveland, and a new commission, running four 
years, was thereupon issued by the President. 
The two terms of service, as fourth-class post¬ 
master and as presidential postmaster, are thus 
added together in making up the four years. 
It is not claimed that these removals are made 
for inefficiency nor for the betterment of the 
service, but upon no other apparent ground 
than the impropriety of permitting a postmas¬ 
ter to serve more than four years. Instances 
of such removals are furnished in the follow¬ 
ing correspondence: 

Post-office Department, "j 

Office of First Assistant Postmaster-General, > 
Washington, D C., Feb. 20,1890. J 

Dear Sir— Your letter of the 12th inst., addressed to 
the President, and requesting to know why you had 
been displaced as postma.ster at Neodesha, Kan., is 
received. 


In reply, I beg to state that your original appoint¬ 
ment was dated Dec. 4, 1885, while the office was 
fourth-class, and you have had continuous possession 
for over four years. Yours truly, 

J. S. Clarkson, First Ass’t P. M. Gen’l. 
L. W. Lee, Esq., Neodesha. Kan. 

John C. McCauley was appointed postmas¬ 
ter at Searcy, Ark., in July, 1885. In July, 
1887, the office became presidential, and he 
was confirmed as postmaster for four years. In 
answer to an ipquiry respecting his removal, 
the postmaster-general responds as follows: 

Post-office Department, ') 

Office OF Postmaster-General. > 

Washington, D. C. Sept. 11,1889. ) 
Mr. Jno. C. McCauley, Searcy, Ark.: 

Dear Sir— Answering your letter, which bears no 
date, I beg to say that an examination of the records 
of the office shows that you were appointed originally 
on the 9th of July, 1885, and therefore you have held 
ihe office for more than four years fixed for the term. 
You would have no reason to complain if the Presi¬ 
dent were to make a new appointment. I shall lay 
the case before him at an early date for his action. 

Yours truly, 

Jno. Wanamaker, Postmaster-General. 

The following copy of a letter from the post- 
master-general is sent to us by C. T. Marsh, 
the removed postmaster at Oregon, Ill. : 

Post-office Department, "I 

Office of Postmaster-General. v 

Washington, D. C., Oct, 10,1889. ) 

Mr. C. T. Marsh, Oregon, III.: 

Dear Sir—I have to-day the honor of your letter of 
the7th, inquiring as to the appointment of postmas¬ 
ter in yonr city, and beg to say that no charges of 
any kind were made against you, but the removal 
was made on the recommendation of the member of 
congress representing the district in which your office 
is located, because you had served a term of four 
years and upwards, having been appointed by the 
removal of your predecessor when congress was not 
in session. Yours truly, Jno. Wanamaker, 

Postmaster- General. 

Mr. W. J. Johnson had been appointed post¬ 
master at Manchester, Mass., October 1, 1885. 
The office was then a fourth-class one. Later 
it became a presidential one, and Mr. Johnson 
was re-appointed January 16, 1888, his com¬ 
mission expiring January 16, 1892. 

The position of the administration is clearly 
expressed in the following letter of the post¬ 
master general: 

Washington, D. C., Sept. 18,1889. 
Mr. W. J. Johnson, Postmaster, Manchester, Mass.; 

Dear Sir— In reply to your letter of the 17th, I beg 
to say that it is held fhat, when a man holds an office 
for four years, which is the usual term in cities and 
municipalities under the federal government, he en. 
joys a full term. Your commission dates from Octo 
her 1, 1885; and all postmasters’ commissions are at 
the pleasure of the President, who is taking great 
pains not to allow the removal of any good officer un¬ 
til he has had four years’ enjoyment of the office. 

Yours truly, John Wanamaker, 

Postmaster-General. 

The following letter from the member of 
congress for the district shows that he con¬ 
siders the matter simply a question of the 
length of the term and politics, and not of fit¬ 
ness for the place: 

Salem, Mass., Sept. 18,1889. 
Dear Sir— Yours of the 17th have received, also 
one of same date inclosing yonr commission, which 
I return this mail. 

Your present commission appears to run to Janu¬ 
ary, 1892; but I have been informed that you will 
have served four years in January next, and it is my 
Impression that the post office department think so 
too. Yours very truly, William Cogswell. 
W. J. Johnson, Postmaster, Manchester, Mass. 

The term of Jno. R. Brunt, postmaster at 
Osage Mission, Kan., expired Feb. 10, 1890. 
He was removed, and Ebenezer B. Park ap¬ 
pointed on July 31, 1889. Prior to his removal. 










188 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


on Nov. 23, 1888, Congressman Perkins wrote 
to him thus: “I know of no complaints 
made against your efficiency ; and, so far as I 
know, all that are asking for the privilege of 
succeeding you admit that you have made a 
faithful and efficient officer, and they seem to 
take pleasure in bearing this testimony in your 
behalf, but desire to succeed you as repub¬ 
licans.” Ilis successor, Mr. Park, writes as 
to the causes of the change: “I understand 
that this is a republican administration I 
was appointed because I was the choice of a 
large majority of the patrons of the office, and 
because the term of the democratic incumbent 
had expired.” (By the expiration of the 
term, Mr. Park probably means that Mr. Brunt 
had lield the office more than four years.) 

It seems evident that this cause for removal, 
like the others, is designed to cover a removal 
made for political reasons; and the political 
motive is all the more apparent from the in¬ 
consistency in appointing several republicans 
who, prior to the last administration, had 
.served four or even eight years. 

If it is right, as we believe it is, to re-appoint 
efficient republicans who have held office four 
years or more, why is it not proper, excepting 
from political motives alone, to allow efficient 
democrats to serve out the terms of their re¬ 
spective commissions, whether they had been 
in office four years or not? 

On a careful inspection of the answers re¬ 
ceived, stating the dates of the expirations of 
the terms of the incumbents removed, it would 
appear that removals have been made on an 
average sixteen and one-half months before 
the expirations of these terms. 

APPOINTMENTS DICTATED BY CONGRESSMEN. 

The influence of Congressmen in dictating 
removals and appointments is very clearly 
shown in a letter sent by the chief clerk of the 
post office department to Edward Smith, post¬ 
master at Carrollton, Ill., which is as follows: 

Post-Office Department. '> 

Office of the Chief Clerk, ^ 
Washi.ngton, D. C , Nov. 25, 1889.) 

Sir— In reply to your letter of the 7th inst., which 
has been referred to this department by Rev. J. W. 
Scott, I beg to inform you that a change of post¬ 
masters for Carrollton was made upon the recom¬ 
mendation of Senator Cullom; that the postmaster 
has been commissioned; and that recommendation 
of this character is in accordance with the long¬ 
standing practice of the department, deemed to be 
the best ground of action. Very respectfully, 

W. B. Cooley, Chief Clerk. 

Mr. Edward S.mith, Carrollton, Ill. 

Ebenezer M. Lockwood was postmaster at 
Burlington, Kan., upon the incoming of the 
present administration. Harrison Kelly, mem¬ 
ber of congress from that district, on July 10, 
1889, wrote to Mr. Lockwood the following 
letter: 

House of Representatives, 1 
Washington, D. C., July 10,1889. */ 
P. M. Lockwood, Burlington, Kan.: 

My Dear Sir— I have been conferring with the de¬ 
partment n reference to the appointment of your 
successor. Your four years from first appointment 
expires the 28th of this mouth. I think your suc¬ 
cessor will be appointed at that time. Courtesy to 
you suggests that you have an opportunity of re¬ 
signing, to take effect August 1, if you wish to do so. 
Would be glad to hear from you in reference to the 
matter at an early date. Kespectfully, 

Harrison Kelly. 

Mr. Lockwood, however, did not resign, and 
was removed. Squire M. Lane being appointed 
in his place. Immediately upon his appoint¬ 
ment, Mr. Lane appointed the daughter of 
Congressman Kelly to a place in the office, and 
a short time afterward promoted her to be as¬ 
sistant postmaster. 

In many cases it was stated that the new ap¬ 
pointee was active in congressional conven¬ 


tions in behalf of the congressman nominated 
at such conventions, and by whom he was 
recommended for the place. 

In every answer received from the slate of 
Arkansas, except one, the change is attributed 
to the influence of the Hon. Powell Clayton. 

Offensive partisanship seems to have been 
employed as an agency of removal by this ad¬ 
ministration in much the same way as by the 
last. The following special dispatch to the 
Chicago Daily News, of March 19, 1889, pub¬ 
lished in an issue of March 20, states as fol¬ 
lows : 

Special to the Chicago Daily News. > 

Washington, D. C., March 19.—Representative Pay- 
son, of Illinois, made a test case before the postmas¬ 
ter general yesterday ; and the result is shown in the 
list of nominations that came to the senate to day. 
Judge Payson said to the postmaster-general: “I 
want Mark A. Reno, postmaster at Pontiac, removed. 
That is the town where 1 live. I have no charges to 
make against his official or personal character or con¬ 
duct, except that he is a democrat, and an offensive 
partisan. He did all he could to defeat the republi¬ 
can presidential ticket and my election to congress; 
and I desire to make an example of him. I submit 
his case first, because I want to know what to do in 
other cases; and I want to have the department de¬ 
cide whether offensive partisanship is a sufficient 
cause ^r removal.” 

Mr. Eeno informs us that he wrote to the 
department to ascertain whethei this informa¬ 
tion was correct, and received a reply that it 
was. 

It is clear to your committee that the motive 
for the numerous changes, more than sixty- 
four per cent, of all the presidential postmas¬ 
ters, has been in great measure political. Mr. 
Clarkson, in an interview sent through the As¬ 
sociated Press to all the leading newspapers of 
the country, is reported as saying : “ The Pres¬ 
ident has made no removals except for cause, 
for delinquency, inefficiency, or violation of 
law. He has refused to make any changes for 
partisan reasons.” Our inquiries have led us 
to the conviction that this declaration can not 
be true; and, in our opinion, it would have 
been more just to have acknowledged the ex¬ 
istence of political influences. This would 
have involved an inconsistency with theprom- 
ises of the last republican platform, that the 
“spirit and purpose of the civil service law 
should be observed in all executive appoint¬ 
ments.” But, where the fact is as clearly es¬ 
tablished as it is in this case, the avowal of 
such inconsistency would have been far better 
than the attempt to conceal it by giving rea¬ 
sons for the changes, which, in point of fact, 
are not the real ones. 

MR. CLARKSON AND MR. WANAMAKER. 

It was indeed hardly to he expected “that 
the spirit of civil service reform ” in the post- 
office department could be enforced through 
such instrumentalities as Mr. Clarkson and 
Mr. Wanamaker. Mr. Clarkson has been 
openly and conspicuously an opponent of the 
reform. At Boston, at Pittsburgh, and else¬ 
where, he has in public speeches endeavored 
to discredit the system to which his party 
pledged itself. His appointment as first assist- 
tant postmaster-general, gave him, we believe, 
control of a larger amount of patronage than 
that of any other officer appointed hy the Pres¬ 
ident. 

The opposition of the postmaster-general to 
civil service reform has been less candid, but 
it has been no less intense. There are circum¬ 
stances which have occurred since he has been 
in office, clearly showing his hostility to tho 
platform of his own party in regard to this re¬ 


form. Marshall Cushing, who afterward be¬ 
came his private secretary, undertook on his 
behalf an investigation of the present civil ser¬ 
vice system by addressing letters to a number 
of gentlemen interested in the reform, of which 
the following is one: 

Boston Advertiser, 1 

Washington Office, D. C., Oct. 23,1889. j 
Confidential. 

Dear Sir— I have undertaken some investigations 
of the present civil service sysiem/or a cabinet officer, 
and beg to ask your distinguished assistance. 

Wliy is the law and the commission subject to .so 
much criticism at this time? W'hat answer do the 
civil service reformers make to the objection that a 
civil pension list is the logical result of the present 
system; to the objection that, having certified 
enough clerks to last ten years, and having instituted 
yearly re-examinations, the commissioners are open 
to the'charge of mereiy providing themselves with 
employment; to the objection that the efficiency of 
the departments will be seriously interfered with in 
ten or fifteen years by the old age of many of the 
clerks who can not be removed? -Why should not 
both parties discard all their insincere professions for the 
laio, and have the pafrioG'sm to go back to the old system, 
under which it was inquired simply whether the 
man was honest, capable and faithful to the consti¬ 
tution? How does the administration of President 
Harrison please the civil service reformers of the 
west? How has it compared in that respect with 
President Cleveland’s administration ? 

What you write me, if I am honored with your 
confidence, will be merely for the eye of the cabinet 
officer referred to, and will not be printed. With 
the greatest respect, your obedient servant, 

Marshall Cushing. 

Hon. William Dudley Foulke, Richmond, Ind. 

As this letter was unsolicited, and refers to 
a public matter only, the inquiries being made 
for a public officer and for public purposes, its 
contents can in no sense be regarded as confi¬ 
dential. It is believed that this is the first in¬ 
stance in which an inquiry instituted on be¬ 
half of a cabinet officer is based upon the as¬ 
sumption that the platform of the party upon 
which he came into power was insincere and 
unpatriotic. 

The feeling of the postmaster-general toward 
civil service reform also appears in the state¬ 
ments made by him regarding Commissioner 
Roosevelt before the select committee of the 
house of representatives on reform in the civil 
service; and the report of this committee, 
which fully exonerated Mr. Roosevelt, is a se¬ 
vere commentary upon the groundlessness of 
the postmaster-general’s allegations. 

The postmaster-general’s attitude toward the 
reform is further shown by his statement to 
Congressman Rockwell, of Massachusetts, who 
recommended the re-appointment of Gilbert W. 
Farrington, a democrat, as postmaster at Mon- 
son. Farrington was indorsed by the mass of 
the citizens and business men of that place, 
without regard to party, and his petition was 
then the only one on file. The statement made 
by Mr. Wanamaker, and taken down in writing 
by Mr. Rockwell, tvas as follows: “The post¬ 
master-general declines to recommend to the 
President the appointment of a democrat un¬ 
less it is clear that there is no republican to 
fill the place.” It is not hard to divine the 
motive for removals and appointments under 
such an administration of this department. 
Respectfully submitted, 

Wm. D. Foulke, Chairman. 
Chas. j. Bonaparte. 

Richard H. Dana. 

Wayne MacVeagh. 
Sherman S. Rogers. 







r 

s V 

J The Civil Service Chronicle. 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapolis. Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. Meridian St,, Indianapolis, 
lud., where subscriptions and advertisments will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana, 


VoL. I, No. 23. INDIANAPOLIS, JANUARY, 1891. 


With the next number the Civil Ser- 
^viCE Chronicle will close its second year. 
Its publication may end at that time, al¬ 
though it was intended to cover at least 
£ [ President Harrison’s term. As has been 
^stated, no one except the printer is paid 
j anything for work upon the paper. It can 
" not, however, enter into financial struggle 
or uncertainty. It has in the main occu¬ 
pied a field of its own in gathering from 
widely difierent sources facts of the actual 
working of the spoils system and printing 
them in a compact form. It is believed 
that this work has never before been done 
by any publication. As a weapon against 
that system, nothing else compares with 
it, not to mention the historical value of 
such a collection. This work ought to be 
done upon a greater scale, but the expense 
has been in the way. The managers have 
too much evidence from too many sources 
not to say frankly that the paper is abund¬ 
antly appreciated. Being, however, a pub¬ 
lication not for pecuniary profit, each 
friend is apt to think, sometimes in the 
case of his own subscription, that all other 
friends are supporting it and that it will 
go on forever. To the managers the work 
of the paper has been a labor that has 
brought its own ample reward. In case of 
discontinuance all unexpired subscriptions 
will be returned, and there will be no un¬ 
paid bills. 


During the month some events have 
happened to the republicans of^the state. 
Louis T. Michener has removed to Wash¬ 
ington and entered into partnership with 
Dudley, who has been giving dinners to 
“ attorneys, statesmen and federal officials ” 
in honor of his new partner. This makes 
it very difficult to believe that Michener 
has not approved of Dudley’s ways, which 
make the latter one of the greatest scound¬ 
rels out of, or for that matter, in prison. 
Michener sent here his resignation as 
chairman of the republican state commit¬ 
tee and the committee met January 6 to 
receive it. For the vacated office, the Ad¬ 
ministration struggled in the old fashioned 
ward bummer style. William T. Steele, 
of Marion, Indiana, now governor of Okla¬ 
homa territory, came and acted as Admin¬ 
istration Boss. Warren G. Sayre, of Wa¬ 
bash, now a member of some Indian com¬ 
mission, also came, as did other office-hold¬ 
ers. Russell B. Harrison, son of the Pres¬ 


ident, also came. Thus organized and led, 
the Administration proceeded to turn a 
hostile majority into a minority. It suc¬ 
ceeded ; just how does not appear. That 
it was the usual deal in which the people 
are to be the paymaster there is no doubt. 
This is an old practice, but that a President 
should so far forget the dignity of his office 
as to allow his son to go into a state where 
he is not a voter and does not live, and 
take part in struggles of party factions and 
join with office-holders appointed by his 
father, to influence the action of a party 
committee is a humiliation to the whole 
people. And the more so when it is done 
with reference, as in this case, to his fath¬ 
er’s renomination. After this meeting, 
TJte Indianapolis Netvs of January 8 has 
the following relating to him: 

He arrived at the New Denison hotel Monday ev¬ 
ening and Tuesday night disappeared. This fore¬ 
noon he walked into the hotel again. 

“I thought you had gone,” said a prominent re¬ 
publican. 

”1 did go but I am back.” 

“ Where have you been ? ” 

“Oh, I’ve been taking a quiet little run out over 
the state, doing a little work.” 

The friends of President Harrison believe it neces¬ 
sary that Indiana be kept in line. 


The reform of the civil service, auspiciously begun 
under a republican administration, should be com¬ 
pleted by the further extension of the reform sys¬ 
tem, already established by law, to all grades of the 
service to which itis applicable.—RepafthcanATattojiai 
Platform, 1888. 

Nearly two years have passed since Presi¬ 
dent Harrison was inaugurated after elec¬ 
tion on that platform, and yet in not a 
single instance has the system been ex¬ 
tended. In the meantime, the country is 
being filled with letter-carriers in all small 
cities and every one is the spoil of some 
congressman or local boss. There are 
dozens of offices of less than fifty employes, 
to which the system is in every sense ap¬ 
plicable. Every friend of the Indians and 
all who are best able to say what the Indi¬ 
ans need urge the extension of the system 
to that service. There is no pretence of 
argument against any of these extensions; 
it is simply not done. It would be inter¬ 
esting to know just what President Harri¬ 
son understands by his position in the 
matter, for he approved the platform in 
writing. Does he wish it understood that 
he joined in a promise which he did not 
intend to keep? If not, why does he not 
keep it? 


TERMS: { 


50 cents persnnnm. 
5 cents [wr copy. 


Under all political skies Maryland is 
despoiled. President Harrison made Bill 
Johnson postmaster in Baltimore, and he 
at the head of the republican ins has ever 
since been carrying on a tremendous war 
with some one at the head of the republi¬ 
can outs. The result of this and other 
similar transactions is that the republican 
party in Maryland is split in two, the fac¬ 
tions being made up of the cold toes and 
the warm toes. Under the late adminis¬ 
tration Maryland gave great promise of 
becoming a republican state. The effect 
upon the Baltimore postoffice as a business 
institution has been disastrous and has 
made Mr. Wanamaker protest. The Civil 
Service Reformer says: “ In addition, and of 
course, in explanation of this inefficiency, 
it is stated that the removals of the force 
left in by Postmaster Brown have been 
very numerous; as many, it appears, as 
one hundred and thirty among the carriers 
alone. Outside of the classified service 
there has been a clean sweep.” 


Among the multitude of good things said by Mr. 
Depew in his address at Pittsburg, this may be sing¬ 
led out as meriting a second reading: “That the 
fireman can become a locomotive engineer, the lo¬ 
comotive engineer the master mechanic, the master 
mechanic the superintendent of motive power, the 
superintendent of motive power the superintendent 
or general manager of the railway, and possibly its 
president, is the law of our American development 
and the source of our national pre-eminence.” Mr. 
Depew rarely fails to hit the nail on the head. In 
this sentence he has admirably set forth a principle 
that bears upon every department of our complex 
life. It applies with equal force to all other voca¬ 
tions as well as to that of the railway man.—New 
York Tribune, Oct. 19,1890. 

But suppose Mr. Depew should inject 
into the above the stipulation that every 
railroad should only employ men of one 
political complexion and that “ for the good 
of the service” there should be a clean 
sweep every four years. How would that 
look ? 


The address of the Civil Service Reform 
Association, of Buffalo, written by Mr. 
Sherman S. Rogers, is published elsewhere 
and ought to be read by every one. It 
brings into strong light the limitations of 
our Commercial Club. This club has 
drawn a bill for the better government of 
this city, but, although the spoils system 
is the root and branch of bad city govern¬ 
ment, the club has evidently not even 
taken the trouble to post itself as to the 
meanslof getting rid of that system. Their 
















190 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


bill is in brief a concentration of patronage 
distributing power. The fundamental 
evils such as have been in the police, the 
fire and street departments still remain. 
City after city is destroying the spoils sys¬ 
tem in its government, and it is discourag¬ 
ing that a club made up of the leading cit¬ 
izens of Indianapolis should seem to be 
unaware of the only distinctive progress 
that has been made in municipal govern¬ 
ment. 


KICKING AGAINST THE PRICKS. 

I. 

The old time civil service reformer who 
has been toughened by divers jokes and 
gibes of the“sniver’service order is appreci¬ 
ating that familiar observation that he 
laughs best who laughs last. For many 
months now he has been diverted by the 
wigglings and twistings and explanations 
and apologies of the spoilsmen, big and 
little. There have been two years of see¬ 
ing Wanamaker cuffed about, his evasions 
brought to light in the most heartless man¬ 
ner and his equivocations exposed so of¬ 
ten that his Sunday-school will surely soon 
have to bring him to account. General 
Wade Hampton, Commissioner Eoosevelt 
and Mr. Foulke have all felt obliged to ex 
pose his tergiversations and all have done 
their work with much neatness and dis¬ 
patch. 

II. 

This political census just finished seems 
full enough of humor to last for a decade. 
Census Supervisor Sid Conger, of this dis¬ 
trict, has evidently returned to the solace 
of fowl-raising for he is reported thus in 
the Indianapolis News of January 10: 

“ Sid Conger, of Flat Rock, is in the city. 
He says if the powers forgive him he will 
never again have anything to do with the 
taking of a census.” 

And the Civil Service Record, always 
mild and persistent and serious, button¬ 
holes Porter thus; 

“Commissioner of Census Porter declared before 
the congressional committee on civil service reform 
that his eliminations for clerks were superior to the 
civil service examinations. We asked for samples of 
these papers to compare with the samples furnished 
by the civil service commi.'-slons, and especially to 
compare with the examinations for census clerks 
under the Massachusetts commission, and were told 
‘ that it is impossible to furnish you with these docu¬ 
ments.’ Why it is ‘ impossible ’ we are not told. The 
examinations were held months ago, and if new 
ones should be held again, of course new questions 
would have to be asked.” 

III. 

The Eaum family, too, have been an 
edifying sight since they were inducted 
into drawing wages from the public treas¬ 
ury. Commissioner Eaum started in with 
a clever little scheme to beat the civil ser¬ 
vice law, which was promptly exposed and 
had to be hustled into an ignominious 


grave. Later the commissioner was put 
on the rack of a congressional investiga¬ 
tion and had every appearance of having 
put into practice that vulgar saw that 
“ public office is a private snap.” Una¬ 
bashed, however, Mr. Eaum came out into 
Indiana to make campaign speeches with 
a happy result for Congressman Cooper 
who had been looking into the Eaum way 
of doing business. Since the election the 
investigation has continued, and the fol¬ 
lowing from the staunch and true Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal of January 20 must be 
authentic: 

Green B. Ranm, jr., was asked by Mr. Cooper the 
name of the man who took care of his horses. He 
replied that his name was O'Donnell, and when 
asked if the man was in the pension office said: 
“ That is none of your business.” 

The committee admitted the questions, and Mr. 
Raum stated that O’Donnell w'as messenger at the 
pension office at $70 a month. He had been ap¬ 
pointed by witness’s father. O’Donnell did his duty 
and attended to witness’s two riding horses after of¬ 
fice hours, for which witness paid him. He refused 
to tell the compensation, saying it was none of Mr. 
Cooper's business. 

Young Raum appears to have made 
Tweed’s manner of meeting the public his 
study; all this must make the President 
wince. 

IV. 


But everything pales beside the spec¬ 
tacle of Ingalls ashamed of his old role of 
the Kansas Mephistopheles and tortured 
into a tea-custard and syllabub dilettante- 
ism on the top of the frivolous and desul¬ 
tory sentimentalism of an epicene. What 
he said last May and how he squirmed 
over it by January must go side by side: 


The purification of pol¬ 
itics is an iridescent 
dream. Government is 
force. Politics is a battle 
for supremacy. Parlies 
are the armies. The dec¬ 
alogue and the golden 
rule have no place in a 
political campaign. The 
object is success. To de¬ 
feat the antagonist and 
expel the party in power 
is the purpo.se. In war 
it is lawful to deceive the 
adversary, to hire Hes¬ 
sians, to purchase mer- 
cenatie.s, to mutilate, to 
kill, to destroy. Tliecom- 
mnndfr who lost a battle 
through the activity of his 
vioral nature would be the 
derision and jest of history. 
This modern cant about the 
rorruption of politics is 
fatiguing in the extreme. 
It proceeds from the tea- 
cusiard and si/llahnb dilet- 
tanteism, the frivolous and 
desultory sentimentalism of 
epicenes. 


He then referred to the 
newspaper interview 
with him several months 
ago. in whicli he had said 
that the golden rule and 
the decal'^gue had no 
place in an American 
campaign. It seemed 
superfluous to explain 
that in that utterance he 
was not inculcating a 
doctrine, but descrioing 
a condition. His state 
ment was a statement of 
fact; not an announce 
ment of faith. But many 
leverend and eminent di¬ 
vines: many disinterest¬ 
ed editors; many ingen¬ 
ious orators perverted 
this utterance in o a per¬ 
sonal advocacy of impur¬ 
ity in politics. He did 
not complain. It was. as 
the world went.legitimaie 
political warfare; but it 
was an illustration of the 
truth ihat thegolden rule 
and the decalogue ought 
to have a place in politi¬ 
cal campaigns. ‘ If the 
enemy smite thee on one 
cheek, turn the other” 
was a good precept to fol¬ 
low. But he would ob¬ 
serve that until ihatpre 
cept was more generally 
observed than it had 
been, or was likely to be, 
if his political enemy 
smote him on one cheek, 
instead of turning to him 
the other, he would smite 
him under the butt end 
of his left ear if he could. 
[Laughter.] If that be 
political immoralitv, he 
must be included among 
the unregenerate.—/ndf- 
anapolis Journal, Jan. 15. 


V- 

Of course we must have our joke in Indi¬ 
ana and Lawyer Brush does not stint in 
quality. The best of it is that the whole 
story is authentic. The Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, of January 8, tells it as follows: 

The only unpleasant incident of Tuesday’s meet¬ 
ing was a speech by Mr. W. T. Brush, of Crawfords- 
ville, in which he took it upon himself to say that 
the only way for republicans to carry Indiana was by 
the free use of money; that the state had been pre¬ 
viously carried by this means, and that it could be 
done again, notwithstanding the Australian ballot 
law. There is no law to prevent Mr. Brush or any 
other man from making a fool of himself. 

Lawyer Brush did not appear to think 
the Journal's version had enough touch 
and go. It is, perhaps, in a rather too heavy 
manner for comic writing, but the Jour¬ 
nal refused to print Brush’s version and it 
appeared in The Indianapolis News of Jan¬ 
uary 10 and can not fail as an explanation to 
arouse the mirth of even the most effemi¬ 
nate civil service reformer: 

William T. Brush, member of the repub¬ 
lican state central committee from the 
eighth district, is very much put out over 
the sensation he caused by his speech be¬ 
fore the republican conference at Indian¬ 
apolis last Tuesday. Ills republican friends, 
upon reading the Sentinel’s report of the 
affair, were very much disgusted, but his 
explanation has satisfied them that he 
made no such bad break as that paper 
claims. To-day Mr. Brush cheerfully con¬ 
sented to an intervieAV. 

“What makes me the maddest,” said he, 
“is that The Indianapolis Journal, without 
investigation, seemingly, took for granted 
that the Sentinel's report was correct and 
proceeded to attack me. As soon as I saAV 
the Sentinel's account I immediately wrote 
out from memory, as nearly as I could, the 
exact words that I said in that speech. I 
have written to the editor of the Journal 
in explanation, asking that he print my 
version of the sifeech, but no reply has 
come, and I don’t exjtect any. I don’t 
think the Journal, now that it has made a 
fool of itself, wants to do me justice.” 

Mr. Brush then read the speech as he 
had written it from memory, as follows: 

Mr. Chairman: 

III Accordance with the motion passed at the last 
meeting of the central committee. I selected and sent 
to the secretary the names of five republicans from 
the eighth district to serve on this committee of six¬ 
ty-five to prepare and submit plans and specifications 
for beating the democrats in 1892. I don’t see any 
of the gentlemen selected here, and suppose their 
absence is to be accounted for on the ground that 
they have no plans to submit to the committee. I 
do not myself think this kind of a meeting amounts 
to much. It partakes too much of the nature of a 
post-mortem into the causes of defeat. We have al¬ 
ready had one meeting of that kind. It was called 
to formulate plans of re-organization for the next 
campaign, and not for the display of oratory; but so 
far, while the districts from one to eight have been 
called, and responses have been received from three 
or four gentlemen from each, no plan for future ac¬ 
tion has been suggested, save the establishment of a 
cheap newspaper and the infusion of more harmony 
into the party. The burden of the speeches so far 
heard seems to be to convince us that some accident 
befell us in November, and that we were not really 
beaten at all. Let us not deceive ourselves into the 
belief that it was an accident, or that the lack of a 
cheap newspaper and the want of harmony did it. 
The fact is there are more democrats than republi¬ 
cans in Indiana, and a larger proportion of them 
voted last fall. Any ymll of the state made within 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


191 


the last twenty years which shows it to be anything 
but democratic is wrong. That being the case, any¬ 
body can see that we have either to convert demo 
crats to our faith or otherwise induce them to vote 
our ticket. Heretofore when the right kind of in¬ 
ducements were used we succeeded, and when not 
we got left, and we always will. The means of con¬ 
version and the inducements held out in the last 
campaign, it seems, were not sufficient. The demo¬ 
crats attribute their late victory to the existence of 
the Australian election law, and perhaps they are 
right about that, but I can’t tell whether it made 
more democrats or lessened the number of republi¬ 
cans. If it did either we want to work some plan to 
circumvent the system, because we need more voters 
on our side, and we will have to get them or get left, 
in spite of cheap newspapers, more harmony and 
everything else. The plans used in 1880 and 1888 put 
us through in fine style, and the eighth district sub 
mils them for your consideration, if you can recol¬ 
lect what they were. The committee is to select a 
new chairman to-day. and I am in favor of finding a 
man for the place with a big head on him ; one who 
has brains enough to know what to do, when to do 
it, and who has the nerve to do it when the time 
comes. 

“Now, that is the whole thing. I never 
mentioned the words ‘ Harrison,’‘hoodie’ 
or ‘money,’ and no one interrupted me 
with a question, or with a remark of any 
kind. The people who were there will tes¬ 
tify to this fact; hut I don’t believe the 
Journal had a reporter there, or it would 
never have followed the course it did. 

“The speech was made, not in a serious 
vein, but to be laughed at, and it was taken 
in that way by all present. All the dis¬ 
tricts (before the eighth) had been repre- 
.sented by long-winded speakers who did 
nothing but whine over the past. I wanted 
to get them out of that rut and put a little 
life into things.” 

^ Yl. 

^ As IF Brush’s erratum were not embar 
srassing enough, The Delphi Journal joins 
in. It is all the more embarrassing for the 
President and Mr. Wanamaker because 
The Delphi Journal is a subsidized sheet. 
Its editor is postmaster and not only advo¬ 
cates buying votes, but flouts those who 
reprehend the practice. That puts the 
President and the postmaster-general, polit- 
[jcally speaking, in a hole, for how can they 
■ indorse the following: 

Mr. William T. Brush, of Crawfordsville, a good 
lawyer, a stalwart republican, and a most agreeable 
gentleman, appears to have thrown the staid and 
tight-laced Indianapolis Journal into a fit of hyster¬ 
ics. According to the Indianapolis Journal, which 
would fain appear to the world as prim," stalely, 
saintly and virtuous as old Aunt Pheebe, who always 
sits at the head of the quilting frame, Mr. Brush has 
been guilty of an unpardonable sin. At a recent 
meeting of the leading republicans of the state, who 
met for consultation, the Journal alleges that Mr. 
Brush made the statement that the republicans 
could not carry the state in ’92 without the use of 
money. And the truly good, pious party organ, tak¬ 
ing this as a text, proceeds to denounce Mr. Brush 
as “a fool” and place him in bad ordor generally. 
Nay, more; the sanctified expounder of republican 
principles at the state capital cries in a loud voice 
and would have the world know that Mr. Brush is 
the only bad man in the republican party in Indiana 
who has ever hinted at such a profane idea, and 
that the other members of'the recent conference in¬ 
dignantly repudiated his expressions in the confer¬ 
ence. The Journal then goes on and attributes the 
victories won by the republicans in this state to the 
“ resistless tide of public opinion,” ‘‘boundless en- 
h usiasm ” and the Lord, and attempts to make itself 


and the dear people believe that the two-doliar bill 
has not been ‘‘in it” at all. All of which has a 
tendency to make any one but a hypocrite and a 
Pharisaical political psalm singer very tired. 

Worse than all, their editor postmaster 
seems to gibe at the President and Mr. 
Wanamaker for being religious men. Of 
the campaign of 1888, he says: 

IVe admit that there was much “ boundless enthu- 
siam,” ‘‘overwhelmingpopular uprising” and Lord 
business in the last campaign, but none of these 
touched the ” floater ” 

Calmly and serenely he sat on the fence and asked 
for ‘‘ turkey.” 

The democrat might talk to him about free trade 
and the republican about protection, but he would 
quietly whistle a little ditty and then ask, 
" What’lyougive ? ” And then it was simply a ques¬ 
tion of who would give the most. The republicans 
generally got the best of it for the simple reason that 
the democratic workers insisted on putting the great¬ 
er portion of the boodle intrusted to them into their 
own pockets. These are facts, and if the Indianap 
o\\% Journal is not acquainted with them it should 
come out in the country and consult some of the 
workers on the political history of the state. The re¬ 
publicans were driven to use money in elections in 
this state. The ugly business was forced upon them 
by democrats. They would have been a lot of nood¬ 
les to have done anything else than fight the devil 
with his own fire. 

And in conclusion: 

If the Indianapolis Journal expects to ride to re¬ 
publican victory in this state in 1892 by dishing out 
to republican workers the tepid ‘‘ pap ” of civil serv¬ 
ice reform, and by recklessly abusing such stalwart, 
ever-vigilant party leaders as William T. Brush, it 
will be worse fooled than the celebrated character 
who attempted to weather the fires of hades by en¬ 
casing his carcass in a cotton jacket. 

Ordinarily, one might expect to see an 
employe dismissed for such language, as 
being not only immoral, but showing con¬ 
tempt for his superior officers; but when 
this editor wanted about a year ago the 
Delphi postoffice, and the high spoils dis¬ 
tributors seemed cold, he proceeded to 
warm them as follows—and got his office 
forthwith: 

If, when John C. New, of the Journal, asked for the 
London consulship, he had been informed that 
Cleveland’s appointee would be retained, what a 
blue tinge the air would have taken on. And how 
Dan Ransdell and W. H. II. Miller and Porter and 
Huston, and all the rest of them, would have howled 
in agony if civil service slop had been doled out to 
them. Under these circumstances would the In¬ 
dianapolis Jowrnnf be feeding the pampered, weak- 
minded, scrofulous child on choice bonbons? No, 
indeed. The Indianapolis Journal would have been 
a center from which greased lightning would have 
darted in all directions. The Jownmiought to know 
that it is of infinitely more importance to satisfy the 
working republicans in theoutcounties on this point 
than the prominent politicians of that paper and in 
Indianapolis. For the out counties give the repub¬ 
lican majorities. <■>;•>;■<■«'<< ■;= 

We can see that President Harrison is merely ex¬ 
ecuting the law as it now is. This is all right. But 
unless the present congress relieves him of the law 
by wiping it out of existence they will show to the 
country that they lack the courage of their convic¬ 
tions, that they are not in harmony with the repub¬ 
lican sentiment of the country. 

Let Congressman Cheadle go ahead. Lethim force 
his bill to a vote. We want to see the names of the 
cowards who are tarred with the same stick that has 
made the names of Roosevelt, Curtis, el al.. odorifer¬ 
ous to a purgative extent. 


AN OLD-TIME MUGWUMP. 

It seems that Attornej’-General Miller 
was formerly guilty of the crime of being 
a mugwump. In 1872, being then a lawyer 
in Fort Wayne, he made a speech against 
the administration of General Grant which 
was very greatly to his credit. This was 
August 31, 1872, and the speech fills six 
columns of The Fort Wayne Sentinel of Sep¬ 
tember 2, following. Of this speech which 
everyone ought to read and which displays 
throughout a high standard of ability to 
distinguish public evils and gives in every 
line evidence of independent thought and 
action, we can give only a few extracts. 
He says to fugitives from the effete des¬ 
potisms of the old world: 

I ask you, cilizens of America by adoption, who 
have fled from the despotisms and family distinc¬ 
tions of the old world, whether a President who re¬ 
gards his high office, with all of its patronage and 
power, as mere family property; and a vice-presi¬ 
dent, who commenced his political life as a know- 
nothing, taking an oath that he would never support 
or countenance the election of a foreign-born citizen 
to any office, are according to your idea of a republi¬ 
can government? 

And to Irishmen: 

I ask the Irishmen of the land whose ancestors 
have for centuries, and whose fathers and brothers 
are to-day writhing beneath the heel of a carpet-bag 
government, whether they are in favor of maintain¬ 
ing such governments in the south? I ask all citi¬ 
zens of every class whether you are in favor of the 
suspension of the writ of habeas corpus in time of 
profound peace; of keeping alive forever the hates 
and enmities of the past; of the use by the President 
of his whole first term in manipulating and pur¬ 
chasing a second ? « <■ v 

Talk of civil service reform, with Tom Murphy, 
through his tool, Chester A. Arthur, assisted by Leet 
and Stocking still running the New York custom¬ 
house; with brother-in-law Casey, notoriously 
steeped in corruption, still holding the most impor¬ 
tant federal office in New Orleans, and with brother- 
in-law Cramer, misrepresenting the American name 
and disgracing the American people and the Ameri¬ 
can pulpit at Copenhagen; with Butler, the worthy 
representative of his notorious uncle, rioting and 
reveling as consul-general in Egypt, with good men 
and true being daily removed from office for daring 
to doubt the wisdom of Grant’s re-election, with as¬ 
sessments being dally levied on all government 
clerks and employes for the purpose of carrying on 
the administration campaign in direct violation of 
these pretended regulations ;• * « * with the 

heads of the departments scattered from Maine to 
Oregon, using all the influence, patronage and money 
at their command to bolster the failing fortunes of 
their chief. 

It is true that in seeming derogation of the 
foregoing sentiments, Mr. Miller is now 
perhaps the most influential member of an 
administration which has set off a very 
large share of patronage “ as mere family 
property.” And if the President, whom he 
much admires, is not manipulating for a 
second term on a scale never known before 
then all signs fail. And it must be admit¬ 
ted that for many years Mr. Miller has not 
been heard to lift up his voice in favor of 
civil service reform, although Wanamaker, 
Clarkson, Noble, Nathan, Willis, AVar- 
mouth, Johnson and others under his very 
nose revel and riot in spoil. And many 
“ good men and true ” have been removed 











192 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


from office by him. Neither does he pros¬ 
ecute plain cases of assessments nor en¬ 
courage such prosecutions, although the 
evidence is so plain that if pressed the cul¬ 
prits would likely throw themselves upon 
the mercy of the court. Canting Phari¬ 
sees may urge these objections to Mr. 
Miller, but this ought not to detract from 
a just and large admiration of him as a 
fearless and independent young man in 
1872, and as a worthy example. 

INDIAN PROSPECTS. 

The spoils system in the Indian service 
goes bravely on. It is not surprising that 
the party in the spoils machine who is re¬ 
sponsible for the reckless order io, in effect, 
kidnap Sitting Bull should be kept con¬ 
cealed. And solely out of our system of 
spoiling the Indians with bogus agreements, 
bogus supplies and bogus officers came the 
massacre of "Wounded Knee Creek, in which 
we have the honor of having killed sixty- 
three women and children. It turns out, 
also, according to Mr. Welsh, and un¬ 
disputed statements from all quarters, that 
the administration appointed as agent at 
Pine Ridge a man named Royer because he 
had rendered conspicuous services to some 
boss in a county convention in South Da¬ 
kota. One day an attempt was made to ar¬ 
rest an Indian in front of the agency, but 
he drew a knife and got away. Royer at 
once took a bee-line for the nearest railroad 
station and telegraphed for troops, and did 
not return to the agency until the troops 
had gone first and made sure of his own 
precious safety. President Harrison and 
Secretary Noble built up their own spoils 
machine in the Indian country in contempt 
of the advice and protests of those who had 
known and worked for the Indians many 
years. The fine-working qualities of their 
machine are illustrated by the fact that 
that when trouble came, and their Indian 
agents should have been of inestimable 
service, as, in effect, fathers of their people, 
the administration had to put out a whole 
grist of them, and appoint in their places 
army officers of honesty and capacity, and 
experience with the Indians. Royer went 
with the rest, remarking with incomparable 
brass that his removal had been brought 
about “by political influences, jealousy, and 
at a time when the Dakota delegation in 
congress was at home looking after an 
election.” Whether any permanent im¬ 
provement will, under this administration, 
be the outcome of the present Indian 
troubles seems doubtful. It is announced 
that none of the henchmen who posed as 
agents have been permanently removed ex¬ 
cept the abused Royer. This means that 
as soon as it seems safe for them to again 
become a part of the Indian spoils machine 
they will be allowed to do so. The instruc¬ 
tions from Washington to Captain Pierce, 
the new agent at Pine Ridge, are not to 


clear out the barnacles he may find in the 
service at that agency, though that would 
be the only way to carry out the boasted 
rule of the spoilsmen that the man who is 
responsible for an office should have the ap¬ 
pointment of his subordinates. He is 
ordered to look over his subordinates and 
make report to Washington as to such as 
he can not keep, with explicit reasons in 
detail for his objections. This simply 
means that the reasons are to be referred 
to the congressmen who own these hench¬ 
men, and who will either bully the admin¬ 
istration into keeping them, or will foist 
upon Captain Pierce another crowd of the 
same stripe. The bottom of all this is, that 
President Harrison has determined to take 
a hand in securing his own re-nomination, 
and he is afraid to offend congressmen. He 
has precedents before him to show that a 
re-nomination by a party machine, bought 
with patronage, does not insure re-election. 


Several thousand miners have sent in a 
petition to the Indiana state legislature to 
the effect that the great hazard connected 
with their work renders it an outrage to 
appoint as mine inspector a man who knows 
nothing aboiit mines and mining. It is 
stated that Governor Hovey appointed for 
this important position a farmer who knew 
nothing about mining. A bill has been in¬ 
troduced to have the state inspector of 
mines appointed by the state geologist in¬ 
stead of by the governor and that there 
shall be a pass examination. 

Pass examinations were discredited years 
ago. They offer no protection against fa¬ 
voritism and are no bar to incompetency. 
Tammany uses them in New York for its 
braves and finds them no inconvenience. 
Unless the legislature is willing to let all 
applicants have an equal chance by means 
of competitive examinations, it is quite as 
proper.to let Governor Hovey go on frank¬ 
ly appointing farmers as mine inspectors 
who may draw the salary of $1,500 and thus 
be paid for political work. 


Dr. R. FrenchStone, one of the pension 
examiners at this point, has been removed, 
and Dr. S. A. Elbert, a negro, appointed. 
At its meeting, .Tanuary 20, the Marion 
County Medical Society, forty members 
members being present, unanimously re¬ 
solved : 

Whereas, The various boards of examiners for 
pensions were created by the government for the 
purpose of fairly adjusting the claims of wounded 
and disabled soldiers; and, 

Whereas, It was the intention of the law that 
these boards should be composed of intelligent and 
reputable physicians in order that justice might be 
done to both the soldiers and the government; there¬ 
fore. 

Resolved, That the recent action of the president of 
the United States in removing from the board of pen¬ 
sion examiners of Indianapolis an honorable mem¬ 
ber of this society and a veteran union soldier, in 
order to give place to one who is not, and who never 
has affiliated with the profession, and who does not 
possess the necessary qualifications for the important 


trust thus committed to his hands, is a base and in¬ 
excusable prostitution of the office of pension ex¬ 
aminer to partisan purposes, and an insult to every 
reputable physician in this city and state. 

Resolved, That the secretary is instructed to for¬ 
ward a copy of these resolutions to the President of 
the United States and to the daily papers of this city. 

Elsewhere are given illustrations of the 
institution known as the primary or cau¬ 
cus. It is not lovely. These examples are 
of the noisier variety and their sharp prac¬ 
tice is coarser, but in the main they do not 
misrepresent the spirit which governs these 
meetings. In the better bred neighbor¬ 
hoods the tricks are slicker. For instance, 
lately we heard one of the better element 
complain that at the caucus in his ward 
the usual allowance of five minutes for dif¬ 
ference in watches was not made, and when 
he got to the place of meeting five minutes 
late, not only had the delegates been 
chosen but every one who had taken part 
in the choosing had vanished. The work¬ 
ers never tire of saying that those who ob¬ 
ject to their delegates and candidates 
should attend the primaries and choose 
better ones, well knowing that if this were 
the only Avay of putting them down they 
would stay up a long while. At the pri¬ 
maries tiieyare invincible, but at the polls 
they are becoming more and more help¬ 
less. No duty of contending in a primary 
with rough and ready rounders or with 
smooth tricksters rests upon a citizen. So 
long as millions a year are to be fought 
over as siioil, this will continue, and in the 
meantime it is the duty of citizens to have 
no bowels of compassion for parties or per¬ 
sons at the j)olls. 

A new republican club, with Roger "Wol¬ 
cott as president, has been organized in 
Massachusetts. It is composed of men 
whose sincerity and patriotism Avill not be 
questioned, and Avho Avill have to save the 
republican party, if it is saved at all, from 
the Dudleys, Quays and Ingallses. The 
club demands, among other things: 

That this club authorizes a committee of the mem 
mens, to be selected by the president, to urge upon 
the President of the United States the extension of 
civil service reform, and increa.sed appropriations for 
that purpose. 

"We ipiderstand that a representative 
of this club, together with Congressman 
Lodge, !Mr. Roosevelt, and INIr. Sherman 
S. Rogers, have called upon the President 
to urge him to extend the operations of 
the civil service laAV and were courteously 
received. 

Theoc^re Roosevelt has “An Object 
Lesson m Civil Service Reform ” in the 
February AfhtJihc Monthly. 


The Civil Service Chronicle has been 
regularly sent for some months to the li¬ 
braries of about four hundred colleges over 
the country. In some instances the gift 
has been acknowledged. It is requested 
that the trouble be taken to state whether 
the paper has been received and is on file 
for general reading. 

















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


193 


SMUG MR. WANAMAKER. 


[From the last report of [Comments by the civil 
the postmaster general.] service commission.] 

1. I hope to see the civil 1. The commission has 
service examinatiojis, vi- never received a hint that 
peciallv with reference to its examinations were not 
the railway mail, im- proper. 

proved. The individual com¬ 

missioners have repeat¬ 
edly told the general su¬ 
perintendent of the rail¬ 
way mail service that 
they were anxious to get 
any advice about these 
examinations, and would 
atonceremedy auydejecl. 

2. A year’s experience 2. The commission is 

confirms me in the judg- strongly of the opinion 
ment formed twelve that in most cases this 
monthsago. that the civil force can be best supplied 
service system, as applied by promotionojmenalirady 
to the rosters of the post- in theposi office depart ment, 
office department, is sus- whictt contains in theneigh- 
ceptible of improvement, borhood of 17 000 classified 
The examinations for the employees. The commis- 
inspector force and for sion, however, is confl- 
the railway mail service dent that it can supply a 
ought to be tuade Hiorcdt/- reasonable number of 
ficuU, so that the candi- good post-office inspectors 
dates for places will bet- from its open examina- 
ter stand the test of actual tions, and is surprised to 
work. learn that the postmaster- 

general does not regard 
these examinations as ^at- 
isfactory. They are of the 
same kind as those that were 
used in the department 
itself before these em 
ployes were classified, 
with the cxciption that from 
being pass examinations 
they are noiv made compet¬ 
itive. Of the seventeen men 
appointed from the com¬ 
mission’s list to these 
places during the year 
and a half that has just 
elapsed, sfa-feea are now in 
the service. Only one has 
resigned or been di.'-miss- 
ed. Any system that pro¬ 
duces such results can 
not be said to be ineffect¬ 
ive or to work badly. In 
any event, the commis¬ 
sion is convinced that it 
will be most iietrimental 
to the public Interests to 
go back to the old method of 
treating the appointments 
of these post-office inspectors 
as so much patronage. 
More effort has been made 
to have these post-office 
inspectors put back under 
the patronage system 
than has been the case in 
regard to any other 
branch of the classified 
service. Evi ry member of 

3. The inspector can not the commission has been up- 

be'capable unless he is proached by influential pol- 
full of resources and iticians. asking that post- 
alertness. office inspectors should be 

excepted from examination; 
and in almost every instance 
where the reguest has been 
made it has been based upon 
the ground that the post- 
office inspectors in office 
when the service was classi¬ 
fied had been appointed 
chiefly for political reasons. 
One of the commissioners 
has himself seen a letter in 
which a very prominent po¬ 
litical lender was urging 
this change, and urging the 
appointment of a post office 
inspector in his district 
frankly for the reason that 
he wished to know about the 
political attitude of the var¬ 
ious local postmasters. An¬ 
other of the commission¬ 
ers was frankly told by a 
political leader of great 
Importance in a certain 
state, that he wished the 
inspectors to be excepted 
from examination, be- 
' cause from the nature of 

their office they were cal¬ 
culated to render such 
very important political 
service; and inasmuch as 
the previous inspectors, 
then in office, had ren¬ 
dered this service to the 
ou t-going ad mi nistration, 
the gentleman referred to 
desired that their succes¬ 


sors should render equal 
political assistance to the 
in-coming administra¬ 
tion. 

-t. It is estimated by the 4. The records show 
railway mail office that that, of the 1,525 eligibles 
the proportion of railway appointed in the railway 
mail eligibles who fail to mail service from our ex¬ 
fill the re(iuiremeuts of arainationsupto June 30, 
that exacting employ- 1890, about 145 have re- 
ment is a quarter ora fftirci signed or been removed. 
of all those examined. There were but thiity one 

removals; and doubtless 
many, if not most, of 
those who resigned did so 
of their own free will, and 
should not by rights be 
included at all in these 
figures. In other words, 
instead of one-third, only 
one-eleventh have been sepa¬ 
rated from the service. The 
others (over 90 per cent, 
of the whole number) are 
still in ; and the commis¬ 
sion had assumed, nottin- 
natu rally, that they 
would not be retained if 
they did not givesatisfac- 
tion, inasmuch as the 
commi>sion stands ready 
at any time to fill the 
places of any dismissed, 
and inasmuch as it is a 
cardinal doctrine of the 
commission that any gov¬ 
ernment employe should 
be promptly dismissed if 
he fails to do satisfactory 
work. 

5. The railway postal 5. We require now a snr- 

clerk can not be efficient geon’s certificate as to the 
unless he has physical applicant’s good health 
endurance. and strength. Moreover, 

part of the e.xamination 
is, as the postmaster gen¬ 
eral doubtless knows, the 
six months’ probationary 
test. 

6. Nor is it truth—and 6. The system of exam- 

It will not stand the test inations and tests applied 
of time—to reiterate over after appointment, under 
and over again that the which the postmaster 
railway mail service, general says the railway 
which had been made the mail service had become 
most effective body of the most effective body of 
civil servants in the civil servants in the 
United States under an United States, has been 
old established merit sys- preserved intact, without 
temof its own, was basely an iota of change under 
prostituted to partisan the civil service rules; 
ends when this adminis and, in addition, an en- 
tration of the post-office trance lest has been pre¬ 
department was busying scribed in the form of an 
itself with putting back open, competitive exam- 
these trusty and tried inaiion, which takes the 
men in the places of per- place of the practice in 
sons whose room was more vogue before the civil 
valuable than their bungling service rules were applied 
assistance, and with wait- to this service—o/ allow 
ingfor the tardy certificat ion ing mt mbers of congress and 
of eligibles. others to nominate to the 

department the persons to 
be appointed. 

This sentence refers to 
the changes made imme¬ 
diately after the present 
administration took of¬ 
fice, between March 4 and 
May 1, 1889, the latter be¬ 
ing the date on which the 
railway mail service was 
classified. According to 
the on 1 y a uthori i ies acces- 
sible to the commission, 
there were some 1,500 re¬ 
movals or over during these 
eight weeks, at least a third 
and perhaps a half of the 
employes appointed dur 
ing the preceding four 
years being removed at 
this time. All of those 
employes had been ap¬ 
pointed under the pat¬ 
ronage system. It is clear, 
then, from the postmast¬ 
er-general’s own state¬ 
ment, that under thepaf- 
ronage system of making 
appointments, a very large 
proportion—probably a half 
—of those appointed are 
of such poor quality that 
even after several years’ 
service they do their work 
in a manner so bungling 
as to render their pres¬ 
ence in the department a 
drawback, notan advan¬ 
tage. Comparing this with 
the results achieved dur¬ 
ing the last year and a 
half under the system of 


open, competitive exam¬ 
inations, the enormous 
superiority of the latter 
is observable at a glance 
from the postmaster-gen¬ 
eral’s own report. 

Under the law, the civil 
service examiners are de¬ 
tailed to the commission 
from the various depart¬ 
ments. The post-office 
department until within 
the last two months has 
been very backward in 
thus detai ling examiners. 
Notan examiner was de¬ 
tailed to the commission 
from the railway mail 
service until a year and a 
quarter after this service 
had been classified, and 
only then when the com¬ 
mission, after repeated re¬ 
quests for the detail, was 
obliged to notify the de¬ 
partment that it would no 
longer be able to do the 
work for the railway mail 
service unless the detail 
was given it. Thus for a 
yearand a half the entire 
work of the commission 
for this branch of the 
service was performed by 
men detailed from other 
departments of the gov¬ 
ernment, who had to neg¬ 
lect the work of the de¬ 
partments from which 
they were detailed in 
order to perform the work 
of examining, marking, 
and certifying applicants 
for positions in the postal 
service. 


Let me briefly mention one or two special 
causes for Thanksgiving: 

1. Ciiil Service Reform. I see progress in 
this direction, and I will tell yon why. Yon 
know that when the present administra¬ 
tion came into office, it came in with the 
most distinct pledges that the civil service 
Avas to be non-partisan; it was to be more 
impartially managed than ever during the 
previous administration. The promise was 
clear, and they were elected and put in 
power upon that understanding. And what 
has been the result? 

The great post-office department, which 
is so closely connected with the life of the 
people; which has to do with every county, 
every town, every village, every little ham¬ 
let in the land, which has nothing to do 
with politics, for it makes no difference 
whether the postmaster who handles your 
letters is democrat or republican, Presby¬ 
terian, Episcopalian, Roman Catholic, or 
even atheist, so that he does his work in¬ 
telligently and honestly—this great depart¬ 
ment is the field above all others where re¬ 
form Avas most needed. The service re¬ 
quired to be made non-partisan, and the 
promise Avas given that it should be. Well, 
Ave all knoAV that the postmaster-general 
violated his promises most shamefully. His 
first assistant postmaster—a Mr. Clark¬ 
son—has boasted that he has remoA’ed 
thousands and thousands of postmasters 
for partisan reasons, to put in members of 
his OAvn party, and not to improA’e the 
service. And this Avas done Avith the hope 
and expectation that this AA Ould benefit the 
political prospects of the party that did it. 
And Avhat have the people said? Why all 
over the country, and right in the very sec¬ 
tion AA’hich claims Mr. Clarkson as one of 


»- 













194 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


its leading men, tlie verdict of (lixajiiiroral 
has come. The i)eoi)le have said, “This 
won’t do. Step down; we are masters,and 
we will show yon what we think of men 
who break their solemn pledges and prom¬ 
ises.” Will anybody tell me that after this 
popular verdict, any party will dare to 
think that they can strengthen themselves 
by prostituting the civil service to partisan 
and dishonoralde vises? Hence 1 seem to 
see that out of this evil progress has come 
in the civil service idea.— From the TIimiL-x- 
girhifi Sprmoii of Her. Hull IJarrlsou. 

The spoils system is a system of lirntal 
iniipiity. [Cries of “Hood!” and ap])lanse.] 

I have chosen my words carefully, simply 
to tlescribe it with scientific accuracy. 
[Laughter and applause.] With yonr jver- 
mission I will give one or two instances to 
bear out the words I have used, although 
they are instances that I have (pioted to 
certain gentlemen here present on another 
occasion. Of the two instances, 1 shall 
take one happening under the last and one 
under the present administration. One of 
the most jvainfiil things in connection with 
my duties as a civil service reformer is be¬ 
ing brought in contact with so much wrong 
that I am powerless to right,to remedy, or 
to attempt to remedy in anyway. We have 
a very wise rule forliidding re-instatements 
of pv'ople in the government service who 
are out more than a year; for, if we allow 
jveople to re-enter after a greater time than 
that, there ivonld be ajvt to lie in the begin¬ 
ning of each administration a wholesale 
jmtting in of men dismissed under the pre¬ 
ceding administration. It is a rule gener¬ 
ally right, though of course in individual 
cases it works harshly. 

A poor woman came to me early in my 
service as commissioner, to ask if she could 
not be re-instated. She had been turned 
out some two or three years before, and had 
been a clerk in the government office at 
Washington. She was a widow, with two 
children. A certain senator had need of 
her place. It was at the time not in the 
classified service. He wanted it for a 
henchman of his own. He had notified the 
division chief of the department that he 
needed that place. The division chief sum¬ 
moned the lady, and told her that he was 
very sorry for her, but she had to go. 

I wish to say here that I want to condemn 
the system rather than the men who did 
wrong under it. The senator who made the 
request made a request simply for a vacan¬ 
cy, and did not knovv anything about the 
hardship of the case or the person who had 
to be turned out; and the division chief who 
had to do the turning out acted under com¬ 
pulsion and with extreme reluctance. The 
Avoman came to her chief, and told him she 
was absolutely dependent on the salary she 
had—that it meant bread to herself and 
children and a roof to cover them; that 
she had been in the service some thirteen 


or fourteen years, and had entirely lost all 
connection with any of her former friends. 
There was no jvlace where shv' could go, 
ami no niche that would be open for her. 

She worked very much on the sympathy 
of the division chief, who said: “Ho you 
back. I will keep you in.” She went, and 
was kei)t about six weeks more. T>ut down 
came the senator. His man was clamorous. 
The senator said it was no. use talking, he 
had to have the jdace, that the thing must 
be done. The thing was done. 

The Avoman was turned out. She did 
manage to pick up a little Avork here and 
there—enough to keep herself and her 
chiMren insufficiently fed and insufficient ly 
clad. She manage<l to just live. 

The woman came to me and told me her 
case. I told her hoAV keenly I a])preciat(Hl 
the Avrong she had suffered, but that, if w(' 
established a i)recedent in this case, it 
Avould entail our helping hundreds of other 
cases Avho would not haA'e been worthy of 
help. The Avoman Avas i)erfectly reasonable 
in thematter, ami saw the pfisition in Avhich 
Ave were placed. She said, “(.)f course, I 
understand hoAv you are situated; but it is 
a little hard for me to live on one meal a 

hay.” 

ysoAA', 1 fail to see hoA\- any person can be 
brought in contact AA'ith instances of this 
kind and not feel that the spoils system is 
an outrage on American manhood; and no 
man of self-respect, with the least spark of 
manhood in him, can su])])ort such a system. 
—From the Address of Hou. Theodore Roose¬ 
velt Before the ('o)umercud Club hi Boston, 
Dee. ,20, ISftO. Briuted in Full in .lunnurij 
Civil Service Record. 


“Letllienian who is too frood and too conceited to 
belong to either parly go to tlie primaries and see 
that good men are chosen. Instead of staying away 
and then kicking against tlie candidates.” 

Party Boss. 

I. 

If a gang of Avild beasts had taken jhis- 
sessionof I’arnell Hall Saturday night, they 
could not haA'e made more noise than the 
seventy-live delegates Avho assembled there 
to nominate tAA'O democratic candidates for 
aldermen in the tifth district. The mer¬ 
cury registered something near ninety de¬ 
grees. In the hall, thirty by forty feet in 
dimensions, Avere crowded the seA'enty-tive 
delegates and a hundred spectators Avho 
AA'ere present to see that there Avas“fair 
play betAveen man and man,” as they an¬ 
nounced. There is a saloon beneath this 
little hall, and of course all the spectators 
and delegates had looked in the bottom of 
a glass before they Avent upstairs. This 
prosperous saloon-keeper also kept cigars 
Avhich he sold for the moderate price of 2L, 
cents each. 

There Avere three small AA'indoAvs in the 
room, through Avhich there Avas danger of 
some fresh air circulating, but seA’en or 
eight thoughtful young men, Avho Avere 
present as ornaments only, were kind 


enough to stand in these air jiassages, and 
thus make it utterly impossible for the air 
to get in, or the tobacco (?) smoke to get 
out. 

Tom IMahoney elboAved his Avay through 
the croAvd and mount,e<I a ])latform, the base 
of AA'hicb Avas on a leA'el Avith the heads of 
the delegates. He stroked his floAving mus¬ 
tache once, and then announced that he 
Avas ready for Imsiness. In a twinkle a 
half-dozen persons had been proposed for 
chairman, and e\'ery time !Mr. yiahoney 
AA'ould attemjit to ask foraA'ote tlu'friends 
of each man proposed Avould set up a yelL 
that Avould drown out his A'oice. !\Ir. :\Ia-,/ 
honey cAmcluded he Avould just let them j 
yell, and folding his arms he posed on his] 
high jierch and calmly saiil: “ 1 am at 

your sei’A'ices, gintlemen.” j 

Pretty soon an idea struck Pat Kelley,^ 
of the twenty-tifth Avard, and mountinghis 
chair and shaking his head like an orator, 
reaching a climax he said: “!Mr. Cdieer- 
man, in the intrust of harmony 1 nominate 
John Rail for cheerman of theeou\ iution.” 
There was a chorus of “yes’s” and a chorus' 
of “no’s,” and then some one raised the 
point that the chairman had to be taken 
from among the delegates. Finally (!has. 
Hauss, the nominee for council in the 
twenty-fourth ward, was elected Avith a 
AA'hoO]). 

Julius Iteinecke, John Iteardon, John 
IllackAAell and Peter Carson Avere jilaced 
in nomination. It aaiis decided that a ma¬ 
jority of all the A'otes cast AA'Ould nominate. 
The balloting aa iis carried on amid confu¬ 
sion. The A'ote on the first ballot AA as as 
folloAVS : Reinecke 20, Reardon 27, Black- 
AA-ell 22, and Carson 0. There Avas little 
change in the A'ote until the eighth ballot, 
AA'lien BlackAA'ell receiA'ed 41 A'otes and aa iis 
nominated. 

There Avas a great uproar for a fcAv 
minutes, and the ballot was taken for the 
second candidate. As Reinecke’s friemls 
had helped to nominate BlackAA'ell, it AA as 
supposeil BlackAvell’s supporters AA Ould uoaa' 
come to Reinecke, and that they did. On 
this ballot but seventy-six A'otes AA'ere cast, 
and of this number Reinecke received 
thirty-nine, Reardon thirty-fiA'e and Carson 
two. Reinecke had receiA'ed the majority 
of all the A'otes cast, and his friends im¬ 
mediately set up a gleeful yell that stirred 
the hot blood in the lighting Celtic sons of 
the tAA'enty tifth Avard. Pat Kelley gaA'e his 
head an infuriated toss, and the fun began. 
The friends of Reardon pretended that he 
had been counted out. They maintaine<l 
that seventy-eight A'otes had been cast, and 
that jMr. Reinecke must have forty to nom¬ 
inate him. Mr, Kelley, AA'ith a voice like a 
fog horn, AA'as heard aboA’e everybody else. 

“AVe AA'ill haA'e our rights, Air. Cheer- 
man,” said he. “ AVe come here not to be 
bull-dozed, but to receiA'e fair treatment as 
betAA'een man and man, and that Ave AA'ill 
have. Air. Cheerman.” 














I 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


195 


jT 

t; Chairman Gauss, as he stood on his ele¬ 
vated perch, was the picture of distress 
He feared personal violence if he declared 
Reinecke the nominee, so he stood there 
and made s])eeches. He must have made 
twenty-tive, and this is what he said every 
time : “ Gentlemen, I have announced the 
vote as it is before me. If you can’t agree 
it is no fault of mine.” His twenty-sixth 
V speech was a little more elaborate. He 
1 begged for mercy. “You ought to under- 
' stand my position,” said he. “It was un- 
^ fortunate that I should have been called to 
X preside over this meeting. I liave the vote 
as it was cast, and yet if I announce it you 
^ will come over into my ward and knife me 
% for council.” 

• Tlie wrangling was kept np for an hour 
T and a half, and then Keinecke’s followers 
, withdrew from the hall. The followers of 

Reardon remained to argue with ]Mr. Ganss, 

* and would probably have been there until 
daylight had not Keardon withdrawn from 
the race, and advised them to su 2 )port this 
nominee. A little before midnight the 

t lights were turned out, and the disappoint- 
^ ed were forced to seek the street cars. 

There appears uudoubtable evidence of 
^ deep treachery in the party ranks, and it 
^ is not surprising to find Councilman 31 ar- 
key as the supposed conspirator. To ac- 
ji comi)lish his purpose he appears to have 
turned his knife upon his own relatives, or 
such of them as he found -were not of his 
own way of thinking. It was given out 
^ tliat 3Iarkey’s relatives, particularly John 
Reardon, candidate for alderman, were re¬ 
ceiving all the support that 3Iarkey and 
■ tlie corporations could give him. Every¬ 
body turned in to help defeat the supposed 
corporation candidates, and in doing this 
helped on 3Iarkey’s real candidates. John 
Blackwell, the nominee for alderman, is 
understood to have secured, through IMar- 
key, a position as engineer at the Insane 
Hospital. 3Iichael Toole, a relative of 
31arkey’s, who didn’t want a public place, 
" and who, tlirough 3Iarkey’s influence, se- 
cui’ed a position as spotter on the street 
" railway lines, voted against Reardon. John 
'■ German, a twenty-third ward delegate, says 
Rail—who was ostensibly Reardon’s friend 
■" —advised him to vote against Reardon. 

The Indianapolis Gas Company’s employes 
- were present in strength doing 3Iarkey’s 
bidding—and one of them, by the way, on 
3Iarkey’s renomination, presented him 
with a cane. 

The point of it all is that 3Iarkey’s sup¬ 
porters, who had been understood all along 
to be for Reardon, when it came to voting 
all turned to the other fellows. It was a 
cute trick, Imt it was carried too far. Mar- 
key’s relatives can hardly be expected to 
complain, but their friends and a legion of 
democrats are in open rebellion. An inde¬ 
pendent candidate is almost a certainty. 
Reardon has declared himself for the 
whole democratic ticket, but the solid dem¬ 


ocrats down that way who are not re¬ 
strained hy personal relations will settle 
all of their disaffection hy voting against 
3Iarkey. They say he has represented 
corporations instead of the people; that 
he hrought corporation agents to the pri¬ 
maries from every nook and corner. Fred 
Hoffer, grocer, head of many benevolent 
societies, will probably 1)e the independent 
democratic nominee for council against 
3Iarkey. As a bit of good politics the dem¬ 
ocrats ho])e the repxiblicans will indorse 
the independent. 3Ir. Hohlt is also Ijeing 
considere<l as a possibility .—IniliniKtpolis 
Ar/r.s, Septruihi’r 

II. 

Everything was “cut and dried” for the 
re-nomination of Thomas 3Iarkey in the 
twenty-third ward, and it was practically 
useless for the opposition to attempt to 
change the prearranged programme. 
IMarkey had the party machinery at his 
command, being liimself ward committee¬ 
man, and he was shrewd enough to use it 
to good advantage. Yesterday afternoon 
the opposers of 3Iarkey saw the way the 
fight was .going, and they persuaded all 
the opposition candidates to withdraw but 
AY. H. Hohlt. Air. Hohlt was acce])table 
to all those who didn’t want to see Alarkey 
re-nominated, and his friends felt confident 
that he would be nominatod. 

It was an enormous crowd that blocked 
the street in front of the engine house for 
half an hour before time for the primary i 
to begin. There must have been nearly 
500 men, all of whom claimed to he demo¬ 
cratic voters in the twenty-third ward. 
AVhen the meeting was called to order by 
Robert Keller, one- of Alarkey’s friends 
moved that Con. Sullivan (said to be a rel¬ 
ative of Alarkey’s) be made permanent 
chairman. The supporters of Hohlt named 
another man, but the Alarkey crowd set 
up a yell that was deafening, and, while 
the uproar was going on, Sullivan was de¬ 
clared elected chairman. As Sullivan! 
mounted the chairman’s table, some one | 
called out: “ Look out; he knocked out J 

Kitrain.” | 

As soon as Sullivan had the meeting in 
hand for his principal, an effort was made 
to carry out a scheme of the Alarkey-Rear- ^ 
don crowd. Y'oung Albert Lieber offered 
a resolution which provided that three 
gentlemen (naming them) should consti¬ 
tute a committee to select delegates to the 
aldermanic convention. The i)ersons 
named were at once recognized as support¬ 
ers of Reardon, and one hundred voices 
were raised in chorus against the presen¬ 
tation of such a resolution. Air. Lieber 
saw he could not get the resolution through 
at that time, and he announced that he 
would withdraw it for the present. 

Chairman Sullivan then announced that 
nominations for councilman were in order. 
August Kuhn nominated Thomas Alarkey, 
and forthwith some relatives of Alarkey in I 


the crowd moved that the nomination be 
made by acclamation. 

“Xot much you won’t,” yelled the crowd. 

“Ao, everybody’s got to have a show,” 
said Chairman Sullivan, as he called for 
more nominations. 

AVilliam H. Hohlt was then placed in 
nomination, and so was Rhilip Wolf. The 
latter at once withdrew and reipiested that 
his friends sujjport Hohlt. Another effort 
was made to have Alarkey declared the 
nominee by acclamation, but the ci'owd 
objected so strenuously that the chairman 
didn’t dare to carry out the scheme and 
entertain a resolution of that kind. 

The arrangements for going through the 
farce of voting was then made. Every¬ 
body was driven out of the engine house, 
and the front and rear doors locked. The 
tellers were then stationed at a side door, 
where they received the votes in a hat as 
the crowd pushed into the house again. Xo 
effort was made to prevent non-residents 
from voting, and there were char.ges that 
Alarkey had many supporters there from 
every ward, from the insane hospital to 
Irvin.srton. 

Alarkey and his gang had planned well. 
It was arranged that when the crowil 
should be turned out of the engine house, 
the Alarkey gang should take up their po¬ 
sitions near the side door where the votes 
were to be taken. The plan was carried 
out, and the first 200 votes taken in were 
nearly all for Alarkey. AVhen the Alarkey 
ringsters thought about all the votes for 
their candidate were in, some one of them 
burst open the front door to the engine 
house and the crowd surged out and around 
to the little side door where the ballots 
were being take. There was hut one thing 
to do, and that was to close the ballot-l)ox 
(hats). Alore than one hundred men were 
still in line, waiting their turn to vote, and 
they all had Hohlt tickets in their hands. 
They protested loudly, and demanded that 
the entire vote be taken over again, but 
the protests counted for nothing. The 
tellers, who were, of course, Alarkey men, 
said they could not be held responsible for 
the doors being opened, and to avoid the 
confusion they went up stairs to a private 
seance to count the vote. 

The Hohlt supporters, disgusted, went 
home, and then it was Reardon’s (Alarkey’s 
brother-in-law) chance to have his sup¬ 
porters chosen as delegates to the alder- 
manic convention. The Liel)er resolution, 
which had been hooted down once, was 
adopted with a whoop and a hurrah. The 
committee of three retired, one of them 
pulled from his pocket a list of delegates 
Reardon had selected, it was pronounced 
all right, and the report was made to the 
meeting, which was now composed ex¬ 
clusively of Alarkey-Reardon supporters. 
Of course no one objected to the list of del¬ 
egates. • 

There was a little wait, and then the 












196 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


teller came down the stairway smiling and 
annonnced that Markey liad received 20!l 
votes and lIoliltl25. There was some ap¬ 
plause, and a call for 3Iarkey, to which he 
replied after the stereotyped fasliion.— In- 
Xeirx, Ani/utit ,//, JSS!). 

Ill. 

The nastiness of gang politics was faith¬ 
fully pictured in the twenty-second ward 
last night, where a most disgraceful affair 
took place. A dirty struggle to elect a 
gang committeeman has disgusted the bet¬ 
ter element of the republican jtarty in the 
ward. The .so-called “convention” was 
hehl in a vacant storeroom in the Bristor 
Block on Virginia avenue. 3Iike Toomey, 
the clerk of the board of aldermen, is the 
authorized agent of the Tin Horn crowd in 
that ward, and it was known that he would 
capture the convention by high-handed 
methods, if such a thing were possible and 
necessary. Early in the evening a number 
of business men and good citizens who 
have not attended a primary for years ar¬ 
rived, and it was sought to have decency 
and fair i)lay. But they did not know the 
gang. At 8 o’clock one of Toomey’s sub¬ 
alterns carried a starch box into the room. 
Ostensibly it was to he used as a ballot- 
box, but the subaltern sat with his arms 
about the box and no one could get near 
it. V hen John Howard, the old commit¬ 
teeman, called the meeting to ordei', 
Toomey and his cohorts, composed in {)art 
of a gang of potatoe peddlers, democrats, 
ward heelers and sluggers, arrived. Mr. 
Howard attempted to have a permanent 
chairman elected. 

This started the row. Toomey sprang 
on a chair, and, waving a dirty piece of pa¬ 
per, shouted that he had been appointed 
temporary committeeman by the city com¬ 
mittee, and he at once assumed to be 
chairman of the meeting. Pandemojiium 
broke loose then. John A. Porter was 
nominated for committeeman by Howard 
and Charles Egger was nominated by 
Toomey. Porter’s friends insisted that no 
democrats should be allowed a voice in the 
proceedings and should be asked to go out. 
To this Toomey objected. 

“How can you tell who are democrats,” 
he shouted. 

“ M e knoAV them, and know who has them 
here,” yelled the other side. “Let the i)o- 
lice come in and i)ut them out.” 

“Xo policeman can take any one out of 
here,” howled the Tin Horn crowd. How¬ 
ard climbed on a tal)le and attempted to 
speak, but he Avas jeered and hooted at 
until his voice could not be heard. Toomey 
clambered up beside him and screamed 
his orders as chairman, and he, too, Avas 
greeted with hisses and yells of derision. 
Once or tAvice a tight was imminent and 
seA’eral blows were passed in the croAvd. 
HoAvard called for the ayes and noes and 
declared Porter elected committeeman. 
Porter attempted to speak, but Avas hissed 


j doAA n. Toomey Avaived his hat to command 
silence. 

j “ Shut up,” yelled some one in the croAvd. 

I “I’ll come doAvn there and climb your 
I collar,” elegantly remarke<l Toomey. 
j “ Climb Avhose collar? ” 

I “Yours; you knoAV me,” continued 
Toomey, Avith a yell like a Comanche In- 
I dian. “ Hands off,” “ i)ut ’em out,” “ knock 
j ’im off the table,” hisses, groans and oaths 
folloAved. IIoAvard, Porter ajid his friends 
left the hall, fairly driven out by the gang. 
Toomey then organized Avhat he called the 
tAventy-second Avard conA'ention, and de¬ 
clared Egger the committeeman. Egger 
AA'as boosted on a table (Avhich,l)y the Avay, 
was a poker tables and Mr. Egger maile a 
little s])eech. He entertained all motions 
in the aflirmatiA-e. The negative side of a 
(jnestion was not thought of, ])articularly 
as Mr. Toomey made :ill the motions and 
introduced all the resolutions. The poker 
table and the starch box Avere moA'ed up to 
the door, and as the gang Avalked out a 
ticket Avas drojiped in. EA’eryone A’ote<l 
that Avante<l to, no matter Avhat their age 
or politics, and Egger Avas declared elected 
by the Tin Horn croAvd. As might be ex¬ 
pected, a Avide split among tin* republicans 
of the Avard is the result. The gang’s bull¬ 
dozing methods Avere condemned bt' the 
better element. “M'e can not expect to 
beat all the potato peddlers and democrats 
in this end of toAvn,” said a business man. 
“This affair is <lisgraceful, and Avill result 
in a democrat’s election. We are tired of 
Toomey and his gang, and don’t ])ropose to 
submit any longer.” “Xone of Porter’s 
friends cast a A'ote,” said another. “ Do 
you suppose Ave Avould A'ote for a man ])ut 
up by a gang like that?” 

The <piestion as to aaIio is the commit" 
teeman elected—Porter or Egger—Avill 
probable come np before the city commit¬ 
tee. That organization is controlled by Tin 
Horns, and Egger bloAA's Avith them. The 
claim that he had been appointed tem¬ 
porary committeeman by the city commit¬ 
tee made by iMr. Toomey, is (piestionable. 
i\Ir. IIoAvard Avas the old committeeman, 
andAvould hold OA’er until his successor Avas 
elected, and the city committee had no 
right, it is claimed, to declare his office va¬ 
cant and appoint another in his stead. “ He 
Avas elected by the peoi)le,” said one of 
Howard’s friends, “and the committee 
could not remoA'e him, especially as iNfr. 
HoAvard has been attending to his duties. 
There Avas no vacancy. Howard was chair¬ 
man of the coiiA-ention, and Porter is the 
legally elected committeeman. Toomey 
Avas an interloper, and had no authority to 
act as a chairman.’’—LidIxnajtolis Xewa, 

A ugiist 1H90. ’ 

IV. 


A Donnybrook fair isn’t a circum¬ 
stance to the riot that marked the demo¬ 
cratic tirst Avard caucus to-day, and 
in the midst of it Avas the Hon. William F. 


Sheehan, leader of the democrats in the 
assembly and Goa’. Hill’s right boAver. He 
Avas supported by se\'eral of his creations, 
among them a dairy ins])ector and a sec¬ 
tion superintendent of the Erie canal. 

(Jasman Bradley Avanted a renomination 
for alderman, and Iceman Sullivan Avas af¬ 
ter the same office. Sheehan considers 
Bradley a juggler, and so he Avas fqr the 
iceman. The chairman of the Avard com¬ 
mittee, Charles iMcDonough, is a Sullivan- 
ite, and during the saloon hours, Avhen 
honest men Avere asleep, last night, it is 
said that Sheehan, ^McDonough, and a feAv 
others put up the “job,” and early this 
morning a gang of SulliA^an’s men SAvarmed 
around the A'oting place and took entire 
possession of the sideAvalk, the building, 
and the room Avherein the ballot boxes 
Avere to be ])laced. When Bradley and his 
friends arrived they could not get Avithin 
a gun-shot of the polls. Finally a feAV of 
the most A'aliant fought their Avay into the 
room Avith .lack O’Connell at their head. 

( i’Connell tried to talk, but he Avas “ tired 
out” immediately. Then the Bradley croAvd 
picked up Tom Shay and pushed him 
through the transom over the door. Tom¬ 
my just touched the door Avhen he Avas 
bounced out. (.)thers Avent in and Avere 
put out in the same Avay. “ Billy Sheenan 
is inside,” shonted a man AvhoAvas clinging 
to the aAvning irons in front of the place. 
“Put him out, he has no right there.” In 
about an hour Bradley came out co\'ere<i 
Avith perspiration. He had been ejected 
by the police. He Avas excited, and said: 
“They haA'e robbed us of the organization.” 
He then began distributing his tickets. 

“Hold a caucus outside, .Tohnny,” said 
one of his adherents. “Let us organize 
here.” 

Mr. Sheehan came out later. He, too, 
Avas very Avarm and showed the effect of 
the effort to organize Avith the struggling 
mass. He said: “Allthere is to it is that 
SulliA’an had the Avard committee and 
Bradley Avanted to get the organization. 
He tried to make an independent move¬ 
ment and AA'as j)ut out.” Bradley mounted 
a Avagon and tried to make a speech. The 
AA agon AA'as pulled aAvay, but it AA'as dragged 
back, and :\Ir. Bradley managed to keep 
his balance long enough to say that the 
Irish coercion act Avas not a marker on the 
methods taken by Sheehan and his gang 
to coerce and beat him out of a nomination 
Avhich he Avas justly entitled to, and that 
he then and there AA'ithdreAA' from the cau¬ 
cus and Avas a candidate of the people re¬ 
gardless of the gang Avho propose to rule 
or ruin the democratic party in the first 
ward. —Bafalo dispatch to Xeir York Times, 
October 14 ,1890. 

V. 

A caucus of the democratic electors of 
the second Avard Avas held in the liA'ery 
stable, Xo. 1.38 Carroll street, j’ester- 
day afternoon. The polls opened at 4 p. m. 
and the A'oting AA'as done by register. 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


197 


“ It was rather a tame affair this year,” 
a bystander sententiously remarked. “ No¬ 
body was arrested, and the stable is in as 
good repair as ever, and no furniture was 
destroj^ed with the exception of a stove.” 

“They had a divil of a time,” said one of 
the three policemen on duty, at the end of 
the count. “ When they began to elect a 
chairpian, the divil was to pay then, and 
five men were standing on that little table 
at the same time. We had to send for the 
patrol wagon with more men, and we 
clubbed the room out twice, before we got 
any order.” 

Alderman Frank J. Trautmanii and.Tohu 
F. Burke were the rival candidates for the 
aldermanic nomination. Alderman Traut- 
mann’s friends got there first and crowded 
into the little seven-by-nine office of the 
livery stable and left no room for Burke’s 
dilatory backers. Then the fun began. 
Each candidate wanted his own chairman, 
for each knew that that meant his nom¬ 
ination. Trautmann’s friends finally se¬ 
cured their chairman and and the other 
party threw up the sponge. The caucus 
resulted as follows: 

For alderman, Frank J. Trautmanu, 108 
majority ; for supervisor, Thomas H. Mun- 
sell; for constable, Wm. Chandler. About 
280 votes were cast. 

The defeated candidate, Mr. .John F. 
Burke, said to an Express reporter last 
evening after the smoke of the battle had 
cleared away: “The men attending the 
caucus fought for two hours like human 
tigers. The caucus should have been or¬ 
ganized at four o’clock, but it was impos¬ 
sible to elect a chairman for two hours; 
there were ten policemen present, and all 
took a hand in the affair and clubbed ev¬ 
erybody into line for Trautmann. I un¬ 
derstand Police Commissioner Tllig sent for 
one man—a Seneca-street saloon keeper— 
and told him that unless he came out and 
worked for Trautmann his license would 
be revoked. The saloon keeper told me so. 
I was clubbed and my hat was crushed in 
the melee. I never before witnessed such 
a struggle. A great many outsiders voted, 
and the way the proceedings were conduct¬ 
ed was outrageous. One cause of the trou¬ 
ble was that a fight was made against 
William F. Sheehan’s ward ticket, and he 
was knocked out. I have no thought of 
contesting the result of the caucus.”— Buf¬ 
falo Express, October 10, 1891. 

VI. 

A thirteenth-ward democratic caucns is 
generally a sight for gods and men. Yes¬ 
terday’s was no exception. Though the day 
passed without an actual display of fistic 
hostilities, the feeling ran none less 
high. There was a merry war all around. 
Three candidates were in the field for the 
aldermanic nomination. They were ex- 
Alderman Adams, Willis J. Crane, and 
Alderman “ Tosh ” Summers. And the last 
was first in this case. Alderman Summers 


scored a genuine triumph in the caucus, 
and the other candidates were left so far in 
the rear that it was with ditficulty that they 
realized they had been in the race. 

Queer methods prevailed at the caucus. 
In the first place, Al<lerman Summers had 
the ward committee so well “fixed” that 
they directed that the caucus should be 
held at James Welsh’s saloon. No. 1145 
Seneca street. This was manifestly an un¬ 
fair place to hold the caucus, as it was clear 
over to one end of the ward, and well nigh 
inaccessible to over half the inhabitants of 
the ward. One member of the committee, 
Henry Clark, refused to sign the call for 
the caucus in this place. Next, the hour as 
set by the committee for holding the caucus 
was from two to eight o’clock. Instead of 
that the time was extended until nine 
o’clock. And finally, it was asserted on all 
sides that everybody, irrespective of party 
lines, was allowed to vote. The etiquette 
in the thirteenth in regard to this little 
matter does not seem to be very lofty. 

When the votes were about to be counted^ 
and all the candidates were collected in the 
room with the caucns committee. Chairman 
Manning broke silence, and said: “ Before 
we open the ballot-boxes, is there any ob¬ 
jection to the way this caucus has been 
held? ” 

Engineer Crane and Alderman Summers 
said they were satisfied. Not so ex-Alder¬ 
man Adams. He boldly stated that the 
whole thing was a fraud from beginning to 
end, and he was not satisfied. 

“Do you charge the committee with 
fraud?” asked one of its members. 

“No, I don’t say that the committee has 
acted wrongfully,” answered ]Mr. Adams, 
but he did not retract his assertion that the 
whole thing was a fraud, neither would he 
promise to support the caucus nominee. 

“ Well, as long as he doesn’t charge the 
committee with fraud, let’s open the boxes,” 
said the chairman. Forthwith the boxes 
were opened and the counting began. Ac¬ 
cording to the list 748 men had voted, but 
the committee announced 768 ballots, of 
which Alderman Summers had received 443, 
Mr. Crane 233, and William Adams 94, a 
total of 770. The discrepancy was not ac¬ 
counted for, and besides 22 ballots were 
thrown out. 

The vote for siipervisor was as follows: 
Thomas Fletcher 448, Mr. Weyand 180, W. 
S. AViles 139. For constable, Arthur Mullen 
received 278 votes aiid Robert Hughes 481. 

As soon as the result was announced ex- 
Alderman Adams left the room in high 
dudgeon. To an Express reporter he un¬ 
bosomed himself as follows : “ The whole 
thing was a fraud, from first to last. Look 
at the place they held caucus. None of my 
friends could get over here. This is Sum¬ 
mers’s stronghold. He lives right near 
here, and so, too, does Crane. It is eight 
miles from my part of the ward. It took 
me over an hour to get here, so you can see 


how far it is. Republicans were allowed to 
vote as well as democrats. And look at the 
place where the voting was done. There 
were lights at both ends of the block, and 
that was all. It was as dark as a pocket 
there, and no one could tell who was vot¬ 
ing. Notice, too, how the ballots came out. 
The whole thing was run in Summers’s in¬ 
terest.” 

AVhen asked whether he was going to run 
as an independent candidate, Air. Adams 
would not say “ yes,” though it was evident 
that he thoiight seriously of so doing. 
Some of his friends assert that he will un¬ 
doubtedly run. 

After the caucus “ Tosh ” “ set ’em up ” to 
the boys. There was a very rum crowd col¬ 
lected in the saloon, and they must have 
run up a pretty big beer bill for the presi¬ 
dent of the common council. AVith his 210 
majority, however, he cared not how much 
beer was drunk .—Buffalo Express, October 
10, 1890. 

VII. 

They say experience is a teacher, but 
Brooklyn republicans don’t seem to find it 
so. They fought last year over the control 
of the local organization and were snowed 
under on election day. Now they are fight¬ 
ing just as bitterly as before, with this dif¬ 
ference—no actual bribery has been dis¬ 
covered. The fight is along the same lines, 
however, AA^oodruff against Nathan [inter¬ 
nal revenue collector], and a great amount 
of bad blood has been created. Franklin 
AA^oodruff said to a Ti)nes reporter the other 
day: 

“Air. George B. Forrester can have the 
chairmanship of the general committee if 
he wants it, and he wants it bad.” 

“ AA^ould you take it again, AIr.AA’'oodruff ?” 

“Not if a salary was tied to it,” was the 
reply. “ I didn’t want it last year, but the 
opposition set up such a howl, and ‘Al’ 
Daggett came over here and opened head¬ 
quarters and began to shout ‘Anything to 
beat old AA^oodruff’ until finally I had to 
go in and make a fight or go out of office 
under a cloud. I fought, but I wouldn’t do 
it again. I’ve had enough of this kind of 
politics.” Some of Air. AA’'oodruff’s old 
friends and allies in this committee fight 
do not agree with him about the probable 
result of the election next Tuesday even¬ 
ing. Clarence A. Barrow, the secretary of 
the general committee, and always a con¬ 
sistent AA^oodruff man, said a day or so ago: 

“ I don’t think Forrester has ‘ a snap ’ at 
all. In fact, I think Nathan vAll control the 
committee and the organization during the re¬ 
mainder of the year. I think he will run it 
to the lowest ebb and will then get kicked 
out, after which the party will begin to 
pick up .”—New York Times, January 11. 

AHII. 

A last effort was made last night to har¬ 
monize the AA'oodruff and anti-AVoodruff 
factions in the Brooklyn republican ma¬ 
chine and to agree upon a candidate to be 








198 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 



elected chairman of the Kings county re¬ 
publican general committee on Tuesday 
night. The Woodrulf people appointed 
Naval Officer Willis, AVilliam li. Leaycraft, 
Israel F. Fischer, Jacob Brenner, and Major 
E. H. Hobbs a committee to confer with a 
committee of Nathan adherents. This lat¬ 
ter committee consisted of David A. Bald¬ 
win, 'William J. Beattie, John K. Smith, 
George F. Elliott, and Michael J. Dady. 

The committees met in the old party 
headquarters, at 153 Lawrence street, went 
away up to the top floor, and posted guards 
and sentinels below. Reporters were rigid¬ 
ly excluded. The Woodruff people made a 
demand that George B. Forrester should 
be nominated, while Baldwin and his as¬ 
sociates wanted M'. W. Goodrich selected. 

After discussing these names for over 
three hours the conferrees came to the 
conclusion that they could never agree, 
and so they adjourned. The Nathan men 
reported to a caucus then in session in 
Everett Hall the failure to agree on a 
compromise candidate. There were 180 
members of the general committee in this 
caucus, over which William C. Bryant pre¬ 
sided. After considerable discussion Good¬ 
rich was named for the offlce of chairman 
of the general committee as the candidate 
of the caucus, and by a unanimous vote he 
was selected. The entire Nathan faction 
will vote for him on Tuesday night. 

In the meantime the Woodruff commit¬ 
tee reported back to the Woodruff’ caucus in 
Waverly Hall, in AVaverly avenue, and this 
caucus decided to support Forrester for 
chairman. There were 150 men in this 
caucus. It will require 203 votes to elect 
on Tuesday night.— Neiv York Times, Jan- 
vary 11 . 

IX. 

The republican machine in Kings county 
was organized for 1891 last night, and 
nal Revenue Collector Ernst Nathan was on- 
hand to boss the job. He succeeded, too. The 
Athenjeum, on Atlantic avenue, where the 
general committee met, was packed to the 
doors, and Nathan’s lieutenants were all 
over. They included David A. Baldwin, 
George F. Elliott, W. H. N. Cadmus, James 
C. Fuller, ex-Assemblyman Taylor, and a 
number of others. The Woodruff faction, 
which wanted to elect George B. Forrester 
president, was led by Naval Officer Willis, 
Port Warden Leaver aft. United States District 
Attorney Johnson, and ‘‘Bob” Sedgwick. 

Both sides were extremely confident, and 
before the committee met some heavy bets 
were made. One of $100 to $90 on Forrester 
was taken six times over, but later on the 
odds were in favor of W. W. Goodrich, the 
Nathan candidate. The fight was the old 
one of Nathan against Woodruff, and 
Nathan won it. 


ensuing year. Under the new by-laws this 
pre-payment of dues became the most im¬ 
portant feature of the evening, for the pos¬ 
session of a receipt for $10 was the creden¬ 
tial that each member had to have before 
he could vote. The first business was a 
call for resignations, and thirty-five were 
received. The only important ones were 
those of S. V. White, Robert J. Tilney, Col. 
John W. Jones and “Billy ” 'Watson. Elijah 
K. Kennedy, the weak-kneed Moses of the 
twenty-second ward, was so disgusted at his 
inability to get control of the general com¬ 
mittee that he refused to qualify or attend 
the meeting at all, but he did not produce 
his much-advertised resignation. 

It was 9:30 o’clock before President 
Woodruff announced that the election of a 
president was in order, and that no nomi¬ 
nating speeches would be made, but that 
each delegate, as his name was called 
should announce his choice. The first ward 
went solidly for Forrester. So did the sec¬ 
ond, but Goodrich got 9 out of the 10 votes 
in the third. He received the entire vote 
of the fourth, and all but 1 of the 0 in the 
fifth. 

The first sensation came when Luther 
W. Emerson of the seventh rose to vote. 
He made a speech, and said; “ I am sick 
and tired of this factionalism; sick and 
tired of being counted as a sheep or a goat ac¬ 
cording to the boss that claims me. We had 
lots of fun out of this factional fight, but 
last fall 20,000 republicans failed to appre¬ 
ciate the fun or to see where the joke came 
in. Now is the time, when the democratic 
hulk is water-logged, for us to come in and 
sink her. I can not, therefore, vote for 
either of the factional candidates pre¬ 
sented, but cast my vote for Eugene D. 
Berri.” 

This produced lots of applause, and one 
other delegate voted for Berri. The others 
went on with the fight. There was loud 
hissing and cat-calling when “Mike” Dady 
voted for Goodrich, and cheering when 
.Tonas M. Farrington, an old "Woodruff man, 
deserted to the Nathan candidate. When 
the last vote was polled Goodrich was found 
to have received 212, while Forrester had 
only 166. This announcement was received 
with tumultuous cheers and more enthu¬ 
siasm than had been seen in the committee 
before for over two years. Finally a com¬ 
mittee was sent after ^Ir. Goodrich. 

When they brought him in iMr. Woodruff 
made a little speech, urging a cessation of 
strife in the future. He thanked every¬ 
body, and then introduced his successor. 
Mr. Goodrich expressed pleasure that there 
had been no personal aspersions during the 
canvass. He thought that no jealousies 
would remain and that harmony mnst pre¬ 
vail. 


to neither of the factions. Now we are all 
disgusted, and we must cry ‘quits.’” 

He then went on to deny that he had 
ever voted the democratic ticket in his life, 
unless the Greeley ticket could be called a dem¬ 
ocratic one. A.S for the charge that he had 
sent e.v-President Cleveland a telegram begin¬ 
ning ‘'Hail to the chief," Mr. Goodrich said 
that his friends uiiderstood it, and as for others 
he didn’t care a, cent.” 

Then he gave Mr. Forrester a chance to 
speak, and the defeated candidate pledged 
his support to Mr. Goodrich. The men back 
of Forrester were disgusted by this time, 
and they made no protest when George F. 
Elliott had the following slate elected: 
'Vice-presidents, John R. Smith, J. S. Ogil- 
vie, W. H. N. Cadmus, W. S. Ryan; secre¬ 
tary, 'Warren S. Treadwell; treasurer, Jas. 
W. Birkett.— New York Times, January I 4 . 

X. 

Although this is the politicians’ off sea¬ 
son, they have plenty of things about local 
organizations to discuss. This week will 
bring with it two primary elections. The 
republican primary will be held Tuesday 
and the Tammany primary on Friday. As 
already indicated in The Times, the repub¬ 
lican primaries will develop into contests 
in some of the districts; perhaps the most 
interesting one will be in the twentieth 
assembly, where there is a stiff opposition 
to the continued leadership of Police Jus¬ 
tice Solon B. Smith. This fight against 
Smith is mainly interesting because it indi¬ 
cates that republicans not only in the twentieth 
district, but elsewhere throughout the city, are 
heartily sick of the Tammany influerice that is 
exerted within their party. 

Smith has so often been accused of being 
friendly to Tammany that people have 
come to believe that his management of 
the twentieth district is by no means whol¬ 
ly in the interest of the republican party. 
Another thing that operates against Smith 
in the present fight is that he is anti-Platt, 
and that he is a member of the republican 
state committee. Platt would like very 
much to have him off the state com¬ 
mittee, and, of course, Platt’s friends 
in the district are going to do their 
utmost to beat him. William A. Gans, who 
is the leader of the opposition to him, will 
have an opposition ticket, in the field, but 
it is the judgment of most of the politicians 
who are watching tins fight with interest 
that Smith can not be beaten this year be¬ 
cause he has the machinery of the district 
too well in hand.— New York Times, Jan. 11 . 
XL 

The republican primaries were held in 
all the assembly districts in the twenty- 
third and twenty-fourth wards yesterday. 
In three of the districts—the fifth, thir¬ 
teenth and twentieth—there were lively 
contests, and in each case the faction already 
in power won the fight. In the fifth an effort 
was made to depose Stephen B. French, 
and in the twentieth the fight was against 


The retiring president, Franklin AVood- 
ruff, called the meeting to order as soon as 
the members had paid their dues for the 


I have pledged myself,” said Mr. Good¬ 
rich, “ to be the chairman of no faction, but 
of the general committee. AV^e have made 
gross mistakes, but they have been confined 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


199 


Police Justice Solon B. Smith. Both Smith 
and French came out on top. In the thir¬ 
teenth the old fight between the Fred S. 
Gibbs and the Cowie-Sprague factions was 
fought over again, and Gibbs, who has been 
ejected from the republican county com¬ 
mittee, won after a sharp struggle. In the 
sixteenth district Richard Lush succeeds 
Henry Kropf as leader as a result of Mr. 
Kropf’s retirement. The total result of the 
primaries leaves the executive committee 
of the republican county committee prac¬ 
tically as it has been for the past year. T. 
C. Platt is in control, of course, and he is 
credited with gaining one man more in 
‘Richard Lush of the sixteenth. 

There were no serious encounters in 
Gibbs’s district, but uncomplimentary 
phrases were throwii back and forth very 
freely. The ticket headed by Henry L. 
Sprague was defeated by a majority of 97 
in favor of the Gibbs men. At first it 
looked as though the result would be very 
close, but in the evening scouts were sent 
out by the Gibbs crowd to the saloons and 
street corners to trap such republicans as 
they could find, and a long line ranged up 
before the ballot-boxes. The contest grew 
bitter as the time neared for closing the 
polls, and efforts on the part of the Gibbs 
adherents to substitute their voters in the 
line called forth a wordy Avar, but a large 
squad of police kept all desire for fistic en¬ 
counters in check. 

The line reached down stairs from the re¬ 
publican rooms in the Grand Opera House 
to the sidewalk when the polls were closed. 
The total vote was 563, of Avhich the ticket 
headed by Gibbs’s men received 330 A'otes 
to 233 for that of the Cowie-Sprague fac¬ 
tion. An incident of the day Avas the 
marching in of a large body of drivers and 
conductors on the Twenty-third Street 
Cross-Town railroad under the guidance of 
Mr. CoAvie. 

The statement Avas circulated in the fifth 
district that Stephen B. French had re¬ 
tired, and that the struggle for the leader¬ 
ship AA'ould be among four contestants. 
They were named as Frank J. Carroll, 
“The” Allen, Audley J. Mooney, and Cor¬ 
nelius Donovan, who waged an unsuccess¬ 
ful fight against Col. Fellows for congress 
last fall. But at 3 o’clock, Avhen the polls 
opened, there AA'ere only tAvo tickets in the 
field. Mlthin the twenty-four hours pre¬ 
ceding there had been an amalgamation of 
the contending forces, and the fight settled 
down to a question of supremacy between 
the French-Dodd-Mooney clan on the one 
side and the Donovan-Carroll clique on 
the other. 

James T. Snedeker was chairman of the 
primary, with Edward Kinley, Henry 
Brockmeier, and Terence Radford as en¬ 
rollment clerks and inspectors. Seated in 
the rear of the hall in Avhich the primary 
Avas held Avas ex-Police Commissioner 
French, surrounded by a feAV of his work¬ 


ers. “All I want is a vindication,” he said 
to a r/mes reporter. “I have been maligned 
in this district for a long time simply 
because I Avon’t submit to dictation. If I 
am re-elected I shall see that the district 
is in proper hands and Avill then resign.” 

A feature of the struggle Avas the hot and 
furious work done by “ The ” Allen. It had 
been expected that he aa^ouM hold aloof or 
at least lend his support to Donovan and 
Carroll, but he appeared on the French 
side and watched the ballot-boxes closely. 

The first skirmish occurred Avhen a Ger¬ 
man attempted to A’ote on the name of 
Gerard. He was challenged by George 
Cooper on behalf of the Donovan-Carroll 
forces. Ten minutes later the same man 
appeared and said his name was Meyer. 
Again he was challenged, and while his case 
Avas being argued he slipped aAvay. 

A would-be voter Avho seemed to be in 
the last stages of consumption said that 
his name Avas George Keegan, and that he 
liA^ed at 9 Varick Place. 

“I challenge this man!” yelled Allen, 
and immediately the opposing factions as¬ 
sumed the attitude of battle. 

“On AA'hat ground?” demanded the chair¬ 
man. 

“That his name is not Keegan.” 

Then the real Keegan came to the front 
and the French adherents demanded the 
arrest of the man. The consumptiA^e said 
that his name was Haynes; that he had 
met Carroll, and that Carroll had asked 
him as a favor to A^ote on the name of Kee¬ 
gan. He didn’t think it Avas Avrong, and 
had agreed to do so. He Avas alloAved to go. 

An Italian attempted to vote tAvice on 
different names, but he Avas caught and 
hustled out of the polling place. 

After 6 o’clock the battle proper occurred. 
Men AA'ho for Aveeks had been the habitues 
of the lodging houses of the district flocked 
in and attempted to \'ote, but the chal¬ 
lengers of both sides Avere Avary and exer¬ 
cised their functions. Scores of men came 
up to the polling tables Avith their hats off 
and gaA'e names Avhich Avere not on the en¬ 
rollment list. 

Just at 9 o’clock there Avere loud cries 
for the polls to close. The hall Avas dense¬ 
ly packed, but Chairman Snedeker exer¬ 
cised his perogatiA’e and, guided by his 
Avatch, closed the polls. At that time there 
Avere at least fifty men in line. The result 
Avas announced as folloAvs: French ticket, 
279; Donovan ticket, 102; scattering, 5. 

The effort to put an end to Police Justice 
Solon B. Smith’s leadership of the repub¬ 
licans of the tAventieth assembly district 
Avas not successful. ‘William A. Gans, Avho 
headed the opposition ticket, made a stout 
fight, but he was outnumbered three to 
one. He, however, made Smith’s friends 
work to save him. Mr. Gans and his fol¬ 
lowers object to Judge Smith’s leadership be¬ 
cause the district has been making so poor a 
showing in republican affairs latelij, and be¬ 


cause there is a strong suspicion that Mr. 
Smith is a very good Tammany republican. 
Mr. Smith had all his workers at the polls, 
and several Avho have moved out of the 
district AA'ere on hand to use arguments in 
his faA'or. Henry C. Perley and City Mar¬ 
shal Goode Avere the leaders of the Smith 
contingent. Curiously enough, the main 
arguments in Smith’s fa\'or used by them 
Avas that if he Avas defeated as leader the 
chances that Mayor Grant AA'Ould re-appoint 
him as a police justice AA Ould be diminished. 
They Avent on the theory that Grant Avould 
re-appoint him if he Avas re-elected leader. 
Smith succeeded in getting 169 A’otes for 
his ticket, AA'hile I\Ir. Gans got 61. The lat¬ 
ter said that he did not expect to Avin un¬ 
der the circumstances, but he thought that 
he had made a start in the right direction. 
—Neiu York Times, January I 4 . 

■ XII. 

The results in the republican primaries 
last night Avere discouraging to the anti- 
Tammany republicans. Wherever a district 
leader, ivho had been accused of secretly aid¬ 
ing or favoring Tammany or Tammany 
schemes, sought a “vindication,” he got it. 
Frederick S. Gibbs triumphed OA^er James 
A. Cowie in the thirteenth, and as soon as 
the result of the A'ote Avas announced gaA'e 
utterance to a dramatic speech Avhich 
teemed with defiances to ex-Senator 
Thomas C. Platt. Gibbs is not “out of the 
AA'Oods ” yet, though. The Cowie people 
charge that the primary Avas carried by 
fraud, and Avill contest the election in the 
county committee. The Platt people still 
liaA'e a majority in the committee. 

In the tAA'entieth district Solon B. Smith 
proA'ed himself entitled to a re-appoint¬ 
ment as police justice by IMayor Grant by 
defeating his opponent, AVilliam A. Gans, 
by a A’ote of about liA'e to one. 

Henry C.Botty, the first lieutenant of ex- 
Alderman Thomas RotliAvell of the “ boodle 
board” of 1884, is to succeed Jacob AI. Pat 
terson in the leadership of the tenth dis¬ 
trict. Botty Avill be merely the nominal 
leader, Rothwell Avill really control the or¬ 
ganization. 

Stephen B. French Avas re-elected in the 
fifth district. He played a A'ery quiet game. 
Yesterday his friends announced that he 
was Avilling to retire, but might run a ticket 
in the primary. AVhen the primary Avas 
opened it Avas found that there Avas a full 
French ticket in the field, and that it was 
backed up by the Dodd and Allen factions. 
The opposition ticket Avas supported by 
Frank Carroll and Cornelius Donovan.— 
New York Evening Post, January 14 . 

XIII. 

The ring “lei itself loose” in Hudson 
county at the primaries for the election of new 
members of the county democratic committee 
Monday night. The boxes Avere all manned 
by the most active ai:d oflensive of Davis’s 
gang of ballot-box stutters. At one ()f the i)re 
cincts Davis was a candiilate himself for elec¬ 
tion. He had the a-ssurance to offer John A. 











200 


THE CIA'IL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Whelan, one of the ballot-box stuffers now on 
trial, as a candidate in another precinct. 
Whelan was beaten, but the ticket that the 
heelers forced was successful everywhere else. 

One gang of repeaters made the round of 
the second district polling places and carried 
things with a high hand. In many precincts 
the polls were opened in advance of the adver¬ 
tised hour to let the heelers get their ballots 
in without challenge, and closed when it was 
seen that an army of opposition voters had 
been marshaled outside the booth. In another 
precinct the heelers were divided into one line, 
leaving the opposition crowd in another line. 
The police kept the opposition crowd from 
voting, while the heelers got in their ballots, 
and then the polls were suddenly closed. In 
the seventh district ballots were voted in 
bunches, and where the decent democrats suc¬ 
ceeded in carrying the polls they were boldly 
counted out. 

Yesterday warrants weie issued for the ar¬ 
rest of William English, John Carroll, Luke 
Conniff, and John English, of the ninth pre¬ 
cinct of the sixth district for stuffing the box. 
There will be no end of |)rotests when the ex 
ecutive committee meets; but there is small 
hope of the results of the fraudulent practices 
being set aside. 

The trial of the indicted election officers 
who officiated at the polliiig place in the sec¬ 
ond precinct of the second district in the fall 
of 1889 was continued before Judge Lippin- 
cott in Jersey City yesterday. The evidence 
submitted was that of an array of men from 
whose houses voters appeared on the poll-books 
as having voted. They all swore that no per¬ 
sons owning the names on the poll record re¬ 
sided in the buildings assigned to them. 

State Committeeman James C. Young testi¬ 
fied that he had found a young man named 
Waddick in a liquor saloon on election day, 
and that Waddick had a number of stamped 
and wetted “joker” ballots in his possession. 
He was giving them out to workers .—NewYork 
Times, Nov. 26. 

ADDRESS OF THE CIVIL SERVICE 

REFORM ASSOCIATION OF BUF¬ 
FALO. 

To the Citizens of Buffalo: 

The late decisions of the court of appeals estab¬ 
lishing the validity of the state civil service stat¬ 
utes, and Mayor Bishop’s recent extension of the 
competitive system to a large additional number of 
city offices seem to warrant our calling public at¬ 
tention to the law and your duties and privileges 
thereunder. This we desire to do briefly and sim¬ 
ply. 

THE CIVIL SERVICE LAW AND RULES SETTLED BY 
THE COURTS. 

First. As a matter of fact, the constitutionality of 
the civil service act and the legality of the rules and 
regulations prescribed by the mayor for its enforce¬ 
ment have been declared in the most explicit man¬ 
ner by the highest court in the state. Hereafter, 
those aldermen who have for years been in rebel¬ 
lion against the law and the public officials who 
have sympathized with them and more or less 
openly endeavored to defeat the operation of the 
law will not have even the semblance of excuse for 
like conduct. 

ALDERMEN AND OTHER OFFICIALS WILL TAKE NOTICE. 

The statute (Laws 18S4, section 8) provides touch¬ 
ing such rules and regulations as follows: “It shall 
he the duty of all those in the official service of such 
city to conform to and comply with any regulations 
made pursuant to this act, and to aid and facilitate in 
all reasonable and proper ways the inforcement of all 
regulations, and the holding of all examinations that 
may be required pursuant to this section." 

We invite the attention of every city official to 
this mandate of the law. 

NE.ARLV ALL CITY PLACES IN COMPETITIVE SCHEDULE. 

Second. As a matter of fact also, the competitive 
system extends to nine-tenths of all the official 


services of the city outside of the educational de¬ 
partment. 

No vacancies in any one of those places can be 
filled except by fairly competing for the place before 
the examiners, and winning it upon the applicant’s 
merit. 

There are nearly eleven hundred of these places, 
the compensation ranging from $1,200 a year down 
to $l..i0 a day. 

In the water department seven places only are 
excepted; in the fire department six places only; 
in the police department six places only; in the 
health department only one place; in the city poor 
relief department but one place, while in the other 
departments, except those of the comptroller and 
treasurer, most of the places are in the competitive 
schedule of the civil service regulations. 

In short, the public service of this city is at last 
practically taken by law out of the spoils system. 

A MAYOR AND COMMISSION WHO AVILL ENFORCE THE 
LAAV. 

Third. We have a mayor Avho is heartily in faA'or 
of enforcing the law, and we have also a live and 
earnest civil service commission. 

FAIR COMPETITION AND NOTHING ELSE AVILL AVIN. 

Fourth. As a necessary consequence it folloAvs 
that if any one wants one of these city places he 
must apply for it under the civil service rules and 
he will have a fair chance to obtain it. 

Heretofore the enemies of the laAV haA'e induced 
many people to believe that it Avas time and trouble 
thrown away to apply, under these rules, for a place 
the appointment to Avhich was to be made by an 
official Avho Avas not of the same politics Avith the 
applicant. 

In some cities there may have been foundation 
for such a charge. Many federal officials undoubt¬ 
edly have been glad to have such an idea dissem¬ 
inated. It was an easy Avay to discredit the law 
and to cause none but political friends to apply for 
places. There have been also many officials in our 
OAvn City Hall who were more than ready to sneer 
at the laAV and to decry it as “ a humbug.” So long 
as the validity of the law Avas in debate they Avere 
not afraid to do this. 

But the day has passed for this sort of thing. 

The opponents of civil service reform have been 
beaten eA^eryAvhere. 

THE CIVIL SERVICE LAAV “HAS COME TO STAY.” 

FeAv thoughtful men noAV doubt that the reform 
system “ has come to stay ” and that it Avill be ex¬ 
tended gradually to the great majority of subordi¬ 
nate administrative places both in state and nation, 
except such as are filled by the direct vote of the 
people. 

Its friends do not pretend that its methods have 
reached perfection. On the contrary they Avelcome 
every suggestion for improvement in those methods. 

But it is safe to say that the laAv Avill neA'er be 
blotted from our statute books. EA'ery day makes 
it stronger. EA'ery day makes it clearer that it is 
necessary; that it lies at the foundation of ballot 
reform, of municipal reform, and of every practical 
moA’emeut tOAvards a purer politics and a true gov¬ 
ernment of the people by the people. 

OFFICE SEEKING UNDER THIS LAAV IS HONORABLE. 

And noAV, nothing is Avanted to make it irresisti¬ 
ble and to deA'elop its beneficence to the full, ex¬ 
cept its practical use by the people without distinction 
of party. 

These public places are legitimate objects of am¬ 
bition for capable and faithful men. They are open 
to all; no official Avho cares for his oath or his per¬ 
sonal liberty dares lay a straiv in the Avay of any 
applicant because of bis politics. 

Citizens of Buffalo, Ave earnestly press these con¬ 
siderations upon your attention. 

Especially do Ave address the young men, many 
of Avhom are seeking places. Why should they not 
look for them in the service of the city ? The odium 
that under the spoils system is incurred by “ office 
seeking” can not attach to the manly strife for of¬ 
ficial place under the reform laAV. 

Let them inform themselves then as to vacancies 


^ In such places as they aspire to fill, and present 
themselves for examination. Let them dismiss 
from their minds the idea that political connections 
or influence must he employed by them. They 
need not be; they can not be so employed. Personal 
influence is of no use here. Much more than places 
in private service are these places to be had because 
of personal merit only. 

Applicants have not to ask for them. They hsA'e 
no political Avork to do for them—neither they nor 
their families or friends. They may demand these 
places of their oAvn right if they shoAV themselves 
on a fair competition to be the best men. 

And Avhenthey haA'e obtained places the practical 
fact is that they can hold them just as long as they 
conduct themselves as they ought and discharge 
their duties faithfully. 

AVHEN THE BATTLE IN BUFFALO AVILL BE AVON. 

When it is once made plain that they knoAV and 
Avill insist upon their rights under the civil service 
reform laAv to compete for these places as they 
would for a situation on a railroad, or in a bank, 
or with an insurance company, or a manufacturing 
company, or with any other employer who needs 
service of similar character and is Avilling to pay 
for it, the battle of ciA'il service reform in Buffalo 
will he won. 

APPEAL TO CITIZENS, 

To all citizens we say: There never was a more 
democratic system than that which the civil service 
laAV and rules provide. They recognize no claim 
to these places but the claims of manhood, honesty 
and ability. There was nev'er a less democratic sys¬ 
tem than that degrading and corrupting one which 
so long has parceled out these places as spoils, 

AVe invite you then not only to believe that the 
civil service statutes and the rules and regulations 
prescribed by the mayor are laAV and must be 
obeyed, but we earnestly request you to avail your¬ 
selves of their benefits and to co-operate Avith us for 
their entorcement. Sherman S. Rogers, 

President. 
Eric T. Hedstrom, 

Jeaa'ett M. Richaiond, 
George Sandrock, 

Jacob L. Schoellkopf, 
Vice-Presidents. 
Frederic Almy, 

Secretary. 

Dr. Chas. S. Butler. John H. CoAving, P. A. Cran¬ 
dall, Dr. T. M. CroAve, Fred. B. Curtis, William F. 
Kip, Joseph N. Lamed, Frank M. Loomis, the Rev. 
Herbert G. Lord, John B. Olmsted, Dr. Frank H. 
Potter, Henry A. Richmond, Walter J. Shepard, T. 
Guilford Smith, Henry W. Sprague, Sheldon T. 
Viele. John R. Warner, John Al. Welter, Charles B. 
AVheeler, Ansley Wilcox, Frank F. AVilliams,'execu- 
tiA'e committee. 

Buffalo, December, 1890. 


CURRENT NEWS. 

Tlie report of Theodore L. De Land, ex¬ 
aminer in the treasury department, and a 
long-time advocate of the merit system, is 
a document of some ninety-two pages. It 
is an instructive and encouraging state¬ 
ment of the workings of the competitive 
system, and contains a large number of 
specimen examinations. 


Civil Service Reform, Its Later Aspects, 
by AVilliam Dudley Foulke, is Economic 
Tract No. XXXI, and printed by the So¬ 
ciety for Political Education, 330 Pearl 
street, Xevv York City. 


The annual report of theXeAv York State 
Civil Service Commission states that the 
appointment of assistant physicians in the 
state hospitals Avill hereafter be determin¬ 
ed by competitiA’e examinations instead of 
pass examinations as heretofore. This was 
urged by the state commission in lunacy, 
and is a long step in advance. During 1890 
999 persons were examined; in competitive 
examinations only 285; of these 62 received 
appointment; in the pass examinations 
[which are subject to about all the abuses 
of the purely spoils system] 714 w'ere ex¬ 
amined and 687 were appointed. 












For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania St., Indianapolis. Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, 
Ind., where subscriptions and advertisments will be received. Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana, 


VoL. I, No. 24. 


INDIANAPOLIS, FEBRUARY, 1891. 


TERMS :{ 


50 cents perannnm. 
5 cents per copy. 


The Civil Service Chronicle is able to 
announce that its financial matters have 
been satisfactorily arranged for the coming 
year. Its managers thoroughly appreciate 
the prompt and generous manner in which 
its interests are being cared for. It is 
desirable that the circulation should be in¬ 
creased to the greatest possible extent 
especially through out the west and it is 
hoped that every friend of civil service re¬ 
form will lend a hand. If he does not care 
for the paper for himself, he can see that 
some library, or club or person gets it. 

Mr. Foulke is about to enter upon his 
duties as president of Swarthmore college. 
He has for a long time filled a large place 
as an enemy of the spoils system and 
those who keep in public life or profit in 
private life by that system need not flatter 
themselves that they have heard the last of 
him. It is expressly stipulated that the 
duties of his new position shall not inter¬ 
fere with his efforts for a better public 
service. Mr. Foukle has been a formid 
able man in this cause and in no respect 
more so than in his last work at Washing¬ 
ton. The value and the singular power of 
his position there can not be over-estimat¬ 
ed. Here was the platform upon which 
the Administration had been chosen and 
here was a man who had helped to choose 
it. He took his stand where he could see 
the operations of the government and 
gathering together a multitude of facts to 
support him he pointed out acts and said 
“This is not as you agreed. This is contrary 
to the platform upon which you were 
chosen, and it is also intrinsically wrong.” 
In no case has he been refuted The moral 
effect of such a work as has been done by 
Mr, Foulke is irresistible. Noadministra¬ 
tion can withstand its silent leavening 
process among the people. 

Since last month, a new movement 
against the spoilsmen in Indiana has at¬ 
tained unexpected prominence and has 
come to a present conclusion. Elsewhere 
is printed Senate Bill Number 272, intro¬ 
duced by Senator Magee, who was Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland’s minister at Stockholm. A 
glance at the bill shows that it had but a 
single intention, which was to take the 
eight charitable institutions of the state 
out of politics. The matter thus narrowed 
to a single issue, concerning which the 


people at large do not have two opinions, 
became a crucial test of individual human¬ 
ity and political wisdom. The first notice¬ 
able feature of the movement was the enor 
mous advance of public opinion. The Ma¬ 
rion County Medical Society, without a 
dissenting voice, indorsed the competitive 
feature as applied to that profession. The 
Social Turn-Verein of Indianapolis, at a 
large meeting, after a full expression of 
opinion indorsed the whole bill unani¬ 
mously. The Indianapolis SerUind, the 
leading democratic paper of the state, ear¬ 
nestly advocated the adoption of the meas¬ 
ure. All this happened within a few days, 
and there is no manner of doubt but that 
in a short time the public opinion of the 
whole state, in all the ways in which that 
opinion is expressed, would have have been 
practically unanimous in favor of this bill. 
A section of small politicians in the gen¬ 
eral assembly are the only ones who have 
made no progress and who have not recog¬ 
nized the signs of the times. Senator Ma¬ 
gee urged the bill with ability and great 
earnestness, in which he was supported by 
all the leading and the best men of the sen¬ 
ate irrespective of party. When the vote 
was taken upon the passage of the bill it 


stood as follows: 

Yeas—22. 

Nays—26. 

Democrats. 

Democrats. 

Akin. 

Burke. 

Holland. 

Byrd. 

Howard. 

Chandler. 

Kennedy. 

Ellison. 

Kopelke. 

Ewing. 

Magee. 

Foley. 

Smith. 

Francis. 

Republicans. 

French. 

Fulk. 

Boyd. 

Griffith. 

Grimes. 

Carver. 

Hayden. 

Caster. 

Holcombe. 

Clemans. 

Hudson. 

Gilman. 

Jones. 

Gross. 

Keith. 

Hanley. 

Lynn. 

Harlan. 

McHugh. 

Hays. 

Morgan. 

Hobson. 

Moore. 

Hubbell. 

Shanks. 

Loveland. 

Sweeny. 

Mount. 

Thompson [Marion]. 
Thompson [Hunt’gt'n] 
Thompson [Pulaski]. 

Shockney. 

Yaryan. 

Wiggs. 


Under the system which these twenty- 
six senators say shall be continued these 
charitable institutions have been for years 
and on a large scale the scenes of inhuman 
and devilish cruelty. With the rarest excep¬ 
tions this cruelty is due to the system of 
place-filling controlled by party and per¬ 
sonal favoritism. And to this system 
Senators Burke and Sweeney and Hudson 
and their followers turn as a dog turns to 


his vomit. Doctor Thompson of this coun¬ 
ty stands with them against the unanimous 
opinion of his county medical society. He 
is too old to learn anything and happily he 
w'ill soon be too old to occupy public posi¬ 
tions and obstruct progress. When the 
bill establishing the board of state chari¬ 
ties was under consideration two years ago 
Senator Burke opposed it on the ground 
that he was opposed to anything which was 
not partisan. And he made it an objection 
to the present bill that the board of state 
charities had appointed as secretary a 
gentleman from Chicago and that a matron 
from the same city had been employed in 
the home for feeble-minded youth. He is 
a nice man for a law maker. Fellows like 
Burke have made Indiana public affairs a 
bye word through the country. Senator 
Thompson, of Pulaski, has a twelve year 
old son whom he has jumped about from 
one place to another at five dollars a day. 
At last accounts he was carrying the senate 
mail. This seems a small price, but it is 
evidently enough to smother in this 
Thompson feelings of pity for the insane. 


Senators Hudson and Foley, of this 
city, voted stolidly against the bill. They 
pose as the representatives of working 
men, and the former is chairman of 
the committee on labor. They do not rep¬ 
resent workingmen. When by their votes 
they say to the people of this state that 
working men are in favor of continuing 
the charitable institutions under the pres¬ 
ent infamous system, they insult working¬ 
men and lie to the people. All the in¬ 
stincts of workingmen are for the better¬ 
ment of the condition of those whose lot 
is harder. And their public expressions 
are in the same direction. We call the 
attention of these two bogus representa¬ 
tives of labor to the words of the Labor 
Signal in another column, and to the fol¬ 
lowing resolution adopted at the annual 
session of the Indiana Federation of Trade 
and Labor Unions at Indianapolis, Septem¬ 
ber 23, 1890: 

Whereas We have witnessed the evil results of 
partisan control of state institutions, wherein all 
public interests are subordinated to the interests of 
party; therefore, be it 

Resolved, By the State Federation of Trade and La¬ 
bor Unions, that we demand such legislation as 
place all state Institutions under non-partisan con¬ 
trol. 




















202 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


If the twenty-six democrats who voted 
in the negative had planned to put their 
party in the deepest hole with the narrow¬ 
est mouth they could count the result as 
the greatest triumph of their political lives. 
The multitude who compose the demo¬ 
cratic party are not in favor of the inhu¬ 
manity to which these petty senators have 
committed them; but their party organiz¬ 
ation is irrecoverably bound by the result, 
and however undeservedly, the multitude 
must stand silent when the charge is made 
against the party. There is absolutely no 
escape; the republicans, to a man, with a 
wisdom which comes to republicans in a 
crisis, having voted on the right side. The 
gravity of the situation is fully shown by 
the following editorial from the Indianap¬ 
olis SentiTid of February 21: 

The democratic state senate on Thursday 
dealt the democratic party of Indiana a severe 
blow when it defeated Senator Magee’s bill to 
regulate the selection of employes of the be¬ 
nevolent institutions. It is not in the power of 
the republicans of Indiana to do the demo¬ 
cratic party of the state so grievous an injury 
as the twenty-six democratic senators inflicted 
upon it when they voted dow-n this eminently 
just, wise an^ righteous measure. It is amaz¬ 
ing that men who profess to be sagacious pol¬ 
iticians, who are familiar with the recent po¬ 
litical history of the state, who are acquainted 
with the wrongs which have been perpetrated 
in our benevolent institutions under shelter of 
the barbarous and infamous system of “ pa¬ 
tronage,” which has converted them into asy¬ 
lums for cross-roads bummers and ward heel¬ 
ers, who know how much odium the demo¬ 
cratic party has had to carry, much of it un¬ 
justly, because of the abuses growing out of 
the existing system—it is amazing, we say, 
that men priding themselves upon their sagac¬ 
ity as politicians should, when the opportu¬ 
nity was offered them, decline to relieve their 
party of a burden so oppressive. 

The democratic senators who voted against 
Senatpr Magee’s excellent bill committed an 
act of -political folly so gross as to be almost 
criminal. The defeat of this measure will 
cost the democratic party thousands of votes 
at future elections. No party can hope to 
hold its own in this state which deliberately 
sets itself against the moral sentiment of the 
people; which plants itself across the pathway 
of progress and reform; which obstructs meas¬ 
ures in whose behalf every consideration of 
humanity, decency and common justice de¬ 
mands. 

We say to the twenty-six democratic sena¬ 
tors who voted down Senator Magee’s bill that 
they have placed the democratic party in a 
false position before the people; that the great 
democratic masses of Indiana do not approve 
their action and will not sustain them in it; 
that the representative democratic newspapers 
of Indiana will not apologize for it or defend 
it in any way. There is, in point of fact, no 
defense to be made for it. It is a manifesta¬ 
tion of “peanut politics” in its most cruel and 
offensive form. That sort of politics is, thank 
God, pretty well played out in Indiana, and 
the politicians who practice it, and the party 
which tolerates it, will, sooner or later—and 
more likely sooner than later—come to grief. 

We have no doubt that many of the demo¬ 
cratic senators who voted to kill the Magee 
bill did so thoughtlessly; because of some 
prejudice against civil service reform, or some 
exaggerated idea of the political value of the 
patronage of the benevolent institutions. But 


! whatever motive acluated them, they luive 
shouldered an unnecessary burden upon the 
democratic party. Let no one doubt that such 
a measure as the Magee bill will, in due time, 
be placed upon the statute books of Indiana. 
This legislature refuses to do this righteous 
thing, but the next legislature, whatever its 
political complexion, will do it. Mark the 
prediction. The people of Indiana, without 
regard to party, are determined that the in¬ 
sane, the idiotic and the other helpless wards 
of the state shall not continue to be the vic¬ 
tims of the barbarism which is now practiced 
under the shelter of the spoils system in our 
public institutions. Democratic senators may 
not realize the condition of public sentiment 
on this question, but the Sentinel does, and as 
a democratic journal which believes that it 
serves its party best when it serves its state 
best, it warns the legislature against a repeti¬ 
tion of such serious mistakes as the senate 
made when it defeated the Magee bill. 

Indian Commissioner Morgan appears 
to have been sent about the country to 
make speeches of general apology for the 
management of the Indians by the Admin¬ 
istration. General Morgan apparently 
lacks the moral courage to stand by the 
facts. The sacrifice he thus makes to of¬ 
ficialism is too great. 

The Indians were starved, the treaties 
were not kept with them, they were put 
into the hands of politicians, and some of 
the leading agents were so incompetent 
that President Harrison had to remove 
them. No man has had as much to do 
with this or is so much to blame for it as 
Secretary Noble. He and President Har¬ 
rison have repeatedly dismissed without 
cause experienced employes. They have 
established the “ home rule ” policy, by 
which the places in the Indian service 
were given to henchmen of congressmen 
in the vicinity like Royer. Secretary Noble 
has treated with supercilious contempt 
protests of people much more competent 
to judge than himself. It is not worth 
while for Commissioner Morgan to gloss 
over a record of incompetency and cor¬ 
ruption which finally led to the loss of five 
hundred lives, men, women and children, 
and to an expense of two millions. 

Upon the question of how the Indians 
have been treated, such witnesses as Bishop 
Hare and Herbert Welsh will hardly be 
discredited even by the statement of the 
President in his somewhat ungracious let¬ 
ter to the Cambridge Civil Service Reform 
Association, printed elsewhere. An addi¬ 
tional witness also appears in Mrs. Cook, 
the wife of the Episcopal missionary to the 
Yanktons. Under date of January 22 she 
writes to Commissioner Morgan from 
Greenwood, South Dakota: 

We have been suffering a season of unusual sick¬ 
ness, a mild form of la grippe having been epidemic, 
aggravated by the well-known tendency of our In¬ 
dians to pulmonary troubles. Men, women, and 
particularly children, are lying sick everywhere. 
Though such is the state of things, we have been al¬ 
together without medical attendance for the past 
three weeks, except such as has been rendered un- 


profe.ssinna'ly by inis.«ionaries and others. At spe¬ 
cial request the physician from Fort Randall was 
called down for twenty-four hours. During this 
time the medical man sent here by the department 
has been in Pierre, engaged in political work. Dur¬ 
ing the past three months he has on two other occa¬ 
sions been absent for a week at a time, we are told, 
for the same purpose. Is it the intention of the de¬ 
partment that 1800 persons should frequently be left 
for longer or shorter periods without the services of 
a physician who has been sent out for the express 
purpose of caring for them ? If the services of any 
one man are indispensable to the successful manage¬ 
ment of Dakota politics, it would seem to the disin¬ 
terested that that man should not assume the duties 
of physician on an Indian agency. 

In the recent debate upon the attempt 
to strangle the civil service commission’. 
Congressmen Cannon and Grosvenor re¬ 
peatedly whined that no one could suggest 
any improvement upon the merit system 
' without bringing down upon himself the 
charge of being a spoilsman. Probably 
this whining was partly hypocritical and 
partly the smart which came from the 
sound drubbing which these men and their 
tikes have received of late. The improve¬ 
ments which they have in mind are such 
as Wanamaker’s move in rushing into the 
railway mail service, a horde of congress¬ 
men’s henchmen to get the start of the 
civil service law. Another improvement 
to the mind of these men was Raum’s at¬ 
tempt to get the law set aside in order that 
a crowd of favorites might be chosen for 
the pension office. Still another improve¬ 
ment is the move fathered by Senator 
Plumb to transfer the employes of the cen¬ 
sus bureau into the other departments with¬ 
out competition. The bulk of the appoint¬ 
ments in the census department was the 
riffraff of political heelers and bummers. 
Having taken a census which will always be- 
discredited, they are now fit, in the minds 
of the Grosvenors and the Cannons, for 
other public employment. If these em¬ 
ployes have any experience that is worth 
anything it will avail them in open com- 
petion. To put them in as proposed 
would sap the foundations of the civil 
service law and that is what these congress¬ 
men are after. As long as they come for¬ 
ward with such suggestions, they may ex¬ 
pect their hypocrisy and malice and greed, 
to be denounced. 


LOCAL FREEBOOTING. 

In another part of this paper are gathered 
together some random facts to illustrate how 
spoils ramify in a fine net work through every 
branch of the public business centering in In¬ 
dianapolis. They extend only over the last 
two years. Indianapolis is the better object 
lesson because it is not a great city, nor is it 
by comparison especially corrupt. If a mass 
of such facts were to be examined by a bar¬ 
barian his impression would be that a com¬ 
munity where they exist must be terrorized 
by a majority steeped in corruption and hard¬ 
ened to evil. But the truth is that the great 


m 







I 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


203 


T 


V 

’ majority of this community are untouched by 
^ corruption or sympathy with corruption. 

These things go on because the Better Element 
^ is inclined to be lazy and is in fact selfish 
I* Sim Coy affords an exact test of how his sort 
5 work for spoil and of how the Better Element 
work to protect the public and themselves. 
Coy is a disreputable and mercenary politican 
who was finally convicted and imprisoned for 
^ altering tally sheets There was an outbreak 
I of righteous indignation among the Better 
f Element and for a little time they forsook 
} private matters and became citizens in the 
' true meaning of the word and they triumphed 
J as they always do in like cases. Then they 
j sat down apparently exhausted. But Coy 
; came out of prison and resumed his business 
’ of getting spoil out of the public as if there 
^ had been no lapse. His work has been patient 
' and unremitting and at the present moment 
like a busy bee he is flitting about the legisla- 
. tnre actively in pursuit of sweets; and the 
Better Element looks on tranquilly. 

When the Coy element fails, it is never dis- 
couraged. It gathers itself up for a fresh as- 
’ sault on some exposed position. When it fails 

• and has to face the jeers that always go along 
with any failure, it is not sensitive ; it does 

, not bury itself and refuse again to expose 
itself. It shows a fine imperturbability; 
but the Better Element can not stand failure. 
Take these scandals, one by one, and consider 
the fact that an intelligent community has 
learjied no lesson in the two years, and that 
every cause for every scandal is still left to 
produce a fresh crop. 

In the fire department a capable man was 
displaced after years of conscientious service 
by a cabal as insignificant as it was malicious. 
Public opinion went far enough to see him re¬ 
stored after a time to his old place. But in 
the selection of his subordinates he is still left 
to be hounded by the Hicklins. His disposi¬ 
tion is to have a department of the highest ef¬ 
ficiency, but no one supposes for a moment 
that his time and strength will not be drawn 
upon to a large degree, to the detriment of the 
public service, to consider political and per¬ 
sonal favorites for positions. It is asking lit- 
, tie of this community to say that it should 
force Mr. Webster to throw the vacant places 
open to competition ascertained by practical 
tests; and that the politics of the applicants 
) should be considered no more than their reli- 

• gion. And so in every other department the 
spoilsmen are pursuing their business unilag- 
gingly, and the dilettante citizens observe the 
process curiously and helplessly. 

i THE END OF A SPOILS INVESTI¬ 
GATION. 

One of the odious features of a government 
run by spoils is its assassination of the character 
, of the men ii can not otherwise dispose of. 
It clings to the oriental practice of stabbing 
its victim in the dark. In the last administra¬ 
tion, Dr. Sherer at the head of the sugar 
laboratory of the appraiser’s office in New 
York was a shining mark. To any open 


attack he was impregnable, and his place 
could not be got for a henchman. Therefore 
secret charges of sugar frauds began to be 
whispered about, until a consent to an investi¬ 
gation was obtained. That investigation will 
always be a disgrace to those who allowed it. 
It was conducted by an irresponsible and un¬ 
qualified newspaper reporter, secretly and 
with no opportunity to Dr. Sherer to meet the 
charges or the accusers. The-peculiar base¬ 
ness of such methods is that few honest people 
take the trouble and the time necessary to 
weigh the matter and very soon there was a 
wide spread impression that Dr. Sherer’s offi¬ 
cial character was smirched. He was removed 
on the adverse report of this reporter, and, 
as the impression was conveyed, because his 
reading of the polariscope in testingsugar was 
lower than the Boston reading and must be 
corrupt. After a time and a vigorous protest 
he was reinstated ; but the lower rating con¬ 
tinued, and some special agents made an in¬ 
vestigation and reported that they knew no¬ 
thing about the rules of reading, but that Dr. 
Sherer was lower and was probably wrong and 
ought to be removed. He was removed, but 
under his successor the polariscope would not 
read high. Finally the government conclu<l- 
ed to tackle the polariscopes of New York, 
Boston and Philadelphia, and Professor Titt- 
man of the coast survey was set to work. The 
result is the complete vindication of Dr. 
Sherer, the Boston polariscope deviating forty- 
eight one-hundreths; the Philadelphia fifty- 
one one-hundredths and the New York only 
fifteen one-hundredths from the true standard. 

The road to the vindication of an honest 
and capable man has been long and trying. 

GROSVENOR-CANNON MALICE. 

Another outbreak of boyish spite against 
the civil-service law has taken place in the 
House. In the committee of the whole, where 
the roll is not called Mr. Qrosvenor, doubtless 
smarting under the recollection of the poor 
figure he has cut, made the point of order that 
no appropriation could be made for additional 
clerks for the civil service commission be¬ 
cause it would change existing law. This 
would cut the commission down to what the 
original civil service law of 1883 gave them, 
that is, a secretary, a stenographer and a mes¬ 
senger. Payson of Illinois, being in the chair, 
sustained the point, and on appeal the decision 
was sustained by 109 to 36. This action was 
meant to cripple the commission, and if not 
reversed would effectually do so. A three 
hours’ debate followed, in which Grosvenor 
and Cannon let out all their pent up malice. 
Against them were Butterworth, Greenhalge, 
Dockery, Boatner, Lodge, McComas and 
others. One of Grosvenor’s statements will 
make New England smile. This was that the 
republicans have “carried the banner of civil 
service reform to the extent” that they have 
driven John F. Andrew, Sherman Hoar, 
George Fred Williams, and other young men 
of distinguished New England families, out of 
the party “because, among other reasons they 


are excluded from all participation in the 
government.” The debate covers twenty-four 
pages of the Record of February 14, and in our 
limited space it seems that an extract from 
the speech of Mr. Lodge is, on the whole, the 
most satisfactory ; 

“Now, I have listened to my friend from Ohio 
[Mr. Grosvenor] with a great deal of atten¬ 
tion. I was anxious to find out exactly what 
the matter was; and also what system he pro¬ 
posed to substitute for the existing system. I 
think I have found out what the matter is. 
The present commission, we are told, is too 
aggressive. It has been a familiar sport in this 
house to make these speeches in regard to 
civil service reform, and to 'assail the com¬ 
mission ; but it has never been part of the 
game to have the commission or any one of 
the commissioners answer back and make 
defense against these assaults. 

One of the present commissioners did that 
when he was attacked here. I think he was 
very sensible to do it; but it was inconsiderate 
of the feelings of the gentlemen engaged in the 
annual practice of assailing civil service re¬ 
form. He was not put there, according to 
the idea of the gentlemen who attacked him, 
to resent attack. He was put there simply to 
be made a text for speeches in regard to the 
“humbug of eivil service reform,” and to 
receive attacks in silence. * * • 

Now, I will just quote from the printed 
Record to show some of the difficulties which 
the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Grosvenor] has 
found in the civil service. He stated in his 
speech last year— 

I will vote not only to strike out this appropriation, 
but 1 will vote to repeal the whole law. 

He then went before the committee; and in 
his testimony of August 23, 1890, page 97, he 
said : 

I do not want to repeal the civil service law; and I 
never said so. 

[Laughter.] 

In his testimony at the same time he said : 

Rufus P. Putnam, fraudulently credited to Wash¬ 
ington county, Ohio, never lived in Washington 
county, Ohio, nor In my congressional district; nor 
in Ohio, so far as I know. 

Then an inconsiderate person goes to work 
and digs up out of the files of Commissioner 
Morgan’s office a letter from the gentleman 
from Ohio, dated February 5, 1890, which 
says : 

Mr. Rufus P. Putnam is a legal resident of my dis¬ 
trict, and has relatives living there now. 

The gentleman from Ohio in his speech said : 

I have not been informed of one applicant who has 
found a place in the classified service from my dis¬ 
trict. 

And in his testimony on August 23, found 
on page 98 of the report, he says. 

That the eight men [whose names were furnished 
him as being appointed from his district] all live in 
my district as now constituted. 

So, I say the gentleman from Ohio was dis¬ 
turbed by the aggressions of the civil service 
commission. 

He says he has only seen one of them, and 
has not seen him frequently. But on one occa- 
j sion, at least, it was by his own invitation, for 
' he wrote to Mr. Roo.sevelt the following letter. 
He said ; 











204 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


I have for some weeks sought an opportunity to 
appear before the committee to refer briefly to a 
statement made by you in which you impugned the 
character of the statement made by me in the house 
of representatives in regard to the administration 
of the civil service law. I respectfully request that 
you will be present. 

In accordance with that request, Mr. Roose¬ 
velt was present. They had a discussion 
which went on for a little while and then Mr. 
Grosvenor said, as appears from the record of 
the testimony: 

A congressman making a speech on the floor of 
the house of representatives is perhaps in a little 
different position from a witness testifying under 
examination. 

[Laughter.] 

There I had the right to give my judgment about 
this matter under the constitution of the United 
States and not have it called in question for that 
reason. «< » <■ 

I must go up to the house now. 

[Laughter.] 

And, Mr. Chairman, he went up to the house 
and left Mr. Roosevelt, and was not pleased 
with the interview, as he said there. But he 
returned to the committee after Mr. Roosevelt 
had gone to North Dakota, and was two thou¬ 
sand miles away, and then said : 

My statement iu the house of representatives has 
been shamefully and criminally misrepresented by 
Mr. Roosevelt, who says I said there had been no 
clerical appointments in my district. I never said 
any such thing, and he knew it. 

Here is what Mr. Roosevelt did say : 

General Grosvenor says he does not know of one 
applicant who has found a place in the classified 
service from his congressional district. 

And here is what the gentleman from Ohio 
actually said in the House: 

[Mr. Grosvenor’s speech April 22—Record, 3897.] 

I have not been informed of one (applicant) who 
has found a place in the classified service from my 
congressional district. ■s * * So far as I 

know not one clerical position has been assigned to 
my congressional district.” 

When Mr. Lodge had concluded. Cannon 
let Grosevenor have five minutes of his time, 
but the latter’s remarks are not printed and 
are withheld for revision. Very likely they 
needed it. As Grosvenor sat by and saw Mr. 
Lodge strew by the way the Grosvenor malice, 
the Grosvenor cowardice, the Grosvenor hy¬ 
pocrisy, the Grosvenor mendacity, and all the [ 
other unhappy qualities which make up the j 
Grosvenor character, Grosvenor himself must 
have passed into a state of ungovernable inco¬ 
herency and probably his ravings would not 
look well in print. At the end of the debate, 
Mr. Dingley, of Maine, ofTered an amend¬ 
ment that the commission be given an addi¬ 
tional sum of i?36,400, to carry out the law. 
No point of order would lie to this, and after 
the chair had twice declared it lost, tellers 
were appointed and the amendment was 
adopted by 95 to 76. This gives the commis¬ 
sion some $1,500 more than it asked. 

Mr. George William Curtis will address the 
state superintendents of common schools in 
Philadelphia the last week in February, on 
the public school and civil service reform'. 


The Qivil Service Reformer in its January and 
February numbers prints some specimen ap¬ 
plications for office from people whose unfit¬ 
ness caused them to fail in the examinations. 
They are worth examining. 

Several cases have been reported where the 
Civil Service Chronicle is not regularly 
received at eolleges and libraries. It will be a 
favor if every ease is at once made known; 
also, the Chronicle repeats its request of last 
month that such libraries as have not already 
done so will acknowledge the donation of the 
paper and state if it is placed on file. 

If there is any reader of the Chronicle 
who does not read the other two civil service 
reform papers, let him send for the Civil 
Service Reformer for February, and have the 
pleasure of seeing Census Superintendent Por¬ 
ter thoroughly routed by Mr. Roosevelt be¬ 
fore the civil service committee of the house 
of representatives, January 29, 1891. 

The Civil Service Record prints in its Feb¬ 
ruary issue an editorial based on the recent 
speech of Congressman Roswell P. Flower, a 
democrat from New York. Mr. Flower’s con¬ 
gressional experience makes him an authority, 
and the viciousness of the present system of 
making about 60,000 ix)st-offiees a part of a 
great political machine has never been more 
completely exposed. There is space but for 
a single quotation : 

The present system has too much that attribute of 
monarchy which centers in the power of one man the 
appointment of thonsands, which makes official po¬ 
sition the reward for partisan intrigue, engenders a 
lack of responsibility on the part of public officials, 
and consumes too much of the time of executive 
and legislative officers in securing appointments 
which should be given to the consideration of affairs 
of state. 

But there are two results which arise from our 
system which seem more deplorable than those 1 
have already enumerated. These have only to be 
stated to be conceded. The present system of federal 
appointments exercises an undue influence on elections, 
and tends to subvert and render impossible the true ex¬ 
pressions of the will of the people as expressed in those 
elections. This system has already murdered one 
President. Is there a member of the house who does 
not feel in his congressional district the influence of 
the post-office, the custoin-hou.se, or the internal rev¬ 
enue bureau? 


The seventh report of the Massachusetts 
Civil Service Commission has been printed. It 
is not too much to say that nowhere else has 
the law been uniformly administered with 
such good faith and intelligence, and the 
yearly reports are indispensable to any one 
who desires to know how the merit system 
really works. 

The report states : 

"The number of public employes in the first 
division of the classified service is about 4,700. Of 
the public offices in the first division, 2,133 have 
been appointed under civil service rules since 1885; 
and, with the lapse of time, the proportion steadily 
increases. Of these appointments, only a very small 
fraction of one per cent, has been removed for cause. 

"In the labor service of Boston 152 requisitions were 
received during the year, and 2,029 men were certi¬ 
fied, of whom 1,550 were required to be under fifty 


years of age. This shows the increasing tendency of 
the departments to call for the strongest and most 
able bodied men. Of those certified, 874 were em¬ 
ployed, of whom 90 were veterans. The number of 
certifications compared with the number employed 
was owing to the declination of some to accept em¬ 
ployment, especially upon Basin V in Ashland. The 
comparatively small number of veterans employed 
was owing to the age limit fixed in the requisitions. 
Of the men employed under certification, only one- 
half of one percent, were discharged for cause. There have 
been 2 360 men registered, including restorations to 
the list during the year. The total number at pre¬ 
sent on the department rolls in this office is ,3466.” 


The Pennsylvania Civil Service Reform As. 
sociation has introduced a civil service reform 
bill into both houses of the state legislature. 
This bill, like the Massachusetts law, brings 
the service of the cities and of the state under 
the control of one commission. It also, like 
the Massachusetts law, seems to include 
laborers. 

We notice that the law is to apply only to 
“such office of employment” where the num¬ 
ber of “ officers, clerks, or employes amounts 
to six or more.” In the twenty-five cities of 
Massachusetts there are several offices where 
the law is applied with the best results, and 
with very little trouble or expense where there 
are in each only one, two, three, or more em¬ 
ployes. Taken altogether, the total number 
is quite large. Indeed, in an ordinary-sized 
city, where there is considerable subdivision 
of the city work into different departments, 
there may not be a single department besides 
the police and fire department, which has as 
many as six clerks in one office. The object of 
this limitation seems to be to save a large num¬ 
ber of small examinations ; but in actual prac¬ 
tice this difficulty is found to be rather imagi¬ 
nary than real.— Civil Service Record, February, 
1891. 

To the President of the United States : 

Sir —The undersigned, the officers of the 
Cambridge Civil Service Reform Association, 
beg leave, in the name of the association, re¬ 
spectfully to request you to extend the limits of 
the classified civil service so as to include all 
persons employed iu custom houses and post- 
offices where there number is not less than 
twenty-five (as recommended in the sixth re¬ 
port of the civil service commission) and also 
the clerical force at navy yards and arsenals. 

Further, the undersigned believing that the 
recent troubles with the Indians afford con¬ 
vincing evidence that a change in the manner 
of appointment of the officials of the Indian 
bureau is imperatively demanded, respecifully 
urge that the civil service rules may be ex¬ 
tended, with proper modifications, to include 
all oSicers employed under this bureau. 

They desire, finally, to urge that the rules 
be extended, with due regard to the interest of 
the public, to all departments of the civil ser¬ 
vice. 

rto-P/-fsid€nis—Charles W. Eliot, Chauncey Smith, 
James Russell Lowell, Charles Theodore Russell. 

Executive Commi^ee—Philip Stanlev Abbot, James 
Barr Ames, William F. Bradbury, Josiah M. Brooks, 
Sanford H. Dudley, Edward H Hall, William O. Hen- 
shaw, William R. Howland, Francis V. B. Kern, 
George V. Leverett, James J. Myers, Albert S. Par- 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


205 


sons, Ezra R. Thayer, Joseph G. Thorp, Jr., Robert' 
N. Toppan, William W. Vaughan, George G. Wright, 
Charles F. Wyman, Morrill Wyman, Jr., Sec'y. 

Chari.es Eliot Norton, President. 

Cambridge, Mass., 31st January, 1891. 

Executive Mansion, Washington,'! 

February 4, 1891. J 

Oentleiiien: I have received by the hands 
of Senator Hoar the communication addressed 
to me by you as officers of the Cambridge 
Civil Service Reform Association, and in re¬ 
ply beg to say that your suggestions will have 
my respectful attention. 

Your reference to the recent outbreak among 
the Sioux as affording convincing evidence of 
the necessity of a change in the manner of 
appointing the officials of the Indian bureau, 
leads me to say that I have not found in a 
very full examination of all the facts from all 
sources evidence of any deterioration in the 
Indian service. On the other hand, the board 
of Indian commissioners, through Merrill E. 
Gates, their chairman, have as the result of 
close observation declared to me under date 
of January 10th last, “that upon the whole 
the Indian service is now in better condition 
than ever before.” The object of their com¬ 
munication was to urge the extension of civil 
service rules to the Indian service, but they 
were careful to recognize that the argument 
was not to be found in any special or recent 
incidents, but in the broader fact that the 
work among the Indians is educational and 
philanthropic and should, therefore, be sep¬ 
arated from party politics. 

I may add that before any special appeal 
had been made to me from any source, the 
subject of including Indian agency clerks and 
employes in the classified service had been un¬ 
der consideration. 

Very respectfully yours, 

Benjamin Harrison. 

To Charles Eliot Norton, Esq , and others, 

Cambridge, Mass. 


LOCAL FREEBOOTING. 

The rise and fall of the democratic gang of which 
Sim Coy was for years the leader forms an interest 
ing ehapter in the history of Marion county. The 
beginning of the end came when the tally-sheets 
were forged two years ago last November, and the de¬ 
parture of John E. Sullivan for Canada marked the 
final downfall of the corruptionists. The formation 
of this corrupt gang of democratic politicians dates 
back several years, when Sim Coy gathered around 
him a few unscrupulous men, some of them possessed 
of means, who were anxious to be able to control the 
elections in this county. In a measure successful in 
managing campaigns, the little gang began to grow, 
and its corrupt influences began to permeate the en¬ 
tire democratic part of the county. Emboldened by 
their success in carrying elections by corrupt meth¬ 
ods, the leaders of the gang in 1886 decided to take a 
step far in advance of any they had before dared take 
—tochange the tally-sheets so as to elect a criminal 
judge and a coroner, and officers who the face of the 
returns showed had been elected by the republicans. 
It is needless to repeat the story of that infamous 
crime. It is familiar to the people, not only of Indi¬ 
ana, but of other states. How many men were con- 
iieeted, directly and remotely, with that conspiracy 
will, perhaps, never be known, but there was evidence 
brought out in court that a great many were in some 
manner connected with it. All the evidence showed 
that John E. Sullivan was one of the prominent fig 
ures in the conspiracy, but the influence which he 


and other members of the gang wielded prevented 
the courts from ever convicting him. 

The story of how justi!e struggled to get a hold 
upon the ring-leaders in the conspiracy is interesting 
at this time. The effort was made first to secure in¬ 
dictment by the county grand jury, but after three 
mouths of failures it was decided to call upon the 
United States grand jury, through which partial jus- 
lice at least was finally meted out. The refusal of the 
county grand jury, in the face of positive evidence, 
to return indictments against the forgers, was con¬ 
demned by every honest man in the state. That re¬ 
fusal showed the power and influences Sullivan and 
the members of the gang exerted. Sullivan, as 
clerk, controlled the drawing of the grand jury, and 
he sueceeded in securing a jury composed entirely 
of democrats. The jury was of his own selection, and 
was drawn with special reference to preventing any 
indictments being returned. It is somewhat remark¬ 
able that among the members of that jury who turned 
a deaf ear to the public's demand, and refused to in¬ 
dict Sullivan orauy of the forgers, were J. B. Conaty 
and James Renihan, two of Sullivan’s official bonds¬ 
men, and the principal losers by the clerk’s dis¬ 
honesty. These men were on Sullivan's bond at the 
time they were serving the county as grand jurors, 
sworn to do their duty, and when that is recalled it 
goes a long way toward explaining why that grand 
jury constantly ignored Judge Irviu’s instructions in 
regard to the tally-sheet forgeries. “ Can it be retri¬ 
bution these men are now receiving?” queried a 
gentleman yesterday who recalled the facts. “ I sus¬ 
pect these gentlemen feel that it is,” continued he. 
“I judge they now wish they had followed the oft- 
repeated instructions of Judge Irvin, and indicted all 
the tally-sheet forgers. How much better off they 
would be if they had done their duty?” With the 
conviction of Coy and Bernhamer and their removal 
to the penitentiary, the gang began to disintegrate. 
Sullivan still attempted to use its waning power to 
his advantage, but there could be no concert of action 
like when the little boss was here. With the depart¬ 
ure of Sullivan it is to be hoped that the county has 
witnessed the last of the acts of the gang. In his de¬ 
parture Sullivan has involved and turned against 
him those who kept him from going behind the 
prison bars two years ago, and it seems impossible 
that the remnants of the gang can again be able to 
muster their [orces.—Indianapolis Journal. 

Jt 'At 

That noble patriot, Simeon Coy, who was pardoned 
out of the state’s prison because, foresooth, he was 
too poor to pay the fine and costs assessed against 
him, has evidently struck it rich somewhere or 
somehow. He seems to have plenty of money that 
he is spending freely as he plays his great role as a 
public benefactor. It is well to remember that a 
councilman’s salary is81.50a year. 

Simeon, it will be remembered, has been playing 
street commissioner down in ward eighteen. He 
proposes to have fine streets, and for twelve days has 
had three teams and a man at work. He has already 
placed three car loads of cracked stone on Delaware, 
Alabama, New Jersey and South streets. Saturday 
he placed fifteen loads of gravel on the streets, and 
thus far this week he has placed twelve loads, mak¬ 
ing twenty seven loads of gravel spread on the 
streets. One of the teams belongs to Lee Fulmer and 
two to Mr. Myers. 

Emanuel Green, an old colored man, was poking 
cracked stone about South street this morning when 
a News reporter happened along. ‘‘The city is doing 
a good deal of work here?” suggested the reporter. 

"The city ain’t doing this. Mr. Coy is having the 
work done,” was the answer. 

"But the city pays for it ?” 

“No, indeed, Mr. Coy pays for it all. He hires 
the teams, pays for the gravel, bought the stone and 
he pays me. I know when he paid me Saturday he 
gave me half a dollar more than was coming to me, 
and he had a great big roll of money, fori saw it.” 

"How much will this work cost, do you suppose?” 

"There’s a man down there says it will cost Mr, 
Coy a 81,000, but that ain’t so. The three teams and 
me cost about 810 a day. We have been at work 
about twelve days, and there is lots to do yet.” 

For a man who was pardoned because he wasn’t 


able to pay his fine. Statesman Coy Is under very 
large expense. 'The three car-loads of stone will cost 
about 835. The gravel will cost sixty cents per load, 
or 816.20. It will require at least twenty-five days to 
“ fix things ” as Simeon wants them " fixed.” That 
is 8-150, making a total of 8301.20. The pay of a coun¬ 
cilman is $150 a year. Thus Mr. Coy is spending 
more than two years’ salary on the publics treets. 
This is only one “budget” of campaign expenses. 
This is an investment. What is the return! 

The stone used on the streets by Coy is broken at 
the work house, and Emanuel Green said Mr. Coy 
had purchased the stone at the works. Colonel 
Boone, superintendent of the work-house, says Coy 
bought no stone out there ; that it is all shipped to 
the street commissioner. Mr. De Ruiter says that he 
has .sold no stone to Coy, and that Coy is getting 
neither stone nor any help whatever from the city. 
Green says that one day the city wagon and Coy’s 
wagons were being loaded from the same car, and 
that Coy objected because there was no more stone 
than he needed himself. 

If Coy could not pay his fine and costs because he 
was too poor, how does it happen that he can pay 
810 per day to improve the public streets of his ward 
and carry around a big roli of money ? Who is back¬ 
ing him and furnishing this money? What return 
will he make for Ml—Indianapolis News, September, 
1889. 

3 ^ ^ 

street Commissioner De Facto Sim Coy was hold¬ 
ing down a chair in the court-house and resting a 
pair of prominent feet on a table this morning, 
when a News reporter accosted him; “Do you 
propose to pay for that stone you hauled away from 
the city yards?” 

"Pay for it ?” retorted the statesman from ward 
eighteenth. "Well, I guess I won’t. I put that stone 
on the streets for the benefit of the tax payers, and I 
don't propose to pay for it out of my own pocket by 
a jug full. I will settle with them feilows in open 
council.” 

“How do you propose to settle with them ?” 

“Well, you will see how. I have had some experi¬ 
ence in street making, and I know if I had had the 
842,000 that the street commissioner claims to have 
spent this year I could have had every street in 
Indianapolis in first-class condition.” 

Here’s a state of things! When Coy’s little scheme 
was discovered he elaimed to be pajing for every¬ 
thing and flashed up plenty of money to do it with. 
Now he declares the stone belonged to the city, he 
used it and won’t pay for it. He says ho “don’t 
think De Ruiter knew he intended taking the stone,” 
and the street commissioner has demanded pay for 
the material used. 

“You fellows talk about twenty-seven loads of 
sand and gravel,” said Coy, waving a chubby hand 
in the air, “why, twenty-seven loads ain’t a patch¬ 
ing to what I used. You couldu’tget ail the gravel 
in this room that I put on the streets.” 

“And that belonged to the city, too?” 

“Why, of course it did.” 

The room to which Coy referred was the sheriff’s 
office, which is large enough to hold a hundred and 
fifty loads of gravel, and still the street commissioner 
did not know that Coy was carting this stuff away I 
Indianapolis News, September, 1889. 

Street Commissioner DeRuiter was interviewed by 
tx.Toiimal reporter yesterday, concerning Sim Coy’s 
alleged appropriation of city property for the pur¬ 
pose of strengthening his councilmanie canvass in the 
eighteenth ward. “I heard Monday afternoon,” 
said the street commissioner, “that Coy had takeh 
a car-load of stone belonging to the city, which had 
been broken at the W'ork house, and set out on the 
tracks to be hauled down to the yard. I immedi¬ 
ately started to find Coy, went to his town residence, 
to Joe Wagner’s and other places, without finding 
him, and finally drove out to his road house east of 
the city. He was not there, but I left word that I 
wanted to see him, and this morning he came to my 
office. I told him what I had heard, and he said it 
was true, that he had taken the car load of stone, 
and that he proposed to take any of the city’s prop¬ 
erty that he chose that was lying around loose. 







206 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


told him I did not think he would, and suggested to 
him that it he kept on he would get himself into se¬ 
rious trouble, and after some further talk, in which 
we both got pretty thoroughly heated, he went out.” 

“ How did he happen to get the car-load of stone 
referred to?” 

“ He took it as any one else would have taken it 
without authority. The car was set out on the 
switch, and was, I suppose, in the possession of the 
railroad people. We were notified of the presence 
there of two other car-loads of stone, which we got, 
but had no notice whatever that this one was there, 
and of course did not send after it. I have notified 
Superintendent Boone not to deliver any more stone 
at the railroad without notifying me.” 

“ What do you propose to do about the city mate¬ 
rial already taken by Coy ?” 

‘‘I propose to be guided by the advice of the city 
attorney. In any event, I will ask that Coy be in¬ 
dicted by the next grand jury, and if there is any 
way of bringing him up sooner, I will take advantage 
of it. I do not consider that he has any more right 
to carry oft' property belonging to the city than you 
have. As for the stories that he did it with my con¬ 
sent, express or implied, they are simply lies. Set¬ 
ting apart my republicanism, and my desire on that 
account to see Coy beaten in his race for council, 1 
would be a fool to help elect a man whose earliest 
vote would be cast for my removal.”— Indianapolis 
Journal, September 2, 1889. 

<■ •:< >;< 

“ We have been examining the street commission¬ 
er's pay-rolls and find on every one of them the name 
of H. S. Post, who is Mr. De Ruiter’s father-in-law. 
He is credited with 82 a day for himself and a one- 
horse wagon. According to the pay-roll, Mr. Post 
has not been idle a day; at least he has been receiv¬ 
ing his 82 per day right along. On the night of the 
first Saturday after January 1, Mr. Post went to Cin¬ 
cinnati, and was there for ten days. During the 
time he has been back he has been idle a number of 
days, yet he is accredited on his son-in-law's pay¬ 
roll with working all the time. 

” There are two one-horse wagons employed by the 
street commissioner. One of these wagons has been 
standing in the city yard until the tires on the wheels 
are thick with rust, and it is apparent to any one 
that the wagon has not been used for a long time; 
yet the city has been paying for it just the same. Mr. 
De Ruiter told me that one horse and wagon is owned 
by George Yanthes, a colored man, and the other 
horse and wagon by Mr. Post, his father-in law. The 
records in the assessor's office show that Yanthes 
pays a poll-tax and is the owner of a 83 watch. Ac¬ 
cording to the books, he owns no horse and wagon. 
I sent a man to him under pretense of buying a 
horse. Y'anthes said he owned no horse or wagon. 
Mr. Post’s name does not appear on the aasessor’s 
books at all, and he does not even pay a poll-tax.” 
—Indianapolis News, Febrtiary 26, 1899, Interview with 
Councilman Martin Murphy. 

* * 

The suburbs of Indianapolis are a unitin seeking 
legislation that wilt enable them to build street-car 
lines into the city. Senate bill 179 is the embodiment 
of their request. It has passed the senate and is re¬ 
posing in (he hands of the judiciary committee. The 
suburbs see great prosperity ahead if they are not 
walled out. At present they can not construct lines 
to the city because the Citizens’ Company will not 
permit them to enter with tracks after they have 
brought them to the corporation limit. What they 
demand as reasonable is that if the Citizens’ Com¬ 
pany jumps in ahead and pro emptsa street to pre¬ 
vent suburban companies from entering, the sub¬ 
urban lines by paying a fair rental may use the Citi¬ 
zens’ tracks, or that the suburban companies, in a 
word, be enabled to deliver passengers into the city. 
The Citizens’ Company will not build to Greenwood 
nor Broad Ripple. Its West Indianapolis, Irvington 
and Brightwood lines are, without an exception, 
wholly unsatisfactory. Greenwood has 8130,000 sub¬ 
scribed for a suburban line; Broad Ripple has a com¬ 
pany signed to put down a rapid transit line so soon 
as this legislation is enacted. Shall the two towns 
be shut out of Indianapolis? This is virtually the 
question they ask. 


Meantime the Citizens’ Company is fighting the 
bill with tremendous vigor. Lobbyists of every degree, 
from Sim Coy up to ex-state officers and congressmen, 
are lobbying for the company. Sim has taken up a 
temporary office in the state house, and is often in tonsul- 
tation with Steele and other representatives of the com¬ 
pany.—Indianapolis News, February n, 1891. 

<< A* 

Mr. C^ has still another year of service in the 
Indianapolis City Council, and will therefore not 
sever his connections with Hoosier politics entirely 
until he has done all the good that can possibly be 
accomplished at the Indiana capital. Thus far his 
stays in this city have been brief. After the adjourn- 
mentofthe Indiana Legislature, which will occur 
in about a month, he says he will be here “right 
along.” He will then be ready to Introduce to the 
attention of the Chicago political fine-workers that 
peculiar brand of politics that made his name famous 
at home, and which is produced in no other state in 
the Union. 

“I carried Indianapolis for Cleveland, Gray and 
the rest of the ticket in 1884,” he modestly sug¬ 
gested, “and it was the first lime we ever showed our 
full strength. Until that time the republicans had 
defeated us because of their superior party organiza¬ 
tion. The eighteenth ward was always republican 
by more than two hundred, but I have made it 
democratic by nearly that figure. I reckon there 
are democrats there now who would vote for me 
for President if I should ask it.” 

“To what do you ascribe your wonderful political 
success?” Mr Coy was asked, and he outlined the 
following code: “I never had a quarrel with a man 
in my life. I never lost my temper in my life. Life 
is loo short to dispute with those who dispute with 
you. I haven’t the time. Then, again, I don’t 
stand on the street corner and proclaim my policy. 
Secret organization is the only road to political 
success. The day for brass-band campaigns is past. 
We have the Australian voting system in Indiana, 
minus, of course, the registration clause. The reg¬ 
istration clause would have defeated us, and it will 
defeat the democrats in Illinois. Laboring men 
can’t take the time to go and register. At the last 
election in Chicago I find that only four voles were 
registered from this house. That shows lack of or¬ 
ganization. There should have been twenty-live, at 
least. 

“ I am not ready to say what I will or will not do 
in Chicago,” said he, “ nor do I care to be quoted as 
criticising your politics. The great trouble with poli¬ 
ticians that I hare found is that it isn't one in a hundred 
who knows politics rvhen he sees it. Down in Indiana we 
have the advantage of a political education not to be ob¬ 
tained anywhere outside of that state. This is because it 
has always been a hand to-hand fight. First one party 
was on top, then the other. We are familiar with every 
subterfuge known to modern politics, ll’is take a back 
seat for nobody .—Chicago News, February 9, 1891, 

* =? «- 

Some days ago the News mentioned the fact that 
the South Side Foundry Company had a bill of 850 
against the city for supplies furnished. Councilman 
Markey is a large stockholder in that concern; in 
fact, “Markey’s foundry” is a common name for the 
establishment. 

A glance over the city books reveals the fact that 
the foundry has been selling considerable amounts 
of goods to the city, and Councilman Markey has 
been voting to allow the payment of the bills from 
the city treasury. On May 24 and 28 his foundry 
sold the city 819.20 worth of castings; May 21, 89.60; 
on April 25, 83.15. The bills, however, are not made 
out in Thomas Markey’s name, but in the name of 
Peter Zeirn, treasurer of the South Side Foundry 
Company. 

The records show also that on May 30 Council¬ 
man William Long sold the city three yards of gravel 
for 80.—Didianapolis News, Aug. 3, 1889. 

}> jIt 

Hospital Trustee-Markey has gnawed off more of a 
political cud than he can masticate. He has tried to 
keep his grip on all that he has held to and embrace 
new fields. He is like many another politician who 
“did well from a precinct, but was too thin to spread 
over a state.” The two or three scores of democrats 


down In Markey’s ward who are said [to have been 
encouraged to hope for appointments at the hospital, 
spend their time in devising means to defeat 
Markey for re-election to council. “We got him the 
place as trustee in the hope that he would give up 
the council and give us help at the asylum,” 
•said one of them, “out he wants to hold both places. 
He wants to get his father into the capital as deputy cus¬ 
todian—and, by the way, this is the same person whom 
Markey, a democrat, had councilman Pearson, a republi- 
can, retain two years as janitor at Tomlinson Hall. 
Some of us were promised the place of watchmen at 
the at the hospital, but Markey appointed Mike 
Kelley (who is clever with a pen, which Markey 
isn’t), and has him do duty as assistant secretary of 
the hospital bo&Td.”—Indianapolis News. 

>:» Af A' 

Dr. Thomas H. Harrison, late president of the 
state benevolent boards, has issued a pamphlet in 
defense of the management of the insane hospital 
under his administration. The statements it con¬ 
tains are those that have long ago been urged by the 
ex-trustees and the democratic party, and arc based 
altogether upon the claim that the Harrison trustees 
have been vindicated by an examination of the 
books of the institution by their successors. In the 
beginning of his defense the doctor states: “The 
Ifospital was not governed by civil service. It teas ab¬ 
solutely a partisan management, as was evidenced by the 
fact that Wayne township, in which the hospital is 
located, was changed from a republican majority to 
nearly 400 Democratic within a period of six years.— 
Indian- polis Journal, June, 1889. 

At 

The publication in the News last evening of the 
business dealings between Phil Gapen, treasurer of 
the insane hospital board, and John E. Sullivan, 
embezzler, forger, fugitive from justice, and high 
muck-a-muck of the corruptest gang that ever ruled 
in Marion county, has caused the people to be more 
clamorous than ever to have the books opened. 

The money loaned to Sullivan was state funds, 
and if Sullivan has paid it back dollar for dollar he 
has been “guilty” of something that his most inti¬ 
mate friend has never accused him with. Complaint 
is made, too, that firms having claims against the 
hospital for supplies furnished have had to wait from 
month to month for their pay, and there are some 
claims of ancient date still unpaid. Governor Hovey 
believes that no investigation can properly be made 
by the general assembly, but the work must be done 
by experts, and the governor might have added, by 
experts who would not be “ influenced,” 

The report of the trustees for the year ending Oc¬ 
tober 31,1888, shows that food, fruit and ice cost 8110, 
000; coal, 825,619.93; wood, 81,682; sweet milk, 85,- 
724.70; butter, 82,185, making the milk and butter 
cost 88,009.70. Last year potatoes cost 810,000. The 
total expenditure for 1888 amounts to the modest sum 
of 8260,000. These figures alone should urge every 
honest man with a desire to see the inside of “ them ” 
books. 

State Treasurer Lemcke says that at difTerent times 
he has loaned Sullivan small sums of money, but 
always had it well secured and got it back within a 
few days. Sullivan, he says, was a most persistent 
beggar, but he had been warned against the late 
county clerk and at last shut down on the beggar, 
and he didn’t get his sticky fingers into the state 
vaults. 

Since December, 1883, up to date, Gapen has drawn 
from the state treasurer, as treasurer of the hospital 
board, the immense sum of 81,477,268.82. If Sullivan 
borrowed nearly 814,000 in so short a time as four 
months, how much did he borrow from this immense 
fund in so many years? 

It is not much of a wonder that Gapen and his friends 
do not appear to want the books opened, at least 
they are not making any frantic efforts to have the 
backs of the books torn off in order to get them open. 

These figures show the amount of checks placed in 
the Meridian National bank by Gapen, from August 
21 to January 23, inclusive. Each of the checks was 
signed by John E. Sullivan, made payable to the or¬ 
der of Philip M. Gapen. They were on Sullivan’s 
New Y'ork bank, and Gapen asked that they be 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


207 


placed to his credit on his account, as treasurer of 
the hospital board. 


August 21. $1,000 

August 31. 250 

September 18. 1,000 

September 29. 300 

December 18. 2,000 

December 18. 1,000 

Decemqer 20. 800 

December 21. 700 

January 21. 4,700 

January 23. 2,000 


Total.$13,750 


Thus, in the very short time of about three months 
John E. Sullivan had, by permission of Phillip M. 
Gapen, his clutches on $13,750 of the state’s funds, 
and Sullivan’s fingers are sticky ones. The News 
showed yesterday that unless Gapen can hold the 
bank responsible for $3,043.€t>, that he has lost that 
much of the state’s money by lending it to Sullivan. 
Wonder what is in “them” books that is being 
guarded so zealously Indianapolis News, 1889. 

* * 

West Market Master Wells is still languishing be¬ 
hind iron bars. He can not be liberated on bait 
until the grand jury meets next Monday. Now that 
he is in jail, all the little and big tin horns are begin¬ 
ning to say, "I told you so.” They accuse him of all 
sorts of misconduct, and blame Councilman “Bill” 
Davis in having him appointed. Davis and Wells 
were old cronies. One of Derk De Ruiter’s deputies 
claims that there was a big kick when Wells was ap¬ 
pointed, as he was known to be the proprietor of a 
low den and “oontz” headquarters. The murder of 
George Thomas was the result of a fight in Well’s 
dive. It was the duty of the city clerk to see that 
Wells turned in the money when he made the af¬ 
fidavit before him. Last Saturday night Wells took 
a’possum in payment of stall rent. Does the’pos¬ 
sum belong to the city 1—Indianapolis News, 1890. 

« <■ « 

Noah Rounds, who drives one of Councilman 
Sweetland’s teams, walked into the city clerk’s office 
and asked for his order. Deputy Bushong informed 
him that the warrants would not be ready until later 
in the day, and then said : 

“ Noah, why don’t Sweetland come after the order 
himself? ” 

“ ’Cause he told me to come and get it, and he 
wants it now.” 

John Dunn was standing by and iaughed at Rounds 
for giving the snap away that Sweetland has his 
team in the city service. 

“Oh, he knows all about it,” replied Rounds. 

Deputy Bushong, in relating the incident this 
morning, laughed and continued, “ but I guess Mr. 
Sweetland’s team don’t work for the city now. I un¬ 
derstand both of them are in the street railroad com¬ 
pany’s service.” 

Let’s see. Is it lawful for a member of the city 
council to hire to the city his team and assist in 
allowing his own claim against the city Indianapo¬ 
lis Nexus, October 1, 1890. 

<{ 

The history of that peculiar transaction whereby 
the republican county central committee was to be 
enriched as the price of favorable street railway 
legislation in the council, is coming slowly into the 
light. 

The councilmen whose names were used in con¬ 
nection with charges to which Mayor Denny re¬ 
ferred on Monday night, are restive under the impu¬ 
tations that grow out of Mr. Darnell’s disclosures. 
They say that the whole truth will make them free, 
and will at the same time give Mr Darnell some¬ 
thing to think about. One of them makes this state¬ 
ment : 

“ Mr. C. F. Darnell came to me and asked me to 
meet certain republicans at the county committee 
rooms (republican), on a matter of importance. I 
went there and found Darnell, Newt. Harding, Mr. 
Floyd, Mr. Fulmer and John Clinton. Mr. Darnell 
said that it rested with me whether we should carry 
the county or lose it; that if I would change my 
vote and vole against the granting of the MacNeal 
charter that Mr. Shaffer would donate $500 to the 
county committee and would compel every man in his 
employ to vote the republican ticket on election day. 
1 have never regarded this as more than one of Mr. 
Darnell’s day dreams, and did not think Mr. Shaffer 
made any such impossible proposition. I make this 


statement for the reason that Mr. Darnell has seen 
fit to charge the mayor and certain councilmen with 
having done something illegitimate in this matter, 
when, so far as I know, he is the only one who advo¬ 
cated or proposed anything that was wrong.” 

It appears that this statement is the key that un¬ 
locks much of the secret business which swayed 
councilmen in their street car legislation. When 
Mr. Darnell let drop the statement that the Citizens’ 
Street Car Company would give $.500 or more toward 
the campaign fund, if the ordinance granting a com 
petitive franchise to the MacNeal Company was de¬ 
feated, the friends of the MacNeal ordinance carried 
the word to the MacNeal authorities. These nodoubt 
recognized the importance of action and prepared to 
meet it. The opportunity was not to be lost. A 
check for $500 was made out, and Councilman Cum¬ 
mings, who was a friend to the MacNeal ordinance, 
was entrusted with it. He, in due course of time, 
endorsed it over to the chairman of the county re¬ 
publican central committee. Either by chance, or by 
pre-arrangement, it was carried for several days be¬ 
fore it was presented at Fletcher’s bank for payment. 
Payment had been stopped in the meantime, but the 
existence of the check had become known to the se 
lect few, and it had done its perfect work. It had 
saved the day. The MacNeal ordinance was passed 
The supporter of that company’s ordinance who had 
been appealed to so tenderly to save the county 
ticket by voting against the MacNeal franchise, was 
not persuaded to do so. As to whether the Citizens’ 
Company paid $500 and voted its men “straight’’ will 
be matter for further inquiry. Also as what became 
of the canceled MacNeal check.— Indianapolis News. 

*:* * 

A correspondent writes the News that Otto 
Williams, while drawing pay as steward at the 
county poor-house, is attending school in this city. 
Commissioner Reveal states that the duties of 
steward are such that young Mr. Williams can easily 
perform them and still have plenty of time to pursue 
his studies at the Indiana Medical College.—Didfan- 
apolis News, 1890. 

)’,t s|t 

Chief Webster entered the fire department as a 
substitute in March, 1860. He showed adaptability 
for the business, care in his work, energy, obedience 
to discipline and was steadily advanced through 
the various branches of the service until eight years 
ago, when he was made chief. From the moment 
Webster took charge the efficiency and morals of the 
department began to improve. Discipline was main¬ 
tained, new methods and improvements were 
adopted as soon as they were found to be of utility, 
and the members were given to understand that 
their retention in place depended wholly upon their 
merits as firemen. For years this high degree of 
efficiency was maintained and the people slept 
soundly of nights, feeling that their homes and 
places of business were reasonably safe from the 
ravages of fire. 

But the greedy gang which has controlled the re¬ 
publican organization in this city for years was dis¬ 
satisfied. It saw in the fire department a machine 
which, if put on apolitical basis, could be made of 
great service. P. C. Trusler, a councilman from the 
twenty-first ward, was selected by the gang to re¬ 
construct the department on a machine basis. He 
approached Webster cautiously and, as chairman of 
the fire committee, demanded the removal of a cer¬ 
tain member of the department. The man whose 
head was asked was a thoroughly competent man, 
against whom no charge had been made, and Chief 
Webster refused to dismiss him. Trusler vowed 
vengeance on Webster and threatened him with dis¬ 
missal. 

For a time Trusler’s plans failed of fruition. He 
was defeated for re-election and for two years Web¬ 
ster was ieft in comparative peace, though whenever 
his name was mentioned the members of the gang 
ground their teeth and indulged in expletives more 
forcible than polite. When Trusler returned to the 
council plans for revenge were immediately formu 
lated. Trusler told Webster: “lhave come back 
into the council for the express purpose of downing 
you, and I’m going to do it.” Trusler brought even 
those members who feltdisinclined to such a plan to 
his way of thinking, urging that Webster had been 


appointed as a republican and owed his first alle¬ 
giance to that party rather than to the city. But a 
presidential campaign was on, votes were highly im¬ 
portant things to have, and the cooler heads saw that 
it wouldn’t do to remove Webster just then. So a 
compromise was attempted. The chief was ap¬ 
proached by Trusler and informed that if he would 
drop one democrat a month he would be permitted 
to retain his place. Mr. Webster replied that his 
business was putting out fires, not democrats, and 
that he didn’t propose to discharge competent men 
because of their politics. He was then told that he 
might expect to be discharged. 

After the interview a new course was adopted— 
that of hampering the movements of the chief. The 
fire committee reported adversely on every sugges¬ 
tion by Chief Webster looking to an improvement of 
the department, subordinates were encouraged to 
mutiny, and everything possible was done to disor¬ 
ganize the force. The men were encouraged to make 
the engine-houses headquarters for the distribution 
of republican documents, and every obstacle was 
thrown in Webster’s way. It didn’t matter to the 
members of the gang that public and private prop¬ 
erty was endangered. That didn’t concern them. 
They had none to lose. If the whole business por¬ 
tion of the town was destroyed it wouldn’t injure 
them a cent. Their business consisted wholly in de¬ 
vising schemes to get their.hands into the city treas¬ 
ury.— Indianapolis Sentinel. 

« « * 

A Joaraai editorial makes the stunning assertion 
that of “eighty odd members of the fire department 
thirty are democrats.” The editorial concludes with 
the amusing observation “that one by one the 
campaign falsehoods of the democratic organs are 
exploded.” Will the Journal please “explode ” by 
naming the thirty democrats? 

There are only nine democrats in the department. 
They are Tom Quinn, at No 1 Engine House: John 
Fox, at No. 4; Tom Barrett and Fred Clump, at No. 
6; Tony Voltz and Gus Ernst, at No. 2 truck; John 
King and William Tobin, on the tower, and Matt 
Rodgers, at headquarters. While these nine have 
been classed as democrats, some of them vote the 
republican ticket about as often as any other. 

It is the height of Trusler’s ambition to see every 
democrat out of the department and the force then 
used as a political nmchiiie.—Indianapolis News, 1889. 

Ki 

The election returns were not all in before the ma¬ 
chinery was put into motion for the removal of 
Webster. On the 8th of November, a caucus was 
held for the nomination of city otficers and Trusler 
began to work for the election of Dougherty as chief. 
Protests against a change were filed by insurance 
men and property-owners, but they were given no 
heed. In the second caucus Trusler promised Joe 
Gasper that the latter’s brother in-law, Jim Davis, 
should be given a fair place, and that councilman, 
who had hitherto opposed Webster’s removal, fell 
into line. On the 12th oi November, in joint session, 
the councilmen and aldermen chose Frank Dough¬ 
erty chief to succeed Webster, the vote stand¬ 
ing: For Dougherty—Aldermen Connett, Reynolds, 
Smith, Tousey and Wright; Councilmen Cummings, 
Darnell, Davis, Dunn, Elliott, Finch, Gasper, Long 
McClelland, Pearson, Smith, Swain, Thalman, Trus¬ 
ler and Wilson—20, For Webster—Aldermen Clark, 
Rgil and Reinecke ; Councilman Burns, Gaul, Hick, 
lin, Johnston, Kelley, Markey, O’Connor and Park¬ 
inson—11. 

Not a republican there had the nerve to stand out 
against the demands of the gang and demand that 
the fire department be kept efficient. They voted as 
the gang told them to, and the department was made 
an adjnnct to the republican msLChine.—Indianapolis 
Sentinel, 1889. 

>:< * 

The Trusler syndicate still has its fangs fastened in 
.the fire department and continues to make and un¬ 
make, as it pleases. Jack Robinson, who was select¬ 
ed by Dougherty as foreman of the No. 3’s, felt into 
disfavor with the Trusler gang and through its influ¬ 
ence has been made driver of the No. 3’s reel. Mr. 
Frank Harvey has taken his place as captain of the 
3’8. Mayor Denny showed the most sickening ser- 

























CI\1L SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


208 THE 


vility in the matter, advising Robinson that he liad 
better not kick against Trtisler. The Trusler gang 
wanted to get Mr. R. H. Brown into Robinson’s 
place, but did not succeed, and accordingly Brown 
has been transferred to the IS’s, Louis Rafert to the 
3’s, vice Huffman to the lO's, vice Mountain to the 
4’s, vice John Keating to headquarters to fill the va¬ 
cancy caused by Harvey’s removal. — Indianapolis 
Sentinel, May 1,1889. 

>;> * >> 

Instead of giving heed to the political shysters who 
are now clamoring to get into the fire department, 
some attention should be paid to those already on 
the "sub” list. Men like Kiley and Loucks, who 
have served long and faithfully in hope of promo 
tion, are deserving of recognition. In his “subbing” 
Loucks has had a serious time, being twice injured. 
It can be said for Dougherty that he favors these 
trained “ subs,” and in consequence the umbilical 
cord between himself and the “Tin Horns” has been 
badly ruptured.— Indianapolis News, 1889. 

* 

Among the changes which Chief Dougherty made 
for betterment of the fire department was detailing 
“ Jack ” Robinson, a trained and valuable fireman, 
as foreman of the No. “3’s.” Jfr. Robinsonwnsa Webster 
man in the recent trouble, but he is noted for his fidelity 
to duty. His selection displeased the Truster syndicate, 
and/or two weeks and more there has been constant fric¬ 
tion in the effort to displace him and subsiitute R. H. 
Brown, a Trusler man. The mayor advised Robinson 
to retire, “ promising to stand by him,” and ne talked 
as if fearful of antagonizing the Trusler syndicate in 
any way. Robinson objected to being displaced at 
the dictation of the syndicate, but eventually he 
placed himself in Dougherty’s hands, and the latter 
has compromised by making him driver of the “ 3’s ” 
reel.— Indianapolis News, May 2,1890. 

* * 

Engine House No. 13 has been used during the city 
campaign as a Trusler headquarters. For some time 
past circulars have been thrown broadcast in the 
twenty-first ward. They relate how “everybody 
knows Mr. Trusler is a candidate for re-election as 
councilman; how for two years he has looked after 
their interests; how he has endeavored to open up 
new territory by building the Willow street bridge, 
and how by the change in the fire department (for 
which he has no apology to offer) better discipline 
has been obtained.” 

There are many other plaintive wails which Mr. 
Trusler makes in his circular, too numerous to be 
mentioned, as Mr. Trusler received many wounds to 
which to apply circular balm while he was a coun¬ 
cilman. Mr. Tiusler thought explanation a great 
healer, and used lots of it in his circular balm. 
When he wrote his circular about the fire depart¬ 
ment, the Bates House fire had not occurred. To Mr. 
Trusler undoubtedly the department service had 
been bettered, but certainly not in extinguishing 
fires, as was shown yesterday. It was bettered for 
him, as he had by the change in the service more 
men to work for his re-election. They worked and 
worked well to that end. They peddled the circu¬ 
lars at No. 13 which related what a good councilman 
he had been. Since the campaign opened Foreman 
Tallentire has not attended a fire, but has devoted 
his entire time to Trusler’s re election. 

When the alarm sounded, announcing the fire at 
the Bates house, members of the department at No. 
13 were out electioneering. One of them, named 
Partie, was talking to J. C. Treeter, brick layer and 
boiler-setter, urging him to vote for Trusler. Only 
three men turned out with that chemical engine, 
whose services were worthless, unless while the fire 
was in embryo. One of those was a sub. Verily, the 
services of the fire department have been bettered, 
so far as Mr. Trusler’s interests are concerned. When 
the alarm was turned in Tallentire was seen election¬ 
eering for Trusler. He was dre-'Sed in citizen’s 
clothes; and was in the company of Trusler; Bar- 
rows, the inspector of that ward, and Despo, the can 
didate for alderman in the fourth ward. This is 
something that Dougherty permits, but would never 
have occurred under Webster. 

Another incident shows Trusler’s desperation. A 
well-known citizen on Hoyt avenue had occasion to 


fill his back yard with dirt. He went to the street 
gang working on Virginia avenue, and asked them 
if they would give nim a load of the street scrapings. 
They told him that a few good cigars would act with 
a magician’s skill. The cigars were forthcoming, but 
the dirt never reached its destination. The citizen 
then met Rubens, the disabled fireman, who is doing 
yeoman service for Trusler, and was promised a load 
the next day. The next day a fine load of soil rolled 
up to the citizen’s door, but it never came from the 
streets. It was .soil that Trusler had probably paid 
lor.—Indianapolis Sentinel, October 7,1889. 

* * * 

Councilman Hickliii, as president of the committee 
on fire department, was completely knocked out last 
night. Hicklin had prepared a list of statesmen to be 
appointed firemen, and didn’t consult with Messrs. 
Cooper and Olsen, members of the committee. Last 
night at the meeting of the fire board Olsen asked to 
see the list. 

“Ah, never mind,” said Hicklin, waving the list 
grandly, “ we will just put it through.” 

“Well, we won’t put it through until we know 
something about it,” exclaimed the mild-mannered 
Cooper. 

“ Now, ain't this thing all right-? ” 

“ Haven’t we got our chief here who is responsible 
for the men, and who should have something to say?” 
interrupted Olsen. 

“ Well, yes, but-’’ 

“ 1 move,” said Cooper, “ that the chief of the fire 
department be instructed to make his own appoint¬ 
ments, and select the men who are competent fire¬ 
men and who will best serve the city’s interests.” 

“Those are my sentiments exactly,” said Olsen, 
“ and 1 am with you, Mr. Cooper.” 

The result was that Mr. Hicklin’s list was ignored. 
Chief Webster will make out his own list and the 
council will approve it. Hicklin was very anxious 
that the little affair of last night be kept out of the 
papers, and the Iridianapolis News has it that he in- 
informed one gentleman by telephone this morning 
that no meeting had been held. Mr. Cooper has ad¬ 
vised Chief Webster to take his time and make ap¬ 
pointments that will be creditable to his judgment, 
if not satisfactory to the bummers who want to make 
a political machine out of the fire department.—Jn- 
dianapoUs News, January 30, 1891. 

SENATE BILL NO. 275 . 

A BILL FOR AN ACT TO REGULATE 
THE E.MPLOYMENT OF OFFICERS 
AND PERSONS IN THE SERVICE OF 
THE STATE IN THE BENEVOLENT 
INSTITUTIONS. 

Section 1. Se it enacted by the General As¬ 
sembly of the Stale of Indiana, That the Board 
of State Charities shall prepare rules for the 
selection of officers and persons to be em¬ 
ployed in the service of the State in the Hos¬ 
pital for the Insane at Indianapolis, the 
Northern Indiana Hospital for the Insane at 
Logansport, the Southern Indiana Hospital 
for the Insane at Evansville, the Eastern Indi. 
ana Hospital for the Insane at Richmond, the 
Institution for the Education of the Blind, the 
Institution for the Education of the Deaf and 
Dumb, the Indiana School for Feeble-Minded 
Youth, and the Indiana Soldiers’ and Sailors’ 
Orphans’ Home. Said Board of State Charities 
shall supervise the administration of the 
rules so established. 

Sec. 2. The rules mentioned in Section 1 of 
this act may be made from time to time and 
they shall among other things provide : 

First. For the classification of the positions 
and employments to be filled. 

Second. For open and competitive examina¬ 
tions by which to test applicants touching 


iheir pracrical fitness to discharge the dutiis 
of the positions which they desire to fill. 

Third. For the selection of officers and per¬ 
sons for positions in said institutions in ac¬ 
cordance with the results of such examina¬ 
tions. 

Fourth. For promotion on the basis of merit 
ascertained by competition. 

Fifth. For a period of probation before per¬ 
manent appointment or employment. 

Sixth. For reports to be given in writing by 
the appointing power to said Board of Stat s 
Charities of the persons selected for appoint¬ 
ment or employment among those examined; ( f 
rejections after probation ; of resignations, sus¬ 
pensions, and removals, and the dates thereof; 
and in case of rejection after probation, sus¬ 
pensions, or removal of the cause therefor. 

Seventh. For the transfer of officers or em¬ 
ployes from any of said institutions to po u- 
tions of the same grade in any other of said 
institutions. 

Eighth. For determining the moral fitntss 
of applicants for examination. 

Sec. 3. The Board of State Charities shall 
appoint local examining boards in local¬ 
ities where examinations are to be held, each 
consisting of three persons, not more than ot e 
of whom shall be in the employ of the State, 
and not more than two of whom shall belong 
to the same political party. The Board of 
State Charities may appoint one member of 
each local board to act as secretary thereof. 
Said boards shall * 0 composed 01 t:''rsons of 
known impar'iality and integrity. Slid 
boards shall act under the rules provided lor 
in Section 1 of this act. Members of said 
boards sh 11 each be paid five dollars for each 
day actu illy employed. 

Sec. 1. The secretary of the Board of 
State Cl arities shall, under the rules of said 
board, have supervision of all examinations 
under tl is act. Every examination he’d 1 hall 
be atten led in person by the secretary, or, in 
case of his inability, by at least one member 
of the Bo rd of State Charities. If the I oard 
of State CParities at any time fail to appoint 
a secretary, the Governor shall appi int a sec¬ 
retary of sai 1 board. 

Sec. 5. The Board of State Charities shall 
grade the comp titors in the various ex: mina- 
lions in the resp ctive classes for wlii'.'i they 
are examined, ana make lists of the same ac¬ 
cordingly, ranging ''■•om the high st down¬ 
ward, and shall re-: riauge such lists after 
each examination. No name shall b ?retained 
in said lists longer than one ye: r fn m the 
time of examination. No name sh ill be re¬ 
tained in said lists after the same h is been 
certified three times for appointment. 

Sec. 6. Within three months iftei this act 
takes effect the Board of State Cl aritb s shall, 
for the purpose of the examii ation herein 
provided for, arrange in one or mor. classes 
the offices and places of employment within 
the scope of this act. And at the en I of said 
three months no person shall be appi inted or 
admitted to or promoted to any i ffice or place 
so classified until he has passed an e.xamina- 
tion in conformity herewith. The superin- 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


209 


tendents of said institutions respectively and 
laborers shall not be classified hereunder. 

Sec. 7. Wherever an appointment is to be 
made in said classified service, the appointing 
power shall give notice of the same under the 
rules of the Board of State Charities, and 
thereupon under said rules the highest three 
names from the corresponding list of examined 
persons, with the rating of each, shall be cer¬ 
tified to said appointing power, and one of the 
three persons whose names are thus certified 
shall receive said appointment. In any and 
all cases where a person is appointed of lower 
rating than one or both of those whose 
names are certified with his, the appointing 
power shall, under said rules, report in writ¬ 
ing in each case the reasons for not appoint¬ 
ing such person or persons of higher rating. 
Each examined person shall be entitled to 
three consecutive certifications for appoint¬ 
ment. 

Sec. 8. No question in any examination 
under the aforesaid rules shall relate to polit¬ 
ical opinions, and no appointment or dismissal 
shall be affected by political reasons, influ¬ 
ence or affiliations. Examinations shall be 
practical and shall relate to matters which 
will fairly test the relative fitness of the appli¬ 
cants. The Board of State Charities shall 
openly publish in all notices of examinations 
to be held that the competition is impartial to 
all, without regard to political opinions or 
affiliation. 

Sec. 9. No recommendation or statement 
concerning any person applying for office or 
. place under this act, except as to the character 
of the applicant, shall be received or consid¬ 
ered by any person concerned in holding any 
examination or making any appointment nn- 
der this act; and said recommendations or 
statements as to character shall be in writing. 

Sec. 10. The Board of State Charities shall 
make a separate classification of the labor 
service of said institutions, and shall keep 
registers of deserving applicants for places in 
said labor service and shall make rules for 
determining what applicants are entitled to 
have their names entered upon such registers. 
Such rules shall guard against political or 
other favoritism in securing entry of names 
upon said registers, but for meritorious rea¬ 
sons, such as having families to support, or 
where special qualifications are required, they 
may provide for preference for employment 
among those registered; otherwise laborers 
shall be employed in the order in which they 
stand on the respective registers. No laborer 
shall be discharged from said labor service 
for political reasons nor except for cause stated 
in \rriting under the rules of the State Board 
of Charities. A registration shall be good for 
one year. 

Sec. 11. All notices and reports required 
herein, all recommendations concerning char¬ 
acter, all lists of persons examined, with their 
respective ratings, all records of examinations, 
all examination papers, with the rating given 
to each answer marked thereon, and all rec¬ 
ords of every kind of said respective institu¬ 


tions and of said Board of State Charities 
shall be open to public inspection. 

Sec. 12. The duties herein assigned to the 
Secretary of the Board of State Charities are 
in addition to such other duties as may be 
assigned to him by said board, and said board 
may, if necessary, appoint a clerk to said sec¬ 
retary at a compensation to be fixed by said 
board. All expenses necessary to carry out 
this act shall be certified as the Board of State 
Charities shall direct, and shall be paid by the 
Treasurer of State upon an order from the 
Auditor of State. 

Sec. 13. The county commissioners of any 
county where any examination under this act 
is to be held, shall provide a suitable place 
for holding the same, properly furnished, 
heated and lighted, and shall furnish the nec¬ 
essary stationery for said examination. 

Sec. 14. The Board of State Charities shall 
annually prepare and print a report of all 
proceedings and expenses under this act. 

Sec. 15. The sum of three thousand dollars 
is hereby annually appropriated out of any 
funds not otherwise appropriated for the pay¬ 
ment of all expenses made necessary by this act. 

Sec. 16. Whoever refuses or neglects to 
comply with the provisions of this act, or vio¬ 
lates any of its provisions, or knowingly 
makes an appointment to office, or selects a 
person for employment contrary to any rules 
duly established according to the provisions of 
this act, shall be liable to a penalty of not less 
than one hundred dollars nor more than one 
thousand dollars for such oflFense. 

the MAGEE BILE. 

Resolutions adopted by the Social Turn 
Verein at its meeting February 14th inst.: 

The Social Turn Verein of Indianapolis has been 
informed that Senate Bill No. 275, will be intro¬ 
duced to the legislature. This bill has the object of 
the employment of officers and persons for our be 
nevolent institutions according to their fitness and 
merits instead of their party faiths, and, 

Whereas, the Social Turn Verein is heartily in 
favor of taking our benevolent institutions out of 
politics, therefore, be it 

Resolted, We regard this as a timely reform, fully 
in the interest of our unfortunates under the care of 
the state, as well as for the public good in general. 


THE STATE DEMOCRATIC PRESS. 

—There is no measure before the legislature which, 
from a strictly partisan point of view, is enti¬ 
tled to more hearty support from the democrats 
than the Magee bill to regulate the appoint¬ 
ment of subordinate employes in the state be¬ 
nevolent institutions. The arguments for the bill 
are so obvious that it seems unnecessary to re¬ 
capitulate them. The bill provides for the exam¬ 
ination of all applicants for positions in these insti¬ 
tutions, the tests to be applied being those only of 
character and capacity. If it becomes a law, it will 
insure the selection of honest and capable men only 
for positions in these institutions, and will put a 
stop forever to the scandal and disgrace of the r use 
as asylums for party workers. Every practice dem¬ 
ocratic politician in the state knows that fo. every 
vote which the possession of the “patronage” of these 
institutions makes for the party it loses five votes. 
For every person who is pacified with an appoint¬ 
ment there are half a dozen disappointed and dis¬ 
gruntled applicants, and for the actions of every 
employe the parly becomes responsible, and is fre¬ 


quently obliged to bear odium which does not b e 
long to it. The attendant in the eastern hospital 
who was recently convicted of manslaughter, is and 
always has been a republican, yet his ofiense is 
charged to the account of the democratic party. 
Considerations of party expediency, not to speak of 
the higher considerations of justice, humanity and 
Christianity, demand the enactment of the Magee 
bill, which, leaving the general management of the 
benevolent institutions still in the hands of the 
dominant party, will take the subordinate appoint¬ 
ments out of politics, thus relieving the state of an 
acknowledged and serious evil and the democratic 
party of a heavy burden. There should be no doubt 
of the passage of the Magee hiW.—Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, February 19. 

—Senator Magee has done one thing for which The 
Signal can heartily commend him. He is ably cham¬ 
pioning senate bill No. 275, to regulate the employ¬ 
ment of officers and persons in the service of the 
state in the benevolent institutions. The bill may 
not be perfect in all its parts, but any law which will 
remove the state benevolent instutions from the con¬ 
trol of political bosses is a move in the right direc¬ 
tion. The state federation of labor put Itself on rec¬ 
ord as favoring such a reform at its last annual meet 
ing.— Labor Signal, February 20. 

—The Linton Call says: “The present legislature may 
well heed the timely warning and place themselves 
in line with the demand for this needed reform. 
The control of these institutions is the source of 
party weakness, and the sooner the democratic party 
unloads this responsibility the better it will be, from 
a party stand-point. The people yet have a few anti¬ 
quated notions that parties should not be held to¬ 
gether for the spoils, and their love of justice will 
correct these growing evils. Party fealty will not 
condone a wrong or excuse those in control.”—/ndi- 
anapolis News, February 3. 

—The Seymou r Demoerai says: “ The control of all 
benevolent institutions should be non-partisan. 
Every time politics is found in contact with state 
charities mischief is found. Men can not stifie par¬ 
tisanship once it is aroused. Wherever party intersts 
are presumed to be in peril partisans will instinct¬ 
ively spring to their defense. There ought to be no 
party interests for any party in public charities. 
Party and politics should be wholly eliminated from 
them.”—Indianapolis Journal, February 2. 

—Speaking of the bill to place benevolent institu¬ 
tions under non-partisan management, the Coving¬ 
ton J^riend says: “By all means let this bill be 
passed, and put these institutions into the hands of 
thoroughly competent officials, and stop this trading 
on the woes and misfortunes of the poor unfortu- 
na tcs. —Indianapolis Sentinel, February 17. 

—The Logansport PAaros says: “ Senator Magee’s 
bill providing for the non-partisan management of 
the benevolent Institutions of the state is a good one. 
The benevolent boards should be wholly non-parti¬ 
san. Men of unquestionable fitness should be placed 
in control of these institutions and they should be 
managed as a man of affairs manages his business. 
The partisan management of the benevolent institu¬ 
tions is a detriment rather than a benefit to the party 
in power.”—Jndianapolis Sentinel, February 17. 

—During the past years thecitizens of Indiana, with¬ 
out regard to party distinctions, have concluded that 
the officers of our benevolent institution, together 
with the entire management and administration, 
should be regulated independently of all party con¬ 
nection, and purely with a view to fitness and merit. 
The masses,taught by the innumerable scandals, de¬ 
mand it in the interests of the general welfare, and 
even discerning party chiefs of both sides unite in 
the same demands for party sake. The latter are 
aware that the “right" of distributing patronage, 
weakens the party Instead of giving it strength; that 
with each appointment a considerable number of 
“unnoticed” candidates became dissatisfied if not 
rebellious, while the fortunate one, who takes away 
the prize, recognizes in it only the well-deserved re¬ 
ward for party service (a soft warm bed and the 
opportunity of making money), not the acceptance 












210 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


of onerous duties and responsibilities which he 
ordinarily neglects to the shame and disgrace of 
his party. The far-seeing and more resolute politi¬ 
cians attribute the re-action, which so often appears 
in the general elections after a presidential election, 
to the distribution of spoils, which never ends 
without a veritable dog-fight. But with indisput¬ 
able right the citizen says, in relation to our bene¬ 
volent institutions, that, as we do not inquire into 
the political faith of the patient, so also should this 
faith not determine the choice of his ofticers, physi¬ 
cian, nurse, etc. 

From such reflections as these, which in the first 
instance bears with it the general welfare and in the 
second party advantages, senate bill No. 275 finds 
its soarce—Indianapolis Tdglicher Telegraph [dem.], 
February 16. 


Resolutions adopted by the Marion County 
Medical Society, at its tneeting February 10: 

The Marion County Medical Society having been 
informed that a bill has been presented to the Indi¬ 
ana state legislature having for its object the placing 
of the state charitable institutions upon a non-parti¬ 
san basis, and making the positions of assistant phy¬ 
sicians competitive, therefore 
Resolved, That the Marion County Medical Society 
heartily indorses the principles involved in this bill. 


REFORM IN THE BENEVOLENT 
INSTITUTIONS. 

The editor of The Sentinel has received con¬ 
gratulations, both in person and by letter, 
from many leading democrats of Indiana 
upon the article published in last Saturday’s 
issue regarding the defeat of the Magee bill 
in the senate. Among the letters received is 
one from a prominent democrat of Frankfort 
—a man who has always been active in the 
service of his party, spending his time and 
money freely in its behalf. This letter was 
not intended for publication, but we take the 
liberty of printing the main portions of it: 

1 want to take you by both hands as an ex¬ 
pression of the cordiality with which I in- 
<lorsed your editorial expressions in to day’s 
Sentinel, especially on the Magee bill. Your 
advice to the legislature has been timely, and 
had it been followed would have saved the 
democratic party the chagrin and humilia¬ 
tion of future explanations and apologies. 
Can’t something be done to have the Magee 
bill reconsidered ? For the good of the party, 
for the good of the state, let something be 
done next week by the legislature to save it 
from shame. I don’t deal in flattery, but I 
mean all I say when I write that you have 
proven yourself a patriot, and therefore, in 
the broadest sense, a good democrat by your 
courageous course in The Sentinel. I may not 
have approved of all your editoral sentiments, 
but you have proven my ideal of what a file 
leader in the democratic party should be. A 
good many members of the legislature act as 
though they thought the people did not read 
and think. In this they deceive themselves. 
This is a progressive age, and if the demo¬ 
cratic party expects to absorb the votes of the 
young men of push, it must in action as well 
as name be democratic. The curse of the 
party has always been its political barnacles. 
VV^e must cleanse the hull of our gallant old 
vessel of them, else we surely will be dis¬ 
tanced in the race for popular favor. The 
actions of our legislature may have a potent 
effect on the national campaign of ’92, and it 
is exasperating in the extreme that it should 
thus put in jeopardy the democratic party of 


the whole country. Commending you again 
for your courage, as well as your sound judg¬ 
ment, I remain yours sincerely. 

Anotlier Indiana democrat of eminence— 
a man who has voted the democratic ticket 
and worked for the democratic party more 
than fifty years—writes the Sentinel lament¬ 
ing the defeat of the Magee bill. He de¬ 
clares that a continuance of the existing sys¬ 
tem, with all its evils and abuses, “ought to 
be enough to bring down the vengeance of 
God upon the state and people, who suffer it.” 
He adds that if this legislature “does not do 
something in the line of the Magee bill it 
must not claim to be honest in its professions 
of reform.” He continues: 

“ Merely pretending to do a great reform 
work by cutting down the salaries of public 
officers will not satisfy the demands of hu¬ 
manity and Christian charity. The Sentinel 
has shown its willingness to do a good work in 
this direction heretofore, and I hope it will 
not quit now.” 

Our venerable democratic friend need have 
no apprehensions on this 'score. The Sentinel 
is not a quitter. It is not “ built that way.” 
One swallow does not make a summer, and 
the defeat of the Magee bill is merely an inci¬ 
dent in the struggle for reform in the benevo¬ 
lent institutions. We believe, as we have 
frequently said, that these institutions, with 
one exception, are to-day as well managed as 
it is possible for them to be under the existing 
system. Whatever abuses exist in them are 
the fault of the system and not of the men 
who are in charge of the institutions. That 
system will have to go sooner or later. The 
reform contemplated by the Magee bill has 
been postponed ; it has not been defeated. It 
has been established in all the eastern and 
middle states and in several of the western 
states. Two years hence it will be introduced 
in Indiana, and by the democratic party—the 
only party which has ever given the people of 
this state any valuable reform in legislation or 
administration.— Indianapolis Sentinel, Februa¬ 
ry 24 . 


VICTIMS STILL FOR CRUELTY AND 
CRIME. 


Victor Hugo says that America in the nine¬ 
teenth century after she had awakened to 
her condition looked upon herself and said : 
“What! I had slaves!” And that Europe 
would awake in the twentieth century and ex¬ 
claim : “What! I had kings!” We believe 
that this goodly state of Indiana will reach 
the condition in which with equal disgust and 
horror she will look at herself and say of her 
helpless insane and other wards: “What! I 
once turned these defenseless beings over as 
the spoils of politics, the victims of the cruelty 
and ignorance of political heelers and ruf¬ 
fians!” Indiana’s good name was again de¬ 
tracted from yesterday when the state senate 
defeated the bill to remove the benevolent in¬ 
stitutions from politics. There was no mis¬ 
taking the issue. Senator Magee and those 


who voted with him offered the incontestable 
demonstrations of business principles, com¬ 
mon sense, fair play and every consideration 
of humanity in support of the measure. From 
these grounds the opposition fled, and took its 
stand squarely in the mire and filth of spoils 
politics. It smeared everything in reach with 
the exudations of appetite as a snake covers 
with saliva the victim of its fangs before it 
begins to gorge. And the comparison is exact 
at other points. The seizure of a public trust 
is as clearly an outrageous attack as a snake’s 
is, and its gluttonizing for the appetite of a 
few bummers and heelers as much of an in¬ 
famy. 

The care of the state’s wards is the people’s 
concern. They pay for it. The objects of this 
care are the unfortunate and afflicted from 
households all over the state. This legisla¬ 
ture began by denying the common rights of 
the public mails to the most helpless class of 
these unfortunates; absolutely forbid them 
from communication with the hearts and 
homes of those to whom nature has primarily 
tied them by blood and affection. They are 
immured in asylums beyond the reach of such 
appeal. And now these places of confinement 
are denied the administration of business fit¬ 
ness, of honest, of common right and human¬ 
ity, the helpless subjects there to he held as so 
much spoils to be “ worked ” for the benefit of 
party bummers, though it may mean neglect, 
starvation, cruelty, murder. Those things 
have been done in the past. They are inher¬ 
ent in the system. They are liable to be re¬ 
peated in the future, and the majority of the 
state senate of Indiana, deliberately taking its 
stand in the blood and the mire of this infamy, 
declares that no change shall be made that 
will prevent this. O shame! O cruelty and 
infamy! But a change will be made! The 
people of Indiana will not forever submit to 
this inhumanity. They will remove this curse 
and crime and stain, and visit with their 
righteous indignation and pity the vile cruel¬ 
ty that partisan corruption works in man.— 
Indianapolis News, February 20, 


The Courier regrets to see that the Magee bill, 
to place the benevolent institutions of the 
state on a non partisan basis, in which merit 
alone will win a position, failed to pass the 
senate Thursday. The democratic party is al¬ 
ways the sufferer under the spoils system. We 
lost the presidential election ip 1888 because 
of the soreheads who failed to get office under 
Cleveland. So from a party point of view 
alone, the patronage of the benevolent itfsti- 
tutions of the state ought to be taken out of the 
hands of politicians. But from a humane point 
of view every consideration that leads to sympa¬ 
thy for the unfortunate pleads that their man¬ 
agement be entirely eliminated from politics. 
The Courier is certain that this view is con¬ 
curred in by nine-tenths of the people out¬ 
side of the partisans who are politicians for 
revenue only.—E’rmismWfi Courier, February 2S. 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


I am, as you know, opposed to removals to make places for our friends.—^ftra/iam Lincoln, December 17, 1846. 

Voii. I, No. 25. INDIANAPOLIS, MARCH, 1891. terms : ^ fcento“pS”“py” 


For sale at Wylie’s News Store, 13 N. Pennsylvania 
St., Indianapolis. 

Published monthly. Publication office. No. 73 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Indiana, where subscrip¬ 
tions and advertisements will be received. 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Indiana. 


The Civil Service Chronicle repeats its request 
that all libraries that have not already done so will 
acknowledge the receipt of the paper, it having been 
sent for the last six months to over four hundred 
libraries. 


Harpers Weekly of March 24 saj's: 

The actual service of the last two years to reform 
is really summed up in the fidelity of the commis¬ 
sion. But there is no allegation that under the 
Cleveland administration the commission was not 
equally faithful. 

In justice to the present civil service 
commission, it must be said that in the 
latter part of the preceding administration 
the commission was not only unfaithful 
but was in a state of helpless inefficiency. 
This is a mild statement of the actual situ¬ 
ation. It is not made in contradiction, but 
to supply the missing allegation which the 
Weekly or any one else can now support by 
abundance of facts. 

The President has removed the demo¬ 
cratic district attorney in Washington who 
had charge of not prosecuting Mahone’s 
blackmailers. There is a decided appear¬ 
ance that he thought masterly inactivity 
was his best guaranty of continuance in 
office. Will his successor break the spell ? 
If he secures conviction followed by a fine 
will the administration then dispense with 
the services of the convicts ? 

Of the 2,899 presidential post-offices in 
existence March 4, 1891, changes had then 
been made in all but 290 since March 4, 
1889. Aside from a small proportion caused 
by death or other legitimate causes, these 
changes were made for reasons that had 
no reference to the good transaction of the 
public business or to the public welfare. 
The acts were done to help persons or to 
satisfy the demand of a party machine. 
They were, therefore, without qualification, 
corrupt acts. The constitution does not 
contemplate that a President shall reward 
his friends and his partisans as a king re¬ 
wards his courtiers and his followers. 


The civil service commission after all 
got no allowance for additional clerks. The 
senate changed the house appropriation of 
a lump sum to specific items, which made 
a conference committee necessary, and 


Cannon was put upon that committee. He 
overawed Dawes, Butterworth, and other 
civil service reform republicans, and got 
the conference agreement shaped to omit 
the additional allowance. Long ago de¬ 
feated and repudiated by an overwhelm¬ 
ingly republican community, in his anger 
and spite he thus runs amuck among mat¬ 
ters of good administration and public 
welfare. The merit system is marching 
irresistibly on, and in a little while “Joe” 
Cannon will be known simply as one of 
the men who undertook to stop its progress 
and was brushed aside. The Indianapolis 
Journal reports that he is very “ near ” to 
the President, and that the latter will soon 
make use of Cannon’s services. This would 
certainly appear like a recompense for suc¬ 
cess in hampering the operations of the 
commission and in breaking republican 
promises. 

Royer is in Washington trying to get 
back the Pine Ridge agency, and is tele¬ 
graphing that his prospects are good. If, 
under the circumstances, his prospects are 
really good with the President, it is useless 
to attempt to add any facts with-a view to 
prevent the re-instatement. Voters,how¬ 
ever, should read the letter of Mr. Cleve¬ 
land, in another column, so that in this, as 
in many other like matters, they may be 
informed. 

Mr. George William Curtis addressed 
the meeting of the department of superin¬ 
tendence of the national educational asso¬ 
ciation February 25, upon “ The Public 
School and Civil Service Reform.” A res¬ 
olution was passed commending the appli¬ 
cation of the merit system to the public 
schools. The CivU Service Reformer in its 
current issue gives an idea of how patron¬ 
age taints the public school system of Bal¬ 
timore. 

Elsewhere are a few items to illustrate 
current spoil. The time concerned is only 
a month and a half, and the range is wide. 
Ingalls fitly makes his exit with a brazen 
and brutal spoils act. How spoilsmen know 
no party and are bound together for mu¬ 
tual interest is indicated by the connection 
of the republican assemblyman, Hen¬ 
dricks, with Governor Hill’s man Pierce, 
of unsavory Tweed association. The fights 
about the post-office troughs in several 
states continue. Vandervooft, whose scan¬ 


dalous appointment was not revoked in 
the face of his disgraceful record, evidently 
feels secure with the President and the 
postmaster-general, and is up to his eyes 
in private snaps of divers sorts. 

It would seem that a casual survey would 
impress any one that the spoils question is 
a question of morals, and that to tolerate 
these scenes over the country is to tolerate 
the lowest and most sordid acts in public 
affairs. 


In the general assembly, just adjourned, 
the senate appointed nineteen door-keep¬ 
ers, although the law allows but seven, and 
although there are but seven doors, in¬ 
cluding the doors to the cloak-rooms, and 
from these into the senate chamber, which 
have any possible communication with the 
senate chamber. These door-keepers were 
paid five dollars a day, although it was 
urged and admitted that dozens of good 
men could be had for two dollars and a 
half. “But, no!” say our buccaneering 
senators, “ that would give all the patron¬ 
age to Marion county. A man can not af¬ 
ford to come to Indianapolis from South 
Bend or Evansville and be a door-keeper 
for less than five dollars a day.” And for 
this freely expressed reason the people 
who do not care where a door-keeper lives 
pay double wages. 

The spoils system in our insane hos¬ 
pitals goes merrily on. A patient died at 
the central hospital, and Dr. Curtis, an as¬ 
sistant physician, furnished the relatives 
with the necessary certificate of death, for 
which he charged and pocketed the neat 
sum of ten dollars. This, says the doctor, 
is not a service for which the state hired 
me. True, no one else can render it, for 
in the service of the state, I alone, as the 
patient’s doctor, obtained the peculiar 
knowledge that enables me to make the 
certificate. But there was no agreement 
that I was to put this knowledge into writ¬ 
ing. What political or personal “ pull ” 
enables this buccaneer to continue to live 
off from the state ? 

At the eastern hospital, recently, a pa¬ 
tient suddenly dies. The doctors examine 
the body and report that the man’s ribs 
broke of themselves. Later, three attend- 
ants, ignorantof this finding, are examined, 
and carefully state that another patient 
kicked the dead man. The three attendants 



























212 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


are discharged for lying. How do the peo¬ 
ple like the sneaking, and thieving, and 
murderous system of Hudson, and Foley, 
and Old Dr. Thompson, and Thompson of 
Pulaski, and Burke, and Sweeney, and all 
the rest of the twenty-six senators who 
voted that it was good and wholesome. 

During the month the general assembly 
has passed a new charter for this city. A 
bitter and desperate opposition to it was 
made under the leadership of Sim Coy, Jim 
Rice, Sterling R. Holt, and Leon 0. Bailey, 
the last named being at the same time city 
attorney and deputy attorney-general of 
the state. The ground of opposition is in- 
tlicated by the names mentioned. It was 
feared that the new charter might make 
more difficult the exploitation of city af¬ 
fairs for personal or party benefit. It was 
enough for this opposition that there ap¬ 
peared the least cloud of uncertainty in the 
matter. They very nearly succeeded. Dr. 
Thompson, old and superannuated, and 
those two counterfeit representatives of 
working men, these being the three sena¬ 
tors from this county, were mere puppets 
in the hands of Coy and his co-workers. 
It was only by the greatest effort that the 
opposition was overcome, and yet of the 
125,000 people concerned, it is within the 
facts to say that 124,000 were earnestly in 
favor of the enactment of the measure. 


In considering the new city charter it 
must be remembered that under the old 
system of a mayor without power and a 
council and board of aldermen which passed 
ordinances and superintended their execu¬ 
tion by boards of their own members, city 
government had practically broken down. 
The new charter is a vast concentration of 
power in the mayor and under him in 
heads of different departments whom he 
appoints and may remove. The city legis¬ 
lature consists of twenty-one councilmen 
acting as one body. Fifteen of these are 
elected by wards and six by the city at 
large. This is an undoubted improvement 
as the one body permits of prompt action, 
and the choice of six by the whole city 
added to those chosen from wards apt to 
choose good councilmen will give the city 
a majority made up of honest and capable 
men, if the voters who want such will take 
the trouble to elect them. Such fellows as 
Coy only get into the council by going to 
wards largely made up of their stripe and 
where the city as a whole has no chance to 
get at them. The council has large legis¬ 
lative powers, the most important of which 
is the appropriation of money. 

As a foundation which makes the best 
city government possible, the charter must 
appeal to every one, and those who secured 
its passage may feel that they have ren¬ 


dered a public service. There is, however, 
too great an inclination to rest upon the 
assumption that the best city government 
must follow the enactment of this law. No 
greater mistake can be made. The charter 
may become a two-edged sword, with the 
sharp edge cutting into the public welfare. 
In the hands of faithful and competent 
officers, the best hopes will be realized. 
But with an able, shrewd, partisan,and un¬ 
principled mayor, backed by a council of 
his kind, or with a respectable, weak mayor 
and council handled by outsiders like Coy, 
we shall have, on a smaller scale, a Tweed 
regime, and any department falling into 
such hands will just so far be the worst 
kind of government. Only by eternal vig¬ 
ilance will good results be obtained. The 
charter will not run itself, and those citi¬ 
zens who stand back and let others criti¬ 
cise public affairs will have to lay aside 
their reserve and hold themselves in readi¬ 
ness to denounce the first appearance of 
official venality, or, sooner or later, now 
this department, now that, will be con¬ 
trolled by political buccaneers, whose small 
numbers and concentrated powers will en¬ 
able them to enjoy to the full the political 
paradise described by Coy in the words, 
“The fewer men you have in this politics, 
the better.” When Governor Hill, of New 
York, appoints Paddy Divver to a judge- 
ship at $8,000 a year, and a member of the 
Tweed ring insurance commissioner of his 
state, the same kind of a man with the 
same motives, may, as mayor of this city, 
give us a similar dose. 

There is a tendency, also, to over-esti¬ 
mate what has been done. One of the 
principal framers and advocates of the 
charter remarked in an interview the day 
after its passage: “If there is a modern im¬ 
provement to be found in municipal gov¬ 
ernment in this country which we 
have not secured it must have been 
invented within the last three months.” 
This shows a provincial limitation of view. 
Perhaps the greatest reform in city govern¬ 
ment during the last fifty years has been 
in the system of employing labor, which 
has been followed in many cities in Massa¬ 
chusetts for several years, and in Boston 
still longer. Yet our charter makes no 
provision for it. A second great reform in 
city government has been in the applica¬ 
tion of the merit system to the police and 
fire departments and other skilled employ¬ 
ment in many cities of New York and 
Massachusetts for seven or eight years; 
and in some of them, notably in Buffalo 
and Boston, the perfection of the system, 
the thorough working out of its methods, 
its unqualified success, and the ease with 
which knowledge of it and its workings 
might have been obtained, leave the framers 
of this charter still far behind the times. 


Their chief action in this direction con¬ 
sisted in incorporating the silly and vicious 
expedient that appointments in the police 
and fire divisions “shall be as nearly as 
possible equally divided politically.” This 
city is not concerned in the politics of its 
firemen and policemen. It is vitally con¬ 
cerned in their fitness, and the best way to 
determine that fitness, now proved beyond 
all cavil by the experience of many cities, 
is by competition, physical and otherwise, 
open to all. 

Some good lessons may even now be 
drawn from the department of public safe¬ 
ty which includes the police and fire forces. 
This department is managed by three com¬ 
missioners appointed by the mayor, and 
he has already appointed Sterling R. Holt 
and Messrs. Catterson and Sullivan. They 
have power to make all appointments and 
removals. Removals may be “for any cause 
other than politics ” and written reasons 
must be entered of record for any remov¬ 
als. Section 97 seems to contemplate a 
trial, for it says, “ On conviction of a mem¬ 
ber of said fire and police force ” of a num¬ 
ber of named offenses, he may be punished 
in various ways,including dismissal. This 
is at best an unfortunate arrangement. 
Having unlimited power of appointment, 
a board of partisans will appoint according 
to the “pull ” or “ influence ”of personal or 
party considerations. That such a board 
will retain worthless employes, the prac¬ 
tice of thousands of similar boards fully 
proves. Over against this maybe fearless¬ 
ly set the plan of appointment by the su¬ 
perintendent of the police or of the fire¬ 
men, according to merit, determined by 
competition, and of removal by him with 
the single limitation that he make a public 
written record of his reasons. Under this 
system we should have the highest disci¬ 
pline and efficiency. 

If it should happen that the commis¬ 
sioners of public safety should consist of 
one strong partisan and two weak men, we 
shall see this department in the hands of a 
boss. If, in all the city, a boss had been 
looked for. Sterling R. Holt, the president 
of the board, would have filled the require¬ 
ment. Of the other two members of the 
board, enough is not yet known to say 
positively how they would act if Mr. Holt 
assumed the functions of a boss. It is not 
yet to be said that he will. The board in¬ 
tends to dismiss every man in the fire and 
police forces, or rather to take the ground 
that they have not yet been appointed, and 
will make, in every case, a new appoint¬ 
ment upon application. This seems an un¬ 
called for act of cruelty. Both divisions 
contain many men of the highest efficiency, 
who have been years in the service. The 
superintendents of both divisions have had 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


213 


a like service, and each could inform the 
board in five minutes of the comparatively 
small number of men unfit for appoint¬ 
ment. Instead, here are some two hun¬ 
dred men, nearly every one with a family, 
put upon the rack for no cause whatever, 
and compelled to besiege the board in a 
most humiliating manner to keep from 
being deprived of employment by out¬ 
siders who have greater influence but no 
experience. The Indianapolis News, of 
March 11, thus describes the situation : 

If there are three men for whom life is rapidly 
losing' its charms, who are growing wan and hag¬ 
gard, who are haunted day and night, button-holed 
and pulled into corners, \vho a thousand times a day 
respond to “Say, let me see you a minit,’’ those three 
men are the commissioners of public safety. “If I 
don’t become on freezing terms with truth I think I 
deserve to be congratulated,’’ moaned Commissioner 
Catterson. Persons who try to get into Sterling R. 
Holt’s olhcefind there such a crowd of would-be po¬ 
licemen and firemen around the door that admit¬ 
tance is next to impossible at times. The applicants 
will not budge an inch for fear some other applicant 
would gain some advantage. One of Mr. Holt’s 
agents stood out in the hallway for an hour. lie had 
$000 he desired to pay his principal. A cannon ball 
might have been forced through the crowd, and the 
agent with the $000 was not a cannon ball. Commis¬ 
sioner Sullivan locked himself up, and wouldn’t let 
his own brother see him. But when going to his 
meals he was waylaid. 

“Now, I tell you,’’ said the youngest commission¬ 
er, “I would like to see you get something, but to 
tell you the truth I ain’t in it. Holt and Catterson 
make all the appointments, but if you think it will 
do you any good you can tell them I sent you.” 

This accounts for the unusual rush after the other 
commissioners. But at public headquarters the 
crowds are immense, and one needn’t be surprised 
to hear of Superintendent Colbert managing the 
force from the court-house tower by telephone if this 
mad rush does not stop soon. In one hour over two 
hundred called at the superintendent’s office for ap¬ 
plications. Big men and little men, young men and 
old men, some drunk and some sober, ward politi¬ 
cians, heelers and boodlers, all came, and the ma¬ 
jority of them insisted on talking with the superin¬ 
tendent. It was a sight calculated to shake one’s 
faith in the city charter. One man said he was too 
old to do active work, and he wanted to act on the 
force. Another applied for a place in either depart¬ 
ment, he didn’t care whether be was a policeman or 
a fireman. A man with one arm wanted tobejani- 
tor, and a man without legs asked to be appointed 
turnkey. A colored citizen dragged Superintendent 
Colbert out into the hall-way, and on behalf of the 
colored voters of the city demanded for himself a 
policeman’s job. 

“Why, you are drunk,” exclaimed the superin¬ 
tendent. 

“Well, boss. I’ll be sober when I go on de force,” 
was the reply. 

This was the last straw that broke the camel’s 
back. Chief of Detectives Splann was appointed 
sergeant-at-arms, and he rushed the crowd out as 
hist as he could supply them with blank applica¬ 
tions. At G o’clock last night about seven hundred 
applications had been filed, and to-day they arestill 
rolling in. The most persistent are the cheap poli¬ 
ticians, who want places for “the gang.” They 
haven’t any idea of the requirements of a policeman 
or a fireman. All they want is a job for some striker 
or tough. There is no use in worrying the life out of 
the commissioners. Every candidate must lile an 
application, and this application is the basis on 
which the commissioners procure their information. 

It must be apparent that the opportuni. 
ties for yielding to temptation in the man¬ 
agement of these two divisions of the city 


government are wide. The only preven¬ 
tion is public opinion, and if public opinion 
goes to sleep there will, sooner or later, be 
no prevention. City officers must be given 
to understand at the start that the people 
expect them to be guided in their acts by 
business principles, and not by politics. 
This understanding can only be brought 
about by constant public criticism. There 
is another important matter for public 
agitation. Under the charter the different 
boards could introduce the merit system 
and the Boston labor-service system. The 
mayor appoints and may remove the 
boards. Will he require these systems to 
be introduced? If not, what will the can¬ 
didates for mayor who will seek the office 
next October say about it? 


Editor Ricretts, of the Delphi Journal, left for his 
home this afternoon Mr. Ricketts has been clerk to 
the house committee on immigration and naturaliza¬ 
tion, and had many friends here.—ITas/tinfif<on Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, March 4. 

The Delphi Journal is the sheet that ac¬ 
cused the Indianapolis Journal some weeks 
since of suffering from hysterics because it 
rebuked Lawyer Brush, of Crawfordsville, 
for stating that Indiana could not be car¬ 
ried in 1892 without the use of money. 
The Delphi Journal’s views will bear re¬ 
peating : 

“ The Journal [Indianapolis] then goes 
on and attributes the victories won by the 
republicans in this state to the ‘ resistless 
tide of public opinion,’ ‘ boundless enthusi¬ 
asm and the Lord,’ and attempts to make 
itself and the dear people believe that the 
two-dollar bill has not been ‘in it’ at all. 
All of which has a tendency to make any 
one but a hypocrite and a pharisaical pol¬ 
itical psalm singer very tired.” 

This seemed to the Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle at the time an impudent gibe at the 
President and Mr. Wanamaker for being 
religious men. And it seemed gross in¬ 
subordination in the view that one of its 
owners and editors was postmaster. And 
coming from a subsidized sheet, it seemed 
to savor of treachery. But this is doubly 
bad, now that it comes to light that the 
other owner, Ricketts, was provided for. 


GENERAL CORSE. 

Tlie President has removed General Corse 
as postmaster of Boston because he is not a 
republican. That he is a patriot in every 
sense of the word no American will deny. That 
he was the best postm.aster that Boston ever 
had, and was wholly non-partisan in the man¬ 
agement of his office, the President and the 
postmaster-general freely admit. The business 
men of Boston were a unit for his retention, 
and six Massachusetts congressmen, including 
both senators, urged the President to keep him. 
But, at last, the stolid, stupid negative came, 
based upon the corrupt reason that General 
Corse was not a republican. Now, the reten¬ 
tion of a single officer, even in every way so 
admirably efficient as General Corse, cuts but 


a small figure for or against the progress of 
civil service reform. That progress is made 
by gathering in the great multitude below the 
rank of postmaster. Nor would such a reten¬ 
tion in any manner clear the skirts of an ad¬ 
ministration engaged in removing a hundreil 
thousand other officers for spoils purposes, any 
more than one swallow makes a summer in 
January. But, under the circumstances, the 
removal of General Corse is an irritating, 
laughable, humiliating proof of the contempti¬ 
bly small size of the President’s public mind. 

Of this removal Mr. John J. Henry, at a 
dinner of the Brookline Republican Club, said 
in disgust: “ For whom? An honest man? A 
businessman? No! But a republican! ” Of 
himself the new postmaster says, in the Boston 
Post of March 2 : “ I know nothing about the 
post-office business, and I shall have to begin 
by learning my trade.” Of General Corse he 
had a short time before written to Senator 
Hoar: “ If the interest of the public service 
is to decide, Gen. Corse will be renominated.” 
TheMassachusettsCivil Service Reform League 
composed of republicans and democrats, has 
passed a resolution of censure, wherein they 
quote from the President’s letter of acceptance, 
“ that in appointments to every grade and de¬ 
partment fitness and not party service should 
be the essential and discriminating test, and 
fidelity and efficiency the only sure tenure of 
office.” 


ALL OTHER REFORMS SHOULD BE 

SUBORDINATED TO CIVIL SERV¬ 
ICE REFORMS. 

The bosses know, first, that they live by the offices, 
and second, that if the people once realize the evils 
of patronage they will take away the offices. The 
skill of the machine is therefore directed to diverting 
the attention of the people from this division and 
enjoyment of spoils. To this end, issues true or false 
are urged forwaid. For many years southern out¬ 
rages, an issue which never did and never was in¬ 
tended to lead to any practicable measure, blinded 
the majority, and enabled the republican machine 
to keep the offices. In Pennsylvania, to-day, Quay 
raises jeopardized protection like a wall close to the 
eyes of republicans to blind them to the criminal 
evil of himself as a man and of his literally feudal 
rulership of his state. For years the people of the 
state of Maryland, in a manner disgraceful to them¬ 
selves, have permitted Gorman to keep his heel on 
their necks, solely by his control of the oflices; and 
in every campaign when they might have over¬ 
thrown him, he has blinded them by the cry that 
such a result would lead to national party disaster. 
>:< 

Again, Senator Gorman, the overlord of overlords, 
two years ago was a protectionist. To-day he is a 
tariff reformer. No one will ask us to believe that 
the merits of the tariff question had anything to do 
with this change of heart. Mr. Gorman read in the 
signs of the times that his party machine was against 
him, and that he must bring about this change if he 
would continue as the absolute party controller of 
offices in Maryland. 

Our boss system of office-holders, with its para¬ 
mount boss and a graded line of under-bosses, has 
thus become a quasi-feudal system, without the ro¬ 
mance or the courtesy or the honor of feudalism. It 
is the footpad in armor. It uses various interests for 
its own ends and lets itself for hire to various inter¬ 
ests. Destroy it and leave every reform and every 
interest standing alone, and spontaneous dl.scussion, 
(ollowed by the untrammeled action of the people> 















214 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


will reward every agitation with that result to which 
the civilization of the country entitles it. 

Therefore, I say that the destruction of the spoils 
system ought to regulate individual political effort. 
Not that other reforms may not have sympathy and 
support. But in every case there comes a time when 
the roads part. Then there can be no compromise, 
no hesitation. The pursuit of these bldodsuckers 
upon all our civil governments should be relentless. 
To cease this attack at any point and unite with this 
common enemy with the hope of benefiting some 
other object is to strengthen the common enemy and 
fill him with joy. Suph deviation prolongs the une¬ 
qual struggle on our hands and does not accomplish 
its object.—From a paper read by Lucius B. be 
Jore the National Civil Service Reform. League in Boston, 
October, 1890. 

Tlie opinion expressed in this extract is 
the opinion guiding the course of the Civil 
Service Chronicle, and the career of Mr. 
Gorman seems always to afford new and 
diverting illustrations of these principles. To 
keep clearly in mind what Gorman, as a boss, 
really is, it is well to quote from the report of 
an address adopted at a great public meeting 
in Baltimore, September 30, 1887, the object 
of which was his overthrow: 

“Time would fail to tell all the outrages that have 
been committed openly, publicly, and systematically 
by this [Gorman’s] association. It has appointed to 
public office thieves, burglars, express robbers, mur¬ 
derers, and men stained with every crime. It has 
burned the ballots when in the custody of the clerk 
of the court, and the perpetrators of the act have 
publicly boasted of it. Indeed, every one connected 
with that act has been rewarded from the public 
treasury. It has secured places in the government 
employ for the two most notorious election thieves 
in the city. It has garrisoned a ward with ruffians 
and kept them in the city’s pay. Of twenty-three 
city, state and federal employes in that ward, we 
have found nineteen whose names appear on the 
criminal records of the city. 

But it has been curious and depressing to 
note how, after Gorman became a tariff re¬ 
former, great numbers of respectable and 
intelligent men in his own party in Maryland 
began to forget how dangerous a man they 
had not long before considered him. There 
have been traces even of a pride that Gorman’s 
adroitness as a politician would be success¬ 
fully used in his new roles. In the midst of his 
growing popularity as a tariff reformer he 
gave a slight shock to the Better Element Dem¬ 
ocrats of his state by going down to New York 
last November and speaking for Grant and 
Tammany against the citizens’ movement. But 
this, too, was judiciously forgotten when he 
used all his astuteness to lead his party in the 
election bill fight in the senate. Then he 
reached the top wave and almost won a “din¬ 
ner ” in honor of his efforts. 

The movement to give Senator Gormau a big ban¬ 
quet in recognition of his work in the elections bill 
fight, like the one tendered to him after the election 
of Cleveland, is still being boomed ’by his admirers. 
The News, one of the two democratic papers of the 
city, continues its interviews with citizens. The gen¬ 
eral expression is that when the banquet is held the 
eight republican senators who voted with the demo¬ 
crats should be invited. This sentiment is echoed by 
Capt. John Hall, president of the first national bank, 
who said to-day: 

“I think that Senator Gorman ought to receive 
public recognition, but I also think that the invita¬ 
tions to any banquet tendered to him ought also to 
include every democratic and every republican sen¬ 
ator who helped him to achieve his glorious vic¬ 


tory.’’—FaMimore Ft,spa/c/i to New York Times, Febru¬ 
ary 3. 

That this particular animal can not change 
his spots is shown by the following from the 
Civil Serveice Reformer for March : 

A singular instance of the .solidarity of spoilsmen 
was seen in the senate during the debate on the pro¬ 
posal to open the supervising architect’s office to 
plunder, when Senator Gorman arose to defend Mr. 
John Wanamaker from the attacks of Mr. Roosevelt. 
It would require the tongue of John Randolph, of 
Roanoke, to fitly describe the alliance thus first 
avowed, though Mr. Gorman’s success in providing 
for his friends under this administration has hereto¬ 
fore given the strongest presumptive proof of its ex¬ 
istence. The combination effected by Mr. Gorman 
was successful,and the draughtsmen’s placeson the 
new public buildings will hereafter be distributed 
among the retainers of Me.ssrs. Gorman and Plumb. 


PERMANENCE OF ISSUES. 

The ebb and flow of a large class of public 
questions is well illustrated by Ex Senator 
McDonald who says in an interview in the 
Indianapolis News of February 14 : 

“This tariff question,’’ continued Senator Mc¬ 
Donald, “is an evidence how history repeats itself. 
The first political speech that 1 ever made was at my 
old liome in Crawfordsville, in Indiana. It was 
forty-four years ago, and President Polk was the can¬ 
didate upon a tariff-for-revenue platform substan¬ 
tially the same as that of the democratic party dur¬ 
ing the last presidential campaign. During the 
Cleveland-Harrison campaign I made my last speech 
at Crawfordsville, and the chairman introducing me 
.said that he did not believe an instance could be 
shown in our history of a man making two speeches 
for a presidential candidate forty-four years apart 
and advocating substantially the same issues. The 
first message of President Polk was substantially the 
same as the tariff reform message of President Cleve¬ 
land, and it brought about the enactment of the 
tariff of 1846.’’ 

This has an important bearing upon the 
tendency of those interested in tariff reform 
to regard the question as new and their move¬ 
ment as original, and to claim for it para¬ 
mount attention. In fact, as Mr. McDonald 
shows, they are but traveling the road trav¬ 
eled in 1844 and later, and which was then well 
beaten. Such questions as taxation and cur¬ 
rency always have been and always will be 
living questions. They are questions which 
must be dealt with as we go along, just as the 
navy must be supported and the mails must 
be carried. The passage, however, of a cur¬ 
rency bill or of a bill raising or lowering the 
tariff does not mark an epoch in the country’s 
history. They are comparatively but tem¬ 
porary matters. Mr. McDonald is now doing 
over again the work he did in 1844. If he 
had then declared that the abolition of slavery 
was the most important public object to work 
for, he would have been told that the Ameri¬ 
can people were opposed to it and that the 
tariff question was the one question of para¬ 
mount importance. Yet how small the .suc¬ 
cessful efforts which secured the tarifl'act of 
1846 now seem. The spoils system, which is 
now such a curse to our cities, counties, states 
and the nation, once broken up will be like 
slavery, forever broken up. Its destruction 
will mark an epoch in our history. It is the 
great step now to be urged upon the people. 


It must be urged in season and out of season— 
and especially out of season. No other ques¬ 
tion must be allowed to supersede it. 

If the republican party lives only to se¬ 
cure * •* * employment at public cost for 
place hunters, it will die because it ought to 
die, provided, of course, that there is some¬ 
thing better to replace it, and sooner or later 
this will be forthcoming. 

But will this something be the democratic 
party? Only the future will show, but there 
is some room for doubt. Thanks to the 
methods of republican politicians, the state 
senate of Indiana is now democratic by more 
than a two-thirds vote. Thanks to the con¬ 
duct of this democr.itic majority, there will be 
little cause for wonder if in 1892, as in 1888, 
the electoral vote of Indiana is cast for a re¬ 
publican. A bill was recently introduced in 
that body to take the eight charitable institu¬ 
tions of the state out of politics. Of these 
four are refuges for the insane, one for feeble¬ 
minded youth, one for the blind, one for the 
deaf and dumb, and one for orphans of sol¬ 
diers and sailors. An investigation, set on 
foot and in great measure carried on by the 
Civil Service Keform Association of Indiana 
some four years since, brought to light shame¬ 
ful abuses in the management of some among 
these institutions, and a narrative of the cruel 
and revolting outrages perpetrated on their 
helpless inmates by the political bummers and 
workers employed among their officers and at¬ 
tendants, excited a wide-spread indignation 
through the state, and caused some temporary 
improvement in their administration. The 
bill in question proposed to safeguard the 
state’s responsibility for similar horrors in 
future by committing their control to a non¬ 
partisan board of state charities and recruit¬ 
ing their employes on the merit system. Its 
author, a Mr. Magee, is a democrat, and was 
minister to Sweden under the late adminis¬ 
tration. It received the cordial approval of 
the medical profession, of various public bodies 
and of all the best newspapers of the state re¬ 
gardless of party. Yet twenty-six out of thir¬ 
ty-three democratic senators voted against it 
on avowedly partisan grounds, and it was de¬ 
feated by four votes. Within a few days a 
Connecticut forger has gone unwhipt of justice 
because Governor Hill, of New York, con¬ 
sidered it was, in his own words, “good demo¬ 
cratic politics” to refuse a requisition from 
the de facto governor of that state. In Indiana 
it is thought “good democratic politics” to 
turn over miserable lunatics and deaf mutes 
and friendle.ss children of both sexes as prey 
for hangers-on of the local machine, many of 
them habitual criminals, whose brutal pas¬ 
sions are known to have been indulged in the 
past with an utter disregard of decency or 
pity. It avails nothing to say that respecta¬ 
ble democrats are disgusted with all this; re¬ 
spectable republicans are disgusted with Quay, 
and Dudley, and Clarkson, but they can not 
thus escape the disgrace and the danger of 
their fellowship. In either case the tree will 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


215 


be judged by its fruits. A party which com¬ 
mits power to such men as Hill and the Indi¬ 
ana senators must suffer and suffer rightfully 
for its abuse.— Oivil Service Reformer, March, 

r. 1S91. 

I — 

The defeat in the senate of Mr. Magee’s 
bill for the government of the state benevo¬ 
lent institutions was as crushing as it was un¬ 
expected. The intelligence of the democratic 
party throughout the state was arrayed on Mr. 
Magee’s side, and only the party bosses and 
parasites who draw sustenance from the public 
treasury opposed it. But the present legisla¬ 
ture is thoroughly bourbon; it is literally 
covered with moss; it is as impervious to re¬ 
form ideas as a duck’s back to rain. Many 
expressions of regret at the failure of the 
Magee bill have been heard, and none are 
given more forcibly than by Hon. I. D. G. 
Nelson, of Fort Wayne, who writes to the editor 
as follows: 

I have read, or at least have had the oppor¬ 
tunity of reading, the Labor Signal since its 
establishment. By inheritance, education and 
instinct I have always been a democrat and a 
free-trader. But I have, also, if I have known 
myself, been a friend of the laborer. Hence, 
I became a subscriber to The Signal, and inter¬ 
ested in its success, although not always ap¬ 
proving of its policy. I am now too old to 
read much, or take much interest in the cur¬ 
rent politics of the day. But I do, neverthe¬ 
less, even at the advanced age of over four 
score years, try to keep posted in regard to 
what is done at Washington and Indianapolis 
in regard to legislation, and I am compelled 
to say that I have never witnessed a more hu¬ 
miliating act of my party than the voting down 
of the Magee bill, that was so eminently cal¬ 
culated to vindicate the party, if not in the 
wrong, or, at least, to show that we are- not 
opposed to the civil service experiments being 
tested in the great battle of reform in behalf 
of our common humanity.— Labor Signal, Feb¬ 
ruary 27. 


The Sentinel is right in rapping the demo¬ 
cratic senators over the knuckles for their fail¬ 
ure to support the Magee bill, which proposes 
to apply the principle of non-partisan ap¬ 
pointments in our state benevolent institu¬ 
tions. Humanity demands that the state’s 
wards should be placed in the hands of compe¬ 
tent persons. The salaries of the attendants in 
the several benevolent institutions are limit¬ 
ed, and it is impossible to get the proper help if 
it feels it must be kicked out at each election. 
Nor can the proper discipline be maintained 
where subordinates feel they owe their posi¬ 
tion to a political boss, and not on good be¬ 
havior. The state is more interested in the 
efficiency of administration of our state insti¬ 
tutions than in the politics of the subordinates. 
The Magee bill is right in principle, and must 
eventually be adopted. The democrats would 
have found considerable advantage in adopt¬ 
ing it, now that the benevolent institutions 
are principally in the hands of the democrats. 
—Jeffersonmlle News, February, 1891. 

Shame upon aparty that desires to continue 
as a sewer to the democratic party institu¬ 


tions provided for the helpless orphans, deaf 
and dumb and insane of the state.— Shelbyville 
Republican, Februa^i-y, 1891. 


As TO the efficiency, fidelity, and non-part¬ 
isanship of General Corse as postmaster, every 
one admits that. Ex-Mayor Thomas N. Hart 
will in time probably become an efficient 
postmaster; but he is far from being non-par¬ 
tisan, and his appointment was made in pref¬ 
erence to that of General Corse on party 
grounds alone. Of all the republican party 
candidates likely to get the post-office, perhaps 
Mr. Hart is the most capable and business¬ 
like. There is some difference of opinion 
among his own party as to his having exhib¬ 
ited any remarkable or unusual executive 
powers while mayor. As to civil service re¬ 
form, Mr. Hart has always declared himself 
in favor of the reform; and he has never re¬ 
fused to obey the civil service law. In the 
only instance where he had an opportunity to 
prevent an invasion of the law by'those under 
him he conspicuously failed to do anything, 
and yet at the same time he kept himself 
within the letter of the law and rules. As far 
as carrying out the spirit of the law to the of¬ 
fices to which the law does not apply, it is no¬ 
torious that Mayor Hart appointed a street 
commissioner who would take in Meehan, the 
democratic politician and former street com¬ 
missioner, who had thrown his influence over 
to Hart. There were other appointments to 
which we have made objection from time to 
time, as having all the appearances of con¬ 
summations of trades and little or none of be¬ 
ing for fitness only. Indeed, Mayor Hart has 
admitted their badness, and pleaded “pres¬ 
sure.” There are one hundred and thirty-six 
positions in the Boston post-office exempted 
from the civil service rules.— Oivil Service 
Record, March, 1891. 

CURRENT SPOIL. 

—A disturbance is threatened in the assembly. It 
is the old story, a quarrel over patronage. The 
speaker and clerk of the lower house are allowed by 
law the appointment of sixty officers. Contrary to 
precedent, when theannouncementsofappointments 
were read from the desk two months ago, the resi¬ 
dences of the fortunate officers were not given. A 
good reason existed for this, as developments have 
shown. It was the deliberate purpose of Speaker 
Sheehan and Clerk DeFreest to prevent the assembly 
and the democratic bosses throughout the state from 
knowing that the debatable county of Erie and the 
iron-bound county of New York, the extreme coun¬ 
ties in the state, had gobbled not only the best 
but 50 per cent of the appointments in the gift of the 
assembly. Erie ought to have been satisfied with the 
selection of speaker, but the speaker was not satisfied 
with the privilege of making personal appointments, 
hut reached out and brought to Albany eleven of his con¬ 
stituents, who are now drawing salary from the state. 

New York’s share in the distribution of spoils is 
eleven also. Mayor Ed. Murphy, Jr., of Troy, chair¬ 
man of the state committee, has corralled five of his heel¬ 
ers; while Boss McLaughlin made a demand for two 
places, which was promptly granted, one of the ap¬ 
pointees emphasizing his feeling of security from in¬ 
terference by taking a two weeks’ absence without 
leave, marked by a protracted drunk, during which 
the clerk of the assembly has had to shift to find a 
man to do the work assigned to McLaughlin’s ap¬ 
pointee. 


The charge of nepotism has been raised against 
Col. George P. Webster, of the twenty-third New 
York district, who obtained the appointment of his son as 
clerk of the committee on privileges and elections and of 
his nephew as stenographer.—Albany, N. Y., Dispatch to 
the New York Times, March 8. 

—As chairman of the committee on the District of 
Columbia, Mr. Ingalls has had at his disposal the posi¬ 
tion of clerk of the committee. Last night Mr. Ingalls 
removed the gentleman who has filled that office for 
several years, and is spoken of as a very capable and 
faithful clerk, and appointed in his place the sena¬ 
tor’s son. By this means young Mr. Ingalls will 
draw the salary of clerk to the committee from now 
until December, as his father’s retirement leaves the 
committee without any chairman to make another 
change before the next congre.ss meets .—New York 
Times, March f>. 

—Every democrat on the floor of the assembly has 
pursued Sergeant-at-Arms Harrigan with wolfish 
greed to demand that his son or his nephew or the 
son or nephew of his friend be given one of the two- 
hundred-dollar sinecures. Harrigan was unable to 
discriminate between them, and he has been guilty 
of the folly of appointing a page for each. There are 
forty democratic assemblymen and, of cour.se, forty 
pages.—TVenfon, N. J., Dispatch to New York Times 
March 1. 

—The state legislature is torn up over a scandal 
which throws the senatorial struggle into the back¬ 
ground. Elgood Bruner, one of the leaders of the 
assembly, was charged to-day by the San Francisco 
Examiner with selling police positions in San Fran¬ 
cisco for $400 each. 

Bruner accused the correspondent of blackmail. 
He attempted to show that he knew of the corre¬ 
spondent’s scheme to entrap him into recommend¬ 
ing a man to the police commissioners for money, 
and that he accepted the offer so as to expose the cor¬ 
respondent.—Saeromewfo, Cal., Dispatch to New York 
Times, March 6. 

—The administration, and especially the post-office 
department, is being scandalized in this city and 
state by the conduct of a man whom ex-Postmaster 
General Gresham once summarily discharged from 
the postal service, and who has done more to corrupt 
the politics of Nebraska than any other one man. 
State politicians declare that his pernicious influence 
must be shaken off, or the powers at Washington 
must take the .consequence. Reference is made to 
Paul Vandervoort, ex-commander in chief of the 
grand army, ex-railroad lobbyist, and professional 
war veteran. 

Upon request of the railway officials at Omaha 
the Nebraska delegation in congress a year or two ago put 
Vandervoort into a sinecure in the Omaluipost-office. The 
title of the po'sition is superintendent of local mails. 
Since the appointment of postmaster Clarkson of 
Omaha Vandervoort is said to have done absolutely 
nothing in the line of official duty. It is asserted 
that there is nothing for him to do; that he is draw¬ 
ing $1,500 a year as a reward for past services to the 
railroad managers, who must see that he gets a living 
lest he make damaging disclosures. 

The legislature has been in session here for two 
months. Most of that time Vandervoort has been 
lobbying here for the telephone company and the 
telegraph company, to ward off a threatened reduc¬ 
tion of tolls. He has also been working on a scheme 
to increase the liquor license, so that, if neces-sary, 
he might explain to the postmaster general that he 
had been really working for prohibition at Lincoln. 
Vandervoort has been incidentally looking after the 
interests of the railways and has not given an hour’s 
time to the office he holds. This scandal is assuming 
such proportions that the postmaster general will be 
unable to explain the case away. He created this 
soft berth for Vandervoort soon after taking the 
post-office portfolio, in the face of the fact that Van¬ 
dervoort was dishonorably dismissed from the serv¬ 
ice, and for that reason was debarred from an ap¬ 
pointment. 

During the administration of President Arthur, 
and when Gen. Gresham was postmaster-general, 
Vandervoori’s defiant neglect of duty and his perni¬ 
cious interference in local and state politics became 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

eight iiuswers. Briggs sent a bid; so did Bernard 


a state-wide scandal. He was dismissed from tlie 
service for neglect of duty and insubordination. He 
retaliated, and threatened Gresham with the thun¬ 
derbolts of the grand army, and subjected him to 
vindictive abuse in the columns of the claim agents’ 
paper, the National Tribune, for which Vandervoort 
had also played capper by rea.son of his temporary 
prominence in the grand army organization. Gresh¬ 
am was as firm as a rock, and would not recede. 

From the railway mail service Vandervoort fell 
back upon his friends, the Union Pacific Railroad, 
and was kept upon the pay roll of that road for a 
year or two. During the legislature here four years 
ago he was in charge of the most venal and disrepu¬ 
table railroad lobby that has ever infested this city. 
The investigation into the conduct of the Pacific 
railroads, by the commission of which Gov. Pattison 
was the head, brought out the history of what ishere 
called “the oil rooms” in strong relief. This testi. 
mony showed that the oil rooms were places where 
members of the legislature had been debauched 
with drink and were corruptly manipulated to de¬ 
feat or carry measures as the railroad managers saw 
lit to decree. It was also brought out that Vander¬ 
voort maintained room 15 in a prominent hotel in 
this city during that session of the legislature; that 
every night, almost, cases of beer bottles, wine, and 
demijohns of whisky were carried there and con¬ 
sumed by Vandevoort and his special friends, and it 
has since been proved beyond question that the rail¬ 
roads paid not only the room rent but also the bar 
bill incurred by Vandervoort.—Lincola, Neb., Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, February 22. 

—The first important change in the treasury de¬ 
partment under Secretary Foster was made to-day. 
Acting Secretary Nettleton accepted the resignation of 
Captain John G. MacGregor, the chief of the customs 
division of the secretary's office. AssistantSecretary 
Spalding, who is in charge of customs matters, said 
in reply to a question that there was nothing on the 
face of the resignation whicli showed that it was not 
voluntiiry. He refused to commit himself, however, 
to the statement that it was voluntary, and he and 
General Nettleton smiled significantly when the 
question was persisted in. General Nettleton said that 
Captain MacGregor had been appointed inspector of 
immigration at S<> per day. llis salary as chie/ oj the 
customs division was $2,750 per annum. 

General Netileton said there was no politics in the 
change, and if there had been Captain MacGregor 
would have been removed from the service alto¬ 
gether. It is ratlier significant, however, that Cap¬ 
tain MacGregor is one of the few democrats left in 
the treasury department, and that he should be the 
first person to go .so soon after the advent of Secre¬ 
tary Foster, who.se skill as a politician is well-known. 
Captain MacGregor was in the customs service prior 
to the democratic administration, but he was pro- 
moteil to the position he has just resigned by Secre¬ 
tary Manning when a vacancy occurred there.— 
Wa.shington Dis])atch to Boston Post, March 9. 

—Joy is going to reign in the camp of the faithful 
in this town. News has come that the great men in 
Washington have heeded the prayer of the envoys 
who journeyed down from New York to tell them 
how badly good republicans needed that which a 
democrat was in a fair way to secure, just because he 
underbid the righteous. But, mingled with the re¬ 
joicings, there will be needless wasting of breath. 
The scramble for the plums will be too lively to al¬ 
low that. 

Two weeks ago gloom reigned among the republi¬ 
can workers. A terrible thing had come to pass. 
The bids for the custom-house cartage contract had 
been forwarded to Washington. Experts had spent 
ilays in figuring out the schedules and Thomas A. 
Briggs, the old eontractor, who secured the job under a 
democratic administration, appeared to he thelowest bid¬ 
der. Anywhere from $;)0,000 to 810,000 a year was 
what the contract was worth, and that was a great 
deal of money to be allowed to go out of the political 
family. Now, however, the treasury department has 
sent out a ruling that the cartage need not be let by con¬ 
tract, and the harps will be taken down from the 
willows. 

Advertisements for bids for the contract brought 


Biglin ; so did six others. Of all of them Btghn was 
the ablest professional republican. Briggs was the low¬ 
est bidder,' and then Col. Erhardt sent on the pro¬ 
posals to Washington. B. Biglin, patriot, was under¬ 
stood to be the second man in the race. 

When news of thisgotout,there was a precious how¬ 
dy-do. Statesmen rushed to the custom-house to see 
what kind of arithmetic was practiced there. The 
republican county committee was in a state of mind. 
It wanted to become popular with the truckmen’s 
association for one thing, and the contract would 
have been a help—a great help. 

There was just one hope left, and that lay in an 
appeal to the powers at Washington. Down to that 
city traveled a delegation full of persuasive eloquence and 
arguments touching the proper disposition of patronage 
where it would “do the most good.’’ Apparently the 
party succeeded in making out a case; at least, the 
contract is not going to be awarded to Mr. Briggs. 

The decision of the attorney general and the treas¬ 
ury department is just what tlie pilgrims to Wash¬ 
ington wanted. They went there to get a change in 
the laethod of letting out the contract, and they got 
it. From now on they have merely to fight among 
themselves for the good things they expect to se¬ 
cure.—Wew York Times, March S. 

—The political atmosphere in the republican camp 
is just now pretty close and murky. A fight is in 
progress over the appointment of a postmaster never 
before equaled in the party. The office is the only 
one of importance in this part of the state held by a 
democrat. 

The candidates for the position are many, but the 
fight has narrowed down to Joseph A. Ward, one of 
proprietors of the Lockport Journal, and John A. 
Merritt, ex chairman of the county committee. The 
friends of the Journal, which paper has been the re¬ 
publican organ here for forty years and always sup¬ 
ported the ticket, feel that the administration can ill 
afford to ignore their demands. Merritt is backed 
by a lot of politicians, and previously wanted the 
custom-house at the Bridge. It is understood that 
Senator Hiscock promised him his support for the 
post-office. 

A large number of politicians have gone toWashing- 
ton to-night.—Z-oetporf, N. Y., Dispatch to Netv York 
Times, February 22. 

—President Harrison has waited until the last night 
of the session to make a nomination that will dis¬ 
gust every decent citizen of Pennsylvania in general 
and of Philadelphia in particular. Late this after¬ 
noon he sent to the senate the nomination of the no¬ 
torious William R. Leeds, of Philadelphia, to be mar¬ 
shal of the United States for the eastern district of 
Pennsylvania. 

As sheriff of the county, a few years ago, and as 
leader of the ring which made the municipal govern¬ 
ment of Philadelphia a by-word and a reproach, 
Leeds made such a record that when he tried to be 
re-elected his own party defeated him, while < arry- 
ing all the other offices by very large majorities. 
Leeds was the man Senator Quay picked out for post¬ 
master of Philadelphia, but his record was so bad 
that even Mr. Wanamaker could not then indorse 
him. All the decent men in the republican party 
joined in sending protest after protest to Washington, 
and delegations of leading citizens visited the Presi¬ 
dent and laid before him the exposures of his cor¬ 
ruption, made by the citizens’ committee, which un¬ 
dertook to save Philadelphia from the gang which, 
under Leeds’s leadership,had taken her by the throat. 

When it became known, a few weeks ago, thattiuay 
was pushing Leeds for the marshalship, there was 
another deluge of protests from the respectable citi¬ 
zens, and the President was again fully informed of 
the character of Quay’s candidate. But a change had 
come over the President and the postmaster-general, 
Mr. Wanamaker, who could not stomach Leeds a 
few months ago, now indor.se him for marshal, and, 
in spite of assurances given to the Philadelphians 
that the President would not make such an utterly 
indefensible appointment, the nomination has been 
made.— Washington Dispatch in New York Times, 
March .1. 

—The appointment of A. T. Anderson to the Cleve¬ 


land postmastership to-day ends a bitter party fight,1 
but will only make local dissatisfaction with thel 
Harrison administration more extended, permanent j 
and pronounced. 

Anderson has been county recorder five years, and has 
still one year to serve. The annual fees of the office 
amount to 811,000. He has had a large share of public 
“pap,’’ and for him to secure the postmastership be- 
shles is very galling to old party workers who have 
done far more than he for the party and received 
nothing for ii.—Cleveland Dispatch to New York Times, 
March 3. 

—There have been some racy developments to-day 
in connection with the senatorial canvass. The in¬ 
formation comes from reliable sources that Hans- 
brough w'as compelled to make written pledges of 
the most extraordinary character to secure his elec 
tion. 

By the first agreement made Alexander McKenzie is 
to be consulted with reference to the distribution of the 
patronage throughout the state and no appointments un¬ 
satisfactory to him are to be made. Col. Ball and one or 
two others, trusted leaders in Fargo, are to control the 
patronage in that district, with McKenzie’s consent.. 
This power is to be used for the upbuilding of the 
clement which started the war on Pierce, and is now 
supposed to be dominant in the state.—Bismarck, N. 
D., Dispatch to New York Times, January 28. 

—Chief of police H. C. Austin and police captain 
Brant, republicans, both of whom were deposed by 
the democrats when the later took hold of the reins 
of local government here January 1, will not remain 
long out in the cold, as comfortable berths have been 
obtained forthemby ex congressman Kean, the republican 
dispenser of government patronage in Union county. 
He has got both officers places as government weigh¬ 
ers of the mails at Jersey City, at $3 per day. The 
retired republican city clerk Coleman will also be 
taken care of, as the sinking fund commissioners 
here will, it is said, appoint him to a position in the 
controller’s department.— Elizabeth, N. J., Dispatch 
to New York Times, January 5. 

—In the opinion of the best posted politicians in 
Syracuse, Gov. Hill has begun very promptly to get 
on good terms with the man who is to be his col¬ 
league in the United States Senate for the next two 
years. Nobody but Senator Hiscock, they believe, 
could have induced Mr. Hendricks to give his sup¬ 
port to such a nomination as that of Pierce for insur¬ 
ance superintendent. It is perfectly well known here 
that Hiscock is extremely anxious to secure the re* 
nomination of Hendricks, who, if re-elected next 
fall, will have a vote for Hiscock’s successor at Wash¬ 
ington. The senator has made a thorough search of 
the district, and has found no man so available as 
Hendricks 

Recent events in political history here have been 
far from encouraging to Hiscock, whose anxiety to 
be his own successor is very great. Hendricks is the 
only strong man the Senator can feel sure of controll¬ 
ing. Ilis friends, indeed, will regard themselves as 
• lost if Hendricks fails to be renominated. Theoffi.ee 
of superintendent of the Onondaga salt springs is the best 
bit of slate patronage here. It carries with it a lot of minor 
appointments, such as inspectors and weighers, which are 
made absolutely by the supeiintendent, untrammeled by 
any civil service restrictions. This patronage can be made 
very useful in securing Mr. Hendricks’ renomination if 
il can only be put into friendly hands. The anti-Cleve¬ 
land democrats have long been greedy for the supet- 
intendency, and, as everybody knows, the Hiscock- 
Hendricks-Smith-Cowie faction of the Republicans is 
in hearty symp.athy with the Hill men. These peo¬ 
ple have given evidence enough of this fact in the 
open alliance with the Hill crowd in the pending 
row between Mayor Cowie and some of the aider- 
men. 

Nobody believes that Hendricks voted for Pierce 
without a consideration, or that HiscocK let him 
vote that way without an object of interest to the 
senator. Everybody believes that Hendricks has 
been promised the office of salt superintendent for 
either an ont-and out Hiscock republican or for a 
Hill democrat satisfactory to him who will live up to 
a bargain by which the superintendent’s heelers 
shall aid in re-nominating Hendricks. With Hen¬ 
dricks in the state senate for one other term Hiscock 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


217 


would be certain of one very much needed vote 
wlien he asks the legislature to send him to Wash¬ 
ington for another six years. Mr. Hendricks was 
likely to have a hard enough row to hoe as His- 
cock’s candidate before this latest disgraceful deal. 
Ilis vote for Pierce to-day will go a good way toward 
olfsetting any benefit he may get out of the patron¬ 
age of the salt superintendent’s office.—Sj/racase A’., 
r., Dispatch to New York Times, February 11. 

-Congressman-elect Henry U. Johnson spent .sev¬ 
eral days in the city last week, with headquarters at 
the Kirby, where he kept open house. His visit os¬ 
tensibly was for the purpose of finding the proper 
person to recommend for the appointment. 

There were no less than ten applicants for the 
place, viz.: Major John F. Wildman, of the Muncie 
Times, a pioneer Harrison boomer, and a stayer for 
"little Ben” in the Chicago convention; Charles F. 
W. Neely, of the Muncie A'ews, a hustler for Johnson 
and an anti-Gregory delegate to the New Castle con¬ 
gressional convention; Robert I. Patterson, better 
known as “corporal Bob,” campaign poet and ex- 
postmaster, who served the last two years of his term 
under the Cleveland administration; N. N. Spence, I 
an attorney at law; Jerrc Gerrard, secretary of the 
county central committee; James L. Streeter, a well- 
known business man; S. W. Hufter, an insurance and 
real estate agent; J. W. Ream, ex-chairman of the 
county central committee; Mrs.Kate Wilson,wife of S. 
A. Wilson, also an ex-chairman of the county central 
committee, and later casliierof the Burson banking 
company, but now an invalid; the Rev. Jacob W. 
Heath, father of Col. P. S. Heath, the well-known 
ami talented-Washington newspaper correspondent; 
and last, but by no means least, the Hon. Frank 
Ellis, mayor.—Jfttwete Dispatch to Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, Februaiy 2. 

—The President sent to the senate this afternoon 
the nomination of Captain Frank Ellis to be post¬ 
master at Muncie. In this he followed the recom- 
meudation of Congressman-elect Johnson and the 
wishes of a majority of the patrons of the office. 
Mr. Johnson went to Muncie a fortnight since, and 
remained three days, looking over the field and in¬ 
vestigating the claims of the various aspirants, of 
whom there were more than a dozen. There was a 
spirited contest between the various factions, but at 
the last moment.several of the aspirants reiiuesied 
Captain Ellis to consent to the use of his name as a 
compromise candidate. This he finally did, re¬ 
luctantly, for he had never applied foran appointive 
office.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journals 
February 5. 

—The bitterest political contest ever witnessed in 
this county came to an abrupt termination this 
morning by the announcement of the appointment 
of Mayor Frank Ellis as postmaster. In the congres¬ 
sional fight last spring, Delaware county had a can¬ 
didate in the Hon. Ralph Gregory. The delegates 
from this county went to the convention instructed 
to vote for him as long as there was a chance for his 
nomination. When the delegates went to the con¬ 
vention at New Castle it soon developed that there 
was treachery in the Delaware delegation. Later de- 
veloi)ments proved that there was a bargain and sale 
of some of the delegates who were promised control 
of the political appointments in the county in the 
event that Henry U. Johnson was nominated. The 
conspiracy resulted in the demoralization of - the 
Delaware county delegation and the election of 
Johnson. 

Frank Ellis, who was yesterday appointed post¬ 
master, defeated Gregory for the nomination. The 
matter created bad blood, and since that time there 
has been merry war here.— Muncie Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, February ti. 

—John Blair is the sole survivor of Mr. Cleveland’s 
appointments among the Indian agents. There are 
fifty-eight of these places, but they are now all filled 
with loyal republicans except the one w'here Mr. 
Blair serves and two which are in the care of army 
officers. This condition of affairs is not so very dif¬ 
ferent from what it was after Mr. Atkins had been 
Indian commissioner awhile under President Cleve¬ 


land. President Harrison found three men in the 
agencies whom President Cleveland found there. 
The showing was bad enough in either event, and 
the practical workings of the spoils system have 
shown how fatal it is to good administration. The 
men whom Mr. Cleveland appointed were beginning 
to become of some use to the department when the 
political wheel took another turn and a fresh lot of 
novices came into the service. President Harrison 
restored to the service three Indian agents who had 
been displaced by Mr. Cleveland, and there are now 
seven of the fifty eight, including the two army of¬ 
ficers, whose experience dates back of the 4th of 
March, 1889. Indian Commissioner Morgan has had 
nothing to do with the appointments except to make 
complaint where the new agents were conspicuously 
inefficient. This he has done in a number of cases, 
and President Harri.son has removed five of his own 
appointees. This ratio of removals is a commentary 
upon the character of the appointments.—Boston 
Post, March 14. 

—It is said that there are fifty-two ex-representa¬ 
tives and ex senators in the city who expect to get 
appointments at one time in the office of Secretary 
Foster. Thi.s morning there were over a dozen rep¬ 
resentatives seeking official influence in procuring 
places for themselves. Many men elected to the 
congress which meets next December are already on 
the ground prowling around the departments for 
appointments. It will take the alliance and some of 
the democratic members a month, it seems, to learn 
that partisan patronage is not given out under this 
administration to persons who are plotting to break 
down the republican party.—Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, March 5. 

—The triple loss of the Galena, the Nina, and the 
Triana, at Gay Head and Cuttyhunk, may prove to 
be not only a national 1)111 a political disaster. 

The Galena was about the only ship available for 
repairs at Portsmouth. She was worth a good deal 
of money and she was to have been thoroughly over¬ 
hauled at the hands of those persons in Maine and 
New Hampshire whose republicanism is stalwart 
enough to entitle them to employment under Uncle 
Sam. The wreck of the Galena, will take bread out 
of the mouths of these employes and, of course, will 
make them irritable. Unless some other vessel can 
be found upon which to make political repairs, the 
uselessness of a navy yard at Portsmouth will be ap¬ 
parent, and a powerful political magnet will be de 
stroyed. 

At Portsmouth, the bureau of construction and re¬ 
pair was to spend 884,000 upon her, and the bureau 
of steam engineering about 845,000 for new boilers 
and other machinery. These boilers had been made at 
the New York navy yard, and the Galena had them 
onboard. When the order was issued sending the 
Galena around to the Portsmouth navy yard for re¬ 
pairs, it was stated at the navy department that she 
was sent there because the New York yard was full 
of work, while the completion of the repairs on the 
Lancaster would leave the Portsmouth yard with no 
work on hand. This would have made necessary a 
reduction in force. 

The Portsmouth yard is not supplied with the 
necessary machinery for repairiiig steel vessels, and, 
as the Galena was the only wooden vessel at the time 
awaiting repairs, she was sent around to keep the 
yard force in operation. Her old boilers were en¬ 
tirely useless, and she could not steam around, so 
she was taken in tow by the little 357-ton tug Nina, 
and carried on her deck the new boilers that were to 
be put in her at Portsmouth. 

It looks now as if there was no way to avert the 
dreadful discharge of workmen at Portsmouth, un¬ 
less the wrecked Galena can be floated up there and 
rebuilt, for there is only one other wooden vessel 
left in the North .Atlantic-theKearsarge—and though 
she is cruising around the West Indies in pretty fair 
condition, she can be called in by cable and sent up 
to keep the Portsmouth yardy busy.-^ IPa.s/ujisiton 
Dispatch to New York Times, March 1C. 

—A well-grounded opinion appears to have arisen 
that the Galena was in no condition to put to sea, 
and that her fate is what might have been expected. 


nothing more and nothing less. Even had the vessel 
been sound in the hull, going to sea In March with¬ 
out boilers or engines, loaded with a full battery 
and with ammunition for the Lancaster, and all 
this in tow of a single tug of limited strength, strikes 
the average sea-going man as extremely foolhardy. 

Inquiry at the navy yard fails to show that the 
Galena’s repairs were absolutely needed at this time, 
and even if they were, they could have been made 
at the Brooklyn navy yard as well as at Portsmouth. 
In the former yard there are three times the men and 
facilities of the Portsmouth yard, and as the docks 
were quite empty there was abundant room for the 
repairs to go on uninterruptedly. She was going to 
Portsmouth, say the officers at the navy yard, to get 
her new boilers. Three of these were stored on her 
spar deck at the time of the accident, and might 
have been fitted here as easily as at Portsmouth, if 
not more easily. The Brooklyn navy yard is engaged 
at present in shipping a lot of material to Philadel¬ 
phia for the equipment of the Newark, and the 
question naturally arises, why could not the Ports¬ 
mouth material have been shipped to New York? 

The Portsmouth navy yard is not at Portsmouth, 
but at Kittery, Me., a small town just below Ports¬ 
mouth and across the river. It was suggested to an 
officer yesterday that possibly Maine workmen 
needed employment by the government at this time; 
that the 8100,000 expenditure promi.scd for the Ga¬ 
lena was a rich morsel for them, and that this offered 
a reasonable explanation of the hazardous attemi)t 
to give them the Galena. The proposition was not 
indorsed, but it plainly suggested something that 
naval officers have thought of many times before.— 
New York Times, March 17. 


Tour reference to the recent outbreak among the 
Sioux as affording convincing evidence of the neces¬ 
sity of a change in the manner of appointing the of¬ 
ficials of the Indian bureau, leads me to say that I 
have not found in a very full examination of ail the 
facts from all sources evidence of any deteriora¬ 
tion in the Indian Hctyiec.—The President to the Cam¬ 
bridge Civil Service Reform Association, February, 1891. 

Pine Ridge Agency, S. D., Mar. 4, ’91. 

My Dear Mr. Welsh — It is evident that, 
sooner or later, under any agent, there would 
have been trouble at this agency. Dissatisfac¬ 
tion and disappointments, with actual hunger 
amounting almost to starvation with some, 
added to strong jealousy of the progressive 
party on the part of the old chiefs and heathen 
element, had prepared the people for the ghost- 
dance craze. 

Dr. Royer took charge when the people were 
at the worst as regards hunger. Nearly all 
supplies were exhausted. Instead of three 
and one-half pounds gross per day, the indi¬ 
vidual ration provided by treaty, they were 
getting less than one pound. The issue got as 
low as one two-year old steer to sixty persons 
for eighteen days, instead of one good sized 
steer to thirty persons for fourteen days, which 
had been the practice, though itself less than 
the treaty gave. 

Flour, sugar and coffee were exhausted. The 
traders supplied them sometimes; whole corn 
was issued in place of them sometimes. In¬ 
dians were living on wild turnips and buying 
food if they could. Several instances are 
given (Miss Goodale gives one) in which In¬ 
dians begged for the corn being fed to the 
horses, and on its being given them they 
parched and ate it eagerly. They said fre¬ 
quently, “our Great Father had better kill us 
outright, than in this slow manner.” There 
can be no doubt of much actual suffering from, 














218 


THE CI\IL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


if not deaths hastened by, hunger. Yet the 
people do not appear to have entertained hos¬ 
tile intentions at that time toward the govern¬ 
ment or the whites, and I meet occasionally 
Indians and half-breeds who insist that hunger 
had nothing to do with the trouble, which 
came after the troops appeared here. 

Major Gallagher had made several inefl’ect- 
ual efforts to stop the ghost-dance, and with 
his police had been defeated in the attempt, 
arrousing to some extent the hostility of the 
ghost-dancers toward the police. There was 
still no sign of their having hostile feelings 
toward the whites. Had that been the case, 
they had abundant opportunity to show it 
against whites continually passing back and 
forth. Or as Dr. Gillycuddy said : “ If they 
had been on the war-path, they would have 
had half a dozen cow boys for breakfast each 
morning.” 

Things had gone so far, however, that they 
were in a very critical condition, and needed 
very wise and careful handling, when Dr. 
Royer was sent as agent. He knew nothing 
about Indians or about handling men gener¬ 
ally. He came witn the expectation of soon 
needing to call for troops, which he did at 
once and secretly when the first little trouble 
arose over the arrest of an Indian for killing 
a cow which did not belong to him. He fled 
with his family to Rushville without warning 
any one else, and meeting one of the agency 
traders there, tried to persuade him to remove 
his family at once, as he said the Indians were 
“on the war-path” and about to burn the 
agency and kill all the whites. There were a 
large number of Indians in Rushville at that 
very time (the day the troops reached there) 
after freight for the agency. He returned 
with about 1,000 soldiers by a forced night 
march, constantly cautioning Gen. Brooke, in 
command, to keep scouts out ahead as he was 
sure they would meet one or more parties of 
“ hostiles” in ambush before they got to the 
.agency. Not an Indian was discovered, nor 
were there any Indians in or near the agency 
when they arrived. The greatest astonish¬ 
ment, curiosity and indignation prevailed 
among all, even the quietest Indians, when 
they heard that soldiers had been sent to their 
agency. They could put no interpretation on 
it except the intention was to disarm and dis¬ 
mount them all as had sometimes happened 
to portions of their people before, and as they 
had been frequently told by some would some 
day happen to them all. Especially the ghost- 
dancers thought this. 

When General Brooke arrived he requested 
Dr. Royer to send his police out and ask all 
the Indians to come in that he might have a 
talk and understanding with them. Royer,of 
his own accord, instructed the police to tell 
the people that only those who had taken no part 
in the ghost-dance would be allowed to come 
in—the rest must stay away. The police seem 
to have gone beyond Royer’s instructions, and 
told them also that this separation wiis in or¬ 
der that the soldiers might disarm the ghost- 
dancers and take all their horses. The coun¬ 


try was thus left in possession of the ghost- 
dancers—no one being at home to protect the 
property of those who had been invited and 
gone to the agency. The ghost-dancers were 
convinced that there was probably no way out 
of it for them but by fighting. The Brules 
came along just then in very large numbers, 
filled with the same alarm, and a growing hos¬ 
tility toward the police and such men as 
American Horse, who had urged the agent to 
send for soldiers, sprung up, and altogether 
they concluded to take refuge in the Bad 
Lands. 

Louis Shangreau and Little Bat volunteered 
to go and persuade the ghost-dancers along 
White Clay to come in. General Brooke told 
them to get honses from the agent and go, if 
they were not afraid. They replied that there 
was no more danger then than there ever had 
been; that the Indians had no hostile intent* 
but were only frightened. They went to Agent 
Royer and he refused the horses, saying those 
Indians were all “ hostile,” and were going to 
kill everybody, and he did not want them to go 
and try to bring them in. They went, however, 
and got Little Wound, who at that time was 
there, and some others, to come in. On reach¬ 
ing the agency they found the gate guarded 
by police, with orders from the agent not to 
let any Indian pass. Little Wound and the 
rest were very indignant, and “ ashamed,” and 
went back saying, they would not go in now 
even if the agent gave them permission. 

The first blood shed in the late Sioux war was 
by ranchmen on the Cheyenne, who killed a 
Carlisle boy who, with several other Indians, 
had gone from the camp in the bad lands to 
buy tobacco, sugar, etc., at a store near by. 
They were fired on and he was shot before they 
reached Dailey’s ranch. Still the Indians did 
not even attempt to avenge this, and no hostile 
act was committed by them off the reservation 
and no depredations, though they had abund¬ 
ant opportunity. They did commit very ser¬ 
ious depredations on the property of those In¬ 
dians who had gone into the agency, and for 
this it would appear, as well as for the troubles 
which then began to multiply. Dr. Royer more 
than any other person is responsible, and that 
through his want of tact and his cowardice. 

Had he called the supposed “hostiles” in 
and left the “friendlies” out to protect their 
homes, it is likely the trouble would have been 
sooner over and the loss of life and property 
much less. 

As for his management of the agency, most 
of those here speak of him as pleasant, gentle¬ 
manly in bearing, and full of schemes for the 
betterment of the Indians, etc., but very ner¬ 
vous and cowardly. He brought a number of 
new employes with him and offended quite 
generally by some of the changes made, chiefly 
at the blacksmith shop. The former black¬ 
smith being a good man and good smith and 
the new man unable through lameness to do 
the work. Meanwhile Edgar Firethunder, a 
Carlisle graduate, who from six or more years 
experience as apprentice was fully competent 
to take charge of the shop and did, in fact, do 


about all the work—the blacksmith not being 
able to shoe a horse—had his wages cut down 
from $30 to $25 per month, and the white 
smith got $75. Young Frank Conroy, who 
had learned the machinists trade at and near 
Carlisle, had earned $3.25 per day at the east, 
and came with highest testimonials from his 
employers at York, Pa., as blacksmith, etc., 
was refused employment because the place 
was to be filled by a white man. 

When Miss Goodale recommended a teacher 
whom she knew to be competent, for Royer’s 
endorsement, he replied that he was sorry but 
he intended giving that place to a woman 
whose “husband had been of great service to 
him.” She asked if the person had ever taught 
or was well qualified, and he replied she had 
never taught but was intelligent, and he 
thought she could fill the place well enough, 
and repeated, “ her husband has been of great 
service to me and I intend she shall have it.” 
She got it. The fact as near as I can get at 
it is that Royer and Gleason were both politi¬ 
cal strikers for Pettigrew and Moody. They 
were both candidates for this agency. It was 
finally decided that Royer should have the 
agency and Gleason be the clerk. After a 
few days’ instruction under the then clerk, it 
was evident to Mr, Gleason and the rest that 
he liad not the ability to fill the clerk’s place, 
and he took the place of farmer, which he still 
holds, though with hopes of getting the Rose¬ 
bud agency or some other, as agent. 

It is said by Dr. McGillycuddy, on the au- 
tliority of some official in Washington, that 
Royer’s letters and dispatches to the interior 
department are the best kind of evidence 
against himself as to fitness for his place. 

*!* « « «« «»« 

I expect to reach Rosebud Saturday, the 7th. 
The country is full of snow and it is now very 
difficult to get about much. Will go from 
there to see Dr. McChesney and thence to 
Santee and Yankton agencies. 

In order to see Gen. Miles and the leaders 
of the hostile party, with some important 
scout, I ought to go to Chicago and Camp 
Sheridan near there. Please write me on re¬ 
ceipt of this if you wish me to do so. 

I shall not stay long at Rosebud, probably, 
and think you better address me care Rev. 
Mr. Wicks, Hope School, Springfield, S. D. 

Cordially yours, Wm. J. Cleveland. 


At the examination for clerks and carriers 
for the Indianapolis post-office held here Feb¬ 
ruary 3, of the nine eligibles for clerkship 
four were from the city and five were from 
other parts of the state as follows: Eck, Leb¬ 
anon, Anderson, Zionsville, and Brightwood. 
This is the competitive system—open to all 
and the test is fitness and nothing else. Con¬ 
trast this with the scramble and pressure for 
places in the police and fire departments where 
a thousand applicants besiege the office of one 
member of the board of public safety upon 
whose favor they believe the appointments de¬ 
pend. 













The Civil service chronicle. 

Published monthly. Publication offic^ No. 23 N. Meridian St.. Indianapolis, Ind., where subscriptions and advertisments will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


VoL. I, No. 26. INDIANAPOLIS, APRIL, 1891. terms 


In the'death of Postmaster Wallace, the 
public service has suffered a loss. When he 
first became postmaster, there was a serious 
misunderstanding as to his powers and duties. 
After that was settled, he took up his duties 
with the single purpose of performing them in 
accordance with the law and with his oath of 
office. His execution of the civil service law 
has been a model of fairness and justice. 
Following this execution his office reached a 
degree of accuracy and capability of accom¬ 
plishing work far beyond what had ever been 
known in this city before. His course en¬ 
hanced the general respect in which he was 
held. 

The Fassett report says; 

“ The eflFect of the law is generally to exclude the 
absolutely unfit. More than this can not be said. We 
always come back to the elective officers and the 
heads of the departments. If the people err in their 
choice of elective officers, or if the mayor errs in the 
appointment of heads of departments, the civil serv¬ 
ice laws are powerless to counteract the error. They 
are easily circumvented, and wherever a motive ex¬ 
ists so to do, they are disregarded in the spirit if not 
In the letter. In New York City the offices are still, 
almost without exception, from the highest to the 
lowest, the prizes of political life and the rewards of 
party service. The remedy for this, however, lies 
not with the legislature, but with the people them¬ 
selves.” 

There is no excuse for such powerful 
civil service reform associations as those of 
New York and Brooklyn permitting such 
a state of affairs to exist. There is no rea¬ 
son why the civil service statutes should 
not be enforced in New York as thorough¬ 
ly as in Indianapolis. That they are thor¬ 
oughly enforced in this city is due to the 
repeated and detailed exposure of viola¬ 
tions. Why does not the New York asso¬ 
ciation grapple with Tammany Hall ? A 
series of reports showing the facts con¬ 
nected with special cases would in two or 
three years tire out even Tammany Hall. 

The talk of the young men’s republi¬ 
can club, of Massachusetts, has an exceed¬ 
ingly refreshing sound. At its meeting 
Secretary Tracy found a congenial audi¬ 
ence to hear his statement of the greatest 
measure of reform under this administra¬ 
tion. In putting forward its president, 
Roger Wolcott, to speak its sentiments, 
the club declared itself opposed to vague 
and shadowy generalities, and it recog¬ 
nized the fact that public progress is made 
by bold and outspoken honesty in relation 
to public affairs. It is a new thing for a 
great republican club to declare against 


Dudleyism and Quayism and to recognize 
civil service reform as the leading issue. 

The league of republican clubs in ses¬ 
sion in Cincinnati heard a speech from its 
retiring president, John M. Thurston, in 
favor of civil service reform. Then it pro¬ 
ceeded to ignore this former republican 
doctrine and put the seal of its condemna¬ 
tion upon it by unanimously electing 
Headsman Clarkson as its president. 
Nothing could be more specific, and there 
is no opportunity for misunderstanding. 
President Harrison’s office-holders from 
this city. District Attorney Chambers and 
his assistant, Cockrum, went over to help 
in this convention of buccaneers, and, 
meanwhile, the United States court here 
stopped business and waited for them. 


It seems by the Civil Service Reformer that 
instead of a “ dinner ” to show appreciation 
of Gorman, money for a silver service is 
being raised and that the thirty-five hun¬ 
dred dollars necessary are coming in with 
painful slowness. This is the most en¬ 
couraging sign for reform in Maryland 
apparent in many a day. We give this 
tribute with the more pleasure from having 
held the private opinion that Maryland 
totally eclipsed Indiana in total political 
depravity; that it was more boss ridden, had 
a bigger and lower-down band of political 
henchmen; and a Better Element even 
more hide bound in party bigotry. And 
yet it is fair to say that the bulk of civil 
service reformers regard Indiana as a state 
given over to spoils, with its population as 
a class entirely indiflferent to any other 
form of government. 

Of the death of Dr. Howard Crosby, the 
Society for the Prevention of Crime truth¬ 
fully says: 

‘‘Our president counted himself a debtor to every 
citizen of New York. This he did because he re¬ 
spected every man as his brother committed to his 
care by the common Father. He met his death in 
part as preacher, educator, author, honest taxpayer, 
and voter. Still he counted himself debtor to aid 
specially the magistrates in two ways; first, encour¬ 
aging, assisting, and constraining them to execute 
existing laws; second, in securing better laws. 

His life and practice were a steady con¬ 
demnation of that large class of clergymen 
who think that to do anything or say any¬ 
thing specific for political improvement is 
“ preaching politics,” and therefore unbe¬ 
coming. 


At a dinner recently given by the Massa¬ 
chusetts Reform Club, Mr. Herbert Welsh, 
speaking of the Indian service, said : 

Under the last administration, out of fifty-eight 
Indian agents fifty-three were removed from office 
during the four years. Under this administration, 
after its two years of power, but one Indian agent 
appointed by President Cleveland remains. There 
was. virtually, a clean sweep among the minor posi¬ 
tions under the democratic administration; und^r 
the republican administration, though I can not 
speak confidently of all, of many places the same 
may be said. Under the democratic administration 
the fact that Mississippi and Tennessee supplied the 
appointees was the jest of the Indian country; under 
this administration by the ‘‘ Home Rule” policy the 
senators and representatives of the states and terri¬ 
tories in which the reservations are situated control 
appointments. Recently, at one reservation the 
agent, physician and virtually all the employes 
were away at one time electioneering for the senator 
who had given them their places. The affairs of this 
agency ha\e been in a deplorable condition. At 
this point, writes a reliable correspondent, from per¬ 
sonal observation, “ the boys’ school is a disgrace to 
the service.” 

To this, Mr. S. B. Capen, answered that 
“ President Cleveland was determined to 
make improvements but he was betrayed 
by his subordinates.” It would seem that 
sometime we ought to hear the end of 
such excuses. No president is deceived by 
his subordinates. President Cleveland had 
before him the fullest information given 
by Mr. Welsh, just as it has been given to 
President Harrison. The way to help on 
reform is to face the facts and not make 
excuses where there is no excuse. Mr. 
Moorfield Storey stated the whole case 
when he said in the closing speech, “ The 
men who handle the throttle are to be held 
responsible.” 

The executive committee of the Nation¬ 
al Civil Service Reform League have passed 
resolutions asking the civil service reform 
association of Maryland to investigate and 
report the recent charges of the unwarrant¬ 
able interference of federal oflSce holders in 
the primary elections of the republican par¬ 
ty lately held in Baltimore. 

The steady persistence of the Civil Ser¬ 
vice Record has at last goaded Mr. Porter, 
United States census commissioner, into 
furnishing specimens of his examination 
questions, which he stated to be superior 
to the civil service examinations. These 
are printed in the April number of the 
Record side by side with those used by the 
state of Massachusetts for census clerks for 
the state census. Since Mr. Porter simply 
tested such political favorites as were al- 



























220 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ready designated for appointment, his 
“ examination ” falls within a class which 
long ago was proved worthless. 


This city may, in time, own and operate 
a gas fuel plant, a water plant, a light plant, 
a street car plant, and other property of 
great general necessity and importance. 
But not one such ownership and manage¬ 
ment is to be thought of for a moment 
while places in the city service are filled 
by the mere arbitrary choice of appointing 
officers. It is the universal experience 
that such choice runs along the lines of 
personal and party favoritism. Every new 
place that is added only adds to the power 
of some boss. 

Paul Vandervoort, ex-commander of 
the grand army, professional office holder 
and political hanger-on, has apparently 
left the republican party and thus writes 
about it; 

“I saw a party, born amid peril in the nation’s 
hour of agony and baptized with the red blood of 
heroes who perished for liberty, go back on the 
golden words of Abraham Lincoln, who said : ‘ We 
will care for him who bore the burden of battle, his 
widow and orphan.’ I am going to leave a party 
which in this state simply represents a streak of rust 
exuding from the iron bands of 5,000 miles of rail¬ 
way, and has for its foundation the rotton, ravenous, 
robbing, blackmailing band of cormorants and vul¬ 
tures of the peniteutiary ring. I am going to join a 
party where pious frauds like John Wanamaker can 
not buy a cabinet office with the largest contribution 
to the campaign fund.” 

Vandervoort is the man who was a chief 
clerk in the railway mail service in 1883, 
and who was then dismissed by Postmaster- 
General Gresham for having been absent 
from his post 265 out of 310 working days. 
Under Postmaster - General Wanamaker 
Vandervoort was appointed superintendent 
of mails at Omaha. While drawing $1,500 
a year in that position he has been in 
Lincoln, some seventy miles away, lobby¬ 
ing in the legislature for various corpora¬ 
tions. Wanamaker has certainly been 
liberal with him, at the public expense, and 
must now be pondering upon the baseness 
of ingratitude. He can not say that he was 
not informed. He was fully informed at 
the start, and that he should keep Vander¬ 
voort in face of the facts made him seem 
to the public as he now seems to Vander¬ 
voort, a “ pious fraud.” 

A New York correspondent writes ; 

I wish to express to you my hearty concurrence 
in your opinion that ‘‘all other reforms should be 
subordinated to civil service reform,” and my sym¬ 
pathy with your article under that heading in the 
last number of the Chronicle. The politicians will 
always fight with or for the machine; and after our 
experience under all administrations, republican 
and democratic alike, we may as well give up hope 
of real aid to the civil service reform movement from 
that quarter. But the citizen and voter is not bound 
to the machine, and, in proportion to his intelli¬ 
gence, is more or less free from party shackles. If, 
among the people, we can induce those who believe 
in civil service reform to subordinate all others to it. 


our victory will be near, and I hope you will iterate 
that opinion in each issue of the Chronicle. 

The question is one between permanent 
issues and shifting issues. An issue like 
slavery lasts until slavery is overthrown. 
In the scale of human progress and good 
government nothing outweighs it. The 
spoils system is its twin. There is no 
doubt that in the latter case, as in the 
former, parties watch for and seize upon 
shifting or temporary issues, like taxation 
or currency, and run campaigns upon 
them, when all the time the main object of 
their struggle is to get hold of the offices 
as spoil. We have examples of this in 
the silence of the Cleveland democrats as 
to what will be done with the offices if he 
is elected in 1892, and in Mr. Cleveland’s 
own silence upon the subject of civil ser¬ 
vice reform, although he writes much for 
the public, and in President Harrison, 
who, after dividing 100,000 offices among 
his friends in two years, which is more 
booty than the czar of Russia divides in 
ten years, is now traveling over the coun¬ 
try and never mentioning the manage¬ 
ment of the federal service, although, un¬ 
der the constitution, this is his greatest 
and almost his only duty. Civil service re¬ 
formers will not allow this question to be 
evaded or tabled by partisan talk that some 
other issue is the great issue. 


“EQUALLYDIVIDED POLITICALLY.” 

The board of public safety, composed of 
three commissioners, and having control of 
the police and fire divisions of the city, is 
busy making appointments and putting in 
force its interpretation of the silly provision 
of the new charter, which says of the police 
and fire forces, “ Provided, That said forces shall 
be, as nearly as possible, equally divided po¬ 
litically.” The result is that in both divisions 
experienced and efficient men have been 
dropped to the inevitable detriment of the 
city service, with the accompanying misfor¬ 
tune to them of being, without cause, deprived 
of an opportunity of earning support for 
their families. Of one of these the Indianap¬ 
olis News, of April 17, said : 

The board of public safety saw fit to relieve police 
officer G. W. McCain of his positton. McCain has 
been a member of the force for years and has made 
many friends among business men, for he is a man 
of irreproachable character, and has been of great 
value in his work, particularly in trying to make 
something better than they promised out of the news¬ 
boys and bootblacks whom he had to look after. In 
every respect he has been a model police ofiBcer. 

That “pulls” and “ influence ” are having 
their way is shown by the fact that, while such 
men as McCain are dropped “to equalize the 
force between parties,” fifteen new republicans 
have been appointed. Turning to the fire de¬ 
partment, Commissioner Holt says: 

The law says the department must be divided 
equally as to politics. There are no ifs about it. It 
is obligatory. When this board took charge of the 
fire department there were forty-eight more republi¬ 


cans than democrats, and we set about to make them 
even. We dropped out six republicans and put in 
six democrats. But still there were thirty-six more 
republicans than democrats, and that is the shape it 
is in now. The board determined that it would not 
cripple the department by making wholesale remov¬ 
als. The finances of thecity bothered us a good deal, 
and we had several meetings on the subject, and, at 
last, decided that we had better strain the financial 
question a little, rather than put green firemen in to 
endanger the property and lives of the citizens. We 
talked with business men and property-owners, and 
with one accord they agreed to our plan—increase 
the fire department by putting on fourteen demo¬ 
crats, that fourteen experienced firemen, who are 
republicans, might remain—and this we have done. 
There are yet eleven repnblicans to be removed, and 
this will be done as soon as the circumstances will 
permit. 

This is a fine exhibition of municipal gov¬ 
ernment. Out of the devotion of the board to 
what it has picked out as its first duty, we 
are paying fourteen green democratic firemen 
of whom apparently we have not the least 
business need. If the board can leave for a 
moment its work of giving places in the fire 
and police divisions to republicans and demo¬ 
crats, we should like to ask it what “equally ” 
means. If an estate is to be divided equally 
among heirs it goes in equal parts to all 
whether they are two or twenty. Now by 
what right does the board give places only to 
republicans and democrats? If you ask Com¬ 
missioner Holt what his politics are, he will 
say he is a democrat and belongs to the demo¬ 
cratic party. Commissioner Catterson will 
answer in like manner that he is a republi¬ 
can. But to this question Eli Ritter will 
say “ I am a prohibitionist and belong to the 
prohibition party.” Now here is a third polit¬ 
ical division of the people, to say nothing of 
other like divisions; and it is such a division 
as is contemplated by statutes when speaking 
of political parties. By what right does the 
board ignore the prohibitionists? By what 
right does it ignore the national labor party? 
Will the board say that, politically, men are 
only divided into republicans and democrats? 
The supreme court would not say so and the 
statutes have repeatedly recognized other par¬ 
ties. The supreme court very likely would 
say that this clause of the law is impossible of 
execution and unconstitutional and void. It 
is time for the mayor to interfere and put an 
end to this humbug. These places should be 
thrown open to competition and not left to be 
filled by the favoritism of any board. If the 
mayor will investigate the manner of choos¬ 
ing firemen and policemen, say in Boston, 
Buffalo and Brooklyn, and will prepare a set 
of rules providing for open competition and 
require this board to put them in force, he 
will be supported by the people. 


STREET CLEANING. 

The hand of the great and rich city of New 
York has for years become paralyzed whenever 
raised to clean the filth off its streets. Finally, 
in January last. Mayor Grant wrote to Morris 
K. Jessup, Thatcher M. Adams, Charles Chand¬ 
ler, David H. King, Jr., and F. V. Green, all 
prominent citizens of the city, and asked them 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


221 


to find out what was the matter. They gave 
the subject the greater part of their time for 
eight weeks, and made a report covering 153 
printed pages. They say a larg,> increase in 
the working force of the street cleaning de¬ 
partment is necessary, but they also say, “ We 
recommend this increase provided ihe entire 
force of the department is brought within the control 
of the civil service regulations, as suggested in pre¬ 
vious portions of this report, but not otherwise.^' 
After setting out the Boston labor system in 
full, the committee says: “It has been in use 
in Boston several years, and has effectually 
abolished the patronage abuse.” 

Speaking of the present method of hiring 
men to work upon the streets, the committee 
says: “ They are appointed and removed prin¬ 
cipally at the whim of persons unconnected 
with the department, making requests to that 
effect. They are selected without reference to 
their ability to do the given work for which 
they are employed and are liable to be dis¬ 
charged without good business reasons there¬ 
for.” They quote from a banker who had 
watched the work on Fifth avenue daily for 
seven years, and who said; “I don’t hesitate 
to say that, as a general rule, four able bodied 
men could in the same time, without extra ex¬ 
ertion, accomplish the work of any ten men 
that I watched.” 

This is Indianapolis over again. Ever since 
anybody can remember the street cleaning 
force of this city has been made up of hang¬ 
ers-on of councilmen and other politicians. 
No one can be found who will say that this 
force ever pretended to do a day’s work. We 
spend about one thousand dollars a week in 
this department and have nothing but filthy 
streets to show for it. If the mayor and board 
of public works want to render this city a 
service, let them see that able-bodied men are 
employed upon the streets and that when there 
they do a day’s work in a day. The only way 
that this can be done is by the abolition of 
favoritism and partyism in the selection and 
to this end the Boston system is the only 
means. This is simply a system of registra¬ 
tion on the plan of first come first served, 
without regard to politics or color. The re¬ 
quirements are siich that unworthy men can 
not get upon the registers. In taking men 
from the registers for employment those who 
have families have a preference and in a few 
other cases there is a preference. Thus a few 
simple rules would shut scalawags and dead 
beats out of the city employ and give the work 
to honest and industrious men. 

THE MONTH’S REFORM. 

Civil service reform has taken a great leap 
forward during the month. The President 
has closed a very wide back door by revoking 
the rule which permitted promotion into the 
classified service without competition after 
serving two years in the unclassified service. 

A beginning has at last been made toward 
taking the Indian service away from the 
spoilsmen. The Indian School Service and 
the agency physicians have been, by order of 


the President, embraced within the civil ser¬ 
vice law. The list includes about 700 places, 
and the move will effectually stop the quarter¬ 
ing of all manner of broken down politicians 
upon the Indians as teachers and doctors. It 
was a mistake not to follow out the first in¬ 
tention and include the farmers. There is no 
class of employes where severe tests would 
give better results, and in no case have the 
Indians been worse swindled than in the men 
who have been sent to them as “ farmers.” 
That these were left out seems to be due to 
Secretary Noble. This order does not affect 
the great mischief making power among the 
Indians. That lies in the agents and in those 
officers who attend to the pecuniary affairs of 
the Indian. So long as these are men holding 
by a precarious tenure and in the mean time “on 
the make,” just so long we shall hear of wars 
and rumors of wars. Nevertheless, when we 
add the new regulations for the navy yard, 
mentioned elsewhere, the whole makes a very 
gratifying month’s progress. 


SECRETARY TRACY AND THE 
NAVY YARDS. 

The thanks of the country are due to Sec¬ 
retary Tracy for having inaugurated a reform 
of such great importance in the navy yards 
that it almost marks an epoch in the reform 
movement. The navy yards have been for 
many decades the most vicious development 
of our vicious system of managing the fed¬ 
eral service. From Norfolk to San Francisco 
they have been rendezvous for men whom the 
Sim Coys of local politics want to quarter 
upon the government to pay them for past and 
future services. Secretary Tracy first an¬ 
nounced his scheme at a recent meeting of the 
Republican Club of Massachusetts, and in 
every line of his announcement he displays a 
thorough understanding of the evil and a 
thorough mastery of the way to destroy it. 
He says: 

One last point in naval affairs remains to be con¬ 
sidered, the question of the employment of labor at 
the navy yards. For fifty years this has been the one 
weak spot in naval administration. Whatever the 
party in control of the government, it seems hitherto 
to have been powerless to exclude political influence 
in the employment of navy yard labor. It is not 
enough, apparently, that the mechanics and work¬ 
men in the government shops should be republicans 
or democrats; they must wear the collar of the ward 
bosses who run the local political machine. The 
practice is a source of demoralization to any party 
that attempts to use it, destructive to the govern- 
. ment service, and debauching to local and national 
politics. It is an ulcer on the naval administrative 
system, and 1 propose to cut it out. My attention 
has been directed for some time past to the system 
adopted here in the city of Boston for the selection 
of laborers enmloyed upon the city work. I have 
caused an exh^stlye study to be made of that sys¬ 
tem by which you have largely succeeded in elimin¬ 
ating politics from'municipal labor, and I believe 
that, by an extension and modification of it, the 
same result can be made reasonably certain in the 
government navy yards. 

The details of the system which I propose to adopt 
are now being prepared, and in a short time will be 
in full operation. Its essential features, as applied 
to the navy yards, are:. First, the appointment, at 
each yard, of a registration board to register all ap¬ 


plicants for employment in the department of un¬ 
skilled labor, to be selected as required on the prin¬ 
ciple of “first come, first served,” preference only 
given to those who have had experience in the class 
of work for which they apply; to those who have 
served in the army or navy; to those who have fam¬ 
ilies to support, and where all other considerations 
are equal, to those possessing superior physical qual¬ 
ifications. Second, the registration of all applicants 
for positions of skilled labor who can give evidence 
of experience at their trade, to be certified in the 
order of their application under the same rules of 
preference, and their employment on trial for a pe¬ 
riod of probation after the necessary test of profi¬ 
ciency, to be ultimately graded or discharged accord¬ 
ing to their merits; and third, the selection of fore¬ 
men upon competitive examination, so conducted 
as to bring out their fitness and qualifications for the 
positions they seek, open to all comers who can show 
the requisite experience. The boards will consist of 
officers of the navy engaged in conducting the work 
of the yard. 

I propose, in carrying out this new system, so to 
regulate it that three ends shall be secured : First, 
free and open eompetition; second employment 
upon grounds of merit, to be determined by non-par¬ 
tisan experts engaged in and responsible for the 
work, and third, absolute publicity of every detail. 
And having begun in the way I have indicated, I do 
not propose to stop until the principle of efiiciency 
and worth is the only test of navy yard employment. 

I am satisfied that such a system will be in the inter¬ 
est, not only of the work, but of the workingmen ; 
that it can be carried out so that it will remove not 
only all machine politics from the navy yards, but 
all suspicion of machine politics; that the economy 
and efficiency of the work will be promoted, while 
the community will be sure that a navy yard in its 
midst, instead of being a focus of local political in¬ 
trigues, is the place of employment of a body of in¬ 
dependent and self-respecting workingmen, whose 
only road to promotion lies in good work, and in 
whom slackness, indolence or bad habits will surely 
lead to discharge. [Cheers.] 

Whether the present civil service law is the best 
that could be devised to improve the civil service of 
the country, I do not know. But this I do know from 
personal observation in my own department, that 
the persons appointed under this system are unques¬ 
tionably more efficient as a whole than those selected 
under any system of pure patronage ; and I know 
further that no republican charged with the respon¬ 
sibility of administering one of the great executive 
departments of the government can be true to him¬ 
self, to the faith of the republican party, or to the 
people of this great nation, whose servant he is if he 
fails to employ any and all means within his power 
to elevate, purify and render more efficient the civil 
service of the country. [Great applause.] 

He has followed this talk with an order 
vacating the positions of foreman and master 
mechanic in the Brooklyn navy yard and ap¬ 
pointing a board of naval officers to hold a 
competitive examination, open to all comers 
throughout the United States, for candidates 
to fill the vacancies. Of this, the exceptionally 
well informed Washington correspondent of the 
New York Evening Post, says: 

Capt. F. M. Bunce is commandant of the station at 
New London. He was the first oflScer put in com¬ 
mand of a ship in the new navy—barring the Dolphin. 
He was chairman of the second board appointed to 
report a site for a naval station on the Gulf of Mexico, 
and his whole record is that of a progressive, thorough 
wide-awake man. 

Chief-Engineer David Smith ranks very high in the 
mechanical and scientific branches of the service. 
He is an expert on metals generally, and is regarded 
as the first authority in the United States Navy on 
the subject of steel. 

Commander Charles O’Neill is the present superin¬ 
tendent of the gun-shops at the navy-yard here, hav¬ 
ing succeeded Folger when the latter was promoted 
to be chief of the ordinance bureau. He has had ex- 















222 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


actly the kind of experience which will enable him 
to judge of the men employed in the yards elsewhere 
as well as In this city, and the state of mind to which 
the political heelers here have reduced him by their 
importunities and threats has made him an enthu¬ 
siastic reformer. 

Commander F. E. Chadwick is in command of the 
Yorktovm. He was for some time naval attach^ of 
the American Legation in London. During that 
period the information which he furnished the 
bureau of naval Intelligence at the department here 
gave the bureau its first dignity, and is thought to 
have done more than any other one thing to estab¬ 
lish its success. 

Naval Constructor Francis T. Bowles, now in charge 
of the construction work at the Norfolk yard, is one 
of the ablest and brightest young officers in the ser¬ 
vice. He has been in hot water with the bosses ever 
since he took hold at Norfolk, all because he would 
not submit to their dictation, but he is a hard fighter, 
and has come out ahead, as the secretary’s present 
evidence of appreciation shows. Mr. Bowles is a 
relative of the late Samuel Bowles, of Springfield. 
He was graduated at the head of his class at Annap¬ 
olis, and took high honors at Greenwich, Eng., 
whither he was sent by the government to complete 
his education. 

Lieut. William B. Caberton, the recorder of the ex¬ 
amining board, has been for four years past a mem- 
Der of the steel inspection board. He is likely to re¬ 
ceive the command of the Miantonomoh as soon as 
she is put in commission again. 

When we compare this board of officers 
with the Mikes and the Jakes and the Barneys 
who have for generations named the employes 
of the Brooklyn navy yard, we begin to get 
a faint glimmering of how the country has 
been robbed and swindled, and of how Brook¬ 
lyn citizenship has been degraded. Other 
navy yards are to be taken in order. Secre¬ 
tary Whitney once issued a fine sounding order 
with regard to navy yard employment and 
then privately sent a messenger to say that it 
might be disregarded. Secretary Tracy will 
not do this, and having the authority and 
knowing the way to overcome this abuse, it is 
proper that he should pursue his own course. 
We must urge him, however, in the light of 
all past reform experience, not to go out of 
ofl&ce leaving the continued execution of this 
reform to the discretion of his successor. To 
be of any permanent value it must be put be¬ 
yond the reach of future secretaries with 
friends to reward, and this can only be done 
by inducing the President to put the navy 
yards under the civil service law. No change 
from Secretary Tracy’s plan will be necessary. 
The boards of naval officers would remain 
and the system of registering laborers, which 
is the Boston system, would be the same. 
These, with open competition, constitute the 
reform, and by taking measures to perpetuate 
it. Secretary Tracy would erect an enduring 
monument to his great service to the country. 

ANECDOTES OF A CHRONIC OFFICE 
HOLDER. 

Chester R. Faulkner was a member of the 
lower house of the late general assembly. He 
attracted attention on account of his opposi¬ 
tion to appropriations which seemed to average 
people necessary to the ordinary efficiency of 
the state government. For instance, to the 
proposition to relieve the supreme court by 
additional judges or by a new court, Faulk¬ 
ner said: 


“ Let them judges take down them spring 
beds and go to work.” This referred to cer¬ 
tain beds which the out-of-town judges have 
in their chambers at the capitol. It is not to 
be inferred that rope beds and feather ticks 
were to be substituted, but that the judges 
were to be cut off from all chance of sleeping 
in their chambers. When the question of sal¬ 
ary for the state librarian came up it was 
proposed to make it $1,500, but Faulkner 
stood stubbornly for $1,000. Such Spartan 
virtue led wicked and envious people to look 
into Faulkner’s past to see what meat he had 
fed on to produce such a development. It 
seems that under the late administration. Sen¬ 
ator Voorhees kept Faulkner steadily under 
government pay. His first position was that 
of clerk of the committee on additional ap¬ 
propriations to the library of congress at six 
dollars a day. This committee had one bill 
referred to it in seven years. Then he became 
chief of the records division of the pension 
office at $2,000 a year. While in this position 
he asked the superintendent of the railway 
mail service to transfer a clerk so that he 
could work and vote in Indiana at an ap¬ 
proaching election. Being refused, he wrote 
an impertinent letter derogatory of the admin¬ 
istration, for which Secretary Vilas demanded 
his resignation. Faulkner refused to resign 
until he had seen Congressman Voorhees, who 
appointed him, and the latter forthwith bullied 
Vilas into backing down. 

It is claimed that Faulkner’s sole perform¬ 
ance of duty in this last position consisted in 
tapping his bell three times at noon and again 
at night. The first tap was for the clerks to 
put away pens, the second, to rise, and the 
third, to march out. One other duty per¬ 
formed, however, is related of Faulkner. His 
young men and women clerks were apt to con¬ 
verse in the corridors at noon, and to meet 
this emergency he prepared and hung up a 
large placard having upon it the notice, “No 
Lofeing in the Corduroys.” Harrison’s ad¬ 
ministration dispensed with his services and 
then Voorhees seems to have quartered him up¬ 
on the senate again, as until some months ago 
he was on the congressional pay-roll as folder 
in the senate document room. 

THE INDIANAPOLIS SYSTEM. 


pointment, and then the appointee goes through 
some sort of a medical pass examination. 
There is no athletic examination. 

Now against this ridiculous and farcical 
“examination” we set some actual examina¬ 
tion tests which have been used in Boston and 
Brooklyn for selecting patrolmen. It must be 
remembered that these examinations are com¬ 


petitive. The board can not make a public 
show of “examinations” and then in making 
appointments secretly give rein to favoritism 
and “ pulls.” The names are listed accord¬ 
ing to success in the competition, and the 
board must take the men accordingly. The 
information afforded by these examples is 
commended to the board of public safety and 
to those framers of the charter who claimed 
that if there was a modern improvement to be 
found in municipal government in this coun¬ 
try which they had not secured “it must have 
been discovered within the last three months.” 


BROOKLYN. 

Examination for Patrolmen, March 1,1889. 
SCHEME OF MARKING. 

Marking.—Perfect, 100: Required Minimum. 

Physique.30. 70 per cent, or 21 

Athletics.20. 70 ‘‘ “ ll* 

Testimonials.20. 70 “ “ 14 

Experience as stated by candi 

date.5. 

Penmanship, spelling and dic¬ 
tation.5. 50 “ 23^ 

Arithmetic.10. 50 “ “ 5 

Intelligence.10. 50 “ “5 

Required minimum generally, 70 per cent. 

■^Tbis minimum is reduced to some extent for 
candidates receiving 80 per cent., and upwards, in 
physique. 

LThe experts upon the physical examination were 
Dr. Stewart Church and Police Surgeon O’Connell, 
from both of whom a certificate was required in 
the same form required, as above, in the case of 
park policemen.] 


Athletic Examination. {Rating, 20 out of 100.) 
[The experts were Dr. Wm. G. Anderson and Inspec¬ 
tor McLaughlin of the police department, from 
both of whom a certificate in the following form 
was required, a rating being assigned to each test 
and a general average being given.] 

Name, 

Height, 

1. Strength of biceps, 


2. 

f 

triceps. 

3. 

<( 

back. 

4. 

<< 

legs. 

5. 

(( 

right hand. 

6. 

4( 

left hand. 

7. 

(4 

chest, 

8. 

44 

back. (Traction) 


The system by which the board of public 
safety gets at the merits of applicants for po¬ 
lice appointments is instructive. The men 
are called in one by one and are solemnly 
told that they are not compelled to answer 
the questions, but that it would be best to do 
so ; and further, that any false answer would 
cause dismissal if found out after appoint¬ 
ment. Commissioner Holt has prepared the 
questions, which are as follows : 

1. Have you ever had any trouble with anyone 
in the city? 

2. Were you ever arrested? 

3. Do you drink whisky? 

4. Do you get drunk ? 

6. Do you ever do anything that you think would 
be unbecoming to a policeman ? 

This test is followed by selection for ap- 


Total .strength, ' 

1. Test with spirometer, 

2. " ladder, 

3. “ vault and jump, 

4. ‘‘ putting shot, 

5. “ one-eighth mile run. 

Rating as to athletic examination by Inspector Mc¬ 
Laughlin, 

Rating as to athletic examination by Dr. Ander¬ 
son, 

Dated, Brooklyn, 1889. 

Signature of applicant, ^ 

Address of applicant, 

Intelligenee. {Rating, 10 out of 100.) 

1. What do you unaerstand to be the reasons for 
your present examination, and your previous phys¬ 
ical examination ? 

2. State the difference between the present and 
the former mode of appointment to the police force 
of the city of Brooklyn ? 


















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


223 


3. If you discovered persons making an excavation 
on property located on your beat, as a policeman, 
what would you do? 

4. In case there were a Are in a building located 
on your beat, and property, such as furniture, etc., 
were brought out and placed upon the street, what 
would you, as a policeman, understand to be your 
duty as to such property ? 

5. How would you go from the Wallabout to Qo- 
wanus? 

6. What is the name given to the water supply of 
Brooklyn, and why? 

7. (a.) Where is the Brooklyn Savings Bank? 

(6.) Where is the Sprague National Bank? 

(c.) Where is the Dime Savings Bank ? 

8. What is the object of the Ambulance Service of 
this city ? 

9. Give the route of the Brooklyn Elevated Rail¬ 
road. 

10. When was the Brooklyn Bridge opened to the 
public? 

Arithmetic. {Rating, 10 out of 100.) 

Notice.—S/iow each operation at length, with all the 
calculations. The Commission will not accept the mere 
final result. 

1. Add the following amounts: Seven hundred 
and nineteen dollars and sixty-seven cents; Thirty- 
three dollars and eighty-four cents; Eighteen hun¬ 
dred and ninety dollars and two cents; Three hun¬ 
dred dollars; Two thousand four hundred and forty- 
nine dollars and thirty-three cents. 

2. Add the following: 

42,993 

304 

6,789 

119,244 

4,633,297 

784,388 

2,666 


3. From eighty-seven thousand three hundred and 
twenty dollars, subtract sixteen thousand two hun¬ 
dred and thirty-eight dollars and forty-nine cents. 

4. Multiply 236 by 84. 

5. Multiply 29,823 by 798. 

6. Divide 35,026 by 83. 

7. Divide 946,368 by 496. 

8. (a.) How many pints in a quart ? 

(6.) How many quarts in a peck? 

(c.) How many pecks in a bushel ? 

9. (a.) How many gallons in a barrel ? 

(6.) How many square feet in a square yard? 

10. (a.) Write in words this sum of money: $362,- 
810.06, 

(6.) Write in words this number: 40,699. 
BOSTON POLICE. 

First Subject. 

Copying a printed statement. 

Second Subiect. 

1. State, in general terms, your occupation since you 

became of age, and any experience you may pos¬ 
sess which will be of use, if you should receive 
an appointment in the police service. 

2. If you have ever served in the police department 

In any capacity, or in any public office, state 
when, where, how long, whether you were ever 
discharged for cause, or requested to resign; and 
whether, while in office, you were ever com¬ 
plained of for violation of the rules of the office, 
or for any conduct unbecoming an officer; and, 
if such complaint was made, what action was 
taken thereon. 

3. Have you ever been convicted of any offence 

against the laws of this or any other state or na¬ 
tion? 

4. Have you ever been a dealer in intoxicating li¬ 

quors, or a bar-tender? If so, when, where and 
for how long? 

5. If you drink distilled or fermented liquors of any 

kind, state fully and definitely what your habits 
are in such use of them. If you are a total ab¬ 
stainer, state how long you have abstained. 

6. Have you served in the army or navy of the 
United States, either in time of peace or war; 


and, if so, how long did you serve, and in what 
capacity, and did you receive an honorable dis¬ 
charge therefrom? 

7. If you have ever served in the volunteer militia, 

name the regiment and company, and state how 
long and in what capacity you served, and 
whether you have been honorably discharged, 
been dismissed, have resigned or been asked to 
resign. 

8. Have you ever had the handling of men, either 

in public office or private employment? 

Third Subject. 

1. Write in figures the following numbers: 

One hundred eleven thousand three hundred six. 

Write in words the numbers expressed by the fol¬ 
lowing figures: 49,852. 

2. Add the following column of figures: 

27,896 

35,427 

12,397 

75,556 

29,872 

12,387 

3. An army of 10,000 men lost 4,809 men in battle; i 

how many men were left? Give the work in full. 

4. How much will 72 barrels of flour weigh if each 

barrel weighs 196 pounds? Give the work in full. 

5. How many horses worth $125 apiece must be given 

for a farm worth $11,000 ? Give the work in full. 

6. What will be the cost of 32 pounds of coffee at 
28)4 cents a pound ? Give the work in full. 

Fourth Subject. 

1. What is an officer’s duty upon discovering a de¬ 
fect in the street ? 

2. When the body of a person supposed to have 
died from violence is found in the street, what is 
the officer’s duty? 

3. How fast can a vehicle be driven around the cor¬ 
ner of a street? 

4. How near can a vehicle approach another at a 
street crossing? 

5. What rate of speed are horse-cars allowed in turn¬ 
ing corners ? 

6. At what hour may itinerant musicians begin to 
perform, and at what hour must they cease? 

7. What is an officer’s duty when he sees an old 
thief or suspicious person enter a horse-car? 

8. When the ringing of bells disturbs sick people, 
how can they be stopped ? 

9. What is the lawful rate of speed at which horses 
may be driven in the public streets? 

10. Ill what way may coasting be allowed in the 
public streets? 

11. What, if any, restrictions are there against people 
walking, standing, or lying on the grass on the 
Common or Public Garden ? 

12. From whom should an officer in charge of a de¬ 
tail at a ward caucus receive his orders ? 

13. Who has the power to license theatrical exhibi¬ 
tions in the city ? 

14. How may the police examine books and articles 
In possession of a collateral loan company? 

15. Can a person who has committed a misdemeanor, 
for whose arrest a warrant has been issued, be 
arrested by an officer who has not the warrant 
in his possession ? 

16. Have constables in Boston the same criminal 
power as police officers? 

17. Have licensed private detectives the power to 
make arrests ? 

18. Have police officers the right to serve a bastardy 
warrant? If so, when? 

19. How can a Boston officer legally serve a warrant 
in Boston issued by a court in Worcester or 
Springfield ? 

20. Name the offenses that the members of the board 
of police can make arrests for personally without 
a warrant? 

21. What is a writ of “ habeas corpus?” 

22. What is the meaning of “nol. pros?” 

Physical Examination. 

(Blank to be filled out by the applicant.) 

I [write your full name]-, hereby declare that 

the answers to the following inquiries touching my 

personal and family health, history, habits and an- 

-tecedents, are true, to the best of my knowledge and 


belief, and that I am the person described in the fol¬ 
lowing record of examination: 

What is your occupation ? 

Do you use tobacco? If so, in what manner, and 
how much do you use in a week ? 

Do you drink intoxicating liquors? If so, how fre¬ 
quently? 

Have you any disease now? 

What diseases have you had during the last seven 
years ? 

Do you know of any hereditary disease in your 
family ? 

If your parents, brothers, or sisters, or any of them, 
are dead, of what disease did they die? 

Have you ever had fits? 

Have you ever had any fracture or dislocation ? 
Have you ever received any injury to the head or 
spine ? 

Are you subject to piles? 

Have you been vaccinated? 

Have you ever had rheumatism ? 

Certificate of Examining Surgeon. 

1. Is the respiring murmur clear and distinct over 
both the lungs? 

2. Is the character of the respiration full, easy and 
regular ? 

3. Are there any indications of disease of the organs 
of respiration or their appendages? 

4. Is the character of the heart’s action uniform, 
free and steady? 

5. Are its sounds and rhythm regular and normal ? 

6. Are there any indications of disease of this organ 
or of the blood vessels ? 

7. Is the sight good? 

8. Is the applicant color blind ? 

9. Is the hearing good ? 

10. Is the applicant subject to cough, expectoration, 
difficulty of breathing or palpitation ? 

11. Are the functions of the brain and nervous sys¬ 
tem in a healthy state? 

12. Has the brain or spinal cord ever been diseased ? 

13. If the applicant has had any serious illness or in¬ 
jury, state expressly what effect, if any, is per¬ 
ceptible in the heart, lungs, kidneys or other ab¬ 
dominal organs, or the skin, eyes, ears, limbs, etc. 

14. Has the applicant any predisposition, either her¬ 
editary or acquired, to any constitutional dis¬ 
ease, as phthisis, scrofula, rheumatism? 

15. Has the applicant varicose veins or hernia? 

16. Does the applicant display any evidence of hav¬ 
ing or having had syphilis? 

Note.—S yphilitic taint or obesity must be regarded 
as a good cause for rejection. 

Remarks. 

I hereby certify that I have this day carefully and 

thoroughly examined the above named- and 

find that he is- sound in limb and body,-is 

able-bodied,-of robust constitution, has-good 

eyesight and —- good hearing, and, in my opinion, 

is-physically qualified to sustain the labors and 

exposures, and perform the duties of a policeman in 
the city of Boston, and that the above is a truthful 
record of the examination. 

-, City Physician. 

-, 188-. 

Athletic Examination, with the Weight given to 
EACH Item. 


Age. — 

Weight.— 

Height. — 

Girth of waist. — 

Depth of abdomen.— 

Girth of chest. 2 

Girth of chest, full. 2 

Girth 9th rib. 2 

Girth 91 h rib, full. 2 

Girth of thigh, r. i 

Girth of thigh, 1. i 

Girth of calf, r. i 

Girth of calf, 1. i 

Girth of upper arm, r. 2 

Girth of upper arm, 1. 2 

Girth of forearm, r. 2 

Girth of forearm, 1. 2 

Depth of chest. 2 


22 




























224 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


Development. 


Capacity of lungs. 3 

Strength of lungs. 2 

Strength of back.— 4 

Strength of legs. 3 

Strength of upper arm, h. p. 3 

Strength of forearm, r. 1. 5 

Traction pull. 5 

Abdominal muscles. 3 

Back pull. 3 

Dumb-bell. 3 

Running ^ mile. 2 

36 

Strength,-. 

I hereby certify that I have this-day of-, 


188-, carefully and thoroughly examined the above- 
named applicant, and that the above is a truthful 
record of such examination. 

-, Physical Examiner. 

The April number of the Civil Service Record 
contains two interesting letters regarding the 
practical effects in Wa.shington of the merit 
system. 

In the current number of Scribner’s Maga¬ 
zine Herbert Welsh has an article on the In¬ 
dian outbreak in Dakota in which he shows 
the disastrous results of using the Indian trust 
for political purposes. 


PROGRESS. 

—There crops up, once in a while, a modern 
instance which plays such havoc with the wise 
saws of the spoilsmen in high places that one 
can scarcely forbear wondering at their temer¬ 
ity in renewing their attacks on civil service 
reform. 

It will be remembered that, of a whole cab¬ 
inet of eight members, Postmaster-General 
John Wanamaker was the only one who, at 
the very outset of the present administration, 
began making complaint of ths obstacles 
which the merit system put in the way of the 
selection of the best sort of subordinates in 
the executive departments. 

It was he whose private secretary sent out 
to public men and reformers that memorable 
circular letter inquiring whether the sham had 
not better cease, and all hands return to the 
good old custom of free selection. 

It was he who raised a storm over the fact 
that President Cleveland had set a date for 
extending the civil service rules to the rail¬ 
way mail service, one of the most valuable 
strongholds of the spoils system, and who de¬ 
clared, through his understrappers and by his 
own lips, that that was not the way to get the 
best class of railway mail clerks, and that he 
was receiving poor material under it. 

In the light of all these recollections, it is 
interesting to observe that, when the postmas¬ 
ter-general bestowed the gold medal and the 
general prize he had offered as a reward for 
the highest proficiency attained in this branch 
of his service, he should have been forced to 
select for the honor Mr. Charles H. Oler, for¬ 
merly of Economy, Ind. 

Mr. Oler was by calling a district school¬ 
teacher and a farm-hand. When the farming 
season was at its height he worked in the field 
and took his hire like the other hands. When 


the season ended and the schools were opened 
he mounted the pedagogue’s desk. He had no 
powerful relatives or friends to help him to a 
“fat thing.” He had no time for or interest 
in political work, beyond what belongs to 
every good citizen. He did not even have the 
benefit of the aid of a member of congress; for 
the representative from his district. General 
Thomas M. Browne, has been physically un¬ 
able to attend to his duties in Washington for 
the last two years. But the young man went 
before the civil service examiners and passed 
the ordeal on his own merits. His rating was 
91 per cent., and he stood twelfth on a list of 
eighty-four eligibles who passed in the same 
series of examinations. There was not an 
iota of political influence used in procuring 
his appointment; the few who had passed 
with better averages than he were taken in 
their order, as vacancies occurred. Finally, 
in September, 1889, his turn came. When he 
handed in his papers, he found no more promi¬ 
nent citizens to certify to his character and 
personal antecedents than a fellow teacher, 
employed in the public schools of Williams¬ 
burg, and a notary public in Economy. 

Mr. Oler stands at the head of 7,000 clerks 
with no second near him. He has broken 
every record ever known in the department 
for brilliant work. He has acquired his pro¬ 
ficiency, like his office, without assistance 
from anybody or anything but his own brain 
and hands. And the postmaster-general who 
does not believe the merit system “ practical ” 
and is quite sure he could do better by ap¬ 
pointing the sons and nephews and cousins 
and brothers of public men,or the “ workers” 
at caucuses and polls, has been compelled to 
give this unknown, unaided young man every 
prize within reach, and finally to promote him 
to a first-class berth in the new ocean mail 
service. What a commentary on the abuse of 
the word “ practical ” in politics !— Washington 
Dispatch to New York Evening Post, March 27. 

—When the sundry civil appropriation bill 
was considered by the senate last month a pro¬ 
vision was inserted authorizing the appoint¬ 
ment of architects, draughtsmen, and civil 
engineers in the office of the supervising arch¬ 
itect of the treasury department without regard 
to the civil service rules and regulations. It 
was asserted that the supervising architect 
could not get such men as he wanted through 
the civil service commission, and the provision 
was agreed to by both houses. 

It does not appear to have been entirely sat¬ 
isfactory to the supervising architect, for since 
congress adjourned he has appointed three 
draughtsmen under the certification of the 
civil service commission, and the latter ex¬ 
pects to continue holding examinations for 
such places.— Washington Dispatch to New Y<y>'k 
Times, March 27. 

—A good many persons appear to have the 
idea that in some way more republicans than 
democrats are getting into the classified serv¬ 
ice under the civil service rules and regula¬ 
tions. The civil service commission has no 
means of knowing the politics of the persons 
who pass its examinations, but it has recently 
received a letter from a resident of a southern 
state which throws a little light on the subject. 

The writer says that of the ten clerks last 
appointed from his state eight are democrats 


to his personal knowledge. One little fact of 1 
this sort offsets a long string of such assertions ij 
concerning favoritism in the appointment of 
classified clerks as have been made by the op¬ 
ponents of the merit system.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, April 2. 

—Congressman Randall was pleased to learn 
from the list of nominations sent to the senate 
that his recommendation for postmaster at 
Sandwich had been approved by the President. 
He obeyed the popular voice in recommending the 
reappointment of Postmaster James Shevlin, the 
popular democratic veteran. The appointment is 
a violation of Postmaster-General Wanama- 
ker’s rule to put none but republicans on 
guard, but nine-tenths of the patrons of the 
office were for Mr. Shevlin, the grand army 
and all the veterans were for him, and the re¬ 
publican town committee endorsed him.— 
Washington Dispatch to Boston Post, Jan. SO. 

—The republicans of Newton are much 
elated over the reappointment of Mr. George 
H. Morgan as postmaster. Mr. Morgan was 
appointed by President Cleveland and has 
managed the offiee to the satisfaction of all of 
its patrons. Owing to his faithful services the re¬ 
publicans of the city were unanimous for his reten¬ 
tion, and would not consider any other candidate. 
R. 11. Gardiner, president of the republican 
ward and city committee, and Mr. C. Bowditch 
Coffin, a former president, worked faithfully 
for Mr. Morgan’s reappointment, even writing 
to the postmaster-general that it would be for 
the interest of the republican party to reap¬ 
point Mr. Morgan. Mr. Coffin gives much 
credit to ex-Congressman Candler for the re¬ 
appointment.— Washington Dispatch to Boston 
Post, April 9. 

CURRENT SPOIL. 

—An interesting and instructive object les¬ 
son in the methods employed by the Tammany 
machine to equip the forces of the park police 
is furnished by the case of Thomas Cole, whose 
experiences as a candidate for appointment 
were brought to light yesterday for the first 
time. Cole is a poor man, earning $2 a day as 
a car driver on the Fourth Avenue Railroad. 
His home is at 158 East Eighty-Eighth street. 
He was promised a position as a park police¬ 
man if he would pay for it. This he did, pay¬ 
ing $300—all the money he had in the world 
—to John J. Shelley, a foreman on the park 
board, living at 176 East Eighty-Eighth street. 
Shelley’s failure to secure the place for his 
victim led Cole to sue him for the recovery of 
his money, and the initiatory proceedings in 
this suit were begun yesterday. 

Cole, whose appearance indicates that he is 
an honest man, was seen by a Times reporter 
yesterday, and told the followingstory: “Early 
in March, 1889, while driving a car on the 
Fourth Avenue Road, I met John Pursell of 
130 East One Hundred and Twenty-third 
street, who is a mounted policeman stationed 
in Central Park. He rode with me frequent¬ 
ly, and we became more or less confidential. 
One day he told me that if I had any money 
he could fix things so that I could get on the 
foree. I told him that I had a little money 
and would consider any proposition he would 
make. 

“A few days later—I think it was March 3— 
I met Pursell by appointment at the One Hun¬ 
dred and Tenth street entrance to the park, 
and was introduced to John J. Shelley, who. 






























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


225 


Piirsell sai(l, was superintendent of the park. 
‘He can put you on the force for the price,’ 
said Pursell. I then asked Shelley what his 
price was and he replied, ‘Four hundred dol¬ 
lars.’ I demurred, on the ground that it was 
too high, and, after some talk, he agreed to 
give me an appointment for $350, of which I 
was to pay $300 in cash and $50 when I got 
the place. I have since learned that Shelley 
is not park superintendent, but merely fore¬ 
man of a gang of workmen in the park. He 
was very well dressed at the time, and this 
fact, added to the loss of my job, owing to the 
strike on the Fourth Avenue Road, and the 
serious illness of my wife, led me to accept his 
offer without suspicion.” 

The afternoon of the day on which this 
proposition was made saw the unsuspecting 
Cole at Shelley’s house, in East Eighty-Eighth 
street, money in hand. He asked Shelley to 
have some witnesses present, but the “super¬ 
intendent” declined, satisfying Cole’s anxie¬ 
ties with a receipt, of which the following is 
an exact copy : 

Rec’d from Thomas Cole the sum of 300 dollars. 

JOHN SHELLEY, 
per 

George Roe. 

Cole says that he immediately asked Shelley 
who George Roe was, and that Shelly replied : 
“ He is the man who acts for Harry Hart in 
this transaction. Hart is the alderman from 
this district, and he is the man to ‘fix’ this 
thing. Hart thinks that you are paying me 
only $200, so when he speaks to you about it, 
tell him that $200 was all you paid me.” This 
explanation seems to have satisfied Cole, and 
he handed the $300 to Shelley without further 
argument. 

That very afternoon Shelley indulged in a 
grand drunk, and Cole, who chanced to meet 
him in this condition, observed that the one 
and two dollar bills that he had given him 
were the bills that he now spent with so lavish 
a hand. This fact served to arouse his suspi¬ 
cions, and they have been aroused ever since. 
Cole went to Pursell the next day and con¬ 
fided his fears, but Pursell persuaded him that 
they were groundless, and the car driver con¬ 
tinued to hope against hope. 

The records of the civil service board at 
Cooper Union show that in November, 1889, 
Cole successfully passed his examination, at¬ 
taining an average of 83.70. His name was 
placed on the eligible list and there it re¬ 
mained, the “ influence ” that he had so dearly 
purchased having failed to get him the de¬ 
sired appointment. Day after day Cole called 
at Alderman Hart’s cigar store, in Leggett’s 
Hotel, to know whether the alderman had 
“ fixed ” matters, but his calls were all in vain. 

Pursell, the go-between policeman, appears 
to have been desirous of fleecing Cole on his 
own responsibility, for he sent for the car 
driver one day and announced, “ on the quiet,” 
that if Cole would pay him $30 he (Pursell) 
would hurry the matter up with the civil ser¬ 
vice board. “I’ll touch those people in Coop¬ 
er Union,” said he to Cole, “ for I’m very 
thick with Lee Phillips, the secretary.” But 
Cole declined the bait. His wife had just died, 


the strike was on, he had no money, and he 
was generally discouraged. 

“ You’ll have to go to Shelley,” he said, 
“ and get some of my money from him. I 
haven’t another cent.” John Callaghan, a 
workman in the park department, was a wit¬ 
ness to this conversation, which took place at 
the One Hundred and Tenth street entrance to 
the park. 

“Having given up hope of getting either 
the appointment or my money,” continued 
Cole, “I laid off a week recently to threaten 
Shelley. I called on him nearly every day, 
threatening to sue him if he did not refund. 
At first he said he had no money, but finally 
he got $225 from his wife which he paid back 
to me. He still owes me $75, however, and 
for this amount I have determined to sue.” 

Henry I. Meinhard, of 115 Broadway, is 
Cole’s attorney. A Times reporter called 
there yesterday and inquired if Cole’s story 
was correct, and if steps had been taken to 
sue. Mr. Meinhard said that the above story 
was just as Cole had told it to him, and that 
he had written to Shelley to demand a return 
of the $75 to his client. 

John J. Shelley was found at his home, in 
East Eighty-Eighth street. He was too much 
intoxicated to understand the gravity of the 
charge against him, but he admitted, incohe¬ 
rently but emphatically, that it was true. He 
said that Cole gave him some money, but that 
he had paid it all back. 

The conversation that passed between Shel¬ 
ley and Cole led the car driver to think that 
Alderman Hart was the head and front of the 
whole transaction, and that Shelley merely 
acted as his agent. Shelley, in fact, so stated 
to Cole. But when a Times reporter confronted 
the alderman with this story last night. Hart’s 
surprise knew no bounds. He denied vigor¬ 
ously that he had received any money or that 
he was aware of Shelley’s having received 
any. “ Cole came to me several times,” he 
said, “ to know if I could help him get a place 
on the park police force, and Shelley also 
asked me to do what I could for him. Fur¬ 
ther than this I know nothing whatever about 
the man. Candidly, I am not surprised at 
Cole’s deal with Shelley, for I know Shelley 
very well, but if he drags my name into his 
transaction I’ll have him arrested.” 

The irate alderman insisted that the reporter 
should accompany him to Shelley’s house, 
where the bogus superintendent, after much 
shaking, was aroused sufficiently to say that 
he had kept all the money himself; that Hart 
had gotten none of it, and knew nothing about 
it. 

The fact remains, however, that a poor man, 
earning $2 a day, has been fleeced by a re¬ 
sponsible employe of the park department, 
who admits the transaction. This sort of 
thing has been, hinted at several times in con¬ 
nection with the appointment of policemen, 
and here are the facts which prove that it is 
done. Doubtless there are many men on and 
off the force to-day who have been through 
the same experience, with more or less satis¬ 


factory results. Cole’s case may lead to the 
uncovering of others. Shelley probably has 
backers; the openness and fearlessness of his 
rascally dealings indicate that he thought he 
had nothing to fear .—New York Times, April 17. 

—A lively battle was fought out last night 
in Baltimore between the supporters of the 
Harrison administration and its opponents in 
the republican ranks. Primary meetings were 
held to choose delegates to district conventions 
which elect delegates to the state convention, 
on April 8. The state convention will choose 
the delegates to the national convention, 
which will nominate Mr. Harrison’s successor. 
The importance of the contest roused all the 
blood of the republican factions. The Har¬ 
rison faction was led by Postmaster Johnson 
and other federal office-holders. The anti- 
Harrison faction was made up mainly of those 
who wanted federal places and failed to get 
them. The outs controlled the election officers, 
appointed by a majority of the judges in each 
precinct, and thought they had “fixed things.” 
The ins, however, made a splendid fight and 
carried eleven of the twenty-two wards, and 
claimed four more. 

All sorts of charges of ballot-box stuffing 
were banded about last evening, and to day 
the police and the municipal courts had their 
hands full in arresting and punishing the 
brawlers. Two of the judges were arrested in 
one ward on a charge of fighting. Two col¬ 
ored men were fined for fighting in another, 
and six men were taken into custody for as¬ 
sault and disturbing the peace in still another. 
One of Mr. Harrison’s United States marshals 
got into a quarrel in another ward and tore 
the buttons off of the coat and vest of one of 
the judges. One of the judges in another 
ward claimed, at the opening of the polls, that 
there were 200 ballots already in the box, and 
the judges, in another ward, refused to have 
the box opened to show whether it was stuffed 
or not. In ward two a big colored man got 
into a fight with one of Postmaster Johnson’s 
letter carriers. The carrier told his fellow re¬ 
publican “you negroes are no good.” In the 
fight which followed, the negro bit the carrier 
on the cheek and mashed his nose. 

Civil Service Commissioner Roosevelt was 
in the city, and, with Mr. John C. Rose, of the 
local civil service examining board, visited 
several wards in the eastern section, and noted 
the government employes who were actively 
engaged in the contest. 

Mr. D. Pinkney West says he saw these gen¬ 
tlemen at the polls in the Fifth ward, where 
two post-office employes and one custom-house 
employe,who were around the polls, were point¬ 
ed out as displaying offensive partisanship.— 
Washington Dispatch to Boston Post, March SI. 

—The removal of Theodore Roosevelt from 
the civil service commission is among the pos¬ 
sibilities of the near future. His presence at 
the republican primary meetings in Baltimore, 
Monday evening, to note the activity of the 
federal officials in securing Harrison delegates, 
has roused a perfect tempest among the repub¬ 
lican politicians. The friends of the adminis¬ 
tration say that he was there to intimidate 
office holders and prevent their doing the work 
they wanted to in the President’s behalf. Mr. 
Roosevelt went to New York to-day, but he was 
at the quarters of the civil service commission 
before leaving, and alluded, in a jocular man¬ 
ner, to some of his experiences with the Balti¬ 
more toughs. His presence in the primaries 
was noted, and he received some cheers from 
those who sympathized with him and a good 
many hoots from those who did not. His ob¬ 
ject in visiting the primaries was to observe 
the conduct of federal officials, and, under the 
circumstances, there is a degree of force in the 
suggestion that he was aiding the enemies of 
the Harrison administration by insisting on 









226 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the observance of the regulations prohibiting 
offensive partisanship by office holders. All 
the office holders were for Harrison, and inter¬ 
ference with them, or “ intimidation,” as Mr, 
Roosevelt’s enemies call it, would subtract just 
so much from the administration strength. 

Mr. Roosevelt is entirely disinterested in the 
matter, and merely wishes to prevent the pros¬ 
titution of the public service, but his efforts 
happen to strike at the friends of the Presi¬ 
dent, just as they did in the prosecution of the 
Virginia assessment cases when the President 
was so disgusted because Mr. Roosevelt could 
find nobody but republicans to complain of for 
violating the civil service law. 

The President appears to favor civil service 
reform when it works the right way, but he 
does not believe in carrying it far enough to 
wound one’s friends. It would not be surpris¬ 
ing if he listened with considerable sympathy 
to the angry protests of his supporters in Bal¬ 
timore. 

Ex-Congressman Sydney E. Mudd, who was 
seated by Mr. Reed’s Congress, but was beaten 
last November by 1,618 majority, was at the 
White House yesterday, and used some pretty 
strong language regarding Mr. Roosevelt. It 
is currently reported that he demanded his re¬ 
moval, and that the President promised to 
give the matter careful consideration. Mean¬ 
while, Mr. Roosevelt will go right on as though 
the ax were not suspended above his official 
head. He will make a report on the condition 
of things in the civil service at Baltimore, and 
it will not be very pleasant reading for Mr. 
Harrison’s friends. 

The delegate conventions in Baltimore last 
night were almost as noisy and disgraceful as 
the primary meeting of Monday. There were 
bolts in two of the three districts, and the 
foundation was laid for a split in the state 
convention.— Washington Dispatch to Boston Post, 
April 1. 

—The manner in which the Indian service 
has been used as party spoils by Secretary 
Noble can be shown in no clearer light than 
by the presentation of the record of William 
D. Ryder of this city, whom the secretary, on 
October 19, 1887, appointed to be chief herder 
and butcher at the Mescalero Agency in Ari¬ 
zona. 

This appointment is the only position of 
trust that “ Billy ” Ryder, as he is always 
known here, has held. Few persons who 
know him have any knowledge of his source 
of supplies. Though for years he has kept 
within the limits of the law in his personal 
conduct, it has not given him a title to respect¬ 
ability even in the minds of those charitable 
enough to overlook the fact that he is an ex¬ 
convict, whose career up to the period of his 
enforced regularity of habits was in keeping 
w'ith his views and conduct to-day. Though 
he has been active in politics, and enlisted in 
a variety of local political movements, no par¬ 
ty manager has ever had the hardihood even 
to suggest placing him in any public position 
here, where he is known. 

William D. Ryder has a record in the St. 
Louis criminal court. At various times a to¬ 
tal of four indictments, charging felonious as¬ 
saults, have been found against him by regu¬ 
larly empaneled grand juries. His most ag¬ 
gravated offences were two attacks upon John 
Smith. The men fell out on account of some 
bar-room brawl. On October 1, 1874, they 
met in the rotunda of the Southern Hotel. In 


the fight which ensued Ryder used a dirk knife 
seven inches long, with which he stabbed his 
opponent in the groin, left side and left arm. 
Smith emptied his revolver at Ryder without 
effect. The:r second meeting was on February 
22, 1875, on Fourth street. Ryder this time 
slashed open Smith’s clothing with a knife. 
For this offence a warrant charging him with 
assault with intent to kill was sworn out. The 
case went before the grand jury of March, 1875, 
which returned against Ryder two indictments, 
and against Smith one. The record of the 
first action against Ryder, as found in the 
office of the clerk of the criminal court, is as 
follows: 

Case No. 25—March Term—St. Louis Criminal Court 
—The State of Missouri v. Gen. William D. Ryder, for 
assault to kill. R. S. McDonald, attorney for defend¬ 
ant. 

The back of the folder giving the record 
of the court proceedings in the action is as 
follows: 

Recognizance in court—$1,500—R. S. McDonald as 
security—first day—March 11,1875. 

Continued for defendant on affidavit-May 13,1875. 

Continued for defendant because of absence of 
witnesses—July 8, 1875. 

Recognizance forfeited—capias scire facias issued 
and continued—September 15,1875. 

Forfeiture set aside—recognizance in court—$1,500. 
R. S. McDonald as security—September 15,1875. 

Waives reading of indictment—pleads not guilty— 
September 16,1875. 

Trial proceeds—convicted and punishment assessed 
at two years in penitentiary—September 18.1875. 

Motion for new trial filed-September 18,1875. 

Motion continued for defendant—October 23,1875. 

Motion taken under advisement—December!, 1875. 

Motion overruled and sentenced according to ver¬ 
dict to two years in the penitentiary—December 7, 
1875. 

Appeal granted—December 7,1875. 

Supersedeas refused—execution of sentence sus¬ 
pended until 18th day of December, 1875—December 
8. 1875. 

On this action Ryder was imprisoned in the 
Missouri penitentiary. Good-behavior allow¬ 
ance secured his release from the institution 
after serving eighteen months of his two-year 
term. Upon his conviction on the first charge 
the second action against Ryder in connection 
with his troubles with Smith was continued 
generally, and his indictment is No. 52, March 
term, 1875. The case against Smith was also 
dismissed. 

The record also shows two other indictments 
for assault with intent to kill which have been 
found against him. Both of these were for 
the same assault, one being found defective 
and withdrawn in order that the second might 
be properly returned. These charge that on 
December 31, 1875, “William D. Ryder did 
make a felonious assualt upon John Brown, 
using a chair, with which he inflicted on 
Brown’s head several severe wounds.” These 
indictments are numbered 6 and 31 of the Jan¬ 
uary term, 1876. When the defendant was 
committed to the penitentiary for the Smith 
assault, action No. 31 was continued generally. 

During the term of September, 1871, Ryder 
was charged with a petit violation of a city 
ordinance. Indictment 87, of that term, fails 
to record any disposition whatever of the ac¬ 
tion. 


Ryder’s character as a government officer 
was not changed. In a little over two months 
he was removed, because, as is stated on thet 
department books in Washington, he was aj 
turbulent mischief-maker, with whom nobody* 
at the agency could get along. This was the J 
kind of a man sent by the government to setP 
an example to half-civilized Indians. The ^ 
significance of the case consists in the fact that 
the appointment was made from Noble’s own 
city, and that the man’s character had long 
been notorious there.— St. Louis Correspondence 
to New York Evenina Post, Anril IS. 


—It is understood at the navy department 
that Secretary Tracy will hold Naval Con¬ 
structor Feaster responsible for poor workman¬ 
ship on the Alert, at the Mare Island Navy ^ 
Yard. There is good reason to believe that* 
the naval constructor is being held responsi- T 
ble for the work of incompetent subordinates, 
who owe their places to the ward bosses of “ 
San Francisco rather than to their qualifica¬ 
tions as workmen.— Washington Dispatch to ' 
New York Times, April 7. 


—Henry Ehlert, prominent in local political 
circles, has been reported mysteriously missing, 
and many people are whistling for money he 
owes them, ranging in sums from $10 to $500, 
and aggregating several thousands. Inquiries 
for him have developed that he is now, or was 
a few days ago, in Washington, D. C., and is 
the central figure in a movement to have Post¬ 
master Harlow, of this city, removed from his 
position. 

Ehlert is a sharp politician, has long been 
recognized as a man with a “pull,” and 
for a long time has held positions, generally in 
the United States marshal’s office or similar 
places where detective talent was required. 
About six weeks ago complaints began to be 
made against Harlow, and they continued and 
assumed quite a serious character, but they 
were disproved. It noxv develops that Harlow's 
course in running his office on business principles 
has displeased the politicians, and a regular plot, in¬ 
volving well known politicians, and several clei ks in 
the post-office, was formed. The clerks furnished in¬ 
formation from inside the office, and Ehlert did the 
outside work, politicians of more prominence direct¬ 
ing the game, but remaining in the background .— 
St. Louis Dispatch to New York Times, April 16. 


—“ Boss ” Filley is coming to be a political 
quantity that even Harrison must consider. 
Missouri people fancy they see a purpose man¬ 
ifest to send him to Japan. Filley was asked 
to go abroad as far as that once before, but 
he thrust his tongue in his cheek and said: 
“No, thank you.” 

Now he is occasionally tickled. To-day Eu¬ 
gene F. Weigel of St. Louis, a worker in Fil¬ 
ley’s political vineyard, was appointed a special 
land inspector by Secretary Noble, who had 
some time ago secured for him a place under 
Census Commissioner Porter. As this business 
had stopped, Mr. Filley has sought something 
more for him, and this is the result. 

The interest to Missourians in this is not as 
to whether Weigel is a fit man or not. It is 
that it indicates the intention of the President 
to use Filley as his agent to capture the Mis¬ 
souri delegation for Harrison in 1892. Noble 
must, of course, be let in, or he would not wil¬ 
lingly let Filley get any patronage Filley 
seems to have forgotten the Schuarte contest, 
and willing to “ let bygones be bygones.”— 
Washington Dispatch to New York Times, March 
20 . 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. Meridian St.. Indianapolis, Ind., where subscriptions and advertisments will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


VoL. I, No. 27. INDIANAPOLIS, MAY, 1891. terms :<( fcentsVer'copy"” 


The annual business meeting of the In¬ 
diana Civil Service Reform Association will 
tbe held at the Denison Hotel,Indianapolis, 
June 6, 1891, at two o’clock in the after¬ 
noon. 

There are some people quite near the 
^ President, who are in the habit of saying 
to him, and to others, that those in Indiana 
who have for some years been earnestly 
working to advance theadoption of the merit 
system, do not have the sympathy of the 
people. They say in effect that the people 
want the offices used to pay for personal and 
party service, and that they like to see the 
recipients of the offices bend every energy 
to help the fortunes of the leaders to whom 
they are indebted; and they even go so 
far as to say that it would be a popular 
thing to repeal the civil service law. The 
demonstration in this city at the Roose¬ 
velt dinner was a crushing blow to these 
assertions. Mr. Roosevelt is the uncom¬ 
promising and outspoken enemy of the 
use of public office in any manner as spoil. 
Indiana has some strong advocates of the 
merit system, but none in any manner 
more so than he is. We call the attention 
of the President to the names of those? 
many of them his neighbors, who joined in 
this demonstration of approval of Mr. Roos¬ 
evelt and of the cause of civil service reform. 

The dinner ought a'so to silence the 
quite general talk that the state of Indiana 
in the matter of spoils is worse than the rest 
of the country, and that its people are al¬ 
most hopelessly besotted. In order to dis 
pel this illusion, not only in the mind of 
the President, but of others not familiar 
with Indiana, we mention with consider¬ 
able particularity, some of those who took 
pari: 

John H. Holliday, editor of the Indi¬ 
anapolis News; Morris Ross, Hilton U. 
Brown,Wm. Fortune and Meredith Nichol¬ 
son, of the News staff; Samuel E. Morss, 
editor of the Indianapolis Sentinel; Wm. 
A. Woods, judge of the United States court; 
Byron K. Elliott, judge of the supreme 
court; James B. Black, chief justice of the 
appellate court; Edgar A. Brown, judge 
of the circuit court; W. E. Niblack, ex¬ 
judge of the supreme court; Livingston 
Howland, ex-judge of the circuit court; 
Rufus Magee, President Cleveland’s minis¬ 
ter to Sweden; William P. Fishback, mas¬ 


ter in chancery. United States court; No¬ 
ble C. Butler, clerk of the United States 
courts; John L. Griffiths, supreme court 
reporter; Jacob P. Dunn, state librarian; 
George T. Porter, son of the present min¬ 
ister to Italy; John R. Wilson, clerk of 
Marion county; E. B. Martindale, world’s 
fair commissioner; Oliver T. Morton, son 
of Indiana’s war governor; J. E. McCul¬ 
lough, member of the general assembly; 
V. T. Mallott, president of the Indiana na¬ 
tional bank; H. H. Hanna, president of 
the Atlas engine works; C. W. Fairbanks, 
general solicitor Cincinnati, Hamilton and 
Dayton railway company; Otto Gresham, 
son of Judge Walter Q. Gresham, Wm. 
Henderson, a life-long democrat and a 
leading citizen in the prosecution of the 
Coy tally-sheet forgers, John A. Butler, 
teller of the Capital National Bank, and E. 
P. Thompson, acting postmaster at Indian¬ 
apolis. 


The Scholar in Politics was represented 
by John M. Coulter, president-elect of the 
State University; J. J. Mills, president of 
Earlham College; A. L. Mason, dean of the 
De Pauw University law school; T. L. Sew- 
all, principal of the Girls’ Classical school, 
and W. W. Grant, principal of the Indian¬ 
apolis high school. 

The church was represented by Rev. N. 
A. Hyde, Rev. H. A. Cleveland, Rev. Jos¬ 
eph A. Milburn, Rev. George E. Swan, 
Rev. R. V Hunter, and Rev. Joseph S* 
Jenckes. 

The medical profession was represented 
by Doctors E. F. Hodges, W. B. Fletcher, 
J. N. Hurty, J. L. Thompson, Theodore S. 
Potter, W. N. Wishard and 0. S. Runnells. 

The legal profession was represented by 
John T. Dye, William A. Ketcham, Addi¬ 
son C. Harris, John Coburn, Edward Dan¬ 
iels, Albert Baker, Alpheus H. Snow, Har¬ 
ry J. Milligan, Chester Bradford, Nathan 
Morris, Alfred F. Potts, J. M. Winters, W. 
F. Elliott, M.G. McLain, W. A. Van Buren, 
Charles Martindale, Frank H. Blackledge, 
Allan W. Hendricks, Albert J. Beveridge, 
Evans Woollen, William H. Dye, H. D. 
Pierce and R. B. Oglesbee. 

There were also Herman Lieber and 
William Haueiscn, representative and lead¬ 
ing Germans; Theodore E. Griffith, 1. S. 
Gordon, H. W. Bennett, D. C. Griffith, W. 
J. Holliday, wholesale merchants; John C, 


Dean, .George Merritt and William L. 
Elder, manufacturers, and others of equal 
standing in the community. 

Can the President look at these names 
in connection with the occasion and be in 
doubt as to their significance ? Their sig¬ 
nificance, Mr. President, is that the people 
like Theodore Roosevelt and they like the 
cause he represents. They like him be¬ 
cause he fights a manly battle against the 
pirates and buccaneers of his own party. 
They like him because he believes in keep¬ 
ing promises, and they like him because 
he knows how to strike a hard and telling 
blow on the right side and is not afraid to 
do it. They like his cause—the cause of 
civil service reform—because it means 
fair play and economy and a higher tone 
of public morals, and because it means the 
disappearance of the Quays and the Dud¬ 
leys and of all those like Mahone and 
Headsman Clarkson. 

The soberness and pertinacity with 
which spoilsmen urge exploded argu¬ 
ments is one of the daily amusements. For 
some time now we have been hearing 
of a man who says he was once a civil 
service reformer, but, in simple ignorance 
of the way the world is passing him, has 
for years been steadily citing Trollope, as 
the one all-sufficient argument in opposi¬ 
tion to the merit system. Anthony Trol¬ 
lope was opposed to the merit system of 
his own country because he had made a 
valuable public official, and yet he could 
never have got into the service by an ex¬ 
amination ; therefore the system of exami¬ 
nations was bad. This argument is a shade 
less foolish than Boss Quay’s and Boss Gor¬ 
man’s dread of an office holding aristocracy, 
and it is about as easily disposed of. Young 
Trollope, who had been zealously sowing 
wild oats, was put by favoritism into the 
public service because that was the least 
expensive field for his operations for his 
family and because of the hope that the re¬ 
sponsibility of public office might sober 
him. It was a toss-up whether his oppor¬ 
tunity would turn him into an officer like 
young Raum or reform him. Under tuese 
circumstances, Trollope was hardly a dis¬ 
interested critic of a system which de¬ 
stroyed the practice of giving places in the 
English service to the younger sons of the 
aristocracy and opened them to compe¬ 
tition, in which the sons of working men 



















228 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


stood an equal chance. It would seem that 
the opinions of the long line of Eoglish 
statesmen from Macaulay to Gladstone, 
backed by the entire body of the English 
people, should weigh something. 

The Chronicle mentioned last month the 
removal of McCain, an excellent policeman 
with years of efficient service and a good 
character back of him, to make roomfor new 
republicans. Since then the board has had 
to dismiss one of the new republicans for 
going into the residence of a prominent 
citizen and insulting the inmates. The 
board had better adopt the competitive 
system and avoid the constant charge of 
exercising the worst kind of favoritism. 

The tax situation here is becoming 
somewhat strained and it will become 
more so. It is beyond doubt that this city 
will have to pay higher taxes, and no one 
can reasonably complain of some increase. 
But the temper of the people is mistaken 
if it is thought that for every dollar of 
their money they will not demand value 
received. The memory of man does not 
run to the contrary when the city has not 
had a crowd of nominal laborers whiling 
away the time upon the streets. The 
street-cleaning department has been a 
place where the street commissioner’s 
relatives and friends hired out their one- 
horse wagons, and the henchmen of coun- 
cilmen and political bosses rendered nom¬ 
inal services for real pay. If the new city 
government is worth anything, it will put 
an end to this species of piracy. There is 
only one final and effectual method, and 
that is the Boston labor system, which ex¬ 
cludes politics from the choice of laborers. 
Street-cleaning by contract is a temporary 
expedient which, like a stone-yard for 
tramps, the Boys will constantly clamor to 
have done away with. It may here be re¬ 
marked that the board of public safety is 
deliberately wasting money in its unlawful 
division of the places in the fire depart- 
rnent. It has hired fourteen democrats 
without the slightest pretense that the city 
needed the men; or as the president,Sterling 
R. Holt, puts it, it decided to “ increase 
the fire department by putting on fourteen 
democrats that fourteen experienced fire¬ 
men, who are republicans, might remain.” 

Perhaps the most striking reason why 
all other reforms should be subordinated to 
civil service reform is the solidarity of 
spoilsmen. When it comes to any attack 
to prevent their plunder of the public, 
they know no party. Some instances of 
this are given in another part of this paper. 
A further illustration is the following from 
the April Civil Service Reformer: 

Whatever party name spoilsmen may find it advan¬ 
tageous to assume, they are always ready to come to¬ 
gether for parcelling out offices when a good trade is 


more profitable than a fight, as we saw in the recent 
debate in the senate, when Mr. Gorman defended 
Mr. Wanamaker in his evasions of the civil service 
law, and united with his republican opponent, Mr. 
Plumb, in looting the office of the supervising ar¬ 
chitect. And whatever set of spoilsmen happen to 
be in power in any given state will always resist any 
measure tending toward a just and fair expression 
of the people’s will at the elections. Thus we find 
Mr. Boutelle, and if the Bangor correspondent of the 
New York Times is to be believed. Mr. Blaine and 
Mr. Reed also, in Maine, in 1891, like Mr. Gorman, 
in Maryland, in 1890, vigorously opposing the Aus¬ 
tralian ballot system. Mr. Boutelle fought the law 
in his Bangor IP/iij;. because it would injure republi¬ 
can supremacy, just as Mr. Gorman denounced it as 
“ a scheme to send the democratic party to the rear.” 
And the Maine " ring influence,’' quite in the tone 
of the Gorman orators and papers, mutatis mutandis, 
sought to influence the republican majority to vote 
against the bill by pointing out that the democratic 
minority was going to vote solidly for it. 

The republicans in the city council 
joined in with Sim Coy and his gang and 
elected a Coy democrat president of the 
council, under the new charter, over the 
regular democratic candidate who is suffi¬ 
ciently vouched for by saying that he is an 
anti-Coy democrat. The republican ma¬ 
chine here secured the pardon of Coy out 
of prison on the ground that he was too 
poor to pay his fine, and he at once put 
upon the market notes amounting to hun¬ 
dreds of dollars secured by mortgage. The 
Indianapolis Journal has taken to eulogiz¬ 
ing him in its columns. Why did not the 
republicans elect Coy president of the 
council and be open and above-board ? To 
choose one of his naming is the same as 
choosing him. The democratic party is 
doing its best to get rid of Coy, and possi¬ 
bly the republican party is going to take 
him up. The majority of the democrats 
are trying to give the city a good govern¬ 
ment, and if they do not succeed it will be 
because the republicans prevent it by unit¬ 
ing with the Coy gang. 


The Civil Service Commission has un¬ 
earthed another Raum peccadillo. This 
particular Raum is the son of the pension 
commissioner for whom his father created 
the place of appointment clerk in the pen¬ 
sion department, and who is charged with 
having sold a place and with stealing .$72. 
The commission called the case to the at 
tention of the secretary of the interior, the 
secretary of the treasury and the attorney 
general. Young Raum was found so guilty 
that he was allowed to resign with thirty 
days’ pay. Attorney-General* Miller, al¬ 
though requested by the commission to 
give an opinion whether this Raum’s 
offenses were punishable by law, with a 
zeal akin to his zeal in the case of the Ma- 
hone blackmailers, declined to do so un¬ 
less requested by the President. He has 
referred the papers laid before him by the 
commission to the government prosecutor 
for the District of Columbia, and, judging 
again by the Mahone-blackmail standard. 


this prosecutor will put the papers where 
they will never trouble any Raum. 

How much more Raumism can the 
President stand ? 

The various labor organizations are the 
stanchest supporters of the merit system 
in Buffalo. The Buffalo Sunday Truth, 
March 29, contains the resolutions of Car¬ 
penters Union, No. 9, over the recent ap¬ 
pointment by the civil service board of one 
of their members to a place in the city fire 
department. The resolutions say: 

Qualified carpenters will find their aspirations for 
po.sitions on the various city offices sooner or later 
realized by applying through the medium of the 
civil service than through politics. 

Politics has a nod and a shake for the workingman 
during the season of incubation, but the delusion 
and deception leaves the seeker after political offices 
in a weak and helpless condition after he has spent 
his time for empty and sterile promises. 

It is not so with the civil service: it is slow but 
quality and merit win without loss of time or 
money. It is the only sure way that the working¬ 
man can obtain a position on any of the city depart¬ 
ments. 


MORE QUAYISM. 

The people of Pennsylvania want a ballot 
reform law like that of Indiana, and with that 
view a bill has been introduced into Quay’s 
legislature. That body made the bill over un¬ 
til if passed it will be an effective agent of 
ballot thieves. One of the most active men in 
thus ruining a great reform measure is Presi¬ 
dent Harrison’s collector of internal revenue, 
Martin. In prder that the make-up of this 
federal office holder may be known, a good deal 
of space is given elsewhere to an accountof him 
from the New York World, which was published 
over six months ago and has never been de¬ 
nied. Making all the allowances necessary for 
a somewhat dramatic style, Martin is, under 
the circumstances, left with a very black char¬ 
acter. The people of Pennsylvania have once 
shown that they can throw Quayism, even 
when backed by the Administration, headed 
by Wanamaker. Apparently they will have 
to do it again, and throw it hard enough to 
break its bones. What it is to be in the grip 
of Quay is shown by the fact that apparently 
no Philadelphia paper dares to tell the truth 
about him or any of his Men. We quote from 
the private letter of a correspondent whose in¬ 
formation and veracity are beyond question : 

I ask your kind attention to the enclosed clipping 
from the New York World of October ^Oih, which 
gives what I believe, in the main, to be a perfectly 
reliable sketch of the career of one of our prominent 
and most influential politicians, David Martin ; and 
also the circumstances attending his appointment to 
the position of collector of internal revenue. The 
citizens’ municipal association was about to protest 
against David Martin’s appointment to his present 
post, when the news came that his appointment was 
an accomplished fact. I regret that the gentlemen 
who had this matter in charge were deterred from at 
least making his career known to the public. David 
Martin and Charles Porter are very near to Mr. Quay, 
and have been instrumental in procuring the amend¬ 
ments to our Baker ballot reform bill, now pending 
in the senate, which changed it from a measure in 
the interest of an honest ballot to one calculated to 
aid the ballot thieves. That a man of Martin’s record 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


229 


and past associations could have come to the posi¬ 
tion of political influence which he now occupies is 
a sad commentary upon the moral standards of Amer¬ 
ican political life; hut this is a fact which we have to 
confront. These men are now doing all in their 
power to prevent ballot reform, and I now feel con¬ 
vinced that so long as they remain in power the pol¬ 
itics of Pennsylvania can not be brought into a 
healthy state. The condition of things is exasperat¬ 
ing to the highest degree. A number of our news¬ 
papers are fighting hard to push the bill through, 
but I liave never known any of them to expose Mar¬ 
lin’s career or attack him personaily on the grounds 
of his public record, nor do they attack Quay. 

THE ROOSEVELT DINNER. 


A surprising anti sure indication of public 
feeling in Indiana was .shown on the evening 
of May 16. Early that week it was learned 
that Theodore Roosevelt would pass through 
Indianapolis on the 16th, and the suggestion 
that he be given some indication of the esteem 
in which both himself and the cause which he 
represents are held was responded to, not only 
from this city, but from all parts of the state, 
with a spontaneity that ought to settle the ques¬ 
tion how the leading men of Indiana stand 
upon the matters involved. The following 


joined in tendering 
at the Propylaeum. 
present: 

Noble C. Butler. 

Wm. D. Foulke. 

Lucius B. Swift. 

Oliver T. Morton. 

John L. Griffiths. 
William Fortune. 
Alfred F. Potts. 

John E. Bradshaw. 

Geo. T. Porter. 

E. F. Hodges. 

John A. Butler. 

W. P. Fishback. 

A. C. Harris. 

W. A. Woods. 

E. B. Martindale. 

N. A. Hyde. 

Meredith Nicholson. 
John H. Holliday. 

Otto Gresham. 

M. G. McLain. 

Morris Ross. 

Byron K. Elliott. 

John T. Dye. 

Evans Woollen. 

Wm. H. Dye. 

W. A. Van Buren. 

W. F. Elliott. 

Chas. R. Lane. 

Hewitt Howland. 

I. S. Gordon. 

Albert J. Beveridge. 

W. B. Fletcher. 

Nathan Morris. 

Chester Bradford. 

Edgar A. Brown. 
William C. Bobbs. 
Claude Griffith. 

John M. Coulter. 
William L. Elder. 
William Henderson. 

W. S. Kirk. 

H. J. Kimble. 

J. K. Lily. 

J. E. McCullough. 
George Merritt. 

J. J. Mills. 

William L. Meredith. 
Rufus Magee. 

A. H. Snow. 

E. P. Thompson, 

John R. Wilson. 

J. S. 


, dinner to Mr. Roosevelt 
Nearly one hundred were 

Frank H. Blackledge. 

W. E. Niblaek. 

Harry J. Milligan. 

Arthur B. Grover. 

A. L. Mason. 

James B. Black. 

John C. Dean. 

W. W. Grant. 

Livingston Howland. 
John Coburn. 

W. R. Holloway. 

Charles Martindale. 
Hilton U. Brown. 

J. N. Hurty. 

H. A. Cleveland. 

Edward Daniels. 

Albert Baker. 

Allan W. Hendricks. 

John Lawrie. 

W. B. Roberts. 

Joseph A. Mllburn. 

Lee Travers. 

J. L. Thompson. 

J. M. Winters. 

W. H. Griffith. 

H. W. Bennett. 

T. E. Griffith. 

C. W. Fairbanks. 

J. K. Sharpe, Jr. 

D. C. Griffith. 

William Haueisen. 
Herman Lieber. 

Jacob P. Dunn. 

W. H. Hobbs. 

W. J. Holliday. 

James W. Hull. 

R. V. Hunter. 

Joseph S. Jenckes. 
William A. Ketcham. 

S. E. Morss. 

V. T. Malott. 

R. B. Ogleshee. 

Theodore S. Potter. 

H. D. Pierce. 

N. S. Rosenau. 

O. S. Runnels. 

T. L. Sewall. 

Geo. E. Swan. 

D. B. Shideler. 

M. N. Wishard. 

H. H. Hanna. 

Holliday. 


Among the regrets were the following: 

[From George I. Reed, Kansas City.] 

I join my Indiana friends in honoring their 
guest, the distinguished advocate of civil serv¬ 
ice reform. 

[From Rev. E. C. Bogemann, otSt. CharlesBorromeo’s, 
Bloomington.] 

I regret very much to be compelled to forego 
the pleasure of honoring one of the foremost 
leaders of so worthy a cause—civil service re¬ 
form. 

[From D. N. Foster, Fort Wayne.] 

Mr. Roosevelt has proven a signal success 
in the very difficult position he fills, and I 
should be greatly pleased to show my appreci¬ 
ation of the manner in which he has dis¬ 
charged his official duties by my presence 
with you at the coming banquet. 

[From George B. Cardwill, New Albany ] 

It goes without saying, that I have very 
great admiration for Mr. Roosevelt, and I envy 
the gentlemen who will have the pleasure of 
dining with him. 

[From Charles H. Aldrich, Chicago.] 

It would afford me deep pleasure to unite 
with you and your associates in this tribute to 
Mr. Roosevelt, whose splendid services to the 
cause of civil service and municipal reform 
entitle him to the gratitude of every "true 
American citizen. 

[From Calvin Fletcher, Spencer.] 

Mr. Roosevelt is one of the few men whom 
I would go far to honor. 

[From John H. Jacobs, Fort Wayne.] 

I very much regret that the condition of my 
health is such as to prevent the acceptance of 
the invitation you so kindly send me. That 
the dinner may be a very enjoyable one, and 
that it may greatly encourage all the par¬ 
ticipants to renewed efforts toward the con¬ 
summation of our hopes is my earnest desire. 

[From C. R. Boyer, Williamsport.] 

I am in receipt of an invitation to join in 
a dinner to be given to the Hon. Theodore 
Roosevelt at the Propylaeum, in your city, on 
Saturday evening. My advanced years make 
it inexpedient for me to roost from home, 
while the night train does not stop at our 
place; but I do not wish to be remiss, when 
measures in support of the good cause are in 
course of prosecution. I would like, there¬ 
fore, to tax your courtesy to put the enclosed 
five dollars where it will do the most good. 

[From Henry M. Williams, Ft. Wayne.] 

I shall hope for the success of the entertain¬ 
ment in honor of Mr. Roosevelt, a most valiant 
fighter in the cause. Please use this draft for 
five dollars, enclosed, for a plate for some one 
who will help on the cause, or otherwise as 
you see fit. 

THE SPEECHES. 

Mr. Noble C. Butler presided, and at the 
close of the dinner introduced Mr. Roosevelt 
as follows: 

Gentlemen: We have not met here as 
members of the republican and democratic 
parties to wrangle over the political issues 
which divide us. If there is any one thing 
on which the two parties are thoroughly 


agreed it is on the importance and necessity 
of reform in the civil service. Any wholly 
unprejudiced person, exempt from local and 
temporary prepossessions, like Macaulay’s itin¬ 
erant New Zealander or Goldsmith’s philo¬ 
sophic Chinaman, for instance, who might 
naturally seek in the platforms of bur parties 
for a disclosure of their senliments and reject 
other testimony as secondary and impertinent, 
would find in them the most ample and indis¬ 
putable proof of my statement. An examina¬ 
tion of their platforms for the last decade or 
two shows how deeply they have been im¬ 
pressed. They have actually vied with one 
another in an emphatic condemnation of the 
practices which ought to be reformed, and 
they have repeatedly, with zeal and enthu¬ 
siasm, pledged themselves to the particular 
reformation of them which has been slowly 
but successfully installed in the governments 
of some of our cities and states, and in the 
national government. It is true that some of our 
statesmen of one party or the other, in execu¬ 
tive sessions or committee of the whole, have 
teased the civil service commission of the 
United States with playful threats of with¬ 
holding the appropriations on which its ex¬ 
istence depends, but on being called before the 
country, in a vote of the yeas and nays, they 
have pulled themselves together with com¬ 
mendable alacrity, and resolutely voted for a 
continuance of the appropriations; and, at 
the very next state or national convention of 
their party, have pointed with pri^e at the 
record and result of their votes. 

As all of us here belong to one or the other 
of the two parties, and our confessions of faith 
are in their platforms, it plainly and inevita¬ 
bly follows that we are all civil service re¬ 
formers. Any impeachment of that syllogism 
must be at the expense of our sincerity or 
partisan fealty. A denial of its conclusion 
would amount to a charge that we are all 
hypocrites, or it might fasten upon us the 
dreadful stigma of being “weak-kneed or “in¬ 
vertebrate,” or something else that is quite 
short of a “good democrat,” or a “good repub¬ 
lican,” and which is simply too horrible to 
contemplate. 

If my argument is so broad that it takes in 
the whole country, and by so doing fails to 
recognize the existence of any difference of 
opinion, here or elsewhere, it may require 
some modification, even at the loss of a beauti¬ 
ful vision of political harmony. But whether 
we are all technically civil service reformers or 
not, we ought, as good citizens, to sympathize 
with purposes which have as their end the se¬ 
lection for minor posts under the national, 
state and municipal governments, of persons 
who are qualified to fill them. There should 
be no difference of opinion about the end we 
seek, whatever may be thought of the means. 
And, so far as the means are concerned, we 
are trying to do just what our brethren over 
the way are doing in the administration of 
their charities and corrections; we are en¬ 
deavoring to substitute a scientific method for 
political empiricism. As good citizens we are 










230 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


( 


all agreed that only those who are qualified 
for official position should hold them, but we 
ought further to agree that there should be 
some precise and definite method for ascer¬ 
taining and testing the qualifications of those 
who seek them. 

Among those whose intentions are good and 
unselfish the differences concerning methods 
will disappear with the progress of enlighten¬ 
ment, although they may be given up slowly 
and even reluctantly. The wife of Martin 
Luther looked back with regret upon old be¬ 
liefs after the Keformation had made them 
impossible for her; and on the verge of Ca¬ 
naan the Israelites yearned for the flesh-pots 
of Egypt. Men may yet think for awhile that 
the old way is the best simply on account of 
its age; that correct views of the tariff are a 
better equipment for a letter carrier than a 
knowledge of reading and writing or the geog¬ 
raphy of his city and state; or that an Indi¬ 
anapolis policeman ought to be examined with 
reference to the state of his mind concerning 
what is known as the southern question in¬ 
stead of the municipal ordinances which he is 
to conserve and enforce. But these are no¬ 
tions which properly belong to the palaeozoic 
age of politics—they are survivals of it. Not¬ 
withstanding these notions, and in spite of 
them, the spirit of civil service reform is 
abroad in the land, and, like that of old John 
Brown, is marching on. It is but a little while 
since it invaded the Indian service, it is break¬ 
ing into the navy yards, and it prevails in the 
Indianapolis post-office. And it is not done 
yet. 

We have heard a good deal about the 
scholar in politics, and the phrase like that of 
the Christian statesman, has been a little 
soiled with misuse. As Doll Tearsheet says, 
they are all most excellent good words, but they 
have been ill sorted. At times I have my doubts 
whether scholarship has much to do with pol 
itics or much influence upon it. Neverthe¬ 
less we admire and respect genuine scholar¬ 
ship, and we know that if politics does not 
heed what scholarship has to say about social, 
political and economic truths, it will be so 
much the worse for politics. But there is 
something I like even better in politics than 
scholarship, and that is manliness. And 
when we have a combination of the two qual¬ 
ities in any man or set of men, it seems to me 
that all of us, who wish well for politics, and 
for the country whose most vital interests are 
described by that term, ought to grapple him 
and them to our souls with hooks of steel. 

I have in my mind some men of that sort 
in both hemispheres, and among them, easily 
the first, the grand old man of England, rises 
before it. And it should be a cause of patri¬ 
otic pride that we have men of that sort in 
our own country and the number of them is 
increasing; that we have men who discuss 
public questions in the reviews as well as on 
the rostrum, intelligently and instructively, 
with fairness and candor; who have written 
thoughtful and discriminating biographies of 
our public men; whose contributions to our 


historical literature are worthy of a place by 
the side of those of Francis Parkman; and 
who take with them into the primaries and 
political conventions the courage of their 
opinions and teaching, and actively and ef¬ 
fectively maintain them. 

It is my privilege to know at least one of 
these rare men, whose “ Winning of the West ” 
has not ended with the delightful volumes 
which bear that title. He is not one of those 
writers who are content to sit in their studies, 
or their sanctums, and survey the political 
arena with a field glass, graciously bestowing 
their valuable opinions upon the actors in it 
at long range; buj he has gone down into it 
and fought with beasts at Ephesus—and other 
places. He is as practical a politician as any, 
with the important qualification of the term 
which is given it by the fact that he stands for 
an idea and not for spoils. F'or aught I know, 
and I speak now after the manner of the unre¬ 
generate, he has as many and as distinguished 
scalps at his belt as any warrior of Tammany 
or member of the Slick Six, for he does not 
fight as one who beateth the air. The gentle¬ 
man of whom I have been speaking, and for 
whom you have been impatiently waiting, I 
now have the honor and the pleasure of intro¬ 
ducing to you in the person of the Hon. The¬ 
odore Roosevelt, of the United States civil ser¬ 
vice commission. 

MR. ROOSEVELT 

began by a discussion of the merit system in 
the federal service and of the character of the 
examinations, and took occasion to answer 
the mountain-in-the-moon critics. After pass¬ 
ing around specimen examination questions 
and answers, he then said : 

“Hitherto I have spoken from a non-parti¬ 
san stand-point; now, I intend to say a few 
words as a republican in a response to a recent 
attack on the reform system by one who also 
claims to be a republican. Ex-assistant Post¬ 
master-General Clarkson, in a recent article in 
the North American Review, has obligingly fur¬ 
nished an instance of that species of attack 
on the law which consists in a loose diatribe, 
equally compounded of rambling declama¬ 
tion and misstatement, and, as he therein 
throws down the gauntlet to the civil service 
commission, it gives me much pleasure to take 
it up. 

“Mr. Clarkson says that the ‘civil service 
commission is more unfriendly and more op¬ 
posed to the republican party under Harrison 
than it was under Cleveland.’ Being inter¬ 
preted, this Bunsby-like utterance is mer ly 
Mr. Clarkson’s way of saying that the com¬ 
mission is rigidly enforcing the law. Mr. 
Clarkson is laboring under a confusion of 
ideas. He mistakes himself and those who 
sympathize with his views for the republican 
party; a mistake akin to that chronicled by 
.^op in his little fable of the frog and the 
ox. Now, the civil service commission most 
undoubtedly is hostile to the individuals who 
share the theories expressed in Mr. Clarkson’s 
article; the commission can not both do its 
duty and retain their good will any more than 


a policeman can do his duty and retain the f 
good will of the law-breakers. But the com¬ 
mission is not hostile to the republican party. 
On the contrary, it is busily engaged in keep¬ 
ing one of the promises which the republican 
party made in the convention of 1888, a prom¬ 
ise which Mr. Clarkson and his friends now 
wish to break. 

“Mr. Clarkson might just as well say that 
Secretary Tracy is hostile to the republican 
party because he has introduced the principle 
of civil service reform into the navy yards, or 
he might go farther yet and say that Presi¬ 
dent Harrison is more hostile to the republi¬ 
cans than ex-President Cleveland was because 
he has extended the classified service to in¬ 
clude the Indian department. 

“There are some points in Mr. Clarkson’s 
article with which I agree, and there are cer¬ 
tain of his objects with which I sympathize. 
But he is not setting to work in the right way 
to attain these objects. He is against mug- 
wumpery. Very good; but does he not see 
that to have a responsible republican poli¬ 
tician advocate such views as appear in his 
article is playing right into the mugmump’s 
hands, and is justifying his existence? More¬ 
over, it is just as foolish for Mr. Clarkson to 
say that the democratic party has ‘purchased’ 
the mugwump newspapers, as it would be to 
say that the democratic party has ‘ purchased ’ 
Mr. Clarkson to write his article, which is 
much better fitted to damage the republican 
party than any conceivable mugmump edi¬ 
torial. Mr. Clarkson says he wishes to get 
the young men of courage and conviction to 
join the republican party ; does he not realize 
that in writing such (stuff) he is doing his 
best to keep them out of the party? Mr. 
Clarkson believes in the practical politician. 

So do I; but when, as he has recently done, 
Mr. Clarkson comes into Massachusetts of all 
places in the world to advocate the spoils sys¬ 
tem and an inflated currency, he is acting as 
if he were an unpractical politician of the 
most comic variety. He is doing his l)e.st to 
help the democrats keep control of the state. 
Nor, be it remembered, did he succeed, in spite 
of the patronage at his command, in keeping 
lov/a in line. 

“ Much of Mr. Clarkson’s article consists of 
the solemn statement of truisms which nobody 
denies and of assaults upon positions which no 
sane being holds; much of the remainder, 
whatever relevance it may have to some not 
very clearly defined idea of his own, certainly 
has none whatever to civil service reform. 
When he does deal with this subject he fails 
to advance one new fact or put forward a sin¬ 
gle theory which has not been a hundred 
times refuted; he merely parades the usual 
dreary Falstaffian army of exploded and fool¬ 
ish untruths. He represents civil service re¬ 
formers as maintaining ‘that office-holding 
does not concern the people.’ On the contrary, 
we maintain that it does concern the people; 
whereas Mr. Clarkson and his friends insist 
that itonly concerns the oligarchy of political 
place-hunters. He apparently thinks that the 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


231 


founders of the government believed in the 
spoils system; whereas a glance at any good 
school history would have taught him that it 
was forty years after the adoption of the con¬ 
stitution before this brutal and degrading 
practice was openly avowed and defended in 
our national politics. He expresses a desire 
for ‘practical’ examinations; but of course, if 
he knows anything of our examinations at all, 
he must know that they are eminently practi¬ 
cal already, and admirably fitted to test the 
qualifications of the candidates ; whereas, 
nothing could be more impractical than to 
examine a would-be clerk or letter carrier as 
to the strength of his political backing, or the 
extent of his influence with prominent party 
leaders. He advocates ‘pass’ examinations, 
which, as every one who has looked into the 
subject knows, are simple shams, serving no 
useful purpose whatever, especially if con¬ 
ducted by the heads of departments, as Mr. 
Clarkson advises. 

“He speaks of the commission as ‘abso¬ 
lutely unknown to the constitution.’ What 
he means by this is obscure—probably he 
himself is not quite certain about it. If he will 
read through the constitution he will find 
that it does not contain a catalogue of offices; 
and, of course, it no more mentions the civil 
service commission than it does the first as- 
* sistant postmaster-general. If he means that 
the law providing for the commission is un¬ 
constitutional, why does he not test the matter 
in the court? He says he would retain faith¬ 
ful public servants, but he knows perfectly 
well that this can only be done under the civil 
service law which he condemns, and that he 
himself, while assistant postmaster-general, ad¬ 
ministered and was obliged to administer the 
patronage of the fourth-class offices—as all his 
predecessors did before him—on a purely spoils 
basis, turning out the faithful and unfaithful 
alike, if their places were sought by influential 
politicians. He also expresses a desire that 
there should be a separation of the appointing 
power from the legislative power. This is ex¬ 
actly what the civil service law provides and 
what Mr. Clarkson and his friends strenu¬ 
ously oppose. Surely he can not keep a serious 
face and deny that during his own term of 
office he treated the fourth-class offices as 
simply theproperty of the congressman, good or 
bad, in whose district they were situated. If 
this is not mingling the appointing and legisla¬ 
tive power nothing (Jan be. Mr. Clarkson is cer¬ 
tainly not happy in his arguments. Mr. 
Clarkson loudly proclaims that he is a 
straightout republican. He says: ‘ I believe 
that when Benjamin Harrison was elected 
President of the United States, on a platform 
of republican principles, he was elected to 
carry out those principles.’ Exactly; and 
one of those principles was the continuation 
and the extension of the reform of the civil 
service, begun under republican auspices. 
President Harrison’s civil service commission 
is actively carrying out this principle, this 
pledge of the party platform, while Mr. Clark¬ 
son and his followers are striving—with entire 


lack of success, by the way—to prevent its 
being done. 

“The fact that the majority of the people 
want one president elected rather than another 
no more means that all the clerks and letter 
carriers should be turned out than having 
Grant instead of McClellan at the head of the 
army of the Potomac implied the dismissal of 
all the privates who served under the latter. 

“Finally Mr. Clarkson makes an astound¬ 
ing confession, though it is a confession which 
logically follows from his principles and prac 
tices. He says that he and his friends ‘be¬ 
lieve in republican officers under a republican 
administration. * *■ ■*' If this conclusion 

is not true * * * all political parties in 
America ought to disband.’ In other words 
these gentlemen, who so loudly vaunt their 
republicanism, in reality care nothing for re¬ 
publicanism at all save in so far as it means 
offices for themselves and their friends. They 
wish the republican party to disband unless 
they are to be paid for supporting it. This 
seems a harsh way of putting their views, but 
it is perfectly just. 

“ There is a certain difference between being 
bribed with an office and being bribed with 
money—exactly as there is a difference be¬ 
tween the savagery of an Ashantee and the 
savagery of a Hottentot—but the difference is 
one of degree only. 

“I think there is no need of a more biting 
commentary on the spoils system than that 
furnished by Mr. Clarkson himself when he 
avows such a doctrine as this.” 

MR. Morton’s remarks : 

It can not be repeated too often that the ap¬ 
plication of the merit system to the civil serv¬ 
ice of this country is much more than a mere 
administrative reform. Whether a letter is 
expeditiously carried, cr whether the civil 
service generally is efficient, is a matter in¬ 
deed of large convenience and even of impor¬ 
tance, but it is not vital. It does not affect 
the character of the people, nor threaten the 
stability of our institutions. The evil is po¬ 
litical aud lies much deeper. The merit sys¬ 
tem substitutes open and manly competition 
for beggary and sycophancy. It takes a man 
from his knees and bids him stand erect. It 
teaches him independence. If he obtains an 
appointment at an examination, or a promo¬ 
tion, it is by virtue of his merit aud his rec¬ 
ord, and not because he has done some shady 
political work. 

But this is not all. The spoils system is 
bribery organized upon a gigantic scale. I 
once heard a candidate upon a presidential 
ticket promise his supporters, in the event of 
his election, at least one-half the offices under 
the government, which, I protest, is the great¬ 
est bribe ever offered to the voters of this 
country. But you will say that bribery is 
multiform—that this is only one of a set of 
corrupt influences which endanger the national 
life. Unfortunately this is true. Jobbery in 
federal office is but a part of a system of brib¬ 
ery which has its roots deep in the past, and 
which has spread like a destroying vine over 


the whole country. The senate of the United 
States is fast becoming a rich man’s club. 
Agents of corporations swarm the national 
and state capitols. Moneyed combinations 
contribute large sums to debauch elections, 
and employers coerce the votes of the em¬ 
ployes. Everywhere the special interest is 
arrayed against the common weal. 

To many—to me at any rate—civil service 
reform means much more than a technical 
and verbal definition of it will allow. It de. 
dares war against this whole iniquity—against 
jobbery in all office, whether federal, state or 
municipal—whether legislative or adminis¬ 
trative. It stands for an unfettered, uncor¬ 
rupted and independent public opinion. 

But all things can not be done at once. To 
take 200,000 offices out of politics is a good 
beginning and is a great gain. To offer office 
as a reward is a most insidious form of bribery^ 
It not only influences the man who obtains it, 
but it affects a score of others who do not. 
Many of these men who will work to obtain 
an office will not accept money in lieu thereof. 
They have not reached that point of degrada¬ 
tion. By abolishing the patronage system 
you will not only remove the temptation 
which perverts their energies, but you will 
also strike down the one man power. A sys¬ 
tem which gives to the president of the United 
States control of 200,000 offices whose income 
is equal to that of 200,000 farms is a foe to 
democratic government. It belongs to a dead 
and bygone age. It is a relic of feudalism, of 
the days of the over-lord and of king-craft. 
The president holding this power is an un¬ 
crowned king. It is true that you may de¬ 
throne him at the end of four years, if you 
can, but you may depend upon it that if he is a 
spoilsman he will wield the great army of the 
civil service in his defense. His office-holders 
will pack the primaries and convention, and 
if possible secure his reuomination, and a 
part of the eighty millions of dollars which 
are paid by the government every year to its 
employes will, in the presidential year, be 
diverted to Influencing the will of the people. 

Now, sir, this is a government of, by and for 
the people, and they have the right to pass 
judgment upon an administration free from 
official coercion. The president of the 
United States is no more justified in using the 
civil service as a personal engine than he is in 
using the army of the United States, which is 
but another branch of the executive depart¬ 
ment. There is no difference in princi¬ 
ple. The spoils system is an anomaly, a. mon¬ 
strosity and an anachronism. It belongs to 
the oriental despotisms of the old world. It 
has no proper place in the republics of the 
Western Hemisphere. 

MR. ROSS’s REMARK.S : 

Until this moment I had been confirmed in 
the truth of the old belief that to assure a 
well-ordered affair of this kind, both in perfec¬ 
tion of detail and completeness altogether, 
there should be a “ Butler ” at the head. 

At this point I had made a mental note that 
there was to be “ laughter ” and “applause,” 












232 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


and then on the waves of merriment, I should 

I 

ride in with the “ thoughts that breathe ” and 
the “words that burn.” I had also made a 
mental note that in case the laugh did not come 
in—altliough I labored very hard on that pun 
and supposed it would go at this time of night 
—I should call it “ Balbec,” as Mark Twain 
did his horse, because it was such a magnifi¬ 
cent ruin, and on the debris take my stand and 
proceed to say that it seemed to me peculiarly 
fitting that these friends should give this tes- 
tiuionial of their personal regard to this guest, 
because in him, springing from his influence, 
has been realized more fully than ever that 
cause which they have loved so long and so 
well. It is because Theodore Roosevelt has 
been at the head of the civil service com¬ 
mission, that civil service reform is to-day a 
fact, as it never has been before. The name 
“civil service reform” is one that I have never 
liked. It has seemed to me always inadequate. 
At best it is the name of a proposition or a 
proposal. There should be instead a name 
that defines a thing, a name with a positive in¬ 
stead of a negative meaning to it. As for ex¬ 
ample, the “merit system.” And I believe 
that those who have this cause at heart can 
give special aid to it by beginning to speak of 
it as the “merit system.” 

They who have been in the thick of the 
fight, perhaps do not realize how much every 
little aid is needed to strengthen this cause. 
Names have been held to mean too little, but 
back of the man whose blood is up and who 
is fighting well this battle is a large host of 
friends who yet are in an apologetic stage. 
They all have belief in this cause, yet they 
stand by old parties and approach them as to 
this subject in a way as much as to say, “ this 
is a little fad of mine, a little weakness in 
which you must indulge me. I am a good 
party man—good this, that and the other, but 
I have this little idiosyncrasy of civil serv¬ 
ice reform, and you must not take exception 
to it.” 

There is that apologetic state of mind, 
whether felt or fully realized or not, among a 
great mass of earnest and honest friends of this 
cause. Anything that would aid the better 
requirements of their conviction, or would 
tend to give them the courage of their opin¬ 
ions, would be a vast help to the cause. And 
to this end, though it might not appear to 
some, taking pains to call civil service re¬ 
form the merit system would be a great pos¬ 
itive strength. There is always attached to 
the word “reform” an assumption of supe¬ 
riority that not infrequently offends good 
people, and to drop it, and in its stead substi¬ 
tute not merely a proposal but the fact as in 
the “merit system,” would add greatly to gen¬ 
eral effectiveness. 

* * * Indiana herself is going to give ac¬ 
count for herself. In her new city government 
the j)rinciple of the merit system is already 
lodged; the principle of business administra¬ 
tion, and its results are to be far-reaching. 
In the state, while there is nothing done that 
can be called a harvest, there is to the experi¬ 


enced eye well-tilled and carefully planted 
fields which 2 )romise surely a most abundant 
harvest, and at no long time in the future 
Indiana will show herself in deed as well as 
in sympathy with this cause. 

Among other speakers was Mr. Jacob P. 
Dunn, who said: “ Civil service reform 
will win because it is right.” Mr.W. P. Fish 
back said: “I admire Mr. Roosevelt for 
two things, his sand and his sense.” Mr. 
Rufus Magee said : “ I favor civil service 
reform and the absence and divorce of the 
spoils system from politics. Merit is al¬ 
ways entitled to recognition regardless of 
the party label it wears. The country wants 
the best talent to be had, and it can only 
be secured through the civil service law. 
During my eight years’ service in the gen 
eral assembly of Indiana two things give 
me the greatest satisfaction—my efforts in 
behalf of the new charter of this city and 
my attempt to secure the passage of the 
bill introduced by me to put the benevo¬ 
lent institutions of the state under the 
merit system.” 

In speaking of the dinner, the Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel of the next day says that it 
“ closed after having proved one ‘of the 
most brilliant ever held in this city, and 
one at which the wit and strong points of 
the speakers were received with the ut¬ 
most appreciation and enthusiastic ap¬ 
plause.” 

The Indianapolis Journal of May 18 says: 

The banquet to Hon. Theodore Roosevelt on Sat¬ 
urday night was a deserved compliment to a very 
bright man and one of the ablest advocates of civil 
service reform in the country. Mr. Roosevelt has 
won distinction in other ways, but at present he is 
best known as chairman of the civil service commis¬ 
sion. His selection for that position was a happy 
thought of the President’s, and has been fully vindi¬ 
cated by the faithfulness, intelligence and impartial¬ 
ity with which he has stood for the enforcement of 
the civil service law. He is a lifelong republican, 
and has proved his devotion to the party in many 
ways. He is doing it now by his zealous advocacy 
of a principle which was embodied in the platform 
on which President Harrison was elected, and to the 
support of which the party is fully committed. 
There are still opponents of civil service reform to 
be found in both parties, but their number is de. 
creasing, and it is to be hoped the time is not far dis¬ 
tant when there will be found no advocates of a re. 
turn to the spoils system. 


ANNALS OF QUAYISM. 

Three men sat in the Cabinet room in the White 
House one bright morning in the year of our Lord 
1889. One was the President of the United States. 
The second was Matthew Stanley Quay, senator from 
Pennsylvania and chairman of the republican na 
tional committee. The third was James McManes, 
the sturdy and wealthy Scotch-Irishman, whose 
sterling qualities had won for him the respect and 
confidence of all the residents of the Quaker City. 

The President raised his eyes inquiringly to Sena¬ 
tor Quay. Obviously he did not know the object of 
the consultation. Neither did the silent senator. 
He had been requested by his companion to intro¬ 
duce him to President Harrison and had fulfilled his 
part. In turn he looked towards Mr. McManes. 

Meanwhile the old Scotsman’s eyes had been fas¬ 
tened upon the impassive countenance of Benjamin 


Harrison. When the time came for him to speak he 
leaned forward in his chair and spoke the few words 
which he deemed it his solemn duty to utter with all 
the earnestness at his command. 

“ I have come here, Mr. President,’’ he said, slowly, 
“ to protest against the appointment of David Mar 
tin looneof the most important federal offices in this 
country. He is a disreputable rascal, and his ap¬ 
pointment as collector of internal revenue would 
be an insult to every re.spectable citizen of Pennsyl¬ 
vania.” 

The old man half rose from his chair as he con¬ 
tinued. His language took on the tinge of the rich 
North Country accent of his youth and the muscles 
of his fine face quivered from the indignation burn¬ 
ing within his breast. Hastily he sketched Martin’s 
early career. He denounced him as a ruflian at the 
polls and a manipulator of ballot-boxes. He de¬ 
clared that he was a dispenser of corruption funds 
contributed by the liquor interests. He held him 
up, with all the scorn born of contempt, as a willing 
tool of that element in the social life of Philadelphia 
which defies law, order and decency. He closed 
with the remark that no President could afford to 
appoint such a man to a position of honor and trust. 

When he had done the President moved uneasily 
in his chair and then glanced appealingly at Senator 
Quay, whose astonishment, though apparent, was 
not sufficient to loose his silent tongue. The silence 
was broken by Benjamin Harrison. 

” They say,” he observed in measured tones, " that 
the charges against Mr. Martin are not true.” 

This was more than the honest Scotsman could 
bear. With all the fierce impetuosity of Roderick 
Dhu he burst forth in resentment of what seemed to 
him a reflection upon his veracity. 

‘‘Mr. President,” he cried, “I have lived long in 
Philadelphia. I am well known there. You can 
not find in that whole city a single responsible per¬ 
son who will say that I ever uttered an untruth. 
There sits Senator Quay., He knows me. I ask you. 
Senator Quay, if I am not respected in Philadelphia 
as a man of my word.” 

‘‘ Mr. McMaues's word is above question,” quietly 
observed the one addre.ssed. 

‘‘Then, Mr. President,” continued Mr. McManes, 
‘‘I reiterate all I have said concerning David Martin. 
Senator Quay informs you that my veracity is above 
question. I say to you again, sir, that the appoint¬ 
ment of David Martin would be a disgrace to your 
administration and an insult to every honest citizen 
of Pennsylvania. That is all I have to say.” 

Again Benjamin Harrison turned to Matthew S. 
Quay. This lime he secured a response. 

‘‘The two senators from Pennsylvania desire this 
appointment, Mr. President,” was all he said. 

Mr. McManes made no rejoinder. He bowed to 
the President of the United Stales and left the room. 

It had already been noised about in this city that 
there was a possibility of Martin’s appointment. 
Great was the excitement. The ward heelers and 
the old lime disorderly gangs who followed Martin 
and did his bidding were overjoj^ed. So the ‘‘growl¬ 
er ” was worked deeply in the slums to the success 
of ‘‘our Dave.” But respectable Philadelphia was 
shocked. The Citizens’ Municipal League, which is 
the survival of the old Committee of One Hundred, 
which cleaned out the thieves.and rascals connected 
with the city government, was concerned, but could 
not act directly. A memorial to the President was 
drawn, however, and signed by JoelJ. Bailey, the 
chairman of the league, and by other leading mem¬ 
bers. The statement set forth, that David Martin 
was a wholly unfit person to be placed in the collec¬ 
tor’s office, and that the appointment of one of the 
criminal class as collector of revenue was an insult 
to respectability and decency. The President was 
given authorities for the charges made, and legal 
evidence in support of them was presented. The 
Protestants declared that they had no candidate for 
the position. All they asked was that a respectable 
man be appointed. 

The me.sscnger bearing this protest was on his way 
to the postoffice when he read on a bulletin board 
the statement that David Martin had been appointed 
collector of internal revenue. 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


233 


Now, who is David Martin? 

In his boyhood he lived in the northeastern part 
of Philadelphia, near a locality known as “ Louse 
Harbor.” He was a slop and garbage gatherer and 
an active uiember of Taylor Hose Company prior to 
the abolishment of the volunteer fire department. 

Those who knew Martin at that time say he was a 
characteristic tough. Taylor Hose Company was a 
disorderly organization and Martin acquired an in¬ 
fluence as a leader early in life. He soon became a 
director of repeaters in the old nineteenth ward. 
His gang of immediate followers was employed by 
corrupt and disreptuable politicians to intimidate 
voters and procure the nomination of men who were 
a disgrace to the republican party. At general elec¬ 
tions Martin directed operations and drove citizens 
from the polls in order that repeaters might vote. 
It was not unusual for him to personally assault vo¬ 
ters without provocation. 

At the Gray senatorial election, Martin had charge 
of the thug.s and repeaters in the portion of the dis¬ 
trict where it was afterwards proven that gigantic 
frauds were perpetrated. In June of the same year 
he took the ballot-box of the fourth division nine¬ 
teenth ward to the station-honse of that ward, and 
there the return was changed and the election offi¬ 
cers’ names were forged. As he could not read or 
write he did not personally forge the names, but he 
aided and abetted the criminal act. This fact was 
sworn to and published in Philadelphia newspapers 
at the time. 

At the election for the adoption of the new consti¬ 
tution of Pennsylvania, the corrupt office-holders op¬ 
posed the change because a portion of the opportu¬ 
nities for comraiting fraud and forgery were cut off 
thereby. Martin was employed as usual and had 
charge of the repeaters of his district. He was one 
of the managers that made up the false returns, 
whereby the nineteenth ward was to give 6,000 ma¬ 
jority against the new constitution. The conspir¬ 
acy to perpetrate the fraud was cooked in a room on 
I Cumberland street. The returns were taken by a 
'Policeman to a house on Trenton avenue, above 
[York There they were falsified to suit the purpose 
of Martin and his fellow criminals and sent to the 
I station-house. 

^The news from the state indicated that the new 
'*'cointitntion had received an overwhelming major¬ 
ity. Mayor Stokely refused to receive the false re¬ 
turns, and used the language published in the pa¬ 
pers at the time, that he ‘‘would not be put in a 
hole.” The nineteenth ward really gave about three 
thousand majority in favor of the adoption. 

In all the frauds perpetrated at elections during the 
past twenty years in North Philadelphia, Martin has 
been one of the prime movers. The committee of one 
i hundred convicted some of his men, and Sent them 
to prison. Martin appeared in court to sympathize 
with and cheer them. 

' One of Martin’s cronies was John Ruhl. The 
twain got up a prize fight in the nineteenth ward, 
IJwhich some of the politicians of the city government 
' attended. During the fight a raid was made by the 
1 police. Martin and Ruhl were taken to the station- 
house. The former’s influence set him free and he 
returned with his gang to the scene of the fight, and 
dthe subsequent debauchery is still a theme of dis¬ 
cussion in the neighborhood. Ruhl was afterwards 
sent to the Eastern penitentiary for swindling. Mar¬ 
tin stood by him until he was taken. 

Among the repeaters convicted by the committee 
of one hundred were William Manecly and William 
Guldey. Their sworn statements are interesting. 
Here they are: 

‘‘William Maneely makes affidavit and swears he 
lived in the seventeeth ward last February [1882], 
that he was arrested and convicted after the spring 
election and went to prison for six months for re¬ 
peating at said election. He said that he was then 
and had been for some time in the employ of parties 
of the nineteenth and thirty-first wards to head a 
gang of repeaters whose business it was to get in as 
many fraudulent votes as they could, by voting on 
other people’s names, going from poll to poll and 
putting in fraudulent votes in any way we could get 
them in. That last February he was so employed by 
Alex. Crawford, Porter Rittenhouse, 503 Diamond 


street; that Rittenhouse gave him a due bill for 
work done on election day as aforesaid; that said 
Rittenhouse signed said due bill, which was drawn 
on David Martin, who was to pay the same, and said 
Martin is the man who has- heretofore paid witness 
for work of this character at elections. The practice 
was that for every fraudulent vote we put in we got 
a bluecheck which was to represent $1, and after the 
election, or as soon as the votes were in we could go 
and get 81 apiece for so many blue checks as we held; 
that said checks were cashed by Dave Martin, 

‘‘ Witness says that there is every probability that 
the same game will be played at the coming election 
and that the same parties wll be wanting to employ 
him in work of a like character, or in some new 
dodge to get their work in, and he says he is willing 
to give this committee aid and assistance in expos¬ 
ing such business; that he has been a soldier and 
wants to lead a straight life, and that he will do a»l 
he can to expose the fraud at the coming election. 

‘‘William Maneely. 

“Philadelphia, Sept. 13, 1882.” 

“ William Guldey, alias Golden, swears that he re¬ 
sides at No. 1420 Frankford road, seventeenth ward; 
says that he was tried and convicted, together with 
William Maneely for fraud on the ballot at the elec¬ 
tion of February, 1882, and that he served his lime in 
prison, from which he has lately been relea.sed; says 
that Porter Rittenhouse employed him last spring to 
act as a repeater, and he agreed that witness should 
be paid $2.50 for each and every fraudulent vote 
that he put in; that on election day, as soon as 
the work was done, witness received from Ritten- 
houso an order on David Martin for payment for 
said work in the shape of the following order; 

“ ‘ Mr. David Martin, please pay to bearer for four 
votes. (Signed) P. R.’ 

“And witness said Rittenhouse wrote said order in 
his presence, and that he has never received any 
money or other consideration on said order; that he 
presented said order to David Martin, who .said that 
Rittenhouse should have paid it, and he (Martin) re¬ 
fused to pay it. Witness .says his understanding was 
he was to receive from Rittenhouse the names of per¬ 
sons that he was to personate or repeat on, and that 
on election day Rittenhouse, who was working in 
his own division, would hand witness a scrap of pa¬ 
per containing the name of the person he was to 
personate or repeat on, and then witness would go 
to the poll and put in the vole accordingly, and that 
he and Maneely each cast two fraudulent votes in 
this way, and under the agreement were entitled to 
pay for the same at the rate of 82.50 per vote; that 
this business has been followed by witness for five or 
six years, and that during that time he has received 
payment for such work from David Martin; that he 
received money for casting fraudulent votes from 
David Martin at the spring election two years ago, 
1880; that he received money from A. Albright for 
like work about five years ago; that David Martin 
has paid witness on several occasions for this kind 
of work.” 

James McManes says that a member of congress in 
Pennsylvania informed him that Martin approached 
a city member of congress and demanded 81,000 or 
he would incite a revolt against him at the polls. 
The member gave a check for the amount and it was 
returned from the bank afterwards, cancelled and 
bearing Martin’s name on the back. 

As a specimen of Martin’s methods the story of 
James Rems, of Norris, near Third street, is of in¬ 
terest. Rems, who is a respectable shoemaker, was 
engaged in putting up posters for a candidate objec¬ 
tionable to Martin. The latter approached and told 
him that he did not permit any one to place adver 
tisements of other candidates than his own in the 
ward. Rems persisted and Martin fell upon him and 
brutally beat him. A bill of indictment for crim¬ 
inal assault was found by the grand jury, but Mar¬ 
tin’s “ pull ” sufficed to bury the case in the district 
attorney’s office. 

A prominent citizen of this city informed the cor¬ 
respondent of the World that he witnessed one of the 
typical as.saults for which Martin was distinguished. 
At an election a group of men, including several 
butchers, were collected near the corner of Amber 
and Drear streets. Martin was out with a gang of 


toughs at his heels intimidating voters. One of the 
favorite tricks of Martin was to arm heelers with 
short, sharp awls, so that they might prod a voter 
until he would abandon the attempt to vote his baD 
lot. Martin approached the group and ascertained 
that those composing it were going to vote against 
his candidate. He gave a signal, and one of the 
gang pushed a young liutcher towards Martin. The 
latter uttered a fearful oath and struck out from the 
shoulder. The man rolled in the gutter. Then the 
gang of thugs rushel on the remainder and forced 
some of them through a fence, which was demol¬ 
ished. The recalcitrant voters did not cast their bal¬ 
lots that day. 

John M. Carson, the well-known correspondent cf 
the Public Ledger ul Wa.shington, wrote an article for 
the Morning Post concerning Martin, of which the 
following is an extract, describing the frauds perpe¬ 
trated at an election of common councilmen in the 
nineteenth ward: 

“John B. Curtis, who is a telegraph operator at the 
nineteenth ward police station, tells under oath the 
story of the fourth division. ‘ I am an operator at 
the eighteenth district station-house. I was there on 
the night of the election. I saw David Martin bring 
the ballot box of the fourth division there. I saw 
the box was open and the returns lying upon the 
table; they (Lieut. Crawford and Martin) were writ¬ 
ing upon the returns. Lieut. Crawford told me the 
box contained the returns of the fourth division. 
He said the change was made to beat Theodore Wal¬ 
ton, as it would look bad for Fareira to run behind. 
I went into the room to get the returns to telegraph 
to the central station. A number of other divisions 
were fixed up in the same way. In the twenty-first 
division the original papers were not taken into ac¬ 
count. Papers were manufactured fixing such ma¬ 
jorities as were required by the ring, and the names 
of the election officers were forged thereto.’ ” 

The headquarters of Martin, when not in the col¬ 
lector’s office of the custom-house, are in a building 
located at the corner of Sixth street and German¬ 
town avenue. It is four stories high and was form¬ 
erly used as a carriage manufactory by Boyer Bros. 
Martin thought that he might be able to raise money 
from manufacturers the easier by calling this place 
the “Home of the Anti-Cobden club.” 

The nominal membership of the Anti-Cobden Club 
is very large, 1,500 or more. In addition to the 
“heelers” and repeaters of its boss, there are many 
respectable mechanics and small tradesmen among 
the members, who were attracted by the bait of po¬ 
litical recognition held out to them. The commin¬ 
gling of the good and the bad in the Anti-Cobden 
Club has made that club unique in some respects. 

On the second floor there is a long bar, and on Sun¬ 
days three bartenders are busily employed dispens¬ 
ing “ hard stuff” and beer to the gang. In a private 
room Martin presides in an autocratic manner, and 
here he perfects his plans and plots to carry out the 
mandates of Statesman Quay. Already the story 
comes that a great scheme has been concocted to 
bribe a heavy contingent of democratic voters on the 
4th of November. Since, by virtue of the indorse¬ 
ment of John Wanamaker and the two senators, and 
the refusal of President Harrison to heed the protest 
of James McManes and other citizens of high stand¬ 
ing, Martin became collector, he has abandoned the 
executive work of directing repeaters and leading 
his gang of toughs, but he still furnishes the brains 
for the guidance of his henchmen. They will be 
ready for business on election day. 

Money will be a great factor in the Quay-Delamater 
canvass on November 4. But who, after reading this 
plain, straightforward story of the acts of David Mar¬ 
tin with the knowledge that one of the best federal 
offices in the state has been his reward, can say that 
fraud will not be a greuter.—Philadelphia Dispatch 
to New York World, October 20,1890. 


SOLIDARITY OF SPOILSMEN. 

—Census Superintendent Porter seems to be 
preparing for the investigation into his ad¬ 
ministration, which, it is taken for granted, 
will be ordered by the house of representatives 




















234 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


next winter. This, at least, is the opinion of 
some of the republican employes of the census 
office, who are grumbling a good deal over the 
favors shown to democrats. They assert that 
democratic representatives find it easier now to secure 
appointments and promotions foi' their henchmen 
than do republican congressmen. 

They attribute this to Mr. Porter’s desire to 
have friends on the majority side of the next 
house, who will have a proper sense of favors 
received when they get ready to investigate 
the census office.— Washington Dispatch to New 
York Times, April 4- 

—Congress having adjourned, and the neces¬ 
sary appropriations for the maintenance of a 
large number of employes in the government 
printing office having ceased at thesame time, 
the public printer has found it necessary to 
discharge a large proportion of the people who 
have found employment there. It is assumed 
that in making the discharges the public 
printer has been controlled by the influences 
that have been at work under this administra¬ 
tion, and has, as a good political printer, made 
the discharges according to some carefully 
conceived political plan. 

But whatever it was, it was not satisfactory 
to a number of politicians, among whom are 
named Attorney-General Miller, Private Secre 
tary Halford, Marshal Ransdell, and First 
Controller Matthews. The Ohio Republican 
Association, of which Secretary Foster has 
been elected a member, is noisy in expressing 
its dissatisfaction at the way the discharges 
have been made. That society had a meeting 
last week, and besides electing Mr. Foster and 
Solicitor-General Taft to membership, it elect¬ 
ed Sixth Auditor T. B. Coulter as president 
and several other office-holders to other offices 
in the society. 

Then the association had a hot time over a 
proposition to name a committee of five to in¬ 
vestigate the cause of the dismissal of Ohio 
republicans from the printing office. Mr. T. 
A. Child, president of the association, and also 
chief clerk of the census office, appointed to 
act with him in finding out why republicans 
from Ohio were put out, while Ohio democrats 
were kept in, Messrs. Coulter, Hart, McGrew, 
and Lowry, all government employes, who are 
straightway to undertake to find out why Ohio 
may not be permitted to regulate all the ap¬ 
pointments and discharges in the service. 

Soon Census Superintendent Porter, having 
finished up the work which he is now crowd¬ 
ing forward with increased force, will find it 
necessary to cut down. It will go hard with the 
employes from other states if Mr. Childs un¬ 
dertakes to do his duty as a member of the 
Ohio state association. It will be a nice busi¬ 
ness to make the discharges from the census 
office. A great many democrats have been accom¬ 
modated with appointments there, as Mr. Cockrell and 
Mr. Gorman and others on the tinder side could tell 
if they were called upon to do so. While Mr. 
Porter desires to have republican friends, he 
must have democratic friends, too, and in order 
to get them he has sometimes intimated to 
democrats that he could find places for good 
people if they would recommend them. 


Mr. Childs ought to have a list of the proteges of 
democratic senators and membeis of the house .— 
Washington DispatchtoNew York Times, April 17. 

—There was a very sad meeting of the Busi¬ 
ness Men’s Republican Association held last 
evening. Their president resigned because 
he could not stand the strain upon his nervous 
system caused by the constant appeals of the 
boys for “places” and “plums.” He begged 
them to put a “practical politician” in his 
place, a man who could go around and hunt 
up the “plums” which the boys want. “I’m 
not fit for it,” he said, “ and I can’t do it be¬ 
cause it’s repulsive to me. I’d rather try to 
dig dollars out of cobble-stones than ask favors 
of politicians.” Then one of the boys laid 
bare the facts of the situation by saying: 

“ The government has spent $170,000,000 extry, 
and there ain’t a man here tvho got a cent of it. If 
the democrats spend thousands to our hundreds, why, 
that’s the party for us to belong to. Our president 
says he’s going to leave us. If that’s so, and 
we are going to adjourn sine die, let somebody 
say so right out, so that we can look for shelter 
elsewhere .”—New York Evening Post, March 20. 

—For several years more or less earnest 
efforts have been made to get new quarters for 
the government printing office. The present 
building is not large enough. It is so old 
and rickety as to be in an almost dangerous 
condition, and its interior arrangements are 
such as constantly to menace the health of the 
employes. 

It looked last year as if there would really 
be a change for the better some time, for con¬ 
gress authorized a commission to select a site 
for a new building. This commission picked 
out a large lot of ground near the present 
printing office, and steps were taken to secure 
it for the government. No sooner, however, 
had the selection been made known than a 
great hue and cry against the site was raised 
by certain persons, who found a champion in 
Senator Gorman. That senator was so persistent 
in his attack upon the site selected that he succeeded 
hi having the whole matter suspended until the next 
congress meets, so that another year is lost. 

Some of the persons interested in govern¬ 
ment printing office affairs think they have 
found the secret of the opposition to the site 
selected by the commission. They have dis¬ 
covered that ez-Senator Mahone, the discredited boss 
of the republican party in Virginia, is the owner of 
a one-half interest in a lot of gro-nnd near the city 
limits, at North Capitol street, in about the 
most inaccessible part of Washington. This 
property has been offered to the government 
for a printing office site for $250,000, and its 
owners have been making very earnest efforts 
to induce the commission to report in its fa¬ 
vor. If they can kill off the site now selected 
and force their land upon the government, it 
will put $125,000 into Mahone’s pocket.— 
Washington Dispatch to New York Times, Aprils. 

—Supervising Architect R. B. Eastman, of 
Brooklyn, who has been mixed up in some of 
the scandals growing out of the maladminis¬ 
tration of affairs at the St. Johnland county 
farm, is said to be slated for removal. He 


owed his appointment, about five years ago, to a deal 
between the democrats and republicans in the Kings 
county board of supervisors.—New York Times, 
May 11. 

—A few days ago John E. Brodsky, tAejepu6- 
lican assemblyman from the eighth district, who 
was elected last fall by the aid of Tammany votes, 
introduced in the legislature a bill whose evi¬ 
dent object is to further embarrass the admin¬ 
istration of public affairs in the annexed dis¬ 
trict by Louis J. Heintz, the commissioner of 
street improvements, who was elected to that 
office over the Tammany candidate put for¬ 
ward by Fire Commissioner Purroy. Mr. 
Brodsky says he introduced the bill by request, but 
when asked by ivhose request, he answers smilingly, 
^‘That’s telling,” and he tells no more. 

John H. V. Ronner, deputy-commissioner 
of street improvements in the annexed district, 
when questioned last night regarding the bill, 
said it was one of the bills introduced lately 
at the instigation of Tammany Hall to annoy 
Mr. Heintz, and to oppose which Mr. Heintz 
had gone to Albany last week. It was intro¬ 
duced without the knowledge of Mr. Heintz. 
Its purpose, said Mr. Ronner, was apparent. 
Tammany had lost in the annexed district the 
control of patronage which the election of its 
candidate for commissi'^ner of street improve¬ 
ments would have given it, and it was now 
determined to destroy Mr. Heintz’s power if 
possible, and to lose no chance of casting un¬ 
favorable reflection upon him. The bill, Mr. 
Ronner continued, was entirely uncalled for 
It was and would continue to be the practice 
of the commissioner to award contracts to the 
lowest responsible bidder. “But,” he asked, 
“why should that official be denied a discre¬ 
tion which other heads of departments pos¬ 
sessed, the exercise of which is often necessary 
in the interests of the city?” 

The animus of the bill is still more plainly 
seen in the clause which would give the Tam¬ 
many board of estimate and apportionment the 
right which Mr. Heintz should have, to desig¬ 
nate the paper in which bids should be adver¬ 
tised for. Some people who are well acquainted 
with municipal politics are surprised that 
Tammany Hall should so openly reveal its 
hand in attempting to steal so petty a bit of 
patronage as the advertising of contracts to 
be awarded by Mr. Heintz may afford .—New 
York Evening Post, March 24. 


“AN EFFECTIVE DELEGATE.” 

Marine D. Tackett, of Greensburgh, Ind., 
was to-day appointed a special agent to allot 
lands in severalty to the Cheyenne and Arap¬ 
ahoe Indians. He is an ex-Union soldier, who 
carries an armless sleeve as evidence of his 
bravery and military service. He teas an ef¬ 
fective delegate to the republican convention at Chi¬ 
cago in 1S88. His official duties will be per¬ 
formed in Arizona, and his pay will be $15 a 
day. The work will last probably two or three 
months.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, April 11. 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. Meridian St.. Indianapolis, Ind., where subscriptions and advertisments will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 

VoL. I, No. 28. INDIANAPOLIS, JUNE, 1891.- terms : ^ fee*t 9 %er"opy.“' 


“ Fur my own pari I could heartily tvish that 
all honest men would enter into an association 
for the support of one another against the en¬ 
deavors of those whom they ought to look upon 
as their common enemies, whedever side they 
< may belong to. Were there such an honest 
f body of neutral forces, ive shotdd never see the 
worst of men in great figures of life, because 
they are useful to a party; nor the best unre¬ 
garded, because they are above practicing those 
methods which ivould be grateful to their fac¬ 
tion. We should then single every criminal 
out of the herd and hunt him down, however 
formidable and overgnnvn he might appear. 
* * * In shortj we should rwt any 

longer regard our fellmv-citizens as whigs or 
lories, bid should make the man of merit our 
friend and the villain our enemy."—Addison's 
Spectator. 


The Boston Advertiser of April 28, says: 

A paper called the Civil Service Chronicle is 
published at Indianapolis, Ind. It is a somewhat 
curious circumstance that the current number has 
copious extracts from but three papers in the United 
States, and each of these is notoriously bitter and 
unfair in its opposition to the republiean party. As 
these exeerpts fill a large part of the Chronicle the 
claim of the editors to any real independence in the 
cause of civil service reform must rest entirely on 
the editorials, which appear to have been written in 
an impartial vein. 

The Chronicle takes the facts bearing 
upon its object wherever it can find them. 
It does not care which side is hurt. A few 
papers have of late years learned that the 
true way to improve the transaction of the 
public business is to carefully investigate 
cases of the use of public offices as mere 
plunder and publish the facts. There is 
nothing that worries a boss more than to 
bring home to him in public print that he 
appointed a lot of Jakes and Mikes to be 
weighers and gaugers and clerks because 
they hustled and tricked for him at a cer¬ 
tain primary. There is nodoubta remuner¬ 
ative field for such investigation, even in 
Boston, and if the Advertiser will make it, 
and will tell its interesting discoveries to 
the public, it shall have a liberal space in 
this paper. 


The fire-alarm telegraph of the city has 
a superintendent in George Halderman, a 
republican, who had an assistant named 
George White, and a sub-assistant named 
Findling. The new board dismissed White 
and Findling, and their combined monthly 
salaries, less twenty dollars, were given to 
ex-alderman James Riley, a dernocrat, who 


was appointed as Halderman’s assistant. 
Riley’s friends claimed that he was sooner 
or later to have Halderman’s p'ace. Now 
if President Holt’s board intended to seize 
this place as party spoil, this is the exact 
course it would have pursued. So far as 
the duties of his position are concerned 
Riley is an ignoramus, and it is ridiculous 
to say that the fire service is benefited by 
turning out a trained assistant and putting 
in an ignoramus at an increased salary. 
Halderman thinks he sees the point and 
refuses to accept Riley as an assistant, or 
to teach him the business, and at the last 
accounts Riley was sitting around the fire 
headquarters doing nothing and drawing 
sixty dollars a month. Open competition 
for the places in the fire department would 
destroy the board’s usefulness in humbug¬ 
ging the people in this manner. Why 
does not the mayor require it ? 


Mr. Charles B. Willy, of Cincinnati, 
recently delivered an address before the 
Unity Church Club of that city upon the 
transaction of city business He referred 
to the efforts of many good citizens of 
Cincinnati to secure the passage of a new 
charter which they expected would remedy 
all of the existing evils. Mr. Wilby has a 
clear sight in this respect and boldly takes 
the ground that no form of a city charter 
which leaves the spoils system in operation 
will give a satisfactory city government. 
This will prove true of the City of Indian¬ 
apolis under its new charter. 

President Harrison has promoted the 
assistant postmaster, Mr. E. P. Thompson, 
to be postmaster of this city. The new 
postmaster in his turn has filled the assist¬ 
ant’s place by promoting the head of the 
money-order department, and the latter 
place by promoting the head of the regis¬ 
try department, and the latter place by 
promoting the assistant in that depart¬ 
ment, and the latter place by promoting a 
clerk from the classified service, whose 
place is filled from the top of the eligible 
list. Truly, merit and business principles 
have come to their own, and the President 
should take note that on every hand there 
is nothing but approbation expressed. So 
generally is it understood that this office is 
given over to the merit system that there 
was no “ pressure” nor even an applica¬ 
tion for one of these vacancies. 


The President is under suspicion of mak¬ 
ing terms with Quay on the supposition that 
Quay can control the Pennsylvania delega¬ 
tion in the presidential nominating con¬ 
vention. This is a very humiliating position 
for the President of the United States to 
occupy. But aside from the immorality 
of such a prostitution of a public trust, 
the President should be very wary. Quay 
in most respects is not unlike Gorman 
and Voorhees to whose vicious tastes 
President Cleveland pretty steadily catered. 
Yet ingratitude comes easy to them. Here 
is Senator Voorhees; 

" Where do you expect to find a Presidential can¬ 
didate, senator?” 

“ He ought to be developed here in the West. If 
we must go East, I favor Senator Gorman, a man of 
superb sense and equipment. If Palmer were 
younger we could goto Illinois. Then there is A. 
E. Stevenson, of Illinois, ex-congressman, ex-assist¬ 
ant postmaster-general, whom, were he better 
known, would be of avail. Right here in Indiana 
we have Gray, a man of availibility and aptitude.” 


Headsman Clarkson writes from Paris, 
France, to the chairman of the young 
men’s republican club of Des Moines offer¬ 
ing some suggestions for a plan of cam¬ 
paign. After the important admission that 
“ the country is evenly balanced between 
political parties just now,” be finally says: 

We should utilize also the friendship of republi¬ 
can women in these clubs. Young men can carry on 
the discussions or debates; young women can aid in 
the entertainments with songs or recitals. 

We would respectfully urge this modifi¬ 
cation. Instead of the “songs and recitals,” 
let the young women, imitating another 
time of the work of the guillotine, come 
and knit, and listen to stories of Clarkson’s 
guillotine. Let them knit on in dry-eyed 
mercilessness as they hear how competent 
and faithful public servants, young and 
old, with families dependent upon them, 
in the nineteenth century, have been 
driven from work for opinion’s sake. Let 
these republican maidens learn how the 
Christian President of a great country has 
allowed senators to farm out the Indian 
service to henchmen in the face of protests 
that the men were unfit. Let it be explained 
with candor what manner of man Quay is, 
and why he still grows fat and impudent 
on the patronage of his state. Let it be 
carefully impressed on these young women 
that the modern plan in this country of 
getting a re-nomination and re-election to 
the presidency by the seizure of the civil 
service is safe, democratic, and patriotic. 


1 , 






















236 


THE CIVIL SEIIVICE CHRONICLE. 


while the method occasionally tried in 
France and elsewhere of retaining power 
by means of the military service is a men¬ 
ace to liberty. 

The board of naval officers designated 
by Secretary Tracy have held examina¬ 
tions for the places of foremen and master 
mechanics in the Brooklyn navy yard. 
There were ninety three applicants, and 
fifty-nine appeared for examination. The 
result of the examination was that with 
three exceptions the present incumbent 
stood the highest on the list. John 
O’Rourke, as master boilermaker, super¬ 
sedes the present incumbent. He held 
the place under the Cleveland administra¬ 
tion, and was turned out by a partisan 1 
foreman under this administration to make 
a place for the man that he now, by virtue 
of a competitive examination, supplants. 
The board states that, 

“ It has in its judgment specified the can¬ 
didates‘best qualified’ for the positions, it is 
of the opinion that the men named for master 
shipwright, master joiner, master shipfitter, 
(outside work), master boilermaker, and 
master sparmaker do not reach that standard 
of excellence which is desirable or which the 
best interests of the government demand. This 
unsatisfactory state of affairs may be largely 
due to the want of a more general knowledge 
on the part of the public as to the require¬ 
ments of the positions or to the inadequate 
rate of pay for some of the more important ” 

A part of the examination was oral, and 
a part written. A sample of the technical 
questions asked candidates for the position 
of foreman in the constructive department 
is: 

Sketch a reverberatory furnace. 

Describe the making and fitting of a si)ar hand. 

How do you test the quality of a bar of iron? 

Describe the tools used in dressing and tempering. 

How would you make a manacle shackle for a 
large ship? 

Describe the arrangement of what you consider an 
efficient smithy for general work—angle and beam 
work. 

The Civil Service Record puts it well: 

These are not hard questions. The men 
who can not write intelligibly and correct 
answers are not fit to be intrusted with the 
work. Many applicants came forward, and 
apparently were men of good qualities. The 
questions cited might prove difficult to the 
old-fashioned style of navy-yard striker, who 
could answer the following with perfect readi¬ 
ness : 

Do you know your congressmen? 

Do you know him well enough to have a pull on 
him? 

Describe the manner of stuffing a caucus. 

Should a ship be repaired in such a manner as to 
keep her at sea at election time? 

Is a ship that can keep atsea atelection time really 
seaworthy? 

Commissioner Roosevelt is a member 
of the twenty-first district republicau asso¬ 
ciation of the city of New York. The 
association threatened to pass resolutions 
charging evils and abuses in the civil 
service system of the New York custom¬ 
house. Thereupon Mr. Roosevelt invited 
the association to appoint a committee to 


go into into the custom-house to investi¬ 
gate the enforcement of the civil service 
law and rules, and this was done, and Mr. 
Roosevelt met the committee in the 
custom-house and proceeded with great 
.earnestness to teach them what the merit 
system is — a system of which they knew 
very little. He started out as follows : 

“ 1 wish to state that I courted this investigation, 
because I wish every act of the civil service commis¬ 
sion to be as public as it can possibly be made. We 
want publicity. We fear nobody but the contempti¬ 
ble, specious slanderer, who makes charges without 
producing the slightest scintilla of evidence to 
substantiate them. I also wish to state publicly now 
that no member of this committee is as much inter¬ 
ested as I am in finding out if this local civil service 
board or any member of it has done anything 
crooked or displayed any favoritism on one hand or 
antagonism on the other. 

Following this in several sessions he 
took the investigating committee over the 
old and familiar objections that the ex¬ 
aminations are not practical; that they 
were unfair, and further that certain 
persons, favorites of this district associa¬ 
tion, could not pass, or having passed 
failed to get appointments, and so on. The 
commitee labored industriously to make 
good the theory of its association, but if it 
is fair, it will have to report that it failed. 
The charges probably originated in a 
blind anger because ‘ the boys ’ found diffi¬ 
culty in quartering themselves upon the 
people, and they hoped to put the merit 
system to rout. The prompt opportunity 
given them to make their charges good, 
and the publicity which they were called 
upon to endure in trying to do it seriously 
embarrassed them. Their failure was 
only equalled by their astonishment when 
they were told by Mr. Roosevelt, whom 
they had hoped to scare, that so far 
as he was concerned politics would cut no 
figure in the competitive system. 

The student of the tendencies of the 
times has reason for discouragement in 
Indiana on one point. Let him look over 
the dispatches stating the commencement 
subjects of the high schools of the state 
and if they are an indication, as they are, 
there is a serious want of interest in all 
living questions connected with our gov¬ 
ernment. The currency, the tariff, immi¬ 
gration, the lives and works of promi¬ 
nent men, and above all, in the opinion 
of this paper, the many phases of the 
spoils system should have been seen on 
these programmes. Boys and girls from 
fifteen upwards should have a vivid in¬ 
terest in these and similar questions. They 
should be entitled to the utmost freedom 
of opinion only curtailed by the require¬ 
ment of courtesy of expression, and they 
should be taught that candor and honesty, 
and a desire for all the facts are essentials 
for every man or woman who desires in¬ 
tellectual and moral growth. What is the 
reason that all such questions are shunned ? 


- 

We think there is no doubt but that the 
answer will have to be because teachers 
fear that any freedom of expression will 
endanger their positions because of the 
bigotry and savagery of party spirit. 
There is just now in this city an enthusiasm 
among the school children for the Ameri 
can flag, and it floats from many school- 
houses. That is very well, but if we are to 
have a spirit of patriotism inculated, the flag 
alone is not enough. The young and the old 
in Indiana and elsewhere must permi. 
freedom of opinion and freedom of its ex¬ 
pression. Washington’s words on the 
baneful effects of the spirit of party might 
well be inscribed on every flag: 

It serves always to distract the public councils 
and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates 
the community with ill-founded jealousies ‘and 
false alarms; kindles the animosity of one part 
against another. 

There is an opinion that parties, in free countries, 
are useful checks upon the administration of the 
government, and serve to keep alive the spirit of 
liberty. This, within certain limits, is probably 
true; and in government of a monarchial cast, 
patriotism may look with indulgence, if not with 
favor, upon the spirit of party. But iii those 
of the popular character, in government purely 
elective, it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From 
their natural tendency it is certain there will 
always be enough of that spirit for every salutary 
purpose. And there being constant danger of excess 
the effort ought to be, by force of public opinion, to 
mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, 
it demands a uniform vigilence to prevent its burst¬ 
ing into a flame, lest instead of warning, it should 
consume. 

Mr. Gorman seems to be still in the saddle. 
Senator Voorhees has nominated him for the 
presidency, and the money has been raised, 
the silver service bought and presented 
amidst the wildest enthusiasm of Mr. Gor¬ 
man’s clubs. Mr. Gorman apparently lis¬ 
tened with gravity to the mayor’s address for 
which, unfortunately, there is space only for 
the following specimen: 

" The pleasing duty has been imposed upon me,” 
said the mayor, “of being the instrument of a very 
large number of your fellow-citizens to present to 
you a token of their grateful appreciation of the 
great services you have rendered to the nation and 
to your state. In doing so, I feel, sir, that I am 
taking an humble part upon an occasion which will 
be, and which is worthy of being historical. 

“Ill the tented field, in the forum, in the senate, 
it has always happened that when the essential 
rights of man have been as.sailed and have been in 
peril, providence has raised up a champion for their 
defense and maintenance.” 

The report also states that a feature of the testi¬ 
monial, which was not ready to be presented with 
the service, is the book containing the names of the 
subscribers. This is being prepared under the di¬ 
rect supervision of Mr. Douglas H. Thomas. It is 
estimated that the book will cost about $500, and it 
will be a high model of the book-binders’ art. The 
names will be inscribed alphabetically in English 
illuminated script letters. The whole silver service 
will be illustrated in one large picture, which will 
probably be made the fronti.spiece. Each separate 
piece will also be illustrated. The whole will be 
bound in crimson and gold, with a suitable in¬ 
scription on the outer cover. It will take several 
months to finish this book, and on its completion 
it will be presented to Senator Gorman without cer¬ 
emony. 

The Maryland civil service reform asso- 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


237 


ciation should be allowed to “edit” this 
memorial volume. Surely the names of 
Eugene Higgins, I. Freeman Raisin and 
Wallace Owings, with a handsome subscription 
from each, will be among the first. A bio¬ 
graphical sketch will always be of interest. 
Something like this: 

“lie appointed Eugene Higgins patronage cleik 
of the treasury. Higgins altered election poll and 
registration books, in 1879, and he reversed an elec¬ 
tion in 1875, by getting possession of the ballot boxes 
after the polls were closed, burning ballots of one 
party and substituting those of the other. He is 
skilled in every phase of political manipulation. 
Gorman kept him in the treasury nearly three years, 
and then transferred him to other fields of useful¬ 
ness. He appointed Morris A. Thomas, Indian 
agent. Thomas was a dishonest business man, a 
fraudulent bankrupt, a ballot-box stuffer, and, as 
an election judge, had received illegal votes. But 
the. plainest proof of these facts by eye witnesses 
weighed nothing against Congressman Gorman's in¬ 
dication that the appointment be made, and Thomas 
is now employing his leisure between campaigns as 
a care taker of Indians. 

I. Freeman Raisin was appointed naval officer. 
Raisin was, before the war, an officer of a political 
club of Baltimore “ th\igs and outlaws ” and is now 
a leader of the criminal classes, a notorious lobbyist, 
a skilled ballot-stuffer and ballot-burner. At one 
period it was his custom to send for any one who 
hail a measure before the city council, and notify 
him of the price at which it could get through. If 
paid, it went through ; otherwise, not. One man was 
put into the government printing office when under 
indictment for a brutal assault. He had during his 
career been indicted four times and arrested nine 
times. Another was put into the Baltimore custom¬ 
house when under indictment, for which he may be 
brought to trial any day, for fraudently striking 22.3 
names from the registration list. 

Wallace Owings was made a gauger. In 1886 he 
was in court as a prosecuting witness against a man 
charged with having assaulted him. The prisoner 
was brought in and stood with his back to Owings, 
and the latter, in this safe position, attempted to 
murder him by shooting; the wound was not fatal. 
For this he was indicted, but never tried. George 
Trust was made a clerk in the office of the collector 
of internal revenue. In 1879, a negro named Robin¬ 
son had just come to Baltimore with his wife and 
child. While walking along the street a man asked 
him his politics. Before he could reply, the 
questioner shot him dead. The murderer was the 
present clerk, George Trust. He had never seen the 
man before, and was absolutely without provoca¬ 
tion. An indictment, trial, and sentence to prison 
for four years and seven months followed; the 
defense being insanity, produced by intemperate 
habits. His appointment caused a storm, which he 
watched awhile, and then, in a mock-innocent 
letter, in which he alludes to his murder as an 
‘ unfortunate occurrence,’ resigned. 

And by all means let the simple statement 
be added from John K. Cowen’s history of 
the Gorman regime in Maryland, that “ murder, 
pure and simple, is recognized as a political 
service to be rewarded in state, national and 
municipal affairs.” 

The Civil Service Record, with the June 
number, completes its tenth year. It states 
that— 

These ten years cover the most critical and 
important part of the history of civil service 
reform ; and, in order to give a complete view 
of its history, the management has had a full 
index prepared, covering the whole ten vol¬ 
umes. 

The work has been done by Mr. Evarts B. 
Greene, a Harvard graduate of 1890, and now 
pursuing a post-graduate course at Cambridge 


in history and political economy. He hashad 
some suggestions as to preparing this from 
Alliert Biishnell Hart, Ph. I)., assistant pro¬ 
fessor in history. The work has been thor¬ 
oughly done, not by compiling the old indices, 
but by going over every number of the Record 
afresh. 

This index, with the title page, will be 
printed with the July number. 

Any college that attempts to teach his¬ 
tory in the modern spirit can find nothing 
to take the place of the volume covering 
these years. Any person who wants to 
keep informed of the current and ever 
changing phases of spoils politics can not 
afford to be without the Civil Service Record, 
and we make free to add the Civil Service 
Reformer and the Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle; and yet it is a constant experience to 
meet friends of the merit system more 
than ordinarily enthusiastic who regret 
“ the want of the facts put in a plain 
way ” that have been illustrated in all of 
these papers more than a hundred times 
each year. 

HARRISON’S RENOMINATION. 

The Indianapolis News of June 22 has per¬ 
formed a public service in securing an inter¬ 
view from “a well-known resident of this 
city” who was present at a recent meeting held 
here of opponents of the renomination of 
President Harrison. The interview, most of 
which is printed elsewhere, is a curious illus¬ 
tration of the hold the feudal idea has upon a 
large class of politicians. This man occupied 
a column of the News and is evidently a rep¬ 
resentative of the gathering in question. He 
is earnestly opposed to the renomination of 
Harrison, but his reasons are not grounded 
upon the least desire to elevate the tone of 
public affairs or to improve the management 
of public business. On the other hand his 
reasons are of the baser sort. The sum of it 
is that the right workers have not been paid 
with offices. There are good reasons why 
President Harrison should not be renominated 
but these opponents evidently do not care to 
lay hold of them or to have them made prom 
inent; nor would they care to see any other 
President carry out the principles upon which 
these objections are founded. 

Just grounds for opposition to the renomi¬ 
nation of the President are such as giving 
offices largely to his relatives, which is com¬ 
paratively a minor but an inexcusable offense 
He has refused to dismiss unworthy public 
officers like Raum. He is responsible for the 
failure to prosecute the Mahone blackmailers 
to conviction. He has combined with Mahone 
and Quay. He has removed officers like 
Corse, Pearson, Graves and Burt to the detri¬ 
ment of the public service and with a view to 
helping his party machine. He re-debauched 
the Indian service. He has used and has per¬ 
mitted to be used the public service to the ex¬ 
tent of more than 100,000 places to pay per¬ 
sonal or parly debts, beginning with the ap¬ 
pointment of Wanamaker. He has done 
some things in the way of permitting the 


enforcement of the civil service law and ex¬ 
tending the merit system which ought to be 
put into the other side of the scale, notwith¬ 
standing the fact that he has rewarded fellows 
like Grosvenor who did all they could to 
break down the law. His merits do not meet 
what the country had a right to expect. It is 
not a question whether he has done as well as 
or better than President Cleveland. Upon 
that point we think he need not fear compari¬ 
son. But the standard of criticism is and 
ought to be higher. President Harrison is to 
be judged by what his party and himself 
promised when he was elected and by what he 
could reasonably have accomplished. These 
promises have been as a whole flagrantly dis¬ 
regarded. The question in a nut-shell is 
whether the people ought to be asked to sanc¬ 
tion by re-election the acts of a President who 
has confessedly used more than 100,000 places 
in the public service with salaries attached 
which are paid by the whole people and with 
duties to be performed which are owed to the 
whole people, to pay for personal or party serv¬ 
ices, or in other words to feed an insatiable 
partisan machine. Is not this exercise of 
autocratic power so unparalleled in the govern¬ 
ments of the world and so stupendous and 
dangerous that it overshadows and dwarfs all 

other acts? - 

RAUM. 

Ills not at all likely that Pension Commissioner 
Raum will be asked to resign, or that he will tender 
his resignation voluntarily. Enough inquiry has 
been made by the secretary of the interior, and oth¬ 
ers directly interested in the administration of the 
pension office, to ascertain that Commissioner Raum 
was in no way responsible for any of the shortcom¬ 
ings of his .son, and that he made no effort whatever 
to shield him when he was finally charged with 
peculation in office. No one has found anything in 
the official work of Commissioner Raum to include 
him in any way in the charges which have been 
made against any employe of the pension office. It 
has not been found that a single penny has been 
ever turned in a dishonest direction by Commis¬ 
sioner Raum, or that anything done or left undone 
by him can be distorted into a connection with the 
shortcoming of any employe of the bureau. He has 
been diligent, honest and capable. The highest pos¬ 
sible confidence has been placed in Gen. Raum’s 
integrity, and the recent vicious and ferocious out¬ 
cry made against the eommissioner is regarded in 
official circles, as well as by private citizens who 
have been watching the management of the office 
from the outside, as due directly to a growing preju¬ 
dice in democratic and mugwump quarters against 
pensions. It may be that much of this talk comes 
from the fact that the, pension laws have been liber¬ 
ally construed and the payments for pensions largely 
increased, but no one has yet charged General Raum 
with anything done which was dishonest. Neither 
have his private business affairs been connected by 
any one, in point of fact, with any of his official con- 
nection.s. Undoubtedly the same fight would be 
continued against any other man who could become 
commissioner of pensions, and it has been concluded 
that ffs we ate entering upon a period of general as. 
sault against pension business it can be resisted as 
well under the present administration of the office 
as it could be under the direction of any other man. 
In other words the attack upon General Raum is 
regarded as an attack upon the pension system, 
since investigation has convinced the President that 
General Raum is guilty of no misconduct in his offi¬ 
cial position.—IFfls/iiMpfon Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, June 4. 

Such a dispatch as the above will under all 



















238 


THE CIVrL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the circumstances be taken as an official 
statement. It means that the President has 
determined to pursue the plan followed by 
President Grant with officials ‘“underfire” 
and that the attempt is to be made to direct 
attention from Kaum by the bogus alarm of 
an attack on the j)ension system. It is well 
then to review some facts connected with the 
Raum family, and thus determine what the 
President’s idea of a public officer is. 

Raum created a new. division known as 
the appointment division, and put his son 
Green B. Raum, Jr., at the head of it, with 
the title of assistant chief clerk. How' the 
President should have been affected by this 
has been stated by Thomas Jefferson. “ The 
public will never be made to believe that the 
appointment of a relative is made on the 
ground of merit alone, uninfluenced by 
family views; nor can they ever see with 
approbation offices, the disposal of which 
they entrust to their Presidents for public 
purposes, divided out as family property.” 
After Raum had created a place for his son, 
he removed from the room a woman clerk 
who had been making some fifteen dollars a 
month in notary fees, and the Journal corres¬ 
pondent showed how the flow of fees was 
turned to Raum, Jr. “ When visitors to the 
office have inquired for a notary they have 
usually been sent to him, and he is doing a 
considerable portion of the business that the 
woman did formerly.” Another son, after his 
father became commissioner of pensions, went 
into partnership in the pension claim busi¬ 
ness, and the firm circulars, scattered to attract 
business, stated the fact that one partner was 
the son of the commissioner of pensions. The 
President and every one else knows that this 
would give the impression, and was intended 
to give the impression, that claims presented 
by John Raum would have ‘ advantages.’ 
The most powerful claim agent in Washington, 
employing hundreds of clerks, and controlling 
the most widely circulated pension paper, 
indorsed a note for the commissioner of pen¬ 
sions a few days before the commissioner 
made an important ruling of advantage to 
this attorney. The New York Times justly 
said of the President’s responsibility: 

He is bound to see that the %vork of the pension 
bureau is trusted only to clean hands, and that there 
shall be no taint of suspicion upon the integrity, the 
purity, the fidelity and disinterestedness of the of¬ 
ficials in charge of it. He knows by his own personal 
observation what any one can readily infer, that this 
work demands peculiarly scrupulous agents, that it 
is liable to great abuse, that abuses have in the past 
been rank in the bureau, and that anything short of 
the most thorough reform is an outrage upon the 
soldiers and a disgraceful betrayal of trust. 

He knows especially that the body of pension 
agents and attorneys that have grown up about 
the bureau, and, for that matter, in thd bu¬ 
reau itself, are as greedy and corrupt as 
any body of men in the country except 
the tariff lobby. He knows their power, their 
wealth, their elaborate organization, their system 
skillfully developed by years of experience and 
study, by which they rob the .soldier-pensioners on 
the one hand and the tax payers on the other. He 
knows that the law intended that their services, or 
those of any intermediary whatever, should be unnec¬ 
essary, and that it was meant that any deserving 


claimant for a pension in any part of the country 
should get all theinformation neces.sary and all the 
aid required to file his claim and get it proved and 
promptly and regularly paid without expense to him¬ 
self. And yet it has come about that this is practic¬ 
ally impossible, that the pensioners are obliged to 
employ outside agents at their own cost, and that 
very freciuently these agents connive at fraud on the 
government, while in other cases they bleed the 
veterans. 

Raum has been under investigation on 
another serious charge, and upon which the 
report of the committee can not be taken as 
conclusive. It is not necessary to rely upon 
any disputed facts. Raum was mouths ago so 
enveloped in suspicious acts that to retain him 
in office was an act of impropriety. So long 
ago as last winter it was shown that young 
Green Raum kept two horses and that a mes¬ 
senger in the pension office cared for them. 
When asked on the witness stand what com¬ 
pensation he gave he declined, saying it was 
none of Mr. Cooper’s business, and according 
to Congre.ssman Cooper 

“The evidence disclosed that he had an old 
soldier removed from the force of laborers and 
secured the appointment in his place of a col¬ 
ored man who was the keeper of a gambling 
house, under indictment at the time of his 
appointment for keeping an unlicensed and 
disorderly house.” 

Young Raum still kept his place, and the 
other day was allowed to resign with thirty 
days’ pay, because he had sold an office and 
stolen $7‘2. It is stated that “a regular bu¬ 
reau for the auctioning off of appointments has 
been maintained in the pension office for 
months. People would be appointed to place 
outside the civil service rules, usually paying 
$600 a year, provided they made the appoint¬ 
ment profitable to Mr. Raum’s ring. It has 
been no uncommon thing of late to see adver¬ 
tisements in the daily papers here offering 
definite sums to any one who would obtain 
places for tbe advertisers—usually the sum of 
$100 or $200. Outsiders have wondered if 
such advertisements ever produced any results. 
Young Green B. Raum might shed some light 
on the subject. It is said that the investiga¬ 
tion has disclosed that he and his confederates 
sold original appointments, that they sold pro¬ 
motions to those in the office and that they 
even sold the privilege of selection under the 
civil service rules. Selling promotions was 
comparatively easy, for that matter was largely 
under control of the thrifty appointment clerk, 
Raum, One of young Raum’s confederates 
was getting $1,000 a year when Raum entered 
the pension bureau. He is now getting $1,800 
and two of his sisters have been promoted 
twice. One of the methods pursued was hav¬ 
ing clerks who had entered the service for pay 
take the examinations for promotions by 
proxy.” 

The particular case requiring Raum’s resig¬ 
nation with thirty days’ pay was the case of a 
South Carolinian named Smith advertised 
to pay $*200 for a place in Washington paying 
$50 a month. He was soon approached by a 
negro who offered to obtain it for him. The 
negro, who was formerly a servant in the 
Raum family, introduced the South Caroli¬ 
nian to Green B. Raum, Jr., and it was not 
long before he received his commission and 
paid the negro the $200. Later on the new clerk 
desired promotion into the classified service, 
but he doubted his capacity to pa.ss the 
civil service examinations.. Another clerk, 
J. L. Johnson, took the examination under 
the name of the South Carolinian and the pro¬ 
motion was soon accomplished under these 
fraudulent papers. 


The climax to this career of the Raum 
family is that the administration evidently 
intends that young Raum shall not be pun¬ 
ished. Attorney General Miller declined the 
request of the civil service commission for an 
opinion whether Raum’s offenses were punish¬ 
able by law unless “ requested ” by the Presi¬ 
dent. The President apparently has not 
“ requested ” the opinion, and at last the pub¬ 
lic is given this Jowmaf dispatch. 


RECENT MEETINGS OF ASSOCIA¬ 
TIONS. 

The civil service reform a.s.sociation, of 
Buffalo, held its annual meeting June 12. It 
met in a community converted to the merit 
system. The life of this association puts to 
shame the helplessness of crowds of good peo¬ 
ple who shake their heads and say, “Things 
always have been so, and always will be.” 
There was no more unpromising ground than 
Buffalo when this association began its work 
ten years ago. It knew what the spoils system 
was and it proceeded to give practical effect to 
its conviction that there was a remedy. .4fter 
the national and state civil service laws were 
passed this association knew when those laws 
were being enforced and when they were being 
tricked, and it did not hesitate to contend with 
the enemy in public meetings, in the public 
prints, in the courts and elsewhere. The last¬ 
ing and final triumph came in repeated deci¬ 
sions of the court of appeals of New York. 
At last completely defeated, the city govern¬ 
ment of Buffalo took up the civil service law 
and outdid itself in zeal of execution. The 
committee reported to the meeting that 
“ there is scarcely an office in the city, except 
those which are exempt by statute from the 
civil service law, to which ajspointment is not 
made by competitive examination only.” As 
is always the case, the only ones who had to be 
defeated were the machine politicians who 
made a living out of politics. The people of 
Buffalo were in favor of the merit system as 
soon as they understood it, and the fight with 
the party machines accomplished the schooling 
process. 

Fifty-three new members were admitted. 
The as.sociation thanked Secretary Tracy for 
his proposed application of the merit system 
to the navy-yards. We quote two resolutions: 

1. That in the judgment of this association, the 
caution which at first limited the operation of the 
]aw for the reform of the civil service to federal of¬ 
fices having not less than fifty employees, is no 
longer justifiable. The reform has passed the season 
of experiment, and stands fully approved before the 
people. Its success justifies and demands its exten¬ 
sion to the great body of the official places in the 
gift of the federal government. 

2. That this as.sociation cordially approves and 
earnestly urges the passage of the bill introduced by 
Congressman H. C. Lodge, of Massachusetts, for the 
selection of fourth-class postmasters on the basis of 
merit. 

The civil service reform association of Penn¬ 
sylvania held its tenth annual meeting in 
Philadelphia April 8. The report of the ex¬ 
ecutive committee submitted to the meeting 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


239 


shows a decided disposition in the association 
to “tackle” the lion in the den—the head of 
an office who puts himself above the law. 
Controller Thompson of Philadelphia, having 
been reported to have taken such a stand, a 
committee of the association asked him about 
it, hut he declined to state his intentions. He 
then began dismissing employes without cause, 
and when the committee again addressed him, 
he declined to give reasons for his actions, and 
denied the right of citizens to interrogate him. 
This is a fortunate answer; it will not lessen 
the pugnacity of the association. Similar 
remarks in Indiana have caused the re¬ 
marker and his party a great deal of trouble. 

The executive committee says that the 
merit system does not stir the mass of the 
community as did slavery and seamen's 
rights. It should he remembered that, par¬ 
ticularly in the case of slavery, it took many 
years to rouse the conscience of the people. 
It may take a higher civilization to justly 
abhor the spoils system, but the time is not far 
off when, if the civil service reformers do their 
duty, the appointment of a political freebooter 
like Martin to be a public officer over the 
citizens of Philadelphia will rouse the peo¬ 
ple of that city more than Garrison ever 
roused the city of Boston upon the subject of 
slavery. 

The committee reported a more faithful ob¬ 
servance of the federal law, and as we remem¬ 
ber the late Postma.ster Harrity, there was 
room for it. At a dinner in the evening Her¬ 
bert Welsh delivered an address, in which he 
said : 

During the past democratic administration, out of 
a force of fifty-eight Indian agents, fifty three were 
removed, and there was virtually a clean sweep of 
the whole Indian service, including the school 
force, with the consequent failure of Mr. Cleveland’s 
earnest desire to promote the welfare of the Indian. 
Under the present administration, the carnival of 
spoils in the Indian service has been as riotous as 
under the last, and owing to a combination of cir¬ 
cumstances far more calamitous, for a serious out¬ 
break has occurred which, it is true, had its origin in 
other causes, but which undoubfedly was precipi¬ 
tated by the spoils system. 


J The-report of the executive committee to 
the Cambridge Civil Service Keform Associa¬ 
tion, which met recently, speaking of the Civil 
Sei-vice Record, of which it is with the Boston 
Association a joint publisher, says: 

The average number of pages during the year has 
been 1054 8.nd the average monthly edition 4350. 

The Record is sent as follows:— 

2621 copies to the following civil service reform 
associations: 


Boston..439 

Philadelphia. 350 

New York.333 

Bufl'alo, N: Y.195 

Milwaukee, Wis.109 

Missouri.220 

Brookline.115 

Cambridge.164 

Newton.314 

Malden. 53 

Geneva, N. Y. 36 

New Haven, Ct.40 

Lawrence, Kansas. 12 

Brooklyn, N. Y .250 


To 1117 young men’s Christian association 
throughout the country, these being distributed in 
every state in the union and the District of Col¬ 
umbia. 

A monthly average of 170 copies has been sent to 
paying individual sub.scribers in Alabama, Cali¬ 
fornia, Connecticut, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, In¬ 
diana, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Min¬ 
nesota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New York, Ohio, 
Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Virginia and Utah 
Territory and the District of Columbia. 

Eighty-nine copies to sundry persons, libraries, 
societies, etc , in Arkansas, California, Connecticut, 
Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, 
Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missi.ssippi, Mis¬ 
souri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New 
York, North f^arolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, 
Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia, Wis¬ 
consin, and the District of Columbia. 

Ninety-five copies to newspapers (exchange list) 
in Alabama, California, Connecticut, Debt ware, 
Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisi¬ 
ana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, 
Minnesota, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, 
New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, 
South Carolina, Vermont, Virginia, Wisconsin and 
the District of Columbia. 

Ninety-eight are sent to the leaders of the reform 
movement in Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, 
Mas.sachusetts, New Jersey, New York, North Caro¬ 
lina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. 

Copies of the Record are also sent to the President 
of the United States and to each member of his 
cabinet. 


The New York Civil Service Reform Asso¬ 
ciation held its annual meeting May 20, The 
report of its executive committee commends 
the Brooklyn civil service commission, hut 
speaks with a more than doubtful tone of the 
state commission, and the New York city 
commission. The last two commissions are 
Delphian, and under them the law shows 
those curious results which we used to witness 
in Indiana. Why does not the New York 
association take u|) the guantlet thus impu¬ 
dently thrown down ? Why does it not measure 
strength with Hill and the commissions? 
There could be but one result to such a 
struggle, and that would be a victory for the 
association. Such a movement was proposed 
at the meeting but it seemed to be discour¬ 
aged by the chairman of the executive com¬ 
mittee, Mr. Everett P. Wheeler. The chair¬ 
man of the new committee on civil service 
examinations, Mr. C. W. Watson, is a good 
man to step into the breach, or to make one 
and then step into it. 


The Missouri Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion held its tenth annual meeting at St. Louis 
May 28. It heard a report of its executive 
committee and elected officers. The late 
Judge Breckenridge was formerly president of 
the association. 

The Indiana Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion held a meeting in this city .lune 6 for 
the purpose of electing officers. William D. 
Foulke, of Richmond, was .elected president 
The appointment of the executive committee 
has not yet been completed. The association 
has several times doubled its membership in 
the last two years, and is composed of severa 
hundred influential men from all parts of the 


state. It has no annual dues, and each work 
undertaken is cared for hy a special subscrip¬ 
tion. It is time that a large number of people 
throughout the state who have never taken 
any interest or made any sacrifices in the war 
against the spoils system should begin to do 
soth. 


THE MINISTER AS A CITIZEN. 

We wish some earnest enemy of the spoils 
system would cause to be printed and sent to 
every clergymen of every denomination in In¬ 
diana the recent address of of Congressmen 
George Fred Williams, of Massachusetts to 
the clergy. It is all .so apt and spirited that 
it is hard to determine what to take and what 
to leave: 

• 

“What is it which deadens the priestly function 
when the immoralities of public life are exposed to 
view?’’ Our public business and its moral stand¬ 
ards and methods belong to every citizen; nay, 
more, as they take the stamp of public approval they 
pass current among men as our authorized coin. 
Yet while public men are striving upward, .seeking 
to bring more honesty, more decency, some touch 
of Godliness into the affairs of the republic, it can 
not be denied that to the pulpit they look, generally 
in vain, for protection or encouragement. 

It is true there have been notable exceptions: and 
ministers of this faith have furnished many of them; 
they make it easy for me now to thank them for 
their work, and to beg that it be honored and emu¬ 
lated. 

It has been given to the church to keep the spirit¬ 
ual interests of men, and the field of moral instruc¬ 
tion has been yielded to it quite as fully as that of 
religious teaching. I ask you by what right you 
abandon the great field of public morals; why are 
you silent in the face of public wrongs aud scandals? 
Where are your words for the champions of -political 
honesty? 

What wonder that the power of the church wanes, 
i;' it stands silent and listless as the devil takes pos¬ 
session of the public business. Let me suggest that 
the ministry owes it intervention in the moral strug¬ 
gles of politics, first to the politician, second to the 
cause of morality itself, and third to his country. 

Y’ou owe it to the politician who is making any 
effort to hold up the standards of political honesty. 
He needs your help even for himself; because there 
is no calling in life which so discourages ideals and 
makes high motives so dangerous as politics. 

Men risk their reputations when they enter poli¬ 
tics ; therefore men with reputations are apt to keep 
out of it. I fear clergymen avoid it less because it 
threatens their reputations than because their pul¬ 
pits are in danger. I agree that there is common 
consent among the political sinners, that they 
should not be referred to from the pulpit, but that 
consent should not settle your duty. 

But surely the church has jurisdiction, sin is its 
peculiar business, aud the ministers are pure men 
who can not be frightened with recriminations. I 
ask in all earnestness “ if public wrong, immorality, 
dishonesty is not the business of the clergy, whose 
business is it?” 

The politician is the thing to be reformed ; he will 
reform as public opinion demands, and you are re¬ 
sponsible for the moral sentiment of the community. 
Indeed, ministers of the gospel should stand in the 
front ranks of attack upon public wrongs. You need 
not mix in politics; but politics is not wrong and 
wrong is not politics. It is because public sins are 
most powerful that it is your first duty to attack 
them. In private sin men shrink and are ashamed, 
because they are alone; public sin becomes bold 
and defiant because many are joined in it. The of¬ 
fenders stand together, they defend together; they 
may be enough to call themselves of the public; 
they may even constitute the public ; they may .sit 
in your front pews aud menace you. 
































t 


“ Larfjo districts or parcels of land were allotted by the conquering generals to the superior officers of the army, and 
by them dealt out again in smaller parcels or allotments to the inferior officers and most deserving soldiers. * * * The 
condition <»f holding the lands thus given was that the possessor should do service faithfully, both at home and in the wars, 
to him by whom they were given,’’ and, on breach of this condition, “by not performing the stipulated service, or by 
deserting Ills lord in battle,” the lands reverted to the lord. 


— Editor O. E. Mohler, of the Fort Wayne 
Gazette, is in the city. The Gazette is the most 
outspoken anti-Harrison republican organ in 
the state. Mr. Mohler says that there are no 
Harrison rej)ublicans in Allen county outside 
of the federal office-holding ring. (Iresham 
would get 99 per cent, of the republican vote 
if the nomination was decided by popular 
ele’tiou— Indinnapolix Sentinel, June 3. 


“No candidate who can not carry his stat® 
undivided can expect to be nominated. It is 
an established fact that Harrison can never 
again carry our whole delegation. If the 
Bruce Carrs and Sam Kerchevals and other 
administration imps come here again to influ¬ 
ence our district convention, they wilt be in¬ 
continently kicked out. Hereafter, if the first 
district of Indiana prefers Blaine, or 
Gresham, or Alger, or anybody else to Harri¬ 
son, its choice must be respected. 

“ There are a few—and very few—news¬ 
papers in this state that care much for Harri¬ 
son. Some of them have post-offices and things tied 
to their tails to hold them steady in the harness ; one 
has a consulship at Palermo, the headquarters of 
the Mafia. The 'court organ' draws $35,000 or 
$ 40,000 a year from the treasury, and therefore 
can afford to ignore the anti-Harrison meet¬ 
ing of last Thursday. But the independent 
republican papers that have no favors to ask 
will get their work in, you bet.”— Evansville 
Journal, June, 1S91. 


—The following Columbus telegram to the 
Cincinnati Post, an independent newspaper 
with republican sympathies, will be of interest; 

“Supporters of the national administration, 
including scores of the fourth-class post¬ 
masters throughout the state, have received 
hints, which, although coming indirectly, are 
none the less regarded as authoritative, to 
the effect that the civil service rules pro¬ 
hibiting their active participation in political 
preliminaries will not be rigidly enforced if 
they are delegates to the convention.— Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel, May 21. 

—No political conference held in this city for years 
has attracted so much attention or excited the same 
interest as the ‘‘anti-Harrifion movement” recently 
inaugurated in this city. Since it adjourned the 
men who composed it have talked comparatively 
little : but tongues are wagging everywhere over the 
affair. There has been more talk abroad than here 
in Indiana, where the President’s friends are alert. 
The Acres called upon a well-known resident of this 
city, who was present, for an interview. It wiil be 
seen that he represents the hostile element that bet 
lieves Harrison a poor politician, and unpopular In 
his contact with republicans who are not his per- 
.sonal friends. 

” What objection is urged against the President? ” 

“ Well, I will name a few. General Harrison was 
no sooner elected than he seemed to feel that he 
elected himself—and that he was under obligations 
to no one, with the possible exception of Mr. Wana- 
maker, who raised 8400,000 to assist in footing the 
bills. Before his cabinet was formed he snubbed 


Mr. Blaine, who offered to visit this city to consnl- 
abont the cabinet. Before he had been President a 
month he offended every member of the national 
republican committee. 

" During the canvass he said to a delegation of re¬ 
publicans from La Fayette, that he recognized the 
fact that most of the republicans in their county had 
another convention preference ; that he had always 
believed convention preferences should be free in 
the republican party, and that no prejudice should 
follow any republican on account of that preference. 
As party men we will judge men by his past conven¬ 
tion conduct. Now, did he follow that course? 
Not much. Where is a republican who favored the 
nomination of General Gresham at Chicago that has 
received an appointment at his hands? ” 

“Were not Major Calkins and General Shackleford 
given appointments?” 

“ I am glad you mentioned those men. The Presi. 
dent always apologizes for Calkins’s appointment as 
judge of the district court of Washington territory 
by saying he did not know that Major Calkins was a 
resident of Washington territoryuntil he received an 
almost unanimous request from the bar of that terri 
tory asking for Calkins' appointment, and that he 
could do nothing else, but when the territory was 
admitted as a state a few months later, and it be¬ 
came necessary to make a new appointment, and 
when the appointment would have been of some 
value, the President refused to appoint him. If it 
was a proper appointment in the first instance it 
was infinitely more so when the territory became 
a state. The little judgeship he gave General 
Shackleford in the Indian territory is too insignifi¬ 
cant to mention. These are the only Gresham men 
who have received recognition from the President. 
He seems to have changed his mind after he made 
that little speech to the La Fayette delegation. He is 
known to have interfered and prevented his cabinet 
and even bureau officers from appointing men whom 
they desired to appoint, who favored General Gresh¬ 
am at Chicago. No, sir; the President has shown 
himself to be selfish and vindictive. 

" The republicans of the Evansville and LaFayette 
districts were known to prefer the nomination of 
General Gresham at Chicago, and for that reason 
they have been ignored, and neither district has 
received recognition, white Mr. Chcadte, congressman 
from the latter district, was snubbed and almost insulted 
by the President when he insisted upon being allowed to 
conti ol the patronage in his district. While President 
Harrison was a member of the senate he was a 
stanch advocate of what is known as senalorial 
etiquette, viz.: allowing the senators to name all 
appointments in the state at large, as well as in dis¬ 
tricts represented by democrats. This he denied to 
Mr. Cheadle, while according it to representatives Steele, 
Owen and Brown. 

“ In Illinois he denied the senators and representatives 
the right to control anything, btd made many important 
appointments over their protest—&\\ because the repub¬ 
licans of that state were for Gresham at Chicago. 
The President did not recollect that Chicago con¬ 
tributed $94,000 to aid in his election, and that much 
rf that amount was solicited by his son Russell and 
his law partner, the present attorney-general of the 
Uniud States. He was determined to get even. In 
Ohio he permitted Senator Sherman to control all the 
patronage he claimed. 

“The gentlemen who attended that meeting will 
call another at no distant day, and will not apply to 
any one for permission to do so. They are the slaves 
of no man, or clique of office holders. 

“ We do not underestimate the influenee of public 
patronage in the hands of men who are now and have 
been using the same since March 4, 1890, to perpetuate 
themselves in poroer. For instance, note the appoint¬ 


ment of Charley Foster, of Ohio, as secretary of the 
treasury. That slate is red hot for Blaine. Charley 
Foster was given the most poiverful department in the 
government, so far as patronage, is concerned to enable 
him to capture the state for Harrison in the next 
national convention. 

“ What was the character of Colonel Conger’s 
speech ?” 

“Well, some portions were semi-confidential and 
therefore will not be repeated; bnt it related to the 
President’s want of experience as a political leader, 
knowledge and judgment of politics as well as of 
men ; the use he is now making of public patronage 
to perpetuate himself and associates in power; his 
efforts to give one faction in Ohio an advantage over 
another. He thought the President did much to 
bring about the defeat of the republicans in Ohio at 
the last gubernatorial election. He doubted 
seriously whether Harrison could carry Ohio if re¬ 
nominated. 

“ General McNulta attributed the recent and pres¬ 
ent demoralization in Illinois politics to President 
Harrison’s treatment of the leading republicans of 
that state, including its senators and members of 
congress. He has ignored their wishes and appointed 
men to office whom no one wanted, or men who did 
little or nothing for the party, because that state 
and its newspaper men almost unanimously sup¬ 
ported Gresham at Chicago. He firmly believed 
that should Harrison be renominated he will fail to 
carry Illinois. The recent victory for the democrats 
in that state has greatly weakened the republican 
party and the mass of the party is so indifferent to 
Harrison that they would not work as they would 
for another candidate. A resolution was adopted by 
a rising vote declaring that all present were opposed 
to the renomination of President Harrison, and 
moving for the appointment of a committee to call 
another meeting, at which a permanent organization 
will be effected. It will be an open movement, with 
nothing to conceal. We propose to see whether pub¬ 
lic office is a public trust ora private snap.”—Indi¬ 
anapolis News, June' 22 . 

—The republican state central comruitteeof 
Iowa has begun to assess the office-holders in 
that state at an earlier date than usual. A 
circular issued by Chairman Mack and ad¬ 
dressed to a railway postal clerk, says; “ Last 
fall our comm-ittee called upon you as a 
republican for a contribution to our campaign 
fund. As our books show you either responded 
only in part or not at alt to our request. 
These contributions were expected to ca^’ry the 
party through the whole year. Owing to the 
failure of our friends to respond, we are in 
need of some funds now to straighten up 
some matters left from the fall’s work, and to 
do some very necessary work before our state 
convention meets.”— New York Evening Post, 
May 25. 

—The reconciliation between Mahone and 
ex-Congressman Langston, whom the former 
has fought so bitterly, bas caused a little flut¬ 
ter in republican circles. This reconciliation is 
accepted to mean that Mahone has returned to poli¬ 
tics and is harmonizing the working factions for the 
Presidential contest. 

Mahone is preparing to secure a delegation 
from this state to the national republican con¬ 
vention which will favor his candidate. The 
reconciliation between Mahone and Langston 
was no doubt effected for practical purposes. 
The chairman of the republican committee, 
who votes as vigorously as he fights, has made 
relentless war upon the colored ex-congress¬ 
man, and, it is believed, has spent money lib¬ 


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The vassal, upon investiture, took an oath of fealty to the lord, and in addition did homage, “openly and humbly 
kneeling, being ungirt, uiieovered and holding up his hands, both together, between those of his lord, who sate before him, 
and there professing that he did become his MAN from that day forth, of life and limb and earthly honor, and then he reeeived a 
kiss from his lord.” Serviees were free and base. Free service was to pay a sum of money, or serve under tlie lord in war. 
Base service was to plow the lord’s land, to make his liedge or carry out his dung.—[Blackstone. 


erally to defeat hioi in his congressional fight 
in the fourth district. Langston passed through 
here on his way to Petersburg this afternoon. 
Here is what he said to a reporter about Ma- 
hone: 

“ I have no doubt that Mr. Mahone would 
now do anything to advance my personal or 
official interests which he and my friends 
might deem advisable and judicious in con¬ 
nection with the advancement of the repub¬ 
lican party, the general interest of colored 
Americans, and the highest welfare of our 
citizens generally. In Mr. Mahoneys integrity 
as a republican, in his intelligence as a Virginia 
gentlemen of high character, and \n his sagacity as 
an American statesman, interested in both sections of 
our country and our common welfare, I have full 
confidence.”—Richmond Dispatch to New York 
Times, March 26. 

—The Young Republican Club, of Philadelphia, 
celebrated its tenth anniversary last night with a 
dinner. Among the speakers was Collector Cooper. In 
the course of his remarks he said : 

“The recent results in revolutionized Rhode 
Island, in ever doubtful New York, in gerryman¬ 
dered Michigan, and even in "the Kansas and 
Nebraska alliance, all go to show a bright Presidential 
promise which has not been shaken by the declaration of 
some club man in Boston, whose name I have forgotten, 
that the chairman of the republican national committee 
xuas responsible for the loss of Massachusetts. It was 
lost last fall, partially, upon a purely personal issue, 
as was Pennsylvania, partially, upon a like issue ; 
but for any club man, however obscure, to attribute 
the loss of Massachusetts to the republican national 
chairman at a time when he exercised no control, 
whereas the state was carried handsomely for Har¬ 
rison in 1888 when he had control, passes the stand¬ 
ard of logic.” 

The members of the club were so disorderly 
during the speeches that City Solicitor Warwick, the 
last speaker, said to them that “ the insolence, not 
to say the inebriety,” of some of the disturbers 
might be pardoned but could not be forgotten.— 
Philadelphia Dispatch to the iVete York Evening Post, 
April 11. 

—United States Senator Quay arrived in the city 
early yesterday afternoon en route from Washington 
to his home in Beaver. Among his visitors at the 
Continental Hotel was Congressman Harmer, whese 
district comprises Germantown. He called on the 
senator in the interest of Mr. Brooks. Col. Quay, it 
is understood, in his conference ^vith President Harrison 
on Monday, when he handed in Collector Martin's res¬ 
ignation, not only discussed the question in connection 
with the appointment of a successor, but also pressed the 
candidacy of Second Comptroller of the Treasury Col. 
B. Frank Gilkesem, of Bucks county, for appointment to 
the bench of the court of claims, to fill the vacancy 
caused by the retirement of Judge Schofield. 

The local politicians who called on Senator Quay 
at the hotel yesterday afternoon and last evening, 
afterwards expressed themselves satisfied that Brooks 
would get the internal revenue collectorshlp and 
Gilkeson the judgeship of the court of claims. One 
of them, an up-town leader, said ; 

" There Ims been a great deal published about reported 
differences between Senator Quay and President Harri¬ 
son. There is not a word of truth in any of the stories. 
Senator's Quay's interview with the President on Mon¬ 
day was one of the most satisfactory he ever had-' ’ \.s 

" Will Col. Gilke.sou be appointed to the bench of 
the court of claims?” 

” It looks that way,” said the politician guardedly, 

“ And Representative Brooks to the internal rev¬ 
enue collectorshlp? ” 

“ It looks that way; I guess it’s about settled that 
Brooks will be the new collector.’ ’ 


The question which is giving some slight uneas¬ 
iness to the minds of the party workers closely iden 
tified with the revenue oflice at the present time, is 
whether or not there will be any changes in the sub¬ 
ordinate places in the department. The gaugersand 
deputies are all at sea as to what is iu store for them 
after Collector Martin goes out on the 1st of July, 
although if William H. Brooks is to be his successor, 
it is not believed there will be any changes, unless 
for cause. Mr. Brooks is conservative, and he is be¬ 
sides on good terms with some of the party leaders 
who were opposed to Mr. Martin’s appointment to 
the collectorship originally, notably James Mc- 
Manes. The latter, who has never had much to do 
with helping elect republican tickets since the pres¬ 
ent collector of internal revenue was put into office, 
it is said may feel prompted by the change in offi¬ 
cials to come out and once more take an active hand 
in the party campaigns.—P/tt'iatfcfp/iio Press, June 9. 

—The President has appointed William H. Brooks, 
of Pennsylvania, to be collector of internal revenue 
for the first district of Pennsylvania, vice David 
Martin, resigned. —lPds/iiJjpf'j?i Dispatch, June 18. 

—“Boss” Quay is on a familiar footing again at the 
White House. If the President shares any of Mr- 
Roger Wolcott’s scruples about the prominence of 
Quay in the party management, he evidently feels 
compelled to stifle them in view of the necessity of 
getting a Harrison delegation from Pennsylvania. 
Quay had quite a slate of federal appointments to 
present to-day, and he was with the President for a 
long time. He wants his creature. Second Comptroller 
Gilkeson, made a judge in the court of claims in 
place of Judge Schofield, who is about to retire. 
This will leave a vacancy in the second comptroller’s 
office which Mr. Quay also expects to fill. He was 
accompanied to the White House by collector 
Martin of Philadelphia, who handed iu his resigna¬ 
tion. Quay had a candidate for this place also. The 
resignation was only made known to-day, so that 
Quay was easily able to forestall other claimants. 

Speaking of general politics, he laughs at the 
other Pennsylvania republicans who are seeking his 
place in the senate, and intimates that he has little 
fear of them. He feels that with the federal patron¬ 
age at his back he can snap his fingers in the faces of 
his enemies in the repubiican party. The power he 
wields at the White House is well explained by a 
fellow republican who remarked today: “If the 
President knows which side his bread is buttered 
on he won’t turn down Senator Quay. If he does, 
he won’t get one of the sixty-two delegates of Penn¬ 
sylvania in the next national convention.”—ifog/on 
Post, .June 9. 

—Senator Sherman has been recently morti¬ 
fied by one of the appointments made by Presi¬ 
dent Harrison iu the south. Just before Mr. 
Harrison started on his “swing around ” trip 
he indorsed on the back of an application for 
the appointment of Emil A. Weber to be post¬ 
master at Donaldsonvilb', La., the words, 
“Let this commission be made out.” Post¬ 
master General Wanamaker’s assistant, Mr. 
Whitfield, of Ohio, had the appointment made 
out, and Mr. Weber is in office awaiting the 
confirmation of the senate. # 

It seems that the appointment was made by 
the President upon the request of Collector 
Warmoth, to meet the emergency created by 
the transfer of the Donaldsonville postmaster 
to the office of melter in the mint. One day 
recently Mr. Sherman visited Mr. Whitfield, 
and expressed astonishment that Weber 
should have been appointed to any office by 
the administration. 

But Mr. Whitfield, it apjieared, had forgot¬ 
ten the history of Weber. He did not remem¬ 


ber that it was Weber who had been a witness 
in 1877 in the Louisiana election controversy, 
and that he had been brought to Washington 
to testify that his brother had received a letter 
from Sherman promising that he should be 
paid $500 for counting certain election re¬ 
turns in a certain way, and after he had 
reached Washington his chief complaint was 
that he had received $300 instead of $500. 
The letter referred to by the witness had been 
found by him iu a trunk belonging to his 
brother, who had been killed, and he had de¬ 
stroyed it. 

Mr. Sherman had a very poor opinion of 
his truthfulness, and he had a lively remem¬ 
brance of the annoyance that Weber’s testi¬ 
mony had given him at the time it was 
brought out. What Mr. Warmolh’s idea was 
in bringing forward thisdiscredited politician 
is not yet known, but it is known that Weber 
has the office, and it is assumed that when the 
delegates to the national convention come to 
be selected, Sherman’s annoyer, Weber, will 
be somewhere in the crowd, prepared to shout 
for Harrison until the Blaine men are ready 
to take possession of the Louisiana delegation 
along with all the other delegations that have 
been set up carefully for tbe man who is seek¬ 
ing popularity at the expense of his secretary 
of state.— Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, April 22. 

—The appointment of an inspector in charge 
of mails, to succeed E. G. Kathbone, who re¬ 
signed to accept the appointment of fourth as¬ 
sistant postmaster-general, will probably go to 
New York. Inspector' Wheelei\ of that state, has 
been strongly indorsed by Hon. Thomas C. Piatt, and 
Senator Hiscock, and it is believed he will be ap¬ 
pointed in a few days .— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, June I 4 . 

—The notorious Frederick S. Gibbs, by following his 
usual methods, managed to win in the special re¬ 
publican primary in the thirteenth assembly dis¬ 
trict last night. The total number of votes cast was 
836, and of these the Gibbs ticket obtained 468 and 
the Cowie-Sprague ticket 360, 'giving the Gibbs 
crowd 100 majority. Charles T. Polhemus an- 
nonnetd that the Cowle faction would make another 
protest. Gibbs made a speech inviting the Cowie 
people to join with him, but they know too much 
about him. 

It was the hottest fought primary ever held in that 
hotbed of republican dissension, and it was held on 
the hottest night of the year. This mid-June pri¬ 
mary was made necessary by the same old row be¬ 
tween the Gibbs and Cowie Sprague factions. At 
the last regular primary, held in January, Gibbs’ 
dishonest tactics carried his ticket through, but the 
county committee rejected his delegation, ordered a , 
purging of the roll, a re-enrollment and a new pri. 
mary. This latter was held yesterday in Grand Op¬ 
era House Hall, the old battle ground. The special 
committee, of which ex-Ttlderman James W. Hawes 
is chairman, had the matter in charge. The polls 
and the wrangling both opened at 3 o’clock and 
closed at 9 o’clock. When the latter hour was 
reached about 500 people were still in line anxious 
to deposit their ballots. The scene at the close was 
one of intense excitement. 

Many characteristic incidents occurred. Thomas 
Larkin, a republican of a dozen years standing in 
the district, was challenged by William II. Reed, of 
the Cowie forces. His only answer was to reach over 
and pull Mr. Reed’s nose. 

Mr. Charles T. Polhemus, a Cowie man, was mak- 














242 


thp: civil service chronicle. 




Allolmeiits thus acquired, mutually eiigafredsuch as accepted them to defend them; and as they all sprau;? from the same 
right of conquest, no part could subsist independent of the whole; wherefore all givers as well as receivers were mutually hound 
to defend each other’s possessions. * * * Every receiver (►f lands, or feudatory, was therefore hound when called upon hy his 
hcnefactor, or immediate lord of his feud or fee, to* do all in his power to defend him. Such benefactor or lord was likewise sub¬ 
ordinate to and under the command of his immediate henefj»ctor and superior ; and so upwards to the prince or general himself; 
and the several lords were also reciprocally hound, in their respective gradations, to protect the possessions they had given. Thus 
the feudal connection was established, a pro])er military subjection was naturally introduced and an army of feudatories was 
always ready enlisted and mutually prepared to muster.—[Blackstone. 


ing an objection when Chairman Howes said; ‘‘Well, 
why didn’t you have the primary called for all day? 
W’e wanted it so.” 

‘‘It wouldn't have made any difference,” said Mr. 
Polhemus, ‘‘they are all democrats here.” 

Soon after this a Gibbs man threw a billet of wood 
at Mr. Polhemus. It struck him behind the ear, but 
he was not badly injured.— Aew Vo. k Times, June 16. 

—The republicans of the thirteenth assembly dis¬ 
trict who support James A. Cowie will attack the 
faction led by cx-Senator Gibbs at to-night’s meet¬ 
ing of the republican county committee, by im¬ 
pugning the validity of the nominal Gibbs triumph 
at the recent primary election The following me¬ 
morial will be submitted on behalf of the Cowie 
men: 

We charge that said frauds and irregularities con¬ 
sisted in: 

(1). Filling the lines of voters approaching the polls at 
said primary election with large mimbersof well-known 
democrats in a ffiliation with democratic organizations, 
who presented Gibbs t ickets, and, when challenged, openly 
and flagrantly swore themselves in, and were permitted to 
vote as republicans, to the exclusion of at least a hun¬ 
dred well known republicans who were kept waiting in, 
the line from two to three hours, and were finally ex¬ 
cluded from the privilege of voting by reason of the lapse 
of time and closing of the polls; that upwards of one 
hundred republicans desirous of voting the Henry 
L. Sprague ticket were thus excluded from the priv¬ 
ilege of exercising their rights as republicans. 

(2.) That large numbers of persons were improp¬ 
erly forced into the lines of voters, displacing those 
already in line, who were thereby deprived of their 
rights and privileges of voting. 

(3.) That a large nuniber of improper persons were in¬ 
jected into the room through the side doors and windows 
of rooms adjoining the room in which the primary was 
being held, and were shoved into the line and im¬ 
properly allowed to vote. 

(4.) That many persons, well-known democrats, 
were improperly allowed to vote by the committee 
against the challenge and protest of the watchers 
representing the Henry L. Sprague ticket, by the 
committee claiming that they must accept the votes 
of any and all persons who would take the re»iuired 
oath as republican electors. 

(5) That out of upwards of eight hundred names of 
non-residents, democrats, deceased persons, and dummies, 
removed from the roll by your committee as a prediminary 
step to said primary, nearly two thirds of said parties' 
names were subsequently allowed to be re enrolled upon 
the list of enrolled republican voters for the 
thirteenth assembly district: and that a request that 
written affidavits should be reijuired from said 
persons, signed by them at the time of presentation 
of their ballots for voting, in order to subse<iuently 
identify the fraudulent democratic voters who were 
allowed to participate in said primary, was deniedi 
and your committee disclaimed any right so to do, 
and no such precaution was allowed to be taken. 

(6) That the side doors leading out of Grand 
Opera-house Hall into the Gibbs headquarters were, 
against the protest of the undersigned, allowed to 
be opened and remained open, and access to and 


from said side rooms to be had, during the entire 
time of holding said primary election. 

(7) The undersigned respectfully call your atten¬ 
tion to the fact that the object of sending a com¬ 
mittee into the thirteenth assembly district, to cor¬ 
rect the vile practices and flagrant abuses that have 
disrupted and divided the organization of the 
republican party, has entirely failed to accomplish 
the purpose intended; and that instead of healing 
the existing differences, that portion of thercpublican 
organization whose candidates are sustained by a large 
majority of the republican electors at the polls on election 
day are entirely excluded from any participation in the 
management of their own local political affairs —New 
York Evening Post, June 18. 

—Curious things developed at last night’s 
meeting of the republican county committee 
held in Grand Opera House Hall. To all in¬ 
tents and purposes the notorious political char¬ 
latan, Frederick S. Gibbs, was taken back into 
full fellowship in the county committee. 
Nominally, Gibbs has no standing in the re¬ 
publican party, but last night he sat with his 
new delegation to the county committee when 
it was welcomed back.—iV. Y. Times, June 19^ 

—Neither political party has been fortunate 
in its selection of subordinate officers of the 
House of Representatives. The new postmas¬ 
ter, a man named Hathaway, is now in trouble 
I in his turn. He is charged with putting a 
j man on the roll to do nothing at $100 per 
month, and discharging a hard-working man 
from Wisconsin to make room for him. He 
explains the matter i-'. what he seems to think 
a wholly innocent way, but the explanation 
throws a rather ghastly light on the way the 
offices are dealt out in the two houses of Con¬ 
gress. He says, according to an interview in 
the Sunday Gazette : 

The facts are these: After I had been elected 
postmaster of the House a number of the mem¬ 
bers came to me and said that Wiscoiisin had too 
many men in the post-office, and that I ought to make 
some changes. Representative Quackenbush of New 
York urged the appointment of Mr. O’Brien. I 
told Mr. Quackenbush that I would like to 
oblige him and that I would see what I could 
do for O’Brien. Toward the latter part of 
March I informed the Wisconsin man that I 
was going to appoint O’Brien, and as there 
were five men charged to the state of Wiscon 
sin I would have to let one of them go and 
that they could fix the matter up among them¬ 
selves. It was then suggested that the man to 
go should receive $200 in Hew of the vacation 
which I had learned the men are entitled to 
during the summer.—IKasAm^fon Dispatch to 
Boston Post, June 

—The custom-house at Portland, Maine, is 
likely to receive the early attention of the 
treasury officials in their efforts to keep the 


force within the scanty appropriations, and 
several inspectors and examiners are likely to 
receive notice that their services are no longer 
required. The Portland custom-house is one 
of the most exfiensive in the country in pro¬ 
portion to the amount of business done. The 
remarkable expenditures at the Portland custom¬ 
house are due to the great influence which the 
Maine delegation has wielded in congress. The 
surveyor and deputy, the assistant appraiser 
and one of the deputy collectors might well 
be abolished, and treasury agents have often 
recommended it, hut the friends of “Tom” Reed 
or of Senators Hale and Fry have never cared to 
be legislated out of office in that way. While the 
salaries of other custom-houses are fixed at the 
pleasure of the secretary of the treasury, in 
proportion to the work done, the Portland offi¬ 
cials have intrenched themselves behind the 
statute requirements, which their friends in 
congress have been shrewd enough to work in¬ 
to the appropriation bills.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Boston Post, May SO. 

—This evening’s Ntar says: “Mr. S. D. Miller, 
the son of the attorney-genera), has been ap¬ 
pointed to the position lately vacated by Mr. 
Tolman, chief of the division of requisitions 
and accounts of the war department, and has 
been designated as private secretary by Secre¬ 
tary Proctor, to fill the position which has re¬ 
mained vacant since Mr. Partridge was ap¬ 
pointed solicitor of the state department, in 
June, 1890.— Washington Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Journal, April 27. 

—George Vest, son of United States Senator 
George G. Vest, escaped from St. Vincent’s 
Insane Asylum, and the police were called 
upon to find him, which they did this evening. 
The notification given the police of his escape 
was the first information anybody except his 
relatives had that the young man had been 
sent to an asylum. 

Young Vest is thirty years old, and has 
lived a life that has caused his father a great 
deal of trouble. He has been dissipated and 
reckless, but not criminal, in financial mat¬ 
ters. During the Cleveland administration his 
farther secured him a position in the diplomatic ser¬ 
vice, but he had to resign it. He was placed in 
St. Vincent’s Asylum about three weeks ago, 
and it was given out that he had gone to his 
brother’s ranch in Montana. 

Friday evening he escaped from the attend¬ 
ants, scaled the walls, and came to the city. 
He roamed about for three day.s, but did no 
damage to himself or anybody else. He is 
not insane but in a sad condition from dissi¬ 
pation.— St. Louis Dispatch to New York Times, 
April 19. ’ 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. Meridian St.. Indianapolis, Ind., where subscriptions and advertisments wiil be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


VoL. I, No. 29. INDIANAPOLIS, JULY, 1891. terms fcenW/c“pT' 


Elsewhere is reproduced from the Bos¬ 
ton Herald an article on physical exami¬ 
nations of firemen and policemen, as con¬ 
ducted in Boston. The article is copied in 
the hope that our new city government 
may compare this business method of test¬ 
ing applicants with our own ridiculous 
practice. 

The next examination of those desiring 
places in the Indianapolis post-office will 
be held in this city in August. The terri¬ 
tory from which applicants may come is 
not limited. The character of the local 
examining board insures impartial treat¬ 
ment. The practice here is to take the 
highest on the list for a vacancy. It is to 
be hoped that competitors will come for¬ 
ward without thought of their politics. 


The tax situation in this city is more 
strained than ever, and it is not likely to 
“ease up” of itself as the months go by and 
tax-paying time approaches next year. 
Those who hold out that, by reason of a 
lower rate, only about the same amount of 
taxes will have to be paid, are mistaken. 
Taxes will be heavily increased. We pay 
about a thousand dollars a week for clean¬ 
ing and repairing streets. Political man¬ 
agers may think that this department can 
be run as spoil and that the people will be 
contented. This also is a mistake. So 
long as this system continues the people 
will believe that they pay for something 
they do not get. Higher taxes will inten¬ 
sify this belief and will deepen the feeling 
against the piratical practice. A street¬ 
cleaning department run on the spoils 
system is one of the many ways in which 
Tammany Hall plunders New York, and 
furnishes a warning to all cities. Now and 
then a street commissioner may be better 
than the average, and may temporarily se¬ 
cure efficiency; but the system remains 
and is a constant menace to honest govern¬ 
ment, and, as a rule, it amply justifies its 
bad character by its works. There is only 
one way to deal with this higher-taxed peo¬ 
ple. Every dollar of the money must be 
expended so as to bring its full value. And 
it will not be sufficient for the people to be 
told that it is bringing its full value; the 
expenditures must be under such a system 
that they can see it for themselves. In the 
street department the only such system is 
the Boston labor system. 


The Indianapolis Journal of July 15, 
says of the new city charter: 

"Section 45 provides that the mayor shall call to¬ 
gether the heads of the departments at least once a 
month. ‘ Records shall be kept of such meetings, 
and rules and regulations shall be adopted thereat 
for the administration of the affairs of the city de¬ 
partments, which regulations shall prescribe a com¬ 
mon and systematic method of ascertaining the com¬ 
parative fitness of applicants for office, position and 
promotion, and of selecting, appointing and pro¬ 
moting those found to be best fitted, without regard 
to political opinions or services.’ This places the 
whole city government on a civil service basis, and 
prohibits any appointments to subordinate positions 
to be made except after an examination as to fitness, 
‘ without regard to political opinions or services.’ ’’ 

As the Journal remarks, the board of 
public safety, including the police and fire 
divisions, is excepted from the above pro¬ 
visions. But with regard to the balance of 
the city service it is difficult to see how the 
new city government can escape this plain 
requirement of the law. This includes 
the labor ^service, and we heartily com¬ 
mend to the mayor and the heads of the 
departments, assembled as above required, 
the Boston labor system as being “ a com¬ 
mon and systematic method * * * of 
selecting, appointing aud promoting” la¬ 
borers in the city service. And the police 
and fire divisions, at the will of the mayor, 
can be put under the merit system. He 
has but to notify the board of public safety 
to do it or make way for those who will. 
Does the new city government intend to 
continue the rule of favoritism in appoint¬ 
ments? 

The Chronicle last month gave the 
facts of the curious action of the hoard of 
public safety regarding the superinten¬ 
dency of the fire alarm telegraph system. 
It dismissed two competent assistants of 
the superintendent, and gave nearly their 
united salaries to ex-Alderman James 
Riley. Then Riley’s friends gave out that 
when he learned the business he was to 
succeed the superintendent, Holderman. 
The board is reported to have dis¬ 
claimed any purpose of relieving Holder- 
man, but he was to coach Riley, and then 
they were to alternate in the superintend¬ 
ency every other month, a queer looking 
innovation. Holderman firmly declined 
this method of relief. The publicity given 
to the matter possibly suggested to some¬ 
body the political inexpediency of the 
arrangement, for Mr. Riley later resigned, 
and stated to a reporter of the Indianapolis 


News, June 30th: “I accepted this place 
with the understanding that after the end 
of my first month’s service, or as soon as I 
should become familiar with the tele¬ 
graphic circuits, I would be installed as 
superintendent of that service, and that I 
would be assisted to reach that position by 
Mr. Holderman, who at present is superin¬ 
tendent.” This explanation differs from 
the one given out by the board of public 
works bub it squares with appearances. 


According to the Delphi Journal, the 
democrats of Carroll county in this state 
are outstripping the republicans in the 
competitive examinations for the federal 
service. And from the tone of the Brook- 
ville American it would seem that the dem¬ 
ocrats are showing the same superiority 
in Franklin county. This not only goes to 
show that the law is impartially adminis¬ 
tered, but it is a staggering blow at the 
time-honored supposition that the stupid¬ 
ity and ignorance of the country is to be 
found among the democrats, and especially 
among Indiana democrats. Of these two 
republican papers, perhaps the Delphi 
Journal takes it most to heart. It says: 

“ Yet this is the situation here In Delphi. And it 
is galling. It is an outrage on the republicans who 
work in the trenches, and would it be remarkable if 
it led to disaster? Politics is largely a personal mat¬ 
ter, and the politician who does not know this to be 
true knows nothing.” 

The times are getting to be bad for “per¬ 
sonal ” politics. With our new ballot law, 
vote selling at from five to fifty dollars 
each, and boodle-handling, with from fifty 
to one hundred per cent, commission stick¬ 
ing to the pocket of the handler, seem to 
be pretty effectually dead industries. And, 
in time, the whole crowd now living by 
“ personal ” buccaneering upon the public 
will find their streams of profit dried up, 
to their great discomfort but to the abound¬ 
ing augmentation of the common weal. 


The Indianapolis News has been question¬ 
ing negroes here as to the feeling of their 
race toward President Harrison. Dr. S. A. 
Elbert thought that fifty per cent, of the 
colored people of the state were opposed 
to Harrison, and said, when asked if three 
good offices given to colored men would 
not change the sentiment, “Well, that 
might have some effect, but the feeling is 
strong.” Editor E. H. Cooper, of the Free- 


























244 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


man when asked the ground of opposition 
said: 

“He has appointed to office those who were not in¬ 
terested in his candidacy nor the party. Any policy 
that follows out to the letter the civil service regu¬ 
lations is bound to bring on unpopularity. The civii 
service law, in its operation here, it is true, has 
helped the colored race, as there are more colored 
people in the post-office than heretofore. Manj of 
these in office were not Harrison republicans, and 
while the law makes places for them, at the same 
tinre Harrison does nothing for representative col¬ 
ored men who were actively for him in the conven¬ 
tion and the campaign.” 

Rev. John H. Clay said: “ The source 
of disaffection is that Harrison has disre¬ 
garded the colored people of his own state, 
whe are deserving of representation.” 
Frank B. Allen, of the Freeman, said: 
“Indiana negroes have not been treated 
justly. No positions of importance have 
been given them, at least no positions com¬ 
mensurate with the importance of the col¬ 
ored vote of this state.” Rev. G. A. Sissel, 
said: “The colored voters have not re¬ 
ceived offices in any sort of proportion to 
their services.” Alfred Banks, said: “The 
offices received have been no credit to the 
race.” Rev. James A. Davis, said: “We 
of the west have received really noth¬ 
ing.” 

The best that can be said of this is that 
these colored men do not take a more 
sordid view of citizenship, have no keener 
feeling that “support” ought to be paid 
for in offices, do not hold stronger views 
that politics are merely “personal” mat¬ 
ters, and are not on any lower plane 
than the white critics of President Har¬ 
rison, whose sayings the Civil Service 
Chronicle gave last month. And the re¬ 
mark may be repeated that there are pow¬ 
erful and manly reasons why Harrison 
should not be renominated, but the fact 
that certain men have not been quartered 
upon the people is not one of them. 

Some time ago the despatches from 
Washington stated to the country that 
Dan Ransdell, marshal of the District of 
Columbia, would go on a trip to Europe. 
Then by the same medium it was told that 
the state department had given him a pass¬ 
port ; then that the government had given 
him a circular letter commending him to 
all United States officers abroad; then that 
he had sailed and would leave his children 
to be educated in Europe. Thus the 
American aristocracy of office-holders 
thrives and enjoys itself. Ransdell had 
grown rich out of office-holding, as a result 
of machine management, before President 
Harrison gave him his present place as a 
reward for personal service. True to his 
political ideas, he gave one place in the 
marshal’s office to his brother-in-law, 
Leonard, whose last office had been the 
collectorship of customs at Indianapolis. 
He gave another place to his brother, Ed. 


Ransdell, who had pleaded guilty in the 
United States court here to the charge of 
robbing the mails, and had been pardoned 
by President Hayes, not because he de¬ 
served to be pardoned, but because of the 
political influence Dan Ransdell was able 
to bring to bear. Doubtless Leonard and 
Ed. Ransdell will take a trip to Europe 
later. In the meantime, the re-elevation of 
this crowd into the line of public vision is 
a good vote-maker in Indiana. 

The death of Joseph E. McDonald re¬ 
moves a respected and prominent man 
from Indiana. He was not a great man 
any more than was the late Mr. Hendricks. 
As public men both busied themselves only 
with current public business. With both, 
but more with Mr. Hendricks, the problem 
usually was what treatment of a present 
public question will best conduce to the 
present success of the party. A great man 
not only treats current affairs with ability 
and honesty, but he looks into the future 
and recognizes those great measures which, 
when adopted, mark an epoch in his coun¬ 
try’s history. To bring about such a 
change is his great work. Thus Cavour 
patiently built up the kingdom of Italy, 
and Bismark the German empire, and 
Gladstone works for Irish home-rule. 
When a question pertaining to the rou¬ 
tine of all governments came up, like rev¬ 
enue or coinage, Mr. McDonald always had 
decided opinions about it; Mr. Hendricks 
less so. Neither ever recognized the great¬ 
ness of the slavery question. In 1844 Mr. 
McDonald advocated tariff reform, which 
was followed by the tariff-reform message 
of President Polk, and this by the tariff 
reform act of 1846. Then and afterwards, 
with Mr. Hendricks, he completely failed 
to comprehend the heroic relief his coun¬ 
try needed—the abolition of slavery. In 
1888, the tariff pendulum had swung back 
farther than ever, and both, following Mr. 
Cleveland’s message, which was very like 
President Polk’s, were advocating a tariff- 
reform measure similar to that of 1846 
They gave Mr. Cleveland no support in 
what he attempted to do against the spoils 
system. Here again both utterly failed to 
comprehend the great measure of relief 
their country needed, and still needs—the 
destruction of the practice of using public 
office to pay personal or party debts which 
now pervades every hamlet, town and city 
throughout the United States wherever 
there is a public office, great or small. 

Ex-Governor Isaac P. Gray is men¬ 
tioned as a presidential candidate. If he 
lived anywhere but in the necessary state 
of Indiana, such mention might not be 
noticed. Still, in his kind of politics he 
is “ no fool.” He was formerly a repub¬ 
lican, and as such has a “ soldier record.” 


For some inscrutable reason he turned 
democrat at a time when his new party 
had no opinions or principles to speak of 
and when its attitute was chiefly denuncia¬ 
tory. He jostled the old party mortgagees, 
Hendricks, McDonald and Voorhees, very 
unpleasantly. Sometimes he played fan¬ 
tastic tricks, as when with a baker he de¬ 
feated Mr. McDonald seeking to be a dele¬ 
gate to the democratic national convention 
of 1888. He now has a good grip on his 
party machine in Indiana, and will control 
the delegates. The boys will be interested 
in knowing that notwithstanding Mr. 
Cleveland’s well known attitude and prin¬ 
ciples relating to the civil service, declared 
on so many occasions, yet at a jubilee meet¬ 
ing held here November 11, 1884, a few 
days after the latter’s election, Mr. Gray 
said, according to the Sentinel of the next 
morning: 

" One of the peculiar phases of the campaign just 
past, and, I think, the most peculiar that I have ever 
seen in any canvass I have ever been engaged in, is 
that our republican friends put forth an argument 
to the people that if the democratic party obtained 
control of the government, it would turn the repub¬ 
lican office-holders out. Of course we will; there is 
no doubt about it. This has been a contest between 
parties. There have always been political parlies in 
this country, ever since the formation of the govern¬ 
ment, and I presume there always will be. The re¬ 
publican party, in its long twenty-four years’ lease 
of power, has filled the offices exclusively with re- 
publicaus. That was right. When the democratic 
party obtains control of the government, which will 
be on the fourth of March next, then we will expect 
the offices, as rapidly as can be done with safety to 
the proper administration of governmental affairs, to 
be filled with democrats." 


The Indianapolis Journal's Washington 
correspondent says in that paper, July 23: 
“Colonel Dudley has, however, repeatedly 
assured his friends that he is done with 
politics, and that he only desires the in¬ 
dorsement of his political activity by his 
election as a delegate-at-large from Indiana 
to the next convention.” A party machine 
is usually slow in giving one of its mem¬ 
bers the cold shoulder, but it would be a 
bold thing, indeed, for the Indiana repub- 
can machine to make this unpunished 
scoundrel a delegate-at-large. 


The following telegrams explain them¬ 
selves : 

Washington, June 20. 

Prof. Francis M. Nipher: 

W’hat are your politics ? 

J. Rusk, Secretary of Agriculture. 

Prof. Nipher telegraphed in reply: 

Replying to your telegram as requested, I respect¬ 
fully state that I am not a politician, and do not in¬ 
tend to engage in politics. 

There seems to be no doubt but that the 
information was sought by Secretary Rusk 
with a view of giving it weight in deter¬ 
mining his choice of a new head of the 
weather bureau. It will come to be one of 
the curiosities of our political history that 
a secretary’s mind could be so constructed 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


245 


as to prompt such an inquiry in relation to 
the duties of an oflBce which can not be 
made to relate to politics without detri¬ 
ment to the public service. There have 
always been men who could tell more of 
themselves in a sentence than they or any 
one else could in a volume. Flannagan, 
of Texas, is one; Secretary Rusk is an¬ 
other. 

By inference a stigma is put upon the 
actual appointee, Professor Mark W. Har¬ 
rington, which we do not believe is justi¬ 
fied. He is thoroughly equipped educa¬ 
tionally and scientifically. He will have to 
show, however, that he is not a partisan 
tool of those above him. He will have to 
do this, not in a mild and obscure way, but 
by openly running his department on the 
merit system, and giving out that appli¬ 
cants of all shades of politics will stand an 
equal chance. Nothing short of this will 
clear the public mind of suspicion. 

The present boss of Tammany Hall is 
the well-known Croker, while the boss of 
the Brooklyn democracy is the equally 
well-known McLaughlin. The Brooklyn 
bridge patronage (composed of divers 
major and minor public trusts) had been 
distributed by Boss McLaughlin, but un¬ 
der the rules of modern buccaneering. Boss 
Croker got it away from him. Now Boss 
Croker desires to have Roswell P. Flower 
made the party candidate for governor 
But Boss McLaughlin says that unless the 
captured patronage is returned to him, he 
will prevent Flower’s nomination. Thus 
the matter stands, and it-is a clear and 
happy illustration of how enterprising men 
may may come to dictate officers great and 
small to 4,000,000 of people and also may 
fall out in the process and lead on the boys 
in a glorious fight of faction against faction 
over the division of spoils captured from, 
a cowardly commonwealth. 

Ex-Headsman Clarkson, president of 
the national league of republican clubs, has 
got back from Europe, and had a dinner, 
at ten dollars a plate, given him at Manhat¬ 
tan Beach, New York, by the big boss, 
Tom Platt, and several little bosses and 
some office-holders. United States Marshal 
John W. Jacobus, Internal Revenue Col¬ 
lector Kerwin, Chief Inspector of Immi¬ 
grants John E. Milholland, Assistant Ap¬ 
praiser Dennis Burke, Postmaster Van 
Cott, Internal Revenue Collector Walker 
and the President’s son, Russell B. Harri¬ 
son. Boss Platt, under whose command 
the President has dealt out New York 
spoil, aptly introduced Clarkson as follows: 

“ We have met, my friends, to do honor 
“ and welcome home a distinguished Amer- 
“ ican citizen, one whom we not only re- 
“ spect, but love; we love him for the heads 
“he has cut off, and we love him because 
“the mugwump hates him.” 


Collector Beard at Boston explains 
that the reason why the thirteen employes 
dismissed by him to reduce the force hap¬ 
pened to be democrats, was because he 
chose from those appointed by Collector 
Saltonstall. He says that these can more 
easily find new employment than those 
who are older and have been longer in one 
line of service. Even Massachusetts, slow 
as she is to dispute a man’s word, will 
hardly accept this explanation without 
winking. In the plain-spoken west it will 
be truthfully put down as the explanation 
of a smart republican politician who was 
determined to serve his party first, and 
therefore took the course by which he 
could hit the most democrats. And it will 
further be truthfully said that in so doing 
Collector Beard squarely violated his oath, 
which requires him to faithfully perform 
the duties of his trust, and one of those du¬ 
ties is, when reducing his force, to dismiss, 
not a class of men because they were ap¬ 
pointed at a particular time, but the men 
who are of the least efficiency in the pub¬ 
lic service, no matter when they were ap¬ 
pointed. 

THE FUNDAMENTAL FALLACY. 

Referring to the statement of the anti- 
Quay organization of Pennsylvania, that 
the fundamental fallacy of the Quay theory 
of politics is that “ public ofiices are spoils, 
the lawful property of the politicians who 
capture them and by whom they are dis¬ 
pensed in turn to their underlings as the 
prizes of war,” some tariff-reform papers 
argue that the protective tariff system is 
the real fundamental fallacy, and they so 
advise the Pennsylvania reformers. The 
Quayism of Tammany Hall and of Gorman 
and Raisin run neck and neck with the 
Quayism of Pennsylvania. The tariff-re¬ 
form administration of President Cleve¬ 
land looted more than 100,000 federal 
offices, as has the present protective tar¬ 
iff administration. There is no doubt 
but that thousands of Pennsylvania re¬ 
publicans want to keep down opposition 
to Quayism for fear that protection will suf¬ 
fer, just as thousands of Maryland demo 
crats in 1888 voted to support Gorman lest 
tariff reform should suffer. The protec¬ 
tionist office-holder of Pennsylvania robbed 
the public treasury; so did the tariff-reform 
ofidce-holder of Maryland. The spoil of 
office is the one great prize which parties 
fight for in a campaign. With absolute 
free trade, we should have Quayism as 
powerful, as insolent, as extended, and as 
thoroughly gifted with the nine lives of a 
cat as now. It is a flourishing relic of 
monarchy and has always existed where 
there have been offices to be given out to 
reward allegiance; and this has been true 
without any regard to trade or commerce 


or legislation. And in our modern strug¬ 
gle, protective republicans of Pennsylvania 
have not shrunk from their duty, but on 
the other hand have given valuable lessons 
to such states as Maryland and New York; 
and this is written in the individual belief 
that the protective principle is wrong. 

PENNSYLVANIA. 

For never land long lease of empire won, 

Whose sons sate silent when base deeds were done. 

—Lowell. 

What is the matter with Pennsylvania and 
with the newspapers of Philadelphia? This 
is the exclamation of the country, which can 
not reconcile the present condition of Penn¬ 
sylvania with the sterling cl>aracter her peo¬ 
ple have borne for more than a hundred years. 
Has that character become debased? Have 
the people become so generally debauched that 
they can not raise their heads above the flood 
of public corruption and crime that now rolls 
over them ? The answer to these questions 
will depend upon the way in which these peo¬ 
ple deal with the matters now before them. It 
is not necessary to enlarge upon Quayism. No 
pirate ever ruled his ship more absolutely than 
Quay rules the party machine in his state. 
No maurauding feudal chief ever had his 
tribute-paying neighbors in more cowardly 
subjection than Quay apparently has the peo¬ 
ple of Pennsylvania to-day. He was branded 
a gigantic thief, and waited many months, 
seemingly afraid to deny. In the campaign 
which followed during this unmistakable con¬ 
fession of guilt, not a single Philadelphia 
paper dared to attack him. A few republi¬ 
cans, the usual “coach-load,” publicly de¬ 
clined to wear that kind of a collar, and 
throughout the state they proclaimed the doc¬ 
trine of anti-bossism and honesty in public 
affairs. They turned 80,000 republican ma¬ 
jority into a minority of 17,000, and won the 
most astonishing victory that has ever been 
gained by any set of men in the war against 
bossism. After this trial of his own choosing, 
and after this conviction before the people of 
his state. Quay offered his denial. Even then 
the country would have permitted him to join 
the issue if he had called the evidence which 
he alone could call. He refused to call Wayne 
MacVeagh and Senator Cameron, whose word 
would instantly fix his guilt or innocence. He 
still remains chairman of the national repub¬ 
lican committee and boss of Pennsylvania. 

In the meantime his chief henchman, John 
Wanamaker, is affording another illustra¬ 
tion of Quayism. A successful shopkeeper, 
he undertook the work of collecting a cam¬ 
paign fund for Quay, and did collect and turn 
over, by common report, $400,000. He made 
an improper suggestion that one of the great 
railroads should contribute a large sum to 
this fund, but he failed to get the money. It 
is more than probable that for his success in 
raising this fund he was made postmaster- 
general. A great robbery of public money has 
taken place in Philadelphia, and this in inex¬ 
tricable connection with the Keystone na- 













246 


k 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


tional bank, an institution originally a nurs¬ 
ling of Wanamaker’s, and which has failed. 
To this business Mr. Wanamaker is tied by 
cords from which a due respect for the public 
imperatively demands that he loose himself; he 
has not so far done so. For instance, he said 
he never owned any stock in the bank, but 
that he once held 2,515 shares given him by 
the president, Lucas, upon which to raise 
money to carry on a deal in Reading stock in 
which, at his suggestion, he and Lucas were 
jointly engaged. Lucas died, and the suc¬ 
ceeding president. Marsh, in December, 1890, 
told Wanamaker that this stock was fraudu¬ 
lently issued. The latter tells what followed 
later; 

“Granville B. Haines and Lawyer Huey, with 
Marsh, came to Washington and saw me with refer¬ 
ence to some settlement of the claim I had against 
the stock. I said that up to that time no person ex¬ 
cept Marsh had called the legality of the stock into 
question. Now that the vice-president of the bank 
and Mrs. Lucas’ lawyer added their testimony, I felt 
obliged to say that they must either settle with me 
or I could not, in justice to myself, allow the con¬ 
troller of the currency to longer remain in ignorance 
of the fact that it was claimed that there had been 
an Illegal issue of stock.’’ 

He then was and had been a cabinet-officer. 
It was the duty of the administration of which 
he is a member to watch this and all other 
national banks. He knew that a fraudulent 
issue of stock rendered a bank unfit to be 
trusted in any particular. Yet for months he 
kept from Controller Lacey the fact that such 
an issue was charged against the Keystone 
bank. Morever, he, in effect, oflered to con¬ 
tinue the concealment if they would “settle” 
with him. At last, on March 19, 1891, Lacey 
found it out from Marsh and then closed the 
bank. In the meantime, depositors had, for 
months, been let to hand their money over to 
a bank that was not worth its office furniture. 
In the meantime, also, Wanamaker’s firm, 
which had $400,000 on deposit in November, 
drew out until it had about nothing in this 
bank when it was closed, March 19. 

These facts are taken from a considerable 
list of the same kind and serve for illustra¬ 
tion. The city councils of Philadelphia ap¬ 
pointed a committee “ to make a thorough 
investigation.” Quayism again gets in its 
work. No cross-examiner appears. What¬ 
ever Wanamaker and the other actors in this 
financial tragedy care to tell, they tell. In the 
middle of the play thus made a farce, the 
Philadelphia papers, having previous to the 
general wreck paid forty per cent, commission 
to the wreckers for public advertising without 
ever calling the attention of the people to the 
patent rascality of the transaction, are true to 
Quayism still. The Ledger says June 9, 1891: 

“All the other hints, innuendoes, insinuations, 
and accusations fade away in the same manner be¬ 
fore the clear and open light of Mr. Wanamaker’s 
testimony; they dissolve into thin air, mere baseless 
gossip and slander—and ‘leave not a rack behind.’ ’’ 

With public opinion thus warped and 
smothered by Quayism, it was to be expected 
hat individual effort would again be disposed 
to try its strength. We have therefore the ad¬ 
dress published in another column. This is the 


hardest public duty a citizen has to do, and it 
is especially hard where, as in Pennsylvania, 
the dry-rot of Quayism has penetrated far and 
wide into all classes and conditions of men. 
In the long run, a small number of fearless 
men, who are free from taint of haying profit¬ 
ed by the spoils methods of many decades of 
bossism, will because they are right, impress 
the right upon the minds of the people of this 
great state, and they will therefore triumph. 

POLICEMEN AND FIREMEN. 

The Competitive Physical Tests Applied 
in Boston. 

[From the Boston Herald, June 21,1891.] 
Would you, kind reader, a “peeler” be? 
Would you become a fireman bold? Do you 
desire to become a member of either of these 
great protective departments? Then you 
must understand at the very outset that it is a 
rather difficult examination which the civil 
service commissioners impose upon all appli¬ 
cants. This, too, before they can even be en¬ 
tered upon the lists of eligibles from which 
names may be certified for appointment. To 
get upon those lists, it is only fair to assume, 
no person on earth but yourself can or will 
aid you. 



The fact is proverbial that “ the policeman’s 
lot is not a happy one.” That was made 
known by the “Pirates of Penzance” years 
ago. Yet the truth remains as great to-day as 
it was then. Still, there are many young men 
who seem an:fious for appointment to the 
force in order that they may be enabled to 
share its sorrows and emoluments. Concern¬ 
ing the life of a policeman, there are very 
many interesting things. And this is equally 
true of the firemen’s occupation. 

But none is any more entertaining than the 
course of mental and physical “sprouts” 
through which the candidate has to go before 
he can become part of either department. It 
is in these anti-official struggles that the can¬ 
didate is often left by the wayside, when he 
must succumb to the inevitable before he has 
even caught sight of the “promised land” 
of the blue and the brass, the helmet and the 
baton, or the right to run with the machine, 
which he is seeking with all his might. 

The work done by the civil service commis- 


ers may be unpopular in certain directions 
and among certain classes of the community, 
who either do not or will not understand it, 
and consider it in a spirit of fairness. Their 
examinations may be considered by some citi¬ 
zens to be tiresome and aggravating, and cov¬ 
ered with red tape, yet it is plainly apparent 
that there is no class of public servants who 
have been so benefited by it as the police and 
firemen of this city. There can be no ques¬ 
tion that the stringent regulations im- 
possed by the civil service board have done a 
great deal to relieve the force of much of any 
odium which may have existed in former 
years. 

Dr. A. H. Brown, who was long the medical 
director of the Boston Young Men’s Christian 
Union Gymnasium, has been for several 
years in charge of* the official physical exam¬ 
ination which, under the auspices of the hoard 
of civil service commissioners, are made of 
applicants for places in either of the two great 
departments of Boston’s protective service— 
the fire and police. He holds a similar posi¬ 
tion in connection with the civil service ex¬ 
amining board of New York City. Although 
yet quite a young man—being under thirty— 
Dr. Brown has, by his energy and ability, suc¬ 
ceeded in securing a place in the confidence of 
the city fathers in both these great cities, 
which makes his future certain. 

The object of these examinations is, of 
course, easily apparent, being to secure men 
of exceptionally fine physique to be the guar¬ 
dians of Boston’s streets and homes. The 
men selected for the fire and police depart¬ 
ments, under the present rules, are fine fel¬ 
lows, of more than average intelligence, 
sound as a dollar, and of remarkably fine 
physique. 

A visit was made recently by the writer to 
the gymnasium in police station 16, at the 
Baek Bay, while Dr. Brown was conducting 
examinations. 

It will scarcely be a difficult matter to per¬ 
suade any one that physical strength, good de¬ 
velopment and a fair amount of agility are 
essential for good, practical police and fire¬ 
men. It is not only necessary that a police¬ 
man should have good hearing and eyesight, 
so as to hear and see a thief, but also that he 
should be able to run fast enough to catch 
him, and should be strong enough to hold him 
after he has caught him. He should be able 
to have more than an average chance in a 
tussle; he should not be lacking in the muscles 
necessary to make a good horseman, his grip 
should be good, he should be able to climb 
out on a roof if necessary, and he should have 
good endurance in all the physical work re¬ 
quired of him. 

For these purposes it is necessary that a 
policeman should have a fair height, which is 
fixed at no less than 5 feet 8 inches ; that his 
chest should be in proper proportion to his 
stature; that his girth of waist should be 
neither too large nor too small for his height; 
that the capacity and strength of his lungs, 
the strength of his back, legs, upper and fore- 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


247 


♦ 


I 


arms, abdominal muscles, etc., should all be 
up to a certain standard. It is obvious that 
it would not be advisable to have long, thin 
men, or men too short and stout. 

**»* -*»»* 

Having run the intellectual gauntlet suc¬ 
cessfully, the candidate was punched, thumped 
and twisted by the regular examining phy¬ 
sician, made to give his family history, and 
name the causes of death of all his departed 
brothers, and his “sisters, and his cousins and 
his aunts,” in the determined search for any 
hereditary taint. 

All these ordeals has the young man gone 
through, and now he has come to station 
16. Here we see him, fairly trembling as 
his eye takes in the curious and awful in¬ 
struments which are about to be used by Ex¬ 
aminer Brown, in finally testing his fitness for 
a place. 

“ Now, then, young man,” said Dr. Brown, 
“take off your coat and vest.” This the can¬ 
didate obeyed with considerable apparent 
trepidation, and submitted to some punching 
and pounding, and looked half scared while 
the examiner made a record of his respiration 
and temperature. 



Then the young man is directed to try his 
hand at climbing a rope, sailor fashion, being 
first kindly admonished by the examiner not 
to get nervous, but to take time and do his 
best. 

The young fellow seized the thick rope and 
went hand over hand to the ceiling, and came 
down again with the same movement, occupy¬ 
ing only a very few seconds in the exercise. 

As he stepped back his pulse and respira¬ 
tion were again taken. Then he was con¬ 
ducted to a long ladder suspended horizon¬ 
tally about eight feet above the floor, and 
told to jump and catch a round, and take 
himself hand over hand to the farther end 


and return, which he did nimbly. Eespira- 
tion was again noted. 

The candidate was then direeted to climb 
an inclined ladder, going up on the under 
side, round by round, while his feet hung mo¬ 
tionless. Respiration taken, and carefully 
compared. 

The idea of these tests is to judge of the 
wind and staying powers as well as the nerve 
of the applicant for an appointment. 

The young man was then required to run 
several laps around the gymnasium, and re¬ 
quired to lift above his head, first with the 
right and then with the left hand, the dumb¬ 
bells, increasing in weight until he put up 75 
pounds. 

Then came the test for strength of muscles 
of the abdpmen, the candidate being directed 
to lie upon his back on a mattress, insert his 
feet under a toepiece, and taking a heavy 
dumb-bell in his hands, the bell resting above 
the shoulders and under the head (that is, at 
the back of the neck), rise to a sitting posture. 

The tests consist of two distinct parts, one 
for development and the other for strength. 
For the development tests the men are meas¬ 
ured for their height by standing barefooted 
on a platform so arranged that an electric bell 
rings only when their heels are resting firmly 
on the line from which the height is taken. 
They are then weighed without clothing, the 
minimum required weight being, in the fire 
department, 130 pounds for a man of five feet 
six inches, and in due proportion for greater 
height. Measures are then taken for the girth 
of the waist and of the chest, first empty and 
then inflated; for the depth of the chest and 
of the abdomen, and for the girths of the right 
and left thighs, calves, upper arms and fore¬ 
arms. The candidate also receives a mark for 
“muscular condition.” This is put under de¬ 
velopment, but depends somewhat on the gen¬ 
eral proportion and strength, and also on the 
action of the heart and lungs and the look of 
the skin and muscles. 

The tests for strength are all recorded under 
a separate head, and they consist in blowing 
into one of the ordinary receivers to measure 
the cubical capacity of the lungs. 

The young man having shown above the 
average physical endurance and muscular 
power, was directed to disrobe. The candi¬ 
date stripped to the buff, displaying a skin in 
splendid condition, and was placed in the 
scales, which he tipped at 130 pounds, and was 
then conducted under the measuring bar, 
where his height recorded just a little above 
the requirement. The candidate was close to 
the limit of the requirements in both weight 
and height, no man being taken in the fire de¬ 
partment who weighs less than 130 pounds 
and is less than five feet six inches (sixty-six 
inches) in height. 

The requirements are less in this direction 
in the fire department than on the police force, 
men in the latter department being required 
to weigh at least 140 pounds and measure five 
feet eight inches. Thus it will be seen that 
the young man could not have entered the 


police force, being not only too light but also 
too short. The idea worked upon by Dr. 
Brown and the civil service commissioners is 
that a policeman should have good legs and 
good wind, so as to come in a good second, at 
least, in a race with a criminal; whereas a 




Fig. 3. 


fireman being required to do more or less 
climbing, should be lighter, with a well-de¬ 
veloped chest and strong arms. A good grip 
is another essential to a good fireman. 

The candidate was given an ingenious ap¬ 
paratus, composed of a French dynometer 
fitted with handles, as in Fig. 1. He was di¬ 
rected to pull upon these handles, with the 
machine resting over his chest, then with first 
the left, and then the right arm extended. 
The strength of the pull was registered in 
kilos, by a hand revolving on a dial. 

Next the dynometer was removed from the 
handles and placed in the candidate’s hand, 
and he was required to grip it, as in Fig. 2. 
With the right hand he gripped the equiva¬ 
lent of 65 pounds, and with the left 58 pounds. 

A larger dynometer, upon a somewhat dif¬ 
ferent principle, and the candidate being re¬ 
quired to stand upon a raised platform, was 
made to lift up with his knees straight. This 
tested the muscles of the back. Next he was 
directed to lift with the legs at liberty and the 
knees bent, to test the strength of the thighs. 

A spirometer, which looked like a steam 
gauge with a rubber hose attached, was pro¬ 
duced, and the n^ perspiring candidate 
was requested to blow sharply and quickly 
into it, as in Fig 3. This was done to test the 
strength of the expiratory muscles. After this 
the capacity of his lungs was measured by 
registering the pressure he put upon a lung 
testing machine of formidable proportions, 
like that in Fig. 4, which Mr. Brown called a 
water spirometer. This latter machine was, 
apparently, regarded by the young man with 
positive dread, as he saw the top rise in re- 





























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


248 


sponse to the herculean effort of his lungs. 
As the top rose, and the hand travelled slowly 
around the dial, his eyes stuck out with as¬ 
tonishment. He looked as though he feared 
that after a big blow she would burst. An 
examination of the lungs and heart with the 
proper appliances finished the information 
sought concerning the applicant’s internal 
economy. 

Then came an exhaustive series of measure 
ments, all, saving the height already men¬ 
tioned, being taken by centimeters. The tape 
measured the length of the body, while sit¬ 
ting, to the knee, and in every possible direc¬ 
tion. The girth of the head, neck and chesty 
waist, hips, etc., were taken, and then, with a 
curious and handy device like a pair of gigan¬ 
tic dividers, the depth of chest and abdomen 
and breadth of head, shoulders, etc. 

The many and curious measurements were 
all very interesting, for it must be understood 
that Medical Examiner Brown’s critical ex¬ 
amination of applicants is based upon long 
experience, and is reduced to an average in 
every case. Thus, so many inches in stature, 
so many centimeters girth, breadth of chest, 
etc., so many pounds grip, and so many pounds 
lung power, added together and divided by 
the averaging figures gives a quotient that 
represents to a fraction the physical condition 
of the man. 

In this respect, at least, it is believed that 
“figures will not lie.” A man may be a veritable 
Hercules to all outward appearances, and yet 
upon this close and critical examination may 
fail to get the per cent, of marking that is 
requisite to pass him. 

A man’s mental qualifications and physical 
average are put together to fix his relative 
standing among the eligibles. The young 
man’s markings are all written down in a big 
book, and they are all curious and remarkably 
thorough. 

After having resumed his attire, the candi¬ 
date was submitted to a rigid cross-examina¬ 
tion, that went into a more minute inquiry 
than even a life insurance examiner, or a cen¬ 
sus enumerator would. He was required to 
answer all the following questions: Place of 
residence, name, class, department to enter, 
occupation, where born, nationality of father 
and mother, and of his father’s father and 
mother, and mother’s father and mother, occu¬ 
pation of father, what his father died of, 
which parent he most resembles, general 
health and hereditary diseases. Next exam¬ 
iner wanted to know if his victim had ever 
been subject to either of a long list of com¬ 
plaints. 

It will thus be seen that these examinations 
of candidates accomplish two purposes. They 
throw out all those who are not up to a cer¬ 
tain minimum standard, and they grade those 
who have passed that minimum according to 
their relative development and strength. In 
order to get a standard a table was first made 
out by Dr. Brown. This table was prepared 
from an average of measurements and tests— 
not of a few great athletes, but of a large num¬ 



Fio. 4. 


ber of individuals of good development and 
strength. If an average of 65 of this stand¬ 
ard is not reached the candidate is rejected 
altogether, and according to the average per¬ 
centage in all the tests the successful candi¬ 
dates are graded. The tables and rules for 
this grading are so arranged that good gen¬ 
eral development and strength count for more 
than special strength in particular sets of 
muscles alone. 

In the total marking, which grades the 
candidate on the eligible list, the physical 
tests count one-half of the whole, and the 
mental examinations count the other half. 
The character and medical examinations do 
not count in the grading. For these the can¬ 
didate either passes or does not pass. Those 
candidates for police, for instance, whose char¬ 
acter is proved good, whose health, eyesight 
and hearing are up to the required tests, who 
know the police rules, powers and duties so 
well, and can make so clear a statement in 
writing, and show such penmanship, and can 
do simple arithmetic so well, and have such 
a degree of physical development and strength 
as to stand near the head of the list, are cer¬ 
tainly a picked lot of men. If they stand the 
probationary trial of six months of actual 
service before final appointment, it may be 
safely said that those selected under this sys¬ 
tem are at least quite as well adapted, if, in¬ 
deed, they are not much better equipped for 
their work than if selected because of their 
political energies exhibited in packing cau¬ 
cuses and getting voters to the polls, or on ac¬ 
count of some secret influence or “pull” in 
city, state or national politics, or in otherwise 
making themselves stiperserviceable to some 
party “boss.” 

In view of the foregoing description of the 
work it is almost superfluous to add that Dr. 
Brown is an enthusiastic believer in the whole 
scheme of examination in development and 
strength. In a chat with him, however brief, 
one would be impressed with his thoroughness 


and his absolute belief in the value of th^ 
tests to the community at large, in securing 
the best fitted men for these two very import¬ 
ant departments of our protective service. 
“ As a result of these examinations,” said he, 
“ I find I have to reject a large proportion of 
those who have succeeded in running the 
gauntlet of the preliminary and physical ex¬ 
aminations. I test the men who come before 
me here and in New York for their all-round 
fitness. It was tried in Boston before any other' 
city in the country, but New York has now! 
adopted the same system, and, I think I am 
justified in saying, the authorities fully appre¬ 
ciate it there, as they certainly do in this city. 
In Boston, when we first adopted the system, 
we had, practically, no data to go by, and we 
picked out fifty of the older members of the 
police force—men who were regarded as the 
best specimens—and examined them. The 
tests they were put to found them very poor 
on their legs. They had poor wind and a poor 
stride when running. They were not active. 
Of course, our tests have been changed and 
improved considerably since the system was 
first put into operation, for since that time we 
have been enabled to collect a large amount 
of valuable data, and the experience which 
we have all had in the actual application of 
the system to the practical needs of the police 
and fire departments has been of very great 
help in many ways. Our averages are based 
upon scientific and well-known principles, the 
system being a modification and extension of 
that used by Dr. Dudley A. Sargent, of Har¬ 
vard University. In order to get the requisite 
percentage, an applicant must be in pretty 
good physical condition, and a pretty sound 
man. We take the symmetry, development 
and strength of a man, and base his normal 
condition upon that. It would be a good thing 
if the men had to go through this examina¬ 
tion every few years, and thus be forced to 
keep up their condition to a proper standard. 
The life of a policeman is such a change from 




1 























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


249 


I- 

I ■ 

1 the active pursuits he has previously engaged 

I in that it has a tendency to make him too 

I heavy, and to a certain extent the life of a 

I fireman may be open to the same criticism. I 

I believe that the men should be required to ex- 

I ercise an hour a day and be paid for the time. 

[ In fact, I believe there should be a gymnasium 

j attached to every police station and engine 

I house, and the members of the departments 

I required to go through certain stated exercises 

as part of their oflficial duties daily.” 


■ AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

jjtoThe vassal, upon investiture, took an 
oath of fealty to the lord, and * * be¬ 
come his MAN from that day forth. * * 
Services were free and base. * * Base 
“ service was to * * carry out his dung. 
— \^Blackatone. 

—Collector of the Port Cooper rushed to the de¬ 
fense of Senator Quay to-day in a self prepared 
half-column interview. He says the address 
is both unwise and unjust^ that it leaves a 
doubt in every mind if the real purpose is 
not to injure rather than to correct, and, if 
this be not so, he wants to know why they 
should call into review the acts of a senator 
who voted right on the elections bill, the tar 
iff, and silver. He says I hat some of the sign¬ 
ers aided in the movement that forced Dela- 
mater on Quay, at a time when the latter was 
ready to take up Hastings. On the whole he 
thinks it is a movement in behalf of the dem¬ 
ocrats. Of the senator he says: 

“Senator Quay has battled with many 
storms. The gentlemen who believe him to 
be a little man but prove the narrowness of 
their own surroundings. He is one of the par¬ 
ty’s leaders—not its boss, surely, not my boss 
nor yours—and if he continues active in poli¬ 
tics he will doubtless, as in the past, seek the 
removal of all serious obstructions to republi¬ 
can unity.”— Philadelphia Dispatch to New York 
Times, June SO. 

|W£vei'y receiver of lands, or feudatory, 
^^as therefore bound when called upon by 
.his benefactor, or immediate lord of his 
Jfend or fee, to doali in his power to defend 

him.— [Blackstone. 

—The Richmond Palladium says that “ the 
President will be his own successor,” and that 
“ there never has been an abler, cleaner or 
more successful administration of public af¬ 
fairs ” than he has given the country. The 
Palladium is edited by Isaac Jenkinson, who 
also edits the post-office at Richmond. 

—Collector Cooper of Philadelphia went last 
week to Atlantic City, where the Pennsylvania 
editorial association was visiting. The edi¬ 
tors represent more than 100 county news¬ 
papers, nearly all of them republican. Mr. 
Cooper repen ts that they are all for Harrison. 

—Amos Smith is a warm Sherman man, and 
owes his position as collector of customs to the sena¬ 
tor. It is pretty generally known that a few days 
ago he called upon Foraker at Sherman’s request, 
with the object of having the ex-governor say 
yes or no as to whether he would oppose Sher¬ 
man’s re-election or be a candidate himself. 

The report goes that Foraker told Smith 


that his mission was impertinent, and gave 
him a very unsatisfactory message to take 
back to Sherman.— Cincinnati Dispatch to New 
York Times, July 21. 

“ Large districts or parcels of land were 
allotted by the conquering generals to the 
superior ollicers of the army. * * The 
condition of liolding the lands thus given 
was tliat the possessor should do service 
faithfully, both at home and in the wars, to 
him by whom they were given.”-[R/acA- 
stone. 

—One of the most disgraceful appointments 
made by the Harrison administration is that 
of Edwin B. Low as postmaster in this village. 
It was opposed almost solidly by the respecta¬ 
ble republicans of Westport on the ground 
that Low’s reputation for honesty was bad and 
his habits so intemperate as to render him to¬ 
tally unfit to discharge the duties of the posi¬ 
tion. Despite the remonstrances of the citi 
zens, whose knowledge of Low’s character is 
complete, this man has been elevated to the 
chief position of trust in the community. 
Quite naturally the people are full of indig¬ 
nation. They feel that their rights have been 
trampled upon by Postmaster-tleneral Wana- 
maker and Congressman-elect John M. Wever of 
Plattsburg. Denunciation of these two wor¬ 
thies is heard on every side in Westport and 
vicinity. 

Wever, who is a banker of Plattsburg and 
politician of the Hill stripe, is charged with hav¬ 
ing promised the office to Low long before election, 
in the face of the fact that the opposition to 
Low was widespread. He disregarded entirely 
the objections offered, and even, it is alleged, 
suppressed the remonstrances and the peti¬ 
tions. When the people saw that Wever was 
determined to put Low in the post-office, they 
turned their attention to Mr. Wanamaker and 
Mr. Whitfield, the assistant postmaster-gen¬ 
eral. Personal appeals were made to both 
these gentlemen against the appointment of 
Low. Many letters were written them in sup¬ 
port of these appeals. Low’s unfitness for the 
post was thoroughly demonstrated. Wana¬ 
maker and his assistant professed to be much 
interested in the case.— Westport, Essex County, 
N. Y., Dispatch to New York Times, June SO. 

Tlius the feudal connection was estab¬ 
lished, * * and ail army of feudatories 
was always ready enlisted and mutualiy 
prepared to muster.—[R/ac^s^onc. 

“The” Allen, gambler, republican political heeler, 
and keeper of places of resort of people of ques¬ 
tionable character, lies hovering between life and 
death at 246 West Forty-third street. He was a quick 
fighter, but he ran across an Italian who was quicker 
than he and received several stab wounds, one of 
which, it is feared, will prove fatal. 

At about 11: 30 o’clock Thursday night Allen and 
four others were playing cards in Allen’s saloon at 
Bleecker street and South Fifth avenue. The game 
that they were playing is called “slaughter in the 
pan.” 

While the game was in progress John Carrero, an 
Italian, came in and asked to be allowed to take a 
hand. Allen said that he would not play with Carrero, 
and the Italian left the saloon. About an hour later 
he returned armed with anice-pick and immediately 
made a rush for Allen. Seizing Allen by the throat 
before the latter could recover from his surprise, the 
Italian stabbed him again and again until he fell 
bleeding to the floor. 

Allen is fifty-three years of age, and has had a bad 
reputation all his life. While he descends from a 
respectable family, his father having been an Epis¬ 
copalian clergyman, most of his brothers have been 
either criminals or associated with the criminal 


classes. Of the five brothers two are doing time in 
state prisons and one was shot in Ohio. 

Wesley Allen, or “Wes” Allen, as he is known, one 
of “The” Allen’s brothers, is spoken of by Inspector 
Byrnes as probably the most notorious criminal in 
the United States. He is described as “saucy and 
treacherous,” and requires to be watched closely, as 
he will use a pistol if an opportunity presents itself. 
He has been a thief for many years, but has not 
spent much time in prison. Martin Allen, another 
brother, is a burglar, and was sentenced on Novem¬ 
ber 1, 1883, to serve ten years in Sing Sing for burg¬ 
lary. Jesse Allen, a third brother, was shot in Ohio 
after committing a burglary, and died. John Allen, 
a fourth brother, is the only reputable man in the 
family. He is a jeweler in this city. 

“The” Allen has consorted with toughs and crim¬ 
inals from his earliest days, which were spent in the 
eighth ward. During the war he kept a bar-room 
known as the “ St. Bernards,” at Prince and Mercer 
streets, which was a notorious resort for bounty 
jumpers, thieves, and loose women. Later on he 
opened a gambling den at 611 Broadway, and it was 
here he killed John Molloy by shooting him with a 
pistol early in the morning. No one was present to 
witness the affair. 

Allen always combined politics with his business so as 
to get the necessary proketion from the police in his nefa¬ 
rious business. He was at one time a political boss of a 
low type—not a boss in the sense of a leader, but a boss of 
his own followers. His affiliations were usually with the 
republicans. He was first prominent in the republican 
affairs of the old eighth ward, where he had considerable 
control of the colored voters. He held the whip over 
them if necessary, but when free handed liberality 
suited his purpose best he used it. Besides his con¬ 
trol over the colored voters he had a certain "gang” of his 
own henchmen, who were useful in running caucuses or 
in packing primaries. 

Alien knew how to manage these things well, and when 
he was at the height of his power an eighth ward primary 
usually went his way. When the fifth assembly dis¬ 
trict succeeded the eighth ward as the political divi¬ 
sion, Allen was still something of a power. Of late 
years he has bobbed up occasionally in the many 
district fights in the fifth. Sometimes he was with 
this faction, sometimes with the other. In the last 
fight, in which ex-Police Commissioner Stephen B. 
French was the winner, Allen was with French. 
Years ago Allen ran for alderman, and he always 
claimed that he was elected and counted out. 

When John I. Davenport was appointed chief su¬ 
pervisor of elections he found a proper tool and asso¬ 
ciate in “The” Allen, and made him one of his prin¬ 
cipal heelers. Part of Allen’s duties to the Grand Old 
Party was to ship repeaters from New York and Phila¬ 
delphia to Indiana and Ohio at election time. At one 
time Allen joined the greenback labor party in this 
city, and Shupe took him for his side partner and got 
him nominated for the assembly. Allen, at one of 
the meetings of the county committee of the green- 
backers, pushed the chairman off the platform, put 
in his own man, and captured the meeting, the dele¬ 
gates being frightened by his heelers. 

The prosperity of Harry Hill in his Houston street 
dive aroused “ The ” Allen’s envy and he started an¬ 
other similar place a short distance away in Bleecker 
street and called it the “Mabille.” It was a resort 
for thieves and loose women, sports, dissipated clerks, 
and strangers who wanted to “d^he town.” It was 
even below the low standard of ffarry Hill’s, but nev¬ 
ertheless, after Harry Hill’s, Billy McQlory’s, and Tom 
Gould’s places had been closed by the police, “ The” Al¬ 
len’s "Mabille ” continued to flourish for some time, ow¬ 
ing to his strong pull with the republican machine. He 
was regarded as a spy and go-between between the 
police and thieves, and was a great pet of Commis¬ 
sioner French’s. Finally the “Mabille” had to be 
closed, too, and “The” Allen became more and more 
of a republican ward worker. His influence with Mr. 
French was said to he enoi-mous, and he could almost al¬ 
ways get his heelers jobs in the post office, custom-house, 
or navy yard.—New York Times, Jxdy 11. 

“ By not performiiif? tlie stipulated serv¬ 
ice, or by deserting liis lord in battle,” the 
lands reverted to the lord.— [R/acAstone. 













250 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—There seems to be no reason known at the 
treasury department for the removal of Ap¬ 
praiser Stearns except that he is a democrat. 
Secretary Foster and Assistant Secretary 
Spaulding are out of town to-day, but no one 
about the department pretends to know any 
other reason than the political one for the dis¬ 
placement of the wounded democratic veteran. 
Some of the treasury officials were reluctant to 
make the change, and it was only just before 
the President started for Cape May that he 
signed the papers driving from the public 
service his comrade of the war for the Union. 
General Cogswell, in accordance with the re¬ 
ports already published, was the most earnest 
advocate for a change in favor of his friend, 
Mr. Dodge. The President, if asked the rea¬ 
sons for the change, would probably reply, as 
he did to the correspondent of the Post, in the 
case of the displacement of postmaster Pear¬ 
son of New York, that he “did not think any 
statement was necessary ."— Washington Dispatch 
to Boston Post, July 6. 

—Sergeant-at-Arms Adoniram J. Holmes, 
of the house of representatives, is an Iowa man, 
and he has evidently heard the cries of dis¬ 
tress which his fellow-republicans of Iowa are 
sending up because of the outlook for next 
fall’s election. 

His first contribution to the cause was made 
to day, when he dismissed Deputy Sergeant-at- 
Arms Thomas Cavanaugh, who has held that office 
since the republicans took control of the house, and 
against whom it is declared no charges have been 
made. By dismissing Cavanaugh after all the 
work of the fifty-first congress has been done, 
Mr. Holmes makes room for the appointment 
of an Iowa man, who will have nothing to do 
but draw his salary until he is displaced by 
a democrat next December. 

Of course, the new deputy can be depended 
upon to work and vote for the republican 
ticket, and as his chief duty will be to draw 
his salary, he ought to be willing to make 
liberal contributions to the party’s campaign 
fund.— Washington Dispatch to New York Times, 
June SO. 

—When Mr. Blaine was called to the most 
important place in the cabinet he wrote, in 
reply to the President’s letter tendering the 
appointment (which letter clearly outlined the 
President’s views), a statement that distinctly im¬ 
plied in the clearest terms unquestioned and un¬ 
bending fealty to the head of the administration, 
and by no act, word or intimation has Mr. 
Blaine at any time since left his loyalty open 
to the slightest suspicion.— Frank Leslie's 
Illustrated Newspaper. 


PARTY EXORCISM. 

—Quayism tried to force the bankrupt Delamater 
on the people as governor, and it is capable of dic¬ 
tating the election of such a treasurer as Bardsley if 
political exigencies demanded. The latter-day Re¬ 
publicanism of Pennsylvania has become a stench in 
the nostrils of honest men.—Buffalo Express [iJep.]. 

—“The movement to force Mr. Quay off the na. 
tional republican committee, and to depose him 
from the leadership of the party in Pennsylvania is 
commendable. It should receive the approval of 
republicans everywhere,” says the Cincinnati Times- 
Star [Rep ]. 

—Men will not woik intelligently and enthusiasti 
cally under the direction of a partisan chiejtain who 
has forfeited their confidence on the score of integrity, 
whose agents and associates are corrupt and discredita. 
ble, whose purposes are usually dishonorable, and who, 
whether his ends be good or bad, is reckless and unscru¬ 
pulous as to the means which he employs for their accom, 
plishment. This is the case with Mr. Quay. It is said 
that the President has entered into a sort of offensive 
and defensive alliance with the Pennsylvania boss- 


The republican masses hope and believe that this 
story is false. Such a league would discredit Gen. 
Harrison, deeply offend his admirers, and fatally 
handicap the party in the campaign. The republi¬ 
can voters of the country demand that Senator Quay 
step down from the chairmanship of the national 
committee before the lines are drawn for the canvass 
of 1892.—S<. Louis Olobe-Democrat [jR(p.], July 14. 

—After the publication of the Philadelphia ad¬ 
dress, the Omaha Bee (rep.) thinks that Quay “ought 
by this time to be convinced of his entire unavaila¬ 
bility as a leader of tlie Keystone republicans.” 

—The Advertiser, which was one of the first to pro¬ 
test against the retention of Senator Quay in an im¬ 
portant position on the republican executive con^ 
mittee, is glad to notice so general a republican con¬ 
demnation of the Pennsylvania boss and his political 
methods. There is much in the Pennsylvania idea 
of political warfare which citizens of both par¬ 
ties have seen fit to condemn, and Mr. Quay’s only 
reply to the recent signed protest against his reten 
tion in a responsible political position is no answe 
to its justice. Even if it be true, as he is reported to- 
have charged, that the signers are “ all democrats or 
mugwumps,” that fact would not militate against 
the truth of their indictment. — Boston Advertiser 
[Rep.]. 

—There is a strong and growing conviction among 
republicans that Mr. Quay's prominence in the party- 
councils is hurtful to the party.—Philadelphia Press 
[Rep.]. 

—“Senator Matthew S. Quay of Pennsylvania can 
not counteract the demand that heshali resign from 
the chairmanship of the republican national com¬ 
mittee and remove his big thumb from the republi 
can party in Pennsylvania, by denouncing his critics 
as mugwumps and free-traders.”—Afliany Journal 
[Rep.]. 

—“It is time for plain speaking an d resolute action. 
The republican party in Pennsylvania needs reform, 
and it can not take the very first step toward reform 
so long as Mr. Quay retains his place in its leadership 
and councils. It is the height of folly for the party to 
run amuck against the public conscience by refusing 
to eliminate the leadership which has brought it 
into discredit and defeat.—Bosto7i Journal [Rep.]. 

—Even the Boston Traveller (rep.), speaks out. 
“ The pressure is increasing,” it says, “and it really 
looks as if Matthew Stanley Quay had better retire 
from the chairmanship of the republican national 
committee while he can do so gracefully.” 


THE ROUT OF SENATORS PLUMB 
AND GORMAN. 

Mr. Theodore Roosevelt, of the national 
civil service commission, is the right man 
in the right place. His alert mind, his strong 
conviction, his accurate knowledge of details, 
and his aggressive temperament instantly chal¬ 
lenge any false statement or sneering assump¬ 
tion against reform from whatever source it 
may proceed. Senators Plumb and Gorman 
have had occasion recently to discover that 
Mr. Roosevelt is “an ugly customer” to deal 
with upon this subject except with facts and 
arguments. If anybody supposes, said Senator 
Plumb in his place, that the civil service 
commisson is now without fear or favor, he is 
entirely mistaken. Favoritism of the grossest 
kind is shown, and underhand work takes 
place by which persons are picked out for 
selection by that commission. This, says Mr. 
Roosevelt, is a charge of cheap corruption. It 
was susceptible of immediate proof or dis¬ 
proof. If true, the commissioners were guilty 
of official misconduct. If false and without 


foundation, the wanton allegation of suchVl 
rumors, or, as Mr. Plumb says, “information^; 
which seems to me to be conclusive,” is savedM 
from being infamous only by being contempt-J 

The commission instantly wrote to Senator® 
Plumb asking that the information on which® 
his assertion was based should be immediately® 
furnished to the President if it aflPected the® 
commisssion, and to the commission if it af-|, 
fected any of their subordinates. They prom-*, 
ised prompt and thorough investigation, add- K 
ing that all their books, records, and papers K 
were open to any responsible person, and that J 
the career of every appointee could be traced v 
in detail from his examination to his appoint-■ 
ment. Nothing could be more frank, honorable, 
and explicit than the offer of the commission ■ 
to meet the charges of Senator Plumb. Three ^ , 
months and more have passed, but neither ^ 
Senator Plumb nor Senator Stewart, who had 
sustained his charge, has answered the letter ' 
of the commission. The reason, says Mr. ■ 
Roosevelt, is that^the statement did not con¬ 
tain a particle of truth, a fact which both 
senators knew, or ought to have known, when ■ 
they made it. 

Senator Gorman also foolishly exposed him¬ 
self to the same unsparing castigation. He A 
said, in an interview, to show the absurdity of ■ 
reform, that a letter carrier was asked “ the 
most direct route from Baltimore to China.” 

Mr. Roosevelt wrote him promptly, saying 
that if such a question was asked it was 
against the explicit orders of the commission, 
which had in its office a complete set of the 
examination papers of every letter-carrier 
since the examinations began. The papers I 
had been thoroughly examined, and no such J 
question appeared. Would Mr. Gorman | 
kindly state the date and place of the exami- ^ 
nation, or would he send a person to search ^ 
the papers for the question which he alleged 4 
to have been put to a “ bright young man in f 
the city of Baltimore?” Mr. Gorman dis- j 
creetly did not respond. After a few weeks, 1 
therefore, Mr. Roosevelt publicly told the jc 
truth in saying that Senator Gorman had told j 
something else than the truth, for no such 1 
question was asked as he asserted to have 4 
been asked. To this challenge Senator Gor- | 
man made no other reply than to state in the 1 
senate that in common with everybody who 1 
had criticised the inability of the commission 4 
to enforce the reform law, he had been very se¬ 
verely criticised by the president of the com- ^ 
mission—meaning Mr. Roosevelt,who is not the .1 
president—and when Senator Blair asked him # 
what he did about it, Senator Gorman answered: 

“ I did about it what I do in the case of all in- f 
terference by impudent people who without * 
warrant ask me about my discharge of my duty. 

I took no notice of it.” Evidently Senator 
Gorman had stated what was untrue, and 
would not acknowledge it. The conclusive 
evidence of its untruth was offered to him, 
and he would not look at it. His conduct 
convicts him of bearing false witness, as that ' 
of Mr. Roosevelt shows the perfect readiness 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


251 





of the commission to answer every question, 
and of Mr. Koosevelt himself to expose re¬ 
morselessly the ignominious attempts of sena¬ 
tors of the United States to slander other 
public officers. No member of congress who 
has read Mr. Roosevelt’s letter describing 
the complete and ludicrous rout of Senators 
Plumb and Gorman, and Senator Stewart as 
their reserve, is likely to attack the civil ser¬ 
vice commission without carefully surveying 
the ground.— Harpers’ Weekly, July 18. 


! Secretary Tracy deserves credit for extend- 
! ing the operations of the merit system to the 
1 navy-yards at Norfolk, Va., and Portsmouth, 
1 N. H. But he will quickly make a farce of 
E this well meant experiment unless he develops 
I » more capacity for resisting pressure than the 
newspapers give him credit for in a case that 
arose at Norfolk. The incumbent of a post 
^ in that yard was, it seems, found to rate lower 
at the examinations than another candidate. 
But the incumbent, like most of them, had a 
pull. This he exerted so vigorously through 
the agency of a former member of congress 
that he was given the place, and the man at 
the head got nothing. This will never do. If 
the secretary yields to one pull he will be sub¬ 
jected to hundreds of them, and his new policy 
will be “pulled” to pieces .—The Civil Service 
Reformer, July, 1891. 


[Secretary Tracy, after careful considera¬ 
tion of the objections, has since upheld the ex¬ 
amination and appointed the man selected by 
i the the competition.— Ed. Chronicle.] 

K* ' ' 

jr Mr. Chittenden had ample personal knowl- 
4 ,edge of official life and the civil .service in 
ij^ iWashington, and his brief but stringent re- 
marks upon them are of great value. The aw- 
V ful suffering and personal ruin due tothespoils 
system of the service he knew well by observa- 
.% tion. “ No men,” he says, “ better deserve the 
attention of philanthropists than the clerks in 
'3 ^the government service; ” and his words out- 
t weigh the gibes of a thousand mere party pol- 
A iticians when he says, “ It will be a fortunate 
j day for the country when the civil servicesys- 
■J tern is extended to all the government offices 
4 except the cabinet and those immediately con- 
? nected with congress .”—From Harpers’ Weekly’s 
Notice of Chittenden’s Recollections of President 
.T.- Lincoln. 
v 

£ In reply to Mr. Clarkson’s statement in the 
^ North American for May that “no boss can live 
^ more than a year,” the Boston Transcript (May 
5) cites the instance of Quay, who continues 
* to hold his place in spite of the denunciations 
hurled at him by men of his own party. Other 
instances disproving Mr. Clarkson’s statement 
will no doubt occur to our readers, and show 
to them how absolutely reckless Mr. Clarkson 
is when he attemps to argue. He has bo 
power of dealing with facts. Vigorous lan¬ 
guage is his sole forte in writing and speaking. 
As an instance of how long a boss may reign, 
the case of I. Freeman Raisin of Baltimore 
may be cited. Before the war he wa? an offi¬ 
cer of a Know-nothing club which made itself 


infamous for its use of pistols and shoemakers’ 
awls at the polls. When his party was over¬ 
thrown, it might be supposed that Raisin 
would disappear from politics; but no, from 
that day to this he has been a power in Mary¬ 
land, and always in most disgraceful ways. 
His life and methods have been fully exposed 
by the reformers of Baltimore. Every one 
knows just what he is; but such is the strength 
of a boss, where the spoils system exists in per¬ 
fection, that neither reformers within his par¬ 
ty nor those who have left it to coalesce with 
the opposition have been able to overthrow 
him, Gorman himself—who, by the way, has 
certainly been a boss more than a year, in 
spite of his published record—would not to¬ 
day think of making a move or deal in Mary¬ 
land without taking into account Raisin’s hos¬ 
tility or friendship, as the case might be.— 
Civil Service Record, July, 1891. 


About one hundred and forty members of 
the Massachusetts reform club recently gave a 
dinner to express their respect and admiration 
for General Corse, the Boston postmaster, 
whom President' Harrison is stated to have 
said that he could not re-appoint in spite of 
gallant services during the war and an admir¬ 
able record as postmaster, because the post¬ 
master had failed to give a public disapproval 
of southern outrages. The readers of the 
Chronicle will be interested in what General 
Corse had to say upon this occasion, and use 
is made of the report of the Boston Post of 
May 8: 

General Corse was greeted with great enthu¬ 
siasm, the whole company rising as he was 
presented. He said it was with some embar¬ 
rassment that he tried to find words to express 
his gratitude for this reception. It was a 
rather sad commentary on the public service 
that a man should be commended for doing 
what was only his duty. He was deeply in 
sympathy with the reform club. He was that 
much of a partisan that he went on the line of 
his party when it commended itself to his 
opinion, and when it did not he was not with 
it. Probably men were more emancipated 
from party to-day than ever before. 

When he took the Boston post-office he found 
the machine a very crude instrument. He 
addressed himself to the details of the busi¬ 
ness, examining the offices in Baltimore and 
several others. He learned it from top to 
bottom. The post-office system of the country 
was not perfect. No private business could 
be managed like this without going into bank¬ 
ruptcy. There were five or ten bureau heads, 
all at loggerheads with each other. If a ^st- 
master got one into sympathy with the im¬ 
provements the others might oppose him and 
his efforts went for naught. The post-office 
department was alien to the post-office. The 
heads of the department probably thought if 
the offices were wiped out they would have a 
very good time. A man must have great per¬ 
sistency to achieve reforms under such condi¬ 
tions. 

The civil service law had been a constant 
bulwark against his political friends. It was 
a singular fact that the best friend a man 
had would unload upon him the most worth¬ 
less whelp in the world to get rid of him. No 
doubt through the agency of such associa¬ 
tions as the reform club civil service was ad¬ 
vanced very materially. It was a delight to 
him that the navy yard and the Indian 


department had been added to the civil ser¬ 
vice. 

.General Corse related how, not long before 
his successor was appointed, he was in Wash¬ 
ington to see the postmaster-general. He found 
that certain politicians could gain access to 
him at all hours, while he who was on depart¬ 
ment business had to wait a long time to find 
out when he could see him next day. The 
postmaster-general said he was so occupied 
with affairs of stale that he could only give 
him a few minutes of time. When he went 
into the office he saw that the postmaster- 
general was occupied with a colored man 
from a southern state who wanted an office. 
The postmaster-general was talking to the 
negro, saying that he understood he had been 
in a democratic caucus. 

“No, sah, I was never in a democratic cau¬ 
cus,” the negro replied. 

“ Well, you were seen in a democratic con¬ 
vention then,” continued the postmaster, 

“No, sah, never was in any democratic con¬ 
vention,” reiterated the negro. 

“ Well, then, were you not in consultation 
with democrats?” pursued the postmaster. 

“ Never, sah, never,” repeated the negro. 

General Corse commented upon this state of 
things, and said he advised the postmaster- 
general to turn over to the first assistant post¬ 
master this matter of investigating the char¬ 
acter of applicants for small post-offices. The 
department, he said, was like a run-down rail¬ 
road. Some man had got to go into the office 
of the postmaster-general some time and 
sacrifice years in building up a new and im¬ 
proved system, for which his successor would 
get the credit. The great idea of some post¬ 
master-generals was to reduce postage, annihi¬ 
late a lottery or annex the telegraph. The 
best step to be taken was to create an admin¬ 
istrative head, and keep him there for ten 
years at a salary commensurate with the 
work. 

Unless a postmaster-general was in sympa¬ 
thy with the congressional committees on 
post-offices and postroads he was entirely help¬ 
less. In the local office there was nothing 
which the ordinary business man could not 
accomplish. It was purely an industry. The 
postal service was designed merely to take a 
letter or package from one man and deliver it 
to another. » * * 

He went on to show that the deficiency in 
the post-office department was due to the fact 
that $5,000,000 worth of work was done for 
the government for which no credit was 
given, and that newspapers were carried for a 
cent a pound which cost five cents per pound. 
In the recent controversy over the Boston 
office it was his desire that the office should 
not fall into the hands of the spoilsmen. The 
man who succeeded him would make a good 
postmaster, and the office would not fall into 
the hands of spoilsmen. If the democratic 
party succeeded in 1892 he hoped a good 
official would not be displaced. 


ADDRESS TO THE CITIZENS OF 
PENNSYLVANIA. 

As Pennsylvanians and as republicans, we, the 
undersigned, feel constrained to address our fellow 
citizens throughout the state upon the present polit¬ 
ical situation—to point out what we believe to be 
the essential causes of the alarming degredation in 
public affairs from which we now suffer, and the 
necessary steps toward improvement. 

The republican machine in this state, under the 
leadership of Senator Quay, and those lieutenants 
whom he has drawn about him, is corrupt, and in 
strong contrast to the rank and file of the party. 
That leadership is absolute in its control, as it is un¬ 
scrupulous in its methods, and disastrous in its re¬ 
sults. With Senator Quay’s political record the pub- 

















252 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


lie is so familiar that it is unnecessary at this time 
to give a detailed history of those more remote pub¬ 
lic acts through which its notoriety was acquired, 
while a brief reference to its more recent events is 
appropriate in order to depict clearly the present sit¬ 
uation. 

Mr. Quay Is mainly responsible for the ovej whelm¬ 
ing disaster which befell the republican party in this 
state during the past autumn, whereby an accus¬ 
tomed republican majority of twenty to thirty thou¬ 
sand was changed to a democratic majority of seven¬ 
teen thousand. The single issue of the campaign, as 
determined by Mr. Quay himself, was the vindica¬ 
tion of his own personal and political character. 
The adoption of the republican platform involved a 
declaration of confidence and respect for the junior 
senator, and in the election of the republican can. 
didate the acceptance of a man who was nominated 
at the dictation of Mr. Quay. The state rejected 
both the plank and the candidate, and a political 
revolution ensued. The republican party was de¬ 
feated in Pennsylvania, its most conspicuous 
stronghold. It might have been supposed that the 
leader who had inflicted such a wound upon his 
party, and to whom It had given so overwhelming an 
evidence of a lack of confidence in him, would have 
retired from public prominence. Mr. Quay, how¬ 
ever, contented himself with an elaborate defense 
of his record before the United States Senate. This 
was both untimely and Inconclusive; untimely, 
since it came after ali possible damage that could re¬ 
sult to his character had been effected by his silence 
under the grave charges repeatedly made against 
him from responsible sources through the long crit¬ 
ical period preceding the election; inconclusive, 
since he failed in it to adopt the simple and the only 
course in relation to the treasury scandal that could 
have made clear his innocence. Had Mr. Quay ac 
cepted the suggestion that lie should call upon Mr. 
MaeVeagh and the other gentlemen who were said 
to have been present when his alleged defalcation in 
connection with the treasury was covered by Mr. 
Cameron, to testify in his favor, he would have 
adopted the obvious means for securing vindication. 
But this he did not do; and failing to take such a 
course his, defense falls to the ground, and his pre¬ 
vious position remains unchanged. Notwithstanding 
these facts he still retains the party leadership, and 
his lieutenants, either acting under his direct, though 
hidden, command, or only in strict accord with the 
principles of his school of politics, by the attitude they 
assumed toward the ballot reform bill, have violated 
the express pledges of the party, have openly defied 
the will of the overwhelming majority of their con¬ 
stituents, and have been guilty of a stupid political 
blunder. The amendments first made by the state 
senate committee to the Baker ballot bill were of 
such a nature as to transform the very spirit of that 
measure from one in the interest of free and fair 
elections to one designed to perpetuate the corrupt 
practices under which the state had so long suffered, 
and by which these leaders have so long retained 
their power. But those who designed and favored 
these amendments, and who thereby declared them¬ 
selves in favor of a fraudulent ballot, will be remem¬ 
bered by the voters of this state, and when the day 
for a consideration of the qualifications of our pub¬ 
lic servants shall have come, the names of those who 
have thus defied the commands of their constituents 
will not be forgotten. 

For the defeat of the bill abolishing the local 
school boards in Philadelphia, which was designed 
to free our public schools from political influence, 
and from a divided and cumbersome control, are- 
publican legislature must also be held responsible. 
The measure had the approval of the great majority 
of our best citizens of all creeds, and of both parties, 
and the time was ripe for its adoption. 

All these statements, while they touch the root 
from which other evils have grown, find a fitting 
culmination in that scandal of more recent expos¬ 
ure—the robbery of the city and state treasury by 
its dishonest guardian. Not only must the citizens 
of Philadelphia suffer a tarnished name, a direct 
loss of a million dollars or upwards, while thousands 
of depositors lose their earnings through the failure 


of banks connected with this defalcation, but those 
untold and untraceable losses, resulting from the 
shaken confidence in the community, must also en¬ 
sue. 

There is a fundamental fallacy in the theory of 
politics which has for years obtained in this state, and 
of which Mr. Quay has been the leading exponent. 
It is that public oflices are spoils, the lawful property 
of the politicians who capture them, and by whom 
they are dispensed in turn to their underlings as the 
prizes of war. But the truth is that these oflices are 
a public trust which should be held in stewardship 
by the politicians for the people. The disaster of a 
looted treasury is explained by the fact that the step 
from this fallacy to the startling and bald appropria¬ 
tion of public funds to the private uses of public 
officers is a long one in appearance only, not in re¬ 
ality. That step has now been taken. A partial 
remedy for future troubles of the same kind lies in 
the party’s acceptance and assertion of the truth 
that a public office is a public trust, and that it will 
not support in power men who deny that truth. We 
are soon to nominate an auditor-general and a state 
and city treasurer. In making these nominations, if 
the elections are to give these posts to republicans, 
we must see to it that the men chosen are both 
honest and of such firm character that they can not 
be twisted to dishonest purposes. 

In the presence of these facts, can the republican 
voters of Pennsylvania hesitate as to their duty, or 
be in doubt as to their course? The moment is a cri¬ 
sis as real and as momentous as any through which 
the state has ever passed. There was a time when 
Pennsylvania rose in arms to victory at the presence 
of a hostile invader upon her border, but the danger 
was less than to-day, when the hands of the public 
thief are upon her ballot-box, and have been through 
her treasury. The poison of political corruption and 
dishonesty have alike affected those who have pro¬ 
moted, and those who have permitted it. It has pro¬ 
duced a paralysis, running through moral causes to 
material results. Many of our good citizens have 
been blind and deaf to the conditions about them, 
until the vicious system and the evil principles which 
have been tolerated so long have brought forth fruit 
after their kind. But when loose political morals 
and methods have culminated in appalling defalca¬ 
tions and increased tax rate, none will dare dispute 
the value of sound principles in politics. With a 
great financial scandal, the black bottom of which 
has not yet been sounded, fastened upon Philadel¬ 
phia, and with the name of our state a word of polit¬ 
ical reproach throughout the country, we are con¬ 
vinced that the time is ripe for change. We appeal 
to the patriotism, to the sound sense of republicans 
throughout the state, or, in the absence of sensibility 
to higher considerations, to that fear of impending 
financial and political danger which further inaction 
will bring, to so consider this question, and so to ag¬ 
itate it as to secure speedily the required reform. 
Here, in reality, is a chance for reform within the 
party by such an expression of popular sentiment 
against the objectionable men, that they shall fail of 
renomination to their respective offices, and thus the 
voter be saved the alternative of accepting an un¬ 
worthy candidate, or voting for one of the opposite 
party. The evils which we now suffer will be over- 
com4, if each man shall but feel a personal responsi¬ 
bility for their removal, and will make those individ 
ual and associated efforts which,if wisely planned and 
faithfully executed, bring victory. The objectiona¬ 
ble public records of the men who have inflicted 
those evils must be exposed. There must be a more 
competent and worthy leadership than that of Mr. 
Quay, and the legislature must be purged of those 
who have placed themselves on record as the ene¬ 
mies of ballot reform. The demand for the retire¬ 
ment of these men from the places which they have 
disgraced, must be unflinching. The political meth¬ 
ods which they have adopted must be discontinued, 
and in their place must be substituted only those 
consistent with sound morals and with the practice 
of honorable men. These ideas must find expression 
through the public press, and by the private letters 
of constituents to their representatives. If they are 
not insisted upon and adopted, the republican party 


in Pennsylvania is doomed. It will fall rapidly from 
decay into dissolution. No party can long survive 
the deliberate abnegation of principle, or the adop¬ 
tion of the heresy that the people at heart have 
ceased to believe in right. That what we urge is not 
sentimentality, but politics of the most practical 
sort, the financial losses which the state and indi¬ 
viduals are now enduring, would seem to have clear¬ 
ly proved. 

We issue our appeal at a time when these events 
are fresh in the public mind, to permit that full con¬ 
sideration and agitation of the subject which should 
precede ultimate action at the primaries or the polls. 
If this appeal shall excite a popular response, ways 
and means can readily be devised for organized ef¬ 
fort at a later date. 


Charles Richardson. 
Rudolph Blankenburg. 
Charles W. Henry. 
John T. Bailey & Co. 
Robert R. Corson. 

Alex. E. Outerbridge. 


J. Rodman Paul. 
Charles E. Pancoast. 
Geo. Strawbridge, M. D. 
Hampton L. Carson. 
Joseph DeF. Junkin. 
Herbert Welsh. 


Henry Hartshorne, M. D. Rev. J. K. Murphy, D. D. 


Robert Frazer. 

Edward Y. Hartshorne. 
Charles M. Lea. 

Rev. W. N. McVickar. D. D. 


Henry S. Pancoast. 

Rev. Joseph May. 

Theodore J. Lewis. 

James E. Rhoads. M. D. 

George Wharton Pepper, Reed A. Williams, Jr 
Rev. Alfred J. P. McClure. George Burnham, Jr. 
Henry L. Patterson. Edward 1. H. Howell. 
William B. Montgomery. George W. Blabon. 
William J. Dornan. 


Charles B. Krein. 
William H. Castle. 
William P. Datz. 
George H. Earle. 
George Burnham. 
C. M. Clark. 
Joseph S. Clark. 


David Scull. 

James S. Whitney. 
Edward Longstreih. 
John Story Jeuks. 
John H. Converse. 
W. C. Allison. 
Thomas J. Martin. 
Charles W. Dulles, 


Charles H. Thomas, M. D. James Pe ers. 


T. Morris Perot. 
Charles Heber Clark. 
Thomas Miles. 

Robert P. McCullagh. 
Ferd. J. Dreer. 
Edward H. Williams. 
Owen Jones. 

Rev. Ezra P. Gould. 
Nathaniel E. Janney. 


Eben F. Barker. 

Reuben Haines. 

Thomas F. Jones. 

Walter Wood. 

Rev. Sidnev Corbett, D. D. 
Philip J. W'alsh. 

Edward R. Strawbridge. 
William N. Mencke. 
George D. Bromley. 
Benjamin H. Shoerhaker. Robert E Hastings. 

Rev. James Lisk, D. D. Edward S. Whelan. 

J. Cheston Morris, M. D. Thomas L. Franklin. 
Rev.J.ElliottWright.D.D. Rev. W. F. Paddock, D. D. 

Rev. W. C. French, D. D. 
Rev. T. E. Brown, D. D. 


Rev. 8. W. Dana. D. D 
J. Sellers Bancroft. 


Rev. WillisonB French. John T. Monroe. 


Edward Lewis. 

Charles Dissel. 

A. J. Hemphill. 

George A. Fletcher. 

B. Frank Clapp. 

George L. Mitchell. 
Charles Hill. 

T. Henry Sweeting. 
Nathan T. Clapp. 

Evan Morris. 

Rev. C. Miel, D. D. 
Lucius H. Warren. 
James Chadw'ick. 
George W. Anderson. 
Emerson Conrad. 

C. D. Ritchie. 

Rev. M. Hulburd, D. D. 
Francis H. Williams. 


Rev. Charles Wood. 

Rev. S. D.McConnell, D.D. 
Enoch Lewis. 

Samuel S. Thompson. 

G. A. Bisler. 

John S. Engart. 

E. W. Clark. 

John Pitcairn. 

Howard Comfort. 

Robert E. Atmore. 

Dr. Owen J. Wister. 
Ebeneezer Wood. 
Maximilian Weiss. 

Harry K. Bisbing 
Alex. E. Outerbridge. Jr. 
Rev. J T. Beckley, D. D. 
William F. Dreer. 

Joseph W. Swain. 


Rev. E. K. Young, D. D. Rev. William Ely. 

Rev. E. T. Bartlett, D. D. Rev. J. R. Miller, D. D. 
Rev Benj. Watson, D. D. Lucian Moss. 


Edwin F. Schively. 
A. M. Collins. 

Joseph P. Bolton. 
George D. Wetherill. 
Frank S. Pleasonton. 
J. Henry Tilge. 
Rufus M. Smith. 
Jesse A. Tilge. 

Peter Moran. 

F. O. Horstmann. 
John J. Boyle. 
Walter Horstmann. 
Graff, Son & Co. 
Joseph S. Perot. 

John V. Hastings. 
John Moss, Jr. 

F. DeB. Richards. 
Henry Brooks. 

R. R. Phillips. 

W. E. Bates. 

Edwin F. Partridge. 
Walter Freeman. 


E. B. Tyson. 

James H. Snodgrass. 
Charles F. Yollmer. 
Nicholas Lennig. 

Dr. W. A. Reed. 
Charles Henry Hart. 
George T. Pearson. 
Lincoln L. Eyre. 

O. M. Jenks. 

William Hazelton 3rd. 
Dr. Chas. W. Gessler. 
Herbert I. Keen. 
Joseph H. Brazier. 

H. O. Hastings. 

Henry G. Thunder. 

R. C. Gaskill. 

Rev. W. W. Hammond. 
George C. Harrison. 
Atwood Smith. 

William P. Lewis. 
William Harmar. 

Dr. Walter J. Freeman. 


Dr. William G. A.Bonwill J. A. Schledt. 


William M. Gordon. 
Charles H. Ashburner. 
George J. Newton. 
John 8. Dovey. 
William H. Bradbury. 
Robert P. Molten. 
Thomas Bromley. 


H. G. Tinker. 

Joseph Hartshorne. 
Dr. William Moss. 
William 11. Bradbury. 
Samuel Bradbury. 

H. M. Sill. 

George W. Allen. 


Joseph Priestley Button. Rev. C. A. Dickey, D, D, 
W, D. Frishmuth, Jr. 







The civil service chronicle. 


Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. Meridian St.. Indianapolis, Ind., where subscriptions and advertisments will be received. 

Address THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, Indianapolis, Indiana. 


VoL. I, No. 30. INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST, 189L terms 


The reform of the civil service, auspiciously begun 
under a republican administration, should be com¬ 
pleted by the further extension of the reform system, 
already established by law, to all grades of the ser¬ 
vice to which it is applicable.—A’cpi/Wicaj» National 
Plal/orm, 1888. 

When President Harrison was inaugu¬ 
rated, the reform system established by 
law had been extended to some 32,000 places 
in the federal service. In two years and 
five months he has extended it to cover 
some 700 additional places. 

The spirit and purpose of the reform should be ob. 
served in all executive appointments * '' to the 
end that the dangers to free institnlions which lurk 
in the power of official patronge may be wisely and 
effectively avoided.—Bepublican Natto7ial Platform, 
1888. 

Headsman Clarkson in less than two 
years removed more than 30,000 fourth- 
class postmasters, and since March 4, 1889, 
more than 100,000 federal place-holders 
have been displaced by partisans of the ad 
ministration. This has been done in the 
wilful and wanton exercise of “ the power 
of official patronage.” 

Last month, with the good authentica¬ 
tion which repeated publication without 
denial in leading newspapers seemed to 
give it, the Civil Service Chronicle pub¬ 
lished what purported to be a dispatch 
from Secretary Rusk to Professor Nipher, 
asking what his politics were, presumably 
with reference to his selection as head of 
the weather bureau. This paper has since 
learned from authority which can not be 
questioned that Secretary Rusk sent no 
such dispatch. There is no doubt as to 
how Professor Mark W. Harrington, who 
was afterwards appointed, stands as to 
“ politics.” In an interview in the New 
York Evening Pbst of August 11, given be¬ 
low, he states his views with entire frank¬ 
ness. It will be a relief for the country to 
find that so far as it lies with the head of 
the bureau the object of transferring the 
weather service to the department of agri¬ 
culture in order to reduce it to the spoils 
basis will, if there was such an object, be 
defeated: 

When asked by your correspondent whether he in¬ 
tended to put his force under civil service rules, or to 
use his influence to that end. he answered : 

“ The Washington ottice is already under the rules, 
except in the case of those employes especially ex¬ 
empt by law, and a few others Ailing positions cre¬ 
ated by the act transferring the bureau from the war 
department to the department of agriculture. The 
employes outside of Washington are not in the clas¬ 
sified service. They were in the army under the old 
regime, and did not need the protection of the civil 


service rules. On the transfer they lost their mili¬ 
tary standing and gained none in the civil service. 
So far, however, there have been few vacancies to fill, 
although there have been some promotions and some 
changes of position.” 

"On what principle do you propose filling vacan¬ 
cies?” 

“ I can not fill them personally; I have no appoint¬ 
ing power. My authority extends no further than 
nominating. Before I entered the public service I 
was always warmly in favor of the merit system. 
Since taking ottice I have found that the civil service 
rules, through their not extending far enough, make 
such a task of reorganization as I was faced with here 
exceedingly difficult.” 

“ In what way ?” 

“By preventing me actually from nominating 
some excellent men for promotion. The highest 
salary in the class! fled service is 81,800. Hence, when 
a man deserves to be raised to be chief of division at 
a salary of $ ’,000, and his superior officer would be 
glad to recommend him for such an increase of re¬ 
sponsibility and pay, the question at once arises, 
will the extra 8200 a year compensate for the risks 
attending its acceptance? For when a man steps 
above the classified service, you know, just as when 
he falls below it, he is beyond the protection of the 
civil service rules, and must take the chances of 
war.” 

“You would prefer, then, increasing the scope of 
operations of the merit system in your bureau? ’ 

“1 am in favor of the extension of the merit sys¬ 
tem over practically the entire service. There are a 
few positions, of course, which should be filled by 
professional experts, who have already so high a 
reputation in their own special fields that a proposal 
to examine them would be an impertinence. Aside 
from these, however, and possibly a few others 
whose exemption would be universally recognized 
as proper, I think all the higher positions ought to 
be filled by promotions from lower grades, and all 
admissions to the service made through competitive 
examination thrown open to everybody. I shall 
recommend that this course be pursued, and I have 
no doubt that in due time the meteorological serv¬ 
ice of the government will be, with the exception I 
have already noted, under the civil service rules.” 

Prof. Harrington declined to be interviewed con¬ 
cerning Secretary Rusk’s probable course in civil 
service matters, or to say anything which could in 
any way commit his chief, even by implication. He 
wished it distinctly understood that for the views 
he expressed he alone was responsible. 

From a gentleman who is believed to speak with 
authority for the secretary, however, it is learned 
that Prof. Harrington expressed his opinions clearly 
and in full before accepting office, and that the sec¬ 
retary was the better pleased with him for his can¬ 
dor. 

At the recent national convention of 
the letter carriers h^ld in Detroit the fol¬ 
lowing resolution was passed : 

“Resolved, That the letter carriers of the United 
States, in convention assembled, respectfully ask the 
Pre.sident of the United States to extend the civil 
service to all free delivery cities of the country.” 

Why does not the President make the 
extension? The carriers want it, the civil 
service commission is ready to take charge 
of the competition, and the republican 
platform emphatically promised it. Why 


is it not made ? Are not two years and a 
half sufficient time in which to keep a 
promise? 


At a national convention of fire superin¬ 
tendents held recently at Springfield, Mas¬ 
sachusetts, the president with the decided 
approbation of the convention expressed 
himself as follows: 

“A politician has no right in a fire department. 
To bring politics into a department is to destroy its 
usefulness. A man worthy to be a fireman must be 
educated in his business, and can’t be a ward heeler 
at the same time.” 


At the recent semi-annual examination 
for clerks and mail carriers for the Indi¬ 
anapolis post-office there were five appli¬ 
cants for clerkships and eleven for posi¬ 
tions as carriers. Ex Congressman Gros- 
venor, if we remember rightly, was very 
solicitous over the hundreds of young men 
who traveled to the place of examination 
at great expense, passed a successful exam¬ 
ination, and then sick at heart waited in 
vain for a place. This objection to the law 
can hardly be thought serious in the face 
of only sixteen applicants, and the young 
men of the state may properly be remind¬ 
ed that race, color, politics or religion 
shuts no one out from a chance to work in 
the Indianapolis post-office; also it may be 
said that it is better for the post-office to 
have the possibility of the higher excel¬ 
lence of a larger number of candidates for 
competition. 


It seems that Assistant Secretary 
Crounze and Treasurer Nebeker each de¬ 
sired to have his son for his secretary. 
The places are worth |1,800 apiece a year 
and are excepted from the civil service 
classification. They have the further ad¬ 
vantage uf being “back doors” to the classi¬ 
fied service because after having served a 
certain period private secretaries are ad¬ 
mitted upon a “pass” instead of a competi¬ 
tive examination. It is stated that Secre¬ 
tary Foster objected to the appointments 
and then Nebeker and Crounze got 
together and fixed up the trick of each 
appointing the other’s son for the place, 
but Secretary Foster vetoed that likewise. 
Just why Secretary Foster drew the line 
on Nebeker and Crounze we do not know. 
The land is dotted with relatives and 
friends from those of the President down 
who have received the gift of offices; all 

















254 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the same, it is always interesting to note 
any squeamishnessin this direction. Pro¬ 
viding for relatives is a delicate operation 
and requires a good deal of secrecy and at 
the best always has an element of un¬ 
certainty as to whether the public will 
swallow it without protest. Such an er¬ 
ratum as Raum’s son lately committed 
undoubtedly requires a temporary pander¬ 
ing to public sentiment. As to Nebeker 
and Crounze they need not be discouraged. 
The familiar plan is yet open to them of 
making a spoils’ appointment upon the 
understanding of a division of the salary. 
They could make at least $900 apiece a 
year in this way. 

The President has made a rule that 
hereafter promotions in the departments at 
Washington shall be made upon competi¬ 
tive examinations under the control of the 
civil service commission. These examina¬ 
tions will now amount to something, and 
those who stand highest will secure the 
promotions. Heretofore there has been a 
pretended examination, so easy that all in 
a given class could pass and then favorite- 
ism did its work by permitting a choice 
from the whole list. The only permanent 
control of examinations in which the coun¬ 
try will have any confidence must rest in 
the commission. Secretary Tracy and 
Postmaster-General Wanamaker, if they 
wish to secure any permanent improve¬ 
ment, will have to take steps accordingly. 

Congressman Warwick, the successor 
of Mr. McKinley in Ohio, instituted a 
competitive examination of candidates for 
appointment to West Point. Being open 
to all, a hundred or more are said to have 
competed. Answering an inquiry con¬ 
cerning a report that Congressman War¬ 
wick was dealing in bad faith with the re¬ 
sults of the competition,a correspondent 
writes: 

“I find your clipping and letter on my 
return from a trip. The newspaper ac¬ 
count gives the facts in part, though there 
is some confusion. It has been the custom 
of Major McKinley to order competitive 
examinations to fill vacancies at West 
Point and Annapolis. Mr. Warwick fol¬ 
lowed the precedent, and made up his 
board of examiners, both educational and 
physical. Among all the applicants the 
son of Dr. T. Clark Miller, of Massillon, 
was facile princeps. His father is a lead¬ 
ing republican, and pressure was at once 
brought to bear upon Mr. Warwick to 
have him appoint some one else, disregard¬ 
ing the recommendations of the commit¬ 
tee which had unanimously endorsed 
young Miller for the place. There was an 
applicant from Holmes county, whose 
name now escapes me, whose father was 
as described in the article sent me. I am 
not able to state that he was lowest on 
the list; my impression being that he 
stood well up, though inferior to Miller 
both in mental and physical making. This 
man received the votes of the committee 


for alternate. Mr. Warwick never, so far 
as I have been able to learn, has made an 
appointment for the place, but it is said 
that he contemplates a new competitive 
examination. There was considerable of 
a sensation at the time and I can readily 
see that Mr. Warwick will be much em¬ 
barrassed by the attitude he assumes, 
whatever it may be. If a new examina¬ 
tion is ordered the committee and the suc¬ 
cessful applicant may well feel aggrieved, 
the one by being stultified, and the other 
by being disappointed. If Miller is ap¬ 
pointed the democratic constituents of the 
gentleman may make it unpleasant for 
him. As Holmes county, the residence of 
the alternate, gives 2,200 democratic major¬ 
ity Mr. Warwick is in a manner between 
the devil and the deep sea. What I have 
said is a very moderate statement of the 
facts, as I understand them. In a word, 
Mr. Warwick is seeking to undo, for polit¬ 
ical effect, the work of the committee 
chosen to inquire into the qualification of 
applicants. 

“A word as to the manner in which the 
examination was conducted. Every young 
man was known by a number only, and 
the report was made on the examination 
papers by the number. Mr. Warwick held 
sealed envelopes containing the names of 
the men, and until these were opened the 
committee were not supposed to know the 
name or pedigree of any applicant.” 

James Russell Loivell died August 12 
at the age of seventy-two years. He was 
a distinguished poet and man of letters, 
but his crowning glory was that he was be¬ 
sides these the ideal American citizen. It 
was a light thing for Mr. Lowell to be so 
thoroughly American as to love his country 
and to feel pride in her greatness, but 
never to have shirked the disagreeable 
task always plucking at the sleeve of the 
real patriot of a watchful attention to her 
specific dangers is proof of a far more gen 
uine Americanism. Seeing clearly the 
menace of the spoils system, he spoke his 
mind freely and he went further and took 
up the burden of allying himself with an 
association organized to fight it. 

In the death of Mr. George Jones, the 
controlling proprietor of the New York 
Times, the cloud of parasites who feed on 
the community have lost a relentless en¬ 
emy. In the course of its attempt to con¬ 
dense the facts showing how the parasites 
work, the Civil Service Chronicle has 
found the Times an inexhaustible source of 
information; and if these columns have 
quoted from it more than from other 
•papers it is because the Times in the same 
proportion strips naked the public evil 
which more than any other eats into 
American public morals. 

MR. ROOSEVELT’S REPORT ON THE 
BALTIMORE PRIMARIES. 

When Mr. Cleveland’s term closed Mary¬ 
land was almost a republican state. The 
struggle had been between Gormanism in con¬ 
trol of the federal and state patronage on one 


side and anti-Gormanism, unsupported by any. 
spoil whatever, on the other. Had this state 
of the issues continued, Maryland would to¬ 
day have been as doubtful as Pennsylvania, 
New York, Indiana and Iowa. But the plum 
of federal patronage was given by President 
Harrison to the republican party machine. 
As always, there was not enough to go around; 
those who did not get any began to fight those 
who did, and Maryland has become as safely 
democratic as Alabama. Having looted the 
federal offices the new incumbents in the post- 
office and in the marshal’s office performed 
their duties as a secondary matter. They gave 
their first consideration and efforts to hand to' 
hand struggles to control republican primaries 
and conventions. The classified service being 
involved Mr. Roosevelt attended their pri-^ 
maries held last March. He obtained a large 
amount of evidence by personal observation, 
affidavits and oral examination of witnesses." 
Congressman Mudd, true to a congressman’s 
notion, that the federal service has no duty so 
important as the manipulation of primaries, 
and exasperated that an official should pre¬ 
sume to take down the facts of such manipu¬ 
lation, rushed to Washington and demanded 
Mr. Roosevelt’s removal. In the face of this de¬ 
mand Mr.Roo.sevelt embodied his evidence into 
a report to the President with pertinent com¬ 
ments. This report has just been given to the 
public, but only extracts of it have so far ap¬ 
peared in print, and it is impossible at this 
writing to give it in full. It evidently strikes 
at the very root of the spoils system. It shows 
among other things “ a federal employe at¬ 
tempting to drag one of the primary judges 
out of a window; another federal employe 
smashing a ballot-box and grabbing two 
handfuls of the tickets, and being pitched out 
of a window for his over-zeal; another trying 
to stop an election which seemed to be going 
against the interest of the faction to which he 
belonged ; still others ‘ fighting fire with fire,’ 
and frankly confessing their willingness to 
cheat or do anything else to carry the day for 
their side.” 


John Reed, an employe of the custom-house, 
frankly testified : 

I don’t say I would’t cheat in the primaries. Who 
ever gets two judges wins. 

Q. How do you do your cheating? A. Well, we 
do our cheating honorably. If they catch us at it, 
it’s all right; it’s fair. I even carried the box home 
with me on one occasion. *<•>;< i have broken up 
more than one election. 

Q. As a matter of fact. In your ward, it is the 
office-holders who do and always have taken an act¬ 
ive part in the primaries? A. Exactly ; they are the 
ones that ought to. 

Q. It is mainly the office-holders who run the pri¬ 
maries? A. Most undoubtedly; * « * the great 
majority are office-holders or people who want office. 

Postmaster Johnson, having made a clean 
sweep in the unclassified service, and having 
dismis.sed fifty per cent, in the classified serv¬ 
ice, thus delivered himself: 

Mr. Johnson—There are men that have told me 
right in my own office, “If you don’t like what I do 
I will go out.’’ People have put men inhere over 
whom 1 have no control about elections; they’re in¬ 
dependent of me. 

Q. You mean that a great many of the men here, 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


255 


although nominally appointed by you, are really 
put ill by somebody else outside; that is, by the dif¬ 
ferent ward leaders of the party? A. They are rec¬ 
ommended by outsiders and they work for the men 
who put them in here, and are under their control. 

Q. Is that so generally in the nou-classified serv¬ 
ice? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. They feel responsible to the men who put them 
. in, to the politicians and ward leaders generally, 
and not responsible to you? A. Yes, sir, that Is it. 

Q. The amount of it is that in making the iion- 
clas-sified appointments you have to parcel them out 
to the different wards—the different ward leaders 
nominate men for the positions? A. Ye.s, sir; there 
are about eighteen hundred applicants and about 
sl.xty places. 

^ THE PUBLIC SERVICE AND PARTY 
I DELEGATES. 


The most important event during the month 


in connection with the management of the 


^ federal service is the acceptance of the resig- 
, nationof Collector Erhardt and the appoint¬ 
ment of J. Sloat Fassett to succeed him in 
the New York custom-house. President Har 
rison said to Mr. Erhardt: 

J “I acknowledged the receipt of your letter resign- 
- ing your office as collector of the port of New York, 
t and advised you that I would, at a later date, com- 
municate with you again. I now accept your resig- 
; nation to take effect upon the appointment and 
qualification of your successor, and in doing so 1 beg 
to say that I have held you, both personally and as 
a public ofiScer, in the highest esteem and confi¬ 
dence. and had no other thought than that you 
would continue to discharge the dutiesof your office 
until the expiration of its term.” 

Collector Erhardt said : 


* 


!. 


1 


“I have resigned because the collector has been 
reduced to a position where he is no longer an inde¬ 
pendent officer, with authority commensurate with 
his responsibility. I have given bonds for 8200,000. 
I have received for the government, during the 
twenty months last passed, 8322,697,135.40, and I am 
all the time personally responsible for enoimous 
values in money and in merchandise. My duties 
are neces.sarily performed through about 1,500 em¬ 
ployes. lam not willing to continue to be respon 
sible for their conduct unless I can have proper 
authority over them. The recent policy of the 
treasury department has been to control the details 
of the customs administration at the port of New 
York from Washington, at the dictation of a private 
Individual having no official responsibility. The 
collector is practically deprived of power and con¬ 
trol, while he is left subject to all responsibility. 
The office is no longer independent, but I am. 
Therefore, we have separated.” 


' Mr. Erhardt undoubtedly stated the truth, 
and the country will believe him. It will also 
f believe that the “ private individual ” is Tom 
Platt. That he stood in the way of Plattism, 


the New York Tribune admits as follows: 

“ Mr. Erhardt, who has resigned his place as the 
collector of the port of New York for the excellent 
and uncompromising reason that there was nothing 
else for him to do, is endeavoring to put himself in 
the light of a hero and a martyr. This is highly 
absurd on Mr. Erhardt’s part, though in that respect 
it is characteristic. The republican party honored 
him with an office of great trust and responsibility. 
It supposed him to be a republican, a believer in its 
policies, anxious for its success in administration. 
This was the view we entertained of him, and the 
view we presented to our readers. But Mr. Erhardt 
has employed the opportunities and powers of his 
office to create party discords, to hold unworthy dem¬ 
ocrats in the offices they had improperly got under 
the Cleveland administration, and to obstruct the 
policies of the treasury department. When he first 
began to do these these things, we gave him some 
good advice in a kindly way, and he ought to have 


taken it. But he preferred to keep the company and 
to heed the counsels of those who were hostile to the 
policies he was put in office to enforce, and he soon 
caused himself to be looked upon as an odd combi¬ 
nation of mugwump Pharisee and Tammany boss. 
The result is that he has “ resigned.” 

Mr. Erhardt has thought himself called upon to 
give out another and a different notion of this inci¬ 
dent. “The recent policy of the treasury depart¬ 
ment,” he says, “ has been to control the details of 
the customs administration at this port from Wash¬ 
ington, at the dictation of a private individual hav¬ 
ing no official responsibility.” It is open to .suspi¬ 
cion that reference is here made to the Hon. Thomas 
C. Platt. We have no commission to speak for Mr. 
Platt, but if he has been doing things that have ren¬ 
dered Mr. Erhardt uncomfortable in the Tammany- 
Mugwump policy he has pursued, we are sure the 
republican party will judge hisoffenselightly. What 
Mr. Erhardt calls " dictation ” we should describe as 
a “narrative of cold facts.” The republicans of 
New York have no desire to see the custom-house 
run as a tender to Tammany Hall under a .sham civil 
service reform. If Mr. Platt has told this to Secre¬ 
tary Foster, he has told the honest truth. The dem¬ 
ocratic and mugwump papers which are mourning 
Erhardt’s departure mourn not for him nor for the 
service, but solely because they know that a large 
quantity of democratic rubbish will soon be swept 
from the custom-house, as it should have been swept 
long ago. 

When Mr. Fassett was sworn in he was pre¬ 
sented with a San Domingo cutlass, in bar¬ 
baric origin and purpose truly emblematic of 
the spoils system, and with the following le¬ 
gend : 

This cutlass is an instrument of torture to be u.sed 
in beheading democrats. Use it quickly and success 
is assured for the republican party. 

Republican directions: Use daily—morning, noon 
and night, until every democratic head is severed. 
Sure cure for democratic headache. 

Frank Platt, the son of Platt, comes to the 
surface as the attorney of the new collector 
and performs his duties in the sprightly man¬ 
ner of a man who has secured a very fat job. 
For this he is clearly indebted to his father 
rather than to his legal attainments. The 
evidence is too overwhelming to admit of the 
least dispute, that Tom Platt, a private citizen, 
without the least authority or right to inter¬ 
fere with the management of the federal serv¬ 
ice, forced Collector Erhardt out of his place 
because the latter would not let Platt have 
places in the public service to give to a gang 
of followers under his control. It is a perfect 
instance of bossism triumphant, such as the 
Civil Service Chronicle has steadily main¬ 
tained was the ruling spirit of American, na¬ 
tional, state and municipal public aflfairs and 
the greatest evil connected with our civil gov¬ 
ernment. President Harrison did not, as he 
might have done, prevent this triumph; he 
alone made it possible. 

Again the evidence is so conclusive as to 
permit no denial, that the expected and un-,» 
derstood payment the President is to receive is 
favorable delegates at the next party conven¬ 
tion. He sold executive power vested in him 
by the constitution. 

POINTS OF VIEW. 


President Harrison has given us the best commis¬ 
sion we have had. But. on the other hand, he has 
given to the lukewarm friends or decided opponents 
of the reform, like Wanamaker and Clarkson, posi¬ 
tions so important tliat they have been able to do 


more in certain directions to retard and injure the 
reform than the commission has done to improve 
and extend it. For while, except for details of man¬ 
agement, the commission has merely advisory 
power, and must receive the sanction of the Presi¬ 
dent for what it may propose to have done, these 
men are autocratic in their department, and can re¬ 
move or appoint as they please thousands of our 
public servants, an extent of arbitrary power far 
more in keeping with the despotism of Russia than 
the democracy of America. The recommendation of 
the commission to extend the reform to the census 
bureau the President has disregarded. Its efforts to 
punish offenders guilty of bribery or of levying po¬ 
litical assessments have been of little avail, because 
they have not received the aid they had a right to 
expect; and consequently the offenders still go un¬ 
punished. The order forbidding office-holders to 
take part in political meetings has been openly and 
constantly violated without rebuke.— Henry 
Tjwibert on the Present Status of Civil Service Reform, 
Civil Service Record, July, 1891. 

While the Civil Service Chronicle de¬ 
sires to put on record an emphatic protest 
against Mr. Lambert’s inference that Wana¬ 
maker and Clarkson have been able to retard 
and injure the reform more than the civil 
service commission to improve and extend it, 
the facts themselves are a fair indictment of 
this administration, and, niutalis mutandis^ we 
think Mr. Lambert should have added, of the 
preceding administration. Change Wana¬ 
maker and Clarkson to Vilas and Stevenson 
and their acts are identical. Brazen brutal¬ 
ity in the one pair may be substituted for 
hypocritical brutality in the other. Politi¬ 
cal assessments were publicly brought to 
notice in the preceding administration and 
were treated just as President Harrison is 
treating them, and the same with the interfer¬ 
ence of federal office-holders in primaries and 
elections. 

In both administrations a few bright spots of 
reform have brought out the exceeding black¬ 
ness and extent of the spoils horizon. It is not a 
fair standard of comparison with one admin¬ 
istration to infer that the bright spots illumine 
the entire black sky and for the other that the 
black sky neutralizes the bright spots. 

Mr. Lambert’s point of view is that of the 
wide extent of spoil under the present admin¬ 
istration. The following quotation, from the 
Boston correspondence of the New York Times, 
July 13, illustrates a point of view based on 
the power of the reform spots: 

“ Nobody will seriously question Mr. Cleveland’s 
.sincerity of purpose to eliminate hurtful partisanship 
from the business of office-holding. He stood out 
against the whole democratic party on this point, and 
he is deserving of credit for his firmness. Not only 
that; he won his party largely to his side, and es¬ 
tablished a precedent which his successors must fol¬ 
low, to a limited extent at least. The reform ele¬ 
ments which broke away from Blaine in 1884 upon 
this issue encouraged him and sustained him. But 
they expected too niuch. They wanted him, in one 
term, to revolutionize public sentiment and break 
down a system which had become firmly rooted by 
long and unbroken usage. Whenever he made a 
mistake they set up a howl which was heard through¬ 
out the length and breadth of the land. The depart¬ 
ments of the government with all their multifarious 
branches were filled with men of one political faith, 
with men who had secured their positions through 
political activity and who utilized their official sta¬ 
tion to retard the progress of true reform. No mat¬ 
ter how offensive these men might happen to be, if 
one of them was disturbed the President was accused 















256 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


of violating the spirit and letter of the civil service 
law.” 

It is this shifting standard that injures 
the influence of civil service reformers. It 
never fools the political bosses who are noth¬ 
ing if not clear-minded. 

Again in the last month it has been a 
hundred times asserted by the independent j 
press that Quay, Wanamaker, Clarkson and j 
Dudley “represent” the republican party, j 
They undoubtedly do represent the controlling | 
machine. They are evil men but it is doubt- j 
ful if Gorman is not a more consummate evil- j 
doer than all of them together. Yet note i 
how the standard of comparison and require- j 
ment changes in the following Washington i 
dispatch to the Boston Post, July 22: 1 

Senator Gorman has been asked to take entire i 
charge of the democratic campaign in Maryland | 
with a view to saving the state to the party this autumn. 
The farmer's alliance movement has become threat¬ 
ening, and the regular democrats are fearful that it 
will defeat their state ticket and, worse still, throw | 
the control of the legislature into dangerous hands. 
Senator Oormaii is asked to take charge, not to secure his 
own re-electio7i, which is certain if the legislature is 
democratic, but to save the state from the disgrace 
which has come upon Kansas and South Carolina by 
the domination of the alliance element. Senator 
Gorman is recognized as the ablest political manager 
in the state, and all elements of the party are urging 
him to take the lead. There is no sign of the old inde¬ 
pendent movement against the senator in Baltimore, but 
on the contrary the independent democrats are willing to 
subordinate personal interests. 

THE MERIT SYSTEM AND INDI¬ 
VIDUAL MANHOOD. 

A young man had passed a civil service ex¬ 
amination in a city at a period when only 
democrats got in through the competitive 
system and republicans were got out by dis¬ 
missal without cause. This carrier, with the 
rest, relied upon his democracy to get his 
place and to keep it. The civil service law 
had been a temporary and unpleasant formal¬ 
ity. He was naturally an indifferent and dis¬ 
obliging carrier with enough of insolence in 
his demeanor to exasperate his helpless repub¬ 
lican patron but not enough for any other 
purpose. This went on until the democratic 
defeat in 1888. Then in a day this high 
stepping young fellow became weazen and 
care-ridden. He was suddenly confronted 
with the old hardship of political proscription. 
The withdrawal of the wages to support his 
family, the task of finding other work made 
the civil service law loom up in his mind as 
something more desirable for him than the 
sort of politics that consists in using a Tom 
Platt cutlass. But he was obliged to remem¬ 
ber that the law had been no bulwark and 
the time seemed at hand when he would be 
manipulated out of work as had been his 
predecessor. Under this strain he succumbed 
as most men do when the means of supporting 
their families are in peril. He became the 
most painstaking and efficient of carriers but 
with a hang-dog servility that almost ex¬ 
hausted the self-respect of his former suflering 
patron through sympathy. After a period 
and a small crisis in the post-office, it was 


noised about that the law was to be enforced 
in spirit and it was to be a bulwark of safety 
to the efficient and honest employe, what¬ 
ever his politics. No student of human na¬ 
ture could view unmoved the moral change 
in the old carrier. His manhood had not 
been restored; it had been evolved. He 
walks about to-day in all confidence that 
so long as he does his work well an<l bears 
himself with courtesy to the public, his means 
of livelihood are in no peril and he is free to 
hold his political and religious opinions It 
is the thousands of identical cases over the 
country that make the strongest argument for 
the warfare on the spoils system. 


THE TOWNSHIP TRUSTEE’S OF¬ 
FICE. 

Trustee’s Office, '| 

Center Township, Marion County, ^ 

■ Indianapolis, Ind., I8al. ) 

Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle: 

Dear Sir— Shortly after I took chargeof this office, 
one year ago, you criticised iu>' appointment ofdep- 
iilies and asserted positively that the county would 
have to pay dearly for my actions, inasmuch as my 
management of the aid given to the poor would 
largely increase the expenses of the county, attribu¬ 
ting this supposed increase to our inexperience and 
imperfect knowledge of the applicants. 

Feeling sure that whatever I might say at that 
time would not change your belief, I remained 
silent until the present. 

My answer to this charge will be found in the 
statements following: 

Aid given by my predecessor from Aug. 1. 1889, to 


Aug. 1, 1890: 

Groceries.$ 3,518 00 

Coal. 1,612 15 

Wood. 212 50 

Transportation. 679 75 

Burial Costs. 1,614 75 


Total. 8 7,637 15 

Aid given by me from Aug. 1, 1890, to Aug, 1, 1891; 

Groceries. 8 3,290 00 

Coal. 992 03 

Wood. 102 50 

Transportation. 565 35 

Burial Costs. 1,730 30 

Clothing. 16 30 

Totel. $ 6,696 68 


Decrease. 8 940 47 

I feel confident that very few, if any, worthy poor 
have been neglected during the past year. You akso 
asserted that my appointments were made solely to 
pay somebody out of the public treasury, for having 
done party work, or, perhaps, personal work for my¬ 
self. Let me say very emphatically that I made no 
promises whatever to any of the men employed at 
this office, or their friends previous to my election. 

Trusting that you will give the above as prominent 
a position in your valuable paper as you gave the 
said criticism, I am yours very respectfully, 

Samuel N. Gold. 

The criticism referred to by Mr. Gold is 
found in the Civil Service Chronicle for 
August, 1890, There was no assertion that 
there would be any increase of expenses, or that 
the county would have to pay dearly for Mr. 
Gold’s actions, A comparison of expenses 
with any preceding year is worth nothing 
against the criticism complained of—that Mr. 
Gold had dismissed thoroughly honest and 
capable employes, whose knowledge of the 
worthy and unworthy applicants for relief 


from the public treasury was in every sense' 
expert, and had put into their places men un¬ 
familiar with tbeir exceedingly important du¬ 
ties. It is no answer to say that the worthy 
poor have not been neglected. That is only 
one side of the question. Moreover,the8tate- 
ment is the mere opinion of a man who de¬ 
prived himself of the means of knowing the 
worthy poor and of baffling the consummate 
adroitness of the thousands of unworthy ap¬ 
plicants for support from the public treasury. 
The Chronicle said : 

Township Trustee Gold, whose township embraces 
the city of Indianapolis, has removed all of the em" 
ployes of the office except one, a woman, and has 
put in Frederick Voght, a molder, Charles Mc- 
Creery, an advertising agent, Thomas L. Duffy, a 
laborer, and Joseph Keisburg, whose name we can 
not find in the directory. 

Mr. Gold will never make anybody believe 
that he could substitute these employes for 
such men as Frank Wright and Smith King, 
whom he dismissed, without detriment to the 
public. He might as well say a plowman 
could command an ocean steamer. 

It is only when in public office and in con¬ 
nection with the business of that office that 
men like Mr. Gold maintain that equally good 
results can be obtained with inexperienced as¬ 
sistants. Mr. Gold does not follow this prin¬ 
ciple in his private business. He is a demo¬ 
crat, but he keeps in his employ some faithful 
and efficient men who are republicans. He 
does not turn out his skilled book-keeper and 
put into his place Voght, the molder, or Mc- 
Creery, the advertising agent. 

Having deprived himself of means of knowl¬ 
edge within his office, the only way in which 
Mr. Gold could have found out how to prop¬ 
erly spend the public money was by applica¬ 
tion to the charity organization society. If 
that organization did the work for him, then 
his deputies hold sinecures; if they searched 
the records and hunted old information them¬ 
selves, then Mr. Gold’s office was spending its 
time getting and wisely applying knowledge 
which it might have had, and skillfully ap¬ 
plied at the start by keeping the men he dis¬ 
missed. 

It is no answer to the charge that Mr. Gold 
paid personal and party debts out of the 
public treasury with his deputyships, to say 
that he made no promises before election. 
Why did he not keep Frank Wright and 
Smith King? 

Mr. Gold is an instance of the respectable 
citizen who gets an office and, in complacent 
ignorance, supposes he can violate business 
principles and then meet criticism by point¬ 
ing to the fact that the cost of his office is less 
than under his predecessor. When our in¬ 
sane hospital was in the most infamous part 
of its career, it answered criticism by point¬ 
ing to its expenditures which showed a less 
cost per capita for maintenance than could be 
shown anywhere else. 


Postmaster General Wanamaker has estab¬ 
lished a board of promotion in the post-office 
department. The board is to determine a 
form and mode of examination subject to the 




























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


257 


approval of the postmaster general. The ex¬ 
aminations shall be competitive, and the 
competition is open to all from the next lower 
grade in the same bureau, and to all from still 
lower grades who obtain special permission. 
The value of this system will, like the system 
of Secretary Tracy’s, depend upon its perma¬ 
nence. If the two secretaries go out of office 
without having their systems brought under 
the civil service law by an order of the Presi¬ 
dent, their successors in office are very likely 
to say that while they believe “in civil ser 
f. vice,” they don’t believe in just this kind, and 
all the work of Messrs. Tracy and Wanamaker 
, will go by the board. 


EULOGY OF QUAY AND DUDLEY 
BY THE NATIONAL REPUBLICAN 
COMMITTEE, JULY 28, 1891. 

Resolved, That we accept, against our judgment 
and with much doubt as to the wisdom and exped- 
» leiicy of It for the party’s interest, the action of 
' Senator Quay on his resignation as chairman and 
member of the national committee. In submitting 
to it, with so much reluctance and regret, we desire 
to express from our knowledge of the facts of his 
pre-eminent service to the party, the deep obligation 
under which he has placed the republican party and 
■ cause of good government and patriotism in the 
United States. He undertook the leadership of a 
doubtful cause, in a time when the republican party 
was disheartened and the democratic party confi¬ 
dent in the power of supreme control in the govern¬ 
ment and the nation, and when the odds of the con¬ 
test were against our party, and by his matchless 
power, his unequaled skill in resources, his genius 
to command victory, won for his party an unprece¬ 
dented victory in the face of expected defeat. We 
know, as no one else can know, that the contest 
which he waged was one of as much honor and fair 
methods as it was of invincible power and triumph¬ 
ant victory, and that it was won largely by the 
power of his superior generalship and his unfailing 
strength as a politicai leader. In the great contest 
of 1888, in the montbs of severe effort, and during 
years of close personal association with him, we 
have learned to know the nobility of the man, and 
we desire in this conspicuous manner to place on 
public record, for the present and for the future, as 
an enduring answer to the partisan as.saults of a de¬ 
feated enemy, our testimony in%ppreciation of his 
public service and his personal worth. 

Resolved, That while we are left by General Dud¬ 
ley’s own wish no other course than to consent to 
his retirement from the committee, we feel that his 
action deprives the committee and the party of the 
invaluable and loyal service of one who has proved 
himself one of t*he ablest and most faithful public 
men of his time. In every field of honorable contest 
and patriotic purpose, as a soldier winning in his 
boyhood the stars of a general in the union army ; as 
a public official, serving with equal fidelity his coun¬ 
try in prominent places; in the political field with 
like ambition for the nation’.s good, he has proved 
himself always worthy of the respect and admira¬ 
tion of his countrymen. In his whole public career 
in his unselfish service, and with his generous na¬ 
ture, he has given freely his time and labor, never 
thinking of private profit or personal emolument. 
His whole life is a proof of his manliness of purpose 
and his patriotism as a citizen. Speaking from what 
we know of his rare abilities and unusual devotion 
to parly and country, we would express this evi¬ 
dence of what we know the republican party owes 
to him forhis services in so many of its contests, and 
especially in the memorable struggle of 1888. We 
part from him officially with sincere regret, and in 
doing so we wish to put in the records of the com¬ 
mittee this expression of that party’s gratitude and 
personal friendship in which we know he is so 
worthy to be held. 


THE RELIGIOUS PRESS. 

—The resignations would givegrealer reason 
for the hope that republican politics are to be 
managed by different methods hereafter were 
it not that Gen. James S. Clarkson was elected 
as chairman in the place of Senator Quay,and 
that Mr. Clarkson has not hesitated to avow 
his belief in politics by the machine and for 
the machine.— Christian Union. 

—Gen. Clarkson can not he considered as 
superior to Mr. Quay in his political ideas. 
These facts, when coupled with the reasons 
which compelled the resignation of Collector 
Erhardt of the port of New York, do not af¬ 
ford satisfaction to the friends of civil service 
reform and decent politics.— Cmgregationalisf 

—Each of the two parties is living on the 
same familiar diet—the mistakes of the other 
party. The republicans, being in power, do 
not appear to much ad vantage as to the d is 
posal of offices and the carrying out of the 
civil service reform, and their choice of lead¬ 
ers is far from ideal.— National Baptist. 

—We are glad Quay and Dudley have re¬ 
tired. We are glad that the sentiment of the 
party was strong enough to make it necessary 
for them to retire; we only regret that it 
seems advisable to the committee to cover their 
withdrawal with such fulsome adulation.— In¬ 
dependent. 

—The Pilot of Boston says of Quay and Dud¬ 
ley that they are more widely than favorably 
known to the public as coadjutors of Post¬ 
master-General Wanamaker in the “frying-of- 
fat” and “blocks-of-five” tactics, whereby the 
late election was won. Turning to Mr. Clark¬ 
son, it says that he is a spoilsman who makes 
no hypocritical pretense of “reform,” and be¬ 
lieves that the parly in power should control 
the distribution of offices. 


In the August Forum Edward P. Clark 
exposes the Jacksonian plan of rotation in 
office as an interloper in our political system. 


Hon. Dorman B. Eaton has a paper on 
“Civil Service Reform” in the North American 
for June. After showing the present status of 
the reform, he adds: “It is no wonder that 
selhsh politicians and bosses, who care more 
for patronage than for principle, are hostile, 
angry, and alarmed.” 


Moorfield Storey, of Boston, at the Harvard 
commencement-dinner said : 

“There are men who are fighting the bat¬ 
tles of the country in various fields, and who are 
proving their fidelity to the vei'itas which is 
stamped upon our seal by many an act of cour¬ 
age and self-denial. Meeting, as they do, 
month after month, abuse and misrepresenta¬ 
tion, should we not do them and our country 
service if once a year we sent them our ‘God¬ 
speed’ in language that could not mistaken? 
Would not a ringing cheer from this Memorial 
Hall encourage the fainting reformer as the 
pipes of the Highlanders revived the despair¬ 
ing garrison of Lucknow? When Theodore 
Roosevelt is fighting wild beasts at our mod¬ 
ern Ephesus, will it not inspire even him 
with courage to know that the graduates of 
Harvard of every political faith are with him 
in his battle, and are sure that he will win?” 
[Tremendous applause.] 

Ex-Secretary of State Bayard delivered the 
annual address to the alumni and students of 
the law department of Michigan University. 


He called the attention of his audience to the 
wrongs the spoils system worked, and said, re¬ 
ferring to appointees to public office under the 
system: 

“These men hold that the public offices, 
which, as thenameimplies, are apportionments 
of public functions and duties for the public ad¬ 
vantage, are created in order to furnish means 
of support and emolument to the individuals 
who are placed in them, thus losing sight al¬ 
together of the mutual relation of a govern¬ 
ment and its agents; indeed, subverting that 
relation and making that the servant of its own 
employes and agents, and this theory logically 
and practically carried to its conclusion in¬ 
volves nothing less than the revolution and 
defeat of our republican system. In fact, it 
reproduces the rule of the pretorian guard of 
ancient Rome.” 


THE MERIT SYSTEM IN THE CIN¬ 
CINNATI POST-OFFICE. 

‘ It is hard to overcome the prejudice that 
has existed against the system of civil service 
examinations, and promotions on a basis of 
merit,” was a remark made by Mr. John B. 
Staubach,on the day his term as cashier of 
the post office and secretary of the local board 
of civil service examiners expired. “The 
system now embraces all offices employing 
more than fifty men and of course embraces 
Cincinnati. All positions here, except the 
heads of departments and places where the in¬ 
cumbent has to handle a great deal of money, 
are filled by examination. During my three 
years’ experience I have witnessed a good 
many improvements and I can assure you 
that the features that were at one time open 
to criticism have been largely eradicated. 

“It was urged once somewhat pertinently 
that the examinations were of a technical 
nature, framed for school boys and not for 
men of experience who were apt to be some¬ 
what ‘rusty’ in geography and arithmetic. 
The tendency has constanily been to correct 
the features that were hohestly criticised and 
to make the tests as practicable as possible.” 

“Postmaster Zumstein is carrying out the 
law in the right spirit. There have been only 
four or five removals made in the classes to 
which the law has been made applicable, and 
these would have been made, I think, by Mr. 
Riley, had he remained. The men removed 
were incompetent.”— Cincinnati Times-Btar, 
Aug. 11. 

The Ohio republican convention, June, 1891, 
in its platform said : 

We denounce the pre.sent governor of Ohio for 
having converted the benevolent institutions into 
political machinery, making political merchandise 
of the sufferings and calamities of the helpless wards 
of the state. 


(4) The existing republican administration prom¬ 
ised, when it assumed power, to give lull effect to re¬ 
forms in the civil service. Offices in that service 
have, notwithstanding such pledge, been conferred 
for political reasons to as great an extent as at any 
former period in the history of the country. The 
civil service of the United States, considered as a 
whole, is to day a partisan organization, doingactive 
political service for the administration by which itis 
employed .—Maryland State Democratic Convention, 
July, 1891. 




















IPL^TTZS^. 


The vassal, upon investiture, took an oath of fealty to the lord, and * * beicome his MAN from that day forth. * * 
Services were free and base. * * llase service was to * * carry out his dung:. — {Bkickstone. 


—“There never was a time when Mr. Platt 
was so thoroughly appreciated or so highly es¬ 
teemed by the republican party as he is to¬ 
day. The republican party without Mr. 
Platt would be like the play of ‘Hamlet’ with 
Hamlet left out.”— Gen. John N. Knapp, Chair¬ 
man of the New York State Republican Committee. 

—“ Did you notice the slaj) that Col. Er- 
hardt made at you? ” asked the reporter. 

Mr. Platt’s eyes twinkled for a moment, then 
he smiled, and, after looking at the reporter 
for a moment, said : “ I .see that he says that 
the affairs at the custom-house have been con¬ 
trolled from Washington at the dictate of 
some private individual who has no official 
responsibility, if that is what you mean?” 
Then came another smile, and as he slipped a 
paper-cutter through the edge of an official- 
looking envelope the ex-senator added ; “ But 
that can not refer to me. He must have been 
thinking of some other fellow when he wrote 
that.” 

“ Well, what do you think of Senator Fas- 
sett’s oppointment?” asked the reporter. 

“No better ap|)ointment could have been 
made,” was the reply. Senator Fassett is pre¬ 
eminently well fitted to assume the responsi 
hilities of the office, and his appointment 
should and 1 believe will please every good 
republican in the state. I think it is certain 
to strengthen the party throughout the state.” 

A few moments after Mr. Platt had finished 
speaking he left his office for the Pennsylva¬ 
nia railroad ferry en route to Washington. 
He teas going on private business, he said. — Inter¬ 
view in New York Evening Post, .July 80. 

—“ The office and its business are absolutely 
strange to me. I have everything to learn. 
I would say, however, that I have a very dis¬ 
tinct purpose to make the administration of 
the office as successful as my present igno¬ 
rance of it and the consideration of its patrons 
while I am learning will })ermit. Whatever 
ability I can command will be at the service 
of the government,and that, I hope, will be as¬ 
sisted by such encouragement as the adminis¬ 
tration of it may seem to deserve.”— Intemiew 
v'ith Collector Fassett, Washington Dispatch to Neiv 
York Times, July 31. 

—Ex-Senator Thomas C. Platt arrived here 
at 9:40 o’clock last evening. This morning 
Mr. Platt called on Secretary Foster and later 
went to the navy department. Talking to the 
Mail and Express man, Mr. Platt said : “I am 
pleased with Mr. Fassett’s appointment, but I 
have already told the Mail and Express all I 
have to say on that matter. There is no truth 
whatever in the rumor that Appraiser Coopi r 
is going to resign. He wasinmy office yesterday, 
and we had a long talk 1 can say positively that 
he will not go .”— Washington Dispatch to New 
York Mail and Express, Aug. 1. 

—At 12:30 Mr. Fassett’s dictation of letters 
was interrupted by the appearance of a small 
but significant group of men. These were 
Frank Platt, son of Thomas C. Platt, Vernon 
H. Brown, Garrett A. Hobart of New Jersey, 
and United States Commissioner John A. 
Shields. Young Mr. Platt, who is a lawyer, 
produced Mr. Fassett’s $200,000 bond duly 
executed. The ink was scarcely dry upon the 
signatures of the sureties, who were Vice- 


President Levi P. Morton, Jesse Seligman, 
the banker, Vernon H. Brown, agent of the 
Cunard steamship line, and Garrett A. Hobart, 
the New Jersey republican politician. Each 
of the bondsmen qualified in the sum of $50,- 
000 . 

Commissioner Shields was then called on 
to administer the oath of office to Mr. Fassett. 
Col. Erhardt, who was also present, remarked 
jocularly that the oath would not be valid 
unless administered by Commissioner Shields, 
who had so long performed this function for 
the collectors of this port. Mr. Fassett then 
dully took the oath of office in the pre.sence of 
the persons named and Mr. Sperry. 

The ceremony was scarcely over when a 
present for Collector Fassett arrived from one 
of his admirers. It was a West Indian cut¬ 
lass, called in San Domingo a machete. Its 
giver was Nathaniel McKay, who made a 
speech at the recent convention of republican 
clubs at Syracuse. Thehamlleof the cutlass 
was tied with red, white and blue ribbons, 
while its blade was tlecorated with small 
American flags and inscribed all over with 
sentiments like this: 

‘‘ This cutlass is an instrument of torture to 
be used in beheading democrats. Use it 
quickly and success is assured for the repub¬ 
lican party. 

Republican directions: Use daily, morn¬ 
ing, noon and night, until every democratic 
head is severed. 

Sure cure for democratic headache.” 

Mr. Hobart, Mr. Brown, and Commissioner 
Shields left the custom-house soon after Mr. 
Fassett had taken the oath. Frank Platt 
lingered behind. At half-past one o’clock he 
and Mr. Fassett came from the collector’s 
inner office and left the custom-house. 

Mr. Fassett, when questioned to-day, de¬ 
clined to say anything on the subject of new 
appointments in the custom-house .—New York 
Evening Post, Aug. 12. 

—Among the callers received by Mr. P’as- 
sett in the course of the day were Bernard Big- 
lin,^ George Hilliard, Senator Saxton, William 
Leaycraft, ex-United States Marshal Clinton 
McDougal of the northern district of the state. 
Postmaster Van Cott, Senator Stewart, Ap¬ 
praiser Cooper, Colonel W’^illiam L. Brown 
and John Simpson. Surveyor Lyon took Mr. 
Fassett out to luncheon. The surveyor’s rela¬ 
tions with the administration are much pleas¬ 
anter than they were with the old one. If Mr. 
Lyon had taken Colonel Erhardt out on the 
same hospitable errand, the wiseacres at the 
custom house would have thought that Area 
diahad come back to earth and had settled 
down to do business at the corner of William 
and Wall streets. 

Last night Collector Fassett was the guest at 
a dinner at the Oriental hotel. Among the 
others present w'ere T. C. Platt, Vice-President 
Morton, Senator Stewart and others .—New 
York Times, Aug. 14- 


['Rumors that have for some time been afloat In re¬ 
lation toa possible change in the office of appraiser 
of the port settled yesterday into a definite report 
that the brother of "Barney” Biglin is hooked for the 
place. The prospect has appalled the Union League 
Club, to whose urgency in connection with that of 
the merchants, with whom for many years he was 
creditably associated. Mr. Cooper owed hisappoint- 
ment. While ready to make full allowances for the 
exigencies of practical politics, the stride from Mar- 
velle W. Cooper ito Barney Biglin’s brother is a 
longer one than people of respectable leanings like 
to contemplate. 

“Barney’s" brother’s name is Joseph C., if it is of 
any interest to identify him more closely than as the 
brother of "Barney.” He is now in charge of the 
ninth division in the appraiser’s department. The 
place came to him, of course, through his brother, 
whom he is credited with having served in it more 
faithfully than he has served the government. If 
stories are to be believed, the place has been used as a lever 
to throw in Barney'sway the tpicking btisiness of mer¬ 
chants whose goods unhappily fall within that division.— 
New York Times, May 5. 

The exposure In yesterday’s Times ot the scheme 
to hand over the appraiser’s department to the Big- 
lins raised a howl of protest throughout the entire 
business district. Merchants were emphatic in de¬ 
claring that unless the administration wishes utterly 
to discredit itself it will shake itself clear of this al¬ 
liance. 

Apart from the humiliation of bowing to the 
authority of such a man, merchants are indignant 
when they think that the appointment would com¬ 
pel them to turn over all their trucking from the 
ptiblic stores to the Biglin family as the price of get¬ 
ting an examination of their goods. Already this 
form of tyranny has become offensive, in spite of 
Mr. Cooper's efTorts to prevent it. With the Biglins 
in full control it would be intolerable. 

Some curiosity was manifested yesterday to see 
how Platt and Elkins would take this business up¬ 
rising. No one cares much for the wishes of these 
schemers, which often miscarry, but they .ire recog¬ 
nized as a power for mischief in things political. 
So far as yesterday's inquiries developed anything 
in this regard, it appeared that the concern of these 
worthies in the Biglin scheme is not of the kind to 
keep them awake nights. 

Platt and Elkins control the syndicate that has 
worked fora Bowling Green site for a new custom¬ 
house. It was to their interest that a cheap site be 
acquired for the ap^iraiser’s warehouse in order that 
the saving might be applied to the Bowling Green 
appropriation. Biglin was useful to them in this 
work, for the appraiser’s site is to go to the govern¬ 
ment for $350,000 less than the appropriation for it, 
provided Lindley carries out his contract to deliver 
for $500,000. 

It is for his service in securing this saving that 
Biglin is promised the appraisership for his brother. 
Of course, if chb syndicate can not bring enough in¬ 
fluence to bear at Washington to carry out this deal. 
Biglin will have wa.sted his time.—JVeu; York Times, 
May 6.] 


—E. C. Lee has enjoyed a variety of expe¬ 
riences lately. For some time he has held 
office as assistant superintendent of the cus¬ 
tom-house. When Joseph Murray resigned 
the post of superintendent a couple of months 
ago Mr. Lee took up his duties. He had de¬ 
voted himself to them but a few days when 
Collector Erhardt happening not to leave the 
custom-house until 5:30 o’clock one afternoon, 
found no watchman on duty at the entrance, 
and therefoi-e suspended Mr. Lee. A few days 
later the assistant superintendent was reinstated, 
but when the orders for a reduction of the 
force were sent out Lee’s name was supposed 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


259 


to be included in the list of those to go. It 
was not there, however, and he continued plac¬ 
idly in office. 

Yesterday there came another change for 
Mr. Lee. By a telegram from the treaswy de¬ 
partment he was appointed janitor of the eustom- 
home at a salary of $1,000 a year. The office is 
made for the man in this case, for hitherto the 
custom-house has got along without a janitor. 

Lee has a powerful “pull” with the republican 
leaders, and in these days of promised prosperity 
for men of “influence” after Plaids own heart, he is 
not likely to be neglected. He has had the hack¬ 
ing of Sheridan Shook and Leader Robert A. 
Greacen of the fifteenth assembly district, 
and William Brookfield, chairman of the re¬ 
publican county committee, has lent him a 
helping hand.— New York Times, Aug. S. 

—At the convention of the republican 
league, held in Syracuse, New York, Augusts, 
the following office-holders were on the com¬ 
mittee on resolutions: Mahlon Chance, in¬ 
spector of immigration; John E. Milholland, 
another inspector; Robert P. Porter, superin¬ 
tendent of the census ; Charles E. Fitch, col¬ 
lector of internal revenue; Henry Hehing, 
collector of the port of Genesee; Edward A. 
McAlpin, postmaster at Sing Sing, and Clar¬ 
ence Smith, son of Dr. William M. Smith, 
health officer of the port, one of Platt’s par¬ 
ticular cronies, appeared as an eleventh-hour 
candidate, and carried off the first vice¬ 
presidency. 

—About two weeks ago the canvass (for 
the republican caucuses in this county) be¬ 
gan in earnest, e.x-Senator Fassett leading one 
section of the party and Postmaster Flood and 
his brother, ex Congressman Thomas S. Flood, 
the other contingent. About that time Gov¬ 
ernor Hill’s Albany heelers came to town and 
took an active part against Mr. Fassett. 

Strange as it may appear the governor 
struck hands with his old party enemy, Mr. 
Arnot, and the triple alliance was formed and 
put into working order. Democratic heelers 
from all parts of the county were called in. 
They got money and instructions and pro¬ 
ceeded to work to carry the caucuses for blood. 
The strange combination was a puzzle to all 
good citizens, and to offset it republicans 
turned out en masse and defeated it. At 
each caucus democrats by the hundred ap¬ 
peared and offered their ballots and swore 
them in, but it was labor in vain, for Fassett 
had an overwhelming majority.— Elmira, New 
York, Dispatch to New York Times, August 0. 

—AtHorseheads to-day, where the Chemung 
county convention was held to name delegates 
to the state and senatorial conventions, 186 
delegates were expected to be in their seats. 
Contests, however, are made in 108 cases and 
these were divided up as follows: Fassett 
faction, 43; Flood faction, 65. 

The widening of the breach to-day means a direct 
fight against Thomas C. Platt’s infltience. 

A newspaper of Elmira prints an open let¬ 
ter from ex-Assemblyman Van Duzer, in 
which he accuses Collector Fassett of trying 
to defeat him in 1884 at the instance of 
Thomas C. Platt, and of swinging over from 
Evarts to Morton at Mr. Platt’s suggestion. 


after promising to support Evarts for United 
States senator. The letter claims that Mr. 
Fassett is trying to make a deal with the 
democrats to get the county. 

Mr. Van Duzer said to-day : “The letter is in 
answer to an open letter sent to me in which Col¬ 
lector Fassett admits that he defeated the renomina¬ 
tion of Congressman Flood because Flood declined 
to let him name the postmaster. Mr. Flood is 
now determined to test Fassett’s power, and if 
he attempts to rnn the convention this after¬ 
noon we will withdraw and hold one of our 
own. We are averse to a split this fall, but 
we do not propose that Collector Fassett shall 
run the place for Tom Platt.” 

Postmaster Flood also spoke against Mr. Fassett, 
and said that the republicans of the district were 
trying to show t! e people of the state that they could 
not be controlled by Mr. Platt.—Elmira Dispatch 
to the New York Evening Post, August 16. 

—The expected struggle between the oppos¬ 
ing factions of the republican party in Che¬ 
mung came to a close at Horseheads this after¬ 
noon. 

Collector Fassett was early on the ground and 
opened head<piarters at the Platt Hotise. Congress¬ 
man Flood, accompaniea by Postmaster Flood of 
this city and Gen. Langdon, appeared early 
and also put up at the Platt House. * * 

Postmaster Henry Flood made a speech, in which 
he denounced the other side. He said they had op- 
posed him for years, had got him out of a position in 
his regidar practice on a railroad, and were now 
trying to oust him from the post-office. He charged 
them with holding snap caucuses and conventions, 
and was especially severe in his remarks in 
reference to the Advertiser. He denied using 
money, said democrats at caucuses referred to 
Mr. Platt as boss, and that he never did and 
never would wear any man’s collar. They 
had threatened and bulldozed him and used 
every effort to drrve him from the republican 
party. * * 

Then the twenty-seven regular Flood dele¬ 
gates and about fifty others were seated, after 
which the following delegates were elected: 
State — J. D. F. Slee, Jonas S. Vanduser, 
Henry Flood, George McCann, A. B. Fitch 
and Benjamin D. Smith; senatorial—C. J. 
Langdon, Thomas S. Flood, Moses Munson, 
John O’Connor, Julius S. Denton, Ira A. Jones. 

In the meantime the regular convention was 
called to order by Abner C. Wright, chairman 
of the republican county committee, and Mr. 
Fassett was made chairman amid great e7ithusia,sm. 
The collector made a speech, dm'ing which he re- 
vieived the history of the factional unpleasantness. 
He referred to the double dealing of the other side, 
and told how they laid connived with democrats and 
slaughtered their party candidates; and how some 
of the late caucuses were run by democrats in the 
interest of the Floods. He denied each and every 
claim of the others, and explained everything 
to the utmost satisfaction of all present in the 
crowded hall, for he was continually inter- 
I rupted by applause.— Elmira Dispatch to New 
I York Times, Atigust 16. 

—Collector J. Sloat Fassett, who has been 
doing political work in Chemung county 
1 nearly all the time since he was appointed to 
his present office, came down to the custom¬ 
house this morning to put in a day’s work for 
the United States government. He was warmly 
greeted by a crowd of place-seekers. The re¬ 
sult of his day’s labor was summed up at two 
i>. M. in the announcement that he was going to 
appoint thirty additional laborers for work at the 
public stores. 

There will be no changes in the big offices 
at present, he said.— New York Evening Post, 
August 17. 


—Granville D. Parsons, ex-mayor of this 
city and at present a member of the excise 
board, was notified yesterday of his discharge 
from the United States Express Company by 
John M. Frazier, general superintendent. 

Mr. Parsons is a stanch republican, and has not 
in every instance satisfied the wishes of Senator 
Fassett and Col. A. E. Baxter, republican 
leaders, who have some friends who have not 
been successful in securing licenses. At this 
disregard of orders Tom Platt, president of the 
company, was consulted, and he deemed it advis¬ 
able, by political discrimination, to dismiss Mr. 
Parsons from his position as cashier and head 
book-keeper of the Elmira office. 

Granville Parsons had been connected with 
the company since 1857 in several trusted 
capacities, anil this piece of political jobbery 
is a deliberate appliance for denying an 
honorable man, gray from service, the means 
of a livelihood.— Elmira Dispatch to New York 
Times, May 17. 

—The preliminary skirmishing to the repub¬ 
lican campaign this fall has commenced and 
the fierce contest over who is going to control 
matters in the cataract county has fairly be¬ 
gun. It is a fight of the Hiscock supporters 
against the anti-Hiscock faction. The leader 
of the latter is ex-Congressman Richard Crow¬ 
ley, and he has back of him the support of 
the party organ, the Journal, which a year ago 
was fighting him 

Hiscock made a big blunder when he 
ignored the Journal’s canvass for the postmast¬ 
ership here, and the party paper is bitterly 
antagonistic to his interests. The first point 
was gained by the anti-Hiscock men last week 
by the election of John T. Davison as chair¬ 
man of the republican county committee. 
Davison was one of the aindidates for the office 
eight months ago, but by a tnck on the part of the 
Hiscock Suspension Bridge custom-house, ex-Col- 
lector Benjamin Flagler, chief lieutenant of 
Collector Low, was elected to the place. He 
was forced to resign and Davison had a large 
majority. 

The Hiscock men who hold office are endeavor¬ 
ing in every way to secure control, and have made 
places in the custom-house and post-office here for 
friends of ex- Congressman Crou'ley, in the hopes of 
appeasing him .— Lockpoid, New York, Dispatch to 
New York Times, July 19. [Hiscock is known 
as Tom Platt’s ‘errand boy.’] 

—Oswego, N. Y., Aug. 1.—The republican 
county convention for Seneca county, held at 
Romulus to-day, was one of the most exciting 
in the political history of this section, result¬ 
ing in a bolt and two conventions. Only one 
convention is held in the county, there being 
only one assembly district, to elect state, judi¬ 
cial and senatorial delegates. The fight was be¬ 
tween the Platt and Miller men, the forces of 
the former being, led by J. B. H. Mongin, a 
partner of ex Senator W. L. Sweet, and the 
Miller men by A. M. Patterson, a millionaire 
manufacturer of Waterloo. The forces have 
been getting ready for the fight for weeks and 
began gathering at Romulus last night, com¬ 
ing from all directions in hacks. 













260 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The convention was called for 12 o’clock 
to-day. At that hour the Miller men marched 
from their hotel to the hall only to find the 
door barred, and to learn that the Mongin 
men had entered the hall by a side door. A 
sheriff’s posse of forty men was on hand to 
preserve order. They were inside, and seemed 
to be all in sympathy with the Platt forces, 
and to take their orders from them. The 
Miller men tried the rear door, but could not 
get in. Then they brought a battering ram 
to play on the front door. When they broke 
in the door they found the muzzle of a deputy 
sheriff’s revolver leveled at them. 

“You hit that door again and I’ll fire,” 
shouted the deputy. 

The Patterson men desisted and started to 
withdraw, when Col. Manning, a Seneca Falls 
lawyer, jumped on a box. 

“Don’t go away, men,” he shouted. “We’ll 
hold the convention right here at the point of 
the pistol.” 

They then proceeded to elect a full set of 
delegates to the state, judicial and senatorial 
conventions, but without the formality of 
credentials or roll-call. 

In the meantime, windows were smashed 
with stones, and somebody threw a bottle of 
vitriol, which struck the sash and broke, dis¬ 
coloring the building. They then withdrew. 

While this was going on outside, the Mon¬ 
gin men were holding a convention inside. 
They elected as delegates to the state conven¬ 
tion, W. L. Sweet, J. B. H. Mongin, P. 
Maguire, G. W. Peterson and E. L. Andrews. 
Only the presence of the deputies, who were 
armed with clubs and revolvers, prevented a 
first-class riot. The Mongin men say that 
when the doors were broken in the county 
committee was in session and the convention 
had not been called. There was great excite¬ 
ment, and to night the two factions are ready 
to clash wherever they meet. —Onwego Duipatck 
to New York Times, August 2, 

—There was a hot republican primary in 
the first ward of this city at noon to-day, in 
which Platt and anti-klatt tickets were voted. 
Over five hundred persons were on hand, and 
a posse of police, under the marshal, was re 
quired to keep them in order and prevent acts 
of violence. 

The Platt forces were led by B. B. Odell, .Jr., 
republican state committeman, and the oppo¬ 
sition by Joseph M. Dickey. When the polls 
were closed not far from one hundred persons 
remained to vote, and were thus disfranchised. 
The vote resulted : Platt, 219; anti-Platt, 129. 

It is expected that the fight will be contin¬ 
ued in all the ward primaries in the city. 
Postmaster W. 0. Taggart, and all the leading 
politicians of the city rallied to the support of 
Odell without regard to their residence so far 
as wards were concerned.— Netvburg, N. Y., Dis- 
patch to New York Times, August 16. 

—We find the administration—which should 
be the neutral quantity, the reconciler of the 
factions—freezing out one of the best collec¬ 
tors New York ever had at the bidding of a 
relentless faction leader and installing in his 
place one whose most apparent claim to preferment 
has been his unswerving loyalty to that leader. It 
looks as if President Harrison were more in¬ 
terested in restoring to Mr. Platt the control of the 
party machinery in New York than in electing a 


republican governor or a republican legisla¬ 
ture next. November.— Brooklyn Times[Rep.^. 

—Mr. Platt declared that he loved Clark¬ 
son for the heads he has cutoff, and he has 
got a collector in the New York custom house 
whom he expects to love for the same reason. 
Do the republicans wish the country to under 
stan<l that the civil service reform pledges in 
the party platform and the President’s letter 
of acceptance were only good until after elec¬ 
tion— Pittsburg Dispatch [fiep.]. 

—The system by which ex-Senator Platt or 
any other individual is enabled purely for po¬ 
litical reasons of a low and sordid character 
to turn out of office an upright and capable 
public servant like Mr. Erhardt is wrong in 
itself. * * It virtually gives notice to every re 

publican office holder in New York that he nivst 
serve Platt. * * And if it is intended to help 

along the second term on the condition that 
Platt shall set the New York machine in mo¬ 
tion for Harrison, it will do the President in 
the long run more harm than good.— Phila¬ 
delphia Bulletin [l?cp.]. 

Thus the feudal connection was estab¬ 
lished, * * and an army of feudsitories 
was always ready enlisted and mutually 
prepared to muster. — [Blackstone. 

—The Cedar Rapids Gazette, July 23d, prints 
the make-up of the recent state republican 
convention. There are ninety-six counties in 
the state and its report covers eighty two. 
There were more than sixty office-holders in 
the convention. The following names are 
given : 

J. B. Patterson, Boone county. 

Byron McQuinn, postmaster, Benton county. 

J. E. Pickering, postmaster at Alta, Buena Vista 
county. 

J. C. Blair, editor aud postmaster at Newell, Buena 
Vista county. 

S. T. Richards, postmaster. Clayton county. 

Ed Darling, postmaster, Crawford county. 

W. C. Marsh, postmaster at Aurelia, Cherokee 
county. 

J. B. Hungerford, editor and postmaster, Carroll 
county. 

D. C. Cha.se, Hamilton county. 

C. Kennedy, railway mail clerk, Harri.son county. 

S. M. Child, postmaster, Harrison county. 

J. 1), Brown, postmaster, Harrison county. 

G. L. Cruikshank, postmaster at Addison, Hum¬ 
boldt county. 

L. A. Rossing, postmaster at Bode, Humboldt 
county. 

W. S. R. Burnnette, postmaster, Jackson county. 

A. C. Blair, postmaster, Jackson county. 

J. P. Harrison, postmaster at Lu Verne, Kossuth 
county. 

B. 8. Chapman, postmaster at Derby, Lucas 
county. 

A. W. Swalm, editor and postmaster [82,600 per 
year], Mahaska county. 

I. M. Treynor, postmaster at Council Bluffs, Potta¬ 
wattamie county. 

C. C. Carpenter, postmaster at Ft. Dodge. Webster 
county. 

F. W. Gunkle, deputy U. S. marshal, Woodbury 
county. 

R. L. Tilton, postmaster, Wapello county. 

Ole Thompson, postmaster, Winneshiek county. 

A. J.Cratsenberg, postmaster, Winneshiek county. 

W. H. Klemme, postmaster, Winneshiek county. 

8. C. Farmer, postmaster, Wright county, 

I W. H Reiley, postmaster, Washington comity. 

I W. P, Hepburn,. government office-holder at 
Washington, on committee on resolutions. 

I —The negotiations pending for the last few 
weeks for the sale of the Logansport Journal 
were consummated to-dav, and the paper is 
now in the hands of a stock company, com¬ 


posed of strictly Harrisouites. The price 
paid was $16,000. Among the stockholders 
are ex-Judge S. H. Chase, ex-State Senator 
A. R. Shrayer, Postmaster D. W. Tomlinson and 
Ex-Representative B. F. Campbell.— Dispatch^ 
from Logansport to Indianapolis Sentinel, July 23f 

—John B. Cockrtim, assistant United 
States district attorney, addressed, August 4, 
a republican club upon the recently nomin¬ 
ated republican candidates for the city offices. 

—“ No, the fact that a meeting was to be held 
was not discovered through the treachery of 
any member of the anti-Harrison forces. 
There are a thousand ways in which such in¬ 
formation can leak out. The leaders of the 
movement throughout the state are known 
and spotted. In the postmasters, postal agents, 
revenue men and other federal employes throughout 
the slate, the administration has what you might 
term an anny of agents and detectives, and any 
suspicious move on the part of a prerminent anti-ad¬ 
ministration man is promptly reported to head¬ 
quarters and his movements are watched, and the 
antidote is promptly applied for any mischief that 
maybe set brewing. In general terms you may 
set it down that the president is nearly as 
well informed as to what is going on in the 
camp of his enemies as his enemies themselves, 
and when the time comes he will show his 
hand.”— Indianapolis Correspondence Cincinnati 
Commercial Gazette. [Rep.] 

—About two hundred Pennsylvanians, mem¬ 
bers of the Pennsylvania state club, and all 
office-holders, of course, sweltered in an upper 
room in the grand army building to-night. 
Mr. Quay was the subject of a highly-com- 
plimentary resolution, which expressed regret 
that he had resigned from the national com¬ 
mittee, and the Pennsylvania state committee 
was requested to return him to that committee 
in consideration of his valuable services to his 
party.— Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, Aug. 6. 

—Senator Quay, fresh from his Beaver 
home, arrived at the Continental hotel this 
morning, where he was soon joined by Collec¬ 
tor Cooper. The ex chairman of the state 
committee sat down, and they were busy for fully 
an hour discussing the coming republican stale 
convention, its platform and candidates. When 
the matter of the convention had been fully 
discussed, the subject of the succession to 
Chairman Andrews was taken up.— Philadel¬ 
phia Dispatch to New York Times, Aug. 12. 

—“If I receive the nomination, I feel con¬ 
fident of an election, and I can assure you that, 
as in the past so in the future, I shall know how to 
take care of those who assist me towards success." 

From the circular letter of Herman H. Goesling, 
county commissioner of Hamilton county, Ohio, seek¬ 
ing to become treasurer of the county. 

—“A lady is a cousin of a prominent oflficial 
in the census office. She secured a clerkship 
through this relationship, and by the same 
means secured the appointment of seven or 
eight more clerks at good salaries, and these 
clerks are now retained through all the dis¬ 
missals that have taken place. They pay the 
lady who got them the place a large portion of 
the salaries they receive each month.”— Wash¬ 
ington Correspondent St. Paul Pioneer Press [Rep.] 







The Civil service chronicle. 

VoL. I, No. 31. INDIANAPOLIS, SEPTEMBER, 1891. terms fcrn?eVeT?o“pT' 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE,, 

Indianapolis, Indiana. 


'■When one thinks of the kind of govern¬ 
ment onr forefathers supposed they had 
established, and ivhen one thinks of tlie 
republic so many valiant soldiers fought to 
preserve, what a travesty it seems as one 
reads the actual state of affairs disclosed 
by this report (Mr. Roosevelt’s)! It never 
before was so clear that to be a true 
patriot, to be worthy of the spirit of 1776 
and honor those who died for their country 
from 1861 to 1865, one must be a civil serv¬ 
ice reformer, and do all he can to abolish 
utterly this horrid spoils system.—C/n^AServ- 
ice Record. 


Rev, Henry Lambert, of West Newton, 
writes the Civil Service Chronicle: 

In noticing the report in the July number 
of the Civil Service Record, of my address 
before the Newton Civil Service Reform 
Association, you remark: 

“ The Civil Service Chronicle desires 
to put on record an emphatic protest 
against Mr. Lambert’s inference that Wan- 
amaker and Clarkson have been able to re¬ 
tard and injure the reform more than the 
civil service commission to improve and 
extend it.” 

Your “emphatic protest” does me great 
injustice, for I made no such sweeping 
statement as you attribute to me, but said 
, distinctly that they had done more to re¬ 
tard and injure the reform, in certain direc¬ 
tions, than the commission iias done to im¬ 
prove and extend it, a very different, but 
entirely true statement, in which Mr. 
Dana, editor of the Record, agrees with me. 
I trust, therefore, that you will do me the 
justice to let my correction appear in your 
next number. 


The Civil Service Commission, Wash¬ 
ington, D. C., will be glad to receive a copy 
of July, 1889, of the Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle to complete their file. 


There seems to be all over the coun¬ 
try, not only an active participation in poli¬ 
tics by federal office-holders but a very 
general domination by them of the ma¬ 
chine. The Civil Service Chronicle 
asks its readers to assist in making its 
record as complete as possible by forward¬ 
ing particular instances. 


The annual meeting of the national 
league of civil service reform associations, 
will be held at Buffalo, September 29th and 


30th. The first public meeting will be 
held Tuesday evening at Concert Hall, 
when George William Curtis will deliver 
an address. Meetings will follow on 
Wednesday at the lecture-room of the 
Buffalo Library, at which, in the forenoon, 
papers will be read as follows: 

The Secret Executive Sessions of the Senate.—By WTl- 
liam D. Foulke. 

Ths Divorce of Municipal Business from Politics.—By 
Moorfield Storey. 

(Upon a topic to be announced hereafter.—By Sher¬ 
man S. Rogers) 

In the afternoon general business will be 
transacted, including the hearing of 
reports and the election of officers. 
Wednesday evening the Buffalo Civil 
Service Reform Association will give a 
dinner to the members of the national 
league. All members of local associations 
are members of the national league. 
Buffalo is near Indiana, and the sacrifice 
to go to this meeting would, for many 
Indiana members, be a small one. Their 
enjoyment would be great, and the same 
may be said of the western members gen¬ 
erally. 

The reform of the civil service, auspiciously begun 
under a republican administration, should be com¬ 
pleted by the further extension of the reform system, 
already established by law, to all grades of the serv¬ 
ice to which it is applicable,—RepuSfican National 
Platform, 1888. 

When President Harrison was inaugu¬ 
rated, the reform system established by 
law had been extended to some 32,000 
places in the federal service. In two years 
and six months he has extended it to cover 
some 700 additional places, and has made 
the rules cover promotions in the depart¬ 
ments at Washington. To have made the 
reform system, months ago, cover many 
thousand additional places, such as letter- 
carriers in free delivery cities, pension 
agencies and so on, would have been but 
ordinary diligence in performance of the 
above plain contract. 

The spirit and purpose of the reform should be 
observed iii all executive appointments to 

the end that the dangers to free institutions which 
lurk in the power of official patronage may be wisely 
aud effectively ayoided.-Republican National Plat¬ 
form, 1888. 

Headsman Clarkson in less than two 
yeafs;. removed more than 30,000 fourth- 
cla§S postmasters, and since March 4,1889, 
more than 100,000 federal place-holders 
have been displaced by partisans of the 
administration. This has been done in the 


wilful and wanton exercise of “the power 
of official patronage.” The office of collec¬ 
tor at the port of New York is now being 
tossed from henchman to henchman to 
placate Tom Platt, a private citizen, in 
order through him te secure delegates at 
the next republican national convention. 
This use of offices is not different in kind 
or unconstitutionality from the use of the 
Chilian civil and military service by Bal- 
maceda to break down the government of 
his country. 


The evidence taken by Mr. Roosevelt, 
assisted by John C. Rose and Charles J. 
Bonaparte, at Baltimore, makes a remark¬ 
able publication. In other official investi¬ 
gations, where it would hurt the other 
party, scraps of evidence have been intro¬ 
duced showing the connection between the 
public offices and primaries and conven¬ 
tions. But this investigation had for its 
one object the discovery of how far and in 
what manner do the federal office-holders 
of Baltimore interfere with the free action 
of the people attempting to perform their 
political duties. Mr. Roosevelt went 
straight to this object without regard to 
who was hit or hurt, and he has put on 
record a mass of evidence which is a mon¬ 
ument of shame and of inestimable value. 
The country can now see the spoilsmen in 
black and white in their own words. With 
equal propriety the administration might 
allow the crew of a man-of-war or the 
troops from Fort McHenry to be assessed 
and brawl and fight at primaries, as to al¬ 
low the civilians from the postmaster’s and 
marshal’s offices to do it. The Civil Service 
Record for September publishes Mr. Roose¬ 
velt’s report in full, and the Civil Service 
Chronicle will, from time to time, pub¬ 
lish the most important parts of the evi¬ 
dence taken. 


We hear a great deal in these days about 
party “ issues,” and many excellent people 
regret that civil service reform has never 
been and never will be an “ issue.” These 
civil service reformers still cling to the 
idol of i)arty or a party leader, and they 
really mean that Platt and Hill and Gor¬ 
man and Quay and their gillies dictate the 
“issues” of their respective parties. If an 
issue springs from a condition of things 
that Hoods the country with facts, the 
spoils system is at this moment the great 



























262 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


issue in this country in spite of scant 
mention in any platform. This paper 
means to gather the facts of municipal, 
state and national spoil and put them into 
condensed shape for people too busy to get 
them themselves. There is not a month 
that its space is sufficient to print one- 
twentieth of what it collects, and it is a 
conservative estimate that it is not able to 
collect one-twentieth of what is printed. 
Such a floodgate of spoil touching every 
phase of public life as Tammany opens, 
this paper has to pass by. If gathered into 
a book as the facts appear from day to day 
in the New York papers, it would form the 
most astounding and incomprehensible 
manifestation of this century. It is crimi¬ 
nal ; it lays a vile touch upon the adminis¬ 
tration of justice; it blackmails; it steals; 
it corrupts far and wide, and though this 
is known by the best men of both parties 
in New York, its power is as great and as far 
reaching as it ever was. So far as any sign 
shows to-day, Tammany may last forever. 
Why, indeed,' should Tammany and Tom 
Platt make an “issue” on civil service 
reform when their power and life are 
dependent upon spoil ? 

The postmaster-general has sent a circu¬ 
lar letter to postmasters at county-seats, 
inviting them to visit each postmaster in 
their respective counties, and report to 
to him before October 15 upon the condi¬ 
tion of the office. In view of the high re¬ 
gard which this administration has for ex- 
Headsman Clarkson, and in view of the 
many reports of the political information 
obtained by the census takers, it was 
natural for many people to suppose that 
Mr. Wanamaker desired before October 15 
to know what republican postmasters were 
not sufficiently active and where it would 
heal breaches to remove the democrats 
who here and there have hitherto escaped 
the knife. The Boston Post, August 19, 
states that the leading white republicans 
of Alabama recently met at Birmingham, 
and appointed a committee of fifty to 
“hunt up and prefer ‘charges’ against every 
democratic postmaster in the state.” Mr. 
Wanamaker suggests an easy channel for 
these “charges.” The suggestion does not 
appear to find favor from republican 
sources. The Cedar Rapids Gazette says: 

It would requipe two wo^s steady work for Po.st- 
master Daniels to examine the offices in this county, 
and his expenses could not be less than $40; besides, 
he would have to pay for extra help at his own office 
while absent. Then again we do not think the aver¬ 
age county-seat postmaster, who is usually a county- 
seat politician, would care to make an unfavorable 
report of a rural postmaster, who is usually a rural 
or local politician. The postmasters will generally 
notify Mr. Wanamaker that they are not in the in¬ 
spection business. 

Minor post-offices in divisions under su¬ 
perintendents who do not hold their places 
by favoritism is one thing, while minor 


post-offices in'divisions by counties under a 
county political boss is another. 

Congressman Warwick, the successor of 
Mr. McKinley, submitted the selection of 
a cadet to West Point to a competitive ex¬ 
amination, and himself selected the board 
before whom the candidates were to com¬ 
pete. They are stated to have been pro¬ 
fessional men of the highest standing in 
the four counties. The sixteen-year-old 
successful competitor proved to be the 
son of a republican, and Congressman War¬ 
wick has finally rejected him and appointed 
a boy who was a candidate and rejected by 
the examining board. This is one of the 
little silly mean things a grown man does 
who barters public office for private pelf. 


FROM THE SPEECH OF WILLIAM 

DUDLEY FOULKE BEFORE THE 

SOCIAL SCIENCE CONGRESS AT 

SARATOGA, SEPTEMBER 3. 

The principles underlying civil service re¬ 
form are as clearly demonstrable as any in polit¬ 
ical economy. They start from the same axiom 
of self-interest, which, while not the sole motive 
of human action, are still apt to play a 
preponderating part. Just as men will 
buy in the cheapest market and sell in 
the dearest, just so is it a necessary conse¬ 
quence of the spoils system that 'men in 
the distribution of offices will pay the high¬ 
est price for political support of the greatest 
political value. As commercial value is 
measured by dollars, so political value is 
measured by votes, either in the caucus, con¬ 
vention or popular election. * * * In the 

primative stages of republican government 
men consider more the quality of the man to 
be appointed than in its later and more im¬ 
personal stages. In the earlier days of our 
government we acted upon the theory of per¬ 
sonal discretion in the selection of office-hold¬ 
ers, the President was supposed to have some 
knowledge of the postmasters and collectors 
w'hose names were submitted to the senate, and 
when postmasters and collectors were few, this 
theory was not unreasonable. In the earlier 
days of the steam-engine the valve was turned 
on by the personal action of the engineer; but 
as the machinery became more highly devel¬ 
oped and complicated, automatic ac.liou was 
found to be necessary. So has it been in our 
government. When the number of postmas¬ 
ters increased to 40,000, personal selection be¬ 
came no longer possible. These things must 
now be done by system. What shall the system 
be? 

The development of the spoils system in 
American politics has been attributed to An¬ 
drew Jackson, to Martin Van Buren, to Aaron 
Burr. It is not due to any man. If Andrew 
Jackson, Martin Van Buren and Aaron Burr 
had never lived it would still have been en¬ 
grafted at some time or other, in some form or 
other, into American institutions, in the ab¬ 
sence of some other definite system established 


by law. So long as appointments were left to 
the personal discretion of an officer selected 
by universal suffrage, the spoils system was a 
necessary result. The vote-value of the man 
could not be disregarded when he sought office 
from those whom he had helped to power. 
But just so surely as the spoils system was the 
product of natural law, just so certain it is to¬ 
day that its abolition is a necessity born from 
the evils which it inflicts. 

No one will deny that party government is 
a necessary phase of popular government. 
Party government in the political world exer¬ 
cises much the same function that competition 
does in the commercial world ; that war does 
in the physical world, and that the constant 
struggle for existence (the strong preying 
upon the weak) does in the organic world. 
It is a part of the great development of na¬ 
ture through the survival of the fittest. 
Where all men vote, the strongest conquer at 
the ballot-box by essentially the same rules 
that armies conquer in war. The temptation 
is powerful to use all means lawful, or unlaw¬ 
ful, according to the decalogue and golden 
rule, or against them, to defeat the enemy. In 
earlier times and among the lower types of 
humanity the love of booty was a powerful 
motive with the man of war. The right to de¬ 
spoil his enemy was never questioned. But it 
has gradually dawned upon the consciousness 
of the civilized world that this right of plun¬ 
der not only inflicts unnecessary hardship 
upon the conquered, but that it is the greatest 
weakness of the conquering army. How 
many have been the battles lost where after 
the first onslaught the victorious troops, in¬ 
stead of securing the fruits of their victory, 
devoted themselves to plunder and have 
in their turn been overcome and despoiled! 
The military world recognizes to-day that the 
courage of the soldier must be sustained by 
other motives than by the hope of spoil, and 
that to allow an army to devote itself to plun¬ 
der is to corrupt and ruin it. This is true 
none the less in politics than in war. In 
nearly every instance patronage is a source of 
weakness rather than strength. The number 
of the disappointed is always greater than the 
number of the successful. Kven the man 
who receives the coveted plum is apt to prove 
ungrateful. The corrupting influence of 
plunder is such that the honor said to exist 
among thieves can not be trusted. President 
Arthur had the patronage yet he could not 
secure a renomination. President Cleveland 
had the patronage, yet it contributed proba¬ 
bly more than anything else to his defeat. 
President Harrison has had the patronage, yet 
the success of the republican party in 1888 
was converted in 1890 into the most s,lisastrous 
defeat in its history. 

The analogy between the spoils of war and 
the spoils of office goes further in the division 
of booty among chiefs and men. The share of 
each was determined not by what he took, but 
by the relative war value of the man. The 
chief was to have one-fifth or one-tenth of the 
whole; then came the greater warriors, while 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


263 


the common man must content himself with 
but little. So in politics, as we have seen, the 
place to which a man is entitled depends upon 
his political value. The man who raises or 
distributes a small campaign fund gets a small 
place, while the man who raises his hundreds 
of thousands may even hope for a seat in the 
cabinet. The small speaker in the country 
district may aspire to a country post-oflBce, 
but the great leader, whom all men flock to 
hear, may perhaps become premier. The 
question which after all determines the office 
to be given and the man to have it is, how 
many votes is he worth? Now, it is evident 
that under such a system as this there is no 
relation of fitness between the man and the 
duties he is required to perform, unless those 
duties are political. If his duty is to guide 
the policy or spread the principles of his party 
and win votes for it, of course the best politi¬ 
cian will be the best man for the place; but if 
the duties are administrative or financial, the 
man whose excellence lies in neither of these 
fields of action will very likely be a bad man 
for the place. In all non-political offices we 
are sure, under such a system, not to get the 
best service, but a rather poor service. Skill 
in managing a caucus has no relation to skill 
in adjusting the accounts of the treasury de¬ 
partment. The man who can best whoop up 
the boys by promises of patronage is not 
always the best guardian of the public funds. 
Indeed, the particular kind of politician w’hose 
vote value is the most easily determined, and 
the results of whose labors are the most palpa¬ 
ble, is generally the one who is most disquali¬ 
fied for responsible office. 

The influences which determine the conduct 
of the conscientious, independent voter are 
not so immediately traceable to the particular 
action of any one man as are the votes of the 
venal “floaters ” to the action of the man who 
divides them into blocks of five, or who raises 
the money to corrupt them. The venal poli¬ 
tician is, upon the immediate face of things, 
a more valuable man than the more remote 
agent who convinces the intelligence. Hence 
he is apt to secure the better place, unless the 
fear of public indignation following the dis¬ 
covery of his methods makes his appointment 
impossible. So it often happens that a few 
votes in the convention which makes the nom¬ 
ination are more important than a vast num¬ 
ber of votes at the popular election. Hence 
we find that the support of delegates is 
specially sought for by aspiring candidates 
and that great i>umbers of those who have 
thrown their influence for the nominee in con¬ 
vention are to be found among the successful 
aspirants for office. 

Another thing which results is a political 
hierarchy, or as Mr. Lucius B. Swift more 
accurately calls it, a system of feudalism in 
office-holding, in which the respective rank 
and power of the men are often quite diflerent 
from that prescribed by the constitution and 
laws. According to the latter, the President 
.and members of the cabinet make the appoint¬ 
ments according to certain statutes, the head 


of a department or bureau is authorized to 
appoint the officers who serve under him, and 
he is responsible for their conduct, dismissing 
^ them if they turn out to be inefficient, yet in 
point of fact we find that appointments are 
not made in any such way. A member of 
congress or political boss of the district or 
city is really the appointing power. Some¬ 
times, like Senator Quay, he holds an office, 
which is often purely legislative and involv¬ 
ing no such duty as the distribution of patron¬ 
age, .and sometimes, like Mr. Platt of New 
York, he holds no office .at all. 

These gentlemen, the greater barons of pol¬ 
itics, divide their possessions among the lesser, 
the county chairmen and political bosses, and 
these again apportion their allotments among 
the leaders in townships and wards, who in 
their turn divide their little holdings among 
their own thralls and hustlers. In each case 
fealty is due, not to the head of the office nor 
to the government itself, but to the particular 
source from which the appointment comes. 
The result is that the men appointed, inas¬ 
much as they do not owe their place to any 
qualifications for the work to be done, and do 
not expect to retain it by virtue of their in¬ 
dustry or fidelity, but on account of their in¬ 
fluence with the men who appointed them, 
often neglect their duties and devote them¬ 
selves to political work quite inconsistent with 
those duties. This system has all the vices 
and lawlessness of feudalism, and those addi¬ 
tional weaknesses which spring from the un¬ 
stable and uncertain tenure upon which these 
offices are held. The men who nominally 
make the appointments, the head of the office 
or department does not dare to make removals 
for incompetency lest he should offend the 
powerful “influence” which stands behind an 
incompetent man. The “ influence,” on the 
other hand, cares little for the manner in 
which his vassal performs the duties of the of¬ 
fice, so long as the personal and political serv¬ 
ice to himself is satisfactory. There is thus a 
divided responsibility, the duties are neglect¬ 
ed, and there is nowhere any power to apply 
the remedy. 

FEUDALISM REVIVED. 

The cities of New York and Brooklyn, the 
former especially, have produced a political 
and social system which bears some resem¬ 
blance to the Roman relation of patron and 
client, and a greater resemblance to the feu¬ 
dalism of the middle ages. It is a spontane¬ 
ous natural growth, and bids fair in future 
years to play a part even more important than 
it exercises at present. The nucleus is an as¬ 
sociation, or club, chiefly political, partly 
social, numbering anywhere from 50 to 5,000 
persons, and headed by a leader, an alderman 
or such like, who dies, or is deposed now and 
then, in which case the succession is not 
hereditary, but determined by the popular 
will, informally expressed. , Each of these 
clubs is part of a still larger body, led by one 
man, and this larger body is, again, part of 
one of the iwo great political parties and sub¬ 


servient to the state boss for the time being. 
Boss Platt on the one hand and Governor Hill 
on the other are the feudal lords now at the 
head of the two great kingdoms or provinces, 
and beneath them is a regular gradation of 
leaders down to the ward “heeler” who haunts 
the liquor saloon of the local boss, and never 
does an honest day’s work—except in the way 
of politics. 

Of course the chief functions of these feudal 
bodies are primaries, caucuses, state conven¬ 
tions, political meetings and elections. But 
scarcely less important are picnics and funer¬ 
als. The Post commented the other day upon 
the fact that two political clubs, both affiliated 
with Tammany Hall, had just enjoyed a mar¬ 
itime excursion—and in neither case was any¬ 
body murdered or even maimed—to such a 
degree of discipline has Tammany attained. 
On Friday last two more sacred politico-feudal 
rites were celebrated, a picnic and a funeral, 
one in Brooklyn, one in New York. The pic¬ 
nic occurred in Brooklyn, and was attended 
by fully 5,000 persons, belonging to the fourth 
senatorial district, it being the annual festival 
of the P. H. McCarren Association. The 
crowd included men, women and children, and 
they were entertained from 4 p. m. till the next 
morning—all at the expense of McCarren, the 
local feudatory, to whom they owe allegiance. 
McCarren stood at the gate of the pavilion 
where the picnic was held and shook the hand 
of every man, woman and child that entered, 
and kissed all the babies. Of course the peo¬ 
ple did not stream in miscellaneously—they 
marched in by divisions, each division consti¬ 
tuting the local association or nucleus, already 
mentioned. Thus we have the “ P. Donnelly 
Association,” the “John Dunn Association,” 
the “Hugh O’Brien Association,** the “Michael 
J. Devine Association,” .and many others. 

But while these festivities were transacting 
at Brooklyn a feudal funeral was occurring in 
New York, being that of John Stroubenmul- 
ler, late boss of “de Ate,” i. e., the 8th assem¬ 
bly district. The chief interest of this occa¬ 
sion arose from the fact that prominence at 
the funeral would be a factor in the selection 
of a new boss. Hence a spirited rivalry 
among the leaders in the size of their “ floral 
tributes.” Hence, also, a contest as to who 
should head the procession. The New York 
World says that Barney Rourke sent the big¬ 
gest “ floral tribute.” It was a wreath bearing 
the following inscription: 


He w.as our friend. 

Yours respectfully, 

Barney Rourke. 


Another aspirant, F. Wolf, is said to have 
remarked when the wreath was borne in, “ I 
wonder where mine is. That kid must be 
crawling. Ah! Here he comes.” And then 
to the bystanders, “ Now what do you think 
of that for a fine one? Barney’s might be a 
little the biggest, but mine cost the most 
money all right enough.” 

But, on the whole, it is conceded that Bar¬ 
ney Rourke profited as much by this funeral 
as McCarren, of Brooklyn, did by his picnic, 
“de Ate” h.as done homage to Rourke.— Bos¬ 
ton Post. 









IPL^TTZS:^- 


» * 


The vassal, upon investiture, took an oath of fealty to the lord, and * * become his ^lAN from that day lorth. 
Services were free and base. * * Base service was to * carry out his dnnj;.—_ 


—It was not long after Collector Erhardt had been 
in office that Platt sent in a list of about twenty 
names of men whom he wanted appointed to office 
at once. Mr. Erhardt looked it over and asked the 
messenger where it came from. 

“From Mr. Platt,” is said to have been the mes¬ 
senger’s answer. Then the collector is reported to 
have said; 

“It is about time that Mr. Platt learned that I am 
the collector of the port of New York.” 

“What answer shall I take back?” asked the mes¬ 
senger. 

“Take back that answer," said the collector, refer¬ 
ring to what he had previously said. 

From that time on Platt began his warfare on Mr. 
Erhardt. He failed for some time to carry his point, 
but when Secretary Foster succeeded Mr. Windom, 
Platt’s chances improved, and now the republican 
party in this state is politely told that any man who 
can not do the bidding of T. C. Platt must get out of 
office, no matter how efficient a public official he 
may be.—New York Times, July SO. 

—It has been for and against T. C. Platt, for 
and against Senator Hiscock, and for and 
against Warner Miller. Kepublican voters in 
this county are largely anti-Platt, and a dis¬ 
tinctively Platt candidate for any office would 
receive scant consideration at their hands. 
This hostility has grown up because of Platt’s 
interference with and control of appointments, 
some of which have been most unsatisfactory. 
The selection of E. E. Robinson as postmaster 
at Ithaca and the removal of the collector’s 
office from this city to Waverly, in Tioga 
county, one of Platt’s henchmen receiving the 
commission, produced deep feeling which 
found open expression of decided dissent. The 
collection district is Tompkins, Tioga, and 
Schuyler, Tompkins county furnishing greater 
revenue than the other two combined, and the 
change of location is regarded here as an out¬ 
rage. The Ithaca postmastership is a mere 
sinecure, the official being a telegraph opera¬ 
tor at the Lehigh Valley Railroad station, 
who sometimes appears at the post-office in the 
latter part of the day. As regards the per¬ 
formance of any duty to compensate for his 
large salary, he might as well be a resident of 
Alaska. His appointment was secured by T. 
C. Platt and John W. Dwight of Dryden, in 
this county, in defiance of an earnest protest 
sent to Washington signed by many republi¬ 
cans of the highest character and most pro¬ 
nounced political views, but this protest was 
entirely disregarded. This parceling out of 
offices in this locality has produced a deep 
feeling of dissatisfaction, which probably will 
appear in the canvass.— Ithaca, N. Y., Dispatch 
to New York Times, August S9. 

—The republican county convention met in 
Ithaca, September 5. Postmaster E. E. Robin¬ 
son, who is employed by the United States 
government at a salary of $3,000 a year to 
keep an eye on the post-office when not en¬ 
gaged in his regular business, despatching 
trains on the Lehigh Valley Railroad, at 
once assumed control of the convention. For 
some reason, probably to discourage the at¬ 
tendance of too many spectators, tho.se who 
had charge of the matter had furnished only 


about the requisite number of seats to accom¬ 
modate the delegates. 

The postmaster called attention to the fact 
that many of the seats intended for delegates 
were occupied by spectators and requested 
that they should be vacated to make room for 
delegates who were standing. » * * The 
postmaster thought the debate had proceeeded far 
enough, and producing that well-known weapon 
used in debate—which ex-farmer Enz is re¬ 
sponsible for introducing into republican 
county conventions—he moved the previous 
question, which was promptly carried and 
Counselor Baker was crushed again, and with 
him the young republican orator who had the 
temerity to say something about the question 
which he was trying to debate. 

The vote on the postmaster’s motion re¬ 
vealed the strength of the machine, and it was 
apparent that Almy would receive the nomi¬ 
nation for county judge, which he did on the 
first formal ballot, his vote being (54, or ten 
more than the number required. '* * * Af¬ 
ter which the postmaster adjourned his con¬ 
vention.— Ithaca {N. Y.) Democrat,September 10. 

—The enrolled republicans of Brooklyn 
and the Kings county towns held their pri¬ 
maries yesterday for the election of delegates 
to the various assembly conventions to-mor¬ 
row night. The object of the latter is the 
election of delegates to the state convention 
to be held Sept. 9. Every effort had been 
made to bring about a harmonious feeling 
among the local leaders before the voting be¬ 
gan yesterday, but it was successful only in 
those wards where a fight would have been of 
no consequence. 

Wherever the party is in a position to dis¬ 
tribute anything there was a struggle for con¬ 
trol. The most serious fight was that between 
State Committeeman Thomas A. MeWhinney 
and Assemblyman Joseph Aspinall in the 
twenty-first ward. Aspinall represented Ernst 
Nathan, whose chief desire now is to remove 
MeWhinney and replace him by Charles J. 
Dunwell. 

When the voters began to arrive they found 
several thousand copies of a circular in which 
“Boss” Nathan was attacked most viciously as 
a man who stabbed in the back everj' candi¬ 
date whom he could not manage. It was 
pointed out that he had given Blaine very few 
votes in his ward in 1884 and had knifed the 
assembly candidate the following year. The 
circular continued : 

“The anti-Nathan ticket stands unpledged to any 
man. This is not a fight against Charles T. Dunwell 
personally, but only because he is being used by Mr. 
Nathan to advance Nathan’s ambition to become a 
supreme boss. 

“The power of Internal Revenue Collector Nathan 
over those having official business with his office is 
well-known and realized by every dealer in spirits, 
tobacco and cigars, and he appears to be attempting 
to press them into his service for his own political 
advancement and against the action of the republi¬ 
can association of the ward. He is spending nearly 
every evening in the ward,superintending the canvass 
and pressing the button, and subordinates from his 
office are exceedingly active there. A circular has 
been issued to the Nathan ring containing the names 
of many gentlemen who will vote the regular ticket, 
and to swell the numbers some of the names have 
been repeated. It may be difficult to forecast the 
result, but many protest against this attempted 
‘bossism,’ and the result of the ‘button pressing’ 


may have the same effect as it had upon our candi¬ 
date for congress last year.”—A’eii; York Times, Sep¬ 
tember 2. 

—The republican primaries in Jefferson 
county have left the party in anything but a 
happy and united condition. The expenditure 
of about 'fiSjOOO by one candidate to sectire delegates 
to a district convention created the impression 
that the county is becoming one of the most 
corrupt in the state. 

The work of federal office-holders who left their 
official duties to ivork the caucuses has awakened 
honest people to a sense of their obligations to 
the state, and it is not unlikely that charges 
will be jireferred against the head of the Cape 
Vincent custom-house and some of his subor¬ 
dinates.— Watertown, N. Y., Dispatch to New York 
Times, August SO. 

—After a factional fight, the most exciting in 
the history of Onondaga county politics, the 
Hiscock-Hendricks faction to-day won the 
first battle in the contest to retain control of 
the state senatorship for the Onondaga 
and Cortland district. They captured by a 
substantial majority the city caucuses which 
elected delegates to the senatorial convention 
to be held next Saturday. The results of the 
caucuses held throughout the district make it 
certain that Assemblyman Rufus T. Peck, of 
Cortland, will’be nominated for state senator. 

The struggle to capture the senatorship in 
the interest of Senator Hiscock has been, ac¬ 
cording to republican authority, the most dis¬ 
graceful ever waged in the district. The 
leading candidates were Assemblyman How¬ 
ard G. White, of Onondaga, and Assemblyman 
Rufus T. Peck, of Cortland. Peck is a gillie 
of Senator Francis Hendricks, and the sena¬ 
tor has in person led the fight for him, as¬ 
sisted by the various leaders of the Hiscock 
faction, with the United States Senator him¬ 
self as director general of the campaign. 
Senator Hiscock himself hurried home from 
his trip to the far west to rally his forces and 
fight for Peck’s nomination. 

The Cortland county caucuses were held 
last week and sent a delegation, practically 
salted for Peck, to the senatorial convention. 
This result, it is claimed by the Standard (re¬ 
publican), was accomplished by the most cor¬ 
rupt and disgraceful methods ever put into 
practice in the district. It is openly charged 
that votes for delegates were purcha.sed out¬ 
right by the most lavish use of money, and 
that no less than $4,000 was spent to corrupt 
the voters and purchase Peck delegates. 

Having carried the Cortland caucuses the 
Hiscock-Hendricks faction set about to de¬ 
feat the will of the republicans of Onondaga 
by adopting the same methods which had pre¬ 
vailed in Cortland. At the republican c in¬ 
cuses held in the town of De Witt, men who 
had received favors at the hands of Senator 
Hiscock were forced into the fight. The sena¬ 
tor's brother, Charles Hiscock, who holds a fat posi¬ 
tion in the United States revenue office, led the force. 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


265 


Eugene Bogardus and Q. 0. Ferris, both of whom 
have sons in the assayer’s office in New York at large 
salaries, were also actively fighting for the Hiscock 
candidate. The sheriff's office also took a hand in 
the fight, and the sons of county postmasters tramped 
the tmvn to help the Hiscock men carry the caucuses. 

Hiscock, since his return from the west, lias 
made frequent visits to New York to confer 
with Platt, and Platt emissaries from Oswego 
and elsewhere have been here and taken a hand 
in the senatorial contest. Peck is not the choice 
of the business men of Cortland .for senator. 
He carried Cortland for the assembly last year 
by less than 100 votes, and is the most unpop¬ 
ular man in the district.— Syracuse Dispatch to 
the New York Times, September 4- 

—Mr. Coykendall is with Platt, and his in¬ 
fluence dominated the conventions in the sec¬ 
ond and third assembly districts and that of 
the first district to the extent of bringing about 
the selection of ex-Member of Congress James 
G. Lindsley, and County Judge A. T. Clear- 
w.ater. Charles Davis, one of the first district 
delegates, is a friend of Sharpe, and Christopher 
O. James, another delegate, is employed in the Netu 
York city post office. It is believed by some that 
Sharpe is with Platt, because Platt sanctioned his 
appointment in the appraiser’s office in Nev’ York 
city after Senator Hiscock had recommended him to 
the President.—Kingston {N. Y.) Dispatch to New 
York Times, September 4- 

—The republican primary elections, at 
which delegates were chosen to the republi¬ 
can state convention, were held in all the as¬ 
sembly districts of this city yesterday. Fred¬ 
erick Leffson, president of a German organi¬ 
zation, telegraphed to Collector Fassett that 
deputy collector Wilson Berryman was work¬ 
ing around the polls. Berryman was at his 
desk when the collector received the message, 
but he subsequently asked for a “ day off,” to 
be charged against his vacation, and Mr. 
Fassett remembering his own work at Horse- 
heads, granted it to him. Mr. Berryman 
went back to the seventeenth district polling 
place and looked out for the interest of the 
regulars.— New York Times, September J. 

—But another thing that the primaries have 
settled is that a complaint is to be made to 
the federal authorities in regard to Internal 
Revenue Collector Nathan’s pernicious activity in 
local politics. His office is being run as a political 
machine. Thesubordinates have been working 
in this third senatorial fight with great vigor, 
and all their efforts have been directed to in¬ 
ducing republicans to vote against Senator 
Birkett. It is said that a list of over one hun¬ 
dred men who have been importuned by these 
subordinates of the collector has been drawn 
up and will be sent to President Harrison. 
One of Nathan’s men was an inspector at the 
recent twenty-first ward primary, and he was 
ordered to New Jersey by the department on 
the day of the primary and kept there until 
just before it opened-. 

Then it was discovered that he had the offi¬ 
cial roll book in his pocket, and that his 
absence was designed to prevent the opposition 


from having the namts of thirty five recently 
elected members placed on the roll, thereby 
enabling them to vote. This trick was ren¬ 
dered worthless by the granting of a man¬ 
damus hy Judge Osborne, under which the 
votes were received. But it is an example, 
and a very fair one, of the way an important 
federal office is being used to advance the for¬ 
tunes of a local party boss.— New York Times, 
September G. 

— The Evening Post’s correspondent met Collector 
of Internal Revenue Nathan in Power’s Hotel this 
morning and asked him whom the Kings county 
delegation would support for governor. “Our first 
choice,” he replied, “is General Stewart L. Wood¬ 
ford.” 

"And who next? ” 

"Andrew D. White " 

"How does your delegation feel towards Collector 
Fassett? ” 

“Very favorably.” 

“In the event of a contest between ex-Minlster 
While and Senator Fassett whom would your dele¬ 
gation support? ” 

"That would have to be determined. The Kings 
county delegation will work in harmony with the 
New York delegation. We shall be a unit in the 
convention.”—RocAes/er Dispatch to New York Even¬ 
ing Post, September 7. 

—It has been reported within the last few days that 
Frederick S. Gibbs is to be the regular republican 
candidate for assemblyman in the thirteenth dis¬ 
trict and that he would have the support of ex- 
Senator Platt and the republican county organiza¬ 
tions. A reporter for The Evening Post learned that 
such is not the case: that if Gibbs should be nomi¬ 
nated by his alleged "regular” organization in the 
thirteenth, the county leaders will not recognize 
him as the parly’s candidate, will not contribute to 
his support, and, in all likelihood, will .see to it that 
the Cowie people place a candidate in the field 
against him. 

Although the Gibbs delegation was seated in the 
county committee, Gibbs was not recognized as the 
regular leader of the district. lie had a number of 
men appointed to places in the custom-house during Col. 
Erhardt's regime, but has had none since Mr. Fassett 
went into office. It is stated by an excellent authority 
that when Collector Fassett begins the weeding out pro¬ 
cess the Oibbs men will be the first to go; that no democrat 
will be touched until after the Oibbs people have gone. 
Oibbs very recently succeeded in obtaining a place/or one 
of his followers in the custodian’s department in the post- 
office. The giving of that place, it is staled, led to a very 
warm interview between ex-Senator Platt and Postmaster 
Fan Cott, and it is understood that the appointee will be 
removed as soon as the state convention is over.—New 
York Evening Post, September 7. 

—The general sentiment seems to be summed up 
in the words of John E. Brodsky to your correspond¬ 
ent: " We’ll give all the candidates a show on the 
first ballot; then the whole business will go for Fas¬ 
sett.” Brodsky proclaimed further, with a chuckle, 
that the New York City delegation was going to start 
off in the convention with a vote for “that great and 
good man, Andrew D. White ” 

Thomas C. Platt has been known for many years 
as a grim joker. According to appearances this 
morning he is carrying out the grimmest joke of his 
life. He sits in his parlor in Power’s Hotel, declar¬ 
ing vehemently to all visitors that he is for 
Andrew D. White, first, last, and all the lime, 
and eulogizing in the most earnest way the 
ex-President of Cornell. But all the time his 
lieutenants are down stairs, preparing for the 
nomination of his chief lieutenant, Fas.sett. This 
idea appears to be to give the impression that he 
thinks Mr. White is the best man, and that he will 
not desert him until a great wave of enthusiasm for 
Fassett sweeps away all other candidates. If the 
wave turns up on schedule time, the boss will proba¬ 
bly shed a public tear for the Ithaca statesman, and 
declare that he could not prevent Fassett’s nomina¬ 
tion. 


The little comedy is very amusing to the delegates 
who are here. They know that until Platt arrived 
yesterday morning there was a general doub: as to 
the nominations, and that within ten hours after 
his arrival the name of Fassett was on everybody’s 
tongue. Delegates who came here shouting for their 
local candidate grew silent and all at once came to 
the conclusion that Fassett might be more available. 
—Rochester Dispatch to New York Evening Post, Sep¬ 
tember 8. 

“ No officer shoiiltl be required or per- 
niilted lo take part in the arrang^emeiit of 
political org'anizatioiis, caucuses, conven- 
1 ions, or election caiupaigiis. Their right 
to vote and to express their views on pub¬ 
lic questions, either orally or through the 
pre.ss, is not denied, provided it does not 
interfere with the discharge of their 
official duties. No assessment for political 
purposes on offices or subordinates should 
be allowed. —President Hayes, June 22, 1S77. 

—Big and little federal office holders have 
been jostling one another in the hotel cor¬ 
ridors ever since this convention began to pull 
itself together. The two most conspicuous 
ornaments of this office-holding array were, of 
course, Thomas C. Platt, member of the com¬ 
mission for the location of a government dock 
in Washington, and the collector of the port 
of'New York, Mr. Fassett. 

Only a single instance is known where the 
chief of a department gave his subordinates to 
understand that it would be better policy for 
them to remain at home than to come to 
Rochester. Naval Officer Theodore Willis 
is understood to have conveyed some such 
hint to his men, and the Brooklyn men in his 
department appear to have generally ob¬ 
served it. Some of the more important place¬ 
holders who were here are the following: 
Thomas C. Platt. 

J. Sloat Fassett, collector of the port of New York. 
Ernst Nathan, collector of Internal revenue for the 
Brooklyn district. 

John W. Jacobus, marshal of the southern district of 
New York. 

John E. Milholland, inspector of emigration at the 
port of New York and press agent for the Platt 
aggregation. 

Denis Shea, deputy collector in Mr. Fassett’s office. 
John H. Gunner, of New York, deputy collector in 
Mr. Fasselt’s office. 

John Collins, of New York, deputy collector in the 
collector’s office. 

Gen. Michael Kerwin, of New York, collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue. 

Ferdinand Eidman, of New York, collector of inter¬ 
nal revenue. 

Robert H. Hunter, collector of internal revenue for 
the Poughkeepsie district. 

Barney Biglin, baggage contractor at Castle Garden. 
Je.sse Johnson, district attorney for the Brooklyn dis¬ 
trict. 

Col. Archie E. Baxter, of Elmira, marshal for the 
northern district. 

Henry Flood, postmaster of Elmira, and contesting 
delegate from Mr. Fassetl’s own town. 

Jonas S. Van Duzer, postmaster of Horseheads and 
also a contestant from Mr. Fassett’s county. 
William B. Morgan, collector of the port of Buffalo. 
James Low, collector of customs at Suspension Bridge. 
Charles E. Fitch, ex editor of the Rochester Democrat 
and Chronicle and collector of internal revenue 
for western New York. 

John E. Smith, of Morrisville, Madison county, as¬ 
sistant district attorney, with headquarters at 
Syracuse, and a candidate for the nomination of 
state senator against Titus Sheard. 













266 THE CIVLL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Mynders E. Van Cliff, of Ilhaca, commissioner of the 

circuit court. 

James Miller, postma.ster of Utica. 

Gen. Reynolds, postmaster of Rochester. 

Carroll E. Smith, postmaster of Syracuse and editor 

of the Syracuse Journal. 

R. M. Ritchie, postmaster of Saratoga Springs. 

George W. Dunn postmaster of Binghamton. 
Leonard Groesheck, of Troy, United States bank 

examiner. 

Amos Roberts, postmaster of Addison, Steuben Co. 
Horace E. Morse, collector of customs at Cape Vin¬ 
cent, Jefferson county. 

—Rochester Dispatch to New York Times, Sept. 9. 

—Mr. J. Slee, of Elmira, the speaker for the 
anti-Fassett Chemung delegates, was given the 
first opportunity to speak. 

He charged that the republican county com¬ 
mittee of Chemung was in the hand of the 
contestants opponents, who did not hesitate to 
use every means, lawful and unlawful, to run 
the primaries to suit their selfish ends. He 
said there was not the slightest doubt that, 
barring the fact that pistols and knives were 
not used by the Fassett people, their methods 
were the most disgraceful ever witnessed in 
the county. Mr. Fassett, he said, repeatedly 
honored by the people of Chemung, had be¬ 
trayed the confidence of his constituents and 
bulldozed them in the hope of making them 
support his line of action. There was a feel¬ 
ing in Chemung so intense against this sys¬ 
tem of party rule, that unless some rebuke was 
administered at this committee’s hands, a wrong 
would be done to the republicans of the 
county that would result disastrously to the 
party in November. 

The contestants, he claimed, after a fair 
fight secured 100 votes out of 186. The only 
convention was called for August 15. On Au¬ 
gust 14 the county committee, made up of 
Fassett men, decided to admit no one to the 
convention who was unprovided with a ticket. 
Tickets were not given to the anti-Fassett 
men until fifteen minutes after the hour for 
the convention to open. Under the circum¬ 
stances, they were obliged to hold a conven¬ 
tion of their own and elect delegates. 

Col. Archie E. Baxter, United Stales Marshal, 
representing the Fassett crowd, consumed 
twenty minutes in replying to this arraign¬ 
ment. He was frequently interrupted by the 
members of the contesting delegation, and 
they asked him some awkward questions. He 
insisted that if democratic money had been 
kept out of the county, Fassett would have 
won in every town. This is a proposition 
that makes men smile who know the facts. 
Dr. Henry Flood, 'postmaster of Elmira, reinied 
the charge.— Rochester Dispatch to Ne^r York 
Times, September 9. 

—The fact is that the business of the convention was 
cut and dried for it. The only question is, how long 
ago Platt wrote out the slate. The best informed 
politicians say that he arranged for the business of 
last night several months ago, when he put Fassett 
into the custom-house, made him a quasi New York 
city man, and thereby secured the 133 votes of the 
New York city delegation. All the evidence Is in 
this direction. Without New York city’s solid vote 
there might have been more than one ballot last 
night, and it was pretty clear that if a struggle for 
the nomination was entered into by even a second 
ballot, Fa.s.sett would find opposed to him a combi¬ 
nation which he could not defeat.—J2oc/tfS/cr Dis¬ 
patch to New York Post, September 10. 


—The news of the appointment of Senator 
Hendricks as collector was no surprise at the 
custom-house, nor did it cause disappointment 
among those whose tenure of office was ren¬ 
dered secure by the resignation of Col. Er¬ 
hard t. Everybody regarded Hendricks as 
Fassett’s natural successor. Hendricks is 
Hiscock’s chief local lieutenant in Syracuse, 
and Hiscock is Platt’s right-hand man. There¬ 
fore, it was thought Hendricks would carry 
out the party plans arranged by Fassett, that 
is, a clean sweep of democrats, and the run¬ 
ning of the custom-house on the Platt spoils 
system.— New York Evening Post, September 17. 

PLATTISM AT LARGE. 

—Colonel Webster Flanagan, who put the famous 
question, “ What are we here for,” at the republican 
national convention, 1880, has had the question very 
satisfactorily answered for him by President Harri¬ 
son. He is now collector of customs at El Paso, 
Texas. Flanagan has the reputation of being a 
very active politician of the sort who believe that 
there would be no use of the spoils if they were not 
for the victors, and that there would be few victories 
without the spoils. He is a power in Texas republi¬ 
can politics, and his appointment is looked upon as 
a shrewd move by Mr. Harrison to obtain a firm hold 
on the Texas delegation at the next republican na¬ 
tional convention. 

Cunie, the colored leader, who is collector at Oalveston, 
was not a personal friend of the President’s. He has 
always been an admirer of Hr. Blaine, and Flanagan is 
said to be the only man in the state who can dispute his 
control of the republican political machine. While it 
is believed that Cunie would be loyal to Harrison 
under ordinary circumstancee, it is not thought that 
anything would prevent his supporting Blaine if he 
is in the field. Flanagan, on the other hand, is not 
a Blaine man, but has been for Sherman and is now 
for Harrison. It is believed by friends of Mr. Harri¬ 
son that, backed by the administration, he could 
take the state conventions away from Cunie if the 
latter turned against the administration, and it is 
said that this consideration entered into his selec¬ 
tion to succeed Collector Chirk at El Paso.—Boston 
Post, September 5. 

CHARGES WITHOUT APPARENT 
FOUNDATION. 

Lucius B. Stoi/t, Esq., Indianapolis, Ind.: 

Dear Sir ; I received your letter enclosing 
the following cutting from the Brookinlle 
American of .July 25, it being a quotation from 
the Delphi Journal: 

The circumstances surrounding the cases of the 
two democrats from this city who have been ap¬ 
pointed under this so-called civil service law since 
the Cleveland administration turned up its toes to 
the daisies, bear some very suspicious marks of favor¬ 
itism. In each of these cases a civil service exami¬ 
nation was passed, butit was amere excuse, for “ the 
pull ” of a friend did the rest. Let the average re¬ 
publican worker ask for a place, and his qualifica¬ 
tions and recommendations are consigned to the im¬ 
penetrable gloom of the civil service lists. But the 
democrats from this county are more fortunate. 
The examination is pas.sed, and ‘‘ a friend ” who has 
influence at court steps up and “fixes” the whole 
thing, and the appointment is made. And this dem¬ 
onstrates that this civil service business is hypocrit¬ 
ical and fraudulent: sort of a family affair, a chan¬ 
nel by which particular pets and favorites, democrats 
who have a “ pull,” float gracefully into the prom¬ 
ised land, while the ordinary republican eats grass 
in the fence corner. 

The article asserts that under the present 
administration there have been two, and but 
two, appointments from Delphi,Carroll county, 


and practically states that the civil service ex¬ 
aminations under which these candidates were 
appointed were fraudulent. This last state¬ 
ment is simply and purely a baseless slander. 
During the time of my service as commis¬ 
sioner, that is, during the last two years and 
a half, there have been, as far as our records 
show, but two appointments from Carroll 
county, and these, I presume, are the two ap¬ 
pointments referred to. One was that of Clay 
M. McClure, who was appointed as a junior 
draughtsman in the supervising architect’s of¬ 
fice of the treasury department on March 19 
last. The other was that of Mrs. Rachel A. 
Crawford, who was appointed a book-keeper in 
the treasury department on July 1 last. 

Mrs. Crawford passed the difficult book¬ 
keeper’s examination with an average of 87 
per cent. At the time of her appointment, 
she was the highest on the woman’s register, 
and, more than that, her average was higher 
than that of any other person on the same reg¬ 
ister for the last four years. 

Mr. McClure passed the much more difficult 
and highly technical junior draughtsman ex¬ 
amination with what is for that examination 
the good average of 75 per cent. At the time 
of his appointment there were a number of 
men on the draughtsman register. Every one 
of these who stood above him was appointed 
before he was, with one exception, the excep¬ 
tion being that of a man who was already in 
the treasury department in another capacity, 
and who had previously been in the supervis¬ 
ing architect’s office, as I am informed. It is 
presumed, therefore, that for some reason that 
office did not wish him back. 

The examination papers of both Mr. Mc¬ 
Clure and Mrs. Crawford are on file in our 
office and can be examined at once by any re¬ 
sponsible person. If the editor of the Delphi 
Jotirnal or the Brookville American or any one 
else can make out the slightest prima facie 
case of fraud in either the examination or 
the marking or the grading or the certifica¬ 
tion or the final appointment of these two can¬ 
didates, not only will the commission imme¬ 
diately investigate the matter, but will also 
call for its investigation by the secretary of 
the treasury, and at the investigation made by 
the commission the gentlemen making the 
charge of fraud can themselves be present, 
either personally or by representatives, and 
can examine all the books of the commission, 
as well as the two candidates themselves. 

To advance a charge of fraud, without also 
showing a sound basis of justification for it, is 
to commit an act no less cowardly than infa¬ 
mous. It seems to me that the article in the 
Delphi Journal, quoted in the Brookville Ameri¬ 
can, is itself good evidence of how faithfully 
the law is being observed. It shows, assuming 
that its statements as to the politics of the two 
persons appointed are true, that democrats 
have precisely as good a chance as republi¬ 
cans under the law, and that no amount of 
“pull” will help a man if he is unable to win 
his place honestly and fairly on his own mer¬ 
its. The Delphi Journal has unwittingly paid 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


267 


a compliment of the highest character to the 
law and its administration, and as a strong 
republican I feel particularly pleased at the 
evidence thus unconsciously given to the effect 
that in the administration of the civil service 
law the republican party is keeping the pledge 
of the national platform. 

Very respectfully, 

Theodore Roosevelt. 

Washington, D. C. 


THE BALTIMORE INVESTIGATION. 


Noah W. Pierson testified as follows: 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) State your full name, Mr. Pier¬ 
son. A. Noah W. Pierson. 

Q. What is your position in the post-office? A. I 
am assistant engineer. 

Q. How long have you been in the service? A. I 
have been here about a year and two months. 

Q. Appointed by Postmaster Johnson? A. Ap¬ 
pointed by the custodian. 

Q. By Mr. Johnson as custodian of the office? A. 
Yes, sir. 

Q. Mr. Pierson, understand that there is nothing 
affecting you at all in any question we put to you ; it 
doesn’t affect you in the least as far as we now know; 
it is simply a matter of observation of the law in cer¬ 
tain particulars by others, not by you. Do you know 
anything of the collection or contribution of any 
funds for political purposes at this time? A. No, sir. 

Q. Do you know anything about the collection of 
8.5 apiece, or the attempted collection of 85 apiece 
from a number of employes of the post-office, or 
of the postmasteras custodian, for primary purposes? 
A. No, sir. 

Q. You have never known of any that you know 
anything about? A. No, sir. 

Q. Y’ou don’t know of anyone having paid any 
sum or having been asked to pay any sum for po¬ 
litical purposes recently? A. No, sir. 

Q. And specifically with reference to the primaries 
on Monday next? A. No, sir; I don’t know anything 
about it. 

Q. You know nothing about it at all? A. No, sir. 

Q And you have never been approached by any¬ 
one who asked you if such and such a man had paid? 
A. No, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) You understand that neither 
Mr. Roosevelt nor I know anything about this mat¬ 
ter, except that certain reports have been brought 
him, and he asked me as president of the local civil 
service reform association to comedown here and a.s- 
sist him in the investigation of them. Now, has any 
officer in this building, either under the postmaster 
as custodian or the postmaster as postmaster asked 
you whether anybody else had contributed to the 
primaries? 

Witness. These primaries coming? 

Mr. Bonaparte. Y’es, sir. 

A. No, sir. 

Q. Well, having inquired of you, has anybody in 
the service inquired of you whether some one else 
had contributed in any way to any fund to be used 
in this republican contest? A. No, sir, 

Q. Now supposing some officer here has reported 
that you had told him that other officers in the 
building had contributed to this, that officer has not 
told the truth then ? A. No, sir; the man that re¬ 
ported that didn’t tell the truth. 

Q. Have you collected any money from any one 
else yourself for these primaries? A. No, sir. 

Q. Have you told any one, any officer in the build¬ 
ing here, that you had collected any money? A. 
No, sir. This is unexpected to me, you know, gen¬ 
tlemen, and I am answering right off. Of course, I 
haven’t had any time to think, you know. 

•■i. Of course, we understand that, and we would 
like you to think pretty carefully, because we don’t 
want to do anybody any injustice. A. No, sir. 

tj. Think carefully if you have been approached 
by any officer employed in this building with the 
inquiry as to whether anybody else had contributed 


to the primaries, or to anything of that sort? A. 
Not to my knowledge; I can’t call any to mind just 
now. 

Q. Has anybody connected with the building, or 
having an office in this building, asked you whether 
you yourself had contributed or whether you had 
collected contributions? A. No, sir. 

Q. And you are quite positive you have never told 
any one anything from which they could understand 
that you were collecting contributions? A. Yes, sir; 
I am positive that I have never told any one that I 
was collecting contributions; I don’t know any¬ 
thing about it. 

Q. And that you never told any one connected 
with the service in any way that anybody else con¬ 
nected with it was contributing? A. No, sir. 

Q. So that if any officer in this building has made 
a report to Mr. Roosevelt to the effect that certain 
other officers were collecting contributions or pro¬ 
moting their collections, and that they knew some¬ 
thing about it, that officer has not told the truth? 
A. Well, of course, I don’t want to say that he didn’t 
tell the truth; he might be mistaken. 

Q. I mean, that it wasn’t so? A. It wasn’t so if he 
made a report of it; yes, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Are you a republican in poli¬ 
tics? A. I am ; yes, sir. 

Q. And actively identified with the republican 
party ? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Identified with one of the organizations here 
in the city, a republican organization or a republi¬ 
can club, or whatever you choose to call them? A. 
Yes, sir; 1 belong to one of the repulican clubs. 

Q. What republican club are you a member of? 
A. The Active Club, they call it. It is down in the 
First ward ? it is a ward organization. 

Q. Are there going to be primary elections next 
Monday? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is there going to be a contest between two re¬ 
publican factions? A. Well it looks that way, sir. 

Q. It looks that way. Do you take an active part 
in this contest or not? A. Well,no; I don’t think it 
is my place to take an active part. 

Q. You don’t think it is the place of any govern¬ 
ment employe to take an active parj: is that your 
idea? A. No, sir. I think it is his place to go and 
vote his sentiments and then go away. 

Q. But you don’t think it is the place of any gov¬ 
ernment employe to stand around the polls and 
work for one faction or the other; hold tickets and 
so fourth? A. No, sir. I don’t think there is any¬ 
thing like that going on there. 

Q. Precisely. Do you know if the post-office em¬ 
ployes, as a whole, sympathize with one or the other 
of these factions? A. I don’t know. 

Q. Or are they divided? A. Well, from rumors; 
that is all I can go by. 

Q. Certainly. It is simply a matter of common 
notoriety. What do you hear? A. There seems to 
be a little difference of opinion. 

Q. Well, are there two factions in the republican 
party here in Baltimore that are going to contest in 
the primaries on Monday ? A. Not that 1 know of, 
sir. 

Q. What will the fight be on ? A. The fight will 
be* this : These people in our ward—I only take my 
ward for instance—they want to send one delegate 
to the convention, and the men that I favor on, they 
want to send another, that is the sum total. 

G. But what are the difference between the two 
factions; is one of the factions identified with Post¬ 
master Johnson ? A. Well, not that I know of. 

Q. Not that you know of? A. No, sir; I don’t 
know anything about that. 

<-.<><■ >;< # # 

AFTERNOON. 

Noah W. Pierson, recalled. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) We want to be clear in order 
that we don’t do anybody any injustice in this mat¬ 
ter. Do I recollect you to have testified this morn¬ 
ing that you didn’t have any conversation with any¬ 
body on the subject of the payments of assessments 
of employes here? I don’t mean to use that term ; I 
should say contribuiions towards the expensesof the 
primaries. 

Witness. How is that? 


Q. Didn’t you tell us this morning that you hadn’t 
had any conversation with anybody on the subject 
of the payment of contributions by any employe of 
the post-office? A. Y’es, sir. 

Q. That you didn’t have any conversation with 
John F. Thomas? I think we asked you that partic¬ 
ularly? A. No, sir; you didn’t ask me that. 

Q. Well, I will ask you now. Did you have any 
conversation with Mr. John F. Thomas, the superin¬ 
tendent of the registry division about that? 

Witness. What do yoai mean? 

Mr. Bonaparte. About certain employes of the 
post-office giving money for the expenses of the pri¬ 
maries? 

A. Well, I was talking to Mr. Thonas, and Mr. 
Thomas told me that Mr. Hammond had told him 
that Ashton had given me 85 for the primaries. 

Q. That Ashton gave you 85 for the primaries? 
Well, now, what more passed between Mr. Thomas 
and yourself? A. Mr. Thomas told me to go down 
and see Mr. Ashton and ask him for that money he 
promised to pay. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Mr. Thomas told you to go 
down and see Mr. Ashton and ask him for the 
money? A. That was after we had the conversation. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Did you go? A. I went down 
and asked Mr. Ashton if he had ever given me any 
money for the primaries, and he said, no. 

^ ^ ^ 

James Wilson, colored, testified as follows: 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) What is your position ? A. I 
am a laborer. 

Q. Under Postmaster Johnson as custodian of the 
post-office building? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been so employed? A. I 
have been here about six months. 

Q. Were you appointed by Postmaster Johnson ? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you know Mr. C. B. Johnson, of South Beth¬ 
el street? A. No, sir; I don’t know him. 

Q. Or Mr. R. H. Harris, of 314 South Caroline street? 
A. Yes, sir; now I know who you mean by C. H. 
Johnson. 

Q. Then you know C. H. Johnson, of South Bethel 
street, and R. H. Harris, of South Caroline street? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do both of these gentlemen take a more or less 
active interest in local politics? A Yes, sir; they 
have in the last primary. 

Q. They live in the third ward? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. There are going to be primary elections next 
Monday, are there not? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is there going to be a contest in the primaries? 
A. Yes, sir; I judge so, from the looks of things. 
There is one polling place. 

Q. There is going to be a contest in the primaries 
then ? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Of course I am speaking of the republican par¬ 
ty ; you are a republican yourself, are you ? A. Yes, 
sir. 

Q. Are you a member of any republican organiza¬ 
tion ? A. I am of the district association, yes, sir. 

Q. Well, in the third ward there seems likely to be 
a contest? A. They appear to seem like it; yes, sir. 

Q. Acting under that committee? A. Yes, sir. It 
seems like the colored element goes with Mr. John¬ 
son. 

Q. Well, go on. A. And the principal part of the 
other element,which is called the Henderson faction, 
arc taking their hands off. 

Q. There are two factions here? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. One called the Johnson faction? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And the other called the Henderson faction? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And the fight on Mohday next is going to be be¬ 
tween these two factions? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And the Johnson faction has for its heads Post¬ 
master Johnson and Marshal Airey? A. Y'es, sir. 

Q. Well, does the fight bid fair to be a pretty bitter 
one next Monday? A. It seems so. 

Q. At one time in the third ward it looked as if 
the colored element was going to be against the 
Johnson faction? A. Not the majority of them, but 
a portion of them. 

Q. A portion of them? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. But now that has been gotten right, and it looks 









268 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


as if they would all go for the postmaster? (i. Yes, 
sir. 

Q. At one time were these two men, C. H. Johnson 
and R. II. Harris, going to go on the ticket opposed 
to the postmaster? A. I don’t know whether they 
were going to go on the ticket or not. 

(-1. Hut they were going to oppose him? A. Yes, 
sir; they were the head parties. 

Q. Of the opposition to him? A. Yes, sir; among 
the Colored? 

Q. Well, I suppose you are- friendly to Postmaster 
Johnson? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And you went to Mr. C. H. Johnson and Mr. R. 
H Harris and asked them to come up here and see 
the postmaster? A. I asked them to come up and 
sec Dr. Weaver. 

(i- Did you take them up here yourself? A. They 
didn't come at all. 

Q. You simply asked them to come and they 
didn’t come? A. Yes, sir; that is right. 

Q. Did they see Postmaster Johnson at all or any¬ 
one coon cted with the ottice then? A. No, sir. 

Q. Then they just changed of their o(vn accord? 
A. Yes, sir; through me. 

il. You persuaded them to change? A. Yes, sir. 

(i (Mr. Bonaparte.) Who is this Dr. Weaver that 
you asked them to come and see? A. He is the as¬ 
sistant custodian. 

Q. Of this building? A. Yes, sir. 

t). And this Mr. Johnson is a cousin of his, this 
Mr. C. H. Johnson ? A. Yes, sir. 

ti. (Mr. Roosevelt.) And Dr. Weaver is a colored 
man, the assistant custodian ? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) And you asked him to come 
up and have a talk with his cousin, but he didn’t 
come. A. He didn’t come. 

() Do you feel pretty sure that he didn’t see any¬ 
body connected with the oflice ? A. Pretty sure, sir; 
I can tell you the reason why; these gentlemen are 
all friends of mine. 

Q. That is what we understand. A. Yes, sir; they 
are all friends of mine; and, well, a gentleman by 
the name of Jacob H. Seaton is in our ward, a col¬ 
ored gentleman, a leader, gentlemen, he is down 
there, and him and I got to talking to these gentle¬ 
men, and he showed them where it was to my inter¬ 
est to fight for this faction. 

ti (Mr. Roosevelt.) To your interest? A. Yes, 
sir. 

(). The leader of the ward showed Messrs. John¬ 
son and Harris where it was for your interest that 
they should fight for this faction? A. Yes, sir; that 
they should fight for this faction. 

Q. For fear it would jeopardize your position here? 
A. Yes, sir; certainly. He told them it was to my 
interest to vote this way, and as they were friends of 
mine they said they were willing to support people 
that had supported the colored people, and that Mr. 
Johnson done that, but they didn’t say they were 
going to vote that way, but they would take their 
hands olT for my benefit. 

t). For your benefit? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) When you say they took their 
hands olf you mean that they were thinking of run¬ 
ning as delegates on the other side? A. I know they 
was with the other faction at the last primary elec¬ 
tion. 

H. (Mr. Roosevelt.) They were the leaders on the 
Henderson side, and it being shown to them that it 
would be to your interest to cease their opposition 
to the Johnson faction they agreed to do so? A. 
Yes, sir; they agreed to do so. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Were you present when Mr. 
Seaton had this talk with them? A. We had a ward 
meeting. 

Q. .\ud Mr. Seaton explained the matter? A. Yes, 
sir; Mr. Seaton explained the matter in the meeting. 

(.1. When was that ward meeting? A. That was 
last Monday night. 

Q. Can you recollect in general terms what Seaton 
said theu? A. No, I don’t recollect everything he 
said, but he explained the situation, and explained 
my situation, and how my appointment was made, 
and all. 

Q. (Mr. R'oscvelt.) How is your appohitmcnt 
made? A. Well, my appointment was made through 


the people in my ward. I was a favorite with the 
people, with both sides; both factions favored me. 

Q. Both the Henderson and the Johnson people? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And the Henderson and the Johnson leaders 
recommended your appointment? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And you were appointed on the recommenda¬ 
tion of the colored republican element of your ward? 
A. Yes, sir; the colored element in that ward. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) You are pretty sure then that 
this explanation of Mr. Seaton to these friends of 
yours, Mr. Johnson and Mr. Harris, was the cause of 
their going out of this contest? A. Here’s what the 
gentlemen said to me; I have been friendly with all 
of them ever since I have been there at work, and I 
was trying to persuade these gentlemen, as they said 
they were favorite to me and wanted me to have the 
appointment, both sides of the question, and ever 
since I liave been here I have been urging them to 
support me, because I didn’t want no split in our 
ward. 

Q. You didn’t? A. No, sir. Until last fall it 
seems as if this Mr. Baumgartner down there, the 
state central committee man, he has been kicking 
down there for quite a while. Well, he goes around 
and get a lot of the colored young men down there— 
lots of them had been voting the democratic ticket— 
and he calls a meeting, and at this meeting he in¬ 
vites these gentlemen, this Mr. Harris and Mr. John¬ 
son, they came around there and got into this meet¬ 
ing ; they heard it was going to be and they went 
there and captured the meeting, and they made the 
leading people in it. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Was this a Henderson meeting? 
A. Yes, sir; well Henderson started it. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) You say ever since you have 
been employed here you have been urging them to 
support you? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Well, there was, I suppose, some money collec¬ 
ted for the primaries? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Had this Mr. Seaton had anything to do with 
the collecting it? A. No, sir. 

Q. Had either of these other two anything to do 
with it? A. Harris and Johnson? No, sir; they 
had nothing to do with it. 

Q. Nothing at all? A. No, sir. 

Q. Now have you any idea who did contribu te to the 
expenses down there? A. Well, there is some gent e- 
men who was office-holders. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt). Certainly; the office-holder,-? 
A. Yes, sir; we had a meeting to ourselves, you un¬ 
derstand. 

Q. The office-holders had a meeting themselves to 
contribute? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte). Now, were Mr. Harris or Mr. 
Johnson present at that meeting? A No, sir. 

Q. Was this confined to the office holders; wasany- 
body else there except people who were in office? 
A. That was all. 

Q. About how many of you were there? A. There 
was about 7 of us. 

Q. About 7 office-holders; there are that many in 
this ward? A. Oh, my; there is 14. 

Q. The other 7 didn’t come? A. No, sir; tli^y 
wasn’t there; I think they sent the money. 

Q. Do you know who they sent it to? A. Well, we 
made a treasurer, you know, amongst ourselves; in 
fact, gave it to one gentleman to keep the money. 

Q. All of these people who attended the meeting 
gave it to one of themselves, one of their own num¬ 
ber? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You are pretty sure they didn’t give it to either 
Mr. Harris or Mr. Johnson? A. No, sir. 

Q. Who was it they gave it to? A. A gentleman 
by the name of Mr. Martin. 

Q. Is he a colored man ? A. No, sir; he is a while 
man. 

Q Is he employed in this building? A. I think 
he is; yes, sir. 

l). In whai capaeitj ? A. 1 think he is a lellerear- 
1 Her; 1 think he is. 

I Q. From what ward ; the third ward ? A. Yes, sir; 

I the third ward. 

<4- Mow, you are pretty cerlnin that neither Mr. 
j Harris nor Mr. John-on or tlii.-old gcuileuiiiu, Mr. 


Seaton, had nothing to do with collecting any 
money? A. Nothing at all; no, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) What is the first name of Mr. 
Martin? A. Henry Martin, I think. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) He is a letter carrier from the 
third ward? A. Y'es, sir. 

Q. Do yon recollect when this meeting was held? 
A. I think it was last Saturday a week. 

<>>;!«! >;• <•>>■> 

Q. And when you had agreed among yourselves 
what you ought to give on that occasion, you gave it 
to one of your own number, and not to an outsider? 
A. Y'es, sir, one of our own number. 

Q. You are pretty sure of that? A. Y’es, sir, pretty 
sure. 

Q. Now you are pretty certain that none of the 
office-holders from the third ward, so far as you 
know of, gave 85 apiece to any outsider? A. No, sir; 
I am pretty sure of that. 

Q. Was $5 the amount they were each to give ? A. 
That was it; yes, sir. 

Q. You have already answered it two or three 
times, but I will ask you the question again; you 
are quite sure that neither Mr. Harris nor Mr. John¬ 
son had anything to do with getting 85 for any¬ 
body? A. No, sir; I don’t believe they would ac¬ 
cept 8100 if it were oflered to them by any one. 

Q. This money that you raised in that way, it 
wasn’t intended to buy votes with, was it? A. No, 
sir; it was just spread in the ward to pay ticket- 
holders. 

Q, And to have tickets printed and so forth. I 
judge? A. Yes. sir. 

Q. And for what other expenses was it? A. That 
is the only expenses; printing tickets and ticket- 
holders. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) What are the ticket-holders? 
A. They get 8J apiece. 

Q Y’ou pay the ticket-holders? A. Yes, sir; for 
working, helping to poll the vole. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Was either of these men^ 
Johnson or Harris, employed as a ticket-holder, do 
you remember; are they going to be employed as 
ticket holders? A. No, sir, they are not. 

Q. Tiie ticket-holders you have, I suppose, will be¬ 
long to your faction ? A. Seme of them have voted 
with ihe others in the last primary. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) But they will vole with you 
now ? A. Yes, sir; they come of their own consent- 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) And this money which you 
raised was raised from among the office-holders? A. 
Yes. sir. 

(1. And it was given to one of your own number, 
and it was intended to be used in the regular ex 
p n-i-s of the j.rimary? A. Yes, sir. 

(). Now we want to get this pretty straight, so that 
we ( an bring it back on the person who is guilty. 
You didn’t give your 85 to Mr. Johnson or Mr. Har. 
ris, that you say positively ? A. No, sir. 

Q. You did give it to Mr. Henry Martin? A. Yes, 
sir, one of our number. 

ti. Now you say there was a man connected with 
the elevator; what is his name ? A. His name is 
Mr. Mitchell. 

Q. You don’t know his first name? A. No, sir. 

Q (Mr. Roosevelt.) Is he a white man or a colored 
man? A. He is a while man. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Did you see him pay his 
money? A. No, sir; I didn’tsee him pay his; he 
told me he gave it to this Mr. Martin. 

Q. You have no doubt about him telling you the 
truth about that? A. Well, he showed me 85 one 
night, and the next morning he told me he gave it 
to Mr. Martin. You see we didn’t give the money 
the first lime we had a meeting. 

t). You didn’t? A. No, sir; that was afterwards. 
.Some of them were willing togive it then and didn’t 
give it. Of course I didn’t have mine at that lime. 

(-1 Do you recollect who were willing to give it at 
that lime? A. I don’t think any one gave it, but we 
all agreed upon it. 

i). And now you have given us your name and 
Mr. Mitchell’s, the elevator man, and you have men¬ 
tioned one or two others. You mentioned the name 
of Mr. Glass? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What was his first name? A. 1 think his name 
was Mr. Harry Glass. 

<i. He is a letter carrier? A. Yes, sir. 

(). Have you any reason to know he gave his 
money to Mr. Martin, or gave it to somebody else? 

1 A. He told me ho gave il to Mr. Mai tin. 






The Civil service chronicle. 


. VoL. I, No. 32. INDIANAPOLIS, OCTOBER, 1891. terms : ^ fcenu^er^opy"”’ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 
Indianapolis, Ind. 


I The genesis of the mugwump is that he 
first becomes better than his party, and 
next better than his country. The teach¬ 
ings of the mugwumps for the past five or 
six years have been for the purpose and to 
the result of stifling enthusiasm and en¬ 
couraging indifference. We want to re¬ 
move this sort of dry rot, and bring repub¬ 
licanism back to its old-time force of warm 
blood, fearlessness and uncompromising 
courage, and to educate every young man 
in the land that next to being an American, 
the greatest badge of honor he can wear is 
membership in the republican party.— From 
Clarkson's Letter for the Dinner of Quay’s Americus 
Club. 


At the meeting held at the opening of 
the recent city campaign to ratify the nom¬ 
ination of the republican candidate, Mr. 
Herod, he being present, ex-Mayor Gale 
Denny expressed his heartfelt gratification 
that there were “ no mugwumps in this 
campaign,” There were none on that side. 
The republican side was under the blatant 
control of the hustlers who removed Chief 
Webster from the head of the fire depart¬ 
ment in 1889 because he would not turn out 
some dozen democrats,out of eighty-two em¬ 
ployes, to make room for republican hench¬ 
men, a full account of which was given in 
the Chronicle for April, 1889. Joined 
with these were the tinhorn-Farwell club 
crowd who, it will be remembered, were a 
club of “ workers ” formed mainly to work 
for federal spoil then being distributed. It 
first called itself the tinhorn club, but it 
got no spoil, and being unable to pay its 
rent, it- moved from large quarters on a 
fine street into small ones on a back street, 
when it changed its name to the Farwell 
club, in honor of Senator Farwell as “ the 
only man who has the sand to oppose civil 
service.” Farwell refused the honor, and 
the club went to pieces, its effects being 
sold for a few dollars. This aggregation of 
boys had a candidate who openly declared 
himself one of them. Office-holder Harry 
McFarland, who has a place in the govern¬ 
ment printing office to pay him for work 
among the worser elements in 1888, came 
weeks ago from Washington and took up 
his work. Office holder A. D. Shaw, who 
was paid with an office for work among 


railroad men in 1888, was brought here 
and again set to work. In the middle of 
the campaign Sim Coy left the democrats 
and went over to the republican machine. 


This hungry and bawling crowd at 
once caught the eye of the independent 
voter, and he instantly comprehended that 
rarely could so many vicious elements be 
balloted under foot in a single day, and 
rarely has the independent done his work 
with greater relish. He had also to justify 
him, the fact that in the main, the present 
administration had been a good one for 
the city, and this was particularly true of 
the board of public works and the control¬ 
ler. Mayor Sullivan, whose re-election 
was sought, had been elected two years 
previous by 1,700 majority admittedly se¬ 
cured by independent votes. October 13, 
his re-election followed by 2,700 majority. 
This was because the best citizens of Indi¬ 
anapolis refused to be bound by party ties. 
The times have happily changed here. 
The Indianapolis Sentinel is not the old 
Sentinel. It is a strong, fearless paper, that 
wants good government and pays regard 
to the ties of honesty as well as the ties of 
party. There is beyond question, a very 
large independent vote here. For the de¬ 
velopment of this fortunate condition, for 
any community, the first credit must be 
given to the Indianapolis News. 

The annual meeting of the National 
League, at Buffalo, September 29 and 30, 
was in many respects the most successful 
ever held. Buffalo was a congenial place,and 
her civil service reformers in great num¬ 
bers, after their many victories securing a 
complete enforcement of both federal and 
state laws, held their heads high. Else¬ 
where are given the tenth annual address 
of Mr, Curtis and the paper by Sherman 
S, Rogers. Mr. Foulke’s paper opposing 
secret sessions of the senate is excellent, 
and Moorfield Storey’s paper on the sepa¬ 
ration of municipal government from pol¬ 
itics, is a real contribution to the cause of 
reform. 

The annual meeting closed with a din¬ 
ner, at which Sherman S. Rogers, pre¬ 
sided, and the speakers were George Wil¬ 
liam Curtis, Charles J. Bonaparte, Lucius 
B, Swift, Edward Cary, William D, Foulke, 
Everett P. Wheeler, Theodore Bacon and 
E. C. Sprague. 


For want of space The Civil Service 
Chronicle has to omit, this month, the 
papers of Mr, Storey and Mr. Foulke, read 
at the league meeting at Buffalo, the re¬ 
port of the special committee on the cen¬ 
sus, and to limit the current facts mainly 
to the assessment circulars and to the ac¬ 
tivity of office-holders. 


Should the President seize upon the 
military and naval services and use them 
as he does the civil service for his renom¬ 
ination, he would have a corps of men in 
uniform. At primaries, at conventions, 
at the business of hustling voters, running 
over the country, laying pipes and the 
thousand other odd jobs, they would be 
conspicuous objects, and the people would 
be greatly interested to watch them at 
work. Now let the President put his civil 
service into uniform. Let us see Col. 
Archie Baxter as he journeys over New 
York state with Fassett, in uniform, and 
Postmaster Van Cott and Collectors Hen¬ 
dricks and Beard and a host of others. Of 
course, such as these should be distin¬ 
guished by certain marks and extra em¬ 
bellishments as officers. It is probably 
a moderate estimate to say that the Presi¬ 
dent has now 75,000 employes paid by the 
whole people and supposed to be giving 
their entire energies to the service of 
those who pay them, as busy as bees in his 
own private interest, or to put it less baldly 
but what really amounts to the same 
thing, at work for the republican machine. 

We take the liberty to suggest that the 
color of the new uniform for the civil 
service should be red. Red has recently 
been adopted as the official color of letter 
boxes for the excellent reason that it shows 
well at long distances, and that is precisely 
what we want of the civil service as it la¬ 
bors for bosses big and little. When Col. 
Baxter passes through the little towns and 
speaks at the car door for Fassett, if he is 
in a bright-red uniform he shows well 
down the street as a federal employe off 
junketing. So with these different post¬ 
masters who have held conventions, their 
red uniform is a constant reminder that 
their living is furnished by general taxa¬ 
tion, while they are using their time and 
official position to carry out the orders of 
a Quay or Platt or lieutenants of those 
worthies. 





















270 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


QUAY. 

Quay is having much to disturb him in Penn¬ 
sylvania. The investigations into the rotten¬ 
ness of the recent scandals bid fair not to be 
stifled after all. Governor Pattison’s procla¬ 
mation for an extra session of the senate has 
obliged Quay to summon his henchmen, 
Marshal Leeds, Collector Cooper, Controller 
of the Treasury Gilkeson, Collector Warm- 
castle, Assistant Postmaster Hughes and others 
to meet the situation. 

The Public Ledger has at last brought its 
great influence for reform: 

It is indispensibly necessary that the “spoils” 
system shall be struck by a crushing defeat in Penn¬ 
sylvania. It is for the voters of the state now to, 
judge—now that the issue is joined as to the deliv¬ 
erances in the resolutions of both conventions— 
which party and which nominees are most likely to 
strike the blow that will defeat and stamp oui the 
system. 

The North American, which calls itself the 
oldest daily paper in America, being in its one 
hundred and seventh year and the stanchest 
of republican papers, says : 

“ Fidelity to party is played out as a battle cry to 
lead the hosts of republicans across fields where they 
may be unwilling to tread.” « 

“ But in the republican party itself there is a dis¬ 
content more dangerous than any attack from out¬ 
side. It is in our own ranks that we best know the 
burden we have borne. It is not reasonable to sup¬ 
pose that it has been borne willingly, and to day no 
man’s individual excellence is enough to insure him 
from defeat at the polls if it is the belief of the re¬ 
publicans who dislike and despise the demoraliza¬ 
tion which has touched the public service that the 
so-called leaders who have caused it may be over¬ 
thrown by the revolt of the ballot.” 

For almost the first time the men who have 
for years been striving to break down the boss 
system in Pennsylvania now find papers that 
will print the facts of their efforts. The re¬ 
publican movement against the leadership of 
Quay is growing. An address has just been 
issued, signed by 322 prominent republicans, 
for a meeting to organize. This address says; 

“ The object of those who have signed this address 
is to secure the recognition of common honesty and 
the establishment of sound political methods in the 
management of the afTairs of this commonwealth, 
and to restore Pennsylvania to her original position 
of honor among the states of the Union. To accom¬ 
plish this end, and as a natural outgrowth of the pro¬ 
test, an organization will be formed to break the 
power of spoils politics in this state, and to obtain a 
fitting representative of Pennsylvania’s interests in 
the senate of the United States upon the termination 
of the incumbency of Senator M. S. Quay. ’ 

While Quay’s enemies are rising up about 
him and party shackles have so loosened that 
the freedom of the press seems to be at hand, 
his friend and ally, William H. Kemble, sud¬ 
denly dies. The following is from the New 
York Times; 

The incident in the life of Mr. Kemble that 
brought him notoriously to the attention of the peo¬ 
ple of the state, was his famous letter to Titian J. 
Coffey of Washington, D. C. George O. Evans, in his 
capacity as fiscal agent of Pennsylvania, was com- 
misssioned to collect a claim from the government 
to reimburse Pennsylvania forcertain bounty money 
that had been allowed to the state’s account. The 
famous letter from Kemble read: 

“ My Dear Titian: This will introduce to you 
Mr. George O. Evans, who has a claim of some mag¬ 


nitude against the government. Treat him as you 
would me. He understands addition, division and 
silence.” 

It was a matter of some years before this remark¬ 
able correspondence, introducing Evans came to 
light. In the year 1878 Mr. Kemble was convicted in 
the ccuirts of Dauphin county, Penn., at Harrisburg, 
of bribing members of the Legislature to vote for the 
famous riot bill, which would have taken about 
$3,000,000 from the state for the benefit of the Penn¬ 
sylvania Railroad Company. Every effort was made 
to obtain a pardon for him before the case came to 
trial. Finding that this could not be done, Kemble 
fled the state. After he had been sentenced he was 
promptly pardoned. Mr. Quay was a member of the 
board of pardons and was the leading spirit that 
brought about Mr. Kemble’s pardon. 


TEN YEARS OF REFORM. 

[An address by George William Curtis at the annual 

meeting of the National Civil Service Reform 

League, at Buffalo, Sept. 29,1891.1 

When the distinguished president of the 
Buffalo Association invited the National 
League to hold its annual meeting in this city, 
we were sure, in accepting the invitation, 
not only of a generous and hospitable wel¬ 
come, but we knew that we were coming to 
one of the holy cities of the reform faith. In 
the revolutionary army every state watched 
with profound interest the conduct of its own 
soldiers, and those states to-day still cherish 
with pride and gratitude the story of the deeds 
of the New York line, the Massachusetts line, 
the Virginia line, all of them uniting in the 
final triumph of the whole American line. 
So in our contest for reform, the contest for 
honest government by the people and not by 
the pensioned politicians, the BuflTalo line has 
been always at the front, and to the convic¬ 
tion, the constancy and the courage of that 
line, some of the noblest victories of the good 
cause are due. It is especially pleasant, 
therefore, that we should assemble in BufiPalo 
for our tenth annual meeting, not only-to re¬ 
new the pledge of our fidelity to reform, but 
to exchange congratulations upon its achieve¬ 
ments and progress. 

The formation of the League was not, as 
sometimes has been pleasantly represented, a 
whim of amiable gentlemen who had a fancy 
for new fashions in politics, for spinning 
moonbeams and dipping water in a sieve. 
The spirit of reform is the instinct of order 
and progress and as old as government. It is 
the creative instinct moving upon the face of 
the waters. When the republican platform 
of 1884, reaffirmed in 1888, spoke of the dan¬ 
gers to free institutions which lurk in the 
power of official patronage, it did not an¬ 
nounce a new discovery; it merely stated a 
historical fact. In the famous declaration of 
1688, which, after consultation with his En¬ 
glish advisers, William the Third issued upon 
embarking for England, he mentioned as the 
sixth among the thirteen particulars in which 
the laws of England had been set at naught 
by the dethroned dynasty, the interference 
with elections by turning out of all employ¬ 
ment such as refused to vote as they were re¬ 
quired; and in the declaration of rights 
drawn by Lord Summers with which the crown 


of England was offered to William and Mary, 
the seventh of the fourteen grievances men¬ 
tioned was the same violation of the freedom 
of elections by patronage. So early and so 
prominently in constitutional history was the 
evil of patronage denounced as a great public 
wrong and peril. 

A century later the evil instead of declining 
had grown to such strength that when the 
most ignoble of British ministers sought by 
the corruption of patronage to restore the su¬ 
premacy of the Crown, Edmund Burke raised 
his great voice in protest. Macaulay, in a 
famous passage, describes the excesses and the 
terror of this abuse in England, and Webster 
draws a similar picture of its ravages in this 
country. It was sixty years ago that he said, 
in arraigning the Jackson administration, 
“As far as I know there is no civilized coun¬ 
try on earth in which, on a change of rulers, 
there is such an inquisition for spoils as we 
have witnessed in this free republic.” The 
evil that both described was the baldest form 
of political corruption. It was making booty 
of the public service, and Marcy, who de¬ 
fended the outrage, justly described the serv¬ 
ice so seized as spoils. In one country the 
public patronage was a bribery fund to prop 
the crown, in the other, to help a party. In 
both it was organized corruption. 

It is not surprising that the passionate ar¬ 
dor of party spirit during a civil war which 
identified support of a party with the exist¬ 
ence of the government should have strength¬ 
ened the tradition that extreme partisanship 
is the rightful condition of public employ¬ 
ment, nor that the immense increase of 
such employment at the very time when 
this conviction was strongest should have 
developed at once and flagrantly the evils 
of an exclusively partisan civil service. 
The exaltation of patriotic feeling during the 
war is an inspiring recollection. But the reac¬ 
tion that always follows such exultation was not 
less signal, and corruption in our politics was 
never felt to be so general, so vast and pene¬ 
trating, as during the last quarter of a century. 
The formation of the League, therefore, did 
not announce the discovery of a new abuse, 
but the conviction of an old once was at once 
so deeply extended and so threatening as to 
demand constant exposure and resolute re¬ 
form. The story of the progress of ten years 
is the evidence of the scope of that conviction 
and of the awakening of public opinion. There 
is no better place for the retrospect than this 
entrenched reform camp of Buffalo, over 
which the flags of victory fly, and in which 
drums are beating for further advances and 
the final triumph. 

The National Civil Service Reform League 
was organized at Newport, R. I., on the 11th 
of August, 1881. It was the result of a con¬ 
ference among members of civil service reform 
associations that had spontaneously arisen in 
various parts of the country for the purpose of 
awakening public interest in the question, like 
the clubs of the Sons of Liberty among our 
fathers, and the anti-slavery societies among 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


271 


their children. The first act of the League was 
a resolution of hearty approval of the bill then 
pending in congress, known as the Pendleton 
bill. Within less than two years afterward 
the civil service law was passed in congress 
by a vote in the senate of 38 yeas to 5 
nays, 33 senators being absent, and in the 
house only a week later, by a vote of 155 
yeas to 47 nays, 87 members not voting. In 
the house the bill was put upon its passage 
at once, the speaker permitting only thirty 
minutes for debate. This swift enactment of 
a righteous law was due, undoubtedly, to the 
panic of the party of administration, a panic 
which saw in the disastrous result of the re¬ 
cent election a demand of the country for hon¬ 
est politics; and it was due also to the exult¬ 
ing belief of the party of opposition that the 
law would essentially weaken the dominant 
party by reducing its patronage. The sudden 
and overwhelming vote was that of a congress 
which probably had very little individual 
knowledge or conviction upon the subject. 
But the instinct in regard to intelligent pub¬ 
lic opinion was undoubtedly sure, and it is in¬ 
telligent public opinion which always com¬ 
mands the future. It is fear of the same right¬ 
eous sentiment, infinitely stronger than it was 
ten years ago, which to-day prevents the re¬ 
peal of the reform law. 

The passage of the law was the first great 
victory of the ten years of the reform move¬ 
ment. The second is the demonstration of the 
complete practicability of reform attested by 
the heads of the largest offices of administra¬ 
tion in the country. In the treasury and 
navy departments, the New York custom¬ 
house and post-office, and other important 
custom-houses and post-offices, without the 
least regard to the wishes or the wrath of 
that remarkable class of our fellow-citizens 
known as political bosses, it is conceded by 
officers, wholly beyond suspicion of party in¬ 
dependence, that in these chief branches of 
the public service reform is perfectly practi¬ 
cable and the reformed system a great public 
benefit. And, although as yet those offices 
are by no means thoroughly reorganized 
^upon reform principles, yet a quarter of the 
■whole number of places in the public service 
to which the reformed methods apply are now 
included within those methods. 

^ I say reformed methods and not principles, 
because the principle of reform is applicable 
to the entire public service. When under 
their oaths to discharge the duties of their 
offices to their best ability and with the divine 
aid, the President nominates and the senate 
confirms a member of the cabinet or a minis¬ 
ter to England, tbe collector of a port or a 
postmaster, both the President and the senate 
are morally bound to select the fittest agents 
for those high public trusts without regard to 
personal or party interests and with reference 
solely to the public welfare. For the public 
service is the service of the people. Its 
offices are not the perquisites of the chief 
magistrate to whom the people commit the 
appointment of persons to fill them. Nor are 


they the property of the constitutional ma¬ 
jority of the people which selects that magis¬ 
trate. The majority which selects him is 
simply the agency by which the whole people 
act, and in executing the trust of appointment 
to office, he is discharging a duty, not to a 
majority nor to a party, but to the whole peo¬ 
ple ; and in making the appointment he is 
morally bound to consider only qualification 
for the service and not agreement with the 
opinion of the majority upon subjects that do 
not affect the duties of the office. Undoubt¬ 
edly, our political system intends the action 
of the President to give effeet to the will of 
the majority in legislation. He officially con¬ 
firms the policy of the country as expressed in 
the election and declared by congress, a policy 
which varies with varying opinion. But 
whatever the changing policy, the actual trans¬ 
action of the public business under that policy 
is unchangeable. It demands only capacity, 
honesty, diligence, subordination. 

This is the principle of the constitution 
which nowhere recognizes party, but every¬ 
where contemplates the general welfare. It is 
the reasonable view of the nature of popular 
government. To admit the practical neces¬ 
sity of government by the majority is not to 
legitimate despotism, as to concede the neces¬ 
sity of government at all is not to justify the 
caprice of a tyrant. The majority, like the 
President, in the discharge of its function, is 
the subject of moral obligation. They are 
both bound to consult the general welfare 
If, for instance, a majority selects a President 
and a congress to promote a policy of protec¬ 
tion, the President and congress must show 
that the duties of postmaster in New York 
necessarily affect the execution of that policy, 
in order, morally, to justify the removal of a 
perfectly efficient and satisfactory officer, be¬ 
cause of his views of that policy. If the 
postmaster’s official duties are in no degree 
dependent upon his political views, his re¬ 
moval is as gross a public wrong and as great 
a violation of public principle and policy as 
Jackson’s despotic dismissal of his cabinet 
because the wives of the secretaries would not 
visit a woman whom Jackson favored. 

Ten years ago this truth was very indis¬ 
tinctly perceived. To-day it is a very general 
conviction. The entire practicability of re¬ 
form, that is to say, the practicability of 
retaining, with the greatest benefit to the 
public service and with no injury whatever to 
any part of our political system, public officers 
of proved and satisfactory ability, is the 
second great achievement of reform within 
ten years. 

Another happy advantage of the reform in 
this retrospect has been the character and ef¬ 
ficiency of the national civil service com¬ 
mission. The prosperity of the reformed 
system depended almost wholly in the begin¬ 
ning upon the sincerity, the special knowl¬ 
edge and the tenacity of those to whom was 
entrusted the duty of putting it into operation. 
To farm out the infant to an enemy would 
have been to smother it. It was easy for 


President Arthur, after he had approved the 
bill, to paralyze reform by the appointment of 
commissioners who had no faith in the law 
and no heart in its proper enforcement. But 
he honestly placed at the head of the commis¬ 
sion one of the most conspicuous, intelligent, 
and earnest friends of reform, who, at the in¬ 
vitation of President Hayes, had made a com¬ 
plete study upon the spot of the English sys¬ 
tem, and whose report is the most important 
contribution ever made to the literature of the 
subject; who had taken a leading part in the 
preparation of the reform law, and whose large 
familiarity with the question especially 
qualified him to organize the practical opera¬ 
tion of the law, Mr. Dorman B. Eaton. Cor¬ 
dially sustained by President Arthur in the 
novel and difficult work, Mr. Eaton and his 
colleagues laid the secure foundations upon 
which their successors have wrought in the 
same spirit. 

President Cleveland, to whose personal in¬ 
terest, while governor of New York, the pas¬ 
sage of the reform law in this state was chiefly 
due, had demonstrated the sincerity of his 
purpose by the appointment of a state civil 
service commission, whose personal character 
and ability and unswerving fidelity to the 
cause were not only the earnest of the honest 
observance of the law, but commended the 
reason and the essential value of reform to the 
sound judgment of the state. As President, 
Mr. Cleveland enlarged the range of the classi¬ 
fied service, revised and strengthened the rules 
of the commission and sustained it in the firm 
enforcement of the law. President Harrison’s 
selection of civil service commissioners, also, 
was in strict conformity to the spirit of the 
platform upon which he was elected, and to 
his own professions and pledges as a candi¬ 
date, and he also has extended somewhat the 
classified service. 

The enforcement of the law through the 
commission by the three Presidents who have 
served since its passage, has been honest and 
honorable. It is certain that neither of them 
has struck at reform by entrusting the execu¬ 
tion of the law to its enemies. They have not 
adopted, indeed, all the progressive recom¬ 
mendations of the commission, but political 
pressure for the practical betrayal of its work, 
or for the dismissal of any actively aggressive 
commissioner, has been manfully resisted by 
them. This is well done, for I can imagine a 
commissioner of so high a faith, so alert a 
mind, so aggressive a temperament, a public 
officer so impatient of humbug, lies and hy¬ 
pocrisy, and with so shrewd an eye to see and 
so sharp a sting to avenge even senatorial vio¬ 
lations and sneaking cabinet evasions of the 
law, that he must be as welcome to lofty 
official delinquents as a swarm of hornets to a 
crowd of Sunday-school boys on a high fence 
stealing peaches. I can imagine such sena¬ 
torial and cabinet delinquents seeking by the 
basest appeal to personal interest and partisan 
servility to persuade a President to dismiss 
such a commissioner; and such a commis. 
sioner I can imagine sometimes in great doubt 











272 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


whether he should long retain his official head 
but never in the least doubt that he should 
always retain both his personal and official 
honor. Such firm and self-respecting public 
officers dignify office and restore the public 
service to universal respect and confidence. 

I am speaking only of the fidelity of the 
three Presidents to the commission. The 
League has pronounced its judgment upon the 
conduct of each of the administrations since 
the passage of the law, in regard to civil serv¬ 
ice reform in general. It has tested them, as 
was its duty, by the principles and spirit of 
reform which apply to the entire exercise of 
the appointing power and to every branch of 
the government and which have been especial¬ 
ly approved by the platform of the present 
administration. The moral obligation of re¬ 
form, as I have said, is not limited to the clas¬ 
sified service. If its principles are sound 
they are as applicable to public offices em¬ 
ploying forty-nine clerks as to those em¬ 
ploying fifty; and an administration which 
observes the letter of the law in appointing the 
fifty, but makes spoils of the forty-nine, is not 
a civil service reform administration, as a man 
who gets drunk occasionally, is not a temper¬ 
ate man. 

It was doubtless in recognition of this truth, 
and to seem to conform to the highest stand¬ 
ard, that the platform of the party of admin¬ 
istration declared that “the spirit and purpose 
of reform should be observed in all executive 
appointments.” It did not say that reform 
should apply to thirty thousand employes only 
of the one hundred and twenty thousand em¬ 
ployes of the government, and that the rest 
should be treated as spoils, but that the spirit 
of reform, whatever the method of appoint¬ 
ment, should be observed throughout the serv¬ 
ice. When, therefore, the assistant postmas¬ 
ter-general endeared himself to the chief ad¬ 
ministration agent of spoils in New York, by 
cutting off official heads as fast as possible, he 
violated the express pledge of his party to re¬ 
spect the spirit of reform as much as if, being 
a soldier of the Union, he had broken the or¬ 
ders of the march and disgraced his flag; and 
the President, by tolerating such riot of con¬ 
tempt for his own professions and for the 
promises of his party, made all such promises 
contemptible, and forfeited the claim of his 
administration to be considered a reform ad¬ 
ministration. Keeping one pledge does not 
condone breaking another. A party, like a 
man, is certainly not bound to make a prom¬ 
ise'. But if it promises and breaks the pledge, 
although a party is an elusive entity, a vote 
is not, and punishment is possible. 

But while no administration can be fairly 
called a reform administration which, like 
the present and the preceding administrations, 
makes spoils of the great multitude of offices 
not included within the law, it does not follow 
that reform does not advance under such 
administrations, nor that the three Presidents 
of whom I have spoken did not sustain the 
civil service commission in enforcing the 
law. It may not be thought high praise to 


say that an executive officer enforces the law 
which he is sworn to enforce, but there are 
different ways of enforcing a law. In the dark 
ages of the Fugitive Slave law, there was an 
officer in Boston, who, being entrusted with a 
writ of arrest for a fugitive slave, used to go 
into the quarter of the city where the colored 
people congregated and announce that he 
believed the fugitive to be there and that he 
should call for him in the afternoon and ex¬ 
pect to have him delivered up at ouce without 
delay; “and it is surprising,” he said, “ that 
after such ample and definite notice making 
everything easy for those who were criminally 
harboring the offender, I was never able to 
find a single fugitive.” There is another 
method of enforcing law to be studied in the 
case of the Sunday liquor law in the city of 
New York. The farmer remarked of the 
Canada thistle and twitch grass in his fields 
that the more he pulled them up the more 
they grew. It may be said in the same way 
that the more the Sunday liquor law is en¬ 
forced in the present way, the more liquor is 
sold on Sunday. Iqdeed, in the early days of 
civil service reform, when it was not en¬ 
forced by law, but by an executive order of 
Presidents Grant and Hayes, I knew an ap¬ 
pointing officer who used the order as a short 
and easy way with politicians whom he did 
not care to gratify, and so secured leisure to 
distribute his patronage more satisfactorily. 
In our history of ten years it is a very great 
victory of reform that the national civil 
service commission has been an honest and 
efficient ministry of the law, and that Presi¬ 
dents Arthur, Cleveland and Harrison have 
honestly supported it. 

Still another victory is the fact that the sys¬ 
tem of party assessments on the civil service 
and the kindred evil of the interference of 
office-holders in elections are now so effect¬ 
ually stigmatized by public opinion that al¬ 
though not abandoned they have become dis¬ 
graceful. The effort to justify the levying of 
blackmail by party committees of congress or 
of local districts, and to defend the moral 
coercion of public employes by irresponsible 
officers of the government, has disappeared in 
the contemptuous scorn of public common 
sense. Undoubtedly the practice in some de¬ 
gree still continues, as the late disgraceful let¬ 
ter of the Ohio republican state executive 
committee shows, but only as sneak-thieving 
and pocket-picking continue after laws are 
enacted to prevent them. The supreme court 
of the United States has affirmed the constitu¬ 
tionality of the laws prohibiting such assess¬ 
ments, and since the publicity given to the 
wide-spread and flagrant extortions of the no¬ 
torious Hubbell congressional campaign com¬ 
mittee of 1882, no senator or representative iu 
congress who is sensitive to public contempt 
would authorize the signature of his name to 
circulars demanding of post-office clerks at 
home and consular officers abroad, and even of 
women clerks who have no vote, the surrender 
of two per cent, and four per cent, of their 
galaries to be spent in buying seven more 


mules or in dispatching soap to Indiana or in 
marshaling floaters in blocks of five. 

This steady change of public opinion in re¬ 
gard to political changes in the non-political 
public service is the happiest result of the ten 
years’ agitation of reform. It is indeed only 
to a certain degree a change in practice, but 
the change of opinion greatly facilitates its 
practical completion. The reform rules em¬ 
brace only about a quarter of the places in 
the registry of the service, and within that 
range the reform may be fairly said to be ef¬ 
fected. But beyond that range the civil serv¬ 
ice is still liable to be treated as spoils. By 
the express direction of President Hayes and 
by the known desire of President Cleveland, 
the immediate control of caucuses and conven¬ 
tions by office-holders was greatly diminished 
during the last few years. But in the state 
convention of the administration party this 
year in New York, where in other years I 
have seen the collector of the port of New 
York, in person, openly directing the votes of 
his subordinates, the office-holding force again 
appeared, and the chief figure in the conven¬ 
tion of the party whose national platform de¬ 
mands that the reform shall be extended to 
every branch of the service and its spirit ob¬ 
served in every appointment, was that chief 
state agent of spoils, who gaily proclaims that 
public officers endear themselves to him not 
by fidelity or efficiency, but by violation of 
their party pledges and by making the public 
service party plunder. The comedy of the 
autumn campaign is that the platform of a 
convention directed by the chief administra¬ 
tion spoilsman in the state reaffirms the affec¬ 
tion of the party for “ thorough, genuine 
civil service reform. ” 

But these are only incidents of a battle 
which is still raging. Here and there the line 
is pushed back and broken. Here, there is 
an advantage, there, a reverse, although the 
general advance is plain. The appointment 
of the late collector of New York was a dis¬ 
tinct violation of the executive pledge that 
“the spirit and purpose of reform should be 
observed in all executive appointments.” But 
the intimation that the collector contemplated 
a course which no law forbids and which in 
the time of his predecessor Swartwout was held 
to be entirely legitimate, nevertheless pro¬ 
voked a protest which was not limited to 
party. I know no reason in his character or 
career to suppose that the late collector, whose 
personal good name even amidst the rancor of 
partisan controversy has been unsoiled, would 
have wantonly blackened it by prostituting a 
public trust to promote a personal or party in¬ 
terest, or would have deliberately sophisti¬ 
cated himself by the pretense that honest and 
efficient public agents might be summarily re¬ 
moved to make place for other equally honest 
and efficient agents, not because the public 
service would be promoted by the change, but 
because it would advance the political interest 
of the officer to whose official act the collector 
owed his power to do the service. But the sig¬ 
nificant fact is that the mere suggestion was 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


273 


i 


1 


resented by the public sense of official decency 
and personal honor. Whatever reaction there 
may be at any point, the moral progress of re 
form is signally illustrated by the undoubted 
fact that it is becoming personally discredit¬ 
able to a public officer to administer his 
office as an agency of spoils, and a serious in¬ 
jury to a party when its conspicuous leaders 
are no longer statesmen but bosses. To say 
that this is not the universal opinion is to say 
nothing. It is an opinion general enough 
and strong enough to make laws and regu¬ 
lations, to secure their faithful execution, 
and constantly to extend the range of their 
operation. 

This revolution in public opinion is the 
result of the agitation of civil service re¬ 
form, and I should not call it the happiest 
result if it were not a revolution which had 
produced practical results. In a rapid glance 
we have seen the general progress in such re 
suits during the ten years of our organization. 
But the annual meeting invites a retrospect of 
the year, and if The partisan ravage of the 
civil service beyond the range of the rules 
were the only indication of the situation, it 
might be thought a year of little promise. 
But the really significant facts are of quite 
another kind. Let me recall some of them, 
although I can but mention them. 

The good work of the year began in Buf¬ 
falo. Just after our last annual meeting, the 
court of appeals decided the case of Kogers 
against the city of Buffalo to test the validity 
of certain appointments made in total disre¬ 
gard of the civil service law of the state. The 
court approved the constitutionality of the 
law, forbade payment of persons illegally 
appointed, and declared the city bound by the 
action of the mayor in employing and paying 
persons to carry out the law, although the 
council had refused to provide for the pay¬ 
ment. The court, in announcing its opinion, 
expressed, with the utmost force and dignity, 
its approval of the principles of reform, saying 
that under the spoils system “ The chief 
reason for an appointment was the political 
work done by the applicant and his supposed 
power to do more, and thus an appointment 
to an office in the civil list was regarded as 
fit and proper reward for purely political and 
partisan service. No one can believe that 
such a system was calculated to produce 
service fit for the only purpose for which 
offices are created, viz., the discharge of duties 
necessary to be performed in order that the 
public business may be properly and efficiently 
transacted. The continuous and systematic 
filling of all the offices of a great and indus¬ 
trious nation by such means became con¬ 
clusive proof in the minds of many intelligent 
and influential men that the nation itself had 
not in such matters emerged from the semi- 
barbarous state, and that it had failed to 
obtain the full benefits arising from an ad 
vanced and refined civilization.” The Court 
added: “The fact must be fully recognized 
that the duties connected with the vast ma¬ 
jority of offices in hoth the Federal and State 


governments are in no sense political, and 
that a proper performance of those duties 
would give no one the least idea whether the 
incumbent of the office were a member of one 
political party or another.” 

The reform association of Buffalo declares 
that the public service of the city is at last 
practically taken by law out of the spoils sys¬ 
tem, and no intelligent man supposes that it is 
any less vigorous, honest, efficient and satis¬ 
factory for that reason, or doubts that the 
problem of city government, one of the most 
difficult and important with which we have 
to deal, would be greatly simplified if what 
the association says of Buffalo could be said 
truly of every other city in the country. 

The year has given us also in the city of 
New York the valuable testimony of private 
citizens in the recommendation of the very 
able committee appointed by Mayor Grant to 
consider the most efficient and most econom¬ 
ical system for the conduct of the street clean¬ 
ing department in that city. The subject, like 
every subject which involves the honest expen¬ 
diture of public money in that community, is 
extremely perplexing. But the public spirit 
of the eminent citizens who served as a com¬ 
mittee led them to a careful and detailed in¬ 
vestigation, and in their report they state that 
the efficiency of the system proposed by them 
will depend upon bringing the whole force of 
the department within the control of the civil 
service regulations. That this is entirely leas¬ 
able, the experience of Boston in its public 
labor department has demonstrated, and that 
the result in New York would be of the high¬ 
est advantage and most satisfactory to all good 
citizens, is unquestionable. 

At the beginning of the present year the na¬ 
tional civil service commission made known 
the fact that it had succeeded in adjusting the 
quotas of appointments under the rules among 
the several states. The spoils system has ob¬ 
tained so firm a hold upon the public mind 
that in parts of the country, especially in the 
southern states, there was a total disbelief in 
the honesty of the reformed system which was 
assumed to be only a scheme to make partisan 
appointments more universal and certain. 
But a perfectly frank conference between the 
commissioners and members of congress and 
and representatives of the press from the 
southern states resulted in the conviction 
upon the part of the representatives of the 
press and the people that the law was a reason¬ 
able law honestly administered by the com¬ 
mission and, consequently, at examinations to 
fill additional places in the departments at 
Washington, candidates appeared without in¬ 
fluence and without regard to party sympathy ; 
the fair proportion among the states was es¬ 
tablished ; the persons appointed were in gen¬ 
eral natives of the states in which they were 
examined, and “ in the overwhelming majority 
of cases, these native born southern whites 
were democrats. ” The great advantage 
gained was not only the proper adjustment of 
the quota, but the practical demonstration to 
partisan members of congress, to the party 


press, and to utterly incredulous party adher¬ 
ents in the states that the civil service law is 
not only just in itself, but is honestly enforced 
by a party administration. The proof that 
such a course is possible is undoubtedly the 
most valuable lesson in national politics that 
the communities in which it was demonstrated 
have ever received, and Commissioner Roose¬ 
velt, in his interesting account of this demon¬ 
stration, says, with a satisfaction that every 
friend of reform must share, “ In the depart¬ 
mental service at Washington we have suc¬ 
ceeded in putting nearly a complete stop to re¬ 
movals for political purposes. ” 

In January of ihis year the Cambridge Civil 
Service Reform Association urged upon the 
President the extension of the reformed sys¬ 
tem to the Indian service. The same request 
was made by the board of Indian commission¬ 
ers, of which Presdent Gates, of Amherst Col¬ 
lege, is chairman. The commissioners stated 
that they desired to secure permanence in the 
service for the greater part of the officers and 
employes. Ii\ April the President directed 
the extension of the rules to physicians at the 
Indian agencies, and to superintendents, as¬ 
sistant superintendents, teachers and matrons, 
of Indian schools, and the rules and regula¬ 
tions prepared by the commission for en¬ 
forcing these executive directions will go into 
efl'ect on the first of October. In February 
the national association of public school su¬ 
perintendents at the annual meeting in Phil¬ 
adelphia, commended the principles of reform 
as applicable to the selection of teachers in 
the public schools, and recommended the pas¬ 
sage of laws requiring from all candidates 
certificates of qualification from the state au¬ 
thorities. In the state of New York, at the 
suggestion of the superintendent of public 
instruction, the school commissioners through¬ 
out the state have adopted a system of uni¬ 
form simultaneous examinations for teachers 
upon conditions essentially competitive. Ev¬ 
ery argument for the selection of the 63,000 
postmasters in the United States by some bet¬ 
ter test than personal partiality and political 
“ pulls ” is irresistible when applied to the 
selection of the 350,000 public school teachers 
in the country. We boast that the public 
schools make American citizens. But the 
teacher is the school, and if it be wise to ascer¬ 
tain the qualification of a street cleaner, or a 
physician at an Indian agency, or custom 
house clerk, for the proper discharge of his 
duty, it can not be unwise to test the fitness of 
public school teachers and to appoint only 
those who are ascertained to be fittest. 

The usual attempt was made in congress by 
members of both parties to starve and par¬ 
alyze the civil service commission. But it 
was briskly and ably resisted also by members 
of both parties. As usual the weight of 
ability and influence and character was with 
the friends of reform and not with the spoils¬ 
men. In the house the attack upon the law 
was defeated, and the moderate increase of 
appropriation asked by the commission was 
granted. But a difference arose between the 










274 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


two houses, and the controversy was adjusted 
by the passage of the old appropriation. The 
house committee on the civil service law made 
an investigation of its workings and reported 
that the public service had been greatly bene¬ 
fited by it and that the law upon the whole 
had been well executed. The conditional 
term of approval was doubtless due to the 
fact that an administration of another party 
had intervened between the passage of the 
law and the present administration, and it 
would have been politically unwise to imply 
that Messrs. Vilas and Dickinson, for in¬ 
stance, had shown the same zeal for honest 
reform in the post-office which have distin¬ 
guished Messrs. Wanamaker and Clarkson, 
although an impartial observer might have 
decided that they were entitled to precisely 
the same praise. The committee proposed a 
bill for the reorganization of the commission 
making the regulations still more stringent 
and declaring that “ any law which revives 
influence, political or personal, in the public 
service of the country, should be vehemently 
opposed, and that no system other than that 
in vogue at the present time can furnish a 
safeguard against this spirit of favoritism.” 
The bill which was reported was not consid¬ 
ered, and if it should be said that it would 
not have been reported had it been supposed 
that it would be considered or could be 
passed, I should reply that the members who 
reported it were honest friends of reform, and 
that the bill itself was evidently the result of 
knowledge and a sincere desire to remedy 
what were held to be defects in the existing law. 

Eight years’ experience of the working of the 
law has demonstrated the necessity of reor¬ 
ganizing the methods of promotion in the serv- 
vice by introducing competition as contem¬ 
plated by the law and established for a time 
under the Grant administration. In January, 
1887, compulsory competition, with the cer¬ 
tification of the whole eligible list, was intro¬ 
duced in certain offices. But upon the recom¬ 
mendation of the commission, the President 
has recently authorized open voluntary com¬ 
petition for promotion within the classified 
service, under such regulations as the com¬ 
mission may provide. These regulations are 
now under consideration and will be applied 
as soon as possible, and the measure may be 
regarded justly as the most important step yet 
taken by the President in the interest of re¬ 
form. Meanwhile, it is a striking illustration 
of the practical wisdom of the reformed sys¬ 
tem that promotion by voluntary competition 
has been lately introduced into the depart¬ 
ment of the service which has been most prosti¬ 
tuted to party and personal influence, the 
post-office. 

At the first examination the postmaster- 
general assured the clerks, as his order ex¬ 
pressly provides, that hereafter advancement 
would depend solely upon the results of the 
examinations and the official records, and no 
longer upon personal favor or party influence. 
“God works in a mysterious way his wonders 
to perform,” 


Before this reform was instituted in the post- 
office department, the legislature of Massachu¬ 
setts last winter requested the senators and 
representatives of the state in congress to urge 
legislation which would secure reform in the 
Charlestown navy yard and the other navy 
yards of the United States. If, however, those 
senators and representatives urged such legis¬ 
lation, congress was obdurate. But in April 
the secretary of the navy, in a luminous, cour¬ 
ageous and decisive speech at Boston, an¬ 
nounced his intention to exclude politics from 
the labor system of the navy yards. He said 
that the degradation of that labor into party 
spoils was demoralizing to any party that re¬ 
sorted to it, destructive to the government 
service, and debauching to national and local 
politics. “ It is an ulcer on the naval admin¬ 
istration system,” he said, “ and I propose to 
cut it out.” He proceeded to state clearly his 
scheme, for which he said the rules were pre¬ 
paring in detail. The three cardinal points 
of the scheme were free and open competition, 
employment on proved merit alone, and the 
absolute publicity of every detail. This was 
the three-edged blade for the secretary’s invig¬ 
orating reform surgery. “ I do not propose to 
stop,” he said, “until the principle of efficiency 
and worth is the only test of navy yard em¬ 
ployment; * * so that it will remove not 
only all machine politics from the navy yard, 
but all suspicion of machine politics.” This 
speech, showing the secretary’s clear compre¬ 
hension of the scope and method of reform, 
and supported by his character, was felt at 
once not to be a mere flourish of political 
rhetoric. The secretary’s rules aflTecting the 
higher positions were applied in May, and 
those aflecting labor on the first of September, 
and bis action is by far the most important 
event in the progress of reform under this ad¬ 
ministration. 

“ It is an ulcer and I mean to cut it out,” 
said the secretary, and he is cutting it out. 
With all the ardor of the Irishman we may cer¬ 
tainly wish him “more power to your elbow,” 
until the cutting is complete. The only re¬ 
gret that can be expressed in view of this ad¬ 
mirable act, as of the promotions in the post- 
office department, is, that the reform in the 
navy yards has not been brought under the 
direction of the national commission as in 
other branches of the service. While Gen¬ 
eral Tracy is secretary of the navy there is 
no doubt that the ulcer of the spoils will not 
thrive in the navy yards. But when he re¬ 
tires will he have extirpated its roots? His 
scheme is admirable and effective, and it is 
based upon sound principles of reform. But 
it is only his official regulation. It is 
not yet law and with his successor the devils 
whom the secretary has expelled may return. 
If the rules of the civil service are to be ap¬ 
plied, as they certainly should be, to the navy 
yards, is there any good reason why they 
should not be applied as in all other depart¬ 
ments, and as they are applied in the clerical 
branch of the navy department ? It is a reform 
too important to be left to the changing sym¬ 


pathies of successive secretaries, and its in¬ 
ception and execution are so important as to 
entitle Secretary Tracy to the gratitude of 
the country while they write his name high 
on the roll of practical reformers. 

Upon a survey even so general as this of 
the progress of civil service reform within the 
ten years of the existence of this League, it is 
idle to deny the prodigious advance which it 
has made, both in public opinion and in prac¬ 
tical application. The evil is not new nor is 
the League first in calling public attention to 
it. Escape from the vicious party despotism 
of the old council of appointment in this 
state was one of the chief reasons for the 
adoption of the constitution of 1821. Congress 
has echoed with loud debate upon the subject, 
with the angry altercations of party chiefs, 
and the terrible array of facts which is the 
most powerful plea of every political reform. 
Investigations, reports, executive orders have 
followed each other. But they have been the 
temporary weapons of party warfare dropped 
when they had served their purpose, not the 
persistent pressure of increasing conviction— 
hot gusts that blew off green fruit, not the 
change of temperature that ripens the harvest. 
The League has represented not party strategy 
to carry an election, but public conviction to 
reform an acknowledged evil of administra¬ 
tion. 

If it had done nothing more its service 
would be great in having forced the spoils 
system to its defence. The political pirates 
are at last driven to show the black flag and 
defiantly to declare that at every election the 
whole public service in every detail, with all 
its emoluments and opportunities, shall be 
made the prize of a vast struggle of greed and 
intrigue, of bribery and dishonesty of every 
kind, all inflamed to fury by party spirit. 
We demand that all public business, which is 
not political, shall be kept free from politics, 
and shall be transacted upon the simple prin¬ 
ciples which are approved by universal pri¬ 
vate experience. The masters of Tammany 
Hall, with the dealers in mules, soap and 
blocks of floaters, who hold that in politics 
fraud is not fraudulent, nor dishonesty dis¬ 
honest, declare that everywhere, except in 
Sancho Panza’s Baralaria, No Man’s Land, 
and the Isle of Fools, the public service is 
spoils and belongs to the victors. But Wash¬ 
ington warned us in advance against these 
voices. Webster said that whoever controlled 
a man’s means of living controlled his will. 
Clay said that Marcy’s doctrine would end in 
despotism. Lincoln, hounded by the remorse¬ 
less demand for spoils, said that the evil would 
destroy the government. Those who would use 
the patronage of public employment as the 
vast bribery fund of a party are on one side. 
Washington and Lincoln, patriotism and good 
sense, the wisdom of age, the instinct of youth, 
are on the other. Let all good men choose 
their part. We have chosen ours. 

Let us now see what extensions have been 
made of the classified service. 

They have been considerable. The entire 





THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


275 


i official service has increased considerably, 
j The commissioners in their first report (Feb¬ 
ruary, 1884) estimated it at about 110,000. It 

I is supposed now to be about 120,000. 

The classified service, as stated by the com¬ 
missioners in their last report, November, 
1890, contained somewhat over 30,000 em¬ 
ployes, an increase since February, 1884, of 
about 16,000. 

A large portion of this must be from natural 
■ increment within the departments, districts 
1 and offices originally classified, but a consid- 
j erable part can be otherwise accounted for. 

I Mr.Cleveland, in March, 1888, extended the 
j classification within the post-offices and custom- 
1 houses named in the classified service (it 
should be borne in mind that not all the 
places within the classified offices and dis¬ 
tricts were originally or have yet been brought 
into the classified service), adding 1,931 to the 
number of officials brought under the civil 
service rules. 

January 4,1889, Mr. Cleveland also directed 
the railway postal service to be classified 
under the civil service rules, the extension 
to take effect March 15, 1889. At the request 
of the commission, which had not time to pre¬ 
pare eligible lists. President Harrison post¬ 
poned the extension to May 1st; since which 
time we have had the classified railway postal 
service. The number of places is understood 
to be somewhat over 4,000. 

April 13, 1891, President Harrison made a 
valuable extension of the rules to about 600 
persons (the number at the present time is 
supposed to be about 700) in the Indian ser¬ 
vice: physicians, school superintendents, 
school teachers and matrons. This extension 
to the classified service is the only one thus 
far made by Mr. Harrison. It is not believed, 
however, that this is because he is not in sym¬ 
pathy with the new system or is not loyal to 
his own personal or party pledges on the 
subject. 

The appointment by him of the present ex¬ 
cellent commission and the support he has 
accorded their vigorous administration of the 
law; his annulling in April last the rule 
which allowed promotions or transfers from 
the non-classified to the classified service (a 
rule which furnished a “back-door entrance,” 
without the ordeal of a competitive examin¬ 
ation), and the extension to a part of the In¬ 
dian service just mentioned, have been of the 
greatest service to the reform. It is fair, too, 
to assume (although the navy-yard service 
has not been brought under the civil service 
rules) that the late extension of the princi¬ 
ples of the reform to the navy yards, with 
their 4,000 or 5,000 employes, announced by 
Secretary Tracy, has been with the full con¬ 
currence of the President. 

But the fact remains that a large part of 
the postal and customs service, to which the 
rules might well be applied, is still in the 
thrall and bondage of the spoils system. 
Why should it so remain? It may be that 
when Mr. Harrison came to the Presidency 
he found an inadequate administration of the 


law and rules. It is not my desire to debate 
this question, for it is not necessary to the 
purpose of this paper. Still I may be per¬ 
mitted, perhaps, to state my personal belief 
that when the commission was reorganized, so 
to speak, by the appointment of Mr. Roose¬ 
velt and Gov. Thompson, the entire system 
was in an unprosperous condition, and that 
unless new life and more vigorous loyalty in 
its administration had been put into it, not 
only would not extension of it have been ad¬ 
visable, but it would have fallen soon into 
serious public discredit. No law is worth 
much that is not properly enforced. 

But the new commission has saved the sys¬ 
tem from the discredit into which it might 
have fallen, and by general consent it is and 
has been now for a long time fairly and 
thoroughly administered. 

Then why has it not been extended to the 
rest of the large post-offices and custom-houses? 
The commissioners, in their report for 1889, 
said: 

The minimum limit for the number of employes 
in the classified post-oflQees should be fixed at twenty- 
five instead of fifty. This would add uot far from 
thirty to the forty-three now classified. 

This recommendation was repeated in the 
commissioner’s report for 1890. 

Why did they not also recommended the ex¬ 
tension to custom-houses having twenty-five 
employes does not appear; but it is believed 
that the limitation of the post-offices at twenty- 
five, rather than twenty or ten, was simply be¬ 
cause, with the meager force in the service of 
the commission, it was not deemed practicable 
to go below twenty-five. Probably for a sim¬ 
ilar reason the recommendation was not ex¬ 
tended to the custom houses. 

But there would seem to be no reason why 
all the custom-houses, as well as post-offices, 
having even ten employes, should not be 
brought into the classified service. If that 
would be too extensive an addition to be made 
at once, certainly the inclusion of those hav¬ 
ing twenty-five officials seems entirely practi¬ 
cable. Why should it not be made ? Why 
should the custom-house in Buffalo be under 
the spoils system, and the post-office under the 
merit system? Competitive examinations for 
the offices on the ground floor ; “ influence, ” 
or personal and party service for the offices on 
the second ! How are the people to be con¬ 
vinced that the system of patronage and 
plunder is not to resume complete sway so 
long as it is permitted by the President to re¬ 
main entrenched in at least fifty of the princi¬ 
pal post-offices and eighteen of the great cus¬ 
toms districts, not to speak of the much 
greater number of considerable offices, where 
there are from ten to twenty-five officials, in 
all of which the old system, which has been 
denounced by Presidents Harrison, Cleveland 
and Arthur is as vigorous and vociferous as 
ever ? 

I desire to speak with becoming modesty 
upon this subject, and I am quite aware that 
the President may .regard the persistent de¬ 
mands of the friends of civil service reform, 
in the midst of his varied and engrossing du¬ 


ties, as irksome. I believe, however, he might 
well enough entertain another view of the 
subject from which he would derive a pleasure 
that is not often within the reach of a Presi¬ 
dent. The civil service reform, after some 
vicissitudes, has achieved a great success. 
More than 30,000 of the principal subordinate 
places in the federal service are under its con¬ 
trol. It stands to-day well accredited before 
the people ; but the condition of its safety, as 
well as of its final success, is that it go for 
ward. Its great enemy still holds much of 
the field ; but a single strong movement will 
decide the contest. If the President were to¬ 
morrow to issue an order by which the offices 
in even the non-classified customs and postal 
services having twenty-five employes were 
brought under the civil service rules, I be¬ 
lieve it would be regarded by the whole coun¬ 
try as practically decisive. It would show 
not only that there is to be no step backward, 
but that the end is not far distant when this 
reform which underlies every other reform in 
American politics shall be completely tri¬ 
umphant. This is the President’s great op¬ 
portunity. If he avails himself of it, more 
than anything he has yet done, more, proba¬ 
bly, than anything else he may yet do, it 
would make his administration illustrious. 


OUGHT THE CLASSIFIED SERVICE 
TO BE INCREASED? 

[A paper read by Sherman S. Rogers before the 

National Civil Service Reform League at Buffalo, 

September 30.] 

I wish to present the case of the national 
civil service reform, with special reference to 
the question of its extension. 

Ought the classified service to be increased ? 

What I have to say will not be new, but no 
apology seems to be needed for urging the 
subject on public attention, for either thig 
reform has justified itself by actual trial, or it 
has proved a practical failure. 

It can not any longer be regarded as experi¬ 
mental. If it has failed, it would seem that 
the act “ to regulate and improve the civil 
service of the United States” should be 
repealed, and the country be permitted to re¬ 
turn to the harmonious and logical methods 
of the spoils system. 

If, on the contrary, it has not only not 
failed, but upon actual trial has approved 
itself by a real and substantial public benefit, 
and that, too, notwithstanding it has not 
always had fair and vigorous enforcement, the 
question is most pertinent whether it ought 
not to be extended, and that, too, without 
further delay. 

I know of no public utterance where the 
proposition which in this brief paper is sought 
to be maintained is better stated than the reso¬ 
lution of the republican party, contained in 
its national platforms for 1884 and 1888, to 
wit: that 

The reform of the civil service, auspiciously begun 
under republican administration, should be com¬ 
pleted by the further extension of the reform system 
already established by law to all the grades of the 
service to which it is applicable. 









276 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The act to improve and regulate the civil 
service of the United States was approved by 
President Arthur, January 16, 1883. The 
first commissioners under it were confirmed 
by the senate on May 1,1883. On the follow¬ 
ing day the rules for carrying the law into 
efiect were approved and promulgated, and 
on July 16, 1883, the act became essentially 
operative. The official service had been 
classified by the rules, but under the act va¬ 
cancies might be filled according to the old 
methods until July 16. Since that time all 
appointments to places within the classified 
service have been made upon competitive ex¬ 
aminations, pursuant to the act and rules. 

As appears by the first oflScial report of the 
commissioners to the President, February 7, 
1884, the entire official civil service of the 
United States embraced about 110,000 persons, 
48,434 of whom were postmasters and 4,017 
persons in the railway postal service. The 
rest were distributed among the various de¬ 
partments at Washington and through the 
customs, internal revenue, postal, diplomatic 
and consular service, etc. The President, in 
the exercise of the discretion reposed in him 
under the act, directed that there should be 
three branches of the service classified (not 
including laborers or workmen or officers re¬ 
quired to be confirmed by the senate,) as fol¬ 
lows: 

First—Those classified in the departments at Wash¬ 
ington, to be designated as the “classified depart¬ 
mental service.” 

Second—Those classified under any collector, 
naval officer, surveyor or appraiser, in any customs 
district, to be known as the “classified customs 
service.” 

Third—Those classified under any postmaster at 
any post-office, including that at Washington, to be 
designated as the “classified postal service.” 

In these branches of the classified service 
there were included at the outset 13,924, per¬ 
sons, of whom 5,652 were in the departments 
at Washington, 2,573 in the customs service 
and 5,699 in the postal service, and there re¬ 
mained, and still remains, in the President 
the power to revise and modify by extension 
or otherwise this classification. 

Thus was inaugurated the most remarkable 
administrative reform in our national history. 
Mr. Arthur had the unique pleasure of say¬ 
ing in his next message to congress: 

Since the 16th of July last no person, so far as I am 
aware, has been appointed to the federal service in 
the classified portions thereof, or at any of the post- 
offices and customs districts above named, except 
those certified by the commission to be most compe¬ 
tent, on the basis of the examinations held in con¬ 
formity to the rules. 

A much more extended classification of the 
service might have been made by the Presi¬ 
dent; but in inaugurating such a tremendous 
change it was deemed prudent, as the civil 
service commissioners say in their first report, 
while making the experiment broadly enough 
to test its merits, not to make it so general as 
to involve serious inconvenience in case of 
failure. Besides, as the commissioners further 
say: 

There was need to bear in mind that the great¬ 
est opposition from patronage-mongers and partisans 
would be at the first stages, when the examiners 


would be the most inexperienced, the commission 
most embarrassed by novel questions and the ill in¬ 
formed most easily misled. 

For these reasons, probably. President Ar¬ 
thur made what seemed at the time to some 
too limited an application of the act to the 
customs and postal services. But it was done 
with the approbation of the commissioners 
and others of the best friends and mosteflScient 
promoters of the new system; and in view of 
the novelty of the situation, and the obstacles 
which the honest and efficient execution of 
the law has since met, it would be difficult 
now to refuse one’s assent to the conclusion 
reached by the President. A great experi¬ 
ment was being made. It seemed well not to 
enlarge its proportions, lest by its own weight 
it should break down at the outset. 

But from the start, notwithstanding the 
difficulties encountered, the new system vindi¬ 
cated itself. 

Mr. Arthur, in his message to the congress 
at its next session, said of it: 

I am persuaded that its effects have thus far 
proved beneficial. Its practical methods appear to 
be adequate for the ends proposed, and there has 
been no serious difficulty in carrying them into 
effect. 

In his next annual message, after a year of 
additional practice under the new law, Mr. 
Arthur said: 

On the 20th of February last, I transmitted to con¬ 
gress the first annual report of the civil service com¬ 
mission, together with communications from several 
of the heads of the executive departments respect¬ 
ing the practical workings of the law under which 
the commission had been acting. The good results 
therein foreshadowed have been more than realized. 
The system has fully answered the expectations of 
its friends in securing competent and faithful pub¬ 
lic servants, and in protecting the appointing officers 
of the government from the pressure of personal im¬ 
portunity, and from the labor of examining the 
claims and pretensions of rival contestants for pub¬ 
lic employment. 

President Cleveland said in his message to 
congress, December, 1886 : 

The continued operation of the law relating to our 
civil service has added the most convincing proofs 
of its necessity and usefulness. It is a fact worthy of 
note that every public officer who has a just idea of 
his duty to the public testifies to the value of this re¬ 
form. Its stanchest friends are those who under¬ 
stand it best, and its warmest supporters are those 
who are restrained and protected by its require¬ 
ments. 

The limits necessarily assigned to this paper 
do not permit extracts so copious as I could 
wish to make from official utterances on this 
subject, especially from the various cabinet of¬ 
ficers; but I ought not to omit the following 
from the annual report of Mr. Windom, late 
secretary of the treasury, in December, 1889. 
He said : 

The beneficial influences of the civil service law 
in its practical workings are clearly apparent. Hav¬ 
ing been at the head of the department both before 
and after its adoption, I am able to judge by com¬ 
parison of the two systems, and have no hesitation 
in pronouncing the present condition of affairs as 
preferable in all respects. Under the old plan ap¬ 
pointments were usually made to please some one 
under political or other obligations to the appointee, 
and the question of fitness was not always a con¬ 
trolling one. The temptations to make removals 
only to provide places for others was always present, 
and constantly being urged by strong influences, and 
these results and the feverish condition of depart¬ 


mental life did much to obstruct and disturb the 
even current of routine work. Under the instru¬ 
mentalities which are now used to secure .selections 
for clerical places, the department has some a.s.sur- 
ance of manly capacity, and also moral worth, as the 
character of the candidates is ascertained before ex¬ 
amination. The manifold duties of the department 
require the closest application on the part of the sec¬ 
retary and his assistants, and the freedom from im¬ 
portunity now enjoyed for appointments to places 
that are within the classified service and the saving 
of valuable time heretofore devoted to the distribu¬ 
tion of minor patronage, are of very great advantage 
and enable those officers to dev'ote more thought to 
the important questions of administration constantly 
arising. The clerks received from the civil service 
commission usually adapt themselves readily to the 
duties they are called upon to perform and rank 
among the most efficient in the department. 

It may be that some utterance by some 
member of the cabinets of the last three 
Presidents, hostile to the law or skeptical of 
its benefit, may have escaped my search; but 
I think it safe to say that no such expression 
can be found, and that it may be stated 
broadly that the concurrent testimony of 
those officials has been favorable to the new 
system. A very remarkable example of this 
is contained in the late address of the secre¬ 
tary of the navy at the Boston dinner, in 
which he announced the speedy application 
of the merit system to the navy yards. To 
this concensus on the part of heads of depart¬ 
ments might be added a vast number of inter¬ 
esting and convincing statements, reports, etc., 
from other executive officials, both national 
and state, members of congress, the great 
public journals and leaders of thought in the 
country, all in the same direction and to the 
same effect. Gradually the people have come 
to understand the true character of the new 
system. The vigorous administration of the 
law by the present admirable commission, too, 
has been its most effective support, and it 
may be said, I think, at this time, without 
hesitation or assumption, that the reform has 
passed the experimental stage and is now an 
assured success. 

A brief statement of the limitations in the 
customs and postal classified service, and of 
the extensions and modifications since made 
in the classification ought now to be made. 

The classified customs service on July 16, 
1883, embraced only such districts as had as 
many as fifty officials. The same is true of 
the classified postal service. 

The customs districts were as follows: New 
Aork, Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco, 
Baltimore, New Orleans, Chicago, Burling¬ 
ton, Vt., Portland, Me., Detroit and Port 
Huron. 

The Portland district was one exception to 
the general rule, for its officials only num¬ 
bered twenty-seven. I can not imagine why 
the exception was made, unless it was that 
some wise statesman from Maine, who de¬ 
sired to be rid of the pestering annoyance of 
the seekers for place in the Portland customs 
house quietly induced President Arthur to 
lengthen his life and that of the collector by 
including the Portland customs house in the 
classified service. 

The classified post-offices were twenty-two in 





THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


277 


number. The number at the present time is 
fifty. 

Whether the number of classified customs 
districts has been increased I am unable to 
state; but, by the prompt courtesy of the 
secretary of the treasury, in reply to an ap¬ 
plication lately made through the civil 
service commission, I* learn that there are 
eighteen customs districts having as many as 
twenty and not more than fifty employes; as 
follows: Portland, Me., 27 employes; Cape 
Vincent, N. Y., 20; Oswego, 25; Suspension 
Bridge, 17; Brownsville, Tex., 26; El Paso, 
Tex., 24; Galveston, 26; Cleveland, 20, Port¬ 
land, Oregon, 25; Buffalo, 42; Ogdensburg, 20; 
Plattsburg, 28; Key West, 37; Corpus Christi, 
Tex., 23; Eagle Pass, Tex., 20; Cincinnati, 23; 
St. Louis, 31; Port Townsend, Washing¬ 
ton, 42. 

I am unfortunately not able to give similar 
information touching the number of post-oflSces 
having as many as twenty and less than fifty 
employes, although a like application was 
made to the postmaster-general, as will appear 
by the following extract from a letter lately 
received by me from the acting first assistant 
postmaster-general. It is as follows: 

Your letter of the 15th instant, from Narragansett 
Pier, R. I., addressed to the United States Civil Ser¬ 
vice Commission, requesting information in relation 
to post-offices whereat twenty or more employes have 
been authorized, has been referred to this office. 

On your stating the use you desire to make of the 
information in regard to the postal employes, 
further consideration will be given to your request. 
Very respectfully, E. C. Fowler, 

Acting First Assistant Postmaster General. 

It is probable, however, with the great in¬ 
crease of population and business and the 
extension of the letter carrier system, that 
there are a large number of post-offices (prob¬ 
ably between fifty and sixty) having more 
than twenty and less than fifty employees. 


THE BALTIMORE INVESTIGATION. 

{ContinuedJl 

W. A. Mitchell testified as fellows: 

Q. What Is your name? A. William A. Mitchell. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) What position do you occupy 
in this building? A. I am the elevator man, sir. 

<< 

Q. Now do you remember attending a meeting 
* * * ? Perhaps! may recall to your mind that 
there was also present a man named Martin, a Mr. 
Henry Martin, and a Mr. Harry Glass. I believe 
they are both letter carriers. A. Yes, sir; and Mr. 
Reed was there too. 

Q. What IS his first name? A. Robert Reed; he is 
foreign clerk; assistant foreign clerk. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Employed here in the post- 
office? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) This man Robert Reed; he 
was also present, you say, your follow clerk? A. Yes, 
sir. 

Q. Now, at the meeting, first of all, did you meet 
together by appointment, or did you happen there 
together accidentally? A. We all came there by ap¬ 
pointment. 

tj. <! if << * * <■ 

Q. * * Now, will you tell us, as uear as you can 
remember, what happened at that meeting, at that 
gathering? A. Well [pause]. 

Q. Was anything done about the primaries, in the 
first place, so as to attract your attention? A. Well, 
we met there in regards to little financial affairs. 

Q. Did you agree to pay anybody money ? A. 


No, sir, we didn’t agree to pay anybody any money 
at all. 

Q There was nothing said, I suppose, there 
about buying any votes for the primaries, was there ? 
A. Not that I know of. I will tell you my opin¬ 
ion ; when you can buy a man’s vote, he ain’t worth 
having a vote. 

Q. Of course we all know that there has to be 
some money raised for primaries for legitimate ex¬ 
penses. A. 1 will tell you, gentlemen, this is the first 
political job I ever held, and I am green about it; 
I am as green as that door. 1 was in the candy busi 
ness about twenty years before I got this job—in the 
confectionery business. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) How did you come to get 
your present position ? Who was it recommended 
you, backed you? A. James W. Bates, the elevator 
man on President street. 

Q. Is he a republican ? A. Yes, sir; old Mr. 
James Bates. His son married my sister, and I have 
a brother a conductor on the Pennsylvania railroad, 
and these two spoke for me, and that is how I got 
the place. 

lit >;« . 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) You say you paid $5 to Mr. 
Martin, a letter carrier? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What time was it that you paid that? A. I 
think it was the 20th or 21st of the month. 

Q. Was that when you drew your money you 
mean ? A. No, sir. 

Q. Well, all the gentlemen there that night who 
were office-holders agreed to pay $5; is that the 
idea? A.Yes, sir. 

Q. How did you come to that agreement, or those 
that agreed to pay that much, how did they come to 
that understanding, do you recollect; it was to be for 
perfectly legitimate purposes, of course? A. Well, 1 
don’t know. When we met there, one of the gentle¬ 
men—of course, we all knew what we went there 
for- 

Q. You knew what you went there for? Yes, sir; 
we had seen one another on the street and had been 
talking. 

Q. What was it you met there for? A. To have a 
little money; to give a little money free gratis. 

Q. For the primaries that are to take place next 
Monday? A. I don’t know what they are going to 
do with the money, but I have an idea that they 
were going to use it for the primaries; I don’t know; 
1 have only an idea, but it was given free gratis; it 
wasn’t an assessment or anything like that. 

Q. It was given perfectly free? A. Yes, sir; yes, 
sir. 

Q. You gentlemen who are connected with the 
post office here, who are office-holders, freely gave 
this money to Mr. Martin? A. Yes, sir; just like we 
would give it to anybody else. 

Q. Precisely, and you agreed on $5 as the rightsum, 
sum,or how was ihat fixed? A. Yes, sir; we agreed 
on S5. 

Q. Was there any discussion about that there? 

Witness. About the 85? 

Mr. Roosevelt. No, about settling it; whether the 
sum should be 85 or was that the sum all the em¬ 
ployes were paying? A. That I couldn’t say; we 
didn’t have any discussion about it that I remem. 
ber of. 

Q. How did you happen to come to the conclusion 
that 85 would be the right sum to give? A. Well, I 
don’t know how that was. 

Q. Was Mr, Martin the treasurer, or how did he 
happen to receive the money? A. No, sir; we just— 
we didn’t exactly appoint him, but some one said, I 
don’t know who it was, but somebody says, “Well 
who shall it be? ’’ and somebody says, “ Mr. Martin ; 
he wiil take it,” and he said, “Yes, sir; I will take 
it.” 

Q. Do you recollect how that started; who it was 
that started the talk about giving the money ? A. 
No, sir; I do not. 

Q. Did you meet there lor the purpose of settling 
about contributing for the legitimate campaign ex¬ 
penses; wasn’t that what you said? A. Let’s see— 
we met there for the purpose of donating some 
money. 

Q. Donating some money with the view to the-? 

A. (Interposing) To the primaries; yes, sir. 


Q. And had there been a formal call for the meet¬ 
ing? A. No more than we would meet one another 
and say: “ You know there’s going to be a meeting; 
you are coming down to the meeting to-morrow 
night,” or something like that. 

Q. Did you meet there every Saturday, or was this 
a specially called meeting? A. I couldn’t say 
whether it was a specially called meeting or not. 

Q. Was it a specially called meeting of the whole 
club, or only just of the officers? A. Just of the 
officers. 

Q. Just a special meeting of you gentlemen who 
are in office here? A. Yes, sir. 

If If i;< If If >;< <• 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) But that little meeting held in 
the room was a meeting, merely, of office-holders 
called there to contribute and settle about contribu¬ 
tions for the primaries? A. Yes, sir. 

at >:» j*.* »;< >ii ijt a* 

George W. Sears testified as follows: 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte). How long have you been let¬ 
ter-carrier? A. I was appointed on the 18th of Au¬ 
gust. 

Q. Of last August? A. No, sir; August, 1889. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Through our civil service ex¬ 
amination? A. Yes, sir, Postmaster Brown ap¬ 
pointed me; that is, he reappointed me; he turned 
me out and reappointed me. 

Q. When were you originally appointed? A. I 
was appointed under Colonel Adreon ; I think it was 
in August; then I was appointed and staid in under 
Postmaster Veazy and Postmaster Brown, and he—I 
really actually forget the date—but I worked on that 
district for sixteen years, and then it was found out 
that I was inefficient, and I was dismissed to improve 
the efficiency of the service. 

Q. And you were reinstated? A. Yes, sir; so I 
took an examination last February a year and passed, 
I believe 87, and they appointed four or five of us old 
carriers that he dismissed ; he appointed us from the 
examination, and I had to take a substitute again and 
start at the bottom of the list. 

Q. Although you were dismissed to improve the 
efficiency of the force ? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. But that was not a bar to your appointment by 
the same postmaster? A. No, sir; I don’t think so. 
I had a letter here. After my dismissal I got a letter 
from the postmaster-general when I asked for the 
charges made against me, and he told me I was dis¬ 
charged to improve the efficiency of the service, al¬ 
though at the same time the carrier that was put 
there that succeeded me—there was tsvo of them that 
worked it for awhile—and there was a letter addressed 
to Mrs. H. G. Stewart, southwest eorner of Hoffman 
and McCulloh streets, and this carrier left the letter 
at Mrs. Stewart’s, southeast corner of McCulloh and 
Preston streets. 

Q. And it was to improve the efficiency of the 
service that the substitution of him, after your dis¬ 
missal, was made? A. Yes, sir. So the party who 
got the letters gave them to me and wanted me to 
send them to Washington. 1 told him it wouldn’t 
do me much good, and the postmaster went to work 
and put these in an official envelope and put an im¬ 
mediate stamp on it and sent it up by another car¬ 
rier, and wrote a note to the party explaining it, and 
signed it “Frank[Brown, Postmaster.” 

Of Ofi 

Q. And at the approaching primaries there is a 
fight on, on Monday? A. There is a division. 

Q. Between the Henderson and Johnson factions? 
A. Yes, sir; that is about it. 

Q. Of course the post-office employes are all inter¬ 
ested in the suecess of the Johnson element? A. 
Yes, sir; certainly. 

it On >;* at i/t 

John L. Shields testified as follows: 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) What is your position? A. I 
am a letter carrier. 

« <s <> 

Q. Now, we will not detain you much longer. Do 

you know of any contributions of money towards 
the expenses of the approaching primaries being 
made among the officials here? A. No, sir; I do 
not. 

<c <1 >5t 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Have you yourself contrib¬ 

uted anything? A. I have sir. 









278 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Q. Who was it that asked you for your contribu¬ 
tion? A. The executive of the ward, Mr. James H. 
Marriott: he is not in the department at all. 

*.1 at m 

Q. It was 85,1 suppose? A. Yes, sir; that is what 
I gave. 

*>,■<<<«<■ « 

Q. Has there been anyjneeting or gathering of the 
employes of your ward to consider the question of 
how much they should give, or whether they should 
give anything? A. I believe there was. 

Q. Where did that take place? A. It took place 
on Carrolton avenue. 

Q. At either of these clubs that you have men¬ 
tioned? A. No, sir. 

Q. At a private house? A. Yes, sir; at a private 
house. 

Q. At a private house of one of the employes? A. 
Indeed, I couldn’t tell you whether he is or not. 

Q. Were you present at the meeting? A. I was; 
yes, sir. 

Q. And was there any discussion then as to how 
much that each should give, or how much they should 
give, or anything of that sort? A. I believe there 
was something said in regards to what they would 
give, and it seems to run in my mind that there was 
some talk about it. 

Q. It was made up of these employes of this office 
who came from the fourteenth ward, wasn’t it? A. 
There were a number of them, I believe, who were 
employes, that is, of this office, and some of them 
. hat were not. 

Q. Were there some there from any other public 
office; some from the custom-house? A. Well, yes, 
sir; I believe there was. 

<•*>;< <• s> * # 

Q You say at this meeting it was agreed or talked 
over as to how much money should be given. Now, 
was there anything said about who it should be paid 
to? A. It was paid to Mr. Marriott. 

Q. And that was the understanding? A. Yes, sir; 
that was the understanding. 

Q. And that was what you did? A. Y’^es, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) You say that they were mainly 
office-holders at that meeting? A. I believe a great 
number of them were. 

Q. Were there any outsiders, non-office-holders, 
except Mr. Marriott? A. Y'es, sir; Mr. Marriott 
wasn’t an office-holder. 

Q. But were they all office-holders or active re¬ 
publican workers in that district? A. Y'es, sir, I 
think they were. 

Q. Did you meet there by invitation ? A. Yes, sir 
we had notes to meet there. 

Q. Who sent these notes? A. Mr. Marriott; they 
were signed by Mr. Marriott, and I supposed he sent 
them. 

^ jji 

John W. Boulden testified as follows ; 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Were you present at a meet¬ 
ing held somewhere on Carrolton avenue, some time 
about Monday or Tuesday last, at which there was 
a discussion regarding the amount of contributions 
that different persons were to make toward the ex¬ 
penses of the primaries? A. I was at a meeting; I 
was notified to come to a meeting, but it was merely 
they wanted a little money, I believe, towards 
ticket-holders, or something of that kind, but I don’t 
know that there was anybody in particular asked to 
contribute at all, any office-holder or anything of 
that kind. 

Q. Well, these ticket-holders were at the approach¬ 
ing primaries? A. I presume that is what it is. 

Q. Who presided at that meeting? A. The execu¬ 
tive of the ward was there. 

Q. Was he a gentleman named Marriott? A. That’s 
his name; yes, sir; I presume it was Marriott; he was 
the one, I think, that is executive. 

Q. Now, did he receive any money on that occa¬ 
sion, do you know? A. There was some money paid 
there, and I think it went to him; I am not sure; I 
came there a little late for the meeting. 

Q. To whom did you pay your subscription? A. I 
just laid it down on a stand that was there; the par¬ 
ties were in there, and I laid it down on the stand 
there. 


Q. It disappeared, I suppose? A. Y’es, sir. 

<1 * <1 Hit ^ 

Q. Now, what sort of a man is this Mr. Hammond; 
I mean is he a respectable and truthful sort of a man? 
A. I have always looked upon him as a very truth¬ 
ful man as far as I know. 

Q. Do you know which side he takes in this con¬ 
test; which side he is on? A. I do not, sir. 

Q. He is not a sort of man, you don't think, that 
would really be on one side and profess to be on the 
other, is he, from the little that yon know of him? 
A. Welt, politics is pretty tricky and I couldn’t say. 
I have played politics in the ward long before the 
civil service, and I know things are pretty tricky; 
they were pretty tricky then, but they have got to be 
a little better; they are not quite so much so now. 

Q. And as far as you were concerned you put your 
contribution on the desk, and where it went, you are 
not able to say from your present knowledge? A. 
No, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Why did you happen to put 
down $5 exactly? A. I didn’t suppose we had to 
put down that exactly, because there was no assess¬ 
ment at all. 

Q. Why did everyone put down that sum? A. 
That I don’t know ; I seen that was what they were 
giving, and I gave 85 too. 

Q. Who wrote to you to come to that meeting? 
A. It was my ward executive. 

Q. This man Marriott? A. Mr. Marriott, yes, sir. 

James L. Webber testified as follows: 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Y’ou are a letter carrier? A. 
Y'es, sir; I was appointed 1st of May, 1890. 

^ il!f *!i 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) What ward do you come 
from? A. The Seventh ward. 

Q. How much, if anything, have you contributed 
to the expenses of this primary election, this ap¬ 
proaching primary? A. Nothing; I am going to 
contribute. 

Q. You have not as yet? A. I am going to con¬ 
tribute. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Y'ou have not contributed? 
A. I have contributed partly, and I am going to 
contribute some more. 

Q. Five dollars is the total amount you were to 
contribute, isn’t it? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How much have you contributed? A. I have 
contributed the whole amount. 

Q. And are you going to contribute more than 
that? A. Yes, sir; some more. I am going to use 
my own discretion about that. 

« « 

Q. What was the purpose for which this was to be 
used? A. I suppose to give the boys a good time for 
this work they do, so they might enjoy themselves. 
On Thursday night we had beer and a supper over 
there to treat the workers. 

Q. And you did tell this Mr. Loane? A. I think 
that is the only one; of course he is a fellow em¬ 
ploye, at least he was. He resigned the other day ; 
he got a better position. 

Q. Does he belong to your faction or to the other 
side? A. I am a republican. I don’t believe in 
either faction. I contribute to both clubs, Mr. 
Stone’s club and to Mr. Johnson’s club. I don’t be¬ 
lieve in faction fights at all. 

Louis E. Gladfelter testified as follows: 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Are you a clerk in the office 
here? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. To whom was it that you paid 85 ? A. I paid 85 
very willingly, voluntarily, to a gentleman in the 
Seventh ward. 

Q. And to be used for legitimate expenses ? A. 
Yes, sir. 

Q. Not to be used for bribery, or anything like 
that? A. No, sir; not at all. 

Q. But for perfectly legitimate expenses ? A. Y'es, 
sir. 

Q. This gentlaman; what was his name? A. Mr. 
Bell. 

Q. What was his first name? A. That I couldn’t 
tell you; he is an office-holder here. He is a dis¬ 
patcher in the mailing division here, formerly night 


superintendent. John Bell, I think it was, I am not 
sure. I will not be positive about the name. 

Q. How did you happen to bring it to him; was 
he the man that was receiving contributions? A. 
Not to my knowledge; no, sir. In fact I know of no 
one who was receiving them. 

Q. Was this just simply voluntarily paid? A. 
Yes, sir. 

Q. Who else do you know that paid to Bell? A. 
Not a soul, to my knowledge. 

Q. When did you pay it to Bell ? A. I paid it to 
Bell about two weeks ago, to the best of my knowl¬ 
edge. 

Q. Did you pay him on the streets? A. No, sir; 
I paid him down stairs. 

Q. What time was it that you handed it to him? 
A. Well, it was in the area way; not in the area way, 
one of the aisles of the building, going toward the 
clerk’s room ; right before going on my time of duty. 

Q. Did he speak to you about it? A. No, sir; 
nobody in the office or any other outsider did. I 
mentioned the fact to him and I just voluntarily 
contributed 85 towards defraying the expenses, such 
as paying for tickets. 

Q. Why did you happen to take 85 as the sum to 
give 7 Is that the general sum that they are all giv¬ 
ing? A. Not to my knowledge. Why I gave the 85, 
because I could spare five very well; in fact, if I had 
more money I might give more; I am only what you 
call a salaried clerk. 

Q. What is your salary ? A. I get 8700 a year. 

Q. I think 85 is all you possibly could be expected 
to give. Did you give any last year, last fall? A. 
Yes, sir. 

Q. How much did you give last fall! A. I gave 
815. 

* »J« 0 4* 


Mr. Clarkson said not long ago that a 
boss could not live a year. He should come 
to Maryland and watch Mr. Gorman’s boss- 
ship. After many years of petty tyranny, Mr. 
Gorman still controls the smallest details of 
office-peddling. 

Mr. Daniel M. Murray, an estimable law¬ 
yer of Howard county, is the last victim. Mr. 
Murray wished to go to the legislature, and 
his neighbors wished to send him there; and 
proved it by carrying the primary for him in 
spite of Mr. Gorman’s expressed desire to have 
Mr. Murray stay at home. Finding that 
Mr. Murray was likely to win in the primary, 
Mr. Gorman in person ordered him to with¬ 
draw. Mr. Murray had too much spirit to 
obey, but Mr. Gorman enforced his order upon 
a slavish convention, which refused Mr. Mur¬ 
ray the nomination to which his victory in 
the primaries entitled him. People in Mary¬ 
land somehow, high-spirited as they are proud 
of calling themselves, endure boss-ship not 
only one year, but many years.— Civil Service 
Reformer, August, 1891. 


One has to go back ten to fifteen years to 
remember a time when political activity 
among oflSce-holders in New York was as great 
and as open as it is now. * * * Numbers 
of custom-house deputies are displaying more 
zeal in working to make Fassett governor than 
in collecting the revenue for the government. 
One of them is doing good service in the state 
committee. The custom-house has become 
what it was in the old days, a center of politi¬ 
cal activity .—Philadelphia Ledger {Rep.), Sep~ 
temher 26. 









! 

I The vassal, upon investiture, took an oath of fealty to the lord, and * * become his MAN from that day forth, * 

Services were free and base. * * Base service waste * * carry out his i\mig.— [Blackstone. 


—Among the members df the Republican 
State Committee are Mr. J. W. Wadsworth, 
representative-elect; Mr. O. Van Colt, post¬ 
master of New York; Mr. F. Hendricks, collector 
of the port of New York ; Mr. John A. Quackcn' 
|bush, representative-elect; Mr. John Collins, 
’ deputy surveyor. New York, and Mr. Frank Bay- 
)■ mond, deputy collector of New York. 


* William Brookfield, Chairman. 

James W. Husted, Chairman Executive Committee. 
t James W. Wadsworth, Treasurer, 
j John S. Kenyon, Secretary. 

I Eeuben L. Fox, Chief Clerk. 

New York, Sept. 25, 1891. 

Dear Sir: The Republican State Committee re- 
1 speclfully invites from you such contribution as you 
may be willing to make toward defraying the legiti¬ 
mate and necessary expenses of the important cam¬ 
paign now in progress in this state. 

The clear and explicit platform unanimously 
adopted at Rochester and the worthy and unexcep¬ 
tionable candidates placed in nomination fairly rep¬ 
resent all that is sound and good in the political life 
of our state, and, it may be confidently assumed, 
meet the cordial approval of the 700,000 republicans 
of the state of New York. 

|i When the beneficent policy established by the 
result of the great national contest of 1888 shall be 
supplemented by the restoration to power of the re¬ 
publican party in this state, and by the triumph of 
the reforms for which it has so persistently labored. 
Intelligent and patriotic citizens will find ample re¬ 
ward for all their endeavors in that behalf. To this 
end a united and harmonious party is bending its 
energies. A full vote will insure success; and we 
Invoke such material aid as will enable this com’ 
mittee to conduct the campaign throughout the state 
. in a manner to secure the attendance at the polls on 
the 3d of November of the vast body of republican 
electors. 

Checks may be drawn to the order of the “Treas¬ 
urer of the Republican State Committee ” and trans¬ 
mitted in the enclosed envelope, addressed to James 

* W. Wadsworth, treasurer. Fifth Avenue hotel. New 

• York. Yery truly yours, 

J. W. Wadsworth, Treasurer. 

P. S.—We venture to request that you will also 
write us your views of the political situation in your 
locality and such suggestions as you may be pleased 
- to make as to needed measures to insure success in 
' the pending campaign. 

I .. - 

■ To the Hon. William Brookfield, Chairman Republican 

State Committee: 

Dear Sir: The attachment of my name to a cir¬ 
cular Inviting voluntary contributions for campaign 
purposes may be considered a violation of the law 
by me, as I am a congressman-elect from New York 
state. I, therefore, can not consent to it, and as this 
may embarrass the committee, I resign the treasurer- 
ship. J. W. Wadsworth 

New York, Oct. 5,1891. 


[Section 11 of the act of Jan. 16, 1883, “An act to 
regulate and improve the civil service of the United 
States,” (chapter 27, Statutes at Large, volume 22, 
page 403,) is as follows: 

“That no senator, or representative, or territorial 
delegate of the congress, or senator, representative or 
delegate-elect, or any oflicer or employe of either of 
said houses, and no executive, judicial, military, or 
naval o^cer of the United States, and no clerk or 
employe of any department, branch, or bureau of 
the executive, judicial, or military or naval service 
of the United States shall directly or indirectly, solicit 
or receive, or he in any manner concerned in solicit¬ 
ing or receiving any assessment, subscription, or con¬ 
tribution for any political purpose whatever, from 


any officer, clerk or employe of the United States, or 
any department, branch, or bureau thereof, or from 
any person receiving any salary or compensation 
from moneys derived from the treasury of the Uni¬ 
ted States.” 

Section 15 of the same law Says: 

"That any person who shall be guilty of violating 
any provision of the four foregoing sections (includ¬ 
ing the eleventh, just quoted), shall be guilty of a 
misdemeanor, and shall on conviction thereof, be 
punished by a fine not exceeding 85,000, or by im¬ 
prisonment for a term not exceeding three years, or 
by such fine and imprisonment both, in the discre¬ 
tion of the court.”] 

—One question was whether Mr. Wadsworth 
regarded it as wrong to have his name on that 
circular, “If a violation of the law is 
wrong,” said Mr. Wadsworth, with a smile, 
“it was wrong. I resigned as soon as I dis¬ 
covered the mistake.” 

“But were not all of the circulars sent out 
by the time your resignation was handed in?” 
he was asked. 

“ No. Only those to the post-offices had been sent 
out.” 

When asked if bethought that any further 
action would be taken in the matter, he said 
that he thought not.— New York Times, Oc¬ 
tober 8. 

— Chairman Husted was athisdeskyesterday 
afternoon, and he had numerous callers. Some 
came in response to the circular, and either 
brought ciish or pledged themselves to make 
contributions. Yesterday W'as payday at the 
custom-house. One custom-house employe 
appeared at headquarters and gave up f25, 
saying that that was the best he could do 
at present. He was told that that was all 
right and to do the best he could. Gen. 
Husted was asked last night if it were true 
thrt manyemployes of the custom-house had 
been hurrying up to the headquarters with 
their money. 

“Have they ?” he answered. “ Let them 
come. We are glad to get money here.” 

Among the officials who called at the head¬ 
quarters yesterday were Deputy Collector 
Gano, Col. Ira Ayers, special treasury agent, 
and Major Cronkite of the public stores. It 
was said about the corridors of the Fifth Ave¬ 
nue hotel last night that many federal em¬ 
ployes had stepped up to Mr. Platt’s head¬ 
quarters in the course of the day and had 
settled with those in charge. 

Among those who had also placed their 
names on the headquarters register were Rev¬ 
enue Collector Kerwin, Congressman Julius 
Caesar Burroughs, of Michigan, who is sched¬ 
uled to do some campaign talking in this 
state, and S. P. C. Henriques, United States 
commercial agent at Cardenas, Cuba.— New 
Yoi'k Times, Oct. 2. 

—Many of those holding offices received 
their circulars early yesterday. There were 
many, notably among the more prominent 
republicans holding offices in this city, who 
responded almost immediately. They knew 
what to expect, if they didn’t. They hied 
them to the Fifth Avenue Hotel, where the 
republican headquarters is located, and seemed 
really cheerful over the prospect of turning 
over a portion of their salary for the purposes 
of the campaign. 

Among those who came down handsomely 
were Deputy Collector Charles A. Burr, Assist¬ 
ant Appraiser Eugene W. Pratt, Deputy Sur¬ 
veyor John W. Corning, Special Treasury In¬ 
spector Traitteur and Custom Inspector Henry 
Keeller, II. H, Howe, Captain Benjamin and 
a lot more. Each one declined to state what 


percentage of his salary he had been compelled 
to turn over to the committee. Many of those 
who have not yet subscribed would like to 
know just how much is to be taken from them, 
because as many of them are clerks on com¬ 
paratively small salaries, they would rather 
give $3 than $5. —New York Dispatch to Boston 
Post, October 2. 

—Mr. Platt’s “ voluntary contribution ” cir¬ 
cular, which practically tells employes in fed¬ 
eral offices to step up and settle with his com¬ 
mittee for the campaign assessments, has 
reached the post-office, and almost every 
olerk there, no matter what his salary may be, 
has received one. —New York Times, Oct. 7. 

—Much credit is due to Postmaster Van Cott 
for the fine campaign meeting in Hardman Hall on 
Thursday evening. Mr. Van Colt and the seventh 
district were on deck early this year; they organized 
a Fasset and Vrooman club an the very day the 
nominations were made at Rochester, and they pro¬ 
pose to remain there until sunset on election day — 
New York Tribune [rep ], September. 

—Few complaints have been made about Gen. 
Husted’s management of the campaign till 
to-day, when it became generally known that 
John McMackin, the former labor leader, had 
been placed in charge of a bureau at headquarters. 
McMackin received a custom-house inspectorship in 
return for services to the Republican National Com¬ 
mittee in 1888, and it has been charged that he 
sold out the labor ticket to help Harrison.— 
New York Evening Post, October I 4 . 

—General Cyrus Bussey, the president of 
the New York state republican association 
has appointed the following named as a cam¬ 
paign committee. * General Bussey is the as¬ 
sistant secretary of the interior, and the first 
two names on his campaign committee are 
those of A. J. Davidson, the deputy commis¬ 
sioner of pensions under General Raum, and 
A. X. Parker, deputy attorney-general. These 
high officials and five others of less promi¬ 
nence are appointed to take charge of politi¬ 
cal campaign work in getting republican 
clerks, who live in New York, aroused to the 
importance of electing the Platt ticket for 
state officers and perpetuating ring rule in the 
Empire state.— Washington Dispatch to Boston 
Post, September 30. 

—In the meantime. Collector Fassett has 
announced that the battle has begun. He 
left for his home in Elmira on the Northern 
Central Road this afternoon. He was accom¬ 
panied by Col. Archie E. Baxter, marshal of the 
northern district. —New York Times, September 
11 . 

—Ogdensburo, N. Y., Sept. 29.—J. Sloat 
Fassett, republican candidate for governor, 
journeyed to-day from Watertown to Ogdens- 
burg. A meeting of 3,000 persons in the town 
hall to-night was addressed by Mr. Fassett, 
Mr. Vrooman, Archie E. Baxter [United States 
marshaf}. 

—Malone, N. Y., September 30.—Mr, Fas¬ 
sett and his party left Ogdensburg this morn¬ 
ing and arrived here at noon. Five-minute 
stops were made at Madrid, Norwood, Win- 
















280 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


throp and North Lawrence, but the candi¬ 
date’s speeches were little more than “good¬ 
morning” and “good-bje” to thecrowds which 
had met at the stations. Mr. Fassett is trying 
to preserve his voice and avoids speaking in 
the open air as far as possible. The outdoor 
oratory devolves upon Col. Archie E. Baxter, 
of Elmira [United States marshal] and * * 

—Lyons, N. Y., October 2.—Mr. Fassett, 
Mr. Vrooman and Colonel Baxter (United 
States marshal), arrived here this morning. 

—Mr. Fassett, Mr. Vrooman and Mr. Bax¬ 
ter (United States marshal), will begin an¬ 
other week of oratory at Oswego to-night, to 
morrow afternoon they will appear in Bing¬ 
hamton, to-morrow night at Owego, Cortland 
Wednesday afternoon, Ithaca, where Andrew 
D. White will preside, Thursday; Saratoga 
Friday afternoon, Sandy Hill Friday night, 
and Troy Saturday.— New York Times, Oc¬ 
tober 12. 

—The faction fact in the republican party 
between S. D. Coykendall and George H, 
Sharpe broke out in the Ulster county republi¬ 
can convention held here today. The strife 
came on the organization of the convention. 

William M. Hayes said the postmaster of 
Kingston, who openly and defiantly opposed 
the election of James G. Blaine, and the col¬ 
lector of internal revenue had taken a trip through 
the county and juggled to get delegates to the con¬ 
vention. * • * 

The result was a Coykendall victory.—[Coy¬ 
kendall is.a Platt man.]— Kingston, N. Y., Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, Oct. 11. 

—There is trouble among the republicans of 
Genesee county on account of a broken slate 
at the county convention, which met at Ba¬ 
tavia to-day. There were many delegates 
present, and the ticket was thought to be in 
fine shape to be railroaded through without a 
hitch. * * 

It is street talk that the convention was con¬ 
trolled by Postmaster Tarbox, and it is every¬ 
where declared that there is a rupture in Gen¬ 
esee’s republican ranks which it will be hard 
to heal.— Rochester, N. Y. Dispatch to New York 
Times, September 29. 

—Several hundred delegates to the Scranton 
convention of the state league of republican 
clubs left here this morning. The bitterness 
over this contest is intensified by the fact that only yes¬ 
terday it was learned that, in the interest of Quay’s 
candidate, who is Congressman-elect Robinson, 250 
clubs were secretly organized in western Pennsyl¬ 
vania by federal office holders. Their delegates left 
for Scranton last night. It is really a fight between 
Quay and the federal office-holders on one side and 
Chris. Magee on the other as to who shall rep¬ 
resent the party in this state, with Dalzell’s 
ambition to succeed Quay in the senate in the 
background.— Pittsburgh Dispatch to the New 
York Evening Post, September 2S. 

—The way that federal office-holders organized 
gangs of heelers for the Scranton convention, pre¬ 
sented them with free railroad tickets and 
beer adlib., as well as paying their hotel bills, 
etc.— Pittsburgh Post, &ptember. 

—Senator Quay came up from his Atlantic 
City retreat to-day, and the fact of his coming 
was known only to a few. Gov. Pattison’s proc¬ 
lamation called him to the city, and republican 


leaders from every direction visited room 34 
at the Continental as part of that political 
sympathy that invariably brings the leaders 
together when the senator is about the city. 
Chairman Porter, Congressman Reyburn, 
Marshall Leeds, Collector Cooper and ex Col¬ 
lector Martin realized early that the situation 
was something more than serious. Among 
Senator Quay’s callers were Gen. Frank 
Reeder of Easton, Controller of the Treasury 
Gilkeson, the close bosom friend who runs 
Bucks county; Gen. Hastings, whose concern 
in the result is shown by his engagement as a 
speaker; Hamilton Disston, Chairman Porter, 
Collector Warmcastle, Senators Crouse and 
Thomas, and Chairman Watres, whom the 
Senator met later at republican headquarters. 

Collector Cooper had the largest end of the con¬ 
ference. He had no sooner emerged from Mr. 
Quay’s room than he said: “Gov. Pattison’s 
action is clearly partisan. ” That declaration 
was the keynote to the conference of the after¬ 
noon .—Philadelphia Dispatch to New York Times, 
September 28. 

—Senator Quay summoned Assistant Post¬ 
master Hughes to the hotel during the morn¬ 
ing and about 12:30 o’clock that official and 
the ex-national chairman met in the state 
committee rooms .—Philadelphia Dispatch to New 
York Times, October 6. 

—Ohio having expressed a desire that the 
republicans who are in office should contrib¬ 
ute of their earnings to help elect McKinley, 
and Secretary Foster having advised the Ohio 
state association that Ohio men should do 
their duty by “the party that put them in of¬ 
fice,” the Pennsylvania republicans are now 
making known their wants. 

Notwithstanding that Postmaster-General 
Wanamaker opposed that thing, a list of post- 
office department employes from Pennsylvania 
was furnished to the state committee, and one 
of those clerks yesterday received the follow¬ 
ing lines: 

Headquarters Republican State Committee, 1 
Continental Hotel, Sept. 25,1891. j 

My Dear Sir— The importanee of the present cam¬ 
paign should not be underestimated. This contest 
Is but a forerunner of 1892. A democratic victory, or 
even a meager republican majority now, would seri¬ 
ously cripple us in the great tariff battle soon to open. 
Only a few weeks are left for active work. Novem¬ 
ber 3 being election day, our vast organization must 
be gotten into line for its best effort on that day. We 
can not perfect such an organization as is necessary 
in an “ off year ” like the present, when there is al¬ 
ways more or less difficulty in arousing the people 
and getting them to the polls unless we receive finan¬ 
cial help. Knowing your activity and iiberality in 
behalf of the party, we invite your earliest conveni¬ 
ent subscription to the state committee, and we es¬ 
pecially request that it be made as liberal as possible. 

Yours very truly, Louis A. Watres, Chairman. 

An officer of the department told a reporter 
who asked about this letter that Mr. Wana¬ 
maker had requested that no such demands be 
sent to clerks in his department, and intimated 
that the postmaster-general had informed Mr. 
Watres that, if he would designate the snm ex¬ 
pected to be realized by “voluntary contribu¬ 
tions” from his Pennsylvania clerks, he would 
send a check for the amount. Now, the ques¬ 
tion is asked whether Watres has not obtained 
the check, and is also trying to get the “vol¬ 
untary contribution” in addition.— Washington 
Dispatch to New York Times, September 28. 

—The fact is that the county-house ring, the 
court ring, the government building ring and 
the city-hall ring got together before that con¬ 
vention and fixed np as late. * * Levi Mea- 

cham, Allen T. Brinsmade, Bill Gabriel, Howard 
Burgess and Mark Hanna simply ran the con¬ 
vention. It would have been better if such men as 
Brinsmade and Gabriel, holding government offices, 


had attended to their neglected offices, instead of 
being present in that convention to steal nomi¬ 
nations for ring candidates.— Cleveland, 0., 
Dispatch to New York Evening Post, Septem¬ 
ber 29. 

STATE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE. 


—William M. Hahn, chairman.Mansfield. 

W. S. Matthews, secretary.Columbus. 

George W. Sinks, treasurer.Columbus. 

Asa S. Busbnel.Springfield. 

Julius Whiting, jr.Canton. 

Myran 1'. Herrick.Cleveland. 

Harry B. Morehead.Cincinnati. 

Dr. J. E. Lowes.Dayton. 

Edward S. Wilson.Ironton. 

George Fields.Toledo. 

Clinton D. Firestone.Columbus. 

M. R. Patterson.Columbus. 


Headquarters 

Ohio Republican State Executive Committee, 

122 E. State st. (Opposite Government Building), 
Columbus, O., Aug. 29,1891. 
-, Esq., Indianapolis, Ind.: 

Dear Sir— The republican executive committee 
of Ohio Is now fully organized and actively at work. 
Funds are required for this work. The campaign in 
Ohio is more than a state campaign; it is national in 
both its importance and effect. The election of the 
Hon. William McKinley, jr., and his associates on 
the ticket and a republican general assembly this 
fall in Ohio, assures a republican success in the cam¬ 
paign of 1892. 

You are the incumbent of place made possible by the 
success of the party in the past. The continued success 
of the republican party is of great interest and ad¬ 
vantage to the whole country, and you, no doubt, 
appreciate it. A liberal contribution from you as an 
individual, will largely aid this committee in the fur¬ 
therance of its work. In the ordinary business 
affairs of life promptness of payment is absolutely 
required. Such promptness in our business is 
equally important. We will be pleased to hear from 
you at once. Yours truly, 

W. M. Hahn, Chairman, 

W. S. Matthews, Secretary. 

—There has been a systematic effort to im¬ 
press upon the government employes that they 
must put up their money for the republican 
party. Early in the summer Secretary Foster 
gave them some very broad hints in his speech 
to the Ohio republican association, and they 
have been followed since by men with sub¬ 
scription books and begging circulars, at first 
mild in tone and then approaching the threat¬ 
ening. The last circular was the following 
notice from Mr. McKinley’s agent to come 
down with their cash : 

Washington, D. C., Oct. 7,1891. 

My Dear Sir: A meeting of Ohio republicans who 
are interested in the success of our ticket this year, 
will be held at the office of McGrew & Small, 623 F 
street, N. W., on Friday evening October 9. Your 
presence is earnestly requested. 

The necessity of electing Major McKinley by a de¬ 
cisive majority on the issue joined is imperative. 
The election of a republican legislature is of still 
greater importance. So the Major says himself, "Self- 
preservation is the first law of human nature." Don’t 
deceive yourself by thinking you <tre safe in any event. 
Show your republicanism and fealty to the party by 
attending this conference. Very respectfully, 

James E. Lowrey. 

The result of this call was the coming to¬ 
gether of eleven timid Ohio employes of the 
government, who brought with them $25 in 
cash with which to placate the growing anger 
of the tin gods. 

Mr. Lowery is now in a very bad temper. 
He says that there are 7,000 Ohio employes of 
the government at Washington, drawing pay 
aggregating $500,000 per year, and that only 
thirty of them have contributed to the cause 
of tin plate and protection. The contribu¬ 
tions, he declares, amount to only about one- 
fifth of one per cent.— Washington Dispatch to 
New York Times, Oct. 11. 




















The Civil service Chronicle. 


VoL. I, No. 33. 


INDIANAPOLIS, NOVEMBER, 1891. 


rpi^T> vfQ . J 50 cents persnnnm. 
1 JiiKIilo . 5 cents per copy. 


Pulished monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 

Indianapolis, Ind. ^ 

Two NOTABLE events have occurred since 
the last issue of the Chronicle. In one of 
the cases against the Mahone blackmailers, 
B the government prosecuting oflScer, after a 
year, brought to argument a demurrer to 
the indictment. The district court at 
Washington unanimously overruled the 
demurrer, taking the ground that every 
kind of solicitation of money in a govern¬ 
ment building for political purposes is un¬ 
lawful. It is clear that the courts neither 
mean to legislate nor to interpret the law 
with a view to helping spoilsmen out of 
scrapes. The United States supreme court 
in the Curtis case, the New York court of 
appeals in the Buffalo cases, and now this 
district court have in strong and unmis¬ 
takable terms upheld the civil service laws 
in their true spirit and object. 

The other event is the dismissal by the 
postmaster-general of some clerks and car¬ 
riers in the Omaha post-office. It seems 
that President Cleveland’s postmaster ap¬ 
pointed a number of these without any 
regard to the civil service law, and 
although they had never -been on the 
eligible list. When President Harrison’s 
postmaster came in he also decided that he 
was greater than the law, and he appointed 
persons not on the eligible list. The 
present civil service commission, neither 
being asleep norafraid,overhauledhim,and 
on its report the dismissals are ordered. 
The present postmaster furnished a perfect 
instance of a spoilsman’s “brass,” by an 
I effort to “save” the men. It seems that he 
I may have to refund the wages thus unlaw- 
[ fully paid. Of course. President Harrison 
will dismiss him. A suit should also be 
brought against the old postmaster to re¬ 
cover the illegal payments under him. 

Mr. John M. Butler, of this city, having 
been to New York, said in an interview in 
the Indianapolis Journal; 

There are a few extremely good fellows over there, 
most too good to live, but hardly good enough to 
die, who are howling about Platt, but they are not 
seriously disturbing Platt or the party. As I said be¬ 
fore, I believe the signs point to a great republican 
victory in New York. 

Mr. Butler is an eminent lawyer, and as 
such, after a brief consideration of the fact 
that the federal offices pertaining to the 
state of New York, including the custom¬ 
house, the post-offices, the sub-treasury and 


the internal revenue collectorships, were 
placed under the control of Tom Platt, a 
private citizen, to be used by him in an at¬ 
tempt to carry the recent election, he 
would say that such an act was wholly un¬ 
constitutional, and that a president who 
turned over offices to be so used was guilty 
of a gross violation of his official oath. If 
he pondered the subject further, and from 
the stand-point of a citizen, Mr. Butler 
would say that such a practice by a presi¬ 
dent was unrepublican in every sense, and 
that it was an unlawful exercise of impe¬ 
rialism such as this government was 
formed to prevent. Further, Mr. Butler, 
still reflecting as a citizen, would say that 
this practice was dangerous to public order, 
and that at any time some able manipu¬ 
lator like Quay or Gorman in the presi¬ 
dential chair might think he had the coun¬ 
try by the throat, and might try the recent 
experiment of Balmaceda in Chili, and 
might make this country incur an outrage¬ 
ous cost of lives and money to put him 
down. 

But as a republican, Mr. Butler is in¬ 
stantly purblind and strabismic. He does 
not examine and judge the acts of his own 
party. Dorseyism and Dudleyism in In¬ 
diana apparently have never crossed his 
view. The stupendous violation of the 
promise of the republican platform, of 
which Plattism is one glaring instance, ap¬ 
parently is unseen by him. To say that he 
knows of these things, and is not goaded 
by his conscience into a protest which 
could but be powerful, would be to say 
that he is grossly recreant to his duties as a 
citizen. His position is that of a man of 
wide influence, whose judgment ought to 
be sound, but who can always be depended 
upon at critical moments to say that Platt¬ 
ism is harmless and to give color of re¬ 
spectability to any republican machine, 
however vicious. It is a good thing for 
the country that it has a large and increas¬ 
ing number of men who are “hardly good 
enough to die.” They will live on, and will, 
in time, destroy Plattism, which is but 
another name for our buccaneering spoils 
system. And Mr. Butler and many other re¬ 
spectable citizens like him, will be ashamed 
that it was done, not only without them, 
but in spite of them. 

Unhappy Headsman Clarkson can only 
expect jeers as he stands among his 40,000 1 


decapitated postmasters and sees his state 
of Iowa, which has had his peculiar care in 
abundance, gradually placing itself in the 
democratic column. In Pennsylvania> 
when Quay had the support and sympathy 
of the administration last year, he was 
defeated ; this year he lost that, but he has 
been successful. He has his heel again on 
the necks of the people of his state. Every 
good citizen may rejoice at the defeat of 
either party in New York, Taking the 
elections together, the result of the na¬ 
tional election next year is extremely 
doubtful. This will make it impossible to 
ignore the subject of civil service reform, 
which both party machines would like to 
do. Every vote will be needed. Those 
members of both parties who have been 
trying to bring it about that the tariff shall 
be the only “ issue,” while the real prize to 
be fought for is the hundreds of millions of 
spoil in federal salaries, will have to 
abandon their ground. The chief business 
of the president of the United States is the 
management of the civil service. How he 
is likely to do that is the chief question to 
be determined in voting for a presidential 
candidate. The president’s use of the fed¬ 
eral service as spoil to divide among his 
relatives and personal and party friends is 
going to be broken up. Happily the op¬ 
ponents of this relic of absolutism, so det¬ 
rimental to public morals, will be needed 
next year by both parties in several close 
states. Neither party can afford to alienate 
its share of this element. 


“The reform of the civil service auspiciously be¬ 
gun under a republican administration should be 
completed by the further extension of the reform sys¬ 
tem, already established by law, to all the grades 
of the service to which it is applicable. The spirit 
and purpose of the reform should be observed in all 
executive appointments, and all laws at variance 
with the object of existing reform legislation should 
be repealed, to the end that the dangers to free in¬ 
stitutions, which lurk in the power of official patron¬ 
age may be wisely and effectively avoided.— 
can National Platform, 1888. 

The more this promise is examined, the 
more magnificent it seems. It could not 
have been made stronger if written by the 
civil service reformers themselves. Indeed, 
it was written by George William Curtis. 
Having been inserted into the republican 
platform of 1888, after a steady four years 
insistence against a democratic adminis¬ 
tration that similar ante-election promises 
ought to be kept, there was a double rea¬ 
son for supposing it was put there to be 

















282 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


carried out. President Harrison publicly 
made this promise his own. He has in 
fulfillment placed about seven hundred 
places in the Indian service under the 
reform system along with the thirty-two 
thousand already there. On the other hand 
he has supplanted more than 100,000 federal 
employes with his relatives or with his 
personal or party friends and all for per¬ 
sonal or partisan reasons. He has turned 
out such men as Pearson, Burt, Graves, 
Saltonstall and Corse, whose sole object was 
to render faithful service. He appoints 
such men as Flanagan, of Texa^i. He 
neglects to require the Mahone black¬ 
mailers to be brought to trial. He ignores 
the most flagrant violations of law in 
Baltimore. He turned the federal service 
in Virginia over to Mahone, in Pennsyl 
vania to Quay, in New York to Platt, to 
be used in attempts to carry elections. 
The time is approaching when the account 
must be taken, and these are examples of 
facts which must be put into the scales on 
the good or bad side respective!j'. Civil 
service reformers have long memories. 

Among the publications of the month, 
Mr. Herbert Welsh has an article in the 
current Forum on “ The Degredation of 
Politics in Pennsylvania,” which is a state¬ 
ment of facts full of humiliation to that 
state. 

The executive committee of the Nation¬ 
al Civil Service Reform League,some time 
ago put out a circular letter containing a 
brief statement of the present status of the 
merit system in the federal service. The 
salaries of the entire service amount to 
over one hundred millions a year, of which 
about forty millions are attached to places 
in the classified service. 

Speaking of the merit system, the letter 
says: 

"It is objected that this system is English snd 
aristocratic. The system prevailing in England at the 
time of the American Revolution was the patronage 
system. Under that old system the chief offices were 
controlled by the great aristocratic families. The 
reform which was begun about 1854, was a move¬ 
ment on behnlf of the common people of England, 
and was resisted by those families who had up to 
that time the monopoly of the offices. The present 
reformed system is most popular among the masses 
of the English people, who now have a fair oppor. 
tunity of getting the offices under conditions that 
make them subservient to no man for his gift or in¬ 
fluence. Under the reformed civil service, sons of 
poor men, without social or political influence, have 
an equal opportunity with the rich and prominent of 
getting appointments, and depend solely on their 
own character and ability.” 

The object of the letter is to call public 
attention to the need of an additional ap 
propriation for the civil service commis¬ 
sion. The commission needs a force of 
clerks of its own instead of clerks detailed 
to it from the departments, and it needs 
more clerks to enable it to mark all exam¬ 
ination papers in Washington, a plan 


which would manifestly secure uniformity 
and, in places less fortunate than Indianap¬ 
olis in local boards, fairness. 


Private-Secretary Halford, when ed¬ 
itor, but not manager, of the Indianapolis 
Journal, is said to have replied to the ques¬ 
tion why the Journal persisted in a certain 
palpably wrong course, “ For the reason, I 
suppose, that only a mule refuses to change 
his mind.” It is not certain that even this 
excuse can be given for the course of the 
administration towards Chili. Balmaceda 
was a president who tried, by using the 
public service, to perpetuate himself as a 
boss. His murder of citizens has no par¬ 
allel except in the Turkish bow-string. His 
removal of the judges was about as if Pres¬ 
ident Harrison should remove the judges 
of the United States courts. Such acts at 
once fixed Balmaceda’s standing through¬ 
out the world as a violent usurper, bent 
upon breaking down the liberties of the 
Chilians. There was not a shadow of ex¬ 
cuse for sympathy with him on the part of 
our government. We should have meted 
to him, as a dc facto power, the strictest let¬ 
ter of international law, and our one wish 
should have been that the Chilians might 
succeed in putting this murderous boss 
under their feet. In fact, our government 
sympathized with Balmaceda. It assumed 
an attitude of hardened indiflerence re 
garding the people of Chili, and treated it 
as a foregone conclusion that the dictator 
was to succeed. Its protection of the per¬ 
sons executing Balmaceda’s order to cut 
the cable yet waits an explanation to bring 
it within the rules of neutrality. When 
the dictator was overthrown and the blun¬ 
der of our government became a glaring 
and humiliating fact, it might have made 
a frank acknowledgement by recalling 
its reckless minister. But seemingly on 
the principle that only the mule refuses to 
change its mind, it still keeps him in a 
place where the only effectual thing he 
does is to exasperate the people with whom 
we ought to be friends. An attack follows 
upon our sailors who are wholly innocent. 
This would occur in any city in the United 
States under the same circumstances. We 
are sending ships to Chili and are talking 
about her “ insolence.” Whatever the law 
requires for the attack upon our blameless 
sailors, that Chili must render. But that 
does not alter the fact that the people of 
this country are glad that the people of 
Chili overthrew their dictator, nor the fact 
that our government managed to throw its 
influence and sympathy in favor of a boss 
attempting to carry bossism to its legitimate 
end, nor the fact that Minister Eagan’s 
office was given to him, not for his fitness, 
out of spoil allotted to him for partisan 
ervice. 


THE DUTY NEXT YEAR. 

A subscriber writes from Providence, Rhode 
Island : 

Enclosed And postal note for sub.scription for one 
year. I send it gladly in view of the good fight you 
are making, but I never read the Chronicle without 
a feeling, almost bitter, that your influence should 
have been used in behalf of Harrison instead of 
Cleveland two years ago. I believe the treachery of 
the Hill democrats would not have defeated Cleve¬ 
land had the reformers and independents in New 
Yoik solidly supported Cleveland. 

No doubt the course of Cleveland in regard to the 
civil service, especially in Maryland and Indiana, 
was obnoxious to the refo mers in those states, but 
what have the latter gained by the change? You 
know as well as anybody. Look at the open and uni 
disguised activity of federal officials in party politics, 
caucuses, conventions and campaigns over the whole 
country; the assessment circulars sent to federa- 
employes by republican state committees of New 
York, Pennsylvania and Ohio; the power of Quay_ 
Platt, Clarkson, Belden with the President; the fail¬ 
ure to extend the provisions of the civil service law; 
the complete looting of the federal civil service; the 
failure to punish violators of the law in Virginia and 
Maryland ; the deliberate violation by the President 
of his letter of acceptance, and of the pledges of the 
convention which nominated him. •■■■ - All of 
which would have been prevented had Cleveland 
been elected, and you have a record calculated to 
make a man feel bitter. The mischief has been done 
and republican defeat next year will not undo it. 
The reformers trusted in the promises of a bigoted, 
narrowminded, petty Indiana politician and a cor¬ 
rupt and rotten party, turned over to Quay, Dud¬ 
ley, Platt, Belden and the like, and they have their 
reward. 

With the correction of the inference that 
this paper took part in the campaign of 1888 
(it was not in existence), and adding also the 
fact continually forgotten that the reason of 
more weight than all others with those re¬ 
ferred to by our correspondent for supporting 
Harrison, was to avoid a ratification of the 
acts of the late administration, we wish to ex¬ 
amine whether it is true to say, regarding the 
action of any who may have supported Mr. 
Harrison on account of his pledges and the 
pledges of the republican party, because both 
the President and his party have since 
violated those pledges, that “the mischief has 
been done and republican defeat next year 
will not undo it.” We claim that the end of 
the spoils system is nearer at hand, and that 
the merit system is stronger among the people 
at large than ever before, and that this ad¬ 
vance is the “reward” of the reformers who 
believed in taking Mr. Harrison and his party 
at their word ; that equally it is true that the 
republican President and the republican party 
have been seriously discredited by their broken 
pledges, and their “reward ” has come in the 
shape of several defeats already and a rather 
gloomy looking future. 

Every one has a right to assume that the 
promises of a platform and of a candidate 
will be kept until by actual performance they 
are violated and then he has no right to apol¬ 
ogize for the violation. No personal devo¬ 
tion to a president, no affection for a party, 
should stay the exposure of the facts, nor the 
unbiased comment on those facts. If a party 
or a president has played a confidence game 
to win votes, or has shown pusillanimity in 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


283 


meeting the worsen elements of the party and 
failed to keep the pledges made to win the 
better elements, let all the world know these 
facts and it is not civil service reform nor its 
advocates who will suffer. But the fatal mis¬ 
take is to ignore, to excuse, to change the 
point of view, and to feel because one accepted 
in good faith the solemn pledges of a party or 
a man he has got to “ stick ” to both. 

If the men who voted and worked for Mr. 
Harrison had blinked his short-comings and 
sighed over the “pressure” brought to bear 
upon him, had expatiated on how he was con¬ 
stantly “deceived” by his friends, and finally 
had maintained that he must not, as a working 
President, fall between two stools, but could do 
his sworn duty only as he could carry his 
party along with him, civil service reform 
and reformers would indeed be now discred¬ 
ited. 

Such a position has been for years the 
great blunder in fighting the spoils system. 
Timid reformers in 1884 said the candidate 
could not withstand his party and a party so 
hungry and thirsty for spoils must be longer 
excluded from power; later the reform ranks 
were too full of apologists, who seemed to 
labor night and day to show that the Presi¬ 
dent really had not promised much, and that 
while things could not be explained in a 
couple of states the fault, if fault there was, 
was in the inability of the sufferers to get 
their troubles to the presidential ear. Every 
spoils act of President Cleveland and his 
party when explained to the people without 
malice and without excuse helped the reform 
and only injured him and his party, and it 
was only when so large a number of civil serv- 
i ice reformers could not withstand the tempta- 
tation to explain away what seemed entirely 
plain to practical spoils politicians, that the 
||. cause was weakened. So far as we know the 
'■personal and political friends, and he has a 
,,^od many, of President Harrison, among 
Kih’e civil service reformers who supported himi 
I have never sought to excuse him or his acts. 
They have regretted the fact that he should 
seize the civil service as spoil to perpetuate 
party, or personal ascendency, but they have 
never sought to shield him from the moral 
consequences of his acts. 

But comparisons are profitless, except as 
they bear upon the practical question of what 
a man is to do next year, if he believes that 
the spoils evil is now the greatest evil to be 
crushed, and he desires the most of all to bruise 
the head of the serpent in the way to wound 
him most sorely. Suppose Mr. Cleveland is 
thedemocratic candidate, as now seems likely, 
and he and his party declare themselves in 
favor of the present law, say that it shall be 
enforced in letter and in spirit, and that its 
provisions shall be materially extended; and 
the republican candidate and platform try to 
ignore the question, or are less explicit and 
vigorous than in the platforms of 1884 and 
1888; the wise civil service reformer does not 
dwell on the errors of the late administration 
and say because that aiiministratiou failed 


once, he will continue to be timid and sus¬ 
picious. Instead, he acts upon the suppo¬ 
sition that Mr. Cleveland and his party have 
profited by experience, and that they will 
probably avoid the mistakes they made before. 
It is a very dull man who learns nothing by 
experience, and Mr. Cleveland is not dull. 

Ou the supposition that the pledges of both 
candidates and both platforms are satisfactory, 
he certainly will not lose the opportunity to 
nail the present “chicken hawk to the barn¬ 
door,” as a warning and a lesson. And if the 
democratic party should succeed and if its ad¬ 
ministration should break its promises as the 
republican administration has done, neverthe¬ 
less civil service reform would have been ad¬ 
vanced over what it would be to ratify or 
condone the division of over 100,000 federal 
places and salaries, amounting to hundreds 
of millions, as spoil. 

THE DIVORCE OF MUNICIPAL BUSI¬ 
NESS FROM POLITICS. 

[A paper read by Moorfleld Storey before the Nation¬ 
al Civil Service Reform League, at Buffalo, September 
30.] 

Every American is brought up to believe two 
things; First, that we are par excellence a business 
people pre-eminently endowed with what we are 
pleased to call “ sound business sense," and, second^ 
that we Invented and understand better than any 
other nation the art of self government. These 
are fundamental articles in our national creed, com¬ 
fortable household beliefs that are handed down 
from father to son and we cling to them with un¬ 
questioning faith. Yet how shall we reconcile them 
with the fact that our large cities are without excep¬ 
tion badly governed, and in many instances dis¬ 
gracefully governed? When we ate applying the 
principle of self government most directly, where 
the people are nearest to their agents and feel their 
neglect or mismanagement most keenly, our " sound 
business sense ” deserts ns and we fail lamentably. 

What are the causes of this failure? How can we 
secure g od municipal government? No more im¬ 
portant questions confront the American people 
to-day, and they must be answered. 

These questions concern not merely the dwellers 
in th cities who suffer the immediate effects of bad 
government, but every citizen of this country, for a 
city which is governed by corrupt men is a plague 
spot that Infects the whole body politic. Baltimore 
dominates the state of Maryland ; New Orleans exer. 
cises a baleful influence over Louisiana. Nor is the 
evil stayed by state lines; a corrupt city govern¬ 
ment may poison the politics of the whole country. 
Tammany Hall rules the city of New York. It claims 
the power to elect and defeat Presidents, and so to 
shape the policy of the country. The candidate who 
refused to promise all that its leaders demand of 
office or public plunder may well owe his defeat to 
their opposition or their treachery, and so the result 
of a close election may be determined by men who 
care nothing for the questions at issue, nothing for 
the vast interests at stake, nothing for the welfare of 
the country, but who are mere political mercenaries 
ready to fight for the party which offers the highest 
wages, and unlike the free companions of the middle 
ages, ever willing to desert their standard in the 
midst of a battle, if desertion seems likely to be 
profitable. It is mortifying to think how many 
months and years of honest and earnest effort to edu¬ 
cate the people upon such vital Issues as tariff reform 
and financial honesty may be brought to naught by 
a miserable bargain made in the city of New York. 
It is humiliating to reflect that the national conven. 
tionsof great parties may be governed in their choice 
of a candidate for the highest office in this coun¬ 
try by the supposed necessity of conciliating men 
like Tweed and John Kelly. Indeed, the very exist, 
ence of republican government may almost be said 


to be at stake. If the people of a single city, whose 
associations, traditions, education and interests are 
more nearly identical than those of widely separated 
communities can ever be, are unable to manage 
their common business with reasonable honesty and 
success, what hope is there lhai the experiment will 
continue to succeed on an enormously greater scale 
with communities as widely separated as Maine and 
California? 

QUESTIONS or PUKE BUSINESS. 

The oflicials who administer the government 
of a city deal with pure business questions. It is 
their duty to see that the air which we breathe is 
unpolluted, that the water which we drink is pure 
that our sewers do not fill our houses with poison 
that the streets upon which we walk are well paved 
and clean, that their use is properly regulated so as 
to preserve the respective rights of pedestrians and 
those who ride in public or private conveyances, that 
our lives and properly are protected by efficient 
police, that fires are prevented and extinguished, 
that the new uses of electricity for light, power, and 
the transmission of intelligence are carefully guard¬ 
ed so as to give the public the service which it 
needs without undue risk to the citizen; that our 
schools are well conducted: that the spread of infec¬ 
tious diseases is checked; that we are not injured by 
unwholesome food and drink; that our feet are not 
obstructed by snow on the sidewalks, nor our heads 
crushed by ice from the roofs. From birth to death 
at home, at school, in the street, in the theater, in 
church, eating, drinking, breathing, sleeping, walk¬ 
ing, sick or well, at every moment of our lives, our 
health, our safety, and our property depend very 
largely on the excellence of our city government- 
Not merely the necessaries, but the luxuries of life, 
libraries, art museums, park.', music, architecture, 
painting and sculpture, are within the sphere of 
municipal government. If that government is inef¬ 
ficient and corrupt, we feel it at every turn in our 
daily life; if it is tfficient and honest, all our lives 
are made easier. If we give the subject a moment’s 
thought, we can not but see how large a part of the 
business which concerns us all most nearly is en. 
trusted to our municipal governments. 

There is nothing in the nature of things which 
makes it impossible to govern a city well. If we 
cross the ocean and examine what some of us like to 
call “ the effete monarchies of the old world,” we 
shall find that the business of ruling a city is well 
understood. The streets of London and Paris, and 
even Liverpool, seem surprisingly clean to any one 
who is familiar with the streets of an American city. 
The sewers of Paris are models, and the efficiency of 
the French police is proverbial. The disastrous con¬ 
flagrations which so cons antly lay waste large sec 
tlons of our cities and towns, are almost unknown on 
the continent of Europe. Illustrations might be 
multiplied, but Glasgow and Birmingham deserve 
more than a passing mention, for they are conspicu¬ 
ous examples of the successful application to munic¬ 
ipal affairs of that “sound business sense” upon 
which we so unreasonably plume ourselves. 

GLASGOW’S MODEL GOVERNMENT. 

In Glasgow we have a city which in 1888 had about 
560,000 people, in an area of some 6,100 acres, so that 
it may well be compared with several of our Ameri¬ 
can citi s. The population is extremely dense and 
dwells largely in tenement houses, so that the con¬ 
ditions are extremely unfavorable to cleanliness 
and health, and there is nothing in the character of 
the population which makes it especially ea>y to 
govern. It is possible in this paper to give only the 
briefest summary of the work which the city govern¬ 
ment does, and does well. 

The public health is secured by a large force of 
trained inspectors, some of whom seek for cases of 
infectious disease; others search for nuisances, such 
as defective drains and tin wholesome accumulations; 
others who are women go from house to house among 
poor families and make suggestions as to house¬ 
keeping methods, and others still are nigh inspectors 
who visit lodging houses to see that the laws against 
overcrowding are respected. Their labors to prevent 
disease are supplemented by admirable hospitals, of 
which the latest is a model. There is a sanitary 












284 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


wash-house, where infected articles are cleansed and 
from which disinfecting operations are directed at 
the houses where cases of disease have occurred. 
Nor should we overlook the house where families 
are received while their houses are being disinfected. 
The results of this system are excellent. 

The street cleaning department sweeps 181 miles of 
streets nightly; cleans 11,000 private courts and passage 
ways at least once a day; waters the streets; removes 
refuse of every kind at least once a week; burns 
what can not be used for fertilizing purposes; sells 
what can be so used, and does all this work at a net 
expense to the citizen of 85 cents a head, the total 
cost, including interest on the city’s outlay of 1600,- 
000 for plant, being $370,000, which was reduced by 
sales of manure and the tax levied on the owners of 
private courts to $190,000. 

The city has dealt with its worst and most crowded 
neighborhoods, where in some places the population 
was 1,000 to an acre, by buying the property, opening 
wide streets, laying out parks and squares, and sell¬ 
ing the land left after the improvements. This work 
has been done on a large scale at a very reasonable 
cost, and with great benefit to the moral and phys¬ 
ical health, as well as to the appearance of the city. 

Not only have old tenement houses oeen demol¬ 
ished, but new ones have been built, and the city 
owns and conducts not less than seven lodging- 
houses, furnishing some 2,000 beds, and accommo¬ 
dating annually nearly 700,000 lodgers at a charge 
per night of from six to nine cents, according as the 
lodger prefers one sheet or two. For this each lodger 
has a separate apartment, a woven wire mattress, the 
use of a large sitting-room, a locker for provisions, 
and a chance to cook his food on the kitchen range, 
while everything is beautifully neat. 

This experiment not only has raised the whole 
standard of lodging accommodations, but pays a net 
income of four or five per cent, on the investment of 
some $500,000, after making a proper annual charge 
for deterioration. 

Another department deserves mention. Some 
$600,000 has been spent in the erection of five public 
baths, in each of which are large swimming baths 
for men and women, in charge of competent swim¬ 
ming masters, and kept open with water at a uni¬ 
form temperature throughout the year. To these are 
added private bath houses and wash houses, where 
a woman for two pence an hour can have the use of 
the most improved washing, drying, and mangling 
apparatus operated by steam, and at the end of her 
hour go home with her clothes washed, dried, and 
ironed. This system takes from the houses of the 
poor a prolific source of discomfort and domestic 
difficulties, for washing done by the wife in the fam¬ 
ily living rooms is a process which exhausts her 
strength and tries her temper, while it is exasperat¬ 
ing to the husband and everyone who is compelled 
to eat or stay for any purpose in an atmosphere of 
steam and sloppiness. 

The gas problem is also dealt with on business 
principles. The city owns the works, and between 
1869 and 1870 so conducted them as to increase the 
consumption of gas 140 per cent., while the increase 
in population has been only twenty per cent.; and 
to reduce the price from $1.14 to sixty-six cents per 
thousand feet. The leakage has been reduced by 
one-half. Not only the street but private courts and 
passages and even the common stair cases in tene¬ 
ment houses are lighted at the public expense, with 
very marked results in diminishing crime and in¬ 
creasing the comfort and security of the people. The 
city lets gas stoves to citizens at a moderate price, 
which the poor who live in tenements find very con¬ 
venient; and all this is done so economically that 
the city can operate the works, construct new ones, 
pay interest on its debt, charge off large sums for de¬ 
preciation, and accumulate a sinking fund which in 
fifteen years has paid nearly $3,000,000 towards the 
cost of the investment. 

The street railway question, which has embarrassed 
us so much in America, has been settled on a busi¬ 
ness basis. The city has built and owns the railways 
and lets them to a company. The lease made In 
1872 expires in 1894, and the company pays as 
rental and interest on the city’s investment, a 


yearly sum for a sinking fund sufficient to pay the 
principal before the expiration of the lease; a sum 
for repairs and renewals equal to four per cent, on 
the cost of the road, out of which it is kept in re¬ 
pair; and in addition a rental of $750 a mile. The 
fares are fixed at a penny a mile and a penny for 
certain routes which in some cases are more than a 
mile long, and on which cars are run in the morning 
and at night for workingmen at half price. The 
original lessees sold this lease for $750,000, and yet 
the purchasing corporation after some hard years 
began to pay dividends which since 1880 have been 
from nine to eleven per cent, a year. After 1894 the 
city will own the tramways in perfect order, and 
their cost will have been paid, some $1,700,000, s® 
that hereafter they will be a source of large revenue 
to the city. 

Equal intelligence has been shown in providing 
the city with the water of Lock Katrine, and the 
works have been so managed as to pay for their main¬ 
tenance and partly for their cost, which will in 
course of years be provided for, while the rates have 
been reduced. The pressure is such that the expen¬ 
ses of the fire department have been so much re¬ 
duced that the saving in this item alone more than 
equals the interest on the entire cost of the water¬ 
works. 

WATCH THK CORPOKATIONS. 

This is a brief resume which shows what can be 
done by the intelligent application of business prin. 
ciples to the conduct of municipal affairs. The suc¬ 
cess of this experiment is peculiarly interesting to 
us. One of the greatest dangers which beset our 
system arises from the existence in our cities and 
states of large aggregations of capital, whose owners 
have interests at variance with those of the general 
public. A street railway monopoly or a great gas or 
water company is naturaly anxious to make as much 
money as possible and to secure whatever privileges 
will aid in the accomplishment of this object. The 
public, on the other hand, which gives such a corpo¬ 
ration its franchises, which permits it to use the 
streets and grants its various rights, is anxious in 
return to get the best possible accommodation at 
the lowest possible price. The attempts of the cor¬ 
poration to secure new privileges and the use of 
those already granted should be carefully watched 
in the public interest, so that the fulfillment of the 
obligations may be secured. On the other hand, 
there are always demagogues or honest fanatics or 
venal politicians who suggest unreasonable de¬ 
mands on the corporation, which the persons inter¬ 
ested in the latter consider attacks upon their vested 
rights. There is inevitably a conflict of interest, and 
out of this grows the danger that the corporations 
will feel themselves obliged to gain their ends de¬ 
fensive or offensive by corruption, and that dishon¬ 
est men will seek municipal office in order to be 
corrupted. When legislation is for sale, no man and 
no private or public right is safe, and it is important 
therefore to have as few great corporations which 
may be tempted to corrupt as possible. 

Take another example. Birmingham is a city a 
little larger than Boston. Here we find liberal parks, 
but to those we are not unused on this side of the 
Atlantic; swimming baths “which offer larger swim¬ 
ming facilities than the people of New York City ever 
possessed within doors in public or private baths 
along shore or in town” (to quote from Mr. Ralph in 
Harper's Magazine) and every convenience for bath¬ 
ing is afforded at the most moderate cost. Here also 
are libraries, an art gallery and museum, enriched, 
it is true, by donations from private citizens but sup¬ 
ported at the public expense. Here again the gas 
works belong to the city, and while charging reduced 
rates to the consumer, who now pays about sixty 
cents a thousand feet, they yield a handsome profit 
for the city on their large cost. 

Birmingham also, like Glasgow, has bought up bad 
neighborhoods and laid them out again at large orig. 
inal cost, but so that the enterprise will prove pecu¬ 
niarily very profitable, while its main objects, the 
prevention of disease and the discouragement of 
crime, have been accomplished and the death rate 
of the city has been reduced more than one-half. 

The difficulties of draining a large inland city have 


been grappled with and overcome. The little river 
into which it naturally drained was wholly insuffi¬ 
cient for a large population, and in consequence a 
new systeffii was necessary. The city accordingly ac¬ 
quired a farm of 1,200 acres, into and through which 
all sewage is conducted by a conduit and system of 
filtration. In this way the sewage is purified and 
the farm fertilized, so that its products are sold for 
nearly $125,000 a year, a little less than half the cost 
of operating the system. All household waste is re¬ 
moved and treated so that what is useful is sold and 
the rest is burned or made by melting into paving 
material. 

Here again street railways are owned by the city 
and rented at a profit; and the finances of the city 
are so administered that the burden of taxation is 
not severe, while the debts incurred in carrying out 
its great improvements are in a fair way of being 
paid. 

Each of these cities are governed by a council con¬ 
sisting of a large number of members who serve 
without pay, and as the best citizens are elected to 
these offices it is considered an honor to serve the 
city. These cities succeed in getting able and honest 
men to manage their business, and in consequence 
it is managed well. 

NEW YORK ONE OF THE WORST. 

What do we do? Let us take for example the city 
of New York, the largest and richest city that we 
have, the center of our business intelligence and ac¬ 
tivity. What is true of New York is approximately 
true of our other cities, though misgovernment is 
more effectively organized there than in any 
other city except perhaps Baltimore. New York is 
governed by the political organization which from 
the .name of its headquarters is called Tammany 
Hall, and this in turn is controlled by its executive 
committee. This organization is not interested in 
the great questions of national politics, the tariff, the 
finances, or any foreign or domestic question of na¬ 
tional interest. It calls itself democratic, but in re¬ 
cent years its power has been more often used to de¬ 
feat than to elect the democratic candidate for Pres¬ 
ident. It is really, to use a slang phrase of its own 
invention, a “combine” of men who wish to live on 
the city of New York, and who consider it no sin to 
labor in their vocation. Their purpose is simply to 
get as large a sum out of the city treasury as they 
can, and their success has been phenomenal. The 
New York Evening Post has done a great public serv¬ 
ice by publishing the records of the twenty-eight 
men who compose the executive committee of Tam- 
many. Its summary shows that they are all profes¬ 
sional politicians, and that among them are one con¬ 
victed of murder, three men who have been indicted 
for murder, felonious assault and bribery respectively; 
four professional gamblers, five ex keepers of gam¬ 
bling houses, nine who either now or formerly sold 
liquor, three whose fathers did, three former pugi¬ 
lists, four former rowdies, and six members of the 
famous Tweed gang. Seventeen of these hold office 
seven formerly did, and two are favored contractors. 
From a corrupt tree must come corrupt fruit. Is it 
strange that the government of New York is bad? 
Is it not strange, is it not disgraceful, that such men 
should be suffered to govern the metropolis of our 
country, and through the bargains by which they 
sell the votes of their followers and buy city offices 
to very largely affect the government under which 
we all live? 

Every city government is not as bad as that of New 
York, but everywhere, with the rare exception, in¬ 
ferior men are elected to municipal office, and any 
man, however little his education or his previous 
training may have fitted him for the work, is 
considered competent to deal with the complicated 
problems of municipal government. A succession 
of men more or less incompetent follow each other 
at brief intervals over the stage, and as a result, there 
is no consistent economical administration of a city’s 
business. In Boston, as a gentleman who has re¬ 
cently been studying the operation of the various 
departments said, “the methods are such that no 
business house could adopt them and keep out of 
bankruptcy six months.” 

We are badly governed because we choose incom- 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


285 


petent, dishonest or at best inexperienced men to 
govern us. We all admit the fact. We all lament it. 
What is the remedy ? Is it possible that a great busi¬ 
ness people like ourselves is powerless to change this 
state of things? Must we look forward to an indefi¬ 
nite future of tame submission to saloon-keepers and 
actual or probable convicts? Is there no chance of 
a new anti-slavery movement in which we, the 
slaves, shall rise against such masters? 

No one can answer these questions without first 
clearly apprehending the causes which have brought 
us to our low estate, nor are these diflScult to dis" 
cover. 

In'^he first place the average American takes very 
little interest in the government of his city. He will 
work hard and contribute freely of his time and 
money in a presidential campaign, or in the efibrt to 
elect a governor or congressman, though these offices 
have less power over his daily life than the aiderman 
who represents his ward. If elected a member of a 
club, committee, or a parish committee, or the build¬ 
ing committee of some charitable institution, he will 
give the most conscientious attention to his duties. 
He will work hard as the director of a business cor¬ 
poration in which his pecuniary interests are trifling 
as compared with his stake of family health and 
comfort and security in the municipal corporation of 
which he is a member. He will take hours and per¬ 
haps days from his business in order to select the 
hangings, or carpets, or furniture for his own house, 
which are mere matters of taste, but he will not often 
give an hour in the course of a year to the intelligent 
consideration of his city’s business. He will grumble 
at dust, swear at bad water or foul smells, vote for 
his party candidate if he can do so without too much 
inconvenience, complain of his taxes, and think that 
he has done his full duty. Every follower of Tam¬ 
many voted for their chief on election day; 30,000 
excellent citizens neglected to vote against him and 
Mr. Astor said that he had no political interest in 
New York. 

THE CAUSE OF APATHY. 

We must go deeper, however. What are the causes 
of this indifference? Can we hope to overcome it or 
must it be dealt with as a constant factor in our 
problem? It arises partly from the fact that munic¬ 
ipal politics seem petty as compared with national 
politics, partly from the fact that they have been so 
many years in bad hands that a certain stigma in 
the minds of many persons is attached to men who 
are active in them, partly from the discouragement 
caused by repeated failures to dislodge bad men and 
the feeling that it is idle for a few disorganized citi¬ 
zens to contest the field with the well disciplined 
army which obey the “bosses,” and in some cases 
from sheer laziness. It is not that Americans do not 
know what good government is or that they do not 
want it. It is not that they are content with their 
rulers, but they find it easier to pay a little more in 
taxes, to swallow a little dust, to breathe a little 
foul air, and to treat disease as inevitable, than to 
spend in working for the public time and money for 
which no one thanks them, and which are taken 
from lucrative business or from rest and recreation- 

Another cause which blinds the eye of the citizen 
and paralyzes his energy is the idea which politi¬ 
cians so carefully cherish that political parties 
should carry their contests into municipal elections, 
that if a man in favor of tariff reform he must 
vote for the Tammany candidate for mayor, or if he 
favors the McKinley bill that he can not safely sup. 
port a candidate for mayor who is selected from 
the democratic party. The superstition goes so far 
that men who joined the republican party in 1856 
because they were opposed to the extension of slav¬ 
ery into the territories and who supported it because 
they believed in the abolition of slavery and the 
restoration of the Union, feel bound twenty-five 
years after all these objects are accomplished to vote 
for a republican candidate for sheriff’ whom they 
know to be entirely unfit for the office. If their 
arguments were extended in plain English it would 
astonish them. “ I believed in the restoration of the 
Union and the abolition of slavery twenty-five 
years ago, and therefore, I vote for a man now who 
had nothing to do with either and whose business it 
is to keep our streets clean simply because he calls 


himself a republican, though I know that he is in¬ 
competent. In short, I am still so busy restoring the 
Union and freeing the slaves, that I have no time to 
think of clean streets or pure water.” 

A third cause of our trouble may perhaps best be 
illustrated by a comparison. A manufacturing cor¬ 
poration, whose stock holders include republicans, 
democrats, prohibitionists and mugwumps, desire a 
president. Those who are interested choose some 
man of acknowledged ability, and without asking 
what his political opinions are say to him: “Become 
our president and we will pay you adequate salary; 
we will give you the assistance of the best directors that 
we can select from our own members; you shall have 
power to manage our business as you think best, 
subject to their advice, and if you succeed you shall 
keep the place as long as you like. ” The ci ty seeking 
a mayor says to the same man: “Do you wish to be¬ 
come our mayor? You must first agree to pay a large 
sum to the campaign fund for expenses; you must 
then satisfy the heads of certain factions that they 
and their followers have something to gain by your 
election, as they are practical men who are not to be 
satisfied with vague expressions of good will and 
will want something very definite. You must then 
take the chances of a campaign in which all your 
sins and many which you have never committed 
will be marshaled against you in the daily papers, 
and you will be exposed to every kind of misrepre- 
.sentation. If you are elected, we shall give you very 
small pay and a board of directors who will be 
incompetent to help you and entirely competent to 
embarrass and perplex you at every turn. You will re¬ 
ceiveplenty of criticism from every corrupt politician 
whose demands you either can not or will not gratify, 
but little or no encouragement or support from good 
citizens who are too busy with their own affairs, or 
too modest to give you much attention or assistance 
or even applause, and who treat your good works as 
a matter of course, while they are swift to visit on 
you not only your own sins, but the shortcomings of 
every city official; and when your term is over and 
you are beginning to learn the duties of your office, 
we wiil remove you in order to put some other un¬ 
fortunate victim in your place.” Is it surprising that 
the private corporation gets its president, and the 
city is obliged to look elsewhere for its mayor? 

MUNICIPAL PROBLEMS AND POLITICS. 

There are three motives which may induce good 
men to take public office: The desire for money, 
the desire for honor, and public spirit, or the sense 
of duty. We appeal to neither. Our salaries are 
inadequate even if we could promise a tenure of 
office during good behavior. Municipal office has 
ceased to be regarded as especially honorable, and 
however keen may be his sense of duty, it is difficult 
to persuade a public spirited citizen that he ought 
to seek municipai office and engineer his own cam¬ 
paign. Until the people whose business is to be 
done are sufficiently Interested in having it done 
well to select good officers, elect them, and keep 
them in office by proper support, our citizens will 
continue to be governed by incompetent men and 
persons who make office profitable in illegitimate 
ways. 

There is another thing which can not be neglected 
in enumerating the causes which contribute to mis¬ 
rule in our cities. They contain a large number of 
ignorant voters, mainly of foreign birth or descent, 
many of whom know nothing of our government or 
even of our language, and who are easily led by a 
few men whose influence is for sale and whose prej¬ 
udices are easily inflamed. These men are ignorant, 
not wicked. They can be influenced for good as 
well as for bad. They do not want bad water, bad 
air, and squalid abodes. They do not wish to see 
their families die of infectious disorders, and if they 
could be made to understand the facts they would 
be ready to vote for everything which will improve 
their condition. Their numbers make them an 
element in the situation which must be considered 
and dealt with. How are these causes to be dealt 
with? How shall we reform our system so that the 
business of our cities may be done by competent 
men? These are the questions. 

In the first place municipal business must be en¬ 


tirely divorced from national politics, and if party or¬ 
ganizations are necessary to secure the elections of 
good mayors and aldermen, they must be organiza¬ 
tions absolutely distinct from the national parties 
and made up on different lines. When the president 
of a railroad or a bank, or the treasurer of a manufac¬ 
turing corporation is to be elected, the stockholders 
do not divide themselves into two hostile camps ac¬ 
cording to their views upon the tariff or the fisheries 
or iheir opinions upon the questions of twenty-five 
years ago and struggle for victory over each other. 
They recognize the fact that their interests in the cor¬ 
poration are identical, and they co-operate to find 
some man whose ability and experience fit him to su¬ 
perintend the corporation’s business. If differences 
arise among them they are differences of opinion as 
to the comparative fitness of different candidates, 
but no one denies that the fittest man should be se¬ 
lected. There is a close parallel between the busi¬ 
ness of a great railroad corporation and the business 
of a great city. Both require great administrative 
and financial ability; skill in the selection of men, 
power of organization, and force of will. The ability 
to organize a force which will run trains for freight 
and passengers economically and efficiently is not in 
kind different from the ability to organize a force 
which will clean or pave streets regularly and well. 
The ability to secure the best results from a given 
expenditure of money in well-built railroads and 
strong bridges is of the .same character as the ability 
to get like results from a similar expenditure in well 
constructed sewers or water-works. The men who 
can deal successfully with rival companies compet¬ 
ing for his business can meet with equal success the 
demands of street railway companies or gas compa¬ 
nies competing with each other to obtain franchises 
from the city. The same financial skill which pre¬ 
serves the proper ratio between the income and ex¬ 
penses of a business corporation will find ample 
opportunity to display itself in dealing with the 
finances of a municipal corporation. 

Railroading, as it is beginning to be called, is a 
profession which offers to those who adopt it 
a definite career. The opportunities are great, 
but he who would seize them must fit himself 
for the work by special training. The Penn¬ 
sylvania company has its own college at Altoona, 
where young men can learn the business of 
managing a railroad. The graduates of this college 
begin at the foot of the ladder and gradually climb 
up. The man who wishes to superintend a woolen 
mill or a paper mill begins as a hand, in his father’s 
mill perhaps. In every private business men recog¬ 
nize the necessity of learning how the work should 
be done before they begin to do it. This is equally 
true of the business which is done for a city, but 
here we act as if no training were necessary. Why 
should not our cities offer young men who will 
learn how to do their business as honorable and 
certain a career as cotton mills and railroads offer? 
Should we not all rejoice if our municipal business 
was in the hands of men trained to do it well, and 
have we not energy and sense enough to secure so 
desirable a result? Let us simply as members of a 
great business corporation apply the same rules to 
the selection of our president and directors that are 
followed by stock-holders in smaller business corpo¬ 
rations. Instead of letting a number of politicians 
associated with the national parties meet and nomi¬ 
nate some of themselves as candidates for the offices 
of the city, why should we not have an entirely new 
departure? Why should not the business men of the 
city, irrespective of their political or religious 
opinions, form a municipal party for the simple pur¬ 
pose of electing competent municipal officers and 
keeping them in office as long as they do their work 
well? It would be easy to draw a platform for such 
a party upon which the whole city could stand. 
Here is a specimen plank: “Resolved, that we are in 
favor of having the streets properly paved and regu¬ 
larly swept.” The party standing for this and this 
alone with an organization in each precinct would 
soon number every one who wished to have the 
city’s business done on business principles, and 
against such a party the petty politicians who live 
by plundering the city would be powerless. The 
committee of fifty in Philadelphia has shown what 



















286 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


nan be done by a small organization of citizens aim¬ 
ing only at the public good. Once break down the 
superstition that national politics have something to 
do with city business, and it wilt be comparatively 
easy to nniteall citiz nis who wantclean streets, good 
water, pure air, good drainage and everything else 
that gi)od government means, in a municipal party 
which will be powerful enough to insure good gov¬ 
ernment. 

INTERVAI.S BETWEEN EBECTIONS. 

To make the distinction between national politics 
and municipal business complete, the municipaj 
election should be held say in May. and themuuicii)a 
year should begin July 1. The greater interval be¬ 
tween the elections the more difficult it becomes to 
sell a congressman for a sheriff’ or a mayor for a 
president. And in this connection let me say tha 
the plan so efficiently supported in Buffalo of sepa¬ 
rating municipal from the other elections by a whole 
year meets my cordial approval. The more com 
pletely municipal business can be divorced from 
national politics, the better for us all. 

E.vperieuce has shown that the apathy which 
makes St) many citizens neglect their duties can be 
overcome at intervals. The people are capable of a 
great uprising such as drove the Tweed ring into 
exile or pri.son, whenever things have re iched such 
a pass as to become unbearable, but where elections 
are frequent men become negligent, both l)ecause 
they weary of the efforts neces.sary to victory in a 
polliical campaign, and because they console them¬ 
selves with the reflection that if the election goes 
wrong it will be ea-^y to correct the mischief next 
year. This tendency can in part be met by making 
the elections less frequent, thus giving municipal 
officers longer terms 'and making it easier t > bring 
out the voters who may be willing once in three or 
four years to make a vigorous effort rather than be 
misgoverned for so long a period. 

The next step is to make positions in ihe city etn 
ploy attractive to such men as we ueed, men of 
ability and character. To fill the higher offices in a 
city government requires a great deal of time and 
hard work, and we can not organize our government 
upon the theory tha' a considerable number of the 
most capable citizens will sacrifl- e themselves for the 
benefit of the rest. In the long run we must pay for 
good work if we expect to get it. We can note )mpete 
with private employers unless we are all willing to 
pay as much The work of governing a city is not 
es jecially agreeable, and the city can well afford to 
pay for the best talent thtt can be had. barge sal¬ 
aries are not so expensive as large stealings and poor 
work. The men who now pretend to serve our cities 
without compensation are often better paid tliati the 
men who receive the largest salaries that private cor¬ 
porations offer. The sound l)usiuess rule is to pay 
good wages for good work, and to expe t nothing for 
nothing If we have not time to govern ourselves, 
we must pav some one else to do the work. 

Money alone will not get such men as we need 
There must be some assurance of permanence, some 
hope of promotion. We must offer a career, if we 
wouhl tempt into o>ir service the able young men 
who every year are choosing their professions. No 
man who can do anything else will accept employ¬ 
ment wnere good service does not help him and 
where he is liable to be turned out at a moment's 
notice. If sound busintss principles ctuild be 
adopted, a successful city officer would be called 
from one city to another as an able railway snperin. 
tendent is called to continuxlly better positions, arrd 
the profession of municipal administiation wou'd 
be extremely attractive. Is it impossible in America 
to create such a profession? Are we forevi r bonnd 
to our present nnbusiness-like method of selecting 
our officers at random and turning them outassoon 
as they begin to know their business? 

GOOD MONEY FOR GOOD WORK. 

With citizens organized toinsnre good municipal 
government, it would be comparatively easy by 
proper effort to reach and influence the mass of 
ignorant voters, who now help the vicious bosses to 
govern our cities, but it is the part of prudence not 
to lake too many chances agaii st ourselves. We are 
struggling with ii great many complicati d (luesiions. 


which it takes intelligence to understand. They are 
to be settled by gradually educating the people. 
Public opinion is the ultimate force in this country, 
if not indeed everywhere, but it takes time and 
effort to create and direct it. A colony of Italians, 
Scandinavians, Germans, or Irish, preserving their 
national languages and their natronal ideas, and 
living ns foreigners among us are very difficult to 
reach, but their voles count just as much as the 
votes of the most highly educated men among us. 
We must make our naturalization laws more strin¬ 
gent. It is not consistent with business ptinciple.^ to 
admit men as equal partners in a prosperous firm, 
who bring neither experience nor capital, w ho know 
nothing of the business, and do not even .speak the 
same language with the other partners. We cer¬ 
tainly may insist that a man shall not vote here 
until he has been here long enough to understand 
our institutions and speak our language, and as we 
must have an arbitrary rule, it would seem safe to 
require fifteen or twenty years' residence This may 
opeiate severely in a few cases, but the country will 
not suffer, and its interest demands that we should 
organize and educate the citizens that we now have 
until they are better able to govern themselves 
before we undertake to admit many more voters 
with the traditions, ideas, and interests of foreign¬ 
ers. 

The tendency in this country is to concentrate 
municipal authority in a few hands. In Glasgow 
and Birmingham the best results are achieved by 
enlisting a large number of able citizens and divid 
ing the work among them, some taking charge of 
sewers, others of lights, others of water, etc. It 
makes little difference which system prevails if only 
good men are inf'need to do the work Make it in 
popula' estimation as great a tribute to a man's busi¬ 
ness ability to make him an alderman as it is to 
make him a director of a bank or railroad and men 
will be glad to take positions in the city government. 
Make it, as it is to-day, rather a questionable dis¬ 
tinction to be promin- nt in city politics, and except 
the few whose public spirit leads them to do a disa¬ 
greeable public duty or whose ambition makes them 
take mu icipal office as the first step in public life, 
the men who hold city office will do neither their 
city nor ihem.selves any credit. If your city officers 
are bad men we can not have too few aldermen or 
councilnjen who intrigue for patronage or consider 
only what their votes or influence in the city legisla¬ 
ture can be made to yield, the fewer we have the bet¬ 
ter. 

Once persuade the people that the government of 
a city is a mere matter of business and induce them 
to treat it as such, and municipal reform is assured. 

The experiment is worth trying. Let even twenty 
of the men in any city who are its business leaders 
meet and really consider what stei>a should be taken 
to secure economical municipal government. Let 
them agree to give, say, two hours a week each to the 
work. Let them take measures to organize their fel- 
low-citizes of all classes in support of their move 
raeut, and let them show the same intelligence and 
energy that they exhibit in dealing with the affairs 
of business corporations in which th y are directors. 
Let them select their candidates and agree to pay 
them what their time is fairly worth, to stand by 
them, and to keep them in office as long ns they do 
their work well Can anyone doubt that such in¬ 
telligent and organized effort would succeed? If 
there are difificjlties, cannot such men find means 
to overcome them? Whoever answers these ques¬ 
tions in the negative must admit that republican in¬ 
stitutions area failure when aiiplied to municipal 
government, or, at least, that we must submit to 
years more of inefficiency, corruption, plunder, and 
disgrace before that public spirit is developed which 
is necessary to their success. 

If some humorous derider of civil service reform 
principles wished to perpetrate a huge joke on all the 
protestations in the republican platform in favor of 
the reform, he could hardly do better than hunt up 
the once famous Flanagan, of Texas, who asked at 
the retiublican national convention, “What are we 
here for, if not for the offices?” and reward the said 
Flanagan with some h'gh office. Strangely enough, 
President Harrison, whom no cne accuses of being a 
humorisi. has. in solemn earnest, appointed this 
same Flanagan C'dlector of customs at El Paso, Tex. 
— Civil Sffvicf RerorC. 


RESOLUTIONS OF THE NATIONAL 
LEAGUE PASSED AT BUFFALO, 
SEPTEMBER 30, 1891. 


The National Givil Service League congratulates 
the country upon the significant progress of reform 
during the last year. The extension of the reformed 
system to a part of the Indian service and its intro¬ 
duction into the navy yards; the executive revoca¬ 
tion of the system of compulsory competition for pro' 
motion, and the executive order authorizing open 
com potion with the actual adoption of such a system 
in the post-office department; the increa.se in the 
number of applicants for examination from all sec¬ 
tions of the country, which has made it possible to 
equalize the quotas of appointments among the 
states, showing a general confidence hitherto un¬ 
known in Ihe honest non-partisan observance of the 
law; the indictment of members of both political 
parties for attempting to levy political a.'-sessments 
uptm public employes, and the defeat by the friends 
of rcfoim in congress of the efforts to embarass the 
commission and paralyze the operation of the law; 
the admirable statement and approval of the princi¬ 
ples of reform by the court of appeals in New York 
in declaring the constitutionality of the reform law 
and confirming itsapplicability to municipal admin¬ 
istration in Buffalo, all attest the steady practical 
progress of reform and the happy advance of the 
public sentiment upon which all effective reform de¬ 
pends. 

The League declares its high appreciation of the 
great and patriotic service rendered to the country 
and to the interests of reform by the secretary of the 
navy in his prompt, comprehensive and thorough 
application of sound principles administration in 
the selection both of skilled and un.skilled employes 
in the national navy yards, which have been hith¬ 
erto scenes of the worse excesses of the spoils sys¬ 
tem. The League trusts that this great measure of 
reform will be secured permanently by an executive 
order which alone can make it a part of the general 
system under the law administered by the national 
civil service commi.ssion. 

The League regards the recent displacement for 
political reasons of the collector of New York, an 
officer of acknowledged integrity, ability and effi¬ 
ciency by compelling his resignation, as a flagrant 
violation of the platform promises and executive 
pledges of the party of administration to re-pect not 
only the letter of the law but the spirit of reform. 
The League holds the declaration that the spirit and 
purpose of reform should be observed in all execu¬ 
tive appointments, and the pledge that fitness and 
not party service should be the essential test in ap¬ 
pointment, if they mean anything, to mean that 
diligent, honest and capable officers whose duties 
are in no sense political shall not be forced for po 
litical reasons to resign. Against this violation of 
solemn public pledges by the highest officers of the 
government the League, in the name of all honorable 
citizens, unqualifiedly protests. 

The League condemns the failure to prosecute ef¬ 
fectively the persons Indicted for levying political 
contributions in violation of law, a failnre which 
can not but encourage similar violations, beeause it 
will be held to indicate a willingness on the part of 
the administration to respectively connive at such 
offences. 

The recent letters signed by the officers of the re¬ 
publican state executive committee in Ohio, and 
the republican state committee in Pennsylvania, 
levying a political tax upon public employes under 
terror of removal, plainly violates the spirit, if not 
the letter of the civil .service act of 1883, which was 
designed to protect public employes against parti¬ 
san extortion and illnstrate the evil effeels of the 
failure which we condemn. Any party which is 
not supported by the voluntary contributions of its 
members, and which resoits to practical blackmail¬ 
ing to ob'ain money for election expenses, strikes a 
fatal blow at the party system by confessing that it 
depends for success, not upon the convietion and 
coifidcncc of those who compose it, but upon the 
fear of those whose livelihood it controls. We pro¬ 
test against these acts as strengthening an abuse 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


287 


which tends to destroy the legitimate function of 
party and the self-respect of public officers, which 
brings the American name and government in con¬ 
tempt, and, in this instance, which disgraces, also; 
the name of a party which is pledged to respect not 
only the letter of the law, but the spirit of reform. 

The League reiterates its conviction that the power 
of removal should be vested in appointing officers, 
subject only to a sound discretion. But it holds as 
strongly that to secure that discretion from danger¬ 
ous temptation every motive for its unjust exercise 
should be removed. The League, therefore, renews 
its recommendations as necessary conditions of re¬ 
form that the laws prescribing fixed terms of office 
which were intended to prevent the odium of arbi. 
trary removal should be repealed; that the widest 
publicity should be given to remov.ils, and that pub 
lie officers should be required by law publicly to 
record the reasons of removals made by their au¬ 
thority. 

The interference of office-holders in elections is 
one of the oldest evils of free constitutional govern¬ 
ment. The dispensers of official patronage hold a 
power over primary political action which is not 
shared by the rest of the people, and which has been 
always grossly perverted to secure control of party 
caucuses and conventions. The attendance of office¬ 
holders at recent political conventions is a sign of 
neglect by the administration of one of the ancient 
safeguards of constitutional liberty. 

The League returns the thanks of all good citizens 
to the United States civil Service Commissioner, ex¬ 
posing to public notice and condemnation the scan¬ 
dalous abuses arising from active participation by 
federal office leaders in primaries of the republican 
party held in the city of Baltimore. It sees in the 
evils the natural results of choosing for offices whose 
incumbents are to enforce the civil service laws, pro¬ 
fessional politicians, indifferent or hostile to that 
law. It considers the prompt dismissal of every 
official shown to have violated the law an impera¬ 
tive requirement of the President’s oath of office. 

B CORRESPONDENCE. 

The Point of View of a Crawfordsv lie 
Reader of the Chronicle. 

Lft* Enclosed I send you 50 cents for one year’s 
fsiibscription to the Chroniclk. It is tlie 
most welcome paper that conies to my house 

( and is generally read first, and from beginning 
to end without stop unless called from it by 
some interruption. 

“I feel particularly itnlignant with Harrison. 
We had a right to expect as decisive action on 
his part in favor of the civil service generally, 
as Secretary Tracy has shown in the naval 
service. He has not done as well as Cleveland 
in spite of the platform on which he was 
elected, and his own speeches in favor of it. 
He is booked for defeat, so far as my vole 
goes, if he is renominated.” 

PLATTISM. 

—The directory of the republican campaign 
subscribers in the possession of the party 
leaders must be a very poor one, for Chair¬ 
man Wagner’s appeals for money have been 
received by hundreds of democrats. Here is 
a sample of the call for funds now being sent 
out: 

Headquarters Kings County Republican 1 
Campaign Committee. I 

Room 10. Arbuckle Buiding, f 

Brooklyn, Sept. 22, 1891. J 
My Dear Sir: The campaign committee is ready 
to receive voluntary subscriptions from all citizens 
having the success of the republican party at heart. 
The conduct of the campaign requires large expend¬ 
itures of money for legitimate purposes, and under 


the laws we have no right to assess any person. I 
would be glad to have you call at the headquarters 
and to give you any explanation required and re¬ 
ceive any advice you may choose to ofTer. A ready 
res.'onse is earnestly requested. Yours truly, 

Arnold H. Wagner, Chairman. 

One of Nathan’s subordinates in the internal 
revenue office was shown this section about not as¬ 
sessing any one, but he merely laughed and shrugged 
his shoulders.—New York Times, October 23. 

—.Judge Ijowery, of Ohio, calculated that 
the 700 Ohio persons in office in Washington, 
with aggregated salaries of $500,000, would 
give at least $25,000 to help McKinley and 
protection. They have, it is understood, 
“paid up” only $1,000. The result of his ap¬ 
peal is said to be “disgusting,” only fifty clerks 
having subscribed. The subscriptions are very 
small, indeed. I do not believe that the 
clerks from any other state in the union are 
as niggardly as those from Ohio. Why, they 
won’t give anything.” 

“I suppose it is,” the judge answered, when 
asked if this indifference could be attributed 
to confidence in their ability to hold their 
\)\aces,but I think some of them will learn they 
are mistaken. Probably 25 per cent, of those in 
office are democrats. They are active, and some of 
them have already made applications for leave. 
Everything I have written has been published here 
by some kicker, who runs immediately to the press. 
There seems to be an entire lack of party spirit 
among them .”— Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, October 19. 

Room 48, Washington Lman and Trust ■) 

Company Building, Corner of Ninth and F >- 

Streets, N. W., Washington, Oct. 15, 1891. I 

—In view of the importance of the pending political 
contest in the state of New York, and the nece.ssity 
for every republican from that state, resident at the 
national capital, to do his whole duty under the de¬ 
mands of the hour, I am prompted, under authority 
from the state committee, to Invite you to call at 
Room 48, Washington Loan and Trust Company 
Building, corner of Ninth and F streets, at your ear¬ 
liest convenience, between the hours of 8:80 a. m. 
and 6 p. M. This is for the purpose of consulting 
with you in regard to the best way for conquering 
the enemy in this fight. Please bring this note with 
you. Respectfully, Ac., .-V. M. Clapp, 

Agent of New York State Republican Committee. 

The lady who rejeived this note will not 
present it to Dairymaid Clapp, but will keep it 
to exhibit, by and by, if occasion should arise, 
to account for any injustice that may be exer¬ 
cised toward her in the way of punishment. 
The civil service commission can find a great 
many of these letters in the department. It is 
understood that a list of every employe from 
New York was furnished to Dairymaid Clipp. 
— Washington Dispatch to New York Times, Octo¬ 
ber 21. 

— As regards the duty of the United States 
district attorney to prosecute Mr. Van Cott or 
Mr. Hendricks, collector of the port, Mr. Platt, 
son of ex-Senator Platt [Tom Platt], in the ab¬ 
sence of his chief, Mr. Mitchell, said that the 
district attorney’s office did not undertake 
prosecutions of its own motion, but only on 
complaints filed.— New York Evening Post, Oc¬ 
tober 14- 

—Among the federal office-holders who 
were seen about Mr. Platt’s preserves yesterday, 
were Gen. Dennis Burke, Deputy Collector 
Burr,Special Agent Pryor, Marcus .A. Hanlon, 


treasury inspector, and Chief Clerk Rose o 
the appraiser’s office.— New York Times, Oc¬ 
tober 3. 

—Platt appeared to be in a disturbed frame 
of mind last night. It has been his habit to 
keep very much in the background at head¬ 
quarters. Last night, however, he stood in 
the main corridors of the hotel, laying the 
law down to his lieutenants. Bernard Biglin, 
William H. Bvllamy, and Internal Revenue Col¬ 
lector Eidman were the center of a group of pol¬ 
iticians which Platt addressed with emphasis. 
—Neiv York Times, October 15. 

—Mr. Platt’s headquarters in the Fifth Ave¬ 
nue hotel had a good many visitors yesterday, 
including Collector Hendricks, Deputy Collectcrr 
Biyor. —New York Times, October 16. 

—Ithaca, N. Y., Oct. 14 —Mr. Fassett’s 
speech was received with great ajiplaiise. 
John W. V’^rooman made a short, witty speech, 
and Col. Baxter [United States marshal] wound 
up the rally in the opera house. 

—At the Lyceum opera bouse,Thirty fourih 
street and Third avenue, James M. Turner pre¬ 
sided over a meeting. ** Pending the arrival 
of Mr. Fassett, Col .1. E. Bailer [United States 
marshal] made a rally-round the-flagspeech to 
a supposed audience of grand army men. Col. 
Baxter jiaid a glowing eulogy to Roger Byron 
Towner, the Brooklyn man who published a 
falsehood about Mr. Flower and the union 
soldiers a few weeks ago. C'ol. Baxter said 
that he would not take Mr, Flower’s word or 
oath about the matter, and that he considered 
Towner a patriot and one of the noblest men 
that ever lived,— Times, Oct. 21. 

—Headed by Internal Revenue Collector Ernst 
Nathan, a machine has been built up. * • 

Now Nathan is absolutely bossing the pres¬ 
ent fight. He says the party has been har¬ 
monized. Yes, with a cl ub. The opposing fac¬ 
tion has been beaten down and out by Nathan. 
* * They saw how he observed the spirit of 

the civil sendee law by going to the stale convention 
that nominated Mr. Eassett and by forcing his offi¬ 
cial subordinates to go. Every enrolled republican 
in the twenty first and twenty-third wards knows 
that the employes in the internal revenue collector’s 
office are used there at the primaries, and that one 
of them was sent out of town with the roll 
book of the twenty-first ward recently, so that 
the opposing faction could not have the namis 
of thirty-five new members placed on it in 
time to have them vote at the primary. — Neiv 
Yoik Times, September 27. 

—The conference began when Collector Nathan 
told Mr. Ziegler that the people wanted to 
make him mayor and that the republican or¬ 
ganization stood ready to nominate him. * * 

A politician who .stands very close to Nathan and 
his fellow-leaders saw Mr. Ziegler after the 
conference and asked him point blank if he 
would be guided by the organization in making ap¬ 
pointments and dispensing patronage. Mr. Ziegler 
looked at him in surprise and said : “That is 
a matter that I had not supposed I would be 
asked to consider.”— New York Times, Septem¬ 
ber 30. 

—Brooklyn republicans were rather blue 
yesterday over the prospect of electing any of 
their candidates. They had anticipated a 
lively, genuine campaign on the issues laid 
down by William Ziegler, but they could not 
but admit that the wisdom displayed by the 
democrats in nominating such a man as David 
A. Boody, aided as they were by the Nathan policy 
of putting forward such a man as Henry A. 
Meyer, had almost eliminated these issues 
from the cfimpaign. No one pretended yester¬ 
day that Mr. Meyer could go on the stump 
and force thos** issues, and every one concluded 
that “ Boss” Nathan had simoly sold out his party. 
—New York Times, October 13. 











288 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


—The Notorious Gibbs, whom Platt will 
need in this campaign, was restored to full 
leadership by the republican organization in 
the thirteenth assembly district last night. 
Gibbs was expelled from the county commit¬ 
tee a year ago on the ground that his action 
with Hamilton Fish and others in the legisla¬ 
ture of 1890 had made him a traitor to his 
party. Afterward, the state committee, at the 
direction of Mr. Platt, read him out of the 
party.— New York Times, September 2^. 

—As Mr. Platt surveys the results of his 
“ harmony ” policy in the legislative districts 
he will not find much to comfort him. He 
took the “ Wicked Gibbs” back into favor in 
the thirteenth assembly district in this city, 
using the federal patronage to crush out all opposi¬ 
tion to him, and the results are the defeat of 
Gibbs for the assembly and of Stewart for the 
senate. Probably no one act of Platt’s did 
more to alienate independent voters in this 
city from Fassett than his championship of 
Gibbs. It gave the lie to all his professions 
of zeal for good government as opposed to the 
bad government of Tammany Hall, for Tam¬ 
many has never produced a worse public serv¬ 
ant than Gibbs.— New York Evening Post, Nov. 4’ 

—There will be some post-mortem politics at 
the monthly meeting of the Kings County Pe- 
publican General Committee this evening,in the 
Criterion Theatre, Brooklyn. The machine 
which has run the party into such straits when 
nearly half the votersof the city are republicans, 
is not likely to mend its ways. Ernst Nathan, the 
dominating spirit in the party management, who 
is hand-in-glove with the democratic regime while 
holding an important federal office, sententiously 
says that the victory was lost because there 
were not votes enough, and then proceeds to 
plan how to make the party smaller by rigidly 
disciplining those who failed to support the 
unfit candidates nominated by his influence. 
Mr. Nathan, who has been dubbed the Me- 
phistopheles of Brooklyn, does not openly 
present himself in the party councils, save at 
great campaign meetings, for he is usually in 
the background pulling wires. But occasion¬ 
ally he makes his way into the gallery of the 
meeting-place of the general committee and 
watches the proceedings.— New York Evening 
Post, November 10. 

— The meeting of the Nathan Machine, which 
seems to govern the republican party in 
Brooklyn, last evening was as lively as was 
predicted in The Evening Post of yesterday. 
The arbitrary action of the chairman, William 
W. Goodrich, in declaring the meeting ad¬ 
journed in face of the fact that a clear major¬ 
ity of the members voted against the resolution 
to adjourn, was denounced in no measured 
terms by groups of the members who lingered 
for an hour in front of the Criterion Theater, 
where the meeting was held, after it was over. 

“ This is the greatest outrage ever perpe¬ 
trated upon a meeting assembled for free 
speech,” declared one member, and he said he 
told Mr. Goodrich so when he left the hall. 

“More arbitrary action I never saw,” said 
another. “In the first place, Mr. Goodrich 
applied gag-law to Mr. Stubbert, and prevent¬ 
ed him from expressing his views, and then, 
when other members wanted to speak, he de¬ 
clared carried a motion to adjourn, when less 
than one-fourth of those present voted for it. 
In fact, the members of the committee sup¬ 
posed the motion lost until they saw Mr. 
Goodrich putting on his overcoat to go away.” 
New York Evening Post, November 11. 


—It was highly appropriate that the highest 
oflScial (Collector Beard) in the federal serv¬ 
ice in this part of the country should preside 
at the club meeting with which the repub¬ 
lican campaign was opened, Saturday after¬ 
noon.— Boston Post, September 21. 


WANTON REMOVALS. 

—The news of the removal of Appraiser 
Stearns, which was published yesterday, cre¬ 
ated a great deal of comment at the custom¬ 
house. 

Neither Collector Beard nor Appraiser 
Stearns had been notified of the change. The 
first Mr. Beard knew of the appointment, or 
that it was contemplated, was when he read 
the papers containing the dispatch, and he 
did not seem in ecstacies over it. 

It is said that the removal of Appraiser Stearns 
and the appointment of Mr. Dodge was brought 
aboxit by Congressman Cogswell, who has felt that 
it was not well to have a democrat in the 
place, while there were so many republicans 
anxious to get into the service of the United 
States government. 

One of the great objections to Mr. Stearns 
was that he stood between his subordinates 
and those republicans who wanted their places 
and thus prevented political workers from se¬ 
curing what they deemed their just rewards. 

Mr. Stearns, when seen yesterday regarding 
his removal, seemed in no way disturbed. 
“ While I have been in the position of ap¬ 
praiser,” said he, “I have tried to do my duty 
faithfully and well, and if I have been re¬ 
moved, I shall lay down the cares of ofllce 
with a sense of having done my best while 
here. Really, at the present time I can say 
nothing about the matter, because I know 
nothing about it. I heard shortly after the 
change of administration that there was some 
attempt made to have me removed from office, 
but I have heard nothing at all in regard to 
the matter now for several months. If I am 
removed, it is entirely without any notifica¬ 
tion up to the present time.” 

Collector Beard said Mr. Stearns had proved 
an unusually competent official. “ He has a 
remarkable knowledge of the details of his 
department and is an excellent executive. I 
am sorry if the report of his removal is true, 
for I think very highly of Mr. Stearns and 
thought the department was very well satisfied 
with him as appraiser. He has made a splen¬ 
did record, and may be well proud of it, and 
if he is to go I am sorry, though I think Mr. 
Dodge may fill the office well. 

“Mr. Stearns has been connected for eigb teen 
years with the custom-house. He was ap¬ 
pointed a measurer in 1872; in 1874 he was 
appointed a liquidating clerk in the ware¬ 
house department, where he remained until 
Jan. 27, 1886, when he was appointed ap¬ 
praiser by President Cleveland, to fill a va¬ 
cancy caused by the death of the then ap¬ 
praiser. He has filled the office of appraiser 
ever since. 

He has made very few changes in his department, 
not allowing politics to enter into it at all. There 
was a great deal of pressure brought to bear by party 
men during the administration of Mr. Stearns un¬ 
der Mr. Cleveland to “ clean out" the republicans in 
the office and put in democrats, but he resisted it and 
retained all the exam iners he found in office tvhen he 
went in. All the changes made were of open¬ 
ers, packers and porters, and most of these 
were to fill vacancies caused by death or resig¬ 
nation. A few removals were made to get rid 
of incompetent persons or those whose useful¬ 
ness had long been a thing of the past. 

Mr. Dodge is a resident of the town of Ham¬ 
ilton in Essex county. He is a distant relative 
of “Gail Hamilton” Dodge who in turn is a cousin 


of Secretary James G. Blaine of the department 
of state. 

Mr. Dodge was appointed a clerk in 
the naval office in 1873 and remained there 
until 1885, when he was removed. He was 
one of the first appointments of President 
Harrison in 1889, having been named for the 
office of assistant appraiser, which position he 
is now holding.— Boston Post, July 4- 

—“Only last week, the postmistress of Olney- 
ville, R. I., who had been in the office for 
twenty years—who was appointed postmistress 
by Cleveland—who had given entire satisfac¬ 
tion, and who had recently been especially 
praised in the official report, was removed to 
make way for an active republican who had 
no experience whatever in the department.” 
—Private letter from Providence, R. I., Oct. 
15th. 

RECENT PARTY PLATFORMS ON 
THE CIVIL SERVICE. 

The Ohio democratic convention, July, 1891, 
was entirely silent on every phase of a reform 
of the civil service. 

17. We denounce the corrupt and shame¬ 
less domination of Senator Matthew S. Quay 
in the politics of the state, and arraign and 
condemn the republican party for its servile 
acquiescence in the leadership of a man who 
has utterly failed to defend himself from grave 
charges against his oflficial conduct and polit¬ 
ical record.— Pennsylvania Democratic State Plat¬ 
form, September 3. 

Thirteenth — We re-affirm the republican 
party’s favor to thorough genuine reform in 
the civil service, and commend the national 
administration for giving effect thereto under 
existing law. And the flagrant and persistent 
abuses in the state civil service by the demo¬ 
cratic administration are held up to condemna¬ 
tion.— New York Republican State Platform, Sep¬ 
tember 10. 

“We believe that public office is a public 
trust, and that appointments should be 
made for fitness, capacity and integrity, and 
in the spirit of civil service reform. The re¬ 
publican administration has shown the hy¬ 
pocrisy of its pretentions in favor of this re¬ 
form by destroying the efficiency of the census 
bureau for the sake of furnishing political 
spoils, by neglecting to bring prosecutions for 
the punishment of violations of the civil serv¬ 
ice law, by ignoring the recommendations of 
the civil-service commission for the dismissal 
of officials who have openly defied the law, by 
reviving the active participation of office¬ 
holders in partisan politics, and the assess¬ 
ment of government employes for partisan 
purposes.— Massachusetts JState Democratic Plat¬ 
form, September 29. 

First—The further extension of civil service 
rules to those in the Indian service. 

Second—The application of the principles, 
if not the rule.s, of the civil service to the ap¬ 
pointment and tenure of Indian agents.— 
Indian Rights Conference at Lake Mohawk, 
October 9. 









The civil service chronicle. 


VoL. I, No. 34. INDIANAPOLIS, DECEMBER, 1891. terms fcrnW^opT' 


Pulished monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 
Indianapolis, Ind. 

The report of the census has crowded 
out much other material this month. The 
report, although widely noticed by the 
press, is reprinted entire that it may be at 
hand to readers of the Chronicle for 
future reference. 

The eighth report of the civil service 
commission has been printed. It shows in 
what directions there has been in the past 
year improvement in making the merit 
system effectual, and with directness and 
candor the commission also states what is 
yet unsatisfactory and what remains to be 
done. 

The correspondence between the civil 
service reform association of New York, 
and the treasury and post-office depart¬ 
ments, regarding the circular sent out by 
the state republican committee to federal 
employes, asking for contributions, has 
been published by the New York associa¬ 
tion. The departments claimed for Col¬ 
lector Hendricks and Postmaster Van 
Cott that the circular was sent out without 
their knowledge, and that Mr. Van Cott 
has (since the election) sent in his resigna¬ 
tion to the state committee. It was not to 
be supposed that Secretary Foster or Post¬ 
master General Wanamaker would do 
otherwise than try to shield these officers, 
but by the side of the letter of Mr. Curtis 
they make a sorry appearance; it is to be 
noted, however, that the offenders and their 
superiors are subdued and apologetic, and 
not as in former daysimpudent and defiant. 

The Pennsylvania civil service reform 
association also prints a correspondence 
regarding political assessments of the city 
employes before the recent election in 
Pennsylvania. 

The following is the President’s message 
relating to the civil service : 

The report of the civil service commission should 
receive the careful attention of the opponents, as 
well as the friends, of this reform. The commission 
invites a personal inspection by senators and repre¬ 
sentatives of its records and methods; and every 
fair critic will feel that such an examination should 
precede a judgment of condemnation, either of the 
system or its administration. It is not claimed that 
either is perfect, hut I believe that the law is being 
executed with impartiality and that the system is 
incomparably better and fairer than that of appoint¬ 
ments upon favor. I have during the year extended 


the classified .service to include superintendents, 
teachers, matrons and physicians in the Indian 
service. This branch of the service is largely related 
to educational and philanthropic work and will 
obviously be the better for the change. The heads 
of the several executive departments have been di¬ 
rected to establish at once an efficiency record as the 
basis of a comparative rating of the clerks within 
the classified service, with a view to placing promo¬ 
tions therein upon the basis of merit. I am confident 
that such a record, fairly kept and open to the in¬ 
spection of those interested, will powerfully stimu¬ 
late the work of the departments and will be 
accepted by all as placing the troublesome matter of 
promotions upon a just basis. 

I recommend that the appropriations for the civil 
service commission be made adequate to the in¬ 
creased work of the next fiscal year. 

The President’s mind is apparently 
cleared of all doubt. The question at once 
arises, how can the President, believing 
that the merit system “ is incomparably 
better and fairer than that of appointments 
upon favor,” seem to think he has done 
his duty by taking a paltry seven hundred 
places in the Indian service out of the 
reach of favoritism, and leaving many 
thousand places to which this incompar¬ 
able system could be applied, to be distrib¬ 
uted as spoil ? The President can not give 
a reason why he does not extend the sys¬ 
tem to all letter-carriers in free-delivery 
cities, to all post-offices and custom-houses, 
of ten employes, to the internal revenue 
service, to the weather bureau, to the pen¬ 
sion agencies, to all government laborers, 
and to other classes of employes. 

In the appointment of Steve Elkins to 
be secretary of war, the President has 
given the country another instance of how 
much he will dare and do when he wants 
to make the offices “count.” It took a bold 
man, under the circumstances, to make 
Wanamaker a cabinet officer, but to “back” 
with the whole power of federal patronage 
such thoroughly discredited political ad¬ 
venturers as Mahone two years ago. Quay 
last year, and Platt this year, seems the ex¬ 
treme of foolhardiness. Yet, to borrow from 
the gamesters, in the elevation of Elkins the 
President sees all of his other moves, and 
goes them at least one better. Elkins has 
never been convicted of anything in court, 
He combines characteristics of Dudley, 
Quay, Platt and Sim Coy. He is simply a 
schemer. His elevation to the head of the 
war department is beyond measure repul¬ 
sive to the American people. 

If the election of Mr. Crisp tends to give 
elements of the democratic party, led by 


Hill and Gorman, an advantage over the 
elements led by Mr. Cleveland, it is to be 
regretted. The Hill and Gorman section 
has and lives by but one principle and one 
practice, the spoil of office and of public 
contracts. For the party to turn back to 
such leadership is to return from compara¬ 
tive civilization to barbarism. 


The signs relating to the management 
of the city service are not re-assuring. In 
spite of talk of “a business administra¬ 
tion,” the god of spoil seems to be quietly 
getting the upper hand. One is impressed 
with the number of ward heelers who 
have got into the service, men who always 
have to be provided for, now in one office, 
now in another. There are too many trials of 
employes for drunkenness, or sleeping on 
duty, or other serious offence. The insur¬ 
ance people have taken the alarm on ac¬ 
count of the results of favoritism in the 
fire department. The engineering depart¬ 
ment is apparently getting ready t© do a 
good thing for the boys. All this proves 
again what has been proved millions of 
times that opportunity for the exercise of 
favoritism should be cut off to the utmost 
extent. To this end all but the highest ap¬ 
pointments should be thrown open to free 
competition, except laborers who should 
be employed upon the system now in use 
in the navy yards. 

TAMMANY AND THE CHILDREN. 

A fresh field of corruption inflicted by 
Tammany upon the subjected and paralyzed 
city of New York is being brought to light in 
recent issues of the New York Evening Post. 
Mr. Wilmer, a school inspector of the fifth 
district of the city, thought it in the line of 
his duty to rid the school-houses in the dis¬ 
trict of the saloons and houses of ill-fame 
that hemmed them in. The law reads: “A 
license will not be issued for a new place ad¬ 
joining a place already licensed, or in the 
immediate vicinity of a school-house.” First 
he tried to get Tammany’s Excise Board to 
define “ immediate vicinity,” and he failed. 
Then he asked the police department for a list 
of the saloons and houses of ill-repute within 
two hundred yards of the school-houses of the 
fifth district. One report was: 

"Within 200 yards of grammar school No. 10, at No. 
180 Wooster street, twenty-three bar rooms; within the 
same distance of grammar school No. 47, at No. .36 East 
Twelfth street, fifteen bar-rooms. Reported houses of ill- 
fame, five." 

Another report was: "Qrammar school No. 40,at 























290 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


No. 225 East Twenty-third street, bar-rooms ten; Pri¬ 
mary school No. 4, at No. 413 East Sixteenth street, bar¬ 
rooms, eighteen ; Primary school No. 23, a-t No. 322 East 
Twentieth street, bar-rooms, eleven; Primary school No. 
29, at No. 433 East Nineteenth street, bar-rooms, thir¬ 
teen." 

Then Mr. Wilmer wrote the police depart¬ 
ment for the number of saloons and houses of 
ill-fame, their owners and licenses, but this 
request was ignored. Finally Tammany’s 
Mayor Grant, in making the appointments for 
school inspectors, omitted the name of the 
troublesome and pernicious Mr. Wilmer. 
Fortunately the Post is doing what Tammany 
most dreads, and that is it day by day prints 
the facts and gives a plat of the school 
buildings and the surrounding saloons in the 
different districts. As the New York Tribune 
says: 

Tens of thousands of children are daily forced into 
contact with the vilest groggeries and the creatures 
that haunt them. They have no means of escaping 
the contamination. Saloons on both sides of the 
school-house, saloons on the nearest corners, saloons 
across the street press demoralizing sights upon their 
eyes and demoralizing sounds into their ears. Fa¬ 
miliarity with vice and degradation is inevitable, 
and it is a short and almosi certain step from famili¬ 
arity to companionship. The poison of such an 
atmosphere is absorbed into body and soul. What 
chance has a child against it ? Citizens are onerously 
taxed that their children may laboriously learn a few 
things out of books and draw in moral infection with 
every breath. This horrible state of affairs exists 
because Tammany can not exist without it. The 
mayor and his advisers know the fact and the reason 
perfectly. Commissioner Koch, whose character was 
clearly revealed when he went into court to plead 
to an indictment, and Commissioner Fitzpatrick, 
who escaped with him at the same time on a techni¬ 
cality, are doing the work they were appointed to do 
in the way in which they are instructed to do it. 
Commissioner Meakim is entitled to the credit of 
being obnoxious to his colleagues and in some 
danger of losing his place. But the majority of two 
is sufficient. And there is no popular agitation. 
Tammany goes unrebuked, re elects its candidates, 
tightens its grip, expands its ambitions, and illus¬ 
trates its depravity by an occasional cheap pretense 
of virtue, while sedulously implanting the seeds of 
vice in the rising generation. The harvest will be 
gathered in due time; and what a harvest it will be! 

What the grip of Tammany is, the random 
facts from time to time quoted in the Civil 
Service Chronicle show. It has been fur¬ 
ther shown that Tammany does not belong 
alone to the democratic party, but that the 
dominating part of the republican machine of 
New York trades its candidates and principles 
with Tammany, according as it can obtain a 
little of the vast spoil. The responsibility for 
the continued existence of this monstrous en¬ 
gine of degradation is fixed in part upon the 
selfish greed and love of ease of the citizens of 
New York, but it is fixed beside upon New 
York democrats, whose zeal for reform is na¬ 
tional, and upon such an organization as the 
republican Union League Club; for these 
all go their separate party ways, and furnish 
the money for these republican and democrat¬ 
ic creatures of Tammany to trade and betray 
for spoil. And it is under their party banners, 
with bogus war cries and by means of their 
respectable cloaks to hide under, that these 
mercenaries can glut themselves with the 
spoil of New York City. And again we beg 
to agk any citizen of New York, What is any 


man, whether Grover Cleveland or Benjamin 
Harrison, or James G. Blaine; what is any 
“issue” of the tariff or currency compared 
with the destruction of a monster like Tam¬ 
many, simply by the withdrawal of its spoil. 
Ballot reform will weaken it, but depriva¬ 
tion of spoil will kill it. 

ELKINS. 

In securing Elkins’s appointment it is not 
at all probable that Mr. Blaine took the 
trouble to remind the President of the star 
route scandals, of the Maxwell land grantsteal, 
or of the gigantic claim against Brazil that 
Blaine and Elkins endeavored to enforce. 
Elkins’s part in the notorious Jewett claim is 
easily ascertainable if reasons were to be 
sought for questioning the propriety of put¬ 
ting him in any office. This was a claim to 
which the attention of Secretary Bayard was 
directed during the administration of Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland. It came to his knowledge as 
a part of the business of the state department 
left unfinished by Mr. Blaine. 

James C. Jewett, of New York City, claimed 
to have discovered deposits of guano in the 
Island of Fernando de Norhonha, within the 
dominions of the empire of Brazil. Jewett 
obtained a permit from Brazil to remove 
portions of these deposits for experiment, with 
a conditioned promise of a contract under 
which he should receive a certain per¬ 
centage. He fitted out two small vessels 
for purposes of exploration, but his agreement 
with the Brazilian minister of agriculture ex¬ 
cited so much hostility in Brazil that the 
minister was forced to resign, and his suc¬ 
cessor canceled all the agreements with Jewett 
and officially informed the United States of 
his action. 

Jewett’s actual losses, according to his own 
figures, were .^27,330. He presented to the 
state department a claim against Brazil for 
more than $50,000,000. The claim was, of 
course, a gross exaggeration of any possible 
right of recovery of such damages. Secretary 
Evarts twice rejected his claim. When Sec¬ 
retary Blaine came in he reopened the case. 
Jewett retained Mr. Stephen B. Elkins as his 
attorney. On August 8, 1881, Mr. Blaine, in 
a dispatch to Minister Osborne, in Brazil, re¬ 
versed the instructions of his predecessor and 
wrote to Mr. Jewett stating that he had taken 
this course “ at the request of Stephen B. El¬ 
kins, Esq., your attorney.” To Minister Os¬ 
borne Mr. Blaine said emphatically, speaking 
of the rescinding of the Jewett contract and 
the claim for $50,000,000 damages, “ I am not 
sufficiently informed as to the law of Brazil to 
know how far its formal requirements as to 
the mere question of right and title would 
nullify this action by its government, but I 
do know that in justice and in equity a re¬ 
sponsibility has been incurred which can not 
be escaped.” 

Notwithstanding the efforts of Mr. Blaine 
in behalf of “Stephen B. Elkins, Esq., your 
attorney,” this preposterous claim slept during 
Mr. Frelinghuysen’s administration, and Mr. 


Bayard, after a careful examination of the 
facts, declared: “Such a claim, so stated, 
shocks the moral sense and can not be held to 
be within the domain of reason or justice. It 
would be an act of international unfriendli¬ 
ness for the United States to lend themselves 
in any way or to any degree in urging, much 
less enforcing, such a demand upon a country 
with whom we are, or design to remain, on 
terms of amity. I, therefore, return the pro¬ 
test as inclosed by you and decline to transmit 
it to the United States minister at Brazil or 
to instruct him to present it officially or oth¬ 
erwise.” 

This ended the business, unless, perchance, 
it has been reopened since Mr. Blaine began 
business “at the old stand” for the benefit of 
“Stephen B.Elkins, Esq.,your attorney.” The 
confirmation of Mr. Elkins as secretary of 
war may give him opportunity to throw the case 
into the hands of a lively man, and with the 
recovery of the $50,000,000 from the republic 
of Brazil he ought to feel fully repaid for his 
rebuke at the hands of so “unpatriotic” a 
secretary as Mr. Bayard.— Washington Dispatch 
to New York Times, December 17. 

—The critics who represent Stephen B. El¬ 
kins as having forced himself into the cabinet 
of President Harrison are as far astray now 
as the prophets who were swearing six weeks 
ago that this nomination would never go to 
the senate. 

The choice was unquestionably the Presi¬ 
dent’s own. It was made with full realization 
of the adverse comment it would call forth- 
To those who are in the inner White House 
circle, it has been evident for a long while 
that President Harrison was spending a good 
deal of time looking into the public and pri¬ 
vate record of Mr. Elkins, and this has satis¬ 
fied many of them that the man of many 
homes and many enterprises was booked for 
something worth having. 

This choice was impelled by two motives 
—gratitude and hope. Mr. Elkins has in 
more than a few ways done favors for the 
President personally, and for his son Russell, 
which could not be ignored. Just how to 
show the proper appreciation of this was a 
question. Elkins was rich and on the inside 
of many big schemes, while the President was 
poor and had nothing in prospect; so recog¬ 
nition in a financial way was out of the ques¬ 
tion. Elkins was not the sort of a man for 
one of the greater diplomatic posts, and the 
lesser ones he would not have accepted at any 
price. All that seemed open to him, there¬ 
fore, was a place at Washington, in which his 
restless activity of mind and body could be 
turned to some account. 

On the other hand, the President understood 
that Elkins was by nature a manager, and the 
lack of enough material of that sort in the 
cabinet, on the eve of a national election, had 
been brought in various ways strongly to the 
notice of all who were interested in the Pres¬ 
ident’s renomination. Blaine, Tracy, and Fos¬ 
ter were useful men in their several places 
politically; Rusk contribute^ ^ certain posi- 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


291 


tive element supposed to be attractive to the 
farmers of the northwest; but Wanamaker 
was engulfed in a sea of public contempt! 
Miller was a negative force, and Noble had as 
many whims as a woman, coupled with man¬ 
ners which antagonized nearly everybody 
who met him on an equal footing. It was as 
a political adjutant that Elkins was given the 
preference over Cheney and Estee and all the 
other equally good republicans talked of for 
the place. 

The friends who are now approving the 
President’s selection of a secretary are sud¬ 
denly confronted with a rather menacing 
array of reminiscences, some of which they 
find it hard to explain away. They discover 
that there still lingers in the memory of many 
people the letter written by the malodorous 
Dorsey to Representative Springer in the 
spring of 1884, concerning witnesses who 
might be brought before the house committee 
investigating the star route scandals, in which 
these words occurred: 

“S. B. Elkins, United Bank building. New 
York, has probably a larger knowledge than 
any other person of all the star-route matters 
and the moneys paid. George E. Spencer de¬ 
manded of the late J. W. Bosler and myself 
$12,000 to pay Mr. Elkins for the purpose of 
avoiding indictment and prosecution, and I 
replied that I would not pay a penny and 
never did.” 

They are reminded, also, of the McMains 
charges of the same year, overhauling Mr. 
Elkins and some other persons for their con¬ 
duct with reference to the Maxwell, Mora 
and Una del Gato grants, together with other 
valuable tracts of land in New Mexico.— 
^Washington Dispatch to the New York Evening 
‘Post, December 18. 


John McCoy and his home rule club in 
the fifteenth assembly district have again 
broken away from Tammany Hall. 

McCoy is now in revolt against William 
J. Dalton’s leadership. Dalton is the deputy 
street cleaning commissioner, a follower of ex- 
Senator George W. Plunkett. He was im¬ 
ported from the seventeenth district (Plunk¬ 
ett’s own) to take charge of the fifteenth. 
McCoy’s chief ground of complaint is that 
Dalton imported a brother-in-law from another dis¬ 
trict, and, after he had resided in the fifteenth for 
three weeks, had him appointed to the police force. 
After his appointment, Dalton’s brother-in- 
law, whose name is Halligan, moved out of 
the fifteenth back into his old district .—New 
York Evening Post, July 21. 


SIXTH REPORT 

Of the Special Committee of the National 
Civil Service Reform League, 


APPOINTED TO INQUIRE INTO THE CONDITION 
OF THE FEDERAL CIVIL SERVICE AND 
OPERATION OF THE REFORM LAW. 


To the Executive Committee of the National Civil Service 
Reform League: 

In the l«ist republican platform, it was declared 
‘ The reform of the civil service, auspiciously begun 
under republican administration, should be com¬ 


pleted by the further extension of the reform system, 
already established by law, to all grades of the serv¬ 
ice to which it is applicable.” This declaration 
was embodied in the platform as a specific pledge; 
and the construction of this written agreement, made 
with the voters of the country,is not dlfBcult. The law 
provides (Civil Service Act, sections 1 and 2) that the 
President shall appoint three commissioners whose 
duty it shall be to aid him in preparing suitable 
rules, providing for open competitive practical ex¬ 
aminations, all places classified by the rules to be 
filled by selections from those graded highest, with 
a period of probation before appointment. These 
rules are entirely under the control of the President 
and the commissioners appointed by him, and it is 
within his power under this act to extend them to 
any grades of the service to which they are applica¬ 
ble. The promise of the republican platform, there¬ 
fore, was not that new laws should be enacted, but 
that the system should be extended by the President. 
Nor, within certain limits, could there be any ques¬ 
tion as to the offices to which the civil service system 
was applicable. The object of the system was to take 
subordinate administrative places out of the field of 
political controversy and to make appointments 
to these places depend upon the fitness of the ap¬ 
pointee, as proved by competitive examination and 
probation, and not upon patronage and political 
favor. It was applicable, then, to non-political ad¬ 
ministrative offices. 

If there was any branch of the service which should 
have been kept free from party controversy, it was 
the census bureau. It was the plain duty of those 
in charge of this bureau to give to the people the 
exact facts as to all matters inquired of, uuwarped by 
political bias. 

In every decade the government spends millions 
of dollars upon this census, and the importance of 
accuracy and thoroughness in the work can not be 
overestimated. The census is at once a record of our 
progress as a people, a picture of our condition in 
each successive ten years of our national history, and 
the basis of instructive comparisons with the condi¬ 
tion and progress of other nations. The representa¬ 
tion of the several states in the popular branch of 
congress rests upon its statistics of population. No 
one will dispute that unfairness, incapacity, or 
blundering in the census is a grave public misfor¬ 
tune, and that the officers charged with a work of 
such importance should use every precaution to pre¬ 
vent the belief that their work is partial or Incom. 
plete. 

The census ought to be as free from partisan color as 
the judiciary. Otherwise, no one can rely upon the ac 
curacy of its conclusions. To gain the confidence of 
the people, it ought to be not merely fair and just, 
but it should be removed from the appearance of 
corrupt or partisan influence. The good sense of our 
ancestors made it an illegal act for a trustee to put 
himself in a position where he could make a profit 
out of the trust funds in his control, even though 
actual fraud could not be shown. An evident anal¬ 
ogy makes it an improper act for one political party 
so to monopolize the taking of the census as to be 
iu a position to profit from the result. If an admin¬ 
istration has a free choice between a non-political 
and a political agency for taking this enumeration 
and chooses the latter, composed of officials of its 
own political faith, the presumption is against the 
fairness of a census so taken. The results of such a 
census will be apt to reflect something of the bias of 
those who take it. And, even if it were fair, many 
would not believe it to be fair. Suspicion is cast on 
such a census in advance of enumeration ; and, if at 
the close of the work many inaccuracies are shown, 
resulting in some cases in the advantage to the party 
by whom it is taken, the work is sure to be discred. 
ited. 

It had already been demonstrated, by actual ex. 
perience, that the patronage system as applied to 
this branch of the service was liable to grave abuses, 
and frequently resulted in the appointment of in¬ 
competent officials, and that the reform system was 
well adapted to a bureau of this kind. This is man¬ 
ifest from the previous experience of the census 
bureau itself, as well as from an examination of the 
methods pursued in the taking of statistics in the state 


of Massachusetts, and from a comparison between 
the patronage and merit systems in the taking of 
the census in England and Scotland. 

The defective results in the census of 1870 were 
directly traceable to the patronage system. Francis 
A. Walker, under whose supervision this census, as 
well as that of 1880, was taken, says in a publication 
of the American Statistical Association (December, 
1890): ■■ The local supervision of the census in the 
southern states was, by the defeat of General Gar¬ 
field’s bill, thrown back into the hands of the 
marshals of the United States courts. * ^ The 
whole battle against the Garfield bill had been fought 
on the question of patronage. It was for the pur¬ 
pose of retaining this large body of more or less 
lucrative appointments in the hands of the dominant 
party that the United States marshals rallied at 
Washington during the winter of'69 and’70 to de¬ 
feat the house measure. They wanted to use these 
thousands of offices as a means of strengthening 
their hands in their respective districts, to fight the 
Ku-Klux and the illicit distillers, to build up the re¬ 
publican party and consolidate the negro vote, and> 
in general, this was precisely the use to which these 
offices were put. The result was an enumera¬ 

tion which we know now, from indisputable evi¬ 
dence, to have been in many parts of several southern 
states inadequate, partial and inaccurate, often in a 
shameful degree.” 

And not only are the disastrous results of pat¬ 
ronage appointments shown by the census of 
1870, but the improvement produced by the 
elimimination of partisanship from the census is 
shown in the comparatively satisfactory results and 
general confidence in the census of 1880. 

In respect to this census it is true that no competi¬ 
tive system was adopted. This was before the passage 
of the civil service law, and before the introduction 
of these methods into our federal service; but the 
essential element of the civil service system—name, 
ly, the exclusion of political consideration in ap¬ 
pointments—was largely observed. Mr. Walker tells 
us in the same article, “supervisors were appointed 
from either party with the utmost impartiality, and 
as they were themselves selected without regard to 
partisan services, they were instructed that it would 
be considered an offence and abuse of trust if. In 
their own appointment of enumerators, they allowed 
partisan motives to appear.” 

The following extract from the letter from the 
chief of the bureau of statistics to the civil service 
commissioners of Massachusetts, dated Nov. 27,1885, 
shows the success that attended the application of 
civil service methods to the taking of the decennial 
census in that stale; 

“ I am very happy to inform you that, as a whole, 
the force supplied by you is very much superior to 
the one we should have been likely to have secured 
through the old method of personal application and 
the indorsement of friends. * In intelligence, 
in capacity, in attainment, and in attendance upon 
work, our present force reflects the greatest credit 
upon the civil service system. 

“ I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
“ Cakkoll D. Wright.” 

In England, after nearly all the places in the civil 
service had been Included in the rules prescribing 
competitive examination, the positions in the census 
bureau were left out and remained a part of the gov* 
ernment patronage. The results of this ommlssion, 
as shown in several investigations, were deplorable. 
The report concerning the civil service in Great 
Britain, communicated to the two houses of congress 
at the beginning of the session of the 40th congress 
(pages 155 and 156), says, concerning an official in¬ 
quiry made in England in regard to the census of 
1871: “ The head of the office gives a sad account of 
the motley imbeciles put upon him by the members 
of Parliament taking the census. ‘They were a 
heterogeneous mass, from fourteen to sixty years of 
age, who had tried many occupations and failed in 
all.’ When the registrar was ordered to take the 
census in 1871, he says he supposed he was to be al¬ 
lowed better clerks, obtained through open compe¬ 
tition under the order of 1870, but he was deprived 
of them. 

“‘The lords of the treasury decided against me, 















292 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


and their lordships took to themselves the patronage 
and divided it among members. Their lordships 
acting on the old system, and following the recom¬ 
mendation of influential adherents, nominated no 
fewer than two hundred and sixty-one census 
clerks.’ He found that inquiry into their character 
and history ‘ was productive of pain and confusion,’ 
and he gave it up. But he forced this miscellaneous 
herd of offloiai favorites into a pass examination be¬ 
fore the commission which rejected fifty-seven per cent, 
of them, and with the residue, the registrar succeeded 
in taking the census of 1871, and wonders that he 
could do it. He says, ‘ Nothing could be worse than 
the system of nomination of clerks by the treasury.’ ” 

The report of the “committee appointed by the 
treasury to inquire into certain questions connected 
with the taking of the census," made on the 23d of 
May, 1890, together with the evidence upon which 
this report is based, also demonstrates the superiority 
of the merit system. 

In Scotland the competitive examinations were 
adopted in the census of 1881. The result is shown 
in the testimony of Mr. Stair Agnew, the registrar- 
general (see pp. 83 and 84), who thus describes the 
manner in which the clerks in this office were sup¬ 
plied : 

“A. 1922. It was arranged that all the names that 
were sent to me as applicants should, after inquiry 
by myself as to their general fitness, be sent up to the 
civil service commissioners, who held a competitive 
examination, and selected those at the top of the 
list. I should state that the patronage was in the 
hands of the treasury at that time, but it was ar¬ 
ranged by myself with the secretary of the treasury 
that I should directly send up the names to the civil 
service commissioners. 

“Q. 1923. But, in the first place, was any person 
at liberty to send in his name, or were the persons 
whose names you received nominated by the treas¬ 
ury ? 

“A. Any person was at liberty to send in his 
name, either to myself or to the treasury. 

“Q. 1927. In fact. It was an open advertisement? 

“A. Yes. 

“Q. 1932. Did they give you satisfaction? 

“A. Yes, 

“Q. 1938. They did their work intelligently? 

“A. Very much so. 

“Q. 1942. And you propose to follow the same 
principle in the coming census? 

“A. I should be quite satisfied to do so.” 

In England, on the other hand, the clerks em¬ 
ployed were nominated by the treasury patronage, 
and underwent “ a rough examination by the civil 
service commissioners;’’ but the results seem to 
have been lamentable. Dr. Ogle, the superintend¬ 
ent of statistics, in England, thus testifies (p. 11): 

“A. 238. The clerks who have been sent by the 
treasury to the census office hitherto have contained 
a number of gentlemen who have fallen out of their 
occupations, and are anxious to get something to do; 
and, as a rule, a very large proportion of them have 
turned out to be absolutely unfit for any work at all, 
certainly for any work that requires either honesty or 
intelligence. A very great deal is work which prac¬ 
tically can not be checked. Anything that we could 
check, anything that was checked, we found was 
oftentimes done so badly that it was hardly worth 
having had done at all; and the inference is that the 
unchecked work must have been very imperfectly 
done. 

“Q. 248. You get them now from the patronage 
secretary of the treasury ? 

“A. That is how we have had them hitherto. At 
each census there has been a protest against this 
mode of appointment, owing to the experience of 
the past one. 

“Q. 249. Would any rough kind of examination by 
the civil service commissioners help you ? 

“A. There was one, but it was quite ineffectual. 

“A. 261. I am afraid myself that no mere pass ex¬ 
amination will meet the difficulty.’’ 

It is true that good men are occasionally obtained, 
and fairly good work done under the patronage sys¬ 
tem. Thus in Ireland, where the system is a mixed 
one, the clerks being the copyists of the civil service, 
and the temporary clerks appointed by the lord-lieu¬ 


tenant, and submitted to an examination by the civil 
service commission, the apparently suitable persons 
being selected first, and the poorer men gradually 
weeded out by examination of the registrar general. 
Dr. Grimshaw declares: 

“A. 564. I think the thing was fairly done on the 
whole. We certainly got a very fair set of men. 
Very few of these men misconducted themselves 
during the course of the work.’’ 

The committee report (p. viii) that they trust It 
maybe found feasible to introduce a system of trans¬ 
fer from other branches of the civil service. And, if 
this should not be the case, they would regard with 
satisfaction the adoption of a method of appointing 
the requisite assistance, by open competition, at an 
examination to be conducted by the civil service 
commissioners. Open competition was accordingly 
held in London, in February, 1891, for filling tempo¬ 
rary clerkships in the census office, the examination 
being on the following subjects: 

1st. Handwriting. 

2d. Orthography. 

3d. Copying manuscript. 

4th. Copying figures and tabular statements. 

.5th. Arithmetic. 

6th. (Optional) Geography, 

Candidates were notified that the employment was 
purely temporary; that every person employed 
would be liable to dismissal at any time at the dis¬ 
cretion of the registrar-general; that, on the cessa¬ 
tion of service, no claim for further employment 
would be entertained; that no pension or gratuity 
would be given on retirement or dismissal; and 
that the successful candidates must be prepared to 
commence their services when required. 

It thus appears that experience in England as well 
as in our own country has demonstrated the advan¬ 
tage of appointing men to this bureau under the 
competitive examinations conducted by the civil 
service commission. 

If, then, the promise of the republican platform 
had any significance at all, it meant that the Presi¬ 
dent would extend this competitive system to the 
clerks of the census bureau, when that bureau 
should be established. Mr. Harrison, in concurring 
with and adopting the platform, distinctly made this 
promise his own, and emphasized it by the declara¬ 
tion that, “in appointments to every grade and de¬ 
partment, fitness, and not party service, should be 
the essential and discriminating test,” and in the 
statement that “further extensions of the classified 
list were necessary and desirable.” 

The act of March 1, 1889, providing for the taking 
of the census, gives the secretary of the interior the 
power to appoint the clerks of the census bureau, 
and provides that all examinations for appointment 
and promotion shall be in his discretion and under 
his direction. The secretary is himself an appointee 
of the President, and subject to his control. It 
would have been easy for the President, if desirous 
of extending the reform system, tohave had appoint¬ 
ments in this bureau made wiihont regard to politi¬ 
cal considerations. This might have been done by 
the appointment of clerks in the bureau through 
competitive examinations under the control of the 
civil service commission. Such a course would, in 
the hands of the present commissioners, have 
given an absolute guarantee of the fairness and 
non-partisan character of the appointments. 
If the president and secretary are unwilling to 
do this, they could have instituted competitive 
examinations for this bureau alone, publicly an¬ 
nouncing that the places were open to all and that 
political influence would not be regarded in making 
appointments. The President was indeed solicited 
by the civil service commissioners to cause a sys¬ 
tem of competitive examinations to be adopted 
for the clerks in this office; but he declined to have 
this done, and, in the words of the superintendent 
of the census (see report of November 6,1889, page 
4), the examinations required by the rules were not 
competitive, but merely tested the qualifications of 
such candidates only as might be designated for ex¬ 
amination by the superintendent of census. It 
thus appears that the superintendent was permitted 
to retain in his own hands the power of making 


nominations without which admission to the census 
bureau was impossible. 

The well known opinions of Mr. Porter, who was 
selected by the President to administer this office, 
made it certain that these appointments would be¬ 
come in great measure matters of political patron¬ 
age. 

Mr. Porter’s opposition of civil service reform 
methods clearly appears in his testimony before the 
house committee on reform of the civil service, Sep¬ 
tember 9, 1890. He said (p. 125), that civil service 
methods were “creating a system of barnacleism.” 
Again: “There was some effort (p. 112), to have the 
census brought under the control of the civil serv¬ 
ice commission. The main objection I urged at the 
time was on account of the temporary employment.” 
Mr. Porter further stated that in the census bureau 
appointees were, as a rule, recommended by repub¬ 
licans (p. 124). 

The act of March 1, 1889 (Sec. 4), provides that the 
secretary of the interior shall, upon the recommen¬ 
dation of the superintendent of the census, designate 
the number of supervisors, who are to be appointed 
by the President with the advice and consent of the 
senate, and directs that “each supervisor shall des¬ 
ignate to the superintendent suitable persons, and 
with the consent of the superintendent shall employ 
such persons as enumerators within his district, one 
for each subdivision, who shall be selected solely with 
reference to fitness and without reference to their political 
party affiliations.” It will thus be seen that the act 
itself endeavors to Incorporate the principle under¬ 
lying civil service reform, which is that in these sub¬ 
ordinate, non-political offices appointments shall go 
by merit, and not by political favor. If this provis¬ 
ion had been fully enforced, complaints of the part¬ 
isan character of the census could not justly be made; 
but, unfortunately, the supervisors were themselves 
largely appointed upon political considerations, and 
the result was that the appointments of enumerators 
was in many localities a matter of political pat¬ 
ronage. Republican members of congress nominat¬ 
ed great numbers. Sometimes the recommendation 
of democratic members or other influential politi¬ 
cians procured the appointment of a few, the object 
being apparently to add to the political strength of 
the office. The great mass of officials, clerks, super¬ 
visors and enumerators came from the republican 
party. Whatever the motive was, such a line of con¬ 
duct was sure to discredit the result. Even had it 
been true that it was not possible to select the 
enumerators under civil service reform methods, it 
was certainly possible to select both clerks and 
supervisors without reference to political considera* 
tions; and the appointment of supervisors in this 
way would to a large extent insure the selection of 
non-partisan enumerators, as the law required. A 
careful inquiry made by your committee as to the 
character of the enumerators appointed shows that, 
while in some places political considerations had no 
weight and the work was, on the whole, well per¬ 
formed, yet the supervisors were influenced in many 
other cases by partisan considerations. Men were 
often chosen without reference to their fitness on ac¬ 
count of their political services; and in such cases 
the work was often badly done, and in many in¬ 
stances thoroughly discredited. 

As far as can be learned, the census was fairly 
well taken in Massachusetts. It was under the 
charge of a man who superintended the state census 
of 1885. Appointments were not made there for po¬ 
litical reasons. The same is true of the first district 
of Maryland, where the supervisor was a well-known 
statistical expert. 

The report furnished us by the secretary of the 
civil service association at Bangor, Maine, in¬ 
forms us that in that city the census seems to 
have been conducted In an impartial manner, and 
the men employed appear to have been selected for 
their efficiency. 

The secretary of the civil service reform association 
of Newburg, N. Y., also reports that in that place 
the enumerators were apparently competent, and the 
result satisfactory, so far as known. The same report 
comes from the mayors of Atlanta, Ga., and Peoria, 
Ill.; and in Memphis, Tenn., while the result is un- 





THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


293 


I satisfactory, this is not attributed to the enumera¬ 
tors, hut to other local conditions. 

From the secretary of the civil service reform asso¬ 
ciation at Madison, Wis., your committee learned 
that the character of those employed in the enumera¬ 
tion was extremely various, some competent and 
some quite the reverse. One of the enumerators was 
so illiterate as to be unable to spell the most ordi¬ 
nary words and names, such as "Samuel,” "Can¬ 
ada,” “lawyer,” etc. Others are supposed to 
have been appointed solely as matters of pat¬ 
ronage, their appointments being controlled by 
the republican member of congress and the post¬ 
master of Madison. The result of the census was 
most disappointing to the citizens, and the accuracy 
of the count is seriously questioned by men of both 
parties. The increase of population in ten years, as 

t shown by the federal census, was 30 9-lOC per cent. 
Comparing the vote cast for governor in 1880, the 
presidential year, with that cast for governor in 1890, 
a non presidential year, there is an increase of 57 
45-100 per cent. Democrats speak of it as a significant 
fact that Mr. Lafollette (the republican member of 
congress) boasted that he had the name of every 
voter in the district. 

The secretary of the civil service reform associa¬ 
tion at Norwich, Conn., says of the enumerators: 
“ They are the men who are ready for odd jobs, given 
in the way party jobs usually are. I do not believe 
that a high degree of confidence is felt in the accur¬ 
acy of the count from such information as I can 
gather. So far as the statistics of industries and 
general business are concerned, I am strongly of the 
belief that very little confidence is felt in their accu. 
racy.” 

The civil service reform association of Buffalo send 
us the following: 

“ The census in Buffalo was not satisfactory to any 
of our citizens. The announcement of the result 
was much delayed, and was given out in a fragmen¬ 
tary and uncertain manner, necessitating several 
j successive changes in figures. It was evident that in 
some of the enumeration districts the work was not 
done promptly and correctly, and these delayed the 
whole enumeration. The newspapers without regard 
Ik to party condemned it. The mayor and the mer- 
Iljchants’exchange formally expressed their dissatis- 
' I#faction, and asked for a recount. * 

“ The population of the city was first announced 
. as about 252,000, then, after a special agent had been 
B here, as about 257,000, and recently this has been 
changed to about 255,500. 

“ We are not prepared to say that the defects in the 
local census are wholly due to the incompetency of 
the enumerators. Indeed, some other contributing 
causes were apparent. Yet there is a general im¬ 
pression that, as a whole, the work of the enumer¬ 
ators was not well done, and as a body they were 
not equal to their task. 

“The enumerators were nominally appointed by 
the local supervisor of the census, but actually they 
were forced upon him by the usual methods which 
control such appointments where they are not other¬ 
wise regulated by law. Personal considerations and 
partisan pressure undoubtedly dictated many of the 
appointments, and combined with other influences 
in bringing about others. It would not be fair to say 
that the fitness of the applicants was disregarded; 
but it was not the sole consideration. We have no 
hesitancy in asserting that the census in Buffalo 
would have been better taken If the enumerators 
had been selected on the basis of merit and fitness 
for their work, ascertained by suitable inquiries into 
these qualifications without regard to any other. 

“We append, without further comment, a copy of 
a circular letter signed by the local supervisor of 
the census, which has been published In the news¬ 
papers. This was sent to some, and probably all, the 
enumerators. It has been stated that this letter was 
merely a personal communication from Mr. Doug 
lass, not official, and that at the time he had no con¬ 
trol over the enumerators, and did not in any way 
attempt to coerce them, and that he explained his 
position personally to some of them. We give you 
this explanation with the letter: 


“ ‘Office of Supervisor of Census for the 
llTH District of New York. 

Oct. 28, 1890. 

“ ‘To-, Esq., Census Enumerator, 

Post-office-, County of-. 

“ ‘My Dear Sir—Aa it is of the utmost importance 
that a republican member of congress be elected in 
this district, I shall feel personally obliged if, on the 
day of the election, you will work specially for Ben¬ 
jamin H. Williams, the republican candidate. 

“ ‘Very truly yours, Sil.\s J. Douglass.’ ” 

Mr. C. R. Lane, formerly secretary of your invest!, 
gating committee, informs us as follows, in regard to 
the enumeration in Indianapolis: 

“ First. The enumeration was conducted by parti¬ 
san enumerators. * Theappointees, asa rule, 

have been of fair character, but there are notable 
exceptions. One, a negro lawyer by profession, a 
disreputable man by nature and training, and an 
acknowledged gambler, was appointed on a promise 
just before the spring election, in order to hold his 
vote; and he was heard to boast that the appointing 
power did not dare to leave him off the list. He is a 
man whom respectable men would not admit to their 
houses except under protest. All appointments were 
delegated to a member of the local republican coun¬ 
ty central committee, for this county and Wayne 
county, to my positive knowledge. * * The recom¬ 

mendations of this committee-man were followed 
almost without exception. It is perhaps worthy of 
remark that the committee-man found himself in¬ 
volved in infinite annoyance, and was heartily sick 
of his job before it was completed. He found him¬ 
self laboring with no reward either of money, com¬ 
fort, prestige, or conscience. 

“ Third. The results of the enumeration are satis¬ 
factory, this city showing a heavy rate of growth. 
Still, the satisfaction was obtained only after a vig¬ 
orous onslaught of the press and privately by the 
alleged oversight of hundreds. Private enterprise 
was stirred up to assist in having every possible name 
enrolled. Every complaint was investigated, and 
the name added to the list, if not already there.” 

Your committee have received from Mr. Merrill 
Moores, the member of the republican central com¬ 
mittee referred to in the foregoing communication, a 
letter from which they make the following extracts: 

“ Mr. Conger was appointed supervisor for this dis¬ 
trict. His home is at Flat Rock, on the south line of 
Shelby county, a good many miles from here. He 
has been a client of mine, and is a good fellow. One 
day he came into my office and said he was bothered 
with a lot of applications for appointment as enumer. 
ator, and that he had called upon nearly everybody 
he knew in town for advice, and most people he had 
talked with had said, ‘Go to Merrill Moores; he 
knows more of these fellows than anybody else.’ 
He wanted my advice as to the competency of the 
applicants Of course I gave it to him. <■ There 
were five democratsappointed, and I think they were 
all who applied. This was, perhaps, because demo¬ 
crats thought they would stand no chance; but the 
fact remains that there were no more applicants. 
The number of applicants was less than the number 
of districts in the city; and it was necessary to hunt 
up enumerators who were known to be competent, 
and persuade them to apply. » * i asked one or 
two of them in very bad districts to give me a list of the 
voters for their districts; but no poll was ever made, 
and no enumerator was asked as to the politics 
of any man in his territory, and I know, as a fact, 
that no statement of any sort of the politics of any 
man was made by any enumerator to any of our 
party. I paid myself for the list of voters, and obtained 
it for my personal use.” * 

The secretary of the Geneva (N. Y.) Civil Service 
Reform Association Informs us regarding the enum¬ 
erators: “They were all republicans; but, from 
what information we could gather, they seem to 
have been appointed, not with the view to benefit 
the republican party, but with the sole view of en¬ 
hancing the political fortune of the member from 
this district, Mr. John Raines. Mr. Raines’s friends 
were provided for. Any one that opposed him was 
ignored. Consequently, there is a very bitter feeling 
against Mr. Raines in his own party, which came 


very near defeating him when he was up for re-elec¬ 
tion last November, although the district is strongly 
republican. * It was known that the enum¬ 

erator received instructions to make a list of voters, 
and classify them as to party connection.” 

A copy of a letter from Congressman Raines to one 
of the enumerators appointed in this district was 
.sent to your committee. It is as follows: 

“ My Dear Sir—As it is quite likely that you will 
in a few days be appointed enumerator for your dis¬ 
trict, I write you this in the strictest confidence. I 
would like very much that you should take the trou¬ 
ble, before you make your report to the supervisor 
of the census, and after you have taken all the names 
in your district, to copy in a small book the name and 
post office address of every voter on the list. After you 
have done so, I wish you to send the book to me at 
Canandaigua. I ask you to do this as a personal 
favor, and to make no mention of the matter to any 
one. What I want is a full list of all the voters in your 
enumeration district. Will you please treat this 
matter as strictly confidential? 

“Very truly yours, J. Raines.” 

A letter was addressed to Mr. Raines as to the facts 
regarding this matter, and a copy of the letter was 
enclosed. He called upon the chairman of your 
committee, and stated that he could not say whether 
this was an exact copy of the letter sent, but that, if 
it were so, as might be the case, he had sent the let¬ 
ter in ignorance of the law, which required enumer¬ 
ators to keep secret the results of the enumeration, 
and that the census bureau was not responsible, but 
only the individual enumerator. He further stated 
that his purpose probably was to get this list for the 
purpose of distributing documents. 

From the chairman of the civil service reform as¬ 
sociation of Bloomington, Monroe county, Ind., we 
learn that the enumerators were selected there, by 
and upon the recommendation of the chairman of 
the republican county committee. They were en¬ 
gaged in making poll lists for the republican party. 
Similar statements were made in regard to other 
counties and states. 

In connection with these lists, your commit¬ 
tee would call attention to section 8 of the act 
of March 1, 1889, which requires that each enum¬ 
erator shall subscribe an oath that he will not dis¬ 
close any information contained in the schedules, 
lists, or statements, to any person oi- persons ex¬ 
cept to his superior officers; and section 13 pro¬ 
vides, that, if he shall, without the authority of the 
superintendent of the census, communicate to any 
person or persons not authorized to receive the same 
any information gained by him in the performance 
of his duty, he shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, 
and upon conviction shall be fined not exceeding 
8500. If enumerators were allowed to remain igno¬ 
rant of this law, the superintendent of the census 
deserves the greatest censure; if they were permit¬ 
ted to violate it wilfully, he is an accessory to the 
crime. 

Hon. J. D. Alderson, M. C., of West Virginia, writes 
that the supervisor in his district has always been 
a prominent and active republican, was the nomi¬ 
nee of his party for prosecuting attorney, and beaten 
by some five hundred more than his party’s lack of 
majority. “ I do not know a single case in which a 
a democrat was appointed by him as enumerator. 
He was a candidate for the republican nomination 
for congress in 1890, but was defeated. We have all 
understood that his appointments were partisan, 
and made with some view at least to his nomina¬ 
tion to congress; but there were too many pins for 
the holes, and he was not nominated, although 
many of his appointees were delegates to the con¬ 
vention in which he was defeated. In my own 
county the republican executive committee held a 
meeting, and voted for persons to be recommended 
for appointment as enumerators. Mr. Mann ap¬ 
pointed some of the personsagreed upon, others not; 
but his appointee, in every case, was a republi 
can.” 

It may be here remarked that the supervisors in 
all parts of the country were nearly always republi¬ 
cans, and generally republican politicians. 

The following letter from Hon. H. Clay Evans, M.C,, 







294 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


states what seems to be the grounds upon which 
many of these supervisors were appointed: “Mr. 
Park was appointed upon my recommendation, and it is 
not my custom to recommend either political or physical 
eunuchs for appointment to office; and I presume he has 
followed a like rule in his appointment.” 

Undoubtedly the worst effects of the patronage 
system of appointments are apparent in the city of 
New York. One C. H. Murray, a republican politi¬ 
cian, was made supervisor of the census of that city. 
The following circular letter from him, which has 
many times been published without question of its 
authenticity, shows the manner in which enumera¬ 
tors were selected: 

“Dear Sir —You will please forward to this office a 
list of the applicants that the republican organiza¬ 
tion of your district desires to have named as census 
enumerators. This list must be sent here on or 
before April 1.” 

Of this method of appointment, President Walker, 
of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who 
was superintendent of the ninth and tenth censuses, 
says, “If the selection of the enumerators was made 
upon any such bases as is implied by that, the census 
could not have been otherwise than bad.” Such a 
method is a direct violation of Section 5 of the act 
providing for the present census, which prescribes 
that enumerators “shall be selected solely with reference 
to fitness, and without reference to their political party 
affiliations.” Such a method is also a violation of the 
supervisor’s oath of office. The manner in which 
the appointments were made pursuant to the plan 
outlined in this letter appears from the statement to 
a repre.sentative of this committee of M. A. Greaves, 
who was personally present at the meeting on March 
28 at 2250 3d avenue, republican headquarters. All 
applications had been filled out in advance. Mr. 
Frank Raymond, a republican leader of the 23d as¬ 
sembly district, presided. Taking the applications, 
he seated himself at a table, with a couple of patty 
workers beside him, who examined the repubiican 
roll and checked off the names as the appointments 
were made. The process was simple: Mr. Raymond 
would call a name, the man called would go to the 
table, and Mr. Raymond would ask him, “are you 
upon the roll?” His answer was always in the af¬ 
firmative. The next question was, “What district 
would you like?” The applicant would choose a 
district, which, if it had not been already selected, 
would be assigned to him. 

It is evident enough that among men thus appoint¬ 
ed there must have been a considerable number who 
were utterly unfit for the work. And it is not sur¬ 
prising that among t ese men Police Inspector 
Byrnes should recognize well known criminals. Mr. 
Byrnes states: “I know that some of the enumera¬ 
tors in this city were thieves. This very morning one 
of these enumerators came here to call upon me. He 
had been three times an inmate of the state prison. 
He was appointed upon the recommendation of a 
republican judge. This thief’s name is known to all 
the city detectives, and his picture occupies a prom¬ 
inent place in the rogue’s gallery. He did not take 
the oath in his own name, and his dealings with the 
census bureau were under an alias.” The danger of 
employing such men as census euumerators is very 
evident. Private houses were opened to them with 
the understanding that the government was satisfied 
with their trustworthiness. 

And, even in cases where the enumerators 
attempted to do their duty, obstacles were in¬ 
terposed, at the supervisor’s office, which often 
made this impossible. For instance, Mr. Alfred B. 
Thieme, an enumerator residing at 37 Ludlow street, 
states that he could not get a sufficient number of 
blanks, and that many other enumerators were in 
the same predicament. His district was a tenement- 
house district, and very large; and it was diffi¬ 
cult to extract from the people the necessary infor¬ 
mation. He wrote to the supervisor asking for an 
extension of time and was refused. He had to leave 
out several tenement houses. He returned three 
thousand names. Sheets were lost in the supervisor’s 
office. Mr. Thieme believes, from his knowledge of 
this district, that there were four thousand people in 
it. He knew of other men who were refused an ex. 


tension of time under the same circumstances, and 
their returns also were incomplete. 

John W. Fulton, another enumerator, states that 
he returned all the people in his district that were in 
town, but that in block after block the houses were 
mostly closed, and hundreds were missed. He had 
no time to hunt up representatives of the absent 
familiei. nor was he inclined to do so at two cents a 
name. He was told to do the best he could about his 
schedule. 

Mr. Samuel C. Sloan, a permanent boarder at the 
Madison square hotel, sends us an affidavit to the 
effect that there were thirty or forty permanent 
guests in this house, and at least ten domestics; that 
the census enumerators called but once, and took 
only two names, those of the proprietor and clerk; 
that Mr. Sloan notified Superintendent Murray forth¬ 
with, but that his complaint was never noticed and 
the census taker never appeared again. This affidavit 
is also confirmed by an affidavit of Charles B. Fisher, 
the proprietor. 

The probable inaccuracy of the census taken in the 
city of New Y'ork first became apparent from an ex¬ 
amination of the vital statistics prepared by the 
health department of that city. Very few per¬ 
sons who have been residents of the metropolis 
during the last ten years can question the improved 
sanitary condition of the city. The direct super 
vision of the plumbing, drainage, and ventilation 
of new houses under the laws of 1879 and 1881, affect, 
ing about six thousand tenement-houses and many 
other dwellings constructed since that time, the al¬ 
most total demolition of vaults and cesspools, 
throughout the city, and the more rigid control of 
contagious diseases, ied to the belief that the death- 
rate had considerably decreased. 

There is a certain class of deceases known to phy¬ 
sicians as “preventable. These are diairhcea and 
zymotic diseases, the latter Including small-pox, 
measles, diphtheria, meningitis, scarlet, typhoid, 
typhus, malarial and puerperal fevers, etc. These 
generally result from bad air, bad water and bad 
drainage—causes which can be greatly diminished by 
improved sanitary conditions. And, in fact, if the 
present census be assumed to be correct, and the 
population on June 1,1890, be regarded as 1,513,501, 
as reported, the death rate from zymotic diseases 
has decreased during the past decade from 8.31 per 
cent, to 7.29 per cent., and the death rate in diar- 
rhoeal diseases from 3.59 per cent, to 2.77 per cent. 
The death rate from consumption has also dimin¬ 
ished. This shows the improved sanitary condition 
of the city. But during the same time the general 
death rate has advanced from 27.44 per cent, to 27.54 
per cent., so that by the federal census we have the 
startling coincidence of an impioved sanitary condi¬ 
tion and an increased death rate. If the federal 
census were true, there was also a considerable in¬ 
crease of the percentage of registered voters and of 
names in the city directory in proportion to the pop¬ 
ulation. 

In addition to this, the count of the city, as first 
added up and published, gave a population more 
than 100,000 greater than the aggregate afterward 
published. 

These things led to the belief that the count was 
irraccurate; and the police authorities, by order of 
the mayor, had the population of the city recounted. 
The result showed a population nearly 200,000greater 
than that shown by the federal enumeration, and 
the mayor accordingly asked the census bureau for 
a recount. This was not granted. The request was 
then made to the secretary of the interior; and the 
books rontaining the names, as taken by the police 
authorities, were sent to Washington, where Mr. 
Kenny, their custodian, offered to the secretary of 
the interior to take them for his inspection to any 
place the secretary might designate, and to keep 
them there for comparison with the federal sched¬ 
ules as long as might be necessary, the books still re. 
maining in Mr. Kenny’s custody. The secretary re¬ 
fused to receive them unless they were absolutely 
surrendered to the exclusive custody of the federal 
authorities, which Mr. Kenny was not authorized to 
do. The New York authorities, considering it im¬ 
practicable to procure copies of the entire federal 
enumeration, which would involve vast expense. 


determined to take one of the wards of the city and 
make the necessary comparison, and a copy of the 
federal enumeration in the second ward was de¬ 
manded, this being one of the smallest wards in the 
city, and one in which the comparison could be most 
easily made. A copy of the federal list for the second 
ward was furnished. It contained 826 names, and 8 of 
these were found upon inquiry to belong to the first 
ward. The police enumeration for the second ward 
contained 1,340 names—a differance of 414, or more 
than 41 per cent, above the federal enumeration. 

The board of health had previously taken an 
enumeration of the inhabitants of this ward during 
the first part of September. It was made rapidly in 
a single day, but it showed a population of 274 more 
than was reported in the federal census. 

The New Y'ork authorities now procured from the 
persons whose names appeared in the police enum¬ 
eration, but who had been omitted from the census 
affidavits, showing their residence in that ward on 
the first of June last. Affidavits were furnished 
showing the residence of some 328 of these persons. 
The chairman of your committee has inspected a 
number of the books containing the police enumer¬ 
ation, as well as a copy of the federal enumeration 
and of the health enumeration of the second ward. 
The work done by the police presents a neat ap¬ 
pearance, and is in each instance verified by an 
affidavit. There are no doubt inaccuracies in it; 
and some of the affidavits of the residents after¬ 
wards taken are irregular in form. But a compar¬ 
ison of the two lists certainly Indicates that a very 
large number of the residents of this ward were 
omitted in the federal enumeration. For instance, 
your chairman ascertained that in the two squares 
bounded by Broadway, John, Nassau, and Liberty 
streets, there were no less than twelve houses wholly 
omitted from the census, in which it appears, both 
from the police reports and by the affidavits, that 
there were thirty-eight persons residing on the first 
of June last. 

The chairman of your committee called upon John 
Kiernan, the enumerator of this district, and in¬ 
quired concerning the manner of his appointment, 
and was told he secured it through the “ regular 
channel,” as an enrolled republican of the third as¬ 
sembly district; that he got it through Charles Wag¬ 
ner, the brother of the candidate for the assembly; 
that one Reed was first appointed, also through the 
“ regular channels,” but soon found that it did not 
pay, and gave up the job after he had taken about 
fifteen names. Mr. Kiernan exhibited his commis¬ 
sion, which was evidently the same one that had 
been issued to Reed in the first place, the name of 
Reed having been erased and his own Inserted. 
Mr. Kiernan said that Reed threw down his book 
and was never required to report. The schedules 
taken by Reed and given to Kiernan, who proceeded 
to verify them; but some of the persons thus taken 
refused to give Kiernan any information, saying that 
they had already been enumerated. The names 
upon these schedules were not included by Kier¬ 
nan in his returns. On December 8lh, Kiernan 
telegraphed to Superintendent Porter, “ Schedules 
containing about fifteen names which were 
not included in my returns, will be mailed 
to you early Monday morning.” Kiernan stated 
that he had been unable to find these,—they 
had been lying somewhere around the house, but he 
could not find them. In this he was corroborated 
by the other members of the family, who said they 
had looked everywhere around the house, but that 
these schedules could not be found. 

Nothing more seems necessary to show the un- 
trustworthiness of a census taken by men appointed 
through the “regular channels” of political ma¬ 
chinery. 

And it seems that in a number of cases the names 
reported by Mr. Kiernan did not appear in the fed¬ 
eral lists. Whether the schedules containing these 
names were lost or destroyed, or in what manner 
the discrepancy occurred, is not known. Among 
these houses were the following: 102, 152, 140 Nassau 
street, 35 Park Row, 25 Ann street, 50 Nassau street. 
Many others can be given. These facts appear from 
a comparison between the telegram sent by Mr. 
Kiernan to Mr. Porter, and read to the cen.sus com- 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


295 


mlttee of the house of representatives, with a copy of 
the federal enumeration of the second ward/* 

Indeed, there is strong reason to doubt the com¬ 
pleteness of the enumeration made, not only in New 
York City, but throughout the entire country. 
Numerous corrections and additions have been 
made, and in cases where a recount was ordered, 
the enumeration was sometimes found to be greatly 
defective. Thus Multnomah county, Oregon, had a 
recount, the result of which showed a population of 
75,657, whereas the first enumeration gave only 
61,000.t In several other cases, the enumeration 
was found to be incomplete when compared with 
the resultsof subsequent recounts by the local author¬ 
ities. For instance, in the city of St. Louis over 12,000 
names, and in Augusta,Ga.,4,150(oroverl2>^percent, 
of the whole) appear to have been omitted. Of course, 
there is always a question which of the two enumera¬ 
tions are the more trustworthy, where two have thus 
been made; but, since the total result falls far short 
of what is to be expected from the statistics of emi¬ 
gration, vital statistics and other evidences of growth, 
it is not unfair to presume that in many places 
where the first returns are still uncorrected they 
are probably inaccurate and unreliable. 

The bulletin of October 30,1890, announces that 
the population of the United States was 62,480,540. 
In this bulletin the superintendent of the census 
considered it necessary to explain this result. 

“Upon their face these figures show that the popu. 
lation has increased between 1880 and 1890 only 
727,845 more than between 1870 and 1880, while the 
^ rate of Increase has apparently diminished from 
lij 30 08 to 24.57 per cent. If these figures were derived 
! from correct data, they would indeed be disappolL t- 
ing. Such a reduction in the rate of increase, in the 
[ face of the enormous immigration during the past 
■ ten years, would argue a great diminution in the 
I 'fecundity of the population or a corresponding in¬ 
crease in its death-rate. 

“These figures are. however, easily explained. It 
is well known, the fact having been demonstrated 
by extensive and thorough investigation, that the 
census of 1870 was grossly deficient in the southern 
states, so much so as not only to give an exaggerated 
rate of increase of population between 1870 and 1880 
in these states, but to effect materially the rate of the 
increase of the country at large. 

“There is of course no means of ascertainlqg accu¬ 
rately theextentof these omissions, butin all prob¬ 
ability they amounted to not less than 1,500,000_ 
There is but little question that the population of 
the United States in 1870 was at least 40,000,000 in¬ 
stead of 38,558,371, as stated. If this estimate of the 
extent of the omissions in 1870 be correct, the abso¬ 
lute increase between 1870 and 1880 was only about 
10,000 000, and the rate of increase was not far from 
25 per cent. These figures compare much more rea¬ 
sonably with similar deductions from the popula¬ 
tion in 1880 and 1890.” 

The superintendent therefore justifies his own 
figures by assuming that the omissions in the census 
of 1870 were not less than 1,500,000. He evidently 
sees that, un iess th is can be establ ish ed, th e resu 1 ts of 
the present census will be discredited. But in this 
explanation Mr. Porter makes no, mention of the 
great increase of immigration in the past decade- 
some two and one-half millions greater than in 
either of the preceding ten-year periods. This would 
make a difference of some 3)4 percent.; and Francis 
A. Walker, who superintended the taking of the 
ninth and tenth census, showed very clearly, in an 
address delivered before the National Academy of 
Science at Boston, on November 11th, that a discrep¬ 
ancy of 1,500,000 in the census of 1870 could not 

"■As the enumerators In New York City were ap¬ 
pointed through the machinery of the republican 
party, and as the city had a large democratic ma¬ 
jority, and the result appeared to be an underesti¬ 
mate of the population, it was inferred that the error 
was intentionally made for the purpose of reducing 
the representation of New York in congre.ss. Thisin- 
ference, whether correct or not, was natural and in¬ 
evitable, and will always be made whenever politi¬ 
cal considerations invade the census bureau. 

tThe president of the board of trade of Portland 
writes us that some of these enumerators were “po¬ 
litical hacks,” others too old to do the work, others 
mentally incompetent. 


exist. That there were Inaccuracies was not denied; 
but these losses occurred in districts where the col¬ 
ored people greatly outnumbered the whites, and 
where they had no regular abodes and often no fam¬ 
ily names. The percentage of growth in the whole 
country by decades and by periods of twenty and 
thirty years is as follows: 


Census. 

10 year period. 

1800 

84.7 

1810 

36.3 

1820 

33.1 

1830 

33.5 

1840 

32 6 

1850 

35.8 

1860 

35.6 

1870 

22.6 

1880 

30.8 

1890 

24.6 


The percentage of increase in the colored popula¬ 
tion (where the census of 1870 was defective) is as 
follows: 


Census. 

Total 

10-year 

20-year 

30year 

per cent. 

period. 

period. 

period. 

1790 

19.3 




1800 

18.9 

32.3 



1810 

19.0 

37.5 

82.0 


1820 

18.4 

28.6 

77.0 

134.0 

1830 

18 2 

31.4 

69 0 

133.0 

1840 

16.8 

23.4 

62.2 

108.6 

1850 

15.7 

26.6 

56.3 

105.4 

1860 

14.1 

22.1 

54.6 

90.7 

1870 

12.7 

9.9 

34.1 

69.8 

1880 

13.1 

34.8 

48.1 

80.8 


Taking the twenty years’ periods, these show a 
constant decline in the percentage of increase of the 
colored people. 

From 1860 to 1880 the fall is from 54.6 to 48.1 per 
cent. Now, if the census of 1870 be omitted, and the 
ratio in that year be fixed at the higher figure, the 
number of colored people would be 5,624,505. If the 
lower ratio, 48.1, be taken, the number would be 
5,390,894. If the 30-years’ period be adopted, the ex¬ 
tremes to be followed were 90.7 for 1860 and 80.8 for 
1880. If the former be taken, the number of colored 
people in the country in 1870 would have been 
5,489,196. If the latter figure be taken, the num¬ 
ber would be 5,206,992. The real figures could hardly 
have been higher than one of these estimates. The 
census of 1870 returned the colored population at 
4,880,009. The true colored population, if the census 
be omitted, must have been between the limits of 
5,206,992 and 5,624,505. Taking either of these figures, 
the inaccuracy of the census of 1870 would be less 
than one-half the one and one-half millions which 
Mr. Porter claims, and the figures derived from the 
present census remain still unexplained. 

In the face of the inaccuracies conceded and the 
omissions proved, it is far more likely that the 
present census is incomplete than that there has 
been the great diminution in the fecundity of the 
population or a corresponding increase in its death- 
rate which its figures necessarily imply. 

Your committee consider the following propositions 
have been established by the results of their in¬ 
quiries: 

1. That the refusal to apply the civil service re¬ 
form system of open, non-partisan competitive ex¬ 
aminations in appointments to the clerical force of 
the census bureau was violation by the President of 
a promise contained in the republican platform in 
1888, and indorsed in his letter of acceptance. 

2. That by the appointment of enumerators on 
political gounds, in open violation of Sect. 5 of the 
census act, great numbers of incompetent men have 
been engaged in taking the census, and that in many 
places attempts have been made to nse oflicial 
positions for the benefit of the party in power. 

3. That while in some places the results of the 
work appear to be free from partisan color and to be 
accurately and well done, yet in many places the 
work has been carelessly and badly done, and is open 
to the suspicion that partisan considerations have 
not been absent, and that finally, there is a wide¬ 
spread distrust of the accuracy of the census, which 
greatly impairs its value to the country, and which 
is caused in great measure by the fact that the census 
bureau has been conducted upon the spoiis system. 

Your committee desires to exple.ss its belief that no 
census vvill hereafter receive the confidence of the 
people until it has been wholly removed from parti¬ 
san influences; and they trust that in the future 


such successful examples as have already been made 
of the merit system will be followed in all federal 
enumerations. William Dudley Foulke. 

Chas. J. Bonaparte. 
Richard H. Dana. 

Wayne MacVeagh. 
Sherman 8. Rogers. 


THE BALTIMORE INVESTIGATION. 

(CONTINUKD.) 

Charles Oeli testified as follows: 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) You are a clerk in the 
oflSce here ? A. Yes, sir. 

iS- * * » * * 

Q. Have you been identified with the John¬ 
son or Henderson factions? A. I haven’t been 
identified with either of them. 

Q. But they have these two factions in your 
ward? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And the two factions are going to fight 
for supremacy next Monday, are they not? 
A. I suppose so. 

Q. And to whom did you contribute, if at 
all, to what faction? A. I contributed to the 
club of which I am a member. 

Q. Was $5 the sum you contributed? A. 
Well, I gave that free gratis to them. 

*♦*»*» 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) You gave this, you 
say, through the president of the club, who is 
a Mr. Pierson? A. Yes, sir ; for the benefit of 
the club, to help to keep the club up ; mostly 
for social enjoyment; that is, to benefit the 
mind, and discussing the things of the day, 
etc. 

* * * -St •» * 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) How much did you 
contribute last fall? A. I didn’t contribute 
anything. 

Q. You made no contribution last fall? A. 
I gave a few dollars voluntarily. 

Q. I mean voluntarily entirely, but how 
much did you give voluntarily last fall; was 
it $15? A. Fifteen dollars; I think it was 
about that. 

•*■***** 

Henry Martin testified as follows; 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) You are a letter-car¬ 
rier? A. Yes, sir. 

****** 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Now, as a matter of 
fact, do you know whether on that day or 
some other day soon after that there was a 
meeting of six or seven employes of the post- 
oflBce, among them being yourself and Glass 
and Reed, at the rooms of the Fairmount 
Club, where there was a discussion as to the 
amount of money there would be needed for 
the primaries? A. No, sir. 

Q. You don’t remember anything of any 
such discussion ? A. Nothing about anything 
like that; no, sir. 

Q. Well, what do you recollect about it, 
about that or any other discussion taking 
place at that time? A. Well, we were going 
to buy a pool table; we wanted to get a pool 
table in the room for the enjoyment of the 
members, and that is what we were talking 
about. 

















296 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Q. At that time? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. On that occasion ? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Well, as a matter of fact, did any of 
these persons whose names I have mentioned 
subscribe anything towards the expenses of the 
primaries? A. No, sir; not as I know of. 

Q. Do you know a man by the name of 
Mitchell? I don’t know what his first name 
is ; he is employed in some capacity on the el¬ 
evator. A. Yes, sir; I know him I am not 
personally acquainted with him; that is, I 
don’t know him well. 

Q. Do you know whether he was present on 
that occasion, at that meeting? A. Well, I 
don’t know whether he was or not. 

(See testimony of W. A. Mitchell, September 
Chronicle.) 

Q. Do you know whether he has contrib¬ 
uted any money towards the primaries? A. 
I think not. 

Q. Whether he has contributed anything to 
the primaries? A. No, sir; none of us con¬ 
tributed any money for the primaries. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Well, for the purchase 
of this pool table? A. Not yet, no sir; we 
are going to get a pool table for the enjoy¬ 
ment of the members of the club. 1 suppose 
there ain’t anything wrong about that? 

Mr. Bonaparte: I suppose not. A. We 
want some kind of enjoyment. 

Q. Now, you say for the primaries there 
has not been any discussion about taking up a 
contribution at all? A. No, sir. 

Q. You have given something toward the 
expenses of the primaries, yourself, haven’t 
you? A. No, sir. 

Q. Nothing at all ? A. No, sir. 

Q. And you haven’t received anything 
from anyone else for them? A. No, sir. 

» i!} * 

Note—At this point, W. A. Mitchell was 
recalled, and the following questions put to 
him in the presence of the witness: 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Do you know Mr. 
Martin? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Now, was he the person whom you testi¬ 
fied had acted as treasurer for that fund that 
was subscribed? A. Somebody said that he 
was willing to give it to him. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) He was the man to 
whom you gave your $5. A. Yes, sir. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Was there anyone 
else who acted as treasurer on that occasion ? 
A. That, gentlemen, I couldn’t say. 

Q. You don’t think there is any mistake, is 
there, in your mind as to its being this Martin 
and not somebody else? A. That is the gen¬ 
tleman I gave it to. 

Mr. Bonaparte : That will do. 

(Whereupon the witness Mitchell retired.) 

Q. (Roosevelt.) Have you anything to say 
in answer to that? 

Witness. In answer to w'hat? 

Mr. Roosevelt. To his statement. 

A. I have nothing to say about that; that’s 
all right. 

Q. Do you deny it? A. I don’t deny that 
he gave me $5. 

Q. You don’t deny that? A. No, sir; he 
gave me $5. 


Q. What was that for? A. To buy a pool 
table; we were going to buy a pool table. 

N( te.—The witness W. A. Mitchell was 
again recalled. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) What did you give 
that for; what was the object of the gift of 
that $5 to Mr. Martin? Didn’t you testify 
that it was for legitimate expenses of the pri¬ 
maries? A. Yes, sir; that’s what I said. 

Q. Was there any talk about its being for 
any other purpose but that? A. They were 
talking about buying a pool table. 

Q. Did you subscribe the $5 for the pur¬ 
pose you testified; you testified that you sub¬ 
scribed for the primaries? A. Yes, sir; I 
did ; but I was willing to give it, though, for 
the pool table; we have got to have a meeting 
about that yet; which way it will go. 

(Whereupon the witness Mitchell retired.) 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) I think that is all, un¬ 
less you want to make some further explana¬ 
tion. A. I have no further explanation to 
make. 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) But you didn’t have 
any talk that night about the primaries at all? 
A. No, sir. 

John H. Ashton testified as follows: 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) What is your position? 
A. I am fireman in the post oflBce. 

Q. Appointed by Mr. Johnson as custodian 
of the public buildings? Appointed by the 
secretary of the treasury. 

Q. How long ago since you were appointed? 
A. This November past a year ago; what 
date I disremember. 

Q. (Mr. Bonaparte.) Do you know a man 
by the name of Frederick Hammond? A. 
Yes, sir. 

Q. He was at one time employed in the 
government service, wasn’t he? A. Yes, sir. 
****** 

Q. Did Mr. Hammond show you a subscrip¬ 
tion paper for the expenses of the primaries 
next Monday? A. Yes, sir; he didn’t show 
it to me; he didn’t tell me what it was for; he 
had it in his hand. 

Q. He was holding it in his hand? A. Yes, 
sir. 

Q. You say he didn’t tell you what it was 
for? J ust tell us how you knew it was for 
that purpose? 

Witness : How I knew it, or him? 

Mr. Bonaparte : Well, how did you know 
it in the first place, and then how did he 
know you knew it? 

A. I didn’t know for what purpose he 
had it. 

Q. What did he say to you about this paper? 
A. He came to me and if I remember now he 
asked me if I contributed anything, and I told 
him no; I told him that the engineers or some of 
them in the building generally came down 
stairs and had a talk when anything like that 
was going on ; so nothing more was said and 
he went away. That is all that was said. 

****** 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) Now, did this man 
Hammond tell you at the same time that he 
showed you the paper that he had collected a 


certain number of subscriptions? A. They 
were marked, you know, on there, “ five.” 

Q. You mean that there were five subscrib¬ 
ers or $5 ? A. No sir, $5. 

Q. Opposite the various names, was that? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do you remember whether these names 
were among those that were down there, John 
F. Thomas, superintendent of the registry di¬ 
vision? A. I seen his name there. 

Q. George Sears, was that down ? A. Yes, 
sir. 

Q. George W. Johnson ? A. W. W. John¬ 
son, I seen his name. 

Q. That would be the postmaster ? A. Yes, 
sir; and George W. Johnson. 

Q. Were there any others? A. Yes, sir, 
there were others; but I don’t remember the 
others. In fact, I didn’t know the others. 

Q. Now, you are pretty clear in your mind 
that you didn’t pay anything yourself? A. 
No, sir. 

Q. Do I understand you to say that you 
didn’t pay to anybody ? A. I paid the sum ; 
that is, I intend to pay the sum. 

Q. You have promised to pay it to some¬ 
body? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. But it was not to Hammond? A. No, 
I didn’t make any promises to him at all. I 
told him in this way, I says, “ I guess I will 
see them people about that.” 

Q. What did you mean by that? A. I 
told him that generally the engineer, he gener¬ 
ally said something if there was anything like 
that on hand, and I was in closer contact with 
him than anybody else. I told him it was a 
wonder that he hadn’t said something if there 
was anything like that on hand. 

Q. Who was the engineer? A. Mr. Pier¬ 
son. 

Q. Noah R. Pierson? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. What you told Hammond was that you 
wondered that Mr. Pierson hadn’t said some¬ 
thing to you about it? A. I said, “It is a 
wonder that he hasn’t.” 

Q. Now, at that time Pierson hadn’t said 
anything to you on the subject, as I under¬ 
stand? A. No, sir. 

Q. Did you tell Hammond that you ex¬ 
pected to pay your money through Pierson ? 
A. No, sir; I didn’t tell him that I intended 
to pay any money at all. 

Q. To whom had you promised to pay this? 
A. Nobody. 

Q. Then we misunderstood you in saying 
that you had promised to pay it to somebody 
just now? A. No, sir; I said, “It was a won¬ 
der that some of them hadn’t been there if 
there was anything to be paid; it is a wonder 
that somebody hadn’t said something about it.” 
And me being in closer contact with the engi¬ 
neer I thought if anybody there was contribu¬ 
ting anything they would certainly let me 
know; if there was a contribution to be made 
I would know it. 

Q. In other words—let me understand you 
—you mean that you were surprised that these 
other oflScers who were so much more with you 
hadn’t mentioned this contribution to you 
rather than Hammond ? A. That an outsider 
altogether, if there was to be any ; but there 
wasn’t anything said to me about any. 
****** 





i 

I 

i 


The Civil service Chronicle. 


VoL. I, No. 35. 

I 

j —^ - 


INDIANAPOLIS, JANUARY, 1892. terms fcrnuT/copT 


P ulished monthly. Publication office, No. 23, 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indiavapolis, Ind, 

1 Mr. W. C. Phipps has been in the city 
service in different capacities for thirteen 
years, the later years of his service having 
been in the capacity of chief clerk of the 
engineer’s office. He has been regarded 
as an especially efficient man, particularly 
I in matters relating to forms and methods 
of business. The charter requires a written 
statement of the cause of dismissal, and 
the city engineer thus states it: 

“ l desire for the betterment of the service in my 
office to introduce a new method of keeping ac¬ 
counts; deliiie a policy of keeping a systematic record 
aud have made the change referred to in order that 
, in the position of chief clerk I could have an ap¬ 
pointee who thoroughly understands the systematic 
methods to be pursued.” 

Mr. Phipps publicly states, and it is not 
denied, that the city engineer first told 
him that he would keep him as long as he 
desired to stay, and later that he wanted a 
democrat in Phipps’ place. The latter says 
that the city engineer admitted both of 
these statements before the board of pub¬ 
lic works, to whom the matter of the dis¬ 
missal was referred. The city will not 
believe that Mr. Phipps was not competent 
to take charge of and improve upon any 
methods of book-keeping which the city 
engineer could devise; on the other hand, 
the belief will be very general that Phipps 
was discharged solely to make room for a 
•• democrat. The city government, by its 

I neglect to comply with the charter in the 
matter of the city civil service, is in¬ 
viting an appeal to the courts which in due 
time will be made. 

Indiana affords to day the most fnterest- 
ing example of the evil of the rule that a 
President may be re-elected. Strike out 
the federal office-holders and it is safe to 
say that a majority of the new republican 
state committee, and of the delegates to the 
coming national convention would not 
have been Harrison men. This fact was 
recognized by the administration and ac- 
, cordingly the full power of the federal 
patronage was turned on. Throughout the 
state it has been used with consummate 
; skill and slyness. It is not a popular move, 
and to the utmost' possible extent its use 
has been veiled. No clumsy and brazen 
bull-dozing by federal officials, such as the 
democrats practiced under the late admin¬ 
istration, appeared. All was smooth and 
secret, but federal patronage was never 
more powerful. For instance. Marshal 
Ransdtill came from Washington, but his 


coming was not announced by the Journal. 
Hanna,a law officer of the government, ap¬ 
pears and holds a secret conference with 
republicans not active in politics. Warren 
G. Sayre, of the Indian service, suddenly 
has business in Indiana, and so on through 
a long list. Meanwhile, thousands of post¬ 
masters and other minor officials give their 
attention to setting up the primaries and 
with such success that Harrison will ap¬ 
parently have a majority of the state com¬ 
mittee. Whether he will have a unani¬ 
mous delegation to the national conven¬ 
tion is yet undecided. 

The undisputed facts are that the re- 
election of Senator Sherman was secured 
by federal office holders. There has never 
before been a case where in such numbers 
and with such aggregate strength, federal 
office holders have worked upon a state 
legislature which is supposed to act with 
deliberation and free from federal influ¬ 
ence. Any one can see what this practice 
if continued hy successive Presidents 
would lead to. The immense power of 
the federal government through its patron¬ 
age w’ould destroy the free action of the 
state legislatures. The worst of it is that 
Senator Sherman saw what was going on 
and admitted it and sanctioned it. In the 
fullness of years of eminent service to his 
country, he was in a position to say, “If the 
legislature of Ohio desires to elect a blather¬ 
skite like Foraker in my place, I will sub¬ 
mit. If the Cincinnati Tammany headed 
by an illiterate keeper of a notorious dive 
can go among the members of the Ohio 
legislature, and influence them to defeat 
me, I will submit. If the respectable citi¬ 
zens of Ohio choose to stand aloof and 
allow this disreputable gang to secure my 
defeat, I will abide the result.” A defeat 
under such circumstances would have 
been a badge of honor. 

In the summer of 1891 Sherman S. Rog¬ 
ers, President of the Buffalo Civil Service 
Reform Association, applied for informa¬ 
tion as to the number of post-offices having 
twenty or more employes. He received 
the following reply: 

On your stating the use you desire to make of the 
information in regard to the postal employes, further 
consideration will be given to your request. 

Very respectfully, E. C. Fowlek, 

Acting First Assistant Postmaster-General. 

It would not seem that Mr. Rogers,armed 
with the information asked for, could 
have done any great damage. Yet the ad¬ 
ministration seems to be working on the 
same line with the Czar, who sends subjects 


to Siberia upon suspicion of a desire to 
change the existing imperial rule. 

Postmaster Flood, of Elmira, hearing 
that he had been removed upon charges 
filed against him, wrote to Postmaster-Gen¬ 
eral Wanamaker demanding a copy of the 
charges. To this Wanamaker answered 
as follows: 

Your demand for a copy of the inspector’s report 
can not be complied with, because this administra¬ 
tion adopted the course laid down by President 
Cleveland, to regard such reports as confidential pa¬ 
pers, and to neither allow them to go out of the office 
nor to permit copies of them to be made. 

Very respectfully, John Wanamaker, 

Postmaster-General. 

It is difficult to fitly characterize this 
transaction. The facts are that Flood was 
not a friend of Platt or Sloat Fassett, and 
they, smarting under overwhelming de¬ 
feat, are hunting up subjects for vengeance, 
and the administration is trying to help 
them. To this end it sends an “inspector” 
to Elmira who is nothing but a tool of 
Wanamaker’s. He makes a report which 
Wanamaker and the administration are 
ashamed to publish, knowing that it would 
bring upon them the contempt of the peo¬ 
ple. They therefore pursue a star cham¬ 
ber method and remove Flood. It is to be 
hoped that the time will come when the 
sneaks and cowards who get into public 
office will understand that the American 
people mean to have the accused con¬ 
fronted with the charges and with his ac¬ 
cusers. 

We have received from the Postmaster 
General a copy of his last report and en¬ 
closed with it a broadside of editorials 
deemed suitable for the use of the press and 
abounding in such expressions as “ Mr. 
Wanamaker believes,” and “ the Post¬ 
master General argues strenuously,” and 
so on. Preferring to prepare our own 
remarks, we leave the broadside to the 
subsidized press. 

Mr,Wanamaker can not boast sufficiently 
of what he calls “an enlargement of the 
scheme of promotions on merit.” He 
says that formerly a great majority discov¬ 
ered that there was no recognition of 
merit and gave up the struggle for ad¬ 
vancement and he felt that “ there was 
but one way to bring about the greatest 
state of efficiency in the clerical force” and 
that was to advance, reduce, retain or dis¬ 
miss on merit only, without regard to 
inffuence. He therefore introduced a daily 
record and competitive examination sys¬ 
tem. At the first examination, twenty- 
three were examined for two vacancies 























298 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


and the successful competitors were 
women. Ninety-two were examined for 
twenty-seven promotions in about three 
months. Mr. Wanamaker says “ the re¬ 
sults of this competitive merit system have 
been extremely gratifying. * * * There is 
marked improvement in the quantity and 
quality of the work done from day to day.” 
He^has further issued an order extending 
this scheme to all post-offices having fifty 
employes. Is this the same Mr. Wana¬ 
maker,whose present private secretary was, 
in Mr. Wanamaker’s behalf, writing over 
the country in 1889 when this same merit 
system Mr. Wanamaker now boasts of gov¬ 
erned admission to over 30,000 places in 
the federal service, asking “ why both 
parties should not discard their insincere 
professions and have the patriotism to go 
back to the old system,” that is, to the 
spoils system ? 


We must criticise Mr. Wanamaker for 
obviously not living up to the precept to 
turn the other cheek. He smarts under 
the smiting of Mr. Roosevelt and, there¬ 
fore, tries to establish a merit system in¬ 
dependent of the civil service commission. 
He says “ this can be done more fairly and 
conscientiously in a great department like 
this from within than from the outside.” 
This is clearly from spite, for Mr. Wana¬ 
maker’s successor can overturn his system 
at a word, while if it is put under the civil 
service commission he would be powerless 
to disturb it. Another instance is Mr. 
Wanamaker’s comments on the bill to reg- 
late the appointment of fourth-class post¬ 
masters. He says it may be doubted 
whether members of congress will give up 
the privilege “ of furnishing the depart¬ 
ment with desired and welcome informa¬ 
tion touching the qualifications of can¬ 
didates,” that is, will give up their 
usurped power of appointing their hench¬ 
men fourth-class postmasters. Wanamak¬ 
er says, “ I fancy that the surrender of this 
power * * *■ is a long way in the future.” 
It seems inconsistent that he can say of his 
new promotion scheme that it takes out of 
any man’s hands the power of promoting 
"under the influence of social or political 
friendships,” and yet can look complacent¬ 
ly and without protest upon the appoint¬ 
ment of over 50,000 postmasters under the 
same influences. The obvious reason is 
that this bill is from the "outside,” and is 
supported by those who have had occasion 
to smite Mr. Wanamaker to bring him to 
a proper sense of his shortcomings, not 
only as a public officer, but as a man. 


No FACT is in these days more promi¬ 
nent than that the merit system has con¬ 
quered its way and is steadily coming to 
its own. Against every kind of opposition 


it has reached the control of original ad¬ 
mission to thirty-two thousand high-sala¬ 
ried places in the federal service, this be¬ 
ing under the civil service commission. 
In addition we have the spectacle of cabi¬ 
net officers originally unfriendly but now 
thoroughly stampeded by the onward 
march of the competitive system, running 
races with each other to get the system in¬ 
troduced throughout their departments. 
Thus Secretary Tracy has revolutionized 
the navy yards. Mr. Wanamaker has made 
the despised civil service reform stone the 
head of the corner in his department, and 
now brags that he is the original maker of 
that stone. Now comes Secretary Foster 
with an admirable set of rules for promo¬ 
tions on merit in his department, devised 
by Mr. De Land. Lastly comes Secretary 
Noble with the most stringent and refined 
set of rules yet established. 


Nobody denies that Mr. Croker asserts truthfully 
that Tammany Hall is the only organization in the 
city recognized by the democratic party of New 
York, nor that Governor Hill is the actual demo¬ 
cratic leader in the state. Nor will anybody deny 
that Mr. Platt is the republican leader in New York, 
and Mr. Quay in Pennsylvania, nor that the attempt 
to justify the appointment of Mr. Elkins is an evi¬ 
dence of decline in the true standard of the public 
service. It is a time when parties do not represent 
the actual division of political opinion, and when 
both parties degrade the political standard, and it is 
therefore a time of greater political independence 
than cyeT.—Harper's Weekly, January 2. 

At no time since between 1850 and 1860, 
have voters shaken off the shackles of 
party as they do now. It is to be encour¬ 
aged by every means. We may continue 
to be ruled by the Platts and Quays, the 
Hills and Gormans, but not if the inde¬ 
pendents do their duty and work each over 
against his own house. 


IS THE REFORM OF THE CIVIL 
SERVICE A MORAL QUESTION.? 

There was a striking illustration of the trage¬ 
dies which spring from the spoils system in 
the recent death of Col. Bario, of Connecti¬ 
cut, late an inspector in the post-office depart¬ 
ment. He served with honor in the civil war, 
and had been colonel of the second regiment 
Connecticut National Guard. In i 886 he 
was appointed a post-office inspector, and soon 
won the reputation of being the best in New 
England. So shrewd and successful did he 
prove that he was often sent for from New 
York, and even as far away as Ohio. Through 
his work in his special field, the United States 
district attorney had been enabled to convict 
forty Connecticut postmasters of selling stamps 
on credit to a firm of New York architects, for 
which offense one of the firm was fined $ 5,000 
and sent to jail for one day. He secured the 
evidence that resulted in the indictment of the 
New Orleans lottery men, and he broke up the 
infamous Connecticut “ card game,” the “ one 


dollar time-piece” scheme, the “Scriptural 
fake,” and other notorious swindles. Re¬ 
cently he had been engaged in collecting evi¬ 
dence against five postmasters of New Haven 
county, who are charged with selling postage 
stamps on credit in violation of law. He was 
devoted to his work, and was in every way an 
official who had the confidence of his superiors 
and earned a permanent tenure. On Friday 
of last week, as a New Year’s gift, came the 
announcement from Washington that he must 
summarily surrender his office, solely because 
he was a democrat in politics. The United 
States attorney, the United States commis¬ 
sioner, and the New Haven postmaster, met 
last Monday to confer regarding the offending 
postmasters, and awaited the arrival of In¬ 
spector Bario. Here is the story of what fol¬ 
lowed : 

“ ‘ I never knew him lobe tardy before,’ said At¬ 
torney Sill. 

“ ‘Nor I,’ said Postmaster Sperry. 

‘‘ Then they began talking about his removal by 
the President, the news of which had only reached 
them that morning. 

" ‘ It’s a shame,’ said Mr. Sperry, who is one of the 
most prominent republicans of the state, ‘and it will 
break Bario’s heart. I never knew a man so wrapped 
up in his duties as he.’ 

‘‘ ‘Nor I,’ said Mr. Sill; ‘and I’d give more for Bario 
than for all the other inspectors in New England put 
together.’ 

‘“Let us write to Washington,’ said Postmaster 
Sperry, ‘and remonstrate against his removal.’ 

‘‘The other gentleman acquiesced, and sat down 
and wrote to Washington. It was decided to ask 
District Judge Shipman, recently appointed to the 
circuit court of appeals. United States Commissioner 
Marvin, and Postmaster Bennett of Hartford to write 
similar letters, and their willingness to so write was 
doubted by none. Then they speculated again on 
the inspector’s tardiness, and it was not until an 
evening paper was handed in which announced his 
sudden death at noon on Saturday that they knew 
the reason of his faiiure to report. 

‘‘ • He has been removed by a higher power than 
the President, said Mr. Sill.” 

The case of Colonel Bario illustrates not 
only the tragedies involved in the spoils sys¬ 
tem, but also the singular indifference of the 
public. It is enough to kill many a man to be 
summarily removed from a place in private 
service which he knows he has filled capably, 
faithfully, and satisfactorily, and which he 
desires to retain. The shock of summary dis¬ 
charge from the public service under similar 
conditions is often quite as hard for a high- 
spirited man to bear. The public would be 
filled with indignation against the private em¬ 
ployer who would thus disgrace a meritorious 
subordinate. Yet it looks coolly on while the 
public employer rewards capacity, industry 
and fidelity with removal. Americans are 
not a heartless people in their relations “be¬ 
tween man and man,” but when it comes to 
the relations between the people as the state 
and its employes they witness the most shock- 
ing spectacles of inhumanity with an equanim¬ 
ity worthy only of savages .—JVew York Evening 
Post, yanuary (j. 


For a President to manipulate the federal 
service to secure a re-nomination is a bold 
assumption of royal power. 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


299 


When we consider the patronage of this great office, the allnrements of power, tlie temptation to retain public place once 
gained, and more than all, the availability a party fliids in an incumbent .whom a horde of office-holders, with a zeal born of bene¬ 
fits received and fostered by the hope of ffivors yet to come, stand ready to aid with money and trained political service, we 
recognize in the eligibility of the President for re-election a most serious danger to that calm, deliberate and intelligent political 
action which must characterize a government by the people.—[Z,e/<er of Acceptance, ISS4, Grover Cleveland. 


IN PENNSYLVANIA. 

Senator Quay was asked if it was true, as 
reported, that his second choice for the Presi¬ 
dential nomination is Gen. Alger, and he re¬ 
plied ; “ I am for Secretary Blaine. He is my 
choice.” 

“But who is your second choice. Senator?” 

“I have no second choice.” 

“ Do you think Blaine will be a candidate ?” 

“ I really don’t know ; but if Mr. Blaine is 
not a candidate, I don’t think he will refuse to 
accept the nomination if it is tendered him.”— 
Pittsburgh Dispatch to Nerv York Times, Decem¬ 
ber lo. 

It looks as if there was to be a general shaking up 
of Senator Quay's office holding liiuttnants in Western 
Pennsylvania by order of the President. There are alle¬ 
gations concerning the mismanagement of affaiis in 
the office of Internal Revenue Collector Samuel D. 
Warmcastleso serious that the collector will visit 
Washington to-morrow to ascertain just what the 
special agents of the treasury department have dis¬ 
covered about him and his subordinates. The state¬ 
ment is made that Warmcastle is to be removed. 
The friends of the President want the office in the hands 
of a man in harmony with the administration, in view of 
the fact that the district embraces nearly half the counties 
inthe state, audits influence will therefore be important 
in the selection of national delegates. Congressman 
Dalzell is also determined that the collector shall not 
use his office offensively for Quay in the senatorial 
contest next year. 

The office of United States District Attorney Wal¬ 
ter Lyon will also be shaken up. The allegation is 
made that it is run too expensively. It is said that 
Lyon maintains three assistants, at an expense of 
$5,000 annually, though there is only about half as 
much to do as there was when the district attorney 
had but one assistant. Lyon is another Quay lieu¬ 
tenant and presided at Quay’s state convention in 
1890, when Delamater was nominated for governor. 

It is possible that the post-office deparlment will 
be asked to make inquiry as to the offensive partisan¬ 
ship of Assistant Postmaster Albert J. Edwards and 
Custodian W. W. Colville. Charges made last spring 
j against Postmaster John A. Gilleland of Alleghany, 
" will also be revived. Gilleland is a Quay man. The 
allegation being made that he was incompetant, an 
Investigation was ordered, and a report was filed 
' sustaining the charge. Through the influence of 
Congressman Bayne this report was ignored at the 
itime. 

/ Altogether the future does not appear to be proni- 
' ising for Quay office holders at this end of the state. 
—Pittsburgh Dispatch to New York Times, December 5. 

* * 

Congressman Dalzell's ambition to succeed Sena¬ 
tor Quay is said to be at the bottom of Dalzell's al¬ 
leged desire to remove Samuel Warmcastle from the 
office of collector of Internal revenue for this dis¬ 
trict, which includes twenty-four counties. This is 
the gist of an article in this morning's issue of the 
Commercial-Gazette, the Pittsburgh organ of Quay. A 
special agent w'as .sent from Washington to make an 
investigation, and the Commercial-Gazelle &s.ys, that he 
was frequently visited by ex-Revenue Collector 
Frank P. Case and Congressman Dalzell. Case set up 
the delegates for Dalzell in his congressional cam¬ 
paign, and wanted another term as collector. He is 
now city assessor. The report of the special agent 
does not reflect criminally upon Collector Warm¬ 
castle, who was for many years a high official of the 
Pennsylvania Railroad Company, and is highly re¬ 
spected by the business element here. It is said the 


report censures him for carelessness in selecting sub- 
ordinales, failure to keep a strict watch over them, 
and devoting too much time to private matters. Col¬ 
lector Warmcastle and Senator Quay will both be in 
Washington to-morrow and a conference will be held. In 
this connection, the position of Chris Magee on the sena¬ 
torial (jufstion is much debated. It is said that he would 
like to support Dalzell, but dare not, because Quay is al¬ 
leged to have had a hand in terminating the rate war be¬ 
tween rival street car lines here, one owned by Magee, 
the other by the Elkins-Widner syndicate of Phila¬ 
delphia, and who have always been close to Quay. 
A termination of the war helped Magee financially.— 
PitUburgh Dispatch to New York Evening Post, Decem¬ 
ber 5. 

* * * 

Internal revenue collector Samuel D. Warmcastle 
of the twenty-third district, expects to be out of office 
within the next few days. He returned from Wash¬ 
ington this morning where he had been for two days 
putting in a defense to charges against him. He 
said this morning that he would probably resign. 
Then he went down to Beaver and had a conference with 
Senator Quay, and on his return said he would await the 
action of the President, in whose hands the case now 
is. The charges against Mr. Warmcastle are that he 
did not turn over the funds in his care as soon as is 
required by the internal reveue laws and that he paid 
employes for full time when they were sometimes engaged 
in political work instead of serving the Government. 
Mr. Warmcastle has been Senator Quay’s principal 
lieutenant in western Pennsylvania, but the ex- 
national chairman now concedes that his case is 
hopeless, and has not gone to Washington to try to 
save him. C. L. Magee who until recently was Quay's 
bitterest political enemy in Pennsylvania, but who became 
reconciled to him in the late state campaign, is now in 
Washington trying to induce President Harrison to 
allow the collector to resign Mr. Warmcastle’s expres¬ 
sion to-day indicates that he will succeed and that 
the collector will be saved the disgrace of dismissal- 
—Pittsburgh Dispatch to New York Times, December 12. 

* * * 

Washington, D. C., December 23.—The 
President to-day issued an order for the re¬ 
moval of Samuel D. Warmcastle, collector of 
internal revenue for the twenty-third district 
of Pennsylvania (Pittsburgh). 

* * * 

President Harrison will not have a delegate in the 
next national conveniion from this city unle.ss Senator 
Quay and those who represetit him in Philadelphia 
recede from their present position. The only oppor¬ 
tunity President Harrison’s friends had of making 
an attempt to elect delegates in his interest was 
brushed aside yesterday by the republican cam¬ 
paign committee. 

About a week ago it became apparent that the 
Quay people were opposed to the election of Harri¬ 
son delegates, and machinery was put in motion to 
redu^'e their chances of success to a minimum. The 
office holders who, of course, would be loyal to President 
Harrison, depended on the special primaries, when they 
would make an appeal to the people for their dele¬ 
gates to the conveniion. The Quay people yester 
day deprived them of this opportunity, by securing 
the passage of a resolution that the primaries to elect 
delegates to the national convention be held on 
Jan. 12, when delegates to the conventions to select 
candidates for other offices will also be elected. 

There was not a dissenting voice to the resolution, 
though Marshal /.gerf.s and Joseph L. Nobre, who are 
candidates for delegates to the national convention, 
in opposition to the Quay people, were at the meet¬ 
ing. It was learned that Marshal Leeds had a confer¬ 
ence with Collector Cooper previous to the meeting, 
when the rules were carefully examined to determ¬ 


ine whether the proposed action of the campaign 
committee was illegal or not. It was found that the 
committee had power to hold the primaries when it 
pleased, which accounted for Marshal Leeds’s and 
Joseph L. Nobre’s silence. 

Elated with the success of their plans, which in 
their minds placed beyond a doubt the possibility 
of the election of any Harrison delegates in this city, 
the Quay people have partly decided upon the dele¬ 
gates who shall go from this city to the national con¬ 
vention.— Public Ledger, December 1. 

* * * 

While President Harrison has not yet declared 
himself a candidate for renomination, some of the 
principal members of his cabinet are hard at work 
endeavoring to secure the election of delegates to the 
national convention who will, by their votes in that 
body, support their chief for renomination. 

Postmaster-general Wauamaker, who, for a long 
time after his acceptance of the position held by 
him was on terms of political intimacy with Senator 
Quay, since the latter declared against Harrison for 
nomination, has been busy arranging his forces and 
the signs of the times point to a battle royal in the 
several counties of this state between the Wana- 
maker and Quay forces for the election of national 
delegates. It is well known that Marshal Leeds, who 
received his ptesent appointment through the influence, 
mainly, of the Postmaster General, has taken his coat off 
and is battling for a seat in the national convention 
against David H. Lane and Jacob Wildermore, the 
slated candidates of the Martin-Porter combination. 

Despite the refusal of the postmaster-general and 
mayor to give out the inside history at to day’s chat, 
Joseph L. Nobre, Gen. Snyder, Thomas Lindsay, and 
other “anti-combine” workers, declare that there is 
a well-developed movement underway to have Har¬ 
rison candidates for national delegates put in the 
field in every district of the city. Word has been re¬ 
ceived from the western part of the state that the removal 
of Collector of Internal Revenue Warmcastle has been 
understood by the federal office-holders of that section to 
mean that they are to go to work in earnest in their dis¬ 
tricts and endeavor to have delegates elected who will fa¬ 
vor the President for renomination. It is also under¬ 
stood that the friends of Congressman Dalzell, who 
is in line with the Wanamaker programme, will lend 
their best efl'orts to defeat the candidates for seats 
in the national convention who have been slated in 
the western districts by Senator Quay’s orders. The 
postmasters located at the county seats of the respec¬ 
tive districts have been given the “tip,” and as the 
country cross-road postmasters within their counties 
are virtually under their control by reason of the 
system of supervision now in vogue, they are ex¬ 
pected to direct their attention toward securing the 
election of friendly delegates. 

Congressman and President of the State League of Re¬ 
publican Clubs John B. Robinson, who has declared him¬ 
self a candidate for tlie succession to Senator Quay, has 
been publicly indorsed for the position by Collector of the 
Port Thomas V. Cooper, who, as editor of the Delaware 
American, last week declared himself in favor of Robin¬ 
son's elevation to the senate. It is a known fact that 
Collector Cooper, who now holds the best office in 
this state within the gift of the President, controlled 
the politics of Delaware county until he and Robin¬ 
son met in the political arena, the result ending in 
Robinson’s favor, since which time “Fighting Jack,” 
as he is termed, has been in undisputed control. A 
close friend of Cooper’s said to-night while discuss¬ 
ing the subject: “ It has been given out that Collec¬ 
tor Cooper will uot be able to get a delegate for the 
President’s renomination. Let me say to you that 
the southeastern counties will be in line for Robinson 
for senator, and they will also name delegates to the 
Minneapolis convention who will support the Presi¬ 
dent for a second ierm."—Philadelphia Dispatch to 
New York Times, December 27. 

















300 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


I am an advocate of civil service reform. My brief experience at Wasliington lias led me to utter the wish, with an 
emphasis I do not often use, Unit I might he for ever relieved of any connection with the di>trihution of public patronage. 
I covet for myself tlie free and nnpurchased snjiport of my fellow-citizens. * * [Senator Benjamin Harvixon. 


A decidedly uneasy feeling prevails among the 
federal office holders who are just now so unfortu¬ 
nate as to have their residences in the second and 
fifth congressional districts. They are with one ac¬ 
cord loud in their protestations of devotion to the 
interests of President Harrison, and each and every 
man asserts in emphatic terms that his loyalty can 
not for an instant be questioned. 

Only a few days ago they were hesitating. They feared 
to obey the orders issued by the ward combine 
to work for such delegates as could be depended 
upon to follow the instructions of Senator Quay, and 
disliked to openly participate in a movement hav¬ 
ing for its object the snubbing of the chief 
magistrate of the nation. It was only a week ago 
that the administration demonstrated its willing¬ 
ness to assist the two men who had the courage to 
wage war upon the powerful ward combination. 
W. H. Brooks, collector of internal revenue, was sus¬ 
pected of oeing wedded to the Quay leaders, and was noti¬ 
fied that he was no longer custodian of the United Stales 
buildings. Marshal W. R. Leeds, who wants to go to 
Minneapolis as a Harrison man, was given the place and 
the patronage attached to it. This was intended as a 
warning, but as it did not have the desired effect, 
four gaugers were “suspended” because of their 
known indisposition to work for Charles W. Henry, 
the administration candidate in the fifth district. 
The announcement of this decided action by Secre¬ 
tary of the Treasury Foster, caused a sensation, and 
there was at once a stiffening of the backbone of the 
Harrison men. The move had a decided flavor of 
Ohio methods, but it was effective, and the weak- 
kneed federal office-holders began loudly to assert 
their allegiance to the cause. On Saturday came the 
announcement that at least a dozen custom-house 
employes had been booked for dismissal, and that 
started a panic among the many men suspected of 
trying to carry water on both shoulders. It was as¬ 
serted that when Charles W. Henry went to Washing¬ 
ton last week, he had in his pocket a list of office¬ 
holders whose loyalty was questioned. The four dis¬ 
missed gaugers were on his list, and it is said that 
the doomed custom-house men were also included. 
Rumor has it that the post-office had also been 
scrutinized by the twenty-second ward man, and 
that quite a number of men who serve under Post¬ 
master Field are to be asked to walk the plank in the 
very near future, unless the result of luesday’s pri¬ 
maries shall show that they have done good service. 
* » * 

Finding that the frankly given warning was not 
having the desired effect, and that some of the Federal 
office holders were not looming up as strongly in the fight 
for national delegates as the friends of President Harri 
son deemed desirable, extreme measures were resorted to 
today, and quite a large-sized basket full of heads fell 
under the ofiicial axe. A telegram from Wash¬ 
ington stated that twelve employes of the internal 
revenue department had been suspended for “rea¬ 
sons satisfactory to Secretary Foster.” The names 
of the men removed were, however, not made public, 
and an air of mystery was thrown around the affair. 
Internal Revenue Collector Brooks stated early in 
the day that he had heard of no removals or suspen¬ 
sions, but late in the afternoon he admitted that six 
gaugers had been notified that their services were no 
longer required. The identity of the unfortunates was 
not positively established, but it was stated on 
apparently good authority that four of the sus¬ 
pended men are Dan Ahearn of the eighteenth ward, 
John S. Todd of the Twenty-fifth, Meschert of the 
Nineteenth and Hecksler of the Twenty fifth. The 
other two are personal friends of David Martin, Senator 
Quay's chief lieutenant. This activity on the part of 
the administration leaves no room for doubt as to 
the sincerity of the fight being made to prevent the 
Quay men from capturing a solid delegation to 
Minneapolis from Philadelphia, but the Beaver 
man’s henchmen are not standing still, and the 
screws have been put on such employes of the city 
as are suspected of taking an interest in the plucky 


fight being made by United Slates Marshal Leeds 
and Henry to prevent the snubbing that President 
Harrison’s opponents are fixing up for him. Three 
employes in the city’s gas works, who owe their ap¬ 
pointments to ex-Sheriff Leeds, were to-day warned 
thnt their places could easily be filled with men 
more zealous in behalf of the ward combine. 
This action is said by the Leeds men to have been 
laken in order to scare off men who are running for 
delegates to the convention in the interest of Leeds. 
Philadelphia dispatch to New Yoi k Times January 9. 

* * * 

Collector Thomas V. Cooper was seen at his Media 
home to day, and in response to some direct ques¬ 
tions, said: 

“This trouble would not have originated at all but 
for the early call for the election of national dele¬ 
gates. It Is several months ahead of the ordinary 
time, and this fact seemed to indicate a desire to 
elect a delegate who would oppose President Har¬ 
rison’s renomination even if Mr. Blaine was not a 
candidate. The friends of the administration, of 
course, opposed this, contending that if Mr. Blaine 
is not a candidate. President Harrison’s renomina¬ 
tion shall not be opposid. In short, they are averse 
to having the delegates carried over bodily to a third 
man, as they are convinced that the sentiment of 
all the people is in favor of Blaine or Harrison. 
There is no other meaning to the contest than this. 
There is no hostility to Mr. Blaine whatever, in any 
sense of the world. All of the combine delegates 
are now willing to .say that if Mr. Blaine is not a 
candidate. President Harrison’s renomination is in¬ 
evitable, and they will support it. The mischief, 
was in calling the delegate elections in advance of 
the accustomed time, and in widely advertising the 
fact that this step was taken for the purpose of injur, 
ing President Harrison’s changes. However, this is 
now disclaimed byihe combine, but the disclaimer 
has not been half as well advertised as the original 
purpose, and therefore the friends of the President 
feel that if the views of the combine have really 
been changed, they ought to show the fact decidedly 
by at least admitting two delegates out of ten who, ii 
is well known, will vote for Mr. Blaii e if he is a can¬ 
didate, but who will assuredly resist any attempt to 
carry the Pennsylvania delegates from President 
Harrison if Mr. Blaine is not a c&adid&ie.—Philadel¬ 
phia Dispatch to N. Y. Times, Jan. 11. 

* * * 

In the fight for delegates to the national repub¬ 
lican convention the Harrison forces to day suffered 
an important defection in the desertion to the Quay 
column of Internal Revenue Collector Brooks, who until to¬ 
day had bf-en counted on as a supporter of Charles W 
Henry, the Harrison- Wanamaker candidate in the fifth 
congressional district. The friends of Henry yesterday 
made a strong effort to get an open declaration from 
Brooks in favor of their candidate, but Mr. Brooks 
hesitated. The significance of this hesitation on his 
part was definitely demonstrated to-day when Mr. 
Brooks, with deliberation and emphasis, declared : 

“Iam no longer interested in Mr. Henry’s candi 
dacy. My independence and manhood will not 
permit me. I have been and am loyal to President 
Harrison. If I were not, I would not now be rev 
enue collector. The moment my loyalty wavered to 
the President, that moment I would surrender my 
position.” 

“ What is the reason, then, for the change in your 
sentiments regarding Mr. Henry’s candidacy?” he 
was asked. 

“ I do not propose to shelter myself behind the 
men in my department and assume a position thai 
would be regarded as selfish, unmanly, cowardly or 
dishonest,” W’as his reply. “1 do not propose to 
permit the men in this department to suffer for their 
Independence. I never have been an object to be 
coerced by any power, and I do not propose to begin 
now.” 

“ When did you make up your mind in this direc¬ 
tion?” 


“ 1 made, it up yesterday afternoon, immediately upon 
being notified of the suspension of the four officers in my 
department. I determined if this course was to be pur 
sued against federal employes unaer me I would not by 
imputation be misunderstood or placed in any uncertain 
position. I therefore wrote to Mr Henry last night 
telling him that I could no longer interest myself in 
his candidacy, and askinghim to call upon me when 
1 would explain my position more in detail.”—PAtl- 
adelphia dispatch to New York Times, January 10. 

* * * 

The result of Senator Quay’s talk with the Presi¬ 
dent last Friday is now known. He was turned 
down and can get no .satisfaction from the President. 
His farce comedy protests against the use of the fed¬ 
eral officials to forward the political fortunes of the 
administration were received with an icy smile by 
the President, but otherwise went unheeded. Mr. 
Harrison seems to have had no terms to offer the 
Pennsylvania senator. He was in no mood to make 
a compromise. Under the circumstances he felt that 
the only thing for Quay was to make a complete sur¬ 
render. As the President has recently pointed to gentle¬ 
men who called on him in regard to Pennsylvania affairs, 
the administration has done everything up to the present 
lime that Quay has asked. He has controlled the appoint¬ 
ments in Penrmjlvania. He has got many of his friends 
and henchmen into the departments in Washington, and 
friends of his have been given fat places in other branches 
of the public service. In spite of all this Quay has missed 
no opportunity to show his contempt for Harrison and 
his administration, and of late he has been openly antag¬ 
onizing Harrison's renomination. At the same time 
he has gone on urging the appointment of his man 
Graham to the revenue collectorship at Pittsburgh. 
All went well as long as the President contented 
himself with simply “ turning down ” Quay’s re¬ 
quests, but when Mr. Harrison buckled on his armor 
and took up the cudgel in his own behalf by striking 
back at Quay’s official friends in Philadelphia who 
did not bow obeisance to his dictates. Quay grew an¬ 
gry.— Washington Dispatch to Philadelphia Times, Jan. 
13. 

* * * 

There were many smiling faces in the rooms of 
the republican city committee last night. The ward 
combine had captured almost everything its mem¬ 
bers wanted and the fact that their victory had been 
gained by the most outrageously fraudulent meth¬ 
ods did not detract one jot from the keen enjoyment 
of the organization. All the leaders were on hand 
and when United States Marshal Leeds, fresh from 
the scene of his crushing defeat in the second con¬ 
gressional district, strolled in with the returns from 
his own ward and looking crestfallen, there were 
many unkind whispers about the rain and the val¬ 
iant marshal’s cherished whiskers. 

The Harrison forces w^re routed at every point. 
Policemen, firemen and city employes of every de¬ 
gree, had obeyed the orders of the combine, and by 
main force controlled the polls in the eighth, ninth, 
tenth, thirteenth, fourteenth and twentieth wards, 
where Leeds were fighting against terrific odds. In 
many instances they took possession of the voting 
places, inside and out, and the Leeds men had prac¬ 
tically no earthly chance. The same tactics were 
used in the up-iown wards, and David Martin’s 
faithful henchmen gave the followers of Charles W. 
Henry but little show. 

’I' * In the twelfth division of the fourteenth, 
John Lacey, who resigned from the police force and 
was placed in '.he custom house in order to work for 
Leeds, was defeated by about fifty votes. 

Despite the plucky fight made in behalf of Presi¬ 
dent Harrison, by Ex-Councilman C. W. Henry, he 
was heavily outvoted. The police and fireman were 
openly against him, and the hundreds of city em¬ 
ployes who live in his district sturdily stuck up for 
the combine, and literally snowed the twenty-sec¬ 
ond ward man under. Internal Revenue Collector 
Brooks was unable to carry his own division for 
Henry, while Naval Officer Tom Powers, made a 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


301 


splendid showing in his ward. John Keller, a cus¬ 
tom house man, turned in his division, the seventh 
of the eighteenth ward, for Henry, and the Quay 
men took everything else.—PhiladeljMa Time-s, Jan¬ 
uary 13. 

<c i;i 

It was announced to-day that Senator Quay had 
finally determined to oppose the present administra¬ 
tion, and that he would do so by offering a resolution 
charging that federal officers had recently "interfered 
with the polities of Pennsulvania," and directing that 
the senate committee on reform in the civil service should 
make an investigation "for the purpose of ascertaining 
to what extent federal officers have interfered with the 
primaries and conventions." 

Senator Quay is simply angry with the present ad¬ 
ministration because President Harrison has not 
taken up his fights in Pennsyivanla and made them 
his own party quarrels and personal strifes. For 
many months after the inauguration of 1889, President 
Harrison recognized the requests of Senator Quay for po¬ 
litical appointments, and in every way possible tried to 
show his appreciation of the senator's party services." 
Finallv the latter’s course in and out of congress 
drew him into many embarrasing personal and po¬ 
litical complications, which resulted in a division 
of the republican party in the state, and a bitter 
personal strife. Naturally, the President did not feel 
that the personal affairs of Senator Quay or any 
other person should be the guiding star of federal 
affairs within any state, and while he has practically 
brought about a standstill in Pennsylvania’s federal 
allotments, it can not be truthfully said, as is charg¬ 
ed by Senator Quay, that the President has in any 
way used the federal patronage or his preroga¬ 
tives to destroy the senator’s political influence.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Jan. 15. 


IN OHIO. 

The one important event of the day has 
been the general protest of Mr. Foraker’s 
friends against the alleged interference of the 
office-holders of the national administration in 
the interest of Senator Sherman. Congress¬ 
man Enochs, of the twelfth district, and Wm. 
Binkley, of Sidney, have both taken occasion 
to criticise this influence. Mr. Binkley, who 
is one of Mr. Foraker’s leading managers, is 
particularly severe. “It is simply outrageous,” 
said he, to-day, “ that this army of federal of¬ 
fice holders should invade Columbus and at¬ 
tempt to dictate the senaiorship. It is a 
shame upon our citizenship that the national 
administraiion should lend its influence to a 
state affair of this kind and permit all the ap¬ 
pointees to come here under government pry 
and take a hand in the matter. The disposi 
tion of all the local federal appointments in 
this state has been under a referee system. 
Senator Sherman appointing the referee in 
each locality and that man dictating the ap¬ 
pointments in his section of the state. To-day 
we find these referees and all the men who 
have profiled under their appointments here 
working for Sherman’s re-election. These 
men are reinforced by a multitude of office¬ 
holders from Washington until there are three 
or four federal office-holders on the ground to 
every member of the general assembly.” 

A visit to Senator Sherman’s headquaiters 
found his followers confident of success and 
di.sjjosed to make merry over the complaints 
of Governor Foraker’s friends of the impropri¬ 
ety of office-holders expressing their personal 
preferences in the contest “ The friends of 
Governor Foraker complain, Senator, that un¬ 
due outside influences are being exerted in 
your behalf, and point particul irly to the ar¬ 
ray of federal office-holders who are working 
in your interest. Have you anything to say to 
this?” “I can only say,” replied the Senator, 
“ that all the former office-holders under Gov¬ 
ernor Foraker are for him also. Nearly ev¬ 
erybody that ever served under him seems to 
be laboring in his behalf. I don’t see that 


there is any difference in this respect.”— Colum¬ 
bus Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Jan. i. 

ill * * 

The Sherman men are making the argu¬ 
ment that the newspapers are a reflection of 
public sentiment, and that a great many 
papers favoring the return of Mr. Sher¬ 
man to the United States Senate, the senti¬ 
ment of the people must be for his election. 
The fact is, that the most influential papers 
of the state are championing the cause of ex- 
G ivernor Foraker. If from the list of Sherman 
papers are taken those which owe official pre¬ 
ferment to him, the remainder, representing his 
free, untrammeled support will be sadly small. 

The postmaster and revenue collector edi¬ 
tors, who are earning their salaries, are nu¬ 
merous enough. A list of the papers support¬ 
ing Senator Sherman’s candidacy has been pub¬ 
lished. Among them are to be found those 
mentioned hereafter: 

The Cincinnati Times Star is edited by Mr. Taft, 
whose father was minister to both Austria and Rus¬ 
sia, and whose brotheris now solicitor general of the 
United States. 

Charles P. Johnson, managing editor of the Cincin¬ 
nati Volksblalt. was appointed consul-general at 
Frankfort-on-the Main. 

Thomas H. Beers, editorof the Ashland Gazette, was 
late supervisor of the census. 

T. J. Howells, editor of the Ashtabula Sentinel, is 
postmaster at Jeffersen. 

W. Ij. Hunt, editor of the Belmont Chronicle, is post¬ 
master at St. Clairsville, and was formerly a super¬ 
visor of the census. 

John Hopley, editorof the Bucyrus Journal, is post¬ 
master at Bucyrus. 

A son of the editor of the Delaware Gazette has for 
many years held official position at Washington. 

J. O. Converse, editor of the Geauga Republican, 
is postmaster at Chardon. 

D. D. Taylor, editor of the Guernsey Times, was for 
twelve years postmaster at Cambridge, and was suc¬ 
ceeded by his brother, who has held the place ever 
since. 

Geo. U. Harn, editor of the Mansfield Herald, was 
appointed one year ago, through Senator Sherman, 
as sugar inspector. 

E. R. Alderman, editor of the Marietta Register, is 
postmaster at Marietta. 

Mr. Iches. associate editor of the Newark American, 
is postmaster at Newark, and his partner, Captain 
Wm. C. Lyon, was postmaster before htm. 

D L Flickinger, brother of the editor of the Ohio 
State Journal, is statistical agent for Ohio, a position 
secured by S. J. Flickinger, the editor, by applica¬ 
tion made through Senator Sherman. 

Mr. Marlin, editor of the Ottawa Gazette is post¬ 
master at Port Clinton, and is said to be the only 
Sherman man in the town. 

The editor of the Painesville Telegraph is postmaster 
at Painesville. 

D. J. Richards, editor of the Zanesville Times- 
Recorder, was made postmaster at Zanesville. 

F. S. Purcell, editor of the Jjogan ^Republican, is 
postmaster at Logan. 

Pietro Cuneo of the Wyandot Union is postmaster 
at Upper Sandusky. 

The editor of the Pike County Republican is post¬ 
master at Waverly. 

The late editorof the Circleville Union-Herald vfas 
appointed postmaster at Circleville. 

The late editorof the McConnelsville Herald was ap¬ 
pointed internal revenue agent. 

One of the owners of the Sidney Gazette is post¬ 
master at Sidney. 

One of the editors of the HohnesCounty Republican, is 
postmaster at Millersburg. 

C. L. Poorman. editor of the BeVaire Tribune, was 
appointed to office through Senaior Sherman, hut 
resigned. 

The editor of the Youngstown Telegraph, is a broth¬ 


er of E J. Halford, private secretary of President 
Harrison. 

Geo. A. Keepers, editor of ihe Monroe Gazette, is 
postmaster at Beallsvilie. 

The editor of the Marion Independent has a son 
holding official position in Washington. 

A son of editor Tripp, of Carrollton, is postmaster 
at that place, and the father's paper is a Sherman 
organ. 

General C. H. Grosvenor is a World’s Fair commis¬ 
sioner, and the Athens Herald is for Sherman. 

Several relatives of Editor Bickham, of the Dayton 
Journal, hold federal places. 

It is .said that Secretary Foster is interested in the 
Toledo Commercial. 

It is not hard to understand after the above state¬ 
ment, why Senator Sherman has a considerable 
newspaper support.—ColMBibus Hfspafc/i to Cincinnati 
Commercial- Gazette, December 9. 

* * * 

Mansfield News, owned by W. S. Cappeler, ap¬ 
pointed railroad commisssoner by Gov. Foraker. 

Ml. Vernon Republican, edited and owned in part 
by Col. Charles Baldwin, appointed penitentiary 
manager by Gov. Foraker; also a member of the 
governor s staff. 

Zanesville Sunday Neivs, owned and edited by 
Charles U. Shryock, appointed member of the Zanes¬ 
ville board of elections by Gov. Foraker. 

Columbus Express and Sonntagsgast, edited and con¬ 
trolled by L. Hir.sch, appointed supervisor of public 
printing by Gov. Foraker. 

Toledo News, edited and controlled by A. D. Fassett, 
appointed commissioner of labor statistics by Gov. 
Foraker. 

Zanesville Courier, edited by R. B. Brown, appointed 
trustee of the soldiers and sailors’ home at Sandu.sky 
by Gov. Foraker. 

Ironton Register, edited by Edward Wilson, brother 
of Col. Henry D, Wilson, appointed on the staff by 
Gov. Foraker. 

New Philadelphia Advocate, edited by W. J. McEl- 
vaine, who received recognition during the adminis¬ 
tration of Gov. Foraker. 

Scioto Gazette, edited by Gen. S. H. Hurst, appointed 
dairy and food commissioner by Gov. Foraker. 

There are doubtless others of the same sort, 
but these are enough to show that Governor 
Foraker’s friends are subject to the same 
charge that they make against Sherman’s 
friends. It would also be interesting to con¬ 
tinue the analysis, and disclose the number of 
Foraker advocates who are such simply be¬ 
cause they have a grievance against Sherman. 
One of these is A. B. Clark, editor of the 
Newark Ttibune and Granville Times, who 
wanted to be postmaster at Newark when 
Capt. W. C. Lyon was appointed. Another 
IS C. E. M. Jennings, of the Athens Messenger, 
who blames Sherman for endorsing Grosvenor’s 
recommendation of Wood, of Athens, for cen¬ 
sus supervisor when he (Jennings) wanted the 
place. These are only samples, but they help 
to show that, if motives are to be subjected 
to scrutiny and analysis, the Foraker men 
will suffer with the rest. The sword is 
two-edged. — Columbus Sunday Morning News, 
December 6. 

• * * 

How did Sherman come so near to failure 
and Foraker so near to succ ss? The question 
is fully answered in a remarkable reviewof the 
senatorial controversy which has just been 
published by Gen. H V. Boynton, the vete¬ 
ran and well known Washington correspond¬ 
ent, whose sturdy republicanism, high per¬ 
sonal character, and intimate knowledge of 
Ohio politics entitle him to spe k with author¬ 
ity. The explanation of the mystery is found 
in the existence of “ a republican Tammany 
organization in Hamilton county [Cincin¬ 
nati],” which General Boynton characterizes 
as “of a lower order of political morality and 
worse than any similar organization in either 
party anwhere else in the United States.” 
The Evening Post has more than once of late 








302 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


years referred to this republican machine in 
Cincinnati, but we have never before seen it 
so clearly and fully described. As a study in 
municijial government, and as an example of 
the baneful influences which a city ring may 
exert upon slate and even national politics. 
General Boynton’s statement merits the closest 
attention. 

“The boss of this Cincinnati Tammany,” 
he says, “is George Cox, an illiterate saloon¬ 
keeper of one of the most notorious dives in 
the most notorious part of the city, known as 
‘Dead Man’s Corner,’ because of the many 
murders committed in and about it. It has 
had a gambling-house attachment and a depart¬ 
ment devoted to even viler uses.” It was while 
running this saloon ihat Cox entered politics, 
and he soon became a power in city affairs. 
A fellow-feeling drew Cox and Foraker to¬ 
gether, when the latter came to the front ten 
years ago, and they have been hand-and-glove 
ever since. When Foraker became Governor, 
he appointed Cox to the lucrative sinecure of 
coal-oil inspector, and the saloon keeper went 
through the form, so familiar in this city, of 
nominally putting the establishment out of his 
own hands and into the handi of his former 
barkeeper. It is this man Cox who was “the 
acknowledged leader of the Foraker forces, 
and without his countenance the governor 
would have had no chance of success.” The 
second in command in this republican Tam¬ 
many is a confidence man, who deals in bogus 
remedies for the alleged cure of consumption— 
a person who has no standing among Cincin¬ 
nati physicians, and who advertises only at a 
distance, manufacturing his worthless stuff by 
the barrel for sixteen cents a quart, and selling 
it to gullible invalids all over the country at 
five dollars a quart. He, loo, early became a 
favorite of Foraker’s, and was appointed to 
office by the governor. 

So absolute has become Cox’s control that 
Gen. Boynton declares it to be “now impos¬ 
sible for any aspirant to be nominated by the 
county republican convention in the city unless 
he first seeks out the local boss and pays him 
spot cash”—save where it happens that he 
deems it discreet to allow a few representatives 
ot decent politics to go on the ticket to allay 
the suspicions of the body of honest voters. 
The way in which Cox “set up the pins” for 
his pal Foraker is thus described ; 

“ In the last campaign the candidates as a body, 
from th'ise aspiring to ihe legislature to those seek 
ing judicial nominations, were obliged to visit this 
boss at his headquarters and pay in advance. The 
sums ranged from $200 up to $2,000. As an example, 
the cash price paid for nomination as sheriff 
was $2,000, and Immediately after the election the boss 
cooly demanded that he allowed to name sixteen 
out of the twenty-one appointments in the sheriffs 
office. Every man on the Hamilton county republi¬ 
can legislative ticket, without an exception, was se¬ 
lected in advance by this boss, George Cox. Doubt¬ 
less this will seem amazing, but it is true, without a 
qualification.” 

This is the way it was done ; Shortly be¬ 
fore the convention, Cox called on the post¬ 
master and collector (both Sherman men) with 
a list of five names as his personal choxe for 
the legislative ticket, and asked them to select 
eight from another list of sixteen, all of whom 
were represented by him, and believed by the 
postmaster and collector to be for Sherman, 
this concession being due to the unquestion- 
b e fact that the republicans of the city were 
overwhelmingly for Sherman and against For¬ 
aker. Eight names were accordingly selected 
from the sixteen, but the thing turned out 
to be a confidence game on Cox’.s part.. 
“Every man of the sixteen, as is now known, 
had made his pecuniary and political peace 
with Cox, and the latter had taken a pledge 
from each one in advance that, in case of nom¬ 


ination and election, he would do such a favor 
for Cox as the lat'er might name. So strong 
was his pledge that those who knew of it 
among Cox’s press supporters made bold to 
announce, in double leads, the morning after 
election, and before a man of those elected had 
been consulted, that the Hamilton county dele¬ 
gation was solid for Foraker for senator to 
succeed John Sherman.’ — New York Evening 
Post, yanuary 7. 


IN INDIANA. 

—Editor Wheeler will be the next postmaster 

at Crown Point, Ind. 

« . 1 ! 

The anti-Blaine element and administration 
supporters held a second conference here last 
night. A large crowd of the faithtul from all 
parts of the state were here. There was a 
good sprinkling of postmasters and revenue 
collectors, and the seventh district was espe¬ 
cially well represented. They were here to 
prepare plans for opposing the anti-Harrison- 
ites next month when the election of the 
central committee takes place. 

The rivalry between the two factions threat¬ 
ens to break out in open warfare long. The 
anti-Harrison men claim that Harrison tried 
to take the breeze out of their sails in the 
Jeffersonville district by apppinting one of 
their number a collector at that point. They 
also say they are perfectly willing to furnish 
office-holders enough to take all the wind out 
of their canvass, if it can be done by ap¬ 
pointments. The postmasters in a meeting 
here some time ago decided to sit on the fence 
during the political row, but their actions last 
night were in direct opposition to that deci¬ 
sion.— dispatch to New York Times, 
December 24. 

* * * 

A bitter fight for supremacy is being 
waged in this, the twelfth congressional district 
of Indiana, between the Harrison and anti-Har¬ 
rison factions. 

The leader of the antis is Mayor G. W. Wil¬ 
son, of this city, a member of the governor’s 
staff. He represents the young republicans of 
the district, and his platform is anything to 
beat Harrison. He is opposed by Harry C. 
Hanna, a young attorney, who is an intimate 
friend of Postmaster Higgins, who is counted 
for the administration. Wilson is immensrly 
popular, and as 90 per cent, of the republicans 
in this district are original Gresham or Blaine 
men, and with the leading republican papers of 
this city openly fighting Harrison, the chances 
for the administration candidate are slim indeed. 
In this extremity Postmaster Higgins sought 
advice from Washington, and the answer came 
promptly. It was in the shape of an order to 
assess the federal office-h< Iders in this dis¬ 
trict to the tune of $2,500, and to spend this 
money where it would do the administration 
the most good. Mayor Wilson was not slow 
in discovering the facts, and is using the in¬ 
formation to good advantage. 

It is said that several of the post office em¬ 
ployes refused to pay the assessments, and sav 
they will resign rather than be mulcted of half 
a month’s salary. Postmaster Higgins, when 
asked about the truth of the report, refused to 
talk. A district convention has been called by 
the republicans for the 9th of January, to meet 
in this city, when the fight will be settled — 
Fort Wayne Dispatch to New York Times, De¬ 
cember 24. 

* * * 

The Harrison republicans are very active all 
over the state putting the machine in shape to 
capture the new state central committee next 
week. Dan Ransdell, marshal for the Dis¬ 
trict of Columbia, is now “ fixing ” the Ninth 
district. He was at Lebonon and Frankfort 
Saturday. The anti-Harrison men are very 


active, also. In the Evansville, Terre Haut^ 
Fort Wayne and Kankakee districts the “an¬ 
tis” could elect committeemen without trouble 
if ihey could agree among themselves. In ihe 
Fort Wayne district, where there are no Har¬ 
rison republicans outside of the office-holding 
class, half a dozen “antis” are running for 
committeemen. It is said that the Harrison 
managers have been scheming for some time 
to induce at least two “antis” from each coun¬ 
ty to come out for committeemen. In many 
counties alleged “antis” are doing fine work 
for Harrison under the direction of Dan Rans¬ 
dell. The Fourth district is about evenly di¬ 
vided, but Internal Revenue Collector John 
O Cravens and his numeroTis deputies, to¬ 
gether with the distilleries at Lawrenceburg 
and the postmasters, will pull Chairman Gow- 
dy through for re-election as committeeman. 
Gowdy lives in Rush, which is now in the new 
Fourth. 

The New Albany district is .slightly anti- 
Harrison, but the posimasters, who generally 
run country stores, have a big pull with the 
republican ex-soldiers from the fact that they 
sell their goods on the “ trust system” until 
“next pension day.” 

U. S District Attorney Smiley N. Chambers 
can be relied upon to “fix” the Second, or 
Vincennes, district, for Harrison as easily as 
he assisted to quash the thirty indictments for 
illegal voting in Judge Woods’ “ court.”— In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, December 28. 

* * * 

The unpopularity of the Harrison adminis- 
stration in Marion county, was fully demon¬ 
strated at last night’s primaries to elect dele¬ 
gates to the district convention which will be 
held January 21, for the selection of a state 
central committeeman. Although the game 
WBS small, the contest was one of the bitterest 
and most hotly contested in the history of re¬ 
publican primaries in the city. From early 
morning the federal officers of high and low 
degree were out hustling and spending 
“ boodle ” freely among the boys. Among 
those who were out during the day setting up 
the pins, were Ed. Thompson, Al. Moore, 
Billy Patterson, George Harvey, Dave Wal- 
Dce, Shel. Woodward, Oscar Wilmington, 
Billy Leonard and D ck Craft. Among the 
many interesting incidents which occured last 
night was the defeat of Otto Gresham for del¬ 
egate in the sixth ward, the selection of Mar¬ 
tin Moran, recently released from jail under a 
heavy bond for attempting to murder John 
Cain, his victim still lying at St. Vincent hos¬ 
pital in a precarious condition, and the elec¬ 
tion of the ward heeler Al. Moore, now hold¬ 
ing a federal position, as committeeman in 
ward eleven.— Indianapolis Sentinel yan. 10. 

* * * 

R. C. Bell of Fort Wayne, was at the 
Grand Hotel to-day. He told a News reporter 
that there was a red-hot canvass on at Fort 
Wayne over the election of a member of the 
republican state committee. “Billy” Watson 
and Editor Leonard, of the Gazette, and Cap- 
tein White are manipulating the Blaine forces 
against the administration as represented by 
Postmaster Higgins, Colonel Rober'son and 
Judge Taylor. Senator Bell thinks the anti- 
administrationists have the best of it.— Indian¬ 
apolis News, yanuaiy. 

* * * 

“Take, for instance,” said a second ward 
republican, “Clint Lowe, ’Gene Saulcy, Al 
Moore, Ed Conway, Bill Davis, George Har¬ 
vey, Ben Bagley, Marshall Woods, Ed Nolan, 
‘Billy' Patterson, Ed Thompson and others I 
might name. They are doing some rapid work 
crystallizing things for the Saturday primaries. 
The primaries will result in a cut and dried 
slate— prepared in the post-office. Then there is 
Con Kelley, who is emigrant inspector at Chi- 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


303 


cago. He is on ‘ detail duty ’ here and he has 
to have his finger in the pie. These individu¬ 
als have important duties theoretically, and 
should be compelled to keep hands off and let 
the rest of our people have a word or two to 
say in selecting the delegates.” 

[Clint Lowe, P. O. Supt., Union Station. 

'Gene Saulcy, Deputy Coll. Internal Revenue. 

George Harvey, Deputy Coll. Internal Revenue. 

Ed Conway, Deputy U. S. Marshal. 

Marshall Woods, Post-office clerk. 

Edward Nolan, Warehouseman U. S, Customs. 

Billy Patterson, Supt. of Mails. 

Ed Thompson, Postmaster. 

A1 Moore, Deputy Th S. Marshal. 

Bill Davis, Post-office clerk. 

—Indianapolis News, Jan. 7. 

* * * 

The result of the general skirmish, Satur¬ 
day, between the Blaine and Harrison repub¬ 
licans in Indiana is not reassuring to the ad¬ 
ministration men. In the fourth. Chairman 
Gowdy, with the assistance of Internal Reve¬ 
nue Collector Cravens and deputies of Dear¬ 
born, seems to have captured a majority of the 
delegates. In this city the post-office gang 
and the “Slick Six ” got the best of the antis. 
Money was spent freely by the administration 
people to bring out the vote. One man alone 
was paid fifty dollars to bring a gang of toughs 
to the sixth ward meeting, where the antis 
were defeated by thirty votes. Nearly all the 
federal officers were out working, a number 
being elected delegates. In the fourth ward 
Deputy Internal Revenue Collector Harvey 
presided. Surveyor of Customs Hildebrand 
was denounced by the gang for his inactivity. 
The federal officers not only managed the pri¬ 
maries in the interest of Harrison, but when 
they were in the minority they held “rump” 
meetings after the reguUrs had adjourned In 
the fourth ward Collector Harvey declared his 
set elected when the anti-Harrison set had se¬ 
cured a majority of seventy-five votes.— Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel, Jan. 11. 

* * * 

The “ antis ” have secured absolute proof 
that in all the large cities of the state, assess¬ 
ments were levied upon the mail carriers to 
raise money to elect Harrison delegates. A 
few days ago the Fort Wayne Gazette, republi¬ 
can, published the correspondence between 
Chairman Daugherty, of Allen countv, and 
his son, a clerk in the U. S. pension office in 
this city. Nicholas Ensley, the pension agent, 
comes from the Twelfth district, and was 
anxious to see his own district go right. He 
ordered young Daugherty to write his father 
that he must call the election by primaries in¬ 
stead of by mass convention. Chairman 
Daugherty, a one-legged soldier, who was re¬ 
fused the post-office to provide for a stay-at- 
home republican, is an “ anti,” and he replied 
that he would call a mass convention. The 
next mail brought another letter from his son 
that if a mass convention was called Ensley 
would discharge him. R. T. McDonald, who 
has spent more money for the success of the 
g. o. p. than all the republican officeholders of 
Fort Wayne, and who thoroughly hates Har¬ 
rison, told Chairman Daugherty to go ahead 
with the mass convention and that if Ensley 
dared to discharge the young man, he (Mc¬ 
Donald), would give him a better job with the 
Fort Wayne electric light works, of which he 
is the general manager,— Indianapolis Sentinel, 
lanuary 19. 


IN NEW YORK. 

The bouncing of Postmaster Flood would 
not have occasioned so much surprise last 
summer as it does now, for ever since his ap¬ 
pointment he has been apprised that a pickle 
was in store for him should the time ever come j 


I to use it. But when Mr. Fassett was made col- 
I lector of the port of New York, republicans 
] generally hoped that the then leader of the 
j senate would bury the hatchet. But notwith- 
! standing that Mr. Fassett was highly honored, 
j he did not forget that as secretary o‘ the 
national committee he could not name the post¬ 
master in his own town, and evidently smarted 
under the well-published fact that ex-Congress- 
man Thomas S. h'iood outgenera'ed him in the 
distribution of the spoils. That there was a 
feeling not less than a factional tug of war be¬ 
came more and more apparent day by day, and 
I the strain continued until the holding of the 
1 caucuses last fall, when Mr. Fassett secured 
control of the county conve'-tion. How that 
was done is also a matter of record. There 
were several contesting delegations; dual con¬ 
ventions were held, and the matter was finally 
disposed of at the state convention, the Flood 
men not receiving the slightest recognition. 

Dr Flood has been aware for a long time 
that government officials were sent here to 
trump up a case against him on any pretext, 
no matter how slight; but he also knew that 
the office had been honestly conducted, that 
the complaints were less than during any of 
his predecessors’ terms of office, and he there¬ 
fore feit sure that his tenure of office would be 
measured by at least a full term. 

Finally a case was made against Postmaster 
Flood. It was mainly to the effect that he did 
not devote personal attention to the office, not 
being there more than one hour a day some 
days. In speaking of the charges Dr. Flood 
said; “Of course you know the so-called 
charges preferred against me were all nonsense 
and without any foundation whatever. They 
were merely a pretext for my removal. I will 
say one thing, and I can say it with a feeling 
of pride, and that is that the Elmira postoffice 
will compare favorably with any office of its 
size in the state, and I have its affairs in such 
perfect order that I have always been ready 
to turn the office over to a successor with¬ 
in sixty seconds and everything be found all 
right.” 

In regard to the charge of spending only one 
hour a day in the office, Mr. Flood said : “That 
is false and is a mere pretext. Every day I 
personally opened all the post-office mail, super¬ 
intended the business, mapped out the work, 
and, besides, I did a great deal of labor at my 
house, where I employed a typewriter at my 
own expense, who worked almost exclusively 
on post-office matters,” 

“During the June and September floods,” 
he continued, “I worked night and day to give 
the people good service, and I think I have no 
reason to be ashamed of my official steward¬ 
ship, In fact, the whole trouble grew out of 
a deal between Tom Platt and Mr. Harrison. 
It was consummated at the time when Fassett 
was appointed Collector of the port of New 
York.— Elmira Dispatch to New Yoik Times, 
December 26, 

4 ; « 

There is a possibility that the plan of Mr. 
J. Sloat h'assett of Elmira, to disgrace his po¬ 
litical foe. Dr, Henry Flood of the same city, 
will come to naught. Dr. Flood was recently 
removed from the office of postmaster of El¬ 
mira, and Lewis G. Rathbun was appointed in 
his place. Everybody in Elmira knew at the 
time that politics alone was at the bottom of 
the doctor’s removal. Against him Fassett 
has borne a grudge for a long time. Before 
the last state convention in New York, when 
Fassett was nominated for Governor, Dr. 
Flood had been threatened with removal. 
Fassett held the threat over him in the hope 
that it would be the means of disarming the 
opposition of Flood and his numerous friends. 
After Fassett received his crushing defeat he 
prepared to make good his threat against 
P’lood. Just before the beginning of the holi¬ 


day adjournment of congress he sprang his 
mine. A posroffice inspector appeared at the 
Elmira postoffice and made a hunied report; 
then Flood received notice of his removfl. 
No reason whatever was given by the Presi¬ 
dent or by the postmaster general for the 
action. Dr. Flood did not propose to submit 
quietly. He sent this letter to Mr, Wana- 
maker: 

Elmira, N. Y., Dec. 25, 1891. 

To Postmaster General: 

Sir: The associated press dispatches report 
that Mr. L. G. Rathbun’s name has been sent 
to the senate for confirmation as postmaster at 
Elmira, N. Y. I an informed from outside 
sources that there are charges on file in your 
office; also that there is an inspector’s report. 
You have not informed me of such charges or 
inspector’s report, nor have you given me an 
opportunity to be heard. I respectfully re¬ 
quest and demand that a copy of all charges 
and the inspector’s report (complete), be sent 
to me by return mail. Yours respectfully, 
Henry Flood, Pos master. 

Six days later Dr. Flood received this letter: 

Office of the Posi master-Gfneral, j 
Washington, D. C., Dec. 31, 1891. j 
To Henry Flood, Esq., Elmira, N, V,: 

Sir —In answer 10 your letter received on 
the 26th. You have been rightly informed 
that Mr. Lewis G. Rathbun has been appoint¬ 
ed postmaster at Elmira, and that you have 
been removed, for the reason that you were 
drawing a salary of $3,100 while giving very 
little personal attention to the duties of the of¬ 
fice. You were present, during a part of the 
time at least, when the inspector visited the 
office, because you made up a shortage in your 
accounts. 

Your demand for a copv of the inspector’s 
report can not be complied with, because this 
administration adopted the course laid down 
by President Cleveland, to regard such reports 
as confidential papers, and to neither allow 
them to go out of the office nor to permit cop¬ 
ies of them to be made. Very respectfully, 
John Wanamaker, Postmaster-General. 

The reference to an alleged shortage showed 
plainly the flimsy ground on which the removal 
had been made. Dr. Flood remembered that 
at the time of the visit of the post-office inspec¬ 
tor, Capt. Brockway, the superintendent of 
the Elmira Reformatory owed the post-office 
$100 for postage stamps. In dealing with the 
reformatory superintendent it has been the 
custom of the Elmira postmaster to permit the 
stamp account to run a few days to accommo¬ 
date the system of auditing accounts which 
prevails at that institution. Stamps might be 
purchased on Monday and the following Sat¬ 
urday payment be made. This custom was 
probably well known to the instigator of the 
investigation, for the inspector appeared on the 
scene at the time when Capt. Brockway was 
in arrears for stamps. Dr. Flood made good 
the amount due the office, as he was always 
prepared to do. He did not realize at the 
time that his removal would be brought about 
on the basis of this transaction. 

Since the doctor’s removal, his friends have 
been very active in his behalf. Fassett has 
disclaimed any share in ousting him, but the 
evidence does not support his statement. Har¬ 
rison removed Flood to satisfy Fassett and 
Platt. Apparently he thought that he could 
do so, without calling down upon himself any 
adverse criticisin. He now finds that he was 
mistaken. Flood’s friends are beginning to 
make life unpleasant for him. They know 
that the removal was contrary to the spirit of 
the civil service system and are impressing that 
fact upon him. He seems to have acted on 
the assumption that Platt and Fasset were 
still men of influence in New York state poli¬ 
tics. Gradually the fact is dawning upon him 










304 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


that he has been laboring under a delusion. 
To-day ex-Congressman Flood, of Elmira, the 
brother of Dr. Flood, and ex Assemblyman 
Toms Van Duzer, the postmaster at Horse- 
heads, called upon the President and protested 
against the outrage. They gave him facts and 
figures to prove that they understood thor¬ 
oughly the reason for the doctor’s removal 
Mr. Harrison was quite gracious at first, but 
soon he grew very nervous, and declared that 
he knew nothing of the matter. Mr. Wana- 
maker, he said, was responsible, and he ad¬ 
vised them to see Wanamaker. They told him 
of Wanamaker’s letter, and reiterated the de¬ 
mand of Dr. Flood to be confronted with the 
evidences of his guilt, if any there were. Mr, 
Harrison tried to smooth the matter over, and 
finally promised to see Wanamaker himself 
about it. He referred to the Chemung county 
row, and asked plaintively why it could not be 
stopped.— Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, January g. 

There was a caucus of the Goodrich fol¬ 
lowers in the Kings county republican general 
committee last night in a room over the Crite¬ 
rion Theatre, Biooklyn. The object was to 
fix up a slate to be voted for by the delegates 
to the committee meeting on Tuesday 
night. State Committeeman Israel F. Fisch¬ 
er presided over the caucus, which was at¬ 
tended by about fifty republicans, among 
them Naval Officer Willis, Port Warden 
Leavcraft. This ticket had no sooner been 
reported than Election Commissioner Cot¬ 
ton stated that he could not stand by Henry 
for treasurer. He had promised to vote for 
James W. Birkett for that office, and he would 
keep his word. Then Joseph Benjamin gotnp 
and protested against the whole ticket. “Ii 
represents the one-man power that has con¬ 
trolled us for three years,” he said, referring 
to “ Boss ” Ernst Nathan [Internal Revenue 
Collector] “ and the people over our way are 
tired of it. They have an idea, and a well 
settled one, that this one-man power is too 
closely allied with the democracy. If you elect 
this ticket the sixteenth ward will give a demo¬ 
cratic majority of over i,oco next November ” 

Still the caucus went ahead and adopted a 
resolution pledging its support to the ticket. 
This means 250 out of 392 delegates to the 
committee on Tuesday night.— Ne^v York Times, 
January lO. 

The Kings county republican general committee 
held its usual noisy annual meeting last evening in 
the Criterion Theater, Brooklyn, and the Nathan 
faction succeeded in electing all the officers for the 
ensuing year and in retaining control of the organi¬ 
zation. This means that Harrison delegates will be sent 
to the next national convention if Nathan can bring that 
event to pass. It required half an hour more to get 
rid of the routine business, and then Henry D. Ham¬ 
ilton of the twentieth ward rose and nominated Mr. 
Goodrich for a second term as president. This was 
seconded by delegates from half a dozen wards, and 
James M. Fuller tried to have the nomination made 
by acclamation, but there were cries of " Don’t cram 
him down our throats.” This roused Charles B. 
Morton, who said that he bore no ill will to Mr. 
Goodrich, but that he felt compelled by the wretched 
condition of the party to oppose the nomination of 
any more Nathan men “ We see our city in the 
handsof the democracy,’’Mr.Morton continued,“and 
we want to know the cause of all this. The men who 
assume to rule our party do not know what to do. 
Self-assumed leadership has produced these effects. 
There is too much bickering and-interference by 
alleged leaders. The politician or the federation of 
politicians who tries to dictate c tn not get our sup¬ 
port and we won’t let them control our votes. It’s 
time the buying and selling of votes was stopptd. 
The present system is obnoxious. A conspiracy has 
has been formed in this city to foil the wishes of a ma¬ 
jority of the republicans of this county in the next 
national convention." This brought out great cheers 


and cries of “ Give it to him! ” “ Pound Nathan! ” 
The .self-constituted boss stood against the wall and 
never blinked. Joseph Benjamin, who denounced 
Nathan at the caucus on Saturday night, seconded 
Mr. Newins’ nomination. He was not against Mr. 
Goodrich, but he was against the influences behind 
Goodrich. Eepubliravs, he said, would not vote their 
parly ticket because they desired to show their independ¬ 
ence of Aat/ian (Internal Revenue Collector). If any 
one would go through the heavy republican wards, 
he would find, Mr. Benjamin said, that the voters 
were sick and tired of the present mactiine. Joseph 
M Farrington spoke to the .same pointaxd added that 
1 the present leaders were too closely allied with the demo- 
1 cratic managers. He then mentioned the name of 
Blaine, and the delegates cheered and yelled them¬ 
selves hoarse. Nathan didn’t move a hand. He put 
forward Israel F. Fischer who pleaded for Goodrich 
for the sake of harmony, and he was greeted with 
jeers. This ended the talking, and the roll was 
called. The big vote for Goodrich encouraged the 
Nathan crowd to put through the slate adopted on 
Saturday night without more ado, and Naval Officer 
Willis rose and read off the following list of candi¬ 
dates, and on his motion, they wereeletced by accla¬ 
mation : Andrew Jacobs, George Nason. Charles 
Bell, W. S. Ryan, Warren C. Treadwell, W. H. N. 
Cadmus, George England, John F. Henry. Some one 
tried to have the resolutions considered, but the 
crowd wanted to go home, and the meeting ended in 
an uproar. 

* * * 

The action of some of the leaders of the Republi¬ 
can party in causing the removal of Dr. John L. Van 
Alstyne from the board of pension examiners will 
cause the parly a great deal of trouble. Dr. Van 
Alstyne is a stanch republican and a veteran of the 
late war, and so incensed are the members of the 
Grand Army of the Republic over his removal that 
they are determined to defeat the republican ring. 
The Grand Army men allege that Col. George W. Dunn, 
postmaster and member of the state republican committee. 
is the instigator of the scheme to remove Dr. Van 
Alstyne, and they propose to have his scalp. For 
the first lime in the history of this county, the res 
publican party leaders can not count on the soldier’- 
vote. It will not bo a surprise if this county is 
placed in the democratic column next fall in the 
presidential election.—Binghamton Dispatch to New 
York Times, January 10. 


AT LARGE. 

George Rundstadtler has been appointed to a po¬ 
sition in the postoffice here, and thereby hangs a neat 
little political tale. He was a member of the city re¬ 
publican committee when the recent faction fight was 
on. The Bain faction, representing the element in the 
republican party favorable to the Harrison adminis¬ 
tration, needed him in order to have a quorum. He 
held a position in the office of the recorder of deeds. 
Recorder Herbbs told him if he met with eithtr 
wing of the committee, he must resign his official 
position. R. C. Kerens and John C. Orrick, law 
partners of Secretary Noble, agreed to pay Runstadt- 
ler $30 a week or find him a position if he would sit 
with the committee. He did so. Pressure was 
brought to bear on Postmaster Harlow to make a 
place for Rundstadtler, but he did not want to be 
placed in the position of taking sides. It is now said 
that orders came direct from Wa.shington that Rnn- 
stadler must be provided for in order to relieve 
Orrick and Kerens of the burden of his support. Ac¬ 
cordingly, Runstadler is now in a snug position in 
the post office, and has resigned from the committee. 
—St. Loxiis Dispatch to New York Times, December 5. 

» * * 

Hardly had the democratic convention ad¬ 
journed in Baton Rouge before the republican 
state central committee was called to order in 
New Orleans. The fight in the republican 
camps is as real and bitter as on the other side, 
while the lottery issue is assisting the similar¬ 
ity by being one of the chief disturbing ele¬ 
ments. Ex-Governor Warmolh has, until 
now, been the acknowledged leader of the 
party in the state. As collector of the port 


he represents the national administration, 
and just now is trying to control the 
Louisiana vote for Harrison. Warmouth is 
backed by almost the entire white repub¬ 
lican element and a great part of the col¬ 
ored vote, but Internal Revenue Collector 
Wimberly and Superintendent of the Mint 
Smythe, with a patronage equal to that of the 
custom house, and better for political pur¬ 
poses, not being tied up by civil-service rules, 
combined with P. F. Herwig, one of the 
wealthiest men in the state, and Ex-Governor 
Kellogg, have been making big inroads into 
Warmoth’s strength. In consequence of this, 
when Mr. Herwig called the state central 
committee to order to day at noon, and a test 
vote was taken on the filling of a vacancy at 
large, the Warmoth candidate received only 
26 votes, while the opposition polled 47. The 
announcement of the vote caused great com¬ 
motion, and this was repeated and exagger¬ 
ated into a tumult when Philly Robinson, a 
colored member, arose and addressed the meet¬ 
ing. He held $120 in bank bills in his hand, 
and said this had been given him to desert 
Warmouth and vote with the anti-administra¬ 
tion faction. There being other charges of brib¬ 
ery, Collector Warmouth left the hall and was 
followed by his supporters. These adjourned 
to the custom house, where they were called 
to order, and their numbers being re inforced 
by other bolters, forty-eight members, a ma¬ 
jority of the committee being present, business 
was proceeded with. They decided to hold a 
convention to nominate a state ticket on the 
third Wednesday in February. 

The anti-Warmoth faction continued in ses¬ 
sion at the original place of meeting. It is 
probable that they will also call a nominating 
convention, with the result that next April 
there will be two republican tickets as well as 
two democratic tickets, in the field for state 
offices. The original intention of the War- 
moth faction was to put up full ticket, mak¬ 
ing anti-lotteryism a main point in the plat¬ 
form. The opposition faction want to take the 
Louisiana delegation to the national conven¬ 
tion uninstructed, and probably have it sup¬ 
port Blaine. When Mr. Herwig, who is a large 
holder of lottery stock, joined their ranks, they 
added to their purpose an intention to thwart 
the plan to put up a state ticket, and to defeat 
the anti-lottery portion of the platform.— New 
Orleans Dispatch to New York Times, Decem¬ 
ber 20. 


CORRESPONDENCE, 

A corresponpent from Denison University, 
Granville, Ohio, writes the Chronicle: 

The gross brutality of the spoils system re¬ 
ceives a fresh illustration in the recent discov¬ 
ery that the asylum for the blind at Columbus, 
Ohio, has been making no provision whatever 
for the special treatment of the eyes of its in¬ 
mates. Can anyone conceive of such a state 
of affairs if the trustees of the institution had 
been chosen simply on the basis of fitness for 
the position, and if they, in turn, had applied 
the same test in the appointments devolving 
upon them ? If the people of this land could 
only realize the inhumanity of entrusting 
to political bummers the care of those who are 
afflicted with mental or physical disease the 
reform, in that line, at least, would be swift 
and sure We can well afford a serious con¬ 
sideration of the question whether our treat¬ 
ment of criminals and unfortunates is not as far 
beneath the just demands of our own civiliza¬ 
tion as the treatment of Russian political 
exiles is beneath the civilization of Russia. 
The spoils system is not only corrupt from a 
business standpoint; it is cruel and brutal from 
the standpoint of humanity.—W. H. J. 














The Civil service Chronicle. 


VoL. I, No. 36. INDIANAPOLIS, FEBRUARY, 1892. 


TERMS: { 


50 cents perennnm. 
5 cents per copy. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

A PRESIDENT who, upon charges made 
by an inspector not belonging to a class 
enjoying or worthy of public confidence 
for impartiality, dismisses an officer from 
a place so important as the postmastership 
of Elmira, and refuses to let the disgraced 
official see or know the nature of the 
charges, is, in this country of open courts 
and public trials, a bold man. 


Cornell University has the notorious 
distinction of having a professor—Collin 
—who has written an elaborate defense 
of Hill, the indefensible. If the uni¬ 
versity permits this to go unpunished, 
parents who want to make good citi¬ 
zens of their sons will hesitate about 
sending them to Cornell. Another public 
institution, The North American Review, 
has published an article in defense of Tam¬ 
many Hall purporting to have been written 
by Richard H. Croker, an " illiterate ex¬ 
tough.” This kind of sensationalism only 
finds its parallel in the Police Gazette. 


expended for municipal purposes is the 
practice >^f giving the subordinate places 
to person i because they are republicans, or 
because uhey are democrats. So long as 
this practice continues, party machines 
will see nothing but spoil in any public 
employment. 


One of the Mahone blackmailing cases 
has been tried at last in Washington, the 
jury finding for the accused. Whatever 
the evidence there could have been no 
other result after the charge of the judge 
which was, in substance, as follows : 


In the past it has generally been useless 
to warn the democratic machine. It is 
nevertheless true that the nomination of 
Hill or Gorman as the presidential candi¬ 
date of the party would be followed by 
such a crusade against the nominee as has 
never been known in this country. Both 
«of these men are in the position of Dudley 
[except that their advice has been acted 
^on. Nor will the nomination of any man 
who might be the tool of these men help 
.the matter. 


i The civil service commission has pro¬ 
vided for a physical examination of appli¬ 
cants for the railway mail service. It can 
be taken before any qualified physician, 
tbutthe successful applicant maybe sub- 
[ject to a further physical examination. 
iThe probable object of this reservation is 
10 guard against the leniency of friendly 
doctors. It has been demonstrated that 
the duties of this service require men 
physically sound and likely to remain so. 
Others should not try for this branch of 
service. 


The common council of Rochester has 
been wrestling with the New York civil 
service law, like its much-discomfited sis¬ 
ter council of BuflFalo, and has been badly 
worsted. It wanted to give a job to one 
Belknap, and did so over the mayor’s veto, 
the latter’s objection being that the pro¬ 
posed job-giving was in contravention of 
the civil service law. An action was begun 
by a taxpayer to restrain payment of the 
salary. The case went to the court of ap¬ 
peals, and that court has just decided that 
the employment of Belknap was illegal, as 
he had not come into the service after 
competitive examination, as provided by 
law. 


Quay did well in his libel suits in Penn¬ 
sylvania against those who charged him 
with sharing with Bardsley because the 
latter sent him a check for some eight or 
ten thousand dollars. Two editors of the 
Beaver Star, where Quay lives, were fined 
$600 each and sent to jail for six months. 
Somehow the country looks on with a 
broad grin. Is this meant as an insinu¬ 
ation that Quay is not “ vindicated,” and 
that the “ slick ” way in which the court 
machinery worked is a great joke on the 
incarcerated editors? It must be con¬ 
fessed it would look better if Quay had 
sought “ vindication ” first against those 
rich people who very particularly charged 
him with stealing some hundreds of thou¬ 
sands of dollars from the Pennsylvania 
state treasury, which Don Cameron made 
up to the treasury out of his private 
means. 


There is nowhere in any constitution, 
state or federal, or in any state or federal 
law, any authority by which an appointing 
officer or any administration may use the 
public service in any manner for personal 
or party purposes. We challenge any one 
to point out such authority, yet hundreds 
of thousands of state and federal offices are 
constantly used for such purposes. There 
is no precedent for such a practice except 
in feudalism, aristocracy, monarchy, and 
imperialism. The country is saddled with 
bogus lords afibrding “ protection ” to con¬ 
temptible vassals, each of whom “plows his 
lord’s land or carries out his dung.” 


In this country, the one thing that pre¬ 
vents the people from getting little more 
than nominal value for the enormous 
amount of money raised by taxation and 


Justice Bradley gave the case to the jury shortly 
after 2 o’clock. He referred to the act as a broad, 
comprehensive one, and said that whatever may 
have been the policy of congress in passing the act 
unless the act was declared unconstitutional it 
should be sustained. 

It may be a matter of doubt if congress contem¬ 
plated such a trivial case, yet in its terms it is so 
broad as to cover this case. 

“ For any political purpose,” is the language of the 
law, and the man who pays the money as well as the 
man who receives it is a violator of the law. It is 
.singular, to say the least, that although the law pro¬ 
vides that offenders shall be dismissed from service 
the offenders are now in the employ of the govern¬ 
ment. It looks like trifling, but some one doubtless 
wants the law vindicated. If the question was on 
the constitutionality of the act he would, perhaps, 
have something to say. 

The late Justice Bradley of the Supreme Court of 
the United States had held the act to be unconsti¬ 
tutional—as an abridgement of the rights of the 
citizen. 

The object was a good one to protect the employes 
of the government. The law was, however, on the 
books and should be enforced. 

He then directed the jury that they were to con¬ 
sider the evidence and determine if the law had 
been violated. 

Those concerned with the enforcement 
of the law in this case perhaps feel proud 
of their achievements: The judge of his 
charge; the jury of the promptness with 
which it took the wink from the judge; 
the prosecutor of his success in securing 
failure ; the President of his cold shoulder 
to any prosecution of blackmailing of the 
stripe charged. 


As WAS to be expected, Congressman 
John F. Andrew, of Massachusetts, regards 
his position as chairman of the house civil 
service committee seriously. He grasps 
the whole scope of civil service reform, and 
takes it as a matter of course that his 
committee will push forward this reform 
in every direction. The steps which Mr. 
Andrew believes now practicable are the 
extension of the classified system to post- 
oflfices with twenty-five or more employes. 





























306 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


to the heads of divisions in the various de¬ 
partments, and to the superintendents of 
postal stations in large cities. He says 
that the present labor service system of 
Massachusetts has been tried “ with re¬ 
markable success,” and should be applied 
to the entire federal labor service. Secre¬ 
tary Tracy having already introduced it in 
the navy-yards, the system to be so incor¬ 
porated in the law that succeeding admin¬ 
istrations can not upset it. Mr. Andrew 
is a democrat, and, filled with these and 
other wholesome ideas which he frankly 
expresses, he may bring his party to such 
aid of civil service reform as to make it no 
longer possible to say that, as a party, it is 
a spoils party. 

We have read with interest The Public 
Service, published at Washington, hy a 
company largely composed of members of 
the civil service. The project of enlarging 
the paper and putting it more into the 
field of the diplomatic and consular serv¬ 
ice is under consideration. Whatever is 
done we hope that the present uncom¬ 
promising stand of The Public Service in 
favor of civil service reform will not be 
modified. 


DAVE HILL. 

The democratic friends and some of the op- 
j)onent8 of Hill are unable to speak of him 
without mentioning “ his splendid services to 
the party.” The Atlanta Constitution, for in¬ 
stance, calls him “that unconquerable demo¬ 
cratic le.ader.” 

It is astonishing that any honest democrat 
can mention Hill in any such terms, or can 
ever mention him at all without denouncing 
him as a scoundrel. The sum of his “splendid 
services” is the capture of the New York leg¬ 
islature. The county board of canvassers 
counted out the elected republican candidate 
of Dutchess county and counted in Hill’s man. 
The county clerk, as clerk of the board, refused 
to sign the certificate, and Hill, as governor, 
removed him and appointed one Emans in his 
place. The certificate was sent to the secreta¬ 
ry of state. The republicans took the case 
before a democrat, Judge Barnard, of the su¬ 
preme court, who declared that the certificate 
was based upon an illegal and erroneous count, 
and restrained the board of state canvassers 
from canvassing it, and ordered the county 
board and the new clerk Emans to forward to 
the state board a certificate of the election of 
the republican candidate. This was done, 
Emans signing the certificate and forwarding 
it to the state board by mailing one copy to 
the governor, one to the comptroller, and one 
to the secretary of state, as the law requires. 
After he had thus ended all lawful connection 
with the returns, some one telegraphed him 
that .Judge Ingraham had granted an order 
restraining him from forwarding them. No 
such order was served upon him, but Emans 


took the train for Albany, went to the secre¬ 
tary of state, and that official gave him back 
his copy. Emans then went to the governor’s 
office and got a messenger-boy to find the gov¬ 
ernor’s copy and give it to him. Isaac H. 
Maynard, deputy attorney-general, went to 
the comptroller’s office and got one of that of¬ 
ficer’s messengers to give him the third copy. 
After this extraordinary theft from the offi¬ 
cial files of the state, two other copies equally 
authentic were offered to the secretary of state 
and the comptroller, but were refused because 
they had not come by mail. Next, the court 
of appeals, the highest court of the statej af¬ 
firmed the decision of Judge Barnard that the 
certificate of the Dutchess county board in 
favor of Hill’s man was based upon an illegal 
and erroneous count. This certificate had 
reached the hands of the secretary of state, but 
not by mail, and immediately after this decis¬ 
ion, and with full knowledge of it, Hill’s board 
of state canvassers canvassed it and declared 
Hill’s Dutchess county candidate elected to 
the senate. This gave the democrats a major¬ 
ity in that body. 

These are the splendid services for which 
Hill is now being praised. He has publicly 
chained himself to this transaction by declar¬ 
ing that his messenger did right in stealing 
the returns filed with him as governor. Now, 
if any one can see any difference between this 
whole transaction and Sim Coy with his re¬ 
turning board altering tally-sheets, it would 
be well to point it out. There is no difference. 
Hill, in every fiber, is of the Sim Coy stripe. 
His methods are Sim Coy methods. His nat¬ 
ural abilities are not greater than Sim Coy’s. 
Were Hill put forward by the east as a candi¬ 
date for the presidency, the eternal fitness of 
things would only be satisfied by the west seat¬ 
ing Sim Coy by his side as a candidate for the 
vice-presidency. The fact that the Coy con¬ 
spiracy which altered tally-sheets was pun¬ 
ished by imprisonment, while the Dave Hill 
conspiracy, which, in violation of the consti¬ 
tution and the laws, pushed aside the govern¬ 
ment of the state of New York, chosen by the 
people, and crowded into its place a bogus 
government, which is now there, does not af¬ 
fect the question; it only goes to show corrupt 
prosecuting officers and venal juries. Given 
an honest jury and a fearless and able prose¬ 
cutor, and this whole conspiracy. Clerk Em¬ 
ans, the state board, the secretary of state, the 
messengers, Isaac H. Maynard and Dave Hill 
would receive the same lesson the Coy con¬ 
spiracy received at Indianapolis. 


A POLITICAL BUCCANEER AS A 
PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE. 

[Compiled from the New York Evening Post-l 

David B. Hill began his political life in 
Elmira, New York, nearly thirty years ago as 
a justice of the peace. Nearly all his friends 
and workers were, and are, the dregs of the 
community. He never mingled in respect¬ 
able society. He has always had a trick of 
“downing” an opponent in his own party by 


a temporary coalition with the opposite party 
He personally bought votes, and since Hill J 
began his career, Elmira has become one of J 
the most politically corrupt cities in the United^ 
States. Says one witness: 

“I personally saw Hill hand an envelope to an 
old man who had the palsy. The man was unable 
to open it and handed it to one of my clerks. 1 saw 
the clerk open it and take out a two dollar bill and 
hand it to the old man.” 

In 1856 the Chemung canal overflowed and 
damaged adjacent property. No one thought 
of holding the state responsible. Years after¬ 
wards Hill’s law firm stirred up the matter 
and agreed to take the case for nothing if they 
lost and for'nearly all if they won. In 1866 , 
and later, bills were passed by the assembly 
to pay nearly six millions of these claims, and 
when the last batch was passed. Hill was a mem¬ 
ber of the assembly. One of the awards was 
for $ 11,445 to James A. Locke, whose whole 
estate was not worth that amount. In 1875 
Governor Tilden’s Canal Commission exposed 
the nature of these claims. Locke testified 
that he first lenrned from the lawyers Smith 
& Hill that he had been damaged by the state 
“Tell us,” said the questioner of the commis. 
sion, “in what manner, and by whom, was 
this question first presented to you of making 
a claim?” “I think it was by Smith & Hill,” 
replied Locke. “You got your information 
in some way?” “ I got it from them,” replied 
the witness. 

Elected to the assembly. Hill became one of 
the most useful agents of Tweed, and finally 
went into partnership with Tweed, publishing 
the Elmira Gazette. Hill voted for Tweed’s 
bills to consummate the plot of robbing New 
York city. He opposed the impeachment of 
Tweed’s judge, Cardoza, and apologized on 
the floor of the assembly for Tweed’s judge, 
Barnard. Hill has always kept up his Elmira 
fights and trades. He invariably appears the 
Sunday before election, and all that day and 
the day following, his office swarms with heel¬ 
ers. Hundreds go away with the envelopes 
that constitute the secret of Hill’s influence. 

Mr. Hill succeeded to the governorship on 
.January 1 , 1885 , when Mr. Cleveland resigned 
the office because of election to the presidency. 
He at once began to work for re-election in 
in November following, and, in order to 
strengthen himself with patronage, he sought 
to gain control of the work of constructing a 
new aqueduct for New York city. The build¬ 
ing of the aqueduct had been authorized in 
1883 , and begun in 1884 under a commission 
of three members, all honorable and able men, 
with the mayor, comptroller and commis¬ 
sioner of public works, members ex officio. 
The commissioner of public works, when Mr. 
Hill became governor, was one Rollin M. 
Squire, an unprincipled adventurer from Bos¬ 
ton, who had been thrust into the office in the 
last days of 1884 , in accordance with a dis¬ 
graceful compact between a mayor who was 
leaving office and a mercenary board of aider- 
men. Mr. Hill opened communication with 
Squire, and entered into an alliance with him 
by which they mutually agreed to stand by 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


307 


each other through thick and thin. The two 
worked together for Mr, Hill’s re election, 
which was accomplished in November follow¬ 
ing. 

Soon after the election Squire went to the 
governor and told him that, in order to get 
the office of commissioner of public works, he 
had signed a pledge to administer that office 
an all respects as one Maurice B. Flynn, a con¬ 
tractor, wished him to; that he supposed 
this pledge had been destroyed, but had dis¬ 
covered that it was still in existence and was 
about to be made public as a means of get¬ 
ting him out of office. The governor ad¬ 
vised Squire not to resign, but to hold on to 
his office, assuring him. Squire subsequently 
testified, that “he would support me (Squire) 
through it all, unless I should do something 
so bad that a criminal court would convict 
me.” The governor kept this promise faith¬ 
fully, though after making it he was shown 
a copy of the pledge which Squire had signed. 
Knowing the existence of this pledge, he en¬ 
tered into a compact, or “deal,” with the re¬ 
publican leaders of the legislature to pass a 
hill so re-organizing the aqueduct commis¬ 
sion as to put Squire in virtual control of its 
work. The partners to this “ deal ” on the 
republican side were Speaker Husted, Senator 
Hoysradt and Hamilton Fish, Jr., and on the 
democratic side. Governor Hill, John O’Brien, 
aqueduct contractor and chairman of the 
democratic state committee, and William 

L. Muller, a former law partner of Governor 
Hill. They had a bill passed which provided 
for the appointment by the governor of three 
new aqueduct commissioners at a salary of 
$5,000 each, and the removal of the mayor 
and comptroller as ex officio members, leaving 
Squire as the sole official representative of the 
city on the commission. After the bill had 
passed, the governor appointed Hamilton 
Fish, Jr., one of the new commissioners, thus 
keeping his bargain with the republicans. 
Before he had given his approval to the bill 
he was shown a copy of Squire’s pledge, and 
then the pledge itself, as proof of Squire’s 
character, and as a reason for refusing to put 
such great power in his hands, but he declined 
to be influenced at all by it. 

One of the first acts of the reorganized com¬ 
mission was to open bids for the work of con¬ 
structing an important section of the new 
aqueduct. The bid of O’Brien & Clark, the 
former the John O’Brien alluded to above, 
was $54,000 higher than the lowest bid. Gov. 
Hill sent his friend Muller to members of the 
commission asking them to vote to accept 
O’Brien & Clark’s bid as a personal favor to 
himself, and a majority of the commission ac¬ 
ceded to the request. As soon as they were 
awarded the bid, O’Brien & Clark, in defiance 
of law, at once sold out their contract to one 
of the lower bidders for $30,000 clear profit. 
The full meaning of this transaction will ap¬ 
pear later on in this narrative. 

The new commission went into power in 
May, 1886. In August following, William 

M. Ivins, having obtained possession of the 


pledge which Squire had given to Flynn, pub -1 
lished it, and Mayor Grace at once began pro¬ 
ceedings for Squire’s removal, basing the de¬ 
mand for it upon this pledge. The governor 
was forced to accede to the demand by public 
sentiment. At the time of doing so, the gov¬ 
ernor made public denial that he had ever! 
seen a copy of the pledge before its publica¬ 
tion. 

In 1888 the scandals about the doings of the 
aqueduct commission became so great that an j 
investigation was ordered by the senate. It j 
was shown by unimpeachable testimony that j 
in the campaign for his own re-election in 
1885, Gov. Hill had drawn two notes, one for | 
$10,000 and the other for $5,000, the proceeds j 
of which had been used to defray campaign ! 
expenses. The first was drawn to the order of ! 
William L. Muller, and was indorsed by Mul- j 
ler, and by John O’Brien and Heman Clark, j 
the two heaviest contractors for aqueduct! 
work. The note was cashed by O’Brien, and | 
charged to him on the books of the firm. The 
second note was indorsed by Muller and Al¬ 
ton B. Parker, and was cashed by John Keen¬ 
an, the alleged “ boodle-holder” in the Broad- 
w.ay railway scandal. Keenan was afterwards 
repaid by John O’Brien. Mr. O’Brien con¬ 
tributed .$500, Alton B. Parker $500, and other 
friends of the governor similar amounts. It 
was to pay these notes that the contract was 
awarded to Clark & O’Brien, though their bid 
was $54,000 above the lowest, for Mayor Grace 
and Squire testified that they were asked to 
vote in favor of that bid in order that the 
governor’s notes might be paid. The testimo- | 
ny also showed that both notes were finally 
paid by O’Brien & Clark, presumably out of I 
the $30,000 profit made on that bid. I 

It was also shown by the testimony during 
the investigation that Gov. Hill had heard of 
the Squire-Flynn pledge several months be¬ 
fore it was made public ; that Squire told him 
of it in December, 1885, and again in Janu¬ 
ary, 1886; that a copy of it was shown him in 
March, 1886, and the original in May, 1886. j 
Yet, after all this knowledge, he had entered ' 
into a compact with Squire, had addressed [ 
him in letters asking for patronage as “ Hon¬ 
orable” and “ My Dear Sir,” had united with ^ 
the republicans of the legislature in passing a j 
bill to put the acqueduct work into his con-1 
trol, and had been profiting in many ways, 
including the receipt of $15,000 of public 
money, from his association with him. Yet 
when the pledge was made public, he was 
forced to remove Squire as a dishonest official, 
thus admitting that the pledge was prima facie 
proof of his worthless character. For their 
friendly services in his hehalf the governor 
•ubsequently appointed John O’Brien receiver 
for the Broadway railway, and made Mr. 
Muller a commissioner of claims. 

In 1887, Hill cultivated the liquor interests 
by vetoing a reasonable high license bill. 
He vetoed a similar bill in 1888, and in that 
year he also vetoed the first ballot reform bill. 
In 1888 he was re-elected governor, although 
Cleveland failed to carry the state. Of this 


the New York Tribune said, “ JHU succeeded only 
because he was able to sell a presidency for a gov¬ 
ernorship.” In 1889, Hill vetoed another bal¬ 
lot reform bill, and in 1890 still another. 

Elsewhere in the Chronicle is described 
the overturning of the elected legislature of 
New York by Hill upon the Coy system. His 
whole public history shows him to be a man 
that stops at nothing, and who jjanders always 
to the lawless and degraded. 


A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF A 
GORMAN HENCHMAN. 

We have the demoralizing spectacle of dem¬ 
ocrats professing morality and yet praising 
the unscrupulous work of unscrupulous Da¬ 
vid B. Hill. As if this were not enough 
there is also similar praise for Gorman, either 
himself a presidential candidate or a demo¬ 
cratic Warwick along with Calvin S. Brice. 
It is not safe to desist in the efl'ort to keep 
awake the moral senses of those honest parti¬ 
sans whom Gorman has put into a lethargic 
state by his fight against the Force Bill. 
With whom Gorman consorts, what manner 
of citizens his work requires, are very well 
indicated in the following sketch, from the 
Baltimore Sun. 


Charlie Goodman, a man who has been in 
the hands of the police a number of times, and 
who has also figured in Baltimore local poli¬ 
tics, shot and killed John T. Duncan yester¬ 
day afternoon. The shooting occurred in 
Louis Steigerwald’s saloon, 105 North Eutaw 
street, at twenty minutes before 6 o’clock. 

« » 35 

Charles Goodman was born in Baltimore 
and is about fifty years old. His early life 
was spent in the southwestern part of the city, 
and when still a young man he obtained a 
reputation as a fighter and was frequently ar¬ 
rested on charges growing out of his belliger¬ 
ent nature. His principal occupation for 
many years was that of a saloon-keeper, and 
at different times he conducted saloons at the 
corner of Green and Baltimore streets, at Gen¬ 
eral Wayne Inn, on Greene street, near the old 
western district police station, on Baca street, 
near the Crescent Club, and at the corner of 
Holliday and Fayette streets. 

While running a saloon at the last-named 
place he had a fight with John Keleher and 
came near being killed. Pistols were drawn, 
and a bullet struck Goodman in the forehead 
and plowed along the scalp to the top of his 
head. 

The first serious charge laid against Good¬ 
man was in 1870, when he assaulted Nathaniel 
Cole, a gate keeper at Camdem Station. He 
was arrested for the assault, and after he was 
released he followed Mr. Cole to his home, on 
Pratt street, near Parkin, and struck him on 
the head with an iron plate. Cole was seri¬ 
ously injured. Goodman was tried on the 
charge of assault with intent to kill, and, be¬ 
ing convicted, was sentenced to four years in 


















308 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the peuiteotiary. lie remained there until 
December 16, 1872, when he was pardoned 
upon the condition that he would leave the 
state. He accepted the condition and went 
to Washington. 

He had not been in Washington long before 
he got into a quarrel with Lemuel Weeden. 
They had a bloody fight in a room, and before 
they could be separated Goodman was shot in 
the shoulder and wrist and the furniture in the 
room was wrecked. While Weeden was 
under arrest, and before he was taken to the 
police station, Goodman drew a pistol and 
shot him. The wound was not dangerous 
Goodman escaped while being taken from the 
jail van to the court-room. He made his 
way to Cincinnati, where he was arrested a 
few weeks later, and w'as started on his return 
to Washington in charge of a Cincinnati oflS- 
cer who volunteered to deliver him to the 
Washington authorities. He professed to be 
willing to return and stand a trial, but, watch¬ 
ing his opportunity, he jumped from the train 
near Sir John’s Run. The train was running 
at a speed of more than thirty miles an hour 
at the time, and it was thought his desperate 
leap had killed him. The train was stopped 
and the officer ran back and found Goodman 
lying beside the track with a broken leg. He 
was taken to Washington. 

During the civil war Goodman was a 
stanch Unionist and served as a soldier. 
Friends in Washington, who knew of his 
army record, interested themselves in his be¬ 
half with President Grant, and he escaped a 
term in the penitentiary at Albany. He re¬ 
turned to Baltimore, and in January, 1873, 
was arrested for violating the terms of his 
pardon. He was afterward granted a full 
pardon. The wound in his shoulder con¬ 
tinued to give him trouble, and he placed 
himself under the care of Dr. W. H, Crim, 
who took several pieces of shattered bone 
from the shoulder. 

In 1879 Mary Lizzie Kuhns, a minor, was 
arrested in the western district by Lieutenant 
(then patrolman) Fullem, charged with being 
drunk and disorderly. The charge was dis¬ 
missed and she was arrested upon a ticket-of- 
leave from the Maryland Industrial School 
for Girls and returned to that institution. 
Goodman had her brought into court on a 
writ of habeas corpus. Upon his promise to 
marry the girl she was released from the In¬ 
dustrial school and they lived together until 
nine months ago. They had numerous quar¬ 
rels. On one occasion Goodman shot the 
woman in the arm, and at another time she 
stabbed him in the abdomen, inflicting a 
wound which confined him to bed for six 
weeks. 

Among other things Goodman was inter¬ 
ested in politics and was a member of the 
Crescent Club, During the political cam¬ 
paign of 1889 he created a sensation by de¬ 
serting the regular ticket and appearing on 
the stage with the fusionists at the Con¬ 
cordia Opera House on the night of October 
20 with Mr. John K. Cowen and Bill Harig. 


He made a speech, in which he said that he 
had been taught revolution for four months 
past in the Cresent Society by its president, 
J. Frank Morrison. Then he said: “Mr. 
Cowen sent for me and accused me of what I 
knew I was guilty of. He asked me in a very 
abrupt way if I was not a ballot-box stuffer. 
He asked me if I would come to this meeting 
and confess my political sins. I said I would.” 
Goodman said he did good work for Mr. Gor¬ 
man in 1879, and told how he made an expe¬ 
dition to Howard county at the election in 
1879 with forty repeaters, all armed, and 
scared the colored voters by firing pistols. 
Two days later the following record of Charlie 
Goodman was published as an advertisement 
in The Sun. 

Charles Goodman, October 17, 1866—Arrested on 
bench warrant for threatening to shoot Samuel 
Warner. 

October 17,1866—Snapping a pistol and threaten¬ 
ing to shoot Samuel Warner. 

December 11,1866—Assault with intent to murder. 

February 21, 1867—Rioting. 

February 27,1868—Assault. 

October 2, 1868—Assault on D. A. Jenkins. 

December 9, 1868—Larceny. 

December 26, 1868—Assault on .Samuel C. Wade. 

August 31,1869—Assault. 

September 9,1869—Assault (two cases.) 

September 7, 1869—Assault with intent to kill A. C. 
Williamson. 

February 20, 1870—Assault with intent to kill; 
sentenced to four years in penitentiary. Second 
case, same charge, stetted. 

January 2, 1873—Returning to state contrary to 
terms of pardon. Afterward pardoned again. 

December 19, 187.3—Assault and destroying prop¬ 
erty. 

December 19,1873—Destroying property. 

May 2, 1874—Assault to kill; returned non est un¬ 
til September 2,1876, when return of cipi was made; 
case stetted December 22,1877. 

August 26, 1878—Assault. 

December 20, 1878—Cruelty to animals. 

November 26,1880—Sunday law. 

June 17,1880—Sunday law. 

January, 1881—Sunday liquor. 

September 28,1883—Assault to kill. 

January 17,1885—Assault. 

October 24, 1885—Assault. 

October 30,1885—Assault to kill. 

Not long after the election of 1889 Goodman 
was appointed to a position on the Chesapeake 
and Ohio canal [Gorman spoil.—Ed. 
Chronicle] where he remained until a short 
time before the election of 1891, when he re¬ 
turned to Baltimore and rejoined the regu¬ 
lars. 


The association at once protested against a 
policy which, however gratifying it may be to 
partisan rapacity, is evidently hostile to In¬ 
dian interests,—a policy which removes re¬ 
sponsibility for the right management of 
the service from the department in Wash¬ 
ington, where it belonged — a department 
that could be held accountable for results— 
and diffuses it among a multitude of irrespon¬ 
sible men fifteen hundred to three thousand 
miles distant; which subjected the Indian to 
local influences in many cases manifestly hos¬ 
tile, and confined the selection of agents who 
possess almost autocratic powers over him to 
localities often permeated with a hostile sen¬ 
timent. But protests against this policy—the 


spoils system in a concentrated and most ob¬ 
jectionable form—were even less effective than 
our remonstrances under the previous admin¬ 
istration. The proscription of agents appoint¬ 
ed under President Cleveland was conducted 
with such neatness and dispatch that so long 
ago as last winter but a single democratic 
agent owing his commission to him remained 
in the service! If we are correctly informed, 
there is to-day not one such agent left to bear 
witness to the fact that there ever was such a 
thing as a democratic president! The policy 
complained of was not long in giving proof of 
its evil nature by its evil fruit. Agents of in¬ 
telligence and high character, in cases known 
to us, were removed to make way for the 
henchmen of local politicians—men who were 
manifestly inferior to their predecessors,whose 
administration has witnessed a steady decline 
in the condition of their agencies, and where 
in two instances serious complaints have been 
made by the leading progressive Indians on 
the reservations.— From the last Annual Report 
Indian Rights Commission. 

One obection is frequently raised to the re¬ 
form system which has weight with many 
friends of pure government; that is, that the 
system will create a bureaucracy. There is a 
certain measure of plausibility about this to 
the extent that continued office holding tends 
to produce routine methods. But whenever 
my mind inclines to be impressed by this ar¬ 
gument, it is promptly recalled to the condi¬ 
tions under the spoils system by a pen picture 
drawn by Josiah Quincy in the early part of 
the century: 

“ Why, sir, we hear the clamor of the craving 
animals at the treasury trough here in this capitol. 
Such running, such jostling, such wriggling, such 
clambering over one another’s backs, such squealing 
because the tub is so narrow and the company so 
crowded.” 

And lest this may seem the idea of an old- 
fashioned theorist and purist, I say to you 
that only two years ago I read what purported 
to be the utterances of a prominent politician, 
in which, as I remember it, he used the same 
figure of speech, and complaining of the 
slowness of removals, demanded that the 
hungry hogs be given speedier access to the 
swill-trough. 

The al ternative is presented—a “bureau” 
or a “trough.” Which is the most desirable? 
For my own part, even if the danger is what 
it is pictured, which I do not believe, I prefer 
a bureaucracy to a trough-ocracy.— From an 
Address of Charles Cluflin .Allen, President of the 
Civil Service Reform Association before the Office 
Men's Club. 


William G. Low, brother of President Low 
of Columbia, has sent to the college an offer, 
which has been accepted, to give a prize of 
$100, for the best essay on civil service reform. 
The award will be made in the spring. 

Lemoohe, Cal., February 3,1892. 

Civil Service Chronicle: I think my subscription ex¬ 
pired with the year past. As I desire not to lose one 
number of your high-charactered little journal, 1 
herewith enclose postal note. W. S. Cunningham. 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


S09 




Heretofore it has been the custom in Newburg to 
call the primaries for the county convention, which 
elects delegates to the state convention, about ten 
days before the date of the latter. Under the new 
ballot-reform law forty-eight hours’ notice is re¬ 
quired. Our citizens observed in town on Sunday 
a number of employes of Sing Sing prison, who owe 
their positions to the fact that they are heelers of Warden 
‘ ‘ Bill ’ ’ Brown. Politicians of bothparties promptly con¬ 
cluded that some of Gov. Hill’s dirty political linen 
was to be washed, and that Brown had sent his heel 
ers to prepare the laundry. Before night all the New- 
burgers whom Brown has taken care of in Sing Sing, 
to the number of a dozen, were here to the neglect 
, of their ofl9cial duties. They have remained over to- 
"day and will be with us to-morrow. In the mean¬ 
time people are asking: “Who is running the pris¬ 
on?’’ and “What is going to be done about it?’’ 
Everybody knows what this battalion of heelers is 
here for, namely, to carry the primaries which have 
been so suddenly called to-night to be held to-morrow 
and Wednesday, in the interest of Gov. Hill, and to 
elect Hill delegates to the Saratoga convention, who 
in turn will elect a state committeeman for Hill. 
The fact was further emphasized this afternoon when 
Brown himself swaggered into town. Within five 
minutes he was surrounded by his henchmen, the 
most prominent among them being “Dave” Craw¬ 
ford, “Tommy” Ray, the notorious “Gil” Crissey, 
who was chief clerk of the post-office when Brown 
was postmaster; “Jack” Glynn, “Teddy ’’Ford, aud 
the noted “ Ed ” Brown, who was made purchasing 
agent at the prison at a salary of $1,200 a year and 
perquisites—a merry lot taken altogether. They ob¬ 
sequiously reported that “things was fixed,” as they 
expressed it. Brown’s programme is to hold the pri¬ 
maries in the first and second wards to-morrow 
night, and in the third and fourth wards Wednes¬ 
day. The better class of democrats deprecate this 
sudden call, and express their disgust that the poli¬ 
tics of this county should be in tbe hands of “ such 
a man as Brown,” as the general expression goes. 
Heretofore the rule has been to call the primaries 
about ten days before the meeting of the state con¬ 
vention, but Brown, inspired with the fear of opposi¬ 
tion, anticipated the old custom and set the call 
three weeks before the date of the convention.—AVio- 
burg, N. Y., Dispatchto Neiv York Times, Aug. 24,1891. 
* « 

Warden Brown of Sing Sing prison has had a hard 
time of it this week, and his face wore anything but 
a contented look as he stepped into the court-house 
in this city to-day, accomi anied by his right bower. 
Clerk Gilbert R. Orissy of Sing Sing prison. The dem¬ 
ocrats of the first assembly district of Orange county 
were in session there to elect delegates to the state 
convention. Brown and his Sing Sing horde were 
here two weeks ago, at the time of electing delegates 
to the several conventions, and intimidated the anti- 
Brown following to such an extent thai there was a 
fight in only one ward, and that he finally captured. 
— Newburg, N. Y., Dispatch to New York Times, Feb. 14. 

When Chairman Watson announced the result on 
a motion to allow only delegates to vote, one of the 
Hill men walked up to him and, shaking his fist in 
his face, yelled, “It’s a lie! It’s a lie!” Another 
Hill man sprang forward to attack Watson, but was 
seized by others and held back. A fight seemed im¬ 
minent. The crowd surged back and forth, over¬ 
turning chairs and tables, and gesticulating wildly. 
When Chairman Watson appointed the secretaries 
another riot occurred, the crowd pushing and pull¬ 
ing each other about and driving the chairmen from 
their seats. Then Bancroft, the Hill chairman, ap¬ 
pointed a committee on credentials, despite the pro¬ 
tests of the anti-Hill men, who cried: “ Give us a 
fair show!” This committee reported, of course, in 
favor of the Hill delegation from Penfield, and then 
the Hill faction went ahead and elected a delegation 
to the state convention.— Rochester, N. Y., Dispatch to 
New York Times, August 25,1891. 


The unanimous acquiescence of the democratic 
state committee in Senator Hill’s plan for a raid-win¬ 
ter convention. Boss McLaughlin, of Brooklyn, join¬ 
ing with the other members in voting for it, shows 
that Mr. Hill has overcome all opposition to himself 
inside his party machine. How he has overcome it 
is not known, but it is a curious coincidence that the 
submission of McLaughlin to his wishes was accompa¬ 
nied by the appearance in the senate at Albany last night 
of a bill which, if it becomes a law, will restore to Mc¬ 
Laughlin the control of the Brooklyn bridge which Tam¬ 
many took away from him some time ago. The loss of 
the bridge has been the chief cause of McLaughlin’s 
hostility to Mr. Hill, and he has more than once 
made the return of it a eoudition of his further sup 
port of Hill’s plans. If the proposed Bridge Bill is 
allowed to pass through the Hill-Tammany legisla¬ 
ture, that fact willbe pretty conclusive evidence that 
McLaughlin has got his “terms.”—AVw York Evening 
Post. 

* 

All this programme was foreshadowed in these 
dispatches, a few days ago. Gov. Hill keenly real¬ 
izes that his chances are desperate, and in spite of 
precedent and of the protests that he has received 
from prominent democrats, in spite of reason and of 
sound judgment, he is determined to force on the 
party a “snap” convention in midwinter, when 
many of the roads are impassable, and when it will 
be well nigh Impossible for the people of the 
country districts to attend the primaries whtre 
the delegates will be chosen, thu8 enabling 
the “bosses” to choose their own delegates 
in their own way and without opposition. 

Coming within twenty-four hours after Gov.Flower 
had affixed his signature to the enumeration bill, 
the real significance of the hurry to pass that meas¬ 
ure now becomes thoroughly manifest. For a 
week before the convention is held, and during the lime it 
is held, the 5,300 enumerators who are to be selected by 
Secretary of State Frank Rice will be engaged in their 
labors—a formidable army of politicians who will e.ecrt no 
little influence, even in those counties where the honest, 
andwtll-grounded opposition to Hill is strongest. The 
passage of that bill, the gag-law that was applied in 
the senate, the precipitate haste of Gov. Flower to 
sign it without giving to it that attention and scrut¬ 
iny which a bill of its importance demands, stand 
forth now in the light of a conspiracy against the 
state, and in the interest of as desperate a gang of 
freebooters as ever ran a political machine.—A’ew 
York Times, January 22. 

tit ^ * 

The names of the enumerators for all the other 
sections of the state were transmitted to Senator Hill 
at his headquarters in this city for his personal inspec¬ 
tion, before they were agreed upon. If the senator ap¬ 
proved of the lists, they were turned over to the sec¬ 
retary of state, with the former’s indorsement. In 
case any of the appointees were found unsatisfactory 
by Senator Hill, who wants none but political 
hangers-on or ward heelers to serve as enumerators, 
the names of the undesirable candidates were 
stricken from the lists, and the local leader was di¬ 
rected to select others. Evidently Hill is not easily 
satisfied in this particular, for it is said that the sec 
retary of state has been kept busy revising the 
“official” lists of enumerators, in accordance with 
instructions receive*! continually from the senator.— 
New York Evening Post, Feb. 10. 

The fact that Secretary Rice refused to give 
out the names of the enumerators shows,more¬ 
over, that this census is to be taken by a close 
corporation, which works on tbe principle 
that the census is not the public’s business.— 
New York Eve.ning Post, Feb. 16 . 

* >,t 

The county democratic convention was held at 
Horseheads to-day, and was one of the liveliest ever 
held in this county. Ale.r.andria C. Eustace, the State 
committeeman and civil service commissioner, as was 
expected, worked things under the instructions of his 
party boss, Senator D. B. Hill, to suit himself. John 


B. Stanchfield, one of Hill’s lieutenants, was chosen 
chairman. The committee on contested delegates 
reported in favor of the Eustace delegates. This oc¬ 
casioned a bitter feeling, and the anti-Eustace men 
expressed their feelings in the most vigorous lan¬ 
guage .—Elmira Dispatch to New York 'Limes, Feb. 


The early call of the New York State Democratic 
Convention to choose delegates to the national con¬ 
vention is in a measure having the eftect it was in¬ 
tended to have in Connecticut. The call for the 
state convention here has not been issued, but the 
Hill men are as industriously at work all over the 
state as if the Connecticut convention was to be co¬ 
incident with the one in Albany. They have 
picked out their candidates for delegates to the na¬ 
tional convention in every county in the state, and 
are strengthening their lines in all directions. Here 
in New Haven the candidate for county delegate who rep¬ 
resents Hill and Hillism is Alexander Troup, who has 
more than once been repudiated by the democrats 
of his own town, and who will be repudiated again. 
In published communications Troup has declared 
that he wears no man’s collar (perhaps he doesn’t 
since William H. Barnum died), and that if chosen 
as a delegate he will act for the best interests of the 
party. He dare not say that he is opposed to Cleve¬ 
land—he filled a federal office under Cleveland—and 
he is careful not to say that he is opposed to Hill. 
But it is not necessary that he should announce his 
preference. Everybody knows that he is working 
for Hill. He believes in and practices the Hill kind 
of politics. He is a spoilsman of the spoilsmen, 
holding rigidly to the motto “ to the victors belong 
the spoils.” He publicly scoffed at President Cleve¬ 
land’s civil service reform declarations while hold¬ 
ing an office in the Cleveland administration which 
Chairman Barnum demanded for him. And if he 
can not have all the spoils he is willing to divide.— 
New Haven Dispatch to New York Times, Feb. 8. 

<< 

Tammany shows its customary defiance of decent 
public sentiment by forcing the board of police jus¬ 
tices to appoint the Hon. John P. Keating clerk of 
the court of special sessions. Keating was indicted by 
the grand jury in 1890 for extorting money from prisoners 
as warden of Ludlow street jail, and was compelled to re¬ 
sign that position. There was never any doubt about 
his guilt. Henry S. Ives testified that he had, while 
confined for fourteen months in the jail, paid Keat¬ 
ing $10,000 for special privileges. Another civil pris¬ 
oner testified that he had paid Keating twenty dol¬ 
lars for the privilege of going about the city in charge 
of a keeper. The indictments against Keating were dis. 
missed on the recommendation of the Hon. John R. Fel¬ 
lows, and Keating was soon after appointed to a city 
court clerkship. Now he goes a step higher and se¬ 
cures a place with a salary of $6,000 a year. He owes 
his steady progress, in spite of all exposures as to his 
character, to the friendship of the Hon. Richard Cro- 
ker, he being the Tammany leader in Croker’s dis¬ 
trict.—New York Evening Post, Jan. 26. 

<■ <■ « 

Gov. Flower’s appointment of Isaac H. Maynard as 
a judge of the court of appeals is recognized by the 
democratic press as so indefensible that they receive 
it in silence. There Is nothing in his career to com¬ 
mend him for this exalted position. He has been a 
politician of the "pernicious activity” kind for 
nearly twenty years. He began as a member of the 
assembly from Delaware county, and though his 
skill as a politician was sufficient to get him elective 
office in that county he has never been able to com¬ 
mand popular support in the state at large. He was 
elected county judge and surrogate there in 1877, 
and his service on that bench constitutes his entire 
judicial experience. He was the democratic candi¬ 
date for secretary of state in 1883, and was defeated, 
running behind his ticket. He then secured the ap¬ 
pointment of deputy attorney-general at Albany, 
and in 1885 Secretary Manning appointed him second 
comptroller in the treasury department at Washing- 























310 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


ton. Secretary Faircnild promoted him to lire post 
of assistant secretary, and in that position he origin¬ 
ated the bOKUs “ sugar fraud” charges against offi¬ 
cials in the New York custom house and used them 
as an excuse for making fifteen removals. We 
charged him with the responsibility for this per 
forniance, and he telegraphed to us denying the 
charge and demanding proof. An investigation was 
held by a committee of the senate, and the charge 
was sustained, Mr. Maynard failing to appear in his 
own defence. The “sugar frauds” were subse- 
<iuently shown to be entirely bogus, the officials re¬ 
moved and assailed by Maynard were exonerated, 
and the Boston Advertiser, which repeated Maynard’s 
charges against one of the accused, has recently 
paid $1,000 damages as a compromise to prevent 
further legal proceedings in a suit for damages in 
which the jury gave a verdict of $12,500 against the 
jiaper. 

* «! 

After his departure from the treasury department 
with this record, Mr. Maynard was appointed again 
deputy attorney-general at Albany. When the 
democratic state convention met last summer, he 
appeared before it as Governor Hill's candidate for 
attorney-general, but found so little encouragement 
for his claims that he left town before the balloting 
tiegan, and his name was not presented to the con¬ 
vention. When Governor Hill began his campaign Jor 
the control of the senate, after election, Mr. Maynard acted 
as his ally and agent in instigating the county ca7ivass- 
ing boards to the various fraudulent proceedings which 
c%dminated in the theft of the Dutchess county-seat by the 
.state board of canvassers. He was the recognized “coun¬ 
sel” of the Onondaga and Dutchess C07inty canvassing 
boards, in which the most outrageous frauds tvere com¬ 
mitted. His activity m this work is universally ad- 
milled to have constituted his chief claim to the present 
appointment, and Governor Flower is generally regarded 
as using a court of appeals judgeship as payment for a 
political debt.—New York Evening Post, Jan. 20. 

);« 

The favored candidate for superintendent of pub- 
lie instruction was a man that not more than five 
members had ever heard of before last Saturday and 
whom less than five had ever seen. He has made no 
canvass, written no letters, applied for no support. 
Beyond the confines of Erie county he had no repu¬ 
tation. There whatever reputation he had was that 
of a politician. At the eleventh hour, when the 
other half dozen candidates imagined the contest 
would be awarded on its merits, the name of Mr. 
Crooker of Erie is sprung, and the members of the 
legislature are informed by Lieut. Gov. Sheehan and 
Senator Hill that they must support him. Many of the 
members are indignant and express their feelings 
openly. Others are angry and conceal it; all are dis¬ 
gusted more or less, but hesitate to say so. 

James F. Crooker has been superintendent of educa¬ 
tion in Buffalo for ten years or more. The office is 
an elective one. its term being two years. Mr. 
Crooker is and always has been, a stanch democrat, 
and Buffalo is, in the main, a republican city, but 
Mr. Crooker has been re elected so many times that 
the republicans have about made up their minds 
that it is useless to nominate a man against him. 
This condition of things is not due to Mr. Crooker’s 
popularity, but to his adroit disposition of the im¬ 
mense patronage at his disposal. Early in his career 
Mr. Crooker catered to the local political bosses in 
the distribution of his “patronage.” He then formed 
an alliance with “ Jack ” White, the republican boss 
of the first ward which has never been broken. For 
years it has been a public scandal in Buffalo that 
“Jack ” White could get anybody that he chose into 
the public schools as a teacher. White is an illiterate 
b»it shrewd man, who has represented his ward in 
the common council for the last sixteen or eighteen 
years consecutively. He is one of the few men who 
control the republican machine in Erie county, and 
he openly works for Crooker’s election, no matter 
who the candidate of his own party may be. So 
powerful is he that no republican leader has even 
suggested that he be disciplined. He is a Barney 
Biglin sort of a man and his followers cling to him 
because he “ takes care of them.”—New York Times, 
February 10. 


Gov. Hill’s action, it is well understood, was polit¬ 
ical. The fish commissioners have the appointment of fif¬ 
teen fish and game protectors, and strong efforts have been 
made to convert the protective system into a part of the 
political machine. The commissioners have ignored 
politics; they have been governed in their appoint¬ 
ments solely by an earnest desire to maintain an effi¬ 
cient service. Their only purpose has been to pro¬ 
tect the game and the fish and to increase the sup¬ 
ply. As public-spirited officers, serving without pay, 
they have acknowledged allegiance to neither dem¬ 
ocrat nor republican ; and they have never consid¬ 
ered an employe’s politics, nor the political bearing 
of his employment in their service. This independ¬ 
ent attitude they have maintained in the face of con¬ 
stant importunings by those in authority to appoint, 
for political reasons, unworthy applicants. This step 
—the summary ousting of a faithful, upright, and in¬ 
dependent public servant from a position of trust to 
make the office and its Incumbent a subservient fac¬ 
tor—is an unmistakable and shameless declaration 
that the fish-culture interests of the state of New 
York are to be sacrificed to political ends. We are to 
have, not game protectors, but ward heelers; the in¬ 
crease of the food-fish supply is to be subordinated 
to the satisfying of partisan greed.—F’cresfaJid Stream, 
January, 1892, on Removal of Fish Commissioner Eugene 
G. Blackford. 

lit 

Senator Hill’s endeavors to turn the state fishery 
commission into a political machine have at last 
been rewarded with success. It was only a short 
time ago that, as governor, he removed from the 
commission its most valued member, Eugene G. 
Blackford, and appointed in his place David G. 
Hackney, a professional politician, whose only rec¬ 
ommendation for the place was that he was a politi¬ 
cal friend of Hill’s. At that time Henry Burden, of 
Troy, another valuable member of the board, pre¬ 
pared his letter of resignation. He was induced to 
put off sending it, but a day or two ago he decided 
to remain a commissioner no longer and sent the 
following letter to Gov. Flower: 

i.' “ In the two and one-half years that I have 

been on the commission, the question of politics 
has not entered into the few appointments we have 
had to make, and I think I voice the sentiment of all 
my former associates on the board that it should 
be kept out, as we recognize the fact that its efficien¬ 
cy would be destroyed if other than fitness and 
merit should control our appointments. I regret to 
say that our freedom of action has been somewhat 
hampered of late by politicians and state officials 
high in authority. The work of the commission is 
of such a nature that it can not be made a political 
machine without destroying its usefulness. 

“ As we receive no salary, I had a personal pride 
that our work should be conducted as one would his 
private business, that is, to give the people the best 
possible results with the means at our command. 
In view of the above facts, I can not consistently 
longer remain a member of this board.” 

Mr. Burden has taken the greatest interest in his 
duties. He is an enthusiastic fisherman, and 
anything relating to fi.sh or fi.sh culture is his de¬ 
light. It was largely through his efforts that the 
legislature empowered the construction of the three 
fishways in the Hudson river. He had charge, also, of 
the Sacondaga fish hatchery, and he was interested in 
the construction of a fish car for the distribution of 
fish. His intention was to have it fitted with a shad 
hatching plant.— New York Times, January 20. 

There is not a decent man in the city, of either 
party, who is not ashamed of the exhibition of Hill’s 
boomers at Albany. A gentleman who has known 
the ex-governor for twenty-five years, and who was 
present when the rabble called upon him, says that 
Mr. Hill has broken his anti-swearing record; that 
when he was accosted by the hungry mob he caused 
the air to become blue with copper-lined oaths, his 
wrath being generally turned upon the managers of 
the excursion. A large crowd was at the station to 
“view the remains” of wrecked humanity as the ex¬ 
cursion train rushed into the station here at nine 
o’clock this morning. The toughs were in a stupor, 
many of them hatless, and there were few whose 


cheap hats were not smashed into the appearance of 
Chinese lanterns. Several fights had taken place, 
and cuts and bruises adorned the faces of some of the 
men. At the station a lively scrimmage took place, 
and several of the mob were locked up. The banners 
looked as if they had been through a cyclone, 
and as a whole a more woebegone aggregation of 
mortals never stepped off a train in this city. An in¬ 
spection of the empty cars revealed a disgusting state 
of things. The floors and seats were completely lit¬ 
tered, and empty bottles were everywhere to be seen. 
It is scarcely necessary to say that the senator is sorry 
that he chartered and paid for the train that carried 
his political puppets to the state capital.— Elmira 
Dispatch to New York T imes, Feb. 24. 


FACTS DISCERNIBLE AFAR OFF 
WITH THE NAKED EYE. 

“ We make no excuses, offer no apolo¬ 
gies, ask no suspension of jiulgment. We 
say, investigate, scrutinize, take our word 
for nothingbut atar otF, or near at hand, 
with glass or naked eye, examine what lias 
been done in great things and little things, 
and on such examination pass judgment. 
■» * * —Attorney General Miller, at Phila¬ 

delphia, Febrtiary 12, 1892. 

Senator Quay is as frank and open in his 
methods as Senator Hill. He says of the 
'Pennsylvania delegation, which he is now 
“packing” for personal use in the National 
Republican convention, that it will not be 
committed to any candidate, but will go to 
Minneapolis as a “Quay delegation,and thativhen 
he gels on the ground with it he will look the field 
over, and see what to do with his men.—Neiv York 
Evening Post, February 15. 

■5}:* sif 

It affords the Ledger as much satisfaction to 
announce this morning the withdrawal of Mr. 
John Field’s resignation of the office of post¬ 
master of Philadelphia asitwill givegratifica- 
tion to his fellow-citizens, especdally to those 
of the active business community, to be au¬ 
thoritatively informed of its withdrawal. A 
few months ago it became an open secret that 
the practical politicians, who had strenuously 
opposed Mr. h'ield’s appointment, were en¬ 
croaching upon his official authority, and in¬ 
terfering with his sagacious and efficient man¬ 
agement. The pressure of this political force 
became greater and greater upon the post¬ 
master, until, at last, he was obliged to recog¬ 
nize that he was no longer untrammelled, no 
longer able to conduct the affairs of the post- 
office in accordance with the same just and in¬ 
telligent principles as those upon which his 
business as a merchant was conducted. Recog¬ 
nizing then that, in respect of his own good 
fame, he could not continue to occupy a posi¬ 
tion of public trust in which his capacity for 
usefulness to the community of business was 
already impaired and likely to be destroyed, 
and his own good faith likely to be impugned, 
Mr. Field tendered his resignation of it. Sub¬ 
sequently, on Saturday evening, Mr. Field 
was induced to withdraw his resignation. It 
is scarcely necessary to assure those who know 
him that he has consented to remain post¬ 
master only upon condition that he shall be 
in fact and deed the postmaster, with absolute 
authority to conduct the affairs of the office 
in harmony with his sense of duty to the pub¬ 
lic, and with his long and honorable record of 
devotion to the welfare of his fellow-citizens, 
regardless of the selfish interests of the practi¬ 
cal politicians .—Philadelphia Ledger,Fehruai-y 1. 
»!« 

The republicans of Pennsylvania are choosing 
delegates to a state convention w’hich is to nomi¬ 
nate a candidate for justice of the .supreme court. 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


311 


Among ilie delegates already elected in Philadelphia are 
three appraisers who were indicted for their complicity in 
the Bardsleyfrauds. Two magistrates in the same city 
hare also been nominated for re-election by the republi¬ 
cans who admitted before the council's committee that they 
permitted Bardsley to retain portions of the costs and 
fees when a settlement was made with him for the delin¬ 
quent mercantile taxes of 1890, the reason for their 
payment of tribute being the outrageous costs which 
thy had themselves piled up, one of them having 
charged $8.76 for each dollar taken in, and the other 
extorting $36 for the collection of $1.—iVew York Even 
ing Post, Jan. 21. 

♦ * jIt 

John Collins, leader of the fourth assembly 
district, started the discussion. He said that 
something should be done at once to get the 
republican workers something to do. He 
raised the old cry and declared that it was an 
outrage that so many democrats were retained 
in the federal offices. He said that he had 
gone to Secretary of the Navy Tracy, to get 
him to put some democrats out of the navy 
yard and that'while the secretary didn’t ab¬ 
solutely refuse to do so, he left it to be inferred 
that he would do nothing of the kind. 

Mr. Collins complained bitterly that demo¬ 
crats were employed in the post-office, in the 
public stores, and in the custom house as well 
as in the navy yard. He believed that the ne¬ 
cessities of the republican party made it im¬ 
perative that a change should be made and 
that at once. He also complained that those 
who were most successful in getting places for 
republicans were men who did not mingle with 
the men who got the votes and who did all the 
hard work for the republican party. Every 
man who got a job had some big republican 
back of him. “ This social line must be 
broken down,” exclaimed Mr. Collins dramati¬ 
cally, thereby giving warning to the “silk 
stockings” that the “short hairs” were get¬ 
ting mad. 

Several other members of the executive com¬ 
mittee also spoke in the same vein. The dis¬ 
cussion was very animated at times. One 
speaker said that Bernard Biglin employed 
sixty men and that none of them belonged to 
the republican organization. He thought 
that all republicans should do what they could 
to secure employment for republican workers 
in or out of the federal service. It was charged 
that not only were democrats employed in the 
federal offices, but they were also employed by 
republican commissions and officers. 

George W. Wanmaker, therepublican lead¬ 
er of the seventeenth assembly district, advised 
the appointment of a committee of five to go 
to Washington and call on Secretary of the 
Treasury Foster with a view to ascertaining 
what could be done toward getting the demo¬ 
crats out. Another leader said: “This com¬ 
mittee should call on everybody and get every 
democrat out.” Mr. Wanmaker insisted that 
the republican workers should be provided for. 
He said ; “ Unless this is done we shall go un¬ 
der in 1892 .” 

John H. Gunner, leader of the republicans 
in the twenty-second district, also argued on 
this line. He said that he had succeeded in 
getting a sweeper appointed in the post-office, 
and that when he made an effort to get this 


sweeper promoted, instead of being promoted 
the sweeper was discharged. Then, to appease 
Mr. Gunner, Postmaster Van Cott appointed a 
woman scrubber. The postmaster was in¬ 
formed by Mr. Gunner that he had no woman 
in his district that could vote, — Meeting of the 
Executive Committee of the Republican County 
Committee, New York Times, November 19 . 

* <c ft 

The republicans of Brooklyn will have the 
satisfaction of seeing Quarantine Commissioner 
John A. Nichols and Port Warden William H. 
Leaycraft put out of office. The former was 
agpointed ten years ago by Gov. Cornell, and 
he has been holding over ever since by grace 
of Thomas C. Platt and the latter’s senators. 
Although the salary is not a large one, Nichols 
has managed to become a well-to-do man since 
he came from Baltimore fifteen years ago, and 
rumor has it that he made his money in the 
rag-disinfecting ring, in which E, B, Bartlett 
and he were interested. It was these men who 
took Ernst Nathan under their united wings, 
and put him forward as a local boss. The re¬ 
sult has been apparent, and there are very few 
republicans who will shed tears over Nichols’s 
decapitation, Leaycraft was also appointed 
by Governor Cornell in 1882 , and he has been 
holding over through Platt’s friendship. His 
office is run on the fee system, and Leaycraft 
claims to have netted between $ 3,000 and $ 4 ,- 
000 a year out of it. His work has never been 
exacting, and rarely requires his personal at¬ 
tention. His time in winter is spent in Albany 
as a “cavalrymin,” and is said to be very pop¬ 
ular with the legislators, and to have exercised 
considerable “persuasive” powers. It is 
hinted that he and Israel P. Fischer, republi¬ 
can state committeeman, are going to organize 
a firm to deal in legislative privileges. They 
have both made arrangements to be in Albany 
all winter.— New York Times, January 
<« << 

Port Warden William H. Leaycraft has be¬ 
gun to realize that he must soon walk the 
plank and make room for some good demo¬ 
crat, so he is spending all his time in Wash¬ 
ington trying to hunt up a profitable job in 
the treasury department. Reports received 
by his friends indicate that he will succeed. 
Leaycraft is very much like Major “Billy” 
Barker, not only in personal appearance, but 
in his ability to get a job at almost any time. 
He is the boss of a very small section of 
Brooklyn, the thirteenth ward, and is always 
on the side of the candidate who has most 
clearly followed lago’s advice to “put money 
in thy purse,” and he has done as much as any 
other man except Ernst Nathan to give the 
democratic ring 20,000 majority in Kings 
county. Yet he can always get a job .—New 
York Times, Februai-y 7. 

ijt * 

An effort is being made by some senators 
who want certain appointments to the circuit 
and district courts to delay confirming the ju¬ 
dicial nominations pending till the President 
has not only filled the circuit court vacancies 
existing, but also the vacancies which may be 
created by appointments to circuits. The pur¬ 
pose of such a movement is plain. It is to 
force the President to yield to the demands of 
senators in making appointments, or suffer the 
penalty of an alliance with democrats for the 


purpose of defeating pending nominations.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
January 12 , 

ft ft ft 

Patronage, spelled with capital letters, has been 
an engrossing topic in Washington to-day. How 
could itbe otherwise, with ten stalwart patronage- 
hunters from New York city in town? Mr. Jacob 
M. Patterson mustered his braves quite early this 
morning. The number had been increased by sev¬ 
eral New Yorkers who did not get here with the 
main body last night, and comprised representa¬ 
tives of ten out of the twenty four assembly districts 
in New York city. This is the way the delegation 
lined up at the Arlington' Hotel previous to the 
opening of hostilities: . - 

J. M. Patterson, tenth district. 

M. J. Healy, first district. 

Charles F. Murray, third district. 

John Simpson, sixth district. 

John R. Nugent, fourteenth district. 

R. A. Greacen, fifteenth district. 

George W. Wanmaker (not Wanamaker), seven¬ 
teenth di.strict. 

Bernard Biglin, eighteenth district. 

Michael Goode, twentieth district. 

All these men had come to Washington to further 
a preconcerted plan to a.sk the administration for 
more patronage for republicans in the city of New 
York. About 11 o’clock the procession started for 
the White House. The President had been warned 
of the coming invasion and was fully prepared to 
receive the place-seekers. They were ushered into 
his presence without delay, and in about fifteen 
minutes he was made fully actiuainted with the 
object of their call. Mr. Patterson acted as spokes¬ 
man and introduced the gentlemen to the President. 
Mr. Harrison was already acquainted with Mr. 
Biglin and one or two others of the party. They 
had been to see him before on similar errands. The 
position of the New York republicans was fully set 
forth by Patterson and Biglin. The party, they said, 
was on the eve of a great struggle. They believed 
that victory could be won in the state of New York 
if the republicans adopted the right tactics. The 
democrats were torn by dissensions, and the recent 
acts of David B. Hill had done much to make repub¬ 
lican success possible. In the city it was hard to 
contend against Tammany and its enormous re¬ 
sources in the shape of party patronage. Patronage 
was necessary to party organization, and party 
organization was necessary if victory was to 
be had at the polls. There were in the employment 
of the government in New York city many demo¬ 
crats who were appointed by the last admintstra- 
tion. Their places ought to be filled by republicans. 
The sight of democrats holding office under a repub¬ 
lican administration was repugnant to old-time re¬ 
publicans, who believed that victory should carry 
with it all the spoils consistent with good govern¬ 
ment. While the delegation believed in the civil 
service law (everybody looked solemn at this 
juncture), there were many places which this law 
did not cover, and these were the ones the republi¬ 
cans coveted. 

The interview came to an end at last, and the 
delegation marched from the White House to the 
treasury department. Secretary Foster had been ap¬ 
prised of its coming and was “in.” For fifteen min¬ 
utes he listened to the tale of woe. However much 
he may have sympathized with the object of the 
visit, he was exceedingly circumspect, and no man 
in the party could say afterward that he had prom¬ 
ised to do anything definite. “He talked about the 
outlook for the party, and even discussed the sub- 
jecs of turning the democrats out, but he didn’t say 
positively that anything would be done,” said the 
republican quoted above. "He promised to talk 
the matter over with the President, and we had to 
be content with this.” The delegation went back to 
the Arlington, and spent the remainder of the day 
there comparing notes. Theodore Roosevelt, of the 
civil service commission, is the man whose scalp 
they deem necessary to the furtherance of their 
plan. Nothing about Mr. Roosevelt was .said to the 
President or to Secretary Foster, but some very 
broad hints were let fall. On this subject one of the 
delegation, who has exercised a controlling voice in 
its movements, said to-night: 














312 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


“Mr. Roosevelt aloue stands in the way of repub¬ 
lican occupancy of the offices we have come to 
Washington to see about. The civil service commission- 
ers, it is well known, have the power to make many rules 
which can be used to the detriment oj the parly in power 
if they so elect. Ur. Harrison could meet all our de¬ 
mands and strengthen himself ivith the party if he would 
remove Roosevelt and put in a man who would be willing 
to change the rules to suit the occasion. These are plain 
words, but they express our feelings exactly. Mr. 
Harrison needs only to look between the lines of 
our argument to-day to recognize our position as re¬ 
gards the civil service commission. If he docs this, 
and acts as we would like to have him do, he will be 
more favorably regarded by the members of the 
party at large.” 

The republican who made this utterance was cer¬ 
tainly in earnest, and there can be no question that 
he stands high in the ranks of the New York City 
members of the party. Perhaps the President did 
not “ look between the lines.” If not, this will be 
sufficient notice to him to do so. 

The offices which the delegation is after are 
greater in number than the general public imagines. 
To begin with, Mr. Patterson wants to be one of the 
commissioners provided for in the law controling the 
construction of the new custom house in New Y’ork. 
There are five of these commissioners to be appoint¬ 
ed by the secretary of the treasury, and they are to 
superintend the construction of the proposed new 
building. They are to be known as United States 
building commissioners and are to receive “a fair 
and reasonable compensation,” to be fixed by the 
secretary. Ex-governor McCormick of Arizona, now 
of Long Island, is another candidate for one of these 
commissionerships. There are many chief clerkships 
at $‘J,500 a year, which the republicans regard with 
covetous eyes. These are now tilled by democrats 
who are protected by the civil service law. It is 
claimed that they were placed on the classified list 
of the service some time before Mr. Cleveland retired 
from the presidency. Other places which are de¬ 
manded are those of the paymaster, the superin¬ 
tendent of weighers, superintendent of laborers in 
the public stores, and superintendent of warehouses. 
Then there are any number of deputy collectorships 
which the democrats now hold, carrying salaries 
which would handsomely support republican fami 
lies. Many of the “hold-overs,” it is said by the 
delegation to-night, are not protected by the civil 
service rules and might just as well be put out to 
make room for republicans and thus strengthen the 
hands of the administration. The leaders of the 
delegation professed to feel confident after their 
visits to the President and secretary of the treasury, 
that their mission would prove successful. Barney 
Biglin said he believed that the administration was 
disposed to do “what was right,” and he believed 
that in good time the rank and file would have no 
cause to complain of its action in regard to the 
offices at its disposal. He expresed the opinion that 
the republicans would win in New York state and 
the nation next fall. “You may say forme that I 
believe that Mr. Harrison will be the republican 
nominee, and that he will be elected.”—lPas/ii«yton 
Dispatch to New York Times, February 5. 

ifi };« >;t 

Kx-United States Marshall Louis F. Payn left here 
for New York this afternoon sore in spirit. He had 
come to Washington full of hope that he might carry 
away with him the fat contract he has been seeking 
for several months for his brother-in-law, Edward S. 
Mellen, for labor at the public stores in New York 
City, He had the indorsement of Thomas C. Platt, and 
Senator Hiscock had promised to aid him. Mr. Payn 
was duly introduced to Secretary Foster, and his 
plea and that of the big man from Syracuse were re¬ 
ceived. Then Mr. Foster refused to give him the 
contract. The refusal was so plainly the result of 
long consideration that Mr. Payn did not tarry in the 
presence of the Secretary. * * * 

All the New York republican patronage seekers, 
with the exception of Jacob M. Patterson and Ber¬ 
nard Biglin, left Washington for home this after¬ 
noon. These two gentlemen remain to see if they 
can not carry back with them the promise of Secre¬ 


tary Foster to make Patterson one of the five com¬ 
missioners to supervise the erection of the new cus¬ 
tom house and the appraisers’ stores. They called 
upon Mr. Foster again this afternoon and pressed 
the claim to the best of their ability. If they get 
away with their personal baggage they will do well. 
Tlie district leaders expressed themselves as not any 
too well satisfied with the outlook for more patron¬ 
age when they departed .—Dispatch to 
New York Times, Feb. 6. 

I <lo lift up a liearty prayer that wo iiuiy 
iievor liavo a rresideiit who will iiotoitlier 
pursue aiul coiupel his eahiiiet advisers to 
pursue the civil service policy pure and 
simple and upon a just basis, allowing: men 
accusetl to bts heard, and tleciding: ag:ainst 
them only upon competent proof and fairly 
—either have that kind of a civil service, 
or for Uotl’s sake let us have that other 
frank and hold, if brutal, methotl of turn¬ 
ing men and women out simply for political 
opinion. Let us have one or the other. 
They will not mingle. » * » — SeneUen' 
Benjamin Harrison, 1886. 

There is much excitement in political 
circles here. Some days ago, Signal Officer B. 
II. Bronson, who has been stationed at Char¬ 
lotte for a number of years, and has always 
been non-partisan, received a letter from the 
war department charging him with being a 
partisan, and with affiliating with democrats. 
Bronson wrote the department, demanding its in¬ 
formant. To-day he received a letter m reply, re¬ 
fusing to give the author of the charges and saying 
that to do so would implicate the republican party .— 
Charlotte, N. C., Dispatch to New Ym'k Times, 
June 7, 1891. 

Oen. G. J. Langdon, Elmira, N. Y.: 

My Dear Sir; Your favor of the 19th 
inst., is just received. I had already exam¬ 
ined with some care the papers on file in the 
postmaster general’s office relating to the El¬ 
mira postmastership, which were forwarded to 
the committee on post-offices and post-roads 
at the request of tlie chairman of the com¬ 
mittee. 

The charges against Dr. Flood, and upon 
which it is pretended his removal was based, 
are of the most trifling character, and are 
wholly unsupported by any evidence in cor¬ 
roboration of them. If charges of a similar 
character were made by any individual in 
somp matter not affecting the government of 
the United States, they-would not stand a mo¬ 
ment’s scrutiny. They deal only in vile innu¬ 
endo, and would not bear the light of the 
most superficial investigation. They were 
sufficient for the postmaster general of the 
United States; they would not be sufficient for 
any fair man. 

The inspectors, and there were two of them, 
commenced their work as early as May last, 
although Dr. Flood’s final removal was not 
requested until December 9th. The result of 
their efforts was as follows : 

They discovered an apparent shortage of 
S39, which upon explanation is shown to be 
no shortage at all. 

The statement by two letter carriers that 
when some question was coming up as to vot¬ 
ing a twenty thousand-dollar loan, and upon 
one other occasion. Dr. Flood asked the car¬ 
riers to canvass their routes. 

That he belongs to a corrupt political 
ring. 

The statement by another physician that 
on one occasion—date not given—the doctor 
was about to amputate a limb without first 
applying torniquet, thereby endangering the 


patient’s life, and that his assistant inter¬ 
fered to prevent it. 

That the doctor belonged to a social club, 
where there was some drinking, and that it 
was “suspected” he was gambling. 

The course pursued in the removal of Dr. 
Flood is in exact accordance with the methods 
of the post-office department, as they have 
been elsewhere exemplified. Every good 
citizen familiar with the management of the 
office deplores them, but they are chargeable 
to the official who sanctions them, and not to 
the political party to which the official be¬ 
longs. The republican party is not to be 
measured by the conduct of its postmaster 
general; if it was, it would be in a bad way 
indeed. 

I understand the removal of Dr. Flood is 
an incident to a factional fight in the county 
in which Elmira is situated. If the true rea¬ 
son had been given for Dr. Flood’s removal 
there might be justification for it, inasmuch 
as the office is not, as it should be, under civil 
service regulations. There are no charges 
against the character of Mr. Rathbun, who is 
named as Dr. Flood’s successor, and it may 
he our duty in such case not to inquire 
further than as to the fitness of the new ap¬ 
pointee. Without, therefore, touching the 
question of Mr. Rathbun’s confirmation, I 
cordially join with you in your expression of 
disgust at the unworthy methods employed to 
effect Dr. Flood’s removal. With regards, 
yours very truly. Edavard O. Wolcott. 

Washington, January 21. 


THE BALTIMORE INVESTIGATION. 

(continued.) 

John A. Bell testified as follows: 

Q. (Mr. Roosevelt.) What is your position 
in the office? A. I am dispatcher here. 

Q. How long have you been in the service? 
A. I came in the office, I think, this month a 
year ago. 

Q. What ward do you live in? A. I live 
in the seventh ward. 

Q. Are you a member of the republican 
club in that ward? A. Yes, sir; I am a 
member of the seventh ward club. 

» -Sr S- » » 

Q. Mr. Bell, do you know of any collection 
of money for use in the primaries on next 
Monday ? A. Well, I don’t know particularly 
about what the money is to be used for. I 
know that Mr. Gladfelter handed me some 
money to hand to the treasurer of the organ¬ 
ization the other day. 

Q. He gave you five dollars, wasn’t it? A. 
Yes, sir; he handed me a five-dollar note. 

Q. Do you remember when that was? A. 
Well, I couldn’t say positively the night, but 
it was one night this present week; two or 
three nights ago. 

Q. Was it down-stairs in the basement? A. 
Well, I couldn’t positively tell you where it 
was he handed it to me. I am generally very 
busy, you know. 

Q. But it was in this building somewhere? 
A. It was around the building somewhere; 
yes, sir. 

***** 

Q. You have not, then, contributed? A. 
I haven’t given him a cent. 

Q. Have you contributed through anyone? 
A. No, sir; not a cent. 









The Civil Service chronicle. 

VoL. I, No. 37. INDIANAPOLIS, MARCH, 1892. terms ?’crnr,^rc‘opT' 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 2.3 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

With this number the Civil Service 
Chronicle enters upon its fourth year, the 
first number having been published in the 
first month of Harrison’s administration. 
The volume will cover the four years of 
that administration, that being deemed the 
most fitting arrangement considering the 
purposes of the paper. That period will 
cover the time it was originally intended 
to continue the publication. It may be 
said that the Chronicle has met with an 
appreciation from leading men in all sec¬ 
tions of the country which is an ample re¬ 
ward for the steady and extended labor 
which has been freely given for three 
years. 

We have received from a professor of 
Cornell University a note, not for publica¬ 
tion, protesting that our criticism of Pro¬ 
fessor Collin last month for his advocacy 
of Hill and Hillism shows a lack of appre¬ 
ciation of the fact that Cornell professors 
hold their positions, and would only hold 
them, with the understanding that they 
are to have the utmost latitude of expres¬ 
sion of opinion. We so understood it and 
should regard any other holding as a sacri¬ 
fice of manliness. The right to the freest 
expression of opinion however is well de¬ 
fined and limited. It does not, for in¬ 
stance, embrace the right of advocating 
the establishment of more gambling houses 
in Ithaca. There is nowhere any pretense 
of denying that securing a democratic ma¬ 
jority in the New York senate was Hill’s 
work; it is this of which his friends are 
the proudest. A few years ago we had a 
returning board in session at Indianapolis. 
Under the lead of Simeon Coy, a local poli¬ 
tician, a conspiracy was formed and car¬ 
ried out to the extent that the figures of a 
number of the returns were erased and 
other figures substituted with a view to 
giving candidates of Coy’s party a majority 
which the people had not given them 
For their part in this conspiracy Coy and 
the chairman of the board were sent to 
prison. Now, we challenged last month 
and we challenge again any one to show 
that the Hill conspiracy by which his 
party got control of the New York senate 
differs in any essential criminal element 
from Coy’s conspiracy. Are we to under¬ 


stand that a professor of Indiana Univer¬ 
sity would be wiihin the limits of the ut¬ 
most latitude of expression of opinion 
w'ere he to become a public champion of 
Coy ? Clearly not, and neither is Professor 
Collin within such limit. 


Since the foregoing was written we have 
received the following extract from the 
Cornell Daily Sun of February 17, quoting 
from an address of Professor Collin before 
the History and Political Science Associa¬ 
tion on the “Machine in Politics”: 

“ It is the duty of every true citizen who has any 
spark of patriotism about him to assist the machine 
in one way or another. No one should feel himself 
above the work of political fighting. The man who 
sells his vote for money is more to be respected than the 
man who stays away from the polls and does not vote." 

We commend the last statement to the 
notice of our readdVs with the remark that 
it seems powerful cumulative evidence of 
fundamental unbalance. We repeat again, 
that parents will not desire their boys to 
be in the path of such notions of citizen¬ 
ship. The political ethics of the Hills and 
Quays will not long be tolerated in the 
teaching of any university. 


The Indianapolis Journal divides its 
time between a silly adulation of President 
Harrison and declarations that indepen¬ 
dence in politics is disappearing. In the 
meantime with ceaseless industry it works 
its notary seal in London to the tune of 
forty or fifty thousand dollars a year. This 
is the unseen but perfectly Well-known 
rudder that guides its course and makes it 
an object of goodnatured pity. President 
Harrison is not helped by its adulation, 
and independence in politics was never j 
so great and growing as it is to-day, and it 
is nowhere more flourishing than in the 
Journal's own city. Parties at present are 
small minorities composing the party ma¬ 
chines in each community. These ma¬ 
chines have no object in the world except 
to quarter their members upon the people. 
Let each citizen look around him and see 
if this is not so. Blind adherence to a 
party leads to the Quay grip upon Penn¬ 
sylvania and the Tammany grip upon New 
York. It is the duty of every citizen to 
look with cold-blooded indifference upon 
mere party success, and this duty is now 
being performed as it never was before. 
Party machines can and do control nomi¬ 
nations, but the voters have absolute con¬ 
trol of the elections. 


The late Oscar C. McCulloch was an ex¬ 
ample to the clergy. He saw that blind 
adhesion to a party was the way not to se¬ 
cure good government. He recognized 
that to keep civil government advancing, 
great reforms are always necessary. He 
knew the stupendous corruption of the 
spoils system and he was its uncompro¬ 
mising enemy. In every election he made 
his vote count with complete indifference 
to mere party success. He was a leader of 
the people. How this course does contrast 
with the course of a large number of his 
brother ministers who occupy comfortable 
pulpits and consider their duty done when 
they have preached their creed. They are 
but dilettante citizens and always break 
down in a crisis. They then take their 
cue from the politicians of their party and 
labor heavily to make the worse appear 
the better matter. 

One of the curious phases of politics is 
the attitude of the democrats towards Hill 
It is true that one of them shows a com¬ 
plete grasp of his character by the remark 
that Hill can not break into the White 
House with a jimmy, and there are doubt¬ 
less others of equal moral courage, but 
they are exceptions. All the corrupt ele¬ 
ments of the democratic party are for Hill. 
A large majority of the rest are against 
him, and this majority is now struggling 
apparently helpless in the hands of the 
Hill machine. Its protest in New York 
may be taken as a fair example. Natu¬ 
rally we should expect to see the acts by 
which a bogus majority was secured in 
the New York senate, brought by these 
protestants with minute detail to the notice 
of every democrat in the state, with indig¬ 
nant insistence, that the party should 
make an outcast of the man who, if the 
boasts of his friends are true, is fit for the 
penitentiary. A statement of the facts of 
Hill’s “splendid services to his party” ends 
the argument, and those democrats who 
should make it would command the re¬ 
spect of the country. Instead they are 
making a great noise because Hill had a 
state convention held in February. There 
is no indication that their conscience is 
roused because a state government has 
been stolen or that they do not mean to 
vote for Hill if his machine rides them 
down. Frederick R. Coudert and Everett 
P. Wheeler, and their associates, have the 
appearance of being indifferent to acta 
that are subversive of free government. 




















314 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


As the readers of the Chronicle know 
there are yet left in Pennsylvania some men 
not deadened to the duties of citizenship, 
who, sacrificing personal ease, financial 
profit and other worldly perquisites, are 
struggling to free themselves and other 
fellow-citizens from Quay’s dictatorship. 

- There are signs that they are making 
headway, for there has lately appeared an 
occasional press report with the startling 
charge purporting to be written by Clark¬ 
son, but said to be written by Quay’s late 
private secretary, now in Clarkson’s em¬ 
ploy, that all these charges against Quay 
emanate from a conspiracy of Tammany 
to ruin him. A few days later the story 
becomes more lurid with the further de¬ 
tail that Tammany threatened to kill 
Quay. This is pretty slippery ground on 
which to hope to stem the rising tide 
against Quay; yet it will avail somewhat. 
His henchmen will with forced soberness 
applaud him as a hero, and a class of very 
ignorant, or very bigoted republicans, will 
grasp this as an excuse for casting another 
ignorant and bigoted vote. Quay as a mar¬ 
tyr is a grotesque spectacle. 


It will be remembered that Eugene 
Higgins cut some figure during Mr. Cleve¬ 
land’s administration. Of late years he has 
lived the best he could on Maryland spoil, 
but he seems embittered and reckless. He 
says; 

“Civil service reform is a fiasco. It is one of the 
greatest outrages that was ever perpetrated on a 
too-confiding public. Let me give you an example: 
When I was a clerk in the treasury department (you 
remember mine was the first appointment Mr. Cleve¬ 
land made), one of the positions of watchman in 
the building became vacant. There were two candi¬ 
dates for the position, one a sturdy young fellow of 
twenty-two and the other a consumptive school 
teacher. The young man was the son of a western 
farmer who had been one of the most useful sup¬ 
porters of the democratic party in his section of the 
country. There was a civil service examination, 
and the school teacher got the place and its salary 
of $1,800, while the young fellow, who needed the 
money to support his father in his old age, did not 
get the position. Do you think that was right? Well 
that occurs every day. I am down on civil service 
reform, and I do not care who knows it.” 

The difficulty with Higgins’s story is 
that watchmen in the treasury are not and 
never were paid $1,800 a year, and they 
are not and never were examined. 


We ask the readers of this paper to ex¬ 
amine the work of Tammany for one 
month ; note the manifold directions of its 
activity, and consider how monstrous is its 
power for evil. New York is most vitally 
concerned to cut herself out from this 
mesh of wickedness, and so also is the 
whole country. Tammany’s last exploit 
was the arrest of Mr. Godkin, of the Even¬ 
ing fbst. He has the supreme satisfaction 
of knowing that he has got through Tam- 
man’y thick hide at last. 


THE VICTOR AND THE SPOIL. 

(Compiled from Indianapolis papers.) 

The Indianapolis fire department is now 
composed of ii 6 men, classified as follows; 

Chief and assistants. 2 

New firemen employed within the past two 

years. 51 

Men in the service two years and upward... 45 

Out of active service. 11 

Tower men. 3 

Line men. 3 

Driver of coal wagon. i 

Total. 116 

* * * 

President Morrison, of the health board, was 
seen by a Jouvnal reporter and said : 

“About Sept. 24 the Price Baking Powder 
Company wrote me asking for a full analysis 
of their baking powder, and offering to pay all 
the expenses connected therewith. I an¬ 
swered, saying that if they wanted a full pri¬ 
vate analysis of their powder they would have 
to make a private contract with chemist Latz, 
if they desired to make such analysis. I then 
wrote Latz a note, inclosing the note of the 
Price company to me. In my note to Latz I 
stated that if he entered into any agreement 
with the baking powder company I would re¬ 
quest that he make his fees reasonable, as we 
did not wish to be placed in the position of 
driving any concern into the position of mak¬ 
ing an expensive analysis by a man who was 
acting for the health board and at the same 
time doing private work. This was suggested 
by a remark made to me by Mr. Harry Gates 
to the effect that he had been compelled to 
pay a good round sum in excess of a fair charge 
to Mr. Latz for a re-examination of his pow¬ 
der, and that such examination has done him 
no good whatever. 

“When the result of the various analyses 
came in the ordinary qualitative analysis of 
various brands was followed by a complete 
quantitative analysis of the Price powder, to¬ 
gether with a puff of the same. This latter 
was neither desired nor tolerated by the board, 
and all of that part of the report was sup¬ 
pressed. The board fully recognizes the right 
of Dr. Latz to take private contracts, but is 
fully determined that the results of such pri¬ 
vate analyses shall not be embodied in its pub¬ 
lic report.” 

Dr. Martin, of the Indiana Chemical Com¬ 
pany, which employs Latz, through whom it 
is understood that the latter was employed to 
analyze the Price baking powder, was also 
seen. He was very surly at first and professed 
to be in entire ignorance of Mr. Latz’s busi¬ 
ness, but he finally softened a little, and ad¬ 
mitted that he knew of the correspondence, 
though declining to say anything about it on 
the plea that it would not be fair to the health 
board, which had suppressed the Price analy¬ 
sis. All attempts to see chemist Latz proved 
futile. 

» • * 

John Maloney, an attendant at the central 


I hospital for the insane, visited Wachstetter 
, Bros.’ saloon, 154 West Washington street,"^ 
j Thursday afternoon. He had twelve dollars, 

] and very soon began spending it freely at the 
j bar, repeatedly paying for drinks for strangers 
I in the room. Among other things he did was 
to buy one dollar’s worth of beef steak at a 
butcher shop and distribute it among several 
loafers in the saloon. His money was soon 
exhausted, and later in the evening he caused 
the arrest of the Wachstetters, charging them 
with robbing him. Judge Buskirk continued 
their hearing yesterday morning. - 
« ■» «• 

Dr. J. E. Curtis, of the Central Insane Hos¬ 
pital, does not deny that he charged the attor¬ 
neys who applied for a certificate of the death 
of Charles Fisher a fee of $10 therefor, but 
says he had a right to mike the charge, since 
this is a service which he is not required to 
render in his official capacity. He is very anx¬ 
ious for an investigation. 

* * 0 

One day, about six weeks ago, a News re¬ 
porter was in Coroner Manker’s office when his 
deputy, Isaac Dunn, was taking the statement 
of M. R. Mansfield in an inquest. Mr. Mans¬ 
field is a railway conductor, and his train on 
the Vandalia struck an escaped inmate of the 
Insane Hospital and killed him. It was in 
the inquest of this case that he was called to 
testify. When he had concluded his testimony 
and signed the written statement, Dunn said : 
“I suppose you want your fee?” 

“Yes,” replied Mr. Mansfield, “if there is 
anything coming to me. I went to Terre 
Haute the other day and got nothing for my 
long ride.” 

“Well, here,” said Dunn, tossing out two 
quarters. “I guess I’d better pony up. Put 
your John Hancock on this please,” indicating 
a small piece of paper bearing a dozen or more 
names. 

Mr. Mansfield signed his name, took the 
fifty cents and left, remarking that he had 
made the cigars off his visit. 

The next day the News reporter called upon 
Mansfield at his home upon Bellefontaine street, 
and asked him if he knew what witness fee he 
was entitled to ?” 

“No, I do not,” he replied, “I suppose fifty 
cents was all I was entitled to. That is all I 
got.” 

“Mr. Dunn didn’t tell you that you were 
entitled to seventy.five cents, did he?” 

“No, sir, he did not. I’ve never had any 
experience in court, and didn’t know whether 
I was entitled to any fee or not. My brake, 
man, B. E. Reynolds, only got the same as my¬ 
self.” 

Saturday afternoon Dunn filed his bill for 
witness fees, together with his personal bill 
and Coroner Manker’s bill, with the county 
commissioners. The fee bill was passed, and 
when passed Dunn receipted for sixty-eight 
witness fees, among them those of Mansfield 
and Reynolds. The warrants which he re¬ 
ceived were for seventy-five cents each. On 
June 6 he receipted for fifty-nine witness fees. 


















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


315 


1 This morning the county commissioners con¬ 
sidered Coroner Manker’s bill, which for July 
was $ 469 . 20 . The coroner is allowed $10 per 

I day for the first day of an inquest, and $ 2.50 
for each succeeding day. The commissioners 
reduced the bill to $ 400 . Dunn’s bill as clerk 
was $ 93 , but the commissioners cut it to $ 81 . 

Deputy Dunn returned this afternoon, and 
gives this explanation : “ Fees are payable at 

the county auditor’s office between the loth 
and the 15 th of each month. I tell witnesses 
that they are entitled to seventy-five cents. If 
they want cash I sometimes offer them fifty 
cents, and they are often glad to accept, rather 
than return or wait. This statement I made 
to Mr. Mansfield, and if he says to the contra¬ 
ry I am sure he must be mistaken. I frequent¬ 
ly, as a matter of accommodation, pay the full 
I fee. The utmost there is in it as a matter of 
speculation is eight or ten dollars.” 

* • s 

The county commissioners yesterday consid¬ 
ered the bill of Dr. Manker, coroner, for the 
month of November. It aggregated $420 for 
ninety-three days’ work. It struck the board 
as singular that so many days could be crowd¬ 
ed into one month, and a reduction of $ 90 , 

I leaving the amount $ 330 , was made in the bill, 
after which it was allowed. This gives the 
coroner fifty-three days’ service, which, while 
it may be within the meaning of the statute 
regulating coronial fees, still distends a month 
of time. 

w ■» -3 

A. G. Smith held up his right hand this 
morning and made oath to support the consti¬ 
tution of the United Siates and of Indiana dur¬ 
ing his term of service as attorney general. 

I have appointed Leon Bailey to be my deputy be¬ 
cause he is a warm personal friend^ and because 
his experience especially fits him for the duties 
of the position,’' said Mr. Smith to The News 
to-day. “The duties of the place are not so 
heavy but that Mr. Bailey can have time to at¬ 
tend to the work of the city attorneyship, to 
which he has been elected. The salary of the 
deputy attorney general is $ 2,000 per year. I 
have not yet determined whom I shall ap¬ 
point to the clerkship in my office; probably 
no one for some time.” Thus Mr. Bailey will 
be city attorney and deputy attorney general, 
and from the two offices will draw the com¬ 
fortable combined salaries and fees, amounting 
to about $ 5 , 000 . 

4: « « 

The appointment of the above officers is to 
take effect January i, thus, for the first time, 
making the terms uniform. The appointment 
of a night watchman was left open. There 
are so many candidates, and the pull to reap¬ 
point Eden is so strong, that some trouble in 
agreement turned up. Commissioner Hunter 
is for Eden, but Commissioner Farrell is dead 
set against him. Commissioner Stout was 
therefore made to feel the brunt of the pres¬ 
sure, but he would not commit himself. The 
boiler-makers of the city are pressing James 
Sullivan, one of their number, for the place. 
He is known as a faithful democrat, whose 


usefulness in his trade has become impaired by 
age. He has an invalid wife and six children. 
These facts are set forth in his behalf, but it is 
not believed Eden will be beaten. Albert 
Sahm is said to be for him, and so is Tom 
Taggart, but he denies having any interest in 
the matter. But the auditor’s office is the only 
one which Eden is free to enter. The rest are 
all closed to him by order of the head officials. 
The matter may be settled this morning. 

1} * * 

It leaked out to day that a week ago last Sat¬ 
urday Thomas Lyons, a prisoner sentenced to 
the penitentiary for two years, escaped from 
the deputy sheriff who had him in charge be¬ 
tween this city and the penitentiary, and has 
not since been heard from And Lyons is a 
one-legged man too. 

The sheriff’s office had arranged to keep this 
escape a secret, and but for the brakeman on 
the train from which the prisoner escaped the 
attempt at secrecy would probably have been 
successful. This morning a News reporter sur¬ 
prised the deputies in the sheriff’s office by 
unfolding the facts to them. The brakeman’s 
story is that at Guernsey, just this side of Mo- 
non, the prisoner, who was sitting on the front 
seat, while the deputy sheriff was in the rear 
of the car, got up and jumped off the train 
and disappeared. At Monon the deputy got 
off and took the return train to Indianapolis, 
The brakeman said the deputy told him that 
he was to have left Indiananapolis with the 
prisoner on the noon train, but he and the 
prisoner had “lushed up” and had missed the 
train. The brakeman said the train was 
scarcely moving when the prisoner escaped, 
and that the deputy made no effort to get off 
and capture the prisoner. “Yes, a man did 
escape,” said Chief Deputy Corbaley. “The 
person’s name was Thomas Lyons, who had 
been sent up two years for burglary. It is 
also true that he is a one-legged man. The 
person from whom he escaped is John A. An¬ 
derson, a bar-tender. Anderson came back 
here and reported that the train was running 
twenty.five miles an hour. His story does not 
agree at all with the one told by the brake- 
man.” 

Anderson, it seems, did not get back here 
until Monday, and by that time the prisoner 
might have been in Halifax, unless he thought 
it safer to be very near bar-keeper Anderson. 
A good m^any persons will want to know why 
the sheriff has been allowing bar-tenders and 
other irresponsible (officials) men to take con¬ 
victs to prison—or rather to let them go free. 
The administration under the present sheriff 
has been one series of disgraces, and this is 
the crowning one. Prisoners run away from 
the jailors, the jail is kept in a lousy, foul con¬ 
dition, the sheriff himself figures in disgusting 
episodes and finally allows a bar-keeper to balk 
justice in the way described. And it is even 
true that this same sheriff has the audacity to 

ask a renomination. 

* « * 

There is dissatisfaction over the commission¬ 
ers’ appointments at the court house. It is 


charged that Mr. “Billy” Eden, who has been 
reappointed night watchman at the court 
house, does not attend to his duty. It is said 
that there are many nights in every month 
when he is not around the building at all. 
This week he took a prisoner to Michigan City, 
and he often goes out of the city and is gone 
several days. Fifty dollars per month is al¬ 
lowed for this service, and democrats say a 
man could be employed who would give the 
valuable court records protection and all of his 
time. 

» • » 

There is likelihood of another bet getting 
into court. The trouble comes about this way: 
John Woodard, who was recently released from 
the penitentiary, went to Sheriff King the oth¬ 
er day and asked permission to escort a pris¬ 
oner to Michigan City. The sheriff, knowing 
his face but not remembering his record, wrote 
him an order to Turnkey Emmett, telling Em¬ 
mett to let him (Woodard) escort a prisoner to 
the penitentiary. Woodard put the order in 
his pocket, and said something to his friends 
about the trip he was going to make. 

Joe Littler didn’t believe Woodard had an 
order from King, and offered to bet Woodard 
that he wouldn’t take the prisoner up. The 
bet was made, $35 on a side being put up. 
After the money had been put in the hands of 
a stake-holder, Woodard presented his order 
to Turnkey Emmett, who, knowing him, re¬ 
fused to recognize the order, and tore it up. 
Woodard now wants his money back, and says 
he will bring suit before ’Squire Feibleman to 
replevin it. 

« * # 

The board of trustees and superintendent 
of the southern Indiana hospital submitted 
their report to the governor yesterday. 

The water supply was entirely inadequate. 
To remedy this deficiency, wells were dug 
which now furnish 300,000 gallons a day. 
The cost of this water plant was $ 7 , 500 . To 
provide against fire, and for use in the boilers, 
a lake was excavated covering an acre of 
ground and fully four feet in depth. A con¬ 
tract was let for the construction of a sewer 
to Pigeon creek, but this necessary work was 
stopped by the auditor’s action in refusing the 
funds to carry on the work. 

* * * 

“Is Dr. Metcalf in?” 

“No, sir,” came the reply of a female clerk 
in the office.of the state board of health this 
morning. 

“When will he be in?” 

“Well, that is hard to say. He ought to be 
down to tend to the mail pretty soon.” 

This was after 10 o’clock. 

“How long has it been since he has been at 
the office?” 

“He was here yesterday afternoon and a 
while in the morning, but his practice often 
keeps him away?” 

The reporter turned from the door of the 
handsome quarters furnished by the state for 
the secretary to tend to his business in, and 
walked over to the city dispensary, where he 
















316 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 




found a young man taking a patient’s name 
and residence in a quarto record book. 

“Is Dr. Metcalf in?” 

“No, sir,” answered the young man. 

“When will he be in?” 

“It’s hard to say about that.” 

“Who is in charge of the dispensary during 
his absence?” 

“I am, sir.” 

“How often is Dr. Metcalf here?” 

“Oh, he manages to drop in a few minutes 
every morning and afternoon.” 

Reporters are not the only ones who ask 
such questions. Visitors and those having 
business at both the state health office and the 
city dispensary ask those questions and get the 
same answers. As secretary of the state board 
of health Dr. C. N. Metcalf gets $ 1,500 per 
year, and as superintendent of the city dispen¬ 
sary he gets $70 per month. So far as public 
observation goes, he doesn’t give proper atten¬ 
tion to the office, and probably if the city 
health board had the authority it would ac¬ 
complish his disconnection with the city dis¬ 
pensary in a jiffy. Metcalf seems to be respon¬ 
sible to no one for his management of the 
health office’s affairs. The two offices he holds 
have been reduced to a minimum of usefulness 
from sheer want of direction. It is highly dis¬ 
creditable that these offices should be at the 
mercy of peanut politics. Metcalf can not be 
interfered with by the health board until his 
term expires. His deputy. Dr. Berg, at the 
state board, is almost as infrequently seen as is 
his superior. 

» * » 

Three weeks ago the daughter of John O’Ma- 
ra died from a malignant attach of diphtheria. 
Contrary to the law Mr. O’Mara allowed the 
funeral service to be held thirty-six instead of 
eighteen hours after death, and had them pub¬ 
licly instead of privately. The board of health 
held a special meeting on the case, and decided 
to prosecute O’Mara. The matter was recon¬ 
sidered, however, and nothing was done be¬ 
yond quarantining the children of four families 
who attended the services. Last Friday Mr. 
O’Mara was appointed sanitary officer by the 
new democratic board of health to succeed 
Leonard Crane. 

* «- * 

Are councilmen and other city officers vio¬ 
lating laws? Some of them are employes of 
corporations doing business with the city. 
Others have for years done business at their 
shops with corporations so profitably that they 
could not afford to “break” with them by vot¬ 
ing against anything the corporations demand¬ 
ed. 

Perhaps some things can be explained. Last 
night Mr. Davis, who is chairman of the com¬ 
mittee on public property, presented two bills 
for expenses at Garfield Park. One was for 
about $450 for fencing, and the other for $50 
worth of supplies furnished by the South Side 
P'oundry. This foundry is owned and managed 
by Thomas Markey, who is a member ef the 
city council. 


“FREE AND UNPURCHASED SUP¬ 
PORT.” 

“ No oflicer should be required or p«>r- 
iiiitted to take part iu the arraugemeiit of 
political organizations, caucuses, conyen- 
tioiis, or election campaigns. Their right 
to vote and to express their views on pub¬ 
lic questions, either orally or through the 
press, is not denied, i)rovided it does not 
interfere with the discharge of their 
oflicial duties. No assessment for political 
purposes on offices or subordinates should 
be allowed.”— President Hayes, June 22,1817. 

When we consider the patronage of this 
great office, the allurements of power, the 
temptation to retain public place once 
gained, and more than all, the availability 
a party finds iu an incumbent whom a 
horde of office-holders, with a zeal born of 
benefits received and fostered by the hope 
of ffivors yet to come, stand ready to aid 
with money and trained political service, 
we recognize in the eligibility of the Pres¬ 
ident for re-election a most serious danger 
to that calm, deliberate and intelligent 
political action wiiich must characterize a 
government by the people.— {Letter of Accep¬ 
tance, 188 4 , Grover Cleveland. 

I am ail advocate of civil service reform. 
My brief experience at Washington has led 
me to utter the wish, with an emphasis I 
do not often use, that I might be for ever 
relieved of any connection witli the dis¬ 
tribution of public patronage. I covet for 
myself the free and unpurchased support 
of my fellow-citizens. * * *— [Seriator Ben¬ 
jamin Harrison. 

* * * 

—The new secretary of the republican cen¬ 
tral committee is a mail carrier. Does this 
indicate that the postoffice is to be made re¬ 
publican headquarters? We do not believe 
that a person in the government service should 
occupy such a position.— Logansport Pharos, 
February 26 . 

—At the republican state committee meet¬ 
ing the P. M.’s were on hand in force. There 
was P. M. Thompson of this city, P. M. Hig¬ 
gins of Fort Wayne, P. M. Greiner of Terre 
Haute, P. M. Godfrey of New Albany, P. M. 
Ellis of Muncie, P. M. Crockett of South 
Bend, P. M. Bennett of Warsaw, P. M. Byerly 
of Goshen, P. M. B. Wilson Smith of La 
Fayette, P. M. Fearis of Union, P.'M. Hen¬ 
dricks of Greensburgh, O. M. Tichner of 
Princeton, and so on ad infinitum. 

After all the other federal officers had 
crowded into the room, including District At¬ 
torney Chambers, Assistant Cockrum, Mar¬ 
shal Dunlap, Collector of Internal Revenue 
Cravens, Deputy Collector Harvey and Pen¬ 
sion Agent Ensley, the creatures of the noble 
army of P. M.’s, the members of the commit¬ 
tee were graciously allowed to crowd in and 
occupy seats, while they were being instructed 
as to their duties, when as a mere matter of 
form they should meet in executive session 
later on in the afternoon. 

“You might have heaved a brick into that 


conference and never missed an office-holder,” 
said a disgusted Blaine man in the Denison' 
office yesterday afternoon. Those who didn’t; 
have offices had relatives in office. Of this 
class were J. A. Coutts, of the Kokomo Tribune, 
whose father is postmaster at Andrews, and J. 
W. Hess of this city, whose son Herbert has a^ 
fat seat in the departments at Washington.— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, January 29 . 

—The tenth congressional republican con¬ 
vention was held here to-day to elect a member- 
of the state central committee. The list of 
office-holders in attendance were two national 
bank examiners, fifteen postmasters, a pension 
agent or two and mail carriers innumerable. 
Ex-Congressman Demotte, the postmaster at 
Valparaiso, and his son-in-law, who is a post- 
office inspector, labored h ird to secure an in¬ 
dorsement of Harrison’s administration.— Lo¬ 
gansport Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, Janu- 
aiy 21 . 

—The republicans of the eleventh congres¬ 
sional district held their convention in this 
city to day to elect a member of the state cen¬ 
tral committee. Resolutions were reported by 
a committee, of which Warren G. Sayre [In¬ 
dian land commissioner] was chairman, warmly 
indorsing the administration.— Wabash Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Sentinel, January 21 . 

—The republicans of the second congres¬ 
sional district met in mass convention here to¬ 
day for the purpose of selecting a member of 
the state central committee. Smiley N. Cham¬ 
bers of Indianapolis [United States District 
Attorney] made several fiery speeches.— Shoals 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, January 21 . 

—The committee on permanent organiza¬ 
tion, through W. Wilson, of Warrick county, 
reported that Warren G. Sayre (Indian land 
commissioner) of Wabash, had been chosen 
by the committee for permanent chairman. 
Mr. Sayre, upon taking the chair, spoke at 
some length. He said that he believed the 
prospect of the republican party continuing in 
power was never brighter. This was so be 
cause t e party deserved it. It was a party of 
progress. He said he had a suspicion that 
this convention was fairly friendly to the Pres¬ 
ident of the United States, Benjamin Harrison. 
The President’s Bible the last three years, had 
been the platform put out by the convention 
of four years ago. Mr. Sayre said many pleas¬ 
ant things about the President, and was fre¬ 
quently applauded. As Mr. Sayre is an ap¬ 
pointee under President Harrison, there were 
some smiles when he alluded to the high grade 
of the appointments. On the call of the roll 
the Third district, through Marcus L. Sulzer, of 
Madison, placed in nomination Newland T. 
DePduw, of New Albany. Although Mr. 
Sulzer a short time ago was opposing the ad¬ 
ministration, he talked out plainly for Harri¬ 
son as the only man the republicans could af¬ 
ford to nominate for President. A few months 
ago Mr. Sulzer was appointed to a special In¬ 
dian agency. 

After the resolutions had been read ex-Con- 
gressman White took exception to the resolu- 











317 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


tion endorsing Harrison. * * At this point 

Captain White’s voice was drowned in hisses, 
J. B. Cheadle came to Captain White’s assist¬ 
ance, and told the convention that Captain 
White was a republican who four years ago re¬ 
ceived 1,400 more votes than Mr. Harrison. 
Captain White then proceeded amid hisses. 

What has President Harrison done ? ” asked 
Mr. White. 

I “Everything!” shouted the c^'nvention. 

Attempt after attempt was made to drown 
Captain White’s voice, but he went on. * 

Ed Conway arose in the midst of the uproar 
and asked that Captain White be allowed to 
go on. “Let him run down,” said Mr. Con¬ 
way. “A republican who is against Harrison 
is a novelty, and I move we hear him 
through.” 

Order was finally restored, and Captain 
White went on. * * 

At this point Assistant District Attorney J, 
B. Cockrum got the floor, and insisted that 
this was a republican convention, and not a 
place where a man could come loaded with per¬ 
sonal bile and spit it out.— Indianapolis News, 
March i. 


—Mr. R. T. McDonald, of Foit Wayne de¬ 
feated candidate for delegate to the republican 
national convention, has appealed to the chair¬ 
man of the national republican committee for 
a new deal. His appeal, addressed to Hon. J. 
S. Clarkson, is as follows: 


“The convention to elect delegates to the 
national convention held in this congressional 
district yesterday, was without jurisdiction on 
account of unfair apportionment. The dele¬ 
gates declared elected did not have a majority 
of the votes of the convention. The whole 
proceedings were dominated by a tyrannical 
office-holders’ machine. I propose to test the 
validity of the election of the delegates and 
the validity of the convention.— Indianapolis 
Journal, March. 


—The arraignment of the democracy by Smi¬ 
ley N. Chambers, United States District At¬ 
torney, in his speech before the Columbian 
Club, Saturday night, was such a powerful 
philippic that the Journal this morning prints 
it almost in full. Mr. Chambers said :— Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal, March 21. 


THE MOUTH. 

Charles J. Bonaparte writes of Political Cor¬ 
ruption in Maryland in the March Forum. 

The North American Review follows its arti¬ 
cle on Tammany by Boss Croker by another 
written by Dorman B. Eaton. 

The eighth annual report of civil service 
commissioners of Massachusetts has been is¬ 
sued. For the thousandth time the facts show 
that competitive tests favor those with the 
the common-school education. Of those ex¬ 
amined, 1,084 passed the requirem'*nts and 
were placed on the eligible lists. Of these, 
1,055 fiave had a common-school education 
only, and 29 have attended college. Also the 
average age of those who passed was 37-28, and 
of those who failed 35.34. Again we commend 
to the Indianapolis Board of Public Safety the 
labor service of Boston. 


Rev. W. H, Kaufman, Milbank, S. Dak., 
would like the Civii, Service Chronicle for 
October, 1889, to complete his file. 


A MOUTH OF TAMMANY. 

Curious and unusual things are being done these 
days by the democrats who operate under the orders 
of the Albany Regency. The legislature, in pro¬ 
viding for the enumeration, authorized Secretary of 
the State Rice to appoint one enumerator for each 
election district, and it was naturally supposed that 
the secretary would at least make a show of appoint¬ 
ing them himself. So far as this city is concerned, 
however, he has adopted a very curious course, lie 
has notified Tammany Ball, through Richard 
Croker, that the Tammany organization should send the 
names of asi enumerators to him before Feb. in other 
words, he authorizes Tammany to dispose of that many 
appointments, 887 being the number of election dis¬ 
tricts in this city. The Tammany committee of twen¬ 
ty-four met yest'rday afternoon, and the acting sec 
retary, John C. Sheehan, read Mr. Rice’s letter. Each 
leader was then authorized to send the names of the 
enumerators for each election district in their sev¬ 
eral assembly districts in to the committee’s secre¬ 
tary as .soon as possible. Richard Croker advised 
the leaders to leave the selection of the men to the 
captains of the election districts, and he suggested 
that each captain select a man thoroughly acquainted 
with his election district to make the enumeration, 
The enumerators can easily be made useful for 
political purposes.—ATsu) York Times, Jan. 20 
* 

Frank A. Lewis, assistant superintendent of the 
Society for the Prevention of Crime, and Justice 
Divver are anxious to know who gave information to 
the gamblers at 522 Sixth avenue and thus spoiled 
the raid that was made on that place Wednesday 
afternoon, Feb. 12, 1892. Mr. Lewis had suspected 
for some time that gambling was going on at this 
place. He visited it and found the room crowded 
with men and boys, who were gambling. Then he 
went before Justice Divver at the Jefferson market 
police court and obtained a warrant. It was decided 
to serve the warrant at 4:30 o’clock Wednesday after¬ 
noon, as the place was generally crowded at that 
time. When Sergt. Coombs and six policemen 
reached the place they found no one there but a 
man who was industriously writing in the express 
office in front of the gambling room. There was 
nothing to suggest that gambling had ever been car¬ 
ried on in the building. Mr. Lewis said it was a 
shame that a warrant could not be obtained without 
the person who was concerned getting information 
about it. Justice Divver said he could not understand 
it. He had made every effort to discover who had given 
Old this information, but he had been unable to do so .— 
New York Times, Feb. 12. 

[Patrick Divver, commonly called “Paddy,” is the 
Tammany leader in the second assembly district. 
He is the keeper of a sailors’ boarding house and is 
the proprietor or has interests in several liquor sa¬ 
loons. He is an ex member of the board of aider- 
men, a race track frequenter, and the friend and 
confidant of gamblers. He is on terms of intimacy 
with “Johnny” Matthews and “Jake” Shipsey, two 
members of the sporting and gambling fraternity, 
wlKjse particular methods of gaining a livelihood are 
unknown to the frequenters of PaUdy Divvers’ and 
other rum shops on Park Row, where they are gener¬ 
ally to be. found.—TAe “New Tammany'' New York 
Evening Post.] 

»;t lU * 

Mayor Grant’s eagerness to punish the Staats- 
Zeitung for daring to oppose his candidacy for re- 
election is carrying him to extraordinary lengths. 
Not content with taking as a site for the new city 
building the property upon which the Staats-Zeitung 
building stands, the mayor declares his intention 
to ask the legislature to pass a law which will enable 
the city to take possession in a more speedy manner 
than would be possible under the usual condemna¬ 
tion proceedings. In other words, he means to 
force the newspaper to abandon possession of its 
property without any regard to its own interests or 
convenience. If such a law were passed, it would 
be an unspeakable outrage upon private rights. The 
Staats- Zeitung must be printed every day, and in 
order to move to new quarters it must have new 
presses built. The old ones can not be moved with¬ 
out stopping the publication of the paper. The con¬ 


duct of the mayor and his Tammnny associates in 
deciding to take the property is indefensible from 
every point of view. The site is not a desirable one 
for a city building, and it will be a great mistake to 
place it there. They are using their power as city 
authorities to erect a great municipal building upon 
a most unsuitiable site, simply that they may “get 
even” with a newspaper which presumed to oppose 
their continuance in office.—JVm York Evening Post, 
February 24. 

<! * « 

The democrats in the legislature apparently mean 
to do everything possible to convince the people 
that their party is unfit to be trusted with power. 
The senate yesterday passed the McCarren East 
River Bridge Bill, which gives a company the ex¬ 
clusive charter for the construction of two bridges 
between this city and Brooklyn, and the power to 
build a three mile elevated railroad on this side, 
neither bridges nor railroad to pay anything to 
either city, neither city to have any authority over 
bridges or railroad, and the foot-path on the bridge 
not to be free. Senator Brown declared that he had 
received from responsible men an offer of $500,000 for 
this charter, and that he would give $250,000 for it 
himself, and yet the senate insisted upon letting the 
company have it for nothing. Meanwhile the as¬ 
sembly was passing what is known as “The Huckle¬ 
berry Road Bill,” which provides for the consolida¬ 
tion of all the street car roads in the annexed dis¬ 
trict, gives the consolidated company a monopoly 
of the street railroads across the Harlem, releases it 
from all provisions [of the present general law for 
the payment of percentages to the city, makes the 
city take care of the street between the car tracks, 
and in short, as the Sun corres; ondent says, “does 
everything that the promoters could ask, except to 
make the city lay their tracks and furnish them with 
cars and motive power.”—iVew York Evening Post, 
February 25. 

* 

The latest “grab” of the Tammany-Hill combine 
at Albany is for the lower part of Fifth avenue, from 
Washington square to Forty-second street, for a 
street railway. The bill embodying it was intro¬ 
duced, in violation of the rules and by stealth, by a 
Hill member of the assembly from Ulster county. 
He took it to Mr. Hill’s speaker of the assembly at 
the latter’s house after the assembly had adjourned, 
and induced him to consent to an illegal way of get- 
ing it on the assembly files. Then the Hill speaker 
had it referred to the committee on cities, which has 
a Tammany chairman and a Tammany majority, 
instead of to the committee on railroads, to which it 
properly belonged. The chairman of the latter com¬ 
mittee protested in vain. The Hill speaker insisted 
that the bill should goto the Tammany committee. 
That it contains a job, and a most outrageous one, 
nobody questions. The Hill-Tammany organs of 
this city, which are being severely tried just now, 
hasten to denounce it and to say it must not pass, 
but unless the Hill-Tammany c mbine shows more 
regard for public sentiment than it has shown thus 
far in its legislative couauct, the bili will follow in 
the wake of the bridge and elevated railway exten¬ 
sion and “ huckleberry ” jobs, pass both houses, and 
go to the Governor.— New Yor1l,Evening Post, February 
Tl. 

❖ Ijt 

Attention has been directed lately to the very low 
voice of the reading clerk of the assembly at Albany, 
which renders it difficult for members to know what 
kind of bills or amendments are going through that 
body. When McCarren’s amendment to the East 
River Bridge Bill was passed unanimously, or nearly 
so, it is stated that hardly anybody in the chamber 
knew what it was. the clerk’s voice was so indistinct. 
This is quite explainable as the clerk himself is a lobbyist 
and the tool of Chairman Murphy. Last year a bill 
known as the McKnight Bill, changing the law re¬ 
garding elevated railroad damage suits, was slipped 
through so adroitly that at least one hundred law¬ 
yers who were watching for elevated railroad bills 
were utterly deceived and never knew of the Mc¬ 
Knight Bill till it had become a law.—iVw York 
Evening Post, Feb. 29, 













318 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


When William F. Sheehan caused to be passed through 
the Legislature in one day a bill creating a commission 
that would appoint a superintendent of education 
of his own choosing to succeed Jamas F. Crooker, 
the new superintendent of public instruction, it 
caused a strong protest from all classes and all par¬ 
ties not strictly of the Sheehan stripe. Politics was 
the only reason for the change, which was at first in¬ 
tended to meet the emergency of the recent vacancy. 
It worked so well, however, that it is understood an¬ 
other bill has been prepared placing the appoint¬ 
ment of the superintendent for a full term in the 
hands of the commission, vHth the mayor left off. 

This would give Sheehan control of the school de¬ 
partment for at least four years. * <■ The mayor is 
to be left off the commission presumably because he 
has connected himself with the anti-Hill element of 
the party and is an active and effective worker in 
behalf of decent politics.—/?u/afo Dispatch to Xew 
York Times, March 2. 

* * * 

The action of Mayor Grant in appointing police 
commissioner John R. Voorhisto a police justiceship 
and John C. Sheehan as police commissioner is pro 
nounced by Tammany Hall men as “good politics.” 
Voorhis’s political career is a remarkable one, and 
he has, since 1873, been more or less of a power. In 
1873 he xoas picked up, unknown, by Mayor Havemeyer 
and made an excise commissioner, and every mayor 
since has appointed him to one place or another. Voor¬ 
his’s appointment is regarded as a fine political 
move. The appointment of Sheehan is said to be in 
the nature of a personal reward for good work done 
and a favor to Lieut.-Gov. Sheehan. The appoint¬ 
ments are far-reaching and by the transfer of the two 
men already in office the Tammany organization ac¬ 
complishes much and brings under its absolute control two 
departments where there are many places and much money 
tobe expended. The placating of the New York de¬ 
mocracy is said, however, to be the chief reason for 
Voorhis’s appointment, and, furthermore, it removes 
the possibility of Voorhis as a mayoralty candidate next 
fall. The yew York and "Voorhis" democracy cast 
about 20,000 votes in the last election, and should Mr. 
Voorhis be a candidate for mayor, these votes token away 
from Tammany would place it in a position to be de¬ 
feated. Whether the New York democracy will prac¬ 
tically dissolve on account of the preferment of its 
leader is not yet certain. Mr. Voorhis’s chief lieu¬ 
tenant, ex-Assemblyman John Martin, has been pro¬ 
vided with a lucrative clerkship in the legislature, 
and this could not have been accomplished had it not 
been approved by the Tammany legislators Police- 
Justice Voorhis, however, says his party will live and 
grow. It has for several years been favorable to 
Tammany, not on the ground that it had nominated 
the best men, but that the members were all demo 
crats. Recently Mr. Voorhis declined to go into aw 
anti- Tammany combination with the Stecklers avd others, 
and this did much towards securing his appointment. 
The appointment was ofiered to him three times, 
once previous to the election and twice since.—A’eto 
York Evening Post, March 2. 

# sS # 

Returning to a consideration of Voorhis, it is curi¬ 
ous that on the very day of his appointment to be a 
police justice the World published a long interview 
with him in his capacity as president of the police 
board, in which he illustrates as naively as grimly, 
his native unfitness for the place. It was all about a 
policeman of the name of Gallagher, who commit¬ 
ted the misdemeanor of brutally kicking and cuffing 
an aged woman who sells newspapers at the corner of 
Ann street and Broadway. For this he was hauled 
before a court and after trial and conviction was sen¬ 
tenced to the penitentiary on Blackwell’s Island for 
a term of six months. But, strange to say, he re¬ 
mained, as this report said, a policeman in good 
standing of the city of New York, and his pay con¬ 
tinued. The late president of the police board, now 
by the favor of Tammany made a police justice, 
was interviewed regarding these facts and is repre¬ 
sented as having justified them, but we are in¬ 
formed that Gallagher has now been removed from 
the force for “absence from duty,” the absence be¬ 
ing caused by his imprisonment. As a sample of 
the commissioner’s talk, take the following extracts: 


"Would you let his conviction in a criminal court 
count against him ?” asked the reporter. 

“No,” .said the commissioner; “no, I do not think 
we should. There often have been cases where par¬ 
ties have been convicted and punished before police 
courts or juries where, in the opinion of the board, 
they have been convicled unjustly. We do not take 
the conclusion of a jury as to a man’s innocence or 
guilt. We draw conclusions from the evidence put 
before us. Policeman Gallagher’s trial has already 
taken place before us; but as a matter of justice to 
an accused oificer we thought that for a reasonable 
time we would suspend the judgment of this board. 
* * <* 

“ We do not consider the time before our judg¬ 
ment is a matter of life or death,” added the Com¬ 
missioner. “ It is better to err on the side of the 
weak and the unfortunate than to take advantage of 
him in his deplorable situation. 

“Weak—and—unfortunate!” gasped the reporter. 
“Mr. Voorhis. what about the old woman who was 
as.saulted?” 

“It would not make any diflerence to her,” replied 
the commissioner, “whether he was on the Island a 
day longer or not. She has had, I suppose, her satis¬ 
faction. She is, from what I hear, inclined to be 
crazy.” 

“Crazy! Then is not that all the worse for the 
officer?” 

“I did not say crazy,” said Commissioner Voorhis. 
“She is a singular creature, from what I have been 
informed. I have never seen her. This case has 
been made a great deal of. Simply that this woman 
has been selling papers at one place for a great many 
years is something that I attach no importance to.” 

It does not seem tobe necessary to add any commen- 
to this man’s exhibition of his notions of official duty 
and the revelation of his ideas of justice and human¬ 
ity, except to say that there is every reason to believe 
they agree with the notions and ideas prevailing in 
Tammany.—Ario York Times, March 2. 

* * if 

A. R. Conkling made an able and convincing ar¬ 
gument in the assembly to-day in support of his 
motion to reverse the unfavorable report of the judiciary 
committee on his bill to prohibit ths payment of assess¬ 
ments or contributions to arganizations or persons by 
candidates for judicial offices. The bill has been held 
in committee for six weeks, and all efforts to get a re¬ 
port upon it proved unavailiug until to-day, although 
Mr. Conkling agreed to amend it so as to make its 
provisions less stringent and radical. In urging his 
motion to-day Mr. Conkling declared that the meas¬ 
ure had the unqualiflea endorsement of the press, 
bar, and bench of the state, all of which viewed the 
reform as most necessary. Xoparticular surprise was 
manifested when the assembly refused by a tie vote of bl 
to 51, to reverse the committee’s unfavorable report 
upon the bill. This vote sufficed to kill the measure, 
but Speaker Bush seemed to think it advisable to 
place himself on record against the proposition to 
pnta stop to the auctioning off of judicial nomi¬ 
nations that now so generally prevails, so he voted 
“no” along with the Tammany men.—Vem York 
Evening Post, March 7. 

■S- j 5 

Mayor Grant to-day accepted the resignations of 
Inspectors H. B. Masterson and Michael Hahn of 
the bureau of weights and measures, who were 
charged with fraud and malfeasance in office. The 
charges were brought about a week ago, and Comp¬ 
troller Myers began an investigation. He found 
that the charges were true, and so reported to the 
mayor yesterday afternoon. It appears that Masterson, 
who is a Tammany man, collected large fees and kept 
them, and turned in small ones. To make up a proper¬ 
looking amount he put in a large number of ficti¬ 
tious names. Hahn was recommended by the gro¬ 
cers' union. He collected sums for January and 
February, and when the charges were preferred last 
Wednesday Hahn came to the comptroller’s office 
and turned in a larger amount than the sums which 
were sworn to. The acceptance of the resignations 
by the mayor was much criticised this morning.— 
Xew York Evening Past, March 9. 


Police Justice William Watson is In trouble again. 
He made an alliance with Alderman Pickering not 
long ago, and induced the latter to introduce a resolu¬ 
tionproviding for a courtroom for him (B'af.son) in Ben¬ 
nett’s Casino. But the democratic leaders, Adams and 
Suter, heard of it, and they frightened Pickering into 
withdrawing his proposed ordinance. They even in¬ 
duced a lot of ministers to protest against having a 
courtroom in such a place as this Casino, which 
would have been raided long ago if its owner had 
been devoid of a pull. Pickering is a weak vessel 
and he deserted Watson, so that the latter has no 
courtroom, and has to draw his 85,000 a year and do 
no work. This is objectionable to him, he says. The 
fact is that he hoped to build up a political following 
when he got a courtroom of his own, and Adams and 
Suter were afraid he would. Xew York Times, 
March 12. 

S' S' =:' 

It was pointed out in The Times a year ago that the 
men who were behind the bills appropriating money 
for the construction of new regimental armories in 
Brooklyn were engaged in nothing more nor less 
than a bunko game. They went to Albany and sub¬ 
mitted their bills, arguing at the time that the money 
they asked for was absolutely all that would be needed 

* * ’sfow the exposure has come, and every one 
appears to have been very much surprised at it. The 
report of the experts appointed to examine the con¬ 
dition of the new thirteenth regiment armory was 
expected, and every one knew that it was going to 
show that a great deal of money had been wasted, 
but no one thought it would disclose such a state of 
corruption as it did. These experts declare very 
positively that the building will cost 8-505,260 when 
it is finally completed instead of the 8300,000 appropri¬ 
ated by the legislature. This is about 75 per cent, 
more than the original appropriation. If this course 
should be pursued in reference to all public con¬ 
structions, thb result would be beyond the wildest 
imagination. But there has been a scandal abotit 
this thirteenth regiment armory from the start. The 
first step in that direction was the selection of Rudolph 
L. Daus as architect. Be is a yomig man with little ex¬ 
perience, btit he is a protege of Hugh McLaughlin, and 
the latter’s backing secured him this job, although Col. 
Austen and ex-Mayor Chapin were opposed to him 
and his plans. Up to the time of his .selection only 
8146,000 had been spent on this project, and that 
went for a site. This left 8300,000 for the building, 
and plans were invited on that basis. Those of Daus 
were accepted, although the members of the regiment 
did not like them at all, and ex-mayor Chapin tried 
very hard to have another set selected. The Mc¬ 
Laughlin influence was too strong, however, and 
Daus triumphed. But when his specifications were 
published and bids called for it was found that the 
building could not be erected for less than 8409.000, 
exclusive of the architect’s commissions. Corpora¬ 
tion Counsel Jenks decided, however, that the com¬ 
mission could not spend more than the appropria¬ 
tion—8300,000. Here was a chance to get rid of Daus 
and his plans, and ex-Mayor Chapin tried to have 
new plans put in, but again McLaughlin was able to 
force the commission to decide merely to strike out 
what they thought would be unnecessary and so re¬ 
duce the cost. But the method of reducing the cost 
was a most peculiar one. “We understand,” said the 
experts in their recent report, “that thismethod was 
knowingly adopted by the commission, yet it was to 
cutout features absolutely essential while adhering 
to a somewhat expensive exterior.” For Instance, 
these wise men cut down the drill-room to one-half 
its proper size, they put a wooden partition at the 
rear instead of a brick wall, and they decided to put 
no plaster at all on the walls of the drill-room or the 
Memorial Hall. They put a miserable little 150 horse 
power boiler in to heat the entire building, and made 
no provision whatever for heating the big drill-room. 
Yet they thought it necessary to select for that one 
boiler the most expensive they could find. But the 
most remarkable discoverj' made by these experts 
was in reference to what was not provided for at all 
in Daus’s original plans and specifications. He had 
submitted his idea of what the armory building 
should be like, and that idea was adopted and con¬ 
tracts made for the erection of some sort of a build- 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


319 


ing, and yet there was absolutely no provision made 
for sidewalks to surround that building or even for a 
fence or for iron slats to keep people from falling 
down the area ways. As the entire appropriation had 
been used uj), where wiis the money to come from to 
pay for these very necessary things? But this was 
not all. Dans had made no provision for lockers in 
the armory, for a rifle-range equipment, for gun 
racks, for lighting fixtures, gas or electric, or even 
for a kitchen. The state law in referencs to armories 
requires, in so many words, that the plans for an 
armory shall provide for these very things. The cost 
of these omissions, the experts reported, would be 
860,100.—.Veio I'orfc Times. March 13. 

if f. * 

The New York Evenivg Post has been looking up 
the records of the men who composed the grand 
jury which exonerated District Attorney NIcoll 
from the Rev. Dr. Parkhurst’s charges. It finds that 
nearly one-third of them are leading lights in the 
Tammany organization. Tammany isn’t caught 
napping when there are charges against any of its 
bosses to be inve.stigated.—Rw^afo Express. 

i'.t 

“Don’t tell me I don’t know what I am talking 
about. Many a long, dismal, heartsickening night, 
in company with two trusty triends, have I spent 
since I spoke on the matter before, going down into 
the disgusting depths of this Tammany-debauched 
town. And it is rotten with a rottenness that is 
unspeakable and indescribable, and a rottenness 
: that would be absolutely impossible, except by the 
I connivance, not to say the purchased sympathy, of 
the men whose one obligation before God, men and 
their own conscience is to shield virtue and make 
vice difficult. Now, that 1 stand by, because before 
Almighty God I know it, and I will stand by it, 
though buried beneath presentments as thick as 
autumn leaves in Vallambrosa, or snowflakes in a 
March blizzard. Excuse the personal releiences to 
myself in the case but I can not help it. I never 
dreamed that any force of circumstances would 
ever draw me into contacts so coarse, so beastly, so 
consummately filthy as those I have repeatedly found 
myself in the midst of these last days. I feel as 
though I want to go out of town for a month to 
bleach the memory of it out of my mind and 
the memory of it out of my eyes. I am not 
ignorant of the collossal spasms of indignation into 
which the trus ees of Tammany ethics have been 
thrown by the blunt and inelegant characterizations 
( f a month ago.—Rev. Charles H. Parkhurst, March 13. 
» * * 

The notorious women of Capt. Brogan’s precinct 
now carry on their trade in the sight of the men and 
women who ride on the Broadway cars. While 
Broadway is torn up the cars of that line, instead of 
turning with the street at Fourteenth street, go down 
University Place by Washington Square and through 
Wooster street. Some time ago the Sun found it nec¬ 
essary to call the attention of the officials at police 
headquarters to the fact that vice was so openly 
flaunted in the fifteenth precinct that Capt. Brogan 
could not go to or from his station without being 
compelled to witness the orgies that occurred in the 
vile dens. Inspector Steers took hold of the matter, 
and for a time the standard of decency was raised. 
It was only for a time, but long enough to show that 
the police can maintain public decency when they 
try to. 

Now, every passenger who travels on the Broadway 
line must close his or her eyes as the car goes through 
the street, or else must be a witness to the atrocious 
conduct of pretty nearly the lowest creatures that 
live in New York. Inspector Steers has a chance to 
distinguish himself again. If he had been on a 
Broadway car with a Sun reporter yesterday, he 
would have seen, at No. 245 Wooster street, a blear- 
eyed woman, partly dressed, with the marks of a Sat¬ 
urday night’s debauch visible, sitting at the window. 
The blinds were closed, but the slats were opened, 
and she hissed her invitation loud enough for the 
men and women who were returning from church 
on the car to hear. He would have seen a young 
girl in one corner of the car look curiously at the 
creature in the window. Her attention had been 
attracted by the hiss. Ho would have seen her ask 


her mother, who sat beside her, a question, and he 
would have seen a look of horror on the mother’s 
face. 

He would liave seen a woman in the window of 
the house next door, and next and next. In hou.se 
after house on either side of the street these crea¬ 
tures .sat and called and beckoned and insulted men 
and women in the very presence of policemen of the 
fifteenth precinct. The only effort made to hide the 
sights of vice were the closed shutters, but in every 
house where the shutters were closed the slats were 
openaud the women were in plain sight. 

In two alleyways between the Park and Bleecker 
street, there were women of the character of the 
women in the windows, and they called to passers- 
by who were on their way from church. The streets 
were filled with children. There are many respect¬ 
able people living in the street in houses side by side 
with these dens. This weather it is impossible to 
keep children off the street, and thi-y watched and 
watched the women ami wondered. 

This was on Sunday. The scenes on week-days are 
worse still, and just as many, it not a great many 
more, respectable people ride on the Broadway cars 
during the week. In the early morning young 
women pa.ss on their way to business down town, in 
theafternoon mothers and their daughters, who are 
at all other times shielded from evil, or even the sug¬ 
gestion of it. and in the evening again the young 
women who earn their own living. After dark 
women from the windows come out on the steps of 
the houses or walk the street and lay hold on men 
w'ho walk by, and these things are witnessed there 
by the men and women on their way to and from the 
theaters in the cars. 

The police of the fifteenth district are respousi 
ble for this condition of affairs. They could keep 
the street decent if they wanted to.— Me^u York Sun, 
August 10. 

* * 

My attention has been called to the political tirade 
delivered yesterday. It is hard to believe that a 
sane man, and especially a minister of the gospel, 
would so far forget himself as to talk in a manner 
that would cause anxious and loving mothers to look 
with alarm on the face of the daughters who accom¬ 
panied them, and to find thereon the blushes of 
shame caused by his improper remarks.— "Jimmy'’ 
Martin of the Police Board on the Rev. Dr. Parkhurst's 
Sermon, in the New York Evening Post, March 15. 

«:< * 

“Boss” McLaughlin of Brooklyn has got his 
pound of flesh. [The first complication was created 
by the action of Tammany Hall in stealing a march 
upon boss McLaughlin of Brooklyn and running 
away with the patronage of the Brooklyn Bridge. 
As McLaughlin puts it, "they might just as well have 
broken into my bedroom at night and stolen my watch and 
pockelbook from umler my pillow." He regarded the 
bridge as his personal and peculiar property, to be 
used for his own emolument and that of the Kings 
county democracy. When Tammany committed the 
theft McLaughlin demanded its return, and called 
upon the governor to enforce the demand. The 
governor declined to honor the call, and then the 
serions trouble began.] Gov. Flower this morning 
sent to the senate the nomination of Alfred C. 
Chapin, ex-mayor and the present congressman from 
the third district, to succeed Isaac V. Baker, Jr., as a 
member of the railroad commission. Mr. Baker is 
the only republican left on the board. Many demo¬ 
crats of position believe that this board, the most im¬ 
portant in the state, should remain non-partisan and 
have so signified to Gov. Flower. The governor, 
himself an old railway man, with a thorough know¬ 
ledge of the dangers and risks to invested property 
by the establishment of a strictly partisan board, has 
not, according to Albany rumor, looked with favor 
upon these exactions from influential democrats. 
To Edward Murphy, Jr., chairman of the democratic 
state committee, was given the post of superinten¬ 
dent of public works and the superintendent of 
buildings; to Lieut. Gen. Sheehan the superinten¬ 
dent of public instruction; to Richard Croker, "boss” 
of Tammany Hall, the health officer of the port of 
New York. 


Having satisfied the demands of Hill, Croker, Mur¬ 
phy, McLaughlin, and Sheehan, Gov. Flower is now 
manifesting a disposition to take care of his own. 
The long expected port warden and harbormaster 
nominations came in with the rest. The majority of 
those displaced were appointed to office by Gov. Cor¬ 
nell eleven or twelve years ago, and have held on 
because a republican senate refused to confirm the 
nominations of a democratic governor. The gov¬ 
ernors old friend and long continued tooter, Thomas 
M. Lynch, succeeds port warden Isaac W. Edsall. 
Lynch is a Watertown man, a saloon keeper in New 
York, formerly represented the twenty-fourth ward 
in the board of alderman of that city, is wealthy, in¬ 
dependent, and a blind worshiperof the governor’s. 
Another ardent friend of Mr. Flower, who has re¬ 
ceived reward for past services, is ex-congressman 
Nicholas Muller. 

The name of Col. Michael C. Murphy, who has been 
appointed a port warden, is familiar to every one 
who followed the course of politics in this state for 
twenty years past. He is about sixty years old. For 
three years past he has been practically an invalid, 
owing to a cancer in the stomach. Many times his 
life has been despaired of, but surgical operations 
have greatly improved his Condition. 

.lohn McGroarty, who has been reappointed port 
warden, is a Brooklyn saloon-keeper. He was born 
In the ninth ward in 1838, and has run a saloon next 
to the Academy of Music in Montague street, Brook¬ 
lyn for fifteen years and has accumulated a fortune. 
His place has long been one of the headquarters of 
the sporting members of the local political ring. It 
was in the basement of this resort that a disgrace- . 
ful fracas over a woman occurred several years ago at 
3 o’clock in the morning. The Emerald ball was in 
progress in the Academy of Music and McGroarly’s 
saloon was in full swing up stairs and down stairs 
and in the basement. In the latter portion of the 
premises were a man and woman drinking cham¬ 
pagne. The woman was a well-known character, 
whose husband was killed by her son. Detective 
Patrick Carr of the Brooklyn central office joined the 
drinking party and a row ensued. Champagne bot¬ 
tles were hurled by the woman and her companion, 
a man got his head broken, the woman hid, and Carr 
vanished in the excitement. The man with the 
broken head was carted away, and although the 
news of the row reached the first district police sta¬ 
tion, it did not get on the blotter. It leaked out, 
afterward, however, and detective Carr was allowed 
to resign, a police sergeant was reduced to the ranks 
and the officer on the beat was severely punished. 
McGroarty got off without so much as a complaint 
against his place, although it was open in direct vio¬ 
lation of the excise laws. 

Thomas M. Lynch, who has been appointed a port 
warden, is a saloon keeper and an ex alderman. He 
was defeated for re-election as alderman at the last 
election. His Nassau street bar room is a popular 
resort for down town politicians. His claim for the 
appointment probably lies in the fact that, like 
Gov. Flower, he is a Watertown man and has been 
able to do many small services for Mr. Flower. 

Port wardens get fees that will aggregate upward 
of 8^1,000 a year. The position is a substantial sine¬ 
cure. There are nine port wardens. Three must 
be nautical men and one must be a resident of 
Brooklyn. Their pay comes from fees levied on all 
vessels entering this harbor. Two of the nine must 
live at quarantine and board all Incoming vessels 
that are detained by the health oflficer. They have 
the appointment and licensing of pilots, and are 
called upon to decide whether owners or insurers 
are liable for damages to cargo.—A’ew York Times, 
March 16. 

il* 

The committee on civil service examinations in 
this city has submitted to the executive committee 
of the civil service reform association of New York 
a carefully prepared report touching the enforce¬ 
ment of the municipal civil service rules. These 
rules apply to 7,098 persons, who are divided in the 
classified service of the city as follows; 3,503 In the 
police department, 1,013 in the fire department, 287 
in the department of public works, and 2,295 miscel¬ 
laneous. 











320 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


The committee present the following conclusions: 

“First—That the civil service rules now In force, 
while excluding the absolutely unfit, present but a 
slight and wholly inadequate barrier to appoint¬ 
ments upon other grounds than merit. 

“Second—That the fact that few or no requisitions 
are made upon the civil service board for clerks 
would justify the suspicion that the law is invaded 
or openly set aside when it proves to be an insur¬ 
mountable obstacle to favoritism.” 

The report is signed by C. W. Watson, A. R. Mac- 
donough, Edward Carry . Seth Sprague Terry, and 
Alfred BLshop Mason.—jVew York Times, March 16. 

Persons who are interested in the methods which 
Mr. David B. Hill pursues in his chase after the pres¬ 
idential nomination are just now making a quiet in¬ 
vestigation into the fads surrounding the pardoning 
of William Conroy, a murderer who was serving a 
life sentence in the state prison. Conroy is an ex¬ 
policeman, and the same influences which secured 
his appointment on the police force are expected to 
aid in helping along the cause of the man who used 
his high office as chief executive of the state to lib¬ 
erate the murderer. In order to avoid an airing of 
the pardon as long as possible, Mr. Hill put it off un¬ 
til his last hours in the governor’s chair, the order 
having been Issued on the afternoon of December 31 
last. Conroy was convicted on December 16,1883, of 
murder in the first degree for killing Peter Keenan 
on November 3 of the same year. Conroy was on pa¬ 
trol duty at the time of the killing. He had been 
drinking more or less during the day, and when he 
was told that “ Tom Murphy had left a drink in Co¬ 
dy’s saloon ” for him he hastened to accept the gen¬ 
erous offer. In the saloon were eight or ten men, all 
of whom were invited by the policeman to drink at 
his expense: Afterward he disputed about the pay¬ 
ment for the drinks, and offered to fight anybody in 
the place. No one accepted the challenge, and Con¬ 
roy rushed into a rear room and began plying the in¬ 
mates with his club. When they ran out for safety 
he stepped back into the main saloon again and, put¬ 
ting his club back in its socket, pulled his pistol, 
took deliberate aim at a group composed of Mrs, 
Cody, a man named Cantwell, and Peter Keenan, 
and fired. Keenan fell mortally wounded. The 
drunken policeman calmly walked out, and, meeting 
two other members of the force who had been at¬ 
tracted by the shot, he started to assist them in car¬ 
rying the wounded man out. It was suggested that 
an ambulance be called, but Conroy said this was 
unnecessary. He took hold of Keenan and made the 
dying man stand up and walk to the station. On the 
way, it was shown by the evidence, he clubbed his 
victim several times. When the couple arrived at 
the station the sergeant at the desk promptly sent 
for an ambulance and Keenan was taken to Bellevue, 
but before he arrived there he was dead. The mur¬ 
derer was stripped of his uniform, and, as his act had 
aroused general indignation, the case was rushed to 
a trial at once. The jury, after deliberating seven¬ 
teen hours, found the defendant guilty, and on De¬ 
cember 21,1883, he was sentenced to be hanged. An 
appeal was taken, however, and the general term of 
the supreme court reversed the verdict on the ground 
that the necessary premeditation to establish murder 
in the first degree had not been shown. The court 
of appeals, while upholding the reversal, did it on 
different grounds, holding that the facts were suffi¬ 
cient to justify the verdict, but that Judge Cowing, 
before whom the case was tried, had erred in refus¬ 
ing to admit certain testimony bearing on Conroy’s 
mental state, counsel for the defense having put in 
a plea of insanity. 

Conroy never faced a second jury. When the time 
for his re-trial came he pleaded guilty in order to es¬ 
cape the gallows, and accepted the life sentence, 
which David B. Hill commuted for him, thanks to 
the “pull” of the gentleman on whom the senator 
relies for his presidential boom. 

Nothing was known in the district attorney's office yes¬ 
terday of the manner in which Conroy’s pardon had been 
secured, and William F. Howe, who was the murderer's 
lawyer, said the first he knew of the affair was when he 
saw it recorded in the newspapers —New York Times, 
March 17. 


There is an unaccountable amount of “ hitch” and de‘ 
lay in the Central Park menagerie investigation by the 
commissioners of accounts. Superintendent Conklin is 
probably trying to get his ''pull,” which has somehow be¬ 
come weakened, into good order again, and the commis¬ 
sioners seem disposed to give him plenty of time. There 
is nothing particularly new in the condition of things 
at the menagerie. Mr. Conklin has for years been 
nursing it as if he owned it. Everybody has known 
that animals belonging to Barnum’s show and to 
importers and dealers in animals had been kept 
there at public expense, and those belonging to the 
city have been used at the discretion of the superin¬ 
tendent for show purposes outside the park. If he 
has bought animals himself and kept them there, or 
has sold or given away those belonging to the collec¬ 
tion, or swapped with other dealers without any¬ 
body’s consent, it is only in keeping with the theory 
upon which he has always seemed to act, that the 
whole establishment was at his disposal.— New York 
Times, March 20. 

iff if tf 

Every resident of this city has an apportunity to¬ 
day to do something toward .saving Central Park from 
despoliation by the placing of a race course along its 
westerly side. The job the Tammany politicians 
"put up” to rob the people of the city of a large slice 
of their finest pleasure garden for the benefit of a few 
hundred owners of race horses and a limited num¬ 
ber of contractors has worked to a charm up to this 
time. Senator Plunkitt's iniquitous bill providing for it 
having been railroaded into a law by the assembly and the 
governor, and an obedient board of park commissioners 
having demonstrated their entire willingness to do the 
dirty work placed tn their hands. The only apparent 
way effectually to undo the evil work that has al¬ 
ready begun is by a popular expression of indigna¬ 
tion such as will call the politicians to a halt and 
demand the immediate repeal of'the law.— New York 
Times, March 20. 

THE BALTIMORE INVESTIGATION. 

(continued.) 

Mr. Charles H. Ray testified as follows: 

Examined by Mr. Roosevelt. 

Q. Your name, Mr. Ray? A. Charles H. 
Ray. 

Q. Position? A. United States assistant 
weigher. 

» » -» -» » » 

Q. Mr. Ray, have you contributed to any 
person within the last week or so for political 
purposes? A. No, sir. 

Mr. Roosevelt. Understand, you have a per¬ 
fect right if you wish. 

Mr. Ray. That’s all right; I tell you, sir, 

I did not contribute. 

Q. Have you been asked? A. No, sir; 
not directly. 

Q. Have you been indirectly? A. The 
treasurer of our association in the seventh 
ward—it is not a political association in any 
way, shape, or form—he said that we would 
have to have some money, and I said I was 
willing to give anything. We have a costly— 

Q. Who is the treasurer? A. Charles A. 
Allard. 

Q. And in office? A. No, sir; I know 
what the law is, and did not intend to put my¬ 
self in the law. 

Q. You then, as a matter of fact, contrib¬ 
uted? A. I contributed one dollar. 

Q. Have you not been spoken to before, so 
that anyone who said his name was on a cer¬ 
tain list was a contributor? A. I told you, y’ 
understand—Mr. Allard y’ understand—that I 
was invited to his house. I though I had a 


I 

perfect right to go to a neighbor’s house. I 
am a republican; I know I was straight. I 
belong to a club. I thought I had a right to 
outside of my business hours. I thought I 
had a right to give my money as I pleased. I 
am an old-stock republican, and I have loved 
the party all my life. The democrats would 
turn me down every time and would not put 
me in, and I could not stand back. I would 
give freely if I was not prohibited by law. 

By Mr. Bonaparte: 

Q. Mr. Ray, what is the name of this club? 
A. We call ourselves “The Young Men’s 
Republican Club of the Seventh Ward,” in op-' 
position to the Stone Club. ' 

By Mr. Roosevelt: j 

Q. The .Stope Club is the same as the 
Henderson Club? A. Our club is the ad-^ 
ministration club. 

Q. The administration club—that’s what 
the fight will be to-day? A. A great many 
people are in the post-office and the custom¬ 
house, and I think it would be ungrateful if 
we went back on Mr. Johnson or Mr. Marine, 
and he never hinted at such a thing, and if he 
would say it to anybody he would say it to me. 
They have tried to crush me and keep me out 
of here, and I was a voter when he was in his 
breeches- 

By Mr. Bonaparte : 

Q. Mr. Ray, let us see if we have you 
down straight. Your name came to be on 
this list by your saying that you were willing 
to give him some money? A. Certainly; he 
did not call on me. 

Q. Has anyone brought the list around 
here? A. I have not seen it. I was out on 
duty, as the books will show, from last Wed¬ 
nesday week to last Tuesday. If the list was 
brought to this custom-house I didn’t see it. 

Q. When did this meeting at Allard’s 
house take place, do you remember? A. 
Tuesday evening, 17th of March, I went up 
there. 

Q. On the 17th of March ? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Is that correct ? A. I think it is. 

Q. Now, was there a Mr. Bell, an employe 
of the post-office, a member of that club? A. 

I don’t know that he is a member of the club 
at all now. He was down there when we first 
started. It’s a social organization, you under¬ 
stand. We have people in it as are against us 
and some are with us—its a social organiza¬ 
tion. And Mr. Bell has not attended that 
club since before last September. 

By Mr. Roosevelt: 

Q. Mr. John Bell, do you mean? A. Yes, 
sir. 

Q. Didn’t you attend a meeting at Mr^ 
Bell’s house when he was absent? A. No, 
sir. (Witness here objected to being cross- 
examined by Mr. Bonaparte. Mr. Roosevelt 
said it was perfectly proper for Mr. Bonaparte 
to cross-question.) 

Mr. Ray. That’s all right. I am willing 
to do it. I will answer you truthfully. I was 
not there. No, sir. 

By Mr. Bonaparte: 

CONTINUED IN NEXT ISSUE. 








The Civil Service Chronicle. 


This devotion of party, not to the ends for which it exists, but to the spoils that accompany success at the polls, has become so absolute that it has pro¬ 
duced an evil greater than any which party proposes torcm 5 ly —George WUliam. Garth, at BiUinore, April, 1892. 


OL. I, No. 38. INDIANAPOLIS, APRIL, 1892. terms fe^uVer^opT' 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


WEare able to give the full address of 
Mr. Curtis before the National League of 
Civil Service Reform Associations at Balti¬ 
more, April 28th. It is a complete state¬ 
ment of the circumstances under which 
the irrepressible spirit of progress acts in 
political matters, and under which civil 
service reform is now waging its war, and 
it is couched in terms which make its 
reading a rare pleasure. Progress is every¬ 
where the Golden Fleece to be won only 
by hard contention. Distrust of political 
power is the safeguard of democracy. 
The demand for civil service reform is the 
cry of that eternal vigilance which is the 
price of liberty, for a still further restric¬ 
tion of executive power. It is but another 
successive step in the development of lib¬ 
erty under law. The superstition of di¬ 
vine right has passed from king to party and 
the old fiction that the king can do no wrong 
has become the practical faith of great 
multitudes in regard to party. Patronage 
has but to capture the primary and it com¬ 
mands the party organization. Devotion 
to party success for the spoil which it 
brings, has become a greater evil than any 
which party proposes to remedy. Party 
is no longer a combination of citizens for 
public ends; it is a trading company seek¬ 
ing the advantage of the leading partners. 
Party machines no more favor civil serv¬ 
ice reform than kings favor the restriction 
of the royal prerogative. Civil service re¬ 
form will nevertheless succeed through 
party action because party machines defer 
to public opinion and independent votes. 
Already planted, it grows like a vigorous 
sapling. The futility of theoretical objec- 
tionp is shown by conclusive experiment, 
as when the first steamship crossed the 
ocean before Dr. Lardner had finished 
demonstrating that it was impossible. 

It is impossible in any synopsis to give 
an adequate idea of this address. It must 
be ranked as perhaps the greatest utter¬ 
ance that has ever been delivered against 
the spoils system. 

The following resolutions, recommended by the 
committee on resolutions a nd read by Carl Schurz, 
were adopted: * 

The National Civil Service Reform League gladly 
acknowledges that notwithstanding all violations of 


pledges and inconsistency of official action, the In¬ 
creasing pressure of public opinion upon public 
officers secures a faithful observance of the reform 
law of 1883, a greater reluctance to remove honest 
and efficient employes for political reasons, a deeper 
sense of shame in extorting political contributions 
from public employes, and the league congratulates 
all good citizens upon the constant and certain 
progress of reform. 

The present administration entered upon its du¬ 
ties with unprecedented promises from its party of 
thorough reform by extending the reformed system 
to all grades of the service to which it is applicable, 
by observing the spirit of the reform in all executive 
appointments, and by repealing all laws at variance 
with the objects proposed by reform legislation. To 
fulfill these extraordinary pledges the President has 
appointed an admirable commission, which has en¬ 
forced the requirements of the law, and has awak¬ 
ened in the southern states confidence in its honest 
operations so that the quotas of appointments may 
be equalized among all the states, and has every¬ 
where stimulated a wholesome apprehension in 
official circles of the danger of violating the reform 
law. The President’s judicial appointments are a 
sign of progress in the right direction. He has in¬ 
cluded some additional hundreds of places in the 
Indian service within the classified system, and has 
authorized open competition for promotion within 
the departments. The secretary of the navy has 
placed the entire labor system of the navy yards under 
reform rules, and the postmaster-general has intro¬ 
duced competition for promotion in the department 
at Washington and the classified post-offices. These 
are all measures of reform which the league recog¬ 
nizes with pleasure and warmly commends. 

REPUBLICAN PROMISES BROKEN. 

Much has been accomplished for reform by the 
force of public opinion, by the fidelity of the civil 
service commission, and by the action of the secre. 
tary of the navy during this administration, but the 
solemn promises of the republican platform of 1888 
have been broken, the voluntary pledges of the Pres¬ 
ident are unfulfilled, and the claim of the republican 
party, however strong may be the sympathy of indi¬ 
vidual republicans to be distinctly the party of civil 
service reform, is not sustained by the course of the 
administration, and against this gross breach of 
plighted faith with the people of the United States 
the National Civil Service Reform League earnestly 
protests. 

But with these exceptions the administration has 
done nothing to fulfill the pledges of extending the 
reformed system to all grades of the service to which 
it is applicable; the spirit of the reform has not been 
observed in all or in many executive appointments, 
and no effort has been made to repeal all laws at va¬ 
riance with the objects of reform. The post-office 
service. Including the employes of 60,000 post offices, 
the custom-houses and other executive offices, with 
the exception of the places within the classified sys¬ 
tem, have been ravaged by party removals; politi¬ 
cal assessments, although happily greatly^restricted 
by law and public opinion, have not been restrained; 
the power of patronage has been boldly exercised by 
the administration in factional quarrels, as in New 
York, and the earnest recommendation of the civil 
service commission for the removal of employes who 
have violated the civil service laws, as in Baltimore, 
have been wholly disregarded by the President. 

ARBITRARY POSTAL REMOVALS. 

The national postal service contained on the first 
of March 1892, 106,459 persons out of a total in the 


entire executive, judiciary and legislative depart¬ 
ments of 175,884. The arbitrary removals in the 
post-office service for political reasons alone wan¬ 
tonly impose upon the country the loss, delay and 
expense which necessarily result from replacing effi¬ 
ciency and experience by Ignorance and inexperi¬ 
ence. The practice is an antiquated political tradi¬ 
tion against which reason and good sense protest. 
It is a wrong which should be corrected by law, and 
we commend warmly as measures of great advant¬ 
ages to the public service the correction proposed by 
the Honorable Sherman Hoar in his bill providing 
for the removal of postmasters solely for cause sta¬ 
ted, and by the bill introduced by Honorable Henry 
Cabot Lodge, providing for the appointment of 
fourth-class postmasters without regard to political 
considerations. 

The league also regards as a public (measure of 
great value and importance the bill introduced into 
the house of representatives by the Hon. John F. 
Andrew of Massachusetts, providing for the selec¬ 
tion, by merit, under equal conditions for every ap¬ 
plicant, ot the labor force of the government in ev¬ 
ery department. Eminent pubiic officers testify to 
the admirable practical working of this system in 
the cities of Massachusetts, were it has been estab¬ 
lished since 1885, and there is no reason to doubt that 
it would be of the utmost benefit in the national 
service. 

FOUR years’ law OPPOSED. 

Believing that the power of removal should be 
vested in appointing officers, subject only to a sound 
discretion, the league holds that such officers should 
be relieved, so far as practicable, of every tempta¬ 
tion and every facility for the partisan exercise of 
such power. It, therefore, renews its demand for 
the repeal of the act known as the four years’ law, 
which, by prescribing a fixed term of office, were de¬ 
signed to facilitate political removals, offering the 
opportunity, which is eagerly embraced, for a mon¬ 
strous abuse of the power of appointment. 

The league calls attention to the fact that at the 
recent trial of persons charged with illegally assess¬ 
ing government employes for political purposes Jus¬ 
tice Bradley charged the jury that the retention of 
the accused in office by the government was reason 
for considering them innocent, and at the same time 
the government failed to remove them till they were 
criminally convicted. Thus, while the President 
does not remove until the offender is convicted, and 
the offender is not convicted because he is not re¬ 
moved by the President, the law is made of no effect. 

The league regrets that no punishment whatever 
should have been inflicted upon those employes of 
the Baltimore post-office proved by their own admis¬ 
sions to Commissioner Roosevelt to have violated 
both the spirit and the letter of the civil service law; 
it finds no satisfactory explanation for the President’s 
silence and Inaction on the subject; it declares the 
reasons given officially for this failure to vindicate 
the law (in so far as any reasons have been given) 
utterly insufficient, and it expects of Congress a thor¬ 
ough investigation and exposure of the entire trans¬ 
action . 

The house is inquiring into the scandals 
of the federal service in Baltimore, set out 
in Mr. Roosevelt’s recent report. The 
committee will find it an easy task to show 
that federal offices in Baltimore have been 
extensively used for personal and party 
ends, that the law relating to the black- 





















322 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


mailing of employes has been openly vio¬ 
lated, and that a multitude of facts show¬ 
ing this disgraceful state of affairs has been 
laid before the President, and that he has 
paid no attention to them. The Baltimore 
district attorney has not brought the mat¬ 
ter to the attention of the grand jury, and 
the law breakers are still in office. Crimi¬ 
nals drawing pay from the public treasury, 
a district attorney in silent league with 
them, and the President looking on with 
indifference, do not make a pleasing sight. 


Ex Congressman Allen, of Michigan, 
has been in Chicago soliciting funds from 
government employes. He “ struck ” Mr. 
Oliver T. Morton in his office in the federal 
building, but Mr. Morton has a way of 
striking back at blackmailers. Allen now 
denies the charge, as might be expected; 
that is an old and convenient dodge. One 
curious distinction may be noted. When 
the person who figures as United States 
marshal at Chicago was questioned, he 
took the ground that Allen only talked 
with Mr. Morton “ as a republican.” The 
millenium of evil doers has arrived if a 
criminal or his friends may answer that 
he has not committed crime but has only 
acted in a capacity. 


The resignation of Civil Service Com¬ 
missioner Thompson is a loss to the public 
service. Being of the minority party he 
was not the spokesman of the commission 
in its contests with the hungry crowd 
that sees the public service slipping away 
from its clutches, but he was not the less 
an admirable officer. He had no favoritism 
for members of his own party, nor any 
blind side toward blackmailers who try to 
squeeze money out of government em¬ 
ployes. He believed in fair play and in 
the enforcement of the law. It is saying 
much in these times to say that he was 
not afraid, either of the President or of any 
office-holder under the President. Those 
who are familiar with the dishonesty and 
the cowardice which has had to be fought 
down by the advocates of the merit sys¬ 
tem will understand that in mentioning 
these qualifications we are paying Mr. 
Thompson the very highest compliment. 


Collector.Beard, of the Boston custom 
house, has given to the^ public a report of 
his office for the two years, ending March 1, 
1892, During this time, in the classified 
service of 219 places, eleven changes were 
made by removal, eleven by death, twelve 
by resignation, and one by promotion to 
an excepted place. The reduction of an¬ 
nual expenses is $69,630. At the end of 
the report is this remark: 

“ Collector Beard'submits to Ithe public the fore¬ 
going statement as illustrating his idea of a practical 




business administration of the civil service, and 
believes that the facts herein presented save him the 
necessity of making ostentatious professions of de¬ 
votion to civil service reform.” 

Ostentatious professions should always 
be avoided and it is to be hoped that Col¬ 
lector Beard will neither make them indi¬ 
vidually nor join in party platforms which 
make them upon any subject. But he has 
not made any professions of devotion to 
civil service reform. He has, on the con¬ 
trary, disapproved of it, while compelled 
by public opinion around him to conduct 
his office upon its principles, and now the 
results confound him. The merit system 
has again conquered its ill-wishers. 


Democrats over the country are hold¬ 
ing their conventions and declaring that 
the tariff must be the issue in the ap¬ 
proaching presidential election. Never¬ 
theless they had better be preparing an 
answer to the question how, if their can¬ 
didate is elected, will he proceed with re¬ 
gard to the some hundred and forty thou¬ 
sand places in the federal service now 
operated as spoil. What will he do with 
regard to the civil service law ? If it is 
said that he will enforce it is it meant that 
he will enforce it as it was enforced in 
Indiana by the last democratic adminis¬ 
tration? Democrats have had too many 
lessons from those who are fighting the 
spoils system to be justified in supposing 
for a moment that they will sit down qui¬ 
etly and let a question of importance, but 
of minor importance, like the tariff be the 
one great question which bears upon a 
president’s qualifications. The tariff ques¬ 
tion has been with us for a hundred years 
and it will be with us a hundred more. It 
can wait and the country will prosper. 
The work of destroying the spoils system 
can not wait. 


The democrats of Indiana have held 
their state convention and adjourned 
without saying anything about the intro¬ 
duction of the merit system into the state 
and municipal service of Indiana. In the 
meantime we have two great prisons, four 
great hospitals for the insane, a large in¬ 
stitution for the blind, one for the deaf 
and dumb, fire and police departments in 
several large cities, and other departments 
of state and municipal service running 
upon a system of personal and party fa¬ 
voritism which is essentially and incurably 
corrupt. 

The annual examination for under¬ 
physicians in the Indianapolis city hospital 
and dispensary was held this month. These 
examinations are competitive and the one 
this year lasted five days, being oral and 
written. There is not a person in Indiana 
who will say that this method of choosing 


physicians is not practicable, or that it is 
not fair, or that it is not free from personal 
and party favoritism, or that it is not in 
every way a thorough success. This was 
brought about by the medical profession 
and that same profession can bring it about 
that similar appointments in our four in¬ 
sane hospitals and in all of our state insti¬ 
tutions shall be relieved of the incubus of 
partisan politics. 


PARTY AND PATRONAGE. 

An Address at the Annual Meeting of the 
National Civil Service Reform League 
in Baltimore, April 28, 1892. 

By George William Curtis. 

If Charles Lamb had been an American by birth, 
as he is certainly an American by affectionate liter¬ 
ary adoption, he would have added, probably, to his 
list of Popular Fallacies the pleasing delusion that a 
republic is a self-adjusting .system of liberty and 
equal rights, and that to upset a throne is to set up 
justice. When Voltaire was insulted by the London 
mob for being a Frenchman, an offence which John 
Bright said is forgiven by John Bull only with the 
greatest reluctance, the Frenchman turned upon the 
steps as he entered his door, and with exquisite sar¬ 
casm appealed to the nobleness of the English char 
acter and complimented the mob upon their institu¬ 
tions and love of liberty. Voltaire knew that in En¬ 
gland the surest appeal was to the national self-com¬ 
placency, a virtue which is not wanting to the En¬ 
glish-speaking race wherever it is found. 

But although we may justly claim that a republic 
upon the whole secures fairer play for every man 
than any other government, it is not necessary, as iu 
a disputed election, to claim everything. However 
it may be in Maryland, in New York the establish¬ 
ment of a republic by our fathers, while it has se¬ 
cured a fairer general chance for all men, has not 
yet developed universal political virtue or absolute¬ 
ly honest government. Like all excellent human 
devices, the administration of government must be 
constantly and carefully repaired and improved. If 
a locomotive upon a railroad must be watched with 
incessant care and be scrupulously oiled and bur¬ 
nished, in order effectively to do its work; if even a 
chronometer must be regularly wound if it is to re¬ 
port accurately the time of day; if a slight derange¬ 
ment of the machinery brings the huge humming 
factory to silence, it is a fond delusion that popular 
forms of government alone will secure honest and 
equitable administration. 

In the ninteenth year of our constitutional union 
Fulton essayed with steam to force his little vessel, 
the Clermont, up the Hudson river to Albany. It 
was an experiment in mechanics, but no more an 
experiment than the republic in politics. Incessant 
care, comprehensive observation, intelligence, dis¬ 
cretion, shrewd modification of details, perpetual 
deference to the hints of experience, a thoughtful 
care which has not yet ceased, all these have devel¬ 
oped Fulton’s struggling, doubtful Clermont pushing 
its way upon a smooth stream to Albany iu thirty- 
two hours into the magnificent marine palace that 
crosses the turbulent ocean in five times thirty-two 
hours. Much more was necessary to this marvellous 
development than the invention of the steam engine, 
and the application of steam to navigation. Very 
much more is necessary to honest government, to 
the security of liberty, the equality of rights, and 
the general welfare, than a republican form of gov¬ 
ernment. Among the Zulus to-day a republic would 
hardly prosper. In Bourbonized France a hundred 
years ago a republic was a saturnalia of wrong and 
blood Wendell Phillips, seeing only the cause and 
the result, the inhuman tyranny that produced the 
French revolution, and the relaxed grasp of despot¬ 
ism that followed it, called it “ the most unstained 
























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


323 


and wholly perfect blessing Kurope has had in mod¬ 
ern times.” However that may be from the orator’s 
point of view, the French republic of 1793, the fierce 
outbreak of a people imbruted by unspeakable op¬ 
pression, was itself an awful revenge in kind. Even 
great as is the progress and marvellous the recuper¬ 
ative force of the French people, and fair their fu¬ 
ture prospect, the republic is built upon volcanic 
ground, and may yet reel with earthquake shocks. 

If Mount Blanc, the sovereign Alp, has not a charm 
to stay the morning star, the American republic, 
greatest and best of all republics, has no more power 
than the Roman republic by its name alone to se 
cure freedom and wise progress. It is but an instru¬ 
ment, and its beneficent efficiency depends upon the 
intelligence, character and conscience of the people 
who wield it, and upon the promptitude and skill 
with which it is kept in repair and adjusted to the 
changing conditions of its operation. The demand 
of reform In methods of administration of govern¬ 
ment, therefore, is not revolutionary, nor Quixotic, 
nor surprising. It is the sign of a healthy and pro¬ 
gressive political life. It is not exceptional, but on 
the contrary it is familiar in every kind of human 
activity. It is the impulse of the instinct which con¬ 
stantly seeks something better; 

” The desire of the moth for the star, 

Of the night for the morrow 

the instinct which stimulates medical science to dis¬ 
covery of more certain relief for the physical pain 
and suffering of mankind, which produces endless 
mechanical inventions, increases the knowledge of 
occult forces and their practical application to hu¬ 
man convenience, arrests the vast and needless 
waste of vitality that lesser knowledge can not stay ; 
which lightens labor and lengthens life by greater 
command of time and space. 

Why should this beneficent inspiration be lost to 
the sphere of politics which is not a less universal 
concern than all these ? When human ingenuity is 
busily improving sewing-machines, and type-writers, 
steam engines, telephones and electric lights, and 
every mechanical and industrial process, why should 
methods of administration and government not be 
supposed susceptible of improvement? As the 
Arabian Nights and the old fairy stories are but 
delightful prophecies of our modern world of larger 
intelligence and shrewder wit, where we are wafted 
from place to place upon an enchanted carpet and in 
a chair of magic, where Ispahan converses with 
Istamboul, and a drop of elixir deadens pain, so 
Plato’s republic, and Sir Thomas More’s Utopia, and 
Harrington’s Oceana, and all the ideal common¬ 
wealths of the poets and philosophers are but vague 
forecasts of states not further from ours than ours 
from those of early history. 

Yet the world is not a garden of the Hesperides 
where we have only to raise our hands and pluck 
the golden fruit of progress. Progress, on the con¬ 
trary, is everywhere the Golden Fleece to be won 
only by hard contention, by taming fire-breathing 
bulls of stupidity, by slaying dragons of malignity, 
and by victoriously withstanding hosts of slanderers 
and liars sprung from the teeth of venemous ser¬ 
pents. If the application of humane discoveries of 
science and the advance of the comfort and conven¬ 
ience of modern civilization have been resisted as 
stoutly as if they were a pestilence or a consuming 
cloud of locusts, it is not surprising that every polit¬ 
ical reform is ridiculed as visionary and denounced 
as incendiary. This has been so universally the wel¬ 
come of improvement in every department of hu¬ 
man interest that it may be said almost that the pre¬ 
sumption is in favor of every proposed reform, and 
that reputed quacks and tiresome fanatics are prob¬ 
ably new Columbuses and Galileos and Jenners, the 
latest benefactors of mankind. It is this jealous 
distrust of progress which led so sagacious a states¬ 
man as Lord Shelburne to say: “The moment 
the independence of America is agreed to by our 
government the sun of Great Britain is set, and we 
shall no longer be a powerful or respectable people,” 
and even Richard Henry Lee called the framers of 
the American censtitution “visionary young men.” 
They were very positive, but it was only their highly 
rhetorical way of saying “ here is a change,” and 


change to certain conservative temperaments means 
only mischief. But the challenge of conservatism to 
the spirit of progress has this advantage, that it com¬ 
pels every change to prove its right by showing its 
reason. 

The uncertain fortune of reform in politics, fluct¬ 
uating between sudden success and long delay, is 
well explained by a remark of Fisher Ames, that 
“the only constant agents in political affairs are the 
passions of men;” and by what Gardiner, the latest 
and masterly historian of the great civil war in En¬ 
gland, says of the Presbyteriani.sm of Prynne, that it 
enlisted on the side of the average intellect of the 
day, “which looked with suspicion on ideas not yet 
stamped with the mint mark of custom ; the feeling 
which unconsciously exists in the majority of man¬ 
kind, of repugnance against all who aim at higher 
thinking or purer living than are deemed sufficient 
by their contemporaries, and who usually, in the 
opinion of their contemporaries, contrive to miss 
their aim.” But existing order con.sists always of 
ideas which are stamped with the mint mark of cus¬ 
tom, and the hope of progress, therefore, lies in the 
ideas which are not yet authenticated at the mint. 
The Bourbon despotism in France, the Stuart abuses 
in England, the supremacy of the Crown in Colonial 
America, had the mint mark of custom. Had no 
other coinage been demanded these coined abuses 
would have remained the sole currency. Political 
progress, and with it larger liberty and higher gen¬ 
eral welfare, are secured only by bringing fresh 
bullion to be stamped with the mint mark. In the 
ever spreading tree of political life it is distrust of the 
established order, not acquiescence in it,which is the 
irritation of the stem that shows the spot where the 
new growth will spring. 

In the legal security of liberty progress has been 
always effected by regulating the executive power 
which is the final force in all politically organized 
communities. The Great Charter, the Grand Re 
monstrance, the Petition of Rights in England, were 
all declarations against the arbitrary exercise of exec- 
• utive power, and steadily diminished by jealous pop 
ular care, this power gradually became mainly the 
arbitrary control of patronage. For this arbitrary con¬ 
trol the English tory had always a plausible plea, and 
in the middle of the last century, when England had 
been freshly reminded by Culloden and the roman¬ 
tic enthusiasm for Prince Charles that the Hanover¬ 
ian throne was not yet secure, David Hume in his 
essay upon the Independence of Parliaments, made 
a better argument for patronage under the British 
Constitution than could ever be made for it under 
ours. It was essential, he said, to the balance of the 
constitution. The House of Commons did not as¬ 
sert its supremacy over the other branches of the 
government only because it did not think it its in¬ 
terest to do so. The patronage of the crown, he said, 
with the aid of honest members alone maintained 
the royal power. That is to .say the King bought 
votes enough to supplement the votes of his friends. 
“We may call this influence,” he says, for Hume 
was an honest man, “by the invidious appellations 
of corruption and dependence, but some degree and 
some kind of it are inseparable from the very nature 
of the constitution, and necessary to the preserva 
tlon of our mixed government.” 

Mr. Lecky points out the coincidence of Hume’s 
view with that of Paley, who attributes the loss of 
the American colonies to the want of royal patron¬ 
age extensive enough, as he says, “to counteract 
that restless, arrogating spirit which in popular 
assemblies, when left to it.self, will never brook an 
authority that checks and interferes with its own.” 
This is the tribute of the moral philosopher to the 
necessity and reasonableness of the spoils system, a 
tribute which is echoed in the political gospel ac¬ 
cording to Tammany Hall as recently set forth under 
the name of the political moralist, Mr. Richard 
Croker, in the North American Review, a plea, I may 
add, which was promptly and thoroughly exposed 
by our friend and associate, Mr. Dorman B. Eaton. 

Our fathers were largely children o^ the English¬ 
men who with great gyves of reform bound the 
royal prerogative ; and the American Declaration of 
Indepemlence in legitimate succession from Magna 


Charta and the Grand Remonstrance wasan arraign¬ 
ment of the abuse of executive power. Our colonial 
politics were, in large part, a contest over patronage 
between the royal governors and the colonial legis¬ 
latures. The destruction of the statue of George the 
Third in the Bowling Green at New York, at the be¬ 
ginning of the Revolution, was symbolic of the in¬ 
stinctive distrust of executive power by the colonists. 
The crown was the emblem of executive oppression, 
and when the republic began in the formation of the 
first state constitutions during the revolution, the 
chief distinction of those constitutions was the at¬ 
tempted restraint of that power by distribution be¬ 
tween the legislature or the council and the 
governor. With the same jealousy the framers of 
the constitution in establishing the national govern¬ 
ment limited the executive power of appointment. 
They provided that only with the advice and con¬ 
sent of the senate should the President appoint 
certain specified officers, while the congress should 
provide at its pleasure for the appointment of others_ 
The constitution thus re.serves to the senate a prac¬ 
tical veto upon the appointing power and to congress 
the designation of the methods of appointment of all 
inferior officers. 

The people had assumed their own government, 
but as they could not administer it directly it was 
administered by agents selected by party or the or¬ 
ganized majority, but under such restrictions as the 
whole body of voters, or the people, might impose. 
The crown had vanished. There was no king or per¬ 
manent executive. There were a president and a 
legislature elected by the people for limited terms. 
But the practical agency of the government was par¬ 
ty, and whoever was elected president, party re¬ 
mained in the administration as permanent as a king 
and with the same control of the executive power. 
But executive power, whether in the hands of a king 
or a party, does not change its nature. It seeks its 
own aggrandizement and can not safely be trusted. 
Buckle says that no man is wise enough and strong 
enough to be vested with absolute authority. It 
fires his brain and maddens him. But this, which is 
true of an individual is not less true of an aggregate 
of individuals or a party. A party or a majority needs 
watching as much as a king. Indeed, that distrust is 
the safeguard of democracy against despotism is a 
truth as old as Demosthenes. Like a sleuth-hound 
distrust must follow executive power however it 
may double and whatever form it may assume. It 
is as much the safeguard of popular right against the 
will of a party as against the prerogative of a king. 
Distrust is. in fact, the instinct of enlightened polit¬ 
ical sagacity which sees that the peril of popular 
institutions lies in the abuse of the forms of pop¬ 
ular government. The great common-place of our 
political speech, eternal vigilance is the price of lib¬ 
erty, is fundamentally true. It is a scripture e.ssen- 
tial to political salvation. The demand for civil ser-' 
vice reform is the cry of that eternal vigilance for 
still further restriction of the executive power. 

Civil service reform, therefore, is but another suc¬ 
cessive step in the development of liberty under law. 
It is not eccentric nor revolutionary. It is a logical 
measure of political progress. In the light of larger 
experience and adjusted to the exigencies of a re¬ 
public in the nineteenth century, instead of a mon¬ 
archy in the thirteenth and seventeenth centuries, 
in the spirit of the wise jealousy of the constitution, 
in the interest of free institutions and of honest 
government, it proposes to restrict still further the 
, executive power as exercised by party. It is a meas¬ 
ure based upon the observation of a century during 
which government by party has developed condi¬ 
tions and tendencies and perils which could not 
have been fore.seen in detail, although at the begin¬ 
ning of party government under the constitution, 
Washington said of party spirit, “ it exists under 
different shapes in all governments more or less 
stilled, controlled or repressed ; but In those of popu¬ 
lar form, it is seen in its greatest rankness and is 
truly their worst enemy.” 

The experience of a century has justified Wash¬ 
ington’s words. The superstition of divine right 
has passed from a king to a party, and the old fiction 
of the law in a monarchy that the king can do no 









324 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


wrong, has become the practical faith of great multi¬ 
tudes in this republic in regard to party. Armed 
with the arbitrary power of patronage party over¬ 
bears the free expression of the popular will and 
entrenches itself in Illicit power. It makes the whole 
civil service a drilled and disciplined army whose 
living depends upon carrying elections at any cost 
for the party which controls it. Patronage has but 
to capture the local primary meeting and it com¬ 
mands the whole party organization. Every mem¬ 
ber of the party must submit or renounce his party 
allegiance, and with it the gratification of his politi¬ 
cal ambition, and such is the malign force of party 
spirit that in what seems to him a desperate alterna¬ 
tive he often supports men whom he distrusts and 
methods which he despises lest his party should be 
defeated. He takes practically the position that 
party loyalty requires him to support one party with 
bad measures and unfit candidates rather than risk 
the success of another party with good measures and 
suitable men. 

This devotion of party, not to the ends for which it 
exists but to the spoils that accompany success at 
the polls, has become so absolute that it has pro¬ 
duced an evil greater than any which party proposes 
to remedy. In order to secure and maintain party 
power, a corruption has been introduced which in 
volves not only the whole system of our politics, 
but the character of the people. It is a corruption so 
general and so familiar that an amendment to the 
constitution is proposed in congress, which contem¬ 
plates the election of senators of the United States 
by the popular vote of state instetd of the legisla¬ 
ture, and the argument gravely urged for the amend¬ 
ment is that it is harder to corrupt the whole people 
than to buy a legislature. Familiar incidents of the 
last presidential campaign, the collection of an im¬ 
mense sum of money by party managers to be spent 
without audit or accounting of any kind, and the 
general public conviction that it was a simple cor¬ 
ruption fund not only spent for Illicit purposes, 
but by which high office was bought, and the 
equally general conviction that if the other party 
could have procured the same sum of money it 
would have done the same thing, show how wide¬ 
spread the evil has become. 

A New York morning paper of the highest char¬ 
acter recently published the remark of a conspicu¬ 
ous politician whose name was given, that, “two- 
fifths of the democratic voters of the state are repre¬ 
sented in conventions by delegates selected by the 
heads of the various departments in New York and 
King’s county,” that is to say in the cities of New 
York and Brooklyn. An evening paper of the same 
day, speaking of the republican nomination for the 
governorship in Rhode Island, said, “it is notorious 
in the state that every republican candidate must 
pay for this honor, and the price has heretofore 
ranged from $20,000 to $40,000. * * * It has fre¬ 
quently happened that a second assessment has been 
necessary when the election by the people has failed 
and the choice has fallen upon the legislature.” 
These statements are not disputed. They are read 
languidly by many readers as illustrations of the 
rottenness of politics. They are read with alarm by 
many others as signs of a taint that will rot the 
whole system if not extirpated. The wrong is not 
peculiar to any party, for its source is the party 
spirit which Washington foresaw. The pot indeed 
Bolemly rebukes the kettle, but when traders in 
mules denounce traders in blocks of five for politi¬ 
cal corruption, w’e instructively recall the legendary 
Roman augurs and the stage direction in Robert the 
Devil, “infernal laughter.” 

This monstrous development of the party system 
in a republic, while it might have been vaguely an¬ 
ticipated, could not have been definitely foreseen. 
The American who had served under Washington 
in the field and had voted for him as President, al¬ 
though he may have seen in the malice of the oppo¬ 
sition newspapers the adder tongue of faction,would 
have smiled to hear the suggestion that in Repub¬ 
lican America, the party proscriptions and excesses 
of Athens and Rome and Florence, without the 
slaughter, might be revived and repeated. Still less 
would it occur to him that a civil service which a 


century ago in the whole Union included only two 
hundred and nine post-masters and a handful of 
other officers, whose tenure was their fidelity and 
efficiency, would suddenly rise like the Afrite from 
the casket in the Arabian tale, into a gigantic and 
towering form, but still the supple slave of reckless 
party power. The increase of the population, the 
vast alien addition to the native stock, the universal 
extension of male adult suffrage, the growth of great 
cities of heterogeneous citizenship, the opening of 
enormous opportunities of contracts and political 
money making, the vast consolidations of capital 
not hesitating to attempt for their purposes the brib¬ 
ery of legislatures, the paralysis of the national con¬ 
science for a generation in the defence by a great 
political party of a huge moral wrong, and finally a 
long and relentless civil war, all these were yet to 
come, and their relation to an enormous increase of 
public patronage, and their influence upon the party 
system, could not be foretold. 

These results, however, are now evident. What 
our fathers could not guess, we can see. Party 
which is properly simply the organization of citizens 
who agree in their views of public policy to secure 
the enactment of their views in law, has become 
what is well called a machine, which controls the 
political action of millions of citizens who vote for 
candidates that the machine selects and for measures 
which the machine dictates or approves. Servility 
to party takes the place of Individual independence 
of action. So completely does it consume political 
manhood that like men suddenly hurried from their 
warm beds into the night air, shivering and chatter¬ 
ing in the cold, even Intelligent citizens who have 
protested against their party machine as fraudulent 
and false, and an organized misrepresentation of the 
party conviction and will, declare that if their pro¬ 
test against the power of fraud and corruption does 
not avail and the party commands them to yield, 
they will bow the head and bend the knee in loyalty 
to fraud and corruption. The despotism of the ma¬ 
chine is so absolute and the triumph of the party so 
supersedes the reason and purpose of party, that we 
have now reached a point in our political develop¬ 
ment, W'hen upon the most vital and pressing pub¬ 
lic questions parties do not even know their own 
opinions, and factions of the same party wrangle 
fiercely to determine by a majority what the party 
thinks and proposes. Meanwhile so completely has 
the conception of party, as merely a convenient but 
clumsy agency to promote certain public objects, 
disappeared, that one of the chief journals in the 
country recently remarked, with entire gravity, that 
it found “no fault with conscientious independence 
in politics,” which was like announcing with lofty 
forbearance that, as a philosophic moralist, it found 
no fault with truth telling or honest dealing. 

The recent vivid and detailed picture of political 
corruption in Maryland, which we owe to the distin¬ 
guished president of the Maryland Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association, one of the earliest, most steadfast, 
and most effective advocates of reform, and its com¬ 
panion-piece depicting political corruption in Penn¬ 
sylvania, by our devoted and undaunted friend of 
political reform, Mr. Herbert Welsh, whom ravaged 
Indians bless, show how completely in two great 
states the two great parties of the country by base 
and dishonest methods pervert their power from 
promoting the public benefit to fostering their own 
aggrandizement. I am not forgetting Burke’s apo¬ 
thegm that we can not draw an indictment against a 
nation. I am not arraigning the individual citizens 
who compose the great parties as guilty of bribery 
and corruption. As individuals they deprecate and 
denounce them. But as partisans they sustain the 
bribers and corrupters. The drivers of the machine 
are necessarily few, but they are also the drivers of 
the party, and substantially they are the party. The 
individual partisan forced to excuse himself can 
only say that it is bad business, but that his party 
machine is no worse than the other. This was the 
plea of Thaddeus Stevens, the leader of his party in 
the house of representatives, who is said to have 
asked in a contested election case, “ Which is our 
damned rascal?” in order that he might vote for the 
right wrong. So far as the mere fact is concerned. 


however, the plea that the other machine is equally 
bad is undoubtedly sound. When Theodore Parker 
delivered his tremendous discourse on Daniel Web¬ 
ster, to which Rufus Choate’s eulogy at Dartmouth 
College was the magnificent but pathetically futile 
reply, a fervent admirer of Webster declared, ener¬ 
getically, that Parker’s discourse was the most out¬ 
rageous deliverance he had ever heard, “and the 
worst of it is,” he said, “ that it is true.” When 
the supporter of one party machine defends himself 
with the rueful apology that theother party machine 
is quite as bad, the worst of it is that it is true. 

If I am telling the truth, it is plain that when the 
control of patronage passed from royal prerogative 
to popular party, the spirit and purpose of its exer¬ 
cise did not substantially change. A hundred years 
ago in England the king bought votes in parliament; 
to day in America party buys votes at the polls. The 
party system has subjected the citizen to the ma¬ 
chine, and the first great resource of its bribery fund 
is patronage. It is the skillful annual expenditure 
of sixty millions of public money in the national 
arena, and by that of thirty millions in the munici¬ 
pal contests of New York alone, not by educational 
arguments and appeals to reason, that the machine 
or the managers of parties attempt to secure or main¬ 
tain their ascendancy. Tammany Hall defends it¬ 
self as Hume defended the king. The plea of both 
is the same. The king must maintain the crowd 
against the parliament, and he can do it only by 
corruption, said Hume. Party is necessary, says 
Tammany, but party organization can be made 
effective only by workers. Workers must be paid, 
and the patronage of the government, that is to say, 
the emolument of place, is the natural fund for such 
payment. This is the simple plea of the spoils sys¬ 
tem. It places every party on a wholly venal basis. 
Under its control party is no longer a combination 
of citizens for public ends; it is a trading company 
seeking the advantage of the leading partners. It is 
the selfishness of the individual, not the public 
spirit of the citizen, upon which it rests. And this 
view has various consequences. 

If public money may be properly given as a pri¬ 
vate reward, the givers may decide upon what terms 
it shall be given. This is frankly asserted by Tam¬ 
many, and in this it speaks for every party machine. 

It asks plainly, why should not a judge who is elected 
by us for a term of years, with a salary of fifteen 
thousand dollars a year, and who except for us 
could not be elected, pay to Tammany the very 
moderate commission of ten thousand dollars for 
his election, which Tammany guarantees ? This is 
the doctrine of political assessments in the custom 
house and post-office, and every branch of the serv¬ 
ice. It is rent paid for the place. It is tribute to 
the party for the personal favor of appointment. 
“Why should not a man pay for benefits? Why 
should not those who are elected to well-salaried 
offices,” asks Tammany, “pay the expenses of the 
election ? Who are so much inter..sted in the elec¬ 
tion as its beneficiaries?” it Inquires, and it asks 
candidly, because the truth that the people ordain 
elections for their own benefit and not for the pri¬ 
vate advantage of the candidates Tammany not only 
does not believe, but when stated does not compre¬ 
hend. And this view of Tammany is the view of 
not only of each party machine, hut of a large ma¬ 
jority’ of both parties. Tammany is called a gang of 
public robbers without political principles, an ob¬ 
scene fungus fattening upon the corruption engen¬ 
dered by a great city. But it is the natural spawn 
of the spoils sy’stem. It is the mirror in which party 
as now organized among us is reflected, and when 
party contemplates the image of that diamonded 
savage with his scalping knife of spoils it may well 
recall the title of Rossetti’s picture, “How they met 
themselves.” 

The sophistry of the spoils extends itself readily 
beyond elections and appointments and assessments 
in the civil service not only into the whole political - I 
system, but into every department of the national i|l' 
life. It is undoubtedly true that whether there 
were a spoils system or not great interests of all 
kinds in the pursuit of their own advantage would H 
alw'ays attempt to bribe legislatures, and that public • I 
officers and voters would still be bought at the polls. ' j I 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


325 


But it is not true that such attempts would be made 
or would succeed under all circumstances. Cholera 
and typhus may not be wholly prevented by the 
wisest sanitary care. But cleanly, well-drained, 
and prudent neighborhoods are much less exposed 
' to their ravages than those which are abandoned to 
foulness of every kind and degree. The spoils sys¬ 
tem is a moral pestilence bred of ignorance, careless¬ 
ness, and knavery, which invites corruption as filth 
invites disease. A community which holds that a 
public office is a private benefit for which the recip¬ 
ient ought to pay, or that citizens of all parlies in a 
free government may be justly taxed for the workers 
of a party, would hardly frown upon the proposi¬ 
tion that the beneficiary of a law may properly pay 
for its passage. I do not say that the cases are ex¬ 
actly parallel, but the moral laxity and blindness in 
the one case would extend naturally and readily to 
the other. So long as it is held that the public 
money may be spent by a party for its own benefit, 
which means that in a country where party domi¬ 
nance should depend upon honest preference of its 
policy, the dominant party may properly pay sixty 
millions of dollars from the public treasury for 
votes so long it will be as impossible to stem the cor¬ 
ruption which threatens us on every side as to stay 
the resistless plunge of Niagara. 

We are approaching the third presidential election 
since the League was organized. Does any intelli¬ 
gent observer doubt that the party of administration 
controlling the vast salary fund of the civil service, 
wnich is practically a corruption fund, enters upon 
the campaign with an immense but wholly illicit ad¬ 
vantage? Like every administration party it is just¬ 
ly entitled to every advantage that arises from a wise 
policy, from the honest and efficient conduct of af¬ 
fairs, from strict adhesion, if it has adhered, to the 
promises by which it solicited public support, and 
from the faithful fulfillment, if it has fulfilled them, 
of voluntary executive pledges. To all these legiti¬ 
mate advantages the party is entitled. But so far as 
its administration has expended sixty millions of 
dollars in salaries with a view to the next election 
and to the continuance of the party in power, so far 
it has betrayed the principle of popular government, 
because so far it has deliberately bought party sup¬ 
port with public money. The disposition of that 
i'Bfund was committed to it in trust for the public 
welfare, and every cent of it which this administra¬ 
tion has spent to advance a party interest has been 
spent in betrayal of a public trust. If the national 
patronage fund were six hundred millions of dollars 
instead of sixty, it is not impossible that, in the 
present development of the party system, the party 
of this administration, as of any other, by the shrewd 
expenditure of that sum might maintain itself in 
power. But the oflfense is not measured by figures. 
The abuse of a trust of sixty millions is morally as 
great as abuse of a trust ten times as large. 

It is not an abuse peculiar to this administration. 
There has been no administration since that of John 
Quincy Adams which has not done the same thing. 
It was long done amid general public apathy arising 
from the good-natured and careless feeling that it 
was the natural order of politics, the common law of 
parties. It grew up gradually amid general igno¬ 
rance of its tendency and public indifference. The 
spoils system may plead that although a breach of 
the earlier tradition in national politics, it is really 
as old in New York and nearly as old in Pennsyl¬ 
vania as parties themselves, and' that it has grown 
strong with the general acquiescence. But that is 
only to say that public evils and abuses do not arrest 
attention and arouse organized resistance until they 
are seen to be public perils. That is now distinctly 
seen, and this League is the living, active, aggressive 
witness of the happy awakening of the public mind 
to the fact that the prostitution of patronage to the 
maintenance of party power imperils liberty to-day 
in a republic no less than the arbitrary will of a king 
imperiled it in a monarchy. 

In appealing to public opinion to bind the exec¬ 
utive power still more closely by restricting the 
license of party in the interest of the whole people, 
we propose nothing which has not been often done. 
The very fact that party is a convenient agency and 


that its disposition is to magnify its authority, is 
conclusive reason for vigilant observation of its con¬ 
duct and for wholesome checks upon its ac.ion. 
Party is a clever servant like Steerforth’s man Litti- 
mer in David Copperfield. But the cleverer he is 
the more insolent, if permitted, he Is likely to be¬ 
come, and the more firmly he needs to be disciplined. 
Party is the servant of the people, but it is so clever 
that it tends to become practically master and bul¬ 
lies the individual citizen as the clever Littimer, 
setting the table and stirring the fire, overpowered 
with awe poor little shrinking David. Those who 
grovel before party as the courtiers in Siam crawl on 
their bellies before the king, forget that the people 
are really master snd often break from their good- 
natured indifference to teach party its place. There 
is, for instance, in this country a public opinion 
which has the force of law that the judicial 
bench, the tribunal of ultimate appeal even in ques¬ 
tions of elections, whether the judges are appointed 
or elected, shall be independent of party partiality 
and influence, and it is a happy fact that the bench 
is so absolutely non partisan that the infrequent ex¬ 
ceptions to the rule, when they occur, justly startle 
the community as with a shock that threatens the 
foundations of social order. Another Illustration of 
this suspicion of party is the condition frequently 
imposed by law upon the executive appointment of 
commissions charged with important public duties, 
that the members shall not be all d awn from one 
political party. But the most striking illustration of 
a sane public sentiment which recoils from the 
abuse of executive power by the party and of the in¬ 
tervention of the people tocorrret it, is found in the 
political history of New York, the state in which the 
spoils system was introduced with the rise of parties 
under the constitution, and which for the first 
twenty-five years of the century witnessed the worst 
excesses of party tyranny. 

When the state constitution was adopted in 1777, 
in order to curb the executive power, a council of 
appointment for all state officers was elected by one 
house of the legislature from the members of theother, 
of which council the governor was made president, 
with a casting vote. For some years before parties 
were definitely organized, its function was honestly 
discharged to the public satisfaction, and upon the 
true principles of the public service. Political re¬ 
movals were practically unknown until as parties 
arose under the constitution, the council of appoint¬ 
ment was swiftly transferred into a clean-sweeping 
party machine, and for the first twenty years of the 
century its action was merciless. In 1820 the coun 
cil controled about 15,000 appointments in a stale 
where there were but 145,000 voters. A change in 
its party majority Inaugurated an orgy of plunder. 
The public service of the state after an election was 
looted like a Chinese city after its capture by barba¬ 
rians. The party proscription was complete, and 
among a healthy and vigorous people it became also 
intolerable. The evil wrought its own cure. There 
was a general demand for the abolition of the coun¬ 
cil, and in 821 one hundred and nine thousand 
votes against thirty-five thousand demanded its abo¬ 
lition, and the clean-sweeping party machine was 
destroyed by the unanimous vote of the constitu¬ 
tional convention. This was not a party victory; it 
was the act of the people regulating the executive 
power by curbing the arbitrary will of party. The 
appointing power was distributed among different 
agencies where it still remains, and as its abuse by 
party, although greatly reduced, still remained under 
the changed form, the people still further abridged 
it by the civil service reform law of 188.3, a measure 
in direct and logical succession from Magna Charta, 
and all the great muniments of political liberty. 

This is the law’ which in its limited operation is 
an undisputed public benefit, that we would apply 
to every branch of the public service, national, state 
and municipal, to which it is applicable. By re¬ 
straining the arbitrary power of party we would 
promote hojiest administration of the government. 
But when we say that our aim is honest government, 
we do not say that the civil service is dishonest. It 
is, therefore, no reply to our demand to allege that 
the percentage of loss to the government in the col¬ 


lection of the revenue is inconsiderable. What we 
affirm is that the theory which regards places in the 
public service as prizes to be distributed after an 
election like j)lunder after a battle, the theory which 
perverts public trusts into parly spoils, making 
public employment dependent on personal favor 
and not on proved merit, necessarily ruins the self" 
respect of public employes, destroys the function 
of party in a republic, prostitutes elections into a 
desperate strife for personal profit, and degrades the 
national character by lowering the moral tone and 
standard of the country. 

Four years ago as the presidential election ap¬ 
proached, the League stated in some detail the rea¬ 
sons for its dissatisfaction with the administration of 
that time. It tested the administration by the sim¬ 
ple standard of reform, and all that it could say was 
that the scope of the classified service had been 
somewhat enlarged and that the rules and regula¬ 
tions had been revised and improved. It declared 
that the general party change in the service which 
had followed the inauguration of the new presiden 
was not demanded by the welfare of the service 
Itself, nor by any public advantage whatever, and 
was due solely to parti.san pressure for partisan ob¬ 
jects which unfortunately the President had not re¬ 
sisted. But it will not be foigotten not only that the 
party of the President bad not demanded reform- 
but that its controlling sentiment was ho.stile to it 
All that was done under the last administration— 
and what was done gave the question of reform a 
place in practical politics which it will not lose un, 
til the reform is fully achieved—was done by the 
President alone. Except for his courage and fidel¬ 
ity to his personal convictions, the reform law of 
1883 would have been practically nullified, and the 
reform ignored and discarded. Tried by the stand¬ 
ard of absolute reform, he failed as President Grant 
failed ten years before, and for the some reason, the 
hostility of his party. But tested by the actual situ¬ 
ation of to-day, notwithstanding the executive 
yieldingito party pressure, the pure flame of reform 
sentiment not only was not extinguished during the 
late administration, but burned more brightly in 
the public mind as the administration ended— 
burned so brightly, indeed, that the opposition 
party in the platform upon which they carried the 
election made the strongest profession of reform 
faith and purpose that any party ever made. 

The present administration came into power not 
with the usual vague platitude upon the subject, 
but with a definite promise of reform and the dis¬ 
tinct pledge to fulfill its pledges. But it celebrated 
the success of its party with a wild debauch of spoils 
in which its promises and pledges were the meats 
and the drinks that were riotously consumed. 
Nevertheless, the reform law has been as faithfully 
observed as by its predecessor, and the scope of the 
reformed service has been greatly enlarged. The 
secretary of the navy, in the interest of the public, 
and he could have done his party also no greater 
service, has introduced the reform into the skilled 
and unskilled labor system of the navy yards. In 
his late speech in Rhode Island, a carefully and 
skillfully prepared defence of the administration 
and the strongest presentation of its claims to public 
confidence that probably will be made during the 
pending campaign. Secretary Tracy says: “I be- 
live I am justified in saying that so far as its admin¬ 
istration is concerned the navy has never been 
treated so little in the spirit of a party question as it 
is to-day; the regulations of the department within 
the last year have eradicated all political considera¬ 
tions from the employment of navy yard labor, and 
have made that employment dependent alone upon 
the skill and efficiency of the workmen.” 

A more signal illustration of the practical progress 
of reform can not be found, and when we add to 
this action of a republican secretary of the navy the 
fact that a democratic member of the house of rep¬ 
resentatives has unanimously reported from the 
committee of which he is chairman a bill to make 
the order of the secretary in one department the 
law in all departments of the government, it is plain 
that the beneficent flame of reform of which I spoke 
is in no danger of extinction. The President has 











326 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


also somewhat extended the classified service, and 
has authorized open voluntary competitions for pro¬ 
motions, while the postmaster-general had already 
adopted the principle of competitive promotion in 
his department. It is the post-office department, 
however, the largest patronage branch of the gov¬ 
ernment, which has been ruthlessly ravaged under 
this administration by the old abuse. At the same 
time, again, in the house of representatives bills 
have been introduced regulating the appointment 
of all postmasters upon reform principles. 

Yet while the steady advance in one of the most 
fundamental of political reforms proceeds, the party 
platforms of the last year have barely mentioned 
it, and in the hot party campaigns of the autumn 
and of the spring, party orators have forborne even 
to compliment it, lest haply some vote might be lost. 
The explanation of this apparent inconsisteucy and 
this evident avoidance and silence, is, however, not 
difficult. Civil service reform proposes to restrict 
the arbitrary power of party. It does not, of course, 
contemplate the dissolution of parties or suppose 
that popular government will be carried on without 
the organization of citizens who desire to promote 
public policies upon which they agree. Indeed, the 
reform will necessarily promote the legitimate power 
of party by making it a representative of opinion to 
a degree which, under the spoils system, is impossi¬ 
ble. But as party has now become largely a machine, 
oiled by bribery and corruption in the form of pa¬ 
tronage and money, and as the result of elections is 
coming, in the popular belief, not to indicate the 
popular will, but to signify merely the preponder¬ 
ance of “boodle” on one side or the other, party 
machines no more favor civil service reform than 
kings favor the restriction of the royal prerogative. 

But it is by party action, nevertheless, that reform 
must be secured. Why, then, do we anticipate suc¬ 
cess? Because party itself is finally subject to pub¬ 
lic opfnion, and whatever the machine may wish it 
is at last obliged to conform to public opinion as a 
sailing ship to the wind. There is already a pecu¬ 
liarly intelligent and Influential reform opinion, an 
opinion with independent votes, of which party ma¬ 
chines are conscious, and to which they now formal¬ 
ly defer. It is an opinion which is known to public 
officers who often share it, and, taught by official 
experience the practical value of reform, they intro¬ 
duce it cautiously into the administration. Once 
planted, like a vigorous sapling, it grows apace. The 
uniform and undeniable excellence of the result 
strengthens and extends the reform sentiment, and 
stili further emboldens public officers to heed it. 
The futility of theoretical objections is shown by 
conclusive experiment, as when the first steamship 
crossed the ocean before Dr. Dionysus Lardner had 
finished demonstrating that it was impossible. The 
wiser and more independent sentiment of party per¬ 
ceives the advantage to be gained by becoming the 
instrument of reform, as the wiser Whigs forty and 
fifty years ago strove to make their party an anti' 
slavery party, and, failing, saw their party disap¬ 
pear. Undoubtedly if the Republican party, born of 
that failure, had proved that It meant what it said of 
civil service reform in its recent platforms it would 
enter upon the contest this year a more powerful 
party than it is. But its platform and the declara¬ 
tions of republican leaders and its obervance of the 
reform law, like the same observance and the reform 
acts of the late democratic President, show in what 
way despite the party machines public opinion, as 
it is strengthened, prevails, and the good work is 
done. The vigorous young sapling must encounter 
gales and frosts and droughts, but still it grows, and 
swells and burgeons. So feeling its way gradually, 
irregularly, inconsistently, halting and stumbling, 
but steadily advancing, reform proceeds. 

Party machines, truculent and defiant, resist, but 
like kings they yield at last to the people. The king 
whose arbitrary excesses produce the peremptory 
popular demand for relief ordains, however reluct¬ 
antly, a restriction that limits his power. So the 
French Bourbon, Louis the Eighteenth, signed the 
charter of 1814, and the Prussian Hohenzollern Fred¬ 
erick William the Fourth, summoned the constitu¬ 
ent assembly of 1848. They call their surrender a 


molu proprio, an act of their sovereign will. But 
they know, and the world knows, that it is the will 
of a greater sovereign than they, the will of the 
people. Our appeal is now, as it has always been, 
not to party, but to the people who are the masters 
of party. As the English barons, in the phrase of an 
old English writer, cut the claws of John; as the 
English parliament taught terribly the English king 
that not he, but the English people was the sovereign; 
as the American colonies taught the English parlia¬ 
ment in turn that the American people would rule 
America, so by every law and custom demanded by 
public opinion, which restrains the arbitrary abuse 
of executive power by party, the American people 
are constantly teaching American parties that not 
the parties but the people rule. We can not expect 
the king, nor the parliament, nor the party, to solicit 
the lesson or to enjoy the discipline. We can not 
expect their supple courtiers either in the palace or 
in the saloon, to demand that the king or the party 
shall be bound. But bound, nevertheless they are, 
bound by the people they have been, and bound by, 
the same power they will be. The record of this 
year, as of last year, and of every year since the 
League was formed; even the reiterated pledges of 
platforms, although reiterated only to be largely 
broken; the most sweet voices of the stump, that 
sink into barren silence; the bills introduced that 
gasp and die in committee, on the one hand, and on 
the other the constantly larger scope of the reformed 
system in the public service, all reveal the ever 
stronger public purpo.se, and the constantly greater 
achievemcment of that purpose, to add in civil serv¬ 
ice reform another golden link to the shining 
chain of historical precedents which by wisely re¬ 
straining executive power promote the public wel¬ 
fare. 

THE BALTIMORE INVESTIGATION. 

LConcluded.] 

Q. You know the meeting to which we re¬ 
fer? A. No, sir, I do not. I have not been 
in Mr. Bell’s house at any meeting when he 
was absent. 

Q. No meeting when he was present? A. 
I stopped in one night. I stop in there often. 
He lives right above me—right in the neigh¬ 
borhood. 

Q. Wasn’t there a meeting there, Mr. Ray, 
about—somewhere—about this same time you 
mentioned—within a week or ten days ago, 
which was attended by different persons, some 
of them in the government employ, to con¬ 
sider ways and means for this coming cam¬ 
paign? A. We often talk—we have been 
talking some time together, among our¬ 
selves, and spend the evening in this way— 
talk over the administration. We took an in¬ 
terest in Mr. Marine. We were going to hold 
up the administration. And I think it is 
right, you understand. I never did anything 
during business hours, and had no hand in it, 
nor made any arrangements. 

By Mr. Bonaparte : 

Q. Why we are asking this is because we 
heard of this meeting up at the post-office, and 
I want to see if the information that we got up 
there is correct. Now, you were not present 
at any meeting at Mr. Bells house? A. I 
stopped at Mr. Bell’s house a couple of weeks 
ago. He was on duty. I went up there one 
night and stopped in and met several of our 
friends there. 

Q. Mr. Bell was on duty that night ? A. 
No, sir. 

Q. He was there? A. For a short time. 


I was in there for an hour. I went in there 
with a friend I knew. We walked down the 
street together but I havent done nothing to 
collect money. 

Mr. Roosevelt. There is no charge against 
you. 

Mr. Ray. If there is a charge I will face 
the music, .sir. 

Mr. Bonaparte; 

Q. Is there not a Mr. Hammond connected 
with your club? A. I don’t know him, sir. 

Q. Do you know a Mr. Lingenfelter ? A. 
No, sir; I don’t know him. 

Q. Do you know a man by the name of 
Oeh ? A. Well, I have met that young fel¬ 
low. He has grown up later. I know more 
of the old stock. 

Q. Do you know a Mr. Aimstrong? A. 
No, sir. 

Q. Is this Mr. Oeh a member of your club? 
A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Was he present at this meeting at Mr. 
Bell’s house? A. I didn’t see him. I usually 
go about and stop in and see my friends some¬ 
times. 

Q. For the friends of the administratron? 
A. I did not say for the friends of the admin¬ 
istration, exactly. I have given no money after 
Mr. Lingenfelder called me up. I thought 
there was people trying to put a job up on me 
and trying to get me into a snap. 

Q. Had you been asked to call at Mr. Bell’s? 
A. I was told some one would be there. 

Q. Who told you? A. Word was left at 
ym house. My wife told me some one wanted 
to see me at Mr. Bell’s house. 

Q. Do you remember how many people 
were at Mr. Bell’s house? A. About eight or 
ten, or a dozen. 

Q. You say some of them are employes of 
the post-office and the custom-house? A. No 
sir; none from the custom-house but myseK. 

Q. Did you see Mr. Bell or any other em¬ 
ploye of the post-office? A. Yes, sir; I seen 
Mr. Bell there, and Mr. Bell stayed there dur¬ 
ing the time we were there. 

Q. Was he there all that time? A. Yes, 
sir. 

Q. What did you mean by saying he was 
was not there? A. I did not say it. 

Q. Yes, you did. Was he there when you 
put your name down on that paper? A. Yes, 
sir; he was. 

Q. Did he put his name down? A. I did 
not notice. 

Q. To whom were you to pay the money? 
A. To Mr. Allard. 

Mr. Ray was dismissed. 

Special Deputy Collector Henry Lingenfel¬ 
ter afterward stated that Ray had told him 
that he (Ray) had made a contribution. By 
order of Mr. Roosevelt, Mr. Ray was recalled. 

Examined by Mr. Bonaparte. 

Q. Mr. Ray, we want to see if we have got 
you quite straight about this matter. Have 
you given anything yourself for this political 
business? A. I tell you no, sir. 

Q. You haven’t given anything at all? A. 
No, sir. 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


327 



Q. Well, you know what I am driving at is 
whether you have made any contributions 
yourself for political purposes in connection 
with this approaching primary election. A. I 
understand what you are driving at, and pre¬ 
cisely what you mean. 

Q. And you say you haven’t given any¬ 
thing? A. Well—that is—you understand— 
I again tell you no, sir. 

Q. You told us you had a conversation 
with Mr. Allard, who is the treasurer of your 
club. 

Mr. Ray. I didn’t say club; I said associa¬ 
tion. 

Mr. Bonaparte. Well, call it association; to 
whom you said that you would put your name 
down on his list, but that nobody came around 
to collect from that list, so far as you know. 

A. I could not look after anybody else. I 
told you nobody came after me. 

Q. And you have not, either at Mr. Allard’s 
house, or at your own house, or at Mr. Bell’s 
house, or here, given anything yourself? A. 
No, sir; I have not. If you want an affidavit, 
I will make it. 

Q. And you have not seen anyone give? 
A. No, sir; not a government employe. No 
one ever approached me in any way, shape, or 
form, neither about here, nor anywhere else, 
at all, sir. 

Mr. Roosevelt. Mr. Lingenfelder, you told 
us that Mr. Ray told you, I understand, that 
he had given. 

Mr. Lingenfelder. He either said that, or 
that he had intended to give. As I recollect, 
he signed his name. He said he had not given* 
but he had intended to give. He had put his 
name down on a piece of paper in his own house. 

***»»* 

Mr. Ray. I told Mr. Lingenfelder I was 
asked—I said I would contribute—by a friend 
outside of government employ, Mr. Allard—I 
say this much, I did not give my money. I 
was on duty outside of this building for a week 
nearly. When I come in I had not given, and 
I did not give, 

Q. You put your name down? A. Yes, sir; 
on Mr. Allard’s paper, 

Q. You did? A. Yes, sir; for the ex¬ 
penses of the club, or organization—I do not 
term it “political purposes.” 

By Mr. Bonaparte: 

Q. When was that you put your name down 
on the paper, Ray? A. About a week or so 
before I seen Mr. Lingenfelder. He went to 
one of our houses. 

Q, Where was it that you put your name 
down—in your own house? A. No, sir; we 
were trying to raise contributions to defray the 
expenses of our club- 

Q. Was it in your club room ? A. No, in¬ 
deed. We were trying to raise money towards 
defraying expenses. 

Q. Where was it that you put your name 
down? A. It was in Mr, Bell’s house. 

By Mr. Roosevelt: 

Q. It was in Mr. Bell’s house? A, Yes, 
sir; at night. 


Q. Who else was there ? A, I don’t know. 

Q. Was Mr. Bell there? A. I did not see 
him. 

By Mr, Bonaparte: 

Q. Where is Mr. Bell’s house ? A. About 
three squares above me. 

By Mr. Roosevelt: 

Q. Who else besides My. Bell and Mr. Al¬ 
lard were there? Was Mr. Oeh there? A. I 
can’t say positively. He is one of the latter- 
day boys. 

Q. There were no other employes of the 
custom house? A, Oh, yes; there were sev¬ 
eral of us there that night. 

Q. Was Mr, Kimball there? A. No, sir; 
he belongs to the Sixth ward. 

Q. Did all the people present put their 
names down on that list? A. I could not 
say. 

Q. Who started the list? A. I don’t 
know. 

Q. Who asked you to put your name down? 
A. No one. We were anxious to get our 
club out of debt, and the money was put in a 
fund. 

Q. Who started it? A. I can’t tell. 

Q. Were there any names down when you 
signed? A. Yes, sir; there were several 
names down, but I could not tell you who were 
ahead of me. 

Q. You could not see who was ahead of 
you ? A. No, sir ; I signed with my glasses 
off. 1 could not. 

By Mr. Bonaparte: 

Q. You went to Mr. Bell’s house to a meet¬ 
ing there with a number of persons. Who 
they were you don’t remember. And there 
was a paper that, somehow or other, was there 
for people to sign, but you don’t know how it 
got there; and you signed it, but you don’t 
feel quite clear how you came to sign it ? 

Mr. Ray. I signed it because I thought it 
was my duty to give my aid. I said I would 
be one of ten men to clean the debt up. 

By Mr. Roosevelt: 

Q. You said you would be one of ten men 
to clean the debt up? A. Our club is a so¬ 
cial organization and has nothing to do with 
anything bearing on this election. We have 
people of both factions in it, and we come to¬ 
gether at night, or Sunday or Monday, or 
whenever we please. 

By Mr. Bonaparte: 

Q. Did Mr. Allard preside over that meet¬ 
ing? A. Which? 

Q. That which met at Mr. Bell’s house; 
who presided over that meeting? A. Now, 
there was no organized meeting. Some young 
man just took a paper; who it was I don’t 
know. 

Q. Took it around ? A. No, he did not 
take it around at all. Nobody was asked 
straight out to contribute. 

Q. Nobody was asked to contribute? A. 
No, sir. 

Q. Did the young man put it down on the 
table? A. No, sir, it was on the table, and 
nobody put it there as I know of. 


Q. Did everyone put down his name ? A. 
I can’t tell that. There is always some peo¬ 
ple who won’t pay nothing. 

Mr. Marine. Was this money that you sub¬ 
scribed for there at that meeting, was it to be 
used in the campaign in the Seventh Ward? 
A. I could not tell you that to save my life. 
I told you I did not pay any money. 

By Mr. Roosevelt: 

Q. When are you going to pay the money? 
A. I ain’t going to pay it at all, now. 

Q What did you put your name down for? 
Tell us frankly about this. 

Mr. Marine. You had better just answer 
the question. You have said that when you 
subscribed you subscribed to the club and that 
it was for club purposes. What these gentle¬ 
men want to get at is this : they want to as¬ 
certain whether you are sincere in telling 
them that you really gave money for club pur¬ 
poses, that you did not really give for some 
other purpose. 

Mr. Ray. No, sir; I am telling the truth. 
I gave $5, you understand. 

By Mr. Roosevelt. 

Q. Just answer me this question: Was the 
money you gave there for the purpose of that 
club or was it for other purposes? A. I could 
not tell you to save my life. I stated that we 
wanted to raise money for the club. Some 
said they were going into this fight and that 
it would take some money to pay the legiti- 
mrte expenses, and after they asked Mr. Allard 
and another office holder, I told them I was 
willing to pay $5. 

Q. Who? A. Mr. Allard and some other 
gentlem in. 

Q. Was Mr. Bell present? A. I don’t 
know. 

Q. Was Mr. Bell present when you told 
Mr. Allard that you would pay' some money? 
A. No, sir. When Mr. Lingenfelder sent for 
me that day I refused; I did not give a cent. 

Q. Do you recollect who it was that said 
that we were going into this fight and needed 
money for legitimate expenses? ,A. No, sir; 
I got a little mixed on that. Of course, we 
have two primaries in our ward, and some of 
them said we had some expenses to meet, 

T. Sewell Plummer, employed in the Balti¬ 
more custom-house, testified as follows : 

Examined by Mr. Roosevelt. 

Q. Your name? A. T. Sewell Plummer. 

Q. Your position? A. Warehouse clerk 
and member of the local civil service board. 

Q. For how long? A. Ever since the 
board was organised. 

Q. How'long have you been in the office? 
A. I have been in the office about 21 years. 

Q. You have been approached, I under¬ 
stand, by a gentleman who asked you to con¬ 
tribute to the political campaign expenses? 
A. There was a man came to my desk. As 
soon as ever he approached I saw that he was 
a very ignorant man. I said to him, said I, 
“Do you know that you are violating the civil 
service act ?” He said he did not know that 
that he was not, or had not passed the exam¬ 
ination. I said, “That’s a mistake. Any 


/ 







328 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


man, whether he passes the examination or 
not, if he approaches a party in the custom¬ 
house to solicit money for political purposes 
is liable to the penalty of the law.” 

Q. Had he asked you to contribute? A. 
Yes, but he immediately left the building. 

Q. Was he a post-office employe ? A. Yes, 
sir. 

Q. His name? A. Bell; John Bell. 

«»»»«• 

C. S. Burns testified as follows: 

Questioned by Mr. Roosevelt: 

Q. Your name? A. C. 8. Burns. 

Q. Your position ? A. Entry clerk in the 
naval office. 

Q. You are secretary of the local board of 
civil service examiners, are you not? A. Yes, 
sir. 

Q. How long have you been in office? A. 
Nearly five years. 

Q. Appointed under the last administra¬ 
tion? H. Yes, sir. 

Q. How long have you been on the board? 
A. I came on the board in May of that year— 
five years ago last May. 

R. Do you know anything about collection 
of names for political purposes? A. No, sir. 

Q. So far as you know ? A. No, sir. 

Q. The bulk of employes now left in the 
office were appointed under the last adminis¬ 
tration? A. Yes, sir. There have been no 
changes in our office since the advent of the 
present administration. Mostly all the clerkg 
are democrats. 

Q. So far as you know, there has been no 
collection of political assessments among them? 
A. No, sir. 

Q. Was there no collection in the fall of 
1888, so far as you know? A. No, sir. 

Q. Any voluntary contributions on their 
part this year? A. I know of none, sir. 

Q. Any such voluntary contributions in 
the fall of 1888? A. I think there was. 

Q. Perfectly voluntary ? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. And they all took part? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Pretty general ? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. All give about the same amount? k. 
No,sir; according to the amount of salary. 

Q. Was it about $50 or $60? A. It was a 
little more than that in 1888. 

Q. How much larger? A. About from 6 
to 8 per cent. 

Q. Well, why did they happen to choose 
that amount? A. Well, I don’t know that. 

Q. What was the amount of your contribu¬ 
tion? A. I made a contribution of 6J per 
cent. 

Q. Made entirely unsolicited? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. How did you happen to select 6^ per 
cent? A. Well, that would make $100 ; that 
was the understanding among the $1,600 
clerks. 

Q. Did the employes of the custom-house 
generally contribute that proportion ? A. 
Well, some gave less than that. 

Q. The contributions, then, were general 
in 1888? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. Do yon know if they were very general 
last year? A. I do not think so. I contribu¬ 
ted. 


Q. You’re a democrat ? A. Yes, sir. 

Q. You contributed to the democratic 
fund? A. No, sir; to the republican fund. 

Q. Why did you do that? A. Well, I 
thought it was my part to do so. I thought it 
was my part to support the administrrtion. It 
was voluntary on my part. 

Q. As a matter of fact, were there any con¬ 
tributions to the opposition, do you know ? 
A. I do not know, sir. 

Mr. Roosvelt. I have heard just that view 
before, that the desk owes so much to the 
party. 

»•**** 

Mr. Roosevelt then asked Collector Marine 
the following question: 

You have not appointed or refrained from 
appointing by reason of politics ? A. I have 
always understood that out of a certification 
of three you were at liberty to select. 

Mr. Roosevelt. But not with regard to pol¬ 
itics? 

Mr. Marine. I have brought the men here 
and had a look at them. I have been careful 
to exercise a proper supervision, and if the 
candidate did not suit me I would not put 
him in. Of course, you will understand that 
my preference is to appoint republicans to 
office. 

Mr. Roosevelt. Not in the classified serv¬ 
ice. There must be no discrimination. 

Mr. Marine. Here is the way I have done 
it; I don’t want to mislead you ; I have never 
when I have had this list before me, for in! 
stance, if I did not know a man on the list, 
which very frequently is the case, and did 
know the others, I would take the man I did 
know in preference to the one I did not. 

Mr. Burns was dismissed. Mr. Marine was 
asked to withdraw. 

Capt. William Fensley, being called, said: 

Examined by Mr. Roosevelt: 

Q. Your name? A Capt. William Fens¬ 
ley. 

Q. What is your position at present ? A. I 
am a night inspector. 

Ijr * 

Q Do you recollect being present within 
the last week or two at a meeting where a 
number of office-holders were present—I think 
Mr. Kimball presided—where some money was 
raised, or they started to collect some money 
in reference to these primaries that are just 
taking place to-day ? A. I was at that meet¬ 
ing ; do you want me to be truthful ? 

Mr. Roosevelt: I would very much prefer 
it. About what date was that meeting? A. 
Well, I think it was on last Tuesday, two or 
three weeks ago. 

***** 

Q. Were the other gentlemen employes of 
the custom-house and post-office? A. Now, 
I could not say. I suppose there were some. 
There was two or three there and more, and 
there was outsiders—to be frank with you, I 
only knew a few. 

Q. What were the names of the post-office 
men who were there? A. Well, now, before 
I proceed any further, I see that you are going 
to interview me closely. Now, sir, in point of 


law, a witness is not bound to incriminate him- ^ 

self. J 

***** m 

Q. Well, who are the employes of the post- 
office building who were there? A. There 
was a gentleman there named Biddleman- 

Mr. Lingenfelder: He is not in the post- 
office; he is in United States Marshal Airey’s * 
office. * 

Q. Well, at that meeting did you decide to i 
raise funds in view of the coming primaries or 
for legitimate expenses? A. Yes, sir; there 
was some funds for to pay the necesssary ex¬ 
penses of the house that we were to occupy for 
that day, and I was there this afternoon and ^ 
saw where they had a private house for hold¬ 
ing the primaries, which is legitimate. 
***** 

Q. To whom did you pay it? A Well, 
now, there was about a dozen persons there, 
and I don’t know who I did hand it to; but I 
was appointed one of the officers to disburse 
the money and yet it was handed to another, 
for I had not been to the meeting; never had 
been to those meetings in that ward, not for a 
number of years, from the time I ran for coun¬ 
cil a number of years ago. 

Q. Don’t you recollect who you handed it 
to? A. I don’t; I handed it to a gentleman 
who was sitting like Mr. Smith and he handed 
it to some one else. 

**-*«* * 

By Mr. Rose : 

Q. Didn’t you hear his name ? A. Well, 
perhaps I did. 

Q. Don’t you remember it ? A. Well, let 
me see, I would not remember it now. I never 
seen the man before to know him. 

Q. Besides Captain Biddleman who else 
was there that you knew? A. Mr. Kim¬ 
ball—- 

Q. Anybody else from the custom-house ? 

A. No, sir; him and I were representing the 
custom-house. 

Who else was theie from the post-office— 
Captain Biddleman of the United States mar¬ 
shal’s office—who represented the post-office? 

A. Well, there were several gentlemen there 
that I did not know, sir. 

Q. Did you know anybody that was there 
besides Mr. Kimball, Mr. Biddle, and your¬ 
self? A. I knew a gentleman named Mr. 
Bond. 

Q. Where is he? A. I don’t know 
whether he is in the post office or in the cus¬ 
tom-house, 

Q. Do you know if he is in office? A. I 
don’t know. 

Q. Is it your impression that he is? A. 

No, sir; I didn’t say that. I don’t know. 

Q. Mr. Bond was there. Who else? Who 
is Mr. Bond? is the first question. A. He 
keeps a coal yard. 

Q. Who else? A. That is all that I 
knew. 

Q. Was this gentleman, the custodian of 
the fund, was he an employe of the post-office? 

A. I don’t know, sir; I could not say. 

Q. Well, do you mean to say that you do 
not know the name of the man to whom you 
gave your money ? A. I did not. He was 
sitting in the parlor of this house, and I was . 
invited there. i 

[There is much more of Interest in this investiga- * 
lion, but as the house is now going over the ground '4 
again, the object of repeatedly calling public atten¬ 
tion to it has been accomplished.— Ed. Chronicle.] 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE; 


Tliis devotion of party, not to the ends for which it exists, but to the spoils that accompany success at the polls, has become so 
absolute that it h.as produced an evil greater than any which party proposes to remedy. —George WUliam Curtis, at Baltimore, April, 1892. 


VoL. I, No. 39. INDIANAPOLIS, MAY, 1892. terms :<( fcrnuVercopr' 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


A FURTHER examination of the address 
I of Mr. Curtis before the League at Balti¬ 
more confirms our opinion expressed last 
month after a first reading. It is the great¬ 
est utterance that has yet been delivered 
against the spoils system. Its fundament¬ 
al principle that the evil of party struggle 
for spoil has become greater than any evil 
which party proposes to remedy is abso¬ 
lutely beyond question. It now remains 
to get this principle thoroughly fixed in 
the minds of the American people. The 
circulation of this address is the most pow¬ 
erful means to this end now at hand. Ev¬ 
ery friend of the merit system should join 
in this work. Mr. John Hemsley Johnson 
whose post-office address is Baltimore, 
Maryland, is chairman of the committee 
having the distribution in charge, and all 
communications and contributions should 
be sent to him. The smallest contribution 
will be welcomed. It is to be hoped that 
every member of the Indiana civil service 
reform association will send money to Mr. 
Johnson for copies and distribute them 
among his neighbors. Civil service reform 
associations everywhere, and especially 
those that have not been able to find any¬ 
thing to do, will find this a most effective 
n work. 


The paper read by Mr. R. Francis 
Wood, of Philadelphia, at a meeting of the 
National League in Baltimore, upon ap¬ 
pointment of postmasters, grounds its dis¬ 
cussion largely upon the last annual re¬ 
port of the postmaster-general and is an 
entertaining commentary upon that bump¬ 
tious document. The following from Mr. 
Wood’s paper defines the situation in his 
own state: 

In the state of Pennsylvania, which seems to 
have been exceptionally favored in the distribution 
of offices, there were in 1891, 4,684 post-offices of all 
classes. If I may use the analogue which has been 
so well applied in the Civil Service Chronicle, 
think what a fine retinue of knights and squires 
these furnish to Duke Donald of Lochiel and to Earl 
Stanley, the lord lieutenant of Pennsylvania; and 
what consideration must be given to nobles with 
such a following, if the lord paramount desires their 
aid in one of his quadrennial wars? Is it strange 
that our newspapers have contained almost daily for 
sometime past the news that one county convention 
after another has given its cordial endorsement to 


Mr. Quay’s candidacy for re-election to the United 
States senate; or can we wonder at the eulogies 
upon that gentleman delivered in the late state con¬ 
vention of his party? “As a dog turneth to his 
vomit, so a fool Iterateth his folly.’’ 


To the young men who have followed 
Mr. Clarkson’s suggestion and have formed 
a national league of college republican 
clubs, we take the liberty to repeat Wash¬ 
ington’s warning: “ The common and 

continual mischiefs of the spirit of party 
are sufficient to make it the interest and 
duty of a wise people to discourage and 
restrain it.” And again: “ It exists under 
different shapes in all governments more 
or less stifled, controlled or repressed, but 
in those of popular form, it is seen in its 
greatest rankness and is truly their worst 
enemy.” 

And, since the machines of both par¬ 
ties are under the manipulating fingers 
of Quay, and Platt, and Clarkson, and Gor¬ 
man, and Hill, and both machines exist 
only for spoil, and only by spoil, these 
young men would do well to heed another 
warning by a patriot as distinguished as 
Washington, Abraham Lincoln, who said 
to a friend a few days after the fall of 
Richmond, pointing to a crowd of office- 
seekers besieging his door: “ Look at that. 
Now, we have conquered the rebellion, 
but here you see something that may be¬ 
come more dangerous to this republic than 
the rebellion itself.” 

As both parties are now constituted, it is 
a misfortune when party ties sit anything 
but lightly on the young college men of 
this country. 

In the new Baltimore investigation, 
cabinet officers have distinguished them¬ 
selves. Mr. Wanamaker testified that after 
Mr. Roosevelt made his report, he sent a 
special agent to look into the matter, and 
this agent reported that the accused office¬ 
holders had not been correctly reported by 
Mr. Roosevelt, and had had no chance to 
defend themselves, and were not guilty. 
He therefore had punished no one. It re¬ 
quires great self-restraint to repeat what 
Mr. Wanamaker swore to and not follow it 
with the declaration that he is willfully in 
collusion with law-breakers and criminals, 
and is shielding them from punishment. 
To note the difference between his acts 
and Mr. Roosevelt’s acts in this Baltimore 
matter, is to note the simple difference be¬ 


tween a sneak and an honest officer. With 
Mr. Roosevelt, every word that fell from the 
lips of the witnesses was taken by a sten¬ 
ographer, and was printed and laid before 
the President and Mr. Wanamaker and 
the public. The evidence of guilt is con¬ 
clusive. The accused are convicted by 
their own testimony. To the same ques¬ 
tions they would again have to make the 
same answers. Now comes Mr. Wanamak¬ 
er and says that he sent a man to Balti¬ 
more who made a re-investigation and re¬ 
ported that the men were innocent. He 
shirks his official duty, and denies evidence 
which he knows is true, and dodges behind 
a report which he knows is false. Mr. 
Roosevelt followed him before the com¬ 
mittee, and, as usual, crushed him in a way 
to make the whole countr}' ashamed of its 
postmaster-general. We give the follow¬ 
ing specimen: 

It is difficult to discuss seriously the proposition 
that a man when questioned as to something which 
has just happened will lie to his own hurt, and six 
months afterward tell the truth to his own benefit. 
The honorable the postmaster-general, in speaking 
of the accused men, says; “ When they declare that 
they have not made such statements, and they do 
that under oath, you are bound to take their state¬ 
ments.” It seems to me that if in a private business 
of large size an investigation into one of its branches 
should disclose that twenty-one men were cheating, 
the men being caught red handed and confessing 
their guilt, it would be very unwise to accept the 
oaths of these same men six months later that they 
were innocent and had lied when they made their 
confessions. 

The position of Attorney-General Miller 
on the subject of raising money on the pay 
of government employes is demonstrated 
by himself. The other day he told the com¬ 
mittee which is re-investigating the fed¬ 
eral offices of Baltimore that his attention 
had not been called to the Baltimore cases 
until within a few days, when a copy of 
Mr. Roosevelt’s report had been sent him. 
Also, that he could not be personally cog¬ 
nizant of all violations of the law, “ even 
violations of the civil service law.” He did 
not know for what purposes the Baltimore 
primaries, reported upon by Mr. Roosevelt, 
were held. He was immediately followed 
upon the stand by Mr. Roosevelt, who 
turned to his letter-book and produced the 
following copy: 

Washington, August 4,1891. 

The Attorney-General: 

Sir—B y direction of this commission I have the 
honor to transmit herewith a copy of Commissioner 
Rooseveit’s report of an investigation made by him 
at Baltimore in respect to alleged violations of the 
















330 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


provisions of the civil service law relating to politi¬ 
cal assessments hy persons in the official service of 
the U nited States. A copy has also been sent to the 
President, the secretary of the treasury and the post¬ 
master-general. The report will not be made public 
except with the consent of the President. 

Very respectfully, Hugh S. Thompson, 
Acting President. 

To this Mr. Roosevelt added that he 
personally sent the report at the time. 
Mr. Miller is not capable of a falsehood in 
this matter. The report undoubtedly 
came to him in his mail, and if he noticed 
it at all, it was simply to throw it aside 
with acontemptuous feeling that he would 
not take the trouble to read it, and he 
has undoubtedly forgotten all about it. 
There was, however, a great deal of talk in 
the papers at the time, and it would be an 
unjust reflection upon Mr. Miller’s intel¬ 
ligence to say that he did not at that time 
know that hundreds of public prints 
charged a wholesale violation of the law in 
Baltimore. 

We believe that he has voluntarily given 
directions to the district attorneys to be on 
the lookout for trusts, but we venture to 
say that it never occurred to him that he 
had any duty to perform in connection 
with the use of public officers to provide 
funds or run primaries, and this, though 
twenty-five or twenty times that number 
should violate the law in a single city. Mr. 
Miller is at times very spicy, and, if he is 
on your side, entertaining. There is no 
doubt that the tone in which he said “even 
violations of the civil service law,” made 
every spoilsman within hearing grin with 
delight. The sum of the matter is that 
efficient prosecution of violators of the 
civil service law can not be secured under 
this administration. 


To the last statement there is one excep¬ 
tion. Mr. George W. Jolley, the United 
States district attorney for the district em¬ 
bracing Owensboro, Kentucky, learning 
that the law had been violated, promptly 
called witnesses before the grand jury and 
six revenue officers were indicted for un¬ 
lawfully soliciting and receiving money for 
political purposes. Before the house com¬ 
mittee on the civil service, recently. Secre¬ 
tary Foster was asked and he answered in 
relation to this transaction as follows: 

“The Chairman. I have received a communication 
signed by C. C. Stewart and others, in which they re¬ 
fer to indictments in Kentucky, and say that parties 
who testified before the grand jury have been dis¬ 
missed from the internal revenue service; while 
those who have been indicted have not yet been 
tried, and have been retained in the service. Are 
you aware of the truth or falsity of that? 

“Mr. Foster. I have some knowledge about it 
which I do not care to make public at this time; but 
if It Is true, these people have been wrongfully in¬ 
dicted.” 

At the same time Secretary Foster’s at¬ 
tention was called to some cases in the rev¬ 


enue service in Baltimore, brought out in 
Mr. Roosevelt’s investigation, as follows: 

“Mr. Boatner. These parties are charged, and two 
of them admit, in answer to questions, that they 
consider any sort of fraud in a primary as entirely 
justifiable. You are the head of this department, 
and of course your judgment will prevail in the con¬ 
duct of the business of your department. Asa mem¬ 
ber of this committee I desire to know whether it is 
consistent with the law and with thegood of thepub- 
lic service to retain such men in office? ■> -■ The 
question I ask is simply, whether, in your judgment, 
the collector of the port should dismiss these men 
upon their confession of having committed these 
acts?” 

“Mr. Foster. I should want to investigate the sub¬ 
ject before answering.” 

This is a secretary of the treasury to be 
proud of. 

The civil service commission gave Dis¬ 
trict-Attorney Jolley the facts upon which 
he started the investigation by the grand 
jury. A Washington dispatch of May 4 to 
the New York Times contained the follow¬ 
ing summary of those facts : 

Similar charges were made by L. H. Axton, of 
Owensboro, Ky,, against officials of the second in¬ 
ternal revenue district. John Feland is the col* 
lector in that district. Axton told the commission 
that in July last Feland permitted assessments of 
from 825 to 850 to be made on officers under his con¬ 
trol. Those who lacked sufficient funds gave their 
individual acceptances, according to Axton, in favor 
of William Feland, son of the collector and chief 
clerk of the office. He charged also that several 
hundred dollars were raised in this way to support 
the candidacy of John Feland, Jr., for county at¬ 
torney. 

The remaining charges made by Axton were that 
the collector authorised N. S. Roark to collect 
throughout the district for him, H. G. Overstreet 
and Gabe Crutcher being implicated; also, that in 
April last Collector Feland, his son William, and 
the clerks under him were concerned in a gen¬ 
eral assessment of the minor internal revenue of¬ 
ficials for convention purposes, 810 being the amount 
exacted from each person. 

Axton enclosed in his communication to the com¬ 
mission a letter written by E. P. Adams, a district 
deputy under Feland, asking a fellow employe 
outright lor a contribution of 825. 

John W. Lane made affidavit that he was directly 
solicited by Adams and also by Roark, the latter de¬ 
manding a contribution of 830. Lane said that he 
spoke to the collector in relation to the matter, and 
that the latter said he could do as he pleased, but 
that he (Feland) expected to do “his part.” 

J. S. Barnett submitted an affidavit reciting that 
he gave his check to Roark and that he was also so¬ 
licited by C. N. Buchannan, to whom he gave hiffac¬ 
ceptance for 825 in favor of William Feland. He 
charged also that William Feland deprived him of 
810 of his pay for political purposes. 

An affidavit by I. O. G. Barnett was to the effect 
that he gave a check for 810, payable to William Fe¬ 
land as a political contribution. Roark had asked 
him for the money. 

It is against such facts as these, believed 
and acted upon by the grand jury, that 
Secretary Foster says he has information 
which he will not divulge, but which 
makes him believe that these indictments 
were wrongfully returned. There has 
never been any unanimity in the world 
like the unanimity with which the Wana- 
makers and Fosters of this administration 
put themselves in the position of appar¬ 
ently deliberately shielding wrong-doers 
and criminals. 


The Netv York Evening Post brings to 
light a “confidential” circular which is 
being sent to postmasters by the Ameri¬ 
can Protective Tariff League, Cornelius 
N. Bliss president. After stating that its 
object is to show “ the benefits of protec¬ 
tion and reciprocity,” the circular says: 

“ Will you have the kindness to at once give us a 
list of the patrons of your office according to the en¬ 
closed blanks? The effectiveness of our work will 
depend upon the care with which you prepare these 
lists. Give the names of intelligent voters only, and 
of those who may become voters before the election 
of 1892. 

“ (A) Under ‘ Our Friends ’ give at the top of each 
blank the names of two active, reliable, influential 
republicans to each blank used. 

“ (B) Next, give the names of republicans who 
ought to take an interest in the cause of protection. 

“(C) Under the head ‘Opposition’ give the 
names of all doubtful voters and reading democrats; 
that is, give name of every democrat who takes a 
newspaper. 

“Immediate reports will be gratefully received, 
but take time to have the lists as perfect as possible. 
If you need additional blanks, please inform us at 
once. 

“Please do not fold the blanks, but return them 
to us by the enclosed post-paid envelope. Give the 
names at your post-office only. If you can not fur¬ 
nish this information, kindly consult some leading 
republican, so that the work can be done thoroughly 
and promptly.” 

Senators Hawley and Platt, of Connecti¬ 
cut, have written a letter indorsing the 
scheme, and, in effect, with irresistible force 
coercing the postmasters of their state. 
Probably other members of congress have 
done the same for their domains. Thus 
the use of public offices for party and pri¬ 
vate purposes has come to its full bloom. 
First, democrats are turned out and re¬ 
publicans become holders of the offices. 
Then, instead of being confined to an im¬ 
partial discharge of their duties, they, 
though paid by taxing all, are set to ren¬ 
dering the most pt>werful aid to the dis¬ 
semination of a party tenet which is of¬ 
fensive to one-half of the American peo¬ 
ple. And at the same time, these banded 
legions of federal office-holders are put 
under the control of an association of pro¬ 
tected manufacturers, who have a direct 
pecuniary interest in the work they are 
calling upon the office-holders to do. Of 
course President Harrison could by a word 
stop this corrupt use of public office. 


A RECENT instance of Hillism was the es¬ 
cape of O’Brien, a notorious bunko crimi¬ 
nal, as he was being transferred from the 
Clinton prison to Utica. The warden after 
thirteen years of faithful service had been 
displaced by Boss Murphy for a local heel-^i 
er with no qualification for the office ex-^ 
cept usefulness to the Hill machine. He j I 
made changes in the prison service to fur- | 
ther parcel out spoil. O’Brien was put in the f 
sole charge of a keeper of two weeks’ expe- f 
rience who is believed to have connived at j 
the escape of his prisoner. The prison as- I 
sociation of New York with the assistances j 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


331 


I 


w 


\ of the civil service reform association are 
taking advantage of the scandal of the 
O’Brien affair to urge a constitutional 
amendment necessary to get prison ap¬ 
pointments under the civil service law. 
At the prison at Dannemora, of fifty seven 
prison officers fifty-one were democrats, 
and about forty were appointed through 
I I the influence of Boss Murphy at Troy and 
I j the rest were Smith Weed’s men. 

^ J. Sloat Fassett having been success- 
I ful in getting Postmaster Flood removed 
is now charged with an attempt to dispose 
|[j- of another political enemy, Vanduzer, the 
i‘' Horseheads postmaster. Lately Wanamak- 
er’s post-oflBce inspectors have been drop- 
I ping in to see Vanduzer and they have 
been followed by captious letters from 
Wanamaker which Vanduser considered 
I the preliminary steps for his decapitation. 
He informed the postmaster-general at 
length of the situation in a letter which did 
not mince matters. Then he waited a 
week and went to Washington and called 
on Wanamaker who said he had not re¬ 
ceived Vanduzer’s letter Vanduzer was sur¬ 
prised and intimated that an investigation 
would be proper, but Wanamaker showed 
no desire to see the letter. Then Vanduzer 
withdrew and procured a copy which he 
saw safely to Wanamaker’s desk. Finally, 
to complete his business with thorough¬ 
ness and neatness, he saw Halford and re¬ 
lated all the facts. According to the Wash¬ 
ington report he talked to the President’s 
private secretary as follows: 

“Before Dr. Flood was removed the President told 
me he did not understand the merits of the case. I 
propose that he shall not be ignorant of the merits 
of this one. I do not propose to remain quiet and be 
blackmailed by either the postmaster-general or Mr. 
Fassett. If I am to be removed, I want the people 
of my district to know upon what grounds.”' 

How Mr. Wanamaker must detest Van¬ 
duzer’s indelicacy in letting not only 
him but the public know that he sees 
through the pious trick to oust him. 


Another interesting tale of Wanamak¬ 
er’s department and his inspectors in Ma¬ 
ryland was lately given in the New York 
Evening Post. The republican congress¬ 
man had the post office removed from a 
good location to an inconvenient one where 
liquors were sold, though not in the same 
room. Complaint was made to Wanamaker 
and he referred the complainants to Clark¬ 
son. After several hours of waiting Clark¬ 
son saw the gentlemen and informed them 
in a discourteous tone that their complaints 
must be in writing. This was done and 
they went home to await the visit of the 
inspector. We quote the outcome of 
the visit: 

“In three or four weeks after this interview the in¬ 
spector came down. He sent for me, and said that as 
for my first reason, the office was within the number 
of rods from the railroad allowed by law, and that we 


must put up with its inconvenient location; that we 
could not expect to have everything just as we want¬ 
ed it; then, that fora post-office in a saloon it was 
very well arranged, and that liquors were hardly an 
objection, as they were sold down stairs. I reminded 
him that that did not prevent people under their in¬ 
fluence coming up stairs, and asked him if it was not 
against the law to have a post-office in a place where 
liquors were sold. He said, ‘Why, certainly it is,’and 
took from his pocket a copy of thatsection of the law 
and read it to me, adding that if that were enforced 
half the post-offices in the South would have to be 
closed;’ and asked me if I was willing to do without 

one at-ville. I told him no, and that argument 

had no force here, as we had another place for it that 
was satisfactory in every respect. He asked, ‘Where?’ 
I said at-’s store, where it had been so satisfac¬ 

tory hitherto. But he said, ‘He is a democrat.’ I 
said, ‘He votes that ticket, but is no politician.’ The 
inspector replied, ‘ Whe.n it comes to a cfwice between a 
democrat and a saloon, the saloon will get it every time.' 
Then in answer to my third reason he required me 
to give him the particulars of their carelessness, etc., 
which 1 did. He said I had good reasons for com¬ 
plaint on that head; that he would reprimand the 
postmaster and threaten him, and he had no doubt 
that things would improve in that respect [as they 
have]. Then I said to him, ‘I suppose there is no 
chance of a change of place for our post office.’ He 
said he thought not, unless our congressman, who 
had it put where it is, would request Mr. Clarkson 
to make a change, which he was not likely to do. I 
have heard nothing more since.’’ 

The Indianapolis Journal, of May 6, has 
the following dispatch: 

Madison, May 5.—The new republican city coun¬ 
cil to-night ousted all the democrats in subordinate 
offices and put in the following good, trusty republi¬ 
cans: Sexton, Earnest Argus; street commissioner, 
Benjamin Mayo; attorney, Solomon J. Bear; market 
master, Anderson Benson; janitor, Paul Wolf; engin¬ 
eer of light station, Frank McKay ; linemen, Mark 
Mollyne and Samuel Medlicott; commissioners, 
James Hargan, Salathiel Grayson, James D. Taylor, 
John Clements and Patrick Wade. 

The Indianapolis Sentinel, of May 11, 
publishes the following: 

Anderson, Ind., May 10.—[Special.]—The new 
democratic council assumed control of affairs 
last night for the first time in four years. In five 
minutes after the newly elected members had taken 
their seats Councilman Forkner introduced a sweep¬ 
ing resolution, which fired out every republican 
holding a minor city office and appointed in their 
stead tried and true democrats. The city attorney, 
chief of police; ten policemen, city engineer, street 
commissioner and a half dozen other offices were 
placed in the hands of democrats. There is a 
great howl going up to day from republicans and 
they threaten to retaliate by firing out every demo¬ 
cratic teacher from the public schools. 

The new appointees were ward bosses 
and party heelers. This is a good instance 
of the almost universal corruption which 
exists in our national, state and municipal 
affairs in relation to appointments to office. 
In these cases there was no pretense of 
inefficiency of those dismissed or of effi¬ 
ciency of those appointed. It was plain 
freebooting. In most cases there is a pre¬ 
tense of efficiency yet the governing mo¬ 
tive in the selection for appointment is fav¬ 
oritism and the action of the appointing 
power is therefore corrupt. The magni¬ 
tude of the evil is colossal and the effect 
upon individual citizenship is degrading 
in the extreme. So widespread is this cor¬ 
ruption that every other public question is 


dwarfed by the side of it. Party machines 
and managers as now constituted do not 
want this corruption removed or citizen¬ 
ship elevated. They like to enjoy this 
spoil and they have no means of political 
existence without it. They constantly at¬ 
tempt to distract the attention of the peo¬ 
ple by pushing forward some other ques¬ 
tion as the all-important one. That trick 
is now well understood. The one great ob¬ 
ject to work for now in American politics 
is the destruction of the spoils system. 
That can best be worked at from a position 
of cold-blooded indifference to mere party 
success. 


A Boston Herald Washington dispatch, 
of April 12, says, regarding Mr. Andrew’s 
bill “to exclude political influence in the 
appointment of labor under the authority 
of the United States:” 

The federation of labor of the District of Columbia 
met last night, and, after a two hours’ discussion of 
the bill by sections, voted to indorse it, with only 
one dissenting vote. It was also voted to appoint a 
committee to wait upon Mr. Andrew to urge^the ad¬ 
dition of a clause making it a penal offence for a 
public officer to violate the law if it is enacted. 

Of the recent application of the system 
in the Washington navy-yard. Commodore 
Folger in his last annual report says: 

It is perhaps unnecessary to state, and it is a fact 
which isgenerally acknowledged,that the gun factory 
at the Washington navy-yard has proved itself suc¬ 
cessful in the direction of economy and efficiency. 
Ordnance material of every description is now man¬ 
ufactured in this establishment cheaper than out¬ 
side contractors will agree to undertake the work. 
This state of affairs is largely due to the methods 
which have been pursued in purifying the manner 
of making appointments, promotions, etc., in the 
labor force, and in the adoption of an administration 
based upon business methods, and it is believed that 
the merit system, which has become finally estab¬ 
lished, is satisfactory and beneficial both to the 
government and to the labor employed. 


The sale of the Indianapolis News by 
Mr. John H. Holliday is an event of great 
political interest. Mr. Holliday founded 
the News with a small capital, and carried 
it through all difficulties until it became a 
great newspaper, and sold, it is reported, 
for three hundred thousand dollars. It 
has been a great power in Indiana, with 
its 25,000 daily circulation and 100,000 daily 
readers. While not without mistakes, it 
has during its twenty years existence stood 
for the free exercise of the powers of citi¬ 
zenship unhampered by partisan bands. 
While the party papers of Indiana have 
ignored the facts, or have lied about them, 
the News has told the truth. Its stand up¬ 
on public questions has been without fear 
or wavering, and with indifference to party 
effect. It has, in most cases, been right. 
It has been a persistent and powerful fight¬ 
er of the spoils system in every phase. 


Mr. Morton has published a statement 
in his usual clear and conclusive terms. 



















332 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


of the solicitation of money by ex-Con- 
gressman Allen in the federal building 
at Chicago. The feeling among the boys 
here is very ugly toward Mr. Morton, not 
that they question for a moment the truth 
of his statements, but for “ blowing,” as one 
them put it. Merrill Moores, chairman of 
the republican county committee, talks of 
having Mr. Morton expelled from the Col¬ 
umbia Club, a “swell ” republican organi¬ 
zation of this city. The last seen of Allen, 
he was hurrying across-lots to Washington 
where he ran around to the President and 
other officers to deny what he had not yet 
been charged with. It was a case of the 
wicked making rapid time in anticipation 
of pursuit. 

The President has placed the employes 
of the tish commission, 132 in number, 
under the civil service law. This was done 
at the urgent request of Fish Commission¬ 
er McDonald, and swells the number of 
additions made by the President to the 
classified service during the three years 
of his term to between eight and nine 
hundred. How full this measure of per¬ 
formance is can be determined by refer¬ 
ence to the platform upon which he was 
elected. 

The President turned the Virginia fed¬ 
eral offices over to Mahone, the Pennsyl¬ 
vania offices to Quay, the New York to 
Platt, and he let Clarkson displace forty 
thousand postmasters with his friends and 
partisans. Yet, to a man, these bosses are 
now his bitter enemies. With this full¬ 
ness of ingratitude, poetic justice punishes 
the President for forgetting his oath of 
office and his duties under the constitu¬ 
tion. 


THE HENCHMEN IN ACTIVE SER¬ 
VICE. 

“ No officer should be required or per¬ 
mitted to take part iu the arraugemeut of 
political organizations, caucuses, conren- 
tions, or election campaigns. Their right 
to rote and to express their views on pub¬ 
lic questions, either orally or through the 
press, is not denied, provided it does not 
interfere with the discharge of their 
official duties. No assessment for political 
purposes on offices or subordinates should 
be allowed.”— President Hayes, June 22,1817 

FIELD SERVICE FOR A MONTH. 

[From the New York Times.] 
Appointments, removals and transfers were nu¬ 
merous at the custom-house yesterday, and the spe¬ 
cial treasury agent’s office came in for the lion’s 
share of the “shake up.’’ It began with Special 
Treasury Inspectors Morton Britton and Ignatius Du¬ 
gan, who were removed. Both of them are republi¬ 
cans. Britton had been a long time in the service, 
and had had to do with some important cases. Chief 
Wilbur speaks well of his work, but that didn’t pre¬ 
vent the sending of an order from Washington for 
his removal. It was gossip yesterday that some power¬ 
ful influence had been exerted against him.—March 5. 


Collector Hendricks has had many sessions lately 
with the local republican leaders, who are hunger¬ 
ing for that amount of spoils represented by what is 
known as the Briggs contract. They have long 
fought for this slice of government patronage, and 
now they are in a fair way to get possession of it 
very speedily. This contract is for the cartage of 
goods to the general order stores. It is estimated to be 
worth 850,000 a year to the holder.—March 16. 

»:t i.** ».t 

Yesterday it leaked out at the custom-house that 
Ex-Sheriff Clark D. Rhinehart, of Brooklyn, was 
likely to come in for one of the shares, and that there 
was strong influence back of him. The story given 
to account for this new factor in the situation is 
rather a roundabout one, and has to do, more or less, 
with the factions in Brooklyn, where the friends of 
Secretary Tracy and Naval Officer Willis are arrayed 
against Revenue Collector Ernst Nathan. A month 
ago Gov. Flower ended the term of William H. Leay- 
craft as a port warden, an ofliee which he had held 
since the time of Gov. Cornell. Leaycraft is leader 
in the nineteenth ward in Brooklyn, and is classed 
as a friend of Secretary Tracy. At one time he was 
looked upon as booked for an assistant appraiser- 
ship, but in the last few days it has been practically 
settled that he will not get the place. The New York 
seekers for the Briggs contract figure it out that it 
is as an offset to delay or failure to bring about Leay- 
craft’s appointment that the scheme to give Rhine¬ 
hart a slice of the contract and pacify his faction has 
been evolved. The result is that the leaders in this 
city are preparing to make the biggest fight they can 
to keep Rhinehart out, even if he has the support of 
Secretary Tracy. They are talking of all sorts of 
rash things if a Brooklyn finger is to be thrust into 
this particular custom-house pie.—April 9. 

v # v 

The Eleventh Assembly District Republican Asso¬ 
ciation had a meeting last night at its headquarters, 
Broadway and Thirty-fourth street, which developed 
such a factional fight that the police were called in, 
and the meeting broke up in confusion. It is in this 
district that many republicans protested against 
machine methods which kept them out of the organ¬ 
ization at the recent meeting of the republican 
county organization. The anti-machine men were 
in authority at the start last night. 

Meantime “the machine’’ was on the sidewalk, 
unable to force its way in. Col. Bliss, Charles A, 
Peabody, S. V. R. Cruger, Alderman Morris, ex-Al¬ 
derman J. C. O’Connor, and others were trying to 
get through the disorderly crowd on the stairs. Busi¬ 
ness was being conducted amid shouts and jeers and 
hisses. The leaders outside said it was a disorderly 
mob and they went for the police. Three or four 
officers came and crowded their way up the stairs. 

“ Put the Tammany democrats out,’’ shouted some 
of the machine crowd. 

“ Put the Tammany police out! ’’ replied some of 
the anti-machine crowd. 

The officers said they could tell a Tammany demo¬ 
crat as soon as they saw him, and they at once began 
removing such as seemed democrats and passing 
them down the stairs. There were shouts and yells 
and a general scramble. The anti-machine men 
wore white buttons in the lapels of their coats. Some 
one had told the officers that these were the men to 
go, and there was a long line of white buttons passed 
down the stairs. Mr. Milholland stood on a chair 
and cried out that Tammany Hall had sent the offi¬ 
cers t(f break up the meeting. Others joined iu the 
cry and confusion reigned. When the hall had been 
cleared the leaders in the district took possession 
and decided to appoint a committee of five to in¬ 
vestigate the trouble. Col. Bliss moved to adjourn 
and the meeting broke up. Several lively bits of re¬ 
partee passed between Col. Bliss and Mr. Milholland 
and others. Col. Bliss said among other things that 
charges had been filed at Washington against Mr. 
Milholland for being an offensive partisan while 
holding a federal office.—ifarc/i 23. 

v * 

Considerable surprise was occasioned yesterday by 
the announcement that the official ax had fallen 
on the heads of three contract labor inspectors 


attached to the immigration bureau on Ellis island. 
John E. Milholland is the chief of the contract labor 
bureau. This reduction of his force is said to be the 
outcome of his quarrel with Col. George Bli.ss and 
other leaders of the eleventh assembly district.— 
March 28. 

The pretty republican row in the eleventh assem¬ 
bly district, wherein John E. Milholland, with a 
very good backing, seeks to overturn the Col. George 
Bliss dynasty, took on a new phase yesterday. Scared 
at the inroads on their strength which Mr. Milhol¬ 
land had been making. Col. Bliss and some of his 
followers got together and prepared a circular. The 
circular, which is a rather remarkable local political 
document, is as follows: 

“Recent occurrences in the eleventh assembly 
district induce us to make the following statement to 
the republicans of the district and the state: 

“ A complaint was presented at the last meeting 
of the republican county committee charging unfair 
dealing in the republican association in preventing 
republicans from joining it and in keeping the roll 
of members inaccessible. The paper was signed by 
39 of the 800 members of the association. Its state¬ 
ments are untrue. No person desiring to become a 
member has been prevented from so doing longer 
than was reasonably necessary to inquire into his 
claim to become such member. The member who 
presented the paper to the association has himself 
been found proposing for membership persons who 
were not eligible. More than a third of the names 
proposed were found to be those of democrats, per¬ 
sons not residents, or who did not desire to join the 
association. 

“The'rollof the association has been always ac¬ 
cessible on proper application, but has been kept 
from those desiring to steal it. 

“Prior to the regular meeting of the association on 
Tuesday last, a gang of ruffians took possession of 
the room, excluded the officers and proceeded to 
act as the association. How they were brought to 
that meeting, and how the gang was made up, is in¬ 
dicated by the following advertisement which ap¬ 
peared in the Herald of that day: 

“ ‘I can give temporary employment to twenty-five 
men. Apply to store438Fourth avenue.’ 

“The ‘store 438 Fourth avenue’is kept by a for¬ 
mer member of the association who was expelled 
under the constitution, and the ‘ temporary employ¬ 
ment’ was to capture a republican association’s 
room. 

“ He was there with them. They were aided by 
gangs recruited all over the city and paid, or prom¬ 
ised to be paid, for going there. The proceedings 
were openly conducted under the supervision of an 
officer under the national government, who was not 
and is not a member of the association, though he 
and his gang went through the motions of electing 
him a member .—March 31. 

«! << !.-< 

Mr. Thomas C. Platt still lingers in Washington. 

He met with a series of disappointments this morn¬ 
ing which would have disheartened a less seasoned 
campaigner. First he called at the White House and 
was informed that the President was unable to see 
him, owing to the fact that he had an engagement 
which w'ould occupy several hours. 

Mr. Platt pocketed disappointment and started for 
the treasury department. Yes, Mr. Foster was in, 
but he was engaged. Would Mr. Platt kindly call in 
the afternoon ? This was the discouraging message 
New York’s republican boss received through the 
colored gentleman on guard at the secretary’s door 
Mr. Platt made a virtue of necessity, and a few hours 
later he was closeted with Mr. Foster. Before even¬ 
ing he contrived to get an audience Avith Mr. Har¬ 
rison. 

“ As stated in The Times this morning, the object 
of Mr. Platt’s visit is to try to patch up peace iu the 
ranks of New York republicans, which has been de- 
stroyed by young Mr. Milholland’s performance in 
the eleventh as.sembly district. When Milholland [ji 
came here last week to explain away the charges 
made against him by Col. George Bliss, and substan. 
tiated by Col. S. V. R. Cruger, he found that he had 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


333 


tackled an exceedingly difficult undertaking. The 

I Union League Club influence had preceded him, and 
both the President and Secretary Foster were pre¬ 
pared to take him to task for his actions. 

“Mr. Milholland asserted while here that he had 
smoothed the difficulty over, but later reports show 
that he was hauled over the coals in the liveliest 
possible fashion by his superiors. Soon after his re- 
j turn home, his force in the contract labor bureau 

^ was reduced and the public was informed that he 

had been rebuked. 

“ Now comes Mr. Platt to straighten out the diffi¬ 
culty if he can. He does not want Milholland to be 
disciplined further, and he wants Col. Bliss and the 
Union League Club to let the matter drop. He finds 
the President and the secretary of the treasury, who 
is his political right bower just now, anxious for 
peace and willing to sacrifice Milholland if it seems 
likely that such a course would prove advisable. Mr. 
Platt discovered that he had a good-sized job on his 
hands when he interviewed the gentlemen this af¬ 
ternoon. He has arranged for another session with 
Mr. Foster to-morrow.’’—Afarc/i 30. 

* l(* 

At 12:25 o’clock this morning information was re¬ 
ceived at The Times office from persons associated 
with the Col. Bliss faction in the Bliss-Milholland 
fight in the eleventh assembly district that Secre¬ 
tary Foster had demanded the resignation of John E. 
Milholland as supervising immigrant inspector as a 
result of his opposition to Col. Bliss. If the news is 
true, a big rumpus in the republican party in this city 
is very certain to follow. Nearly all of the big repub¬ 
lican politicians here sympathize with Mr. Milhol¬ 
land. It will also intensify the interest in to-day's 
primary in the eleventh district, where the Bliss and 
Milholland factions will battle at the polls from 9 
A. M. until 9 p. M. The election will be held at the 
Hamilton Club, Thirty-fourth street and Broadway. 

The Milholland faction goes in under decided dis¬ 
advantage. Col. George Bliss controls the organiza¬ 
tion, and particularly the inspectors of election. 
Many of the wealthy men in the district are with 
the Bliss faction. 

Since Mr. Milholland has been making the fight 
against Col. Bliss the latter faction has called for help 
from the national administration and the official 
head of Mr. Milholland has been demanded. Mr. 
Milholland’s refusal to sign the letter of withdrawal 
from the contest and his consequent decision to fight 
it out at the polls have aroused the Bliss people. 

Cornelius N. Bliss said yesterday that it w'as simply 
a matter of Mr. Milholland’s withdrawal. No com¬ 
promise would be considered. He charged Mr. Mil¬ 
holland with not keeping faith. It was also de¬ 
clared that the whole matter of Mr. Milholland’s re¬ 
moval from office was left by Secretary Foster in the 
hands of Cornelius C. Bliss, and the latter wrote to 
Mr. Foster yesterday demanding Mr. Milholland’s 
removal. 

John C. O’Conor, jr., chairman of the enrolled re¬ 
publicans of the eleventh district, stirred up a hor¬ 
net’s nest and stepped on a good many respectable 
republican corns yesterday by writing a letter which 
in most districts would help Mr. Milholland’s cause. 
For instance, he made this remarkable statement in 
reference to the famous meeting of March 22: 

“What else this gang of hirelings may have con¬ 
templated I know not, but I have been informed 
that prior to the assembly of these worthies it was 
arranged to overpower the secretary of the regular 
organization, take his books away by force, and also 
to pull the president from the chair and throw him 
out of the window. The window was on the third 
story. These acts became unnecessary, the officers 
of the association being unable to make an entry. 

“This was the beginning of the Milholland move¬ 
ment. These are the people who comprise the Mil¬ 
holland element. You will readily understand that 
with the iuaugurators of such a movement or the sup¬ 
porters of such people no conference is possible, nor, 
in my judgment, could any conference be held with 
them. They are heyond the pale of consideration, 
political or otherwise.” 

When asked last night about Cornelius N. Bliss’s 
request for his removal, Mr. Millholland said. 


“I have simply to say that I am not in the least 
surprised. The Col. Bliss crowd have been clamor¬ 
ing for my removal ever since I began the fight 
against the way in which they managed the district. 
They may convince the administration that it is its 
duty to interfere in this little assembly district row, 
and if they do, I don’t think I shall worry much 
about it. I certainly shall not hesitate for an instant 
to keep up the fight, nor shall I or my friends, and I 
have plenty of them, recede one inch from the posi¬ 
tion that I have taken. I told Cornelius N. Bliss, 
when I met him at the personal request of Secretary 
Foster, that all the threats he or his friends could 
indulge in were wasted upon me, and that the only 
influence to which I would yield would be that 
which was presented by Chairman Brookfield, name¬ 
ly, the interests of the party. 

“There is not a fair fighter among them. Their 
circular having proved a boomerang, they rushed off 
to Washington and tried to have me removed. They 
say now that they did not pretend to represent the 
Union League Club in making this request, and they 
did not threaten to cut off contributions to the cam¬ 
paign if I were not called down, but I say they did, 
and I can prove it by authority that they dare not 
question.—Ajjrtf 15. 

>.' 

Republican primaries were held yesterday in all 
the assembly districts of the city except the twenty- 
fourth, and men were selected to go to Albany to 
nominate as delegates to the Minneapolis convention 
those persons who were long ago selected by “ Boss’’ 
Platt to perform that service. 

In the eleventh assembly district John E. Milhol¬ 
land’s effort to overthrow the regular ticket headed 
by Cornelius N. Bliss was a failure. There was, 
however, a lively fight all day long for supremacy, 
and the district was scratched over for voters by the 
ward-workers with great zeal and vigor. 

The Bliss crowd set up a mighty cheer up stairs 
and down when the result was announced. John E. 
Milholland and his followers adjourned to their 
headquarters, on Sixth avenue above Thirty-fourth 
street, and there Milholland got on a table and made 
a speech. He accused the Bliss faction of unfairand 
illegal voting, and declared that the fight would 
go on. 

He said that he had evidence in his possession to 
show that a number of the Bliss tickets were fraudu' 
lently voted .—April 16. 

<1 * !S 

Last night Dr. L. L. Seaman, one of the best-known 
republicans in the eleventh district, sent a dispatch 
to President Harrison indignantly protesting against 
the interference of the administration in the Bliss- 
Milholland faction fight, as described on another 
page of The Times. Dr. Seaman also mailed to the 
President a letter in which he said: 

“The newspapers say that Milholland’s resigna¬ 
tion is demanded, not for neglect of duty or any 
dishonorable act, but because he failed to arrange 
matters satisfactory with Bliss. What a text for 
democratic orators next fall! How they will ring 
the changes on it! It will be interpreted by the in¬ 
dependent element of our parly as an unwarranted 
interference in local affairs by the administration, a 
repetition of Hillism, an insult to a righteous effort 
to purify politics, and will be justly rebuked next 
November by a split in the party at the polls.” 

Ethan Allen wrote the following open letter on 
Mr. Milholland’s removal: 

“I can’t refrain from uttering my protest as a re¬ 
publican against the action of the authorities in 
Washington in the most unwarrantable interference 
in the primary of the eleventh district yesterday. 

“Mr. Milholland had as much right as any voter in 
the land to resort to fair means and an open fight for 
the supremacy of his views and wishes. It seems 
that he was repressed in his manly views by a cabi¬ 
net minister, and removed from office because he 
interfered with the motives of a district boss, whose 
pocketbook at all times seems more powerful than 
his brains in party management. 

“Boss Croker could have done nothing lower nor 
meaner than was expressed in the demands of this 
eleventh district republican magnate, nor could 
Tammany Hall have been more subservient than 


was the pliant powers of a republican cabinet.— 
April 17. 

<« • <■ 

There was no lack of interesting features about the 
republican cougressional district conventions which 
were held last night for the purpose of electing dele¬ 
gates to the republican national convention. 

Through the medium of the conventions, T. C. 
Platt found a way to get a sharp slap at the adminis¬ 
tration, Col. George Bliss, and Cornelius N. Bliss for 
the removal of John E. Milholland from his position 
as supervising inspector of immigrants. Secretary 
Foster removed Mr. Milholland from his position 
last Friday because the Bliss faction in the eleventh 
assembly district demanded it. Mr. Milholland’s 
friends were seeking to overthrow the Bliss dynasty 
in the eleventh, and that is why he was removed. 

The politicians began to ask what Platt would do 
about all this. His plan only came out at the con¬ 
vention in the sixth congressional district last night. 

Mr. Milholland was elected a delegate to the na¬ 
tional republican convention with H. 0. Armour. 
Only five days had elapsed between his removal by 
the administration and his election as a delegate to 
the national convention at which the head of the 
administration expects plain .sailing to a renomina¬ 
tion. 

This incident indicates the feeling of the Platt 
people toward the administration. 

With the exception of the delegates chosen from 
the tenth congressional district, practically all ihe 
delegates can be counted on for Platt, and they will 
be for whatever candidate he may determine, be he 
Harrison or some other man.—April 20. 

j;« 

Thomas C. Platt is mad. There is no more doubt 
about this than there is about the more interesting 
fact that by the removal of John E. Milholland and 
Charles H. Murray the administration, and espe¬ 
cially Secretary Foster, intended to make Platt mad. 

Mr. Platt said yesterday that these removals were 
the funniest things he had ever heard of, because 
both men removed were delegates to the national 
republican convention. He calmly averred that 
there was no politics in Mr. Murray’s removal, and 
yet he said: 

“Tlie persons who removed him had not got 
wind of Murray’s election as a delegate to the na¬ 
tional convention.” 

“ How about Milholland ?” Mr. Platt was asked. 

“ Mr. Milholland is all right.” 

“ What will he get ?” 

“ Even,” said Mr. Platt. 

“ The administration is quite chummy with me,” 
was another of Mr. Platt’s repletions. 

Speaking of Mr. Milholland getting even, if noth¬ 
ing else, Mr. Platt said, with fine sarcasm : “ I sup¬ 
pose we will have to see Mr. Cornelius N. Bliss and 
fix it up with him.” 

When asked about the possibility of Mr. Milhol¬ 
land being reinstated, he said : 

“Oh, the administration would never do anything- 
as wise as that.”—April 23. 

♦ <1 »;< 

The rupture between Thomas C. Platt and the 
federal administration is now so pronounced that 
many officials who are now holding their places in 
government offices here through the Platt influence 
are in dire fear for their heads. 

It was announced last night that Secretary Foster 
had followed up the removal of John E. Milholland 
from the office of supervising inspector of immi¬ 
grants by dismissing Charles H. Murray, who was 
counsel to the immigration department at a salary 
of 88 a day. Murray Is ex-supervisor of the Porter 
census in this city, a man for whom the administra¬ 
tion had great use when the count in this city was 
attacked. He is the republican leader of the third 
assembly district, and is a protege of Platt. 

Murray’s removal is a direct slap at Platt, just as 
the Milholland removal was. It was made just be¬ 
fore the congressional conventions were held in this 
city for the election of delegates to the national re 
publican convention, although Mr. Murray declined 
to state positively last night just when he received 
the notification that his services would be dispensed 
with. He said no charges had been made against 











334 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


him, and no explanation was given him whatever- 
He was simply notified by Secretary Foster that his 
services would be dispensed with after April 30 — 
April 25. 

« * * 

The fight between the administration and Thomas 
C. Platt assumed new proportions yesterday when 
Immigration Commissioner Weber appointed George 
K. Gilooly, of Brooklyn, supervising inspector of 
the immigration bureau in place of John E. Mil- 
hollaud, removed. The appointment was credited 
to Secretary Tracy, and was another attack on 
Platt’s control of the party in this state. It is ru¬ 
mored that a lot more of Platt’s appointees are to go 
by the board, and the administration is about as un¬ 
popular with the machine politicians here as it is 
possible to make it. 

There was something of a rebellion among the 
other inspectors when the department order making 
Gilooly supervising inspector was sent out by Mr. 
Weber. Department orders have to be signed by 
each of the inspectors to show that they have fuU 
cognizance of ihem. 

When a copy of the order was sent to Major S. C. 
Osborn, he wrote under his signature “Under pro¬ 
test.’’ Mr. Weber called him into his office and ask¬ 
ed him what he meant. 

Major Osborn said he meant what he had written, 
and that the appointment was unfair to the other 
men. 

Mr. Weber said this was insubordination. 

Major Osborn said he could not help that. 

Then Mr. Weber read a lecture to all the inspect¬ 
ors, in which he told them substantially that he was 
boss there and any one who did not like it could get 
out. 

Some of the other inspectors are in a highly indig¬ 
nant frame of mind. Several of them are the right- 
hand political workers of such men as Senators Hig¬ 
gins and Allison. Major Osborn is one of Senator 
Allison's men in Iowa, and Captain 0. H Gallagher 
is one of Senator Higgin’s men in Delaware. Mr. 
Gallagher was a candidate for Mr. Milholland’s 
place, and so was Colonel “Tim” Lee, who hails 
from Virginia. 

These men are in such an indignant frame of mind 
that some of them are going to their senatorial pa¬ 
trons and try to get them to take a hand in the row. 
Some of them expect to be removed because they 
were friendly to Milholland and because of their 
action yesterday. 

They declare that Gilooly is incompetent and has 
only worktd about one full week since his first ap¬ 
pointment, two years ago. 

“He did so little work,’’ said one of the inspectors 
last night, “that some time ago his pay was reduced 
from $8 to $1 per pay.’’—April 26. 

si! * it 

The following document, which seems to indicate 
that the Milhollanders are extremely virtuous these 
days, has been sent to Commissioner Roosevelt at 
Washington, accompanied by the signatures of 
200 or more eleventh district republicans; 

“We, the undersigned committee, representing the 
republicans of the eleventh assembly district. New 
York, desire to call your attention to the action of 
certain office-holders of the administration at the 
primary election held at 107 West Thirty fourth 
street, in the eleventh district. New York, on the 15th 
inst. 

“Not less than twenty of these individuals took 
part in this primary, not merely to vote, but la¬ 
bored at the polls from the time they opened at 9 
o’clock in the morning until they closed at 9 o’clock 
at night, neglecting their government duties, and 
apparently with the approval of their superior offi¬ 
cers. 

“Four of these officers were inspectors of election 
on that day, namely: 

“George D. Overin, inspector, custom-house. 

“James W. Leeds, inspector, custom-house. 

“George Finkenhauer, gauger’s laborer, custom¬ 
house. 

“Henry A. Hill, messenger, barge office. 

“The rest devoted themselves throughout the day 
to the work of electioneering for the machine. 


“Andrew Peddie, deputy collector internal reve¬ 
nue. 

“J. C. H. Smith, watchman, public stores. 

“William Graham, gauger’s laborer, custom-house. 

“John T. Mayers, laborer, public stores. 

“Caleb Simms, messenger, custom-house. 

“Thomas H. Brown, messenger, public stores. 

“Samuel Stokely, messenger, .shipping commis¬ 
sioners. 

“Benjamin A. Levy, examiner, public stores. 

“Sherman Williams, examiner, public stores. 

“Edward S. Flow, messenger, public stores. 

“Daniel Morrison, public stores. 

“William H. Baker, laborer, public stores. 

“Robert Edwards, laborer, custom-house. 

“Joseph Kirwin, laborer, custom-house. 

“James Reilly, laborer, custom-house. 

“A Munson, laborer, custom house. 

“Pierre Bargae, messenger, Ellis Island. 

“Besides their work on election day, most of these 
men have canvassed the district for weeks previous 
to the election, some of them neglecting their gov¬ 
ernment work to do so. 

“The facts above stated are so well known that we 
assume that a mere statement of them is all that is 
necessary to lay before you. If, however, you need 
further proof in the form of affidavits, we shall be 
pleased to furnish them promptly.’’—April 30. 

^ <« 

Wlien we consider the patroiiag^e of this 
great office, the allurements of power, the 
temptation to retain public place once 
gained, and more than all, the availability 
a party finds in an incumbent whom a 
horde of office-holders, with a zeal born of 
benefits received and fostered by the hope 
of favors yet to come, stand ready to aid 
with money and trained political service, 
we recognize in the eligibility of the Pres¬ 
ident for re-election a most serious danger 
to that calm, deliberate and intelligent 
political action which must characterize a 
government by the people.— [Letter of Accep¬ 
tance, 1884, Grover Cleveland, 

<■ 

John C. New, of Indiana, the President’s able 
lieutenant of four years ago, who was rewarded 
with the consul-generalship at London, is said to be 
coming home to manage Mr. Harrison’s campaign 
at Minneapolis. * « 

The republican state convention met here to-day 
and was under the complete domination of the federal 
office-holders. Ninety counties are represented by 
more than average delegations. 

Virgil S. Lusk was elected permanent chairman. 
It was then proposed to proceed to elect a new state 
committee, and an attempt was made by the Eaves 
faction to cut off discussion by calling the previous 
question. This precipitated a row that for two 
hours turned the convention into a howling mob.— 
Raleign, N. C., Dispatch to New York Times, April 14. 
❖ *.■« 



Eighth—L. L. Jenkins, postmaster at Qostonia, and 
Dr J. A. Wilcox. 

Ninth—C. J. Harris and R. W. Logan. 

Except when otherwise stated the delegates are 
white men and hold no federal offices. Of the 
twenty-two, eight are federal office-holders and have 
been instructed for Harrison.—Raleigh, N. G., Dispatch 
to New York Times, May 8. 

<< <« <« 


The republicans of Harrison county met in mass 
convention at Corydon to-day and appointed dele¬ 
gates to the state and district conventions. Hon. 
Smiley N. Chambers [United States district attorney^ 
was present and addressed the meeting.—Dwiian- 
apolis .Journal, April 10. 


« -•> 


An enthusiastic meeting of the Richmond repub¬ 
lican club was held this evening, it being the occa¬ 
sion of the second annual election of officers. After 
the business of the evening had been transacted the 
club was addressed by Hon. Smiley N. Chambers, of 
Indianapolis, on the political issues of the day.—Jn- 
dianapolis Journal, April 12. 

* * « 

The republicans of this county held their conven¬ 
tion here to-day. Smiley N. Chambers [United States 
district attorney] was present and addressed the 
brethren on the tariff and other issues.—Gremcnstfe 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 30. 

The election for delegates to the republican state 
convention, which was held throughout the state 
yesterday, was attended by some disorder in this 
city, and marked the preliminaries of what promises 
to be a lively fight against the continued rule of the 
Higgins wing of the republican party here. In the 
three wards where contesting delegate tickets were 
run, the Higgins candidates won easily, but the feel¬ 
ing was more intense than was indicated by the poll 
of votes, and resulted in several spirited rows. One 
of these, between Letter Carrier Sylvanus, an ardent 
Higgins advocate, and County Constable Brown, led 
to a battle at republican headquarters after the elec¬ 
tion. In the melee the letter carrier was savagely 
assaulted by Brown and two other constables and 
and brutally beaten. Saturday morning Postmaster 
David F. Stewart, one of the leaders of the Higgins 
forces, issued an address to the employes of the post- 
office, directing their attention to the civil service 
regulations prohibiting the interference of federal 
employes in political primaries. In the afternoon. 
Postmaster Stewart was electtd a delegate to the 
state convention from the tenth ward, with one of 
his clerks as a colleague, while the employes of the 
post-office and federal officials generally were con¬ 
spicuous throughout the city for their eager work at 
the polls.— Wilmington, Del., Dispatch to New York 
Times, May 2. 

i'fi lit * 

At the republican convention of this slate the fol¬ 
lowing office-holders were present: Postmaster Hart, 
Collector Beard, Appraiser Dodge, Assistant Apprais¬ 
er Dunham, Clerk Pousland, and the examiner of 
drugs and two inspectors, all of the custom-house, 
and a few others not of the custom-house.—Rosfon 
Civil Service Record, May. 


The full list of delegates to Minneapolis from this 
state is as follows: 

At Large—E. A. White, collector of internal revenue; 
John C. Dany, colored, collector of the port at Wilming¬ 
ton-, Henry P. Cheatham, colored; Congressman 
Jeter C. Pritchard. 

First District—C. M. Bernard and Hugh Cole, col¬ 
ored. 

Second—C. A. Cook, United States district attorney; 
J. H. Hannon, colored, postmaster at Halifax. 

Third—G. C. Scurlock and A. R. Middleton, both 
colored. 

Fourth—John Nichols, chief of the mail and files di¬ 
vision, treasury department; Edward A. Johnson, col¬ 
ored. 

Et/fft-Thomas B. Keogh, James A Cheek. 

Sixth—James H. Young, colored, inspector of customs, 
Archibald Brady, postmaster at Charlotte. 

Seventh—Zeb V. Walser, deputy collector, and W. A. 
Bailey. 


j;? 

Yesterday’s convention was an office-holder’s con¬ 
vention, pure and simple. Nearly every district 
delegation was represented by two or more office¬ 
holders, many of them owing their places to the gen¬ 
erosity of President Harrison and incidentally to the 
influence of Thomas C. Platt The office-holders 
from New York formed a veritable army. The cus¬ 
tom-house was well represented by all the most in¬ 
fluential office-holders. Collector Francis Hendricks, 
Surveyor George W. Lyon, and Naval Officer Theo¬ 
dore B. Willis headed the list. 

Then there were Dennis Shea, deputy collector; 
Charles H. Murray, ex-attorney for the bureau of im¬ 
migration; John Collins, deputy surveyor; John 
Simpson, bureau of immigration; Major W. H. Corsa, 
clerk of the third judicial court; John W. Jacobus, 
United States marshal; George B, Deane, custom¬ 
house contractor; Clarence W. Meade, police justice; 
John R. Nugent, food contractor in the barge office; 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


335 


Barney Biglin, luggage contractor; Geii. Denis F. 
Burke, internal revenue collector; Charles W. An¬ 
derson (colored), clerk in internal revenue office; 
John H. Gunner, deputy collector; Frank Raymond, 
deputy collector; J. Thomas Stearns, custom-house 
auctioneer. 

From the city of Brooklyn came Andrew J. Perry, 
Wallabout land appraiser; J. J. Scheusser, assistant 
custodian federal building; Theodore B. Willis, 
naval officer; A. R. Booth of the navy yard, Jesse 
Johnson, United States district attorney; John 
Kissel, navy yard ; George Buchanan, navy yard; 
G. N. Dick, internal revenue officer; Ernst Nathan, 
internal revenue collector; Jacob Mass, secret ser¬ 
vice bureau ; George H. Mason, book-keeper post-of¬ 
fice; John E. Smith, secretary to the naval office; 
John H. Fisher, internal revenue officer; Joseph 
Benjamin, Wallabout land appraiser. 

From the country districts were the following: 
Albany, Postmaster Gen. J. M. Warner; Allegany, 
Postmaster Glenn of Cuba; Auburn, Gen. John N. 
Knapp and Congressman Sereno E. Payne ; Colum¬ 
bia, County Judge J. Rider Cady; Cortland, Assem¬ 
blyman James H. Tripp, who owes his nomination 
'^o T. C. Platt; Erie, Assemblyman Mason H. Clark ; 
Onondaga, Postmaster Carroll E. Smith of Syracuse; 
Postmaster John I. Platt of Poughkeepsie, Internal 
Revenue Collectors Robert H. Hunter of Pough¬ 
keepsie and Charles E. Fitch of Rochester, and a 
score or more of country postmasters.—Al6a«!/ Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, April 30. 

* 

The visit of the honorable the secretary of the 
treasury to Ohio has not been without fruit. That 
high functionary is able to report to his chief, as the 
result of the energetic and faithful performance of 
the duties for which he was selected, that the ad¬ 
ministration will be indorsed by the Ohio republi¬ 
can convention, and that the Ohio delegation will 
support the renomination of Mr. Harrison.—iVeia 
York Times, April 25. 

>|t s.** 

The republican factions are hard at it again. This 
time it is the registration for the primaries which 
forms the bone of contention. 

In the old eighth the registration was held in the 
rear of Thomas Sheridan’s saloon, Barclay and Fed¬ 
eral streets. The Gary officers were Richard B. Evans 
and Dorsey Whittaker, and the Johnson man ap¬ 
pointed was J. R. Wetherill, but the two other of¬ 
ficers did not allow him to take his seat because he 
did not have his commission and threatened to have 
him arrested if he persisted in remaining in the 
room. Sixty-seven names were placed on the poll- 
books, and of these the Johnson men declare that at 
least eleven are democrats and can be readily proved 
so. [Johnson is postmaster.] 

In the Ninth ward the registration place was at 
German and Eutaw streets. The officers were Frank 
Duhurst and John G. Kipp, both Gary men. John 
Walters, the Johnson representative, was not al¬ 
lowed to take his seat either. So he and some of 
his friends contented themselves with standing out¬ 
side the whole time the officers were there and 
keeping tab on the applicants for registration who 
went inside. One of this party of watchers, a federal 
official, says that twelve men passed the threshold 
of the door, yet the books show that twenty-three 
were registered. 

In the thirteenth ward the two factions had a 
free-for-all fight in the registration room. The of¬ 
ficers here were Harry Lardowsky, James Robinson 
and Harry Hartzel, all Gary men. One of these will, 
however, be relieved next Monday night and John 
A. Whitney, a Johnson man, put in his place. 

John F. Thomas, in the registered letter division 
of the post-office, went to the registration place. 651 
W. Baltimore street, with about a dozen of his 
friends. They were all refused registration on the 
grounds that they had not been registered at the 
last primary. Mr. Thomas said he saw George Con- 
rades, 876 W. Fayette street, registered by the officers 
while he was there. He knows that Conrades is a 
democrat. 

In the twenty-second ward about the same state 
of affairs, it is said, prevailed. One of the registra¬ 


tion places was at Quaker Lane and Gorsuch avenue. 
Here again there were only two judges, both Gary 
men. Arthur Flitten was the Johnson man, but he 
was not allowed to take his seat. Mr. Flitten and 
Monitor Watchman, the latter secretary of the 
Twenty-second Ward Republican Club, are responsi¬ 
ble for the statement that a man whom they recog¬ 
nized as a democrat registered three times under 
different names last Monday night. The man, they 
say, changed his hat with his name each time. It 
is said that he was quite indignant, because he 
began with a new stiff hat of his own, and wound 
up with an old slouch belonging to some one else, 
and did not get his own hat back. His arrest was 
ordered by the Johnson men, but the policeman on 
duty there would not take him in cliarge, as he 
thought no law covered the case. 

United States District Attorney Ensor was applied 
to for relief but could not give any. Mr. Ensor took 
Mr. Watchman, who complained, over to State’s 
Attorney Kerr’s office, and Mr. Kerr now has the 
case under advisement. The man, in the mean¬ 
time, has become very much frightened and has 
confessed all about the job, saying that he did not 
know he was violating any law.—Baltimore News, 
Aprils. 

The Baitimore republicans held their primaries 
tu-day, and the administration men and anti-admin¬ 
istration men had a lively time of it. 

The administration leader was Postmaster Johnson, 
and the opposition was led by James A. Gary, the 
national committee man and a capitalist, who wants 
to go to Minneapolis. There were many exciting 
scenes. In the twelfth ward the Johnson men pulled 
a Gary judge bodily out of the window, and had him 
arrested because they said, he was using a registra¬ 
tion book of his own make. 

In the eleventh ward the hottest fighting of the 
day took place. Hiram Watty, the colored leader, 
in a little discussion at the registration office two 
weeks ago got into trouble and was assaulted. To¬ 
day he had his revenge. Last night he stowed away 
150 negroes in one house and locked them up. This 
morning at 6 o’clock he marched them to the polling 
place. The window did not open until 4 o’clock in 
the afternoon, but they stood there ten solid hours 
and carried the day. 

The result is not settled to-night because the Gary 
judges in some wards refused to sign the returns: 
but the Johnson men have probably carried two leg. 
islative districts and the Gary men orb.— Baltimore 
Dispatch to New York Times, April 26. 

»:« 

The delegates to the republican state convention, 
which will be held to-morrow, have arrived. There 
is more bitterness than has been displayed in a re¬ 
publican state meeting since 1876, when the conven¬ 
tion was in this same town, and when the Blaine 
crowd was out-generaled and defeated. 

The direet representatives of the administration, 
the federal office-holders and their men, are clam¬ 
oring, but they are whipped out of their boots. 

The district conventions in Baltimore to-day 
were more eruptive than usual. In the third 
the majority made an open assault on the office¬ 
holding crowd, who retreated and held a conven¬ 
tion all to themselves. The amusing part of the 
whole situation is that the men whom Mr. Wana- 
maker and Secretary Foster are apparently protect¬ 
ing against the effect of the civil service laws have 
been unmercifully defeated, and are trembling, not 
because they violated civil service rules, but for fear 
that their failure to carry the city and state will 
lose them their positions.—FrecfertcA:, Md., Dispatch to 
New York Times, May 3. 

’Jt 

Mr. Gary had carried the state against the federal 
office-holders and had arranged for an uniustructed 
delegation, but Southern Maryland, speaking 
through Captain Potter, bluntly said that all Its men 
would vote against Gary unless the delegates were 
instructed. There was a stormy scene, and Gary 
tried every means to escape the demand, but he 
was finally forced to yield. This work is attributed 
to Internal Revenue Collector Hill who was not 
present except through representatives. 


In spite of civil service investigation at Washing¬ 
ton, Postmaster W. W. Johnson, of Baltimore, was 
there at work to-day, openly managing his hench¬ 
men and directing administration politics.—Freder¬ 
ic!:, Md., Dispatch to New York Times, May 4. 

^ ^ is 

The testimony of Postmaster-general Wanamaker 
and Secretary Foster before the investigating com¬ 
mittee regarding the violations of the civil service 
law in Baltimore, emboldened the offie-holders, and 
the following actively participated in yesterday’s 
convention: W. W. Johnson, postmaster oj Baltimore; 
Dr. Tuck, postmaster at Annapolis; Mr. Mulliken, post 
master at Easton; Qeorge L. Wellington, United States 
sub-treasurer; W. D. Burchinal, surveyor oJ the port of 
Baltimore; Mr. Hill, United States revenue collector, and 
Clay Dodson, deptUy revenue collector. To the work of 
these men is attributed the unexpected result of 
getting the delegates instructed for Harrison.—Baffi- 
more Dispatch to New York Times, May 6. 

* * * 

The republican state convention, which meets in 
this city to-morrow, will have a majority of mem¬ 
bers who have been chosen through the active and 
persistent effort of federal office-holders, under the 
direction of Senator McMillan. They have controlled 
the primaries through a greater portion of state, 
many of their employes being given a vacation to 
engage in this work, while the private secretaries 
of bo*h McMillan and Stockbrldge have been serv¬ 
ing as field marshals.-Dcfroif Dispatch to New York 
Times, April 13. 

if it it 

The republican state convention held in this city 
to-day was merely a ratification of the slate prepared 
by Senator McMillan and made a winner through 
the activity of federal office-holders and their em¬ 
ployes in Michigan.—Defrotf Dispatch to Neio York 
Times, April 14. 

* <1 * 

There gathered in Springfield early in the week a 
number of gentlemen who are paid salaries by the 
United States to attend to certain specific duties, 
among which the running of state conventions and 
the supervision of “booms” are not included. These 
gentlemen are exercising their “perniciousactivity” 
not in obedience to their official superior, the Presi¬ 
dent of the United States—for he is in favor of civil- 
service reform and the faithful discharge of duty by 
government officers—but in obt dience to the orders of 
a superior unknown to the law—the senior senator 
from Illinois. That high dignitary is not on the 
ground. He remains at Washington and instructs his 
deputies by telegraph. He sits at the Washington 
end of the wire and dictates the quantity of ginger 
in the instructions and the number of rounds of 
applause with which they shall be received. Per¬ 
sons not in the secret will think that all that is done 
is the spontaneous act of the republicans of Illinois, 
but he knows better. 

One of the deputy bosses of Illinois is Col. A. C. 
Matthews, the second controller of the treasury. He 
has been absent from his post—possibly without 
leave, certainly without the approval of the Presi¬ 
dent—for the last three or four weeks. During that 
time he has been endeavoring to convince the repub¬ 
licans of Illinois that they are boiling over with enthu¬ 
siasm to commit themselves on the presidential ques 
tion a month in advance. The chief deputy boss" 
Sub-Treasurer Tanner, is also on the ground. Al-^ 
though he has just been appointed to an important 
financial office in Chicago, he has spent his entire 
time for three weeks in the rural “deestricts” collar¬ 
ing “enthusiastic” delegates, and bj' threats, prom¬ 
ises and entreaties inducing them to join the spon¬ 
taneous movement for “instructions” in favorof his 
chief. 

Other deputy bosses are there—Collector Mamer, 
Collector Hogan, Collector Starr—forgetful of their 
duty' to the government in their eagerness to dis¬ 
charge their duty to the chief boss. Postmasters, 
pension agents, large and small, gaugers, storekeep¬ 
ers and all the other federal officials and employes are 
at Springfield, neglecting their duty and outraging 
the civil service reform feelings of the President. 














336 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


They have no business there, for they do not attend 
as republicans, but as deputy bosses, seeking to im' 
pose on the convention a policy which pleases the 
chief boss, but not the mass of the republican voters 
of the state. They went to the capital to intrigue 
and terrorize, to hold out to one man prospects of 
rewards from the chief boss and to threaten another 
with his displeasure.—C/ifcago Tribune, May. 

* * * 

The republican party in Cincinnati is now divided 
into two factions—the government building crowd 
represented by Amor Smith and McClung, and the 
George Cox-Foraker element, which seems to be in 
almost complete control. Both sides are after the 
delegates to the national convention at Minneapo¬ 
lis. The administration office-holders feel it to be 
their duty to show Harrison that thej*^ represent a 
majority of the republican voters in the city, while 
Mr. Cox and his followers are just as anxious to 

prove the contrary.—So«</i West, April 15. 

«! 

The refusal of the convention to instruct for Ilar- 
ri.son was looked upon as the best indorsement the 
convention could give Collector Wennecker, now in 
expectation of removal, at the request of Secretary 
Noble, for his friendship to Filley.—St. Louis Dispatch 
to New York Times, Mayd. 

»l* ^ 

The republican county convention held here to¬ 
day to select delegates to the congressional district 
convention, which will send two delegates to the 
national convention, was one of the liveliest affairs 
of the kind that ever took place. It was controlled 
by Gen. George H. Sharpe, through his son, Severyn 
B. Sharpe is one of Mr. Harrison’s office-holders. 

In the further proceedings William M. Hayes made 
a speech accusing Noah Woolven, the Kingston post¬ 
master, of writing letters to postmasters in the rural dis¬ 
tricts threatening them with removal if they did not send 
the right kind of delegates to the county convention. 

In response to this the postmaster said Hayes was 
a liar, and also that he had lied in the convention 
last fall. Mr. Hayes in reply said he had one of Mr- 
Woolven’s letters in his pocket. Mr. Woolven dared 
him to produce it In further remarks on the mo¬ 
tion, G. D. B. Ha.sbrouck characterized it as tending 
to a tyrannical and outrageous use of power, of 
which only one family, Gen. Sharpe and his son, 
would be guilty.—JSTinjrstott. N. Y., Dispatch to New 
York Times, April 19. 

s;: # * 

The republican convention to elect two delegates 
to the national convention was held here to day. 
When the delegates assembled vigorous canvassing 
was in order. Delaware, Ulster and Greene each 
had a candidate, but it was soon seen that Gen. 
George H. Sharpe was general manager for both 
Ulster and Greene counties, through his wide-awake 
son, Severyn B. 

Ex-Assemblyman James Ballatine, of Delaware 
county, declaimed loudly against office-holders run¬ 
ning conventions. He didn’t believe it right that a 
federal office-holder receiving a salary of 8700 a year 
and a postmaster should be forced on the party as 
their representatives to the national convention. He 
referred to Oen. Sharpe and Mr. Jacobs of Catskill. It 
had been agreed that the vote of each county should 
be cast by the chairman of each delegation. The re¬ 
sult of this little game was that Oen. Sharpe of Ulster and 
J. Leroy Jacobs of Oreene each received 18 votes, and 
George W. Crawford of Delaware 7.—Kingston, N. Y., 
Dispatch to New York Times, April 26. 

A hot fight is on foot in the republican ranks be¬ 
tween the supporters of Ernst Nathan, who holds 
the office of collector of internal revenue, and The¬ 
odore B. Willis, naval officer, and his supporters, 
over the choice of delegates to the national conven¬ 
tion. Nathan, who represents T. C. Platt, and is 
more than suspected of close affiliations with the 
democratic leaders in the city, has shown a grasp¬ 
ing desire to control the choice of all the delegates, 
after Willis and his friends had been assured that 
they would be recognized in the choice. The real 
purpose of Nathan is to secure the choice of such men as 
can be controlled in the interests of Platt, and can be used 
by him to support Harrison's renomination or the choice 


of some other man, if it shotdd be deemed desirable. 
The opposition desire the delegates to be firmly 
bound to support the President for renomination, 
thus insuring, in the event of his re-election, the 
continuance of Secretary Tracy in the cabinet. 
Nathan is accused of treachery, and if the opposition 
to him can only solidly combine, he will be defeated 
at the primaries. But the men, to get ahead of the 
Mephistophelian collector, must rise early.—ATfw 
York Evening Post, March 26. 

The merry little contest between Internal Reve¬ 
nue Collector Nathan and Naval Officer Willis is 
going right along, and each side claims to be ahead 
in the fight for delegates to the national convention. 
The real contest will be at the primaries and con¬ 
ventions in the latter part of this month, when the 
leader of each faction will ascertain how many 
Harrison delegates he can control. Judging from 
the result or the past week’s work Nathan will come 
very near winning. 

Ex-Senator Birkett was the first one taken out, 
but he was quickly followed by Michael J. Dady, 
William Buttling and Israel F. Fischer. The latter 
was a Willis man until recently, but the Nathan 
bait was too attractive to be resisted. It was an 
offer of a comfortable job when Harrison begins his 
second term. 

Nathan is waging this fight in his usual way, by 
depending upon ten or twelve ward bosses instead 
of upon the enrolled voters who will cast the ballots 
at the primaries. He expects each of these men to 
carry his ward and send delegates whom he can 
control to the conventions.—iVisw York Times, April 10. 

* * 

The dispatch relates chiefly to Capt. George J. Col¬ 
lins, who is at present the postmaster of Brooklyn. 
He was passing through Washington on his way to 
Fort Monroe for a week’s vacation and was inter¬ 
viewed. He told the reporter that he was literally 
running away from the Brooklyn republican poli¬ 
ticians who are just now engaged in a bitter fight for 
the control of the delegation to Minneapolis. The 
fight is between Tom Platt and Ernst Nathan, in¬ 
ternal revenue collector, on the one side, and Naval 
Officer Willis, backed by Secretaries Tracy and Elkins 
on the other. The former pretend to be favorable 
to Harrison; the latter undoubtedly are so. Capt. 
Collins declared that he was worn out and could 
hardly go through another week like the past, so 
that he had been obliged to ask a week’s leave to 
escape the “onslaught.” “I have been,” he says, 
“threatened, browbeaten and persecuted simply be¬ 
cause I refused for some time to take action with 
either faction and desired to preserve harmony 
among my fellow-republicans of Brooklyn.” Capt. 
Collins, we take it, must be a man of very considera¬ 
ble consequence in Brooklyn politics, but he would 
hardly have been subjected to such strenuous treat¬ 
ment if he had only his own vote to give at the 
primaries, or even, we fear, for the influence his 
personal example might exert. The correspondent 
explains \vhy Capt. Collins’s decision is a matter of 
such moment to the leaders of the contending fac¬ 
tions. He gives a statement of the “patronage” that 
the postmaster, now moved into a new building, 
has to dispose of. It is as follows: One assistant 
custodian, one engineer, one assistant engineer, four 
watchmen, one janitor, one assistant janitor, eight 
laborers, six firemen, and finally, twelve char¬ 
women. Here are thirty-five places in all. Capt. 
Collins having decided to take sides with the Willis 
faction, it is assumed that these places will be given 
where they will secure the most votes at the pri¬ 
maries for that faction, and thus promote the nomina¬ 
tion to the chief magistracy of the greatest republic 
of the world of Mr. Benjamin Harrison.—A'ew York 
Times, April 12. 

<! S! # 

The latest developments in the Nathan-Willis fight 
for control of the local republican machine is the 
conduct of Postmaster Collins in climbing down on 
the Willis side of the fence. He has held aloof from 
the fight as long as possible and has received nothing 
but the reproaches of both sides. Then he went on to 
Washington and saw Secretary Tracy, and the result was 


his declaration against Nathan. The postmastership is 
not usually worth fighting for, but just now, owing 
to the opening of the new federal building, he has 
the power to appoint about thirty-five subordinates, 
including twelve charwomen, and the great republi¬ 
can party in Kings county is not despising charwo¬ 
men in these days.— New York Times, April 17. 

sjs 

The first step toward electing delegates from 
Kings county to the republican national convention 
will be taken on Thursday night, when primaries 
will be held in each ward and town. 

From present appearances the fight on that occa¬ 
sion between the Willis and Nathan factions, one 
representing Secretary of the Navy Tracy, the other 
Thomas C. Platt, will be bitter. 

A report was also circulated by the Nathan people 
that the employes in the navy yard had been or¬ 
dered to get out at the primaries and work for Willis 
or take the consequences. 

Naval Officer Willis returned from a trip to Wash¬ 
ington on Saturday and, it is said, brought this order 
from the navy department. Of course, Mr. Willis de¬ 
nied this story, but there were politicians about town 
who knew men in the navy yard who had decided to 
do just what this alleged order called for, although 
until a few days ago they had not favored Willis. 

George A. Buchanan, of the twenty-second ward, 
Brooklyn, was appointed a special treasury agent 
yesterday. He will serve under Special Agent 
Whitehead, who is in charge of the office at the cus¬ 
tom-house. Buchanan’s appointment is credited to 
the backing of Secretary Tracy, in whose interest 
he has been active in the squabble between the 
republican factions in Brooklyn. In fact, the fight 
across the river is becoming so lively and the de¬ 
mand for patronage is so great that the custom-house 
and other federal offices in this city are feeling the 
effects. Anything in the way of any office that is to 
be had these days is being sought by the Brooklyn 
leaders.—A7ew York Times, April 19. 

<1 v ■:= 

The republican primaries in Kings county were 
held last night, and neither of the factions, headed 
by Naval Officer Willis and Internal Revenue Col¬ 
lector Nathan, won the great victory which its lead¬ 
ers had predicted. The delegates elected to the as¬ 
sembly and congressional conventions, the former to 
be held to-night and the latter to-morrow night, will 
be about equally divided. 

Nathan had a formidable combination to oppose, 
and was regarded as fortunate In having escaped an 
overwhelming defeat at the hands of men who have 
grown tired of the Platt management. As it is, he 
will go to the state convention with more delegates 
than Willis can control, and, will also name four of 
the eight delegates to the national convention.—ATew 
York Times, April 23. 

>;* ^ 

The Willis-Nathan fight for control of the republi¬ 
can party in Kings county did not end with the pri¬ 
maries on Thursday night by any means. The vari¬ 
ous ward leaders were about yesterday working just 
as hard as ever, and conferences were held with Na¬ 
than and Willis all day long. 

Willis said that when the conventions are held it 
will be found that he really won a great victory 
at the primaries and that some of the delegates who 
are now supposed to be Nathan men, will vote for 
his candidates.—A7ew York Times, April 23. 

I am an advocate of civil service reform. 
My brief experience at Wasliing^ton lias led 
me to utter the wish, with an emphasis I 
do not often use, that I miglit be for ever 
relieved of any connection with the dis¬ 
tribution of public patronage. I covet for 
myself the free and unpurchased support 
of my fellow-citizens. * * *— {Senator Ben¬ 
jamin Harrison. 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


This devotion of party, not to the ends for wliich it exists, hnt to the spoils that accompany success at the polls, has become so 
absolute that it has produced an evil greater than any which party proposes to remedy.— George William Curtis, at Baltimcn e, April, 1892. 


VoL. I, No. 40. INDIANAPOLIS, JUNE, 1892. terms :<( fee*t8%er"opy.“ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

NATIONAL REPUBLICAN PLAT- 


“ The men who abandoned the republi¬ 
can party in 1884 and continued to adhere 
to tii^eniocratic party have deserted not 
only the cause of honest government, of 
sound iinance, of freedom and purity of the 
ballot, but especially have deserted the 
cause of reform in the civil service. We 
will not fail to keep our pledges because 
their candidate has broken his. We there¬ 
fore renew our declaration of 1884, to wit: 
‘The reform of the civil service, auspi¬ 
ciously begun under a republican admin¬ 
istration, should be completed by the fur¬ 
ther extension of the reform system already 
established by law to all the grades of serv¬ 
ice to which it is applicable. The spirit 
and purpose of the reform should be ob¬ 
served in ali executive appointments, and 
all laws at variance with the object of ex¬ 
isting reform legislation should be re¬ 
pealed, to the end that the dangers to free 
institutions which lurk in the power of of¬ 
ficial patronage may be wisely and effec¬ 
tively avoided.’ ” 

1892. 

“We commend the spirit and evidence of reform in 
the civil service and the wise and consistent enforce¬ 
ment by the republican party of the laws regulating 
the same.” 

We have devoted much space this month 
to uncovering the motive power which 
successfully operated the republican na¬ 
tional convention, beginning at Minneapo¬ 
lis, June 7. The spoils system was in its 
full fruition. The successful candidate was 
successful because through his henchmen 
he had the convention literally by the 
throat. One hundred and forty place¬ 
holders at the lowest estimate had votes. 
On the best authority at least three thou¬ 
sand other place-holders gathered around 
and bore down opposition. All these 
were led by a place-holder who makes 
thirty or forty thousand dollars a year out 
of his place and who came specially from 
London for this purpose. The whole was 
superintended by the President who had 
wires connecting the White House with 
the convention, and who, as the IndL 
anapolis Journal puts it, was busy “sending 
and receiving communications from the 


seat of war.” It is to be hoped that our 
United States executive government has 
now reached its lowest point of degrada¬ 
tion. It would not seem that political 
pirates and buccaneers could get or would 
want greater power. 

It was not the fault of the President that 
Quay, Clarkson and Platt were opposed to 
him in the convention. It is doubtful if 
any man in the same length of time ever 
controlled such an amount of patronage as 
the President gave to each of these men. 
No doubt he now feels that they bunkoed 
him out of this spoil, but that is not the 
game with which the people are concerned. 
The matter which concerns the people is 
that before his election the President prom¬ 
ised that the reform of the civil service 
“ should be completed by the extension of 
the reform system already established by 
law to all grades of the service to which it 
is applicable.” He also promised that “the 
spirit and purpose of the reform should be 
observed in all executive appointments.” 
All this was promised “to the end that the 
dangers to free institutions which lurk in 
the power of official patronage may be 
wisely and effectively avoided.” General 
Harrison was elected, but these promises 
have not been kept. Was that a confidence 
game, too ? 

The Lord Paramount literally fought 
his own battle, and with his faithful hench¬ 
men he has completely overthrown the 
greater and lesser barons. Quay, Clarkson, 
Platt, Wolcott, Miller, Fassett, Pettigrew 
and others who were in rebellion. His 
position at the moment of final triumph is 
described by the Washington special of the 
Indianapolis Journal, dated June 10. 

The center of attraction to-day was at the White 
House. All the morning the President and his able 
and faithful lieutenants were busily occupied, as 
they have been for several days and nights past, in 
sending and receiving communications from the 
seat of war. 

The New York Evening Post, of June 9, 
gives two interesting incidents of the con¬ 
vention from the Minneapolis correspond¬ 
ence of the New York Press. One is a mes¬ 
sage sent from Washington J une 8th, by 
Mr. Foster, the President’s secretary of the 
treasury, to the Utah member of the na¬ 
tional republican committee as follows: 

“Whatever you can do for us at Minneapolis will 
be duly appreciated and gratefully remembered in 
Washington." 


The Other was a letter seen in Minneap¬ 
olis on the same date, from the President’s 
son, Russell Harrison, to E. H. Studebaker> 
of South Bend,in these words: 

“Mr. George A. Halsey, of New Jersey, who is a 
delegate to Minneapolis, is said to be inclined to fa¬ 
vor Mr. Blaine. Will you please use Influence with 
him to get him to support father? ” 


How platoons and companies of place¬ 
holders swarmed to Minneapolis needs 
little illustration. For example. Land 
Commissioner Carter, Assistant Post¬ 
master-General Rathbone, United States 
Marshal Ransdell, Fourth Auditor Lynch 
and Register Bruce led the Washington 
contingent. Postmaster Johnson led a 
club from Baltimore. The President’s 
brother. United States Marshal Carter 
Harrison, had charge of the Tennessee 
delegation. Postmaster Thompson and 
his assistants, Wallace, Patterson, and Wood- 
ward, and United States Marshal Dunlap, 
Pension Agent Eusley, Collector Hilde¬ 
brand and United States District Attorney 
Chambers headed the Indianapolis place* 
holders, while those of New York were 
led by Postmaster Van Cott, Naval Of¬ 
ficer Willis and Collector Hendricks. This 
was the way throughout the United States. 

What were the repeated communica¬ 
tions for days and nights to the seat 
of war ? What would the President have 
to say or authorize to be said to a halting 
delegate ? Again, what was it in relation 
to tampering with delegates that the Har¬ 
rison managers threatened the Blaine 
managers to expose ? Would Messrs. New 
and Michener have us believe that the 
Blaine managers bought delegates and 
that they got them back by moral suasion? 
Why do strong Harrison men who were 
at Minneapolis come back to Indianapolis 
and talk that the “southern niggers” were 
bought three or four times before the final 
vote ? 

On receiving the news of his renomina¬ 
tion the President made a short speech to 
the reporters and others who gathered 
around him. The burden of his thought 
naturally would have been that he had 
fulfilled the promises upon which he was 
elected in relation to his greatest duty 
under the constitution—the management 
of the civil service. But he was clearly 
not examining himself upon that point. 






























338 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The weight then greatest upon him was 
evidently expressed in his words: “I have 
felt great regret that I was unable to find 
a suitable place for every deserving friend.” 

It is proper for every civil service re¬ 
former to inquire whether the promises of 
the republican platform of 1888 have been 
kept. That part of the platform when 
adopted was known to have been written 
by George William Curtis for and adopted 
in the platform of 1884. It was therefore 
chosen with deliberation. Its promises 
are liberal. 


At its late meeting in Baltimore the Na¬ 
tional League provided for a committee to 
investigate assessment of office-holders and 
for a committee to investigate the interfer¬ 
ence of office-holders in campaigns and 
elections. Upon the first committee Mr. 
Curtis has appointed John C. Rose, Balti¬ 
more, Lucius B. Swift, Indianapolis, C.W. 
Watson, New York; and George A. Merser, 
Philadelphia, with one vacancy yet to be 
filled. Upon the second he has appointed 
Moorfield Storey, Boston; Lucius B. Swift, 
Indianapolis; Herbert Welsh, Philadel¬ 
phia; John C. Rose, Baltimore; and Ed¬ 
ward Cary, New York. 


Mr. Charles A. Lewts, of this city, has 
taken up, on a large scale, the distribution 
in Indiana of the address of Mr. Curtis at 
Baltimore. Any one desiring to co-op¬ 
erate may communicate with him. This 
is important in order to keep the distribu¬ 
tion systematic. Mr. Lewis has had some 
whole counties listed, and will there 
completely cover the field. Will not some 
of our Fort Wayne, Evansville, and Terre 
Haute friends join in this matter? The 
price is §18 a thousand, and orders should 
be sent to John Hemsly Johnson, Box 793, 
Baltimore. 


Harper’s Weekly of June 4, answer¬ 
ing a correspondent in relation to the rel¬ 
ative merits of Harrison and Cleveland, 
says: 

“ This is the test by which Mr. Harrison 
is to be tried. He had behind him what 
Mr. Cleveland had not, a strong reform 
sentiment in his own party, with the most 
vehement party declaration for reform, 
and the most unconditional party pledge 
to keep its pledges, with its own detailed 
and specific engagements, some of them 
made a year or two before in censure of 
Mr. Cleveland’s course. Practically, Mr. 
Harrison has kept none of these pledges, 
although the reform, impelled by public 
opinion, has advanced decidedly during 
his administration. * * * The Presi¬ 

dent has sustained examinations under the 
law as Mr. Cleveland did. He has sup¬ 
ported the commission as Mr. Cleveland 


did, except that Mr. Harrison has not 
adopted its most important recommenda¬ 
tion, that for the dismissals in Baltimore. 
He has extended somewhat the classified 
service, as Mr. Cleveland did.” 

Many reformers will not balance the ac¬ 
counts in this manner. They will say that 
Mr. Cleveland amply supplied any lack of 
party pledges in favor of civil service re¬ 
form with his own written pledges in dif¬ 
ferent forms and shapes, and that he was 
elected in reliance upon his personal 
pledges, which the constitution gave him 
ample powers to keep. That a President 
is in no sense a trustee of his party with a 
duty to look out for its welfare, but that 
it is his duty to conduct his part of 
the govenment upon business principles 
without regard to party advantage. 
That Mr. Cleveland let his civil service 
commission go to the dogs. That it 
is impossible to compare favorably his 
administration of the civil service law 
with that of Mr. Harrison ; otherwise, how 
ever, the two administrations are not great¬ 
ly different. But they will also say that 
favorable comparison with the preceding 
administration is not the true test. That 
the question is. What ought the President 
to have accomplished? That the sum of 
all favorable allowances is insignificant by 
the side of the fact that in distinct violation 
of his own and his party pledges the Pres¬ 
ident has refused to extend the classified 
service, and has divided more than 100,000 
federal offices as spoil among his relatives 
and personal friends and among a pestifer¬ 
ous and dangerous set of political manipu¬ 
lators, and has shamelessly used the offices 
to secure renomination, and ought not 
to have his acts ratified by re election. 
That Mr. Cleveland was defeated, and 
therefore his acts were not ratified. That 
he is undoubtedly sincerely in favor of 
civil service reform. That he can look for 
no future renomination or re-election. 
That he will probably profit by experience. 
That he knows that the democrats who 
wrung the most spoil from him before do 
not want him for president, and he will 
not be likely to yield to them again., That, 
in short, the advantage to civil service re¬ 
form in the next four years would be much 
greater with the defeat of Harrison and 
the election of Cleveland. That in saying 
this they mean to be understood as expect¬ 
ing more of the latter than was expected 
of Harrison for the reason that the stand¬ 
ard of requirement of abstention from 
spoil is constantly being raised and that it 
is about time that a president should com¬ 
prehend that the use of any office as spoil 
is unconstitutional and is in violation of 
his oath, and that it is his first duty to de¬ 
vise and enforce plans totally exterminat¬ 
ing the whole practice—and this without 
regard to what he or the platform has said. 


AMERICAN_FEUI)ALlSM.l 

“ To the Victor Belong the Spoils.”- 1 
THE LORD PARAMOUNT. 

I am an advocate of civil service reform. 
My brief experience at Washington has led 
me to utter the wish, with an emphasis I 
do not often use, that I might be for ever 
relieved of any connection with the distri¬ 
bution of public patronage. I covet for 
myself the free and unpurcliased support 
of my fellow-citizens. * * * [Senator Ben¬ 
jamin Harrison.'] 

Only conceive such a lure held out to this 
great people, and all the little offices of the 
Government thus set up for the price of 
the victory, without regard to merit or 
anything but party services, and you have 
a spectacle of baseness and rapacity such 
as was never seen before. No preaching 
of the Gospel in our land, no parental dis¬ 
cipline, no schools, not all the machinery 
of virtue together, can long be a match for 
the corrupting power of our political 
strifes actuated by such a law as this. It 
would make us a nation ©f apostates at the 
foot of Sinai. —From a Sermon by Rev. Horace 
Bushnell, in ISjO. 

“I do not want federal office holders at the 
Minneapolis convention,” was the order which 
the President issued last week, and forthwith 
Secretary Foster, Secretary Elkins and a 
number of other prominent officials announced 
their determination not to attend. If the 
President is really in earnest in this matter, 
there will be considerably over one hundred 
absent delegates. It is a fact that at the con¬ 
vention which is to meet to select the republican 
candidate for the presidency one man in every 
eight will be a federal office-holder, appointed 
by President Harrison who is himself a candi¬ 
date for nomination.— Washington Post,May22. 
* * * 

“I do not believe that individual disappoint¬ 
ments will control the convention at Min¬ 
neapolis .”—Froftn President Harrison’s talk tvith 
the World’s Washington correspondent, May 26. 
* * * 

The remark about “individual disappoint¬ 
ments” indicates how thoroughly the Presi¬ 
dent misapprehends the nature of the opposi¬ 
tion to his candidacy, and also how wise is 
the American system of frequent changes in 
the personnel of the government. It is aston¬ 
ishing how quick and easy is the process by 
which a man comes to look upon the place he 
holds as his private property. He becomes 
accustomed to the exercises of power, and to 
the homage which follows in the train of 
high authority, and he soon regards it as 
little less than impious to suggest that 
he would better make way for another. * * 
Now I am what our mugwump friends delight 
to stigmatize as a “practical politician.” I 
look at things as they really are. * * The 
charge against Mr. Harrison’s supporters can 
not so easily be set aside. It is a much to be 


















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


339 


regretted fact that the President has placed 
his campaign in the hands of those who hold 
office under him, and has even recalled men 
from their posts abroad. It will be a serious 
matter, if, by any chance, he should be nomi¬ 
nated, should this fact give rise to the charge 
that he was forced to give his campaign to 
these men because he could get no others to 
assume the task .”—From Tom Platt’s Answer, 
United Press Dispatch, May SI. 

* * * 

“I do not look for a snap judgment on the 
part of the Minneapolis convention,” said Mr. 
Miller. “There will be no ‘stampede’ of the 
delegates. I have no doubt that President 
Harrison will be renominated.” 

“Have you anything to say of the remarks 
of President Harrison printed in the World 
to-day?” 

“No, although perhaps I may say that some 
of the ‘individual disappointments’ to which 
General Harrison refers are felt by gentle¬ 
men for whom much has been done. There 
are men for whom you can not do enough. 
Load them with favors, and like the often 
quoted ‘daughter of the horse-leech,’ they are 
not satisfied. Such men become disappointed. 
Disappointment may possibly develop a re¬ 
vengeful state of mind. When the President 
says that disappointment will not prevail at 
Minneapolis, I quite agree with him.” 

^ ‘‘The President says he has declined to call 
on his friends for assistance. What are his 
^friends doing?” 

“His friends, personal and political, need 
no requests, no stimulation. They are going 
'before the convention and they will present 
his name for renomination. They do not an¬ 
ticipate any sensations or stampedes.”— Fro^n 
the Woi'ld’s Washington Correspondent’s Interview 
^ith Attorney-General Miller, May 29. 
t « « « 

There are already many Harrison men in 
Minneapolis prepared to do missionary work 
among the delegates as soon as they arrive, 
and others are preparing to get away in a day 
or two. Nothing more has been heard of the 
alleged order which Mr. Harrison issued last 
week calling upon office-holders to remain 
away from the convention. There are more 
than 100 of these who will be seated as dele¬ 
gates. A prominent republican said this even¬ 
ing in regard to this matter: 

I “The President was not aware that so many 
men who draw pay from the government had 
been selected as delegates. When he discov¬ 
ered that the office-holding class was to have 
such a large representation he was very much 
dissatisfied. But, if he contemplated issuing 
any such order as was reported, it must soon 
have occurred to him that it would be not 
only impracticable, but decidedly hazardous 
at this stage of the game. So he decided to 
take no action. I think it was the wisest 
thing he could do under the circumstances. 
He would be playing into the hands of his 
enemies by adopting any other course .”—New 
York Times, June 1. 


President Harrison’s telegraphic facilities 
for reaching the men who are engineering his 
fight have been increased. A wire has been 
put into the White House which will give in¬ 
stant communication with the leaders in Min¬ 
neapolis. Expert operators have been em¬ 
ployed and bulletins will be sent direct to the 
executive mansion by the telegraph compa¬ 
nies. This and some other incidents would 
seem to indicate that the President is very 
much absorbed in the question. For some 
reason he saw fit not to go to Gettysburg to¬ 
day, as he had half promised to, but remained 
within easy reach of his wire. The arrivals 
of his friends and enemies at Minneapolis are 
duly noted.— Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, June 2. 

* * * 

There are two sensations in the air here. 
The first is caused by the publication of the 
authorized dispatch of the associated press 
announcing that Blaine will write no more 
letters. This is interpreted to mean that he 
will put nothing further in the way of the men 
who are resolved to make him a candidate. It 
has frightened the Harrison contingent very 
badly. They had already begun to weaken, 
and they now show signs of staggering. Two 
of their most earnest workers are on the 
ground in the person of John R. Lynch of 
Mississippi, the colored orator, and Thomas 
Carter of Montana. Mr. Lynch is fourth auditor 
of the treasury and Mr. Carter is commissioner of 
the general land office. Mr. Carter, although an 
office-holder himself, is too shrewd and long¬ 
headed a politician not to recognize the gross 
folly of the President in using the creatures 
of his executive favor, and the White House 
family influence, to push his interests in Min¬ 
neapolis. It was first arranged that “ Prince” 
Russell Harrison should come on here and 
work with the Montana delegation for his 
father, but Mr. Carter made a personal visit 
to the White House, it is understood, to insist 
upon the President’s putting his veto upon 
this scheme. His arguments prevailed and 
the young man was kept at home. Mr. Car¬ 
ter came here to look the field over and see 
what the chances looked like. He has made 
his canvass, and the result is that he has run 
up the danger signal. In response to this a 
car-load of office-holders will be poured into 
this city at once to direct and lead the forlorn 
hope. Most of them will come from Wash¬ 
ington and be clothed with the insignia of 
Presidential authority. The arrangement, 
before Mr. Carter left Washington, was that 
these office-holders were to be kept at home 
unless the Harrison cause looked deperately 
blue. Their release, therefore, wears an omi¬ 
nous aspect.—Minneapolis Dispatch to New York 
Evening Post, June 5. 

* » • 

“Mr. George A. Halsey, of New Jersey, who 
is a delegate to Minneapolis, is said to be in¬ 
clined to favor Mr. Blaine. Will you please 
use influence with him to get him to support 
father ?”—Letter of Russell Harrison to E. B. 
Studebaker, New York Evening Post, June 9. 


“Whatever you can do for us at Minneapo¬ 
lis will be duly appreciated and gratefully 
remembered in Washington. 

“Charles Foster.” 

—Letter of the President’s Secretary of the Treas¬ 
ury to the Utah member of the National Republican 
Committee, New York Evening Post, June 9. 

* ■ * * 

President Harrison’s two brothers—J. Scott 
Harrison, of Kansas City, and Carter Harri¬ 
son, of Nashville—are here .—Minneapolis Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, June 9. 

* * » 

The center of attraction to-day was, of 
course, the White House. All the morning 
the President and his able and faithful lieu¬ 
tenants were busily occupied, as they have 
been for several days and nights past, in send¬ 
ing and receiving communications from the 
seat of war .—Indianapolis Journal, Washington 
Dispatch, June 10. 

» * » 

Word was given to a pronounced Harrison 
man in each of the delegations to notify only 
the members from his state who were known 
by him to be friendly, and wherever the chair¬ 
men were favorably inclined they were asked 
to make a careful poll and bring with them all 
those who were sure to go for Harrison. By a 
quarter to 1 o’clock this afternoon the dingy 
hall was fairly packed with delegates, the only 
outsiders present being a few members of the 
national committee, perhaps a dozen gentlemen 
who have been here from the first in General 
Harrison’s behalf, and the Journal’s corre¬ 
spondent. The door was guarded by Sam Miller, 
son of Attorney-General Miller, Gerald Pierce, 
of North Dakota, and B. Wilson Smith, of 
Indiana, and each delegate as he entered the 
hall gave his name, state and preference for 
the presidency .—Minneapolis Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, June 10. 

* » » 

The news which they received was [said to 
be uniformly favorable. About noon the 
premises were invaded by a company of news¬ 
paper correspondents and other privileged in¬ 
dividuals, who established themselves in the 
rooms and hallways of the upper story and 
awaited fateful tidings with as much compos¬ 
ure as they could muster. The President, 
meanwhile, was in his private office surround¬ 
ed by the members of his cabinet, who re¬ 
ceived every few minutes the successive tele¬ 
grams from Minneapolis and made calcula¬ 
tions from them. Secretary Tracy kept the 
tally-sheet, Secretary Elkins and Attorney- 
general Miller did the heavy figuring, and the 
other cabinet officers rendered whatever assist¬ 
ance they could. In the telegraph room across 
the hall. Private Secretary Halford took down 
the first draft of the figures as they came over 
the wire, and sent duplicates in to the Presi¬ 
dent. The room was full of subordinate offi¬ 
cials, newspaper men and other interested 
parties. Postmaster-general Wanamaker made 
excursions from one room to the other, and 
did some very accurate and business-lik 
figuring from time to time. 















340 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


For three hours or more, during the long 
struggle, characterizing the ballot, the most 
intense excitement prevailed in the upper 
rooms. Until about four o’clock it seemed to the 
White House people there would be no choice 
on the first ballot, and there were many specu¬ 
lations and criticisms in regard to the strength 
displayed by the McKinley vote. After Ohio 
and Pennsylvania had been passed, however, 
the probabilities of the President’s immediate 
success dawned upon the company and 
caused a flutter of pleasant anticipation, in the 
midst of which, at exactly ten minutes past 
five, the record of the roll-call was momen¬ 
tarily interrupted as the telegraph instrument 
ticked out the words: “Harrison is nomi¬ 
nated.” At once there was a shout, and all 
those in the room, including the postmaster- 
general and Private Secretary Halford, rose 
and made a rush for the President’s room.— 

hidianapolis Journal, June 11. 

* * * 

When he was congratulated last Friday 
night on his renomination, the most note¬ 
worthy thing the President found to say was: 

“ I have felt great regret that I was unable 
to find a suitable place for every deserving 
friend; but I have insisted that I did not dis¬ 
parage those I could not appoint to place.” — 
Indianapolis Journal June 11. 

* * * 

The President is reported by a simple-mind¬ 
ed organ as being “ deeply grieved ” at the 
action of Senator Chandler in declaring for 
Blaine, despite the fact that all the “good 
things” in New Hampshire had been freely 
at his disposal. In like manner he is said to 
be “much pained” at the ingratitude of ex 
Minister Langston in turning on his “ bene¬ 
factor,” and working among the colored men 
for Blaine, notwithstanding the patronage 
conferred upon him by Mr. Harrison.—New 
York Evening Post, June 16. 

THE CHIEF HENCHMAN. 

Allotments thus acquired, mutually en¬ 
gaged such as accepted them to defend 
them; and as they all sprang from the 
same right of conquest, no part could sub¬ 
sist iiidcpeudeut of the whole; wherefore 
all givers as well as receivers were mu¬ 
tually bound to defend each other’s pos¬ 
sessions. * * * Every receiver of lauds, or 
feudatory, was therefore bound when 
called upon by his heuefactor, or immedi¬ 
ate lord of his feud or fee, to do all in his 
power to defend iiim. Such benefactor or 
lord was likewise subordinate to and under 
the command of his immediate benefactor 
and superior; and so upwards to the prince 
or general himself; and the several lords 
were also reciprocally bound, in their re¬ 
spective gradations, to protect the posses¬ 
sions they had given. Thus the feudal con¬ 
nection was established, a proper military 
subjection was naturally introduced and 
an army of feudatories was always ready, 
enlisted and mutually prepared to muster. 
— Blackstone. 


Counsel-General John C. New arrived Satur¬ 
day afternoon on the City of Chicago. When 
asked his views on the presidential situation, 
he said : “ Harrison will be renominated and 

will be elected. I am so certain of his being 
the choice of the convention that I shall have 
nothing whatever to do with influencing delegates to 
the convention in his favor. It is a mistake io say 
that my object in coming home at this time is to 
manage the canvass of President Hairison at Min¬ 
neapolis. That has been said of every minis¬ 
ter and consul who has got leave of absence 
and come home. It is natural that all of them, 
good republicans as they are, should desire to 
be at home and attend the convention. I 
should very much like to attend myself, for I 
believe my place is there. I have attended 
every national convention since 1856, with 
the exception of that of 1864. I feel all the 
more desirous to go this time, because I am 
the oldest member of the national committee. 
—New Yoik Dispatch to Indianapolis News, May 
23 

* * » 

Gen. John C. New took hold of the Presi¬ 
dent’s interests in earnest to-day. He spent 
most of the day at the White House in con¬ 
ference with Harrison and Elkins. To-night 
there was a meeting in his room at the Shore- 
ham of a number of administration men. Mr. 
Elkins dropped in for a few minutes to see 
that the arrangements for an aggressive cam¬ 
paign were well under way. Fourth Assistant 
Postmaster General Paihbone was one of the 
gentlemen who met Mr. New. The confer¬ 
ence continued until a late hour, and a num¬ 
ber of people who called to see Mr. New were 
told that he was busily engaged.— Washington 
Dispatch to Neto York Times, May 25. 

* •» » 

Consul-General New reached home yester¬ 
day afternoon to remain a few days before 
going to Minneapolis. Mr. New had but 
little to say yesterday regarding political 
movements which has not been already re¬ 
ported. When asked as to the probability of 
Robert T. Lincoln being named in the con¬ 
vention, he said he was authorized to state 
that Mr. Lincoln would not be a candidate. 
As to Mr. Blaine he knew nothing of his in¬ 
tentions except as they have been expressed 
in his letter and his interviews.— Indianapolis 
Sentinel, May 2S. 

• 

John C. New, consul-general at London, one of 
President Harrison’s most trusted political lieuten¬ 
ants, reached Chicago to-day, en route to 
Minneapolis. He will probably remain in 
Chicago until Wednesday. Speaking of the 
permanent chairmanship of the convention, 
Mr. New said: “Mr. Harrison’s friends 
have no candidate. Any one of several names 
suggested would be acceptable. Major Mc¬ 
Kinley, who has been mentioned, would suit 
very well.” The executive committee of the 
republican national committee will be here 
to-morrow, and Mr. New may have some sug¬ 
gestions to make to them as to the appoint¬ 


ment of a temporary chairman of the conven¬ 
tion, which is in the hands of the commit¬ 
tee.— Chicago Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
May 30. 

^ 

The early opening of the Harrison head¬ 
quarters is a surprise to the Blaine men, who 
expected to be first when they came in with 
the national committee to morrow. In short, 
the President’s friends have stolen a march on 
the Blaine boomers, and their sudden arrival 
means fight from start to finish. It is said 
that their unannounced arrival and quick 
opening of headquarters was at a telegraphic 
suggestion from Washington. President Har¬ 
rison had got his back up and the men sent 
here and to come to-morrow are the same 
ones who did so much for Harrison’s nomina¬ 
tion in 1888. Gen. Michener and John C. 
New will be in command.— Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, June 1. 

* » » 

About the time that this group of anti-Har¬ 
rison men arrived, Gen. John C. New, consul- 
general to London, arrived with Harry S. New 
and a few of Harrison’s Indiana friends. 
These men diluted a little the flood of jour¬ 
nalists that had crowded through the corri¬ 
dors of the West Hotel without much admix¬ 
ture of statesmanship and politics for twenty- 
four hours. The managers had not been here 
long before they began to talk sharply about 
one another. 

Gen. New finds something in Col. Conger 
that exasperates him. Col. Conger has said, 
in an interview, that Harrison’s interview, in 
which he spoke of the opposition of the disap¬ 
pointed, placed him on an equal footing with 
Blaine regarding an instructed delegate. Gen. 
New does not like that. He says: 

“Col. Conger knows better, and ought to tell 
the truth. He understands English well 
enough to know that the contents of the Pres¬ 
ident’s letter bears no resemblance to the 
Blaine epistle, and means moreover that Mr. 
Harrison wants a renomination. 

“The trouble about Col. Conger is that he 
has a political sore toe and is showing it all 
over because his man was not appointed post¬ 
master at Akron. The President chose to 
take the advice of the Ohio senator instead of 
Conger, a private citizen. Hence Conger’s at¬ 
titude of opposition to the President. I don’t 
approve of Col. Conger’s conduct, nor of the 
opposition to Harrison by a man who hasn’t 
brains enough to see straight over his eye¬ 
glass.”— Minneapolis Dispatch to New York Times, 
June 2. 

» * • 

John C. New, and A. L. Conger of Ohio, 
Blaine leader, had an encounter in one of the 
corridors of the West Hotel last night. They 
had been talking at one another through the 
newspapers, but had not met before. 

“I know what is the matter with you. Con¬ 
ger,” said New. “You didn’t get your man 
appointed postmaster at Akron. That is all 
there is to it, and that is the only explanation 
of your anti-Harrison attitude.” 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


341 


Conger replied indignantly, and the words 
ran pretty high, though both men kept their 
tempers.—Minneapolis Dispatch to New York Eve¬ 
ning Post, June 3. 

« « • 

The Harrison men were stirriug at seven 
o’clock, and an hour later they had begun 
their work in the state delegations. The ad¬ 
mirable organization of the President’s forces 
compels the admiration even of his enemies. 
For more than a week the whole conven¬ 
tion membership has been blocked out by 
state delegations and each block has been put 
in charge of a trusted lieutenant of John C. 
New. These lietenants have reported to Mr. 
New three and four times a day, and as often 
they have talked with the Harrison men in 
their delegations and reported immediately 
any sign of weakness. The greatest argument 
which Mr. New has used from the beginning 
of the canvass is the table of votes by states. 
It was made up as soon as he arrived in 
Mi nneapolis, and it has been revised every 
day. To every doubtful delegate the Harrison 
men have displayed this table, urging him at 
the same time to “get into the Harrison band¬ 
wagon.” The table has been the strongest 
argument to bring recruits, and the strongest 
argument to hold doubtful Harrison men in 
line. On every man who was not sworn to 
support Harrison right through the fight, the 
idea has been impressed as strongly as possi¬ 
ble that it was only nece.ssary to hold the 
assured Harrison strength together and his 
nomination on the first ballot was certain. 
The final coup came yesterday when Mr. New 
brought his forces together in caucus for a 
showing of strength. This meeting was held 
less for the purpose of giving Mr. New assur¬ 
ance of Harrison’s strength than for the pur¬ 
pose of holding the Harrison men in line just 
before the test vote was made. As soon ag 
the meeting was over the Harrison men spread 
the story of it through the corridors of the 
hotel and about the stale headquarters. It 
created an enthusiasm which undoubtedly had 
its effect on the first ballot in the convention 
last night. The second ballot showed the 
moral effect of the first for it increased the 
apparent strength of Mr. Harrison and gave 
renewed confidence to his managers. They 
found when they started in this morning that 
it needed little encouragement to hold their 
men in line.— Minneapolis Dispatch to New York 
Evening Post, June 10. 

» » * 

John C. New, who has figured as largely as 
anybody in Harrisonian councils, was in fine 
spirits. He said that the President has given 
the country a splendid, safe, honest and cour¬ 
ageous administration. He had the people 
with him and he would be elected. Mr. New 
said he had made a hard fight and had to meet men 
who were skillful opponents, but he had noth 
ing to say against them.— Indianapolis Sentinel, 
June 11. 

» » * 

The evening trains brought back to the city 
a goodly number of tired pilgrims. They 


have practically the same story to tell. They 
are all for Harrison now, or, at least, with few 
excej»tions, they say they are. Hon. John C. 
New, who arrived to-day, says the prospect for 
victory was never better. After calling on 
the President Mr. New visited the state de¬ 
partment, and left Washington at 4 o’clock for 
New York. He sails on Wednesday for Lon¬ 
don.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, June 14. 

* ■* » 

The battle at Minneapolis has been fought 
over and over several times to-day at the 
White House. The door to the President’s 
private room has been swinging inward at fre¬ 
quent intervals, and the victorious generals 
have been telling the President just how it 
was brought about that they and their brother 
office-holders carried the Harrison banner to 
victory. 

Col. A. M. Hughes, the chairman of the Ten¬ 
nessee delegation, was there to-day. Two mem¬ 
bers of the Virginia delegation and Col. John 
C. New have also reported. Colonel New, it is 
announced, will soon go back to his duties as 
consul general at London, which position, it 
will be remembered, he left, as he said, on a 
short leave of absence “to attend to some pri¬ 
vate matters,” some weeks ago. 

Colonel New’s meeting with the President 
is said to have been unique. For the first 
time in all the excitement of the past two 
weeks the President is said to have shown 
some signs of melting and to have displayed 
some emotion. At all other times he has been 
as cool and calm and unmoved as the Wash¬ 
ington Monument. He is said to have list¬ 
ened while Colonel New told him how Platt, 
Clarkson and Quay, and the others of their 
crowd, had set up the Blaine image and com¬ 
manded all the people to fall down and wor¬ 
ship, like the scriptural king who built the 
great golden image in the plain of Baby¬ 
lon. 

There is a story that the President, drawing 
from his store of scriptural knowledge, car¬ 
ried the incident to its climax by recalling 
that the old king after it was all over, was 
forced to “eat grass as oxen,” and it is gossiped 
that up in the White House there was a good 
laugh at the figure of Platt and Quay thus 
humiliated. Colonel New having completed 
his matters of personal business is scheduled 
to return no later than the last of this week.— 
Washington Dispatch to New York Times, June 14- 

* ♦ 

Gen. John C. New, United States consul- 
general at London, who came to the United 
States “on a little private business” a short 
time ago, was at the Gilsey House yesterday. 
Very few persons called upon him. Those 
who did were not members of the New York 
delegation to Minneapolis. 

“ I met Tom Platt on the street when I went 
out this morning,” said Gen. New, “ and he 
said it was all right.” 

“ With regard to supporting the republican 
ticket?” Gen. New was asked. 


“ Oh, yes. Mr. Platt said he was in favor of 
the ticket—now.” 

“ Will Mr. Platt do any active work for Mr 
Harrison ? ” 

“It doesn’t make any difference whether he 
he does or not. Mr. Platt and myself have 
been in conventions for twenty years. We 
have fought together for our man. We have, 
politically speaking, starved for our man. But 
that is all past. Mr. Platt’s dice on this oc¬ 
casion were not loaded. He made a mistake. 
But he told me he would support the ticket.” 

“ Will the men who supported Blaine at 
Minneapolis stand up for the ticket during 
the campaign ? ”- 

“ Well, I saw a telegraphic interview with 
Mr. Clarkson, who still remains in Minneapo¬ 
lis, in the Philadelphia Press yesterday. In 
that interview Mr. Clarkson showed more 
temper and less judement than I should have 
expected of him. He said, for instance, that 
Harrison was only nominated by the aid of 
copious promises of offices by myself and Mr. 
Depew, and that the men who already held 
office were given assurance of four years’ 
further tenure of their jobs. Mr. Clarkson 
even said that the mission to St. Petersburg 
was to be one of the rewards of Harrison’s 
best worker. 

“Didn’t I work pretty hard for Ben Har¬ 
rison at Minneapolis? Well, I’m going back 
to London to-morrow morning. I was offered 
the St. Petersburg mission three years ago. 
If I wanted to go to Russia couldn’t I have 
gotten the assignment?” 

“ Mr. Clarkson says that the St. Petersburg 
mission was offered to three men when he first 
took hold of the national committee,” said the 
reporter. 

“Mr. Clarkson said so, did he? Have you 
figured up where Mr. Clarkson will be, polit¬ 
ically speaking, a year hence, when the repub¬ 
lican party will once more resume its regular 
business of making history? Some of the 
newspaper men compared Mr. Clarkson at 
Minneapolis with Puck, Cupid, Ariel, and so 
on. The newspaper men struck it about right. 
Mr. Clarkson has a wand that doesn’t wield. 
In Iowa they worship false gods occasionally. 
Mr. Clarkson might get into the Iowa legis¬ 
lature some time for that reason.” 

“ Is there any possibility of the republican 
split healing before November?” Gen. New 
was asked. 

“ Split? There hasn’t been any split. The 
fellows that shrieked for Mr. Blaine will be 
out-doing themselves, two months hence, in 
the style of their bell-crowned high white 
hats. There wasn’t any bitterness. There 
wasn’t any split. The men whom I have men¬ 
tioned as being insane on the Blaine subject 
have lost their grip utterly unless they fight 
for the republican nominee.” 

“Shall you be in this country between now 
and November?” 

“ My private business may call me here within a 
short time.'' 

“It has been said that in your interview 














342 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


with Mr. Harrison yesterday a certain scrip¬ 
tural king who ate grass was mentioned.” 

“ I never saw any pasture lands at Bar Har¬ 
bor,” said Gen. New, “ and I have been there 
several times. But I want to say that there 
was not the least sort of an alfalfa tone to my 
conversation with Mr. Harrison yesterday.” 

“ Were you in any wise responsible for the 
result at Minneapolis?” 

“ No, sir. As a citizen of Indiana I did my 
duty. Chauncey Depew touched all the but¬ 
tons. He’s the only man in America that can 
touch a button and secure results without his 
actual presence.” 

Gen. New and his daughter will sail for Eu¬ 
rope this morning.— New York Times, June 15. 
» * * 

Gen. John C. New, United State consul in 
London, who helped to manage the Harrison 
campaign at the Minneapolis convention, 
sailed yesterday for his post by the'steamer 
City of New York. He was accompanied by 
his daughter, and wore in the lapel of his coat 
a new badge with a silver grandfather’s hat 
attached. There was no delegation to see him 
off, but on board he met the Rev. T. De Witt 
Talmage, who is a passenger on the same 
steamer. Gen. New hopes to come over again 
when the campaign becomes lively .—New York 
Times, June 16. 


UNDER-HENCHMAN CARTER. 

It is only a few weeks since Senator Petti¬ 
grew (Rep. S. D.), because of alleged neglect 
at the hands of the administration declared 
that he would so fix matters that the eight 
delegates to be selected would be opposed to 
the renomination of the President. His chal¬ 
lenge was accepted by Land Commissioner 
Garter, who went to South Dakota, and the 
liveliest political skirmish the state has known 
for some time took place. The result was the 
complete defeat of Pettigrew. The eight men 
selected are pledged to the support of Harri¬ 
son. Pettigrew himself will not deny this. 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
May 29. 

» * * 

Soon after noon Land Commissioner Thomas 
H. Garter arrived at the West Hotel from St. 
Paul. He has come from Washington with 
his wife and baby on his way to Helena, and 
will interrupt his journey long enough to see 
the convention get under way. He is a strong 
arm to the Harrison men, better perhaps than 
Clarkson and Fassett together, and almost a 
match for Platt and Fassett.— Minneapolis Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, June S. 

» * » 

All day Harrison men were being sent out 
to buttonhole delegates and others, and prin¬ 
cipally Land Commissioner Carter and Mr. 
Michener were on hand to receive the assur¬ 
ances of those who came in. Mr. Carter said : 
“ We are perfectly serene. The people at 
headquarters are absolutely confident. They 
have received assurances that their delega¬ 
tions are going to stand firm.”— Minneapolis 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, June 6. 


I have just seen Land Commissioner Garter 
who is looking cheerful. In answer to my 
question as to how things were going, he said ; 
“ We are as strong as ever. The Harrison 
line is without a break anywhere. We have 
our own notions of the action of the national 
committee in slating men for the temporary 
organization who have no right to be there, 
but it has not yet reached the point where it 
will hurt us. We know our men, and can 
count our votes on paper in plain figures. We 
can whip those fellows, and we are going to 
do it. We shall waste no time or energy on 
side issues or preliminaries. When the fight¬ 
ing begins we shall all be there and the other 
fellows wont.”— Minneapolis Dispatch to New 
York Evening Post, June 7. 

» ♦ * 

The chief of President Harrison’s triumvi¬ 
rate in Minneapolis is Land Commissioner 
Carter. After consultation with the other 
two, Michener and New, he summed up the 
situation in their headquarters to-day just be¬ 
fore leaving for the convention for the day’s 
battle. Carter and Michener had been in con¬ 
ference several times before since daybreak 
with Senator Cullom and other prominent 
Harrisonians, and they have arrived at an 
understanding as to the policy to be adopted 
before the convention in regard to the Blaine 
tactics of the day. Mr. Carter said 

“We fully realize that the opposition to the 
President dare not go to a vote between the 
President and Mr. Blaine, as the President 
would defeat him by 100 majority on a square 
vote. Under these circumstances we expect 
that the opposition will employ means at their 
command to put off the ballot on candidates. 
We do not intend to interpose any objections 
to the employment of all the time that any 
reasonable person may consider necessary for 
the investigation of questions at issue on cre¬ 
dentials and the perfection of permanent or¬ 
ganization, but when it becomes obvious that 
dilatory tactics are being employed to keep 
the convention from expressing its free voice, 
we are satisfied that the convention will take 
the matter in hand and dispose of all frivolous 
and dilatory opposition in very short order.— 
Minneapolis Dispatch, New York Evening Post, 
June 8. 

* * • 

In answer to further inquiries Mr. Depew 
said he and the President had talked over the 
fight at Minneapolis as a matter of history. 
History is always an interesting subject, said 
he, especially when it is inside history. There 
were some men who had done excellent work 
at Minneapolis and had not received due 
credit for it in the newspapers, and Mr. De¬ 
pew took care that the President was fully in¬ 
formed with relation to these men. Among 
others he mentioned were Michener of Indi¬ 
ana, “Long” Jones of Chicago, and Thomas 
H. Carter [land commissioner] of Montana, 
all of whom rendered valuable services.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
June 19. 


AN ARMY OF FEUDATORIES. 

“Large districts or parcels of land were 
allotted by the conquering generals to the 
superior ollicers of the army, and by them 
dealt out again in smaller parcels or allot¬ 
ments to the inferior ollicers and most de¬ 
serving soldiers. * * The condition of 
holding the lands thus given was that the 
possessor shouhl do service fait hfully, both 
at home and in the wars, to him by whom 
they were given,” and, on breach of this 
condition, “ by not performing the stipu¬ 
lated service, or by deserting his lord in 
battle,” the huids reverted to the lord. 
The vassal, upon investiture, took an oath 
of fealty to the lord, and in addition did 
homage, “openly and humbly kneeling, 
being ungirt, uncovered and holding up 
his hands, both together, between those of 
his lord, who sat before him, and there 
professing that he did become his MAN 
from that day forth, of life and limb and 
earthly honor, and then he received a kiss 
from his lord.” Services were free and 
base. Free service was to pay a sum of 
money, or serve under the lord in war. 
Base service was to plow the lord’s land, 
to make his hedge or carry out his dung.— 
Blackstone. 

United States Marshal Ransdell will go to 
Minneapolis to help out Harrison.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to Courier Journal May 27. 

» « » 

B. W. Smith, postmaster of La Fayette, Ind., 
talked warmly for Harrison, and it is aston¬ 
ishing how many Harrison votes the letter of 
resignation made in La Fayette yesterday.— 
Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
June 6. 

» * •» 

Postmaster C. R. Higgins, of Fort Wayne, who 
has been an industrious hustler for Harrison, 
as in duty bound, is known as an incorrigible 
wag. The other day, when the news of Mr. 
Blaine’s resignation was received at the Har¬ 
rison headquarters, an eloquent silence fell 
upon the boomers therein assembled. It last¬ 
ed for half a moment, and until broken by 
Mr. Higgins’s exclamation : “ Well, I have 
got no use for a man who will resign a good 
oflSce until he has a sure thing on a better 
one.”— Indianapolis Sentinel, June 7. 

* * * 

Higgins is postmaster at Fort Wayne, Ind., and 
Greiner is postmaster at Terre Haute. Higgins 
is for Harrison: Greiner is supposed to be for 
Blaine, and wears a Blaine badge. Higgins 
meets Greiner, falls into an argument with 
him about the merits of the candidates, and 
Greiner is convinced, takes off his Blaine 
badge, and becomes a Harrison convert. This 
happens several times a day in localities discreetly 
selected.—New York Times, June 6. 

* * » 



district attorney, and formerly of Indianapolis, 
arrived yesterday. After an hour’s conference 
with Geneial Clarkson, he said: “I believe 





















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


343 


! Mr. Harrison will be nominated, and I feel 
* certain Mr. Blaine’s name will not go before 
I the convention in any form. Clarkson, Quay 
: and Fassett are not sweating the dye off their 

j suspenders to nominate Blaine. They are 
i working for the defeat of Harrison, and there 
I is now a movement on foot of which you will 
I hear within twenty-four hours, by which it is 
! hoped to nominate a third man whose name I 

S am not at liberty to give you. Blaine will 
not be heard of in the convention.”— Minneap- 
, oils Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 7, 

' * * -x- 

At a meeting of the Ohio delegation this af¬ 
ternoon twenty-nine votes were pledged for 
I Harrison, against seventeen for Blaine. The 
boasted Foraker strength did not pan out. 
Immediately after the meeting Col. D. S. 
Alexander [United States district attorney], of 
1 Buffalo, formerly of Indianapolis, met Gov- 
1 ernor McKinley, and asked him what he 
t would do about the effort of the opposition to 
, the President to force a McKinley boom. “It 
will not materialize,” was the reply. “I shall 
take occasion to suppress it.”— Indianapolis 
t Journal, June 7. 




Business about the federal building this 
week is quiet almost beyond precedent. Judge 
Baker, District Attorney Chambers, Assistant 
District Attorney Cockrum, Marshal Dunlap, 
Postmaster Thompson, Assistant Postmaster 
Wallace, S. G Woodward, chief of the money 
order department of the post-office, and others 
perhaps of those having offices in the building 
are at the republican convention at Minneap¬ 
olis.— Indianapolis News, June 9. 


'The Columbia club delegation [of Indian¬ 
apolis] arrived this morning. The patriots 
looked quite natty, and have been on dress 
parade all day, admiring themselves im¬ 
mensely. These office-holders are the lead¬ 
ing features in this kid-gloved galaxy of 
youth, beauty and virtue. U. S. Marshal 
Dunlap, Pension Agent Ensley, Assistant Dis¬ 
trict Attorney Cockrum, Postmaster Thomp¬ 
son and three of his assistants, Wallace, Wood¬ 
ward and Patterson, are among the party, and 
even Collector Hildebrand came along. [All 
Indianapolis office-holders.] Among other ar¬ 
rivals of the day were D. S. Alexander, U. S. 
district attorney at Buffalo, formerly of In¬ 
dianapolis, and Harrison’s private secretary 
during the campaign of ’88, and Judge Tay¬ 
lor, of Fort Wayne, Mississippi river com¬ 
missioner.— Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, June 6. 


* * * 

Smiley Chambers [United States district 
attorney] and Hugh Hanna are in charge of 
the public Indiana headquarters.— Minneapolis 

Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 6. 

* * * 

Dan Ransdell [marshal District of Colum¬ 
bia] said: “We are in excellent shape, and 
I firmly believe the President will be nomi¬ 
nated on the first ballott. The opposition 
has the noise here to-night, but we have the 
votes.”— Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis 
. Joitmal, June 7. 


For the first time the Columbia Club went 
wild for Benjamin. Rhody was lifted upon the 
shoulders of U. S. Marshal Dunlap and Postmaster 
Thompson and carried through the lobby at the head 
of the procession, which the Columbians instant¬ 
ly formed. Rhody waved a huge picture of 
Harrison at the end of a fifteen-foot pole. For 
fifteen minutes the Columbians circled about 
Rhody and Ben’s picture like Indian ghost 
dancers, singing: 

Every mother’s son from Maine to Oregon 

Is a son of a gun if he don’t vote for Harrison. 

Suddenly Rhody jumped off' the shoulders 
of Dunlap and Thompson and made a dash 
for a colored delegate who happened to be so 
unfortunate as to catch Shiel’s eagle eye. 
Placing his arm around the negro’s neck, 
Rhody disappeared toward the bar, and the 
ghost dance broke up. Then a quartet, con 
sisting of Bruce Carr, O. H. Tripp of North 
Vernon, Postmaster De Motte of Valparaiso, and 
Postmaster Greiner of Terre Haute, went from 
one street corner to another repeating the 
refrain of the song, “ Every mother’s .son,’ 
etc.— Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, June 9. 

* *■ -* 

The Harrison men at the Indiana head¬ 
quarters were wild with enthusiasm this aft¬ 
ernoon. They say their faith in the Harrison 
boom bas developed into positive knowledge. 
The following message was sent whizzing over 
the wires to the White House expressive of 
the feeling which permeated the Harrison 
contingent: 

E. W. Halford, Washington, D. C.: 

The Harrison delegates have just had a 
meeting in Market Hall, presided over by 
Chauncey M. Depew. A roll-call by states 
showed 521 votes for the President, not count¬ 
ing contested seats. He will be nominated at 
the first opportunity to ballot. 

D. M. Ransdell, 
[Marshal District of Columbia.] 

—Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
June 9. 

* * » 

Hon. Smiley N. Chambers [United States 
district attorney], was then introduced. He 
looked as if he had done a hard day’s work, 
and his voice was husky. When the applause 
that greeted his appearance had subsided, he 
said: 

“One week ago, yesterday, my fellow citizens, we 
left this city for the great convention, carrying with 
us, as we felt then, and now know, the best 
wishes of all of you, that victory might be 
ours.”— Indianapolis Journal, June 12. 

» * » 

Ever since certain republicans set about to 
defeat the nomination of Chase for governor, 
some people have been busy creating the im¬ 
pression that President Harrison and the In¬ 
diana republicans at Washington do not desire 
to see Governor Chase nominated. The report 
has been circulated until the story has been 
accepted as true by many of the politicians. 
But things have taken a dififerent turn the last 
day or two, since the arrival here of Dan Rans¬ 
dell, United States marshal for the Distinct of Co- 
lumbia. The friends of the governor who were 


at Minneapolis called the attention of the ad¬ 
ministration people there to the report that 
was in circulation, and asked that something 
be done to counteract the injury the governor’s 
cause was sufTering. When the matter came 
up, Mr. Ransdell, so it is said, stated to some 
of Chase’s friends that he was for Chase, and 
that, if it was necessary, he would come to 
Indiana and remain until after the state con¬ 
vention and do something to help along the 
governor’s cause. 

Mr. Ransdell did come to Indiana, and he 
will probably remain until after the state con¬ 
vention, and he is urging that Chase be nomi¬ 
nated at Fort Wayne next week. Mr. Rans¬ 
dell said to-day: 

“I have heard that some one is circulating 
the report that the administration, which, I take it, 
is intended to mean the President and the Indiana 
republicans in office, is opposed to the nomina¬ 
tion of Chase. This story is without founda¬ 
tion.”— Indianapolis News, June 17. 

* * * 

The Brooklyn republican delegates and 
others who purpose to attend the Minneapolis 
convention will start on Thursday by a 
special chartered car over the Pennsylvania 
railroad. They have arranged foi’ a trip of ten 
days, including five days in Minneapolis and 
one day in Chicago. In the party will be Naval 
Officer Willis.—New York Evening Post, May 28. 

* * -*- 

The custom-house will not lack for repre¬ 
sentatives at the Minneapolis convention, al¬ 
though the customs officers on the list of dele¬ 
gates and alternates are not many. Naval 
Officer Willis is a delegate and Deputy Collector 
Shea is an alternate. Collector Hendricks will be 
one of the spectators of the proceedings. So 
will Surveyor Lyon, Deputy Collectors John H. 
Sunner and Frank Raymond are going, too, 
along with Gen. Dennis F. Burke, assistant ap¬ 
praiser. Others to make the trip will be Gen. 
Wheeler, chief custodian of the custom-house and 
Edmund G. Lee, who once did valiant battle 
with the General for the pos.session of the office 
now held by the father.— New York Times, 
May 28. 

-3f * * 

Federal office-holders make up the major 
part of the state delegation to the national 
republican convention. The state convention 
broke up in a big row, and two sets of dele¬ 
gates for the state at large were sent, both 
claiming to be regular. The first delegation 
is headed hy James Hill (colored), postmaster at 
Vicksburg. His associates are, A. F. Wimber- 
ley, late interned revenue collector for the district of 
Louisiana and 3Iississippi, who was removed by 
the President for participation in the attempt 
to re-charter the Louisiana State Lottery 
Company; W. E. Mollison, colored, chancery 
clerk of Issaquena county, and John McGill, 
formerly mayor of this city, whose defeat in 
January, 1888, was the subject of investiga¬ 
tion by the senate of the United States. These 
delegates are uninstructed. 

The other side’s delegates are, John R. 
Lynch, colerred, fourth auditor of the treasury; W. 














344 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


H. Gibbs, poslviaster at this city; George M. Bu¬ 
chanan, of Holly Springs, deputy collector of inter¬ 
nal revenue, and George W. Goyles, colored, a 
member of the house of representatives from 
Bolivar county. This delegation is instructed 
for Harrison. 

The district delegates are: 

First District — H. C. Powers, of Starkrille, col¬ 
lector of internal revenue for the district of Louisi- 
a?ia and Mississippi, and Mr. Shanno7i, a fourth- 
class postmaster. 

Second—John S. Burlin, United States 7nai-shal 
for the northern district; Frank B. Hill, colored, 
deputy collector of internal revenue. 

Third — A. G. Pierce, colored, deputy collector of 
internal revenue, and Wesley Creighton, col¬ 
ored. 

Foui'th — S. S. Mathews, late United States mar¬ 
shal for the southern dishdcl (removed under 
charges, and now deputy postmaster at Wi¬ 
nona), and W. D. Frazee, assistant United Stales 
district attorney. 

Fifth —W. H. Monnger, of Jasper; J.J. Gar¬ 
ret, colored, of Yazoo. 

Sixth—Fred W. Collins, United States marshal 
for the so7ithern distivct, and George F, Boyles, 
colored, of Natchez. 

Seventh — E. E. Perkins, colored, postmaster at 
Edwards, and E. E. Eugharth, postmaster at Rod¬ 
ney. — Jackso7i, Miss ., Dispatch to New York Times^ 
May 30. 

* * * 

Senators Felton of California, Powers of 
Montana, Teller and Wolcott of Colorado, 
Jones of Nevada, Dubois of idaho, and Gallin- 
ger of New Hampshire, are the recent depart¬ 
ures from that end of the capitol. Every one of 
them is a pronounced Blaine man. They will 
find at Minneapolis Senators Stockbridge and 
McMillan of Michigan, Hansbrough of North 
Dakota, Washburn of Minnesota, Cullom of 
Illinois, Quay and Cameron of Pennsylvania, 
and Hiscock of New York. Possibly Aldrich 
of Rhode Island and Higgins of Delaware will 
join them. 

This large crowd of anti-Harrison men will 
be to some extent offset by Marshal Dan Rans- 
dell. Commissioner Thomas H. Carter, Director of 
the Mint E. 0. Leech, Fourth Assistant Postmaster. 
General Rathbone, and other office-holders who 
will join Consul-General New and the other 
Harrison workers. — Mmneapolis Dispatch to 
New York Times, June S. 

* * * 

The Harrison delegates from Kings county 
left town at 1:30 o’clock yesterday afternoon 
and started for Minneapolis on the Pennsyl¬ 
vania railroad. In the party were Naval Officer 
Willis, * * * They were all positive that 
Harrison would be renominated, practically 
without opposition. They will stop over in 
Chicago to-night.— New York Times, June 3. 

• * * 

Nine carloads of delegates and visitors to 
the Minneapolis convention left the Grand 
Central Station at 10:20 o’clock this morn¬ 
ing. Few of the republican leaders were in 
the crowd. Platt, Depew, Fassett, Chairman 
Brookfield of the state committee, and the 




other men who will dictate the action of the 
New York delegation had already started for 
Minneapolis. The most prominent man on the 
tram was Collector Hendricks. Among the dele¬ 
gates and visitors were: David Friedsam,George 
Hilliard, ex-Coroner John R. Nugent, Michael 
Goode, Deputy Collector Dennis Rhea, William 
Henkel, ex-Police Justice Jacob M. Patterson, 
John Reisenweber, Charles F. Bruder, Collector 
Francis Hendncks, John S. Kenyon, secretary 
republican state committee. Deputy Collector 
Frank Rayinond, H. Henry, M. B. Bryant, 
William C. Roberts, Jntei-nal Revenue Collector 
Ferdinand Eidman, William I. Martin, Henry 
Gleason, Internal Revenue Collector Michael Ker- 
win. Judge Rooney, Wilbur F. Wakeman, 
Robert W, Taylor, Deputy Surveyor John 
Collins, Isaac T. Stoddard, David F. Porter, 
Deputy Collector John H. Gsmner, R. M. Lush, 
T. W. McGown, Secretary William H. Bella¬ 
my of the republican county committee. Col. 
E. A. McAlpin, president of the state league 
of republican clubs, Charles B. Page and W. 
V. Ruppert, of this city .—New York Evening 
Post, June S. 

* * » 

John R. Lynch [fourth auditor of the treas¬ 
ury], the well-known colored politician from 
Mississippi, was at the Palmer house talking 
for Harrison. “ The Blaine boom is wind,” 
he said. “ Harrison’s treatment of the colored 
men has been very satisfactory, and there is 
no concerted movement on their part to se¬ 
cure the nomination of any other man.” 

In contrast with Lynch, ex-U. S. Senator 
William Pitt Kellogg, of Louisiana, “the 
colored man’s friend,” is at the Auditorium. 
Mr. Kellogg heads the Louisiana delegation, 
and he has a long, sharp knife which he ex¬ 
pects to use in crippling the Harrison forces. 
He declares that Harrison has practically 
given nothing to the colored men of the north, 
but that Bruce [register of deeds] and Lynch, 
of Mississippi, where votes do not count, got 
all they wanted .—Chicago Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel, June 3. 

* * * 

Special Treasury Agent MUes Kehoe, one of the 
delegates at large from Illinois, left for Min¬ 
neapolis this afternoon. He says the Blaine 
boom will not last longer than Sunday next, 
and Harrison will have a clear field before 
him when the convention meets. Post-office In¬ 
spector Stuart, Maj. John Burit, of the immigration 
department. Assistant Treasurer John Tanner, and 
other federal officials, will leave for Minneapolis 
Saturday night .—Chicago Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, Jtme 3. 

» • • 

United States Marshal S. S. Matthews, of Wi¬ 
nona, Miss., was a conspicuous figure at the 
Grand Pacific. “Our four delegates at-large,” 
he said, “ are instructed for Harrison, and a 
majority of the others are favorable to the 
President. It must be said, however, that 
there is a remarkably strong undercurrent of 
enthusiasm for Blaine .”—Chicago Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, June S. 

♦ iic 

Contrary to the belief generally held, there are 
but thee federal office-holders in the delegation. 


Collector Feland, United States Marshal Bur- 
chell and Surveyor of the Port Collier. To the 
Times correspondent Col. Bradley expressed 
the belief that Blaine would not allow his 
name to go before the convention, for the rea¬ 
son that, however much he might desire the 
nomination now,his letter removed him from 
the field of candidates, and that he could not 
permit his name to be used without being pal¬ 
pably guilty of a breach of faith .—Minneapolis 
Dispatch to New Yoi'k 'Times, June 4. 

* * * 

The city’s delegation on the special included 
Collector Hendricks and Postmaster Van Cott, who 
are for Harrison and who thought it too hot 
to talk politics; Jacob M. Patterson, chair¬ 
man of the republican county committee’s ex¬ 
ecutive committee, who said that the dele¬ 
gates were going to Minneapolis to do the best 
they could; Deputy Collectors Denis Shea and 
Frank Raymond, who thought it was pretty 
hot for men of their size to go traveling, a be¬ 
lief that was shared in by John H. Gunner, 
another deputy collector, and John D. Lawson. 

Deputy Surveyor John Collins helped to swell 
the office-holding contingent that went out to 
shout for Harrison if their official heads seemed 
to demand it. John Reisenweber, Charles F. 
Bruder, Michael Goode, Wilbur H. Wake- 
man and William Henkel were also aboard.— 
New York 'Times, June 4- 

* » ♦ 

The New York delegation to the republican 
convention at Minneapolis left here on a 
special train of eight cars, from the Grand 
Central depot, at 10:20 o’clock this morning. 
Most of the prominent leaders of the party 
started a few days ago. Among those who 
started to-day were Collector Hendricks, Secre¬ 
tary Kenyon, of the republican state commit¬ 
tee; Jacob Patterson, W. H. Bellamy, Deputy 
Collectors Frank Raymond, Denis Shea and John 
H. Gunner, Liternal Revenue Collector Ferdi¬ 
nand Eidman, Deputy Surveyor John Collins. On 
either side of each of the eight cars in the 
train is a strip of white canvas with the words, 
“New York Delegation, National Republican 
Convention,” printed in large, black letters.— 
New Yo7'k Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 

June 4. 

* » ♦ 

There were some bets made during the 
evening, of which the largest was $1,000 even 
on Harrison’s nomination against the field. 
Marcus Johnson, revenue collector at St. Paul, took 
the Harrison end of the bet, and Delegate Eustis, 
of Minneapolis, a Blaine man, the other end. 
Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
June 4. 

* » * 

The first of the New York delegation to arrive 
was John W. Dwight, of Dryden, the advance 
guard of the Blaine forces. Dwight, Fassett, 
Armour, Frank S. Witherbee and Collector 
Frank Hendricks, who is not a delegate, and 
who is the only loyal Harrison man in the 
outfit, have rented a palatial residence and 
installed a French chef for the entertainment 
of their friends. 










345 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Edward C. O'Brien, who holds a position under 
the administration, followed Dwight bj a few 
feet, and oft’ set the former’s sinister slurs 
against Harrison by declaiming on his excel¬ 
lent qualities and the fine record he has made. 
Then followed Fassett, who took much pleas¬ 
ure in firing a number of case shot into the 
administration, a part of which he once was. 
The majority of the New York delegation— 
II and they are all expected to arrive on Sunday 
morning—will occupy the quarters secured 
for them several months ago by Dwight Law¬ 
rence at the West. Messrs. E. B. Bartlett 
and Naval Officer Willis, of the Brooklyn con- 

S tingent, will occupy two rooms, the six other 
delegates having found quarters in private 
houses.— Minneapolis Dispatch to New York 
'Times, June 4- 

* * * 

Chauncey I. Filiey, a member of the na¬ 
tional committee and delegate-at-large from 
Mis.souri, made another lightning change last 
night. When he reached Minneapolis the Harri¬ 
son sentiment seemed very strong. Mr. Filiey 
immediatelyannounced that under instrui'tions 
from the Missouri convention he would vote 
for Harrison. Following the Blaine boom’s 
lively impetus received last night Mr. Filiey 
this morning says he is going to vote for 
Blaine in spite of his instructions. 

“When instructions were given for Harri¬ 
son,” he said, “they were given under the im¬ 
pression that Blaine would not accept the 
nomination. 'There were 137 office-holders in our 
convention who instructed us for Harrison, but 
Blaine is the choice of the people of Mis¬ 
souri.” Mr. Filiey adds that all of the dis¬ 
trict delegates from his state vote for Blaine. 
—Minneapolis Dispatch to New York Evening 
Post, June 4- 

» * ♦ 

Leaders of the anti administration forces 
held a secret conference to night lasting sev¬ 
eral hours. There were present Chairman 
Clarkson, Senators Washburn, Stockbridge, 
Quay and Hansbrough, Secretary Fassett, 
Conger, of Ohio; H. C. Payne, of Wisconsin, 
and Chauncey Filiey, of Missouri. The state¬ 
ments previously published purporting to give 
the delegates unplaced were placed before the 
gentlemen, and were carefully considered. 
The roll of delegates were canvassed, state by 
state, and their preferences, so far as could be 
determined from the information at hand, 
were tabulated. When the meeting was over. 
Senator Stockbridge stated that the gentlemen 
of the conference were of the opinion that 
Harrison could depend upon 347 all told, of 
whom 144 are federal officeholders, while there 
were opposed to him 551 delegates.— Indianap¬ 
olis Journal, June 4- 

* * * 

Utah has come to Minneapolis with a lively 
contest which the convention will have to 
settle. United States Marshal Parsons, of Salt 
Lake City, who heads the Harrison crowd from 
the territory, is confident that their claims 
will be upheld. Naturally he is “satisfied with 
the candidacy of President Harrison.”— New 
York Times, June 5. 


Emmons Blaine went to Minneapolis to¬ 
night at 6 o’clock. He disappeared as com¬ 
pletely as though the earth had swallowed 
him, when the first whisper of the news of his 
father’s action began to get abroad. No in¬ 
formation concerning the son could be ob¬ 
tained, either at his office or his residence, ex¬ 
cept that the first train this evening bore him 
to Minneapolis. A thrill of excitement ran 
through the crowded rotunda of the Grand 
Pacific at the reception of the intelligence 
from Washington. Hundreds of politicians 
were in the great apartment, and in a moment 
all else was lost sight of. “ Such a thing was 
never before known in American politics,” 
exclaimed Justice Harlan, of the United 
Stales Supreme Court. The distinguished ju¬ 
rist checked his astonishment and comments 
suddenly, however, and refused to discuss the 
bearings of the matter in connection with the 
Minneapolis convention. 

“ It is too late. He should have done it be¬ 
fore,” almost shouted the celebrated Webster Flani¬ 
gan, United States collector at El Paso, 'Tex., who 
became famous with his convention query of 
“ What are we here for, if not for the offices?” 
When seen he said that the general verdict 
was that the news meant business now from 
the word go.— Chicago Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, June 5. 

♦ * 

Within a few moments after the reception 
of President Harrison’s acceptance of Mr. 
Blaine’s resignation, Mr. Wolcott, the elo¬ 
quent senator from Colorado, was called upon 
for his views in reference to the sudden 
change of the political situation. He said : 
“ It does not change the situation materially, 
except to accentuate the result which the 
President in his interview and Secretary Mil¬ 
ler and Foster in theirs, attempted to inflict 
upon him. His friends have realized for 
some time that the President sought to 
aggrandize the effects of the wisdom and sa¬ 
gacity of the secretary of state, but it appears 
that they not only desire to ignore him, but 
because he did not seem disposed to ‘ write a 
letter’ every few minutes, they saw fit to 
throw mud. The resignation may be of some 
help here, as it leaves vacant another office to 
be peddled for Harrison votes. The assistant 
postmaster-general, the chief of the bureau of 
engraving and printing and scores of heads of 
departments fill the lobbies, and promise 
offices and favors promiscuously, but they are 
having no effect.— Minneapolis Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, June 5. 

* * * 

Webster Flanagan [collector at El Paso] of 
Texas (“What are we here for?”), says that 
his delegation and most of the southern dele¬ 
gations are for President Harrison.— Indianap¬ 
olis News, June 6. 

* » * 

Ex-Qovernor Warmouth, of Louisiana, a man 
of strikingly handsome presence, says: As a 
federal office holder, I feel a little diffident about 
expressing myself. But if I might dare to 
speak, I would say that Louisiana is for Harri¬ 
son, and that the electoral vote of that state will 


be cast for him this fall. Of course you know 
that we have a contesting delegation. * * 

The sugar, rice and lumber interests are very 
strongly for Harrison and the republican ticket 
because of what the McKinley bill has done 
for them.” Hon. John R. Lynch, the colored 
leader of Mississippi, was temporary chair¬ 
man of the convention that nominated Blaine, 
but he is not for the plumed knighi this time. 
He has been a member of congress from the 
“Shoe-string” district of his stale and is now 
an appointee of the Harrison administration as 
fourth auditor of the treasury. “It is an unfortu¬ 
nate thing,” he said to day, “that the delegates 
to this convention should be called upon to 
decide between Blaine and Harrison.— Minne¬ 
apolis Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, June 4. 
• * » 

Fred Douglass [late minister to Ilayti], not¬ 
withstanding his age, is actively at work in 
the Harrison cause addressing the colored 
men and stiffening the lines where they are 
inclined to waver.— Minneapolis Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, June 7. 

* * » 

Ex-Senator Bruce [register of deeds]. Audi¬ 
tor Lynch and other colored men are working 
for Harrison. An effort was made to win 
over Mr. Langston to the President’s support, 
but he told the committee in an outspoken, 
vigorous manner that he was on the other 
side. He claims that Virginia will vote for 
Blaine with the exception of four or six dele¬ 
gates. Others give the President at least eight 
votes from Virginia.— Minneapolis Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, June 7. 

* • * 

Nearly all the southern delegates were 
named by the federal office-holders. They 
were selected, of course, in Harrison’s interest, 
and most of them were instructed for him. If 
he can hold them he will be nominated. As 
his people have offices to promise in addition 
to plenty of cash to pay down, they ought to 
be able to hold their own at the auction. 
John C. New and Dan Kansdell and Michener, 
it would seem, should be as handy at this sort 
of business as Quay, Clarkson & Co., but there 
are indications to-night that the latter have 
got the start of them and that Harrison will 
lose a large number of his colored delegates. 
If so, it is all up with him. 

Ben Thornton is at the head of a force of 
colored detectives employed by the Harrison 
managers to watch “the coons,” as they are 
usually styled by the republican politicians 
here. Thornton is a pretty good detective* 
but he has the biggest contract on his hands 
that he has ever undertaken.— Minneapolis Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Sentinel, June 7. 

* » » 

There sat at the head of several delegations 
from the south certain federal office-holders, 
who voted their delegations as if they had 
been so many cattle. Talk about plantation 
manners! When one of these delegates arose 
the chairman called to him : 

“Sit down, blank you, sit down!” 

The delegate sat down. When another 







346 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


started to leave the hall, the chairman, turn¬ 
ing sharply, exclaimed; 

“Where in thunder are you going?” 

And the delegate returned and took his seat. 
One body of these southern delegates was 
herded in the top floor of a hotel at night and 
marched to and from the convention with 
about the same volition that a chain gang 
moves. It was not pleasing to the winners 
that such a condition helped on the victory. 
The recollection of how certain southern del¬ 
egations were handled leaves a sore spot for 
the side which won.— St. Louis Globe-Democrat 
[Eep.]. 

*■ » * 

When the Louisiana contest was heard, ex- 
Seuator William Pitt Kellogg and ex-Gov. 
H. C. Warmouth [collector at New Orleans] 
headed their respective forces. Kellogg, who 
appears as the regular delegate, prevailed be¬ 
fore the sub-committee, beating Warmouth, 
who led the contesting delegation in every 
district except the sixth,where the sub-commit¬ 
tee split the two votes evenly between each 
faction. In the third and fifth districts the 
Warmouth men withdrew their contests, and 
in the first, second and fourth districts they 
lost the fight. This is a Blaine victory. 

Wright Cuney [collector at Galveston], the 
colored national committeeman from Texas, 
licked hib competitors from the Lone Star 
state, who are known as the “lily whites.” 
The point he worked to advantage was that 
the contestants were an antiriiegro organiza¬ 
tion and therefore hostile to the principles of 
the republican party. The point was well 
taken, the committee deciding not to admit 
the so-called “lily-white” delegation to the 
convention. It appears that the color-line 
was drawn in the selection of delegations, 
which action the committee regarded as un¬ 
republican, and they decided, therefore, that 
the paper presented was not admissible as a 
communication from a republican body.— 
Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
June 7. 

* * * 

An amusing story is told of an interview 
between Carter Harrison, United Stales marshal 
for Tennessee, and brother of the President, and 
Crawford Fairbanks, of Terre Haute. Fair¬ 
banks came as far as Chicago on the train 
bearing Postmaster Greiner and other republi¬ 
can patriots from Terre Haute en route to the 
convention. On the same train was Carter 
Harrison in charge of the Tennessee delegation. 
Greiner introduced Fairbanks as a republican 
and a Harrison boomer. Fairbanks played 
the part well and was soon engaged in a confi¬ 
dential chat with Harrison over the situation. 

“The only thing I fear,” said Fairbanks, “is 
that the Blaine crowd will buy our niggers 
away from us.” 

“Yes, that’s the danger,” replied Harrison. 
“We picked out the most reliable ones we 
could find but they’re mighty uncertain. We 
shall have to watch them every moment, and 
even then they are liable to give us the slip.” 
—Indianapolis Sentinel, June 7. 


The Blaine men are greatly exasperated be¬ 
cause of participation in the convention of so 
many office-holding delegates. They are con¬ 
stantly referring to the fact. In the argu¬ 
ments that take place office-holders are flatly 
insulted as “hirelings” who are “earning their 
money for their masters,” and weatherbeaten 
old politicians like Senator Teller talk of their 
“ubiquitousness” with a horror that would be 
more impressive if it were not humorous. 
They would be glad to have all the office¬ 
holders for Blaine, however. There are 100, 
more or less, of business appointees in the roll 
of delegates. Some of them will be glad to 
vote for Blaine. Then there are shoals of 
postmasters, revenue officers, customs officers 
and others in the Harrison vote, all inclined 
to be fearful of the result should their man 
be defeated in the convention. A republican 
ax will kill a republican should Harrison go 
out as remorselessly as if he were a democrat. 
Minneapolis Dispatch to New York Times, June 6. 

♦ * 

“The promises of the Blaineites are poten¬ 
tial, those of the Harrisonites real. The Har' 
risonites have got the offices. There is where, 
in the contest for delegates, the Harrisonites 
have got the advantage.” So spoke a shrewd 
observer. There is a force in the fact that 
there is already a good deal of loud talk at 
the number of office-holders here, and it is 
not confined to the Blaineites. They are the 
first and fourth assistant postmasters-general, the 
commissioner of the land office, the commissioner of 
the navigation office, the director of the mint, the 
superintendent of the bureau of engraving, the mar¬ 
shal of the District of Columbia and collectors of 
internal revenue and postmasters not to be named, 
not counting the 147 office- holders who are delegates. 
It is making comment among the President’s 
friends that these office-holders should be ap¬ 
parently in charge of his interests. Sam Mil¬ 
ler, son of the attorney general, is here. Maj 
George Steele is here, and apparently full of 
business. Horace Speed [United States district 
attorney for Oklahoma] is at this point des¬ 
canting on the greatness of Oklahoma and 
Harrison, with Harrison in the lead.— Indian¬ 
apolis Netvs, June 6. 

* * 

There was the usual collection of notables 
just behind the chairman’s platform. Senator 
Carey and Senator McMillan sat side by side 
under the gallery. Assistant Postmaster-General 
Ralhbone was in his accustomed place.— Even¬ 
ing Post, June 6. 

Postmaster Brandt, of Des Moines, afterward 
presented resolutions adopted by the Tippeca¬ 
noe club in Iowa. No action was taken on 
the resolutions.— Indianapolis Sentinel, June 7. 

* » * 

The Harrison managers have summoned to 
Minneapolis an officer of the post-office de¬ 
partment, who has under his orders twelve de¬ 
tectives, who are tracking the Blaine agents 
about to see that they do not corrupt the Har¬ 
rison delegates. Our dispatches to-day report 
that the Harrison managers not only employ 


these detectives, but have served notice upon 
the Blaine managers that if they continue their 
policy of trickery and delay, a complete ex¬ 
posure of the detectives’ discoveries will be 
made in the convention. There seems to be 
nothing to add to this picture.— New York 

Evening Post, June 9. 

* * * 

The first Alabama case called was from the 
eighth district, and here the report of the na¬ 
tional committee was approved with substan¬ 
tial unanimity. The anti-Moseley delegates 
were permanently enrolled. A fight was made 
on Hendricks and Fitzpatrick, the represent¬ 
atives of the faction headed by Stevens and 
Gee of the New Idea and known as the anti- 
Moseleys in the Third Alabama district, but 
a poll showed 27 Blaine to 21 Harrison votes, 
and they were also enrolled. In the fourth 
district it was also demonstrated that there 
was a good working majority and Bland and 
Wilson, the anti-MoseJeyites, were sustained 
in their right to seats. The fifth district was 
also carried, but when it came to the delegates at- 
large and the contest over one seat in the first district 
the administration forces mustered strong and exe¬ 
cuted a skillful coup d'etat. They surprised the 
other side and carried the day temporarily for the 
Moseley or offiee-holders’ faction by a vote of 24 to 
23. In describing how it was done one of the 
members of the committee said : “A couple 
of fellows suddenly jumped over to the other 
side, one sneaked and another was absent.” 

—Indianapolis Sentinel, June 9. 

* * » 

There was quite an exciting time this morn¬ 
ing in the meeting of the Missouri delegation 
and Kerens was chosen committeeman by a 
vote of 19 to 13 for Filley, one for Maj. 
Warner, and one absent. In the present po¬ 
litical fight Filley has been for Blaine and 
Kerens for Harrison. The Missouri delega¬ 
tion is a little slow on going on record about 
the presidential nomination, but the probabili¬ 
ties are that Harrison has twenty-one or twenty- 
two out of thirty-four delegates. The trouble 
got very hot before the meeting was over. Major 
Warner and District Attorney Bexjnolds, both of 
whom ai'e for Hairison, came to blows. Both are 
impetuous, hot-headed men, and a row of 
words terminated in Major Warner shooting 
out his fist with such effeet that Reynolds was 
knocked down. Afterward a reconciliation 
was effected.— Indianapolis Sentinel, June 9. 

* * * 

Ex-Senator Platt was of the same opinion as 
Mr. Clarkson regarding the importance of the 
Harrison gathering. He characterized it as a 
pow-wow of office-holders, office-holding dele¬ 
gates and alternates, together with a number 
of outsiders. “About one third of those pres¬ 
ent were Blaine curiosity seekers,” he said, 
“while the whole number present was less than 
450.”— Indianapolis Journal, June 10. 

* * » 

John A. Sleicher [civil service commissioner 
New York], of New York, had a point to 
make against one vote in that delegation, but 
Mr. Fassett explained it away.— Indianapolis 
Jownal, June 10, 













CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


347 


Then Webster Flanagan [collector at El 
I Paso] of Texas, came to the edge of the plat- 
I form to speak for the Lone Star state. 

“What are we here for?” cried some face¬ 
tious individual. 

“To nominate Benjamin Harrison,” quickly 
responded the doughty Texan.— Indianapolis 
i Journal, June 10. 

» » • 

Neil McGroarty, ex-councilman of the old 
sixteenth ward, who, until a short time ago, 
was a rampant anti-Harrison man, now has 
nothing to say. Mr. McGoarty’s reticence is 
due to his appointment to a lucrative position 
in Revenue Collector Craven’s office.— Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, June 10. 

* * * 

Carroll E. Smith [postmaster], editor of the 
Syracuse Journal, explained the policy of the 
Harrison forces to-day as follows: 

“If there is a fight in this convention, the 
Harrison men will not be found in it. We 
don’t propose to make a contest on anything 
but the nomination, and we have that to a 
certainty. Nor do we propose to allow the 
impression to be spread broadcast over the 
country, for effective use in the doubtful states, 
that the republican party is split beyond re¬ 
demption. It is our policy to conciliate and 
not to antagonize the members of our own 
party. If the Blaine forces desire to fight, I 
trust they will fight among themselves. They 
can’t involve us. We can afford to be mag¬ 
nanimous.”— Minneapolis Dispatch to New York 
Times, June 10. 

* * • 

When the vote of Texas, cast by negro office¬ 
holders, secured Harrison’s renomination, the 
Harrison delegates and office-holders in the 
galleries cheered for a few minutes.— Minne¬ 
apolis Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, June 11. 
» * * 

A huge six-by-eight portrait of the Presi¬ 
dent was borne down to the grand stand, and 
Fred Douglass [late minister to Hayti], the 
leader of the colored race, led the mighty 
ovation by mounting a chair and waving his 
hat high in air, his white hair swung to the 
breezes.— Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinal, June 11. 

* * * 

A little flutter of applause greeted the re¬ 
port by Senator Quay that the Hon. David 
Martin [collector of internal revenue], of 
Philadelphia, had been selected as Pennsyl¬ 
vania’s member of the national committee. 
Marlin was Quay’s candidate and his selection 
indicates the continued sway of the senator in 
the Keystone state.— Minneapolis Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Sentinel, June 11. 

* » » 

Senator Wolcott, of Colorado, seems to have 
an unique way of “ talking out in meeting” 
that is not pleasing to the republican bosses. 
We extract the following from his brief but 
instructive remarks at Minneapolis : 

“ I hold in my hand, Mr. Chairman, a list 
of ISO-odd office-holders who are delegates to this 
convention, nine-tenths of whom live in states j 


where there is a hopeless democratic majority. 
[Applause.] The trouble in this committee 
as to these contests comes not alone from these 
men, but comes from the government office¬ 
holders who swarm the corridors of the hotels 
and fill these galleries, haunting the delegates 
who ought to be in Washington and else¬ 
where attending to other business. [Ap¬ 
plause.] Mr. Chairman—[Cries of ‘sit down.’] 
I won’t sit down. 1 will speak. [Applause.] 
We republicans from republican states would 
like to have a little voice in naming a candi¬ 
date for the presidency. Possibly the office¬ 
holders will name him, but we don’t believe 
it. We from the republican states ask the 
office-holding contingent who are bringing a 
solid south against us to at least conduct 
their side of the case in common decency and 
common honesty, so we won’t be ashamed to 
vote the republican ticket.” 

In connection with this, the following fig¬ 
ures of the vote nominating Harrison may 
prove of interest: 

For For all other 
Harrison. Candidates. 


Solid South (including 


Delaware). 245 1-6 

New Jersey. 18 

Alaska (ice-wagon dis¬ 
trict.). 2 

New Mexico. 6 

Utah. 2 


69 5-6 
2 


Total 


273 1-6 71 5-6 


—Indianapolis Sentinel, June 14- 


This morning Platt, Quay, Clarkson, Miller 
and Wolcott were in consultation nearly an 
hour considering the proposition of Senator 
Wolcott to exclude from the convention 142 
federal office-holders. The convention is op¬ 
erating under the rules of the fifty-first con¬ 
gress, which provide that members shall not 
vote upon measures in which they have pe¬ 
cuniary interests. These 142 delegates hold¬ 
ing office under Harrison, Wolcott claimed, 
were financially interested to the extent of 
their annual salaries, and voting to continue 
Harrison in office four years they were also 
voting to continue themselves in office. Platt 
and Miller opposed this bold proposition, and 
it was only after great pressure was brought 
on Wolcott that he desisted from offering a 
resolution to oust the federal office-holders.— 
Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
June 11. 

« » # 

Three months ago an assessment was made 
on the office-holders by the national commit¬ 
tee for the purpose of organizing the cam¬ 
paign. This money was used for Clarkson, 
Platt et al. to buy off Harrison delegates, but 
they encountered a big obstacle in the state. 
The majority of the delegates are office-holders 
under Harrison and they could not be bought. 
The remainder took the Blaine money, but 
were brought back by the Harrison men. 
There were 5,000 federal office-holders in the 
city to draw upon.— Minneapolis Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, June 11. 


Field Marshal Lew Payn was more out¬ 
spoken than most of his colleagues of the 
Blaine persuasion. 

“Why is President Harrison so unpopular?” 
asked the reporter. 

“Because of his unrivalled ability for of¬ 
fending every one. For weeks previous to 
the convening of the convention. Secretary of 
the Navy Tracy, and the office-holders, big 
and little, throughout the state, were at work 
day and night to secure a Harrison delega¬ 
tion. They distributed patronage, promoted 
men, and removed others who could not be 
won over to their schemes. Never in all my 
experience have I seen such a shameful inter¬ 
ference by the administration for the sole pur¬ 
pose of capturing a convention.— New York 
Times, June 11. 

» * * 

The vast majority of the returning delegates 
who passed through Chicago to-day did not 
leave the depots, being anxious to reach their 
homes as soon possible. The Young Men’s Re¬ 
publican Club of Baltimore, headed by Postmaster 
W. Johnson, escorted the Maryland delegation 
into the city and immediately scattered to va¬ 
rious parts of the city for a brief rest before 
leaving at 5 o’clock to-morrow morning. 
“Our club was for Harrison,” said Postmaster 
Johnson, “and we are consequently happy.”— 
Chicago Dispatch to Journal, June 12. 

* * • 

The nomination of Harrison was very coldly 
received by the republicans here. The only 
member of the party celebrating to-night is Postmas¬ 
ter Patterson.—Memphis Dispatch to New York 
Times, June 11. 

* * * 

At the meeting of the republican city cen¬ 
tral committee last night, William R. Will¬ 
iams, who was an enthusiastic Blaine man, 
offered a resolution congratulating the dele¬ 
gates on concluding their work. It was adop¬ 
ted. But when W. F. Otis, a federal employe, 
made a motion that the conyratidations of the com¬ 
mittee be extended to President Harrison, it failed 
to pass. Three cheers, proposed for Blaine, 
were given with a hearty good will.— Newark, 
N. J., Dispatch to New York Times, June 13. 

* * » 

Postmaster Cornelius Van Co« said, in speaking 
on the topic last night: It seems to me that 
Mr. Hendricks [collector], is pre-eminently the 
man to take charge of the republican cam¬ 
paign in this state this year. He has no ene¬ 
mies in the party and his judgment is magnifi¬ 
cent. You can not quote me too highly in 
the praise of ex-Senator Frank Hendricks. I 
know him well. I was in the state senate 
with him.—New York Times, June. 

» » « 

Dan Ransdell, United States marshal for 
the District of Columbia, will arrive in In¬ 
dianapolis this evening, and will probably 
have some advice to give the republicans as 
to the nomination of a governor at Ft. Wayne. 
Mr. Ransdell is at Lebanon to-day, visiting 
his mother.— Indianapolis News, June 15. 



















348 


CIVIL SERA^CE CHRONICLE 


To day’s victory places Chauucey M. De¬ 
pew at the head of the republican organiza¬ 
tion in New York State, with Collector Francis 
Hendricks, of Syracuse, as his second in com¬ 
mand. Mr. Hendricks was one of those “per¬ 
nicious office-holders” who was here on the 
ground, and it is due to his skill and sagacity 
that the Blaine delegation was no larger. He 
was so quiet and unobstrusive and modest that 
the Blaine leaders underestimated his power 
as a politician and his skill as a leader .—New 
York Times, June 11. 


COMMISSIONED HENCHMEN. 


' Delegates to the Minneapolis Convention. 


It assumes, however, that oftieial patron¬ 
age eau l)e made a strong factor in secur¬ 
ing the renomination and re-election of a 
President, which is very doul)tful. It 
must he femembered, also, that a Presi¬ 
dent who would prostitute the olftce in 
this way would be just the kind of man 
that the people would turn out at the end 
of four years. In the present state of pub¬ 
lic opinion on this question, it would be 
sure defeat for any President to have it 
known that he had used the power and 
patronage of his ofliceto secure his reuomi- 
nation or that he was using it to secure his 
re-election. The people are not easily 
hoodwinked about such matters, and they 
can not be trifled with at all.— Indianapolis 
Journal, June I 4 , 1892. 


Take New York, for instance. In that state Mr. 
Theodore B. Willis, the native officer of the port, 
openly exerted the power of his official position to 
secure the delegation for Harrison, if possible, and 
succeeded in having himself elected from the fourth 
district, with a subordinate as his fellow-delegate. 
Geo. H. Sharpe, of the board of appraisers, testifies 
his appreciation of the good care bestowed upon him 
by going as a delegate from the seventeenth district, 
and E.C. O’Brien, who fell into the commissionership 
of navigation after he had fallen out of a senate 
office, and who has been an ardent Harrison man 
ever since, is also fixed in a delegate’s position. 
Then there is S. W. Allan, of Auburn, who is one of 
the commissioners of the World’s Fair by appoint¬ 
ment of the President; Charles H. Murray, who was 
supervisor of the census in New York City, and 
Jacob M. Patterson, who said, when he was here a 
few days ago, that he had been promised an office. 
There are said to be also a number of other office¬ 
holders on the delegation. In the Nebraska delega¬ 
tion the interests of the President will be watched 
by C. H. Gere, the postmaster at Lincoln, while an¬ 
other friend of the administration is found in the 
Minnesota delegation, of which ex-Representative 
Darwin S. Hall, who was provided with a place in 
the Red Lake Indian commission after he had been 
defeated for congress, is a member. 

Michigan’s delegation contain.®, a federal post¬ 
master, Gen. J. H. Kidd, of Ionia, but as he is an 
earnest friend of General Alger, his presence is 
hardly a victory for the administration. In New 
Hampshire, Delegate George T. Croft is postmaster at 
Maplewood, while Henry B. Quimby, of Lakeport, is 
a relative of General Batchelder. The latter, by the 
way, was appointed quartermaster-general by the 
President, and is now adding his efforts to those of 
others to secure Mr. Harrison’s renomination. The 
head of the New Hampshire delegation is Frank 
Churchill, of Lebanon. His brother is the post¬ 


master at that place. Even in far-off North Dakota 
the interests of the administration were not neglect¬ 
ed. John A. Percival, the receiver of the land office 
at Devil’s Lake, found a resting-place in the delega¬ 
tion along with Thomas Marshall, who has a large 
number of contracts with the government for sur¬ 
veys, and to whom a special agent was sent direct 
from delegates who were elected. In Kansas, Cyrus 
Leland, Jr., one of the delegates from the first dis¬ 
trict, is the internal revenue collector for the state. 

While the list of office-holding delegates from 
northern states is by no means complete, it affords 
some idea of the endeavors which have been put 
forth to secure men who might be relied upon to 
vote for the President. It is in the south, however, 
where the republicans naturally acquiesced in rath¬ 
er than resented federal manipulation that the dele¬ 
gations show such an array of office-holders as to pre¬ 
sent a remarkable spectacle. Georgia leads the list 
with twenty-two office-holders out of twenty-six del¬ 
egates. Here is the list: 

A. E. Buck, United States marshal. 

*W. A. Pledger, railway mail service. 

W. W. Brown, railway mail service. 

M. J. Doyle, postmaster. 

*8. B. Morse, custom-house employe. 

<'B. F. Brimberry, postmaster. 

’‘■'C. B. Barnes, internal revenue service. 

*Chas. E. Coleman, railway mail service. 

'^E. S. Richardson, railway mail service. 

A. J. Laird, postmaster. 

John T. Sheppard, internal revenue. 

<'C. C. Wimbush, custom-house employe. 

E. A. Angier, assistant district attorney. 

R. D. Lock, postmaster. 

■^'Erank Dissron, post-office employe. 

W. T. Blackford, internal revenue service. 

Madison Davis, postmaster. 

S. A. Darnall, internal revenue service. 

J. M. Barnes, postmaster. 

*J. H. Devreux, custom-house employe. 

*W. H. Matthews, deputy collector internal reve¬ 
nue. 

In Alabama there are two sets of delegates, one of 
them representing what is known in that state as the 
Moseley faction, in honor of Robert A. Moseley, Jr., 
who is the federal collector of internal revenue. 
While Collector Moseley is not personally on the 
delegation, he has not allowed it to lack for want of 
other office-holders. Here is a list of them: 

William H. Smith, special United States assistant 
attorney. 

D. Baker, postmaster. Mobile. 

Charles O. Norris, mailing clerk, Montgomery. 

Henry Boyd, postal clerk, Selma. 

Julian H. Bingham, register United States land 
office. 

Benjamin W. Walker, marshal southern district. 

T. A. Miller, postmaster, Tuscaloosa. 

Owen T. Harris, special receiver public lands. 

M. F. Parker, postmaster, Cullman. 

James Jackson, assistant United States attorney. 

Robert L. Houston, postmaster, Birmingham. 

A. L. Matthews, mail carrier. 

The anti-Moseley wing will send only one office 
holder, Alfred H. Hendricks, a postal clerk at Ope¬ 
lika. 

There is also a contesting delegation from Missis¬ 
sippi, but the office-holders are in both. In the reg¬ 
ular delegation there are the following: 

James Hill, postmaster, Vicksburgh. 

H. C. Powers, internal revenue collector. 

Dr. John Burton, United States marshal, northern 
district. 

F. P. Hill, deputy revenue collector, 

A. G. Pierce, revenue collector, fourth district. 

W. D. Frazee, assistant district attorney. 

F. W. Collins, marshal, southern district. 

<'John R. Lynch, fourth auditor treasury depart¬ 
ment. 

tGeorge M. Buchanan, deputy revenue collector. 

W. H. Gibbs, postmaster, Jackson. 

Two more of the eighteen delegates from Missis¬ 
sippi, a state which is counted in the Harrison col¬ 
umn, are A. T. Wimberly, the internal revenue col¬ 
lector, who was recently deposed by the President, 
according to the statements made at the time his sue 
cessor was nominated, because he opposed the send, 
ing to Minneapolis of a delegation friendly to the 
President, and S. S. Matthews, the United States mar¬ 
shal, who was recently dismissed. 

In Texas, N. W. Cuney, the collector of customs at 
Galveston, leads the delegation with Deputy Interna- 
Reveuue Collector John W. Rector and L. M. Daniel 

’■‘Colored. 

tContestants. 


recently appointed an alternate on the World’s Fair 
commission, among his numerous office-holding col¬ 
leagues. In Arkansas, Henry M. Cooper, internal 
revenue collector, is the most prominent office¬ 
holder on the delegation. Delaware’s small contin¬ 
gent contains George V. Massey, who was appointed 
a World’s Fair commissioner by the President, while 
North Carolina comes to the front with the follow¬ 
ing: 

E. A. White, collector internal revenue. 

♦John C. Dancy, collector customs, Wilmington. 

C. A. Cook, United States district attorney. 

*J. H. Hannon, postmaster, Halifax. 

John Nichols, chief division, treasury department. 

■I'dames H. Y’’oung, inspector customs. 

Archibald Brady, p stmaster, Charlotte. 

Florida has eight delegates, and of these four are 
office-holders, as follows: 

’^‘Joseph E. Lee, collector customs, Jacksonville, 

E. R. Gunby, collector customs, Tampa. 

John F. Horr, collector customs. Key West. 

Henry S. Chubb, deputy collector internal revenue. 

In the proportion of office-holders to delegates, 
South Carolina makes even a more generous showing 
than Florida. Of the eighteen men who will go from 
the Palmetto state to Minneapolis, eleven are draw¬ 
ing pay out of the United States treasury through the 
kindness of the President. The instructions, there¬ 
fore, to vote for him are borne with easy grace. The 
office-holders are: 

*E. A. Webster, collector internal revenue. 

E. H. Deas, deputy collector internal revenue. 

G. J Cunningham, United States marshal. 

’i'C. H. Fordham, deputy collector internal revenue. 

=:‘S. E. Smith, postal clerk, Aiken. 

J. P. Scruggs, deputy collector internal revenue. 

J. F. Ensor, deputy collector internal revenue. 

’M. E. Wilson, postmaster, Florence. 

T. B. Johnson, collector customs. Charleston. 

J. H. Ostendorf, deputy collector customs. 

<‘R. H. Richardson, postmaster, Wedgefield. 

There are no federal office-holders on the West Vir¬ 
ginia delegation, although Prof. T. C. White, the ge¬ 
ologist of the West Virginia University and one of 
the district delegates, is a brother of United States 
Marshal White. Maryland sends one office-holder, 
John T. Ensor, United States district attorney, but 
there would have been a large number if the efforts 
of the administration men had been more success¬ 
ful. In the adjoining state of Virginia the list is 
considerably larger, as follows: 

A. W. Harris, inspector of customs. 

S. Brown Allen, deputy collector internal revenue. 

V. D. Groner, World’s Fair commissioner. 

Edgar Allen, special attorney department of jus¬ 
tice. 

S. I. Griggs, United States court commissioner. 

H. C. Wood, United States court commissioner. 

P. H. McCaull, internal revenue collector, Lynch¬ 
burg. 

C. M. Loutham, deputy internal revenue collector. 

P. W. Strouther, deputy internal revenue collector. 

The Kentucky delegation has been also pretty well 

packed, no less than seven federal office-holders 
finding places within it. They are as follows: 

John Feland, collector internal revenue. 

Jordan Jackson, government storekeeper. 

A. D. Crosby, deputy collector internal revenue. 

T. B. Matthews, deputy collector internal revenue. 

T. P. Tarlton, deputy collector internal revenue. 

Dr. Collier, surveyor port, Louisville. 

D. J. Burchett, United States marshal. 

In Louisiana a condition of affairs somewhat simi¬ 
lar to that in Alabama exists. Under the leadership 
of Henry C. Warmoth, collector of customs at the 
port of New Orleans by the grace of the President, a 
convention was organized, and it was arranged that 
the delegates elected should vote for the President 
at Minneapolis. These delegates are nearly all of¬ 
fice-holders, or, as in the case of Pearl Wright, who 
is a broker at the custom-house, have some reason to 
be attached to the administration. The office¬ 
holders are: 

James Lewis, inspector of customs. 

J. Vigneaux, United States marshal, western dis¬ 
trict. 

J. B. Donnelly, United States marshal, eastern dis¬ 
trict. 

J. K. Small, employed in federal building. 

Lucien B. Carmouche, employed in federal build¬ 
ing. 

J. B. Budd, employed in federal building. 

A. R. Blount, employed in federal building. 

D. Young, employed in federal building. 

J. G. Donato, employed in federal building. 

E. J, Barrett, postmaster at Alexandria.— 

ton Post, May 22. j 


^‘Colored. 















F 

’• THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


This devotion of party, not to the ends for wliich it exists, but to the spoils tliat accompany success at the polls, has become so 
absolute that it has produced an evil greater than any w liich party proposes to remedy.— Georjrfi William Curtis, at Baltimme, April, 1892. 


I VoL. I, No. 41. INDIANAPOLIS, JULY, 1892. terms :<( fernt^r^opr' 


Published monthly. Publicatipn ofiice, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC PLAT¬ 
FORMS. 

1888. 

“Honest it-.foriii ill the civil service hiis been inaugurateil 
auci iiiiuiitained by I’resideut Cleveluiid.” 


tend that Harrison has kept the promises, 
but they say that opposition to him on the 
ground of bad faith “ will make it impossi¬ 
ble for him to do anything for this reform.” 
It seems as though in years past and under 
other skies we have heard something like 
that before. And now again it has the 
sound of coming from very near the pres¬ 
idential chair. The answer is that the 
cause of civil service reform does not need 
thelpatronage of any President. It can 
make its own way and it can not be over¬ 
thrown. It expects that a President will 
do as he agrees, and the question now is. 
Why has not President Harrison kept his 
promises ? 

The Indiana state democratic platform 
carefully avoids committing the party to 
the merit system in the state service, and 
we followed the corresponding republican 
plank with interest to see what the end 
would be. The end was a demand for “an 
absolute non-partisan management of the 
benevolent and reformatory institutions 
of the state through boards whose mem¬ 
bers shall be appointed by the governor 
from the different political parties of the 
state.” As a reform measure, the estab¬ 
lishment of a non-partisan board is very 
nearly a humbug, and those who got up 
this platform probably so considered it. 
The places are given out by favoritism the 
same as before, the only difference being 
that the minority member is usually 
allowed to distribute some share of the 
favors among his partisans. The only civil 
service reform worth lighting for is that 
which provides for the appointment of 
laborers according to the Boston labor 
system, and which gives the other subordi¬ 
nate places to the successful competitors 
in competition open to all, without regard 
to politics, religion, color or any other im¬ 
proper consideration. 

There is a disposition in some reform 
quarters to attempt to make Stevenson, 
whom the democrats have nominated for 
vice-president, presentable. It is impossible; 
he is simply another Clarkson, and his nom¬ 
ination for that reason was the last expiring 
kick of Tammany Hall. No independent 
would vote for him if there were any way 
to leave him out. The dislike is mutual, 
and never ought to be reconciled while 
Stevenson holds his present spoils views. 
As vice-president he will, if elected, be the 
usual vice-presidential cipher. 



NATIONAL REPUBLICAN PLAT¬ 
FORMS. 

1888. 

“ The lucii who abandoned the repnbli- 
ean party in 1884 and continued to adhere 
to tlie deinoeratic party liave deserted not 
only the cause of honest government, of 
sound finance, of freedom and purity of the 
ballot, but especially have deserted the 
cause of reform in the civil service. We 
will not fail to keep our pledges because 
their candidate has broken his. We there¬ 
fore renew our declaration of 1884, to wit: 
‘The reform of the civil service, auspi¬ 
ciously begun under a republican admin¬ 
istration, should be completed by the fur¬ 
ther extension of the reform system already 
established by law to all the grades of serv¬ 
ice to which it is applicable. The spirit 
and purpose of the reform should be ob¬ 
served in all executive appointments, and 
all laws at variance with the object of ex- 
'lliisting reform legislation should be re- 
*pealed, to the end that the dangers to free 
institutions which lurk in the power of of¬ 
ficial patronage may be wisely and effec¬ 
tively avoided.’ ” 


1892. 

“ We commend the sjnrit and evidence of reform in the 
civil service and the wise and consistent enforcement by the 
republican party ofthe laws regulating the same.” 



1892. 

“Public oHice is a public trust. We 
reallirm the declaration ofthe democratic 
national convention of 1876 for the reform 
of the civil service, [Reform is necessary 
in the civil service. Experience proves 
that eflicient, economical conduct of the 
government business is not possible if its 
civil service be subject to change at every 
election, be a prize fought for at the ballot 
box, be a brief reward of party zeal, in¬ 
stead of posts of honor, assigned for proved 
competency and held for fidelity in the 
public employ; that the dispensing of pa¬ 
tronage should neither be a tax upon the 
time of all our public men, nor the instru¬ 
ment of their ambition] and we call for 
the honest enforcement of all laws regu¬ 
lating the same. The nomination of a Pres¬ 
ident, as in the recent republican conven¬ 
tion by delegations composed largely of his 
appointees, holding office at his pleasure, 
is a scandalous satire upon free popular 
institutions, and a startling illustration of 
the methods by which a President may 
gratify his ambition. We denounce a pol¬ 
icy under which federal oflice-holders 
usurp control of party conventions in the 
states, and we pledge the democratic 
party to the reform of these and all other 
abuses which threaten individual liberty 
and local self-government.” 


The Chronicle last month with great 
T care set out the facts relating to the Min- 
* neapolis convention. These facts were 
taken from original sources and there is 
nowhere any pretense of denying them. 
The shame of the whole proceeding does 
not grow less with time and it ought not 
to. It will be in accordance with the Min¬ 
neapolis example for federal employes to 
now turn themselves into Harrison elec¬ 
tion agents, and we shall doubtless soon 
have a large spectacle of this kind before 
us. Few things ought to stir the blood of 
honest citizens more than to compare these 
things with the republican platform of 
1888. It is worth while for every voter to 
ask himself to what class of governments 
those which attempt to control popular 
action by the efforts of thousands of agents 
paid from the public treasury have always 
belonged ? 


The republican party has a body of what 
may be called passive civil service reform¬ 
ers. They are in a general way opposed 
to the spoils system, but they never lift a 
hand to assist those who are actively fight¬ 
ing it. This has been their course during 
Harrison’s administration. In the great 
struggle which has been carried on now 
for three years under the leadership of 
Theodore Roosevelt against the Wanama- 
kers and Clarksons of the administration, 
they have never raised their voices to tell 
the President that he ought to keep the 
promises of the platform upon which he 
was elected. And now when an election 
is drawing near, their party machine, 
needing a covering of respectability, reach¬ 
es out and pinphes them and they wake up 
to astonishment that there are civil service 
reformers who will not vote for Harrison 
again. In remonstrating, they do not pre- 






























350 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Like the resort to Paris for pure French, 
to London for the best English, and to the 
seaside for the best enjoyment of the prod¬ 
ucts of the sea, so in the population 
around New York harbor is to be found 
the highest development of the American 
system of politics. True, it requires a 
mind trained like a race-horse to keep up 
with the ever-varying struggle. Now Hill, 
by a quick turn, takes the Brooklyn bridge 
from McLaughlin, and then McLaughlin 
wrenches it away again by threatening 
Hill’s chances for nomination at Chicago. 
Now Collector Erhardt snubs Platt, and 
then the President kicks Erhardt out to 
placate Platt. Elsewhere will be found the 
latest picture made by this troubled sea. 
Just a little while ago Naval Officer Willis 
was irresistible, and carried everything for 
the Harrison delegates. But lo! Collector 
Nathan has his district enlarged by his 
democratic allies, and Willis now lies very 
flat. The kaleidescope is nothing to this. 


The Indianapolis Journal of June 25 has 
the following: 

The Indiana Civil Service Chronicle, a sporadic 
sheet, fills its latest is.sue with accounts of the oflice- 
holders who went to Minneapolis to work for Presi¬ 
dent Harrison’s renomination. It is filled with hor¬ 
ror at the very idea, and is evidently under the im¬ 
pression that its showing will induce somebody or 
other to bolt the republican ticket and vote for that 
champion of political purity and perennial office- 
seeker G. Cleveland. Perhaps in the next issue the 
Chronicle will tell how many of Cleveland’s ap¬ 
pointees worked for him in Chicago. It can begin 
with five of his ex-cabinet officers. Stevenson was 
only an assistant secretary, but there was an army of 
still smaller fry whose names will help fill the 
Chronicle’s pages, though they can not make them 
interesting. 

The Journal of June 14 may answer the 
Journal of June 25: 


insist that it is well to salt religion with 
those facts; it will make better citizens. 
The church should not forget the time 
when it winced under the bitter gibes of 


I 


Wi 


I 


the anti-slavery agitators. 


DIVERGENT VIEWS. 



Notwithstanding its party pledges to 
abridge the spoils system, the republican 
majority in the senate has tacked to the 
appropriation bill that Wanamaker may 
employ at free delivery offices mail col¬ 
lectors who shall simply collect mails and 
whose pay shall be $600 a year. The object 
of this is undoubtedly to find places for re¬ 
publican workers during the coming cam¬ 
paign. Mr. Andrew, of the house, how¬ 
ever, has been promised by the democrats 
that no such amendment shall pass unless 
the appointments are made under the civil 
service rules. In the face of such a con¬ 
dition the Wanamaker crowd will doubt¬ 
less lose interest in the matter. 


In recent times opposition to a second term comes 
from two classes: First, those who honestly oppose it 
in the interest of good government, believing that 
restriction to one term would make a President more 
independent and remove entirely the temptation to 
use the power and patronage of the office to secure 
his renomination and election. This view, w’hen 
honestly entertained, is entitled to respectful con¬ 
sideration. It assumes, however, that ofiScial pa¬ 
tronage can be made a strong factor in securing the 
renomination and re-election of a President, which 
is very doubtful. It must be remembered, also, that 
President w'hb would prostitute the ofifice in this 
way would be just the kind of man that the people 
would turn out at the end of four years. In the 
present state of public opinion on this question it 
would be sure defeat for any President to have it 
known that he had used the power and patronage of 
his office to secure his renomination, or that he Y^as 
using it to secure his re-eiection. The people are 
not easily hoodwinked about such matters, and they 
ean not be trifled with at all. 


One of the most satisfactory things which 
has lately happened was the Indiana crowd 
of, at heart, Hillites going to the Chicago 
convention to shear Mr. Samuel E. Morss> 
the editor of the Indianapolis Sentinel 
and themselves coming home very closely 
clipped. Mr. Morss is the most valuable 
addition that has been made to Indiana 
democratic politics for a generation. He 
succeeds not at all because he is a boss or 
a political manipulator, but because he 
takes a stand that is right and can not be 
scared out of it. It is a revolution to have 
the Sentinel favor the merit system in the 
state institutions. 


We have many complaints' that the 
Chronicle is not received by those 
whom it is sent. For instance, the library 
of Cornell University has not received half 
of its numbers. The number of errors is 
so large and in so many different direc 
tions that the fault can only be chargeable 
to the mails. 


Philadelphia, June :!0,1892. 

To the Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle : 

Dear Sir— Pleasd discontinue sending me yourj J 
periodical. I am a member of the civil service re. 
form association of this citj', and I am a thorough 
believer in the principles of civil service. No one 
could go further than I would in the application of 
the reform to existing evils, but your periodical is in 
my opinion so blindly rancorous in its reference to 
President Harrkson, so partisan and unfair, and in 
my judgment so wilfully insulting, that I do not 
wish to see the paper any more. In my opinion, it 
does the cause more harm than good, and shows 
plainly, I think, that there must be some animus for 
such labored denunciation of the President other 
than merely a love for civil service reform. If any 
other political party offered a satisfactory alterna¬ 
tive ; if any other party was more sincere in regard 
to civil service reform, there might be some excuse 
for the indulgence of such expressions as “Pirates,” 
‘Buccaneers, “liOrd Paramount,” etc. 

Under Cleveland’s administration the Philadel¬ 
phia post-office was nothing short of a national scan¬ 
dal ; and the friends of civil service certainly can not 
consistently endorse the democratic nominee for vice- 
president. As stated above, your blind and unjust 
partisanship in my opinion does the cause more 
harm than good, and you will therefore please 
strike my name from oflf your lists, as I wish to 
continue to believe in the reform, which is gaining 
ground, notwithstanding the harm done by over- 
zealous friends of the cause. 

Henry Justice. 


Mr. Thomas A. Hall, of Chicago, has 
subscribed for seventy-five copies of the 
Civil Service Chronicle to be sent to 
libraries and reading-rooms, and particu. 
larly to the Young Men’s Christian Asso 
ciation reading-rooms in Illinois. It is to 
be hoped that the latter will take better 
care of them than seems to be the case with 
the Young Men’s Christian Association of 
this city. Soon after the June number 
came out it was not found in the reading- 
room and was asked for at the desk. Af¬ 
ter fumbling around a little, the attendant 
said, “ I can’t just now lay my hand on it.” 
He was then asked for the file since Janu¬ 
ary and said “I haven’t got them.” Was 
the fumbling around a pious deception, and 
is the paper in fact thrown into the waste- 
paper basket as soon as received? If 
any of our Illinois friends do not want the 
paper we shall be glad of an intimation to 
that effect and it will be discontinued 
As we have said elsewhere, the facts from 
month to month published in the Chron 
ICLE are unpalatable, and to none are they 
more so than to civil service reformers. 
Whenever the facts in relation to the man¬ 
agement of the civil service become pleas¬ 
ant, its reform will have been accom¬ 
plished, and there will be no need of re¬ 
form papers. But in the meantime, we 


We have always believed that the Phil¬ 
adelphia post-office under the late admin¬ 
istration was a national scandal, and the 
editor of the Chronicle at the time de¬ 
nounced it and other like scandals with 
all his might and at considerable expense. 
He also did all he could to secure the de¬ 
feat at the polls of those who caused those 
scandals. The writer of the above letter 
does not dispute the facts which are from 
month to month set out in the Chronicle, 
and it does not seem that his mind ought 
to be so powerfully affected by the condi¬ 
tion of the Philadelphia post-office four 
years ago, without being similarly affected 
by the circumstances of the Minneapolis 
convention, which are scarcely four weeks 
old, and which are truthfully related in the 
June Chronicle, and which make up the 
greatest single national scandal that has 
ever occurred in connection with the fed¬ 
eral service. Nor would it seem that his 
mind ought to be unaffected by the re¬ 
cent spectacle of Wanamaker shielding 
law-breakers in Baltimore, and for proof 
of this he need not regard reports of com¬ 
mittees, but needs only the testimony taken 
by Mr. Roosevelt. Nor would it seem that 
the three years’ career in which the Presi¬ 
dent, through the Quays, Clarksons, Ma- 
hones and Platts, until he quarreled with 
them over the division, has looted the fed¬ 
eral service, ought to be ignored. The 















r 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 351 


way to fight the spoils system is to tell the 
facts about it, not only under a democratic 
administration, but under a republican 
administration. These facts are very un- 
^ pleasant, but that is the fault of those who 
create them, not of those whose duty it is 
to bring them to the notice of the people. 
The use of any office as spoil is absolutely 
and without qualification illegal, and the 
comparison which the Chronicle has 
urged between the American spoils sys¬ 
tem and feudalism and piracy, is apt and 
just. There is no question of any other 
party being “more sincere in regard to 
civil service reform.” The question is 
whether outrageous acts now going on 
shall be ignored. If they are ignored 
now, similar ones, if they occurred, would 
have to be ignored under the next admin¬ 
istration, though it might be democratic. 


THE CLARKSON STANDARD. 

In the course of his remarks, thanking the 
national committee for the offer of the chair¬ 
manship, Mr. Clarkson said : 

“I have spent twenty-five years in politics, 
and I believe, from my experience that the 
best place to serve the republican party is in 
its ranks. In my political life I have found 
that in that field can be made, and are made, 
the most precious friendships of one’s life. 
There are more sacrifices made in that field 
than in any other. There is more heart in 
politics than in any other walk in life, and I 
say fearlessly and honestly that men engaged 
in politics will go further to serve a friend 
than in any other sphere of man’s existence. 
In 1884 we had a hard working committee 
and lost. In 1888 we had aharder working com¬ 
mittee, and, to my knowledge, no campaign 
was ever conducted more cleanly, more hon¬ 
orably than the campaign of 1888. I know 
Senator Quay and Colonel Dudley and I hope 
there is not a republican in this land who will 
ever cease to render due honor to these two 
honorable men who went into the hottest fire 
for the republican party and emerged victori¬ 
ous and without detraction. I have known 
many men—I have large friendship in the 
United States—and I want to say to you, 
gentlemen, that upon my dying bed, before 
my family, I could not name two men more 
to be loved and honored than Senator Quay 
and Colonel Dudley. 

“1 want to warn you, gentlemen of the com¬ 
mittee, against a growing tendency in the 
republican party, under the hypocrisy of the 
times, not to defend its party leaders. The 
cases of Senator Quay and Colonel Dudley 
afford vivid examples of this practice. They 
were attacked by a party whose success is de¬ 
rived by the use of the knife in the south and 
the assassination of character in the north. 
They were attacked, not because Senator Quay 
was guilty of any wrong in thecampaign, but 
because he won a victory for the republican 
party and restored the government to an hon¬ 
est basis. The democrats saw in Senator Quay 
a corrupter and began their abuse, and a cow¬ 
ardly republican press soon became their 
allies. No man who has the good of the re¬ 
publican party at heart can do otherwise than 
to put his honest, strong hands between this 
accusation of the democratic party and the 
gentlemen I have just named. So far as I 
am concerned, if I ever have another boy to 
name, I will be glad to confer upon him the 
name of Senator Quay or Dudley, and this as 


an evidence of the affection I have for the 
men. In conclusion, I want to state that no 
man on this continent desires to help the re¬ 
publican ticket or will do more, according 
to his ability than I.” 


THE QUAY STANDARD. 

[A reminiscence of David Martin, appointed by 
President Harrison collector of internal revenue, and 
lately chosen member of the republican national 
committee.] 

Three men sat in the cabinet room in the 
White House one bright morning in the year 
of our Lord 1889. One was the President of 
the United States. The second was Matthew 
Stanley Quay, senator from Pennsylvania and 
chairman of the republican national commit¬ 
tee. The third was James McManes, the 
sturdy and wealthy Scotch-Irishman, whose 
sterling qualities had won for him the respect 
and confidence of all the'residents of the Qua¬ 
ker city. 

The President raised his eyes inquiringly to 
Senator Quay. Obviously he did not know 
the object of the consultation. Neither did 
the silent senator. He had been requested by 
his companion to introduce him to President 
Harrison and had fulfilled his part. In turn 
he looked towards Mr. McManes. 

Meanwhile the old Scotsman’s eyes had been 
fastened upon the impassive countenance of 
Benjamin Harrison. When the time came for 
him to speak he leaned forward in his chair 
and spoke the few words which he deemed it 
his solemn duty to utter with all the earnest¬ 
ness at his command. 

“I have come here, Mr. President,” he said 
slowly, “ to protest against the appointment of 
David Martin to one of the most important 
federal offices in this country. He is a disrep¬ 
utable rascal, and his appointment as collector 
of internal revenue would be an insult to 
every respectable citizen of Pennsylvania.” 

The old man half rose from his chair as he 
continued. His language took on the tinge of 
the rich North Country accent of his youth 
and the muscles of his fine face quivered from 
the indignation burning within his breast. 
Hastily he sketched Martin’s early career. He 
denounced him as a ruffian at the polls and a 
manipulator of ballot-boxes. He declared 
that he was a dispenser of corruption funds 
contributed by the liquor interests. He held 
him up, with all the scorn born of contempt, 
as a willing tool of that element in the social 
life of Philadelphia which defies law, order 
and decency. He closed with the remark that 
no President could afford to appoint such a 
man to a position of honor and trust. 

When he had done the President moved un¬ 
easily in his chair and then glanced appeal¬ 
ingly at Senator Quay, whose astonishment, 
though apparent, was not sufficient to loose 
his silent tongue. The silence was broken by 
Benjamin Harrison. 

“They say,” he observed in measured tones, 
“that the charges against Mr. Martin are not 
true.” 

This was more than the honest Scotsman 
could bear. With all the fierce impetuosity 


of Roderick Dhu he burst forth in resentment 
of what seemed to him a reflection upon hi® 
veracity. 

“ Mr. President,” he cried, “ I have lived 
long in Philadelphia. I am well known there. 
You can not find in that whole city a single 
responsible person who will say that I ever 
uttered an untruth. There sits Senator Quay. 
He knows me. I ask you, Senator Quay, if I 
am not respected in Philadelphia as a man of 
my word.” 

“ Mr. McManes’s word is above question,” 
quietly observed the one addressed. 

“ Then, Mr. President,” continued Mr. Mc¬ 
Manes, “I reiterate all I have said concerning 
David Martin. Senator Quay informs you 
that my veracity is above question. I say to 
you again, sir, that the appointment of David 
Martin would be a disgrace to your adminis¬ 
tration and an insult to every honest citizen 
of Pennsylvania. That is all I have to say.” 

Again Benjamin Harrison turned to Mat¬ 
thew S. Quay. This time he secured a re¬ 
sponse. 

“ The two senatm's from Pennsylvania desire this 
appointment, Mr. President,'' was all he said. 

Mr. McManes made no rejoinder. He 
bowed to the President of the United States 
and left the room.— New York World, October 
20, 1890. 


THE MUGWUMP. 

The result is that the politicians of both parties, 
who are fond of speaking of any who refuse to obey 
the orders or accept the mandates of the party lead¬ 
ers as traitors and apostates, regard the mugwump 
with utter abhorrence. They themselves may arrange 
"deals" by which certain candidates are "knifed" in the 
interest of the opposition; they may "cut" the ticket, or 
even within certain limitations "bolt," and not lose caste. 
All that is legitimate when done in theway of “politics.” 
But that men should actually vote one ticket one 
year and refuse to vote the same the next from prin¬ 
ciple—from principle, mark ye—why what will the 
world come to at that rate ? For the creed of your 
working politician is: 

I d 07 i't believe in princerple. 

But O I di* in interest. 

The worst epithet in the politician’s vocabulary is 
mugwump! An oath may add sonority, but does 
not really increase its ignominious force. That a 
candidate has the approval of the mugwumps is 
sufficient cause for voting against him. When Ira 
Davenport ran for governor of New York against 
David B. Hill, in 1885, he was defeated by the re¬ 
publicans because the mugwumps favored him. 
When Edward Murphy, jr., chairman of the New 
York democratic state committee, put forth his pro- 
nunclamento at Chicago against Mr. Cleveland the 
burden of it was that the regular New York demo¬ 
crats did not like- Mr. Cleveland because the mug¬ 
wumps did. Bourke Cockran, in his speech before 
the convention, presented the same great objection 
to the ex-president with wonderful rhetorical full¬ 
ness and force. It really does seem extraordinary 
that the fact that a candidate is liked by an element 
outside his party and promises to draw votes there¬ 
from should make him unpopular with his own 
p&Tty.—Indianapolis News, June 28. 

I. 

The republican county committee held an 
harmonious meeting in Grand Opera House 
Hall last night until near the ending, when a 
firebrand was thrown by ex-Police Justice Pat¬ 
terson which destroyed all the harmony, and 













352 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


a scene was enacted such as is usual at the 
meetings of the committee. * * * a pro¬ 
test from some republicans against the present 
machine in the twentieth district was made. 
It charged upon the organization a continual deal 
with Tammany Hall, and declared that the 
organization was spiritless and ineffective.— 
New York Evening Post, January 22. 

II. 

The decent republicans of Cincinnati have 
been trying to escape from the domination of 
their party by Geo. B. Cox, the illiterate ex¬ 
saloon keeper who secured control of the 
organization a few years ago and has ruled 
that great city ever since. But the attempt 
was a failure. The reformers found that they had 
to fight not merely Cox and his republican gang, but 
also the whole democratic machine, which threw 
all of its strength in favor of the republican 
machine. The republicans of the citizens’ 
movement cast about 6,200 votes and were 
not allowed one more than they cast. The 
Cox ticket was credited with 11,000 votes, but 
a large share of them were cast by democrats 
and a good many men voted more than once. 
The Times-Star, a republican newspaper, says 
of the proceedings: 

The democrats who were in office were just as 
eager for the election of the Cox ticket as city repub¬ 
lican office-holders. At the primaries there seems to 
be little or no protection against wholesale voting of 
democrats for republicans. In certain precincts it 
is stated that some of them voted twice. It is de¬ 
veloped that under our by-partisan system of city 
government the controlling machine in each party 
is worked for the benefit of the other, and in yester¬ 
day’s primaries Mr. Bernard’s machine turned out 
as strongly for Mr. Cox’s machine as it was possible. 
Jerry Mulroy and Mr. Furst were quite as active in 
yesterday’s primaries as they ever were in any demo¬ 
cratic primary.” 

III. 

There was a similar “combine” of the two 
party machines against the reformers of one 
party in Philadelphia a couple of months ago. 
Four magistrates were to be chosen. Two of 
the incumbents had been exposed as having 
shared their fees with the notorious embezzler 
Bardsley. Nevertheless, both of them secured 
a renomiuation. The decent republicans put 
two independent candidates in the field against 
them, and it might have been expected that 
their majority would have been cut down, if 
indeed they were not beaten. But the delinquent 
officials were not at all worried. They made an ar¬ 
rangement with the bosses of the democratic party by 
which the latter refused to exercise their right to 
nominate four candidates for magistrates, and put 
up only two, and threw all of their strength in favor 
of the two republican rascals. The result was that, 
although the two independent candidates re¬ 
ceived about 6,000 votes, the two against whom 
the movement was directed polled several 
thousand fewer votes than their respectable 
associates on the republican ticket .—New York 
Evening Post, April 27. 

IV. 

The announcement that Boss McKane will 
support the democratic ticket this year is of 
interest and importance. McKane is the man 
who rules the town of Gravesend, which in¬ 
cludes Coney Island, and he rules it with a 


rod of iron. In 1884 this town gave Cleve¬ 
land 667 votes and Blaine 295. Not long af¬ 
terward McKane quarrelled with the leaders 
of the Kings county democracy, and in 1888 
he came out against his old party, the result 
being a vote in Gravesend of only 397 for 
Cleveland, while Harrison had 833. Harrison 
rewarded McKane by allowing him to name 
his man for United States marshal. In 1890 
the boss still opposed his old party, and al¬ 
lowed a most popular democratic candidate 
for sheriff to poll only 233 votes, while his re¬ 
publican opponent was given 1,023. Before 
the election of 1891 a peace was patched up, 
but McKane had previously promised to vote his 
town for the republican state ticket, and he kept 
that promise, giving Fassett 1,908 votes against 
only 180 for Flower, while the democratic 
county ticket, which was acceptable to him, 
received about 1,800 votes, as against only 
about 250 for the republican .—Neiv York 
Evening Post, July 6. 

V. 

The Brooklyn republican politicians who 
have been fighting one another steadily for 
five years are engaged just now in another 
wrangle, and the lines of battle are drawn on 
theold Nathan and anti-Nathan basis. Ernst 
Nathan [internal revenue collector], who is 
very closely related, politically, to certain democratic 
leaders, was able to induce the aldermen at a 
recent meeting to alter the boundary of his 
ward, the twenty-third, by annexing to it a 
large section of the twenty-fifth ward, con¬ 
taining about 3,000 voters, of whom 2,000 are 
republicans. 

In this way Nathan is able to control enough 
votes to name the candidate in his assembly 
district, and with the help of the twenty-first 
ward, to name the candidate in his senatorial 
district. This practically makes him boss of 
the party in Kings county, and the anti- 
Nathan forces are beginning to grumble. 
United States District Attorney Jesse Johnson took 
the initiative yesterday and lodged o formal protest 
against the change with Acting Mayor Coffey. 
It was in the form of a letter asking for a 
chance to be heard before the resolution was 
signed .—Nexv York Times, July 

VI. 

Naval Officer Willis returned from Washing¬ 
ton yesterday, and when told that the demo¬ 
cratic aldermen had cut out part of the 
twenty-fifth ward and handed it over to 
Nathan in the twenty-third ward, he said : 

“ There is no doubt in my mind but that the 
change was made to pay Mr. Nathan for the favors 
that have passed between him and Mr. McLaughlin 
and Mr. Shevlin. Why, everybody knows it. It’s 
as plain as day. The democratic party, it is easy to 
see, did not make those changes for its own benefit 
in the twenty-third and twenty-fifth wards. They 
would never have proceeded in the way they did if 
their desire was to make the best possible profit of 
the circumstances. It was done for Nathan, and, if 
I am right, will not help him materially. He, of 
course, thinks differently. Of one thing I am cer¬ 
tain, and it is this;—This move has demonstrated to 
a great many people, that Nathan and McLaughlin 
and Shevlin are on very good terms. The story of 
their friendship is an old one and very generally 
known, but until this move a great many did not 
pay much attention to it. They are all convinced 
now .”—New York Times, JulyS. 


AMERICANJEUDALISM. '■ 

“ To the Victor Belong the Spoils.” J 
THE LORD PARAMOUNT. % 

I am an advocate of civil service reform." 
My brief experience at Wasliington has led 
me to utter the wish, with an emphasis I 
do not often use, that I might be for ever 
relieved of any connection with the distri-" 
bntioii of public patronage. I covet for 
myself the free and nnpiirchased support 
of my fellow-citizens. * * * [-Senator Ben¬ 
jamin Harrison,'] 


Only conceive such a lure held out to this 
great people, and all the little offices of the 
Government thus set up for the price of 
the victory, without regard to merit or 
anything but party services, and you have 
a spectacle of baseness and rapacily such 
as was never seen before. No preaching 
of the Gospel in our land, no parental dis¬ 
cipline, no schools, not all the machinery 
of virtue together, can long be a match for 
the corrupting power of our political 
strifes actuated by such a law as thi.s. It 
would make us a nation ®f apostates at the 
foot of Sinai. —From a Sermon by Rev. Hmace 
Bushnell, in 1840. 


A LOCAL RAID. 

Dan Ransdell, the marshal of the District of 
Columbia, is in tmvn. He arrived last evening. 
His mission is purely political. He will re¬ 
main in the state long enough at least to help 
the administration curb the political ambi¬ 
tions of Governor Chase .—Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, June 16. 

* ■» * 

A. D. Shaw, deputy third auditor of treasury, 
will be given a reception on Thursday even¬ 
ing June 2, at Grand Army Hall, 60 Clifford 
avenue, by his Grand Army, railroad and 
Knights of Pythias comrades and friends.— 
Indianapolis New.s, May SS. 

* » » 

Ruckle Post hall was illuminated last night 
and upon the walls hung many flags and yards 
of bunting. Col. A. D. Shaw, deputy third aud¬ 
itor of the treasury and supervisor of railroad 
votes for the Harrison administration, form¬ 
erly, plain “Gus” Shaw, boss of the Big Four 
yards in this city, was to be received. He 
was to be welcomed home, as it was an¬ 
nounced “by his comrades of the Grand 
Army, and brethren of the link and pin and 
fraters of the great pythian order.” “ It was 
an auspicious occasion,” remarked Harry 
Mounts, a deputy in Collector HUderbrand’s office, 
when he called the meeting to order. He told 
the large audience, principally composed of 
Grand Army representatives, that they had 
met to give greeting to their old comrade, who 
had come home to spend a few days.—Indianapolis 
Sentinel, June 3. 

* * * 

Sha,w [deputy third auditor]. Mounts [Uni¬ 
ted States custom-house] and the other Indian- 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


353 


apolis railroad men are here using the blue 
book against Chase and are trying to organize a 
laboring men’s demonstration against him for 
this evening.— Ft. Wayne Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis News, June ^7. 

» * * 

Charles Martin, Harry Mounts and Frank 
Alley have been reinforced by Gus Shaw, dep¬ 
uty third auditor of the treasury. When a 
railroad man is proclaiming against the par¬ 
son he is a follower of Gus Shaw, the office¬ 
holder. * * 

Shaw is still paying for his place in the 
treasury department by operating for the ad¬ 
ministration against Chase, and Alley is as¬ 
sistant. * * 

^’During this speech, Harry Mounts, secreta¬ 
ry of the Conductors’ Brotherhood, and a 
trainman wearing a Chase badge got into an 
argument about the merits of Murray’s speech. 
It was quite heated at times, and closed with 
this remark from Mounts: “I will vote for 
Chase, but he is not the man to nominate. He 
will weaken the ticket, and the desire to nominate 
him is to weaken poor Ben Harrison.” 

The value of this remark will be appreci¬ 
ated when it is recalled that Mounts is a dep¬ 
uty in the custom-house, and Murray, the con¬ 
ductor, an employe of McKeen, the never- 
wavering friend of Harrison.— Ft. Wayne Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Sentinel, June SS. 

♦ * » 

Henry Mounts, cf the custom-hoaise, the leader 
of the “ railroad ” opposition to the “ parson,” 
rushed up to the nominee, and grasping his 
hand in a tight grip, declared, “ I am for you. 
Governor.” Less than a week ago Mr. Mounts 
was busy circulating dodgers, which in burning 
words asserted that if Chase were nominated 
he would lose the votes of ten thousand rail¬ 
road men in Indiana, of whom it was under¬ 
stood Mounts was many. Now Mounts de¬ 
clares himself not one of the ten thousand.— 
Indianapolis News, June S8. 

* * • 

A. D. Shaw, deputy auditor, has returned 
from Indiana and elsewhere, after a month's ab¬ 
sence .— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, July 4‘ 

* ♦ * 

United States Marshal Dunlap and Assist¬ 
ant District Attorney Cockrum arrived at 
noon.— Ft. Wayne Dispatch to Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, June 25. 

* * * 

John B. Cbc^Tum [assistant United States dis¬ 
trict attorney], has Smiley N. Chambers’s boom 
in hand. lie is working like a man who sees the 
district attorneyship in his grasp, in case he 
wins for his chief.— Ft. Wayne Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis News, June 27. 

* * * 

Al. Moore, deputy United States marshal, 
Ed. Conway, deputy United States marshal, 
John Cockrum, assistant United States at¬ 
torney, Henry Mounts, of the United States 
custom-house ; Eugene Saulcey, of the United 
States revenue department; Billy Patterson, 
of the United States postal department; Ben- 


no Mitchell, of the United States government 
at large, are among the high-toned visitors 
who are honoring Fort Wayne with their 
presence.— Fort Wayne Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, June 27. 

* * * 

It was the voice of the meeting that if Chase 
is to be beaten, the opposition must be organ¬ 
ized at once. The merits of the various men 
mentioned were considered, and it was voted 
that Judge Elliott would be the strongest can¬ 
didate to put up against the governor. The 
only person present who objected to Elliott 
was Warren G. Sayre [Indian commissioner], 
who stated his rea.son to be that when he 
[Sayre] and Robertson were having their 
trouble with Green Smith, Judge Elliott was 
asked to swear in the lieutenant-governor, and 
declined on the ground that the question at 
issue might get into the courts and possibly 
come before him for judgment.— Ft. Wayne 
Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 27. 

* * * 

It is averred that Mr. Chambers never had 
any idea of being nominated, and that he con¬ 
sented to enter the race for the sole purpose of 
taking away some of the strength that threat¬ 
ened to go to Chase. Whether this story is 
true or not, it has been evident that the men 
who have been here pretending to be for 
Chambers have been much more industrious 
in opposing Chase than in furthering the 
chances of Mr. Chambers. John B. Cockrum 
[assistant U. S. district attorney], who has 
been managing the Chambers boom, has been 
ready and anxious for two days to promise 
Chambers’s strength to any one upon whom 
the anti-Chase people might unite. Mr. Cock¬ 
rum was in the “round-up” anti meeting last 
night and pledged Chambers’s support for El¬ 
liott. The true friends of Judge Elliott have 
no hand in the movement to make him a can¬ 
didate.— Fort Wayne Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, June 28. 

FEUDS. 

In spite of the sweltering atmosphere there 
was a large gathering at the Carnegie music 
hall. Fifty-seventh street and Seventh avenue, 
last night, at the ratification meeting held 
under the direction of the republican club. 
Letters of regret were read from Vice-Presi¬ 
dent Morton, Senator Hiscock, .1. Sloat Fas- 
sett, William M. Evarts and Warner Miller. 
But not one word came from ex-Boss Plait.—New 

York Times, June 22. 

* * * 

The voluble Clarkson probably sees by this 
time how he cheapened himself by his precip 
itate haste in getting back into the Harrison 
camp. Those more astute campaigners, Quay 
and Platt, have a higher idea of their own 
worth, and are calmly waiting for the invita¬ 
tions which they are sure will come all in 
good time. Quay says he feels “the need of a 
long rest,” as he is “tired”, and must “nurse 
himself,” and the erstwhile loquacious Platt 
has “not a word to say.” It is already given 
out at Washington that “there is no disposi¬ 


tion on the President’s part to punish Platt or 
Miller or Quay,” as he is ready to “let by¬ 
gones be bygones and to encourage everybody 
to come together and work harmoniously for 
the success of the ticket.”— New York Evening 
Post, June 18. 

* * ♦ 

The Herald says: “ Ex-Senator Thomas C. 
Platt received his first overture from the Har¬ 
rison administration yesterday. Secretary 
Tracy met him at the Manhattan Beach Ho¬ 
tel, and they were in close consultation for 
two hours. The conference was a satisfactoiy 
one. As a result of it Mr. Tracy left the ho¬ 
tel shortly after it was over, although he had 
expected to spend the night there, and took 
an evening train back to Washington to carry 
the news to the President. Just what was 
asked of Mr. Platt and was promised to him 
it will be impossible to say until these things 
develop in the approaching campaign. It is 
understood that Mr. Tracy came here with the 
express purpose of taking initiatory steps to 
placate the man who controls the republican 
machine in this state. That Mr. Platt was 
willing to receive the secretary and talk over 
the situation in good spirits, is the best of ev¬ 
idence, say the politicians, that he is in a 
frame of mind to be placated.”— NewYork Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, June 21. 

* * » 

General Clarkson, chairman of the republi¬ 
can national committee, had a long confer¬ 
ence with the President at the White House 
to night in regard to the political situation. 
— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
June 26. 

* * * 

There is a general agreement that the truce 
entered into between Senator M. S. Quay and 
C. L. Magee at Harrisburgh last year has been 
broken, and that the battle for supremacy in 
the republican party of the state, of which 
the defeat of Delamater for governor in 1890 
was an incident, will be taken up again. The 
two leaders have been drifting apart for some 
time. The positive attitude of each against 
the other at Minneapolis strained their bonds 
to the breaking point. Senator Quay’s per¬ 
sistent opposition to the confirmation of George 
W. Miller for internal revenue collector for 
the twenty-second district is expected to be 
the last straw. Magee’s paper, the Pittsburgh 
Times, this morning printed a Washington 
dispatch, in which these words were used : 

“It is asserted thatshould Mr. Quay attempt 
by his opposition to Mr. Miller’s confirma¬ 
tion to continue the assumption of a proprie¬ 
tary right in the political affairs of the state 
in which he has in recent years received a se¬ 
vere rebuke, he may expect to receive a repri¬ 
mand direct, instead of through his man, as 
in the gubernatorial election of 1890.” 

This is construed to mean that Magee will 
take off his coat to prevent the return of Quay 
to the United States senate.— Pittsburgh Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, June 30. 

* * » 

Messrs. Hiscock and Platt were both at work 
among the committeemen in the corridors of 









354 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the hotel last night. Among other promi¬ 
nent republicans in the corridors were ex- 
Congressman Henry J, Burleigh, ex-Railroad 
Commissioner Isaac V. Baker, Congressman 
James W. Wadsworth, Congressman N. W. 
Curtis, Congressman John M.Weaver, Howard 
White, editor of the Syracuse Standard; Wil¬ 
lard A. Cobb, editor of the Lockport Journal; 
Ellis H. Roberts, assistant treasurer; William 
Leary, John A. Sleicher, Collector Frank Hen¬ 
dricks and ex-State Senator Sweet.— New York 
Times, June S8. 

* * * 

A gentleman who talked with Land 
Commissioner Carter to-day asked him what 
he thought of the organization of the New 
York republican state committee, and Mr. 
Mr. Carter is quoted as replying, “It looks 
as though they had given us a cold deck.” It 
is the impression among the republicans in the 
national committee that if there is to be any 
work done in New York for Harrison, it must 
be done by the national committee. The state 
committee will do nothingfor Harrison. 

Mr. Platt is reported as having said that 
there was no trouble in getting promises from 
Mr. Harrison ; he had a barrel full of them 
now, all several years old and unfulfilled. To 
work for Harrison’s election would be to 
simply accept a number of promises that 
would be broken almost as soon as made. 

There is no doubt among Harrison’s friends 
that if anything is to be done in New York 
for him it must be done by the national 
committee, and by his friends. The organiza¬ 
tion of the state committee is regarded as a 
menace to Harrison’s success in the state. In 
order to be sure that Harrison is looked after, 
a branch of the national committee will have 
to be named for New York, as there is a dis¬ 
trust of the intentions of the Platt and Warner 
Miller faction.— Washington Dispatch to New 
York Times, July 1, 

PUBLIC OFFICERS AT THEIR DU¬ 
TIES. 

There was some doubt last night whether 
Land Commissioner Carter, of Montana, would 
accept the secretaryship of the national com¬ 
mittee. Mr. Carter believes that he could 
materially assist in making Montana purely 
republican this year, including the legisla¬ 
ture, which will elect a United States senator, 
if he could only give the state his undivided 
attention.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, June 30. 

» » » 

Who will be chairman of the republican 
national committee? Mr. Campbell reached 
Washington this morning and made known 
his decision to the President as soon as he 
could gain admittance to the White House. 
He had, in fact, arranged for a conference at 
the White House, and it began soon after Mr. 
Campbell arrived. Besides the President and 
Mr. Campbell, there were present Land Commis¬ 
sioner Carter, Secretaries Elkins and Rusk, ex- 
Sen ator Spooner of Wisconsin, and L. T. 
Michener.— Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, July 6. 


Chairman Campbell, of the national re¬ 
publican committee, arrived in the city on 
the noon train from Chicago. He was met at 
the depot by Mr. Michener, the President’s 
personal friend. They immediately took a 
carriage for the Arlington Hotel. Mr. Camp¬ 
bell did not register, but went directly to the 
room of Commissioner of the Land Office Car¬ 
ter, who is also secretary of the national re¬ 
publican committee, where Mr. Carter, Mr. 
Michener and Mr. Campbell held a consulta¬ 
tion lasting about half an hour. They after¬ 
wards left the hotel together, going directly to 
the White House, and were in conference for 
four hours with the President, Secretary Elkins, 
ex-Seiiator Spooner, of Wisconsin, and Secre¬ 
tary Rusk.— Washington Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Journal, July 6. 

» » * 

Mr. William J. Campbell, who has put 
aside the chairmanship of the republican 
national committee, was very busy in Wash¬ 
ington to day up to the time of his departure 
for New York. In the morning he had a long 
conference with Col. Dudley and Gen. Mich¬ 
ener of Indiana, and then he went to the 
White House and was closeted with the Presi¬ 
dent, Secretary Elkins, and Land Commissioner 
Carter. The composition of the executive com¬ 
mittee was discussed, but after the conference 
Mr. Campbell said he was not yet ready to 
announce the committee. He said he might 
announce it after he reached New York. It 
was generally understood that he desired to 
consult with Gen. Clarkson before completing 
the list. There has been a decided hitch con¬ 
cerning this committee, the President desiring 
to have several men on it whom Campbell and 
Clarkson do not favor.— Washington Dispatch to 

New York Times, July 7. 

* * « 

Chairman William J. Campbell, of the re¬ 
publican national committee, arrived at the 
Imperial Hotel, Broadway and Thirty second 
street, early last evening, having left Wash¬ 
ington a little after noon. “Do you expect to 
confer with Mr. Clarkson and Mr. Platt while 
heref ” 

“I should be glad toseethem both if oppor¬ 
tunity presents itself, but I have made no ar¬ 
rangements for any meeting with them.” 

A story was passed through the corridor 
last night that “Sam” Fessenden, of Con¬ 
necticut, Land Commissioner Carter, Secre¬ 
tary of the Treasury Foster, General Clark¬ 
son, and possibly one or two others, were to 
meet Mr. Campbell and make an attempt to 
select some one to take up what seems to be 
the unattractive task of managing President 
Harrison’s campaign. 

Mr. Campbell said that while it was true 
that Commissioner Carter was on his way to this 
city he did not think it was for the purpose of 
conferring on this particular topic. 

‘Jf Mr. Carter is heix during my stay, probably 
I shall see him,” said Mr. Campbell. “I do not 
know that Secretary Foster is coming, or that 
his visit would have any connection with the 
selection of the committee if be did come.” 
—New York Times, July 7. 


HENCHMEN IN ACTIVE SERVICE." 

The republicans opened their campaign 
here this evening, John L. Griffiths and John 
B. Cockrum [assistant United States district 
attorney], of Indianapolis, making addresses. 
—Lebanon Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
June 14. 

* » * 

The Indiana republican association of 
Washington v/ill have a ratification meeting 
at G. A. R. Hall, No. 1,411 Pennsylvania 
avenue, at 8 o’clock to-morrow night, at 
which the nominations made by the Minne. 
apolis convention will be indorsed by resolu¬ 
tion and speeches. The principal speaker 
will be the Hon. William M. Marine, collector of 
the port of Baltimore .— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, July 2. 

* * » 

Indiana republicans in Washington feel 
that the cause of republicanism was given a 
very decided impetus at their ratification 
meeting last night. There was an immense 
turnout of Hoosiers, quite all of the members 
of the Indiana republican club and many 
others being present. President John C. 
Cheney presided. The speech by William Ma¬ 
rine, collector of the port of Baltimore, indorsing the 
nomination of Harrison and Reid, was a gi-eat suc¬ 
cess. It was largely devoted to the personal 
character of the President, and was a high 
tribute. Thomas H. McKee, Frank Swigart 
and A. D. Shatv [deputy third auditor] also 
delivered short, but eloquent speeches.— Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to In-dianapolis Journal, July J. 

* » * 

The political allies of President Harrison 
are already confessing that they expect to see 
him make a very poor showing in Kings 
county on election day, and they do not hesi. 
tate to give their reasons. They merely point 
to the fact that that old political trickster, 
Ernst Nathan, is again in the saddle, and ask 
all inquirers to point to a single year when 
Nathan led his party to anything but igno¬ 
minious defeat.— N. Y. Times, July S. 

* * * 

There is no doubt about the fact that 
Nathan, who was badly beaten by Naval Officer 
Willis at the primaries which decided the complexion 
of the Kings county delegation to the Minneapolis 
convention, is again at the head of affairs. By 
a neat trick he elected one of his own tools, 
Michael J. Dady, chairman of the executive 
committee, and then forced the election of 
Francis H. Wilson as chairman of the cam¬ 
paign committee. Through these two men he will 
have absolute control of the approaching fight, and 
the candidates must call on him for support 
or get up an internal fight which would prove 
fatal. 

“The outlook is certainly not very cheer¬ 
ful,” said oue of the few friends President 
Harrison has made in Brooklyn, “for this fellow 
Nathan is the most pliant tool Thomas C. Platt has 
in this state. He has been keeping hold of his offixe 
of collector of internal revemix, given him by Har¬ 
rison, solely for the power it confers upon him, yet 
he did not hesitate to use that power in his efforts to 
defeat the President’s renomination. 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


355 


“There are certainly no republicans in this 
city who do not know of the fight made by 
Nathan to send anti-Harrison delegates to the 
convention, so that none of us can be deceived 
now by his assertion that he was for Harrison 

I all along and had never favored any one else. 
He has not even the self-respect to resign the 
oflBce given him by the President, and yet he 
1 knows that he would have been removed be¬ 
fore this if it had not been that Gen. Harrison 
realized that he could not afford to dismiss a 
public officer solely because of that officer’s 
personal treachery to him. 

“ But it is very humiliating, I can tell you> 
to be compelled to go to this political jockey 
for every single thing we want during the 
next four months. What is more, a great 
many of the best men in the party won’t do 
it. I know half a dozen who have already 
refused and who declare they will take no 
I part in a campaign managed by Nathan.— 
■ New York Times, July S. 

Bj * $ « 

I The employes at the Brooklyn navy yard 
^|were surprised to learn yesterday that Ed¬ 
ward F. Page, chief of the Ordnance Depart¬ 
ment, had been removed by Secretary Tracy. 

■ Page is a good republican, but is said to 
have expressed a belief that Harrison could 
not be re-elected, and to have worked in his 
ward to send an anti-Harrison delegate to 
Minneapolis. 

“I have not the slightest idea why I have 
been discharged,” he said yesterday. “ I 
went to Washington to asscertain the cause 
and demanded the right to face my accusers. 
The secretary merely said that he had been 
told that I had neglected my duty. That is 
false, no matter who says it. My books, all 
written up to date, prove it.” 

J. W, Beaty, the opponent of ex-Senator 
Birkett in the fourth ward, and a Harrison 
worker in the recent faction squabble, expects 
to get the vacant place.— New York Times, 
July 1, 

» » * 

The President to-day sent to the senate the 
j nominadon of William H. Leaycraft of New 
i York to be assistant appraiser of merchandise 
p in the district of New York. For years Leay- 
b ; craft has been the republican boss of the thir- 
I teenth ward, and has been able to carry around in 
j ; his pocket the delegates elected from that ward to the 
nominating conventions in the ninth assembly, the 
j third senatorial, and the third congressional 
, districts. He was a devoted follower of Thos. 
^ C. Platt until the latter lost the legislature 
and Leaycraft was put out of his position as 
port warden. Since then he has trained with 
I Naval Officer Willis, and his appointment 
now is regarded as a slap at Platt and Nathan. 

I —New York Times, July 7. 

*• * * 

Some racy testimony against the republican 
office-holders in Alabama will be considered 
by the house committee on civil service re- 
J form at the meeting which Chairman Andrew 
has called for to-morrow morning. 

The matter comes before the committee on 
i the resolution ofiered Monday by Representa¬ 


tive Herbert (Dem., Ala.), for an investiga¬ 
tion, and the striking feature of the charges 
is that they are signed by William J. Ste¬ 
vens, chairman of the republican executive 
committee of Alabama, and dated June 25, 
1892. 

This state committee represents the anti¬ 
office holding element in Alabama, and it is 
evident from its complaints that it is not 
ready to wheel into the Harrison column, 
even though the President has been renomi¬ 
nated. Mr. Stevens, in his letter to Repre¬ 
sentative Herbert, incloses a copy of the reso¬ 
lutions unanimously adopted by the republi¬ 
can state convention at Montgomery on April 
28, 1892, charging most flagrant violations of 
the civil service law. 

He goes further than this, however, and de¬ 
clares that the United States marshal and re¬ 
ceiver of the Mobile and Girard Railroad 
Company’s lands has not managed his trust in 
the interest of the government, and that many 
thousands of dollars have been disbursed with¬ 
out vouchers or receipts being taken. 

He makes serious charges against the Uni¬ 
ted States district attorney and declares that 
he has continued cases on the promise of de¬ 
fendants that they would return home and use 
their influence in controlling conventions, and 
has dismissed cases in order to secure indorse¬ 
ments as a candidate for judicial honors. It 
is further declared that he has used his pres¬ 
tige to control the action of juries, and, in one 
case, has called men from the jury room in 
order to change their votes and action before 
the jury. 

It is further declared that the collector of 
internal revenue has not only violated the 
civil service law, but has levied, collected, and 
borrowed large sums of money from numerous 
applicants for office, said money having never 
been repaid. Numerous witnesses are cited 
to sustain the accusations, and affidavits are 
made to some of them.— Washington Dispatch 
to New York Times, June SO. 

A CALAMITY. 

“ What would the nomination of Mr. Cleve¬ 
land mean?” 

“ It would mean the destruction of the 
regular organizations in the great demo¬ 
cratic cities of the state and in the state 
itself.” — Murphy, Tammany Boss, at Chicago, 
June 17. 

EXAMPLES. 

I 

All persons who think of getting on the Brooklyn 
police force are advised to see to it that they have a 
political “pull” before they endeavor to pass the 
civil service examination. 

They will find it very useful later on. 

That has been the recent experience of Nicholas 
Callan, prize fighter. He decided some time ago 
that there was more money to be made in raiding 
prize fights than there was in conducting them, so 
he consulted ex-Assemblyman Sheridan about get- 
ing on the force. 

In due time he appeared for his competitive exam¬ 
ination, and passed well toward the head of his class, 
standing No. 6. This was really embarrassing, for 
Callan had arranged to participate in just one more 


fight before retiring, but if he was appointed a po¬ 
liceman he could not do it. 

Sheridan was appealed to, and again he “fixed” 
things, so that Police Commissioner Hayden ap¬ 
pointed thirty-three new patrolmen, but left Callan 
out. The latter thereupon took his place in the ring 
and was badly whipped. He at once yearned for the 
police force, and the commissioner very accommo¬ 
datingly turned back on the list a few days ago and 
appointed him.—New York Times, May 30. 

II. 

The recent appointment of Alexander McLean as 
acting janitor of the new grammar school. No. 62, on 
One Hundred and Fifty-seventh street, near Cort- 
landt avenue, by Tammany trustees of the twenty- 
third ward, in which the school is situated, is a strik¬ 
ing illustration of the way in which the organization 
rewards its supporters, “ without regard to race, col¬ 
or, or previous condition.” 

McLean has had dealings with the board of educa¬ 
tion for more than six years, receiving many jobs of 
repairing school buildings in the twenty-third ward. 
His bills for this work have not always been found 
correct when sent to the comptroller’s oflice for pay¬ 
ment. Instead of making these accounts out in his 
own name, he used at different times the name of 
E. A. McLean & Co. and M. E. McLean, which was 
found to be the name of his twelve-year-old daugh¬ 
ter, by Superintendent of School Buildings George 
W. Debevoise, who was asked by President Simmons 
of the board of education to make an examination. 
This request by the president was explained in a let¬ 
ter to the clerk of the board of education, in 1886, by 
E. V. Loew, comptroller, declaring that many of Mc¬ 
Lean’s bills were “ false in fact, and that if payment 
were made by this department upon the strength of 
the certificates attached to the vouchers, the city 
would be defrauded.” 

When an inspeetor of the comptroller’s office made 
an investigation he found that many false charges 
had been entered by McLean. One of them was for 
“2,400 brick, four days’ labor for mason, five days’ 
labor for laborer.” The alleged repairing was done 
at the branch of school No. 60, at Brook avenue and 
One Hundred and Forty-first street. The inspector 
found that not a brick was in the building except the 
chimney, and no work of any kind had been done 
by McLean. Another instance was where, two years 
previous, McLean had slated the roof of grammar 
school No. 60, at College avenue and One Hundred 
and Forty-fifth street without authority. He at¬ 
tempted to charge for it, but the account was not 
indorsed by the superintendent of school buildings. 

The reductions recommended in the report of the 
inspector from the comptroller’s office were made, 
and no demand for payment in full was received 
from McLean. 

During the term of office of George W. Debevoise 
as superintendent of school buildings, the trustees of 
the twenty-third ward made frequent attempts to 
have McLean, who is a Tammany “heeler” in that 
.section, appointed as a janitor. Mr. Debevoise knew 
the man was unfit for the position, and refused to 
sign his license. The trustees who are backing Mc¬ 
Lean are William Hogg and Samuel Samuels, whose 
devotion to Tammany is well known. There is a 
third trustee who votes with them in these matters, 
and by his aid the appointment of McLean has at 
last been made. The other three trustees in addi¬ 
tion to Hogg and Samuels are: Thomas J. Rusk, 
James A. Ferguson and Dr. A. F. Brugman. The 
position will net McLean about $800 a year, with no 
rent, and free coal, after he pays his assistants and 
all necessary expenses, leaving him ample time to 
continue his work as “repairer” of public schools.— 
New York Evening Post, May 9. 

III. 

State Railroad Inspector Thomas W. Snencei has 
been asked for his resignation, to take effect July 1. 
Mr. Spencer has occupied the position nine year.s. 
He is peculiarly well qualified for the office, ha-in't 
spent many years in charge of the building and 
equipment of several important railroads. His rec¬ 
ord in the position has been admirable, as he is a 
man of the highest integrity and ability. 

















356 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


' The place is to be filled by the appointment of 
Frank K. Baxter, ex-city surveyor of this city, and 
a close political partner of Railroad Commissioner 
Beardsley. His main qualification for the position is 
his ability to run a caucus or engineer a convention in 
the most approved Hill style. He is utterly incompe¬ 
tent as an expert, and has had no experience in rail¬ 
road work whatever.— Utica Dispatch to New York 
Times, May 3. 

IV. 

The dictation of Senator D. B. Hill and the influ¬ 
ence of State Comptroller Frank Campbell in the 
matter of the appointment of game and fish protect 
ors for the Lake Keuka district have renewed the li¬ 
cense of the fish pirates on that lake, and virtually 
notified them that they may go on with their illegal 
netting of salmon trout with the same immunity 
from interference by the protectors under Governor 
Flower’s administration that they enjoyed to the ut¬ 
most during Governor Hill’s time. It was only a 
few years ago that Lake Keuka, the fairest of New 
York’s inland waters, provided the best salmon trout 
fishing of any water in the country. It was Seth 
Green’s favorite fishing place. Twelve-pounders 
were not uncommon, and a four-pounder was not 
regarded as much of a catch to brag of, so plentiful 
and superior were these princes of game fish. 

Four or five years ago Governor Hill appointed a 
saloon keeper of Penn Yan, John Sheridan, to take 
charge of the fish interests of Lake Keuka. Sheridan 
was and is a local Hill healer of the most enthusiastic 
kind. He knew nothing about salmon trout or their 
importance, but he knew many of the most per¬ 
sistent fish pirates of the lake, for there were many 
of them who were regular patrons of his saloon. 

Protest after protest went to Albany, during the 
administration of Governor Hill, against the reten¬ 
tion of so palpably unfit a man, through personal in¬ 
terest and association, as guardian of the fish inter¬ 
ests of the lake, but they were never listened to. 
The fish pirates had votes, and they were not likely 
to go against the wishes of the governor’s game pro¬ 
tector.—flawmondsporf Dispatch to New York Times, 
June 7. 

V. 

Christopher C. Collins was made captain of the 
Park police by the Park board yesterday to succeed 
Capt. Thomas Beatty, who died on March 26. The 
appointment is a curious one, and it iilustrates the 
beautiful workings of local civil service reform as 
the system is now administered. Collins, who has 
been a sergeant of the Park police for a few weeks, 
was born in Ireland in 1852, and became a gate 
keeper in Central Park in 1879, as a member of the 
Park police force. He was made a park keeper in 
March, 1880, and a roundsman in 1886. 

Then came a set-back to Mr. Collin’s career. In 
1887 he was reduced from roundsman to park keeper 
He held that place until March 24, just two days be¬ 
fore the death of Capt. Beatty. He was then made 
roundsman again, and his later promotions have 
come with a rapidity that is singular. After serving 
as a roundsman for a month and a few days Collins 
was made a sergeant by the Park board on May 5. 
This promotion was not made because of any special 
service he had rendered the department, but because 
it had been planned by the Tammany leaders to 
make him a captain, and he had to be a sergeant be¬ 
fore he could take the civil service examination for 
the captaincy. 

The sergeants who took the civil service examina¬ 
tion were James B. Ferris, who got a rating of 98.75; 
Louis Flock, the senior sergeant of the force, who 
has been in the service for twenty years, and who 
got a rating of 96.50, and Collins, who got a rat¬ 
ing of %.52. Collins was chosen at yesterday’s meet¬ 
ing without opposition by the votes of Commission¬ 
ers Dana, Gallup and Tappen. Commissioner Straus 
was not present and Sergeant Flock thought that he 
would have stood a better chance had Mr. Straus 
been there. 

Mr. Gallup, in explaining why Collins was chosen, 
said that the department wanted new blood, and 
that Collins was a man of strong individuality. Mr. 
Gallup thought that a retired cavalry officer, who 
would be “a good horseman and a gentleman,” 


would make the ideal police captain; but there was 
no retired cavalry officer on hand. Collins, he said, 
would look well in the saddle. 

Capt. Collin’s salary will be 82,750. He is a relative 
of Mrs. Richard Croker and he is a member of the Tam¬ 
many Hall general committee.—New York Times, July 1. 

VI. 

Drs. Abraham Jacobi and T. Mitchell Prudden 
have withdrawn from the health department of this 
city. The reason they give for this action is that the 
board has become a political machine, and as their 
connection with it was purely in a non-partisan and 
scientific capacity, they concluded that their useful¬ 
ness was fast drawing to a close. 

Dr. Jacobi said last night: * 

‘‘When I say that the department has fallen into 
the hands of a political machine, of course I mean 
Tammany Hall. 

“The trouble dates back to the peremptory demand 
for the resignation of Dr. W. A. Ewing, sanitary su¬ 
perintendent, which was without warrant, only that 
his place was wanted for a Tammany man. The 
way in which Ewing’s resignation was demanded 
was simply disgraceful. I was told by him that on 
the day he resigned. President Charles Wilson, of the 
board, a.sked him for his resignation, and he said he 
would take twenty four hours to consider it, but 
President Wilson told him that he must have the 
resignation that afternoon, and added: ‘If your 
resignation is not forthcoming at once, mine will be 
demanded by the powers that be.’ 

“I was very reluctant to sever my connection with 
the department, for it was I who suggested the Wil- 
lard-Parker Hospital for scarlet fever and diphthe¬ 
ria while I was president of the state medical so¬ 
ciety. Besides, the best methods for doing good for 
the health of the community are through the health 
department, and I had hoped to be of much more 
service than I had been, but the outside pressure 
was too great and I could not consistently remain 
in the position.” 

Dr. Prudden was reluctant to discuss his resigna¬ 
tion. “My connection with the board of health,” 
he said, “was solely in a scientific capacity. I am 
not a partisan of any kind, and when I saw matters 
shaping the department into a political machine, I 
did not consider that my professional duties were 
any longer required. The forcing out of Dr. Ewing 
and Counselor Prentice, two men of great worth to 
the board and its impartial work, was the beginning 
of the trouble.” 

Dr. Ewing reiterated what Dr. Jacobi had said in 
regard to his sudden withdrawal from the board and 
how impatient President Wilson was for his resigna¬ 
tion. 

“Now,” said the doctor, “I wish it understood 
that the position of sanitary superintendent came to 
me from President Wilson in the spring of 1889 un- 
solicted. I am not a politician but a physician, and 
devoted myself to the impartial service of the city 
as its chief sanitarian. I do not in the least regret 
leaving the position. The simple fact is Tammany 
wanted the place for Dr. Cyrus Edson and had to 
have it. So I got out.”—iVew York Times, June 25. 

VII. 

Drs. Richard H. Derby, Daniel M. Stimson and 
Joseph O’Dwyer resigned yesterday from the medi¬ 
cal consulting board of the health department. The 
reason actuating them was the same as that which 
caused Drs. Janeway, Jacobi, Prudden and Smith to 
leave the board—the infusion of too much politics 
into the administration of the department. By the 
withdrawal of these last three gentlemen, the con¬ 
sulting board is practically wiped out, only one 
member. Dr. George F. Shrady, remaining. 

“My resignation,” said Dr. O’Dwyer to a reporter, 
“is to be attributed to the same cause that led to the 
resignation of the other members of the consulting 
board. Tt is a protest on my part against the intro¬ 
duction of politics in the administration of the 
board of health. I have no objection to urge against 
Dr. Cyrus Edson, the new sanitary superintendent, 
on the score of his ability, but Dr. Ewing was equally 
able, and there was absolutely no excuse for dis¬ 
charging him.—iVcw York Times, July 6. 


VIII. 

Now that the Chicago convention is over and the 
Kings county leaders want to show to the world 
that they will cordially and honestly support Cleve¬ 
land, the story of how and why they agreed to sup¬ 
port Hill is gradually leaking out. 

To those who knew how McLaughlin denounced 
Hill last fall as a trickster and fraud for his treat¬ 
ment of Alfred C. Chapin, it was a surprise to hear 
that he had fallen in with the February convention 
plan, and had agreed to stand by Hill to the last. 

Those men said then that there was some deal, and 
they were right, although they didn’t know just 
what it was. 

As a matter of fact, there was a sale by Hill, and 
the article disposed of was the New York and Brook¬ 
lyn bridge. 

This statement is made, not on the word of some 
“well-informed man,” but as an actual fact, and The 
Times can substantiate it. Hill went about the state 
buying up delegates wherever he could not bulldoze 
them into supporting him, and he found that the 
thing Hugh McLaughlin most wanted was the con¬ 
trol of the big bridge, which he had lost through the 
stupidity of ex-Mayor Chapin, Controller Jackson, 
and a few others. 

So Hill sent one of his numerous emissaries over to 
Willoughby street with this message: 

“For a full delegation from Kings county 1 will 
give you the bridge.” 

McLaughlin considered the matter and accepted 
the bargain. But he did not have much faith in 
Hill’s promises and was ready to dump him and his 
presidential aspirations overboard even as late as the 
Hoffman House conference. 

A gentleman who was at that conference said to a 
Times reporter yesterday ? 

“McLaughlin went over to that meeting solely to 
see Hill and ascertain if he was going to keep to his 
part of the bargain, and they had a long talk on the 
subject in my hearing. Hill vowed by everything 
that he was dealing straight, and closed the conver¬ 
sation by hammering his fist upon the table and say¬ 
ing : ‘I assure you, Mr. McLaughlin, that the bridge 
will be yours. This fellow Wagstaff will resign at 
the next meeting.’ And he did.”—New York Times, 
June 26. 


A subscriber at St. Cloud, Minnesota, writes: 
“The Chronicle has been to me of the high¬ 
est worth. It has fanned a spark of patriotism 
that greatly needs kindling, in a latitude 
where one is tempted to believe that every 
man has his price, and where few believe that 
office is public trust,” 


Another subscriber from Buffalo says: “I 
wish to congratulate you on the first number 
of the fourth year. You do manage to hit the 
bull’s eye on what you have to say on this 
question, about as ofien as you shoot. There 
is nothing, to my mind, like saying what you 
have to say in such shape that no one can 
misunderstand it.” 


“I enclose one dollar, my usual subscription, 
to your paper. I see an intimation in the last 
number that after the present year its discon¬ 
tinuance is probable. The field you occupy 
is so important, and the service you are ren¬ 
dering so valuable, that I can not but view 
your retirement with extreme regret. 

“The fight for civil service reform is but just 
begun, as I view it, and to give up any of 
our positions now is hazarding everything. L 
“Very truly yours, John H. Magee.® 
‘'Scottsburyh, New York.” 





1 















The civil service chronicle._ 

This devotion of party, not to the ends for which it exists, Imt to the spoils that accompany success at the polls, has become so 
absolute that it has produced an evil greater than any which party proposes to remedy.— George. William Curtis, at Baltimore, April, 1892. 


VoL. I, No. 42. 


INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST, 1892. terms : ^ fcrnuVercopT' 


Published monthly. Publication oflSce, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

IndiarMpolis, Ind, 


The Chronicle will be glad to receive 
information from all sources relating to the 
participation of oflSce-holders in the cam¬ 
paign. The facts are often shown in news¬ 
papers, and the favor of wrapping and 
mailing will be much appreciated. 

The pictures the Chronicle is able to 
give this month of the progress of the cam¬ 
paign are interesting and vivid. The great 
triumph of the month is the Placation of 
Platt and Quay. They blocked all prog¬ 
ress, and when the Placation was an¬ 
nounced the Indianapolis Journal said, as 
its load of anxiety rolled oflf, “ Now that 
Senator Quay and ex-Senator Platt have 
got into the republican band wagon the 
procession is ready to move.” The other 
noticeable feature of the campaign is the 
ceaseless activity of the President, in which 
he is openly aided by a large number of 
his great office-holders like Collector Hen¬ 
dricks of New York. On every hand the 
question arises, What are “ the dangers to 
free institutions which lurk in the power 
of official patronage” ? 

In a speech at Malone to “ old soldiers,” 
President Harrison declared himself to be 
in a non-partisan mood, and this was the 
only condition fit for the occasion. Ex¬ 
pressing his reflections as a non-partisan 
he declared that we are a favored nation, 
free from contiguity with great military 
powers; but that, nevertheless, we have 
duties and responsibilities. He was not 
very definite in pointing out those duties 
and responsibilities, except to say that we 
should resume our “ once proud participa¬ 
tion in the ocean-carrying trade of the 
world.” It is a pity that while in a non¬ 
partisan mood he did not consider, and in 
good set terms, such as he knows so well, 
reflect upon a President who uses the full 
power of the civil service to secure the 
selection of delegates favorable to himself, 
among whom are 140 who hold places in 
the service absolutely at his will, and who 
has another office-holder, to whom he has 
given a chance to make $40,000 a year, 
come from London to manage the conven¬ 
tion of these delegates, and who sits at the 
ends of two wires running into the official 
presidential residence for days “sending 


and receiving messages from the seat of 
war,” until he has by these means accom¬ 
plished his renomination. There is much 
which could be said as to our responsibili¬ 
ties and duties in relation to such a Presi¬ 
dent. 


In the general laudation of President 
Harrison, which is going on among his par¬ 
tisans and the general boast about his 
“clean administration,” we have looked 
patiently for some expression concerning 
his management of the civil service as 
compared with his platform. Among 
other places we have looked in the New 
York Tribune, in Colonel Elliott Shepard’s 
paper, and particularly in Senator Hoar’s 
article in the July Forum, and we have 
watched a large list of eastern and western 
papers. On every hand there is silence. 
We call attention to this, for if a favorable 
comparison can be made it will be of the 
greatest advantage to the candidacy of 
President Harrison, and will save him the 
loss of several close states, including In¬ 
diana. 

With the cholera approaching, it is pos¬ 
sible that this city will examine the con¬ 
duct of some part of its affairs. We have 
the best city government that we have ever 
had. Nevertheless no one can return from 
eastern cities without being impressed 
with the comparatively scandalous amount 
of dirt that lies on the streets and side¬ 
walks of Indianapolis. We pay a large 
sum weekly for street hands. It would be 
interesting to know where in the world 
these men put in their time. Are we be¬ 
ing swindled by “ politics,” and are these 
men hired not for their services but to give 
them places? Do they get in and stay in 
by political “pulls” and work about as 
their feelings dictate? Will not the mayor 
and the board of public works render this 
city the greatest service and give it the 
worth of its money as they can by intro¬ 
ducing the Boston labor system? There 
is no cleaner city than Boston. Secretary 
Tracy with this system has revolutionized 
the work of the navy-yards. New York 
under Tammany was one of the dirtiest 
cities in the world, but its few months 
under this system is rapidly making it 
one of the cleanest. 

The Civil Service Record, published at 
Boston, and the Civil Service Reformer, pub¬ 


lished at Baltimore, have been consoli¬ 
dated, and now appear as Good Government, 
published at Washington. We shall miss 
the Record, with its even temper and abso¬ 
lute fairness; and we shall miss the Re¬ 
former, with its scholarly ability and its 
stinging blow. The editor of Good Gov- 
eryiment is Mr.FrancisE. Leupp, well known 
as the Washington correspondent of the 
New York Evening Post, There is also a 
committee of publication consisting of 
George William Curtis, Charles J, Bona¬ 
parte, Edward Cary, Richard H. Dana, 
William Potts and Herbert Welsh. The 
subscription is one dollar a year, and it is 
to be hoped that every friend of civil 
service reform will subscribe. The ad¬ 
dress is the Corcoran Building, Washing¬ 
ton, D. C. 

Many years ago “Jim” Tyner was an 
Indiana republican politician. He passed 
into obscurity to be resurrected by Presi¬ 
dent Harrison along with Warmouth, Paul 
Vandervoort, and many others of unpleas¬ 
ant memory. He is now assistant attor¬ 
ney-general for the post-office department. 
He is Wanamaker’s kind of a man, and 
he has been giving his chief an “ opinion ” 
upon the civil service law and the Balti¬ 
more post-office investigation. He quotes 
from the statute the prohibitions against 
soliciting or receiving money “ for any po¬ 
litical purpose whatever,” and then says 
that they do not apply to primaries where 
Postmaster Johnson and Marshal Airey 
heading the Baltimore federal office-hold¬ 
ers, and forming the Johnson-Airey fac¬ 
tion are, on behalf of the President, des¬ 
perately fighting the non-office-holding 
republicans. Then he takes the ground 
that the rule which directs that any em¬ 
ploye who shall willfully violate any of the 
above prohibitions “shall be dismissed 
from the service,” should only be applied 
after “conviction upon indictment.” It 
will be remembered that Judge Bradley 
charged the jury which acquitted Mahone’s 
blackmailers that the failure of the execu¬ 
tive to dismiss the accused was prima facie 
evidence of their innocence. Mr. Charles 
J, Bonaparte in Good Government, for Au¬ 
gust, thus closes a discussion of this knav¬ 
ish trickery: 

While the assistant attorney-general says they can 
not be removed until they have been convicted, the 
judge says they can not be convicted until they 
have been removed. The result of the two views 



















358 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


combined is that the law and the rules may be vio¬ 
lated with equal Impunity and become, practically, 
a dead letter. 

It issufhciently easy to detect an underlying mo¬ 
tive for all this paltry quibbling. A postmaster-gen¬ 
eral may not wish his subordinates to rob the mails; 
so, if there is reasonable ground to suspect that any 
of them have done this, he will consider these per¬ 
sons unfit to remain in the service and will purge it 
of them. The same officer may wish them to violate 
the civil service law whenever he believes—very 
foolishly, perhaps, in some Instances—that his own 
party or faction may profit by their wrongful acts. 
Then, as he is virtually an accomplice in their guilt, 
he will seize any pretext, shrewd or silly, to secure 
them impunity; and it may be the business of some 
brother officer, whose resonant title would justify a 
popular notion that he spoke with authority on the 
legal phases of the case, to furnish such pretexts 
when required. The conduct of the unjust steward 
in the parable would be perplexing enough were we 
bound to assume his honesty and devotion to his 
master’s interests. Mr. Wanamaker Is reputed to be 
a careful Bible student; and doubtless, if he speaks 
his candid judgment, he dismisses the steward with 
the simple verdict that he was a rascal. What 
opinion must he entertain of a public officer who 
either refuses to carryout in letter and spirit a law 
which he has sworn to execute, or supplies shallow 
sophistry, in quantities to suit, to excuse another 
functionary called to account for such perjury and 
breach of trust ? 

The civil service commission has again 
shown that it knows its duty and is not 
afraid to do it. We do the President no 
injustice in saying that he does not favor 
encouraging in government employes a 
spirit of independence of the blackmail¬ 
ers who would wring money out of them 
for political purposes. His indifference, 
to put it with extreme charity, in the 
Mahone cases, and his refusal to punish in 
the Baltimore cases, conclusively show his 
real convictions, humiliating as the show¬ 
ing is. If he could prevent it without dis¬ 
aster he would not let the commission 
put forth such a warning as is printed be¬ 
low. What the country knows the com¬ 
mission knows, and it is therefore doubly 
refreshing in these times of vassal and 
chief, master and man, henchman and 
boss, to have some officers fearless in the 
performance of duty, though it requires 
bearding their chief. The document is as 
follows: 

United States Civil Service Commission, 
Washington, D. C., July 27,1892. 

At the outset of the political campaign which is 
now pending, this commission feels it to be its duty 
to call public attention to the provisions of the civil 
service law in relation to political assessments or 
contributions, to inform government employes of 
their rights in the premises, and to warn those not 
in the government service, of whatever political 
party, not to infringe upon these rights. 

Political assessments, under any guise, are pro¬ 
hibited by law. The provisions of the law on the 
subject are, in substance, as follows: 

That no government officer or employe shall, 
directly or indirectly, solicit or receive, in any 
manner whatever, a contribution for political pur¬ 
poses from any other government officer or em¬ 
ploye. 

Second, that no government officer or employe 
shall make a contribution for political purposes to 
any other government officer or employe. 

Third, that no person shall in any manner, 
directly or indirectly, solicit or receive contributions 
for political purposes in any room or building 


occupied by government employes In the discharge 
of official duties; and 

Fourth, that no superior officer shall discriminate 
against or in favor of any government officer or 
employe on account of his action in reference to 
contributions for political purposes. Government 
employes must be left absolutely free to contribute 
or not as they see fit, and to contribute to either 
party according to their preferences; and an em¬ 
ploye refusing to contribute must not be discrimi¬ 
nated against because of such refusal. 

It is the duty of the commission to see that the 
provisions of this law are enforced, and it will em¬ 
ploy every available means to secure the prosecution 
and punishment of whoever may violate them. The 
commission requests any person having knowledge 
of any violation of this law to lay the facts before it, 
and it will at once take action upon them. 

Charles Lyman, 
Theodore Roosevelt, 
George D. Johnston, 
Commissioners. 

In the preceding house of representa¬ 
tives six republicans introduced bills pro¬ 
posing the direct repeal of the civil service 
act, and every one of these republicans 
has disappeared from public life. In the 
present house no such bill has been intro¬ 
duced. Of the present committee Mr. 
Roosevelt says: “The friends of civil ser 
vice reform, without distinction of party, 
are to be congratulated upon having such 
a committee in the house, and especially 
upon having such a chairman as Mr. An¬ 
drew.” 

The cities of Boston and Cambridge 
have passed and now have in force the fol¬ 
lowing ordinance: 

“No head of a department, member of a board, 
clerk, employe or other officer of the city, except 
such as may be elected by popular vote, shall be an 
officer of a caucus or member of any political com¬ 
mittee or convention.” 

Fifty-six office-holders in Boston and five 
in Cambridge are affected. Thus two im¬ 
portant cities stamp out the nefarious 
practice of having their politics managed 
by those who are paid from the public 
treasury. They know very well that party 
management will be put upon a higher 
plane by this action. The man who makes 
place-holding the condition of his political 
efforts is conscienceless and lost to patriot¬ 
ism ; he is the meanest mercenary among 
men. 

In the Cincinnati post-office there was 
recently a competitive examination among 
the fourteen stampers to determine who 
should have a higher place with |300 addi¬ 
tional salary. The successful competitor 
reached over ninety-nine, while all of the 
others were under ninety-one. The test 
was relative rapidity at work. Under 
favoritism that one of the fourteen who 
had the strongest “ pull ” would have been 
promoted, but open competition elevates 
the best man without regard to “pulls.” 

When Collector Erhardt was forced out 
of office, the New York Tribune said of him : 

“ The republican party honored him with an office 


of great trust and responsibility. It supposed him to 
be a republican, a believer in its policies, anxious 
for its success in administration.” 

Ever since then events have happened 
logically and the New York Evening Fbst of 
July 12 adds the following interesting 
batch. 

Collector Hendricks has realized the expectations 
of the republican “boys” by taking the contract 
for cartage at the custom-house away from a wicked 
though efficient democrat, and giving it to a good 
republican who will let Barney Biglin and sundry 
other good republicans have slices of the $100,000 
a year involved. One of the chief complaints against 
Col. Erhardt was his action, or rather non-action, 
about this matter. He found the work in the hands 
of a democrat who was doing it satisfactorily, and 
when he advertised for new bids this democrat’s 
figures were the lowest. Accordingly Col. Erhardt 
allowed him to continue in charge of the cartage. 
As the Tribune says: “While the civil service law 
did not control the awarding of this contract yet the 
collector decided that Briggs should continue with 
the work, to sustain what was thought to be the 
spirit of the law.” In other words. Col. Erhardt 
actually tried to live up to the civil .service plank of 
the republican national platform of 1888, which had 
pledged the party toobserve “ thespiritaud purpose 
of the reform” everywhere. It was, of course, a 
fatal blunder, and he paid the penalty when he was 
compelled to tender his resignation. Collector 
Hendricks has a clearer understanding of the reason 
he was appointed, and the cartage business will now 
be controlled by George B. Deane, “ the leader of the 
ninth assembly district,” who will sub-let portions 
of the work to George W. Wanamaker, “the leader of 
the fifteenth assembly district;” George Hilliard, 
“leader of the twelfth district;” Barney Biglin of 
the eighteenth district and Leroy Jacobs of Green 
county. 

WHAT TO EXPECT. 

Commenting upon the platform Harper's 
Weekly of July 9, said, “ It is too much to 
suppose that with the present feeling of the 
democratic party, Mr. Cleveland’s admin¬ 
istration, however friendly to reform, 
would be, in the sense of the League, a civil 
service reform administration.” 

Of this the Indianapolis Sentinel of July 
13 says: 

“ Mr. Cleveland’s administration will be a 
democratic administration. The civil service 
laws and all other laws will be honestly en¬ 
forced. But we have no doubt that Mr. 
Cleveland will rid the public service as quickly and 
fully as practicable, consistent with the laws and 
public interests, of tbe republican partisans who 
have been given place by President Harrison, and 
that, in selecting their successors, good democrats 
will, other things being equal, be given the prefer¬ 
ence. Mr. Cleveland realizes the evils of the spoils 
system, but his experience has taught him that these 
evils can never be extirpated until the great party 
which for twenty-five years was debarred from all 
participation in the public service has been restored 
to an absolute equality in that respect with the op¬ 
position party. Civil service reform means that the 
public service shall not be a mere asylum for party 
workers, but it does not mean that one party shall 
monopolize government employment both when “in 
power ” and when “ out of power.” 

There is no more intelligent or zealous advocate of 
civil service reform than Harper's Weekly, and its sup¬ 
port of Mr. Cleveland, while admitting frankly that 
it does not expect him to give the country a civil 
service reform administration in the extreme sense 
of the League, is creditable to its good sense and 
fairness.” 

Whether Mr. Cleveland will give the 
country a civil service reform administra- 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


359 


tion “ in the extreme sense of the League” 
is not the question. Whether he will live 
up to his oath of office and to the fair in¬ 
tent of the platform upon which he is a 
candidate is the question. To say as this 
platform does that the “ civil service ought 
not to be subject to change at every elec¬ 
tion, be a prize fought for at the ballot- 
box, be a brief reward of party zeal,” and 
then proceed to make a clean sweep by 
turning out republicans and putting in 
democrats would not be living up to the 
platform but would be a treacherous repu¬ 
diation of it. Experience has never taught 
Mr. Cleveland that he can remedy ,the 
evils of the spoils system by turning over 
the service to democrats as spoil. It has 
taught him that he can in this way bring 
defeat to his party on every hand. 

A declaration that there ought not to be 
a change of the service at every election is 
a promise to take such measures as will 
put an end to such changes. The demo¬ 
crats, if successful, will have before them 
the plain duty, the opportunity, and the 
ways and means of forever ending the dis¬ 
graceful prostitution of the federal service 
to personal and partisan ends. Large ad¬ 
ditions to the classified service, the appli¬ 
cation of the system of the railway mail 
service to all higher grade post-offices and 
including the postmasters, the establish¬ 
ment of the regulations proposed in Mr. 
Andrew’s bill for the appointment of 
fourth-class postmasters, and the incorpo¬ 
ration of the Boston labor service system 
into the federal labor service are the great 
fundamental measures which will prac¬ 
tically complete the reform in the national 
service, and will be but meeting the fair 
and reasonable expectation to which Mr. 
Cleveland’s platform gives rise. 

' AMERICAN^UDALISM. 

It assumes, however,that official patroii- 
fage can he made a strong factor in secur¬ 
ing tlie renomination and re-election of a 
President, which is very donlitful. It 
must be remembered, also, that a Presi¬ 
dent who would prostitute the office in 
this way would be just tlie kind of man 
tliat the people would turn out at the end 
of four years. In tlie present state of pub¬ 
lic opinion on this question, it would be 
sure defeat for any President to have it 
known that he had used tlie power and 
patronage of his office to secure his renomi- 
natioii or tliat he was using it to secure his 
re-election. The people are not easily 
hoodwinked about such matters, and they 
can not be trifled with at all. —Indianapolis 
Journal, June 1//, 1892. 

THE LORI) PARAMOUNT. 

A few minutes before noon Russell Harri¬ 
son walked into the Fifth Avenue Hotel. He 
waived off the reporters and retired to the 


cafe with a Montana friend. Young Mr. 
Harrison’s appearance here at this time was 
not unexpected. He generally turns up at 
any place where there is to be a meeting 
affecting his father’s interests. None of the 
small politicians about the hotel approached 
the son of the President .—New York Evening 
Post, July 15. 

* » * 

Mr. Clarkson had invited the whole execu¬ 
tive committee to spend Sunday with him, 
but Mr. Fessenden went to Connecticut, Mr. 
Kerens went off with Russell Harrison.— 
New York Times, July 17. 

* * » 

Russell Harrison arrived at the Fifth Ave¬ 
nue Hotel early this morning. He went 
direct to Chairman Carter’s room .—-New York 
Evening Post, July 22. 

» * ♦ 

Chairman Carter and the members of the 
Republican National Executive Committee 
have again failed to hold the informal con¬ 
ference which has been on the programme for 
two weeks. Last night Mr. Carter went to 
Washington to get further orders from the 
President. To the politicians it appears that 
the chairman of the Republican National 
Committee is as much a subordinate of the 
President as he was when he held the United 
States land commissionershlp. He does noth¬ 
ing without consultation with Mr. Harri¬ 
son, and when he is in New York Russell 
Harrison is nearly always at his side .—New 
York Evening Post, July 27. 

* •» 

President Harrison and Mr. Carter dined to¬ 
gether at the White House, and then took a ride this 
evening, and came to an understanding concerning 
the preliminaries of the campaign. 

Jacob'M. Patterson, chairman of the cam¬ 
paign committee of the republican county com¬ 
mittee of New York has divided his time to¬ 
day between the White House, the treasury 
department, and Senator Hiscock’s rooms. 
He seemed to feel unusually “chipper” to¬ 
night, and the impression is growing that the 
custom-house commissionership he has been 
chasing so long is much nearer his hand than 
it was a month ago. The outlook in New 
York county has been carefully canvassed to¬ 
day by the President, Secretary Chas. Foster, 
Mr. Patterson, and Surveyor of the Port 
Lyon. — Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, July 21. 

« « • 

“It would be a great convenience if a tele¬ 
phone could be put in between the White 
House and the national republican committee 
headquarters, or if the President would im¬ 
itate the vice-presidential candidate and set¬ 
tle himself near the rooms where he is to con¬ 
duct his campaign,” said a gentleman yesterday 
who has been watching the struggles of the 
committee in its attempts to begin business. 
The remark was called out by the announce¬ 
ment that Chairman Carter was going to 
Washington again to submit some further 
details of the campaign to the President.— 
New York Times, July 27. 


The conference which Mr. Carter held yesterday 
in Washington with President Harrison, it is 
thought by the republicans, can not fail to be 
productive of good results. Whether, how¬ 
ever, the President has signified his willing¬ 
ness to accede to certain demands which Mr. 
Platt is known to have made, is a subject that 
is full of interest .—New York Evening Post, 
July 29. 

♦ * * 

J. S. Clarkson and J. N. Huston, of the 
National Republican Committee, joined 
Chairman Carter in Washington to-day. With 
Senator Felton, of California, they called at the 
White House and spent some time with President 
Hairison, discussing the political silufition and 
probabilities of the campaign. One thing 
that they talked of with much interest was 
the work of the literary bureau of the cam¬ 
paign, which is to be under Mr. Clarkson’s 
special management. Messrs. Carter and 
Clarkson lunched with the President, and in 
the afternoon and evening held conferences 
with numerous politicians who called to see 
them.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, July 29. 

» # * 

The conferences between the President and 
Chairman Carter, ex-Chairman Clarkson, Col¬ 
lector Hendricks, J. N. Huston of Indiana and 
others have led to all sorts of reports concern¬ 
ing the prospects for adjusting the troubles be¬ 
tween the President and the New York repub¬ 
lican leaders. The New York leaders refused 
to support the President without a definite un¬ 
derstanding regarding patronage. This was 
the situation when Chairman Carter, General 
Clarkson, Collector Hendricks and others visited 
Washington on Wednesday last.—New York Dis¬ 
patch to Boston Herald, August 1. 

* * * 

The President has had to-day his first vis¬ 
itor of note in the person of Collector Hen¬ 
dricks, of the port of New York. There is a 
delicate business under consultation. Mr. 
Hendricks slipped away from work and from 
the Fifth Avenue hotel on a moment’s notice. 
He did not even take the time to telegraph 
the President that he was coming. He told 
the World correspondent that his trip to Loon 
Lake was unexpected and would in all prob¬ 
ability last “a day or two.” That his busi¬ 
ness with Mr. Harrison was important he 
made no secret, but he declined to discuss it or 
give any one an idea of its nature. “Oh, no,” 
he declared, jocularly,■“ we are not a bit un¬ 
easy over the outlook. I have said time and 
again, and I still hold to the opinion, that the 
prospects for a republican victory are good, 
very good .—Loon Lake Dispatch to New York 
World, August 13. 

* » * 

The vicinity of Loon Lake assumed a 
slightly political air to-day. Francis Hen¬ 
dricks, collectm- of the port of New York, arrived 
and called upon the President. He was with 
the chief executive some length of time.— 

Loon Lake Dispatch to New York Press, Aug. 17. 

* * * 

It has been rather a busy day for the Presi¬ 
dent, Arising at about the usual hour he ate 









360 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


a hearty breakfast, and after the meal took a 
short walk of about a mile altogether. Then 
he saw Collector Hendricks. Mr. Hendricks came 
here upon a very important mission, as he informed 
The Press correspondent, but the nature of it 
he would not divulge. Mr. Hendricks left 
soon afterwards for New York.— Loon Lake 
Dispatch to New York Press, August 19. 

* * * 

No one knew that Elijah W. Halford, the 
President’s private secretary, was coming here 
yesterday, and when at noon, direct from 
Washington, he stepped into the Denison and 
registered everybody wanted to know the 
meaning of his visit at this time. Mr. Hal¬ 
ford was greeted by friends about the lobby 
and told them that he did not expect to come 
until later in the year, but that did not lessen 
the pleasure he had in being with Indianapolis 
friends once more. It was dull at Washing¬ 
ton, and he had, he said, a breathing spell of 
two or three days, which, on the spur of the 
moment, he decided to use in coming here, 
staying a day or two and going back. He as¬ 
sured inquirers that he was not on a political 
mission to prod Chairman Gowdy of the state 
central committee into something like activity. 
In the afternoon he was at the Central-ave. 
methodist Sunday-school, in which he has 
always had the liveliest interest.— Indianapolis 
Sentinel, August 15. 


PLACATING REBELLIOUS BARONS. 

PLATT. 

Mr. Reid’s task of making terms at the court 
of Thomas C. Platt, it was said yesterday, was 
likely to call into play all his powers as a dip¬ 
lomat. It was generally put down as being as 
delicate a thing to handle as any which _pame 
in Reid’s way while he was the minister to 
France. On the one side was placed the ob- 
stinancy of President Harrison, who hated to 
yield a point to an enemy with all theHoosier 
hatred for which he has become celebrated, 
and on the other the cool and dignified man¬ 
ner in which Mr. Platt sat back and refused 
to turn over his machine to anybody. —New 
York Times, July 15. 

* * * 

The failure of the executive committee of 
the republican state committee to meet yes¬ 
terday was a matter of general comment. 
That the real reason for the failure is that 
Thomas C. Platt, being still in a sullen mood, 
wants to point out to the President that he is 
not ready to go on with the campaign in this 
state, and that will not be until the President 
is ready to dicker with Platt, is very certain 
from all the evidence.— New York Times, 
July 17. 

* » » 

Jacob M. Patterson, of New York, regis¬ 
tered at the Arlington about 9 o’clock to¬ 
night. As soon as he had made arrangements 
fer a room with a breeze, he started for the 
apartments of Senator Hiscock and remained 
with the Senator until 10 o’clock. Soon after 
his arrival Mr. George W. Lyon^ surveyor of the 


port of New York, also placed his name on the 
Arlington register. Lyon and Patterson had 
a private confab after the latter left Mr. 
Hiscock. 

To all inquiries concerning their presence 
in Washington at this time they returned 
purely diplomatic replies. It is not long 
since Mr. Patterson was in Washington seek¬ 
ing an appointment as one of the commission¬ 
ers of the new custom-house in New York. 
He was not in very good odor with the ad¬ 
ministration then, and his appeal met with 
no response. Now that he is chairman of the 
campaign committee of the republican county 
committee, he feels that his chances have ma¬ 
terially improved. To-morrow he will call upon 
the President and Secretary Charles Foster, who 
rehtrned to the city to-day. 

Postmaster George T. Collins, of Brooklyn, is 
in Washington to-day trying to arrange for 
an enlargement of the force under his imme¬ 
diate control. He has a friend with a good-sized 
political ‘'pull” whom he would like to have made 
janitor of the new government building in Brook¬ 
lyn .— Washington Dispatch to New York Times, 
July 20. 

« * * 

Field Marshal Louis F. Payn, of Columbia 
county, looking a trifle subdued since his un¬ 
happy Minneapolis experience, and John E. 
Milholland of New York, came to town to¬ 
day. The field marshal is here in the role of 
Thomas C. Platt’s envoy extraordinary to the 
court of Benjamin I. Platt and the Presi¬ 
dent are “ getting together ” slowly. Payn is 
Platt’s trusted friend. The President is will¬ 
ing and anxious to obliterate the differences 
which have arisen between the administra¬ 
tion and the New York republican machine, 
as manipulated by Plait.—Washington Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, July 23. 

» ♦ * 

Mr. Carter came back from Washington two 
days ago. Yesterday he had an extended con¬ 
ference with Mr. Platt. Charles W. Hackett, 
chairman of the state executive committee, 
by grace of Mr. Platt, also called on that gen¬ 
tleman yesterday. These two calls were the 
chief events in the republican circle of poli 
ticians during the day.— New York Times, 
July 24 -. 

s » » 

Collector Francis Hendricks whose coming 
in the interests of harmony between the ad¬ 
ministration and Thomas C. Platt-has been 
heralded for several days, placed his neat au¬ 
tograph on the Arlington register this morn¬ 
ing. Mr. Hendricks went to the treasury de¬ 
partment and had a long talk with Secretary 
Charles Foster, and afterward he called upon 
the President and was closeted with him so 
long that the excuse advanced by Mr. Hen¬ 
dricks that he came to discuss departmental 
affairs is forced deep into the “chestnut” 
receptacle.— Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, July 29. 

» * * 

Chairman Thomas H. Carter, of the repub¬ 
lican national committee and James S. Clark¬ 
son, his predecessor, departed this evening for 


Old Point Comfort. Collector Hendricks left 
for New York on an afternoon train. Before 
thegentlemen leit they consulted ivith the President 
again regarding the political outlook. The impres¬ 
sion prevailing here is that when they reach 
New York they will be in position to tell Mr. 
Platt that he can begin running his machine on 
his own terms, and that the administration will 
not shove any bars between the spokes while 
the machine is in motion. “I am as certain 
there will be entire harmony between the 
President and Mr. Platt as I am that we are 
both standing here,” said Senator Hiscock to¬ 
night to a correspondent of the Times .— IFctsA- 
ington Dispatch to New York Times, July 30. 

• * * * 

Chairman Carter brought messages from 
the President to politicians in this state, and 
it was said the two members of the state com¬ 
mittee received a portion of them at the con¬ 
ference at headquarters. In substance, the 
messages from the President were that the 
New York committee would be allowed, and, 
in fact, was desired, to conduct the campaign 
in this state without much interference from 
the White House or the national committee, 
and, in case of victory, those who did the 
work would be entitled to such standing and 
influence at the White House as come to 
faithful laborers. Further than this, it was 
said, the President was not willing to specify. 
It was by no means certain in the minds of 
the leaders that this would be satisfactory to 
Mr. Platt. Some doubted if he would con¬ 
sider this an olive branch of sufficient size to 
make it worth his while to accept it.— New 
York Times, August 2. 

« « « 

The chief topic of conversation today 
among the few politicians in the hotel cor¬ 
ridors is the failure of Chairman Carter to 
secure suitable terms from the president to 
conciliate Platt and Miller. It is now thought 
that the New York bosses will stand aloof 
during the campaign. Their demand, as an. 
nounced in the Evening Post before Carter went 
to Washington, is that they be allowed to take 
entire charge of the campaign in this state 
and there should be no supervision from 
Washington or the national committee. The 
president has not been able to bring himself to 
place implicit trust in the men who abused 
him before and after the Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion. And so the breach widens. Platt spends 
his time at his office and at Manhattan Beach, 
Miller looks after his private business, and the 
Platt-Miller State Committee is taking a long 
vacation, while the national executive com¬ 
mittee is trying hard to make a show of doing 
something. That is the republican situation 
at present.— New York Evening Post, August 2. 

fit « « 

Mr. Platt had not been at the headquarters 
of the national republican committee since 
they were established, nearly three weeks ago. 
He has had interviews with few of the promi¬ 
nent republican leaders, and such as he has 
had have not been of his own seeking. He 
has kept away from the haunts of the politi- 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


361 


cians. Since Chairman Carter’s return from 
the White House, nearly a week ago, he and 
Mr. Platt have been strangers, and there have 
been no signs of the love feast and general 
getting into line and taking off of coats which 
were promised a short time ago .—New York 
Times, August 5. 

* * * 

Despite all reports the contrary, Mr. Thomas 
C. Platt and Whitelaw Reid came together 
yesterday. A little after 1 o’clock the repub¬ 
lican candidate for vice-president dropped 
into the office of the United States Express 
Company on Broadway, and a few minutes 
thereafter the two leaders were sitting vis a vis 
over a luncheon upon Mr. Reid’s invitation. 
Whether the long expected placatory dish 
was served on this occasion, or whether it has 
been deferred for some other occasion, only 
three men know—President Harrison, Mr. 
Platt and Mr. Reid. 

Those who are close to Mr. Platt make no 
hesitation in declaring that if Mr. Harrison 
wishes to deal with the ex-senator a compact 
must be drawn and duly signed and sealed in 
the presence of witnesses. These friends of 
Mr. Platt’s claim that twice within eight years 
he has been deceived by Presidents—by Gar¬ 
field in 1881 and by Harrison in 1889—and 
that if Harrison now aspires for his support 
he must give pledges that can neither be re¬ 
nounced nor broken. 

As a matter of fact, it is claimed by Platt’s 
friends that in the fall of 1888 Gen. Harrison 
promised, in the event of his election, that he 
would nominate Platt as secretary of the 
treasury, and, but for the interference of 
Warner Miller, that pledge would have been 
redeemed. Mr. Platt’s vindictive disposition 
was not so well known by Gen. Harrison then 
as it is now. At all events Platt habitually 
spoke of Garfield’s treachery to Mr. Conkling 
as the purest kindness compared with Harri¬ 
son’s treachery to him. — New York Times, .4m- 
g^^st 6. 

* * * 

The latest news is that if Thomas 0. Platt 
desires to establish himself on a peace footing 
with President Harrison he must get down on 
his marrow bones and ask to be forgiven for 
past sins and give signs that he will be sub¬ 
missive in the future. President Harrison, it 
is said, will make no attempt to “placate” 
him, and has indicated that for various 
reasons, which he has given to his confidential 
friends, it is a matter of indifference to him 
what attitude Mr. Platt may please to take 
during the next two months. Mr. Harrison 
has further indicated, so the report has it, that 
he is disgusted with the attempts which Mr. 
Whitelaw Reid and others have been making 
to secure favoring glances from tbe Tioga 
statesman, and will tolerate no more nonsense 
of that sort. These statements came from a 
source that is close, not only to the President, 
but also to the men who have charge of the re¬ 
publican campaign at both national and state 
headquarters. They were given as a condensed 
summary ojf 3 UJituber of interviews with the 


President and his managers .—New York Times, 
August 12. 

* * * 

The fact that Mr. Platt has joined forces 
with Mr. Harrison was announced formally 
and officially early in the evening. “ Chair¬ 
man Hackett of the state executive committee 
had an interview with Thomas C. Platt to-day, 
at which Mr. Platt expressed loyalty to the 
party, and said that he desired to take an act¬ 
ive part in the canvass and do all in his power, 
as he always has done, to bring success to the 
republican ticket.” These were the words in 
which the news was broken. This was coupled 
with the statement that Mr, Platt’s utterances 
were satisfactory to Mr. Hackett and led him 
to believe that Mr. Platt was proposing to do 
all in his power for the canvass in this state.— 
New York Times, August 18. 

i * « * 

Mr, Platt was good-natured yesterday and 
discussed somewhat the “official declaration” 
of his position. He said that it had not been 
his intention to make a formal declaration, 
although he had told Mr. Hackett that he 
might announce the fact that he was loyal to 
the ticket. Mr. Platt was said by some to 
have visited national republican headquarters 
again yesterday, although no official corrobo¬ 
ration of the statement could be secured. One 
of the officials in charge at headquarters, 
when asked whether the Tioga statesman had 
been there, winked one eye and said; “Well, 
there was a man here who looked very much 
like Mr. Platt. It may have been his double, 
if he has one .”—New York Times, August 19. 

QUAY. 

Senator Quay dropped into the city very 
quietly this evening, and expects to meet a 
few of the city leaders to-morrow. His com¬ 
ing was without herald beyond a brief tele¬ 
gram to ex-Collector Dave Martin, who met 
him in parlor 49 at the Continental Hotel 
shortly after 7 o’clock. The only other caller 
was Secretary Frank Willing Leach, whose 
specialty in this year’s campaign is the man¬ 
agement of the legislative districts. Mr. 
Richard R. Quay accompanied his father. 
The senator will return to Washington late 
to-morrow afternoon."' First on the list of his 
engagements for to-morrow -is his usual con¬ 
ference with Collector Cooper. Mr. Quay would 
not say that politics had anything to do with 
his visit .—Philadelphia Dispatch to New York 
Times, July 19. 

* * ♦ 

Thomas V. Cooper, collector of the port of Phila¬ 
delphia, had just gone up to see the national 
committeemen and candidate Whitelaw Reid, 
who made “his usual Tuesday call,” as one of 
the republicans described it, and was consult¬ 
ing with Chairman Carter. Mr. Cooper had 
been sent for. He is counted one of the most 
expert politicians in the Keystone state, hav¬ 
ing served at times on the state committee, of 
which he was once chairman. Just at pres¬ 
ent holding a fat position through the kind¬ 
ness of Mr. Harrison, he is one of the leaders 
of the administration crowd in his state, for 


politicians say that the classification is no 
longer made there on the Quay-Magee basis. 
There is no “Quay faction” and no “Magee 
faction,” but it is either administration or 
anti-administration. As Mr. Cooper would 
like to retain his present comfortable job for 
four years more, it is easy to define his stand¬ 
ing. Mr. Magee was in the city on Monday, 
and, after some extended conferences, it was 
thought best to ask Mr. Cooper to come up. 
It is believed that in his position, with the 
patronage of the custom-house, and assisted 
by Mr. Magee and others, he may be a valua¬ 
ble man in raising a good-sized contribution 
to carry on the campaign. He was for some 
time concealed in the private room up stairs 
where the campaign orders of President Har¬ 
rison are carried out .—New York Times, Au¬ 
gust 8. 

* * * 

Several Pennsylvanians who are counted as among 
those best calculated to raise money were at headquar¬ 
ters yesterday. Christopher L. Magee, whom the 
committee has come to regard as the successor 
of Quay as the recognized leader in the state, 
was there. He is supposed to have influence 
with the professional politicians. Collector 
Cooper, of Philadelphia, was also there. He 
is counted an able worker among federal 
office holders .—New York Times, August 19. 

* * » 

Mr. Quay sent a message to Mr. Carter, and 
Mr. Carter thought it of sufficient importance 
to warrant a quick trip to Philadelphia,where, 
it was said, Mr. Quay was. The message came 
at about the same hour that Mr. Platt sent for 
Mr. Hackett. There was for the first time in 
this campaign talk of “Quay’s mailed hand” 
which he was supposed to be stretching out in 
the direction of the machine again. Chair¬ 
man Carter returned to this city yesterday 
morning after a two day’s visit to Washington. 
—New York Times, August 18. 

» » » 

Chairman Carter got back from Philadel¬ 
phia and was at republican national headquar¬ 
ters early ye.sterday. Among the callers at 
headquarters yesterday were Solicitor of the 
Treasury Hepburn, and Minister to Denmark 
Clark E. Carr, who sailed yesterday. Chairman 
Hackett saw Mr. Carter late in the day, after 
one of the usual delays. Christopher L. Magee 
and Collector Cooper, of Philadelphia, also 
called .—New York Press, August 18. 

* «- ♦ 

Outside of Collector Cooper and ex-Collector 
Dave Martin, no one knew of Senator Quay’s 
intention to visit the city to-day, and a tele¬ 
gram apprised them of his coming. The sen¬ 
ator slipped into the Continental hotel just be¬ 
fore noon, accompanied by his son Dick. Dur¬ 
ing the morning Mr. Quay called at the Peo¬ 
ple’s Bank, the offices of the Traction Company 
and at the custom-house, where he met Col¬ 
lector Cooper. With this business over, he met 
Gen. Reeder at republican state headquarters 
and was in conference with him over an hour. 
Senator Quay’s principal caller was ex-Col¬ 
lector Martin, and the two were not only to- 









362 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


gether all the afternoon, but left the hotel 
together shortly before 6 o’clock.— Philadelphia 
Dispatch to New York Times, August 2S. 

» » * 

Now that Senator Quay and ex-Senator 
Platt have got into the republican band 
wagon the procession is ready to move. It 
promises to be a great procession and a long 
time passing a given point.— Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, August 20. 


THE ARMY OF FEUDATORIES AT 

WORK. 

John R. Leonard, who formerly trained with the 
“Slick Six," but is now doing a watchman's duty in 
the treaswy department at Washington, is in the 
city to see if the local republican organiza¬ 
tion is doing its duty. Leonard on Monday 
night dropped into the old soldiers’ meeting 
and took a seat near the door. “Why, halloo! 
Leonard, I did not know you were here,” said 
one of the veterans. “I didn’t see anything 
about it in the newspapers.” “No, I don’t 
want the newspapers to get on to it that I am 
here,” replied Leonard.— Indianapolis News, 
Judy IS. 

* * * 

Third Auditor Hart has gone to his home 
at Frankfort for a few weeks’ rest.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, July 25. 

• « « 

After a stormy session at the meeting at 
Cambridge City some months ago Capt. Frank 
Ellis, Mancie's post-office manager of Harrison 
affairs in Delaware county, was selected chair¬ 
man of the district. At yesterday’s meeting 
his resignation was accepted. Now the ques¬ 
tion that has set the Delaware republican 
tribe of anti-Harrison men to guessing is, 
what does it all mean, this manner of light¬ 
ning changes bn the quiet.— Muneie Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Sentinel, July SO. 

» * Sit 

At the meeting of the Allen county repub¬ 
lican central committee to-day Chairman 
Vesey did not resign, but Clark Fairbanks, 
committeeman from the First and Edward 
Sheltabarger from the Seventh ward, did. 
Eli Higgins, postmaster, ^vas elected to succeed 
Fairbanks.—Fort Wayne Dispatch to Indianapo¬ 
lis Sentinel, July 24- 

* * * 

Postmaster Higgins and President Harper, 
of the Morton club, were in secret conference 
all day. The Blaineites were in high glee 
and the Harrison men were in the depths of 
despair. A portion of the committee were in 
telegraphic correspondence with R. T. McDon¬ 
ald, who is in New York, and the other 
portion with Gowdy.— Indianapolis Sentinel, 

July 28, Fort Wayne Dispatch. 

» * * 

Col. Higgins, the dapper little postmaster, 
is wielding the headman’s ax dexterously or 
otherwise now. Some days ago he decapi¬ 
tated William Rockhill, postmaster at Areola, 
and selected in his place a renegade demo¬ 
crat, Dr. McGoogle, or some such name. Col. 
Higgins’ latest engagement on the block was 
to cut off the official head of R. Latham, 


postmaster at Huntertown, and put in his 
place A. G. Dunton. His work was confirmed 
at Washington yesterday.— Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, August 4, Fort Wayne Dispatch. 

» » • 

J. B. Throop, collector of internal revenue for 
the Terre Haute district, has not been attend¬ 
ing to his official duties personally since June 
28. The collector’s office is located in Terre 
Haute, but Mr. Throop, who resides in Orange 
county, it is said, has devoted nearly all of 
his time since June in repairing Harrison’s 
fences in the second congressional district.— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, August 24. 

* ♦ * 

William Petty and Bradley Connett, the 
two war politicians recently appointed in the 
government inspection service at Kingan’s, 
were the loudest kickers against Harrison the 
Blaine club took to Minneapolis. They were 
the leaders of the contingent that charged 
upon the Harrison drum corps in the West 
hotel and tore down the Harrison banners of 
the Columbia club. But now they are fixed 
with forteen-dollar per week jobs, these two 
patriots are shouting for Harrison and “pro¬ 
tection.”— Indianapolis Sentinel, August 24. 

» * * 

Hon. Blanche K. Bruce, ex-United States 
Senator, and at present recorder of deeds for 
the district of Columbia, is in the city, visit¬ 
ing his father-in-law. Dr. Joseph Wilson, on 
College avenue. Mr. Bruce is one of the 
most effective colored speakers, if not the 
most, in the United States, and has in his life 
been honored with many offices, elective and 
appointive. 

He was seen at the Denison Hotel last 
night and talked concerning the political 
situation happily and without reserve. “Presi¬ 
dent Harrison,” he said, “will undoubtedly 
have a much larger majority at the next elec¬ 
tion than he had at the last.” 

“Where will your work be done in the 
coming campaign ?” 

“I have been assigned by the national com¬ 
mittee to the middle and western states.”— 
Indianapolis Journal, August 1. 

* * * 

A number of young republicans have organ¬ 
ized a young men’s republican club, which it 
is intended to make a permanent organization 
on the order of the Marion club. Wednesday 
night they met in the United States marshal's 
office and admitted a number of new members. 
The club will meet regularly on Wednesday 
nights, at the same place, until they can secure 
quarters of their own.— Indianapolis Journal, 
August 20. 

* * * 

The republicans of this county opened the 
campaign to-day • * Smiley Chambers 

[United States district attorney] followed 
Shockney in a speech for two hours. * * 

—Noblesiille Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
August 29. 

» * » 

With this in view Eaves has resigned as 
stamp clerk at Statesville for the avowed pur¬ 
pose of running the campaign. He estab¬ 


lished headquarters here yesterday. He has 
already assessed every federal office-holder in 
the state, and Collector Rollins has appointed 
another son of Eaves a clerk in his office, 
making two of Eaves’s sons in his office, in 
order to furnish Eaves money in place of his 
salary as revenue stamp clerk.— Raleigh {N. 
C.) Dispatch to New York Times, July SI. 

♦ * * 

The most disgraceful scene ever witnessed 
among the g. o. p. politicians in this city was 
that of last evening at the police court room, 
when attempt was made to organize a Harri¬ 
son and Reid club. The paid hireling of the 
government— Collector Pew, and his retinue oj 
office-holders, save one. Postmaster Mansfield, 
were present.— Gloucester Dispatch to Boston 
Post. 

* * * 

I think a few of the many illustrations in 
this state would be of interest to your readers. 
During the recent county conventions I do not 
recall a single federal officer who did not take 
part in the wire-pulling. In Yakima county, 
for instance, among the delegates were the Indian 
agent and his employes, the register and receiver of 
the United States land office, the postmaster in the 
leading post-office, etc. When it is remembered 
that the local land officers occupy positions of 
a judicial nature, further comment is unnec¬ 
essary.— New York Evening Post Seattle Letter, 
Aug 15, 

* » * 

A regular meeting of the republican na¬ 
tional executive committee will be held this af¬ 
ternoon, and to-morrow a hearing will be given 
to A. H. Leonard of Louisiana, the republican 
candidate who polled 30,000 votes in the gub¬ 
ernatorial election last April. Mr. Leonard 
will ask the committee to use its power to “ call off'' 
Warmo^dh, the collector of the part of New Orleans 
who through control of federal patronage has built up 
a faction which destroys the harmony of the parly in 
Louisiana. Mr. Leonard will promise that if 
his recommendation is followed harmony will 
prevail and two republican congressmen will 
be elected, and two farmers’ alliance men, out 
of the delegation of six.— New York Evening 
Post, Aug. 15. 

* * * 

Although Chairman Carter of the national 
republican committee was in Washington 
yesterday, a large amount of work was turned 
oflT at headquarters. 

Among the callers yesterday were Congress¬ 
man J. C. Burrows, Senator Proctor and M. S. 
Colburn, of Vermont, ex-Congressman Horr 
and Collector Cooper, of Philadelphia.— New 
York Press, August 17. 

♦ • * 

Col. J. C. Hill, chief of the Indian division of 
the office of the secretary of the interior, has 
resigned to enter the campaign. He will be 
under the direction of the national republican 
committee.— Indianapolis Sentinel, Aug. 25. 

* * * 

Col. “ Dan ” Macauley, who holds a posi¬ 
tion in the treasury department at Washing¬ 
ton, was at national republican headquarters 
yesterday. He will remain during the cam- 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


363 


I 

I 


) 




paign as one of Chairman Carter’s assistants. 
It was announced that he would resign his 
position in the treasury department .—New 

York Times, Aua. 21. 

^ ♦ 

One occurrence has become public in these 
days which throws a significant light on the 
proceedings of the Minneapolis convention, 
and authorizes the gravest apprehension as to 
what the administration is capable of. The 
story is this: William D. Crum, a colored 
man, had for three years been seeking the 
appointment as postmaster in Charleston, 
South Carolina. President Harrison had 
steadfastly refused to appoint him. Crum 
then managed to be elected a delegate to the 
National Republican Convention. Arrived 
at Minneapolis, he gave out that he was going 
to vote for Blaine. Suddenly he changed his 
attitude, and announced himself as a sup¬ 
porter of Harrison. He voted accordingly. It 
was then said that Crum had been assured of 
his reward. From Minneapolis he went 
straightway to Washington and saw the Presi¬ 
dent. A few days later his nomination for 
the postmastership at Charleston was sent to 
the Senate. No sooner was this known in 
Charleston than indignant protests against 
the appointment poured into Washington. 
Crum was summoned before the post-office 
committee of the Senate, and the opposition to 
the appointment in that body became so 
strong that the President saw himself forced 
to withdraw the nomination.— Harper's Weekly, 
July 30. 

* * * 

Just before the convention began, members 
of the South Carolina delegation announced 
that Crum would vote for the President, and 
that in return for his vote he would receive 
the Charleston postmastership. It was even 
said that he had a written guarantee to that 
effect, made on behalf of the President, when 
Crum refused to accept a verbal promise. 

Crum came to Washington from Minne¬ 
apolis and saw the President. Soon afterward 
he was nominated for postmaster at Charles¬ 
ton. That his nomination was the result of a 
political deal was apparent. 

At the hearing last week before the com¬ 
mittee on post-offices it became apparent that 
Crum would not be confirmed. Senator Wol¬ 
cott asked him a number of leading questions 
concerning his action at Minneapolis, and 
finally threw him into confusion by asking 
him whether he did not pledge himself to 
vote Lr some person other than Harrison. 

“I don’t remember,” was all that Crum 
could say in reply.— Washington Dispatch to 
New York Times, July 16. 

THE SINEWS OF WAR. 

From a republican source comes the infor¬ 
mation that the calls which the republican 
state central committee are making for money 
for the campaign are already becoming oner¬ 
ous and are at this early day arousing some 
serious antagonism. Before the Minneapolis 
convention the requests for money began to is 
sue from the committee, according to the au- j 


thority here quoted. A circular was sent to 
every republican in the state who had been 
mentioned for nomination to state office, as¬ 
suring him that the only hope of republican 
success in the coming campaign lay in the re¬ 
nomination of Harrison, and calling on him to 
pay $50 to help defray the expenses of the state 
committee and of other influential friends of the 
President at the national convention. An ef¬ 
fort was also made to assess every delegate to 
the national convention $250 in addition to 
his personal expenses of attendance, the 
amount thus realized to be used to defray the 
expenses of the committee and Harrison work¬ 
ers at the convention. This last request was 
refused by the delegates at a rather stormy 
meeting, it is said, partly through the influ¬ 
ence of Charles F. Griffin,who made a computa¬ 
tion to prove that the total sum realized would 
be $7,500, and that that would be a great deal 
more than the committee would need. It is al¬ 
leged, too, that the pension office did not escape, 
but on the contrary, that it was assessed for 
$500,andpaid itpreliminary to the Minneapolis 
convention. Since the convention the de¬ 
mands for money have been heavy, it is said. 
The candidates have been assessed mercilessly, 
and each district committeeman has been in¬ 
formed that he is expected to see that the 
money prorated to his district is duly collected. 
The pension office, it is said, is not yet consid¬ 
ered to have done its part and has been called 
upon for $1,000 more. In response to this 
second call. Pension Agent Ensley is alleged 
to have openly rebelled, and there the mat¬ 
ter stands. In brief. Chairman Gowdy is cred¬ 
ited with greater boldness in soliciting cash 
than any of his predecessors for years.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, July 28. 

» » * 

About the first move Mr. Carter made when 
he became chairman was in the direction of a 
campaign fund. Lists of government em¬ 
ployes were desired, and he laid plans to 
secure them. At the meeting last night of 
the New York Republican Association Mr. 
Carter’s methods were plainly shown. He 
started out a fortnight ago to secure a list of 
all the New Yorkers employed in the govern¬ 
ment departments, and this association readily 
lent itself to his scheme. At last night’s 
meeting the announcement was made that the 
treasury, war department, and government 
printing office lists were complete, but that 
the post-office department declined to make 
up such a roster, because the clerks who 
would have to do it, were it ordered, had 
other and more important business to attend 
to. Mr. Wanamaker has in mind his recent 
experience with the civil service commission, 
in which his hide was gracefully removed, 
and, knowing the meaning of the demand for 
a roster of his subordinates, he does not pro¬ 
pose to render himself liable to further pun¬ 
ishment by furnishing it. 

The “nerve” of Carter is shown in a request 
made by the New York association for a list 
of civil service commission employes who be¬ 
long to New York.— Washington Dispatch to 
New York Times, Aug. 19. 


Treasurer Bliss of the national republican 
committee entertained a distinguished coterie 
of republicans, all possessed of standing in 
the party and considerable wealth, at the 
Union League Club house last night. It was 
an invitation “affair,” which was kept as 
secret as possible. “The Campaign, and How 
to Carry It On ” was the subject of the discus¬ 
sion, which was said to have been very in¬ 
formal. 

Among those who received invitations were 
Messrs. Clarkson, Kerens, and McComas of 
the national committee, and they were all 
there last night. Others present were Gen. 
Felix Agnus, editor of the Baltimore American; 
Alexander Shaw, of Baltimore, and W. W> 
Johnson, postmaster of that city; Christopher L. 
Magee, of Pittsburgh, CoUectw Thomas V. 
Cooper, of Philadelphia. 

Considerable significance was attached to 
the facts surrounding this gathering. Yester¬ 
day morning Chairman William Brookfield, 
of the state republican committee, returned 
from Loon Lake, where he had extended con¬ 
ferences with President Harrison. Yesterday 
afternoon Mr. Brookfield went to republican 
headquarters and had a confidential talk with 
some members of the committee who chanced 
to be present. Among others he talked with 
Mr. Carter. Some inclined to the belief last 
night that Mr. Brookfield indicated to Chair¬ 
man Carter some of the information given 
him by the President. On this point, however, 
those who were present gave no information 
for publication. 

It was said by some who commented on the 
meeting that Postmaster Johnson was not in¬ 
clined to pay much attention to the circular 
issued by the civil service commissioners, be. 
cause after the severely-plain English which 
Commissioner Roosevelt had used in regard 
to his observance of the civil service law he 
was disposed to treat any document signed by 
Mr. Roosevelt with utter disrespect. 

Collector Cooper, it was also said, was not 
disposed to let the circular interfere with his 
functions as a solicitor if he were called on to 
act in that capacity .—New York Times, August 
19. 

* * ♦ 

Pennsylvania, which is looked on as the 
harvest field for campaign funds, according to 
the best information is to be held largely 
responsible for the fight in that stale. Thomas 
V. Cooper, of Philadelphia, collector of the 
port, has been placed in direct charge of the 
southern portion of the state. He is also to 
have charge of Delaware. He is not only an 
expert in raising campaign funds in his own 
state, but has had experience in the intrica¬ 
cies of the politics of both states. He had a 
prominent hand in the management of the 
campaign in Delaware when the republican 
legislature was chosen which elected Anthony 
Higgins to the United States Senate four years 

ago .—New York Times, August 28. 

% « 

In discussing the late republican convention 
this afternoon, Mr. Clarkson said that one 
man who, as much as any other, was responsi- 












364 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


wt 


ble for the nomination of President Plarrison 
was Senator Philetus Sawyer, of Wisconsin. I 
“ Had he not been on the ground the vote of 
Wisconsin would have gone away from Har¬ 
rison,” said Gen. Clarkson. “ He did some of 
the heavy work of the week.” 

“How did he do it?” was asked. 

“ In the first place,” said Gen. Clarkson, “his 
very presence counted for a good deal. He is 
eighty years old and stands high among men 
in all parts of the country. Further than this, 
he is chairman of the senate committee on post- 
offices, and it has been my experience that post-offices 
are a not unimportant factor in politics.” — IPas/t- 
ington Dispatch to New York Times, June 26. 

* * * 

A serious charge is made in the third con¬ 
gressional district by one wing of the republi¬ 
can party against the other wing, which in¬ 
cludes several postmasters. Governor Burleigh 
is one of the four candidates for the congres 
sional nomination. Joe Manley, Mr. Blaine’s 
friend, is another, and he is the postmaster of Au¬ 
gusta. The postmaster of Waterville is a Milliken 
man. 

In the town of Vassalborough, twelve miles 
from Augusta and five miles from Waterville, 
there were mailed on the 3d, 4th, 5th and 6th 
of April last eighty sacks of a weekly news¬ 
paper, a publication entered as second-class 
matter. On these S40 postage was paid. In 
the eighty sacks were 33,000 papers, wrapped 
and addressed, one to each voter, in the dis¬ 
trict. 

These papers contained an article in the in¬ 
terest of Governor Burleigh. The sacks going 
south from Vassalborough went into the Au¬ 
gusta office all right. This much is known. 
There was a paper directed to each voter in 
Blaine’s home. Not one in ten of them has 
been delivered. Five business men doing 
business in one block declare they never saw 
the paper. Not over 200 delivered papers 
can be found in Augusta, where 2,000 were 
sent from a point only twelve miles away. 
Papers going north from Vassalborough went 
five miles and into the Waterville oflSce, 
and here all trace of thousands have been 
lost. 

Burleigh men and detectives have been hunting 
the district, and are satisfied that over forty of these 
sacks of mail have been destroyed in the interest of 
Manley and Milliken. A formal complaint and 
charge will be made against several officials, 
and another lot will be printed. The govern¬ 
ment will be asked to see to it that the mails 
are not looted. As the facts become known 
the indignation grows.— Bangor {Me.) Dispatch 
to Neiu York Times, May 27. 


CORRESPONDENCE. 

Rockville, Ind., Aug. 2, 1892. 
Editor Civil Service Chronicle: 

Dear Sir —I am pleased that your paper is 
outspoken on the only true line of reform. As 
a civil service reformer, I could not support 
Grover Cleveland in 1884, but was perfectly 
satisfied with his course as President. It was 


a “ stagger ” at reform from a very unexpected 
quarter. I therefore voted for him in 1888, 
when many who had voted for him four years 
before supported Harrison. It is quite plain 
that in spite of its past the democratic party 
is more progressive to-day than the republi¬ 
can. Respectfully, 

Isaac R. Strouse. 


Baltimore, Md., Aug. 3, 1892. 

To the Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle: 

Sir —I wish to thank you for the thorough¬ 
ness with which you have collected and 
published the facts as to the participation of 
federal officials in the work of the Minne¬ 
apolis convention. Ninety-five per cent, of 
the active politicians in each party are bit¬ 
terly opposed to the merit system. One na¬ 
tional convention has renominated the Presi¬ 
dent who is responsible for Wanamaker, 
Clarkson and Dave Martin, and who, in his, 
to a great e.vtent at least, personally conducted 
campaign for renomination, used the offices 
in bis gift for all they were worth. The 
other has asked the suffrages of the people for 
the author of the Fellows letter, the man who 
gave Vilas, Stevenson and Higgins a free 
hand. And yet each convention in making 
these nominations voiced the desires of the 
great mass of the best elements of their re¬ 
spective parties. Under such circumstances 
neither party is entitled to pose as a reform 
organization nor to ask the votes of reformers 
as such, and the reform vote will not all be 
cast one way. Those reformers who believe 
that the decalogue forbids a protective tariff, 
or that the federal control of congressional 
elections will be dangerous to local liberties 
and will produce violence and corruption in 
the cotton states, will doubtless vote for Mr. 
Cleveland. Those who believe in protection, 
together with those who are on the subject of 
the tariff economic agnostics, unwilling to 
turn things upside down, with little idea of 
whether such an overturning would produce 
good or ill results, or who believe that the 
constitutional gift of power to the federat 
government to regulate congressional elections 
imposes the corresponding duty to exercise 
that power when for any considerable period 
and over any large area the states have al¬ 
together failed to make such elections reason¬ 
ably free and fair, will support Harrison. 

While those who are inclined to view all 
the party cries as to a large extent insincere, 
and as shouted the loudest by men who are, 
after all, chiefly concerned in getting or keep¬ 
ing the oflSces, may find it as diflScult to agree 
as to what outcome of the election will do 
most good or perhaps least harm to the cause of 
civil service reform. The Chronicle believes 
that the duty immediately at hand is to pun¬ 
ish Harrison. The writer believes that it will 
be wiser not make the country believe that 
reformers are willing to vote for the man who 
allowed the civil service law to fall in many 
places into what he himself might call a state of 
innocuous desuetude rather than for the man 


under whose administration, in spite of the m 
grave and even scandalous failures to observe J 
its spirit outside of the classified service; f 
within that service the law has been reasona- ^ 
bly well enforced almost everywhere. The , 
Chronicle takes one side, the writer takes C 
the other. But let us agree that whatever 
side we take we shall do it with our eyes as ' 
wide open as past party affiliations and preju¬ 
dices will let us get them. Whether Harrison 
or Cleveland shall be elected whatever else is 
doubtful, it is certain that the reform will not 
long hold its own, much less go forward, un¬ 
less reformers mercilessly expose the failures 
of the men in power to obey the letter of the 
reform law and observe its spirit. Therefore, 
although a republican who expects to vote for 
Harrison, I rejoice in the persistency with 
which you hold up to public view the spoils 
mongering, no matter what party or man is 
responsible for it. J. C. R. 

Many voters will not agree with our 
correspondent upon the relative weight of 
things. The manipulation of the civil 
service by President Harrison is not sim¬ 
ply a brazen violation of his pledges. It is 
the most universal, unscrupulous and 
dangerous use of that service for personal 
ends that this country has ever witnessed. 

It is but a step from this to the tricks 
which Balmaceda undertook to play with 
the government of Chili. In the presence 
of this tendency, of which President Har¬ 
rison’s manipulation of his office-holders 
leading up to and at the Minneapolis 
convention, was a startling example, every 
other question is dwarfed. The President 
does not enact tariff laws or force bills. 
This President has very greatly increased 
the dangers to free institutions, which, as 
his platform said, “lurk in the power of 
official patronage.” The evidence is con¬ 
clusive against him. 


I beg to inclose a postal note in payment for 
your admirable paper. Hall Harrison. 
Ellicott City, Md. 


I enclose one dollar as subscription to the 
Chronicle to December, 1893. May you con¬ 
tinue long in the good work. 

Chas. H. Gilbert. 

Menlo Park, Cal. 


MASSACHUSETTS TO THE WILD 
AND WOOLLY WEST. 

We have received copy of paper bearing the 
name “The Civil Service Chronicle.” 
published at Indianapolis, Ind. Its chief ob¬ 
ject and aim seems to be to laud Cleveland and 
the democratic party, and to berate Harrison 
and the republican party. There is a vast 
deal of claptrap about civil service, and any¬ 
body taking stock in the fad is not wise.— 
Chelsea, Mass. Gazette, August 13. I 











H ' 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Tliis devotiou of party, not to the ends for which it exists, l)nt to the spoils that accompany success at the polls, has become so 
absolute that it has produced an evil greater than any wliicli party proposes to remedy.— George. William Curtis, at Baltimore, Ajnil, 1892. 


VoL. I, No. 43. INDIANAPOLIS, SEPTEMBER, 1892. teems:<( “rnuVer^opT' 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

We gladly give all possible space this 
month to the speech of George W. Julian 
delivered in this city, September 15, and 
which appeared in full in the Indianapolis 
Sentinel the next morning. We do this the 
more gladly because Mr. Julian is the first 
of his party, whether person or paper, to 
lay hold of the only issue in this campaign 
which is vital to the people and connected 
with the election of the next President— 
the abuse of his power over the civil serv¬ 
ice by President Harrison. It will be 
seen that Mr. Julian’s stroke was never 
more steady and certain. Nothing more 
entertaining from an intellectual and 
literary stand-point will be said in this 
campaign, and we commend the speech as 
an enunciation of the soundest principles in 
its denunciation of the unsoundest princi¬ 
ples by one who has no object in view but 
to serve his country. 

The speech delivered by Mr. Foulke be¬ 
fore the Keform Club of Boston, September 
10th, was received at the last moment, and 
it is with regret that the Chronicle can not 
find room for all of it. It was published 
in full in the New York Evening Ibst, of 
September 15th, and in the New York Times 
of 16th. It is the speech of a man who 
justly feels that it is his peculiar duty to 
stand forth and declare the worst that can 
be said of a President—the bad faith of 
President Harrison. The declaration comes 
with a power which might be expected from 
the indisputable facts and Mr. Foulke’s 
well known ability to arrange them, aided 
by the irresistible incentive that he is en¬ 
gaged in behalf of a great and outraged 
cause. 

The democratic platform touching the 
civil service is in marked contrast with 
that of the republicans. The democrats 
must be held to believe in their declara¬ 
tion, and in addition they clearly made it 
to induce the independent vote to unite 
with them. The platform is a promise to 
render it impossible for the service to be 
subject to change at every election, or to 
be a prize to be fought for at the polls, or 
to be a brief reward of party zeal. Those 
independents who design voting for Mr. 
Cleveland have a right to rely on this 


promise. Nothing but the convention 
itself can modify it, and all attempted 
modifications by local papers or personages 
may be disregarded. We do not mean to 
say that living up to this platform would 
be welcomed by all democrats. There are 
yet in Indiana, for instance, a class of rock- 
ribbed, hide-bound, and moss-backed dem¬ 
ocratic politicians who never had and 
never will have a single political idea ex¬ 
cept looting the offices. They care noth¬ 
ing upon what issue a campaign is argued, 
so that nothing is said or done that will 
make it more difficult to seize the spoil of 
victory. Any side of the tariff question 
is, they think, a haven of safety; they are 
not particular what side, and as likely as 
not after success at the election they will 
be found lobbying against the very tariff 
legislation which they said their success 
in the election would bring about. Inde¬ 
pendents understand this class. They are 
not so numerous nor so strong as they 
were, but they are still here. Unfortu¬ 
nately for them, their party in national 
convention has put them in close quarters. 


Upon this issue the republicans are as 
dumb and helpless as they were upon the 
issue involved in the Mulligan letters in 
1884. Every night they go to bed rejoic¬ 
ing that they have had no general attack 
at the only point at which they can make 
absolutely no resistance. For instance, no 
one here, in the President’s own city, will 
answer Mr. Julian’s attack for the simple 
reason that it is unanswerable. Yet the 
acts charged are of such a nature that if 
they can not be denied they must, with a 
large body of voters, unfit for re-election 
the man who has committed them. To say 
otherwise is to say that the American 
people are hopelessly venal. To convince 
them is only a question of a forcible, re¬ 
iterated and persistent presentation of the 
facts. 


Zealous tariff reformers are apt to 
urge that until that question is settled, 
the civil service can* not be reformed. 
This is nonsense. The tariff situation does 
not materially differ from the tariff situa¬ 
tion of 1844. The democrats then won a 
great victory upon that issue. Yet the 
spoils system was in greater vigor than 
ever. In 1848 the democrats were totally 
defeated. Nothing was settled except a 


redistribution of spoil. Suppose the coun¬ 
try were carried now ostensibly for tariff 
reform. In the course of time a consider¬ 
ably moderated tariff' might be the result; 
it would depend upon the effect the party 
machine thought a given bill would have 
upon its hold upon the offices. That and 
nothing else would fix the course followed. 
The fact becomes more prominent every 
day that no public question will or can re¬ 
ceive more than hand-to-mouth treatment 
while an enormous federal patronage re¬ 
mains a prize to be fougbt for at the polls. 
When voting for President two things 
should be remembered: he is an executive 
officer; he does not make tariff laws and 
all his other duties put together are noth¬ 
ing compared with his duty of superin¬ 
tending the civil service. A voter should 
also remember that he can, when voting 
for his congressman, completely perform 
his duty toward any question requiring 
legislation. 


It is a matter of universal remark that 
the campaign seems “dead.” It seems 
settled that neither candidate from his 
personality nor either side of the tariff 
question can “rouse” the people. The rea¬ 
son of the lack of interest is the lack of 
prominence of any moral issue. The only 
moral issue in this election is President 
Harrison’s course with the civil service, 
with particular reference to the dangers 
to free institutions arising from his per¬ 
sonal use of it, which finally led up to the 
formation and manipulation of the Minne¬ 
apolis convention. It would be an insult 
to the people of Indiana, for instance, to 
say that all are not interested in this vital 
question; but there are in this state fifteen 
to twenty thousand voters who have a keen 
and abiding interest in it. They are usu¬ 
ally quiet people scattered through all the 
hamlets, country-sides and cities of the 
state. The party-worker rarely knows of 
them. He says there are no such voters, 
and in polling his district he, in dense ig¬ 
norance, puts them down as democrats or 
republicans. They pass nominally as such, 
and unless stirred by facts and arguments 
they are apt to vote with their nominal 
party. The democrats within the line of 
their platform have facts and arguments 
which can be made to stir these voters as 
they were never stirred before, but they 
will have to be used. 





























366 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


There are, however, some obstacles in 
the way of securing for the democrats the 
widest presentation of the case against Pres¬ 
ident Harrison. We hear, for instance, of 
democratic leaders in Indiana who have al¬ 
ready fixed upon the offices that they will 
take if Mr. Cleveland is elected, and this 
report involves even the subsidizing of 
Democratic newspapers. Of course so far 
as these have anything to do with the cam¬ 
paign they will have nothing to say of the 
evils inherent in the distribution of spoil 
by President Harrison. They are, in fact, 
already muzzled. This quite authentic 
report makes some things plain which 
were before obscure. 

We give President Harrison the full 
benefit of what he said of the civil service, 
in his letter of acceptance: 

The civil service system has been extended and 
the laws enforced with vigor and impartiality. There 
has been no partisan juggling with the law in any of 
the departments or bureaus as had before happened, 
but appointments to the classified service have been 
made impartially from the eligible lists. The sys¬ 
tem now in force in all departments has for the first 
time placed promotions strictly upon the basis of 
merit as ascertained by the daily record, and the 
efficiency of the force thereby greatly Increased. 

Mr. Roosevelt produced conclusive evi¬ 
dence that certain officials in Baltimore 
had violated the civil law. This was months 
ago. Those officials are in office to-day. 
The President knows that the evidence is 
conclusive. 

The President also says in the same let¬ 
ter: 

I have endeavored, without wavering or weari¬ 
ness, so far as the direction of public affairs was com¬ 
mitted to me to carry out the pledges made to the 
people in 18S8. 

The displacement of more than 100,- 
000 officers to make room for parti¬ 
sans and relatives would have wearied 
an ordinary man. Probably he rested 
while adding 832 places to the classified 
service. 


Herbert Welsh has an entertaining 
and valuable article in the September Fo¬ 
rum on publicity as a cure for corruption, 
with particular reference to the work of 
campaign committees. The very fact that 
secrecy is sought is proof that the commit¬ 
tees know that the public would not ap¬ 
prove of their use of money. It does not 
take a large amount of money in any com¬ 
munity to meet all of the expenses of an 
honorable campaign. The committee and 
the beneficiary mutually shrink from hav¬ 
ing the public know that the latter’s house 
rent has been paid, for the public would 
correctly denominate the act as the pur¬ 
chase of a “ floater.” The good influence 
of an honest publication of accounts is 
clear. Mr. Welsh says of the main ques¬ 
tion: 

“It is becoming more and more apparent to 
thoughtful men that no question before the country 


to-day is of greater national importance than that of 
civil service reform, the question whether the public 
funds represented by the salaries of the one hundred 
and twenty-five thousand officers of the civil service, 
aggregating sixty million dollars annual expendi' 
ture, shall be used in the interest of the people or 
whether they shall continue to furnish an Immense 
bribery fund by which a small but highly organized 
class of professional politicians shall acquire and 
maintain their power." 

Mr. Louis H. Gibson, the well-known 
architect of this city, recently read before 
the Century Club a paper on “The Relation 
of the Civil Service to Comfortable Living 
in Cities.” Mr, Gibson has carefully stud¬ 
ied the street and road question and city 
government generally in Europe, and the 
foundation of all he has to suggest—and he 
has much to suggest—is that the service of 
cities must be skilled, and to be skilled it 
must be permanent. He incontestibly 
maintains that street-cleaning is skilled 
labor. Here is an extract: 

“ In order to carry out all of these vast undertak¬ 
ings the work must be done by those having special 
knowledge; it must be done by men especially edu¬ 
cated for the kind of work in hand. In order to se¬ 
cure such educated service there must be assurance 
that individuals will be as regularly employed as in 
any private enterprise, entirely independent of po¬ 
litical belief. There is no more reason why any 
matter of politics should have to do with municipal 
service than with ordinary business enterprises. In 
general business, active political interest is regarded 
as a demerit rather than otherwise. The only thing 
needful for proper municipal administration is edu¬ 
cated service. W'hat is wanted is knowledge. In 
order to secure this knowledge there must be a rea¬ 
sonable assurance of employment." 


It seems to be undisputed that a local 
politician here named Bradley Connett, 
was much opposed to President Harrison’s 
renomination; that he afterward assumed 
such a threatening attitude toward his 
party that he was given a place in the govern¬ 
ment meat-inspection department which is 
located at Kingan & Co.’s in this city. If 
true, is this, or is it not, a purchase of the 
influence of Connett, giving him therefor 
a public office ? If so, is that, or is it not, a 
corrupt use of public office ? Again, Mer¬ 
rill Moores, the chairman of the republi¬ 
can county committee, has been endeav¬ 
oring to bully Postmaster Thompson, of 
this city, into making places in his office 
for certain republican henchmen, who also 
made threats. There is no claim of in¬ 
competency on the part of the employes 
sought to be displaced. We repeat that 
the man who will not work for his party 
unless he is paid with an office is the 
meanest mercenary among men. 

In the August examination for carriers 
in the Indianapolis post-office three colored 
men were successful and one of them 
stood at the head of the whole list. The 
merit system is the truest democracy con¬ 
nected with our government, and there is 
no race for whom it has such benefits in 
store as it has for the colored people. 


GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS. 

It is hard to find words to express what 
deserves to be said of George William Cur¬ 
tis. From the beginning, his was an un¬ 
ceasing effort to make his country and his 
fellow Americans better. His career 
stretches over two great epochs, the one 
characterized by the Philadelphia mob,the 
other by the Jay Hubbell campaign text¬ 
book. In the full maturity of his powers 
the war against slavery enlisted all his 
strength and to the victorious end he 
was a foremost leader. When that was 
over, his unerring judgment selected the 
uprooting of venal practices in public rela¬ 
tions, the eradication of the element of 
spoil in the transaction of American pub¬ 
lic business as the greatest service which 
could be rendered to the country. To this 
end the merit system and the various re¬ 
forms which have the general name of civil 
service reform are indispensable helps. 
How easy it would have been for him to 
fatten upon the country. For allegiance 
to his party, right or wrong, there was 
nothing it would not have given him. How 
easy to have held sinecure offices until he 
became rich. How easy to have have en¬ 
joyed the best at foreign courts. Either 
could have been had if he would but make 
the sacrifice of leaving undone the 
work which he knew was the greatest 
which could be done for his country. He 
refused the English mission and became 
one of the first civil service commissioners. 
In entering upon the war against the spoils 
system, he undertook one of the greatest 
reforms that has ever been attempted in a 
commonwealth, and yet it was an humble 
task. Venality in public affairs, a feeling 
that in public business it was to be ex¬ 
pected that there would be something over, 
for which the recipient had not given value 
but which accrued to him by reason of pol¬ 
itics, had thoroughly debauched the public 
conscience. The multitude did not join in 
the new reform. Party leaders passed by 
on the other side with coarse abuse. It 
however gathered strength and then the 
sting and smart of defeat wrung 
great tears of repentance from party ma¬ 
chines. Step by step the reform made its 
way until it became rooted so firmly that 
it can not be overturned. How small and 
mean the political Hubbells now seem. 
Of all the leaders in this crusade George 
William Curtis was without question the 
first; and no leader ever had greater love 
and no leader’s memory greater respect 
and reverence from his associates. He 
has trained them well. It is with no sense 
of weakness that they mourn his death. 
They look with confidence into the fu¬ 
ture. Their hands are not stayed but 
strengthened by the responsibility laid 
upon them. The greatest monument they 


















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


367 


can build to George William Curtis will be 
to complete his work, and it shall be done. 

MR. JULIAN’S ADDRESS. 

I propose this evening to devote a b^ief hour 
to the discussion of a single issue of the pend¬ 
ing campaign, namely, the reform of the civil 
service; and I have chosen this topic for rea¬ 
sons which will abundantly appear as I pro¬ 
ceed. This issue was involved in the canvass 
of 1888, but the attitude of the opposing can¬ 
didates was then strikingly different. Mr. 
Cleveland had already tried his hand at civil 
service reform, and although his actions had 
disappointed the hopes and expectations of a 
portion of his friends, and were severely criti¬ 
cised, yet he did more for the cause than any 
President had done since the inauguration of 
the spoils system. It should be remembered, 
moreover, that what he accomplished was pre¬ 
eminently his own work, for the leaders of his 
party generally disagreed with him, while the 
time-honored policy and traditions of the par¬ 
ty itself stood in his way. General Harrison, 
on the contrary, had his party behind him, or 
at least a powerful sentiment in the party, and 
its declaration of principles was not only 
sweeping and unconditional, but it embodied 
specific and detailed pledges which could not 
possibly be misunderstood. Indeed, both the 
'party and the candidate seemed to gather 
strength and courage from the alleged short¬ 
comings of Cleveland and to be hungry for 
the conflict and eager to demonstrate their 
faith by their works. Here is their platform : 

We will not fail to keep our pledges because their 
candidate' has broken his. We therefore renew our 
declaration of 1884, to wit: "The reform of the civil 
service, auspiciously begun under a republican ad¬ 
ministration, should be completed by the further 
extension of the reform system already established 
by law to all the grades of the service to which it is 
applicable. The spirit and purpose of the system 
should be observed in all executive appointments, 
and all laws at variance with the object of existing 
reform legislation should be repealed, to the end 
that the dangers to free institutions which lurk in 
the power of official patronage may be wisely and 
effectively avoided.” 

In his letter of acceptance General Harrison 
adopted these declarations as his own, and 
said: 

In appointments to every grade and department 
fitness and not party service should be the essential 
and discriminating test, and fidelity and efliciency 
the only sure tenure of office. Only the interest of 
the public service should suggest removal from office. 

In speaking of the civil service law he de¬ 
clared : 

The law should have the aid of a friendly inter¬ 
pretation and be faithfully and vigorously enforced. 
All appointments under it should be absolutely free 
from partisan considerations and influence. 

In his inaugural address he declared : 

Heads of departments, bureaus and all other pub¬ 
lic officers having any duty in connection therewith 
will be expected to enforce the civil service law fully 
and without evasion. 

In this address he took occasion to say : 

We may reverently invoke and confidently expect 
the favor and help of Almighty God; that he will 
give to me wisdom, strength and fidelity, and to our 
people a spirit of fraternity and a love of righteous- 
ne.ss and peace. 


This zeal for civil service reform was not 
new-born. It seems to have been the travail 
of his soul while he was a member of the senate, 
and in a speech on the subject on the 26th of 
March, 1886, he delivered himself as follows : 

1 do lift up a hearty prayer that we may never 
have a President who will not either pursue, and 
compel his cabinet advisers to pursue, the civil serv¬ 
ice policy pure and simple, and upon a just basis, 
allowing men accused to be heard, and deciding 
against them only upon competent proof and fairly 
—either have that kind of civil service, or, for God’s 
sake, let us have that other frank and bold, if brutal 
method, of turning men and women out simply for 
political opinion. Let us have one or the other. 
They will not mingle. It was the conflict of these 
currents—the President on one side endeavoring to 
be responsive to his self-imposed pledges, and the 
pressure of his party on the other, that has driven 
those who were at the heads of the departments in 
the attempt to preserve and maintain the President’s 
professions and at the same time to give to the hun¬ 
gry who were demanding to be fed—it was an at¬ 
tempt to reconcile the irreconcilable that has brought 
this wretched condition of things in which men and 
women are condemned without a hearing. 

No words in the English language could 
more absolutely have bound the judgment 
and conscience of Gen. Harrison to the sup¬ 
port of civil service reform than did the ex¬ 
tracts I have quoted. They imported pro¬ 
found earnestness and absolutely sincerity. 
They not only committed him to the reform 
without qualification, but they brought him 
to the front as its chief prophet. His devo¬ 
tion to it seemed to be a fascination, and his 
reference to the recreancy of his predecessor 
gave evidence that his heart palpitated and 
his soul panted for the great cause. His fer¬ 
vent words could fairly be accepted as the 
evangel of political righteousness, while his 
earnestness was attested by the sanctities of 
religion. He was known to be a devout mem¬ 
ber of the Presbyterian church. He was an 
elder in the church, which is a priestly oflice 
and a spiritual dignity. He was so straight- 
laced in his Puritanism that he would not 
travel on Sunday. He was a man of prayer, 
and this has not been kept from the public; 
for the newspapers emphasized the fact that 
on his journey to Washington in the spring of 
1889 he attended to his morning devotions in 
the palace car in which he journeyed. Would 
such a candidate for the presidency violate 
his plighted faith to the nation ? Would a 
religious man and a Presbyterian elder look 
heaven in the face with a lie on his lips? He 
was as sacredly bound to maintain the spirit 
and purpose of civil service reform in all ex¬ 
ecutive appointments, and to make fitness and 
not party service the essential and discrimi¬ 
nating test in appointments and removals, as 
Abraham Lincoln was bound to maintain the 
prohibition of slavery in our territories in 
1860; with this diflerence, that Lincoln could 
do nothing without the help of congress, while 
Gen. Harrison could perform nearly all his 
promises without legislative aid. He was far 
more explicitly committed to the reform of 
the civil service by reiterated pledges and as¬ 
severations than he was committed to the 
force bill or the principles of protection. The 
people so understood him and trusted him. It 


was their faith in his promises which made 
him president. The contest was a close one, 
and there were independent voters enough in 
New York and New England alone who de¬ 
serted Cleveland and threw their votes for 
Harrison to turn the scales in his favor. One 
possible way was only left open by which he 
could defend himself against the charge of 
obtaining the presidency by false pretenses if 
elected, and that was the proof of his sincer¬ 
ity by performing his resounding promises. 

But I come now to the painful part of my 
duty. In his inaugural address, from which 
I have already quoted. General Harrison said: 
“ Retrospect will be a safer basis of judgment 
than promises.” This is most true. Men are 
to be judged by what they perform, and not 
by what they promise. In the forum of mor¬ 
als and religion it is not the men who content 
themselves with crying “Lord, Lord,” hut the 
doers of the word who are to be recognized, 
and the moral world would be turned upside 
down if any other principle should prevail. 
General Harrison invites us to try him hy 
his acts, and his own words must be my text. 
It will not be necessary to go extensively into 
details, and I shall therefore only refer to a 
few conspicuous cases which will serve as cru¬ 
cial tests of his honesty and consistency in dis¬ 
pensing the federal patronage. 

Soon after his inauguration he was called 
upon to deal with the post-office of New York 
City. Pearson was the postmaster, and had 
been appointed by Garfield in 1881 as the suc¬ 
cessor of Postmaster James, who had conduct¬ 
ed the office so admirably that he was after¬ 
ward made postmaster-general. Pearson so 
improved and perfected the management of 
the office and so completely lifted it out of the 
mire of party politics and made it a great 
business concern that Cleveland, when his 
term expired, reappointed him, which he did 
against the powerful opposition of his own 
party leaders. * * ♦ 

Let me refer to the case of Mr. Saltonstall, 
collector of the custom-house at Boston, who 
was removed from office early in the following 
year before the expiration of his term, and 
solely for political reasons. He was accepta¬ 
ble to men of all parties and was universally 
regarded as one of the best collectors that had 
ever occupied the office. * * • 

In March, 1891, General Corse was displaced 
from the post-office at Boston. He was gener¬ 
ally regarded as the best postmaster Boston 
had ever had, and all parties desired his re¬ 
tention. Even Senators Hoar and Dawes, not¬ 
withstanding their proverbial partisan zeal, 
together with four Massachusetts representa¬ 
tives, joined the people in the demand for his 
continuance in office. He was the head of the 
Loyal Legion and one of the best generals in 
the war for the Union. As a man, an officer 
and a citizen he was popular, and there was 
not even the shadow of a reason for his dis¬ 
placement. The gentleman who succeeded 
him declared that he knew nothing about the 
business of the office, and he had signed a pe¬ 
tition for the retention of the incumbent. He 








368 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


had further declared that “if the interest of 
the public service is to decide, General Corse 
will be renominated.” * • » 

Another remarkable case is that of Mr. 
Burt, naval officer of New York, who was re- 
•moved in the summer of 1889. He had not 
filled out his term of office under his appoint¬ 
ment by Cleveland, but was summarily dis¬ 
missed at the bidding of ex-Senator Platt for 
political reasons only. He had been twenty 
years in the public service and was well 
known as a determined friend of the civil 
service policy. He was a trained officer, thor¬ 
oughly familiar with the duties of his posi¬ 
tion, and as thoroughly conscientious in dis¬ 
charging them. Like Pearson, he was suc¬ 
ceeded by a man who was unfamiliar .with the 
work of the office and opposed to the civil 
service law; and the inference is irresistible 
that the change was made for no other pur¬ 
pose than to make the office a party machine 
under the control of Platt, to whom the federal 
patronage of the state was farmed out by the 
President. 

A more shocking illustration of the Presi¬ 
dent’s faithlessness was given soon after his 
inauguration in his action touching the bureau 
of printing and engraving. This is one of the 
chief bureaus in the treasury department, and 
it controls more places not included in the 
classified service than all the other treasury 
bureaus combined. Under different adminis¬ 
trations preceding that of Mr. Cleveland it 
had become notorious as the refuge of para¬ 
sites and spoilsmen, and an investigating com¬ 
mittee of experts in the treasury had reported 
that a force which in some divisions was twice 
and in others three times as large as was nec¬ 
essary had been employed, and that more than 
half the force in the bureau might be dis¬ 
pensed with. President Cleveland, soon after 
his inauguration, selected the chairman of 
this committee, E. O. Graves, as the chief 
of the bureau. Graves was an independent 
republican, but was appointed by Cleve¬ 
land and warmly supported by Secretary 
Manning on the score of his rare qualifications 
for the work and his proved fidelity. He did 
not wait for civil service rules and regulations 
but courageously applied the principles of re¬ 
form so as to make the bureau a strictly busi¬ 
ness establisment. No employes were dis¬ 
charged for political reasons or to make places 
for others. * * * 

Let me mention one further illustration. 
Under the administration of President Arthur 
a lady named Isabella de la Hunt was ap¬ 
pointed postmistress atCannelton, in this state, 
on the recommendation of Senator Harrison. 
She was the widow of a soldier who died of 
wounds received in the service. I think it was 
on some complaint of offensive partisanship 
that she was removed under Cleveland’s ad¬ 
ministration and a democratic politician and 
editor appointed in her place. Senator Har¬ 
rison was exceedingly indignant, and was at 
once overtaken by one of his spasms of virtue 
and patriotism. He said : 

If there was in all this country one person who, by 


reason of her sex, who by reason of her widowhood- 
who by reason of the sacrifice she made in giving the 
arm on which she leaned to her country’s service, 
was entitled to be kept in office, was entitled to have 
her reputation guarded jealously by all men who 
represented the government, it was Mrs. Isabell de 
la Hunt. 

This is very fine ; but let us follow the case a 
little further. Senator Harrison afterwards 
became President, and Mrs. Isabella de la 
Hunt, whom he had taken under his wing 
with such fatherly tenderness, asked him to 
restore her to the place from which she had 
been driven. What did Elder Harrison do? 
Did he visit the widow in her affliction? Yes, 
but his visit was a visitation. He gave the 
office to a male applicant, and this poor wo¬ 
man, “who by reason of her sex, who by rea¬ 
son of her wTdowhood, who by reason of the 
sacrifice she made in giving the arm on which 
she leaned to her country’s service,” was 
turned over to the consolations of religion and 
the hope of a better world, and to meditations 
on the blessedness and beauty of civil service 
reform as illustrated by a ruling elder in the 
Presbyterian church. It seems as if the Presi¬ 
dent was determined to leave no manner of 
doubt in the mind of any man or woman re¬ 
specting his brazen infidelity to his jiledges. 
It is true that his friends have tried to excuse 
him in this case on the plea that it was Clark¬ 
son, his wicked partner, who did this out¬ 
rageous thing, but as Clarkson was the Presi¬ 
dent’s subordinate, and under explicit instruc¬ 
tions to enforce the civil service policy 
“without evasion,” and inasmuch as the Pres¬ 
ident never put him under discipline for this 
“ bold if brutal ” act, it would seem to be pret¬ 
ty clear to a layman that this defense simply 
aggravates his recreancy. He was bound to 
watch his subordinate. It was his duty to 
keep alive the fires of his chivalric devotion 
to the fortunes of this widow, whose case only 
a little while before had so roused his indig¬ 
nation. * * * 

Let me proceed with my subject in the way 
of further illustrations. I understand the 
fundamental principle of civil service reform 
to be that in all executive appointments fidel¬ 
ity and efficiency, not party service, should be 
the tenure of office. This is the President’s 
creed, and keeping it in mind I wish to inquire 
why John Wanamaker was made postmaster- 
general. It is true that, like the President 
himself, he is a religious man and zealously 
devoted to the interests of the church and the 
Sunday-school. But these qualifications were 
not sufficient in a cabinet minister. He was 
wholly unknown to the public as a statesman 
or even a politician. He was a successful 
Philadelphia shop-keeper and a man of wealth. 
According to the high authority of Mr. Her¬ 
bert Welsh, he also had a “ reputation for 
skill in diving into the depths of political 
waters and fetching brilliant results to the 
surface.” What strange influence all at once 
brought such a man before the eyes of the na¬ 
tion as the incumbent of a great office ? Who 
believes he would ever have been thus hon¬ 
ored for his piety merely, if he had not pos¬ 


sessed more solid charms? The explanation 
is an open secret. Near the close of the cam¬ 
paign of 1888, when the contest grew doubt¬ 
ful and money was sorely needed, especially 
in such pivotal states as Indiana, where Dud¬ 
ley was organizing his “ blocks-of-five ” and 
furnishing them with funds for the conversion 
of the heathen. Senator Quay asked Wana¬ 
maker to take the lead in raising $400,000 for 
the blessed work. The request was responded 
to favorably, and Wanamaker himself has 
since admitted in a public interview that 
more than $200,000 were raised, and that he 
paid $10,000. In that interview he said: “I 
had a large experience in raising money from 
my connection with the Christian association 
and other enterprises.” Harrison was elected 
and Quay now asked the President, in consid¬ 
eration of Wanamaker’s services, to make 
him postmaster-general, and it was done. The 
President personally knew all about the mean¬ 
ing of this monstrous transaction. He knew 
that Wanamaker’s financial aid in a great 
emergency was urged as the ground on which 
he should be thus honored, and he knows that 
he honored him accordingly. These are the 
simple facts, and they furnish a very instruct¬ 
ive commentary upon the President’s civil 
service policy. They constitute a “damned 
spot” in his record which no waters can ever 
wash out, and the revolting affair can best be 
accounted for by referring it to an unholy al¬ 
liance between office greed and godliness. 
Wanamaker was a man of prayer whose or¬ 
thodoxy was unquestioned, whatever might 
be thought of the morality of this perform¬ 
ance. To his piety he had added wealth and 
cunning, and these advantages made him very 
attractive to a man of the President’s practi¬ 
cal turn of mind when facing a great tempta¬ 
tion. Both seem to belong to a class of re¬ 
ligionists Avho 

PI5' every art of legal thieving, 

No matter, stick to sound believing. 

In conducting this important negotiation I 
have no doubt that both preserved their custo¬ 
mary self-complacency, and that each could 
have entered heartily into the sprit of “Holy 
Willie’s Prayer:” 

Yet I am here a chosen sample 
To show thy grace is great and ample; 

I’m here a pillar in thy temple, 

Strong as a rock, 

A guide, a buckler, an example. 

To a’ thy flock. 

Again, let me inquire tvhy Stephen B. El¬ 
kins was made secretary of war in the last 
half of the administration. His career is 
historic. More than a quarter of a century 
ago he settled in New Mexico and became a 
member of the territorial legislature. He 
studied the Spanish language and the charac¬ 
ter and habits of the Mexican population. 
President Johnson afterward appointed him 
district attorney for the territory, which office 
he held three years. He was then elected a 
delegate to congress and served two terms. 
This experience amply prepared him for the 
brilliant ventures in real estate through which 
he became rich. His dealings were mainly 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


369 


in Spanish grants, which he bought for a 
very small price from their Mexican claim¬ 
ants or their grantees. The boundaries of these 
grants were vague and uncertain and their 
definite settlement had to be determined 
by the surveyor-general of the territory, sub¬ 
ject to the final action of congress. Elkins 
became a member of the land ring of the 
territory, and largely through his influence 
the survey of these grants was made to con¬ 
tain hundreds of thousands of acres that did 
not belong to them. He thus became a great 
land-holder, through the manipulation of 
committees in congress grants thus illegally 
surveyed were confirmed with their fictitious 
boundaries. He made himself particularly 
conspicuous as the hereof the famous Maxwell 
grant, which, as Secretary Cox decided in 18G9, 
contained only twenty-two square leagues, or 
about ninety-six thousand acres, but which, 
under the manipulation of Elkins, was sur¬ 
veyed and patented for 1,714,764 acres, or 
nearly two thousand, six hundred and eighty 
square miles. Congress, through the action of 
its committees, was beguiled into the confirma¬ 
tion of the grant, with the exterior boundaries 
vaguely indicated in it so stretched as to cover 
the whole of this immense area, and which con¬ 
firmation by congress compelled the supreme 
court to recognize this astounding robbery as 
valid. By such methods as these more than 
ten million acres of the public domain in New 
Mexico have become the spoil of land grab¬ 
bers, and the ring leaders in this game of 
spoiliation was Stephen B. Elkins, the confed- 
rate of Stephen W. Dorsey, and the master 
spirit in the movement. He was thoroughly 
qualified for his work. He was irrepressible 
and full of resources. He was Quay, Platt, 
Mahone and Clarkson rolled into one. He 
was a genius in business, and in the pursuit of 
his ends was singularly unshackled by a con¬ 
science. He used the surveyor-general of the 
territory, the land department in Washington 
and the committees of congress as his instru¬ 
ments in fleecing poor settlers and robbing the 
government of its lands. To cheat a man out 
of his home is justly regarded as a crime 
second only to murder; and to rob the nation 
of its public domain and thus abridge the 
opportunity of landless men to acquire homes 
is not only a crime against society, but a cruel 
mockery of the poor. 

If any such considerations ever disturbed 
the dreams of Mr. Elkins, they were summa¬ 
rily silenced by his overmastering zeal in the 
work of “practical politics.” According to 
Dorsey, Elkins knew more than any other per¬ 
son about the star route cases, which became 
famous a dozen years ago, and he will also be 
remembered as engaged in the prosecution of 
a claim for $50,000,000 against Brazil, while 
Blaine was secretary of state under Garfield, 
which claim was afterward indignantly re¬ 
jected by Secretary Bayard. In the light of 
his other performances it is not surprising that 
the President should desire to place such a 
man as Elkins under special obligations on 
the eve of a desperate struggle for renomina¬ 


tion. Elkins had been Blaine’s chief political 
manager for years. Up to the time of his ap¬ 
pointment he was known everywhere as an 
enthusiastic friend and admirer of Blaine; 
and I think it is morally certain that he 
would so have continued but for this remark¬ 
able display of the President’s zeal for civil 
service reform. Harrison knew his man and 
he knew all about his career in the southwest 
as I have depicted it; for while he was in the 
senate he was a member of the committee on 
territories and gave particular attention to 
the affairs of New Mexico. In referring to 
these matters I do not speak at random, but 
from official documents and ascertained facts 
with which I became familiar during my pub¬ 
lic service of four years in that territory under 
the last administration. * * * 

The discussion of the President’s civil serv¬ 
ice policy invites attention to his nepotism. 
Early in his administration he made his 
brother. Carter Harrison, marshal of Tennes¬ 
see. His brother-in-law, John N. Scott, was 
appointed superintendent of construction in 
the office of the supervising architect at Port 
Townsend. The list of places given to other 
relatives includes the deputy collectorship of 
customs at Port Townsend, a five-thousand- 
dollar position in Utah, the post of naval at¬ 
tache to the Samoan commission in Berlin, 
the collectorship of internal revenue in the 
First Ohio District, the position of naval offi¬ 
cer at New Orleans, and that of law clerk in 
the post-office department. These appoint¬ 
ments are utterly irreconcilable with the 
President’s various pledges, and they have a 
sinister meaning. His brother, for example, 
may be a fit man for the position of marshal, 
but the public will be slow to believe that his 
fitness was “the sole and discriminating test” 
in his appointment, or that he would even 
have been thought of for the place if he 
had not been the relative of the President. 
This is equally true of all the positions named. 
The policy of giving office to relatives was 
denounced by all our early Presidents, who 
turned away from it as a political indecency. 
No administration can be regarded as “clean” 
which adopts it, and it is particularly un¬ 
comely in a President who has paraded him¬ 
self as the champion of the merit system of 
appointments. 

A far more flagrant prostitution of federal 
patronage was the attempt of the President to 
control the freedom of the press in furtherance 
of him ambition. He has appointed scores 
and hundreds of editors of influential journals 
to important places at home and abroad, and 
thus placed before them a temptation which 
may prove stronger than the love of truth. A 
journalist who is dependent upon the govern¬ 
ment for his bread is an untrusty representa¬ 
tive of public opinion. The newspapers fav¬ 
ored by the President are located in various 
sections of the Union, and each is a center of 
power which may be used by him both offen¬ 
sively and defensively in a political compaign. 
He evidently regards them as fortified places, 
which he hopes to command through the po¬ 


tency of patronage, and the effect can not be 
otherwise than pernicious. The foremost of 
all his subsidized organs is the New York Tri¬ 
bune, “founded by Horace Greeley,” and edited 
by Whitelaw Keid. It is a great power in 
politics, and to win it over to his side was nat¬ 
urally a darling purpose of the President. 
Reid was always well known as an ardent 
friend of Blaine prior to his appointment as 
minister to France, and but for the important 
favor thus bestowed there is every reason to 
believe he would have been his zealous sup¬ 
porter in the late struggle for the presidential 
nomination. At heart he undoubtedly pre¬ 
ferred Blaine; but the acceptance of an hon¬ 
orable and lucrative position could scarcely 
fail to have a certain influence. It created 
an obligation. It may have been the make¬ 
weight which secured the President’s renomi¬ 
nation, and probably prompted the statement 
already quoted that the President “ has given 
the country a clean administration.” The 
appointment of Clarkson, the editor of the 
Iowa Slate Register, as first assistant postmas¬ 
ter general, suggests kindred observations, 
which would apply with varying degrees of 
force to all of the many journalists singled 
out by the President for his official smiles. 
His obvious purpose was to bring the patron¬ 
age of the government into conflict with the 
freedom of the press, and thus to purchase the 
presidency with the public money. It was a 
bold and comprehensive scheme, and there 
was method in it; but it was as flagitious in 
principle as it was unprecedented in the his¬ 
tory of the government. The grandfather of 
the President, more than half a century ago^ 
said : “ There is no part of the means placed 

in the hands of the executive which might be 
used with greater effect for unhallowed pur¬ 
poses than the control of the public press.” 
And Daniel Webster declared that “ an open 
attempt to secure the aid and friendship of 
the public press, of bestowing the endowments 
of office on its active conductors, seems to me 
®f everything we have witnessed to be the 
most reprehensible. It degrades both the 
government and the press. As far as its nat¬ 
ural effect extends, it turns the palladium of 
liberty into the engine of party. It brings 
the agency, activity, energy and patronage of 
the government all to bear, with united force, 
on the means of general intelligence, and on 
the adoption or rejection of political opin¬ 
ions.” All this was perfectly understood by 
the President, for in a speech in the senate in 
the spring of 1886 he arraigned Mr. Cleveland 
for doing on a very small scale what he him¬ 
self has been doing on a large one. He knew 
that his purpose was to muzzle the press of his 
party, and thus serve himself. “Give me the 
liberty,” said Milton, “ to think, to know, to 
believe, and to utter, freely and according to 
the conscience, above all other liberties.” It 
was against this liberty that the President 
deliberately conspired in attempting to bribe 
the journalists of his party by federal offices 
to give him their support. 

This review of the President’s civil service 


















370 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


policy would not be complete without some 
reference to the Minneapolis convention of the 
7th of June. No better illustration of the 
power of the spoils was possible than the per¬ 
formances of this body. As nearly as I can 
determine 140 office-holders attended as dele¬ 
gates and cast their votes, while probably 
3,000 other place-holders reinforced them by 
their presence and influence. * * * 

I have spoken plainly because I desire to 
be perfectly understood. My subject demands 
that I speak after the fashion of Nathan to 
David. I have not alluded to General Harri¬ 
son’s relations to the church in any spirit of 
levity or irreverence. The subject of relig¬ 
ion has burdened the hearts and minds of men 
in every age and clime. It is an affair be¬ 
tween the soul and its Creator, and as such it 
is inviolate. No man should trifle with the 
religious faith of any man or woman. It is 
not a matter which can decently be put on 
dress parade or placed upon the market as an 
investment in business or politics ; and he who 
makes it a cloak for selfish ends merits uni¬ 
versal condemnation and contempt. The news¬ 
papers have told us that Judge Gresham re¬ 
gards the President as a Pharisee. In my 
opinion Judge Gresham is right, and I believe 
the Pharisees of to-day are no better than 
those of nearly nineteen centuries ago. They 
have abounded in every age of the church, 
and like the poor they are always with us. In 
their ceremonial righteousness they are im¬ 
maculate, but in the weightier matters of law 
they are infidel. I think they are nowhere so 
well characterized as in the twenty-third 
chapter of the book of Matthew : 

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! 
for ye devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense 
make long prayer; therefore ye shall receive the 
greater damnation. Woe unto you, scribes and 
Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye compass sea and land 
to make one proselyte, and when he is made ye 
make him twofold more the child of hell than your¬ 
selves. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypo¬ 
crites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cum¬ 
min, and have omitted the weightier matters of the 
law, judgment, mercy and faith; these ought ye to 
have done, and not to leave the other undone. Ye 
blind guides, which strain at a gnat and swallow a 
camel. Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypo¬ 
crites ! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and 
of the platter, but within they are full of extortion 
and excess. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that 
which is within the cup and platter, that the out¬ 
side of them may be clean also. Woe unto yoxi, 
scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like 
unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beau¬ 
tiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s 
bones, and of all uncleanness. Even so ye also out¬ 
wardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye 
are full of hypocrisy and iniquity. 

AMERICAN_FEUDALISM. 

The President is of opinion that it is 
n great ahnse to bring the patronage of 
tlie federal government into conflict with 
the freedom of elections; and that this 
abuse ought to be corrected wherever it 
niaj’ have been permitted to exist, and to 
be prevented for the future; He, there¬ 
fore, directs that information be given to 
all ollicers and agents in your department 


of the public service that partisan inter¬ 
ference in popular elections, whether of 
state officers or officers of tliis govern¬ 
ment, and for whomsoever or against 
whomsoever it may be exercised, or the 
payment of any contribution or assessment 
on salaries or official compensation for 
party or election purposes, will be regard¬ 
ed by him as cause for removal.— From a 
Circular issued by Daniel Webster, Secretary of 
State under President William Henry Harrison, 
to the Heads of the Departments under the Oorern- 
ment of the United States. 

The campaign is on in Rushville, having been 
opened to-night by Smiley N. Chambers [United 
States attorney], of Indianapolis.— Rushville Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 4. 

* * * . 

The repnblicans of Hancock county met in mass 
convention at the court-house this noon. After 
calling the convention to order he introduced Hon. 
S. N. Chambers [United States attorney], of Indianap¬ 
olis, who addressed the people for over an hour in a 
highly interesting m&nner.—Oreenfleld Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 4. 

* * » 

There was a ronsing meeting of republicans in this 
city to-night. The Hon. J. B. Cockrum [deputy Uni¬ 
ted States attorney], of Indianapolis, addressed the 
Harrison and Baker guards, two republican organiz¬ 
ations of this city. One hundred and fifty members 
escorted the speaker to the court-house. The speech 
aroused much enthusiasm.— Columbus Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, Sept. 13. 

* * * 

An enthusiastic republican meeting was held in 
Ross’s Opera House last evening. Eon. Smiley N. 
Chambers [United States attorney] was present and 
addressed the crowd.—Union City Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, Sept. 14. 

* » » 

Hon. Smiley N. Chambers addressed a splendid 
meeting of republicans here [Nashville, Ind.] yester¬ 
day afternoon. 

Hon. Smiley N. Chambers will address the people of 
North Indianapolis, at Greenleaf Hall. The West 
Indianapolis McKinley drum corps will be in at¬ 
tendance. 

Following is a list of additional assignments of 
speakers throughout the state made by the republi¬ 
can state committee: 

Hon. S. N. Chambers. 

[United States District Attorney.] 

Sept. 17—Union City, Randolph county, 7 p. m. 

Hon. J. B. Cockrum. 

[Assistant District Attorney.] 

Sept. 17—Martinsville, Morgan county, 7 p. m. 

Sept. 19—Knightstown, Henry county, 7 p. M. 

Sept. 23—Elizabethtown, Bartholomew county, 7 p.m. 
Oct. 7—Marion, Grant county, 7 p. m. 

—Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 10. 

* * * 

The republican clubs of the city turned out^ 
and fully six hundred voters were present to 
listen to the speech of the Hon. Smiley N, 
Chambers, of Indianapolis.— Columbus Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 17. 

* * * 

United States Treasurer Nebeker returned last night 
from Indiana, where he has been on business for 
some time. During his stay in Indiana he visited a 
number of counties and had several conferences 
with the republican candidate for governor, Mr. 
Chase, and with the chairman of the state republi¬ 
can committee, Mr. Gowdy.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 1. 

* * ♦ 

The only interest shown in the convention was that 
caused by the efforts of many of Harrison’s friends 
to defeat as candidate for county treasurer, R. R. 
Shiel. But Mr. Shiel with the a.ssistance of a score or 


more federal office-holders, led by Postmaster Thomp¬ 
son, Wiliam Patterson, superintendent of letter-carriers. 
United States Marshal Dunlap and Deputy Marshal 
Moore, routed the other administration gang.—/ndf- 

anapolis Sentinel, Sept. 5. 

* * * 

The republicans of Delaware county shot the ini¬ 
tial gun in Muncie to-night. Col. Charles W. Fair¬ 
banks was the principal speaker. The reception 
committee consisted of Postmaster Ellis, ex-Postmas- 
ter Eiter and other post-office aspirants. All of to¬ 
day Postmaster Ellis had runners out personally urging 
everybody to come to the meeting.-ifuncie Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Sentinel, Sept. 3. 

* » * 

Assistant Secretary Crouse of the Treasury Depart¬ 
ment says he expects to relinquish charge of his office 
some time next week when he will go to Nebraska 
to enter the gubernatorial campaign.—TFas/iinfffon 

Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 4. 

* * ♦ 

“Dave” Martin, the national committeeman from 
Pennsylvania, and Postmaster W. W. Johnson, of Bal¬ 
timore, who is rated no lower than the second class 
as a campaign-fund raiser, were at headquarters for 
a time on Tuesday. Among the other visitors were 
Oj/rws Bussy, assistant secretary of the interior.—New 
York Times, Sept. 1. 

» » * 

Col. J. D. Brady, collector of the revenue for this dis¬ 
trict, and a bitter opponent of Mahone, has for some 
time posed as the President’s accredited Virginia 
representative. Gen. Mahone has served notice upon 
the administrative and the other republican leaders 
that if they desire the party machine to work in 
their interest the chairman of the state committee 
must be treated with and Brady he utterly ignored. 
—New York Evening Post, Sept. 1. 

* « ♦ 

There are a large number of delegates here to at¬ 
tend the republican convention. The whole day has 
been devoted to the discussion of the propriety of 
nominating a state ticket. Those in favor of a lickei 
were led by two white men who are federal office-holders 
and several negroes. The better argument was made 
by the opponents of a ticket, but there is no doubt 
that the convention will decide to-morrow to nomi¬ 
nate one.—Raleigh, N. C., Dispatch to New York Times, 
Sept. 7. 

“I desire to obtain from you the names of from 
eight to twelve of the most active, earnest, discreet, 
and trustworthy young republicans who will yet their 
mail at your post-office. I particularly wish, also, 
that you keep this request a secret, even from those 
whose names you furnish me. I want twelve names, 
but if there are but ten or eleven,' send the ten or 
eleven; if only eight or nine, send them. They 
should be men between twenty-two and forty, of 
good character and standing in their neighborhood. 
But I desire young men between twenty-two and 
thirty-two if you have the number between those 
ages. Each man’s age, occupation, whether married 
or single, and his nationality, should follow his 
name. Kindly send this information by return 
mail, if possible. If not able to respond so quickly, 
let the answer come within three days at least. Your 
prompt service in this matter will not be forgotten ."— 
Confidential Circular of Hackett, Chairman of the New 
York Republican State Committee {New York Evening 
Post, Se 2 )l. 7). 

* * » 

Marshal Jacobus, of Brooklyn, was a brief visitor to 

the President to-day.—Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 11. 
* « * 

A meeting of republicans was held on Sept. 8 in 
Blachley’s hall for the purpose of effecting a perma¬ 
nent political organization and arranging prelimi¬ 
naries for active campaign work. Postmaster Qeorge 
Lincoln explained * « « —Cedar Rapids Gazette, 
Sept. 15. 

* * * . . 

Oen. Oreen B. Baum, commissioner of pensions, 
addressed a republican rally here to-night, it 
being the dedication of the republican wig¬ 
wam.— Decatur, 111., Dispatch to Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, Sept. IG. 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


371 


I } 

i 

't 

i 


\ 

r 


Consul Wood, Collector French and Railroad Com¬ 
missioner Putney were also on hand early from force 
of habit, [Republican State Convention.]— Concord, 
N. IL, Dispatch to New York Times, Sept. 6. 

. » » » ^ 

All the arrangements for the new contract were 
completed yesterday at the custom-house. The 
leaders tried hard to get it when the time came to re- 
let it while Collector Erhardt was in office, but a dis¬ 
pute arose between the collector and the treasury 
department, which resulted in postponing an award. 
Ootlector Erhardt held that it should be made to the low¬ 
est bidder, while the officers in Washington took the 
ground that the law did not make such a course obliga¬ 
tory, and that there was no need of public advertiseme7its 
forbids. No agreement on the point was reached, 
and matters dragged along, Mr. Briggs holding over 
and the republican leaders getting hungrier and 
hungrier for a slice of the good things. This feeling 
had developed into something very close to famine 
by the time Collector Erhardt went out of office.— 
New York Times, July 12. 

« » » 

The appointment of William H. Leaycraft to a po¬ 
sition in the appraiser’s department has simply 
added fuel to the flame of republican dissension in 
Kings county. It was a direct slap at Internal Rev¬ 
enue Collector Nathan, the local representative of 
Thomas C. Platt, and is regarded by all his associates 
as a notification by the President that he does not 
want any help from the Nathan faction. Yet it is 
Nathan who has absolute control of the local ma¬ 
chinery, and he is in a position to apply the knife to 
Mr. Harrison in a most scientific manner.—Times, 
July 10. 

♦ ♦ * 

For years Leaycraft has lived solely by politics. He 
was kept in office by Platt, whom he now repudiates, 
but his winters were all spent in Albany. The third 
house knew him well, and men here of the legiti¬ 
mate branches of the legislature have had many 
business dealings with him. These transactions have 
been profitable to both parties, and Leaycraft has 
been able to make a good showing in public. Lo¬ 
cally he has been nothing more than a ward boss, 
and other leaders anxious for the votes of delegates 
from the thirteenth ward have always known how 
to get them. They have dealt directly with Leay¬ 
craft, and he has always been able to deliver the 
goods. He has made no secret of the fact that he is 
in politics for what he can get out of it, and every¬ 
body knows what that means.—Wem York Times, 
July 10. 

, * * * 

It was announced at republican headquarters last 
week that “harmony” prevailed in the ranks of the 
party in Kings county, and this flattering statement 
was interpreted to mean that Secretary of the Navy 
Tracy and Naval Officer Willis would cease from 
fighting Ernst Nathan [internal revenue collector], 
who is to be left in control of the local machine.— 
New York Times, Aug. 29. 

* » * 

The Kings county republican organization is in a 
pitiable plight, being torn by dissensions and petty 
jealousies. Worst of all, the rigors of a Presidential 
campaign stare them in the face. Ernst Nathan 
[internal revenue collector], the half-acknowledged 
leader, looked woe-begone and disconsolate yester¬ 
day when he admitted that things were decidedly 
blue. He said he had experienced a feeling akin to 
that felt by the aged female in the nursery rhyme, 
who, though disposed to feed her dog, found she had 
an empty cupboard. Brightening up a little, he 
said: "Well, the democrats have the money and they 
have the county, but we will get money enough to 
keep the majority down .”—New York Times, Sept. 11- 
* * » 

The republican campaign in Brooklyn will be 
practically opened this evening, when the County 
Committee of Four Hundred will meet for the first 
time after the summer vacation, during which the 
factional hostilities which rent the body in twain last 
springwereof necessity intermitted. At the last meet¬ 
ing in June there was a perfunctory indorsement of 


the national ticket nominated at Minneapolis coupled 
with a denunciation of Brooklyn’s representative in 
the administration. Since that time there has been 
a persistent effort on the part of the opponents oi 
Secretary Tracy to secure control of all the party 
machinery. They are led by Ernst Natha^i, collector 
of internal revenue, and by securing control of the 
executive committee of thirty-five by the use of un¬ 
derhand means, he dictated the appointment of a 
campaign committee of fifteen, who in turn added 
to their own number up to 100 from among the active 
republicans of the city, being careful to assure a 
majority of Nathan men. The adherents of Secre¬ 
tary Tracy with Naval Officer WUlis at their head have 
sulked in their tents while all this was done, as 
they felt powerless and helpless, although they were 
able to elect the majority of the delegates to Minne¬ 
apolis in the interest of President Harrison. But 
when the democratic scheme to alter ward bounda¬ 
ries in manipulating assembly districts was put 
through, Nathan had influence enough to secure the 
alteration of the boundaries of the twenty-third 
and twenty-fifth wards in his interest, so as to con¬ 
trol the senate and assembly districts of which they 
form a part, and which are almost the only surely 
republican districts in the city. This was a purely 
partisan movement, and the Tracy- Willis faction de¬ 
termined to do all in their power to upset It. To this 
end the proceedings were begun to set aside the re¬ 
apportionment and to declare the alteration of ward 
boundaries illegal. When the proceedings were de¬ 
feated in the supreme court, the Nathan interest gave 
out the statement that the matter would end there 
and no appeal would be taken. But the Tracy- Wil¬ 
lis people have appealed and the matter comes up 
for argument in the general term to-morrow. In or¬ 
der to profit by the change in ward boundaries as 
much as possible, the Nathan faction has devised a 
scheme to have the "representation of the wards in 
the governing body of the party remain the same as 
before they were divided until the end of this year, 
but to permit the representatives in nominating con¬ 
ventions to be counted as representing the wards as 
now constituted. This device is simply to give Col¬ 
lector Nathan’s ward a preponderance of votes when 
nominations are made and enable him to name an as¬ 
semblyman. The scheme has to come before the gen¬ 
eral committee for ratification to night, and much as 
they deprecate factional contests in the face of a pres¬ 
idential campaign, the Tracy-Willis side is deter¬ 
mined to give battle to the Nathan men to-night. 
A lively meeting is expected and there will be sharp 
debate and a close drawing of factional lines. Naval 
Officer Willis, District Attorney Johnson, Col. Charles 
B. Morton and Joseph Benjamin will be heard on 
one side; while Senator Aspinwall, David A. Bald¬ 
win, Jacob Brenner, M. J. Daly, and others, will 
speak for Collector Nathan, who will pull wires in 

the background.—JVeifl York Evening Post, Sept. 13. 

♦ * * 

The Kings county republican general committee 
met last night in the Criterion Theater, Brooklyn. 
It was near ten o’clock when Chairman W. W. Good¬ 
rich called the committee to order. On a test vote 
as to the representation of the twenty-fifth ward in 
the committee, it was decided that the ward had all 
the delegates it was entitled to by a vote of 176 to 142. 
This means another victory for the Nathan faction and 
leaves him hi control of the ward.—New York Times, 
Sept. 14. 

» -» * 

The removal of Henry F. Merritt, consul at Chem¬ 
nitz, by the appointment of one Barnes of Illinois to 
that place, has drawn from Mr. Merritt’s friends 
some bitter remarks about the President’s regard for 
“interest of the public service.” It appears that 
Merritt was promoted from Aix-la-Chapelle to Chem¬ 
nitz because he had ferreted out violations of the 
customs laws, and that he continued his labors at 
Chemnitz with notable industry and success. The 
explanation is given that “the Chicago politicians 
have constantly been clamoring for his place,” and 
that the President came to the conclusion that he 
could further his own interests in the campaign by 
conveniently ignoring his assertion that “only the 
interest of the public service should suggest remov¬ 
als from office.”—iVew York Times, Aug. 31. 

r-. 


The appointment of A. Barton Hepburn as con¬ 
troller of the currency was a bid for harmony and 
the first treasury crumb that has been flung at the 
empire state republicans since Batchellor was made 
assistant secretary, and he wanted to be minister to 
Turkey.—ATew) York Times, July 28. 

» » * 

Walter D. Stinson, who has been appointed post¬ 
master at Augusta, Me., to fill the vacancy caused by 
the resignation of Hon. J. H. Manley, is a nepiiew of 
Mrs. Blaine.-/ndfoMapofls Journal, July 24. 


PLACATING REBELLIOUS BARONS. 


The national committee has given out the follow¬ 
ing as its part of the arrangements: 

“No arrangements have been made for anything 
like a formal reception of the President during his 
stay with Mr. Reid. It is not known who will be in¬ 
vited by Mr. Reid to meet him. All of the members 
of the republican national committee who are in 
the city at this time and who can conveniently go to 
Ophlr farm will undoubtedly present themselves at 
some time during the day. It is expected that ex- 
Senator Platt and Mr. Brookfield and Mr. Hackett 
of the state committee will also call upon the Presi¬ 
dent. 

“The President’s main purpose in coming to Ophir 
farm at this time is to see and consult with Mr. 
Reid, and a large part of his time will be occupied in 
conference with his host.”—New York Times, Aug. 31. 
* * * 

Ex-Senator Platt arrived at 11: 30 a. m., accompa¬ 
nied by John E. Millholland. The visitors drove over 
to Ophir farm, and when they arrived they were re¬ 
ceived on the piazza by Mr. Reid and I). O. Mils. 
Mr. Platt was at once conducted into the reception 
room, and a conference took place between the 
President and Mr. Platt.—New York Evening Post, 


“Doubts were raised in my mind after the Minne¬ 
apolis convention how far my services were desired 
by those who seemed then to be in charge of Mr. 
Harrison’s campaign. I heard that some persons 
were representing to him that all the misfortunes 
the republican party had ever undergone in the 
state of New York were to be attributed directly to 
me, and that it would be good politics for him to let 
it be understood that he wished to have nothing to 
do with ‘bosses.’ 

“Certainly, I had no desire to obtrude myself upon 
the President, nor to force myself into the conduct 
of his campaign if I was not wanted. As the facts 
have proved, I was probably over-sensitive. But if 
a man must have faults, that one is among those most 
easily forgiven.” 

“So you waited,” said the reporter.” 

“Yes, I waited. I waited to hear from President 
Harrison. Some people said that I waited to hear 
from him a request to take office; that I waited to 
make a sordid bargain; that I stood like a road agent 
‘holding up’ a coach. 

“These were lies, and they were among the mean¬ 
est and most irritating, most painful and most hurt¬ 
ful lies I have ever had to endare.”—Interview with 
Tom Platt, New York Times, Sept. 5. 


MR, FOULKE’S SPEECH. 

***»-»»* 
BROKEN REPUBLICAN PLEDGES. 

“The reform of the civil service [says the 
platform of 1888 ], auspiciously begun under a 
republican administration, should be com¬ 
pleted by the further extension of the reform 
system already established by law to all grades 
of service to which it is applicable.” 

The only extensions of the classihed service 
made by Mr. Harrison, in pretended pursuance 












372 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


of the promises of the platform, were the ex¬ 
tensions to about 700 teachers and superin¬ 
tendents in the Indian bureau, less than 200 
in the fish commission, and a few employes in 
the patent office. The entire number of such 
extensions is not far from 1,000. 

When the civil service law first took effect 
there were about 16,000 subject to its provis¬ 
ions. At the close of President Cleveland’s 
term there were, after including the railway 
mail service, which he had incorporated, more 
than 30,000 men in the classified service. But 
there are more than 100,000 in the entire fed¬ 
eral civil service which still remain unclassi¬ 
fied. Of this immense number President Har¬ 
rison has extended the civil service rules to 
about 1,000 employes. 

Secretary Tracy has, indeed, provided for a 
registration of laborers in the navy depart¬ 
ment, under a system quite similar to the 
classified service, although it is not embraced 
within the rules or placed under control of the 
civil service commissioners, and it would be 
discretionary for any subsequent secretary of 
the navy to abolish his regulations. With 
these trifling exceptions there has been abso¬ 
lutely nothing done by the present adminis¬ 
tration in performance of its promises that the 
reform system should be extended to all the 
branches of the classified service to which it is 
applicable. 

The civil service law itself provided that it 
should apply to all post-offices and custom¬ 
house offices having fifty or more employes, 
and that it should be extended to other post- 
offices and custom-houses having less than 
fifty employes whenever so ordered by the 
President. The law itself designated these 
custom-houses and post-offices as places to 
which it was applicable. 

After the accession of President Harrison to 
office, his own civil service commissioners re¬ 
ported recommending its extension to post- 
offices having twenty-five employes or more, 
and afterward, in 1891, recommended its ex¬ 
tension to post-offices, custom-houses and in¬ 
ternal revenue districts in which there are 
twenty-five or more employed, as well as to 
clerks in the navy yard, to the employes of 
the District of Columbia, to the mints and 
sub treasuries, and to all free delivery post- 
offices. 

Yet, during his entire term. President Har¬ 
rison has utterly failed to extend it to a single 
post-office or custom-house, or to any of the 
offices to which this extension was recom¬ 
mended. A clearer violation of the written 
promise of the party could not be imagined. 

CENSUS. 

If there was any branch of the service where 
appointments should have depended upon the 
fitness of the appointee, as proved by ex¬ 
amination and probation, and not upon pat¬ 
ronage and political favor, it was the census 
bureau. It was the plain duty of those in 
charge of this bureau to give to the people the 
exact facts as to all matters inquired of, un¬ 
warped by political bias. If the promise of 
the republican platform had any significance 


at all, it meant that the President would ex¬ 
tend this competitive system to the clerks of 
the census bureau when that bureau should 
be established. Mr. Harrison, in concurring 
with and adopting the platform, distinctly 
made this promise his own. His civil service 
commissioners advised this extension also. 
The President refused to make it. The census 
bureau has been used as a partisan machine, 
and the result of the work has been greatly 
discredited. 

HOW HAS THE LAW BEEN ENFORCED? 

In his inaugural President Harrison de¬ 
clared : “ Heads of departments, bureaus and 

other public offices having any duty connected 
therewith, will be expected to enforce the civil 
service law fully and without evasion. Be¬ 
yond this obvious duty, I hope to do some¬ 
thing more to advance the reform of the civil 
service.” How far, then, has President Harri¬ 
son enforced the law? 

The civil service commission, whose duty it 
is to enforce it, is composed of three mem¬ 
bers, two of whom must belong to opposite po¬ 
litical parties. When the present adminis¬ 
tration came into power, Charles Lyman, a 
Republican, was the sole acting commissioner 
Mr. Harrison then appointed Theodore Roose¬ 
velt, a republican, and Governor Hugh S. 
Thompson, a Democrat, a man who had been 
selected for the place by Mr. Cleveland before 
he went out of office. These were excellent 
men, who determined to enforce the law im¬ 
partially, so far as they had the power. They 
could see that examinations were fairly con¬ 
ducted, and they did. But they could not re¬ 
move any officer who violated the law, they 
could not personally conduct prosecutions, 
they could merely investigate, report and rec¬ 
ommend. The rest lay with the President, 
the cabinet officers and their subordinates, 
and these have utterly failed in many import¬ 
ant instances to sustain the commission in 
their efforts. 

THE BALTIMORE POST-OFFICE. 

Take, for example, the Baltimore post-office. 
Commissioner Roosevelt heard that this office 
was being used to influence a primary election 
on March 30, 1891, and he went to Baltimore 
personally to investigate the matter. His re¬ 
port contains the following: 

“On the day when the primaries were held, I went 
around in person to several of the wards to observe 
what was done, preferring to see for myself what the 
facts really were rather than to seek to sift them out 
afterward from the conflicting testimony of scores of 
interested and possibly untrustworthy witnesses. I 
herewith submit all the testimony taken. In my 
opinion it establishes the following facts: 

“ The primaries held on March 30 were marked by 
a very bitter contest between two factions of the re¬ 
publican party. One of these factions was generally 
known in the newspapers, as well as among its own 
supporters and opponents, who took part in the pri¬ 
mary election, as the ‘ Johnson crowd,’ or ‘Johnson- 
Airey faction,’ Mr. Johnson being the postmaster 
and Mr. Airey tlie marshal in Baltimore. The other 
faction was known similarly as the ‘ Henderson fac¬ 
tion,’ or ‘Henderson-Stone faction,’ Messrs. Hender¬ 
son and Stone having been, respectively, candidates 
for appointment to the positions of postmaster and 
marshal. 

“Asa whole, the contest was marked by great fraud 
and no little violence. Many of the witnesses of 


each faction testified that the leaders of the opposite 
faction in their ward had voted repeaters, democrats 
and men living outside of the ward, in great num¬ 
bers. I am inclined to believe that, in this respect, 
there is much reason to regard the testimony of each 
side as correct in its outline of the conduct of the 
other. Accusations of ballot-box stuffing were freely 
made, with much appearance of justification. A 
number of fights took place. In many wards there 
were several arrests. In one or two cases so many 
men were arrested that the police patrol wagons 
could not accommodate them. In several cases the 
judges of the election were themselves among those 
arrested. The judges, three in number in each ward, 
sat within a house at a window opening on the street, 
and the voters at the primary were marshaled in a 
line outside, surrounded by a great crowd of onlook¬ 
ers. 

“ One of the incidents of the day was an effort on 
the part of Marshal Airey to drag a judge, whom he 
accused of misconduct, out of the window, a fierce 
struggle being the result.’’ 

As to the post-office and marshal’s office, 
Mr, Roosevelt reports: 

“The evidence seems to be perfectly clear that both 
these offices were used for the purpose of interfering 
with or controlling the result of the primary election 
and that there was a systematic, though sometimes 
indirect, effort made to assess the government em¬ 
ployes in both, for political purposes. 

“The only two deputy marshals examined, Messrs. 
Biddleman and Sultzer, both confessed that they 
had collected money for political purposes from 
other office-holders, in defiance of the law, and that 
they took a very active part at the polls. It seems 
clear from the testimony of these two deputy mar¬ 
shals, and of Mr. McAllister, as well as Incidentally 
from the testimony of some of the other witnesses, 
that the marshal’s office was used, apparently by or 
with the consent of the marshal himself, to influence 
the election. General Rule 1 of the civil service rules 
reads as follows: 

‘“Any officer in the executive civil service who 
shall use his.official authority or Influence for the 
purpose of interfering with an election or controll¬ 
ing the result thereof * ■i' shall be dismissed 
from office.’ 

“In my opinion, therefore, all the following gov¬ 
ernment employes should be dismissed from office 
for vioiating Sections 11 to 14 of the civil service law. 
[naming them.] 

“It is evident,” says Mr. Roosevelt, “from the testi¬ 
mony, that the non-classifled service in the Balti¬ 
more post-office, as is the case with the non-classifled 
service in almost every patronage office, was treated 
as a bribery chest from which to reward influen¬ 
tial ward workers who were useful, or likely to be 
useful, to the faction in power. 

* >,■< 

“Mr. Johnson has filled the entire unclassified and 
half the classified service with republican ward 
workers, and has permitted the post-office to be 
turned into a machine to influence primary elec¬ 
tion. Doubtless, unless checked, it will be similarly 
used as a machine to influence the course of the state 
and national elections.” 

These were the statements contained in the 
report of an upright republican official. Cop¬ 
ies of this report were sent on August 4,1891 
by direction of the entire civil service com¬ 
mission to the President, to Postmaster Gen¬ 
eral Wanamaker, to Mr. Foster, secretary of 
the treasury, and to Mr. Miller, attorney-gen¬ 
eral. Although the report was delivered in 
person by L. C. Westerfield, one of the clerks 
of the commission, at the department of jus¬ 
tice and the treasury (report of civil service 
committee to house of representatives, fifty- 
second congress, report No. 1,669, page 59), 
the attorney-general stated that he never 
knew anything of it until nine months after. 


i 



4 

i \ 

t 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


373 


when the matter was investigated by con¬ 
gress. The solicitor-general had never looked 
upon the testimony as calling for action! (Id. 
pp. 40, 41.) Secretary Foster says: “Upon in¬ 
quiry at the department I find that probably 
about the time that this report was printed, a 
copy was sent to the department. It so hap¬ 
pened that I never saw it, and we can not find 
it at the department.” (Id., p. 18.) 

WANAMAKER COMPLAISANT. 

Postmaster-General Wanamaker, however, 
saw the copy which was sent to him. One 
would suppose that such a report would call 
for energetic action, not only by the depart¬ 
ment of justice, whose duty it was to prose¬ 
cute the offenders and dismiss the marshal 
and his guilty subordinates, but also by the 
postmaster-general, to whose department most 
of the culprits belonged. But not a single one 
of these violators of the laws was removed or 
punished for his misconduct. 

On April 19, 1892, the house of representa¬ 
tives instructed its select committee on civil 
service reform to inquire whether these men 
were still in office or whether any of them 
had been prosecuted. 

Mr. Wanamaker admitted to the committee 
(Id. page 2), that they were all still in the gov¬ 
ernment service, and that none had been in¬ 
dicted. He had another investigation made 
by some post-office inspectors of his own, who 
reported in the following December (four 
months afterward) that: 

“After hearing the evidence from all the witnesses 
and the accused, and giving the whole subject 
thoughtful study, and consideration, we are of the 
opinion that the facts do not justify the dismissal of 
the twenty-one men, or of any, for violation of the 
civil service law, as charged. On that report,” says 
he, “no order has been issued for the dismissal of 
any person. <• « » The inspectors making the 
: declaration that in their judgment these men have 
: not violated the civil service law, I have not issued 
any order for their dismissal, and if it is true, as it 
must be in most of the cases, if not in all of them, 
that these men were innocent, it seemed to me that 
they were sufficiently punished in having charges 
made against them which were not found on investi¬ 
gation to be sustained by the facts.” 

Again, “Did I understand you to say that the state¬ 
ments made by these government employes in Sep¬ 
tember to the Inspectors who investigated the 
matter under your instruction differ from the state¬ 
ments made to the civil service commission ?” 

Answer— “They are totally different in almost all 
cases.” 

To this Mr. Roosevelt answers (page 27): 

“It is difficult to discuss seriously the proposition 
that a mail when questioned as to something which 
has just happened will lie to his own hurt and six 
months afterward tell the truth to his own benefit.” 

At last the postmaster-general sent to the 
civil service committee the report of the in¬ 
spectors appointed by him. The testimony 
submitted with it (extracts from which are 
given at great length in the report of the civil 
service committee, page 66 to 74 (show that in 
spite of their efforts to screen themselves the 
bulk of the men found guilty by Roosevelt 
had again confessed the same illegal acts. 

The conclusion of this committee was as fol¬ 
lows : 

“We therefore find that the report of the civil 


service commission recommending the removal of 
certain employes in the post-office at llaltimore 
was well founded; that the postmaster at Ilaltimore 
has not removed any of these parties, substantially 
by direction of the postmaster-general; that the re- 
tport of the inspectors upon which they were retained 
is unsupported by the evidence taken by themselves, 
and Indicates either complete ignorance of the pro¬ 
visions of the civil service law or a determination 
that in this particular case their violation should not 
be punished.” 

The key to this disgraceful business is found 
in the fact that at the Minneapolis convention 
Postmaster Johnson led a club from Balti¬ 
more, and that he and his law-breaking sub¬ 
ordinates were among the most active and in¬ 
fluential of the supporters of Harrison for re- 
nomination. 

In many other cases contributions were 
shamelessly demanded from office-holders in 
plain violation of law, and no man has been 
punished for it. 

The blackmailing of government employes 
went on two years ago, and is going on to-day 
as flagrantly as in the time of Congressman 
Hubbell. 

IN THE PENSION BUREAU. 

Another illustration of the manner in which 
the civil service reform law has been enforced 
by the present administration is furnished by 
the pension bureau. In the fifty-first congress 
the Hon. George W. Cooper, a member from 
Indiana, introduced a resolution to investi¬ 
gate the pension office and conducted the in¬ 
vestigation himself. He was renominated for 
congress, his competitor being J. G. Dunbar, a 
republican. Raum wanted to beat Cooper 
and gave Dunbar, his opponent, the privileges 
of the pension office. For the purpose of 
making friends of the old soldiers he allowed 
Dunbar to call up their claims. At that time 
it was the practice of the office, when claims 
were thus called up for status, if they were 
found complete, to carry them forward for ad¬ 
judication. This was all done just before 
election to get votes for Dunbar against Coop¬ 
er. After election neither Raum nor anyone 
else in the office cared anything for the claims 
of these soldiers, and nothing further was 
done. 

General Rule No. 1, adopted and approved 
by the President to carry out the civil service 
laws, provides— 

“That any officer in the executive civil service 
who shall use his official authority or influence for 
the purpose of interfering with an election or con¬ 
trolling the result thereof shall be dismissed from 
office.” 

Yet, in spite of this prostitution of his offi¬ 
cial place, confessed by the commissioner him¬ 
self, he still retains control of the pension bu¬ 
reau. 

Thus has the President enforced the law and 
his own regulations made in pursuance of its 
provisions. 

Another part of the promise in the republi¬ 
can platform was this: “All laws at variance 
with the object of existing reform legislation 
should be repealed.” 

The republican party has been in power for 
four years; for two years it has had control of 
the senate, the house of representatives, and 


the executive branch of the government, yet 
no bill has been passed to repeal any law at 
variance with the reform legislation referred 
to in the platform. There has been not the 
slightest pretense of even attempting to fulfill 
this explicit promise of the platform. 

Another declaration of the republican plat¬ 
form is: “The spirit and purpose of the re¬ 
form should be observed in all executive ap¬ 
pointments.” 

This spirit and purpose was to make ap¬ 
pointments depend upon proved merit and not 
upon political considerations. 

THE HEADSMEN AT WORK. 

The man who has the most extensive ap¬ 
pointing power in the civil service is the first 
assistant postmaster-general. Into his hands 
are committed all changes in fourth-class post¬ 
masterships, not far from 50,000 in number. 
Whom does the President select to do this 
work? A man who will conform to civil serv¬ 
ice reform principles, who will make remov¬ 
als only when the interest of the public service 
suggests it ? He appoints J. S. Clarkson, a pol¬ 
itician of the same class as Quay, Platt, and 
Dudley. Mr. Clarkson has declared in the 
most public manner, in his speeches (as at 
Boston), as well as in published articles, his 
contempt for this service reform. Men do not 
gather grapes of thorns, nor figs of thistles, nor 
could the President hope for the redemption 
of his promises by such an agent. Under 
Clarkson’s administration political executions 
have gone on at a more rapid rate than ever 
before, and the entire service, including all 
desirable fourth-class postmasterships, has 
been substantially changed for political rea¬ 
sons. 

Shortly after Mr. Harrison’s inauguration 
he appointed Joel B. Erhardt, a republican 
politician, collector of the port of New York. 
Erhardt turned out to be an efficient man, and 
enforced the civil service regulations so faith¬ 
fully that the politicians were dissatisfied. 
But after a while he resigned, and he thus 
tells the reason of his resignation : 

“I have resigned because the collector has been 
reduced to a position where he is no longer an inde¬ 
pendent officer with authority commensurate with 
his responsibility. I have given bonds for 8200,000. 
I have received for the government during the 
twenty months last past 8322,697,135.40, and I am 
all the time personally responsible for enormous 
values in money and merchandise. My duties arc 
necessarily performed through about 1,600 em¬ 
ployes. I am not willing to be responsible for their 
conduct unless I can have proper authority over 
them. The recent policy of the treasury depart¬ 
ment has been to control the details of the customs 
administration at the port of New York from Wash¬ 
ington, at the dictation of a private individual hav¬ 
ing no official responsibility. The collector is practi¬ 
cally deprived of power and control, while he is left 
subject to all responsibility. The office is no longer 
independent and I am. Therefore we have sepa¬ 
rated.” 

The private individual referred to was Mr. 
Thomas C. Platt, the republican boss of the 
state of New York. In place of Erhardt Mr. 
Harrison appointed Mr. Fassett, Platt’s man, 
collector. Fassett said when he was ap¬ 
pointed that he had no knowledge of the du¬ 
ties of the place. 










374 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


When Mr. Fassett was sworn in he was pre¬ 
sented with a San Domingo cutlass, in barbaric 
origin and purpose truly emblematic of the 
spoils system, and with the following legend : 

“This cutlass is an instrument of torture to be 
used in beheading democrats. Use it quickly and 
success is assured for the republican party. 

"Kepublican directions: Use daily, morning, 
noon and night until every democratic head is 
severed. Sure cure for democratic headache.’’ 

Fasset had scarcely taken the oath of office 
when he left the city to take charge of the Platt 
division in a quarrel in Chemung county. He 
soon resigned the place to be candidate for 
governor, for which office he was defeated by 
a large majority. 

But not only has President Harrison thus 
removed the most efficient men in the service; 
he has conspicuously appointed those who 
were most unfit. 

* * * 

Smiley N. Chambers was appointed by the 
President, United States district attorney for 
Indiana, to prosecute offenders against the 
law. His fitness for this office is shown by his 
declaration in regard to the famous Dudley 
letter, “Divide the floaters into blocks of five, 
and put a trusted man, with necessary funds, 
in charge of these five, and make him respon¬ 
sible that none get away and all vote our 
ticket.” Of this the public prosecutor, ap¬ 
pointed by Mr. Harrison, said in an interview 
in the Indianapolis Journal of December 13th: 
“The letters, construed in the light of the 
knowledge that we all possess of how elections 
in Indiana are conducted, by both parties, 
have nothing in them of a criminal character; 
but, on the other hand, when so construed, are 
honorable, and indicate simply a patriotic in¬ 
terest in the elections.” 

Elliott Sandford was appointed by Cleve¬ 
land chief justice of the supreme court of 
Utah. On May 10, 1889, his resignation was 
demanded. He asked whether he had been 
accused of misconduct; if charges were pre¬ 
ferred against him, it would be improper for 
him to resign until they were proved or dis¬ 
proved, and the attorney-general answers: 
“There are on file in this department some pa¬ 
pers complaining of the manner in which 
your judicial duties are discharged. Inde¬ 
pendently of these particular complaints, how¬ 
ever, the President has become satisfied that 
your administration of the office is not in har¬ 
mony with the policy he deemed proper to be 
pursued with reference to Utah afl'airs, and 
for this reason he desired to make a change, 
and out of courtesy gave you an opportunity 
to resign.” Here were charges against a judi¬ 
cial officer which he could neither see nor re¬ 
fute. He was to be removed, however, for 
not carrying out the policy of the administra¬ 
tion. But a judge has no right to carry out 
any policy. He must interpret and administer 
the law as he finds it. If a judge of a supreme 
court could be removed because his policy in 
interpreting the constitntion differed from that 
of the President, then the two functions of the 
judiciary and executive departments become 
merged in one. The independence of the ju¬ 
diciary is one of the most important supports 
of free government. A President who re¬ 
moves a judge for not doing his political work 
for him is essentially a tyrant and an autocrat. 
Judge Sandford’s rejoinder was conclusive. 
It was as follows: 

“In reply I have to say that my earnest pur¬ 
pose while on the bench as chief justice of 
this territory has been to administer justice 


and the laws honestly and impartially to all 
men under the obligations of my oath of of¬ 
fice. If the President of the United States 
has any policy which he desires a judge of the 
supreme court to carry out in reference to 
Utah affairs other than the one which I have 
pursued, you may say to him that he has done 
very well to remove me.” 

Ernst Nathan, a local republican boss, was 
appointed internal revenue collector in Brook¬ 
lyn. William C. Wallace was the republican 
candidate for congress and William J. Coombs 
the democratic candidate. Nathan was deter¬ 
mined to see that Wallace was elected, and 
printed the following circular letter: 

“Brooklyn, Oct. 25, 1890. 

“Dear Sir: The Hon. William C. Wallace 
having been renominated for member of con¬ 
gress for the third district, comprising the 
seventh, thirteenth, nineteenth, twentieth, 
twenty-first and twenty-third Wards, and be¬ 
ing very much interested in his re election, I 
would deem it a personal favor if you would 
interest yourself among your friends by advo¬ 
cating his election. Respectfully yours, 

“Ernst Nathan.” 

And in order to enforce the recommenda¬ 
tions of this letter among the liquor dealers 
and cigar manufacturers he had his official 
stamp placed upon it, as follows: “Ernst Na¬ 
than, Collector of Internal Revenue, Oct. 27, 
1890. First District, Brooklyn, N. Y.” Then 
he sent these to the liquor dealers and cigar- 
makers, whom he could continually harrass 
and embarass by his official action. 

Another of President Harrison’s appointees 
was Flanigan, of Texas, a man who passed 
into happy immortality by his declaration at 
a national republican convention, “What are 
we here for if not for the offices?” 

SAMPLE APPOINTMENTS. 

But, unfortunately, there is still a darker 
page of this history of official prostitution. 
David Martin was appointed collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue in Pennsylvania. Who was 
David Martin? He was a man who had be¬ 
come a director of repeaters in the nineteenth 
ward of Philadelphia. At general elections 
he directed operations, driving citizens from 
the polls, sometimes personally assaulting vo¬ 
ters without provocation. He had charge of 
thugs and repeaters in a district where gigantic 
frauds were perpetrated. On one occasion he 
took the ballot box to the station, where the 
returns were changed and the election officers’ 
names were forged. As he could not read or 
write, he did not personally forge the names, 
but he aided and abetted the criminal act. 
At the election for the adoption of the new 
constitution for Pennsylvania, Martin again 
had charge of the repeaters of his district. He 
was one of the managers who made up the re¬ 
turns whereby the nineteenth ward gave 6,000 
majority against the new constitution. 

One of Martin’s tricks was to arm his “heel¬ 
ers” with short, sharp awls with which to prod 
adverse electors until they abandoned the at¬ 
tempt to vote. Martin, however, was one of 
Quay’s subordinates and henchmen. When his 
appointment was suggested, Mr. McManespro 
tested against it in person to President Harri¬ 
son. He denounced Martin as a ruffian and 
a manipulator of ballot boxes. Quay was 
present at the interview. His answer to the 
charges was that two senators from Pennsyl¬ 
vania desired his appointment. A memorial 
to the President was drawn and signed by 
Joel J. Bailey of the citizens’ municipal 
league protesting against the appointment, 
and evidence in support of the charges was 
adduced, but as the messenger bearing this 
protest was on his way to the post-office he 
read on the bulletin the statement that Martin 
was appointed. 

Otis H. Russell, appointed as postmaster at 
Richmond, Va., had been collector of customs 


under Arthur, and special agents of the treas¬ 
ury had reported a shortage of over $800 in 
his accounts. 

R. H. Paul was appointed marshal of Ari¬ 
zona. Five years before he had been defeated 
for election as sheriff, but secured a recount 
which gave him a majority. The polls had 
been tampered with and Paul and his ac¬ 
complices were indicted. Two of them con¬ 
fessed, but as Paul surrendered the sheriff’s 
office, the proceedings were nollied. A certified 
copy of the court proceediftgs was sent to the 
dejiartment of justice. 

The President sent to the senate the name of 
George P. Fisher as first auditor of the treas¬ 
ury. This was the man of whom the New York 
Tribune says: “While he was district attorney 
in Washington his office was the chief bulwark 
of the district ring. There were hatched con¬ 
spiracies to convict innocent citizens of felony, 
plots to get rid of witnesses, and schemes to 
take burglars out of jail. Public opinion 
would not tolerate Pusher’s appearance in the 
safe conspiracy trial, and after some miserable 
revelations of the misconduct of his office, the 
President was obliged to call for his resigna¬ 
tion.” General Grant afterward nominated 
him as United States district attorney for Del¬ 
aware, but was compelled to withdraw the 
nomination. Yet, under Harrison, this man 
is nominated by the senate and confirmed to 
this important office. 

William R. Leeds was appointed in March, 
1891, marshal of the eastern district of Penn¬ 
sylvania. He was one of Quay’s tools in Phil¬ 
adelphia, the leader of the worst republican 
ring that the city had ever known. He was 
repudiated by his party in 1887, when he ran 
as candidate for sheriff, running more than 
25,000 votes behind his ticket. Even the Phil¬ 
adelphia Press declares: “It is an appoint¬ 
ment which should never have been made, 
and it will deeply disappoint the President’s 
best friends in Pennsylvania.” 

Governor Warmoth’s unsavory reputation is 
national. The New York Tribune said of him 
December 28, 1874: “That his administration 
as governor was corrupt and bad is unfortu¬ 
nately true.” The best part of the republican 
press in the north has long repudiated War- 
moth. He was one of the black spots in the 
reconstruction period. He killed a man in 
New Orleans under the. gravest suspicion of 
murder. He was charged by the lieutenant- 
governor of the state with trying to bribe him 
with an offer of $50,000 and unlimited ap¬ 
pointments in the fight with Kellogg in 1872. 
He went into the governorship poor, and came 
out a rich man after a scandalously extrava¬ 
gant administration. All these facts, and 
many more, have been brought to the atten¬ 
tion of President Harrison and to the senate. 

Warmoth has been appointed to the collec- 
torship of the port of New Orleans. The po¬ 
sition has a salary of $7,000 a year. The 
office is under civil service rules, and it is the 
sixth custom-house in size in the United States. 

The cabinet itself has not been secure from 
corrupt appointments, as Mr. Wanamaker got 
his place in consideration of the corruption 
fund which he raised, and it is not a violent 
presumption to infer that Stephen B. Elkins 
was appointed for like services to be rendered 
in the future. Elkins is immensely rich and 
has been a most successful money-getter. His 
political reputation is most unsavory. He 
was mixed up with land-grant scandals of past 
republican administrations. He was an hon¬ 
ored guest of the “soap” banquet in 1880, and 
his appointment was regarded by Brady as a 
vindication of those who were connected with 
the star-route scandals, which have become 
infamous in our political history. Clarkson 
said that in the campaign of four years ago 
“ he carried with him the promises made by 
Mr. Harrison.” * • * 




% 
















The Civil, service chronicle. 


This devotion of party, not to the ends for whicli it exists, but to the spoils that accoiupaiiy success at the polls, has become so 
absolute that it has produced an evil greater than any which party proposes to remedy.— George William Curtis, at Baltimore, April, 1892. 


VoL. I, No. 44. INDIANAPOLIS, OCTOBER, 1892. teems 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

. Indianapolis, Ind, 

• Public officials are the agents of the people. It is, 
therefore, their duty to secure for those whom they 
represent the best and most efficient performance of 
public work. This plainly can be best accomplished 
by regarding ascertained fitness in the selection of 
government employes. These considerations alone 
are sufficient justification for an honest adherence to 
the letter and spirit of civil-service reform. There 
are, however, other features of this plan which 
abundantly commend it. Through its operation 
worthy merit in every station and condition of 
American life is recognized in the distribution of 
public employment, while its application tends to 
raise the standard of political activity from spoils¬ 
hunting and unthinking party affiliation to the ad¬ 
vocacy of party principles by reason and argument. 
—Cleveland’s Letter of Acceptance. 

Elsewhere will be found the report 
made to the chairman of the committee of 
the National League, showing the results of 
an investigation of the interference of fed¬ 
eral office-holders in primaries,conventions 
and elections in Indiana during this admin¬ 
istration. It shows in still stronger light, 
what wasalready well known,that the Harri¬ 
son delegates to the Minneapolis convention 
from Indiana were not the choice of the 
republican party. If his office-holders had 
given no more attention to his re-nomina¬ 
tion than they gave for instance to the 
nomination of candidates for the county 
offices in their respective counties, he 
would not have had half of the delegates 
from this state. As it was he only got all 
of them by the most desperate efforts of 
his office-holders, who literally seized pri¬ 
maries and conventions. 

The campaign in this state still remains 
'' dead.” The people are not listening to 
the tariff discussion. They view with ap¬ 
parent unconcern the most dismal fore¬ 
bodings of tariff or non-tariff calamities 
that campaign orators can picture. There 
is one vital fact. The democrats have 
found a large number of voters who voted 
for Harrison four years ago and who will 
vote against him now; they have also found 
a large number of voters who decline to 
say how they will vote. These do not go 
to political meetings. Under the new bal¬ 
lot act, which is the most beneficent law 
ever made in Indiana, they will cast un¬ 
hampered votes. 

The only thing which could have put 
life into the campaign would have been a 


discussion at every cross-roads of Presi¬ 
dent Harrison’s revolutionary civil service 
record. The democrats have kept out 
this discussion to the unbounded relief of 
ihe republicans, who in this matter are 
absolutely helpless. The situation is a 
reminder of the situation about 1850, de¬ 
scribed by Mr. Julian in his life of Gid- 
dings, where both party machines sought 
to divide the people upon economic ques¬ 
tions in the expectation that the slavery 
question would be forgotten. The great 
question in American politics to-day is the 
dangers to free institutions which lurk in 
the prostitution of the civil service to par¬ 
tisan and particularly to personal ends. 
This question will not be suppressed. 


Those who are insisting that all other 
questions shall wait until the tariff ques¬ 
tion is “settled” are asking a great deal. 
In the North American Review for October, 
Senator Vest says of that question : 

The .same issue that disrupted the cabinet of 
Washington in 179.3 and caused Jefferson to surren¬ 
der his portfolio as secretary of state, aligns the two 
great parties in the pending canvass. <<<•■.•<>!■■;< 
Through all the mutations of American politics, 
though often obscured and interrupted by sectional 
and financial questions, this great controversy has 
marked the dividing line between the democratic 
party and its adversaries. 

This has been going on something like a 
hundred years. Will another hundred 
be long enough to settle it? 

Evidently Mr. Adlai Stevenson has not 
grown wiser. In introducing him at a 
meeting near Hamilton, Ohio, recently, 
ex-Governor Campbell in defining “a vig¬ 
orous and true democrat” said, that as a 
favor to him Stevenson had decapitated 
sixty-five republican postmasters in two 
minutes. Stevenson then said that he 
considered that the highest compliment 
he had ever received. Some men are grat¬ 
ified by things in every way little. These 
two worthies would do well to read the 
platform upon which they are now stand¬ 
ing. 


An attempt has been made to interest 
college students in the campaign. They 
ought to be interested in it. They 
could not do a more profitable work than 
to investigate the composition, acts, and 
surroundings of the Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion. From this point they should go 
back to the various state and district con¬ 


ventions which chose the Minneapolis del¬ 
egates. Then they should study the ma¬ 
nipulation of the primaries and conven¬ 
tions which chose the state and district 
delegates. From all of these the manipu¬ 
lating strings lead straight to federal offi¬ 
cers and on to President Harrison at 
Washington. Then these students should 
ask themselves whether there are any dang¬ 
ers to free institutions lurking in the power 
of official patronage. If so, what are those 
dangers ? 


However much the administration in 
general shirks its duty, the civil service 
commission does not. In September Mr. 
Roosevelt found a regular system of black¬ 
mail in practice by republican campaign 
committees upon the Indian service, in¬ 
cluding teachers, mostly women and help¬ 
ers, mostly Indians. He at once public¬ 
ly notified the employes that they need 
not give unless they chose, and even 
then could give to whatever party they 
preferred. President Harrison and Sec¬ 
retary Noble give no support to this, but 
look on in silence. Again, the Michigan 
republican state committee called upon 
postmasters for the names of “ from eight 
to twelve discreet and trustworthy young 
republicans,” and asked the postmasters to 
keep the matter secret. The commission 
notified Wanamaker, and he responded, 
not by a special warning to Michigan post¬ 
masters that dismissal would follow any 
service to the committee such as he would 
give unless he wanted them to help out the 
republicans, but by writing to the commis¬ 
sion that he can not help such attempts, 
but that there is an order against giving 
information gained “in the discharge of of¬ 
ficial duties,” and asks the commission for 
evidence of a violation of this order. A 
postmaster-general who wanted to find vi¬ 
olations of this order would set his inspec¬ 
tors at work. 

Since the above was written Wanamaker 
has discovered that the order above re¬ 
ferred to has been been violated. He does 
not dismiss the culprits; but after a pub¬ 
lic outcry, and after the mischief is done, 
he issues a warning to postmasters that 
they must not do it. 


In answer to our Greensburgh corres¬ 
pondent, whose letter is elsewhere, we 
say that the Chronicle editorials have 































376 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


not expressed “all-abiding faith” in the 
democratic party, as our correspondent de¬ 
clares. That party, four years hence, may 
have to be beaten for the very reason for 
which President Harrison ought to be 
beaten now. In the face of the present 
and the worst prostitution of the federal 
service that has ever been known, it is 
useless to point to what the democrats 
have heretofore done. Mr. Foulke did not 
speak for Mr. Cleveland and against Blaine 
in 1884. Mr. Cleveland was justly de¬ 
feated in 1883, for the reason that he had 
not withstood his party spoilsmen; but it 
does not follow that he should be defeated 
a second time for the same reason, while 
Harrison, who did not “yield” to the spoils 
element of his party, but invited it to come 
on and share in the loot,is re-elected. It 
is true that Harrison has had unstinted 
criticism, but our correspondent could not 
have lived in Indiana from 1885 to 1889 if 
he means to intimate that Cleveland did 
not have the same. It is easy to say that 
criticism is unfair, but if the remark is 
expected to have any weight, cases must be 
specified. It would be well to point out 
the unfairness of criticisng the appoint¬ 
ment of Wanamaker for raising a large 
campaign fund; the appointment of Elk¬ 
ins to detach him from Blaine; the re¬ 
fusal to retain Pearson, Graves, Corse, and 
Saltonstall; the distribution of a valuable 
block of offices among relatives; the subsi¬ 
dizing of the press condemned by Webster 
and by William Henry Harrison; the 
work of Headsman Clarkson; the loot of 
the Indian service; the turning of the Vir¬ 
ginia offices over to Mahone, the Pennsyl¬ 
vania to Quay, the New York to Platt; the 
refusal to let the civil service commission 
apply competition to the census bureau; 
the same refusal as to offices having twenty- 
five employes; the promotion of indicted 
office-holders; indiflference to the prosecu¬ 
tion of violators of the civil service law; 
the refusal to dismiss confessed crim¬ 
inals in the Baltimore post-office; the 
general failure to keep the promises of the 
platform; the personal use of the civil 
service by President Harrison to secure 
renomination; and his connection with 
the Minneapolis convention. His party 
did not “honor” him with a re-nomina¬ 
tion. He is not the nominee of his party. 
His nomination was brought about by the 
seizure of primaries and conventions by 
his office-holders. Tammany is a bad in¬ 
stitution. It is one with Platt’s republican 
machine in New York, and they now seem 
to be in a deal together. 

To support Harrison, a civil service re¬ 
former would have to change his princi¬ 
ples ; the only way he can be consistent is 
to oppose Harrison. Stevenson and Clark¬ 
son are as near alike as two peas, but the 


former will not be first-assistant post¬ 
master-general. 

Judging from the unbroken past, may a 
merciful providence protect the country 
against a president who feels “the restrain¬ 
ing influence of an ambition for a re-elec¬ 
tion.” President Harrison has not kept 
his pledge to extend the reform system es¬ 
tablished by law to all offices to which it is 
applicable, nor has he observed the spirit 
and purpose of the reform in his execu¬ 
tive appointments. He has used the serv¬ 
ice for his personal ambition. The ques¬ 
tion of Mr. Julian’s speach is the facts. If 
they are true, Harrison ought to be de¬ 
feated. Our correspondent does not deny 
a single fact. It is no answer to charge 
personal pique. 


Henry Cabot Lodge, in a recent speech 
at Brookline, addressed himself to the sub¬ 
ject of civil service reform, a notable mat¬ 
ter considering the present otherwise si¬ 
lent helplessness of his party. Even Mr. 
Lodge does not undertake the least defense 
of President Harrison, but attempts a di¬ 
version by way of comparison with Mr. 
Cleveland. The question, however, is 
whether Harrison’s course can be in any 
way defended. If it can not, and Mr. 
Lodge seems so to admit, he deserves de¬ 
feat. Mr. Lodge’s comparison does not 
need further attention except to notice 
some of the facts by which he tries to sus¬ 
tain it. Mr. Lodge is right that the civil 
service commission is the best we have ever 
had and that it has done its duty admirably. 
But he omits to say that this commission 
has been a thorn in Harrison’s side. He 
knows the astounding words with which 
Harrison met the request to prosecute the 
Mahone blackmailers. He omits to state 
that Harrison refused to allow the com¬ 
mission to apply competition to the census 
bureau, or to extend the classified service, 
except to 700 places in the Indian service 
and 132 places in the fish commission. He 
is compelled to “regret” that no one was 
punished at Baltimore, but his severe feel¬ 
ing because the civil service papers did not 
warm up at the bad condition found by 
Mr. Roosevelt to have existed at Baltimore 
under Mr. Cleveland is like trying to raise 
sympathy for a thief because some other 
thief stole years ago. Mr. Lodge knows 
very well that all that can be said for Har¬ 
rison’s attitude toward the commission is 
that he has not removed its members for 
doing their duty. 

In speaking of the classification of the 
railway mail service Mr. Lodge omits to 
state that President Harrison tricked the 
law and in violation of its spirit displaced 
more than 2,000 members of that service 
in six weeks for partisan reasons. The ac¬ 
tion of Secretary Tracy with the navy- 


yards is improved administration, but it is 
not permanent reform. The next secre¬ 
tary may disregard it entirely. Where 
has the President recommended that it be 
made permanent by law ? Mr. Lodge 
sums up by stating that “Cleveland took 
out of politics and placed under the re¬ 
formed civil service system in round num¬ 
bers 5,000 places and President Harrison in 
round numbers 10,250.” To this we make 
the plain and specific answer that Presi¬ 
dent Harrison has taken out of politics and 
placed under the reform system just 832 
places and no more. 

As to places not embraced within the 
civil service law, Mr. Lodge denies the 
right, for instance, to criticise the loot of 
50,000 fourth-class post-offices after the 
Clarkson method. He has apparently 
never read that part of the republican 
platform which said that the spirit and 
purpose of the reform should be observed 
in all executive appointments. He men¬ 
tions and favors an admirable bill designed 
to take these offices out of politics. Has he 
noted Harrison’s silence as to this bill and 
has he read Wanamaker s report upon it ? 


INTERFERENCE OF INDIANA FED¬ 
ERAL OFFICE-HOLDERS IN PRI- 
MARIES, CONVENTIONS AND 
ELECTIONS. 

To Moorfield Storey, Esq., Chaiiman of the com¬ 
mittee appointed by the President of the National 
League of Civil Service Reform AssociaJtions to in¬ 
vestigate and report upon the interference of fed¬ 
eral office-holders in primaries, conventions and 
elections, under the present National Administra¬ 
tion : 

Sir: The following is my report of the 
matters within the object of this committee, 
and pertaining to the state of Indiana: 

A clear understanding of the bearing of the 
labors of the Indiana office-holders in the 
management of the republican party machine 
during this administration can not be had 
without a brief preliminary statement of the 
original distribution of spoil by President 
Harrison. Under their platform it was to be 
expected that the republicans would have ab¬ 
stained from looting the offices; having, how¬ 
ever, disregarded their promises any course 
was to be expected, and that, in turning the 
federal patronage to the personal behoof of 
the President, they took the worst and most 
dangerous, is not a matter for surprise. 

There have been and are a large number of 
Indiana republicans not favorable to General 
Harrison. These in a general way have fa¬ 
vored Judge Gresham. The feeling has al¬ 
ways been intense, but the reasons for this 
preference of leadership are not within the 
province of this report. 

President Harrison has given his personal 
attention either directly or through trusted 
agents to the distribution of the Indiana pa¬ 
tronage. One of the cardinal principles 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


377 


seems to have been to leave out every unre¬ 
pentant Gresham man, or, if this rule was 
overstepped, to make the gift so insignificant 
as to be valueless to the recipient. A case of 
this kind was the appointment of William H. 
Calkins to a judgeship in Washington Terri¬ 
tory just previous to its admission as a state. 
The only exceptions to this ungracious giving 
have been where it was possible to bring the 
recipient over to the Harrison interest. For 
instance, Marcus L. Sulzer, of Madison, was 
in opposition, but after a few months enjoy¬ 
ment of a special Indian agency given him by 
Harrison, he declared the latter the only man 
whom the republicans could afford to nomi¬ 
nate. 

Another rule of distribution which he who 
runs may read was the rewarding of dele¬ 
gates who supported General Harrison in the 
convention of 1888. Examples of this kind 
of important dignity or great emolument are 
the following: 

John C. New, consul-general at London, (whose 
perquisites are admitted to amount to over $40,000 a 
year.) 

W. L. Dunlap, United States marshal of Indiana, 

Smiley N. Chambers, United States district attor¬ 
ney for Indiana. 

John B. Cockrum, deputy United States district 
attorney for Indiana. 

Albert G. Porter, minister to Italy. 

E. W. Halford, private secretary. 

James N. Huston, treasurer of the United States. 

[ * Marine D. Tackett, special Indian land agent. 

. ©A. K. Sills, special swamp land agent. 

J-Kniseley, Columbia City, special internal rev- 

laenue collector in Tennessee. 

^ A. C. Bearss, Peru, chief clerk railway mail service. 
L Newspapers have been systematically subsi¬ 
dized. The following are instances of the gift 
' of post-offices taken from all parts of the 
^ state: 

S. M. Noyes, Echo, Akron. 

J. P. Prickett, New Era, Albion. 

J. P. Clugate, Union, Sullivan. 

L. H. Beyerle, Times, Goshen. 

Ed. Charles, Record, Carthage. 

Isaac Jenkiuson, Palladium, Richmond. 

Thad. Butler, Herald, Huntington. 

»\V. F. Voght, Spence’s People’s Paper, Covington. 
Bw. E. Knight, Monitor, Grand View. 

■ C. E. Newton, Herald, Kewanna. 

■ John H. Rarick, Standard, LaGrange. 

■ M. L. Enyart, Monitor, Macy. 

G. W. Fountain, Gazette, New Carlisle. 

J. P. Carr, Tribune, Oxford. 

C. B. Cady, Republican, Pendleton. 

J. W. Siders, Republican, Plymouth. 

A. L. Lawshe, Journal, Zenia. 

E. J. Marsh, Commercial, Portland. 

J. J. Wheeler, Lake County Star, Crown Point. 

In the distribution of the fourth-class post¬ 
masterships and other spoils small in size but 
great in number, the personal supervision of 
the President clashed with the assumed pre¬ 
rogative of Indiana republican congressmen. 
Of the personal supervision the complaints 
were steady and bitter. In the case of Con¬ 
gressman Cheadle there was an open rupture, 
and the administration forces successfully op¬ 
posed Cheadle’s renomination in 1890. In 
this distribution for a while the general agen¬ 
cy of Mr. Huston, chairman of the republican 
state committee, was used. He soon became 
United States treasurer and was succeeded by 
L. T. Micheuer, then the attorney-general of 


Indiana, and now the partner of Dudley, the 
author of the “ blocks-of-five letter.” Mr. 
Michener has always been an untiring and in 
the closest degree a trusted agent of General 
Harrison. Of this particular work he said: 

“ When I became chairman of the slate central 
committee, the assignment of such fourth-class post- 
offices as remained in democratic hands in demo¬ 
cratic congressional districts was put into my hands.” 

How promptly Mr. Michener went to the 
point is illustrated by the case at Freedom, 
Owen county, Indiana. The post-office there 
was held by a one-legged soldier named Suf- 
fall, who had performed his duties satisfacto¬ 
rily. A strenuous attempt to have him re¬ 
tained was ended by the following from Mr. 
Michener: 

Office of Attorney-General, ) 
Indianapolis, Ind. | 

IF. W. Hart, Washington, D. C.: 

My Dear Hart— We have decided that Frank Watts 
should be appointed postmaster at Freedom, Owen 
county. 

Please have it attended to at once. You may put 
this on file as a recommendation. 

Yours truly, L. T. Michener, 

In the early part of this administration 
there was little for the office-holders to do. 
The administration was busy with the distri¬ 
bution and the favored ones were engaged in 
the enjoyment of their shares, or possibly 
in helping others less fortunate. For instance? 
in July, 1889, the Franklin Star says that 
United States Marshal Dunlap asked Brown, 
the democratic postmaster of that city, to re¬ 
sign; and in the same month the Evansville 
Journal said of United States District Attor¬ 
ney Chambers, “ There was no occasion for 
Chambers to go on sundry pilgrimages to In¬ 
dianapolis and Washington in order to preju¬ 
dice the authorities against Adams.” After 
the election of 1888, there was no general 
election in Indiana until 1890. Ordinarily 
in the off year federal office-holders are most¬ 
ly occupied in helping congressmen to renomi¬ 
nation, but in 1890, in Indiana, there was lit¬ 
tle occasion for such service, except in the 
case of Cheadle, and he was deprived of it. 
There was, however, a constant fear of the 
Gresham men, and the attention of the office¬ 
holders was directed to every incident which 
would have a bearing on the desired renomi¬ 
nation of President Harrison. It was impor¬ 
tant that the state committee should be friendly 
to him andtliat the state convention should in¬ 
dorse him. The new state committee was 
chosen in January, 1890, by district conven¬ 
tions. An entirely reliable informant who 
had personal knowledge "of the facts, wrote 
me at the time: 

At the various district conventioijs the federal 
office-holders, particularly the postmasters, were very 
prominent. In one district, the third, in which the 
administration, through Micheuer, was very anxious 
to win. Postmaster Ridland, of Scottsburg, a recent 
appointee, was compelled to change the vote of his 
county from the man of his choice to Michener’s 
candidate. Postmaster Godfrey, of New Albany, 
was a delegate to that convention and worked ac¬ 
tively for Carter, the Michener candidate, for com¬ 
mitteeman. But for the official pressure brought to 
bear in that convention. Carter would not have re¬ 
ceived one-third the vote. 

The efforts of the office-holders failed, for 


the state committee then selected was unmis¬ 
takably anti-Harrison and continued so for 
a year. 

With regard to the congressional nomina¬ 
tion in Cheadle’s district, the same informant 
says: 

In the ninth congressional district contest for the 
nomination, Mr. La Follette, superintendent of pub¬ 
lic instruction, was backed by Chairman Michener 
and all the patronage. B. Wilson Smith, postmaster 
at LaFayette, was particularly active in Mr. LaFol- 
lette’s behalf. Postal clerk Hack helped out, but in 
spite of all. La Follette was beaten. 

The industry of the office-holders through¬ 
out the state up to the time of the state con¬ 
vention in Sept., 1890, ran about like the fol¬ 
lowing instances taken from Indianapolis: 

David Wallace, head of the money order 
department in the post-office, was a delegate to 
all conventions. Deputy United States Mar¬ 
shal Conway and Deputy Collector Schmidt 
were delegates to all conventions and members 
of the republican county committee. Deputy 
Collector Saulcy, proudly spoken of as “a 
hustler from way back,” was a member of the 
county committee. 

At the state convention in September, there 
was a determined and persistent attempt, led 
entirely by federal office-holders, to secure from 
the convention an approval of President Har¬ 
rison. The following are the names of some 
of these leaders out of a list of forty: Post¬ 
master Higgins, of Fort Wayne; Postmaster 
Smith, of Lafayette; Postmaster Greiner, of 
Terre Haute; Postmaster Bennett, of Evans¬ 
ville; Postmaster Crockett, of South Bend, 
Postmaster Thompson, of Logansport, and 
Postmaster DeMotte, of Valparaiso. 

The attempt was generally regarded as a 
failure. While in words the convention did 
approve of the President’s administration, this 
declaration was nullified by other parts of the 
platform. It was known that the convention 
was hostile to the President and it left in bad 
shape matters bearing upon his renomination. 
It did not seem possible that he could secure 
a united delegation from Indiana. 

In the campaign which followed, leading 
up to the November election, the club of In¬ 
diana office-holders at Washington made its us¬ 
ual demonstration. Every Indiana republican 
in the government service at Washington re¬ 
ceived a demand for money to defray the cam¬ 
paign expenses, signed by W. W. Curry as 
agent for the Indiana state committee. This 
demand contains the folloAving : 

“There are two classes who are always 
ready to cry out against such contributions— 
those whose meanness seeks an excuse for re¬ 
fusing to aid in securing the success of the 
party of which they are the beneficiaries, and 
those whose consciousness of their own cor¬ 
ruptness makes them able to charge corrupt 
motives on others.” Also the following: “You 
can not be solicited at your places of official 
duty, but outside those you can confer and 
contribute as you please. The civil service 
laws are designed to protect you in the full 
exercise of your rights—not to convert you 
into political eunuchs.” 













378 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The office-holders themselves appeared in 
all parts of the state. For instance the Indi¬ 
anapolis News of October 17, 1890, says ; 

This is about the time when all the Indianians em¬ 
ployed in the government departments at Washing¬ 
ton come home for a vacation. The Indianapolis 
contingent has begun to arrive. Gus Shaw, who is 
influential with railroad men, has been here several 
weeks getting the "boys” into line. The first of next 
week all the Indianapolis republicans who have po¬ 
sitions at the capitol-are expected here. 

The Indianapolis .lournal reports twenty- 
five Indiana office-holders as having gone 
home as early as October 16. Among others 
who came were Harry McFarland, of the 
government printing office, notorious for his 
influence among the lowest voting element in 
Indianapolis, and D. N. Ransdell, marshal of 
the District of Columbia, who is the Presi¬ 
dent’s right hand political manager. These 
and scores of others appearing from all parts 
of the country did not come merely to vote, 
but they came days and weeks before the elec¬ 
tion and put in the time “hustling” for the 
party. The efibrts of these and of the office¬ 
holders located in Indiana supplemented each 
other. For instance, Postmaster Higgins, of 
Ft. Wayne, and his chief deputy headed the 
petition for federal supervisors. 

After the overwhelming defeat at the No¬ 
vember election in 1890, the internal struggle 
in the party again broke out. In order to se¬ 
cure re-nomination. President Harrison had 
to have every delegate from Indiana. It 
seemed impossible of accomplishment. The 
state committee and certain districts in the 
state were thoroughly against him. The fed¬ 
eral office holders addressed themselves to this 
task. The meeting of the state committee in 
in January, 1891, first required attention. A 
new chairman was to be chosen in place of 
Michener, who had moved to Washington. It 
was highly important that the new chairman 
should be in the President’s interest. The 
committee met at the Denison hotel, at In¬ 
dianapolis. William T. Steele, governor of 
Oklahoma territory, and Warren G. Sayre, an 
Indian land commissioner, both from Indiana, 
and Russell B. Harrison, the President’s son, 
appeared at the meeting with other office¬ 
holders and in some manner turned a hostile 
majority into a minority. 

About this time the Indianapolis corres¬ 
pondent of the Cincinnati Commercial-Ga¬ 
zette (rep.) thus stated the situation with re¬ 
gard to the opposition to Harrison in this 
state: 

In the postmasters, postal agents, revenue men and 
other federal employes throughout the state, the adminis¬ 
tration has what you might term an army of agents and 
detectives, and any suspicious move on the part of a 
prominent anti-administration man is promptly reported 
to headquarters and his movements are watched, and the 
antidote is promptly applied for any mischief that may 
be set brewing. In general terms you may set it down 
that the President is nearly as well informed as to 
what is going on in the camp of his enemies as his 
enemies themselves, and when the time comes he 
will show his hand. 

In June of that year O. E. Mohler, editor of 
the Ft. Wayne Gazette, declared that there were 
no Harrison republicans in Allen county out¬ 


side of the office-holding ring. The Gazette and 
the Evansville Journal, both important pa-, 
pers, were strong leaders of the opposition to 
Harrison. It must be said, however, that the 
subsidized press was very faithful and active 
in his interest, and it is believed that in no 
case, from the time the subsidy was received 
until the present, can there be found in any 
column of these papers anything but lauda¬ 
tion and praise of their benefactor. If the 
President’s administration has had any faults, 
these papers have in consideration overlooked 
them. 

A new state committee was to be chosen in 
January, 1892, and this enlisted the attention 
of the President’s office-holders. The selection 
was by congressional districts and the work 
was done there. We find Marshal Ransdell 
in December, 1891, at Lebanon and Frankfort, 
fixing the ninth district. The fourth district 
was close, but Collector John O. Cravens and 
his deputies, together with the postmasters, 
turned the scale in favor of Harrison. When¬ 
ever the Harrison men could bring it about, 
they had the delegates for the district conven¬ 
tions, and for every other convention, for that 
matter, chosen by primaries rather than by 
mass conventions in order that the fourth-class 
postmasters and the other small office-holders 
might work more efficiently and secretly. In 
the Indianapolis district Deputy Collector 
Harvey presided at the fourth ward primary 
and Postmaster Thompson, post-office clerks 
Dave Wallace, Shel Woodward, Billy Leon¬ 
ard, Bill Davis, Clint Lowe and Marshall C. 
Woods, Deputy Collector Saulcy, Warehouse¬ 
man Nolan, Deputy Marshals Moore and Con¬ 
way and Superintendent of Mails, Billy Patter¬ 
son, and Superintendent of Carriers Craft, are 
examples of a large number of federal office¬ 
holders who bent their best and highly skilled 
energies to the manipulation of these pri¬ 
maries. 

The delegates to the various district conven¬ 
tions met to elect the members of the state 
committee. In the tenth district the meeting 
was at Logansport, January 20. Two national 
bank examiners, thirty-seven postmasters, 
three post-office inspectors, a pension agent 
and a number of mail carriers were in attend¬ 
ance. Among others, were Postmaster De 
Motte of Valparaiso and his son-in-law, a 
post-office inspector. At the convention of the 
eleventh district, held at Wabash, January 
20, the resolutions warmly indorsing President 
Harrison were reported by a committee of 
which Indian Land Commissioner Sayre was 
chairman. 

The result of these combined efforts was the 
choice of a state committee favorable to Har¬ 
rison. The new committee met at Indianapo¬ 
lis, January 28. Among other office-holders 
who crowded into the same room to oversee the 
proceedings, were the following: Postmaster 
Thompson of Indianapolis, Postmaster Higgins 
of Fort Wayne, Postmaster Greiner of Terre 
Haute, Postmaster Godfrey of New Albany, 
Postmaster Ellis of Muncie, Postmaster Crock¬ 
ett of South Bend, Postmaster Bennett of War¬ 


saw, Postmaster Byerly of Goshen, Postmaster 
Smith of Lafayette, Postmaster Fearis of 
Union, Postmaster Hendricks of Greeusburgh, 
Postmaster Tichner of Princeton, District At¬ 
torney Chambers, Assistant Cockrum, Marshal 
Dunlap, Collector Cravens. Deputy Collector 
Harvey and Pension Agent Ensley. 

The selection of delegates to the Minneapo¬ 
lis convention was the next step to be taken. 
There were four delegates at large and two 
from each congressional district. Under the 
circumstances only the most consummate skill 
and the most diligent application of every 
force could secure the entire delegation for 
Harrison. 

The seventh or Indianapolis district was a 
vital point and the struggle was long and 
bitter. Postmaster Thompson exercised to the 
utmost all of his well known skill as a prim¬ 
ary and convention manipulator. The evi¬ 
dence seems clear that in some of the prima¬ 
ries at Indianapolis, the Administration was 
in a minority, but its friends got up con¬ 
testing delegations and these were admit¬ 
ted to seats in the convention. At the district 
convention following, it was openly charged 
by delegates on the floor that such frauds had 
been perpetrated, and in addition that federal 
office-holders had used money to secure the 
choice of delegates for Harrison, who were 
then sitting in the convention. In one prima¬ 
ry the Harrison men had nine men while the 
opposition had 118 by actual count. Never¬ 
theless half of the Harrison delegates were 
admitted to seats. One of those who seemed 
to have particular charge of the matter in the 
Indianapolis district was Mr. Stanton J. 
Peelle. He gave it careful attention at all 
points, and on the day of the primary in his 
own ward, which was also the’ President’s 
ward, he personally solicited voters to attend, 
saying, “They will down Ben if his friends 
don’t turn out.” Soon after the selection of 
Indiana delegates unanimous for Harrison, 
Mr. Peelle, himself a delegate, was appointed 
judge of the court of claims. The juxtaposi¬ 
tion of the extremely valuable services ren¬ 
dered by Mr. Peelle, and the extremely valu¬ 
able gift made to him is unpleasant. His 
place as delegate was taken by his alternate. 

Robert Metzger, of Indianapolis, makes the 
following statement: 

I have been republican committeeman of what is 
now the tenth ward in Indianapolis for four years in 
the last six and a member of the county committee 
two years. The tenth is in the central part of the 
city and is one of the most important wards. Before 
the district convention, which met in January, 1892, 
at Indianapolis, to select a member of the state com¬ 
mittee, J. W. Hess, who was a Harrison candidate, 
asked me to support him, and said that if he were 
chosen and Harrison was re-elected he would have 
control of patronage and would remember his friends. 

A colored man named “Doc” Wilson had always 
worked with me and had been one of my most relia¬ 
ble friends. At the tenth ward primary, which was 
held to choose delegates to the district convention 
which was to choose Minneapolis delegates, Wilson 
was detached from me, and he has since told me 
how it happened. He said he had a family to sup¬ 
port and it was a matter of money with him. That 
before the primary was held Hess came to him and 
told^him that Metzger, meaning me, would have a 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


379 


majority at the primaries and it was useless to buck 
against him, but to be there with his crowd, and no 
matter what the majority did, to hold anotAer pri¬ 
mary and choose delegates and they would be recog¬ 
nized, and that he, Wilson, would be taken care of. 

I was opposed to the renomination of Harrison, and 
was working for anti-Harrison delegates. Wilson 
came to the primary and mustered just eight men, 
while I had 118. My ticket went through first by ac¬ 
clamation, but the Wilson crowd called out that 
there were democrats in the room, and a ballot was 
therefore taken, which resulted in 118 for my ticket 
to two against it. 

The same primary also elected me a member of 
the republican county committee and the credentials 
of the delegates were signed by the secretary of the 
primary and by me as chairman. After this meeting 
had adjourned, Wilson and his crowd stayed behind 
to hold another. Not more than thirty people re¬ 
mained in the room and a large part of these were 
spectators. They persuaded our secretary to act as 
secretary of their meeting and elected GritBn chair¬ 
man, and then choose delegates to the district con¬ 
vention. They also named Griffin for the county j 
committee. 

Afterwards the county committee met to decide 
on the contesting committeemen. The county com¬ 
mittee was for Harrison. Before the meeting “Doc” 
Wilson came to me and said if I would let the dis¬ 
trict delegation go, they would give me the county 
committeemanship. I refused. When the commit¬ 
tee met I was there with twelve or fourteen wit¬ 
nesses, while the Wilson crowd had three. The 
county committee said that their time was taken up 
and they could only hear three witnesses on a side. 
Deputy United States Marshal Conway was there a 
member of the committee, and I said to him: “You 
know that I was squarely elected down there.” He 
answered; “Well, Bob, you know how it is in these 
things. Those who are not with us are against us.” 
He then made a motion to appoint a committee to 
hear the testimony. He was made chairman of the 
committee and after hearing three witnesses on a 
side, the committee reported that Griffin was chosen 
and the county committee adopted the report. 

When the district convention was held, the tenth 
ward contest was referred to a committee of which 
Ross Hawkins was chairman. Hawkins is one of 
the Slick Six and is a desperate Harrison man. 

He went through the form of hearing testimony, 
and then reported in favor of dividing the delegation 
three and three, which was done. Wilson was after¬ 
wards appointed to a place in the railway mail serv¬ 
ice as weigher of mails. 

Afterwards Stanton J. Peelle, now judge of the 
court of claims, asked me about supporting Layman 
as delegate to the Minneapolis convention. He 
brought up the subject of the tenth ward trouble and 
asked me why I was against Harrison. After some 
talk, he said, “Metzger, what do you want?” with a 
look and tone which I understood to signify what re¬ 
ward I wanted to cease opposing Harrison. I said I 
wanted justice. 

In the twelfth or Fort Wayne district the 
federal office holders won their most signal 
victory. The convention was held at Auburn, 
March 3. The Courier of that place speaks of 
it as “the district meeting of republican post¬ 
masters.” Kobert T, McDonald, in his appeal 
to the national republican committee, says: 
“The whole proceedings were dominated by a 
tyrannical office holders’ machine.” The fol¬ 
lowing are part of the postmasters who were 
present from a single county, DeKalb: Pron- 
ner, of Spencerville; Gordon, of Auburn; 
Bicknell, of Garrett; Abies of St. Joe Station; 
Crane, of Sedan; Bachman, of Carrunna, and 
Jones, of Butler. It is within the facts to say 
that by no possibility could Harrison dele¬ 
gates been chosen in this district without the 
most strenuous offorts of these hundreds of of¬ 


fice-holders. The same is undoubtedly true 
of at least several other districts. 

The state convention which selected the del¬ 
egates at large met at Indianapolis, March 1. 
It was presided over by Land Commissioner 
Sayre. When a delegate undertook to speak 
against a resolution indorsing Harrison, Assist¬ 
ant District Attorney Cockrum interfered and 
insisted that “this is a republican convention 
and not a place where a man can come loaded 
with personal and bile and spit it out.” But 
Deputy Marshal Conway, with just confidence 
in the Harrison machine, said: “A republi¬ 
can who is against Harrison is a novelty, and 
I move we hear him through.” 

Practically all of the leading and a large 
number of the minor office-holders of Indiana 
attended the Minneapolis convention, and 
rarely have office-holders enjoyed greater noto¬ 
riety. Consul-General New came from Lon¬ 
don, denying that he came to manage the can¬ 
vass of President Harrison. He then went to 
Washington and spent most of a day confer¬ 
ring with the President, Elkins, Rathbone and 
others. Then he went to Minneapolis and for 
many days and nights managed the Presi¬ 
dent’s canvass. Marshal Ransdell, River Com¬ 
missioner Taylor, Collector Hildebrand, Mar¬ 
shal Dunlap, Pension Agent Ensley, District 
Attorney Chambers, Assistant District Attor¬ 
ney Cockrum, Postmaster Thompson, of Indi¬ 
anapolis, and three of his assistants, Wallace, 
Woodward and Patterson; Postmasters Smith, 
of Lafayette; Higgins, of Fort Wayne, and 
Greiner, of Terre Haute, were among*those at 
Minneapolis to whose efforts the President 
owes his renomination. One kind of official 
effort which made for this renomination is 
illustrated by the following undoubtedly cor¬ 
rect dispatches, the “Rhody” referred to being 
Roger R.Shiel, a prominent republican “Boy” 
of Indianapolis: 

For the first time the Columbia Club went wild for 
Benjamin. Shody was lifted upon the shoulders of U. 
S. Marshal Dunlap and Postmaster Thompson and car¬ 
ried through the lobby at the head of the procession, 
which the Columbians instantly formed. Rhody 
waved a huge picture of Harrison at the end of a fif¬ 
teen-foot pole. For fifteen minutes the Columbians 
circled about Rhody and Ben’s picture like Indian 
ghost dancers singing: 

Every mother’s son from Maine to Oregon 

Is a son of a gun if he don’t vote for Harrison. 

Suddenly Rhody jumped off the shoulders of Dun¬ 
lap and Thompson and made a dash for a colored 
delegate who happened to be so unfortunate as to 
catch ShieTs eagle eye. Placing his arm around the 
negro’s neck, Rhody disappeared toward the bar and 
the ghost dance broke up. Then a quartet, consist¬ 
ing of Bruce Carr, O. H. Tripp, of North Vernon, 
Postmaster De Motte of Valparaiso, and Postmaster 
Greiner of Terre Haute, went from one street corner 
to another repeating the refrain of the song, “Every 
mother’s son,” etc.—Minneapolis Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel, June 9. 

United States Marshal Ransdell will go to Minneapo¬ 
lis to help out Harrison —IFas/ifnpfon Dispatch to 
Cou/rier-Journal, May 27. 

Dan Ransdell [marshal District of Columbia] said: 
“We are in excellent shape, and I firmly believe the 
President will be nominated on the first ballot. The 
opposition has the noise here to-night, but we have 
the Yoies."—Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, June 7. 


E. W. Halford, Washington, D. C.: 

The Harrison delegates have just had a meeting in 
Market Hall, presided over by Chauncey M. Depew. 
A roll-call by states showed 521 votes for the Presi¬ 
dent, not counting contested seats. He will be 
nominated at the first opportunity to ballot. 

D. M. Ransdell. 

[Marshal District of Columbia.^ 
—Minneapolis Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 9. 

B. W. Smith, postmaster of La Fayette, Ind., talked 
warmly for Harrison, and it is astonishing how many 
Harrison votes the letter of resignation made in La 
Fayette yesterday.—ilfmwapolis Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Journal, June 6. 

Higgins is postmaster at Fort Wayne, Ind., and Grei¬ 
ner is postmaster at Terre Haute. Higgins is for Har¬ 
rison; Greiner is supposed to be for Blaine, and 
wears a Blaine badge. Higgins meets Greiner, falls 
into an argument with him about the merits of the 
candidates, and Greiner is convinced, takes off his 
Blaine badge, and becomes a Harrison convert. 
This happens several times a day in localities discreetly 
selected.—New York Times, June 6. 

After the Minneapolis convention still 
another state convention drew upon federal 
official energies. This met at Fort Wayne, 
July 27, 1892, for the nomination of state of¬ 
ficers. The administration opposed the re¬ 
nomination of Governor Chase, the chief argu¬ 
ment used being that the railroad men would 
not vote for him. To put this argument in shape 
A. D. Shaw, deputy third auditor of the treas¬ 
ury, gave a great deal of time- during a 
month’s absence from Washington. He had 
been the chief organizer of railroad men for 
General Harrison in 1888. At Fort Wayne 
he was assisted by Deputy Marshals Moore 
and Conway, and Deputy Collectors Mount 
and Saulcy. Another movement in the oppo¬ 
sition to Chase was the candidacy of District 
Attorney Chambers, backed by another group 
of office-holders, chief of whom were his assist¬ 
ant Cockrum and Marshal Dunlap. Chase 
was nominated. 

The following particular instances of the 
industry of President Harrison’s office-holders 
in his behalf are given in further illustration 
and proof of what has been said : 

Pensioner Examiner Drayer, and Postmaster Ca¬ 
ble, of Hartford City, worked for Harrison delegates, 
and attended the convention at Bluft’ton, to select 
them. 

A reliable report from the Lawrenceburgh district 
says: “The entire revenue force of this district 
were actively engaged in securing delegates to elect 
George M. Roberts, brother-in-law of Revenue Col¬ 
lector Cravens, as district delegate to the Minneap¬ 
olis convention.” Collector John O. Cravens and a 
number of his force attended the Minneapolis con¬ 
vention. 

Postmaster Lucas, of Lawrenceburgh, and United 
States Storekeeper Sortwell, have been workers in 
primaries and conventions. 

Postmaster Hudson, of Corydon, has attended 
state, congressional and county conventions. 

Postmaster Shaw, and his deputy Long, of Vevay, 
are active political workers. 

Postmaster Simpson, of Lamb, and Postmaster 
Langsdale, of Florence, have been active in select¬ 
ing delegates and in conventions. 

Amos Hartman, postmaster at Columbus, went to 
the Minneapolis convention. 

Postmaster Stevens, at Peru, Postmaster Fite, at 
Denver, Postmaster Lawshe, at Xenia, take part in 
all local federal politics. 

Post-office Inspector Bearss, Peru, and Auditing 
Attorney Stutesman, Peru, attended the Minneapolis 
convention. 

Postmaster Quinn, Decatur, attended the distric 







380 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


and state conventions, and took an active part in the 
selection of Minneapolis delegates. 

Postal Clerk Baldwin, of Austin, attended the Min¬ 
neapolis convention. 

Postmaster Dryden, Martinsville, has been an ac¬ 
tive political worker. 

Postmaster James H. Fearis, Connersville, is the 
most active republican worker in that place. He has 
been prominent in all primaries and conventions. 
He is president of a republican club organized for 
this campaign. He took an important part in the se¬ 
lection of county delegates to the district conven¬ 
tion and attended the convention at Cambridge City, 
where Minneapolis delegates were chosen. He at¬ 
tended the Minneapolis convention in the interest 
of Harrison. 

Postmaster McPheeters, Bloomington, helped se¬ 
lect the delegates to and attended the Minneapolis 
convention. 

Deputy United States Marshal Mathers, Blooming 
ton, and Postmasters Sharp, Ellettsville; Woodard, 
Harrodsburgh, are active in local federal politics. 

Postmaster Geo. W. Bennett, Warsaw, has taken an 
active part in every political convention and rallies 
the voters on election day. He was at the state con¬ 
vention to help select delegates to Minneapolis and 
attend the Minneapolis convention. He was recently 
an active participator at a convention at Elkhart. 

Postmaster Joseph A. Gant, Marlon, attended the 
Minneapolis convention after working for Harrison 
delegates at home. He also attended the Indianap¬ 
olis convention whii h chose the delegates at large. 
He is chairman of his party county committee. 
Every federal officer connected with the post-office 
in Marion is a republican worker in this campaign. 

Postmaster Rogers, Huntington, attended the 
Minneapolis convention. 

Pension Examiner Hobbs, Salem, is chairman 
of the county committee, and works wherever dele¬ 
gates are to be selected. He attended the conven¬ 
tion at Jeffersonville which selected delegates to the 
Minneapolis convention and was a delegate to the 
Indianapolis convention for the same purpose. 

Postmaster Ward, Salem, has always helped to se¬ 
lect delegates. He attended the convention at Jef¬ 
fersonville and the state convention which selected 
Minneapolis delegates. 

Postmaster Tindolph, Vincennes, has been active 
in politics, in primaries and in state and local con¬ 
ventions. He attended the Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion. 

Postmaster Hovey, Mount Vernon, has been very 
active for Harrison and attended the Minneapolis 
convention. 

Bank Examiner Holman, Rochester, has been act¬ 
ive in primaries and in state and local conventions. 
He helped select the delegates in his district and at 
large, at Indianapolis, and attended the Minneapolis 
convention. 

Postmaster Marsh, Portland, has been a steady 
worker for Harrison. He attended the convention at 
Bluffton to select Minneapolis delegates and iittended 
the Minneapolis convention. 

Pension Examiner Bindley, Paoli, attended the 
Minneapolis convention. 

Collector J. P. Throop, of the Terre Haute district, 
resides in Orange county, where the republicans 
were anti-Harrison. He spent about two months at 
home “ continuously, trying to whip the boys back 
into line.” 

Postmaster Pate, of Boonville, attended the dis¬ 
trict meeting at Shoals and nominated H. R. Lowder 
as a candidate for delegate for Minneapolis, and was 
Lowder’s chief worker until he was chosen. 

Postmaster Cushman, of Newburgh, has been a 
worker in primaries, and state and local conven¬ 
tions. 

Postmaster Provnes of Spencerville, Postmaster Gor¬ 
don of Auburn, Postmaster Bicknell of Garrett, 
Postmaster Abies of St. Joe Station, Postmaster Crane 
of Sedan, Postmaster Bachman of Corunna, Postmas¬ 
ter Jones of Butler, attended and helped to manipu¬ 
late for Harrison the district convention at Auburn, 
to select Minneapolis delegates. 

All the postmasters of DeKalb county have been 


deeply interested in all conventions in behalf of Har¬ 
rison. 

Postmaster Gordon of Auburn and Postmaster 
Bicknell of Garrett, attended the state convention 
which selected delegates at large for Minneapolis. 

Postmaster Zimmerman of Cannelton, has been ac¬ 
tive in all primaries and conventions. Himself and 
Postmasters Schrieber of Tell City and Gardiner of 
Troy, assisted in selecting Harrison delegates at 
their district convention. 

Postmaster Higgins of Fort Wayne, is reputed to 
be the President’s right hand in the twelfth distriet, 
making and unmaking fourth-class postmasters and 
other minor officers at will. He is a ward committee¬ 
man. He has taken an active part in the seleetion 
of all delegates in federal matters. In addition to 
the local conventions, he attended the state conven¬ 
tion which selected Minneapolis delegates, and the 
district convention at Auburn for the same purpose. 
He had the letter carriers take the poll of the city of 
Fort Wayne. He, with Utah Commissioner Robert¬ 
son and River Commissioner Taylor, worked in Min¬ 
neapolis for Harrison, and the latter two were with 
Higgins at the state convention above mentioned. 

Utah Commissioner Robertson, River Commis¬ 
sioner Taylor, Pension Examiner Bueman and Pen¬ 
sion Examiner Stemen of Fort Wayne, are now mak¬ 
ing Harrison speeches. 

United States Marshal Dunlap permits the mar¬ 
shal’s office at Indianapolis to be used as a meeting 
plaee of a Harrison club. The club was organized 
there. 

Postmaster Godfrey, of New Albany, was a delegate 
to the distriet convention atScottsburgh in 1890, and 
worked hard for the Harrison candidate for the state 
committee. He worked in his own distriet and at the 
state convention for the selection of Harrison dele¬ 
gates to the Minneapolis convention and went to that 
convention. Deputy Collector Plattand Letter Carrier 
Marsh, of New Albany, went to the Minneapolis 
convention after attending the state convention at 
Indianapolis to select delegates at large. Pension 
Examiner Idding of Merrillville has been a delegate 
in a state convention. 

Postmaster Royer, of Noblesville, has attended the 
state, and the congressional and local conventions of 
his district. He is an incessantly active manager for 
his party. He helped to select Harrison delegates to 
the Minneapolis convention, and attended that con¬ 
vention as “a Harrison boomer.” 

Postmaster Hammond, of Booneville, has attended 
most of the county and district conventions and the 
primaries of his party, but “has been very shy.” 

Letter Carriers Irvin and Fletcher, of Frankfort, at¬ 
tended a party county convention as delegates and 
in uniform. Irvin was chairman of his precinct 
delegation. Fletcher challenged a voter at the polls 
while in uniform. Irvin also has remained off duty 
to act as his party challenger, and, in addition, 
polled the first ward in Frankfort. 

There is not room to set out more than a 
small part of what has been done by federal 
office-holders in the way of henchman service 
in Indiana under this administration. I ven¬ 
ture, however, one further illustration in 
the cases of two peculiarly zealous hench¬ 
men. District Attorney Chambers and his 
assistant, Cockrum. These will be found 
very interesting cases. Both began with be¬ 
ing delegates to the convention which nomi¬ 
nated Mr. Harrison in 1888. Having re¬ 
ceived these positions Language can hardly ex¬ 
press the zeal with which they have labored 
in the line of their fealty. In December, 
1889, Dudley came to Indianapolis and an af¬ 
fidavit was filed and a warrant was made out 
for his arrest. District Attorney Chambers 
ordered that the warrant be not issued. In 
speaking of it afterwards he said: 

“I exercised the prerogative in this case that I 
would exercise in any other of like character, and 


decided that the warrant be not issued upon this 
affidavit.” 

Speaking also of the celebrated Dudley 
letters, Mr. Chambers said: 

The letters, construed in the light of the knowledge that 
we all possess of how elections in Indiana are conducted 
by both parties have nothing in them of a criminal char¬ 
acter, but, upon the other hand, when so construed, are 
honorable, and indicate simply a patriotic interest in the 
elections.” 

Dudley had written to divide the floaters in 
blocks of five and put a trusted man with nec¬ 
essary funds in charge of these five. “The 
knowledge we all possess” was that floaters 
were paid cash for their votes. In thus de¬ 
claring himself Mr. Chambers made a sacrifice 
that few men would care to make. 

In illustrating these two cases I prefer to 
take the accounts of those present on the dif¬ 
ferent occasions: 

The republicans of Warrick county met in mass 
convention in Boonville,Saturday, Sept. 6, and nomi¬ 
nated the following county ticket. '*• J.B. Cockrum, 
assistant district attorney, came down and took an 
active part in the convention. He told the boys here 
how things were worked at Indianapolis, and how 
this convention must act. They made John chair¬ 
man of the committee on resolutions, and let him 
write them to suit himself, and to flatter the bosses 
at Washington and Indianapolis.— Boonville Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Sentinel, Sept. 8, 1890. 

District Attorney Chambers’s speech at the Colum¬ 
bia club to-night will be devoted to democratic in¬ 
iquities and election methods. He will have for his 
text that portion of the democratic platform that al¬ 
leges all political evils against the opponents of that 
party and claims for it all political purity. Mr. 
Chambers will detail many instances of democratic 
bribery, not those of mere assertion, but those that 
have been established by evidence. He has given 
great care to this speech, and it will be made up of 
facts obtained from nearly every county in the state. 
—Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 5,1890. 

The speech of Hon. Smiley N. Chambers, delivered 
last night before the Columbia club, will be found 
elsewhere in this paper. It abounds in indisputable 
facts concerning democratic rascality, and giveS in 
detail some of the political infamies committed by 
that party in Indiana. These crimes have been fre¬ 
quent and flagrant, and the party committing them 
should be deprived of power by an outraged people. 
The speech is strong in statement, and will prove an 
effective campaign document.—Indianapolis Journal, 
Sept. 6,1890. 

Hon. Smiley Chambers [United States district at¬ 
torney] delivered a splendid address before a large 
audience at the opera house this evening. He dwelt 
at length upon the Indianapolis Sentinel and its an¬ 
archistic utterances and tendencies, and stated a 
fact not generally known—that the editor of the 
Sentinel had circulated in Fort Wayne a petition for 
the pardon of the Chicago anarchists after they had 
been convicted.— Marion Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, Oct. 15,1890. 

Mr. Hinton was followed by Hon. J. B. Cockrum 
[assistant U. S. district attorney], of Indianapolis, in 
a masterly presentation of state issues, giving a thor¬ 
ough discussion of the iniquities of the democratic 
party that have pa.ssed directly under his notice as 
an officer of the United States coavt.—RushviUe Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 17,1890. 

District Attorney Chambers has written to the 
state central committee that he and Mr. Trusler, re¬ 
publican candidate for secretary of state, had two 
grand meetings at Marion and one at Kokomo. 
“Our meetings have been well attended, and very 
enthusiastic,” he writes.—Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 
17, 1890. 

The Hon. John B. Cockrum delivered a telling 
speech to a large and enthusiastic audience at the 
court-house in this city last night. * <■ He also 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


381 


dealt with the infamous violation of election laws 
by the democratic party, and the extravagant and 
dishonest manner in which the affairs of the state in¬ 
stitutions of this state have been mismanaged at the 
hands of the democratic legislature.—iVoblcswlle Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 12, 1890. 

John B. Cockrum, assistant United States disirict 
attorney, addressed, August 4, 1891, a republican 
club upon the recently nominated republican candi¬ 
dates for the city ollices. 

At this point Assistant District Attorney J. B. 
Cockrum got the floor, and insisted that this was a 
republican convention, and not a place where a man 
could come loaded with personal bile and spit it 
ont.—Indianapolis News, March 1,1892, Account of 
State Convention. 

The arraignment of the democracy by Smiley N. 
Chambers, United States district attorney, in his 
speech before the Columbian club, Saturday night, 
was such a powerful phillipic that the Journal this 
morning prints it almost in full .—Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, March 21, 1892. 

The republicans of Harrison county met in mass 
convention at -Corydon to day and appointed dele¬ 
gates to the state and district conventions. Hon. 
Smiley N. Chambers [United States district attorney] 
was present and addressed the meeting .—Indianapolis 
Journal, April 10, 1892. 

An enthusiastic meeting of the Richmond republi¬ 
can club was held this evening, it being the occasion 
of the second annual election of officers. After the 
business of the evening had been transacted the club 
was addressed by Hon. Smiley N. Chambers, of Indian¬ 
apolis, on the political issues of the day.— Indianapo¬ 
lis Journal, April 12, 1892. 

The republicans of this county held their conven¬ 
tion here to day. Smiley N. Chambers [United States 
district attorney] was present and addressed the 
brethren on the tariff and oilier issues. Oreencastle 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 30, 1892. 

Smiley Chambers [United States district attornej] 
and Hugh Hanna are in charge of the public Indiana 
headquarters—J/macapohs Dispetch to Indianapolis 
News, June 6,1892. 

Hon. Smiley N. Chambers [United States district 
attorney] was then introduced. He looked as if he 
had done a hard day’s work, and his voice was hus¬ 
ky. When the applause that greeted his appearance 
had subsided, he said : 

“One week ago, yesterday, my fellow-citizens, we left 
this city for the great convention, carrying with us, as 
we felt then, and now know, the best wishes of all of 
you, that victory might be ours .”—Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, June 12, 1892. 

United States Marshal Dunlap and Assistant Dis¬ 
trict Attorney Cockrum arrived at noon .—Wayne 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, June 25,1892. 

John B. Cockrum [assistant United States district 
attorney] has Smiley N. Chambers’s boom in hand. 
He is working like a man who sees the district attor¬ 
neyship in his grasp, in case he wins for his chitf.— 
Ft. Wayne Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 27,1892. 

The republicans of this county opened the cam¬ 
paign to day * Smiley Chambers [United 

States district attorney] followed Shockney in a 
speech for two hours. * —Noblesville Dispatch 

to Indianapolis Sentinel, Aug. 29,1892. 

It is averred that Mr. Chambers never had any idea 
of being nominated, and that he consented to enter 
the race for the sole purpose of taking away some of 
the strength that threatened to go to Chase. Wheth¬ 
er this story Is true or not, it has been evident that 
the men who have been here pretending to be for 
Chambers have been much more industrious in op¬ 
posing Chase than in furthering the chances of Mr. 
Chambers. John B. Cockrum [assistant U. S. district 
attorney], who has been managing the Chambers 
boom, has been ready and anxious for two days to 
promise Chambers’s strength to any one upon whom 
the anti-Chase people might unite. Mr. Cockrum 
was in the “round-up” anti meeting last night and 
pledged Chambers’s support for Elliott. The true 
friends of Judge Elliott hare no hand in the move¬ 


ment to make him a candidate.— Ft, Wayne Dispatch 
to Indianapolis News, June 28,1892. 

The campaign is on in Rushville, having been 
opened to-night by Smiley N. Chambers [United States 
attorney], of Indianapolis .—Rushville Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, Sept. 4, 1892. 

The republicans of Hancock county met in mass 
convention at the court-house this noon. After call¬ 
ing the convention to order he introduced lion. S. N. 
Chambers [United States attorney], of Indianapolis, 
who addressed the people for over an hour in a high¬ 
ly interesting manner.—GreenJield Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, Sept. 4, 1892. 

There \vas a rousing meeting of republicans in this 
city to-night. The Hon. J B. Coctruwi [deputy United 
States attorney], of Indianapolis, addressed the Har¬ 
rison and Baker guards, two republican organizations 
ofthiscity. One hundred and fifty members escorted 
the speaker to the court-house. The .speech aroused 
much enthusiasm .—Columbus Dwpntch to Indianapolis 
Journal, Sept. 13, 1892. 

An enthusiastic republican meeting was held in 
Ross’s Opera House last evening. Hon. hmiley N. 
Chambers [United States attorney] was present and 
addressed the crowd.— Union City Dispatchto Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, Sept. 14, 1892. 

Hon. Smiley N. Chambers addressed a splendid 
meeting of republicans here [Nashville, Ind.] yester¬ 
day afternoon. 

Hon. Smiley N. Chambers will address the people of 
North Indianapolis, at Greenleaf Hall. The West 
Indianapolis McKinley Drum Corps will be in at¬ 
tendance. 

Following is a list of additional assignments of 
speakers throughout the state made by the republi¬ 
can state committee: 

Hon. S. N. Chambers. 

[United States District Attorney.] 

Sept. 17—Union City, Randolph county, 7 p. m. 

Hon. j. B. Cockrum. 

[Assistant District Attorney.] 

Sept. 17 — Martinsville, Morgan county, 7 p. m. 

Sept. 19—Knightstown, Henry county. 7 pm. 

Sept. 23 —Elizabethtorvn, Bartholomew county, 7 
p. M. 

Oct. 7—Marlon, Grant county, 7 p. m. 

—Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 10,1892. 
The eleventh ward republicans were addressed at 
the corner of West and Maryland streets last night 
by the Hon. John B. Cockrum. Mr. Cockrum’s ad¬ 
dress was a forcible one, and he was warmly ap¬ 
plauded at frequent intervals. He made his appeal 
to the working men and for the inestimable aid that 
the protective tariff has been to them. He exposed 
the fallacy of free trade principles in so clear a man* 
ner that more than one of his hearers involuntarily 
exclaimed, "That’s right.” He drew a vivid compari¬ 
son of the opposing candidates of the two great par¬ 
ties; pictured Harrison and Reid at the front during 
the war, fighting for their homes and their nation, 
and Cleveland and Stevenson enjoying their ease 
while their paid substitutes suffered, the latter propa¬ 
gating the interests of the Knights of the Golden 
Circle; compared their records as statesmen and as 
men whose promises had been fulfilled or unful¬ 
filled, and finally urged them as thinking, intelli¬ 
gent men to vote the republican ticket.— Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, Sept. 39. 

The fair officials at Newport have introduced po. 
litical days for the fair this year. D. W. Voorhees 
will speak Thursday, Col. R. W. Thompson, of Terre 
Haute, and Smiley N. Chambers, United States district 
attorney, Friday .—Newport Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, Oct. 4. 

Hon. John B. Cockrum was in the city yesterday, 
having returned from a campaigning trip to Mont¬ 
gomery and other counties. “The state is in fine 
condition,” he said yesterday, “for the republicans 
and is getting better every day. I think Montgom¬ 
ery county has as fine an organization as I ever saw. 
Republicans I find are wide awake and will be out in 
force on Novembers. I have no fears that any re¬ 
publican will stay at home this year. There is too 


much of individual and national prosperity at 
stake."—Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 7. 

Hon. S. N. Chambers. 

Oct. 7—Newport, Vermillion county, 1 p. m. 

Hon. j. B. Cockrum. 

Oct. 7—Marion, Grant county. 

Oct. 4—Crawfordsville, Montgomery county, 7. p.m. 

Oct. 5—Wingate, Montgomery county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 10—Oakland City, Gibson county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 11—Huntingburg, Dubois county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 12—Brookville, Warrick county, 1 p. m. 

Oct. 13—Rockport, Spencer county, 1 p. m. 

Oct. 14—Mt. Vernon, Posey county, 7 p. m, 

Oct. 15—Corydon, Harrison county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 18—Franklin, Johnson county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 19—Rushville, Rush county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 20—Carthage, Rush county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 21—New Castle, Henry county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 22—Greenfield. Hancock county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 24—Danville, Hendricks county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 25—Greencaslle, Putnam county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 26—Kokomo, Howard county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 27—Wabash, Wabash county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 28—W’arsaw, Kosciusko county, 7 p. m. 

Oct. 17—Jeffersonville, Clarke county, 7 p. m. 

Nov. 1—Amo, Hendricks county, 2 p. m. 

Nov. 3—Plainfield, Hendricks county, 7 p. m. 

— Appointments, Campaign Speeches, Indianapolis 
Journal, Oct. 11. 

Oct. 17—Jeffersonville, J. B. Cockrum. 

October 21—Orleans. S. N. Chambers. 

—Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 10. 

Hon. John B. Cockrum, deputy United States at¬ 
torney, of Indianapolis, spoke last evening in Lado¬ 
ga.—Craia/ordsviiie Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
Oct. 6. 

At the rooms of the Lincoln Club, Friday night, 
J. B. Cockrum made an interesting and forcible ad¬ 
dress. The point that attracted greatest attention 
was a denunciation of the Australian-ballot law as a 
scheme of the democracy to steal this state.—J/arion 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 10. 

Hon. John B. Cockrum, a federal office-holder, vio¬ 
lated the civil service rules, and spoke to a fair crowd 
ill the court-house in this city last night.—Jiff. Vernon 
Democrat, Oct. 15. 

Indianapolis, Oct. 15, 1892. 

Respectfully submit ed, 

Lucius B. Swift. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

The President is of opinion that it is 
a great aimse to bring the patronage of 
the federal government into conflict with 
the freedom of elections; and that this 
abuse ought to be corrected wherever it 
may have been permitted to exist, and to 
be prevented for tlie future: He, there¬ 
fore, directs that information be given to 
all oflicers and agents in your department 
of the public service that partisan inter¬ 
ference in popular elections, whether of 
state oflicers or oflicers of this govern¬ 
ment, and for whomsoever or against 
whomsoever it may be exercised, or the 
payment of any contribution or assessment 
on salaries or oflicial compensation for 
party or election purposes, will be regard¬ 
ed by him as cause for removal.— From a 
Circular issued by Daniel Webster, Secretary of 
State under President William Henry Harrison, 
to the Heads of the Departments under the Gcyrern- 
ment of the United States. 







382 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


BUSY HENCHMEN. 


Col. A. D. bhaw, third auditor of the treasury, is in 
the city.— Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 1. 

» » * 

E. H. Nebeker, treasurer of the United States, is in the 
city.—Indianapolis Neios, Oct. 1. 

» • » 

CajA. John R. Leonard, of the United States marshal's 
office, goes to Indianapolis at the end of this month.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 3. 

* » * 

“There will not be many men in Washington on 
the 8th of next month who can vote in Indiana,” 
said President John C. Cheney, of the Indiana Re¬ 
publican Club, to the Journal correspondent to-day. 
“The Indiana republicans here feel the keenest in¬ 
terest in the political situation in their state,” con¬ 
tinued President Cheney, “and they will do their 
part towards giving General Harrison as large a 
majority as he had four years ago.” 

Themeetingof the Indiana Republican Club last 
night was largely attended. There wasgreaten husi- 
asm shown and a quiet determination evinced in 
the impending contest. The club will meet again in 
two weeks, when it is expected that about two hun¬ 
dred Hooslers will have announced their intention 
of going home to vole. This is nine tenths of the 
Indianians in Washington.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 3. 

♦ ♦ * 

Daniel M. Ransdell, United States marshal for the 
Districxof Columbia, will leave for Indianapolis to¬ 
morrow evening. He expects to spend a few days 
socially with friends at his old home.—W'os/iington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 27. 

W 

Third Auditor W. H. Hart and Deputy Controller of 
the Currency Nixon, of the treasury department, will 
go to their homes at Fraukfort and New Castle, re¬ 
spectively, about the middle of next month, to re¬ 
main till after the election.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 27. 

* «- » 

United States Treasurer E. II. Nebeker intends to 
leave for his home at Covington in a few days. He 
has received his annual leave time for October.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Sept. 27. 
-* * * 

Daniel M. Ransdell, United Stales marshal for the 
District of Columbia, is at the Bates. He came in 
from Washington last night and will remain here 
several days.— Indianapolis News, Sept. 29. 

-*- ■» * 

The republican committees, state, and county, are 
having the assistance of federal office-holders. 

United States Treasurer Nebeker and United Stales 

Marshal Ransdell have been lending an advisory hand 
to the state committee, and Mr. Shepherd, of Wash¬ 
ington, is advising Merrill Moores as to his work. 
John R. Leonard will be here soon to add his services 
to the campaign.— Indianapolis News, Oct. 3. 

* * * 

Ex-Congre,ssman William D. Owen, superintendent of 
immigration, leayes here on next Monday for Indiana 
to enter the campaign, and to remain till after elec¬ 
tion.— Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 4. 

-» * * 

Paul Leibhardl, superintendent of the dead-letter office, 
post-office department, will leave here for his home 
in Wayne county next week, to remain there till 
after the campaign.—B'asftinjfon Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, Sept. 29. 

* * * 

Harry McFarland, a foreman in the press-room of the 
government printing office, will go to his home at Indi¬ 
anapolis on Sunday for a month's leave.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 8. 

* » * 

Postmaster Thompson will to-morrow begin a tour 
of the post-offices of this county. There are forty of¬ 
fices, including that of Indianapolis, and the tour 
will require sixteen or eighteen days. The object is 
to instruct postmasters in their duties, where necessary, 
and to encourage them in efforts to better the service — In¬ 
dianapolis News, Oct. 7. 


E. ir. Halford, the President's private secretary, will 
make some political speeches in Indiana near the 
close of the present campaign.— Indianapolis Journal, 
Oct. 10. 

« » * 

Hon. Oreen B. Raum, United Stales commissioner of 
pensions, will arrive in this city on Wednesday.— 
Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 10. 

* * * 

Ex-Senator Brace, recorder of deeds, who has j ust re¬ 
turned to Washington from New Jersey, where he 
has been aiding the republican campaign, says that 
he thinks Mr. Harrison is going to carry New Jersey 
as well as New York. He says the enthusiasm of the 
New Jersey republicans is such as never seen before. 
—Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 10. 

» ♦ 

United States Marshal Ransdell ran in from New 
York yesterday on his way to Indiana, where he will 
remain until the campaign is over.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 12. 

* * » 

Hon. W. D. Owen, commmissioner of immigration’ 
has left Washington for Indiana to take part in the 
campaign.—Dtdtanapoffs Journal, Oct. 12. 

_ * * * 

Hon. W. D. Owen opened his campaign at this 
place to-day, when fully three thousand enthusiastic 
people greeted the speaker.— Kentland Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, Oct. 13. 

* * * 

Report comes that C. S. Hudson, postmaster at this 
place, drove twelve miles the other night to make a 
rabid republican speech.— Corydon Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, Oct. 11. 

* * * 

Mr Egan is counted on to conduct a republican 
propaganda among the Catholic Irishmen in the 
middle west. 

A glance over the blue-book shows how the diplo¬ 
mats have been used. Ryan of Mexico and Conger 
of Brazil were both home on leave at a time when 
matters needed straightening out in Iowa and Kan¬ 
sas, preparatory to the Minneapolis convention. 
Reid of Paris resigned his place to come back and 
gel a grip on the tail of the ticket, and Mr. Coolidge, 
who was appointed to his place, was chosen very 
largely because his politics bordered so closely on 
mugwumpism as to make it desirable to send him 
abroad. Porter of Rome was brought home to do 
preparatory work. Carr of Denmark was engaged in 
it also, and was forced back only by the crisis reached 
in the Ryder scandal. Pitkin of the Argentine Re¬ 
public is in this country, working like a beaver; Ma- 
hany of Ecuador, who is noted as an orator, has taken 
the stump; Lincoln of Great Britain has been sent 
for; Beale of Persia resigned at a convenient date to 
turn in and work. Smith of Russia came back in 
time for the Minneapolis convention, and another 
republican of uncomfortably strong reform tenden¬ 
cies, in the person of Andrew D. White, was sent out 
of the country to succeed him. When we get below 
the diplomatic rank and strike the consuls and con- 
suls-general the name of absentees for party purposes 
is legion.—IPos/awsfoM Dispatch to New York Evening 
Post, Oct. 11. 

* » -?- 

The republican state convention is at midnight 
in a wrangle over permanent organization. The ad¬ 
ministration forces, led by Collector E. A. Webster, are 
in control of the convention, and so far have had ev¬ 
erything their own way. E. M. Brayton leads the 
opposition.—CohtmMa, S. C., Dispatch to New York 
Times, Sept. 30. 


BUSY BLACKMAILERS. 

The “confidential-circular” business of the 
republican managers is on the increase daily. 
The brazen tactics of Carter and Hackett in 
their confidential circulars were outdone yes¬ 
terday by one sent out by the American Pro¬ 
tective Tariff League to certain post-offices. 


The league seeks to use the post-offices as 
free distributing agents for high-protection 
literature. It practically seizes the postmas¬ 
ter by the official throat and demands that he 
give up §5, or that if he can not chip in that 
amount to pay for protection literature, he 
must get some one else to do it. 

Dear Sir—A ccrpf our congratulations upon your recent 
appointment. Situated as you are, you can accomplish 
the best results for the cause of protection of any one in 
your locality. It is our plan to have at least one offi¬ 
cial correspondent of the league at every post-office, 
and through him secure information, obtain the dis¬ 
tribution of documents, and exert every legitimate 
influence in favor of protection and reciprocity. 

It is impossible for us to bear all the expense of 
this work, for this is a big country. Every intelligent 
voter should receive complete information showing 
the benefits of protection. We wish to have you act as 
our confidential agent and correspondent to assist in this 
work. 

We expect that each correspondent will, either person¬ 
ally or with the aid of friends, furnish at least $5 before 
the next election for circulation of our literature at his 
home. If you do not feel like personally contributing 
the amount suggested, a.sk friends to help. They will 
do it. If you accept, we will outline a plan to secure 
the co-operation of others. Will you act as our cor¬ 
respondent? * 

It is imperative that every friend like you put his 
shoulder to the wheel and work in season and out of 
season until the election of 1892. Yours very truly, 
Wilbur F. Wakeman, General Secretary. 

—New York Times, Oct. 2. 
« » » 

Since Gowdy has been at the head of the republi¬ 
can state committee he has done nothing but bleed 
office-holders. There never has been such a beggar. 
For nearly two years he has written letters to Indi¬ 
anians at Washington all on the subject of money, 
and months ago they sent back word that they had 
no more money to give until the campaign began. 
That was before the Minneapolis convention when 
Gowdy was working for contributions tO pay his 
proposed extravagance in keeping the state central 
committee in wine, cigars and luxurious quarters at 
the national convention. He then tried to assess the 
Indiana delegates and alternates to the convention 
S200 and 8100 respectively. They denounced the 
state chairman so vigorously that he pleaded for 8100 
from the delegates and 850 from the alternates, and 
in the end compromised on 850 each. Now he has 
broken loose again and has addressed the following 
to the railway postal clerks and all other employes 
who owe their employment to a republican adminis¬ 
tration and republican influence: 

“Dear Sir— The campaign is now on. A fierce bat¬ 
tle is to be fought. The importance of republican 
success in this state can not be overestimated. Upon 
it depends the election of a full state ticket, the 
possible election of a United States senator and the 
contingency of success to the party in the Union. 

“A period in the campaign has been reached when 
your counsel and your substantial aid should be ten¬ 
dered. No good republican or other person desiring to con¬ 
tinue present favorable conditions can afford to beindiffer- 
ent or fail to recognize the necessities to a committee 
involved in organizing and conducting a campaign. 
Legitimate expenses must be met. The success of 
the ticket is involved as well as the pleasant condi¬ 
tions about you. You understand the necessities for 
funds with which to defray expenses. We confi¬ 
dently expect you to give generous assistance, and this 
can not be more timely or effective than if given at 
present. * 

“Awaiting your early reply, we are yours truly, 
“John K. Gowdy, Chairman.” 

—Indianapolis Sentinel, Oct. 4. 

* * * 

Messrs. Huston and Long, members of the national 
republican committee from Indiana and Florida, re¬ 
spectively, have been closeted in this city, to day, 
with leading republican federal office-holders, black and 
white, from all parts of the state. All efforts to official- 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


383 


ly ascertain the object of their presence has failed, 
but it has leaked out from republican sources that their 
mission here is similar to that in Texas and Louisiana— 
Ihe assessment and collection of money for campaign pur¬ 
poses. More republican office-holders were present 
in the city than have been seen here before at any 
one time, other than a state convention, for years. 
They decline to be interviewed, further than to state 
that their presence here was requested, but refuse to 
disclose the source from whence the invitation came. 
It is alleged by republicans who ought to know that 
there will be no republican electoral ticket in this 
state.— Jackson, Miss., Dispatch to Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, Oct. 8. 

* « » 

It is openly charged by the Evening States of this 
city, after a careful investigation of the facts, that 
Huston and Long, ambassadors from the national 
republican party, who spent a couple of days in this 
city, took away with them from the “ faithful ” here 
a sum approximating S10,000, to be used in further¬ 
ing the interests of Benjamin Harri.son, President of 
the United States and candidate for re-election. 
Messrs. Huston and Long got the money they wanted, 
but there are several leading office-holders who are 
now in a state of perplexity, and who are out of 
pocket as a result of the harmonizing visit of their 
party conferrees. 

Superintendent Smyth, of the mint. Collector War- 
moth and Postmaster Eaton have had to stand the 
brunt of the tax. Shortly after their arrival here the 
republican ambassadors sent for these officials and 
others to call upon them, and made their proposi¬ 
tion. The success of the party, they said, meant a 
great deal to the office holders, and the office-holders 
ought, therefore, to be willing to contribute their 
mite toward achieving that success. It is prohibited 
by the civil service law to assess government em¬ 
ployes, but Messrs. Huston and Long assured the officials 
that if any trouble resulted from the effort to collect money 
the national committee's influence with the powers that 
be at Washington was sufficient to prevent any unpleas¬ 
ant consequences. They wanted money badly, and 
wanted it at once. They could not afford to wait 
until the hat was passed around indiscriminately 
among the subordinates. What they desired was 
that the heads of the departments should furnish 
their personal checks and then look to the employes 
for reimbursement. 

It is estimated that the committee of two counted 
on 815,000 from New Orleans, and it is said they got 
two-thirds of that amount. The mint was put down 
for 84,000 and at that rate the post-office and custom¬ 
house, which employ a great many more men, must 
have been slated for much larger sum. Whatever 
the amounts were, it is sufficient to say that Collec¬ 
tor Warmoth and Postmaster Eaton each promptly 
wrote out his check and handed it to the ambassa 
dors, and the employes in the granite building are 
expected to make up the greater part of what the of¬ 
ficials were required to fork over. 

Superintendent Smyth “ kicked ” like a 'Texas 
steer at the plan of the committeemen and the 
amount they demanded, but he became more docile 
after persuasion, albeit he succeeded in cutting 
down the appropriation budgeted against his de¬ 
partment. Messrs. Huston and Long said they 
thought the superintendent could easily afford to 
contribute 84,000 to the cause on behalf of the mint, 
but Smyth called the bluff and got out of the hole 
for the time being by agreeing to furnish a check for 
82,.500, 8500 of which was to be considered a personal 
contribution by the superintendent of the mint. 
The superintendent was told that he might use his 
own judgment as to the best means of getting the 
money back, and that if those engaged in making 
the collection got into trouble, the matter would be 
made all right at Washington. The superintendent 
did use his “best judgment,’’ but his judgment 
does not seem to have been very good. He delegated 
several assistants to formulate a plan for the re¬ 
covery of the money, and they did so. They pro¬ 
ceeded to assess the employes without regard to color 
or sex, and that caused a howl, for the ladles, if they 
are denied the right of suifrage, are as much pro¬ 
tected by the civil service law as are the men. A list. 


however, was made out, and handed to the cashier 
for collection. It was found, however, that this plan 
was a dangerous one and might cause trouble. 
Thereupon the list was taken to the desk where the 
employes sign for their money and the tax was levied 
there. It was said that each employe was assessed 
two days’ pay for three months. Coiner Burkdell 
created trouble for the superintendent when a list 
reached his department. He knew the assessment 
was contrary to law and he did not propose to put 
his foot in a trap. So it appears that he did not even 
wait for those under him to broach the subject, but 
at once told them that they would not have to con¬ 
tribute a cent. He explained the law to them and 
said he would have nothing to do with any assess¬ 
ment of employes. He is said to have even gone 
further and said that any employe caught violating 
the law would be reported to the proper authorities. 
There is where there is a hitch just now. 

The coiner and superintendent conjointly em¬ 
ploy the force in the coiner’s department, but the 
superintendent of the mint has authority to re¬ 
move them when he elects to do so. So the coiner’s 
employes are between the devil and the deep blue 
sea. They are afraid to refuse to contribute, lest 
they shall bring down upon their devoted heads the 
wrath of the superintendent, who is ai present out 
of pocket, and they are equally afraid to assist in a 
violation of the law when their chief threatens to 
enforce it against them .—New Orleans Dispatch to 
New York Times, Oct. 6. 

-* * » 

I am able to corroborate through personal inquiry 
the published reports concerning the violation of the 
civil-service law by the federal officials in this city. 
The evidence against Andrew W. Smythe, superin¬ 
tendent of the mint, is direct and convincing. 
Messrs. Huston and Long, members of the republican 
national committee, during their recent visit here, 
called upon the leading federal office-holders for 
campaign funds. Mr. Smythe gave his check for 82,- 
500. In order that he might be partly or wholly re¬ 
imbursed, a subscription list was circulated among 
the employes of the mint, who were to be assessed 
an amount equal to six days’ pay. Mr. Burkdoll, 
coiner of the mint, refused to allow the circulation 
of the list in his department, and this probably ex¬ 
plains how the scheme was made public. Your cor¬ 
respondent is reliably informed that the same meth¬ 
ods are being pursued in the custom-house in a 
manner less direct, and therefore not so liable to 
detection.—iVew Orleans Dispatch to New York Even¬ 
ing Post, Oct. 3. 

};< ♦ 

Early in the campaign the civil service commission 
issued a statement designed to protect employes of 
the government from the rapacity of the republi¬ 
can sharks charged with the duty of collecting head 
money to be used in the corruption of voters. * 

It was apparent, however, that a new scheme for 
“bleeding” employes would be set in motion when 
the excitement due to the civil service commission 
circular had died down. It seems that the time has 
arrived. The “scheme” which Mr. Harrison has 
adopted is to appeal to the employes of the govern¬ 
ment through their stale associations in this city. 
Nearly every state in the Union is represented here 
bj" an association. Missouri has been selected to 
hold the right of the line in this new movement. To¬ 
day every government clerk who hails from Missouri 
received a copy of the following circular: 

S. G. Brock, President. F. C. Jones, Secretary. 

Office of the Financial Secretary of the Mis¬ 
souri State Republican Association, 

463 G. Street, N. W., Washington, D. C., Oct. 5,1892. 

Sir—I have the honor to inform you that I have 
been selected as the financial secretary of the Mis¬ 
souri State Republican As.sociation of this city. 

Believing that you have an interest in the contest 
now going on in the state, 1 would ask that, if you 
have any suggestions to make which would be bene¬ 
ficial to the cause of republicanism in the state, you 
will call at my office at the above number. 


I will be at my office on Wednesdays and Fridays 
during this month and on Saturday the 15th inst., 
and on Monday the 31st inst., from 4 to 7 p. m , when 
I will be pleased to see all Missourians and talk over 
the conduct of the canvass in our State and receive 
any suggestions which may be offered. 

Very respectfully, 

James T. Hunter, 

Financial secretary. 

One acquainted with political methods does not 
need to be told that the word “suggestions,” which 
figures so prominently in this circular, means “cash.” 
Financial secretaries of political organizations are 
not supposed to have anything to do with “sugges¬ 
tions” that do not bear directly upon the subject of 
finance. 

That Financial Secretary Hunter is no exception to 
the rule is proved by the experience of a Missourian, 
a clerk in one of the departments, who called at the 
office of the secretary this morning to ask the mean¬ 
ing of the circular. He says he was told frankly that 
it was the belief of the managers of the republican 
party that clerks in the employ of the government 
ought to give at least 5 per cent, of their salaries to 
help the republican canvass.—TPas/impton Dispatch 
to New York Times, Oct. 8. 

* * » 

Civil Service Commissioner Roosevelt recently un¬ 
did a little extortion game which the republican 
politicians in St. Joseph, Mo., were playing on the 
post-office employes. He found that every clerk was 
expected to join the republican club and promptly 
pay the “dues.” The commissioner promptly de¬ 
cided against the “dues” system of collecting cam¬ 
paign assessments—Spring^efd Republican. 

The clerks in the bureau of Indian affairs at Wash¬ 
ington have been assessed fifty dollars each for the 
republican campaign fund. The Indian office is lo¬ 
cated in the Atlantic building, and the question 
arose whether, as it was leased by the government, 
it was a government building within the meaning of 
the law prohibiting political assessments in govern¬ 
ment buildings. The solicitor, to be on thesafeside, 
gave back all the money he had collected in the 
buildings and tore up the receipts. Then he called 
at the residences of the clerks, collected the money 
there and gave new receipts .—Indianapolis Sentinel, 
Oct. 10. 

75 ? 3 ^ ^ 

The U. S. civil service commission to-day 
made public the following : 

Washington, D. C., Oct. 10.—A blank book, pur¬ 
porting to have been sent by W. R. Bates, secretary 
at Detroit, Mich., on behalf of the republican 
state committee to George B. Daniels, the post¬ 
master at Withey, Mich., has been laid before this 
commission. It requests the postmaster to furnish 
a canvass of the patrons of this office with informa¬ 
tion as to their former and present politics, and as 
to the papers they take, together with recommenda¬ 
tions as to what papers should be sent to them, etc. 
The postmaster is further informed that he is ex¬ 
pected to consult with prominent republicans of his 
locality as to this work, but as far as possible to keep 
his labors from becoming public. The signature is 
printed, the address is in writing. The commission 
has also received information from various sources 
to the effect that requests of this kind have been 
made by political committees not only in Michigan, 
but elsewhere. Services of the kind requested in 
the book submitted to the committees are clearly 
political services and to render them is contrary to 
the postal regulations. With this, however, the 
commission has nothing to do, but it feels in duty 
bound to inform this postmaster, and all po.stmasters 
and postal and other nublic employes in Michigan 
and elsewhere that the civil service law expressly 
provides (sec. 2, division 2, subdivision 58) that no 
person in the public service is for that reason under 
any obligation to render any political service, and 
that he will not be removed or otherwise prejudiced 
for refusing to render it; while general rule 1 of the 
civil service^rules provides for the dismissal of any 








384 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


public servant, removing him or causing him to be 
removed because of such refufal. 

(Signed) Charles Lyman, 

Theodore Roosevelt, 
George D. Johnston, 
Commissioners. 

—Associated Press Dispatch, Oct. 12, 1892. 

* * * 

It was learned yesterday that Col. II. C. Powers, 
internal revenue collector, had made a contribution 
to the republican campaign fund of $2,500. He has 
the appointment of 160 sugar-weighers, and early in 
the week began to make his selections. He required 
every man whom he appointed to sign a check, and 
this was done in the case of every one of the 130 ap¬ 
pointments already made, each appointee signing a 
check for $15, the amount to be deducted from his 
first month’s salary. The task of making these collec¬ 
tions was placed in the hands of Chief-Clerk Young. 

Mr. Buekdohl, coiner of the mint, in answer to a 
letter from the civil service commission as to the 
facts and figures about the assessments, sent to 
Washington yesterday clippings of the case from lo¬ 
cal papers.— New Orleans Dispatch to New York Even¬ 
ing Post, Oct. 15. 

» * * 

Office of the Secretary, 1 

Allegany County Postmasters’ Association, j 
Silas Burdick, Pres., M. H. Bailey, Treas., 

Clarence Ricker, Sec. 

Black Creek, N. Y., 1892. 

Dear Sir: At a meeting of the executive commit¬ 
tee held at Cuba Aug. 12, the following was unan¬ 
imously adopted: 

Resolved, That the president and secretary are in¬ 
structed to notify each postmaster of Allegany coun¬ 
ty that the amount of the contribution to be made to 
the republican county committee be 5 per cent, of 
one year's compensation. 

You have no doubt received a letter from the Alle¬ 
gany county republican committee requesting that 
you make some contribution toward defraying the 
legitimate expenses of the coming campaign. It is 
earnestly hoped that you will comply with the re- 
quq^t. Yours truly, S. C. Burdick, Chairman. 

Clarence Ricker, Secretary. 

—New York Times, Oct. 16. 

COMMISSIONER ROOSEVELT ON 

THE TRAIL OF BLACKMAILERS. 

At the Pine Ridge agency, in South Dakota, 
I found that the following letter had been re¬ 
ceived by the agent, Capt. George LeEoy 
Brown, the letter eoming from the chairman 
of the South Dakota Republican Campaign 
Committee: 

August 12, 1892. 

Maj. at Pine Ridge; 

My Dear Sir— Will you kindly send me a list of 
all parties at the agency, including all teachers, 
helpers, etc. Give me a tabulated list showing name 
of each and salary per year. 

I am very desirous of a speedy reply to this inquiry 
so I can make up my asst, list soon and correctly. 

Very truly yours, 

J. M. Greene, Chr. 

Captain Brow’o, very properly, made no an¬ 
swer to this communication but forwarded it 
immediately to the civil service commission. 
I wish to call attention in the first place to 
the fact that the chairman of the republican 
committee, Mr. Greene, makes no pretense 
that these collections are to be voluntary con¬ 
tributions. He distinctly uses the word “as¬ 
sessment.” In the next place it is to be noted 
that he particularly requires the names of 
the helpers, most of whom are themselves In¬ 
dians, and of the teachers, who are mostly 
women. In other words, he makes the per¬ 
fectly bald request to Captain Brown to com¬ 
mit a criminal act for the purpose of assisting 
him to blackmail women teachers and Indian 


helpers for the benefit of a political party. 
Had Captain Brown acceded to the request 
he would of course have been guilty of viola¬ 
ting the law, which provides that no govern¬ 
ment employe shall be, directly or indirectly, 
concerned in soliciting political contributions 
from any other government employe; and to 
assist in making up such an assessment list, 
would, of course, have amounted to being at 
least indirectly concerned in making the as¬ 
sessments. Chairman Greene, therefore, was 
endeavoring to procure the commission of a 
criminal act by Captain Brown. Whether he 
was himself guilty of a criminal act I am 
hardly prepared to say. The law ought to 
prohibit outsiders from soliciting government 
employes at all; but all that it does in this 
respect is to prohibit them in the most sweep¬ 
ing terms from soliciting in any way in a gov¬ 
ernment building. This, of course, includes 
solicitation by writing. The letter sent by 
Mr. Greene to Captain Brown was addressed 
to him at Pine Ridge agency. I do not know 
whether this would be held as being addressed 
to him in a government building or not; but 
it seems to me that it would be well to lay the 
the matter before the attorney-general in any 
event. 

Furthermore, I found that this Pine Ridge 
case was not exceptional. At every reserva¬ 
tion and government school which I visited in 
South Dakota, letters similar to the above, al¬ 
though varying in details, had been received, 
showing that the republican state committee 
was engaged in a resolute effort to assess all 
the governmental employes under different 
agencies and in the different schools. 

In all the other places, however, the agents 
and school superintendents whom I questioned 
informed me that they had lost or mislaid the 
letters sent them by the committee, although 
on being cross-examined they all admitted, 
with more or less reluctance, having received 
them. The agent at the Cheyenne river res¬ 
ervation told me he had received such a letter 
requesting a contribution of two per cent, on 
the salary of himself and his subordinates, 
but that he had handed it to his son and paid 
no further attention to it. Here I summoned 
all the teachers and other employes together 
and informed them that they need not pay 
one cent, and that if they were solicited by any 
one, or threatened with molestation for not 
contributing, I would be grateful tc them for 
promptly communicating with the commis¬ 
sion, and that I thought the commission could 
guarantee that they would be protected, for 
the interior department would certainly see 
that they received no harm. The agent in¬ 
formed me that he had received such a letter, 
but that the writer had evidently learned be¬ 
forehand the names and salaries of all his em¬ 
ployes, for it contained a regular list of them, 
with the amount that was expected from each, 
varying from one hundred dollars, in the case 
of the agent, to ten dollars, in the case of the 
lower-grade teachers. He told me that he 
had paid no attention to this letter, and as at 
Cheyenne river, I called together the em¬ 


ployes and informed them that they need not 
contribute a cent unless they wished, and that 
they could contribute to whichever party they 
cho.se. The superintendent of the Indian 
school at Pierre told me he had received the 
same kind of a letter, addressed to him at this 
Indian school at Pierre. He said he did not 
have the letter at hand, but that it requested, 
as well as he remembered, a subscription of 
two per cent, from himself and those under 
him. I told him and the only one of his 
teachers that I saw that they need pay no heed 
to the letter; and that they would not be mo¬ 
lested for failing to contribute, to which he 
answered that he hoped that this was true, 
but that he feared, and he knew many other 
government employes feared, that if they did 
not contribute, the local politicians would re¬ 
member it against them, would trump up 
charges to their discredit and have them re¬ 
moved on the first occasion, not ostensibly for 
failure to contribute, of course, but because of 
some other alleged misdeed. It is due to the 
superintendent of this school to say he struck 
me as being a very able and conscientious 
man, devoted to the welfare of his pupils; and 
undoubtedly the sentiments he expressed ob¬ 
tain very largely among the employes who 
receive such blackmailing letters as this of 
Chairman Greene, and who do feel coerced in¬ 
to contributing because they fear that, even 
though the contributions are not asked for by 
their superior officers, yet these superior 
officers will themselves be influenced more or 
less by the members standing high in their 
own party who do make the requests for con¬ 
tributions. In this case of the government 
school at Pierre, I think the solicitation was 
clearly illegal, as the letter was without doubt 
addressed to a government building. I had 
no facilities for carrying on the investigation 
there myself, not being able to put witnesses 
under oath; but I have no doubt that an in¬ 
vestigation by the law department of the gov¬ 
ernment would produce facts sufficient to war¬ 
rant a prosecution at least in this case. 

In Nebraska I found much less evidence of 
solicitation than in South Dakota. At the 
Santee agency, where many of the Indians are 
voters, complaints were made to me that 
under the last administration efforts had been 
made by government employes to coerce the 
Indians into voting the democratic ticket, 
precisely as I found that in North Dakota po¬ 
litical assessments had been collected among 
the agencies by the democrats prior to the 
last presidential campaign. At the Winne¬ 
bago and Omaha agencies no attempt had been 
made to collect assessments during the past 
two or three years, as far as I could find out. 
On the Santee reservation the agent had been 
solicited for a hundred dollars by the repub¬ 
lican campaign committee a year or two ago, 
but no solicitation has been made this year. 
In all these cases it would be useless to at¬ 
tempt to take action on what happened prior 
to the present year, owing to the great diffi¬ 
culty of getting any testimony save that of 
the persons involved. 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


385 


In Kansas I visited only the government 
Indian non-reservation boarding school, 
known as Haskell Institute, under the charge 
of Superintendent Charles F. Meserve. Here 
I found that there had been a resolute effort 
on behalf of the republican committee of the 
second congressional district to assess the 
superintendent and those under him, the at¬ 
tempt being made by R. B. Stevenson, the 
secretary of the republican executive commit¬ 
tee for the second congressional district; and 
it appears to me that Mr. Stevenson has clear¬ 
ly laid himself open to prosecution for violat¬ 
ing the law. Exhibits A, B, C and D contain 
three of the original letters sent out by Stev¬ 
enson to Mr. Meserve, to Mr. H. B. Peairs, the 
principal teacher, and to Mr. C. W. Jewett, 
the assistant clerk, all being addressed to 
these gentleman at Haskell Institute, at Law¬ 
rence, Kansas, written and signed in the same 
handwriting, the signature being “R. B. Stev¬ 
enson, secretary.” Exhibit D contains the 
stenographic report of my examination of the 
various gentlemen who were assessed. From 
this it appears, for instance, that Mr. Charles 
\V. Grant, the assistant clerk, received a letter 
from this Mr. Stevenson, the secretary of the re¬ 
publican committee of the second congressional 
district, addressed to him at Haskell Institute, 
soliciting ten dollars for political purposes, 
about the first of August last; that Dr. Oliver D. 
Walker, the physician at Haskell Institute, re¬ 
ceived the same kind of letter, similarly ad¬ 
dressed, requesting fifteen dollars; that the 
letter sent to Mr. Jewett requested seven dol¬ 
lars, the request being couched as follows : 

The congressional committee has directed that you 
be asked to contribute forcampaigii purposes in this 
district. Those occupying positions similar to the 
one you do are giving seven dollars. You may send 
your contribution to the treasurer of the committee, 
Mr. W. H. Haskell, 522 Minnesota avenue, Kansas 
City, Kansas, who will make due entry thereof and 
receipt to you for same. An early response will be 
highly appreciated by the committee. 

M. Peairs was asked to contribute on the 
same ground, that persons occupying positions 
similar to the one he did were giving that 
amount. Mr. Meserve was asked to con¬ 
tribute forty dollars, similar reasons being 
given for specifying this sum. Mr. Meserve 
and the other gentlemen named were natural¬ 
ly not very anxious to testify in the matter, as 
to do so would very probably seriously embroil 
them with the local politicians of influence in 
the dominant party; but they did testify with 
honorable frankness as soon as I requested 
them to do so in my official capacity. In re¬ 
sponse to my question as to what action Mr. 
Meserve had taken in reference to the request, 
he informed me that on finding that his em¬ 
ployes had received such letters he notified 
them that the tenure by which they held their 
offices at Haskell Institute would be neither 
weakened nor strengthened by replying to 
the request or by failing to reply. If all of 
the gentlemen occupying positions similar to 
Mr. Meserve would take such action as he 
took when their subordinates are solicited for 
political contributions, the work of this com¬ 


mission in trying to protect government em¬ 
ployes from blackmail would be very materi¬ 
ally lightened. 

It seems to me that the papers in this case 
should be transmitted to the attorney-general 
for such action as he may deem wise, and I so 
recommend, for it would appear that Mr. 
Stevenson has certainly laid himself open to 
prosecution. 

As I deemed it of the utmost importance 
publicly to call the attention of the employes 
in the government service to their rights, and 
also to warn the various campaign committees 
that any attempts on their part to violate or 
evade the law would be watched with a jeal¬ 
ous eye by the commission, I caused to be 
printed in certain papers of wide circulation 
in the three states visited the following no¬ 
tice : 

Sioux City, Sept. 15,1892. 

Upon investigation just completed I find 
that for years it has been customary for state 
and congressional campaign committees sys¬ 
tematically to levy political assessments on 
the Government employes in certain Indian 
reservations and Indian schools through Kan¬ 
sas, Nebraska and the Dakotas. This practice 
is most rife during Presidential campaigns. 
It obtained four yoars ago under the demo¬ 
cratic administration; but this is no excuse 
for the fact that it is now prevalent. 

Within the last month there has been a bold 
series of efforts to practice this series of black¬ 
mail. On mostof the reservations and in the In¬ 
dian schools which I have mentioned attempts 
of the kind have just been made by local state 
and congressional campaign committees. At 
one agency, for instance, the agent received 
the following communication: “Send me a 
list of all parties at the agency * * includ¬ 

ing all teachers, helpers, etc., showing name of 
each and salary per year * * * so I can 

make up my assessment list soon and correct¬ 
ly;” signed by the chairman of the republican 
state committee. Beit remembered that these 
teachers are mostly women, and the helpers 
Indians; there is an infamy of meanness in 
trying to extort money from such defenseless 
employes. 

At another agency the sums assessed were 
stated outright, ranging from $100 for the 
agent to $10 for the lower grade teachers; at 
one school 2 per cent, of the salaries was speci¬ 
fied, and so on and so on. 

I wish publicly to assure the governmental 
employes in the Indian service that they need 
not pay a dollar to any political party at 
all unless they wish, and that if they do 
wish they can pay it to whatever party they 
prefer. Immediately on my return to Wash¬ 
ington I shall lay all the information I can 
collect in each case before the department of 
justice so that wherever practicable the per¬ 
sons offending against the law prohibiting po¬ 
litical assessments may be prosecuted. 

Theodore Roosevelt. 

I promptly notified the commission of my 
action, and I was careful to refrain from giv¬ 
ing any names in my notice lest I might 


thereby hamper the subsequent action of the 
commission. I thought it important not to 
delay in publishing this card, for the reason 
that very many of the employes who would 
submit to being blackmailed if they felt that 
they had no promise of protection would un¬ 
doubtedly be encouraged to resist if they 
knew that the commission was actively watch¬ 
ing their interests and was bent on maintain¬ 
ing them. 


BE JUST; BE CONSISTENT. 

Greensburg, Ind., September 25, 1892. 
Editor Civil Service Chronicle: 

In reading the editorials in the various is¬ 
sues of your publication for some months 
past the child-like and all-abiding faith which 
your writers have for the accomplishment 
of that much-to-be-desired object, the enforce¬ 
ment of the civil service laws and their ex¬ 
tension to other branches of public service, at 
the hands of the democratic party has struck 
me as a most unique expectation. The edi¬ 
tors of the Chronicle, I believe, claim to be 
independent of party bias except in so far as 
the civil service principle is involved. This 
being the case, permit me to inquire what the 
history of the democratic party holds which 
gives promise of the attainment of your de¬ 
sires? To gentlemen of your mentality it is 
unnecessary to recall the fact or argue that 
all the past performances of the democratic 
party have proven its devotion to the spoils 
idea; what then is the cause of such belief in 
its change of heart and policy? Is it faith 
in the virtue of Mr.. Cleveland alone? In 
1884 the writer heard Mr. Dudley Foulke, of 
civil service advocacy, speak against Mr. 
Blaine and in favor of Cleveland; Blaine 
was defeated and Mr, Cleveland, the idol of 
civil service reformers, took the reins of gov¬ 
ernment. He was given a most fair and im¬ 
partial trial. And what of his admirer, Mr. 
Foulke? Four years later, in 1888, we again 
hear him speak. Is he praising Cleveland 
and the democratic party for their brave ad¬ 
herence to civil service reform ? Not so. He 
is found advocating the election of Benjamin 
Harrison, whom he has known as a neighbor 
and as a man of much sincerity of purpose. 
Cleveland, unable to withstand the pressure 
from the large spoils element of his party, has 
disappointed Mr. Foulke and his co workers, 
and is not then considered as at all worthy ^ 
a re-election. Harrison defeats Cleveland 
and is put on trial, but instead of having the 
support of the civil service advocates, from 
the first he suffers unstinted criticism, criti¬ 
cism not noted for fairness and which seems 
rather to be more in a spirit of self-satisfac¬ 
tion than of regret. His party honors him 
with a renomination, and now where do we 
find Mr. Foulke? He appears on the political 
stage, but he has see-sawed back to Cleveland, 
who has also once been tried and found want¬ 
ing, and the party of that noted reform(?) or- 
ganization,Tammany. Webegto ask wherein is 
to be found the consistency in such support? 
Democracy, with all its record of opposition, 








386 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


with Cleveland’s failure and broken pledges 
—wherein has it retrieved itself that such im¬ 
plicit faith as your journal continually 
breathes should be felt? The party is the 
same party and Cleveland is the same Cleve¬ 
land ; their records are unchanged, their prom¬ 
ises are no more to be relied upon, and as an 
additional argument against them comes the 
nomination of Stevenson, notorious as the 
headsman of the Cleveland regime, in direct 
recognition of the “ real democrats ” of the 
democratic party. Surely this slap in the face 
of civil service reformers can not inspire them 
with renewed confidence? What then is there 
to expect at the hands of Cleveland and his 
party except a repetition of past experiences, 
with the loss of the restraining influence of 
an ambition for a re election which doubtless 
favored the reformers in his first term ? 

The nation has prospered under President 
Harrison, who has kept every personal pledge 
he has made, and while he may not be perfect 
—who is?—I believe that the verdict of the 
people, who remember that a president is not 
all powerful, and that all reforms promised 
by a party can not be accomplished in the 
brief period of four years, will be that he is 
entitled to and shall receive the endorsement 
of a re-election. 

The speech at Indianapolis on the 15th 
inst. by George W. Julian, to which you give 
space in your last number, I regard as simply 
an example of what personal pique can do 
for a man, no matter how brilliant he may be 
when away from the subject of his grievances. 
Mr. Julian was an appointee under Cleveland’ 
and his remarks, which are full of a spirit of 
personal dislike for President Harrison, are 
not to be accounted altogether disinterested. 

Civil Service Fair Play. 

SPOILS AT LARGE. 

One of the most acrimonious and bitter po¬ 
litical fights in Onondaga’s history is now on 
between the two factions of the republicans— 
the Beldenites and the Hendricks-Smithites. 
In the contest are involved the Standard, which 
supports Belden, and the Journal, Postmaster 
SmitPs organ and the advocate of Col. George 
N. Crouse’s canvass for congress. The attacks 
on both sides have been of the most virulent 
character, and the outcome will be the most 
vicious knifing. Although the war between Con¬ 
gressman Belden and Postmaster Carroll E. Smith 
dates back to W'ar times, the present issue is 
on the call for the congressional convention. 
Belden gathered together the old congression¬ 
al committees from Onondaga and Madison, 
her new political sister, on June 16, and called 
a convention for August 24 in this city. There 
will be 117 delegates from Onondaga and 42 
from Madison. 

The Hendricks-Smithites bolt this conven¬ 
tion entirely, claiming that the state commit¬ 
tee alone has power to call the congressional 
conventions, in view of the resolutions empow¬ 
ering them to organize the new congressional 
districts of the state, passed at the last state 
convention. 


Belden claims that congressional nomina¬ 
tions are a national matter, and entirely out 
of the jurisdiction of the state committee. On 
these lines Belden and Smith have been call¬ 
ing each other liar and scoundrel, until the 
party is wrought up to the highest pitch over 
the war of words. The matter will be fought 
out before the state committee at Albany next 
week, and it may be expected that neither 
party will give in without a supreme struggle. 

—Syracuse Dispatch to Neiv York Times, June 26. 

» * « 

The Belden-Smith feud is still waging with 
unabated ardor, though probably there will 
be no pyrotechnics until the hearing before 
the sub-committee of the republican state 
committee in this city on July 8. 

Both sides are busily organizing. On Thurs¬ 
day night a meeting of anti-Belden republican 
office-holders was held in the ofjice of Collector Fran¬ 
cis Hendricks, where the headquarters of Col. 
G. N. Crouse will be. The call was issued to 
all the republicans of Onondaga. Corpora¬ 
tion Counsel Charles E. Ide announced that 
the purpose of the meeting was to organize for 
a fight against the renomination of James J. 
Belden. He said he presumed that all pres¬ 
ent were supporters of Col. Crouse, and asked 
any who were not to retire. Luther S. Mer¬ 
rick, a prominent republican and grand army 
of the republic man, arose and said that if it 
was that kind of a game they wanted to be 
counted out. Others followed this example 
and left the room. 

Postmaster Carroll E. Smith was in charge, and 
made a speech assailing Congressmen Belden 
on every side. The conference lasted a long 
time, and considerable enthusiasm was shown. 
Col. Crouse was present.— Syracuse Dispatch to 
New York Times, July 3. 

*- » 

Col. George N. Crouse, who has been contesting the 
republican congressional nomination in this district 
against Representative Belden, has withdrawn from 
the fight, although one town caucus has been held. 
The sentiment for Belden was loo strong, although 
Crouse was supported by Collector Hendricks, Senator 
Hiscock, Postmaster Smith, editor of the Journal, and 
other federal and city officeholders. Belden will be 
renominated by acclamation. The Hendricks ma¬ 
chine in this county is thoroughly demoralized and 
Belden's influence promises to be supreme. The 
Journal has been fighting Belden with the greatest 
bitterness, even threatening to bolt his renomination, 
but it will probably desist from further open oppo¬ 
sition before and after the renomination.—Syracuse 
Dispatch to New York Evening Post, July 22. 

v/t 

The first meeting which the republican city com¬ 
mittee has held, called for the purpose of naming 
the time and places for holding the caucuses in the 
congressional election, was held tonight in the 
assembly room of the new city hall. It was the most 
disgraceful fracas of all the broils of the contest be¬ 
tween Congressman James J. Belden and his oppon- 
eirts of the Hiscock-Hendricks [collector] ring. The 
shouts, hisses, groans and threats of the meeting 
could be heard at the hotels several blocks away 
and in the heat of the turmoil the delegates were 
standing on their seats yelling and calling for the 
blood of Clarence G. Brown, a Hiscock man, the 
chairman of the committee. The trouble began in 
the naming of sub.stitutes. The Hiscock-Hendricks 
people offered a number of substitutes which the 
Beldenites openly declared to be forgeries.—Syracuse 
Dispatch to New York Times, July 28. 


Senator Frank Hiscock and Collector of the Port of 
New York Francis Hendricks arrived in town to day, 
and Congressman J. J. Belden left after a brief con¬ 
ference with them. He has gone to his summer 
home in the St. Lawrence. The probable meaning 
thereof is that HiscockandHendrickshavepromised 
to keep their hands off Belden’s canvass for the le- 
nomination to congress, and Belden in his goodness 
of heart has conceded to his opponents the supreme 
court judgeship. The last probability is strength¬ 
ened by the fact that this afternoon Frank H. His¬ 
cock, a nephew of the senator, came out as a candi¬ 
date for the position, haying previously held off. Mr. 
White has been conducting a canvass for at least six 
weeks on the supposition that he was backed by Col¬ 
lector Hendricks. He has made the assertion openly. 
It is stated now that he will make the fight in spite 
of being thrown overboard by the Hiscock-Hendricks 
people.—fyracuse Dispatch to New York Times, Au¬ 
gust 6. 

■» * * 

The appointment of Edward G. Harrison as post¬ 
master to succeed A. R. Toland, who was appointea 
by ex-President Cleveland, stirred up a hornet’s 
nest in the ranks of the republicans in this section. 
A majority of the workers favored Water Commis¬ 
sioner George W. Treat for the post. Ex-Assemblyman 
Oviatt, Gen. Sewell’s lieutenant in this section, did 
not look favorably upon Treat’s candidacy and sent 
in the name of John L. Coffin, formerly editor of 
the Journal. The two factions waged a bitter war 
for six months. Now that a dark horse has walked 
off with the prize, the Treat men are furious. Sev¬ 
eral leading republicans to-night denounced both 
Gen. Sewell and President Harrison, and a number 
of them declare openly that they will vole for 
Cleveland in November. Treat’s friends say that 
they will disband the Young Men’s Republican Club 
at the next meeting and pass resolutions denouncing 
Sewell and Harrison .—Asbury Park Dispatch to New 
York Times, July 15. 

* * * 

There is widespread dissatisfaction here among 
bu.siness men with the administration of the post- 
office by John T. Platt, who was appointed by Presi¬ 
dent Harrison a year and a half ago. Platt cofibints 
with his post-office duties the light and airy job of writing 
editorials for the Poughkeepsie Eagle. He wasappointed 
against the protest of the respectable republicans, 
who distrusted him because of his record in the as¬ 
sembly, where his name was often associated with 
the notorious Poughkeepsie bridge lobby. His first 
act when he received his appointment was to remove 
Deputy Postmaster Samuel Smith, a trusted official 
of thirty years’ experience. In his place he put Ezra 
White, a general utility man who had been defeated 
for mayor by 500 votes. Smith died of a broken 
heart a few months after his removal. The local 
newspapers contain daily complaints of the laxness 
of the postal service. Mails are not distributed for two 
hours after they are received, and each one of the 
twenty-five employes seems to be a postmaster in 
himself. It is notorious that carriers leave in the of¬ 
fice letters that take them any distance off their regu¬ 
lar routes until it is convenient to deliver them.— 
Poughkeepsie Dispatch to New York World, August 18. 

« « * 

President Harrison’s appointment of Grocer Kess¬ 
ler as postmaster at Short Hills has aroused the in¬ 
dignation of the residents of that suburban resort. 
When Short Hills was first laid out it was urged that 
a post-office would be a convenient thing to have, 
and that the railway station would be a convenient 
place for its location. So, at the request of the Short 
Hills residents, J. C. Goodrich, the station agent and 
telegraph operator, was named to take charge of it. 
Short Hills was a small place at that time. Its mail 
service was a small thing, even for a place of its lim¬ 
ited population. It has grown since, and Mr. Good¬ 
rich has so improved the service that the post-office is 
now a presidential appointment, with 81,800 per year 
attached to it. The 81,800 tempted Grocer Kessler 
and he began circtilating petitions for his appoint¬ 
ment. The result is that President Harrison has 
just named him to succeed Mr. Goodrich. The resi¬ 
dents agree that his store is not half as convenient a 
place as the station, and that he is not half as nice a 
man anyhow as Mr. Goodrich, and so they are all up 
in arms.—Newark Dispatch to New York Times, July 17. 










The civil service chronicle. 


If we see notliin^ in our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoils, we shall fail at every point.— President-elect Cleveland 

at New York, November 18. 


VoL. I, No. 45. 


INDIANAPOLIS, NOVEMBER, 1892. 


TERMS:^ 


50 cents persnnnm. 
5 cents {^r copy. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Addres.s, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

Frederick Almy, secretary of the Buf¬ 
falo Civil Service Reform Association, 24 
Law Exchange, Buffalo, New York, will be 
glad to get a copy of the Civil Service 
Chronicle for October, 1889, to complete 
the file of the association. 


The Civil Service Chronicle contin¬ 
ues its references to the part played by 
federal officeholders in the campaign in 
order that the record may be as complete 
as possible. These same brisk fellows, 
paid by general taxation, and a couple of 
weeks ago such busy and brazen hench¬ 
men, are now so limp and apprehensive 
that they rather excite pity. 


In other columns will be found taken 
from the Indianapolis Evening NetvsH long 
list of those who “aspire” to federal offices 
from different localities in Indiana. Other 
lists are promised by the News in the 
future. The value of this service to the 
public can not be overestimated. The 
publication of the acts, facts, and motives 
which are always part of any scramble for 
spoil is the one thing that the scramblers 
do despise. 


The “ best citizens ” among the republi¬ 
cans are astounded and heartbroken at 
their defeat. But, as a matter of fact, these 
republicans have looked on with apparent 
indifference while their party in office was 
carrying out a wholesale violation of its 
promises. With a few exceptions, like 
Henry C. Lea,nothing seemed treacherous 
or scandalous enough to call for a protest. 
Mahoneism,Quayi8m, Plattism and Elkins- 
ism were viewed with equanimity. The 
efforts of civil service reformers to keep 
the administration to its promises did not 
have the least support from these “best cit¬ 
izens.” They looked on while Harrison 
manipulated and with otiices bought his 
re-nomination, and then woke up with sur¬ 
prise because voters who had voted for 
him in 1888 would not vote for him again. 
These “best citizens” will have to learn 
that they have a duty to perform between 
elections. One of these duties is to see 
that the promises which they and their 
j)arty have made are kept. 


The republican state committee of In- i 
diana undoubtedly knowingly violated the 
law in its circular soliciting money from 
federal employes The case of the post¬ 
master at Ditney, Ind., is now in the hands 
of Attorney-general Miller. Almost all 
federal officers answered that circular with | 
contributions. That, however, was not 
enough. All who made one contribution 
at once received the following communica¬ 
tion, the words “favorably situated” in 
these circulars meaning that the recipients 
are in some office : 

INDIANA RERUBLICAN STATE COMMITTEE. 

Rooms 4, .30 and 32, The Denison. 

Telephone No. 1119. 

Indianapolis, Oct. 29, 1892. 

Dear Sir —We appreciate what you have done In 
the way of general work in this campaign, and thank 
yon for whatever aid you have rendered the com¬ 
mittee direct, but we must ask you for further 
assistance. 

Indiana is a republican state. It must be kept 
where every business tie and interest places it—in 
the republican column. She, of all other states, 
should participate in the electoral college that will 
re-elect her worthy citizen, and retain the position 
she holds in the counsels of the government. 

The result in the nation may depend upon this 
state. Let every republican do his duty. We know 
that you desire to be as industrious and as liberal as 
others as favorably situated, a.id that you wish to 
continue so worthy an administration. You will ap¬ 
preciate the importance of promptness at this hour. 

May we not hear from yoti further? 

Yonrs very truly, 

Frank M. Millikan, Secretary. 

The President in no way failed more 
disgracefully than in the way in which he 
allowed United States marshals to prosti¬ 
tute their offices to party uses. Marshal 
Dunlap of Indiana was a typical example. 
In law he had the right to appoint deputies 
to keep the peace at the election. It is a dan¬ 
gerous power if in thehandsofan unscrupu¬ 
lous man, and a marshal could have no 
higher duty than to act in this matter free 
from partisan bias. Marshal Dunlap made 
his appointments under the direction of re¬ 
publican politicians of the most obnoxious 
sort. He was ashamed to let the public 
know the names of his deputies. He did 
not know how many he was appointing, 
which makes it appear that he was ap¬ 
pointing all of a certain class whose names 
were suggested by his party workers. He 
finally appointed five hundred and seventy- 
five, who will be paid ten dollars each for 
their services. They are reputed to have 
been among the class known as “ doubtful.” 
There was not the least need of appointing 
a single deputy and no one knew it better 


than Dunlap. The Indiana law requires 
deputy sheriffs from both parties at the 
polls. When asked if he would appoint any 
democrats, here is what this peace officer, 
who is paid by and who is supposed to act 
impartially for all the people, said : 

Not a democrat. In business my office Is run for 
the people, in politics it is managed solely for repub¬ 
licans. 


Marshal Jacobus appointed some five 
thousand deputies of a similar class in 
New York. Such reckless use of power is 
full of the gravest danger. It needs but a 
conflict between state and federal officers 
with a “ strong ” President to send troops 
to the support of his marshals and we have 
reached imperialism. Those who laugh at 
such fears should study the career of Bal- 
maceda in Chili. 


The action of John I. Davenport, chief 
supervisor of elections at New York, is a 
clear illustralion of the length to which 
desperate professional politicians in office 
will go. He sent out the following letter: 



New York, October —, 1892. ) 

Sir: Your right to register and vote in the 31 Elec¬ 
tion District of the 16 Assembly District of the city 
of New York has been questioned. By calling at 
this office you may be able to satisfactorily explain 
the matter and thus avoid further trouble. 

Yours, etc., 

John I. Davenport, Chief Supervisor. 
Martin Norton, Esq., 400 East Fifty-fourth Street. 

More fligrant or violent abuses of official 
position are rare in this country. Daven¬ 
port had not a shadow of authority for such 
an action. It was a bold attempt to scare 
timid voters by unscrupulous and violent 
henchmen, openly encouraged by the ad¬ 
ministration. 


The Washington correspondent of the 
New York Evening Post is informed that 
the President is considering whether it 
will not be “good politics” to extend the 
civil service rules only in a trifling way, 
and to trust that the democratic party will 
be wrecked by its rapacity for office. It 
was well known among Mr. Cleveland’s 
friends in 1888 that whatever the results of 
the election, it was his intention to sub¬ 
stantially extend the rules. It has been 
understood by President Harrison’s friends 
for a long time that it was his intention 
after the recent election to materially ex¬ 
tend the rules. It would have been better 




























388 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


had Mr. Cleveland done his work earlier, 
and the same is true of President Harrison. 
It is hardly conceivable that the President 
will be so petty as to neglect this in order 
to annoy his successor. 


Indiana politics have always been noto¬ 
rious and interesting, and the recent cam¬ 
paign affords another illustration of the 
political backwardness of this state. The 
Columbia Club of Indianapolis is a pow¬ 
erful republican organization. It has a 
handsome club house with a dining-room 
to which the members might invite a 
young Boston republican with compla¬ 
cency. To belong to the club is a distinct 
social advantage. Its members call them¬ 
selves, and they undoubtedly are, the 
“ leading young men ” of the city. To 
such a club, if anywhere, one would look 
for the best spirit of the republican party, 
that tendency “for reform within the par¬ 
ty,” of which much has been heard. 

In Massachusetts the members of such a 
club would be the aggressive enemies of 
the spoils system. They would denounce 
the blackmailing of government employes. 
They would not view with indifference the 
methods by which Harrison’s renomina¬ 
tion was secured. They would remain re¬ 
publicans but they would not occupy a 
cowardly attitude in relation to the reform 
spirit said to exist among the better ele¬ 
ments of the republican attitude. Has the 
Columbia Club any of that reform spirit, 
or is it organized as an aid to common, or¬ 
dinary, every day ward politics ? 


A Philadelphia correspondent, thoroughly 
convinced that the use of the federal service as 
poil is the most serious menace to free insti¬ 
tutions, said to the writer in a recent private 
letter: 

“The part that Tammany will play in this 
campaign, and the presence of Stevenson on 
the presidential ticket, makes it to my minp 
extremely doubtful that the interest of good 
government will best be served by the success 
of the democratic ticket.” 

He says in effect, we are now under the heel 
en, Tof Quay, Dave Martin, Hackettom Platt’ 
and a change will only substitute the heel of 
Tammany. Our correspondent should not 
forget that the greatest obstacles to successful¬ 
ly throwing off tyranny are the apathy and 
acquiescence of the subjects. Especially in 
Pennsylvania is any effort for relief hampered 
by the fact that the present generation has 
never known any other condition than servi¬ 
tude under a Cameron dynasty or its successor. 
Quay. But aside from the valuable habit of 
frequent revolts against bosses, many of us 
think that if we must carry a boss, it lightens 
the weight to shift the load; that it is no worse 
to be spoiled by a Tammany than by a Quay 
and that, moreover, every time a boss is beat- 
ndahe is weakened. 


If any one can point out in detail the way 
by which the republican vampires who have 
for years been draining the life of the repub¬ 
lican party can be destroyed by the method, 
which is our correspondent’s, of the supply of 
fresh carcass, it ought to be done. 

Another correspondent says : “ I have, 
myself, little faith that the democratic 
party will do any better for the civil 
service than the republicans did.” This 
has been for years a typical attitude of a 
large number of people and it has more 
impeded reform than hostility to it. The 
question is what course will in the long 
run most eflfectually kill patronage. The 
answer seems clear— sharp and immediate 
punishment to the offender now, four years 
from now, again in eight years, and again 
in twelve years if the lesson has not been 
learned before. 

But what is going to be the immediate 
effect upon the civil service reform move¬ 
ment provided the democratic party should 
do no better than the la'e republican 
party ? The answer to that seems equally 
plain if experience goes for anything. 
Spoil was divided in 1884, and again in 
1888 and each time it was an object lesson 
that did ten-fold more to arouse popular 
disgust for the spoils system than all the 
efforts of all the civil service reformers- 
If there should be another distribution of 
spoils in 1892, the President who permitted 
it would violate his oath of oflSce and he 
and his party would suffer; but the reform 
of the civil service would in fact go on the 
faster. 

THE DEMOCRATIC CHANCE. 

The democrats have on various grounds 
won a great victory. The situation has 
nowhere been better summed up than by 
the Indianapolis Sentinel, which realizes 
that more than one thing brought it about. 
No one can yet say that the democratic 
party is equal to its time and its oppor 
tunity, but it gives such promise that it is 
entitled to the chance. If now the demo¬ 
crats regulate the tariff in a way that 
pleases the greatest number of Americans 
and yet turn the civil service over to their 
Quays and Platts, and put their party in an 
attitude of opposition to the civil service 
law and civil service reform, their majority 
will all be worn away and they will be de¬ 
feated in 1896. The reason is that enough 
voters to turn the scale have an irreconcil¬ 
able hatred of being ruled by bosses, and 
of the use of the civil service as spoil. The 
lessons of the defeats of 1884, 1886, 1888, 
1890 and 1892 may be read by all. No 
party in power can stand the grinding 
power of public criticism of its prostitu¬ 
tion of the civil service to personal and 
party ends. 

The democrats so far bear their victory 


well. It is only in republican papers that 
the democrats are going to set up wildcat 
banks, destroy our manufactures, and re¬ 
peal the civil service law. A repeal of the 
civil service law would be about like the 
repeal of the Missouri compromise. Under 
the present administration six republican 
congressmen introduced bills to repeal that 
law and the whole six went into private life 
at the next election—not solely for this 
reason but this was one of the reasons. 

For three successive presidential elec¬ 
tions the party which has had the oflSces has 
been defeated. Yet we shall hear once more, 
though probably not to such an extent, the 
exploded argument that the offices are es¬ 
sential to party success, and about the Boys 
with cold toes, and so on. Mr. Cleveland 
is in a position to smile grimly at all such 
nonsense. In fact, he is in a position to 
reform the civil service to almost any ex¬ 
tent he desires. His platform makes the 
simple statement that the civil service law 
shall be enforced ; that the offices ought 
not to be subject to change at every elec¬ 
tion, or be a brief reward of party zeal, or 
be a prize fought for at the polls. This 
covers the whole ground, and good faith 
requires that matters be put in such shape 
that the principles of the platform will he 
permanently established. The further this 
is carried the stronger the party will be at 
the end of four years. 

It does not seem possible that further 
attempts to trick the civil service law will 
be made, or that the new commission will 
be less efficient, aggressive and fearless 
than the present one. It ought to be a sine 
qua non that heads of offices within the law 
shall be friendly to it. Beyond this a few 
measures will complete the reform of the 
federal civil service. The first is the pass¬ 
age of a bill introduced by John F. An¬ 
drew, a democrat, taking the fourth-class 
postmasters out of politics. The second is 
the passage of a bill, also introduced by 
Mr. Andrew, establishing the Boston labor 
service system in the federal labor service 
The third is the addition by the President 
to the classified service of the remainder 
of the federal service which is capable of 
being put under competition. About 35,- 
000 places are now under the rules, and 
probably 25,000 more can go under. These 
include a large number of places like 
heads of divisions in the departments at 
Washington, and in large offices through¬ 
out the country. These are now used to 
quarter political hacks upon the people, 
and these political hacks are usually igno¬ 
rant of the law and of their duties, and 
are, in most cases, enemies of the merit 
system. Such appointments are like 
choosing collecters of customs from pro¬ 
fessional smugglers. These places should 
be thrown open to competion among the 
under employes, from whose numbers bet- 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


389 


ter men can be obtained than have ever 
filled them yet. 

When President Harrison, before his in¬ 
auguration, was urged to adopt a plan of re¬ 
form, he declared that he would have 
none, but would deal with each matter as 
it came up. We see where this led to. 
The greatest danger before Mr. Cleveland 
would be in having no plan of dealing 
with the gravest questions that will be pre¬ 
sented to him—the demand for spoil—and 
it will be presented at once. There is 
no half-way ground. To substitute party 
workers for party workers, in office, is mere 
favoritism. Such a gift of offices has been 
for all time the most conspicuous mark of 
arbitrary government. 


The incalculable value of a secret ballot has 
been made plainer than ever. It has seeming¬ 
ly destroyed the business of actual buying and 
selling votes at the polls in Indiana. Some 
slight changes will make voting much more 
satisfactory. The law is designed to make 
“scratching” difficult, but the politicians may 
as well give up trying to compel voters. In¬ 
dependent voting is happily going to increase, 
not diminish. The voter is now compelled to 
stamp opposite the name of every candidate 
for whom he wants to vote. Where there are 
thirty or forty candidates on each ticket this 
is a needlessly tedious and care-requiring op¬ 
eration. Usually one ticket contains the ma¬ 
jority of a voter’s candidates. He should be 
allowed to stamp the head of this ticket and 
then the names of candidates on the other 
tickets for whom he wants his vote counted. 
If he will vote for none of the candidates for 
a given office he should be required to stamp 
them all out. Again, the booths are too 
small. There is plenty of room and plenty of 
lumber, and there is no reason why a voter 
should not have elbow-room and a shelf wide 
enough to lay his ticket on. There will be a 
good deal of talk by the enemies of the system 
about the number who lost their votes by mis¬ 
takes in stamping. This number will steadily 
decrease, and even now it is not so large as the 
number who formerly sold their votes. 

AMER1CAN_FEUDAL1SM. 

Services were free and base. Free ser¬ 
vice was to pay a sum of money, or serve 
under the lord in war. Base service was 
to plow the lord’s land, to make his hedge 
or carry out Iiis dung.— Blackstone. 


BUSY HENCHMEN. 

At the opera-house eighteen hundred voters 
listened to Hm. E. W. Halford, President Har¬ 
rison’s private secretary, for an hour and a 
half. The day closed with a decided advant¬ 
age in favor of the republicans.— Columbus Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, Nov‘. 6. 

» » * 

Private Secretary Halford was in the city yes¬ 
terday, between appointments, having spoken 


at Columbus Saturday. To-day he will speak 
at Huntington.— Indianapolis Journal, Nov. 7. 

* * * 

The evening celebration was followed by a 
mass meeting held in the opera-house. It was 
addressed by Hon. C. W. Fairbanks and Private 
Secretary Halford. This closed a day full of 
old time enthusiasm.— Marion Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal, Nov. 4. 

« * * 

Patrick Eagan, United States Minister to Chili, 
will take the stump in the interest of the re¬ 
publican ticket next week. He will make his 
first appearance at Indianapolis, October 28.— 
Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 22. 

» * » 

B. K. Bruce, recorder of deeds of the district, 
leaves the city to-day. He will address a re¬ 
publican meeting at Wilmington, Del., to¬ 
morrow evening, and before returning will 
speak in New Jersey and Indiana.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to Indianapalis Journal, Oct. 22. 

» * » 

Postmaster General Wanamaker’s tour 
through northern Indiana is proving a bril¬ 
liant ovation. * * William Patterson [su¬ 

perintendent of mails in Indianapolis post- 
office] of Indianapolis, accompanies him to 
arrange routes, time, etc., and proves an ex¬ 
cellent manager.— Fort Wayne Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal, Nov. 5. 

• ♦ * 

Mr. Lincoln [minister to England], left Bra¬ 
zil immediately after the meeting for Terre 
Haute, where he was to make a short speech, 
and then hasten on to Sullivan, where the 
biggest rally in Sullivan county in this cam¬ 
paign is in progress, and where he spoke to¬ 
night.— Brazil Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
Nov. 4. 

♦ « * 

Deputy Controller of the Currency Nixon 
has gone to Indiana.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, October 24. 

* * « 

The republicans inaugurated to-day a series 
of noon day meetings, which are to last 
through the week. The principal speaker at the 
committee rooms to-day was William M. Marine, 
collector of customs at Baltimore.—Indianapolis 
Evening News, Nowmber 1. 

» * » 

Attorney General W. H. H. Miller, Col. A. L. 
Conger and Han. Wm. Marine [collector at 
Baltimore] were the orators. The opera-house 
and Odd-fellows’ Hall were both filled to 
overflowing. Thousands from the surround¬ 
ing country and towns were in attendance.— 
Elwood Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Novem¬ 
ber 4. 

* » * 

There will be a big meeting in Fort Wayne 
to day, addressed by Robert T. Lincoln, Stephen 
A. Douglas and Hon. W. M. Marine, which 
makes a big team.— Journal, Nov. 1, 1892. 

* » « 

The republicans held another large and en¬ 
thusiastic meeting, Saturday evening, the 


speaker being Gen. Green B. Baum, commis¬ 
sioner of pensions.—Lafayette Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, October 31. 

* » * 

A few hours before the time for the train to 
arrive to-night it was learned that Gen. Green 
B. Raum would be here to address the repub¬ 
licans.— Franklin Dispatch to Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, October 29. 

* * * 

Republicans of Jackson township had a 
rousing meeting at Roanoke, Saturday after¬ 
noon, which was addressed by Hon. Warren G. 
Sayre [Indian commissioner].— Huntington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, November 1. 

• « * 

Lafayette post-office carriers in uniform dis¬ 
tributed, October 26, the following notices : 

Republican 

speaking. 

Hon. W. W. Curry, 

Chaplain Lozier, 
at opera house 
to-night. 

» * » 

One of the largest republican meetings of 
the campaign was held at the Grand opera- 
house last evening. Hon. John B. Cockrum was 
the first speaker.— Greensburg Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal, Oct. 31. 

» ♦ * 

During the meeting John B. Cockrum came 
into the room and gave a half hour’s speech, 
which captivated the audience.— SpicelandDis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 23. 

» * » 

The republican round-up rally was a mon¬ 
ster. * Stirring and eloquent speeches 
were made by Marcus R. Sulzer, Assistant Dis¬ 
trict Attorney John B. CockrUm. * * —Madison 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Nov. 6. 

* » * 

Mr. Henry retired at this juncture, plead¬ 
ing weariness, and the Hon. John B. Cockrum 
took his place. He spoke entirely on two 
questions, that of the soldier and the force bill. 
In an adroit and telling manner he compared 
the war records of Grover Cleveland and Ad- 
lai Stevenson with those of General Harrison 
and War-correspondent Reid. He told how 
the first had sent a substitute, and the second 
had done likewise, and afterwards became a 
Knight of the Golden Circle.— Indianapolis 
Journal, Nov. 4. 

♦ * * 

Smiley N. Chambers, United States district 
attorney, presided over the noon-hour meeting 
of the republicans at county headquarters to¬ 
day.— Indianapolis Evening News, Nov. 2. 

* * * 

Hon. Smiley N. Chambers speaks at Bright- 
wood to-night; C. W. Smith and George W. 
Spahr at Millersville, and F. J. VauVorhis at 
Traders Point.— Indianapolis Journal, Nov. 1. 

* <> •> 

We appeal for a careful consideration of the 
following question and answer in regard to 
the appointment of deputy marshals in this 
state: 

Reporter—I presume there will be some 
democrats among the deputies. 








390 


THE CIVIL'SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Marshal Dunlap—Not :i democrat. In busi¬ 
ness my office is run for the people; in politics 
it is managed solely for republicans .— Indianapolis 
Sentinel, November 5. 

• » * 

In the afternoon, Hon. W. D. Owen ad¬ 
dressed a large an lienee, devoting the princi¬ 
pal part of his remarks to the tariff question.— 
Ehiffloit Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, No¬ 
vember 4. 

•s » * 

Twenty-five hundred people came in yester¬ 
day to hear Commissioner of Emigration W. D. 
Owen deliver one of his republican speeches. 
— Valparaiso Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
October 29. 

* * » 

Hon. ir. D. Owen spoke under the auspices 
of the republican club last night.— Garrett Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, October 21. 

* » » 

Hon.’ W. D. Otuea addressed a large audience 
in this city to-night.— Wabash Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, October 21. 

4^ ifJ 

Hon. W. D. Owen spoke at the opera house 
last night to a good audience.— Albion DispiUch 
to Indianapolis Journal, Oct. 20. 

» s «■ 

H on. L. \V. Brown, United States consul to 
Glasgow, delivered a telling speech before a 
large audience in Bell’s hall last night.— 
Knightstown Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
Oct. 20. 

» * 9 

Ogden, Ind., Nov. 4, 1892. 
Indianapolis Sentinel Company, Indianapolis, In¬ 
diana : 

Dear Sirs —I have been taking the Sentinel 
for four years, and yesterday when our post¬ 
master handed out the Sentinel, he also handed 
oat this small sheet. 

They are distributing them very liberally 
to all. 

Use this for what you want to. 

A. O. Hooton. 

[The head lines of the circular are : 

CALUMNY SILENCED. 

Allegatioxs of Matthews, Myers, and 

THE Sentinel, Proved to re False. 

Democratic Libelees Put to Rout.] 

* « « 

Mr. McMillan is assisted in his work of “re¬ 
demption” by Internal Revenue Collector F. C. 
Stone, and others to the number of twelve. 
Jay A. Hubbell, the solicitor of contributions 
from the departments at ^Vashington in years 
gone by, is one of the republican candidates 
for election at large.— Detroit Dispatch to New 
York Times, November 2. 

♦ * * 

Mr. Quay was at national headquarters yes- 
terdiiy completing his deal for administration 
support. Vice-President Morton was one of 
the callers there, and Mr. Quay had a consul¬ 
tation with him. He also took pains to talk 
the matter over not only with Chairman Car¬ 


ter, but with Messrs. Manley anil Clarkson. 
Thomas V. Cooper, collector of the port of Phila¬ 
delphia.—New York Times, November 2. 

* » » 

“Steve” Elkins is seeking to justify his ap¬ 
pointment as secretary of war by working 
night and day for the success of the national 
republican ticket in West Virginia. Since 
Mr. Harrison was nominated Elkins has spent 
but little time at the war department, and 
about every matter of importance there is left 
pending. “Until after the election” has be¬ 
come a common expression at the department 
in connection with inquiries concerning the 
secretary’s absence. In the last few months 
five West Virginia republicans have been ad¬ 
ded to the clerical force of the department. 
Every clerk hailing from IFest Virginia who has a 
vote has been granted leave of absence and asked to 
go into the state and work for the republican ticket. 
— IFasAia^ton Dispatch to New York Times, Oc¬ 
tober 28. 

» * 9 

Customs Collector Williuin J. Morgan w'ent with 
two lieutenants into the fifth election district 
of the nineteenth ward and presented affi¬ 
davits signed by Michael C. Hogan, United 
States supervisor of elections (republican), to 
the effect that fifty-one names of persons duly 
registered were of those not qualified and en¬ 
titled vote at said election .—Buffalo Dispatch 
to New York 'Times, Oct. 24. 

» » 9 

The administration republicans, led by Col¬ 
lector of customs, John M. Bailey, carried their 
fight into the county convention to day and 
succeeded in defeating State Committeeman 
William Barnes, jr .—Albany Dispatch to New 
York Times, Oct. 18. 

♦ a » 

How very necessary the republicans deemed 

the polling of every possible vote is shown by 
the fact that on Saturday last the employes 
of the sub-treasury in this city were per¬ 

emptorily ordered to go to the polls yesterday 
and cast their votes for the republican candi¬ 
dates. 

They were informed that their positions in 
the treasury depended on their doing their 
whole duty, and that the defeat of the repub¬ 
lican ticket meant that their places would be 
taken by Tammany men. The orders were 
given without any attempt to gloss things 
over. 

One man who has been in the treasury for 
over a dozen years said that this was the first 
time that he had ever been instructed or even 
asked to vote since he has been in the employ 
of the government .—New York Times, Novem¬ 
ber 9. 


BUSY BLACKMAILERS. 

H. G. Ewart, ex-republican congressman 
from North Carolina, was in Charleston last 
week soliciting funds for the national republi¬ 
can campaign committee from federal office¬ 
holders in this city. He kept very quiet, but 
had many conferences with office-holders here. 


The following is a copy of the letter .sent by 
Ewart to office holders : 

Charleston, S. C., Oct. —, 18'.t2. 

Dear Sir— Your name has been given me by our 
friends here as one likely to aid the cause. Yon 
must appreciate its importance. Funds are urgently 
needed, and at once. Please be prompt. Delay is 
tantamount to refusal. T hat you have already ren¬ 
dered local aid is no reason or excuse for not assist¬ 
ing in this, which is of far greater importance than 
local contests. 

I inclose certificate No.—, which I am assured you 
will take. If so, please fill in name and address, and 

mail with amount,-dollars, to me as per address 

given below. If not taken, return certificate at once 
to the same address, unless it is convenient for yon 
to pay the amount by Nov. 1, in which event retain 
the certificate till that dale. A favorable and immedi¬ 
ate answer is expected. Yours respectfully, 

P. S.—If certificate has been sent you, will you be 
kind enough to either refund at once or return the 
same? 

—Associated Press Dispatch from Charleston, 
Oct. 31 

9 « 9 

An assessment circular, which must have 
bad the H))proval of the republican national 
committee, has been sent to the departmental 
employes in Washington by the republican 
state committee of West Virginia. A copy of 
it fell into the hands of a democrat, who for¬ 
warded it to the democratic national commit¬ 
tee, together with an explanatory letter. 

The “stand and deliver” circular follows. 
Note the bulldozing postscript and the threat 
of dismissal it contains; 

West Virginia Repubi.ican State ( o.mm ittee, i 
32 Tenth Street, Wheeling, West Va.. [ 
Sept. 8.1892.) 

Dear Sir— The prospects for republican success in 
West Virginia are most excellent. We confidently 
expect to win. It is now simply a <iuestion of secur¬ 
ing means wherewith to complete-the splendid or¬ 
ganization begun. If we are enabled to do that suc¬ 
cess is sure. We solicit from you a contribution of 

8-. This will cover all your contributions to the 

national, congressional and other political commit¬ 
tees. We are in urgent need of funds now. If you 
will help us. do so at once. Send remittances to P. 
B. Dobbins, treasurer. Wheeling, West Va., who will 
acknowledge receipt. Hoping you will assist us at 
once, and substantially, we are, yours very respect¬ 
fully, Willia.m M. Dawson, Chairman. 

G. W. Atkinson, Secretary. 

N. B. Scott, Member of National Committee. 

P. S.— Do you think you can afford to ignore the sug¬ 
gestion of this committee^ 

—New York Times, Oct. 25. 

^ 

Some one in Ohio, who signed himself “A 
Friend,” forwarded to Mr. Theodore Roose¬ 
velt copies of two circulars sent by the Ohio 
republican state committee to a government 
clerk, calling for contributions. The name of 
the person addressed, presumably the author 
of the anonymous letter, was cut out, so that 
the commission might not profit by it. The 
circulars show that Chairman Dick, of the 
Ohio state committee, has been violating the 
spirit, if not the letter, of the civil service 
law. If they were addressed to the clerk at 
his place of employment, Dick can be pro¬ 
ceeded against. 

The first circular was as follows: 

De.vr Sir: The republican executive committee 
of Ohio, which has been actively at work for the 
past two month.s, finds itself at this stage of the cam- 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


391 


paiga greatly ia aeed of faads, and is obliged to 
call apoa repablieaus throughoat the state for con- 
tribatioas to carry oa its work. The prosperity of 
the whole coaatry depeads apoa the coatiriued suc¬ 
cess of the republicaa party. As aa iadividual, you 
are iaterested ia the party’s success, aad as such we 
ask you for a coatributioa to aid this coaimittee ia 
the furtherance of its work. 

This is the only request that will be made of you 
by any coiamittee, therefore aa early response, with 
a liberal contribution, will be thankfully received 
aad acknowledged, aad, as promptness ia oar busi¬ 
ness Is of the utmost importanre. we will be pleased 
to hear from you at once. Yours truly. 

Charles \V. F, Dick, Chainnaa. 

John K. Moli.oy, Secretary. 

(Remit to C. W. F. D’ck, or, if more convenient, 
l>ay in person to W. H. Campbell, 36 West Third 
street. Cincinnati, Ohio.) 

Kvidently the person solicited believed in 
the assuran es of the civil service commission, 
for he made no reply, as the following circu¬ 
lar shows: 

Dear Sir —Nearly five weeks ago vve wrote yon re- 
(inestiag a contribution to the republican campaign 
fund. Our books show to that request you have not 
responded. A numberof your associates in the pub¬ 
lic service have replied to our letter, aad hold our 
receipts as evidence of their fidelity to the cause and 
interest ia the success of the party under whose ad¬ 
ministration they are holding positions. It is due 
them, and to you as well, thatall should share alike 
in the legitimate expense of the campaign. 

In this campaign Ohio is compelled to take care of 
herself, and if those who are direct beneficiaries of 
public positions do not contribute, it is unreasonable 
to expect non-office-holders to do .so. We agai a call on 
you fora reasonable contribution, and hope you will 
not delay in sending it, for which we will mail you 
a receipt and give you due credit on our books. 

We would be j>leased to have your reply at once. 
Kespectfuly, C. W. F. Dick, Chairman. 

John R. Malloy, Hecretary. 

—Nexo York Times, October 31. 

« * <1 

The 'Timer’s <oirespondent was informed 
here to day that the chairman of the re- 
pnhlican committee had assessed the office¬ 
holders in Jefferson county to the amount of 
over $10,000. Every postmaster and custom 
house employe has been asked to contribute 
from 5 to 20 percent, of his salary. The cam¬ 
paign fund derived from the post-office in this 
city alone will amount to over $1,400. Every 
letter carrier in the city has been assessed $40, 
and even the janitor of the federal building 
has been asked to stand and deliver $50 for 
campaign expenses. In several instances 
where contributions have been delayed, the 
victims not being willing to submit to the 
demands, threats of removal have been made 
to force payment. These threats have come 
from the republican managers and not from 
the superiors of the men assessed.— Watertoum, 
N. Y., Dispatch to New York Times, Oct. 21. 

» * -s 

One of the office holders to whom this cir¬ 
cular was sent was Postmaster Preston E. 
Terry, Terryville, Suffolk county. Mr. Terry 
is a prominent prohibitionist, hut he was lucky 
enough four years ago to be appointed post¬ 
master at Terryville by the republicans. 

Treasurer Samuel Thomas’ circular reached 
Postmaster Terry on August 5 last. It asked, 
practically, for a share of his salary for cam¬ 
paign purposes. 

Mr. Terry made up his mind that no one 


had a right to assess him in that way. He 
not only refused to deliver up, but sent word 
back to Gtn. Thomas that he would not con¬ 
tribute. 

Now, mark the spt^ed with which the Na¬ 
tional government avenged itself upon Post¬ 
master Terry. Before September 1 Mr. Terry 
received notice that his services were no 
longer required. He was dismissed from 
office. 

Naturally,he was desirous of knowing what 
had caused his dismissal, and he wrote to the 
post-office de[)artment at Washington about it. 
What satisfaction he got can he found in the 
following letter receivul hy Postmaster Terry : 

Post Office Depart.ment, i 

Office of the Fourth Assistant Postmaster, 1 
General Appointmf.nt Division, f 

Washington, D. C., Sept. 7, 1892. j 

Sir: Your communication of the27ih ult. relative 
to the recent appointment at Terryville has been re¬ 
ceived. In reply, you are informed that it would 
not be jiracticable for the department to enter upon 
written discussions of its causes for changes. Very 
respectfully, E. G Rathbone, 

Fourth Assistant Postinaster-Geneial. 

To Mr. P. E. Terry. 

— New York Times, Oct. 23. 

Si « » 

An edict went forih a few days ago that the 
postal employes should make some contribu¬ 
tion to the republican campaign fund. Ac¬ 
cordingly yesterday the local republican coun¬ 
ty committee issued a circular which was sent 
to every person enijiloyed in the postal service. 
The assessment is 10 per cent, of the year’s sal¬ 
ary. Thus the clerks in the post-office who 
receive from $400 to $900 a year are assessed 
from $40 to $90. The carriers, who get from 
.$600 to $1,000 per annum, are mulched $60 to 
$100, and so on up to the $400 assessment of 
the postmaster himself.— Buffalo Dispatch to 
New York Times, Nov. 2. 

« « » 

Montgomery, Ala., October 19, 1892. 

Dear Sir —In older that we may win the 
election in November, it is of vital importance 
that we have funds with which to thoroughly 
organize our friends throughout the state. 

It will be necessary to have each county 
thoroughly canvassed, and to do so it will re 
quire a number of speakers whose expenses 
will have to be paid by this committee. 

If you are in sympathy with the movement 
to elect the nominee of the convention held at 
Lake View, near Birmingham, on the loth 
ultimo, we respectfully ask that yoti contribute the 
sum of $50, xvkich is the amount assessed you by the 
campaign committee. 

Send the money by registered mail or post 
office money-order to L. W. Willis. By the 
same mail please notlfj E. M. Smith at Mont- 
gemery, Ala., that you have donqso, and state 
the amount sent. Very truly yours, 

Ben De Lemos, 

Secretary Republican Campaign Committee. 

Montgomery, Ala., October 28, 1892. 

Dear Sir —Some days since you were notified by 
the committee that you are assessed fifty dollars, to 
which no reply has been reeeived. Your at¬ 
tention is again called to this matter, as you 
have had a sufficient time to make a reply. 


The position which you have held under, 
this administration has paid you sufficiently 
to have justified a demand for four times this 
amount. 

This committee keeps a list of Fulscribers, 
showing the amount of money contributed op¬ 
posite their names. We must insist that the 
amount lequested of you be transmitted as directed 
in this letter, forthwith, the sum oj which is $50.00. 

If no reply is received hy or before Novem¬ 
ber 6, 1892, it will be considered sufficient evi- 
denceof your refusal tocontribute as requested. 

Send the money hy register!d mail or mon¬ 
ey-order to L. W. Willis, Montgomery, Ala., 
and notify by same mail E M. Smith, post- 
office box 634, Montgomery, Ala., of the 
amount you have sent, that the same may be 
credited on the pay roll of public officials of 
this state. L. W. Willis, 

Treasurer of Republican Campaign Commit¬ 
tee.— New York Evening Pest, Nov. 3. 

• * * 

Headquarters of Republican Advisory 1 
Committee, Room 108, Imperial Hotel. [ 
Baltimore, Oct. 29, 1892. ) 

At a meeting of this committee and city 
members of the republican state central com¬ 
mittee, held on the above date, the following 
preamble and resolution were unanimously 
adopted : 

Whereas, There is a large number of per¬ 
sons holding office in Washington and ac¬ 
credited to Maryland as republicans, many of 
whom do not vote or reside in Maryland ; 
now, therefore. 

Resolved, That the committee heretofore ap¬ 
pointed to receive contributions from those 
holding office in Washington who are accredi¬ 
ted to Maryland be instructed to communicate 
with such office holders and inform them that it 
is the sense of this committee that republicans hold- 
ing office should help to bear the campaign expenses 
of their state, and a refusal on their part to do so 
will justify this committee in asking that their 
places be filled by more useful republicans. 

Inclosed with this circular was the follow¬ 
ing notice, addressed to the person in each 
case to whom the circulars were sent: 

“The committee will be at 737 North Capi¬ 
tol street, on Tuesday, Nov. 1, between the 
hours of 11 and 5 o’clock, to receive contribu¬ 
tions. Frank G. Duhursf, William T. Rob¬ 
erts, committee.”— New York Times, November 3. 

A BUSY CIVIL SERVICE COMMIS¬ 
SION. 

Washington, Oct. 26, 1892. 

To the Honorable Attorney-General: 

Sir —The commissioner forwards herewith 
a copy of testimony taken by it in reference 
to an alleged effort by Samuel Thomas, treas¬ 
urer of the republican state committee of 
New York, to assess employes in the treasury 
department, Washington, together with the 
original letters, envelopes, and enclosures 
sent to three of the employes, marked exhibits 
A 1, 2, 3; B 1, 2, 3, and C 1, 2, 3. 

It appears that H. A. Dobson, Luther W. 
Covill and Andrew H. Stamp are clerks in the 











392 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


sixth auditor’s office; that on or about 21st of 
October, as shown by the postmark of the 
AVashington post-office on the letters in ques¬ 
tion, Messrs. Dobson, Covill and Stamp re¬ 
ceived each a letter from the republican state 
committee of New York. This letter was 
printed, thesignature “Samuel Thomas, Treas¬ 
urer,” being also in print, and it had at its 
head the names of the chairman of the execu¬ 
tive committee, the treasurer, the secretary, 
and the chief clerk of the committee. It con 
tained a request for a contribution to defray 
the legitimate and necessary expenses of the 
campaign in New York. No amount was 
specified for contribution, the request merely 
being for such amount as the receiver might 
choose to give. Inclosed was a stamped en¬ 
velope with on it, in printing, the address 
“Samuel Thomas, Fifth Avenue Hotel, New 
York City.” The head-line for the address in 
the printed letter was filled in in writing, in 
one case with the name “Andrew H. Stamp,’ 
in another with the name of “Luther W. Co¬ 
vill,” intheother with thatof “H. A.Dobson.” 
The envelopes were addressed: “Andrew H. 
Stamp, AVashington, D. C., Treasury Depart¬ 
ment;” “Luther AV. Covill, AA’ashington, D C., 
Treasury Department,” and “H. A. Dobson, 
Washington, Treasury Department.” It ap 
pears that there is no H. A. Dobson in the 
treasury department, but that Mr. H. A. Dob¬ 
son frequently receives mail thus addressed. 
In the case of Mr. Stamp and in the case of 
Mr. Covill, however, the address is correct. 

It thus appears that the New York state 
republican committee has sent letters, signed 
in print with the name of Samuel Thomas, 
treasurer of the committee, to certain New 
York clerks in the departments at AVashing- 
ton, these letters being addressed to them at 
the treasury department, which is, of course, a 
government building, and containing stamped 
and addressed envelopes in which their con¬ 
tributions could be sent back to Samuel 
Thomas at New York. Clearly, therefore, the 
New York state committee, through Samuel 
Thomas, and whoever had been concerned in 
addressing the letters, has been soliciting by 
letter government employes in a building oc¬ 
cupied in the discharge of official duties. The 
commission has always held that the prohibi¬ 
tion to solicit, “in any manner, whatever,” in 
a government building, includes solicitation 
by letter. It is, therefore, of the opinion that 
the offense committed by Samuel Thomas, and 
perhaps other members of the republican 
state committee of New York, comes under 
section 12 of the civil service act, and has the 
honor to forward the papers to you for such 
action as you may deem best. 

Very respectfully, 

Theodore Roosevelt, 

Acting President. 

Attorney General Miller, when questioned 
on the subject this afternoon, said he had just 
received the papers in the case, and had not 
yet had time to examine them. He added 
that he would investigate this particular case 
himself, hut certainly would not act until- Mr. 


Thomas had full opportunity to answer the charges 
against him.—Netv York Times, Oct. 1. 

« ♦ 

Civil Service Commissioner Roosevelt for- 
w'arded this communication to the attorney- 
general’s office to-day: 

“Sir —The commission directs me to inclose 
to you a copy of the report and testimony 
taken by the scretary of the commission, Mr. 
Doyle, in an investigation held at Watertown, 
N. Y., by the direction of the commission. 

“It appears from this that DeWitt C. Middle- 
ton, the chairman of the republican county 
committee in Jefferson, has been engaged in 
an effort to assess the federal employes in the 
post-offices in Jefferson county, having at¬ 
tempted to collect very large sums of money 
from them. Subsequently, when it was an¬ 
nounced in the papers that the commission 
would investigate the facts an effort was made 
to withdraw these circulars. It does not ap¬ 
pear that any money Avas contributed in re¬ 
sponse to them and the secretary of the com¬ 
mission, Mr. Doyle, states that it has even 
been decided that no money will be received 
from the officers and employes at the post- 
office at AV'atertown. It does not appear that 
Mr. Middleton is responsible for this latter 
action, and it will be observed that he repeat¬ 
ed the solicitation on October 15, the first 
letter having been written on Sept. 19. 

“The commission has been able to get but 
one of the envelopes in which the circulars 
were sent. This is the one addressed to the 
postmaster and is addressed “E. M. Gates, 
city.” It was delivered to him at the post- 
office. The postmaster furnished frankly all 
the information in his power. It was more 
difficult to obtain it from some of the other 
employes, and the commission does not feel 
competent to decide whether the circulars 
making the assessments can be considered as 
directed to the employes in a government 
building or not, nor does it feel that it 
would be advisable for it to continue further 
the investigation, in view of its inability to 
administer oaths and summons witnesses. 

“It appears, however, beyond question, that 
a resolute attempt was made to assess the fede¬ 
ral employes, and that the letters containing 
the assessment circulars were delivered in the 
government building. The commission turns 
the papers over to your office for such action 
as you may deem wise in the premises.— New 
York Times, Nov. 3. 

» * » 

The civil service commission have sent to the at¬ 
torney-general copies of a circular sent to C. K. 
Ketcham, the postmaster at Ditney, Ind., and of a 
letter written by this postmaster to the editor of the 
Nonconformist. 

“It appears from this circular,” says the commis¬ 
sion in its letter to the attorney-general, “ that John 
K. Gowdy, the chairman of the Indiana state com¬ 
mittee. has sent a letter to Mr. Ketcham, this letter 
being addressed to him as the postmaster at Ditney, 
Ind. In this letter request is made for funds to in 
sure republican success, the letter stating in one 
place the legitimate expenses must be met, and in 
another, ‘the success of the ticket is involved as well 
as the pleasant conditions about you.’ It would 
certainly appear that in addressing the letter to C. 
K. Ketcham as postmaster at Ditney, Mr. Gowdy has 


been guilty of soliciting him in a government build¬ 
ing. The papers are also turned over to your office 
for such action as you may deem wise .”—Associated 
Press Dispatch, Nov. 6. 


THE ONSLAUGHT. 

Ft. Wayne.— Charles A. Zollinger is named as a 
candidate lor the postmastership, but it is said he 
prefers to be state pension agent, which he held dur¬ 
ing Cleveland’s former administration. Wright W. 
Rockhill, one of the proprietors of the Ft. Wayne 
Journal, wants to be postmaster. John H. Winge- 
mach, principal of the Lutheran schools, is a candi¬ 
date. P. J. Fallon is talked of as having a promise 
of the deputy postmastership. Montgomery Ham¬ 
ilton, one of Congre.ssman McNagney’s hardest work¬ 
ers, wants the Heidelburg consulate. Andrew J. 
Moynlhan, editor of the Journal, is talked of for an 
Irish consulate. Wm. Kaough, ex postmaster, wants 
something, he is not particular what. Louis Jac- 
quel thinks he (Jacquel), should have the post- 
office. W. P. Denny will be pushed for a place in 
the patent office at Washington. P. W. Schader has 
aspirations for a place in the attorney-general’s 
office. Thomas Mannix, who looked after the mail 
transfer ageney four years ago at the depot, is sure 
of reappointment. Clarence Edsall, clerk of demo¬ 
cratic headquarters, and Joseph Cope are candidates 
for government clerkships. Over one hundred men 
have already made the rounds of politicians to se¬ 
cure places in the post-office and government build¬ 
ing. 

Evansville.— August Brentano, Jack Nolan, and 
James D. Saunders are the conspicuously-named 
candidates for the post-office, with Nolan having 
much the strongest following. Thomas C. Bridwell 
has an eye upon the revenue collectorship. He has 
just closed a losing campaign for county clerk. Jo¬ 
seph Cox, of HoAvelPs Station, is after the position 
of surveyor of customs. He held the place under 
Cleveland four j'ears ago. Captain F. M. Dougherty 
is looking after the supervising inspectorship, but 
there will be several more applicants. 

Goshen.— The great scramble here is for the post- 
office. Elias Gortner was the first to spring into the 
arena with a petition which is being numerously 
signed. Mr. Gortner has a son-in-law, J. C. Beck, jr., 
in the mail service. J. C. Beck, sr., is also a full- 
fledged candidate, and so is Thomas A. Starr, who 
rendered Congressman-elect Conn great assistance. 
Mr. Starr is the Goshen Times' candidate, while 
Martin V. Starr, also a candidate, is supposed to be 
backed by the Goshen News. J. A. Beane, of the 
Goshen Democrat, will also be pushed forward. D. 
L. Miller and Milton Galentine are candidates and 
there is a possibility that J. A. Arthur will be sprung 
as a dark horse. The struggle for this place over¬ 
shadows all other possible gifts by the incoming ad¬ 
ministration just at present. 

ANDERSON.— For the postmastership John Baker, 
the Adams express agent: B. B. Campbell, deputy 
county clerk, and George Beehe, secretary of the 
democratic central committee, will contest. C. K. 
McCullough, whose name has been mentioned in 
Washington dispatches in connection with controller 
ol the currency, is not a candidate, and his friends 
think that springing his name is only intended to 
sidetrack him and get him out of the way of some 
good home appointment. James J. Netterville, 
John L. Forkner, D. F. Mustard and W. R. Myers will 
control the patronage in this county, while A. C. 
Davis a House employe, wilt be pretty close to Mr. 
Bynum when at comes to naming men for places at 
W’ashington. 

Columbus.— Wirt Hord, formerly of Indianapolis, 
and financial secretary of the Gray club, is a candi¬ 
date for government printer under the Cleveland 
administration. Bud King wants a position in the 
government printing office. The list of Avould-be 
postmasters includes Col. H. Daily, of Mexican 
war fame, Capt. G. E. Finney, ex-editor of the 
Herald; Da\id Stobo, ex-couuty recorder; the Hon. 
W. S. Swengel: C. M. Spencer, ex-mayor; W. W. 
Stader, ex-mayor; John Mahoney, ex-city treas¬ 
urer; George King, jr., ex-rccorder Jackson comity 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


393 


Jas. F. Toohey, proprietor St. Denishotel; C. Cooper, 
city attorney; Thos. A. Rush; John Carr,councilman; 
and Dr. Barrett, ex-state senator. 

New Castle.— For the post-offlce, so far as heard 
from, Sam Arnold, Ed Smith, T. A. Balser, D. A. 
Tracy, P. M. Gillies, C. F. Sud worth. Dr. Kissell, 
John Heichart, Col. John Mulford and Julia Loer. 
Thos. Bogot has his eye on the mission to Ncrway 
and Sweden ; James Brown wants very badly to go 
to Rome; John Branch would like a good clerkship, 
and Col. Reuben Barr is looking out for a good thing 
in the treasury department, something about the 
size of first auditor. There ate others aspiring to 
clerkships in the postal service. 

Greensburg.— Cicero Northern, the only democrat 
elected to the mayoralty of this city for the past ten 
years, is a candidate for postmaster. John Lugen- 
bell, a party orator, same case. Col. Hugh Galla¬ 
gher, defeated candidate for county treasurer, wa.s 
Cleveland’s agent at Pine Ridge. He will not ask to 
be reinstated. Abel Ewing, who recently resigned 
the position of deputy warden in the pri.son south, 
will demand recognition. James E. Mendenhall, ex¬ 
editor of the New Era, is a candidate for collector of 
revenue. He will have the backing of Congressman 
Holman and the entire party machinery of this quar¬ 
ter of the state. W. J. Johnston wants to be city post¬ 
master, J. W. Fletcher gauger. Hal Hamilton, a re 
cent convert from the people's party, and who made 
the race for prosecuting attorney, wants to go into 
the attorney-general’s office. Ex-State Senator Cor 
tez Ewing, chairman democratic county central com¬ 
mittee, son in-law of Governor-elect Matthews, is 
timid about making his wants known, but will enter 
for something. Editor Clark, of the New Era; Thos, 
H. Greenfield, Riley Billings, Lewis Wallace, Davison 
Wilson, H. C. Sandusky and Ale Howard will seek 
recognition of some sort. Benj. Jenkins, of St. Paul; 
Sanford Grayson, of Westport; James Tarplee, of 
Clarksburg, and Fred Wolfe, of Newport, expect to 
be rewarded for political services. 

Mt. Vernon. —The principal office of emolument 
in Posey county is the post-office here, and Col. A. A. 
Sparks, editor Daily Democrat; J. M. Harlem, chair¬ 
man democratic county committee ; J. C. LefTel, edi¬ 
tor the Sfar; Enoch E. Thomas, ex-mayor; Captain 
Silas P. Jones and Henry Yunker are already avowed 
candidates. Col. J. W. Hiatt, of New Harmony, 
wants an appointment at Washington, waiting fora 
copy of the "Blue Book ’’ before making a selection. 
V. M. Courtwright, an old soldier, and ex-county re¬ 
corder, it is said, wants to be special pension exam¬ 
iner. 

New Albany.— The main topic is the successor to 
Postmaster Walter B. Godfrey. Charles W. Schindler, 
recorder of Floyd county, is an avowed candidate. 
During the campaign he was Congressman Brown’s 
right-hand man,and it is said that Brown will urge his 
appointment. Schindler’s term as recorder does not 
expire for two years yet, but he has already secured 
signatures to his petition to be appointed postmaster. 
Postmaster Godfrey does not anticipate being re¬ 
moved before July next. Sheriff John Thornton, 
whose term expires next week, is looking toward the 
post-office with its 82,400 salary and 8300 as custodian 
of the custom-house. Adam Heimberger, a young 
democratic leader, is being urged for the same place. 
Thomas Hanlon, chairman democratic county com¬ 
mittee, is the only applicant for internal revenue 
collector, a position now held by Joseph Throop, 
with headquarters at Terre Haute. Hanlon admir¬ 
ably managed the campaign, and is believed to be 
backed by Senator Voorhees. Hanlon was appointed 
collector in 1885 through Voorhees’ influence, but 
after holding the position for one year the United 
States Senate refused to confirm the appointment. 
This was due to the opposition of Senator Harrison, 
who claimed that Hanlon was incompetent. 

Vincennes.— Royal E. Purcell, editor of the Vin¬ 
cennes Sun, is an applicant for the post-oflBce. Dex¬ 
ter Gardner is also a candidate. Patrick Kelleher 
and John M. Berry are aspirants for agricultural 
agent of Indiana, to succeed Daniel Alton. 

Richmond.— The post-office with its salary of $3,- 
000 per annum is sought by the Hon. Luther M. 
Mering, defeated candidate for congress; John H. 
Rolling, a zealous worker; John P. Thistlewaite, ex¬ 


mayor, and Henry Culler. Frank Elder could have 
the place, but he is provided for. John H. Macks, a 
former collector, and W. K. Young, deputy oil in¬ 
spector, want to be collector of internal revenue. 
Judge L. C. Abbott, nothing special in view, would 
like to be United States district attorney. 

Kentland.— For the post-office, C. F. Wifenberg, 
W. J. Cunningham, W. T. Drake and J. B. Howe. 
Public sentiment leads to Wittenberg, but the 
chances favor Cunningham because of zealous party 
work. J. T Sanderson is mentioned asa candidate 
in the future for United States judge; is a life-long 
friend of Senator Turpie, and in 1844 was a candi¬ 
date for territorial judge. 

Huntington.— For the post-office, J. M Wright, A. 
J. Rosebrough and N. A. Myers, old soldiers, have 
a goodly following. The railway men are under¬ 
stood to be supporting James Claybaugh, who is em¬ 
ployed by the Chicago & Erie line. John J. Young, 
a retired business man, has the office in view. J. A. 
W. Kiniz will probably present himself asa candi¬ 
date for Collector of revenue in the sixih district. 

English —Mrs. Melissa Bird is a candidate for 
postmistress; no opposition. William J. McDermott 
will seek position as proof-reader in the public print¬ 
ing department. Ed Wells wants to be postmaster at 
Bird’s Eye, and Joshua Holland at Taswell. George 
W. Baltins will seek similar recognition at Marengo. 
John V. Benz, of Harrison county, will be pushed for 
collector of revenue in the seventh district, while 
William L. Gregory, it is understood, will stand for 
postmaster at Grantsburg. 

Hartford City.— Dr. Henry C. Davison, who wa.s 
pension examiner under Cleveland, wants his old 
appointment. Dr. W. N. Cronin is also an applicant. 
James Ozenbaugh, an old soldier, and James Ken¬ 
ney, as well as a host of minor lights, wants the 
post-office. 

Greencastle.— Willis G Neff wants the post-office. 
He was the flist appointee under the former Cleve¬ 
land administration. Geo. J. Langsdale resigning be¬ 
fore expiration of term rather than serve under 
Cleveland. Rival candidates are W. B. Vestal, chair 
man of the Democratic central committee; Louis 
Steeg, Ed Haneman, T. C. Grooms and Judge Bachel- 
der. Putnam has a candidate for speaker of the In 
diana housein theperson of the Hon. Frank D. Ader, 
joint representative-elect of the counties of Clay, Put¬ 
nam and Montgomery. Dr. N. G. Smith will be pre¬ 
sented for appointment as adjutant-general. 

Crawfordsville.— Walter Hulet will be pushed for 
internal revenue collector. He is a warm personal 
friend of Congressman Brook.'-hire. James Wright, 
John A. Booe and William E. Henkle are conspicu¬ 
ously mentioned for the post-offlce. 

Logansport.— Three strong candidates for the post- 
office are V. C. Hanawalt, chairman of the democratic 
county committee; B. F. Louthain, editor of the 
Logansport Pharon, and T. J. Immei, a prominent 
business man. It is said that H. D. Hattery, the 
presidential elector from this district, will have the 
naming of the man, and he is quoted as saying that 
if it becomes too difficult to decide, he will take it 
himself. The Hon D. P. Baldwin, formerly a re¬ 
publican, is prominently mentioned for a good con- 
sultate. Dr. H. J. Banta, ex-republican, and form¬ 
erly agent of the Mescalero Indians, is said to be 
booked for a good paying agency in return for his 
democratic campaigning. Wiles Berry, an artist, 
wants something. The Hon. J. C. Nelson, beaten by 
Chase for lieutenant-governor, and C. N. Graffis, 
deputy county auditor, will seek recognition. A. D. 
Fansler, Frank Riley, and H. H. Six, among the 
younger democrats, have the first call for clerkships. 

Shelbyville.— Squire L. Major, who held the post- 
offlce under Cleveland, it is understood, will not re¬ 
fuse a second term. A relative of his, Mr. William 
J. Buxton, ex-county recorder and for two years 
chairman of the county central committee, is an 
avowed candidate for the place. So is ex-Mayor 
John W. Vannoy. Judge K. M. Hord, who managed 
Congressman Holman’s campaign in Shelby county 
in the nominating convention against Bellamy S. 
Sutton, favors Vannoy. Edward A. Major, present 
city clerk and son of the late Judge Steven Major, is 


after the same office. Mr. Major, as secretary, prac¬ 
tically managed the campaign in this county two 
years ago. 

Connersvii.le.— Applicants for the post office: 
William Merrill, chairman of county central com¬ 
mittee; John M. Higgs, editor Connersville Fiamtiier, 
and Elder Charles M. Reed, a medicinal agent. Dr. 
Joshua Chitwood wants to be minister to some place 
where the German language is spoken. E. J. Smith, 
attorney, will take a clerkship; so also Alf Hatchlas, 
secretary of the local democracy. A. M. Mayer would 
like to get into the post-office. James L. Miller 
wants the deputy-postmastership. George Mayers, 
Willard Walley, (fflarles Hires, Michael Gillespie 
and Vincent Gibes want to be mail carriers. Dufley 
Murphy and James Downs want to be revenue col¬ 
lector. Thomas J. Higgs wants a department clerk¬ 
ship. 

Madison.— Judge John R. Cravens and the Hon. 
C. A. Worbly are named for foreign missions. Can¬ 
didates for postmaster: Ex-Mayor Joseph T. Brash- 
ear, Capt. Jos. C. Abbott, Ed G. Nicklaus, A. S. 
Chapman, editor of the Democrat-, John Adams, pro¬ 
prietor of the Herald; John McGregor, Simeon E. Le- 
land, Mrs. Bessie H. Woolford, C. I. Branham, John 
W. Scott and G. K. Lodge. Congressman Brown says 
that the democrats of Madison must decide on one 
before he will make a recommendation, Thomas 
Gavin is mentioned for deputy revenue collector. 
Fergus Cochran is a candidate for superintendent of 
construction of the new public building here, and 
Ben Sering for surveyor. Fred Schran, Alex Coch¬ 
ran. Thomas Leland, Michael Hughes, Andrew 
Steinhardt, Will White and others want to be mail- 
carriers. 

Liberty. —For postmaster, Theo. Miller, John 
Maley, Geo. W. Pigman, Luther Leonard Charles A. 
Drapier and Dr. W. W. Shriner. Railway mail serv 
ice, William Drlggs, Will Hamilton wants a place 
at Washington. Thomas Pentecost, of Colhge Cor¬ 
ner, wants to join the revenue service. 

Marion.— Post-office, Clarence E. Hawkinsand W. 
J. Houck, of the Marion Leader, defeated for senator 
by O. A. Baker. Mr. Hawkins served four years as a 
mail clerk under Cleveland, and did good work as 
chairman of the county central committee. Charles 
Kile, of Vae Leader; Gilbert Wilson and Miles Mur¬ 
phy are also aspirants. Dr. Marshall Shiveley served 
on the pension board under Cleveland, and it is 
believed he will again hold the place. Dr. Hubbard 
and Dr. Kimball are also mentioned. 

Gosport.— For the post-offlce petitions are already 
circulated, but it is thought it will take a local elec¬ 
tion to decide. Aspirants Include W. D. Deitrich, 
Clinton L. Wampier, Dr. F. V. Stueky, Joseph P. 
Gentry, James Chenowith and Chas. M. Rogers. 
Luther U. Downey and Edward S. Davis are expect¬ 
ing some favor of Cleveland. Edward F. Graham 
wants to be clerk in the post-offlce. Dr. J. W. Smith, 
Dr. J. M. Stueky, Dr. C. A. Pritchard and Dr. Ben 
Fox hope to be appointed on the pension examining 
board. 

Indianapolis— Isaac P. Gray wants something 
good. 8. E. Morss is credited with a willingness to 
succeed John C. New as consul-general to London. 
William K. English wants to be sent abroad. Will¬ 
iam F. Christian will ask for the Indianapolis post- 
office. Lewis Jordan wantsany good paying position. 
Richard Herrick, of the state committee rooms, wants 
any 83,000 a year place. Thomas Colbert, present 
superintendent of police, wants to be United States 
marshal in case Edward Hawkins is not a candidate. 
Mr. Hawkins says he does not want the place again. 
He will probably be a candidate for mayor and will 
give way to others seeking federal recognition. John 
Steeg, present secretary of the board of public safety, 
wants to be collector of customs. So does August 
Kuhn, who was collector under Cleveland before. So 
does A. Abromet. Charley Taylor wants any fat 
place about the federal building. There are two or 
three hundred ward workers who will ask for places 
in this building or at Washington. John W. Kern 
would like to succeed Smiley Chambers as district 
attorney. So would Leon Bailey. The few colored 
men in Indianapolis who worked for and voted with 










394 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLF^. 


the democratic party in tlie recent election will be 
disappointed unless they are rewarded. “There are 
more than two thousand places, paying from 81,000 
to 82,000, held by colored men, such as chaplains in 
the United States army, timber agents, land agents, 
heads of bureaus, food inspectors, etc.,” said one of 
these colored politicians to-day. “Democratic col¬ 
ored men should be given these places as far as 
possible.” It is said that the following appointments 
would suit the colored democrats of Indiana: Min¬ 
ister to Hayti, E. E. Cooper; fourth auditor of the 
treasury, A. E. Manning: recorder of deeds, L. E. 
Christy. These aspiring colored democrats are car¬ 
rying around with them the following list of the best 
otliees held now and heretofore by colored men: 
Recorder of de«ds, $15,000, R K. Bruce: minister to 
Hayti, 83,000, John Durham; minister to Liberia, 
84,000, VV. D. McCoy; consul to San Domingo, 82,500. 
H. T. Downing; consul to Kingston. 83.000 (white 
man); consul to Loanda, 81,500 (white man); super¬ 
intendent Freedmen’s hospital, $2,500, Dr. C. U. 
Purvis: assistant librarian house of representatives, 
$2,000, W. II. Smith; surveyor port Galveston, Texas, 
$5,000, N. W. Caney ; Indian agent, Oklahoma, 82,000 
(white man): recorder general land office, 83,000, the 
Rev D. P. Roberts: fourth auditor treasury, 84,000, 
John R. Lynch. 

\V.4.SHiXGTON—R. C Davis, of the Peoples’ National 
Bank, wants to be national bank examiner of the 
state. Ex-Congressman O’Neal is talked of for dis¬ 
trict attorney. For postmaster, J. W. McCarty, jr., 
Hamlet Allan and Wm. Guy. Deputy revenue col¬ 
lector, the Hon. John H. Spencer.—From the Indian¬ 
apolis EveningNews, Nov. 17 and 18, 1892. 


GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS. 

Mr. Curti'^ was the most influential repre¬ 
sentative of that true patriotism which 
Washington iuvoaed in his last words to his 
countrymen, and his loss is a national calam¬ 
ity which long will be felt. 

In course of time the whole American peo¬ 
ple will recognize the pre eminent value of 
his services in this second struggle for polit¬ 
ical freedom which now is waging. George 
Washington delivered his country from the 
despotism of the Jlritish crown, but the super¬ 
stition of divine right was not exterminated 
by the union of our states. As Mr. Curtis well 
said, “It was transferred, in justification of 
Washington’s warning from a king to a 
party,” and George William Curtis asthe hon¬ 
ored leader of the army of independents, 
fought the first battles in the war for our po¬ 
litical rights against the tyranny of party. To 
use his own words again: 

“The old fiction of the law in monarchies, 
that the king can do no wrong, has become 
the practical faith of great multitudes in this 
republic in regard to party.” 

He was the independent whom all partisans 
were forced to respect an 1 whose leadership all 
patriots freely recognized. 

As Washington was reviled as the traitor, 
insurgent and rebel, so Curtis was jeered at by 
the creatures of that tyranny whose right 
he denied, as pharisee, renegade and mug¬ 
wump. * * * 

The position of Curtis was almost unique. 
His political services had been eminent and 
for them he had asked nothing. His devotion 
to his party had been absorbing. Of his sin- 
ceriv^ there could be no doubt. 

The history of all countries has shown that 


when a leader is needed in a social or political 
crisis, some great man soon stands forth pre¬ 
eminently fitted for that leadership. By birth, 
associations and many facts of theearlier years 
of his life, Mr. Curtis was especially equipped 
for that contest against the political bondageof 
the American people which glorified his later 
years. Had he lived at another time his serv¬ 
ices would n(»t have been called for, or would 
not have availed so much. T’^ntil the end of 
the administration of John Quincy Adams, 
and for more than the first third of our histo¬ 
ry, though party spirit ran high and its bitter¬ 
ness had already caused al'^rm among thought¬ 
ful friends of the republic, it had not yet 
armed itself with the power of patronage and 
consequently had not yet been able to over¬ 
come the popular will. * * ® 

In 1808 John Adams said : “Party spirit 
confounds the distinction between truth and 
falsehood, right and wrong, and it corrupts 
the moral sense,” but true as this indictment 
then was and still is, excessive party spirit 
alone could not prevent the American people 
from governing themselves according to the 
system guaranteed by the constitution until it 
was allied with the spoils system. This com¬ 
bination is what endangers our institutions 
and destroys confidence in the method of gov¬ 
ernment by party. * ^ * 

To free his countrymen from the chains 
thrown around them by this alliance was the 
work of the ripe years of George William Cur¬ 
tis. » * » 

The work before him who would attack this 
evil, involved, first the breaking away from 
tbe superstition of party worship, and then 
the creation of a public opinion in favor of a 
decent, business-like method of filling the 
public offices. No man who had not proven 
his devotion to the principles of one of the 
great parties could have any influence as an 
independent in the attempt to show the follv 
of blind partisanship. No man who had not 
proven his devotion to the principles which 
had made the republican party great and 
grand could have had any influence in the 
crusade which was preached by George Will¬ 
iam Curtis. He was ripe for it just when the 
time was ripe for him. Other questions of 
more immediate moment had engrossed the 
attention of the people until the new Declara¬ 
tion of Independence was made in the pre¬ 
sentation of the civil service reform bill. A 
glance at the services rendered by George 
William Cnrtis to the republican party will 
show how eminently he was fitted to lead that 
crusade. » » * * —Pjorn the Address ot 

Charles B. Wilby, before the Literary Club of Cin¬ 
cinnati, October 1. 

At the September meeting of the executive 
committee of Buffalo Civil Service Reform 
Association appropriate action on the death 
of President George William Curtis was taken 
by adoption of the following 
“ MEMORIAL. 

“The death of George William Curtis has 
taken from the civil service reform its fore¬ 


most champion, and in common with all 
friends of the cause to which he had given 
the last and best years of his life, we feel that 
it has sustained a loss almost overw’helming. 
He was indeed our great leader, wise, devote<l, 
able, fearless, faithful. He brought to the 
service of this reform a mind of the first or¬ 
der, trained in the most admirable manner. 
He was an attractive and vigorous writer, 
and an orator of such persuasive eloquence 
that it may be justly said he had no superior. 
His character was altogether noble. The bit¬ 
terest opponents of the cau.se he advocated, 
equally with its friends, knew and acknowl¬ 
edged his sincerity, and to those who were not 
well Informed as to its purposes and methods 
it seemed incredible that he should be its de¬ 
voted leader if it did not merit success. In a 
time when personal authority is little re¬ 
garded, his judgment upon large questions of 
social obligations and public morals carried 
more weight jierhaps than that of any other 
.American. 

“ But great leader as he was, he never in¬ 
sisted upon primacy. His leadership was 
never disputed because he never sought it and 
because he was so hearty and generous a com¬ 
rade. He died at the height of bis power. 
At an age when most men are ready to retire 
from active service, he did not seem to have 
been touched by the weariness and apathy of 
advancing years. He never doubted of the 
complete and final success of the cause to 
which he had consecrated his life. Nor will 
we. * 

“Sherman S. Rogers, 

“ T. Guilford Smith, 

“ Henry A. Richmond, 
Committee. 

John B. Olmsted, Secretary pro tern. 

CORRESPONDENCE. 

I greatly appreciate your continued good 
work. Hubert Tuitle. 

Ithaca, N. V. 

Oxford, Ga., Oct 8, 1892. 

To the Civil Service Chronicle: 

Dear Sir —The junior class of Emory— 
about forty in number—in mydtparlment— 
Greek—are engaged now with the Greek po¬ 
litical economy. In lecturing them upon the 
Aoy.c/j.aa{a, or examination for political posi¬ 
tion, I have made use of every opportunity to 
press upon their attention, both by compari¬ 
son and for illustration, our own efforts at 
civil service reform. Much interest has been 
awakened in the class upon the subject, and we 
have a very favorable opportunity for push¬ 
ing investigation in this line What books, 
pamphlets, etc., could the civil service reform 
association furnish to help on the work’? As 
college students become leaders of thought in 
after life, and the influence of our college in 
the South is very commanding, I am anxious 
that our students should become grounded 
well upon a policy in which I take a very 
deep interest. Very truly, 

H. A. ScoMP. 









The Civil service chronicle. 


If we see uothing in our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoils, we shall fail at every President-elect Cleveland 

at New York, November 18. 


VoL. I, No. 46. INDIANAPOLIS, DECEMBER, 1892. terms“ ruVer^opT' 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

“Public ofilce is a public trust. >Ve 
reafllnu the declaration of the democratic 
national convention of 1876 for the reform 
of the civil service, [Reform is necessary 
in the civil service. Experience proves 
that efficient, economical conduct of the 
government business is not possible if its 
civil service be subject to change at every 
election, be a prize fought for at the ballot 
box, be a brief reward of party zeal, in¬ 
stead of posts of honor, assigned for proved 
competency and held for fidelity in the 
public employ; that the dispensing of pa¬ 
tronage should neither be a tax upon the 
time of all our public men, nor the instru¬ 
ment of their ambition] and we call for 
the honest enforcement of all laws regu¬ 
lating the same. The Homination of a Pres¬ 
ident, as in the recent republican conven¬ 
tion by delegations composed largely of his 
appointees, holding office at his pleasure, 
is a scandalous satire upon free popular 
institutions, and a startling illustration of 
the methods by which a President may 
gratify his ambition. We denounce a pol¬ 
icy under which federal office-holders 
usurp control of party conventions in the 
states, and we pledge the democratic 
party to the reform of these and all other 
abuses which threaten individual liberty 
and local self-government.”— Dem¬ 
ocratic Platform, 1S92. 

The first volume of the Civil Service 
Chronicle will close with the number for 
February, 1893. The first number was 
published in March, 1889, and this volume 
will therefore cover Harrison’s adminis¬ 
tration. The original intention of making 
the paper a record of facts connected with 
the use and enjoyment of public office as 
spoil, and adding a reasonable amount of 
editorial comment, has not been departed 
from. It is believed that as a record the 
completed volume will be invaluable for 
historical reference. A full index will be 
sent with the last number. The price of 
the completed volume will be twenty-five 
dollars. 


The management has become more and 
more convinced that the publication of the 
accumulated facts is the most effective way 
to fight the spoils system. Many men like 
to enjoy office as spoil; very few like to be 


told or have their neighbors told that they 
are so enjoying it. It has also generally 
been found best to state the facts in the 
words of the authority vouching for them; 
this permits investigation at original 
sources. Comparatively few newspapers 
as yet give attention to this phase of public 
affairs. For instance, county, city, and 
township government throughout the 
United States is honey combed with trades 
and deals and favoritism yielding office 
or a contract or some job reaching into 
the public treasury, yet local papers as a 
rule are silent upon the subject. The 
press can have no greater duty than that 
of finding out and holding up to the public 
the tainting element in every public trans¬ 
action whether it be the favoritism in the 
selection of a common laborer on city 
streets or the manipulation of the national 
service to the personal ends of one man. 

On September 8 there was a conference 
of prominent democrats with Mr. Cleve¬ 
land at the Victoria hotel in New York. 
At this meeting Lieutenant-Governor Shee¬ 
han and Edward Murphy, Jr., seem to have 
given Mr. Cleveland to understand that 
there must be forthcoming certain “prom¬ 
ises” or “stipulations,” or “conditions” or 
“understandings,” or “encouragements,” or 
some equivalent thereof, which “would 
make the workers feel that the candidate 
was and meant to be a democrat.” He 
heard them through and then according 
to the Brooklyn Eagle of November 16 : 

“ They learned that Mr. Cleveland would make no 
promises or anything of the sort to any of them, or 
to or for any others through them; that he had not 
sought the nomination which, on the contrary, had 
sought him; that he considered the success of the 
ticket in this state a matter of much more importance 
to them than to him; that he repelled the idea that 
his democracy was questionable by them or doubta¬ 
ble by any one; that they knew he was aware who 
had been his friends before nomination and would 
know who had and who had not been his friends 
after election; that he would have no friends to re¬ 
ward on account of friendship, and no formeroppon- 
ents to punish on account of former opposition; that 
he would go to election or to defeat equally free and 
absolutely uncommitted; but that, if the democratic 
people and ticket were beaten in this stale by the 
democratic machine, another democratic organiza¬ 
tion was ready to take its place at once, and that. In 
such case, the youngest man present would not live 
years enough to see that machine sufficiently strong 
to win or beiray a cause thereafter, or one of their 
number ever sitting In a state or national conven¬ 
tion again.” 

On the same day at the dinner of the 
Single Tax Club, Thomas G. Shearman, re¬ 
ferring to the Eagle article, said that Shee¬ 


han did the talking and that Mr. Cleveland 
answered him as follows: 

"Mr. Sheehan, I have listened with the utmost 
attention to what you have said. I have followed 
you very carefully, and I think I understand you 
perfectly; and what I have to say in reply, Mr. Shee¬ 
han, is, that I’ll be damned before I pledge myself 
to any man on any subject whatever, and I’ll be 
doubly damned before I give to you those particular 
pledges for which you have asked at this particular 
time.” 

The New York Herald of November 27 
completes Mr. Cleveland’s reply: 

"I will appeal from the machine to the people. 
This very night I will issue a declaration to the elec¬ 
tors of the state, telling them the proposition you 
have made to me and the reason why I am not able 
to accept it. I will ask them to choose between us. 
Such Is my confidence in the people that before the 
week ends I believe your machine will be in revo¬ 
lution against you. I can not make the promise 
you ask.” 

The presidency was really at stake. 
Desperate and unscrupulous leaders in full 
control of the most powerful political ma¬ 
chine in the country and seemingly able 
by a word to turn away from Mr. Cleve¬ 
land the electoral votes of the greatest state 
in the union, thus securing his defeat, lit¬ 
erally called upon him to stand and deliver. 
There is nothing in our time to compare 
Mr. Cleveland’s act with, for we live in a 
time when public affairs are trades and 
deals, bargains and sales, and, on similar 
occasions, independence and manhood go 
for a price. Considering what was at 
stake, this was an act genuinely great—by 
far the greatest done by Mr. Cleveland or 
by any contemporary public man. It in¬ 
dicates a power strong enough to perma¬ 
nently drive party machines away from 
the public treasury as a means of subsis¬ 
tence. 


At a reception given to Mr. Cleveland 
by the Manhattan Club in New York, No¬ 
vember 19, amid great enthusiasm, he 
pointed out in the following words the rev¬ 
olution which has taken place in this coun¬ 
try : 

The A.nierican people have become politic¬ 
ally more thoughtful and more watchful than 
they were ten years ago. They are considering 
now vastly greater questions than then. Party 
policy has become the important thing in 
contradistinction to parly spoils. The distri¬ 
bution of party rewards for party action is no 
longer the mainspring of a political campaign. 
Thesituation must be gravely and intelligently 
met by those in charge of our political organ¬ 
ization. No party, I care not whether demo- 






















396 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


cratic or republican, can get the support of the 
naass of the voters by merely promising party 
rewards for party supremacy. The whole 
people will be satisOed with nothing less than 
the redemption of the sacred pledges made to 
them collectively—the administration of wise 
policies, and the carrying on of an honest 
government. I would not have it otherwise. 
I am willing that the democratic party should 
only hope to succeed by meeting the situation 
fairly and squarely, by being absolutely and 
patriotically true to its principles and its pro¬ 
fessions. This is the assured guarantee of suc¬ 
cess, and I know of no other. 

Mr. Thomas Taggart, chairman of the 
state democratic committee said the other 
day in Chicago, that “ we are a unit,” for 
Ex-Governor Gray for a cabinet position 
under President Cleveland. It is not quite 
clear whom Mr. Taggart meant by his “we,” 
but if he means the people or even the 
democrats of Indiana he is mistaken. Only 
those in Indiana who think they might 
“get something” if Gray were in ofl&ce, 
want him in the cabinet or in any other 
oflBce. Nothing more discouraging could 
happen. His business in life is to plan and 
scheme to get himself into place. Thfs is 
the beginning and the end of his statesman¬ 
ship. 

ISA4C P. Gray has spent several busy 
years posturing as a Presidential Possibili¬ 
ty on the plan of aiming high to get some¬ 
thing. For the last few months he appears 
to have been working up coups on the cabi¬ 
net. It is probably a fact that Gray’s 
grammar and spelling, which in unrevised 
state papers have tickled the newspaper 
men, are no disqualification for dividing 
spoil. That is Gray’s understanding of a 
public office. As a matter of personal taste, 
we should suppose that even spoilsmen 
would feel themselves unable to endure four 
years of Mr. Gray’s Smile, but they probably 
have in mind what he said at the jubilee 
meeting held here November 11, 1884, a 
few days after Cleveland’s election, accord¬ 
ing to the Sentinel the next morning: 

“ One of the peculiar phases of the campaign just 
passed, and, I think the most peculiar that I have ever 
seen in any canvass I have ever been engaged in, is 
that our republican friends put forth an argument 
to the people that if the democratic party obtained 
control of the government, it would turn the repub¬ 
lican office-holders out. Of course we will; there is 
no doubt about it. This has been a contest between 
parties. There have always been political parties in 
this country, ever since theformation of thegovern- 
ment, and I presume there always will be. The re¬ 
publican party, in its long twenty-four years’ lease 
of power, has filled the offices exclusively with re¬ 
publicans. That was right. When the democratic 
party obtains control of the government, which will 
be on the fourth of March next, then we will expect 
the offices, as rapidly as can be done with safety to 
the proper administration of government affairs, to 
be filled with democrats.” 

Ex-Governor James E. Campbell, of 
Ohio, is evidently finding his political 


level and means to make it low. He closed 
his speech at the Reform Club dinner in 
New York December 10 as follows: 

“ I am also in favor of the boys who want the post- 
offices, because from the postmaster at Confederate 
cro.ss-roads to Van Cott in New York, I am in favor 
of putting them all out, and putting in men who 
voted for Grover Cleveland.” 

This is the standard of Dave Hill and 
Ed. Murphy. Campbell evidently means 
to join with them. His speech places 
him on a par with Flannegan of Texas. 
He must have known that the division of 
spoil, which he took advantage of his 
opportunity to bawl for, was directly 
opposed to the principles of the Reform 
Club whose guest he was and to the prin¬ 
ciples of the chief guest, Mr. Cleveland, 
in whose presence Campbell spoke, and 
to the principles of the platform upon 
which Mr. Cleveland was elected. Though 
apparently not aware of it, Mr. Campbell 
owed something at least to good manners, 
to say nothing of his readiness to disregard 
the promises of his party. 

In gratifying contrast with the dema 
gogical utterances of Mr. Campbell is the 
speech of Carl Schurz, delivered on the 
same occasion, and of which the following 
is an extract: 

‘‘So long as democracy means the preservation of 
popular self government in its whole sphere; the 
maintenance of sound constitutional doctrines; hon 
esty and wise economy in administration; war upon 
the corrupting agencies of our political life; war 
upon selfish monopoly and favoritism by law; tax¬ 
ation not for the advantage of the few at the ex¬ 
pense of the many, but just to all and for the benefit 
of all; a currency system that will cheat nobody and 
keep us in harmony with the money of the world’s 
commerce; a public service not the spoil of party, but 
honestly organized upon the principle that a public 
office is a public trust, so long as democracy means 
in Itself a government for the people and by the peo¬ 
ple, so long will those who came from outside the 
democratic parly to vote for Cleveland continue to 
march in its ranks. * 

‘‘These friends rejoice to know that you will enter 
upon your high duties not only unembarrassed by 
personal pledges but unburdened by any personal 
obligations. No man, and no set of men, has a claim 
upon your political gratitude, for the uprising of the 
people for your cause and yourself was so spontane¬ 
ous and overwhelming that there is no man and no 
set of men whose efforts in behalf of your election 
might not safely have been spared. Whatever of 
personal triumph there is in this you owe only to the 
generous confidence of the American people; and 
their confidence greets you at the threshold of your 
second administration with an abundance that has 
but few precedents in the past history of the repub¬ 
lic. But great as is the popular confidence, so is the 
popular expectation. This consciousness, no doubt, 
rests upon your heart as a heavy load of responsi¬ 
bility. But be assured as you are true to the moral 
forces in American politics which nominated and 
elected you, so these moral forces will be true to you 
to the end. Doubt not, whatever struggles and per¬ 
plexities your efforts for good government may bring 
upon you, you may always confidently appeal to the 
good sense, the honesty and the patriotism of the 
American people—and you will never appeal in 
vain—against any unjust assault from the opposite 
party as well as against any cabal of selfishness 
within your own.” 

President Patton, of Princeton Col¬ 
lege, is reported to have recently said: “ I 


am interested in philosophy and theology, 
and these are the only things I want to be 
known in. I vote for neither party.” It 
is a stigma upon President Patton, an 
American citizen, to show such callous¬ 
ness to his duty. It ought to be a stigma 
for the trustees of an American college in 
which American boys are to pass four 
years to retain as president such a man; 
and it ought to be a discredit for any 
parent to permit his son to be under the 
influence of one so wanting in the appre¬ 
ciation of the elements that go to form 
character. Of what ancient stuflf are his 
theology and philosophy made? Those 
genial cynics who claim that it is necessary 
to buy and sell votes, steal and lie in poli¬ 
tics, are really less dangerous than this 
college president who is so admirably 
suited to pursue theology and philosophy 
in a Russian college. 


His annual report shows that Postmaster 
General Wannamaker still smarts under 
the strictures upon his action in shielding 
the Baltimore post oflice employes. He 
ought to understand by this time that 
denials or statements from him of any kind 
cut no figure with the American people. 
In this Baltimore matter he started in with 
the deliberate purpose of protecting law¬ 
breakers, and that purpose he impudently 
carried out in the face of conclusive proof 
of their guilt. After years of ready de¬ 
nunciation of others as Pharisees the re¬ 
publicans have produced some apparently 
perfect specimens, and one of these is Mr. 
Wannamaker. 


Mr. Oliver T. Morton’s admirable es¬ 
says on civil service reform, which origi¬ 
nallyappeared in the Atlantic Monthly,hsiwe, 
with several other papers, been issued in a 
volume by Houghton, Mifflin & Co. Mr. 
Morton’s answers to the objections to civil 
service reform are the best that have been 
made. He has assumed that the objec¬ 
tions have been made in good faith and 
from an honest patriotic doubt, and he 
proceeds with the utmost patience to sat¬ 
isfy every possible degree and sort of ob¬ 
jection. When the essays first appeared, 
the Civil Service Chronicle urged that 
they be reprinted for general distribution 
in the shape of short tracts. Their fitness 
for this is as apparent now as then. 


The report of the civil service commis¬ 
sion was made public December 6. Dur¬ 
ing the year ending June 30, 1892, 3,919 
applicants were examined for the depart 
ments at Washington, and of these 1,315 
failed to pass. For the railway mail serv¬ 
ice, out of 4,597 examined, 1,648 failed; for 
the customs service, out of 1,624 examined 
662 failed; for the postal service, out of 9,162 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


397 


examined, 3,611 failed ; for the Indian serv¬ 
ice, out of 158 examined, 64 failed. The 
whole number examined was 19,460, of 
whom 12,160 passed, and 7,300 failed. Over 
the previous year there was an increase of 
386 in the whole number examined. Dur¬ 
ing the year 3,961 received appointments. 
In the departments 245 men, and 86 
women were appointed. 


The commission says: 

The classified service, should be extended as 
rapidly as practicable to cover every position in the 
public service to which it can appropriately be ap 
plied; as, for instance, to clerks and writers in navy- 
yards, to almost the entire body of oflficials in the 
District of Columbia, to the internal-revenue service’ 
to custom-houses with twenty-five employes, and to 
free-delivery post ofifices. 

It also recommends the enactment into 
laws of some such bills as those introduced 
by Mr. Andrew, to take federal laborers 
and the fourth-class postmasters out of 
politics. 

Most friends of civil service reform 
were surprised to find this report signed 
by Comissioners Roosevelt and Lyman only 
Then follows the remark : 

“ I approve the body of the report, but prefer that 
the recommendation for the extension of the classi¬ 
fied service on page 8 shall conclude with the sen¬ 
tence, ‘ The classified service should be extended 
as rapidly as practicable to cover every position in 
the public service to which it can appropriately be 
applied.’" 

This is signed by Commissioner John¬ 
ston. When asked about his action by the 
correspondent of New York Evening Post, 
Mr. Johnston said: 

I regretted very much the necessity of differing 
with my colleagues, even apparently. I am a civil 
service reformer and believe in the extension of the 
merit system, but I consider ihat at this time it is 
well that the commission should move slowly. The 
passage in the report to which I refer in my paragraph 
at the end contains a number of specific recom¬ 
mendations, with some of which, I may say, I am in 
sympathy. As to others I am not able to speak posi¬ 
tively, because I have not yet had an opportunity of 
giving them the necessary study. I could not con 
scientiously join with my colleagues in recommend¬ 
ing specific extensions of the rules without fully as¬ 
suring myself of the wisdom of these proposals. The 
first sentence in the passage under consideration is a 
broad general one on which we are entirely agreed— 
that is, that the cla.ssified service should be extended 
‘as rapidly as practicable.’ Beyond that I did not 
feel that it would be wise to go at this time. I had 
no desire or expectation of being drawn into the 
newspapers with reference to this matter, as I sedu¬ 
lously avoid unnecessary publicity, but your inquiry 
leaves me no alternative but to make this explana¬ 
tion." 

The question is naturally asked, why is 
Mr. Johnston, with his doubts and lack of 
knowledge, serving on the civil service 
commission ? He is not put there as a 
novice to learn a business. Why should 
the commission move slowly “at this 
time ?” To save places to divide as spoil 
among democrats? The recommenda¬ 
tions of the commission are moderate. 
This matter has been discussed and succes- 
fully experimented upon for years. Has 


Mr. Johnston been hidden in the swamps 
of Louisiana all this time? Under Mr. 
Cleveland’s first administration we had 
experience with commissioners who hid 
behind generalities, and wanted to “move 
slowly,” and the experience was not happy. 
We do not want any more Edgertons. 


Mr. Cleveland owes it to the country 
to retain Mr. Roosevelt and make him the 
head of the civil service commission, and 
Mr. Roosevelt owes it to the country to ac¬ 
cept the place. He has been the advocate 
of fair play for democrats as well as repub¬ 
licans. Emphatically, he has not been 
afraid, and this means almost everything. 
He has compelled respect for and obser¬ 
vance of the law. There is no one to take his 
place. He has the confidence and respect 
of the country. With him at the head of 
the commission there would be no uncer¬ 
tainty, either as to what President Cleve¬ 
land meant to have done or as to what 
would be done. 


President Harrison’s annual message 
was sent to congress December 7. We 
have read it carefully and here give 
those parts bearing upon the reform of the 
civil service: 

The civil service commission asks for an increased 
appropriation for needed clerical assistance, which, 
I think, should be given. I extended the classified 
service March 1,1892, to include physicians, superin¬ 
tendents, assistant superintendents, school teachers 
and matrons in the Indian service, and have had 
under consideration the subject of some further ex¬ 
tensions, but have not as yet fully determined the 
lines upon which extensions can most properly and 
usefully be made. 

<c 2^ lit if i,t 

I have several times been called upon to remove 
Indian agents appointed by me and have done so 
promptly upon every sustained complaint of unfit¬ 
ness or misconduct. I believe, however, that the 
Indian service at the agencies has been improved and 
is now administered on the whole with a good degree 
of efllciency. If any legislation is possible by which 
the selection of Indian agents can be wholly re¬ 
moved from all partisan suggestions or considera¬ 
tions I am sure it would be a great relief to the ex 
ecutive and a great benefit for the service. 

We can not refrain from quoting once 
more, and in close proximity to this 
record of performance, the promise from 
the platform of 1888, and we suggest that 
it is not yet too late to do much to di¬ 
minish the prodigious difference in size: 

"The reform of the civil service, auspiciously be¬ 
gun under a republican administration, should be 
completed by tlie further extension of the reform 
system already established by law to all the grades 
of service to which it is applicable. The spirit and 
purpose of the reform should be observed in all ex¬ 
ecutive appointments, and all laws at variance with 
the object of existing reform legislation should be 
repealed, to the end that the dangers to free institu¬ 
tions which lurk in the power of ofiScial patronage 
may be wisely and effectively avoided." 


This paper prints in full the newspaper 
reports of the attempt of Senator Higgins 
by bribery to defeat the ballot, because 
whatever the actual facts, the admissions 


illustrate vividly the baseness of the pa¬ 
tronage system. Postmaster Smith is the 
senator’s henchman and, paid by the pub¬ 
lic, does the base service of his chief. Sen¬ 
ator Higgins admits, callous to the shame 
of it, that he was ready to purchase influ¬ 
ence with an office. And last, a minister, 
the republican nominee for congress, is 
reported to have sat by and heard Post¬ 
master Smith promise a “ good office ” for 
help this fall, and to have responded that 
he would do all he could to carry out the 
postmaster’s suggestions in regard to fed¬ 
eral patronage. 


DEMOCRATIC PROMISES. 

Very early in the next administration 
the democrats will have to decide what 
they will do with the civil service. The 
demand that it shall all be divided as spoil, 
will be presented to them at once, and they 
will have to make some answer. They 
have won by decisive numbers. Their 
superior numbers however are spread thin 
over a large extent of territory. It will be 
a fatal mistake for them to believe that 
they can indulge in a carnival of spoil and 
experience anything but defeat in 1896. 
President Harrison and his administration 
from the start treated the reform element 
of the country with contempt, and this was 
carried to an extent that patience and for¬ 
bearance ceased to be a virtue and almost 
to a man the reformers became hostile to 
the administration, and they pursued and 
published its multitude of glaring faults 
with a relentless persistence that would 
have been a warning to wiser officers. This 
element now looks to the democrats with 
the most cordial good wishes, and with the 
highest hopes of what they will accomplish. 
But it should be remembered that it has 
not forgotten how to criticise and that it 
wilt do its duty. 

The democrats have every reason urging 
them to the completion of the reform of the 
federal service. They have bound them¬ 
selves to do so in their platform. They 
said that the service ought not to be sub¬ 
ject to change at every election, or be a 
prize fought for at the polls, or be a brief 
reward of party service. This can not be 
made to mean anything except that these 
principles shall now be put into practice. 
They were the principles of the party 
under Tilden, and they are now its princi¬ 
ples under Cleveland; and Tilden and 
Cleveland are the only successful national 
leaders their party has had for a genera¬ 
tion. 

We are not saying that republicans not 
within the civil service law shall be kept 
in office; but we do say that sixty thousand 
republican heelers shall not be succeeded 
in the fourth class post-offices by sixty 
thousand democratic heelers. That would 













398 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


be a carnival of spoil. There is a well de¬ 
vised system of appointment free from 
politics and favorition. Let it be adopted 
and then if the party demands it let the 
places be vacated and filled accordingly. 
Every part of the unclassified sevice should 
be treated in a similar manner, or should 
be classified under the present law. Heads 
of bureaus and under secretaries, should be 
made permanent, though always with 
all other officers subject to removal for 
cause. With a change of administra¬ 
tion only the highest officers should be 
changed. This is the way to get rid of a 
change of officers at every election or to 
keep the offices from being a prize fought 
for at the polls or from being a brief re¬ 
ward for party service. 


THE MASSACHUSETTS CIVIL SER¬ 
VICE REFORMERS. 

The following resolations were adopted at a 
conference of Massachusetts Civil Service Re¬ 
form Associations, held in Boston, December 
8, 1892: 

We welcome the announcement of President Har¬ 
rison that he contemplates an extension of the civil 
service rules, and we hope that the extensions al¬ 
ready recommended by the National Civil Service 
Commission will be made without delay, viz.: “to 
clerks and writers in navy yards, to almost the entire 
body of officials in the District of Columbia, to the 
internal revenue service, to custom houses with 
twenty-five employes and to free delivery post-of¬ 
fices,” and that the system introduced into the navy 
yards by the secretary of the navy will be adopted in 
permanent form. 

We urge our representatives in congress to spare 
no effort to secure a liberal appropriation for the 
needs of the civil service commission. 

The withdrawal of Mr. Roosevelt from the National 
civil service commission would be a serious loss to 
the cause of reform, and we respectfully urge him to 
reconsider his announced intention of resigning. 

A committee of three shall be appointed by the 
chairman of this meeting, to secure, if possible, from 
the leading supporters of President-elect Cleveland 
In Massachusetts, an indorsement in writing of the 
views recently expressed by him in condemation of 
the distribution of patronage as spoils, and their 
promise of support in any effort which shall be made 
by him to discontinue this odious and demoralizing 
praetice. 

We urge upon our representatives in congress the 
passage of the fourth-elass postmaster bill and the 
bill for the seleetion of laborers, favorably reported 
in the last session by the house committee on civil 
service reform. 

Inasmuch as the duty of the officer is to the coun¬ 
try, and not to a party, we disapprove the resignation 
of a non-political office in deference to the perni¬ 
cious theory that a change of administration should 
involve a change of officers. 

Arthur Hobart, 

Boston, December 12,1892. Secretary of Conference. 


WHO WAS ELECTED PRESIDENT.? 

Since theelection therehavebeen at least ten 
democrats who have in some manner made 
known their intention to become candidates 
for postmaster at this place. These parties 
through their friends, have so pressed Con¬ 
gressman Cooper for indorsement that he has 
made known his intention to favor George E. 
Finney, ex-editor of the Herald, for this posi¬ 


tion, and now there is a howl from the rank 
and file of the party that extends all over the 
county. Finney and Congressman Cooper 
held the post-office under Cleveland, Cooper 
resigning to become a candidate. Finney suc¬ 
ceeded him, holding the office for about four 
years. The young working democrats are the 
ones that are mad, and there is trouble ahead. 
A numerously signed petition for the appoint¬ 
ment of a man by the name of Guthrie as 
postmaster at Nashville, Brown county, was 
handed to Mr. Cooper yesterday, but he in¬ 
formed the party that he would recommend 
Alonzo Allison, of the Brown County Demo¬ 
crat.—Columbus Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
November 18. 

* * * 

One of the most bitter post-office fights that 
ever took place in this part of the state is on 
in this city. It was charged against Congress¬ 
man Cooper that he had made up his mind 
before election as to whom he would recom¬ 
mend for the post-office, but many thought 
that this could not be the case. These parties 
now say that they were deceived. He pub¬ 
licly announced that George E. Finney was to 
be the man for the place, and late last night, 
after this statement appeared in the local 
democratic organ, sixty-four leading and in¬ 
fluential democrats, many of whom were Cath¬ 
olics, called on Mr. Cooper and asked him to 
reconsider his action and leave the appoint¬ 
ment open to the decision of the voters of the 
democratic party receiving their mail at this 
office. This the congressman refused to do, 
and, to a few, gave as the reason that if an 
election were held that a hoodlum might be 
chosen, as no one would be allowed to vote for 
postmaster that did not vote for Cooper. This 
remark did not set well, and an election will 
be held, and the man chosen will receive the 
indorsement of all other applicants for the 
place, and his appointment urged against the 
wishes of Cooper .—Columbus Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, November 25, 

* « » 

Congressman Cooper to-day announced to 
the democracy of Franklin that he had de¬ 
termined to recommend Samuel Harris to be 
appointed postmaster at Franklin. As a re¬ 
sult the local democracy is worse torn up than 
ever at any time within its history. Cooper is 
accused openly of lying and treachery. He 
announced that he would be in no hurry to 
make the appointment, and that he would 
come to Franklin and consult those interested 
in the matter. He never came, and he con¬ 
sulted nobody. Democrats here are opposed 
to the appointment of Harris. They vow that 
Harris shall not be confirmed. They also 
vow that Cooper will never again get a dele¬ 
gate from Johnson county to secure renomina¬ 
tion. The war is on .—Franklin Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, November 25, 

» » » 

The Franklin Republican has interviewed 
some of the afflicted, who have expressed 
themselves freely, as the following extracts 
show: 

“J. A. Smith said: ‘It looks as if it were 


Mr. Cooper’s appointment on personal prefer¬ 
ence, and not on the recommendation of the 
people. Mr. Cooper has made a mistake. He 
should have come to Franklin as he promised 
and found out what the democrats wanted.’ 

“Fred Staff said: ‘Cooper has lied like a 
dog. Even in a dog fight I like to see fair and 
honorable treatment. He has decided the 
case before he heard it. Cooper has broken 
his promises and acted in bad faith. He will 
regret it.’ 

“ Ben Brown said: ‘ You may quote me as 
saying that George Cooper has lied and de¬ 
ceived knowingly in the matter, and has de¬ 
ceived his best friends in an ungentlemanly 
manner. He has shown himself to be a cow¬ 
ard in that he has not come to Franklin and 
given all a fair show. I can find no fault in that 
I did not obtain Mr. Cooper’s indorsements, 
but I do have a right to find fault with Mr. 
Cooper’s lying and deceptive method of treat¬ 
ment. I wish that I had not been a candidate 
that I might be free to make the vigorous kick 
which such cowardice and treachery makes 
consistent and proper .’”—Indianapolis Journal, 
November 28, 

* * » 

Besieged from every quarter, “cussed” and 
discussed on every street corner, and driven 
almost wild by the constant ringing of his 
door-bell by men who want place under the 
incoming administration. Congressman Cooper 
has left his district and gone east, but to what 
point the average democrat does not know, 
and can not find out to a certainty. For days 
his home in this city has been invaded by men 
wanting places and his influence to secure 
them, and these men have come from all parts 
of the district. To a few he has promised his 
support publicly, and in each case this has 
brought committees with protests until it 
really appears that his decisions have not 
pleased his constituents in a single instance, 
but, on the contrary, have worked them up to 
fever heat against him. As he stepped off the 
Big Four train he looked as if he had just re¬ 
covered from a severe spell of sickness, and 
appeared to be glad that he would soon be out 
of the reach of those who were wanting favors 
at his hands .—Columbus Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, November 29. 

» * * 

Congressman Cooper has aroused in Danville 
the same storm of opposition over his action 
in recommending a new postmaster that he did 
in Columbus, Edinburg and Nashville. Three- 
fourths of the local democrats have placed 
their names on a petition asking that they be 
allowed to hold an election to select their 
postmaster. While this petition was in circu¬ 
lation, letters were received from Cooper stat¬ 
ing that he would recommend Mr. Will King, 
editor of the Danville Gazette. Immediately 
there was a cry against such action, but Cooper 
still persists in his course. It is generally ad¬ 
mitted that King would have stood no show 
in an election, and it is taken as an indication 
that Cooper feels that he will need newspaper 
support in future campaigns. The rank and 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


399 


file of local democracy will hold an election, 
and send certificates of the result to the pow¬ 
ers that be.— Danville Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, December 17. 

« « « 

The democratic contest for the post-office at 
this place has narrowed down to but two can¬ 
didates, J. A. Lewis and John Duncan. Lewis, 
it is said, has been promised the place by 
Congressman Cooper, but Duncan’s friends 
claim it was promised Lewis provided he 
could “ satisfy the boys,” and the boys won’t 
be satisfied. Neither will withdraw from the 
race; neither favor an election, but will re¬ 
sort to this only as a last means of settling the 
difficulty.— Martinsville Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, December 16. 

» « * 

The democrats of this place and vicinity are 
on the ” ragged edge ” over a letter received a 
few days ago by Superintendent T. J. Charlton, 
of the reform school, from Congressman Geo. 
W. Cooper, under date of December 12, in 
which he says: 

It has been my purpose, whenever I could, to 
decide all contests for postoffices as soon as possible. 
I think it is better to do so and announce the decis¬ 
ion as soon as reached, in order that prolonged and 
bitter contests, resulting in greater disappointment, 
may not follow. 

I have decided to recommend Mr. Isaac Holton for 
Plainfield. In arriving at this conclusion I make no 
reflections on any good democrat who has applied 
for the place, I have about 180 of these cases to in¬ 
vestigate and decide, and my hope is that I may be 
able to get through with them in time to give the ap¬ 
pointees the benefit of the full term of Cleveland’s 
administration. 

Whatever your views or personal aspirations may 
have been I sincerely hope that this determination 
will meet your approval, and believe that Mr. Holton 
will make an efficient and faithful officer. 

Respectfully, Geo. \V. Cooper. 

The publication of the letter in the Plain- 
field Progress last Thursday was like a bomb 
thrown into the rank and file of the democracy 
of Guilford township, and caused a crestfallt-n 
look to spread over the faces of the other half- 
dozen or more candidates for the position. 
Immediately the kicking began, and as time 
rolls by the defeated candidates are getting 
madder and have started on the war-path. 
One of the defeated candidates declared that 
he intends to have Mr. Charlton’s scalp dang¬ 
ling in his belt as soon as the legislature meets. 
By this it is inferred he proposes to have Mr_ 
Charlton removed as superintendent of the re¬ 
form school. 

Another gentleman who received one of 
Congressman Cooper’s manifold letters is said 
to have written a letter telling him that it 
would have been better for him to have hied 
himself to the wilds of Brown county and 
never entered public life. Still another dem¬ 
ocrat, it is asserted, has written a short, crisp 
letter to Mr. Cooper in which he uses this ex¬ 
pression : “ You have played h—1! ” 

Mr. Holton knows, and Mr. Cooper was ad¬ 
vised, that his favored candidate would stand 
no show for the post-office if the matter was 
referred to a vote of the democrats of the 
township. It is going to be a Kilkenny cat- 
fight, and no means, fair or foul, will be left 


untried to induce Cooper to change his views 
in regard to recommending Mr. Holton for the 
Plainfield post-office.— Plainfield Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, December 19. 


THE ONSLAUGHT. 

Bourbon.— Post-office: James Laurence and George 
Stuckman. 

Bluffton.— For district attorney: Edwin C, Vaugh. 
For the post-office: James R. Bennett, ex recorder; 
Wm. B. Bennett, ex-postmas'er; Maurice Sawyer, 
ex-postal clerk; Marcellns M. Justice, ex-sheriff; 
Robert F. Cummins, son of Repre.sentative Cum¬ 
mins; B. F. Kain, recently candidate for treasurer, 
and Gus Michaels, who has never held an office. 
Congressman Marlin is understood to favor the selec¬ 
tion of postmasters by popular vote. 

WiNAMAC. — Post-office: W. E. Jackson, Charles 
Shine, S. Pearson, J. J. Gorrell, J. B. Agnew, Sr., M. 
H. Ingrim and T. B. Hedges. Mr. Ingrim, editor of 
the Democrat-Journal, served as postmaster under 
Cleveland before. Charles H. Howard wants the 
post-office at Star City. 

Rochester —Valentine Zimmerman, native of Ger¬ 
many, run for Congress, Tenth district, 1888, will be 
pushed for a consulate at some important city of his 
native land. Merritt A. Baker, depnty prosecuting 
attorney, wants a place In the law department at 
Washington. Charles Meyer wants the revenne col- 
lectorshin of this district. John C. Phillips, Oliver 
P. Waite and Andrew T. Bitters want the post office. 

Danville -Post-office: James W. Williams, who 
was displaced by Harrison, H. B. Lingenfelter, Joseph 
G. Bowen, Will A. King, editor of the Gazette, and R. 
D. Snyder. Cleveland appointed A. P. Pounds, post 
master in ls85. and he died in office. Miss Anna 
Pounds, an efficient deputy, was an unsuccessful 
applicant as her father’s successor. She is now a 
possible candidate. John McClain, of Avon, wants 
the same place in the treasury department he held 
under Cleveland before. R. F. Hiatt wants the post- 
office at Plainfield. Lewis Marsh, Jr., of Danville, 
wants a small place at Washington. Levi A. Bar¬ 
nett expects to be again appointed trustee of the re¬ 
form school by Matthews. Simon Rammell, of Dan 
ville, a life long democrat, has purchased a grocery 
at New Winchester, in the hope of becoming post¬ 
master there. 

Attica.— For the post-office: Martin Schoonover, 
Henry G. Schlos.ser, Wm. Lippold, Chas. Hatton, O. 
S. Clark and Ed Hemphill. 

Delphi.— Want to be postmaster: Rhen Isherwood, 
editor of the Times; A. B. Crampton, editor of the 
Citizen; Allison Rogers, president of the democratic 
club; Albert Brewer, Fred Neiworth, the Hon. John 
C. Odell. Mrs. Lydia Pollard, mother of Judge Chas. 
R. Pollard, who was a delegate to the Chicago con¬ 
vention; Mrs. A. Ball and John G. Troxell. Charles 
Walker dropped from the mail service by the Harri¬ 
son administration, wants his old place. So does 
Allison Rogers, if he fails to get the post-office. Col. 
Isaac Dreifus, who made the race for mayor two 
years ago. will apply for a post-tradership. [Judge C. 
R. Pollard will be an applicant for something, but 
he has not determined what he wants. Judge Chas. 
R. Pollard, of Delphi, is casting an eye toward the 
office of commissioner of emigration, his friends say. 
The office is the one at present filled by ex-Congress- 
man Owen, of Logansport. Mr. Pollard was a dele¬ 
gate to the national democratic convention, and has 
been chairman of the democratic committee of his 
county for several years. It is said that his candi¬ 
dacy will have the backing of many of the influen 
tial democrats of northern Indiana.—December 3.] 

MUNCIE.— The Hon. R. S. Gregory, who recently 
joined democratic ranks, will apply for a high-sal¬ 
aried position, possibly a foreign consulate. Alex. 
Kirkwood will be satisfied with a post-office inspect 
orship. For the post-office: Editor Thomas Me. 
Killop, of the Herald; ex-postmaster John Banta, 
Vernon Davis, John Ritter, ex-mayor Charles Kil¬ 
gore, B. Frank Gubben, Arthur Shldeler, John 


Graham, Val. Gilbert, Percy Craig, Ed. Everett and 
Thomas Duncan. Want to be door keeper at the 
White House: Robert Winters, a yoiu g journalist; 
Mark Batton, Daniel Kelly, Mark Beehtell, Will 
Kirk, Frank Beehtell, Frank Beemer, William Pat¬ 
terson and Ed. Mauck. Capt. Hilligas, W. W. Walby, 
Lafayette McCormuk, Charles Bell and Dr. Searcy 
will ask for paying clerkships at Washington, or to 
he mail agents. 

South Bend.— Would-be postmasters: Sorden Lis¬ 
ter, postmaster under Cleveland four years ago, and 
chairman of the democratic central committee; John 
Gallagher, Adolph H. Ginz, present councilman from 
first ward; August Beyer, Andrew J. Jaquilh and 
Patrick Sheckey. Emmet F. Marshall, member of 
the democratic state central committee, wants to be 
post office inspector, and John M. Shlmp revenue 
collector. 

Lebanon.— For postmaster: Ed. F. Hughes, Henry 
C. Ulin, secretary of the county committee, and the 
Hon S. M. Ralston, presidential elector for the ninth 
district. 

Shoals.— The Hon. Thomas M. Clarke wants a 
judgeship of some kind ; wanted one in the Okla¬ 
homa country in 1884. For the post office; A. C. 
Hacker, editor of the Hews; Fabius Gwinn, a young 
alb rney ; W. K. Smith, postmaster under Cleveland 
formerly, and H. M. Carroll, I. N. Plummer and Dr. 
G. M. Freeman, want places on the pension board. 

Wabash.— For the post-office: E. A. Edwards and 
John Hipskind. W. W. Wood, the present incum¬ 
bent, has over three years to serve. 

LaPorte.— For the post-office: S. E. Grover,chair¬ 
man of the democratic county committee; S. J. 
Kessler, one of the owners of the La Porte Argos; N. 
McCormick, defeated candidate for sheriff; D C. 
McCollum, of the state monument commission; 
George H.Storey, superintendent of the water works, 
and Thomas Fargher, an ex-soldier. W. H. Parker, 
ex-gauger, will seek re-appointment. David Walker, 
Charles B. Kenney and Wm. C. Criss, want to be 
mail carriers. 

Brazil.— The Hon. J. M. Hoskins, chairman of the 
congressional central committee, is a candidate for 
revenue collector. E. M. Henkel and John Stough 
want the post office. 

Spencer.— For the post-office: F. M. Field, post¬ 
master under Cleveland before; O. T. Dickerson, ex- 
auditor; Joseph W. Workman, deputy auditor, 8. 
N. Chambers, ex sheriff; Michael Wolf, ex marshal; 
M. V. Halton, Capt. J. W. Archer, Mrs. W. S. John¬ 
son, wife of county clerk Johnson and sister of Miss 
Nellie Ahern, assistant state librarian, and Mrs. Wm. 
Howard, a cousin of Mr. Cleveland. 

Gosport.— B. F. Hart, C. L. Wampler, J. P. Gentry, 
Dr. Fred. Stuckey and B. F. Fox. Judge Wm. M. 
Franklin, who was a candidate before the demo¬ 
cratic state convention for appellate judge, will be 
pressed for the best appointment due this quarter of 
the state. 

Mitchell.— Dr. J. T. Briggs. Moses Clinton, Ed. C. 
Burton and James Moore are aspirants for the post- 
office. Most talked-of man for the place is Walter L. 
Shanks, the defeated candidate for sheriff of Law¬ 
rence county. J. F. Dilley and Oscar Williams want 
good government places. 

Salem.— Candidates for the post-office are ex-Post- 
master J. D. Alvis, W. M. Rudler, H. R. Winsklet, D. 
V. B. Motsinger and John Shanks. For the pension 
board. Dr. W. J. Purkhiser, Dr. H. M. Paynler and 
Dr. J. J. Mitchell. 

Plymouth.— For the post-office, Adam Vinnege, J. 
A. Palmer, Thomas Webber and J. C. Jillson. The 
Hon. Daniel McDonald wants to be commissioner of 
pensions. W. E. Peterson would be route agent on a 
mail line. 

Bedford.— For the post-office, John Johnson, Jr., 
and Mrs. Frances Wilson, widow of the late Judge 
Wilson. McHenry Owen wants a place in the pen¬ 
sion office. 

Lafayette.— For the post-office, James B. Falley, 
wholesale merchant; George T. Beardsley, city treas¬ 
urer; W. Bent Wilson, of the Daffy Jburnaf; Michael 








400 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


H. Kennedy, wholesale merchant; Nicholas W. Box. 
retail merchant; F. E. D. McGinley, now holding 
his fifth term as mayor, and Walter J. Ball, real es¬ 
tate dealer. Rumor has it that the local managers 
promised the post-ofiftce to Mr. Beardsley if he would 
manage the campaign. Mr. Wilson publishes the 
only morning democratic daily in the ninth district, 
and his friends urge him because he has no county 
patronage. Drs. W. S. Walker, Samuel S. Washburn, 
Emil Schnaible, J. T. Littell, George W. Washburn 
and Samuel Seawright want to be on the pension 
board. Col. John .S. Williams, third auditor under 
Cleveland’s first administration, wants something. 

Peru.— Those desiring office Include Jerome Herff, 
Frank McElheney, Clarence Jackson, Wm. Angor, 
M. W. Ream, C. Huffman, W. W. Robbins, J. M. Jack- 
sou, Orson Durand, John Toll, M. Rosenthal and C, 
McDowell. 

Valparaiso.— For the post-office, E. Zimmerman, 
editor of the Messenger and Sun. He was postmaster 
for three years and eleven months under Cleveland 
before. Henry Binnaman, John H. Magee, Cyrus 
Axe, S. R Martin and J. Brodie are possible candi¬ 
dates. Postmaster DeMotte’s commission expires 
May, 4, 1894. 

Waterloo.— Alfred Kelley wants to be deputy rev¬ 
enue collector, but will take the post-office. Candi¬ 
dates for the latter place: John Koons (if nothing 
better offers), John Duncan, Benjamin Duncan, 
Oliver P. Smith, I. J. McFadden, Miss Ella Jackman, 
Miss Maude Kepler, Wm. S. Getz and Marion Bemen. 
derfer. Homer M. Henning wants to be postal clerk. 
Bemenderfer, John Duncan and Ella Jackman have 
petitions already in circulation. 

Plymouth.—T he Hon. Dan McDonald, editor of 
the Plymouth Democrat, in a special from that point, 
was credited with aspiring to be commissioner of 
pensions. Says Mr. McDonald, in a note to The News, 
“ That office is always given to a distinguished sol¬ 
dier. and it so happens that I served my country in 
the late unpleasantness by proxy, and am therefore 
ineligible.” 

Leavenworth —For postmaster at this place Peter 
Ouerbacker, James Clark, George E. Sherron, Clarke 
F. Cracleus, Thomas Westfall and William Callaghan 
are named as candidates. The office pays $1,200 an- 
nualiy. 

Moore’s Hill. —Eighteen democrats at Newton, a 
little suburb of Lawrenceburgh, are circulating peti 
tions for government office.—Indianapolis News, No 
vember 23. 

Tipton.— This city has its full quota of candidates. 
Those mentioned for the post-office include John R. 
Bowlin, present county superintendent; B. W. S. 
Ressler, Samuel Vawter, R. M. Roberson, who held 
the office under Cleveland before; A. Bennett, Chas. 
Means and John Woodruff. Mr. Rober-son is also 
mentioned as a candidate for door-keeper of the 
house. James Mettlin wants a place in the mail 
service where he served during the last democratic 
administration. W. O. Legg also wants a similar 
place. The Hon. W. R Ogleby would like to go 
abroad, having a preference for the Italian mission. 
M. T. Shiel wants a place in the pension department, 
and E. E. Van Buskirk desires to go west and teach 
in the Indian schools. He was a teacher until re¬ 
lieved by Harrison. A number of young democrats 
are already importuning influential men to secure 
places at Washington. 

Franklin.— There were about fifteen applicants 
for the office of postmaster of this place, and a city 
election was talked of to determine a choice, but 
Congressman Cooper threw a dampener thereon by 
writing a letter to Samuel Harris, pledging Harris 
that he would be recommended. Mr, Harris is ex¬ 
county clerk and ex-mayor, and during the last cam¬ 
paign he was chairman of the county committee. 

Columbus. —Congressman Cooper has announced 
that George E. Finney would be recommended by 
him as postmaster here. This has given offense to 
friends of other candidates, and a committee waited 
upon Mr. Cooperand urged him to reconsider his de¬ 
termination, and leave the election open to popular 
choice. Congressman Cooper declined to accede to 


the request, fearing that an unworthy person might 
be selected. However, it is now the understanding 
that the local democracy will insist on an election, 
and will urge the appointment of the applicant re¬ 
ceiving the greatest number of votes. It is further 
said that a formal remonstrance will be prepared 
against Mr. Harris’s appointment, to be laid before 
the President. This failing, the matter will be car¬ 
ried to the senate, hopeful of preventing the con¬ 
firmation. The additional aspirants for office under 
Cleveland include ex-Mayor Charles M. Spencer, 
who desires a clerkship in the pension department 
Abe Terhune will seek appointment in the govern¬ 
ment printing office, and Dr. C. V. Kent, of Hope, 
will ask to be appointed medical examiner. Alonzo 
Allison, editor of the Brown County Democrat, and 
James Guthrie are applicants for postmaster at Nash¬ 
ville. It is understood that Congressman Cooper 
will recommend Allison. Ephraim Norman wants 
to be postmaster at Hope; also, J. K. Righter, a phys¬ 
ician, and S. C. Felsberg, editor of the News-Journal. 

English. —Dr. C. D. Luckett will seek a position on 
the board of pension examiners. James R. Duffin, 
George W. Davis, James P. Smallwood and Louis N. 
Jobe are named for postmaster at West Fork. Rich- 
aid Byrd is seeking similar recognition at Oriole. 
Dr. William A. Cole, of this place, will apply for the 
collectorship of the Seventh district. 

Lapel.— N. W. Klepfer is circulating a petition to 
be appointed postmaster at this place under the new 
administration. 

Atlanta.— The candidates for postmaster are: J. 
M. Whisler, Dr. J. C. Driver, Dr. L. C. McFatridge, 
Amos Scott, Daniel Achenbach and J. E. Washington. 

Moore’s Hill. —Foremost among those who worked 
to swing southeast Indiana solidly against Gray and 
solidly forCleveland at Lawrenceburgh were Hunter 
and O’Brien, editors of the Register. Dr. Hunter is 
strongly talked of as consul to the port of Lisbon. 
O’Brien looks toward the collectorship, so said War¬ 
ren Tebbs wants an Indian agency. Captain Rief, for 
revenue agent, and likewise Ed Frederick, William 
Bryan, Henry Huseman, Parker Rand, Mike Fitterer, 
William Huston, Jacob Shepard, Louis Ellerbrook, 
and Charles Wilson are actively asking. Mentioned 
for postmaster are John Tittle, Ernst Everhart and 
George Columbia. Here at Moore’s Hill petitions 
for the postmastership were in circulation two days 
after the election. Charles Robinson has the most 
signers to his petition. There are twelve other ap¬ 
plicants. Mr Holman’s preference is the unknown 
quantity. 

Milan.— At Milan there are six post-office appli¬ 
cants. Thomas Kane went to see Mr. Holman right 
away after the election. Mr. Holman has promised 
a pretty gift, it is reported, to Mr. Kammon, north of 
Milan. 

Guilford.— Martin Miller, merchant, would read 
postal-cards. Little competition. 

SUN.MAN.—Virado Bigney, druggist, would more 
than gladly accept his old place as postmaster.—/n- 
dianapolis News, November 26. 

La Grange.— Candidates for the post office, to suc¬ 
ceed Dr. J. H. Rerick, editor of the Standard, whose 
commission expires in March, 1893, are looming up. 
David Fawcett, editor of the Democrat and secretary 
of the county central committee, who came here 
from Delphi in 1886, is in the race. Through his ex¬ 
ertions McNagney, democratic congressman-elect, se¬ 
cured one-half of the votes of this county in the con¬ 
gressional convention, over the protest of the other 
half, headed by Ballou and Hanan. Ora Rowe, a 
brother-in-law of Ballou, democratic elector and 
chairman of the central committee, whose candidacy 
was opposed by the Lowery democrats in 1884 and 
the office given to Snyder, is still in the ring. A 
split in the party followed Snyder’s appointment, 
and Congressman Lowery was defeated for re-election 
by the anti-Loweryites voting for Stanley and White. 
H. M. Kramer, pension attorney, is being backed by 
the old soldier boys, but the bee in the bonnet has 
been so often knocked out that his candidacy is 
looked upon as a chestnut. His attempt a few years 
ago to start a democratic G. A. R. is being worked 
against him for all it is worth. He has been a life¬ 


long resident of this county.—Jndtanapolfs News, De¬ 
cember 1. 

The following is a list of the candidates for the 
different post offices over Grant county: 

Van Buren—William Whittaker, Charles Griffith, 
T. E. Ballard, Dr. G. A. Landis, A. J. Barnes and G. 
W. Hulce. 

Roseburg—Milton Druckemiller. 

Swayzee—Isaac Smith, George W. Fisher, M. D^ 
Bish, Harrison Mark, Thomas Hubbard and O. W, J. 
Larkin. 

Sweetser—Mrs. N. E. Spurgeon. 

Pointlsabel—J. V. John, G. A. Brizendlneand Will, 
iam Mann. 

Fairmount—At this place the democrats held an 
election, the polls being open from 6 am. until 6 p- 
m. Four names were presented: W. H. Campbell, 
L. R. W’hitney, Samuel Stokes and Jefferson Fowler. 
W. H. Campbell was chosen .—Indianapolis News, 
December 3. 

—It has been given out among the Indianapolis 
democrats that ex-Congressman C. C. Matson, of 
Greencastle, wants to be made United States pension 
agent for Indiana. Mr. Matson is allied to the 
Voorhees-Gray wing of the parly, and the original 
friends of Cleveland here are recalling that during 
the meeting of the national democratic convention 
in Chicago, Mr. Matson was referring to Cleveland as 
the “stuffed prophet of Williams street.” 

John W. Cravens, clerk of Monroe county, is at the 
Grand Hotel. Mr. Cravens has his eye on the post- 
office at Bloomington, and his friends say he will get 
the appointment. He is still under thirty. When 
just of age he went to Bloomington from Danville. 
He was soon elected superintendent of the schools of 
Monroe county, and after having filled that office two 
terms, he was elected county clerk .—Indianapolis 
News, November 22. 

—Now that the campaign is over and the democrats 
have gained such a sweeping victory, the prominent 
politicians of democratic faith in this city and coun¬ 
ty have begun to look for offices. 

The post-office, with its salary of $3,000, is the chief 
objective point, and as many as a dozen are looking 
after this. Among these are Hon. Lu'her Mering, 
late candidate for congress; Frank Elder, postmaster 
under Cleveland’s first term; John W. Thistlewaite, 
George Eggemeyer, J. C. Macke, S. C. Whltsell. editor 
of the Independent, and others .—Richmond Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Sentinel, November 29. 

—Richmond is not the only place in Wayne county 
where the contest for the post office promises to be a 
warm one. At Hagerstown also the eligible are look¬ 
ing after their interests. Ex-Postmaster Mike Conniff 
wants it. Joseph Wallick is also an aspirant. Be¬ 
sides these two, J. C. Fritz, John B. Allen and Jack 
Richey are each being urged by his friends.—iJfcA- 
mond Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, December 2. 

—The Hon. Thomas J. Newkirk of thisclty isa can¬ 
didate for internal revenue collector of this district. 
Mr. Newkirk was chairman of the democratic county 
central commitee.—iSws/iviife Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, December 3. 

Indianapolis.— William E. English wants to besent 
abroad. William F. Christian will ask for the Indi¬ 
anapolis post-office. 

There are a good many aspiring democratic attor¬ 
neys who have their eyes on the district attorney- 
ship. Republicans generally believe that John W. 
Kern will be the appointee, although he has not the 
support of the Voorhees-Gray wing of the party. Mr. 
Kern, it is said, will have the indorsement of the 
original Cleveland men, with whom he cast his lot 
when the Cleveland-Gray-Hill fight was on before 
the meeting of the national convention. The other 
men who would like to have the office are Frank 
Burke, of Jeffersonville; John W. Holtzman, of this 
city, and Mason J. Niblack, of Vincennes. 

So far as can be learned there are not so many per¬ 
sons after the UnitedStatesmarshal’s office. Indian¬ 
apolis democrats seem to think that Geo. W. Geiger, 
the commercial traveler, has earned the office, and it 
is said that he will get a strong support from here. 
The men who think they know all about how the 
offices will be distributed say that Indianapolis will 







THE CIVILS ERVICE CHRONICEL- 


401 


not be permitted to gobble up everything in sight, 
and that it is foolish to talk about both the district 
attorneyship and the marshal’s office coming to this 
city. They say that Indianapolis will do well if it 
gets one of these offices. 

•‘My mail is almost as heavy as it was during the 
campaign,” said Chairman Taggart to day. “The 
applications for post-offices I send back with direc¬ 
tions that they be referred to the local committees. 
I can’t undertake to have anything to do with the 
selection of officers that affect no one outside the 
community where the officer is to serve.” 

Mr. Taggart does not say what he does with the ap¬ 
plications for other offices that come in, but those 
who claim to know say that he is filing them all 
away, and will, when the proper time comes, take a 
hand in the recommendatious to be made. “Taggart 
is a man who remembers his friends,” said a demo¬ 
crat to-day, ” and you can rest assured that when the 
proper time comes he will have something to say 
about who is recogni ed in Indiana. He will not 
decline any invitation to assist in portioning out the 
spoils.” 

Mr. A. Connor is an applicant for the North In¬ 
dianapolis post-office. 

Bloomington.— The avowed candidates for the 
post-office are: R. H. East, Peter Bowman, S. R. 
Phorer and W. P. Dill. James Ryan and Samuel 
Gilmore want to be wagon inspectors at the govern¬ 
ment depot at Jeffersonville. Other applicants in¬ 
clude: For the mail service, John Riley, John Har¬ 
ris and George Riley; Indian agency. Joseph N. Al¬ 
exander and D. D. Spencer. John R. East, C. R. 
Worrall and John D. Morgan are liable to present 
claims for recognition. 

Vernon.— James W. Clarkson, J. W. Forsyth, who 
was postmaster under Cleveland, E. J. Hutton and J. 
W. Sinnett will be applicants for the post-office at 
Butlerville. 

Waterloo. —Lee F. Stamets is an applicant for the 
post office. He was not Included in the former list. 

Franklin.— Benjamin P. Brown, who served four 
years under Cleveland, desires re-appointment as 
postmaster. Samuel Harris, ex-mayor and chairman 
of the county central committee, is prominently 
mentioned: so also William Neal, ex-sheriff, S. M. 
Forsythe, Aquilla Mathes, J. M. Needham, John 
Diel, A. B. Colton and A. M. Ragsdale. J. C. Mc¬ 
Nutt, prosecuting attorney of the Shelby-Johnson 
circuit, will petition for appointment as judge, vice 
Judge Hackney, elevated to the supreme bench. At 
Greenwood John Taylor Green, John Arbuckle, J. S. 
Pernett, Samuel Jennings and Jordan Graves want 
the post-office. Dr. Meyers, of Edinburg, commander 
G. A. R. post, wants on the board of pension exam 
iners. Dr. W. C. Hall, L. L. Whitesides and J. F. 
Jones, of this city, aspire to the same position, as 
also Drs. Lee and Province, of Union Village, and 
Dr. Willan, of Trafalgar. 

Winchester.— Lewis Ellingham, Frank Preston, 
Conrad Meier, Oliver Davis, Charles Favorite, An¬ 
drew Lewis, Garland D. Williamson, Mrs. Emma 
Riley and S. O. Irvin are named as applicants for the 
post-office. Mr. Irvin was tendered the position 
eight years ago, but declined in favor of John Neff, 
who was an old man and an applicant for the place. 
It is understood that ex-Governor Gray will support 
Mr. Irvin. Col. Martin B. Miller, who held a posi¬ 
tion in the pension department under Cleveland, 
will be an applicant for something similar. 

Lebanon.— Mr. S M. Ralston writes to the News 
that he was wrongly classified as an applicant for 
postmaster at Lebanon. He should not have been 
included in the list forwarded from that point. 

Lapel.—J. W. Barrett is named as a probable suc¬ 
cessor of W. H. Walker, the present postmaster. 

Martinsville. —Eb. Henderson, deputy commis¬ 
sioner of internal revenue under Cleveland, is desir¬ 
ous of being appointed commissioner. James A. 
Lewis, who served as postmaster twenty-two months 
under Cleveland, and who is chairman of the county 
central committee, is thought to have a good chance 
for reappointment as postmaster; he will be opposed 
by John C. Duncan, Harry Tarlton and John Fusel- 
man, Sr. Drs. S. A. Tilford, J. C. Paxon, R. H. Tarl¬ 


ton and 8. H. Schofield have an eye on the pension 
examiners’ board. Col. Jeff K. Scott is mentioned 
in connection with the adjutant-generalship of the 
state. 

Anderson. —It is pretty definitely settled that Dale 
J. Crittenberger, editor of the Anderson Democrat, 
will receive the appointment of postmaster for An¬ 
derson under the Cleveland administration. He is 
the son-in law of Postmaster Daniels, and Itis thought 
the latter will resign soon after the 4th of March, so 
that Crittenberger may take the office. 

Rockville. —The Parke county democrats are not 
talking much about the offices. Lo Humphries, 
county chairman, is mentioned for postmaster; so, 
also, John Overman, T. F. Gaebler. J. R. Strouse, 
editor of the Tribune, is being boomed by the Repub¬ 
lican, the opposition paper. Mrs. Maggie Stockbridge, 
chief deputy under W. E. Henkel, postmaster under 
Cleveland before, is talked of. No aspirants for fed¬ 
eral positions are heard of, Parke county democrats 
standing little chance with their hungrier brethren 
in Montgomery and Vigo counties. 

J bffersonville.— Strangely enough, theoffice- 
hunter has not yet developed with anything like the 
expected virulence in this county or city. Sheriff 

P. C. Donovan can have the post-office if he wants it. 
S. B. Diffenderfer is asking for it, and friends are 
pushing Capt. “Polk” Burlingame for the place. 
Capt. Henry Dugan, of the ferry company, wants to 
be inspector of the steamboats in this district. The 
great government depot of quartermasters’ supplies 
is located here, with half a hundred subordinate 
positions, ranging from a mule-driver to a two thou- 
sand-dollar clerkship. A clean sweep will be de¬ 
manded. 

Bloomfield.— For the post-office: W. E. Inman, 
deputy under the Cleveland regime ; Will Isensee, 
ex-deputy auditor; Horace V. Norrell, ex-prison di¬ 
rector; Geo. E. Endres and M. L. Combs. W. M. 
Moss, of the Democrat, expects the best thing in the 
district to be given him. 

Valparaiso.— A mass-meeting has unanimously 
adopted resolutions favoring the candidacy of John 
Brodie for the district marshalship of Indiana. Mr. 
Brodie is chairman of the democratic county com¬ 
mittee. 

New Castle.— Citizens regardless of party affilia¬ 
tions are working to secure the appointment of the 
Hon. George B. Morris as secretary of agriculture 
under Cleveland. Mr. Morris is vice-president of the 
First National Bank of New Castle, and a personal 
friend of Mr. Cleveland.—/ndiawapotts News, Nov. 22. 

Greenfield. —The Hon. David S. Gooding wants a 
paying position either in the foreign service or at 
Washington. Eugene C. Bojden will apply for a 
place in the government printing office or in the 
railway mail service. The Rev. Andrew J. Ander¬ 
son wants a position as deputy revenue collector in 
this district. Dr. J. N. Howard, Jr., will seek ap¬ 
pointment on the board of pension examiners. 
Those named for tbe post-office include : Jonathan 

Q. Johnson, ex city clerk ; Eugene Lewis, editor of 
the Greenfield Herald; Charhs C. Cochran, who was 
a candidate under Cleveland before, and Isaiah A. 
Curry, ex city treasurer and chairman county com 
mittee. Captain Curry, while treasurer, sustained a 
loss of 88,000 by the failure of Indianapolis banks, 
and he made good the deficiency out of his private 
store. 


AMERICAN_pUDALISM. 

Services were free and base. Free ser- 
vice was to pay a sum of money, or serve 
under the lord in war. Base service was 
to plow the lord’s land, to make his hedge 
or carry out his dung.— Blackstone. 


Nothing in the way of a political excite¬ 
ment that ever occurred in this state equaled 
that occasioned here this afternoon upon the 
publication, in two afternoon papers, of a 


story of attempted bribery in connection with 
the approaching election, in which United 
Slates Senator Anthony Higgins is personally 
involved. 

The story of the attempted debauchery of 
the ballot is told by Isaac J. Wootten, of 
Laurel, Sussex county, a democratic registrar 
for the east election district of Little Creek 
hundred, upon whom the attempt was made. 
The man who makes this astounding charge 
against the republican senator from the state 
of Delaware is a citizen of the highest respect¬ 
ability, against whose character for integrity 
and veracity not a word can be uttered. He 
is major of the First Regiment, National 
Guard of Delaware, and a business man of 
high standing in the town of Laurel. 

Major Wootten has made affidavit to the 
truth of his statement, which is being held in 
reserve to refute any denials that may be put 
forth by the accused parties. 

Major Wootten says that George E. Smith, 
the postmaster at Laurel, who was appointed 
by Higgins, came into his store about four 
weeks ago and told him he had been waiting 
a long time to talk politics with him. Smith, 
who is a republican “ worker ” of the most un¬ 
scrupulous kind, began by asking him, he 
says, what he expected to get out of politics, 
any way. 

He said that Wootten was a hard-working 
democrat, and the latter told him he didn’t 
expect to get anything unless Mr. Cleveland 
was elected. Smith went on to talk about the 
certainty of republican success, and finally 
told Wootten that if he would help the re¬ 
publicans they would surely carry Sussex 
county, in which case he should have “ any¬ 
thing he wanted.” He added that if Woot¬ 
ten didn’t believe him he would summon Sen¬ 
ator Higgins to Laurel to convince him. 

Wootten continues his story as follows : “ I 
felt like knocking Smith down when he ap¬ 
proached me in this way, but I wanted to find 
out from him all I could, and controlled my¬ 
self so I could get more from him. He went 
on to say that I could help the republicans as 
registrar by ‘ turning down democrats,’ that 
is, by registering republicans as qualified 
voters when they were not qualified. 

“He said if I wanted to, and just said the 
word, the democrats would make me voters, 
assistant, and if I was voters’ assistant I could 
so manipulate the tickets of illiterate voters’ 
that they wouldn’t know it, and that I could 
stamp the tickets so that democratic ballots 
would turn out to be stamped for the republi¬ 
cans when they came to be counted. 

“After our first talk in this way 1 immedi¬ 
ately consulted Col. William T. Records, of 
Laurel, who is a prominent democrat and the 
nominee of the democrats for state senator in 
our county. I asked him to go to Georgetown 
and see Alfred P. Robinson, chairman of the 
democratic county committee, and consult 
him as to what I should do to expose the fraud 
and bribery which I was satisfied the republi¬ 
cans contemplated in our county. 

“Col. Records went to Gtorgetown, and said 








402 


THE CIVEL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


he had seen Mr. Robinson, and ‘.hat they 
thought it best for me to lead Smith on and 
get what I could out of him.” 

Wootten goes on to say that Smith kept pur¬ 
suing him, and he kept on putting him off un¬ 
til he learned the decision that Records and 
Robinson had come to. Then he told Smith 
he could get the place of voters’ assistant, and 
Smith insisted on bringing Senator Higgins 
down to see him. A few days later Smith 
made an appointment with Wootten to come 
to his house on the night of October 13. 

Wootten goes on with his story thus: 

“About 10:30 or 11 o’clock I went up to 
Smith’s back door as he had requested, and he 
met me in his back yard and took me into his 
house, where I found Senator Anthony Hig¬ 
gins waiting for me. 

“Higgins began to talk about the certainty 
of Harrison’s election, and went on to mention 
what states he would carry. ‘Delaware is sure 
for him,’ says he. ‘If you will do this thing 
we’re all right.’ 

“He said that he would get me any place un¬ 
der the government I wanted outside the civil 
service. He said : ‘Of course, I can’t tell 
you what a third man will do, but Harrison 
will back me up and Noble will stand by me.’ 
The next morning Smith came to see me to 
talk to me, and said to me that Higgins meant 
what he said. 

“I reported all this to some of my friends^ 
and they told me try to get Mr. Higgins to 
promise me some particular place. So I said 
to Smith that I wanted the place in the land 
office that Gus Parsons, of Salisbury, had 
under Mr. Cleveland. 

“Smith told me that he wrote to Mr. Hig 
gins, and when he got a reply showed me Mr. 
Higgins’s letter. Higgins said that he didn’t 
see any Gus Parsons in the Blue book, but 
found that a J. A. Parsons, of Maryland, had 
an eighteen hundred dollar place. Smith 
told me that that wasn’t good enough for 
me. 

“The letter which Smith showed me was 
on one of Mr. Higgins’s letter-heads, and in a 
postscript Higgins told Smith to destroy the 
letter. 

“Last Saturday, when I was sitting on the 
board of registration, it was necessary to de¬ 
cide to strike off the names of some republi¬ 
cans who had been registered improperly as 
qualified voters. Smith came to me and said 
he didn’t understand what I meant by such 
action. I told him that he knew I could not 
do otherwise, with the democrats all around 
me knowing what I did, and I think he left 
me with the idea that everything was all 
right for his scheme. Wednesday night Smith, 
I think, went to see Mr. Higgins at some 
place where he was to speak, to find out a 
better place for me. I haven’t seen him 
since.” 

A representative of the associated press saw 
Senator Higgins this afternoon and handed 
him a copy of the paper containing the 
charges against him. Mr. Higgins said : 

“About two weeks ago, while I was at 


Laurel, Wootten called on me at the house of 
George Smith, informing me that he desired 
to change his political connection and to so¬ 
licit an office under the government. Having 
understood him to be a man of influence and 
good standing, I told him I thought an office 
could be had for him. Nothing was said 
about what work he should do for the repub¬ 
lican party ; nothing was said about his being 
registrar nor voters’ assistant; nor did I know 
he was a registrar, nor even hear that he was 
until a reporter so said to me to-day. Noth¬ 
ing was said as to his doing, nor did I have 
any understanding that he was to do anything 
on behalf of the republican party as an official, 
or in the discharge or abuse of any official 
duty. Subsequently, Mr. Smith wrote to me 
to know if Wootten could have a place in the 
land office held by one ‘Gus’ Parsons, and I 
replied that I could find no such person’s 
name in the Blue book, but only one John A. 
Parsons.”— WUminglon Dispatch to New York 
Times, October 30. 

* » * 

In his explanation of the attempted corrupt 
deal with Major Wootten for the vote of Sus¬ 
sex county, made public last night, Senator 
FTiggins practically admitted his connection 
with the unsavory affair, and also admitted 
having met Major Wootten at the house of 
Postmaster Smith, the other republican con¬ 
spirator, in Laurel. His declaration to this 
effect has been published all over the country. 

Last night telegrams were sent flying in all 
directions in a wild endeavor to find Smith 
and summon him to Wilmington, presumably 
for the purpose of holding a conference and 
agreeing upon some concerted explanation of 
the perplexing situation. But Smith failed 
to respond. This morning, however, realizing 
that it was incumbent upon him to say some¬ 
thing, and evidently unaware that Senator 
Higgins had admitted that he met Wootten at 
his house. Smith hastily wired to a newspaper 
in Wilmington the following dispatch: 

“Laukel, Del., Oct. 30. —Wootten’s state¬ 
ment is without a word of truth. I defy him 
to produce the letters. Wootten oflfered to sell 
the secrets of his party to me for a position. I 
mentioned the fact to Higgins and he refused 
to have a thing to do with the matter, and I 
declared the whole thing off with Wootten on 
Tuesday night last. He then became alarmed 
and made a lie out of the whole cloth, with 
the help of others in Wilmington, as a cut at 
an honorable senator. D. E. Smith.” 

This bold denial only puts a worse face on 
the affair, for while Higgins admits the Woot¬ 
ten interview. Postmaster Smith now asserts 
that Higgins declined to have anything to do 
with the attempted deal.— Wilmington Dispatch 
to New Yoj'k Times, October SI. 

» » « 

Another chapter in the republican plot to 
corrupt the vote of Sussex county is given in 
an affidavit made by Cyrus Ward, the demo¬ 
cratic nominee for treasurer of that county, a 
man who is well known and whose reputation 
stands indorsed by hundreds, if not thousands, 


who have heretofore recommended him for 
official appointment at the hands of the gover¬ 
nor. 

The affidavit shows that Mr. Ward was one 
of the men whom Senator Higgins went down 
to Laurel on October 13 to meet at Postmaster 
Smith’s house, and it further shows that the 
Rev. Jonathan S. Willis, the republican nom¬ 
inee for congress, is as lavish with the offer of 
federal appointments for party service as is 
Senator Higgins himself. 

In his affidavit Mr. Ward says: “About 
one week after the democratic county conven¬ 
tion at Georgetown, George Smith the post¬ 
master at Laurel, drove up to my sawmill at 
Coverdale Cross Roads, in Sussex county, 
where I was at work. In the carriage with 
him was Jonathan S. Willis, whom I knew 
only by sight. Mr. Smith got out of the car¬ 
riage and came into the mill. He asked me 
to come outside for a little talk, and we went 
to one side of the mill. He said : 

“You have been treated badly by the demo¬ 
cratic party and I would like to make a 
proposition to you to help us (meaning the 
republicans). I know you are a democrat, 
but if you will.do what we want I will see 
that you get a genteel, permanent and lucra¬ 
tive position.” 

“I didn’t ask him what it was, for I didn’t 
interest myself in what he was saying, but he 
went on to state that it was a clerkship; that 
the work would be easy and not more than 
eight hours a day, and that it would pay not 
less than $1,000 a year, and perhaps $1,200 or 
$1,500. During the conversation he said: 
“If you think favorably of this call at my 
store in Laurel.’ 

“As he was leaving he asked me to walk out 
to the carriage and meet Mr. Willis. To Mr. 
Willis he said: ‘Mr. Ward is a democrat and 
can do as much or more than any man in 
Little Creek Hundred. I have just told him 
that if he will help us this fall I will get 
him a good office that he will think some¬ 
thing of.’ 

“Mr. Willis spoke up and said : ‘If I am 
elected to congress, and every one says I will 
be, I will do all I can to carry out Mr. 
.'Smith’s suggestions in regard to federal posi¬ 
tions.’ 

‘T replied, ‘Very well,’ and they drove off. 

“On October 9, Mr. Smith drove to my house 
and said that he had seen Senator Higgins, 
and that the senator said he could get me a 
place not later than the 1st of January, and 
perhaps by the 1st of December. He repeated 
what he had said at the mill. He asked me if 
I knew how the democrats were going to spend 
their money. I told him I did not. He said : 

‘ We propose to hire them to stay at home, and 
that is the way we want you to work your 
men.’ I suppose he meant the men I have 
some influence with. He said they were giv¬ 
ing $5 to $10 apirce to them to stay at home. 

“Isaid: ‘If I should conclude to do this, 
and you should fail, where would I be?’ He 
replied: ‘We don’t expect you to do it all; 
we have lots of others who are working for us.’ 
I suppose by lots of others he meant demo¬ 
crats.” 

In conclusion, Mr. Ward says Mr. Smith set 
a date for him to meet Senator Higgins, but 
he. did not go.— Wilmington Dispatch to New 
York Times, November 3. 








The Civil Service chronicle. 


If we see nothing in our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoils, ive shall fail at every point.- 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November 18. 


VoL. I, No. 47. INDIANAPOLIS, JANUARY, 1893. teems 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Jnd, 

The arrangement under which the Civil 
Service Chronicle has been published 
will end with the next number. If no new 
arrangement is made the publication will 
then cease. The last number will be de¬ 
layed on account of the index and also to 
enable it to cover Harrison’s administra¬ 
tion to the end. It is not necessary to re¬ 
peat that no one except the printer and the 
postmaster is paid anything in connection 
with this publication. The accounts are 
open to the inspection of subscribers, and 
statements of them have been at frequent 
periods sent for inspection to various cen¬ 
ters where the Chronicle had large sup¬ 
port. If publication is discontinued all 
unexpired subscriptions will be returned 
and all funds left over will be under the 
order of those who contributed them. 
There will be no unpaid debts, and there 
is nothing in the four years’ career of the 
paper of which those who have been ac¬ 
tively connected with it are not frankly 
and openly proud. Many will be glad to 
see the Chronicle stop. 

Letter-carrier Dunn, of the Indianap¬ 
olis post-office, seems, by the account of his 
transactions printed in other columns, to 
have acted in deliberate and insolent de¬ 
fiance of the law. The evidence appears 
conclusive that he solicited contributions 
for political purposes of other federal offi¬ 
cers and that he did so in a federal build¬ 
ing. Postmaster Thompson did his duty 
in promptly dismissing Dunn. County 
Treasurer Backus figures in this busi¬ 
ness. He called upon the democratic em¬ 
ployes of the post-office to make up four 
hundred dollars to pay a debt of the county 
democratic committee. Having bidden 
them to the Hendricks club he took them 
into a room by themselves and told them 
that the next postmaster was named, and 
that he was a good democrat, and that 
those who contributed freely would be re¬ 
membered. Making his own hide safe, he 
puts up Dunn to violate the law. Again, 
after the election and after it is known that 
these employes will have a democrat over 
them, who, if he is dishonest, can trick 
them out of promotion or out of their 
places, he tells them that the next post¬ 
master is named, and that he is a good 


democrat, and that those who contribute 
freely will be remembered. There is a 
covert threat in this declaration that makes 
it inseparable from blackmailing. Those 
who do not contribute freely will be re¬ 
membered also. That is what the words 
mean. Further, these men are in the 
classified service. They get their places 
by competition, and their right to promo¬ 
tion rests upon their daily record of effi¬ 
ciency. There is no way of “ remember¬ 
ing” them, either by way of reward or 
punishment, without violating the law. 
This did not trouble Backus, but it will 
seriously trouble any one who tries to put 
it into practice. 

The transfer of all of the free-delivery 
post-offices and the weather bureau service 
by President Harrison to the classified 
service is the most notable event in civil 
service reform that has happened under 
this administration. In Indiana, for in¬ 
stance, instead of only one city many cities 
will aflFord a daily object lesson in the fair¬ 
est and most democratic method of distrib¬ 
uting public employment that has ever 
been discovered. It is to be regretted that 
the President did not see his way clear to 
transfer a much larger portion of the serv¬ 
ice. There is no fitness nor sense in going 
out into the streets and picking up ward- 
heelers, absolutely ignorant of the duties 
required and making them heads of di¬ 
visions in the Indianapolis post-office or in 
any other office as is now the practice, 
and the stupidity of the practice becomes 
intolerable when it is considered that these 
ward-heelers are made superintendents of 
highly skilled under-employes who are 
thus cut off from promotion. Nor is there 
any reason why the pension agency of this 
city with its twenty-five employes, should 
continue to be the family perquisite of the 
agent, nor that custom-houses and revenue 
offices of the country should again pre¬ 
sent disgraceful scenes of onslaught for 
spoil. But we are gladder than we can 
express to have this large extension to 
post-offices. It is another conclusive evi¬ 
dence that civil service reform is grind¬ 
ing the life out of favoritism in the pub¬ 
lic service. 

In the west we have seen in democratic 
quarters no criticism of the President’s 
action. The Buffalo Courier, which ought 
to know better, says that it was done with 


a design to keep republicans in office, and 
that President Cleveland took care not to 
put his transfer of the railway mail service 
to the classified service four years ago be¬ 
yond the power of his successor and there¬ 
fore he fixed the date of taking effect, 
March 15,1889. Like William Tell and 
the apple, this story will have to go the 
way of all the world. The date, March 15, 
was a clerical mistake, President Cleve¬ 
land having ordered and intended that 
February 15 should be the date. The 
Courier ought to know that this transfer of 
post-offices does not prevent the dismissal 
of unfit persons. Their places however 
must be filled by competition. Complaints 
against the extension of the rules at this 
particular time lead to the suspicion that 
the real grievance is that it so far prevents 
the quartering of a new lot of democratic 
politicians upon the public. It undoubtedly 
does do this unless the law is tricked. All 
the signs are that Mr. Cleveland does not 
intend to let it be tricked. In all places 
where the civil service law is to be newly 
applied civil service reformers should crit¬ 
ically watch every movement made. There 
should be a local committee of one or more 
determined men, self-constituted if neces¬ 
sary, whose business should be to note 
every departure from absolutely fair deal¬ 
ing with competitors. In Indiana the state 
civil service reform association should ap¬ 
point such committees. 


There is still undoubtedly a wide-spread 
feeling that competitors who are not of the 
party in power stand no chance. A great 
change has taken place in this respect. 
Many postmasters take pride in a rigid 
and impartial enforcement of the law and 
in a short time it will be regarded as a 
public disgrace, rather than as an evidence 
of “smartness” for any officer to try to “beat” 
the fair intent of the law. Public opinion 
more and more requires that the highest 
on the list shall be taken, unless there is a 
good business reason for passing to the 
second or third. In the coming four years 
it is to be hoped that all parties and creeds 
will crowd the eligible lists. 


No honest democrat can complain of any 
number of transfers to the classified service. 
The democratic platform says that the 
offices ought not to be subject to change at 
every election and the only way at present 





















404 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


to carry out this principle is to place the 
offices under the civil service law. Pres¬ 
ident Cleveland ought to complete what 
Harrison has left undone. We are glad to 
see the civil service rules extended at any 
time. The merit system can fight its way 
against any odds. But now at the end of 
two successive administrations and after 
the offices in question had been filled with 
partisans, large extensions have been made. 
This process puts the hardest possible 
strain upon the law, because partisans 
of the incoming administration claim 
that they have been “euchred” and are 
tempted to evade the law—a temptation 
Harrison’s administration shamelessly 
yielded to and thus started on the road to 
final defeat. The law should now have its 
turn and should be given a fair chance. 
Whatever President Cleveland is going to 
do, he ought to do early. It is established 
beyond question that a process of turning 
out republicans and putting in democrats 
will weaken the party of the latter. Then 
why do it? Why not put an end to the 
matter by extending the rules to all offices 
to which they are applicable ? The estab¬ 
lishment of the registry system for the la¬ 
bor service is a simple matter, and if con¬ 
gress will not do it, it can be done by an 
executive order. Then let it be under¬ 
stood that there will be no headsman of 
fourth-class postmasters and no fourth-class 
post-offices to be vacated until congress has 
made it practicable to fill them without 
favoritism. 

Among the backwoods jokes may be put 
down the late introduction of a bill by 
Congressman DeArmond, a Missouri dem¬ 
ocrat, to suspend all civil service rules dur¬ 
ing the first year of each presidential term. 
And very much like it is the bill lately in¬ 
troduced by Congressman Martin of this 
state to limit the terms of all federal em¬ 
ployes to four years. Why not include 
the Atlas Engine Works of this city where 
about a thousand men are employed ? The 
trouble with all of these men is that with 
a blindness like Egyptian darkness they 
will not see that the same principles apply 
to public and private business. They 
think that in public business there is some¬ 
thing else than mere business principles— 
that there is something left over. At pres¬ 
ent there is something over. There is 
money to pay to political blackmailers. 
There is time to be watch-dogs for con¬ 
gressmen. There is time to sec up pri¬ 
maries for the renomination of a Presi¬ 
dent. There is time to howl down opposi¬ 
tion in and around a national convention 
and to do many other things to carry out 
the “policy” of an administration. For 
more than twenty years congressmen 
alone have stood in the way of ridding the 
service of these badges of feudalism and 
imperialism. 


Mr. Clevelanp need not fear that the 
people are anything but thoroughly satis¬ 
fied with his openly expressed opinion that 
Murphy ought not to be senator from New 
York. No one outside of a lot of cheap 
politicians is in the least concerned at this 
“ interference.” Murphy, like Quay, is the 
final and finished product of the system by 
which a party machine gets control of the 
public offices and public contracts of a 
state and treats them as plunder. When 
it is understood that only those who will 
obey certain bosses can have any chance at 
this plunder, such present themselves and 
are employed. Then follow subservient 
primaries, conventions, and, later, a legis¬ 
lature absolutely under these bosses. This 
body will choose a statesman for senator if 
the bosses say so; or it will, if ordered, 
choose a smart political rounder like Mur¬ 
phy. New York politics will not sink any 
lower. Mr. Cleveland ought to be at open, 
irreconcilable, relentless war with this 
whole crowd, Murphy can not live politi¬ 
cally without spoil to divide. Deprived of 
this, he would pass away as efllectually as 
Roscoe Conkling did for the same reason. 

When it is doubted that Mr. Cleveland 
will be ruled by congressmen in the mat¬ 
ter of appointments, the Bourbons answer 
glibly that he will want the support of sen¬ 
ators and representatives and will there¬ 
fore have to yield to them. Mr. Cleveland 
is not a safe man to try the stand-and-de- 
liver policy on. This is an old plan, and it 
has always been more or less successful; 
but it may net succeed with Mr. Cleveland. 
Suppose, for instance, he should conclude 
not to allow Senator Turpie to appoint a 
postmaster at Indianapolis; what could 
Turpie do? Nothing but sit in the senate 
and look glum. And what could Senator 
Voorhees do if cut off from naming the 
Terre Haute postmaster? Nothing but 
bluster. It is said that the senate would 
not confirm nominations. Then let them 
go unconfirmed. There is no greater hum¬ 
bug than this pretense of the terrible things 
congressmen will do if the President does 
not knuckle to them. Before a determined 
President they would go down like men of 
straw, or up like smoke before a wind. 

President Patton, of Princeton college, is reported 
to have recently said; “ I am interested in philoso¬ 
phy and theology, and these are the only things I 
want to be known in. I vote for neither party.” It 
is a stigma upon President Patton, an American citi¬ 
zen, to show such callousness to his duty.—Civil 
Service Chronicle. 

If President Patton is correctly reported he 
must have said : “I vote for neither party ” 
with a twinkle in his eye, for he is not an 
American citizen. He was born on the island 
of Bermuda and has never been naturalized, 
because if he did certain property interests in 
Bermuda would be alienated .—Indianapolis 
News. 

The Civil Service Chronicle is also in 
receipt of a private letter containing sim¬ 


ilar information. As the purported state¬ 
ment of President Patton was seen in the 
New York Evening Post some days before 
the late election, and was never contra¬ 
dicted, it seemed just to comment upon a 
college president who could say: “lam in¬ 
terested in philosophy and theology, and 
these are the only things I want to be 
known in.” This paper is very glad if it 
is in error. 

When Tammany pursues its bold and 
iniquitous way in New York because of 
the indifference, selfishness and party big¬ 
otry of the decent citizens; when Quay is 
returned to the senate by influences of the 
same character in Pennsylvania, there is 
nothing more depressing than to see young 
college men return to their homes such 
political bigots that they smother all their 
moral senses regarding their own party, 
or to see them return “interested in phi¬ 
losophy and theology,” society or foot ball, 
but bored by any intimation that they 
have, as citizens, pressing, disagreeable 
and continuous duties to perform. There is 
no doubt but-that nearly all American col¬ 
leges are failures so far as turning out 
young men who have an active conscience 
for the duties of citizenship. 


The police commissioners of New York 
wanted a police matron, and, as the place 
was within the civil service law, the city 
civil service authorities put the competitive 
examination under the charge of Mrs. Jose¬ 
phine Shaw Lowell and Miss Edith Collins 
as being especially fitted to test applicants 
in the duties required. There were 114 
applicants, and of these only 39 were found 
fit for a place on the eligible list. All, how¬ 
ever, were graded in the order of merit. 
In the eighty-fourth place on the list was 
one, Mrs. Lizzie Molony, who had come to 
the examination saying that she expected 
to ge*t the place because she had political 
influence. There were ten weights, and 
experience was to count two. Mrs. Mo¬ 
lony was found to be without experience of 
any kind, even in housekeeping. The re¬ 
sults of the examination were handed in 
and Mrs. Molony was promptly appointed 
to the matronship. The Tammany civil 
service board had taken the papers and 
given Molony 65 for experience where the 
examiners who had tested her had given 
nothing, and 95 for technical knowledge 
and intelligence where the ladies gave her 
60, and 100 for writing where the ladies 
gave 60, and, after some other dextrous 
turns, behold a new eligible list with 101 
names, and Lizzie Molony standing first. 
That is the incorruptible way in which 
Tammany does business. Lizzie Molony 
turns out to be a professional beggar of 
twelve years’ standing, and her touching 
appeals for “ aid ” addressed to various in¬ 
dividuals cover pages of the records of the 
charity organization society of New York. 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


405 


Republican papers are spending their 
time abusing mugwumps and urging their 
party to “organize” at once for future 
work. Mugwumps who know how to re¬ 
member facts and how to use them in a 
campaign are amused at any plan which 
proposes to attain success by organizing 
a party machine. Republicans may or¬ 
ganize until they get their last man into 
some club and make him a blind and stu¬ 
pid follower of their Quays and Platts and 
yet they will lack votes, and before they 
get the lacking votes they will have to 
learn the simple rule of keeping promises. 
They know what their platform was in 
1888 in relation to extending the civil serv¬ 
ice law. Yet we do not recollect having 
seen anywhere any intimation to President 
Harrison before the late defeat from any 
republican paper, or club, or party commit¬ 
tee, or convention, or organization of any 
kind, that he ought to make additions to 
the classified service as the platform prom¬ 
ised. The few individual republicans like 
Sherman S. Rogers and Theodore Roose¬ 
velt who urged him to do this were put 
down by the mass of active republicans as 
no better than mugwumps. By this and 
other treachery the republicans have sue 
ceeded in driving almost every progressive 
man out of their party and “organization” 
will not make up the loss. 


The Netv York Recorder prints an inter¬ 
view with John Sabine Smith which shows 
a truly chastened spirit. Being stranded 
beyond all chance of getting offices, and 
being without power to put republican 
“principles” into practice, all should work 
to establish those principles “without fear 
or favor.” Smith says : 

“ Being practically out of power at oiice iii the na¬ 
tion, state and city, there is hot much left for repub¬ 
licans except the principles of the party, which are 
eternally true, and the heritage of its great men and 
great deeds of the past. Once more we can look each 
other in the face and discuss the great questions of 
the day without fear of jostling aside any one from 
hisambition to secure office. Therefore, there seems to 
me to be no good reasou why all of us should not pull 
together for the establishment of these great princi¬ 
ples without fear or favor. This, I believe, will unite 
and vitalize the party to a degree it has not known 
since the days of its inception. It is not so much a 
question of kind or form of organization as it is to 
bring the whole line into harmonious action for a 
common purpose.” 


“APPOINTMENTS” BY CONGRESS¬ 
MEN. 

Bourbon democrats and democratic pa- 
papers in Indiana are blandly expatiating 
upon the blessedness of the President hav¬ 
ing congressmen to make appointments 
to offices for him throughout the country. 
All through this state, as our columns 
show, congressmen have gone to work 
hearing applications and deciding whom 
they will “appoint” to all the federal of¬ 
fices, without any apparent knowledge 


that the constitution absolutely lodges 
this duty elsewhere, and without the least 
apparent thought that President Cleve¬ 
land may have a mind of his own in this mat¬ 
ter and may tell them plainly that they are 
officious and pestiferous meddlers. Con¬ 
gressman Bynum will allow Senator Turpie 
to “ appoint ” the postmaster at Indianapo¬ 
lis, and Turpie is giving a large portion of 
his time to hearing claimants and their 
friends and backers. Congressman Brook¬ 
shire will allow Senator Voorhees to “ap¬ 
point ” the postmaster at Terre Haute and 
Senator Voorhees regrets “ that there are 
so few offices to be given to so many 
worthy and capable applicants.” It is to 
him “a most painful duty to be compelled 
to decide between friends who are equally 
meritorious and capable.” Congressman 
Cooper has been traveling from town to 
town in his district solely to hear appli¬ 
cants and their backers and determine 
whom he will “appoint” to the various 
offices, and so on to the end. Is Indiana 
never to be relieved of moss-backed, hide¬ 
bound, dyed-in-the-wool Bourbons ? Every 
one of these men indorsed a platform 
which said that the offices ought not to be 
subject to change at every election and yet 
before Mr. Cleveland is inaugurated they 
are working day and night to bring about 
such a change. Will they never learn that 
civil administration in this country is ad¬ 
vancing, and that the methods under 
Pierce and Buchanan are not the methods 
of to-day ? The interference of congress¬ 
men in federal appointments is not only a 
usurpation of power belonging to the ex¬ 
ecutive, but it is an unmixed and unmiti¬ 
gated evil and has been so regarded by the 
best men of all parties for many years. 
The practice is destined to be completely 
broken up and a congressman who had a 
single element of the statesman in him 
would be trying, as Mr. Andrew tries, to 
find some way to hasten the end. Yet not 
a single Indiana congressman ever thinks 
of the subject with so much attention as 
he gives to a single cross-roads post-office. 
Again, the merit system in its different 
forms adapted to the labor service, the 
classified service and the selection of 
fourth-class post-masters is going to pre¬ 
vail in the federal service. Its opponents 
all recognize and reluctantly admit that 
“ it has come to stay.” Next to the relief 
of the country from slavery, this revolution 
now going on will take rank. Yet it has 
not the good-will of a single Indiana con¬ 
gressman. 

PROCEEDINGS OF THE GENERAL 
ASSEMBLY OF INDIANA. 

For every member of the legislature who 
came in here to-day there arrived not less 
than two men who wanted office under the 
general assembly, or who had frieinls whom 


they desired to help along. The men who 
are after the principal offices have nearly 
all been at the hotel since Saturday, with 
no material at hand on which to work, and 
when the law-makers began to drop in this 
forenoon, singly and in couples, they were 
pounced on as a drove of hungry wolves 
would pounce upon a flock of sheep. Old 
politicians declare that the crowd of office- 
seekers that has preceded the members to 
the city is the hungriest they have ever 
come in contact with. If it were left to the 
candidates for the principal offices to make 
all the noise, there wouldn’t be a great deal 
of interest in the contest; it is the men 
who desire appointments under the suc¬ 
cessful aspirants for the best places that 
are doing the hardest work. It is esti¬ 
mated that there are, all told, over one 
thousand of these place-seekers, and each 
one has his favorite candidate for door¬ 
keeper, or secretary of one of the houses. 
Some two or three hundred aspirants for 
five-dollar-a-day places are from this city, 
and they are not permitting the floor of 
the hotel corridor to get cold under their 
feet .—Indianapolis News, January 2. 

The usual activity preceding the meeting 
of the legislature is at its bight at the state 
house. The number of visitors is large, and 
as the time grows shorter the office-seekers 
fairly swarm in and out of the building. 
They seem to have centered their clamor 
at the Capitol on Governor-elect Matthews, 
and his office is constantly besieged by the 
aspirants. As soon as the doors of his of¬ 
fice are opened in the morning the stream 
of men begins to pour in, and continues 
until the closing hours in the afternoon. 

The candidates have all kinds of founda¬ 
tions upon which they think the secretary 
of state can base his indorsement of their 
causes. One candidate sought Mr. Mat¬ 
thews’ aid in securing an appointment in 
the legislature, basing his claims on having 
knocked a man down during the campaign 
for having said some slighting things about 
the secretary. It is authoritatively an¬ 
nounced that JMyrou D. King will be Mr. 
Matthews’s private secretary, and Miss 
Callie McMechen will be the clerk in the 
governor’s office. Miss McMechen is the 
first woman that was ever appointed to the 
position in this state. The appointment of 
the messenger has not yet been announced. 
The appointment of secretary of state to 
serve eight days, and other appointments 
to be made by the new governor, have not 
been made public .—Indianapolis News, Jan¬ 
uary 4 . 

The struggle for the minor positions in 
the two houses began last night immedi¬ 
ately after the caucus ended. The nomi¬ 
nees were besieged and importuned upon 
every side by an army of applicants rep¬ 
resenting almost every county in the state. 
The hotel corridors and the lobbies in the 
capitol building swnrmed Avith them. The 










406 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


successful candidates were given a taste of 
what political success means.— Indianapo¬ 
lis Sentinel, January 5. 

THE HOUSE. 

Chief Clerk Crawley, of the house, has 
not made up his list of subordinates, and 
will not until the house decides how many 
men he shall have. Mr, Crawley says J. A. 
Marlowe, of Terre Haute; Benjamin F. 
Harrell, of Fayette county ; Edward Leffel, 
Tipton, will be on his force when it is made 
up. He has not yet decided what work he 
will assign them. 

Doorkeeper Grazebrook will not make up 
his force until the house has had a report 
from the committee appointed to fix the 
number of employes and their salaries.— 
Indianapolis News, Jan. 5. 

In the house the method was not pre¬ 
cisely the same. Curtis and Crawley had 
each several managers, as did Carter, but 
McMahon, of Fulton, “handled” Glaze- 
brook alone. Crawley has nine men under 
him, which will probably be increased to 
thirteen; Carter has seven, and will have 
probably eleven, while Glazebrook will have 
twenty. They will get their lists this morn¬ 
ing. Crawley was rather anxious last night 
to know whom he would appoint. Bud 
Swift, for chief enrolling clerk, was about 
the only one he knew anything about. “I 
can’t give out Glazebrook’s appointments 
to-night,” said McMahon, when asked for 
the list by a Journal reporter. “Yes, I 
am distributing his patronage, but I got 
through with only fifteen promises, and 1 
have five places I can do as I please with, 
so I shall not complete the list to-night.” 
Marion county, however, is to get five door¬ 
keepers and four clerkships, and the dele¬ 
gation is taking much glory to itself there¬ 
for. The celebrated “ Jack ” Higgins, John 
Mullen and “Mike” Welch are to go on 
doors, and a young man named Derry is to 
have a minor clerkship .—Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, .Tanuary 5. 

The only patronage Speaker Curtis will 
have to distribute will be the places on 
committees and the appointing of five 
pages. There are already a half hundred 
or more applications for the latter places 
and each hour the number grows rapidly. 
—Indianapolis Sentinel, January 6. 

About the lobby of the Grand Hotel still 
lingers a horde of minor place-hunters. The 
men who have the patronage of the house 
at their disposal decline to give out any list 
of appointees until the committee appoint¬ 
ed yesterday to determine the size of the 
force, and their compensation, reports, and 
that committee will probably withhold its 
report until Monday in the hope that the 
crowd will starve out, and thin out, and 
thus give the place-givers some chance for 
their lives. The committee was in session 


all yesterday afternoon. The force of clerks 
will not be cut, and the time for employing 
the copyists will be fixed about January 20, 
instead of January 26, as two years ago. 
All sub-clerks will receive $5 per day. 
iMembers of the doorkeeper’s force will re¬ 
ceive $5 per day from the start, instead of 
starting in at $4, and being granted an ex¬ 
tra dollar a day back pay at the end of the 
seseion, as was done in 1891. This force 
will not be cut. The only question is wheth¬ 
er or not Tim Griffin shall be allowed seven 
extra janitors at $40 a month, as was done 
in 1891, or only five .—Indianapolis Journal, 
January 7. 

John F. Habernel, of Harrison county, is 
serving as postmaster of the house. It is 
understood that John Mullen, Kepresenta- 
tive Wilson’s appointee of this county, is to 
have the place eventually. 

The house pages on duty are Harry Bus- 
kirk, Frank Palmer, Leon Smith, James 
Kackney, Raymond Preston, Frank Fippen, 
Burrie Redmond, James Burke and Flarry 
Doyle. 

Miss Cora M. Alexander, of this county, 
has been appointed house stenographer and 
typewriter .—Indianapolis News, January 9. 

The caucuses that followed the adjourn¬ 
ment of the house this forenoon were for the 
consideration of the question of employes. 
The committee that was appointed the first 
day of the session has been having a hard 
time to agree upon a report. After wrest¬ 
ling with the question Saturday and most 
of yesterday the democratic members of 
the committee decided to leave the matter 
to a caucus of the democrats of the house. 
The three democratic members of the com¬ 
mittee, through Chairman Cullop, reported 
that they had decided to recommend the 
appointment of twenty assistant doorkeep¬ 
ers and sixteen assistant clerks. The re¬ 
port was adopted, hut not without opposi¬ 
tion. Twenty-six members voted against 
the appointment of so many doorkeepers, 
and it is possible that these twenty-six may 
not abide by the decision of the caucus, but 
may join with the republicans in cutting 
down the number of doorkeepers. It was 
also decided by the democratic caucus that 
the pay of the assistant doorkeepers and 
assistant clerks shall be $5 a day each. 

The republicans, as soon as they learned 
that the democrats were caucusing, went 
into hiding to also consider the question of 
employes. It was the unanimous vote of 
the caucus that the minority oppose any 
effort to increase the number of employes 
over that fixed be statute. It was decided 
not to object to the five-dollar-a-day pay 
of efficient clerks and doorkeepers.— Indian¬ 
apolis News, January 9. 

“ Syd” Moon, the new reporter of the Su¬ 
preme Court, is all right. He got one son 
in as postmaster of the house and another 
as assistant in the state museum, and a 


nephew as page in the house. “ Calamity 
Jim” Fippen, the Tipton reformer, has se¬ 
cured a job for his boy as page in the house. 
While the little pages were discussing the 
matter yesterday one of them offered a res¬ 
olution that “no member be permitted to 
bring his sons, daughters, wife or hired girl 
down here to be ipaid.”--Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, January 10. 

Clerk Crawley, of the house, is still ab¬ 
sent, and his appointments are not yet an¬ 
nounced. Assistant Clerk Carter has filled 
his force, but declines to give out the list 
as yet. However, he had at work yester¬ 
day, W. I. Zacharias, ex-sheriff of Frank¬ 
lin county ; Frank J. Kapps, of Vincennes ; 
Mr. Buskirk, of Bloomington; T. C. AVill- 
iams, of Terre Haute, and E. H. Deery, of 
this city. 

Door-keeper Glazebrook also declines as 
yet to give out his list. His chief assistant 
is F. N. Hoffman, of Rochester, and he had 
on the doors yesterday W. E. Peterson, of 
Plymouth, W. H. Winters, of Goshen, Syl¬ 
vester Bertrain,of Starke county, and Philip 
Dellinger, of Pulaski .—Indianapolis ,Tour- 
nal, .January 10. 

Cullop and his faction favored fixing the 
doorkeeper’s force where it was last session, 
at twenty-two all told, fifteen doormen at 
$5 per day, a raise of $1 per day, and seven 
janitors at $45 per month, a raise of $5 per 
month over last session. This did not sat¬ 
isfy McMahon and his crowd, and an acri¬ 
monious discussion followed, in the course 
of which two or three of Cullop’s followers 
declared they would not be bound by the 
caucus. Cullop put his views in the form 
of a motion, and Rodebaugh, of Fort Wayne, 
moved to amend by having twenty, instead 
of fifteen, men on the door, and two extra 
copying clerks. When it came to a vote 
the McMahon crowd won by four votes, the 
vote standing 26 to 30, and Mr. Cullop, as 
chairman of the committee, was directed 
to report in favor of twenty doormen at $5 
per day, and seven janitors at $45 per 
month, making the total number of em¬ 
ployes of the house, pages, doormen, clerks 
and janitors all told, fifty-eight, or over 
half as many as there are members. Daily, 
Blair, Cravens and one other member there¬ 
upon bolted and left the room. Cullop and 
his friends were feeling pretty badly over 
this after the caucus, as a little group, con¬ 
taining Daily, Hill, Higby and others, dis¬ 
cussed it about Cullop’s desk. “ They are 
entirely needless,” said Mr. Cullop, “ and I 
had no idea but what our report would go 
through, but we got left and all these men 
will be employed.” One of the group sug¬ 
gested voting with the minority, but Daily 
couldn’t vote for anything republican, even 
though it were religion itself, and the group 
broke up without determining upon any 
line of action. The republican minority 
decided to report in favor of the number 
of doormen allowed by statute, seven, which 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


407 


is all that is needed. When the house con¬ 
vened after the inauguration ceremonies, 
about its first and only business was the 
presentation of the majority report of this 
special committee on house employes, by 
Cullop. It recommended seven janitors at 
$45 per month, twenty doorkeepers at $5 
per day, seven assistants to the clerk at $5 
a day, beginning at once, and three at the 
same salary beginning January 20, seven 
assistants to the assistant clerk, beginning 
at once and receiving $5 per day, five com¬ 
mittee clerks at $5 per day, and four pages 
at $2 per day. These, with the postmaster 
and speaker’s page, make fifty-eight em¬ 
ployes. The report had a useless paragraph 
on the end of it, making it a little bit diffi¬ 
cult to further increase the horde or their 
pay, put in to ease Cullop’s conscience.— 
Indianapolis News, January 11. 

Chairman Cullop, of the house commit¬ 
tee, appointed to fix the number of employes 
the house should have, and their compensa¬ 
tion, reported to the house yesterday after¬ 
noon, after the inaugural ceremonies. The 
majority report recommended an increase 
in the force. It favored the employment of 
seven janitors, at $45 per month; of twenty 
assistant door-keepers, at $5 per day; seven 
assistants to the chief clerk, at $5 per day, 
and three additional assistants on and af¬ 
ter January 20; seven assistants to the as¬ 
sistant clerk, at $5 per day ; five committee 
clerks, at $5 per day, and five pages, at $2 
per day. The report of the minority of the 
committee was presented by Representa¬ 
tive Brown, of Steuben county. It recom¬ 
mended that the house employ the number 
of persons allowed by statute. In the dis¬ 
cussion of the report. Representative Cul¬ 
lop, who had presented the report of the 
majority of the committee, stated that the 
report was not what he desired; that the 
majority had been against him, and he 
concluded to carry out the will of that ma¬ 
jority. Representative Lindemuth spoke 
for the republicans. He called the atten¬ 
tion of the democrats to the fact that they 
had just returned from the corridor below 
where they had heard Governor Matthews, 
in his inaugural address, caution the legis¬ 
lature to be careful of the people’s money. 
The minority report was tabled by a viva 
voce vote. The roll was called on the adop¬ 
tion of the majority report, and eight dem¬ 
ocrats bolted the caucus instructions and 
voted against the increase of the force. 
The eight were Representatives Blair, of 
Cass and Miami; Johnson, of Dearborn; 
Gill, of Huntington ; Smith, of Posey ; Hig- 
bee,of Sullivan; Montoux, of Vanderburgh ; 
Cravens, of Washington, and Farlow, of 
Madison. The bolters nearly all explained 
their votes by saying that they had been 
sent to the legislature with the under¬ 
standing that they would favor economy 
in the management of state affairs; they 
could not understand why the house needed 
more employes than it had two years ago. 


The report of the majority of the commit¬ 
tee was adopted by a vote of 53 to 44.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, January 1^. 

It was evident before the house assem¬ 
bled this afternoon that the majority was 
not in good humor. It was related that 
the bolters of yesterday who were so “ sat 
upon” by the speaker during the morning 
were mad, very mad. The keeper of the 
door to Speaker Curtis’s room was busy. 
There were a score or more of members who 
wanted to get the speaker’s ear. Among 
those Avho called was Chairman Taggart, 
of the democratic state committee. When 
Mr. Taggart came out of the room he stated 
that “all is now peaceable.” There was 
much caucusing on the floor of the house, 
and it was finally stated, in private, that 
the “bolters” had been persuaded not to 
bring up the employe question again.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, January W. 

Barnes has been mollified. He kicked up 
such a row about the place he was prom¬ 
ised for a friend that the other democrats 
offered to make another place at the state’s 
expense if he would quit. He got them to 
carry out their promise, but did not quit. 
Accordingly, yesterday morning early he 
moved to give Clerk Crawley authority to 
appoint a roll-clerk, and the motion was 
declared carried by the speaker on a viva 
voce vote. Barnes had threatened to offer 
a resolution ousting Door-keeper Glaze- 
brook. But the howl of the “sore-heads,” 
as the disappointed members are denomi¬ 
nated by the rest of the democrats, had 
gotten beyond Barnes’s control. He could 
not have shut off the subsequent row if he 
would, and probably would not if he could. 
During the call for new bills McIntyre, of 
Floyd, offered a resolution reducing the 
number of door-keepers from twenty to 
fifteen, and immediately there were signs 
of war. Collins at once moved to table it, 
and Passage raised the point of order that 
this whole business had been settled and 
clinched on Tuesday by tabling a motion 
to reconsider. McIntyre tried to answer 
the point, and claimed that it was in order 
at any time to increase or reduce the force. 
Collins tried to insist on Passage’s point of 
order, but the speaker reminded him that 
it would be easier to insist on his motion 
to table. He did so, and the speaker was 
declaring it tabled when there was such a 
howl for the yeas and nays that he had to 
listen to it. - 

As the roll-call proceeded it became ap¬ 
parent that the salary-grabbers were wiped 
out. The republicans, consistent in their 
fight for economy, voted against the mo¬ 
tion to table, and the F. M. B. A. combine 
and “ sore-heads ” did the rest. Ader and 
Hench and some of the other noble re¬ 
formers were in a tight place, and dodged 
the vote until it was all over, when they 
asked permission to vote with the crowd. 

Quite a number of these claimed to have 


voted with the majority in order to recon¬ 
sider, and it is known that Erwin, Lowe 
and Stover did. When the vote was an¬ 
nounced, McMullen at once moved to refer 
the McIntyre resolution to a special com¬ 
mittee of three, and though there was a 
storm of nays, the speaker declared this 
carried. The speaker declined to announce 
the committee until to-day. Door-keeper 
Glazehrook at once consulted the roll and 
made up a black-list, knocked off his force 
the proteges of those who voted against 
him, and made up his “official” list of em¬ 
ployes .—Indianapolis Journal, January 13. 


THE SENATE. 

There was some surprise this afternoon 
when Lon McClellan, of this county, can¬ 
didate for doorkeeper of the Senate, with¬ 
drew from the race. The understanding 
is that Marion county forced Mr. McClel¬ 
lan off the track. Mr. McClellan was as¬ 
sured that he would be elected if he con¬ 
sented not to make any appointments from 
Marion county. Mr. McClellan declined 
to make any such promise, and stepped 
out of the race. He said in reference to 
his action : 

“ In withdrawing from the race for door¬ 
keeper of the senate, I desire to return my 
thanks to the senators from every part of 
the state who so generously tendered me 
their support. My chief reason for with¬ 
drawal lies in the fact that I could not ob¬ 
tain the place without giving up the right 
to name my own assistants. It would have 
been impossible for me to reward my many 
friends in Marion county. I want no place 
for myself that will not benefit my party 
associates here at home. I was not a can¬ 
didate in the beginning, but became such 
at the unanimous request of our senators. 
So far as honor goes, this is honor enough 
for me .”—Indianapolis News, January /f. 


The senate cabal has attended to all this 
very systematically. In this “combine” 
are twenty-six senators—none from Marion 
county. In their caucus at the Grand Tues¬ 
day morning they not only agreed upon the 
“slate,” but also appointed a committee 
three to distribute the petty patronage. 
That committee consists of senators Chand¬ 
ler, of Hancock; Fulk, of Monroe, and Mc- 
Kelvey, of'Owen. These statesmen met at 
the English Hotel last night, compared 
notes on promises, and made out therefrom 
a partial list. They were unable to see 
some senators to whom patronage had been 
promised, and could not complete it. 

This petty patronage consists of a read¬ 
ing, roll, registry and file clerk, and five 
enrolling and engrossing clerks, nominally 
appointed by the secretary; a minute 
clerk, journal clerk and five copying clerks, 
nominally appointed by the assistant sec¬ 
retary ; a postmaster, folding clerk, mail- 
carrier and fifteen doormen, cloak-room 
men, spittoon cleaners, etc., nominally ap- 







408 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


pointed by the doorkeeper. But last night 
Messrs. Pleasants, Friedman and Mannix 
confessed to a Journal reporter that they 
had no idea whom they would appoint this 
morning. “ Haven’t received my list yet,” 
was the answer of each.— Indianapolis News, 
January 5. 

The demand for subordinate positions 
was not unusual, but it was felt to an un¬ 
comfortable extent by the legislators. In 
the senate the entire matter of appoint¬ 
ments was referred by caucus agreement 
to a committee composed of Senators Mc- 
Kelvey, Chandler, Ellison and Holcomb. 
These gentlemen had a merry time farm¬ 
ing out the places, and had not completed 
the task to-day. The heads of the various 
departments were notified that “ their ap¬ 
pointments” included the following: 

FOR PRINCIPAL SECRRTARY, PLEASANTS. 

R. T. F. Abbott, Switzerland county, file clerk. 

John McNew, Hancock county, reading clerk. 

George H. Ball, Tippecanoe county, registry clerk. 

Messrs. Spangler, of Huntington county, and H. H. 
Miller, of Marshall, engrossing clerks. 

0. B. Burrell, Jackson, enrolling clerk. 

A. M. Waltz, Blackford, roll clerk. 

W. E. Stillwell, Gibson, unassigned. 

FOR ASSISTANT SECRETARY, JOSEPH FRIEDMAN. 

Charles Zuckreigel, Spencer county, journal clerk. 

John Holland, Lawrence county, journal clerk. 

Joseph B. Workman, Owen county, minute clerk 
(same as in 1891). 

Charles Collins. Miami county, journal clerk. 

J. M. Aiken, Sullivan, and Mr. Stillwell, of Gibson, 
journal clerks. 

FOR W.T. MANNIX, DOOR KEEPER. 

James Brovard, James Barnett, Charles F. Waltz, 
John Crabtree, William Snyder, Peter Hoffman, W. 
W. Kintner, W. L. Hulett, John Smith and five more 
not yet selected. 

John C. Brophy, Minnie E. Galbresth and John 
Francin were added to the door-keeper's force this 
afternoon. Miss Galbreath will not “keep doors,” 
but will be one of the folding clerks. The others are 
not yet assigned. 

PAGES. 

Fred Trevely, Warren; George Schley, Marion; O. 
Beck, Carroll: Leo. Lefkovits, La.kQ.—Indianapolis 
News, January 5. 

The work of senators getting their sons 
positions as pages at $2 a day, progressed 
fairly well yesterday. Senator Beck, of 
Pulaski, and French, of Warren, both un- 
blushingly accomplishing the delicate task. 
—Indianapolis Journal, January 6. 

Senator Sweeny, of Perry, has seen, prob¬ 
ably, more public service than any other 
man of his age in the senate. He has been 
sheriff three times, door-keeper of the sen¬ 
ate, and was in the secret service under 
Cleveland. He is now engaged in farming 
near Tell City. He is yet a young man, and 
while not a public speaker, he knows what 
is going on and does not get left when it 
comes to obtaining patronage for his dis¬ 
trict, which also embraces Dubois. Mr. 
Sweeny championed Mr. Friedman’s cause 
in his successful race for assistant secre¬ 
tary.— Indianapolis Sentinel, January 7. 

Just before adjourning yesterday morn¬ 
ing, Senator Loveland, of Miami, offered 
this resolution; 


Whereas, The debt of the state of Indiana is more 
than 88,000,(X)0, and 

Whereas, The taxes levied for the support of the 
state and its institutions are burdensome, and were 
increased at the last session of the legislature, ren¬ 
dering rigid economy necessary, to the end that the 
debt and the taxes may be reduced, and 

Whereas, Upon yesterday a resolution was passed 
by this senate providing for the appointment of 
eleven doorkeepers of the senate in addition to the 
four provided for in Section No. 4970 of the Revised 
Statutes of 1881, making a total force of fifteen, and 

Whereas, There are only ten doors to the senate 
chamber, including all the doors to the gallery, 
cloak-room and ante room; therefore 

Resolved, That a committee of three senators be 
appointed to investigate and make report to the sen¬ 
ate on Tuesday, January 10,1893, with recommenda¬ 
tions as to the number of doorkeepers and assistant 
doorkeepers actually necessary for the dispatch of 
the business of the Senate, and with such report 
state the facts on which such recommendation is 
based. 

Before tlie resolution was read. Senator 
McHugh, of Tippecanoe, rose to a point of 
order claiming that it was no time for res¬ 
olutions. Senator Loveland defended the 
propriety of his resolution at that time and 
read the rules that directly supported him, 
but President Griffith looked down with a 
beneficent smile, tapping his xylophone 
delicately while sustaining McHugh’s point 
of order, and the army of unnecessary door¬ 
keepers, against whose employment the 
protest of the republican minority was filed 
the day before, and against which every 
citizen of the state should protest, still 
holds the fort. This resolution was for the 
express purpose of giving Senator Kern, of 
Marion, Senator Wray, of Shelby, and Sen¬ 
ator Morgan, of Johnson, a chance to with¬ 
draw their support, which they had given 
spontaneously when the original vote was 
cast that the order might be temporary. 
The clincher put upon the steal by Senator 
Magee, of Cass, who moved the day before 
to reconsider the resolution and table the 
motion to reconsider, was an adroit move 
not anticipated Viy the trio of democratic 
senators mentioned, who now claim to be 
ready for any kind of penance, and would 
willingly be on record with the republic¬ 
ans.— Indianapolis Journal, January 7. 

The following appointments additional 
to those already announced have been 
made by the senate: 

Postmaster—Fred Zollars, of Allen county. 

E. Wright, Johnson county, journal clerk ; Edward 
Mullen, Spencer, copying clerk. 

In the senate the appointees to date include fifteen 
doorkeepers and eigh teen clerks—an excess of two in 
each department over the statutory number.—Jn- 
dianapolis News, January 9. 


Senator McHugh (Marion) offered the 
following resolution upon which over an 
hour of the senate’s time was wasted by 
members indulging in the “old soldier rack¬ 
et.” Both sides of the house participated: 

Whereas, The ventilation of this chamber is so 
imperfect and the heat furnished so irregular as to 
make the chamber uncomfortable and the services 
of some one to look after the same needed. 

Resolved, That Timothy Dawson, a soldier, be ap¬ 
pointed at 85 per day to attend to this duty. 

Mr. Loveland was for the “ old soldier,” 


but thought some member of the existing 
force, who was not a soldier, ought to be 
discharged to make room for Capt. Daw¬ 
son and offered a resolution to that effect, 
which was rejected. 

THE AFTERNOON SESSION. 

But the “ventilation” question came up 
again and an hour was taken up fighting 
the war over. Finally Mr. McHugh’s res¬ 
olution prevailed by a vote of 27 to 18, and 
Capt. Dawson will regulate the heat and 
ventilation during the remainder of the 
session.— Indianapolis Sentinel, January 19. 

The infant son of the Hon. James M. Fippen, of 
Tipton, a page in the House, was ill yesterday and 
the “Sleeping Beauty” did not appear on the floor 
until about 3 p. m. When he did his flrst act was to 
oflFer a resolution for the employment of three more 
pages. The members supposed he had three more 
children unemployed at home and were appalled. 
The member from Tipton explained with vehement 
eloquence that these boys were overworked. “I 
know,” he cried in stentorian tones, “the patriot¬ 
ism of Tipton county don’t ask us to proceed with 
insufficient force, and I introduce this resolution 
so’s that we will not be impeded, and so’s that the 
boys won’t be impaired by their health.” He was 
called down on points of order and it was explained 
that the rules required such a resolution to iay over 
three days, but he moved to suspend the rules.— 
Indianapolis Journal, January 21. 

ECHOES FROM THE PAST. 

Another illustration of the way the administration 
used federal offices to secure Harrison’s renomina¬ 
tion is afforded by the story of the post-oflice at 
Princess Anne, Md., as told by E. F. Duer, the late 
postmaster. Duer was appointed about three years 
«go and has managed the office so successfully that 
it was not long ago raised to a higher grade, which 
brought the piace within the range of a presidential 
appointment. The rule in such cases is for the 
President to name the incumbent if his record 
has been a good one, and his continuance is de¬ 
sired by the patrons of the office. There is no 
dispute whatever as to Duer’s efficiency, or as 
to the satisfaction of the local public wuth his 
administration. He filed his papers with the de¬ 
partment in due course on the ]8lh of May, and 
was told by the fourth assistant postmaster-gen¬ 
eral that the appointment would not be made before 
fifteen d tys. Notwithstanding this, seven days later 
VV. F. Lankford %vas appointed, without even a 
notice to Duer that his claims would be heard, and 
without any examination by the postmaster-general 
of the papers which he had filed. The explanation 
is that Lankford’s name was presented by Thomas S. 
Hodson, who was a delegate to the republican na¬ 
tional convention, then soon to meet. As Duer says 
in his letter to the postmaster-general, “ How far 
these things stood to each other in relation to cause 
and effect, is a question which each one can decide 
for himself, and in view of the charges generally 
made as to the manner in which the President’s re¬ 
nomination was effected, it may prove an interesting 

question.”—A'ew York Evening Post, August 3. 

« * • 

The democratic campaign opened in Ohio to-day 
with a meeting at Woodsdale Island Park, near Ham- 
ilion, Butlercounty. It was estimated that fully five 
thousand people were in attendance. Ex-Governor 
Campbell, who was among his home neighbors, made 
a short dud witty speech, confined mostly to sallies 
at the audience as some one would prompt him with 
a question. He spoke of Mr. Stevenson’s record as a 
creator of democratic postmasters, relating an in¬ 
cident where the present candidate for vice presi¬ 
dent had, as a favor to him [Campbell], decapitated 
sixty-five lepublican postmasters in two minutes. 
He regarded a man of that sort as a vigorous and 
true democrat. When the cheers following this 
statement had subsided, Mr. Stevenson rose and said 
the considered that the highest compliment he had 
received in his whole Hie.—Cincinnati Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, Oct. 1. 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


409 


THEl onslauqht:". 

“Public office is a public trust. We reaffirm the declaration of the democratic national oonYention of 1876 for the reform 
of the civil service, [Reform is necessary in the civil service. Experience proves that efficient, economical conduct of the 
government business is not possible if its civil service be subject to cliange at every election, be a prize fought for at the ballot 
box, be a brief reward of party zeal, instead of posts of honor, assigned for proved competency and held for fidelity in the public 
employ; that the dispensing of patronage should neitlier be a tax upon the time of all our public men, nor the instrument of 
their ambition] and W'e call forthe In.nest enforcement of all laws regulating the same. The \Jominationof a President, as in the 
recent republican convention by delegations composed largely of his appointees, holding office at his pleasure, is a scandalous 
satire upon free popular institutions, and a startling iiliistralion of the methods by which a President may gratify his ambition. 
We denounce a policy under which federal office-holders usurp control of party conventions in the states, and we pledge the dem¬ 
ocratic party to the reform of these and all other abuses which threaten individual liberty and local self-government.”—.A^a^iona/ 
Democratic Plat/orm, 1892. 


COOPER’S DOMAIN 


Franklin.— Office aspirants continue to multiply. 
Prominently mentioned for the post-office at Tra¬ 
falgar appear the names of J. C. Slack, D H. Hunter, 
J. C. White and Mrs. Van Cleve. The promise of 
Congressman Cooper to recommend Samuel Harris 
for postmaster here is still a favorite topic of discus¬ 
sion, and A. B. Colton, a defeated candidate, has 
challenged Mr. Harris to a public discussion why he 
(Colton) should have been the chosen one. The 
question may be put to a vote of the citizens. It 
seems to be authoritative dictum that the next pen¬ 
sion board will include Dr. Province, of Providence; 
Dr. Myers, of Edinburg, and Dr. Whitesides, of 
Franklin.— Indianapolis News, Dec. 13. 

Plainfield.— Isaac Holton, has been recommended 
by Congressman Cooper as an efficient person to suc¬ 
ceed William Stanley as postmaster at this place. 
Mr. Holton is proprietor of the Mansion House Hotel 
and one of the leading democrats of the town.— 
Indianapolis News, Dec. 16. 

Trafalgar?— The post-office race is ended at Traf¬ 
algar. Congressman Cooper having written persons 
here and in that town to the effect that he had de¬ 
cided to recommend Carey J. Slack. 

Moorksville.— The race for the post-office at this 
place was brought to a sudden termination to-day by 
several letters to prominent democrats from Con* 
gressman Cooper, stating his intention to recom¬ 
mend the appointment of John J. Bayless to be post¬ 
master. The notice was received before other appli 
cants had forwarded their petitions.—Jndianapolfs 
News, December 20. 

Plainfield.— Could George W. Cooper, of the fifth 
congressional district, be in Plainfield for an hour or 
so any day of the week since it has become known 
that he had decided to recommend Isaac Holton for 
the postmastership at this place, he would have to 
listen to the preaching of his funeral before he was 
ready to plant beneath the sod. A madder set of 
office seekers were never seen than at present in this 
vicinity. The democrats here do not regard Mr. 
Charlton as a simon pure, dyed-in-the-wool, Jack¬ 
sonian democrat, and claim that he was a republican 
during the Grant campaign, and only abandoned 
that party in hopes of finding pastures more green in 
the fold of the party of broken promises and pledges. 
There has not been the best of feeling existing be¬ 
tween the prominent democrats of this place and the 
reform school since the memorable democratic con¬ 
vention held at Gosport several years ago, in which 
the reform school delegates took such a prominent 
part against the renomination of Congressman Mat- 
son. It is also claimed that Mr. Charlton has held 
his position as superintendent through republican 
and democratic administrations solely through his 
indifference to politics. It is openly charged that 
Cooper listened to no one except Mr. Charlton in 
making the selection of a postmaster for Plainfield. 
One of the defeated aspirants for post-office honors 
said, in the hearing of the Journal correspondent, 
Thursday: “An election will be held by the demo¬ 
crats, and the lucky aspirant will be recommended 
to Congressman Cooper for appointment.’’— Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, December 23. 

Spencer. — Congressman G. W. Cooper has an¬ 
nounced his Intention of recommending C. L. 
Wampler for the position of postmaster at Gosport. 


He was at Spencer last night, and listened to the ap 
peals of applicants for a like position here. Mr. 
Cooper reserved his decision, but it is conceded that 
Otto Dickerson, ex auditor, will be recommended. 
Many desire an election to settle the matter.—7ndt- 
anapoUs News, December 27. 

Spencer —Congressman Cooper was in Spencer last 
night, and gave audience to candidates for the post- 
office and their friends. A majority of them fnvored 
holding a primary election, but this Mr. Cooper 
would not sanction. He has decided to recommend 
O. T. Dickerson. This is in return for personal fa¬ 
vors to himself. When Cooper was needing votes 
to nominate him, Dickerson and S. L. Wallace (now 
of Indianapolis) were the only friends he had in 
Owen county. C. L. Wampler will be recommended 
at Gosport.— Indianapolis Journal, December 27. 

Greencastle.— Congressman Cooper has been here 
among his constituents and disposing of the patron¬ 
age at his command. Applicants for the different 
post-offices in the county have been here to inter¬ 
view him. The fight for the office at Cloverdale is 
between Horn and Foster, with the chances in favor 
of Foster. Milroy Gordon and Oliver Hubbard are 
both named for the office at Bainbridge, with the 
chances in favor of Gordon, if he wants it. Charles 
E. Winn will probably be chosen at Russellville and 
Charles Lewis at Okalla. There will be no primary 
election held at this place for the purpose of choosing 
a postmaster, but the impression is that Willis G. 
Neff will be the lucky man. Mr. Neff held the office 
under Mr. Cleyeland.—Indianapolis Sentinel, Jan. 7. 

Greencastle.— Hon. George W. Cooper visited this 
part of his political bailiwick to day, with a view to 
the distribution of political patronage among his 
henchmen. The principal bone of contention was 
the Greencastle post-office, and how to reconcile the 
conflicting claims of the legion of aspirants puzzled 
the congressman. It is given out that Willis G. Neff, 
who held the position under the former Cleveland 
administration, has the promise of a reappointment, 
and that the claims of the young democracy will be 
subordinated to the demands of the court-house 
ring. Mr. Cooper was urged to submit the contest to 
a popular election, but turned a deaf ear to the ap¬ 
peals, and the curses visited upon him by the disap¬ 
pointed aspirants were both loud and deep.— Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal, January 7. 

Bloomington —Last week Congressman George 
W. Cooper was in our city looking after the pat¬ 
ronage which will be at his disposal after March 
4. He made his headquarters at the Stockwell House 
where a large number of friends were cordially re¬ 
ceived. Almost every position in the county, which 
will be controlled by Mr. Cooper, had more than one 
applicant, and consequently he was placed in the 
exceedingly embarrassing position of making a 
choice between personal friends and equally good 
democrats. The choicest position was the postmas¬ 
tership at this place and it was sought by the follow¬ 
ing named well known citizens: Dr. Peter Bowman, 
John W. Buskirk, Edwin Corr, W. P. Dill. R. H. East 
and Dr. 8. K. Rhorer. Friends of each candidate 
presented the claims of their favorite, and be It said 
to the credit of all concerned that the contest was 
conducted in an honorable and gentlemanly man¬ 
ner. We are not prepared to say what disposition 
will he made of the applications, and until Congress¬ 


man Cooper makes a definite statement we will not 
venture an opinion. 

Delegations were here from other places in the 
county asking official favors for friends and to all 
these Mr. Cooper gave respectful attention. He has 
taken all applications under consideration and hopes 
to make known his decision for the entire district 
before March 4. There are about two hundred post¬ 
masters in this district, and these together with 
other applications will require all his extra time be¬ 
tween now and the date of inauguration.-T/ie Bloom¬ 
ington World. 


THE TERRE HAUTE OVERLORD¬ 
SHIP. 

“ My mail these days is something appalling,’’ said 
Senator Voorhees. “I have had experience before 
on the approach of an incoming administration, but 
nothing like this. I am doing the best I can with 
the aid of short-hand writers to answer everything 
without much delay, but I find the task impossible. 
I hope my friends in Indiana will be patient. Every 
letter received will be carefully noted and filed 
away for future reference and for consideration. No 
one shall be overlooked or neglected. My greatest 
regret is that there are so few offices to be given to so many 
worthy and capable applicants. It is a most painful 
duty, so far as 1 am concerned, to be compelled to decide 
between friends who are equally meritorious and capa¬ 
ble.”—Indianapolis News, December 13. 

Terre Haute— The post-office fight at Terre Haute 
is between A. G. Austin, the hardware merchant, 
Robert Hunter, a liveryman, and Harry Donham, a 
young lawyer. The Sentinel correspondent is able to 
state that the latter will receive the appointment. 
Both of the other applicants are stanch democrats 
and well worthy in every way to receive this honor, 
but Mr. Donham’s active services in the late cam¬ 
paign entitle him to this reward in the estimation of 
democrats who appreciate the v ilue of Mr. Donham’s 
services as chairman of the Vigo county democratic 
committee. — Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, December 23. 

Terre Haute —The Terre Haute postmastership is 
again to be a bone of contention. Two congressmen 
have been defeated for re-election by members of 
their respective parlies on account of this office, and 
it looks as if Congressman Brookshire, the present 
congressman from this district, is to be the third vic¬ 
tim. A few weeks ago Congressman Brookshire an¬ 
nounced that he would leave the recommendation 
for postmaster entirely with Senator Voorhees. Un¬ 
der ordinary circumstances that would be sufficient 
excuse forthe congressman’s non-interference, but 
in this instance circumstances alter the case. A dem¬ 
ocrat whose name is familiar to all who have ob¬ 
served political affairs in this district, talking about 
the situation, said: 

“ I understand that Voorhees has said he will rec¬ 
ommend the appointment of Harry Donham, and I 
suppose Donham will be appointed. The other ap¬ 
plicants, and hundreds of democrats who are not 
applicants for office, would not object to Brookshire’s 
action if they felt that the senator himself was the 
one who is to make the selection, but they know it 
would be waste of time for them to appeal to him 
unless John E. Lamb be on their side. Donham was 
Lamb’s obedient henchman during the campaign. 













410 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Lamb and editor Ball, of the Gazttte, have no liking 
for each other’s political methods. The editor doesn’t 
like bossism and Lamb doesn’t like any one who 
bolts a ‘regular’ cut-and-dried programme. Ball 
was the steadfast Cleveland advocate here prior to 
the Chicago convention. As you know, he and 
Lamb had a bitter contest for delegate to the Chicago 
convention, Lamb capturing it, although 90 percent, 
of the democrats in this district were for Cleveland. 
Lamb was recognized as an anti-Cleveland man, and 
did, in fact, lead the anti-Cleveland Indiana forces 
at Chicago after Senator Voorhees left the city in the 
midst of the struggle. For a year or more, until im 
mediately after the election, it had been understood 
that Mr. B ill was to have the position of collector of 
internal revenue in the event of the election of a 
democrat to the presidency. Well, now comes in 
Mr. Lamb’s master stroke- Without any delay it is 
made known, in a quiet way, to leading local demo, 
crats that Mr. Voorhees has decided to recommend 
Donham for postmaster. If Donham be made post¬ 
master Mr. Ball can not be collector. Donham mar¬ 
ried Mr. Ball’s sister not long ago, and it would not 
do for brothers in-law to hold two big offices of the 
district.” 

Two of the other applicants for the post-office are 
Col. Bob Hunter, brother of Andy Hunter, elected 
congressman at large in Illinois, and Mr. A. G. Aus¬ 
tin. The former is a carriage manufacturer and the 
latter a hardware dealer. Hunter was a member of 
the “Kickers’ Club,” or anti-Lamb organization, in 
1886. when Lamb was defeated for congress. Mr. 
Austin is a good business man, but does not know 
much about political wire-pulling. He has reason 
to expect Senator Voorhees’ aid, but, of course, he 
will be disappointed. 

The impression here Is that the Lamb faction has 
agreed upon Hoskins, of Clay county, for revenue 
collector. He was made chairman of the congres¬ 
sional committee by Lamb in a unique manner, 
early in the year. The ex-congressman was chair¬ 
man of the convention, and, without assistance from 
the convention, so to speak, declared Hoskins the 
choice for the position, although the Parke county 
delegation had come instructed to vote for Dr. Gil¬ 
lum, of that county. But Lamb did it so smoothly 
that hardly any one realized how it had been done 
until after the convention had adjourned. Within 
the past few days the report has been circulated 
here that the Hon. Mason Niblack, of Vincennes, 
would be an applicant for the collectorship.—IndiuM 
apoUs Journal, December 29. 

The Washington dispatch to the Journal of yester¬ 
day, announcing that Senator Voorhees would rec¬ 
ommend Harry Donham for postmaster is in accord 
with what was known here by the senator’s friends 
before he went to Washington, and which was first 
made public in these dispatches. Since then Don¬ 
ham has proceeded upon the assumption that all 
yet to be done was the formality of placing Cleve¬ 
land’s signature on the commission. The more the 
local democracy, and especially that portion which 
espouses the claims of either of the other applicants, 
ponders over the cut-and-dried proceeding the 
greater becomes the resentment of what is termed 
bossism. The fact that the bosses are the ones who 
were bitterly opposed to the renomination of Mr. 
Cleveland and set up the primaries in this county, 
where 90 per cent, of the democrats were unequivo¬ 
cally for the renomination, so that an anti Cleveland 
delegation was chosen, increases the feeling of in¬ 
dignation which is sure to result in an open revolt 
sooner or later. One ol the reasons why it has not 
broken out before this has been the hope of the hun¬ 
gry to get some of the crumbs of office. Now that 
the hope of five hundred (more or less) has been 
shattered by the President’s order there is more like¬ 
lihood of the outbreak before the time for the ap¬ 
pointment of a postmaster comes around.—Indian- 
apolis Journal, January 8. 

CHIEFS OF HIGH AND LOW DE¬ 
GREE. 

The democrats of Indianapolis have been notified 
from Washington that Congres man Bynum has de¬ 
cided to leave the selection of a postmaster for this 


city entirely with Senator Turpie. This announce¬ 
ment has been expected. It is related among demo¬ 
crats that, before he returned to Washington, Con¬ 
gressman Bynum said to some of his friends that he 
intended to escape all responsibility for the selection 
of an Indianapolis postmaster by turning the ap¬ 
pointment over to Senator Turpie.—Jndianapohs 
News, December 21. 

Senator Turpie, who is at his home in this city 
spending the holidays, is besieged by office-seekers 
The men who are after government positions go di¬ 
rect to the senator’s residence, as he is remaining 
away from the hotel corridors where expectant dem¬ 
ocrats delight to congregate and lay in wait for men 
of influence. Among the callers on the senator to¬ 
day was W. D. H. Hunter, of Lawrenceburgh, who 
wants to be re-appointed collector of internal revenue 
for the southern district of Indiana. Dr. Hunter 
filled the office under Cleveland before, and he feels 
that he is entitled to it again. He requested that 
Senator Turpie say a good word for him to Mr. Cleve¬ 
land. Another one of the callers the senator has re¬ 
ceived this week is D. F. Allen, of Frankfort, who is 
anxious to succeed Nicholas Ensley as United States 
pension agent for the district of Indiana. Captain 
Allen, like ex-Governor Gray, made a visit to Cleve¬ 
land at Gray Gables, and he thinks his acquaintance 
with the President-elect, together with a few words 
from the Indiana senators, will secure him the office. 
Still another caller was Frank Griffith, of Muncie, 
who also wants to be collector of internal revenuein 
the southern Indiana district. John S. Williams, of 
Lafavette, has also paid the senator a visit since his 
arrival at home. Mr. Williams was fourth auditor of 
the treasury during Cleveland’s former administra¬ 
tion. He is anxious to go a step higher this time; 
he desires to be appointed third auditor of the treas¬ 
ury During his stay at home Senator Turpie has 
also been furnished the names of the men who would 
like to be appointed United States attorney for In¬ 
diana. They are Judge Nelson, of Logansport; John 
W. Kern, John W. Holtzman, of Indianapolis; Will¬ 
iam A. Cullop, of Vincennes; Frank B. Burk, of Jef¬ 
fersonville; W. O. Pickens, of Spencer, and C. E. 
Vohn, of Bluffton.—inefianapoHs News, December 30. 

Fort Wayne.— It is learned from the best author¬ 
ity that on Monday Congressman McNagney, of Co¬ 
lumbia City, will be in Fort Wayne and decide who 
shall be postmaster under the new administration. 
This will end a good deal of suspense and will prob¬ 
ably be the cause of considerable ill-feeling. It is 
said Mr. McNagny will meet all the candidates and 
hear their respective claims. It will be decided 
probably some day next week, but the decision will 
not be known at the time. The most prominent 
candidates are William Meyer, proprietor of one of 
the leading furnishing stores; Wright Rockhill, pro¬ 
prietor of the Fort Wayne Journal; Prof. Ungemach, 
who is at the head of the Lutheran schools in this 
city; John B. Monning, a real estate agent; Dr. 
Samuel Metcalf and M. V. B. Spencer, a leading at¬ 
torney .—Indianapolis Journal, January 8. 

Delphi.— Congressman elect Hammond, of this dis¬ 
trict, is having a lively time with applicants for of¬ 
fice, there being from one to a dozen candidates for 
every post-office in the district. R. M. Isherwood, 
editor of the democratic paper, and chairman of the 
county committee, is the most prominent aspirant, 
and it will be the field against Isherwood. The men 
composing the field are now circulating petitions 
praying Hammond to leave the settlement of the 
question to a vote of the democratic patrons of the 
office, and these petitions are being generally 
signed. Isherwood will oppose such an election, 
taking the broad and comprehensive ground that he 
has earned the place. His claims will be seconded 
by Charles R. Pollard, who was a delegate to the 
Chicago convention and an uncompromising Cleve¬ 
land raun.—Indianapolis Journal, December 31. 

It is stated at democratic headquarters that Con¬ 
gressman-elect Conn, of the thirteenth district, has 
decided to escape all responsibility by having an 
election for every postmaster in the district. So far 
as can be learned the other congressmen from the 
slate are pursuing the old course of receiving all the 
applications and recommendations that come in, and 


then appointing the man who seems to be the favor¬ 
ite in the community .—Indianapolis News, Dec. 21. 

Congressman Jason B. Brown was in the city last 
evening. He came from Washington. Mr. Brown 
said that so far he had not been bothered by his con¬ 
stituents seeking office. “ I have stated two or three 
times,” he remarked, “ that I would take no part in 
the struggle before Mr. Clevelaud'siuauguration. It 
would be hardly proper for me to do so, and my con- 
stitutents know my position fully, I think, and I 
don’t anticipate being troubled any.”—Indianapolis 
Sentinel, December 23. 

Salem. —The unsettled condition that has existed 
here since the election of Clevland as to who should 
be postmaster took a sudden turn to-day. While it is 
Senerally understood that Congressman Jason B. 
Brown is opposed to a primary by the people about all 
the candidates met to-day and entered into an agree¬ 
ment to hold a primary, and the chairman of the 
democratic county committee, who is also a candi¬ 
date, issued a call for it to be held February A.—In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, January 17. 

Knightsville. —The democracy have a post-office 
fight on hand. The office is worth about J350 or 8400 
a year. Scott luge, postmaster under Cleveland, is 
an aspirant for re-appointment. David Lawson, the 
man who controls 1,300 miners’ votes, but was op¬ 
posed to Congressman Brookshire, is also an aspirant. 
Benjamin Males and George Hoaglin are also press¬ 
ing their claims. One prominent young man wants 
to be gauger at Terre Haute. John O’Neal, who is a 
warm friend of Brookshire, will try and have Mr. 
McQuade’s position as mine inspector. H. C. Payne 
Is also an aspirant for mine inspector. ’Squire 
Eckles says he will be satisfied with fish commis¬ 
sioner. Taken altogether the fight for office is going 
to be hotly contested.—KnightsviUe IHspatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, Nov. 22. 

Elwood. —The post-office is a plum that mauy dem¬ 
ocrats are eager to pluck. Although the term of 
the present incumbent will not expire for over 
a year, petitions by different democratic aspir¬ 
ants are being circulated and generously signed. 
The first applicant in the field is France Harbit. He 
Is widely known here, and Is a ceaseless and untir¬ 
ing worker for democracy. He is at present a mem¬ 
ber of the city council, from the first ward. “Dock” 
Peed is also an aspirant. He is making no flourish 
of trumpets, but he wants the office as bad as any¬ 
one. James Par.sons is also in the field. He is work¬ 
ing like a trooper and the race between him and 
Harbit is being watched with Interest. The claims 
set forth by Parsons are known only to those who 
are on the inside of several political contracts and 
compromises, which were enacted between the dem¬ 
ocrats last spring and fall. Parsons was a candidate 
for the nomination for sheriff. Dave de Hority of 
this city, was also an aspirant for the same nomina¬ 
tion. Both are popular men. The race was warm, 
but as both were from Pike Creek township the 
chances of each were impaired. Something had to be 
done. It was decided among the leaders that the 
only way out of it was for Parsons to withdraw from 
the race. A prominent democrat said a committee 
waited on Mr. Parsons and he consented to with¬ 
draw, after receiving 8100 from De Hority. The 
money was to pay the expenses already incurred by 
Parsons in his canvass. Besides this, it was under¬ 
stood (by Parsons at least) that, in case of a demo¬ 
cratic victory. Parsons was to be indorsed for the 
post-oflice. The democratic victory came, and now 
Parsons demands his reward. At Anderson a num¬ 
ber of prominent democrats signed an agreement to 
use their influence in securing the post-office for Par¬ 
sons. This paper is said to be in possession of Mr. 
Parsons, and he will produce it in his claims. Lead¬ 
ing democrats of Elwood gave a promise of a similar 
nature, but were wise enough not to do so in writ¬ 
ing. Your correspondent’s informant .said that those 
who promised Parsons their assistance are falling to 
the rear. When the paper was presented to De Hority 
be refused to sign it, saying that he fulfilled his con¬ 
tract when he paid the 8100.—EJiaood Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, Nov. 29. 

Portland. —The Portland post-office is now the 
bone of contention among eligible democrats, and 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


411 


as Congressman Martin does not care to mix in the 
scramble, it is not unlikely that a city election will 
be held to determine a choice. Among the promi¬ 
nent candidates are W. W. Timmonds, editor of the 
Portland Sun; A. W. Evilsizer, justice of the peace; 
W. A. Humphries, chairman of the county central 
committee; S. T. McGovney, ex-member of the slate 
legislature; L. S. Burkett, timber man; Gjorge F. 
Whittaker, ex-prosecutor, and S. A. D. Whipple, dep¬ 
uty clerk of the circuit court.—Indianapolis News. 

Grebnsbdrg.— The democracy of this county openly 
declare that the republican office holders will not 
serve out their time, and this declaration is bringing 
out a new crop of office-seekers. Three new caiidi 
d ites have appeared for the post-office. S. F. Rogers, 
George Shoemaker and George Magee. Outside of 
Greensburg there are only six or eight paying post- 
offices in the county. At St. Paul the scramble is 
terrific. The candidates are Jeff. DeBolt, Daniel 
Dickey, ex-State Senator Howard, Luther Bailey and 
Benjamin Jenkins. The principal applicants at 
Adams are W. 0. McKee, Robert Kirby, James 
Darby and John Turner. James Tarplee is booked 
for the office at Clarksburgh, and James S. Harper 
has the call at Sardinia. Sandford Grayson and 
Samuel Webster will contest at Westport. There is 
some talk here of having the choice of postmaster 
determined by popular election, and this is favored 
by those who consider themselves strong with the 
people but a little shaky with the appointing power. 

Rockport.— Mentioned for postmaster under Cleve¬ 
land at this point are George Procrasky, the former 
incumbent, Henry Hochand Calvin Jones, ex-editor 
of the Rockport Democrat. C. N. Douglass, present 
editor of the Democrat, is an aspirant for a clerkship 
at Washington. A. E. Stevenson, formerly of the 
state committee, wants the position of judicial ex¬ 
aminer, now held by Sam Kercheval, of this city, 
Allen Armstrong, who was the candidate for county 
clerk, stands a chance of entering the revenue serv¬ 
ice, and Hugh Haler, defeated candidate for sheriff", 
expects a position in the secret service.—Indianapolis 
News, December 7. 

Greensboroh.— The democracy are preparing to 
boom Judge J. K. Ewing for collector of internal 
revenue. It is said that he will be supported by 
Congressmen Holman, Brown and Cooper, and the 
state officials. The Hon. William H. Bracken, for¬ 
merly of this county, but now of Franklin, is also in 
the race. He was an elector-at large candidate, and 
made a strong canvass of the State, Bracken has 
congressional aspirations, and if disappointed in his 
present quest he may contest for the congressional 
nomination two years hence. Dr. Hunter, editor of 
the Lavvrenceburgh Register, was collector under 
Cleveland before, and, it is said, is again aspiring. 
The Hon. Jacob Benham, of Ripley, is in training. 
He is a presidential elector. Other candidates for the 
collectorship are said to be Frank J. Hall, of Rush- 
ville, and Dan Manning, of Switzerland.—/ndianapo- 
lis News. 

Noblesville.— There seems to be no end to the list 
of applicants who will fight for the Cicero posi-oflSce. 
The number has already been increased to nearly a 
dozen. Among the prominent applicants are Samuel 
Dale, Grant Jacobs, Samuel Dunham, George An¬ 
thony and J. S, Williamson.—/ndfanapoKs Sentinel, 
December 21. 

Greenfield.— Captain Osaiah A. Curry, ex-county 
treasurerand chairman of the county democratic cen¬ 
tral committee, and a highly estimable and well- 
known citizen of this city, at the solicitation of many 
of our prominent business men and citizens, has an¬ 
nounced his intentions of being a candidate for 
postmaster, and will begin a vigorous canvass at 
once.—Indianapolis Sentinel, December 13. 

Greentown.— After a wrangle over a choice for 
postmaster, the Greentown democrats concluded to 
ballot. L. C. Knight received 31 votes; Wm. Dun¬ 
can, 29: T. H. Frice and T. A. Seagraves, 15 each ; 
J. B. Mozingo, 12; Chas. Hawberger, 8, and William 
Wooters, 7. Duncan is admitted to be the best quali¬ 
fied man for the place, and the result of the ballot 
has only increased the dissatisfaction,—JndtanapoHs 
News, December 13. 


James Chapman has discontinued publication of 
the Review, at Converse. Mr. Chapman was a post- 
office candidate, but was defeated in a popular 
election. He complains of ill-treatment by the local 
democracy.—Jndianopofis News. 

Portland —James H. De Tray, of this city, is ap¬ 
plicant for the position as minister to France under 
the next administration, and is circulating petitions 
to thateffect. DeTray is a‘‘Buckeye” by birth. He 
came to Portland in 1885. He is a fourth cousin of 
the famous General Lafayette, and at the time of the 
Yorktown celebration, in 1881, he was present by in¬ 
vitation from the secretary of state as the American 
representative of the Lafayette family.—Indianapolis 
News, December 17. 

Bedford.— John Johnson, jr., is an applicant for 
the postmastership here, and it is stated that Con¬ 
gressman Bretz will probably see that he gets it.— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, December 18. 

Richmond.— The candidates for the Dublin post- 
office held a caucus Monday night to determine upon 
a plan for the selection of a postmaster. They de 
termined upon an election to be held January 21. 
All known democrats who voted for Grover Cleve 
land will be entitled to vote at that time. The fol¬ 
lowing persons are candidates: Ira Ellis, Mrs. Sarah 
J. Roberts, W. B. Smith, Dr. J. R. Hollingsworth, G. 
W. Steffy, Tolbert More and Thomas Kemmer.—Jw- 
dianapolis Sentinel, January 7, 

Lebanon.— The question of Lebanon's next post¬ 
master seemed to be a difficult one a few weeks ago. 
when there were as many as half a dozen aspirants, 
but now it seems narrowed down to a single person 
Henry C. Ulin, secretary of the county central com¬ 
mittee, is circulating a petition which Is being gen¬ 
erally signed, and from the present outlook Mr. 
Ulin has almost a clear field.—/ndtanap/is News. 

Wabash.— The post-office fight here is becoming 
decidedly interesting. A month ago less than a hall 
dozen candidates wanted the place, but now there 
are seventeen. The contest is growing somewhat 
personal In its character, and so fearful are the dem¬ 
ocratic local managers that there will serious partj 
trouble grow out of the scramble that an election ha.s 
virtually been decided upon as a solution of the 
controversy. All but two or three aspirants have 
signed the compact, and the primary will take place 
February 14. The candidates arc: Dr. M. R. Cra- 
bill, John Katchem, Jonathan Haas, James Early, 
E. A. Edwards, James Jackson, Sam Junfee, H. H. 
-Millican, W. J. Alber, Frank Alber, Simon Swartz, 
John Hoover, Valentine Smith, William Collin.s, 
James V. Simpson, Ed Kinerk and John Hipskins. 
The commission of Postmaster Wood does not expire 
until December 10,1895, and it is not expected there 
will be a change short of a year or two. as Mr. Wood 
is competent and in no sense an “offenseve par- 
tisan.’’—Indianapolis News, January 18. 


THE WORST CASE YET. 

The report of Commissioner Roosevelt to 
the United States Civil Service Commission 
on the investigation of a peculiar political 
assessment case in Indianapolis, has just 
been given to the press. The facts ascer¬ 
tained from the witnesses examined point 
to a special variety of offense differing 
from any other that has yet come to the 
public notice. 

It appears that the democratic campaign 
committee in Indianapolis found itself, at 
the close of the late campaign, several 
thousand dollars in arrears. The commit¬ 
tee had its headquarters in the rooms of 
the Hendricks club, to which some of its 
members belonged. County Treasurer 
Backus, a prominent committeeman, spoke 
to C. J. Dunn, a letter-carrier, of the short¬ 
age, and suggested, apparently as a con¬ 


clusion of the committee, that the demo¬ 
cratic employes in the post-office—the so- 
called “hold-overs” under the present 
administration—ought to make up about 
four hundred dollars as their share of it. 
Mr. Backus further notified Dunn to re¬ 
quest various employes to come to a meet¬ 
ing at the club “ to see what they felt like 
doing.” 

Accordingly the invitations were dis¬ 
tributed, mostly by Dunn, it being under¬ 
stood that the meeting was partly for the 
purpose of raising funds; partly with the 
idea that the employes should press one 
of their number, Mr. Lorenz, for superin¬ 
tendent of carriers under the incoming ad¬ 
ministration ; and partly in order to meet 
a Mr. Sahm, who, according to the com¬ 
mon talk among “ the boys,” had been de¬ 
cided upon as the next postmaster. Mr. 
Lorenz himself, also, seems to have been 
instrumental in inducing the carriers to 
attend the meeting. 

Alexander McNutt testified that Dunn 
told him of the straits of the committee 
and asked “if we could reach in our pockets 
and help them out;” that Dunn approached 
him in regard to making a donation to 
make up the deficiency, the request being 
made in the letter-carriers’ office, but no 
specific amount being named, although it 
appeared as if about ten dollars apiece 
was expected. McNutt said that he did 
not contribute, and that he and Dunn had 
not been on good terms since. 

W. A. Balk, a letter-carrier, testified that 
Dunn asked him, in the carriers’ room, for 
a contribution to a campaign fund. 

R. 0. Shriner testified that Dunn said to 
him : “ The committee is short some money 
and we want to know if you can’t help to 
make it up,” or something to this effect. 

Jacob Mathias testified that Dunn asked 
him to come down to the Hendricks club, 
saying that there was a shortage in the 
democratic campaign fund, and that he 
was authorized to notify “the boys”— 
meaning the democratic carriers in office — 
that they had to raise some money. 

AVilliam Darby testified that Dunn said 
to him, in the street, that the committee 
would require ten or fifteen dollars apiece 
from “the boys,” and invited him to at¬ 
tend the meeting at the Hendricks club. 

F. A. Lorenz testified that Dunn told 
him, in the street, that the committee was 
short and wanted the democrats in the 
post-office to help it out, adding: “What 
will you do?” or “ Will you do anything?” 
or “Can you do anything?” and stating 
that he expected the democratic carriers 
to contribute four hundred dollars. 

C. W. Parish testified that Dunn men¬ 
tioned to him the committee’s need of 
money; told him to go to the Hendricks 
club on a certain date, and asked for a 
contribution, as it was desired to raise 
about four hundred dollars from office¬ 
holders. Parish refused to give anything. 

W. P. Marlatt testified that Dunn told 











412 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


him, in effect, that the democratic com¬ 
mittee would be glad to receive any con¬ 
tributions any one desired to give to make 
up the shortage. 

Dunn’s sole defense was a lack of mem¬ 
ory. He did not remember speaking about 
the finances when he invited “the boys’’ 
to the Hendricks club, but afterwards ad¬ 
mitted that he “might have told one or 
two that there was a shortage.” 

. About a dozen government employes, 
chiefiy carriers with a sprinkling of clerks, 
went down to the Hendricks club at the 
time appointed. A number of the ordi¬ 
nary members of the club were present, 
but the carriers met in a room by them¬ 
selves, no outsider except Mr. llackus 
being present. Mr. Sahm was not in the 
room, though at the club at the time, 
hackus addressed the carriers, saying that 
there was a shortage of several thousand 
dollars, and that the post-oftice employes 
ought to raise three or four hundred dol¬ 
lars of the amount. The meeting, he said, 
was for the purpose of paying tlie cam¬ 
paign expenses, but no assessment would 
be made, the men being free to give or not. 
He added that “the next postmaster was 
named, and that be was a good democrat,” 
and “that those that contributed freely 
would be remembered.” 

Some discussion followed as to how the 
money should be given, and objections 
were made at once to giving it to Mr. 
Dunn or taking receipts for it; and Dunn 
was warned that he had better be careful 
in his behavior lest he might get into 
trouble by coming into contact with the 
cinl service law’. 

At one time Dunn intimated that he 
would receive the money himself, and 
again it was suggested that the contribu¬ 
tions should simply ))e left in a box in the 
oifice. 

Commissioner Roosevelt comments on 
the evidence as follows : 

“This case seems to me to be akin to the 
cases of political assessments in the Balti¬ 
more post-office at the time of the republi¬ 
can primaries in the spring of 1891, and in 
the departmental service by the Old Domin¬ 
ion republican club in the fall of 1889. In 
both these cases the evidence showed that 
gov’ernment employes bad been endeavor¬ 
ing to assess other government employes, 
aside from what the evidence showe<i 
against outsiders. In each of these cases 
it Avas the opinion of the commission, on 
the evidence taken, that certain govern¬ 
ment employes w’ere clearly guilty, ex¬ 
actly, as it seems to me, that the evidence 
shows Dunn in this case to have been 
clearly guilty of directly or indirectly so¬ 
liciting money for political purposes from 
certain of his associates, and in one or two 
cases thus soliciting them in a government 
building. In each case the commission 
brought the matter to the attention not 
only of the attorney-general, but of the j 
head of the department wherein the offi¬ 


cials implicated were employed, being of 
the opinion that in many of these cases, 
even where there is difficulty in securing a 
conviction, there may, nevertheless, be 
amply sufficient evidence to remove all 
reasonable doubt of the guilt of the ac¬ 
cused and to warrant his dismissal from 
office, it being, in the opinion of the com¬ 
mission, very desirable that appointing 
officers shall take prompt action to punish 
the wrongdoers themselves, w’herever they 
are in government employ. This case, and 
the two cases above mentioned, have, of 
course, many points of dissimilarity, al¬ 
though they resemble one another in this 
essential, all three including attempts to 
collect money for political purposes by cer¬ 
tain employes from other employes of the 
government. 

“ In the case of the Old Dominion league, 
an organization composed partly of out¬ 
siders and partly of individuals in govern¬ 
ment employ, an attempt was made to col¬ 
lect funds from various employes in the 
departments at Washington, from the 
state of Virginia, for the purpose of aid¬ 
ing the republican campaign in that state. 
At Baltimore the postal employes, together 
wdth some of the employes in the office of 
the collector and the marshal, joined to 
assess one another and to solicit and re¬ 
ceive from one another sums of money to 
be expended in the interests of one faction 
in the republican primaries. In the pres¬ 
ent instance a democratic letter-carrier, 
appointed AA’hen a democratic postmaster 
was in oifice at Indianapolis, but continued 
in office to this day under the operations 
of the civil service law, acts as the instru¬ 
ment of a local democratic campaign com¬ 
mittee, in the effort to procure political 
contributions from various other demo¬ 
cratic letter-carriers, in order to make up 
a shortage in the campaign account of the 
committee. This request is in the nature 
of a reduclio ad absurdtmi of the arguments 
usually advanced in behalf of political as¬ 
sessments. Thus the circular sent out by 
the Ohio republican state committee in the 
last campaign requesting money from the 
various postal employes in Ohio, upon the 
ground that they owed their positions to 
the republican party. This was, of course, 
in so far as these positions are under the 
civil service laAV, a deliberate and willful 
untruth, and in any event furnished no 
excuse for the attempted blackmail. But 
the climax of iniquitous absurdity is cer¬ 
tainly reached Avhen an attempt is made 
to collect money from government em¬ 
ployes by a democratic campaign commit¬ 
tee on the ground that, thanks to the op¬ 
eration of the civil service law’, these same 
employes have been kept in office nearly 
four years under a republican administra¬ 
tion.” 

The Indianapolis case has been laid by 
the commission before the attorney-gen- 
j erel and the postmaster-general for ac¬ 
tion .—Good Government, January, 1893. 


CORRESPONDENCE. 

The Closed Ear. 

IIaverford College, 
Haverford, Pa., Jan. 3, 1893. 
Civil Service Chronicle, Indianapolis, Ind.: 

We have been receiving the Chronicle for some 
time and it has regularly been put in our reading- 
room. We have understood that the paper is sent 
by a friend of the college; if this is not the ca.se 
kindly discontinue and oblige. Respectfully, 

Allen C. Thomas, Librarian . 

While writing I wish to say, while personally a 
civil service reformer, I doubt very much whether 
the cause is permanently helped by such unvarying 
and Avholesale condemnation, and by such grudging 
praise when any commendation is given, I confess 
what I have read in your paper has, if anything, 
rather weakened my devotion to the cause than 
strengthened it. I believe in fairness to opponents, 
and while I have no doubt such is the proposed at¬ 
titude of the paper, it does not convey that impres¬ 
sion to me. One would think that the United States 
ofllclals were the worst class imaginable—in fact 
about fit for the penitentiary—if the Chronicle’s 
articles were fair accounts of the average official and 
office-holder and seeker. However wrong the “spoils¬ 
men ’’ may be in their opinions, there is something 
to be said on their side, as the debates in congress 
when the present post-office tenure of office was 
passed, or thereabouts, will .show. (Of course I write 
this as an individual.) 

The object of this paper has alw ays been 
to set out the facts and circumstances con¬ 
nected with the use of the public service 
for personal and party ends, giving so far 
as possible the sources of information. Mr. 
Thomas makes no question about these 
facts. They are unpleasant and along with 
us, Mr. Thomas finds them so. But unlike 
us he can not bear that such things should 
be said about such nice men, as he knows 
many of them are. For they are nice men 
in the ordinary meaning of that term. 
They are respectable, they are carefully 
honest in all private relations, and they 
attend to all charitable and religious du¬ 
ties, as, for instance. Quay is determined 
that the Sabbath shall not be desecrated 
by a fair. But all the same, they buy votes, 
they steal public money, they use thugs 
and ruffians to cheat in primaries and con¬ 
ventions, they use public offices to quarter 
friends and relatives on the people, and 
they use the civil service to break down 
the Avill of the people. The only way to 
break up this business is to drag these 
persons and their acts out to daylight. Mr. 
Thomas is not alone in finding it too un¬ 
pleasant. Everywhere there are multi¬ 
tudes of “good citizens” w’ho think that 
something can be said on the other side. 
They, how’ever, never say it. We have for 
years been trying to find some one who 
w’ill argue for the “other side,” and if Mr. 
Thomas w ill do it he can have room in the 
Chronicle. If his faith has become weak 
in proportion to the facts given in the 
Chronicle he must be a strong advocate 
of the spoils system by this time. If any 
thing can be said for the “other side” of 
Quay, it is time some one was saying it.— 
[Ed. Civil Service Chronicle.] 

The Open Ear. 

Cornell University Library, 
Ithaca, N. Y., January 4,1893. 

I beg to acknowledge with best thanks the receipt 
of your gift to the library. Civil Service Chronicle, 
for 1892. The continuance of this favor of a free copy 
for the year 1893 will be very welcome. 

Yours truly, Qeo. W. Harris, 
Librarian. 







The Civil Service chronicle. 


If we see nothing in our victory hut a license to revel in partisan spoils, we shall fail at every point.— 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November 18. 


INDIANAPOLIS, FEBRUARY, 1893. 


VoL. I, No. 48. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

There are but eight complete files of the 
Civil Service Chronicle and one of these 
has already been sold. Several more files 
could be completed if numbers 5, 16, 17 
and 22 could be supplied. 

The publication of the Civil Service 
Chronicle will be continued as hereto¬ 
fore. The subscription price will be one 
dollar a year, beginning with the second 
volume. The present number, which com¬ 
pletes the first volume, has been delayed 
in order that this volume might include 
the whole of Harrison’s administration. 
The index to the first volume will be sent 
to subscribers as soon as completed. 

The course of Mr. Cleveland since his 
election has been beyond criticism. He 
has shown himself master of the situation. 
He has proved that if a President-elect de¬ 
clares that he will not be harried by poli¬ 
ticians about offices, there are no meeker 
men than those same politicians. He has 
been left to select his cabinet in his own 
way and from the men he wanted. The 
result is a cabinet made up of men who 
sympathize with his views and who will 
assist him in carrying them out. Are the 
people dissatisfied because he thus kicked 
out the bosses? They were never so 
well satisfied with Mr. Cleveland as they 
are now. Has the party been ruined ? It 
never was so strong as it is to-day. What 
is true before inauguration will be true 
after. Let President Cleveland stand upon 
his constitutional rights and strike off once 
and for all the unlawful grip of congress¬ 
men upon the presidential office. What¬ 
ever the consequences let him put an im¬ 
passable gulf between congressmen and the 
control of the civil service. If it must be, 
let us have the spectacle of congressmen 
refusing to perform their duties because 
the President will not pay them for it with 
offices. The country will make short work 
of such mercenaries. 

While Mr. Cleveland has been busy se¬ 
lecting his cabinet, with his judgment un¬ 
ham perd by party workers, the country has 
been treated to the sight of congressmen di¬ 
viding the offices. They have no authority 
whatever in the law or in the constitution, 
and they do not seem to have the least au¬ 


thority from Mr. Cleveland. Nevertheless, 
they are holding conferences, ordering 
elections to decide “ contests,” and decid¬ 
ing who shall have this post-office and who 
shall have that collectorship. In this bus¬ 
iness our Indiana democratic congressmen 
appear the most prominent and the most 
contemptible. Senator Voorheesand Sen¬ 
ator Turpie do not “ agree ” as to who 
shall have the Indiana district attorney- 
ship. Senator Voorhees claims the ap¬ 
pointment of the collector for the Terre 
Haute district as his perquisite as against 
Congressman Brookshire, and so it goes. 
Every one of these men went about the 
country before election upon a platform 
which declared that offices ought not to be 
subject to change at every election, and 
yet they are working day and night to 
bring about the change. They know very 
well that the Harrison administration was 
ruined because it failed to keep its prom¬ 
ises in relation to the civil service. Most of 
these men did all they could to baffle Mr. 
Cleveland’s efforts to better the manage¬ 
ment of the civil service during his former 
administration, and they mean to repeat 
their efforts. They do not care what dis¬ 
aster is brought upon the party. They 
want spoil to give to heelers and hench¬ 
men, and they mean to have it. 


In this determination of congressmen, 
Mr. Cleveland has presented to him the 
gravest question for decision that will 
come before him. His decision will settle 
the question whether his administration is 
to be a success or a failure. If he shall 
determine that the great departments of 
the government shall be confined to the 
exercise of their legitimate functions, and 
that congressmen shall be absolutely cut 
off from influence in the management of 
the civil service,and if he shall hold to that 
determination regardless of the conse¬ 
quences be will justly rank among the first 
statesmen in the world. If congressmen 
will not legislate upon the tariff, or the 
finances, or make appropriations unless 
they are paid for it by him with offices, let 
the tariff, the finances, and the appropria¬ 
tions go unlegislated upon. The first step 
toward buying legislation with offices will 
be a fatal mistake. Mr. Cleveland need not 
fear. In any such struggle he would have 
the country back of him as he has never 
had it yet. 


TWTJ MK • J dollar per annum 
lUiXvino . 10 cents per copy. 


We do not wish to be understood as say¬ 
ing that cutting congressmen off from the 
patronage is the beginning and completion 
of reform; it is an absolutely essential step. 
Nor do we wish to be understood as taking 
any interest in the retention of mere poli¬ 
ticians in places. But we do say that if the 
promises of the democratic platform are 
to be kept, mere politicians can not be 
succeeded by mere politicians. There is 
no limit to the power of dismissal; but be¬ 
fore dismissals are made the reorganiza¬ 
tion of the system of appointment should 
be completed to the extremest extent pos¬ 
sible. The entire service capable of it and 
not so transferred should be transferred to 
the classified service. Higher positions 
below presidential offices should be filled 
only by promotion. Only such persons as 
are known to be friendly to the civil serv¬ 
ice law should be appointed by the Presi¬ 
dent to any place connected with it. No 
laborer should be allowed to be hired in 
the federal service except under rules like 
those of the Boston labor service. If con¬ 
gress will not approve the plan by making 
a law the President has ample power to do 
so by an executive order. There should be 
no headsman of fourth-class postmasters. 
If congress will not pass the Andrew bill 
for filling fourth-class post-offices, then the 
President should leave in the present in¬ 
cumbents, and through the present force of 
inspectors he should fill vacancies in ac¬ 
cordance with the principles of the An¬ 
drew bill. The balance of the service the 
President could manage with comparative 
ease and without need of any advice from 
congressmen. Above all there is no hurry. 
There is plenty of time to mature plans. 
It is not important that any of the present 
clamorers should have an office. They are 
not seeking office for the public good but 
for their own private benefit. The public 
good requires that measures be taken to 
end disgraceful onslaughts for spoil such 
as our columns show are now going on. 


The division of spoils has wrecked the 
usefulness of every administration since 
Andrew Johnson went out of office. The 
one prominent feature in the history of the 
country since 1869 is the struggle of the 
Logans, the Conklings, the Camerons, the 
Mahones, the Gormans, the Voorheeses and 
the Quays to get offices for their hench¬ 
men and to force the President to give 



















414 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


these offices. His yielding to these leech¬ 
es against his own principles cast a blot 
upon Grant’s noble career, and the last tri¬ 
umph of the division of spoil has been to 
make Harrison’s administration a ridicu¬ 
lous and disgraceful failure. 


The viciousness of “politics” is unbridled 
in the present general assembly. The 
democratic politicians who control that 
body seem to think the people will stand 
anything. The law extending the terms 
of town officers is one of the most flagrant 
instances of swindling legislation that ever 
was enacted and it is well worthy of the 
cheats and swindlers who had a hand in it. 
Another worthy specimen of their work 
is the apportionment bill they are go¬ 
ing to pass. It is practically the law lately 
declared unconstitutional by the supreme 
court. The proposed bill is such an im¬ 
pudent cheat and swindle that the Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel opposes it and Messrs. Hord 
and Wilson, two democrats from this 
county, voted against it. No such legis¬ 
lation is democratic or republican. It is 
imperialism applied by party bosses, and, 
like imperialism with a single head, under 
the form of law, it robs the people of their 
rights. A Fort Wayne paper has suggested 
that when this legislature finally adjourns, 
the people of Indianapolis should drum 
the rascals out of town, and it must be con¬ 
fessed that the spectacle would be gratify¬ 
ing and wholesome. And in this parade 
the true character of the members would 
be accurately illustrated by making each 
one carry in public view the property he 
has actually stolen from the state. 

The Indiana general assembly has trans¬ 
ferred the power of appointing trustees in 
the various public institutions from itself 
bo the governor. Indiana is now nearer a 
great office holders’ machine than she has 
ever been before. She also has some 
politicians who like to copy after Hill and 
Quay. It is useless to say that the law 
vests in superintendents the power of ap¬ 
pointing subordinates. A request from a 
trustee, who may be a tool of the gov¬ 
ernor’s, that certain persons be given 
places is not disregarded by a superintend¬ 
ent. This power to build up a personal 
machine was well apprehended by the op¬ 
ponents of the transfer, and in the lower 
house the change had to be carried through 
against a majority of the democrats and 
by a combination of the minority with the 
republicans. In this maneuver the repub¬ 
licans promptly voted down a proposal to 
make the boards non-partisan, although to 
so make them was one of the most osten¬ 
tatious planks of their platform last fall. 

A GREAT quarrel among the democrats 
is the result of this struggle over patron¬ 


age. The state and the public institutions 
have in no manner been benefited. The 
state service will not be in any manner 
better. If the republicans elect the next 
governor, while the general assembly re¬ 
mains democratic, the latter will again 
take the power from the governor. If this 
general assembly had put the state service 
under the merit system it would have 
enacted one of those great reform laws 
which mark an epoch in civil adminis¬ 
tration, and it would adjourn with the 
party strengthened in this state as it never 
was strengthened before. Instead, we shall 
have no better service, and the party has 
on its hands the usual quarrel over spoils. 


It is said that Mr, Frank Burke is seek¬ 
ing to be appointed district attorney for 
Indiana, Burke was a member of the 
general assembly two years ago, and as 
such he was one of the most persistent 
and malignant opponents of the bill which 
would have taken the benevolent institu¬ 
tions of this state out of politics. It is to 
be hoped that no such opponent of Mr. 
Cleveland’s well known principles will be 
given an office. And before ex-Pension 
Agent Zollinger is given any office Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland should be informed that 
while Zollinger held the pension agency 
here the clerks in his office were in plain 
violation of the law solicited for money for 
campaign expenses by his chief clerk and 
Zollinger has never denied that it was 
done at his instance. Now if it is answered 
that the federal grand jury investigated 
that matter and found no indictments, 
knowing something of that investigation, 
we are prepared to meet such an answer. 

Thb gift by President Harrison of a 
paymastership in the army to his private 
secretary, Mr. Halford, is a curious in¬ 
stance of the survival of royal favoritism 
among us, and sending him over seas to 
pay half a dozen agents their wages 
though all the world pays millions over 
seas every day by drafts, is a harmonious, 
further and probably final favor. Mr. 
Halford has in past years rendered 
service to General Harrison, and for this 
it would have been proper and republican 
for General Harrison to pay him at his 
own expense. Instead, he rewards him 
out of the public treasury as Elizabeth re¬ 
warded Burleigh with castles and estates. 
And some capable army officer who has 
waited all his life on slow promotion must 
wait still longer. 


Another civil service reform paper is 
needed, one devoted simply to a chronicle 
of the doings of Tammany. The daily press 
of New York does its work thoroughly, and 
furnishesagreat mass of material that ought > 


to be startling to any person of average in¬ 
telligence and conscience. But the cumula¬ 
tive effect of facts scattered through daily 
papers is largely dissipated. These facts 
should be combined, and arranged month 
by month; above all they should be put in¬ 
to compact shape for exhibition at the next 
centennial. 

There are four great and disreputable 
chiefs, McLaughlin, Murphy, Hill and 
Croker, who are sure to furnish instruc¬ 
tive material in the next few months. If 
Mr. Cleveland declines to hand over the 
state of New York to them as booty, they 
will try to crush him. What they do and 
how they do it, given in detail, will be 
curious reading for the patriotic citizen. 
In fact the lund of Murphy is already felt. 
John B. Riley, chief examiner of the civil 
service commission,has just been removed, 
because, as one of Murphy’s henchmen 
said, “he was not with us, that’s all.” 


It is now stated that during the past year, 
Govenor Flower has suspended the com¬ 
petitive tests for thirty five to fifty places 
in order that henchmen of the machine 
might be more easily provided for. This 
has been the case at the state agricultural 
station. At the suggestion of Lieutenant- 
Governor Sheehan, the rules were suspend¬ 
ed to let three of his heelers into the dairy 
commissioners’ office. These worthies get 
$2,000 apiece. Last December Murphy 
had the rules suspended so that his hench¬ 
man, Sternberg, could be appointed corpora¬ 
tion bookkeeper in the secretary of state’s 
office. In January the messenger in the 
office of the superintendent of public 
buildings died. There were men on the 
eligible list, but they were passed, and the 
place given to a heeler who had passed no 
examination. The attention of the civil 
service commission was called to this viola¬ 
tion of the law, but the superintendent of 
public buildings is Murphy’s father-in-law 
and nothing was done. Last week Labor 
Commissioner Dowling turned out six em¬ 
ployes, and then applied to the commission 
to suspend the rules to enable him to make 
some appointments. So it goes. It is time 
for the civil service reformers of the state 
of New York to begin a crusade. 


The political reputation of Indiana has 
been such as often to embarrass her citi¬ 
zens who have outgrown their party bigotry 
and cant. Those who know the state best 
are not discouraged because Dudley and 
his sort have done a great deal of efficient 
“work,” nor of the swinish onslaught go¬ 
ing on now, but rather because of the 
apathy of those who regard themselves as 
good citizens, moral leaders by reason of 
intellectual or social position. As was 
' noted in slavery times the northern man 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


415 


with southern principles was most exas¬ 
perating and obdurate, so in Indiana the 
greatest incubus on the movement to 
down the spoils system has been the in¬ 
difference or the hostility of many sons of 
New England, or of New England colleges 
resident in Indiana. It was therefore a 
happy coincidence that Mr. Charles Dud¬ 
ley Warner, the guest of the New England 
society of Indianapolis, December 22, 
should say in his address: 

We think that our form of government Is the one 
best calculated to attain this end. It is. of all others 
yet tried in this world, the one least felt by the peo¬ 
ple, lea.st felt as an Interference in the affairs of pri¬ 
vate life, in opinion, in conscience, in our freedom to 
attain position, to make money, to move from place 
to place and to follow any career that is open to our 
ability. In order to maintain this freedom of action, 
this non-interference, we are bound to resist central¬ 
ization of power; for a central power in a republic, 
grasped and administered by bosses, is no more tol¬ 
erable than central power in a despotism, grasped 
and administered by an hereditary autocrat. Let us 
not be deceived by names. Government by consent 
of the people is the best government, but it is not 
government by the people when it is in the hands of 
political bosses who juggle with the theory of major¬ 
ity rule. What republics have most to fear is the 
rule of the boss, who is a tyrant without responslbil- 
ityj He makes the nominations, he dickers and 
trades for the elections, and at the end he divides 
the spoils. The operation is more uncertain than a 
horse-race, which is not decided by the speed 
of the horses, but by the state of the wagers 
and the manipulation of the jockeys. We strike di¬ 
rectly at his power for mischief when we organize the 
entire civil service of the nation and of the states on 
capacity, integrity, experience, and not on political 
favor. 

Mr. Warner’s remarks are aptly illus¬ 
trated by a recent occurrence. Early in the 
session of the present legislature of New 
York, a bill was introduced to put into 
practice in Oswego a scheme of munici¬ 
pal reform which aimed to do away with 
the power of the machine by providing 
for primary assemblies of the people in 
numbers drawn by lot, the persons so 
chosen to meet at once, and choose a rep¬ 
resentative to vote in their behalf for 
municipal officers. Dr. Clark, a citizen of 
Oswego, had been urging the plan for 
years. The town was anxious to try it. As 
the New York Times said of the bill, “as 
there was nothing in it contrary to the 
constitution or to good morals, and inas¬ 
much as the experiment was to be tried at 
their own risk and charge, there seemed no 
good reason why they should not be al¬ 
lowed to try it. That seems to have been 
the view of the assembly, which passed the 
bill by 87to 21.” But Sheehan, the lieu¬ 
tenant-governor of the state, and the lieu¬ 
tenant of Hill and Murphy, frankly ex¬ 
plained that he would not “ let it pass” if 
every man in Oswego wanted it, because, 
to quote the language attributed to him by 
Dr. Clark, “it would knock parties and 
politicians to the devil,” and, upon being 
reminded that the assembly had passed it, 
cheerfully made answer, “ I know they did, 
the d-d fools.” 


The Boston Civil Service Reform Asso¬ 
ciation recently gave Mr. Roosevelt a din¬ 
ner. Henry H. Sprague, who presided, 
said that— 

“The coming administration can not more 
clearly demonstrate its fidelity to the princi¬ 
ples of civil service reform than by demand¬ 
ing a continuance of his service in the future. 
A man who has proved the sincerity and in¬ 
tegrity of his motives by never hesitating to 
hold with an unflinching tenacity the mem¬ 
bers of his own party to a strict observance of 
the law, certainly can not be charged with 
partisanship or partiality if he pursue the 
same course under the administration of an¬ 
other party.” 

It is well to take count now of how much 
we owe to Mr. Roosevelt. Publicity in¬ 
stead of secrecy in all matters of the rec¬ 
ords has been the most effective step ever 
taken to guard against tricking the law. 
The invitation that competition was open 
to all, at once disposed of the bugbear re¬ 
peated by high civil service reform author¬ 
ities that in a republican administration 
we must expect only republicans to apply 
for examination, and likewise only demo¬ 
crats when their party was in power. To 
realize the effect of courage and common 
sense, note in the reports of investigations 
and in the letters of civil service reformers 
to the papers, say six years ago, the halt¬ 
ing, quibbling stand on evasions of the law 
and what Mr. Roosevelt said at this dinner, 
as reported in the Springfield Bepublican: 

The last great add i tiou and great advance, the incl u- 
sion in the classified service of the free delivery 
post-offices, has been a blow to the spoils system 
right in its home, the local politician is attacked, 
and there Is a “fierce fight” ahead in enforcing the 
law in many of these offices, most of all in the small¬ 
est ones. I earnestly believe that it is the duty of 
the commission to proceed upon the assumption 
that any sweeping change of force in any one of 
these offices shows prima facie that there has been a 
violation of the law, and that in the event of such 
sweeping change the postmaster himself should be 
held to a full accountability and required to show 
cause why he should not be regarded as having made 
such changes for merely partisan reasons. 

There is one rule that we hope will in all 
cases be adopted by the new administration. 
When a man fixes his eye upon an office 
he wants but finds a present incumbent in 
his way and then goes about and gets oth¬ 
ers to help him make “charges,” let the 
charges in all cases be in writing and 
signed by the persons making them. Then 
let them be given out for publication a 
substantial period before action is taken. 
If it is known that this is to be the rule 
much moral deterioration will be pre¬ 
vented. Where the protection of secrecy 
is allowed, most of the “charges” have no 
foundation whatever, but are manufact¬ 
ured under the impulse of a wolfish desire 
for prey. Every congressman, every party 
committeeman, and every citizen should 


be given to understand that what he has 
to say toward getting an officer out of his 
place must be said openly and that he 
must be prepared to take the consequences. 


The annual meeting of the National 
Civil Service Reform League will be held 
in New York in April at a date not yet fixed. 
Carl Schurz will preside and deliver the 
annual address. Any member of any civil 
service reform association may take part 
and vote in the League. 


THE SPOILS SYSTEM. 

Catskill, Feb. 20. —Brooding over the im¬ 
pending loss of his office, Postmaster Judson, 
of Prattsville, finally became violently insane, 
and to-day was brought before Judge Sander¬ 
son, who, upon the finding of physicians who 
examined him, decided .that Mr. Judson be 
taken to the Hudson River Hospital at Pough¬ 
keepsie. 


The next day a fever developed and later 
pneumonia. In his delirium the pressure that 
office-seekers and office-holders had distressed 
him with was made apparent by his ejacula¬ 
tions: “My dear Madam, I did not direct 
that your husband should be turned out. I 
did not know it. I tried to prevent it!” 

At another time he cried : “It is wrong—I 
won’t consent — ’tis unjust!” And again: 
“Oh, these applications! Will they never 
cease ?”—Death bed of President William Henry 
Harrison. 


Gov. Altgeld’s flight from Illinois for a 
health resort was caused by the office-seekers. 
This is what his physician said:— 

If the horde of place-hunters would only give him 
peace, he would soon be on the road to recovery. As 
it is, as long as he remains here he will get no better. 


THR MERIT SYSTEM. 

In March 1892, post-master General Wana- 
maker announced that he would present a gold 
medal to the railway postal clerk, in each of 
the eleven divisions of the service who should 
make during the calendar year the best general 
record in his division. 

Harry P. Swift of New York led all his 
companions. He is in the second class of the 
Greenport and New York railway post-office. 
In all he handled 35,309 cards in the examina¬ 
tion, with a correct percentage of 96.84, and a 
record of 14 cards per minute. In connection 
with his work Mr. Swift showed remarkable 
development in his power to memorize. The 
distribution in the case work implied famili¬ 
arity with the quickest method of forwarding, 
and the exact location of over 50 per cent, of 
the post-offices in the United States, covering 
most of the territory east of the Mississippi 
river. Mr. Swift has been in the service one 
year and a half. 













416 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


T?HEL ONSKAUQHT. 

“Public olHce is Ji public trust. We reafllrm the declaration of the democratic national convention of 1876 tor the reform 
of the civil service, [Reform is necessary in the civil service. Experience proves that etiicieiit, economical conduct of the 
government business is not possible if its civil service be subject to change at every election, be a prize fought An* at the ballot 
box, be a brief reward of party zeal, instead of posts of honor, assigned for proved competency and held for fidelity in the public 
employ; that the dispensing of patronage should neither be a tax upon the time of all our public men, nor the instrument of 
their ambition] and we call forthe honest enforcement of all laws regulating the same. The nomination of a President, as in the 
recent republican convention by delegations composed largely of his appointees, holding office at his pleasure, is a scandalous 
satire upon free popular institutions, and a startling illustration of the methods by which a President may gratify his ambition. 
We denounce a policy under which federal office-holders usurp control of ptirty conventions in the states, and we pledge the dem¬ 
ocratic party to the reform of these and all other abuses which threaten individual liberty and local self-government.”—^a<tono/ 
Democratic Platform, 1892. 


COOPER’S DOMAIN. 

Danville.— Democratic patrons of the Danville 
post-office to-day protested, in no uncertain manner, 
against Congressman Cooper's action in recommending 
William A. King, editor of the Gazette, as postmaster 
under the incoming administration. There are 175 
democratic patrons of the office and there were 162 
votes cast in the election which resulted in the se¬ 
lection of Robert W. Wade. Four ballots were neces¬ 
sary to decide which of the six candidates had a 
majority. Feeling among local democrats is run¬ 
ning high, and those who went into the election 
claim that they are supported by the State central 
committee, while Mr. King is endorsed solely by 
Cooper.—Indianapolis Journal, January 22. 

Martinsville.— Congressman George W. Cooper 
was in the city to-day. His apartment at the Grand 
Hotel was constantly crowded by office-seekers dur¬ 
ing the entire time. The fact has leaked out that he 
promised James A. Lewis, county chairman of the 
democratic committee, the post office. The appoint¬ 
ment will not meet the approval of the democrats. 
There has been a general sentiment prevailing here, 
suggesting the election of a postmaster by demo¬ 
cratic patrons of the city. Should such a thing oc¬ 
cur, Mr. Lewis would probably little more than re¬ 
ceive a complimentary vote. It is generally thought 
that Eb. Henderson and son Guthridge will receive 
fat plums. Eb’s son Will., who received half a dozen 
appointments during Cleveland’s former term, is 
also curling his hair in anticipation of a clerkship 
of some sort.— Indianapolis Journal, January 25. 

Martinsville.— Hon. Geo. W. Cooper, while in 
this city, yesterday, appeared to be in excellent 
spirits, with the exception of the recommending of 
a postmaster here. That part of his job he would 
like to let out to some person and pay them to take 
it. He does not favor the selection by popular vote, 
and yet he dislikes to appoint one for fear of ex¬ 
citing enmity that may work disadvantageously 
two years hence, when Judge Cunning, of Blooming¬ 
ton, will make his nomination improbable as mat¬ 
ters now stand. Being asked what he had to say 
about the local pension board. Cooper remarked: 

“ I am taking little interest in that, for I do not 
know what will be the policy of the new administra¬ 
tion—whether it will be to divide the members of the 
board between the two parties or to select all from 
among democrats. At any rale you may say that Dr. 
S. A. Tilford will be one of the members of Iheboard.” 
The congre.ssman also said Eb Henderson wants his 
old position as deputy revenue commissioner, and 
thinks there is no doubt but that he will get it. 
Being asked of W. S. Shirley’s chance of becoming 
district attorney of Indiana, he replied: “Well, I 
can’t say. I am embarrassed there because I have 
another candidate in my districtfrom the same place. It 
is William Pickens, of Spencer."—Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, January 26. 

Congressman Geo. W. Coeperuas here all day yester¬ 
day, and the applicants for the post-office were on dress 
parade before the distinguished gentleman. While he 
did not definitely state his preference for the posi¬ 
tion, the aspirants are satisfied that James A. Lewis 
will receive his approval. Cooper was somewhat as¬ 
tonished when notified that an election had been 
held at Danville after his preference had been made 
public, rfnd he intimated that it would make no dif - 


ference in the selection of a postmaster for that 
place. Eb Henderson, he says, will undoubtedly be 
appointed deputy revenue commissioner. He fur¬ 
ther stated that be [Cooper] was poorer now than 
when he became congressman, and his purchase of 
Washington property was purely a business tran.sac- 
tion. He had mortgaged his property in Columbus 
to obtain the money to make the first payment. 

Some dissatisfaction exists here over Cooper’s ac¬ 
tion in refusing an election to determine the post¬ 
mastership, and four of the applicants have ex¬ 
pressed a wish that an election be held over his pro¬ 
test.— Indianapolis Journal, January 26. 

The five candidates for the post-office at this place 
held a meeting last night in the democratic central 
committee rooms to try and agree upon an election. 
Nothing was accomplished and the fightstill goeson. 
—Indianapolis News, January 28. 

Danville.— The democratic patrons of the Dan¬ 
ville post-office held an election recently and elected 
R. W. Wade for postmaster,—jRdianapoh's Sentinel, 
January 31. 

Plainfield.— Notwithstanding that William Stan¬ 
ley has been but recently reappointed postmaster 
here, an election will be held to morrow by the local 
democracy to determine a choice. The main object 
of a large portion of the democrats is to thwart the 
plans of Congressman Cooper.—Didianapolis News, 
January 27. 

None of the democratic candidates for the post- 
office at Plainfield would submit his chances to a 
popular election, thinking it no use, R. F. Hiatt alone 
excepted, and for him but forty votes were cast. 
Congressman Cooper has named Isaac Holton.—/n- 
dianapolis News, January 30. 

A special from Danville stating that an election 
had been held there, notwithstanding the fact that 
Mr. Cooper had decided upon the candidate whom 
he would recommend, was shown to the congress¬ 
man, and he was asked if he wasn’t meeting with 
some dissatisfaction in his selection of candidates. 

“Yes,” he replied, “ that is to be expected. This, 
too, in spile of the fact that I have indicated whom 
I will recommend for the office. There has also been 
some dissatisfaction at other places."—Indianapolis 
Journal, January 25. 

Martinsville.—W. 8. Sherley, of this city, is a 
candiate for district attorneyship of Indiana. He 
was a delegate to the Chicago convention, and was one 
of the seven supporters of Cleveland from this state, 
giving him the nomination on the first ballot. Mr. 
Sherley says: “ I believe I will be appointed to the 
district attorneyship. If Mr. Cleveland takes it upon 
himself to distribute the important patronage in this 
state, I am confident I will be appointed, for he can't be 
ungrateful to his friends, and the district attorneyship 
is the only office I would accept.” 

Among the twelve candidates. Judge Nelson of 
Logansport, Mr. Corbaley, of Madison, and John W. 
Kern, of Indianapolis, are recognized as Mr. Sher- 
ley’s most formidable opponents, but as neither of 
these gentleman was a delegate, while two of them, 
Kern and Corbaley, are from districts whose dele¬ 
gates opposed the nomination of Cleveland for a 
second term, the friends of Mr. Sherley claim hes 
much the lead in the race. —Indianapolis News, Febru¬ 
ary 13. 


Martinsville.— Eb Henderson, Sam Guthridge, 
James Lewis, and probably Charles G. Renner, will 
leave Tuesday for Washington to attend the inaugu¬ 
ration. A ticket agent of an eastern line was here 
Thursday to see them tickets. Hr. Henderson is do¬ 
ing the negotiating for the crowd. After the rates 
and limitations of the tickets had been given, Mr. 
Henderson said: 

“I don’t want a ticket that will run out in eight 
days.” 

"How long,” asked the agent, “do you want it to 
run?” 

“Why, I can’t tell, exactly. It might be four years. 
You don’t think I’m coming home before I get an 
office, do you?”— Indianapolis Journal, February 25. 

* » » 

Hammond's Domain. 

Logansport.— Congressman Thomas Hammond, of 
this district, has the largest post-office matinee on 
his hands that ever twitched the nerves of a poli¬ 
tician, and all the fortune tellers in the Wabash 
valley could not give him a formula that would ac¬ 
complish the appointment of candidates that would 
give entire satisfaction. In every town from the size 
of Logansport, which is 18,000 strong and the largest 
town in the district, to the snoring hamlet that goes 
by the classic name of Tailholt, is a following of en¬ 
thusiastic office-hunters, and the new congressman 
has served notice on the party workers who have 
surfeited him with their supplications that he will 
name all postmasters within twenty days. Here in 
Logansport there are five prominent candidates for 
the post-office and about twenty others who are pa¬ 
trons of the black-horse style of campaign, and will 
feel as though commendable traits have gone un. 
crowned if they are not successful. The foremost 
applicants are V. C. Hanawalt, chairman of the 
county committee; Dr. H. D. Hattery, presidential 
elector; Harry Torr, ex-auditor, and John Hawkins, 
foreman of the Pan-Handle shops. Each of these 
gentlemen Is entitled to credit for the zeal mani¬ 
fested in his work, while it is the calm, sober judg¬ 
ment of the vast majority that V. C. Hanawalt is en¬ 
titled to the appointment from every stand-point 
from which the merit of a political figure can be 
reckoned. For thirty years he has been a hard¬ 
working party man and has been successively 
turned down, not because he was not popular, but 
because he was out-classed by the artifice of his op¬ 
ponents. He has never sulked in his tent, has la¬ 
bored strenuously for the ticket in campaigns when 
he had been treated shamefully by tricksters at the 
convention and when the only beneficiaries were 
those who had always fought him at the convention. 

Harry Torr is a fine man, but has just retired to 
private life about 860,000 better off than eight years 
ago, when he became county auditor. He hardly 
had time to brush the dust off of his private affairs 
before he appeared as a claimant for the post-office, 
much to general surprise, but he is making a vigor¬ 
ous fight and will go down only after he has fought 
valiantly. 

Hattery is a shrewd, persistent worker, and he has 
not lost any opportunity since the morning of vic¬ 
tory to strengthen his chances with the congress¬ 
men. The fact that he is a presidential elector, en¬ 
dows his cause with some additional prominence, 
and he realizes it, too. 

The dark horses who have been groomed and will- 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


417 


ing for three months are John Sheerin and B. F. 
Louthain. Louthain is proprietor of the democratic 
Pharos, has always been a potent factor in state poli¬ 
tics and was postmaster during Cleveland’* former 
administration. When it is remembered that Lou¬ 
thain was one of the intriguers that sprang the un¬ 
expected nomination of Hammond on the conveii 
tion at the eleventh hour when there appeared to be 
no candidate but Zimmerman, it will be seen that 
Hammond must have gratitude for the editor. 

John Sheerin is the brother of the Hon. S. P. 
Sheerin, national democratic secretary, and an offi¬ 
cial who can get almost anything under the coming 
dispensation. 

In several other places the inhabitants have been 
given to novelties in the way of determining post- 
office contests. The scheme has been that of per¬ 
mitting all democrats to vote for the preferred candi¬ 
date, and this man to be indorsed by the public as 
the desired appointee. When Congressman Ham¬ 
mond learned of this movement he thought it an in¬ 
vasion of his privilege to appoint regardless of any 
local assistance, and has notified all that he is not 
in sympathy with this procedure, and his language 
has been so positive that all who w'ant to curry favor 
with him have dissolved connection with this prop¬ 
osition. Hammond will not permit the people to 
assume any position that threatens to lessen the dig¬ 
nity or patronage of his station, as he realizes it, but 
it is thought that the politicians who inside of an 
hour transformed him from a congressional delegate 
to a congressional nominee, will exercise an influ¬ 
ence that will be heeded in the distribution of 
spoils.—CWcapo News Record, February 9. 

Delphi.— There is nothing new in the post office 
situation. John Odell is still in the race with all his 
might, as are a half dozen others. Jim Weidner went 
up to see Hammond last week and reports a satisfac¬ 
tory interview. Isherwood, accompanied by Will 
Smith, also paid his respects to the next congress¬ 
man, and it is said, flxed the whole thing up. When 
Odell, Weidner, Kennard, Rogers, Nieworth and the 
rest of them hear of Isherwood’s appointment they 
can’t say that I did not tell them about it in advance. 
—Delphi Journal, February 2. 

Several weeks ago the leading democrats of this 
city decided that they would prefer to settle the 
question of postmastership at this place among 
themselves, and accordingly sent to Thomas Ham¬ 
mond, congresssman elect, a petition to leave the 
matter to a vote of the democratic patrons of the 
office. The petition was signed by nine out of ten 
of the democrats of the city. In a letter to Hon. 
JohnC. Odell, whose name headed the petition, Mr. 
Hammond plainly and emphatically gives the peti¬ 
tioners to understand that he can name the post¬ 
masters in this district without any assistance. He 
said that petitions and recommendations would be 
received and filed and given due consideration at 
the proper time. Mr. Hammond’s letter has aroused 
no little bad blood in the party here, but it has 
greatly stimulated the post-office candidates. No 
less than a half dozen are circulating petitions, and 
itis said that no one who can write is barred. The 
signatures of men and women, democrats, republi¬ 
cans and prohibitionists are gladly received. There 
can be no question but that R. M Isherwood, editor 
of the Times, will receive the appointment. He is 
circulating no petition, but he stands in with the 
state machine, the members of which will name Mr. 
Hammond’s postmasters for him. — Indianapolis 
Journal, January 27. 

The Rochester Sentinel says that Congressman Ham¬ 
mond has named the incoming postmasters in Fulton 
county as follows: Rochester, J. Shields; Akron, 
Neal Hettmansperger; Fulton, H. M. Wood ; Tiosa, 
Milton Fertz; Letter’s Ford, Wilson Brugh ; Bruce's 
Lake, J. K. Smith; DeLong, Wm. Heeter; Blue 
Grass, John W. Rush ; Grass Creek, Ed Cook; Bloom- 
ingsburg. S. Y. Grove; Grant, L. T. Barkman; Siu- 
conger, Sol Burns, and Richland Center, Jesse Mar- 
tindale.—/ndtanapofis News February 18. 

Delphi.— The post-office row at this place was 
brought to a focus yesterday when a letter was re¬ 
ceived from Congressman Hammond announcing to the 
contestants that he had decided to recommend the ap¬ 


pointment of R. M. Isherwood, editor of the Times. Mr- 
Isherwood was chairman of the county central com¬ 
mittee, and the son-in-law of Charles R. Pollard, who 
was a delegate to the Chicago convention that nom¬ 
inated Cleveland. This appointment is received 
with anything but joyous acclaim by the democrats 
of the city. The contestants were Hon. John S 
Odell, a democratic war-horse, and James W. Weid- 
ener, a vigorous representative of the county democ¬ 
racy. Soon after the contest opened Congressman 
Hammond announced that the man who presented 
the best petition would be recommended for the 
place, and Odell and Weldener spent weeks circulat¬ 
ing petitions. Isherwood circulated no petition, say¬ 
ing that if he could not get the appointment without 
thus humiliating himself he did not care for it. 
Without presenting the shadow of a petition he se¬ 
cures the place. This is what aggravates the other 
contestants and their friends more than anything 
else, and they are talking of dire revenge on the con¬ 
gressman. Dherwood will not give up the publica¬ 
tion of his paper during his incumbency. The post- 
office and democratic organ will both be managed 
from the same tent and both will be auxiliary to the 
democratic county central committee, of which Mr. 
Isherwood will remain chairman.-J«dtanapoHs Jour¬ 
nal, February 26. 

Logansport.— Congressman Hammond will rec- 
commend V. C. Hanawaltfor post master at Logans¬ 
port. 

Chesterton.— Among the petitions in circulation 
for appointment as postmaster, and there are a num¬ 
ber of them, is one by F. F. Maroney, in which he 
says of himself: “There is no question about his 
democracy; it was born in him. His mother is a 
radical and cordially hates the politics of a republi¬ 
can and mugwump. All of his ancestors before him 
have been believers in the Jacksonian principles of 
democracy.’’—indfanopoHs News, February 18. 

* » » 

HOLMAN'S DOMAIN. 

Greensburg.— The candidates for the city post- 
office under Mr. Cleveland have agreed among them¬ 
selves to submit their claims to the democratic pa¬ 
trons of the office and the action will be promulgated 
to the party in a day or two. The date for holding 
the election has not yet been fixed. The action on 
the part of the candidates, itis said, is due to a letter 
received from Congressman Holman, who advised 
such a step. Who the successful man will be it is 
hard to say, but at this time Mayor Cicero Northern 
and S. F. Rogers are the leaders —/ndianapoh's News, 
January 81. 

Greensburg.— The post office election occurs to¬ 
morrow, and the ten candidates have been unusual¬ 
ly active to day in an effort to pull themselves to¬ 
gether in good shape for the contest of the ballots. 
Charges and counter charges are being made on every 
hand. The struggle has caused much bad blood 
among the rival candidates, and it will be many a 
day before all the sore places have been healed.—/n- 
dianapolis News, February 27. 

Greensburg.— The following was the vote for post¬ 
master to-day: C. F. Northern, 29; W. N. Boyles, 29; 
William Haas, 9; John Lugenbell, 89; S. F. Rogers, 
153; G. W. Magee, 15 ; G. P. Shoemaker, 89; M. Jack, 
son, 13; Bernard Keeh, 65; Miss Lida Black, 6. To¬ 
tal vote, 445.— Indianapolis Sentinel, March 1. 

Shelbyville —The scramble for political spoils 
among the democrats is amusing. Before the offi¬ 
cial count disclosed the victor in the last election, 
men made their claims known for the various 
places. When it was announced that Holman was 
recommending elections, the applicants who did 
not possess the necessary political pull commenced 
to ask for an election for the post-office. There are 
already eight applicants for the postmastership, and 
if there is an election several more will shy their 
castors into the ring. The applicants up to date are 
John W.'Vannoy, formerly mayor of the city; Wm. 
Buxton, ex-county recorder, and for years chairman 
of the county central committee; Ed Major, city 
clerk; Adam Flaitz, Joe Kennerly, deputy post¬ 
master under Cleveland and the Harrison appointee; 
Wm. Ryse, an old and intimate'friend of Mr. Hol¬ 


man, besides 'Squire Higgins, justice of the peace for 
years. S. S. Major, Cleveland’s postmaster, is 
strongly talked of, but as yet he has made no state¬ 
ment The friends of the candidates are anxious to 
hold an election, but those who possess influence de¬ 
sire to leave the matter to the appointive power.— 
Indianapolis News, February 16. ' 

Rushville —The democrats who are patrons of the 
Rushville post office have determined upon an elec¬ 
tion to settle the matter of a postmaster. It has 
been arranged by the candidates to hold the election 
Saturday, March 11, under the Australian system. 
This means of settling the matter has been suggested 
by the Hon. William S. Holman. 

There are now in the field twelve candidates for 
the position, each of whom good naturedly pledged 
himself to abide by the results. The names of the 
worthy aspirants who desire to handle the U. S. mails 
are as follows: Perry Parrish, T. B. Monjar, Albert 
English, John Cavitt, J. T. Niron, Perry Alexander, 
D. P. Shawhan, Patrick Lynch, Douglas Morris, T. M. 
Ochiltree, W. C. Meredith, J. F. Bigger.— Indianapo¬ 
lis Sentinel, February 27. 

To the Editor.— Sir: The communication pub¬ 
lished in your issue of this date from Rushville re¬ 
lating to an election of postmaster is far from stating 
the facts. Mr. Holman did not suggest an election, 
and parties here have letters from him of very re¬ 
cent date expressly saying he did not, nor has not 
intended, to suggest an election. This mode of set¬ 
tling the matter has not been agreed to by a part of 
the aspirants named in the published article. Some 
of them have expressly refused to engage in or take 
part in an election called in this manner. The cen¬ 
tral committee of this county, or the executive com- 
mitte of this township, has not been consulted in the 
matter, and the call, if call there is, has been made 
by no one with authority to call an election. I do 
not understand that a lew seekers for a petty office 
can disregard the constituted party authorities and 
have an election under any arrangements they may 
think proper and whenever they may think proper. 
If they can, then we will soon be having an election 
every day. I would be glad if you would publish 
this to correct the false impression made, or intended 
to be made, by the article referred to. 

John D. Magee. 

Rushville. February 27. 

—Indianapolis Sentinel, February 28. 

To the Editor: Sir —In your issue of the Sentinel 
to-day I notice an article over the signature of John 
D. Magee in relation to the call for an election to be 
held here on the 11th of March, to determine who is 
the most popular democrat in the city for postmaster. 

In his article he states that the election was not 
officially authorized by any one and that it is not the 
work of Mr. Holman. In reply to these statements I 
desire to say that the notice for an election is regu¬ 
larly signed by Thomas J. Newkirk, chairman of 
democratic central committee of Rush county, and 
that we have in our possession a letter from Mr. Hol¬ 
man requesting the post-office matter to be settled 
here by the democracy of this city. 

Rushville, February 28. Thomas M. Ochiltree. 

—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 1. 

Rushville.— The democrats of Milroy concluded 
to decide their choice for postmaster at that place, a 
few days ago, by holding an election. There were sev¬ 
eral worthy aspirants for the position,and ihe election 
was held according to previous arrangements. The 
result was that a Miss Susie Pegg was chosen, she 
having received the necessary majority of votes. It 
has since leaked out that Miss Pegg is a strong pro¬ 
hibitionist. This result has brought about quite an 
uproar among the faithful, who declare that another 
election should be held to settle the matter.—/ndt- 
anapolis Sentinel, February 10. 

Moore’s Hill.-I t is a reliably stated that there are 
thirty nine applicants for the post office at Aurora. 

Moore's Hiil.—A bitter post-office war, which 
threaten to involve the entire neighborhood, is wag¬ 
ing at Boston. More's the pity, for the salary of the 
postmaster at the hamlet is not $i0.—Indianapolis 
News, February 25. 








418 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


BYNUM’S DOMAIN. 

Anderson.— But little interest is taken in the post* 
office fight here. This is probably due to the pre¬ 
vailing impression that Dale J. Criltenberger, editor oj 
the Democrat, and a warm personal and political friend 
of Congressman Bynum, is an applicant for t’:e place 
and has the inside track. Other candidates men¬ 
tioned are Thomas J. Fleming, John Baker and B. 
W. Scott. Mr. Crittenberger has the support of the 
leading men of his party, and it looks now lhat he 
could not fail to get the appointment, as it is under¬ 
stood Mr. Bynum is pledged to his support.—Z)ispafc/» 
to Indianapolis News, February 4. 

HauohviLLE.— There is a strong tendency toward 
having J. M Taylor for Haughville’s next postmas¬ 
ter. There is no dissatisfaction with the present in¬ 
cumbent, but the change in administration makes 
possible a change in postmasters, and the popular J. 
M. Taylor is the almost unanimous choice.—Jndiaa- 
apolis Sentinel, February 10. 

The Irish element of the Haughville democracy are 
putting forward John Gallagher as a candidate for 
the post-office.—/ndiatjapoh's News. 

There are as many aspirants for the Indianapolis 
post-office as there are local democrats, almost, but 
the knowing ones say lhat Albert Sahm is the one 
“Vic" Backus had in mind when he told the clerks 
at the post-office that the postmaster \vas already se¬ 
lected.—Jndianapofis Journal, February 27. 

Marion. —VV. J. Houck, editorof the Marion/>eader, 
is a candidate for collector of internal revenue for 
the sixth district. A petition urging his appoint¬ 
ment for this position has been circulated by his 
friends, and the names of a great many of the promi¬ 
nent local democrats secured. Mr. Houck at first 
was a candidate for the post-office at this place.— 
Indianapolis News, January 5. 

Local democrats say that the question of federal 
patronage for this city has been settled; that the 
only appointment Indianapolis will get is that of 
the post-office and collector of customs. Cleveland 
has not been heard from, but “Bynum and the boys 
havefixedit all up.” Congressman Bynum is reported 
to have said that Albert Sahm would be appointed post¬ 
master, and it h&s been inferred from Mr. Bynum's 
talk that the collectorship would go to Maurice C. 
Donnelly; that Sahm would be appointed as a repre¬ 
sentative German and to satisfy the German-Ameri- 
can club, and that Mr. Donnelly’s appointment would 
be as an Irishman and a representative of the Shields 
club. J. L. F. Steeg, who is an applicant for thecol- 
lectorship, had a talk with Mr. Bynum, and soon dis¬ 
covered that there was no chance for him, even 
when he said to the congressman from this district 
that he did not ask the office as a representative of 
the German, French. Irish or American element, but 
as a Democrat, he did not receive any encourage¬ 
ment. He has withdrawn from the race. Smith 
Myers, however, has not given up all hopes. Hesays 
that the man who beats Maurice Donnelly will be 
appointed. The appointment of United States mar¬ 
shal and district attorney will not, it is believed, be 
made in Indianapolis. It is believed that Captain 
Allen, of Frankfort, will be appointed pension 
agent; Judge Nelson, of Logansport, United States 
attorney, and Mr. Hawkins, of Sullivan, for United 
States marshal.—JwdianopoHs News, February 2Z. 

AT INDIANAPOLIS. 

Mr. Erwin yesterday introduced a resolution, 
which the house adopted, asking the Cleveland ad¬ 
ministration to •’fire ” all the mail clerks employed 
during the Harrison administration, and replace 
them with democrats.—indianapoffa Journal Febru¬ 
ary 25. 

if * i.> 

The Cleveland Club gave a benefit last (Sunday) 
night at the Empire Theater, and drew as laige an 
audience as was ever seen there. The object of the 
entertainment, was to secure funds for an excursion 
of the club to Washington, to attend the inaugural 
ceremonies. The show netted the club about 81,C00. 
The first part of the entertainment consisted of regu. 
lation blackface minstrel .show. Numerous pictures 
of Cleveland were hung about the boxes, and on the 
stage, and bunting was freely used. The first row of 


people on the stage were the performers, black faced, 
and dressed in swallow tail coats. In the center sat 
James Fenncssy, the manager of the house,.inter¬ 
locutor for the nonce. A row of members of the 
Cleveland Club sat on raised seats just behind the 
performers, clad in light overcoats and silk hats, 
holding their canes rigidly before them. They were 
designed to help the decoration of the stage, and were 
much and loudly admired by friends in the audi¬ 
ence. The great disappointment of the evening 
burst upon the audience when the curtain rose. The 
‘ • HoiUfrable Simeon Coy, ’’ so advertised to appear as 
one of the end men, at ihe last moment backed out. 
He was seen however, in the second row on thestage, 
w'earlnga silk hat and looking sublimely uncomforta¬ 
ble. During the whole of the first part he was not 
seen to move a muscle of his face. The lower boxes 
were filled with politicians. The Rhake family oc¬ 
cupied the left box, and Ollie Lanham, with his 
family was to the right. The performers seemed to 
think the presence of these gentlemen a good joke, 
and various references to “7 and 11” were made 
which seemed to be thoroughly understood by the 
audience. 

The ..rst part was composed of songs and choruses 
in the best style of amateurs, and w’hen such songs 
as ‘'Push Dem Clouds Away” and “Sunday at Fair- 
view Park ” were sung the enthusiasm of the audi¬ 
ence refused to be restrained. 

When the curtain went down the male portion of 
the audience rose en masse and filed out of the house, 
and during the wait filled the wide open saloon 
across the street, drinking and congratulating each 
other on the success of the entertainmei t. Chief of 
Police Colbert looked benignly on. During the in 
termission Police Judge Buskirk appeared in front of 
the curtain and made a speech, in which he tdld the 
“boys” their duty, and emphasized the fact that “to the 
victorsbelong the spoils.” Nothing was said by him or by 
the chief about the violationsof law before them. It 
was the first evening, so far as is recalled, that a row 
of patrolmen was not in line in the foyer of the thea¬ 
ter. There had been some curiosity to know if the 
authorities would interfere, as the entertainment 
was like others lhat had been suppressed —Jndian- 
apolis News, February 27. 

♦ * >s 

The politicians and applicants for places were 
flocking around “ Gil ” Shankliu last night in such a 
force that he was hardly able to eat his supper, and 
he got little sleep. “Where’s Gil?” was an inter¬ 
rogatory heard about every five minutes, and, as a 
final resort, a room at the Bates was given to them, 
and from it they marched in on Mr. Shanklin in a 
solid platoon. Mr. Shanklin, who had a two-hours’ 
talk with Mr. Cleveland, said to his friends that he 
found the President-elect thoroughly informed on 
the condition of Indiana politics, and that the result 
of the interview was that “Cleveland men” will be 
rewarded above all others. 

Mr. Shanklin is advocating the cause of Maurice C. 
Donnelly for collector of customs, and this leads the 
friends of Donnelly to believe lhat he will be ap¬ 
pointed. John Reaume and John Reardon are also 
mentioned for the place. John H. Foley wants to 
succeed Hart, of Frankfort, in the sixth auditor’s 
office, or Colonel Shaw, of the treasury department. 
Charles Rogers has put in his application for superin¬ 
tendent of the railway mail service in the fifth dis¬ 
trict. “Denny” Colbert is an applicant for the same 
place. “Billy” Colbert wants a place in the Indl. 
anapolis post-office, and Thomas Colbert is a candi¬ 
date for United States marshal. M.F. Kelly, now 
emplojed at the Central Hospital for the Insane, is 
applicant for consul at either Belfast or Londonderry, 
Ireland. “Con” Cunningham, of Crawfordsville, is 
after the same place. George W. Geiger wants the 
United Slates marshalship. John Higgins, assistant 
doorkeeper of the House of Representatives, will ask 
for a place in the navy department. “Wils” Mc¬ 
Ginnis’s friends are at work to secure his appoint¬ 
ment as deputy revenue collector in place of L. F. 
Karvey.—Indianapolis News, February 24. 

♦ 

The friends of Isaac P. Gray say there is no doubt 
that he will be sent to Mexico to represent the Uni¬ 
ted States. They say that he is well aware that the 


President will have a cabinet lhat will accord with 
his own views. Mr. Gray feels that he might differ 
with him on some things, and therefore it would be 
better that he be not in the position of a confidential 
adviser. He has, it is claimed, signified his desire 
for the mission to Mexico, and has been slated for 
that place. His friends say, that while they would 
prefer that he be given an office of more importance, 
they are satisfied, if he is. The office pays $12,000 a 
year. 

It was hoped that Mr Gray would be in a position 
to dispense a little patronage, and about half of 
the members of the club named in his honor, it is 
.said, had their plates ready to hand out as soon as 
their patron was in a place to fill them. It is said, 
however, that Mr. Gray has not lost sight of his 
friends in his own good fortune, and will make an 
effort to have some of them remembered. 

Captain Allen, of Frankfort, is in the city. He has 
returned from a political mission east. Captain 
Allen has been the steadfast friend of ex-Governor 
Gray. He has done everything lhat a loyal follower 
could do, and now that there is nothing else to do 
for Gray there are evidences that the captain is look 
ing out for himself. He is a candidate for the In¬ 
dianapolis pension agency. He has the support of 
the Indiana senators and has been asked by them to 
return to Washington about March 10. He was told 
while down east that Governor Gray would be given 
a place under the new administration. 

Sheriff Hawkins, of Sullivan, is a candidate for 
United States marshal for the Indiana district. It is 
said of him, politically, that he has possessed him¬ 
self of every political honor he has ev’er sought, and 
that his reputation and backing are of the best. He 
is not a relative of Edward Hawkins, who was mar¬ 
shal under Cleveland four years ago.—Indianapolis 
News, February 20. 

s;« 

Isaac Pusey Gray will go to Mexico as United 
States minister. All doubt of this has been set at 
rest by Mr. Gray himself, who said so, confidentially, 
to a friend. The Mexican mission was suggested 
for Gray by Mr. Cleveland himself. In a financial 
sense it is the best of the missions. 

There is really only one candidate for the Indianap¬ 
olis post-office who is making a determined fight, 
and that is Albert Sahm. Mr. Sahm has the in¬ 
dorsement of nearly the entire Indiana delegation, 
and the local leaders have made frequent trips to 
New York in his behalf. Tho.se of his friends who 
have talked to Mr. Cleveland and to the latter’s ad¬ 
visers say that there is no doubt but the appoint¬ 
ment will be given to Mr. Sahm. 

Fred Lorenz is the latest applicant for the position 
of superintendent of carriers at the Indianapolis 
po.st-office. 

Local politicians who are watching events closely, 
say that the election of United States Senators is 
having a strong influence in the Federal appoint¬ 
ments. There is a reconnoiter going on at this time. 
Senator Voorhees wants to succeed himself. The 
intimate friends of J. G. Shanklin say that he will 
be a candidate. W. D. Bynum is anxious to go up a 
step and Is taking care of himself for the senatorial 
race. Governor Mathews’ friends are insisting that 
he will make a good candidate for senator. Isaac 
P. Gray, his friends declare, has not lost his love for 
the senate. Thus it is shown that Federal appoint¬ 
ments are mixed up to a great extent with political 
aspirations and ambitions, and the result is a great 
deal of confusion. The candidates for senator, it is 
said, will aid those who will best serve their future inter¬ 
ests, and an o ffice-seeker who has the indorsement of one 
of the aspirants will find it difficuH to secure an indorse¬ 
ment from the others.—Indianapolis News, March 2. 

D. F. Mustard, of Anderson, is in the city to-day. 
He was mentioned for United States treasurer, but 
says he had never thought of such a thing. A num¬ 
ber of his friends, Mr. Mus’ard says, have urged him 
to apply for the pension agency at Indianapolis. 

“I have not,” said Mr. Mustard, “declared myself, 
and I am not, understand, a real sure-enough, ap¬ 
plicant. If the matter gels all tangled up by the va¬ 
rious candidates and an outsider is selected, why, I 
will try and be the outsider. I think I am competent 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


419 


for the place and I am a democrat. But I will not 
make a canvass or fight against any one else for the 
position.”— Indianapolis News, March 2. 

The Indianapolis Journal and Indianapolis News 
have heen printing during the last two weeks a series 
of absurd statements touchingex GovernorGrayand 
his prospective relations to the new administration. 
The fact is. as intimated in these dispatches many 
days ago that due provision has been made for the 
ex governor. As is pretty well known in political 
circles, boih here and in Indiana, the ex governor 
was quite anxious to enter the cabinet. His prefer¬ 
ence was the post-office department or the interior 
department. Quite a strong pressure was put by 
the ex-governor’s close friends upon the President¬ 
elect to secure his appointment to one of these posts 
or, in lieu of these, to some other position in the 
cabinet. The President elect, however, after can¬ 
vassing the situation thoroughly, could not see his 
way clear to tender the ex-governor a cabinet posi¬ 
tion. He thereupon determined to offer him the 
Mexican mission. The tender was made through a 
close friend of the ex-governc r, and promptly ac¬ 
cepted. His nomination will be sent to the senate 
very shortly after the inauguration—certainly not 
later than some day next week—and will undoubt¬ 
edly be confirmed at once. There is not the slightest 
prespect of opposition to the confirmation from any 
quarter. The Mexican mission is a comfortable 
berth, with little to do and a good salary. But, of 
course, there is no patronage attached to it.— Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, February 28. 

Bretz’s Domain. 

Congressman Bretz has gained the reputation of 
being one of the frankest dispensers of federal pat¬ 
ronage {neither house of congre.ss. Already, a month 
before inauguration, he has settled on the men he 
will recommend for the principal post-offices in his 
district, and makes no concealment of his choice. 
He read off a list of some of those he will recom¬ 
mend for appointment as postmasters under the new 
administration to the News correspondent to-day: 
Vincennes, Royal E. Purcell, editor Vincennes Sun; 
Bedford, John Johnson, editor Democrat; Shoals, A1 
Hacker, editor Democrat; Jasper, Charles Egg; Mit¬ 
chell, Joseph T. Dilley.—fPas/iiapfon Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis News, January 28. 

Over Lords Voorhees and Turpie. 

The Indiana senators will have a lively question 
on hand when it comes to settle the post-office at 
Richmond. Luther M. Mering, who was defeated 
for congress by Henry U. Johnson, believes he is en 
titled to the appointment, but his democracy is not 
old enough to meet the requirements of some of the 
old time Jacksonian school, whobelieve thatdemoc- 
racy like Bourbon ought to be at least ten year old 
before it is put on tap. Vigorous protests have al¬ 
ready reached Wa.shington against the appointment 
of Mr. Mering.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, January 28. 

Mr. Luther Mering, of Richmond, who made an 
unsuccessful race against Congressman Johnson, is 
at the capital, and it is reported that he claims the 
privilege of dispensing th; patronage of Mr. John¬ 
son’s district, which, by an arrangement between 
the senators, had been allotted to Senator Voorhees. 
Mr. Mering is an applicant for postmaster at Rich¬ 
mond.-IPos/iinjifoTi Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
February 2i. * * 

The two collectors of internal revenue have, it is 
stated most po.sitively, been agreed upon. It is 
stated that Judge Joshua Jump, of Terre Haute, has 
been "officially” informed by the arbiters that he 
shall be collector of internal revenue for that dis¬ 
trict, and that Capt. William Bracken, of Brookvllle, 
who has recently been here, was informed that he 
would be appointed collector for that district. The.se 
selections are said to be positive and definite, and 
the Journal correspondent is authorized to say that 
unless President Cleveland turns down the delega¬ 
tion these men will be appointed, as there recom¬ 
mendation is to be unanimous. A great many men 
applied for these two places. Judge Holman, when 
informed that his district would get one of the 


places, and that he could name the man, nearly 
fainted. He had pretended to be anxious to secure 
the place, but when confronted with the responsibil¬ 
ity he got red in the face, was confused, and finally 
acknowledged, before the delegation, that he w'as 
“placed in an embarrassing position,” as he had 
two men for the place, and it leaked out that he had 
been playing fast and loose, and both of the appli¬ 
cants believed they had the judge’s undivided sup¬ 
port. Finally Senator Voorhees said he was willing 
to relieve the judge of his "embarrassment;” he 
would lake the responsibility and name Captain 
Bracken, of Brookville. The judge, rather than per¬ 
mit the senator to take the responsibility, and conse¬ 
quently the credit, said he would also name Captain 
Bracken, so Dr. Hunter, of Lawrenceburp, who 
thought he would surely have his neighbor’s sup¬ 
port, is left out in the cold. There w'ill likely be trou¬ 
ble over the appointment of Jump, of Terre Haute, 
to be collector of internal revenue. Editor Moss, of 
the Bloomfield Democrat, is said to be entitled to the 
place, it indorsements and general fitness count for 
anything. He is taid to have by far the greatest 
strength in indorsements, and it is hinted that he 
intends to appeal to President Cleveland, in which 
event It is hard to foretell the result.—H'as/itnpfon 
Dispatch to Indianapelis Journal, February 23. 

The announcement from Washington that 
Senator Voorhees would recommend ex Judge 
Joshua Jump for collector of internal revenue 
for this, the seventh district, was so much of a sur¬ 
prise that but few persons believed there was any thing 
in it. In all the general discussion of applicants his 
name had not been used. It seems, however, that 
the Voorhees Lamb faction of the democracy had 
quietly agreed, several months ago, to get the ap¬ 
pointment for him. That he is the ehoice of this 
faction is now frankly admitted by those who are 
best acquainted with the situation. Ex-Judge Jump 
is ex-Congressman Lamb's law partner and was not 
supposed to want office of any class. The firm has 
the best paying law practice in the city, but the 
collectorship, with the $1,.'>00 salary, is a decided in¬ 
ducement for him. It is now well understood that 
Lamb has prevailed on Senator Voorhees to recom¬ 
mend Harry Donham, another lawyer, for post¬ 
master. The report has been received here through 
firivate channels from Washington that all the dem¬ 
ocratic members of the incoming congress have con¬ 
sented to recommend the appointment of ex Judge 
Jump. Among the other applicants are William M. 
Moss, the Bloomfield editor; J. M. Hoskins, of Clay 
county; George Dixon, of Evansville, and James 
Bolton, of this county.—iHdionapofis Journal, Febru¬ 
ary 24. 

# * * 

It is definitely settled that the matter of recom¬ 
mendations for the local patronage in the two repub¬ 
lican districts of Indiana will be settled by Senators 
Turpie and Voorhees. The two senators have virtually 
agreed upon a division of the spoils, Senator Voorhees to 
deal out the appointments in Congressman Johnson’s 
district, and Senator Turpie to have the say as to the ap¬ 
pointments in Congressman Waugh's dislrict. 

George L. Dixon, of the firm of Mackey, Dixon i& 
Co., of Evansville, is a candidate for collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue in the Seventh district, and will have 
the indorsement of Representative Taylor, congress¬ 
man-elect from that district. The appointment, how¬ 
ever, as stated in the News some time ago, has been 
practically settled upon Joshua Jump, of Terre 
Haute, law partner of the Hon. John E. Lamb, whQ 
seems to have his heart set upon this particular piece of 
federal patronage .— Washington Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis News, February 24. 

stt 

As already announced in a Journal special, Joshua 
Jump, of Terre Haute, who is John E. Lamb’s law 
partner, is to have the place, if Senator Voorhees, 
Jason Brown and Judge Holman can deliver it to 
him. There are other applicants for the place who 
are at this moment engaged in making trouble over 
Mr. Jump’s selection. They are alleging that Jump 
is the creature of Crawford Fairbanks, a large dis¬ 
tiller of Terre Haute, and that if he should be ap¬ 
pointed it would give Fairbanks undue advantages. 


Representative Brookshire has a candidate for that 
collectorship, and he is not discouraging the rumpus 
which is brewing.— Washington Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Journal, February 26. 

<> * <• 

Indianians are beginning to arrive here for the 
inauguration, and incidentually to get government 
obs. Interest centers in the U. S. district attorney- 
ship, marshalship and pension agency. Indiana 
will probably present candidates for pension com¬ 
missioner, public printer, commissioner of internal 
revenue and at least one important diplomatic ap¬ 
pointment, perhaps more. 

John W. Kern, of Indianapolis, and Frank Burke,of 
Jeffersonville, continue to be in the lead for the dis¬ 
trict attorneyship. Senator Turpie will support Mr. 
Kern. Burke will have the support of iScaator Voor¬ 
hees and Representative Jason Brown. Senator Voor¬ 
hees and Mr. Brown committed themselves in favor 
of Burke, before Kern sought to secureany influence- 
There will be no hard contest between the friends 
and supporters of these two rival candidates. Sena¬ 
tors Voorhees and Turpie usually agree on all matters af¬ 
fecting the best interest of the state, and although each one 
0 ] the senators will earnestly work to secure the appoint¬ 
ment of his respective candidate, there will be no very 
great rivalry, and the appointment will be made accord¬ 
ing to merit. 

It was reported a few days ago that Representative 
Brookshire would insist that he should be allowed to name 
the internal revenue collector for the Terre Haute district 
but as Senator Voorhees is not quite ready to concede this 
much to Brookshire, Joshua Jump, of Terre Haute, will 
probably be appointed, as heretofore stated in these 
dispatches.—IFrt8/ii«pto« Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, February 26. 

And still they come. The Indiana sight-seers and 
office-seekers are coming in squads and batialions. 
Among the prominent arrivals to-day is Thomas B. 
Buskirk, of Poali. He is after the United Stales mar¬ 
shalship for Indiana, and, it is said, will have the 
support of nearly all of the Indiana delegation. 
James M. Hoskins, of Brazil, arrived to-day. He 
wants to be internal revenue collector. Joshua 
Jump,of Terre Haute.issaid to be Senator Voorhees’s 
choice. Representative Brookshire, of the Eighth 
district, will recommend another man for the posi¬ 
tion. Mr. Brookshire was asked to day why he 
would recommend a man to oppose Senator Voor¬ 
hees’s candidate. He said because Holman was to be 
allowed the privilege of naming the collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue for the Seventh district He thought 
he ought to be conceded as much by the Indiana 
senators. Mr. Brookshire does not state whom he will 
recommend for the place, but it is believed to be Mr. 
Hoskins, of Brazil. S. H. Taylor, of Daviess county, 
and O. M. Packard, of Plymouth, are the leading 
candidates for bank examiner, although there are a 
few other applicants for this position, which pays 
81,000 a year. Pugh, of Rushville, who is here, woul 1 
like to have the place. Senator Voorhees promised 
to recommend Taylor if he was physieally able to 
perform the duties. Senator Turpie will be for 
Packard, who is highly esteemed in his section of 
the state. All of the Indiana representatives in con¬ 
gress who know him intimately have the highest 
praise for his character and ability.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, February 28. 

« <■ <« 

Thomas Hanlon, of New Albany, who has had his 
eye upon the collectorship of internal revenue, gives 
up that chase. He concedes that Mr. Jump, of Terre 
Haute, has it nailed down, and now Thomas says he 
will take any other good place which the delegation 
may give him. If he gets nothing under Uncle Sara 
he proposes to go back to railroading, provided he 
does not fall into the position of warden, of the prison 
south, a place now held by Mr. Patten. Mr. Hanlon 
has had the wardeuship in view for some time, as a 
last resort before going into private, occupation.- 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, March 1. 

Martin’s Do.main. 

North Manchester.— Samuel McCutchenhas been 
elected postmaster by the local democracy of this 
city and vicinity, receiving a plurality of seven 






420 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


votes. The board will recommend Mr. McCutchen 
to the President through Congressman Martin for ap 
pointment.—Indianapolis Sentinel, Fehiuary 14. 

Congressman Martin has within the last two days 
decided to recommend the following gentlemen for 
appointment as postmasters in his district: C. M. 
Hawkins at Marion; W. W. Timmonds, editor of the 
Sun, at Portland; W. A. Gutelius at Bluffton; Ed 
Smith at Converse (formerly Xenia); W. H. Camp¬ 
bell at Fairmount, and George Peele at Upland. 

There are two candidates for consulships in the 
Eleventh district. They are J. H. Detray, of Port¬ 
land, for consul to Havre, and Herman Wiecklng, of 
Bluffton, for one of the German consulships.— 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, February 25. 

Representative Martin has determined upon the 
men he will recommend for appointment as post¬ 
masters at a number of the most important cities in 
this district. They are as follows: W. A. Gutchins, 
at Bluffton ; C. M Hawkins, at Marion; W. W. Tim¬ 
monds, at Portland; Ed Smith, at Converse (for¬ 
merly Xenia); W. H. Campbell, at Fairmount, Mr. 
Martin will try to name the successors to the Hon. 
Warren G. Sayre, of Wabash, who is one of the Chero¬ 
kee commissioners, and General James N. Tyner, of 
Peru, who is an assistant attorney general, assigned 
to the post-office department. He hopes also to name 
the successor to the superior of special post-office 
agents located at Cincinnati, who is also a Peru man, 
although this position rightfully belongs to the civil 
service classification.— Washington Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, March 1. 

THE GENER.^L SCRAMBLE. 

Roann.— The local democracy of Roann have 
named Dr. Baird as the choice for postmaster.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, January 31. 

Salem.— At an election held here to-day for post¬ 
master, John D. .\lvis received 133 votes; Henry M. 
Munklet, 110; John Stherlan, 33; Collin McKinney, 
17 ; John Warner, 9. John D. Alvin was postmaster 
under Cleveland four years &go.—Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, February 3. 

John J. Hoover was the successful candidate in 
the election for postmaster at Wabash to-day. There 
were eight names on the ticket.—/ndfanapolis Senti¬ 
nel, February 6. 

Noblesville.— The post-office fight is fairly on. 
The candidates are G. W. Ingermann, who was post¬ 
master under Cleveland and is ex-chairman of the 
democratic county committee; F. M. Applegate, F. 
W. Applegate, R. H. Goeble, O. A. Harnish, W. F. 
Lacy, E. Lacy and Henry Sappa. It has been de¬ 
cided that no election shall be held, but that each 
one shall go before the appointive power on his 
meiiis.—Indianapolis News, February 15. 

Tipton —The post-office fight is now on in earnest 
here, and six candidates are in the field. Last night 
a meeting was held by the candidates, and it was 
decided, by a close vote, that they would hold a 
primary, nothing but democratic patrons of the office 
being entitled to a vote. The time was fixed for Sat¬ 
urday, March 4. The candidates are E. C. Elliott, 
Samuel Vawter, W. B. S. Resseller, J. R. Bowlin and 
Charles Means, of this city, and Wm. Smart, a 
farmer, with a prospect of one or two dark horses in 
sight. [Also Alpheus Bennett and J. W. Pope.]—J«- 
dianapolis Journal, February 27. 

New Castle.— a merry war is in progress among 
the numerous applicants for fourth-class post offices 
in Henry county. At each town there are from one 
to a dozen applicants, each confident of success. 
On Saturday elections to decide who should be the 
appointee were held in several towns. At Lewis¬ 
ville and Middleton, two of the most important 
offices, some of the applicants would not agree to 
allow the democratic patrons of the office to settle 
the vexed question and are still circulating petitions 
and seeking the influence of the more prominent 
politicians. The condition of affairs is daily growing 
worse and will only be settled when President 
Cleveland makes the appointments. At this place 
all is harmonious, and from outside appearances one 
would not judge that a new postmaster is to be 


named before a year rolls by.—Indianapolis Sentinel, 
February 21. 

Ed Smith, of New Castle, arrived in the city last 
night to secure a little “’flooence” to aid him in his 
candidacy for postmaster of that place. He was 
chairman of the county central committee, and has 
always been an active democrat. His friends say 
that he is stron s ly indorsed. There are several other 
applicants for the place.—Indianapolis News, Febru¬ 
ary 28. 

^ 

JamesT. V Hill, the colored lawyer, is a candidate 
for recorder of the general land office.—Indianapolis 
Sentinal, February 28. 

About all of the prominent federal offices in Indi¬ 
ana have been parceled out already by the Hoosier 
democratic delegation in congress. There has been 
a conference, at which consideration was given the 
claims of the army of applicants. As a result it is 
known by the delegation, “ on the dead quiet,” you 
known, who will get the places, provided, always, 
that Mr. Cleveland does not enter a veto to the ar 
rangements. As has been announced frequently in 
dispatches to the Journal, ex Governor Gray has 
been left out altogether, upon the request of Messrs. 
Morss, Shanklin and Bynum, but an effort will be 
made by Senators Voorhees and Turpie to veto that 
decision. The ex-governor has sent word that he 
does not propose to be left out or sent away on some 
third or fourth-class mission, just to begotten rid of, 
so that he will achieve neither wealth nor fame. Al¬ 
though beggars should not be choosers, the ex-gov¬ 
ernor will recognize the fact that he is regarded as 
having no real claim to office. He says that if he is 
to be sent away he will go only to Mexico and take 
the mission which is now held by ex-Representative 
Ryan, of Kansas. The Mexican mission has been 
made first-class, and has a salary attachment of 817,- 
600 a year. It is not believed that Sir Isaac Pusey 
will get nearer the Mexican mission than he is 
at present—that is if the three distinguished Hoosier 
democrats named can keep him out of it, but if he 
is nut given it, his friends send word here that he 
will remain in Indiana and “see his enemies later.” 

It is stated that Frank Burke, of Jeffersonville, who 
is the protege of Representative Jason Brown, will 
likely be United States district attorney, although 
John W. Kern is pushing him hard. Others “promi¬ 
nently mentioned ” for the position are Judge Nel¬ 
son, of Logansport; Charles Offut, of Greenfield; 
Mr. Cullop, of Vincennes, and Mr. Sherley, of Mar¬ 
tinsville. Offut is “ Bynum’s man” it is said.— IFosA- 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis Joxunal, Februaro 23. 

if ^ % 

Ex-Editor Luther Short, of Franklin, wants to go 
to Constantinople as consul-general .—Indianapolis 
Netos, February 24. 

j{» >:t 

Luther Short, secretary of the Indiana editorial 
association, would like to visit Constantinople as 
consul-general. John F. Sherman, of Waterloo, 
wants a consulship. Just which one he has not de¬ 
cided upon. Dr. Leibecker, of Aurora, thinks a 
German consular post would repay him foi his serv¬ 
ices during the late campaign ; but Prof. Rucker, of 
the Lawrenceburgh high school, says he has a claim 
on that at Leipsic. Prof. Wright, of Valparaiso, 
would like to represent the United States at Victo¬ 
ria, B. C., and believes he could put a slop to the 
smuggling of Chinamen at that port—Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel March 2. 

if >:* 

E. B. Swan, of Rockport, is a candidate for district 
attorney; J G.Winfrey, of Evansville, forassistantdis- 
trict attorney general; Leroy Wade, of Posey county, 
wants a territorial judgeship; W. L. Hargrove, of 
Gibson, aspires to the United States marshalship; 
Thomas Fuller, of Warren county, would like to be 
a territorial district attorney; Henry Mellen, a 
Boonvilie lawyer, wants a consulship; Dr. Fritsch, 
of Evansville, would like to go as a consul to Ger¬ 
many, and Henry Kramer, of Rockport, who made 
an unsuccessful race for the democratic nomination 
for congress in the First district, would like a South 
American mission or consulship. 

Congressman-elect Conn, of Indiana, has a candidate 


for public printer In the person of Editor Wadsworth, 
of the Laporte Argus. He will probably be indorsed 
by the entire Indiana delegation and formally en¬ 
tered as a candidate in a day or so. 

The Hon. Eli Brown, who was here a few days 
ago, has b.een slated for the Frankfort post-office, ac¬ 
cording to the gossip. George Mitchell, of Batesville, 
is also here in quest of the post-office.— Washington 
Diepatch to Indianapolis News, February 24. 

The Sentinel correspondent learned to night that 
practically the whole Indiana delegation will pre¬ 
sent the name of H. E. Wadsworth, editor of the La¬ 
porte Argus, for public printer. Representative 
Conn, of the South Bend district believes that Mr. 
Wadsworth will stand a very good chance for the 
appointment. It is understood that Senators Voor¬ 
hees and Turpie, Representatives Bynum, Brown 
and Martin have agreed to support Wadsworth. 

Brookshire had proposed a candidate in the per¬ 
son of W. C. Ball, of the Terre Haute Gazette, but it 
is not certain that that gentleman will be an appli¬ 
cant. If not, Brookshire will probably support Wads¬ 
worth. Bretz will act with his Indiana colleagues. 
Shively and Martin will talk with Holman and en¬ 
deavor to secure his influence in favor of Wadsworth, 
Taylor, McNagney, Patton and others of the Indiana 
delegation have as yet had nothing to say with re¬ 
spect to Wadsworth’s candidacy, but all of the In¬ 
diana men will doubtless soon be in line for Mr. 
Conn’s man. Wadsworth has telegraphed Conn 
agreeing that his name be presented.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, February 24. 

»!> 

Gen. John S. Williams, of Lafayette, arrived to-day 
He wants to be commissioner of internal revenue. 
Mr. Williams made a very efficient third auditor of 
the treasury under President Cleveland’s adminis¬ 
tration, and as he may have the support of the Indi¬ 
ana delegation, his prospects for the appointment 
ought to be very good. 

Col. C, A. Zollinger will probably be appointed 
pension agent at Indianapolis. 

The petition in favor of the appointment of Henry 
E Wadsworth, of Laporte, as public printer has been 
signed by Senators Voorhees and Turpie, Represen¬ 
tatives Bynum. Brown, Holman, Martin, Shively, 
Brookshire, McClellan, Bretz and Representative- 
elect Conn, who is working earnestly for Mr. Wads¬ 
worth’s appointment. Representatives Cooper, Par- 
rett and Patton and Represeutatives-elect Ham¬ 
mond, McNagney and Taylor will sign the petition, 
thus making the Indiana delegation solid for Wads¬ 
worth, both as it is constituted in the present con¬ 
gress and as it will stand after March 4 next.— Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, February 26. 

if M if 

There is a new Richmond in the field for marshal 
for the Indiana district. It is ex Sheriff Joseph C. 
Gray, of Versailles, Ripley county. It is said he made 
a very good sheriff, and believes he is well qualified 
for the office of marshal. 

Colonel Jones, of Manilla, Rush county, Ind., one 
of Judge Holman’s constituents, has made applica¬ 
tion for appointment as commissioner of pensions. 
This causes some surprise and comment here, in 
view of the candidacy of Colonel McLean, of Terre 
Haute, who, up to this time, has been the only can¬ 
didate from Indiana, and seemed to have the united 
support of the delegation.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis News, February 24. 

O <! « 

Not much is being said as yet concerning (he post¬ 
mastership of Indianapolis. The name of Albert 
Sahm is frequently and favorably mentioned for this 
appointment. 

There are several candidates for the Indiana bank 
examinershlp, the place formerly held by Samuel H. 
Taylor, of Washington, Daviess county. Mr. Taylor’s 
health will not permit his candidacy again, and it 
seems to be the impression here that the appoint¬ 
ment will go to Orlando M. Jackson, of Plymouth, 
who would make a most excellent officer in the opin¬ 
ion of the Indiana representatives in congress who 
are intimately acquainted with him. 

It is generally known that Gil Shanklin would like 
to be consul general to London. Some of the Indiana 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


421 


representat ives wilt soon announce a complete list of post- 
office appointments in their respective districts. Repre¬ 
sentative Brown is inclined to appoint as postmaster at 
North Vernon James Remie, editor of the North Vernon 
Sun.—Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
February 26. 

Among the candidates for the office of collector of 
customs for Indianapolis is W. T. Steele, ex superin 
tendeut of the Citizens’ Street Railroad.—/ndianap- 
olis Journal, December 17. 

)!( * 

D. F. Mustard, of Anderson, is mentioned for 
United States treasurer. Ilis brother “Dick” says 
he (Dick) wants to go back into the railway mail 
service long enough to “fire” the republican who 
took his place. Thomas B. Busklrk, of Paoll, who 
bases his claims for United States marshal on the 
ground that he was chairman of the first democratic 
convention in the state to indorse Cleveland as a 
candidate for President, is the bearer of 116 letters 
and recommendations representing fifty-five coun¬ 
ties of the state. He also says he has always been a 
democrat and a worker. His friends say his chances 
are bright. Lewis Jordan, it Is said, is to have a place 
in one of the departments at Washington. Crawford 
Fairbanks, of Terre Haute, has not asked for any¬ 
thing, but it is said that he can be appointed one of 
the Mississippi river levee commissioners if he so de¬ 
sires.—T/tdianapoIis News, February 21. 

“ Full little knowest thou, that hast not tride. 

What hell it is in suing long to bide: 

To loose good days, that might be better spent; 

To waste long nights in pensive discontent; 

To speed to-day, to be put back to-morrow; 

To feed on hope, to pine with feare and sorrow ; 

To fret thy soul with crosses and with cares; 

To eate thy heart through comfortless dispaires; 

To fawne, to crouche, to wait, to ride, to ronne, 

To spend, to give, to want, to be undone.” 

>> ■;< <« 

W. A. Cullop, of Vincennes, has two opponents 
for the district attorneyship who are strongly in¬ 
dorsed. They are Charles Korbly, of Madison, and 
ex-Senator Ewing, of Decatur county, son-in-law of 
Governor Matthews.—IFasftinpton Dispafc/i to India¬ 
napolis News, February 17. 

^ >!< >S* 

The Indiana candidates for office are beginning to 
arrive. John W. Kern, of Indianapolis registered at 
the Riggs house to-night. He is a candidate for dis¬ 
trict attorney. W. A. Cullop, of Vincennes, and 
William A. Pickens, of Spencer, are also mentioned 
for the office. It is said Gil. Shanklin would like to 
go as consul-general to Loudon. He is at the Willard 
hotel. C. E. Allen, of Frankfort, who is here, and 
Col. Zollinger, of Fort Wayne, are among the appli¬ 
cants for the Indiana pension agency. Prof. Moss, 
of Bloomfield: Joshua Jump, of Terre Haute, and 
Dr. C. C. Cole are among the many applicants for 
collector of internal revenue for the Terre Haute 
district. Jump will be appointed. Representative- 
elect Taylor will recomend Mr. Nolan, postmaster 
at Terre Haute. Thomas B. Buskirk, of Orleans, 
wants to be United States Marshal f r Indiana. Dr. 
W. D. Hunter and Capt. William Bracken arc among 
the candidates for internal revenue collector for 
the seventh district. Representative Bretz will 
recommend John Johnson for postmaster, at Bed¬ 
ford, and J. T. Lilly, at Mitchell.—IFas/iincfon Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Sentinel, February 19. 

The visit of John W. Kern, of Indianapolis, to 
Washington, has been fruitful of results. It is stated 
on good authority now that he has a walkover for 
district attorney. The fight, it seems, had narrowed 
down to the field against Frank Burke, of Jefferson¬ 
ville, and the field, according to latest reports, is 
prepared to combine on Kern. Mr. Burke has been 
backed by Congressman Jason Brown. The Gray 
and anti-Gray elements have figured in the district 
attorney fight to the disadvantage of Burke, who was 
a Gray man against Cleveland. Kern, it is claimed, 
was an original Cleveland man. Congressman By¬ 
num has stated that he favored Charles G. Offut, of 
Greenfield. W. A. Cullop, of Vincennes, who had a 
promising boom, some time ago, is declared now to 


be out of the race altogether. If Kern is made dis¬ 
trict attorney it will necessarily take the United 
States marshalship away from Indianapolis.— B’asft- 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, February 21. 

lit ft ft 

John C. Nelson came down from Logansport yes¬ 
terday to add something, if possible, to his prospects 
as a candidate for United States district attorney. 
Judge Nelson has the support of S. P. Sheerin, secre¬ 
tary of the democratic national committee, whose 
standing and influence with the incoming adminis¬ 
tration is believed to be potential. Judge Nelson’s 
most formidable competitor for the district attorney- 
ship is Senator John W. Kern, of Indianapolis, who 
went to Washington last week to lay some pipes ex¬ 
tending toward the office. 

When Mr. Kern’s friends recall the eulogy pro¬ 
nounced by him when he presented the name of the 
candidate recently elected United States senator, 
they think it is fair to presume that Turpie is for 
Kern. Senator Voorhees is understood to have a 
leaning in the same direction. 

“I believe my chances are as good as those of any 
other one man,” said Judge Nelson. Another man 
said he would rather have thebackingof Mr. Sheerin 
than to be recommended to Cleveland by the entire 
Indiana democratic delegation in congress. 

In Mr. Kern’s favor it is urged that he was one of 
the earliest and most aggressive Cleveland men, 
while Judge Nelson and his most influential backer 
were identified with the opposition. 

The other aspirants for the position are: W. A. 
Cullop, of Vincennes; Courlland Ewing, of Greens- 
burg; Mr. Corbaley, of Madison, and Mr. Ballow, of 
Bluffton. Mr. Ewing is a son-in-law of Governor 
Matthews. 

What is regarded as a serious stumbling block in 
the way of Mr. Cullop is the difference that has been 
stirred up between him and the Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, it being taken for granted that Mr. Morss has 
some influence with the coming administration. 
Messrs. Corbaley and Ballow are not regarded as for¬ 
midable isciors.—Indianapolis Sentinel, February 21. 

ft ft ft 

The next United States district attorney, it is now 
said by those who believe they know, will be Judge 
John C. Nelson, of Logansport. He is a personal 
friend of Si Sheerin, secretary of the national com¬ 
mittee, and it is understood that Sheerin is urging 
him for the place.—Indianapolis Journal, Febrxiary 25. 

ft ft ft 

At a meeting held at the opera house last even¬ 
ing resolutions were adopted by a rising vote favor¬ 
ing the candidacy of John Brodie, chairman of the 
Porter county democratic committee, for the U. S. 
marshalship of Indiana.—Pidparaiso Dispafeft to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, November 21. 

ft ft * 

Col. I. B. McDonald, of Columbia City, is an 
avowed candid.ate for United States marshal of Indi¬ 
ana.— Indianapolis News, December 18. 

<*>:** 

Northern Indiana politicians are crediting John 
Brodie, of Valparaiso, Col. I. B. McDonald, of Colum¬ 
bia City, and George W. Reid, of La Porte, as avowed 
candidates for district marshal of Indiana under the 
incoming administration, while Judge Pollard, of 
Delphi, wants to be commissioner of immigration.- 
Indianapolis News, January 16. 

ft ft ft 

Thos. B. Buskirk, of Paoli, who wants to be United 
States mar hal for Indiana, and who was supposed 
to be backed by the solid delegation of Indiana 
democratic congressmen, is, it is believed, drifting 
away from the goal. It is stated that he has not now 
the solid delegation, and that he may not have half 
oliX— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
March 1. 

ft ft * 

Tom Newkirk, last clerk of the lower house, is 
making a fight for the office of collector of internal 
revenue for the southern district. He has the sup¬ 
port of three of the seven congressmen in the dis¬ 
trict, and says if good backing amounts to anything 
he will get the of&ce.—Indianapolis Sentinel, Decem¬ 
ber 23. 


J. W. Nusbaum, of Elkhart, Ind., has written to 
Congressman Shively and others of the delegation 
saying that he is a candidate for collector of internal 
revenue of the sixth district, and will file strong pe¬ 
titions laiCT.—Indianapolis News, January 12. 

W. H. Osborn, of Lawrenceburg, the well-known 
democratic politician and son-in-law of Dr. Hunter, 
is at the capital. His business here is to try to ad¬ 
vance the interests of Dr. Hunter for appointmentas 
revenue collector. Mr. Mendenhall, another demo¬ 
cratic politician, of Greensburg, is here.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis News, February 15. 

Dr. W. H. H. Hunter left for Lawrenceburg to-daj'. 
While here he was the guest of Judge Holman, and 
saw other members of the Indiana delegation about 
his candidney for revenue collector of the sixth In¬ 
diana district. His hurried trip here was due to a 
report that Wm. Bracken had secured the indorse¬ 
ment of the Indiana congressmen. He returned in 
better spirits. 

Judge Gooding, of Greenfield, arrived to-day, and 
called on the members of congress from Indiana.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, January 31. 

tf. if 

The internal revenue collectorships of Indiana 
afford the liveliest contests that are now going on 
among the Hoosier democrats. Early in the week 
editor W. H. O’Brien, of Lawrenceburg, arrived and 
took a hand in the fight that is being waged be¬ 
tween his father-in-law. Dr. Hunter, and William 
Bracken, of Frankiin county, for the collectorship of 
the sixth district. The pins had already been set up 
for Bracken, but O’Brien, who is a clever politician, 
has been expending his efforts quite freely to change 
the arrangement. James Mendenhall, of Greens¬ 
burg, another democratic editor, was here Tuesday 
and Wednesday urging Bracken’s appointment. 

In the seventh internal revenue district there is 
quite as interesting a complication. Wm. M. Moss, 
editor of the Bloomfield Democrat, started out soon 
after the election to secure indorsements for ap¬ 
pointment as revenue collector. The result is that 
he is the most strongly indorsed applicant for fed¬ 
eral office now in the country. He has presented 
letters from the governor. Chairman Taggart, a ma¬ 
jority of the Legislature, and nearly all the demo¬ 
crats of prominence in the state. In his own district 
he has also the indorsements as second choice of the 
friends of several of the other candidates. The fight 
will probably be between Moss and Joshua Jump, of 
Terre Haute. The latter is Hon. John E Lamb’s law 
partner, and it is understood that Mr. Lamb is very 
anxious to have the appointment go to Mr. Jump. 
Another point in his favor is that most of the reve¬ 
nues in the district are collected in Terre Haute. An 
effort is being made among Lamb’s influential dem¬ 
ocratic friends to have Moss withdraw as a can¬ 
didate for the collectorship, and apply for something 
else. But he is reluctant to do so. It is understood 
that a letter was sent out from Washington this week 
advising Moss to withdraw, as it had been practically 
settled among the Indiana delegation to recommend 
Mr. Jump’s appointment.—TFas/i£»p<on Dispatch to 
Indianapolis News, February 17. 

AT W.\.SHINGTON. 

Hoosier democrats, up to the present time, have 
been content to Are at the federal patronage at long 
range. The Indiana delegation in congress has re¬ 
ceived as many petitions and letters for places as 
have come from any other state in the Union. But 
the number of “visiting statesmen” is not large. 
The fight that is attracting most local interest at this 
time is the contest for revenue collector of the sixth 
district Apparently the two senators and most of 
the representatives who live in the sixth district are 
disposed to favor the appointment of William Brack¬ 
en, of Brookville. But Congressman Holman is 
playing a mysterious part in the proceedings, and 
it is the opinion that he is secretly in favor of Dr. 
William H. H Hunter, of Lawrenceburg, who was 
collector under the Cleveland administration. If 
Mr. Holman secures the appointment of Dr. Hunter, 






422 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


he will have to overcome the Bracken boom, which 
up to this time has had the field. 

jji 

W. A. Cullop, of Vincennes, is the most popular 
candidate for United States district attorney for In- 
ana who has yet entered the field, although it Is un¬ 
derstood that he will have many competitors. 

Wm. M. Moss, of Bloomfield, and Dr. W. A. Cole, 
of English, are candidates for revenue collector in 
the seventh district. 

Dr. Woolen, of Vevay, has been at the capital for 
several days. He was chief of the swamp lands divis¬ 
ion of the land office under Commissioner Stocksla- 
ger, and is said to he looking for his old position 
Again—Washington Dispatch to Didianapolis News, 
January 28. 

« * « 

The mail' of the average Indiana member of con¬ 
gress is a burden to him these days. The candidates 
for office are more numerous than ever before. There 
are forty or fifty applicants for the two collectorshlps 
of internal revenue in Indiana. The pension acency 
is another office for which the candidates are as thick 
as blackberries.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, February 3. 

<• << * 

Orlando M. Packard, of Plymouth, Ind., arrived at 
Willard’s hotel to-night. Mr. Packard’s friends be¬ 
lieve he stands a chance to be appointed bank exam¬ 
iner. He will secure the support of Senator Turpie 
and Representative Conn. It is understood that when 
Senator Voorhees visited Washington, Daviess county, 
during the late campaign, he assured S. H. Taylor 
that he would indorse him for the position. Mr. Tay¬ 
lor held the place under Mr. Cleveland’s first admin¬ 
istration. 

Plymouth has another candidate. Dan McDonald, 
editor of the Plymouth Democrat, wants to be made 
third auditor of the treasury. Some of Mr. McDon¬ 
ald’s friends aver that he was an "original Cleve¬ 
land man” but there are those who remember that 
Mr. McDonald, just before the Chicago convention, 
requested that his name be withdrawn from the pub¬ 
lished list of Indiana editors who were for Mr. Cieve- 
land's nomination. 

William Merrill arrived from Connerst^lle to-night. 
He is a candidate for postmaster. He is backed by 
the democratic organization of his county. Chair¬ 
man Tom Taggart has also indorsed him.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, February 27. 

*>!<<• 

Indiana will present another candidate for an im¬ 
portant federal position not heretofore mentioned in 
these dispatches. Dick Johnson will try to be third 
assistant postmaster general. George W. Cooper, 
representative from the Columbus district, may be 
able to secure the support of a good many of the In¬ 
diana people for Johnson.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Sentinel, March 1. 

❖ »!« 

James C. Carleton, of Bedford, has arrived, and 
will seek a chiefshlp of division in one of the execu¬ 
tive departments as soon as the administration 
changes.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, February 26. 

E. J. Smith, of Connersville, is here. He used to be 
a special examiner in the pension bureau, and will 
be willing to take the place again providing he can 
gel nothing better. 

Solomon E. Jackson, formerly of Greenfield, Han¬ 
cock county, now of Indian Territory, js here, and is 
a candidate for United States district attorney down 
there. He will probably be indorsed by Representa¬ 
tive Bynum and perhapsbySenatorsVoorhees andTur- 
pie. Mr. Jackson removed from Indiana about four 
years ago, and has already made himself prominent 
In the politics of the territory. He was a delegate to 
the Chicago convention, and voted for Mr. Cleve¬ 
land's nomination. There is a Spirited contest for 
the United States district judgeship for Indiana Ter¬ 
ritory, the place now held by Judge Shackleford, 
formerly of Evansville, Ind. There are three candi- 
didates for the position. 

Thomas Hanlon, of New Albany, is here. He was 
being piloted around by Representative Jason Brown. 
Mr. Hanlon would, no doubt, like to be collector of 


internal revenue again. It is hinted that Mr. Han¬ 
lon would accept the United States marshalshlp if he 
were pressed hard, but failing to get anything better 
would be content with the postmastership of New Al¬ 
bany.—B’asTiDipfo?! Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
February 28. 

Dr. Jere Roberts, of Holton, is a candidate for local 
medical pension examiner. He is now in the city 
urging his candidacy. A little deal will be arranged 
to-day which will probably knock out the ambitions 
of two Indiana men. Col. McLean, of Terre Haute, 
and Col. Jones, of Mr. Holman’s district, both of 
whom want to be commissioner of pensions. Col. 
Charles A. Zollinger, fourteen years mayor of Fort 
Wayne, and a politician of adroitness, will swoop 
down on the capitol to-day, and his coming portends 
the collapse of at least two booms. A deal is already 
arranged which awaits only the sanction of Colonel 
Zollinger, and that has been procured in advance, 
whicn amounts practically to the dropping of the 
names of Col. McLean and Col. Jones for pension 
commissioner and the putting forward of Col. Zol 
linger’s name for deputy commissioner. Col. Zol¬ 
linger was formerly pension agent. This position, 
according to the programme, arranged to-day, will 
go to Capt, Allen, another Indiana man. Editor 
Will A. King, of the Danville Gazette, who is to be 
recommended by Congressman Cooper for postmas¬ 
ter at Danville, arrive 1 last night with Mrs. King. 
W. H. Hargrove, of Princeton, is said to be in the 
lead to-day for appointment as United States mar¬ 
shal. There are a number of candidates here, among 
them Buskirk, of Paoli, and Hawkins, of Sullivan. 
Samuel Harris, who is to be recommended for post¬ 
master of Franklin, is here. James R. Ryan, of 
Bloomington, is desirous of being appointed in¬ 
spector of supplies at an Indian agency. He ar¬ 
rived this morning. Edward D. Pugh, a national 
bank cashierof Rushville, is here seeking the position 
of national bank examiner for Indiana.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 2. 

Among other arrivals are C. A. Zollinger, candi¬ 
date for pension agent. Royal C. Purcell, of the Vin¬ 
cennes Sun, candidate for Vincennes post-office, ex- 
State Senator Hudson, of Indianapolis, who wants to 
be consul to Toronto, and Capt. Kilaus, of Madison, 
who Is an applicant for postmaster of that city.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, MarchS. 

<<!><! 

Roscoe C. Griffiths, a well known and popular law¬ 
yer of Muncie, Ind., arrived this evening. He comes 
to secure the collectorshlp of internal revenue for 
his district, a position which Dr. Hunter, of Law- 
renceburg, and Captain Bracken, of Brookville, have 
been wrangling over for some time. Mr. Griffiihs 
has strong backing and promises to be a winning 
compromise. L. A. Kirkwood, of Muncie, has also 
arrived, and wants his position of four years ago— 
that of post-office inspector on the Pacific slope. 

Hon. Frank Burke, of Jeffer-onville, a candidate 
lor district attorney of Indiana, arrived last night.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, March 2. 

if if ir 

Col. C. C. Matson arrived to-day. He is stopping 
with Hon. George W. Cooper. It i> generally under¬ 
stood that Mr. Matson is after some prominent posi¬ 
tion in the treasury department. The Sentinel cor¬ 
respondent was told to-night that he wants to be 
commissioner of internal revenue. This is the posi¬ 
tion which John S. Williams is after. Whether Mr. 
Matson wants this commissionership or not, it is said 
that he will certainly be provided for in a handsome 
manner. Senator Voorhees and Mr. Carlisle are very 
good friends and the latter's recommendation of Matson, 
coupled with Senator Voorhees' indorsement, would go a 
long ways in securing the position for Mr. Matson. 

Another candidate for district attorney arrived to¬ 
night. He is Elbert M. Swan, of Rockport, Ind. It 
issa^d that Tom Newkirk, of Rush county, has writ 
ten a letter here, withdrawing from the contest for 
collector of internal revenue for the sixth district in 
f-ivor of Tom H. Bracken, of Brookville. George C. 
Griffith, another candidate for this place, arrived to¬ 
day. The contest is between Bracken and Griffith. 
The latter lives at Muncie. Alexander Kirkwood of 


Muncie wants to be a post-office inspector again. He 
is also on hand. 

W. A, Hawkins, of Sullivan, candidate for marshal 
of Indiana, is at the National. Mr. Hawkins’ friends 
believe he will receive the support of Senator Voor¬ 
hees and most of the Indiana delegation. 

C. A. Zollinger and Capt. Allen, the latter of Frank¬ 
fort, are the principal candidates for pension agent 
at Indianapolis. The Sentinel’s correspondent re¬ 
ceived a tip that Zollinger would be appointed, but 
Allen’s friends declare that he is a winner.—TFasft- 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, March 2. 

■if, if -tf 

One of the most interesting rivalries is over the po¬ 
sition of special bank examiner. There is only one 
to be appointed for Indiana, but there are four active 
candidates and a number of dark hor-es. The active 
candidates are Col. Taylor, of Washington ; W. H. 
McIntyre, of Auburn ; O. A. Packard, of Plymouth, 
and E. B Pugh, of Rushville. Mr. Holman seems es- 
pecially interested in Mr. Pugh’s behalf. Congress¬ 
man McClellan and Congressman-elect McNagney are 
backing McIntyre and are said also to have the quiet 
support of Congressman-elect Hammond. Congress¬ 
man Conn is behind Packard’s candidacy. The In¬ 
diana senators are said to be somewhat disposed to 
favor Col. Sam Taylor, of Washington. Geo. W. Gei¬ 
ger, of Indianapolis, has been putting in some pretty 
strong work for the United States marshalshlp. A 
short time ago it looked as if Mr. Kern would be 
taken and Mr. Geiger left, but in the last few days 
Geiger has sent on a large number of strong petitions, 
particularly from the traveling men over the state 
who are recognized as political factors that can not 
be ignored. Thomas B. Buskirk, of Paoli, who is 
backed by Congressman Bretz for United States mar¬ 
shal, is here also, and is making a strong fight. It is 
stated, however, on high authority, that he will hard¬ 
ly be appointed.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, March 3. 

CORRESPONDENCE, 

Haverford, Pa., Jan, 24, 1893. 

To the Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle : 

Sir— The January number of the Chroni¬ 
cle has just come to hand. You will doubt¬ 
less allow me space to disclaim altogether the 
interpretation which you have put upon an in¬ 
formal note, A hasty personal postscript to a 
business letter, written without an idea of 
publication, might easily be so expressed as to 
be misconstrued, but, even taking this fact 
into consideration, I fail to find in my post¬ 
script anything to justify or excuse the use 
made of it, the title prefixed to it, or the com¬ 
ments made upon it. I distinctly stated that 
I was a civil service reformer, and yet because 
I criticised the methods employed by the 
Chronicle, and because I happen to live in 
Pennsylvania, you jump to the conclusion 
that I support Mr. Quay. No conclusion 
could be more inconsequent or further from 
the truth. It would be about as inconsistent 
for me to defend “spoilsmen” as for the ed¬ 
itor of the Chronicle himself; yet neverthe¬ 
less I believe in fair play, even towards those 
who do not support civil service reform, and 
even to —corre.«pondents. 

Respectfully, Allan C. Thomas. 

We quote the following from a correspon¬ 
dent at Crawfordsville: 

“ No papers published are doing so much 
good as those exclusively devoted to the civil 
service of the country, and I prize the Chroni¬ 
cle more than any other paper I get. The 
civil service is gradually extending, and if 
the President will extend the rules to the ex- 
tremest limit that he can under the law, he 
will have the applause of the great body of 
the people who expect no office, and whose 
highest interest in office is, that the holders of 
them discharge their duties faithfullv. 









The Civil.service chronicle. 


If we see 

nothing ill our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoils, w( 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November 18. 

5 shall fail at every point.— 

VoL. II, No. 1. 

INDIANAPOLIS, MARCH, 1893. 

fTimvia-J One dollar per annum. 
J-iiiitalo . 10 cents per copy. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

One mode of the misappropriation of public funds 
is avoided when appointments to office, instead of 
being the rewards of partisan activity, are awarded 
to those whose efficiency promises a fair return of 
work for the compensation paid to them. To secure 
the fitness and competency of appointees to office 
and to remove from political action the demoralizing 
madness for spoils civil service reform has found a 
place in our public policy and laws. The benefit 
already gained through this instrumentality and the 
further usefulness it promises entitle it to the hearty 
support and encouragement of all who desire to see 
our public service well performed, or who hope for 
the elevation of political sentiment and the purifica¬ 
tion of political methods.—President's hiaitgural. 


Already the field seems broad for the 
Civil Service Chronicle during the next 
four years, and we earnestly invite all to 
subscribe who are interested in the culti¬ 
vation of this field. The only promise we 
can make is to be thorough and impartial. 
The greater the support, the greater will 
be the usefulness of this paper. 


So FAR it does not appear that the Pres¬ 
ident has determined upon any funda¬ 
mental changes looking to the disuse of 
the offices as patronage. To make the ap¬ 
plications public, to refuse to apppoint 
ex-office-holders, to refuse to appoint 
editors unless they will give up their pa¬ 
pers and other rules which have been 
given out from time to time, will lead to 
more or less improved administration but 
they do not and will not constitute reform. 
That can only come by such fundamental 
rules as will kill the patronage element in 
executive acts. Of these we have spoken 
elsewhere. Meanwhile our columns show' 
the rush of office-seeking, and our Presi¬ 
dent sitting patiently while the torrent 
boils and seethes around him. We are 
the going curiosity of the continents and 
hemispheres. We are the civic fool of the 
world. 


The appointment of Frank B. Burke, of 
Jeffersonville, to be United States district 
attorney for Indiana, is so unfortunate that 
it ought to be withdrawn. Burke was a 
member of our state senate in 1889 and 
1891. He was one of the leaders in defeat¬ 
ing the civil service bill which would have 
taken the benevolent institutions out of 
politics. He opposed the Australian bal¬ 


lot bill and was the only democrat in the 
general assembly who voted against it. 
He opposed the new charter for this city. 
Any measure that was for the general ben¬ 
efit could safely count on Burke’s opposi¬ 
tion. He is one of the most vicious men 
who ever got into public place. His ap¬ 
pointment seems to be due to the influence 
of Senator Voorhees. After being the chief 
factor in bringing Mr. Cleveland’s former 
administration into disgrace in Indiana, it 
is strange that Voorhees should have any 
influence. He is working solely and only 
to secure the re-election of Daniel W. 
Voorhees to the senate without friction. 
He cares nothing for the public service. 
He is a bourbon of the bourbons: he has 
never been known to lift up his voice for 
any kind of reform. There is a reform 
element in the democratic party in this 
state. It has had to fight steadily against 
such men as Burke and Voorhees, and 
against them it has already accomplished 
important work. 


The editor of the Anderson Democrat 
has been appointed postmaster of Ander¬ 
son, Indiana. This is a good illustration 
of the way we do public business. Ander¬ 
son is a large and flourishing city. Hand¬ 
ling mail matter has become in the highest 
sense an expert business. Yet to take 
charge of it in a place like Anderson, we 
go out into the street and pick up a politi¬ 
cian who never worked at the business an 
hour in his life. This is not done to fur¬ 
ther the public business, for public business 
isadvanced in the same manner that private 
business is, and no private business ever 
goes into the street and picks up a politi¬ 
cian for a manager. But by this appoint¬ 
ment Congressman Bynum pays the editor 
of the Democrat for past and future services 
to himself. The principles of private busi¬ 
ness would have chosen from the lower 
ranks of the postal service some thorough¬ 
ly skilled postal man for postmaster at An¬ 
derson. This would have been for the in¬ 
terest of the people, while the above ap¬ 
pointment is against the interest of the 
people. Mr. Bynum and the whole crew 
who are now preying upon the public serv¬ 
ice could long ago have brought the proper 
application of business principles to the 
people’s business; but they fight such ap¬ 
plication at every step. 


It is claimed to be settled that Mr. Al¬ 
bert Sahm is to succeed Postmaster 
Thompson in the post-office of this city. 
Mr. Thompson’s commission has two years 
and more yet to run. In this connection, 
Mr. Sahm says in an interview in the In¬ 
dianapolis News of March 14 ; 

“Should I be appointed postmaster here, I will 
not, as some have said, make a clean sweep from cel¬ 
lar to garret. In taking the office the incumbent 
takes oath to observe the laws, and I propose to fol¬ 
low the laws, especially the civil service law, in let¬ 
ter and spirit. So far as my liberties extend I shall 
appoint democrats to positions in the office, but oth¬ 
erwise the law will be enforced. Another thing that 
a misapprehension exists about is the time when I 
shall succeed Thompson. Mr. Thompson will fill 
out the time for which he has been commissioned.” 

Mr. Sahm’s expression indicates the gen¬ 
eral political progress which has taken 
place among political workers. It is to be 
hoped that before Mr. Thompson’s time is 
out such rules will be made as will leave 
very little “liberty ” for partisan proscrip¬ 
tion. All but one or two of the chief places 
in this post-office should be filled by com¬ 
petitive promotion from among the under¬ 
employes of the office 

Congressman Conn, of South Bend, Ind., 
has won immortality like only to that of 
Flannigan of Texas, who in the Chicago re¬ 
publican convention of 1880, hearing talk of 
civil service reform, with honest surprise 
inquired, “What are we here for if not for 
the offices?” Conn has promulgated some 
rules limiting the class among whom he 
proposes to divide spoil. One of these limi¬ 
tations is as follows. “No person can be a 
candidate for the office of postmaster who 
is not a good democratic voter in good 
standing, * * * and who has not been 
an active worker for the democratic party 
in past years.” This is the view of public 
office held by the average politician and 
party manager, but very few of them are 
callow enough to put their views in writ¬ 
ing. Cromwell made religion a test for of¬ 
fice. How does he differ from Congressman 
Conn? King James II insisted that none 
but those who approved his policy should 
have a license for selling wine, beer or cof¬ 
fee. How does he differ from Congressman 
Conn? The test proposed by Conn is the 
one peculiar test of absolutism, and has 
been used by every absolute ruler who has 
governed since the world began. Men of 
the stripe of Congressman Conn had better 
stop talking about “democracy,” and make 
their words square with their actions and 

























2 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


beliefs. They like monarchical institutions; 
they like feudalistic notions, anJ they are 
doing all they can to perpetuate them. 
The only known democratic method of 
awarding public employment is by meth¬ 
ods of selection which exclude politics, re¬ 
ligion, race, or color. Yet Conn and his 
associates tight the application of this 
method with a desperation born not of a 
willingness to stand equal with all their 
fellow-citizens, but of a knowledge that only 
by the ways of the pirate and the bucca¬ 
neer can they hope for place and profit. 


George W. Russell, has been postmas¬ 
ter of Irvington, a suburb of Indianapolis 
and the seat of Butler university, for some 
twelve years. The people like him, and 
more than two-thirds of the voting popula¬ 
tion, including all parties, have asked that 
he be retained. It seems that Congress¬ 
man Bynum has determined upon a change. 
We shall watch with interest to see if this 
office will be kept “ near to the people ” 
by forcing a change when two-thirds of 
the people are against it. This is another 
proof of the humbug of the claim that the 
people demand ‘‘rotation in office.” The 
only people in this country who demand 
rotation in office are the comparatively 
small number who want to quarter them¬ 
selves upon the rest. The rest care no 
more for the change of a republican gauger 
for a democratic gauger in the public serv¬ 
ice, than they do for the change of a re¬ 
publican boilermaker for a democratic 
boilermaker in the Pan Handle shops. 

The Boston correspondent of the New 
York Evening Post writes to that paper 
an interesting letter upon Josiah Quincy, 
now assistant secretary of state. He quotes 
Mr. Quincy as believing “that it would be 
a waste of strength for the administration 
to neglect the tariff and currency problems 
to devote attention to the civil service in 
the way the National Civil Service Reform 
League would have it done.” He would, 
further, “devote the strength of the reform¬ 
ers to extending the rules for the classified 
service.” Mr. Quincy has long been a civil 
service reformer and he will take pleasure 
in doing his utmost to bring the foreign 
service to the greatest practicable extent 
under the classified service rules. We 
shall be much mistaken if the subordinate 
places in that service are given over to be 
the spoil of congressmen. As to the rest, 
we would rather think that the corres¬ 
pondent had misunderstood Mr. Quincy. 
Securing extensions of the classified serv¬ 
ice rules has come to be only one part of 
civil service reform. Probably the great¬ 
est evil that now exists in connection with 
the public service is the practice of allow¬ 
ing congressmen to station watch dogs for 
themselves in the shape of fourth-class 


postmasters at every cross-roads. Is this 
to be repeated lest congressmen may te- 
fuse to legislate upon the tariff" and the 
currency? Are congressmen to be bribed 
with offices to legislate upon these subjects? 
As to neglect of the tariff and currency 
problems, if left alone by congre.ssmen,the 
President will have plenty of time to do his 
share upon these problems, while if con¬ 
gressmen are cut off from the offices they 
will have more time than they have ever 
had before in their congressional lives. 
The only true course in this matter is the 
straight and narrow one of doing right 
and the whole right, though the heavens 
fall, and leaving the people to take care of 
mercenary congressmen. 

In urging the gift of places to editors the 
Brooklyn Eagle says: “ There are thous¬ 
ands of country newspaper men seeking 
to eke out an adequate income from petty 
but respectable sheets by obtaining little 
places.” This fact is one of the greatest 
public abuses with which the country is af¬ 
flicted. The law of Indiana requiring the 
printing of the ballot in newspapers, before 
elections, has just been repealed. It cost 
the people two hundred thousand dollars 
a year and was of little practical value; yet 
its repeal was taken as a personal insult by 
the “petty but respectable sheets” that are 
trying to eke out an adequate income. 
The political morals of the Eagle need re¬ 
generating. Fully one-third of the news¬ 
papers of the country exist only because 
they are in some manner quartered upon 
the public treasury. It is a truth that 
ought to be branded into newspaper ethics 
that the opinion upon public affairs of such 
papers, or of any paper that is receiving 
money from the public treasury except 
in the way of ordinary business competi¬ 
tion is worthless. No paper should exist 
which can not be free and unbiased in its 
opinions. There is no greater misuse of 
power than the distribution of offices 
among editors to pay them for “fighting 
battles.” 

The Eagle also says: “ So long as gov¬ 
ernment is run by parties, parties will be 
run by organizations. That long, too,, the 
cause and case of parties will be forwarded 
by ‘workers,’ and by putting ‘ workers’ in 
places.” This is a well-worn statement 
usually called into play when there is no 
other excuse for seizure and division of 
plunder. It has been answered every day 
for many years in England, where, for in¬ 
stance, in the long struggle and repeated 
elections turning upon the Irish question, 
there has not been so much as a messen¬ 
ger’s place with which to reward “ petty 
but respectable sheets ” or “ workers,” or 
any other agency that helped in the cam¬ 
paign. It will be so in this country. Ad¬ 


ministrative reform will make it so. When 
elections cease to be a fight for spoil, every 
American citizen will take a keen interest 
in the questions to be decided. Campaigns 
will be conducted with much less expendi¬ 
ture. Instead of levying blackmail upon 
office-holders, all the money needed will 
be raised without difficulty from the great 
body of citizens, for each will feel that he 
has something at stake. This is Sunday- 
school politics, but it will prevail. The 
false course of great and influential papers 
like the Eagle simply puts off the day. 

! - 

In his call for the coming meeting of 

the national republican league, Clarkson 
invites all “ who believe in practical civil 
service reform, such as will separate the 
spoils idea from politics and yet preserve 
the people in control of public offices and 
all public affairs.” What is control of the 
offices by the people ? Is it distribution of 
places to henchmen by an oligarchy of pol¬ 
iticians, or is it an impartial distribution 
of public employment after competitive 
t.ests in accordance with a law made by the 
people ? What is “ practical civil service 
reform?” Is it the Clarksons removing 
thirty thousand postmasters a year, or is it 
the Andrew bill, the Boston labor service, 
and the merit system as we have it to-day 
in the Indianapolis post-office ? When it 
meets in May, if it means well, it will be 
better for the national republican league 
to say what it means. It will hardly be 
worth while to attempt to hoodwink any 
one by a general declaration for “ practical 
civil service reform.” 


The announcement that the civil service 
commission has canceled all examinations 
scheduled to be held between March 21 
and June 30, in six states and in a number 
of cities, comes at an unfortunate time. 
The addition to the classified service made 
by President Harrison at the last moment 
increased the expenses of the commission, 
and it asked congress to appropriate a 
thousand dollars additional to pay the 
traveling expenses of examiners. This 
was refused, and the commission has been 
obliged to curtail the number of examina¬ 
tions. At the beginning of Harrison’s ad¬ 
ministration the commission was unable 
to get eligible lists ready, and advantage 
was taken to put into the railway mail 
service more than two thousand heelers of 
congressmen—an act of treachery that cost 
the republican party dear. A similar con¬ 
dition has now come about. We trust to 
President Cleveland to do right in this 
matter. It will not be right to repeat re¬ 
publican treachery by hurrying in new 
postmasters and permitting them to carry 
out the doctrine that to the victors belong 
the spoils. We are not speaking in the 
interest of the retention of ward workers 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


3 


whom the republicans may have put into 
the offices in question. We are speaking 
in the interest of improved administration, 
of civil service reform. It is President 
Cleveland’s duty to see to it that no unus¬ 
ual change takes place in these offices un¬ 
til the eligible lists are ready. It is hard 
to believe that if the President’s time had 
not been so taken up by office-seekers, 
some way could not have been found to 
avoid this unfortunate postponement. A 
way has been found in a similar case in 
the bureau of engraving and printing. 
The resolutions of the National League, at 
its annual meeting in Philadelphia in Oc¬ 
tober, 1889, declared it to be a “ flagrant 
violation of pledges ” that “ a brief neces¬ 
sary delay in the preparation of eligible 
lists by the civil service commission was 
improved to sweep out of the railway mail 
service hundreds of employes, regardless 
of efficiency, and into these vacancies were 
hurried hundreds of partisans of the ad¬ 
ministration, with but a subordinate regard 
to their fitness.” It is to be hoped that the 
League, which meets again in April, in New 
York, will not have a similar disagreeable 
duty to perform. 

Four years ago President Harrison vir¬ 
tually invited the party-workers of the 
United States to “pitch in” for the offices. 
He disregarded the rule established to a 
large extent by his predecessor that offi¬ 
cers should serve out their terms. He 
hustled out incumbents to make room for 
his party-workers at a rate never heard of 
before. Now, President Cleveland says 
that offices ought not to be used to pay 
party-workers and that present incum¬ 
bents shall serve out their terms, no mat¬ 
ter how long it may take. In these two 
policies there is a vast and refreshing dif¬ 
ference in favor of the latter, and show in 
Mr. Cleveland a purpose to have reform 
instead of a debauch. We entirely credit 
him and his cabinet with this purpose. 
But while a change of officers made at the 
end of each officer’s term is more orderly, it 
is, nevertheless, a change, and if each officer 
shall proceed, as heretofore, to discharge 
his subordinates to make room for his 
partisans, a clean sweep will occur the 
same as always and with the same motives; 
and before the end of his term Mr. Cleve¬ 
land will have turned out more than 100,- 
000 place-holders, and will have put parti¬ 
sans into their places. This is not reform. 
This is the power of official patronage 
which endangers free institutions. Again, 
congressmen are seeking to make the ap¬ 
pointments the same as ever. Their mo¬ 
tives are not changed. Senator Voorhees 
hardly slept nights until he got Isaac P. 
Gray an office that Gray would take, be¬ 
cause Voorhees feared that Gray would in¬ 
terfere with his re-election to the senate. 


Every congressman has some analagous 
motive with every appointment. As the 
Indianapolis Sentinel’s Washington corres¬ 
pondent said, March 12, of the groan of 
congressmen at the President’s refusal to 
appoint editors unless the latter would 
give up their papers: “What good can 
they do us with their papers under the 
control of others, perhaps disappointed 
office-seekers?” Appointment by congress¬ 
men is not reform. No permanent reform 
can come without the absolute separation 
of congressmen from patronage. They 
will never let go of themselves; they must 
be cut off. 


EXPECTING TOO MUCH. 

We are receiving advice from various 
friendly quarters that, while we are un¬ 
doubtedly honest and patriotic, we are ask¬ 
ing altogether too much; that it is unwise 
and a waste of strength to press adminis¬ 
trative reform to an extreme, and that such 
a course would endanger tariff reform and 
the silver question. We have no desire to 
be misunderstood. We want to be under¬ 
stood as pushing administrative reform to 
the utmost extreme. Now is the time. We 
want to be understood as holding that neith¬ 
er tariff reform nor the silver question are 
of a feather’s weight when put by the side 
of the necessity of bringing about adminis¬ 
trative reform and of bringing it about now. 
Taxation not in accordance with sound 
economic laws is a mistake and the people 
suffer pecuniary loss, but it is a passing 
evil like the routine evils that come and 
always will come in every period of gov¬ 
ernment and are and will be corrected in 
every period. For a government to pur¬ 
chase and store a man’s product to keep up 
its price is the very depth of economic stu¬ 
pidity, but it bears its own inevitable pun¬ 
ishment and cure. If administrative re¬ 
form is to be postponed to such questions 
as these it will always have to be post¬ 
poned, for they will always be present. 
But the struggle against those who prey 
upon the people by seizing public offices 
and by controlling public contracts is a 
mortal one to government. If this strug¬ 
gle fails and comes to an end it is only a 
question of time when republican govern¬ 
ment will cease. Every postponement 
makes failure more imminent. The people 
get used to the warning and cease to listen. 

Those reformers who fear for tariff re¬ 
form and the silver question are but play¬ 
ing into the hands of both party machines. 
Mr. Julian, an eye witness of the move¬ 
ments of 1^52, in his life of Giddings, says 
of the Free-Soilers of that date, “ They 
saw clearly that what slavery needed was 
two pretty evenly divided parties pitted 
against each other upon economic issues 
so that under cover of their strife it could 


be allowed to have its way.” The perpet¬ 
uation of the spoils system needs just that 
condition now. We can not be a party to 
the scheme. We call upon the President 
to stand upon his constitutional rights and 
to take the great measures now left to be 
taken to complete the revolution which 
has been going on for more than twenty 
years. We are aware of the difficulties. 
We know that the road at some points is 
obstructed. But, in urging this action, 
we are not viewing President Cleveland as 
a pigmy or as a figure-head, but as a giant. 

A giant can make a way where there is 
none. 

We are asking that the transfers to the . 
classified service shall be completed to the 
fullest extent; that the system of promo¬ 
tion by competition in the lower grades 
shall be carried to the extent that the 
great body of even the nominations by the 
President to the senate shall represent the 
sifting process of merit in the service; 
that the Boston labor system already in 
force in the navy-yards, shall be applied to 
the entire federal labor service; that fourth- 
class postmasters shall only be chosen by 
some impartial method such as is set out 
in the Andrew bill; and that these and 
similar measures shall be carried to the 
extent that there is nothing left in federal 
appointments for congressmen or parti¬ 
sans to exercise their influence upon. 

There is an element among reformers, 
weak-kneed, half-hearted and supercilious, 
withal, who declare that the civil service 
commission would be swamped and that the 
co-operation of congress is essential to the 
full completion of administrative reform. 
We know that, and to that we insist that if 
congress refuses to co-operate, the President 
shall not, thereupon, turn over the federal 
reins to congressmen nor to any other men 
as party plunder nor to“ reward ’’anybody 
for anything. Because congressmen tie 
his hands it will not be any excuse for 
him to permit a repetition of Clarkson’s 
disgraceful career, nor will it be ahy ex¬ 
cuse for him to use the public service to 
“recognize” anybody. With the co-oper¬ 
ation of congress in the application of non¬ 
partisan and impartial principles to gov¬ 
ernment appointments, let the President 
express himself ready and willing to rid 
the service of mere politicians now in it. 

If congress, demanding plunder, refuses, 
let the President sit down and wait. Let 
the issue be defined and let the people 
discuss it. Let us see how long congress¬ 
men can stand that fire—the President 
refusing to prostitute the public service to 
personal and party ends—the congressmen 
demanding it. This is not the first Presi¬ 
dent we have urged to make this stand, 
nor would President Cleveland be the first 
to refuse and to turn to the vexatious and 










4 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


unhappy course of temporizing with 
spoils hunters and trying to make one loaf 
go where twenty would not suffice—a 
course that surely leads to personal and 
party failure. There is now no half-way. 
To deprive a congressman of a cross-roads 
post-office infuriates him as much as to de¬ 
prive him of all. After President Harrison 
had given everything, those to whom he 
had given most turned against him, and 
he only saved his nomination by whipping 
in thousands of place-holders whose bread 
he controlled. War there is bound to be. 
Then let it be for something great. If Mr. 
Cleveland is a great man he will appreciate 
and take advantage of the greatness of his 
opportunity. 


TWO SPECTACLES. 

Two great political spectacles are now 
presented to the world. In 1886, Mr. 
Gladstone and his party went out of office 
overwhelmingly defeated because they de¬ 
manded home rule for Ireland. They be¬ 
gan the work anew. There was not a 
post-office, nor a clerkship that could be 
hoped for by any voter who. sided with 
them. Out of more than a hundred thou¬ 
sand offices not a hundred would be va¬ 
cated by their success. They had but one 
principle upon which they could ask for 
success—that home rule was right. There 
was but one reward they could hold out— 
that home rule should be made a law. For 
seven years they urged this argument, 
and in converting the British people they 
achieved the triumph of popular govern¬ 
ment of this generation. After the elec¬ 
tion, Mr. Gladstone does not have to give 
public notice that office-seekers must keep 
away from him while he selects his cabinet. 
He goes into office but aside from the places 
immediately around him, he does not con¬ 
trol a clerkship. Members of parliament 
do not come streaming around him intro¬ 
ducing office-seekers by the thousand, nor 
at all. All his energies, all the energies of 
his cabinet, all the energies of members of 
parliament, and all the attention of the 
British people are given to the subject of 
incorporating into legislation the princi¬ 
ple upon which the victory at the election 
was won. This is government by the 
people. And yet the offices of Great Bri¬ 
tain are distributed upon the most demo¬ 
cratic system known in the world—a sys¬ 
tem that gives the son of a day laborer an 
equal chance with the son of a peer. 

The other spectacle is to be seen in this 
country. We have an election in which 
public questions are discussed with great 
earnestness and the result is decisive. The 
victorious party started into the campaign 
with the declaration that offices ought 
not to be subject to change at every elec 
tion. Now what is the result? Have con¬ 


gressmen been busy with measures which 
would do away with a change of offi¬ 
cers? Have they spent the time trying 
to get even a surface knowledge of 
the principles of taxation? Not at all. 
Some of them have traveled from 
county to county preparing for a 
change of officers. They have nominal¬ 
ly attended a session of congress but their 
waking moments have for four months 
been given to dickering with party-work¬ 
ers relating to changes in offices. Forbid¬ 
den by Mr. Cleveland to speak to him on 
the subject, before inauguration, they kept 
on, full swing, planning changes in office 
without Mr. Cleveland. The day after the 
inauguration they and the party-workers 
passed through the White House and 
looked at Mr. Cleveland. The next day, 
the wolf could no longer be restrained and 
the despatches say that Voorhees and 
other congressmen called upon the Presi¬ 
dent, not to confer upon methods of in¬ 
corporating into legislation the principles 
of the campaign, but to demand when the 
changes in office would begin. With this 
the scramble for office began. It seems 
likely to go on for months. Not a word is 
said in favor of any principle that was a 
part of the campaign. Every issue upon 
which the election was won has apparently 
been forgotten. This is government by an 
oligarchy of congressmen. 

Which is the nobler spectacle, Mr. Glad¬ 
stone and his host, daily and nightly fight¬ 
ing the battle of home rule, or Mr. Cleve¬ 
land sitting at his desk day after day while 
congressmen, party committeemen, edi¬ 
tors, party workers and all the other belong¬ 
ings of a party machine crowd around 
him in succession by thousands demand¬ 
ing post-offices, consulships, clerkships and 
all the other offices pertaining to the 
government system, not because of merit 
but as pay for service claimed by them to 
have been rendered to himself or to his 
party? 

In order that there may be no mistake 
about the way in which public employ¬ 
ment is awarded in England, we quote Mr. 
Gladstone’s own words in a speech made 
in Greenwich, October 28, 1871. He said: 

“ It has been onr happy lot in almost every 
department of the state—I believe there are 
but two exceptions—to give up that which has 
always been considered the special patronage 
and the highly prized patronage of a govern¬ 
ment, namely, the appointment of clerks to the 
civil offices of the country. We have aban¬ 
doned that power; we have thrown every one 
of them open to public competition. The 
transition is now ne'arly complete, and, with 
regard to the future, I can say, that as to 
the clerkships in my own office—the office of 
the treasury—every one of you have just as 
much power over their disposal as I have. * 
* * And in order that the public service 


might be indeed the public service, in order 
that we might not have among the civil of¬ 
ficers of the state that which we had complain¬ 
ed of in the army, namely, that the service 
was not the property of the nation, but of the 
officers, we have now been able to remove the 
barriers of nomination, patronage, jobbing, 
favoritism in whatever form, and every man 
belonging to the people of England, if he so 
pleases to fit his children for the position of 
competing for places in the public service, may 
do it entirely irrespective of the questioti, 
what is his condition in life, or the amount of 
means with which he may happen to be or not 
to be blessed.” 

How immeasurably Mr. Gladstone and 
the English government would be lowered 
in the estimation of the world if instead 
of leading the liberal party to a trium¬ 
phant result in the contest for home rule 
he should sit “ patiently ” in his office 
while members of parliament crowded 
around by hundreds introducing their 
heelers by thousands and demanding for 
them post-offices, clerkships, consulships 
’and places as watchmen, dog catchers, 
and what not, to pay them for services 
rendered to Gladstone or to his party. 
What a travesty upon Gladstone’s great ca¬ 
reer and what an indignity upon the noble 
cause of home rule such a sight would be! 


The annual meeting of the National 
League will he held in New York April 
26 and 27. The address will be delivered 
by Carl Schurz on the evening of the 26tb, 
in the Madison Square Garden assembly 
room and the other usual meetings will be 
held. The dinner will be on the evening 
of the 27th. It is to be hoped that the 
west will be well represented. Any mem¬ 
ber of a civil service service reform asso¬ 
ciation is entitled to take part in the pro¬ 
ceedings. Further information can be 
obtained by writing to William Potts, Sec¬ 
retary, New York. 


“Some removals” said President Jeffer¬ 
son “ I know must be made. They must 
be as few as possible, done gradually, and 
bottomed on some malversation or inherent 
disqualification. Good men to whom there 
is no objection but a difference of political 
opinion, practiced on only so far as the 
right of a private citizen will justify, are 
not proper subjects of removal” We com¬ 
mend these Jeffersonian principles to the 
Jeffersonian democratic congressman and 
their followers now engaged in an on¬ 
slaught upon the public service. 


Probably the hottest contest now on is that over 
the public printer, with 2,700 places to give out. No 
less than thirteen candidates are in the fight, each 
one working vigorously to wla.—Buffalo Expreu, 
March 13. 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


5 


AMRRiaAN FELUDARISM. 


The Interference of senators and representatives with nominations and minor appointments in the civil service is not only 
without constitutional warrant, hut it is an indecent and dangerous confusion of two functions which the constitution carefully 
keeps distinct. The senator or representative who makes himself an otlice broker, to pay his ow n parasites from the public purse, 
should staud well exposed in the pillary of public contempt, and by reason of such interference should forfeit the respect of tlie 
country and tlie confidence and support of his constituency.— George William C^lrtis. 

Tlie oath I now take to preserve, protect and defend the constitution of these United States not only impressively defines the 
great responsibility I assume, but suggests obedience to constitutional demands as the rule by which my official conditions must be 
guided. —President Cleveland’s Inaugural. 

Anxiety for the redemption of the pledges which my party has made and solicitude for the complete justification of the trust 
the people have reposed in us constrain me to remind those with whom I am to co-operate that we can succeed in doing the work 
which has been especially set before us only by the most sincere, harmonions and disinterested effort. Even if insuperable ob¬ 
stacles and opposition prevent the consummation of our task we shall hardly be excused, and if failure can be traced to onr fault 
or neglect we may be sure the people will hold us to a swift and exacting accountability.— President’s Inaugural. 


To-day Senators Voorhees and Tur'pie called 
on President Cleveland and had a long talk 
with him. Their call was for the purpose of 
ascertaining the President’s policy in regard 
to changes in the federal offices in the State of 
Indiana. The Indiana men have at least 
solved the difficulty presented by the candi¬ 
dacy at one and the same time, of Colonel 
Zollinger, of Ft. Wayne, for deputy commis¬ 
sioner of pensions, and that of Colonel Mc¬ 
Lean, of Terre Haute, for pension commis¬ 
sioner. One of the Indiana congressmen said this 
morning that both names would be presented to Mr. 
Cleveland, properly recommended, and the Presi¬ 
dent would be left to choose either or both, as he saw 
fit —Indianapolis News, March 7. 

For bank examiner. Mayor Packard, of Ply¬ 
mouth, has secured the majority of the delega¬ 
tion, including Turpie. Congressman Conn has 
been very diligent in his behalf and has in¬ 
duced Dan McDonald, of the Plymouth Dem¬ 
ocrat, to withdraw in his favor .—Indianapolis 
Sentinel, March 7. 

Mayor Packard, of Plymouth, has gone 
home to await his appointment as bank ex¬ 
aminer. He has the endorsement of both senators. 
—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 10. 

Judge Jordan, of Indianapolis, has filed his 
application for the first auditor of treasury. 
He says his interests will be taken care of by Turpie 
and Voorhees, and will return home to-morrow 
and wait there for his commission.— Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel, March 7. 

Senators Voorhees and Turpie are pushing Col¬ 
onel Taylor, of Washington, for the position 
of national bank examiner of Indiana, while 
E. B. Pugh, of Rushville, Cashier McIntyre, 
of Auburn, and O. A. Packard are indorsed 
by individual members of the delegation. 
Pugh promises to be a compromise candi¬ 
date. 

Senators Voorhees and Turpie have an engage¬ 
ment with President Cleveland to-morrow 
morning. They will try to decide what ex- 
Qovernor Gray is to have, and will present 
the names of Colonel William E. McLean, of 
Terre Haute, for commissioner of pensions, 
and Mr. Zollinger, of Fort Wayne, for a dep- 


utyship under the commissioner of pensions. 
They will leave the President to decide which place 
the state shall have, and let him also decide betiveen 
McLean and Zollinger. 

Representatives Bynum and Martin saw Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland to-day. They wanted to know 
about the rapidity with which changes are to be made 
in the offices.—Indianapolis Journal, March 8. 

There seems to be a disposition among the 
India7ia delegation to repeat the mistakes of 
1885 and to crowd upon the administration pro¬ 
fessional office holders. Far example, the first can¬ 
didate to be pushed fora place by the two senators is 
J. C. Carleton,of Bedford, who was postmaster 
under Cleveland an<l Buchanan, and several 
previous administrations. One of his sons 
has held an office in the house for eight years. 
To-morrow the two senators and Mr. Bretz 
will call upon the postmaster-general to urge 
his appointment as chief of division at $2,000 
a year .—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 8. 

The two Senators claim as their own the mar- 
shalship, attorneyship, pension agency and the 
two collectorships. They had agreed to give 
the northern part of the state—the pension 
agency—to Zollinger, but now that he is ruled 
out on account of being an ex-officer the 
twelfth district, with Allen county, which 
gives nearly all the democratic majority of 
the state, was left without a representation on 
the Voorhees-Turpie slate. Congressman Mc- 
Nagney began to raise a vigorous kick against 
this discrimination, and threatened to appeal to 
the President. This morning he was reinforced 
by ex-Senator Barrett of Fort Wayne. The 
two senators were soon convinced that such 
treatment would not do. McNagney wants 
the collectorship or the U. S. marshalship for 
the twelfth district, and in this he is supported 
by other congressmen who desire to see fair 
play. Senator Turpie announced to-night that 
he would not enter into any arrangement by 
which that part of the state would be left out, 
and would not decide whom he would support 
for collector of the eastern district and mar¬ 
shal until he and Senator Voorhees could ar¬ 
range matters from a geographical standpoint. 
Indianapolis Sentinel, March 9. 


It took Representative John L. Bretz, the 
blunt German democrat who presides over the 
political pap of the second Indiana district, 
only fifteen seconds to day to extract from 
President Cleveland a job lot of information 
which a number of more timid congressmen 
have been trying all week to ascertain. It 
had been reported that Mr. Cleveland had 
made up his mind to appoint no one to an of¬ 
fice who ever held office under him; that this 
was to be an entirely new deal; and, having a 
number of constituents here who wanted to 
enter the post offices at their homes, Mr. Bretz 
thought he would find out the truth of the re¬ 
port going the rounds of the hotel corridors. 
So Mr. Bretz was early at the White House this 
morning and asked to see the President for a 
moment only. As soon as he appeared before 
the President he plumped it right out. 

“I just came to know if it was true, as re¬ 
ported, Mr. President, that you will appoint 
no one who has ever held office under you?” 

‘‘It is true, sir,” was the President’s direct 
reply. 

‘‘Well,” said Mr. Bretz, slightly out of 
breath, ‘‘does that apply to postmasters?” 

‘‘It does,” came the President’s answer. ‘‘It 
applies to all offices .”—Indianapolis Journal, 
March 9. 

It was stated yesterday upon apparently 
good authority, that Senators Voorhees and 
Turpie had reached an understanding as to 
the distribution of offices in the two republican 
districts of Indiana, and that Senator Voor¬ 
hees would look after those in the sixth, and 
Senator Turpie those in the Ninth district. 
An aspirant for office in the sixth district to¬ 
day asked Senator Voorhees as to this reported 
arrangement, and the senator replied: "Ap¬ 
pointments in those two distr icts will be made, as we 
understand, upon the joint recommendation of the 
two senators. We have not divided the territory.” 

Senator Voorhees’ committee room was 
visited to-day by about one hundred Indiana 
office seekers. The senator is being run al¬ 
most to death, but he is patient and good tem¬ 
pered about it. He says he recognizes the 
fact that the men who are seeking places have 
as much right to do so as he has to ask for re- 








6 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


electiou every six years. The excursion tickets 
exspire with to-morrow, when the exodus for 
home will begin.— Indianapolis Journal, Mar. 9. 

One of these fair days Mr. L. M. Mering, of 
Richmond, who was the democratic candidate 
for congress last year, will get himself into a 
delightfully lively political complication with 
Chairman Taggart and Indiana’s two senators. 
It is stated by prominent democrats that Mr. 
Mering has for some days been trying to con¬ 
trol the appointments in the sixth congression¬ 
al district of Indiana. He takes the position 
that inasmuch as he was nominated for con¬ 
gress by the democrats of that district, and 
since he would have been entitled to distrib¬ 
ute the offices if elected, he is the choice of 
the district democrats in the distribution of 
the patronage at this time. The score or more 
democrats from the sixth district who are now 
here are up in arms about it, and say that it 
is none of Mering’s business; that tradition and 
custom have awarded the job of giving out offices in 
minority districts to the senators in the majority, 
and that Senator Voorhees and Turpie have not re¬ 
quested Mr. Mering's interference.—Indianapolis 
Journal, March 9. 

Congressman Bynum called at the White 
House this morning with John W. Kern. Mr. 
Bynum has been for another candidate for 
district attorney, but now that Kern is so far 
in the lead, Mr. Bynum, it is understood, will 
not withhold his indorsement, as his own can¬ 
didate is out of the race.— Indianapolis News, 
March 10. 

Representatives Holman and Martin of In¬ 
diana saw the President. They have many 
friends who want plaees, not counting ex-Gov. 
Isaac Pusey Gray.— New York Times, March 9. 

As for the collectors of internal revenue, 
they are not settled, except that Senator Voor¬ 
hees will recommend Jump of Terre Haute, 
and that Mr. Holman claims the privilege of 
naming the collector of the eastern district 
and that Senator Turpie has not opposed them. 
However, Mr. Brookshire will make a desper¬ 
ate fight for Hulet against Senator Voorhees’ 
man.— Indianapolis Sentinel, March 14. 

Senators Voorhees and Turpie, it is said, have 
agreed upon the following slate: 

Marshal—Ex-Sheriff Hawkins, Sullivan. 

District Attorney—J. W. Kern, Indianapo¬ 
lis. 

Bank Examiner—0. M. Packard, Plymouth. 

Collector of Internal Revenue — Joshua 
Jump, Terre Haute, and W. H. Bracken, 
Brookville. 

For Second Comptroller or Commissioner of 
Internal Revenue—Col. C. C. Matson. 

This leaves the Fort Wayne district, with 
its large democratic majority, without a state 
or federal office, as Zollinger can not be pen¬ 
sion agent. Congressman McNagney entered a 
vigorous protest and demanded the U. S. mar- 
shalship. Senator Turpie was willing to con¬ 
cede it, but Senator Voorhees remained firm 
and said Sullivan county must have the place, 
and Hawkins must be the man. McNagny 


will appeal to the President, but the two sena¬ 
tors claim these offices. 

Hawkins is a bright young man; has served 
as sheriff of Sullivan connty. He is but thirty 
years old. The appointment will be made 
Monday. A few days ago Mr. Voorhees hesi¬ 
tated about pressing Hawkins’ claim, fearing 
it would interfere with Jump’s chances for the 
collectorship, but the President informed him 
that the present republican collector would be 
allowed to serve until October. Voorheescon- 
cluded that Hawkins’ appointment would not 
jeopardize Jump’s interest. Jump is a law 
partner of John E. Lamb. Brookshire is still 
in the ring, with Hulett for the same place. 

Bracken is a lawyer of Franklin county. 
He was an elector at large. Sam Ralston, of 
Boone, had a large number of indorsements 
for United States collectorship of the Terre 
Haute district. He did not come here but left 
the matter in the hands of friends here. It 
has been stated that Senators Turpie and 
Voorhees had divided the republican territory 
as far as it relates to the post-offices, Mr. Voor¬ 
hees taking the sixth district and Turpie the 
ninth. Mr. Turpie denies this. He says the 
post-office appointments will be made upon 
the joint recommendations of the two senators. 
In Frankfort the fight is between Eli Brown 
and Mr. Marvin. Mr, Brown was postmaster 
under Cleveland in Columbia City. 

This morning T. B. Buskirk withdrew his 
name as a candidate for United States mar¬ 
shal. It is said that Senator Voorhees notified 
him this morning that Hawkins, of Sullivan, would 
he appointed,—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 10. 

Congressman Taylor has decided to recom¬ 
mend ex-Representative John J. Nolan for 
postmaster at Evansville. 

Congressman Brookshire is still making a 
valiant fight for his favorite, Mr. Hawlett, of 
Crawfordsville, of the position of internal 
revenue collector for the seventh district, 
which Senator Voorhees seems disposed to 
confer on Joshua Jump, of Terre Haute.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, March 11. 

To-morrow the President will settle the controver¬ 
sy which has been practically settled by the two sena¬ 
tors, who have agreed upon all the state offices 
but the district attorney. Mr. Turpie is for 
John W. Kern actively, while Mr. Voorhees 
will present Burke’s name. But he will make 
no fight against Kern. Mr. Kern called upon 
the President to-day and had a satisfactory 
interview. He will be appointed. 

With this exception Mr. Voorhees’ men get 
everything else in the state: Hawkins of Sul¬ 
livan for marshal. Bracken of Franklin for 
collector sixth district; Jump, collector sev¬ 
enth district. Mr. Turpie will not oppose 
these selections by Voorhees. 

The twelfth district is thus entirely ignored, 
notwithstanding the protest of Representative 
McNagny. He intended to appeal to the Presi¬ 
dent, hut he was advised by the other members of the 
house thcU such a course would result in no good, as 
the two senators would insist on controlling this pa¬ 
tronage.—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 11. 


Capt. Allen, who wants the pension agency 
at Frankfort, Ind., was accompanied by Sen¬ 
ator Voorhees. The Senator and Representa¬ 
tive Bynum also filed papers indorsing John 
W. Kern, of Indianapolis, for the attorneyship 
of his district. 

The United States marshalship is settled, 
and the United States district attorneyship for 
Indiana is still in doubt, but the chances are 
in favor of Kern. Senators Voorhees and 
Turpie joined hands in presenting Hawkins> 
of Sullivan, for marshal. 

It was generally understood that Mr. Voor¬ 
hees would yield the appointment of the 
United States district attorney to Mr. Turpie, 
in consideration of the latter’s support of 
Hawkins; but Congressman Brown insisted 
on presenting Frank Burke, of Jeffersonville, 
for the attorneyship, and Mr. Voorhees stood 
by him. Both Burke’s and Kern’s claims 
were laid before the President to day. Mr. 
Brown urged the appointment of Burke. Mr. 
Voorhees was not present, but sent a written 
request for his appointment. Messrs. Turpie 
and Bynum urged the appointment of Kern, 
and the President now has the matter under 
advisement, but Mr. Turpie feels confident 
that the President will nominate Kern. 

Monday morning the Indiana delegation 
will meet and in a body present ex-Congress- 
man Patten, of the tenth district, for commis¬ 
sioner of immigration, the place which his 
predecessor, Billy Owen, now holds.— Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel, March IS. 

The announcement made by the President 
that no newspaper man would be appointed 
to office until he had relinquished his connec¬ 
tion with the papers has caused another howl 
of discontent. The President wants every 
man appointed to an office to give up his 
business, and devote his whole time to the 
business of the government. This is directed 
especially against country editors who in¬ 
tended to run the post-offices and newspapers 
at the same time. In Indiana several editors 
have already been indorsed for postmasters, 
and this will come hard on them. They will 
have to give up their papers or the post- 
offices : 

“In the first district, Philip Zoercher has a cinch 
on the Tell City post-oflfice and he edits the Nenvs of 
that place. Representative Bretz has recommended 
three editors in the second—Purcell, of the Vincen¬ 
nes Sun, John, of the Bedford Democrat, and Hoker, 
of the Shoals News. They must give up their papers 
or get no post-office. In the third, there is Mercer, of 
the Brownstown Democrat, who has been selected 
by Mr. Brown. In the fifth, the editors of the Nash¬ 
ville and Danville papers have both been recom¬ 
mended by Mr. Cooper. In the sixth, McKillop, 
of the Muncie Herald, is the postmaster selected by 
Senators Voorhees and Turpie. In the seventh, 
Mr. Bynum has selected Crittenberger, of the An¬ 
derson Democrat, and Eugene Lewis, of the Green¬ 
field Democrat. In the ninth, Eli Brown wants the 
Frankfort oflice, and he runs a paper there. In the 
eleventh, Fawcett, of the La Grange Democrat wants 
the post-office, and throughout the other districts 
are many editors whose services have been justly ap¬ 
preciated by their members with post-offices.” 

Of course, they can dispose of their papers, 
but say the congressman: “ TFAaf good can 
they do us with their papers under the control of oih- 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


7 


cr«, perhaps disappointed opice-seekers.” These ed¬ 
itors are appointed because they can do the members 
some good in securing renomination, and without 
their county organs they are powerless. — Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, March 12. 

Editor L. C. Christie, of the Indianapolis 
World, the colored organ, was presented to 
the President to-day by Congressman Holman. 
Mr. Holman urged his appointment to the 
office of recorder of deeds for the District of 
Columbia, now held by Blanche K. Bruce.— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, March 12. 

Capt.ain Allen, who wants the pension agency 
at Indianapolis, called at the White House, 
accompanied by Senator Voorhees. The sen¬ 
ator and Representative Bynum also filed pa¬ 
pers indorsing John Kern, of Indianapolis, 
for the attorneyship of his district.— Indianap¬ 
olis Journal, March 12. 

The Indiana senators have united in rec¬ 
ommending Col. I. B. McDonald, of Columbia 
City, for cousul to Calioa.— Indianapolis News, 
March 13. 

Congressman Martin presented the applica¬ 
tion of Mr. Waugh for district attorney to¬ 
day.— Indianapolis Sentinel, March I 4 . 

Postmaster-General Bissell has requested all 
members of congress to file the indorsements 
of every applicant for postmasterships for con¬ 
sideration before appointments can be acted 
upon. This was construed as meaning that 
the recommendation of members of congress 
would be ignored and that the postmaster- 
general would take the matter in his own 
hands and decide upon the merit of the appli¬ 
cants, regardless of the wishes of members. 
This caused a general alarm among members 
and this morning Congressman Conn submitted 
in writing a number of interrogations, among the 
number being the following: 

Will the recommendation of con?ressmen govern 
appointments of postmasters or will the petitions 
and letters of indorsement be considered in your 
department and appointments be made accord- 
ingly? 

—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 14. 

Secretary Reiley, of the state central com¬ 
mittee, Judge Jordan and C. C. Kerr, of In¬ 
dianapolis, left to-night for home. Judge 
Jordan’s application for appointment as first 
auditor of the treasury has been favorably 
acted upon. Both senators urged his appoint¬ 
ment and Chairman Taggart, Secretary Reiley and 
Mr. Bynum made especial efforts in his behalf. — In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, March 15. 

Senators Voorhees and Turpie took John G. 
Shanklin to the President to-day to urge his 
appointment to a consular oflSce.— Indianapo¬ 
lis Sentinel, March 16. 

Mr. Bynum has made the following recom¬ 
mendations for postmaster: 

Elias Hltghshlre, Traders’ Point; T. C. Wyrick, 
Maywood; Henry C. Cook, Bridgeport; James W. 
Webb, Southport: Charles C. Weaver, Acton; Will¬ 
iam M. Brown, Clearmont, Hancock county; A. T. 
Wilson, Mohawk; A. C, Vanduyn, Shirley; James M. 
Trul, Edinburg: John Gerner, Philadelphia; Frank 
Brandenburg, Charlottsville; Ira Beville, Cleveland, 
Madison county; James W. Barrett, Lapel; Asslan 
Cook, Pendleton: William H. Barnes, Florida. 


Weaver, Brown, Wilson, Bradenburg and 
Beville are “exes” and may be rejected by the 
post-office department. It is understood that 
the Indianapolis post-office will be filled by a 
democrat when the four years of republican 
rule have expired. Albert Sahm will be ap¬ 
pointed. Postmaster Thompson will have 
served four years, part of the term as deputy. 
Had he succeeded a democrat he would then 
be allowed to go on. While he has a commis¬ 
sion for four years, he is really filling out 
Wallace’s unexpired term. The appointment 
of a new postmaster belongs to Senator Turpie, 
and Mr. Bynum says that as soon as the sena¬ 
tor takes the initiative in the matter he will 
join him in the movement to replace Thomp¬ 
son with a democrat.— Indianapolis Sentinel, 
March 17. 

The Indiana congressmen are getting out of 
the city for their homes rapidly. Mr. Conn 
has been overrun with applications for office, 
and has been giving close attention to arrang¬ 
ing the recommendations he intends to make, 
will leave for his home this week. Mr. Ham¬ 
mond will probably go the latter part of the 
week. Mr. Hammond, too, is wrestling with 
a large number of applications for office, and 
is finding it very difficult to appoint them to 
his own satisfaction. Congressman McNagny 
has a room at Willard’s, and has been holding 
levees from early morning till late at night 
daily, with the crowds of Indiana politicians 
who stayed over until after the inauguration. 
Mr. McNagny hopes to return to his home this 
week also.— Indianapolis News, March 9. 

Representative Hammond makes no secret 
of the fact that he has promised the Logans- 
port postmastership to N. C. Hanawalt. Al¬ 
though there will be no change under several 
months, Mr. Hammond has come to the con¬ 
clusion that the best way to avoid trouble is 
to anticipate vacancies as far in advance as 
possible, in which conclusion he has many 
followers. He has selected editor R. M. 
Mishelwood, of the Delphi Journal, for the 
Delphi poslmastership, but there is a hitch in 
that selection.— Indianapolis Journal, March 15. 

Congressman Conn has addressed the fol¬ 
lowing to his constituents: 

Now that the policy of the administration with 
reference to the appointment of postmasters has 
been defined there can be no further objection to 
the selection of those officials for the thirteenth In¬ 
diana district, and whenever a majority of the dem¬ 
ocratic voters of the same post-office present a peti¬ 
tion before April 15, 1893, requesting me to call an 
election for the selection of postmasters I will do so 
under the following conditions: 

1. No person can be candidate for the office of 
postmaster who was an office-holder under the 
former Cleveland administration. 

2. No person can be a candidate for any post-office 
where the salary of such an office exceeds $800 per 
annum who is connected with any other business of 
any kind or character. 

3. No person can be a candidate for the office of 
postmaster who is not a good democratic voter in 
good standing, who is not a man of good business 
ability, who does not bear a reputation for honesty, 
morality and sobriety, and who has not been an ac¬ 
tive worker for the democratic party in past years. 

4. No person can be a candidate for a post-office 
who will not pledge himself to give his time and at¬ 


tention to the duties of the office, provided he is 
elected. In other words, every postmaster in the 
thirteenth district is expected to be a postmaster and 
not turn the office over to a paid employe. 

5. No petition for the election of a postmaster will 
be accepted for consideration after April 15,1893, and 
all recommendations for postmasters will be made 
before May 15, 1893. 

The above qualifications of postmasters are neces¬ 
sary to applicants for post-offices where they are 
elected toappointmentor recommended, and I earn¬ 
estly request all democratic voters in the thirteenth 
district to give me their assistance in selecting post¬ 
masters who will discharge the duties of their .sev¬ 
eral offices with fidelity, zeal and honesty to the gen¬ 
eral public. C. G. Conn, 

M. C. Thirteenth Indiana District. 

—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 14. 

Representative Conn and wife will leave to¬ 
morrow for home in Elkhart. Mr. Conn will 
return in a few weeks to deal out the post-offices .— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, March 15. 

Representative Conn, of Elkhart, deprecates 
the Cleveland order forbidding the appoint¬ 
ment of country editors to post-office and other 
positions, and in an interview in this even¬ 
ing’s Star he says: 

“ My district is an agricultural district 
largely. I canvassed it very thoroughly and 
was brought in contact with the editors of 
the local rural press. No class of men do 
more in a campaign to further the interests of 
their party than do the editors and newspaper 
men. This is particularly true of the coun¬ 
try editor. The circulation of their paper is 
small, they work very hard and they fight 
their battles as if the fate of the nation and 
their own lives depended upon the success of 
their candidates. They are certainly deserv¬ 
ing of reward and should be the very last class 
of recipients for presidential favor who should 
be discriminated against.”— Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, March 15. 

Congressman Conn left this morning for his 
home at Elkhart, Ind. He will be in Indiana 
two weeks closing np post-office matters.—Indianapolis 
News, March 15. 

Congressman Conn, who left the city, ac¬ 
companied hy his wife, yesterday, goes home 
for the purpose of settling a number of post- 
office disputes in his district. He expects to 
settle up most of the offices and have his rec¬ 
ommendations ready in about two weeks, 
when he will return to Washington.—Jndtan- 
apolis News, March 16. 

Columbus. —The post-office war has broken 
out here in earnest and promises to result in a 
factional fight that threatens to disrupt the 
party. At the close of the last campaign Con¬ 
gressman Cooper recommended Capt G. E. 
Finney, who formerly held the office under 
Cleveland, for postmaster, over the protest of 
nearly every democrat here except himself. 
Delegations of prominent democrats waited 
upon Mr. Cooper and tried to persuade him to 
he silent, but he refused to listen to their mpplica- 
tions and claimed he had absolute right to appoint 
the postmaster, and proposed to exercise that right, 
regardless of what his constituents might 
think or say. Now, since Cleveland has ruled 
out the old office-holders, the fight has been 







8 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


renewed, and last night one hundred representa¬ 
tive democrats met, and speeches were made 
denouncing Congressman Cooper in the most 
violent language as a dictator and usurper of 
power that by right belongs to his constitu¬ 
ents. The result was the appointment of a 
committee to wait upon Mr. Cooper and de¬ 
mand of him that he “shall appoint” whom 
the democrats select, in such manner as they 
determine on. Cooper was specially invited 
to attend the meeting, but he left the city, it 
is said, to avoid being present.— Indianapolis 
News, March 14- 

Congressman George W. Cooper was in the 
city an hour yesterday afternoon, en route 
home from the national capital. 

“ What do the office-seekers think of Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland’s policy concerning those who 
held positions under his former administra 
tion?” Mr. Cooper was asked. 

“ Well, it has caused a great many heart¬ 
burnings and disappointments. I have no ob¬ 
jections to the rule if he applies it to the re 
publicans who are now holding office, but if 
he does not f can see serious reasons why such 
a policy should not be pursued. I don’t be¬ 
lieve tbe fact of a man once having held office 
should disqualify him from holding again if 
he has performed his work in a satisfactory 
manner.” Congressman Cooper says it is the 
President’s policy to only appoint such men 
to office who will give their whole time to the 
duties of their respective places. This he be¬ 
lieves will not work very successfully, and it is 
doubtful if it can be carried out at all. He 
thinks .John W. Kern is sure of the district 
attorneyship, and looks for his nomination 
during the coming week. “Senator Voorhees,” 
said he, “ is making no fight on Kero, but is 
simply carrying out pledges made to the 
friends of Frank Burke.”— Indimapolis Senti¬ 
nel, March 13. 

Congressman Taylor, of the first district, 
has been wrestling with Washington malaria. 
In consequence of his illness, Mr. Taylor has 
not had an opportunity to give close attention 
to the interesting array of office-seekers that 
is here from his section, and consequently will 
be detained in Washington for some time yet. 
Mr. Hammond will be here about the first of 
May, and the others will probably come about 
the same time, for then, it is expected, the ad¬ 
ministration will be prepared to take up and 
deal with the small offices. Congressman Ham¬ 
mond said to-day that he had not settled any of the 
large post-offices in his district yet, but would do so 
during his stay at home. He has had quite a 
number of applications for consulships and 
other places as bureau chiefs, etc., which he 
will file with the President before he leaves. 
One of the strongest applications which he 
will file is that of ex-Congressman Patton, 
who is a candidate for superintendent of im¬ 
migration, which office was vacated by Mr. 
Owen, of Indiana, a resident of Mr. Ham¬ 
mond’s district. Congressman Patton has the 
indorsement of all the Indiana and Kentucky 
delegations and has nearly all the representa- j 


tives on the democratic side of the last house. 
—Indianapolis News, March 17. 

Kepresentative Bynum is still at the wheel, 
trying to turn out an office or two for his con¬ 
stituents, but he expects to get away when the 
decks are cleared. Jason Brown, Mr. Taylor 
and the other representatives here from Indi¬ 
ana are all anxious to go home.— Indianapolis 
Journal, March IS. 

Among the callers upon President Cleveland 
this morning were several Hoosiers, besides 
the two senators and Governor Matthews. 
Representative Martin brought an uncom¬ 
mon name when he presented that of Jerome 
HerflT, of Peru, as a candidate for the Havana 
consulship. Congressman Bynum introduced 
S. W. Ralston, of Lebanon, who wants to be 
appointed collector of internal revenue for the 
seventh district. Mr. Brookshire was also at 
the White House. The name of Joshua Jump, 
of Terre Haute, was presented for collector of 
internal revenue by some of the Indianians.— 
Indianapolis Journal, March 18. 

Congressman Taylor has filed the applic<i- 
tion of Dr. George W. Buckner, of Evansville, 
for recorder of the land office. He is a col¬ 
ored man.— Indianapolis Sentinel, March 18. 

Representative Pendleton, of West Virginia, was one 
of the early (lallers. He urged that Frank H. Jepson 
of his state be appointed United States treasurer. 
He also discussed for a few minutes the policy of 
allowing office-holders appointed by President Har- 
son to serve out their terms. 

Representative Kilgore, of Texas, who has called 
daily at the White House, was there again to day. 
He introduced Judge Robert McCart, of Texas, who 
would like to be appointed minister to Belgium.— 
Neiv York Times, March 11. 

<■ * <« 

Representative Ealoe, of Tennessee, introduced R. 
H. Coe of his state, who is a candidate for United 
States marshal for the western district of that state. 

Sejiator Lindsay, of Kentucky, with Representative 
Montgomery, presented the name of Gen. Richardson 
of that state for marshal, and Judge Severs for col¬ 
lector of internal revenue for the second Kentucky 
district. 

Senator Palmer, of Illinois, came next, and he had 
a candidate for marshal for the southern district of 
Illinois. He recommended Capt. Brinton for that 
position. 

Representative Oates, of Alabama, presented the 
name of Hannis Taylor, of Mobile, for the Spanish 
mission. 

Representative Bynum was with the President long 
enough to say a good word for John Kern, of Indi¬ 
anapolis, who would like to be district attorney for 
that district. 

Senators Proctor, Voorhees and West, George R. Tin¬ 
gle, and Representative Outhwaite, of Ohio, made 
brief calls. Mr. Outhwaite brought Thomas Wetzler, 
of Lancaster, editor of the Eagle, who wants to be 
public printer.—Wew York Times, March 11 

<< <t 

" This must be Kentucky Derby day,” remarked 
Congressman Carulh this morning, as he walked into 
the President’s anteroom and saw three Kentucky con¬ 
gressmen with thirteen friends, who are in the race for 
office, awaiting their turn. “That being the case,” 
hecontinued, "I guessl’ll make afew entries myself. 
Here’s my friend, W. R. Kinney, whom I’ll back for 
collector of the fifth internal revenue district. He’s 
a good goer, too.” Mr. Caruth also filed the papers 
of Caleb Dorsey for United States marshal of his dis¬ 
trict in New York.—Indianapolis Journal, March 14, 

* <■ « 

The report that Mr. Cleveland had told congress¬ 
men that he did not Intend to appoint newspaper 


men to office for the reason, among others, that he 
might be accused of subsidizing the press, does not 
hold good. Congressmen Dockery, De Armond, Cobb, 
Burns, and Morgan, of Missouri, called on the Presi¬ 
dent to day for the express purpose of ascertaining 
the truth about the “no journalist need apply” rule. 
— Indianapolis Journal, March 14. 

Representative Kilgore and Bailey, of Texas, were 
among the early callers. They came to present the 
name of C. B. Stewart, of Gainesville, Tex., for ap¬ 
pointment as judge of the Muskogee (I. T.) court. 

“Will you request a federal appointment?” Mr. 
Kilgore was asked. 

“Not much,” he replied. “1 am coming back to 
congress to raise cain.” 

Representative Springer, of Illinois, presented the 
name of Edgar Morrison, of Morrisonville, cousin to 
William R. Morrison, with an application for ap¬ 
pointment as consul to Kanugawa, Japan.—/ndiana- 
polis Sentinel, March 15. 

« << >;« 

The Brooklyn contingent is not going to be .satis¬ 
fied with a small share of customs service patronage. 
Hugh McLaughlin wants both the appraiser and sur¬ 
veyor. He is said to care very little about the naval office, 
but he does want the other places,—New York Times, 
March 15. 

i> <■ 

Senator Irby (S. C.) with Judge Earle, ex-attorney 
general of South Carolina, who wants the district at¬ 
torneyship for his state, visited President Cleveland 
lo-day. 

Representative Meredith (Va.) introduced a candi¬ 
date for the Lyons consulate—George S. Shackelford, 
of Orange, Va. 

J. A. Manson, of Memphis, and E. P. Bond came 
•wiih. Representative Patterson (Penn.). Mr. Manson 
is a candidate for the United States marshalship of 
the western district of his state, and Mr. Bond wants 
to be internal revenue collector for its middle and 
western districts.— Buffalo Express, March 16. 

The Mississippi senators are conceded by the rep¬ 
resentatives from that state the right to suggest and 
insist upon the appointments to some of the offices 
in Mississippi. To keep all disputes concerning the 
offices allotted to the senators from coming to the 
President, the senators to-day had a conference, and 
agreed upon certain nominations which shall be rec¬ 
ommended and urged by both senators. 

The Alabama senators and representatives have 
decided to meet at the capital March 28 and “ con¬ 
sider fairly, fully and carefully all applications that 
have heretofore been or may up to that day be sub¬ 
mitted to us for such joint recommendation, together 
with all papers filed in support of each such appli* 
cation, and shall act upon the same.”—iVew York 
Times, March 14. 

>:< * 

“The men who went to Wa.shington after offices do 
not move out very rapidly, in spite of the hints which 
have come from the White House,” J. J. Richardson, 
member of the national democratic committee from 
Iowa, said to a New York Times reporter at the Fifth 
Avenue Hotel yesterday. Mr. Richardson has been 
In Washington ever since the inauguration, and has 
called on the President several times. He made sev. 
eral recommendations for federal offices in his state. 
—New York Times, March 15. 

* 

Although Pennsylvania and New York candidates 
are scarce, this does not apply to the northwestern 
cornerof the Keystone Stale. The democrats of that 
section want office, and they are not afraid to ask for 
it either, and their representative, Mr. Sibley, is hus¬ 
tling with all his might to gather in as many loaves 
and fishes as possible before the other Keystone dem¬ 
ocrats awake tothesltuatlon.—R«#aIo Express, March 
15. 

* # 

Speaker Crisp, who is a daily visitor, appeared 
abont 11 o'clock with Mr. J. W. Walters, of Albany, 
Qa., who wants to be district attorney for the south¬ 
ern district of Georgia. 














THE CIVIL SERVICE ,CHRONICLE 


9 


Mr. Edgar Morrison, of Illinois, called at the White 
House to-day with Representaltve Springer. Mr. Mor¬ 
rison is a cousin of the Hon. William R. Morrison, 
who is now asking the appointment and would like 
to be consul to Kanagawa, Japan. 

Mr. Harry Hawkins, of Duluth, Minn., who de¬ 
sires to be governor of Alaska, was presented to the 
President this morning by Representative Baldwin of 
Minnesota .—New York Times, March 12. 

<« » 5 « 

Speaker Crisp v!ns another of the early birds. He 
escorted Col. Blackburn, of Atlanta, who desires a 
foreign mission; Mr. Lindsey Johnson, of Rome, who 
would like to go abroad as consul, and Mr. T. W. 
Rucker, who wants to be the district attorney for the 
northern district of Georgia. 

Senator Oeorge, of Mississippi, introduced to Mr. 
Cleveland Major Dockery of his state, who wants to 
represent the United States at Rio de Janeiro, and 
Col. Gordon, w'ho is after the consulship at Hong¬ 
kong. Lieut. Gov. Evans, of Mississippi, was also 
presented. 

Senator Martin, of Kansas, came with Charles H. T. 
Taylor, the colored Kansan, who desires to succeed 
Mr. Bruce as recorder of deeds. Mr. Taylor left his 
papers with the President. 

Representatives Dockery, Morgan, Burns, Cobh and 
Dearmond of Mississippi sought an interview with 
Mr. Cleveland in order to ascertain whether it was 
true that their editorial constituents need not hope 
for any appointments. Mr. Cleveland assured them 
that the report to the effect that newspaper editors 
would not receive any consideration at the hands of 
the administration was incorrect, and he could not 
imagine how it gained currency. So far as he was 
concerned, he said, newspaper men would be treat¬ 
ed just as considerately as any class of citizens who 
might desire to serve the covernment. This infor¬ 
mation put the Missouri delegation in a very good 
humor. 

The presence of Reprensentative Wilson, of West 
Virginia, in Mr. Cleveland’s office this morning was 
said by the gossips to have a close connection with 
the movement to make Senator Faulkner of West 
Virginia, chief justice of the new district court of 
appeals.—WeM York Times, March 14. 

When the President passed into the public hall¬ 
way, after his conference with the bishops, on his 
way to his oflQce, he was waylaid by several congress¬ 
men and stood for a time in the hallway talking to 
them .—New York Times, March 16. 

« « «> 

All the visitors to the President came between 10 
and 11 o’clock, and consisted chiefly of senators and 
representatives, including Senators Berry of Arkan¬ 
sas, Voorhees and Turpie, of Indiana; Vance, of North 
Carolina: Mills and Coke, of Texas; Carey, of Wyom¬ 
ing; Palmer, of Illinois; Stanford, of California; Gor¬ 
don, of Georgia; Representatives Brookshire, of Indiana; 
Amerman, of Pennsylvania,with John J. O’Boyle, of 
Scranton, who wants the postmastership there, and 
John J. Fahey, sheriff of Lackawanna county, Penn¬ 
sylvania; Bynum, of Indiana; Painter, of Kentucky; 
Forman, of Illinois; Martin, of Indiana; Henderson, 
of North Carolina; Hicks, of Pennsylvania; Paschal, 
of Texas, and Henderson, of lo-v/n.—Indianapolis 
News, March 17. 

The Pennsylvania delegation have come to a pretty 
good understanding among themselves, and, feeling 
that the situation with them is too serious to admit 
of their risking any mistakes, have assumed the wait¬ 
ing policy, having armed themselves against Harrity 
as well as they can. 

Representative Sibley’s mail contains but little else 
than letters about the post-offices in his Pennsylva¬ 
nia district. The applicants began work on the day 
after the election in November and have kept it up 
ever since. For every presidential office in his dis¬ 
trict there are from five to eleven, and in one or two 
instances thirteen candidates. And the contest for 
the small fourth-class offices is nearly as brisk. For 
the Erie nost-office there are said to be seven candi¬ 
dates.—Rujfofo Express, March 15. 


Whenever the Minnesota men can agree upon a 
method of procedure there are many men whose 
claims will be presented. Some have filed applica¬ 
tions with the President to-day. Ex-Representative 
W. H. Harris wants to go to Alaska as governor, and 
he has some backing among democrats of his state. 
If he can not have that place his friends say he will 
be urged as collector of internal revenue for the Min¬ 
nesota district.—A’cio York Times, March 9. 

4 

It will be a week or more before the democrats of 
New Jersey will be ready to make an organized effort 
to secure the offices which they think should be be¬ 
stowed upon them. They would have been clamor¬ 
ing at the White House before now but for the advice 
of several of the congressional delegation to the effect 
that from a well-organized plan of action much bet¬ 
ter results might be expected. In deference to this 
opinion the eager Jerseymen are restraining them¬ 
selves, and arrangements are making for a meeting of 
the New Jersey senators and democratic representatives 
to be held next week for the purpose of deciding upon the 
policy to be followed in besieging Mr. Cleveland. 

So far, each of the New Jersey democrats in con¬ 
gress has received about 200 applications for post- 
offices from his constituents, and there is no sign 
that the deluge will cease at once. The question of 
post-office will probably be settled outside of the 
general patronage conference. Each senator and 
democratic respesentative will do his best for the 
men finally decided upon. Prom present indications 
there will be plenty of work to be disposed of at the 
conference. Candidates for internal revenue col¬ 
lectors, ministers, and consuls have already sent 
their names to members of the delegation, and they 
will be on hand when the time comes to decide up¬ 
on the prize winners. Afterward the tug of war will 
come at this end of the line.—Neu» York Times, Mar. 9. 

v >> * 

The business of handling the office-seeker is being 
systematized, at least by one of the Texas senators. 
He is keeping a llstof all the applications sent to him 
by his constituents, and his crop of 1893 promises to 
be an abundant one. So far he has received and 
placed on file 500 communications asking govern¬ 
ment jobs for as many men.—iVew York Times, 
March 8. 

«C« 

New Jersey’s share of federal patronage is to be 
distributed decently and in order. In about a week 
the democrats of the state’s delegation in congress 
will get together for a conference to settle the vari¬ 
ous questions arising in the distribution of offices, 
and such fighting as has to be done is to be settled 
by the delegation. In the conference the two dem¬ 
ocratic senators will take the places of the two repub¬ 
lican members of the house. It is likely that to the 
senators will be left the settling of questions con¬ 
cerning appointments which have to be confirmed 
by the senate, while the congressmen will look after 
the others. Where the meeting will be held is in 
doubt, but the chances are very good that the Jer- 
seymen will get together in New York City.—iVew 
York Times, March 8. 

» « « 

Senator Palmer, of Illinois, called on the President 
this afternoon and presented the name of Judge 
Browning of Illinois for the position of commissioner 
of the general land office. 

Ex-Representative Rogers, of Arkansas, is backed 
by some of the congressional delegation from that 
state for the office of solicitor general. His name 
has been presented to President Cleveland for that 
place. Senator Jones of that state called on the 
President this afternoon, and the appointment of 
Mr. Rogers was said to be one of the topics of conver¬ 
sation .—New York Times, March 8. 

A Virginia delegation, consisting of Senator Hunton 
and Representatives Wise and Meredith, presented to 
the President the name of Judge John Goode, of 
Virginia, for the solicitor-generalship. 

Senator Lindsay, of Kentucky, came with C. T. 
Allen, of his stale, and asked Mr. Cleveland to ap¬ 


point the latter an assistant postmaster-general. Mr. 
Wheeler and Mr. McKenzie want foreign missions 
and Mr. Watts would like to be a consul at one of 
the British ports. Their claims are being pressed by 
Congressman William J. Stone, who called on the 
President this morning. Chief Justice Bennett, of 
Kentucky, who came with Congressman Stone, mere¬ 
ly paid his respects to Mr. Cleveland. Judge Ben¬ 
nett’s claims will probably be 7)ressed for the circuit 
judgeship left vacant by the promotion of Judge 
Jackson to the supreme bench. 

Senator Palmer and Representatives Newberry and 
Durborrow VIere ushed into the President’s presence 
with several Illinois applicants for prominent offices 
behind them. They were ex-Congressman Scott 
Wike, Mr. Delos Phelps and Gen. R. J. Smith. Mr. 
Wike is after the position of comptroller of the cur¬ 
rency, and Mr. Phelps wants to be a consul to some 
prominent place. General Smith is after the position 
of postmaster at Chicago. 

Congressman Kilgore, of Texas, had a little talk 
with the President about the Mexican mission, the 
position for which he has been indorsed by the Texas 
legislature. Congressman Amos J. Cummings intro¬ 
duced to Mr. Cleveland a delegation representing 
typographical organizations. They entered a pro¬ 
test against the appointment of C. W. Edwards, of 
Wilmington, Del., to the office of public printer. A 
hot fight for the office has already begun.—/ndian- 
apoUs News, March 8. 

»:» # » 

Two other visitors came a short time after who at¬ 
tracted some attention. They were Senator Irby and 
Governor Tillman, of South Carolina. They were 
among Mr. Cleveland’s most bitter opponents up to 
the time of his nomination, but since that lime have 
been “ placated.” Since the election they have been 
protesting that they admire Mr. Cleveland exceed¬ 
ingly, and they have said with considerable frank¬ 
ness that they believe the Tillman faction of South 
Carolina should be given a good share of the federal 
offices which will naturally go to that state.—A’ew) 
York Times, March 9. 

>i» 

Senator Mills, of Texas, was one of the early visitors 
at theWhite House,and after he had gone away Senator 
Hunton and Representatives Wise and Meredith called^ 
They presented the name of John Goode for the po¬ 
sition of solicitor general.—Wew York Times, March 9. 

Another applicant for his former position appeared 
in ex-Minlster Buck, of Kentucky, who had the Pe¬ 
ruvian mission during the first Cleveland term. With 
him was Representative Breckenridge, of Kentucky.— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, March 12. 

« « 

Postmaster-General Bissell has on his desk a “lit¬ 
tle list” which will cut an important figure for a 
few months to come. It is a list of 356 congressional 
distHcts of the United States, and alongside every 
district is, or will be, the name of the man who will 
contest the post-office patronage of that district. 
The list shows 217 democratic districts, and in eachof 
these the name of the democratic congressman appears as 
the one who is to advise on offices.—Indianapolis Journal, 
March 12. 

« 

Congressman Springer, of Illinois, was one of the 
earliest callers, and he went away with the knowl¬ 
edge that Mr. Cleveland intended to adhere to his 
rule about not appointing former office-holders to 
their old office. As he himself jokingly expressed 
it: “My worst suspicions were confirmed.” This is 
the second talk Mr. Springer has had with the Presi. 
dent on the subject. 

Undeterred by the no-reappointment rule. Col. 
Childs, ex-minister to Siam, asked the President to 
send him back to the land of he white elephant. 
He was with Representative Dockery, of Missouri, who 
put in a good word for him. 

Congressman Richardson saw the President in be¬ 
half of Chief Justice Lerton, of the Tennessee su¬ 
preme court. Judge Lerton wants to succeed to the 
circuit court vacancy caused by the promotion of 
Justice Jackson to the federal supreme bench.— In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, March 12. 






10 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


'THR ONSIaAUQHT:". 

“Public office is a public trust. IVe reaffirm the declaration of the democratic national convention of 1876 for the reform 
of the civil service, [Reform is necessary in the civil service. Experience proves that efficient, economical conduct of the 
government business is not possible if its civil service be subject to change at every election, be a prize fought for at the ballot 
box, be a brief reward of party zeal, instead of posts of honor, assigned for proved competency and held for fidelity in the public 
employ; that the dispensing of patronage should neither be a tax upon the time of all our public men, nor the instrument of 
their ambition] and we call forthe honest enforcement of all laws regulating the same. The nomination of a President, as in the 
recent republican convention by delegations composed largely of his appointees, holding office at his pleasure, is a scandalous 
satire upon free popular institutions, and a startling illustration of the methods by which a President may gratify his ambition. 
We denounce a policy under which federal office-holders usurp control of party conventions in the states, and we pledge the dem¬ 
ocratic party to the reform of these and all other abuses whicb threaten individual liberty and local self-government.”—.^’a<^onai 
Democratic Platform, 1892. 

JACKSONIAN DRMOGRAGY. 

That the indiscriminate removal of publie officers for a mere difference of political opinion is a gross abuse of power; and 
that the doctrines lately boldly preached in the United States senate, that “ to the victors belong the spoils of the vanquished,” is 
detrimental to the interests, corrupting to the morals and dangerous to the liberties of the country. — Democraticplat/oim 1832. 


THE SCENE AT WASHINGTON. 

Judge Gresham was feeling well this morning and 
did not seem to be in the least fatigued from the 
strain that had been put upon him by the events of 
two days and the importunities of many place- 
hunters.—/ndtanapofis Nevrs, March 6. 

# <■ « 

The steady tramp, tramp of the office-seekers sound¬ 
ed through the White House all day. There was prac¬ 
tically no cessation in the line of people who ascended 
the stairway leading to the President’s room, and 
nearly all who came saw Mr. Cleveland.—/ndianapo- 
tis Sentinel, March S. 

Jjc <1 <« 

If some tents could be pitched in the spacious 
grounds about the White House and rations be 
served there, a large crowd of people now in this city 
would doubtless be very thankful. They would thus be 
spared the trouble of doing so much walking, as they 
are now doing, between their hotels and the execu¬ 
tive mansion. In effect they have gone Into camp 
before the President’s door, and they lay almost con¬ 
tinuous siege in an effort to reach the interior rooms 
where Mr.Cleveland doesbusiness. They want offices 
for themselves or their friends. The crowd is said to 
be larger than the most sanguine person had an¬ 
ticipated. Delegation after delegation has been ad¬ 
mitted to see the President to day, and there has 
been almost a constant line before the White House 
doors of those who come alone to present their 
claims. Much of the President's time has been de¬ 
voted to these visitors. For the most part, however, 
the President has been very accessible, and has re¬ 
ceived his visitors with a degree of good nature and 
interest in their errands which has been surprising. 
—New York Times, March 9. 

* >> <■ 

The President was in his office at nine o’clock, and 
within two hours had exchanged greetings with a 
dozen senators and as many more members of the 
house, listened to a dozen or more pleas for appoint¬ 
ments, and devoted the remainder of the time to 
some delegations from different states who wanted 
to discuss his policy with reference to appointments. 

Soon after Senator Hill went away the crowd be¬ 
gan to gather and at 10 o’clock the office hunters 
were there in a throng. As soon as they had gone 
there came a delegation who wanted to protest 
against the appointment of ex-Governor Gray, of 
Indiana, to be minister to Mexico. 

A delegation of the Virginia democratic associa¬ 
tion saw the President. From other states the num¬ 
ber of office-seekers is increasing and the siege at the 
White House and at some of the departments is kept 
up with a zeal that is exhausting. There are a dozen 
candidates for some of the fat positions and the 
claims of some are pressed on all possible occasions. 
New York Times, March 16. 

* <• << 

Secretary Carlisle has been so overrun with callers 
since he assumed office that he has not had time to 
give the subject of changes in the offices his atten¬ 
tion. To-day he took possession of a private room in 


the treasury department, far removed from his office, 
where he could work without being constantly in¬ 
terrupted by office-seekers. The location of this 
room is kept secret. There he has begun work on a 
pile of applications of office that would have discour¬ 
aged a less determined man.—Wew York Times, March 
12 . 

The desire of members of congress and applicants 
for office- to see the papers on file for positions has 
retarded the work of appointment division so much 
that Secretary Carlisle has issued an order on the 
subject.— Indianapolis Sentinel, Marchll. 

«■<<>:< 

For an hour and a half prior to the assembling of 
the cabinet Mr. Cleveland saw a large number of 
visitors, Ihegreater number composed of office-seekers 
and theiradvocates.-//idiaaapofis Journal, Marchll. 
^ ^ 

To day the new secretary of the treasury got a taste 
of the wiles of persistent office-seekers. His room 
was fairly filled with callers. Mr. Carlisle’s mall 
this morning was so large that it was taken to the 
appointment room in a great basket. It measured 
several bushels and nearly all of the letters were ap¬ 
plications and Indorsements for office. Five addi¬ 
tional clerks have been detailed for work in the ap¬ 
pointment division to assist in keeping the work up- 
—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 9. 

>:»»>>!« 

The President has been just as busy to-day as he 
has been every day during the week, and the num¬ 
ber of callers ceased only when the word “Closed” 
was fastened at the main entrance. 

It was said at the White House, late this afternoon, 
that Mr. Cleveland was anything but worn out with 
his week’s work, and that the onslaught of the office 
hunters had apparently affected him no more than 
if he had been a rock. 

The crowd began to call about 10 o’clock this 
morning. It included senators, representatives and 
place hunters in large numbers, and the waiting 
room was filled to overflowing.—Wcw York Times, 
March 12. 

<* ifi* ♦ 

To-day witnessed but little diminution in the num¬ 
ber of callers at the state department.— Indianapolis 
Sentinel, March 12. 

* » <■ 

Despite the inclement weather, there has been a 
great rush of patronage seekers in the different de¬ 
partments to-day. The ante-room of Mr. Hoke Smith 
of the interior department was crowded at noon. 
Soon after 12 o’clock the door opened and Mr. Smith 
appeared. He seemed to be in good humor, notwith. 
standing the pressure brought to bear upon him 
since he assumed office. 

During the day a large number of politicians from 
al parts of the West called upon Mr. Smith. Among 
them were half a dozen senators and a dozen or 
more representatives, all of whom came on political 
errands. 

Mr. Smith told the correspondent of the New York 
Times that he had not been able to pay much atten¬ 


tion to business since he took charge of the depart¬ 
ment. 

Secretary Morton had a breathing spell to-day and 
at once began to familiarize himself with the de¬ 
tails of the office.— New York Times, March 12. 

J."* « 

The thunderbolt which burst over the heads of 
the patronage-hunters when the President announc¬ 
ed that old office-holders would be barred for reap- 
polnlment momentarily cleared the atmosphere, but 
only for a moment. It might be thought that this 
announcement would suspend applications while 
the old men were falling to the rear and the new 
ones getting to the front, but no sooner were the old 
applicants turned down than each senator and rep¬ 
resentative reached into his inside pocket, where he 
had a little list of available applications ready to 
spring upon the President.— Indianapolis Journal, 
March 12. 

^ 

When Mr. Cleveland entered his office this morn¬ 
ing, ready to take up the work of receiving senators 
and members of congress with their friends, he 
found a bigger crowd waiting for him than he has 
seen on any previous day since his inauguration. 
Possibly the bright sunshine had something to do 
with the size of the throng. It is more likely, how¬ 
ever, that the rumors circulated within the past 
twenty-four hours to the effect that Mr. Cleveland 
did not Intend to make the barrier against the office- 
seekers quite so heavy as had been at first intimated 
had much to do with the outpouring.— New York 
Times, March 12. 

<1 

The calling at the White House was renewed this 
morning with about the same vigor that it was con¬ 
tinued last week, but it did not last so long, the rush 
being over at one o’clock, leaving the President 
some time In which to consider business that re¬ 
quired quiet forthe attention that it demanded. 

An object lesson in office-seeking is daily present¬ 
ed to every visitor to the Metropolitan and National 
hotels. These are the houses most popular with 
southerners, and at present they are full to overfiow- 
ing. Democrats from all parts of the south crowd 
their corridors, the majority of them clad in black 
and wearing the inevitable black wool hat with ex¬ 
pansive brim.—New York Times, March 14. 

jCt ;;t ^ 

To-day closed a busy week^for President Cleveland, 
and the last day was marked by as much activity and 
bustle among those seeking office as the first or any 
of the intermediate days. 

Secretary Hoke Smith does not, however, reach his 
office a moment too early to suit the crowd of office- 
seekers, many of whom he finds when he arrives, 
waiting around the doors of the department until 
the hour of nine o’clock arrives, when they are ad¬ 
mitted to the building. 

At the post-office department there was the usual 
crowd waiting to see Postmaster-general Bissell, and 
the President’s announced determination to permit 
all efficient postmasters to serve out their four years’ 
term has produced a depressing effect. But man.v 
of the applicants for places are men of resources and 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


11 


they try to convince Mr. Bissell that the postmasters 
in their respective towns are anything but eflicient 
and richly deserve dismissal in case they refuse to 
resign lorlhvfHh.—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 12. 

* * * 

The crowd at the While House has become so ob¬ 
jectionable, from the standpoint of the man who 
thinks business ought not to be interfered with, that 
a set of rules for the government of the otfieial por¬ 
tion of the mansion has been formulat.d. 

This is the text of the rules: 

The cabinet will meet Tuesdays and Fridays at 11 
A. M. Monday will be reserved by the President for 
the transaction of public business requiring his un¬ 
interrupted attention. 

The President will receive senators and represent¬ 
atives in congress from 10 to 12 o’clock on other days, 
except cabinet days, when he will receive them from 
10 to 11 o’clock. 

Persons not senators and representatives having 
business with the Piesident will be received from 12 
to 1 o’clock every day except Mondays and cabinet 
davs. 

Those having no business, but who desire merely 
to pay their respects, will be received by the Presi¬ 
dent in the east room, at 1 o’clock r. m. on Mondays, 
Wednesdays and Saturdays. 

The President intends to devote the hours designa¬ 
ted for the reception of senators and representatives 
exclusively to that purpose, and he requests their co¬ 
operation in avoiding encroachments upon the time 
set apart to their business —New York Times, Marchlb. 

* S, <! 

To all his political visitors Mr. Bissell said that the 
matters to which they had directed his attention 
would be considered in due time, and that he did 
not intend to rush things. Fourteen elerks have 
been detailed for duty in the office of the fourth as¬ 
sistant postmaster general in anticipation of the ar¬ 
rival of Mr. Maxwell. When the latter is confirmed 
and assumes the duties of his new position he will 
find several thousand applications for postmasters’ 
places stacked upon his desk, and it will be his task 
to consider them in their order. The applications 
are coming at Ihe rate of about a thousand a day 
now, and they are being acknowledged and filed for 
future action.—JVeu) York Times, March 14. 

The second week of this reform administration 
opened with fully as large a crowd of office-seekers 
pulling and hauling as was here on inauguration 
day. But many of the old faees were missing. The 
Old Guard, the term applied to former office holders, 
had many of them gone to their homes, but the 
vacancies thus created were speedily filled by new 
arrivals. The consequence was that it was a large 
audience which awaited President Cleveland when 
he began the work of receiving senators and repre¬ 
sentatives with their friends this moming.—Buffalo 
Express, March 14. 

There is a big book in the office of the chief of the 
appointment bureau of the treasury which is in great 
demand these days. It contains the names of all the 
democrats who have thus far a.sked for offices in the 
treasury under the new administration, and, after 
examining it, one is apt to ask himself whether there 
are any democrats in the country who are not office- 
seekers. Every state in the union is represented in 
this huge volume, and thousands of names have al¬ 
ready been inscribed upon it. One of the employes 
of the office has been assigned to the duty of record¬ 
ing the names as fast as they are received, and he is 
kept almost constantly busy.—iVew> York Times, 
March 15. 

^ j!* 

Up till noon there was a steady stream of visitors 
and cards fell like a steady snowstorm. Early in the 
day there were a number of senators who called to 
see the President and they were fortunate in that 
they were able to reach the ear of the chief execu¬ 
tive at once. They were the envied of all the less 
fortunate mortals who were compelled to cool their 
heels in the ante-rooms, and who were fortunate if, 
after wailing all the forenoon, they were able to get 
as far as the private secretary’s room. Among the 
visitors were Senators Mitchell of Wisconsin, Jones 
of Arkansas, Camden of West Virginia, Palmer of 
Illinois, Turpie of Indiana, Dolph of Oregon, White j 
of Louisiana, Teller and Wolcott of Colorado, Mc¬ 


Millan of Michigan, George of Mississippi and Gordon 
of Georgia; Representatives Wilson of West Virginia, 
Enloe of Tennessee, Paschal of Texas, Black of 
Georgia, Forman and Cable of Illinois, Washington 
of Tennessee. Representatives Wheeler, of Alabama, 
and Washington, of Tennessee, accompanied Col. Ed 
Baxter, of Nashville, president of the Tennessee 
state bar association, and Joseph L. B. McFarland, 
of Memphis, who presented additional papers urg¬ 
ing the appointment of Judge Lerton to the circuit 
judgeship made vacant by the promotion of Judge 
Jackson to tlie supreme bench. Senator Palmer 
brought Judge Southworth, of Litchfield, 111., and 
William McCabe, of Chicago, who want to be an 
auditor of the treasury department and public 
printer respectively. Representative Outhvvaile, of 
Ohio, presented additional papers indorsing Thomas 
Werts for the public printership .—Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel March 17. 

* » ♦ 

“You are very much in the minority,” said Mr. 
Cleveland this morning when Representative Houk 
of Ohio called with a friend and announced that 
neither of the men were looking for office. The ma¬ 
jority were represented in undiminished force this 
morning, and Mr. Cleveland was very busily occu¬ 
pied until lunch lime.—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 
10 . 

>:« >:« >:« 

So many office-seekers, mostly from Indiana, ap¬ 
peared in the corridors of the capitol to-day that 
when a recess of the senate was taken, shortly after 12 
till 3 o’clock, the doors leading to the floor of the 
chamber ^vere kept closed “under exeenlive orders.” 
Thus the senators had a rest free from callers. When 
the doors of the senate are closed in executive ses¬ 
sion a senator can not be communicated with by any 
one on the oniside.—Indianapolis Journal, March 16. 

* * 

The visitors at the White House began coming 
somewhat earlier than usual to-day, and the larger 
number of them consisted of congressmen.—Rit/aio 
Express, March 17. 

#1 * * 

As soon as the body had adjourned the army of 
officers who have been thronging the corridors for 
days past found entrance and opportnnlty to scg 
their senators, and all found their way to the demo¬ 
cratic side of the chamber, with the result that 
nealy every .senator seated there was soon sur¬ 
rounded by a group of wistful-eyed men, or was 
obliged, in self-defense, to flee to the retiring 
rooms of the committee rooms.-Indianapolis Journal, 
March 17. 

• * * 

Office-seekers swarmed about the senate wing of 
the capitol to-day and made life miserable for the 
senators who ventured into the corridors. After the 
adjournment the doors were not opened to the pub¬ 
lic for a full half hour, in order to enable as many of 
the senators as desired to make their escape from the 
horde of place-hunters. Some of them availed them¬ 
selves of this opportunity, while others remained and 
braved the storm. The sight of a senator impor¬ 
tuned by a dozen or more men,with petitions in their 
hands and determined looks on their faces, is enough 
to impress the observer.-Aeio York Times, March 17. 

<< >,** ^ 

Postmaster-General Bissell naturally is anxious to 
have Mr. Maxwell confirmed as speedily as possible 
in order that he may relieve him of some of the pres¬ 
sure now centered against his department. The 
strain has been awful, but so far Mr. Bissell has 
seemed not to mind it, although it is apparent that 
he is anxious to shift the load of office-seekers upon 
Mr. Maxwell’s shoulders in order that he may have 
the time to give his attention to the work of the de¬ 
partment. 

When the Express correspondent called upon him 
to-day, Mr. Bissell said: “ I really have not a line of 
news. All of my time has been taken up by the 
office-seekers and their friends. If you want to give 
the people of Buffalo some idea of this rush for office, 
tell them that I have been compelled to detail forty 
clerks from other divisions to help out the large 
force of clerks in the appointment division in brief¬ 
ing and filing the applications. I have not had time 
to consider whom I desire for my assistants.”—Rwjalo 
Express, March 17. 


“GOOD POLITICS.” 


Ex-Governor Gray is the subject of considerable 
political speculation this morning. If not here now, 
he will show up soon. His chances for securing the 
Mexican mission are varionsly estimated, but it is 
impossible to predict how he will come out, in view 
of the rivalry for that office. The towering form of 
the Hon. J. G. Shanklin was seen about the rotunda 
of Willards to day. He is the object of considerable 
interest to the Indiana politicians, and his recom¬ 
mendations are being sought with much eagerness. 
He will remain here several weeks.—Indianapolis 
News, March 6. 

>!« 

About 10 o'clock Secretary Gresham received a call 
from Senators Voorhees and Turpie, who remained 
witli him nearly an hour. They were alone with the 
new secretary of state, and while they declined to 
discuss their visit, it is certain that their call was for 
the purpose of urging the appointment of ex-Gov- 
ernor Gray, of Indiana, as minister to Mexico.-lUas/i- 
inglon Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 6. 

i\t >;t >;t 

Ex-Governor Gray and Hon. W. A Cullop left last 
evening for Washington city over the Pennsylvania 
road.-Indianapolis Journal, March 7. 

* 

Ex-Governor Isaac P. Gray has his reward. He will 
be appointed minister to Mexico. It is stated on 
good authority that the appointment will be made at 
once. Official announcement of his appointment 
is likely to be given out from the White House at 
any time. Ex-Governor Gray spent last evening at 
the White House. Nearly all the prominent Hoosier 
democrats in the city called on him at his hotel yes¬ 
terday afternoon and last night. This morning he 
appeared in the rotunda of the Ebbitt House, dressed 
in black broadcloth, with decollete vest, and a huge 
diamond stud that looked decidedly diplomatic. Mr. 
Gray came to Washington in response to a telegram 
from Senator Voorhees. 

At the last moment the local influences that have 
always opposed the ex governor made a final stand 
against his nomination as minister to Mexico. They 
were willing to concede him the Chinese mi.ssion, 
but Governor Gray stated positively and unequivo¬ 
cally that he would not accept the appointment to 
the Celestial empire. He had back of him, for the 
Mexican mission, the influence of the Indiana sena¬ 
tors, most of the congressmen and many influential 
men from other states. Finally Mr. Gray’s political 
enemies gave up the fight — lUas/iinpfon Dispatch to 
Indianapolis News, March 8, 1893. 

♦ 

Gray, it may be added, has only the support of 
Senators V’oorhees and Turpie in his aspirations. 
Representative Bynum openly opposes him. Of 
course John Gil Shanklin and Editor Morss and their 
friends will not encourage Isaac’s preferment. The 
most serious part of the Gray situation is four.d in 
the fact that Mr. Shanklin stands infinitely higher 
with the President and Secretary Gresham than Gray 
does, and Mr. Shanklin is to be given a place him¬ 
self. Both cari not be given first class missions. In¬ 
diana democrats declare it would be shameful to 
give Gray the higher place, and the friends of Mr. 
Shanklin say he would not accept an office lower in 
rank or less remunerative than is given Gray.—Jn- 
dianapolis Journal, March 8. 

« >> 

Gray’s nomination as minister to Mexico has been 
made out, and it will be sent to the senate to mor¬ 
row. This announcement was made by ex-Congress- 
man Courtland C. Matson as he emerged from the 
state department this morning, after a conference 
with Secretary Gresham. Senator Voorhees saw the 
President again this morning, and this evening 
stated in most positive terms that Mr. Gray’s ap¬ 
pointment as minister to Mexico was a certainty, 
and that the President had assured him that it would 
be sent to the senate without delay, probably to¬ 
morrow. Of course the selection of Gray for a first- 
cla.ss mission, and especially the one of his first choice. 
Is a hard slap at the Shanklin-Bynum combination, 
and it is a victory for the Voorhecs-Turpie crowd. 









12 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Indiana's two senators have stood faithfully by Mr. 
Oray. They have made his appointment to Mexico the 
first requisite to their friendship for the administration, 
but ex-Governor Gray lias not been idle. He has 
been looking out for No. 1. When, some time ago, 
he dispatched to Lakewood Hugh Dougherty, of 
Bluffton, and James Murdock, of La Fayette, his per¬ 
sonal friends, to ascertain direct from Mr. Cleveland 
what it was intended the democratic ex-governor of 
Indiana should get in the way of an office, Mr. Gray 
showed an acumen which should recommend him 
to his party as a practical politician. He did not in¬ 
tend to take anybody’s word for it, but was deter¬ 
mined to learn for himself what the incoming Presi¬ 
dent intended doing for him. “I shall take early 
occasion,” Mr. Cleveland is reported to have said 
to Mr. Gray’semlssaries, ” to tender Mr. Gray a place 
which will be commensurate with his ability, and I 
hope satisfactory to him and his friends.” This Mr_ 
Cleveland said after the Mexican mission had been 
mentioned, and he said It in a way which led Messrs. 
Dougherty and Murdock to report to Mr. Gray that 
the mission was his own.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, March 9. 

It has come to light that the nomination of Isaac 
P. Gray as United States minister to Mexico was 
practically agreed upon in this city. The tiight of 
Governor Matthews’s inaugural ball a secret meet¬ 
ing was held, in a law office here, of prominent dem¬ 
ocrats from all parts of the state. At that time Gray 
was considered a cabinet possibility, and there was 
much opposition to him, and the feeling among 
some was that Gray should not be recognized at all, 
and especially should not go into the cabinet. John 
G. Shanklin took an active part in the meeting, and 
urged that in the interest of “good politics,” Gray 
should get something. “If he does not,” said Mr. 
Shanklin, “he will be the man aboutwhomall the 
disappointed democrats in Indiana will rally, and 
in two years he will have the most powerful follow¬ 
ing in the state.” Mr. Shanklin urged that Gray be 
sent out of the country so far that he would not be 
fn touch with the Indiana democrats. John P. 
Frenzel was opposed to any recognition for Gray, 
but finally agreed with Mr. Shanklin that it would 
be “good politics” to have Gray recognized and 
send him across the sea. While the subject was un¬ 
der discussion S. E. Morss came in. He was in even¬ 
ing dress and did not remain more than ten min¬ 
utes. Jlr. Morss when asked for his opinion replied 
that his name was pending for an appointment and 
he did not think it proper for him to take any stand, 
but personally, he said, he was. in favor of Mr. Gray 
being recognized. The Mexican mission was men¬ 
tioned and Mr. Shanklin opposed it. He thought 
that would keep Gray too near home. It was finally 
decided to urge him for the Chinese mission. This 
knowledge of meeting came to the ears of Gray’s 
friends, and James Murdock, of La Fayette, and 
Hugh Dougherty, of Bluft’ton, hurried on to New 
York and saw Mr. Cleveland, and from him received 
the understanding that Mr. Gray would be appointed 
minister to Mexico if he desired. Grey was com¬ 
municated with and said he would take the place, 
and it has been given to him. Had the meeting 
mentioned not been .satisfied that Gray would not 
be appointed to a cabinet place, a strong fight would 
have been made against him. Now it is said that 
Gray’s friends will “remember” some of the men in 
that meeting when they come up for office. 

tit ★ 

Many democrats who have been opposed to Gray 
d) notr.ke to put themselves in print as approving 
the appointment, though they profess themselves to 
b 2 pleased over the situation. They are glad that 
Gray is to be sent abroad. They would have prefer¬ 
red the Chinese mission, or something even farther 
away, but Mexico will suffice. They did not want 
Gray to stand in the attitude of a martyr to gather 
about him all the disappointed office-seekers and 
make trouble, as they say he undoubtedly would do 
had he not received substantial recognition. Some 
of his friends and some of his enemies wanted him 
sent to Russia. Others would have preferred Siberia. 
The Russian mission, however, was considered out 
of the question, as all the countries represented in 


St. Petersburg send their most skillful diplomats, 
and Mr. Gray’s knowledge of diplomacy is not edn- 
sidered great.—Indianapolis News, March 9. 

>> >> *:« 

The first list of appointments sent to the senate by 
President Cleveland to-day fulfilled two predictions 
that have been made in the dispatches to The News 
and will probably prove a double disappointment to 
the Cleveland wing of the Hoosier democracy. In the 
first place, ex-Governor Gray’s appointment as min¬ 
ister to Mexico was the severest blow of all. But 
Mr. Shanklin went down fighting bravely. Two 
hours before the nomination of Gray was sent to the 
senate, Shanklin, accompanied by Maurice Donnel¬ 
ly and Captain Baker, of Indianapolis, called at the 
lYhite House and entered a solemn protest against 
Gray’s appointment as minister to Mexico, on behalf 
of the Cleveland wing of the Indiana democracy. 
Mr. Shanklin stated to a reporter on leaving the 
White House that the appointment of Gray was a 
disappointment to the Cleveland men in Indiana 
and would be generally regretted by them. He was 
willing that Gray might be sent to China or some 
other mission, but objected to his being given the 
Mexican mission because he felt that it would lessen 
the chances of recognition of other Indiana demo¬ 
crats. When the rumor got abroad on the street yes¬ 
terday afternoon that Gray’s nomination would be 
sent in to-day, Shanklin hurried over to the White 
House and asked Private Secretary Thurber if he 
might be permitted to see Mr. Cleveland. Beingin- 
formed that the President was very busy, Mr. Shank¬ 
lin said he would call this morning, as he did.— TUas/i- 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 9. 

i‘t ij* s^s 

The chief interest to the Indiana office-seekers in 
to-day’s developments at the capital was in the nom¬ 
ination of ex Governor Gray to be minister to Mex¬ 
ico. The selection was received with much favor by 
the office-seekers, most of whom have been long-time 
adherents of the ex-governor and who seem to think 
that he will have sufficient influence with the administra¬ 
tion to land them in soft berths.— Washington Dispatch to 

Indianapolis Sentinel, March 10. 

<> <■ 

“Gil” Shanklin left for New York this morning, 
and it is reported he will not return to Washington. 
Ex-Governor Gray left his hotel this morning and 
went to the house of a relative. He will return to 
Indiana Saturday night. His indorsement is being so¬ 
licited on every hand by the Indiana office-seekers. The 
ex-governor spends much time in the company of Senator 
Voorlues, and the two seem to be shaping affairs for Indi¬ 
ana. — Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
March 10. 

sit 

“ I regard the Mexican mission as the most desira¬ 
ble for a man of my temperament,” said Mr. Gray to 
the Journal correspondent, “and it was my first 
choice. I would rather have the place than a cab¬ 
inet office. I can make frequent trips home, and the 
climate is pleasant and the country most beautiful.” 
— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, March 
10 . 

» » « 

’The Indiana democrats who led the “ninety per 
cents” at the Chicago convention, and, as they be¬ 
lieve, made the nomination of Cleveland possible, do 
not attempt to hide their disappointment at the 
turn Indiana democratic politics has taken. To use 
the expression of them : “We are wondering where 
we are at.” They say they have not lost faith in 
President Cleveland, but they believe i was impol¬ 
itic for him to recognize the “ten per cents” or the 
Gray wing of the party, so soon after his inaugura¬ 
tion. When J. G. Shanklin came here fresh from a 
visit to the President-elect, he was besieged by place¬ 
hunting democrats as long as he remained in the 
city. It was taken for granted that he was nearer the 
President than any other man from Indiana. No 
one then thought of going to Isaac P. Gray for a rec¬ 
ommendation under the new President. It was fre¬ 
quently reported froin apparently reliable sources 
that the President would appoint Gray to the Mexi¬ 
can mission, but the original Cleveland men refused 
to believe the story. As a result of the appointment, 
Indiana democrats who are seeking the smaller 
offices do not know which wing of the party should 
be asked to recommend them. They are asking 


themselves these questions; Is the Gray-Matthews 
wing the one to which the President intends to 
listen? or, is it the idea of the President to get Gray 
out of the way and then allow Gil Shanklin and 
the other members of the party who were for Cleve¬ 
land “first, last and all the time” to control the 
patronage.—/ndtawapoh's News, March 10. 

>;< »It 

The Post this morning prints an interview with 
editor J.G. Shanklin, of the Evansville Cottr/er, on 
the appointment of ex-Governor Gray as minister to 
Mexico, in which Mr. Shanklin relates the following 
incident of the ante-convention campaign of Indiana: 
“The personal relations of Governor Gray and my¬ 
self were pleasant up to a time that is now some¬ 
thing more than a year ago. I telegraphed him to 
meet me in Indianapolis and took the train from 
Evansville. In order to have a witness to our meet¬ 
ing, I also telegraphed Mr. Taggart, chairman of the 
state democratic committee. Mr. Taggart, however, 
did not reach the hotel until after the talk had 
ended. The purpose of my visit was to secure Mr. 
Gray’s support of Mr. Cleveland, and thereby place 
him (Gray) upon the national ticket as the vice- 
presidential nominee. He flatly refused, saying that 
he did not want the vice presidency, and that the 
man who stood, or could stand, between him and 
the nomination for the highest office within the gift 
of the nation was David B. Hill, of New York. I 
laughed, telling him that Indiana would be glad to 
see him the Vice-President just as I would be glad to 
see him, but that 90 per cent, of its democracy were 
in favor of Mr. Cleveland against anybody. He said 
that Grover Cleveland’s name would not be men¬ 
tioned in the convention, save in the casual manner 
I said it would; that not only would its wearer be 
mentioned, but that he would be nominated and 
elected. 

“ ‘ Gil Shanklin,’ he declared, ‘you think that you 
are a politician. I am a politician—that is my busi¬ 
ness—and I am willing to put my judgment against 
yours.’ 

“‘It is very true. Governor,’ I answered, ‘that I 
am merely a newspaper man, but I tell you that the 
presidency is utterly out of your reach.’ 

“Subsequently, I went down into Orange county 
and made a speech to its convention. Its delegates 
to the state convention were instructed for Mr. Cleve¬ 
land; Gray has not forgiven me. We do not speak 
when we pass by, which is not very often.”— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 10. 

Jl: jK 

The fact is not concealed among leading politicians 
here that Governor Gray’s appointment was to dis¬ 
charge an obligation made at the Chicago conven¬ 
tion, by which he withdrew at an opportune time 
tor Mr. Cleveland. It is understood that Mr. Whit¬ 
ney and Governor Francis, of Missouri, and other 
managers of the Cleveland boom, gave Gray’s friends 
to understand that the latter would be given a cabi¬ 
net place, although the position was not definitely 
agreed upon. The announcement made by Governor 
Gray’s friends from Indianapolis, even before elec¬ 
tion, that in the event of Mr. Cleveland’s success the 
ex-governor would be made postmaster-general, was 
doubtless founded on the deal at Chicago, and the 
expressed choice of ex-Governor Gray. When Mr. 
Cleveland found it impossible to confer a cabinet 
place on Indiana’s ex-governor he did the next best 
thing and gave him the choice foreign mission. 
While Mr. Shanklin lost in his fight on Indiana’s ex¬ 
governor, he has not, according to the general belief, 
injured his own prospects for abundant recognition 
at the proper time. Mr. Shanklin has said that he was 
a candidate for no office, and never asked Mr. Cleve¬ 
land for anything, but when some of his friends had 
consulted him on the subject he had told them that 
there \¥as only one position he would care to have, 
and that was consul-general to London. One reason 
assigned for President Cleveland’s persistence in ap¬ 
pointing Mr. Gray over the protest of Mr. Shanklin 
and other representatives of the Cleveland democ¬ 
racy is a respect for the pledge made by Mr. Whitney 
and Governor Francis. It is said that Mr. Whitney 
felt very much disappointed that President Cleve¬ 
land did not confer a cabinet place on Mr. Gray.— 
Indianapolis News, March 11. 





The civil service Chronicle. 


If we see nothings in our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoils, we shall foil at every point.— 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November 18. 


VoL. II, No. 2. INDIANAPOLIS, APRIL, 1893. terms : ^ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

One mode of the misappropriation of public funds 
is avoided when appointments to office, instead of 
being the rewards of partisan activity, are awarded 
to those whose efficiency promises a fair return of 
work for the compensation paid to them. To secure 
the fitness and competency of appointees to office 
and to remove from political action the demoraliz¬ 
ing madness for spoils civil service reform has 
found a place in our public policy and laws. The 
benefit already gained through this instrumentality 
and the further usefulness it promises entitle it to 
the hearty support and encouragement of all who 
desire to see our public service well performed, or 
who hope for the elevation of political sentiment 
and the purification of political methods.—Prest- 
dent’s Inaugural. 

The eye of the world still remains upon 
Mr. Gladstone. Night after night, he stands 
forth for the right of local self-government, 
and behind, and in support of him, watch¬ 
ing ev'ery movement of the contest, and 
with every faculty enlisted, stand a majority 
of the British people, moved alone by the 
justice of the cause. He is a true leader of 
the people. He commands the admira¬ 
tion and approval of all nations. He is ad¬ 
ding a crown of glory to a great career. 

The eye of the world also still remains 
upon our American President. He too is 
occupied to the utmost point of endurance. 
Let any man read how, and then tell the 
American nation where it can turn to hide 
its shame and humiliation : 

Senator Voorhees gathered together this 
morning all the Indiana candidates for con¬ 
sular positions still in the city and took them 
to the President in a body. They were Jerome 
Herd of Peru, who wants the Havana consul¬ 
ate; Editor Jennings of the Salem Dmocraf, 
who would like to go to Hamburg or some 
other place in Germany; Dr. Chitwood of 
Connersville for Berlin, or some other place 
equally as good ; Con Cunningham of Craw- 
fordsville, for Belfast; Dick Johnson of John¬ 
son county, for a Canadian or South American 
port, and last but not least, that rising states¬ 
man from the Kankakee regions, George D. 
Glazebrook of Starke county, who thinks 
Buenos Ayres about a place suitable for his 
talents. Mr. Herff was introduced first. The 
President remembered meeting him and told 
him frankly that no change would be made 
at Havana for the present. He told him he 
could have something equally as good. Con¬ 
gressman Martin was also present to urge his 
appointment, and the President requested Mr. 
Martin to leave a list of six places that HerfiF 


would accept, which was promptly done, and 
Herd’s friends feel confident that his name 
will be sent to the senate this week. It may 
be sent to-morrow. Senator Voorhees says 
there is no doubt of Herd’s appointment. 

The President catechised Cunningham about 
his business and nativity. Con said he was 
born forty miles from Belfast. 

“Suppose that I find another good democrat 
for the place, what will you take then?” asked 
the President. 

“Take the next best thing,” replied Con 
with a profound bow, then gave way to Glaze- 
brook, who bowed, too—not quite so low, 
however, as Con. “Many good democrats 
want the same place,” said the President. 
“Yes, Mr. President,” replied Glazebrook, 
and said no more. Jennings simply shook 
hands with the President, remarking that he 
was happy to meet him. Johnson and Chil- 
wood had met the President before. The net 
result of this interview is that Herff will be 
appointed to an office worth about $5,000.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
April G. 

This was the most fatiguing day the President has 
had since his inauguration, and he was completely 
tired out after three hours and a half talk with sen¬ 
ators, representatives and office-seekers. 

“Did any of them get away?” asked the Presi¬ 
dent when Senator Palmer entered his office at the 
head of a delegation of about twenty. 

“ I think not, sir; there appears to be a quorum 
present,” answered Senator Palmer, gravely, as he 
ran his eye over the groxxp.—Indianapolis Sentinel, 
March 30. 


A Washington dispatch to the Indian¬ 
apolis News, April 6, says: 

Congressman Martin made a clean sweep of the 
pension medical boards in his district yesterday. 
All the republican examiners were replaced with 
democrats, as follows: Wabash, Drs. Hale, Kidd 
and Barnet: Bluffton, Drs. Cook, Harton; Marion, 
Drs. Shirely, Horn and Barnes; Peru, Drs. Boggs, 
Passage and Helm; Huntington, Drs. Carson, 
Sprowl and one to be appointed soon; Portland, 
Drs. Hale and Dicks, one vacancy to be filled. 

No administration with an adequate no¬ 
tion of pension reform would ever permit 
such use of pension offices for private ends 
as this. Under Mr. Cleveland’s former ad¬ 
ministration the pension oflBce, so far as 
Indiana was concerned, was one of the 
worst political machines that ever existed, 
and if tools of congressmen are to become 
pension examiners it will become so again. 
The only improvement now proposed is to 
appoint younger physicians. It will prove 
a worthless remedy. A congressman’s 
tool is a congressman’s tool whatever his 


age. Here, too, we must call upon the ad¬ 
ministration to show evidence of greatness. 
The reform must be from the bottom. The 
pension examiners must be as independent 
of congressmen and as free from political 
control as the army and navy surgeons are. 
This must apply to all branches of the pen¬ 
sion service. Without this freedom from 
the political whip pension reform will be 
a failure, no matter how unexceptionable 
the pension commissioner may be. 


The work of Headsman Maxwell goes 
grimly on. It is given out that removals are 
largely for cause. Maxwell is not particular 
about exact meanings. That congressmen 
want the changes, is sufficient “cause” for 
him. It is also said that republicans have 
learned to resign. This is a lesson peculiar 
to clean sweeps. In some way the republi¬ 
can postmaster is given to understand that 
if he resigns his office, his traps will be 
bought by his successor; but if he refuses to 
resign, he will be removed and will have to 
store his traps in his woodshed for want of 
a purchaser. It is also said that, by order 
of the President, no fourth-class postmas¬ 
ters will be removed without cause unless 
they have served four years. Are they to be 
removed if they have served four years ? If 
so, they will go at the rate of over thirty 
thousand a year. Does the President mean 
for the country to understand that, not¬ 
withstanding the platform upon which he 
was elected, and after all his own talk, he 
means to dismiss sixty thousand fourth- 
class postmasters to make room for sixty 
thousand of his own partisans ? That is a 
question he ought to answer plainly. He 
can stop Headsman Maxwell by a word. 
He can put him out of office, and put in a 
man who looks upon office as a public 
trust, and not as a party snap. He can say 
to congressmen that when they give him 
the means and the machinery to appoint 
fourth-class postmasters upon business 
principles, he will rid the service of mere 
politicians. Then he can sit down and 
wait, and time will do the rest. We say 
this with entire confidence in Mr. Cleve¬ 
land’s power to destroy the greatest and 
most wide-spread source of corruption now 
remaining in the federal service. We urge 
it with the utmost earnestness, and in the 
belief that the President and his cabinet 
want to do what is best for the country. 





























14 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


As soon as Fourth Assistant Postmaster- 
General Maxwell was named, we received 
reliable information concerning him from 
his neighborhood. He is from a western 
New York village, and his political ideas 
are such as grow and fester in the small 
wards of such a village. His experience 
away from home was to hold an office un¬ 
der Hill, which in some way he managed 
to hold until Mr. Cleveland had offices to 
give out. He is a very small partisan. He 
will trail his forehead in the dust before 
congressman, and thank them for the privi¬ 
lege. But he is dragging the administra¬ 
tion into the dirt along with himself. 


The information comes from Washing¬ 
ton thatthe administration thinks it should 
be judged by comparison with Harrison’s 
administration. This is an unconscious ad¬ 
mission that it is doing what it ought not 
to do. The claim that one party is not do¬ 
ing as much wrong as the other did, under 
the same circumstances, has been made a 
cover for wrong-doing long enough. The 
comparison must be made with what the 
present administration ought to do. To 
determine that, the platform upon which it 
went into office, the constitution and the 
laws, and the oath of office are the standards. 
Do these standards warrant the setting up 
of Headsman Maxwell to remove sixty- 
thousand fourth-class postmasters solely to 
make room for watch-dogs of congressmen? 


It is in one sense a good sign when for 
any reason officers engaged in making 
clean sweeps deem it necessary to cover up 
their work. It shows a realization that they 
are doing that of which the people would 
not approve. The attempt to keep from 
the public the changes in fourth-class post- 
offices broke down before the day was out. 
A second “stagger” at secrecy was made in 
the notice to congressmen not to tell the 
names of those they recommend. The ad¬ 
ministration has now put itself in the light 
of wanting to make a clean sweep if it can 
catch the people looking the other way. 
This is all very silly. In other governments, 
secrecy is the dread instrument of iron- 
handed despotism; in a republic, it is the 
hiding place of the ashamed, the resort of 
the witless and the cover of the sly. 


If anything is clear, it is the fact that 
there is no demand among the people for 
the carnival of spoil which is rapidly gather¬ 
ing full headway in Washington. On every 
hand those who have always been the warm¬ 
est supporters of Mr. Cleveland, are ex¬ 
pressing open disapprobation. One says, 
“ Mr. Cleveland is acting very badly.” An¬ 
other says, “Cleveland could stop this post¬ 
master business if he wanted to.” Already 
the effect has been to bring the republican 


party into a state of convalescence. What 
has become of the new party which Mr. 
Cleveland and Judge Gresham were to build 
up ? No candle ever went out any quicker 
than that party will go out if the divis¬ 
ion of spoil is continued. From present 
prospects it will be the duty of every inde¬ 
pendent to be more independent than ever 
and thousands in every state who have not 
been independent will find it their duty to 
become so. This will have to go on until 
both parties are destroyed, and anew one 
formed, or until one or the other learns 
that promises made before election will 
have to be kept after election. 


It has been decided that the administra¬ 
tion will not prepare a tariff-reform bill, 
lest congress should be jealous of encroach¬ 
ment upon its rights. Now let the Presi¬ 
dent be equally jealous of congressional 
encroachment into his field. An amazing 
encroachment is now being made. There 
has never been a greater insult offered to 
the rights, the power, and the dignity of 
executive government than is now cast 
upon President Cleveland by congress¬ 
men in attempting to force him and his 
officers to quarter their primary aud con¬ 
vention manipulators upon the public 
treasury. The true parallel to this is to be 
found in the pretorian guard of Borne and 
in the janissaries of Constantinople. 


The Springfield Republican aptly brushes 
aside the flimsy excuse attempted to be 
put forward in the statement that Maxwell 
in the same time has not removed post¬ 
masters so fast as Clarkson did. It says: 

“Custom does not make right. If Hea Isman Clark¬ 
son put a stop to the official life of thousands of re¬ 
publican postmasters, that is no reason why Heads¬ 
man Maxwell should do likewise. If the administra¬ 
tion of President Harrison cast off all restraint in 
this matter, such policy, does not justify President 
Cleveland in doing the same thing.’’ 

And again: 

“But the people of the United States are not going 
to be satisfied with any demonstration that this ad¬ 
ministration is less a sinner than its predecessor in 
dealingwith the fourth-class postmasters.’’ 

The Republican also discusses most profit¬ 
ably the senate of the United States with 
its small items of party plunder. After 
the “ battle was over and the victory 
won,” and it was settled that a number of 
clerks were to lose their means of support 
for no cause in the world, the democrats 
fell to moralizing. The Republican thus 
describes it: 

Nor did the democrats rejoice: far from it; they 
were as glum as the republicans. They acted as 
though they were ashamed of the job in hand, as 
well they might be. They professed to be driven to 
it by stern necessity, and to approach it as Jephtha 
approached the sacrifice of his daughter, with grief 
unspeakable. Said Senator Voorhees. " Sometimes 
after the battle is over and the victory won there 
are circumstances which are sorrowful in their na¬ 
ture. I, so far as I am concerned, encounter one of 
those circumstances now in parting from the able, 
courteous, kind and efficient officers of this body.’’ 
Senator Blackburn could not trust himself “ to speak 
of the sense of regret with which I contemplate his 
(Secretary McCook’s) retirement from this chamber.’’ 


Senator Palmer said that if the proposition had 
been to change the secretary of the senate violently, 
“ I am not now prepared to say what course I should 
have been compelled to pursue.’’ Even Mr. Gor¬ 
man, avowed spoilsman as he is, voiced the same 
note of regret that stern necessity compelled the re¬ 
moval of a set of officers who were competent, ef¬ 
ficient and faithful, and who, he declared, had con¬ 
ducted the affairs of the senate as well as they have 
ever been conducted during the forty years he has 
known the senate. 

An interview with District Attorney 
Burke,in the Indianapolis Journal of March 
28, runs as follows: 

“ The civil service reformers have a grievance with 
you,’’ was suggested. 

“Yes; they wanted a bill passed which gave the 
state board of charities power to select the employes 
of the state institutions. I was opposed to that be¬ 
cause I believed that Dr. Wright, here at Indianapo¬ 
lis, and the several boards of trustees, were more 
competent and better equipped for this work than 
the board of charities.’’ 

It is hardly worth while for Burke to try 
to deceive about a matter so plain as this. 
The bill gave the board of charities no power 
to select employes. It directed the board 
to apply certain tests to those who desired 
employment in the state benevolent institu¬ 
tions. Those tests were to be such as would 
reach the practical fitness of the applicants 
for the duties to be performed, without re¬ 
gard to politics or influence or any other 
matter having nothing to do with the per¬ 
formance of those duties. From among 
those who best stood such tests, the present 
appointing officers were to select the em¬ 
ployes. Burke was not in favor of such a 
plan ; it was too democratic. He and Voor¬ 
hees, and their likes, prefer the monarchi¬ 
cal system of appointing by favoritism. 


The appointment of Burke to be district 
attorney was undoubtedly due to the fact 
that recommendations are kept secret in 
Washington. There is no more absurd no" 
tion. If a recommendation must be kept se¬ 
cret, the President should discard it. If rec¬ 
ommendations were open to public inspec¬ 
tion, men would stop lying aboutapplicants 
for office. It is said that Burke had the ap¬ 
proval of a number of circuit judges. That 
showed nothing; almost every man signs 
every recommendation for office that is laid 
before him. Mr. Francis T. Hord, a mem¬ 
ber of the late Indiana general assembly, 
became “singular” because he refused to 
sign recommendations of persons with 
whom he was not acquainted. If indorse¬ 
ments were not kept secret in Washington, 
the weakly yielded and chiefly baseless 
eulogy of Burke by Judge Elliott would 
have been buried out of sight by a flood of 
protests and facts showing Burke’s unfit¬ 
ness. 


It was well known that Senator Voor¬ 
hees would seek an antidote for the “poi¬ 
son” which his efforts in behalf of Anti- 
Labor Burke instilled in the minds of work¬ 
ingmen. As a starter he declared the 
other day in the senate, that “the most dan- 















THE CIVIL SERVICECH RONICLE. 


15 


gerous question novv before the country is 
the encroachments of corporations with 
their power of colossal wealth against those 
who are helplessly in their power.” Every 
pet of Voorhees in Indiana, beginning with 
John E. Lamb, is and has been for years a 
tool of corporations, ready at all times to 
do any work corporations want done. The 
following from the Indianapolis News of 
March 22 sets out the true nature of the 
Voorhees crowd: 

“It is recalled that Immediately after the adjourn¬ 
ment of the Indiana general assembly, two years 
ago, there was great rejoicing over the defeat of the 
co-employes hill, and of other bills in which the 
railroads were interested, particularly the Pennsyl¬ 
vania and Vandalia railroads. The Vandalia rail¬ 
road company placed at the disposal of Mr. Burke, 
who had fought so hard for the railroad companies, 
John E. Lamb, who had been an industrious lobby¬ 
ist of the railroads, and other democrats, a private 
car in which they traveled to Hot Springs in elegant 
style. Champagne was the cheapest drink aboard. 
At Hot Springs there was a gathering in which were 
Senator Voorhees, Lamb, Burke, Crawford Fair¬ 
banks, the Terre Haute distilier Joshua Jump, and 
other democrats of that character. It was during 
the stay of that party at Hot Springs that, according 
to Senator Voorhees, the United States attorneyship 
was promised to Burke. 


The state of Missouri has passed a very 
complete corrupt practices act. The daily 
papers have given it such extended notices 
that it is not necessary to give a synopsis 
here. It was mainly brought about by the 
efforts of the Missouri Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association, of which Charles Claflin 
Allen is president. This association in¬ 
cludes in its work other subjects than its 
name would strictly indicate, and the pass¬ 
age of such a bill shows that it is in an ac¬ 
tive and healthy condition. 


No bills are sent to non-subscribers who 
receive the Chronicle. An increase of 
subscribers is, however earnestly desired, 
and we ask all who are friendly to the ob¬ 
jects of this paper to interest themselves 
in increasing its circulation. The second 
volume will cover President Cleveland’s 
administration, as the first did that of Presi¬ 
dent Harrison. Those who contemplate 
having the first volume bound should wait 
until the index, now being prepared, is 
ready. For number five of the Chronicle, 
fifty cents each will be paid. 


The annual meeting of the National 
Civil Service Reform League will be held 
in New York Tuesday and Wednesday, 
April 25th and 26th. The headquarters 
will be at the City Club, 677 Fifth Avenue. 
The annual address will be delivered by 
Carl Schurz at the Madison Square Garden 
Assembly Hall, Madison Avenue and 
Twenty-sixth streets, Tuesday evening, 
April 25th, at eight o’clock. The first meet¬ 
ing will be held Wednesday, at 10:30 A. m. 


at the City Club. At 1:30 a collation will be 
served. Another business meeting will be 
held the same afternoon. Wednesday 
evening at seven p. m. the New York Civil 
Service Reform Association will give a din¬ 
ner to the members of the League at the 
Hotel Savoy, Fifth Avenue and Fifty-ninth 
streets. Every member of any civil service 
reform association is a member of the 
League, and is entitled to vote in its meet¬ 
ings. 

POETIC JUSTICE. 

When President Harrison extended the 
civil service law to the free-delivery post- 
offices, the examinations necessary to the 
preparation of the eligible lists led the civil 
service commission to ask congress for a 
thousand dollars to pay traveling expenses 
of examiners. Congress, under the influ¬ 
ence of Holman and Dockery, refused. 
Holman advises Mr. Shanklin, of this state, 
to accept a Mississippi river commissioner- 
ship because it is a sinecure. The commis¬ 
sion is a sinecure. It does nothing but take 
pleasant trips at public expense. There is 
no more need of a Mississippi river com¬ 
mission than there is of a Lake Ontario 
commission, or a Lake Champlain com¬ 
mission, or a Pogue’s Run commission, 
yet Mr. Holman and congress vote twenty 
thousand dollars a year for this sinecure 
without any twinges of conscience. But a 
thousand dollars to hold a hundred exam¬ 
inations for perhaps ten thousand appli¬ 
cants can not be allowed. The consequence 
is that examinations have to be cut down 
in number. But we were mistaken last 
month in saying that they had been post¬ 
poned as to the free-delivery offices re¬ 
cently classified. The civil service com¬ 
mission determined that the offices newly 
added were entitled to attention first, and 
therefore examinations in all of those of¬ 
fices will be held at once. This will fur¬ 
nish the new'postmasters as they come in 
with eligible lists from which to fill va¬ 
cancies. An object lesson in civil service 
reform will now be given in many cities in 
Indiana and all through the country. The 
commission has, however, been compelled 
to postpone in many places examinations 
for the departments at Washington, the 
railway mail service, and for the formerly 
classified service generally. True, con¬ 
gressmen are besieged with applicants for 
positions in these parts of the service. They 
can only tell applicants to get on the elig¬ 
ible lists. But applicants can not get on 
the lists unless examinations are held. Ex¬ 
aminations can not be held because con¬ 
gress refused the thousand dollars. The 
siege will therefore have to go on. It is 
not the kind of a siege congressmen like, 
but they have only themselves to blame 
for it. 


A LATTER-DAY DOUGHFACE. 

The Boston Herald of April 4 says that 
the best opportunity for the rapid advance 
of civil service reform was lost under Har¬ 
rison. That the republican party had 
more in its ranks favoring the reform; 
it returned to power promising to promote 
it; and, having held office twenty-four 
years out of twenty-eight, it was peculiarly 
in a position to be magnanimous toward 
democrats then in office. That it hunted 
them out ruthlessly and retaliation was 
inevitable, and there is no occasion for sur¬ 
prise that it has come. That President 
Harrison has had to take the responsibility 
for this and justly. That the offices should 
be taken out of politics; but that it is not 
to be expected that the democrats will 
agree that civil service reform shall begin 
with themselves tabooed, and with the re¬ 
republicans in full possession, and that, too, 
after having been in possession so much 
more than their share of the time. That 
the American people like fair play, and 
will be at least charitable toward the 
democrats in this transaction. That the 
greediness of the republicans under Har¬ 
rison put a discouraging obstacle in the 
way of ever having civil service reform. 
That a see-saw has been established be¬ 
tween parties which is difficult of relief 
from executive quarters; and we must 
therefore rely more upon the legislative 
branch of the government. 

It is such doughfaced talk as this that has 
kept, and will keep Massachusetts a republi¬ 
can state. The American people do like 
fair play, and one of the kinds of fair play 
they like, is to see one President judged by 
the same standard that another is. The 
Herald had better read over the platform 
upon which Mr. Cleveland was elected last 
fall, and also what he has said upon the sub¬ 
ject of patronage. The platform covered, 
and was intended to cover by those who 
drew it, every phase of civil service reform. 
It covered the subject just as much as Har¬ 
rison’s platform covered it, and it carried 
with it as fair a promise as ever was made 
to stop the use of the offices as spoil. Now 
upspring reformers to whose mind re¬ 
sponsibility and treachery were never 
charged too sharply upon Harrison, and 
to whose notion the lash could never be 
laid too heavily upon republican patronage 
pirates, and tell us that democratic patron¬ 
age pirates, resistless and unresisted, will 
probably have President Cleveland by the 
throat until he delivers to them all the of¬ 
fices, but that we must not hold him re¬ 
sponsible, and our proper course is to ask 
these same pirates to cut themselves off 
from spoil. We decline to join in this cra¬ 
ven surrender. The officer in whom the 
constitution vests executive authority 
must be held responsible for executive acts. 








16 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


To say that President Cleveland can not 
help himself is to ofifer him the great¬ 
est insult. It is to say that he is not a giant, 
but only a pigmy and a figure-head. He 
can help himself. The way to stop the use 
of public oflfices as spoil is to stop it. The 
man or the paper that says that because we 
had a Headsman Clarkson, we must there¬ 
fore have a Headsman Maxwell, is the 
enemy of good government, and is a part¬ 
ner in the ward-rounder politics with 
which this country is infested. President 
Cleveland has but to refuse to change em¬ 
ployes unless congress will make provision 
for the appointment of new ones upon 
business principles. The plans are well 
digested. Thereis not a shadow of an excuse. 
Any other course will not be from neces¬ 
sity, but from choice, and the responsibili¬ 
ty will be fixed where it belongs. 


THE PRESIDENT’S OPPORTUNITY. 

We must not forget that President 
Cleveland’s opportunity is almost the great¬ 
est that ever in the history of government 
came to a man the second time. In his 
first term he was not successful in his man¬ 
agement of the civil service. His defeat 
followed. It was not caused by his attitude 
upon the tariff. As Harper's IFeeHy recently 
said, that attitude was the only thing that 
gave the campaign of 1888 any affirmative 
life. Now, again, by the drunken folly of 
the republicans, the opportunity has come 
to him. There is nothing for him in tariff 
legislation beyond what there was for 
Polk. There is nothing for him in cur¬ 
rency legislation beyond what there was 
for Grant and Hayes. But the patronage 
system eats away public morality; in its 
perfection, as in Tammany Hall, and as in 
Maryland under Gorman, it destroys free 
government. Mr. Cleveland can kill this 
system in the federal service, and, in kill¬ 
ing it, he can do the greatest work which 
has come to the hand of any American 
since Abraham Lincoln. But mere expe¬ 
dients, such as refusing to appoint ex-office¬ 
holders, if the places are filled after all as 
patronage; and such as refusing to remove 
fourth-class postmasters unless they have 
served four years, if the sixty-five thous¬ 
and are after all removed to make room 
for partisans, will not kill it. They will 
leave it as flourishing as ever. The 
remedy must go to the root. Measures 
must be taken to exclude favoritism of 
every kind from the exercise of the ap¬ 
pointing power. We do not represent that 
the contest will be mild or petty or easy. 
It will be one which Hercules might relish. 
The time is ripe. The means are at hand. 
The call to duty will not be stilled. The 
golden opportunity will soon pass by. If 
Mr. Cleveland lets it pass, he will refuse the 
greatness which is fairly thrust upon him. 


THE SUMMARY. 

The summary of the present state of the 
new administration as shown by public in¬ 
formation, and in the columns of the 
Chronicle, is in general, as follows: The 
President and every member of the cabi¬ 
net spend about all their time with oflBce- 
seekers. The daily applications for postmas¬ 
terships exceed two thousand. There have 
been over eighty thousand applications for 
consulships. A congressman takes as high 
as twenty office-seekers before the Presi¬ 
dent at a time. All of the rules against 
appointing editors, ex-office-holders and so 
on are readily overstepped. Fourth-class 
post-oflBces are being filled with partisans 
of the administration at the rate of more 
than thirty thousand a year. There was 
an appearance at Washington of paying at¬ 
tention to other recommendations than 
those of congressmen, but practically there 
was nothing of this beyond such excep¬ 
tions as have always occurred. It w.as re¬ 
garded as worthy of note that three In¬ 
diana post-offices, out of several hundred 
already filled, have lately been filled with 
persons not recommended by congressmen, 
and Congressman Conn, in asking to have 
seventy of his favorites put into post-offices 
at once solely on his recommendation, 
seems to have offered too strong a dose 
even for Maxwell. In general, so far as the 
division of offices has proceeded, it has been 
made among the favorites and henchmen 
of congressmen ; the latter are giving out 
the offices with an eye to controlling the 
primaries and conventions next year. They 
are constantly travelling over their dis¬ 
tricts, and to and from Washington, solely 
engaged in distributing offices. Positions 
of chiefs of division have not been put un¬ 
der the civil service rules, but they are be¬ 
ing filled slowly with democrats. Hughes 
East was given one of these places with 
some hundred and forty men under him. 
He was correctly described in the Indian¬ 
apolis Journal as a curbstone and bucket- 
shop lounger. 

It is expected that Chester E. Faulkner, 
an Indiana illiterate, a chronic place¬ 
holder, and a favorite of Voorhees, is to have 
another. A small proportion of notably 
good appointments has been made, but the 
seemingly admirable selections for mem- 
bes of the cabinet have not been followed 
up by corresponding reform plans. The 
cabinet officers, in their acts, are not up to 
expectation from a reform point. The only 
distinctive action for reform so far taken by 
the administration is found in the declar¬ 
ation of Secretary Herbert, of his deter¬ 
mination to maintain and extend the labor 
service system in the navy, and in the 
declaration of the President that he will 
divorce Indian affairs from politics. There 
is so far no sign of the reform influence 


Secretary Gresham was to exercise. No 
movement has been made to place the con¬ 
sular service upon a permanent business 
basis, but, on the other hand, the places are 
being given out as “ plums.” The appoint¬ 
ments of Burke and Risely were bad. The 
new Indian commissioner has no knowl¬ 
edge of Indian affairs, and he is said to be 
not much of a civil service reformer. If 
he is let to go as Maxwell is we may expect 
another wreck of Indian affairs to aid in 
bringing disaster to the administration. 
The appointment and retention of Maxwell 
with free scope to act is in direct violation 
of platform promises. The general con¬ 
clusion must be that the administration 
has no fundamental plans of reform. The 
general aspect is that of a wild scramble 
for place, where the scramblers in squads, 
headed by congressmen, crowd in upon 
the President and other appointing officers 
and stop public business. Congressmen 
have entirely abandoned legislative duties 
or preparation, and have become simply 
squad leaders,marching their squads about 
the streets and through the public build¬ 
ings of Washington in the onslaught upon 
the executive. The scene beggars descrip¬ 
tion, and what we give elsewhere in the 
Chronicle is an almost infinitesimal part 
of what is actually occurring. The worst 
of it is that there is no demand among the 
people for a continuance of this system, 
and the great proportion of those who are 
demanding places have been paid in actual 
cash for all services they ever rendered to 
the party. 


APPOINTMENT OF NEWSPAPER 
MEN. 

Hoke Smith, of the Atlanta Journal, Secretary of 
the Interior. 

Claude Meeker, of the Cincinnati Enquirer, consul 
to Bradford. 

Louis C. Hughes, editor of the Tuscan Star, gover¬ 
nor of Arizona. 

A. C. Hacker, editor of Martin County News, post¬ 
master at Shoals. 

M. P. Pendleton, editor of the Belfast (Me.) Age, 
consul at Pictou. 

A. Allison, of the Nashville Democrat, postmaster 
at Nashville, Indiana. 

Charles W. Clare, editor of ——, postmaster at 
Watertown, New York. 

Robert B. Brown, editor of the Messenger, post¬ 
master at Meadville, Pa. 

Samuel E. Morss, editor of the Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, consul general at Paris. 

Philip Zoercher, editor of the Tell City News, post¬ 
master at Tell City, Indiana. 

Ernest P. Baldwin, editor of the Laurel (Md.) Dem¬ 
ocrat, first auditor of the treasury. 

Dr. Joseph A. Senner, of the New York Staats Zeit- 
ung, commissioner of immigration. 

Benjamin Lauthier, of Massachusetts, editor of two 
French papers, consiil to Sherbrooke. 

Dale J. Crittenberger, editor of the Anderson Dem¬ 
ocrat, postmaster at Anderson, Indiana. 

Ambrose W. Lyman, of the Helena (Montana) In¬ 
dependent, collector of internal revenue. 

Lewis Baker, proprietor of the St. Paul Olohe, min¬ 
ister to Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Salvador. 

Herman Van Lenden, editor of the Paducah (Ky.) 
Standard, private secretary to Secretary Carlisle. 

Royal E. Purcell, editor and proprietor of the 
Vincennes Sun, postmaster at Vincennes, Indiana. 

George P. Parker, editor of the Globe [and author of 
a Campaign T,ife of President Cleveland], counsel at 
Birmingham. 








THE CIVIL- SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


17 


'THEl ONSIaAUOHT:^. 

“Public office is a public trust. We reaffirm the declaration of the democratic national convention of 1876 for the reform 
of the civil service, [Reform is necessary in the civil service. Experience proves that efficient, economical conduct of the 
government business is not possible if its civil service be subject to change at every election, be a prize fought for at the ballot 
box, be a brief reward of party zeal, instead of posts of honor, assigned for proved competency and held for fidelity in the public 
employ; that the dispensing of patronage should neither be a tax upon the time of all our public men, nor the instrument of 
their ambition] and we call forthe honest enforcement of all laws regulating the same. The nomination of a President, as in the 
recent republican convention by delegations composed largely of hi8 appointees, holding office at his pleasure, is a scandalous 
satire upon free popular institutions, and a startling illustration of the methods by which a President may gratify his ambition. 
We denounce a policy under which federal office*holders usurp control of party conventions in the states, and we pledge the dem¬ 
ocratic party to the reform of these and all other abuses which threaten individual liberty and local self-government.”— 
Democratic Platform, 1892. 

JACKSONIAN DRMOGRAGY. 

That the indiscriminate rem')val of public officers for a mere difference of political opinion is a gross abuse of power; and 
that the doctrines lately boldly preached in the United States senate, that “to the victors belong the spoils of the vanquished,” is 
detrimental to the interests, corrupting to the morals and dangerous to the liberties of the country.— Democratic platform 1832, 


THE SCENE AT WASHINGTON. 

March 18.—For two hours to-day it seemed to the 
White House attendants as if all the office-seekers in 
the country were in the mansion. For two hours, 
which is the prescribed time for the reception of 
congressmen who call to present the claims of their 
constituents for office, the public rooms of the White 
House were thronged. A list of the senators and 
representatives who were there would comprise the 
major part of the names on the rolls of both houses 
of congress. Mr. Cleveland was in a good humor, 

"I intended to call and pay my respects to the 
President, but deferred it until some other lime, on 
learning of the great pressure of visitors, and the 
many cares of office which were pressing upon him. 
The pressure for office is fearful, but not greater than 
usual at this period of a new administration. Indi- 
anians were numerous, some of them probably a lit¬ 
tle over noisy, and too zealous in demanding recog¬ 
nition. There was more zeal than good judgment 
shown in many instances.”—IFm. H. English, in In¬ 
dianapolis News, March 20. 

“ Why, the hotels are full, the corridors are packed 
with office-seekers from everywhere, and they are 
making life a burden to the members of congress and 
senators from various states.”—Governor Matthews, in 
In4ian:ipolis Sentinel, March 20. 

March 20.—There were a great many callers at the 
White House to-day, but none but those who had 
appointments with the President were permitted to 
see him.— York Times. 

March 22.—Secretary Herbert spends most of his 
time with office-seekers, and has had little opportu¬ 
nity to attend to departmental matters. To-day on his 
desk there were 500 letters. This pile of correspond¬ 
ence mainly related to places which will be filled by 
the President and were not confined to any depart¬ 
ment. Yesterday Mr. Herbert answered 105 letters. 
The people who have charge of the record book in 
the appointment division of the treasury department 
are beginning to wonder if there are any democrats 
in the country who have not applied for positions un¬ 
der the secretary of the treasury. To-day the flow of 
applications was as heavy as on any previous day 
since March 4.—New York Times. 

March 23.—The rush for office continues, and the 
number of callers on the President to-day showed no 
falling off as compared with previous days. Senators 
and representatives formed the bulk of the visitors, 
but their missions were mostiy in connection with 
local o&ces.—Indianapolis Sentinel. 

March 23.—From all the visitors to the White 
House there comes one account of the reception of 
callers by the President, and that is an assurance that 
he is taking his arduous duties very calmly, and that 
he is not permitting the monotonous round of appeals 
to him to try his temper. Men who have had occasion 
to call upon the heads of several of the departments 
and afterward to go back to the White House, have 
declared that no member of the administration is so 
easily approached or more amiable when reached 


than the President. He does not appear to be wor" 
ried; he listens to everybody as if he was willing to 
hear the applicant out, and he manifests an Interest 
in every case that indicates that his attention has 
been fixed upon the story of his visitor.—iVeio York 
Times. 

March 23.—This was another busy day for Secre¬ 
tary Lament at the war department and Secretary 
Herbert at the navy department. Each official had 
many callers, many of whom staid until after four 
o’clock before they secured an audience. Neither 
Secretary Lament nor Secretary Herbert has had 
very much time to attend to departmental matters, 
and beyond the perfunctory signing of the daily 
mail—quite a task itself—the business of the govern¬ 
ment must wait until the office-seekers have been 
disposed of.— New York Times. 

March 25.—Beyond the inward rush of scores of 
place hunters, with their escorts of senators and rep¬ 
resentatives, there was little of interest at the White 
House to-day. The President’s office was crowded 
constantly.—Indianapolis News. 

March 26.—Secretary Lament is tired. Since he 
came to Washington he has worked without inter¬ 
ruption when he was so free from visitors as to be 
able to work. But the contact with callers, some of 
whom are brief and business-like and some prosy 
and tenacious, has been almost constant. They 
come early and late. Before he leaves his rooms at 
the Arlington they are at his door. As soon as he 
reaches his rooms in the war department they arrive 
in crowds, and they stay there until he is obliged to 
go to the cabinet meeting or to luncheon, the lunch¬ 
eon hour being interrupted by the bold approach of 
the importunate. This is the experience, as a mat¬ 
ter of fact, of each of the members of the -cabinet. 
Their strength is sapped by this wearying receiving 
of callers, who come for the most part to urge the ap¬ 
pointment of some one who is not satisfied to have 
filed his application for office.—JVew; York Times. 

March 26.—The congressmen say that the President 
reserves Monday to himself, and that, in consequence, 
they are left but three days in each week in which to 
transact their business at the departments. It is un¬ 
derstood that an effort will be made to bring about a 
modification of the order, but it is unlikely that Mr. 
Cleveland will make any change which will give the 
office-seekers any more leaway. 

For the past three weeks it has been practically 
impossible for any of the heads of departments to 
perform their legitimate duties, because of the free 
access to their apartments given members of con¬ 
gress and their friends. At all the departmen^S'th#- 
the work is in arrears because of‘the unpre^ddnted 
rush of place hunters. At present the daily applica¬ 
tions for postmasterships at the post-office depart¬ 
ment exceed 2,000, with a good prospect that these 
big figures will soon be increased.—Wcw York Times. 

March 26.—Most of the leading railroad lines run¬ 
ning south from here have arranged excursion rates 
for office-seekers, and the daily returns show that 


travel has never been so heavy as it has been since 
Mr. Cleveland was inaugurated. Mr. Evan Howell, 
of the Atlanta Constitution, made the declaration 
some time ago that Georgia was entitled to 2,400 gov¬ 
ernment offices, and it is reported that arrangements 
are now being made to run a special train from At¬ 
lanta to Washington for the exclusive use of office- 
seekers.— Washington Special. 

March 29.—The departments were thronged with 
visitors to-day, mostly political, who made up for the 
time they were compelled to lose yesterday. The sec¬ 
retaries had scarcely a minute to themselves, and 
were practically unable to attend to the regular de¬ 
partmental business. The question has arisen as to 
the expediency of amending the President’s order 
prohibiting the reception of visitors at the depart¬ 
ments on cabinet days, so as to include one or two 
more days of the week. If to-day’s experience is re¬ 
peated throughout the week the heads of depart¬ 
ments will have to transact all their official business 
on Tuesdays and Fridays, and surrender the remain¬ 
ing four secular days of the week to the office- 
seeker and his iilcnds.—Indianapolis Journal, 

March 30.—This was the most fatiguing day the 
President has had since his inauguration, and he 
was completely tired out after three hours and a half 
talk with senators, representatives and office-seekers. 

“ Did any of them get away ? ” asked the President 
when Senator Palmer entered his office at the head 
of the delegation of about twenty. 

”I think not, sir; there appears to be a quorum 
present,” answered Senator Palmer, gravely, as he 
ran his eye over the %ronp.—Indianapolis Sentinel. 

March 31.—There were no signs of letting up in the 
rush of office-seekers at the White House to day. 
They came early and stayed late and some of them 
would have stayed later if opportunity had been pre¬ 
sented.—/ndianapolig Sentinel. 

April 1.—Secretary Hoke Smith has announced 
that on next Monday afternoon, at four o’clock, he 
will see persons interested in the appointment of a 
governor of New Mexico, with the view of obtaining 
information for the President’s use in making the 
selection. On next Wednesday, at the same hour, he 
will see all persons who may wish to be heard on the 
subject of the appointment of the governor of Utah, 
and on Thursday next, citizens of Oklahoma and 
others will be given a hearing on the subject of the 
appointment of a governor of that territory. The 
secretary has also announced that during the com¬ 
ing week he will not be able to take up any applica¬ 
tions for appointments as surveyors general and 
registrras and receivers of land oSlccs.—Indianapolis 
Journal. 

April 1.—Mr. Cleveland devoted three hours to the 
politicians to-day. They were at the White House 
in unusually large numbers, and there was a crush 
outside the door of his private room, which con¬ 
tinued up to the hour when the sign was hung out 
that the reception was over.—New York Times. 

April 3.—People who stopped in front of the door 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


of the secretary of the treasury this afternoon found 
attached to it a card with this inscription on it: 

“ No visitors or cards received after 1 p. m.” 

Inquiry developed the fact that Mr. Carlisle had 
benefited but little by the recent order barring cabi¬ 
net officers from the general public on cabinet days 
by reason of the fact that on the remaining days of 
the week the office-seekers managed to make up for 
the time lost through its issuance.—New York Times. 

April 4.—This was a “show” day at the White 
House, the calling of the visitors being checked at 
11 o’clock by the arrival of the members of the cabi¬ 
net to attend the regular meeting. Before that hour, 
however, there were many southern callers, who 
came in quest of appointments, asking for large and 
small offices. They are not easily discouraged, and 
the congressional visitors begin to be a little more 
Importunate as adjournment of the senate seems im¬ 
minent.— New York Times. 

April 6.—There appears to be a new crop of office 
seekers in town. These are the men who want the 
post-offices, the clerkships in the departments here, 
and the smaller places. They wear broad-brimmed 
sombreros, yellow and stiff, and some have bulging t 
hip-pockets, and a few wear their “pants” in their 
boots. There are so many of these brawny sons of elec, 
tion victories here that two or three extra sheets of the 
nominations sent to the senate each day are posted 
in the senate corridors for their benefit. It has been 
the custom for years when the President sends a list 
of nominations to the senate about 12:30 or 1 o’clock 
to make a dozen or more manifold copies for the in- 
fdrmation of press representatives and others. Three 
or four copies are immediately sent up to the press 
galleries of the senate, and a copy posted in the 
large room occupied by the clerks to the secretary 
of the senate. When the clerk from the White House 
appeared with his nominations, before the present 
arrangement, the fellows with the broad hats and 
bulging hip-pockets made a dash for him, and he 
could scarcely dodge into the senate chamber. 
When the copy for public posting was sent out, these 
follows almost fell over one another. It was a mob. 
They wanted to see if their names were on the list. 
It is the same the next day. About the hotel corri¬ 
dors, day and night, the typewriters are driven to 
their utmost capacity. The applicants want their 
papers all copied In the nice, bold hand of the type¬ 
writing machine so the appointing power can readily 
read.— Indianapolis Journal. 

April 8.—Candidates for consulships have been the 
last to go. During the last week they became a little 
mutinous and wanted to chew up each other. If 
one candidate for a consulship happened to get a 
hearing with a senator or a congressman, the others 
demanded like recognition at once. Each seemed to 
feel that some other applicant was trying to advance 
his own personal interests at the expense of all the 
rest. The senators have complained that all the can¬ 
didates have injured their chances by Insisting on 
going to the White House in a body whenever the 
senators arranged for a meeting with the President. 
One day this week there were seven applicants for 
consulships in the President’s room at one time from 
the state of Indiana, and the impression which they 
made on the President by going thus in a body was 
not at all favorable.—Jhdia«apoJis News. 

April 11.—A private letter fromWashington, written 
by a gentleman who is deeply interested in the pub¬ 
lic questions which are calling most imperatively for 
attention from the Cleveland administration, con¬ 
tains the following: 

‘'Ido not believe that either the President or Secretary 
Carlisle has been able to give a moment's thought, since 
taking office, to either the tariff or the silver question, be¬ 
cause of the offices and the office-seekers. Mr. Carlisle 
looks as if he were about to break down under the strain." 

It is said by other observers that President Cleve¬ 
land is also very weary of the struggle for office, 
which absorbs all his time, that his visit to ex-Secre- 
tary Bayard at Wilmington was taken for the purpose 
of giving him a brief respite from it, and that he is 
especially disgusted with the conduct of many pub¬ 
lic men in signing the “Indorsements” of candidates 
for office, and then \yriting privately to him asking 


that he give no weight to their signatures. Every 
member of the cabinet is In a continual state of 
seige, and if Mr. Carlisle proves to be the first to 
break down under the strain, it will be only because 
he has less power of physical endurance than the 
others. Secretary Lamont, who is supposed to repre¬ 
sent the President in his frequent trips to New York, 
finds himself accompanied by a small army of office-seek¬ 
ers, who take passage on the trains with him and "pre¬ 
sent their cases ’ ’ to him en route. There were no less than 
thirty who adopted this method on the lastest rally.—New 
York Evening Post. 

THE GUILLOTINE. 

Robert A. Maxwell began his duties to-day as fourth 
assistant postmaster-general. His predecessor, Mr_ 
E. G. Rathbone, introduced him to the employes and 
then relinquished to him his chair and desk. 

The new officer was prepared to begin work, but 
office-seekers made their appearance, and for the re¬ 
mainder of the day Mr. Maxwell listened to the 
“ claims ’ ’ of democrats from ail parts of the country. 
It will be a week or more before Mr. Maxwell will be 
able to get down to business. There are thousands 
of resignations demanding his attention, and thou¬ 
sands of applications which must be considered. As 
soon as the office-seekers permit him to attend to the 
business of his office, it is likely thatchangesin the post- 
offices of the country wiU be rapid enough to suit the most 
exacting democrats.—New York Times, March 23. 

Congressman Cooper is on deck again ready to 
tackle a republican postmaster.—iras/if»jp<on Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Sentinel, March 23. 

!.•< 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster Maxwell’s first day in 
office resulted in the appointment oiforty-four fourth- 
class postmasters, and of this number five were to fill 
vacancies caused by the removal of the incumbents. 
Yesterday’s appointments aggregated thirty-one, 
which included four removals.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch, March 26. 

ijt iff 

The guillotine is doing rapid work among the 
fourth-class postmasters, making up for the time lost 
by Mr. Maxwell in getting started. The record of 
yesterday with sixty-seven removals in a total of one 
hundred changes, is not matched in ab olute numbers 
to-day, but the percentage is greater, being thirty- 
seven removals in a total of forty eight changes. 

From this day forth we may expect to see greater 
speed than ever, for the entire clerical force of the 
department [about 400] is to be turned loose upon the 
work of preparing the documents. The regular em 
nloyesof the appointment division have been found 
unequal to cope with the mass of matter accumu¬ 
lated in relation to the 58,000 post-offices within their 
jurisdiction. The letters containing charges and 
recommendations have therefore been sorted as well 
aspossibleand distributed through the several rooms 
in the department building, where they lie in heaps 
in corned against the wall, or under tables and in 
other out of the way places. This afternoon at four 
o’clock every clerk will drop his regular routine work 
and attack his pile, continuing at it for an hour. 
Every day the whole force will stay till five o’clock 
in the afternoon for this purpose till the work is 
finished. 

Every letter has to be read, every newspaper clip¬ 
ping skimmed, the names attached to every petition 
counted and briefs made of all matters relating to 
the present postmaster or the person urged as his 
successor. Each bundle is then to be packed and 
endorsed, and placed in a cupboard devoted to its 
particular state. Mr. Maxwell will thus be able to 
make his changes by hundreds where he now makes 
it by dozens. 

There is no business in the department more re¬ 
pugnant to the clerks who have to do It. They have 
a fellow-feeling for the men and women In whose 
decapitation they are assisting. They realize, as out¬ 
siders can not, how flimsy the pretexis are on which re¬ 
movals are made, and how little real scrutiny any of them 
get.—Washington Dispatch to New York Evening Post, 
March 28. 

The largest number of changes was made in the 
state of Wisconsin, where there were twenty-two ap¬ 


pointments, fourteen of the incumbents being removed. 
In Arkansas there were eight appointments and four 
removals, and in Tennessee seventeen appointments 
and ten removals.— Washington Dispatch, March 28. 

3tt % 

Congressman Brookshire, who has been down with 
the grip, is now able to prepare victims for the Max¬ 
well ax.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, March 29. 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Maxwell to¬ 
day appointed forty-nine fourth-class postmasters. 
All but thirteen of these involve removals.—Was/i- 
ington Dispatch, March 29. 

* Hf 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Maxwell has 
indicated the line of policy which will govern him in 
the selection of about 50,000 fourth-class postmasters 
this year. “In the first place,” said he, “I don’t 
propose to permit unsuccessful politicians to dictate 
appointments. Ex-congressmen and men who ran 
for congress and were defeated will not control ap¬ 
pointments under me. In states where there is not 
a democratic senator, and the districts are represent¬ 
ed by republicans in congress, the state, district, or 
county democratic committees, will be asked to 
make recommendations for postmasters. We want 
to deal with live democrats, men of influence, not 
worn-out politicians. 

“ Men and women who held post-offices four years 
ago will not be appointed if new blood can be found. 
The ‘no-ex,’ as a rule, will apply in the selection of 
fourth-class postmasters. Of course, if we can not 
get democrats who have not held the offices to ac¬ 
cept them, we will reinstate the old postmasters, 
rather than permit the republicans to hold the offices. 
We are now ready for business, and changes will be 
made as rapidly as possible. It is the intention to re 
organize the service and put in as many new postmasters 
as possible. There is no tenure to these offices, and chartges 
can be made at any time."—Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis News, March 29. 

if if * 

Of forty-nine changes among fourth-class postmas¬ 
ters announced this morning, thirty-flve are re¬ 
movals. No New York or New Jersey appointments 
were among them. Bradley B. Smalley, of Vermont, has 
been paying close attention to business since he arrived 
here from Vermont, and in one instance he spent thirty- 
flve minutes at the post-office department, and secured 
twenty-one charges from republican to democratic post¬ 
masters. He considers this a strictly democratic ad¬ 
ministration.—Wasftinjrton Dispofc/i to New York Ev¬ 
ening Post, March 29. 

if if if 

The following fourth-class post offices in Indiana 
were fllled with democrats to day by Executioner 
Maxwell. 

First district, on recommendation of Congressman 
Taylor: [Here follows list of 13.] 

Second district, recommended by Congressman 
Bretz: [Here follows list of 26.] 

Seventh district, recommended by Congressman 
Bynum : [Here follows list of 2.] 

Eleventh district, recommended by Congressman 
Martin; [Here follows list of 2.] 

It will be seen that Messrs. Taylor and Bretz did a 
good day’s work in placing the post-offices of their 
districts in the hands of democrats. Hacker, of 
Shoals, is editor of the Martin County News .— Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, March 30. 

* * * 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Maxwell to. 
day appointed one hundred and eighty-eight fourth- 
class postmasters, and of this number eighty-five were 
to fill vacancies caused by removals. The largest 
number appointed from any one state was forty-five in 
Indiana, which involved eleven removals; in Ken¬ 
tucky there were twenty-four appointments and six 
removals; in Vermont there were twenty appoint¬ 
ments and ten removals; in West Virginia fifteen ap¬ 
pointments and eleven removals, and in Wisconsin 
ten appointments and five removals.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 30. 

Representative Cooper got one post-office to-day. 
Mr. Bretz obtained one, also. Maxwell promises to 
swing his ax to-morrow.—IFasWngfon Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, March 30. 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


19 


The rapidity with which the post-offices of Craw¬ 
ford county are changing hands is pleasing the ultra 
democrats very much. Seventeen new postmasters 
have already been chosen, and the others are daily 
expected,—Boston [/ndiana] Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, March 30. 

<• * «i 

Quite a number of New York politicians congre. 
gated in the Arlington lobby to-night. Ashbel P- 
Fitch and Judge Truax came over this evening. 

J. W. Hinckley, editor of the Poughkeepsie News- 
Press, spent an hour or more in conversation with 
Senator Murphy. 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster General Maxwell 
dropped in about 10 o’clock, and Mr. Hinckley and 
he had a Sew minutes of private conversation. Mr. 
Maxwell was quite fatigued as the result of examining 
and signing the commissions of one hundred and eighty- 
eight postmasters during the day. Eighty five of the 
places thus filled were made available by removals. 
Forty-five Indiana Democrats were rewarded with 
postmasterships. The increased force of clerks now 
at work under Mr. Maxwell enables him to swing the 
ax much more vigorously than he did last week. In 
a few days he expects to strike a much livelier gait. 
— Washhigton Dispatch to New York Times, March 30. 

* * 

Washington, D. C., March 31.—Fourth Assistant 
Postmaster-General Maxwell again remembered the 
Indiana democrats, especially those of southern 
Indiana, well to-day. He removed thirty-six repxtb- 
lieans and put in their places as many stalwart democrats! 
who had been designated by the congressmen in the dis¬ 
tricts in which they are located. Congressman Taylor 
of the first district, who fared so well yesterday, got 
the following democrats into post-offices to-day: 
[Here follows list of 2.] 

In the second, Mr. Bretz, who also got more than 
his share yesterday, succeeded in landing the follow¬ 
ing additional to-day: [Here follows list of 5.] 

Third district, recommended by Congressman 
Brown: [One.] 

Fifth district, recommended by Congressman 
Cooper: [Here follows list of 3.] 

Seventh district, recommended by Congressman 
Bynum: [Here follows list of 6.] 

Eighth district, recommended by Congressman 
Brookshire: [Here follows list of 16.] 

Eleventh district, recommended by Congressman 
Martin: [Here follows list of 2.] 

Twelfth district, recommended by Congressman 
McNagny : [One .]—Indianapolis Sentinel. 

lit )Cc 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Maxwell to¬ 
day appointed 136 fourth class postmasters, which in¬ 
volved fifty-nine removals. The largest number of 
appointments was made in Indiana, where there 
were thirty six, involving eighteen removals. In Mis¬ 
souri there were sixteen appointments and seven 
removals; in Tennessee twenty appointments and 
seven removals; jn Vermont eleven appointments 
and ten removals; in Kentucky nine appointments 
and two removals, and in West Virginia eight ap¬ 
pointments, all the incumbents having resigned.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 31. 

i» * * 

Indiana got fifteen new fourth-class postmasters 
to-day.— Washington Dispatch, April 1. 

Beside the two presidential offices, Indiana got 
eleven fourth-class post-office appointments to-day, 
as follows: 

Eleventh district—Congressman Martin: [Here fol¬ 
lows list of 6.] 

Congressman Taylor secured two more republican 
scalps in the fourth class. 

Congressman Cooper got W. N. Smith at Dolon, Mon¬ 
roe county; and Mr. Bretz obtained J. W. Right’s 
appointment for Wright, Green county. 

Cannellton and Tell City, Perry county, became 
presidential offices last January, and President Har¬ 
rison sent to the senate two republican postmasters 
who had been in nearly four years as fourth-class 
officials. Had they been confirmed they would have 
held four years more, and to avoid this Congressman 
Taylor, who was only an elect then, came here and spent 
the last three weeks of Harrison’s administration to pre¬ 


vent their confirmation. He succeeded, and these two 
thriving cities of Perry will have their post-offices 
conducted by democrats, at Tell City by Phil. Zoer- 
cher, who has already been confirmed, and at Can¬ 
nellton by the man who was nominated to-day. 
Dickerson of Spencer, is the second presidential 
post-o^CQ secured by Mr. Cooper. Harris of Franklin, 
was nominated last week. So far every appointment 
made has been upon the recommendation of congressmen. 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 3. 

'Cl >:« 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Maxwell to¬ 
day appointed one hundred and nineteen fourth-class 
postmasters. Illinois heads the list with 19, Ken¬ 
tucky with 16, Missouri 14, Maine 13, Tennessee 13, 
and Virginia and Indiana? Washington Dis¬ 

patch. Aprils. 

«• « « 

Indiana postmasters appointed to-day: [Here fol¬ 
lows list of 5.]— Washington Dispatch, April 4. 

* « >» 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Maxwell ap¬ 
pointed one hundred and forty-three postmasters to-day. 
Mr. Maxwell said this evening to the correspondent 
of the New York Times that for the next few days he 
would devote his time to filling the vacancies caused 
by resignations. There were several thousand of 
these, he said, and the list was constantly increasing .— 
Washington Dispatch to New York Times, April 4. 

«i « 

The following fourth-classappointments were made 
to-day for Indiana post offices: [Here follows list of 
10.]— Washington Dispatch. April 5. 

For the first time in*the history of the post-office 
department the fourth assistant postmaster-general 
declined to-day to give for publication the names of 
the fourth class postmasters appointed yesterday. 
The only excuse given is that it was too much trou¬ 
ble to prepare the list. It is alleged that the real rea¬ 
son for discontinuing the publication of the names 
was to relieve the administration from the references 
which the press has been making to the work of 
“Headsman ’’ Maxwell, and the disparaging remarks 
about wholesale removals.—Assoctale Press Dispatch, 
April 5. 

M << 

Mr. Maxwell to-day appointed 134fourth-class post¬ 
masters. Of this number 13 were in Indiana, 11 in 
Georgia, 22 in Pennsylvania and 14 in Kentucky. 

Secretary Smith to-day directed the removal of 25 
pension examiners now in the field. In making the 
selections for dismissal, it is said that the politics of 
the examiner has not been considered, but that the 
only question taken into account was that of pro¬ 
ficiency.— Washington Dispatch, April 6. 

Secretary Hoke Smith announced that to-morrow 
he would be glad to see at the departmental! persons 
who are Interested in the selection of suitable per¬ 
sons to fill vacancies now existing, or which will ex¬ 
ist within the next thirty days in the offices of regis¬ 
ters and receivers of land offices, and also in the of¬ 
fices of surveyors general. He also requests those who 
intend to present charges upon which removals are asked, 
either for registers, receivers or surveyors general, to at 
once file their charges in full with the commsssioners of 
the general land office .— Washington Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, AprU 5. 

Fourth assistant postmaster Maxwell, yesterday 
appointed one hundred and twenty four fourth-class 

postmasters.— Washington Dispatch, April 5. 

* <■ <• 

At the bottom of the list of appointments made to¬ 
day appeared a note explanatory of the changes, and 
intended to excuse the large number of removals 
of republicans. After stating the number of ap¬ 
pointments for to-day. the number of removals, reg- 
ignations and vacancies created by death which were 
filled, the explanatory official note observed that 
" twenty-six of the postmasters removed served four 
years and over, and thirty-three served over three 
years. The fourth-class postmasters appointed to¬ 
day for Indiana were as follows: [Here follows a list 
of 17.]— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
April 6. 

The following fourth-class appointments were made 
yesterday for Indiana postoffices: [Here follows list 
of 11.] 


The total number of appointments to fourth-class 
post-offices to-day was 131, of which seventy-two were 
to fill vacancies caused by resignations and deaths, 
and fifty-nine to fill vacancies caused by removals. 
Twenty-six of the postmasters removed served four 
years and over, and thirty-three served over three 
y^ars.—Washington Dispatch, April 1. 

# <■ « 

Forty-eight field pension examiners were removed 
to-day, including a number of Hoosiers, but their 
names could not be learned this morning. 

Congressman Martin made a clean sweep of the pension 
medical boards in his district yesterday. All the repub¬ 
lican examiners were replaced with democrats.— 

— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, April 6. 

Congressman Cooper got another scalp to-day. 
Ford, the assistant chief of division in the pension 
office, who figured in the Raum scandal investiga¬ 
tion, was removed to-day. 

Congressman Bretz had the board in Dubois county 
changed to-day.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, April 6. 

« 

The Kansas office-seekers are in a bad plight. The 
office-seekers were completely knocked out when 
President Cleveland decided that until they settled 
their internal disputes and agree upon who shall re¬ 
ceive the Federal patronage, no further offices of any 
kind whatever shall be filled in Kansas or by Kansas. 

"A plague on both your houses,’’ said Mr. Maxwell 
to-day to Mr. Mitchell, the Kansas stalwart. “ I will 
have nothing to do with them.’’ 

Mr. Maxwell said that he was carefully investigat¬ 
ing the various factions, and until he reached a con¬ 
clusion would appoint no postmasters of that class 
in that State.— Washington Dispatch to Buffalo Express' 
Apr il 6. 

Postmaster-General Bissell has been taught by his 
experience of the past few days that he can not af¬ 
ford to attempt to muzzle the press, and has, there¬ 
fore, transferred his efforts toward the suppression 
of news to the congressmen, whom he evidently ex¬ 
pects to find more subservient. Every congressman 
who called at the post-office department to day was noti¬ 
fied by the postmaster-general that hereafter he must not 
disclose to newspaper correspondents the names of the 
persons recommended for appointment. In every case 
the congressman promptly obeyed the order. 

Headsman Maxwell’s “explanatory note’’ ac¬ 
companying the list of postmasters appointed to day 
wasas follows: “Total number of fourth-class post¬ 
masters appointed to day, 117, of which eighty-three 
were to fill vacancies caused by resignations and 
deaths and thirty-four removals. Of the postmasters 
removed twelve served four years and over.’’ The 
changes for Indiana were as follows, all being appoint¬ 
ments to fill vacancies created by resignations: [Here 
follows list of 21.]—IFas/iiwpfoa Dispatch to India¬ 
napolis Journal, April 7. 

« >» «< 

Although the heads of 120 /oarfA-cfoss postmasters 
rolled into the sawdust under headsman Maxwell. 

— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Aprils. 

<« Jj* 

The President has called a halt on indisciimiuate 
removals of fourth-class postmasters. Consequently 
Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Maxwell has 
announced that, by order of the President, no more 
removals will be made, except for cause or where 
the incumbent has served four years. The effect of 
this order will be to establish a four-year term of 
office in fouth-class offices just the same as that 
which is established by law for the presidential post¬ 
masters and other important officers. The enforce¬ 
ment of this rule does not make much of a reduction 
in the numbers of fourth-class postmasters appoint¬ 
ed daily, however, for there are a large number of 
vacancies by resignation to be filled yet.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to Indianapolis News, April 8. 

Indiana received four fourth-class postmasters to¬ 
day as follows[Here follows list of 4.]— Washington 
Dispatch, April 8. 

Indiana received the following new fourth-class 
postmastes to-day: [Here follows list of 7.] 

The total number of fourth-class postmasters ap- 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


SO 


pointed to-day was 119. Of these, ninety-nine were 
to fill vacancies caused by death and resignations, 
and twenty by removals. Of the postmasters re¬ 
moved, seventeen had served four years and over. 

Mr. Edwin C. Fowler, the chief clerk to the first 
assistant postmaster general, has been detailed to as¬ 
sist Mr. Maxwell. During the first administration of 
President Cleveland, Mr. Fowler was acting first assis 
tant much of the time, and as chief to Mr. Stevenson, be¬ 
came thoroughly familiar with the duties of the office .— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Mews, April 10. 

>» » « 

The total number of fourth-class postmasters ap¬ 
pointed to-day was 119. Of these 99 were to fill vacan¬ 
cies caused by deaths and resignations, and 20 by 
removals. Of the postmasters removed 17 had served 
four years and over.— Washington Dispatch, April 10. 
<><■<• 

Of the 117 fourth-class postmasters appointed to day 
19 are for Indiana as follows:— Washington Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Sentinel. 

<• « V 

Political-butcher Maxwell had his partisan abat¬ 
toir running in full blast to-day. His executioners 
dragged 177 republican postmasters under the guil- 
otine, and beheaded them in the interest of oflice- 
leeking democrats. Indiana got 19 of the changes 
made by the bloody work. Fourteen of the decapi¬ 
tations were made by force, that number of repub¬ 
licans being forcibly executed. The appointments 
were as follows.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, April 11. 

* 

Representative Conn, of Elkhart, will arrive to¬ 
morrow. He hopes to be able to recommend a num¬ 
ber of post-ofifice changes for his district as soon as he 
arrives. Mr. Conn says there is nothing gained for any 
one by mincing matters, and that the only way to make 
changes in offices is to make them, and that he will openly 
recommend appointments as rapidly as he agrees upon 
the men.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal. 
April 11. 

* « «< 

Congressman Conn returned to the city to-day and 
made a bee line for Axman Maxwell with a complete list 
of fourth-class postmasters for his district. In most 
cases the terms of the republican postmasters do not 
expire till next winter. However, the fourth-class 
postmasters will be decapitated next week.—Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 14. 

April 10.—The Maxwell ax did a poor day’s work 
In Indiana to-day. The following democrats were 
appointed in the places of decapitated republicans: 
[ 6 .] 

April 11.—The total number of fourth-class post¬ 
masters appointed to-day was 177. Of this number 
114 were to fill vacancies caused by resignations and 
deaths, and 63 by removal. 

April 12.—One hundred and twenty-one republi¬ 
can fourth-class postmasters were beheaded to-day 
and as many democrats appointed. The slaughter 
continues unabated. Thirty-nine of them were re¬ 
movals. Indiana got thirty changes, fourteen of 
which represented removals of incumbents.—/n- 
dianapolis Journal. 

April 13.—Indiana Is still at the bat. She continues 
to get her share of the game of changes in fourth- 
class postmasters. To-day she got twenty-three, of 
which nineteen were removals. There is a greater 
per cent, of removals from Indiana postmasterships 
than In any other state. The changes to-day were as 
follows:—iridianapoits Journal. 


THE ASSAULT UPON THE CONSUL¬ 
SHIPS. 

Indiana has more candidates for consul¬ 
ships than any three other states in the Union, 
according to the estimates made at the state 
department. The number is between sixty 
and seventy, and is being augmented daily by 
new applications. In Mr. Bynum’s district 
alone there are said to be about twenty-five. 
From the best information to be had Indiana 
will secure three foreign missions and four 


consulships. One of the foreign missions is 
already settled. Another will probably go to 
the Hon. Will E. English, and for the third 
there a large number of men on the waiting 
list, one of the most prominent being Mont¬ 
gomery Hamilton, of Ft. Wayne.— Indianapo¬ 
lis News, March 13. 

Jonathan S. Lee, ex-member of the legislature from 
Vigo county, wants to be consul to the city of Mexico. 
He has been getting signatures to his petition among 
the state officials. 

Colonel I. B. McDonald, of Columbia City, left to¬ 
night feeling certain that he will be sent to Hong 
Kong as eonsaX.-Indianapolis Sentinel, March 10. 

Col. I. B. McDonald of Columbia City has a danger¬ 
ous rival for the Hong Kong consulate In the person 
of State Committeeman Charles Buchanan of 
Union City. He left for home this evening well satis¬ 
fied with his prospects.— Indianapolis Sentinel, Mar. 12. 

Col. I. B. McDonald, of Columbia City, is 
said to be booked for the consulate at Callao. 
—Indianapolis Journal, March IS. 

Mort Hamilton, of Fort Wayne, arrived to-day 
with an application for a second-class mission.—/n- 
dianapolis Sentinel, March 10. 

H. E. Matthews, the well-known merchant of In¬ 
dianapolis, it is said, can have the Belfast consulate 
if he wants it.— Indianapolie Sentinel. March 13. 

The Hon. John G. Shanklin has again returned to 
Washington. When he left here last week for New 
York it was reported that he would not come back. 
Mr. Shanklin is here and expects to remain for sev¬ 
eral weeks. He is said to be a candidate for a con¬ 
sulship. He is desirous of securing the consulship to 
Liverpool, but is ready now to take any other lucra¬ 
tive post. 

One of the Indianapolis contingent who is back 
home and cheerful is M. A. Kelly, who wants to be 
consul to Belfast, Ireland. Kelly’s friends are tell¬ 
ing this story, part of which he says is true. He was 
presented to the President by Congressman Bynum, 
who said: 

“Mr. Kelly is an applicate for the consulship at 
Belfast, Ireland, Mr. President.” 

“Yes, Mr. President,” chimed in Kelly, “and a 
good man he is for the place, too.” 

At this the President bowed, and Kelly (so says 
that faithful chronicler, P. H. McNeils), not to be 
outdone in bowing, lifted his hat and bent nearly to 
the floor. 

“ Well, if I don’t get the place,” said Kelly, “ the 
President can not say that I was not as polite as he 
was.” 

Will E. English, who has been making a strong 
fightfor the Swiss mission, will, it is understood, ap¬ 
ply for the mission to Sweden if he fails to be sent to 
Switzerland.—Jndfanapolfs News, March 13. 

A telegram has been received by Secretary Gresh¬ 
am, signed by all the state officers of Indiana, stating 
that the appointment of the Hon. Will E. English to 
be minister to Sweden would give general satisfaction 
to the democrats of Indiana,.—Indianapolis Sentinel, 
March 15. 

J. H. Defoe, of Portland, wants to go to Havre as 
consul. He speaks French, and as the Germans and 
Irish are recognized he claims that democrats of 
French descent who have always stood by the party 
should at least be given one place. 

Dr. Chitwood, of Connersville, wants the Berlin 
consulate and D. W. Krisher, of North Manchester, 
Eleventh district elector, wants the Hamilton (Ont.) 
consulate. He was postmaster under the first ad¬ 
ministration, which fact rules him out of the race. 

Dr. Egbert, of Richmond, left for Indiana to-night 
confident that he will get the Victoria consulate. Eg¬ 
bert has always been a hard worker for the party, 
has never held office and Wayne county made the 
largest gain in the last election.— Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, March 12. 

Representative Hord, of Indianapolis, says he is 
not here to apply for assistant district attorney, but 
to secure the appointment of his cousin, Percy Hord, 
to a consular position. 


James H. Willard, of Bedford, who was a candi¬ 
date four years ago for the Spanish mission, is now 
an applicant for appointment as consul to Frankfort, 
Germany. He reached the city a few days ago, and 
has been making an active canvass for the place.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 15. 

George E. Trow, of Madison, who has been 
here several days, is an applicant for a con¬ 
sulship. 

Will H. O’Brien, editor of the Lawrence- 
burg Register, and one of the active politicians 
of Mr. Holman’s district, has been here sev¬ 
eral days quietly looking over the field. He 
is suspected of having designs on a consulship. 
He returned yesterday to Lawrenceburg. 

Kirahm Walsh, of Fulton county, a retired 
farmer, has made application for a consulship 
at some point in Ireland .—Indianapolis News, 
March 17. 

Louis Holtmau, editor of the Brazil (Ind.) 
Democrat, arrived yesterday. He wants to be 
consul-general at Berlin .—Indianapolis News, 
March 16. 

The Leipsic consulate is now held by Prof. 
Diederich, of Fort Wayne, and Congressman 
McNagny has entered for the place Joseph 
Storm, of Fort Wayne .—Indianapolis Sentinel, 
March 28. 

J. C. Carlton, of Bedford, has returned to 
urge his appointment to a good soft snap. A 
few weeks ago he filed his papers for a two- 
thousand-dollar job in the post-office as post¬ 
master, but now he is inclined to transfer his 
papers to the state department for a place in 
the consular service .—Indianapolis Sentinel, 
April 1. 

Dr. Teal, of Kendallville, who wanted the 
Glasgow consulate, has taken a toboggan slide 
since Morse’s appointment to the post. He has 
come down to Leeds. Dr. Teal was a member 
of the last house .—Indianapolis Sentinel,March28. 

Dr. Teal, of Kendallville, who came here 
shortly after the inauguration with his family, 
is desirous of going to Leith, Scotland.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, April 7. 

Tenney, of the Marion county auditor’s office, 
has arrived with an application for the Ottawa 
consulate .—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 28. 

D. A. Jennings, editor of the Salem Demo¬ 
crat, has arrived, and is making a still hunt 
for the consulship to Hamburg .—Indianapolis 
Sentinel, April 4. 

D. A. Jennings, editor of the Salem Demo¬ 
crat, is dragging the Potomac river now for the 
Hamburg or Dresden consulate. He was at 
first undecided what to apply for, but when 
once he made up his mind he began with earn¬ 
estness .—Indianapolis Journal, April 5. 

Dick Johnson, of Frankfort, was also intro¬ 
duced by the senators. He wanted a consulship. 
Dr. Chitwood, of Connersville, who wants to 
go as consul to Berlin, and Dr. Jennings, of 
Salem, were also of the party .—Indianapolis 
News, April 5. 

A. E. Manning, of the Marion county clerk’s 
office, arrived to-day with an application for 
the Liberian mission, which is now held by 
Prof. McCoy, of Indianapolis. Manning is an 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


21 


original colonial democrat.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 5. 

A. E. Manning, of County Clerk Wilnon’s 
office, has returned from Washington. He says 
that he has not made application to the state 
department for the Liberian mission, but that 
when he arrived there he was told that an 
application had been made for him, and that 
the place had been assigned to Indiana, He 
says that he talked with Secretary Gresham 
on the subject, and asserted that he would pre¬ 
fer any other position. He was assured that 
if he was not appointed to Liberia he would 
receive a place equally as good. The Liberian 
mission, which pays $5,000 a year, is now held 
by W. D. McCoy, of this city.— Indianapolis 
News, April 10. 

Jerome HerflF, of Peru, has secured the entire state 
delegation for indorsement for consul-general to 
Havana, salary 86,000 and feeB.— Waahbigton Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Sentinel, March 16. 

Jerome Herd, the member of the state com¬ 
mittee from Peru, left yesterday for his home, 
after having filed a strong petition for ap¬ 
pointment as consul to Havana. There is a 
sharp rivalry for this place, but Mr. Herff 
has no opposition from Indiana and will be 
indorsed by the delegation. His Indiana 
friends believe he stands a fair show of ap¬ 
pointment. 

Jerome Herflf, of Peru, is still in the city 
confidently expecting appointment as consul 
to Havana. He will remain here another 
week.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
March 23. 

Jerome Herff’s prospects for consul-general 
to Havana are improving. The Eleventh dis¬ 
trict has not yet been recognized, and Herff 
will be the first to get a big office from the 
district. Herff did some good work during 
the campaign. He has always been an active 
democrat, and has never held office. He is 
indorsed by the whole delegation.— Indianapo¬ 
lis Sentinel, March 28. 

Two candidates are on the ground, and will 
remain this week and perhaps longer—Jerome 
Herfl’ of Peru, who is looking in the direction 
of Havana, Cuba. There seems to be some, 
doubt as to whether or not Mr. Herff will get 
Havana, as that consulship is so desirable that 
it has calleJ out lively competition from all 
parts of the country. If he fails to land on 
the island it will not be for lack of Indiana 
encouragement and indorsements. He has the 
united state delegation and nearly every in¬ 
fluential democrat within the Hoosier borders. 
The support that has rallied to Mr. Herff’s 
cause is not purely perfunctory. There seems 
to be a strong desire, because of his active 
connection with Indiana politics, among the 
Hoosier leaders for Mr. Herff’s political pro¬ 
motion. If he does not go to Havana it is 
averred that he will land one of the other 
choice consulships that are yet dangling over 
Indiana.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, March 31. 

Jerome Herff, of Peru, was at the state de¬ 
partment to-day, pressing his application for 


the consul-generalship of Havana, a position 
worth $15,000 a year, fees and salary combined. 
— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
April 5. 

Jerome Herff, of Peru, thinks his name will 
be bulletined for a good consulate.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch, April 10. 

Representative Martin said to-day that Je¬ 
rome Herff, of Peru, would be appointed to a 
consulate this week. Mr. Herff became dis¬ 
couraged last week, and was about to leave for 
his home, when Mr. Martin assured him that 
if he would remain a few days longer the ap¬ 
pointment would be made. Mr. Heriffwanted 
the consul-generalship to Havana, a position 
worth $12,000 to $15,000 a year. Where he 
will go in not known, but the Cairo (Egypt) 
consul-generalship is mentioned as the place 
he may get.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapo¬ 
lis Journal, April 11. 

Con Cunningham, of Crawfordsville, formerly of 
Indianapolis, has filed his application for the Belfast 
consulate.— Indianapolis Sentinel, March 15. 

C. W. Cunningham, a Crawfordsville mer¬ 
chant, has been here several days. He came 
over from New York with “Gil.” Shanklin, 
and has been keeping pretty quiet until yes¬ 
terday, when he confided to some of his friends 
his ambition to be consul to Glasgow. 

C. W. Cunningham, of Crawfordsville, is se¬ 
curing signatures to a petition to be appointed 
consul to Belfast.— Indianapolis Journal, March 
23. 

C. W. Cunningham, of Crawfordsville, has 
not given up his designs on a consulship. He 
arrived here yesterday, and was taken up to 
the White House by the senators this morn¬ 
ing.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
April 5. 

The candidacy of Cornelius Cunningham, of 
Crawfordsville, for the position of consul of 
Belfast, Ireland, and the fair chance he has of 
winning, is causing the democracy of Mont¬ 
gomery county to growl quite angrily. It was 
noticed that he was rather quiet during the 
last campaign, but when a couple of months 
ago he sold his stores and announced himself 
as a candidate for the consulate at Belfast 

t 

the triumphant democracy bade him God 
speed, and Congressman Brookshire, Senator 
Voorhees, John Lamb, Gil Shanklin, and 
others promised him their influence. 

It had been whispered about for some time 
that the loyalty of Cornelius to Jeffersonian 
principles was questionable, to say the least, 
and the republicans laughed loudly as they 
boasted of Cunningham’s offers to sell out last 
summer. John Johnson, ex-county recorder 
and a prominent Irish republican, has taken 
peculiar delight in spreading the good news 
and relating his own personal experiences and 
chats with the candidate for the Belfast mis¬ 
sion. The most reliable charge, however, is 
one that comes from John S. Brown. He is 
one of the most prominent republicans in the 
state, and naturally when Mr. Cunningham 
felt a little shaky last summer in his faith, he 
could settle upon no better father-confessor 


than Mr. Brown. ^Mr. Cunningham stated that 
he had, through reading and observation, been 
converted to the principles of the republican 
party, and intended to vote for Harrison. He 
also intended to bring with him into the fold 
twenty heretofore staunch democrats. He de¬ 
sired some recognition for all this, however, and 
wanted Mr. Brown’s assurance that in case victcny 
alighted on the banner of the republican party that 
be would receive the district’s indorsement for the 
position he now seeks from Cleveland .— Crawfords¬ 
ville Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 27. 

Those who know B. D. L. Glazebrook, doorkeeper 
of the last house of representatives, will be surprised 
to learn that he aspires to represent the government 
in the consular service. He is not particular where 
the position may be so long as he gets it. 

Three judges of the supreme court—Howard, Mc¬ 
Cabe and Hackney—recommended him In a letter to 
the President as “a young man of ability and splen- 
ded morals.” Governor Matthews also writes a let¬ 
ter for him, in which he testifies to his fitness for a 
place in the consular service. Ed Hawkins, president 
of the board of public safety, indorses him as " a’ 
sterling young democrat of northern Indiana, with 
influence.” Oscar Henderson drops in line als., with 
a testimonial as to the applicant’s ability. Other 
prominent democrats do likewise. 

Glazebrook has been an office-seeker ever since he 
arrived at age. He is only about thirty years old now, 
and has already held one or two government posi¬ 
tions, besides being given other places by his party.— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, March 9. 

It seems that an injustice has been done in the in¬ 
timation that Doorkeeper Glazebrook is a chronic 
office-holder. With the exception of the legislative 
office of doorkeeper, he has held but one public 
office. He was in the railway mail service during 
the last half of President Cleveland’s first term. Mr. 
Glazebrook carries with him to Washington a lot of 
as fine Indorsements as were ever taken by any man 
from Indiana.— Indianapolis Sentinel March 10. 

Ex-Doorkeeper Glazebrook of the late lamented 
house has arrived. He has not made up his mind 
what he v/SiXiia,— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, March 12. 

Ex-Doorkeeper Glazebrook of the Indiana house 
has selected his post. After consulting the Blue 
Book he decided to apply for the consulate at Buenos 
Ayers, Argentine Republic. The office is worth 
85,000.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
March 13. 

Ex-Doorkeeper Glazebrook was relieved of his 
pocketbook last night. Since the inauguration the 
city has been full of sneak thieves, and Glazebrook 
is not the, sole victim.—IPasABtpton Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Sentinel, March 15. 

Ex-Doorkeeper Glazebrook, of Starke county, an¬ 
nounced to his friends to-day that he had “ a dead 
cinch ” on the Buenos Ayres consulate. Mr. Glaze¬ 
brook has certainly been sleeping on his office ever 
since he came here, for he has not lost sight of it.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, Mar. 17. 

Senator Voorhees introduced P. F. Glaze¬ 
brook, of Indiana, a candidate for consul to 
Buenos Ayres, to the President to-day.— IFasA- 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 25. 

Glazebrook, of Stark county, has not used 
his toboggan yet, and is still sticking for 
Buenos Ayres.-- Washington Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, March 28. 

P. F. Glazebrook lacks none of the staying 
qualities that are said to be essential to polit¬ 
ical success. He is bringing every influence 
possible to bear on the White House.— TFasA- 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, March 31. 

One of the most persistent office-seekers is 











22 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


B. D. L. Glazebrook, late doorkeeper of the 
lower house of the legislature. A.fter the leg¬ 
islature adjourned he concluded he wanted 
more of public life, and wanted to go to Wash¬ 
ington to urge his claims. He had no money 
when he left this city, and would have been 
embarrassed about his board bill at the hotel 
if some friend had not stood good for it. But 
he managed to raise $30, and he started for 
Washington. He had $15 when he arrived 
there, but took a carriage, as bigger politi¬ 
cians with no more money have been known 
to do, and drove to the Arlington, the head 
quarters for the time of the administration 
leaders. The terms were $6 a day, but he did 
not care for that. ‘‘ That the way to do!” he 
conhded to a friend. “You have got to put 
on style in Washington. The Arlington is 
where the big fellows stop, and they take no¬ 
tice of who is there.” 

Glazebrook staid there two days. Of course 
he was by this time nearly broke. Then came 
the old story. He announced that he had been 
robbed, and on the strength of that borrowed 
$40 of his congressman, Conn. He soon 
ran out of money again, and was making no 
progress in getting an office. He telegraphed 
his father at LaPorte to send him some money 
in care of a certain bank. Day after day he 
called at the bank for some response, but he 
was as regularly disappointed. He Bnally 
telegraphed his father that he was appointed 
and must have some money. His answer was 
a telegram, which he opened expectantly. All 
it contained was: “Congratulations.” The 
ruse had not worked, but at last accounts he 
was in Washington, still in the same quest of 
office.— Indianapolis Journal, April 1. 

Senator Voorhees has asked the President to 
remove the consul at Buenos Ayres and appoint 
Ex-Doorkeeper Glazebrook, of Indiana. The 
President said he would think about it. 
“ There are a' great many applicants for the 
South American consulships,” said he.— PFasA- 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, April 5. 

Glazebrook has been the most persistent of¬ 
fice-seeker from Indiana, and he thinks he has 
made himself solid with the administration by 
abusing newspaper men here as well as in In¬ 
dianapolis. The Buenos Ayres consulate is the 
most important in South America, and it has 
been filled by Baker for thirteen years. It re¬ 
quires a man of cool judgment and ability to 
fill the place. Baker, who is an old newspaper 
man, has been kept chiefly for his graphic 
reports on the resources and progress of 
the country, yet Glazebrook, whose only ex¬ 
perience outside of a drug store has been as 
a postal clerk and doorkeeper of the Indiana 
house, has been indorsed by all the state offi¬ 
cers, judges, members of the legislature, as a man 
eminently qualified to fill any position in the gift of 
the President. It is also true that some of his 
indorsers have written the President that their 
indorsements were given because they under¬ 
stood such documents don’t count, anyway.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
April 11 . 


MISCELLANEOUS. 

There is quite a lively fight on for the Ft. 
Wayne post-office between Col. \V. W. Rock- 
hill, of the Ft. Wayne Journal, and M. V. 
B. Spencer.— Indianapolis News, March 13. 

County Chairman Merrill will be appointed 
postmaster of Connersville. Editor Hicks, of 
the Examiner, being an “ex,” is out of it. 

Editor McKillop, of the Hera/d, will be post¬ 
master of Muncie. He was county chairman 
and is entitled to the place on account of his 
telling service to the party of Delaware county. 
—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 11. 

* 

There is a story related among the democratic pol¬ 
iticians of Indiana, which gives much encourage¬ 
ment to the original Cleveland men. The story is to 
the effect that the appointment of Gray to the Mex¬ 
ican mission does not mean that the President in¬ 
tends to allow the Gray-Voorhees-Matthews wing of 
the party to control the patronage in Indiana. The 
appointment of Gray, it is said, is the fulfillment of 
a contract made at the Chicago nominating conven¬ 
tion by ex-Secretary Whitney. According to the sto¬ 
ry, the contract was made with Gray by Whitney 
without Mr. Cleveland’s knowledge or consent, 
but that the President, much as he disliked to ap¬ 
point Gray, could not well fail to fulfill the agree¬ 
ment entered into by his manager at Chicago. It is 
said that before the Indiana delegation in the conven¬ 
tion agreed to vote solidly for Cleveland, there was 
an express understanding with Mr. Gray’s friends 
on the delegation that the ex-Governor was to be 
well taken care of by the administration in case he 
failed to secure the nomination for vice-president, 
and in the event of Cleveland’s election. It is further 
told that to make certain that the agreement was to 
be kept, Mr. Gray visited Gray Gables before he 
raised his voice for Mr. Cleveland.—Indianapolis 
News, March 13. 

Editor Shanklin, of Evansville, who was so en¬ 
raged yesterday at ex-Governor Gray’s appointment, 
has postponed his departure for home, and will take 
a leading part in the hunt for spoils. In discussing 
the Gray appointment to-day, he said: “It is a hu¬ 
miliation, because Gray does not represent in any 
sense the democrats of a state which cast its electoral 
vote against one of its own sons in favor of Mr. 
Cleveland, of New York. He was not a Cleveland 
man, is not now, and will never be. I am, and the 
people for whom I am speaking, have been constant 
supporters of the ^man who will be our executive 
for the next four years.— Washington Dispatch to Buf¬ 
falo Express, March 11. 

NEPOTISM. 

Vice-President Stevenson, made his son his 
private secretary. 

Secretary Carlisle to-day appointed his son, 
Logan Carlisle, chief clerk of the treasury de¬ 
partment, vice Stocks, resigned. 

Senator Peffer has appointed his daughter 
clerk of the civil service committee of which 
he is chairman. 


James S. Ewing, minister to Belgium. 

[April 6.—Vice-President Stevenson was very much 
pleased over the appointment of Mr. Ewing, for he 
is his law partner at Bloomington. Mr. Ewing is 
about forty-five years of age, and has long been an 
active democrat. He is a cousin of the vice-presi¬ 
dent. Mr. Ewing was originally a candidate for a 
judgeship in Illinois, but surrendered that ambition 
when he discovered that the President desired to 
give him a foreign mission.—New York Times.] 


Senator Voorhees has appointed his son, 
James P. Voorhees, clerk of the senate com¬ 
mittee on finance. 

[The appointment by Senator Voorhees of his 
son “Jim” as clerk to the committee on finance, 
was something of a surprise. It was said, a few 
days ago, that Chestner Faulkner, a protege of the 
senator who was formerly chief of the record di¬ 
vision of the pension office, would be named for 
the place. It is said that "Judge” Faulkner will 
have a position with the committee. In addition to 
the clerk will be an assistant clerk and a messenger 
to be appointed. The salary of young Voorhees’s 
position is $2,500 a year. It has been held under the 
republican organization of the senate by Benjamin 
Durfee, an authority on the tariff schedule.—1«- 
dianapolis News, March 16.] 


Senators Cockerell, Blackburn, Pugh, Morgan, 
Vance, Mills and Harris removed experienced clerks 
to give their places on the senate committees, of 
which they are chairman, to their sons. Cockerell’s 
son was clerk of his father’s committee at the same 
time that his name appeared in the catalogue of 
Harvard college as one of its students. Senator Pal¬ 
mer made his daughter private secretary, at six dol¬ 
lars per day.—South West, March 24. 


R. W. Springer, son of Chairman Springer, of Illi¬ 
nois, was clerk of the committee on ways and means, 
at $3,000 a year; B. A. Enloe, son of Chairman Enloe, 
of Tennessee, was clerk to the committee on educa¬ 
tion; B. U. Stump, son of Chairman Stump, of Mary¬ 
land, was clerk of the committee on immigration 
and naturalization; the son of Chairman Peel, of 
Arkansas, was clerk of the committee on Indian af¬ 
fairs; the brother of Chairman Wise, of Virginia, 
was clerk to the interstate commerce committee; the 
son of Chairman Reilly, of Pennsylvania, was clerk* 
of the committee on Pacific railways; the son of 
Chairman Tilman, of South Carolina, was clerk of 
the committee on patents; the son of Chairman 
Bankhead, of Alabama, was clerk of the committee 
on public buildings and grounds; the son of Chair¬ 
man Catchings, of Mississippi, was clerk of the com" 
mittee on railways and canals. Each one of these 
committee clerks drew $2,000 a year. The son of 
Speaker Crisp held a clerkship in the house at $2,200, 
and the brother of the sergeant at-arms of the house 
held a $3,000 position.—Indianapoh's Journal. 


Asa Dickinson, brother of Confidential Messenger 
Don Dickinson, consul to Nottingham. 

James Blackburn, of Kentucky, brother of Senator 
Blackburn, United Stales marshal. Eight years ago 
Mr. Cleveland deemed Blackburn unfit for the same 
office and refused to appoint him. 

John Tracey, of New York, brother of Representa¬ 
tive Charles Tracey, superintendent of charities for 
the District of Columbia. 

John E. Risley, of New York, brother-in-law of 
Senator Voorhees, minister to Denmark. 

James McKenzie, of Kentucky, cousin of Vice- 
President Stevenson, minister to Peru. 

Newton B. Eustis, of Louisiana, son of Ambassador 
Eustis, second secretary of Legation at Fails.—Buf¬ 
falo Express- 


Sett Shepard, of Texas, nominated to be associate 
justice of the court of appeals of the District of 
Columbia, was deiegate at large at the Chicago 
convention. 

James A. McKenzie, of Kentucky, who goes as 
minister to Peru, has been a delegate to the last two 
national democratic conventions. It was McKenzie 
who made the celebrated humorous speech at the 
St. Louis convention,wherein he likened Cleveland 
to a thoroughbred Kentucky racehorse ready for 
victory. At the Chicago convention he broke aw-ay 
from Henry Watterson’s lead, and by another 
timely and funny speech carried a number of his 
fellow-delegates from Kentucky over to the Cleve- 
1 land line .—New York Times, March 31. 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


2S 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 


The interfereuce of senators and representatives with nominations and minor appointments in the civil service is not only 
without constitutional warrant, but it is an indecent and dang'erons confusion of two functions which the constitution carefully 
keeps distinct. The senator or representative who makes himself an ollice broker, to pay his own parasites from the public purse, 
should stand well exposed in the pillory of public contempt, and by reason of such interfereuce should forfeit the respect of the 
country and the confldence and support of his constituency.— George William Curiis. 

The oath I now take to preserve, protect and defend the constitution of these United Slates not only impressively defines the 
great responsibility I assume, but suggests obedience to constitutional demands as the rule by which my oflicial conditions must be 
guided.— President Cleveland’s Inaugural. 

Anxiety for the redemption of the pledges which my party has made and solicitude for the complete justification of the trust 
the people have reposed in us constrain me to remind those with whom I am to co-operate that we can succeed in doing the work 
which has been especially set before us only by the most sincere, harmonious .and disinterested effort. Even if insuperable ob¬ 
stacles and opposition prevent the consummation of our task we shall hardly be excused, and if failure can be traced to our fault 
or neglect we may be sure the people will hold us to a swift and exacting accountability.—Prestrfeni’s Inaugural. 


COOPER’S DOMAIN. 


Editor A. Allison of the Nashville Democrat 
was appointed postmaster to-day at the request 
of Congressman Cooper. To-morrow the ax 
will fall on sixty republican postmasters in 
the first and second districts.— Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, March 2S. 

There were many surprised democrats in 
Spencer when it was announced that the ap¬ 
pointment of postmaster had been made for 
this place, as it was not expected for some time 
yet. In fact, three remonstrances were being 
circulated against O. T. Dickerson, the choice of 
0. W. Cooper, which over one-half of the 
democratic patrons of the office had signed. 
Dickerson heard of the effort being made 
against him, and telegraphed Mr. Cooper, who 
hastened the appointment.— Spencer Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, April 5. 

The appointment of Isaac Holton as post¬ 
master at Plainfield is one to be commended. 
Mr. Holton is a good business man, and from 
a party standpoint he had well earned the of¬ 
fice.— Indianapolis Sentinel, April 13. 

[Readers are referred to the December and 
succeeding numbers of the Chronicle for fur¬ 
ther information regarding these appoint¬ 
ments. Harris, Allison, Dickerson and Hol¬ 
ton were Cooper’s “men ” and Cooper, in spite 
of the protests of a large number of democrats 
claimed his right to name their postmaster, and 
he has done so.]— Editor of Chronicle. 

The fight for the postmastership of this city 
has broken out again, and threatens to be more 
fierce than ever before. For a time after Con¬ 
gressman Cooper had publicly given out that 
George E. Finney, an ex-editor,who held the of¬ 
fice during Cleveland’s first term, should have 
the office again, there was a great stir among the 
other applicants for the place, and Mr. Cooper 
was publicly denounced. Now that the Presi¬ 
dent’s no-reappointment rule shuts out Mr. 
Finney, the strife for the place has become 
more fierce than ever. Publicly advertised 
meetings have been held, at which communi¬ 
cations were read demanding, in very emphatic 
terms, that Mr. Cooper allowed an election to be 
held to determine who shall be postmaster. — Colum¬ 
bus Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, March 20. 


Two hundred democrats held a public meet¬ 
ing at the court-house last night to “ agree up¬ 
on some plan to select a postmaster,” and to 
receive a report from a committee deputized 
by a former meeting to wait upon Congress¬ 
man Cooper and demand of him that he shall 
appoint, or recommend, whom the democrats 
select.— Columbus Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
March 21. 

The democrats of this city are greatly stirred 
up over the matter of the appointment of a 
postmaster. Congressman Cooper has pledged 
himself to the man who held the position four 
years ago. He left for Washington Monday, 
and will see President Cleveland in regard to 
the rule that no ex-postmasters are eligible 
for reappointment.— Columbus Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, March 22. 

For three months past the democrats here 
have been clamoring for a primary election in 
order that the masses, as well as the party 
bosses could have a voice in the selection of a 
man for postmaster. The plan was strenu¬ 
ously opposed by the Daily Dispatch, the party 
organ, the editor, C. H. Havens, being himself 
a candidate and unwilling to go into a contest 
for the place at an election. Last Friday peti¬ 
tions containing the names of three hundred 
representative democrats were presented to 
Capt. M. W. Barnes, and he, in his capacity of 
central committee chairman, issued a call for 
a primary to take place March 25. Accord¬ 
ingly, the election will be held Saturday. To¬ 
day a paper signed by fifty prominent demo¬ 
crats, was presented to the Dispatch, protesting 
against the course of the paper in opposing a 
popular expression from the patrons of the of¬ 
fice. The bitterness is growing, every hour, 
and the election will but add fuel to the flames. 
—Kokomo Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
March 23. 

The post-office election in this city Saturday 
puts the local democrats in a strikingly pecu¬ 
liar position. Charles H. Leach, who won at 
the primary, is an old soldier, a good man, and 
out of a total vote of 886, with six candidates 
he secured 463 votes, or a clear majority of 40 
over all his competitors. Havens declined to 
go into the primary. Havens has the indorse¬ 
ment of Senators Voorhees and Turpie.—Kokomo 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, March 28. 


Harris, who was appointed by the President, 
postmaster of Franklin, is the chairman of John- 
son county. He was recommended by Congressman 
Cooper.—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 25. 

Congressman Cooper has written a letter 
here that President Cleveland has refused to 
entertain the nomination and appointment of 
Capt. G. E. Finney as postmaster, for the rea¬ 
son that Mr. Finney was postmaster four years 
ago.— Columbus Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
March 30. 

[Yet Congressman Bynum has just re-ap¬ 
pointed three of his old postmasters.] 

Kokomo is in the throes of a “ post-office 
election.” The movement is opposed by a num¬ 
ber of leading democrats, and it has the hearty 
disapproval of the democratic newspaper or¬ 
gan, the Dispatch. The primary plan was sug¬ 
gested several weeks ago, and the advice of 
Senators Voorhees and Turpie asked. They 
answered, in effect, that all applications would 
receive due consideration, primary or no pri¬ 
mary. This settled the matter until the ap¬ 
pointment of Dale Crittenberger at Anderson. 
Crittenberger’s father-in-law resigned in his 
favor, and the aspirants for the Kokomo office 
feared a like coup de etat here. C. H. Havens, 
who has had the editorial management of the Ko¬ 
komo Dispatch, is said to be seeking the place. His 
father-in-law is the present incumbent of the post- 
office.—Kokomo Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
March 21. 

Congressman Cooper has made the follow¬ 
ing nominations for postmasters: 

Morton, A. V. Thomas; Roachdiile, John Dodd; 
Ellettsville, J. E. Steele; Whlteland, J. F. Tracy; 
Stinesville, G.B. Easton; Hall, Dr. A. S.Tilford; Bean 
Blossom, Wm. Grosser; Beck’s Grove, Andrew A. 
Manuel: Spearsville, E. E. Urich; Mt. Liberty, W. H. 
Seitz; Freedom, James H. Courim; Ilartsville, John 
W. Bline; Morgantown, George M. Montgomery; Gos¬ 
port, Clinton L. Wampler; Mooresville, James H. 
Bayliss; Raccoon, J. F. Shannon; Alaska, A. H. Se- 

crest; Waverly, Samuel -; Hazlewood, E. V. 

Millan; North Salem, Wm. W. Hocker; Nlnevah, Ad¬ 
dison M. Dunham; Trafalgar, Cary J. Slack; Carters- 
burg, Thomas A. Prewitt; Clifford, John F. Hey- 
worth; Brownsburg, W. A. Euliss; Cataract, Miss 
Levina Meek; Clayton, Henry Johnson; Taylorsville, 
George W. Cook; Elizabethtown, Phillip J. Sater; 
Bainbridge, Milroy Gordon; Clear Creek, George C. 
Wingfield; Mt. Clair, Morton Ellis: Victor, John W_ 
Whitaker; Uniouville, Mrs. Elizabeth M. Kerr; 
Romona, Sidney S. Bryant; Barnard, Noah H. Bar- 











24 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


lett; Kirksville, Joseph W. Crane; Reelsville, Wm. 
Poster; Bellunlon, James M. Hurst; Needmore, John 
C. Chitwood; Cleona, Wm. Cook; Nashville, Alonzo 
Allison; Fincastle, Mrs. Era Edwards; Kinder, F. M. 
Kiphart; Samaria, C. L. Paris; Smith’s Valley, Wm. 
L. Rush; Pittsboro, V. D. Richardson; Eminence, 
John R. Mannan; Mead, George L. Craven; Stone's 
Crossing, Albert Browning; Brooklyn, Levin H. Gam¬ 
ble; Friendswood, Frederick V. Beeler; Landersdale, 
John W. Park; Ramelton, James A. Mead; Hope, E. 
A. Norman; Rocklane, E. A. Shipp; Cloverdale, W. E. 
Horn; Smithville, Theodore Thrasher; Portland Mills, 
Fay Hamilton; Alaska, Arthur H. Secrest; Mt. Merid 
ian, Wm. Hurst; Dolan, Wm. Smith; Amo, John W. 
Newman.—/ndtanapoJis Sentinel, April i. 

Dalton Wilson has been appointed postmas¬ 
ter of Greenwood, at the request of Mr. Coo¬ 
per.— Indianapolis Sentinel, April 6. 

Congressman Cooper has secured the removal 
of Philip King, superintendent of the pension 
office building.— Washington Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis News, April 15. 


BROOKSHIRE’S DOMAIN. 

Congressman Brookshire has settled eighty post- 
masterships in his district. During the last ten 
days he has devoted his entire time to the con¬ 
sideration of the applications. 

Mr. Brookshire is just recovering from a bad 
case of the grip. Had it not been for this ill¬ 
ness he would have visited each important 
town of his district to settle the post-offices on 
the ground. 

Following is a list of the post-offices, and 
the names of the candidates he will recom¬ 
mend for appointment: 

Clay County—Matt Jones, Ashboro; J. W. Sutton, 
Martz; Scott Inge, Knightsville; John Schoer, Poland: 
Mrs. Clarissa Varsley, Cloverland, C. G. McClintock, 
Staunton; Thomas Anderson, Carbon; N. H. Vego, 
Perth; Lewis McCullough, Asherville; Wm. McCul¬ 
lough, Center Point; Richard Gantz, Saline City; 
John S. Stough, Brazil; Wm. Folsom, Bowling Green; 
Frederick Mackel, Turner; R. J. Hill, Harmony; D. 
W. V. Morton, Cardonia; Esau Bolin, Hoosierville; F. 
A. Staggs, Cory. 

Vermillion County—John Cade, Gessie; David M. 
McDonald, Cayuga; Frank H. Munson, Newport; H. 
A. Sturm, Eugene; John W. Winterwood, Hillsdale; 
John L. Smith, Dana; O. N. Ayres, St. Bernice; Wm. 
Bebeflel, Perry ville. 

Fountain County—H. J. Davidson, Hillsboro; J. 
W. Shuster, Stone Bluflf; Monroe Barker, Yeddo; S. D. 
Alexander, Kingman; W. R. Etchison, Coal Creek; 
Mrs. Ellen Basham, Wallace; C. H. Quinn, Newtown. 

Montgomery County—John E. Talbott, Ladoga; 
John Adams, jr., Parkersburg; Miss Jennie Sweeny, 
Yountsville; John W. McCardle, New Richmond; J. 
W. Kirkpatrick, Kirkpatrick: Charles McBee, Linden; 
Henry D. Serves, New Market; R. C. Cording, Win¬ 
gate, Isaac Woodard, Bowers. 

Parke County—Mrs. Anna White, Lena; Ellis Bran¬ 
son, Milligan; R. R. Pence, Catlin; J. C. Vickory, 
Bloomingdale; Frank Randolph, Waterman; Thomas 
Truman, Marshall; Norvil Hamilton, Bellmore; Geo- 
Kemp, Montezuma; L. B. Humphries, Rockville. 

Vigo County—W. A. Michaels, St. Marys; Jessie S. 
Harrold, Lewis; B. H. Gallagher, Fountnette; A. F. 
Miller, Macksville; R. H. Modisett, Seelyville; Chas. 
J. Asperger, Riley; James Hanger, Prairie Creek; 
Wm. Hansell, New Goshen; Edward Davis,Coal Bluff; 
Zina Doty, Burnett. 

Sullivan County—Miss Minnie Duncan, New Leb¬ 
anon; J. K. McClain, Farmersburg; Dora Beckett, 
Hymera; Harry Conkle, Farnsworth; Albert Gilmore, 
Pleasantville; Owen Kissner, Fairbanks; Robert Gam- 
hill, Allen Cave; W. H. Burks, Sullivan; W. C. Wat¬ 
son, Paxton; W. F. Latshaw, Carlisle; Mrs. Sadie 
McKissick, Dugger; W. L. Hunt, Meron; Wm. H. Mc- 
Grew, Case; E. G. Carithers, Graysville; H. V. Stark, 
Shelburn. * 


The postmaster of Terre Haute will be 
named by Senator Voorhees. It is the custom 
to allow a U. S. Senator to name the postmas¬ 
ter of his own city. 

Mr. Brookshire has not yet decided whom 
he will recommend for Covington, Attica, 
Crawfordsville and Clinton—all presidential 
offices. In Clay city a democrat was appoint¬ 
ed by Harrison during the last days of his ad¬ 
ministration, and there is a strong effort made 
on the part of the local democrats to have him 
sustained by a democrat of Cleveland’s choice. 

Mr. Brookshire says that he will file all the 
applications, together with letters of indorse¬ 
ments and petitions, but will also file his own 
recommendation. Thus far the member’s recom¬ 
mendation has not been overruled .— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, March 31. 

Representative Brookshire, who has been 
confined to his room at the National for several 
days with the grip, came out to-day and made 
the rounds of the departments in the interest 
of his office seeking friends.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Journal, April 2. 


BRETZ’S DOMAIN. 

A letter has been received from Congress¬ 
man Bretz, stating that he has indorsed the ap¬ 
plication of John W. McCarty for postmaster of 
this city. McCarty is chairman of the county 
democratic central committee .— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis News. 

About three months ago Congressman Bretz 
named the man that he would recommend for 
postmaster here, but since Cleveland’s state¬ 
ment that he considered an election a good 
recommendation for appointment, application 
was made to Bretz to let the matter be settled by an 
election. He refused, and now the matter will be 
carried to the postmaster-general for decision. 
—Mitchell Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
March S9. 

Miss Lois Buskirk has been recommended 
by Congressman Bretz for postmaster of Paoli. 
She is the daughter of Tom Buskirk. [Candi- 
for U. S. Marshal and failed.]— Indianapolis 
Sentinel, March 30. 

The announcement in Friday’s Journal of 
the appointment of A. C. Hacker as postmas¬ 
ter at this point, and A. T. Ackerman at Loo- 
gootee, the two principal post-offices of Martin 
county, though not wholly unexpected, has 
created a great hubbub in the camp of the 
local democracy. The appointments are con¬ 
demned in unmeasured terms by the better ele¬ 
ment of the party, and Congressman Bretz is 
being roundly denounced by the leaders. At 
Shoals Fabius Gwin, a popular and sterling 
young democrat, who has ever been an active 
and ardent champion of the party, and who 
has been giving the best of satisfaction as an 
officer, is displaced to make room for the above 
appointee, who for the past few years has been 
the editor of the News, the democratic official 
county organ. 

At Loogootee the successful applicant is 
even more obnoxious, he being an ex-saloon 
keeper, who for many years, until the past few 


weeks, has been running a dram show continu¬ 
ously.— Shoals Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
April S. 

The appointment to-day of democratic post¬ 
masters for Marion and Vincennes, caused 
some rejoicing among democrats here, because 
in both cases the republican postmasters were 
removed. These two appointments indicate 
the policy of the administration next January. 
Hawkins, who was appointed postmaster for 
Marion upon Mr. Martin’s recommendation, 
was chairman of the Grant county democratic com¬ 
mittee in the last campaign. He is a man of busi¬ 
ness capacity. Purcell who secured the Vin¬ 
cennes office through Mr. Bretz, is editor of the 
Vincennes Sun, the oldest paper in the state.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
March 31. 

In the second district Congressman Bretz has 
settled a number of post-offices. For Bedford he 
will recommend John Johnson of the Democrat; 
for Vincennes, R. E. Purcell of the Sun; Mit¬ 
chell, T. J. Dilley; Worthington, Mr. Wilson, 
who is in the grocery business; Linton, a Mr. 
Beasley, and Jasper, Charles Egg. 

Huntington has not been settled. Capt.Fisher, 
Ed. Pickhardt of the News, and Frank Burns 
are the candidates, with the chances in favor 
of Pickhardt. At Paoli, Dave Murr of the 
News, and John Pro are the candidates. James 
Frost for Orleans has been selected by Mr. 
Bretz.— Indianapolis Sentinel, March 30. 

The following physicians were appointed 
medical examiners to-day upon the recommenda¬ 
tion of Congressman Bretz : [Here follows list of 
15.J— Indianapolis Sentinel, April 1. 

Congressman Bretz has appointed A. C. 
Hacker, editor of the Democrat, postmaster at 
Shoals. 


TAYLOR’S DOMAIN. 

Leonoy Wade of Posey county seems to have 
a “cinch” on one of the assistant generalships 
of the department of justice. He is backed by 
Congressman Taylor and two senators. Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, March 34. 

Congressman Taylor of Indiana, has filed the 
application of Thomas Fuller, of Barnesville, 
for seal agent to Alaska, also that of Dr. W. 
Fritsch, of Evansville, for consul at Frank¬ 
fort.— Indianapolis News, March 24. 

Congressman Taylor has not settled all the post- 
offices in his district. Two of the presidential of- 
fices,Tell City and Cannelton have already been 
filled. Philip Zoercher of the Tell City News 
is the new postmas'.er of his city, and Albert 
A. May will be appointed for Cannelton. For 
Evansville he has recommended John J. No¬ 
lan, who was a member of the legislature of 
1889 and 1891. 

Mt. Vernon has four candidates. John C. Leffel of 
the Star, A. A. Sparks of the Democrat, Silas Jones 
and County Chairman Harlan. Mr. Taylor will rec¬ 
ommend Harlan. Posey ville has two candidates, J. 
Haynes of the News and A. R. Trenor. New Har¬ 
mony held an election, and Wm. Richards was nom¬ 
inated by a large majority, but they are petitioning 
against the appointment. For the Princeton office 
are Dr. A. R. Burton, A. W. Lego, W. H. Evans, O. 
M. Knobb and Thomas Nichols. At Oakland City, 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


25 


Lewis Deltch, Mr. Phillips who keeps the Phillips 
Hotel, George Mayo, Green Brashlre and Martha 
Robinson are the applicants. At Petersburg, Thomas 
K. Fleming, Dan C. Ashley, Perry Chappie, Milton 
Mitchell and O. R. Patterson. At Boonville, Francis 
D. Sches, Thomas B. Thel, Robert Taylor and Griffith 
Taylor. At Rockport, George Pracusky, John Nester 
and Mrs. oonln.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapo¬ 
lis Sentinel, March 31. 

Congressman Taylor went to the White House 
this morning, and afterward to the department 
of justice accompanied by judge E. A. Ely, of 
Petersburg. JudgeEly comes fromCongressman 
Taylor’s home town. He was entered in the race 
for a territorial judgeship, either of Arizona 
or Oaklahoma.— Indianapolis News, April 1. 

In the First district Congressman Taylor se¬ 
cured the appointments of Drs. Hutchinson, Lo¬ 
max and Clothe for Perry county, and as pen¬ 
sion examiners for ^Varrick Drs. MeVey, 
Tucker and Guyatt. They are all democrats. 
—Indianapolis Sentinel, April 7. 

If Representative Taylor, the new member 
from Petersburg, Ind., representing the First 
district, is not careful he will have more 
applicants for oflBce on his hands than he 
can well take care of. His list, large 
as it is, has so far been anything but 
a mascot, and plums do not seem to be drop¬ 
ping into his hands. To-day he comes to the 
front with another lot. Among them is Dr. 
Wm. A. Fritch, of Evansville, who wants to 
be consul to Stuttgart. Mr. T. W. Venneman, 
also of Evansville, is another appliaant for 
office who appears to be well qualified. He 
wants to be one of the board of Mississippi 
river commission. He has been connected 
with the river service for the past thirty years, 
and is now the president of the water ways 
commission. Another newcomer, fresh from 
Indiana and in search of office, with a record 
behind him which would do credit to any man, 
is Capt. John J. Sinzicuh, also of Evansville. 
Capt. Sinzicuh is a candidate for supervising 
inspector of steamboats for the Sixth district. 
— Washington Dispatch to Cincinnati Commercial- 
Gazette, April 10, 

Congressman Taylor, of the First Indiana 
congressional district,has secured the appoint¬ 
ment of the following medical pension exam¬ 
iners, all democrats: 

Gibson County—Drs. M. W. French of Ft. Branch: 
G. P. Powell, of Princeton, and George Strickland,of 
Francisco. 

Spencer County—Drs. Molasky, Hackleman and 
Curry. 

Three county boards remain yet to be changed in 
the First district. They are Vanderburg, Posey and 
Pike. They will be reorganized soon. 

Congressman Taylor ivill secure the removal of 
Postmaster Stokes Bennett, of Evansville, in a few 
days, and the appointment of the Hon. “Jack” 
Nolan in his stead.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis News, April 12. 

BYNUM’S DOMAIN. 

It is stated that Congressman Bynum, who 
wants to act with the greatest circumspection 
in his recommendation of an appointee for 
the office of collector of customs, will return 
to the city soon and take up the matter. He 
hopes to nominate a collector without stirring 


up any more ill feeling than is now manifesting 
itself about other appointments.— Indianapolis 
News, March 23. 

Mr. Bynum has made the following recommenda¬ 
tions for postmasters: Alfonte, Samuel Denton; 
Carrollton, Asa Hutton ; New Palestine, Sophia Mit¬ 
chell; New Augusta, George Avery. Avery was ap¬ 
pointed to-day.—Indianapolis Sentinel, March 30. 

Komeo L. Depuy, theex-laundryman of In¬ 
dianapolis, was to-day appointed chief of the 
eastern division of the pension office, to suc¬ 
ceed Captain Wilhite, of Crawfordsville, re¬ 
moved. Depuy was recommended by Representa¬ 
tive Bynum .— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, March 31. 

Congressman Bynum, who returned to the 
city yesterday, called at the White House this 
morning. “ I just stepped in to see if things 
had been running all right during my ab¬ 
sence,” said he. The Indianapolis congress¬ 
man was alone.— Washington Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis News, April J. 

Irwin Dickson of Indianapolis came here a 
week ago to accept a position which Congress¬ 
man Bynum had secured for him —treasury watch¬ 
man. Dickson went home last night and will 
return his commission as soon as he reaches 
Indiana. He is a one-legged soldier and 
draws a pension of $40 a month. He owns 
two houses and lives in one. His salary here 
was $55 a month, which would have paid house 
rent with but $15 surplus. He concluded he 
could save more by remaining at home in his 
own house and live on his pension money.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
April 8. 

Congressman Bynum arrived from Wa.shing- 
ton yesterday afternoon. He will spend this 
week, and perhaps a part of next, in his dis¬ 
trict consulting with constituents as to merits 
of the many candidates for federal office. The 
special object is to gather information that 
will enable him to make up his li.«t of candi- 
datesfor postmasters intelligently. Mr. Bynum 
went to Anderson to-day, and will spend three 
or four days in the eastern part of the district. 
He says it is his desire to ascertain what the 
local sentiment is in each town, and to follow 
it in making recommendations. 

Yesterday afternoon and last night Mr. 
Bynum had many callers a.t the Grand Hotel. 
Albert Sahm, who is booked for the Indian¬ 
apolis post-office, spent some time with him, 
but Mr. Sahm says that the Indianapolis post- 
office was not mentioned during the conference. 
It is the understanding that Mr. Bynum has 
consented that Senator Turpie shall name the 
Indianapolis postmaster, but the congressman, 
it is said, is willing to second the request of 
Senator Turpie that Mr. Sahm be appointed.— 
Indianapolis News, April 16, 

Congressman Bynum is in Madison county, 
looking after the fourth-class postmasters in 
that district. He is very anxious, it is said, to 
build up a following which will steer him over 
the shoals of a renomination two years hence. 
— Indianapolis, Journal, April 12. 

Congressman Bynum found it necessary to¬ 
day to flee from the office-seekers. It was al¬ 


most noon yesterday when he wrote his name 
in the Grand hotel register, and from that 
time until after midnight he did not have a 
moment’s rest. It is estimated that not less 
than two hundred persons called on him in 
the interest of themselves or some one else. 
About half of the callers wanted places in the 
departments at Washington ; the others wanted 
post-offices, or recommendations for positions 
under the chief federal officers in this state. 
This morning Mr. Bynum said to some of his 
friends that he could not endure the pressure. 
During the afternoon betook a train for Green¬ 
field, where he will remain two or three days con¬ 
sidering the applications for post-offices in Hancock 
county. 

Congressman Bynum has had a hundred call¬ 
ers a day at the Grand Hotel. Among them was 
Dr. Joseph D. Youart, who wants to he a mem¬ 
ber of the pension examining board. Youart 
says he “made it possible for Bynum to secure 
the nomination for Congress the first time.” 

Mr. Bynum has, so far as it is possible for 
him to do so, settled one question of interest 
to those concerned. The Irvington post-office 
through several administrations has been in 
the hands of George W. Russell, republican. 
He is an applicant for reappointment, and 
has the support of George W. Julian and 
other influential democrats, as well, of course, 
as of republicans. Dr. Dougherty, physician 
and druggist in the suburb, also applied for 
the post-office. Dr. Long and other democrats 
obtained signatures to a petition in Dough¬ 
erty’s behalf, which, together with democratic 
argument, was sent to Bynum. Russell’s 
friends used the wire effectively, they hoped, 
and made a plea that, on civil service princi¬ 
ples and because there had never been politics 
in the office, Russell ought to be retained. A 
third candidate also appeared, and the entire 
community took sides. No small affair has 
recently given the suburb so much more or 
less good-natured concern. 

“ Have you settled the question as to who is 
to be postmaster at Irvington?” Mr. Bynum 
was asked to-day, as he wearily opened one of 
many letters. The congressman looked over 
the spectacles to which he has been drivtn by 
stress of service in behalf of applicants, and 
said, decidedly: 

“ Yes, it is settled. The post-office will go to 
Dougherty. There was nothing else to do.” — Indi¬ 
anapolis News, April 13. 

Congressman Bynum is in town, and is be¬ 
sieged by office-seekers and friends at the 
Grand Hotel, having just returned from a 
short trip to Madison county. When asked 
what had been the object of his trip, he said : 
“ Well, I am looking after the appointment of 
postmasters, though I can’t say that anything 
of importance has been done as yet. I am 
just making a survey of the situation, so as to 
know better what is expected. I go from here 
to Hancock county to continue my survey, 
and may have something more interesting to 
say on my return,” concluded Mr. Bynum.— 
Indianapolis'Sentinel, April 14- 








26 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


In the March Chronicle was a partial list 
of Bynum’s intended postmasters. Since then 
the post-office department has made official his 
choice at Acton, Southport, and Charlottsville. 


MARTIN’S DOMAIN. 

A few days ago Congressman Martin wired 
John Young, of Huntington, that he had been 
appointed state agent of the agricultural de¬ 
partment by Secretary Morton; the next day 
Congressman McNagny also wired Argo, of Ft. 
^Yayne, that he had been appointed to the 
same place. Both claimed that Secretary Mor¬ 
ton directed his chief clerk to issue the com¬ 
mission to their respective candidates in their 
presence. An investigation shows that no 
commission has been issued. Mr. Morton ad¬ 
mits that he promised both men, but under 
misapprehension, and that he must recall his 
promises and reconsider the whole matter. As 
it stands now Young is indorsed by Voorhees 
and Martin, Argo by Turpie and McNagny.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
March SI. 

The controversy that has been going on for 
a month between Messrs. McNagny, of the Fort 
Wayne district, and Martin, of the Bluffton 
district, for the control of the state agent of 
the agricultural department, was settled to day 
by the senators. N. E. Argo, of Allen, Congress¬ 
man McNagny’s man, was appointed, and John 
Young, of Huntington, Congressman Martin’s 
man, was given a job at Hammond as beef in¬ 
spector, at $1,200 a year. Argo will receive 
$900, but will have nothing to do but guess at 
the condition of the crop and send a report 
accordingly.— Washington Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, April 6. 

Congressman ‘Martin has appointed C. M. 
Hawkins, chairman of the democratic county 
committee, postmaster at Marion. 

Congressman Martin said this morning that 
he expected Jerome Herff to be named for 
some good consulship this week.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, April 12. 


HOLMAN’S DOMAIN. 

Judge Holman said to-day that if John G. 
Shanklin would accept the position of Missis¬ 
sippi river commissioner, he could undoubt¬ 
edly secure the appointment. “ To my mind,” 
said Judge Holman, “the Mississippi river 
commission is the greatest official snap going. 
The salary is $5,000 a year and it involves no 
labor to speak of. For my part I have been 
in favor of abolishing it. But, if Mr. Shank¬ 
lin wants the office he certainly can get it and 
I don’t see why he should not draw the salary 
as well as anybody else so long as the commis¬ 
sion is to be maintained.”— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis News, April 7. 

Judge Holman Las not acquiesced in the 
movement to appoint O. A. Packard, of Ply¬ 
mouth, bank examiner .—Indianapolis News, 
April 8. 

Rumors of a new arrangement of the politi¬ 
cal slate, particularly on bank examiner for 
Indiana, has brought O. M. Packard, of Ply¬ 


mouth, to the capital, and he has been trying 
to strengthen his indorsements. He already 
has the two senators and a majority of the represen¬ 
tatives, and it is believed he will get the ap¬ 
pointment, although Congressman Holman 
still thinks that cashier Pugh, of the Rush 
county bank, has a fighting chance.— Indi¬ 
anapolis News, April IS. 

S. K. Gold, of Dearborn county, is here. He 
says he wants nothing, but the fact that he 
has been hobnobbing with Congressman Hol¬ 
man and other Indiana statesmen looks sus¬ 
picious. Gold wants something.— Washingtm 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 7. 

S. K. Gold, of Dearborn county, returned 
home with his wife to-day. He was offered a 
$1,200 office in the treasury department 
through the influence of CongressmanHolman. 
Gold declined, as he could not support his 
family on such a salary.— Washington Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 11. 

Congressman Holman has made the following re¬ 
commendations for medical examining boards: 
Rush county, Drs. Megee, Smith and Hackle- 
men ; Ripley county, Drs. Roberts, Anderson 
and Abbott; Dearborn county, Drs. Gatch, 
Rectamns and Freeland.— Washington Dispatch 
to Indianapolis News, April 15. 


MISCELLANEOUS. 

Yesterday Congressman Conn was informed 
by Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Max¬ 
well that letters of recommendation and peti¬ 
tions must accompany the congressman’s in¬ 
dorsement for the appointment of postmasters. 
Mr. Conn had previously filed with the de¬ 
partment his own recommendation for post¬ 
masters, but not the indorsement of the patrons 
of the offices. He was then given to under¬ 
stand that the congressmen would settle every 
post-office contest. To-day Maxwell informed 
Conn that under no consideration would the 
recommendation of the congressman be final. 
Conn replied that he could not afford to make 
recommendations and then be turned under; 
that if he could not have the influence to name 
a fourth-class postmaster he would make no 
recommendations whatever. In three cases 
postmasters have been appointed in Indiana 
lately where the congressman had recommend¬ 
ed some one else. This new rule which Conn 
has just discovered is not to the liking of con¬ 
gressmen.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, April 16. 

Henry C. Paul and John Peters, of Fort 
Wayne, were here to-day in consultation with 
Representative McNagny over the Fort Wayne 
postmastership. There is a serious hitch over 
this place. Two or three men are demanding 
it, and say they will have nothing else. Each 
one has strong claims. It is believed here 
that the editor of the Fort Wayne Journal 
will get it, although ex-Pension Agent Zollin¬ 
ger’s friends believe he is a sure winner.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
April 12. 

The Hon. Jason B. Brown arrived home 
yesterday from Washington City, and is looking 


unusually well considering the vast amount of ardu¬ 
ous labor performed by him since the adjournment of 
congress.—Seymour Dispatch to Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, April 8. 

OVERLORDS VOORHEES AND 
TURPIE. 

This morning a grand rush was made on the 
White House. SenatorsVoorhees and Turpie and 
Congressmen McNagney and Martin took Colonel 
Zollinger, of Ft. Wayne; Dr. Chitwood, of 
Connersville, and Judge Lowry, of Ft. Wagne, 
to the White House and introduced them to 
the President. Judge Lowry has been here 
for nearly a month. It was rather amus¬ 
ing to witness the way in which Judge Lowry 
got ahead of another office-seeker this morn¬ 
ing, who wanted to get in the White House. 
A well known Hoosier who is a candidate for 
a consulship, and has been hanging on to 
Washington for several weeks, had an engage¬ 
ment with the two senators and one congress¬ 
man to take him up to the White House, and 
present him to the President. He wanted to 
go alone with the members of the delegation, 
because he thought it would have more effect 
than if he came in company with a number of 
other office-seekers. Last night he quietly 
went around and made engagements to meet 
the senators at the Riggs house this morning 
at 10 o’clock. They came at the appointed 
hour, but Judge Lowry had heard of it mean¬ 
while and was on hand, and when the two sen¬ 
ators and one congressman stepped into the 
carriage to be driven to the White House, 
Judge Lowry stepped in and completed the 
circle, while the candidate for consulship ele¬ 
vated his nose in supreme disgust and walked 
away.— Washington Dispatch to IndianapolisNews, 
April 1. 

Two months or more ago the question of a 
primary election was broached to about ten 
gentlemen who were known to be seeking the 
place. The vote on the question broke in the 
middle and it was determined to ask the ad¬ 
vice of Senators Voorhees and Turpie, who, it is 
.supposed, will make the recommendations for the 
“ orphaned ” ninth district. They replied, and by 
the strongest pos.sible inference disapproved of the 
primary plan. — India7iapolis Sentinel, March 25. 

Eli W. Brown, of the Frankfort Crescent is 
not only an applicant for the Frankfort post- 
office, he claims the right to name all the post¬ 
masters in the ninth congressional district. In the 
last campaign the democrats made two or three 
nominations for congress, but they all declined 
to make the race, as the district is 4,000 re¬ 
publican. Mr. Brown volunteered to make 
the race, and a few days before the election 
his name was placed on the ticket by the dis¬ 
trict committee. He made no canvass of the 
district and paid no campaign assessment. 
His name was used simply to fill up the place 
on the ticket. But now he bobs up as a de¬ 
feated candidate, claiming the same right to 
name postmasters that members have. It has 
always been the custom to let the senators 
look after the post-offices in republican dis¬ 
tricts and Senators Voorhees and Turpie have 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


27 


an understanding in the disposition of post- 
offices of the sixth and ninth districts. To¬ 
morrow Brown will meet the two senators to 
talk the matter over, but it is not likely that 
they will yield to him this power. They are 
more competent to settle the post-office ap¬ 
pointments than Brown.— Washington Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Sentinel, March 29. 

Senators Voorhees and Turpie, Messrs. Shcerin, 
Murdock and Eli W. Brown, editor of the Frank¬ 
fort Crescent, held a conference this afternoon to 
decide who shall name the postmasters in the 
ninth congressional district. Mr. Brown claims 
the right, as the last democratic candidate for 
congress, to control this patronage, but Sena¬ 
tor Turpie does not concede it, for by an ar¬ 
rangement with Senator Voorhees just after 
election he was to control post-offices in 
Waugh’s, and Voorhees in Johnson’s districts. 
“Jim” Murdock and Sheerin also want to 
take a hand in the matter. Brown may have 
a say in the offices, but it will not be final. It 
is conceded that while Senator Turpie will 
have the ostensible say, Murdock will really 
control matters.— Washington Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis News, March 29. 

Senator Turpie presented to the President to¬ 
day Col. J. M. Hoskins, of Brazil; M. S. Scud- 
der, of Washington and John T. Taylor, of 
Guthrie, Oklahoma. Hoskins is an applicant 
for internal revenue collector.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, March 30. 


CONGRESSIONAL OFFICE BROKERS 
AT LARGE. 

Congressman-elect Latimer has made a spectacle 
which Is a little the worst yet presented. He is the 
man who introduced the re olntion at the democrat¬ 
ic convention last May which declared : 

“We shall look upon the nomination of ex Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland, if forced npon the party at the Chi¬ 
cago convention, as a prostitution of the principles 
of democracy, as a repudiation of the demands of 
the farmers’ alliance, which embody the true princi 
pies of democracy, and a surrender of the rights of 
the people to the financial kings of the country.’’ 

In spite of that, he is now assuming to have influ¬ 
ence with Mr. Cleveland, and has begun a programme 
of distributing fourth-class post offices to his friends in 
the farmers’ alliance. He called a meeting at Seneca 
City recently, which had for its object the discussion 
of the distribution of patronage in his district. Thir¬ 
ty or forty were present, nearly all alliance men. 
Mr. Latimer acted as auctioneer, and, while the alli¬ 
ance men were ready takers, he disposed of about all 
the offices in the district. He called out the offices, 
and nominations were made, and then, according 
to published reports of the meeting, came speeches 
of commendation.—CofwmftMS, S. C., Dispatch to New 
York Times, March 8. 

if is fji 

A representative of the Connecticut delegation in 
congress submitted to the President the name of 
Daniel M. Morgan, of Bridgeport, Conn., for the posi¬ 
tion of United States treasurer. He is a banker and 
is said to have the indorsement of all the democratic 
congressmen from his state and of Carlos French, 
the member of the national democratic committee.— 
New York Times, March 9. 

if if >:« 

F. R. Richardson, of the Atlanta Journal, Cleve¬ 
land delegate-at-large, is an applicant for appoint¬ 
ment as minister to Gautemala. He is backed by 
about the entire delegation in congress.-iVeto York 
Times, March 11. 

<<>»<■ 

Representative A. J. Pearson, of Ohio, called and 
presented the name of Ross J. Alexander, of Bridge¬ 
port, Ohio, for first assistant postmaster general. 


Representatives Catchings and John Alien, of Missis¬ 
sippi, called with Joseph Johnson, of Alabama, and 
introduced Col. W. M. Inges, of Mississippi, who is a 
candidate for United States minister to Guatemala. 

A delegation from Iowa called and made recom¬ 
mendations for one or two places. They were Rep¬ 
resentative J. T. Hamilton, Thomas Bowman, W. H. 
Butler and F. E. White. They recommended Mr. 
Butler for superintendent of the railway mail service. 
—New York Times, March 10, 

if if if 

Sewafor PoZmcr brought with him Messrs. Brluton 
and Shutt, of Illinois, the former an applicant for 
the United States marshalship for the southern dis¬ 
trict of Illinois, and the other a candidate for the of¬ 
fice of district attorney for the same district.—Jn- 
dianapolis News, March 10. 

<■ * 

Representative Springer, of Illinois, who was also 
one of the President’s callers to-day, asked him if the 
rule of not appointing men who had held office 
under him four years ago was to prevail as reported. 
The President replied in the affirmative, and when 
asked if the rule was inflexible, Mr. Cleveland re¬ 
sponded that it would be so substantially. There 
might be exceptional anl extraordinary circum¬ 
stances which might cause some departures from it, 
but he could not call to mind any possibilities to 
justify change from the policy decided upon. Mr. 
Springer asked if the rule was also to apply to fourth- 
class postmasters. Mr. Cleveland’s response was that 
he had not thought about that, but he gave the de¬ 
cided impression that it would prevail to as great an 
extent as possible with the small poslmasterships.- 
Indianapolis Journal, March 10. 

The delegation in congress from Minnesota, with 
Michael Doran, the national committeeman, pro¬ 
poses to make an onslaught on the White House, en 
masse, as soon as possible. Its members had intend¬ 
ed to do so to day, but decided to postpone it, and 
Representative Castle was the only one who came.— 
New York Times, March 9. 

if if if 

This morning the Missouri delegation in congress 
called upon Postmaster-General Bissell and asked 
him to deflne his policy regarding the appointments 
of postmasters and others that came under him. The 
delegation stated that they desired this information 
in order that they might be governed by it in mak¬ 
ing their recommendations.— Express, March 
11 . 

a * t) 

A delegation from Minnesota called and was at 
once allowed to enter the private office of the Presi¬ 
dent. Michael Doran, the national committeeman, 
and Judge Charles E Flandrau, of St. Paul, headed 
it, and Representative Hall was one of the party. 
When it was their turn to talk to the President, they 
asked him to appoint Louis Baker, the editor of the 
St. Paul Globe, to one of the foreign missions. They 
said Mr. Baker would like a mission of the second 
class, and that Brazil would probably be agreeable 
to him. They asked that James Bowers, of Minne¬ 
sota, be appointed solicitor-general, and they named 
some of their candidates for the local federal of¬ 
fices. 

“Are the applications filed at the proper depart¬ 
ments?’’ asked the President. 

“They are,” was the reply. 

“That is the proper course,” said the President.- 
New York Times, March 11. 

Up to date 847 unterrifled democrats of West Vir¬ 
ginia have filed their applications for federal offices. 
The list is headed by Joseph S. Miller, of Cabell 
county, who was commissioner of internal revenue 
during Cleveland’s former administration.— 
Express March 15. 

■> >!■ <« 

Senator Edward Murphy, Jr., of New York, was 
one of the first callers. He had with him Editor John 
M. Francis, of the Troy Times, the ex-minister to 
Austria, and his grandson, who desired to pay their 
respects to the President. They remained only a few 
minutes. A reporter called Mr. Murphy’s attention 


to the general absence of New York office seekers, 
and the senator is credited with this reply: “That 
shows the power of organization. New York will be 
heard from at the proper time. Instead of having 
every Tom, Dick and Harry running down here to 
Washington and bothering the life out of the Presi¬ 
dent, the leaders of the party in New York will de¬ 
cide upon the men whom they desire to have ap¬ 
pointed to positions in the federal employ and whose 
appointment they think will benefit the party most. 
These names being decided upon, the men will come 
onto W’ashington, present their papers, and will, if 
necessary, be introduced to the President. Yes, 
organization is a great thing.”—WeM York Times, 
March 14. 

<■ <■ * 

Troy is the home of Edward Murphy, Jr., chair¬ 
man of the democratic state committee, to day the 
most powerful democrat in the state outside of New 
York and Kings counties. In this county Mr. 
Murphy’s will is the law of the land. No appoint¬ 
ment to office is made without his endorsement, nor 
can an aspirant for a political nomination reach the 
coveted goal without his approval, — New York 
Times, Oct. 27, 1892. 

Representatives McMillen, Enloe^ and Richardson 
also of Tennessee, and a party composed of G. B. 
Murray, J, N. McKenzie, W. R Chambers, Dexter 
Reed, L. D. Hill, George C. Elston, and A. C.'Welch, 
of the same state, made the President a short 
visit. They would like to have him appoint Judge 
Lerton, now chief justice of the state supreme court, 
to succeed Circuit Judge Jackson, who was promot¬ 
ed to the United States supreme bench. 

Speaker Crisp and Senator Gordon, of Georgia, were 
among the visitors. They presented the name of 
Bascom Myrick, of Americus, who was a Hill dele¬ 
gate at Chicago, for a foreign appointment, and R. 
W. Patterson, of Macon, for a government director¬ 
ship in the Union Pacific Railway .—New York Times, 
March 12. 

♦ 

Representative TFosAinpfon, of Tennessee, was one of 
the morning visitors. He fell to discussing appoint¬ 
ments for places in the District of Columbia Mr. 
Enloe presented F. W. Moore, a candidate for pension 
agent at Knoxville, and Mr, Washington introduced 
Judge H. H. Ingersoll, of Knoxville, who has an ap¬ 
plication on file for the position of solicitor-general. 
Mr. Washington also presented James H. Bible, of 
Chattanooga, who would like to be district attorney 
for the eastern district of Tennessee. Some of the 
party with Ifr. McMillen are also candidates for the 
positions. Mr. Murray wants to be district attorney. 
Mr. McKenzie would like to be marshal of the 
middle Tennessee district, and W. R Chambers 
would like to be consul at Melbourne.—New York 
Times, March 12. 

« # 

George William Carnth, editor of the Gazette, of 
Little Rock, Ark., anl a brother of Congressman 
Caruth; of Kentucky, presented an application for 
the po.sltion of minister to Turkey. He was vouched 
for by Senator Jones of Arktinsas.—Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, March 12. 

<f J.*C >.•« 

Telegrams from Washington convey the informa¬ 
tion that Congressman John M. Clancy is to keep his 
weather eye open for federal patronage at that end 
of the line. The announcement runs: "He has been 
officially designated by Hugh McLaughlin to reprdent 
him on all questions of patronage aff'eeting Kings 
county.—New York Times, March 12. 

^ <« jC* 

Congressman McMillan, of Tennessee, brought J. 
N. McKenzie, a candidate for marshal of the fourth 
district of Tennessee, and G. B. Murray, of Gaines¬ 
ville, who wants to be district attorney for the same 
district. With Congressman Cobb, of Missouri, came 
Judge Speck, who has made application for the 
surveyorship of the port of St. Louis. A. W. Bas- 
com’s claims for collector of internal revenue in 
the Lexington district of Kentucky were presented 








28 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


by Congressman Paynter, of Kentucky.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to New York Times, March 18. 

« « * 

The Texas delegation saw the President, and state 
that he will probably nominate A. W. Terrell, of 
Texas, minister to Turkey.—ira«/u’n£?<o/i Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, March 18. 

in ^ in 

Wm. F. Harrity, of Pennsylvania, chairman of 
the national democratic committee, and Attorney 
General Ilensel, of Pennsylvania, were among the 
first to enter the President’s apartments. They had 
come in response to invitations, and they remained 
some time. The object of their visit was to discuss 
the question of the Pennsylvania appointments. 
Both gentlemen are non communicatlve to-night 
concerning the result of their visit, but those who 
understand the politieal situation in Pennsylvania 
say there is little doubt that they made satisfactory 
arrangements for patronage for Pennsylvania dem¬ 
ocrats.—IFas/unfirton Dispatch to New York Times, 
March 21. 

* l{t 

The visitors declined to reveal anything concern¬ 
ing their conversations with Mr. Cleveland and his 
assistants, but those to whom they talked have not 
proved so reticent. In the first place it was absolutely 
determined that the political patronage of Pennsylva¬ 
nia should be disposed of upon the recommendations 
of Mr. Harrity and his friends in the state adminis¬ 
tration. No man will be appointed to office in the 
Keystone commonwealth who is objectionable to those 
gentlemen. To such an extent will this be carried 
that Postmaster General Bissell is credited with 
having presented Messrs. Harrity and Hensel to 
Assistant Postmaster General Maxwell, the “heads¬ 
man”—as he is humorously known in Washington 
—with the remark: "These are the friends whose 
counsel we will follow in Pennsylvania.” That decis¬ 
ion determines the selection of over U.OOO postmasters. 
— Washington Dispatch to New York Times, March 22. 

The Illinois delegation is again cast down. For 
several days its members have been pressing upon 
the President the advisibillty of appointing Judge 
Browning, of Illinois, as commissioner of the gen¬ 
eral land office. Senator Palmer and others have 
been at the White House repeatedly to recommend 
their man, who was set forth as a candidate of ex¬ 
ceptionally high characrer, of thorough integrity, 
and free from all railroad and speculative entan¬ 
glements. There was an anxious caucus this after¬ 
noon at Willard’s of the Illinois senators and sev¬ 
eral of the representatives, the upshot of which 
was that Senator Palmer went to the White House 
even at 5 o’clock, to make one more appeal for 
Judge Browning. Mr. Palmer was oppressed to 
learn from the President that it would be useless to 
urge further the appointment of Judge Browning' 
for the reason that he had decided to appoint Mr. 
Lamoreux, of Wisconsin. Mr. Lamoreux is the 
candidate of Senator Vilas.—irasWnf/ion Dispatch 
to New York Times, March 22. 

* * * 

The nomination of Daniel M. Browning, of Illi¬ 
nois, to be commissioner of Indian affairs, made 
yesterday, occasioned a good deal o' astonishment, 
as the President was supposed to be looking for a 
man who had made a specialty of the study of the 
Indian question. Mr. Browning is an Illinois 
lawyer, with some experience on the state bench. 
He is a great friend of William R. Morrison, but 
was backed by the solid delegation of Illinois for the 
comnissionership of the general land ofiice, and the 
Indian office appears to have been given him as a 
consolation prize. Republicans admit that he is a 
good lawyer, a man of excellent character, and 
gifted with abundant common sense in business 
affairs. He is said not to be much of a civil service re¬ 
former, however. It was supposed that if the office 
was given out as a political place it would go to 
John H. Oberly, but Mr. Eckels, nominated for 
comptroller of the currency, is a brother-in-law of 
Mr. Oberly, and this, together with the extraordi¬ 
nary number of Illinois appointments, has prob¬ 
ably worked against Mr. Oberly’s chances.—IPas/i- 
ington Dispatch to New York Evening Post, April 13. 


Mr. Cleveland is bound to have difficulty in distributing 
the patronage in Kansas. There are two factions of 
the democratic party in the state, the “stalwarts” 
and the “fuslouists.” Senator John Martin and ex- 
Governor George W. Glick represent the“fuslonists” 
here. To-day David Overmyer, J. B. Crouch and W. 

M. Mitchell, representing the “stalwart” democracy, 
reached the city. The avowed object of their visit 
is to see that none but “stalwart” democrats are 
given offices. So far Senator Martin has shown a 
disposition to forward the interests of populists as 
well as democrats. He has already presented to the 
President the names of a number of Kansans for 
office, and the “stalwarts” declare that the most of 
these are populists at heart. They claim also that 
Mr. Martin proposes to make further fusion between 
the populists and democrats of Kansas possible by 
giving offices to men of this stripe. 

Senators Martin and Peffer have dally conferences, 
and it is an open secret that they are trying to have 
the offices bestowed in the interest of the fusion ele¬ 
ment. 

Next week there will be many Kansas men at the 
White House, and the troublesome question of the 
patronage will be brought squarely before the Presi¬ 
dent.— New York Times, March 18. 

« * * 

It is understood here that Congressman Alexander 
and Senators Ransom and Vance have made up a slate. 
They propose to have the President appoint Col. W. 
R. Kenan, collector and G. L. Morton, postmaster. 
It is also understood that the men for the places 
under these two heads have been selected. There 
are several other applicants for both offices and the 
friends of these men have combined to see what 
can be done. A telegram has been sent to Mr. 
Cleveland and a public meeting has been held to 
protest and formulate a petition. Four hundred 
signatures have already been secured. A strong 
delegation will go to Washington to try and “ knock 
out” the congressman and senators.— 

N. C. Dispateh to New York Times, Mareh 24. 

* * * 

The Virginia delegation in Congress held a caucus 
last evening at the Ebbitt hou,se, all of the members 
being present. After a discussion of nearly three 
hours they came to the conclusion not to indorse 
any applications at this time but to present to Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland the following resolution which 
was unanimously adopted: 

We desire to act in harmony and union.'and wish 
to ascertain what are your wishes as to the mode of 
presenting or indorsing the names of applicants for 
the marshalships, district attorneys and internal re¬ 
venue collector ships .— Washington Dispatch to New 
York Times, March 24. 

* * • 

A large delegation of Illinois democrats, escorting 
Jerry O’Donnell, a candidate for public printer, ap¬ 
peared at the White House to-day, led by Senator 
Palmer .— Washington Dispatch to New York Times, 
March 30. 

* * * 

The senators from Missouri were exceedingly grati¬ 
fied to find that Mr. Cleveland had respected their 
wishes and appointed Mr. Max Judd to be consul- 
general at Vienna. Mr. Judd is one of the most 
prominent Hebrew's in Missouri. He is very wealthy 
and has long been identified with St. Louis politics. 
Prominent Missouri democrats say that his nomi¬ 
nation at this time will add several thousand votes 
to the democratic ticket in St. Louis in the coming 
municipal election. Besides being an expert poli¬ 
tician and business man, Mr. Judd enjoys the dis¬ 
tinction of being one of the best chess players in 
the United States.— New York Times, March 23. 

* * * 

The crowd was very great. Tennessee was repre¬ 
sented in force. Representative Washington had 
with him six constituents, whom he presented to 
Mr. Cleveland.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapo¬ 
lis Journal, March 23. 

* * * 

Minnesota had a hearing to-day. Congressman 
Hall, Representative-elect Baldwin and Mr. Lawler 
presented the name of Mr. Lewis Baker, editor of 
the St. Paul Globe, for minister to Brazil. Mr. Harry 
Hawkins, of Duluth, for governor of Alaska, and 
Mr. C.F. McDonald for receiver of the land office 


at'',.St. Cloud.—Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, March 23. 

Congressman Barnes Compton, of Maryland, was 
at the Fifth Avenue Hotel yesterday. 

“Is it true that word was passed around to Mary¬ 
land democrats that their chances would not he 
helped by a visit to Washington?” 

“Yes,” said Mr. Compton. "Our delegation in 
congress advised them to stay at home and not worry 
the President.—Netc York Times, Mareh 26. 

There is a determined fight over the Raleigh post- 
office. Senators Vance and Ransom are pressing 
Chas. M. Busbee, and Congressman Bunn is for W, C. 
Stronach. Mr. Bunn was here yesterday and an¬ 
nounced, after a consultation with his friends, that 
he would protest to the postmaster general and 
President Cleveland against the impertinent inter¬ 
ference of the two senators as to this office, on the 
ground that by custom he has the right to dictate 
who shall fill this important office, Mr. Bunn was 
much incensed at Senators Vance and Ransom, 
and he does not intend that they shall rob him of 
this important piece of patronage. 

Mr. Busbee married a niece of Mrs. Vance, and 
this fact will be called by Mr. Bunn to the atten¬ 
tion of the President as suggesting a species of 
nepotism.— Dispatch to New York Times, 
March 27. 

« 

For the information of all the democratic candi¬ 
dates for offices in Erie county it might be stated 
that ex-Representative Bunting, of Hamburg, is 
the proper man to apply to, and not to Mr. Hertel, 
who made the hopeless contest against Judge Dan¬ 
iels last fall. It is understood among the post-office 
department officials that Postmaster General Bissell 
has directed that Mr. Bunting's indorsement be recog¬ 
nized in all cases but one in Erie county outside of 
Buffalo, aud that exception is the office at Ham¬ 
burg, the home of Mr. Bunting.—TPas/tfn<7fon Dis¬ 
patch to Buffalo Express, March 29. 

* * * 

As there are no democratic senators from Iowa, 
the referees for the state will be the representatives in 
the fifty-second congress and the state organization. 
Whatever the recommending authority, it is under¬ 
stood among the lowans that there shall be no ex¬ 
hibition of differences at the White House over the 
offices, hut that there shall be a settlement of all 
disputes before the preferred names are sent to the 
executive for approval.—If’asTitasrfon Dispatch to 
New York Times, March 31. 

* * * 

Mr. W. J. Brinton, treasurer of the state central 
committee of Illinois, is registered at the Denison 
House. He arrived yesterday from Washington, 
where he has been for several weeks in the interest 
of his application to be appointed United States 
marshal for the southern district of his state. When 
asked what his chances are, he said : 

“ I have no opposition as yet, and I think I will 
be appointed. We did not ask for the removal of 
the present marshal, whose term is not out until 
July 1, and between now and then one can not tell 
what may happen. I have, however, the recom¬ 
mendations of Senator Palmer and of the congress¬ 
men of the state, besides many business men.— Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal, April 1. 

1C« 

Senator Camden, of West Virginia, escorted Col. W. 

G Handlon and Dr. Charles W. Cowan, of Wheeling. 
Dr. Cowan has his eye on the Ottawa consulship. 
J\idge Long, of New Mexico, was introduced to the 
President by Delegate Joseph, of that territory.-^TPas/i- 
ington Dispatch to New York Times, April 1. 

<<<•<• 

Many senators and representatives were in the 
throng. Senator Bate, of Tennessee, introduced one 
of his constituents who presented a card upon which 
was printed “Jacob Schaefer, applicant for United 
States consulship, Cologne, Germany.” Mr. Schaefer 
wants that office, and he does not care who knows it. 
Senator Bate al.so presented J. W. Gaines, who has 
applied for the district attorneyship at Nashville. 

Congressman elect Cockerill and Cooper,with Congress¬ 
man Kilgore, of Texas, brought Col. Dick Ware, of 
Mitchell county, who wants to he marshal of the 
western district. They also presented John Mc¬ 
Connell, of Childress county, who would like to be 
marshal of the northern district.—IFasAlngifon Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, April 2. 







The Civil Service chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 3. INDIANAPOLIS, MAY, 1893. terms 


Published monthly. Publication oflice, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

THE USE OF PATRONAGE TO IN¬ 
FLUENCE LEGISLATION.* 

The President of the United States is a leg¬ 
islative officer. He is required by the Consti¬ 
tution, he was expected and intended by its 
framers, to aid in making the laws he exe¬ 
cutes; to this end he is given powers, in a 
measure atrophied by disuse, which, wielded 
by a true leader of freemen would profoundly, 
affect, if they did not control, the work of 
congress. It may be well to brieffy consider 
what are his means of legitimate influence be¬ 
fore dealing with the special subject of my pa¬ 
per, for I believe that, while many good citi¬ 
zens are now troubled lest congress refuse the 
President practical support fora policy which 
the people endorsed by his choice, compara¬ 
tively few realize that such anxiety questions 
his statesmanship no less than the enlighten¬ 
ment and patriotism of senators and repre¬ 
sentatives. 

I need not dwell upon the more familiar 
feature of the President’s legislative power; 
everybody knows that he has “power, by and 
with the consent of the senate, to make treaties,” 
although everybody does not know, or, at least, 
constantly remember, that treaties are laws 
and may override and repeal other laws en¬ 
acted by congress. In more than one country 
the principles professed by our tariff reform¬ 
ers were embodied in treaties of commerce for 
the very purpose of thus eluding a hostile 
chamber. All have heard of his right of veto* 
but all have not reflected that this constitutes 
him a standing “committee of conference,” 
wherewith the author of every proposed law 
must deal, or how seriously and positively this 
act may affect the course of legislation. The 
ti-ibunicia polestas was a prime factor in shap¬ 
ing the old Roman polity. 

The President, however, has further legisla¬ 
tive duties and is armed with the authority 

those imply. “He may.convene both 

houses or either of them.” If congress tries to 
run away from its work, to hide itself from 
public opinion, he can chain it to its post. 
And he not only may but “shall from time to 
time give to the congress information of the 
state of the Union, and recommend to their 
consideration such measures as he shall judge 
necessary and expedient.” In the stormy days 
of Andrew Johnson a senator once proposed 
that a message from the President be not read ; 
a night’s reflection, however, convinced every 
one that, when he chooses to talk, congress is 
bound to listen. Indeed, to refuse him a for- 

*A paper read at the annual meeting of the Nation¬ 
al Civil Service Reform League, held in the city of 
New York, April 27,1893, by Charles J. Bonaparte. 


mal hearing, would be to hand him a trum¬ 
pet; he speaks t)ver the heads of the people’s 
other servants to their and his common mas¬ 
ter; if they stuff their ears with cotton, that 
master will be the more certain to listen, the 
more ready to act. 

The value of such a privilege to a President 
depends on the President himself. A critic of 
the constitution of the German Empire, writ¬ 
ing when this was newly framed, said it ought 
to have provided that the chancellor should 
always be a man of genius and never grow 
old or fall ill. Our fathers were lessexacting, 
but in the Presidency they created a place far 
too big, as they conceived and shaped it, to be 
filled by a little man. They foresaw that its 
incumbent might be great enough to be dan¬ 
gerous, they did not think of him as small 
enough to be contemptible. Therefore the 
trustcommitted to him and the means granted 
him to fulfill this trust are not devised on 
the hypothesis of his own insignificance. If 
he has no thoughts worth the uttering, or if 
neither he nor any of his chosen advisers can 
clothe what thoughts he has in language 
worth the reading, then it is a matter of little 
moment that he is ever entitled to the coun¬ 
try’s ear when he sees fit to claim this. It is 
no great boon to a dumb man that we always 
recognize his right to the floor. But from a 
President who has something to say, and can, 
either himself, or through a fitting mouth¬ 
piece, so say it that his countrymen will stop 
to hear him, this privilege has an enormous 
value. He can lay bare to public scrutiny in 
any exigency what he would have the people 
know; he can, in any controversy, place his 
adversaries on the defensive and summon them 
with unequaled authority, to the bar of public 
opinion. When he speaks he compels a hos¬ 
tile congress to answer him, and the answer, 
whether given by a hundred orators, whose 
discordant words the country will have no 
time to heed, or in the cumbrous pronounce¬ 
ments of large assemblies, is of necessity 
far less effective than his speech. If, wielding 
these weapons, a President can not so awaken 
and guide public opinion that even an unwill 
ing congress must give the form of law to 
his policy, this shows either that his policy is 
not the people’s or that he is unfit for his 
place. Should he ask indulgence for irregu¬ 
lar and unworthy means employed to the 
same end, because otherwise he had failed, he 
stands as a lawyer, who for lack of skill, 
learning and eloquence to gain his cause, has 
bribed the jury; and indeed bribery in a 
form more than ordinarily repulsive and nox¬ 
ious, has been too often the resource of help¬ 
less mediocrity, struggling with the responsi¬ 
bilities of his mission. 

The President, as first servant of the people, 
chooses, or ought to choose, an immense num¬ 


ber of under-servants to help him in his work. 
Their offices no more belong to him than does 
the furniture of the White House; and he has 
as little right, either in law or in morals, to 
place one at the disposal of a complaisant con¬ 
gressman as to reward the latter for his vote 
with a piano or a painting for which the 
treasury has paid. Bishop Latimer called 
bribery “a princely kind of thieving;” it may 
have seemed so in his day, but I, at least, see 
little room for the adjective, when the Presi¬ 
dent of the United States uses his patronage as 
a huge corruption fund to repay official per¬ 
jury and breach of public trust in the national 
legislature. 

The nature of the legislation obtained is al¬ 
together beside the question. Lord Bacon 
professed to have never decided any cause 
against his judgment of its merits, although 
he had often exacted pay for his decisions, but 
posterity has ratified the finding of his judges 
that this fact (if fact it were) in no wise light¬ 
ened his guilt. The southern or western con¬ 
gressman who believes in free silver or incon¬ 
vertible greenbacks or agricultural “sub-treas¬ 
uries,” is to my thinking foolish or ignorant, 
or both, but he maybe an honest man; if, 
while so believing, he votes for the best law 
which the most experienced financier can de¬ 
vise to restore a sound currency because, by 
thus voting, he will get a foreign mission 
for his brother-in-law or a consulate for 
his invalid nephew, or a post-office for his 
best “worker,” then I pronounce him a scoun¬ 
drel, and those who pay him the price of his 
infamy no whit better than himself. 

There is one feature about this beggarly 
business which makes it superlatively mean. 
The plaintiffs or defendants who greased the 
itching palms of the Lord Chancellor in Ba¬ 
con’s days did so out of their own pockets. 
What they gave him may have been unfairly 
earned or wrongfully withheld but it was at 
least formally their own. They were acceso- 
ries to his breach of trust, but were not them¬ 
selves unjust stewards. When, however, a 
President distributes appointments in return 
for legislation, this costs him nothing personal¬ 
ly but his self-respect and the esteem of good 
men. He is no less bribed than is the senator or 
representative with whom he bargains; each 
of them buys up the other. For one servant to 
pay another to betray the confidence of their 
master is sufficiently shameful. That heshould 
do this with the talents that very master has 
placed in his keeping deepens to ink the 
shade of his perfidy. 

This abuse is no less dangerous than odious. 
The President called for by the constitution is 
well nigh omnipotent in legislation where he 
inspires and voices public opinion but as near¬ 
ly powerless when this no longer sustains him. 
He ensures the constant supremacy of the 













30 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


whole country over local prejudices or inter¬ 
ests, he can do little or nothing to thwart 
its will. He is a demagogue in the first and 
best sense of the word; by him the people can 
be always led, but never driven. And if he is 
sternly and vigilantly limited to his lawful in¬ 
struments of agitation and influence he can 
only—therefore he will—be such a man as can 
handle these. A nonentity or worse could 
never reach the chair that was fashioned for 
and first filled by Washington. 

But something much worse than a nonentity 
will serve to swap off pounds of patronage for 
yards of lawmaking; for this occupation 
“statesmen” who tamper with bills and choose 
for judges purloiners of election returns have 
a right of pre-emption, if not a patent, which 
those of another type should not seek to in¬ 
fringe. Such methods may seem at times to 
advance public welfare; England appeared to 
owe many years of peace and comparative 
prosperity to the systematic corruption of Wal¬ 
pole; but no free people can long tolerate 
them and remain long free. When the exec¬ 
utive can say of the legislature truly and safe¬ 
ly, as the lady said of her hair, “It is my own, 
for I have paid for it,” although not, as she 
added, “ with my own money,” a system of le¬ 
gal checks and balances, however elaborate, 
may serve to disguise but will not qualify a 
practical autocracy. The forms of a republic 
lasted at Rome long after Augustus, and sub¬ 
sist now with much parade throughout Span¬ 
ish America. 

Against this peril the founders of our govern¬ 
ment sought to safe-guard by constitutional provis¬ 
ions which sufflceonly to prove theirsolicitude. That 
‘ No senator or representative shall, during the 
times for which he was elected, be appointed to 
any civil office under the authority of the United 
States, which shall have been created, or the enrol 
uments whereof shall have been increased during 
such times; and no person holding any office 
under the United States, shall be a member of 
either house during his continuance in office,’ is of 
little avail; that the President can appoint only‘by 
and with the advice and consent of the senate,’ is, 
for this purpose, of less than none. Our real pro¬ 
tectors are the strong common sense and sturdy hon¬ 
esty of the American people. Some well-meaning 
persons may from time to time persuade themselves 
that to secure good laws when these seem sorely 
needed, the President can be forgiven a prostitution 
of his constitutional powers, a violation of his oath 
of office. I believe the people can, and, if need be, 
will be made to see that as well might a woman sell 
her chastity to give the profits in alms. 

The strangers who this year throng our shores 
may perhaps report on their return home, that they 
found in Chicago, with other exhibits of our civili¬ 
zation, a specimen of the model American mayor; 
such of them as pass through Albany can tell their 
fellow-countrymen what manner of men triumph¬ 
ant democracy delights to honor in the rulers of our 
greatest state ; let us hope, however, that they may 
not find the fair image of popular government 
* V ‘ moulded into calm completeness,’ 
by an auction-booth at Washington, where sen¬ 
ators peddle out votes for places w'ith a President 
who peddles out places for votes. 

PARTY PLATFORMS AND PROM¬ 
ISES.* 

The workmen in the navy yards and a few places 
in the Indian service and under the fish commision 
were all that Mr. Harrison gave us in fulfillment of 

’^From the paper of William Dudley Foulke before 
the National League, April 27.1893. 


his extensive engagements, until after the election 
of 1892. It is when an administration is in extremis 
that its heart turns toward reform. It was amid dis¬ 
heartening surroundings in 1893 that the republican 
party favored the enactment of the civil service law. 
It was after his defeat in 1888 that Mr. Cleveland 
classified the railway mail service. It was after the 
writ of ejectment was served last November that 
President Harrison included all free delivery offices. 
Ourchief executives are not wholTj’ unlike that other 
distinguished ruler with whom the affliction of dis¬ 
ease was a condition precedent to his desire to as¬ 
sume the sacerdotal office. In a civil service reform 
sense it may be said of more than one of our Presi¬ 
dents that nothing in his official life became him 
like the leaving of it. The retiring administration 
resembles the swan, it sings sweetest in the hour of 
its passing. And so may it continue to be until the 
time when it shall be no longer necessary for the 
people to decree the death of the singer before they 
can hope to listen to the music. Rotation in political 
office is not without its uses. Iii the last campaign 
the respective situations of the two parties were re¬ 
versed. It was the republicans who were stricken 
dumb by the paralysis of office-holders, it was the 
democracy which lifted up its voice like one cry¬ 
ing in the wilderness. ’ For it is with parties as with 
Presidents, there is no greater incentive to the cult¬ 
ure of self-sacrificing patriotism than exclusion from 
the table of patronage. Public virtue resides princi¬ 
pally in the party out of power. Sweet are the uses 
of adversity. It is sorrow that chastens and purifies 
the soul. It is largely in recognition of this fact that 
Indiana civil service reformers are so often found in 
the ranks of the opposition. We want to be in the 
company of those who stand most for political recti¬ 
tude. * * * 

It was the exiled democracy who could see much 
more clearly that things were not going on as they 
ought to go. And as theirs is the platform intended 
for the guidance of the present administration, it 
will be well for us to consider, somewhat in detail, 
the meaning of the language, and what we have a 
right to expect from a fair reading of its terms taken 
in connection with the declarations of Mr. Cleveland 
since it was adopted. I will promise that this is not 
done in any spirit of prophecy. We have had both 
words and acts from the same sources before and we 
know that they have not always kept step together. 
There was great appropriateness in Dante’s punish¬ 
ment of the Soothesayer, “Because he wished to see 
too far before him; backward he looks and back¬ 
ward goes his way.’’ The outlook in retrospect is 
not always so comforting as that which fancy pict¬ 
ures for the future. “Retrospect,” as President Har¬ 
rison informs us, “will be a safer basis of judgment 
than promises.” 

The question is simply this, what have we the right 
to expect from the platform? “Public office,” it 
says, “is a public trust.” If it be this, it can not be 
used to pay personal or party debts. It can neither 
be made a family prerequisite, nor a fund for the re¬ 
ward of those who have rendered efficient service in 
conventions and campaigns. It is the administra¬ 
tion of the office to the benefit of the people which 
must alone be considered, otherwise the trust will 
not be performed. A trustee can not deal either 
personally or as a member of a firm or corporation 
with the trusted property. A President can not so 
deal with the offices either for himself or his party. 

“We reaffirm,” so says the platform, “the declara¬ 
tion of the democratic national convention of 1876, 
for the reform of the civil service and we call for the 
honest enforcement of all laws regulating the same.” 
The enforcement of such laws can not be expected 
if men who have the appointing power in the classi¬ 
fied service are themselves unfriendly to the law, 
and like the late Aquilla Jones, say “that they de¬ 
spise it. ’’Men do not gather grapes of thorns nor figs 
of thistles. The law can not be enforced unless the 
commissioners are men of unflinching integrity, ear¬ 
nest purpose, ability, energy and enthusiasm. This 
is not enough, but the law can not be enforced if 
other officers of the government fail to do their duty 
In regard to it. It can not be enforced if the depart¬ 
ment of justice fail to prosecute those who violate 
its penal provisions. It can not be enforced if cabi¬ 


net officers, heads of divisions, postmasters, collect¬ 
ors and all other officers in charge of classified sub ■ 
ordinates fail to remove men who violate it. If the 
postmaster-general or the secretary of the treasury 
should, like their predecessors, retain in the service 
men who by their own confession are guilty of col¬ 
lecting prohibited political assessments, it can not 
be enforced. The party has promised then that this 
thing will not be done. 

The platform of 1876 referred loin the.se resolutions 
declares “Reform is necessary in the civil service. 
Experience proves that efficient, economical conduct 
of the government business is not possible if the civil 
service be subject to change in every election, be a 
prize fought for at the ballot-box, be a brief reward 
of party zeal, instead of posts of honor, assigned for 
proved competency and held for fidelity in the pub¬ 
lic employ.” W'e are therefore to have no “clean 
sweep.” The civil service is not to be subject to 
change as the mere result of the election. We are 
no longer to see the participants in the political con¬ 
test rewarded by the offices. That is what the plat¬ 
form means. These places are to be posts of honor 
assigned for proved coTTipefeJicj/. How shall this com¬ 
petency be proven? Within the classified service no 
doubt by examinations and probation, and outside 
of that service is there any better proof than expe¬ 
rience? And yet we find that the President looks 
with disfavor upon applications of per.sons who held 
office under his former administration for reappoint¬ 
ment to their old places. No doubt in .some cases 
this disfavor is justified. But is not the rule which 
excludes the good as well as the bad rather incon¬ 
sistent with the platform? But the declaration goes 
further. The place must not only be assigned for 
proved competency, but must be held for fidelity. 
If this rule is observed no man who has been thor¬ 
oughly faithful to his trust will be removed or sup¬ 
planted. There is no question of any four years term 
in this; fidelity is to be the criterion of retention. 

The platform of 1876 says something even more im¬ 
portant: “The dispensing of patronage should neith¬ 
er be a tax upon the time of our public men nor the 
instrument of their ambition.” If this be carried out 
in letter and spirit democratic congressmen can no 
longer seek re-election by apportioning federal offices 
in their respective districts. The postmaster-general 
will no longer regard as conclusive the recommenda¬ 
tion of a congressman, nor indeed as valuable in any 
other sense than as giving information of the quali¬ 
fications of the man to be appointed. The domain 
of public office is no longer to be held upon feudal 
tenures by those congressional barons and divided 
among their henchmen. It is no longer to be a tax 
upon the time of representatives in congress nor the 
instrument of their ambition. When patronage shall 
be abolished as completely as this platform calls for 
we shall have passsed the turning point in civil 
service reform. 

THE RESOLUTIONS ADOPTED. 

[Committee on Resolutions: Carl Schurz, William 
D. Foulke, Archibald M. Howe, Charles J. Bonaparte, 
C. W. Watson and Lucius B. Swift.] 

“ On the 4lh of March last the democratic party 
took charge of the national government. The plat¬ 
form upon which the people intrusted it with power 
declared that public office was a public trust, and 
they have a right to expect a fulfillment of this as¬ 
surance by the present administration.’ Public of¬ 
fices can not be used as a reward for party services, 
but should be bestowed without other consideration 
upon those best fitted to administer them. 

“ The platform reaffirmed the declaration of the 
democratic convention of 1876 for the reform of the 
civil service, and called for the honest enforcement 
of all laws regulating the same. The people, there¬ 
fore, have the right to expect not only that the civil 
service commission shall be composed wholly of men 
of courage and devoted to this reform, but that the 
heads of departments and bureaus and chiefs of di¬ 
visions, as well as all officers of the department of 
justice shall be impartial and vigilant in prosecuting 
violatoisof the law and in otherwise promoting its 
efficiency.” 

“ The platform of 1876 declares that the dispensing 
of patronage should be neither a tax upon the time 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


31 


of our public men nor the instrument of their ambi¬ 
tion. This declaration implies the abolition of con¬ 
gressional patronage, and we look to the President 
to see that the system by which oflices are distributed 
among congressmen and by them are portioned 
among their political friends and supporters shall 
entirely cease. 

“These declarations further tell us that the efli- 
cient, economical conduct of the government busi¬ 
ness is not possible if the civil service be subject to 
change at every election. Weare, therefore, justified 
in expecting that under this administration there 
will be no general change in the offices, and the dec 
laration that such places should be posts of honor, 
assigned for proved competency and held for fidelity 
in the public employ, assures us that there will be 
no removals of faithful and efficient public servants, 
no matter what may have been the term of their 
service. 

" The President himself has in frequent public ut¬ 
terances explicitly declared his conviction that the 
system which distributes public position purely as 
the reward for partisan service, threatens utterly to 
demoralize our political life, puts our government to 
a dangerous strain, and undermines the working of 
our free institutions. Declarations so clear and em¬ 
phatic justify the belief that he will use his whole 
power to secure the extension of the civil service law 
to all branches of the service to which it is applicable 
and to apply its principles likewise to all executive 
appioiniments. 

“As it is the evident duty of the President to re¬ 
move unfaithful or inefficient public servants and 
bring to justice offenders against the laws of the 
United States, the league demands the dismissal of 
every federal officer who has failed to obey in letter 
and spirit the civil service law, and also demands 
the effective prosecution of all who have violated its 
penal provisions. And it expresses its hearty appre 
elation of the zeal and energy of the civil service 
commission in exposing abu.ses and crimes among 
unworthy officers during the last presidential cam- 
paign. 

“ The civil service commission has performed its 
duties in a manner which deserves and has the ap- 
proval of the country. The League declares that 
congress in refusing to appropriate funds sufficient 
to provide for the necessary examinations, did not 
represent the sentiment of the people, and it earn¬ 
estly commends the action of the commission in 
providing, nevertheless, for immediate examination 
in the newly classified free-delivery post-offices 
And as four years ago the League condemned the 
late administration for taking advantage of a brief 
delay in the preparation of eligible lists, to sweep 
hundreds of employes out of the railway mail serv¬ 
ice and fill their places with partisans, so now the 
league would regard a like change in the newly- 
classified offices as an evident evasion of the law and 
deserving of the like condemnation. 

“The removal of office-holders upon secret charges 
without opportunity for defense, denial, or explana¬ 
tion on the part of the accused, is unjust, inquisito¬ 
rial, promotive of slander and falsehood, utterly in¬ 
consistent with the spirit of American institutions 
and a disgrace to a great government, and the 
League earnestly urges its immediate discontinu¬ 
ance. 

“The unequivocal utterances of President Cleve¬ 
land justly raised the hopes of all who believed in 
civil service reform. It is, therefore, with regret that 
the League must record the fact of the allotment of 
fourth-class postmasters as the prize of political serv¬ 
ice, and it hopes that a method may be adopted in 
the near future by which such appointments and 
removals in this, the most numerous class of office¬ 
holders, may be made in accordance with the prin¬ 
ciples of civil service re form. 

“Fourth-class post offices as prizes for political 
service have long been and still are the treasured 
fields of the spoilsman, and since the adoption of the 
civil service law appointments of fourth-class post¬ 
masters have constituted the most widely advertised 
as well as the most scandalous exhibition of his ac¬ 
tivity. Arbitrary removals in the postal service, for 
political reasons alone, impose upon the country the 


delay and expense which necessarily result from re¬ 
placing efficiency and experience by ignorance and 
inexperience. 

“The League again commends the bills Introduced 
by the Hon. Sherman Hoar providing that all post¬ 
masters should be removed only forcause staled, and 
by the Hon. Henry. Cabot Lodge providing that 
fourth-class postmasters shall be appointed without 
regard to political consideration.” 


THE ADDRESS OF CARL SCHURZ. 

When I was honored with the request to de¬ 
liver this annual address, I accepted the charge 
with very serious misgivings. For I remem¬ 
bered that on many successive years on occa¬ 
sions like this you have been wont to listen to 
a voice the exquisite charm of which still lin¬ 
gers in our ears, and will never cease to echo 
in our hearts. ^ No man can succeed George 
William Curtis here without being oppressed 
by the consciousness of inability to fill his 
place. It would be a vain attempt to rival 
his annual addresses in their abundance of 
knowledge and illustration, their ripeness of 
thought, their strength of reasoning, their deli¬ 
cacy of humor, and their literary grace. They 
were so complete an arsenal of facts and argu¬ 
ments that it is almost impossible to speak 
on the same subject without repeating him; 
and the repetition will always fall short of 
the original. And no one succeeding him at 
the head of this National League can hope to 
be so naturally, so spontaneously, accepted as 
the ideal leader of an organized endeavor for 
purity, justice, and honor in politics. It may 
be said without in the least straining the 
sense of words that George W'^illiam Curtis 
and the cause of civil service reform were 
made for one another. All that the reform 
aspires to was illustrated and exemplified in 
his personality. 

Who can speak of him in other than tones of 
eulogy? It is a consoling satisfaction to the 
soul of a friend to do so. We, members of 
the League, who have worked with him so 
long, are fond of recalling the many titles he 
held to leadership among us; his sincerity, 
unselfish devotion, and singleness of purpose; 
his profound understanding of the subject 
and large experience; his fearlessness in the 
defense and in the application of his principles; 
his keen discernment of opportunity; his ab¬ 
solute freedom from small jealousies; his 
cheerful and generous recognition of the 
merits and services of others; his gentleness 
in meeting adverse opinions; his sense of jus¬ 
tice and his fine tact in composing differences; 
in the inspiration flowing from his very being 
in the common endeavor for high aims—all 
these things gave him without question the 
first place in our councils. The leadership, 
therefore, fell to him by a general consent the 
absolute unanimity of which, never broken, 
proved that we all felt it to be due to our 
cause and due to him. Thus the death of Mr. 
Curtis is to us in the truest meaning of the 
word an irreparable loss. He could not be¬ 
queath to us his genius nor his virtues. He 
could leave us only his teachings to remem¬ 
ber, the inspiration of his zeal to quicken our 


own and his noble example to follow as best 
we can. 

But if he were now here to dictate my speech, 
he would call it away from himself and direct 
it to the cause which he cherished so much, 
and which was in so large a sense his own. 
Indeed, the ultimate victory of this cause* will 
be the fittest monument of this great citizen 
whom we who knew him well so warmly loved, 
and whose memory the American people can 
never too highly honor. 

It is a comfort to his surviving friends to 
know that, although he did not witness the 
full consummation of his endeavors, he lived 
at least long enough to see his cause rise from 
small beginnings to a measure of success prom¬ 
ising complete triumph at no very distant day. 
The question is only what President and what 
political party will carry off the greatest hon¬ 
ors of the achievement. 

I speak of this with so much assurance be¬ 
cause civil service reform has grown and flour¬ 
ished in spite of the bitter hostility of an over¬ 
whelming majority of the professional politi¬ 
cians in both parties. They have exultingly 
proclaimed its death and burial a hundred 
times. It has survived an endless number of 
obituaries. They have derided it, and reviled 
it, and plotted for its-destruction in a hundred 
ways. Without knowing it, by their very en¬ 
mity they have advanced its progress. Men 
have begun to respect and to love it for the 
enemies it has made. We have not far to 
seek for the reason. What is civil service re¬ 
form? It is the application of common sense 
and common honesty to the public service. 
And the American people are in the main a 
sensible and an honest people. It is the resto¬ 
ration to full power of honorable and patriotic 
motives in our political life. And the Amer¬ 
icans are, in the main, an honorable and patri¬ 
otic people. Therefore they will insist upon 
the general application and enforcement of 
civil service reform principles in the same 
measure as they recognize how sensible and 
honest and patriotic those principles are. In 
the acquisition of this knowledge they are at 
times powerfully aided by striking object les¬ 
sons. Recently they had one of them. 

OFFICE SEEKERS AND THE NEW ADMINISTRA¬ 
TION. 

The fourth of March last a new administra¬ 
tion went into power. Untold thousands of 
men poured into the national capital clamor¬ 
ing for office ; not for offices that were vacant, 
but to be vacated in order to make room for 
the clamorers. No matter whether he was 
ever so good a public servant, the man who 
was in was to be kicked out, to let him in who 
was out, no matter whether he would be not 
half so good a public servant. The office¬ 
hunting throng swept into the White House 
and into the departments like a cloud of lo¬ 
custs. The President, sturdy as he is, could 
hardly stand up before the impetuous onset. 
The cabinet ministers, all new men in their 
places, who felt the urgent need of studying 
somewhat their departmental duties, were 
hunted down so that they had hardly time 
to eat and to sleep, much less to study. When 









32 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


their cry for pity availed nothing, they at 
last barricaded their doors with strict regula¬ 
tions. They went into hiding in order to save 
some hours for the business of the govern¬ 
ment. The post office department was not 
only overrun by the crowd, but snowed under 
with written applications and recommenda¬ 
tions for office which in huge heaps covered the 
floors of the rooms, and the whole force of the 
department had to work after business hours 
merely to open and assort them. Senators 
and members of the house of representatives 
ran wildly about like whipped errand boys to 
press the claims of greedy constituents or 
mercenary henchmen. It was what Mr. Cleve¬ 
land calls the madness for spoils in finest 
efflorescence. 

And what are these claims for office that 
are so vehemently urged? I know them well 
from long and varied experience. Special fit¬ 
ness for the duties of the office is the one thing 
which even the most daring claimant but sel¬ 
dom dares to claim. He does indeed claim 
that he can do one thing as well as another if 
he is only permitted to try, like the Yankee 
who, when asked whether he could play the 
violin, answered, he guessed so, but he had 
never tried. So the office-seeker is ready to 
try his hand at administration. In most cases 
the claim to office is based upon party service, 
the payment or collection of money for the 
campaign chest, the making of speeches, or 
other political work deserving reward. And 
this claim is fortified with all sorts of reasons 
appealing to sympathy. Here is a patriot 
who has a large family to support and needs 
a post-office to help him along. There is an¬ 
other who wants a consulship abroad because 
he himself or his wife is in bad health and a 
change of climate would do good, or his 
daughter has a fine talent for music which 
should be developed in Europe. There is still 
another who wants the prestige of official rec¬ 
ognition in the shape of a collectorship or a 
marshalship to enable him to exercise still 
higher political authority over the minds of 
his fellow-citizens. A man in Kansas, so the 
papers report, recently urged the appointment 
of his daughter to some place in the postal 
service in connection with the World’s Ex¬ 
hibition at Chicago, on the ground that she 
would be the largest public servant in the 
country, weighing 472 pounds. And for aught 
I know, this qualification is as good as many 
of those seriously urged. 

This spoils carnival has been going on since 
the 4th of March, and it is not ended yet. In a 
measure it continues through the larger part 
of the Presidential term. I affirm and main¬ 
tain that the American people are heartily 
disgusted with a spectacle so absurd, so ludi¬ 
crous, and at the same time so barbarous, 
shameful and revolting—a spectacle exposing 
the American name to ridicule and reproach. 
When speaking here of the American people I 
do, of course, not mean all the people. I do not 
mean the machine politicians of the two par¬ 
ties, who live on spoils. I do not mean Tam¬ 
many Hall. I do not mean those poor creat¬ 


ures in congress and in other high places who 
know they have not ability enough to sustain 
themselves as statesmen, and depend upon a 
following bought with patronage to prop them 
up. I do not mean the selfish speculators in 
politics who find in the corruption under-ly¬ 
ing the patronage trade a congenial element. 
Nor do I mean those who like to be fed at the 
public crib, no matter whether they furnish 
an equivalent for their salaries. All these 
classes are the fast friends of the spoils system; 
but they form only a small minority of the 
American people. When I speak here of the 
people, I mean the men apd women who earn 
an honest living by honest industry. I mean 
the patriotic citizens who have the welfare of 
the country, the success of free institutions, 
and the honor of the republic sincerely at 
heart. 

In their earnest endeavor to serve the public 
interest, these people may be warm partisans. 
They wish their party to be successful and to 
win control of the government. But a large ma¬ 
jority of them are in their inward souls dis¬ 
turbed and disgusted when they see, after a 
party victory, hordes of partisans pounce upon 
the offices of the government like a band of 
greedy mercenaries plundering a captured 
city. They are ashamed when, after the in¬ 
coming of a new administration, they hear of 
President wishing to abolish this scandal but 
not being permitted to do so by the ravenous 
spoilsmen of the party, and of an official guil¬ 
lotine at work and of so many heads falling 
every day. This shame and disgust may not, 
by all who feel it, be loudly expressed in 
words; but nevertheless it exists, as in times 
gone by the conscientious abhorrence of slav¬ 
ery existed among the masses of the northern 
people long before exciting events loosened 
their tongues. 

THE CLASSIFIED SERVICE. 

But there is one part of the public service 
which now remains untouched by the tumul¬ 
tuous deb inch of the spoils carnival. It is 
like a quiet, peaceable island, with a civilized, 
industrious population, surroun<led by the 
howling sea. The President and the chiefs of 
the government departments contemplate this 
part of the service with calmness and content¬ 
ment, for it gives them no trouble while the 
turmoil of the office-hunt rages all around it. 

The good citizen, anxious for the honor of 
his country, beholds it with relief and satisfac¬ 
tion, for here he finds nothing to be ashamed 
of, and much that is worthy of this free and 
great nation. This is the “classified service,” 
covered by the civil service law, the creation 
of civil service reform. On the portals the 
words are written : “ Nobody enters here who 
has not proved his fitness for the duties to be 
performed.” The office-hunting mob reads 
this and recoils. The public servant within 
it calmly walks the path of his duty, undis¬ 
turbed by the thought of the greedy cormor¬ 
ant hungering for his place. He depends 
upon his merit for his security and advance¬ 
ment, and this consciousness inspires his work. 
This is the application of common sense and 


common honesty to the public service. It is 
civil service reform. 

The present civil service law was enacted 
under President Arthur. Under the rules es¬ 
tablished by virtue of it applicants for clerk¬ 
ships and other subordinate places in the gov¬ 
ernment departments in Washington and in 
the greater custom-houses and post-offices in 
the country have to pass appropriate competi¬ 
tive examinations to prove their fitness for the 
places they seek, and the appointments are 
made from those rated highest, without any 
regard to political affiliation or influence. 
Removals are discretionary with the appoint¬ 
ing power; but inasmuch as the element of 
favoritism is eliminated from appointments, 
removals are no longer made merely to make 
room for more favored individuals. The pub¬ 
lic servant who proves himself faithful and 
efficient is, therefore, wherever the law is hon¬ 
estly observed, substantially secure, no matter 
to what party he may belong. And it may be 
said that, under the national government, the 
law, as far as it reaches, is honestly observed. 
That it is universally recognized to be so is 
due, more than to any other man, to Mr. The¬ 
odore Roosevelt, who, as a member of the Uni¬ 
ted States Civil Service Commission, has per¬ 
formed his duties with rare fidelity, energy, 
and fearlessness. All the high officers of the 
government whose working force has been un¬ 
der the operation of the civil service law have, 
without any notable exception, borne emphat¬ 
ic testimony to the fact that the law has re¬ 
lieved them of serious difficulty and trouble, 
and has given to the country a greatly im¬ 
proved service. 

At the close of President Arthur’s adminis¬ 
tration in 1885 the number of pi aces classified, 
that is, covered by the civil service law, was 
about 15,500. At the close of President Cleve¬ 
land’s administration, in 1889 it was about 
27,300. At the close of President Harrison’s 
administration in 1893 it was about 43,400, to 
which should be added several thousand labor¬ 
ing men in the navy yards placed under simi¬ 
lar rules by the voluntary and most laudable 
act of Secretary Tracy. As the whole number 
of places under the national government 
amounts to about 180,000, we may say that 
more than one-fourth of the service of the na¬ 
tional government has ceased to be treated as 
mere spoils of party warfare. In one-fourth 
the party boss has lost his power. One-fourth 
is secure from the quadrennial loot. In one- 
fourth influence and favoritism go for nothing. 
One-fourth has been rescued from barbarism. 
One-fourth is worthy of a civilized country. 
So much civil service reform was accomplished 
in the time of three presidential terms. But 
great and encouraging as its progress has been 
civil service reform, having conquered only 
one-fourth of the service, has done only one- 
fourth of its work. 

There are still the laborers in the government 
departments and the higher grades of the cler¬ 
ical force, such as the chiefs of division, to 
be brought under the civil service rules. These 
rules are to be extended to many offices in 







THE CIVIL SERVICECH RONICLE. 


33 


which they are not yet in operation. The 
quadrennial slaughter, this relic of American 
savageness, has to be abolished first with re¬ 
gard to the fourth-class postmasters, of whom 
there are at present about 65,000, and whose 
execution en masse has so frequently caused 
conspicuous scandal. A bill regulating the 
appointment, and in effect precluding the 
wholesale removal, of this class of public 
servants, has already been before congress. 
This or a similar measure should be pressed 
until it becomes a law. Meanwhile it is rea¬ 
sonable to ask that the spirit of civil service 
reform be observed in all executive appoint¬ 
ments. Although the President, in making 
the so-called presidential appointments by and 
with the advice and consent of the senate, can 
not under the constitution be bound by rules 
restricting his power, yet he may impose rules 
upon himself for the government of his own 
conduct in the exercise of the appointing 
power, so as to strip the offices of the character 
of party spoil and to treat them as what they 
are really intended to be—places of trust and 
duty and to be administered for the benefit, 
not of a political party, but of the people. 
MUCH EXPECTED OF PRESIDENT CLEVELAND. 

I know patience is one of the most necessary 
and most useful of virtues, especially in the 
pursuit of great reforms. But this virtue 
should not be cultivated to the extent of dis¬ 
regarding and neglecting any really existing 
possibility. And even the soberest view of the 
circumstances surrounding us at present per¬ 
suades us tliat the time is fully ripe for a fur¬ 
ther and a very essential advance in the reform 
of the civil service. Since the enactment 
of the civil service law every President of the 
United States has done something to extend 
the area of its operation. As it is said that 
no rich man in Boston can decently die with¬ 
out leaving a sum of money to Harvard Uni¬ 
versity, so it seems no President can quit office 
without commending himself, by a tribute to 
civil service reform, to the merciful judgment 
of posterity. But President Cleveland has 
authorized us to expect from him a legacy of 
extraordinary value. 

He is known as a man of genuine convic¬ 
tions, and may be trusted to mean what he says 
and to act according to his meaning. On no 
subject of public concern, neither on the tariff 
nor on the currency, nor on constitutional 
principles, has he expressed himself with 
deeper earnestness, with more emphatic di¬ 
rectness, than on the necessity of civil service 
reform. Here are some of his words: 

“ I venture to hope that we shall never again be 
remitted to the system which distributes public posi¬ 
tions purely as rewards for partisan service. Doubts 
may well be entertained whether our government 
could survive the strain of a continuance of this sys¬ 
tem, which upon every change of administration in¬ 
spire an immense army of claimants for office to lay 
siege to the patronage of government, engrossing the 
time of public officers with their importunities, 
spreading abroad the contagion of their disappoint¬ 
ment, and filling the air with the tumult of their 
discontent. The allurements of an immense number 
of offices and places, exhibited to the voters of the 
debauch the suffrage and rob political action of its 
thoughtful and deliberative character.The e vil wou Id 


increase with the multiplication of offices consequent 
upon our extension, and the mania for office hold, 
ing, growing from its indulgence, would pervade 
our population so generally that patriotic purpose, 
the support of principle, the desire for the public good, 
ai.d solicitude for the nation's welfare would be 
nearly banished from our party contests and cause 
them to degenerate into Ignoble, selfish, and dis¬ 
graceful struggles for the possession of office and 
public place.” 

And in his last inaugural address he said : 

“ One mode of the misappropriation of public 
funds is avoided when appointments to office in¬ 
stead of being the rewards of partisan activity, are 
awarded to those whose efficiency promises a fair 
return of work for the compensation paid to them. 
To secure the fitness and competency of appointees 
to office, and to remove from political action the de- 
morali ing madness for spoils, civil service reform 
has found a place in our public policy and laws. 
The benefits already gained through this instru¬ 
mentality, and the further usefulness it promises, 
entitle it to the hearty support and encouragement 
of all who desire to see our public service well per¬ 
formed, and who hope for the elevation of political 
sentiment and the purification of political mcth 
ods.” 

These are patriotic and statesmanlike utter¬ 
ances. The man who pronounced them show¬ 
ed that he well nnderstands the nature of the 
disease, and he would not permit us to doubt 
his earnest (fetermination to apply the rem¬ 
edy. It is true, his words do not distinctly 
promise this or that specific measure. But he 
points out so clearly the evil to be redressed 
and the end to be reached, that the adoption 
of efficacious means is obviously implied. If 
“the system which distributes public positions 
purely as rewards for partisan service,” which 
“debauches the suffrage and robs political ac¬ 
tion of its thoughtful and deliberative char¬ 
acter,” the system which makes it doubtful 
“ whether the government will survive its con¬ 
tinuance” is to be done away with, if “the 
demoralizing madness for spoils ” is to be 
stemmed for the sake of the better perform¬ 
ance of the public service, and “ the eleva¬ 
tion of political sentiment and the purifica¬ 
tion of political methods,” then, evidently, 
public offices must cease to be regarded as po 
litical patronage and be treated in the truest 
sense as public trusts; the civil service rules, 
recognized as efficacious, must be extended to 
all the branches of the service to which they 
are applicable, and the principles of civil 
service reform, recognized to be correct, ap¬ 
plied to all appointments, whether they can 
formally come under the rules or not. Noth¬ 
ing could be plainer. 

We may, therefore, reasonably expect that 
President Cleveland, who now has the benefit 
of a larger knowledge of men and things than 
during his first term, will exert his whole 
power to do what the administration which 
preceded him promised but failed to do—ex¬ 
tend the civil service rules to all branches of 
the service to which they are applicable, and 
to cause the spirit and purpose of civil service 
reform to be observed in all executive appoint¬ 
ments. It is especially to be hoped that, as to 
executive appointments and removals, a be¬ 
ginning may be made with the 65,000 fourth- 
class postmasters; that the sweeping changes 
in this branch of the public service formerly 


customary may yield to civilized methods, and 
that the savage spectacle of the postmasters’ 
massacre may forever disappear, to be remem¬ 
bered only as a relic of barbarism which 
strangely survived among the freest people on 
earth, down to the last decade of the nine¬ 
teenth century. 

When a President announces his firm deter¬ 
mination to stop this savagery without fear or 
favor, and to be governed only by the public 
interest in making such changes in any branch 
of the service as may be necessary, it will 
probably no longer be difficult to carry through 
congress a law regulating the appointment of 
the minor postmasters upon sound civil serv¬ 
ice principles. Then the superstition that 
every branch of the administrative machinery 
must be manned with adherents of the party 
in power will be thoroughly exploded, and 
the back of the spoils system will be broken 
forever. 

I venture to affirm that the President who 
gives the decisive impulse towards such aeon- 
summation will render the republic a more 
lasting service, will entitle himself more to 
the gratitude of posterity, and will achieve 
greater renown for himself by this one act 
than he could by the most ingenious device 
of taxation and the most brilliant financial 
policy. For he will have removed an evil 
threatening not only our material welfare, but 
the very vitality of our free institutions. He 
will have imparted a new moral spirit to our 
political life, rendering infinitely easier the 
rational solution of the other problems hang¬ 
ing over us. 

To doubt that President Cleveland sincerely 
wishes to accomplish this would be to doubt 
that he is an honest man. The question may 
be asked whether his ])arty will not throw dis¬ 
couraging obstacles in his way, such as the re¬ 
publican party threw in the way of President 
Grant and his successors, and whether he can 
be moved by them from his purpose. But the 
democratic party should be the last to do so, 
if it is to deserve the name it bears; for civil 
service reform is, in its field, the most perfect 
realization of the true democratic principle. 

WHAT TRUE DEMOCRACY IS. 

The truest definition of democratic govern¬ 
ment is furnished by Abraham Lincoln’s fam¬ 
ous saying that it is “government of the peo¬ 
ple, by the people, and for the peo[)le;” of the 
people, for the people constitute the sovereign¬ 
ty from which it springs; the people, for 
the people through their chosen representatives 
and servants conduct it; /or the people, for it 
is to be conducted solely for the people’s ben¬ 
efit. The people are, therefore, evidently en¬ 
titled to the best service they can get, and no 
interest, neither that of a political party nor 
that of any citizen, has a right to stand in the 
way. Those intrusted with the power of ap¬ 
pointing officers are, consequently, in duty 
bound to regard office solely as a public trust, 
and to appoint only persons found fittest to 
give the people the best possible service. 

Democratic government rests upon the prin¬ 
ciple of equal rights. It abhors privilege and 
favoritism. But it is privilige and fa voritism 
upon which the spoils system rests—the priv¬ 
ilege of those in authority or of influential 
politicians to dispose of the public offices as 
their patronage, distributing that patronage 
by way of personal or political favor. It is 
justly said that the offices belong to the people 
and must be open to the people. Most cer¬ 
tainly. But what does this mean? Does it 
mean that they must be open only to those 
who have influence themselves, or who have 
the influence of powerful politicians behind 








34 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


them? No, according to true democratic 
principle it means that the offices must be 
open to all citizens according to their fitness 
to fill them; that they must be most open to 
those who are most fit to fill them; and that 
free and equal opportunity be furnished to all 
for showing who are the most fit, whether they 
be rich or poor, politicians or no politicians, 
backed by influence or not backed. Under 
the spoils system the offices are open only to 
the privileged few—those favored by the in¬ 
fluence of the powerful. Civil service reform 
has undertaken to open the offices to all ac¬ 
cording to their ability to serve the people. 
The spoils system asks the candidate for office: 
“Does your member of congress recommend 
you; or does the party boss in your state or 
county ask for your appointment? Or are 
you backed by a man who gives much money 
to our campaign fund ? What men of influ¬ 
ence have you behind you? If you have none, 
you can have no place.’' Civil service reform 
asks the candidate: “Are you a man of good 
character, and what can you show to prove it? 
What do you know? What can you do? 
What ability and acquirements have you to 
serve the people? Have you more than other 
candidates for the place?” On the one side, 
under the spoils system, the aristocracy of in¬ 
fluence—and a very vulgar aristocracy it is— 
robbing the man who has only merit unback¬ 
ed by power, of his rightful chance. On the 
other hand, civil service reform, inviting all 
freely to compete, and then giving the best 
chance to the best man, be that man ever so 
lowly, and be his competitor ever so great a 
favorite of the wealth or power. On that side 
the aristocracy of “pull,” on this the democ¬ 
racy of merit. 

This is true democratiy, and, as a civil serv¬ 
ice reformer, I have a right to say, “I am a 
democrat,” Senator David B. Hill to the con¬ 
trary notwithstanding. But what are you, 
spoilsman? You may be whatever else, but as 
a democrat you are an impostor. 

The spoils politician is fond of objecting 
that civil service examinations do not always 
point out the fittest man for the place. Per¬ 
haps not always. The best marksman does 
not hit the bull’s eye every time; but he misses 
itrarely. The civil service examinations may 
have asmall record of failures. But what the 


its movement for civil service reform, and that 
it was a movement for honesty and economy 
in government, and for the rights of the citi¬ 
zen. They would find that the growth of civil 
service reform in England went hand in hand 
with the decline of aristocratic influence, and 
with the growth of the democratic idea in gov¬ 
ernment. They would find that the progress 
of the democratic idea there in the shape of 
civil service reform has banished from the 
service the power of influence and favoritism; 
that it has truly opened the public offices to 
the people; that it has given the poorest child 
of the people the right freely to compete with 
the son of the richest peer to show his fitness 
for official employment within the civil serv¬ 
ice rules, and to obtain it according to the 
showing; that it has vindicated the right of 
the best man to the best chance. They would 
find themselves forced to the conclusion that 
the spoils system, as it has grown up in this 
republic in the last sixty years, is only a re¬ 
lapse into the corrupt and demoralizing pa¬ 
tronage system of monarchical and aristocratic 
England when it was at its worst, and that 
civil service reform is the embodiment of the 
truly democratic principle there as well as 
here. 

JEFFERSON AS A CIVIL-SERVICE REFORMER. 

That it is so here as there, does that make 
it un-American? What fool is thereto pre¬ 
tend this? It is just as little un-American as 
Magna Charta and the Bill of Rights; just as 
little as the common law, trial by jury, and 
the writ of habeas corpus; just as little as 
constitutional government, free press, and free 
speech; just as little as common honesty and 
common sense. In fact, the principles of civil 
service reform are none other than those which 
governed the original democracy of America. 
Thomas Jefferson is called the father of the 
democratic party. The sons would do well to 
learn and inwardly digest and keep living in 
their souls the lessons taught by the sire. 
What are those lessons? Jefferson was elected 
to the Presidency after one of the hottest party 
contests this country has ever witnessed. He 
went into power in 1801. There was a heavy 
pressure for place from members of his party, 
the offices being almost all in the hands of the 
defeated federalists. What did Jeffeson do? 
Let us see. On March 24, 1801, he wrote to 


system, fairly conducted, always does is to 
snatch public office from the undemocratic 
control of influence and favoritism. And 
there is the point which stings the spoils poli¬ 
tician. Jt would trouble him little whether 
or not the fittest man is put in the proper field 
of action. That is not what he cares for. But 
that the reform system so effectively repels the 
demoralizing touch of political favor, that it 
so thoroughly takes away from the office the 
character of spoil, that it does not tolerate 
public place to be a means of bribery and 
an article of barter—this the spoils politician 
will never forgive us, for it destroys his trade. 
The very democracy of civil service reform 
makes the spoilsman’s heart sore with sorrow, 
and in the bitterness of his soul he wildly de¬ 
nounces it as an aristocratic notion imported 
from England, and as a thoroughly un-Ameri¬ 
can contrivance. 

There is no better illustration of the demo¬ 
cratic character of civil service reform than 
its history in England. Our opponents might 
read with profit, although they would read 
with dismay, the excellent work of our friend 
Mr. Dorman B. Eaton on the civil service in 
Great Britain. They would find that England, 
too, had its spoils system once, with all the 
characteristic attributes of tyranny, corruption 
and demoralization. They would find that 
the struggle against the spoils system there 
was a struggle against the abuse of the royal 
prerogative and the predominance of the aris¬ 
tocracy. They would find that England had | 


Dr. Rush : “ With regard to appointments, I 
have so much confidence in the justice and 
good sense of the federalists [the defeated par¬ 
ty] that I have no doubt they will concur in 
the fairness of the position that after they 
have been in the exclusive possession of all 
the offices from the very first origin of party 
among us to the 3d of March, at nine o’clock 
in the night, no republican [democrat] ever 
admitted, and this doctrine newly avowed, it 
is now perfectly just that the republicans 
should come in /or the vacancies that may fall in, 
until something like an equilibrium be restored. 
But the great stumbling-block will be remov¬ 
als, which, though made on those just princi¬ 
ples only on which my predecessor ought to 
have removed the same persons, will neverthe¬ 
less be ascribed to removal on party princi¬ 
ples.” He then designates some persons that 
should be displaced, and proceeds: “Of the 
thousands of officers, therefore, in the United 
States, a very few individuals only, probably 
not twenty, will be removed, and those only 
for doing what they ought not to have done. 
I know that in stopping thus short in the ca¬ 
reer of removal I shall give great offense to 
many of my friends. That torrent has been 
pressing me heavily and will require all my 
force to bear up against, but my maxim is Jiat 
justitia, ruat caelum.'! And in his letter of July 
12, 1801, to the merchants of New Haven, he 
said: “It would have been a circumstance of 
great relief had I found a moderate participa¬ 
tion of office in the hands of the majority. I 


would gladly have left to time and accident 
to raise them to their just share. But their 
total exclusion calls for prompter corrections. 
I shall correct the procedure, but that done 
shall return with joy to that stale of things 
when the only question concerning a candi¬ 
date shall be, Is he honest? Is he capable? 
Is he faithful to the constitution?” 

I invite the modern democrat to contem¬ 
plate in a spirit of candor and soberness, and 
perhaps with some reverence, the example set 
by the father of the democratic party. The 
federalists, the first party in possession of the 
government, had filled almost all the offices 
during three presidential terms. When, after 
a furious contest, the democrats came into 
power, the provocation for sweeping changes 
was as great as it has ever been since. What 
did Jefferson do? He was a warm partisan 
himself, and a keen politician too. But did 
he permit himself to be swept off his feet by 
the greedy clamor of his adherents? Did he 
resolve upon a clean sweep and, in the san¬ 
guinary parlance of to-day, “set up the guillo¬ 
tine” to make the heads of federalist place¬ 
men promiscuously fly into the basket? Did 
he proceed upon the idea that under a demo¬ 
cratic administration all government officers 
must be democrats? Not he. He deplored 
that the federalists should have found it nec¬ 
essary to fill almost all the offices with feder¬ 
alists. He denounced this as an injustice; 
but he did not propose to retaliate by being as 
unjust as they had been. He simply declared 
his purpose to equalize the possession of the 
offices between the parties by making a small 
number of removals, but only for cause, and 
then by filling vacancies as they might other¬ 
wise arise in the ordinary course of things 
with a just proportion of democrats. This 
done, then Jefferson would joyfully return to 
the regular practice of making appointments 
on the sole ground of fitness without regard to 
party. 

It was thus clearly Jefferson’s professed ob¬ 
ject, not to make the government service a par¬ 
tisan service, but on the contrary to take from 
it the character of a partisan service which it 
had borne before; and then to start it anew on 
a distinctly non partisan basis. 

How did he carry out this plan? He did 
indeed make some removals, perhaps a feAV 
more than he had originally intended, and 
more than his secretary of the treasury, Albert 
Gallatin, wished him to make, but in the eight 
years of his two presidential terms made after 
all only thirty-nine, and, as he often solemnly 
affirmed, not one of them solely for party rea¬ 
sons. There being at that time no law limit¬ 
ing the tenure of offices to four years, and of¬ 
fice-holders being not in haste to die and un¬ 
willing to resign, the process bringing about 
the equilibrium was necessarily trying to pa¬ 
tience. But Jefferson saw no danger to his 
country nor to his party in the circumstance 
that a large number of the offices still re¬ 
mained in federalist hands; for, being a sen¬ 
sible man, he knew that a postmaster had to 
receive and distribute not democratic or fed¬ 
eralist letters, but simply letters; that a col¬ 
lector of revenue had to handle not democrat¬ 
ic or federalist money, but simply money; 
that the officers of the United States courts 
had to secure and enforce not democratic or 
federalist justice, but simply justice; that In¬ 
dian agents had to take care of not democrat¬ 
ic or federalist Indians, but simply Indians; 
and soon. This was Jeffersonian democracy 
—the democracy which Thomas Jefferson not 
only preached but practiced. 

He stood not alone. With him James Mad¬ 
ison and Albert Gallatin formed the famous 
triumvirate which initiated the democratic 
epoch and have ever since remained the most 
brilliant constellation of the democratic firm¬ 
ament. Of these fames Madison was the 








THE CIVEL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


35 


greatest constitutional authority. He had 
been one of the makers of the constitution 
and he has always been respected as one of its 
weightiest contemporary expounders. He ex¬ 
pressed it as his opinion that under the con¬ 
stitution the power of removal from offices, 
filled by the President with the advice and 
consent of the senate rested in the President 
alone. But did he think that the President 
had the lawful power to remove meritorious 
officers merely to put party friends in their 
places? Let us hear him! “The President 
who does that,” said Madison, “will be im¬ 
peachable by the house before the senate for 
such an act of maladministration, for I con¬ 
tend that the wanton removal of meritorious 
officers would subject him to impeachment 
and removal from his own high trust.” Nor 
were these idle words. These principles were 
well kept in mind by the democratic Presi¬ 
dents of that period; for we find it recorded 
that Madison, during the eight years which 
he was President, made only five removals; 
Monroe during his eight years only nine, and 
John Quincy Adams during his four years 
only two. 

Nor was Gallatin, the great financier and 
administrator of the triumvirate, of a differ¬ 
ent mind. In a circular to the collectors of 
revenue drawn by him, he emphatically ex¬ 
pressed his desire “that the door of office be no 
longer shut against any man merely on ac¬ 
count of his political opinions, but that, 
whether he shall differ or not from those 
avowed either by you or by myself, integrity 
and capacity suitable to the station be the only 
qualification that shall direct our choice.” 
And then he went on to say that office-holders 
should not use their official standing and op¬ 
portunities as a means of partisan infiuence. 

Such was the democracy of Jefferson, Madi¬ 
son, and Gallatin, the greatest apostles of the 
democratic church in America. And it may 
not be presumptuous to suggest that Jefferson, 
Madison, and Gallatin are as democratic au¬ 
thorities preferable to Hill, Murphy, and 
Croker, and even to Senators Gorman of Mary¬ 
land, Voorhees of Indiana, and Vance of 
North Carolina, to whom civil service reform 
is an abomination and the distribution of 
offices as spoils a necessity of political life. 

WHAT A .lEFFESSOSIAN ADMINISTRATION WOULD DO. 

It may be profitable to consider what an adniini.s- 
trati m conducted on the principles of Jeffersonian 
democracy would do under existing conditions. It 
would, of course, scorn the idea of making “a clean 
sweep,” turning out all public servants belonging to 
the opposite party, to put in its own. It would not 
make a removal except for good cause connected 
with official conduct, and it would utterly reject the 
notion that such a cause was furnished by the cir¬ 
cumstance that a man has been in place four years— 
a notion, by the way, from a business point of view, 
so strikingly preposterous that it is amazing how it 
could ever be seriously considered among sensible 
people. Imagine a merchant discharging his sales¬ 
men and book-keepers, a manufacturer discharging 
his foremen and artisans, a railroad corporation dis¬ 
charging its engineers and switchmen, a bank dis¬ 
charging its cashiers and tellers every four years on 
the ground that they had been in their places long 
enough and somebody else ought to have them now. 
Would you trust a bank conducted upon such prin¬ 
ciples with your deposits, and would you like to 
travel on such a railroad? The Jeffersonian admin¬ 
istration would, therefore, as a matter of common 
sense, never think of applying to the far more im¬ 
portant government business a rule which would be 
scouted as criminally absurd when applied to the 
business of a railroad or a bank. It would go further 
and consider as an improper removal the non-re¬ 
appointment of a meritorious officer to whose place 
the existing four-years-term law applies,and it would 
do all in its power to bring about the repeal of that 
mischievous law. It would remember that this law 
was in its very inception a fraud practiced on the 


people. Crawford, the secretary of the treasury un¬ 
der Monroe, instigated its enactment under the pre¬ 
tence that it would give him better control over 
officers handling the public money, a pretence the 
futility of which became soon apparent. His real 
purpose was to strengthen his hold upon the office¬ 
holders and to make them further, as a political ma¬ 
chine, his chances for the presidency. The bill was 
passed without debate, and Monroe signed it in a 
hurry without consideration. Thomas Jefferson, in 
a letter of Nov.28,1827, addressed to James Madison 
called it “the mischievous law vacating every four 
years nearly all the executive offices of the govern¬ 
ment.” And thushe describes, with admirable fore¬ 
sight, its effects: "It saps the constitutional and sal- 
utory functions of the President, and introduces a 
principle of Intrigue and corruption which will soon 
leaven the mass, not only of the senators but of citi¬ 
zens. It will keep in constant excitement all the 
hungry cormorants for office, render them, as well 
as those in place, sycophants to their senators; en¬ 
gage them in eternal intrigues to turn out one and 
put in another, in cabals to swap with, and make of 
them, what all executive directories become, mere 
sinks of corruption and faction.” Madison replied ; 
“The law terminating appointments at periods of 
four years is pregnant with mischiefs such as you de¬ 
scribe.” And in a letter to Monroe he raised serious 
question as to its constitutionality. Its repeal was 
urged by the foremost statesmen in ourhistory. Clay, 
Webster, Calhoun, and others, but in vain. 

An administration conducted on Jeffersonian prin¬ 
ciples would not permit so iniquitous a law to sur¬ 
vive; for if the law was mischievous then, it is, in 
consequence of the multiplication of the offices to 
which it applies and the greater “madness for 
spoils,” infinitely more mischievous now. A Jeffer¬ 
sonian administration would certainly never think 
of still increasing the mischief by applying a four 
years’ rule to offices to which the four years’ rule 
does not apply—such as the minor post-offices. And 
I am glad to learn that the rumor which ascribed to 
the post-office department the intention of adopting 
such a rule, is unfounded. 

A Jeffersonian administration would recognize 
that the mere practice of permitting officers belong¬ 
ing to the opposite party to serve out their four-years 
terms, then to be all supplanted by men of the rul¬ 
ing party, would not be a reform of real value. It 
might be an improvement upon more brutal prac¬ 
tices formerly prevailing, but it will in the course of 
fours years result in a general partisan change. It 
will be a clean sweep slowly and bashfully execut¬ 
ed, a clean sweep ashamed of itself, but a clean 
sweep for all that, to be followed by another clean 
sweep when the other party comes into power, a 
substantial continuation of the old demoralizing 
abuse. It will have only one merit, the merit of 
carrying the proof of its own consistency on its face. 
Look at it. A democratic executive permits repub¬ 
lican office-holders to continue in place, one, two, 
or three years, until their terms expire. The demo¬ 
cratic executive thereby recognizes two things: (1) 
that these republicans are good officers—for if they 
were not, they would have been removed for cause; 
and, (2) that republican officers may continue to 
serve under a democratic administration without 
detriment to the public interest. In other words, 
the democratic executive practically recognizes that 
the public interest does not demand the displace¬ 
ment of these republican officers—and yet, taking 
advantage of the mischievous four years-term law, 
the executive displaces them—displaces them con¬ 
fessedly without valid reason. 

The Jeffersonian administration will not do things 
so irrational; but, casting aside all inconsistencies 
and subterfuges, it will simply follow the precept 
given by Jefferson, Madison, and Gallatin, remove 
only such officers as are, upon fair ascertainment, 
shown to have become obnoxious to the public in¬ 
terest; fill vacancies in such a way as to give the 
service an unpartisan character, and ask about can¬ 
didates only: “Is he honest? Is he capable? Is he 
faithful to the constitution?”—employing, in order 
to secure to such questions reliable answers, the 
most trustworthy methods and instrumentalities. 
This is democracy according to Jeffersonian teaching. 


It is the destruction of the spoils system. It is civil 
service reform. And he is no Jeffersonian democrat 
—he is no true democrat at all—who will obstruct, or 
rather, who fails actively to support the President in 
any endeavor to bring about a practical return to 
these sound democratic principles. 

GROUND FOR REFORMERS’ HOPES. 

Is such a consummation beyond reasonable hope? 
Why should it be ? I do not underrate the difficulty 
of uprooting abuses which seem to have become im¬ 
bedded in popular habits and ways of thinking. But 
no brave man will recoil before an error because it 
appears popular; and frequently he will find it in 
reality far less popular than it appeared before he 
resolutely attacked it. Those of us who witnessed 
the first beginning of the civil service reform move¬ 
ment might well have been discouraged by the 
seeming hopelessness of the undertaking. The poli¬ 
ticians despised it as an idle dream of visionaries, 
and waved it aside with a sneer. The people seemed 
to Ignore it with stolid indifference. The first prac¬ 
tical attempt resulted in dismal failure. That pub¬ 
lic sentiment was in any degree prepared for it when 
the work was begun, few of us would have been san¬ 
guine enough to affirm. But that public sentiment 
became rapidly prepared for it as the work went on, 
nobody will now deny. The danger now is, not that 
those who have the matter practically in hand rush 
ahead of public sentiment, but that they lag behind 
it. 

One by one the old fictions by which the spoils 
politician sought to discredit civil service reform 
are vanishing into thin air. Of the demagogic pre¬ 
tence that it is an out-landish notion Imported from 
England, an un-American contrivance, I have al¬ 
ready spoken. We still hear sometimes the silly 
story that it will build up an office-holding aristoc¬ 
racy. That people should fear the growing up 
among us of an aristocracy of millionaires—that I 
can conceive But think of an aristocracy of reve¬ 
nue collectors, custom-house appraisers, district- 
attorneys, and United States marshals! Imagine a 
nobility composed of postmasters, Indian agents, 
and department clerks! If there be anything like a 
federal aristocracy in politics, it is that born of the 
spoils system—the party bosses, the machine leaders, 
the dealers out of patronage—such as King Croker, 
Duke Murphy, Marquis Sheehan, Earl Gilroy, and 
the sturdy barons holding fiefs and wielding power 
as Tammany district leaders here—a somewhat 
rough nobility to be sure, but quite as enterprising 
as any that levied tax on unprotected merchants’ 
wagons and upon the unwary traveler’s purse in the 
middle ages. It is for the Jeffersonian democracy to 
deal with this precious chivalry. 

SPOILS A SOURCE OF PARTY WEAKNESS. 

There is the other curious conceit that the spoils 
of office are necessary to hold political parties to¬ 
gether, to create an interest in public affairs among 
the people, and to give life and spirit to our political 
contests. Is this possible ? Look at England, where, 
after the overthrow of one party and the coming 
into power of another, scarcely more than sixty of¬ 
fices change hands. Look at Germany, where the 
victory of one and the defeat of another party in¬ 
volves no change in the administrative machinery at 
all. There are no spoils there, but are there no par¬ 
ties? Are there no party contests stirring the popu¬ 
lar mind to its very depth ? And now, in the freest 
of all countries, where the people in the largest 
sense are called to govern themselves, where the 
people owe so much to their democratic institutions 
and are said to be so proud of them, here there 
should not be patriotism and public spirit enough, 
here it should require the sordid allurement of 
spoils and plunaer to inspire the citizens with an 
active interest in their own affairs? Shame upon 
the slanderers who revile and blacken the American 
name with so infamous a charge! For it is a slan¬ 
der, wanton, foul, and abominable. There was as 
much interest and ardor in our political con¬ 
tests as there ever has been anywhere in the world 
before the spoils of office were an element in Amer¬ 
ican politics. There was more interest, more patri¬ 
otic fervor, more self-sacrificing devotion, than any¬ 
where and at any time in history, in the greatest po¬ 
litical contest this country has ever seen—in the 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 




struggle for the salvation of the Union—in which 
hundreds of thousands freely ofTered their lives 
without any thought of spoil. And now it should 
be necessary to stimulate the patriotism of the Amer¬ 
ican people with plunder? In the name of the na¬ 
tional honor I repel the calnmny. 

If there has been anything calculated to chill pa¬ 
triotic zeal in public affairs, and to drive high-mind¬ 
ed public spirit out of active political work, it was 
the intrusion of the spoils system that did it. It has 
injected the virus of mercenary motive into political 
endeavor. It has attracted to political organizations 
bands of greedy camp-followers and enabled them to 
crowd out men of self respect with their disgusting 
predominance. It has put the political boss, the 
leader of organized selfishness, in the place of the 
statesman. It has tended to make the political par¬ 
ties mere machines in the service of sordid greed. 
Instead of imparting healthy life and spirit to our 
political conte.sts, it has sought to degrade them to 
the level of scrambles for plunder. Takeout that 
spoils element and there will still be parties, but 
they will not become mutual assurance companies 
of speculators and self .seekers. These parties will 
not be smaller, but they will be better There will 
still be political workers, but they will be workers 
for public measures and policies, no longer the mer¬ 
cenary crowd working for loot. There will be lead¬ 
ers, but statesin mlike leaders of thought and en¬ 
deavor—no longer leaders of hireling bands. There 
will be party contests, but contests of opinion fired 
with the enthusiasm for great principles—no longer 
miserable cat-fights for post-offices and collector- 
ships. It is true the political trickster, whose whole 
statesmanship consists in the art of political barter, 
and the patriot whose whole public spirit springs 
from a desire to be fed at the public crib—they will 
be sadly discouraged and chilled ; they may perhaps 
sullenly retire from the trade. But the real patriot¬ 
ism and statesmanship of the country, inspired with 
new zeal and hope, will move untold thousands to 
more than fill the gaps. 

Wo hear it said that the “heelers” and the men of 
dirty work are necessary for party organization. Re¬ 
move the spoils system, and you will see how super- 
tluoiis they are. Their places will be taken by men 
who attend to organization with no less zeal and far 
more honorable purpose. This city groans under 
Tammany dominion, and Tammany asserts that its 
methods are necessary to hold an effective party or¬ 
ganization together. Take away the spoils, put all 
the non-elective places, from the department com¬ 
missioner to the street-sweeper, under sound and 
strict civil .service rules, and there will be the end 
of Tammany. But the city will have other organiza¬ 
tions for government, and then a government of 
public spirit, a government in which the best men 
will be proud to take part; and it will at once appear 
how little the political ardor and activity of the 
Tammany kind was required to make New Yorkers 
happy. We hear it said that the possession and the 
u.se of the spoils of office is needed to render a politi¬ 
cal party strong and successful. It is refreshening to 
see what the American people have of late come to 
think of the virtue imparted to a political party by 
the possession of the plunder. In 1884 the republi¬ 
cans had all the offices, and they were defeated; in 
1888 the democrats had all the offices, and they were 
defeated; in 1892 the republicans had all the offices, 
and they were defeated. And if in 1896 the demo¬ 
crats should have all the offices again, that possession 
would certainly not save them from defeat. 

As an element of party strength the possession of 
the offices has clearly proved a failure. The wise 
politician will serioutly consider, in the light of re¬ 
cent history, whether it is not really an element of 
party weakness. How much stronger than a party 
gorged with spoil would that party be in the respect 
and confidence of the people that could truthfully 
say; “1 was in control of the government, and I have 
not selfishly abused my power. I have removed no 
meritorious public servant, although many of them 
were politically oppo.sed tome. For every appoint¬ 
ment I had to make, I have carefully selected the 
fittest man regardless of party. The interest of the 
people was my supreme consideration. I have faith¬ 


fully treated the public offices as public trusts.” 
Would not a party able to say this win for every 
discontented office seeker ten recruits among our 
good citizens? 

CIVIL SERVICE REFORM GOOD POLITICS. 

I say, therefore, that civil service reform is not 
only right, not only democratic, but also “good pol¬ 
itics.” It is good politics in a larger sense now than 
it has ever been before. The rapid repetition since 
1884 of the sweeping changes in the public service, 
with the scandals of absurdity and brutality in.sep- 
arable from them, has stirred up a moral sensitive¬ 
ness among good citizens all over the land, which Is 
consUinlly increasing. The ravages committed by 
Mr. (fiarkson in the postal service during Mr. Harri¬ 
son’s administration called forth much severer criti¬ 
cism than anything done by Mr. Stevenson before 
him; and fifty removals made by Mr. Maxwell now, 
whatever explanations may bo given, cause a far 
more painful sensation than five hundred removals 
made by Mr. Clarkson did four years ago. The na 
tional pride begins to be stung by a feeling of .shame 
at the thought that abuses so glaring have been per¬ 
mitted to live so long in this mighty republic of ours; 
ami this feeling will be especially keen at this period 
of the World’s Exposition—it might be Called the 
world’s meeting—upon our soil, when merchants, 
manufacturers, working men, artists, men of science, 
men of letters, statesmen, publicists, thinkers of all 
nations visit this republic. They will study not only 
our natural resources, our material development, 
and the produclionsof our industries, but the work¬ 
ing of our political institutions, our morals, ourcu-s- 
toms, our manners, our ways of thinking, all the 
fruits of onr civilization. The patriotic American, 
mindful of the honor of his country, asks himself 
with anxious interest how the spectacle of the pass¬ 
age of our nation d government from the control of 
one party to that of another will strike these keen 
observers, and how their experiences communicated 
to the world, will affect the standing of this republic 
in the opinion of civilized mankind. 

Imagine such men to go to Washington in order to 
look into the machinery of what may without exag¬ 
geration in some respects be called the greatest and 
certainly the freest government on earth—the one 
which ought to be the model government of the 
world. Imagine them to find the National Capitol 
occupied by eager crowds clamoring for the public 
offices as the hireling soldiery of past centuries may 
have clamored for the booty of a town taken by as¬ 
sault. Imagine them to find the President of the 
United States, the greatest elected officer In the 
world, literally besiege<l by the throng of office-hunt¬ 
ers demanding his instant attention. Imagine them 
to see the President, as well as the secretary of the 
treasury, at a moment when the financial interests 
of this people of 65,000,000 are drifting into the perils 
of a great crisis, obliged to confess that the place- 
hunting invasion does not leave the highest officers 
of the government time quietly to study the pressing 
dangers of the situation and the means to avert 
them. Imaclne the observers to inquire into the 
"claims” of the impetuousofflee-hunters, and to find 
in an overwhelming majority of cases mere party 
service urged as their only title to public employ¬ 
ment, coupled with an impatient demand that all 
officers of different politics be instantly ousted to 
make room for the victors. Imagine them to see 
senators and representatives, the law-makers of the 
republic, vehemently pressing such action. Imagine 
them to take up their daily papers and to find in one 
of them a despatch announcing that yesterday 150 
new postmasters were appointed, among them fifty 
in the place of persons removed, mostlybecau.se they 
have been in office four years, just long enough to 
make them experienced and useful postmasters; in 
another paper a jubilant outcry that the “headsman” 
in Washington is vigorously swinging his ax and 
makes the heads fly ; and in still another a threaten¬ 
ing growl at the slowness with which the execution¬ 
er is doing his work, and which is chilling the en¬ 
thusiasm of the party. Imagine these bedlam scenes 
to be the pictures these observers would carry home 
with them of American practical sense, of the Amer¬ 
ican development of democratic institutions, of the 
fruits of American civilization, of the character of 


this great republic of ours, which we proudly think 
should be in all things an elevating example, a guid¬ 
ing star to all nations on earth! 

The shame of the fact that the spoils system, of 
which all this is but ihe natural outgrowth, has pre¬ 
vailed among us for more than half a century, we 
can not hide from the searching eyes of mankind— 
just as in times .gone by we could not hide the hid" 
eous blot of slavery. Nor is the exi.sting evil of less 
moment than that which we have overcome. We 
find it recorded that a few days after the fall of Rich¬ 
mond, Abraham Lincoln pointed out to a friend 
the crowd of office-seekers besieging his door, and 
mournfully said: “Look at this. Now we have 
conquered the rebellion; but here you see something 
that may become more dangerous to this republic 
than the rebellion itself.” But as we overcame slav¬ 
ery and the rebellion, so the American people can 
again furnish the proof that, however strongly an 
evil may be intrenched in power and in habit, they 
are, in the exercise of their democratic government, 
wise enough, patriotic enough, and vigorous enough 
to deal with it. And nothing would redound more 
to the glory of this republic than such a demonstra¬ 
tion now, when, more than ever, it is the ob.served of 
all observers. 

AN AI’PF.AI, TO THE PRESIDENT. 

When thinking of the means to abolish the spoils 
system, onr eyes turn not unnaturally to the man 
whom the people recently put at the head of the na¬ 
tional government. He has the power to strike a 
decisive blow; he has the opportunity, and it would 
be an offense to doubt that he has the will. He knows 
as we know, that the people put him where he is be¬ 
cause he was trusted to be opposed to the vicious 
methods which have so long poi.soned our political 
life. He was believed to be able and willing to se¬ 
cure to the people not merely a smaller measure, but 
the opposite of a tyrannous and demoralizing spoils 
politics of which they are tired. He owes his eleva¬ 
tion to the hope that his administration would be 
different from most of those which preceded it, not 
merely in degree, but in kind. We, who are an or¬ 
ganization of devoted volunteers in the struggle for 
this cause, may, without presumption, speak to him 
and say: “You are beset by politicians great and 
small, who for their own advantage, seek to drive 
you from your noblest purposes. Tell them once for 
all that the President of the United States, as you 
understand his duty, has in the use of his power 
only one interest to serve and that is the common 
welfare. 

You have told us that it is very doubtful whether 
our government could survive the strain of a con¬ 
tinuance of the spoils system. Tell the spoils-seekers 
that it is the sacred duty of the President of the 
United States to guard the government against this 
perilous strain, that he has no right to continue it, 
and that, therefore, the distribution of offices as 
party spoils must cease altogether. Y'ou have told 
us that the use of offices as rewards for partisan ac¬ 
tivity involves “a misappropriation of the public 
funds.” Tell them thai the I’resident of the United 
States has no right to misappropriate the public 
funds, and to increase the cost of the government 
and the burdens of the people, by disiilacing efficient 
public servants because they belong to the opposite 
party, and by filling the places with inexperienced 
and therefore expensive men of his own. Tell them 
this with decision and firmness, and soon the wild 
scramble will cease which harrasses yon and your 
aids beyond endurance, almost blocking the wheels 
of the government and exposing us to the scoffs of 
civilized men. Let all concerned well understand 
that only the public interest will be served and no 
spoils are to be had while you are president, and you 
will find congress more willing than it ever has been 
to regulate the service permanently by rational leg¬ 
islation. It may be said that by doing this you will 
offend many politicians. So you will. You will of¬ 
fend the same men whom you have offended many 
times before, and whose hostility has been your 
glory and strength. And they will be equally of¬ 
fended if you do only half of it. But by doing the whole 
you will win the support and the lasting gratitude of 
a patriotic people. No living man has more reason 
than you to know that the people can be trusted, 
that as to all questions of political morals they are 
far in advance of the professional politicians, and 
that they are capable of enforcing their will. If they 
were not, then you would not be where you are. We 
read of able and brave men in history whose achieve¬ 
ments remained crude and commonplace, while a 
little more of bold decision at the moment of great 
opportunity would have made them heroes and 
placed them among the immortals. Y’ours is the op¬ 
portunity of a generation. It is an enviable oppor¬ 
tunity, worthy of the noblest, the most patriotic am¬ 
bition. As Abraham Lincoln stands in our annals 
as the liberator of the slave, yon may stand there, if 
you will, as the regenerator of our political life. 









The civil service chronicle. 


If we sfee nothing iii oiir victory but a license to revel in partisan spoil, we shall fail at every point.— 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November 18. 


VoL. II, No. 4. INDIANAPOLIS, JUNE, 1893. terms : ^ ?o“cTn?”pUc%r““ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

We gladly gave the space of The Chron¬ 
icle last month to the addresses and reso¬ 
lutions brought out at the meeting of the 
National League. These put the League 
and the cause of civil service reform be¬ 
fore the country in the bravest and best 
manner. There is not a single note of 
flinching or equivocation. The same stand¬ 
ard is to be applied to this administration 
that was applied to its predecessor. In 
Carl Schurz as president the League has 
secured a great leader. 


John H. Daugherty, who removed to 
Irvington last fall from California, has been 
made postmaster there in place of George 
W. Russell, removed. Mr. Russell had 
held the office for twelve years, and nearly 
the entire community interested desired 
his retention. This was shown by their 
petition, signed by the people without 
respect to party, which was duly forward¬ 
ed to the postmaster-general. Daugh¬ 
erty got up a counter petition, and among 
its signers were sundry minors and women, 
and people who did not receive their mail 
matter at Irvington, including resi¬ 
dents of neighboring towns, which have 
post-offices of their own. This fraudulent 
petition was forwarded to the postmaster- 
general, along with charges of official 
misconduct against Mr. Russell. On 
learning these facts, a leading and in¬ 
fluential democrat in Irvington, went 
to Washington representing Mr. Rus¬ 
sell and asked the postmaster-general 
for the privilege of looking at the papers 
of Daugherty in order that the character 
of this petition and the falsity of the 
charges against Russell might be shown. 
This was refused with the statement that 
nobody but Mr. Bynum could be permit¬ 
ted to see the papers. Mr. Russell and 
his friends were dumbfounded at this rul¬ 
ing. They expected, as a matter of simple 
decency and fair play, that the opportu¬ 
nity to make a defense against charges 
would be promptly given, and that the 
real wishes of the people concerned would 
be consulted. But this did not suit Mr. 
Bynum, who “decided” that Daugherty 
should have the place. By all the rules of 
fairness which appeal to the American 


people, Mr. Russell should have been 
enabled to find out what particular charges 
had been made, and who made them. He 
would not only have had the means of de¬ 
fending himself, bu he would have put 
Mr. Bynum on trial for these star chamber 
proceedings. 

Senator Voorhees is a state calamity and a na¬ 
tional nuisance. If he has ever done anything that 
reflected honor on the commonwealth he misrepre¬ 
sents, We fail to recall it. He can be regularly 
counted on to be on the wrong side of every public 
question and every public policy and principle. 
Everybody knows this. And yet no man in the 
whole United States appears to have so much in¬ 
fluence with the President. What does it mean 7 
The Terre Haute post-office episode is the logical 
result of Voorhees’s methods and Voorhees’s ideas- 
of public oi&ce.—Indianapolis News. 

The question the News asks is being 
asked on every hand and by every condi¬ 
tion of men. The apparent power of Voor¬ 
hees is the most astonishing fact of Mr. 
Cleveland’s second presidency. If the ap¬ 
pearance is true, the old truth will come 
home bitter to the President that he can 
not serve two masters. He can not serve 
the people of this country and Dan Voor¬ 
hees. 


One who has not been in personal con¬ 
tact with the executive officers in Wash¬ 
ington can hardly realize the terror in 
which they stand of the individual ven¬ 
geance of congressmen. A fair illustra¬ 
tion of this pitiable condition is seen in 
the wording and tone of the letter of First 
Assistant Postmaster-General Jones upon 
the Terre Haute post-office. Congress¬ 
men, at any sign of hesitation in an exec¬ 
utive officer, at once begin to threaten 
him. Executive officers are rare who do 
an act without first considering whether 
it will offend a congressman. Congress¬ 
men are the instigators and managers of 
the secret charge system. They are 
ashamed of their work and want it kept 
covered. If it were not for them that in¬ 
famous practice of our government would 
cease, and charges would be as public as 
other matters are. The average congress¬ 
man has gone on threatening and bully¬ 
ing, and using underhand and secret 
means, until he appears to be a cross be¬ 
tween a bully and a sneak. All this is for 
patronage. In this degraded condition of 
things it is a relief to have one congress¬ 
man, Dr. Everett, of Massachusetts, de¬ 
clare that he will have nothing to do with 


the distribution of patronage. If one dis¬ 
trict can get along without an office- 
broker, all can. The President, for him¬ 
self and all officers under him, should de¬ 
clare the independence of the executive. 
He should cut off congressmen absolutely 
from all connection with appointments to 
office. Nothing but good would result. 
Congressmen are too cowardly to stand 
before the country as refusing supplies to 
the executive because they are refused 
control of offices. 


President Cleveland asked Mr. Roose¬ 
velt to remain on the civil service commis¬ 
sion and the latter consented to do so. It 
was against Mr. Roosevelt’s personal incli¬ 
nation to stay, a more congenial career be¬ 
ing open to him in other directions. But 
the call of reform was too imperative. 
There was no one to take his place. And 
he is appreciated, not only by civil service 
reformers, but by the American people, 
who like a man who will not equivocate, 
who will not temporize, who will not play 
the sycophant, who will not flinch, but who 
knows his duty and will do it, whatever 
the consequences—in a word, whom no 
man nor set of men can make afraid 
These are the qualities the times need. 


President Cleveland can not honora¬ 
bly leave Mr. Roosevelt handicapped. The 
civil service commission has again come 
to a standstill so far as usefulness is con¬ 
cerned. Commissioner Johnston’s later 
acts show that our former estimate of him 
was correct. He is simply a bourbon pol¬ 
itician and another edition of Edgerton^ 
whom Mr. Cleveland removed. His course 
has been such as to encourage such as¬ 
saults upon law and reform as were made 
at Terre Haute. He is in sympathy with 
the enemies of civil service reform, and 
makes it his study to see how much the 
operations and influence of the commis¬ 
sion can be limited. He does not repre¬ 
sent civil service reform and is not in sym¬ 
pathy with it. He must know this, and if 
he is an honorable man he will get off 
from the commission. This cause has 
struggled too long and too hard to be in 
any manner blocked by such a man. If 
he does not resign the President should 
deal with him as he did with Edgerton, 
but with much more promptness. 






















38 


THE CIVIL Service chronicle. 


There never was any excuse for the 
least uncertainty with regard to the newly 
classified free delivery offices. Four years 
ago, as Mr. Roosevelt shows in his report, 
the republicans while waiting for the eli¬ 
gible list turned over 2,000 men out of the 
railway mail service, and this was always 
properly denounced as an act of treachery, 
and it was one of the costliest of many 
costly mistakes made by the Harrison ad¬ 
ministration. It was the duty of President 
Cleveland and the postmaster-general to 
regard the platform upon which they went 
into office, and, in carrying out its letter 
and spirit, to give special attention to the 
newly classified offices. A single word from 
them that changes must wait upon the eli¬ 
gible lists would have been sufficient. This 
word was not spoken but, instead, they 
have given the impression that if a newly 
appointed postmaster can, with the help of 
his congressman, hustle around and get 
hold of his commission and get possession 
of his office in time, whatever he does in 
the way of a clean sweep will be all right; 
that they will neither give him active help 
nor stand in his way. After this kind of 
hustling the postmaster at Little Rock was 
permitted to turn out eleven employes to 
make room for his favorites, and at Quincy 
(III.), it is said, a clean sweep has been made. 
This has simply put another good weapon 
in the hands of Mr. Cleveland’s enemies. 
Nor can it be credited to the President, 
but rather to the postmaster himself, that 
Postmaster John J. Nolan, who recently 
took charge of the Evansville office, re¬ 
fused to make removals until there was an 
eligible list to fill vacancies from; and he 
emphasized his determination with the re¬ 
mark, “There will not be any jimmy or 
crowbar business in this office.” 


The President has appointed Charles W. 
Dayton postmaster of New York. Mr. Day- 
ton is a lawyer and is nominally a mem¬ 
ber of Tammany Hall. He was a Hill 
democrat in the snap and anti-snap strug¬ 
gle, and supported Hill for President. Of 
his qualifications he said when he heard of 
his appointment: “Why, I know absolutely 
nothing about postal matters, and to the 
running of the post-office have never given 
a thought. It is best to be absolutely frank. 
Whatever talent for postal affairs I have 
will have to be developed by 'study 
and experience.” About the same time he 
said of the 140 places which are outside 
of the classified service: “There is not 
much chance for a clean sweep, and even 
if there were I would not take advantage 
of it.” Later, to the Harlem democratic 
club he said: “I belong to the democratic 
party and to the regular organization of 
that party in this city, and when it be¬ 
comes my duty to take a stand, in its be¬ 


half I will be found as firm as a rock.” 
June 10, while making a call at the post- 
office, he said: “I will put in good demo¬ 
crats wherever I find that a change would 
be for the benefit of the service.” The 
President has been much commended for 
the “adroitness” and “wisdom” of this ap¬ 
pointment. This commendation, however, 
does not pertain to the manner in which 
the man can perform his duties, but to 
the fact that the appointment is an unre- 
sentable move against the ruling Tam¬ 
many Hall bosses. Either in the New 
York post-office itself, or elsewhere in the 
postal service, there must have been a man 
who not only was not an ignoramus in pos¬ 
tal matters, but who was well-fitted to 
take the place once filled by Pearson. 
This was the man the country was entitled 
to have, for the management of this office 
concerns the whole country. In omitting 
to find and select that man, Mr. Cleveland 
has missed a great opportunity to carry 
out the reform promises of his party and 
himself, and he has put another weapon 
into the hands of his enemies. 

If Postmaster-General Bissell can stand 
the odium which his plan in relation to 
the fourth-class post-offices if carried out 
will bring upon him, he can stand any¬ 
thing. There is no doubt but that he 
means to accomplish the greatest reform 
which now remains to be accomplished in 
the civil service, but it is in no spirit of crit¬ 
icism that we point out that he is pursu¬ 
ing the hardest possible road. He will not 
remove any postmaster without cause. 
But to fill vacancies he relies upon con¬ 
gressmen, and democrats only are ap¬ 
pointed. Congressmen are ravenous for 
vacancies, and they hunt for causes of re¬ 
moval. Trumped-up charges to an extent 
never before known will soon flood the 
postmaster-general. If these are listened 
to, the reform would have been better not 
undertaken. If they are not listened to> 
congressmen will noc accomplish a clean 
sweep and their exasperation against Mr. 
Bissell will be sharpened by defeat. The 
only true way is for Mr. Bissell to stand 
upon the constitution and the laws. The 
simple announcement that congressmen 
shall no longer have any voice in filling 
these offices, but that vacancies will be 
filled without regard to politics upon in¬ 
formation to be obtained on the ground by 
inspectors and officers of the department, 
would meet with an approval throughout 
the country that would astonish Mr. Bis¬ 
sell; and further, after a thirty-day spasm, 
he would have less hatred and opposition 
from congressmen than he will under the 
present method. 

Secretary Carlisle promptly quar¬ 
tered his son Logan on the country by 


making him chief clerk of the treasury. 
Of the tried and experienced clerks of the 
treasury young Mr. Carlisle says that he 
does “not believe in these indispensable peo¬ 
ple, and when I hear of one go he will, no 
matter what the mugwumps say.” The 
father says, “The idea that any officer un¬ 
der this government is essential to its effi¬ 
cient administration is absurd.” Having 
thus delivered themselves, they set about 
violating the pledges of the platform upon 
which both of them got places. As perhaps 
the fittest example of efficiency and expe¬ 
rience they dismissed the chief of the sta¬ 
tionery division, and put into his place a 
democrat without experience in the duties 
to be performed. If the Carlisles, father 
and son, want to do Mr. Cleveland great 
harm they have only to continue carrying 
out their ideas. The remark of the son, 
concerning present employes, that they 
had “heard notice in November which 
ought to have been loud enough” is the re¬ 
mark of a smartish and unfeeling upstart. 
As to Secretary Carlisle, it seems likely to 
be found that even in matters not pertain¬ 
ing to the civil service he is not a states¬ 
man but only a Covington lawyer with 
many rickety notions. 


The distribution of patronage in Wash¬ 
ington has taken on phases not known be¬ 
fore in fifty years. The President has been 
compelled by the perpetual presence of the 
mob to cut off all conferences with office- 
seekers, and the postmaster-general refuses 
to remove fourth-class postmasters without 
cause. This leaves it that congressmen 
are the only ones who have the ear of the 
President in the matter of patronage, and 
their vicious power is so far consolidated 
and strengthened. The congressmen are 
the root of the trouble. The moment the 
President declares that he will never allow 
the influence of a congressman to enter 
into an appointment, the atmosphere will 
clear and business methods will spring into 
use in all departments of the government 
with surprising rapidity. We have point¬ 
ed out elsewhere the likelihood that the 
postmaster-general will be flooded with 
baseless charges trumped up by congress¬ 
men to make vacancies for their hench¬ 
men in fourth-class post-offices. In other 
respects the situation has not greatly 
changed. Congressmen are giving their 
time, as usual, to getting their followers 
quartered upon the people. Senator Tur- 
pie innocently expressed the fact the other 
day in his remark, “The time since the ad¬ 
journment of congress has been largely 
occupied in preparing and presenting can¬ 
didacies for various appointments.” But 
it takes the har'dest work they have ever 
done to get their men in. Probably the 
Voorheeses, the Bynums and the Vests 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


39 


have had more bad hours since the fourth 
of last March than they had had before in 
all their lives. Spoil appointments are not 
made more than a third as fast as they 
were under Harrison, but they are still 
spoil appointments. The heads of division 
have not been classified but are slowly 
being removed and their places given to 
democrats. No one will claim but that 
making Hughes East and Lewis Jordan 
heads of division in Washington from In¬ 
diana, is the spoils system in its worst 
form. Of the former we have before spok¬ 
en ; the latter is over sixty years old and 
is a bourbon politician, and has always 
been an open and active enemy of the 
merit system in every shape, and is not a 
man of established efficiency in any de¬ 
partment; and as to the party services for 
which this office was openly given him, he 
was paid in cash for the services more than 
they were worth. The President has no 
right to allow under-employes to be beaten 
out of a chance of promotion by competi¬ 
tion by such appointments as these. It 
should be borne in mind that a slow clean 
sweep has all the evils of a rapid one. 
There have been some excellent appoint¬ 
ments, but in general the spoils system is 
going on, and complete and eftective plans 
for its disuse seem to be slow in appearing. 

THE TERRE HAUTE POST-OFFICE. 

The decision of First Assistant Postmas¬ 
ter-General Jones, in its main point, that 
Postmaster Donham must fill vacancies 
from the eligible list, completely blocks 
the game which Voorhees and the post¬ 
master were trying to play at Terre Haute, 
and all their efforts have been wasted. 
Aside from this the decision in its fulsome 
and unendurable sycophancy, clearly in¬ 
spired by fear of Voorhees, sounds like the 
usual decisions of the ward politicians who 
get into the under places at Washington. 
For instance, Jones knows well enough that 
the charge of insubordination is wholly 
untrue and dishonest. Donham was a mere 
interloper, was forbidden to take posses¬ 
sion until a certain time, was trying to 
take possession after he had been so for¬ 
bidden and the insubordination consisted 
in the employes continuing to obey Post¬ 
master Greiner, which it was their duty to 
do. Jones speaks of this attempt of Don¬ 
ham with his followers to mob the office as 
“possibly too hasty and ardent,” but he 
thinks it will be approved by Donham’s 
political associates. 

Reference of one branch of the case, 
the removal of clerks and carriers, to a 
subordinate will not relieve the President 
of responsibility as to Donham himself. It 
is well to keep in mind the case as it 
must be considered by the President: 
Some persons of Terre Haute, who styled 


themselves democrats, wanted to get con¬ 
trol of the post-office, so as to fill it up 
with their followers before the civil serv¬ 
ice rules took effect. They have always 
openly declared this to be the purpose of 
their conspiracy. The postmaster had 
some weeks to serve, but before his time 
would expire the rules would go into ef¬ 
fect. It was therefore represented to him 
directly, and also through his friends and 
relatives, that if, in order to enable the pro¬ 
ject to be carried out, he would resign, he 
would be given a certain amount of mon¬ 
ey. At the same time he was told, in 
substance, “ If you do not resign, an im¬ 
moral act will be charged against you 
to secure your removal.” He refused 
to resign and the immoral act was 
charged. There was influence enough 
to procure a government inspector to be 
sent to Terre Haute to make the investi¬ 
gation, and he went with orders to report, 
and did report, to John E. Lamb. The 
inspector reported the charge proved and 
the postmaster was removed, seven weeks 
before the end of his term. The fact that he 
had become blind, that he had a wife and 
children, and a large number of relatives, 
whose pain under this knife is like almost 
no other, should perhaps be left out of 
consideration in forming an impartial 
judgment. 

How do the democrats of Indiana like this 
work ? We can say for hundreds of them, 
from personal knowledge, that they loathe 
and despise it. When Senator Voorhees 
took up this transaction he entered upon 
the foulest work a man can put his hand 
to. It is for such work that respectable 
people shun a man. It remains to be seen 
whether the people of Indiana have spirit 
enough to drive this dishonorable blather¬ 
skite out of public life. 

If President Cleveland can tolerate a 
postmaster who obtained his place as Don¬ 
ham did, he has the power to keep him in, 
but he will put a weapon into the hands of 
his enemies, than which they will ask no 
better. We do not need to repeat the 
other well known reasons for which Don¬ 
ham should have been removed instantly. 
His avowed purpose to get possession of 
the office to beat the civil service law, was 
enough. His refusal to obey the order of 
the department to delay taking possession 
was enough. His illegal attempt to dis¬ 
miss carriers, was enough. His openly 
declared enmity to the civil service law, 
was enough. How long would a republi¬ 
can guilty of any of these offenses be now 
left in office? 

SWINISH SPOIL. 

The United States inspection of meat 
for export at this point teaches several les¬ 
sons. The Harrison administration set up 


an establishment of one physician. Dr. 
Brayton,at$l,400a year; six young women 
as assistant microscopists, each at $600 a 
year, and one tagger at $720 a year. There 
was nothing small or mean about this pro¬ 
vision for meat inspection, the cost aggre¬ 
gating $9,720 annually. During all of the 
last winter and until Harrison went out of 
office this array must have been kept under 
pay solely to reduce the surplus, for one 
person could have done all the work and 
more, commencing with the tagging and 
ending with a look through the micro¬ 
scope. Now comes Secretary Morton and 
reduces the force to a physician, two as¬ 
sistant microscopists and a tagger. But he 
makes the discovery that the policy of this 
administration could not be carried out if a 
tagger with republican proclivities were to 
cut strips from hogs for inspection, and so 
the republican tagger is dismissed and a 
democrat is appointed, and to this extent 
the policy of the administration is safe 
from betrayal. For a like reason it was 
found that young women whose fathers 
were or had been republicans could not be 
trusted to fasten the meat upon slides for 
the microscope and they were promptly 
discharged and others whose relatives were 
democrats were, at the direction of Bynum 
and Turpie, given the places. One of the 
dismissed assistants was a daughter of the 
late ex Governor Conrad Baker, and if 
there is any smaller business than to turn 
her out because her father was a republi¬ 
can it would take a microscope of much 
higher power than that used in meat in¬ 
spection to find it. Likewise, Dr. Brayton 
being a republican could not be trusted to 
examine slides under the microscope any 
longer and he was dismissed and one Dr. 
Stucky, “a good sound democrat,” was 
given the place. Dr. Brayton is a physi¬ 
cian in high standing with a large prac¬ 
tice, which he doubtless attended to dili¬ 
gently while holding this office, the gov¬ 
ernment having little for him to do, while 
Dr. Stucky is not a physician of high 
standing nor with a large practice and he 
will haye to idle away a good deal of time; 
but he can probably look through a micro¬ 
scope and find worms in pork. The secre¬ 
tary of agriculture would do well to turn 
his attention once more to the meat in¬ 
spection department and take the politics 
out of it. And we make the further sug¬ 
gestion that since exporting meats goes by 
fits and starts the pay for inspection should 
be per hog, so that when for weeks and 
months there is nothing to do the reduc¬ 
tion of the surplus may cease. 

THE REORGANIZATION OF PEN¬ 
SION BOARDS. 

About all that is known here concerning 
changes in medical pension boards has 









40 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


come through the Washington special cor¬ 
respondence of the Indianapolis Sentinel. 
According to this information the clean 
sweep of these boards in Indiana is nearly 
complete and soon will be entirely so. 
This change consists in turning out repub¬ 
lican doctors and putting in democratic 
doctors. There was some talk about keep¬ 
ing a republican doctor on each board, but 
Congressmen “Cooper, Bynum and others 
convinced the commissioner that such a 
board produced discord, and each side tried 
to work the applicant. * * * Often the 
democratic member would vie with the 
republican member in rating the applicant 
just to catch his vote.” These remarks, 
made June 2 by the Sentinel correspond¬ 
ent, tell more of the work of these worth¬ 
less boards than could be told in whole 
columns. There are 1,237 medical pension 
boards, and the country pays them $1,750,- 
000 a year. The places have always been 
treated as spoil, and the doctors have been 
the tools of the congressmen who got them 
their places. To the congressmen and these 
boards, rating persons for pensions who 
ought not to be rated, is due most of the 
dishonest pensioning which has occurred. 
There is no choice of parties. The demo¬ 
crats are just as dishonest as the republi¬ 
cans. There never was a more corrupt 
political machine than the pension ma¬ 
chine in Indiana during Mr. Cleveland’s 
first administration. 

There are undoubtedly many persons 
drawing pensions whose names should be 
struck off. But if these political boards 
are put before the country as an instru¬ 
ment with which to distinguish names 
fraudulently on the list, the country will 
conclude either that there is no honest in¬ 
tention to make the list true, or that the 
administration stupidly fails to grasp the 
situation. For instance, suppose persons 
in Indianapolis have obtained pensions on 
the ground of physical disability, but in 
fact are not physically disabled. Is it ex¬ 
pected that Congressman Bynum and the 
board lately named by him will have the 
confidence of this community in its fair¬ 
ness in pointing out these fraudulent pen¬ 
sioners? We can assure the administra¬ 
tion that a very few moves by this con¬ 
gressman and his board would produce 
almost open rebellion here, for the reason 
that the board is a political board and its 
acts would be believed to be biased by po¬ 
litical considerations. After a short course 
with these political boards the administra¬ 
tion will find it too late for anything ex¬ 
cept reflection upon how great defeat a 
party can suffer just after winning a great 
victory. 

In purging the pension list the adminis¬ 
tration has a stern duty, and it will have 
to perform it in a manner so honorable 
and fair that all the world will say it was 


done honorably and fairly. In this work, 
congressmen and poli deal boards and pol¬ 
iticians should be absolutely discarded and 
ignored. The only boards in which the 
ex-soldiers and the people have any confi¬ 
dence are army and navy boards, for the 
reason that they are known to be clear of 
politics and free from the coercion of con¬ 
gressmen. The transfer of the pension 
boards to the classified service and filling 
them anew from eligible lists, thus making 
the members independent, is the very least 
that can be done with safety. There is ab¬ 
solutely no method of appointment except 
by competition which will free them from 
suspicion. 

STEPS TOWARD “PURGING THE 
PENSION LIST." 

Congressman Conn caused a clean sweep to be 
made of the republican examining surgeons in the 
thirteenth district. The following democrats 
were to-day appointed in their places: 

La Porte county—D. L. Brown, Michigan City; Ja¬ 
cob Martin, Rolling Praire; T. S. Omis, Laporte. Stj 
Joseph county—John B. Bedling, Nortre Dame; N. 
T. Montgomery, C. A. Doughorty, South Bend. Mar¬ 
shall county—J. W. Edson, Bourbon; C. F. Wahle, 
Breman; J. H. Wilson, Plymouth. Kosciusko county 
—Levi J. Johne, Mildford; L. F. Moody, Princeton, 
James M. Amiss, Silver Lake. Elkhart county—Wal¬ 
lace F. Haul, Elkhart; JohuS. Suks, Naponee; Dan¬ 
iel F. Miller, Goshen.— Washington Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, April 20. 

Examining surgeons were also appointed in 
the first district, upon the recommendation of 
Congressman Taylor, as follows: 

Posey county—Drs. Ramsey and Pearce. Vander- 
burg county—Drs. Carter, Wosshen,and Mulheuisen. 
— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, Apri. 
20 . 

Drs. J. T. Smith, of Lockport, P. L. Fish, 
of Quincy, and John M. Stucky, of Spencer, 
have been appointed pension examiners for 
Owen county under recommendation of Congress¬ 
man Cooper .— Washington Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, April 20. 

Representative Taylor has had the following 
board of pension examiners appointed for 
Rockport, Ind.; Drs. Ehrman, F. M. Hackle- 
man, and Felix Maslow.— Washington Dispatch 
to Indianapolis News, April 2.5. 

Congressman Brookshire is disposing of his pen¬ 
sion boards just now. He will reorganize each 
one in his district. To-day he recommended 
appointments upon pension boards as follows: 

Terre Haute —Drs. Haworth and Moorehead, of 
Terre Haute, and Russell, of Riley. 

Clay County—Drs. Veach, of Staunton; Tulley, of 
Brazil, and Madisett, of Corry. 

Sullivan County—Drs. Durham, of Graysville; De- 
lashmutte, of Sheldon, and Pertile, of Carlisle. 

Parke County—Drs. Vancleve, of Catlin; Peare, of 
Bellmore, and Goldsbury of Bloomingdale. 

The appointments of the above medical 
boards are expected to be made to-morrow. 
Mr. Brookshire will name the members of the 
other pension boards in his district very soon. 
Most of the remaining unorganized boards 
will likely be named by him to-morrow.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Jownal, 
April 25. 


Upon the recommendation of Congressman By¬ 
num the pension medical board for Hancock 
county was reorganized yesterday with the 
following members: Drs. Martin, Boots and 
Selman.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, April 29. 

Representative Bynum has caused the pension 
medical boards of Marion and Madison counties to 
be reorganized. To day the following members 
were appointed upon his recommendation : 

Marion—Drs. Rooker, of Castleton; W. J. Brown¬ 
ing and Ernest Reyer, of Indianapolis. 

Madison—Drs. J. W. Branch and J. B. Fattie, of 
Anderson, and Dr. S. W. Edwins, of Elwood. 

They are all democrats and the retiring 
members are all republicans. The commis¬ 
sions of the new members will be sent out 
next week.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapo¬ 
lis Sentinel, May 5. 

Congressman Broivn to-day selected and recom¬ 
mended to the commissioner of pensions the following 
gentlemen as examining surgeons for the pension 
boards in his district: 

New Albany—Drs. R. P. Rutherford, Frank H. Wil¬ 
cox, Richard M. Ziegler. 

Charlestown—Drs. W. F. Work, S. S. Williams, J. 
M. Nickles. 

Madison—Drs. J. V. Rawlings, T. E. Swan, C. C. 
Copeland. 

Scottsburg—Drs. T. W. Warmouth, H. Tammage, 8. 
H. Smith. 

North Vernon—Drs. A. B. Light, W. M. Stemm, O. 
Gaddy. 

Seymour—Drs. D. S. Cummings, A. May, J. H. 
Green. 

Salem—Drs. C. W. Murphy, H. S. Paynter, J. K. 
Mitchell.—TFas/iinpfon Dispatch to Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, May 3. 

Congressman Cooper to-night sent the following 
nominations to Washington for members of the pen¬ 
sion boards: 

Bartholomew county—Drs. K. D. Hawley, R. E. 
Holden, J. K. Smalley. 

Johnson county—Dr. E. B. Williams, to fill va¬ 
cancy. 

Morgan county—Drs. S. A. Tllford. C. M. Lindly, 
M. F. Brackney. 

Putnam county—Drs. G. W. Bruce, J. R. Leather- 
man, J. F. Cnlley.—Columbus Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, May 5. 

A few weeks ago the appointment of demo¬ 
cratic physicians to pension medical boards 
was announced in nearly every county in Ind¬ 
iana, but the commissions were riot sent out. 
When the new commissioner of pensions took 
possession of his office, the question came up 
as to whether the boards should be composed 
of three democrats or two democrats and one 
republican. Ex-Commissioner Black exerted 
his influence in favor of the minority repre¬ 
sentation board as he had them under the for¬ 
mer Cleveland administration. Representatives 
Cooper, Bynum and others convinced the com¬ 
missioner that such a board produced discord, 
and each side tried to work the applicant. If 
an applicant was rejected the minority repre¬ 
sentatives would console the applicant by tell¬ 
ing him the only way to secure a pension was 
to “ vote our ticket next time.” Often the 
democratic members would vie with the re¬ 
publican member in rating the applicant just 
to catch his vote. The Harrison administra¬ 
tion recognized this defect in a minority-rep- 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


41 


resenting board and all the members were 
taken from the republican ranks. The boards 
will now stand solidly democratic and the 
commissions of the physicians heretofore ap¬ 
pointed are being sent out as fast as they can 
be filled out.— Washington Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, June 2. 

SUBSIDIZING THE PRESS. 

Hoke Smith, of the Atlanta Journal, secretary of the 
interior. 

Claude Meeker, of the Cincinnati Enquirer, consul 
to Bradford. 

Louis C. Hughes, editor of the Tuscan Star, govern¬ 
or of Arizona. 

A. C. Hacker, editor of Martin County News, post¬ 
master at Shoals, Indiana. 

M. P. Pendleton, editor of the Belfast (Me.) Age, 
consul at Pictou. 

A. Allison, of the Nashville Democrat, postmaster 
at Nashville, Indiana. 

Charles W. Clare, editor of Re Union, postmaster at 
Watertown, New York. 

Robert B. Brown, editor of the Messenger, postmas¬ 
ter at Meadville, Pa. 

Samuel E. Morss, editor of the Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, consul-general at Paris. 

Philip Zoercher, editor of the Tell City News, post¬ 
master at Tell City, Indiana. 

Ernest P. Baldwin, editor of the Laurel (Md.) Dem¬ 
ocrat, first auditor of the treasury. 

Dr. Joseph A. Senner, of the New York Slants Zeit- 
ung, commissioner of immigration. 

Benjamin Lauthier, of Massachusetts, editor of two 
French papers consul to Sherbrooke. 

Dale J. Crittenberger, editor of the Anderson Dem¬ 
ocrat, postmaster at Anderson, Indiana. 

Ambrose W. Lyman, of the Helena (Montana) In¬ 
dependent, collector of internal revenue. 

Lewis Baker, proprietor of the St. Paul Globe, min¬ 
ister to Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Saivador. 

Herman Van Lenden, editor of the Paducah (Ky.) 
Standard, private secretary to Secretary Carlisle. 

Royal E. Purcell, editor and proprietor of the Vin¬ 
cennes Sun, postmaster at Vincennes, Indiana. 

George F. Parker, editor of the Globe (and author 
of a Campaign Life of President Cleveland), consul 
at Birmingham. 

Charles E. Peoples, editor of the Democrat, post¬ 
master at Pomeroy, Ohio. 

Wm. A. Hume, editor of the Times, postmaster at 
Chilton, Wisconsin. 

James E. Brown, editor of the Herald and Adver¬ 
tiser, postmaster at Newnan, Georgia. ^ 

Thomas H. Craig, of the Journal, postmaster at 
Athens, Ohio. 

Lewis Green, editor of the Hocking Sentinel, post¬ 
master at Logan, Ohio. 

Charles T. Denit, editor of the Times-Register, post¬ 
master at Salem, Virginia. 

C. F. Chase, of the Cass County Democrat, postmas¬ 
ter at Atlantic, Iowa. 

L. E. Rowley, of the Journal, postmaster at Lan¬ 
cing, Michigan. 

W. H. McCabe, of the Democratic Standard, post¬ 
master at Coshocton, Ohio. 

Paul J. Willard, of the News-Item, postmaster at 
Antigo, Wisconsin. 

D. S. Johnson, of the Oneida Herald, postmaster 
at Rhinelander, Wisconsin. 

James Mitchell, editor of the Arkansas Democrat, 
postmaster at Little Rock, Arkansas. 

John P. Kerr, editor of the Citizen, postmaster at 
Asheville, North Carolina. 

Alexander McDonald, of the Lynchburg Virginian, 
minister to Persia. 


Geo. W. Van Horne, editor News-Tribune, postmas¬ 
ter at Muscatine, Iowa. 

Frank H. Brooks, of the Chicago Tribune, consul 
at Trieste. 

George Horton, of the Chicago Herald, consul at 
Athens. 

Clinton Furbish, of the Chicago Times, director of 
the bureau of Arfierlcan republics. 

Milton H. Northrop, editor of the Courier, post¬ 
master at Syracuse, New York. 

William E. Quimby, editor of the Detroit Free 
Press, minister to the Netherlands. 

George William Caruth, of the TJttle Rock Gazette, 
minister resident and consul-general to Portugal. 

Thomas L. Thompson, editor of the Sonoma Dem¬ 
ocrat, minister to Brazil. 

Howard N. Thompson, Wa.shington correspondent, 
vice-consul to Liverpool. 

James B. Taney, editor of the Wheeling Register, 
consul at Belfast. 

T. O. Whitman, editor of the Journal, postmaster 
at Lewisburgh, Pa. 

W. W. Screws, of the Advertiser, postmaster at 
Montgomery, Alabama. 

J. N. Shepler, editor of the Standard, postmaster at 
Milan, Missouri. 

Snyder, editor of the Herald, postmaster at Joplin, 
Missouri. 

C. B. Hill, of the Eustls Lake Region, postmaster at 
Eustis, Florida. 

Van Leer Polk, of the Nashville American Consul- 
general to Calcutta. 

Peter H. Pernot, Washington correspondent In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, Cherokee appraiser. 

John W. Potter, editor of the Argus, postmaster at 
Rock Island, Illinois. 

S. P. Tufts, proprietor of the Democrat, postmaster 
at Centralia, Illinois 

Isaac Fielding, of the Times, postmaster at Cham¬ 
paign, Illinois. 

Wm W. Timmonds, editor of the Sun, postmaster 
at Portland, Indiana. 

U. A. Ashby, of the Iowa Homestead. 

GOVERNMENT BY CONGRESSMEN, 
OF CONGRESSMEN, AND FOR 
CONGRESSMEN. 

BYNUM’S. 

There are democrats in Indianapolis who would 
pay well for information that will lead to the discov- 
ery of the hiding-place of Congressman Bynum. The 
congressman returned from Hancock county some 
time Saturday, and since then has been avoiding the 
members of his party who are afflicted with the de¬ 
sire for public office. Mr. Bynum was shaved at the 
Grand Hotel barber shop Saturday evening, and 
since that time his best friends have been unable to 
get any trace of him. There was a large and impa¬ 
tient crowd in waiting for him at the Grand Hotel all 
day yesterday, and to-day the Grand, the Denison 
and the English Hotels were besieged by the men 
who want places. The members of some of the dele¬ 
gations became indignant when they learned that 
the congressman was purposely avoiding them. 

As the day grew older it developed that the con¬ 
gressman had agreed to meet various office-seekers, 
some at the Grand, others at English’s, and still oth¬ 
ers at the Denison. Among those who called at En¬ 
glish’s was Chairman Jackson of the Hancock coun¬ 
ty democratic committee. He was informed that 
Mr. Bynum was not in the hotel. 

‘‘But I have a letter from him, agreeing to meet 
me here,” said Mr. Jackson. 

“I can’t help that,” said the clerk, "he isn’t here.” 

About that time the telephone in the office of the 
same hotel rang. Terry Cullen, manager of the Den¬ 
ison House, was at the other end of the line. The 
conversation was about as follows: 

"Is Bynum stopping with you?” 

"No.” 


“This is Cullen, of the Denison. If he is there, I 
should like to know it. There is a delegation over 
here from Anderson looking for him.” 

"Sorry, but we can’t help you out. We would also 
like to know where he is.” 

During the forenoon the delegations, representing 
all sections of the district, traveled from one hotel to 
another in the fruitless search for the missing 
congressman. Trips were made to the congress¬ 
man’s law office on East Washington street, and to 
the residence on Bellefontaine street he formerly oc¬ 
cupied, but no trace of the missing congressman 
could be found. A few of the men who do not want 
office themselves, but had agreed to take time to call 
on the congressman in the interest of friends, were 
indignant because he had written that he would 
meet them at a certain hotel, and then had failed to 
keep his appointment. 

Mr. Bynum came out of hiding this afternoon and 
announced that he would return to Washington this 
evening.—Jndianapoh’* News, April 17. 

The action of Congressman Bynum in avoiding the 
seekers after federal offices during the last few days 
of his stay in the city is being criticised by many 
members of his party. Some harsh things are being 
said about the congressman by the men who feel 
that they were mistreated It is asserted and not 
denied that the congressman wrote letters to con¬ 
stituents in Hancock and Madison counties prom¬ 
ising to meet them at certain hotels here and then 
deliberately remained away from the hotels while 
the visitors were in the city. "I have no doubt Mr. 
Bynum was worn out by the office-seekers,” .said a 
democrat to-day, “but he shouldn’t have made 
promises he did not intend to keep. These things 
will be treasured up against the congressman, and 
when he asks for another nomination he may find 
that some of those who have stood by him in the 
past have deserted him.—-Indianapolis News, April 
18. 

Congressman Bynum reached Washington Tues¬ 
day night. As soon as the Hoosiers beheld his tow¬ 
ering form in the rotunda of Willard’s they gathered 
about him, and drew their petitions. It looked 
to many as if Mr. Bynum had aged very much 
since he left Washington, to escape the importuni¬ 
ties of office-seekers, only to find in Indianapolis 
that he had encountered even a more voracious 
crowd than he left behind.—IFasAmpfojj Dispatch to 
Indianapolis News, April 20. 

To the Editor of The Indianapolis News: 

Your statement that I made engagements and 
broke them is untrue. I challenge you to produce a 
single letter making an appointment which I did 
not meet. W. D. Bynum. 

Washington, D. C., April 20. 

[Mr. Bynum is something of a simpleton, or else 
he thinks the News is. Of course he is safe in chal¬ 
lenging us to produce a letter of his making an ap¬ 
pointment which he did not keep. We recorded the 
assertions of a great number of angry and disap¬ 
pointed men that he had promised to see them and 
failed. We took their word for it. We are not quite 
willing to take Mr. Bynum’s word to the contrary.— 
Editor the News.] 

The next surveyor of the port of Indianapolis will 
be John Rail. This, it is said, has been practlcallj' 
decided by Congressman Bynum, with whom the 
appointment lies absolutely, the federal constitu¬ 
tion to the contrary notwithstanding. He has no 
education, and the Journal has shown in the past 
that the degree of his illiteracy is sufficient to bar 
him out of any place of trust requiring business 
ability. He was engineer at the water-works pump¬ 
ing station for a long while, and has lately been em- 
ploj'ed by the Electric Lighting Company, at work 
but little better than common unskilled labor. 
Talking with a prominent democrat yesterday, a 
Journal reporter heard him say; “Rail is absolutely 
unqualified for the place. He has no property inter¬ 
ests, and there has been no call in his life for him to 
acquire the commonest rules of business. He would 
not know what a ‘schedool,’ as he would pronounce 
it, is, much less understand it.’’—Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, April 17. 

Congressman Bynum said that he proposed to 
name John Rail a.s his choice for the appointment 













42 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


of collector of customs of the Indianapolis port, and 
announced that he would make the recommenda¬ 
tion at a date long since passed. The fight against 
Rail has become so pronounced that the congress¬ 
man has become alarmed and it is said is trying to 
figure out some way to let go. Maurice Donnelly is 
practically out of the race, and Smith Myers does 
not have much hope. But John A. Reaume is mak¬ 
ing an earnest fight for it. He left for Washington a 
few days ago and carried with him a formidable 
bundle of papers containing charges against Rail. 
Among the documents is a verbatim copy of a reso¬ 
lution introduced in the board of aldermen by Mr. 
Rjiil, when a member of that body, in which he is 
said to have usetl some eccentric orthography. Rail 
and his friends-, however, do not seem to be at all 
frightened, and are sending in strong denials of the 
charges made against the candidate. They feel sat¬ 
isfied that Rail will receive the appointment.—/n- 
dianapolls News, May 15. 

Albert Lieber, who went to Washington .several 
days ago, saw Congressman Bynum, of course, and 
liad a little talk with him. 

"Did he intimate who will be appointed collector 
of customs here?” 

"He says John Rail will be appointed. The protests 
that have been forwarded, lie says, tvilt not affect that sit¬ 
uation any.”—Indianapolis News, May Tl. 

There is much talk among Indianapolis democrats 
over what is regarded as tlie endeavor of Congress¬ 
man Bynum to put all of the responsibility for the 
attempt to remove Postmaster Thompson upon Sen¬ 
ator Turpie. It is said by members of the party that 
the elTort to have Mr. Thompson removed originated 
with Mr. Bynum, and that while he was at home a 
few weeks ago he assi-tedin getting into shape the 
charges against Mr. Thompson. Democrats say that 
now, when it looks as though the effort would be a 
failure, Mr. Bynum desires to throw the responsibil¬ 
ity upon Senator Turpie; that Senator Turpie has 
taken iittle, if any, interest in the attempt to have 
Mr. Thompson removed, and that all the scheming 
has been done by ..congressman Bynum, assisted by 
Senator Voorhees .—Indianapolis News, May 24. 

The Hancock Democrat calls for the retirement of 
Congres.sman Bynum in this district, speaking of 
him as "a would-be deputy President or patronage 
boss of the worst type,” who "has outlived his use¬ 
fulness in congress, and is unfit to properly repre¬ 
sent the people .”—Indianapolis News, June 2. 

Congressman Bynum has recommended Franc Har- 
bitt for postmaster of Elwood.—/ndiannpofig News, 
April 29. 

After a long struggle the Elwood postmastership is 
settled, and Francis M. Harbitis tlie successful man. 
The scramble after that position here has been one 
that has caused much enmity between the different 
factions of the democratic party. Candidates for the 
office were James Parsons, who held the office un¬ 
der a former democratic administration; "Dock” 
Peed, David DeHarity and Francis Harbit. Mr. By¬ 
num was deluged with correspondence against liar- 
bit by different democrats who did not want to 
award honors to Harbit. But all to no avail. By¬ 
num had given his promise —Elwood Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, May 25. 

Mr. Bynum has recommended Eugene Lewis for 
postmaster of Greenfield at the request of nearly all 
the active democrats of the county. Lewis is editor 
of the Greenfield Herald, but it is understood he is to 
give it up. It will probably be consolidated with 
the Hancock Democrat in the interest of democratic 
harmony. Mr. Bynum has also recommended for 
appointment for postmasters in Madison county, F. 
M. Harbett at Elwood, \V. J. Cunningham at Alexan¬ 
dria, William Wright at Frank on —Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, May 4. 

There are more presidential post-offices in Madison 
county than in any other county in the country. 
Anderson, Alexandria, Elwood, Pendleton and 
Frankton all pay over 81,000 a year. Pendleton and 
Frankton, while not actually presidential offices at 
present, will be made so at the next quarterly settle¬ 
ment. With the appointment of Harbett at Elwood and 
Cunningham at Alexandria to day, these five big offices 


all pass over into democratic hands. The Anderson of¬ 
fice was the first one in the country to be filled by 
the present administration. Mr. Bynum has done 
well for Madison. It was through his untiring work 
that this change was accomplished .— Washington Dis 
patch to Indianapolis Sentinel, May 24. 

Mr. Bynum also secured the appointment of J. D. 
Compton of Indianapolis as carpenter of the treasury 
department; salary, 81,000. Compton is an old sol¬ 
dier, and was backed by the democratic soldiers’ 
and carpenters’ union.—IFasWopfon Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, April 29. 

Several appointments have been made and charged 
the seventh district forw'hich Representative Bynum 
is not responsible. The appointment of James Neal 
to day for special inspector of customs is among the 
number. This appointment was secured by Colonel 
Dick Bright, Senators Voorhees and Turpie, and Mr. 
Bynum wants it distinctly understood that he re¬ 
fused to indorse the application. Under President 
Cleveland’s former administration he was steamboat 
inspector.—IFasAinpfoji Dispatch to Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, May 16. 

Congressman Bynum is so much interested in the 
controversy over the Indianapolis post-office and 
surveyorship that he will not leave the capital for 
some time yet. He will probably be here during 
most of the month of July.—If'as/mipfojt Dispatch to 
Indianapolis News, June 13. 

CONN’S 

Congressman Conn, of Elkhart, reached Washing¬ 
ton late this afternoon, having arranged the post- 
office matters in his district. He went at once to 
Fourth Assistant Postmaster General Maxwell, and 
submitted a list of recommendations. Mr. Conn will 
remain here for some time.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolts Sentinel, April 13. 

Congressman Conn’s action in withdrawing his 
recommendations for fifty-four fourth-class postmas¬ 
ters yesterday, because Fourth Assistant Maxwell 
said that the congressional recommendation was not 
necessarily final, will not be receded from. He said 
to-day; "Mr. Maxwell told me when I first presented 
my indorsements that they would be acted upon. 
Yesterday he saw fit to go back on this ruling. 1 will 
now file all applications with him and he can settle 
the matter to suit himself, I will Indorse nobody.” 
— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, April 15. 

Congressman Conn has decided to settle every 
postoffice in his district, cross roads and all, by elec¬ 
tion. He has recommended candidates for all the 
fourth-class offices in the district, but upon being 
informed that his recommendations would not be 
considered unless accompanied with petitions he 
withdrew his indorsements, and will let the depart¬ 
ment settle the contests among the applicants. He 
will advise his constituents to hold elections and 
file the papers with the department. He will make 
no recommendations.— Washington Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, April 18. 

Headsman Maxwell has descended from his alii- 
tudinous perch and is groveling before Represeiita- 
tive Conn, of Elkhart. A couple of days ago it was 
related by a Journal special how Mr. Maxwell refused 
to respect the old custom of permitting the majority 
congressmen to name fourth-class postmasters in 
their districts without filing petitions from the pat 
rons of the offices, and how Mr. Conn withdrew fifty- 
two of his recommendations and declared that rather 
than be held responsible for these appointments and 
not be allowed to name them himself he preferred to 
let the whole business rest with his constituents. 

Late last night Mr. Maxwell called upon Mr. Conn. 
They were closeted for an hour or more. This morn¬ 
ing Mr. Conn called at the post-office department. 
Smiles wreathed his cleanly shave face. "I have re¬ 
submitted all of my recommendations for appoint¬ 
ments,” said he, “and am assured that my recom¬ 
mendations will be respected. Mr. Maxwell assures 
me that he will hereafter follow the recommenda¬ 
tions of democratic congressmen and hold them re¬ 
sponsible lor the appointments. I shall not now ask 
my constituents to hold elections and choose post¬ 
masters. I will name them.”—IFas/itJif/tow Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Journal, April 20. 


Returns from Congressman Conn’s fourth-class 
postmaster indorsements are coming in. His hand 
may be seen in the list for to-day in Indiana. All 
the appointments were made to supply vacancies 
caused by resignation, except at Sumption, where 
the vacancy came about through the death of the 
incumbent. The new postmasters areas follows:— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, April 27. 

Repre.sentative Conn intends to go with Mr. O. M. 
Packard to Controller Eckles to-morrow, and talk 
about the Indiana bank examinership. Mr. Conn is 
confident that Mr. Packard will get the position, and 
soon. It may be determined this week, as pressure 
is being brought to secure early action.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, April 25. 

[Packard got the place.] 

Representative Conn, Col. John.son and Editor 
Starrof the Goshen News leave for Indiana to-morrow. 
Mr. Conn says he is doing fairly well as regards post- 
office appointments for his district, still the-changes 
are not being made as rapidly as he would like. 
There are four postmasters against whom he has filed 
charges who will be removed in a few days, he be¬ 
lieves.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
April 25. 

Representative Conn is another new member who 
has been active and successful. Two of the four re¬ 
movals to-day, were from his district, Plymouth and 
New Carli.sle, in St. Joseph county.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis Sentinel, May 24. 

cooper’s. 

The senate’s confirmation of the appointment of 
the appointment of Isaac Holton as postmaster at 
Plainfield has torn up the local democracy, because 
it was regarded as an unfortunate appointment and 
because it means that Congressman Cooper has a pull 
and his men are being located as fast as possible. 
The most bitter fight was waged against Holton. He 
has not lived in Plainfield long, his conduct has not, 
at all limes, been approved by the people, and last 
Wednesday, on which day his name was sent to the 
senate, he was in Danville engaged in giving bond 
on five indictments charging him with allowing mi¬ 
nors to play pool in the establishment which he for¬ 
merly conducted in Flain^eld.-Danville Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, April 18. 

Congressman Cooper this morning had his grip 
packed for home, but the fifth district ofiice seekers 
here coaxed him to remain another week to help 
them out.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, April 19. 

Congressman Cooper sent the following names for 
postmasters: J. A. Lewis, St. Louis Crossing; J. M. 
Osborn, Petersville; Bartholomew Hunter, Maysville, 
Putnam county; Charles Ballard, Monroe, Morgan 
county.-Indianapolis Sentinel, May 4. 

Congressman Cooper has recommended Otis Hen¬ 
derson for postmaster at Siilesville, Hendricks coun¬ 
ty.—CoiamhusDispafc/ifo Indianapolis Sentinel, Mayl4. 

Congressman Cooper left for Indiana to-day after 
visiting the departments. Of 192 fourth-class post¬ 
masters in Mr. Cooper's district, all but ten republican 
incumbents have been succeeded by democrats. Of the 
presidential offices four out of nine are now in the hands 
democrats— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
June 3. 

The hostility to Joseph G. MePheeters, postmaster 
at this city, manifested by the vicious manner of his 
removal on charges of immorality, after the postmas¬ 
ter-general had declared the charges of offensive par¬ 
tisanship insufficient, is still fell by the greedy gang 
who, for place, are willing to become assassins of 
character. The furniture and equipment of the 
Bloomington post-office is the finest in southern In- 
indiana, of offices of like grade. When the retiring 
postmaster found that the Incoming administration 
contemplated the buying of other furniture, he 
made an offer of the entire equipment for less than 
half price. After the late election the threat was 
freely made on the streets that "MePheeters would 
have an office left on his hands,” and the new post¬ 
master made good the threat by contracting for an¬ 
other equipment Friday. All decent democrats in 
this place are outspoken in their condemnation of 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


43 


wliat they do not hesitate to call an “iudecent pro¬ 
ceeding.” The petty political spite that would seek 
to smirch the character and then injure the outgo¬ 
ing administration is a degradation of the public 
service which every honorable man will condemn. 
The people of all parties believe that John R. East 
and his sou Rufus have made a serious blunder in 
the beginning of their official life, and that before 
four years have gone by their defeat will be over¬ 
whelming and theirmortiticationcomplete.—Rfoom- 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, May 2. 

Two of the three democratic presidential poslma.s- 
ters were appointed to-day for Indiana to supersede 
republicans removed for cause. The republicau 
postmasters of Bloomington and Bluffton had each 
three months longer to serve, but they are removed 
upon charges preferred against them of offensive 
partisanship. Postmaster McPheeters of Blooming¬ 
ton was charged with having destroyed political sup¬ 
plements to democratic papers during the campaign 
of 1890, and in the last election while making a tour 
of the county ostensibly to inspect country post of¬ 
fices, he distributed republican campaign literature 
and put in most of his time organizing the g. o. p. 
He hung up in the post-offices, much to the disgust 
of self-respecting patrons, outlandish pictures of 
Cleveland with all sorts of ridiculous descriptions. 
Rufus H. East, the new postmaster, is a young man 
who has been deputy county clerk for two years, and 
is a son of John R. East, a well known lawyer. East 
was highly recommended by the business men and 
patrons generally. The editors of the two democratic 
papers, the Courier and World, united on East.—Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentmel, April 20. 

Mr. McPheeters’ term of office would not have ex¬ 
pired for almost a year, and it is the universal testi¬ 
mony of patrons of the office, regardless of party, 
that the office was conducted strictly on a business 
basis and according to law. But a compact had been 
made, as early as last Christmas, which, to be car¬ 
ried out, required that the Bloomington office be va¬ 
cated at once. Senator Voorhees has a niece here who 
is one his special favorites, and the senator was anxious 
for her to have a position, and it was, therefore, agreed 
that if he would assist Congressman Cooper to get Edwin 
Corr in as assistant United States attorney, he, in return, 
would appoint R. H. East, postmaster, and he, in re¬ 
turn, would make his favorite niece the assistant. To 
this end Cooper and Voorhees worked. They filed 
charges of offensive partisanship, one of them being 
that the republican postmaster had placed cartoons 
of Cleveland and his wife in the office, and other 
charges equally false. All these failed, however, 
and word comes from Washington that Voorhees 
finally demanded the removal on a charge of immor 
ality, followed by the statement that the charges 
were of such a nature as to be unfit for publication. 
This is the grossest fabrication, as there is not a citi¬ 
zen of Bloomington but believes him to be a man of 
upright Christian character. All of this again shows 
the complete control of Voorhees in Indiana affairs, 
and his unscrupulous methods of dealing in polit¬ 
ical matters .—Bloomington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, April 25. 

HAMMOND’S. 

John J. Young was appointed a meat inspector at 
Hammond to-day. Salary, 81,COO. He was reccom- 
ntended by Congressman Hammond,— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis News, April 18. 

Pursuant to notice given by the chairman of the 
democratic county central committee, a post-office 
election was held here yesterday. Of the 289 votes 
polled, John M. Turner received 288. Gustave Lowe, 
a wealthy cattle dealer, who recently moved to town, 
has the recommendation of Congressman Hammond 
for postmaster, and the election yesterday was an ef¬ 
fort by his opponents to set aside the congressional 
choice. Lowe declined to enter the contest, claiming 
that such proceedings were not properly authorized. 
It is presumed that he feels secure in the recommen¬ 
dation of Congressman Hammond. On the other hand 
Mr. Turner is distantly related to Senator Turpie, be¬ 
sides which he is an intimate personal friend, and it 
is conjectured that this relationship may have 
brought about the election as a means by which to 


head off Lossc.—Monticcllo Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, May 17 

John Turner, who was appointed by the President 
yesterday postmaster at Monticello, was not recom¬ 
mended by Representative Hammond, who repre¬ 
sents that district. Mr. Hammond recommended A. 
Low and felt confident of 8ucce.ss a week ago when 
assured that the senators would not interfere. The fight 
against Mr. Hammond’s man was conducted by 
Judge Reynolds and ex United States Attorney Sell¬ 
ers. *>.■>* This fight was precipitated by a county 
factional fight which originated in the repairs of the 
court-house, ordered by Judge Reynolds, the Mon¬ 
ticello Drmocraf opposing the expenditure. Turner, 
the postmaster, is a nephew of Mr. Turpie.—Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, May 24. 

The overruling of Congressman Hammond by Post¬ 
master-General Bissell, in the matter of the appoint¬ 
ment of a postmaster at Monticello, has created 
the greatest stir among democratic politicians in 
this congressional district that has been known 
since the election. Oustavus Lowe was a delegate to 
the convention that nominated Hammond. White county 
was the last county called, and one vote was all that was 
needed to nominate Hammond. Lowe gave it and 
Hammond was nominated. As a reward Lowe was 
recommended for postmaster at Monticello, but 
the announcement of the recommendation stirred 
up a great muss .—Delphi Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, May 27. 

BROWN’S. 

Jason Brown is very well pleased over the success 
he is having in turning the republican postmasters 
out, and appointing democrats to the vacancies in 
his district. Out of ten appointments for Indiana to¬ 
day Mr. Brown secured five for his district. The list 
of Indiana appointments is as follows:—TFas/tinyfon 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 25. 

Mr. Walter B. Godfrey having resigned the post- 
office at New Albany, Ind., his resignation to take 
effect July 1, Congressman Jason B Brown has rec¬ 
ommended Charles W. Schindler to succeed him.— 
Washington Dispatch, May 4. 

Representative Brown will leave for Indiana to¬ 
morrow. Since his return here he has decapitated 
nearly all the republican fourth-class postmasters in 
his district and reorganized the county medical 
boards. The presidential offices in his district are 
filled by republicans, good till January, although 
they have all been in office four years already. Mr. 
Brown is anxious to have them ousted to make room 
for good democrats.— Washington Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel, May 8. 

The Hon. Jason Brown, congressman for the third 
district, was in the city yesterday. Mr. Brown was 
asked what he thought of the policy being pursued 
by the postmaster general in the case of the Indian 
apolis office. He said: 

“According to a letter which I received from Mr. 
Bissell I believe the present postmaster will hold 
until his commission expires. The postmasters at 
New Albany, Madison and Salem, three points in my 
district, were appointed during a vacation of con¬ 
gress in the summer of 1889, and were not commis¬ 
sioned until January of 1890. I wrote to the post¬ 
master general asking if these men were to be al¬ 
lowed to remain in office until their commissions 
were four years old or if they could not be removed 
when they had been four years in the office, and Mr. 
Bissell replied that unless some charges could be brought 
against the men they must remain four years from Ihe 
date of their commissions. Since then, however, the 
Madison postmaster has held two or three alleged 
civil service examinations, in which he had a lot of 
republican clerks for judges, and which resulted in 
the appointment of republicans. I think I can make 
this the basis of a charge upon which he can be re¬ 
moved. The others, 1 suppose, will have to stay un¬ 
til January. I think the President ought to revoke 
this ruling, which was made by President Harrison 
after he had been defeated for re-election, which 
shows plainly that it was done simply to lengthen 
the official lives of a lot of republican office-hold¬ 
ers.”—7ndtanapoft«Scn<fnrf, May 30. 


TAYLOR'S. 

Representative Taylor visited the government 
printing office to day for the first time. He came 
out with a commission for Miss Lucy Simmons of 
Boonville, Warrick county, who will have a nine- 
hundred dollar job during the next four years un¬ 
less she gets married. There are half a dozen voters 
in her family, all democrats, and hers will be the 
first office held by a member of the family. Ex Sen¬ 
ator Faulkner of Ripley county, who is now assisting 
Senator'Voorhees in his department routine work, 
discovered the vacancy.— Washington Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, May 4. 

Congressman Taylor will leave for home to-mor¬ 
row. He was before the civil service commission 
yesterday and secured a postponement of the civil 
service examination at Evansville until the 20th 
Inst., when the commission will send representatives 
out to take charge. Representations had been made 
to Mr. Taylor tliat the republicau officials in the Ev¬ 
ansville office refused to supply blanks to democrats. 
Congressman Taylor also called at the department of 
justice and filed charges against Samuel Kercheval, 
of Rockfort, inspector of United Slates courts. He 
requested, also, the appointment of Anthony Steven¬ 
son in his place.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapo¬ 
lis News, May 4. 

The first victim singled out by Representative Tay¬ 
lor, of the first district, for the ax of headsman 
Maxwell was W. F. Hudson of Patoka, Gibson coun¬ 
ty, a man who was mustered out of the Eightieth 
Indiana with broken health, and who has been an 
excellent postmaster. His successor Is an able bod¬ 
ied young demoemt—Indianapolis Journal, May 11 . 

Representative Taylor is a new member. He will 
not take his seat until fall, but he has accomplished 
much. He came here in February, long before he 
was on the pay-roll, to prevent the confirmation of 
two republican postmasters at Cannelton and Tell 
City, which became presidential offices after the 
election. He succeeded, and two democrats were 
appointed as soon as President Cleveland returned 
to the White House. He remained here until he had 
the assurance that the Evansville and Rockport par¬ 
tisan postmasters were removed. Meantime, he 
cleaned out the fourth-class post-offices of republi¬ 
cans. 

Congressman Taylor will leave for Evansville in a 
few days. He called on Attorney-General Olney 
this morning in the interest of Anthony Stevenson, 
of Rockport, who desires to succeed Samuel Kerchi- 
val as examiner of federal courts. Congressman Tay¬ 
lor believes Mr. Stevenson has a good show of ap¬ 
pointment. — Washingt07i Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, June 3. 

Nolan, however, did not receive the appointment 
on account of his services to the labor organizations- 
btUfor the simple reason that as a delegate to the con¬ 
gressional convention he threw a certain number of votes 
to A.H- Taylor, when the Posey county delegation 
deserted that gallant Union soldier. Col. A. D. Owen, 
and thus aided in securing the nomination for our 
accidental friend.—J/<. Vernon Democrat, May 26. 

MCNAGNY’S. 

William Meyer, jr., this evening received a letter 
from Congressman McNagny of this district, stating 
that he had decided to recommend W. W. Rockhill, 
proprietor of the Fort Wayne Journal, for postmas¬ 
ter of this city. Mr. Meyer was a candidate for the 
position and the contest has been a bitter one be¬ 
tween them.—Et. Wayne Dispatch to Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, April 24. 

A sensation was caused in political circles here 
this evening. Congressman McNagtiy some time ago 
recommended W. W. Rockhill for appointment as 
postmaster of Fort Wayne. Postmaster Higgins’ com¬ 
mission does not expire until January, '94. He took 
the office, however, four years ago July 8. 

Yesterday Mr. Rockhill called upon Higgins and 
asked him to resign, his resignation to take effect 
July 8, at which time he would have held the office 
four years. Rockhill told him that charges would 
be preferred. Higgins at once demanded that the 
charges be^jeiit to Washington and that he be con- 









44 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


fronted with them, saying he had conducted the af¬ 
fairs of the office faithfully and well. To-night he 
wrote President Cleveland aud Postmaster-General 
Bissell asking that he be confronted vviih the charges. 
The city democratic central committee prompted Mr. 
Rockhill to ask for the resignation. The president, 
secretary and five members have preferred charges 
of offensive partisanship against Higgins and will 
ask for his dismissal before July 8. Another charge 
is a criticism of the manner the last civil service ex¬ 
amination was conducted in the post-office. The 
charges say the examining board was purely parti¬ 
san and consisted of three republican employes of 
the post-office and was unjust, unfair and a viola¬ 
tion of the fundamental principles of civil service 
reform. 

Higgins has taken a firm stand and says he will 
act as postmaster till his commission expires iii Jan¬ 
uary, 1894, unless peremptorily dismissed by the 
President.—Ff. Wayne Dispatch to Indianapolis Sai- 
tinel, May 19. 

VOORHEES’S AND TURPIE’S. 

Hughes East, formerly of Indiana, but now of South 
Dakota, has been appointed assistant custodian of 
the agricultural department at 81,600 a year. He was 
private secretary to Vice-President Hendricks, and 
after the latter’s death was appointed receiver of the 
land office at Yankton, S. D. His appointment was 
re<iuest(d by Senator Kyle and recommended by Senators 
Voorhces and Turpie .— Washington Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, April 4. 

William M. Moss, editor of the Bloomfield Demo¬ 
crat and member of the state committee, has applied 
for the office of superintendent of Indian schools. 
To-morrow he will have an interview with the Pres¬ 
ident and Senators Voorhees and Turpie will be pres¬ 
ent to urge his appointment.— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Sentinel, April 18. 

Senator Voorhees has been feeling badly for a few 
days and has not been able to get around much in 
quest of office for Hoosier friends.— Washington Dts- 
patch to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 25. 

It is now conceded that the Indiana bank examin- 
ership is practically settled in favor of Orlando M. 
Packard of Plymouth. Indeed, he has no serious oppo¬ 
sition save that caused by Congressman Holman's per¬ 
sistent advocacy of Pugh of Rushville, in spite of the gen 
erous treatment accorded the former by both Senators 
Voorhees and Turpie at Mr. Holman's urgent request, in 
permitting him to name Capt. Bracken for internal reve¬ 
nue collector of the sixth district. Bracken will have the 
naming of about one hundred and fifty subordinate 
officers from Holman’s district. The latter expressed 
himself satisfied at the time, but soon began the fight 
for Pugh, claiming the bank examiner also for his 
district—all this in face of the fact that northern In¬ 
diana has not yet received a single important ap¬ 
pointment, and that all the other local stateappoint- 
raents have gone elsewhere. 

It is well understood here that Senators Voorhees 
and Turpie are not pleased regarding Mr. Holman’s 
attitude in this matter. This morning Senator Voor¬ 
hees, in spite of his severe rheumatic illness, accom¬ 
panied by Senator Turpie, Representative Conn and 
Mr. Packard, had a satisfactory interview with Comp¬ 
troller Eckles at the treasury department. Mr. Pack¬ 
ard’s claims for the position were eloquently pleaded 
by both senators and Mr. Conn on the ground of fit¬ 
ness and also for political and geographical reasons. 

— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, April 
28. 

Orlando M. Packard, of Plymouth, Ind., was yes¬ 
terday appointed national bank examiner for Indi¬ 
ana. Packard was elected as an out-and-out Cleve¬ 
land delegate to Chicago last year after a hard fight. 

— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, April 29. 

There is considerable comment here among Indi¬ 
ana politicians who understand the inside workings 
of the Hoosier political machine, at the statement 
put forward by friends of the Indiana senators, that 
they are dissatisfied because Congressman Holman 
opposed the appointment of 0. M. Packard, of Ply¬ 
mouth, as bank examiner. Senator Voorhees’s 
friends make the claim that he conceded to Mr. 
Holman the nomination of Wm. Bracken, of Frank¬ 


lin county, as collector of internal revenue. As a 
matter of fact everybody conversant with the Indi¬ 
ana situation here knows that Congre.ssman Holman, 
much against his own inclinations, was forced to 
support Bracken, and that in bringing this about 
Senator Voorhees played no small part. Congress¬ 
man Holman was in favor of the appointment of Dr. 
Hunter, of Lawrenceburgh. Early in the fight' 
Bracken’s friends came to Washington and read the 
riot act to Mr. Holman. They told him that if he 
did not support Bracken for revenue collector, they 
would see that he was defeated for renomination for 
congress, and they even threatened to put Bracken 
forward as a candidate. Senator Voorhees seemed 
to enjoy the embarrassment of Congressman Hol¬ 
man and contributed to it. He invited him to his 
committee-room to a conference in presence of 
Bracken’s friends, and then and there wrung from 
him an indorsement of Bracken. Congressman Hol¬ 
man found that he could either indorse Mr. Bracken 
as a matter of self-preservation politically, or put 
himself in the attitude of opposing a man from his 
own district who had the senatorial indorsements. 
Everybody conversant with the Indiana situation 
knows that Congressman Holman was brought re¬ 
luctantly to the support of Bracken, who is the can¬ 
didate of the slate-makers, and the statement that 
Bracken’s appointment was conceded to Holman 
is very amusing. Up to date Congressman Holman has 
received nothing from the state machine, except his local 
medical examiners and postmasters.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis News, April 30. 

The resignation of seventeen republican fourth- 
class postmasters in Indiana were received to-day, 
and as many democrats appointed to their places. 
The appointments were for the sixth and ninth con¬ 
gressional districts, and were made upon the reeoinmen- 
dations of Senators Voorhees and Turpie. They were 
as follows: 

Advance, Boone county, H. M. Coulter, vice J. H. 
Sublett; Atlanta, Hamilton county, J.N. Spidel, vice 
James LaFever; Cicero, Hamilton county, Albert 
Slack, vice J. A. Hall; Daleville, Delaware county, 
C. W. Fletcher, vice J. N. Barnard; Edna Mills, Clin¬ 
ton county. Jerome Shigley, vice Frederick Geiger; 
Gaston, Delaware county, J. W. Jones, vice J. W. 
Hannan; Harrisville, Randolph county, William Ac- 
kles. vice J. B. Fortenbaugh; Hobbs, Tipton county, 
C. Warne, vice M. M. Hobbs; Max, Boone county, 
G. E. Adams, vice Shelby Ilarrod; Oakford, Howard 
county, C. M. Randolph, vice J. G Martin; Oakville, 
Delaware county, C. A. Fleming, vice Mary A. Flem¬ 
ing; Rainsville, Warren county, Jacob Brown, vice 
F M. Jones; Reed, Delaware county, C. M. Curtis, 
vice Rachel Newhouse; Royalton, Boone county, T. 
E. Sanders, vice E. M. Strawmeyer; Spiceland, Henry 
county, H G. Yergin, vice E. C. Bogue: Straughn, 
Henry county. Dill Waddell, vice J. W. Haskett; 
Sycamore, Howard county, J. F. Saxon, vice O. P. 
Hollingsworth — Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Journal, April 30. 

Several months ago a popular election was held by 
the democracy of Russiaville, looking to determin¬ 
ing a choice for postmaster, and Samuel Hudson was 
chosen. L. M. McDaniel, John Gifford and C. W. 
Jones were the other candidates. Mr. Hart refused 
to submit his name to this election, and it developes that 
he buitded better than his competitors, as he had the in¬ 
dorsement of both Voorhees and Tui-pie, and was a sure 
winner.—/ndtanapoits News, May 2. 

Senator Voorhees walked proudly out of the treas¬ 
ury department this morning bearing “Charley” 
Hedges’ official head aloft to the yelling delegates of 
the Hoosier democratic contingent.—ITas/iinpfon Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis News, May 8. 

Senator Voorhees called on Postmaster-general Bis¬ 
sell to-day in regard to the removal of Postmaster 
Thompson, of Indianapolis, but secured no definite 
promise of immediate action.—Wasktngifon Dispatch 
to Indianapolis Journal, May 10. 

To-day Senators Voorhees and Turpie called upon 
Secretary Carlisle with Mr. Thomas, of Rushville, 
who wants to succeed General Rosecrans as register 
of the treasury. Thqmas is a prominent farmer, and 
stumped Indiana for Cleveland. — Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis News, May 11. 

Captain Allen, the newly-appointed state tax com¬ 
missioner, arrived home yesterday from Washington, 
where he went, he says, to thank Senator Voorhees 


for the kindness shown him when recently an appli¬ 
cant for the place of pension agent for this state. “I 
asked the senator,” said he yesterday, to a Journal 
reporter, “ who would be appointed to this position. 
He said it would go to some man in the northern 
part of the state, and none other would be consid¬ 
ered. He asked me why 1 did not slick to my first choice, 
and said that I could have had it; that he had promised 
it to me. I thanked him, of course, and told him I 
would reciprocate his favors whenever I could. I 
also saw Senator Turpie, and he told me he was stay¬ 
ing in Washington to see that the post-office at this 
place was disposed of as he desired. He said that he 
would not come home until the appointment is 
made. That is all that keeps him in Wa.‘;hington 
now, and I take it that he means to see that a change 
is made in the Indianapolis post-office as soon as he 
c&n."—Indianapolis Journal, May 16. 

James I. Parker, of Tipton, Ind., who was yesterday 
appointed law clerk in the interior department, was 
a member of the legislature that elected Senator Turpie in 
1885. He was Turpie's first private secretary, then be¬ 
came law clerk of the land office during President 
Cleveland’s first term. He was mayor of Tipton un¬ 
til the republicans captured that tov,’n.—Indianapolis 
News, May 19. 

Indiana is a remarkable exception to the rule of 
the comparative modesty of the North and West. 
Senators Voorhees and Turpie have remained in the 
federal city since the adjournment of the senate’s 
extraordinary session, and have been both faithful 
and zealous in pressing the multitudinous claims of 
their constituents. Representatives, Bynum, Coop¬ 
er and Brookshire have returned and had frequent 
audienct-s with the President and members of the 
cabinet. Congressman Taylor is now on his way 
here, and will contribute his mite toward securing 
proper official recognition for Indiana.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis News, May 29. 

The case of Bert Kelly, of Terre Haute, is very an¬ 
noying to Senator Voorhees. This is the man who 
acquitted himself so discreditably at the end of the 
last administration, but he has been hanging on to 
the local politicians of Terre Haute, and is making 
things very unpleasant right now for Senator Voor¬ 
hees by ringing the latter’s door-bell at most unsea¬ 
sonable hours of the night and asking for political 
indorsements for various treasures that are inclosed 
in the Blue Book. A happy thought struck the sen¬ 
ator a few days ago, and the Indiana politicians all 
concurred in it. It has been decided to offer Mr. 
Kelly a position outside of Indiana, where he can be 
of more use to the democratic party than at home. 
Kelly seems to concur, also, in the idea, and Senator 
Voorhees is now trying to convince the interior depart¬ 
ment that Mr. Kelly would make an excellent man to at¬ 
tach to one of the Indian bureaus.— Washington Dispatch 
to Indianapolis News, May 18. 

Senator Turpie returned from Washington yester¬ 
day. He is in the best of health and spirits and 
talked to a Sentinel reporter on various interesting 
topics in his usual candid and cordial manner. Re¬ 
ferring to the Indiana offices and office-seekers he 
said: “ The time since the adjournment of congress 
has been largely occupied in preparing and present¬ 
ing candidacies for various appointments. I believe 
that in cases pending the work has been fully done 
up to the pointof decision aud awaits now only the 
action of the appointing power. In cases not imme¬ 
diately pending much work has also been done, but 
as vacancies do not occur in these for many months, 
future attention will be given them. This work has 
been cheerfully done by all members of the demo¬ 
cratic delegation in congress from Indiana. It has 
involved the examination of much correspondence, 
a mass of papers on file, numerous personal inter¬ 
views and careful consideration. We have served 
all, but it is impossible that all can be appointed. We 
have tried to give every applicant a fair chance in 
the canvass for appointments. Some of the places 
will not be filled until the next session—or until the 
beginning of the next year-but when the roll is 
completed no section of the state will be found neg¬ 
lected.”—/ndtonapolis Sentinel, June 1. 










The civil service chronicle. 


One mode of the misappropriation of ]niblic funds is avoided wlien appointments to office, instead of being tlie rewards of 
partisan activity, are awarded to those whose efficiency promises a fair return of work for tlie compensation paid to tliem. To 
secure tlie fitness and competency of appointees to office and to remove from political action the demoralizing madness for spoils, 
civil service reform has found a place in our public policy and laws. The benefit already gained through this instrumentality 
and the further usefulness it promises entitle it to the hearty supjiort and encouragement of all wiio desire to see our public 
service well performed, or who hope for the elevation of political sentiment and the purification of political methods.— Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland’s Inauejural. 


VoL. II, No. 5. INDIANAPOLIS, JUhY, 1893. terms 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 
^ Indianapoli*, Ind, 

Last month we gave some facts relating 
to meat inspection at Indianapolis. As a 
friend of the Chronicle expressed it, 
“ there is hardly a boy’s work ” here. A 
dispatch to the Indianapolis News of June 
24th says: 

Senators Voorheesand Turpie have recommended 
a large number of applicants for appointment as 
meat inspectors at Indianapolis under the bureau of 
animal industry, and have been complaining at the 
delay of Secretary Morton in appointing their can¬ 
didates. 

Here is another added to the ten thou¬ 
sand evidences of the swindling worthless¬ 
ness of the men whom Indiana now has in 
congress. It was well known that there 
is, and has been, and, so far as can be seen, 
will be almost nothing to do in meat in¬ 
spection here. The total cost of meat in¬ 
spection at Indianapolis for the eleven 
months ending May 31,1893, was 15,654.08, 
while the total meat exports were $2,264. 
Yet Voorhees and Turpie find fault be¬ 
cause some more of their henchmen are 
not given places. Nothing could more 
plainly show the character of their public 
service. Nominally they are working for 
the interests of the people; but such facts 
as these show that they are reckless of the 
interests of the people. We renew our 
suggestion that inspection be paid for per 
hog. This would forthwith reduce the 
retinue at Indianapolis to one person, who 
would be his own tagger and microscopist, 
and he would have much time to spare. 

It seems the four democratic congress¬ 
men from the northern part of Indiana, 
and of course some workers who have yet 
to work for a living, are dissatisfied with 
the division of spoil. Congressman Ham¬ 
mond, for instance, “has nothing to show 
except a string of meat inspectors and his 
postmasters.” Congressman Conn “ has 
not so much as a bureau chief put down to 
his credit.” The Chronicle has given 
much space to the siege which Congress¬ 
man Martin carried on to get Jerome 
HerflF a consulship, “ but Mr. Herfl has re¬ 
ceived no recognition.” It is the old story. 
These congressmen, utterly false to their 


party word, pay no attention to their du¬ 
ties as congressmen but spend their time 
in a scramble for spoil to give to followers 
who will set up primaries and conventions 
for them next year. Some other counter¬ 
feits, also going under the title of congress¬ 
men, have got the start of them. That is 
all there is of it. The people are not dis¬ 
turbed ; they are always glad when a spoils- 
hunter is discomfited, and they are dissat¬ 
isfied when one, like Voorhees, succeeds. 
No President ever has nor ever can divide 
patronage without stirring up quarrels 
and fights and weakening himself and 
his party. The wonder is that any more 
lessons should be needed to teach our 
Presidents that. In this complaint found 
in the Indianapolis News of July 1, it is 
said that Allen county has received from 
President Cleveland only its local spoil, 
while a formidable and correct list is given 
of the spoil allotted by President Harrison 
to that county. It includes a Mississippi 
river commissioner, a Utah commissioner, 
the consul to Leipsic, a special treasury 
agent and a dozen other like plums. Then 
follows this remarkable statement: “Jn 
Allen county, last fall, Mr. Cleveland ran three 
hundred votes ahead of his ticket.” How much 
more evidence will it take, in view of the 
last three presidential elections, to con¬ 
vince our higher appointing officers that 
the complaint of a few politicians is not 
the complaint of the people, and that the 
man who divides the most spoil is the man 
who runs behind his ticket ? 

A Washington dispatch to the Indian¬ 
apolis News of June 22, says: 

The Muucie board of pension examiners has at 
last been filled by the appointment of Drs. Edgar A. 
Shields and Henry N. Winans, of Muncie, and W. 
8. Brandox, of Daleville. This board waa agreed 
upon in May. but a protest was made by certain 
Muncie democrats against the appointment of Dr. 
Edgar A. Shields, alleging that he was not an ortho¬ 
dox democrat. The senators made an investigation 
of Dr. Shield’s democracy, and have found him 
fully equipped politically for the position. 

Bringing a wholly unlawful element to 
be the controlling power in selections for 
office is the only capacity which our Indi¬ 
ana senators have ever developed. They, 
with men who masquerade as congressmen 
from this state, have thoroughly disgraced 


the state and made her an object of con¬ 
tempt and a by-word throughout the 
country. The purging of the pension list 
is the work most dangerous to itself which 
this administration has undertaken to do. 
What inconceivable stupidity to mock the 
country with pension boards selected upon 
such principles ! How many times does 
a man have to be elected President before 
he learns that a congressman is wholly sel¬ 
fish—that the petty officers of his com¬ 
munity working to continue him in place, 
he will make of such stress that he will 
bring it about if he wrecks every scheme 
of reform, however necessary and wide¬ 
spread ? For no other object he wrecked 
Mr. Cleveland’s first administration, and 
he has made a good start toward wrecking 
his second. 


The New York Times, of June 21, says 
of the self-debauchment of congressmen by 
patronage: 

They tend to become double-faced, tricky, bully¬ 
ing on the one hand, sneaking and cowardly on the 
other. They are continually guilty of deception, of 
evasion, of chicane and intrigue, which in business 
life they would scorn. They come to have one 
standard of conduct in private life and another and 
much lower standard in politics. They do not hesi¬ 
tate to betray their trust as legislators and use their 
power to grant or withhold appropriations in order 
to influence the execxitive departments or to attempt 
to influence the President himself to advance their 
personal or factional interests. It is useless to point 
out that this is all unconstitutional. They know 
that perfectly well if they stop to think of it at all. 

Two congressmen. Senator Butler, of 
South Carolina and Representative Everett, 
of Massachusetts, have asserted their man¬ 
hood. Meanwhile, our Indiana congress¬ 
men fight at the trough,and in the columns 
of the Civil Service Chronicle make 
voluminous, accessible and mortifying 
history, which their descendants, and per¬ 
haps in their old age some of themselves, 
would give a great deal to have blotted 
out. 


At the recent meeting of the National 
League Mr. Frank M. Loomis,of the Buffalo 
association, vigorously denounced the state 
authorities of New York for disregarding 
and cheating the civil service law of that 
state. Mr. Loomis, who is a democrat, is 


< 
















46 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


for civil service reform without any hum¬ 
bug about it; which is in fact an estab¬ 
lished characteristic of the Buffalo associa¬ 
tion. He met with a good deal of opposi¬ 
tion, some of it contemptuous. Particu¬ 
larly notable in the League meeting was 
the speech of a New York civil service 
commissioner, setting forth the glories and 
good faith of Governor Flower’s adminis¬ 
tration. The result of the discussion was 
that June 28th, Mr. Loomis and others met 
in Albany and formed a state civil service 
reform league. This league was rapidly 
getting into position to try conclusions in 
the courts with Tammany civil service re¬ 
form, but note the result: July 5th, Gov¬ 
ernor Flower calls upon the state commis¬ 
sion to know whether any appointments 
have been made contrary to the law. On 
the same day the commission replies that 
it has discovered one hundred and fifty-four 
“ seeming violations ” of the law besides a 
number of other violations. It also says 
that it has reduced the one hundred and 
fifty-four to thirty-four, but it does not see 
how it can go any further. Perhaps a les¬ 
son or two from the very excellent courts 
of New York may show them a way. 


The Carlisles, father and son, are briskly 
continuing their work of turning the ‘‘in- 
dispensibles ” out of the treasury service, 
“ no matter what the mugwumps say.” 
They recently went to Chicago, but just be¬ 
fore starting they called for the resigna¬ 
tions of five chiefs of divisions. One of 
these, Mr. Rathbone, has doubtless saved 
the country millions of dollars by his effi¬ 
ciency and his integrity, and his dismissal, 
like that of Mr. Stetson, of recent date, acts 
in direct aid of the claim agents and lob¬ 
byists of Washington. Secretary Carlisle 
evidently means to challenge the inde¬ 
pendent element of the country. Other 
men in high place have done that but, in 
the long run, it did not profit them; they 
suffered great humiliation, but the princi¬ 
ples of the independents went marching 
on. Meanwhile the question is pertinent, 
if this is a civil service reform administra¬ 
tion, as it promised to be in its platform 
and its campaign text-book, why are not 
the headships of divisions put under the 
civil service rules? Ten lines from the 
President would do it. 


In the New York Times of June 28, Post¬ 
master Dayton, of that city says: 

“ When I find a man that 1 do not want to continue 
in the service I shall remove him, and In filling the 
place a democrat will surely get the preference." 

This remark probably refers to the 140 
places, the most important in the office, 
which are not under the rules. But sup¬ 
pose such a remark should be made by 
Chauncey M. Depew regarding the service 
of the New York Central. The country 


would take it as proof of softening of the 
brain. Stockholders would apply for a re¬ 
ceiver, to get rid of such a president until 
a new one could be elected. Every lawyer 
with an action for damages received under 
such a service would have what is known 
in the west as a “ ground hog case.” 

Politicians who do not want good rea¬ 
sons for changes have always maintained 
that it was not practicable to make a record 
of them. A few officers like Postmaster 
Corse and Collector Saltonstall, of Boston, 
found it easy and profitable to keep such a 
public record. Secretary Lament also has 
no difficulty, and his action has called forth 
the following deserved declaration of appre¬ 
ciation : 

Civil Service Reform Association, 1 
56 Wall St., New York, June 22, 1893. ) 

My Dear Sir: I am instructed by the executive 
committee of the Civil Service Reform Association of 
New York to express to you their hearty apprecia¬ 
tion and approval ©f your action in filing and mak¬ 
ing public the reasons for the removals and altera¬ 
tions in grade in the clerical force in your depart¬ 
ment. 

The members of the committee look upon this ac¬ 
tion as a forward step of the first importance. 

Yours very respectfully, 

William Potts, Secretary. 

The Hon. Daniels. Lamont, Secretary of War, Wash¬ 
ington, D. C. 

Senator Gorman, who did more than 
any other man, except Voorhees, to wreck 
Mr. Cleveland’s first administration, is still 
“ on deck.” Sixty democrats from his state 
called upon him some weeks ago in regard 
to spoils and he stated Germanism to them 
in the following concise manner: 

It is my purpose, and the purpose of the whole 
Maryland delegation, to serve deserving democrats. 
It is only by such means that we have built up such 
a party organization in Maryland—an organization 
that is not surpassed by any state in the union, and 
which was begun here immediately after the war. 
The men who have contributed to the success the 
party has achieved are the men whom we wish to 
see rewarded, and none others need apply. 

He omitted to state that in his party or¬ 
ganization, murderers, thieves, and black¬ 
legs of all descriptions are favorites, but in 
general his statement is correct. Govern¬ 
ment, in Maryland, is Gorman with a gang 
of heelers who set up primaries and con¬ 
ventions for him and are paid out of the 
public treasury. 

The facts of the present onslaught upon 
the offices should not be lost sight of. The 
people of this country are not making it. 
There is a fringe of congressmen who are 
looking out for their own continuance in 
place, and are therefore buying with of¬ 
fices the support of a considerably larger 
fringe of vicious local politicians. This is 
the whole situation, and to this pressure 
the administration slowly yields. The 
only times so far that Mr. Cleveland has, 
in civil service matters, had the approba¬ 
tion of the country were such as when he 
defied the Tammany bosses, and when he 


“stood off” the office-hunting crowd before 
his inauguration, and at the times since 
when it seemed that he was going to over¬ 
throw the spoils system. 


It is a humiliating sign of the deteriora¬ 
tion of American public morals, that so 
many are indifferent to, or openly advocate 
the propriety of the suggestion that Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland purchase with offices the 
votes of mercenary congressmen for the 
repeal of the silver-purchase act. The pro¬ 
test against this suggestion can not be too 
loud nor too earnest, and we are surprised 
that the pulpit and the religious press are 
silent. It can not be that they have to be 
told that the purchase of a congressman’s 
vote with an office is not different from its 
purchase with the President’s check upon 
the public fund, which is always at his dis¬ 
posal, and for which he is never called to 
account. It is very unfortunate that the 
impression has gone out, that the success 
of Voorhees in obtaining offices for his 
henchmen and relatives is due to a plan 
to buy his vote. We can not account for 
his success, but we refuse to believe that 
the President has, to put it mildly, depart¬ 
ed from an honorable course. It does not 
matter whether or not this was necessary 
to secure the repeal, but in fact, it was 
wholly unnecessary. The financial situa¬ 
tion has passed beyond discussion. The 
question whether the country will stay upon 
a gold basis or go upon a silver basis will 
not wait for a reply. And the country has 
made up its mind. It will stay upon a 
gold basis, and it is not in a mood to stand 
trifling from mercenary congressmen who 
want to be bought. The country is going 
to have the act under which it is compelled 
to buy and store the product of a private 
industry to keep up its price repealed, and 
that too without any ifs or ands about it. 
The seller who wants to sell and can not, 
the borrower who wants borrow and can 
not, the lender who dare not lend upon the 
best security, the carpenter without a house 
to build, the plasterer without plastering to 
do, the worker out of work with payments 
on his home coming due, every wage- 
earner without wages, the merchant with 
his diminished trade, and the man of every 
sort and condition, each has his eye on his 
congressman. Hard experience has taught 
the people, the least, as well as the most 
intelligent, what their congressmen were 
too busy dividing spoil to learn. They will 
now teach their congressmen. The latter 
will have to vote accordingly and that too 
without being bought. All the spoil under 
the control of the President could not 
change the result. The truth which the 
Civil Service Chronicle has many times 
asserted again comes out plain to all the 
world. Whatever openly reaches into the 


> 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


47 


pockets of the people, the people may be 
trusted to set right, but the spoils system 
eats its way silently until suddenly the 
bearings are lost. So blind are many to it 
that they would use it to correct an evil, 
which of itself makes every man smart un¬ 
til he turns to and helps cure it. 

It is difficult to speak moderately of the 
situation relating to the newly classified 
post-offices. At Anderson, in this State, 
the postmaster is evidently in the course 
of a clean sweep. At Terre Haute, Don- 
ham who got his office after a movement 
disgraceful to everyone who had anything 
to do with it, and who was himself guilty 
of insolent insubordination, has had his 
removal of a large number of employes, 
under the lying charge of insubordination 
to himself before he was postmaster, ap¬ 
proved by the department. The President 
does not answer whether Donham is or is 
not to be removed. As the matter now 
stands it offers, in the hands of those who 
know how to use it, most effective cam¬ 
paign material against the administration. 

At Topeka, the new postmaster, Frank 
S. Thomas, got the department to dismiss 
seventeen letter-carriers. When applied 
to for the reasons. First Assistant Post¬ 
master-General Jones replied that the dis¬ 
missals were made upon the recommenda¬ 
tion of postmaster Thomas “ for incompe¬ 
tency and violation of orders and instruc¬ 
tions.” Postmaster Thomas was then called 
upon to explain, and he replied that the 
removals “ were solely for political rea¬ 
sons.” The carriers seem to have been in 
every way first-class men; nine-tenths of 
the people of Topeka, without regard to 
politics, signed a statement to that effect. 
This lying and duplicity is one of the most 
noted characteristics of Russian adminis¬ 
tration. It only remains for the adminis- 
tion to stick to it that the Topeka carriers 
were removed for cause and the Russian 
system will be in its full perfection. These 
dismissals were completed before July 1st, 
on which date the civil service law took 
effect. The dismissed men were all re¬ 
publicans and the new appointees were all 
democrats. 

The department has made removals in 
the newly classified offices generally when¬ 
ever the postmasters wanted them, and in 
cases where it must have known that the 
object was to beat the civil service law. It 
would be interesting to know what it ex¬ 
pects its friends to think of it for putting 
itself in such an indefensible position, and 
what excuse it expects them to make for it. 
Here were civil service examinations soon 
to be held. The result of these would be 
eligible lists from which appointments 
could be made. In the opinion of the 
President and of the Postmaster-General 
this is the best way to get employes for 


such vacancies. Yet postmasters are per¬ 
mitted to beat the best plan and give places 
to political heelers. A word would have 
prevented even an attempt of this kind, 
but it was not spoken. When the republi¬ 
cans did this four years ago it was called 
treachery to promises—what is it to be 
called now ? 

Ip the merit system were not a giant 
it would have been crushed long ago. After 
being racked through Mr. Cleveland's first 
administration by the Harritys and Edger- 
tons, the law was made to include the rail¬ 
way mail service at a time which put the 
hardest possible strain upon it. The serv¬ 
ice had been filled with democrats and 
then the law was extended just in time to 
take effect and be enforced by republicans. 
No act could have made the law more un¬ 
popular, and the republicans in flat viola¬ 
tion of their civil service reform promises 
viciously gave the merit system another 
wrench by turning more than two thousand 
men out of the service to make room for 
their partisans. The fair and right way 
would have been to have made the exten¬ 
sion in the first year of the administration. 
Yet the merit system recovered from the 
shock and prospered. Again at the end 
of his term, after nearly four years of cyn¬ 
ical indifference and hardly concealed en¬ 
mity toward the reform. President Harri¬ 
son, at a time which would again cause the 
hardest possible strain upon the law and 
the rules,and the reform, classified all of the 
free delivery offices. No act could have 
made the law more unpopular, for the 
offices classified had been filled with re¬ 
publicans. And now we have these offices 
not in the hands of friends of the merit 
system but of its Donhams and Thomases, 
who are repeating the treachery of four 
years ago. Yet the merit system will re¬ 
cover from this outrage, and will prosper 
while the disreputable politicians who are 
tricking it will soon be forgotten. Selec¬ 
tions of employes by competion in all 
places except the highest is going to sup¬ 
plant every other system in state and na¬ 
tional services. Nothing can stand against 
its democratic fairness. But is it not about 
time that the merit system had a fair 
chance? What other law is put in charge 
of its vicious and open enemies? How 
many tricks upon the customs law would 
be approved at Washington ? For the fu¬ 
ture, the commonest principles of fair play 
call for the placing of the law in the hands 
of its friends, and for extensions to be 
made promptly so that they may be thor¬ 
oughly established before another party 
comes in. 

We have continued this month the course 
which the Civil Service Chronice has al¬ 
ways aimed to follow. We have tried to 
accurately state the effect which the pres¬ 


ent line of management of the civil serv¬ 
ice produces, when judged by the standards 
by which ordinary business affairs are 
judged. To do this, an emphatic state¬ 
ment has been sometimes found neces¬ 
sary, as our columns show. But we use 
emphasis because the facts seem to require 
it, and not because we are seeking occa¬ 
sion for emphasis. We regret the neces¬ 
sity and we wish the facts were different, 
and we do not wish our position to be mis¬ 
understood. We believe this administra¬ 
tion wants do something else than merely 
serve party ends. We believe that the 
views of the President and the pbstmaster- 
general as to the final result which ought 
to be reached in the reform of the civil 
service do not differ materially from the 
views of the Chronicle. There, however, 
the resemblance ends. Judged by their 
acts, they believe that it is necessary to 
yield more or less to the buccaneers who 
prey upon the civil service. We do not; 
we take the ground that it is their duty to 
stand upon the constitution, the laws and 
their oath of office, and take the conse¬ 
quences. It is this yielding which makes 
necessary the unpleasant comments of the 
Chronicle, and which is causing to slip 
away Mr. Cleveland’s last opportunity to 
become a great President. The treatment 
of the pension boards, of the newly classi¬ 
fied offices, of the fourth-class post-offices, 
the failure to classify heads of divisions, 
the subsidizing of the press, the submission 
to Voorhees indicated by such appoint¬ 
ments as Burke, Risely and Donham, and 
the submission to insolent bullying by con¬ 
gressmen are all sign-boards which can not 
be ignored, and which point in the direc¬ 
tion of disaster and failure. Some friends 
of the Chronicle, to some extent, think 
that for the present criticism should be 
suspended, but others urged that all through 
Cleveland’s first administration and all 
through Harrison’s administration. Long 
experience has taught that suspension of 
criticism only lets the spoilmen get greater 
headway. The way to suspend criticism 
is to suspend the occurrence of the facts 
which call for it. Nothing, for instance, 
could more promote the attack upon the 
civil service than to keep silent about the 
Topeka post-office where seventeen men 
were dismissed upon a charge now known 
to be false, and yet the postmaster is left 
to enjoy his insolent and rascally triumph. 


REFORM IN THE DEPARTMENT OF 
STATE. 

We note the following dispatch in the 
Indianapolis News: 

Washington, D, C., June 2.1.—As a result of the 
enormous pre.ssure brought to bear upon the depart¬ 
ment of state, nearly one-third of the United States 
consuls abroad have been changed. There are 
about three hundred consuls in the service, but ow- 











48 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ing to the small compensation attached to a number 
of places, and the difficulty of securing competent 
persons who are willing to accept them, the number 
of really desirable posts, paying not less than $1,500 
per annum, does not exceed 250, and of these Mr. 
Quincy has made changes up to June 15 in the cases 
of eighty-three consulates. 

We looked forward to the operations of 
the department of state with interest and 
with a not unnatural expectation that here 
would appear the most perfect work of an 
administration entirely committed to the 
reform of the civil service. At the head 
of this department was Secretary Gresh- 
ham who, with President Cleveland, it was 
said was to slough ofif the Voorhees-Gor- 
man element and build up a new party out 
of safer elements, and who in this work 
would have been a host, but who as a 
looker-on, while Voorhees has his way, 
will be only one with a few unpaid ex¬ 
republican Indiana ward workers addi¬ 
tional. The second place in the depart¬ 
ment was held by Mr. Josiah Quincy, of 
whom it was not possible to think as a 
divider of spoil, and than whom, in the 
line of thorough reform, which would 
cause consulships to cease to be subject to 
change at every election. Secretary Gresh¬ 
am could not seemingly have had a better 
assistant. The possibilities for future es¬ 
teem for both secretary and assistant lay 
only in fighting the spoils system. Per¬ 
haps Judge Gresham’s opportunity is not 
yet wholly lost. As a member of the cabi¬ 
net there is yet a field in which he can put 
forth his well known powers against a 
system which, if left to go, would Mexi- 
canize this country; but it will be long be¬ 
fore he will recover the confidence he has 
lost in submitting to see the clutches of 
Voorhees fastened tighter upon us by such 
appointments as Risely and Burke, and by 
permitting Mr. Quincy to treat the con¬ 
sulships as Tammany Hall treats the 
offices of New York. 

But Mr. Quincy has evidently burned 
the bridges and does not care for any other 
future than that which his present course 
will make for him. He was long, and is 
now, perhaps, a member of the National 
Civil Service Reform League and was a 
more or less frequent attendant upon its 
meetings. He had charge of the prepara¬ 
tion and circulation of campaign literature 
for the national democratic committee in 
the campaign of 1892, and among other 
sagacious and useful acts he caused to be 
circulated 100,000 copies of the address of 
George W. Julian, devoted to the most 
severe and the most complete criticism of 
its violations of every phase of civil service 
reform which the Harrison administration 
ever received. We have also turned over 
Mr. Quincy’s national democratic cam- 
gaign text-book and we find there thirty- 
six out of three hundred and eight large 
and closely printed pages devoted to the 


subject of civil service reform. The non- 
extension of the classified service, the refusal 
to classify the employes of the census bu¬ 
reau, the refusal to punish the Baltimore 
assessment blackmailers, the use of the 
pension service as a political machine, the 
failure to repeal the four-year-term law, 
the removal of 50,000 fourth-class post¬ 
masters by Clarkson and other pertinent 
shortcomings are lashed up hill and down 
dale in a wholesome and refreshing man¬ 
ner. 

Upon his appointment as assistant sec¬ 
retary of state, the least that Mr. Quincy 
could do was to move heaven and earth 
for the application of the wholesome sys¬ 
tem of appointment by competition to the 
consular service. He did not do this. He 
did not move for it at all; if he had, it 
would have been done. Instead of this, 
he announced in an interview printed in 
the New York Evening Post, that this would 
not be much of a civil service reform ad¬ 
ministration, after all. Then he went to 
work putting out consuls to make room 
for democrats as a reward for party serv¬ 
ice and to subsidize the press at a rate at 
which he will complete a clean sweep 
with its usual vicious accompaninments in 
less than a year. Mr. Quincy will find that 
it is easy to tarnish an honored name, but 
that he will make of himself only a local 
politician of the Clarkson stripe. It has 
often been wondered at by those who saw 
what could be done in Indiana by inde¬ 
pendent voting, that Massachusetts has not 
become, in national elections, a doubtful 
state. It is plain now. The independent 
voters of Massachusetts evidently know 
their men. They require that acts after 
election shall square with professions be¬ 
fore election. 


CHILDREN AND FOO LS—A N D 
SMALL POLITICIANS—TELL 
THE TRUTH, 

Its limited space has prevented the Civil 
Service Chronicle from giving those spe¬ 
cial notices which are due to fellow-work¬ 
ers in the journalistic field; but in Mr. 
Peter Pernot, until lately the special cor¬ 
respondent of the Indianapolis Sentinel, at 
Washington, an exception must be made. 
The Chronicle is heavily indebted to Mr. 
Pernot. -Beginning with the first call of 
Voorhees and Turpie upon Mr, Cleveland, 
two days after the inauguration to demand 
what he was going to do about Indiana of¬ 
fices, and running through the long line of 
events such as the processions of from two 
to twenty led by Voorhees before the Pres¬ 
ident, demanding chances at the public 
treasury, the triumphs of Voorhees over 
his fellow congressmen in the grab for loot. 
Congressman Conn’s bullying the fourth 
assistant postmaster-general. Congressman 


Bynum’s night and day work to find places 
for the ward workers who will help him to 
renomination next year, the sweeping out 
of worthless pension-board doctors and 
putting in others just as worthless, the 
sickness which made Voorhees for periods 
of hours back away from the trough, the 
trips of congressmen back and forth from 
Washington, “deciding” upon “claims” 
for offices, the conflicting “ prerogatives ” 
of senators, representatives, and defeated 
congressional candidates, the removals se¬ 
cured by Voorhees for “immorality,” the 
mightiness of the offensive partisanship 
lever in the hands of democratic congress¬ 
men, and all the ups and downs, ins and 
outs, hopes and depressions of thousands 
of “aspirants” for chances to be quartered 
upon the public treasury, Mr. Pernot has 
innocently set forth the facts in his Sentinel 
dispatches with particularity and relish, 
seemingly unaware that he was proving 
our‘senators and representatives a con¬ 
temptible set of humbugs, and that he was 
stripping the mantle of reform from an 
administration which went into office un¬ 
der the strongest promises not to do these 
very things. 

These facts were promptly transferred 
to the columns of the Chronicle, We 
miss them now. Mr. Pernot has an office, 
and has left the service of the Sentinel. He 
has rejoiced at anything, honest or dis¬ 
honest, that would give a democrat an 
office, and now he has his reward. It 
seems there are some intruders upon 
Cherokee lands whom the government is 
going to drive off, but rather paradoxically 
it is going to pay them for the land. Mr. 
Pernot is a “commissioner” to appraise 
this land and gets eight dollars a day and 
expenses. The appropriation will run out 
in a few months, but Mr. Pernot hopes 
that congress will make another. “ There 
is enough work to keep us busy a good 
while.” he says, which shows that he is a 
true commissioner. The Chronicle hopes 
no other appropriation will be made. It 
wants Mr, Pernot back with the Sentinel. 
But did Mr, S. E. Morss, now consul-gen¬ 
eral at Paris, the owner of the Sentinel, 
who got Mr. Pernot his place, want to get 
rid of him and so turned him over to the 
country ? Did Mr. Morss feel that Mr. 
Pernot’s facts, when put beside the last 
national platform, made for an exhibition 
of hypocrisy and phariseeism, and that, as 
Mr. Pernot, like Voorhees, Bynum, Cooper 
and others had no comprehension of any 
other facts connected with government, 
to get rid of publishing the facts, he must 
get rid of the correspondent? Perhaps 
this question will never be answered. 

Henry F. Libbey, postmaster at Pittsfield, 
Me., was first appointed in 1887, continued 
through the republican administration and 
just reappointed by President Cleveland. 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


49 


AMEIRIQAN KEIUDALISM. 

Tlie iuterference of senators ami representatives witli iioiniiiatioiis ami minor appointments in the civil service is not only 
without constitutional warrant, hut it is an indecent ami dangerous confusion of two functions which the constitution carefully 
keeps distinct. The senator or representative who makes himself an olllce broker, to pay his own parasites from the public parse, 
should stand well exposed in the pillory of public contempt, and by reason of such interference should forfeit the respect of the 
country and the conlldence and support of his constituency.— George William Curtis. 

The oath I now take to preserve, protect and defend the constitution of these United States not only impressively defines the 
great responsibility I assume, but suggests obedience to constitutional demands as the rule by which my olTicial conditions must be 
guided. —President Cleveland’s Inaugural. 

Anxiety for the redemption of the pledges which my party has made ami solicitude for the complete justillcation of the trust 
the people have reposed in us constniin me to remind those with whom I am to co-operate that we can succeed in doing the work 
which has been especially set before us only by the most sincere, harmonious and disinterested effort. Even if insuperable ob¬ 
stacles and opposition prevent the consummation of our task we shall hardly be excused, and if failure can be traced to our fault 
or neglect we may be sure the people will hold us to a swift and exacting accountability.— President Cleveland’s Inaugural. 


The total number of changes made in fourth- 
class post-offices in Indiana from March 4, 
1893, to June 27, was 603, less than one-third 
the total number in the state, distributed 
among the congressional districts as follows: 


No. of No. of 
Districts. Offices. Changes. 

1 . 146 42 

2 . 176 78 

3 . 210 66 

4 . 190 47 

5 . 189 79 

6 . 129 24 

7 . 78 42 

8 . 176 80 

9 . 175 34 

10 . 173 29 

11 . 178 46 

12 . 129 16 

13 . 115 20 


The number of post-offices above stated was 
taken from the postal guide issued January, 
1893, and, therefore, does not include the 
changes, in the way of establishments and 
abolitions, since that date, but the number 
given in each congressional district is approx¬ 
imately accurate. The number of changes in 
postmasters was taken from the official records 
in the department. 

The race between Congressman Brclz of the sec¬ 
ond, Cooper of the fifth, and Brookshire of the eighth, 
is an exceedingly close one — Cooper hamng secured 
one more appointment than Bretz, while Brookshire 
heads the list with one more than Cooper. Con¬ 
gressman Bynum leads the delegation in the highest 
per cent, of changes, having secured more than half 
the ofiices in the seventh district for his partisans. 
The sixth and ninth districts are looked after by 
Senators Voorhees and Turpie, while the three new 
members, Congressmen Hammond, McNagnefy and 
Conn, represent the tenth, twelfth and thirteenth. 
The older members, being well acquainted in 
their districts, were, no doubt, prepared to 
make recommendations early after the 4th of 
March, and were thereby enabled to secure a 
greater number of appointments. The num¬ 
ber of offices in Indiana is about one-thirtieth 
of the total number in the whole country. 
The total number of changes, provided re¬ 
movals have been made in the same ratio in 
other states, has been about 18,000, which 
would have required the removal of about 
200 per day. The changes have not aver¬ 
aged more than 125 per day; it is, therefore, 
apparent that Indiana democrats have fared 
better than those of other states.— Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, June SO. 


TURPIE AND VOORHEES. 

The Indiana democrats fared to-day at the na¬ 
tional pie counter. Oce consul and two special 
examiners of the pension office were appointed 
and two Indiana republicans were removed. 
W. H. Jacks, who receives the London (Out.) 
consularship, is a Logansport man, whose ap¬ 
pointment was asked for by Senator Turpie.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
June 9. 

Captain Jacks belongs to the labor wing of 
the democratic party, and during the last cam¬ 
paign made numerous speeches throughout 
the state. The agency pays a salary of $1,500 
per annum.— Indianapolis News, June S. 

G. C. Williams, of Muncie, visited the capi¬ 
tal a few days ago and made application to the 
Indiana senators for appointment as cashier of the 
government mint at New Orleans.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to Indianapolis Netvs, June 5. 

The appointment of Postmaster Carter, at Arcadia, 
Ind., has been revoked by the postmaster-general. 
The reasons were purely political, the indorsements of 
Mr. Carter having been unauthorized by the senators of 
Indiana, who are thepost-ojjice referrees in the republican 
districts .— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Nervs, 
.Tune 3. 

“Judge” Chester J. Faulkner, of Ripley county, 
and the trusted clerk of Senator Voorhees, who was 
slated for chief of the record division of the pension 
office, has shifted, and will be appointed on the staff 
of Col. “Dick” Bright, now sergeant-at-arms of the 
senate.—TFas/ifnflrfon Dispatch to Indianapolis News, 
May 11. 

Senator Voorhees will probably secure the ap¬ 
pointment also of Clark Crecelius, of Crawford 
county, for chief of division in the pension office. 
This office is worth 82,000. Crecelius has been county 
treasurer three terms, and was a member of the house in 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
May 11. 

William Merrill, chairman of the democratic com¬ 
mittee of his county, will be the postmaster at Con- 
nersville. The Indiana senators have been wrestling 
with this postmaster problem for some time, hut settled it 
Tuesday by deciding to recommend Mr. Merrill. Editor 
Higgs, of the Connersville Examiner, who was post¬ 
master under a former democratic administration, 
was the most formidable rival Mr. Merrill had. Mr. 
Merrill left for home Tuesday night.—lFas/iin£f<on 
Dispatch to Indianapolis News, April 20. 

DAN VOORHEES. 

[It remains to be seen whether the people of 
Indiana have spirit enough to drive this dis¬ 
honorable blatherskite out of public life.— 
CivU Service Chronicle. 


Strong language this; but is it aught too strong 
To paint a man who wilfully is wrong. 

And when he thinks the crooked course will pay 
Will swear that blackest night is brightest day? 

He cursed the soldiers with rapscallion tongue. 
And in our hearts was as a traitor hung. 

But now he blusters as the soldier’s friend. 

And wags that .same old tongue (which has no end) 
To plead for pensions for “A. Lincoln’s degs,” 

And vows a love—this prince of demagogues— 

So keen for any man who wore the blue 
(Whose vote he wants) that, though they never 
knew 

The clash of arms, the country shall be “just” 

To those whose war cry was “ the rear or bust!” 

Well, Dan was whipped. Our honor then at stake. 
And Daniel, then as ever on the make. 

Declared that when you’d .said your debts you’d 
pay 

You’d paid them! By this short and easy way 
He’d lift the burden from our aching backs. 
Honor? Damn honor when it means a tax I 
Those same greenbacks whose issue he had fought 
Became in his enraptured eyes “ blood-bought 
And, having bought them once (with blood), ’twas 
clear 

Again to buy them would be paying dear I 
Beaten again I We paid our little notes; 

Once more the Sycamore must root for votes. 

To tax ounelves to save the Nation’s life 
Imperiled in a most tremendous strife; 

To tax ourselves to keep a spotless name 
And free our honor from a speck of shame— 

This is outrageous! But of course we will 
Now tax ouselves to run our neighbor's mill! 
Protection’s creed he then begins to .screech ; 

Visits Atlanta ; makes a crazy speech ; 

Of our vast industries he sagely prates. 

And, in this rot, McKinley antedates! 

At last, at last! He’s safely up the spout? 

Ah, no! Sad day! For Cleveland pulls him out! 

Recurring then to his old greenback days. 

See him infected with the silver craze! 

If rags get value from the nation’s stamp 
(Whoever thought thev did save fool or scamp?) 
Why not a silver coin ? Why not, indeed ? 

Shall we not satisfy Bill Stewart’s greed ? 

A slip of paper is a dollar, hence 
Why not a dollar made of sixty cents? 

O, wondrous triumph! Muses aid my song! 

Dan's logical! But logically wrong! 

But see him now his la.st conclusion shirk. 

Give up his sliver dear, to win with Burke. 

What does the man believe in? Who can tell? 
Whate’er’s on top—hence dl.sbelieves in hell! 

Your conscience-killer always tries to blink 
The yawning pit, though crouching on its brink ! 
The “ poor man’s money ” left to take its chance, 
The “poor man’s friend” now leads the devil’s 
dance 

Through White House and departments! Every¬ 
where 


























50 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


You hear the yells of joy or of dispair 
As these Apaches wildly clutch their loot 
Or (rarely) feel the presidential boot. 

Where is our gush beslobbered workingman ? 
Athoine, of course, for sympathetic Dan, 

Who’s poured forth floods of tears for honest toil, 
Can’t use him in distributing the spoil! 

Tiie only man who stands the slightest show 
Is he who on his belly best can go ; 

And as the workingman goes head erect. 

What but contempt from Duncan he expect? 

Merit counts nothing, manhood’s a disgrace. 

The potent pull procures the sought-for place; 

The unknown worthy man must stand aside. 

While into power the creeping creatures slide. 
Democracy? Tom .Tefferson awakes ; 

“Democracy’s for men, and not for snakes! ’’ 

But Burke, who’s labor’s foe and Daniel’s price, 
Gets, thanks to Daniel, a substantial slice 1 

Is he a blatherskite ? What do you say ? 

Will such a record bear the light of day ? 

And yet he’s been consistent in one thing;' 

A traitor always—else conscience is not king. 

—From The Indianapolis News. 

James P. Voorhees has been appointed by 
his father,Senator Voorhees, of Indiana,clerk 
of the finance committee, at a salary of $2,500. 
There is nothing like keeping easy jobs in the 
family.— Pittsburgh Chronicle-Telegraph. 

Henry Mellen, of Spencer county, Indiana, 
who has been on the waiting list for several 
weeks, is remaining here on the strength of a 
promise of Senator Voorhees that he should be 
cared for. Mr. Mellen will probably get a 
clerkship in one of the departments.— Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 5. 

Senator Voorhees landed another place to¬ 
day, Wtea ex-Sheriff William Hargrave, of Prince¬ 
ton, Gibson county, was appointed Indian agent 
at the Western Shoshone agency, Nevada. Har¬ 
grave came here just after the inauguration, 
made a strong play to be United States mar¬ 
shal for Indiana, but Mr. Voorhees had Hosea 
Hawkins for that place, .so he calmly dropped 
Mr. Hargrave overboard. To-day he landed 
him at the Shoshone agency, which officially 
pays $1,600 per year, but which is not without 
opportunities. Senator Voorhees extends his 
usefulness in placing old-time friends outside 
the limits of the Hoosier state. Not long ago 
he persuaded Hoke Smith to appoint his old 
friend Col. John Lane to be a special agent of 
the land office at $2,000. Col. Lane lives in 
Oregon and has never benefited the Hoosier 
democracy, but then he is the son of old Lane 
of Breckinridge and Lane history, and was a 
rebel colonel during the war. So, for that 
score, Mr. Voorhees had him appointed.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, 
June 20, 

E. N. Bowman, of Covington, Ind., will be 
appointed deputy third auditor at a salary of 
$2,250 a year. The appointment will be made 
on the recommendation of Senator Voorhees. 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 
2S. 

Senator Voorhees, who has been devoting 
his time ever since the 4th of March, endeavor¬ 
ing, with varying success, to secure positions 
for his constituents, leaves early next week for 
White Sulphur Springs, Va.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to Indianapolis News, June SO. 


Senators Voorhees and Harris belong to tha 
credit of changing President Cleveland’s ob¬ 
stinate determination not to call a session be¬ 
fore September. Mr. Voorhees is chairman 
of the finance committee, the committee in 
whose hands will rest the fate of the silver 
bill. He has hitherto always been regarded 
as an out-and-out free silver man. According¬ 
ly, Mr. Cleveland has lavished upon him many of 
the choicest plums of federal patronage. Almost 
every wish of his has been granted, from foreign min¬ 
isters to the humblest lines of patronage. Xs a fitting 
conclusion to this unprecedented recognition Jilliod 
Boivman, an old classmate and the senator's “ best 
man," was made a deputy auditor of the treasury at 
the senator's request. This appears to have com¬ 
pleted Mr. Vooi-hee.s' conversion, for he went to 
the White House at once for the purpose of 
advising the President to call an early session, 
and to assure Mr. Cleveland that he would 
vote for an unconditional repeal of the Sher¬ 
man act, and that he believed the senate would 
pass the repeal bill. He failed to see the Pre.s- 
ident, but he and Senator Harris called on 
Secretary Lamont, and to him they confided 
the duty of laying before the President their 
views. They believe there will be enough 
democrats in the senate to join the republican 
senators and pass the bill. Voorhees author¬ 
ized Mr. Lamont to assure Mr. Cleveland and 
the cabinet that, as chairman of the finance 
committee, he would pledge himself to use all 
his influence and authority to facilitate the 
progress of the bill in the senate. Mr. La¬ 
ment’s report to the cabinet gave the assur¬ 
ance for which Mr. Cleveland has been wait¬ 
ing, and without which he believed it would 
have been useless to call an extra session. In 
partial explanation of his sudden and unex¬ 
pected change of heart. Senator Voorhees said : 
“I think the President has acted wisely, and 
I have no doubt that as soon as congress gets 
to work it will repeal the Sherman act. I 
voted against the bill when it came up, on the 
yea and nay vote when it passed, and told the 
silver men who supported it that it was not the 
legislation needed for silver, and that they 
would live to regret the day they supported 
it. That day has come. I, for one, shall vote 
for its repeal. It must not be understood, 
however, that I abate a single jot or tittle of 
my adherence to the coinage and the use of 
silver as money under proper regulations for 
its parity with gold.”— Washington Dispatch to 
Indianapolis News, July 5. 

Senator Voorhees is at the Sulphur Springs of Vir¬ 
ginia. He is utterly worn out, and was too fatigued 
to return to Washington to-day to attend the funeral 
of Mr. Frank E. Banby, his son’s brother-in-law, who 
was run over by a Baltimore & Ohio train last night 
and killed. Mr. Banby was a native of Detroit, but 
had been living for ten years in this city. Three 
years ago Senator Voorhees had him appointed to a 
small office under the District government.— B'os/i- 
ington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, July 11. 

BROWN. 

The Hon. J. B. Brown returned to the city yester¬ 
day and will remain until the first of July, He is 
probably watching the New Albany post-office. 

Con Cunningham, of Crawfordsville, has returned 
to press his candidacy for a consulship. Cunning¬ 
ham filed an application for the position at Belfast, 


when that was filled he changed it to another. When 
that went he named five otliers, either of which 
would be acceptable, and returned home to await 
his appointment. Recently the President filled 
three of the positions named by him, and he hastened 
back to make another effort before the other two 
were disposed of.— Washington Dispatch to Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, June 15. 

Congressman Jason Brown has been laboring faith¬ 
fully for two weeks to secure the removal of the post¬ 
master at New Albany and the appointment of C. W. 
Schindler. Up to this time he has not succeeded, 
but Mr. Schindler will probably secure the plum 
when it falls. He is in the city waiting for the event. 
— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 21. 

The man who will succeed Major Luke as post¬ 
master of'Jeffersonville is Patrick C. Donovan. At 
the time of Mr. Cleveland's election Congressman Brown 
tendered the position, which pays 82,500 per annum, to 
Mr. Donovan, but not until yesterday did he signify 
his acceptance. His commission will likely be issued 
in November, when the term of Mr. Luke expires. 
Mr. Donovan retires from theofficeof sheriff of Clark 
county Angust 22. Twice was he chosen for that po¬ 
sition by a majority which was overwhelming.—Je/- 
fersonville Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, June 30. 

Representative Brown has fixed this (Wednesday) 
evening as the time of his departure for home. He 
realizes that but little can be accomplished in the 
way of securing full-grown plums during the Presi¬ 
dent’s absence, and the fact that Postmaster-General 
Bissell and Secretary Smith are both taking vaca¬ 
tions, removes the possibility of even gathering in a 
few unimportant places for the faithful among his 
personal friends.— Washington Dispatchlo Indianapolis 
News, July 5. 

A wholesale slaughter of the rank and file em¬ 
ployed at the Jeffersonville depot of army supplies 
is on, and the heads of ten of the faithful layeth in the 
basket, thereby giving a chance for a corresponding 
number of good democrats to take their places. This 
decapitation only commenced last Friday, and if 
the good work keeps going on with the same rapidi¬ 
ty in the future, every republican employed at that 
institution will be deposed within a fortnight. 
Democrats are greatly pleased over Congressman 
Brown’s unerring labor in the interest of his con¬ 
stituents regarding these removals, and on his next 
visit to this city he will be given an ovation. Those 
who have been dismissed are Capt. James Meyers, 
clerk; John Flynn, assistant engineer; J. A. Sage, 
saddler; William Wilson, watchman; Joseph Sear- 
cey, A. N. Joslyn, James Reed and two others, pack¬ 
ers. It is said that Capt. T. A. Mann, inspector, will 
be removed, and that Nathan Sharks, a prominent 
dry goods merchant of this city, will be given his 
place.—Jeffersonville Dispatch to Indianapolis Sentinel, 
July 11. 

BROOKSHIRE. 

Repretentative Brookshire is naming a good many 
federal officers for his district these days. He has 
recommended the appointment of the following post¬ 
masters in his district, and his recommendation is 
equivalent to appointment in offices of the classes 
named : Covington, James Simmerman ; Attica, 
Henry G. Schlosser; Veedersburg, J. B. Dunkle.— 
Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, April 26. 

The B. & O. Southwest limited brought in the city 
to-day Indiana Representatives Taylor of the first, 
Bretz of the second, Brookshire of the eighth, and 
McNagney of the twelfth. Mr. Cooper arrived yester¬ 
day. With Bretz came Eph Inman of Martin county. 
Inman Is an applicant for internal revenue agent. 
Mr. McNagney within two hours after his arrival se¬ 
cured the appointment of Thomas Mannix for mail 
transfer agent at Fort Wayne at ninety dollars per 
month. He held the same place under the first 
Cleveland administration.—TTasWngfoji Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Sentinel, May 25. 

Congressman Brookshire Is still here keeping a 
close watch on the revenue collectorship for the 
seventh district.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
News, June 21. 

An Impression has prevailed here that Representa¬ 
tive Brookshire was of the opinion that neither 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


51 


Josiah Jump nor Walter Hulit would be appointed 
collector of the seventh district, but that a dark horse 
would come iu winner. Mr. Brookshire is indorsing 
Hulit and is working for his candidate tooth and 
nail. He to-day tiled a number of additional strong 
indorsements, and is of the opinion that his man 
will be appointed. Josiah Jump is backed by Sena¬ 
tor Voorhees. 

Mr. Brookshire leaves to-morrow. During tlie past 
few days he has been getting in some good work for 
his constituents. E. B. Miller, of Brazil, has through 
his influence, received the appointment of deputy 
consul and clerk at Bordeaux. This position pays 
about 81,500 a year. Thomas B. Eaton, an ex-Union 
soldier, of Sullivan, has been appointed a messenger 
iu the PensionoflSce. Wm. A. Huff, of Shannondale, 
will be appointed a member of the treasury watch. 
— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 30. 

The appearance in Washington of County Treas¬ 
urer oouzman as an applicant for the collectorship 
of internal revenue puts a new phase to the contest be- 
tweai Senator Voorhees and Congressman Brookshire for 
the control of this bit of patronage. The senator has 
been insisting on the appointment of ex-Judge 
Jump, the law partner of the senator’s protege, ex- 
Congressman Lamb. Congressman Brookshire had 
been contending that this appointment falls to the 
congressman, and has recommended Hulet, of Craw- 
fordsville, the congressman’s home city. For some 
time it has been understood that Brookshire did not 
expect to have Hulet appointed, and the selection 
of Couzman is a compromise effort to thwart the 
Voorhces-Lamb people, who so far have controlled 
patronage iu this district. The Brookshire follow¬ 
ing counts on the scandal arising from the con¬ 
troversy over Postmaster Douham’s attempt to evade 
the civil service law to help overcome the senator’s 
prestige with the President.—Terre Haute Dispatch to 
Indianapolis Journal, June 8. 

E. V. Brookshire, congressman, was in this city to¬ 
day and held a consultation with the democrat^ in 
regard to the post-office in this city. The eight or 
ten candidates for the place were present and a 
long private discussion was held. It was finally de¬ 
cided that Mr. Brookshire should recommend Ed 
Voris for the place.—Crawfordsville Dispatch to Indi¬ 
anapolis Journal, July 8. 

MCNAGNEY. 

Congressman McNagney won a victory to-day by 
the appointment of W. W. Rockhill as postmaster at 
Ft. Wayne to succeed Higgins, removed. Some time 
ago Mr. Higgins was asked by the Democratic man¬ 
agers to resign, so that they would not have to re¬ 
sort to the painful necessity of preparing charges 
against him. He replied that he wanted the salary 
until his term closed, which was in January next. 
Charges were preferred, some of which were sworn 
to by the chairman of the republican committee of 
Ft. Wayne. The charges alleged that Postmaster 
Higgins levied campaign assessments on post-office 
employes, and that he compelled his clerks in the 
office to work on a campaign poll-list during office 
hours. Higgins’ successor is one of the publishers 
of the Fort Wayne Journal.—IPas/iwigfo/t Dispatch to 
Indianapolis News, June 28. 

Congressmau McNagney has recommended W. H. 
McEwen, a young man, for postmaster at Albion. 
There were five candidates, four of whom were ex¬ 
soldiers.—Jndianapofis News, June 28. ^ 

Alexander Orr was recommended for postmaster 
at Kendallville by his congressman.—/ndionapolts 
Sentinel, June 24. 

The unexpected call for an extra session has caused 
the few congressmen in the city to think about mak¬ 
ing final preparations for a long sojourn in Washing- 
tion, and, incidentally, to learn the wishes of their 
constituents in regard to the monetary situation. 
Representative McNagney, of the twelfth district, 
boarded a west-bound train Monday night for his 
home in Columbia City. He felt happg over his victory 
in the Fort Wayne post-office fight, and said that no im¬ 
portant changes were impending in his bailiwick except 
some dozen fourth-class postmasters and a few minor ap¬ 
pointments .— Washington Dispatch to IndianapolisNews, 
July 5. 


Congressman McNagney, of Columbia City, was in 
the city last night to make one more plea for the ap¬ 
pointment of his law partner, Thomas Marshall, to 
the vacancy on the supreme bench. Mr. McNagney 
will spend a few days at home, and will then go to 
Washington to remain during the special session of 
congress. He says he is happy now that he has se¬ 
cured the removal of Postmaster Higgins, of Ft. 
Wayne .—Indianapolis News, July 7. 

BYNUM. 

Senator R. Y. Stewart came into Washington to-day 
quietly: so very quietly that he forgot to register at 
Willard’s, where he is stopping. He immediately 
started oil' for Mr. Bynum, and when he found him 
talked very earnestly about the Indianapolis post- 
office, and Indianapolis surveyorship. Mr. Stewart 
does not seem to be altogether satisfied at the delay 
in filling those offices. Bynum wants Rail to be 
surveyor, and will probably get him. During the 
afternoon Messrs. Bynum and Holman called on the 
President, and talked surveyor and postmaster to 
him. Mr. Bynum believes that the post-office change 
will be made before the President goes away on his 
holiday. Democrats here blame the Terre Haute 
post-oflice scandal and Mr. Sahm’s recent interview, 
in which he admitted Mr. Thompson’s efficiency, as 
the reason for the delay. All the charges that have 
been filed against Mr. Thompson are still at the 
post-office department.—Was/iMipfon Dispatch to In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, June 21. 

It is conceded on all hands that Congressman 
Bynum will name the surveyor of the port of India¬ 
napolis. The contest seems to have narrowed down 
to two men, John Rail and John A. Resume. It 
is asserted that Mr. Bynum has already decided up¬ 
on the man he will name, and the guessing is about 
even as between Rail and Resume. Mr. Bynum is 
reported to have said that he believed Rail would 
secure the appointment. The man whom Mr. Bynum 
recommends will probably be appointed.— Washing¬ 
ton Dispatch to Indianapolis News, July 5. 

HOLMAN. 

Dr. Woollen, of Switzerland county, returned home 
to-day after being assured that the office of medical 
referee for the pension office could not go to Indiana 
for the reason that the three Indiana applicants for the place 
lived in the same district, and were all indorsed by Rep¬ 
resentative Holman. They were Woollen of Switzer¬ 
land, Henry and Brout of Dearborn. The office will 
go to New York.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis 
Sentinel, May 24. 

It is reported that there is already an organization 
to defeat the renomination of Congressmau Holman. 
It grew out of the contest for revenue collectorship 
iu the sixth district. Dr. Hunter, who is a candidate 
for the position, claims to have been misled by Mr. 
Holman, and Hunter’s son-in-law. Editor O’Brien,of 
Lawreuceburg, who is a clever politician, threatens 
to make troubie for Mr. Holman. At the same time 
there are a number of complaints coming from the 
northern part of the sixth district against the ap¬ 
pointment of Bracken as collector, because the reve¬ 
nue collector under the former Cleveland adminis¬ 
tration came from Holman’s district. Congressmau 
Holman is in Washington looking after some minor 
appointments. He wiil be here about two weeks 
He thinks there is no doubt of Bracken’s appoint¬ 
ment.— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Bentind, 
June 13. 

Representative Holman left to day for Indiana. 
Just before going he had a iong conference with 
Controller of the Currency Eckels, and urged upon 
the latter official the necessity of appointing a sec¬ 
ond bank examiner for Indiana at once. The cou- 
trolier of the currency contemplates such action 
soon, and Mr. Holman hopes to secure the appoint¬ 
ment for Cashier Pugh, of the Rush county national 
bank, at Rushville, Ind. Mr. Pugh was Holman’s 
candidate for the bank examinership when O. M. 
Packard, of Plymouth was appointed, and Mr. Hoi- 
man claims that Pugh passed a better examina¬ 
tion than Mr. Packard, but failed for want of a politi¬ 
cal pull. There seems to be a disposition among the 
Indiana delegation to concede Che bank examinership to 


Mr. Pugh when the new district is created.^ Washington 
Dispatch to Indianapolis News, June 21. 

Congressman Taylor has secured the appointment 
of Anthony Stevenson, of Rockport, a cousin of Vice- 
President Stevenson, to be inspector of federai courts 
for southern Indiana, to succeed Samuel Kercheval. 
— Washington Dispatch to Indianapolis Journal, June 19. 

Congressman Martin announced, Februarj 25, his 
postmasters as follows: Hawkins at Marlon, Editor 
Timmonds at Portland, W. A. Gutelius at Bluffton, 
W. H. Campbell at Fairmount. Timmonds and 
Campbell were the last to be appointed—June 13. 

WANTON REMOVALS. 


I believe, with reason, that we are to have a civil 
service reform administration of the best in every 
sense of the word. Mr. Cleveland was nominated by 
no politician; he was elected by no party; no one 
state was pivotal in determining the result; the peo¬ 
ple called for him and he answered the call. I do 
not believe that he will betray them. I have heard 
him in conversation deplore the patronage system, 
and the trials and cares imposed upon the President 
in administering it. I have heard him quote the 
ominous warning of Senator Pendleton, “that unless 
the government destroyed the spoils system, the 
spoils system would destroy the government.’’ No 
President is omniscient or omnipresent; but I be¬ 
lieve that, if you will hold up his hands, criticising 
where criticism is deserved, praising where praise is 
due, you will see in the next four years the best civil 
service reform administration since the days of Wash¬ 
ington, Adams and Jefferson.—C/mrfes Theodore Rus¬ 
sell, Jr., of the Massachusetts Board of Civil Service 
Commissioners, March, 1893, 


Logan Carlisle, it is said, has declared to his father 
that they are “ in for a fight now with the newspa¬ 
pers, and must not weaken.’’ It is but frank to say 
that they would have had this fight precipitated a 
good while ago if it had not been for the general de¬ 
sire of the newspapers not to throw obstacles in the 
way of the newcomers till they had had time to look 
about them and get their bearings. Under the late 
administration. Secretary Foster was loudly praised 
everywhere, by both friends and foes, for his refusal 
to permit the practice of nepotism by two of his sub¬ 
ordinates who wanted to give their sons employment 
under the government; and when he finally weakly 
yielded, he received an equal measure of blame. 
President Cleveland has been credited with an in¬ 
tense dislike of having his own secretary of the treas¬ 
ury appoint a relative, and the nearest of relatives 
at that, to office. He is understood to have con¬ 
sented to overlook the act because of some peculiar 
circumstances which seemed to afford an apology for 
it; but it is hard upon him now to find his many 
professions belied, and his administration scandal¬ 
ized with the public, by the very young man whose 
appointment had beeu so offensive to him on general 
principles.— Washington Dispatch to New York Evening 
Post, May 11. 

It is urged by some of the defenders of the course 
things are now taking iu the treasury, tliat the sec¬ 
retary put his son in charge of his present post be¬ 
cause he wanted there a young man of “ nerve,” 
who would not allow himself to be swayed by any 
consideration in cutting right or left. That he has 
got what he was looking for is evident from a scene 
which occurred iu the chief clerk’s room a few days 
ago. A poor-looking man, evidently a laborer in the 
department, was observed on the outskirts of the 
crowd of office-beggars who were swarming around 
Mr. Carlisle, jr. When it came the turn of this vis¬ 
itor to speak, he advanced hesitatingly, and held out 
his notice of discharge with a trembling hand. 

“Well, what is it?” inquired Mr. Carlisle, who 
likes to do business briskly. 

“I wanted to ask, sir,” faltered tlie workingman, 
“ if I could have a little more time on my notice to 
quit. I have just lost my wife, and her sickness and 
funeral were expensive, and I am in debt, which it 
will take me a little while to work off.” 

“ Oh, bless your soul,” answered Mr. Carlisle, with 
a merry chuckle, “ the fellow who wants your place 











52 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


is just as badly oft' as you are.” And with that he 
passed ou to the next caller.— Washington Dispatch to 
New York Evening Post, May 13. 

Another case which illustrates the way things are 
going in the treasury department is that of Capt. A. 
F. McMillan, who has resigned under compulsion 
his place as deputy first auditor. He has been in the 
treasury department and in the first auditor’s oflice 
continuously for more than twenty-seven years. 
Every one, regardless of politics, who has served with 
him speaks well of his work. His industry may be 
judged by the fact that he has been absent only six¬ 
teen days in t’ne last seven years. He has a gift for 
dispatching business. A democratic oflice-holder 
occupying a highly responsible position, and himself 
one of the brightest men in the service, said to day 
to your correspondent: 

“I have known McMillan and worked with him 
for years, and it is my honest conviction that he has 
earned three times over every dollar he has drawn 
out of the United States treasury in salary.” 

Mr. McMillan is no longer a young man. He served 
from the very outbreak of the civil war till the hour 
of its close, entering the union army as a private in 
the volunteers and quitting it a captain by successive 
promotions in the field. Some mouths afterward he 
came to Washington from his home in Michigan as a 
temporary clerk, at a time when the treasury was 
swamped by the multitude of accumulated accounts 
to be audited and settled. He expected to stay two 
years and then go home. lie doubtless wishes now 
that he had adhered to his original programme; but 
he probably did not look forward to a day when the 
rule at the treasury department would be that long 
and faithful service was a disqualification for further 
continuance in office. 

Mr. McMillan is a republican in his sympathies. 
In the years that have intervened since his arrival 
in Washington he has had no political backing, be¬ 
cause he became a citizen of the District of Columbia 
and stuck at his work instead of going home to vote. 
Nevertheless he has received promotion after pro¬ 
motion, till the last Cleveland administration, ou 
coming into control at the treasury, found him a 
chief of division. Secretary Manning asked for his 
resignation and received it; but the democratic first 
auditor, a party man of the most ultra variety, put 
in so vigorous a protest against the removal of an in¬ 
valuable assistant that the resignation was given 
back. When the Harrison administration came in, 
he was raised from chief of division to deputy audi¬ 
tor, and this was recognized as one of the good things 
done in the line of civil service reform. Now he goes 
out, a poor man, to begin life anew at a time when 
most men in private occupations are beginning to 
think about closing up their active affairs and en¬ 
joying themselves on their incomes. 

The work of the firstauditor’s office is of no trifling 
importance. It is there that all accounts accruing 
in the treasury department, except those arising un¬ 
der the internal revenue laws, are examined and 
certified to the first comptroller or to the commis¬ 
sioner of customs. The customs division deals with 
the fines, emoluments, forfeitures, debentures, and 
drawbacks of the customs service, the marine hos¬ 
pital service, and the revenue marine. The judic¬ 
iary division deals with the fees of district attorneys, 
marshals, commissioners, and clerks, rent of court¬ 
houses, support of prisoners, etc. The public debt 
division deals with the redemption of the public 
debt, including principal, premium and interest, 
payment of interest, redemption of certificates of de¬ 
posit, notes destroyed, etc. The ware-house divis¬ 
ion deals with ware-house and bond accounts re¬ 
ceived from custom-houses. Besides these, there is a 
miscellaneous division which handles the accounts 
of mints and assay-offices, the territorial accounts, 
the coast survey, salaries and contingent expenses 
of the legislative, executive and judicial branches of 
the government, the construction, repair and preser¬ 
vation of public buildings, and the general receipts 
and expenaitures passing through the office of the 
United States treasurer.— Washington Dispatch to New 
York Evening Post, May 24. 

Secretary Carlisle called for the resignation of 
James R. O’Beirne, assistant commissioner of immi¬ 


gration at the port of New York some time ago. He 
waited for the resignation until to-day when, as it 
had not arrived he issued an order removing Mr. 
O’Beirne from ihe service and appointing Edward 
F. MeSweeney of Boston, Mass., to succeed him. Mr. 
MeSweeney is a personal friend of Assistant Secre¬ 
tary of State Josiah Quincy, and it is understood 
owes his appointment to Mr. Quincy’s recommenda¬ 
tions.— Washington Dispatch to New York Times, July 1. 

Before leaving for Philadelphia this afternoon. 
Secretary Carlisle set the guillotine at work and the 
official head of St. Julien A. Dapray, the chief of the 
law division, supervising architect’s office, rolled in" 
to the basket. Mr. Dapray has been employed in 
that bureau for the last twenty years, is a most com¬ 
petent official and a veritable encylopedia on all 
questions relating to public buildings throughout 
the country. His retention was asked for by about 
fifty senators, regardless of party, but the secretary 
wanted his place for a party-worker and he got it.— 
Washington Dispatch to Buffalo Express, June 21. 

Secretary Carlisle has appointed John W. Kinsey, 
of New Philadelphia, Ohio, superintendent of con¬ 
struction of the post office building at Washington, 
D. C., vice Thomas C. Stewart, removed. He was 
backed by the united Ohio democratic congressional dele¬ 
gation .— Washington Dispatch, June 24. 

Secretary Carlisle, before starting on his westward 
trip, gave orders that resignations should be called 
for as follows: M. J. Hall, Thomas Rathbone, and 
Thomas S. Parks, chiefs of division in the second 
auditor’s office; W. A. Rogers, a chief of division in 
the third auditor’s office, and L. K. Brown, a chief 
in the fourth auditor’s office. The case in this group 
which excites most indignant comment is that of Mr. 
Rathbone. He is another veteran, like Mr. Stetson 
who was removed some days ago, of more than a 
quarter century’s service. He belongs to a small 
company of genuine watch dogs of the treasury—not 
iheshow sort, but the kind that do the hardest and 
most intelligent work. As a citizen of the District of 
Columbia, he has no senator or representative to 
appeal to for aid, and his extreme deafness, while 
not interfering in the least with his work in auditing 
claims against the treasury, is likely to be a serious 
obstacle in the way of his getting certain kinds of 
employment outside. He has remained a poor man 
jn spite of opportunities to grow rich by winking at 
doubtful claims, and has doubtless saved the govern¬ 
ment many millions of dollars by his absolute integ¬ 
rity and his thorough knowledge of his business. 
Such an adept had he become that, like Mr. Stetson, 
he could scent the fraud in a claim on account as 
soon as it came before him, no matter how smooth its 
exterior. All his expert knowledge, however, goes 
for nothing because his place is wanted for a demo¬ 
crat. 

It is fortunate for Secretary Carlisle that his own 
reputation for honesty is so high. A man with a 
less honorable and scrupulous record would be sus¬ 
pected of conspiracy with the claim agents and lob¬ 
byists who infest Washington. All the disreputable 
members of this erowd are chuckling and rubbing 
their hands over the fact that they have a secretary 
now in office who, without being purchasable in any 
way himself, is playing straight into their hands. 
They have long been struggling to get rid of Stetson 
and Rathbone, who knew too much to be swindled 
by them. The next men who come in will be un¬ 
trained and therefore easier to handle ; and the pre¬ 
cedent established by Mr. Carlisle, if literally in¬ 
terpreted, makes it plain that it is not worth while to 
study the government’s interests any more. The 
moment a man becomes so proficient in his work 
that he is promoted to a place where he ean direct 
the work of others in the same line, he will be 
marked for summary dismissal. William A. Day, 
who was second auditor during Cleveland’s former 
administration, and one of the most efficient heads 
that office has ever had, not only retained Mr. Rath¬ 
bone, but made no secret of regarding him as a 
highly valuable subordinate.—IFas/impfon Dispatch 
to New York Evening Times, July 7. 

Secretary Carlisle’s last lot of dismissals included, 
besides Mr. Rathbone, whose case was treated in 


the.se dispatches yesterday, George II. French, chief 
of the navy division in the second comptroller’s of¬ 
fice. This division has jurisdiction of disbursements 
by navy paymasters for pay and rations, by paymas¬ 
ters at navy-yards, for navy pensions at foreign sta¬ 
tions, by the financial agent in London, and by and 
for the marine corps. Mr. French came up to his 
present position from the ranks by diligence and 
good work. He lacks one arm, lost in the union army 
during the civil war. He was retained all through 
the former Cleveland administration. Another 
victim was L. K. Brown, chief of the paymasters’ di¬ 
vision in the fourth auditor’s office. This division 
had charge of the accounts of navy paymasters, in¬ 
cluding mechanics’ rolls—work in which there Is a 
vast amount of detail, requiring the keenest accu¬ 
racy. Mr. Brown was reduced from chief of division 
to a $1,800 clerkship during Cleveland’s former ad¬ 
ministration, but remained actually in charge of the 
division, its nominal head being an untrained man, 
aud no untrained man being able to handle it. How 
much Brown’s services were appreciated then is 
shown by the fact that Gen. Shelley, the democratic 
fourth auditor under whom he served then, was in¬ 
strumental in procuring his restoration to the chief- 
ship, from which he was deposed temporarily for 
partisan reasons. Brown has only one leg. The 
other he left on a union battlefield.— Washington 
Dispatch to New York Evening Post, June 9. 


“A BRIEF REWARD OF PARTY 
ZEAL.” 


Lewis Baker, editor of the St. Paul Qlobe, the chair¬ 
man of the state democratic committee during the last 
campaign, appointed minister to Nicaragua. 

V ■ i{< <« 

Louis C. Hughes, w'ho becomes governor of Ari- 
zono. Is one of the political powers in that territory 
and is a newspaper man, editing apaper at Phoenix. 
He is about fifty-four years of age and ivas a dele¬ 
gate to the Chicago convention, 

* * * 

James E. Neal was appointed consul to Liverpool 
as apersonal compliment to ex-Governor Campbell, 
of Ohio. He is chairman of the democratic committee 
of Ohio. Ex-Governor Campbell asked special re¬ 
cognition for two of his political proteges—Neal 
for Liverpool, and Claude Meeker for Glasgow. 
Mr. Neal got Liverpool; but, owing to a defect of 
memory, President Cleveland appointed another 
man to Glasgow, yet recognized Meeker afterward 
by giving him the Bradford consulship, one of the 
best in England in the way of tees.—Indianapolis 
News, April i. 

* ♦ » 

Q. O. Eckford, of Mississippi, who succeeds Dr- 
Dent, private secretary to the late Secretary Blaine, 
as consul at Kingston, Jamaica, is a leading lawyer 
of Aberdeen, Miss., and has been an active spirit 
in state politics, being chairman of the democratic 
state executive committee last year. 

* * * 

Theodore M. Stephan, appointed consul at Anna- 
berg, Germany, is a Lutheran minister at Austin, 
Ill. In the campaign of IS'JS he was chairman of the 
campaign committee of the Lutheran churches of Illi¬ 
nois, and as such was brought into intimate rela¬ 
tions with ex-Represeiitative Cable, upon whose 
recommendation his appointment was made. 

ijt 4i *:« 

Jeremiah W. Coveney, postmaster at Bos¬ 
ton, is chairman of the democratic state cen¬ 
tral committee. 

* <« 

Frank H. Jones, appointed first assistant 
postmaster-general, is the president of the 
leagne of democratic clubs of Illinois and was 
a delegate to the last democratic national 
convention. 










The Civil Service chronicle. 


If we see uotliiiig in our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoil, we shall fail at every point.— 

President-elect Cleveland at New York,' November 18. 


Voi.. II, No. 6. INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST, 1893. terms ?o”oTn?BpL'’coVy““"“ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

President Cleveland has never done 
anything more to be commended than his 
separation of himself from congress after 
calling it together and delivering to it his 
message. There his duty ended. It was 
no more his business to stay and interfere 
with legislation and seek to influence 
congressmen than it is the business of 
congressmen to interfere with the appoint¬ 
ment of fourth-class postmasters. He de¬ 
liberately cut the patronage tie between 
himself and congressmen in a manner 
more marked than it has been done 
before in sixty years. There is little 
doubt but that congressmen went to Wash¬ 
ington expecting to sell him their votes for 
patronage; but the President has put 
congress into the breach where the consti¬ 
tution intended it to go and has left it to 
get along as best it can. It will have to 
fry in its own grease. It will have to do 
something and that without any certainty 
of receiving pay in patronage. It is in the 
full blaze of the eye of the country and 
although it may writhe and squirm it will 
have to act. 

In the boston Herald of July 31, Mr. 
Josiah Quincy, assistant secretary of state, 
occupies three columns in explanation of 
his loot of the consular service. We do not 
recall anything like it since the days of 
the doctrine of local option in the execu¬ 
tion of the civil service law. Mr. Quincy 
has been going at a rate at which a clean 
sweep will be completed in the consular 
service within a year. He says that this is 
faster than the rate under other adminis¬ 
trations. That is true. He says he be¬ 
lieves that he has secured a better class of 
men than those he caused to be dismissed. 
Every boss who ever divides spoil among 
henchmen says that. Mr. Quincy says that 
it was impossible to deal with the service 
upon “a purely non-political basis.” He 
has not dealt with it upon a non-political 
basis at all, purely or otherwise. He has 
not made the least attempt to deal with it 
upon a non-political basis. So far as this 
clean sweep has gone, it has been a division 
of spoil made in the usual manner and 
upon the usual spoils principles. Con¬ 
gressmen have exercised their usual con¬ 


trol. Newspaper editors and other party- 
workers have shared as usual; and along 
with this have gone aggravating cases of 
unjust and unbusiness-like dismissals 
which would not have occurred under any 
attempt to apply any sort of reform prin¬ 
ciples. The question most important to 
himself, Mr. Quincy ignores. He has 
been for years a member of a civil service 
reform association, and has attended its 
meetings. Did he, when he had the op¬ 
portunity, attempt to establish the princi¬ 
ples of civil service reform in the consular 
service, or, in treacherous recreancy to his 
professed principles, has he been a mere 
divider of spoil ? The facts seem to be 
against Mr. Quincy. 

Since the comments upon Secretary 
Carlisle, to be found elsewhere in this 
paper were written, another case has been 
published which shows again the corrupt 
and diseased nature of his view of the 
reason of existence of clerkships as well as 
of his duty as the head of a great depart¬ 
ment. In 1884 Eugene Gaddis, by compet¬ 
itive examination, secured a place in the 
treasury. He served with credit through 
the successive administrations of Cleveland 
and Harrison and received several promo¬ 
tions. March 1, this year, he was detailed 
as an examiner under the civil service 
commission and the commission, there¬ 
fore, has, since Carlisle became secretary, 
been the only proper superior to judge 
how Gaddis has performed his duties; yet, 
without a word to or from the commission 
or Gaddis, the latter has been dismissed. 
When asked by the correspondent of the 
New York Evening Pod as to any cause of 
complaint, Mr. Roosevelt said : 

“ On the contrary, we found him a very satisfac¬ 
tory clerk—so much so that when we learned of his 
dismissal, we were as astonished as he was, and 
one member of the commission went up to the 
treasury at once to find out what the trouble was, 
but was given no Information by the department. 
I then wrote myself, on the 7th of August to Assist¬ 
ant Secretary Curtis, saying that the commission 
was wholly in the dark as to any reason why Mr. 
Gaddis should be dismissed, and thought there must 
have been some mistake in the matter. To this let¬ 
ter I received on August 9 a response from Acting 
Secretary Hamlin, which simply stated that the 
department had ‘good and sufficient reasons’ for 
the removal of Mr. Gaddis. On the 10th I wrote to 
Mr. Hamlin, going into the case at some length and 
showing that there was no possibility of the depart¬ 
ment’s knowing anything about Mr. Gaddis’s serv¬ 
ices for the last five months, during the time the 
present administration has been in power, except 
through the commission. To this letter I received 


no answer. Accordingly, after waiting until the 
16th, I sent to the secretary of the treasury a long 
letter, giving a full statement of the case, and say¬ 
ing in conclusion: 

Whether the reasons for his dismissal are or are 
not “good and sufficient’’(and with the facts as 
given above it is very difficult to believe they are), 
I would, with all deference and respect, but with 
all earnestness, state that it seems hardly possible 
that there can be any “good and sufficient reason” 
for refusing to state to Mr. Gaddis or to the com¬ 
mission under which he has been serving the 
cause of his dismissal. It is hardly necessary to 
point out the demoralizing effects upon the com¬ 
mission’s force of detailed men of letting it be un¬ 
derstood that faithful service rendered to the gov¬ 
ernment while with this commission affords no 
guarantee against sudden removals for reasons 
unknown to the man himself and unknown to the 
only body which has any knowledge or can have 
any knowledge of how he is performing his official 
duties; while it certainly seems that the commis¬ 
sion should itself be informed If any of its em¬ 
ployees are guilty of misconduct of which it has no 
knowledge. 

“Has Secretary Carlisle answered you yet?” 
Mr. Roosevelt was asked. 

“No. I have waited now nine days, but have 
heard nothing.” 

The reasons which were “ good and suf¬ 
ficient” to Secretary Carlisle, probably 
were that he has taken upon himself the 
task of attempting to block civil service 
reform. His insulting neglect to answer 
Mr. Roosevelt’s letter can only mean that 
he intends to openly show his contempt 
for the reform and for every officer and 
person connected with it or advocating it. 
He will find that reformers will not shrink 
from this contest. They have had like 
contests with officers fully the equal of Mr. 
Carlisle and they have no reason to be dis¬ 
satisfied with the results. 


A LETTER from Vincennes, which we 
publish, illustrates a condition which will 
continue to exist and will breed deceit and 
falsehood and hypocrisy and will bring 
contempt upon every administration so 
long as we pursue the practice of going 
into the street and picking up local poli¬ 
ticians and making them postmasters, as 
was done at Vincennes. Such men have 
heard of the civil service law, but they 
know nothing of its provisions, and they 
hate it, and they start out not with the in¬ 
tention of giving it a fair enforcement, but 
of beating it if they can. The result is a 
series of tricks of about the grade of an or¬ 
dinary bunco game. This has gone on 
under the present administration until the 
postmaster-general is thoroughly compro¬ 
mised. We do not yet regard itas hopeless 
that he will in the near future relieve his 
department of this odium. 


What politics can do for the public ser¬ 
vice is well illustrated by the fire-alarm 
telegraph service of this city. In June, 


















54 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


1891, the new charter having then recently 
gone into effect, the Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle had the following: 

The fire-alarm telegraph of the city has a 
superintendent in George Holderman, a re 
publican, who had an assistant named George 
White, and a sub-assistant named Findling. 
The new board dismissed White and Findling, 
and their combined monthly salaries, less 
twenty dollars, were given to Ex-Alderman 
James Riley, a democrat, who was appointed 
as Holderman’s assistant. Riley’s friends 
claimed that he was sooner or later to have 
Holderman’s place. Now if President Holt’s 
board intended to seize this place as party 
spoil, this is the exact course it would have 
pursued. So far as the duties of his position 
are concerned Riley is an ignoramus, and it is 
ridiculous to say that the fire service is bene 
fited by turning out a trained assistant and 
putting in an ignoramus at an increased sal¬ 
ary. Holderman thinks he sees the point and 
refuses to accept Riley as an assistant, or to 
teach him the business, and at the last accounts 
Riley was sitting around the fire headquarters 
doing nothing and drawing sixty dollas a 
month. Open competition for the places in 
fire department would destroy the board’s use¬ 
fulness in humbugging the people in this 
manner. Why does not the mayor require it? 

In August, 1893, the Indianapolis News 
says: 

There has been complaint for weeks about 
the condition of the fire alarm telegraph serv¬ 
ice, and the department has been put to a 
great deal of annoyance. Not only this, but 
there was danger of a great destruction of 
property at any time, for the alarms came in 
irregularly and incorrectly. Not a little criti¬ 
cism has been indulged in concerning Super¬ 
intendent of Telegraph Fanning. This morn¬ 
ing the board of public safety sent for him. 
Instead of making the affair public, the mem¬ 
bers of the board took him into a room with 
curtained doors and windows and talked to 
him. The complaints and the condition of 
the alarm service was explained to him, and 
he was requested to deliver the key to the re¬ 
peater at headquarters to his assistant, George 
Holderman. He did not object, but handed 
over the key at once. Members of the board 
say that Fanning will continue to act as super¬ 
intendent but will have nothing to do with 
the repeater at headquarters, “which is an in¬ 
tricate piece of mechanism and needs careful 
attention.” 

We do not know what became of Riley, 
nor by what particular pull one. Fanning, 
became superintendent of the fire alarm 
service. The one thing that is plain is that 
George Holderman, the only man who ap¬ 
pears to have been thoroughly competent, 
was reduced to a subordinate position and 
for the sake of politics the city was left at 
the mercy of an incompetent superintend¬ 
ent. Probably he was in “sympathy” with 
his superiors. 

The silver-purchase crisis is one of the 
questions which the Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle has always pointed out as arising 
now and then with a demand for solution 
so imperative and even terrifying that it 
paralyzes the average congressman in the 
pursuit of his ordinary avocation as a spoil 
hunter. In the presence of a nation 
suffering the keenest commercial distress, 
congressmen are ashamed to publicly 


demand places for their henchmen. It is 
very distasteful to them to have to drop 
office-seeking and turn to legislation, but 
the President has brought them to it at 
last. They have spent all of their time 
since the election of Mr. Cleveland in 
turning employes out of their places and 
putting in workers who will fix the prima¬ 
ries and conventions for them next year, 
and they are forced to legislate upon finan¬ 
cial questions without having given any 
thought to such questions except in the 
most shallow and cursory manner. It 
must be said that they are sobered by the 
situation, and that a portion of them have 
had a real clarification of views. But how 
easy it would have been to have known 
the subject years ago and to have avoided 
the great loss and misery which has come 
upon the country. The people may set 
down this panic and all of its consequences 
to the ignorance of congressmen arising 
from the fact that they do not study public 
questions but spend their time mostly in 
getting federal offices for their personal 
followers. The present grave interruption 
of their occupation will not cure them, but 
after this urgency is oyer, their onslaught 
upon the civil service will be the more 
ferocious for the interruption. 

The committee of the National League 
of which Mr. C. W. Watson is chairman, 
and which has charge of civil service re¬ 
form literature, issued sometime since an 
attractive pamphlet, setting forth the ad¬ 
vantages of the merit system to working 
men. The pamphlet under various sub¬ 
jects does this in a simple and straightfor¬ 
ward manner. It all comes to what is 
known as the Boston Labor System in 
which it should be remembered there is 
no examination, but in which the selection 
of laborers upon public work is freed from 
personal and partisan favoritism. We re¬ 
peat what we have said many times, that 
no part of the reform movement has 
in actual practice met with such unquali¬ 
fied approval from all quarters as has this 
method of hiring public labor; and this 
approval is the most earnest when it comes 
from the superior officers who have been 
the nearest to it. Such examples as Mayor 
O’Brien and Mayor Matthews, of Boston, 
and Governor Russell, of Massachusetts, 
and many others may be given. Charles 
Theodore Russell, one of the Massachu¬ 
setts civil service commissioners, says of 
the results: 

“The advantage to the laborer is manifest. In¬ 
stead of loitering around the corridor oj the city hall 
to importune his alderman or councilman, and promise 
personal and political support, in return for the 
right to labor at the public expense, he can now go 
to that labor upon his manhood and merit, with full 
knowledge that he is to be judged by the character 
of his work, and not by the complexion of his 
politics: that the only credential needed is the 
certificate of work well performed, not of a caucus 
cunningly manipulated. 


The committee met with a curious dif¬ 
ficulty in the distribution of its pamphlet. 
Having been read for instance by a labor 
leader, it received his enthusiastic endorse¬ 
ment, and he set about devising plans for 
its distribution among workingmen. In 
the midst of this he suddenly became silent 
and inactive. The reason was that the 
politicans of his organization had inter¬ 
fered. This system would prevent them 
from getting jobs by favoritism and almost 
every labor organization has a sprinkling 
of such men. They are loud mouthed and 
have influence and each one has his eye 
upon some political job which he hopes to 
get by the favor of some higher boss. This 
personal selfishness leads them to do what 
they can to smother a movement which 
would be of incalculable benefit to the 
great body of workingmen. The object 
which the civil service reform movement 
has for working men is to make the dis¬ 
tribution of public employment impartial 
and to make the employment as permanent 
and as stable as it is in the best private em¬ 
ployment. It is one of the strongest phe¬ 
nomena of the human mind that working¬ 
men will go upon a strike to prevent a 
private employer from dismissing a man 
without cause; yet they look on with in¬ 
difference while thousands upon thousands 
are dismissed from public employment by 
political bosses without any cause whatever. 
The fact is that an immense amount of 
labor is removed from the field of the gen¬ 
uine workingman; street cleaning in cities 
is an instance. This department is given 
up to heelers and shirks and it is so con¬ 
ducted that, as a means of subsistence, it is 
of little advantage to the real laborers of 
the country. 


The New York Evening Fbst gives an in¬ 
teresting account of the recent debate in 
the house of commons relating to the 
Irish civil service. The members of this 
service obtained their places by competi¬ 
tion and under a long and harsh tory rule, 
executed tory measures. Then came Mr. 
Morley under a liberal administration. 
Now if ever the argument that the head 
of a civil service must choose his subordi¬ 
nates “in order to carry out his policy,” 
was worth anything, this was such a case. 
But in this debate Mr. Morley tells the 
commons: 

“ I have received from all members of that service 
with whom I have had dealings treatment of the 
utmost consideration, though to many of them the 
policy with which I was associated was not altogether 
welcome. They have shown a government with 
which they are only partially in sympathy the same 
loyalty and fidelity which they have shown to other 
governments.” 

With the situation in Ireland amount¬ 
ing to tragedy an honorable and capable 
governor-general has no difficulty nor em- 
barassment in carrying out a radically 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


55 


changed policy without a vestige of a clean 
sweep. When we place this situation by 
the side of the meanness and hypocrisy of 
Secretary Carlisle in dismissing clerks be¬ 
cause he wants democrats to keep books 
in the treasury and of Assistant Secretary 
of State Quincy dismissing the consul at 
Dublin after eleven years of service because 
he wants a democrat to verify invoices and 
of hundreds of postmasters dismissing em¬ 
ployes because they want democrats to 
handle the mails and of all the other official 
changes now going on in this quiet and 
peaceful country, where the duties are 
not republican duties nor democratic duties 
but simply business duties, the comparison 
is very humiliating. 

This, however, is not all. The time is 
near when Ireland will control its own 
civil service. Then again if ever the argu¬ 
ments that subordinates must have the 
same political belief that the government 
has, in-order to keep books and handle 
mails and count money would if ever come 
into play. In this country Secretary Car¬ 
lisle’s son, Logan, wherever he hears of an 
employe whose long service and natural 
and acquired skill has rendered him in 
the ordinary acceptation of the term in¬ 
dispensable, dismisses him with brutal 
levity provided his political opinions do 
not suit young Mr. Carlisle. The contempt¬ 
ible littleness of the American practice 
can only be brought out by quoting Mr. 
Gladstone in the above debate, reported in 
the London Times, as follows: 

" He had never meant to say that there might not 
be persons whom a new Irish government would de¬ 
sire to dismiss, but he thought he had limited him¬ 
self properly when he suggested that they would 
probably be confined to two or three persons. He could 
not ascribe to the new Irish government such fatuity, 
stick gross and wicked injustice as the intention, or the 
possibility of the intention, of its rushing into such 
a course of wholesale dismissal*as had been sug¬ 
gested.” 

Mr. Gladstone is the greatest of living 
statesmen and his opinion will stand against 
the petty acts of the men now making or 
tolerating the American clean sweep. 
With a narrow majority and without a 
postoffice to give, he is accomplishing the 
most important political work now being 
done in the world, and civil service reform¬ 
ers may freely invite a contrast between 
the triumphant sweep of his reform and 
the greedy, mercenary and sullen higgling 
which has led up to the scene now being 
enacted at Washington. 


The evidence that Secretary Carlisle is 
less of a statesman and more of a Coving¬ 
ton politician than was supposed daily 
becomes stronger. He is of some promi¬ 
nence in the legitimate line of his duties, 
but yet, in the presence of the greatest 
financial crisis, he is chiefly conspicuous 
for an incessant activity in reducing em¬ 


ployes to a lower grade or in dismissing 
them entirely from the service, in order to 
give the vacated places to democrats. 
There is not even a claim that the service 
is improved. Another interesting step of 
his is a new rule directing that a promo¬ 
tion fairly earned by competition under the 
regulations of the department shall not take 
place unless it is approved by a board of 
three, one of whom is his private secretary 
and personal friend, and another is his 
son Logan Carlisle. The Carlisles seem 
likely to occupy themselves indefinitely in 
this business. They are callous to the 
misery they inflict, to their violation of 
platform pledges, to the disgrace they are 
bringing upon the administration, and to 
the odium which they incur. These acts 
will weigh heavily against the administra¬ 
tion when the reckoning is taken at the 
end of the four years. 

Senator Lodge has introduced into the 
senate the measure, brought forward by 
him last year in the house, to provide for 
taking the fourth-class post-offices out of 
politics. The present use of these offices is 
to secure watch-dogs for the individual in¬ 
terests of congressmen at every cross-roads 
and have them paid by the people. The 
present administration is allowing that 
process to go on at nearly the Clarksonian 
rate of thirty thousand a year. President 
Cleveland missed a golden opportunity to 
do a great act when he would not refuse 
to dismiss fourth-class postmasters until 
congress should pass some such measure 
as the Lodge bill. This would have been 
real statermanship, and the people would 
have been solid behind Mr. Cleveland 
to-day. The opportunity will never return 
to him. He has yet, however, great oppor¬ 
tunities to benefit the civil service. He 
can stop short the vicious division of spoil 
which is going on, and if legislation is 
needed he can insist that mere lack of leg¬ 
islation is no excuse for the continuance of 
a corrupt use of the civil service. 

Elsewhere will be found an editorial 
from Harper's Weekly relating to removals 
upon charges, with particular reference to 
the postal service. We urge its careful 
reading. It is difficult to believe that a 
practice so hostile to official honor and 
personal honesty and to the principles of 
free government has been established in 
this country, but there it is. This is true, 
that no cabinet officer in former adminis¬ 
trations has tolerated this system and re¬ 
tained the respect of the American people, 
and no such officer need expect to do so 
under the present administration. It is 
an infamous system. 

We print in this number the address by 
Sherman S. Rogers and a large part of the 


address by Seth Low before the civil ser¬ 
vice reform congress, held August 8th, at 
Chicago, under the auspices of the World’s 
Fair management. We have omitted the 
address by Mr. Foulke because it is printed 
in full in the August number of Qood 
Government and will be read there by the 
majority of our readers. 


PENSION REFORM. 

Congressman Bretz to-day secured the reinstate¬ 
ment of Capt. James H. Shank, of Vincennes, to 
the position of special pension examiner.— Indian¬ 
apolis News, August 15. 

Mr. Crampton, a veteran editor of Delphi, is in 
town. Mr. Crampton’s sou was recently appointed 
on the Delphi pension board, but he could not 
qualify, having been a practitioner less than five 
years, the time required by the commissioner of 
pensions. The father came to have that require¬ 
ment waived in the case of his son, and he has 
succeeded. To-day Senator Voorhees accompanied 
Mr. Crampton to the pension office, and the order 
for young Dr. Crampton’s appointment was finally 
carried out in full. Mr. A. B. Crampton, who had 
this rule abrogated, was chairman of the demo¬ 
cratic committee in this congressional district a 
number of years ago, was postmaster here under 
Cleveland four years ago, and is now editing a 
democratic paper.— Washington Dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, August 1. 

The pension management continues to 
be an interesting study. Some six thou¬ 
sand pensions in all have been suspended 
on account of wrong rulings or defective 
evidence on file, but a part of these will 
doubtless be restored. This is a mere 
drop in the bucket when it is remembered 
that the size of the pension list is about 
900,000. No taxpayer likes to pay $160,- 
000,000 a year for pensions. That we pay 
that amount is perhaps the most astound¬ 
ing fact that ever occurred in the govern¬ 
ment of an orderly community. Until 
the contrary is proved, it will seem that 
there must be something radically wrong 
about it. The Civil Service Chronicle 
believes that the size of our pension list is 
primarily due to the individual corruption 
of congressmen. They have secured the 
distribution of pensions in order to catch 
votes for themselves or their party. Con¬ 
gressmen have dogged the pension depart¬ 
ment, have secured extravagant rulings, 
and acted as attorneys for applicants 
whom, and the friends and relatives of 
whom, they thus sought to make hench¬ 
men. They have controlled the local pen¬ 
sion boards and have had all the influence 
which such control has had in all genera¬ 
tions. If the natural consequences have 
followed, then the pension list is crowded 
with pensioners who ought not to be draw¬ 
ing pensions. The only just way to de¬ 
termine this fact is by a re-examination by 
boards with whose appointment politics 
shall have had nothing to do, and who 
shall be as independent of congressmen 
as army and navy boards are. And in th^ 
re-examination every kind of meddling 















50 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


individual congressmen should be abso¬ 
lutely cut oflf. Such boards, and only such, 
would have the confidence of the country. 
There are now no such boards. The local 
boards are composed of democratic polit¬ 
ical doctors appointed by congressmen 
because they were democrats and were or 
are to be their followers, and in whose 
fairness and freedom from improper influ¬ 
ences no one has any confidence. Con¬ 
gressmen are already meddling. Indiana 
congressmen are beginning their pressure 
in Washington with the complaint that it 
seems as though every one dropped was a 
democrat. These partisan boards were 
chosen in disregard of protest and warn¬ 
ing, and this patronage takes $1,700,000 a 
year from the treasury. Of course, purg¬ 
ing the pension lists with such boards is 
impossible. 

MIXED CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 

The Terre Haute Gazette has a recent article 
upon civil service reform which deserves no¬ 
tice as coming from one of the leading papers 
of the state. The editor has been, in a general 
way, a civil service reformer, but he now 
clearly labors under the embarrassment of 
being the brother-in-law of Postmaster Don- 
ham. The editorial, with much that is right, 
is alloyed with attempts to make civil service 
reform fit the Terre Haute situation. Refer¬ 
ring to Harrison’s extension of the rules, it 
says that Harrison “sought to fasten in office 
thousands of his political appointees who had 
not won their places by civil service examina¬ 
tions.” The Gazette knows better than that. 
It knows that Harrison’s order was but a mere 
beginning, at the very last moment, of the 
fulfillment of promises made years before, and 
that the step had been urged upon him inces¬ 
santly, and that it was approved by the coun¬ 
try and by the people of Terre Haute. The 
Gazette knows further that there would never 
have been any trouble at Terre Haute if those 
political soldiers of fortune, Voorhees and 
Lamb, had not put in a mere political tool as 
postmaster and then tried their usual game of 
“controlling” the oflSce. Happily, they fell 
into the ditch in a most humiliating manner, 
and all of the henchmen they had sought to 
quarter upon the people fell with them. We 
do not say that Donham, if he is willing to be 
a knave, can not yet beat the civil service law. 
The Indianapolis postmaster beat it steadily 
from 1885 to 1889, but we submit that the 
result was not well for his party, nor for the 
administration, nor for his own reputation. 

The Gazette declares squarely for filling 
places in the civil service by open competition. 
It also declares that appointments should be 
made from the eligible list in the order of the 
rating—a doctrine that can not be thundered 
too loudly into the ears of appointing oflScers. 
But the Gazette says no person should hold his 
place more than eight years, and brings up 
the Ipng-exploded office-holding class, life 
tenuin^ and pension bugbears. The Gazette 


would smile at a proposal to apply this plan 
to its own business. It would be ashamed at 
the absurdity of its calling upon the Vandalia 
to dismiss all trackmen who had been in its 
employ eight years; it is equally absurd to 
dismiss a letter-carrier for that reason. As to- 
life tenure, a letter-carrier should have a life 
tenure in the same sense in which a boiler¬ 
maker in any Terre Haute shop has it, and in 
no other sense. 

The Gazette completely overthrows itself as 
an advocate of the recently attempted clean 
sweep when it looks forward to the time when 
Donham is succeeded by a republican who 
will find the oflice under the civil service 
rules, and the Gazette adds: “ He can not make 
changes, and the business of the office will 
proceed without friction or jar, with regular¬ 
ity and precision, and to the great advantage of 
the people who use the mails, and whose great 
and only concern is that their mail matter shall 
be promptly and properly attended to.” The 
men Donham found in the post-office and 
whom he tried to put out to make room for 
partisans with one or two exceptions entirely 
unfamiliar with the work of the office, were 
trained men, and could have made the busi¬ 
ness of the oflBce proceed “ with regularity and 
precision.” 

The Gazette urges President Cleveland to 
make his extensions of the rules now. This, 
with some other good things, makes the short¬ 
comings of its article more bearable. As the 
Chronicle has already said, extensions at the 
close of a President’s term put an unfair strain 
upon the law. They lead to official dishon¬ 
esty and trickery and to attacks which it takes 
reformers half the period of the next admin¬ 
istration to beat off. 

BAFFLED PLACE-HUNTERS. 

Senator Voorhees recently introduced into 
the senate a petition from Cass county, Ind., 
for the repeal of “ the civil service system.” 
The action is undoubtedly one of party work¬ 
ers who, after being paid in cash out of the 
campaign fund for more work than they did, 
now want double pay by being quartered upon 
the people. They will not abide the demo¬ 
cratic method of competition, but they want 
the places allotted to them by the Voorheeses 
as by barons to henchmen for “ plowing the 
lord’s land or making his hedge or carrying 
out his dung.” Voorhees also wants the re¬ 
peal. He too hates the democratic method of 
competition for public employment, and likes 
the monarchical and feudalistic method of dis¬ 
tribution by gift to faithful favorites. 

There is reason to believe that this petition 
is the result of a movement of ward-workers 
attempted to be started in Evansville in this 
state. Last month the democratic city cen¬ 
tral committee of Evansville adopted the fol¬ 
lowing resolutions: 

Resolutions passed by the democratic central 
committee of Evansville, Indiana, reRarding the 
order issued by ex-Presldent Harrison, extending 
civil service rules to all free delivery post-offices: 

Whereas, The order issued by ex-President 
Harrison in February last, extending the civil 


service classification to all free delivery post-offices 
was done for the obvious purpose of preventing 
the appointment of democrats and the removal of 
republicans from positions in which custom had 
prepared the people to look for and expect changes 
as heretofore, and 

Whereas, The present incumbents are permitted 
to remain in their respective positions without ex¬ 
amination as to their fitness therefor, which ex¬ 
amination is required of applicants, thus showing 
that the said order of ex-President Harrison was 
directly contrary to the spirit of civil service re¬ 
form, and was a partisan measure of the most 
radical character, and 

Whereas, The civil service commission ordered 
a special examination for applicants for positions 
in post-offices of the class above referred to nearly 
three months prior to the time set for the regular 
examinations, the effect of which has been to em¬ 
barrass newly appointed postmasters in recom¬ 
mending for their subordinates persons who are 
friendly to and in sympathy with them, therefore 
be it 

lieeolved. That the chairmen of the democratic 
central committee where free delivery post-offices 
are situated be requested to co operate with us, 
with a view to secure the repeal or suspension of 
said order issued by ex-President Harrison, until 
all applicants and incumbents are at least placed 
on an equal footing. 

Resolved, That C. J. Kehr be delegated by this 
committee to conduct the work necessary tO bring 
about said co-operation. 

Mr. Kehr set about his work, and the fol¬ 
lowing letter of his was forwarded to us from 
Central New York:— 

Democratic Central Committee of Evans¬ 
ville, Ind. 

Evansville, Ind., July 25,1893. 
Chairman Democratic Central Committee, 

Dear Sir —I enclose herewith a copy of resolu¬ 
tions passed at a meeting of our democratic city 
central committee which explain themselves, also 
a copy of some of the questions asked in the civil 
service examination of applicants for the posi¬ 
tion of letter carrier, and a statement of Mr. Cleve¬ 
land’s order of 1888, regarding railway postal clerks. 

The partisan nature of Mr. Harrison’s order ex¬ 
tending the civil service classification to all free 
delivery post offices, becomes only too apparent 
when we consider that the order was issued only a 
few days before the end of his term, and when we 
further consider that the time of holding examina¬ 
tions for applicants was changed from August to 
May of this year. 

Our committee, being desirous of bringing about 
a repeal or suspension of Mr. Harrison’s order, 
have requested me to enter into correspondence 
with the chairmen of the democratic central com¬ 
mittees (nearly 500 in number) affected by this or¬ 
der, with a view of securing concerted action. 

It seems that endorsement by central committees 
of resolutions similar in character to those we have 
adopted here, and petitions to your U. S. senators 
and congressmen, when of your political faith, 
would be the simplest way of interesting those whose 
Influence might accomplish our purpose. 

As there will be a special session of congress in 
August, it Is of the utmost importance that action 
be taken at once, and I would therefore be pleased 
to have your views in this matter as early as pos¬ 
sible. . Yours respectfully, 

C. J, Kehr. 

The questions referred to in Kehr’s letter 
were stated as follows:— 

Among the questions asked of applicants for the 
position of letter-carrier at the examination held 
in May last In this city were the following:— 

An exercise in copying from dictation, in which 
spelling, use of capitals, punctuation and all mis¬ 
takes and omissions of whatever nature are taken 
Into consideration in percentages. 

The addition of an absurdly large and almost im¬ 
practicable combination of numbers. 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


57 


Add the following: f, |, 

From I of 318,405 subtract | of 264,890. 

The number of pieces of mail collected by a car¬ 
rier on his trip was f of the number delivered, and 
together they amounted to 497. How many did he 
collect, and how many deliver? 

A carrier bought a house and lot for $2,200. He 
spent I as much more in repairs. The house was 
then destroyed by fire, being Insured for f of the 
costs of the house and lot and repairs. The carrier 
sold the lot for $750. How much did he gain or 
lose? 

A carrier walked on an average 185 feet in the de¬ 
livery of every three pieces of mail. His route con¬ 
sisted of 50 squares of 370 feet each. How many 
pieces of mail did he deliver on the trip? 

Is there a design in asking such questions of ap¬ 
plicants for the position of letter carrier when we 
consider the nature of the work required of them ? 

The questions seem simple enough and well 
adapted to test the rudiments of a common 
school education. They are probably not 
adapted to the Mikes and Jakes who have 
been setting up primaries and conventions 
and voting floaters in Evansville. The friends 
of civil service reform need not fear this 
“ movement,” and the Evansville committee 
will only waste postage. Doubtless a party 
organization could get up a good many peti¬ 
tions like this one by asking only disappointed 
place-hunters to sign; but the order will not 
be rescinded. The merit system is marching 
forward, not backward, and it is going to pre¬ 
vail over all opposition in national, state and 
municipal service. Referring to this particu¬ 
lar case, the Indianapolis Sentinel of August 
20, marks the advance thus: 

Civil service reformers need not be In the least 
alarmed by the utterances of Senator Voorhees the 
other day or the circular issued by the Evansville 
city democratic committee. Neither of them speaks 
on this point for any considerable number of dem¬ 
ocrats in Indiana or elsewhere. The democratic 
party is pledged to a reform of the civil service, and 
that reform was advanced more during the previous 
administration of President Cleveland than during 
any other period since the spoils system was inau¬ 
gurated. President Cleveland may be relied upon 
to carry out the party pledges and his own declar¬ 
ations regardless of the wishes of the spoilsmen in 
his or any other party. 

THE PURIFICATION OF POLITICS 
IS NOT AN IRRIDESCENT DREAM.* 

In the year 1881 the total number of em¬ 
ployes in the civil service of the United 
States of America was 124,640—a vast army. 
Ten years later the number had swelled to 
183,488—another great army added to that of 
1881 at the rate of nearly 6,000 each year. 
The increase in the number during the decade 
was over thirty-nine per cent.—a much faster 
growth than that of the population in the same 
time. If the same ratio of increase shall pre¬ 
vail during the balance of the waning century 
the year 1900 will find the civil service of the 
United States not less than 240,000. So that 
if the monstrous system which prevailed in 
this country so many years almost without 
opposition, whose motto was “to the victor 
belong the spoils,” could have full swing in 
the presidential election of 1900, and the har¬ 
vest year following, and there should be a po- 

* An address by Sherman S. Rogers before the 
Civil Service Reform Congress at Chicago, August 
8, 1893. 


litical overturn, not less than 225,000 people 
—men and women, old and young, and most 
of them poor—would probably have to vacate 
their places and give room to the “hungry 
and thirsty” crowd which, with its bosses at 
its head, its generals and colonels and cap¬ 
tains and officers of low degree, had fought 
the great campaign of 1900 for the spoils ! 
It must be confessed that here would be much 
to console those statesmen who believe that 
“ the purification of politics is an irridescent 
dream.” 

In the hearts of presidents and cabinet offi¬ 
cers and heads of bureaus ever since the re¬ 
form law began to assert itself there has been 
undoubtedly a growing sense of gratitude that 
in the wild storm and tumult quadrennially 
evoked by the office-seekers they have been 
able now and then to take refuge in the civil 
service reform ark. More than this, to drop 
the figure, with reference to the overwhelming 
mass of offices not included in the classified 
service, they have been able to show now and 
then some independence of spirit because they 
knew that among the great mass of the people 
the principle of the civil service reform was 
obtaining favor, and that if they occasionally 
repudiated the orthodox standards of the 
spoilsmen they would not certainly be visited 
with condign and immitigable punishment. 

The law for the improvement of the civil 
service went into effect in July, 1883—about 
14,500 employes being then included within 
its provisions, while in that year the total 
number of employes in the service of the 
United States in round numbers was 131,000. 
In 1891, the classified service, i. e., the places 
filled by competitive examinations, were about 
34,000 in all, while the entire public service 
included in the neighborhood of 183,000. The 
gratifying fact that they disclose is this, 
namely, that while the growth of the public 
service has been much faster than the increase 
in population, the classified service has been 
increased in a much greater proportion, so 
that whereas only about eleven per cent, of 
the public service was removed, from party 
politics in 1891, nearly nineteen per cent, has 
been rescued from them in 1893. 

The chief contributions to this increase of 
the classified service were by Mr. Cleveland, 
just before the end of his first term, of about 
4,000 offices in the railway postal service, and 
by President Harrison (at a period in his term 
nearly corresponding), of all the post-offices 
not previously classified having free deliv¬ 
eries. 

From these facts we are fairly authorized to 
infer not only both these distinguished and 
patriotic presidents were sincere believers in 
the reform system, but that their belief exer¬ 
cised its most strenuous and effective influ¬ 
ence after its possessor had been definitely beaten 
in his candidacy for re-election. Also, that if 
Mr. Cleveland and Mr. Harrison should con¬ 
tinue for the remainder of the century to lead 
their respective parties in the presidential 
contest, we might reasonably expect that each 
time just after the incumbent was beaten, as 


he probably would be, in his effort to secure a 
re-election, he would make a substantial in¬ 
crease of the classified service. However this 
may he, the time has come when no matter at 
what period in his term any president may 
add to the classified service, the great body of 
the good citizens of both parties will heartily 
applaud him. 

The reform in the civil service, though not 
in terms an amendment to the constitution of 
the United States, is such in its substance and 
effect. It seeks to supply the grievous defect 
which the fathers left in that snblime instru¬ 
ment of government and to write in the heart 
and mind of every American citizen this man¬ 
date : Political spoils shall not be made of the 
people’s offices. If this commandment is obeyed 
the purification of politics will not prove an 
“ irridescent dream.” Political controversies 
will become, more and more, contests over prin¬ 
ciples and policies, and not mere struggles for 
power and scrambles for office. Office seeking 
will become honorable in the lowest and the 
highest, and office holders will find themselves 
entitled to their own self-respect. They will 
gain place by their merits and will have a 
just pride in the achievement. Does this 
seem an optimistic dream? Is the grotesque 
and horrible nightmare of the spoils system 
preferable? Reduce, if you will, the rainbow 
hues of our dream enough to suit the sober 
fancy, and then say whether you prefer the 
latter. 

Part company with all figures of speech 
and look soberly and earnestly at the politi¬ 
cal situation in the cities of the United States 
to-day and say what it is that makes possible 
the vile and brutal sway of the party bosses 
and their bands of unscrupulous followers; 
what but the power of the public plunder? 
What packs our jury list with men who have 
no regard for their oaths in a political case? 
What makes our sheriffs’ offices asylums for 
criminals? What emasculates our prosecut¬ 
ing officers and bates the breath of our judges 
but the power of public plunder? What 
makes of men of the commonest clay party 
bosses and public leaders and bars the way to 
all entrance to public life by superior men 
who value their self-respect above the attrac¬ 
tions of place? What corrupts the young 
men, degrading their ideals and leading them 
to believe that success vindicates itself no 
matter by what means attained, but the power 
of public plunder? These are questions which 
bring a blush to the patriot’s cheek, but they 
have to be asked and they must he answered. 
Will it help the situation to say that the 
hope to reform it is an irridescent dream ? I 
seem to hear a calm voice from the land of 
shadows: “ Civil service reform is but another 
successive step in the development of liberty 
under law.” 

Fred W. Smith, postmaster at Adams, Mass, 
was first appointed clerk hy the democratic 
postmaster during Mr. Cleveland’s first term, 
was continued hy Mr. Harrison’s appointee 
and now has been promoted as an efficient 
clerk should be. 













58 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 

From the Point of View of City Govern¬ 
ment. 

If civil service reform, like the tariff, is a 
national question, it is, also, like the tariff, a 
local question. Wherever the civil service is 
numerous, the problem presents itself in some 
form. Everywhere, in a certain sense, the 
problem is the product of the multiplication 
table. I have in my mind a small place in 
New Hampshire, where the post-office has re¬ 
mained, through all recent changes of admin¬ 
istration, in the same store. The store is con¬ 
ducted by a firm of which the senior partner 
is a democrat and the junior partner a repub¬ 
lican. Under democratic administration the 
senior partner is the postmaster ; under repub¬ 
lican administration, the junior partner. The 
store remains in the same place; the post-office 
does not change its location; the community 
is in no way inconvenienced by a change of 
postmaster ; and in the meanwhile every one’s 
sense of party triumph is gratified by the 
change of commission. Naturally, in a place 
like this, it is hard to carry the conviction 
that civil service reform is a national ques¬ 
tion of far-reaching importance. 

On the other hand, in the same place, the 
problem of the water supply is solved by the 
digging of a well for each house. But this 
same problem of water supply, transferred to 
the city of New York, calls for the exercise of 
the best engineering talent to be had, and for 
the expenditure of many millions of dollars. 
It is precisely so with civil service reform. 
What is no problem at all on a very small 
scale, becomes a problem of the first magni¬ 
tude by the process of enlargement. As it 
concerns cities, I imagine that the necessity 
for the regulation of the civil service by 
proper legislation is important precisely in 
proportion to the size of the civil list. Doubt¬ 
less something is desirable even in small cities, 
because there the tendencies begin that in large 
cities do such palpable mischief; but in large 
cities there can be no question that an evil 
exists that must be remedied. It will be borne 
in mind that my own observation of the mat¬ 
ter has been had in a large city. 

In the city of Brooklyn there is an institu¬ 
tion known as the Truant Home. It is a place 
to which boys who are habitual truants from 
the public schools may be committed by a 
magistrate. It is intended to exert a reforma¬ 
tory influence. Necessarily it is called upon 
to provide for all the necessities of the boys 
while they remain in its care. By an anom- 
ally in the city charter all appointments in 
the Truant Home were made, in my day, 
by the board of aldermen. The majority of 
that board held a caucus and divided the pa¬ 
tronage of the Truant Home among the mem¬ 
bers of the majority by lot or by some other 
process equally satisfactory. The board of 
aldermen then officially confirmed the selec¬ 
tion of the different members of the majority. 

[From an address by Seth Low, president of Col¬ 
umbia College, before the Civil Service Reform 
CongrjSss at Chicago, August 8,1893.] 


On one occasion a hatter was appointed the 
farmer of the Truant Home. He resigned with 
indignation when he learned that the farmer 
was expected to milk the cow and to raise pota¬ 
toes. In other words, the needs of the public 
service were never thought of. It was simply so 
much patronage incidental to the position of 
an alderman lo be enjoyed, if he was fortunate 
enough to belong to the majority of the board. 
This single incident illustrates, as well as many 
could, the evils with which civil service re¬ 
form has to cope in the large cities. 

** 

There is no more striking figure in connec¬ 
tion with the political life of our large cities 
during the last twenty-five years than the city 
boss. He has been at once so permanent and 
so universal that one hardly knows whether 
to look upon him as a necessity of the situa¬ 
tion, or as its natural flower. Whichever he 
may be, he can not be other than an unlovely 
figure to those who love liberty and honor 
manhood. Americans hesitate to give large 
powers even to elected officials. They carry 
their fear not unfrequently to the point of de¬ 
priving their officials even of powers that they 
ought to have to enable them to serve the 
people to the best advantage. But Americans 
have permitted a political system, more es¬ 
pecially a system of nomination, to be devel¬ 
oped in their midst, whereby individuals not in 
office and in no sense responsible to the people 
become so powerful as even to exercise almost 
arbitrary control over the officers and legisla¬ 
tive bodies elected by the people. At this 
writing there is scarcely a large city in the 
land where one man, not in office, is not so 
powerful as to be practically the dictator of 
the city. Those who wish action at the hands 
of the city confer with him. The officers of 
the people, in many cases, scarcely preserve 
the appearance of being free agents. The im¬ 
mediate source of the boss’s power lies in his 
control of nomination. That in turn depends 
largely, if not wholly, upon his control of pat¬ 
ronage. Thus we discover a most powerful 
motive for insisting upon civil service reform, 
such a reform as will make it impossible in 
cities for a man not in office to manipulate the 
patronage of the city to increase his own 
power. 

I have referred already to that frequent 
loss of manhood incident to the spoils system, 
whereby men desiring to be candidates barter 
away the appointing power of their offices in 
the event of election in return for the nomi¬ 
nation. But that is only one form of the de¬ 
moralization of men that is incident to the 
system. I suppose that no class of men in the 
country enjoy so little of the fundamental 
privilege of American citizenship as the sub¬ 
ordinates in the public service where the spoils 
system prevails. Such men experience all the 
ills of those who hang on princes’ favors, and 
their prince is often a pretty mean sort of a 
prince. The right to vote as you please, and 
the right to say what you please, as to public 
questions, appear to be very nearly funda¬ 


mental rights according to our American con¬ 
ceptions. But let a subordinate in the public 
employ vote contrary to the wish of his supe¬ 
rior, or for those who think for his supe¬ 
rior, or let him utter sentiments that are un¬ 
welcome, and he will speedily find that the 
exercise of his privilege has cost him his 
place. A man so circumstanced is not the 
servant of the people; he is the slave of a mas¬ 
ter. He is not really a free man. As our 
people realize this more and more they will 
recognize that in this aspect of the case civil 
service reform is verily a new declaration of 
independence. 

REMOVALS ON CHARGES. 

The postmaster-general, Mr. Bissell, is, 
among the chiefs of the great patronage de¬ 
partments of the national government, prob¬ 
ably the sincerest friend of reform. The 
manner in which he treats the clerical force 
of his department is characterized by more 
justice, more sincere regard for the interests of 
the service, and less partisan spirit than we 
observe in the conduct of either the interior 
department or the treasury. He has recently 
made some praiseworthy promotions in dis¬ 
tinct defiance of the spoils politician’s dis¬ 
pleasure. So much more is it to be regretted 
that in other directions he should so recklessly 
jeopard the character and usefulness of the 
administration. We have already discussed 
the scandalous circumventions of the civil 
service law of which some of the newly ap¬ 
pointed postmasters have made themselves 
guilty, so far with impunity, as well as the 
slowly but surely progressing clean sweep of 
the fourth-class postmasters. We referred to 
the fact that fourth-class postmasters who 
had not yet served four years were removed 
only on charges of official misconduct, while 
postmasters who had been in office four years 
dr more are removed without any charges be¬ 
ing preferred, merely because they belong to 
the other party, and have in addition rendered 
themselves guilty of having acquired four 
years’ experience in the discharge of their du¬ 
ties. (This, our readers will remember is a 
rule not invented in a lunatic asylum, but 
followed by the post department of the United 
States.) Now, how are charges made against 
postmasters not yet guilty of four years’ ex¬ 
perience acted upon? 

If such charges of misconduct are required 
at all to justify a removal, it must be because 
the postmaster-general would regard the re¬ 
moval of a postmaster as yet innocent of hav¬ 
ing been four years in office, who has performed 
his duties well, improper and unjustifiable. 
It would follow that the postmaster-general, 
unwilling, as an honorable man should be, to 
inflict unjustly upon any one the indignity of 
removal, would take good care to have the 
justice of the charges well ascertained before 
taking action. For, being no baby in politics, 
he must be aware that such charges are fre¬ 
quently, if not in most cases, made by inter¬ 
ested parties, such as candidates for the office, 
or their friends who want to get the incumbent 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


59 


out of the way, or congressmen or party com¬ 
mittees who want places for their henchmen 
and workers, and that such charges made by 
such men for such a purpose have naturally 
a strong flavor of untrustworthiness about 
them. The postmaster-general would there¬ 
fore, as a matter of course, permit the accused 
official to know what the charges against him 
are, and give him an opportunity to say some¬ 
thing in his justification. This, one would 
think, were the least that could be done in a 
civilized country to protect a public servant 
against gross wrong, and also to preserve the 
self-respect of the high officials presiding 
over such a system. 

The unsophisticated citizen who believes in 
fair dealing will be surprised to learn that 
the charges are treated as secrets to be known 
only to those who made them. An assistant 
postmaster-general, Mr. Jones, recently said to 
a journalist asking permission to inspect cer¬ 
tain files that papers containing charges were 
to be shown only to the person making or fil¬ 
ing them. “If a member of congress wants to 
inspect the papers which he has filed against 
a postmaster and in favor of a candidate—in 
order, for example, to be sure that his chain 
is complete—he is permitted to see his own 
papers, but those of nobody else. The post¬ 
master-general was obliged to make a rule of 
that kind in order to guard against the abuse 
of any greater freedom of inspection, and to 
give all persons sufficient confidence of privacy 
to encourage them to make complaints frankly 
if they know of any reason why the retention 
of any postmaster is not for the good of the 
service.” In other words, the accuser, be he 
the candidate for the office of the person ac¬ 
cused, or the congressman who wants the 
place vacated for one of his henchmen, or a 
local boss who wants the place for one of his 
heelers, is permitted to see the charges again 
in order to strengthen them, to “complete the 
chain,” if the case as first presented should 
not be sufficient to cause a removal. But the 
accused is not to see the charges, nor anybody 
in his behalf. The accuser is to be protected 
by secrecy; he can lie and slander to his 
heart’s content without the least danger of 
being held responsible, for the postmaster-gen¬ 
eral stands guard over his safety. The post- 
master-general even wishes to “encourage,” 
by this assurance of “privacy,” everybody 
who wishes to have somebody removed to 
make room for somebody else to do his very 
best in getting up “charges.” While thus the 
accuser is amply protected and encouraged, 
the accused has “no rights that a white man 
is bound to respect.” He has simply to hold 
still until he is removed from office, because 
somebody whom he does not know has accused 
him of something which he does not know. 
And such a rule is followed at a time when 
the hot chase for office is going on, and when 
what President Cleveland called “the demor¬ 
alizing madness for spoils” has notoriously, as 
to the making of charges, relaxed the human 
conscience to the utmost. 

It is not too much to say that by such rules 


the postmaster-general invites false accusa¬ 
tions; he encourages calumny. And by re¬ 
moving public servants upon charges so made, 
without any regard for the rights of the ac¬ 
cused—for it will not be pretended, when post¬ 
masters are removed upon charges day after 
day by scores, that the charges have been de¬ 
cently investigated—he commits a gross out¬ 
rage upon his fellow-citizens. This matter of 
charges means something or it means nothing. 
If it means something, then a removal of a 
public officer on charges implies a serious re¬ 
flection upon his character or his ability. It 
afi'ects his good name; and nobody should 
forget that the meanest fourth-class postmaster 
in the land has as clear a right to his good 
name as the postmaster general has to his. If 
the postmaster general blackens the good name 
of his subordinates without well-ascertained 
cause, he does a thing which done in private 
life would exclude him from the company of 
gentlemen. If he should say, in justification, 
that it would be impossible carefully to in¬ 
vestigate such a multitude of charges, he would 
only be taking advantage of his own wrong; 
for there would not be such a multitude of 
charges were they not encouraged and invited 
by the assurance of secrecy and by the levity 
with which removals are made according to 
them. There would be far less were the ac¬ 
cuser held to a sense of responsibility ; and 
the service would surely not suffer from it. 
As the practice now appears, it is a disgrace 
to our public morals and our civilization. 
But if the matter of charges really means 
nothing, if it is a mere disguise for a partisan 
clean sweep, if it is to be understood that the 
officer ostensibly removed on charges was 
really removed because he did not belong to 
the dominant party, then it must be called a 
mockery, an unmitigated fraud, which gentle¬ 
men of self-respect will scorn to be connected 
with. 

We are always glad to praise the postmaster- 
general for any good thing he does. But those 
are not his true friends who fail to tell him 
that in the conduct of the most conspicuous 
part of his business he is in a very dangerous 
way. If at the close of President Cleveland’s 
term it should be the verdict of public opin¬ 
ion that his administration as to the reform 
of the civil service was a sad failure, the post- 
master-general, unless he speedily changes his 
course of action, will be held principally re¬ 
sponsible for it. The plea of good intentions 
will hardly modify the judgment of history. 
— Harper's Weekly, August 5. 

THE RUSSIAN SYSTEM. 

Frank S. Thomas, the new postmaster at 
Topeka, Kan., has on file at the post-office de¬ 
partment a full set of specific charges against 
the republican letter-carriers whose removal 
he procured about a month ago. His general 
charge, which is the only one that the depart¬ 
ment is willing to make public, is: “Incompe¬ 
tency and violation of orders and instruc¬ 
tions.” To the carriers’ own faces he pretended 


that he had no fault to find with them, and 
the form of dismissal which he used was a 
placard posted in the post-office saying that 
“ the postmaster general at Washington, D. C., 
under date of June 13, 1893, removed the fol¬ 
lowing named persons,” etc., etc. * * 

In view of Postmaster Thomas’s double- 
faced performance, your correspondent asked 
Acting Postmaster General Jones to-day for 
permission to look at the specific charges 
made against the carriers at Topeka. The 
request was denied on the ground that Post¬ 
master General Bissell had made a very strict 
rule concerning the inspection of charges filed 
against anybody. “ He will show them,” 
Mr. Jones said, “only to the person making 
or filing them. If a member of congress wants 
to inspect the papers which he has filed 
against a postmaster and in favor of a candi¬ 
date—in order, for example, to be sure that 
his chain is complete—he is permitted to see 
his own papers, but those of nobody else. The 
postmaster general was obliged to make a rule 
of that kind in order to guard against the 
abuse of any greater freedom of inspection, 
and to give all persons sufficient confidence of 
privacy to encourage them to make complaints 
frankly if they know of any reason why the 
retention of a postmaster is not for the good of 
the service.” 

“ Does this rule apply, in your judgment, to 
the case of a postmaster who has told an un¬ 
truth, either to the government or to the old 
employes of his office?” 

“ It applies universally, I believe.” » ♦ * 
— Washington Dispatch to the New York Evening 
Post, July 12. 

A REFORMER IN OFFICE. 

“ Whatever may be said as to the superiority of 
a consular service from which political considera¬ 
tions are excluded, such as that of the leading na¬ 
tions of Europe, it is certainly impossible, under 
existing conditions, to deal with the matter upon a 
purely non-political basis. * * * * 

It is true that senators and representatives have 
taken a lively interest in the applications of some 
of their constituents for consular appointments, as 
has always been the case in the past. * * * 

* * * It is impossible, under present con¬ 

ditions and with due regard to the claims of the 
different states for a fair share of the consular 
offices, to make altogether ideal appointments, or 
even to avoid some mistakes. —Erom Jl/r. Quincy’s 
Defense in the Boston Herald, July SI, 1893. 

Mr. Piatt was appointed consul to Queens¬ 
town in 1882, and after serving there some 
years was promoted to Dublin. His services 
at the latter post have been very acceptable to 
the government, and both he and his wife have 
become very popular among the Irish people. 
The testimonial referred to was probably 
called out by a recent announcement that 
President Cleveland had selectsd Mr. Piatt’s 
successor, and that he would soon be removed. 
It is addressed to the President. The peti¬ 
tioners say: 

“During his career at Queenstown the serv¬ 
ices rendered by Mr. Consul Piatt to the Irish 
people have been such that the mayors of 
Cork, Limerick and Waterford, together with 










60 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


many members of parliament and represen¬ 
tative men of the entire province, made special 
acknowledgment thereof, and, on two several 
occasions, addressed the American govern¬ 
ment to continue him as its representative. 
To which memorial their excellencies Presi¬ 
dent Harrison and President Cleveland most 
courteously assented. 

“ Now, remembering the services so ren¬ 
dered to our countrymen; bearing in mind the 
exceptional recommendations of the great cor¬ 
porate cities of the south; and desirous also, 
and especially, that the Irish metropolis should 
have the advantage of the presence of a gen¬ 
tleman skilled not alone in matters commer¬ 
cial and industrial, but highly distinguished 
in literature, we do hereby express our desire 
and hope that his excellency the President 
may be good enough to continue Mr. Consul 
Piatt in the position he at present occupies, as 
representative of the United States at the cap¬ 
ital of Ireland.” 

The signatures to this testimonial constitute 
its most remarkable feature, including the 
names of the lord mayor of Dublin, the high 
sheriff, members of the board of aldermen, 
leading members of the bar, forty-seven Irish 
members of Parliament, the provost, the vice¬ 
provost, and twenty-two professors and tutors 
in Tripity College, and some of the most 
prominent business firms of Dublin. It is 
doubtful if any American representative 
abroad ever had as strong an appeal as this 
made by representative foreigners for his re¬ 
tention in office .—Indianapolis Journal. [Mr. 
Piatt has since been removed.] 

* * 

Mr. Quincy is singularly silent, too, as to 
certain specific instances of rank partisanship 
which have aroused the indignation of civil 
service reformers throughout the country. 
Was it “ to improve the service ” that the ad¬ 
ministration summarily removed Consul Gen¬ 
eral Adamson of Panama, an official of con¬ 
spicuous integrity and discretion, whose orig 
inal commission bore the name of Abraham 
Lincoln? Was it “to improve the service ” 
that Consul General Sutton of Mexico was 
dismissed, in spite of his ability, long experi¬ 
ence and thorough training? Was it “to im¬ 
prove the service ” that Mr. John J. Piatt was 
deprived of the Dublin consulate, after a 
brilliant career which reflected honor, not 
only upon himself, but upon his government? 
—Boston Journal. 


I. 

THE PROMISES. 

* * To remove from political action the 
demoralizing madness for spoils civil service 
reform has found a place in our public policy 
and laws .—President Cleveland’s Inaugural. 

• 

* * 

♦ * That the dispensing of patronage 
should neither be a tax upon the time of all 
our public men nor the instrument of their 
ambition * * and we pledge the demo¬ 
cratic party to the reform of these * • 
abuses which threaten individual liberty and 


local self-government. — National Democratic 
Platform, 1S92. 

* 

« * 

The oath I now take to preserve, protect 
and defend the constitution of these United 
States not only impressively defines the great 
responsibility I assume, but suggests obedi¬ 
ence to constitutional demands as the rule by 
which my official conditions must be guided. 

—President Cleveland’s Inaugural. 

* 

* * 

Anxiety for the redemption of the pledges 
which my party has made and solicitude for 
the complete justification of the trust the peo¬ 
ple have reposed in us constrain me to remind 
those with whom I am to operate that we can 
succeed in doing the work which has been 
especially set before us only by the most sin¬ 
cere, harmonious and disinterested effort. 
Even if insuperable obstacles and opposition 
prevent the consummation of our task we 
shall hardly be excused, and if failure can be 
traced to our fault or neglect we may be sure 
the people will hold us to a swift and exact¬ 
ing accountability .—President Cleveland’s In¬ 
augural. 

II. 

THE PERFORMANCE. 

Wm. F. Harrity, of Pennsylvania, chairman 
of the national democratic committee, and At¬ 
torney General Hensel, of Pennsylvania, were 
among the first to enter the President’s apart¬ 
ments. They had come in response to invita¬ 
tions, and they remained some time. The 
object of their visit was to discuss the ques¬ 
tion of the Pei.nsylvania appointments. Both 
gentlemen are non-communicative to-night 
concerning the result of their visit, but those 
who understand the political situation in 
Pennsylvania say there is little doubt that they 
made satisfactory arrangements for patronage 
for Pennsylvania democrats.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch to New York Times, March ^1. 

♦ 

The visitors declined to reveal anything con¬ 
cerning their conversations with Mr. Cleveland 
and his assistants, but those to whom they 
talked have not proved so reticent. In the first 
place it was absolutely determined that the political 
patronage of Pennsylvania should be disposed of 
upon the recommendations of Mr. Harrity and his 
friends in the state administration. No man will 
be appointed to office in the Keystone commonwealth 
who is objectionable to those gentlemen. To such 
an extent will this be carried that Postmaster 
General Bissell is credited with having pre¬ 
sented Messrs. Harrity and Hensel to Assistant 
Postmaster General Maxwell, the “ headsman” 
—as he is humorously known in Washington— 
with the remark: “These are the friends whose 
counsel we will follow in Pennsylvania.” That 
decision determines the selection of over j,000 
postmasters .— Washington Dispatch to New York 
Times, March 22. 

*** 

Most of the men who ran the engines and 
the elevators and watched the doors were 
democrats who had been retained by his re¬ 
publican predecessor on the ground that they 
were faithful and competent. When asked 
by a reporter for a democratic newspaper the 
meaning of the changes, the collector an¬ 
swered : 

“ These employes received their notice of 
dismissal last November. They have only 
held on since the people demanded a change 
at the polls, because I had to look around 
and find the best material with which to re¬ 
place them. 


“ It is a mistake to say that there are any 
good democrats among them. Every one of 
them held office under a republican adminis¬ 
tration, and that wipes out alt the democracy 
they ever possessed. Why, if I had found my 
own brother here when I came, and he had 
been drawing a salary under a republican ad¬ 
ministration for one day, I would have fired 
him at once. 

“ That’s the kind of a democrat I am ! The 
people demanded a change last November— 
not only a change in the heads of the govern¬ 
ment and departments, but a change clear 
down to the charwomen, and that is the kind 
of a change it is my sacred duty to give them, 
as far as is in my power. Some of the dis¬ 
charged employes are good people, I know, 
but they are not good democrats .”—Interview 
with Kearns, Collector of Internal Revenue at Pitts¬ 
burgh, Pa., July, 189S. 


CORRESPONDENCE. 

Vincennes, Ind., Aug. 22, 1893. 
To the Editor oj the Civil Service Chronicle: 

I respectfully Inform you that I was yesterday 
removed by Postmaster Royal E. Purcell from the 
position of letter carrier. When I returned Satur¬ 
day morning from my first trip, about 9:30 a. m., I 
was Informed by the postmaster that Mr. James 
Hall (one week a substitute) had been appointed 
my successor. I demanded of him what charges 
he had against me for removal. His answer was 
that it was not necessary to state any, and that he 
had simply done as his predecessor, Allen Tin- 
dolph, had done four years ago—“Choose his man 
and send in his name.” He also stated that there 
was nothing dishonorable about the discharge, as 
it was the same as had been done four years ago. 
Now,what I wantto know is. can I not be reinstated, 
as I think this is a political removal, as there had 
been no charge preferred against me. He also 
stated that it would only be a question of time un¬ 
til he would make other changes, as he wanted 
men of his own selection. Have been referred to 
you, and should be glad to hear from you with any 
consolation you may be able to hold out. I was 
appointed regular carrier March 1, after serving 
almost four years as a substitute. Awaiting your 
answer, I am, Respectfully yours. 

Edw. L. Townsley, 
Ex-Carrier No. 3. 

[As stated in this letter, the facts show that 
Postmaster Purcell has, without any cause, de¬ 
prived of his place an employe who had 
learned his duties in a long apprenticeship, 
and who could perform them better and was 
more useful to the people than any new man. 
The d'smissal was purely wanton, in the sense 
in which Mr. Madison used that term. The 
act, of course, is a corrupt one, and is entirely 
against the intention of the civil service law 
and the postal regulations. No officer who de¬ 
sires the most efficient service ever dismisses a 
man because he happeus to take the notion, 
and no superior officer with a like desire ever 
sanctions or permits such a dismissal. There 
are always practical difficulties in the way of 
the correction of such evils. No civil service 
reformer is in favor of limiting the power of 
dismissal; in the interest of discipline and 
efficiency that power must be left in the ex¬ 
ecutive. The only restraint that reformers 
ask is that there shall be a written public rec¬ 
ord of the reasons for dismissal, and that the 
president and heads of departments shall not 
allow the power to be abused. Any dismissal 
in which politics or favoritism, or any other 
motive except the efficiency of the service 
plays any part, is an abuse of this power. Ac¬ 
cording to this letter this dismissal was such 
an abuse. The only question left is whether 
the postmaster-general will correct it. If he 
will not, he will not perform the duties he has 
sworn to perform, but there is no help for it 
except punishment by public opinion. He has 
the physical power in his hands. Mr. Towns¬ 
ley and the citizens of Vincennes should make 
the proper representations to Postmaster-Gen¬ 
eral Bissell, and should, above all, make their 
protest public. — [Editor Civil Service 
Chronicle.] 







The Civil service chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 7. 


INDIANAPOLIS, SEPTEMBER, 1893. 


TERMS : ^ 


One dol!ar per annum. 
10 cents per copy. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolit, Ind, 


The index to the first volume of the 
Chronicle is nearly completed. It is the 
work of Mr. Charles Allen Lewis (Har¬ 
vard, ’90), of Indianapolis, who has given 
to it a' great deal of time and care. To 
speak more definitely, many weeks of in¬ 
telligent labor have been freely given by 
Mr. Lewis in the belief that the cause of 
reform would be proportionately benefited 
by making the facts in the Chronicle ac¬ 
cessible. As we have before said the vol¬ 
ume is the only work of its kind relating 
to the spoils system. The index will only 
be sent to those who request it; as by rea¬ 
son of the cost no more numbers will be 
printed than are actually needed. It is re¬ 
quested that applications be forwarded 
without delay. 


In the House, September 23, Representa¬ 
tive Bretz of Indiana had a letter read, ad¬ 
dressed to him by John Hasenour, the 
fourth class postmaster at Celestine, in 
Bretz’s district in which Hasenour offers 
Bretz 115 if the latter will let him keep the 
post-oflBce. Bretz went on to say that with 
this letter he demanded of Maxwell the 
removal of Hasenour. But the latter 
could not or did not act instantly. With 
ffamingcheeks and flashing eyes Bretz said, 
“in my oflScial capacity my character and 
reputation has been assailed. * * I un¬ 
derscored the offer of $15 with a lead pen¬ 
cil mark. * * The only reason that is 
assigned to me why I shall be held up in 
scorn and contempt before a part of my 
constituents, and before the country in a 
cause of this kind, is because, perhaps, I 
have received a greater per cent, of changes 
of postmasters in my district than any 
other member of congress. I have availed 
myself of this opportunity to vindicate 
myself as well as to inform the House and 
the country that the responsibility of re¬ 
taining corrupt men in office does not rest 
on my shoulders as it appeared to do in 
the past.” 

His charges had been filed seven days. 
It takes an opportunity of this kind for 
the average of the present congressional 
delegation from this state to show his 
knavish political propensities. Bretz does 
not feel sensitive because a man offered 
him money for an office. He has steadily 


been selling offices ever since last March, 
not for $15 cash, but for work. There is no 
difference and he need not pose with flaming 
cheeks and flashing eyes with the expecta¬ 
tion that the House and the country will 
do anything but laugh at him. Everybody 
recognizes that so far as moral ends' are 
concerned he might just as well take $15 
apiece for his fourth class post-offices as to 
take weeks of work setting up primaries 
and conventions for his renomination. 
Hasenour recognized this. Bretz’s real 
animus was anger at the post-office depart¬ 
ment for a slight delay in obeying his 
orders. 


Congressman Bynum works along the 
same line in his repeated visits to the 
President and Carlisle to see about changes 
in his district. The good of the public 
service does not require changes but the 
canvass for Mr. Bynum’s renomination 
sharply demands it. There is no differ¬ 
ence in principle between his getting $500 
for the collectorship of customs here and 
getting the services of the new collector 
and his deputies for a couple of months to 
help his renomination. In some respects 
it would be even less detrimental to public 
morals. The cash sale would leave the 
people free to choose a nominee; but a 
sale for work results in preventing an un¬ 
trammelled choice. Congressmen Holman 
is now working along the same line. He 
is not only selling the offices for services, 
but to an astonishing extent he has gone 
into the business of engineering private 
bills. We give a partial list of these else¬ 
where. Holman is threatened with over¬ 
throw in his district, and there could be 
no happier expedient to raise up workers 
for himself in every ward and township 
than to raise the hope that Smith may be 
put upon the pension list or that a bill 
may be got through for the relief of 
Brown. 


The descent from Pearson through Van 
Cott to Dayton as postmaster of New York 
is sufficiently striking. Dayton says: “ I 
always give the places to democrats and 
mostly to Tammany Hall men.” Tam¬ 
many is the most corrupt, powerful and 
dangerous political organization that ever 
existed in this country. It has become a 
household word that the city of New York 
does not govern itself but is governed ab¬ 
solutely by this political Mafia. It is the 
duty of every citizen to fight this organi¬ 


zation at every point and at all times. It 
must be broken up. Yet here is Post¬ 
master Dayton joining hands with it and 
using the public treasury to keep it alive. 
This ought not to have to be pointed out 
to the President and the postmaster-gen¬ 
eral. If they ignore it they will find at 
the end that this is one of the many things 
now being done by the democrats to the 
up-building of the republican party. We 
do not overestimate the character and 
danger of Tammany Hall. No Roman 
governor ever returned from his province 
in greater glory than Croker now enjoys. 
A glance at the extracts taken almost at 
random from different sources and pub¬ 
lished in another part of this paper are 
enough to convince anyone that govern¬ 
ment by the people has practically ceased 
to exist in New York, and for that matter 
in Brooklyn. Even amusements are fur¬ 
nished with the same object and along the 
same line that they were furnished to the 
Roman rabble. 


One Jones, a deputy in the office of the 
United States Marshal for this district, has 
resigned, and makes charges reflecting on 
the honest conduct of the office. The chief 
deputy, Foley, says that— 

Jones has been a peace disturber ever since he 
came into the office. Mr. Hawkins, Mr. Foley says* 
had decided to discharge him, and would have 
done so in a few days if he had not resigned. “All 
this talk by Jones is simply for the purpose of in¬ 
juring the reputation of the office,” said Mr. Foley. 
“Mr. Jones says that one of the first things he 
learned when he came up here was to steal. Now 
it seems that he would have been perfectly willing 
to have remained in the office for $125 per month, 
but he wouldn’t remain at $75 per month. Mr- 
Foley says that the office is conducted precisely as 
it was under Marshal Dunlap. “Everything we 
know about the office we learned from Mr. Dunlap 
and his deputies,” said he, “and I do .not believe 
they would mislead us in any way.” 

We may dismiss the charge of “stealing” 
with the remark that the office is what is 
politely called a political office which means 
that it is intended to yield to the party at 
the time owning it the utmost pay possi¬ 
ble in patronage and money, and that no 
doubt Marshal Dunlap, in a matter of this 
sort, realized that there was no distinction 
of party and gave freely all the fruits of his 
experience. 

But what we especially wish to dwell 
upon is the statement that Jones had been 
a “ peace disturber.” How did Hawkins 
happen to select an employe of this sort ? 
Have not spoilsmen for years been sol* 
emnly asseverating that since they were 

















2 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


responsible for their office they must 
choose their own men and that this was 
one of their sincere objections to choice by 
the merit system ? Now note the facts re¬ 
garding Peace Disturber Jones. He was 
Voorhees’s man, a farmer from Posey 
county, and was appointed at Voorhees’s 
dictation. Thus, in divers ways, Voorhees 
rewards his henchman, and this sort may 
be classified as his secondary patronage. 

A YOUNG man who had lately been appointed 
a messenger in one of the great departments 
was seen the other day strolling through the 
main corridor puffing vigorously on a cigar¬ 
ette. One of the chiefs of division, in passing, 
ventured to suggest to him that he was violat¬ 
ing a rule of etiquette, if nothing more, but 
was cut short in the middle of a sentence with 
the sharp retort: 

“ I guess you don’t know who I am ? I was 
put here by William F. Harrity ! ” 

The chief did not swoon at the announce¬ 
ment, as he was evidently expected to. Neither 
did he carry the matter to the head of the de¬ 
partment, as was doubtless his duty. Being 
a prudent man and an officer of long experi¬ 
ence, and having a great deal of work to do at 
his desk, he simply ignored the incident; and 
the messenger, for all that is known to the 
contrary, may still be filling the corridor with 
the smoke of cheap cigarettes during business 
hours.— Good Government, September, 1898. 

The way is clear enough in this matter, 
the head of the department will have to 
approach Harrity, not too abruptly, and get 
permission to administer a rebuke. That 
is all there is of it. The messenger is 
Harrity’s man, quartered upon the people 
for Harrity’s benefit, and can not have his 
sauntering elbow jogged without Harrity’s 
permission. And what Mr. Harrity is in the 
Kepublic in the year of our Lord eighteen 
hundred and ninety-three and in the midst 
of Columbian festivals, the New York Times 
succinctly shows as follows: 

Mr. Harrity, secretary of the commonwealth, 
chairman of the democratic national com¬ 
mittee, and dispenser of Mr. Cleveland's patronage 
among the democrats of the Keystone State^, 
has as heavy a hand on the democratic organ¬ 
ization as Mr. Quay ever laid upon the republi¬ 
can machine. The result is a unanimity of sen¬ 
timent among the delegates, a promise of harmony 
altogether unusual in a democratic convention .— 
September 19. 

The secretary of agriculture has found 
a way out of a corner. With a great flour¬ 
ish he discharged part of his force of meat 
inspectors throughout the country for the 
very good reason that there was nothing 
for them to do.. Then he discharged the 
remaining men because they were repub¬ 
licans, and the remaining women because 
their fathers were or had been, when living, 
republicans. Into these places he put 
democrats and women whose fathers were 
or had been democrats. This half division 
of spoil, however, did not suit bosses of the 
Voorhees and Turpie stripe. They did 
not want less places in the service, but more, 
and it suddenly developed that it would be 
a good thing to have meat for home con¬ 


sumption inspected, too, and the announce¬ 
ment comes that the force of inspectors is 
to be largely increased. If this is a genu¬ 
ine measure to benefit the public the secre¬ 
tary will reappoint the experienced em¬ 
ployes he dismissed for reasons so disgrace¬ 
ful to himself. If he lets political bosses 
fill the places, no stronger proof will be 
needed to show that the measure was sim¬ 
ply taken to make places for favorites to 
use up an appropriation. 

Postmaster General Bissell has given 
out a table showing the proportion of cor¬ 
rect to incorrect placing of mail matter 
by clerks in the railway mail service for 
various years. The table is as follows: 


Year. 

Proportion 

Correct. 

Year. 

Proportion 

Correct. 

1885. 

.5,575 to 1. 

1890. 

.2,834 to 1. 

1886. 

.4,228 to 1. 

1891. 

.4,261 to 1. 

1887. 

.3,364 to 1. 

1892. 

.5,564 to 1. 

1888. 

.3,698 to 1. 

1898. 

.7,144 to 1. 

1889. 

.3,954 to 1. 



These figures tell a plain story. The loot 
of the railway mail service during Mr. 
Cleveland’s first administration under the 
guise of “dismissals for the good of the ser¬ 
vice” ran the service down, and there was 
but partial recovery. Then, in 1889, Har¬ 
rison and Wanamaker looted it again 
under the guise of “improving the service,” 
and its efficiency ran to the lowest point 
ever reached. Then the merit system took 
it and to-day its magnificent triumph is 
marked by the figures for 1893. 

The majority by which Mr. Gladstone 
carried his home rule bill through the 
Commons was in all stages narrow. It, 
however, was sufficient, because it was 
steady and unflinching. The victory was 
a remarkable triumph of popular govern¬ 
ment. It was such because it was gained 
solely by argument. England was changed 
from a position of hostility to the opposite, 
because it was urged that this was the 
right thing to do. No clerkship nor post- 
office nor hope of reward or preferment of 
any kind helped to bring about this re¬ 
markable result. When the bill went to 
the House of Lords no member was under 
obligation to the government for patron¬ 
age, and there had been and was no at¬ 
tempt to influence the action of any 
member by giving him control of appoint¬ 
ments, There was no member with a polit¬ 
ical conscience so corrupt that he would 
not have resented an attempt to “ work ” 
his vote in such a manner, and the offer of 
a single place, however indirectly made 
and however insignificant, with even a sur¬ 
misable connection with such an object, 
would have set England ablaze in an hour. 

ANECDOTES OF A LIFE OFFICE¬ 
HOLDER. 

It seems that “ Judge ” Chester R. 
Faulkner no longer represents Indiana, 
This perpetual office-holder can no longer 


be confined within the narrow bounds of 
state lines. He has, as it were, joined the 
regular political army. In April, 1891, 
the Chronicle, under the head of “Anec¬ 
dotes of a Chronic Office holder,” gave an 
extended account of Mr. Faulkner, which, 
in order to refresh the memory of our 
readers, we reproduce: 

Chester R. Faulkner was a member of the 
lower house of the late general assembly. 
He attracted attention on account of his 
opposition to appropriations which seemed 
to average people necessary to the ordi¬ 
nary efficiency of the state government. 
For instance, to the proposition to relieve 
the supreme court by additional judges or 
by a new court, Faulkner said: “ Let 

them judges take down them spring beds 
and go to work.” This referred to certain 
beds which the out of town judges have in 
their chambers at the capitol. It is not to 
be inferred that rope beds and feather 
ticks were to be substituted, but that the 
judges were to be cut off from all chance 
of sleeping in their chambers. When the 
question of salary for the state librarian 
came up it was proposed to make it $1,500, 
but Faulkner stood stubbornly for $1,000. 
Such Spartan virtue led wicked and envi¬ 
ous people to look into Faulkner’s past to 
see what meat he had fed on to produce 
such a development. It seems that under 
the late administration. Senator Voorhees 
kept Faulkner steadily under government 
pay. His first position was that of clerk 
of the committee on additional appropria¬ 
tions to the library of congress at six dol¬ 
lars a day. This committee had one bill 
referred to it in seven years. Then he be¬ 
came chief of the records division of the 
pension office at $2,000 a year. While in 
this position he asked the superintendent 
of the railway mail service to transfer a 
clerk so that he could work and vote in 
Indiana at an approaching election. Being 
refused, he wrote an impertinent letter 
derogatory of the administration, for 
which Secretary Vilas demanded his resig¬ 
nation. Faulkner refused to resign until 
he had seen Congressman Voorhees, who 
appointed him, and the latter forthwith 
bullied Vilas into backing down. 

It is claimed that Faulkner’s sole per¬ 
formance of duty in this last position con¬ 
sisted in tapping his bell three times at 
noon and again at night. The first tap 
was for the clerks to put away pens; the 
second, to rise, and the third, to march out. 
One other duty performed, however, is 
related of Faulkner. His young men and 
women clerks were apt to converse in the 
corridors at noon, and to meet this emer¬ 
gency he prepared and hung up a large 
placard having upon it the notice, “ No 
Lofeing in the Corduroys.” Harrison’s 
administration dispensed with his services 
and then Voorhees seems to have quar¬ 
tered him upon the senate again, as until 
some months ago he was on the congress¬ 
ional pay-roll as folder in the senate docu¬ 
ment room. 

We do not know when Senator Voorhees, 
from inability “to place” this henchman 
anywhere else, felt compelled to make 
him his private secretary; but it has been 
apparent ever since the inauguration of 
Mr. Cleveland that perhaps the weightiest 
problem upon Voorhees’s mind was how 























THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


3 


to get Faulkner into a good berth. Per¬ 
haps there were grammatical reasons for 
urgency, Faulkner seemed at one time 
dangerously near becoming again chief of 
the records division of the pension depart¬ 
ment, but some other henchman got some¬ 
thing else which would make this, if carried 
out, an uneven division of spoils. Voorhees 
has, however, finally landed his man. A 
Washington dispatch of August 8th says: 

Judge Chester R. Faulkner, of Ripley 
county, private secretary to Senator Voor¬ 
hees, was appointed superintendent of the 
Maltby building to-day, at a salary of 
$1,800. He was appointed from the coun? 
try at large, and hence will not be charged 
to Indiana. 


MR. QUINCY, AGAIN. 

Mr. Josiah Quincy has resigned his place 
as assistant secretary of state to resume 
his chairmanship of the Massachusetts 
state democratic committee. Before Mr. 
Quincy went to Washington, his political 
career had been a promising one for re¬ 
form politics. He was regarded as a demo¬ 
crat, whose intellectual astuteness had 
mastered the apparently simple problem 
that the great masses of the American 
people desire courageous and bold reforms 
in political matters, and more j’^et, as 
a man whose conscience would compel 
him to courageous and lofty patriotism, 
calmly abiding the consequences. Of all 
places in the public service, there was none 
so plainly in the line of “practical” reform 
as the consular service. In that service 
there is no dispute, but that educational 
qualifications are desirable. There is no 
doubt either that if the places were not 
used for “rewards” and “gifts,” there are 
many men of especial fitness who for one 
reason or another would like the places 
and would be glad to submit to a competi¬ 
tive test. Did Mr. Quincy show any signs 
of courageous or lofty patniotisim ? Not 
in the least. Pitifully feeble, ineffectual 
and timid, he says, “it is certainly im¬ 
possible, under existing conditions to deal 
with the matter upon a purely non-politi¬ 
cal basis. It is true that senators and 
representatives Lave taken a lively interest 
in the application of some of their con¬ 
stituents for consular appointments as has 
been the case in the past.” How silly all 
this will sound when some man says the 
consular service shall now be a merit serv¬ 
ice, and proceeds forthwith to make it a 
merit service by excluding from it every¬ 
thing pertaining to political or personal re¬ 
ward. 

Mr. Quincy’s future will now be a curi¬ 
ous and interesting thing to watch. In 
practice when tested he has been no bet¬ 
ter than our own Indiana spoilsmen. He 
has used the consular service about as 
Voorhees would. In externals his use has 


not been perhaps so coarse and noisy, but 
he has been a bona fide spoilsmen with 
bona fide spoils methods. In spite of all ex¬ 
planations we believe that more and more 
he will feel that he has disappointed those 
whose lowered opinion is a distinct loss to 
him. We shall see whether even the poli¬ 
ticians and the spoilsmen with whom he 
is to come into close relations do not show 
the contempt that even low grade men 
have for one who has failed to maintain a 
standard that they expected to be main¬ 
tained in spite of their own efforts to break 
it down. 


THE ABSORBING OCCUPATION OF 

THE SECRETARY OF THE TREAS¬ 
URY DURING A GREAT FINAN¬ 
CIAL CRISIS. 

Secretary Carlisle intends to weed out the 
inefficient clerks in the treasury department. 
He began operations yesterday by dropping 
six clerks from the rolls. Others will be 
dropped from time to time as they are re¬ 
ported from the chiefs of the divisions. These 
vacancies will be filled through the civil service com¬ 
mission, and in doing so it is the secretary's inten¬ 
tion, everything else being equal, to give 'preference 
to democrats .— Washington dispatch. New York 
Evening Post, July S6. 

it tf i. 

It is said that Secretary Carlisle will give 
his attention soon to a number of Indiana re¬ 
publicans who are still ensconced in places in 
the treasury department.— Washington dispatch, 
Indianapolis News, July 27. 

* 

Senator Voorhees arrived this morning and 
saw Secretary Carlisle. The result of the in¬ 
terview was that Mr. Carlisle sent to Mr. John 
O. Cravens, collector of internal revenue for 
the sixth Indiana district (at Terre Haute), 
a request for his resignation.—Washington dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Journal, Aug-ust 27. 

There is to be a “shaking up” in the bureau 
of engraving and printing. Chief Johnson, 
who recently took charge, has made an earnest 
study of the bureau and its needs and has pre¬ 
pared plans for its improvement which he 
submitted to Secretary Carlisle this afternoon. 
Mr. Carlisle assured him of his active co-op¬ 
eration. The overhauling will proceed rap- 
— Washington dispatch. New York Times, 
July 27. 

# * <t 

Collector of Internal Revenue, John C. 
Quinn, on Wednesday was asked for his resig¬ 
nation. In answer. Collector Quinn, yester¬ 
day, sent the following reply: My term of 
office as internal revenue collector will expire 
next March, although at that time I will have 
held the office but three years, one year of the 
term being held by my deceased predecessor. 
There is a popular impression that resignation 
implies a desire on the part of an official to 
avoid the disclosure of something unpleasant 
in the administration of his office. Knowing 


that I have performed the duties of my posi¬ 
tion as internal revenue collector with the 
acknowledged approval of my superiors, I 
must decline to give grounds for ill-natured 
criticism by a resignation which in future 
might put me upon explanation .—San Fran¬ 
cisco dispatch. New York Times, August 18. 

« « • 

There are at present between twenty-five 
and thirty vacancies in the position of internal 
revenue collector. These vacancies have been 
occasioned by the collectors’ resignations being 
asked for. It is not yet known what action 
will be taken by the President in the matter 
of filling these places. It has been understood 
that no new appointments, unless the good of 
the public service urgently demanded it, would 
be made until the financial legislation now 
pending in congress should be out of the way. 
This view of the situation is evidently not en¬ 
tertained by many sermtors and congressmen, who, 
knowing of the President's return, crowded the 
rooms of Secretary Carlisle and Commissioner Miller 
this morning, urging them to recommend to the Presi¬ 
dent their candidates for internal revenue collector- 
ships .— Washington dispatch. New York Times, 
September 2. 

« <■ <■ 

William B, Donovan, whose services as clerk 
to the superintendent of government buildings 
were discontinued August 28, and in whose 
place Dexter P. Wager was appointed, this 
morning received a telegram from Secretary 
Carlisle stating that the order removing him 
had been revoked. Donovan is an “ anti¬ 
snapper” and Wager was the candidate of the 
“snapper” faction .—Troy dispatch. New York 
Times, September 3. 

Secretary Carlisle has issued new regula¬ 
tions, “directing the conduct of official busi¬ 
ness relating to the personel of the public 
service under the treasury department.” Some 
of the new heads of bureaus, it is said, have been, to 
use a western woi d, somewhat “ brash ” in preparing 
and laying before the secretary for approval lists of 
promotions, removals and appointments, and it has 
happened once or twice that in the hurry of business 
the secretary has signed these lists without very close 
examination. 

The result has been that he has, in sev¬ 
eral instances had, to revoke his action. To 
obviate this necessity the secretary now directs 
that all such recommendations shall be first 
sent to the appointment division. To correct 
another bad practice into which some of the 
new appointees have fallen, the secretary fur¬ 
ther mentions in emphatic italics that “re¬ 
commendation by officers of the department of per¬ 
sons not in the service is not in accordance with the 
rules and regulations."—Washington dispatch. New 
York Times, September 3. 

if it if 

The plums around the treasury department 
are ready to fall. Secretary Carlisle insists 
that the fruit is ripe and that the President 
must shake the trees. Representatives, there¬ 
fore, are hustling for their constituents, and 
several more patriots soon will be made happy. 
Within a very few days, in fact, at some time 








4 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


during the present week, Secretary Carlisle 
will hold an extended conference with the 
President on the subject of filling the existing 
Presidential vacancies in the treasury branch. 
This conference was to have been held long 
ago, but the absence of President Cleveland 
from the city and the importance of other 
matters side-tracked the question of appoint¬ 
ments for a period. There are a number of 
vacancies in the treasury service to be filled at 
once. There are thirty internal revenue dis¬ 
tricts in which vacancies exist, and these will 
be first considered. At present there is no 
deputy second comptroller.— Washington dis¬ 
patch, Buffalo Express, September 7, 

* »D< 

Secretary Carlisle was at the White House 
for a time last evening for the purpose of dis¬ 
cussing some treasury appointments, butfound 
Senator Mills of Texas in private consolation 
with the President, and only had a short talk 
with the President himself.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Sentinel, September 9. 

♦ « « 

A Washington dispatch to-day says that the 
secretary of the treasury has asked for the 
resignation of Philip M. Hildebrand, surveyor 
of customs here. No intimation of this action 
had been received at Mr. Hildebrand’s oflBce. 
His term of office does not expire till January 
30, 1894. He was commissioned for four years. 
The office belongs to the class where from 
custom the stipulated tenure is supposed to 
protect the incumbent, though he is removable 
with or without cause. Thomas Madden is 
supposed to have the inside track in the race 
for Mr. Hildebrand’s position, though other 
candidates are numerous—including John 
Reaume, Maurice Donnelly, John Rail, 
Thomas Steele and Smith Myers.— Indianapolis 
News, September 11. 

Congressman Bynum was closeted to-day 
with Secretary Carlisle, but the nature of their 
conference is unknown. It may have had 
something to do with the request of the secre¬ 
tary made later for the resignation of Mr. 
Hildebrand, surveyor of customs at Indianap¬ 
olis. It is also quite probable that the inter¬ 
nal revenue collectorship of the sixth district 
came up for consideration. This appointment 
may be looked for at any time now.— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, September 12. 
« • « 

Secretary Carlisle has requested the resigna¬ 
tion of J. Webb Flanagan, collector of cus¬ 
toms at El Paso, Tex.— Washington dispatch, 
August 18. 

[Flanagan, as a delegate to a national con¬ 
vention, inquired what they were there for, 
if not the offices. President Harrison evi¬ 
dently took Flanagan’s view and gave him an 
office. Secretary Carlisle, with the sympathy 
of a fellow spoilsman, lets him hold on six 
months.] 

<1 >> 

Secretary Carlisle has appointed T. Aubrey 
Byrue, of Boston, special agent of the treasury 
department, with headquarters at Boston.— 
Washington dispatch, New York Times, Sep- 
emper IS. 


[Files of the New York Evening Post, in 
Mr. Cleveland’s former administration, show 
the discreditable part played by Byrne in his 
efforts to work out of the service employes of 
high character.] 

HOLMAN IN THE FINANCIAL 
CRISIS. 

The many friends of Frank J. Hall, the 
popular democratic attorney of Rushville* 
are grooming him for the congressional race 
against the Hon. William S. Holman. 

Holman, who, for over thirty years, has 
held the demoerats of the fourth district un¬ 
der complete control is losing his influence, 
and open denunciation of his course in regard 
to the present distribution of offices may be 
heard on every hand. He has made a terri¬ 
ble muddle of the collectorship, and in this 
instance alone has lost the influence of the 
Lawrenceburg Register, a paper that has man¬ 
fully stood by him through good and evil re¬ 
port for many years. In Rush county the 
squabble over the post-office has cost him 
scores of stanch supporters, while in this 
county his action in regard to the patronage 
and the pension board appointed upon his 
recommendation has made a breach among 
his followers that may never be healed. In 
Franklin, Shelby and Ripley counties the 
same conditions exist, and it is safe to say, 
that never in his political career has Holman 
been brought face to face with such wide¬ 
spread dissatisfaction as exists to day. —Greens- 
burg Dispatch to Indianapolis News, August 18. 

Editor William O’Brien, of Lawrenceburg, 
will, according to advices received here, be a 
candidate against Mr. Holman for the congres¬ 
sional nomination. Mr. O’Brien is one of the 
cleverest politicians according to reports that 
southern Indiana contains. He is said to have 
been disappointed because his father-in-law. 
Dr. Hunter, failed to g^ Mr. Holman’s sup¬ 
port against Bracken for collector of internal 
revenue. In his displeasure over the alleged 
political inconstancy of Mr. Holman, he 
found consolation from Senator Voorhees and 
other Indiana politicians. They expect him 
to be a candidate for Congress, and believe 
he will make things decidedly lively for Mr. 
Holman.— Indianapolis Neivs, August 29. 

tt * 

A long letter from the Hon. W. S. Holman 
was received here recently in which he de¬ 
clares his intention to recommend Prof. Will 
S. Meredith for postmaster of this city. He 
intimates that while this may not be his 
own personal choice, that after a careful ex¬ 
amination of all the recommendations of 
the various applicants, it appears that Mr. 
Meredith has the strongest indorsements and 
that he feels that duty warrants this action in 
favor of Meredith, which is final as to him.— 
Rushville disjmtch, Indianapolis Sentinel, Septem¬ 
ber 12. 

if in if 

The news which reached Rushville that 
Congressman Holman would recommend W. 
S. Meredith for postmaster of that city is 


causing considerable friction in democratic 
ranks. The friends of J. A. Spurrier, D. P. 
Shawhan and Douglass Morris are still push¬ 
ing the claims of these genthmen for recogni¬ 
tion.— Indianapolis News, September 15. 

if if if 

Mr. Holman has interested himself in W’. A. 
Posey, of Rushville, and it is understood that 
he has the promise of Secretary Hoke Smith 
that the young man shall be appointed either 
as clerk in an Indian agency or a special 
agent of the land office.— Indianapolis News, 
September 6. 

« 

Congressman Holman secured an appoint¬ 
ment in the interior department to-day for 
W. A. Posey, Rushville.— Indianapolis Sentinel, 
September 16. 

Congressman Holman is not frightened at 
the outlook for his renomination. The News 
correspondent is informed by one of Mr. 
Holman’s close friends that the congressman 
does not expect any serious opposition. He 
doubts the report that William O’Brien, of 
Lawrenceburg, is a candidate. Mr. Holman’s 
friends say that he secured the appointment 
of Dr. Hunter as internal revenue collector 
under President Cleveland’s last administra¬ 
tion, and that his attitude toward the doctor 
in the fight was strictly fair and honorable. 
Mr. Holman does not believe that Dr. Hun¬ 
ter’s friends are antagonizing him or that the 
doctor’s son-in-law, William O’Brien, will be 
a candidate.— Indianapolis News, September 8, 

# ♦ 

[why he is not afraid.] 

Congressman Holman has introduced a large 
number of bills of a private character, intended for 
the relief of his constituents. They are as follows: 

A bill for the relief of Herman Schrover; a bill 
for the relief of Mrs. Mary H. Fremire; a bill for 
the relief of Julia LeClerc, widow of John LeClerc; 
a bill for the relief of Theodore Wal ker; a bill for the 
relief of Albert Munson; a bill to correct the military 
record of Alonzo Carter; a hill to correct the military 
record of John C. Partlow; a bill to correct the mili¬ 
tary record of Myron H. McMullen; a bill for the 
relief of Wm. T. Romlnger; a bill for the relief of 
Nancy Loslyn; a bill for the relief of Mrs. Hulda F. 
Stone; a bill ior the relief of John Maholm; a bill * 
for the relief of Mrs. S. O. N. Pleasants; a bill for 
the relief of Nancy A. Fuller, mother of Samuel 
Phipps; a bill granting a pension to Laura M. 
Cheek; a bill granting a pension to James Theo¬ 
dore Walker; a bill for the relief of Wm. F. Poe; a 
bill for the relief of Samuel Brown; a bill for the 
relief of F. W. Zeickendrath ; a bill granting a pen¬ 
sion to Selinda E. Smith; a bill granting a pension 
to Matilda Weed; a bill granting a pension to Sam¬ 
uel Maguire; a bill granting a pension to Joseph M. 
Ward; a bill for the relief of Henry J. Bischoff; a 
bill granting a pension to John W. Wright; a bill 
granting a pension to Esther Todd; a bill for the re¬ 
lief of the surviving partners of J. and O. P. Cobb, of 
Aurora, for value of the barge Moule, taken by the 
United States; a bill to correct the military record 
of Patrick Sweeney; a bill for the relief of Mrs. 
Nannie Shaffer and children of James M. Alley; a 
bill for the relief of John F.Williams; a bill for the 
relief of Jacob L. Tudor; a bill for the relief of John 
Gray; a bill to correct the military record of W. S. 
Fox; a bill granting a pension to Margaret Withers; 
abill to correct the military record of Wm. E.Burns; 
a bill granting a pension to Jefferson Jordan; a bill 
increasing pension of Moses Crawford; a bill for 
the relief of the widow and heirs of Martin A. Bar¬ 
nett, deceased; a bill to relieve Elisha Lunsford 
from the charge of desertion ; abill granting a pen¬ 
sion to Johanna Knab; a bill granting a pension 
to Anna T. Unger; a bill for the relief of Isaac M. 
Bower, of Lawrenceburg; a bill for the relief of 
Isaac H. Wheat; a bill granting a pension to Nancy 
Altlzer, of Ripley county; a bill granting a pension 
to Hester A. Bonnell; a bill granting a pension to 
Anna H. Anderson, of Decatur county; a bill for 
the relief of Charlotte Rarison; a bill granting an 
Increase of pension to Thomas H. Kennedy; a bill 
to remove the charges of desertions against Frank 
Wempe; a bill granting a pension to Bernard Brun¬ 
ner ; a bill granting a pension to Clara I. Worrtell; 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


5 


a bill to extend to Wm. M. Snyder the benefit of the 
arrears of pension act; a bill granting a pension to 
George Pulskamp; a bill for the relief of Charlotte 
H. Fenton; a bill for the relief of George F. Roberts 
and others; a bill granting a pension to Marla 
Thomas, of Union county; a bill for the relief of 
Thomas W. Johnson, of Ripley county; a bill grant¬ 
ing a pension to Theodore Eck, of St. Paul; a bill 
for the relief of the heirs of Joseph Jennison; a bill 
granting a pension to Elizabeth P. Mullin; a bill to 
restore the name of Drusilla Fowler, of Switzerland 
county, to the pension roll; a bill granting a pen¬ 
sion to Ardenia Dillon; abillto correct the military 
record of John Dickson; a bill for the relief of Julia 
A. Wolf; a bill to correct the military record of 
John Faust; a bill to correct the military record of 
Wm. Barnes; a bill for the relief of John Colter; 
a bill for the relief of Samuel Treater; a bill for the 
relief of Benjamin A. Waybrlght; a bill to increase 
the pension of Simeon P. Bell.— Washington dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Sentinel, September 16. 

INDIANA CONGRESSMEN IN THE 
FINANCIAL CRISIS. 

Congressman Bynum will call on President 
Cleveland as soon as the latter returns from 
Gray Gables, and hopes to be able to learn 
something definite in regard to Indianapolis 
appointments.— Washington dispatch, Indianap¬ 
olis News, August S9. 

* * <■ 

Congressman Bynum waited an hour at the 
White House this morning to see the Presi¬ 
dent, but there were so many appointments 
ahead of him that he left the White House 
without securing an interview. Mr. Bynum 
called to discuss the Indianapolis patronage. 

Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, Septem¬ 
ber 9. 

<c ♦ Jjt 

Congressman Bynum says the surveyor of 
the port at Indianapolis will not be appointed 
for some time yet.— Washington dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis News, September 15. 

if ■fy -tS 

Samuel R. Meyers, of Rockport, Ind., will 
probably be appointed chief of the reimburse¬ 
ment division of the treasury soon. Congress¬ 
man Taylor is working seemingly for Mr. 
Meyer’s appointment.— Washington dispatch, 
Indianapolis News, September 14- 

if if if. 

Mr. Hammond, like his colleagues from 
northern Indiana, complains that the admin¬ 
istration has been too slow making political 
removals in his district.— Washington dispatch, 
Indianapolis News, August 4- 

if if if 

Ex-Congressman Patton, of the lake district, 
who was an applicant for superintendent of 
immigration, and failed of the appointment, 
has applied for the receivership of the land 
office at Cherokee Outlet. The Indiana dele¬ 
gation will try to secure the place for him. 
— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, Au¬ 
gust 16. 

^ if if if 

The nomination of ex-congressman Patton, 
of Remington, Ind., as register of the land 
office of the eastern district of the Cherokee 
Outlet, has already been sent to Buzzard’s Bay 
by Secretary Smith for President Cleveland’s 
approval. Congressman Hammond was chiefly 
instrumental in securing the appointment of 
Mr. Patton.— Washington dispatch to Indian¬ 
apolis News, August IS. 

♦ 

The good work continues at the Jefferson¬ 
ville depot of army supplies. News reached 
here to-night that L. L. Hurlburt, of St. Louis 


Mo., had been appointed by the officials at 
Washington to a position as copyist at the de¬ 
pot. As there are two republicans holding 
the position it is not definitely known whom 
Mr. Hurlburt will succeed. In any event one 
will go for the present, and it is not unlikely 
that the other fellow will make room for some 
good democrat in a few days. This morning 
Capt. T. T. Thompson, a democrat in every 
sense of the term, was given a place at the de¬ 
pot, vice Albert Burnett, removed for political 
cause. This makes twelve changes within five 
days. There are applications from all parts 
of the state, Ohio and Illinois for positions. 
Of course, there will be many disappointed, 
because places can not be procured for all. It 
is safe to say that a clean sweep is one of the 
possibilities, and that, too, very soon.— Jeffer¬ 
sonville dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, July 14- 

« « « 

There is much partisan rejoicing at Jeffer¬ 
sonville, over the rumer that Quartermaster- 
General Hodges, of the government depot, is 
to be replaced by Lieutenent Colonel A. G. 
Robinson, now stationed at Ft. Vancouver, 
Wash. The grievance against Colonel Hodges 
is that he refuses to interest himself in the re¬ 
moval of republicans so that democrats can 
take their places. Colonel Robinson, on the 
other hand, is quoted with being a democrat 
who believes in the Jacksonian doctrine. “To 
the victors belongs the spoils.”— Indianapolis 
News, August SO. 

if if if 

Word comes from Crawfordsville that there 
is some uneasiness shown among the local 
democrats over the delay in the appointment 
of a postmaster. A letter was received this 
week complaining that Hulit, who is a candi¬ 
date for deputy internal revenue collector, 
was having the appointment delayed so that 
in case he failed to land the collectorship in 
the seventh district he could apply for the 
Crawfordsville post-office. The term of the 
postmaster at Crawfordsville has expired, and 
as the collector of internal revenue will not be 
appointed until November, complaint is made 
in a certain quarter that the post office appoint¬ 
ment should not be delayed so long. Indica¬ 
tions point to a very lively fight between Hulit 
and Jump for the collectorship, the former be¬ 
ing backed by Congressman Brookshire and 
the latter by Senator Voorhees.— Washington 
dispatch, Indianapolis News, July 31. 

* it if 

Congressmen Cooper and Brookshire called 
at the White House this morning and saw the 
President. Mr. Brookshire is interested in the 
appointment of a postmaster at Crawfords¬ 
ville. He has recommended Mr. Voorhis for 
the appointment.— Washington dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis News, September 7. 

Congressman Cooper has three presidential 
offices yet to fill. Besides Edinburg, there are 
the Danville and Greencastle offices, terms of 
both of which expire in January. Congress¬ 
man Bretz has three presidential offices yet to 
fill, all of which expire in January—Bedford, 
Washington and Worthington. 


Representative Cooper has secured quite an 
important office for one of his constituents of 
Greencastle. William B. Vestal has been ap¬ 
pointed special agent of the treasury, and he 
is ordered to report here for duty at once. 
Mr. Vestal is ex-sheriff of Putnam county.— 
Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, Septem¬ 
ber S. 

if if 

Chester R. Faulkner, of Ripley county, cus¬ 
todian of the Maltby Building and Senator 
Voorhees’s political lieutenant, has just per¬ 
formed a philanthropic deed in securing the 
appointment of Mrs. Margaret Lemon as post¬ 
mistress at Holten, Ripley county, vice a re¬ 
publican summarily bounced.— Washington 
dispatch, Indianapolis News, September 16. 

if if if 

The fourth-class post-office question is still 
a lively one in Indiana. The Hon. J. M. 
Fippen, of Tipton, has been here several days 
trying to settle the Arcadia post-office ques¬ 
tion, while numerous letters have been re¬ 
ceived from the Hon. Robert Bell, of Fort 
Wayne, on the same subject. 

James Briscoe, a prominent politician of 
Lynn, Ind., is also here, to correct an alleged 
error in the appointment of a post-master in 
his town. He claims Senator Turpie secured 
the appointment of a man as postmaster who 
did not reside in the community.— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis News, August 10. 

if if if 

Indiana office-seeking politicians, whose 
staying qualities failed them many months 
ago, and who went home after a fruitless 
search for office unsatiated, may well contem¬ 
plate the case of the Hon. “Con” Cunning¬ 
ham, of Crawfordsville, and take courage. 
Mr. Cunningham is a merchant of Crawfords¬ 
ville, who amassed a small fortune by a suc¬ 
cessful business career, and who now has an 
ambition to go to Scotland as a consul. He 
came here shortly before the inauguration, 
and has been here since, except for a few short 
intermissions. He has made many warm 
friends, and does not seem to be discouraged 
because of the outlook for appointment nor 
awed by the hotel bills of Washington. Mr. 
Cunningham is taking the world easy, and 
declares that Washington is a nice place to 
stop over, and says his chances are brighter 
to-day than they were in March.— Washington 
dispatch, Indianapolis News, September 8. 

Senator Voorhees chaperoned C. W. Cun¬ 
ningham, of Crawfordsville, to the depart¬ 
ment of state this morning. Mr. Cunning¬ 
ham hopes that when the assistant secretary 
rounds up the consulships in the next few 
days, before leaving the department, that he 
will get one.— Washington dispatch, Indianapo¬ 
lis News, September 14. 

«> << « 

Office seekers are pouring into Washington 
just now from every part of the country. Just 
why they should invade the capital at the 
particular time is a matter hard to explain. 
There is always a large number of them about 
the town, but the corporals guard on hand in 







6 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the latter part of August has been swelled in¬ 
to an army. These men and women are very 
much in evidence in the capital in the morn¬ 
ing hours, and are particularly numerous 
when the house fails to meet as it has done 
during the past three days. The absence of 
the speaker gives them a fair whack at the 
members, and they do not fail to avail them¬ 
selves of the opportunity. Over at the senate 
end of the big building, after 2 o’clock in the 
afternoon, they keep the pages busy carrying 
in cards. After adjournment the male part of 
them throng the lobbies of every hotel on the 
avenue. The ladies go to the theater. The 
return of the President is supposed to have 
something to do with this sudden expansion of 
the ranks of the unemployed, though as they 
can’t see him, just what good his presence can 
do them is unexplained.— Washington dispatch, 
Indianapolis Sentinel, September 6. 

A MODERN ROME. 

Hugh McLaughlin, more than any other one man 
in Brooklyn to-day, controls the political destinies 
of a great city. Called the “Boss,” there is no one 
who dare dispute the title with him. He is boss 
and master of the third largest city on the Ameri¬ 
can Continent. He can make and unmake the for¬ 
tunes of men at will. 

Hugh McLaughlin is not a hard master to those 
who acknowledge him as their “boss.” He, is faith¬ 
ful to his friends, rigid in those principles in which 
he believes, and steadfast to a degree of obstinacy. 
Politics is the meat this Csesar feeds upon, andupon 
which he has waxed so great. 

This man, whom everybody in Kings county 
knows either personally, by sight, or by hearsay, is 
a man of but few words. The “boss” is a man of 
simple habits, seldom indulging in the frivoli¬ 
ties of life, and never venturing into the giddy 
swirl of society. Mr.McLaughlin was once in very 
moderate circumstances. He is now in extraordi¬ 
narily easy circumstances. Times have changed 
since he was a young man, and, although his tastes 
are just as simple, and his habits just as unassum¬ 
ing now as then, his position has changed. He now 
lives in a magniflcant brownstone front house, the 
handsomest on the block, on the very exclusive 
Remison street, Brooklyn .—York Times, July 

• • • 

When the daughter of Hugh McLaughlin, the 
Brooklyn boss, was married recently, wedding 
presents to the value of 8760,000 was given her by 
friends and her father’s henchmen. The bride has 
had built for their safe keeping, a fire and burglar- 
proof vault under the sidewalk in front of her 
new home. 

* * * 

United States District Attorney Jesse Johnson of 
Brooklyn, tendered his resignation to President 
Cleveland last July, but his successor has not yet 
been appointed. So quiet was the affair kept that 
It was not known until yesterday that the resigna¬ 
tion has been tendered. It is believed Mr. Cleve¬ 
land will not appoint his successor until an agree¬ 
ment between the administration and the McLaughlin 
machine is reached—New York Times, September 18. 

« * * 

A rumor floated from Willoughby street, Brook¬ 
lyn, yesterday that ‘Boss” McLaughlin had written 
to President Cleveland urging the reappointment 
of Internal Revenue Collector Nathan, whose term 
expires shortly. Mr. Nathan is a leading republi¬ 
can, and Mr. McLaughlin’s action was in some quar¬ 
ters regarded as sinister. When asked whether the 
report was correct, the Willoughby street sphinx 
said he would neither affirm nor deny it. Mr. Nathan 
was equally non-communicative. Those who know 
the men, say it would be only natural for Mr. Mc¬ 
Laughlin to exert himself for Mr. Nathan. They 


are warm friends, and either would stretch a politi¬ 
cal point to help the other .—New York Times, Sep¬ 
tember 8. 

* * * 

Events have blazoned themselves on the tablets 
of the* boss’s” memory like the legend that burned 
upon the wall of Belshazzar. To beat once attended 
to and “fixed,” no matter at what cost, the follow¬ 
ing sinister array of facts awaits and confronts him, 
each a gaping crevice in the fortifications of the 
“machine 

First. The Columbian celebration scandal; the 
preposterous bills illegally audited; the lavish 
“jamboree” of his Alderman and Supervisors, and 
all the other offenses against statute law and pub¬ 
lic morals which made the commemoration of the 
discovery of the continent an immortal infamy in 
Brooklyn. 

Second. The desperate plight of his Mayor, 
Boody, saved only from indictment by the equally 
desperate strategy of his District Attorney, Ridge¬ 
way. 

Third. The abominable false burials of living 
veterans at the public’s expense by this Board of 
Supervisors in order that the pecuniary fruit of 
such sacrilegious knavery might be seized by some 
of its members. 

Fourth. The ghastly failure of the Commercial 
Bank in the hands of the favored contractor, 
Keeney; the outrageous deception and defiance of 
the law charged and proved against its officers; 
the spreading of the cancer of “ring” affiliations 
with the hitherto unpolluted regions of finance. 

Fifth. The several profitable franchises and con¬ 
tracts lavishly distributed among his satellites and 
correlatives of the “regular” centre. 

Sixth. The disgraceful epidemic of brawlingaud 
personal encounters which has taken possession of 
the functionaries of the county and city govern¬ 
ments. 

Seventh. The insolent rejoinders and lawless con¬ 
tempt showered by his Board of Health onpor- 
testing citizens. 

Eleventh. The previous scandals that have come 
to a head, in which his system of garbage contracts 
now looms up as fresh regions of chicanery, and 
robbery, and incompetence. 

Twelfth. The amazing effrontery of his Board of 
Supervisors in selecting a time of national distress 
and economy in which to raise the salaries of their 
underworked and overpaid employes. 

Thirteenth. The alarming increase by his fiscal 
officials of the city tax rate. 

Fourteenth. The abandonment of all public im¬ 
provements by his various representatives and the 
distress and depression consequently resultant to 
the deluded workingmen of the city, now denied 
the employment to which they are entitled.—iVew 
York Times, September. 

“Alderman McGrath was seen at his saloon. North 
Seventh street and Bedford avenue, by an Eagle re¬ 
porter,” says a local article on the first page of the 
Brooklyn Eagle of last evening. In another local 
article on the same page we read that “ Mrs. Eliza¬ 
beth C. Volckening, the wife of Alderman Charles 
J. Volckening, was at police headquarters this 
morning,” that she “called the attention of the 
Eagle reporter to her face, which was bruised and 
discolored;” that she “explained that the aider- 
man had given her a brutal beating last night,” 
and that the alderman keeps a saloon on Fulton 
street near Buffalo avenue .—New York Evening 
Post, September 7. 

iit * * 

Additional indications of the value to Richard 
Croker of his position as the chief of Tammany 
Hall was furnished to day by the announcement of 
his purchase of the one-half Interest in the famous 
Belle Meade Stud in Tennessee, for $250,000. Besides 
this amount, it is known that he spent at least $C9,- 
000 in the purchase of race horses in training last 
fall. The source of the wealth which is necessary to 
acquire and keep such a stable as he is preparing has 
always been a subject of conjecture. He has never 
followed any regular business except that of office- 
holding in this city. Mr. Croker began his politi¬ 


cal life as a clerk in a district court at a small sal¬ 
ary, and then was elected alderman, which office 
he held at a salary of $2,000 for about two years, 
going out of it at the time of the upset of the Tweed 
ring. He got back into office again in 1874, and un¬ 
til 1887 held the position of coroner at a salary of 
$5,000 a year. He was elected alderman in 1873, but 
did not take his seat, as he was appointed fire com¬ 
missioner by Mayor Edson in 1874, and was re¬ 
appointed by Mayor Hewitt, the salary being $5,000 
a year. He was made city chamberlain in 1890 by 
Mayor Grant, at a salary of $25,000, resigning a year 
later; and he has not held public office since, nor 
has he been engaged in other business, so far as is 
known, until this year, when it was announced 
that he entered into partnership in a real estate 
firm. Since 1868, therefore, or in the last twenty- 
five years, Mr. Croker’s receipts from the various 
offices which he has held have been $86,000, and as 
he has been in no other business, as far as is known, 
this new evidence of great wealth is a subject of 
thought by those who have watched his career.— 
New York Evening Post, March 16. 

* * * 

Perhaps Richard Croker’s new house. No. 5 East 
Seventy-fourth street, would have been finished, 
furnished and occupied without attracting public 
attention if it had not been for the strike of the 
workmen who were completing in the house that 
feature in which rich men are so prone to delight— 
elaborate wood carving. It was designed by James 
E, Ware, and gives its owner the pleasant con¬ 
sciousness of living in a rennaisance mansion 
modified by artistic touches borrowed from the 
Spanish. The front of the house is built of brown 
stone from the Longmeadow quarries. It is called 
brown stone, but it is a very light shade of brown, 
and almost pinkish. The front steps ascend, first, 
parallel with the wall of the house, then turn 
towards the frontdoor—an arrangement permitting 
greater architectural effect, and Mr. Ware has im¬ 
proved the opportunity. The doorway has a round 
arch, and above that the treatment is such as to 
give the entire doorway a square castellated ap¬ 
pearance, which yields a rich effect, both from out¬ 
line and plenteous carving. The architect has 
again tried himself on the fourth story, where a 
rich decorative scheme is carried from the bottom 
of the windows to the roof. 

* >.•< o 

But it is the interior of Mr. Croker’s house which 
is to gratify his desire for luxury. For the decora¬ 
tions and furnishings Mr. Croker has employed a 
Fifth avenue firm which makes a specialty of 
“high art” in their line and whose services com¬ 
mand such sums that only the wealthy can afford 
to engage them. The schemes of decoration in Mr. 
Croker’s house have just, after repeated confer¬ 
ences between the firm and their rich patron, been 
finally decided upon. Mr. Croker proved fastidious 
and the firm were put upon their mettle to please 
him. The wood carving, the frescoing, the paint¬ 
ing, and all that having been settled, the firm is 
now trying to please Mr. Croker in the matter of 
furniture. Their artists are at work making special 
designs which are to be submitted to Mr. Croker. 
He will not make a final decision from descrip¬ 
tions merely; he insists upon seeing a graphic 
representation of the article of furniture before 
concluding that it will do. If it does not suit, the 
artist must make other designs. The furniture of 
his new house, therefore, is all to be specially 
manufactured from special designs. Electric light 
delivered in many artistic shapes is to be the 
illumination of Mr. Croker’s house, and inasmuch 
as the very large extension before mentioned is 
to be the dining room—where the lights are to 
be especially numerous—further confirmation is 
afforded of the belief that Mr. Croker intends be¬ 
ing a generous entertainer.—A^ewlorl Evening Post, 
August 5. 

* * * 

Richard Croker called on Collector Kilbreth yes¬ 
terday. Ills visit, which lasted half an hour, caused 
a stir in the custom house.—New York Times, Aug¬ 
ust 2.7. 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


7 


Collector Kllbreth says In an Interview in the 
New York Mail that Tammany will he recognized 
when the New York Custom House is reorganized. 
—Buffalo Express, Septeviber 20. 

Jjt 

Richard Croker has returned to his farm at Rich¬ 
field Springs. Before going he had a conference 
with Postmaster Charles W. Dayton at Tammany 
Hall, and the politicians say that the distribution of 
post-office patronage among Tammany men was 
discussed .—New York Times, August 11. 

* * * 

D. P. Nevins has been appointed in the news¬ 
paper, periodical and postage department of the 
post-office in place of .Tames H. Marr, and Joseph 
W. Kerrigan has been made stamp clerk in place 
of B. Foster. Both appointees are Tammang Hall 
men.—New York Evening Post, September 9. 

* * * 

The Tammany men are naturally very well pleased 
with the appointments Postmaster Charles TF. Dayton 
is making. Yesterday he appointed William E. Mc¬ 
Donald, for several years a clerk in the city court, 
chambers, cashier in the money order department 
of the post-office, at a salary of $2,500 a year, the ap¬ 
pointment to take effect October 1. Mr. McDonald 
is a member of the general Committee of Tammany 
Hall in the Twenty-eighth Assembly district, where 
William E. Stillings is the leader.—New York Times, 
September 19. 

* * 

Meanwhile postmaster Charles W. Dayton had 
taken a seat upon the platform. Sachem Nelson 
Smith quietly took off his collar like badge and 
slipped it over Mr. Dayton’s head. 

“You’ve got the Tammany collar on now,” said 
one of the congressmen. 

Mr. Dayton smiled, and wore it for some time. 
He did not wear it however, when making his 
speech. 

The introduction of postmaster Dayton was a 
surprise. Mayor Gilroy brought him forward just 
after representative Robert E De Forest had 
finished. The audience gave him a splendid ova¬ 
tion. His presence on the platform, it was argued, 
shou’ed that he was an “organization man," and that 
means a great deal to a Tammany man.—New York 
Times, July 5. 

Concerning the principle of his appointments, 
Mr. Dayton said: 

“I have acted in accordance with recommenda¬ 
tions from Tammany leaders, whenever they sent 
me men fit for the places named. They have sent 
me people utterly unable to do the dutles'of the of¬ 
fices to be filled, and I have refused to accept them. 
I recognize the organization and give members of 
it preference, but I let the leaders know that their 
nominees must be thoroughly fit, and I do not hesi¬ 
tate to remove them if I find they can not do the 
work.” 

“You have made no such removals of Tammany 
men ? ” 

“No; there was none here —in the ‘excepted 
places.’ Those I have appointed are able men. 
Indeed, I think I have a very competent force. At 
any rate I shall be able to do the work of this office, 
and at the holiday season I want you to come in 
here and see how the large mails are handled. 
That will enable you to compare the efficiency of 
my force with that of a year ago.” 

Mr. Dayton then spoke of the changes he had 
made at some of the stations, referring in particular 
to Stations L and O. He said he had given men 
who were in places above their capabilities other 
lesser posts, and he had found that they did very 
well In them. 

“Do you always put in Tammany Hall men?” 
was asked. 

“I always give the places to democrats, yes, and 
mostly to Tammany Hall men,” replied Mr. Dayton. 
In some cases I have advanced Tammany men from 
lower to higher positions. Thus, Tunnison, whom 
I put in charge of station L, I found In this office, 
with a good record. He has justified his advance¬ 
ment.” 


“ Have you made any appointments on other 
than Tammany recommendations ? ” 

“Yes; Mr. Abram S. Hewitt suggested a man for 
a place, and I appointed him stamp clerk. Mr. E. 
Ellery Anderson asked for a place for one of his 
friends, and I gave it. Mr. C. C. Baldwin, Mr. R. 

G. Woodward, and others not usually classed as 
Tammany men, have asked to have appointments 
made, and I have granted their requests .”—Nexv 
York Evening Post, September 19. 

* * * 

Alderman Rogers succeeded in having an inter¬ 
view with Commissioner Andrews at three o’clock 
yesterday afternoon. The commissioner had just 
returned from a tour of inspection of the city. Al¬ 
derman Rogers had been waiting for two hours. 
Both were warm when they met. Commissioner 
Andrews because of physical exercise, Alderman 
Rogers on account of mental irritation. The latter 
wanted a certain discharged sweeper reinstated. 

“He’s a good, hard-working man,” remarked the 
alderman, “although, perhaps, a little slow.” 

“I’ll look into thecase. If I find the sweeper has 
been unjustly reported I will reinstate him and dis¬ 
charge the foreman,” said Mr. Andrews. 

“But the foreman’s all right. He’s willing to take 
back this sweeper,” returned the alderman. 

“That’s the very reason he isn’t all right,” retort¬ 
ed Mr. Andrews. “He reported the sweeper as in¬ 
efficient. If the sweeper is Inefficient the foreman 
should not wish to take him back. If whatyou say 
about the sweeper is true I will discharge the fore¬ 
man.” 

Both gentlemen were excited. The commissioner 
had arisen and was pale. The alderman’s ruddy 
countenance was several shades redder than usual. 

This is the explanation of the affair; The dis¬ 
charged sweeper and the foreman who discharged 
him are both in Alderman Rogers’ district. The 
alderman would like to have the sweeper reinstat¬ 
ed, but is not willing to sacrifice the foremau, for 
the latter’s political influence is to the sweeper’s as 
$1,000 per annum is to $000 per annum.—A’eia York 
Herald, August 16. 

« it * 

At the meeting of the board of city record to-day, 
the resignation of David N. Ryan, assistant super¬ 
visor of the city record, was accepted, and Edward 

H. Hayes was appointed in his place. Hayes is a 
clerk in the office of the commissioners of accounts^ 
and is one of “Barney” Martin’s trusted lieutenants 
in the eighth assembly district. He did not have 
to pass an examination for the place, as it was taken 
out the jurisdiction of the Civil Service Board last 
week by the board of aldermen by a trick which 
was explained In the Evening Post at the time, 
namely, by making the assistant supervisorship a 
bonded office. The appointment is regarded as an¬ 
other indication that the mayor is trying to concil¬ 
iate the Martin brothers, who were not on friendly 
terms with him before “Barney” was appointed a 
police justice.—iVew York Evening Post, June 26. 

<c * 

Despite the very severe storm of last evening^ 
seventy-one members of the City Club went to the 
club’s house. No. 077 Fifth avenue, to attend the 
special meeting of the club called to hear the re¬ 
port of the committee on the appointments of John 
J. Scannel as fire commissioner and Joseph Koch 
as police justice by Mayor Gilroy, and to take some 
action respecting the appointments. W. Bayard 
Cutting presided in the absence of the president, 
James C. Carter. The reading of the report of the 
committee was listened to with the closest atten¬ 
tion and at its close was adopted with unanimous 
voice. The committee were William C. Gulliver, 
John Jay Chapnmn, J. Noble Hayes, William B. 
Hornblower, Henry E. Howland, W. Harris Roome, 
and R. W. G. Welling. The report was in part as 
follows: The members of which this committee 
is composed have given much time and attention 
to the collection of historical statements embodied 
in this report and to the avoidance of Inaccuracies 
therein. All allegations founded on mere rumor 
have been rigorously excluded, and although much 
might with propriety be added concerning the 
character and reputation of Messrs. Scannell and 


Koch, it was thought better to keep strictly within 
the limits of historical record. We believe the 
following statements to be conservative and just. 
On the third of December, 1869, a riot occurred In 
the liquor saloon of Thomas Donohue, No. 378 Sec¬ 
ond avenue, corner Twenty-third street. The offi¬ 
cial account of the shooting states that “Florence 
Scannell was shot in the spine, Thomas Donohue 
in the right arm, George Johnson was shot in the 
neck, and John Martin was clubbed on the head.” 
John Scannell was arrested for shooting Donohue 
and Donohue for shooting Scannell. Upon being 
searched in the station-house a seven-barreled re¬ 
volver with six chambers discharged, was found 
in the possession of John Scannell, also a large 
bowie knife. During the summer of 1870 Scannell 
made his first attempt on Donohue’s life in front 
of the stable of Forbes Holland, in Fourth avenue, 
corner Eighteenth street. He made a second at¬ 
tempt on Donohue’s life September 19,1870, on the 
southwest corner of Seventeenth street and Third 
avenue. On this occasion he shot Donohue, but 
Donohue recovered. He had disguised himself, 
but Donohue recognized him. Hiram B.Ferguson, 
a witness for Donohue on his second trial testified, 
on cross-examination, as follows: 

“ Soon after O’Brien was elected sheriff, Scannell 
was appointed deputy; about two or three months 
after his appointment, I acted for Scannell by 
taking charge of the business assigned to him; his 
processes were stopped in the latter part of 1870. I 
mean by stopping his processes that the sheriff 
didn’t assign him any work In the office; that was, 

I think, before October 1, 1870. I know of John 
going out of the city for about ten days after his 
processes were stopped; I think he was in the 
sheriff’s office a portion of two years. His pro¬ 
cesses were stopped at the time Donohue was shot 
in Third avenue; subsequent to that time he lived 
in Willett street. He gave me as a reason that there 
was a warrant out for him and he didn’t want to be 
arrested; he lived at my house before he went to 
Willett street; he came to my house the second day 
after the shooting of Donohue; he came about nine 
o’clock in the evening; he said there was a warrant 
out for him; I don’t remember if he said what the 
warrant was out for; he said he didn’t want to be 
arrested for the reason he thought Donohue was in 
the Tammany ring and would have him railroaded 
without giving him a chance to prove his inno¬ 
cence.” 

Scannell at last succeeded in killing Donohue on 
the 2d of November, 1872: on this occasion Richard 
Murphy, Francis H. Hamilton and John F. Barrett 
testified to the coolness of Scannell prior to and 
during the act of assassination. 

Scannell has ever denied that he was the man 
who fired the five shots; over a dozen witnesses 
identified him. 

The first trial of Scannell took place on Monday, 
February 17,1873. He was tried a second time No¬ 
vember 17,1875. Nothing new was elicited upon 
this trial, and on this occasion the jury rendered a 
verdict of not guilty on the ground of emotional 
insanity. He was admitted to the Utica asylum on 
December 4, 1875, and was discharged from there as 
not insane on February 24, 1876, less than three 
months from the date of his admission. 

Ex-Mavor Hewitt has stated to this club that he 
was urged while mayor to appoint Scannell to mu¬ 
nicipal office, and that after having examined into 
his qualifications therefore he refused to make the 
appointment. It has been stated, and not contra¬ 
dicted by the press, that ex-Mayor Grant had re¬ 
ceived a similar request and responded to it by a 
similar refusal. 

Your committee, after careful investigation, adds 
that Mr. Scannell is known to the public and to this 
committee only as the hero of the scandals already 
detailed in this report, as a victim of a dangerous 
homicidal mania, and as a rejected aspirant for 
office under Mayors Hewitt and Grant.—.Vew) York 
Evening Post, February IS. 

John J. Scannell, the fire commissioner, whoso 
appointment by Mayor Gilroy was the subject of 
special investigation by the City Club, declined to- 













8 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


day to make any statement concerning the practical 
dismissal by him of Dr. Samuel Johnson, who for 
twelve years has held the post of vice-medical offi¬ 
cer of the fire department in this city. Dr. Johnson 
told a reporter for the Evening Post that the account 
of the matter published this morning was accurate. 

“A week ago,” he said, “I was asked to appear 
before Commissioner Scannell, who said bluntly: 
•Doctor, I want your resignation.’ ‘Why ?’ I asked. 
‘Because you are a republican, and we want the 
place for political reasons.’ ‘When do you want 
it?’ ‘Now.’ ‘When is it to take effect?’ ‘Immedi¬ 
ately.’ Commssioner Scannell added by way of ex¬ 
planation : ‘Understand, Doctor, there has been no 
fault found with the way in which you have per¬ 
formed your duties. Your services in the depart¬ 
ment have been satisfactory in every way, but your 
place is wanted for a member of the Tammany Hall 
organization, and so I ask for your resignation.”’— 
New York Evening Post, April 19. 

<> <> * 

I do not assert too much when I declare that the 
position of a police justice is more important to the 
community than that of a judge of the court of ap¬ 
peals. The latter finally settles the law, but the 
former applies it in the first instance in nearly all 
cases affecting the life, liberty, and property of the 
citizen. He has, in minor cases, the power of par¬ 
don, and often after judgmentrevokes the sentence 
and releases the offender. The exercise of this 
power, in order to oblige political friends, gives to 
the justice an influence which is as dangerous as it 
is indefensible .—From Mayor Hewitt’s Message of 
ms. 

j{» 

The trial of Dr. Robert W. Buchanan was in 
progress in Part III of General Sessions, and 
the court room was crowded. A dozen people in 
the corrider were trying to get into the room. Po¬ 
liceman Brown was on duty outside the door, and 
Charles Wundt, a court officer, stood by it in the 
court room. Two young men, one a big fellow, 
stood near Wundt. One of them, the taller, got up 
on a railing running across the room, and was in 
the way of several other spectators. The officer 
asked the man to get down, but he refused to do it. 
The obstreperous man’s companion went into the 
hall with him and the two then tried to bulldoze 
and browbeat Wundt. The taller one showed a 
big gold shield of the street cleaning department, 
and said; ‘‘Say, young fellow, don’t you know who 
you’re talking to ? I’m superintendent in the street 
cleaning department, and I’ll get you into trou¬ 
ble.” The other fellow also told in loud tones 
what would happen to Wundt. The young man 
told what influence his father had and how he 
would salt the court officer. Wundt told them to 
go away, but they refused to do so, and kept up 
their noisy threats. Finally Wundt asked Police¬ 
man Brown to arrest the two. One of them was 
Michael Padden, a district superintendent in the 
street cleaning department. The policeman and 
the court officer took the two men to the city hall 
police station, and Wundt charged them with dis¬ 
orderly conduct. The prisoners were immediately 
taken to the Tombs police court. They went into 
Police Justice Ryan’s private room, and in a brief 
space were free. Young Divver was arrested in 
October charged with bribing a man to register il¬ 
legally. The man swore that Divver had paid him 
to register in several election districts, and Divver 
was indicted by the federal grand jury. At this 
trial, however, the complainant said he had for¬ 
gotten all about the circumstances. Divver openly 
paid him money in court after the jury had ac¬ 
quitted him.—i'Tew York Tribune, about April 28. 
[Young Divver is the son of police judge Divver.] 

«■ <1 • 

The vulgar exhibitions of newly-acquired wealth 
which the leaders of Tammany hall and their fam¬ 
ilies are making seem to be creating an impression 
which is likely to affect the public mind. News¬ 
papers are beginning to point out this phase of life 
in New York City, and the thoughtful citizen puts 
this and that together. It may be that along this 
line will come the awakening that is necessary as 
a preliminary to reform in the local government of 


our chief city, whose people are quite too indiffer¬ 
ent to the plain drift of things. The New York cor¬ 
respondent of the Philadelphia Press writes: 

This display this summer has been quite as offen¬ 
sive, vulgar and persistent as it was in the days 
when Tweed was in his glory. We do not see so 
much of it in the city, because the opportunities 
for display here are not so great, but in the country 
resorts, and especially at Saratoga, it has been so 
pronounced as to drive away scores of persons who 
have been in the habit of making yearly visits to 
that resort. For instance, a Tammany official who 
only a few years ago was glad to lunch at a 10-cent 
restaurant, and whose early training was amid the 
most humble and menial surroundings, has taken 
a fine cottage at Saratoga. No man could live as he 
does who is not in receipt of a handsome income. 
His family is gorgeously, conspicuously and most 
fashionably gowned. Their diamonds represent 
small fortunes, and intheglareof the electric lights 
of the dining room and parlors flash with superb 
brilliancy. 

Men who not longer ago than the time when Mr. 
Hewett was mayor of the city were humble Tam¬ 
many henchmen, earning three or four dollars a 
day, strut the piazzas of the great hotels there, 
dressed conspicuously and in costly raiment,sport¬ 
ing jewels and jewelry, going forth each day to the 
race track with great wads of money in their pockets 
and going forth every night to the gambling-house, 
which is run with open doors, staking their money 
at the tables. I went up to the Windsor hotel, per¬ 
haps the most expensive resort in the United States, 
and I was told that Mr. Croker had been spending 
a season there, living in magnificent luxury. It 
was only a few years since the utmost income of 
Mr. Croker was $5,000 a year, and he has had no 
ostensible business except politics since that time, 
unless he calls his racing stable a business.—Sprinjr- 
fleld Republican, August 20. 

if iji i/i 

When Isidor Dreyfuss, a court reporter at Essex 
Market, went to Alderman ‘‘Silver Dollar” Smith, 
about two years ago, and asked him for the hand of 
his daughter ‘‘Tillie”in marriage,‘‘Silver Dollar” 
gave for an answer, ‘‘ Well, Issie, she’s talk’n about 
you all the time, and I’ve no objection, but don’t 
have the wedding until I say so.” 

That was enough encouragement for Mr. Drey¬ 
fuss; he regarded it as settled that he was to have 
Miss Smith for his wife. In the meantime Papa 
Smith determined that when his daughter should 
take a husband, the marriage ceremony and the 
attendant feast should be something out of the or¬ 
dinary, to stir ‘‘de old ate,” now the third assembly 
district, in the political weal of which Mr. Smith, 
whose saloon and dollar tiled floor is not unknown, 
has a word to say. • * « 

After the wedding dinner there were speeches by 
Congressman Campbell, Judges Ehrlich, New- 
burger and Hogan, a number of the lawyers pres¬ 
ent, and some other guests. Then came general 
jubilation and merry making, with dancing, which 
was keptup until this morning. Mr. and Mrs. Drey¬ 
fuss will make a trip to Washington and Niagara 
Falls, and then settle down in a very pretty home 
in East Sixty-ninth street. 

The presents sent to the newly wedded pair were 
numerous enough, as ‘‘Silver Dollar” Smith said, 
to start in any business. The father estimated their 
worth at $27,000 last night. Among them was a big 
case of silverware from John Y. McKane, an ivory 
fan from Congressman Campbell, a carving set 
from Judge Newburger, silverware from Barney 
Rourke, a dinner service from Edward J. Sparen- 
berg, rugs and tapestries from Timothy D. Sullivan, 
and a sugar bowl and spoon from Inspector Mc¬ 
Laughlin. There was enough In all to fill two 
trucks .—New York Times, December 23,1892. 

>> 0 <1 

Excise commissioner Dalton marshaled the Mutual 
Association of the fifteenth assembly district. New York 
to Donnelley’s boulevard park. College Point, to-day. 
They came on the steamer Crystal Stream. After 
breakfast, and while waiting for their second an¬ 
nual clam bake, they held athletic games, which 


proved Interesting as well as unique .—Flushing 
Dispatch, New York Times, September 10. 

* <1 10 

All the politics of the district radiate from Abing¬ 
don Square. It is the hub of the ninth’s political 
wheel. All the political headquarters in the dis¬ 
trict face upon it—the big Tammany headquarters, 
the republican headquarters, the Jefferson Club, 
the Lincoln League, and the headquarters of the 
Voorhis democracy are all there practically in a 
bunch. The ‘square” has from time Immemorial 
been the forum of the ninth district In all political 
matters. This season the old square has seen a new 
departure in political work—nothing more or less than 
a band of music. Queer as it may seem, music is now 
made to play its part in keeping the voters in good 
humor. The district had never had free band concerts 
until this season, when James \V. Boyle, the Tammany 
leader of the district, went down and urged upon the 
park enmmissioners the wisdom of providing free 
concerts for Abingdon Square. The commissioners 
assented, and made arrangements with the old 
Guard band to give a series of eight concerts in the 
square. On the night of the first of this series of 
concerts, the Tammany headquarters was brilliant¬ 
ly illuminated, and fireworks were set off by the 
committee. The republican Lincoln League rooms, 
just beside the Tammany quarters, were not illu¬ 
minated at all, and the Tammany folks Impressed 
it upon the voters that it was to their efforts that 
the concerts were due, and the efforts were no 
doubt appreciated. 

On concert nights now, all the club houses, in¬ 
cluding the Lincoln League, are illuminated and 
decorated, and they are gala nights in the district. 
The Tammany committee always displays fire¬ 
works as a prelude to the concerts.—iSYw York 
Times. 

« 

The Tammany general committeeof the Ninth As¬ 
sembly district met last night at its headquarters 
in Abingdon Square. W. H. Dobbs, who presided 
at the meeting, announced that Mr. Boyle had se¬ 
cured 120 places for the Tammany men in his district 
from the various departments of the city government 
since he was selected as leader.—New York Times, May 
12 . 


SUBSIDIZING THE PRESS. 


John Ringle, of the Wochenblatt, postmaster at 
Wausau, Wis. 

W. F. Beck, editor of the Times, postmaster at 01 
ney. Ill. 

Milton A. Smith, editor of the Times, postmaster 
at Anniston, Ala. 

W. R. Mehaftey, editor Allen County Democrat, 
postmaster at Lima, Ohio. 

Joseph Newton, editor of the Advocate, postmaster 
at Newark, Ohio. 

Mrs. Hannah G. Denison, of the Reporter, post¬ 
master at Belton, Texas. 

Josiah Door, editor of the Times, postmaster at 
Georgetown, S. C. 

Benjamin H. Ridgely, a newspaper man of Louis¬ 
ville, Ky., consul at Geneva, Switzerland. 

William F. Kemmler, editor of the Columbus (O.) 
Weslvolk, consul to Horgen, Switzerland. 

James A. Demarest, editor of the Plainfield (N J. 
Daily Press, consul at Brockville, Canada. 

Thomas C. Jones, editor of the Louisville Truth, 
consul to Funchal, Maderia. 

W. W. Rockhill, proprietor of the Journal, post 
master at Fort Wayne, Ind. 

James F. Tillman, editor of the National Economist, 
register of the treasury. 

Henry M. Smythe, editor of the Graham Head¬ 
light,consul General to Hayti. 

L. P. Stevens, a newspaper man of Columbus, O.- 
State Statistician for the department of Agriculture. 

Lurther Short, editor of the Franklin Democrat, 
Consul General to Constantinople. 

Robert K. Gillespie, nominated to be principal 
clerk of public lands in the general land office, 
was nominated at the request of Congressman Mc¬ 
Millan, of Tennessee. 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


VoL. II, No. 8. 


INDIANAPOLIS, OCTOBER, 1893. terms : ^ ?o°cen?sper%r"“ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


If all who desire the index to the first 
volume of the Civil Service Chronicle 
will send a request to that effect, it will 
save the expense of printing more than are 
needed. 

Missing numbers have been supplied to 
such an extent that it is now possible to 
complete several more volumes. 

This paper made an effort during the 
administration of President Harrison to 
ascertain the names and offices given to 
those connected with newspapers, and 
found that the facts were apparently de¬ 
liberately concealed as far as possible. 
The facts are even more difficult to learn 
under the present administration. It is 
earnestly requested that all readers of the 
Chronicle will lend assistance to make the 
list as complete as possible. Another set 
of facts equally significant would be the 
list of the delegates and the leaders of the 
party organizations paid by offices. 


One of the most righteous victories ever 
gained in an election was gained in the 
Indianapolis city election on the tenth of 
this month. With fairly decent conduct 
the democrats would have been sustained 
by the people, but they seem to have gone 
mad. As the time for election approached, 
they created useless oflices like the office of 
“weed inspector,” to provide for workers 
who always have to have “a place.” They 
allowed Sim Coy to again become a party 
leader. They tried to buy votes by hiring 
three times the usual number of men as 
street-cleaners. For weeks they let the 
saloons openly ignore the law requiring 
them to close at eleven at night and on 
Sundays. For weeks they let the gambling- 
rooms be run as openly as the drug stores. 
They made the gamblers pay a large part 
of their campaign expenses. Finally one 
of their members of the police board 
publicly declared the doctrine that 
gambling-rooms could not be closed, 
but only “regulated.” These things were 
the culmination, but back of this was, 
in many of the departments, a long 
course of manipulating the affairs and 
money of the city for personal and party 
benefit by means of pulls of party bosses. 
All this is called having a genuine party 
administration with no mugwumpery,and 


is laid down as necessary to party success. 
Now note the result: Two years ago 
Mayor Sullivan was elected by 2,700 ma¬ 
jority ; but after this completed type of 
genuine party administration he is defeated 
by about 3,000 majority. Truly the inde¬ 
pendent voter multiplies and grows strong. 
This great victory is largely due to the 
Indianapolis News. 

The republicans now have complete 
control of the city government, with the 
executive power entirely centered in the 
new mayor, Caleb S. Denny. The new 
boards appointed by Mayor Denny will 
doubtless manage well unless they try to 
run the city business with a view to bene¬ 
fiting the republican party. If they set 
their minds to that it is only a question ©f 
time when the republicans will be turned 
out. It will be much easier to turn them 
out than it was the democrats. 

The new ofl&cers talk well. So far as 
they have spoken, there has been no such 
foolish declaration as “this is going to 
be a republican administration,” but on 
every hand it is declared that the merit 
system must be introduced. The charter 
lays an ample foundation for this, and 
there is really nothing to do but for the 
mayor and his assembled heads of depart¬ 
ments to adopt rules for the labor service 
and for competition in the other depart¬ 
ments. Our late experience has again 
demonstrated the utter humbug of the 
“non-partisan board” as a reform agency. 
Cheap politicians are nearly always ap¬ 
pointed upon these boards and the result 
is double-headed partisanship of the most 
ordinary kind. What civil service re¬ 
formers want is open competition, with 
honorable men upon the boards who will 
impartially enforce the law and the rules 
and with whom a trick is impossible, and 
it does not matter what their politics are. 

Since the above was v/^ritten, the new 
board of public works has appointed a 
street commissioner who has appointed 
foremen, and is apparently about to hire 
street laborers on the favoritism plan. 
The foremen are the vital part of the 
system and if reform were intended, they 
would only be chosen by competitive ex¬ 
amination. 

Mr. William W. Wight, chairman of 
the Milwaukee board of fire and police 
commissioners, read an interesting paper 
describing the Milwaukee fire department 
before a convention of fire chiefs in that 


city in August. We should like to pub¬ 
lish it in full, but the narrow space of the 
Chronicle renders it impossible. The 
Milwaukee fire force was put under the 
merit system in 1885. All citizens of Mil¬ 
waukee not under five feet seven inches, 
of average weight, and between twenty- 
four and thirty-five years of age may com¬ 
pete. The tests are mental and physical. 
Mr Wight very pertinently says : 

No fireman is expected to be an astronomer, a 
botanist or a rhetorician, but he is expected to be 
able to read and write with fair fluency; to cipher 
through the fundamental rules; to know, in a gen¬ 
eral way, the geography of this city and of the 
United States and the form and history of the 
American government. It is believed, for instance, 
that a grown man who never heard of Washington, 
or Lincoln, or Grant, who can not locate New York 
city or the Mississippi river, who does not know the 
capital of his own state, is too deficient in general 
Intelligence to be a fireman in Milwaukee. So also 
is it affirmed, that an adult Individual who can not 
add, subtract, multiply or divide simple numbers, 
who has not learned the chief buildings of the city 
and their location, and who is not familiar, in a 
general way, with the duties required of a fireman, 
is mentally incompetent for the situation to which 
he aspires. 

The physical examination is by an ex¬ 
pert gymnast, and the tests are in lifting^ 
jumping, climbing, running, and other 
well-known and accurate tests for de¬ 
termining physical capabilities. Then fol¬ 
lows a medical examination, with the re¬ 
sult that thirty out of every one hundred 
applicants are rejected. Upon a vacancy 
in a certain rank it is filled by competition 
from among those below. Politics are ab¬ 
solutely eliminated. Only two officers, the 
chief and the first assistant, may be ap¬ 
pointed without competition. The system 
is thoroughly liked and believed in by the 
people of Milwaukee. But it should be 
borne in mind that their fire board is 
made up of men who believe in it and who 
are too honorable to try to cheat it. 


The confirmation of Van Alen by the 
senate brings a movement politically stu¬ 
pid and vicious to an unfortunately suc¬ 
cessful conclusion. He had literally nevei* 
been heard of. Ex-Secretary Whitney got 
him to give $50,000 to the democratic cam¬ 
paign fund. After the election Whitney, 
calling the President’s attention to the fact 
that this was his only “approach” on the 
matter of spoils, asked the President to ap¬ 
point Van Alen ambassador to Italy. Van 
Alen has no claims whatever to education, 
scholarship, cultivation or statesmanship. 
He is of the Ward McAllister type; he can 
dispute successfully about the essentials of 
a good entre4, and knows what, in his lim- 



















70 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ited circle, constitutes “good form.” If he 
had not given the $50,000 he would never 
have been mentioned for this place. The 
President, before naming him, was fully in¬ 
formed of all the facts, and the nomination 
has been almost universally cendemned. 
Yet the President, with a stolid persistence 
indicating an opinion of personal infalli¬ 
bility, and which so many other times in 
his career has hurt him with the whole 
people, refused to hear the most disinter¬ 
ested advice not to allow this purchase and 
sale of an office to be carried out. That the 
senate majority, composed of Quays, Gor¬ 
mans and V oorheeses, confirmed V an Alen> 
in no manner relieves the President of the 
lasting disgrace which permeates this whole 
transaction. 


The reports from Washington appear to 
be authentic that the President has turned 
over to his cabinet and the heads of de¬ 
partments the appointments to the civil 
service. This is a grave matter. There 
has not, so far as we now recall, been a con¬ 
spicuous movement for reform made by 
any of these officers. The postmaster-gen¬ 
eral has been called a friend of reform; 
just why, is not clear. The course of the 
secretaries of the treasury and of the in¬ 
terior could not be worse. It does not 
matter whether the President has shirked 
his great duty from indifference or weak¬ 
ness. He has lost the opportunity offered 
to but few men in a country’s history. 
Although he has delayed and hindered the 
destruction of the spoils system, civil serv¬ 
ice reformers need not be discouraged. 
The day of reckoning can not be delayed 
nor hindered. We do not believe that any 
party can succeed itself which has been oc¬ 
cupied with distributing spoil as Mr- 
Cleveland did in 1884, as Mr. Harrison did 
in 1888, and as Mr. Cleveland is now doing. 
The blow to reform is serious, and it was 
needless, and it is only temporary; but the 
humiliating failure of Mr. Cleveland is 
sickening. There is no more pitiable sight 
than to see a man, believed to be a great 
man, and posing as a courageous man, who, 
in spite of all the efforts of his friends to 
shield him, willfully displays himself in all 
the nakedness of a common politician. 

A Washington dispatch to the Indian¬ 
apolis News, dated October 23, says: 

On Saturday, the last medical board in Mr. Hol¬ 
man’s district was recommended for appointment. 
The district at Shelbyville has been the subject of 
a very hard and bitter fight for some time, and it 
was with difficulty that Judge Holman saw his way 
clear to the appointment of men who would be re' 
liable and satisfactory to any considerable degree 
to his constituents at that place. He recommended 
Dr. Wolf, of Morristown; Dr. Samuel Kennedy, of 
Shelbyville, and Dr. Morris Drake, of the same 
place. Dr. Wolf is an old man and a well known 
doctor in that part of the country, but the other two 
are young aspirants for glory with not a great deal 


of experience as yet. They were nominated in ac¬ 
cordance with the line of policy outlined by Sec¬ 
retary Hoke Smith at the beginning of this admin¬ 
istration, that in the medical boards young doctors 
should be given a chance, and “ mossbacks,” as a 
rule, should be given a back seat. Dr. Wolf was 
placed on the board, or rather nominated for the 
position, in order to keep the younger members in 
the proper path. The appointment of this board is 
looked for daily at the pension office, and there 
seems to be no doubt in any quarter but that they 
will be appointed. 

This is a fair sample of the pension 
“reform” which has been going on under 
this administration. Throughout the 
country congressmen, after more or less 
bitter fights, have filled up these boards 
with political doctors, and we pay these 
selected henchmen $1,700,000 a year. The 
object aimed at is not the good of the serv¬ 
ice, but to enable congressmen to quarter 
upon the people followers who will be easy 
toward applicants for pensions favored by 
congressmen and who will help set up the 
primaries and conventions next year. Pres¬ 
ident Cleveland has allowed this swindling 
operation to go on in the face of the plain¬ 
est warning and protest made directly to 
him. Purging the pension list under this 
administration is going to be a dismal 
failure, and all because the President chose 
to continue the boards as tools of congress¬ 
men rather than make them independent. 


IT IS TIME TO SPEAK OUT. 

Reform papers have been disposed to be 
slow of criticism in deference to the sup¬ 
posed occupation of the administration 
with the silver question. But it has be¬ 
come apparent that while ostensibly on ac¬ 
count of this pre-occupation, civil service 
reform has been suspended, the distribu¬ 
tion of spoil has not been suspended. The 
clean sweep of the fourth-class postmasters 
goes on at the Clarkson rate of 30,000 a year. 
The loot of the consulships continues. The 
ambassadorship to Italy was sold. Con¬ 
gressman Bynum is daily expecting to 
“name” a collector for this port, and every¬ 
where congressmen are appointing their 
henchmen to offices of all kinds and grades. 
There seems every prospect that the Voor- 
hees appointments of Burke, Risely and 
Donham, bad of themselves, but infamous 
because they seem the purchase-price of 
Voorhees’s support, are to be crowned by 
the appointment of Voorhees’s man, the 
distillers’ attorney, Joshua Jump, as col¬ 
lector of internal revenue at Terre Haute. 
The silver crisis seems a good cover for 
evil doing, but not at all an incentive to 
well doing. The rules of promotion in 
the departments at Washington are ig¬ 
nored by the secretaries. In every office 
in the country heads of divisions could 
have been put under the rules, but in no 
case has this been done. No extension of 
the rules have been made, although it is en¬ 


tirely feasible to make them cover many 
classes of employes like those in pension 
agencies, and in the internal revenue serv¬ 
ice. The civil service commission is 
crippled by the President’s leaving upon 
it a hide-bound partisan in Commissioner 
Johnston. The bunco tricks of Carlisle 
and his son Logan, we have many times 
called attention to. Attorney-general Olney 
remains director of a road it may be his 
duty to prosecute. 

The time has come for reformers to speak 
out. The democratic platform covers the 
entire subject of civil service reform, and 
the present course of the administration is 
in flat violation of its promises. Even at 
this early day the overthrow of the demo¬ 
cratic party at the next national election 
forces itself for consideration. This ad¬ 
ministration was not chosen to treat us to 
another revel in spoil. If it means to do 
anything else, it is time it began to show 
signs of it. The administration had better 
study the recent Indianapolis election. It 
is pretty good evidence that, in Indiana at 
least, there are many quiet people who will 
not stand everything. 


“THE EXISTING POLITICAL CONDI¬ 
TIONS.” 

We give this month some ten columns 
in small type concerning the quest for two 
petty federal offices in the state of Indiana. 
It has extended over one year. What is 
printed in the Chronicle has been greatly 
condensed and is perhaps a fourth of what 
has been printed in the three leading pa¬ 
pers of Indianapolis. What has found its 
way to the surface of these papers is a hint 
only of the low intrigue, the political black¬ 
mailing and the desperate struggle for 
personal supremacy that has actually gone 
on. 

We ask every person in whom yet sur¬ 
vives the belief in democratic government 
to read this account of sales of offices, of 
trickery, of bargains and deals and dickers 
and broils and then consider that the per¬ 
sons involved are the President of this re¬ 
public, his secretary of the treasury, two 
venerable senators, some seven congress¬ 
men, and that for twelve months they have 
given no one knows how much time to 
this contemptible business. These two 
places, which have engaged the respectful 
and solicitous attention of the President, 
the eager activity of the secretary of the 
treasury and the plotting and fighting of 
several hundred henchmen, should be filled 
by the promotion of two competent men 
familiar with the duties, and the subordi¬ 
nates should be selected by competitive 
tests. This picture of a network of cabals^ 
involving the high and the low, recently 
euphemistically called by Mr. Josiah 
Quincy “the existing political conditions,” 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


71 


aad which he says it is no more possible 
to stop than it is to stop the blowing of the 
winds, represents an infinitesimal fraction 
of the sort of thing that has actually en¬ 
gaged the administration since last March. 
No president who falters at the disruption 
of his party, if disruption is necessary, to 
end forever the disgrace of legislation by 
patronage on the one hand and an olig¬ 
archy of barons and henchmen on the 
other, can command the respect of the 
American people. A dry rot appears to 
have undermined the courage, the morals 
and the intellect of certain members of 
this administration, as well as of others 
that have preceded it, so soon they got fixed 
in Washington; but the sound integrity of 
the American people has not been under¬ 
mined, and the time has come that no ad¬ 
ministration can remain in power which 
is indifferent to this evil or helpless to 
crush it. 


“A CRAVEN HUNG ALONG THE 
BATTLE’S EDGE.” 

Elsewhere is the speech of Moorfleld Story 
before the Reform Club, of Boston, calling 
Josiah Quincy, the late assistant secretary of 
state, to the bar of his fellow-citizens to answer 
why, as a professing civil service reformer, he 
had been acting as a common spoilsman. No¬ 
where else, perhaps, is so felt the force of 
moral pressure to make defense as to one’s ac¬ 
tions as in Boston. It is right and it is a 
pleasure to do homage to such public sensitive¬ 
ness for right conduct. 

Mr. Quincy’s reply is worth notice only 
because he yet claims to be a civil service re- 
"former. A spoils foundation with a thin 
stucco of civil service reform is dangerous 
only because it is deceptive. A reform pro¬ 
fessor practising unreform acts unblinkingly, 
with solemn asseverations that he is a practical 
reformer, exercises undue influence upon the 
timid and the party bigot reformers; there¬ 
fore it is worth while to examine what Mr 
Quincy says. 

First. Civil service reform is urgent; it is 
practicable;-it is chiefly to be advanced, how¬ 
ever, by extending the law [when, he fails to 
mention], and by the strict enforcement of the 
law. We are getting on. Between 1884 and 
1888 the practical reformer told us that to in¬ 
sist upon the rigid enforcement of the law was 
impossible; there was a great deal then writ¬ 
ten that looks silly to-day about local option 
in the enforcement of the law. 

Second. Mr. Quincy says: “I do not re¬ 
call at the moment anything in the last dem¬ 
ocrat platform or in the utterances of Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland during the campaign or since 
which can be called a pledge that he would 
carry out what has been called, as I say, the 
spirit and purpose of civil service reform, out¬ 
side of the operation of the civil service rules 
and the civil service law.” 

Mr. Quincy, upon re-reading the democratic 
platform^ his own campaign text-book and 


the President’s acceptance and inaugural, will 
hardly maintain that the votes of civil service 
reformers were not solicited upon something 
more than a statement to “ support civil serv¬ 
ice reform and to continue it and carry it 
farther than it has yet been carried.” For 
one thing, the President very solemnly swore 
to obey the constitution, and congressional 
patronage is in deadly and irreconcilable con¬ 
flict with the constitution. 

Mr. Quincy says that it is desirable and 
practicable to put the consular service under 
the merit system ; but he then goes on to say 
that “it is practically politically impossible 
for any President to apply a purely civil 
service system to the service as it now stands. 

* * Under the operation of our system of gov¬ 

ernment at Washington, no administration can 
cut loose from the influence of congressmen 
without imperiling its success and the ac¬ 
complishment of the purposes for which the 
people elected it.” 

What the peculiar feature of our govern¬ 
ment is that we must continue to buy Dan 
Voorhees with patronage to clear his financial 
vision, Mr. Quincy is careful not to specify. 

An Indiana statesmen might claim that con¬ 
gressional patronage is inseparable from party 
government, but Mr. Quincy, of Massachusetts, 
in the face of the Irish reform bill, will not. 
That Mr. Quincy, one of the young and reform 
democracy, did not dare urge so small a re¬ 
form as to put the consular service out of 
reach of the demoralizing madness for spoils 
speaks ill for his courage and for his opinion 
of his party. In 1888, Theodore Roosevelt 
was put, as a professing civil service reformer, 
face to face with the spoils system as was Mr. 
Quincy in 1892, and we beg to quote to Mr. 
Quincy and his excusers these lines as show¬ 
ing why one has served his country and his 
party and why the other has lamentably failed 
in both : 

This I beheld, or dreamed it In a dream; 

There spread a cloud of dust along a plain, 

And underneath the cloud or in it raged 
A furious battle, and men yelled, and swords 
Shocked upon swords and shields. A Prince’s 

banner 

Wavered, then staggered backward, hemmed by 

foes, 

A craven hung along the battle’s edge 
And thought: “Had I a sword of keener steel 1— 
That blue blade that the King’s son bears—but this 
Blunt thing I”—he snapt and flung it from his hand. 
And, cowering, crept away and left the fleld. 

Then came the King’s son, wounded, sore, beset 
And weaponless, and saw the broken sword 
Hilt buried in the dry and trodden sand. 

And ran and snatched it, and with battle shout. 
Lifted afresh, he hewed his enemy down 
And saved a great cause on that heroic day. 

But later in Mr. Quincy’s defense we can 
not even offer the justification that he has 
been tirnid and irresolute and lost his great 
opportunity for he says with an outburst of 
unmistakable fervor: “His [the President’s] 
power to deal with all the offices is of more 
importance because of the influence and control 
which it gives him in the settlement of these great 
vital questions which affect us all so closely than it 
is in any other respect.” 

If this means anything it means that it is 


right for the President to .coerce legislation 
good or bad, through the cupidity and dis¬ 
honesty of congressmen by the giving or with¬ 
holding of patronage. 

As a mere indication of the far-reaching, the 
interminable corruption, and the utter anni¬ 
hilation of the power of the people to express 
their will in the choice of their representa¬ 
tives, we refer to the facts elsewhere regarding 
two small Indiana appointments. It is fair 
to suppose that Mr. Quincy, having lived in 
the midst of this for nine months, knows that 
this is a hint only of what has actually been 
going on. These are things that ought not 
only to shock “a consistent reformer of the 
more-advanced and radical type,” but a man 
of very ordinary, commonplace views of hon¬ 
esty, manliness and fair play. Has Mr. Quincy 
become calloused? 

He will remember those lines quoted with 
so much effect in a memorable campaign of 
another brilliant young reformer from Massa¬ 
chusetts who at the critical moment appeared 
to Mr. Quincy and others to falter: 

The path of duty is the way to glory. 

He that walks it, only thirsting 
For the right, and learns to deaden 
Love of self, before his journey closes 
He shall find the stubborn thistle bursting 
Into glossy purples, which outredden 
All voluptuous garden roses. 


At its last annual meeting the Buffalo 
Civil Service Reform Association resolved 
that it would prosecute all ofificers or per¬ 
sons of Buffalo or of Erie county who are 
in any way concerned in political assess¬ 
ments upon public emplojes. The New 
York State League is also getting into 
thorough working condition, with Matthew 
Hale as president and George McAneny 
as Secretary. It has before it one of the 
most formidable tasks that ever came to 
an association. The state civil service law 
of New York has been broken down by 
the state democratic machine, headed by 
Governor Flower. To put it upon its feet 
again will be a great work, but it can and 
will be done. 


There is a continuing inconceivability 
that a great government should lend itself 
to the business of reducing men and wo¬ 
men from higher to lower positions be¬ 
cause they are republicans and promoting 
into the vacancies thus made other men 
and women solely because they are demo¬ 
crats. This has been done repeatedly un¬ 
der this administration in Washington, 
and yet each time it seems impossible that 
the government should be the active agent 
in this superlative littleness. The Buffalo 
Express has a Washington dispatch of Oc¬ 
tober 23, giving the following account of 
this low business: 

On Saturday the following changes were made 
In the dead-letter office: Reductions—Ward Bur¬ 
lingame, from class 4 to class 2; Thomas D. Taylor, 
from class 3 to class 2; Charles M. Dalsell, from 
class 3 to class 1; J. E. W. Thompson, from class 2 
















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


7 


2 


to class 1; Miss H. H. Webber, from class 2 to class 
D; Miss A. R. Thurlow, from class 2 to class D, and 
Peter B. Cook, from class 1 to class D. Promotions 
—Walter F. Aycock, from 81,400 to $1,800: Caleb B. 
Bourne, from $1,400 to $1,600; Charles Hardin, from 
$1,200 to $1,600; L. C. Woodson, from $1,200 to $1,400: 
ThomjiB G. Allen, from $1,000 to $1,400; Robert L. 
Baines, from $1,200 to $1,400; Mrs. M. F. Horyon, 
from $900 to $1,200; Miss Minnie F. Dennis, from 
$1,000 to 81,200; Miss Lizzie J. Mazie, from $900 to 
$1,000, and James C. Lyon, from $900 to $1,000. 

The Express correspondent was Informed to-day 
that everyone of those reduced were republicans, 
and everyone promoted was a democrat. One of 
the worst acts of injustice in this list was in the 
case of Miss H. H. Webber. She has been a com¬ 
petent employe in the bureau for twenty-five years, 
and was the chief of division of women clerks at 
$1,400 a year. She has been reduced to $900 per 
annum to make place for a young democrat, and 
has now been detailed to instruct him in his new 
duties. 

THE BRUTAL SPOILS SYSTEM. 

Among the victims of the disaster was the 
son of John A. Daly, an ex-soldier from Penn¬ 
sylvania, employed as a watchman in the in¬ 
terior department. Mr. Daly was discharged 
some days ago, and when Secretary Smith 
learned that young Daly had been killed in 
the theater wreck, and that the family might 
suffer by reason of the father’s dismissal, he 
immediately ordered his reinstatement.— 
Washington dispatch, to the Indianapolis Sentinel, 
June 17. 


“THE EXISTING POLITICAL CON¬ 
DITIONS.”—Josiah Quincy. 

November 17 and 18,1892.—Walter Huletwill be 
pushed for internal revenue collector. He is a 
warm, personal Iriend of Congressman Brookshire. 
—Indianapolis News. 

* * * 

December.—The Hon. W. H. Bracken is in the 
race for collector of internal revenue. He was an 
elector-at-large candidate. Bracken has congress¬ 
ional aspirations, and if disappointed in his present 
quest, he may contest for the congressional nomination 
two years hence.—Indianapolis News. 

<• * * 

January 8.— See January Chronicle for numer¬ 
ous extracts showing the beginning of the Voor- 
heeS'Lamb combination. 

<• « v 

February 17-24.—See February Chronicle for 
numerous extracts of the Voorhees-Lamb combin¬ 
ation. 

» • « 

March 6, 189:1.—The Indiana office-hunting con¬ 
tingent and the democratic leaders are still hang¬ 
ing on. Several of the important appointments of 
the state have been practically settled within the 
last two or three days. Joshua Jump, of Terre 
Haute, will in all probability be collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue in the seventh district, and William 
Bracken in the sixth. There seems to be a combin¬ 
ation this morning that looks to the appointment of 
.Tump as revenue collector in the seventh district and 
of Hargrove as marshal — Washington Dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis News. 

* * * 

March 7.—The fight for collector of the Terre 
Haute district is creating some bad blood. Voorhecs 
is for Jump, ,Tohn Lanib's law parfacr, and Brookside 
is pushing Hulet, of Crawfordsville, for the same 
place. Col. Hoskins, of Clay, member of the state 
commission, entered the field upon the under¬ 
standing that he would receive the support of 
Voorhees and John Lamb. He says Voorhees is for 
him at heart, but that Lamb has bulldozed Voor¬ 
hees into supporting Jump. Hoskins claims that 
it was he who elected Lamb a delegate to Chicago, 
and feels the opposition of Lamb keenly. How¬ 


ever, he says he will fight it out to the last. He has 
been asked to apply for the pension agency, but he 
says he will have nothing else. Editor Moss, of 
the Bloomfield Democrat, also a member of the state 
central committee, is in the ring with Congressman 
Bretz for backer and a majority of the state com¬ 
mittee indorsing him. Sam Ralston, of Lebanon, 
has been suggested as a compromise candidate. 
Ralston was among the first to iightfor Cleveland’s 
nomination. At the same time he is a friend of 
both Voorhees and Turpie, having always stbod by 
them. For collector in the Lawrenceburg district. 
Bracken, of Franklin county, and Hunter, of Law¬ 
renceburg, are the only ones in the field. Bracken 
has the advantage, from the fact that Cleveland 
has declared his Intention of not reappointing men 
who served in his first administration. Bracken 
gained his prominence from being an elector-at- 
large. Editor O’Brien, of the Lawrenceburg Reg¬ 
ister, a son-in-law of Hunter, as a member of the 
committee on organization of the last state con¬ 
vention, made a big fight in the committee to have 
Bracken made an elector-at-large, little knowing 
that he was putting a club in the hands of a man to 
knock out his father-in-law.— Washington Dispatch, 
Indianapolis Sentinel. 

* Ct 

March 8.—In the last few days the opposition to 
William Bracken, of Franklin county, for the in¬ 
ternal revenue collectorship seems to have disap¬ 
peared , and the 1 atter’s appointment seems to be cer¬ 
tain. For a time there was much talk of smashing the 
Bracken slate, and a number of the leading politi¬ 
cians in the sixth district were appealed to to al¬ 
low their names to be used for the position in an 
effort to knock out Mr. Bracken. While Mr. Hol¬ 
man has entertained a warm feeling for Dr. Hunter, 
of Lawrenceburg, who was a candidate for the 
place, and was desirous early in the fight to have 
him appointed, he much prefers to see Mr. Bracken 
secure the place to any candidate outside of his 
congressional district.—iras/itnpfo?i Dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis Neios. 

March 8.—It was given out by the Marion county 
democrats to-day that the nominations of John W. 
Kern to be district attorney; ex-Sherlff Hawkins, of 
Sullivan county, to be marshal; Joseph Jump, of 
Terre Haute, and Captain Bracken or Roscoe Grif¬ 
fith, of Muncie, to be the two collectors of internal 
revenue, would be made this week. Mr. Griffith left 
for his home this afternoon. He believes he will 
be appointed. He says he would not accept the 
deputy collectorship if he never got an office—that 
it must be the collectorship or nothing. Mr. Grif¬ 
fith has some strings upon the appointing power 
and looks as though he would wrest it from Cap- 
taih Bracken, of Brookvllle, who is his only con¬ 
testant now.— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis 
Journal. 

* * * 

March 8.—The distribution of the Indiana patron¬ 
age will begin with Che United States district-attor¬ 
neyship. The applications will be filed to-morrow. 
The fight for the marshalship has overshadowed 
everything else. Hawkins, who seems to have had 
the best of it yesterday, is only a possibility to-day. 
Geographical location is against him. His chief 
backer is Voorhees, and as Hawkins’s appointment 
would jeopardize Jump’s chances for collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue, Hawkins can not obtain the proper 
pressure to reach the place. Hawkins resides in 
Sullivan and Jump in Vigo, adjoining counties in 
the same district. Brookshire is pressing Voorhees 
hard with Hulet of Montgomery, and will make 
the fight of his life for his man. The marshal- 
ship will be disposed of first, and Voorhees can not 
afford to weaken his position in his fight with 
Brookshire. — Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis 
Sentinel. 

<»<»>!« 

March 14.—Mr. Holman declares that he has not yet 
determined whom he will recommend for collector 
in the eastern district, although Bracken claims the 
place. The collectors will not be appointed for 
some months yet.—Washington Dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel. 

^ J{C 

March 16.—The contest over the collectorship of 


internal revenue for the western district of Indi¬ 
ana, which was believed to be finally and perma¬ 
nently closed in favor of Joshua Jump, of Terre 
Haute, has been reopened with some fury. There 
were many protests filed against the appointment 
of Jump It was alleged that Jump is too friendly 
with certain distillers, although his personal char¬ 
acter was in no wise assailed, and then it was al¬ 
leged that his appointment would be viewed as a 
Lamb victory, so Representative Brookshire comes 
forward again with one of his constituents, and 
Representative Taylor has brought forth Mr. Dixon, 
of Evansville. Samuel Ralston, of Lebanon, is on 
the ground hard after the place. There will not be 
a change in the office until some months, and the 
prospects are that after all Jump will get the place. 
He has the power at the throne.-Washington Dis¬ 
patch, Indianajjolis Journal. 

« * •> 

March 17.—Among President Cleveland’s callers 
this morning was Congressman Bynum, who was 
accompanied by S. M. Ralston and S. T. Tyre, of 
Lebanon. Mr. Tyre is chairman of the democratic 
county committee, and Mr. Ralston is the man who 
hopes to disarrange the present slate for federal 
appointments in Indiana and secure the internal 
revenue collectorship that has been assigned to 
Joshua Jump. Mr. Ralston puts forth a geograph¬ 
ical argument, and claims that the appointment of 
the marshal and revenue collector, both from the 
Terre Haute congressional district, is not good 
politics. Boone county, which Mr. Ralston repre¬ 
sents, is in Mr. Waugh’s republican district, and 
Mr. Ralston argues that his appointment as revenue 
collector in that dislrict would strengthen the min¬ 
ority. Mr. Ralston was an original Cleveland 
man.— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

iji tlf ^ 

March 17.—Governor Matthews’s mission here was 
divulged this morning when he called upon the 
President to urge the appointment of Joshua Jump, 
of Terre Haute, for collector of internal revenue; 
W. A. Cullop, of Vincennes, for district attorney, 
and Jerome Herff, of Peru, for consul to Havana. 
He left for Baltimore this afternoon, but will not 
return here. Joshua Jump was present at the in¬ 
terview with the President and so was Senator 
Voorhees. However, the collector will not be ap¬ 
pointed till September.— Dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel. 

tit tn 

March 19.—Senator Voorhees said to-day that 
there would be no change in either of the revenue 
collectorships before August at the earliest. Mean¬ 
while the opponents of Joshua Jump are trying to 
consolidate the field against him, and are making 
some headway. Of his rivals, Samuel Ralston 
seems to be the most active. His personal “pull” 
on Cleveland is worrying the friends of Jump. 
Ralston patiently w'aits about the corridors, smiles 
on everybody he meets, and says the collectorship 
in the seventh district is far from settled yet. Hon. 
John E. Lamb, who was appealed to by Jump’s 
friends to come on and add his Influence to that of 
Governor Matthews in favor of Jump, was expected 
here before this, but if here he was not visible to 
the naked eye of the hosts of waiting democrats 
who want to tie on to his tow-line.—iras/tinpfon 
Dispatch, Indianapolis Journal. 

V • 

March 30.—It is given out here on what is consid¬ 
ered good authority that Will H. O’Brien, of Law¬ 
renceburg, will be the next collector for this dis¬ 
trict. Mr. O’Brien is the son-in-law and business 
partner of Dr. Hunter, who was collector under 
Cleveland’s first administration, and who is a can¬ 
didate for reappointment against Captain W. H, 
Bracken, of Brookville. The President’s rule rela¬ 
tive to reappointments was considered as settling 
Hunter’s chances and enhancing Bracken’s, but it 
only called for renewed effort on part of the Hun¬ 
ter men. O’Brien went to Washington for the 
third time, in response to a “hurry call,” and it is 
claimed that on this last trip it was arranged that 
he should receive the appointment. If this selec¬ 
tion is made, it gives the collectorship to the Hun¬ 
ter familyagain, and at the same time it affords the 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


73 


President an opportunity to strengthen his declara¬ 
tion that no ex-oflSceholder will be recognized by 
this'administration. Mr. O’Brien is the member of 
the democratic state central committee for this 
district and also mayor of Lawrenceburg, part 
owner and associate editor of the Lawrenceburg 
Register, wealthy and one of the shrewdest politi¬ 
cians and hardest workers in the fourth congress¬ 
ional district. He was always a Cleveland man.— 
Greensburgh (Ind.J Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

March 30.—While this contest in the sixth internal 
revenue district is exciting attention, there appears 
to be quite as interesting a contest brewing in the 
seventh district, where Congressman Voorhees 
Brookshire is making a fight against his namesake, 
the senior senator, with a view to knocking out 
Joshua Jump. Itis said that this little fight between 
the senator and his congressional protege involves 
Indirectly the latter’s seat in congress. The immense 
patronage of the seventh district is a great political 
factor. Mr. Brookshire is said to realize this fact 
and is anxious to keep it out of the hands of Joshua 
Jump, who, he avers, will use it in the interest of his 
law partner, John E. Lamb, who is suspected of hav¬ 
ing designs on Congressman Brookshire's seat in 
the House of Representatives. Mr. Brookshire’s 
candidate is the deputy auditor of Montgomery 
county, who is said to have rendered some clever 
political service to the Cleveland faction of the 
Indiana democracy in Mr. Brookshire’s congres¬ 
sional district last winter. — Washington Dispatch, 
Indianapolis News. 

* * * 

April 1.—Ex-Pension Agent Zollinger, of Fort 
Wayne, is the latest aspirant for the honor which 
was some weeks ago set aside for Capt. William 
Bracken, of Brookvllle. Zollinger, being side¬ 
tracked for the pension agency by the “anti-ex” 
rule, la here, and believes that he is going to be the 
compromise candidate for the collectorship of in¬ 
ternal revenue. A strong protest has been made 
against giving the place to the southern part of the 
state, and Representative McNagny is pushing 
Zollinger for it, and it is believed that he will be 
indorsed by the other member of the House from 
the northern part of Indiana. Editor W. W. Rock- 
hill, of the Fort Wayne Journal, who has been here 
some days seeking the postmastership of Fort 
Wayne, and has gone home, has, it is stated, refused 
the internal revenue collectorship of the eastern 
district. It is said that at least one, if not both, of 
the Indiana senators, an i two or three of the dem¬ 
ocratic congressmen from the northern part of the 
state Joined in urging Editor Rockhill to accept the 
collectorship, but he steadfastly refused, preferring 
from pride and other reasons to be postmaster. 
This incident would also indicate that Captain 
Bracken Is likely to be defeated for the collector- 
ship.—Tf'as/itw.qfo/i Dispatch. Indianapolis Journal. 

April 19.—The Hon. John E. Lamb, Senator 
■Voorhees and Judge Hench made a tour of the de¬ 
partments to-day. It is believed that the latter will 
be appointed solicitor of internal revenue. Mr. 
Lamb is here to look after the interests of Joshua 
Jump, of Terre Haute, who is slated for the col¬ 
lectorship of internal revenue. Incidentally he is 
looking after some other friends who want places, 
but Jump is his primary object.—TFasW/ff/ffm/h's- 
patch, Indianapolis Journal. 

» # ❖ 

April 21.—Congressman Brookshire, in his fight 
for Hulet, of Montgomery, for collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue, is putting Senator Voorhees and 
Mr. Lamb slightly at a disadvantage. Early in the 
struggle Mr. Brookshire agreed to concede the 
naming of the postmaster to Senator Voorhees, but 
since the latter is suspected by Brookshire of trying 
to ignore him in the collectorship matter and other 
appointments, the congressman threatens to make 
war on Donham, who is the senator’s choice for 
postmaster at Terre Haute.—H'a.s/iMiplon Dispatch^ 
Indianapolis Neios. 

>;:«<■ 

April 22.—The arrival, almost simultaneously, of 
Peputy Auditor Hulet, of Montgomery county. 


who is a candidate for Internal revenue collector 
of the seventh district, and the Hon. John E. Lamb, 
who is sponsor for Joshua Jump’s boom for the 
same office, has revived the interest in this war for 
office. As was stated before, the important stake 
in this contest is the congressional nomination a 
year hence. Congressman Brookshire desires to 
be renominated, and as a part of his program 
wants Mr. Hulet made revenue collector. Mr. 
Lamb would like the nomination for congress also, 
and believes that it will be a point in bis favor to 
have Jump made collector. The lines seem to be 
drawn between the Cleveland and Gray elements, 
as they have been on most of the other choice 
federal offices in Indiana. Lamb and Jump train 
with the Gray democracy, while Mr. Hulet did 
the work of organizing the congressional district 
in favor of President Cleveland’s renomination. 
Congressman Brookshire relies upon the fact that 
Mr. Hulet was an original Cleveland man to aid 
in securing the appointment for him. The light is 
very warm and both factions seem confident. Jump, 
of course, is the candidate of the slate-makers and 
seems to have all the indorsements that would be 
necessary, ordinarily, to secure the place.—TFas/i- 

ington Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

<• « <> 

April 25.—Walter N. Hulet and his friends are 
somewhat put out at the announcement that is be¬ 
ing circulated throughout the country to the effect 
thathe is no longer an applicant for the collector- 
ship of internal revenue in the eighth district. 
He is yet in the ring, and his prospects of success 
seem as bright as when his name was first pre¬ 
sented. He has Just returned from Washington, 
where he thoroughly Investigated his chances of 
success, audit is noticeable that he has been very 
contented since his return. His friends are in¬ 
clined to think that the story going the rounds 
about Hulet withdrawing is Intended to injure 
his chances of success and benefit the candidacy of 
Judge Jump. It is reported that Congressman 
Brookshire is more than ever of the determination 
that the place shall be given to Hulet. A great 
many democrats here are anxious for this matter to 
be settled, as with Hulet provided for as collector 
of internal revenue, it will take the most formidi- 
ble candidate for the postmastership out of the way. 
—Crawfordsville (Ind.) Dispatch, Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal. 

* 

April 30.—As a matter of fact everybody convers¬ 
ant with the Indiana situation here knows that 
Congressman Holman, much against his own in¬ 
clinations, was forced to support Bracken, and that 
in bringing this about Senator Voorhees played no 
small part. Congressman Holman was In favor of 
the appointment of Dr. Hunter, of Lawrenceburg. 
Early in the fight Bracken’s friends came to Wash¬ 
ington and read the riot act to Mr. Holman. They 
told him that if he did not support Bracken for 
revenue collector, they would see that he was de¬ 
feated for renomination for congress, and they 
even threatened to put Bracken forward as a can¬ 
didate. Senator Voorhees seemed to enjoy the em¬ 
barrassment of Congressman Holman and contributed 
to it. He invited him to his committee-room to a con¬ 
ference in presence of Bracken’s friends, and then and 
there wrung from him an indorsement of Bracken. 
Congressman Holman found that he could either in¬ 
dorse Mr. Bracken as a matter of self-preservation 
politically, or put himself in the attitude of opposing 
a man from his own district who had the senatorial 
indorsements.— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis 
News. 

« * 

May 5.—It may be stated upon the very best of 
authority that the two revenue collectors for Indi¬ 
ana will be appointed about July 1. There seems 
to be no longer any doubt that Bracken, of Frank 
lln county, will be named for the sixth district, 
and Joshua Jump, of Terre Haute, has the lead in 
the seventh, although there has been considerable 
opposition to him of late, and his chances can 
hardly be said to be as good as those of Bracken.— 
Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis News, 

lOt # * 

July 31.—The request of Secretary Carlisle for the 


resignation of the internal revenue collector of the 
sixth district of Indiana does not imply an ap¬ 
pointment at once. There seems to be no doubt 
that Bracken will secure the appointment. It was 
said at the treasury department Saturday that In 
calling for the resignation the secretary merely 
meant to have it ready for the President incase he 
felt disposed to act on the case,' when he returned. 
The secretary does not look for the appointment for 
several weeks yet. There is a marked coincidence 
in the fact that Senator Voorhees returned from 
Warm Springs, Va., one day and the resignation 
was called for the next. The senator is ready to 
move on all Indiana republican office-holders not 
protected by civil service as soon as the President 
returns, and Is making up his list of intended 
victims already.— Washington Dispatch, Indianapo¬ 
lis News. 

« « 

August 9.—The Indiana revenue collectorships 
will probably be filled by September 1. In the sixth 
district William Bracken, of Franklin county, seems 
to be in the lead, and there is not much doubt that 
he will be appointed. Some of the opponents of 
Bracken have thought that Judge Holman's posi¬ 
tion in favor of free coinage might weaken the 
chances of his candidate. Congressman McNagny* 
called on Secretary Carlisle in the interest of Wm. 
Meyers, of Fort Wayne, a few days ago. Meyers is 
probablythe strongest candidate in the field against 
Bracken, but the latter has the senatorial backing, 
and enough representatives, it would seem, to se¬ 
cure his appointment. His name was put on the 
slate among the earliest, and it is a significant fact 
that the program on the slate has been carried out to 
the letter up to this time. There may be a departure 
in the case of Joshua Jump of the Terre Haute dis¬ 
trict, who is the choice of Senator Voorhees and the 
other big wigs of Indiana politics. Congressman 
Brookshire has been making a strong personal fight 
for W.B. Hulet,of Crawfordsville, and has predicted 
the latter’s appointment. He has the backing of 
several of the original Cleveland men of Indiana, 
who believe that the appointment of Jump means 
a war against Brookshire for renomination. Even 
if Hulet is not appointed the fight may become so 
warm against Jump that some compromise candi¬ 
date like Treasurer Conzman, of Vigo county, may 
be selected.— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis 
News. 

« i.< * 

August 14.—It was expected that a change of In¬ 
ternal revenue collectors would be made in the 
sixth district this month, but this may deferred 
till the President’s return. It is generally sup¬ 
posed that Bracken will be appointed. This is the 
star appointment in the internal service in Indiana, 
so far as the patronage that goes with the office is con¬ 
cerned. Collector Bracken, when he qualifies, will have 
some rather juicy plums to distribute. He will have 
under him, the appointment of which will be practi¬ 
cally within his control, fifteen deputy collectors, with 
salaries ranging from $.S00 to $1,000 per year; one 
clerk at $1,000; fifteen storekeepers at $4 per day; 
seven storekeepers arid gaugers at from $I to $.1.60 per 
day, and eleven gaugers at $5 per day. This consti¬ 
tutes afield of very fair pickings for some of the faith¬ 
ful. There has been some talk, it may be said a 
good deal of talk, in certain republican newspapers 
about an alleged fight for the collectorship In the 
seventh internal revenue district. These reports 
are purely imaginary and are without a shadow of 
foundation. There is no fight for that collector- 
ship and there has been none. The President and 
Secretary Carlisle have not even considered the 
matter, and, of course,they will not reach it, under 
existing conditions, for some lime.—Washington 
Dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel. 

^ <1 <t 

August 16. —Mr. Brookshire is making a hard, 
fight against John E. Lamb, of Terre Haute, to se¬ 
cure renomination. Those who are anxious about 
Mr. Brookshire’s financial views say that he has a 
large business constituency and many moneyed in¬ 
terests in his district, and that these may not take 
kindly to his free coinage views. Another point, 
which is of vital importance to Congressman 
















74 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Brookshire, is the selection of Internal revenue 
collector for the seventh district. Up to this time 
Mr. Brookshire has had an unbroken record as a 
Cleveland man. For him to part company now 
with the President’s views on the important ques¬ 
tion of finance, which President Cleveland has so 
much at heart, would be equivalent, some of his 
anxious friends think, to throwing away the rev¬ 
enue collectorship. There is the impression here 
that President Cleveland will “ keep tab ” on the 
democratic representatives who do not act in ac¬ 
cord with the administration’s financial policy, 
and will not confer any favors upon those who stand 
out against the administration's views. This may 
be an uncharitable view to take of Mr. Cleveland’s 
position, but it seems to be the impression that ob¬ 
tains with most of the party leaders. JohnE Lamb 
was here this week and carefully looked into the 
revenue collectorship fight in the seventh district. 
The Indiana democrats make no concealment of 
the fact that there is a fight on to the finish between 
Lamb and Brookshire for the congressional nomi¬ 
nation next year. The preliminary skirmish will 
be for the collectorship.— Washington Dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis News. 

« <■ 

* September 13.—The appointment of William Brack¬ 
en, of Franklin county, as collector of internal rev¬ 
enue for the sixth Indiana district seems now to be the 
consideration of but few days. This has been a case 
of nomination long deferred, not hopelessly, how¬ 
ever, and Mr. Holman has been the victim of sacred 
promises, which seem to have required ages for 
execution. Congressman Holman claims to have had 
a distinct understanding with the treasury department 
that this appointment was dated for June S7 last .— 
Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

it if if 

September 22. — The appointment of William 
Bracken, of Brookville, as collector of internal 
revenue for the sixth Indiana district, disposes of 
the last important federal appointment in Indiana 
except two. The collectorship in the seventh dis¬ 
trict will not be settled before the latter part of 
October. Unless something unforeseen happens, 
Joshua Jump, of Terre Haute, will be appointed. 
Bracken’s appointment was accepted with fortitude 
by the friends of other candidates. There has 
been some mild criticism from the north end of 
the state over the fact that southern Indiana has 
received nearly all the appointments, and this is 
about the only point upon which Bracken’s nom¬ 
ination is criticised. It is conceded, however, even 
by those who would like to have seen the appoint¬ 
ment go to northern Indiana, that everything will 
turn out well providing the new collector gives the 
northern congressmen a say in the selection of his 
employes. — Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis 
News. 

m if if 

September 26.—Just at present the Indiana repre¬ 
sentatives are quietly discussing their chances of 
renomination and re-election. In a number of dis¬ 
tricts it is already apparent that there will be a 
close fight for the nomination. The greatest interest 
perhaps is shown in the outcome in Congressman 
Brookshire’s district. Mr. Brookshire is a candidate 
for renomination. He will probably find ex-Congress- 
man John E. Lamb, of Terre Haute, as chief oppo¬ 
nent for the nomination. The fight will be a test of 
strength between the old Cleveland and Gray fac¬ 
tions that divided Indiana prior to the last presi¬ 
dential convention. John E. Lamb is identified 
with the Gray element, which seems to have se¬ 
cured most of the federal offices in Indiana. Mr. 
Lamb is now greatly interested in the appointment of 
his law partner, Joshua Jump, as internal revenue col¬ 
lector. If he succeeds, the immense patronage of the 
collector’s office will probably be directed toward se¬ 
curing Mr. Lamb’s nomination to succeed Congress¬ 
man Brookshire. It looks now as if Jump would be 
appointed. Mr. Brookshire naturally opposes the 
appointment because he realizes that it will 
materially lessen his chances for renomlnatlon. 
Another strong factor in favor of Lamb’s nomination 
is Crawford Fairbank, head of the big distilling inter¬ 


ests of Terre Haute. Senator Voorhees will quietly 
lend whatever assistance he can to Mr. Lamb. 

Considerable interest is manifested in Congress¬ 
man Holman’s race for renomination. “7 have not 
given thesubject of renomination a moment’s thought,” 
said Mr. Holman to The New’s correspondent, last 
night. “ I suppose, if my people want me again, 
they will renominate me. It is a curious fact, not 
known to many people, that no representative has 
served to exceed fifteen terms in the house.” Mr. 
Holman will have served that number of terms 
when his present term ends. Mr. Holman said 
this with a decided wink, which might have indi¬ 
cated that the precedent would be broken or that 
it might not. He has been playing some clever 
politics, whether he is giving much thought to re- 
nomination or not. It is the common belief here 
that he removed the principal opposition to his re¬ 
nomination when he appointed Capt. Wm. Bracken, 
of Brookville, as collector of internal revenue. Bracken 
would have undoubtedly been a candidate for con¬ 
gress had he not secured the appointment. His 
friends had determined to take the step. The op¬ 
position to Mr. Holman centers in Lawrenceburg. 
The Lawrenceburg Ee£/fs<er, which is conducted by 
Dr. Hunter, ex-revenue collector, and his son-in- 
law, Will O’Brien, is now saying some unpleasant 
things about Holman. Dr. Hunter posed for many 
years as Mr. Holman’s political mainstay in the 
congressional district. His friends claim that he 
has quelled a number of political revolutions 
against Mr. Holman, and cleared the pathway for 
his successful re-entry into congress. Whatever 
merit may lie in his claim the fact remains that 
Dr. Hunter wanted to be revenue collector again, 
and was very much disappointed when he failed to 
secure it. The “ex” rule which President Cleve¬ 
land announced early in his administration was 
quoted by Holman against Dr. Hunter, when he 
applied for the collectorship. The doctor then 
conceived the clever plan of having the office con¬ 
ferred on his son-in-law, and Mr. O’Brien came on 
to Washington for the purpose of getting it. Fail¬ 
ing, he went back to Lawrenceburg feeling very 
sore at Mr. Holman, and since that time the Law¬ 
renceburg Register has been suggesting the de¬ 
sirability of retiring Congressman Holman with¬ 
out pay.—IFas/iLtfirton Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

« » 

September 27.—Numerous democratic applicants 
are making pilgrimage to Franklin county every 
day to see the new collector. Twelve hundred and 
fourteen have applied to him for j^ositions, with sev¬ 
eral out townships to hear from. He has the appoint¬ 
ment of thirty-eight officers.— Greensbxtrgh {Ind.) 
DispaUth, Indianapolis Journal. 

October -.—The Hammond News says that the ap¬ 
pointment of W. H. Bracken as revenue collector 
for the sixth district insures the selection of M. 
F. Pierce, of Hammond, as chief deputy for the 
fourth division, Mr. Bracken having repeatedly 
pledged Mr. Pierce to that effect.—Indianapolis Netvs. 

* le* 

Octobers.—There is considerable complaint al¬ 
ready over the appointments under the internal 
revenue collector at the sixth district. The north¬ 
ern counties have served notice on Collector 
Bracken that they will demand a fair share of the 
places under him, but up to date there are about 
three applications from the southern counties to 
one from the northern tier, according to reports 
received here. This has caused some uneasiness 
on the part of the representatives from the north¬ 
ern counties, who fear that they will be left out in 
the allotment of places. Mr. Holman is now at 
home giving Collector Bracken a few pointers on 
the selection of his force.— Washington Dispatch, 
Indianapolis News. 

<■ << o 

October 9.—Representative William S. Holman 
has been in a disturbed frame of mind ever since 
his recent visit to his home at Aurora. He now 
fully realizes that the opposition to his renomina- 
tlon is as persistent as it is bitter, and as formid¬ 
able as it is personal. A new trouble entered Judge 


Holman’s political household to-day. When he 
visited his home the other day he was called upon 
by a number of constituents, who solicited his as¬ 
sistance in securing positions under Internal Rev¬ 
enue Collector Bracken. When Judge Holman re¬ 
turned to Washington information came here to Rep¬ 
resentative Cooper and others that Holman had been 
home for the purpose of disarming the opposition to 
his renomination by having the most of his opponents 
appointed to minor places under Revenue Collector 
Bracken, &ad that he had apportioned out nearly 
all of the forty-eight or fifty offices which the 
Brookville citizen has at his disposal. The judge 
had played sneak upon his colleagues, it was re¬ 
ported. Not only was Representative Cooi>er, but 
Representatives Martin, Hammond- and McNagney, 
of the northern part of the state, soon up in arms. 
Before Bracken was agreed upon for appointment 
these men were assuredby Holman that they should 
have the lion’s share of the offices under the col¬ 
lector. It will be remembered that Holman was 
buncoed into the Indorsement of Bracken much 
against his will, and that the real credit of Brack¬ 
en’s appointment is due to Senator Voorhees. For 
several weeks Holman had been unable to screw 
his courage to a point where he was willing to dis¬ 
criminate in favor of or against any of the many 
aspirants for the place in his district. Finally 
Senators Voorhees and Turpie sent for him, The 
former insisted that Holman should name his man 
then and there. After a long hesitation. Senator 
V’oorhees says he would name the man, and that 
Holman might take the responsibility and the 
credit. He then announced to Holman that he 
would recommend Bracken. It immediately be¬ 
came a case of Holman indorsing Bracken and re¬ 
ceiving the credit or permitting the appointment 
to go outside of the fourth congressional district 
and to Voorhees. The three or four representatives 
from the northern districts of the state had been 
making a demand for the collectorship, and when 
they were called off they were assured by Holman 
that they might have the minor places under the 
collector. So the discovery that Holman was about 
to appropriate a large share of the places under 
Bracken for the purpose of allaying opposition to 
his renomination put the four democratic repre¬ 
sentatives named upon the war-path to-day, and 
they have severely “sat down” upon the venerable 
representative of the fourth district, and have left 
him leaning so far backwards that they believe his 
nerve for claiming even his own will not return 
again. Judge Holman says there are about thirty- 
five positions under Bracken which are free and 
may go to any of the counties in the collection dis¬ 
trict. There are twelve or thirteen local officers 
which must come from certain places, like one or 
two to Indianapolis, one to Madison, two to Fort 
Wayne, and one to Hammond. Representative 
Cooper said to-day that the result would be an 
equable distribution of the offices by congressional 
districts, and that nearly all of the counties in the 
collection district would get a place. He did not 
take into calculation the distribution of as much of 
the minor patronage to the fourth congressional 
district as would go to the others, because the col¬ 
lector was located in that district. It looks as 
though the entire democratic delegation from In¬ 
diana was “dead onto” the antiquated objector, 
and that his troubles never end so long as he re¬ 
mains in political life.— Washington Dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis Journal. 

^ tfi 

October 9.—Senator Voorhees has taken a hand 
in the matter and will insist that Collector Bracken 
divide the places equally between the districts. 
There will probably be a clash between Senator 
Voorhees and Congressman Holman over the dis¬ 
tribution of the offices, and it remains to be seen 
whether Collector Bracken will follow the advice 
of Senator Voorhees and make an equal division of 
the spoils or whether he will allow Congressman 
Holman to divert a large portion of it toward the 
re-election of himself to congress. — Washington 
Dispatch, Indianajiolis News. 

* V # 

October 9.—Senator Voorhees was at the treasury 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


75 


department this morning in the interest of some of 
his office-seeking constituents. After he left the 
department Secretary Carlisle directed that the 
resignation of Joseph P. Throop, of Terre Haute, 
collector of Internal revenue for that district, be 
called for, the same to take effect upon its receipt. 
Joshua Jump, who was some months ago recom¬ 
mended for the position, is to be appointed.— Wash¬ 
ington Dispatch, Indianapolis Journat. 

October 10.—It is expected that the appointment 
of an internal revenue collector for the western 
district of Indiana, to succeed E. H. Throop, of 
Terre Haute, who will resign or be removed, 
will be made within a few days; surely next 
week. Representative Brookshire is significantly 
confident that his candidate, Walter F. Hulet, 
of Crawfordsville, will get the appointment, in 
spite of the fact that Senator Voorhees is stand¬ 
ing firmly by Joshua Jump, of Terre Haute. 
There is a great deal of opposition from Vigo 
and Montgomery counties to Jump’s appoint¬ 
ment, and the intimation has been made in high 
official circles that he will not get the place even 
though he is backed by the potent influence of 
Senator Voorhees. Mr. Brookshire occupies a very 
Influential position in the house of representatives, 
being one of the most active members of the com¬ 
mittee on appropriations, a position almost as im¬ 
portant to the President and Secretary Carlisle as 
that held by Mr. Voorhees in the senate. There is 
no objection to Hulet. The contest between Voor¬ 
hees and Brookshire has attracted attention at the 
national capital. This evening’s Washington News 
says: “The request for the resignation of the col¬ 
lector of Internal revenue for the Terre Haute dis¬ 
trict has quite a history. The sequel will he the 
appointment of Joshua Jump to that office. Mr. 
Jump is recommended by Mr. Voorhees. Many 
years ago when the “Tall Sycamore of the Wabash” 
was first running for congress, he stopped over 
night at the house of Mr. Brookshire. So pleasant 
did he make himself to that gentleman that Mr. 
Brookshire became charmed with his guest, and the 
acquaintance ripened. When a son was born to Mr. 
Brookshire he was named Voorhees in honor of the 
brilliant Hoosier. Voorhees Brookshire is now a 
member of congress from Indiana. Mr. Brookshire 
has a candidate for the collectorshlp. In the person 
of W. B. Hulet, of Crawfordsville. There has been, 
and is yet, a bitter fight betweenVoorhees and Brook¬ 
shire, upon the outcome of which will depend the 
success of the latter in bis next congressional cam¬ 
paign. The law partner of Joshua Jump Is ex-Con- 
gressman John E. Lamb, and it is expected that when 
he obtains the office Jump will turn the large amount 
of patronage connected with the same over to Mr. 
Lamb, In order to help the latter along in his fight 
for congress against Mr. Brookshire. What makes 
the friends of the young congressman particularly 
“sore” is the fact that Brookshire was an origi¬ 
nal Cleveland man in Indiana and helped defeat 
Governor Gray for the nomination, while ex- 
Congressman Lamb was a stanch adherent of Uncle 
Isaac. The appointment of Jump to the collector- 
ship is as near a certainty as anything political can 
well be.— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal. 

* * * 

October 12.—The next ten days will see some 
lively skirmishing among the Indiana politicians. 
Congressman Brookshire and Senator Voorhees 
are playing for a big political stake—the revenue 
collectorshlp of the seventh Indiana district. The 
appointment is now being considered at the treasury 
department and at the White House. While every 
Indication points to the appointment of Joshua 
Jump, who is Indorsed by Voorhees, Turpie and all 
the representatives in congress from that revenue 
district except Taylor and Brookshire, there is still 
a strong opinion among the opponents of Jump 
that he will not be able to win over the protest of 
Brookshire. President Cleveland is averse to giving 
encouragement to any political faction as against an¬ 
other, and it is believed by Brookshire’s friends 
that he will not lend his aid to the movement to 


defeat Brookshire for renomlnatlon. He would 
certainly do so if he appointed Jump and gave Lamb 
the control of all the patronage and put him in touch, 
in an official way, with the big distilling interests of 
Terre Haute, which are political factors not to be 
overlooked. 

“Joshua Jump will be appointed internal revenue 
collector in the seventh district beyond a question 
of doubt. I give you permission to quote me as 
saying so.” It was Congressman Cooper who made 
this apparently official announcement to The News 
correspondent, confirming what has been stated in 
these dispatches as a probability.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis News. 

October 13.—Congressman Holman stated in an 
interview, printed in r/i<> iVctrs Monday, that he had 
not asked for any appointments under Collector 
Bracken. Some of Mr. Holman’s political rivals 
charge that they have seen hie name attached to a 
number of indorsements for places under Collector 
Bracken.— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

October 13.—President Cleveland gave an audi¬ 
ence yesterday to Congressman Taylor. Although 
the Impression prevails that Jump, of Terre Haute, 
will be appointed, this fact did not deter Congress¬ 
man Taylor from making a strong plea in favor of 
Mr. Dixon, the Evansville merchant, as the busi¬ 
ness men’s candidate. President Cleveland listened 
very attentively while Mr. Taylor recited the strong 
business qualifications of his candidate, his high biisi- 
ness and social standing and many deeds of local 
philanthropy which had endeared him to the hearts of 
the people of Evansville and vicinity. Congressman 
Taylor does not believe that the fight is entirely 
lost yet, and with a fight on between Senator Voor¬ 
hees and Congressman Brookshire, that has become 
very bitter already, he thinks it is possible that the 
President may decide to take a compromise candi¬ 
date, and In that case Mr. Dixon will be an avail¬ 
able man. — Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis 
News. 

* * * 

October 15.—Representative Holman has capitu¬ 
lated on the Internal revenue spoils fight. He has 
thrown up his hands, and there is to be a distribu¬ 
tion this week extending all over Collector Brack¬ 
en’s district by counties, and Holman’s district is 
to get the least of all. If Jump, of Terre Haute, is 
made collector for the western district it is under¬ 
stood Mr. Brookshire’s Crawfordsville candidate 
for the collectorship, W. B. Hulet, will be Jump’s 
principal deputy. A demand has'been made that 
Roscoe Griffith, of Muncle, be selected as Bracken’s 
first deputy.—TFas/iinpfon Dispatch, Indianapolis 
News. 

* * « 

October 16.—It looks as if Joshua Jump, of Terre 
Haute, is to be appointed revenue collector of his 
district very soon. This morning Secretary Carlisle 
received the resignation of the republican in¬ 
cumbent, G. H. Throop, also of Terre Haute. It is 
understood, however, that the appointment may not be 
made until after the silver queston is disposed of.— 
Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel. 

* * * 

October 17.—Secretary Carlisle to-day, in talking 
about Internal revenue appointments for another 
state, remarked that the President had put his foot 
down upon all Presidential appointments, and that 
there would be a cessation of that kind of business 
until after the silver question was acted upon by the 
senate.—Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

* • ♦ 

October 17.—Capt. William H. Bracken is kept 
very busy these days examining the many applica¬ 
tions for office in the sixth revenue district. He 
now has applications to the number of fifteen hun¬ 
dred, and when it is remembered that there are 
only about forty-five places to be filled, it is seen 
that his task Is a difficult one. It is said that W. J. 
Zacharias, of this city, will be traveling deputy.— 
Brookville (Ind.) Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

* * <■ 

October 20.—Some of the aspiring democrats in 
this county who are seeking appointment under 
Captain Bracken, the new collector, are very in¬ 


dignant. It has come to their knowledge that Gov¬ 
ernor Matthews has asked Collector Bracken, as a 
personal favor, to appoint Abel Ewing, of this city, 
to a position under him. In this recommendation 
may be seen the fine work of ex-Senator Ewing, 
who is a son of Abel Ewing, and a son-in-law of 
Governor Matthews.—Greensbwrsr (Ind.) Dispatch, 
Indianapolis Journal. 


MOORFIELD STOREY TO JOSIAH 
QUINCY. 

[Before the Massachusetts Reform Club, October 
7,1893.] 

In taking the stand I do in the discussion 
this evening I feel that I am transgressing a 
rule, than which none is better established 
in my experience, to never play a game 
you don’t understand against a professional. 
But it is right that at this table Mr. Quin- 
(cy and the administration with which he 
has been so closely identified should hear 
frankly and freely from men who strongly 
supported Mr. Cleveland, who thoroughly be¬ 
lieved in his character and his honesty, and 
who have not been satisfied with his perform¬ 
ance in regard to civil service reform. 

This is a question of principles, not of per¬ 
sons. Mr. Quincy’s interview published in the 
Herald in regard to this subject contains what 
I understand to be his position as stated by 
himself. He begins by saying: 

“It is true that changes in the consular 
service have been made more rapidly than 
under the preceding administration. The 
only difference has been that this administra¬ 
tion has proceeded upon the theory that it was 
better for the service, as well as for other rea¬ 
sons, that inevitable changes should be made 
with reasonable promptness, instead of after a 
long period of delay and uncertainty; that 
such changes should coincide as nearly as 
possible with changes in administrations rather 
than be made near the middle or end of an 
administration. This gives the new appointees 
an assurance of a continuance in office for at 
least four years, if they perform their duties 
with efficiency, while the service of a political 
appointee of a former administration, who 
necessarily feels that he may be displaced at 
any moment, is not likely to be of much value 
to the government. Whatever may be said 
as to the superiority of a consular service, from 
which political considerations are excluded, 
such as that of the leading nations of Europe, 
it is certainly impossible, under existing con¬ 
ditions, to deal with the matter upon a purely 
non-political basis. This administration did 
not find such a consular service when it came 
into power. It found, on the contrary, very 
many important consulships filled by appoint¬ 
ments of a purely partisan and political char¬ 
acter.” 

Whatever may be the merits of a consular 
service organized upon business principles, 
Mr. Quincy tells us it is practically impossi¬ 
ble to have such a service in the United States 
under existing political conditions. Now, 
when the gentleman, who many years ago en¬ 
listed with us an active member of the Boston 
civil service reform association, which took 











76 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the ground that men should be retained in 
office as long as they did their work well, and 
that offices should not be used for partisan 
purposes, tells us, as the first who is called 
upon to administer the service upon those 
principles, that it is practically impossible to 
do so, a very grave question is presented. If 
he is right, we have for many years been very 
wrong. Under his leadership and under the 
leadership of Mr. Cleveland we denounced 
the republican party very strongly, because 
they filled the consular service on that princi¬ 
ple. If it is practically impossible to do oth¬ 
erwise I owe President Harrison an abject 
apology. 

The democratic party, in platform after 
platform, in speech after speech, have urged 
us to turn the republican party out of power 
and to put them in, because, among other 
things, the republican party has used the of¬ 
fices as spoils. 

We who supported President Cleveland, be¬ 
lieving as we did'in his courage and honesty, 
knew perfectly well that on the questions of 
tariff reform, currency and federal election 
bills, he was powerless, that he could do noth¬ 
ing of his own motion. With every purpose 
in the world to reform the Sherman act we 
see how powerless he is to bring about the con¬ 
summation which the whole country desires, 
and, if he can not bring the senate to a 
vote on the silver bill, how likely it is that 
they will be brought to a vote on the tariff 
bill, federal elections bill or any other bill, 
which not only a small minority, representing 
a number of rotten boroughs, are inclined to 
oppose, but which the republican party, repre¬ 
senting a large section of the voters of this 
country, are bitterly opposed to? 

There was one thing which he was able to 
deal with alone. Congress had given him 
power to bring the public service under civil 
service reform rules, and I am informed that 
Civil Service Commissioner Roosevelt has 
prepared, and had before Mr. Cleveland came 
into office prepared, a scheme by which the 
consular service should be brought within 
those rules; and it was entirely within the 
power of the President, of his own motion, to 
apply that system, or certainly if the system 
itself was not matured it was in his power as 
each individual case rose to consider only the 
good service and not the partisan qualifica¬ 
tions of the applicant in the past. 

Now, Mr. Quincy and the whole adminis¬ 
tration have for something like eight months 
lived in the perverted atmosphere of Wash¬ 
ington, exposed to the constant importunities 
of men who do not so much care how the pub¬ 
lic business is done or how public questions 
are settled, provided they are supplied with 
offices, and he now comes to meet a body of 
men who represent, I think, all but a very 
inconsiderable fragment of his fellow-citizens 
all over the country who do not so much care 
who fills the offices as they do how the public 
business is done and how public questions are 
settled. 

I agree cordially with Mr. Quincy that he 


did not find a non-partisan, non-political con¬ 
sular service. He found undoubtedly a very 
bad service filled with republican politicians, 
republican newspaper editors, men who were 
selected without the least reference to the du¬ 
ties of the place which they were asked to fill> 
simply as a reward for partisan service, and’ 
while I believe a great many of the removals 
were imperatively demanded, in order that 
the business of the country may be done well, 
and that, so far as that has been done, the ad¬ 
ministration has done the country a good ser¬ 
vice, the difficulty arises in connection with 
the filling of the vacancies. When the same 
considerations are urged in order to persuade 
the oppointing power to appoint a democratic 
politician or newspaper editor in place of the 
republican politician or newspaper editor who 
has been removed, then and there the same 
offense against public morals is committed 
with which we charged the administration of 
President Harrison, and of which he was con¬ 
demned. 

Why is it impossible or impracticable in fill¬ 
ing the places which are left vacant by proper 
removals to select new men with reference 
to their fitness for the offices? Why is it nec¬ 
essary to ask for the indorsement of the demo¬ 
cratic congressman from the state in which 
the applicant belongs, or for the indorsement 
of town or city committees? Why is it neces¬ 
sary that all the political machinery which 
exists throughout the land should be brought 
to bear for the purpose of placing a man who 
has distinguished himself as a partisan only 
in a place where partisanship is not called for? 

Mr. Quincy said, with great propriety in 
the interview I have just read, that political 
consuls, men who identify themselves with the 
fortunes of the party in power, and who feel 
that it may be in the interest of their party to 
have statistics in favor of protection or against 
it, are bound to collect statistics one way or 
the other, and he points out that that has been 
the case. It is perfectly obvious that consuls 
of that sort are bad, but are they any better 
when they come from one party than when 
they come from the other? If one set of con¬ 
suls is misrepresenting the facts in favor of 
protection, another set may be misrepresenting 
the facts in favor of the other side. 

What we want to do is to select men who are 
familiar with the business. I found when I 
looked up this matter that some 23 or 24 news¬ 
paper editors were appointed to consulships, 
and some six or seven to foreign missions, out 
of a total number of 117 changes, I believe, up 
to that time. And when I found Mr. Vande- 
veer Polk, a gentleman whom Mr. Quincy de¬ 
scribes as a person of varied and valuable at¬ 
tainments, removed from the editorship of the 
Nashville American and placed as consul-gen¬ 
eral at Calcutta, I intended to ask what his 
experience in Nashville had been which fitted 
him to take charge of that important consul¬ 
ate. 

And it is not that instance alone, but there 
are other offices all over the country in con¬ 
nection with our federal system where vacan¬ 


cies have been filled by editors and newspaper 
men. As long as such positions are filled in 
that way, presumably on account of support 
by the papers during the campaign, it will be 
impossible to apply business principles to the 
consular service. 

There never has been in the presidential 
chair a man so absolutely independent as 
Grover Cleveland. Placed in the office by the 
largest electoral majority we have seen since 
Grant beat Greeley, almost unprecedented in 
the history of the country, in the nature of 
things not likely to be a candidate for re- 
election, as strong as courageous, as powerful 
as a human being can be, having had an ex¬ 
perience of four years and having made the 
most distinct promises, what Is to prevent him 
from saying; “I appoint that man to Cal¬ 
cutta because he is fit; I appoint that man to 
Liverpool because he is fit?” The whole 
country is behind him, and if platforms mean 
anything the whole democratic party is behind 
him, because there can not be a more distinct 
pledge than the democratic party has made in 
its platform, year after year, in favor of civil' 
service reform. If Grover Cleveland can not 
carry out those promises, this country is never 
going to see a man who can. 

If a gentleman, high in the councils of the 
party before the election, said to the editor of 
the National American or the National Times, 
“ If this party gets in, we are going to appoint 
you to such and such an office,” that prom¬ 
ise would be religiously kept, and I think it 
is time that the gentlemen who are charged 
with the conduct of this government under¬ 
stood that promises made to all the people of 
the United States are just as binding as prom¬ 
ises made to a single individual; that promises 
to do right are just as sacred as promises to do 
wrong. 

These congressmen, these supporters or 
“ heelers ” of theirs whom they put in office, are 
not the people of the United States. They are 
the merest froth upon the surface, and some¬ 
time or other a man will rise brave and wise 
enough to know that he can perfectly well af¬ 
ford to set those men at defiance, and the 
whole people will uphold his hands in so 
doing. 

Benjamin Lanthier, of Massachusetts, who is 
named as consul to Sherbrooke, was a factor in the 
late campaign in that state. He edits two French 
newspnpers, and so he ivas made the medium by which 
the democratic party was enabled to appeal effectually 
to the large and increasing French Canadian popula¬ 
tion of the state for their support in the campaign. 

* * 9 

James E. Neal, of Hamilton, Ohio, was nominated 
for consul at Liverpool at the personal reciuest of ex- 
Oovernor Campbell, reinforced by Senator Brice. 
He is one of the leading democrats of Ohio, and 
early in the seventies, while a young man, was 
speaker of the house of representatives of the gen¬ 
eral assembly. He has always been an active demo¬ 
crat, and was chairman of the state committee during 
the campaign which resulted in Mr. Campbell's elec¬ 
tion.—New York Times, April 8. 

* * * 

Secretary Carlisle has appointed Herman Van 
Sejiden, editor of the Paducah (Ky.) Standard, 
his private secretary. Mr. Van Senden is thirty 
years of age, a native of Kentucky and was aps 
pointed upon the recommendation of Congressman 
Stone. 








The civil service chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 9. INDIANAPOLIS, NOVEMBER, 1893. terms : ^ 


If we see nothing in our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoil, we shall fail at every point.— 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November 18 1892. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolit, Ind, 


Notwithstanding the great satisfaction 
afforded by the result of the late elections, 
the fact should not be lost sight of that 
while we have driven out one nefarious 
crowd, to a greater or less extent the way 
has been opened to let in another crowd of 
the same nature. The republicans of New 
York show signs of leaning again upon 
Platt and Jake Patterson. At the prospect 
of success in Indiana next year, the same 
republicans that looted the offices under 
Harrison gathered here in a swarm the 
other day. To put out the democratic 
machine anywhere means letting in an 
equally bad republican machine. Party 
machines will continue to be corrupt and 
utterly untrustworthy until the progress 
of reform shall have completely deprived 
them of the offices as a means of support. 
Until that time comes, events since 1884 
have made it plain that there is no way to 
make progress except by upsetting first 
one and then the other. The average citi¬ 
zen stands no chance in the primary, but 
if he controls his own vote on election day 
he can be a terror to those who manipu¬ 
late in politics for what there is in it. A 
defeat makes the sick devil a saint for the 
time being and reform takes a forward 
step. 

A GOOD instance of bringing back the 
“same old crowd” is shown in the appoint¬ 
ment of “Pres” Trusler as comptroller of 
this city. He was the one man who more 
than all others brought the republicans 
to disastrous defeat here when they 
went out of office some years ago. His ab¬ 
sorbing occupation was to secure the re¬ 
moval of democrats to make places for re¬ 
publicans, which culminated in turning 
out the chief of the fire department be¬ 
cause the latter would not obey his orders 
and remove democrats, Trusler being a 
member of the city council. This went 
on until the people thoroughly detested 
him. He seems to have learned nothing, 
for he now declares that in the late city 
election “the people voted for a change 
and they ought to have it,” and he takes 
up his old occupation of working hench¬ 
men into places, one of his efforts being to 
secure the removal before the end of his 


term of the present efficient and highly 
satisfactory superintendent of the city 
hospital. Trusler hardly comprehends the 
situation. The people did not vote for a 
change which would bring back the Trus- 
lers; he could not, if he were a candidate 
for an office, get a fourth of the votes of his 
own party. The people did not vote for 
any division of offices as spoil; they have 
passed beyond that relic of feudalism. 
They did not vote for any such change in 
offices as has been made, and, as we said 
last month, the same voters who gave the 
republicans this chance will turn them 
out unless they show a substantial, perma¬ 
nent progress in municipal administra¬ 
tion. This can only be brought about by 
the introduction of the merit system, and 
that without any party string to itj 
nor will it be well to go on with the divis- 
sion of places, and in the meantime give 
out that the mayor has secured some civil 
service rules from Koston, and is determ¬ 
ining whether there is anything in them 
suitable for Indianapolis. 


Reports from Washington say that No¬ 
vember 4, upon the heels of the passage of 
the repeal bill, “Senator Voorhees and sev¬ 
eral democratic congressmen went up to 
the White House to call upon the Presi¬ 
dent.” What about? Now anybody in the 
world who had ever heard of these worthies 
could have answered at once, “ About office.” 
There were a “number of Hoosier demo¬ 
crats on the anxious seat.” Con. Cunning¬ 
ham “still hangs on” for a consulship. Je¬ 
rome Herff “was told two weeks ago by 
Senator Voorhees that if he only lingered 
in the city until the repeal bill was disposed 
of his appointment would come promptly.” 
Mellow and calm and feeling that all the 
world (of patronage) was his, Voorhees 
went up to demand the “immediate ap¬ 
pointment of Mr. Herff.” But the Presi¬ 
dent had gone squirrel shooting. Then 
Voorhees and his suite of congressmen 
called upon Secretary Gresham. But 
Gresham had gone squirrel shooting too. 
Thus our senior senator and a considerable 
number of our representatives were baf¬ 
fled for the time in their main occupation 
and were compelled to pass an idle day. It 
must not be supposed that they were care¬ 
less or indifferent to the gravity of the sit¬ 
uation. “The air of disappointment in 
Hoosier circles became so dense that you 


could have easily carved it.” Voorhees 
“wore a countenance that told plainer than 
words that the lines of senatorial duty did 
not lie in pleasant places about him.” The 
report further says that “he did not mince 
words in expressing his digust to his Indi¬ 
ana friends.” Judging by the past, this 
will produce results. Voorhees has been 
notorious in Indiana for the names he has 
called the President, and for each epithet 
he seems to have been awarded another 
office. It is reasonable to expect that the 
President will hold back a while and then 
yield. 


The Chronicle, for July, gave some ac¬ 
count of the exploits of Mr. Cleveland’s 
postmaster, Frank H. Thomas, at Topeka, 
Kansas.’ Thomas dismissed seventeen let¬ 
ter carriers and reported to the depart¬ 
ment the cause to be “incompetency 
and violation of orders and instructions.” 
But to the men themselves in Topeka, 
Thomas said that the removals “were 
solely for political reasons.” The Presi¬ 
dent has just removed Postmaster Thomas 
and appointed a new postmaster. Let us 
hope that this is the beginning of a new 
era and not be critical because it took, the 
administration from July to November to 
punish this impudent liar. Donham’s 
time ought to come soon. Half a dozen 
such examples would end all attempts to 
beat the civil service law under this ad¬ 
ministration. 


From Good Government we learn that 
Secretary Carlisle’s brother Pole has been 
made postmaster at Covington, five months 
before the expiration of the term of the 
present postmaster, an efficient man and 
a one armed veteran, who, moreover, has 
a letter from the Secretary promising to 
allow him to serve out his term. 

President Cleveland has written copi. 
ously and weightily concerning various 
evils, among them nepotism, but he sits in 
stolid helplessness, or indifference, ap¬ 
parently impervious to the personal dis¬ 
grace resulting from Carlisle nepotism. 
The discomfort and depression arising 
from such scandalous violations of what is 
due to the people who elected Mr. Cleve¬ 
land make one wish to have the myopia 
of President Eliot, who happy and enthu¬ 
siastic in the face of these things, is stated 
to have aroused his audience before the 



















78 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


late elections to wild applause by quoting 
again of President Cleveland that so long 
as the helm of state is entrusted to his 
hands should the storm come, with Sene¬ 
ca’s pilot he will say: “0, Neptune, you 
may save me if you will; you may sink 
me if you will; but whatever happen, I 
shall keep my rudder true.” 


One of the most unnecessary and un¬ 
called for trials to which the merit system 
is made to submit is the advent of provin¬ 
cial politicians. They come from all sorts 
of places in the party machine, and get 
into all sorts of offices. They have heard 
of the civil service law, but know nothing 
of its provisions and workings. If any part 
of the classified service comes under their 
superintendence they start out in the be¬ 
lief that they are pioneer explorers to find 
some way to beat or break down the law. 
When they have determined upon a way 
they are much pufied up by their supposed 
discovery, and regard themselves as hav¬ 
ing undermined the merit system. They 
usually succeed in doing some injury, but 
meet an opposition which surprises them, 
and in the end they get a reputation more 
or less unsavory. This has been true 
through all grades, from Carlisle to Don- 
ham. 

The last of these provincial politicians 
to bring himself into notoriety is Mr. 
Cleveland’s new commissioner of Indian 
affairs. He has “discovered” that it is not 
well to have the fitness of Indian school 
superintendents, who have given bond for 
the safe keeping of the chairs, desks, tables, 
and other property committed to their 
care, “gauged by their rank in a pedagog¬ 
ical examination.” It is not worth while 
to discuss this objection upon its merits 
for it has no merits. It is simply the act 
of a political sneak who got into office upon 
a platform promising to do away with 
the use of offices as spoil, and who is now 
trying to bring back into the spoils system 
places which had already been removed 
from it. He has no object except to divide 
offices among his partisans. Mr. Herbert 
Welsh, in the New York Evening Post, ol 
November 10th, entirely exposes the falsity 
of the claim that it is necessary for the 
good of the service to turn these places 
back to the spoilsmen, and Mr. Welsh is the 
best authority in the country. During his 
former administration no one thing did 
more to bring political ruin to Mr. Cleve¬ 
land than the debauchment of the Indian 
service. Experience does not seem to have 
taught its lesson. There is not the least 
excuse for having a common spoilsman for 
Indian commissioner. Five minutes con¬ 
versation would have developed the fact 
that he was the enemy of a great body of 
literature found in Democratic platforms. 


and in President Cleveland’s writings in 
favor of the merit system. What is to be 
done about it? The President will, doubt¬ 
less, refuse the commissioner’s suggestion. 
When is a reform, acknowledged by the 
President to be of the greatest desirability, 
to be taken out of the hands of its ene¬ 
mies, where it is cheated at every turn, 
and put into the hands of officers friendly 
to it? 


The general verdict is that the spoils 
system is largely responsible for the mur¬ 
der of Mayor Harrison. Among the pa¬ 
pers that have made editorial comment to 
this effect are the Philadelphia Record, New 
York Times, New York Evening Post, Chi¬ 
cago Tribune, Indianapolis News, Buffalo 
Express, Cleveland Leader, New York Morn¬ 
ing Advertiser, Brooklyn Eagle, Springfield 
Republican, Oil City Derrick, Jamestown 
News, Grand Rapids Herald, Boston Tran¬ 
script and Baltimore fiun. 

Immediately after the murder Prender- 
gast, in an interview, replied emphatically 
to the question: 

“What was your reason for killing the mayor?’’ 

“I was to have had the position of corporation 
counsel, but he played false to me, and I only did 
right in killing him.” 

And again on November 19 he repeated 
his reason with the same emphasis: 

“They propose to enter a plea of insanity. I shall 
object to that. I want to acknowledge the commis¬ 
sion of the crime and plead and prove justifica¬ 
tion.” 

“In what way will you prove justification?” 

“The broken promise td make me corporation 
counsel. And then there are other things. But it 
will all come out at the trial.” 

Everyone acquainted with spoils ethics 
knows that it is not considered conduct un¬ 
becoming a spoils gentleman to promise 
an office to one in order to obtain the leisure 
and peace of mind necessary to give the 
place to another. If all the great officials and 
honorable representatives who have been 
occupied since last March with the distri¬ 
bution of places were to be murdered for 
the lies they have told their victims, the 
result would be a most startling and bloody 
object lesson; not, however, of the num¬ 
ber of lies told, because the guilty person 
could be murdered but once. 

The dreadful fear arises: Would Indi¬ 
ana, for instance, have any feudal chiefs 
surviving for the distribution of the small 
portion of spoil still undivided? The two 
appointments of Jump and Bracken alone 
must have required a colossal number of 
lies, from various persons; lies large and 
lies small, lies direct and lies indirect, and 
from the indications in the present 
Chronicle likely to continue indefinitely. 


The executive committee of the Nation¬ 
al League at its late meeting in New York 
reappointed the committee of investiga¬ 


tion, headed by Mr. Foulke, and which so 
thoroughly kept before the country the 
civil service shortcomings of the Harrison 
administration. The committee will find 
plenty of work to do, and we are sure it 
will do it without any regard as to who is 
hurt. It would do well to begin with the 
Carlisles, and the sooner the committee 
can reach Hoke Smith the better. 


After the adjournment of the fifty-first 
congress, in 1890, the senators claim to 
have kept at work, for sixty days, sixty- 
five personal and committee clerks. When 
congress met again, the house refused to 
allow a bill of $22,000 for this alleged em¬ 
ployment. The other day, when congress 
was about to adjourn, the house appropri¬ 
ated $200,000 to pay the clerks of members 
for services during the repeal session. The 
senate promptly tacked on the old item of 
$22,000, and a wrangle between the two 
houses followed as persistent, absorbing 
and petty as any family quarrel. In the 
midst of this the time fixed for adjourn¬ 
ment came and the session ended. It is 
interesting to note some of the families 
who will be more or less inconvenienced 
by the failure of the rider, and to see how 
near “home” it came to posing patriots 
and statesmen: 

Among the clerks who were to have six dollars a 
day for sixty days are T. Blodgett, son of ex-Senator 
Blodgett of New Jersey; L. L. Carlisle, son of ex-Sen- 
atorCarlisle; L. W. George, son of Senator George; 
N. K. Jones, son of Senator Jones of Arkansas; C. B. 
Power, son of Senator Power of Montana; H. L, 
Pugh, son of Senator Pugh of Alabama; Mrs. M. F. 
Reagan, wife of ex-Senator Reagan of Texas; L. P. 
Sanders, son of ex-Senator Sanders of Montana; Ew¬ 
ing Cockrell, son of Senator Cockrell of Missouri; R. 
R. Quay, son of Senator Quay of Pennsylvania; C. N 
Vance, son of Senator Vance of North Carolina ; g! 
W. Morgan, son of Senator Morgan of Alabama, and 
J. P. Voorhees, son of Senator Voorhees of Indiana. 


A VOORHEES TRIUMPH. 

The appointment of Joshua Jump to be 
collector of internal revenue of the Terre 
Haute district closes one of the most dis¬ 
heartening and disgraceful chapters in the 
civil service. If, upon his second inaugu¬ 
ration, Mr. Cleveland was not after all the 
great statesman he was represented to be 
and could not manage the civil service 
without a system of distributing offices 
which required the advice of local politi¬ 
cians, it was not to be supposed that he 
would make Voorhees his chief adviser in 
Indiana. Before his last nomination, 
Voorhees and his crowd were the enemies 
of Mr. Cleveland. They scarcely spoke of 
him except with foul-mouthed epithets. 
They worked night and day to cause him 
to fail of nomination. They did not like 
him and did not want him because they 
did not believe that his politics was of 
their kind, and their kind is, and always 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


79 


has been, well known to be of the lowest 
and most vicious. Mr. Cleveland knew 
this; he knew that they had wrecked him 
in Indiana during his first administration 
because he had allowed them their vicious 
way. The majority of Mr. Cleveland’s 
party in Indiana in 1892 were not of the 
Voorhees stripe. They were at least on a 
clean plane of politics and followed such 
leaders as Mr. Morss, of the Indianapolis 
Sentinel, and Mr. Shanklin, of the Evans¬ 
ville Courier. These leaders stood immov¬ 
able against the attempt of Voorhees and 
his followers to carry the Indiana dele¬ 
gates over to Hill, or some fellow like him, 
and by their stand alone, they finally 
cowed down Voorhees and secured the 
votes of the delegation for Cleveland. After 
the election the people of Indiana supposed 
that Voorhees, the sympathizer with se¬ 
cession and the champion of the Union 
soldier, the free-trader and protectionist, 
the anything and everything of finance, 
the man whose one unvaried pursuit was 
the loot of oflSces, had come to the end of 
his career. But it was not so. Mr.Shank- 
lin’s advice was openly disregarded, and 
Mr. Morss was quietly shelved by being 
giveu a consulship. Then Voorheesism 
spread over Indiana with all its blighting 
effects upon political morals. Risley, 
Burke, and Donham, followed in quick 
succession, and it was demonstrated that 
no one could stand with the President 
against Voorhees. The people of Indiana 
remembering the circumstances under 
which the Indiana delegates were brought 
to Mr. Cleveland at Chicago, regard the 
President as having licked the hand that 
smote him. When this had reached a cer¬ 
tain point, and Voorhees was asked what 
course he would take in the matter of the 
suspension of the purchase of silver, he 
replied that the President had granted 
him so many favors that he could not re¬ 
fuse him anything he might ask. This 
lofty declaration of principles was fol¬ 
lowed by the action of Voorhees in the 
repeal matter and this in turn by the 
appointment of Jump, who was Voorhees’s 
pet candidate, and whose appointment he 
apparently at the last moment bullied the 
President into making. There is only 
one possible excuse which the President 
can put forward and that is that he wanted 
to buy Voorhees’s vote upon a measure in 
congress. The President’s friends make 
this excuse for him, but if they think it 
was an honorable act, they are beyond the 
reach of argument. 

In view of the final and complete tri¬ 
umph of Voorhees, it is well to recall an 
extract from the Indianapolis News of 
March 22, setting forth the nature of the 
Voorhees following in Indiana, remember¬ 
ing that the Burke referred to is now 


United States District Attorney Burke, and 
the Joshua Jump referred to is now 
United States Collector Joshua Jump: 

“It is recalled that immediately after the adjourn¬ 
ment of the Indiana general assembly, two years 
ago, there was great rejoicing over the defeat of the 
co-employes bill, and of other bills in which the 
railroads were interested, particularly the Pennsyl¬ 
vania and Vandalia railroads. The Vandalia rail¬ 
road company placed at the disposal of Mr. Burke, 
who had fought so hard for the railroad companies, 
John E. Lamb, who had been an industrious lobby¬ 
ist of the railroads, and other democrats, a private 
car in which they traveled to Hot Springs in elegant 
style. Champagne was the cheapest drink aboard. 
At Hot Springs there was a gathering in which were 
Senator Voorhees, Lamb, Burke, Crawford Fair¬ 
banks, the Terre Haute distiller, Joshua Jump, and 
other democrats of that character. It was during 
the stay of that party at Hot Springs, that, according 
to Senator Voorhees, the United States attorneyship 
was promised to Burke.” 


LESSON OF THE ELECTION. 

The voting at the election of November 
8 took place under circumstances devoid 
of enthusiasm for the democratic party or 
for Mr. Cleveland’s administration. The 
President’s course since his inauguration 
had been such as to put the independent 
sentiment of the country in an attitude of 
hardly suppressed hostility, or, at least, of 
suspicion. The loot of the consulships, the 
open disregard by the cabinet officers of 
the established rules for promotion, the 
peculiar and brutal viciousness of Carlisle 
in his treatment of treasury employes, the 
apparent entire lack of notice from the 
President to his cabinet that in the man¬ 
agement of the civil service the principles 
of the democratic platform must be ob¬ 
served, the open and wholesale removal of 
officers upon secret charges, the placing of 
inefficient ward politicians at the head of 
divisions in the departments at Washing¬ 
ton, thus depriving subordinate employes 
of a chance for promotion, the general 
practice of placing men who are the bitter 
enemies of the merit system at the head of 
offices within the classified service, the 
failure to make any extension whatever of 
the civil service rules, the failure to punish 
officers who tricked the civil service law, 
the removal of fourth-class postmasters at 
the rate of 30,000 a year, the clean sweep 
at once inaugurated without hindrance by 
newly appointed officers, such as collectors 
of internal revenue, the universal per¬ 
mission to congressmen to manipulate the 
federal offices, with a view to their own re¬ 
nomination, the bogus attempt to reform 
the pension boards with congressmen’s 
democratic doctors, the Voorhees domina¬ 
tion, the Van Allen sale and the general, 
impudent and overbearing prevalence of 
the feudal system made it impossible for 
anyone except President Eliot, Of Harvard 
college, and Colonel Codman, of Boston, 
to be enthusiastic for the President or his 


party. Independents, therefore, turned 
themselves to teaching wholesome home 
lessons. The city of Indianapolis led ofl 
by changing a democratic majority of 
2,700 two years ago to 3,000 the other way. 
The people of Brooklyn changed a 25,000 
majority for Cleveland in 1892 to 25,000 
the other way for a reform mayor, and the 
great democratic majority in the state of 
New York last year was changed to 89,000 
against Maynard. In New Jersey a simi¬ 
lar revolution took place, and Massachu¬ 
setts sent Quincyism to the wall by 30,000 
majority. The people were tired of being 
ruled by bosses, whose only means of liv¬ 
ing is in the parcelling of offices among 
henchmen. The division of the federal 
offices as spoils was a part and parcel of 
the general division which caused the dis¬ 
satisfaction. The result of the elections is 
a great cause for rejoicing, and the chief 
element in that cause is the fact that now 
at every election many thousand voters 
join the ranks of those who refuse to be 
bound or ruled by a party machine. 

MORE SWINISH SPOIL. 

In The Chronicle for June, 1893, under the 
heading “Swinish Spoil,” we gave some ac¬ 
count of the federal inspection of hogs in this 
city. At that time the republican superin¬ 
tendent of inspection and his two republican 
taggers and the six women whose fathers were 
or had been republicans, had been turned out 
because under a democratic administration 
they could not conduct an unbiased search for 
worms in pork. Their places had been taken 
by one Dr. Stucky, “a good, sound democrat,” 
and two democratic taggers, and Mary Lucid 
and Nora Toomey, whose male relatives were 
democrats. Stucky received $1,400 a year, the 
taggers $720 each, and the others $600 each. 
They had literally “a soft snap.” No pork 
has been exported from this point since July 
and they had after that date nothing what¬ 
ever to do. November 1 the secretary of agri¬ 
culture, with a great newspaper flourish in 
which he had his joke at the “bureau of ani¬ 
mal indolence.” “suspended” this inspection 
bureau and all pay was stopped at that date. 

There was an appropriation, however, for 
meat inspection. For Bynum, particularly, it 
was a golden opportunity to put under gov¬ 
ernment pay some additional hustlers for his 
renomination next year. Another bureau 
of inspection was invented. This was to 
inspect hogs intended for home consump¬ 
tion while foreigners were to take their 
chances. At the head of this bureau appears 
Dr. Pritchard, a veterinary surgeon, with a 
salary of $1,800, $400 more than Stucky re¬ 
ceived. The two aforesaid taggers, John 
Clegg and Martin Quinn, were transferred to 
him at their former pay. He has also under 
him the following additional hog inspectors^ 
Jacob Fox, William Wampner, and W’illiam 
Peggs, each receiving $900 a year. This bu- 










80 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


reau is to inspect the hogs on foot as well as 
after slaughter—alive, and dead. This re¬ 
quires a very considerable degree of expert 
knowledge. We have made some examina¬ 
tion of the appointees. William Peggs from 
1886 to 1893 appears in the city directory as 
a laborer, a teamster, a driver, and again a 
teamster. William Wampner appears from 
1886 to 1893, as a carpenter, a driver and a 
teamster. Jacob Fox has a more varied his¬ 
tory, running into public and private life. 
He was originally a shoemaker. In 1885, 
when the late Postmaster Jones turned the 
four women mail bag menders out of their 
places in the post-ofiSce here, Jacob Fox was 
given a place and mended mail bags during 
Mr. Cleveland’s first administration. Then 
he seems to have drifted temporarily into 
shoe-making again, but in 1891 he became a 
policeman, from which position as a sort of 
finishing education, he goes to the inspection 
of hogs. Stucky with his bureau is hoping 
and expecting re-instatement for the inspection 
of hogs “for abroad.” 

It is interesting to note the “practical” prin¬ 
ciples which have governed this whole trans¬ 
action. Stucky and his subordinates were 
“appointed” by Bynum and Turpie. Pritchard 
and his subordinates were “appointed” by By¬ 
num. Each member of both crowds is for 
Bynum for renomination. Next spring Prit¬ 
chard and Stucky and Clegg and Quinn and 
Fox and Wampner and Peggs and the male 
relatives of Miss Lucid and Miss Twoomey 
will show what men can do in the way of set¬ 
ting up primaries for a congressman, when 
the congressman pays them out of the public 
treasury. This is “practical politics.” This 
is Quincy’s “existing political conditions.” 
This is party administration having its hogs 
inspected by its “friends.” 

TWO PETTY FEDERAL OFFICES. 

“ The Existing Political Conditions.”— 

Josiah Quincy. 

II. 

JOSHUA JUMP. 

October 31.—Ex-Congressman John E. Lamb, of 
Terre Haute, is here in the interest of his friends 
who want Washington Dispatch, Indianapo¬ 

lis Sentinel. 

Kt >!« 

November 1.—Hon. John E. Lamb sent an impor¬ 
tant telegram to Joshua Jump, at Terre Haute, to¬ 
day, respecting the appointment of a collector of 
internal revenue for that district. There is consid¬ 
erable anxiety among the friends of Representative 
Brookshire as to the contents of the message. Sen¬ 
ator Voorhees’s followers believe the message in¬ 
formed Jump that he would be appointed collector 
this week. Mr. Brookshire’s followers contend 
that it either indicated doubt as to whether the ap¬ 
pointment would go to Terre Haute or Crawfords- 
ville, or informed Jump that his appointment 
would not be made until after the adjournment of 
congreas.—Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal. 

<■ <• S' 

November 1.—Reliable information from Wash¬ 
ington to-night states that to-morrow or day after 
Joshua Jump of this city will be appointed inter¬ 
nal revenue collector of this district. This will be 
a victory for Senator Voorhees, as Congressman 


Brookshire Is backing Hulet of Crawfordsville.— 
Terre Haute Dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel. 

if * * 

November 2.—President Cleveland and Secretary 
Carlisle are considering the Terre Haute internal 
revenue collectorship along with several other 
treasury offices at Woodley to-day. Joshua Jump 
will be appointed.— Washington Dispatch, Indianap¬ 
olis News. 

* * * 

November 3.—It is believed that the appointment 
of Joshua Jump as collector of the Seventh Indiana 
revenue district will be announced in a few days. 
There is little doubt that he will be the successful 
candidate, and great effort was made by Senator 
Voorhees to have the appointment confirmed be¬ 
fore adjournment was taken. Secretary Carlisle has 
been closeted with the President at Woodley for two or 
three days, and announces that as soon as the election 
is over quite a batch of appointments will be made 
public .— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel. 

* 

November 4.—Mr. Voorhees confidently expects 
the appointment of Joshua Jump to be collector of 
internal revenue the first of next week, but when 
Jump’s name was mentioned to Representative 
Brookshire to-day, the Crawfordsville statesman 
inquired what assurance has been received by Sen¬ 
ator Voorhees that Mr. Jump would be appointed, 
and who had given the assurance. A friend of Mr. 
Brookshire said to-day, after talking with that gen¬ 
tleman, that the Terre Haute man was not sure to 
get the place; that it might yet go to W. B. Hulet, 
of Crawfordsville, and that Mr. Brookshire was 
evidently in possession of spme secret information 
from the President which led him to reasonably 
doubt the success of Jump. It is stated that all of 
Jump's business ramifications, including his partner¬ 
ship with John E. Lamb, his warm friendship for Dis¬ 
tiller Fairbanks, and various other matters relating to 
the Terre Haute ring, have all been carefully ex¬ 
plained to the President, and that the latter was deeply 
impressed by them .— Washington Dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis Journal. 

* % * 

November 6.—Joshua Jump’s commission as col¬ 
lector of internal revenue was forwarded to him at 
Terre Haute to-day. As stated in the dispatches 
Saturday the nomination was agreed upon last 
week, but it was decided not to make the formal 
announcement until to-day. Congressman Brook¬ 
shire has been opposing Jump’s appointment. He 
called at the White House this morning and made an 
effort to see Mr.Cleveland, but the President was not 
reeeiving. When informed by the News correspond¬ 
ent that the appointment was settled and Jump’s 
commission had beenforwarded to him, Mr. Brook¬ 
shire looked amazed, and started for the Treasury 
Department to verify the news. The nomination 
of Jump is a triumph for Senator Voorhees and 
John E. Lamb, although Jump was indorsed by 
every Demoeratlc congressman in the revenue dis¬ 
trict except Taylor and Brookshire.—iras/iinpfon 
Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

# * 

November 8.—A congressman who called to see 
Senator Voorhees to-day says he found the dis¬ 
tinguished Hoosier statesman in a frame of mind. 
It appears that the Senator expected to leave the 
city for Indiana this afternoon, with Senator Tur¬ 
pie and Representative Cooper, who departed for 
their homes, but he did not want to leave till he knew 
the appointment of Joshua Jump to he collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue was so fully determined that his ap¬ 
pointment papers were in the mails. When he called 
at the Treasury Department he learned that the ap¬ 
pointment was made out yesterday and sent to the 
White House for the signature of the President, but 
that it had not been sent baek to the Treasury De¬ 
partment for the mails; furthermore it was inti¬ 
mated that “there was a hen on,” or words to that 
effect, as the President had not indicated that he 
would surely sign the appointment. The Senator 
could not get an audience with the President, al¬ 
though the latter was at the White House to-day, 
and attended a cabinet meeting.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Journal. 


November 9.—Rain poured down continuously un¬ 
til nightfall. The water fairly piled up on the as¬ 
phalt streets and ran in torrents through the gutters. 
It was a dismal journey, indeed, under such condi¬ 
tions, that Senator Daniel Woolsey Voorhees set out 
upon about 9 o’clock this morning. Alone In a 
covered carriage he started toward the country- 
seat of President Cleveland, situated five or six 
miles west of the White House. What might have 
been his thoughts and his opinion of the chief 
magistrate of the nation, as the senator from Indi¬ 
ana sat in his hired vehicle and peered out of its 
windows upon the down-pour can only be imagin¬ 
ed from the condition of his mind. 

Being refused an audience by the President at 
the White House yesterday. Senator Voorhees de¬ 
termined to visit that personage in the quiet re¬ 
cesses of his woodland home this morning, and to 
learn why one Joshua Jump, of Terre Haute, had 
not been officially informed of his appointment as 
collector of internal revenue; or why, to be tech¬ 
nically correct, the commission of Jump, which 
was sent to the White House four days ago, and 
had not received the President’s signature. The 
fact that Senator Voorhees was In a frame of mind 
during all of that part of yesterday following his 
rebuff at the White House was reported by your 
correspondent yesterday. The senator did not 
find himself in a more comfortable condition this 
morning. He told his friend before his lonely 
journey through the rain that he intended to go to 
Woodley and see the President or know why he 
could not see him, and learn why Jump had not 
been appointed, even if it resulted in his ultimate 
return to the practice of law in Indiana. He 
thought he would just as leave hang up his 
shingle again in Terre Haute aud expound Black, 
stone as stay longer in the senate if he was to have 
a continuation of the treatment which had, during 
the past few days, been accorded him at the hand 
of the administration. A number of the senator’s 
Hoosier friends lingered about his committee- 
room at the capitol and in the room in the Maltby 
Buildings, just north of the capitol grounds, 
where Chester R. Faulkner, the faithful private 
secretary to the senator, conducts the personal and 
political end of the senator’s Interests. They anx¬ 
iously awaited a report upon Daniel’s desperate 
move. About noon a closed carriage drove under 
the porte cochere of the White House, and a min¬ 
ute later a doorkeeper handed the occupant a 
message in writing. The vehicle then disappeared. 
A short time afterwards official announcement 
was made that “Joshua Jump, of Indiana, had 
been appointed collector of internal revenue.” It 
is stated that Senator Voorhees brought the mes¬ 
sage himself, or caused it to be brought by a mes¬ 
senger, and that it was not forthcoming with ease. 

It is now stated that the mind of the President 
was many weeks ago filled with direct charges and 
vague insinuations against Joshua Jump. These 
charges led him to believe that while Jump might in 
himself be capable and honest he would be surrounded 
as an official with influences which should not be for 
the good of the service. It is probable that these 
charges will be laid before the committee on finance 
when nomination goes to that body next month for ac¬ 
tion preliminary to confirmation, but inasmuch as 
Senator Voorhees is chairman of the committee it is not 
likely that any move to defeat confirmation will suc¬ 
ceed. 

The appointment of Joshua Jump as collector of 
internal revenue is an impotrant event in the po¬ 
litical career of Hon. Elijah Voorhees Brookshire, 
of Crawfordsville, representative of the eighth 
district. It is stated by one of that gentleman’s 
most intimate friends, that it means Mr. Brook¬ 
shire’s retirement from congress. The appoint¬ 
ment is the consummation of a general deal by 
which John E. Lamb, of Terre Haute, law partner 
of Jump, is to be returned to congress. Mr. Brook¬ 
shire will not discuss the subject for publication, 
but he is quoted as having in private conversation 
acknowledged that he understood the details of 
the deal, and that Lamb would be his opponent for 
the nomination next spring. With Jump in charge 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


81 


of the powerful machinery of the internal revenue of¬ 
fice and Distiller Fairbanks in the saddle, not only will 
the interests of Senator Voorhees be taken care of, but 
John E. Lamb will be boomed for political honors.— 
Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis Journal. 

BRACKEN. 

October Z).—Representative McNagney is on the 
warpath against Internal Revenue Collector Brack¬ 
en. The trouble is over the appointment of a dep¬ 
uty collector. Mr. McNagney says that the office 
belongs to the Fort Wayne district; that it has been 
given to that district for many years past, and that 
it is as much entitled to it as it is to any other office, 
and he has, upon this assumption, recommended 
Charles Reese for the position. Mr. Reese is a 
prominent German Lutheran, of Fort Wayne, and, 
proceeding under the belief that the office would 
go to that district, he has secured a large number 
of indorsements. Captain Bracken has, in some 
manner. Indicated to the people of Fort Wayne, 
that he does not intend to give the deputyship to 
that district. He does not indicate where he will 
place the office, but a belief prevails in some quar¬ 
ters here that it may go to Roscoe Griffith, of Mun- 
cie, who was strongly Indorsed for the collector- 
ship. At any rate, the information that the place 
will not go to Fort Wayne has struck Mr. McNag¬ 
ney broadsides and almost taken him off his feet. 
He naturally feels very much cut up about it, and 
Intends to strike back. 

There is good ground for the Fort Wayne demo¬ 
crats to protest against the determination of Brack¬ 
en to place his deputyship outside of their district. 
The Fort Wayne democrais have, unquestionably, 
been treated shabbily by this administration, and 
the representative from that district is not slow to 
openly denounce their treatment. He says that 
President Harrison did a great deal more for the 
district than President Cleveland has done or in¬ 
tends doing. The democrats fully expected to fill 
the Leipsic consulship, but when the incumbent 
was removed the place went to another state, and 
nowit has been stated that the Mississippi-river 
commissionership, held by Judge Taylor, has been 
offered to another section.—iras/itnj/ton Dispatch, 
Indianapolis Journal. 

if % * 

October 25.—A lively “kick” has come up from 
Fort Wayne over the choice of a deputy collector of 
internal revenue in the sixth district. Collector 
Bracken has served notice on the politicians of Al¬ 
len county that he will depart from the time-hon¬ 
ored custom of taking the deputy internal revenue 
collector from the Twelfth congressional district. 
The Twelfth district has submitted the name of 
Charles Reese, a leading German Lutheran, of 
Fort Wayne, for deputy collector. He was heavily 
indorsed, and by Congressman McNagney and 
others.— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis News. 

!{■ * * 

October 26.—The official announcement that Will¬ 
iam Zacharias has been appointed traveling deputy 
and Louis Federmann stamp clerk by Collector 
Bracken has caused quite a flurry among the local 
applicants for places in the revenue service. Zach¬ 
arias and Federmann both belong to Franklin coun¬ 
ty, the home of the collector, and the boys say that 
this is all the patronage that county Is entitled to. 
Here there are about forty applicants, with four places 
to be filled.—Greensburg (Ind.) Dispatch, Indianapo¬ 
lis News. 

October 28.—“ I guess we have made a mistake in 
this man.” This is what Senator Voorhees is, upon 
reliable authority, quoted to have said in a private 
conversation the other day, referring to the ap¬ 
pointment of Capt. William H. Bracken, of Brook- 
vllle, to be collector of internal revenue for the 
eastern Indiana district. 

The senator had been writing and wiring Collector 
Brackenin reference to the appointment of two or three 
deputy collectors and had been unable to obtain a re¬ 
ply to his requests. The senator, in a moment of 
despair, remarked that he had probably made a 
mistake In securing the appointment of Bracken, 


as it was evident that the latter did not Intend to 
give him any patronage. Subsequently, it is stated, 
the senator succeeded in securing an answer and a 
promise. But Bracken’s delay left an impression 
upon the senator. 

It is stated by a prominent Indiana democrat 
here that the reason Collector Bracken did not re¬ 
ply to the requests of Senator Voorhees was that he 
had communicated them to Judge Holman, and 
was awaiting instrnctions from the latter. In point 
of fact Captain Bracken owes his appointment to 
the influence of Daniel W. Voorhees, but he insists 
upon recognizing Willlgm S. Holman as his spon¬ 
sor. As has been explained by the Journal corre¬ 
spondent, Judge Holman was buncoed into the in¬ 
dorsement of Bracken, much against his will,— 
Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis Journal. 

if * * 

October.—Representative Cooper Is another one 
of the Indiana democrats who is deeply disgusted 
at Bracken. Mr. Cooper confidently expected to 
secure a number of positions under Collector 
Bracken, and he lays his failure, as does Senator 
Voorhees, to secure places to the interference of 
Judge Holman. 

Meanwhile, every democratic member of con¬ 
gress in Collector Bracken’s district is railing at 
Holman. The three members from the northern 
part of the state, who were confident that the chief 
deputyship would be given to McNagney, have no 
language adequate to the occasion. They are un¬ 
able to express their indignation toward Holman, 
whom they hold responsible for the distribution of 
the Internal revenue offices, and whom they charge 
with not only having turned Bracken against them, 
but with attempting to “play the pork” and gobble 
up all the positions, with a view to quelling the op¬ 
position against him in his district. The situation 
is interesting. There is a general row over Brack¬ 
en’s patronage, and two or three of the democratic 
members of the house directly Interested threaten 
to rise In their places one of these fair days and 
make some observations decidedly personal to Hol¬ 
man and Bracken.—IVas/iinpfoji Dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis Journal. 

# * * 

November 7.—William H. Bracken, the new inter¬ 
nal revenue collector for this district, spent Sun¬ 
day in the city. Mr. Bracken said that all the 
places would be filled by the end of the week. The 
collector has recommissioned all the old deputies and 
he will continue them in office until tne new men fa¬ 
miliarize themselves with the duties.—Indianapolis 
Sentinel. 

* * * 

There is a prospect of a break between Senator 
Voorhees and Collector of Internal Revenue 
Bracken, of Brookville, if the latter don’t keep his 
promises and make a few appointments for the 
Senator. One bone of contention at present is the 
appointment of a deputy collector in Ripley county. 
Before his appojntment Captain Bracken promised 
to appoint Luther Cox, of Holton, deputy, in case 
Mr. Bracken landed the collectorship. Luther Cox 
is one of the fiery, young Jacksonian element, who 
resigned a place in the railway mail service when 
President Harrison was elected because he declined 
to serve under a Republican president. This dra¬ 
matic move commended Cox particularly to Sena¬ 
tor Voorhees. As soon as Bracken was appointed 
Voorhees sent him a telegram requesting Cox’s ap¬ 
pointment at once. It did not come. The senator 
failed to get a reply, and has been trying to hurry 
Bracken ever since. One of Luther Cox’s relatives, 
George W. Cox, wants the place, and Representative 
Holman, although he indorsed Luther Cox, now 
claims that he did so under a misapprehension. 
Bracken wants to name George W. Cox to serve 
half the term, with a promise to Cox No. 2 (Luther) 
he shall serve out the remaining half. Senator 
Voorhees is very wrathy over this attempt of 
Bracken to “do the sneak act” on his promise, and 
proposes to make the political waters of Indiana 
turbulent if Bracken don’t come totime.—IFasADip- 
ton Dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, November 19- 


CAUSES OF THE LANDSLIDE. 

“I am entirely unfamiliar with the duties of 
the office and the workings of the custom¬ 
house, what offices I shall be called upon to fill, 
and what the demands of the service are. I be¬ 
lieve in making haste slowly, and am not in 
favor of revolutionizing things in hot haste.” 
—Interview with Judge Kilhreth, on his appoint¬ 
ment as collector, in New York Times, July S9. 

W. F. Harrity ran over from Philadelphia 
to-night to look after some fourth-class post- 
offices in Pennsylvania in which he is in¬ 
terested. He found Fourth Assistant Post¬ 
master-General Maxwell and escorted him to 
his room at the Arlington, where the subject 
was discussed. Mr. Harrity will return home 
to-morrow, and the chances are that in a day 
or two his recommendtions will be carried out. 
— Washington Dispatch, New York Times, Octo¬ 
ber 5. 

Preparatory to leaving for the west to¬ 
day, Senator Palmer made the rounds of the 
departments and saw the President for the 
purpose of settling up some of the important 
Illinois appointments — Washington Dispatch, 
Indianapolis Journal, November 6. 

Civil Service Commissioner Koosevelt this 
morning, in discussing the wholesale reduc¬ 
tion of competent republican clerks in the de¬ 
partments in order to give democrats the bet¬ 
ter positions and salaries, said : “Unfortunate¬ 
ly the commission is powerless to stop those 
outrages. It has no authority to interfere. 
Under the last administration I vainly en¬ 
deavored to have the control of promotions in 
the departments placed with the commission, 
but unfortunately President Harrison could 
not be persuaded that there was even a possi¬ 
bility of a change in administration. Fre¬ 
quent complaints have been made to the com¬ 
mission about the acts of Secretaries Carlisle 
and Smith on this line, but this is the first 
case against the post-office department under 
Mr. Bissell, and I must confess my surprise. 
Mr. Bissell always has been perfectly frank 
and honest with me .”—Washington Dispatch, 
Buffalo Express, October 85. 

Surprising to both the friends and enemies 
of true civil reform is the act of Secretary 
Hoke Smith in abolishing the board of pro¬ 
motions in the interior department. To the 
enemies of an honest public service the sur¬ 
prise must be most gratifying, but to those 
who believe that government business should 
be transacted in accordance with business prin¬ 
ciples this official declaration of hostility is 
far from welcome.— Washington Star, July 15. 

This plan provides for reducing the repub¬ 
lican clerks holding positions of the higher 
grade to the lower ones, and promoting good 
democratic clerks to the vacancy. The records 
and pension division of the war department 
was the scene of the first operations of this 
plan. During the summer months over one 
hundred clerks were reduced and a hundred 
promoted to the higher places. Secretary La¬ 
ment, on the plea that he did not wish to em¬ 
barrass the clerks by having the truth known 
that they were reduced on the ground of ineffi¬ 
ciency, suppressed all their names from the 
newspapers, and the victims, desiring to hold 
their place even at reduced salaries, kept quiet 
and submitted to the reduction. 

In Secretary Carlisle’s department no secrecy 
has been observed. All actions of this kind 
have been announced, and it was no trouble to 
learn that politics, pure and simple, governed 
this change of places. In the second auditor’s 
bureau, which is provided over by T. Stobbo 
Farrow, of South Carolina, on the 10th of this 
month, sixty clerks were compelled to change 
places. In some instances the reduction in sal- 








82 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ary and promotion accordingly amounted to 
$400 per annum. From a source that is entirely 
trustworthy the Express correspondent learns 
that every one of the thirty clerks that were re¬ 
duced were republicans and every one of those 
promoted were democrats or had strong dem¬ 
ocratic influence. It is also asserted that those 
reduced had splendid records and far exceeded 
in ability those who take their places. 

In the first comptroller’s oflSce, however, the 
changes have almost been unanimous. This 
bureau is presided over by Kobert B. Bowler, 
of Ohio. When he took charge of his bureau 
he found therein sixty-one employes, of whom 
thirty-five were republicans. He has been in 
in office only about four months, but during 
that period seven of the republicans have been 
dismissed, while twenty-seven of the others 
were compelled to change places and salaries 
with democrats. This official also has an¬ 
nounced that if he is left alone he will make 
a clean sweep, giving all the higher class 
places to democrats and forcing the republi¬ 
cans down to the lower grades. 

In the second comptroller’s office an order 
was issued the other day making eighteen of 
these political changes. In the sixth auditor’s 
office twenty-nine changes have been made so 
far. 

Another place where this plan has been 
worked very successfully for the democrats is 
in the pension office. During the past two 
weeks over one hundred of these political 
changes have been made. An investigation 
shows that of those promoted not more than 
eight or ten were republicans.— Washington 
Dispatch, Buffalo Express, September 25. 

Secretary Hoke Smith came to Atlanta yes¬ 
terday ostensibly to see his family, but in re¬ 
ality to settle the postmastership fight, and, 
unless all signs fail, he did settle it. The 
fight was a three-corned one between J. M. 
Couper, backed by Senator Gordon; Dr- Ames 
Fox, backed by Senator Colquitt and Con¬ 
gressman Livingstone, and Anton Kontz, who 
has strong local backing. But none of these 
will win. The lucky man isex-Postmaster Ren- 
roe, who was postmaster under Mr. Cleveland’s 
first administration. The appointment will 
not be an especially popular one, but the peo¬ 
ple will be glad to see the controversy settled. 
—Atlanta {Ga.) Dispatch, New York Times, Sep¬ 
tember 19. 

Secretary Smith’s l.\andling of everything 
connected with the civil service in his depart¬ 
ment is fantastic in the extreme. His latest 
performances in the census ofiBce include some 
dismissals which are beyond explanation by 
any ordinary rules. One of these cases is that 
of Josiah C. Stoddard, of New York, late dis¬ 
bursing clerk. Mr. Stoddard was formerly dis¬ 
bursing clerk in the department of labor, hav¬ 
ing been placed there by Commissioner Car- 
roll D. Wright, who has just been placed in 
charge of the census office also. Mr. Stod¬ 
dard left the department of labor to go over 
to the census office because they need a par¬ 
ticularly careful oflScer there. Census accounts 
are curious things, involving all kinds of 
out-of-the-way items. The disbursing clerk, 
therefore, requires to have a keen intelligence 
to enable him to discriminate between what 
can properly be paid and what can not. A 
former disbursing officer of the census office, 
through no intentional wrong-doing of his 
own, succeeded in laying up against himself a 
mass of charges which were disallowed at the 
treasury department, aggregating some $12,- 
000, and his bondsmen had finally to go to 
Congress for relief. Mr. Stoddard, however, 
has handled his business with such care and 
precaution that some $9,000,000 have passed 
through his hands without a single disallow¬ 
ance, so far as can be ascertained. On the 


very eve of Commissioner Wright’s taking 
charge of the census office, this man whom he 
had selected once for his own department on 
account of his exceptional abilities is turned 
adrift. 

Another instance in point is that of John 
D. Leland, of New York, who was chief of the 
population division in the tenth census, was 
very highly thought of by General Walker, 
was retained by Superintendent Porter through 
all his administration because of his experi¬ 
ence and his record for usefulness, and who is 
withal, it is understood, an out-and out demo¬ 
crat. The fact, however, that he was a north¬ 
ern man and came over from the last admin¬ 
istration was probably argument enough to 
enable somebody who has the ear of Secretary 
Smith to procure his dismissal.— Washington 
Dispatch, New York Evening Post, October 7. 


A REPUBLICAN DISTRICT ATTOR¬ 
NEY PROSECUTES REPUBLI¬ 
CAN LAW-BREAKERS. 

The fourth and most important of the series 
of prosecutions begun this year in Kentucky 
under the federal law prohibiting political as 
sessments, resulted, on the 25th of October, in 
the conviction of Walter P. Shaw in the Uni¬ 
ted States district court. A brief review of 
the facts brought out can not fail to interest 
your readers. 

Shortly after Albert Scott was appointed 
collector of this, the fifth district of Kentucky, 
there was organized among the storekeepers 
and gaugers of the district what was termed a 
“revenue circle.” Shaw, who was at the time 
a clerk in the collector’s office, visited the va¬ 
rious distilleries in the district where the rev¬ 
enue officers were assigned to duty, and organ¬ 
ized the society ; he administered an oath to 
the officers and explained the object of the or¬ 
ganization. It was in substance that they 
were to secretly contribute two per cent, of 
their salaries each month to be used for polit¬ 
ical purposes and for the maintenance of them¬ 
selves and the collector in office. It has been 
impossible to ascertain precisely the amount 
of money collected by the “circle,” but it 
probably amounted to three or four thousand 
dollars. This “circle” was dissolved June, 
1890, and another organization was got up, 
fixing the monthly assessments at five percent, 
from the beginning of each officer’s service, 
crediting those who had paid the “circle” 
with the two per cent., and this five per cent, 
was collected until the 1st of December, 1892. 
A complete list of the clerks, employes and of¬ 
ficers in the internal revenue service in this 
district, together with the amounts of the sal¬ 
ary drawn by them, and the amount due by 
them—that is, five per cent, on the whole 
amount of the salaries, less any payments that 
had been made—was furnished monthly to a 
man, first C. R. Barnes, and afterward F. M. 
Heinig, whose duty it was to send to the per¬ 
sons whose names appeared on the list a card 
requesting them to pay the amount or remit 
it to him. The person who collected these as¬ 
sessments made a list at the end of the month, 
giving the name and the amount paid by each 
officer, and then made a check to one Niman, 


who is a brother-in-law of the chief deputy, 
William E. Riley. Niman would cash the 
check, and, after deducting two per cent., take 
the money and the list to one Wade Sheltman, 
who had formerly been a business partner of 
Riley’s. Sheltman deposited a good deal of 
the money in bank; it appeared that he had 
paid out to various political committees about 
$11,700. 

The total amount collected was something 
like $40,000. About $25,000 has been traced, 
by the evidence of bankers, into the hands of 
Sheltman, but other large collections have 
been made by him, the amount of which it has 
been impossible to ascertain. It is estimated 
that there was something like $20,000 or $25,- 
000 paid to ex-Collector Scott and Riley. 
What disposition was made by them of this 
large sum of money is not yet known. 

Barnes and Heinig deducted two or three 
per cent, for their services for making the col¬ 
lections, Niman two per cent., and Sheltman 
various amounts at different times, amounting 
to two or three per cent. 

The list that was prepared by Barnes and 
Heinig of each month’s collections was de¬ 
livered to Sheltman, who delivered it at the 
end of each month to Riley or to Scott. The 
persons who failed to pay their assessments 
were not assigned to duty until the assessments 
were paid. There never was any committee 
of any sort to ex;amine the accounts of any of 
these parties. Besides this, the collector and 
his chief deputy often had the store-keepers 
and gaugers going to ward meetings and to 
political conventions to aid them in their fac¬ 
tional controversies, and were allowed by 
Scott to make up claims against the govern¬ 
ment for services which were never rendered, 
and these claims were approved by the collect¬ 
or. It is doubtful, in short, whether there 
ever existed anywhere more gross abuses than 
have been discovered in this district under ex- 
Collector Scott and his chief deputy Riley. 

The prosecutions now on foot resulted from 
investigations made by the grand juries, pur¬ 
suant to a request of the United States Civil 
Service Commission. The commission trans¬ 
mitted to George W. Jolly, the United States 
district attorney, a number of affidavits and 
letters received by them in Washington about 
a year ago, charging that the civil service law 
had been violated in the second collection 
district and in the fifth collection district. Six 
indictments were returned by the grand jury 
at Owensboro ; three have been tried, and two 
out of the three defendants tried have been 
convicted. Three indictments were returned 
at Louisville, one of which has just been tried 
with the result of convicting Shaw. The cases 
of Scott and Riley will be tried on the 27th of 
November, and, if they have been worked up 
with the same admirable thoroughness which 
has distinguished Mr. Jolly’s work in the other 
cases he has tried, there is good reason to look 
for conviction in both instances. Every pa¬ 
triotic Kentuckian is prouder of his state for 
this month’s record .—November Good Govem- 
‘ ment. 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


83 


THE PLEDGES. 

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY. 

“ Public office is a public trust. We reaffirm the 
declaration of the democratic national convention 
of 1876 for the reform of the civil service, [Reform 
is necessary in the civil service. Experience 
proves that efficient, economical conduct of the 
government business is not possible if its civil serv¬ 
ice be subject to change at every election, be a prize 
fought for at the ballot-box, be a brief reward of 
party zeal, instead of posts of honor, assigned for 
proved competency and held for fidelity in the 
public employ; that the dispensing of patronage should 
neither be a tax upon the time of all our public men, nor 
the instrument of their ambition] and we call for the 
honest enforcement of all laws regulating the 
same. The nomination of a President, as in the 
recent republican convention by delegations com¬ 
posed largely of his appointees, holding office at 
his pleasure, is a scandalous satire upon free popu¬ 
lar institutions, and a startling illustration of the 
methods by which a President may gratify his am¬ 
bition. We denounce a policy under which federal 
office-holders usurp control of party conventions in 
the states, and we pledge the democratic party to 
the reform of these and all other abuses which 
threaten individual liberty and local self-govern¬ 
ment.’’— National Democratic Platform, 1892. 

THE DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENT. 

One mode of the misappropriation of public funds 
is avoided when appointments to office. Instead of 
being the rewards of partisan activity, are awarded 
to those whose efficiency promises a fair return of 
work for the compensation paid to them. To secure 
the fitness and competency of appointees to office, 
and to remove from political action the demoral¬ 
izing madness for spoils, civil service reform has 
found a place in our public policy and laws. The 
benefits already gained through this instrumental¬ 
ity, and the further usefulness it promises, entitle 
it to the hearty support and encouragement of all 
who desire to see our public service well performed, 
or who hope for the elevation of political sentiment 
and the purification of political methods. 

The oath I now take to preserve, protect and de¬ 
fend the constitution of the United States not only 
impressively defines the great responsibility I as¬ 
sume, but suggests obedience to constitutional 
commands as the rule by which my official conduct 
must be guided. I shall, to the best of my ability 
and within my sphere of duty, preserve the consti¬ 
tution by loyally protecting every grant of federal 
power it contains, by defending all its restraints 
when attacked by impatience and restlessness, and 
by enforcing its limitations and reservations in 
favor of the states and the people. 

Fully impressed with the gravity of the duties 
that confront me, and mindful of my weakness, I 
should he appalled if it were my lot to hear un¬ 
aided the responsibilities that await me. I am, 
however, saved from discouragement when I re¬ 
member that I shall have the support and the 
counsel and co-operation of wise and patriotic men, 
who will stand at my side in cabinet places, or will 
represent the people in their legislative halls. I 
find also much comfort in remembering that my 
countrymen are just and generous, and in the as¬ 
surance that they will not condemn those who, by 
sincere devotion to their service, deserve iheir for¬ 
bearance and approval. 

Above all, I know there is a Supreme Being who 
rules the affairs of men, and whose goodness and 
mercy have always followed the American people; 
and I know He will not turn from us now if we 
humbly and reverently seek His powerful aid.— 
From the President’s Inaugural Address. 

A REPRESENTATIVE DEMOCRATIC PAPER. 

So, on the subject of civil service reform. Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland speaks in language which none can 
misunderstand. There is no hedging because now 
the spoils happen to be within the reach of those of 
his own party. President Cleveland is just as much 
in favor of putting the civil service on a business 


basis as ever was Candidate Cleveland. Not only 
does he promise faithful observance of the law as 
it stands, but he expresses the desire that its scope 
be extended. A politician would have spoken 
otherwise. But Mr. Cleveland is a statesman.— 
Indianapolis Sentinel, March 6. 


THE PERFORMANCE. 

AN OVERBEARING FEUDAL SYSTEM. 

Ex-Sheriff Wicks, of Vigo county, has been here 
several weeks looking for a chiefship of a bureau 
in the treasury department. Senator Voorkees has 
assumed the responsibility of providing for Wicks, 
but is having some difficulty in securing a place for 
him, as the Indiana quota was filled some time 
ago.— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis News, No¬ 
vember S. 

* A v 

Michael Burke, of Michigan City, has been ap¬ 
pointed to a place in the government printing office 
through Senator Voorhees.— TEas/i«»»j7fon Dispatch, 
Indianapolis Sentinel, October 21. 

* * * 

Miss Virginia Kaiser, of Richmond, Ind., lately 
arrived in Washington, has been appointed to a po¬ 
sition in the bindery department of the govern¬ 
ment printing office. This is another case of the 
philanthropic spirit of Judge Chester Faulkner, of 
Ripley county. Miss Kaiser came here recently in 
search of employment, and failing to secure it was 
soon reduced to comparatively destitute circum¬ 
stances. The case was brought to the attention of 
Judge Faulkner, private secretary to Senator Voorhees. 
He sought the public printer and stated the case, and 
in less than two hours had secured an appointment 
for Miss Kaiser .— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis 
News, October 25. 

* * * 

Senator Voorhees arrived in this city yesterday 
on his way from Washington to his home in Terre 
Haute. He did not stop off, however, but met sev¬ 
eral of his friends at the union station while wait¬ 
ing for his train. He stated that he would rehirn to 
this city in a few days, when there would be a general 
consideration of the political patronage which he has 
been instrumental in dispensing. There are a great 
many dissatisfied persons who will have to be placated 
before Mr. Voorhees will have any real rest or peace 
of mind. He was accompanied to Terre Haute by 
John E. Lamb.— Indianapolis Sentinel, November 16. 

0 « « 

A few days ago Peter Staff and Zeb Smith, two 
Terre Haute soldiers, were dropped from the pen¬ 
sion rolls. They were drawing pensions under thg 
general law, and not under the act of 1890. They 
applied to Senator Voorhees, and both have been re¬ 
stored to the rolls with increased pensions .— Washing, 
ton Dispatch, Indianapolis News, September 16. 

v • >» 

Three written questions were handed the sena¬ 
tor. They were: ' 

‘‘Did you take a hand in the appointment of 
George G. Tanner as surveyor of customs here?” 

“Have you been asked to assist in getting Edward 
P. Thompson, postmaster here, out of office ?” 

“When will Pension Agent Ensley’s successor be 
appointed ?” 

The senator read them over carefully, and then 
said: “Now, I do not care to talk about these 
things. I will tell you why. I never interfere with 
appointments that belong to other men. The ap¬ 
pointments in Indianapolis are under the control of Con¬ 
gressman Bynum and Senator Turpie. Mr. Bynum 
and Mr. Turpie both live here. It would be wrong 
for me to interfere with appointments at their 
home. I have said to congressmen all along: ‘You 
go ahead in all matters in your district; if I can be 
of any service to you I shall be glad to help you.’ 
I never take the lead in these cases. Take the case 
of Mr. Tanner. If I should sign his recommenda¬ 
tion it would be because the congressman had 
asked me to do so. I control the appointments in the 
city in which I live. I was able to secure the ap¬ 
pointment of a democratic postmaster at Terre 


Haute and a democratic collector of internal reve¬ 
nue in that district. I say this all by way of ex¬ 
planation. You can readily see that I ought not 
to discuss appointments that belong to Senator 
Turpie and Congressman Bynum.” He said in ref¬ 
erence to the appointment of Joshua Jump, as col¬ 
lector of internal revenue, that when he decided 
to recommend the appointment of Jump he felt 
that he was recommending a man against whom no 
objection could be raised. He said he did not be¬ 
lieve there were more than two or three persons 
objecting to the appointment. In reference to the 
Indianapolis post-office, the senator said: “ Of 
course Mr. Thompson ought to be removed. He 
ought to be removed at once. He was not fit timber 
for postmaster in the first place. He wasn’t ap¬ 
pointed in the regular way; became in to serve 
out the term of another man. Of course he ought 
to go; he ought to go at once.”— Indianapolis News’ 
Inerview with Senator Voorhees, November 23. 

v <« v 

Congressman Bretz has secured an appointment for 
McHenry Owens, of Bedford, as special pension ex¬ 
aminer.—Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, October 27. 

* v 

Congressman Hammond’s private secretary, D. 
H. Fenton, is candidate for chief of a bureau in the 
treasury department. Mr. Hammond will use his 
influence to secure the appointment of his protege. 
Mr. Hammond scored quite a victory in securing 
the appointment of his predecessor. Dr. Patton, as 
receiver of a land office in the Cherokee strip. It is 
believed that he made the way easy for his own re- 
nomination also by so doing.—Washington Dispatch, 
Indianapolis News, September 28. 

V * V 

D. H. Fenton, private secretary to Congressman 
Hammond, and a resident of Hammond, Ind., has 
been appointed chief of the book-keeping division 
of the sixth auditor’s office of the treasury de¬ 
partment.— Washington Dispatch Indianapolis Netvs, 
November 8. 

V ■> * 

Leroy Wade, of Posey county, is said to have a 
fair prospect of being appointed assistant attorney- 
general. He is indorsed by Senator Voorhees and 
Congressmen Bretz and Taylor .— Washington Dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis News, April, 1893. 

V <■ o 

Congressman Taylor will not be to blame if Posey 
county is not given substantial recognition in the 
near future. Backed by both senators Mr. Taylor 
is pushing Leroy Wade, of Posey county, for assist¬ 
ant attorney-general to succeed Judge Chaney, ap¬ 
pointed from Indiana.— Dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, October 5. 

* * 

Major Kidd, of Wabash, wants to succeed Jim 
Tyner of Peru, as assistant attorney-general for the 
post-office department. The major is an infiuential 
man .— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel 
March 12. 

* * * 

Through the efforts of Congressman Martin, Mer¬ 
edith Kidd, of Wabash, has been appointed upon the 
commissionto negotiate with the five civilized tribes .— 
Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, Novem¬ 
ber 2. 

<1 * «i 

Congressman Cooper is given credit for the ap¬ 
pointment yesterday of Luther F. Short as consul- 
general to Constantinople. Mr. Short is editor of 
the Franklin (Ind.) Democrat and secretary of the 
Democratic Editorial Association of Indiana. Mr. 
Short was one of the earliest consular applicants from 
Indiana, having applied for a place before the inaug¬ 
uration. In the fight before the democratic na¬ 
tional convention he was a steadfast Cleveland 
man. The consul-generalship at Constantinople 
is worth probably $5,000 a year.-Wa.shington Dis¬ 
patch, Indianaj>olis News, September 22. 

« 

Dr. G. W. Buckner, colored, of Evansville, will 
probably be appointed assistant supervising sur¬ 
geon of the Freedmen’s Hospital in Washington at 












84 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


a salary of $1,800 a year. Congressman Taylor has 
been making a fight for Dr. Buckner for the first place; 
but that has been settled on another colored man. 
Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis News, October 4. 

The laugh just now is on editor William M. Moss, 
of the Bloomfield Democrat. Mr. Moss has caused 
to be printed in his own printing office a circular 
letter signed by the chairman and secretary of the 
democratic committee of his county and addressed 
to Senators Voorhees and Turpie, expounding his 
many virtues and arguing to the point that he 
should be appointed collector of internal revenue 
for the district he resides in. The circular has been 
placed in the hands of certain independent demo¬ 
crats here, but Mr. Moss’s friends, seeing the im¬ 
propriety of it, are trying to suppress the document. 
The circular relates among other things that Mr. 
Moss was born in a log house; that he printed at 
his own cost the democratic tickets in the campaign 
of 1884 and charged nothing for the work; that he 
published two democratic newspapers, and that he 
is now superintendent of the Bloomfield schools, 
member of the state committee and leader of the 
affairs of his town. Mr. Moss is now seeking after 
the position of superintendent of Indian schools, 
with fair prospects of success.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Journal, April ^1. 

[Moss got an Indian inspectorship a few days 
ago.] 

tt tlf 

The fight for the position of collector of the Indi¬ 
anapolis custom-house has become acrimonious in 
its nature. It is a three-sided fight between Mau¬ 
rice Donnelly, John Rail and Smith Myers. There 
are other applicants for the place, but they do not 
appear to figure in it to any great extent. Word 
was received here a few days ago that Congress¬ 
man Bynum had said that the appointment would 
probably be made Saturday (to-morrow), and that 
the appointee would be John Rail. This stirred up 
Donnelly’s friends to a white heat, and a lot of 
charges against Rail was sent on to Washington; 
one bundle for Mr. Bynum, another for President 
Cleveland, and a third for Secretary Carlisle. 

One of Mr. Rail’s strongest supporters is Martin 
J. Murphy, president of the city council. A friend 
met Mr. Murphy on the street and said to him, “If 
John Rail gets that place, there will be h—11 to 
pay.” 

“Yes,” said Murphy, “and if he don’t get it there 
will be two kinds of h—11 to pay.” 

There was some talk this morning that the de¬ 
mocracy would unite on some other candidate and 
telegraph Bynum to drop Rail and Donnelly in the 
interests of harmony. Rail’s friends, however, say 
that this will not be done; that the place has been 
promised to him and he must have it. 

There is another story going around to the effect 
that persons receivlngthe appointment to office are 
required to obligate themselves to pay in a certain 
portion of their salary for campaign funds. This 
could not be traced to any person who had been 
requested to make such contributions, and Chair¬ 
man Taggart says that it is a falsehood.—Jndmnap- 
oUs News, May 5. 

* * * 

Congressman Bynum, of Indiana, was one of 
about twenty congressmen to call on Secretary 
Carlisle this morning before 10: 30 o’clock. This is 
one of the secretary’s regular reception days, and 
he has been very strict in allowing no office-seek¬ 
ers to call on him at other than reception days. 
His office this morning was crowded with appli¬ 
cants and their congressional representatives. Mr. 
Bynum was alone, but came to see the secretary 
about having the surveyor of the port at Indiana- 
apolis appointed within a short time.— Washington 
Dispatch, Indianapolis News, October 19. 

« << <• 

Representative Bynum called at the treasury de¬ 
partment this morning to make known his recom¬ 
mendation for the surveyor of the port at Indian¬ 
apolis. Secretary Carlisle, however, has com¬ 
menced to feel the strain of the silver fight and was 


confined to his house, weak and Indisposed. Mr. 
Bynum was compelled to postpone his recommen¬ 
dation until the secretary could be seen at his office. 
He said this morning that he had made up his mind 
some months ago whom he would recommend, but 
would not make known the name until the appoint¬ 
ment was ma.de.—Washington Dispatch, Indianapo¬ 
lis Netvs, October ZS. 

<c « 

Congressman Bynum called on Secretary Carlisle 
and again Indicated his readiness to spring the 
name of the new surveyor of the port at Indianapo¬ 
lis whenever the secretary was prepared to hear it. 
Secretary Carlisle said to-day that he would take 
up appointments probably next week. This con¬ 
clusion is undoubtedly based on the belief that the 
silver question will be out of the way by that time. 
The surveyor will probably not be named before 
next week. It is reported that an entirely new 
name has been secured by Mr. Bynum. “Charley” 
Bridges, of Indianapolis, who was here several 
days last week, made an attempt to land the office, 
so it is claimed, but men who are closest to Bynum 
do not believe Bridges will succeed.—li'as/tfwpton 
Dispatch, Indianapolis News, October 25. 

* * * 

Representative Bynum is said to be having about 
as much agony over the surveyorship of customs 
at Indianapolis as Representative Holman had at 
one time recently over choosing a collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue. Neither wanted to name a man 
from among the many aspirants; neither wanted 
to discriminate, and each would have been happy 
with either dear charmer aspirant away. Mr. By¬ 
num’s action just at this time is a mystery at the 
treasury department, where officials say they are 
unable to learn who the Indianapolis congressman 
wants given the place, which is regarded as a fat 
plum. Mr. Bynum refuses to tell even his most inti¬ 
mate friends in congress whom he wants appointed. 
He says he has no choice, and yet he is quote i as 
having said that the man who will be appointed 
has not been publicly named for the position, and 
that the appointment will create surprise. Secre¬ 
tary Carlisle is reported to be in Mr. Bynum’s con¬ 
fidence and to have the name of his choice. A high 
treasury official said to-day that the secret of Mr. 
Bynum’s mysteriousness and secrecy was due to 
the fact that he had “queered” himself at the White 
House over an appointment some months ago. It 
is already anticipated by Indiana democrats in 
congress that a great deal of dissatisfaction will 
follow the appointment, which Secretary Carlisle 
hinted to-day would be made next week. It will 
surely be made within a couple of days after the 
silver bill is passed by the senate.—Washington 
Dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, October 26. 

* * * 

Representative Bynum has cut the gordian knot 
in the matter of the surveyorship of the port of In¬ 
dianapolis. The fight for the place has been so bitter 
and there have been so many candidates that Mr. By¬ 
num deemed it -best to select some one for the place 
who had not been a candidate, and therefore in no 
way mixed, up in any factional quarrel. Mr. Bynum 
and Senators Voorhees and Turpie picked out the 
man and got his consent to accept and then joined 
in his recommendation to the President. The name 
was satisfactory to the latter and the appointment 
will probably be made by him to-morrow. The 
new surveyer will be Mr. George G. Tanner.—TPasft- 
ington Dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, November 7. 

» * * 

The appointment of Mr. Tanner ends a contest for 
office that has been annoying to Congressman By¬ 
num. Soon after the election of President Cleve¬ 
land many candidates for the place announced 
themselves. It was the understanding that the ap¬ 
pointment would be made on the recommendation 
of Mr. Bynum, and he was beselged early and late 
by the applicants. The original candidates for the 
place were Smith H. Myers, Maurice Donnelly, 
James M. Healy, Thomas Madden, John A. Reaume, 
John Rail and Edward St. George Rogers. Several 
of the candidates and their friends spent much 


time in Washington immediately after the inaugu¬ 
ration. Each candidate professed to believe at 
some time during the long wait that he would be 
appointed. Local Democrats have charged that 
Congressman Bynum played “hot and cold” with 
the candidates. It is averred that at one time he 
told the friends of Smith H. Myers that Mr. Myers 
would be appointed, and that at other times he 
said the same thing with reference to other candi¬ 
dates. Along in the summer it was announced 
from Washington that John Rail, the superintend¬ 
ent of the water company, would be appointed. 
This announcement brought forth a protest from 
some Democrats, who declared that Rail was not 
qualified for the position. The protest was for¬ 
warded to Washington, and Rail’s commission did 
not come. Still later it was declared that either 
Thomas Madden or J. A. Reaume would be ap¬ 
pointed, and later still some of the local Democrats 
seemed to think that W. T. Steele, ex-superintend¬ 
ent of the Citizens’ Street Railroad Company,would 
be the man. The fight all the way through was 
marked with bitterness, and friends of the various 
candidates have threatened to “get even” with By¬ 
num unless their particular candidate was ap¬ 
pointed. Congressman Bynum has maintained all 
the way through the contest that he was not guilty 
of double dealing, and that he was not making 
definite promises to candidates, as was alleged.— 
Indianapolis News, November 7. 

* * * 

Senator Voorhees, Congressmen Martin, Cooper 
and Bynum were at the White House this morning, 
before the cabinet meeting,hoping to seethe Presi¬ 
dent in the interest of several applications for 
office. The President sent word out that he would 
be occupied with executive business until the cabi¬ 
net meeting, and could not see his callers. This 
was considerable of a disappointment to the In¬ 
diana men. Senator Voorhees intends to leave for 
Indiana to-morrow. President Cleveland gave out 
word through his private secretary this morning 
that no new appointment cases would be con¬ 
sidered until congress met. A number of new ap¬ 
pointments have been considered and practically 
settled. These will be announced, but no new 
cases will be taken up. One of the appointments 
settled is understood to be the Indiana pension 
agent. Mayor Zollinger, of Fort Wayne, will be 
appointed, 

“When will the Indianapolis postmaster be ap¬ 
pointed?” Congressman Bynum was asked to day. 

“I don’t know; ask Senator Turpie. He is look¬ 
ing after that.”— Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis 
News, November 10. 

if if if 

Congressman W. D. Bynum has about concluded all 
satisfactory arrangements for the appointment of 
George 6. Tanner, of Indianapolis, as collector of 
customs for that port .— Washington Dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, November 13. 

* * * 

Yesterday Capt.Thomas Hanlon, chairman of the 
Floyd county democratic central committee, re¬ 
ceived from Senator Voorhees a letter in regard to 
the appointment of the postmaster of this city to 
succeed W. B. Godfrey that showed in the most un¬ 
mistakable manner the position of the distinguished 
statesman, and caused the friends of C. W. Schind¬ 
ler considerable elation, with a corresponding de¬ 
pressing effect on the other aspirants for the place 
and their friends. In the letter Mr. Voorhees states 
that he had indorsed the recommendation of Mr. 
Schindler for the place at the request of the Hon. 
Jason B. Brown, congressman from the New Albany 
district, and that he could see no reason for with¬ 
drawing his indorsement. The appointment of the 
postmasters, the letter recited, rested with the congress¬ 
man from the various districts when they were in accor^ 
with the administration having the appointing power, 
and that in this case he could see no reason why Mr^ 
Brown should be deprived of that privilege.—New Albany 
Dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, July 14. 

[Schindler was appointed postmaster.] 











The Civil service chronicle. 


If we see nothing in our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoil, we slnill fail at every point.— 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November 18 1892. 


INDIANAPOLIS, DECEMBER, 1893. terms : ^ ?o“cen?8pL%y“""“ 


VoL. II, No. 10. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

The President’s message is noted for its 
vigorous support of civil service reform, 
and in this respect it is in line with all of 
his writings. It is noticeable also that he 
particularly mentions cabinet officers who 
express an opinion in favor of reform, or 
who have done anything to carry it out in 
their departments. An example of this 
notice is in his calling attention to the fact 
that Secretary Morton has not made spoil 
of his chiefs of division. This is a severe 
censure upon such cabinet officers as Car¬ 
lisle and Hoke Smith. But why has the 
President been so timid? Why did he 
not long ago tell Carlisle and Smith that he 
would have none of their spoils methods? 

The President has also this month done 
another vigorous act which makes for 
righteousness in the removal of Johnston 
from the civil service commission, and in 
the appointment of Mr, John R. Proctor to 
the vacancy. It is to be hoped that we 
again have a useful coinmission. Johnston 
was strangely out of place. He was in 
favor of an extension of the merit system 
but dissented from naming particular 
places for it. He. was always unhappy 
over the classification of the free delivery 
post-offices, and at last criticised this to 
President Cleveland because it was done 
after Harrison’s defeat, not thinking that 
he was with equal severity criticising his 
own superior. He was sleepless in his 
vigilance for democratic partisans. He 
thought no man entitled to know the cause 
of his removal until it came to the request 
for his own resignation. He went about 
Washington with a pistol in his hip pocket, 
shaking his fists when he felt his honor 
was touched, and threatening to “slap” the 
faces of those who criticised him. The 
editor of the Chronicle has been specially 
mentioned for this last attention. 

The President, in his message, said some 
things about civil service reformers which 
would have been better omitted. Still, a 
man who has turned out a civil service 
commissioner and the Topeka postmaster 
in the same month for blocking or tricking 
the civil service law, may claim some room 
for his temper. It is well known that Mr. 
Cleveland has never liked to hear unpala¬ 


table truth, and reformers do not lay it up 
against him that he calls them “querulous” 
and “self-constituted guardians of the law,” 
and their theories “sublimated,” and so on. 
It does not hurt them; it makes him feel 
better, and it eases the rage of the crowd 
of looters whom he allows chiefly to have 
his ear. 

It can not be expected, however, that the 
“self-constituted guardians of reform” will 
be silent. One of their sublimated theories 
has been that it was unmanly and unjust 
to dismiss officers upon charges which only 
the congressmen were allowed to see, and 
they have “queruously” insisted that the 
President ought not to buy Voorhees’s vote, 
nor in the name of pension reform fill up 
the pension boards with congressmen’s po¬ 
litical doctors to whom we pay $1,700,000 a 
year; nor should the offices under the 
civil service law be put in charge of those 
who would be glad to see that law broken 
down. They will not stop talking about 
these and other things like them, for they 
have found that if they do, the ideas which 
at once come to the front exclusively are 
not the ideas in the fervid writings of Mr. 
Cleveland in favor of civil service reform, 
but they are the ideas of the Carlisles and 
the Hoke Smiths. The “self-constituted 
guardians” began advocating this reform 
in 1867, and they have always been used to 
such little pleasantries as the President 
now treats them to, and from all kinds of 
politicians, from the President to the ward- 
heeler. Against this they have brought this 
reform to its present rugged and healthy 
state, and they propose to carry it to com¬ 
pletion. 


The report from Washington that Voor- 
hees wants to be the democratic candidate 
for President in 1896, seems to have a 
foundation. It would be a bitter comment¬ 
ary upon Mr. Cleveland’s statesmanship, 
should it result that “ placating ” this hum¬ 
bug, who would be comic if he were not so 
dangerous, with spoil gave him such im¬ 
portance as to make him the presidential 
candidate of his party. If it should turn 
out that the democrats deserve defeat in 
1896 it is to be hoped that they will nom¬ 
inate Voorhees. Let them shoulder all 
that is bad in politics and in public life and 
blunder into a defeat in comparison with 
which Maynard’s defeat will seem a vic¬ 
tory. 


In other columns we give the usual de¬ 
tailed account of the labors of Indiana 
congressmen in Washington during the 
month. Congressman Cooper is trying to 
get a place for “ Dick” Johnson. Bynum 
has worked William Warmack, colored, 
into a porter’s place in the railway mail 
service, and has revived here what Secre¬ 
tary Morton called the “ Bureau of Animal 
Indolence,” and Dr. Stucky and his assist¬ 
ants have been again restored to full pay. 
The only concern which exports meat 
from this place has had an order from Ger¬ 
many, and it is likely that this bureau will 
have several days’ work to do before the 
holidays. Congressman Martin has caused 
Collector Bracken to appoint “the Hon. 
William H. Harkins, of Portland, a deputy 
collector.” Martin is also the hero of a 
bill to repeal the civil service law. Con¬ 
gressman Hammond “is giving some at¬ 
tention to presidential postmasters.” Bretz 
is trying to have John Johnson, editor of 
the Democrat, made postmaster at Bedford, 
and John W. McCarty at Washington, and 
one Wilson at Worthington. Jason Brown 
expects “ a sweep-out of the republican 
employes at the Jefiersonville army depot 
about the first of January.” Congressman 
Conn very boldly refused the postmaster- 
general to get up a petition to support his 
man for the postmastership at Notre Dame. 
Congressman Taylor is trying hard to get 
his man in as inspector of steamboats at 
Evansville, against Poet Hays, Congress¬ 
man Caruth’s man. He expects to “ name” 
an Alaska commissioner, a surgeon of the 
freedmen’s hospital, and an assistant attor¬ 
ney-general. Congressman Holman “is 
sweating purple moisture” over the fight 
for the Shelbyville post-office. Congress¬ 
man Voorhees has called upon Logan Car¬ 
lisle to give “ Charles E. Brown, a colored 
democrat,” a place, and has designated 
three men, any one of whom may be turned 
out for his man. 


The Indian Rights Association has re¬ 
cently issued a pamphlet under the title, 
“The Appointment of a First-rate Indian 
Agent by the New Administration.” It 
was written out of the fullness of heart to 
do all possible justice, and not, as a for¬ 
eigner unfamiliar with the American civil 
service system would suppose, to lampoon 
the administration. In natural surprise 
he might be pardoned the exclamation. 




































86 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


“ Great Heavens, in this land of the free, 
is it such an epoch, so unusual a circum¬ 
stance, that they issue a bulletin to an¬ 
nounce that a first-rate Indian agent has 
been appointed! What sort of men is it 
their custom to put over these helpless 
wards of the nation ? What a land is this! 

I shall next read of the jailer who is hu¬ 
mane and competent, of the manager of 
the orphan asylum who does not beat and 
starve the orphans, and of a gentleman 
who does not lie and cheat.” 

If he is a philosophical foreigner he will 
read that the grossly incompetent agent 
removed was Senator Pettigrew’s man, 
and he will then come upon the astound¬ 
ing fact that in this country these places 
are parcelled out, after months of broils 
and fights, among senators and congress¬ 
men who use them largely as private per¬ 
quisites. Upon further investigation he will 
find that the principle of appointment has 
not been changed, but the new Indian 
agent was chosen by favoritism, as Petti¬ 
grew’s man was, only the former turns out 
to be a good man. 

Secretary Carlisle has made another of those 
changes which have so often disarmed the would- 
be defenders of this administration. A. O. Latham, 
chief of the diplomatic and consular division of 
fifth auditor’s office, whose resignation has been 
called for, is a veteran treasury officer, with an ex¬ 
cellent record for character, skill, and ability. 
There are no visible reasons for his removal except 
the fact that he has attended too honestly to his 
duties to take the sort of interest in politics which 
is a passport to the secretary’s favor. He will have 
to step out and make room for a raw recruit who 
has proved his democracy by his works. The man¬ 
agement of the diplomatic and consular division 
requires expert knowledge in order to protect the 
government thoroughly well and to save time and 
friction for all concerned. To take out a man who 
has the work of the office at his fingers’ ends, whose 
acquaintance with the precedents is so full as to 
save searching in nine cases out of ten, and to put 
in his place one who will require twenty years’ 
practice to reach the same point of excellence, can 
have only one effect; it must cripple the service 
and add to the labors of everybody in the office or 
having business with it—Washington dispatch, New 
York Evening Post, November SI. 

As is well understood, the President al¬ 
lows the members of his cabinet entire 
freedom to act as spoilsmen or not. Each 
man is free to run his department accord¬ 
ing to his individual taste, and most of 
them prefer to act in opposition to the 
democratic platform and to the President’s 
repeated utterances. Yet he seems an¬ 
noyed to have their acts brought to his no¬ 
tice, and he has turned a deaf ear to all re¬ 
quests to him to interfere. He has always 
vigorously disapproved of nepotism. It 
has been suggested that there were family 
reasons why the secretary of the treasury 
needed his son. Whatever the reason, the 
president gave way and Logan Carlisle was 
appointed. Month after month this youth 
has visited an unmerciful proscription 
upon old and faithful employes, and 
his father has acquiesced and the Presi¬ 


dent has acquiesced. Has not the time 
come for a public protest from the various 
civil service reform associations against 
these acts, and especially against the per¬ 
nicious principle adopted by the President 
of non-interference? Doubtless the com¬ 
mittee, of which Mr. Foulke is chairman, 
will look into the civil service of the treas¬ 
ury, and it may be well to wait for their 
report. 


The Civil Service Reform Association of 
Pennsylvania has issued a bulletin under 
date of October, 1893, which contains a 
feature that could be copied by other asso¬ 
ciations with great profit. It prints clip¬ 
pings from the daily press regarding ap¬ 
pointments and removals in the various 
oflBces. Elsewhere will be found some 
interesting illustrations regarding the 
Philadelphia post-office and the class of 
men whom Postmaster Carr has chosen to 
fill the places of the republican incum¬ 
bents, out of “duty to the government, 
and to the patrons of this office, having re¬ 
gard to the duty I owe myself as an official 
not only under oath but also under heavy 
security.” Mr. Carr should free his mind 
of cant and imitate the brutal frankness of 
Harrity’s internal revenue collector, who 
decapitated his subordinates with the ex¬ 
planation that to the victor belong the 
spoils. 


To the Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle: 

In your resume of the results of the election you 
omitted all notice of the fact that the republican 
ticket in this state was elected on a direct civil serv¬ 
ice reform issue; on a platform which distinctly 
pledges the party to reform existing abuses in 
the civil service, and, best of all, that the comp¬ 
troller-elect has not only pledged himself, hut is 
going to keep his pledge, to refuse warrants for the 
payment of salaries to persons whom we show have 
been illegally appointed. I think that there never 
has been a state election in which civil service re¬ 
form was made so direct and positive an issue, nor 
which has been more productive of results. Mr. 
McAneny’s communication to the last issue of Good 
Government, if anything, understates the case, hut it 
was written in ignorance of the fact that Comp¬ 
troller-elect Roberts had personally renewed to me 
his anti-election pledges, and by his earnest and 
diligent inquiry into the detail of the matters in¬ 
volved in our civil service reform crusade, has 
given the very best evidence of his sincerity. 

Very truly, etc., Frank W. Loomis. 

Buffalo, New York, November S9. 

The canvass of the election returns since 
the above letter was written shows that 
James A. Roberts led all other candidates, 
and bears out Mr. Loomis’s statement of 
the weight of the reform question in the 
campaign. The reform structure in New 
York had been nearly racked to pieces by 
Hill, Flower and Tammany. And to the 
Buffalo Association, which is now the most 
efficient in the country, must be given the 
credit of leading in the movement to right 
it up. This association spends time and 
money and knows no party or individual. 
To its incentive, more than to anything 


else, will be due the coming final overthrow 
of Plattism, Hillism, and Tammanyism in 
that state. 

One of the most powerful causes of the 
republican defeat in 1888 was Plattism. 
In the recent election in New York Hill¬ 
ism, which is the same thing, brought de¬ 
feat to the democrats by 100,000 against 
Maynard. It would be the height of ab¬ 
surdity to say that this, defeat indicated 
that the people wanted Plattism back. Yet 
in the republican primaries in New York 
December 12, the old crowd headed by 
Platt’s man, Jake Patterson, were over¬ 
whelmingly victorious. This again shows 
what the Chronicle has always main¬ 
tained, that the primary is impracticable 
as a place for ridding the public of a cor¬ 
rupt and incorrigible party machine. Not 
a tenth of the members of a party go to the 
primary, and if they did the life-politicians 
would “down” them. The only practicable 
means in sight of dealing with Plattism 
and Hillism is for voters to refuse utterly 
to be bound by the action of any party 
caucus or convention. 


Five or six years ago Croker, the chief 
boss of Tammany, declared under oath that 
he was a poor man. Later he became the 
head of Tammany Hall. He has recently 
invested a half million in a stock farm and 
has bought and maintains a stable of race 
horses, and has now purchased an eighty 
thousand dollar house on Fifth avenue, and 
he lives as a very rich man. Five years 
ago Mayor Gilroy, another Tammany 
leader, was only a deputy county clerk 
and was poor. He has^ never had any oc¬ 
cupation but politics. He is now a very 
rich man. The same condition of wealth, 
perhaps in a less extent, is true of other 
Tammany leaders who were poor men, 
and who, while becoming rich, have en¬ 
gaged in no business except politics in con¬ 
nection with Tammany Hall. The money 
they have can come from no other source 
than from receipts which come into their 
hands as Tammany bosses. This shows 
what an amount of money can be made 
out of political pulls when the spoils sys¬ 
tem reaches its full perfection as it has in 
Tammany Hall. No books are kept by 
this organization. But no man can be ap¬ 
pointed to an office until he has made a 
contribution to Tammany. No man, from 
judge to constable, can be a candidate un¬ 
less he buys the privilege by a contribu¬ 
tion. The periodical assessments upon the 
wages of public employes are as relentless 
and irresistible as public taxation is. Con¬ 
tractors are obliged t© pay for their con¬ 
tracts and for the privilege of carrying 
them out unmolested and for having their 
bills allowed after their work is done. The 
great corporations and business interests 





















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


87 


of New York city pay blackmail to be let 
alone in the exercise of their ordinary 
rights. They also pay blackmail to pre¬ 
vent blackmailing legislation. The busi¬ 
ness interests of New York city do not 
dare to make an open contribution to any 
object unfriendly to Tammany. No busi¬ 
ness man in New York dares publicly to 
say anything against Tammany. Small 
tradesmen are forced to join Tammany 
and contribute to its funds to save their 
business from being destroyed. Saloons 
and houses of ill-fame are constant objects 
of enormous blackmail. As a high au¬ 
thority says, this condition of things is 
such that there is nothing in Russia that 
approaches it, nor in Turkey that can sur¬ 
pass it. 

The late assistant secretary of state ex¬ 
pressed the opinion that however excel¬ 
lent the management of their consular 
service by foreign countries might be^ it 
was not feasible for us. Just why was not 
then plain and it is still less so upon read¬ 
ing the London letter to the New York 
Evening Past, under date of November 24, 
regarding the English consular system, and 
printed elsewhere. There is a record of 
promotions and longer service whilst our 
latest barbarity was the removal of Mr. 
Studer, our consul at Singapore. He writes 
to a friend: 

“ Health permitting, I may see you next spring 
In New York (the doctors don’t want me to leave 
here for the north in autumn). I am not at all 
ashamed to tell you that, after twenty-two years of 
service as consul (undermined health from cli¬ 
matic causes and hard work), I not long ago was 
notified by the department of state that the Presi¬ 
dent had appointed my successor to be consul gen¬ 
eral at this port. I expect him to arrive shortly.” 

In the face of this apparently wanton 
brutality it is encouraging to note the plain 
speaking of Mr. Quincy’s fellow-citizens, 
the Boston Merchants’ Association, a non¬ 
partisan organization. They also appear 
to think that there is no diflBculty in or 
ganizingthe consular service purely on the 
merit system. It is safe to say that Mr. 
Cleveland’s successor will have learned 
wisdom by his experience, and that the 
consular service will not again be used as 
spoil to reward editors, and the secre¬ 
taries and presidents and chairmen of po¬ 
litical committees nor other importunate 
and blatant party hacks. 


One of the hopeful signs is the increas¬ 
ing tendency among civil service reform¬ 
ers to have the same standard of judgment 
for the acts of a republican President and 
of a democratic President in his manage¬ 
ment of the civil service. It marked an 
epoch in reform when a republican like 
Henry C. Lea addressed a letter of bit¬ 
ter and humiliating truth to a republi¬ 
can President, and the following resolu¬ 


tion marks an even greater gain for reform 
because it is the utterance of those whose 
personal devotion to President Cleveland 
has been such that to disassociate his acts 
and to judge them absolutely without bias 
required a high grade of citizenship. 

The followiug resolution, bearing the signatures 
of Charles Eliot Norton, president, an 1 Philip S. 
Abbot, secretary, has been adopted by the execu¬ 
tive committee of the Cambridge Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association: 

“ Resolved, That the execntive committee of the 
Cambridge Civil Service Reform Association deeply 
regret President Cleveland has thus far in his sec¬ 
ond administration failed to carry out the pledges 
of the democratic party and his own utterances in 
regard to the reform of the civil service, and they 
further regret that under his administration a large 
proportion of the appointments to ofifice has been 
made for partisan services. They regret this the 
more deeply because they believe that President 
Cleveland had an unparalleled opportunity to pro¬ 
mote the principles of reform in the civil service, 
and that his dereliction in respect to appointments 
has rendered further steps of reform more ardu¬ 
ous.” 

LOST OPPORTUNITIES. 

Harper’s Weekly of December 9th has a 
just and conclusive editorial upon Mr. 
Bissell as postmaster-general. He has in¬ 
curred the hatred of the spoilsmen. They 
are angry at him as “not a good democrat.” 
He has brought this upon himself by re¬ 
fusing to wantonly remove division chiefs, 
by refusing to promote democrats and re¬ 
duce republicans, by causing the removal 
of the Topeka postmaster, by insisting that 
the civil service law shall be enforced, by 
requiring charges before he will remove 
fourth-class postmasters who have not been 
in office four years, and by other acts in the 
same line. Nevertheless, all these things 
together do not make the beginning of a 
great career. Yet, as the Weekly says, Mr. 
Bissell has encountered nearly all of the 
enmity and opposition that he would have 
met had he set out to accomplish a funda¬ 
mental reform. This would have been to 
secure the transfer of the chiefs of divis¬ 
ions in Washington and throughout the 
country to the classified service, and to es¬ 
tablish rules for promotion under the civil 
service commission, to apply the Boston 
labor service system to his department. But 
the one great work before him was the 
overthrow of the abuse of the fourth-class 
post-offices. He has not done that; instead 
he has retrograded. He has made a rule 
that a four-year tenure shall of itself be a 
cause for removal. Granted that congress¬ 
men are to continue to put in their favor¬ 
ites, reform could not be set back more 
than by such a rule. He has allowed con¬ 
gressmen to come with charges which are 
kept secret, but upon which these post¬ 
masters have been removed wholesale, so 
that his rule is in great measure a shadow, 
and the removals have been full of out¬ 
rageous injustice. Witness the Irvington 


post-office, in this county. Congressmen 
never put in their watch-dogs more freely 
than they do now. Yet they are angry 
because they have to get up charges, know¬ 
ing that it is a mere form, and therefore 
holding it in contempt. On the other 
hand, Mr. Bissell has not gained the people, 
for the country views the practice with 
grave disapproval. This is neither states¬ 
manship nor practical politics. Mr. Bissell 
has missed his opportunity. It lay in 
grasping and acting upon the fact that the 
right system for the appointment of fourth- 
class postmasters, when it is adopted, will 
cast out every personal or party considera¬ 
tion, and will absolutely remove the influ¬ 
ence of congressmen from these appoint¬ 
ments. This last is the sine qua non to any 
reform. 

The same is true of President Cleveland 
in his larger field. He came into office 
this time absolutely free to follow any 
course he might choose. The country was 
ready for the fullest measure of reform in 
his dealing with the civil service. His 
own utterances for years, his party plat¬ 
form, and the party campaign text-book, 
were a complete barrier against the on¬ 
slaught of the spoilsmen. He, too, lost his 
opportunity. This seems the more un¬ 
bearable, for it came back to him after he 
had lost it once before. It will never come 
again. He chose to make of first import¬ 
ance matters of minor importance. The 
silver crisis could have had no other result 
than it did have. Property and labor were 
aroused, and Voorhees did not need to be 
“ placated.” It was of no greater moment 
than the greenback crisis in the seventies, 
nor than any other of the economic ques¬ 
tions which have, from time to time in the 
history of our government, become acute. 
In dealing with them, no President does 
more than his routine duty, and no acts of 
any President in connection with them 
have made him great. The tariflf revision, 
if carried through, can not claim to rank 
above the revision of 1846; yet President 
Polk has and deserves no high place in the 
country’s history. 

These unfortunate mistakes of Mr. Cleve¬ 
land and Mr. Bissell can only come from 
shortsightedness. They must believe that 
the pressure upon them for places is the 
pressure of the nation. In reality, it is 
solely and only the pressure of a would be 
oligarchy made up of congressmen and 
their followers scattered throughout the 
country, noisy and persistent, but in real¬ 
ity comprising but a small fraction of the 
people. The people do not want this de¬ 
grading seizure of the public offices to con¬ 
tinue. They would have gathered around 
President Cleveland in any struggle, how¬ 
ever radical, he chose to make to overthrow 
the practice. 









88 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


THE TENTH REPORT OF THE CIVIL 
SERVICE COMMISSION. 

Everyone should send for the tenth an¬ 
nual report of the civil service commis¬ 
sion, which contains information to be 
found nowhere else, and in a gratifying 
manner makes clear the triumphant prog¬ 
ress of civil service reform. The civil 
service law now embraces about 44,000 
places, and that it is to be enforced is 
^ rapidly coming to be an accepted fact. 
The cost to the government of carrying 
out the act is about a dollar a place, or 
$42,000. In addition to those in these 
places there are about 150,000 more per¬ 
sons in the civil service, 69,000 of these be¬ 
ing postmasters and 25,000 being laborers. 
The balance is largely composed of places 
which can be transferred to the classified 
service by presidential order, and this is 
only a matter of time. A like presidential 
order can classify the 25,000 laborers. This 
leaves the 69,000 postmasters to be taken 
away from the spoilsmen by the Lodge 
bill and by a system of promotion and 
permanence of tenure which shall cause 
postmasters in the larger offices to disap¬ 
pear as local political manipulators as the 
higher officers in the railway mail have so 
disappeared. 

The report treats at length of the classi¬ 
fication of the free delivery offices, and 
gives lively examples of the notions of pub¬ 
lic business which have prevailed in this 
country. At one office where the post¬ 
master made a clean sweep before the or¬ 
der went into effect each new letter carrier 
paid thirty-five dollars down and five dol¬ 
lars a day to his predecessor to teach him 
how to do his work. The warfare against 
postmasters who tricked the law goes on 
steadily but not satisfactorily for lack of 
sufficient power in the commission for a 
complete investigation. 

The commission attacks the absurdity of 
the number of excepted places which both 
in Washington and throughout the coun¬ 
try are used to quarter upon the treasury 
in superior positions mere politicians ig¬ 
norant of the duties. Here, again, the 
same queer notions of business crop out. In 
dismissing the incumbent of one of the ex¬ 
cepted places, the postmaster said to him 
in writing: 

Your conduct as chief register clerk while under 
my charge as postmaster, calls from me an expres¬ 
sion that is well merited. The place you occupied 
being an excepted place, and one that I am neces¬ 
sarily compelled to fill with one of my own party, 
makes it necessary for us to part; no cause of com¬ 
plaint in regard to your official acts, as I have found 
you an efficient officer, besides your gentlemanly 
treatment of myself, prompts me to write you this 
letter, and I recommend you as an honorable and 
capable man, and any one would do well to have 
such men as yourself in their employ. 

In another office and on like occasion the 
postmaster said: 

I assure you that It is with feelings akin to pain 


that circumstances over which I have no control 
make it necessary that I should fill the offices un¬ 
der my control with gentlemen of my own party 
affiliations. Your gentlemanly and courteous treat¬ 
ment, and your business quallflcations are such 
that I feel warranted in recommending you to any 
position to which you aspire. Since you have been 
associated with me you have proved by your works 
that nothing I could say In your behalf would be 
amiss. In parting with you I part with a man who 
Is not only capable, but honest, and in every sense 
a gentleman; and I can truthfully say that our 
patty differences is the only reason of our severing 
the pleasant business relations that have existed 
between us. 

The commission has made an extremely 
valuable investigation of the civil service of 
diflferent nations and publishes the results 
in full. In brief,'the systems vary from 
Morocco where the theory and practice is 
that public officers should, by bribery and 
in every other way, make as much money 
as possible out of the offices, to the demo¬ 
cratic government of Switzerland where 
appointment and tenure are for merit and 
open to all without favoritism. The differ¬ 
ence is the difference between barbarism 
and the highest civilization. In our civil 
service law, with its democratic competi¬ 
tion open to all, without life tenure, but 
with the same tenure that prevails in all 
great business institutions, we have the in¬ 
auguration of the system which goes with 
high civilization. In our treatment of the 
fourth class post-offices and of the excepted 
places and of the 150,000 places in the un¬ 
classified service generally, we are on a 
par with Russia, Turkey and Morocco. 

THE VAN ALEN CASE. 

[From the Indianapolis News,December 7.] 

In response to a request for his own views 
and those of the civil service reformers in re¬ 
gard to the refusal of J. J. Van Alen to ac¬ 
cept the Italian ambassadorship, Lucius B. 
Swift said to-day: 

“ The facts in the Van Alen case are not in 
any manner changed. It will always be true 
that his sole distinction was in being a society 
man, moving in a limited circle, and that or¬ 
dinarily the President would never have heard 
of him, to say nothing of making him an 
American ambassador. Van Alen’s denial 
does not make it any the less true that he re¬ 
ceived the office solely because Whitney got it 
for him for having made a large contribution 
to the Democratic campaign fund. It is one 
of the healthiest signs that public opinion 
made a stand against this gross misuse of a 
public trust. We have many very rich men 
who with their families would like to shine 
socially in foreign capitals, and if contribu¬ 
tions of $30,000 or $40,000 to campaign funds 
would secure amba-ssadorships, plenty of them 
would pay the money, and we have plenty of 
Whitneys who would see that the offices were 
handed over in return. The danger of this 
practice does not seem to have been over¬ 
estimated either by the ‘decent’ or the ‘ma¬ 
lignant’ critics of the Van Alen appointment. 
It is not probable that Van Alen was moved 


to refuse by American criticism. He would 
care very little for that, but he had reason to 
fear for his social standing in England, where 
public offices are not used to pay private in¬ 
dividuals for anything. He doubtless also 
keenly realized that at the Italian court and 
in the streets of Rome he would feel that he 
was always being pointed out as the man who 
bought his place with a money contribution to 
a party committee.” 

[From the Indianapolis Sentinel, December 9.] 

We regret to observe that Mr. Lucius B. 
Swift is still ‘‘chewing the rag” in the Van 
Alen matter. We have a great deal of re¬ 
spect for Mr. Swift because we believe him to 
be one of the few civil service reformers who 
are thoroughly in earnest and quite disinter¬ 
ested. Although he carries the logic of his 
hobby to an extent that makes his ideas ut¬ 
terly impracticable, he is usually fair in his 
statements, but we do not think he is at all 
fair in the following; 

The facts in the Van Alen case are not in 
any manner changed. It will always be true 
that his sole distinction was in being a society 
man, moving in a limited circle, and that or¬ 
dinarily the president would never have heard 
of him, to say nothing of making him an 
American ambassador. Van Alen’s denial 
does not make it any less true that he received 
the office solely because Whitney got it for 
him for having made a large contribution to 
the democratic campaign fund. It is one of 
the healthiest signs that public opinion made 
a stand against this gross misuse of a public 
trust. 

There are comparatively few men appointed 
to office of whom the President would ever 
have heard if they had not been recommended 
to him by some one. That is one of the ne¬ 
cessities of any administration of government. 
It is absolutely immaterial whether the Presi¬ 
dent ever heard of him before the appointment 
was recommended to him or not. Neither 
is it material that an applicant should have 
attained any “distinction,” nor is it any det¬ 
riment that he is “ a society man,” or that he 
moves in “a limited circle.” The only ques¬ 
tion is whether he is “ fit” for the position. 
That is Mr. S wifi’s own standard for appoint¬ 
ment. That is what is urged by all civil serv¬ 
ice reformers everywhere as the proper stand¬ 
ard. President Cleveland says he investigated 
the matter and was thoroughly satisfied of his 
fitness, and until some evidence can he shown 
to the contrary the opinion must stand.. The 
President is the head civil service examiner, 
and he has passed this man with the highest 
mark that could be given. The only further 
evidence before the public, of which we have 
knowledge, is Van Alen’s letter, and that 
certainly confirms the opinion of the Presi¬ 
dent. 

We do not understand on what grounds Mr. 
Swift asserts positively, in the face of the de¬ 
nial of Van Alen and of the President, that it 
is “ true that he received the office solely be¬ 
cause Whitney got it for him for having made 
a large contribution to the democratic cam¬ 
paign fund.” This is not only a gratuitous 
assumption, but it is an assumption in the 
face of evidence. What does Mr. Swift know 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


89 


about the relations of Whitney and Van Alen? 
How does he know that this contribution is 
the only link that binds them? How does he 
know that Mr. Whitney did not know the 
“fitness” which the President ascertained, and 
which the public now generally concede? 
And even if that were Whitney’s only motive, 
what right has Mr. Swift to say that it was the 
President’s motive? If Mr. Swift has any 
evidence to submit on these points we should 
be pleased to have him produce it. 

[From the Indianapolis Sentinel, December 16.] 
To the Editor of the Indianapolis Sentinel: 

In the Sentinel of December 9 you ask what 
evidence I have,as against the President’s judg¬ 
ment that Van Aten was fitted for the Italian 
ambassadorship and after Van Alen’s denial 
that he received the place because he made a 
large contribution to the democratic campaign 
fund, that he did receive the place for that 
reason. 

Mr. Van Alen was a man whose sole dis¬ 
tinction was along society lines—dinners at 
Newport in the summer and a hunting stud in 
England during the hunting season. He had 
been entirely unknown in tbe political history 
of the country. Last year, as Mr. Whitney 
says, “when friends were few and calls were 
great,” Van Alen paid something over |30,000 
into the democratic campaign fund. Then he 
expressed a wish for and was appointed to the 
place of ambassador to Italy. 

Mr. John Wanamaker was a Philadelphia 
shopkeeper, and was distinguished in no other 
manner, except in the field of religion. In 
1888, by solicitation, he raised some $400,000 
for the republican campaign fund. Then he 
applied for and was appointed to the place 
of postmaster-general. 

Turning to the index of the National Dem¬ 
ocratic Campaign Text-Book of 1892, under 
the title of “Wanamaker, Postmaster-General,” 
we find “ Purchase of a Cabinet Seat, 189.” 
Turning to the page referred to, the text-book 
says: “ Perhaps the most disgraceful act com¬ 
mitted by President Harrison was the ap¬ 
pointment of Mr. Wanamaker as postmaster- 
general. Wanamaker was a man who had 
been entirely unknown in the political history 
of the country. * » * When the election 

had elevated Mr. Wanamaker’s candidate to 
the presidency, Mr. Wanamaker by virtue of 
his services became an applicant for a cabinet 
position. Mr. Harrison generously responded, 
and Mr. Wanamaker was made postmaster- 
general.” Notwithstanding the fact that Presi¬ 
dent Harrison and Mr. Wanamaker always 
said that the latter was appointed solely for 
fitness, I have never thought that the text-book 
over-stated the case, and I do not hesitate to 
say, with the text-book, that Mr, Wanamaker 
received his place solely by virtue of his 
services. If he had not raised the fund he 
would not have been thought of for the ap¬ 
pointment and would not have received it. 

The Wanamaker case, as annotated by the 
text-book, throws a bright light on the Van 
Alen case. It is difficult to find any difference, 
except that another ox is now being gored. If 


Mr, Van Alen had not made the heavy contri¬ 
bution, he would not have been thought of 
for the place, and he would not have been 
“backed” by Whitney’s coercive statement to 
the President, “TAi.?, yow know, is the first lime 
you hate been approached by me on the sulfiect of 
appointments," and the President would not 
have felt compelled to appoint him. Letter 
writing by Mr. Van Alen and the President 
can not change the facts. The victory gained 
by public opinion will make future appoint¬ 
ing officers and political managers reluctant 
to repeat this dangerous example. 

Lucius B. Swift. 
Indianapolis, December 12, 1893. 

(The Sentinel of the same date comments editori¬ 
ally upon the above letter. After stating that no 
evidence is produced as requested and after re-stat¬ 
ing its argument as to Van Alen’s fitness it con¬ 
cludes as follows:) 

“ Mr. Swift’s citation of Wanamaker is un¬ 
fortunate for his theory. No comparison could 
more clearly show the high character of Mr. 
Van Alen. Wanamaker was known every¬ 
where as a man who did everything on the 
business principle of getting what he paid for. 
He not only contributed largely, but acted as 
a soliciting agent for the worst gang of cor¬ 
ruptionists the country ever knew—the Penn¬ 
sylvania crowd that Mr. Swift aided in fight¬ 
ing. When the office was obtained for him he 
took it in the face of a clamor greater than 
that raised in the Van Alen case. He had 
paid and he wanted his goods. Very different 
was Mr. Van Alen. When the clamor was 
raised in his case, he waited until the con¬ 
firmation by the senate had shown that there 
was no objection to him as a man. Then he 
said, in effect: ‘ I have bought no office, and 
I will not accept one under circumstances that 
are claimed to indicate that I did. I do not 
wish even the tarnish of suspicion on my good 
name.’ Mr. Cleveland urged him to accept, 
but he preferred this conclusive evidence that 
he was not an office-purchaser—that he was 
not a Wanamaker. Surely Mr. Van Alen is 
entitled to his good name. That is all he 
asks.” 

Removals and appointments made nut of ‘'duty to the 
government, and to the patrons of this office, having 
regard to the duty I owe myself as an official not 
only under oath, but also under heavy security.”— 
Postmaster Carr. 

Postmaster Carr yesterday discharged fourteen 
republicans from the post-office and appointed 
democrats to succeed them. All of the republicans 
discharged were outside the civil service rules and 
regulations. 

Postmaster Carr yesterday made half a dozen ap¬ 
pointments of portal station superintendents and 
clerks. All the appointees had been backed by demo¬ 
cratic organizations of their respective wards. 

At Station B, Thirty-eighth street, below Market, 
Hart Sterr, republican, is succeeeded as superintend¬ 
ent by William H. Schembs, secretary of the Twenty- 
fourth ward democratic executive committee. 

George Malone, president of the Keystone Demo¬ 
cratic Club, of the twenty-ninth ward, and brother of 
the vice-president of the National Association of 
Letter-carriers, becomes superintendent of Co¬ 
lumbia Station, Twentieth street and Columbia 
avenue, in place of Frank P. Goodwin, republican. 
The salary is $1,200. Mr. Malone resides in the same 
division with National Chairman Harrlty. 


John Osborne, who has had a news stand in Ger¬ 
mantown and has been prominently active in poli¬ 
tics there, is made clerk in charge of the Upsal sta¬ 
tion, succeeding Charles A. Unruh, resigned. 

F. Antoine Stleber is a candidate for superintend¬ 
ent of the Brldesburg station. The salary is $800. 
Mr. Stieber is supported by Democratic City Commit¬ 
teeman Charles J. Young and the ward committeemen. 

Postmaster Carr yesterday notified Charles B. 
Hall, superintendent of the registry division of the 
post-office, that Lehman P. Ashmead had been ap¬ 
pointed to become his successor on the 16th inst. 
Mr. Hall is a co-laborer with Magistrate Durham 
and Select Councilman Houseman in Seventh 
ward republican politics, and was appointed regis¬ 
try superintendent by Postmaster Field. 

Tbe numerous candidates for his $2,100 a year 
place, in addition to Mr. Ashmead, included Ben¬ 
jamin F. Gilbert, of the twenty-second ward, ex¬ 
superintendent of the stamp division, who was 
backed by ex-City Treasurer W. Redwood Wright 
and the ward organization; Walter Warner, of the 
Sixteenth ward,formerly cashier of the money or¬ 
der department; John D. Ruoff, of the twentieth 
ward, ex-Assistant Custodian of the Post-office 
Building, and City Committeeman Richard C. Gor¬ 
man, of the thirty-seventh ward, and ex clerk of 
the registry department. All of these candidates 
were supported by the democratic organizations of 
their respective neighborhoods. 

Mr. Ashmead’s appointment was recommended 
by many prominent democrats, among whom were 
Governor Pattison, William F. Harrity, Justice 
Samuel Gustine Thompson, Henry Flanders, Judge 
Arnold, John R. Read, ex-Mayor King, David W. 
Sellers, ex Sheriff Wright, Health Officer Veale, ex- 
Sheriff Krumbhaar, City Chairman Wilhere, John 
M. Campbell, Joseph I. Doran and John Huggard. 
Among other citizens by whom Mr. Ashmead’s 
competency for the position was attested were: 
George W. Childs, L. Clarke Davis, Charles E. War- 
burton, J. J. Sullivan, John M. Gest, A. Warren 
Kelsey and James F. Sullivan.—P/iifndefp/ifa Rec¬ 
ord, September 9. 


DEPUTY PRESIDENT VOORHEES. 

Secretary Hoke Smith scored a point on Senator 
Voorhees a few days ago. The relations that have 
existed between the administration’s representa¬ 
tive in the Senate and the secretary of the interior 
have been strained for some time past. Senator 
Voorhees has had a rod in pickle for Secretary 
Smith for several months. He went out of his way 
to apply it mildly on the pension question in his 
repeal speech. The trouble between the two states¬ 
men originated several month ago over the subject 
of office. Secretary Smith made his point on the sinator 
a few days ago byrefusing to appoint the latter's son, 
Charles P. Voorhees, of Washington State, as one of the 
commissioners to treat with the Puyallup Indians. There 
was a strong demand from tbe Washington demo¬ 
crats for Mr. Voorhees’s appointment. There are 
three members of the commission, and such com¬ 
missions are generally constituted of two members 
of one political party and one from the other. 

Congressman John L. Wilson, of Washington, went to 
Secretary Smith and asked him to waive the usual cour¬ 
tesy to the minority party and give the place reserved for 
a republican to Mr. Voorhees. Congressmen Wilson is a 
republican and a former Hoosier, and made this plea for 
Senator Voorhees’s son in return for a favor which the 
senator showed him several years ago, by securing his ap¬ 
pointment from President Arthur as receiver of the land 
office in Washington Territory. Congressman IPiison 
claims that the appointment which Senator Voorhees se¬ 
cured for him gave him his first start in the west, from 
which he has risen to his present position in politics. 
Naturally he desired to contribute to the success of 
{he senator’s son. But Secretary Smith declined to 
appoint Senator Voorhees’s son, but gave the posi¬ 
tion to a republican instead.—Was/ifwpfon Dispatch 
Indianapolis News, November 9. 

• • • 

There is no admiration between Senator Voorhees 
and Secretary Smith. They disagreed over patronage 
shortly after the inauguration, and the Senator has 













90 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


asked no favor of Secretary Smith since When the 
secretary refused to appoint the senator’s son as a 
member of the Puyllup Indian commission in the 
state of Washington a few days ago, he touched the 
senator again on a tender spot. Senator Voorhees 
did not ask the appointment, but he feels that the 
blow was aimed at him personally.—WosAfnyion 
Dispatch, Indianapolis News, November 10. 

* ♦ 

This morning word was brought to Senator Vgor- 
hees that Secretary Smith had declined to recog¬ 
nize any further indorsements of the senator in 
making appointments, and that the senator’s ap¬ 
pointees would be discharged. It was reported that 
two had been displaced already. “I wish he would 
discharge some of the men whose appointments I 
secured,” was the senator’s comment this morning 
Senator Voorhees is not disturbed over the rumor. 
Secretary Smith is in Georgia — Washington Dispatch 
Indianapolis News, November 13. 

<> » <■ 

It may be of interest to Indiana democrats to 
know that there is already a movement on foot to 
instruct the next Indiana delegation to the dem¬ 
ocratic national eonvention for Senator Daniel 
W. Voorhees for president. Some of the senator’s 
friends here believe that the time has come when 
his name should be brought to the front for the 
presidency. Never, they say, was the organization 
in Indiana in better shape for securing instructions 
to the national convention than at the present time. 
The senator will have his enemie»in his own party, 
as usual. But it is believed that the distribution of 
federal patronage in that state has been carried on so 
suceessfully that the Voorhees machine is invincible. 
Tfte Vftfls’s correspondent has the very highest au¬ 
thority for stating that already some of the plans 
have been laid for securing a Voorhees delegation 
to the next national convention.— Washington Dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis News, December 13. 

* 

Senator Voorhees. who reached Washington 
yesterday afternoon, came up to his office in the 
Maltby building this morning and resumed work. 
Several Indianaoffice-seekers were waiting for him. 
The Senator is in excellent health.— Washington 
dispatch, Indianapolis News, December 1. 

<! <C # 

Senator Voorhees has asked Chief Clerk Logan 
Carlisle, of the Treasury Department, to reappoint 
Charles E. Brown, a colored democrat, of Rich¬ 
mond, Ind., to his old place as clerk in the third 
auditor’s office. Brown was in the employ of the 
late ex-Senator McDonald for thirteen years, and 
was appointed to office on Mr. McDonald’s recom¬ 
mendation under President Cleveland’s last ad¬ 
ministration. Senator Voorhees has designated 
three Indiana colored republicans, Thomas Evans, 
Harry Williams and William Thompson, now hold¬ 
ing office under the third auditor, and asks that one 
of them be removed to make way for Senator Mc¬ 
Donald’s protege. The claim is made that Mayor 
Denny, of Indianapolis, made a special trip to 
Washington, as soon as President Harrison was in¬ 
augurated, to have Brown removed.— Washington 
dispatch, Indianapolis News, December 8. 

>> s{* 

The disappointed 375 applicants for positions 
under Joshua Jump, the new internal revenue col¬ 
lector, are mad enough to-day to be talking about 
holding an indignation meeting. Their complaint 
is that the twenty-five men appointed are not en¬ 
titled to the places. The chief deputy, Lindeman, 
has been a democrat but four years, and Scott, the 
second deputy, not much longer. One of the new 
gaugers has been keeping a saloon and club-house. 
The selections are all of Lamb’s make. The Scott 
appointment has caused quite a sensation by reason 
of the discovery that he A'as dismissed as a gauger 
when General Manson was collector four years ago 
last August, and his dismissal was on the recom¬ 
mendation of special agent Somerville. The charge 
is understood to have been that in gauging spirits 
he gave the distillers the benefit of all doubts. As 
second deputy he will have supervision of the 


gaugers and theirdeputles. It will be recalled that 
soon after Mr. Cleveland took office in March the 
Indianapolis Sentinel printed a series of Washing¬ 
ton specials in which it was alleged in positive 
terms that the appointment of Jump was in the in¬ 
terest of a conspiracy of distillers. Fairbanks, the 
great distiller and brewer, who is Jump’s relative 
and John Lamb’s “side partner,” has been holding 
various conferences with the gang since the facts 
about Scott came to the surface. The Sentinel 
specials are also printed in the Gazette, the demo¬ 
cratic organ here. Moreover, the editor of the 
Gazette wrote a personal letter lo Mr. Cleveland 
making the point against Jump’s appointment that 
it would be in the interest of Fairbanks, who, ac¬ 
cording to the talk heard on every hand now, 
“owns the town.” 

So strong was the pressure for places that Post¬ 
master Donham was called upon to again perform 
his familar part as a wielder of Lamb’s ax. Superin¬ 
tendent of Carriers Adams was much surprised to 
find in the daily paper the announcement that he 
had been removed and Mike Brophy, former secre¬ 
tary of the democratic committee, appointed in his 
place. Adams had served in his position for ten 
years continuously, and on Donham’s assurance 
that he could remain through his term he declined 
a business offer. At that time the Gazette praised 
Donham for adhering to “genuine civil-service re¬ 
form” by the retention of Adams and two others, 
one of whom has since been removed and the other 
is retained for personal reasons. 

The Journal correspondent met Mr. Fairbanks 
this morning and asked him if he had known of 
the cause for Scott’s dismissal from the service 
when a gauger. He pretended to take the question 
as applying to the dismissal in the first instance, 
when Scott was a gauger under Collector Minshall, 
and when he was a republican. Fairbanks said 
Scott had then helped a democratic candidate for 
the council and was dismissed for that. 

“ Well you believe in that doctrine; ought not he 
to have been dismissed ?” 

“ Certainly.” 

You are a spoils man, aren't you ?” 

“Yes.” 

“And you also believe in the ‘machine ?’ ” 

“Certainly.” 

Fairbanks declined to discuss the dismissal of 
Scott under Collector Manson, democrat.— Terre 
Haute dis})atch. Indianapolis Journal, November 26. 

>9t i> 

Mr. John E. Lamb is saying that the statement 
printed in the Journal to the effect that Scott, whom 
he (Lamb) had appointed second deputy of the in¬ 
ternal revenue office, had been dismissed for cause 
as a gauger under Collector Manson (Dem.), is a 
lie. Collector Jump has been trying to learn where 
the Journal correspondent obtained his informa¬ 
tion, but so far as known he has not made any ef¬ 
fort to learn if the statement is true. Lamb and 
Jump can easily ascertain the truth of this state¬ 
ment also; That Scott has been dismissed three 
times from the service. He was dismissed under 
Collector White for gauging spirits to the benefit of 
the distillery, but was restored later. Collector 
Minshall dismissed him. Mr. Minshall is In Terre 
Haute. Either Lamb or Jump can learn the facts 
from him. The third time was the instance when 
he was a gauger under Collector Manson, and when 
his dismissal was ordered by telegraph from the 
department at Washington.—Terre Haute dispatch, 
Indianapolis Journal, December 7. 

* * * 

Senator Voorhees and members of the Indiana 
delegation expect to call on the President to-mor¬ 
row in the interest of Col. Zollinger for pension 
agent.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, 
December 11. 


DEPUTY PRESIDENT HOLMAN. 


The President on Saturday ended a bitter and 
earnest fight by the appointment of Robert J. Gar¬ 
diner as postmaster at Aurora, Ind. The office pays 
$1,700 a year, and has been the bone of contention 


of four of the leading citizens of that town, or rath¬ 
er of three citizens and one woman. Gardiner was 
backed by Judge Holman, and therefore there was but a 
slim chance of the other candidates even getting within 
speaking distance of the office. The fight was all made 
before the judge.—Washington Dispatch, Indianapolis 
News, October 23. 

* * * 

The appointment of John M. Turner as postmaster at 
Monticello, White county, Ind., ends a contest which has 
lasted for over flvemonths, in which the post-office de¬ 
partment declined to acton the nomination of Con¬ 
gressman Hammond. Mr. Turner was appointed on 
the 24th of May last, but before his commission was 
forwarded Congressman Hammond intercepted it, 
and filed a protest against the appointment. The In¬ 
diana congressman did not urge any personal ob¬ 
jections to Mr. Turner, who is well recommended, 
but protested against the nomination of a man 
whom he had not recommended. Mr. Hammond’s 
strong fight for Mr. Low is explained on the ground 
of his desire to discharge a political debt of grati¬ 
tude. In the congressional convention in which 
Mr. Hammond was nominated Low was a member 
of the White county delegation, and his vote alone 
decided the contest in- favor of Hammond. Low 
was the only member of the White county delega¬ 
tion who voted for Mr. Hammond, and he did so 
against the strong resistance from every other 
member of the delegation, which was committed to 
Valentine Zimmerman, of Rochester, who had 
been the congressional candidate in 1888.—B’as/i- 
ington Dispatch, Indianapolis News, November 7. 

[Turner was Holman’s “man.”] 

* * * 

There is considerable buzz in Washington over 
the Shelbyville post-office, and a goodly number of 
politicians from that little Indiana city are here In 
the interests of their candidates. The two chief 
contestants, Alfred Major and William Buxton 
came in early this morning. Also came Isa M. 
Wray, who is another applicant. Judge L. C. 
Hackett and Mr. Briggs brought up the rear, but 
they are inclined to reticence as to the purpose of 
their visit. Mr. Major is a book-keeper for Scott 
Wray, editor of the Shelbyville Democrat,vrhUe Bux¬ 
ton is Wray’s brother-in-law and ex-chairman of the 
democratic committee of Shelby county. So inter¬ 
esting has this contest for the post-office honors become 
Jhat it is now thought best to call a primary election to 
decide which of the candidates should receive the ap¬ 
pointment .— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, December 1. 

v « • 

It would seem that William S. Holman’s official 
troubles will never end. The Shelbyville post-office 
worm is just now gnawing at his vitals. The Rays 
and Wrays are after him. Isom Wray called on 
Holman to-day and asked for the place for Brux- 
ton, ex-chairman of the county committee. There 
is another prominent candidate in the person of 
Majors, who is Editor W. Scott Ray’s book-keeper. 
Isom Wray is Bruxton’s brother-in-law. It looks 
to one upon the ground here as though the Rays 
and Wrays were locking arms in the contest with 
some bitterness—Isom striving for Bruxton and 
Scott laboring for Majors. Judge Holman listened 
to Isom to-day, and then said he guessed he would 
just order an election to determine the contest, and 
so the ballot is to finally settle the dispute. The 
judge is sweating purple moisture over the fight 
and feels that he is sure to come out at the little 
end of the horn, for the man who wins at the elec¬ 
tion will not feel, of course, that he owes his place 
to Holman, and the one that loses will certainly 
lay his loss to the congressman of the district 
Judge Holman would like to please Editor Ray in 
the matter, but he fears to “take sides.” W. Scott 
Ray, it will be remembered, bitterly denounced 
the idea of renominating Cleveland at Chicago last 
ye&T.—Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, 
December 1. 

Kt * 

The announcement in the Washington dispatches 
this morning that Representative Holman would 
order an election for postmaster here was received 
with approval. The underhand fight between certain 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


91 


rival candidates has been particularly bitter and much 
bad blood exhibited. The local leaders are about 
evenly divided in their support. Edward Ames Ma¬ 
jor, city clerk and book-keeper for W. Scott Ray, tvas 
supposed to have a sure call on the position, hut 
the appointment of his cousin, S. S. Major, to the 
Internal revenue service has caused the friends of 
William J. Buxton, the strongest rival candidate, 
to make a more vigorous fight for their man. These 
two have control of nearly all the local politicians. 
The other candidates, Gen. John W. Vannoy, Joseph 
R. Kennerly and John H. McGuire would not be in 
a fight against the leaders, not belonging to any 
ring, hut among the mass of democratic voters 
would give the ringsters a good fight. Both Ray 
and Wray will probably be aspirants for congress in 
this district the next time.—Shelbyville dispatch. In 
dianapolis Journal, December 2. 

<■ •> i> 

Congressman Holman—/rom whose renominntion 
Editor O’Brien, of the Lawrenceburg Register, has 
been appealing to be delivered —appears to be san¬ 
guine. He says he never has fought for renomina¬ 
tion, and does not intend to at his age. He will 
rest his case “in the hands or his friends,” mean¬ 
while giving them a quiet tip occasionally on how 
they can handle it to the best ad vantage.'— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis News, December 9. 

DEPUTY PRESIDENT TAYLOR. 

Congressman Taylor called on Secretary Carlisle 
this morning in regard to the steamboat inspector¬ 
ship of the Evansville district which will be va¬ 
cant in a few days. The leading candidates are 
Captain Zinzach, of Evansville, and Will J. Hays, 
a Louisville poet. The latter is backed by Con¬ 
gressman Caruth.— Washington dispatch, Indiana¬ 
polis News, December 7. 

»Di * i(t 

Congressman Taylor called at the White House 
this morning and had an extended interview with 
President Cleveland upon the matter of appointing 
a steamboat inspector for the sixth district, which 
includes Evansville. It has been reported that 
Secretary Carlisle was in favor of the appointment 
of*a man named Hayes of Louisville, but the result 
of Mr. Taylor’s interview warrants a belief that a 
resident of Indiana will get the place. Mr. Taylor 
and the entire Indiana delegation, without excep¬ 
tion, have been working for the appointment of 
Capt. John Zinzich of Evansville. Capt. Zinzich is 
at present ship chandler and he has been in the 
river service for fifty years. Not only is he strongly 
backed in Indiana, but delegations from Kentucky, 
Tennessee, Missouri and Illinois are supporting 
him.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, 
December IS. 

it * 

Congressman Taylor called at the White House 
again this morning in the Interest of Capt. Zinzich 
of Evansville, who wants to secure the appoint¬ 
ment as supervising inspector of steam vessels. 
President Cleveland informed the congressman 
that he desired to give the matter his personal at¬ 
tention, and that notwithstanding the resignation 
of the present incumbent has beer^called for a 
change is not likely to occur for some little time. 
It is well known that Secretary Carlisle leans a lit¬ 
tle toward Hayes of Kentucky, who is also an ap. 
plicant for the place. This fact leads the Kentucky 
members to believe that their man will succeed to 
the place that has been so long filled by an Indiana 
resident. They say Secretary Carlisle will en¬ 
deavor to settle the matter very soon. This only 
Invigorates the Indiana members to make a harder 
fight for their man.— Washington dispatch, Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, December 16. 

* it it 

Congressman Taylor made a call on Secretary 
Smith yesterday to secure action on several Indiana 
appointments which have been promised him, but 
was unable to get an audience. Several of Mr. Tay¬ 
lor’s demoeratic constituents are on the anxious 
seat. He expects to secure the appointment of a 
commissioner to Alaska, an assistant surgeon of 
Freedman’s Hospital from the Department of the 
Interior, and has hopes, also, that an assistant attor 


ney-generalshlp will be conferred on a citizen of 
his district.—irasfttnpfon dispatch, Indianapolis 
News, December 7. 

In the first district, which is represented by Mr. 
Taylor, one of the most unobtrusive but useful 
members in the delegation, a fight is being made 
by a sprinkling of the local democrats against his 
renomination. Just what it will amount to re¬ 
mains to be seen. There are usually lively con¬ 
tests in the first district for democratic nomina¬ 
tions. One of Mr. Taylor’s opponents, his chief op¬ 
ponent, in fact, is Editor Sparks, of the Mt. Vernon 
Democrat. Mr. Sparks failed to get the appointment 
as postmaster, and has been hopelessly irreconcil¬ 
able since. — Washington dispatch, Indianapolis 
News, December 9. 

* * * 

Indiana has knocked another plum from the of¬ 
ficial tree and this time it fell into the open bonnet 
of Henry W. Mellen, a young attorney of Boone- 
ville. He has been appointed commissioner in 
and for the district of Alaska, to reside in Juneau 
City. It is a place of profit. Mr. Mellen is a very 
deserving young attorney and a democrat of high 
morals. He came here several months ago and 
filed his application for the office of secretary to 
Alaska. President Cleveland deemed it wise to 
appoint a resident of Alaska to this place, though 
at the same time he promised that Mr. Mellen 
should be recognized with something. He was 
backed not alone by his congressmann, Mr. Taylor, 
but by the entire Indiana delegation, to whom the 
news of the appointment comes with gratification. 
— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, De¬ 
cember 11. 

it it it 

Congressman Taylor, of the First Indiana district, 
has made a record in securing appointments of 
postmasters that is the envy of all his democratic 
colleagues. He has secured a greater per cent, of 
democratic postmasters than any other congress¬ 
man in the country. There are but two republican 
postmasters left in his district. One of these is presi¬ 
dential, at Petersburg, where there will be a change 
very shortly, after which the sole remaining repub¬ 
lican postmaster in the First congressional district 
in Indiana will be at Rome, a small, fourth-class 
office In Perry county. Next to Congressman Tay¬ 
lor are Messrs. Bretz and Brookshire of Indiana. 
For a long time Congressman Bretz was accredited 
with having secured more removals of fourth-class 
postmasters than any other democratic congress¬ 
man in the country. But Mr. Taylor has since 
quietly forged to the front. Mr. Brookshire has only 
one presidential postmaster remaining in his district, 
and he expects that there will be a change in that 
office very soon. The lone republican postmaster 
in the presidential class in Mr. Brookshire’s district 
holds forth at Sullivan. Mr. Brookshire has only a 
few fourth-class oflices remaining, and only one of 
these is of much Importance, and that is Veeders- 
burg. Congressman McNagny has seven presi¬ 
dential offices, as follows: Angola, Lagrange, Gar¬ 
rett, Butler, Albion, Kendallville and Ligonier- 
He has about twenty fourth-class post-oflBces from 
which Republicans still hand out the mail.—IFosA- 
ington dispatch', Indianapolis News, December 13. 

ifi tin if 

Three presidential postmasters were appointed 
in Indiana to-day. The iricumbents were removed in 
each case. At Princeton, in Congressman Taylor’s 
district, was the most important change. Ollie W. 
Kolb, the appointee, is a grocer, and a scion of one 
of the pioneer democratic families of Gibson coun¬ 
ty. He succeeds O. M. Liohner, removed for offen¬ 
sive partnership. The office pays $1800 salary. 

« <• <• 

Through the influence of Congressman Bynum, 
United States Marshal William H. Hawkins, of In¬ 
dianapolis, has been appointed custodian of the 
public building.-TKns/iinfiffon dispatch, Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, December IS. 

* * * 

Upon the recommendation of Congressman Bynum, 
William Warmack, colored, of Indianapolis, has 
been appointed porter on a mail car in the railway 
mail service.—IPas/u'wpfoji dispatch, Indianapolis 
Sentinel, December 8. 


THE MERIT SYSTEM IN CONSULAR 
SERVICE. 

The British consular service, in contradis¬ 
tinction to the American consular service, is 
regarded by its members in the light of a ca¬ 
reer. Applicants for consular posts, after 
having received a nominaiion, must pass 
an examination, of which the chief subjects 
are the French language, British mercantile 
and commercial law, and the particular lan¬ 
guage spoken in the district where the post 
applied for is situated. Having obtained an 
appointment, usually that of vice-consul at a 
minor port, advancement depends upon the 
amount of energy and ability displayed by 
the appointee. As will be seen from the state¬ 
ments of services of the attached list of con¬ 
suls, important consular posts are not filled 
capriciously, but are only given to men who 
have shown exceptional ability during serv¬ 
ices extending, in the majority of cases, over 
a considerable length of time. Appreciation 
of long and meritorious services is occasion¬ 
ally shown by the bestowal of diplomatic ap¬ 
pointments on consular officers. Some in¬ 
stances of this are here given : 

Henry Francis Cowper, consul at Lisbon.— 
From 1862 to 1868 held unpaid positions in 
the consular service at various placesin South 
America. Was appointed paid vice-consul at 
Trinidad de Cuba in December, 1868, and 
employed on special service at Omoa, Hondu¬ 
ras, from March to July, 1875. Promoted to 
be consul at Santos in May, 1878. Appointed 
consul for the provinces of Sao Paulo and 
Parana, to reside at Santos, March, 1885. 
Transferred to Lisbon, March, 1890, and ap¬ 
pointed for southern Portugal, to reside at 


Lisbon, July, 1891. 

Length of service.31 years. 

Consulship.15 years. 


William Henry Wrench, senior consul at 
Constantinople.—Was acting consul at Da¬ 
mascus in 1860; vice consul at Beyrout, 1862; 
vice consul for the Dardanelles, 1864; vice- 
consul at Stamboul, July, 1872. Had varied 
diplomatic experience in Eastern Europe, and 
after occupying alternately positions of acting 
consul-general and acting assistant judge at 
Constantinople till December, 1877, was, in 
April, 1879, promoted to the consulship at 
Constantinople. His consulship has, however, 
been broken and renewed at various times 
through appointments to conduct special ne¬ 
gotiations with Turkey. Was made C. M. M. 
in 1885. 

Period of service.33 years. 

Consulship.14 years. 

Charles Louis St. John, consul at New Or¬ 
leans.—Nominated vice-consul at Christiana, 
November 21, 1867. Passed an examination 
February 28, 1868. Was acting consul-gen¬ 
eral from time to time in Christiana. Ap¬ 
pointed vice-consul at Jassy in 1871. Be¬ 
tween 1872 and 1877 was acting consul-general 
for various periods at Bucharest and Belgrade. 
Was promoted to the consulship at Eagusa in 
March, 1877. Acted temporarily as consul at 
Prisrend from September, 1879, to October, 
1880. Transferred to Reunion, February, 
1883; to Charleston in March, 1890; as consul 
for North and South Carolina, Georgia and 
Tennessee, and to New Orleans in January, 
1893, as consul for Louisiana, Arkansas, Mis¬ 
sissippi, Alabama and Florida. 


Length of service.25 years. 

Consulship.16 years. 


James Troup, consul at Yokohama.—After 
being engaged in the civil service as assistant 
interpreter in Japan, was between 1869 and 
1873, at various times, acting consul at Nee- 
gata and Hakodaki. Promoted to be vice- 
consul at Neegata in April, 1873, and to be 
consul at Nagasaki, April, 1877. Transferred 
to Hiogo and Osaka in April, 1882, and to 
Yokohama, June, 1888, as consul for the dis¬ 
trict of Kanagama. 















92 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Period of service.23 years 

Consulship.16 years 


George Jamieson, consul at Shanghai.— 
Was at first a student interpreter in China in 
1864. Afterwards filled various appointments 
in China, sometimes as acting consul, till No¬ 
vember, 1877, when he was promoted to be 
vice-consul at Pagoda Island and to be consul 
at Kiukiang in February, 1880. Was called 
to the bar in June, 1880. Became acting as¬ 
sistant judge at Shanghai, acting judge at 
Yokohama, and in April, 1891, was appointed 
assistant judge of supreme court for China and 
Japan and consul at Shanghai. 


Period of service.29 years 

Consulship.13 years 


Denis Donohoe, consul at San Francisco — 
Entered the consular service in 1857, and was 
appointed vice-consul at Puerto Cabello on 
January 6. On June 4, of same year, passed 
an examination and was appointed consul at 
Buffalo, U. S., July 1, 1857. Was transferred 
to New Orleans, May 14, 1864, and appointed 
consul for the town and district of New Or¬ 
leans and for the states of Arkansas and Mis¬ 
sissippi, February, 1871. On November 7, 
1871, Mr. Donohoe was transferred to Balti¬ 
more as consul for Maryland, Tennessee, Vir¬ 
ginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Missouri; 
was appointed consul for states of California, 
Oregon, and Nevada, and for territories of 
Washington, Idaho, Utah, and Arizona; went 
to reside at San Francisco, January 6,1887. 


Length of service.36 years 

Consulship.36 years 


John Michell, consul at St. Petersburg.— 
Entered the public service as a third-class 
clerk in the admiralty in 1860. Was ap¬ 
pointed unpaid vice-consul at St. Petersburg, 
November, 1866 ; was acting consul there at 
various periods during 1867, 1868, and 1869. 
He then assisted in the work of verifying the 
Turko-Persian boundary maps, till August, 
1869, when he resumed the post of acting con¬ 
sul at St. Petersburg. In January, 1875, he 
was promoted to be consul and translator, and 
in July, 1886, northern, northeastern and cen¬ 
tral Kussia were placed under his charge. 


Length of service.33 years 

Consulship.18 years 


Capt. Robert Charles Clipperton, consul at 
Philadelphia —Was an officer in the Austrian 
army, from 1848 up till 1856 He was ap 
pointed British vice-consul ai Theodosia, 
Crimea, in May, 1858, after passing an exam¬ 
ination. Was acting consul at Kertch in 1861, 
and promoted to the consulship there in De¬ 
cember, 1862. He was transferred to Nantes 
in 1866, and to Brest in 1871. In June, 1874, 
he returned to Nantes; his supervision being 
extended to the ports and places in the de¬ 
partments of Loire Inferieure, La Vendee, and 
Charente Inferieure. He was transferred to 
Philadelphia October 1, 1872, as consul for 
Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illi¬ 
nois, and Wisconsin. 


Length of service.35 years 

Consulship.31 years 


Col. James Hayes Saddler, consul at Chi¬ 
cago.—Served as officer in the British army 
from 1858 till 1882, and was in the meantime 
appointed unpaid vice-consul at Boulogne in 
October, 1868. Was acting consul there from 
September, 1869, till October, 1871, and act¬ 
ing paid vice-consul at Boulogne and Caen 
from April, 1873, till June, 1874. Was ap¬ 
pointed vice-consul at La Rochelle in June, 
1874, and promoted to the important post of 
consul at Chicago June 1, 1886. The state of 
Missouri was added to his district in March, 
1887. He was acting consul-general at Gua¬ 
temala for a short period in 1889 and 1890. 


Length of service.2.5 years 

Consulship. 7 years 


Capt. William Francis Seagrave, R. F. R. G. 
8., consul at Baltimore.—Served from 1845 
till 1865 as officer in the British army. Ob¬ 


tained the post of consul at Reunion by ex¬ 
amination, November, 1867. Transferred to 
Stockholm as consul for the eastern coast of 
Sweden, February, 1874. Took over the con¬ 
sulship at Nantes, October, 1879, and in Janu¬ 
ary, 1887, was appointed consul at Baltimore, 
for the states of Maryland, Virginia, West 
Virginia and Kentucky. 

Length of service as consul.26 years. 

Ronald Bridget!, consul, Buenos Ayres.— 
Was acting consul at Buenos Ayres from July, 
1873, till November, 1874 Nominated vice- 
consul at Buenos Ayres, March, 1875. From 
May, 1875, from time to time, till 1881, was 
acting-consul at Buenos Ayres. Was pro¬ 
moted to be consul for Texas, to reside at Gal¬ 
veston, in July, 1882, and transferred to Bue¬ 
nos Ayres as consul for the Argentine Repub¬ 
lic in May, 1884 Was placed in charge of 
the archives of the legation, as acting consul- 
general at Buenos Ayres, from May to June, 
1885. 


Length of service .26 years 

Consulship.11 years 


Albemarle Percy Inglis, consul, Copenha¬ 
gen.— Was acting consul at Caen and Leghorn 
at various periods from October, 1864, till 
May, 1870. Was appointed unpaid vice-con¬ 
sul at Leghorn in June, 1870. Was frequently 
acting consul at Leghorn from August, 1870, 
till May, 1883, when he was promoted to be 
consul for the provinces of Lucca, Visa, Leg¬ 
horn and Grossero. Was appointed consul for 
Denmark, to reside at Copenhagen, April 22, 
1887. 


Length of service.29 years 

Consulship.10 years 


William Lane Booker, C. M. G., consul- 
general, New York.—Was employed for five 
years in the consulate at San Francisco; was 
acting counsel there from July, 1856, till 
April, 1857. Appointed consul at San Fran¬ 
cisco, May 1, 1857, for state of California. In 
February, 1871, state of Oregon and Wash¬ 
ington territory were added to his district. 
Was promoted to be consul-general at New 
York, January 1, 1883. He was made a C. M. 
G., August 6, 1886. 

Length of service as consul.36 years 

Charles George Guy Percival, consul, Mar¬ 
seilles.—Served twelve years in the royal navy, 
from 1845 to 1857. Was appointed to be vice- 
consul at Caen, December, 1859. Removed to 
Port Said in July, 1873, and was promoted to 
be consul January, 1875. In October, 1879, he 
was appointed consul at Bordeaux, and in Oc¬ 
tober, 1882, transferred to Marseilles as con¬ 
sul for that port and six neighboring depart¬ 
ments. 


Length of service.34 years 

Consulship.18 years 


Adam Samuel James Block, consul at Con¬ 
stantinople.—Passed a competitive examina¬ 
tion in October, 1877, and was appointed a 
student dragoman at Constantinople in Octo¬ 
ber, 1877, Appointed vice-consul at Beyroot, 
September, 1882. Was acting vice-consul at 
Damascus during part of 1883 and 1884. Was 
appointed assistant dragoman to the embassy 
at Constantinople, with the rank of vice-con¬ 
sul interpreter, in August, 1885. Was pro¬ 
moted to be consul and interpreter at Constan¬ 
tinople, March 1, 1890. 


Length of service.16 years. 

Consulship. 3 years. 


Sydney Hamilton Little, Consul, Madrid.— 
Was appointed vice consul at Havana in 1887. 
Was acting consul at Havana during part of 
1889 and 1890. Was promoted to be consul 
at Madrid and clerk and assistant to the lega¬ 
tion March 1, 1890. 


Length of service.6 years. 

Consulship.3 yeais. 


Raphael Borg, consul at Cairo.—Entered 
the public service as supernumerary clerk to 
the consular court at Alexandria, in March, 


1863. Served as acting consul at Cairo at vari¬ 
ous times from June, 1868, till October, 1878. 
Was appointed vice-consul at Cairo in May, 
1880, and was promoted to be consul there 
March 1, 1884. 


Length of service.30 years. 

Consulship. 9 years. 


William Ward, consul at Bordeaux.—Was 
acting consul at Hamburg for several short 
periods from 1861 till 1866, when he passed 
an examination, and was appointed vice-con¬ 
sul at Memel in June, 1886. Was promoted 
to be consul at Bremen, August, 1871, for 
Bremen and its territory, the grand Duchy of 
Oldenburg, and the ports and districts of Em- 
den. Leer and Geestemunde. In 1880 his 
supervision was extended to the province of 
Hanover. In the same year he was transferred 
to Portland, Me., where he remained until 
placed in chargeof theconsulate at Bordeaux, 
which post he still holds. 


Length of service.32 years. 

Consulship.22 years. 


DIPLOMATS FORMERLY IN CONSULAR SERVICE. 

Colonel Sir Charles Bean Euan-Smith, K. 
C. B., C. S. I.—After serving in the Indian 
army was acting consul-general at Zanzibar 
from June till September, 1875. Was consul 
at Muscat during part of 1879. Between 1880 
and September, 1887, when he was appointed 
agent and consul-general at Zanzibar, he was 
engaged in political service under the Indian 
office. He was made a C. B. in 1889, and K. 
C. B. in 1890. Was appointed envoy extraor¬ 
dinary and minister plenipotentiary to the 
Emperor of Morocco, and consul-general in 
Morocco, March 10, 1891. He recently va¬ 
cated the latter post. 

Sir Spencer St. John, K. C. M. G., British 
minister at Mexico.—Was secretary in politi¬ 
cal missions to Borneo and Siam during 1848 
and 1850. Was appointed consul-general at 
Borneo in 1855. Later he served as charge 
d’affaires and consul-general in Hayti. He 
was promoted to be minister resident and 
consul general in Hayti in 1872. He after¬ 
wards acted in the same capacity at Laim, and 
was subsequently intrusted with special mis¬ 
sions to Bolivia and Mexico; was appointed 
envoy extraordinary and minister plenipoten¬ 
tiary at Mexico, November 28, 1884. 

Sir John Walsham, Bart. — Minister at 
Bucharest. Began his public career as clerk 
in the foreign office. Appointed acting con¬ 
sul at Mexico in 1859. Was subsequently in¬ 
trusted with minor diplomatic posts at Madrid, 
Berlin, and Paris. At various times during 
1884 and 1885 he was appointed acting minis¬ 
ter plenipotentiary at Paris in the absence of 
the ambassador, and in November, 1885, was 
promoted to be envoy extraordinary and 
minister plenipotentiary to the Emperor of 
China and the King of Corea. Was trans¬ 
ferred to Bucharest in April, 1892, where he 
still remains. 

Captain Henry Michael Jones, V. C., Minis¬ 
ter at Bankok.—After a military service of 
about eight years, he was given a temporary 
charge of the consulates at Bosna, Serai, and 
at Scrutaria. Was appointed consul for the 
Fiji and Tonga Islands, July, 1863. Promoted 
to be consul-general at Tahreez, July, 1868. 
Transferred to Christiana and Phillippopolis 
in 1875 and 1880 respectively, was promoted 
to be minister resident and consul-general at 
Bankok in January, 1889; at which post he 
still remains. 

Major James Hay Wodehouse, Minister at 
Hawaii.—After brief service in the militia, 
was appointed consul in the Leeward Islands. 
He was subsequently transferred to Para, 
Brazil, and later promoted to be commissioner 
and consul-general in the Sandwich Islands. 
After thirty two years of consular service he 
was rewarded with the post of minister resi¬ 
dent at Hawaii in July, 1892. 



































the Civil service chronicle. 


If we see nothing in our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoil, we shall fail at every point.— 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November 18 1892. 


INDIANAPOLIS, JANUARY, 1894. terms : ^ ?o“oen?lpeTlo7y”“^^ 


VoL. II, No. 11. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


In stating last month that the Buffalo 
Association had initiated the present move¬ 
ment in New York against the Hill ma¬ 
chine we understood the first step to have 
been a resolution offered by a Buffalo del¬ 
egate in the last meeting of the National 
League. We have since learned that the 
New York Association had by a commit¬ 
tee already taken steps in the matter. The 
movement now has gathered headway and 
promises to set the law of that state firmly 
upon its feet. 

Before the election last fall, it was re¬ 
peatedly charged that the New York civil 
service law was being violated by Governor 
Flower and the state oflBcers, and the Hill 
machine generally. Flower and his officers 
denied it and in this they were sustained 
by a servile civil service commission. One 
of the commissioners had the effrontery to 
appear at the last meeting of the National 
League and there make a speech defend¬ 
ing Flower and claiming that the law was 
honestly enforced. When the attention of 
Flower and of the state comptroller, Camp¬ 
bell, was called to distinct violations, and 
they were warned not to continue paving 
salaries, they ignored the whole matter. 
The election gave the state an honest comp¬ 
troller who declared that he would pay no 
salaries of employes in the classified service 
who had not obtained their places through 
competition under the law. Comptroller 
Roberts held the key to the situation, and 
his determination completely baffled the 
Hill machine and brought the facts to 
light. A report by the chief examiner 
dated January 11, shows that as early as 
Febuary 27, 1893, 271 persons had been 
given places in the state service in deliber¬ 
ate violation of the law. In some of the 
institutions the civil service commission 
had held no examinations for applicants 
since 1884. This is Hillism. This is the 
Hill-Tammany notion of enforcing the 
law. Since he found an immovable comp¬ 
troller in his way. Flower has been loudest 
in his declarations that the law must be en¬ 
forced; yet just before the comptroller 
went into office in order to save some 
favorites, he transferred some fifteen of 


the places concerned from the classified to 
the unclassified service. This goes to show 
that he is the same rascally tool that he 
always was. 

It is announced that Congressman By¬ 
num will “take up” the Indianapolis post- 
office as soon as he gets through with the 
tariff bill. The country should understand 
that our post-office is in excellent condi¬ 
tion, the employes are faithful, politics are 
excluded, the civil service law is honestly 
enforced and that any change which Con¬ 
gressman Bynum can bring about will be 
a damage to the public service. This un¬ 
deniable fact should not be lost sight of. 
Bynum has no interest in this matter ex¬ 
cept a personal benefit to himself in the 
way of getting henchmen to work for his 
renomination and re-election while being 
paid out of the public funds. He hesi¬ 
tated about trying for renomination for 
fear he could not be re-elected but he 
seems to have decided that he can be. He 
has never been anything but a buccaneer 
in politics. His views of public adminis¬ 
tration are wholly bad and his acts carry 
out his views. He belongs to a class of of¬ 
ficials who have been a curse to Indiana 
and she will never take her rightful place 
until she can shake them off and be repre¬ 
sented by men who have political morality. 

The dispatch of the Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel’s special Washington correspondent 
dated January 23 says: 

To-morrow Senator Voorhees and Representative 
McNagney will call on Secretary Hoke Smith to 
recommend the appointment of Spencer, of Ft. 
Wayne, for pension agent. * * * It is safe to 
predict that Secretary Smith will not object to 
Spencer on account of brief army record and his 
appointment seems almost certain. There are other 
candidates, it is true, who have the earnest support 
of their members, hut it is well understood that 
Senator Voorhees controls all the state appoint¬ 
ments. He has controlled all the other appoint¬ 
ments, such as bank examiner, marshal, district 
attorney, and revenue collector, and he is not go¬ 
ing to be turned down on the last office to be filled 
in the state. 

However much the regret, it can not be 
denied that this dispatch states the truth. 
In granting this control of appointments 
the President has knowingly put into 
places of profit and honor and influence 
the worst in the politics of Indiana, a state 
which has not had a high standard of politi¬ 
cal morals. It would seem well for this mat¬ 
ter to be discussed by reformers and reform 


papers. Let us find out where we stand. 
This is either a corrupt use of public office 
and a flagrant breach of a public trust, or it 
is not. 


Mr. Burke, the member of the Voorhees 
ring whom Voorhees made attorney of the 
district of Indiana, has been brought to no¬ 
tice again by inexcusable and fatal blun¬ 
dering in drawing the most important 
counts of indictments against men charged 
with wrecking the Indianapolis National 
Bank. It is worthy of note also that the gov. 
ernment has called in John W. Kern, who 
was the only other candidate for Burke’s 
office, to assist the latter in the first i mporta n t 
cases which have come before the court 
since Burke’s appointment. It is worthy 
of note also that Mr. Kern was appointed 
attorney for the receiver of the bank who 
in turn is said to have been appointed by 
Mr. Bynum. Thus do all things work to¬ 
gether for harmony, especially public of¬ 
fices and perquisites. 

In the rejection of Hornblower, nomi¬ 
nated for the supreme court, the President 
has another lesson of the small account in 
which he is really held by the average 
spoils congressman and of the stand-and- 
deliver spirit which the average congress¬ 
man has towards the executive department. 
The Chronicle has often noted the terror 
and abject submission to which congress 
has reduced executive officers in Washing¬ 
ton, and the Hornblower incident is but 
another evidence of its contempt. We 
have heard much of how the President 
may manage congress by “judicious” use 
of the offices. Yet here again it is shown 
that for the least exercise of his constitu¬ 
tional right against their taste they turn 
upon him like pirates who see their prey 
slipping away. The President is not en¬ 
titled to any particular sympathy in this 
matter. The technical ground of the re¬ 
jection was that he had not counselled 
about the nomination with Hill and Mur¬ 
phy, the senators from New York. Not to 
consult was right; but where is the room 
for sympathy with a President who does 
counsel about Indiana nominations with 
Voorhees, a man no whit better than Hill 
and Murphy, and who lets other senators 
dictate nominations. There has never been 
a more brazen looting of offices by con¬ 
gressmen than President Cleveland has 
























94 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


allowed for nearly a year. It has never be¬ 
fore been so openly taken for granted that 
congressmen “appoint” to the offices. What 
could Mr. Cleveland have meant when he 
said before inauguration,“If we see nothing 
in our victory but a license to revel in par¬ 
tisan spoil, we shall fail at every point ”? 
There has been a constant revel in parti¬ 
san spoil with the President’s permission 
and assistance. Every man who knows 
anything of the subject knows that there 
can never be reform while the President 
permits congressmen to seize the offices. 
We had hoped that President Cleveland, 
profiting by the failure of his first admin¬ 
istration, would declare and maintain the 
independence of the executive. Refusing 
to do so, he is doomed to a second failure. 
He seems to have shortened his sight and 
can see only certain legislation, important, 
to be sure, but not more important than 
has occurred, and always will occur, in the 
routine affairs of government. Meantime 
the venality and piracy which sap the 
moral foundations of the government of 
our cities, of our states and of the nation 
flourish with but. slight hindrance from 
him. With his second presidency the 
completion of national reform was possible 
and hoped for. But it is not to be, and re¬ 
formers will have to gird themselves for a 
long future struggle. Again, and perhaps 
many times, they must resort to the bal¬ 
lot. It is, after all, not yet settled under 
what party the final victory will be gained. 


The President has nominated Wheeler 
H. Peckham, of New York, for the su¬ 
preme court vacancy, and again without 
consulting Hill and Murphy. The latter 
are much exasperated, and are straining 
nerve and muscle to defeat the nomina. 
tion. The senate will be likely to think 
twice before rejecting the nomination, as 
the people almost to a man are with the 
President as against any claim of any sen¬ 
ator to be consulted. The only fault in the 
matter lies with the President himself. It 
is very enjoyable to see Hill and Mur¬ 
phy in such stress as this move puts them, 
and great strife and excitement will re¬ 
sult. The President may gain this vic¬ 
tory. But if he does no principle will be 
established; it will only be established 
that now and then he will not allow sena¬ 
tors to dictate appointments. Yet merely 
to carry this isolated point, he will stir 
up as much strife, and he will engender a 
more relentless hatred of himself than he 
would if he had announced to the country 
that dictation and advice, and all man¬ 
ner of interference of every kind, by mem¬ 
bers of either house of congress in relation 
to appointments, except the constitutional 
right vested in the senate when in actual 
session, were at an end, and had after that 


lived up to the announcement. Streaks 
of reform with very thick layers of spoil 
do not give satisfaction to the people 
while to political buccaneerslike Hill, Mur¬ 
phy, and Voorhees, a streak of reform is 
like the proverbial red rag to a bull, al¬ 
though in fact in the finest pasture. 

A COMMITTEE of the national league, of 
which Morrill Wyman, Jr., is chairman, 
has prepared a bill for an act to aid the 
President in appointing first, second and 
third class postmasters. The bill provides 
for a record of fidelity and efficiency to be 
kept of all such postmasters, and of the 
higher grades of employes under them. 
All of these may become applicants for 
vacancies. Vacancies in first and second 
class offices are open to those in service in 
such offices throughout the country. Va¬ 
cancies in third class offices are filled from 
the appointment district and from those 
employed in such offices. The country is 
to be divided into appointment districts. 
The postmaster-general must require cer¬ 
tain information in applications. He is 
then to examine application papers and 
rating of applicants, and make his recom¬ 
mendation to the President. Other things 
being equal, rank and seniority are to 
govern. The President may direct the 
civil service commission to hold examina¬ 
tions for the third class offices. Under the 
English system, in many respects like this, 
it is interesting to note that a clerk at 
Plymouth became postmaster at Bridge- 
water ; a chief clerk at Manchester became 
postmaster at Bristol; the postmaster at 
Lynn became postmaster at Doncaster; an 
inspector of letter-carriers at Liverpool 
became postmaster at Lynn. 

Sometime such a bill can be got through 
congress. In the meantime, a President 
who went into office as Mr. Cleveland did 
in March last, could by a simple executive 
order accomplish every object aimed at by 
this bill. All it needs is a fair degree of 
statesmanship and nerve and consistency, 
instead of a childish fear of losing his 
party. Suppose the President had ordered 
Postmaster General Bissell to provide such 
a system of selection as this bill provides 
for and had made his nominations to the 
senate accordingly, what could the merce¬ 
naries, who have in fact dictated his ap¬ 
pointments, have done about it? Nothing 
but curse and refuse to confirm and cut 
down appropriations and other spiteful 
things natural to them, all of which would 
have briefly preceded the final triumph of 
the President. 


The Chronicle is indebted to Mr 
William P. Fishback for a copy of some 
resolutions drafted by his father for a local 
Whig convention in Ohio, in 1835. They are 
interesting, as showing that from the very 


beginning of the Jacksonian practice, its 
dangerous, monarchical, and despotic ten¬ 
dencies were comprehended by thought¬ 
ful men. The riot which has been run 
during all the years since has been due, 
not to parties, but to the party machines, 
the system of bargain and sale, by which 
ward heelers help men into large places 
and in return receive from them small 
places. The resolutions are as follows: 

Resolved, That all attempts on the part of the 
high officers of the government to bring the patron¬ 
age of their official stations into conflict with the 
freedom of elections, by holding out to the voter 
the hope of reward or menace of punishment, Is 
subversive of our republican institutions. 

Resolved, That public offices, created for the 
public benefit, ought not to be regarded as “the 
spoils of victory,” as the doctrine has a direct 
tendency to degrade elections [the highest acts of 
freemen], into mere mercenary scrambles for the 
loaves and fishes in which the honest many are 
always the losers and the designing few the 
gainers. 

Two important indications of a wide¬ 
spread desire for better administration 
have appeared. An association called the 
Anti-Spoils League has been formed, which 
is designed to unite throughout the coun¬ 
try all who are in favor of excluding every 
element of spoil from the transaction of 
public business. No expense is incurred 
in joining this association; citizens are 
sinply asked to openly declare themselves. 
The other movement appears in a meeting 
to be held this month in Philadelphia of 
those throughout the country who are in 
favor of better city government. The list 
embraces many distinguished names. The 
admitted fact that city government is the 
greatest failure of American institutions 
has made a deep impression, and the de¬ 
termination to find a remedy has a grati¬ 
fying strength. 


Judge William H. Taft, of the Cincin¬ 
nati district of the United States court, 
delivered an address in that city upon 
civil service reform before the alumni of 
the Woodward high school, and it was 
published in the Cincinnati Tribune of De¬ 
cember 28 last. The address shows a 
thorough familiarity with the reform sys¬ 
tem, and with the public service, and was 
admirably adapted to the audience. Hav¬ 
ing been formerly at tbe head of the de¬ 
partment of justice. Judge Taft is able to 
say from experience that the methods of 
the civil service commission are “a most 
satisfactory means of determining the fit¬ 
ness” of candidates for places. The ad¬ 
dress fitly says that no defense worthy of 
the name has ever been made of the spoils 
system. Another exact truth is also stated 
in the assertion that it would be a vast im¬ 
provement over the prevailing system in 
our cities if laborers and employes were 
selected only from those who measured 
nearest to a certain height. This is true 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


95 


because politics would be excluded, and it 
is only some such comparison that fully 
brings out the absurdity of the spoils sys¬ 
tem. The particular urgency of the ad¬ 
dress is to show the necessity for intro¬ 
ducing the merit system into cities. Judge 
Taft shows how the boss makes himself an 
“uncrowned king,” but we do not agree 
with him that the boss is not necessarily a 
wrong-doer. He does not, as a rule, vio¬ 
late the criminal laws, but he belongs and 
always will belong to the class which preys 
upon the community. He uses, or causes 
to be used, a public trust for his personal 
benefit, and this is corrupt. 

We are glad to see such an address de¬ 
livered before an educational body. As a 
rule our schools and churches are afraid to 
openly and specifically oppose the spoils 
system. The teacher and the preacher 
dread its Briarean arms. The fear is 
not unlike the fear which forty years ago 
made the church and the school anxious 
to repress discussion of the right and 
wrong of slavery. We do not mean to 
overlook the religious press. In a consid¬ 
erable list of exchanges we have never 
found a single line of opposition to the 
spoils system. The Chronicle believes 
that it tells the truth without regard to 
persons or parties, but the uneasiness of 
schools and young men’s Christian associa¬ 
tions at a free copy seen in their read¬ 
ing-rooms is frequently and ludicrously 
displayed. 

Mr. Quincy has received another rebuke 
from the most influential body of his fel¬ 
low-citizens. The Boston Chamber of Com¬ 
merce at its annual meeting, January 17, 
adopted resolutions to the efiect that the 
consular service should be reformed “so 
that it shall stand upon merit and perma¬ 
nency rather than upon the spoils system.’’ 

THE MASSACHUSETTS REFORM 
CLUB. 

The Massachusetts Reform Club has 
cleared the atmosphere around it. It has 
been a problem whether it was really a 
reform club, or whether it was a club 
whose motto should have been “For 
Cleveland and Everything He does. Right 
or Wrong.” At its meeting January 12th, 
the club settled the matter by declaring 
that it stands for reform without regard to 
persons. 

The question was whether the club 
should keep silent as to Mr. Quincy’s 
view of civil service reform, and as to 
the use of offices to buy votes in con¬ 
gress. Among those in favor of this si¬ 
lence, Mr. Winslow Warren urged that 
the administration needed confidence and 
support, and abstention from criticism; that 
the President feels that he has plenty of 


cold criticism and little real encourage¬ 
ment; that civil service reform would 
never come through any President; that 
the tariff and silver questions vastly over¬ 
shadow this reform in importance. He 
regretted to be compelled to vote so as to 
declare that he would never believe it wise 
to use offices to carry through any great 
question. Mr. Gamaliel Bradford on the 
same side said the President could not get 
anything done without the pressure of the 
offices. Said Mr. Bradford: 

“Take the matter of the silver bill; the only way 
the President could get that passed was by putting 
the consulships im* the congressmen’s hands, just 
as Mr. Quincy did. and I believe he was right in 
doing so.” 

We submit that there has been nothing 
like the foregoing since the days of the 
Cotton Whigs. It is the same craven 
spirit which made the career of Daniel 
Webster end in ruin and which led George 
Ticknor and his following to put Charles 
Sumner and the Richard H. Dana of that 
time under the ban. So it seems will 
President Cleveland’s career come to 
nothing, and all who depart from true 
principles to shield him will find them¬ 
selves with those who made the mighty 
mistake which preceded the destruction 
of slavery. 

Against these astounding positions spoke^ 
as we gather from the various accounts, 
Richard H. Dana, James J. Myers, Moor- 
field Storey, J. G. Thorp, Morrill Wyman, 
jr., Archibald M. Howe, John W. Carter 
and Charles F. Dole. We regret the lack 
of space to give the fullest report of what 
each one said. Quoting generally from the 
different speakers, Quincy was thanked 
for stating the spoils theory in the most 
gentlemanly manner possible, although 
his stand was the same as that of Senator 
Ingalls. It was absurd to keep silent in 
order to spare the President’s feelings. 
That was tried and it failed in Cleveland’s 
former administration. Never for twenty 
years had the spoils system, been so fla¬ 
grant at Washington as now. Office-seek¬ 
ers surround the President. If reformers 
keep silent how can the reform grow? The 
President was busy nine-tenths of his 
time distributing offices. Edward Atkin¬ 
son was called to Washington to confer 
with the President upon monetary mat¬ 
ters, but after waiting three days came 
home without seeing the President, so 
busy was the latter distributing offices. It 
was time to speak and if the principles 
declared were the principles of the club, 
then it had departed from the object of 
its formation. The club did not have 
consideration for President Harrison’s 
feelings, and if it now kept silent it owed 
Mr. Harrison an apology. If we wait for 
tariff"reform, the Wilson bill is only a com¬ 
promise, and we shall have to wait till 


doomsday. If the offices had not been 
used for silver legislation the senators who 
held out would have yielded sooner to 
public opinion. If we believe it is proper 
to buy legislation with offices, we can not 
consistently rebuke the lobby and any one 
wanting a law passed can justify himself 
by the example of the club. It was sur¬ 
prising that the club had listened to such 
doctrine. Any one who begins with tol¬ 
eration of the spoils theory in any way 
will end where Quincy has ended. 

At the close of the speaking the follow¬ 
ing resolutions were adopted: 

iJesoJved, That the unqualified and active support 
which the President gives and has given to the 
United States civil service commissioners in the 
work of executing the civil service laws and rules, 
as well as the acts and recommendations of several 
cabinet officers, which help to strengthen the work 
and methods of the commission, afford much en¬ 
couragement to all who are interested in the de¬ 
struction of the spoils system. 

Resolved, That we earnestly request the President 
to extend the civil service rules so that they shall 
be applied to the non-political, unclassified service 
in all the departments of the executive branch of the 
government at the earliest possible day, believing 
that it is well recognized by all honest citizens and 
officials that wherever the law and rules regulat¬ 
ing the appointment, promotion and removal of 
public servants are applied the public service is 
made better and stronger. 

Resolved, That this club emphatically dissents 
from the proposition that all hope of civil service 
reform outside the classified service is but “a sub¬ 
limated theory,” but, on the contrary, this club be¬ 
lieves and asserts that it is both possible and prac¬ 
tical to apply the spirit of civil service reform in 
making all appointments to non-political positions 
under the government. 

Resolved, That this club is unalterably opposed to 
a system which permits appointments to office to 
be made the price of legislative support. 


INDIANA STATESMEN AT WORK. 

Our record of the occupation of Indiana 
congressmen during the month is perhaps 
more interesting than usual. Senator Voor- 
hees has been absorbed in the Indianapolis 
pension agency. The death of Colonel Zol¬ 
linger, who had been promised the place, was 
a severe blow, though promptly recovered 
from. Voorhees sent a long message of con¬ 
dolence to the widow, and the same afternoon 
held a conference with Indiana congressmen 
where it was agreed that northern Indiana 
should have the spoil. Voorhees gave no 
consideration to applicants from southern 
Indiana, it being admitted that Congressman 
McNagny was “short” on loot and this place 
must be “accorded to him for district 
strength.” In spite of this, candidates ap¬ 
peared from all sides and Voorhees has been 
nearly pulled to pieces. McNagny has got one 
of his editors into the Lagrange post-office. 
Congressman Taylor has a man for the pension 
agency and thini s he has a cinch on it. 
His time is mostly occupied with his pro¬ 
longed boost of Zinzich up to the Evansville 
steamboat inspectorship, but he announces 
that a colored man will be made assistant 
surgeon of the Freedmen’s hospital, and is 
making a heroic efTort for a place for Colonel 













96 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Wm. Gavitt in the interior department, and is 
pressing a man for an Oklahoma judgeship, 
and has got one Stowers into the government 
printing office. Martin also thinks he has a 
cinch on the pension agency, and he has got a 
man in as treasury watchman, and has ap¬ 
pointed a postmaster at Zanesville and like¬ 
wise at Decatur. Under Congressman Conn 
the South Bend post-office question is at a 
white heat. One candidate, Ginz, after prom¬ 
ising in writing to abide Conn’s decision and 
comply with all of Conn’s conditions and re¬ 
quirements, withdrew his application and 
then tried to get the place on his own hook as 
an original Cleveland man. Conn is on the 
war path. Jason Brown was at home in a 
fight to the finish for renomination and had 
to be arrested and taken back to Washing¬ 
ton. He has had two-thirds of the laborers 
in the Jeffersonville depot removed and has 
put his men at the trough. Bretz has re¬ 
moved the postmaster at Odon, and has 
knocked from the tree two appointments, a 
revenue agency and an Indian school inspec¬ 
torship. Bretz has worked hard to quarter 
his henchmen on the treasury, and it is in¬ 
teresting to note the effect in his struggle for 
renomination. His postmasters and his reve¬ 
nue service appointees are all for him. The 
newspapers owned by his postmasters at Vin¬ 
cennes, Shoals, Bedford and other places are 
warmly loyal, and the Paoli News, edited by 
his private secretary, says: “The gallant de¬ 
mocracy of the second congressional district 
is falling into line like a stone wall in sup¬ 
port of the present member of congress, the 
Hon. John L. Bretz.” Holman is still sweat¬ 
ing purple sweat over the fight for the Shelby- 
ville post-office, and apropos of his appoint¬ 
ment of Noah Mendenhall to be his private 
secretary when a brother of the latter already 
had a place, the democrats of Decatur county 
declare that “two of a family is more than 
they can and will stand.” Congressman Ham¬ 
mond decided to appoint Editor Isherwood 
postmaster at Delphi. Thereupon the editor 
of a rival democratic paper began a tremen¬ 
dous anti Isherwood campaign and nine other 
candidates are d manding the place. The seat 
of war has been moved to Washington. 

These brief notes give some idea of what our 
congressmen are doing. Any unbiased man 
must admit that they are stirring around. 
Meanwhile there are nominally before con¬ 
gress and the country questions of trade and 
finance which some claim are more important 
than dealings with the civil service. Clearly 
our Indiana statesmen do not think so. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

OVEK-LORD VOORHEE8. 

Another caller at the executive mansion was 
Col. C. A. Zollinger, of Ft. Wayne. He wants re¬ 
appointment to the office of pension agent for In¬ 
diana, which he formerly held.— Washington dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Sentinel, December SO. 

■)■>>■» 

The death of Col. Zollinger, mayor of Ft. Wayne, 
was sorrowfully discussed by the Indiana mem¬ 
bers present to-day. for it has been but a few days 


since President Cleveland announced in a quiet 
way that he should receive the appointment as 
pension agent for the State of Indiana, which posi¬ 
tion he so creditably filled eight years ago. Sena¬ 
tor Voorhees this afternoon sent this message of 
condolence: v *■' 

Later in the afternoon a little conference was held 
between Senator Voorhees and Congressmen Martin 
and Conn. It was agreed that Northern Indiana 
should have recognition in the appointment of pension 
agent.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, 
December S9. 

* « 

It is a sad commentary on the “race for spoils” 
among the Indiana Democrats, that while the 
death of Mayor Zollinger, of Fort Wayne, was not 
generally known to the Indiana delegation until 
noon to-day, at 2:30 p. M. Senator Voorhees and 
other members of the delegation were in confer¬ 
ence trying to settle who should succeed Zollinger 
as the prospective pension agent for Indiana. 
There are between thirty and forty places under 
Pension Agent Ensley, most of which had been 
spoken for already on the strength of Col. Zol¬ 
linger’s prospective appointment.—TFas/tiripfon dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Journal, December 29. 

>» « » 

Senator Voorhees has received a large number of 
applications for appointment as pension agent of 
Indiana by telegraph. They come principally 
from southern Indiana. The senator will give no 
special consideration to the applications, for the 
office is conceded to the Ft. Wayne Congressional 
District, if a suitable man can be found, and under 
any circumstances is limited to either Martin’s, 
Conn’s or McNagny’s congressional district. The 
fact that Congressman McNagny’s Democratic 
constituents have received so little federal patron¬ 
age, influences his colleagues (Martin and Conn) 
to refer to him in the matter.—IVas/itwpfon dispatch, 
Indianapolis News, December SO. 

« « « 

Representative McNagny, of Ft. Wayne, is to 
name the new pension agent for Indiana. This 
conclusion was the result of a conference upon the 
part of Senator Voorhees, and all the Democratic 
congressmen here from Indiana. The position had 
been conceded to the late Mayor Zollinger, of Ft. 
Wayne, and the untimely and sudden death of that 
gentleman has left a sort of implied obligation to 
give the place to that district. Added to this is a 
feeling here that Mr. McNagny has not fared well 
with this administration, so far as outside patron¬ 
age is concerned, a7id that this position should be 
accorded to him for district strength. Mr. McNagny 
will not divulge the name of the man whom he 
will present for the pension agency, but it is the 
understanding that he will name Martin Van Buren 
Spencer, a lawyer and ex-soldier of Ft. Wayne. A 
veteran is sure to get the place. Col. I. B. McDon¬ 
ald, of Columbia City,was an aspirant, and many of 
his friends have, during the past day or two, be¬ 
lieved he was in the race, but he is not.—Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, December 30. 

♦ * 

M. V. B. Spencer, of Ft. Wayne, whose appoint¬ 
ment as pension agent for Indiana is considered 
highly probable, arrived at a late hour last night. 
He wants the appointment, and carried a grip sack 
full of strong local recommendations. He will re¬ 
main several days to confer with Congressman Mc¬ 
Nagny and the senators.—Washington dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis News, January 4. 

# 

Dr. Norman Teal, of Kendallville, is in Ft. Wayne 
to-day getting the indorsement of prominent demo¬ 
crats for the state pension agency. Dr. Teal, it is 
said, will make a tour of the entire district .—Fort 
Wayne dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, January 4. 

* l(t • 

Congressman Taylor has a candidate for pension 
agent for Indiana in the person of Col. A. D. Owen, 
of New Harmony.—TFasWnpfon dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis News, January 6. 

* 

The friends of Martin Van Buren Spencer, of 
Fort Wayne, who have been working for his ap¬ 


pointment to the position of pension agent for In¬ 
diana, are reported to have run up against a snag 
in the form of a protest against his appointment on 
account of alleged Irregularities in his war record. 
It is said that consideration of the filling of the 
office has been postponed for some days in order 
that Mr. Spencer’s record may be inquired into. 
The arrival of Senator Turpie, who wants Joseph 
Reilly appointed to the position, adds another new 
element of doubt and delay to the situation. 
Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, Janu¬ 
ary 6. 

Senator Turpie arrived to-day. A crowd of Hoo- 
siers wanted him to take up the pension agency 
matter and see the President at once, but he said he 
was tired and couldn’t look after it until next 
Tuesday, so it has been postponed.— Washington 
dispatch, Indianapolis News, January 5. 

* * * 

Each of the three congressmen, McNagny, Taylor 
and Martin, thinks he has a cinch on the pension 
agency. All have presented their claims to Senators 
Turpie and Voorhees, for it is recognized that their 
indorsement will go in getting the office. The 
senators have given ear to all claims, but no decis¬ 
ion has yet been rendered. Ft. Wayne still has the 
lead.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, 
January. 

« * * 

Judge Samuel M. Hench, of Ft. Wayne, put in an 
early appearance at the capital this morning, os¬ 
tensibly to assist his cousin, C. S. McLaughlin, of 
Pennsylvania, who was injured at the Ford Thea¬ 
ter disaster. There are others, however, who be¬ 
lieve that the Judge is going to take a hand in the 
pension agency which is just now attracting so 
much interest. With due respect to them all, it is 
conceded that Mr. McNagny’s man, Martin V. 
Spencer, has by far the lead, and if no question is 
raised as to the time of his service in the army, he 
will be likely to get the appointment. If this bars 
him, there will be a merry time before another 
winner is picked. Mr. Spencer is here and also is 
Elza T. Stringer, another resident of Ft. Wayne, 
who wants the place. Ft. Wayne has other candi¬ 
dates in Milton Thompson, Dr. Norman Teale and 
Capt. Charles Rees. Besides these candidates Con¬ 
gressman Martin comes forth with one in the per, 
son of Marcellus M. Justus, of Bluffton,— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, January 9. 

* * * 

The Indiana democratic leaders are beating the 
bushes of Allen county trying to find material for 
pension agent of Indiana. Several candidates are 
expected here this week under the belief that the 
office will be disposed of before the week ends. 
Col. I. B. McDonald, of Columbia City, whom Sen¬ 
ator Voorhees is Inclined to favor, and Dr. Norman 
Teal, of Kendallville, are already overdue.—TFas/i- 
ington dispatch, Indianapolis News, January 9. 

• * * 

The solution to the Indiana pension agency con¬ 
test is no nearer now than yesterday, but the con¬ 
gressmen are inclined to think that in another 
week the matter will be disposed of. Mr. Elza T. 
Stringer, of Fort Wayne, who has been mentioned 
as one of the candidates for the place, returned 
home to-night, leaving Mr. Spencer to fight it out. 
— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, Janu¬ 
ary 10. 

^ <1 

The pension agency contest continues to occupy 
the attention of the Indiana members, but there 
has been no real progression unless perhaps the 
struggle has narrowed down between two men, 
namely, Martin Spencer, of Fort Wayne, Mr. Mc¬ 
Nagny’s candidate, and Mr. Owens, of Mt. Vernon, 
who is backed by Mr. Taylor. While the other can¬ 
didates who were here have withdrawn and de¬ 
parted for home, leaving the field practically to 
Spencer, Mr. Taylor has been one who would not 
give up. He says he will be in the race until the last 
and believes his man will win .— Washington dispatch, 
Indianapolis Sentinel, January 11. 

« • • 

Intimation was made to-day at the capltol that it 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


97 


was not all together Improbable that a prominent j Senator Voorhees stated to your correspondent 
German citizen of Ft. Wayne may, after all, get this afternoon, that the long talked of and all Im- 
the Indiana pension agency. While Representa- portant conference which is to be held for the in- 
tive McNagny has not given up hope of the ap- j dorsement of a pension agent will not take place 
pointment of Martin Spencer, others regard his i for the time being, as other important matters are 
chances as less favorable than a few days ago.— ' 


Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, January 11. 

* <« <• 

This week has been devoted to but one topic of dis¬ 
cussion by Indiana democrats—the selection of a pen¬ 
sion agent for Indiana. The democratic leaders 
predict that the nomination will be announced 
before the week ends, but complications have 
arisen which promise to delay the appointment. 
If Voorhees could control the appointment, he 
would name I. B. McDonald, of Columbia City. 
As it is, the chances are that Congressman McNag- 
ny’s voice will prevail. If it does, the delegation 
will indorse M. V. B. Spencer. He has practically 
all the indorsements from Allen county, but other 
candidates are appearlngln the field. E. F. Stringer, 
of Ft. Wayne, an old soldier, is here looking for 
the appointment. There are suggestions of names 
from other parts of the state, if the twelfth con¬ 
gressional district democrats should fail to agree 
on a man. Congressmen Martin and Conn have a 
few dark horses standing in the stable groomed 
and eager to enter this race. Col. C. C. Matson, of 
Greencastle, will certainly go into the race if it 
becomes a free-for-all, while Congressman Taylor, 
of the first district, has a candidate in Col. A. D. 
Owen, of New Harmony, who, if the appointment 
goes to Southern Indiana, is not to be counted out. 
But Spencer, of Ft. Wayne, may fairly be said to 
be the favorite now. Judge Hench, of Ft. Wayne, 
Is also a dark horse.— Washington dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis News, January 11. 

* ifr 

Some of the recent aspirants at Ft. Wayne pre¬ 
sented good claims for the office, but Mr. McNagny 
concluded that the retirement of Spencer for any 
other man in his district would only compound 
his troubles and make him new enemies. Captain 
Campbell, of Anderson, was at one time seriously 
considered, and was ardently supported by Mr" 
Bynum, but Senators Voorhees and Turpie have 
finally swung into line again with Mr. McNagny, 
and agreed that the office shall go to Spencer. The 
nomination is confidently expected the first of 
next week. — Washington dispatch, Indiatiapolis 
Journal, January 13. 

J. B. McDonald, editor of the Ligonier Banner, is 
expected here this week to urge on the Indiana delega¬ 
tion the claims of his father,!. B. McDonald, of Colum¬ 
bia City, for the pension agency. 

Congressman Conn has presented to Senator 
Voorhees and the Indiana delegation the applica¬ 
tion of Col. Matthew Mclnery, of South Bend, for 
the pension agency.— Washington dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, January 13. 

» * * 

This was to have been the second day for settle, 
ment in the minds of Indiana’s senators who shall 
be the pension agent. Pressing business, however, 
caused consideration to be deferred, and to-mor¬ 
row is expected the decision as to which one of the 
numerous candidates will receive the indorsement. 

— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, Jan, 
uary 17. 

• • * 

Senator Voorhees is in trouble over the Indiana 
pension agency. The Fort Wayne democrats served 
notice on him early in the game that unless Col. 
Zollinger’s mantle fell on an Allen county demo¬ 
crat, they would make trouble for the senator. To 
appease this cry. Senator Voorhees publicly an¬ 
nounced that he would recommend no one except 
a northern Indiana democrat, because southern 
Indiana had received the lion’s share of patronage. 
This has stirred up southern Indiana democrats. 
Congressman Taylor saw the senator to day and 
laid a number of “sassy” letters from southern In¬ 
diana democrats before him, strongly refuting his 
declaration and demanding either the pension 
agency for southern Indiana or his political 8calp_ 

— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, Jan¬ 
uary 18. 


occupying the attention of the Indiana Senators.— 
Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, Jan' 
uary 18. 

* * * 

The appointment of the Indiana pension agent 
could have been accomplished two weeks ago with¬ 
out much friction. But now the fight is decidedly 
warm and promises to grow hotter before it is 
finally settled. Until a few days ago the chief 
factors in the delegation have agreed upon M. V. 
B. Spencer, of Ft. Wayne. Repeated efforts to get 
the delegation together to formally Indorse Spen¬ 
cer have failed, and now it Is understood that 
nothing will be done until next week. The delay 
has brought out all the dark horses. Nearly every 
congressional district now has from one to two can¬ 
didates.—TPasAt/ipfon dispatch, Indianapolis News. 
January 19. 

« * * 

Congressman McNagny to-day voiced his opinion that 
if Senators Voorhees and Turpie indorse Martin V. Spen¬ 
cer for pension agent. President Cleveland will make the 
appointment without paying attention to any objection 
that might come from the interior department. Judge 
Holman, on the contrary, believes that the wishes 
of a cabinet officer will be respected, and that 
President Cleveland will not upon his sole respon¬ 
sibility make the appointment. This is the exist¬ 
ing state of affairs while the two Indiana senators 
withhold their indorsements.— Washington dispatch, 
Indianapolis Sentinel, January 19. 

* <1 * 

John G. Schwegman was sworn in to-night as 
postmaster for this city under the democratic ad¬ 
ministration, and B. F. Wissler [editor of the Sun] 
was appointed his assistaat.—Richmond dispatch, 
Indianapolis Journal, January 16. 

* it i> 

Judge Samuel Hench, of Fort Wayne, is a candi¬ 
date for a place in the treasury department. This 
morning he called on Secretary Carlisle, accom¬ 
panied by the senators from Indiana, to make 
known his desires.—Washington dispatch, Indianap¬ 
olis News, January 11. 

The democratic county primary yesterday to 
select delegates to the congressional convention, 
which will select a district chairman, was the first 
occasion the Larab-Falrbanks Tammany has had to 
dictate the action of a democratic meeting. The 
machine worked as smoothly as that of its New 
York prototype. Postmaster Donhnm, who is chair 
man of the county committee, called the meeting to order, 
and Police Commissioner Sankey was installed as 
chairman. The delegates from the city to the con¬ 
gressional convention are all out-and out Lamb- 
Fairbanks men, one of them being a new employe of the 
revenue office. The Lamb-Fairbanks Tammany now has 
absolute control of the post-office, revenue office, county 
commissioners’ court, police department, and indi¬ 
cations are that it “bosses” the school board.— 
Terre Haute dispatch,Iudianapolis Journal, December 31. 

• * * 

There is quite a contest at present over the post- 
ofifice at Winchester. G. D. Williamson is here in the 
interestsof 0. E. Davis. Col. M B. Miller, special pen¬ 
sion examiner, of Freeport, has left his post to work for 
L. O. Ellingham [editor Winchester Democrat.] It is 
also understood that he filed charges against the other can¬ 
didate, which makes the matter all the more Inter¬ 
esting. The ofiice is in a republican district and 
Senator Voorhees will have the disposition of it. As 
yet the senator has made no choice.—Washington dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Sentinel, January 11. 

<• <i 

About ten days ago Garland D. Williamson went 
to Washington to work in the interest of O. E. 
Davis, but that is regarded as a joke, and occasioned 
Mr. Heaston’s friends no uneasiness; but when 
Col. M, B. Miller, who is special pension examiner 
at Freeport, Ill., left his post of duty and went to 


the national capital to work in the interest of his 
prospective son-in-law, Mr. Ellingham, they be¬ 
came a litte shaky. The editor recognizes the fact 
that he is not very popular, and has said a number of 
times that he would not under any circumstances 
go into an election, because he knew he would not 
stand a ghost of a show. Local democrats claim 
to have polled the democratic vote and to know 
that Mr. Ellingham would receive but three votes 
besides his own. They say that Mr. Ellingham is 
aware of this fact, and, regardless of democratic 
harmony, is relying on the influence of Miller to 
make him postmaster over the almost unanimous 
protest of the democratic patrons of this office, 
even though it wrecks the party.— Washington dis¬ 
patch. Indianapolis Journal, January 15. 

« • 

The Indiana senators have recommended John 
Lynch for postmaster at Liberty, Ind., after a long 
contest. Ex-Representative Rude and George C. 
Strubel, of Liberty, have been here working for 
the appointment of Miller.—IPasAmpfon dispatch, 
Indianapolis News, January 19. 

* * * 

Con Cunningham, of Crawfordsville, who made 
a struggle at Washington for months to secure a 
consulate, writes to friends that he has been given 
a place temporarily as assistant doorkeeper of the 
house of representatives, and that “he will soon 
be invited to the pie counter,” meaning thereby 
that he will be sent aibrosid.—Indianapolis News- 
January 19. 

* * * 

The nomination of C. H. Leach to be postmaster 
at Kokomo gives excellent satisfaction to the de¬ 
mocracy of this city and county. He had the sup¬ 
port of nearly every prominent democrat in Koko¬ 
mo and was successful in a popular election held 
last March, receiving a clear majority over the com¬ 
bined vote of the five other contestants. Up to that 
time his most formidable opponent was C. H. Havens of 
the Kokomo Dispatch. Auditor of State Henderson’s pa¬ 
per. Havens is a brother-in-law of Leach. He did not 
enter the election and withdrew from the race, 
throwing his strength to Leach. 

The appointment has been reckoned a foregone 
conclusion here since last July, Leach having the 
indorsement of both Senators Voorhees and Tur¬ 
pie and the active support of Auditor of State Hen¬ 
derson and other eminent democrats. The retiring 
postmaster, O. W. McKinsey, has been a most excellent 
official.—Kokomo {Ind.) Dispatch, Indianapolis Senti¬ 
nel, November 6. 

• Ci <• 

The appointment of Michael H. Kennedy to be 
postmaster at Lafayette came like a clap of thunder 
to those who were not on the inside. It was gener¬ 
ally supposed that in view of the all-important 
financial situation now occupying senatorial and 
presidential circles, there would not be any for¬ 
ward movement on the post-office here, particular¬ 
ly as the Hon B. Wilson Smith, present incumbent, 
had but about five months more to serve. His 
predecessor, Mr. Ruger, a democrat, was not dis¬ 
turbed by President Harrison, and actually served 
four years and two or three months.—La/ayetfe Dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis News, September 27. 

* * • 

UNDER-LORD MCNAGNY. 

Congressman McNagny secured the appointment 
of D. A. Fawcett for the Lagrange office. Mr. Faw¬ 
cett is the editor of the Lagrange Democrat, and his 
appointment is considered a vindication for the 
democrats, because a contemptible fight was made 
on him. The othtr presidential office goes to Congress¬ 
man Hammond's man, Adam R. Eberl .— Washington 
dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, January 9. 

* « i) 

Two other members of the Indiana delegation 
are rejoicing over to-day’s appointments. Mr. Ham¬ 
mond has placed V. C. Hanawatt in the post-office at 
Logansport, and Mr. Brookshire has secured the Sulli¬ 
van office for his friend, Wm. H. Parks. Mr. Ham¬ 
mond has also recommended a change in the office 
at Delphi. Editor Isherwood, of the Delphi Times, is 






98 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


his choice for postmaster, and the change is dally ex- j 
pected.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, | 
January 10. 

* if if 

Congressman McNagny has secured the appoint¬ 
ment of George E. Young as postmaster at Angola, 
Ind.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Stniinel, Jan¬ 
uary 10. 

<c i|< 

Abram Orr, who was recommended for postmas¬ 
ter at Kendallville by Congressman McNagny, after 
an exciting contest, has added to the embarrass¬ 
ment of the situation by declining the office now 
that it is within his reach. He has offered no ex¬ 
planation.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, 
January 5. 

»*.* << <« 

Upon the recommendation of congressman Mc¬ 
Nagny, J. C. Compton, of Fort Wayne, has been ap¬ 
pointed inspector of the free delivery system for 
Indiana.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, 
January 19. 

UNDER-LORD TAYLOR. 

Capt. John J. Zinzich, of Evansville, will now 
work all the harder to secure appointment as In¬ 
spector of steam vessels on the Ohio river. To-day 
Secretary Carlisle called for theresignation of John 
Ingle, supervising inspector.— Washington dispatch, 
Indianapolis Sentinel, December 13. 

❖ 

Secretary Carlisle, to-day told Representative 
Caruth, of Louisville, that the appointment of 
supervising inspector of steamboats at Cincinnati 
would likely determine who should be appointed 
to the similar office at Evansville. The secretary 
does not want to give the Cincinnati and the Evans¬ 
ville offices both to Kentucky men.—IFas/tingfow 
dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, December 16, 

* *:* 

Congressman Taylor and Capt. Zinzich, of Evans¬ 
ville, called at the White House to day and held a 
long interview with the President. The captain 
feels that his chances for appointment have im¬ 
proved wonderfully, and he expects the place.— 
Washington dispatch, Indianaj)olis Sentinel, Decem¬ 
ber 20. 

if * if 

Capt. John Zinzich, of Evansville, called at the 
treasury department to-day with Representative 
Taylor, to see Secretary Carlisle, and then visited 
the Capitol. Captain Zinzich believes, as does Rep¬ 
resentative Taylor, that he will surely be appointed 
supervising inspector of steamboats for the Evans¬ 
ville district. Mr. Taylor assured the Journal cor¬ 
respondent to-day that Will S. Hays, of Louisville, 
was not in the race, although the Kentuckians be¬ 
lieve their man will be appointed.— Washington dis¬ 
patch Indianapolis Journal, December 20. 

»;« * 

Captain John J. Zinzich has been here fortwo or 
three days, but was only discovered this morning, 
as he did not desire his presence to become public. 
He came on from Evansville to make a personal ef¬ 
fort for appointment of supervising steamboat in¬ 
spector. He hopes, with the assistance of Congress¬ 
man Taylor, and one or two other Indiana mem¬ 
bers, to present to Secretary Carlisle and President 
Cleveland the necessity of allowing the office to 
fall again upon a residentof Evansville.— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, December 20. 

if if * 

Congressman Caruth says that he has discovered suf¬ 
ficient evidence to convince him that there is treachery 
among some Kentuckians, who, while indorsing W. S. 
Hayes, of Louisville, for the Evansville steamboat in¬ 
spectorship, are secretly at work to secure the place for 
Captain Zinzich. Caruth is much exercised over 
his discovery.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis 
News, .January 6. 

* * 0 

Representative Taylor is not only confident of se¬ 
curing the appointment of Captain Zinzich, of 
Evansville, to the position of supervising inspector 
of steamboats within the next ten days, but he be- 
ieves now that he may bag the state pension 


agency.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, January 7. 

* * » 

At this peculiar time the friends of John H. 
Thropp, of Evansville, are making a grand rally, 
proclaiming that Captain Zinzich is out of the field. 
Congressman Taylor says Zinzich is in to win and 
his appointment may be looked for within the next 
few days.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, January 16. 

* * * 

Congressman Taylor announces that Dr. George 
W. Buckner, colored, of Evansville, will be ap¬ 
pointed assistant surgeon for the Freedmen’s Hos¬ 
pital, this city. He endeavored to give an Indiana 
man the office of surgeon-ln-chief, but it is very 
likely a resident of this city will get it.—Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, December 15. 

* * * 

Congressman Taylor, of the first Indiana district, 
is making a heroic effort to secure a place in the 
Interior department for Col. Wm. Gavitt, of Evans¬ 
ville.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Netvs, De¬ 
cember 20. 

* * * 

Congressman Taylor is pressing Judge E. A. Ely, 
of Petersburg, for appointment to a judgeship in 
Oklahoma.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Sen 
tinel, January S. 

* * * 

Congressman Taylor succeeded in getting John B. 
Stowers, of Evansville, in the government printing 
office to day.— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis 
Sentinel, January U. 

if * * 

Congressmen Taylor and Jason Brown were at the 
White House to-day, urging the appointment of 
John J. Zinzich, of Evansville, as steamboat in 
spector. Congressman Stone, of Kentucky, has 
added to the complications about this office by rec¬ 
ommending John Troop, an Evansville man.— 
Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, January 18. 

>:* >:< ^ 

UNDER-LORD'JASON BROWN. 
Representative Jason B. Brown observed to the 
Journal correspondent to-day that he expected a 
sweep-out of the republican employes at the Jef¬ 
fersonville army depot about the 1st of January. 
There are loud complaints from the democrats who 
want those places, and the general demand from 
the hungry office-seekers has been made for some 
months. They point to the fact that under the last 
administration republicans were early installed in¬ 
to the positions, and bewail the inaction under 
President Cleveland. It looks as though the re¬ 
publicans who took charge at Jeffersonville early 
in the spring of 1889 were so capable that no grounds 
for their dismissal can be found.—IPasliiriplon dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Journal, December 8. 

if if if 

Representative Jason B. Brown will call upon 
Secretary Lament again to-morrow and make an¬ 
other insistance upon the immediate removal of all 
the republican employes at the Jeffersonville army 
depot.—Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, 
December 17. 

Representative Jason B. Brown continues absent 
from his seat in the house. He is at home looking 
after a renomination. He has told his friends here 
that he is in the field for an aggressive race and a 
fight to the finish.—IFas/itnfiffon dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, January 8. 

* * * 

The democrats of the Third district met at North 
Vernon this afternoon to select a member of the 
state central committee for this district. The con¬ 
test was a spirited one, and was the field against 
Hon. Jason B. Brown, congressman from this dis¬ 
trict, who is seeking a renomination.—Sci/mour dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Journal, January 9. 

* if if 

Representative Brown sent the names of three 
democrats to the secretary of war to-day for ap¬ 
pointment to positions in the quartermaster’s mili¬ 
tary depot at Jeffersonville, and is confident of 


their immediate appointment, although he will 
not make known their names for some days yet. 
About two-thirds of the force of that depot have been 
changed recently .— Washington dispatch, Indianapot 

Us Journal, January 21. 

* * * 

The Hon. Jason Brown has secured the appoint¬ 
ment of Hugo Albln, of Jeffersonville, to the posi¬ 
tion of chief packer at the government depot at 
that city. It is a permanent position, and pays a 
good salary .—Washington dispatch Indianapolis 
Sentinel, January 23. 

* * if 

UNDEK-LORD HAMMOND. 

Congressman Hammond is giving some attention 
to the question of presidential postmasters. Four 
of the leading offices in his district become vacan- 
early in the year. These are at Hammond, Good- 
land, Rochester.— Washington dispatch, Indianapo¬ 
lis Neivs, December 9. 

* >!» 

R. M. Isherwood, the editor of the democratic 
paper at Delphi, is in the city. He is an applicant 
for the post office in his city, with fair prospects of 
getting it.—IFas/iinpfon dispatch, Indianapolis Sen¬ 
tinel, January 6. 

if if if 

R. M. Isherwood, editor of the Times, wants to be 
postmaster at Delphi, and is now in Washington 
looking after his interests. A. B. Crampton, editor 
of the Citizen (democratic), and John A. Cartwright, 
ex-representative to the state legislature, are op¬ 
posed to Isherwood, and they, too, are in Washing¬ 
ton, attempting to persuade President Cleveland 
that Isherwood’s appointment would split the 
democratic party of Carroll county into two sec¬ 
tions, and that the largest section would be the one 
opposed to Isherwood. This contest has been long 
and bitter, and whichever way it is settled it will 
leave the party of Jackson and Cleveland in a badly 
demoralized condition.—DefpM dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis Journal, January 9. 

* * * 

The opposition to the appointment of Editor Ish¬ 
erwood, of the Delphi Times, as postmaster of Del¬ 
phi, has taken very positive form, and the local 
democracy has ordered a popular election to de¬ 
termine a choice. Mr. Isherwood is indorsed by 
Congressman Hammond. Nine candidates will sub- 
mittheir names to ballot, but Mr. Isherwood de* 
dines to enter the coatest.-Indianapolis Neivs, Jan 


There is a lively row on over the Delphi office. N. 
J. Howe, of Delphi, is here, trying to induce Senator 
Turpie to override Congressman Hammond’s rec¬ 
ommendation for the of&ce.—Washington dispatch 
Indianapolis News, January 22. 

% if * 

There is a hitch in the senate committee on post 
offices and post-roads over the nomination of V. C. 
Hanawalt to be postmaster at Logansport. The 
nomination has been held up on charges preferred 
against the nominee. Some letters, and an affidavit 
or two, have been laid before the committee, stat¬ 
ing that Hanawalt is an exceedingly unpopular 
citizen of Logansport, and that his nomination was 
made in payment for services which he rendered 
National Committeeman S. P. Sheerin, and others 
interested in the gas plant of Logansport, by pro¬ 
curing certain franchises and privileges at the 
hands of the city council, and manipulating affairs 
in the interest of this corporation and against the 
interests of the citizens there. It is alleged that 
the improper motive which brought about the 
nomination, and the intense unpopularity of Han¬ 
awalt, should be enough to cause the committee to 
report the nomination adversely, and the sen¬ 
ate to reject it. Had it not been for these charges, 
which are well authenticated, the nomination 
would have been acted upon favorably some days 
ago.— Washington dispatch Indianapolis Journal, Jan¬ 
uary 19. If * * 

UNDEB-LOKD CONN. 

Congressman Conn called on Postmaster-General 
Blssell this morning, in regard to the appointment 
of a postmaster at Notre Dame. The post office is a 


1 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


99 


small Institution, whose patrons are all connected 
with the university. First Assistant Postmaster 
Maxwell requested that a petition signed by the 
students of Notre Dame also be submitted in be¬ 
half of Father Cosby. Congressman Conn has de¬ 
clined to comply with this request. In a polite but 
emphatic letter to Postmaster General Bissell to-day, 
he said that he thought the recommendation of the 
trustees of the university, backed by his own 
ought to he sufficient in view of Father Cosby’s 
high standing, and the custom that has prevailed 
for forty years of vesting the office in the president 
of Notre Washington dispatch, Jndianapolis 

News, November 24. 

* * * 

The South Bend (Ind.) post-office question is now 
at white heat There promises to be lively times 
between Adolph Glnz, one of the applicants, and 
Congressman Conn, the member from the South 
Bend district. Ginz filed an application March 1, 
last, with Congressman Conn, accompanied by a 
personal letter, in which he pledged himself, his 
friends and supporters to abide by Mr. Conn’s de¬ 
cision as between the various applicants which he 
would recommend. Mr. Oinz,it is said, also pledged 
himself to comply with all the conditions and require¬ 
ments Mr. Conn might see Jit to impose, and to exert his 
efforts toward keeping peace over the result, whatever 
it might be, Oinz's letter making these sweeping and 
abject compliances is nowonjilein the post-office de¬ 
partment. Last week there came a hitch between 
Ginz and Mr. Conn and Ginz ordered his papers re¬ 
turned by telegraph. The congressman understood 
this to mean a withdrawal from the race and for¬ 
warded the papers. It has since been learned that 
Ginz has tried another route to the appointment 
than through Congressman Conn’s influence, and 
has been writing to President Cleveland, Secretary 
Lament and other prominent officials explaining 
that he was an original Cleveland man, and asking 
the appointment.— Washington dispatch, Indianap¬ 
olis Nexvs, December 29. 

s< « • 

Five presidential postmasters for Indiana were 
nominated by the President to-day. Of these Con¬ 
gressman Conn secured two, at Goshen and Notre 
Dame, and Congressman Jason Brown lays claim to 
the remaining three, at Jeffersonville, North Ver¬ 
non and Seymour. The nominations were as follows: 
Patrick C. Donavan at Jeffersonville, Joseph A. 
Bean at Goshen, James Renie at North Vernon, 
George D. Price at Seymour, and William Corby, 
presidentof Notre Dame University, at Notre Dame. 

— WashingtonDispatch,IndianapolisNews,December 6. 

<! * * 

UNDER-LORD MARTIN. 

Congressman Martin had James McCoy, of Dan¬ 
ville, a republican and an old soldier, removed 
from his position as a treasury watchman fo-day. 
The place was given to James Lynch, of Wells 
county, a democratic ex-soldier. Representative 
Martin has been promised the appointment of O. 
K. Chaney as postmaster at Lanesville to-morrow. 
The republican postmaster is to be removed at Mr. 
Martin’s request.— Washington dispatch, Indianapo¬ 
lis Journal, December 26. 

• * ♦ 

O. K. Chaney was oppointed postmaster at Zanes¬ 
ville, also on Mr. Martin’s recommendation.—IVasft- 
ington dispatch, Indianapolis News, December 26. 

* * * 

Collector Bracken of the Sixth Indiana revenue 
district, upon the recommendation of Congressman 
Martin, has appointed the Hon. William H. Harkins 
of Portland a deputy collector.— Washington dis. 
patch, Indianapolis Sentinel, December 8. 

lO" <■ V 

Congressman Martin of the Eleventh Indiana dis¬ 
trict this morning recommended the appointment of 
two new postmasters in his district. James B. 
Chapman will probably get the Hartford City office, 
and John M. Jackson the one at Peru. Recommenda¬ 
tions in either case is as good as appointment.— Wash¬ 
ington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, November 29. 

if * t> 

UNDER-LORD COOPER. 

Congressman Cooper is endeavoring to secure an 
appointment for “Dick” .Johnson, an Indiana man. 


who formerly held an office in the Treasury de¬ 
partment.—TVasftingrfoii dispatch, Indianapolis News, 
December 8. 

* * * 

The democratic patrons of the Danville post-of¬ 
fice yesterday elected a postmaster, according to 
the orders of Congressman Cooper, and Robert 
Wade was the lucky man. He was the man who 
was elected last winter at the meeting held to pro¬ 
test against Cooper's recommendation of Editor King of 
the Gazette.—Danville dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, 
January 18. 

<• V • 

There was a stir created in the post-office here to¬ 
day when Postmaster Rush Informed mail carriers 
Albert Owens and Cornelius Larlbee that their 
services were no longer desired. These two men 
were efficient employes and democrats on their 
routes would not sign a petition for their removal. 
Some days ago, however, they learned they were to 
be removed and at once wrote to the president of 
the civil service commission.-Cofuwftiis dispatch, 
Indianapolis Journal, January 12. 

A * * 

Henry C. Hoagland of Trafalgar, Johnson county, 
who has been assured of a place on the capitol police 
through the efforts of Congressman Cooper, came in to¬ 
day and submitted to an examination.— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, January. 

* ♦ ♦ 

Congressman Cooper has secured the appoint¬ 
ment of C. H. Spencer, ex-mayor of Columbus, 
Ind , as lieutenant of the watch in the interior de¬ 
partment. This is preparatory to securing abetter 
position for him later.— Washington dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, January 10. 

* * * 

Willis G. Neff will be appointed postmaster at 
Greencastle in the next few days. Mr. Neff has 
some very high recommendations for the office, 
and was indorsed by Congressman Cooper.—TFas/i- 
inqton dispatch, Indianapolis News, January 5. 

UNDER-LORD BROOKSHIRE. 

Friends of Congressman Brookshire, in the eighth 
district, see danger ahead for Mr. Brookshire in 
the fact that Thomas J. Mann, of Sullivan, who was 
elected district committeeman, is a close friend of John 
E. Lamb, of Vigo. A strong fight against the recom¬ 
mendation of Brookshire is anticipated.—B'a«/anp- 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis News, January 11. 

* V * 

Walter F. Hulett, of Crawfordsville, is in the city 
and called at the treasury department to-day. It 
is said that he is after a government position. He 
was a candidate for the collectorship of his district .— 
Washington dispatch Indianapolis Sentinel, Dec. J4. 

* * <1 

The batch of appointments that went before the 
senate to-day caused happiness to Congressmen 
Taylor, Brookshire and Martin, for they got three 
more presidential post-offices for Indiana demo¬ 
crats. These offices are; Petersburg, Mr.Taylor’s 
district, to be filled by T. K. Fleming, a liveryman. 
This is the last one in his district to be looked after; Sulll 
van, Mr. Brookshire’s district, Wm. H. Burk, a 
merchant, appointed; Decatur, Mr. Martin’s dis¬ 
trict, John Welflen, appointed.—IFcs/iittfffow dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis Sentinel, January 8. 

* * * 

The office pays 11.800 salary. The appointment 
of Charles W. Bristley at Thorntown, sefffes a long 
controversy. Charges were preferred against the in¬ 
cumbent and affidavits made to secure his removal. 
The case was called up a few days ago at the request of 
Congressman Brookshire. Both senators have also 
indorsed Bristley. The salary of the Thorntown 
Office is $1,200. The Warsaw office, to which W. D. 
Alleman was appointed, was in Cogressman Conn’s 
district. The salary was $1,200.—TFasftinpfon Dis 
patch, Indianapolis News, October 3. 

• • * 

The State of Indiana has received more patron¬ 
age proportionately, it is claimed, than any other 
one state in the Union. This is partlcularlytrue of 


places in the treasury department. It is very diffi¬ 
cult for an aspirant for office to gain access to the Presi¬ 
dent, or any member of his cabinet, without he is accom¬ 
panied by his senator or representative. 

<> 0 <• 

UNDER-LORD BRETZ. 

Congressman Bretz will be a candidate for re¬ 
nomination, but will not have a clear field. W. A. 
Cullop, of Vincennes, is supposed to be a candi¬ 
date. Mr. Cullop sought the appointment of district 
attorney for Indiana, and afterwards wanted to be ap¬ 
pointed Governor of Utah.—Washington dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis News, December 9. 

* * * 

Three important presidential offices in Congress¬ 
man Bretz’s district will be vacant January 8. The 
names of the successful candidates have already been 
settled, and they will be appointed probably on the ex¬ 
piration of the terms of the present postmasters. At 
Bedford, John Johnson, editor of the Bedford Demo¬ 
crat, will be recommended by Mr. Bretz. At Wash¬ 
ington, John W. McCarty will sectire the congres¬ 
sional recommendation, and at Worthington, Mr. 
Wilson, who was the choice of the democratic pri¬ 
mary election, will be appointed, if Congressman 
Bretz’s recommendation prevails.—TFasftfnpfon dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis News, December 9. 

V «■ * 

Congressman Bretz returned home this afternoon 
to spend the holidays. Before going he was noti¬ 
fied by Postmaster-General Bissell that John John¬ 
son, editor of the Bedford Democrat, would be appoint¬ 
ed this afternoon to the Bedford post-office.— Wash¬ 
ington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, December 21. 

# <c 

Congressman Bretz has succeeded in removing the post¬ 
master at Odon, Daviess county, although he has served 
but two years, and William J. Danner, a prominent 
merchant, has been appointed to the office.— IFasA' 
ington dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, January 6. 

i9> 0 

Congressman Bretz is likewise well pleased, for 
he succeeded in knocking two appointments from 
the tree. Eph. Inman, of Shoals, who was elector 
from the second congressional district, is named as rev¬ 
enue agent and assigned to New Orleans to look af¬ 
ter the sugar industry. Henry Wiegman, of Bed¬ 
ford, gets a six hundred dollar place as inspector 
in the Indian school at Genoa, Neb.— Washington 
dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, January S. 

<t lilt in 

Mr. Bretz has made a very conservative member 
of congress. He has worked hard to please his 
friends, but, unfortunately, he does not control 
enough offices to go round. However, he has filled 
the majority of the post-offices with democrats, who 
are working for his renomination, and he has also 
secured places for a few friends of his in the reve¬ 
nue service. These gentlemen are also for him. 
Eph. Inman, of Shoals, through Mr. Bretz, was ap¬ 
pointed a revenue agent. The democratic newspa¬ 
pers of Vincennes, Shoots, Bedford, and other places, 
whose editors have received commissions as postmasters, 
are very earnest in their support, and the Paoli News, 
whose editor is Mr. Bretz's private secretary, begins a col¬ 
umn editorial in his praise this week, with the declara¬ 
tion, “ The gallant democracy of the second congressional 
district is falling into line like a stone wall in support of 
Its present member of congress, the Honorable John L. 
Bretz.—Indianapolis News, January 13. 

* « << 

UNDER-LORD HOL.MAN. 

There is going to be a lively fight in the house of 
representatives one of these days when Collector 
Bracken, of the sixth Indiana revenue district, 
asks for an appropriation for additional clerk hire. 
It is probable that several Indiana democratic con¬ 
gressmen will take occasion to pay off a few politi¬ 
cal scores and get even with Collector Bracken for 
broken promises in regard to the patronage of the col¬ 
lector’s office Senator Voorhees is not feeling in the best 
of humor toward Bracken, aad the latter may find a 
formidable obstacle in the senate. Ail the north¬ 
ern Indiana representatives are feeling “sore” be¬ 
cause Mr. Bracken has not, it is alleged, made a 





100 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


fair distribution of his patronage among the north¬ 
ern counties. Bracken’s defender will loom up in 
the person of Judge Holman.— Washington diagatch, 
Indianapolis News, December 28. 

<« * <■ 

The election for postmaster ordered hy Con¬ 
gressman Holman takes place here to-morrow. 
The management of the affair was taken by the city 
democratic committee, which limited the voters 
to the democratic patrons of Addison township. 
Nearly a hundred democrats who reside in sur¬ 
rounding townships get mall at this office, and 
they could not understand why they should be 
shut out. There will be eight names on the tickets. 
Edward Ames Major, the city clerk; General John 
W. Vannoy, Wm.J. Buxton, ex-auditor; Joseph R. 
Kennerly, deputy postmaster; John H. Maguire, 
Thomas J. Cherry, Andrew J. Higgins and James 
Dickinson. Major seems to have the best of the 
fight up to to-day, although some surprise may be 
expected. Higgins has offered to distribute $100 
every month to the poor of the city it he be elected, 
and has executed a five thousand dollar bond to 
that effect.— ShelbyviUe dispatch, Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, December 28. 

* «< « 

The election of a democratic postmaster passed 
off quietly in this city to-day. Charges were made 
rather openly during the day of the bribery of 
electors and other frauds. One candidate declared 
that although he had signed an agreement to abide 
hy the result of the election, the frauds were so 
open and brazen that he would be compelled to 
make a squeal .—Shelbyviile dispatch, Indianapolis 
Journal, December 29. 

* * * 

The election for postmaster here on last Thursday 
does not seem to have settled the question. As 
soon as the vote was announced letters and tele¬ 
grams were sent to Congressman Holman protest¬ 
ing against his recommending City Clerk Major, 
who received more votes than any other one man. 
The bitter feeling among the candidates and their 
friends has not abated a particle, hut is getting 
stronger as each day passes. It is understood that 
charges have been filed against Major to the effect 
that he attended the last national democratic con¬ 
vention and worked against the renomination of 
Clevela.nd.ShelbyvUle dispatch, Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, December 31. 

• • • 

The fightagainst the renomination of Represen¬ 
tative Holman, by members of his own party, is be¬ 
ing carried on with great energy. Wires are being 
pulled to sidetrack him in every movement that is 
being made to continue him in congress. The 
democrats of this (Decatur) county are angry over 
the recent appointment of Noah Mendenhall, of 
Franklin, a brother of James E. Mendenhall, and 
private secretary of Judge Holman. They declare 
that two of a family is more than they can and will 
stand; that the day will come when they will have 
a voice, and they propose to even up.—Oreensburgh 
dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, January 8. 

* * • 

Three factions developed in the democratic con¬ 
vention held here yesterday afternoon, W. H. 
O’Brien appearing in direct hostility to Congress¬ 
man Holman—John S. Martin espousing Holman’s 
cause, and Judge Hord being regarded as repre¬ 
senting Governor Matthew’s forces. O’Brien was 
nominated for district committeeman on the first 
ballot. This ballot was interpreted as meaning 
that the forces in opposition to Holman were in the 
ascendency in the district.—Lawrenceburg dispatch, 
Indianapolis News, January 9. 

* « • 

The fight for the Shelbyviile post-office does not 
seem to be over by any means, but is growing 
warmer day by day. From the very start there were 
four strong applicants with strong political “pulls,” 
and last November Mr. Holman picked out ex-Re- 
corder Buxton for the place, but the Ray wing, 
which for years controlled the patronage, made se¬ 
rious objections and demanded an election, at 
which their candidate received a plurality of the 
votes cast. Mr. Buxton’s recommendations were 


the strongest, but the Ray wing had no trouble in 
getting their man, Q. A. Major, selected. Mr. Hol¬ 
man at last handed his name to the President, but 
it was met by protest from men of standing and in¬ 
tegrity. The Ray ring has been opposed to Cleve¬ 
land’s renomination, and it is said Major himself 
attended the national convention and opposed him 
and favored Hill .—Shelbyviile dispatch, Indianapolis 
Journal, January 9. 

» « « 

Cogressman Holman’s friends are very much ex¬ 
cited over the re election of O'Brien, of Lawrence- 
burg, as a member of the state committee. It is 
understood here that O'Brien’s re-election was con¬ 
tested in every township by the Holman men.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, January 12. 

« « * 

Edwin F. Uhl, of Michigan, assistant secretary of 
state, vice Josiah Quincy, resigned, was delegate-at- 
large to the Chicago convention last year, where 
he stood for Cleveland, and nominated Judge Morse 
for vice-president. 

<1 <1 << 

Secretary Herbert has appointed his son-in-law, 
Benjamin Micou, an Alabama youth to fortune and 
to fame unknown, to be chief clerk of the navy de¬ 
partment. The son-in-law knows nothing what¬ 
ever of the business he will be called upon to at¬ 
tend to, but other clerks in the department, among 
whom the secretary should have found his chief 
clerk, can show him how while he draws the salary. 
—New York Commercial Advertiser, December 6. 


THE PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE. 

The railway mail service not only adds to 
the promptness of mail delivery at all offices, 
but it is the especial instrumentality which 
puts the smaller and way-places in the service 
on an equality in that regard with the larger 
and terminal offices. Thisbranch of the postal 
service has, therefore, received much attention 
from the postmaster-general, and though it is 
gratifying to know that it is in a condition of 
high efficiency and great usefulness, I am led 
to agree with the postmaster-general that there 
is room for its further improvement. There 
are now connected with the post-office estab¬ 
lishment 2,324 employes who are in the classi¬ 
fied service. The head of this great depart¬ 
ment gives conclusive evidence of the value of 
civil service reform, when, after an experience 
that renders his j’udgment on the subj'ect abso¬ 
lutely reliable, he expresses the opinion that 
without the benefit of this system it would be 
impossible to conduct the vast business in¬ 
trusted to him. 

I desire to commend as especially worthy of 
prompt attention the suggestions of the post¬ 
master-general relating to a more sensible and 
business-like organization and a better distri¬ 
bution of responsibility in his department. 

<1 <1 <1 

The method of employing mechanical labor 
at navy-yards through boards of labor and 
making efficiency the sole test by which labor¬ 
ers are employed and continued, is producing 
the best results, and the secretary is earnestly 
devoting himself to its development. 

Attention is invited to the statements of 
his report in regard to the workings of the 
system. 

« » « 

Among the heads of divisions of this depart¬ 
ment [agriculture] the changes have been 
exceedingly few. Three vacancies, occuring 


from death and resignations, have been filled 
by the promotion of assistants in the same 
divisions.^ These promotions of experienced 
and faithful assistants have not only been in 
the interests of efficient work, but have sug¬ 
gested to those in the department who look for 
retention and promotion, that merit and de¬ 
votion to duty are their best reliance. 

I join the secretary in recommending that 
hereafter each applicant for the position of in¬ 
spector or assistant inspector in the bureau of 
animal industry be required, as a condition 
precedent to his appointment, to exhibit to the 
United Statee civil service commission his 
diploma from an established, regular and 
reputable veterinary college, and that his ap¬ 
pointment be supplemented by such an ex¬ 
amination in veterinary science as the com¬ 
mission may prescribe. 

* • • 

The continued intelligent execution of the 
civil service law and the increasing approval 
by the people of its operation are most grati¬ 
fying. The recent extension of its limitations 
and regulations to the employes at free deliv¬ 
ery post-otfices, which has been honestly and 
promptly accomplished by the commission, 
with the hearty co operation of the postmas¬ 
ter-general, is an immensely important ad¬ 
vance in the usefulness of the system. I am, 
if possible, more than ever convinced of the 
incalculable benefits conferred by the civil 
service law, not only in its effect upon the 
public service, but also, what is even more im¬ 
portant, in its efl'ect in elevating the tone of 
political life generally. 

The course of civil service reform in this 
country instructively and interestingly illus¬ 
trates how strong a hold a movement gains 
upon our people which has underlying a sen¬ 
timent of justice and right, and which at the 
same time promises a better administration of 
their government. The law embodying this 
reform found its way to our statute books, 
more from fear of the popular sentiment ex¬ 
isting in its favor than from any love of the 
reform itself on the part of legislators; and it 
has lived, and grown, and flourished in spite 
of the covert as well as open hostilities of 
spoilsmen, and notwithstanding the querulous 
impracticability of many self constituted 
guardians. Beneath all the vagaries and 
sublimated theories, which are attracted to it, 
there underlies this reform a sturdy, common 
sense principle, not only suited to this mun¬ 
dane sphere, but whose application our people 
are more and more recognizing to be abso¬ 
lutely essential to the most successful opera¬ 
tion of their government and its perpetuity. 

It seems to me to be entirely inconsistent 
with the character of this reform, as well as 
with its best enforcement, to oblige the com¬ 
mission to rely for clerical assistance upon 
clerks detailed from other departments. There 
ought not to be such a condition in any de¬ 
partment that clerks hired to do work there 
can be spared to habitually work at another 
place, and it does not accord with a sensible 
view of civil service reform that persons 
should be employed on the theory that their 
labor is necessary in one department when, in 
point of fact, their services are devoted to en¬ 
tirely different work in another department. 
I earnestly urge that the clerks necessary to 
carry on the work of the commission be regu¬ 
larly put upon its roster, and that the system 
of obliging the commissioners to rely upon the 
services of clerks belonging to other depart¬ 
ments be discontinued.- This ought not to in¬ 
crease the expense to the government, while it 
would certainly be more consistent and add 
greatly to the efficiency of the commission. 










The civil Service chronicle. 


If we see nothing in our victory but a license to revel in partisan spoil, we shall fail at every point.— 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November IS 1892. 


VoL. II, No. 12. INDIANAPOLIS, FEBRUARY, 1894. terms :*( fo“centrpL^ooVy““““ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


The President has at last removed Post¬ 
master Thompson,' of the Indianapolis 
post-office, for offensive partisanship dur¬ 
ing Harrison’s administration. In view 
of the fact that the President is now let¬ 
ting democratic congressmen use the fed¬ 
eral service to the fullest extent to secure 
their own renomination, and in view of 
the further fact that some of them, like 
Holman, Jason Brown and Cooper, could 
not possibly be renominated without the 
utmost efforts of their federal office-hold¬ 
ers, the removal of Mr. Thompson for 
ofiensive partisanship will have to be put 
down as a perfect specimen of colossal hy¬ 
pocrisy. The only approximation to it in 
Indiana were the removals secured by 
Voorheesfor “immorality.” Senator Tur- 
pie had refused to vote for the confirma¬ 
tion of Hornblower. He has been much 
humiliated among the spoilsmen at home 
because he could not secure Thompson’s 
removal. Two days after that removal he 
voted for Peckham, and the belief is very 
general that his vote was influenced by the 
“tact” of the President, of which we are 
hearing. There is a painful juxtaposition 
of the removal of Thompson and the vote 
for Peckham. Mr. Albert Sahm, the newly 
appointed postmaster, can undoubtedly 
learn the post-office business, but it would 
be absurd to say that he can learn in a 
short time what Mr. Thompson has learned 
in nineteen years in this post-office. Mr. 
Sahm declares that he will enforce the 
civil service law “in letter and in spirit.” 
This means a good deal, but there is rea¬ 
son to believe that he will do it, and in 
view of this fair promise it is fair to omit 
notice of some points in his political career 
which are open to grave criticism. 

The success of the Peckham nomination 
would not have established any principle 
and its failure is therefore no more at 
most than a regrettable incident. If the 
President had laid down the rule that 
he would not allow a senator or a repre¬ 
sentative to speak to him or to commu¬ 
nicate with him in any manner upon the 
subject of appointments to office and had 
made the Peckham nomination under that 
rule, the defeat of the nomination because 


it was not dictated by Hill would have 
aroused the country. As it was, success 
would only have shown that the President 
would not let some senators dictate. The 
victory would have been as bare of perma¬ 
nent result as were the victories of Hayes 
and Garfield over Conkling in similar cases. 
As we said last month the President will 
stir up a strife over this isolated case 
as great as he would cause in putting 
through a fundamental reform; nor can 
the people see that he is consistent in let¬ 
ting such men as Voorhees, who are no 
better than Hill, dictate nominations and 
refusing the latter the same privilege. 

The reports are so numerous and so well 
authenticated that there can be no dispute 
as to the manner in which the President 
attempted to secure the Peckham confirm¬ 
ation. The constitutional way which he 
was bound to follow was to send the nom¬ 
ination and leave the senate uninfluenced 
to make its decision. As a matter of fact 
members of the cabinet went to the senate 
and personally lobbied for votes, and offices 
were showered upon senators suspected of 
being doubtful. It is almost impossible to 
believe it, but this transaction is like a 
chapter from Walpole’s time. 

In view of developments which have 
been coming to light in Washington since 
congress met last summer, the people of 
Indiana will have to consider whether 
men who represent this state in the na¬ 
tional legislature have sold their opinions 
and votes for patronage—not necessarily 
in open bargain and sale, but has patron¬ 
age been presented in such a “tactful” 
manner by the President that it has caused 
some of our representatives to advocate 
and vote for measures which they would 
otherwise have been against? Has the 
determination, which the President’s clos¬ 
est friends declare he has been acting 
upon, to purchase congressmen’s votes 
with offices caused some of our congress¬ 
men to sell their votes for such a price ? 
The evidence is almost conclusive against 
them. Congressman Bynum and Senator 
Voorhees will be called upon particularly 
to answer this question. Indiana will car¬ 
ry a heavy load of bad government, but 
we do not believe she will tolerate men 
who trade off their votes and opinions. 

The investigation of the Fort Wayne 
post-office brought out again the general 


character of inspectors. With each change 
of administration they adapt themselves to 
their superiors. They go out knowing 
what kind of a report is wanted, and they 
come back with that report. It was so at 
Terre Haute and it was so at Fort Wayne. 
It is so with inspectors generally under 
every administration. If they show a dis¬ 
position to be honest and impartial, it af¬ 
fects the tenure of henchmen, and that 
makes trouble for congressmen, and the 
inspectors incur an enmity which is all- 
powerful in the civil service. 

Another point made plain is the entire 
groundlessness of the average charges. 
The remedy for this is publicity at all 
times. The secrecy which has been en¬ 
forced has encouraged falsehood and back¬ 
biting throughout the country to a degree 
beyond comprehension, and to enforce this 
secrecy is criminal in any administration. 
If a man knows that his charge against a 
public employe will be telegraphed back 
home, he will try to keep to the truth. 

Probably a complete remedy for the at¬ 
tempt of the heads of offices to create va¬ 
cancies for political reasons would be to 
give the civil service commission the right 
by law to summon and swear witnesses in 
matters relating to dismissals, and this 
should by all means be done. In the 
meantime what is to hinder the commis¬ 
sion from going to any place and getting 
what information it can about dismissals? 
In most cases it could get all the infor¬ 
mation, and after hearing one side it 
would find the heads of offices only too 
glad to make the best possible explanation. 
In all cases everything should be done 
publicly. With the information thus 
gained the commission could come at the 
truth, and could with great force ask the 
proper authorities to correct misuse of the 
law. 


We have read with interest a report 
of the proceedings of the national con¬ 
ference for good city government held 
in Philadelphia, January 25 and 26. It is 
curious to note how many of the partici¬ 
pants just missed the mark, how many had 
palliatives but were not aware that there 
was a specific. One proposition was to meet 
the bad influence of the corruptionists and 
disorderly classes with a good influence 
equally persuasive and equally energetic 
of the other people of the community. 






























102 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


Another proposed to educate the people 
in the province of municipal government. 
Another proposed to bring pressure to se¬ 
cure better nominations. There was also 
the declaration that municipal politics 
should be divorced from national politics 
and that the influence of women should be 
brought to bear, and so on. Carl Schurz 
set forth the specific. The cause of mu¬ 
nicipal corruption is the spoil of ofl&ce. 
No amount of pressure by good citizens to 
keep public officers straight, no plan to se¬ 
cure good nominations, no separation of 
municipal from national politics, nor any 
any other thing proposed at this confer¬ 
ence will ever bring about municipal re¬ 
form, so long as minor city offices and em¬ 
ployment are distributed as spoil by ward 
bosses. The spoil must be taken away and 
there is only one tried and approved meth¬ 
od of doing it, and that is by the merit 
system of open competition and by the 
Boston labor service system. 

It is not often that the doctrine that the 
salaries of public employes are to be taxed, 
not for the benefit of the people by an in¬ 
come tax, but for the benefit of a party 
machine, by a stand-and-deliver assess¬ 
ment, finds such a bold statement as is 
given it by the Democratic State Com¬ 
mittee of Connecticut, which sent out to 
the employes referred to the following: 
Finance Committee, Democractie State Committee, No^ 

778 Chapel Street, Room C, Garfield Building, New 

Haven, Conn.: 

Dear Sir— For the purpose of paying rents, ex¬ 
penses and legitimate bills of the Democratic State 
Committee, 

Resolved, By the finance committee of the Demo¬ 
cratic State Committee, that all oflScials who may 
be appointed to office under the national and state 
governments be requested, upon receiving said ap¬ 
pointments, to pay into the treasury of the said 
Democratic State Committee the following sums 
annually: For all appointments from which an 
income of between |200 and $400 per annum is de¬ 
rived, the sum of $10; for all appointments from 
which an income of from $400 to $1,000 per annum 
is received, 2}^ per cent, of the salary; for all ap¬ 
pointments from which an income of 1,000 and up. 
wards is received, 6 per cent, of the salary, payable 
semi-annually to the treasurer of the said com¬ 
mittee. 

Resolved, That the Secretary of the Democratic 
State Committee be requested to forward to every 
appointee of Gov. Morris, and to every democratic 
appointee of the national and state governments, 
a copy of the above vote of the finance committee, 
with the request that they comply as far as possible 
with the tenor of the resolution. 

One of the members of the committee is 
the collector of customs at Bridgeport, and 
if justice is to have its due, he will have to 
answer for soliciting funds from persons 
in the employ of the United States. The 
sending of the circular to employes in 
public buildings renders every member of 
the committee liable. The maximum pen¬ 
alty is a fine of $5,000 and imprisonment 
for three years. 

There are a class of reformers, much 
less in numbers than a few years ago. 


who couple with a peculiar devotedness to 
Mr. Cleveland the doctrine that civil serv¬ 
ice reform must wait until the tarifi’ques- 
tion is settled. Now if any person has 
been supposed fitted to speak for tarifif re¬ 
formers it has been Mr. Watterson. In a 
recent interview he gives some idea of how 
long under the above doctrine the reform 
of the civil service would have to wait. He 
says: 

I have recently expressed myself so elab¬ 
orately as to the Wilson bill that any rep¬ 
etition would seem superfluous. It is a 
bad bill from the beginning to the end. It 
will do no good and much harm. It may 
set the cause of genuine revenue reform 
back a generation. But it will not stop 
tarifif agitation. Every one who supports 
it begins by qualifying his approval. 

The civil service reformers of Mary¬ 
land have again come forward by a bill in¬ 
troduced into their general assembly to 
establish the merit system in that state. 
The bill contains the usual provisions of 
such laws. It is interesting to note that at 
a conference held upon the subject with 
members of the general assembly there 
appeared a decided feeling in favor of the 
bill, and the mayor of Baltimore so de¬ 
clared himself by a letter. That such a 
law should pass is probably too much to 
expect from Gorman’s state, but it is only 
a question of time. 

In announcing his determination to re¬ 
tire from public life. Congressman Harter 
says: 

“A congressiODal career has many attractions, 
but more drawbacks. It does not suit me to be 
nine-tenths an office-broker and one-tenth a legis- 
iator.” 

We were told the other day by some 
Boston reformers that the only hope of 
breaking up congressional patronage was 
through congress. As a matter of fact, the 
men who would be in favor of the reform 
are more and more leaving congress. The 
only hope of bringing congressmen back 
to their constitutional duties is through 
the President. He must by his fiat cut 
them off' from patronage. 


Pennsylvania democrats who are tired 
of the boss organization of their party in 
that state have united under the name, 
“The Pennsylvania Democracy,” and have 
nominated a candidate for congressman- 
at-large. He gives an interesting descrip¬ 
tion, applicable universally to party ma¬ 
chines, of the way in which the “regular 
democracy” of Pennsylvania occupies 
itself. He says: 

Although Mr. Patterson’s election as gov¬ 
ernor was understood to be a triumph over 
political bossism, he was no sooner in office 
than he surrendered the government of the 
state into the hands of a political clique 
which immediately made the executive de¬ 
partment a political headquarters for com¬ 
pleting a system of boss organization of the 


democratic party. The department heads 
were filled by the boss and his supple lieuten¬ 
ants, and the public offices swarmed with his 
henchmen and satellites. The public business 
was subordinated to political scheming for 
controlling conventions, making and defeat¬ 
ing delegates, bartering patronage,, promul¬ 
gating edicts and advancing and securing 
factional control of the party. Executive 
appointments were distributed at boss dicta¬ 
tion without regard to personal character or 
fitness in the appointees, but solely as a re¬ 
ward for cringing subserviency. No surren¬ 
der could be more abject, no betrayal of the 
people more utter. 

The regular democratic machine as 
thus described, headed by ex-Postmaster 
Harrity, has just been given by the Presi¬ 
dent the offices of collector, surveyor and 
naval officer of the port of Philadelphia. 


F. W. M. CuTCHEON, chairman of the 
Minnesota state democratic committee, re¬ 
cently resigned the chairmanship in a let¬ 
ter which again proves, what every one 
knew, that party machines as they flow ex¬ 
ist in this country are devoid of political 
principles of any kind, and are only kept 
in existence, so far as their present mem¬ 
bership is concerned, by the enjoyment or 
the hope and prospect of enjoyment of offi¬ 
cial plunder. In his letter of resignation 
he tells a shameful story in which the pres¬ 
ent administration has an active and will¬ 
ing part. Mr. Cutcheon says: 

I accepted the chairmanship of your com¬ 
mittee in the earnest hope that I should be 
able to be of service in so preserving and im¬ 
proving the organization of the democratic 
party in this state that it would be prepared 
successfully to meet the demands of the polit¬ 
ical camf)aign of the coming year, and that I 
might thus assist to hasten the coming of the 
complete triumph of the principles we all 
have at heart. Either the building up of a 
political machine, in the popular sense of the 
word, or the mongering of federal offices was 
very far irom my thought, and is to-day far¬ 
ther from my inclination. However, I was 
hardly installed in the position to which in 
April last you did me the honor to elect me, 
when I was forced to realize that the demo¬ 
crats of the state expected from me the devo¬ 
tion of virtually my entire time and energies 
to obtaining and distributing federal patron¬ 
age; that for the present, at least, they had 
little attention to devote to the promotion of 
the effectiveness of the party organization ; 
that all eyes were turned towards the spoils of 
past success, instead of towards the necessity 
of laboring for future victory. The work of 
attempting to obtain and parcel out offices 
was forced upon me, not only from this pres¬ 
sure upon the part of the members of the par¬ 
ty in the state, but by continual requests from 
some of the departments of the federal govern¬ 
ment for recommendations of fit persons to be 
appointed to a multitude of minor offices. 
Under the circumstances, I have endeavored 
to render the individual members of the party 
who have applied to me, and who seemed de¬ 
serving, such assistance as lay in my power, 
and so to perform these services and to pro¬ 
mote the public and party interests. 

The work, however, has required and still 
requires an expenditure of time, money and 
energy that is entirely beyond my ability. 
The position of chairman of this committee 
demands a person who possesses ample leisure 
and pecuniary means as well as an inclina- 




















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


103 


tion for its duties. I possess none of these 
qualifications. The chairmanship should be 
filled by one either in sympathy with the 
other and more powerful agencies which the 
present administration chooses to employ in 
selecting persons for federal appointment in 
Minnesota, or one who commands leisure, 
means, and inclination to combat these agen¬ 
cies successfully. I do not enjoy the sympa¬ 
thy, the leisure, or the means, referred to. 
Moreover, without being guilty of disloyal 
criticism of the present democratic adminis 
tration, I may say that I am not iir sympathy 
with the policy that has been adopted by it in 
making appointments to federal offices. I 
believe that no one would give support more 
heartily than would I to a policy of genuine 
civil service reform—a policy in accordance 
with which removals from office would be occa¬ 
sioned solely by unfitness to hold it on the part 
of the incumbent—and appointment dictated 
only by the special fitness of the appointee; 
but with the policy adopted by the present ad¬ 
ministration, which is at once retrogressive 
from the stand point of the reformer, and unjust 
from the standpoint of the partisan, I have no 
sympathy. In my opinion this system retains 
all the vices characteristic of the spoils system 
and possesses none of its redeeming qualities. 


THE FORT WAYNE POST-OFFICE. 

Oa account of the repeated complaints of 
partisan manipulation in the Fort Wayne 
post-office, a committee consisting of Will¬ 
iam Dudley Foulke and Ltjcius B. Swift, of 
the Indiana Civil Service Reform Asssocia- 
tion, was appointed to look into the mat¬ 
ter. They spent two days in Fort Wayne 
and their report may be found in full in the 
Indianapolis Journal of February 8. The 
present postmaster, W. W. Rockhill, part 
owner of the Fort Wayne Journal, took 
possession of the office July 20,1893. He 
found it under the civil service rules, un¬ 
der whose operation three democrats had 
already gained places. Mr. Rockhill’scase 
is of that class which in the past have caused 
great struggle and bitterness in connection 
with the civil service law and the outcome 
of which has caused the administrations 
under which they occurred to be branded 
as hypocritical and treacherous. Mr. Rock- 
hill was a man of good standing in the 
community, liked by his fellow-citizens 
and in his business.dealings honest. But 
he is one of those officers, plenty enough 
now but becoming less numerous, who 
think that the ordinary rules of fair deal¬ 
ing do not apply in politics. His mind was 
corrupted with the view that he must make 
places for partisans, and to accomplish 
this he resorted to slyness, trickery and de¬ 
ceit. With two exceptions, he would have 
been ashamed in his Fort Wayne news¬ 
paper establishmant to deprive men of 
their means of support for analogous rea¬ 
sons to those given for dismissing carriers 
and clerks from this post-office. If the rea¬ 
sons had been true, as a private employer 
he would have first given a reprimand. 
The men would have been warned and 
everything would have been done frankly 


and openly, but as postmaster he did not 
mention the subject to the men but he 
sent charges against them secretly to 
Washington and the first notice the men 
had was a dismissal from employment. 
Cases were filed, the trials had and the 
judgments were rendered without a word 
of notice to the accused. In one case he 
dismissed a carrier upon charges wholly 
untrue and the carrier was reinstated from 
Washington. Mr. Rockhill almost imme¬ 
diately dismissed him again upon new 
charges which were undoubtedly false. Be¬ 
fore the second dismissal and before the 
carrier heard of the new charges, an in¬ 
spector named Holmes appeared as he 
said for the purpose of investigating the 
charges, but he left Fort Wayne and for¬ 
got, as he afterwards wrote, to mention the 
new charges. Yet upon his adverse report 
as to those charges the second dismissal 
was approved. In one case the charge up¬ 
on which a carrier was dismissed was not 
known to the postmaster when he sent the 
written dismissal. This fact puts the mo¬ 
tive of Mr. Rockhill beyond any question. 
The post-office department has made one 
improvement; after the men are dismissed 
it will in most .cases let them know the 
grounds and that is the way these assigned 
causes came to light. What has always been 
claimed is now proved : If the charges 
could be brought to light they would not 
stand the test of the judgment of the 
community. These were trumped up 
and they had no foundation in fact. In 
some cases there was no pretense of an ac¬ 
cusation; the men were told that they were 
dismissed for the good of the service. In 
other cases the postmaster sent them let¬ 
ters, saying; “Your resignation will be ac¬ 
cepted,” and then crowded them out by 
putting other men in their places. He 
cares nothing for the civil service law and 
admits that he does not understand it. He 
is simply McNagny’s man; and we repeat 
again that the civil service law should be in 
the hands of men who want to carry it 
out. 


THE MACHINE ROUTED. 

There has been going on at Indianapolis for 
many weeks a struggle which is of interest to 
the whole country. It will be remembered 
that the republicans elected a mayor last Oc¬ 
tober by 3,000 majority. He frankly realized 
the fact that the enormous change from 2,- 
700 the other way at the preceding election 
was caused by voters who want and are deter¬ 
mined to have, if possible, the best city gov¬ 
ernment, and he determined to address him¬ 
self to the matter, of getting it. The mayor 
with the three city boards and the comptroller 
are required under the charter to form a cabi¬ 
net and are directed to adopt the merit system 
for appointments. The police and fire depart¬ 
ments are expressly excepted but the board 


having control of those departments is given 
the power to adopt the rules. The mayor de¬ 
clared in favor of the merit system and pro¬ 
posed that his cabinet should adopt it; and the 
board of public safety declared that it would 
adopt similar rules for the police and fire de¬ 
partments. A curious and motley crusade 
against these proposals was begun by the party 
machine. Comptroller Pres. Trusler, whom 
the mayor by a serious mistake of judgment 
had given his office, led the machine. In 
wards, precincts and club rooms and where 
two or three could be got together, resolutions 
against “civil service” were carried with a 
whirl. Individuals one after another declared 
themselves against it, and finally the party 
organ, the Indianapolis Journal, although an 
old civil service reform advocate, was whipped 
into line. Merrill Moores, chairman of the 
republican county committee, worked desper¬ 
ately to secure their defeat. It must be said that 
all together they made a good deal of noise. 
The mayor and the members of the boards 
listened to everything but kept steadily on in 
the preparation of the rules. From time to 
time they gave public expression of their 
views to the effect that they knew what their 
duty was and they meant to do it. The board 
of public safety adopted its rules without dis¬ 
sent. When the mayor’s cabinet met the vote 
stood ten in favor of the rules to Trusler 
against them. 

We give elsewhere the principal points of 
the objections publicly made. Clearly neither 
they nor the members that made them 
are formidable. The citizens of Indianapolis 
with the exception of this hungry fringe of 
party hacks and ward workers and little bosses 
were with the mayor, ft is a great example 
to show what the Chronicle has always 
claimed—that the people are opposed to the 
spoils system. The rules are not yet accessi¬ 
ble and we defer comment. 

A TYPICAL BOSS. 

Since the defeat of Maynard there has been 
no penal news so gratifying to the public as 
the verdict of guilty against John Y. McKane, 
of Gravesend. He was a carpenter, and took to 
town politics. By the usual hustler’s methods 
he became town supervisor, chief of police, 
commissioner of police, commissioner of high¬ 
ways, commissioner of common land and com¬ 
missioner of excise all at once. He was now 
in shape to do business. No person or cor¬ 
poration that had to ask favors could safely 
ignore Carpenter McKane. When letting 
building contracts, railroad corporations,hotel 
builders, jockey clubs, and all keepers of ques¬ 
tionable resorts took note of this, and McKane 
was overwhelmed with business. As excise 
commissioner he could grant his patrons li¬ 
censes, and as chief of police he could look 
the other way while pool selling, prize fight¬ 
ing, and all manner of law breaking went on. 
He controlled all town expenditures, handled 
the town money and paid the bills with his 
personal checks. He sold the town lands, and 
built the town buildings. He became rich. 










104 


THE CIVIL SEtlVICE CHRONICLE. 


He had a difference with Boss McLanghlin, of 
Brooklyn, and to punish the latter he decided 
to have his town go for Harrison in 1888, and 
the vote was counted that way. The New 
York Tribune called attention to his good 
work, and he led the John Y. McKane Asso¬ 
ciation at the inauguration of Harrison, and 
was received at the White House, and was al¬ 
lowed to name the United States marshal. 
Two years later he supported Fassett, and 
Gravesend gave 1098 votes for the latter 
against 180 for Flower. In 1892 he had made 
up with McLaughlin, and Gravesend was 
counted heavily for Cleveland. The John Y. 
McKane Association marched in the Cleve¬ 
land inaugural procession, and McKane 
named the present postmaster. He was a good 
man—at Sheepshead Bay, where he lived. He 
was superintendent of the Sunday-school, and 
zealous in his religious duties. But at West 
Brighton he consorted with pool sellers, prize¬ 
fighters, dive keepers, and so on. He divided 
up the town so that the six election districts 
centered in one room, where the election could 
be under his eye. In 1891 the number of reg¬ 
istered voters was 2,547, in 1892 it was 4,843. 
He finally toppled over. In 1893 he put 6,218 
names on the registry list as voters where the 
population of the town was 8,418. He refused 
to allow the registry list to be copied. He defied 
a court injunction, and arrested and threw into 
jail persons who came under the protection of 
the court to act as watchers. For these offenses 
he has been tried and convicted. His career 
represents the natural and complete develop¬ 
ment of the spoils system. It is true he is 
convicted, but it took the ablest lawyers and 
a trial of over three weeks, costing thousands 
of dollars, to doit. And with that it was 
feared to trust the regular methods of draw¬ 
ing the grand jury, or the regular sheriff, or 
the regular prosecuting attorney. 

It has often been said that the spoils system 
would subvert free government. The blindest 
can see that if it were perfected throughout 
the country as McKane perfected it, free gov¬ 
ernment would be actually gone, and no courts 
or juries could help us. 


THE SAME OLD STORY. 

The report of the Indian Eights Association 
for the year 1893 has the merit of being plain. 
So far as the Indian service is concerned, it is 
the old story of lying, deceit, trickery and 
treachery. Before his inauguration President 
Cleveland, through a friend, asked the associ¬ 
ation to suggest a name for Indian commis¬ 
sioner. A number of names were suggested 
and were disregarded, and an Illinois politi¬ 
cian named Browning was appointed, who was 
entirely devoid of experience in Indian mat¬ 
ters. Among its other exploits the adminis¬ 
tration removed Mr. Steele, the Blackfeet 
agent, and of remarkable efficiency, appoint¬ 
ing an army officer in his place. When asked 
the reason. Browning said the President felt 
almost obliged to make military appointments. 
Mr. Crouse, the Pima agent, was removed and 


Mr. J. Eoe Young, of Kentucky, who was not 
a military officer, was given his place. Mr. 
Crouse being anxious to know why he was re¬ 
moved, wrote to the association: 

“ I should be very much pleased to learn 
the nature of the charges preferred against 
me, if any. I have had from three to five em¬ 
ployes of democratic faith in good positions 
here ever since I took charge of the affairs of 
the agency, and in the selection of employes 
for various places no religious or political af¬ 
filiations have been considered at any time. 
What I am most interested in is to know the 
cause of my removal.” 

The association asked Browning, and the 
only reply it could get was, “ the good of the 
service required it.” 

Mr. and Mrs. Charles W. Robinson were 
removed from the post of superintendent and 
teacher respectively of the Ponca school. 
They asked Browning for a copy of the 
charges, but he ignored their request. The 
association then made the same request, and 
Browning replied that it was for the good of 
the service, but that he was not required to 
give reasons. The association gently replied, 
regretting the necessity of discussing the case 
before the public. Browning at once responded 
that the chargeshad been sent to Mr. Robinson. 
The charges consisted of a report by an inspec¬ 
tor, a new political appointment, and whose re¬ 
port was pervaded with personal hostility, ac¬ 
counted for by a statement which the inspec¬ 
tor’s indiscretion at the school drew from Mr. 
Robinson. Benjamin H. Miller, an experi¬ 
enced and faithful Indian inspector was re¬ 
moved, and the only charge the association 
could ever find out was that “a man from 
Georgia wanted his place.” It is difficult to 
comment upon the removal of Captain Brown, 
the Pine Ridge agent. The reason stated 
was that the assistant Indian commissioner 
regarded him as an enthusiast, impractical 
and extravagant in his estimates. The in¬ 
stance given of his extravagance was a request 
for steel fence-posts in the sand-hills, where 
wooden ones were constantly destroyed by fire. 
That he was impracticable was false, and his 
enthusiasm was sadly needed. The Chroni¬ 
cle has already commented upon Browning’s 
proposal to remove from the classified service 
superintendents who have to give bond for 
school furniture and like property. In this 
line Browning has been doing a little business 
on his own account. He abolished two teach¬ 
ers’ positions within the classified service at 
Chilocco school and created two assistant 
teachers’ positions without the classified serv¬ 
ice. Into one of these creations he put his 
niece and into the other the son of a friend. 

At the writing of the report Hoke Smith 
had deigned to counsel with the association re¬ 
garding the improvement of the Indian school 
service. The report is anticipating the ap¬ 
pointment of Dr. Hailman, and if it is made, 
it bespeaks support for the administration- 
The appointment has been made, but the 
Chronicle will wait awhile to see if Dr- 
Hailman is cramped by any more of Brown¬ 
ing’s capers. 


THE LAKE MOHONK CONFERENCE. 

We have received the printed proceedings of 
the Lake Mohonk conference which was held 
in October, 1893. Through the whole the 
spoils system is made to appear'the one insur¬ 
mountable obstacle to the civilization, or 
even fair treatment, of the Indians. In a con¬ 
ference of one hundred and seventy members, 
embracing some of the most eminent philan¬ 
thropic names of the country, this was the 
universal declaration. We can not do better 
than quote the words of the speakers. Herbert 
Welsh said: 

“Upon the policy adopted by the executive 
in making appointments to and removals from 
office within the Indian service will depend, 
in a large measure, the success or failure of 
this great work. The spoils system has in the 
past been the bane of this as of all other de¬ 
partments within the civil service of the 
United States. Both political parties have 
been equally guilty of the abuse of the Indian 
service by making its salaries the purse from 
which to pay party debts, and by improper 
political appointments and removals. This 
system, so wholly at war with common sense 
and those established principles on which ev¬ 
ery successful business concern is based, has 
afflicted the Indian service with a spirit of 
weakness and inefficiency amounting at times 
to demoralization and chaos. It has not only 
introduced at various times into every part of 
the service large numbers of persons wholly 
without qualification, either in character or 
ability, for their positions—persons who were 
never selected with that end in view, who se¬ 
cured appointment by political pressure—but 
it has taught every worthy person in the serv¬ 
ice that high character and faithful work are 
no guarantee to the retention of place. It has 
scattered the garnered harvest of experience 
to the winds, as of no greater value than chaff, 
and has undone the patient work of years 
with a single thoughtless stroke of the pen. 

Philip C. Garrett said : Very disastrous to 
successful administration from any business 
point.of view is this most unbusiness-like and 
pernicious system. When is the day to come, 
when, with ears closed to interested parties and 
politicians, a President will be allowed by 
public opinion to observe and investigate de¬ 
liberately on his own initiative the merits of 
all incumbents of offices in his gift, and retain 
or dismiss for merit or demerit only ? Not till 
then will it be possible to administer the In¬ 
dian office so as with reasonable celerity and 
humanity to solve the troublesome problem it 
presents. 

Captain Wotherspoon said: I do not 
think an army officer should be used except 
as a stop-gap, until a proper law can be passed, 
applying civil service to the Indian service 
from its top to its bottom. My own experi- 
rience is this as ^wasi agent. When I come to 
take charge, I find my doctor is a blacksmith, 
appointed by Senator So-and so. My carpen¬ 
ter is an indifferent saddler, my saddler noth¬ 
ing, and my clerk the political henchman of 
some politician. How can we do efficient work 
unless we can appoint our own employes and 
be responsible to the heads of our department, 
as in military service? Give us these, and we 
can do good work. I have one interpreter 
who has a salary of one hundred dollars a 
month, and his fitness consists in a perfect 
knowledge of the Apache language. I have 
had nearly five hundred applications from 
politicians, backed by senators and congress¬ 
men, to discharge this man, and put in people 
who never saw an Apache in their lives and 
know absolutely nothing of the language. 
Yet my clerk must act as interpreter for the 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


105 


Apaches. Unless he can do this, he is of no 
use. 

Dr. Proudfit said : I want to call attention 
to one argument which has been left out, in 
behalf of placing the Indian service under the 
civil service rules; and that is the argument 
of humanity. I am an original civil service 
reformer. If there is one argument which 
ought to commend itself to everybody without 
regard to politics as pre-eminently requiring 
to be administered on civil service reform 
principles, it is the Indian department. Why? 
Has not experience taught ns that it is utterly 
ruinous to administer it on any other princi¬ 
ples? It makes little difference whether our 
letters are delivered twenty-four hours earlier 
or later, whether we lose a few hundred dol¬ 
lars in the ordinance department of the army 
or navy; but I tell you it makes all the differ¬ 
ence in the world whether you are going to 
put a man in office, for political reasons, who 
will mismanage a department where the bodies 
and souls of men and women are concerned. 
You put in an ignorant, corrupt, inefficient 
man, you put in place-men, a man who is “on 
the make,” and what is the result? It is de¬ 
moralization to the Indians. 

These extracts show the opinion of those 
who spend much time and money for no other 
reason than to benefit the Indians. They have 
accurate knowledge of what will benefit the 
Indians. The administration is an igno¬ 
ramus in comparison. Yet their experience 
is disregarded, their recommendations are 
ignored, and congressmen from Maine to 
California are permitted to send their hench¬ 
men to the Indian country to be quartered 
upon the Indian appropriations. We could 
commend to the conference a less excusing 
tone toward public officials. It is not worth 
while to be deprecatory when dealing with of¬ 
ficials who are at heart political sharpers. 


PRESIDENT CLEVELAND AND THE 
PURCHASE OF CONGRESSMEN. 


Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle : 

Sir— In your January issue you quote, with some 
severity of criticism, a remark of mine at the din¬ 
ner of the Massachusetts Reform Club, to the effect 
that the President was right in using the consul¬ 
ships to buy the votes of the senators on behalf 
of repealing the Sherman silver bill. The words 
were no doubt correctly quoted, but they do not 
cover all which, with the context, I intended to con¬ 
vey. I have been a civil service reformer for twen¬ 
ty-five years, but I thought at the first as I think 
now, that the promoters overlooked a defect in the 
organization of our government against which their 
efforts would dash themselves in vain. By tre¬ 
mendous and persistent agitation a certain meas¬ 
ure of reform has no doubt been accomplished, 
but at the end of a quarter of a century I find the 
outcry against the spoils system nearly as great as 
ever. It may be said that the people of the coun¬ 
try are thoroughly weary of the subject. No Presi¬ 
dent ever has been found, and it is almost certain 
that under the present system none ever will be 
found, to meet the demands of the reformers. The 
civil service commission exists by the reluctant 
tolerance of congress under the lash of incessant 
public agitation. If that body dared it would sup¬ 
press it at once, and if the senate, by a few more 
experiments like that of last autumn, finds out that 
it can safely defy public opinion, the country may 
be treated to the spectacle of an appropriation 
bill, which will reduce the civil service commis¬ 
sion to an untimely end for want of funds. 

The root of the evil lies in the usurpation by con¬ 
gress of the whole power of the government. At 
the Massachusetts Reform Club dinner Mr. R. H. 
Dana, civil service reformer pur sang, referred to 


the civil service of other countries. If he will fol¬ 
low out the comparison he will find that in every 
case the civil service is pure just in proportion as 
the executive is strong, because it is for the interest 
of the executive that it shall be. The governments 
of Prussia and the German empire are a military 
despotism such as I, for one, have no desire to see 
here; but in no country is the civil service tenure 
more permanent, or promotion more regular. In 
Great Britain, which has the strongest executive 
of any really parliamentary government, the 
spoils system has been wholly done away with. It 
is in France and Italy, where executive power is 
merely a puppet in the hands of the chambers, 
which occupy themselves in setting up and pulling 
down ministries at the bidding of private inter¬ 
ests, where the finances are in disorder and the 
budget shows a constant deficit. It is in these coun¬ 
tries, and for precisely the same reasons, that the 
spoils system rages almost as fiercely as in the 
United States. 

Of course the control of legislation means the 
control of administration, and the President of the 
United States has little more voice in legislation 
than any ordinary citizen. He has, indeed, power 
to say in extreme cases, what shall not be done— 
unless two-thirds of congress insist upon it. Be¬ 
yond this he can only send messages, and these are 
referred to committees, which use them purely as 
a means of compelling submission to party and 
private demands. A good illustration is furnished 
in the disgraceful spectacle of our financial condi¬ 
tion. The revenue shows a deficit, current bills are 
unpaid, and the cash in the treasury is rapidly run¬ 
ning down, yet congress has taken no step to re¬ 
lieve the emergency. After pleading in vain with 
the committees, the secretary has felt himself 
obliged to resort to an old statute authorizing the 
issue of five per cent, bonds, an implement about 
as antiquated as a muzzle-loading musket. Yet 
congress, with, be it observed, a democratic major¬ 
ity in both houses, instead of trying to help him 
out, falls to quarreling whether he has the right to 
issue the bonds, or to use the money for his ex¬ 
penses. 

Mr. Dorman B. Eaton, a kind of Apostle Paul of 
the movement, has written a considerable and very 
interesting book in praise of the reform and condi¬ 
tion of the English civil service. Yet not once 
does he take the trouble to consider how these 
things were brought about. It was through the 
public, personal and individual responsibility of 
ministers for their appointments. Some years ago, 
Mr. Disraeli was suspected of having appointed a 
relative to some minor office. Instantly he was set 
upon in the House of Commons, and received such 
punishment as served for ample warning not only 
for himself, but for all future ministers. 

The first effectual step towards civil service re¬ 
form will be taken when the country insists that 
the President, through his cabinet, shall have the 
same opportunity of stating publicly his views and 
wishes with regard to legislatlon^as members of 
congress have, and shall thus be relieved from the 
necessity of private solicitation and lobbying with 
members and committees, and as a corollary of 
this,that the cabinet shall beheld to public and 
personal responsibility for appointments on the 
open floor of congress; so that prompt and sharp 
castigation shall make it more costly to yield to 
than to resist the solicitation of office-seeking mem¬ 
bers. 

To recur to the original point. Last autumn a 
large part of the people of the country felt, 
wrongly as I thought, and still think, that the 
great financial depression was owing to the silver 
law. If Mr. Cleveland shared that feeling, and saw 
that no other means of securing the repeal by the 
vote of the senate was open to him, than that 
which always has been used for such purposes and 
against which no law existed, then I do not think 
that he should be denounced for deciding that ac¬ 
tions may be of relative importance, and that the 
general welfare of the country is above any details 
which are not immoral or wicked in themselves. 

Respectfully yours, 

Gamaliel Bradford. 


MR. BRADFORD AND THE PUR¬ 
CHASE OF CONGRESSMEN. 

The words of Mr. Bradford quoted last 
month in the Chronicle were as follows: 
“Take the matter of the silver bill; the only 
way the President could get that passed was 
by putting the consulships into the congress¬ 
men’s hands, just as Mr. Quincy did, and I 
believe he was right in doing so.” On receipt 
of the letter printed above we expected to 
find a denial of these words, or at least Rome 
modification of them. The words, however, 
are not only admitted, but there seems to be 
in Mr. Bradford’s mind no conception of the 
political morality which the words indicate. 
Passing to the statements of his letter, the 
only people in this country who are weary of 
the subject of civil service reform are the 
spoilsmen and the nominal reformers. It has 
made a tremendous progress. In almost all 
parts of the country it has permeated the 
public thought, and the people at large have 
come to believe in it. There are few commu¬ 
nities where a dismissal to make room for a 
partisan does not meet the disapproval of the 
majority. The reform has reached the stage 
that if the machinery of the law and the rules 
were once established throughout the country, 
the people would no more submit to a repeal 
than they would submit to a repeal of the 
ballot reform acts. We can not say what a 
congress composed as our congress is might 
not do. It might strike out the appropria¬ 
tion. A cowardly submission without criti¬ 
cism to any abuse of the civil service is the 
way to bring that about. In 1874 the repub¬ 
lican party struck out the appropriation, and 
immediately after met the greatest defeat 
which had come to a party since the downfall 
of the whigs. To strike it out now would re¬ 
sult in the shattering of the party that did it, 
as the repeal of the Missouri compromise 
shattered the party which did that. 

Mr. Bradford says the root of the evil lies 
in the usurpation by congress of the whole 
power of the goverment. The evil lies in the 
usurpation by individual congressmen of the 
President’s power of appointment, and in his 
weak submission. Our executive is not weak. 
Next to the arbitrary governments, it is one of 
the strongest in the world. Compared with 
ours, the English government is a town meet¬ 
ing democracy. Mr. Eaton considered fully 
how the reform of the English civil service 
was brought about, and Mr. Bradford has 
evidently been too “weary” of the subject to 
read his book with advantage. It was not 
brought about because the cabinet had seats 
in parliament. The cabinet had seats in par¬ 
liament a hundred and sixty years before the 
English service was reformed ; and if cabinet 
officers like Whitney, Don Dickinson, Wana- 
maker, Carlisle and Hoke Smith had seats in 
congress a hundred and sixty years, our serv¬ 
ice would not through them be reformed. The 
English reform originated wholly with the 
executive. The first report was made in 1853, 
and the order establishing examinations was 













106 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


made by Lord Palmerston in 1855, and was 
that same year disapproved by a vote of the 
commons. Nevertheless the executive did 
not hack down and talk about not being able 
to “carry its party,” or “of the danger of sit¬ 
ting down between two stools.” 

It persisted and submitted the matter to a 
discussion of the people with such effect that 
in a single year the commons were compelled 
to give way. The same result would be reached 
here if we had a President with backbone 
enough to do his sworn duty. 

The trouble with Mr. Bradford and those 
who agree with him is that they have the no¬ 
tion that it is the business of the President to 
get certain legislation through congress. The 
President has no such business. It is his 
business to publicly state his views, and there 
he should stop. If congress will not then leg¬ 
islate as the people desire, and if the people 
have no remedy except the coercion or pur¬ 
chase of such legislation by the President, 
then among us popular government has come 
to an end. The people have a remedy in the 
ballot. It is the remedy and the only remedy 
which the constitution designs, and if the cor¬ 
ruption of congressmen by the executive can 
he brought to an end, the ballot will do its 
effectual work. It is true that needed legisla¬ 
tion might be delayed, but this country had 
better suffer years of financial rack than have 
its laws given it for a price. It is an impro¬ 
priety for the President, except by his pub¬ 
lic utterances, to seek to influence congress¬ 
men in any manner. He goes beyond his 
constitutional authority in attempting to work 
laws through congress; and if with offices he 
deliberately purchases senators or representa¬ 
tives to vote for measures which they would 
otherwise vote against, he makes a corrupt 
use of the power with which the people have 
trusted him. If Mr. Bradford can not see 
that, or if it is sufficient to him that there is 
no law against it, so much the worse for Mr. 
Bradford. It is no different from ordinary 
blocks-of-five purchase. The blocks-of-five 
men always say that they are simply paying 
the floaters “ to vote right.” If it is right for 
the President to buy legislation with offices, 
it is right for Mr. Bradford to buy it with 
money. It is true that no President has been 
found to meet the demands of reformers, but, 
as Mr. Bradford knows, it has not been for 
want of promises. Such a President will be 
found, and under the present system. He will 
manage the civil service as the constitution 
provides. He will publicly express himself as 
to legislative needs. He will resent any in¬ 
trusion upon his constitutional power. And 
congress, without hope of reward from any 
source except in the approval of the people, 
will pass bills and submit them to the Presi¬ 
dent for approval, and upon these bills he will 
exercise the discretion the constitution gives 
him. The time of waiting will be lengthened 
or shortened according as men like Mr. Brad¬ 
ford shall attempt to drag the name of reform 
into apology for acts for which there is no 
apology. 


“CIVIL SERVICE” IN INDIANAPO¬ 
LIS. 

“Of course I’m dead agin it. Say, I’d be a rank 
sucker to give up all me spare time fer an oftise and 
then cut it up with some other bloke. Kot on yer 
life! I believes that them as do the hustlin’ should 
get the offises, and when they gets a pig-iron cinch 
on a job, spike her down an’ keep the other guy out. 
Dat’s polyticks, an’ dat’s what makes us fellers do 
the hustlin’. Dat man Trusler is a terror bred, an’ 
yer bet we’re all wid ’im to a standstill.”—ToTOWi/ 
Miller, light-weight boxer, republican, ex-member of 
Tammany Hall. 

“ Keformers will eternally blast the hopes of any 
party that tolerates them. Then here is the civil 
service reform. That is the only thing that will 
cause men to leave their party.”—Sm Coy. 

« * <■ 

“I am in favor of Pres. Trusler and agin civil serv¬ 
ice. I tell you civil service never did cut any Ice.” 
—Royal Hammer. 

• <t • 

I believo the civil service idea is a political her¬ 
esy; that its tendency is to eliminate from the civil 
service all who have the manhood to have political 
opinions and who are worthy of American citizen¬ 
ship; that it perpetuates an ofBce-holding class 
who are either hypocrites or are white-livered to 
the extent that they will change opinions to hold 
office; that in removing the interest of the masses 
in politics, it is the first step toward a monarchy or 
at least an aristocracy; that it is a cover for un¬ 
grateful politicians to hide their responsibilities to 
those who elevated them.— Pres. Trusler, City Con¬ 
troller. 

<« 0 *> 

There is no disputing the fact that civil service 
breeds a class that cares for nothing but their own 
aggrandizement. Love of country is a pretty fable 
for school children and it finds no lodgment in 
their calculating natures, for if they were ever 
possessed with that commodity it has been de¬ 
stroyed through the blighting civil service meth¬ 
od.—iriffiam W. Jackson. 

* * * 

We believe that it is as honorable for a man to try 
to become a fireman or a policeman as to try to be 
a United States senator, and we believe he should 
be appointed if the majority wants him to be. We 
do not believe that any party believes in civil serv¬ 
ice, as it is, unless the other party is iu power. We 
do not believe that a man running a large business 
would employ men to help him in running his 
business if their sympathy and interest were in an¬ 
other concern in the same kind of business on the 
opposite side of the street. We do not believe that 
any man, a candidate for any office before any con¬ 
vention of any party, could be nomiuated if he de¬ 
clared himself in favor of civil service.—Protest of 
Southsiders, read by Joseph B. Cameron. 

0 0 0 

“ I notice an interview with Controller Trusler in 
last night’s News. He expresses my idea of civil 
service—to the victor belongs tbe spoils. Why is it 
that Mr Denny is so much better lawyer than 
Mayor Sullivan? He never discovered the civil 
service in the new city»charter. Mr. Denny had to 
go to Boston to see how he could keep the demo¬ 
crats in their places. Why do we w'ork for our can¬ 
didate ‘day and night?’ Is it because we expect 
him to leave the democrats in their places and 
allow the republicans to hang around the streets 
and be called ‘ tin-horn’ and ‘ peanut politicians ’ ? 
Is it not strange that this city has been saved as 
long as it has when it was run by political parties 
and paid political assessments? We had money 
then in the treasury, but now it takes it to pay s>ila- 
ries to officers to help us out with civil service.”— 
Cal. Darnell. 

* * tf 

“Civil service be-be-be blowedl Say, you will 
be short every night. What’s the use of civil serv¬ 
ice, anyhow? No one will be able to get a job. 
Everybody would have to go to high-school and 
graduate, so they could tell the names of all the 


rivers in Posey county, and how the Mississippi 
river compares with White river, and how high the 
Alps are, and a whole lot oi stuff. There isn’t any¬ 
thing in it.”—P. J. Ryan, democratic councilman and 
deputy collector of revenue. 

* 

“ Say, didn’t you see what our club did last 
night? ” 

“No. What did your club do? ” 

“ Wh—wh—why, we passed resolutions against 
the civil service rules. ” 

“ Did you read the rules? ” 

“ Yep. We read them section by section, and 
they are no good.” 

“ What particular section is objectionable? ” 

“Why, under the rules a man who has office 
cau’t talk politics nor pay a cent to the party.”— 
Ed Duvall, sanitary officer for the board of health. 

0*0 

The members of the city administration who are 
in favor of the code of civil service rules, which 
will be considered by the mayor’s cabinet to-night* 
assert that a strong effort is made on the part of 
politicians not only to defeat the adoption of the 
code, but to bring such a pressure to bear as to 
compel the discharge of the few democrats left, 
that republicans may get their places. This, It is 
asserted, is true in every department. Among 
those against whom these accusations are made are 
John W. Bowlus, candidate for county clerk; Ed 
Duvall, sauitary officer; Henry Smith, ex-council¬ 
man ; H. B. Stout, ex-deputy city clerk; Merrill 
Moores, chairman of the republican county com¬ 
mittee; William W. Milford, secretary of the re¬ 
publican county committee and clerk to the board 
of public works; Charles Krauss, councilman at 
large. Mr. Moores recently appeared before the 
board of public safety and asked that Clarence Fos¬ 
ter (republican) be made clerk of that board, a po¬ 
sition held now by Richard Herrick (democrat). 
He explained that he did not ask that one man be 
discharged that another might be appointed, but 
insisted that republicans should have all appoint¬ 
ments to be made. 

Mr. Moores is a member in good standing of the 
Indiana Civil Service Reform Association, of which 
William Dudley Foulke, of Richmond, Is president. 
The object of the association is thus set forth in itg 
constitution: 

“The object of the association shall be to estab¬ 
lish and maintain a system of appointment, promo¬ 
tion and removal in the civil service, founded upon 
the principle that public office is a public trust, ad¬ 
mission to which should depend upon proved fit¬ 
ness. To this end the association will demaud that 
appointments to subordinate executive offices, with 
such exceptions as may be expedient, not incon¬ 
sistent with the principle already mentioned, shall 
be made from persons whose fitness has been ascer¬ 
tained by competitive examinations open to all 
applicants properly qualified; and that removals 
shall be made for legitimate cause only, such as 
dishonesty, negligence or inefficiency, but not for 
such reasons as political opinion or refusal to ren¬ 
der party service; and the association will advo¬ 
cate all other appropriate measures for securing 
integrity, intelligence, efficiency, good order and 
due discipline in the civil service of the national 
government, the state of Indiana and the various 
municipalities therein.”—Indianapolis News. 

0 0 ^ 0 

Col. W. W. Holloway, Mayor Denny’s private sec¬ 
retary, is sometimes given to expletives. Ex-coun- 
cilmau Jasper came in to talk about “civil service.” 
The mayor being out, Jasper and Holloway had, 
according to the News, the following conversation : 

“Morning, Bill.” 

“Morning, Joe.” 

“Colonel, about thb civil service rules. Don’t 
you know that ? I ! — — <‘*18— 1 ! 

-!!!!!!” 

“Joe, — — — !1!?? — *, — 111 
— — — 1???I4 — quoth Mr. Hol¬ 
loway, and the meeting was at an end. 

« 

“The republicans of the first ward In mass 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


107 


meeting assembled enter their emphatic protest 
against the adoption by a republican administra¬ 
tion of so-called civil service rules formulated by 
a set of men who helped to achieve democratic 
success in the last presidential election.” 

« <■ * 

"Resolved, That the republicans of the south 
side earnestly protest against the adoption of the 
proposed civil service rules, believing them to be 
un-American and treasonable to a republican form 
of government.” 

"Be it further resolved, That we, as republicans 
do not believe that the Indianapolis News is capa¬ 
ble of judging of what is for the best interest for 
the republican party. As proof, note its position 
on the tariff question.” 

"Be it further resolved. That we believe in ma¬ 
jority rule, and to the majority belong the emolu¬ 
ments of office, from the highest to the lowest, and 
as republicans we are willing to stake our political 
future on that line of action.” 

* V <■ 

“Whereas, It is reported that the city adminis¬ 
tration is about to adopt a set of civil service rules, 
which rules have been published in the Journal; 
and, 

“Whereas, It is reported that said rules werepre- 
pared by persons whose opposition to the repub¬ 
lican party is notorious, and whose motives may 
be viewed with distrust; therefore, be it 
"Resolved, That said rules are un-American and a 
step toward the disfranchisement of a large num¬ 
ber of voters, and that we condemn in the strong¬ 
est terms the rules now under consideration by the 
Mayor’s cabinet; and, be it further 
"Resolved, That we will support no candidate for 
office who will not openly announce himself as 
opposed to all interference with the rights of 
voters under the guise of civil service reform. 

“The Fourteenth Ward Lincoln League.” 

V * <• 

Whereas, We are informed through the columns 
of the dally press of this city that his honor has un¬ 
der consideration the introduction of civil service 
into our municipal government, which, as a club, 
we believe that at this time is inexpedient, there¬ 
fore be it 

Resolved, That this club most respectfully and 
earnestly protests against such action.—Commercial 
Travelers' Republican Club. 

There was another “ mass”-meeting of men op¬ 
posed to “civil service,” lastnlght. This time it was 
in the Sixth ward. There were six persons, not 
candidates, present. -4t noon to day still another 
“mass-meeting” was held. It was composed of 
John W. Bowlus, candidate for county clerk, and 
two other men who are trying to secure places 
under Mayor Denny .—News Item. 

The precinct committeemen of the Tenth ward 
met in the criminal court room, Saturday night, 
and passed a resolution declaring that the repub¬ 
licans of the Tenth ward and of the city generally 
are opposed to the proposed rules .—News Item. 

* * * 

Eleven of the sixteen republican members of 
council met in the city clerk’s office to canvass on 
the proposed civil service rules. The greater num¬ 
ber present were either candidates for something 
or expect to be some time. Those in attendance 
were Rauh, Cooper, Krauss, Allen, Shaffer, Stout, 
Murphy, Puryear, Kaiser, Drew and Young. The 
majority agreed that they were opposed to the code 
and would tell Mayor Denny so. They also said 
that they intended to make an effort to prevent the 
rules from being adopted.—Wews Item. 

« * •> 

Controller Trusler is against the rules openly, 
and will fight their passage by the cabinet. For 
his alleged valor in opposing the mayor in his civil 
service idea, Controller Trusler has been idolized 
by the spoils element of the party. Yesterday he 
was presented with a glass upon which was in¬ 


scribed: “Civil Service—Rats.” On the other side 
was a flag, and underneath was the name, “P. C. 
Trusler.” Around the bottom of the glass was tied 
some red, white and blue ribbon.” 

* * • 

The Indianapolis Journal, in its columns, 
has long been in favor of the merit system, 
and for many years, in editorials, it has set 
out the great benefits to be derived from 
the extension of civil service reform. While 
this city was under the democrats, it repeated¬ 
ly upbraided them for disregarding the plain 
direction of the charter that the merit system 
must be introduced. October 20, 1893, ten 
days after the great victory of the republicans 
last fall, it had the following: 

The placing of subordinate appointments in the 
city government on a civil service basis is not a 
matter of choice or discretion with the mayor or 
his boards. It is made obligatory by law. The 
charter, after providing for monthly meetings of 
the heads of departments, says, etc.: 

We think it unfortunate that this provision ex¬ 
cepts from its operation employes under the depart¬ 
ment of public safety, which includes the fire and 
police departments. But if the letter of the law 
does not include these departments, its spirit 
should more or less be applied to them. Outside 
of the fire and police forces, every subordinate ap¬ 
pointment in the city government is required to be 
made according to civil service rules and “without 
regard to political opinions or services.” This be¬ 
ing the case, the appointments of deputy controller 
and deputy clerk, already made, were in violation 
of law. 

But, February 2, 1894, the Journal said : 

This provision [of the charter declaring that civil 
service rules shall be adopted] expressly excludes 
from its operation the chiefs and members of the 
police and fire departments, the market master, 
station-house keeper and all clerks and employes 
of the board of public safety. As to employes in 
other departments the charter requires the adop¬ 
tion of uniform rules to ascertain the fitness of ap¬ 
plicants for office, without regard to political opin¬ 
ions or services. This gives the mayor and heads 
of departments the widest possible discretion as to 
what kind of rules or regulations shall be adopted. 
The charter would be fully complied with by a rule 
providing that all appointments to subordinate po¬ 
sitions in the city government should be made with 
a view of promoting its efficiency, and that no ap¬ 
pointment or promotion should be made except on 
the written report of a majority of the board con¬ 
trolling the department that they had examined 
the person and found him qualified. Such a rule 
could be put in a dozen lines. * v * It should 
not be necessary to examine a hundred men to find 
one competent clerk, nor is it necessary for any 
city administration to go outside of its party ranks 
to find persons to fill responsible positions. * v * 
The people who worked and voted for a change of 
city government last October wanted reform, but 
not that kind. Nor does the charter require that 
kind. 

The Journal has evidently been seen by the 
machine. Yet there are few even of the par¬ 
tisan papers which, at the command of the 
party machine, would in such public humili¬ 
ation return their necks to the yoke. 


A MANACLED PRESS. 

But remember, sir, that these are tlie 
attributes of a free press only. And is a 
press tliat is purcliased or pensioned more 
free than a press that is fettered? Can 
the people look for truths to partial 


sources, whether rendered partial through 
fear or through favor ? Why shall not a 
manacled press be trusted with the main¬ 
tenance and defense of popular rights? 
Because it is supposed to be under the in- 
tluence of a power which may prove greater 
than the love of truth. Mucha press may 
screen abuses in government or be silent. 
It may fear to speak. And may it not fear 
to speak, too, when its conductors, if they 
speak in any but one way, may lose their 
means of livelihood? Is dependence on 
government for bread no temptation to 
screen its abuses? Will the press always 
speak the truth, when the truth, if spoken, 
may be the means of silencing it for the 
future? Is the truth in no danger, is the 
watchman under no temptation, when he 
can neither proclaim the approjich of na¬ 
tional evils, nor seem to decry them, with¬ 
out the loss of his place ? 

3Ir. President, an open attempt to secure 
the aid aud friendship of the public press, 
by bestowing the emoluments of office on 
its active conductors, seems to me, of ev¬ 
erything we have witnessed, to be the most 
reprehensible. It degrades both the gov¬ 
ernment and the press. As far as its natu¬ 
ral effect extends, it turns the palladium 
of liberty into au engine of party. It 
brings the agency, activity, energy, and 
patronage of government all to bear, with 
united force, on the means of general in¬ 
telligence and on the adoption or rejection 
of political opinions.— Daniel Webster in 1832. 

-Baldwin, editor of the Herald, collector At 

Erie, Pa. 

Wm. H. Peffer, of the Sentinel, postmaster at Car¬ 
lisle, Pa. 

W. C. Bush, of the Democrat, postmaster at Pitts¬ 
field, Ill. 

James Renie, of the Sun, postmaster at North Ver¬ 
non, Ind. 

F. S. Rufy, editor of the Democrat, postmaster at 
Elyria, 0. 

B. C. Allensworth, editor of the Times, postmaster 
at Pekin, Ill. 

C. Donahue, editor of the Democrat, postmaster at 
Freeport, Ill. 

C. G. Barus, editor of the Argus, postmaster at 
Albion, Neb. 

Perry Hughes, of the Register postmaster at Clin¬ 
ton, Illinois. 

A. J. Coil, of the Enterprise, postmater at Beards- 
town, Illinois. 

F. W. Frye, editor of the Palladium, postmaster at 
Parsons, Kan. 

C. W. Miller, editor of the Democrat, postmaster 
at Waverly, la. 

W. A. Eaton, editor of the Democrat, postmaster at 
Kingman, Kan. 

S. A. D. Cox, editor of the Herald, postmaster at 
Humboldt. Kan. 

John Johnson, editor of the Democrat, postmaster 
at Bedford, Ind. 

John H. Sherman, of the Democrat, postmaster 
at Oceola, Iowa. 

E. W. Renkln, editor of the Sentmel, postmaster 
at Hooper, Neb. 

Eugene Lewis, editor of the Herald, postmaster at 
Greenfield, Ind. 

C. P. Rogers, editor of the Bulletin, postmaster at 
Huntington, N. Y. 

Fred A. Lischer, of the Demokrat, postmaster ai 
Davenport, Iowa. 

T. A. Jernigan, of the Raleigh State Chronicle, 
minister to Corea, 











108 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


B. F. Wissler, editor of the Sun, deputy postmaster 
at Richmond, Ind. 

Giles Devler. editor of the Register, postmaster at 
Harrisonburg, Va. 

C. P. Rogers, editor of the Bulletin, postmaster at 
Huntington, N. Y. 

William N. Hood, of the Democrat, postmaster at 
Washington, Iowa. 

Lucius O. Bishop, editor of the Argus, postmaster 
at Clinton, Indiana. 

V. B. Crane, editor of the Pilot, postmaster at 
Jackson, Minnesota. 

John O.Cronn. editor of the Cowrier, postmaster at 
Berryvllle, Virginia. 

Charles E. Kinder, editor of the News, postmaster 
at Mlamlburg, Ohio. 

W. H. Balthis, editor of the Herald, postmaster at 
Huntsville, Missouri. 

Wm. B. Davis, of the Democrat- Message, post¬ 
master at Mt. Sterling. 

A. W. Buchanan, editor of the Brazos Pilot, post¬ 
master at Bryan, Tex. 

H. L. Storke, of the Auburn Bulletin, postmaster 
at Auburn, New York. . 

George W. Apgar, editor of the Democrat, post¬ 
master at Ithaca, N. Y. 

Clyde McManlgle. editor of the Commercial, post¬ 
master at Horton, Kan. 

Geo. D. Cline, editor of the True Republican, post¬ 
master at Hudson, Wls. 

J. B.Sherrill, edltorof the Piedmont Farmer, post¬ 
master at Abilene, Kan. 

John Adams, editor of the Post, postmaster at 
Columbia City, Indiana. 

B. L. Strother, of the Dickinson Co. Yews, post¬ 
master at Concord, N. C. 

David A. Fawcett, editor of the Democrat, post¬ 
master at Lagrange, Ind. 

George S. Stout, editor of the Independent, post¬ 
master at Lake City, Mich. 

John Culbertson, editor of the Advertiser, post¬ 
master at Delaware, Ohio. 

Samuel E. Nichols, of the Buffalo Times, pension 
agent at Buffalo, New York. 

C. H. J. Taylor, publisher American Citizen, Kan¬ 
sas City, minister to Bolivia. 

Eugene T. Chamberlain, of the Albany Argus, 
commissioner of navigation. 

Robert M. Crawford, editor of the Democrat, post¬ 
master at Mineral Point, Wls. 

W. I. Branagan, editor of the Democrat, post 
master at Emmetsburg, Iowa. 

Daniel F. Davis, editor of the Telegram, post¬ 
master at Columbus, Nebraska. 

Joseph H. Adams, editor of the Southern Star, 
postmaster at Ozark, Alabama. 

Beauregard Ross, editor of the Jeffersonian, post¬ 
master at Plattsburg, Missouri. 

L. T. Alexander, edltorof the Jones county Times, 
postmaster at Monticello, Iowa. 

James Todd, editor of the Nodaway Democrat, 
postmaster at Maryville, Missouri. 

William M. Moss, of the Bloomfield (Indiana) 
Democrat, Indian school supervisor. 

William D. Merrill, editor of the Courier, post¬ 
master at Prairie Du Chien, Wisconsin. 

Washington Hesing, principal owner of the Il¬ 
linois Staats Zeitung, postmaster at Chicago. 

J. F. Salmon, editor of the People’s Press, Cam¬ 
bridge, Ohio, inspector railway mail service. 

William E. Timmons, edltorof Chase county Com- 
rant, postmaster at Cottonwood Falls, Kansas. 

Charles Belmont Davis, son of L. Clarke Davis* 
of the Philadelphia LeeZgier, consul to Florence. 

TYPICAL CASES OF THE FORT 
WAYNE DISMISSALS. 

THE MORGAN CASE. 

My name is Frank M. Morgan. I was a carrier in 
the Ft. Wayne Post-ofiBce from August, 1889, to Jan¬ 
uary, 1891, when I became a distributing clerk in 
the same office, which place I held until October 
28,1893. I threw the letter mail and always had it 
ready for the carriers, and my work seemed to give 
satisfaction. October 28th, last, I received a note 
from Postmaster Rockhill stating that my services 


were no longer needed. I went to Mr. Rockhill 
the same day and asked him if there were any 
charges against me and he said nothing whatever. 
My place was taken by a man named Worden, a 
democrat. I am a republican. I wrote to First As¬ 
sistant Postmaster-General Jones, asking if there 
were any charges against me. Receiving no reply, 
I wrote again, and received an answer th.at my let¬ 
ter was on file. His letter was as follows: 

Washington, D. C., January 8,1894. 
Mr. Frank M. Morgan, Ft. Wayne, Ind., 18i E. Jeffer¬ 
son St.: 

Sir— Your letter of the 6th inst., relative to 
charges for which you were dismissed from Ft. 
Wayne P. O., has been received, and will be duly 
considered. Very respectfully, 

Frank H. Jones, 

First Assistant Postmaster-General. 

I have heard nothing further. 

Frank M. Morgan. 

THE BOWER CASE 

My name is Claude Bower. 1 was a messenger boy 
in the Ft. Wayne post-office, appointed in 1892. I 
held that place until December, 1893, when I was 
promoted to be stamp clerk, it being my duty to 
stamp letters and assist in distribution. I kept my 
work up. I had a partner and he was sick a great 
deal, and I kept his work up, too. August 15,1893, 
a man name Kerr was sent in to me to be instructed 
in my work. I had been showing him about two 
hours when the following letter was handed to me: 

Ft. Wayne, Ind., Aug. 15,1893. 
Mr. Claude Bower, Ft. Wayne, Ind.: 

Sir —Your resignation as stamper will be accept¬ 
ed, to take effect this evening. 

Yours truly, W. W. Rockhill, Postmaster. 

I left the office that evening. I had no talk with 
the postmaster. I never asked for any charges and 
never heard of any. Claude Bower. 

THE ASHLEY CASE. 

My name is George L. Ashley. I was a letter car¬ 
rier in the Ft. Wayne post-office from August 12, 
1889, until August 24, 1893. No complaint had ever 
been made against my service to my knowledge be¬ 
fore I was dismissed. About August 10, 1893, Mr. 
Amos K. Mehl, a democrat who had been appointed 
substitute letter-carrier upon civil service exami¬ 
nation, informed me that Mr. Gallmeier and Mr. 
Wright would be dissmissed and that I would be 
dismissed also. He said if Mr. Paul Richter was 
placed on my route when I went on my vacation 
that I would never come back again. I asked what 
charges were against me and he said he did not 
know. I was notified about August 16th to take out 
the rest of my vacation. Mr. Kettler told me that 
Mr. Rockhill had requested it. I went on my vaca¬ 
tion and Mr. Richter took my place. / receiveda no¬ 
tice on the night of the 23d that after the 24th my serv¬ 
ices would be no longer required. On the morning 
of the 24th I went to Mr. Rockhill, the postmaster. 

I asked him what the charges were against me and 
he said for the good of the service. 1 asked him was 
it for the good of the service to appoint in my place 
a man who during the preceding week had deliv¬ 
ered the Masonic Temple mail to the Newspaper 
Union ? He asked if I had never made any mistake. 

I answered that I had in a rush or where names 
were similar, but not such a break as that. He 
said, “Well, I have dismissed you for the good of 
the service.” I asked First Assistant Postmaster 
Jones, who answered as follows: 

December 21,1893. 

Mr. George L. Ashley, Ex-Letter Carrier, Fort Wayne, 
Ind.: 

Sir—R eplying to yours of the 18th inst. in which 
you make inquiry as to nature of the charges on 
which you were removed as a letter carrier, you 
are informed that said charges were preferred by 
the postmaster, who accused you of neglect, in¬ 
efficiency and inability to cover your route in a 
reasonable and a required time, that he assigned 
one of the substitutes to the route, who m ade much 
better time and did more satisfactory service. 

He specifies one instance of finding in your desk 
a letter addressed to C. H. Van Gorder, 221 Main 
street, which should have been delivered a month 
prior to the date of finding it. 


The exigencies of the carrier service at this time 
make it imperative that only the best men should 
be continued therein. 

Very respectfully yours, 

Frank H. Jones, 

First Asst. Postmaster-General. 

I saw Mr. Rockhill and asked if he made theie 
charges. He said he had, and they were correct. 
I said they were not correct, and I would see Van 
Gorder. I did so, and showed him the letter. 
Then he said, “Where is there a notary, I will 
make an affidavit?” He said he had made no 
charges, and asked where there was a notary, and 
at once made the following affidavit which was 
sent to First Asst. Postmaster-General Jones, and 
its receipt acknowledged: 

State of Indiana, j 

Allen County, 

C. H. Van Gorder, being duly sworn, on his oath 
says that he resides at 221 Main street, in the city of 
Fort Wayne, Ind., and is the person named in the an¬ 
nexed letter, signed by Frank H. Jones, first assist¬ 
ant postmaster-general of the United States; that 
he has resided at the said 221 Main street in the 
said city for about four years, and has been ac¬ 
quainted with Mr. George L. Ashley as mail-carrier 
for about three years, during which time said Ash¬ 
ley delivered mail at affiant’s residence; that said 
Ashley was prompt, efficient and industrious as 
such mail-carrier, and was the most prompt and 
capable carrier that ever delivered mail upon said 
route; that the letters of affiant were never de¬ 
tained by said Ashley; that the letter specified in 
the charges against the said Ashley w'as detained 
in the Fort Wayne post-office at affiant’s request 
during his absence at the World’s Fair in Chicago, 
Illinois. Charles H. Van Gorder. 

Snbscribed and sworn to before me this 23d day 
of December, 1893. Henry C. Hanna, 

[seal.] Notary Public. 

I never failed to cover my route under Postmas¬ 
ter Rockhill within schedule time, and Postmaster 
Higgins has told me that he had no complaint 
against me during his administration. 

Mr. Mehl, who took Gallmeir’s place about Au¬ 
gust 27, told me that Mr. Slater would not keep his 
place because he was secretary of the local civil 
service board, as all Mr. Rockhill’s transactions 
passed through his hands. Slater was dismissed 
October 30. George L. Ashley. 

My name is Paul Richter. I am a letter-carrier 
in the Fort Wayne post-office. I am a democrat, 
and was appointed a substitute letter-carrier by 
Mr. Higgins on 2l8tof June, 1893. I began to carry 
Geo. L. Ashley’s route on the 17th of August, 1893. 
He was then on his vacation. When I began that 
route the Van Gorder family had returned from 
Chicago. After August 2Sd, in going through my 
case I found a letter in a drawer addressed to Mrs. 
C. H. Van Gorder, which I took and delivered to 
her. Ashley’s vacation began on August 17th. 

The same day I found the letter I told Mr. Mehl. 
The date of the postal card was the 23d of July. At 
least one month afterward I delivered the letter to 
Van Gorder’s. and I told Mr. Mehl of the letter the 
same day I found it. The postal card was substan¬ 
tially as follows: I am going to Chicago for one 
week. Please hold my mail until I return. 

Paul O. Richter. 


A correspondent from Ogdenshurg, New 
York, writes ; “I think I owe for the Chron¬ 
icle. * ♦ I wish there more of other than 
Indiana politics in it.” 

[The Chronicle has made every effort to 
get the patronage spoils news of other states as 
fully and vividly told as that of Indiana and 
has failed. The goings on in this state are 
no worse than in many others, but here they 
are brought to the light of day. If there is 
ever the dawn of a better time in this state, it 
will he largely due to the steady, persistent 
gathering of facts by the three leading papers 
of Indianapolis, representing republican, dem¬ 
ocratic, and independent policies. One New 
Y'ork paper that in the Harrison administra¬ 
tion was an inexhaustive store-house of spoils 
news the country over, is, most unfortunately 
for the Chronicle, silent in these days,] 








The Civil Service Chronicle. 


If we see nothing in our victory hut a license to revel in partisan spoil, we shall fail at every point.— 

President-elect Cleveland at New York, November 18, 1892. 


INDIANAPOLIS, MARCH, 1894. 


>T<irx> itrc > J dollar per annum. 
1 10 cents per copy. 


VoL. II, No. 13. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian 8t., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, - 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


The index to the Chronicle, extending 
over the Harrison administration, has 
been printed and mailed to those who re¬ 
quested it. It will be promptly forwarded 
to any others who desire it. There are 
several reflections suggested by this very 
complete resume. One is that there is 
now a distinct lowering of tone toward 
wanton removals. They are in the pres¬ 
ent administration taken for granted. The 
ruthless proscriptions of Carlisle and 
Quincy have aroused public disgust for 
them, but the cases themselves have not 
been repeatedly told, and the meanness 
and hardship of each case dwelt upon as 
in the preceding administration. There 
was nothing in that to equal the cynical 
openness of the claims of the congressional 
barons to parcel out spoils. Such reports 
as are now sent from Washington regard¬ 
ing what appointments Indiana congress¬ 
men have made, are making, or are 
about to make, were never sent before. 
There were no advocates among promi¬ 
nent reformers as now that worthy legis¬ 
lation may be rightfully attained by brib¬ 
ery with patronage, and no culmination of 
such baleful doctrine in the confirmation 
of a justice of the supreme court, sought 
in an open market, by the offer of spoil. 
For the first time in nine years it now ap¬ 
pears to be taken for granted by civil serv¬ 
ice reformers that all outside the classified 
service will be removed, nor is there now 
any steady protest over the removals 
pressed forward as rapidly as practicable 
of postmasters, nor is there any protest 
over the admitted fact that the removals 
and appointments are for political reasons. 
It seemed inconceivable that a President 
elected under the conditions that Mr. 
Cleveland was, could be diverted from the 
one great reform possible to him, but he 
has been, and it can not be denied that the 
standard has been lowered, and specious 
excusing is far more prevalent than in the 
preceding administration. 

The close of the first year of President 
Cleveland’s second administration brings 
little satisfaction to the friends of good gov¬ 
ernment. With rare exceptions, of which 


Hill is one, he has delegated his presidential 
power of appointment to political bosses. In 
the light of his long experience, he has done 
this with a full knowledge of what he was 
doing and he has done it in complete stul¬ 
tification of his many declarations against 
doing it. In view of the large body of lit¬ 
erature produced by him antagonistic to 
this course, he would naturally be ashamed 
and humiliated by his own acts. But as 
has been well said he seems to have become 
cynical. This is illustrated by the fact that 
while the rate of the removal of postmasters 
for the first twelve months of Harrison’s 
administration was 1,646 a month, Mr. 
Cleveland’s monthly rate for the same pe¬ 
riod has been 1,977. The boss system was 
never more flourishing, and there are yet 
graver matters. It was for a long time in¬ 
credible, but it is no longer beyond ques¬ 
tion that the President has given places in 
the civil service for votes in congress. This 
is a brief statement of the most corrupt 
and dangerous act which has occurred in 
the whole history of the spoils system. 
This, too, seems to have been done with 
the utmost deliberation and in doing it Mr. 
Cleveland has placed a blot upon his career 
which can neither be removed nor ex¬ 
cused. During his first administration his 
wreck of the civil service found a host of 
apologists. They are silent now; a few 
Josiah Quincys are the only ones left to 
say it is right to bribe congressmen with 
offices. This bribery undoubtedly delayed 
the repeal of the silver purchase act; in 
the Peckham case the bribe was lost as 
completely as any money ever paid to a 
treacherous floater; and with the tariff 
bill bribed members have been paid a 
higher price by the whisky, sugar, coal and 
iron trusts. Every one should rejoice at 
this futility of presidential bribery. 

Two important federal offices of Indian¬ 
apolis are being “settled.” The new post¬ 
master will take his office in a few days. 
For the fourteen places which it is re¬ 
ported he will treat as spoil he had over 
1,400 applications when he gave notice 
that he would receive no more. The new 
pension agent, Martin Van Buren Spencer, 
had difficulty in getting his place. For a 
long time Secretary Smith refused to ap¬ 
point him because his term of service as a 
soldier was short. When Voorhees deter¬ 
mined to have Spencer appointed, he 


brought Smith’s neck under the yoke in 
short order. There are twenty-eight places 
in the agency office. He says that in or¬ 
der to secure the office he promised to 
different congressmen every place there 
was in it, and up to March 7, congressmen 
had not furnished him the list of hench¬ 
men to be appointed. In the actual divis¬ 
ion, however, which is now going on, there 
is much crimination and recrimination, 
but Spencer says that he has made it satis¬ 
factory to the Indiana senators. The post- 
office of this city is admitted on all hands 
to be the most efficient it has ever been. 
Some of the fourteen employes about to be 
dismissed are model public servants, as, 
for instance, the superintendent of car¬ 
riers and the stamp clerk. Of the twenty- 
eight present employes in the pension 
agency, Mr. Spencer has expressed himself 
as “greatly pleased,” but he has told them 
that he will discharge them as fast as new 
men can learn the work. All of these men 
in both offices are to be removed because 
they are republicans and new men are to 
be put into their places because they are 
democrats. This is called the reward of 
party service. The declaration of the last 
democratic national platform that places 
in the civil service ought not to be a re¬ 
ward for party service is to be treated 
with contempt. Business principles have 
nothing to do with these proposed 
changes. They are to be made upon prin¬ 
ciples which would wreck any private 
business and which make taxes higher 
and more oppressive. It is true these two 
officers have an example in President 
Cleveland. Meanwhile the logic is likely 
to be applied both to the President and to 
them that if it is a good thing to loot the 
offices now, it will be a good thing for some 
other party to do it four years from now. 

The machine republicans here and else¬ 
where are openly saying that they “ could 
put a yellow dog on the ticket this year 
and elect him.” From their recent town¬ 
ship nominations here they appear to be¬ 
lieve what they say. It is impossible to 
say how much further down the democrats 
will get, but it is a good while yet to elec¬ 
tion, and there are large opportunities for 
them to recover. The situation would 
have to be desperate before the republi¬ 
cans, in local and state matters, could suc¬ 
cessfully shake yellow-dog tickets in the 


























no 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


faces of voters in this state. So long as the 
spoils system continues yellow-dog politi¬ 
cians will come to' the front after every 
great victory. On account of yellow-dog 
politics the people at last drive out one 
party by a great defeat. It is a victory 
of the best in the community over the 
worst. In a little while the yellow-dog 
politicians of the victorious party step for¬ 
ward and claim it was their victory, and 
being in control of the machine nominate 
themselves for the offices, and we start on 
the other half of the circle. 


Mr. Cleveland must be proud of his 
manipulation of "Voorhees. Against all 
the honest sentiment of the state he let 
Voorhees name Burke for district attorney, 
Donham for postmaster at Terre Haute, 
and every man for every place that Voor¬ 
hees wanted. It was supposed that the 
naming of Joshua Jump, the partner 
of Voorhees’s particular proteg6, John 
Lamb, and attorney of the distiller 
Crawford Fairbanks, to be collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue, would be too great a strain 
upon Mr. Cleveland’s “ tactful ” policy; 
but it was not. It is true Voorhees voted 
for the repeal of the silver purchase 
act, but he attempted to annul his vote by 
shouting a speech full of all the finan¬ 
cial fallacies of the time. He voted also 
forPeckham; but the administration mi¬ 
nority was hopelessly safe. When, how¬ 
ever, he came to the tarifl bill, Voorhees 
was himself again. As soon as the bill 
went to the senate committee John Lamb 
went to Washington, where he has re¬ 
mained much of the time since, and is al¬ 
ways reported to be “in close touch ” with 
the committee having the bill in charge. 
Voorhees suddenly concludes that the 
whisky men ought not to pay their taxes 
now, but some years hence, and further, 
that being heavily burdened with taxes, 
they deserve a reduction which they get 
by a nominal increase. Those who said 
that Voorhees and Lamb, and Jump and 
Fairbanks, were going to rule things in 
this state, were right; but what about the 
President ? There is one glimpse of sun¬ 
shine in this infamous business. It may 
result in the defeat of Voorhees here in 
Indiana. 


The law gives Secretary Carlisle the 
power to select plans for public buildings 
by open competition among the architects 
of the country. The advantages are plain, 
and, if the intent of the law was carried 
out, there is no question but that the coun¬ 
try would soon begin to get permanent ef¬ 
fects in architecture similar to the noble 
but transitory exhibition which astonished 
the world at Chicago last summer. Mr. 
Daniel H. Burnham, president of the 


American Institute of Architects, says: 
“This country is the greatest client of archi¬ 
tecture known in history unless Rome, in 
the height of her wealth, power and glory, 
be excepted.” We have built buildings by 
the rule of congressional patronage in¬ 
stead of by the rule of architecture. Con¬ 
gressmen and their heelers have passed 
into perpetual oblivion but their buildings 
stubbornly stay with us. Meanwhile new 
congressmen and new heelers are all the 
time making new buildings to become in 
turn exasperating monuments when in 
the near future the names of the vulgar 
builders will be forgotten. A year ago 
Secretary Carlisle informed the American 
Institute that he would choose plans for 
the Buffalo building in open competition. 
But, as Mr. Burnham says, congressional 
patronage interfered, and, without notify¬ 
ing the institute, Carlisle had plans pre¬ 
pared by the politicians who pose as gov¬ 
ernment architects. Of course the plans 
are undesirable, and the Civil Service 
Chronicle knows without being told in 
the words of Mr. Burnham, that “the dis¬ 
reputable practices of municipal politics 
rule in the treasury department.” The 
Secretary is simply a weak Covington poli¬ 
tician who is ruled by a vicious son whom 
he has quartered upon the people. 


Mr. Henry C. Lea recently said in 
Harper's Weekly, that Mr. Cleveland keeps 
congress “ under fitful control by a prosti¬ 
tution of patronage more cynical than has 
hitherto disgraced the nation.” To this, 
the Weekly says editorially: 

“Now we are certainly not disposed to spare 
Mr. Cleveland whenever his management of the 
patronage is open to criticism, and we are far from 
approving all he has done. But in common jus¬ 
tice we must say that when he is charged with ‘a 
prostitution of patronage more cynical than has 
hitherto disgraced the nation,’ the exaggeration is 
simply absurd and scandalous. To go no farther, 
Mr. Harrison’s management of the patronage 
was unquestionably more cynical than Mr. Cleve¬ 
land’s.” 

Mr. Lea’s comment dealt only with the 
use of patronage to buy legislation. Mr. 
Harrison, evil as his administration was, 
in its wanton removals and appointments, 
never used patronage to purchase con¬ 
gressmen’s votes. The incessant occupa¬ 
tion of the present administration, night 
and day, week in and week out, has been 
to appeal through patronage to the cupid¬ 
ity, and weakness, and dishonesty of con¬ 
gressmen, to secure legislation. There 
has never been anything more cynical 
than the openness with which this has been 
done, and it is useless to try to be blind or 
deaf to the danger of using patronage in 
this way. Granted that Mr. Harrison and 
his co-adjutor Clarkson, manipulated the 
patronage wholesale, that their motives 
were bad, that they both should have been 


impeached, while Mr. Cleveland has had 
only the best of motives, and that the leg¬ 
islation he desires is needed, it is still true 
that in far-reaching demoralizing corrup¬ 
tion, Mr. Cleveland’s prostitution of pa¬ 
tronage has been “ more cynical than has 
hitherto disgraced the nation.” 


The Civil Service Chronicle does not 
believe in extra pay for government em¬ 
ployes who have worked over hours. 
These employes are better paid than the 
same grade of employes are in private busi¬ 
ness ; for instance, letter-carriers are paid 
several hundred dollars more annually 
than they would be for the same grade of 
work in private employment. Neither 
does the Chronicle believe in any law 
which sets apart letter-carriers as a class 
whose tenure is to be specially protected. 
Business principles should be applied to 
the entire public service; but no other 
principles should be applied. The exec¬ 
utive department should have the power 
of dismissal; this is essential to discipline 
and efficiency. The civil service law is 
right in this respect. It is true that heads 
of offices take a mean and dishonest advan¬ 
tage of this power, as was done in Topeka, 
Terre Haute, Fort Wayne and elsewhere. 
The remedy for that is public opinion 
and punishment by the President. Infor¬ 
mation, however, is an absolute necessity, 
and to this end the civil service commis¬ 
sion should have power to investigate 
every change in the public service within 
its charge, and to report the facts. Upon 
such facts public opinion and the Pres¬ 
ident could act, and the time would speed¬ 
ily come when heads of offices would be 
ashamed to trick employes out of their 
places. It is unnecessary to repeat that 
every dismissed employe should be en¬ 
titled at the time to an honest and fairly 
complete written statement of reasons, 
and that thoee reasons should be a part of 
the office records. 

Civil service reformers should insist 
that the scales of justice weigh fairly all 
administrations and that the standard be 
not changed. If those interested will turn 
over their files of the Chronicle they will 
come across the case of Colonel Rice, the 
postmaster at Springfield, Mass., whom 
Mr. Harrison turned out. This was con¬ 
demned in language none too vigorous or 
explicit as bad for the service, a betrayal 
of pledges, and coarse ingratitude toward 
an old soldier and efficient officer. If any 
change were to have been made in the 
Springfield office by the present adminis¬ 
tration, Colonel Rice should have been re¬ 
instated. Tbe business community tried 
to get him appointed; but there has been 
so fierce a demand for this place for polit- 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Ill 


ical purposes, backed by Josiah Quincy, 
that the intimation has come from Wash¬ 
ington that a new candidate must be pre¬ 
sented. Have the friends of reform been 
so clear cut and outspoken in their denun¬ 
ciation of the use of this office for political 
purposes by this administration as they 
were when President Harrison used it in 
this same way ? Turn also to the case of 
Postmaster Sperry, of New Haven. He 
had twenty-six years of the most efficient 
service back of him. The whole commu¬ 
nity wanted him kept. The President 
called it a “ hard case,” considered two 
months and then removed him. It is 
probably true that the late President would 
only have considered two minutes and 
would then have removed him. What is 
the difference in yielding after two min¬ 
utes or after two months ? Then there is 
the case of Postmaster Harlow, of St. Louis, 
His removal is wanton and in wanton dis¬ 
regard of the best interests of the city, of 
the desires of the people, and of decent 
treatment of a good officer. This large of¬ 
fice has again simply been manipulated 
for political purposes, but like the other 
cases very little public protest has been 
made by civil service reformers. Do we 
have one standard for Mr. Harrison and 
another for Mr. Cleveland, or are we all 
getting calloused and brutalized by these 
recurring changes ? 

On February 20 a meeting of Harvard 
students was held in Sanders Theater, 
Cambridge, to combine against the spoils 
system. President Eliot presided, and in 
opening the meeting said : 

We have in this university the spectacle of a 
rightly organized staff of men employed in a pub¬ 
lic service. They are taken into the service of the 
college on probation, to be retained In that service 
if they are found efficient. In this way we have a 
body which is highly efficient, serviceable and 
American. Some people say that if we had civil 
service reform in our government service that 
changes would not come often enough, and that 
after all places were filled there would be little 
chance for any one to enter the service of the gov¬ 
ernment. There are in this university 385 officers. 
All but six of these men have been appointed or 
promoted during my connection with the college. 
We have here as permanent a system as there is, 
yet we see that it is almost completely renovated 
in a period of twenty-five years. , 

The next day some 300 Harvard students 
met to perfect an organization for the pro¬ 
motion of civil service reform. The news¬ 
paper report says great enthusiam pre¬ 
vailed. 

We urge Indiana colleges to follow Har¬ 
vard College. We urge it as a duty, and 
the most pressing duty at hand. The feu¬ 
dal spoils system is the most widely rami¬ 
fying and the deadliest corruption at work 
to-day in the body politic. It is a question 
peculiarly fit for the enthusiastic work of 
college men; it is not sectarian, and it is 
not political, because it is the vice of all 


parties of to day. Indiana colleges can not 
afford to be indifferent or timid, and so in¬ 
tensify the unjust suspicion that there is 
in this state no general appreciation of the 
moral degredation of the spoils system or 
a callous indifference to it. 

If a simultaneous movement were be¬ 
gun, it would be easy enough to secure the 
names of several thousand Indiana stu¬ 
dents in enthusiastic support in the new 
Anti-Spoils League. Below is a copy of 
the simple declaration to be signed, and 
which calls for no dues: 

THE ANTI-SPOILS LEAGUE. 

CARL SCHURZ, President. WILLIAM POTTS, Sec¬ 
retary. SILAS W. BURT, Treasurer. 

Office 54 William Street, New York. 

We hereby declare ourselves in favor of the com¬ 
plete abolition of the Spoils System from the public 
service, believing that system to be unjust, un¬ 
democratic, injurious to political parties, fruitful 
of corruption, a burden to legislative and execu¬ 
tive oflScers, and in every way opposed to the prin¬ 
ciples of good government. 

We call upon all in authority to extend to the ut¬ 
most the operation of the present reform laws; and 
by additional legislation, to carry the benefits of the 
Merit System to the farthest possible limits under 
our national, state and municipal governments. 

Name . 

Address . 

At the call of the senate the civil service 
commission has made a report of its in¬ 
vestigations since March 4, 1889. These 
investigations have occurred in Washing¬ 
ton, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, 
Troy, New Orleans, St. Joseph, Toledo, 
Indianapolis, Albany, Atlanta, Rochester, 
Buffalo, Omaha, Denver, Topeka, Quincy, 
Rome, Terre Haute, Paducah and many 
other places. The completeness and effi¬ 
cacy of the commission’s investigations 
are striking. Whenever it sets out it ap¬ 
pears to get at the truth. With a reasonable 
addition to its authority, specifically giving 
the commission full power to investi¬ 
gate and report upon all occurrences under 
the civil service law, the fair and honora¬ 
ble enforcement of that law would only be 
a question of the near future. The rec¬ 
ommendations of the commission have in 
cases of the highest importance, such as 
Baltimore, been entirely ignored, butthere 
have been exceptions. Persons improp¬ 
erly employed have been dismissed in 
Denver, Omaha and elsewhere, and em¬ 
ployes improperly discharged have been 
reinstated in San Francisco, Topeka and 
other places. Carlisle maintains his rep¬ 
utation. Among the irritating cases is 
that of a clerk named Gaddis, who had 
been detailed from the treasury depart¬ 
ment, and had worked under the com¬ 
mission for some months, giving good sat¬ 
isfaction, when he was dismissed through 
the baneful and callow influence which 
reigns in the treasury department. 

Another Carlisle case, not in the report. 


is that of a clerk in the treasury depart¬ 
ment, named Cumming, who, in an 
interview in a Washington paper, relating 
to the Wanamaker loot of the railway 
mail service in 1889, went out of his way 
to make false and malicious statements 
concerning Commissioner Roosevelt. Car¬ 
lisle’s attention was called to this, and he 
promptly promoted Cumming with an 
increase of several hundred dollars in 
salary. 

UNPLEASANT REMINISCENCES. 

Since the jury found John Y. McKane, 
the boss of Gravesend, guilty the Indianap¬ 
olis Journal goes into a spasm at the bare 
mention of the fact that McKane in 1888 
counted the vote of his town for Harrison 
and then named the United States marshal. 
Greater criminals than McKane were 
given vastly greater spoil by the late ad¬ 
ministration. For instance. Quay had his 
hundreds and thousands, where McKane 
had only his fives and tens. But the ver¬ 
dict of the jury, followed by the sentence 
of a court, has a conclusiveness about it by 
which the respectable, though usually 
blind, republicans must, however unwill¬ 
ingly, admit themselves convinced. 

It is not only true that McKane counted 
the vote of his town for Harrison and then 
named the United States marshal, but it is 
one of the most degrading instances of 
paying a rascal for a rascal’s work in an 
administration where excessively degrad¬ 
ing instances were common. Nor until 
now has it ever been in any manner de¬ 
nied. It was widely noted at the time it 
occurred in New York and Brooklyn pa¬ 
pers. It was again noted in 1892 in the 
same papers and at no time was it denied 
because it could not be. 

In 1884 the town of Gravesend gave 
Cleveland 667 votes and Blaine 295. After 
that McKane quarreled with McLaughlin, 
the boss of the Kings county democracy, 
and in 1888 McKane went over to the re¬ 
publicans and in Gravesend Harrison re¬ 
ceived 833 votes, while Cleveland got only 
397. A man named Dan Lake was demo¬ 
cratic boss of the Eighth ward of Brooklyn 
and had been for many years a most active 
ward worker. The democrats had several 
times elected him supervisor and for two 
terms he was county auditor. While he 
was in the latter office all of the fraudulent 
bills for which the supervisors were in¬ 
dicted were audited and paid on the 
strength of Lake’s guaranty. So much for 
the Journal’s statement “that Mr. Lake had 
long been a reputable citizen of Brook¬ 
lyn.” While in the auditor’s office he 
went over to the republicans with McKane 
and lost his job of democratic office-hold¬ 
ing. 

When Harrison was inaugurated Me- 











112 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Kane led one hundred of his henchmen in 
the inaugural procession. They were put 
ahead of Brooklyn republicans as a mark 
of honor. In front of the reviewing stand 
Bufialo Bill led McKane close up to the 
stand, which compliment the president 
acknowledged amid great cheering. Later, 
McKane asked that Lake be appointed 
United States marshal, going very slyly to 
Washington March 13, 1890, refusing to 
register at the hotel. On the 17th of the 
same month the name of Daniel Lake was 
sent to the senate to be United States 
marshal for the eastern district of New 
York, and McKane in the meantime re¬ 
turned to Gravesend boasting that he had 
demanded and obtained Lake’s nomina¬ 
tion for services in casting the vote of 
Gravesend for Harrison. 

The republicans in Lake’s ward had a 
candidate in Robert W. Fielding, and the 
chairman of the county committee, with 
all his followers, had been to Washington 
urging Fielding’s appointment. Fielding 
declared that insult had been added to in¬ 
jury “ by shelving me and taking in my 
place a democrat from my own ward whom 
I have had to fight politically for over a 
dozen years. Here I have been struggling 
to hold our party vote in this democratic 
district for a decade, and have had to buck 
against the great power of this fellow 
Lake backed by Boss McLaughlin.” 

The Journal says that the fact that “ Mr. 
Lake was a faithful and competent officer 
brands the assertion that he was named by 
McKane as a falsehood.” Lake never took 
the office. Before the time came he was 
killed on his way home from one of Mc- 
Kane’s Gravesend horse races. The Jour¬ 
nal attempts to shoulder the matter of 
Lake’s appointment upon General Tracy. 
If Tracy had anything to do with it, he 
would now be filled with contrition; he 
would not attempt to lie out of it. He 
went into the cabinet with crude views as 
to the civil service; but those views became 
clarified and he did what he could, and in 
doing so he rendered his country a great 
service. He did not go into the adminis¬ 
tration a professed saint and come out a 
convicted promise-breaker and incorrigi¬ 
ble sinner. Considering the confidential 
relations which the Journal holds with two 
members of the late administration it must 
have been in possession of all of the facts, 
and must have willfully prevaricated. 

THE PRESENT CONDITION OF MU- 

‘nicipal government in 

BALTIMORE. 

A certain oriental nation is said to have no 
legal title for its sovereign, he is too sacred to 
be named by his subjects. It may be for the 

[A paper read at the conference for good city 
government, held in Philadelphia, January 25, 1894, 
by Charles J. Bonaparte.] 


same reason that there is no constitutional 
provision, statute or ordinance defining the 
powers or even recognizing the existence of 
the true ruler of Baltimore. I shall call him 
in this paper the Supreme Boss, but claim for 
the designation no other merit than that it 
will be readily understood by those most in¬ 
terested. 

The office has existed for some twenty-five 
years, but it has not always been held by one 
man. On several occasions during that period 
it has been placed in commission. On October 
27th, 1892, a speaker who had every reason to 
know whereof he spoke said at a public meet¬ 
ing: 

“ I tell you, your political liberties are in 
danger. There is a clique who have seized 
the democratic organization, and who hold it 
for personal aggrandizement. They have said 
to you (I am talking to democrats), ‘We have 
determined who shall be the judges.’ Frank 
Morrison, Robert J. Slater, and Rasin say to 
any yonng man who aspires to office : ‘You 
shan’t be nominated unless we say so, and we 
won’t say so unless you pay for it.’ ” Since 
then the two first named of the triumvirate 
have shared the fate of Antony and Lepidus, 
the democratic primaries of 1887 correspond¬ 
ing in result to the battle of Actium, and for 
the past six years an Augustus has borne un¬ 
challenged sway. The tenure of his office may 
be described as “during good behavor,” but, 
“good” as thus used must be understood, like 
agathoi or aristoi in the literature of Greek 
politics, in the conventional sense. Mr. Free¬ 
man calls an aristocracy, as he nses the term, 
a rule of the best, not indeed of the best mor¬ 
ally, but of those best fitted to rule. So a 
Baltimore boss remains such, while, and only 
while, he shows himself a better man than his 
competitors; not better in what he and they 
would call a Sunday-school sense, but better 
fitted to be a boss. Nowhere is the survived 
of the fittest better illustrated, each succes¬ 
sive boss wrests power from the grasp of one 
who.had previoutly clutched it and looks upon 
his own lieutenants and pupils much as a 
Roman Emperor regarded his generals. Were 
he a classical scholar (which he usually is not) 
his office might remind him of 

“Those trees in whose dim shadow 
The ghastly priest doth reign. 

The priest who slew the slayer. 

And shall himself be slain.” 

But, however this may be, he knows well 
enough that he will keep his place no moment 
longer than he can hold it with the strong 
hand against all odds and all comers. 

A boss in Maryland, like a Turkish Pasha, 
owes his dignity to merit only, and in great 
measure to the same kinds of merit. For the 
one position, as for the other, no one is dis¬ 
qualified by humble birth or limited education, 
or questionable antecedents and reputation. A 
poor man may rise to be a boss as he may to 
be a Pasha; but, in either case, he usually 
becomes a rich man soon after. The Ameri¬ 
can potentate, however, lives in no such bar¬ 
baric splendor as surrounds his eastern 
brother. Again, like Augustus, our present 


ruler dwells among us to outward view a mere 
private citizen, with no shade of that divinity 
which doth hedge about a king. He is fa¬ 
miliarly known as “Free,” not because, as 
Clarendon said of an English king: “He is 
as free as any other monarch of Christendom,” 
but from a corruption or abbreviation of his 
middle name. His colleague of the state at 
large (for we have a state boss as well) has 
been for some fourteen years a senator of the 
United States, but he has always preferred to 
rule Baltimore as Pericles did Athens, with¬ 
out any official authority. It is true that as 
Pericles was annually elected strategos, he has 
been successively a clerk of court, a naval offi¬ 
cer of the port, and insurance commissioner, 
but the modern, no less than the ancient ruler, 
has invariably sought the substance, not the 
show, of power. He is willing that others 
should make and administer our laws, pro¬ 
vided that he makes the law-makers and all 
other public servants, decides what laws shall 
be made and how they shall be administered. 
In certain respects, however, he differs widely 
from Pericles; he is no orator, and pretends 
to be no statesman. I do not recollect that I 
ever heard of his making a speech, and so far 
as my memory serves me, the only topic of 
national interest on which the public had a 
seemingly authentic statement of his views 
was the nomination of Mr. Cleveland in 1892. 
This he was reported to favor, although most 
of our politicians expressed another prefer¬ 
ence, because, as he was said to have declared 
in substance, “He had never found any cause 
to complain of Mr. Cleveland.” Indeed, the 
cacoethes loquendi and any real interest in pub¬ 
lic affairs are very dangerous to a boss: the 
immediate predecessor of our present senior 
senator, both as senator and as state boss, and 
who was also afterwards city boss, had, while 
on both thrones, brief and turbulent reigns, 
closed by decisive overthrows, very largely 
because he could and would make speeches, 
and even express opinions in them. 

The ordinary duties of a supreme boss are 
both responsible and onerous. He relieves 
those legal voters of the city who belong to 
its dominant party of the labor and anxiety 
involved in choosing candidates for all elect¬ 
ive offices, and he renders, in no small meas¬ 
ure, the same service to the party of opposi- 
sition, for patriots of the kind called in New 
York “Tammany republicans,” are well known 
in Baltimore. It will be remembered that 
this function had been already assumed by 
his former colleagues and himself in 1892, and, 
in view of the complaint then made by the 
speaker I have quoted, as to the terms of its 
exercise, I deem it but just to say that he has, 
to my knowledge, permitted, and even caused 
“young men who aspired to office” to be nomi¬ 
nated without his being paid for it, at least in 
money or by them. In the principal demo¬ 
cratic paper in Baltimore there appeared some 
months ago a narrative, in much detail, of 
his interview with another magnate, of greater 
dignity, but less real power, namely, the Pres¬ 
ident of the United States. According to the 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


113 


account thus published, the latter requested of 
him recognition (in political parlance, a eu¬ 
phemism for some measure of support at pub¬ 
lic expense) for certain “elements” in their 
common party, guilty in the past of much 
disaffection and even insubordination towards 
the supreme boss, but in warm sympathy with 
the President’s reputed views. Our ruler is 
said to have shown none of that ill-judged 
bitterness exhibited by Queen Liljiuokalani 
towards the rebels against her authority, but 
conceded promptly and gracefully a “reason¬ 
able” portion of such “recognition,” and soon 
after the alleged interview, four gentlemen be¬ 
longing to the association which I here repre¬ 
sent were notified of their selection to serve in 
the present general assembly, one as senator, 
three as delegates, from the city of Baltimore. 
Together with all the other candidates for 
these or any other offices, they were unani¬ 
mously nominated by the appropriate con¬ 
vention ; the functions of such bodies in Bal¬ 
timore, and their relations to the boss being 
closely analogous to those of the old French 
parliaments when the king appeared in a lit 
de justice. No one who knows these gentle¬ 
men (and they are well known) needs any 
assurance from them that they have gone to 
the legislature absolutely untrammeled by 
pledges express, or implied, or doubts that 
whatever may have been the motives of those 
who offered them election, their acceptance 
was dictated by a sense of public duty; in¬ 
deed, rumor credits the boss with an expres¬ 
sion of perfect indifference as to what bills 
they might introduce, he would “take care,” 
he is currently quoted as saying, of these 
bills afterwards. It is therefore clear that his 
act of gracious oblivion was either a matter of 
pure “comity,” or else is to receive his reward 
from some one other than those immediately 
favored. 

Article 9 of the Bill of Eights in the Con¬ 
stitution of Maryland declares: 

“That no power of suspending laws or the 
execution of laws, unless by, or derived from 
the legislature, ought to be exercised or al¬ 
lowed.” 

“Nous avons change tout cela,’* and a power of 
suspending laws or their execution exists in 
Baltimore, which is in no wise “derived from 
the legislature,” although the political exist¬ 
ence of members of the legislature is often 
“derived” from those who exercise this power. 
On our statute books are laws which seem to 
prescribe penalties for election frauds for vari¬ 
ous forms of gambling and of swindling dis¬ 
guised as gambling, for illicit liquor selling 
and for maintaining or advertising resorts for 
sexual immorality, but practically all these 
pretended crimes are licensed except the one 
first named, and that is rewarded. In an ad¬ 
dress which I delivered some years since at 
one of the annual meetings of our local society 
for the suppression of vice, I said, and I now 
and here repeat: “It is no exaggeration of 
language to say that saloons and gambling 
houses and brothels are here nurseries for 
statesmen, and the active hostility of their 


keepers is, if not fatel, at least a grave im¬ 
pediment to success in public life; and that 
men and women who gain their living by 
habitually breaking the laws have a potent 
voice in selecting the public servants, who 
make, interpret, and execute those laws. The 
proprietor of a dive may be of one party or 
the other; neither enjoys a monopoly of this 
desirable constituency, but, whatever his poli¬ 
tics, he is almost certainly a power at the pri¬ 
maries as a factor in the vote of his precinct; 
only practical experience can teach how much 
these facts aggravate the task of bringing him 
to punishment.” The fishing bounties once 
granted by the National Government were de¬ 
fended as fostering a nursery of seamen; we 
ought not to complain of a mere impunity for 
the breach of obsolete laws accorded to those 
who provide training schools for our future 
rulers. 

Still less can we reasonably object to a serv¬ 
ice pension, in the form of permanent pub¬ 
lic employment, awarded to those who have 
“worked” for the boss or his lieutenants at the 
polls and even suffered for them in jail. Of 
the admirable custom lastly mentioned, a sig¬ 
nificant illustration has been recently brought 
to my knowledge. In the year 1887 the Balti¬ 
more Reform League prosecuted criminally 
a large number of those who had served as 
judges or clerks of election throughout the city 
in the autumn of 1886. By a deplorable over¬ 
sight on the part of the reigning bosses, which 
has not been repeated, the assistant state’s at¬ 
torney was a lawyer of marked ability and dis¬ 
posed to really bring criminals to justice, and, 
as a consequence, some twelve or fifteen of 
the officers mentioned were convicted of fraud 
in various forms and sent to jail. Moreover, 
the annoying irritability of public opinion at 
that time, due in some measure to the previ¬ 
ous conviction of two of the same set of elec¬ 
tion judges for a murder, committed after 
their appointment and just before the elec¬ 
tion, prevented the governor’s receiving orders 
to pardon them until they had all endured 
some months of imprisonment. Among these 
exemplars of loyalty and zeal was a certain 
clerk of election who in July last was ap¬ 
pointed elevator man at the post office build¬ 
ing. This patriot’s record was investigated by 
a special committee of the Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association of Maryland, and by them 
called to my attention as president of the as¬ 
sociation, and by me to that of the custodian 
of the building, who is also collector of inter¬ 
nal revenue and the first appointee of the 
present administration to an important office 
in Maryland. My letter to him remained 
without acknowledgement, but very soon af¬ 
terwards the newspapers announced that the 
health of the elevator man, undermined, per¬ 
haps, by his cruel incarceration for about 
seven months six years before, had failed 
under the arduous labors of his position, and 
this he resigned. Within the past month it 
has been ascertained that he continues to 
draw pay from the national treasury, but his 
post of duty has been changed to the base¬ 


ment, where he is well enough to act as fire¬ 
man. The treatment of his case by his super¬ 
iors exemplifies a kind of devotion to reform 
which displays itself upstairs and fades away 
as the reformer’s scene of action disappears 
from public view. Doubtless this spirit has 
its merits, but it awakens in me a qualified 
enthusiasm. 

A very important “condition” of municipal 
government in Baltimore is the “Grand¬ 
mother’s Fund.” As I am away from home, 
it may be well to explain that this is not a 
particular sum of money committed to a des¬ 
ignated custodian, but represents the aggre¬ 
gate proceeds of various kinds of tribute lev¬ 
ied upon the community by its real, as contra¬ 
distinguished from its normal, rulers- This 
tribute includes assessments on office-holders 
and candidates for office, “benevolences” from 
contractors doing work or furnishing supplies 
of any kind to the city or state institutions 
under public control, the price of franchises 
and privileges and special legislation of every 
kind, whether from the city council or the 
general assembly, the amounts contributed 
by corporations when subjected to a process 
known technically as “plugging,” and the 
ransom paid by criminals of all sorts, and es¬ 
pecially, as I have endeavored to explain, by 
policy players, brothel keepers and offenders 
against the liquor laws, for impunity. It will 
be readily seen that great tact and judgment 
as well as vigilence, must be displayed in thU 
work of levy, for, such is the selfishness of hu¬ 
man nature, that hardly one of those tithable 
would hesitate to evade payment of even the 
most moderate subsidy could he do so with 
safety, and, on the other hand, here as else¬ 
where, business will be checked by a prohib¬ 
itory tariff. It is, moreover, necessary to 
“size up” each “job” separately before this is 
undertaken, for the circumstances and the 
disposition of the person “struck” will often 
determine whether or how hard to strike him. 

To study the supreme boss, his rivals, his 
followers and his revenue, is to learn some¬ 
thing of the true conditions of municipal 
government in Baltimore; he can say with 
Louis XIV, and with much the same measure 
of truth: “ L’Etat e'est moi; ” he embodies and 
typifies those influences which have made the 
city’s politics what they are, just as the great 
monarch embodied and typified the absolutism 
of his time and country. Any one boss may 
lose power, or die orgrow virtuous, when he is 
rich enough and wishes to get into good so¬ 
ciety; but while his environment remains what 
it is, he will surely ha'^e a successor. Every 
people has had, and will have always, as good 
a government as it deserves. 

GOVERNMENT BY AN OLIGARCHY. 

It is believed that the nomination of Scott Harri¬ 
son, brother of the ex-President, to he surveyor of 
the port of Kansas City, will be defeated. Chair¬ 
man Vest, of the committee having in charge the 
nomination, and a Missourian himself, says the 
nomination can not be confirmed. Senator Vest 
says he was not consulted about the nomination, which 
was a personal one of the President.—IPas/nn.ofon 
dispatch, Indianapolis News, January 9. 








114 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


The senate committee on commerce has just rejected 
the nomination of J. Scott Harrison for surveyor of 
the port at Kansas City. It is stated that the vote 
was unanimous.—Washington dispatch, Indianapolis 
News, January 11. 

* * • 

The senate, in executive session, yesterday re¬ 
jected the nomination of J. Scott Harrison, to be 
surveyor of customs at Kansas City. A yea and nay 
vote was not asked upon the nomination after a state¬ 
ment of the case had been made by the Missouri sena¬ 
tors .— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, Jan¬ 
uary 18. 

♦ <» »> 

This Mr. Harrison was a brother of ex-President 
Harrison, and a democrat. So Mr. Cleveland, as 
an act of courtesy to his predecessor, appointed 
him government surveyor at Kansas City, Mo., 
which is Mr. Harrison’s home. It was an excellent 
appointment, and on its merits deserved to be con¬ 
firmed, aside from the fact of the relationship with 
the ex-President. But President Cleveland hadn't 
consulted Senators Vest and Cockrell of Missouri, and 
these worthies immediately unsheathed their knives. 
In their search for “reasons” why J. Scott Harrison 
should not be confirmed, these senators claimed 
that the appointee was not a democrat, because he 
had voted for his brother for President of the 
United States, although being in Missouri, a safe 
democratic commonwealth. General Harrison’s 
brother might have been pardoned for so doing in 
view of his fraternal feeling. But the august senate 
stood by Vest and Cockrell, and J. Scott Harrison was 
rejected simply because he was not the choice of the 
Missouri senators, and for no other reason in the 
world.— Springfield Republican, February 3. 

* * <• 

There is considerable speculation as to the atti¬ 
tude of the two Missouri senators toward the nom¬ 
ination. Messrs. Vest and Cockrell voted against 
the confirmation of Mr. Hornblower, and it was 
taken for granted by many that they would take 
the same stand against Mr. Peckham,but Governor 
Francis of Missouri arrived in Washington, and 
soon after his arrival the report became current 
that he had come as a peacemaker, and would en¬ 
deavor to restore harmony between the President 
and the senators from Missouri. The President this 
afternoon sent to the senate the nomination of John R. 
Walker of Missouri, to be United States attorney for 
the western district of Missouri, and of Gen. Joseph 
0. Shelby to be United States marshal in the same dis¬ 
trict. Mr. Walker is a brother-in-law of Senator Cock¬ 
rell, and his application was presented by the sena¬ 
tor some time ago The senator, however, did not 
especially recommend him, or at least says he did 
not. Gen. Shelby was supported for the place for 
which he has now been named by Senator Vest.— 
Washington dispatch. New York Times, February 5. 

# Jji 

In connection with the Hornblower case there 
is an interesting story afloat regarding the action 
of Senator Martin, of Kansas, in voting to confirm 
Mr. Hornblower. Some time ago the President 
nominated Dr. S. F. Neely, of Leavenworth, to be 
United States Marshal of Kansas. Neely had been 
recommended by Mr. Martin, and his appointment 
caused surprise to many who believed that the 
Kansas Senator was not in favor with the adminis¬ 
tration. It is said at the capitol that Mr. Martin 
induced the two New York senators to favor the 
immediate confirmation of Dr. Neely, and gave 
them to understand that he would vote against 
confirming Mr. Hornblower. However that may 
be, it is certain that Mr. Martin stood by the ad¬ 
ministration.—IFas/unpfon dispatch, New York 
Times, January 17. 

Interest in the Peckham case was intensified to¬ 
day by the arrival of Secretaries Gresham and Car¬ 
lisle at the capitol about 1 o’clock. Secretary 
Gresham went to the marble room and Secretary 
Carlisle took a seat in the private room of Secre¬ 
tary of the Senate Cox. 

For the next hour there were some animated dis¬ 
cussions between the secretaries and senators 
whom they had summoned from their seats. It 


did not take Mr. Hill very long to ascertain that 
Messrs. Gresham and Carlisle were laboring in be¬ 
half of Mr. Peckham, and he immediately renewed 
his efforts to prove that he has greater influence 
with the senate than the administration has. A 
dosen or more senators who voted against Mr. 
Hornblower’s confirmation were consulted by the 
two secretaries. Mr. Gorman had quite a long in¬ 
terview with Mr. Gresham. Mr. Martin, of Kan¬ 
sas. was another who was requested to meet the 
visitors. About the time Mr. Martin was invited out 
of the senate the President sent to the senate eleven 
Kansas post-office nominations. In the Hornblower 
struggle Mr. Martin was regarded as an ally of Hill. 
At the eleventh hour, however, he deserted Hill and 
voted for Hornblower, much to the disgust of the 
New York senators.— Washington dispatch. New 

York Times, February 8. 

~ • * * % 

According to the officials of the senate more nom¬ 
inations have already been rejected than during 
the whole of President Harrison’s term, and the 
end is not yet. The first contest in the senate to be 
brought to a vote was on the nomination of Van 
Alen, as embassador to Italy, and was won by the 
administration. After a protracted struggle, the 
nominee was confirmed on October 20th,only to re¬ 
sign later on. Next came the attack on Horn¬ 
blower, resulting in his rejection on January 15th. 
The committee on commerce was next supported 
by the senate on January 17th in the rejection of J. 
Scott Harrison, nominated to be surveyor of cus¬ 
toms for Kansas City, Mo , both the Missouri sena¬ 
tors opposing the executive. On the same day the 
name of Kope Elias, nominated to be collector of 
internal revenue for the 4th North Carolina district, 
against whom Senator Vance made a fight, was with¬ 
drawn, he having previously declined the appoint¬ 
ment in order to restore harmony. His successor 
was promptly confirmed. Against F. M. Simmons, 
nominated for the other North Carolina district, 
Senator Vance, aided by the republicans, is waging a 
relentless war with the probability that the nominee 
will be rejected or forced to withdraw. On Febru¬ 
ary 13th Benjamin Lenthier, nominated to be con¬ 
sul to Sherbrooke, Que., was rejected, to be fol¬ 
lowed three days later by the rejection of Wheeler 
H. Peckham in the second bout over the supreme 
court vacancy. The atmosphere is not yet clear in 
the matter of nominations. Senator Cullom is op¬ 
posing confirmation of some postmasters in Illi¬ 
nois; Senator Call Is up in arms over the batch of 
appointments for Florida, sent in last week, and 
Mr. Hill has not ceased his attack on some New 
York nominations which are particularly objec 
tionable to him.—B'as/ifa.cfon dispatch, Buffalo Ex¬ 
press, February 2S. 

« * 

The President to-day withdrew the nomination of 
Arthur M.Randall to be postmaster at St. Johnsbury, 
Vt. Mr. Randall is a democrat suggested for the 
office by Bradley B. Smalley, and, so far as anybody 
can find out,f/iere is nothing the matter with him. except 
that he is persona non grata to Representative GroxU. 
Not long ago a case came before the committee 
from another state where the name of a postmaster 
sent in by the President to occupy an office at Dan¬ 
ville, Ill., was withdrawn because Representative 
Cannon, a republican, objected to him. Having con¬ 
sidered the subject in what it is pleased to call a 
“broad” manner, the committee resolved that it 
would not report any person for postmaster who 
was objectionable to the representative from the 
district.— Washington dispatch. New York Times, 
February 31. 

QUINCY. 

The senate has rejected the nomination of Ben. 
jamin Lenthier, of Massachusetts, to be consul at 
Sherbrooke, Canada. He was a personal selection 
of Josiah Quincy. He was first nominated soon 
after March 4, 1898. The nomination was not re¬ 
ported from committee, and when the extra ses¬ 
sion convened his name was again sent in. The 
nomination fell with the session and was renewed 
at the beginning of the present session. This time 
the nomination was reported unfavorably, the 


main objection being that Mr. Lenthier received 
his appointment as a reward for political services 
to Mr. Qiiiucy.—Washington dispatch, New York 
Evening Post, February 16. 

» 

Col. J. Courtney Hixson, appointed consul and 
judge of the consular court at Fuchu, China, has 
issued a printed circular containing his photograph, 
autograph and a sketch of his life. From this it 
appears that he was “bawn In Georgia, sah,” but 
at an early age became a resident of Alabama. He 
has been “commandant” of the military depart¬ 
ment of the Alabama university, which, of course, 
makes him a colonel. He has also practiced law 
and been editor of a weekly paper at Union 
Springs at Ala. The circular says he was a writer 
of great force and originality. Of his personal ap¬ 
pearance the colonel says: “Colonel Hixson has a 
striking personality, and in any crowd he would 
attract attention, being of splendid and massive 
physique—six feet tall, straight as an arrow, with 
a dark, heavy mustache and military imperial, 
and the easy, graceful bearing of a gentleman of 
education and travel.” As this information is fur¬ 
nished by the colonel himself it may be accepted 
as reliable. Those who have seen him say that he 
does not at all exaggerate the impressiveness of 
his mustache, and that his imperial is, in the lan¬ 
guage of the day, “out of sight.”—Indiatiapolis 
Journal, February 16. 

•> * * 

One of the faithful and experienced officials to 
whose lot it fell to feel the keen edge of Mr. 
Quincy’s guillotine during the latter’s brief but 
sanguinary career in the state department was Mr. 
George L. Catlin, our consul at Zurich. A college 
friend of Mr. Catlin's at Yale has written a letter 
in which he expresses some very justifiable indig¬ 
nation at the manner in which the removal was 
accomplished. Mr. Catlin’s first Intimation was a 
paragraph in his evening paper announcing that 
one Eugene Germain of Los Angeles had been ap¬ 
pointed to his place. That was the way a grateful 
republic rewarded sixteen years of continuous and 
successful labor in the consular service. Mr. Cat¬ 
lin was stationed first at La Rochelle and then at 
Stuttgart, before being transferred to Zurich, where 
Quincy’s avenging blade found him. Mr. Catlin 
declares that he has “reason to believe that it was 
Mr. Josiah Quincy, and he alone, who did it—and 
that at five minutes’ notice.” What kind of a man 
is he whom our Massachusetts prince of spoilsmen 
turned off with such uncommonly short shrift? 
Mr. Catlin is a Yale alumnus, a veteran officer of 
the Union army, a gentleman of scholarly tastes, 
speaking fluently three European languages. For 
many years he was the editor of the New York Com¬ 
mercial Advertiser. Mr. Catlin was considered one 
of the model consuls of the service. He was re¬ 
tained by Mr. Cleveland during his first presiden¬ 
tial term, only to fall a victim to our insatiable 
young Bay State “reformer.”—Rosfoti Journal. 

* * 

Take Julius Goldschmidt, our late consul-general 
at Vienna, for instance. He was one of the most 
uncompromising republicans ever in public em¬ 
ploy, but he was also one of the most efficient men 
in our foreign service. Quincy turned him out 
and put into his place a man whose chief claim 
rests on his ability to play chess. 

Another instance in point was that of Consul- 
General Lay at Ottawa, From a consular point of 
view the place does not amount to a great deal, but 
on its semi-diplomatic side it is very important. 
Mr. Lay is a natural diplomat, and is on the most 
agreeable social terms with all in Ottawa whom it 
is useful to know. Why should he be called home 
to make room for Mr. Riley, who, whatever his 
virtues as a citizen, must figure as a raw recruit in 
diplomacy for a good while to come? 

Warner P. Sutton, our consul-general at Nuevo 
Laredo, was another man whom nature seemed to 
have cut out for his particular place. The Mexi¬ 
cans are a people by themselves; notone Ameri¬ 
can in ten thousand understands them. But Sut¬ 
ton does. He knows them, their language, their 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


115 


literature, their politics, their business and social 
Interests. He understands how to treat them, and 
they like him and are ready to do anything for 
him. He had his eye on the whole frontier, and 
saved this country from many a collision on the 
border land. He must have been in the service a 
dozen years or so. 

Adamson, our consul-general at Panama, had 
some odd traits, was a good deal of a martinet, and 
possessed a tremendous thirst for paper contro¬ 
versy when aroused. He was, nevertheless, so 
useful an oflBcer, and so thorough going an expert 
in local matters on the isthmus, that he served un¬ 
der Arthur, Cleveland and Harrison without dis¬ 
turbance. 

Fechet, who was consul at Piedros Negras, is now 
in Washington, doing clerical work for one of the 
senators. He was a good consul, with something 
like a genius for the special duties laid on him in 
Mexico. Brown, who was at Glasgow, was a first- 
rate consul, and made a good local reputation for 
Americans, which is of great advantage to us in 
such a community. His reports were of the high¬ 
est value to the department. Thomas H. Sherman 
at Liverpool—who was one of the stand-bys of the 
department, and whose knowledge of his consulate 
even before he went there was greater than any 
new man could hope to acquire after a considera¬ 
ble residence—must give way when Quincy takes 
charge. Why? The answer which Mr. Quincy 
would make to this question doubtless would be 
that the place is worth $40,000 a year with its fees, 
and that it must go to some one belonging to the 
party in power. But why not ask congress to or¬ 
der the fees put into the treasury and give the oflSce 
a fair salary, and then try to keep an experienced 
man there? 

Trail, who was consul at Marseilles through Har¬ 
rison’s term, served under the former Cleveland 
administration as secretary of legation at Rio; so 
he evidently was not an offensive partisan. He 
was a Harvard graduate, a good linguist and a 
most faithful consul, sticking to his post through 
all the cholera panic and keeping the department 
carefully informed of everything which would be 
of value in protecting this country against the in¬ 
vasion of the scourge. He seemed to be ambitious 
for a career, and he ought to have been encouraged. 
So ought Washburn and Loomis, two other young 
men who gave promise of a future of marked use¬ 
fulness. Washburn was consul at Madgeburg, and 
his reports were among the very best sent to Wash¬ 
ington. He was a Cornell graduate, and a bright, 
intelligent fellow. Loomis was a scholarly young 
man and an able writer. He was at St. Etienne 
when his head came off. The crime for which he 
suffered was that he had been private secretary to 
Clarkson, the Iowa republican boss, while the lat¬ 
ter was in charge of the campaign of 1888. But al¬ 
though Loomis was an ardent republican, he di¬ 
vorced politics and business, and would have made 
a useful officer under any administration. 

Gardner, who was at Rotterdam, was another 
strong partisan. It is not known whether he 
would have wanted to stay; but Quincy should 
have given him the chance if he was willing, for 
he was one of the most faithful and energetic men 
we ever had in the service. 

Frank Hill, who was consul at Montevideo, was 
one of Cleveland’s original appointees. He was 
sent as consul to Asuncion in 1887. He was a Min¬ 
nesota man, and a warm personal friend of the 
late Secretary Windom’s. When Mr. Windom en¬ 
tered President Harrison’s cabinet, he Interested 
himself in procuring Hill’s promotion—a task 
which was not difficult, because his record was of 
the best. Catlin, at Munich, was a nephew of ex- 
Secretary Tracy. He did not distinguish himself, 
for exceptional general ability, but he was admira¬ 
bly fitted by his personal traits and education for 
the special place to which he had been assigned. 
Dougherty, at Callao, found consular work con¬ 
genial, and did it in the most satisfactory manner. 
— Washington dispatch to New York Evening Post, 
January SO. 

♦ ♦ 

It is to be said of the appointment of Michael J. 


Griffin as postmaster of Holyoke that the office has 
been filled on the basis of political support, and not on 
the simple and sound ground of seeking to discover 
mhat the business men and patrons of the office wanted 
and doing it. Mr. Griffin finally won the favor of 
Josiah Quincy and the democratic state committee, 
through a more or less open harmonizing of con¬ 
flicting local ambitions, and so the democratic ma¬ 
chine has carried the day, just as it has been boast¬ 
ing it would do. The activity of the democratic state 
committee in post-ofiice fights, under the leadership of 
Josiah Quincy is something beyond what this state has 
before seen.—Springfield Republican, January IS. 

« « «■ 

It is an interesting fact in this connection that 
the ante-room of Mr. Quincy’s Boston office is daily 
crowded with hungry applicants for place, a^id that 
the initials "J. Q." appear upon the papers of most of 
the successful candidates for the Massachusetts post- 
offices.—Springfield Republican. 

* 

Josiah Quincy’s latest performance, while no 
worse in principle than some other things he has 
done, is liable to bring the administration into real 
trouble. There is a very large scandal brewing 
over his acceptance of a retainer from the govern¬ 
ment of the Argentine Republic to represent its in¬ 
terests as counsel before President Cleveland, who 
has been chosen arbitrator of the boundary contro¬ 
versy between Argentina and Brazil. The only 
ostensible reason for choosing Mr. Quincy for this 
work when so many abler international lawyers 
could have bean retained, was his intimacy and 
supposed Influence with the President.—TFasliinp- 
ton dispatch, Febrv.cry 15. 

CARISLE. 

Collector of the Port Townsend to-day appointed 
William A. Comegys as deputy collector. Secretary 
Carlisle recently ordered Collector Townsend to dis¬ 
charge William R. Shinn, his republican deputy, and 
to appoint John F. Callahan in his place. This the 
collector refused to do, and selected Comegys, who 
is a democrat and ex-speaker of the house of repre¬ 
sentatives.— Wilmington dispatch, Ne^v York Times, 
February 17. 

<• * « 

“The chief attorney of the lottery is the secretary 
of the treasury, John G. Carlisle.” So says Mana¬ 
ger James Douglass of the Kentucky State Lottery. 

» « « 

John H. Wise, of California, came to Washington 
last spring to plead his claims to “recognition” by 
the new administration, and went back in June 
with the collectorshlp of the port of San Francisco 
in his pocket. He was so full of Democratic zeal 
that he dribbled interviews all along his route 
westward, telling how he was going to reorganize 
the custom-house force and turn it into a good 
democratic institution. 

Among his first acts as a reorganizer was the dis¬ 
missal of several republicans who were in the 
classified service. Two examiners named Raymer 
Sharp and Charles J. Evans, and a sampler named 
G. D. Bunker, who were appointed on probation 
under his predecessor. Collector Phelps, reached 
the end of their probationary period on the 21st of 
June. Appraiser Ralston reported to the collector: 

They have been punctual, industrious, and show 
themselves to have the ability to fill their positions 
thoroughly. I commend them to your favorable 
consideration, and recommend that they be ap¬ 
pointed according to the civil service rules. 

The collector’s only response came in the form 
of a letter to each of the probationers, saying; 

Your conduct and capacity not having been sat¬ 
isfactory to me as nominating officer, you will not 
be absolutely appointed, and therefore, in accord¬ 
ance with the terms of your temporary appoint¬ 
ment, you will be out of service on the 22d Inst., as 
provided in the civil service rules and regulations. 

Mr. Sharp is a Harvard graduate and Mr. Evans 
a graduate of the University of California. Their 
places were filled by the reinstatement of two 
democrats named I. G. Underwood and D. W. Mor¬ 
ris, who were removed by Collector Phelps. “I 
think it is only right that they should be rein¬ 
stated,” Mr Wise was quoted as saying to a repre¬ 
sentative of the San Francisco Call. 


“Sharp and Evans did not succeed them directly, 
but, as they are new men and on the probation list, 

I can remove them, and thus provide places for 
Underwood and Morris.” 

“Have the conduct and capacity of Messrs. Sharp, 
Evans, and Bunker been satisfactory ?” he was 
asked. 

“Certainly, and nothing can be said against 
them in that respect. As far as I know there has 
never been a complaint against them.” 

When asked if he had received the appraiser’s 
letter commending the probationers, he answered; 

“Yes, I believe there was such a letter received, 
but I did not pay much attention to it. 

“Why did I remove Sampler Bunker? Just be¬ 
cause I had to make a place for W. R. Prouse. Mr. 
Bunker performed his duties all right, but you 
know how it is—I must make places for some of my 
friends.” 

Two other sufferers in like manner, “to make 
room for friends” of the collector, though guiltless 
of any misdoings, were Inspector L. E. Beban and 
Night Inspector T. J. Halpin. 

The attention of the civil service commission was 
called to the cases, and it investigated them. The 
affidavits of the newspaper reporter who had the 
significant interview with the collector, was for¬ 
warded from California and laid before the secre¬ 
tary of the treasury, with the other facts in the 
case. Wise was confronted with the affidavit, and 
admitted that it was substantially the truth. 

Secretary Carlisle has written to the collector or¬ 
dering him to reinstate Sharp, Bunker, Beban, and 
Halpin. The case of Evans is still under advise¬ 
ment.—IFasWnpfon dispatch. New York Evening Post, 
February 9. 

* * * 

A “shake up”—so-called—the first of many yet to 
come, occurred among the clerks in the register’s 
office, treasury department, to-day. The work of 
reorganizing the register’s office is now in progress. 
Reforms will follow in other offices, and a plan mapped 
out by Secretary Carlisle contemplates the saving of 
from $350,000 to $1,00,000 a year in the treasury depart¬ 
ment when all the bureaus and divisions shall be 
trimmed down and all of what is regarded as "dead 
timber" shall be eliminated from the treasury roll.— 
Washington dispatch. New York Times, February IS. 

* <1 * 

The changes made by Secretary Carlisle in as¬ 
sistant chiefs of division in the treasury depart¬ 
ment were officially announced this morning. 
Burton T. Doyle of Tennessee, first controller’s of¬ 
fice, is appointed assistant chief of the warrant di¬ 
vision, vice Charles H. Miller of Massachusetts, re¬ 
duced; Silas L. Lupton of Virginia, first auditor’s 
office, is appointed assistant chief of public moneys 
division, vice Jerome Wise of New York, reduced. 
All the new men appointed are within the classi¬ 
fied service at present, and all those reduced have 
been dropped into fourth-class clerkships at $1,800 
uyetLT.— Washington dispatch. New York Times, Jan¬ 
uary 27. 

* * * 

The remains of John L. Ingraham, of Jefferson 
vllle,the treasury clerk who died suddenly in Rep¬ 
resentative Jason B. Brown’s room at the Riggs 
yesterday afternoon, were shipped to his old home 
this afternoon. There appears to be no doubt that 
the recent changes in the division where he worked 
and fear concerning the stability of his position 
and desire for a promotion and transfer wrought 
his death. He probably died from heart trouble.— 
Washington dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, Janu¬ 
ary 29. 

« « * 

The treasury department is getting another shak¬ 
ing up from Secretary Carlisle and his energetic 
son. Chief Clerk Logan Carlisle, which is causing 
something of the terror that was felt last spring 
when Mr. Sturtevant, the experienced chief of the 
stationery division, was removed. A number of 
assistant chiefs of divisions were disrated a fort¬ 
night ago and clerks from the classified service, 
whose democracy was vouched for by their local 
representatives, were shoved up into their places. 
These changes were recommended In one or two 








116 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


caaes on the ground of the efficiency of the service, 
bat in others politics was apparently the controll¬ 
ing reason. Controller Eckels did not take kindly 
to the idea of having his chiefs of division “fired” 
without his approval. When one of his chiefs, W. 
W. Eldridge, of Maryland, brought him a request 
which he had received from the secretary’s office 
for his resignation, Mr. Eckels was a good deal sur¬ 
prised and somewhat piqued. He had heard noth¬ 
ing of it, and he promply took the paper to Secre¬ 
tary Carlisle and intimated that he would like to 
have some knowledge, if not some voice, when 
changes were to be made in his office. He stated 
that Mr. Eldridge had been promoted under Secre¬ 
tary Fairchild; that be was a competent official 
and that he did not wish him removed. The sec¬ 
retary admitted the force of these representations, 
and Mr. Eldridge will not be disturbed. Secretary 
Carlisle is not much of a fighter, and he probably 
did not care for a round with the young controller. 
There are not many chiefs of bureaus, however, 
who have the courage and Independence of Mr. 
Eckels in such matters, and Mr. Eldridge would 
undoubtedly have had to go If he had been in any 
other bureau. The present management at the 
treasury department is very different from that 
which prevailed under Mr. Fairchild, Mr. Cleve¬ 
land’s former secretary of the treasury. Mr. Fair- 
child recognized nothing but merit in making ap¬ 
pointments and promotions, and several republi¬ 
cans, among them A. T, Huntington, who comes 
from Western Massachusetts, received important 
advancement while he was secretary.—TTas/iinpfon 
dispatch, Springfield Republican, February 16. 

MISCELLANEOUS SPOIL. 

By the appointment of Messrs. O’Donnell and 
Beach to-day as postmasters at Pittsburgh and New 
Haven respectively. President Cleveland has dis¬ 
posed of two cases which have given him consid¬ 
erable trouble. He has repeatedly referred to them as 
the two “hard” cases of his administration. 

There was a fierce contest over the Pittsburgh 
office. The state administration, as well as Mr. 
Harrlty, the chairman of the national democratic 
committee, were favorable to Messrs. Larkin and 
Foley. Congressmen Sipe Indorsed Mr. Howley. 
Mr. O’Donnell was the dark horse in the race. He 
had been an applicant for the office of surveyor of 
customs at Pittsburgh, but had stepped aside for 
another candidate, whose friends subsequently in¬ 
dorsed Mr. O’Donnell. After considering the mat¬ 
ter for several months, the President, finding it 
Impossible to choose between the other three, se¬ 
lected Mr. O’Donnell as the compromise candidate. 

Mr. Beach, who was nominated as postmaster at 
New Haven, was the only candidate for the office. 
He had the indorsement of Congressman Plgott, 
but strong pressure was brought to bear upon the 
President to retain Mr. N. D. Sperry, the republi¬ 
can incumbent. The influences in favor of Mr. Sper¬ 
ry were so great that the President hesitated for two 
months before making the change. 

The first assistant postmaster will be John J. 
Lane, private secretary to Congressman Pigott from 
this district .— Washington dispatch, New York Times, 
March 9. 

<*<*<» 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Maxwell, 
the axman of the post-office department, is threat¬ 
ened with a duel, and, what is worse, with a con. 
gresslonal investigation. The man who is after his 
official and physical scalp is Representative Strait, 
of South Carolina. The congressman claims that 
Mr. Maxwell has not only persistently deceived 
him but actually lied to him in regard to the dis¬ 
tribution of post-offices In the Palmetto state. Mr. 
Strait has, therefore, sent a letter to Mr. Maxwell, 
one paragraph of which reads as follows: 

"You have promised to notify me when you were 
ready to consider the post-office appointments in 
Lancaster county. South Carolina. You have lied 
to me. You are unworthy the notice and respect of 
a gentleman, and you are nothing but a puppy.” 

He was elected to the present congress as an alli¬ 
ance democrat, and is a radical free-trader and free 


silverite, but is welcomed in the deliberations of 
the democratic caucus. Last fall the antl-Tillman- 
Ites of the South Carolina delegation were black¬ 
listed at the post-office department after a long con¬ 
ference between the Tlllmanltes, represented by 
Senator Irby, and their opponents, represented by 
Senator Butler. At this conference, which was 
presided over by Postmaster-General Bissell, there 
was a very lively time, and some of the participants 
came very near having a knock-down argument. 
Mr. Strait is a Tillmanite; so his name has ever 
since been on the black-list, and he has been abso¬ 
lutely Ignored, being unable to name the postmas¬ 
ter even in his own town.—IPasftfngrfon dispatch, In¬ 
dianapolis News, February ZS. 

* * * 

The bitter struggle for the postmastership of 
Plainfield is practically ended. John Hetfield un¬ 
doubtedly will get the place. 

There were a dozen applicants for the post, but 
Congressman Dunn and the democratic senators united 
in favor of Mr. Hetfield, and his name on Saturday 
was sent in to the postmaster-general.—Pfainjicld 
dispatch. New York Times, March 11. 

• * 

There was great excitement on the floor of the 
house this morning by a report that Chairman Wil¬ 
son, of the ways and means committee, who is sick 
in Mexico, had taken a sudden turn for the worse. 
Mr. Wilson’s closest friends here have but little 
hope of his recovery. Mr. Wilson himself, when 
he left for Mexico, intimated to two of his associ¬ 
ates on the committee the belief that he would 
never return alive. The West Virginia congress¬ 
man was very weak physically, and had suc¬ 
cumbed to the continual strain of work on the 
tariff bill and the importunities of the office-seek¬ 
ers. He had more than six hundred applicants for 
office from his district, and being near Washington 
most of them waited upon him in person and pressed 
their claims persistently while he was in the thick¬ 
est of the tariff fight.— Washington dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis News, March 1. 

* 

The vice-president has fared pretty well under 
the present administration as regards the places in 
the public service conferred upon members of his 
family. The latest one to profit is his son, Lewis 
G. Stevenson, who is now private secretary to the 
vice-president, and who was married a little while 
ago. The young man is slated for appointment as 
assistant paymaster in the navy.— Washington dis¬ 
patch, New York Evening Post, March 9. 

<• * <■ 

It would be sad news to Senator Voorhees and In¬ 
diana congressmen to hear that the government 
printing office had been brought under civil serv¬ 
ice regulations. The Senator has as many ap¬ 
pointees in that bureau as any other man in Cong¬ 
ress, with the possible exception of Senator Gorman. 
Even under the Harrison administration the senator’s 
friends were “placed." When every other depart¬ 
ment seemed crowded to the limit with Hoosier 
employes. Senator Voorhees, as a last resort, always 
sent his trusty lieutenant, Faulkner, to the govern¬ 
mentprinting office with “his man,” and he has 
never come away disappointed.—IFasfttn£r<07i dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis News, December Z7. 

• * «i 

The condition of affairs in the government print¬ 
ing office amounts almost to a crisis. Public Printer 
Palmer has no assurances whether or not he will 
continue to serve In that capacity during the re¬ 
mainder of the administration or give way to a 
democrat. This unsettled condition of affairs has 
lasted for several months. Mr. Palmer has dis¬ 
charged none of the old working force of the office put 
in under the Harrison administration, and several 
hundred new employes have been added to the force 
since the new administration came into power, at the 
urgent demand of democratic senators and representa¬ 
tives. .A few weeks ago the public printer found 
that be had a larger force on hand than ever before, 
and that they were idle about half the time. The 
additions to the force continually added to the 
crowded condition of the building, until eight men 
are working in one alley, where formerly only four 


were placed in the arrangement for convenience.— 
Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, March t. 

♦ • * 

Collector Kllbreth yesterday restored the custom 
house cartage contract to Thomas A. Briggs. The 
treasury regulations call for the advertising of bids 
for the contract, which is estimated to be worth 
1100,000 a year. Collector Magone, when he was in 
charge of the custom house, awarded the contract 
to Briggs, who was the lowest bidder. Last sum¬ 
mer Collector Hendricks took the contract away 
from Briggs, and, without advertising for bids, 
awarded It to George B. Deane, Jr., the republican 
leader In the ninth assembly district, who took in 
partnership Bernard J. BIglin, George Hilliard, 
George Wanmaker, all republican district leaders 
in this city, and Le Roy Jacobs of Greene county. 
Yesterday Mr. Kilbreth canceled the contract with 
Deane and restored it to Briggs.—New York Times, 
February 10. 

[Why “restore” to Briggs except upon open com¬ 
petition to the lowest bidder 71 

• • « 

So many changes in the unclassified list of em¬ 
ployes in Collector Kilbreth’s department at the ap¬ 
praiser’s stores have taken place recently that the 
men speak of them as nothing short of a revplutlon 
in the department causing for the present considera¬ 
ble confusion. So many new faces are seen, It Is 
said, that it is hard to tell who are employes of the 
department, even for those who have been there 
for some time. One of Appraiser Bunn’s men the 
other evening saw a man In the stores whom he be¬ 
lieved had no business there, and unceremoniously 
ordered him out. The man returned and proved 
himself a recently appointed watchman. Since 
then unfamiiar faces at the stores are regarded with 
caution. The changes have been made quietly, not 
from any feeling of compunction, for that they were 
made for political reasons is freely admitted. It has 
been done without fuss, in order to keep off a host 
of applicants, otherwise, it is said, the collector’s 
office would have been crowded with at least 600 
applicants for many days. Gen. Williams, when 
seen to day, was very reticent on the subject, but he 
admitted that the radical change described had 
taken place. When asked for what cause, he said: 

“Oh, these changes are simply political; there is no 
other cause. They take place at the beginning of each 
administration. The men understand this perfectly 
well, and there is not much ado when they find them¬ 
selves discharged.—New York Evening Post, January 
20 . 

«• • • 

P. H. Geelan, postmaster at Big Springs, Kansas, 
was shot and killed to-day by Fred Hill. The 
shooting was the result of hard feelings between 
the men, because Geelan had held the post-office 
four years and did not get out and allow a suc¬ 
cessor to be named. Both are prominent in local 
politics. Hill’s weapon was a rifle. The shooting 
occurred in the post-office.—Associated Press Dis¬ 
patch, March 14. 

• « • 

In the appointment of William R. Dawson at Tid- 
ioute. Pa., this administration recognizes again the 
importance of a county chairman. About a year 
ago John M. Slgtried, democratic chairman of War¬ 
ren county, carried off the Warren postmastership 
with its $2,700 salary. It Is the most remunerative 
office in the county. Mr. Sigfried was succeeded as 
chairman by Mr. Dawson, who now rakes In the 
$1,500 postmastership at Tidioute, the second office 
in the county. Mr. Dawson was postmaster under the 
other Cleveland administration and made a good 
record. A savage fight was made against him this 
time, but he won with ease. 

The democrats who have been conspiring to have 
Postmaster Dornfeld at North Tonawanda ousted be¬ 
cause the office has been promoted to the presidential 
class, have run afoul an obstacle. It appears that Mr. 
Dornfeld is a democrat, and was appointed as a dem¬ 
ocrat by the fourth assistant postmaster-general, 
Col. Rathbone, just previous to the incoming of this 
administration.— Washington Dispatch, Buffalo Ex¬ 
press, March IS. 









The civil service chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering’ of tlie 
ship of state.— From Archbishop Ireland's address: The Duty and Value oj Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II , No. 14. INDIANAPOLIS, APRIL, 1894. teems : ^ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. '23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

The index of the Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle through the Harrison administration 
will be sent without charge to all who re¬ 
quest it. 


Mrs. George William Curtis has tend¬ 
ered to the senate the bust of Sumner pre¬ 
sented to her husband by the Common¬ 
wealth of Massachusetts. It almost seems 
as if this were a case of casting pearls* 
What does the senate of the United States 
to day know or care about Charles Sumner 
and his ideas of the duties and dignities of 
the once honored office of senator ? Is it 
not almost an ignominy to place the bust 
of Sumner in the midst of men whose days 
and nights have been given up to patron¬ 
age traffic? Would that the marble bust 
could come to life long enough to speak 
the mind of Sumner on the political low¬ 
ness of the senate; when, for instance, the 
Indiana members sell a pension agency 
for the naming of every clerk but one 
which the agent demands for a relative, 
and their colleagues still meet them as 
honorable men and gentlemen. 

The republicans of this county have 
made their nominations for the various 
lucrative county offices. They are not in¬ 
teresting except that being made in the 
full expectation of election, they indicate 
about what we could expect of the party 
if again in power. Generally speaking, 
the nominees are of the machine ; to a 
man they are thorough spoilsmen, largely 
wheel-horses, apt to be attached to polit¬ 
ical moves which will succeed for the 
time being, and who have done in the past 
a good deal of party machine work, with 
the hope and expectation of its leading 
sooner or later to a good paying office. 
There is nothing very lofty or patriotic 
about this. The people of Indiana for a 
good while have been trying to get rid of 
being taxed outrageously for the purpose 
@f making lucky party machine men rich 
out of county offices. The struggle has 
been a desperate one between the people 
and the holders and seekers of these of¬ 
fices. These nominees will not help along 
that reform, but will do all they can to 


block it. These remarks are pertinent, 
because the republicans here aie saying 
that all who want reform in the county 
offices will vote their ticket. 

The proposed changes we mentioned 
last month in the Indianapolis post-office 
and pension agency are under full head¬ 
way. Men and women are being turned 
out because they are republicans and other 
men and women are being put in because 
they are democrats or relatives, or more 
than all, because they are named by politi¬ 
cal bosses. This travesty upon business 
principles is being carried on side by side 
with the operation of the classified service. 
In that service there is no terror, no in¬ 
humanity and no practice which would 
wreck any private business. That this is 
infinitely better is universally admitted. 
Why, then, does President Cleveland per¬ 
mit the other to go on ? Why does he not 
put the whole pension agency and the 
heads of divisions in this post-office under 
the rules? In this pension agency the sit¬ 
uation shows the degradation of politics. 
Mr. Spencer, the pension agent, is a mem¬ 
ber of the Indiana Civil Service Reform 
Association ; yet, to get this office, on his 
own admission, he promised every one of 
the twenty eight places in it to Senators 
Voorhees and Turpie, except one place re¬ 
served for his sister, and which she has 
received. Voorhees and Turpie sold him 
the office and he sold them the places; 
President Cleveland ratified the contract, 
and it is now being carried out. If the 
President’s apologists say that he knew 
nothing of the contract, and then the facts 
are brought to his notice by the Indiana 
association, and he refuses to remove 
Spencer, will they still deny his ratifica¬ 
tion of the contract? 

The New York Times, of April 14th, says 
that a month ago the President notified 
Senator Gorman and the rest of the Mary¬ 
land delegation to submit a “slate” of 
Maryland appointments,“intimating, how¬ 
ever, that he reserves two places for him 
self—the postmaster at Baltimore, and the 
district attorney.” The “slate” has been 
submitted and the President has made the 
nominations, and in doing so, he has per¬ 
petuated the power of a man who for years 
has deprived the State of Maryland of free 
government. 


The Indianapolis Sentinel, of April 16th, 
has a valuable dispatch from Washington 
concerning Gorman. The latter is appar¬ 
ently engaged in holding up the nomina¬ 
tion of public printer until patronage 
terms are made. There are 2,000 em¬ 
ployes in the printing office, and they are 
not in the classified service. Eight years 
ago Gorman was on the committee of pub¬ 
lic printing and secured so many appoint¬ 
ments in the printing office that the Balti¬ 
more and Ohio Railroad ran a special train 
from Baltimore to Washington every 
morning, and back every night, to carry 
Gorman office-holders to and from their 
work. With those office-holders he com¬ 
pletely throttled every attempt to throw 
off his machine. When the senate com¬ 
mittees were reorganized under this ad¬ 
ministration, Gorman could have had his 
pick, but he chose the committee on 
printing, having an eye to the 2,000 places. 
His reasons are well set forth in the Sen¬ 
tinel dispatch: 

In Baltimore there is a strong reform element in 
the democratic party opposed to Gorman, which 
has repeatedly failed to crush out the Maryland 
boss for want of organization. With the entire 
democratic press of Baltimore, and the profes¬ 
sional and business element against him, Gorman 
always carries the primaries of that city, notwith¬ 
standing. This he accomplishes through the ward 
politicians, who are well organized under the con¬ 
trol of trusted leaders. A machine politician can 
not succeed unless he is loyal to his henchmen, 
and Gorman never forgets the men who fight for 
him at the primaries, and Gorman men are seen by 
the hundreds at the navy yard, in the printing of¬ 
fice, on the Capitol police, and other public works of 
this city. Gorman does not barter his patronage 
on the “statesmen” of his state. The appointment 
of a Maryland man to a diplomatic or consular po¬ 
sition is of no benefit to Gorman. The appoint¬ 
ment of a ward-worker, or a township boss to a 
place on the capitol police, or an active Baltimore 
printer to a job in the printing office, will bring 
greater returns to Gorman when he has a fight on 
hand at the primaries, than the appointment of a 
dozen foreign ministers. When the primary day is 
at hand, the printers, carpenters, blacksmiths, 
whom he fixes with jobs at Washington, go home 
and pull of their coats and whoop it up for their 
boss at the primaries. That is practical politics. 

But what about President Cleveland ? 
He knows Gorman, and he knows that he 
is, and has been for years, at the head of a 
machine in which the efforts of thugs, 
murderers and scoundrels have been in¬ 
dispensable. Why does Mr. Cleveland 
have anything to do with such a man? 

A CORRESPONDENT Writes: 

I sincerely regret the attitude of the present ad¬ 
ministration toward the reform. But I find it dlffi- 



























118 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


cult to believe that Mr. Cleveland Is guilty of direct 
vote-buying by selling offices. It seems to me you 
should not depart from your usual practice of be¬ 
ing specific.'' Give ’names, dates, offices, etc., be¬ 
fore imputing so much evil to one we feel i8"in 
sympathy with our cause. 

We were never present, and'never ex¬ 
pect to be present, at the making"of such 
bargains. We did not hear the bargain 
by which Wanamaker raised money for 
Quay, and received the postmaster-general¬ 
ship, but we know that he got the ofl&ce be¬ 
cause he raised the money. We were not 
present when any bargain was made that 
McKane should count the vote of Graves¬ 
end for Harrison, and name the United 
States marshal, but we know that he was al¬ 
lowed to name the marshal for that service. 
We can not give names, dates and offices 
where Platt has made deals with Tam¬ 
many, but we know that such deals have 
been carried out for years. We heard no 
bargain by which Van Alen was to give 
$30,000 to the campaign fund, and recei-ve 
the Italian mission, but we know he was 
named for the mission because he made 
the contribution. We were not present 
when votes upon the silver question were 
traded for patronage, but such votes were 
given. Nor| did we hear patronage bar¬ 
gained for votes for Peckham, but patron¬ 
age was used to secure such votes. Bar¬ 
gains in such matters are never made. 
Direct purchase and sale never occurs. 
But if any man can say that Mr. Cleveland 
has not used the patronage to influence 
congressmen’s votes he is blind to the 
facts. It has been universally asserted. 
Voorhees has said that the President has 
been so kind to him in patronage that he 
could not refuse him anything. Quincy 
has openly boasted of the value and power 
of patronage in securing legislation. Sen¬ 
ator Lodge gave as one of his reasons for 
voting against Peckham the shameless use 
of patronage to purchase votes for him. 
Not one of these and other facts is pre¬ 
tended to be denied. 


Since the statement, was published,'of 
which the Chronicle gave the figures last 
month, showing that,the changes in post- 
offices aggregate^ more than they did in 
the same time under Harrison, we have 
been looking for the per cent, calculator, 
who, in (Mr. Cleveland’s first administra¬ 
tion, so gravely figured out apologies amid 
the wrecks of the civil service which 
strewed the country, and he has come. A 
writer, from Washington to the New York 
Evening Post, March 28, takes account of the 
whole number of post-offices existing at 
the respective times and , makes out that 
in the.presidential offices during the first 
year and nineteen.days, the changes under 
Wanamaker were 17 per cent, and under 
Bissell 11 per .cent. In the fourth-class 
post-offices during the first year the changes 


were 37 per cent, under Wanamaker and 
34 per cent, under Bissell. The writer also 
repeats the following Cleveland saw; 

To anybody who wishes to see things as they are 
and not distort them for purposes of misrepresenta¬ 
tion, it will be plain enough that the spirit’of civil 
service reform has made distinct progress, even if 
it has not gone as far as some of its promoters 
would have been'glad to see it go. 

We shall never be able to comprehend 
what satisfaction arises from such figuring 
and reasoning. In the opportunity to break 
up the loot of the fourth-class post-offices 
Mr. Bissell had one of the greatest which 
come to the hand of a statesman. He has 
completely missed it. His attempt to es¬ 
tablish a four-year tenure isjnot a blessing 
but a curse, for it extends the scope of.the 
pernicious four-year tenure act of 1820. 
Whether he goes a little slower or a little 
faster does not alter the facts. The fourth- 
class post-offices are being looted by con¬ 
gressmen and that is all there is of it. 

Since the above wasTwritten, Mr. Ever¬ 
ett P. Wheeler has, in the New York Times 
of April 16th, a blanket apology for the ad¬ 
ministration. Any one who knew Mr. 
Wheeler knew that this would come 
sooner or later. It is, perhaps, sufficient 
to say that he adopts Quincy’s notion that 
consulships and other offices will be looted 
until the looters, that is the congressmen, 
pass a law forbidding it. Meanwhile, the 
President, with absolute authority vested 
in him by the constitution, is helpless. 
Mr. Wheeler does not notice such little 
circumstances as the snubbing of the re¬ 
form democratic’elementin Indiana which 
securedjCleveland’s nomination at Chi¬ 
cago, while, the Voorhees-distillery crowd 
revel in?spoil. Nor does the undisputed 
fact}that the administration tried to buy 
votes with patronage for Peckham seem 
to have made any impression upon Mr. 
Wheeler. As chairman of the executive 
committee of the New York Civil Service 
Reform Association, Mr. Wheeler sat for 
years and let Tammany tweak the nose of 
the civil service law, and his view of the 
matter was that you could not believe all 
you heard. 


A senate committee after a long in¬ 
vestigation introduced a bill to improve 
the organization and methods of the 
treasury department. The second con¬ 
troller happens to be one Joe Nicholl, once 
a not very successful lawyer of Indianap¬ 
olis, a government clerk during the first 
Cleveland administration, a brother-in-law 
of Sergeant-at-Arms Bright, and a nephew 
of the late Joseph E. McDonald, being one 
of the relatives that the latter so freely 
quartered upon the people. The new bill 
proposes to abolish Nicholl’s office, and the 
Washington dispatches all say that for that 
reason Voorhees and Turpie and every 


democratic congressman, including Hol¬ 
man, are opposing} the. bill with all their 
might, and are 'confident of defeating it. 
In this}they are entirely true to their po¬ 
litical nature. That nature is to strike the 
lowest political level that can possibly be 
found; and to keep Joe}Nicholl in “a good 
soft berth,” quickens their energies to an 
alacrity in which they’delight. Their no¬ 
tion of statesmanship is to work and keep 
henchmen in place at whatever cost, and 
without any regard for the public service; 
to work the pension system for all it is 
worth, without any regard to merit or to 
the principles upon which pensions should 
be granted; and to load up the treasury 
with cheap dollars, without any regard to 
or knowledge of financial principles, ut¬ 
terly reckless of the effect upon the busi¬ 
ness of the country—and utterly oblivious 
of the fact that variation, or danger of vari¬ 
ation in the standard of value, is the most 
successful paralyzer [of business the be¬ 
fogged wit of man ever invented. 


The young men of the Christian En¬ 
deavor Societies in .Kansas City and the 
“department of good citizenship” in the 
Indianapolis Christian Endeavor Union 
are stated to be engaged “ actively, though 
quietly and unobtrusively,” in the effort to 
promote the interests of good government. 
They are urged “ to'attend the primaries 
and to see to it, personally, that only clean, 
pure men are nominated.” The machine 
has always been very much in earnest in 
pointing out the primary as the proper 
field for the reformer to work in. Mc¬ 
Kane, Murphy, Hill, Platt, Croker, Divver 
Gorman, Quay, and all the other big and 
little bosses are disinterested and emphatic 
in this opinion that the primary is the 
spot where the good citizen has the chance 
to down the bad citizen, and for thirty 
years their gullible victims have been bun¬ 
coed again and again. It does not seem as 
if it required a very clever man to see that 
men whose living is assured by public 
taxation, with time and some offices to 
give and contracts to control, and with 
with an increasing skill with increasing 
experience can “steer,” neatly and success¬ 
fully, the young men of the Christian En¬ 
deavor Union so that they really assist, by 
their respectability, to hide the operations 
of a selfish, unscrupulous party machine. 

No man has any duty to meet the boss 
and the machine in the primary. He 
stands no show and he will accomplish 
nothing. Learn from the enemy to do the 
one thing that always starts him to profane 
and ribald denunciation—be an independ¬ 
ent, uncertain voter. 

iNjhis closing address to the law class at 
the Leland Stanford University, ex-Presi- 
dent Harrison advised the members to 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


119 


“ keep out of politics.” Probably he had 
in mind the politics with which he has al¬ 
ways been familiar—machine politics,Slick 
Six politics, politics which extends from 
very small deals and trades to the distri¬ 
bution of offices by the hundred thousand 
among political buccaneers. If this was 
in mind the advice was well timed. In 
not defining his meaning, Mr.^Harrison 
indicated his own limitations. Any col¬ 
lege man who does not propose to take an 
active and incessant part in such matters 
as municipal reform and in breaking up 
the spoils system generally, in maintaining 
a sound currency and in the minor, but ever 
present question of taxation, has not been 
well educated, and is not a good citizen. 
Every man should take a part in politics; 
he should give time to it, make sacrifices 
for it, and no important election or politi¬ 
cal movement should take place without 
his giving his best efibrts to the side that 
makes for freeing government in every re¬ 
lation and locality from the parasites 
which prey upon it. 

Mr. McAneny, assistant secretary, says in 
his monthly report: 

That the work of enrolling members in the anti¬ 
spoils league is progressing with an encouraging 
degree of success. The league numbers 8,229 voters. 
The signatures represent 871 localities, distributed 
through forty-seven states and territories. In sixty 
cities, in which there are at present no active civil 
service reform associations, the signers form a 
body numerous enough to warrant urging the or¬ 
ganization of such associations at once in atli na¬ 
tion with the national league. 


BOSS GOVERNMENT. 

Its Dependence Upon Spoil; Its Wide 
Ramifications ; Its Impregnable Position 
Having Spoil to Give—Every Phase of 
which is Illustrated in New York. 

This issue of the Chronicle devotes con¬ 
siderable space to an attempt to show how 
New York is now governed. A corrupt trad¬ 
ing machine, manned by Platt for the state of 
New York and called the republican party, 
and democratic Tammany, entrenched in its 
largest city of over two millions, and formid¬ 
able democratic machines elsewhere, like Mc¬ 
Laughlin’s in Brooklyn and Murphy’s in 
Troy, make conditions favorable for the mani¬ 
festation of every phase of the boss system. It 
is worth while to study the conditions in New 
York and the biographies of the two notorious 
bosses, Divver and Murphy, given elsewhere^ 
because it all makes plain what a good many 
people are apt to forget—that the essential 
features of boss government are the same in 
New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Graves¬ 
end, Indiana and Podunk. If our machine 
does not murder and maim as do Gorman’s 
and Murphy’s; does not blackmail and flaunt 
its manifold power openly and on a great 
scale as does Boss Croker’s, and does not bully 
when nullifying the franchise as did Mc- 
Kane’s, we get to thinking that the home ma¬ 
chine is different and harmless. It may be 


more galling to be ruled by a machine domi¬ 
nated by a single boss than by a machine run 
by an oligarchy, but there is no difference in 
methods. Tammany in New York and the 
Slick Six in Indianapolis got their power by 
the use of spoil and by spoil maintained their 
power. All boss or machine government is 
spoils government. The two are never found 
separated. And whether accomplished by 
Tammany methods or Gorman methods or 
Quay methods or Podunk methods there is al¬ 
ways a throttling of the natural workings of 
a democratic government; always the use and 
manipulation of the tough and law-breaking 
elements of the community, and always the 
smothering by brutality or by guile of the 
disinterested and patriotic leadership of both 
parties. The state and city of New York seem 
to lie helpless under the heel of a boss sys¬ 
tem developed as variously and wonderfully 
as it is possible to conceive. 

The chief cause of this helplessness is Mr. 
Platt’s republican machine. It is responsible 
for the continued supremacy of Tammany. It 
might have been ended again and again had 
it not had secret republican aid. 

“Many people fancy, because Gov. Hill carried 
New York when President Cleveland was defeated, 
that a plurality of the voters in the state would 
support him again, but in that contest, as the people 
here well know, i/iil succeeded only because he was 
able to sell a presidency for a governorship.—New 
York Tribune, February U, 1S90. 

Last autumn Mr. Platt had no intention of 
winning a republican victory, but the astutest 
of bosses occasionally miscalculates the depth 
of a popular uprising. The New York legis- 
islature became heavily republican, and de¬ 
cent citizens took courage. It could not fail 
to investigate the Tammany government of 
New York city root and branch. There is 
now a “Plati” investigation on after weeks of 
mysterious delays and moves, and rumors of 
trades and dickers regarding this investiga¬ 
tion, and after the conduct of it had been de¬ 
clined by a number of lawyers of distinction. 
Wheeler H. Peckham gives the reason : 

“This time they can’t find a lawyer. What’s the 
reason? I know, for myself, it is because they 
wouldn’t give me the power, without which I 
wouldn’t act, and because they wouldn’t allow me 
to direct the prosecution whither I wished.’’ 

The speaker of the house goes weekly to 
Platt for instructions and every intelligent 
man who is not a partisan knows that Plait’s 
will IS the legislature’s will. Platt is inves¬ 
tigating Tammany’s police department just 
far enough to get two of his men on the com¬ 
mission instead of Crooker having all four. 

A reform bill introduced into the legislature 
gave power to the next mayor to remove the 
heads of departments and to appoint their suc¬ 
cessors, making all their terms expire with 
that of the mayor. This bill has just been 
defeated by the aid of Platt republican votes. 
It hit Tammany but Platt wants Tammany 
and relief comes from his men. If a reform 
mayor like Schieren, of Brooklyn, should be 
elected next year, he would have to work with 
every head of department a Tammany selec¬ 
tion ; Mike Daly as commissioner of public 


works, Scannell in the fire department and so 
on. What could he do? 

Republican Hamilton Fish reports favor¬ 
ably bills increasing Tammany salaries; and 
he wears to-day some diamond shirt studs, the 
gift of Tammany. Says Owens, nominated 
by a Platt machine and elected last autumn 
to the legislature : 

“I am a republican on general principles, but 
there is a $7,500 mortgage on my house, and I think 
I ought to do all I can this winter to pay it oft. 
Isn’t that all right? ’’ 

With every paper of standing in New York 
clamoring for favorable action on various 
bills in the interest of good government and 
for the benefit of New York City, the New 
York Tribune in alliance with Platt, had only 
a few perfunctory words for such bills as 

The rapid-transit bill of the chamber of Com¬ 
merce. 

The bill to put the sheriff on a salary and give all 
the fees of his office to the city. 

The bill giving the next mayor power to remove 
all heads of departments. 

The New York Post says ; 

Clear as is the trace of Tammany power in all 
these cases, it comes out most plainly in the treat¬ 
ment of the chamber of commerce’s rapid transit 
bill. That is a measure upon which the best and 
most intelligent elements of the city are agreed as 
furnishing the wisest solution of the problem. 
Yet, when Mr. Hewitt went to Albany yesterday to 
advocate it, he discovered that there had been 
“sneaked” through the assembly a bill which gave 
the elevated railway company a complete monop¬ 
oly for elevated structures on all the streets of the 
city below the Harlem river, and gave Tammany 
the very reasonable prospect of being able to con¬ 
struct with city money and operate as a city work 
an underground road which it could construct and 
operate in its own way. At the very time Mr. Hew¬ 
itt was denouncing this astounding measure. Sena¬ 
tor Lexow, Platt’s spokesman and investigator, was 
doing his utmost to force it through the senate and 
get it to the governor before its true character 
could be exposed. If any additional proof was 
needed of a Platt-Tammany “combine,” this per¬ 
formance of Senator Lexow would furnish it. He 
was opposing a Tammany investigation and advo¬ 
cating a huge Tammany job in almost the same 
breath. 

* * * Putting aside all party considerations, 
too, one would say that the legislature of a Chris¬ 
tian people would not adjourn leaving “Paddy” 
Divver and “Barney” Martin on the bench admin¬ 
istering justice to the poor, and leaving “Jimmy” 
Martin in charge of its police force, and Croker 
levying blackmail on its taxpayers. 

And yet, in spite of all this, Platt’s grip on 
the party machine is secure, and he will be 
able to hold in line, as he has before, those ex¬ 
cellent bigots who are always fooled by the 
party boss and are always used as the respect¬ 
able wall behind which Tammany robs and 
and blackmails and Platt trades for a poor 
measure of spoil. 

It is physically impossible, in the space of 
this paper to give any adequate illustration of 
the infinite ways the boss or spoils system is 
working in New York. 

McKane’s shortage is something like $200,- 
000. He had used the public funds to pay 
Sutherland, his justice of the peace, over 
$10,000 for the year 1893, and for constables 
and justices for the town of Gravesend, with 
8,000 inhabitants, for 1892 and 1893, $66,568. 
According to the sworn confessions of elec- 









120 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


tion inspectors McKane and his chief lieuten¬ 
ant stuffed 1,000 bogus ballots in the boxes at 
the close of the voting in the presidential 
election of 1892. In 1888 there was no pre¬ 
tense of a canvass of the votes. At least 
1,000 bogus ballots were stuffed into the boxes 
after the polls were closed, and the totals 
were set down according to figures furnished 
by McKane, and based on the exigencies of 
the occasion. As an instance of the extortion 
practiced by this land pirate, after he had 
established his artificial ice plant on Coney 
Island, a license fee of $200 was put on every 
wagon peddling natural ice. This squeeze 
drove out all competitors. 

After tremendous effort and expense Mc¬ 
Kane and Sutherland were convicted. Six¬ 
teen election inspectors, including McKane’s 
school-teacher, plead guilty and have been sen¬ 
tenced. His police justice, Sutherland, is a 
fugitive, and another, Newton, is serving a 
nine months’ sentence. 

In New York thirty nine men for frauds 
in Tammany’s attempt to make its man May¬ 
nard a supreme court judge, either plead 
guilty, or were convicted upon trial or ran 
away forfeiting their bail. All these were 
Tammany democrats, except six Tammany 
republicans. For these Tammany worked as 
for her own braves. The district of Police 
Justice Divver furnished eighteen of these 
thirty-nine criminals. 

These are surface indications of the extent 
of the crimes that have been going on against 
the franchise. McKane, as a boss, has been 
crushed, some of his tools have been punished, 
and other tools of other bosses in New York 
likewise; but all the elements are still left to 
make new bosses, and to do the same work 
again. So long as spoil is left to be divided 
among henchmen, so long will another set of 
bosses build another machine. 


In other fields Tammany is equally busy 
and equally infamous. Mr. Peckham says : 

Tammany Hall takes the place of the lobby. At 
its head is a man who handles a large amount of 
money yearly and is accountable to no one. He 
says whether a bill shall pass or not. They are 
all afraid of Tammany. Many corporations pay 
large amounts for peace, as they put it. The Met¬ 
ropolitan Telephone Company pays, I understand, 
$.50,000 a year for peace. I know of one corpora¬ 
tion which pays a similar amount. I tell you that 
every day of their lives these Tammany men are 
bribed and bribe others. Of course there is some¬ 
times a cry of investigation. 

As we have tried to show above, a republi¬ 
can machine is always ready to call off an at¬ 
tack for compensation in spoil. 

A year ago Police Justice Andy White re¬ 
signed his position and became a dock commis¬ 
sioner. He quit an $8,000 place for a $5,000 
one. It was queried at the time in all of the Tam¬ 
many dives, “Has Andy lost his grip?” Andy 
and Tammany had lost no grip. His advent 
made the board a unanimous Tammany body. 
The enormous work of this board had been 
done by contract, after advertised competition. 
After Andy’s accession construction began to 
be done by days’ work. One pier, for instance. 


built upon Andy’s system, cost just $12,000 
more than such piers had cost by the previous 
contract system. The board now has the pro¬ 
posed building of a water front which they 
place at a cost of between $6,000,000 to $7,000,- 
000. Experts place the cost at fully $20,000,- 
000 and property owners put the cost at $50,- 
000,000. Last year Comptroller Myers blocked 
this undertaking until he could examine the 
plans and thereupon Tammany refused him a 
renomination. 

Last winter $1,000,000 was appropriated in 
park improvements to aid the unemployed of 
New York. Thereupon Tammany employed 
a labor expert at $5,000 a year who rode 
around in a carriage to inspect and to hire 
Tammany heelers; yet few were employed. 
Thousands of men came day after day for the 
promised work, but Tammany had other 
plans. It is keeping the .$1,000,000 to expend 
just before the next election. 

Some of the rich men of New York desired 
to get through the legislature a bill to incor¬ 
porate a provident loan association, which is 
a pawn shop for the benefit of the poor, and 
an entirely charitable undertaking; but the 
bill did not get on. Mayor Gilroy passed 
from enthusiasm to coolnes.s. Tammany Sul- 
zer said it was “a bad bill.” It is stated that 
the regular pawn shops sent down to the leg¬ 
islature $30,000. Unless the protests of the 
press make Tammany democrats and republi¬ 
cans feel uncomfortably notorious, the poor 
of New York will continue to pay 36 per cent, 
to the regular pawn shop. 

Mr. Paul Dana has just had to resign from 
the park board because his associates refused 
to be bound by the law. Mr. Gray had to 
leave the fire department board because of the 
scandals in the purchase of supplies which he 
was powerless to avert. Dr. Parkhurst says a 
man told him that he dared not contribute 
openly to Dr. Parkhurst’s fund because his 
new building would have an additional as¬ 
sessment of $200,000 put upon it. When Boss 
Croker recently returned to New York, after 
his sixty-day trip across the continent in a 
magnificent private car, republican Chauncey 
M. Depew ordered that it be drawn over the 
New York Central railroad free of charge. 

Harper’s Weekly of April 7 shows the finan¬ 
cial side of the boss or spoils rule in Brook¬ 
lyn. Two-thirds of all moneys professedly ex¬ 
pended for city purposes really have gone to 
the machine and its henchmen. They got the 
Long Island Water Supply Company’s proper¬ 
ty for $175,000 and Mayor Chapin prepared 
to take it off their hands for $1,750,000. In 
this case there was an indomitable good citi¬ 
zen who fought this deal and the supreme 
court sustained him. Again the machine got 
the refusal from the owners of a public dump- 
ing-ground, started a clamor to buy a park 
for the poor and then through a dummy sold 
two thirds to the park commissioner for twice 
as much as they had paid for the whole. Again, 
three years ago, a South Brooklyn politician 
was about to be turned out of his house for 


non-payment of rent. Six months ago he 
boasted he was worth $300,000. Between these 
times he was a power in the board of aider- 
men. He held them together through a trol¬ 
ley deal and the franchise extension and the 
park purchases. 

“At present he Is a senator, with a big fur collar 
on his coat, and a roll of money so large that when 
he goes in a friend’s saloon he throws down a $100 
bill, cocks his stump of cigar up as he pulls his 
mouth into an expression of infinite disdain, and 
says: 

“‘Jim, ask de blokes what dey’ll have, and keep 
de change.’ 

“Swaggering and rolling his shoulders, he walks 
the streets, looking with wall-eyed haughtiness on 
his admiring fellow-men, who whisper as he passes 
along: 

“‘Dat’s de man what bled de railroad for two 
hundred t’ousand cool plunks. Ain’t he nervy ?’ 

“‘Someofdem aldermen only got two t’ousand 
out of it. Dis mau hung on to de bag. Ain’t he a 
daisy ’?’ ’’ 

The holding up of the Kings County Ele¬ 
vated Eailway by the politicians was as open 
as any stage robbery on western plains, fn 
spite of the protest of the press they bound 
this railway hand and foot and built their 
own line before the court of appeals could 
come to the rescue. Years after electric light 
companies were ready to illuminate Brooklyn 
they were not allowed franchises because they 
would not come to terms. 

“At last Pope, Sewall & Co., two enterprising 
young men, ran wires over the house-tops to serve 
their customers in the business districts. Their 
wires were constantly cut and their men arrested, 
till they let in one of the political chiefs, who got 
in other political chiefs, and kicked out Pope and 
Sewall. Then, by means of the city government, 
they gave themselves large contracts at high fig¬ 
ures, and stole their factory water from the city by 
a secret connection. They then made the closest 
kind of monopoly of the electric lighting, and 
prospered exceedingly until the last election.” 

The other day Judge Martine sentenced a 
policeman who had arrested a saloon-keeper 
for no other reason than a refusal to give the 
policeman free drinks. Says the account: 

Before sentencing the prisoner. Judge Martine 
publicly told Mr. House, the policeman’s counsel, 
that he refused to be dictated to by those who be¬ 
lieved themselves in power. The strongest pres¬ 
sure, said the judge, had been brought to bear on 
him, from very high politicians, hut he refused to 
he influenced by any such men in his judicial find¬ 
ings. Not a day had passed since the case was call¬ 
ed, continued Judge Martine, without his being 
approached from some source concerning the fate 
of the guilty policeman. 


The state has spent on the unfinished capi- 
tol at Albany, in thirty years, $20,673,499. 
The capitol commissioner in 1892, said the 
building would be completed for a little over 
$2,000,000. In 1894, he said it would take 
$3,000,000 more to finish it. The Buffalo Ex¬ 
press says: 

There are now 1,600 men employed on the 
construction of the capitol. They are appoint¬ 
ed by Commissioner Perry on the recommen¬ 
dation of the state officers, political commit¬ 
tees and members of the legislature. Not a 
man gets a job unless he has the backing of some 
politician. The work has become simply a public 
trough at which the Albany spoilsmen can feed 
their clamorous supporters. John E. Milholland 



















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


121 


went to Albany the other day to try to get patron¬ 
age on the Capitol for his new machine in New 
York. Milholland did not meet with good success, 
because, just at present, Tammany controls most 
of the appointments and has none to spare for its 
republican assistants. William Barnes, Jr., ac¬ 
cording to the New York Herald, confesses to having 
84 men at the trough, but is kicking because he 
ought to have 400. Milholland says that Speaker 
Malby has been able to get but eight on the pay¬ 
roll. As he is ex-officio, a capitol commissioner, he 
is naturally looked upon by the gang ^s no good. 
Perhaps he is too honest to be a successful spoils- 
grabber In competition with the experts who have 
fed so long on this rich garbage. Sulzer, the mi¬ 
nority leader, is more successful. He as 90 men. 


Elsewhere is a sketch of Murphy, a great 
boss and a United States senator. March 5 
the Troy dispatch to the New York Times 
stated that the political prestige of the boss 
was trembling in the balance; that the signs 
were that the election on the morrow would 
result in his defeat; that the citizens were in 
open revolt at his bossism. From Albany, on 
the same date to the same paper, was the dis¬ 
patch that Governor Flower refused to sign 
the bill to provide for non-partisan boards of 
inspectors for Troy, on the ground that it was 
imperfectly drawn; that a delegation of sev¬ 
enteen clergymen called upon him and begged 
him to sign the bill; that Murphy, recogniz¬ 
ing the tremendous uprising, was at home 
leading his forces in person; that the gang of 
toughs who followed the lead of the senator 
realized that they must make a desperate fight. 
What happened the next day is well known. 
Robert Ross, a reputable unarmed citizen, 
was wantonly murdered by one of a gang of 
repeaters. Troy was aroused and a committee 
of safety organized. With Murphyism con¬ 
trolling the mayor, the police department and 
the prosecuting oflBcers, the people’s committee 
have to contend. Governor Flower insisted 
that the attorney-general of the state should 
appoint as his deputy the assistant district at¬ 
torney of Rensselaer county, and the attorney- 
general declined to take charge of the case 
under those conditions. A memorial to the 
governor said, “The forces that now disgrace 
and enthrall this city can not be dislodged ex¬ 
cept by persistent, honest and fearless attack. 
That attack can not be made by a prosecuting 
ofiice which is itself a partof the corrupt system 
to be attacked.” Governor Flower declined to 
meet the one hundred distinguished citizens of 
Troy who went to Albany to protest against 
leaving the conduct of the prosecution within 
the circle of Murphyism. 


The last point is the enforcement of the 
civil service law in the state and in the cities. 
An appeal for an investigation has just been 
made to the legislature to investigate the vio¬ 
lations and breaking down of the law by the 
governor. In New York City and Brooklyn 
the machine has found the law no impedi¬ 
ment. 

In conclusion, the reasons for this awful con 
dition are vast spoil, and a republican machine 
intrenched in the state and democratic ma¬ 
chines intrenched in various cities, both 


ready to fight to the death any good citizen or 
any measure that puts this spoil in peril. In 
such a condition is it not worse than folly, is 
it not a crime, to be a party man in NewYork ? 


A GREAT BOSS—MURPHY, UNITED 
STATES SENATOR. 

Who la Edward Murphy? 

If it be a warm, comfortable afternoon, and busi¬ 
ness for the day has been attended to, it is more 
than likely that a short, thick-set, good-natured, 
genial-looking man with a white mustache, neatly 
dressed, will be leaning against the door-way of 8 
Third Street. Possibly one or two congenial com¬ 
panions will be with him. 

If the afternoon is hot, he may be up stairs, in 
the little building which is on the lot mentioned. 
The elderly gentleman has blue eyes and soft white 
hands. He wears a diamond in his scarf. Appa¬ 
rently he is a gentleman of leisure, a good liver, 
temperate, and a pleasant man to meet. He has a 
genial way about him; his smile is soothing. He 
shakes hands warmly, and is glad to see the visitor. 

If J|he visitor’s business has been something that 
requires a confidential talk thekindold gentleman 
has probably taken him up stairs into a little club- 
room which is comfortably furnished, has some 
easy chairs, a poker table or two, and some racing 
pictures for its most noticeable pieces of furniture. 

This is the headquarters of the little coterie 
which admires the old gentleman, and in whose so¬ 
ciety he spends much of his time evenings and 
pleasant afternoons when he is in the city. He does 
not look like a “boss.” He is intelligent, but will 
not enter into any profound discussion of law, 
metaphysics, poetry, art, or any of the finer topics of 
conversation. His discourse will be limited chiefly 
to political places, stocks, and horse trotting. If 
the visitor tells him that Corbett has knocked 
Mitchell out he will probably ask “where did he 
land on him?” 

If he were asked for his views on the tariff ques¬ 
tion, he would probably smile and say that he did 
not care to express any opinions just at present. 

If, in company with him, a stroll down the street 
be taken past one or two prominent saloons, the 
keeper sitting in the doorway will nod to the rosy 
old gentleman and say “Hello, Ed,” and Ed will 
reply, “Hello, Jim.” 

This will be the exchange of greeting between 
Jim Dwyer, poolroom keeper, and Edward Alurphy, 
Jr., United States senator from the state of New 
York. 

Edward Murphy is fifty-seven years old. He was 
born of parents who came from Ireland, and he has 
lived in Troy all his life. His father was a brewer 
on a small scale and made some money. Edward 
attended the public schools, and for a time was at 
the Catholic Institution at Fordham. He was not 
a brilliant scholar according to report, and had no 
tastes for professional life. 

His early associates, some of whom are now alive, 
had not been good. He had more money to spend 
when he was a boy than the others, and it pleased 
his vanity to become something of a leader because 
of this fact. Some of those associates became 
afterward notorious sports. Murphy trained with 
them long enough to have acquired some of their 
tastes. When he was a young man, or even a boy, 
chicken fighting in Troy was a common pastime 
among the rougher element. When a crowd of the 
boys wanted a good chicken fight they appealed to 
Murphy, and he bought the chickens. He liked to 
see the fun. 

Mr. Murphy was interested for a time in a place 
called the “Nonpareil,” near the corner of Fulton 
street and Fifth avenue. Tradition says there was 
a cockpit in the place, and the sports used to 
gather there from time to time whenever good 
game birds could be secured. This place was 
burned in 1862. 

Mr. Murphy’s power in Troy is due to three or 
four prominent reasons. He has business Interests 
which would make any man powerful. He has 


been in politics, holding public offices, which he 
has used for his own advantage, long enough to 
have entrenched himself among that class of people 
which makes itself felt on election day, and he con¬ 
trols absolutely the so called “ Murphy machine.” 

He has associated with him in business enough re¬ 
publicans to secure a considerable influence from that 
party. When he was an alderman, he learned how 
the business of making or killing ordinances was 
done. He learned that franchises could be granted 
by the city councils. Later, he wanted some fran¬ 
chises of his own, and the city council was such 
that it was easy for him to get them. He is one of 
the large stockholders in the Troy City Railway 
Company. Some capitalists who knew how to make 
money in handling corporations took Mr. Murphy 
as a partner, and secured control of this corporation. 
The council which Mr. Murphy owned granted 
franchises on application, and the company now 
has the right to own and operate railways on almost 
every available street in the city, for which it paid 
not one red cent. 

Some years ago, Daniel E. Conway became presi¬ 
dent of a company, which, if it had secured fran¬ 
chises, would have been a rival company. Mr. Con¬ 
way’s company offered the city $40,000 for a franchise 
to lay tracks and run cars through certain streets. 
Mr. Conway is a political opponent of Mr. Murphy. 
The city council refused to grant the franchise. 
Mr. Murphy controlled the city council. 

Mr. Murphy is the president of the Troy City Gas 
Company. He has taken a few republicans into that 
company, and they naturally knowing how he controls 
the municipal business of the city, are enrolled among 
what is generally known as the "Murphy Republicans.” 
One of the stockholders in the street railway com¬ 
pany, who is also a director, is Ex-Mayor William 
Kemp, who is a leader in the republican party. For 
business considerations, many of his followers are 
not hostile to Murphy Mr. Murphy is president of 
the gas company and he has made considerable 
money by the manner in which the stock of this 
corporation has been handled. He is also a stock¬ 
holder in the Electric Light Company and has 
made more money out of this. 

Mr. Murphy’s name has also been connected with 
the Huckleberry Road, and he is supposed to have 
made a comfortable amount of money from stocks 
in this corporation. 

But the great and irresistible element in his potver 
in Troy to-day is a machine which perpetuates itself, 
is absolutely within his control, and itself controls an 
army of ruffians, dive keepers, repeaters, cheap gam¬ 
blers, saloon keepers, loafers and all manner of men 
who have no scruples to do any political trick, who 
have low ideas of morality, and will obey orders if 
they are paid for it. The machinery of law, which 
in ordinary circumslances would be expected to mete 
out Just deserts to some of the army of the law breakers 
which infest the city on election day, is so absolutely 
controlled, directly or indirectly, by this Murphy ma¬ 
chine, that decent men have almost decided that justice 
is impossible. 

* * * 

Edward Murphy has lived in the city of Troy all 
his life, and for the last twenty-five years has been 
actively engaged in politics. 

At first he was an Alderman, after that he was a 
police commissioner, then he was mayor, after¬ 
wards he was chairman of the state democratic 
committee. On numerous occasions he had been a 
delegate to national conventions. He has attended 
every state convention. * * <• 

Isaac McConihe was the really big “boss” at that 
time, and Murphy was his pupil. McConihe was 
not only the “boss” of Rensselaer county, but fig¬ 
ured in that capacity in state politics. He was 
chairman of the state committee. Innocently, as it 
is said, with probable truth, he became involved in 
business transactions with Tweed, and when the 
big “boss” of Tammany was overthrown and con¬ 
victed, McConihe was forced out of that position. 

That was Murphy’s opportunity. As a member of 
the local police commission he secured absolute 
control of the police force of Troy. At about the 
same time he entered the brewing business, and 
soon built a prosperous trade. It has always been 








122 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


iilleged that his political influence helped make a 
market for his beer. He soon became the leading 
political figure in his town. He went across the 
river to Alt>any and began to take a hand in secur¬ 
ing legislation from the state which would intrench 
him in his position in his own county. If any of¬ 
fice-holder was obiwxious to him he would procure a 
charter amendment to legislate that man out of office. 

Mr. Murphy had become the accepted ‘-boss” of 
Rensselaer county in 1874, when Mr. Tilden was 
nominated for governor. He had extended his ac¬ 
quaintance to politicians all over the state. His 
pleasing address, a certain personal magnetism, and 
the fact that many unscrupulous and daring men 
in Troy looked to him as a leader and would obey 
his orders, made him useful to men who were at 
that time powerful throughout the state. Mr. Mur¬ 
phy was then well known as a sporting character. 
John Morrisey, whose early home was in Troy, was 
one of his chums, and he and Mr. Murphy trained 
together, attending sporting events and gaining ac¬ 
quaintance with sporting men with persistent 
regularity. * * * 

Hostility to Mr. Cleveland was the bond which 
cemented more firmly than ever Mr. Murphy to Mr. 
Hill. They had been associates before. Their 
stylesof politics were one. Hlllknewthathecould 
use Murphy to his own advantage, and, as soon as 
Hill adopted his policy of antagonizing Mr. Cleve¬ 
land, he made Mr. Murphy his first lieutenant and 
chief adviser. They began a systematic “ peanut” 
policy of driving out of public places all the men 
whom Mr. Cleveland had appointed, each of whom 
had been originally selected with a view to his 
efficiency as well as to his position in the democ¬ 
ratic party. James Shanahan, a friend of Mr. Cleve¬ 
land, was forced to resign as superintendent of public 
works. This was brought about because the superinten¬ 
dent would not allow Mr. Murphy to dictate certain 
appointments on the ChampU^n Canal. When this 
change was made, the great patronage office of the 
state, that of superintendent of public works, 
passed into the hands of one of Mr. Murphy’s sup¬ 
porters, Mr. Edward Hannan. He had lived In 
Troy in one of the toughest wards. He had been 
associated with the young loafers with whom Mr. 
Murphy had spent his boyhood. 

From that time Mr. Murphy and Mr. Hill used the 
immense patronage of the canal against Mr. Cleve¬ 
land in building up their state machine. Anybody 
who wanted an office or work did not go to Albany 
to apply to Mr. Hannan, but to Troy to apply to Ed¬ 
ward Murphy. * ■> * 

While Mr. Murphy was thus the head of the state 
organization, and his distribution of patronage had 
fixed it so that it could not be shake7i, he fixed his atten. 
Hon upon the state legislature for a season. Richard 
Croker, of New York was a friend of Mr. Murphy. 
It used to be said that Murphy would manage the 
legislature, while Mr. Croker would control New 
York City. 

Up to the time that he set his hands on a legisla¬ 
ture,individualshad made up his machine. When 
he had grasped the state lawmakers, the corpora¬ 
tions were added to his list. They could be made 
very valuable in campaigns and in every part of the 
state. Railroads, gas companies, electric companies, 
insurance companies, and whoever else depended for 
prosperity or existence on the nature of the laws that 
were made, were thus under the dictation of the man 
whom David B. Hill had set up in Troy. Great 
campaign funds can be raised when corporations 
are forced to contribute. 

When once a favorable relationship between the 
corporations and Mr. Murphy had been established, 
Mr. Murphy was enabled to make money for him. 
self. In perfectly legitimate ways he began ex¬ 
tensive and successful operations in business. 

During the last few years he has grown rich. He 
is a millionaire, and more, too. He practically 
owns the greatest corporations in Troy. If he does 
not own them, he is the dominating influence in 
their management. He has been allowed to come 
in ” on the ground floor ” in extensive operations. 

It would be a mistake to infer that such a man 
had confined his attention entirely to state legisla¬ 


tion. He has acquired a great influence in many 
of the cities of this state. He has great influence 
with Richard Croker in New York City. Mr. Mur¬ 
phy has been interested with Mr. Croker in enter¬ 
prises of large importance, and their political con¬ 
nection has been as close as must necessarily be 
that of any two men who stand at the head of New 
York City and the New York state democratic or¬ 
ganization. They have been so successful that they 
have bought a farm near Richfield Springs, stocked 
it and are joint partners in it and a racing stable. 

Since Mr. Murphy became a United States sena¬ 
tor he has in no wise changed his former style of 
life or his political habits. Although a representa¬ 
tive of the state of New York in a seat which has 
been held by Evarts, Conkllng, Hamilton Fish and 
other distinguished men, he still attends to the 
ward politics of Troy. He dictates the nominations 
of the local candidates, he scans the list of election 
inspectors, and looks after the movements of the 
police in the tough wards of his city. Neglecting 
all thoughts of the tariff and other questions on 
which he is expected to vote as a representative of 
the state, he found It more congenial to spend the 
lew days before election in consultation with the 
men who manipulate the squads of repeaters and 
adjust the election machinery so that whajpver 
may be the vote cast, the count will show that the 
machine he has built up is still intact. 

His political headquarters when in Troy are di¬ 
vided. Much of the work is done from his brewery 
office on Ferry street. Some of it is outlined in the 
saloons on Third street, where Mr. Murphy finds 
congenial companions. 

The Murphy machine is still rolling on, but its 
wheels are red—red with the blood of men. 

Slowly it has been built, but surely. Decent men, 
honest politicians, have not been able to withstand it. 

It is held together by the "■cohesive force of public 
plunder." It dictates the nomination of city officers— 
after consulting with Mr. Murphy. Nearly every one 
of its members holds an office which Mr. Murphy gave 
him. 

This machine is composed of a general committee 
of two from each ward in the city. There are thir¬ 
teen wards. The committee selects the inspectors 
for the primaries just before election. Those in¬ 
spectors are men who will do as the committee or¬ 
ders them to do or they will not be selected. 

There are three inspectors from each ward. It 
has been the experience in Troy for a number of 
years that the Inspectors thus appointed declared 
the Murphy candidates at the primaries to be the 
successful candidates, without much regard for the 
number of votes which may have been cast for any 
other candidate. The result is that very few people 
go to the caucuses. It is a useless proceeding, they 
think. The primaries are held, the inspectors ap¬ 
pointed meet, go through the formality of receiv¬ 
ing a few votes, and declare who are the candidates. 
The whole thing has come to be a farce In most of 
the wards. When a member of the general com¬ 
mittee has about completed his term an election is 
held for a successor. The general committee ap¬ 
points the men to pass on the qualification of voters 
and to count the votes. The result, in most cases, 
is a perpetuation of the committee. It practically 
reappoints itself. 

An analysis of this committee, with names, his¬ 
tory and occupation, will prove interesting to 
people who live in some other city than Troy, and 
may, perhaps, think that the Murphy “ machine ” 
is simply political talk. 

In the first ward the members of the committee 
are William Donohue and William N. Keenan. Mr. 
Donohue is a police magistrate. He held that office 
ten years ago. Samuel Morris and others preferred 
charges against him, which he did not see fit to 
face, and he resigned. Later, Mr. Murphy reap¬ 
pointed him. Mr. Keenan, the other inember from the 
first ward, is one of Mr. Murphy’s bookkeepers. 

In the second ward, the members of the general 
committee are William Dunphy and James W. 
Dwyer. Mr. Dunphy is an engineer in the Osgood 
Steamer Company. He is a brother of Police Cap¬ 
tain Dunphy. James W. Dwyer keeps a poolroom in 
which gambling is openly conducted. 


In the third ward committeemen are Charles R. 

De Freest and John F. Ahern. Mr. De Freest is the 
well-known secretary of the democratic state com¬ 
mittee, formerly clerk of the assembly. He now 
has a post with the slate railroad commission, which 
Mr. Murphy secured for him. John F. Ahern keeps 
a saloon in Third street. A faro “ lay-out ” is above 
it on the second floor, and as long as Mr. Ahern 
obeys Mr. Murphy, the Murphy police do not inter¬ 
fere. 

In thefourth ward the committeemen are William 
Holmes and Andrew J. Forrest. Mr. Holmes is the 
business partner of Mr. Ahren in the saloon in Third 
street. Andrew J. Forrest holds a position in the dis¬ 
trict attorney's office, secured by Murphy influence. 

In the fifth ward, John J. McCormick and Thomas 
McCabe are the members of the committee. Mc¬ 
Cormick is city clerk, by grace of the Murphy infiuence 
and bookkeeper in Mr. Murphy’s brewery. Mr, Mc¬ 
Cabe is in the fire department, and foreman of the 
Farham Steamer Company. 

In the sixth ward John Kinney and William Fal¬ 
lon are the committeemen. Mr. Kinney is an em¬ 
ploye at the court house through the Murphy infiuence. 
William Fallon keeps a saloon in that delectable part 
of Troy known as ‘‘ the Patch." The police kindly 
allow Mr. Fallon to conduct business without any 
interference. 

The seventh ward presents a peculiar and in¬ 
structive situation. It is peculiar because it is the 
only ward in Troy which is anti-Murphy. It is In¬ 
structive because it illustrates the fact that as soon a 
man breaks from Murphy, if he holds a public office 
he will lose it. The two committeemen are George 
E. Sands and John Allen. Formerly they marched 
under the Murphy banner. Mr. Sands was then 
clerk of a court. He broke from Mr. Murphy. He 
is not clerk of a court now. John Allen was in a 
department at Albany in the state house. He re¬ 
volted against the Murphy domination. He was 
removed from his office. 

In the eight ward, Kyron V. Cleary and John 
Devery are the committeemen. Mr. Cleary is Mr. 
Murphy’s eotisin. He also holds a position in the office 
of the state controller at Albany. John Devery holds 
no office. He is anti-Murphy, and supported Whelan 
in the recent contest. 

In the ninth ward William H. Donahue is the 
only member of the committee, his associate hav¬ 
ing died recently. Mr. Donahue is a brother of 
Clerk Donahue of the police board, an ofifice kindly 
given to him by the Murphy influence. 

The members of the committee from the tenth 
ward are “Dan” Carney and “Jerry” Denny. Mr. 
Carney is engineer of the Eddy Steamer Company. 
He has the reputation of being one of the most suc¬ 
cessful and skillful dog-fighters in Troy. Senator 
Murphy used to enjoy seeing a dog-fight himself 
years ago, before Mr. Hill thought of taking him to 
Washington as his associate. “Jerry” Denny of 
the tenth ward is a fireman of the Eddy Steamer 
Company. 

In the eleventh ward, William Martin and John 
J. Kenna are the members of the committee. Mr. 
Martin is janitor at the city hall, and Mr. Kenna has 
an office in Mr. Hannan’s office, the superintendent of 
public works. Both of these offices were bestowed 
by the Murphy influence. 

In the twelfth ward Patrick Byron and Charles 
Burke are the members of the committee. Mr. 
Burke is a carpenter by trade, and inspector of the 
state dairy department by reason of the Murphy in¬ 
fluence. Mr. Byron is chief engineer in the fire de¬ 
partment, because the Murphy influence appoint¬ 
ed him. 

In the thirteenth ward Martin Kane and Patrick 
Lewis are the members of the general committee. 
Mr. Kane is a policeman, appointed through the 
Murphy influence. 

This constitutes the framework of the Murphy 
machine. Mr. Murphy is chief engineer of this 
machine. It grinds out the sort of grist which he 
directs. He attends to it almost as closely now that 
he is a member of the United Stales senate, as he 
did when he was simply a Troy brewer. 

The committee meets usually at 8 Third street, 
upstairs, over Dwyer’s poolroom. Dwyer is a mem- 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


123 


ber of the committee, it will be remembered. His 
“place” is five doors from the resort of Senator 
Murphy when he is down town of an evening. 
This is at 18 Third street, over Breeze’s.— From Ihe 
New York Times. 

A LESSER BOSS—DIVVER, POLICE 
JUSTICE. 

“ Piitrick Divver, commonly called ‘Paddy,’ 
is the Tammany leader in the second assem¬ 
bly district. He is the keeper of sailors’ 
boarding-house and is the proprietor, or has 
interests, in several liquor saloons. He is an 
ex-member of the board of aldermen, a race¬ 
track frequenter and the friend and confidant 
of gamblers. He is on terms of intimacy with 
‘Johnny’ Matthews and ‘Jake’ Shipsey, two 
members of the sporting and gambling frater¬ 
nity, whose particular methods of gaining a 
livelihood are unknown to the frequenters of 
Paddy Divver’s and other rum-shops on Park 
Row, where they are generally to be found.” 
—^'Tammany Biographies,” April, 1890. 

A few months later a Tammany mayor was 
able to get a judge of a court of record, a pres¬ 
ident of the board of education, and two lead¬ 
ing merchants to say that Divver was in “every 
way qualified ” for the police justice bench. 

“Gentlemen of the committee, I hope you 
will do your best at this election. They have 
been attacking our standard bearer, Judge 
Isaac H. Maynard [Hooroo ! Woop ! Bully 
for Maynard!], the most uprightest judge 
that ever lived. This is the banner district of 
Tammany Hall [Hcoray ! Three cheers for 
Judge Divver!], and no other district must 
get ahead of the old second. We must win 
tljis banner again. [We will ! We will !] As 
the leader of this district, I will give the captain of 
the election district that polls the most votes for the 
democratic ticket a $1,500 place. He can take the 
place himself or give it to one of his friends. [Most 
enthusiastic cheering.] To the captain of the 
district that polls the second largest number 
of votes I will give a gold watch and chain, 
and to the third largest I will give this silk 
banner.”— Woild. 

Patrick Divver’s friends and lieutenants are 
among the most disreputable men in the city 
of New York. His political power is built 
upon crime and law-breaking. Here are the 
men upon whom he chiefly depends for his 
power and success; here are the men with 
whom he associates, who are constantly seen 
in the club-house of the Divver association, 
the headquarters of the Tammany hall com¬ 
mittee of the district: 

“Los” Curtis.— Notorious fourth ward dive- 
keeper, ready man with a gun, political heeler and 
supposed to be an office-holder of the class not re¬ 
quired to enter their names on the city roll. Curtis 
formerly kept his dive in the basement at the cor¬ 
ner of north William street and Park Row. He also 
kept a dive at No.;6 James street, which Police Cap¬ 
tain Slevin, of the Oak street station, overlooked in 
May last when he raided the dives at Nos. 2 and 4 
James street. Curtis was on the list to be raided, 
but, it is said, was saved through the influence of 
Divver. Curtis is Divver’s most valuable man on 
election day, as he is afraid of no law. It was he 
who helped young Jimmy Divver poll 608 votes out 
of C20 cast in young Divver’s election district. But 


that was not all he did that day for the “cause,” he 
helped other captains in the same way. Curtis has 
been Involved in many shooting “scrapes.” In the 
election of 1884, when Divver was defeated by 
“Fatty” Walsh in his race for alderman. Curtis 
shot at a man for voting against Divver, but he was 
too drunk to have agood aim. He has been arrested 
many times, but always manages to escape. 

“Mickey” C. Paddon —Former proprietor of a 
shady resort. He is a district captain for Divver 
and was never known to flinch. It was this gentle 
man who held, two years ago, the honorable position 
of librarian of the city hall. It was a standing joke 
that “Mickey” could not read a single book in his 
charge. He is now In the street-cleaning depart¬ 
ment, and holds an $1,800 position as district super¬ 
intendent. It is a very agreeable position, as all it 
requires is to drive around the district for a few 
hours dally. He is a member of the Divver Asso¬ 
ciation and of Divver’s committee on organization. 

Mike Lally— Who hasn’t heard of him ? He was 
appointed a policeman on the Brooklyn bridge 
through the influence of Divver, about four years 
ago. He left his post on the bridge one night, and, 
going to a saloon in Front street, of which he was 
himself the owner, ordered his bartender to dance 
a jig. Although his request was complied with, 
Lally drew a pistol and shot him. In spite of the 
publicity given the affair Lally remained on the 
force. Subsequently Lally, while drunk, kicked 
Roundsman Brophy in the abdomen, and, while 
under suspension on this charge, entered a Water- 
street dive and shot Michael Delati, a bartender,in 
the breast, inflicting a wound which for a long 
time it was thought would prove fatal. As a result 
of Divver’s omnipotent pull Lally was discharged 
in police court. The World then took up the case 
and the grand jury promptly indicted Lally, who 
fled before the indictment could be served. When 
he returned, two years later, every witness was 
conveniently absent from the city. The indict- 
mentstill hangs over him. Lally was also involved 
in numerous other assaults. On one oceasion he 
brutally knocked down and kicked, while pros¬ 
trate, an elderly and respectable resident of Brook¬ 
lyn for asking a question, and on another occasion 
insulted and beat a young woman. Last summer 
Divver got John Y. McKane to employ the ex-po¬ 
liceman as a detective at Coney Island. Prior to 
that he worked under Tammany Hall Contrac¬ 
tor Dailey. Two weeks ago the remarkable fact 
became public in court that Divver had the ef¬ 
frontery to make Lally one of his assistant district 
captains. Lally was arrested for defying the 
election laws, and on his plea of guilty escaped 
with a fine of $250 before Judge Barrett. He is, of 
course, a nightly visitor at the Divver Association, 
and it is generally understood that his name is on 
the city pay-roll under the classification of “ la¬ 
borer.” 

Alfred O. Neilson— Notorious fourth ward dive- 
keeper, twice convicted of keeping a disorderly 
house. He kept a resort at No. 94 Cherry Street. 
On July 21, last, he was tried in the court of special 
sessions, and was sentenced to the penitentiary 
for three months. Several months before that he 
had been fined $50 for the same offense’. He did 
not go to prison, however, succeeding in the usual 
mysterious way in getting out on ball, pending an 
appeal. For a third time he was arrested three 
weeks ago for keeping a disorderly house in the 
twenty-second precinct, but he escaped on the ex¬ 
traordinary plea that he was “ a respectable citi¬ 
zen.” 

Ed. Flynn— Member of the Tammany Hall Gen¬ 
eral Committee and of the Divver Association, and 
reputed owner of a shop at Pell street and the Bow¬ 
ery, a place frequented by the most degraded of 
the women who frequent Chinatown. He has been 
repeatedly arrested for violation of the excise law, 
and once for felonious assault. 

Tom H. Connelly— Under indictment for assault 
on Policeman James E. Dougherty, of the Elizabeth 
street station. Thejpollceman hadlordered Connel¬ 
ly to remove the ice from the sidewalk in front of 
his residence at No. 40 City Hall place, several 
months ago, and for reply Connelly felled him to 


the ground and stamped on him. Connelly is a 
member of the Tammany Hall general committee 
and of the Divver .Association. 

Henry Lawson— Ex-divekeeper and proprietor 
of the den known as “The Lighthouse,” at No. 103 
Cherry street. Lawson had been a persistent vio¬ 
lator for years. He was recently closed through 
the efforts of Dr. Parkhurst. Election worker for 
Divver. 

Patrick Foster— Ex-keeper of the Tombs, handy 
man with a pistol and district captain for Divver. 
Several years ago he created a panic on a pleasure- 
boat by discharging his revolver at a boatload of 
passengers, wounding two of them. The steamer 
was heading for Brooklyn at the time, and Foster 
was taken to the Raymond street jail. He was 
balled, and bis case never came to trial. Member 
of the Tammany Hall general committee and Div¬ 
ver Association. Foster was captain of the eigh¬ 
teenth election district. Vote, Maynard, 267 ; 
Bartlette, 0. Buckley was convicted from this dis¬ 
trict. 

John Bieregel— Keeper of a thieves’ resort at 
No. 73 New Chambers street. His place was closed 
several weeks ago through Dr. Parkhurst. When 
the case came up before the excise board the po¬ 
lice of the Oak street station said that it was one 
of the worst resorts in the precinct. One of Div¬ 
ver’s assistants on election day. 

Henry Redding— Divekeeper at No. 342 Water 
street. He was arrested in May last through the 
exposures made in the newspapers, was promptly 
bailed in court, and went right back and oi>ened 
up his place again. 

Vincenzo De Vito— Padrone and fraudulent ob- 
tainer of naturalization papers. Exposed by The 
World. Member of the Tammany Hall general 
committee and of the Divver Association. 

“Fatty” Walsh— Ex-alderman, ex-warden of the 
Tombs, and lieutenant for P. Divver. Holds a 
$2,100 position as dock master in the dock depart¬ 
ment. Career too well known to require more 
specific mention. Member of the Tammany Hall 
general committee and of the Divver Association. 

Jeremiah J. Cronin— A faithful, very faithful 
worker on election day. Member of general com¬ 
mittee and Divver Association. Captain of the 
nineteenth election district for Divver. Registra¬ 
tion, 271. Vote, Maynard, 271; Bartlett, 0. In¬ 
spectors James J. Dooley and Michael Fay sen¬ 
tenced to State prison for five years each from this 
district, and Edward S. O’Donnell, said to be a rel¬ 
ative of Divver; fled to Canada, forfeiting $2,600 
ball. Cronin was considered to have won the 
second prize offered by Divver. 

Robert M. Dore— Inspector of excise, salary 
$1,200; district captain for Divver in spite of his 
office; member of committee on organization and 
Divver Association; formerly frequenter of the 
dive known as “Blsmarek Hall,” on Park Row. 

Peter Peterson— Divekeeper at No. 110 Cherry 
street. His plaee was closed by Dr. Parkhurst two 
months ago. A good “quiet” worker. Is impatient 
at being counselled to lie low for the present, and 
not re-open up. 

James Grother —Ex-divekeeper at No, 340 Water 
street, a vile place where no law is known. The 
dive was raided In May last, because of exposure 
*n the newspapers, but quietly opened the follow¬ 
ing day. Recently closed for good by Dr. Park¬ 
hurst. 

Frank Tiernan— Divekeeper at No. 346 Water 
street. Was arrested and his place closed in May 
last, but opened again. Finally closed by Dr. Park¬ 
hurst. Marches at the front of the Divver “chow¬ 
der” parades. 

Frederick Wilson —Divekeeper at No. 344 Water 
street. Recently closed up by Dr. Parkhust. A 
heavy contributor. 

Harry Larsen— Keeper of the dives at Nos. 88 
and 97 Cherry street. Closed by Dr. Parkhurst. 
Wears the biggest diamond iu the Divver club. 

Jacob Harland— Divekeeper at No. IIOJ^ Cher¬ 
ry street. Closed by Dr. Parkhurst. Would like to 
be an alderman. 

Charles J. Auffarth— Election worker for Div¬ 
ver, and is a clerk in the license bureau attached 














124 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


to the mayor’s office at a salary of $1,HX); was cap¬ 
tain of the twenty-second election district. Regis¬ 
tration, 363. Vote, Maynard, 3G2; Bartlett, 1, Auf- 
farth was considered to have won the first prize. 
Member of general committee and Divver Associa¬ 
tion. 

Michael A. ScuDi— Recently arrested for keep¬ 
ing a disorderly house in the back of his saloon at 
No. 195 Worth street. Member of the Tammany 
Hall general committee and the Divver Associa¬ 
tion. 

Louie Franz— Dive-keeper at No. 953^ Cherry 
street. Election worker for Divver. 

Dennis J. Buckley—S erving a sentence of one 
year in the penitentiary for election frauds com¬ 
mitted in the hope of winning one of the prizes 
Divver offered. Member of the Divver associa¬ 
tion. 

Thos. F. Humphreys— In Canada. Had to skip 
out because he was indicted for election frauds, 
member of the Divver Association. He said before 
he went away that he would never go to prison, 
and threatened to turn state’s evidence. 

James J. Dooley— In Sing Sing for five years. 
He tried to win one of Divver’s prizes. Member of 
the Divver Association. 

Meyer Marks— In Canada. Prize, fraud, indict¬ 
ment, flight. Member of Divver Association. Said 
to be a cousin or nephew of Divver. 

Edward S. O’Donnell— In Canada. Tried to 
win a Divver prize. Sorry that he ever joined the 
Divver Association. 

James Collins— In Canada. Ditto, ditto, ditto, 
ditto. Also member P. D. A. 

Patrick J. Maroney— Indicted for election 
frauds and fined $500. Member of Divver Associa¬ 
tion. 

Will J. Giles— Indicted for election frauds and 
fined $500. Member of the fatal association. He is 
on the eligible list for appointment on police force. 

Phil Hargraves— Indicted for election frauds; 
fine $500. Member same organization. 

Joseph Anderson —Indicted for election frauds, 
but fined only $250. Member P. D. A. 

Edward J. Coppers— District captain, member 
of the general committee and the Divver Associa¬ 
tion. Holds the position of excise inspector, salary 
$1,200. He was paid nearly $6,000 for plumbing 
work by the department of public works in 1892. 
When Deputy Comptroller Storrs caught sight of the 
case he objected strongly and Coppers turned the 
business over to his son, Edwin, who does plumb¬ 
ing for the city at the old stand, at No. 483 Pearl 
street, while the father continues to hold the in¬ 
spectorship. Edwin is also a member of the gen¬ 
eral committee. The excise inspector spends much 
of his time around the plumbing shop. 

Mike Callahan— Former bouncer at Koster & 
Blal’s, and owner of a low resort at No. 12 Chatham 
square, was nominated for assembly by Divver de¬ 
spite the protest of decent citizens of the district. 
Divver promised to withdraw Callahan in case of 
his own nomination for sheriff, but when it was 
refused him he said he would run Callahan if it 
meant his own political deathblow. Salary as as¬ 
semblyman, $1,500. 

John O’Brien—P olitical heeler and member of 
the Divver Association, holds the position of city 
marshal. Salary, $2,000. 

James Divver— Sonof Patrick Divver,was arresetd 
in November,1892,by United States marshals for giv¬ 
ing, as was alleged, Charles Harris 50 cents to reg¬ 
ister under the name of Patrick Ryan in the forty- 
eighth election district of the second assembly dis¬ 
trict. The indictment charged that young Divver 
employed Harris, or Ryan, to register at fifteen dif¬ 
ferent polling places, and that he paid the man 50 
cents every time he registered. When the case was 
called for trial before Judge Benedict, March 14, 
1893, Harris had a defective memory and the case 
was dismissed. Much to the surprise of every one 
in court Divver walked over to where Harris was 
confined and handed hin a $10 bill. Divver is a 
clerk in the second district civil court. Salary, $3,- 
000 . 

Harry Wilson— Keeper of a dive of the lowest 
type at No. 357 Water street. October 27,1891, Joseph 


Farley, one of Wilson’s workers, was arrested for 
false registration on complaint of Thomas F. Har¬ 
rington, a republican watcher, and was taken be¬ 
fore Divver, who occupied the bench in the Tombs 
police court. Wilson testified for Farley and the 
case was dismissed. Wilson is a Divver heeler. 

Here is a list of Divver’s office-holders, all of 
whom contested for the prizes, but were lucky 
enough not to be caught. These men are members 
of the general committee and of the Divver Associ¬ 
ation, and mingle with the divekeepers in the 
club-rooms in Madison street. They are: 

James W. Ledwitii, warden at the Jefferson Mar¬ 
ket Prison; salary, $2,000. 

William, alias “Kid,” Gallagher, subpana 
server in the district attorney’s office; salary> 
$ 1 , 200 . 

Thomas P. Dinneen, clerk at the Yorkville police 
court; salary, $ 2 , 000 . 

Francis J. O’Connor, clerk at the Yorkville 
police court; salary, $2,000. 

Michel Parker, recording clerk in the surro¬ 
gate’s office; salary, $1,200. 

Patrick Wolfe, clerk in the bureau of the 
water purveyor; salary, $1,500. 

Constantine Donohue, inspector in the water 
surveyor’s office; salary, $3..50 a day. 

Thomas J. Sheehan, messenger in the commis¬ 
sioner of jurors’ office; salary, $1,000. 

Daniel Sullivan, janitor of the county court¬ 
house ; salary, $1,000. 

Edward F. S.mith, examiner in the register’s of¬ 
fice; salary, $1,500. 

John Powers, keeper in Ludlow Street Jail; sal¬ 
ary, $1,000. 

Timothy J. Donohue, transcript docket clerk, 
county clerk’s office; salary, $1,200. 

John Davis, janitor of hall of records; salary 
$900. 

Michael Herlihy, foreman of stables in street 
cleaning department; salary, $900. 

Daniel J. McChrystal, foreman of stables, street 
cleaning department; salary, $900. 

Bartholomew McGowan, disinfector attached 
to sanitary bureau; salary, $1,000. 

Michael D. Downey, keeper in Tombs prison; 
salary, $900. 

William Flynn, keeper in Tomlis prison; salary 
$900. 

Edward H. Din an. Inspector of buildings; sal¬ 
ary, $1,200. 

Timothy F. Payne, messenger, building depart¬ 
ment; salary, $900. 

James McCollough, janitor of the second dis. 
trict civil court; salary, $900. 

Matthew Gaughan, machinist, to supervise ele¬ 
vators, department of buildings; salary, $1,200. 

James Langan, night watchman, registrar’s of¬ 
fice; salary, $1,200. 

Henry Driscoll, general copy clerk, registrar’s 
office; salary,$1,000. 

Francis J. Grimes, certificate clerk, registrar’s 
office; salary, $1,000. 

Lawrence Langan, messenger, bureau for the 
collection of assessments and arrears of taxes; sal¬ 
ary, $1,150. 

James Quinlan, keeper in the penitentiary; sal¬ 
ary, $900. 

Roger T. Harrison, steam engineer, park de¬ 
partment; $3 a day. 

Samuel Wolf, deputy sheriff; salary, $2,500. 

James Divver, son of Judge Divver, clerk in .sec¬ 
ond district civil court; salary, $3,000. 

Michael J. Deery, comparing clerk in the coun¬ 
ty clerk’s office; salary, $1,400. 

Michael F. Burke, redemption clerk in the fi¬ 
nance department; salary, $1,300. 

Richard M’Loughlin, court attendant general 
sessions; salary, $1,000. 

Frederick Strauss, court attendant, city court; 
salary, $1,000. 

Philip Furlong, court attendant, supreme court; 
salary, $1,000. 

James R. Kiernan, clerk of the chamber of rec¬ 
ords, supreme court; salary, $1,200. 

John J. O’Connell, messenger,surrogate’s office; 
salary, $900. 


Tho.mas Crowley, assistant enrollment clerk, 
commissioner of jurors office; salary, $960. 

Joseph Fitzgerald, inspector of meters, water 
register’s department; salary, $3 a day. 

Thomas E. Holland, measurer, water register’s 
department; salary, $1,000. 

Thomas Gilmartin, measurer, water register’s 
department; salary, $1,000. 

Patrick Keane, measurer, water register’s de¬ 
partment; salary, $1,000. 

Edward Collins, park policeman; salary, $900. 

John T. Norton, dairy inspector; salary, $1,200. 

John T. Martin, court attendant; salary, $1,000. 

What do the citizens of New York think of Pat¬ 
rick Divver, his district and his friends?—Nw York 
World, Aprils. 

SPOIL AT LARGE. 


Tower was appointed postmaster at Bloomfield in 
J&nweiTy, having been indorsed by Senator Smith and 
Congressman Cornish. Many Bloomfield democrats 
had no sooner heard of the appointment than they 
began to protest. They said that Tower was not the 
popular choice, but rather the selection of Robect 
Rudd, a New York lawyer. Mr. Rudd controls a 
large faction of the local party. It was said that 
Tower owed money to two of the men who became 
his bondsmen, and secured their signatures by 
promising to pay his bills if he should secure the 
appointment. It was determined to keep Tower 
out of his office if poBsihle.—Bloomfield dispatch. 

New York Times, March 1. 

« * * 

Wilmington, N. C., is the largest city in this 
state, and the post-office there is the best paying 
one in North Carolina. Capt. W. P. Oldham, a 
prominent citizen of that city, was the leading ap¬ 
plicant for the postmastership, and it was gener¬ 
ally supposed that he would be successful, until a 
few days ago another man, a Mr. Morton, was ap¬ 
pointed. The reason of Capt. Oldham's defeat has 
now come to light. It seems that Oldham, in a 
letter to Senator Ransom, used the following lan¬ 
guage: 

The custodian of post-office building is made by 
the treasury department. If you will have this 
duty added to the postmaster, I will be under many 
obligations to you, and will be willing to share the 
pay of the office with you. I do not know what it 
pays, but I think it is about $1,000 per year. The 
building has three departments, court-room of 
United States district court, post-office and observ¬ 
atory, all government property. The supervision 
of this building properly belongs to the postmaster, 
but it does not necessarily follow that he is always 
appointed custodian. It adds but little extra to his 
duties as postmaster, and the pay is good. 

Senator I{a7isom naturalhj rei^arded this as an at¬ 
tempt to bribe him, and saw proper to lay the corres¬ 
pondence before the postmaster-general, and the other 
man was soo7i appointed.—Raleigh dispatch. New 
York Eve7ii7ig Post, December SO. 


CORRESPONDENCE. 

“ I find that a year ago at this time I sent $5 
for your paper, and I am very sorry, indeed, 
that I must limit my contribution this year 
to $2. This does not mean that my apprecia¬ 
tion of the value of your work has lessened, 
nor that other interests have crowded it out, 
but simply that it is impossible for me to do 
more. 

Thank you very much for your clear state¬ 
ment of Mr. Bradford’s mistake in the Febru¬ 
ary issue. * * * His letter only makes 

the matter worse, as it repeats in cold blood 
what might possibly have passed for an acci. 
dental expression drawn from him by the ex¬ 
citement of the speaking. If Gamaliel Brad¬ 
ford can not see the absolute wickedness of the 
executive purchasing legislation by the bribe 
of office, how almost hopeless seems the mis¬ 
sion of the civil service reformer. 

Your paper ought to have thousands, where 
now it has dollars. I wish you good cheer.” 









The civil service chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering of the 
ship of state.— From Archbishop Ireland's address: The Duly and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II, No. 15. INDIANAPOLIS, MAY, 1894. terms : ^ 


Published monthly. Publication offlc5, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


Dr. Charles E. Ferguson, superinten¬ 
dent of the city hospital, has at last been har¬ 
ried into resigning, or rather, perhaps, re¬ 
signed because he discovered that he was 
about to be removed. Professionally com¬ 
petent, possessed of business and executive 
ability of a high order, strictly impartial 
and in every way honorable, he was a 
model public ofl&cer. When the present 
city administration came in, in answer to 
the universal demand, it was announced 
that Dr. Ferguson would be left to serve out 
his term; but immediately a series of petty 
annoyances and higgling vexations were 
begun against him, such as disallowing 
bills for planting a few trees to shade a 
sunny ward, and other minor expenditures 
of a similar nature, all of which were 
after all paid. At last the “pins” seem to 
have been set, so that Dr. Ferguson was to 
be turned out solely to make room for a 
republican. The mayor could have pre¬ 
vented this if he had desired to do so, and 
he is the one to hold responsible for it. 
The fact that he was compelled, by some 
malicious and vicious appointees of his, to 
permit this dishonest use of the public 
service, will not be taken as an excuse. 


The new republican council at Ander 
son, in this state, immediately put in a re¬ 
publican superintendent of the electric 
light plant, republican lamp trimmers, and 
a republican city engineer, displacing the 
men who were in those positions. Yet we 
suppose Anderson would be surprised and 
grieved to know that this method puts 
her on a level with Morocco which trans¬ 
acts business after the same barbaric fash¬ 
ion. 

On the other hand, all Indiana is not 
like Anderson and Algiers. The Logans- 
port Times of May 4th says, that the com¬ 
plaint of the blunders of the new clerks 
and carriers in their post-office at Logans- 
port, has been universal, that years of 
faithful service for the public seem to count 
for nothing in this department, but what 
does seem to count is the amount of work 
one has done to put his party in power. 
And very refreshing after the usual nause¬ 


ating doses of “the patriotism of the bel¬ 
fry” is the following from the Times: 

The United States can take many profitable les¬ 
sons from Great Britain, the nations of continental 
Europe, and a few lessons even from the pagan 
Chinese. We yet lack considerable of knowing it 
all. There is absolutely no sense in discharging a 
mall carrier for any other reason than inefficiency. 
The public, whom he is supposed to serve, cares 
nothing about his political complexion. What the 
public wants is that its mail be handled as it should 
be. 

The Indianapolis Sentinel says that the 
recent appointment by Secretary Morton 
of Col. William Hicklin as government 
inspector at the stock yards is a striking 
illustration of the old adage as to bread 
cast upon the waters. Years ago the Mor¬ 
ton and Hicklin farms in Nebraska were 
adjacent. Mr. Morton lost his farm through 
unfortunate speculation and Mr. Hicklin 
generously engaged his neighbor, Morton, 
at a hundred dollars a month to manage 
a newspaper owned by the former. Years 
passed on and Hicklin met with reverses 
and Morton prospered, and now comes the 
touching climax. According to the naive 
admission of the Sentinel 

“One of the first acts of Secretary Morton’s official 
life was to hunt up the address of Col. Bill and 
write him a personal letter inquiring as to his af¬ 
fairs. Learning that some return for former favors 
would not come amiss, the secretary wrote asking 
Mr. Hicklin what he wanted in the way of appoint¬ 
ment.’’ 

Mr. Morton’s private obligations should 
certainly have been discharged but not by 
the public treasury. We are teaching a 
great deal in our public schools—patriot¬ 
ism among other things. Might it not be 
well whenever the scholars salute the flag 
to have them repeat a solemn invocation 
for strength as they grow older to resist 
all temptations to quarter upon public 
employment their needy relatives and all 
others to whom they are under private ob¬ 
ligations. 

In contrast to the moral callousness shown 
in the above, it is refreshing to come upon 
one who had the moral delicacy which 
ought to characterize citizens in their pub¬ 
lic actions. The late Teakle Wallis, of Bal¬ 
timore, who fought Gormanism unflinch¬ 
ingly and unsuccessfully because the boss 
whenever menaced had a President to for¬ 
tify him with patronage, refused an ofi&ce 
that he had pecuniary need of. He had 
given his support during a campaign to 
the mayor who offered the office, and Mr. 


Wallis said he could not afford to have 
any one think that his support had not 
been disinterested. 

The people of Indiana for a long time 
have been endeavoring to grade the pay of 
county officers so as to make it bear some 
relation to the value of the services ren¬ 
dered, and the general assembly finally 
passed an act for that purpose. Under the 
former system in the wealthier and more 
populous counties there had come to be a 
considerable sprinkling of men who had 
gone into these offices worth nothing and 
had come out comparatively rich. They 
usually became men of leisure, remaining 
active in politics, and were pernicious sup¬ 
porters of the system by which they bad 
prospered. This was county government 
of the most odious kind. There existed 
and still exists in Indiana an association of 
county officers whose sole object is to pre¬ 
vent the overthrow of this oligarchy-breed¬ 
ing system. After the reform law was 
passed they made a combined attack upon 
it by means of suits to test its constitution¬ 
ality with relation to the different offices. 
In the case of the sheriffs they were de¬ 
feated by a decision of the supreme court 
in which Judge Coffey joined. He was a 
candidate for renomination before the re¬ 
publican state convention which lately 
met in this city. Prior to the convention 
two attempts were made by persons in the 
interests of the county officers’ association 
to obtain from Judge Coffey an expression 
in writing as to how he stood upon the 
other fee and salary cases yet undecided 
in the supreme court. These infamous 
attempts were met with the refusal they 
deserved, and the advocates of this old 
system of legalized robbery set to work to 
defeat Judge Coffey’s nomination and suc¬ 
ceeded in doing so by four votes. There 
is no mistake about these facts. The In¬ 
dianapolis Journal was so scared about it 
that it said the next morning that if any 
mistakes had been made they could be 
corrected before the election. Every at¬ 
tempt has been made to cover the matter 
up. We wonder if the people of Indiana 
will stand this sort of thing. It was a plain 
attempt to corrupt the judiciary and to 
make sure that the candidate was corrupt 
when he was nominated. The Folger 
nomination in New York was a party ma¬ 
chine trick; yet for that he was defeated by 

















126 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


197,000 majority. The successful scheme 
against Judge Coffey goes to the very foun¬ 
dation of government. Is the state of In¬ 
diana so debauched that it will take no 
notice of it? 

The new abolition movement, known as 
the Anti-spoils League, is rapidly gaining 
in numbers, but a membership of 10,000 
is a mere beginning. As is usual in this 
state, Indiana University is the first to 
show activity and open sympathy. In the 
East, Williams College has followed Har¬ 
vard with a membership at the start of 
forty. The secretary of the league, Mr. 
William Potts, 54 William street, New 
York City, will furnish cards for member¬ 
ship. The Civil Service Chronicle is 
sent to the reading rooms of all the col¬ 
leges in Indiana, to many Christian asso¬ 
ciations and to a large body of clergymen. 
It can not be possible that the facts it has 
printed for the past five years have not 
aroused the interest and desire of thought¬ 
ful readers for the total abolition of the 
spoils system, and from these should come 
a large enrollment. 


Mr. Winslow Warren, who is a Quin¬ 
cy apologist and collector of the port of 
Boston, according to his speech at a recent 
meeting of the Massachusetts Reform Club, 
has evidently come to the conclusion that 
independence is such a good thing that he 
can not have too much of it. He declared, 
“ I even propose to be independent of the 
Massachusetts Reform Club.” He defines 
this somewhat by adding, “Since taking 
oflSce I have found many diflSculties of a 
practical nature which stand in the way of 
the civil service reform.” Mr. Warren’s 
acts as collector will later define his mean¬ 
ing better, but the sound is not reassuring. 
It suggests the wicked forestalling pursuit. 
He belongs to the cult, now much nar¬ 
rowed in numbers, who have always main¬ 
tained that Mr. Cleveland could do no 
wrong, which would make criticism ad¬ 
missible or which would permit one jot 
of “sympathy” to be withdrawn. His words 
now import that like some others he 
will fail under the test, and that he has 
become so independent as to be a free 
lance as it were among his own principles. 
Possibly he and Quincy may combine and 
as Free Companions ride rough shod over 
their lifetime professions. It is true he 
says that he does not abate one jot of his 
civil service reform principles. We do 
not understand that Quincy has abated 
any of his principles; he is still in favor 
of abstract declarations. But it is the acts 
that strip a man of his honor and his good 
name and make him the most despised of 
public men—a reformer transformed into 
the puppet of bosses. 


Surely he Is not ])elieved by any considerable 
number of Americans to be a frivolous, short¬ 
sighted intriguer, who seeks his ends by means 
that would shock and discourage all his friends.— 
New York Times. 

Congressman Caruth is a free silver man; 
he was zealous and bold in trying to pre¬ 
vent Mr. Cleveland’s nomination, and ever 
since Cleveland became President, Caruth 
has been hostile. Now he is engaged in 
crushing a rebellion in his district in Ken¬ 
tucky. The rebels, like those of Gor¬ 
man’s, “are the very cream of the popula¬ 
tion politically, socially, and in a business 
way.” Mr. Cleveland has popularly been 
supposed to represent this class of people, 
and these citizens of Kentucky spent 
money and time in the successful effort to 
crush the machinations against Mr. Cleve¬ 
land, of men like Caruth. It does not 
seem that it would be too much to expect 
that under these circumstances Caruth 
and his rebels should be left by this ad¬ 
ministration to wind up their war with no 
outside interference. This is not the case, 
however. The treasury department, the 
post-oflBce department, and the war depart¬ 
ment, have been called upon by Caruth, 
and they have responded. 

The crowning ignominy was recently 
made known by the Washington corre¬ 
spondent of the New York Evening Post. 
Major Handbury, of the United States en¬ 
gineers, was assigned to Louisville to take 
charge of the engineering work of the 
Ohio Falls canal. First Caruth secured 
the removal of Mr. Shaw, who had been 
assistant engineer for fifteen years; then 
he designated the brother of his law part¬ 
ner for the place. Major Handbury thought 
if his competent assistant had to go, he 
would try to get along without anybody in 
his place. Mr. Caruth kept getting men 
dismissed, but Major Handbury kept on 
conducting his oflBce on scientific and busi¬ 
ness principles. Secretary Lament and 
the chief of engineers were the tools to 
execute Caruth’s orders. At the war de¬ 
partment, says the Post, the only informa¬ 
tion given out about the matter is that the 
major had made himself very obnoxious 
to Mr. Caruth and some other citizens of 
Louisville by his persistent habit of “turn¬ 
ing down ” all their requests and sugges¬ 
tions. The climax of this odious work was 
that Major Handbury was transferred to 
Florida and was ordered to turn over his 
unfinished work to a subordinate oflBcer 
and to leave at once. 

The only explanation is that the admin¬ 
istration has tried to buy Carutb’s vote, 
and in the process has attempted to assist 
in crushing a revolt of decent citizens 
against a congressman who does not rep¬ 
resent them, and has wreaked a contempt¬ 
ible vengeance upon an army officer of 
high character. The President indeed 


“seeks his ends by means that shock and 
discourage his friends.” 


THE CLERGY AND THE RELIGIOUS 
PRESS. 

We commend the sermon of Mr. Dew- 
hurst, printed in this paper, to the relig¬ 
ious press, to the Christian associations to 
which this and other civil reform papers 
have been sent, and to the clergy of this 
state especially, because, with many notable 
exceptions, they have not given this reform 
the support and sympathy to which its 
relative importance entitles it. The prog¬ 
ress of the movement to abolish the spoils 
system is curiously like the movement for 
the abolition of slavery. As that history 
is read to-day one feels that the church at 
large did not appear well. Its ministers 
showed a timidity,a weakness, a vacillation^ 
a bent toward casuistry, a deliberate blind¬ 
ness and deafness to facts distressing to 
those who feel that in all matters of con¬ 
duct clergymen as a whole ought to lead 
the people in clear-seeingand in courageous 
action. The future student will find a 
like backwardness of the great masses of 
the clergy in their feeling toward the evils 
and the inherent wickedness of the spoils 
system. If ministers do not realize that 
the evils springing from that system ram¬ 
ify to every village in this country, that 
the system is dangerous to private morals, 
that it menaces the stability of a republi¬ 
can form of government, that it is brutal 
and degrading, it is only because they 
choose to be blind and deaf to facts thrust 
upon them, and for willful indifference and 
ignorance there is no excuse. 

A common plea is that the pulpit should 
keep out of politics. The abolition of the 
spoils system can not be made “politics” by 
any jugglery. It pertains to no party; it 
is hated with equal hatred by the machines 
of both parties. All bosses of all parties 
fight to preserve spoil in the desperate ef¬ 
fort to save themselves. If a clergyman 
objects to the advocacy of this reform in 
his pulpit, while we do not agree with the 
wisdom of the opinion, there is no criti¬ 
cism to be offered. But out of the pulpit 
he is a citizen and a minister and he can 
not evade his double obligation to stand 
openly for righteousness and to denounce 
a system that shows itself more base the 
more it is known. Rev. Robert S. MacAr- 
thur in celebrating his twenty fourth anni¬ 
versary to the pastorate of the Calvary 
Baptist Church in New York, very pithily 
said last Sunday: 

“If the sacred salt is to save the secular meat 
they should not be put Into separate barrels. 
Every true American should find cause for patri¬ 
otism and piety in the history of his country.” 

It is true that Phillips Brooks in the pul¬ 
pit did not touch upon specific reforms 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


127 


but out of it he made very manifest that he 
felt he had a stand to take and a duty to 
perform. But in the pulpit the power of 
Phillips Brooks to arouse the human heart 
to a passion for righteousness by dealing 
with great principles only in the abstract 
and stripped of all special illustrations 
from contemporary life was a great and 
rare gift. When attempted by njost cler¬ 
gymen the result is an entire absence of 
influence on matters of conduct. 

There are certain evils that have become 
the safe and respectable foot balls to be 
kicked about in the pulpit and in the religi¬ 
ous press. These evils are puerile by the 
side of the evils inherent in the spoils sys¬ 
tem, and it is amazing to listen to denun¬ 
ciations of these comparatively petty mis¬ 
demeanors and then to meet silence or in- 
difierence or exasperating want of com¬ 
prehension regarding a system founded 
upon injustice and immorality. 


THE FAILURE OF THE SPOLIA- 
TION OF THE CIVIL SERVICE 
FOR TARIFF REFORM. 

The combination of reformers against the 
spoils system has always had among its num¬ 
bers a large contingent who have never felt 
that this struggle was of the first importance. 
Tariff reform, they have said, must have pre¬ 
cedence. While this theory has been preached 
and acted upon we have seen President Cleve¬ 
land turn out over 150,000 public employes to 
make places for henchmen of his own party 
and quit office without accomplishing any¬ 
thing for tariff reform. We have seen Presi¬ 
dent Harrison turn out over 150,000 public 
employes to make places for henchmen of his 
own party and quit office with the McKinley 
bill upon the statute book. We have then 
seen President Cleveland again in the process 
of turning out over 150,000 public employes to 
make places for henchmen of his own party 
and using this patronage with special refer¬ 
ence to securing the votes of congressmen for 
measures he desires to see passed, and we have 
the prospect of some changes in tariff taxa¬ 
tion and of an income tax, which is a fair 
exponent of the views of organized bands of 
tramps who are now going about living upon 
the savings of other people. 

We have never believed that the tariff 
turned the tide which caused the defeat of 
Cleveland in 1888, or of Harrison in 1892. 
We believe that hypocrisy exposed, bogus 
saintship in office stripped of its covering, 
Gorman and Quay rascality—in a word, the 
disgust of a boss-ridden nation—has caused 
the loss of voters which brought deserved de¬ 
feat. However that may be, the tariff reform¬ 
ers came into complete possession of the gov¬ 
ernment by reason of the election of 1892. No 
devotees of a cause ever had a better opportu¬ 
nity, but for ten months after the election 
they put in their time dividing spoil. This 
is a part of the programme by which civil 


service reform waits upon tariff reform. It 
was a veritable sacrifice, made with delibera¬ 
tion. Here were Voorhees and Gorman and 
all of the other supposably propitiated bosses 
pampered with spoil under two Cleveland ad¬ 
ministrations at last brought to the point of 
dealing with tariff reform. This is the ninth 
month of their work. Of what they have 
done the following authorities speak decisive¬ 
ly. March 9 the Indianapolis Sentinel said : 

The senate committee has made its report on the 
Wilson bill and the report is simply infamous. It 
shows the sugar trust, the whisky trust, the rail¬ 
road aud coal combine, and the iron mine com¬ 
bine have had their way with the committee, and 
the whisky man from Troy has had his demands 
granted as to collars and cuffs. 

Within a week Senator Mills said : 

“I find that the bill before us is not the Wilson 
bill, but a bill that ought perhaps to bear the hon. 
ored name of the senior senator from Maryland, 
Mr. Gorman, or the name of the senator from Ohio, 
Mr. Brice. 

“No man can torture me into the admission that 
the bill pending before this body is a response 
to the pledges made by the democratic convention 
to the democratic people of the United States.’’ 

What is the cause of this wreck of expecta¬ 
tions? For many months federal offices, 
worth in the aggregate millions a year, have 
been given out as a bait in the interest of tariff 
reform. The excuses given for it sanction 
bribery with startling frankness. This is the 
end of a policy which has been followed and 
advocated and excused since 1886. The end 
is a prospective law which is a legal outrage. 

How much longer is this to go on? It 
ought not to go on any longer. So long as 
party machine managers have the spoil, it 
will always be a matter of indifference to 
them whether laws are passed or not. Their 
principles are the principles of the floater, 
who gets his money before casting his vote, 
and then is ready to sell it over again. 

This purchase and sale has been of gradual 
growth. When the first signs appeared that 
the President might be entering upon this 
policy in his second administration, the New 
York Times said, editorially ; 

But as he could not rely upon it [the respect and 
confidence of the people] long if he undertook to 
carryout his views with congress by a “deal” in 
which offices were traded for votes, it is not con¬ 
ceivable that he contemplates such a deal. <• * * 
Surely he is not believed by any considerable num¬ 
ber of Americans to be a frivolous, short-sighted 
intriguer, who seeks his ends by means that would 
shock and discourage all his friends, and that 
would moreover be hopelessly inefficacious. 

Later it became apparent that the plan to 
buy with patronage the representatives who 
could not be trusted to carry out the pledges 
of the demociatic party, had been mapped out 
with cool deliberation and on a large scale. 
There was not even the excuse that it was re¬ 
sorted to in a desperate fight as a last measure. 
Josiah Quincy, in Boston, before a large num¬ 
ber of its most distinguished citizens, was tri¬ 
umphant over the power of the President to 
influence legislation by patronage. He had 
sympathy and support; fortunately for one’s 
faith in the survival of a conscience in Bos¬ 
ton, only a minority gave sanction. 


In 1890 two papers were read before the 
national civil service reform league meeting 
in Boston, insisting that the abolition of the 
spoils system was the first issue and the vital 
issue, and that those who believed other ques¬ 
tions were more important could accomplish 
nothing while great bosses and little bosses 
were maintained and kept strong and impu¬ 
dent on spoil. An effort was made in the 
league to prevent the printing of those papers. 
The soundness of those views has been dem¬ 
onstrated by what has since happened. It is 
time to protest more vigorously when a tariff 
reformer, who claims also to be a civil service 
reformer, disposes of the question by a state¬ 
ment that tariff reform is the more pressing 
and more vital issue. We have yet to hear or 
to read any detailed proof or argument main¬ 
taining such a position ; on the other hand, 
civil service reformers have not shirked the 
demonstration that the evils of the spoils 
system ramified to every city and town and 
hamlet in this country, and attacked the very 
foundation of a democratic government, and 
that aside from all moral considerations as a 
practical question every other reform was 
prostrate so long as we bore the yoke of a lot 
of feudal chieftains. 

The time has now come to put under foot 
the doctrine that it is necessary for any pur¬ 
pose whatever to give public offices as spoil to 
any party machine or any boss or set of bosses 
or to any person or persons for any purpose 
whatever. The war-cry should be the spoils 
system must be destroyed, and the way to de¬ 
stroy it is to cease to use it. If this destroys 
a President, or a dozen Presidents, a party or 
a dozen parties, so let it be. 


ANNALS OF INDIANA CONGRESS¬ 
MEN. 

Barring some minor interruptions, such as 
the necessity for Voorhees to speak an hour or 
two upon the tariff bill, the reports show that 
our Indiana delegation in Washington since 
our last notice of them three months ago have 
kept quite steadily to their normal work. In 
his speech Voorhees made a resounding noise 
about wealth and trusts under cover of which 
those favored entities were creeping into the 
statute books upon favorable terms. Turning 
to the reports, in the appointment of Lynch 
to be postmaster at Liberty, Voorhees admin¬ 
istered a slap in the face to a large section of 
Liberty democrats and eighty-five telegraphed 
Voorhees that the appointment “will be re¬ 
sented at the polls.” As heretofore stated 
Voorhees brought Hoke Smith to time in forc¬ 
ing the appointment of Spencer to the Indian¬ 
apolis pension agency. He had a pitched bat¬ 
tle with some presumptuous democrats over 
the Frankfort post-office. An election was held 
and one Smith was chosen, but Voorhees was 
for Marvin and lost the battle. Perhaps his 
most signal victory in his long list of triumphs 
during the past year was in getting a place for 
Con. Cunningham, who has been in Washing¬ 
ton since the inauguration and whose strug¬ 
gles for a place have occupied pages of the 









128 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Chronicle and who has now became an emi¬ 
grant inspector at Port Huron. Voorhees a 
month ago was working tooth and nail to 
make Joseph Gwin superintendent of the rail¬ 
way mail service, but appears to have failed 
for the present. 

The Indianapolis Sentinel has pretty stead¬ 
ily criticised Senator Voorhees for what he 
did to give the whisky ring more time to 
pay taxes. This made Voorhees smart, and 
April 19th he declared of Mr. Morss, the 
owner of the Sentinel, and the present consul- 
general in Paris, “I could have called him 
home to-morrow if I but said the word,” 

Our readers will remember “Judge” Chester 
R. Faulkner, annals of whom have from time to 
time appeared in the Chronicle, and whom 
Voorhees keeps steadily in some public job. 
He also, as Voorhees’s man, joined in the 
effort to put down the Sentinel, and sent it the 
following letter: 

UNITED STATES SENATE, 

Washington, D. C., April 7,1894. 

To THE Editor—Sir: I See that you aire giving 
a good Eal advise a Bout the tariff and if you 
will Compalre the Differnt tariff Bills you will 
flnde this Result; 

McKinley Bill.49.58 per cent. 

Wilson Bill.35.52 per cent. 

Mill Bill.42.78 per cent. 

Senate Bill.34.15 per cent, 

Now these aire the Facts So take your Chise. 

Yours as ever, 

C. R. Faulkner. 

The Indiana delegation is likely to be beaten 
in the effort mentioned last month to defeat 
the bill reorganizing the treasury department 
and legislating Joe Nicholl out of office, but 
it is given out that Carlisle will fix Nicholl 
with something equally as good. April 11 
Voorhees and Turpie went up to the post-oflSce 
department and urged greater rapidity in de¬ 
capitating fourth-class postmasters. May 9 
our senators spent but little time in the sen¬ 
ate. They first went with Representative 
McNagney and an Indiana lawyer to the 
President to try to obtain a pardon for one 
Ritter, a bank defaulter. Then the two sen¬ 
ators joined Representative Taylor and Cap¬ 
tain Zuchsiegle, of Evansville, whom they 
escorted to the treasury. Captain Zuchsiegle 
is an old constituent of Secretary Carlisle, 
but the purpose of his visit to-day with his 
political backing was to enter a plea for ap¬ 
pointment as an inspector of buildings. 
Voorhees delivered a eulogy upon Zuchsiegle, 
saying that in a campaign he was indispensa¬ 
ble in rounding up the German vote at the 
last moment for the democrats and his dialect 
speeches were simply irresistible. All he 
asks for this is a little inspectorship, says 
Voorhees. 

Our representatives are beginning to find 
out what sly old dogs Voorhees and Turpie 
are. The other day they slipped up to the 
public printer and had him give two-thous¬ 
and dollar places to William Edmonds and 
H. O. Holman. Shortly after McNagney went 
up to have a man appointed, but was told 
that the Indiana quota was full. Thereupon 


McNagney, Cooper, Taylor, Bynum, Holman, 
Bretz, Martin and all the rest raised a loud 
and exceeding bitter cry. Each had hench¬ 
men to quarter upon the printing department, 
“worthy and bona fide residents of Indiana,” 
yet the places are given to men who have not 
seen Indiana for years; and when they go 
with demands for their bona fide henchmen 
the appointing power inquires whether In¬ 
diana wants the earth. They propose to let 
the democrats of Indiana know who is re¬ 
sponsible for this imposition. 

Congressman Taylor never relaxed his 
struggle to make Zinsich steamboat inspector 
up to April 5th. This struggle has been de¬ 
picted in columns of Washington dispatches 
extending over many months, but on April 
13th it went to an Arkansas man. Hammond 
has disposed of three very bitter post-office 
fights. The most noted was at Delphi, where 
there was an election, but Mr. Bissell refused 
to sanction the successful candidate, because 
he lived over the Delphi corporation line, 
and this secured Hammond’s man, Editor 
Isherwood, for the place. The anti-Isher- 
woodites kept up the struggle for two months. 
Hammond has also appointed William Jack- 
son postmaster at Winamac, Thomas Mayors 
at Remington, and one Houser at Rensselaer, 
John Brodie, prison director, postmaster at Val¬ 
paraiso, and Jay Shields, a clerk in the audi¬ 
tor’s office, postmaster at Rochester. After a 
long struggle, Bretz got the postmaster at 
Epsom removed, and put Jerome Reese into 
his place. At Kendallville there was an elec¬ 
tion, and Jerry Foley was chosen for the post- 
office; McNagney wrote for the returns, and 
they were found stowed away in a barn. 
When they reached McNagney they were badly 
mutilated, and were accompanied by a bill 
against him for the expenses of the election. 
He did not see the joke, but with some bitter¬ 
ness he agreed to pay the bill. This circum¬ 
stance started up remonstrances against Jer¬ 
ry’s appointment, but McNagney finally got 
him through. 

Bynum got a place for J. J. Netterville in the 
government printing-office, and allowed Sec¬ 
retary Morton to appoint Bill Hicklin to 
inspect meat in Bynum’s animal industry po¬ 
litical machine at Indianapolis. Senator Tur¬ 
pie tried to get his nephew, J. W. Jones, made 
receiver of the Bozeman land-office, but met 
with the failure usual to his many struggles 
after spoils. Congressman Brookshire has 
appointed W. H. Huff, watchman in the 
treasury department. Brookshire will have a 
hard pull for re-nomination. The Washing¬ 
ton dispatch of April 16lh, to the Indianapolis 
News says that— 

John E. Lamb has been quietly undermining 
Brookshire’s political fortress, and Senator Voorhees 
has been helping him. Whenever Brookshire de¬ 
clined to recommend a man to an office. Lamb and 
Voorhees took him up and managed to secure him a 
place somewhere in the government service. The 
senator and his Terre Haute protege have caused 
Mr. Brookshire a great deal of embarrassment in 
appointments. 

After a long fight Conn appointed Walter 


Harrigan postmaster at South Bend; also, 
one Beck, of Goshen, was appointed, through 
his influence, assistant teacher in an Indian 
school. 

Since last February Congressman Jason 
Brown has been in a fierce struggle for re¬ 
nomination, United States district attorney 
Burke spent two weeks attending to necessary 
work in the primaries of Clark county. As 
the Indianapolis News briefly put it: “It was 
first. Brown for Burke; now it is Burke for 
Brown.” Editor Jennings, to whom Con¬ 
gressman Brown failed to give an office, says : 

Brown made a hundred speeches in the district 
during the campaign for the free and unlimited 
coinage of silver, but he made the third speech 
that was made in the house for the repeal of the 
Sherman act. He flopped for a piece of patronage 
pie in the appointment of Frank Burke as district 
attorney. He has appointed two or three lieuten¬ 
ants in each county to distribute the patronage, 
and if I had consented to become a member of the 
ring I coujd have had the appointment I sought. 
Brown told me plainly that he would not be able 
to do anything for me unless I would agree to work 
for his renomination. 

In Jennings county Brown’s forces are said 
to be led by the editor of the North Vernon 
Sun, who is also postmaster of the town. The 
correspondent of the Indianapolis News, in a 
diverting account of Brown’s fight for renom¬ 
ination, said: 

When republican filibustering required the dem. 
ocrats in congress to secure a quorum of their own 
members, a warrant was issued for the arrest of Mr. 
Brown, who was then in his district in the interest 
of his renomination. The charge of absenteeism 
has been pressed so vigorously in Washington 
county that he has not dared to leave his post of 
duty to go there and confront and disprove the ac¬ 
cusation. But he has detailed his secretary of the 
house committee on elections, who lives in Salem, to go 
there and organize his f riends. This secretary is Mr. 
Robert H. Mitchell, formerly prosecuting attorney of 
the county, and he is there now earnestly at work for 
his chief—at government expense. 


General C. C. Williams, late United States minis¬ 
ter to Stockholm, contributes an article to The 
American Journal of Polities, New York, March* 
condemnatory of “the spoils-system.” Citing the 
condition of the Papal States under Gregory XIII, 
and attributing to the high-handed injustice of that 
potentate the swarms of banditti which overran the 
country, he draws a parallel between the then con¬ 
dition of things in the Papal States, and the exist¬ 
ing prevalence of disorder and crime in our own 
country, as illustrative of the position that like 
causes produce like results. As the spoils-system, 
he says, is in every way lacking in justice, it must 
be charged with responsibility for a large part of 
the present demoralization. It is a common say¬ 
ing, he continues, that nothing can be done at 
Washington (in respect to offices) without influ¬ 
ence, and that anything can be done by influence. 
Landed estates are not confiscated, as under Greg¬ 
ory XIII, but, take the President and senate togeth¬ 
er, their confiscations of civil offices will aggregate 
in value about as much as the confiscations of the 
church potentate. He refers to no particular Pres¬ 
ident or administration; the practice has been the 
same with each party, for many years. If, In addi¬ 
tion to the national government, we take city and 
state governments, there are more than two hun¬ 
dred thousand offices in this country which are 
subject to the spolls-method, and the injustice of 
the system tends to alienate respect for govern¬ 
ment, and produce demoralization.—/.fferary Di¬ 
gest, March 29. 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


129 


The stalwart democratic state central committee 
met here to-day. J. B. Crouch was removed from 
the committee, it being charged that he was en¬ 
gaged in an office brokerage business in Washing¬ 
ton and had been representing “stalwart” appli¬ 
cants for employment ever since last March. The 
secretary was instructed to notify the President 
and heads of departments at Washington that 
Crouch no longer represented the stalwart democ¬ 
racy of K.&nsa.s.—Topeka Dispatch, New York Times, 
February 20. 

Buffalo furnished the most interesting feature of 
to-day’s investigation of the State board of health. 
That feature was a letter from Lieutenant-Governor 
Sheehan to Secretary Balch. Until Comptroller 
Roberts relieved him, Julius H. Haas, a faithful 
Sheehanite from the second assembly district in 
Buffalo, was a registrar in the health department. 
He got |125 a month from the state. He is one of 
the employes who, by the report of the board’s ex¬ 
ecutive committee, did considerably less work 
than he was paid for doing. Mr. Haas did prac¬ 
tically nothing for the $125 salary he drew for Oc¬ 
tober, 1S92. 

“Buffalo, Oct. 10. 

“Dear Dr. Balch —I need the services of Julius 
Haas here absolutely until after election. He is 
indispensable to me in a legislative contest in one 
of the districts, and in other ways. Yon will do 
me a great personal favor if you will give him a 
vacation until election is over. 

“Yours very truly, 

“William F. Sheehan.” 

—Albany dispatch, Buffalo Express, March 8. 

Gov. McKinley’s second term as Ohio’s chief ex¬ 
ecutive has thus far proved no improvement upon 
his first from a strict business standpoint. An at. 
mosphere of scandal continues to hang about a 
number of the state institutions where McKinley 
office-holders have been enjoying their easy places 
without much regard for the public welfare. 

The penitentiary In this city is the greatest of the 
state institutions. Two thousand prisoners are 
crowded Into it. Chaplain Dudley fell from grace 
so far as to have very peculiar financial relations 
with convicts seeking his influence for parole and 
had to step down and out. He was the second of 
McKinley’s appointees in that place to retire in 
disgrace. The warden is being attacked for incom¬ 
petency even by republican papers. Shocking 
stories of cruel treatment of prisoners are published 
frequently and are believed to be well founded. 

The McKinley management of the deaf and dumb 
institution in this city has also been discredited 
Superintendent Clark was investigated two months 
ago at the governor’s direction by the Board of 
State Charities, a non-partisan board composed of 
highly-respected gentlemen, and two weeks since 
a report was submitted to McKinley finding the 
superintendent incompetent and disqualified by 
disposition for the place. Among other facts ft was 
shown that he had reported an average attendance 
for last year greater by sixty than the largest num¬ 
ber of pupils enrolled in any single day. This fact 
revealed the methods by which Superintendent 
Clark was able in his last annual report to exhibit 
the lowest per capita cost of maintenance in the 
history of the institution. The governor has not 
yet removed Clark or indicated what he intends 
to do. 

The Boys’ Industrial School at Lancaster has also 
been the theater of numerous scandals, and while 
the board of trustees promptly whitewashed the 
management the stories will not remain smothered, 
but reappear to bother and worry the administra¬ 
tion.—Cofwm&ws dispafcA, iVew York Times, March 10. 


A MANACLED PRESS. 

Blit, remember, sir, that these are the 
attributes of a free press only. And is a 
press that is purchased or pensioned more 
free than a press that is fettered? Can 


the people look for truths to partial 
sources, whether rendered partial through 
fear or through favor ? Why shall not a 
manacled press be trusted with the main¬ 
tenance and defense of popular rights? 
Because it is supposed to be under the in¬ 
fluence of a power which may prove great¬ 
er than the love of Iruth. Such a press 
may screen abuses iu government or be 
silent. It may fear to speak. And may 
it not fear to speak, too, when its con¬ 
ductors, if they speak in any but one way, 
may lose their means of livelihood ? Is de¬ 
pendence on government for bread no 
temptation to screen its abuses ? Will Ihe 
press always speak Ihe truth, when tlie 
truth, if spoken, may be the means of 
silencing it for the future? Is the truth 
in no danger, is the watchman under no 
temptation, when he can neither proclaim 
the approach of national evils, nor seem to 
decry them, without the loss of his place ? 

Mr. President, an open attempt to secure 
the aid and friendship of the public press, 
by bestowing the emolumenfs of ollice on 
its active conductors, seems to me, of 
everything we have witnessed, to be the 
most reprehensible. It degrades both the 
government and the press. As far as its 
natural effect extends, it turns the palla¬ 
dium of liberty into an engine of party. It 
brings the agency, activity, energy, and 
patronage of government all to bear, 
with united force, on the means of intelli¬ 
gence and the adoption or rejection of po¬ 
litical opinions.— Daniel TPtisfe?- in 1SS2. 


Benton B. Jones, editor of the Democrat, postmas¬ 
ter at Cortland, New York. 

Martin Russell, newspaper man,collector of cus¬ 
toms at Chicago, Ill. 

J. W. Stewart, editor of the Bazoo, postmaster at 
Smith Center, Kansas. 

B. J. Sheridan, editor of the Western Spirit, post¬ 
master at Paola, Kansas. 

Matthew Thomson, editor of the Signal, postmas¬ 
ter at Alma, Kansas. 

Thomas J. Lowry, editor of the News, postmaster 
at Mount Airy, N. C. 

Andrew Simonson, editor of the Agriculturist, 
master at Racine, Wls. 

J. F. Henderson, of the Democrat, postmaster at 
Aledo, Ill. 

J. L. Highley, editor of the .Journal, postmaster at 
Garnett, Kansas. 

J. E. Wolden, editor of the Journal, postmaster at 
Napa, Cal. 

R. M. Isherwood, editor of the Times, postmas¬ 
ter at Delphi, Ind. 

H. G. Crouch, editor of the Argus, postmaster at 
Kingston, N. Y. 

C. C. Chain, editor of the Democrat, postmaster at 
Bushnell, Ill. 

Wm. Sulier, of the- Review, postmaster at Rose- 
bury, Oregon. 

J. F. Hall, editor of the Spirit of the Times, post¬ 
master at Batavia, N. Y. 

Andrew Herod, of the Courier-Democrat, postmas¬ 
ter at Seneca, Kansas. 

Nathaniel T. Allison, of the Star-Courier, post¬ 
master at Columbus, Kansas. 

Rainard B. Wohlquist, editor of the Democrat- 
postmaster at Hastings, Neb. 

A. G. Moderow,editor of the Democrat, postmaster 
at Stanton, Neb. 

Mark W. Murray, editor of the Times, postmaster 
at Pender, Neb. 


Bridget Lane, mother of editor of the Record, 
postmaster at Summit, N. J. 

Cyrus N. Walls, editor of the Democrat, post, 
master at Taylorsville, Ill. 

E. P. Thompson, editor of the Weekly, postmaster 
at Aberdeen, Minn. 

W. W. Smith, editor of the Free Press, postmaster 
at Leipsic, O. 

John Adams, editor of the Post, postmaster at 
Columbia City, Ind. 

John B. Gaines, editor of the Times, postmaster 
at Bowling Green, Ky. 

J. M. Higgs, editor of the Examiner, postmaster 
at Connersville, Ind. 

Elpha Bledler, nephew of the editor of the News 
postmaster at Mt. Pulaski, Ill. 

John F. Sherman, of the Democrat, postmaster at 
Wahoo, Mo. 


SERMON 

Delivered by Rev. Frederic E. Dewhurst 
at Plymouth Church, Sunday, April 15, 
1894. 

[Preceded by readings from Lincoln’s first inau¬ 
gural and “Lowell’s Commemoration Ode.”] 

Luke xi :47, 48.—Ye build the tombs of the proph¬ 
ets and your father killed them. So ye are wit 
nesses and consent unto the work of your fathers; 
for they killed them and ye build their tombs. 

It is needless to say that this is satire of the 
keenest sort; satire that is almost aglow with 
the white heat of indignation, yet an indigna¬ 
tion that is not blind to those incongruities of 
life that awaken the sense of humor. 

There is something terrible in the lashing of 
words that it gave to the representative religi¬ 
ous people of his time, something far more 
terrible than the actual lashing with the whip 
of small cords when he drove the traders from 
the temple. But if we ourselves had stood 
there, the actual victims of his scornful at- 
ack, I do not see how we could have sup¬ 
pressed a passing smile at the subtle humor in 
this allusion to the tomb building propensity, 
even though like all the other words it had car¬ 
ried the shaft of condemnation to our hearts. 

Let us view the situation for a moment. 
Jesus stood there almost at the close of his 
tragic career, fully conscious now at last of 
the irreconcilable conflict between himself and 
those who represented the official religion; 
it was himself against the whole church; he 
had realized by degrees that those from whom 
he naturally might have expected sympathy 
were his most implacable foes ; and at length 
unable to restrain longer his indignation he 
launches forth on this tide of invective. Pres¬ 
ently he points with his hand toward those 
white tombs outside the city that had been re¬ 
built by that generation and gathered from 
ruin and oblivion; they were the pride and 
boast of these people. “Our fathers killed 
the prophets,” they said, “and in order to show 
our sorrow and to help undo the wrong and to 
prove that we ourselves have the prophet lov¬ 
ing spirit we will rebuild their tombs.” 

But how strangely and swiftly Christ re¬ 
verses all this—“Ye consent,” he says, “unto 
the deeds of your fathers; for they killed the 
prophets and ye build their tombs; you are 
fit and worthy successors; your tomb building 
is only another exhibition of prophet-slay¬ 
ing.” 








130 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


Now, I say there is a subtle sense of humor 
in this swift reversal of motives underlying a 
deed that was intended to correct and dis¬ 
countenance the deeds of a past generation; 
but deeper than the humor or the satire of it 
is an analysis of motives that is searching to 
the last degree—a disclosure of the inner work¬ 
ing of certain phases of human life that cov¬ 
er a wider field than the men or the genera¬ 
tion to whom the words were first addressed. 

These words have come afresh to my 
mind on this anniversary of Lincoln’s 
death. Many of us here to-day can well re¬ 
call that mournful morning twenty-nine years 
ago to day, when the telegraph or the daily 
papers brought the tragic tidings of the Pres¬ 
ident’s assassination. It was like a thick 
cloud that completely hid the sun which had 
been shining upon us with new light and 
clearness in the few brief days since there 
had come the happier tidings that the long 
war was over. 

IIow inevitably humanity marches onward 
to its triumphs and conquests over new Cal 
varies, planting upon each a cross. Verily 
without the shedding of blood there is no re¬ 
mission of sins. The atonement fqr the 
wrongs that are graven deep in human life is 
made when the innocent, the brave, the holy 
suffer and perish that they may disappear. 

In those events some of you here to day 
were actors, bearing the marks still in your 
bodies. Others of us here to-day were but 
mere children, not old enough to know the 
meaning of it all. And I look into the faces 
of many more to whom all these events are 
mere history, and to whom the name of Lin¬ 
coln, like that of Washington, is an object of 
reverence about which gathers the halo that 
surrounds the memory of all heroes who have 
receded far enough into the past. 

Almost an entire generation has passed 
away since Lincoln died, and more than a 
generation has come and gone since the days 
when the prophets of emancipation opened 
their mouths to proclaim their “Thus saith 
the Lord,” the message that failed not until it 
reached its Mount of Transfiguration in the 
Emancipation proclamation and its Golgotha 
in the tragedy of April 14th. 

The generation which has been passing over 
the stage since then has not been negligent in 
the building of tombs to the prophets. In the 
most beautiful and fashionable avenue in 
Boston, through whose streets GarrLson was 
dragged by a mob of her citizens, now stands 
his statue, almost fulfilling Lowell’s words: 

“The hooting mob of yesterday in silent awe re¬ 
turn. 

To glean up the scattered ashes into History’s 
golden urn.’’ 

And all the men and women who belonged 
to the prophetic group are now at last held 
in reverence; their monuments glisten in the 
light of day; their deeds are immortalized in 
bronze. 

Lincoln to be sure was not a prophet; he 
had not the temper of the seer; it would not 
have been possible for him to do the work 
of Garrison and Phillips. He was of that com¬ 


pany, also noble, who serve the future best by 
serving their own day and generation well. In 
him at last the pent-up feeling and purposes 
of the people found a voice. Emerson in his 
funeral eulogy gave the true estimate of Lin¬ 
coln. He said: “He is the true history of 
the American people in his lime. Step by 
step he walked before them; slow with their 
slowness, quickening his march by theirs; the 
true representative of the continent; an entire¬ 
ly public man; father of his country, the 
pulse of twenty millions in his heart, the 
thought of their minds articulated by his 
tongue.” 

Now all these men have receded into the 
past; those of the prophet type, those also of the 
statesman type, and we are the children of the 
generation in which they lived, which they 
served. The natural and fitting duty that be¬ 
falls us, so far as they are concerned, is to 
build their monuments, to perpetuate their 
names and memories in sacred memorials. 

It is obedience to a right and holy instinct 
that places the statue of Garrison on Com¬ 
monwealth avenue; that enshrines in bronze 
the memories of heroic men in the public 
squares of our cities and villages; that sends 
toward heaven a shaft so strong and stately 
as this monument close by. Such visible 
tokens of love and devotion, however belated 
they may be, are honorable to humanity. 

But we must not forget that there is also in 
all this tomb-building activity an immense 
power to deceive and bewilder. It is all so 
evidently noble that it carries with it the pre¬ 
sumption of a motive and spirit which men 
do not by any means always possess. There 
is great satisfaction in building monuments 
and erecting statues; we seem in that honora¬ 
ble activity to be proclaiming to the world 
that if we had lived in the days of the fathers 
we should not have been sharers with them in 
the blood of the prophets; the very proof of 
this, we say, is seen in the reverence and honor 
in which we now hold their names. But it was 
just the charge that Christ brought against his 
contemporaries, that they were fitting and 
worthy successors of their fathers and that 
their tomb-building showed it. Now how could 
this be true? Is not this the explanation? 
These people, like the most of men perhaps, 
lived not out of convictions, butoutof tradi¬ 
tions; their acts sprang not from original inspi- 
tions and deep-rooted personal persuasions, but 
from that which they had received by inher¬ 
itance, by education and by the compulsion 
of forces external to themselves; they were 
not really themselves; they were acting a part; 
they had assumed a role; they were enacting 
a character, and that is why they were called 
hypocrites; it was largely an unconscious pro¬ 
cess. Most cant, Carlyle used to say, is sin¬ 
cere cant. The essential fault was that they 
did not stand in original and open-eyed re¬ 
lations with life; therefore they could not un¬ 
derstand and receive the prophets. They 
could understand only the routine that had 
been marked out and walk in the path that 
was already well beaten, so distinctly the safe 
road that the fool could not err therein. 


Therefore when the time came that they were 
willing to build tombs to the prophets, eager 
to do them honor, it meant no essential change 
of attitude on their part; it did not mean 
that they had exchanged the way of tradi¬ 
tion for the way of conviction and life. It 
meant only that the prophet had at last come 
to his posthumous reward, as the prophet al¬ 
ways does; it meant that his new and original 
word had now been so long familiarized that 
it could at last itself become a safe tradition; 
it meant that these masqueraders in garments 
not their own could at last weave the ideas 
of the past prophets into a new garment for 
the present and go on masquerading still; it 
meant that the prophet had simply provided 
them with a new raft by means of which they 
could still preserve their inertia and spiritual 
indolence and float on down the sea of life. 

That, I think, was the real sting of Christ’s 
satire and the true meaning of his declaration 
that they were consenting unto the work of 
their fathers; “for they killed them and ye 
build their tombs.” The killing of the last 
generation was an exhibition of the tradition¬ 
al spirit; the tomb-building, when it came, 
was also an exhibition of the traditional spir¬ 
it, for the past conviction which was rejected 
had at length become a new tradition, which 
it was safe and popular to accept. And this 
charge was the more convincing because they 
were rejecting the new and living prophet be¬ 
fore them, which was proof that they had no 
ears for the prophetic message. “If ye had be¬ 
lieved Moses, ye would have believed me, 
also.” 

Herein, then, is the great lesson for us all. 
It is not building tombs to the prophets that 
established our reverence for them, but such 
a response to the spirit of their message as 
shall show itself in lives morally alert and 
eager. Our statue and monument building 
may be honorable to us, but before we can 
know that it is we must ask ourselves one 
question: Whose statue would you erect in 
the public square to-day? Who among liv¬ 
ing men is your idol and hero? To whose 
voice do you listen and by whose words are 
you persuaded and led on to action? Who is 
your man and your chieftain among living 
men ? 

It all comes back to this—that life is a 
holy and ceaseless struggle. “There is no 
discharge in this war.” There is a sublime 
moral sense in which the teaching of the old 
Greek philosopher Heraclitus is true, that 
this universe is in perpetual flux and move¬ 
ment; it is continually changing its form and 
meaning; the devouring and cleansing fire is 
its perpetual symbol. And the Hebrew writer 
caught something of that meaning when he 
wrote that the divine voice once shook the 
earth and said, “Once more will I make to 
tremble not the earth only but also the heaven 
which signifieth the removing of the things 
that are shaken as of things that hath been 
made, that those things that are not shaken 
may remain.” 

So there is the ceaseless movement, the rest¬ 
less, eager, unsatiable demand of the moral 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


131 


order upon us. There is scarcely time for 
bivouac; you win a battle and stop to take 
breath, to rejoice in the victory, but you must 
be up and on; there are more battles to win, 
and so it will be forever. 

It is wholly right that our past moral gains 
should fix themselves in the customs, the tra¬ 
ditions, the laws and habits of the people; fix 
themselves until they become moral instincts 
transferable by heredity and ingrained in the 
moral fiber of the race. We must hold on to 
our gains. We must put the pawl into the 
ratchet to keep things from unwinding. But 
after all the ratchet wheel is not the wheel 
that goes forward; it is not the symbol of 
movement and progress; it is the symbol only 
of the conservation of what we have. And 
unless we progress there is no sense in conserv¬ 
ing anything; unless the sight of the prophets’ 
tombs inspire us to the exercise of the pro¬ 
phetic spirit, the building of the tombs is it¬ 
self a delusion and a snare. 

I trust I may not be misunderstood, but it 
sometimes seems to me a mistake to perpetuate 
the veterans’ organizations in the generation 
that lies beyond the participants themselves. It 
was a noble and inspiring moment when the sol¬ 
diery dissolved quietly back into citizenship, 
for the soldiery is the vanishing fact; citizen¬ 
ship is the perpetual and abiding fact; it van¬ 
ishes not away; in all shakings of heaven and 
earth it alone is not removed. The sons of 
veterans do indeed perpetuate the memory of 
their soldier fathers; but it is a loftier and 
holier duty for all of us who are sons of vet¬ 
erans to be the sons of soldiers who be¬ 
came citizens. To discern the vital and ur¬ 
gent duty of the present, to see the duty that 
claims us for our struggle even as it claimed 
our fathers for theirs, this is the most noble 
monument we can build. 

And all this seems more urgent and true 
than ever when we look around us and realize 
the graver responsibilities of citizenship in a 
land like ours. Terrible are the responsi¬ 
bilities of freedom. The experiment of 
popular self-government is one as full of 
peril as it is of opportunity. It is an experi¬ 
ment that calls for vigilance to the last. “We 
have solved the problem already,” say the po¬ 
litical optimists. Let us not say that; let us say 
rather, it must be solved, and by God’s grace 
it shall be solved. 

“Here or nowhere is thy ideal.” Out of the 
material, the spiritual is to be wrought. Life 
is not in the monastery, but here in the world 
of commerce, of politics and of social life. 
What we need to realize is that the moral life 
is in these things, not apart from them. All 
political, commercial and social questions are 
but the other side of ethical questions. 

The progress and safety of a republic be¬ 
yond all other forms of government therefore 
depend upon the constant discernment of the 
moral heart of all political problems. The 
sons of veterans, if they are really loyal to the 
fathers, must do something more than build 
monuments to them; they must bring to the 
front the moral claims of the present; that is 


the way to build the monument that no satire 
can touch. 

I wish to speak above all possible implica¬ 
tions of partisanship (and all moral issues in¬ 
evitably rise above partisanship), but certain¬ 
ly there are issues and problems in our politi¬ 
cal life that need more than anything else a 
clear moral discernment to make them in 
their way as important as those for which our 
fathers fought. 

Almost ever since the close of the civil war 
we have been trying to eradicate the spoils 
system from our political life. And the main 
reason why it is not buried in the depths of 
oblivion is because it has not found its way 
into the citadel of our consciences with suffi¬ 
cient force. It is not because it lacks the ma¬ 
terial for moral enthusiasm, for it is the most 
unequivocally ethical question in the whole 
field of our political life. There is hardly any¬ 
thing more utterly debauching, more blinding 
in its effects, than this infamoussystem. It has 
stood in the way of the highest usefulness of 
all our recent national administrations, and 
it sends its poison into the remotest regions of 
petty local politics. It is, next to slavery, the 
most absolutely corrupting influence in our 
political life. Some of the most promising 
and right-minded young men that I have 
known who have gone into political life (and 
you all can duplicate cases from your own ac¬ 
quaintance) have fallen before its power as 
trees fall before the hurricane. It is sad 
enough to read some of the recent apologies 
that have come from men high-minded in 
most relations of life, but who have become 
so bewildered as reluctantly to admit that it 
is right to buy patronage and political sup¬ 
port with office rather than imperil the prin¬ 
cipal issues before the nation. 

Fellow-men, when that degree of moral de¬ 
bauchery has come about, it is time for a par¬ 
ty to arise which shall distinctly avow that 
there is no measure that can be primary and 
essential until the corrupting spoils system is 
buried in fifty feet of earth; slung into the 
sea with the millstone of the gods about its 
neck. It would not take long to do this; one 
President who would not vacillate or shrink 
for an instant would accomplish it; one who 
should be willing to leap into the gulf like 
Curtius would fill up the gulf forever, and 
though it meant political failure to himself, 
his failure would be the vicarious sacrifice for 
a people. 

The moral quality of such things as this is 
slow in making itself fully realized. There 
was once indifference to the fact of slavery; but 
gradually it became apparent that it was a 
corrupting and demoralizing thing for a man 
to have a proprietorship in a fellow-man. Well, 
it is also corrupting and demoralizing for any 
man tohavesuch a proprietorship in a fellow- 
man’s political action that he can buy his sup¬ 
port with the promise of a post-office or a petty 
consulate in some remote Patagonia or can 
barter for his political support by granting 
him the distribution of patronage. It is not 
simply an indecent and impolitic thing; it is 


morally debauching beyond power of exag¬ 
geration and it is a direct plunge at the very 
heart of self-government; for if those who gov¬ 
ern themselves are not incorruptible, where in¬ 
deed is the stability of free institutions? 

I affirm this not from the standpoint of a 
cast-iron ethics. I fully believe there is rel¬ 
ativity in moral action; that some thifigsclaim 
precedence of others in importance and so in 
right. I would not insist on the too easy moral 
formula that the right is right and that’s the 
end of the matter. The right itself often has 
to be determined by a comparison of all inter¬ 
ests involved. 

Again and again I have tried to feel the 
force of those who are telling us that the 
spoils system is wrong, but that it must wait 
until the pressing questions of finance, or of the 
tariff, of the election bills and the like, are 
disposed of. “Men can go on buying and sell¬ 
ing patronage a little longer,” it is said, “but 
they can not bear the suspense of uncertainty 
on these graver and more pressing issues.” 

It is plausible but it is misleading, for there 
are always questions of greater apparent ur¬ 
gency than the simple questions that need only 
firmness and courage to settle once for all. 
Here is a wrong that has come to the point 
that all honest men are ashamed of it. And 
yet we appear to be powerless to effect a 
change. 

Now, in the face of all this, it seems to me 
that our monument building can wait. We 
can let the graves of the fathers go a little 
longer uncared for. Their bones will rest in 
peace and their spirits will rejoice in an activ¬ 
ity on our part that is contemporaneous with 
ourselves. 

There are a few men now in congress engaged 
in the fatuous attempt, which every now and 
then is made, to put the name of God into the 
constitution. How vain and foolish such an 
endeavor! It would change no fact; it would 
create no new relation; it would stimulate to 
no new devotion. A fiat God would be no bet¬ 
ter than a fiat dollar. God is in the constitu¬ 
tion only when the infinite purpose gets dis¬ 
cerned and loved and enacted by mortal man. 
It almost seems that he would break through 
the eternal silence and cry out: Spare me the 
empty honor of putting my name on the 
pages of the constitution and exert yourselves 
toward staying corruption and bribery. Not 
those who say to me, “Lord, Lord ! but those 
who do my will, are those in whom my soul 
delights.” 

I have seemed to particularize, but it is only 
in the way of seizing what is perhaps the most 
conspicuous example. The applications are, 
however, far wider than to this single example 
of a corrupting influence at work incur polit¬ 
ical life. But the principle is that we should 
live not in the past but in the present; that 
we should seek the place of application to our 
own conditions of the ideas and spirit which 
have made the past glorious and our father 
worthy to be praised. If we really love and 
honor the men whose deeds at last seem 
to us glorious and praiseworthy, let us declare 







132 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


that love not so much by erecting memorials 
to their name as by manifesting in the midst 
of our own life the spirit that was in them. 

“ Is earth too poor to give us 
Something to live for here that shall outlive us? 

* * * * * << * 

No age was e’er degenerate 
Unless'uien held it at too cheap a rate 
For in our likeness still we shape our fate. 

Ah, there is something here 
Unfathomed by the cynic’s sneer. 

Something that gives our feeble light, 

A high immunity from Night, 

Something that leaps Life’s narrow bars 
To claim its birthright with the host of heaven; 

A seed of sunshine that doth leaven 

Our earthly dullness with the beams of stars. 

And glorify our clay 

With light from fountains older than the Day; 

A conscience more divine than we, 

A gladness fed with secret tears, 

A vexing, forward-reaching sense 
Of some more noble permanence; 

A light across the sea. 

Which haunts the soul and will not let it be. 

Still glimmering from the heights of undegener¬ 
ate years.” 


RESOLUTIONS. 

‘‘We condemn the outrageous bargain and sale of 
federal patronage by the Cleveland administration 
in its unblushing efforts to usurp the prerogatives of 
the legislative branch of the government, to force 
favorite measures through congress and compel the 
confirmation of presidential appointments by the 
senate. 

‘‘We believe that the benevolent, educational and 
correctional institutions of the state should be 
placed under non-partisan control.”—/ndtana Re¬ 
publican Slate Platform, April 24, 1894. 


Under the present administration an abuse has 
arisen which, though not heretofore unknown, has 
been so little worked that it comes with startling 
force and opens to the reformer an almost endless 
vista of struggle and dismay. Heretofore the de¬ 
bauchery of the public service has been mostly for 
the purpose of aiding in factional fights: for the 
advancement of one or another person within the 
ranks of a party, the implied return being in the 
form of personal loyalty to the appointing power 
and support to his claims for party position. The 
new bargain is on a different basis. It being un¬ 
derstood that the head of the administration has 
no further design for place for himself, his return 
for feed at the public crib is to come, not in the 
shape of votes for him in convention, but of votes for 
his measures in congress. We are thus brought 
face to face with the presence of a most insidious 
and dangerous corruption. 

Heretofore our congressmen have found their 
forces sapped, their energies weakened and their 
time taken from their legitimate duties by the 
office-brokering demands, which have, first, weak¬ 
ened their power as legislators, and, second, tended 
to a great deterioration in the character of the men 
seeking congressional honor. Now it is supposed 
that their votes on public questions are to be the 
price of places for their henchmen. 

In the past a congressman has earned his re- 
election by much running after and Importuning 
of the cabinet and heads of departments. In the 
future he is to earn it by the sale of his convictions. 
An abyss of corruption so great as to be conquera 
ble only by overturn, instead of by uplifting, yawns 
at our feet. That this is not more generally seen 
and more severely denounced, lies in the fact the 
use of the system so far has been in the interest of 
legislation which is in accord with the beliefs and 
convictions of most of us who are identified with 
the civil service reform movement. How doubly 
dangerous is such an evil, when men whose mental 
clearness and moral purpose we are wont to ap¬ 


plaud, can throw them both to the winds; and not 
only uphold it in the excitement of debate, but can 
defend and approve it in studied communications 
to the press? 

It would be idle to claim that the evil named 
does not exist because no evidence of corrupt bar¬ 
gaining can be shown. Of course it can’t. But it 
is nevertheless believed that this evil is upon us, 
and is already working.—From the resolutions of the 
Newton [jliass.] Civil Service Reform Association, 
April, 189U. 

CORRESPONDENCE. 

A correspondent writes: My attention has 
been called to a reference in the current num¬ 
ber of the Chronicle, at the foot of page 121, 
as to the effect of the operation of the civil 
service law in Brooklyn. I suggest that 
Brooklyn’s experience has really been better 
than is indicated and ask whether some atten¬ 
tion may not be directed to this fact in your 
next issue. Except during the administration 
of Mayor Whitney, the civil service rules have 
been a serious impediment to the “machine,” 
and at the present time may be said to be op¬ 
erating perfectly. Brooklyn was fortunate in 
having rules drawn with the utmost care by so 
competent a draftsman as Mr. E. M. Shepard, 
and their enforcement has always been in the 
hands of a first-class commission. The result 
of this has been that so far as entrance to the 
service is concerned there has ’been almost 
a total absence of cause for complaint. Dur¬ 
ing previous administrations it has been of 
course impracticable to protect the men ap 
pointed to office or position from the influence 
to which they have been subjected immedi¬ 
ately after coming into service. The promo¬ 
tion or relegation of employes, and even the 
amount of drudgery forced into their work, 
has been at the will of heads of departments, 
and for this reason the influences they have 
been able to exert have always been for the 
best. But up to the point of entrance nothing 
of this kind has occurred. Even during May¬ 
or Eoody’s administration, for instance, when 
the control of the system was in the hands of 
the splendid commission of which Mr. Alex¬ 
ander E. Orr was chairman, the machine 
found that the civil service was admirably pro¬ 
tected from any assaults it might hope to 
make. The present commission, of which Mr. 
Orr is still chairman, is, if possible, even a 
stronger one than the last, and there is every 
reason to believe that within the next year 
Brooklyn may present a perfect object-lesson 
of the good effects of civil service reform prin¬ 
ciples in practice in municipal government. 

To The Civil Service Chronicle : Your 
long chapter in the last Chronicle on New 
York was very effective. A similar chapter 
on Philadelphia would be equally startling. 

Wm. a. Aikin. 

Reform Club, New York. 

THE INDIANAPOLIS PENSION 
AGENCY. 

A few days ago Mr. Bynum wrote to the pension 
agent demanding “official” recognition for the 
seventh congressional district in the distribution 
of Mr. Spencer’s patronage. The reply came prompt¬ 


ly from Mr. Spencer that, acting under the instructions 
of Senators Voorhees and Turpie, he had given nearly 
all the political plums to the twelfth congressional 
district, and there was nothing in sight for Bynum’s 
district .— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, 
March ‘16. 

« « » 

United States Pension Agent Spencer has notified 
John P. Stone, James R. East and Miss Mary Sim¬ 
onson that their services in the office will not be 
needed after this week. Mr. East served through 
the war and was wounded. Miss Simonson is a 
daughter of Captain Simonson, the artilleryman, 
who was killed during the war, and who was often 
mentioned in the war reports as an artilleryman of 
unusual bravery and skill. —Hidfanapolts News, 
March 26. 

* * * 

In Miss Simonson’s place the pension agent has 
appointed his sister. 

Current report is that there are differences be¬ 
tween Pension Agent Spencer, Congressman Mc- 
Nagny and the two United States senators from In¬ 
diana about the patronage of the office. Congress¬ 
man McNaguy, who comes from Columbia City, 
the home of Miss Simonson, said to her before the 
appointment of an agent was made, that she should 
hold her place in the office. He knew of her 
father’s faithful service to the government, and 
was aware that, for other reasons, she was deserv¬ 
ing. The day after Miss Simonson had been noti¬ 
fied by Mr. Spencer that her services would not be 
required after April 1, she received a letter from 
Congressman McNagny, in which he said it seemed 
that he did not have any influence with the new 
pension agent. He said he had tried to have Miss 
Simonson retained in the office, but Mr. Spencer 
was unable to carryout his (the congressman’s) 
wishes, because the senators from the state had 
men for all the places in the office. At that time 
the pension agent’s sister had come here to take 
the place of Miss Simonson. 

It is the understanding among Indianapolis demo¬ 
crats that Mr. Spencer, before he was able to get the 
help of the two senators, surrendered all rights as to 
appointments, except as to the one place for his sister. 
A democrat said to day that Mr. Spencer could not 
get the appointment through Congressman McNag- 
ney alone, and that before the two senators would 
recommend him for the place they exacted an 
agreement that they should make the appoint¬ 
ments in the office. Mr. Spencer has said to 
friends since he came to Indianapolis, that every 
one of the old clerks will have to go.—Indianapolis 
News, April 5. 

v « «> 

“Has Mr. Cooper had any more success in secur¬ 
ing appointments than other congressmen have 
had?” 

“No more than any one else. He has no more in¬ 
fluence with me than other congressmen have that 
I know of.” 

There are twenty-eight employes in the pension 
office. Ten of these are new. Four were made to 
fill vacancies caused by the resignations of Messrs. 
Ensley, Jones, Smith, and Davis. The other six 
vacancies were caused by removals. 

“Will there be other changes?” 

“Not until the present payment of pensions has 
been completed.” 

“Will all of the eighteen old clerks be changed?” 

“They will probably all be changed, but the 
changes will be gradually made, and the clerks 
who occupy the most prominent positions will be 
retained to the last, so that the efficiency of the 
new force may be promoted.” 

Mr. Spencer said that Miss Simonson had not 
been removed as had been alleged, but she had re¬ 
signed upon the statement of the case to her that 
persons promised employment had followed Mr 
Spencer to the city, and hoped for immediate in¬ 
stallation into the office. Of the remaining old 
clerks in the office, two are democrats, but they 
will go.—Interview, Indianapolis News, May 3. 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and llie ultimate foundering of the 
ship of state.— From Archbishop Ireland's address: The Duty and Value oj Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II, No. 16. 


INDIANAPOLIS, JUNE, 1894. 


TERMS:^ 


One dollar per annum. 
10 cents per copy. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


In this commencement season, when all 
eyes are turned toward the colleges, the 
Civil Service Chronicle prints in full 
the short-hand report of the address of 
Mr. Moortield Storey in Sanders theater 
before students of Harvard College. The 
Chronicle has now for over five years 
been regularly sent to the libraries of all the 
best known colleges of the United States. 
Will not Mr. Storey’s speech move these 
college readers to a keener feeling for the 
duties of citizenship? College presidents 
and professors, as a rule, personally depre¬ 
cate the spoils system, but with many and 
notable exceptions they, like the masses of 
the clergy, have been strangely indifferent 
to the duty of doing anything to make 
others realize the actual condition and sig¬ 
nificance of the spoils system in this 
country. This indifference is largely will¬ 
ful. It is not convenient or pleasant to 
state the facts regarding the gifts of public 
offices, regardless of party or persons; to 
give the histories of big and little bosses; to 
describe the present system of buying and 
selling legislation, the barter used being 
patronage. These odious facts hit so many 
respectable persons all about us. They 
strain social relations. They cool the inter¬ 
est of private benefactors who thrive upon 
legislation bought with patronage. They 
anger spoils-grabbing legislators on whose 
good humor state institutions depend for 
income. But in spite of all pains and pen¬ 
alties, colleges must do their part toward 
making the republic safe by sending out 
citizens. And we must not let our colleges 
escape their duty. We must prod them on. 
Mr. Storey has done it genially, thor¬ 
oughly and eloquently, and his audience 
manifested proper enthusiasm. 

The $25,000 proposed to be raised for a 
memorial to George William Curtis is 
such a modest sum that it ought to be an 
offering of many people widely scattered. 
Those who understood while he lived what 
manner of man he was, and the many who, 
through partisan bigotry, were blinded 
until his death cleared their vision, all 
have now a chance to build a monument 
to him and better yet to perpetuate his 
work in the “Curtis lectureship,” a course 
of annual lectures upon thej duties ,,of 


American citizenship and kindred sub¬ 
jects. This feature was a happy thought, 
and the feeling of everybody who knew 
Mr. Curtis must be, how pleasing to him 
would such a testimonial be. Subscrip¬ 
tions are to be sent to William L. Tren- 
holm, treasurer, 160 Broadway, New York 
City. 

Since the last issue of the Chronicle 
the dreaded calamity which weak-kneed 
civil service reformers always predicted 
would happen if other civil service reform¬ 
ers refused “sympathy” to compromising 
Presidents, refused respect to knavish 
congressmen, refused to tolerate plunder¬ 
ing the public service under the guise of 
“practical politics,” and in fact insisted 
upon hitting an enemy whenever and 
wherever he appeared, has happened. The 
appropriation for the civil service com¬ 
mission and for the operation of the civil 
service law has been struck out. It was 
done in the house May 22. The victory 
was easy and complete. AH of the demo¬ 
cratic congressmen from Indiana voted to 
strike out. Bynum so voted and made a 
speech to the same effect. We emphasize 
this now because, following his well-known 
habit, Bynum will be denying it before 
long. The victory, however, was not final. 
On May 24, when in open daylight the en¬ 
emies of civil service reform had to face it 
and go upon record in a recorded vote, 
they melted away like smoke. The prop¬ 
osition to strike out was beaten two to one. 
Reform has not won such another victory 
since the passage of the Pendleton act. It 
is the Gettysburg of the war against the 
spoils system. When the final vote was 
taken only two Indiana congressmen, Tay¬ 
lor and Bretz, dared to vote to strike out. 
Johnson, Brookshire, Cooper and McNag- 
ny voted against striking Out. Brown, 
Conn, Hammond, Holman and Martin, 
democrats, and Waugh, republican, did 
not vote. While the vote was being taken 
Bynum left the hall and stayed away until 
it was finished. 

The freedom with which Quay once made 
use of the state money is well known, and 
of course the people of Pennsylvania do not 
approve of that. He is full of vagaries up¬ 
on financial questions, although the peo¬ 
ple of his state are sound upon these ques' 
tions. He openly says that he deals in 
sugar certificates at the same time thathig 
vote as senator is helping to raise or de¬ 


press the price; but the people he claims 
to represent are too honest to sanction 
that transaction. He is a thoroughbred 
political rascal. Yet if his office were va¬ 
cant and a senator were to be chosen to¬ 
morrow from Pennsylvania, he would get 
the place. This is because the free will of 
the people is completely throttled by the 
system known as the spoils system. The 
faithful henchmen for whom he secures a 
living out of the public treasury control 
and largely compose the party machine 
and Quay may, if he chooses, defy law and 
sound judgment and honesty; they will 
see to it that the people do not get at him. 
They call this performing the duties of cit¬ 
izenship; they have not, they say, ceased to 
be citizens because they have become 
office-holders. Gorman and Murphy and 
their followers in their respective states 
are like examples. It is the boss system 
in its perfection, and while it exists no 
other important question can proceed to¬ 
ward solution without danger of being 
ham-strung as buccaneers in the senate 
are now ham-stringing the sugar question 
in order to give millions to a trust. 

The government printing-office in Wash¬ 
ington continues to be a national disgrace. 
The office apparently has need of 2,000 
to 2,500 hands. After Mr. Cleveland’s 
last inauguration. Superintendent Palmer, 
the republican hold-over, seems to have al¬ 
lowed democratic congressmen to quarter 
their followers upon the office, for whom he 
had neither room nor work, until he had 
3,600 employes. Then the new demo¬ 
cratic superintendent, Benedict, came in 
and it was found that the public interest 
required a large reduction in force, and 
700 have been discharged. The 700 are 
not selected from among the least efficient 
and the least experienced, but from repub¬ 
licans. This wasteful and corrupt manage¬ 
ment of the public business could be termi¬ 
nated instantly by the President, by trans¬ 
ferring this office to the classified service. 
To bring in 700 henchmen of congressmen 
and deprive 700 men of this settled and 
steady means of supporting themselves, 
and their families, is no different from 
the descent of 700 Goths and Vandals 
upon Southern Europe, and driving 700 
families off from their farms. 

The devilish inhumanity of this plun¬ 
dering system is well illustrated by the 
following Washington dispatch: 

A great many of the diseharged employes, partle 
















134 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ularly the women, are very poor, have no homes to 
go to, and have no other means of support. They 
are haunting the halls of congress from morning 
until night, and beseeching representatives who 
are supposed to have influence, to assist them In 
getting their places back. 

Charles F. Stone has been nominated 
to be naval officer at the Boston custom¬ 
house. Stone says: 

As a democrat, all other things being equal, I be¬ 
lieve the olliccs belong to democrats, but it will not 
be my purpose to Impair the elTiciency of the serv¬ 
ice by creating vacancies simply to give positions 
to those of my own party faith, irrespective of 
qualifications. However, I am frank to say that in 
my opinion, so far as the same can be done consist¬ 
ently, the plums should go to democrats. 

Any private employer would at once get 
rid of a superintendent who declared such 
unbusiness-like and vicious sentiments. 
Yet, of the multitude of shallow, prating 
appointees who have slapped President 
Cleveland’s face with his own reform liter¬ 
ature, he has been cowed, seemingly, by 
every one, and there is no reason to ex¬ 
pect a different result now. But how re¬ 
freshing it would be if even one such up¬ 
start politician were told that his princi¬ 
ples are not such as must prevail in the 
civil service, and that he may seek some 
other field. 

The civil service law provides that no 
person shall, in any room or building oc¬ 
cupied in the discharge of his duties by 
any government employe, “solicit in any 
manner whatever,” money for political 
purposes. Attorney-General Olney has 
given an opinion that the solicitation may 
be by letter without violating the law. A 
campaign committee may not blackmail 
by word of mouth, but may blackmail in 
writing. This opinion fits in well with 
general course of this administration in re¬ 
lation to the civil service. It is not the 
judgment of a court, but its effect will be 
that the district attorneys, who, almost to 
a man, are in favor of assessments, will 
find it a welcome excuse for laxity in the 
matter of offenses against the civil service 
law. If there had been no Josiah Quincy 
we should have wondered how Massachu¬ 
setts could have produced a man like Ol¬ 
ney. 


Some three months ago the highly effi¬ 
cient postmaster of Indianapolis, after hav¬ 
ing been in the post office nineteen years 
in various positions, was turned out be¬ 
cause he had been up to the Minneapolis 
convention and had worked for General 
Harrison’s renomination. 

On June 6th, however, a Sullivan dis¬ 
patch to the Indianapolis Sentinel said: 

The democrats of the county held a very enthusi- 
a/stic convention here to day. The convention was 
called to order by United States Marshal W. H. Haw¬ 
kins. 

We do not wish to be “querulous” nor 


“impertinent,” but we venture to ask 
whether turning out the republican par¬ 
ticipator and keeping in the democratic 
participator is hypocrisy? 

On June 18tb, is the following dispatch 
from Greensburgh, Ind.: 

Saturday afternoon the democrats of Washington 
township met at the mayor’s oflice. Delegates 
were chosen to the state and congressional conven¬ 
tions, Holman’s friends getting their men accord¬ 
ing to programme and contrary to the expectations 
of a number opposed to the veteran. Mendenhall 
is Holman’s clerk of the committee on Indian af¬ 
fairs, and has been here for several weeks laying 
the pipes to secure a solid Holman delegation from 
Decatur county. The better class of democrats are 
growing tired of his bosslsm. He occupied a prom¬ 
inent position in the convention and dictated what 
should be done. 

Postmaster General Bissell is circu¬ 
lating among the postmasters President 
Cleveland’s famous order of 1886, forbid¬ 
ding office-holders to interfere in politics. 
Probably Mr. Cleveland never made a 
more conspicuous failure than he did in 
enforcing that order. The order is known 
by heart to every democrat in the country, 
and what it now needs is not circulation 
but enforcement. In all the years of its 
existence we do not recall an example 
made of a democrat. Thousands of repub¬ 
licans have been removed for being active 
partisans, while thousands of democrats, al¬ 
though active partisans in exactly the same 
manner, are unmolested. If Mr, Bissell 
wants to show the country that he is sin¬ 
cere, he can do so by dealing with the post¬ 
masters in Congressman Bretz’s district— 
beginning with Royal E. Purcell, postmas¬ 
ter at Vincennes and editor of the Vin¬ 
cennes Sun. It was by the efforts of these 
postmasters that Brelz secured his renom¬ 
ination. The same may also be said of 
Congressman Cooper and his postmasters, 

June 16 the democrats of Huntington 
West Virginia, undertook to hold a prima¬ 
ry election. Mr. Cleveland’s United States 
marshal, Vinson, though not living in the 
county, and a gang of deputy marshals ap¬ 
peared and began to work for candidates 
who favored the re election of Senator 
Camden. This led to fights and bloodshed, 
a deputy marshal being prevented from 
shooting Ex-Congressman Gibson only by 
the interference of the police. The chair¬ 
man of the primary at last sent the follow¬ 
ing telegram to Washington: 

Attorney-General Olney, Washington — United 
States Marshal Vinson, of Wayne county, with a 
platoon of deputies, is here at work as partisans in 
the democratic primary for legislative candidates. 
Is it not unlawful? Please advise him at once. 
Answer. 

Every body must remember the recent 
history of the Murphy machine, printed in 
the Chronicle, closing with the murder of 
a citizen of high standing by Senator Mur¬ 
phy’s henchmen, the uprising of the citizens 
of Troy, and their fruitless attempt to get 


Governor Flower to have the trial of the 
murderers taken from the influence of this 
machine. A large body of eminent and 
distinguished citizens of Troy believe that 
Senator Murphy is responsible for the 
murder of a man who was doing what 
every honest man should do in the protest 
against fraudulent voting. These same 
citizens have declared that the Murphy 
machine is so fortified by patronage that it 
is well-nigh impregnable. And yet two 
weeks ago the President appointed Mur¬ 
phy’s man, Michael F. Sheary to be post¬ 
master at Troy. The senate confirmed 
him the same day. His bond reached the 
post-office department on Sunday night; 
was approved Monday morning, went the 
same evening to the President, and in 
short, in one week Murphy’s man was 
nominated, confirmed and commissioned, 
“This record,” says the newspaper report, 
“is unprecedented.” The Springfield Re¬ 
publican says: 

The admiuistration has evidently brought Sen¬ 
ator Murphy to its support, so far as tariff legisla¬ 
tion is concerned, by the only means which would 
influence the “collars and cuffs” statesman from 
Troy. He has been permitted to name the new 
postmaster in that city. Statements are now fre¬ 
quent in the newspapers, that Murphy will not 
support Hill in his policy of obstruction to the ad¬ 
ministration, and certainly he has not been voting 
with him of late. 


Up to the time I differed with Mr. Cleveland on 
the silver question, he had done me the honor to 
consult me freely and often as to Missouri appoint¬ 
ments, and I had honestly endeavored to advise 
him, as was my duty. When he suddenly departed 
from this custom, and appointed to the most im¬ 
portant office in Kansas City a gentleman who had 
supported almost the entire republican ticket in 
1892,1 considered his action a declaration that my 
opinions were no longer needed, and that the Pres¬ 
ident intended to emphasize that fact in the most 
public manner.—J^rom the letter of Senator Vest to 
the New York Evening Post, June 8, IS'JU. 

Senator Vest evidently believes that pa¬ 
tronage was withheld from him as a pun¬ 
ishment for his stand upon silver legisla¬ 
tion. Looking at congressmen, for in¬ 
stance, Voorhees of Indiana, whose opin¬ 
ions had been the same as Senator Vest’s 
but whose vote was with the administra¬ 
tion and whose rivulets of patronage 
swelled into rivers, there is hardly a chance 
to doubt the correctness of Senator Vest’s 
diagnosis of his case. We can not do bet¬ 
ter than to quote from Mr. Storey: 

“The moment it is understood that legislation is 
for sale, that moment the seeds of revolution have 
been sown, and the revolution in time is sure to 
come. If the populist, the anarchist, the socialist, 
succeed in turning out the men who are in power 
and appointing men of their own caliber, their own 
party, in their places, they will apply the same 
rule; they will use the offices to buy votes for their 
pernicious measures.” 

Mr. Vest’s experience also illustrates 
why Mr. Cleveland has felt as he has the 
tremendous pressure against reform in his 
own party. Whenever his reform friends 
have ventured to suggest any criticism of 
his course, he has turned with the demand 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


135 


for sympathy because of the dreadful dif¬ 
ficulties of his position. He has made 
these difficulties. How can one expect 
Vest or Hill to respect a stand on the spoils 
system that is one thing for one senator 
and another thing for him? We hear a 
great deal about practical and practicable 
reform. A steady, consistent plan of 
reform, even the most drastfc and far- 
reaching plan would never have resulted 
in the venom and in the onslaught that 
have come from the President’s isolated 
efforts to assert for personal reasons the 
supremacy of the executive. 


It would seem that the Indianapolis 
district had carried an incubus in the shape 
of Congressman Bynum long enough. He 
was too cowardly to have his vote recorded 
in favor of breaking down the merit sys¬ 
tem, yet he is and has always been one of 
the most vicious enemies of that system. 
This action illustrates his whole character. 
He has no political principles by which he 
will stand in a personal emergency. He 
is devoid of reliable political opinions. 
His notion of politics is to work spoil for 
all it is worth. From the first day he be¬ 
came a congressman he has debauched the 
public service to his utmost. The effect of 
his whole course as a congressman has 
been, not to elevate, but to degrade poli¬ 
tics. The only way to do with such a man 
is to beat him at the polls. 


MAJOR HANDBURY AGAIN, 

Some one sent a long dispatch from 
Washington to the New York Times, .June 
11th, in which the Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle is charged with not stating the facts 
last month as to Major Handbury, who 
was transferred by the war department 
from Louisville to St. Augustine. We 
note some things in this rebuke with much 
satisfaction. We note that while Major 
Handbury is an excellent engineer, “he is 
not a person of tact.” We honor the 
lack of tact which will not allow an of¬ 
ficer to stand silent while political bosses 
load up the service with heelers and 
rounders. Again, Major Handbury re¬ 
fused to heed a recommendation of Con¬ 
gressman Caruth, who wanted a “friend” 
quartered upon the public treasury, and 
then did not refrain from “discussing, 
with unconcealed satisfaction, in more or 
less public places, the decision he had 
shown in jumping on a politician.” Thus 
“he had needlessly and undiplomatically 
provoked Mr. Caruth’s dislike.” If there 
is in the whole United States one officer 
who is brave enough to openly denounce 
a congressman engaged in preying upon 
the public service, a ray of light has cer¬ 
tainly appeared. The fact that heads of 


divisions, heads of departments, cabinet 
officers and the President stand in such 
cringing fear of congressmen that they 
dare not refuse them spoil is the most 
disgraceful fact connected with our gov¬ 
ernment. The army officer who denounced 
Caruth set them a lesson in manliness 
which ought to make them ashamed. 

Again, the Timea’s dispatch asserts that 
Secretary Lament made a minor appoint¬ 
ment under Major Handbury, and that the 
latter notified the appointee in writing 
that he might not find the place comfort¬ 
able, and thereupon the appointee declined 
it. Why are facts kept concealed? Who 
was this man? It has always been said 
that Presidents and cabinet officers could 
not personally know men for subordinate 
places, but must rely upon recommenda¬ 
tions. Who recommended this man? In 
the face of this studied concealment fair- 
minded men will conclude that the man was 
a leech, a heeler, recommended by Caruth, 
and that Major Handbury knew the char¬ 
acter of the man, and very properly 
warned him off", and thereby again showed 
himself a faithful and efficient officer. 
Upon the evidence of his accusers the 
more this matter is sifted the more it ap¬ 
pears that Major Handbury has been made 
the victim of an ignoble spite and sacri¬ 
ficed to a desire upon the part of the ad¬ 
ministration to mollify Caruth whom he 
had angered. The fact that Caruth did 
not know when the transfer was made 
only makes the matter worse. For Secre¬ 
tary Lament or the President to attempt 
to give Caruth an agreeable surprise of 
this kind is only the more abject. 

It is rather late in the day for followers 
of the administration to begin to be sensi¬ 
tive about the purchase of congressmen’s 
votes with patronage. Such a sensitiveness 
might have been useful months ago, but 
the fact is now so branded upon the ad¬ 
ministration that the mark can never be 
removed. As to the “impertinence,” the 
“overzealousness,” and the “querulous¬ 
ness” of the Civil Service Chronicle, it 
is proud of the acts which have caused it 
to be thus charged, and in the same manner 
it intends to be more impertinent, more 
overzealous and more querulous as the 
time goes on. 


THE JACKSONIAN DOCTRINE IN ITS 
FINAL DEVELOPMENT. 

Since the publication of the Civil Service 
C iiRONiCLi: began it has given much space to 
the political organization known as Tammany 
Hall of New York City. This, with Gorman’s 
organization in Maryland, (Quay’s in Pensylva- 
nia, and others of greater or less note, it has 
regarded as the perfection of the spoils sys¬ 
tem and as being upon the margin between a 
government by the people and oligarchy and 


imperialism. We have from time to time 
given facts to prove this position. Neverthe¬ 
less Tammany and the other organizations 
have not only been tolerated but have been 
nursed and petted by their respective parties. 
Members of Tammany Hall have been distin¬ 
guished by appointments to great offices like the 
postmastership at NewYork, and in many other 
places throughout the country, notably in In¬ 
dianapolis, this organization has been the 
envy of party leaders. But Tammany Hall 
is uncovered, and an amount of degradation, 
of thieving, of multitudes of officials ac¬ 
cumulating vast sums by preying upon that 
great under world which lives without the 
pale of the law, has been revealed to an ex¬ 
tent infinitely beyond the faintest suspicion of 
the people of this country. The thousands of 
executive officers of the city of New York hold 
their places at the will of Tammany and they 
are not in any sense the trustees of the people, 
but an organized band of ghouls feeding ujion 
the vices of the criminal and the weak. This 
is the last stage of the spoils system. This is 
giving the offices to the party in power in or¬ 
der that subordinates may be in touch with the 
party policy. To be more explicit: Captains 
of the police are from time to time shifted. 
Upon the advent of a new captain each dis¬ 
orderly house in his district pays him an “in¬ 
itiation fee” of $500. After that the fee for 
keeping the house without molestation by the 
police is $50 a month, with a Christmas pres¬ 
ent to the captain and something for the 
“ward man,” the captain’s factotum ; $25 a 
month are paid by saloons for the privi¬ 
lege of running without a license. In addi¬ 
tion all must be ready to take five or ten tick¬ 
ets to chowder parties or picnics at $5 a ticket. 
There is an attorney system by which favorite 
attorneys take fees from $100 upward from ar¬ 
rested law-breakers and secure for them by a 
word or by a name written on a slip of paper 
immunity from prosecution. One such attor¬ 
ney, named Roesch, after a profitable career 
of this kind has become a police justice him¬ 
self. To get a position as patrolman the ap¬ 
plicant must pay $300, while a captaincy costs 
$10,000. In this perfect instance of the work¬ 
ing of the spoils system we have exhibited the 
most degraded and conscienceless official and 
private character and the most infamous sys¬ 
tem of official blackmail now existing any¬ 
where in the world. 

SPOIL WITH ONE HAND AND MERIT 
WITH THE OTHER. 

On June 1, Mr. Warfield, of whom excel¬ 
lent things are reported, became postmaster 
at Baltimore. In a short speech to the em¬ 
ployes he said : 

I desire to say to the carriers and clerks that I 
propose to run the oITice on strictly business prin¬ 
ciples and as laid down In the rules by the depart¬ 
ment at Washington. I believe In civil service re¬ 
form, and in the classified service democrats and 
republicans alike shall receive the same treatment. 
.Inst so long as they perform the duties requiretl of 
them their places are secure, but I shall hold each 
man to a strict performance of his duties. 

We note that he believes in civil service re- 















136 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


form, and in the clamfied service democrats 
and republicans shall receive the same treat¬ 
ment. 

On May 14, in response to an inquiry of the 
Civil Service Chronicle, Washington Hes- 
sing, postmaster at Chicago, wrote: 

The clipping you sent me from the New York 
Evening Post is correct. Those remarks were made 
to a number of eligibles who were about to be put 
on the substitute list as clerks in this department. 
In excepted places I have of course given prefer¬ 
ence to personal and political friends, but wher¬ 
ever I have considered the efficiency of the depart¬ 
ment was best served by a republican, I have re¬ 
tained such a man in office. All other things being 
equal, of course I would put on men of my own po¬ 
litical faith. I believe in civil service, and no gov¬ 
ernmental appointee wili be more strict and ear¬ 
nest in carrying out civil service law’s than I. 1 be¬ 
lieve if every employe, federal, state and local, 
could be under civil service rules, millions of dol¬ 
lars would be saved to the people themselves, the 
service much more satisfactory, and even the office- 
seekers, to say nothing of the office-holders, better 
pleased. 

Mr. Hessing is even more explicit than Mr. 
Warfield. He says that if every employe, fed¬ 
eral, state and local, could be under civil serv¬ 
ice rules, millions of dollars would be saved 
to the people, the service would be more satis¬ 
factory, and even the office seekers would be 
better pleased, and yet Mr. Hessing turned the 
unclassified service over to personal and polit¬ 
ical friends. When, by his own admission, he 
could have taken such a reform step, why did 
he not himself put these places under a com¬ 
petitive test? The civil service commission 
has for years plead with whoever was Presi¬ 
dent over the absurdity of the “ excepted 
places.” It puts, in almost every case, over 
employes who have got into the service by 
competition, a man who is the enemy to com¬ 
petition because his place came through fav¬ 
oritism. These are the leaders in all the bul¬ 
lying and trickery against the classified serv¬ 
ice, and yet the moderate amount of backbone 
re(iuired for this moderate step forward does 
not seem to be at hand. 


DILETTANTE REFORMERS. 

The trying part of fighting the spoils system 
is not in the kicks of the spoilsmen, but the 
needle-thrusts of the great body of dilettante 
sympathizers who assure you that they ap¬ 
prove of your object, but your methods are 
tiresome. The golden mean of interesting 
these people in reform, but not of arous¬ 
ing any consciousness of obligation to arise 
and put on their own armor, is an acro¬ 
batic position extremely hard upon the 
fighter. He knows perfectly well that vic¬ 
tory will end the struggle, that the fight is 
thoroughly interesting, that it is being con¬ 
ducted scientifically and practically; but these 
dilettanti, who call themselves conservative 
reformers, warn him against pessimism, against 
boring people with unpleasant facts and over¬ 
zealousness, and at the last, superciliously 
class him as a man of one idea and a theorist. 

To continue his work in spite of such criti¬ 
cisms of the friends of good government re¬ 


quired more courage and persistence in Dr. 
Parkhurst than all the open barriers Tammany 
could raise. In fact these people were more 
or less the instruments of Tammany Hall. 
It knew how to arouse the party bigotry, the 
dislike to the disagreeable work of citizen¬ 
ship of this class of the community, and it 
recognized the imperative necessity of furnish¬ 
ing an anesthetic for the rigorous American 
conscience, and so Dr, Parkhurst was re¬ 
proved for sensationalism, for contaminating 
the young and for employing spies to track 
out infamous things. He persisted and now 
he is vindicated. 


CIVIL SERVI.CE REFORM.* 

Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : 
No human government, however cunningly 
devised, however skillful its system of checks 
and balances, can succeed unless it is admin¬ 
istered by men of ability and integrity. In 
every form of government, brains and charac¬ 
ter are required for public office. As Mr. 
Schurz put it the other day, speaking of mu- 
nicijial government, “If Gabriel draws your 
charter, and Lucifer administers it, your gov¬ 
ernment will be bad. If Lucifer draws your 
charter, and Gabriel is called upon to adminis¬ 
ter it, your government will be good.” Most 
of all men, we, who are working out the great 
experiment of self-government for the world, 
who are called upon to deal, not only with 
the delicate questions of taxation, of finance, 
of the relation between labor and capital, of the 
business of sixty-five millions of people, which 
other governments to a certain extent are 
called upon to deal with also, but who are re¬ 
quired to consider and settle these questions 
under difiSculties of our own, difficulties aris¬ 
ing from the presence in this country of four 
millions of people who were lately slaves, dif¬ 
ficulties arising from the constant immigra¬ 
tion of men who bring here no acquaintance 
with our questions, no familiarity with our 
traditions and our methods, and frequently no 
understanding of our language. We, certain¬ 
ly, with municipal questions, as well as na¬ 
tional questions before us, require brains and 
character. 

Let me remind yon, briefly, if you will per¬ 
mit me, of a tendency which has lately devel¬ 
oped in this country toward the methods of 
Mexico. I will not allude to the newer com¬ 
munities, nor even to a state like Kansas, 
where last year we found the governor of the 
state ordering a colonel of the militia to take 
possession of the house of representatives, and 
the colonel refusing to obey his orders, and 
the democrats and republicans engaged almost 
in a fisticuff fight for the possession of the 
hall. That is comparatively a new communi¬ 
ty. But here in New England, in the most 
orderly and best conducted part of this coun¬ 
try, where the traditions of self-government 
are the strongest, only a few years ago in 

•^Address of Moorfield Storey delivered before 
the students of Harvard College, at Sanders Thea¬ 
ter, Cambridge, February 20,1894. 


Maine, under the administration of Governor 
Garcelon, the worst frauds were perpetrated, 
violence, and deceit of every kind, for the 
purpose of defeating the will of the people. 
Two years ago, in New Hampshire, we found 
a republican assistant clerk—the clerk himself 
having resigned because he was unwilling to 
do the work—organizing the legislature in the 
interest of the republican party, by refusing 
to recognize certain persons who had been 
elected by the people, in defiance of the ojiin- 
ion of the best republican lawyers. In Con¬ 
necticut, only two years ago, the whole legis¬ 
lative power of the state was paralyzed for 
two years. In New York the legislature was 
made democratic because the attorney-gen¬ 
eral of the state stole a return and prevented 
the proper canvassing. And in New Jersey 
to-day we have one republican and one 
democratic senate, each claiming to be the 
true senate. 

This is in the very best part of America. 
We certainly need brains and character if 
republican institutions are to succeed. And 
yet we have a skilfully devised sj’stem, aptly 
called “ the spoils system,” which keeps both 
out of the public service, whose tendency is 
inevitable, and steadily operating, and its re¬ 
sults are before you. 

We have, in this country, two hundred 
thousand offices, dealing only with those offices 
which come under the federal government. 
If you add those which belong to the state 
and municipal systems, the number would be 
something like five hundred thousand. The 
amount paid in salaries to the federal office¬ 
holders alone is one hundred millions a year, 
and that great sura of money is treated, by 
those of the public servants who are charged 
with the duty of appointing others to office, 
as a fund which belongs to them, and which 
they have the right to spend, not for the pur¬ 
poses for which itwas created, but for the pur¬ 
pose of helping themselves—helping their 
own political fortunes—helping their party in 
order that they may keep in office; and at 
times, and times which become more frequent 
every year, for the purpose of supporting their 
friends and their relations. That is going on 
about you every day. Our money, placed in 
their hands in trust for a certain purpose, is be¬ 
ing, in effect, stolen and applied to an entirely 
distinct purpose. Raised for the public use, it 
is being put in private pockets, and used for 
private gain. 

Now, what is the effect of that on the public 
service? Let us deal, first, with its effect on 
the office-holder. How does a man get office? 
Leaving out of view, for the present, that por¬ 
tion of the federal offices which has been res¬ 
cued from the operation of the spoils system 
by the civil service law, a man gets office, 
first, by establishing claims on his party. The 
doctrine is very well expressed by two office¬ 
holders under the last administration. One 
of them was the man who was appointed col¬ 
lector of internal revenue for the Indian¬ 
apolis district, and who said that to secure an 
appointment from him a man must show 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


137 


“that he is an unwavering, active republican.” 
Tlie mere fact that a man may always have 
voted the ticket is not nearly enough. He 
must have been an active party worker.” And 
General Coulter, of Ohio, the sixth auditor of 
the treasury, having dismissed the deputy and 
chief clerk and nine of the chiefs of divisions 
for no reason except that they were democrats, 
remarked: “That is what we are here for, and 
it is about time that the men who did the 
horn-blowing during the lastcampaign should 
have something to show for their labor.” 
[Laughter.] There is the doctrine, from high 
official sources. 

After a man has worked at party caucuses, 
after he has attended conventions, after he has 
attached himself to the fortunes of some suc¬ 
cessful political chief, he has established 
claims, claims which must be recognized. 
And what is the next step? The next step is 
to get indorsements. To get them, he himself 
or his friends must carry around a paper, 
must get the signatures of all the prominent 
men of the same political way of thinking 
that he can find, must get the signatures of 
prominent citizens who are independent, but 
who are believed to have some influence with 
the appointing power. And then, with these 
credentials, he goes to his member of con¬ 
gress. He there meets various other people 
with like claims, and very likely with the 
same indorsements, for this business of in¬ 
dorsements has been reduced very nearly to a 
science. An officer high in the federal gov¬ 
ernment told me not long ago that one mem¬ 
ber of congress said to him: “Whenever you 
see my name written in lull on an indorse¬ 
ment, you will understand that it counts for 
nothing. Whenever you see it written with 
my initials, that means business.” [Laughter.] 

So the unhappy candidate, provided with 
indorsements which either do not count or do, 
enters into a struggle with other men similar¬ 
ly equipped, and by and by he gets, perhaps, 
an appointment. And what does he get? Not 
a place where he may be sure that fidelity and 
efficiency will count, not a place which holds 
out to him a career. No matter how faithful 
his service, no matter how long his experience, 
it his party is defeated, if that wing of the 
party to which he attached himself loses its 
control, if his particular patron goes out of 
power, or, even worse, if his patron findssome 
other henchman whose services he thinks are 
more likely to be useful, out he goes. The 
best of records is ignored. He may have spent 
twenty years of his life in office, he may have 
fitted himself to discharge the duties of that 
office singularly well, he may be absolutely 
unfitted for any other employment, as a man 
is likely to be who spends his life in a bureau, 
he may have a large family dependent on him 
for support; and when he pleads these claims, 
the answer of the appointing power is, “Other 
men have families. You have had it twenty 
years. Other men want salaries. Out you 
go.” No one thinks of the public service. It 
is simply a question between two claimants. 
The public service is sacrificed. 


Now, is that a system which is likely to at¬ 
tract men of brains and character? A man 
who occupies official ]) 08 ition is bound, not 
merely to think as his party thinks—any lack 
of political orthodoxy is fatal—but he is 
bound to think as his wing of his party thinks, 
as his patron thinks. And his melancholy 
position is perhaps illustrated by a story I 
used to hear of a man who was postmaster at 
Concord when that town was strongly anti¬ 
slavery, and he held office under a demo¬ 
cratic administration. He was an apothecary, 
and wanted to keep his customers. He was a 
postmaster, and he wanted to keep his office. 
Consequently he was singularly non-commit¬ 
tal, and it was very hard for his fellow-citizens 
to find out where he stood on any of the burn¬ 
ing questions of the day. And he did not 
mean that they should. By and by there came 
an election, and they set a trap for him. A 
committee was appointed to watch him and 
see how he voted. He went up to the polls, 
and it happened to be the first year when the 
law took effect which allowed a voter to ask 
for an envelope and inclose his ballot. He 
asked for an envelope and went through the 
form apparently of inclosing his ballot, and 
they thought they had lost him. But when 
the votes came to be counted it was found 
there was only one envelope, and they thought 
they had got him. But when they opened the 
envelope they found there was no ballot in it. 
[Loud laughter.] 

Consider what the miserable position of a 
man must be who does not even dare to tell 
himself what he thinks on politics [laughter,] 
who does not even dare to vote in secret. That 
system, gentlemen, does not attract men of 
brains and character. And what is the re¬ 
sult? Take, for example, the census, which is 
a very important business. It is very im¬ 
portant that the statistics of this country 
should be taken accurately once in ten years, 
and a great deal of money is spent in order to 
secure accuracy. The civil service reformers 
urged the President, and urged the commis¬ 
sioner of the census, to put that office under 
the civil service rules before the last census was 
taken, but he declined to do it, and the census 
went on. The first thing that was discovered, 
by a recount in New York, *ras a difference of 
200,000 inhabitants in that city—a pretty 
large percentage. And the question was 
asked the superintendent of the census, “How 
do you explain this?” “Well,” said he, “I 
do not know that I can fairly say whether it 
is due to carelessness in the original enuiuer- 
ation, or whether it is due to fraudulent 
counting the second time.” Now, certainly, 
if his census was of the least value, he ought 
to have known; if his enumerators were to be 
trusted at all, he ought to have known. Per¬ 
haps, again, a story of personal experience 
which happened in a family with which I am 
very familiar, in Brookline, may throw some 
light on the cause of that discrepancy. The 
enumerator came into the house, and, being 
informed that the oldest daughter was in Eu¬ 
rope, declined to enumerate her on the ground 


that she would be counted there. [Laughter.] 
He was finally driven from that position and 
consented to count her. He then asked the 
birthplaces of different members of the fam¬ 
ily, and the mother said, “I was born in 
Washington, D. C.” “Delaware county?” “No, 
D. C., District of Columbia.” “Well, in what 
state is it?” “It is not in any state, it is the 
District of Columbia.” “But it must be in 
some state.” And again a club was used, and 
he finally surrendered, saying “Well, I will 
put it so, but they won’t know where it is,” 
[Laughter.] He then insisted on cla.ssifying 
the oldest daughter as a housemaid without 
pay [loud laughter], as being the only blank 
which the census offered, there being no 
other possible heading under which she could 
be enumerated. Now, gentlemen and ladies, 
this did not take place in any remote part of 
this country, but it took place in Brookline, 
under the shadow oi Harvard College [laugh¬ 
ter], in sight of the gilded dome, and in per¬ 
haps the most intelligent community about 
here. Only the spoils system could find such 
an enumerator in Brookline. If it happened 
there, what do you suppose must have hap¬ 
pened in the Tammany districts of New York, 
and what happened all over this country? 
That is the legitimate business result of the 
spoils system as applied to the census. 

Now, take the Indian question. I do not 
know how many Indians you suppose we have 
in this country. We naturally imagine they 
are very numerous. I believe there are 
250,000. And it has been stated that we spend 
enough in taking care of them to board each 
one at the best hotel in New York. [Laugh¬ 
ter.] Why? Because we have neither brains 
nor character in the Indian service. If by 
accident either of those qualities appear, it is 
promptly extirpated. [Laughter.] Under the 
last administration, or under the last admin¬ 
istration but one, my recollection is that out 
of fifty-eight Indian agents, fifty-six were re¬ 
moved. Under the last administration fifty- 
seven of the fifty-eight were removed. Against 
the protest of every body who was familiar 
with the subject, the experienced and compe¬ 
tent men were turned out. And what was the 
result? The result was the death of a great 
many people in the northwest. The result was 
that Pine Ridge outbreak, directly traceable 
to replacing a competent man, in whom the 
Indians had confidenc, with a miserable poli¬ 
tician, who was appointed at the behest of one 
of the senators from Dakota, on the ground 
that the home-rule doctrine must be applied, 
and that the spoils of that particular state be¬ 
longed to the senators from that state. The 
result was an outbreak. Farmers were obliged 
to abandon their property, farms were laid 
waste, a whole section was thrown into confu¬ 
sion ; and the final result was, that men, 
women and children were surrounded and 
shot down by men who wore the uniform of the 
government. That is the result of the spoils 
system in another form. 

Now, take the consular service. Here is a 
great country which desires to preserve inti- 









138 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


mate commercial relations with its neighbors. 
An excellent consul in any part of the world 
is a missionary, a missionary of commerce, a 
man who can lay bifore the merchants of this 
country important facts for their guidance. 
And what do we have? The longer a consul 
remains in place the more familiar he becomes 
with the people, the more familiar he be¬ 
comes with the business, the more useful he is 
to those of his fellow-citizens who happen to 
find themselves there, the more useful he is to 
his country. But our system is, once in four 
years, to turn them all out and fill their places, 
not with men who are selected because they 
are fitter, not with men who know anything 
about even the language of the place to which 
they are accredited, but men who have success¬ 
fully packed some caucus, perhaps in Indiana, 
and who have claims and indorsements. Some 
years ago we had a minister in Chili under Gen¬ 
eral Grant, a man whose character and whose 
conduct was such that the Chilian government 
requested his recall. General Grant looked 
into the case and recalled him. Shortly after¬ 
ward another republican president was elected, 
and this man, who had been making cam¬ 
paign speeches in one of the states, desired an 
appointment, and they sent him back to Chili. 
They slapped the most powerful government 
in South America in the face, they paralyzed 
our influence there for a great many years, 
they injured our commerce, merely that that 
man might have perhaps ,?12,000 a year, which 
he did not earn and to which he was not in 
the least degree entitled. That is the way the 
spoils system works in our foreign relations. 
You have got a system which drives the men 
of character and the men of brains out of 
your service, for such men will not pay the 
price which is now charged for a public office. 
Men will not pay any price unless they get 
something in return. And an office which 
leads nowhere, an office where character and 
capacity count for nothing, is not a place 
which a man of either character or brains is 
likely to take. The result is you have bad 
workmen, and where you have bad workmen 
you are sure to have bad and expensive work. 

Now, there is another effect. People some¬ 
times say that a class of office-holders is to be 
avoided. Well, gentlemen, a class of office¬ 
holders is not to be named in the same day 
with a class of office-seekers. [Laughter.] For 
one office-holder there are twenty men who 
are demoralized by the hope that they may be 
able to get their living without work; that 
they may get an office, which to them seems a 
sinecure. Those men may be said to live on 
faith, hope, and ultimately on charity. [Laugh¬ 
ter.] They fill the departments at Washington, 
they beset congressmen and the President, they 
grow more and more demoralized, and finally 
they degenerate into deadbeats. If you will 
go with me to Washington and walk up and 
down Pennsylvania avenue, I can show yon 
shoals of them, aimless, hopeless, useless men, 
who have been ruined by the spoils system— 
men who might have been useful citizens, who 
might have filled some prominent place in the 


body politic, but who are now mere driftwood 
on the surface of the stream. 

Now, what next? How is it with the legis¬ 
lature? How does the present system act with 
men of character and ability there? I could 
occupy all my time, and more time than you 
would feel disposed to listen, by reading you 
testimony from thefinst statesmen of thecountry 
as to the effect.which it produced on them. 
One man, for example, said, after spending two 
or three years in congress, that there ought to be 
one man to attend to the business for which 
congressmen were elected, and another man 
elected from the same district to take care of 
the offices; one man could not do both. Now, 
as a matter of fact, a man who goes to con¬ 
gress soon finds himself beset by these people 
with influence and with claims. It is a very 
hard business to decide between them. He is 
pretty certain, if he recommends A, to offend 
B and a large variety of other letters of the 
alphabet. After he has made h's selection 
with pains and thought, he has got to go and 
beset the President, beset the secretary of state, 
infest the offices of various members of the 
cabinet, and struggle with representatives 
from other states. His time and his thought, 
which ought to be devoted to considering the 
very delicate questions of legislation which 
come before congress, are in fact largely occu¬ 
pied, and in some cases entirely occupied, with 
this miserable business of trying to minister 
to the selfish wants of certain office-seekers. 
No thought of the public service enters here. 
These men do not go to the President and 
secretary of state and say: “You have got 
in that place a wholly incompetent person, 
and I offer you here a man whose training, 
whose ability, whose experience, singularly 
fit him to fill the place.” Nothing of that 
sort occurs. They are very apt to go and say: 
“Here I have a constituent who wants a con¬ 
sulship, and his salary ought to be about 
$2,000. Let us look over the list of consuls.” 
So he runs them down. “That place I have 
promised to So-and-So, of Arkansas; he can 
not have that. But here is a consulship with 
a salary of $2,000 that will suit him.” 
“Who is in it?” “A. B.” “Oh, kick him out 
and appoint my man.” Nobody stops to in¬ 
quire whether tfi« man who is there is a good 
consul, nobody thinks of asking primarily 
whether the man that seeks the place is the 
man best fitted for it. He has claims, and he 
has influence, and the public service suffers. 

Now, that work is not work which men of 
brains and character like to do. It is not 
pleasant when you are elected to congress to 
find your waking and your sleeping hours oc¬ 
cupied by office seekers; to be continually 
weighing in the balance their respective de¬ 
mands, and offending other people to gratify 
them. But the member of congress who neg¬ 
lects that work, in many sections of the coun¬ 
try, soon finds that what he calls his “fences” 
are down, and he has- to go home and look after 
them or lose his place. The result is, that the 
men who are in congress, the men who ought 
to be able to give their whole time and 


thought to the legislative work which they are 
elected to do, have not the time for it, and 
they are continually distracted from their 
work by these petty considerations. And, on 
the other hand, constantly worse men are 
elected, because the man who makes the most 
promises to the would-be candidates for office, 
the man who establishes the closest relations 
with the men who manage the caucus and the 
machine, is the man who is likely to go to 
congress; while the man who should stand up 
at the beginning of his campaign and say be¬ 
fore the nominating convention met, “If I 
am elected I do not propose to recommned a 
single person for any office,” would be pretty 
reasonably certain of not securing even a 
nomination. In that way, the character of 
your legislative bodies is steadily deteriorat¬ 
ing. Do you want evidence of it? Ask your¬ 
selves who are the senators to-day from the 
great republican state of Pennsylvania and 
the great democratic state of New York? 
Quay and Cameron; Hill and Murphyl 
[Laughter.] How happen these men to be 
there? What is their record as statesmen? 
What contribution have they ever made to 
the great questions which this country is 
called upon to decide? Were they selected on 
account of their eminent public services, on 
account of conspicuous ability, or because 
they are leaders of public opinion? I doubt 
if there is any strong partisan of either party 
in this audience who would stand up and an¬ 
swer that question in the affirmative. Those 
men are there because they knew how to 
wield the patronage successfully, because they 
were good managers of the machine. And 
what is the result? Last summer the business 
of this country was paralyzed, disaster to 
many of us seemed imminent, great industries 
were stopped, workmen were out of work, and 
the prospect on every side seemed desperate. 
The country made up its mind that the cause 
was the law which required the purchase of 
.so much silver every month, and congre.ss was 
called together to repeal it. Certainly there 
were no states in this Union more strongly in 
favor of that repeal than Pennsylvania and 
New York. And yet Senator Cameron stood 
up and made a speech in opposition to it. 
And when the senate tried to force a vote by 
remaining in continuous session, and failed. 
Senator Hill walked out of the chamber and 
remarked, “Well, it wasn’t a very good Cleve¬ 
land day, was it?” All these men thought of 
was their petty political contest. The inter¬ 
ests of the country received no attention at 
their hands. Those four senators are the le¬ 
gitimate fruit of the spoils system, in the 
highest legislature of the country. If you are 
mortified that the largest and richest states in 
the country are so represented, the remedy is 
to abolish the system which puts them there. 

Now, let us come to the President. How is 
he affected? I might remind you of the first 
President Harrison, who was killed in a 
month by office-seekers, a man who had served 
in various wars, but who could not bear that 
contest. I might remind you of President 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


139 


Garfield, whose assassination was generally 
recognized as being the direct result of an un¬ 
seemly contest over spoils, which occurred 
during the first six months of his term. But 
I do not care to take such comparatively re¬ 
cent illustrations. Let me carry you back to 
the time of the civil war—a time certainly 
when every patriotic citizen in this country 
recognized that his first duty was tp his coun¬ 
try, when men were willing to sacrifice their 
lives and their property, and every thing that 
they valued, in order that the rebellion might 
be put down. Every sane man recognized 
that at that time the future of the country, 
the future of a race, in large part depended on 
President Lincoln, upon his wise determina 
tion of the many embarrassing questions 
which he was called upon to decide. In that 
supreme moment we find him writing: “ I 
wish I had time to attend to the southern 
question, but these office-seekers demand all 
my time. I am like a man so busy let¬ 
ting rooms at one end of my house that I have 
not time to put out the fire which is burning 
in the other.” Now, if that was the experi¬ 
ence of President Lincoln at that time, what 
think you must be the experience of President 
Cleveland now, with a united country to bear 
its fruit of office-seekers, with a population 
enormously increased, with a system solidified 
by long continuance, when the offices are more 
than twice as numerous as they were then, and 
the office-seekers of course numerous in much 
larger proportion? How isit possible for a single 
human being to meet this flood of applica¬ 
tions? How is it possible to find time to con¬ 
sider the important questions that come be¬ 
fore the President of the United States, when 
every waking and sleeping moment is occu¬ 
pied by this demand? I remember, even in 
that time. President Lincoln was asked how 
he passed his day. And he had in mind a 
certain senator from New York, whom he 
called Ira. “Well,”said he, “I comedown to 
breakfast in the morning, and I find Ira there, 
and he stays and talks to me about the New 
York offices while I eat my egg, and remains 
about an hour afterward. Then I have time 
to look over my letters, and am getting ready 
for lunch, when Ira is ushered in, and he 
stays another hour—stays with me to lunch, 
and very likely goes out to drive with me. 
Then I have my dinner, and I meet a few peo¬ 
ple in the evening. Then I go to my room, 
and look under the bed and see if Ira is there, 
and if he is not I go to sleep.” [Laughter.] 
And this is not the worst of it. It is not 
merely that the system interferes with the op¬ 
erations of your government. The theory on 
which our whole institutions rest is, that when¬ 
ever we are dissatisfied with a public officer we 
have only to say so, and turn him out. At the 
next popular election the people rise in their 
might, and the officer is removed. That beau¬ 
tiful theory has disappeared in practice under 
the spoils system. Suppose you go to Balti¬ 
more. You will find there the scene of the 
hardest political battle that has been fought 
in this country for years. You will find 


there perhaps the worst city government in 
the world, a government administered by 
blackmail. And if you ask the prominent citi¬ 
zens of that place why it is that, with all their 
efforts, they have been unable to displace their 
corrupt rulers, the answer will be, “Why,Sen¬ 
ator Gorman has organized the office-holders 
of this state into such an efficient army, so 
thoroughly disciplined, that our efforts are 
useless. We can not break the line.” When 
Mr. Cowan was making his speech there he 
said to his fellow-citizens, “Why is it that 
murder, pure, simple murder, has got to be re¬ 
garded in Baltimore as a qualification for of¬ 
fice? How is it that at this moment there are 
seven murderers holding office under our city 
government, through the favor of Mr. Gor¬ 
man and his associates?” That is the fact, 
and if you want the names of the murderers I 
can give them here. But they are only feat¬ 
ures of the general situation. The truth is 
that the man who stands at the head of the 
machine buys, with the money which we con¬ 
tribute to carry on the public business, a cer¬ 
tain number of mercenaries, forms them into 
a disciplined cohort; and men who are less 
disciplined, who take a few hours from their 
business once a year for political work, which 
is what we mean by “the public rising in their 
might,” find it almost impossible to displace 
them. Take an illustration a little nearer 
home. Two years ago the people of the United 
States, certainly those who belonged to the 
democratic party, had made up their minds 
that Mr. Cleveland should be the candidate of 
that party at the next election. He seemed 
to be the person who had the strongest hold 
upon this country. It was perfectly clear that 
a majority of the democratic voters of New 
York wanted him. Senator Hill desired, him¬ 
self, to be the nominee. He knew perfectly 
well that a fairly-called convention would be 
certain to send Cleveland representatives. He 
had the entire control of the office-holders of 
the state, and he called what was known as the 
“snap convention,” before the usual time and 
without due notice, and it returned a unani¬ 
mous Hill delegation to Chicago. That is 
what it was to have the command of a band of 
mercenaries, paid for by the public money. 
What was the result? The people of New 
York were not satisfied, and, with infinite 
trouble, obtaining signatures all over the state, 
with a copious enrollment, at a great sacrifice 
of time, they succeeded in demonstrating prac¬ 
tically to every man in the country that a ma¬ 
jority of the democrats of New York were not 
satisfied with the delegates elected at that con¬ 
vention and were determined to be represented 
by delegates who were for Mr. Cleveland. And 
yet when they went to the convention their 
delegation was not admitted. Every one knew 
it was the true delegation, but this organized 
band of office-holders were determined to 
stand between the people and the bosses, and 
nothing but the strong force of public opinion 
outside the organization, clamoring at the out¬ 
side wall, finally persuaded the men inside to 
nominate Mr. Cleveland. Now, suppose they 
had not done that—and they came very near 
failing to nominate Mr. Cleveland—suppose 
Mr. Hill had been the candidate of the demo¬ 
cratic party, as under many circumstances he 
would have been against a candidate less 
strong than Mr.Cleveland, the result undoubt¬ 
edly might have been a republican victory. 
The result might have been that the verdict 
on the tariff would have been reversed, and 
the whole economic policy of this country for 
a series of years might have been changed, 
simply because this senator from New York, 
through his control of the mercenary office¬ 
holders, was able to misrepresent the people of 
that state. This is the way in which the 


spoils system deprives the people of their right 
to change their rulers at their pleasure, and 
that is an evil which it is impossible to exag¬ 
gerate. 

Nor is this all. Last year almost ever good 
citizen in the country recognized the impor¬ 
tance of repealing the silver bill. They felt 
the pressure of impending disaster, they felt 
the misery which was hanging over a great 
many innocent people, workingmen, opera¬ 
tives, the community generally. They went so 
far a.s to say that they thought the President of 
the United States ought to buy votes for the re¬ 
peal of the silver law by giving offices to 
senators; in other words, that the President of 
the United States ought to bribe congress to 
do that which the people demanded. No 
more dangerous doctrine than that was ever 
preached in a free government, and it is 
amazing to find that honorable men for a mo¬ 
ment entertained the possibility of such a 
course. And yet there are many who believe 
that that thing was done. And what does 
this mean? The American people are per¬ 
fectly disciplined to yield when the majority 
is against them. We are always willing to 
obey the will of the majority. But on this 
silver question there were a great many of our 
fellow-citizens, as honest as ourselves, who 
really believed in the existing law, who really 
believed in free silver, scattered throughout 
the south, scattered throughout the west, 
some of them here in New England. Now, 
if these people were satisfied that the majority 
of the congress of the United States, after 
careful debate] in the use of their unbiased 
judgment, had reached the conclusion that 
the silver law ought to be repealed, as good 
American citizens they would have submitted. 
But suppose they are left with the impression 
that the real belief of the majority was in 
favor of the law and that its repeal was 
brought about by bribery, you have sown the 
seeds of revolution. The moment it is under¬ 
stood that legislation is for sale, that moment 
the seeds of revolution have been sown, and 
the revolution in time is sure to come. If the 
populist, the anarchist, the socialist succeed 
in turning out the men who are in power and 
appointing men of their own caliber, their 
own party, in their places, they will apply the 
same rule; they will use the offices to buy 
votes for their pernicious measures. A bad 
example, once set, is certain to be followed; 
and instead of having a government of reason, 
we shall have a governmeutsimply of bribery, 
and no government can long endure where 
that prevails. 

Mr. Emerson said, at the breaking out of 
the war, we had been trying to do without 
justice. It was a pithy sentence. It summed 
up in a few words the whole cause of that 
struggle. Now, if we try to do without hon¬ 
esty, the revolution is just as certain to follow 
as the rebellion was to follow slavery. The 
moral laws of the universe are just as inexor¬ 
able as the law of gravitation. You can not 
avoid them. There is no truer word than the 
text, “ Be sure thy sins shall find thee out.” 
You may push the pendulum as far as you 
will one way. The farther you push it, the 
surer and the stronger is the recoil. 

Now, we have another result. If the Presi¬ 
dent interferes with the legislature, if he un¬ 
dertakes to control their action by bribery, 
the legislature, on the other hand, undertakes 
to deprive him of his undoubted prerogative. 
The senators say, “The patronage of our state 
is so important to us that we will exercise it, 
and not allow it to be exercised under the con¬ 
stitution by the President.” There has grown 
up, in consequence, what is called senatorial 
courtesy, a corrupt combination between sen¬ 
ators from different states, by which they agree 
that in case a man is nominated to office from 
one state he shall be defeated if the senators 








140 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


from that state disapprove of the nomination ; 
and if the senators happen to be of different 
political parties, if the senator who is of the 
same political faith with the appointing power 
disapproves of it. It was openly avowed the 
other day by Senator Cullom, when the ques¬ 
tion came up of confirming Mr. Hornblower, 
“Why, we must stand by Mr. Hill. We shall 
want his assistance some day. We can’t af¬ 
ford to defeat him.” And what is the result; 
what is the result that you have just seen? 
Two years ago the attorney-general of New 
York took a return when it was on its way to 
the returuing-board or the registering officer, 
at a time when the legislature of New York 
hung in the balance. The bar of New York 
proceeded to investigate the case. The bar as¬ 
sociation, through its committee, denounced 
the act, and branded the man who did it as a 
criminal. Senator Hill undertook to defy the 
public sentiment of New York by nominating 
that man for the court of appeals through an 
office holding convention which he absolutely 
controlled, and the people of New York set 
their foot upon the fraud by an enormous ma¬ 
jority. Prominent in that fight to keep the 
bench of New York pure were Mr. Hornblow¬ 
er and Mr. Peckham. One is the president of 
the New York Bar Association; both are men 
whom their fellow-members of the bar of both 
parties cordially indorse as fit for the bench; 
and they have both been defeated, not because 
they were unfit, but simply because Senator 
Hill intended to punish those men for daring 
to try to keep the bench of New York State 
pure. The thief tried to drive the judge who 
helped to convict him from the bench. And 
the whole senate of the United States, or a 
large part of it, joined hands with the thief— 
joined hands with a man whom they despised, 
and helped him to carry out that malicious 
purpose. That is the present conspicuous re¬ 
sult of the spoils system as it appears in the 
senate of the United States. 

Now, gentlemen, what is the remedy ? It is 
perfectly simple. It is the civil service re¬ 
form law; that is to say, it is a system which 
invites every citizen of this country, who 
desires to serve the United States, who de 
sires to take public office, who has the honor¬ 
able ambition of serving his country, to come 
forward and present himself as a candidate. 
Let him show his fitness, and the man who 
proves his competency is chosen. 

I need not say to you, familiar as you all are 
with the examination, that men are not exam¬ 
ined for letter-carriers on the differential cal¬ 
culus ; that it is possible, in human ingenuity, 
to devise an examination which shall test the 
fitness of a candidate for the particular of¬ 
fice for which he presents himself. And 
whenever you hear a man talk of ridiculous 
questions being asked of this kind and that 
kind, you may set that man down either as ill 
informed or as a liar. The men who have 
framed these examination papers are sensible 
men, and their purpose is to get fit men; and 
the examinations are so framed as to test the 
fitness of a man for the particular place he is 
to fill. There is no hanging around the ante¬ 
chambers of congressmen, there is no beseech¬ 
ing fellow-citizens for indorsement, there is 
no working in caucuses and conventions to 
establish claims. Fitness, and fitness alone, 
is the qualification for a place. And the 
fittest man gets it. That is the way in which 
you get men of brains and men of character. 

That law to-day applies to a certain portion 
of the service. It is capable of very great 
extension; but there are certain offices to 
which it can not be applied, certain places, for 
example, like the fourth-class postmasters, 
where the salary is so small, where .so much 
depends upon locality, that is difficult, by 
competitive examination, to select a candidate. 
But there are other schemes by which all 


these offices can be taken out of politics 
and placed purely upon a business basis, and 
some of those measures are pending in con¬ 
gress now. 

And now the question comes before you, 
young gentlemen, upon whose shoulders is 
soon to devolve your share in the government 
of this country, what can you do to end this 
abuse, what can you do to bring to an end the 
spoils system, and to bring about civil service 
reform? And remember that each one of you 
is just as responsible as every other. 

In the first place, you can declare yourselves 
the friends of the reform. You can make 
its friends your friends, and its enemies 
your enemies. You can let it be understood 
that you vote as you think. This is not 
a partisan question. This is not a case where 
the reform is to be carried through by adhe¬ 
sion to either of the great political parties. 
It would be difficult to find a hole in the 
armor of either that is not paralleled by an¬ 
other of just about the same size in the armor 
of the other. Certainly since 1876 both par¬ 
ties have zealously devoted themselves, when 
they have met together to frame a platform, to 
declaring their undying adhesion to the prin¬ 
ciples of civil service reform. They promised 
that if they were only trusted with office, the 
principles of civil service reform should be ap¬ 
plied in their entirety. And we have trusted 
them, first one and then the other, during 
these twenty years, and we have not got civil 
service reform from either. 

Now, the man who undertakes to be first a 
republican and then a civil service reformer, 
does not help. A man who undertakes to be 
first a democrat and then a civil service re¬ 
former, does not help. The moment you put 
yourself in the position of attacking the sins 
of your political enemies, and disguising the 
sins of your friends of exactly the same qual¬ 
ity, you put yourself in a false position. You 
can not attack one man for doing that which, 
in your friend, you pardon or excuse. And 
let it be understood that the man who always 
votes his party ticket, does not count. Put 
yourselves, if you will, in the position of a 
boss who is making his calculations. “There 
in the eleventh ward are a thousar.d respect¬ 
able republican voters, or a thousand respect¬ 
able democratic voters, as the case may be. 
If I appoint Smith to the post-office, they will 
be very angry. If I do not appoint Smith to 
the post-office, those fellows in South Boston, 
will be very angry. The fellows in the 
eleventh ward, wdiat will they do about it? 
Oh, they will grumble, and they will write 
articles to the newspapers, but how will they 
vote? They will vote the republican ticket 
on election day all right. But how is it with 
those fellows in South Boston? Well, they 
will knife the ticket just as certain as I do not 
appoint that man to the post-office.” Now', 
which set of voters influences that particular 
boss? Certainly not the man Avho always 
votes the ticket, whose vote he can rely upon, 
and whom he can not drive out of the polit¬ 
ical fold by any appointment he makes. The 
man w’hom you can not drive away is a voter 
whom you can count upon anyway, and you 
need not shape your course to suit him in the 
least. 

Now, the next remedy is public opinion. 
And you have got to reach, let me explain to 
you, not men who think as you think, but men 
who do not. The trouble, for example, with 
our institutions in New York, is the presence 
there of a very large number of citizens who 
are apparently under the absolute dominion 
of Tammany—Italians, Germans, Irishmen, 
Americans, ignorant men. You may start 
with this postulate, that the majority of the 
people of tnis country or any other country 
want good government. They desire just what 
you desire. They only do not know how. Now, 


if you have a meeting in a hall and invite 
none but civil service reformers who think as 
you do, you do not reach these men. If, once 
a year, just before election, you go down and 
talk to them, even if you give them some 
money when they are unemployed, you do not 
reach them. They say, “What they want is 
our votes.” Call yourselves, if you please, the 
leaven, and them the lump. The leaven never 
affected the lump in the least while it was in 
a cup on one side of the room, and the lump 
was on the other; it has got to permeate the 
whole lump. You have got to get down side 
by side and interest yourselves in the daily 
lives of these people, stand with them, under¬ 
stand their problems, work with them in Jan¬ 
uary, February, March and April as well as 
in November, before you have any real influ¬ 
ence. 

That is the work which is required of you, 
and you may think it is disagreeable. Well, 
I admit it is thoroughly disagreeable, thank¬ 
less, unpleasant work. But there is nothing 
in this world worth having that is not won in 
that way. It is not pleasant for Howard to go 
through all the prisons of Europe and see the 
vice and disease that he saw, for the purpose 
of exposing the system. It was not agreeable 
to freeze and starve at Valley Forge. It wss 
not agreeable, like Garrison, to be imprisoned 
in Baltimore, and to be pursued by a mob in 
Boston, and to be threatened with death be¬ 
cause he was opposed to slavery. There was 
nothing agreeable in Sumner’s position when 
he was beaten on the floor of the senate, and 
his colleagues, unmindful of any courtesy of 
the senate, stood around and held their hands. 
The trenches before Petersburg, the swamps 
of Vicksburg, Libby Prison, Andersonville, 
were not attractive, but the men who went be¬ 
fore you were willing to bear those hardships 
for the sake of their country. Are you not 
made of as good stuff ? 

You have all of you, as boys, read the story 
of the choice of Hercules, and I have no 
doubt that every one of you, when he read it 
as a child, said to himself: “Why, of course, 
between the life of ease and luxury and wealth, 
and the task of killing the Nemean lion and 
cleansing the Augean stables, and doing all 
the laborious and difficult and dangerous 
things that Hercules did, any gentleman would 
have chosen the latter.” I (Jo not suppose a 
boy ever read the story who thought it |) 0 ssible 
for a moment that he would actually have 
chosen the life of ease and luxury and wealth, 
when he could have killed the Nemean lion. 
Why, gentleman, there is no Nemean lion more 
dangerous than the spoils system, no Augean 
stable which requires cleansing any more than 
Tammany in New Y’^ork. When you were 
children the choice was easy. Now that you 
are men, are you going to shrink from it? Be 
sure of this, that if you once enlist in that 
work, once get thoroughly interested in it, it 
makes very little difference whether you suc¬ 
ceed or fail. The struggle, the fight, the work 
for something which you know is worth work¬ 
ing for, makes your life full of interest, and 
wortli living. You will learn the truth so 
well expressed by Lowell: 

“ ’Tia not the grapes of Canaan that repay, 
Butthe high faith that failed not by the way.” 

But if, by chance, like Sumner and Garri¬ 
son, you live to see slavery abolished; if even 
at the moment of death, like Wolfe, you hear 
that the foe are fleeing, you may rest perfectly 
wellassured that lifehasnothinginstoreforyou 
that can be compared for a moment with the 
joy of such a triumph. No luxury, no ease, 
no wealth, nothing that fortune can give, is 
more than dust in the balance when weighed 
against a life spent in such a struggle, even if 
it is not crowned with such a victory. 

Messieurs Hercules, the choice is before you. 
[Loud applause.] 







The Civil service chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering of the 
sllip of state.— From Archbishop Ireland’s addi'ess: The Duty and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II, No. 17. 


INDIANAPOLIS, JULA% 1894. 


TEEMS : 


One dollar per annum. 
10 cents per copy. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


As WAS in another form stated, the 
address delivered by Mr. Godkin on the 
occasion of the unveiling of a memorial 
bust of Henry G. Pearson, for having ably 
and conscientiously performed his duty, 
and his whole duty, as a public officer, is a 
humiliating illumination of the great body 
of the civil service of which he was a 
member. Mr. Godkin’s address was a calm 
and judicial statement of the principles 
and practices which are in combat in the 
spoils and anti-spoils struggle. The argu¬ 
ment leads on to the crushing conclusion 
that free government and spoils can not 
permanently remain side by side. The 
manner in which the exigencies of busi¬ 
ness are fighting the battle of civil service 
reform is given by analogy a powerful il¬ 
lustration. Speaking of modern industrial 
machines, Mr. Godkin says : “The touch 
of a drunkard’s hand sets them wild. * 
* * The anger of a mismanaged ma¬ 
chine is so serious in its consequences that 
no employer can afford to overlook even a 
single case of intemperance.” So the 
growth of business and the consequent in¬ 
creasing impatience of the public with 
bungling are helping to drive out the pub¬ 
lic officer who undertakes to run prima¬ 
ries and conventions, and at the same time 
write letters and collect revenue. The ad¬ 
dress has no favorites. Few more leveling 
things have been said of Mr. Cleveland 
than that, in his first term, he appointed 
Pearson postmaster of New York, not be¬ 
cause he was the fittest man in the world 
for the place, but to gratify the mug¬ 
wumps. We could have wished that more 
of the history of that term had been given. 
We believe the facts will sooner or later 
show that there was a most dastardly and 
continuous attempt to break down an of¬ 
ficer who had no thought for anything but 
a complete performance of his duties, 
solely because he refused to have any 
other thought, or, in other words, refused 
to mix politics with his duties, and that 
the wear, the indignity and the injustice 
of the attempt shortened Pearson’s life. 
We believe also that the facts will fasten 
this attempt upon William F. Vilas and 
Don M. Dickinson, each respectively post¬ 


master-general, and that Mr. Cleveland 
will have to bear a share of the responsi¬ 
bility. 

Tammany’s park commission could find 
no place for this memorial although it was 
offered to them,and Tam many’s postmaster, 
Dayton, could not attend the unveiling in 
the postoffice building. It would have 
been a hopeful sign if from some part of 
the administration at Washington there 
had appeared an expression showing some 
realization of the fact that Pearson was a 
pioneer, amid enormous difficulties, of a 
higher civil service civilization which 
ought to and must spread over the country. 


A Washington dispatch of July 7 to the 
Indianapolis Neivs says that Voorhees is 
not feeling in very good temper over the 
report that Governor Matthews is a candi¬ 
date for the senate. It further says: 

It looks now as If the Indiana senator was pre¬ 
paring to contest every inch of the ground with 
any and all comers. He has been holding confer¬ 
ences with representatives in the house recently, 
and strengthening his relations, which were se¬ 
verely strained in a number of Instances by the 
distribution of federal patronage in the Hoosier 
state. His health has not been very good for the 
last three months, and he has been conserving his 
energies and transferring the burden of the tariff 
fight in the senate to other shoulders in order to 
keep himself in trim for an energetic canvass of 
Indiana this fall. 

We always felt that after Voorhees got 
well loaded with spoil he would become 
ill or aftiicted with lassitude before he had 
completed his tariff work. It is a coarse 
suggestion, but the only safe way in this 
matter of the exchange of patronage for 
legislation is to follow exactly the methods 
devised after profound reflection and bit¬ 
ter experience with floaters. If the Presi¬ 
dent had intimated to Voorhees, “After the 
tariff bill—offices,” how spry and single- 
hearted we should see our distinguished 
senator now. 

The Civil Service Chronicle has re¬ 
ceived a second rebuke in a Washington 
dispatch to the New York Times regarding 
Major Handbury, but this like the one re¬ 
ferred to last month is in vague and gen¬ 
eral terms. There is still a studied 
concealment of the facts. If Secretary 
Lament, who is undoubtedly talking 
through this dispatcher, is not ready to 
give the facts, he would better drop the 
matter. Talking about an “inadvisable 
champion of civil service reform” is not 


meeting the charge that he was a party to 
an ignoble revenge reaped upon Major 
Handbury. Who was the man whom the 
secretary expected to give a certain report 
and whom Major Handbury did not want 
and what was the report to be about? 
There is no pretense of denial that he was 
Caruth’s heeler. There isno pretense of de¬ 
nial that Major Handbury’s strained rela¬ 
tions with Caruth was one of the reasons 
for his transfer to St. Augustine. If those 
who are smarting under the general con¬ 
demnation of this business will give out 
the names and data, we will verify their 
statements. In the meantime we repeat 
that Major Handbury was an officer of the 
highest efficiency; that he fought steadily 
and in case after case the attempts of po¬ 
litical bosses to quarter their followers 
upon the public service; that in doing this 
he was carrying out the democratic plat¬ 
form; that his course brought upon him 
the enmity of Congressman Caruth and to 
the abject practice of placating congress¬ 
men Major Handbury was sacrificed. Of 
course Major Handbury’s mouth is closed. 
There are worse posts than St. Augustine. 

It is painful to admit the fact, but it really be¬ 
gins to look as if we were to have merely demo¬ 
cratic protection as a substitute for republican 
protection.—/ndta7!.apolts Sentinel, July 17. 

There is no failure of his administration 
that will cause President Cleveland such 
humiliation and disappointment as a fail¬ 
ure to enact a real tariff reform law. The 
cause of this failure is again indicated in 
the passages elsewhere, showing the pro¬ 
cess of using patronage to make a great 
boss. Gorman’s subsidized press, McPher¬ 
son’s successful demand upon the Presi¬ 
dent to withdraw a nomination, and the 
evident desire not to antagonize Tammany 
in spite of the shocking disclosures of its 
apparently never-ending corruption, dis¬ 
close powers made by patronage given by 
the President. The recipients are defiant 
of the President, their party and public 
opinion, and they are the chief personages 
in the shameful tariff dickers and deals. 
This is the way to undertake a reform and 
to fail through timidity and compromises. 
Last week the President met an assault 
upon the government of the United States 
with boldness and decision, and he has 
gained the hearty approval of all citizens, 
regardless of party. The American people 
love a brave man. The President has not 



















142 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


been brave in his part of tarifi reform. 
What is worse, it has had through the 
methods employed, a deadly blow, for who 
can urge further agitation and business 
peril to again make the reform the foot-ball 
of patronage? 

While the best citizens of Troy were 
holding Senator Murphy responsible for 
the murder of Robert Ross, and were try¬ 
ing to fix the execution of the crime upon 
a Murphy heeler, another follower of Sen¬ 
ator Murphy was given the postmastership 
by the administration. But in spite of this 
strange mark of power or favor, and of 
the hostility or indifference of the Gov¬ 
ernor of New York, Murphy’s man has 
been convicted of the murder. It is the 
old story of an American community so 
long and so helplessly in the grip of a boss, 
that it seems to the outsider to have lost 
all courage, all patriotism and all moral 
sense, suddenly rising in wrath and smit¬ 
ing the boss. 

According to tbe published reports. 
Pension Agent Spencer, of this city, al¬ 
though but a short time in office, has dis¬ 
missed twenty-four of the twenty-eight 
men under him to make room for demo¬ 
crats, and the remaining four are to go 
after the August payment. Not a fault is 
found with the dismissed men. Spencer 
has never denied in any manner his pub¬ 
lished interviews, in which he stated that in 
order to get this office he had to bargain 
away these clerkships to Voorhees and 
Turpie. Time was when it was incon¬ 
ceivable that President Cleveland would 
allow such a fraudulent misuse of a pub¬ 
lic trust. We wish some of his apologists 
would take space in the Chronicle to ex¬ 
plain this transaction. 


The administration has appointed a suc¬ 
cessor to Mr. Milchrist, United States dis- 
tric attorney at Chicago. Attorney- 
General Olney is stated to have explained 
the change as having been made 
“Only because Mr. Milchrlst’sterm of office expired 
on the 2d of August next, and It was desirable to 
have his successor ready to qualify at that time, 
whether congress was or was not then in session. 
So far as he had had opportunity to observe, Mr. 
Milchrist had always been a loyal and efficient 
officer.” 

“A loyal and efficient officer” is displaced 
to make a place for a democrat. How 
grossly improper this is. A district attor¬ 
ney of the United States, as an upright 
officer, must know no class, no religion, no 
color, no politics, and yet one officer is dis¬ 
placed and his successor is appointed 
solely because of politics. 

Secretary of tbe Treasury Carlisle 
asked for the resignation of Supervising- 
Inspector McMaster at Buffalo, and is re¬ 
ported to have said: 


“ There are no charges against Mr. McMaster that 
I know of, but he has now served about nine 
months more than his four-year term, and I want 
to fill his place with a democrat. I will do this as 
soon as possible. I suppose I can find some one 
who is competent and willing to take it. Post¬ 
master-General Bissell or Mr. Lockwood will prob¬ 
ably recommend Mr. McMaster’s successor.” 

This dismissal is, compared with others, 
one of the secretary’s minor ofl'enses, but 
let any one reflect upon what would natu¬ 
rally be the view of a man fit to be the 
secretary of the treasury of a great country 
like the United States, and the pettiness 
and flippancy of the man who occupies 
the post are painful. When an ordinary 
politician is placed in one of these great 
offices and runs it on the grade of ward 
politics, with more than suggestions of 
trickery and false witness and conduct 
generally unbefitting a gentleman, with 
how much dignity and respect is he to be 
treated because of his office? And when 
we throw over the common politician the 
mantle of his responsible and dignified 
office to belittle such political acts as the 
indignity put upon Major Handbury by 
Secretary of War Lamont, and the indig¬ 
nity put upon Professor Mendenhall by 
Secretary of the Treasury Carlisle, is our 
respect for the great office itself thereby 
impaired? 

“Having been called by the National Assembly 
to the position of first magistrate of the country, I 
am not the man of any party, but belong to France 
and the republic.”— From the inaugural message of 
Casimir-Perier, July S, 1891,. 

“The need of this country is lofty, disinterested 
patriotism, which forgets all minor allegiances in 
the presence of the general welfare and has the 
courage to make all sacrifices which may be needed 
to uphold this welfare.” — From the interview of 
Archbishop Ireland, July 15,1891,. 

Does President Cleveland also consider 
himself the man, not of any party, but of 
the republic? What he has done that he 
ought not to have done for spoils, and what 
he has failed to do that he ought to have 
done, have been pardoned by many on the 
ground that any other plan would break 
up his party. So we see reform blocked, 
because a president is the man of a party, 
instead of belonging only to the republic. 
The obstacle now looming up in the effort 
to purge New York of Tammany is the want 
of “ lofty, disinterested patriotism, which 
forgets all minor allegiances.” The partisan 
reformer is being played upon by cunning 
Tammany and Platt players, and it looks 
as if the players would get a response. Mr. 
Herbert Welsh finds the greatest obstacle 
to municipal reform the party bigotry of 
the good citizens. A late illustration from 
Indianapolis is the following: 

If the army of tramps should come into the city 
after being forbidden by the mayor, every one of 
them will be arrested as vagrants and sent to the 
workhouse. The workhouse is now crowded, but 
this will not be permitted to interfere with the de¬ 
termination to prevent the citizens from being im¬ 
posed upon by another aggregation of tramps. 

I The mayor was asked if the men would be put to 


work upon the Fall creek dike, which the city has 
been endeavoring to build for some time. He said 
the city had no authority to put the men at this 
work without the consent of the county commis¬ 
sioners, which it was impossible for the city to ob¬ 
tain. The commissioners have full and absolute 
control of the workhouse, and the city can not 
work its prisoners confined there upon public 
works without the consent of the commissioners. 
This the commissioners will not give for political 
reasons. The city administration being repub¬ 
lican and the county democratic, the commis¬ 
sioners use their offices for political purposes, aud 
will not permit the working of workhouse pris¬ 
oners upon public works that will not otherwise 
be constructed for lack of funds. 

How can we diminish this blind, deaf 
and dumb and violent party spirit, so that 
a president will consider his duty to the 
whole people, and not to his party ? And 
how can the party bigotry of respectable 
citizens be eradicated? For only when 
this has been accomplished will Tammany 
have met its death blow, and all municipal 
government of the United States have 
ceased to be a lesson in corruption. It is 
in the hope of doing something in this di¬ 
rection that the Civil Service Chronicle 
prints Mr. Julian’s interesting paper upon 
independence in politics. 

Carrier Wells has just completed 
twenty five years of service in the Indian¬ 
apolis postoffice, and during that time has 
distributed mail in a single district. He 
is a quiet, modest citizen and excellent 
carrier, but this length of service puts him 
in the “office-holding aristocracy,” and 
makes him a menace to a republican form 
of government. Poor Mr. Wells. 

Congressman Jason Brown has failed 
to secure renomination, and at the con¬ 
vention made an address in which he is 
reported to have “skinned alive” those 
who accomplished his defeat. We quote 
what he says of civil service reform, be¬ 
cause we think it is the first instance of a 
congressman openly regretting that there 
is not “an office to every applicant.” The 
climate of Indiana is at present unsuited 
to the mathematical computation of the 
size of a civil service in which every con¬ 
gressman should have an office for every 
applicant. It is fitting that Congressman 
Brown is about to retire to private life 
after the following: 

A word about civil service reform. If I could 
have given an office to every applicant Stockslager 
would not have been In it. He would now be 
hanging on to the coupling pole. The people I did 
appoint were honest democrats and none of them 
were my relatives. I have tried to get appoint¬ 
ments on, but had this bill stuck under my nose. 
I hate and dispise the civil service law. It should 
have been passed by the A. P. A. It was passed in 
1883, and I have been its common enemy ever 
since. You are opposed to this civil service rot, 
and yet you put me out and put In Stockslager 
who voted for it. 

The monthly report, for June, of the 
secretary of the New York Civil Service 
Reform Association contains many inter- 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


143 


eating items. The association has secured 
the enactment of a law forbidding comp¬ 
trollers or other disbursing officers of any 
city to authorize payment of salaries to 
officers or employes appointed in violation 
of the civil service law and rules. This is 
one of the most efiective safeguards that 
could have been raised up. The party ma¬ 
chines of seven cities which ha,ve ignored 
the law will now have to swallow an un¬ 
palatable dose of reform, and the bosses 
in many other cities where the law has 
been tricked can now be dealt with on 
even terms. An application to the excel¬ 
lent courts of that state to enjoin the pay¬ 
ment of an incumbent’s salary will bring 
forward for review the whole process by 
which he got his place. Party heelers will 
be slow to take places by tricks when they 
may after all fail to receive any pay. The 
present state comptroller applies a similar 
rule in the state service. The board of 
electrical control of New York city ignored 
the law in the appointment of thirteen in¬ 
spectors. The present comptroller found 
them in office and refused to pay them. 
The bosses then had twelve of them pass a 
non-competitive examination, but the 
comptroller was still immovable. If any 
of them get upon the public pay-roll it 
be after an open competitive examination 
duly advertised. 

The thirteenth annual meeting and the 
first annual dinner of the Buffalo Civil 
Service Reform Association were held 
June 18. Herbert Welsh, of Philadelphia, 
spoke upon municipal reform, and is re¬ 
ported as follows: 

The questions he submitted were: Can Ameri¬ 
can institutions permanently succeed with dishon¬ 
est management? Is public office under our 
American institutions to be used as a position for 
private gain or is it to he a great stewardship for 
the public? He held that these questions were as 
fundamental and vital as was the slavery question. 

Political partisanship is more than any other 
thing the bane of good city government, for it pre¬ 
sents a wholly false issue and divides citizens who 
really desire the well-being of the municipality 
into two hostile armies perpetually at war with one 
another. Doubtless the machine boss grins in se¬ 
cret and is tempted to exclaim “What fools these 
mortals be,” when he sees that a transparent device 
will lead the community by the nose to its own 
great loss. For it is the pocket of the voter which 
must meet the heavy costs of official stealings and 
the wasteful extravagance which. In a hundred 
ways, is the outcome of partisan boss rule. 

The stronghold of corruption in Philadelphia 
to-day is that alliance which we are forced to be¬ 
lieve exists between machine leaders and the ma¬ 
jority of the city council on the one side, and cor¬ 
porate wealth unscrupulously used on the other. 
The machine influence is systematically built up 
and maintained by corporate interests for purely 
business reasons. The maintenance of extreme 
partisanship is the first object of the machine, for 
the political partisan will sacrifice every moral 
consideration to his party prejudices. 

We wish Mr. Welsh would give as de¬ 
tailed and as specific a history of the re¬ 
publican machine in Philadelphia as has 
been given of Tammany. He would not 


be supported, however, as the fighters of 
Tammany have been, by a free and un¬ 
trammelled press, backing the investiga¬ 
tion and distributing the facts. 


At the dinner the new democratic post¬ 
master, Howard H. Baker, “expressed his 
hearty sympathy with civil service reform 
and with the law which now relieved post¬ 
masters from many embarrassing situa¬ 
tions, where formerly patronage had to be 
doled out to ward politicians and caucus 
manipulator8,who are ever anxious to serve 
the people—‘for revenue only.’ He re¬ 
joiced at the dawn of a new and better era.” 
And yet ten days later Postmaster Baker 
is reported by the BuflFalo Express as fol¬ 
lows : 

“ He Intended to make changes in all the posi¬ 
tions not covered by the civil service regulations, 
and he believed that there were about 20 of these 
places. The heads of all the departments, such as 
the stamp, the registered letter, the money order, 
the superintendent of letter carriers, the superin¬ 
tendents of sub-stations, would be changed, but he 
could not tell just how soon he would appoint men 
to succeed those now in office. He had received 
any number of applications from very good men, 
and he realized that it would be a difficult task to 
make the selections.” 

Since the above was written there are 
indications that Mr. Baker is doing better 
than he thought he should. He is not 
pleasing the local machine. Mr. Baker is 
reported as follows: 

“I am running this office and intend to get the 
best service I can. In many cases I didn’t know 
the politics of the men I appointed and promoted. 
Take, for instance, the appointments I made to¬ 
day. I appointed Charles A. Watson first clerk in 
the inquiry division and Nelson S. Fairbush second 
clerk. Mr. Watson is a man who has been here 
under several administrations and his appoint¬ 
ment was made strictly in accordance with civil 
service reform ideas and politics didn’t figure at 
all.” 

We have received the eleventh report 
of the New York State Civil Service Com¬ 
mission, covering the year 1893, which 
completed the first ten years of the civil 
service law of that state. The first year 
there were appointed from the eligible 
lists 18; the second, 22; the third, 57; the 
fourth, 58; the fifth, 29 ; the sixth, 47; the 
seventh, 62; the eighth, 71; the ninth, 
101; the tenth, 129, making a total of 626 
appointments from the eligible lists 
formed by competitive examinations in 
ten years. The state has 4,846 employes. 
The commissionor makes various explana¬ 
tory statements, such as that the rules 
adopted by the first commission were 
“very elaborate, so elaborate and complex, 
in fact, that they have never been fully 
followed.” The commission says “the 
law was new and untried, and met with 
little favor from many heads of depart¬ 
ments, and was either misunderstood or 
not comprehended by them.” Transfers 
from the competitive to the non-competi¬ 
tive classes have cut an interesting, and to 


the average civil service reformer, an as¬ 
tounding figure. The commission has 
much to say about this, and cites the com¬ 
mission of 1886 as holding that all requests 
by heads of departments for such transfers, 
should be granted; but this commission 
says it has always required proof of confi¬ 
dential relation or financial trust before 
permitting such transfers. Turning to 
some instances they give, we find the su¬ 
perintendent of public buildings asked to 
have his “confidential messenger” trans¬ 
ferred. The labor statistics man asked to 
have three statisticians and one private 
secretary transferred. The state commis¬ 
sioner of lunacy asked to have two transfer 
agents, one estimate clerk and two medical 
internes at each state hospital for the in 
sane, transferred. The railroad commis¬ 
sion asked to have its marshal and its 
inspector transferred. The forest com¬ 
mission asked to have its special agents, 
performing duties as foresters, transferred. 
The state entomologist had appointed a 
woman as assistant, and was much worried 
until he got her placed beyond the reach 
of competition. The factory inspector 
urged that his examiners were “confiden¬ 
tial.” The commissioners of statutory 
revision urged that their law clerks held 
confidential positions. These requests and 
others were all granted, and in a number 
of instances the appointments had already 
been made. Since, in ten years, there 
have been only 626 appointments to places 
by competition, allowing for deaths, resig¬ 
nations and removals, there would not 
seem to be 300 such places in the 4,846 
places in the state service. The comlnis- 
sion does not give the number. Forty- 
six places would be a liberal allowance for 
political places in this service, leaving 4,800 
places to be filled by competition or by 
labor-service requirements, which entirely 
eliminate politics. According to the show, 
ing made by this report the manipulation 
of the civil service law in New York ap¬ 
pears like a colossal triumph of Hillism. 


POLITICAL INDEPENDENCE. 

GEORGE W. JULIAN. 

John Quincy Adams. 

Among the great and heroic men of our Re¬ 
public John Quincy Adams will always hold 
an undisputed place. In politics he was a 
federalist, and he was such by education, by 
family inheritance, and by conviction. He 
was honored by the friendship and confidence 
of Washington, and quite naturally allied 
himself with the great men whose shaping 
hand and inspiring genius gave us a nation, 
and not a mere confederacy of states. After 
the federal party, however, had completely 
fulfilled its mission and suffered itself to be¬ 
come an organized obstacle to progress, Mr. 
Adams declined to follow its fortunes. In 












144 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


1807 the strife between the federalists and re¬ 
publicans over Mr. Jefferson’s embargo was 
nearing its climax. Mr. Adams then held a 
seat in the United States senate from Massa¬ 
chusetts. Unlike his federal associates, he did 
not sympathize with England. He' did not 
sympathize with France. He was eminently, 
nay, pre-eminently, an American, being then, 
as always, unhesitatingly on the side of his 
country and against his enemies. The hostil¬ 
ity of the federalists towards the embargo was 
remorseless. They lavished upon Jefferson 
their sincerest and most heartfelt curses, but 
they proposed no policy of their own. In 
facing English insolence and aggression they 
were nerveless and servile. Mr. Adams did 
his best to breathe into them his own spirit of 
courage and independence in facing the crisis 
which then so fearfully menaced the honor of 
the country. But his labors were vain. The 
embargo, it is true, was a debatable measure, 
but it gave some promise of relief, and was a 
vigorous protest against English domination 
at a time when strong measures had become 
absolutely necessary; and Mr. Adams could 
not control himself with the purely fault-find¬ 
ing attitude of his party, which left Mr. Jef¬ 
ferson utterly without support. He therefore 
deserted the camp of federalism, and took his 
place in the ranks of the republicans. It was 
an act evincing the highest courage and self- 
renunciation. He could not have been ignor¬ 
ant of the consequences to himself which were 
to follow. He was called a traitor and an 
apostate. He was branded as a renegade, who 
had run away from a failing cause and sold 
himself to the enemy for the honors and emol¬ 
uments of his treachery. They would doubt¬ 
less have called him a mugwump; but that 
frightful epithet was then waiting to be born. 
The federalists pursued him “like a hive of 
enraged hornets,” and opened upon him all the 
sluice-gates of abuse and defamation. Their 
warfare was as furious as it was relentless, 
and it had not fully died away at his death 
in 1848, while its echoes still linger in some 
parts of his native state. But he never 
flinched. Dr. Andrew P. Peabody, in speak¬ 
ing of his friend Dr. Palfrey, said he was “a 
man who would have defied all the powers of 
earth and hell in pursuit of what he deemed 
right, and who never failed to have heaven on 
his side.” The language is perfectly applica¬ 
ble to John Quincy Adams. To him the word 
fear had no meaning. His courage was as 
flawless as his integrity, and both were per¬ 
fect. In order to degrade and humiliate him 
the legislature of Massachusetts proceeded to 
choose his successor in the Senate several 
months before the customary time for such 
elections. He indignantly resigned his seat 
and offered his enemies his defiance. It was 
sufficient for him to know that he was in the 
right, and he lived to see his action vindicated 
by the judgment of history. By his change 
of sides in politics he did not make himself 
an apostate, but simply revealed the apostacy 
of the party he left. “It is easy to see,” says 
his biographer, “as one looks backward upon 


history, that every great and successful party 
has its mission, that it wins its success through 
the substantial righteousness of that mis¬ 
sion, and that it owes its downfall to 
assuming an erroneous attitude towards 
some subsequent matter which becomes 
in turn of predominating importance.” Mr. 
Adams saw this clearly, and he had the 
courage of his convictions; and his example 
has been extensively and savingly followed in 
later times. He was, in fact, the father of the 
mugwumps, and our first great apostle of po¬ 
litical independence. 

But, although the federal party perished, 
and Mr. Adams regained his lost estate and 
finally became president, his troubles were by 
no means ended. Other and still severer 
trials of his political courage awaited him. 
On the 4th day of March, 1829, Andrew Jack- 
son entered upon the first terra of his presi¬ 
dency. Mr. L. Marcy, of New York, a man 
of great ability and a member of the famous 
“Albany Regency,” fathered the political 
motto that “To the victors t>elonri the S 2 ) 0 ils.” 
President Jackson adopted it and devoted 
himself unsparingly to its practical illustra¬ 
tion ; and for the past fifty odd years the gov¬ 
ernment has been like a city alternately 
sacked and retaken by two contending armies. 
In a speech in the Senate in 1837, reviewing 
Jackson’s career, Henry Clay declared that 
his administration had “swept over the coun¬ 
try like a tropical tornado,” and that “every 
department of the government exhibited the 
ravages of the storm.” So far as the spoils 
system was concerned, this was true, and, of 
course, no member of the Adams family could 
have any party affiliations with this new 
phase of republicanism. But Mr. Adamshad 
to deal with a still more formidable question. 
The Democrats of the northern stales had now 
formed their alliance with the slave-holders 
of the south. It was an unholy alliance, and 
it paved the way for that frightful southern 
domination which at last ripened into civil 
war. What did Mr. Adams do in facing 
these new dangers? He had left the federal 
party in 1807 and joined the followers of Jef¬ 
ferson, and he now again severed his party 
relations and identified himself with the new 
organization which became known as the 
whig party. But, although he was nominally 
a whig during the remainder of his life, he 
always defied party discipline and asserted his 
independence. He used to call the democrats 
“the consistent Swiss guards of southern 
slavery,” while he spoke of the whigs as “the 
languid, compromising, non-resistants of the 
north, who were afraid to answer a fool ac¬ 
cording to his folly.” Both parties feared 
and disliked him, and his attitude made it 
perfectly clear that he had completely put 
away ambition and was ready to taste polit¬ 
ical death in following the truth. Two years 
later, on taking his seat as a representative in 
Congress from Massachusetts, he entered upon 
his memorable fight for the right of petition 
and the freedom of debate, and after a strug¬ 
gle of nine years the 2Ist rule, known as 


the “Gag,” was abrogated. He opposed the 
annexation of Texas as unauthorized by the 
constitution. He denounced the war with 
Mexico as a war of invasion, wantonly begun 
by the president, and he was opposed to voting 
supplies to carry it on and to thanking Gen¬ 
eral Taylor for his military services. His 
term of sixteen years in the house of repre¬ 
sentatives eclipsed all the glory he had pre¬ 
viously earned in his long and honorable 
public career; but it exposed him to more 
personal abuse and popular obloquy than had 
ever before fallen to the lot of any public 
man since the formation of the government. 
On his celebrated trial in the house of repre¬ 
sentatives in 1842 Mr. Wise called him a 
“white-haired hypocrite” who had forsaken 
the friends of his father and trampled on the 
ashes of the dead. He characterized him as 
one who, in the fury of his apostate zeal, 
could prey upon the dead like a vampire, and 
pronounced him “dead as Burr, dead as Ar¬ 
nold.” The Alhany Arcjus called him the 
“Massachusetts madman.” The dharleston 
Mercury referred to him as “that eccentric old 
showman, John (Quincy Adams.” At a pub¬ 
lic dinner in Virginia the company drank as 
a toast, “John Quincy Adams, once a man, 
twice a child, and now a demon.” In South 
Carolina this toast was drunk: “May we 
never want a hangman to prepare a halter for 
John Quincy Adams.” Letters poured in 
upon him threatening his life, and southern 
members refused to sit with him on the same 
committee. For successive years he was un¬ 
doubtedly the most thoroughly hated man in 
the United States. But it did not check in 
the slightest degree the perfect independence 
of his political action or the absolute free¬ 
dom of his speech. In a letter replying to an 
invitation to address an anti-slavery meeting, 
he said he rejoiced that the defense of human 
freedom was falling into younger and more 
vigorous hands. They “are buckling on their 
armor,” said he, “and the scourging over¬ 
seer, and the lynching lawyer, and the servile 
sophist, and the faithless scribe, and the 
priestly parasite, will vanish before them like 
Satan touched with the spear of Ithuriel.” 
Above all other public men, he was the Abdiel 
of the anti-slavery conflict, and one can not 
read the story of his heroic life and magnifi¬ 
cent courage without applying the words of 
Milton: 

“Servant of God, well done! Well hast thou 
fought 

The bitter fight; who, single, hast maintained 
Against revolted multitudes the cause 
Of truth, in word mightier than they in arms. 

And for the testimony of truth hast borne 
Universal reproach, far worse to bear 
Than violence; for this was all they care— 

To stand approved in sight of God, though worlds 
Judged thee perverse.’’ 

But let it not be forgotten that when he was 
stricken down at his post of duty in the house 
of representatives, and the stormy life of the 
old hero was at last closed, he was honored 
by the whole nation as no man had been 
honored since Washington. The heroism of 
his life was attested by popular acclamation. 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


145 


Even South Carolina and Virginia relented, 
and joined in the general shout of praise 
which went up from every section of the 
Union. Let the young men of our country 
ponder the lesson and remember that single¬ 
ness of purpose and heroic endeavor are the 
only sure passport to renown. The people love 
courage. They believe on the man who will 
take the responsibility, and whea they find 
him ready to forget himself in the service of 
a great cause they will always take him to 
their hearts. 

Charles Sumner. 

But let me illustrate my subject by another 
example. Charles Sumner graduated at 
Harvard at the age of nineteen. After com¬ 
pleting his legal studies at the Harvard Law 
School and editing important legal publica¬ 
tions, he gave three years to foreign travel, 
which he undertook at the age of twenty-six, 
receiving such a welcome from the famous 
scholars, jurists and statesmen of the Old 
World as had never before been given to a 
man of his years. In 1845, before he em 
barked in public life, he had delivered some 
of the masterly orations which rival the best 
efforts of Chatham and Burke, and will be 
read as long as the English language shall be 
spoken. He then stood at the sunrise of his 
magnificent career, while his heart palpitated 
with an ambition as pure as ever inspired the 
soul of a hero. But it w'as not political am¬ 
bition. To him the thought of public life 
was repellant. What he coveted was the 
service of literature, and the moral uplifting 
of humanity ; but events overruled his earnest 
wishes. In politics Mr. Sumner was a whig, 
but at this time the whigs of Massachusetts 
were divided into two hostile camps on the 
question of Texas annexation. On the one 
side were the “Conscience Whigs,” with whom 
he mustered, who were utterly opposed to an¬ 
nexation, and in favor of making moral prin¬ 
ciples the basis of political action. On the 
other side were the “Cotton Whigs,” who 
mainly represented the commercial and manu¬ 
facturing interests of the state, and were in¬ 
terested in southern trade and a conservative 
policy. The hostility of these parties was in¬ 
tense and unquenchable, and the root of it was 
slavery. The annexation of an extensive 
slave-holding foreign territory to the Union 
was not only unauthorized by the constitu¬ 
tion, and very offensive to the free states, but 
it threatened to involve the country in a war 
with Mexico. It was morally impossible for 
Mr. Sumner, with his inborn hatred of slavery, 
to stand aloof from such a controversy. His 
talents, his scholarship, his impassioned elo¬ 
quence, and the unquestioned purity of his 
life, all singled him out for leadership, but 
the price of this leadership was his social out¬ 
lawry by the aristocracy of Boston, with 
whom he had at all times held the most 
pleasant relations. Driving down Beacon 
street one day with a friend, he said : “There 
was a time when I was welcome at almost 
every house within two miles of us, but now 


hardly one is open to me.” Of course, this 
social pressure fell heavily upon him. Mr. 
Adams, with his family lineage, his estab¬ 
lished fame, and his eombative disposition, 
could defy such methods of warfare ; but Sum¬ 
ner felt it. He had been a favorite in the 
circle from which he was now banished, and 
had greatly enjoyed the taste and refinement 
which had so warmly greeted him. It was 
not easy for him to understand such treat¬ 
ment. His nature was tender and feminine. 
He was a great lover, and no man ever more 
perfectly enjoyed the luxury of being loved in 
return; but never for a single moment did he 
allow his social relations to hold him back 
from the complete discharge of his public 
duties. It was this perfect and never failing 
moral courage which has given him his place 
in history, while the men who have faltered 
have been lost. 

But Texas was annexed, and the predicted 
war with Mexico followed. The whigs de¬ 
nounced it as a war of conquest wantonly and 
unconstitutionally begun by the president, and 
Mr. Sumner and his friends urged them to re- 
fuse to vote supplies of men and money for its 
prosecution. It was Mr. Sumner who, in de¬ 
fending this policy, first cited the example of 
Burke, Chatham and other British statesmen 
in refusing to vote supplies for the prosecu¬ 
tion of the war against the colonies during 
our revolutionary struggle or to vote thanks to 
the British generals for their services, on the 
ground that the war was one of rapine and 
murder. In dealing with the new territories 
which the war brought us Mr. Sumner con¬ 
tinued his anti-slavery leadership, and every 
step he took Indicated its wisdom. He had 
now gone too far in his political career to call 
a halt, and naturally took his place as a leader 
of the free soil revolt of 1848, and the most 
formidable opponent in New England of the 
eompromise of 1850. In 1851 he yielded re¬ 
luctantly and with sincere regret to the pow¬ 
erful pressure of his friends and allowed him¬ 
self to be elected to the senate of the United 
States by the independent voters of Massa¬ 
chusetts. Here his great work began. In 
1852 he spoke for three hours and three quar¬ 
ters on the fugitive slave law, marshalling 
“law, logic, history, facts, literature, morals, 
and religion against slavery.” It was an 
epoch-making speech. Nothing like it had 
ever before been heard in congress, and it was 
scattered in pamphlet editions by hundreds of 
thousands throughout the country, reaching 
multitudes who had hitherto been indifferent 
on the question, and giving a tremendous im¬ 
pulse to the anti-slavery cause. In 1856 he 
delivered his historic speech in the senate on 
“The Crime Against Kansas,” which was cir¬ 
culated by the million, and doubtless did more 
to create an anti-slavery public opinion in the 
free states than any speeeh ever delivered in 
congress. It had been made absolutely neces¬ 
sary by the growing and unbearable audacity 
of slavery, and it provoked the murderous as¬ 
sault of Preston S. Brooks, which exiled him 
from the country for nearly four years and en¬ 


tailed untold suffering. In 1860, he made his 
great speech on “The Barbarism of Slavery,” 
which took rank with the two preceding ones 
in eloquence and power. Mr. Sumner, beyond 
all the public men of his time, was the creator 
and molder of opinion. Without the three 
great speeches referred to it is safe to say the 
people of the northern states could never have 
been successfully rallied in the war for the 
union in 1861. Mr. Sumner did not make his 
policy the foot-ball of events, but he made 
events the foot ball of his policy. He did not 
study the drifts and currents of opinion as the 
guide and limit of his action, but like Bright 
and Cobden he trusted the people, and be¬ 
lieved that through argument and agitation 
they would be able lo see the truth and follow 
it. He did not speak as a politician merely, 
but as the servant of truth, whose unselfish 
patriotism and purity of life were never ques¬ 
tioned. His speeches embodied the best 
thoughts of the statesman and the moralist, 
and it was the work of his public life to in¬ 
spire in the people bis own lofty spirit. He 
said in 1856: “I seek nothing but the triumph 
of truth. To this I offer my best efforts, care¬ 
less of office or honor. Show me that I am 
wrong, and I stop at once, but in the complete 
conviction of right I shall persevere against 
all temptations, against all odds, against 
all perils, against all threats, knowing 
well that whatever be my fate the right 
will surely prevail. Terrestrial place is 
determined by celestial observation. Only by 
watching the stars can the mariner safely 
pursue his course, and it is only by obeying 
those lofty principles which are above men 
and human passion that we can make our way 
safely through the duties of life.” 

But after the war was over and the work of 
reconstruction had been accomplished, the 
severest trial of Mr. Sumner’s life awaited 
him. The republican party had played its 
grand part in crushing the rebellion and giv¬ 
ing freedom to the slave, and he had prophe¬ 
sied in 1860 that after the accomplishment of 
its immediate work it would be “filled with 
higher life” and “lifted to yet other efforts,” 
which would make its continued existence 
necessary. He loved'the party as a father 
loves his child. He was as devoted to its 
fortunes as was Louis Kossuth to Hungarian 
independence. In the ardor of his feelings he 
did not reckon with the fact that a very great 
war is followed by an afterpiece of political 
huckstering and organized greed. The well- 
earned renown of General Grant as a com¬ 
mander did not prevent him from carrying 
into his civil administration the ideas and 
habits of camp life. The civil service of the 
government was prostituted to the base uses 
of selfishness and plunder. Carpet-bag thieves 
from the north made common cause with 
scalawags in the south in debauching the 
public service and making political morality 
a jest. Our national politics became so de¬ 
based that the Netv York Tribune said the 
country was obliged to “hang its head and 
hold its nose and wait for the administration 






146 


THE CIVIL SERyiCE CHRONICLE. 


to pass.” The disappointment and sorrow of 
Mr. Sumner can better be imagined than de¬ 
scribed. But he did not despair. He raised 
the cry of reform. The men who surrounded 
the president, however, told him that those 
who demanded reform were worse than the 
rogues they were seeking to expel; that the 
attempt to reform the party would divide it 
and open the way for the return of the rebels 
to power; and that the party was greater 
than any man in it, while it was the duty of 
malcontents to submit to its discipline. But 
Mr. Sumner could not be silenced. “The 
slave of principle,” said he, “I call no party 
master.” When the president set his heart 
upon the annexation of San Domingo, and 
undertook to accomplish it by methods un¬ 
authorized by the constitution and con¬ 
demned by the law of the nations, he entered 
into the fight against the whole power of the 
administration and its camp followers. 
Conkling of New York, Carpenter of Wiscon¬ 
sin, Chandler of Michigan, and others who 
composed the “senatorial group” of party 
bosses at that time, were bent upon his humil¬ 
iation. Week after week and month after 
month through this prolonged and painfnl 
struggle Mr. Sumner held them at bay, always 
preserving the decorum of a senator while 
meeting the ribald gibes and sneers of his as¬ 
sailants, whose darling scheme of annexation 
be finally demolished. With health rapidly 
giving way and his life nearing its close un¬ 
der the unequal burden of his work, he never 
appeared more grandly or triumphantly in 
the senate than in his heroic fight for the 
honor of his country. But, although his as¬ 
sailants were defeated and were obliged to 
abandon their project, the preciousness of re¬ 
venge was theirs. They degraded him from 
his chairmanship of the committee on foreign 
relations, which he had so long honored, and 
gave it to Simon Cameron, while Sumner him¬ 
self was located at the tail of the committee 
on education and labor, with Flanagan of 
Texas at its head ! More cruel even than the 
bludgeon of Brooks was this pitiless warfare 
of republican leaders against the man who 
had done more to create and inspire the re¬ 
publican party than any man in the nation, 
living or dead, and who, in opposing this mad 
project, was grandly in the right, as the coun¬ 
try then decided and nobody disputes to-day. 
But Mr. Sumner bowed to the inevitable 
without the slightest hesitation or fear. He 
had a genius for rectitude? He knew that the 
duties of life are more than life. He was 
what Prof. Von Holst calls him, “a man with 
a conscience”; and when he walked out of 
his party and turned his back upon its recre¬ 
ant leaders, he towered above them all as the 
Alps among mountains. 

“Unshaken, unseduced, unterrified. 

His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal. 

Nor number nor example with him wrought 
To sever from truth or change his constant mind.” 

Our Own Day. 

So much for two notable illustrations of my 
text, and I cite them because history is philos¬ 


ophy teaching by example. But the duty of 
political independence is likewise enforced 
by the general course of our politics. Indeed, 
political reform is impossible without polit¬ 
ical independence. Parties do not reform 
themselves, butconstantly gravitate in the op¬ 
posite direction. The leaven must come in 
untrammeled action from without, and this 
makes independent voters exceedingly un¬ 
popular with party bosses. The smallness of 
their numbers and the potency of their efforts 
make them both feared and hated. They hold 
the balance of power, and have repeatedly de¬ 
termined the result of both state and national 
elections. Senator Conklingused to call them 
“ guerrillas,” “tramps,” “jay-hawkers,”“kick¬ 
ers” and “ impracticables who vote in the 
air.” But epithets sometimes become honor¬ 
able. Sixty odd years ago, when Mr. Garri¬ 
son started his tittle newspaper in a small, 
dingy room in Boston, assisted by a negro 
boy, both sleeping on the floor and living on 
bread and water, “ abolitionism” was almost 
universally despised and denounced. The 
south set a price upon his head, and the 
wealth and respectability of Boston turned 
itself into a howling mob in the effort to sup¬ 
press him. But the little cloud, no bigger 
than a man’s hand, finally spread over the 
whole heavens, and the slave was made free. 
What multitudes to-day, some of whom hurled 
brickbats and unmerchantable eggs at the 
anti-slavery pioneers, would now gladly ac¬ 
cept the epithet and wear its honors ! And, 
in fact, how many of them were always abo¬ 
litionists, but in some mysterious way found 
themselves belated in the work of making it 
known to the world ! Let me refer to the men 
who gave only seven thousand votes for their 
candidate for the presidency in 1840. They 
were Mr. Conkling’s “jay-hawkers” and 
“ tramps,” who became disgusted with the 
strife of the old parties over the spoils while 
the underlying and real question of the can¬ 
vass was utterly ignored or treated with con¬ 
tempt. They were the sappers and miners 
who prepared the way for the armies that 
were to follow, and are now honorably re¬ 
membered as the founders of the liberty 
party. The free soil party of 1848 was like¬ 
wise the outcome of political independence. 
It was composed of “impracticables” who 
bolted from the old whig and democratic 
parties, and “voted in the air;” but they 
laid the foundation of the larger movement 
which nominated Lincoln in 1860, and shared 
in the imperishable glory of suppressing the 
rebellion and establishing liberty throughout 
the land. But the republican party itself 
was a hoU. It was a combination of “ kick¬ 
ers.” Some of my old republican friends seem 
to believe their party is of divine appoint¬ 
ment and necessary to salvation ; but it never 
would have existed but for the “ guerrillas” 
and “ tramps” who turned their backs upon 
the old parties and made a new one out of 
their fragments. If every man in those old 
organizations had been a straight-laced parti¬ 
san, who believed in all that his party had 


done in the past or might do in the future, the 
old republican ship would never have been 
launched, and the slave would still be clank¬ 
ing his chains. And if the Democrats in the 
free States could have raised a healthy crop 
of mugwumps in due season the power of 
slavery over the national government would 
never have reached its bad eminence, and the 
curse might have been eliminated without the 
frightful surgery of civil war. The bane of 
our politics is not too much party independ¬ 
ence, but too little. As to the need of parties 
in a free government, there is no controversy. 
Men who think alike on important questions 
naturally find each other out and stand to¬ 
gether. The end is good government, and the 
party the means ; but whenever the end is lost 
sight of in our zeal for the party machine, 
honest men shall ditch it, and thus open the 
way for reform. Our politicians have often 
told us that an army in which each soldier 
goes out to fight on his own hook must prove 
a dismal failure, and that parties also must 
conform to fixed regulations. But a party is 
not an army. Ic is an aggregation of men 
who are supposed to have opinions, and to be 
capable of acting upon them. The discipline 
of the camp is foreign to their work, and the 
reference to it by the party bosses shows the 
clumsiness of their thinking. 

In dealing with this subject I have referred 
to the facts of the past. Is there anything in 
the present state of our politics to tempt any 
one to tie himself to the chariot wheel of any 
party? Compare the record of the last ad¬ 
ministration on the question of civil service 
reform with that of the present up to date, 
and tell me what there is in either to awaken 
party enthusiasm. Party loyalty finds as lit¬ 
tle to inspire it in the action of the present 
congress in dealing with the question of 
finance. As to tarifif reform, members of the 
United States senate who call themselves dem¬ 
ocrats completely block its way in defiance of 
the repeated and thundering demand of the 
people by overwhelming majorities. These 
Taramanyized stipendiaries of monopolies and 
trusts have also been able to prevent confirma¬ 
tion of the most perfectly faultless and admi¬ 
rable nominations made by the President dur¬ 
ing his present term of ofiice; and such is 
political morality in the senate that these reb¬ 
els against political decency, for value re¬ 
ceived or promised, have been welcomed to 
the sweet dalliance of the most scholarly, dis¬ 
tinguished and self-respecting republicans in 
that body. This compact between political 
buccaneers and moral invertebrates touches 
the dead line in practical politics, and meas¬ 
ures the awful descent of a legislative body 
which was the pride of the republic in its 
better days. “To this complexion have we 
come at last.” If we had a few such men 
there to-day as John Quincy Adams and 
Charles Sumner the work of regeneration 
would begin, and the people would rejoice. 
But there is not one. Heaven save us from 
the senate of the United States as now consti¬ 
tuted and inspired, and help us to work and 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


147 


pray for a new one, chosen by the direct vote 
of the people, and obedient to their will. But 
the work of reform, whether in the senate or 
out of it, does not wait on party machinery, 
but political independence, and that eternal 
vigilance of the peojde which is the price of 
their liberty. The remedy for all curable 
political ills is in their hands, and if they fail 
to apply it the blame must lie at their own 
doors. 


A LATE INSTANCE OF SECRETARY 
CARLISLE’S LOOT. 

For many months the Washington corre¬ 
spondent of the New York Evening Post has 
been sending out warnings of the various as¬ 
saults being made by Mr. Carlisle, secretary of 
the treasury, aided by various congressmen, to 
force out Prof. Mendenhall, the distinguished 
superintendent of the coast survey. It is not 
worth while to place the moral responsibility 
for this upon Logan Carlisle. Such dirty 
political business has always been handed over 
to dirty political tools—generally not to one’s 
own son. But it can not be denied that Logan 
Carlisle has shown himself to be admirably 
fitted for his work. The processes of “ forcing 
a resignation” and the sufierings of the victim, 
in this case one of the highly-equipped 
scientific men of this country, are partially 
indicated by the following excerpts covering a 
small portion of the time given by the treas¬ 
ury department to this business. 

• * » 

The politicians who have been trying so 
long to drive Prof. Mendenhall out of the 
superintendency of the coast survey are now 
industriously circulating a newspaper para¬ 
graph in which it is being represented that 
Prof. Mendenhall was given his place by 
President Harrison as a political sop, and in 
defiance of the spirit of civil service reform. 

During President Cleveland’s first admin¬ 
istration an effort was made to procure an 
eminent man of science for the head of the 
survey. Secretary Manning wrote to Prof. 
Alexander Agassiz offering him the place, but 
the offer was declined. A treasury officer 
named Thorne was presently appointed ad 
interim, to straighten out the finances of the 
bureau, which had fallen into some disrepair. 
It was perfectly understood on the part of Mr. 
Thorne, as well as of the president, that this 
appointment was intended to be only tempo¬ 
rary, and that when the right scientific man 
could be found—one who had executive 
ability as well as learning—he would be 
placed in command. It must have been to¬ 
wards the close of the Cleveland administration 
that the American Association for the Ad¬ 
vancement of Science adopted resolutions 
urging upon the president the appointment of 
a scientist to head of the survey, and he made 
another effort to find one. He sought advice 
from the association, but as that body had no 
special candidate in mind, it could give him 
no assistance officially. Personally, the ad¬ 
vice of several of its members was sought, and 


unless the present writer errs in memory, 
Prof. Mendenhall himself was one of these. 
The inquiry resulted in the naming of several 
men to the president, but for some reason none 
of them was appointed. 

At the next meeting of the American asso¬ 
ciation, similar resolutions were adopted, and 
Prof. Mendenhall, being at that time in In¬ 
diana, was deputized to present them to Mr. 
Harrison, who expressed a good deal of inter¬ 
est in the survey, and again suggested that 
some men of science be named, from among 
whom he could safely make his choice of a 
superintendent. Prof. Mendenhall discussed 
with him a few names which had occurred to 
both, including that of Henry Mitchell, with 
whom Mr. Harrison was personally acquainted. 
It was understood at the time that Mitchell 
received an offer of the place but declined it. 
Soon afterwards Prof. Mendenhall was sum¬ 
moned to Washington by a message from the 
president, and to his great surprise was offered 
the superintendency of the coast survey him 
self. His engagement at the time was such as 
to cause him considerable doubt whether or not 
to accept, but Mr. Harrison advised him to 
think it over, and gave him time to do so. 
The next day Prof. Mendenhall made up his 
mind to take the place, stipulating only that 
it should be treated absolutely as a scientific, 
and not at all as a political office. All these 
facts were known to Secretary Windom, who, 
in speaking of them afterward to a friend, 
mentioned with some surprise that President 
Harrison had never made the slightest inquiry 
or conceived any idea of what Prof. Menden¬ 
hall’s politics were. The attempt to discredit 
him and his appointee is founded on a lie, and 
is as contemptible as anything in the history of 
Washington spoils politics.— Washington dis¬ 
patch to New York Evening Post, June 20, 

* * * 

Every one in Washington familiar with 
the management of the treasury department 
knows that Logan Carli.sle, the son of the sec¬ 
retary, and his chief clerk, long ago fixed his 
eye upon the coast survey, and resolved to 
drive Prof. Mendenhall out of it. He has 
found an ally in congress in the person of one 
Enloe, a Tennessee democrat, who has made 
assault after assault upon the professor, for no 
better reason than that the latter preferred to 
run his survey on scientific instead of political 
lines. Every time Enloe has struck at Prof. 
Mendenhall, Mr. Outhwaite, of Ohio, and 
other intelligent democrats, have come to his 
defence and routed the attacking party, but it 
has been possible for the Carlisles to loot 
the survey piecemeal, and it is understood 
that the hopelessness of keeping up a resist¬ 
ance to such aggression has worn out the su¬ 
perintendent’s patience.— Washington dispatch, 
New York Evening Post, June 23. 

* * » 

Prof. Mendenhall, in charge of the coast 
and geodetic survey, has tendered his resigna¬ 
tion to the president on the ground, it is said, 
that the secretary of the treasury has inter¬ 
fered with the working of the bureau by the 


retirement of experts and the substitution of 
inefficient men. Logan Carlisle, the sec¬ 
retary’s son, who is chief clerk of the treasury 
department, declared some time ago that he 
would have Prof. Mendenhall’s official scalp 
in a very few weeks. The office was wanted 
for John C. Underwood, of Chicago, an ex- 
Kentuckian and friend of the secretary of the 
treasury. If Secretary Carlisle’s counsel pre¬ 
vails with the president. General Underwood 
will be appointed.— Washington dispatch, Indi¬ 
anapolis News, June 23. 

» « « 

If Prof. Mendenhall has been forced to re¬ 
sign his place as head of the coast survey by 
the greed of Logan Carlisle for spoils it is full 
time that the president interfered and sent 
young Carlisle back to Kentucky, or at least 
forbade any more political fugling with the 
coast survey. The coast survey is an institu¬ 
tion of which the country has every reason to 
be proud. Its work is of the highest value, 
and is so regarded throughout the world. It 
has reached its present state of high efficiency 
by being managed on scientific principles, re¬ 
gardless of politics. Since Logan Carlisle has 
been chief clerk of the treasury department 
under his father, he has distinguished himself 
by looting every office he could lay his hands 
on, and of late has been driving experts and 
scientific men out of the coast survey in order 
to put democrats in their places, no matter 
whether they were efficient or not, and regard¬ 
less of the effect on the work of the survey. 
Prof. Mendedhall is said to have borne this 
substitution as long as he could, and finally to 
have resigned rather submit to a constant 
overruling of his protests.— Springfield Repub¬ 
lican, June 29. 

• * « 

If President Cleveland wants to prove the 
sincerity of what he has said and written in 
favor of reform in the civil service he has a 
good chance now. For several months, in 
fact ever since the present administration 
came into power, there has been a continual 
attack by politicians upon the coast survey 
because Prof. Mendenhall, the superintendent, 
has declined to allow political considerations 
to interfere with the management of the bu¬ 
reau. It is true that he is a republican and 
was appointed by a republican president, 
but he is not a politician, has never 
taken any active part in political affairs, 
and could not with any justice be rated 
as an offensive partisan. Prof. Menden¬ 
hall is one of the most famous and emi¬ 
nent scientists in the United States, and his 
reputation is universal. His ability and 
learning are recognized by every school of 
science in the world, and he is considered one 
of the foremost authorities in several branches 
of scientific investigation. 

Since he has been superintendent of the 
coast survey he has declined to make dis¬ 
charges or appointments for political reasons, 
and has thereby offended several prominent 







148 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


democratic politicians, particularly Mr. En- 
loe, of Tennessee, who has since been perse¬ 
cuting him in every possible manner. Strange 
to say, Secretary Carlisle’s sympathies appear 
to have been with Mr. Enloe, and, regardless 
of the protests of Professor Mendenhall, the 
secretary has made removals and appoint¬ 
ments in the coast survey without so much as 
consulting the superintendent. Some of the 
men he has removed are experienced and 
valuable scientists who have no political con¬ 
nections whatever and have performed their 
duties with an ability and fidelity that were 
beyond criticism. The men who have been 
appointed in nearly every instance have been 
politicians without scientific attainments or 
any knowledge or experience to fit them for 
the work to which they were assigned. 

Professor Mendenhall has protested to the 
secretary of the treasury and to the president 
against this kind of interference with his sub¬ 
ordinates, but it has done no good, and now 
the announcement is made that he has ten¬ 
dered his resignation because the secretary of 
the treasury persists in appointing to his 
bureau incompetent men and making him re¬ 
sponsible for their work. This matter has 
been brought to the attention of President 
Cleveland several times, and he has promised 
to talk with Secretary Carlisle about it, but if 
the president has given him instructions on 
the subject the secretary disregards them, 
which is very improbable.— Washington dis¬ 
patch, Chicago Record. 

* ♦ • 

The Worcester polytechnic institute is to be 
congratulated on securing as its next presi¬ 
dent Dr. Tliomas C. Mendenhall, the efficient 
superintendent of the United States coast sur¬ 
vey, who has been driven out of office by the 
folly of Logan Carlisle, the bumptious son of 
the secretary of the treasury. But the loss of 
the United States is the gain of Worcester and 
Massachusetts. Dr. Mendenhall has accepted 
his unanimous election, and will spend the 
next three months in visiting the principal 
scientific schools in Europe, returning 
to take up his new duties October 1. Dr. 
Mendenhall holds high rank in scientific 
circles and as a practical educator. He was 
called from his professorship of physics and 
mathematics in Ohio university to help found 
one or more scientific schools in Tokio, Japan, 
returned to his old chair in 1882, two years 
later entered the United States signal service, 
and in 1886 accepted the presidency of Rose 
polytechnic institute at Terre Haute, Ind. He 
was next appointed by President Harrison 
superintendent of the United States coast and 
goedetic survey, succeeding the late Prof. 
Pierce of Harvard. This place he resigned 
July 1, though President Cleveland has not 
yet accepted his resignation. Dr. Menden¬ 
hall received the degree of Ph. D. from Ohio 
University in 1878, and of LL. D. from the 
University of Michigan in 1887. Within the 
last few years he has delivered two courses of 
lectures before the Lowell institute in Boston. 
—Springfield Republican, July IS, 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

A PowEKLESs Executive and Reigning 
Chiefs. 

Senator McPherson to-day asked the Presi¬ 
dent to withdraw the nomination of Captain 
James Parker to be United States Attorney 
for the District of New Jersey, which was 
made last Tuesday. Speaking of his action, 
Mr. McPherson said: 

“I had not asked for the appointment of 
Captain James Parker. 1 have recently repeat¬ 
edly stated to Captain Parker that I could not con¬ 
sent to his appointment to that office, because I ivas 
otherwise committed. Finding, however, that the 
nomination had been made under some misappre¬ 
hension in regard to my wishes in the matter, I hive 
asked the President to withdraw tho nomination, 
for I can not consent tb be placed in a false 
position in respect to it.”— Washington dis¬ 
patch, July 12. 

The withdrawal by the President of the 
nomination of James Parker as United States 
district attorney for New Jersey has caused 
considerable discussion here, owing to the pe¬ 
culiar attitude in which it has placed the two 
New Jersey senators. The facts in the mat¬ 
ter are slowly coming out, and appear to be 
as follows; 

Senator McPherson had an informal under¬ 
standing with Senator Smith that the appoint¬ 
ment should “belong” to him (McPherson), 
and on that understanding promised the 
award of the appointment to Miles Ross, the 
New Brunswick politician, who controls votes 
that will be valuable to Senator McPherson in 
his contest for re-election to the Senate next 
fall. Ross delayed in urging the appoint¬ 
ment, and Mr. Parker solicited the two New 
Jersey senators for support in his application 
for the office, without conference with Ross. 
Senator McPherson wrote a letter to the Presi¬ 
dent, of which the following is a copy: 

Senate Chamber, ") 
Washington, April 7, 1894. j 
To the President: 

Sir —I am informed that the bearer, Capt. 
James Parker, of Perth Amboy, N. J., is de¬ 
sirous of obtaining some position under your 
administration. Capt. Parker is a lawyer of 
good abilities and much experience, and will 
fill the office of United States district attorney 
for New Jersey, or any other office whose 
duties are of a legal character that he will 
undertake to fill, with great credit. I indorse 
and commend Capt. Parker in every way, and 
ask for him such consideration as may be 
possible to give. Yours, etc. 

J. R. McPherson. 

Senator Smith’s reply was that he had in¬ 
dorsed some other application and could not 
therefore help Mr. Parker. It appears that in 
spite of this fact Mr. Parker filed the letters 
from both senators together with others from 
Frederick R. Coudert, ex-Governors Ludlow, 
Green, Abbett and Bedle, and Messrs. William 
R. Grace, Everett P. Wheeler and others, and 
got the nomination. 

When the announcement was made Mr. 
McPherson expressed himself as displeased, 
and declared that his letter was not intended 


as an indorsement of Mr. Parker, a statement 
which he reiterated with some emphasis when 
protests came from Senator Smith and all the 
New Jersey delegation in congress except 
Messrs. Geissenhainer and English,and finally 
one from Miles Ross. He at once hastened to 
the White House and secured the promise of a 
withdrawal of the nomination, which has since been 
made. 

The whole matter has caused a great deal of 
severe criticism of Senator McPherson, the 
more so as there has been a continual squab¬ 
ble over all federal appointments between the 
two New Jersey senators to an extent which 
had practically “held up” all the appoint¬ 
ments. The fight is particularly emphasized be¬ 
cause Senator McPherson is using every effort to 
employ federal patronage to secure his re-election 
next fall. 

At the White Plouse no information is 
vouchsafed regarding the case.— Washington 
dispatch New York Evening Post, July 16. 

* » * 

All the nominations of New Yorkers before 
the judiciary committee, except Bennett in 
Kings county, are to be reported favorably to 
the senate in executive session. The most re¬ 
cent nominations are considered by the “machine" 
as made in the interest of conciliation, and have 
reconciled Senator Hill and his backers to the idea 
of letting the rest of the names go through .— Wash¬ 
ington dispatch New York Evening Post, July 16. 


BOSS GORMAN AND HIS SUBSI¬ 
DIZED PRESS. 

How A Subsidized Parer Works for Its 
B oss. 


“The Port Tobacco Times, the Laurel Demo¬ 
crat, the Rockville Advocate, the Ellicott City 
Times, the 'Towson Journal, and other county 
journals have been throwing hot shot at 
the Baltimore Sun for its course on the tariff 
and its malice toward certain democratic lead¬ 
ers and for its general attempt to rule or ruin 
the democratic party. The criticisms have 
been ricbly merited and very forcibly applied.” 
— Westminster Advocate. 


" The editor oj the Port Tobacco Times, we believe, 
is the clerk of the committee on printing, of which 
Senator Horman is chairman. The editor of the Lau¬ 
rel Democrat, we believe, has recently been appointed 
to a good office in Washington. The editor of the Elli¬ 
cott City Times, we believe, is a candidate for the posi¬ 
tion of postmaster at Ellicott City. The editor of the 
Towson Journal, we believe, is commissioner of immi¬ 
gration at a salary of $1,800 a year."—Centerville Ob¬ 
server. 

“Editor Busteed, of the Centerville Observer, errs 
slightly. He has not brought out the full relation 
of the editors named to Senator Gorman and the 
ring. Francis M. Cox, of the Port Tobacco Times, is 
clerk to the. senate printing committee ; Ernest P. 
Baldwin was editor of the Laurel Democrat when 
President Cleveland appointed him first auditor of 
the treasury, and the paper is now run by his broth¬ 
er, and is owned principally by Senator Gorman and 
Naval Officer Barnes Compton; J. Emory Hill, of the 
Ellicott City Times, holds a lucrative Howard county 
office by the grace of Mr Gorman’s following, and his 
associate, J. B. Morrow, was a candidate for the Elli¬ 
cott City post-office. Col. William II. Ruby, of the Tow¬ 
son Journal, holds the place named by Editor Busteed. 
The editor of the Rockville Advocate, Albert J. Al- 
money, is postmaster of that town, and Editor William 
H. Vanderford, of the Westminster Advocate, wants 
to hold the same ofiice in Westminster.—Baltimore 
Evening News. 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering of the 
ship of state.— From Archbishop Ireland's address: The Duty and Value oj Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II, No. 18. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N' 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


The editor of the Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle has sent the following request to the 
post-masters of Indiana whose offices come 
under the civil service rules: 

Indianapolis, Ind., June22, 1894. 

My Dear Sir— I shall be gratified if you will 
kindly Inform me for publication in the Civil 
Service Chronicle ; 

1. The number of employes in the post-office 
when you took charge. 

2. The number now in the classified service. 

3. The number now in the unclassified service. 

4. How many of the employes in the office when 
you took charge are there now? How many of 
these were in the classified service? How many 
in the unclassified service ? 

5. How many appointments have been made 
under your administration to the classified service ? 
IIow many to the unclassified service? 

6. Do you know whether the appointees under 
the civil service law have included democrats and 
republicans? 

7. Will republicans under your administration 
have in the classified service the same treatment 
as the democrats? 

A prompt reply will greatly oblige me. 

We regret that the commemorative ad¬ 
dress upon George William Curtis by Park 
Godwin, before the Century Association, 
was received too late for such extended ex¬ 
cerpts as we should like to make. The ad¬ 
dress is adequate to the subject, which is 
saying a great deal. Every college library 
should have it. All teachers of American 
history and literature in our high schools, 
should read this memorial of a great citi¬ 
zen. It maj be had for ten cents by ad¬ 
dressing the secretary of the Civil Service 
Reform Association, 54 William street, 
New York. 


How like our own Bynum was the shifty 
performance of substituting the Houk bill 
providing for the reinstatement of dis¬ 
charged railway postal clerks for his own, 
and when questioned as to whether the 
two bills were the some casually replying 
that they were, in order to get the change 
without objection. Bynum’s bill instructed 
the civil service commission to place the 
names of discharged employes on the eli¬ 
gible list. Houk’s bill provided that the 
postmaster-general should, as fast as va¬ 
cancies occur, fill them from the list of 
discharged employes. Bynum’s bill made 
no provision for determining what names 


INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST, 1894. 


should go at the head and what at the 
foot of the eligible list, as it expressly pro¬ 
vided for no examinations and thus was 
an impracticable measure which Bynum 
was shrewd enough to discover would have 
to be vetoed by the President on technical 
grounds alone; but Houk’s bill offers a 
golden opportunity for the ex-postal clerks 
to battle and scramble for reinstatement 
on their political pulls. So far as the bill 
itself is concerned we need not worry. It 
will never become a law. 


The clerical force of the civil service 
commission has been for the most part 
made up of details from different de¬ 
partments. The departments naturally 
did not always send their best men. The 
clerks did not like to be removed from the 
line of promotion and the commission had 
no power to protect, as in the Eugene Gad¬ 
dis case, its own efficient employes from 
the vengeance of a Logan Carlisle. The 
House, in its recent onslaught on the com¬ 
mission and the law, struck out the amend¬ 
ment to remedy this unsatisfactory condi¬ 
tion of things. But in the senate a clause 
was inserted granting the commission a 
force of thirty-six clerks of its own, duly 
classified, providing also that the commis¬ 
sion might transfer to its own rolls any of 
the detailed department clerks who had 
proved useful as examiners and giving an 
appropriation of 152,000 for the pay of 
these clerks. This is a gain in many ways. 
It dignifies the civil service commission. 
It lessens the power of such fellows as 
young Carlisle to harry and irritate the 
commission and to cripple their work. 


Since the above was written, the Chron¬ 
icle has received the following from a 
well-informed correspondent: 

Repeatedly in its annual reports, and in 
other ways, the commission has urged upon 
congress the importance of amending the law 
so that the men upon whom it relies to do its 
work shall be subject to its control. Until 
this session the spoilsmen have always been 
successful in their efforts to maintain this 
handicap upon the effectiveness of the com¬ 
mission. Sometimes they persuaded the house 
committee on appropriations to refuse the 
commission’s request. Sometimes, when the 
committee included the appropriation desired 
by the commission in the bill as reported to 
the house, the enemies of the merit system 
raised a point of order in the house that as 
the effect of the amendment was to change 
an existing provision of law without thereby 


One dollar per annum. 
10 cents per copy. 


reducing expenditure, it was inadmissible 
under the house rules. Such was the method 
to which they successfully resorted in the 
house this year. In the senate, where no such 
rule prevails, Senator Lodge re-introduced the 
amendment in an improved and more prac¬ 
tically useful form. With the assistance of 
Senator Cockerell, chairman of the appropria¬ 
tion committee of the senate, Mr. Lodge steered 
it successfully through all its stages in that 
body. In the senate, indeed, there was no op¬ 
position to the change, and no debate upon it 
except that Senator Platt, of Connecticut, 
asked a few questions to satisfy himself and 
the senate as to the precise purpose and effect 
of the amendment, and to make certain that 
there was nothing in it which could by possibil¬ 
ity, interfere with the effective working of 
the commission. The amendment was not 
yet, however, out of the woods. Once before 
it had passed the senate only to be stricken out 
in the conference committee. This year it had 
better fortune. The house conference agreed 
to accept it. The report of the conference 
committee was adopted in the house without, 
so far as this amendment is concerned, any 
debate or question. 

Oood Government, familiar as it is with the 
practical workings of the law, declared that 
the change is the “most important piece of 
legislation in furtherance of civil service re¬ 
form since the enactment of the civil service 
law itself eleven years ago.” 

The thanks of all friends of decent govern¬ 
ment are due to Senators Lodge and Cockerell 
who contributed more than any one else to 
the successful result. Senator Cockerell’s 
course in the matter was particularly note¬ 
worthy, because in the past he has not pro¬ 
fessed to be a special friend of the reform, and, 
perhaps, is not now. While the merit system 
is part of the law of the land, however, he 
frankly and fully recognized his responsibility 
as chairman of the appropriations committee 
of the senate to see to it that the commission¬ 
ers charged by statute with the discharge of 
important duties should be given power to 
perform them efficiently. 

The excellent and belated order of the 
postmaster-general, printed below, must 
be taken along with Mr. Cleveland’s put¬ 
ting the railway mail service under the 
merit system and Mr. Harrison’s taking 
the post-offices having the carrier service 
out of spoils as encouraging indications of 
the inevitable progress of civil service re¬ 
form. All, however, were done after such 
pointed delays and after such conspicuous 
frisking in spoils that about the most one 
can do is to give a perfunctory sort of 
praise. Upon the appointment of the suc¬ 
cessors of the present postmasters who 
have been actively employed in what is 
known as “beating the law,” we shall again 
hear the old cry: “Postmaster-General Bis- 
sell delayed his order until he knew that 
his postmasters had practically made a 





























150 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


clean sweep of republicans, and now in all 
justice we must be allowed to equalize the 
service.” These belated reforms, like most 
timid measures, are alike a severe strain 
upon reform and upon spoilsmen. 

The following is the recent order : 

To Postmasters Free Delivery Offices. 

Post office Department, } 
Washington, D. C., June 28, 1894.^ 

Order No. 235. 

For the purpose of avoiding unjust removals 
of clerks and carriers in the classihed service, 
and to avoid embarrassment and annoyance 
to the department and postmasters with 
reference thereto, postmasters in free delivery 
offices are hereby notihed that the following 
policy prevails in the post-office department, 
and will be enforced : 

All removals and new employments of clerks 
and changes in rosters, must be reported to, 
the first assistant postmaster general as soon 
as made. 

No carrier shall be removed except for 
cause, and upon written charges filed with the 
post-office department, and of which the car¬ 
rier shall have full notice, and an opportunity 
to make defense. 

No resignation requested by the postmaster, 
or by any one for him, will be accepted by 
the department. W’. S. Bissell, 

Postmaster-General. 


In 1891, at the annual meeting of the 
Buflfdlo association, its president, Sherman 
S. Rogers, spoke of the “anomaly existing 
in the federal building” in Buffalo. In the 
postoffice the civil service law was in full, 
operation, but upstairs in the collector’s 
office, the collector, “in full war paint and 
feathers,” by having less than 50 employes, 
was able to defy the law. The custom 
house remained under the spoils system. 
This was the condition of things all over 
the United States, and Mr. Rogers called on 
President Harrison to extend the law so as 
to remedy the evil. “ Such action would 
be like the march of a victorious army into 
the enemy’s camp, and would prove the 
claim that Gen. Harrison is a reformer.” 
And the association adopted a resolution 
asking for such extension. At the dinner 
in 1894, when Postmaster Baker rejoiced 
“ at the dawn of a new and better era,” 
Toastmaster Rogers followed with: “ We 
hope that era will extend higher than the 
first story of the government building. 
We want it to take in the custom house.” 
At the call of the president for a rising 
vote on the part of all who favored the 
doing away with the anomalous state of 
things that had too long disfigured the cus¬ 
tom house, everybody rose, and President 
Rogers desired the secretary to make a 
minute of this fact, to be forwarded to 
President Cleveland. 


The Buffalo Express says: 

What Mr. Rogers charges is very true—and very 
notorious. It has been true under republican col¬ 
lectors and democratic collectors alike. It is 
claimed that there are usually more than fifty per¬ 
sons employed in collecting customs revenue in 
the district of Buffalo Creek. But all above forty- 


seven or so are on the pay-roll as “temporary” or 
“extra” employes. 

We have not had this little extension be¬ 
cause Mr. Harrison and Mr. Cleveland 
feared their respective party machines. 
We shall not get this extension or the order 
putting the unclassified places in the post- 
offices under the rules until civil service 
reformers clamor, make themselves dis 
agreeable, conscientiously refrain from 
“sympathy” and make threats exactly as 
the party machine does. If a president’s 
own party organizition acts the part of a 
tyrant and lashes him through his admin¬ 
istration for selfish ends, he should not 
complain if others follow the example 
for unselfish ends. 


The Chronicle was evidently prema¬ 
ture in its supposition from an interview 
with Postmaster Baker, of Buffalo, that he 
would not treat his unclassified service as 
spoil. His collapse has begun, according 
to the Buffalo Express. He asked for the 
resignation of the superintendent of a 
branch office and is reported as follows: 

Mr. Baker told Mr. Miller that the resignation 
was demanded on purely political grounds. Mr. 
Miller was a republican and Mr. Warner was 
a democrat. Mr. Miller was told that he might send 
in his resignation if he wished. Mr. Miller’s resig¬ 
nation was worded something like this: “In com¬ 
pliance with your request I herewith tender my 
resignation,” and so on. 

Mr. Baker is also reported as stating 
that Mr. Miller “was a first-class man and 
knew his business thoroughly.” 

An administration that professes to be¬ 
lieve in the merit system but puts over 
the rank and file, whose places were se¬ 
cured by competition, heads of depart¬ 
ments whose places were doled out as 
spoil, is like a farmer who piously protects 
his sheep by the use of wolves as shep¬ 
herds. The putting of these excepted 
places under the rules would for an entire 
week make all the local spoilsmen seethe 
and boil, but we suppose Washington 
officialism has the President so thoroughly 
in hand that he believes, if he should 
correct this absurd and incongruous state 
of things, he would disrupt his party, 
which seems to be an idle fear, in view of 
the present harmonious condition of his 
party, which is largely the result of his 
subservience to the spoils gang. 


How shall we characterize the man who 
loses his character and thereby furthers a 
great reform? It really looks as if Josiah 
Quincy had, unintentionally, we suppose, 
by sacrificing his reputation given the nec¬ 
essary impetus to consular reform. On 
every hand in the daily papers, in the im¬ 
portant magazines, are springing up wit¬ 
nesses qualified to judge, who show what a 
disgrace our consular service treated as 
spoil has become, and who claim more¬ 


over that reform through merit and com¬ 
petition is entirely practicable. We doubt 
if another administration in the face of 
the aroused public opinion would have the 
bravado to again treat this service as spoil. 
And all this public interest is due to Mr. 
Quincy. It was his unmistakable use of 
the consular service to reward party hacks, 
to pay party and private debts, the brutal, 
the reckless and callous sweeping out of 
decent officers, the unblushing delight in 
the power of patronage to influence legis¬ 
lation expressed by Mr. Quincy, the re¬ 
former in politics, that aroused the pa¬ 
triotism of many people as no ordinary 
spoils mongering of an ordinary spoils- 
monger could have done. It is a matter 
of some delicacy just how to express 
proper gratitude to Mr. Quincy. 

Secretary George McAneny, of the 
New York Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion, recently appeared before the special 
senate committee investigating the admin¬ 
istration of the civil service laws. He gave 
the history of the efforts of the association 
to get the law enforced by the commission 
and by Governor Flower. Their method 
of correcting the violations of the law is 
unique. The report of the evidence states: 

On January 16 the commission made six¬ 
teen more corrections of existing violations. 
Of this numher six were corrected in conform¬ 
ity to the law. Two of the other places were 
transferred from the competitive to the non¬ 
competitive class at the request of Governor 
Flower. The correction of two of these other 
violations was affVcted by a change of the 
title of their positions and in the cases of the 
remaining four violations new examinations 
were held. 

A long tabulation was put in evidence by 
Sefretary McAneny, showing the number of 
violations of the law which the commission 
had undertaken to correct since the promul¬ 
gation by Comptroller Koberis of his inten¬ 
tion not to pay salaries to officials appointed 
in violation of the civil service law. The po¬ 
sitions affected numbered over 100. Most of 
the corrections were accomplished by trans¬ 
ferring the positions from the competitive to 
the non-competitive class. 


The Galveston Neivs ought to have had 
some influence with this administration. It 
is an important democratic paper, printed 
in a section supposed to believe that a par¬ 
ty can not survive the loss of patronage. 
Last May it said : 

Some of the very men to whom Mr. Cleve¬ 
land has given the most are the men who are 
telling their constituents that he is an enemy 
of the South. Nothing has done more to de¬ 
moralize the democratic party in the South 
and elsewhere than the dependence of its 
leaders upon patronage and their great and 
incurable expectations and demands for spoils. 

And later: 

Mr. Cleveland has not succeeded in satisfy¬ 
ing the demands of a single chronic spoils¬ 
man. The more he has given to them the more 
have they demanded. The greed of a party 
spoilman is a most dangerous disease. 

And now it might add that those who 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


151 


received the most from the President show 
not even the grace of loyalty to him. 


PENSION AGENT SPENCER. 

Pension Agent Spencer is reported as 
having reduced salaries enough to get five 
additional employes. This necessity for 
an increased force is a natural consequence 
of dismissing men who had learned the 
work and of training new men. He also is 
about to complete his clean sweep by the 
dismissal of four remaining republicans 
and one hold-over democrat. It is also 
reported that’“the new force have been to¬ 
gether for several months and have be¬ 
come well acquainted with each other. Ac¬ 
quaintance has ripened into friendship of 
true worth.” 

This “friendship of true worth” was 
emphasized by the recent presentation of 
“two handsome alabaster ink-stands and 
bottles” to Mr. Spencer and his chief 
clerk, and by the reciprocal attention of 
“a large box of fragrant cigars” to the 
male employes and “a large box of ele¬ 
gant candies” to the female employes. We 
trust that these amenities mark an end of 
the unpleasant decapitations that have 
been going on, and which no doubt have 
had a tendency to lower the spirits of the 
working force. 

Mr. Spencer’s suspended animation as a 
civil service reformer seems also to have 
happily ended and he is again a true-blue 
reformer, with certain reservations. The 
Indianapolis News, August 10, reports him 
as follows: 

“Competitive examinations should be held for 
the various clerkships in government offices. In 
this way the most competent man will always se¬ 
cure the place. When the republicans are in 
power, examinations should be held for repub¬ 
licans only. When the democrats succeed to of¬ 
fice, democrats alone should be allowed to pass the 
examinations. We can not have a spirit of patriot¬ 
ism unless we reward men for political and patri¬ 
otic service. Under my plan, while each party 
would secure the results of its victory, only the 
best men would get office.” 

If the railway mail service, the Pennsyl¬ 
vania Railroad Company or the Atlas En¬ 
gine Works should dismiss their employes 
once in four years and then hold examina¬ 
tions to which the old men were not eligi¬ 
ble, in order to get hold of the best new 
material to train for another four years, we 
have Mr. Spencer’s plan, and the obvious 
break-down of any business so conducted. 
But we wish to call attention to the state¬ 
ment that “we can not have a spirit of 
patriotism unless we reward men for 
political and patriotic service.” Mr. Spen 
cer’s view is that to get him to continue 
to love his country, to perform his duties 
as a citizen, and as a party man to propa¬ 
gate his party views and to vote for them 
at the polls, he had to be paid with an of¬ 
fice. No doubt he is qualified to speak for 


himself, but the people generally have not 
yet fallen so low. At present there are 
many who do not feel that they are in 
duty bound to undertake the political 
work that brings them into the unequal 
personal contest with the hirelings of a 
political machine. They are, we believe, 
justified in declining such political work 
so long as a congressman is allowed to 
subsidize editors, reward his henchmen 
with public offices and marshal them to 
throttle all free expression of public opin¬ 
ion ; but when this tyranny of patronage 
is removed, the political vacuum made 
by the withdrawal of Mr. Spencer and 
all others who withdraw unless they can 
be paid, will be speedily filled by men who 
want no other reward than the pleasure 
of making a fight for the opinions in 
which they believe. 


THE PRESIDENT AND THE TARIFF. 

No one regrets so much as we do our 
frequent censure of President Cleveland, 
for it he, and only he, must bear the blame. 
We shall be delighted to let him alone if 
he will make Carlisle and Hoke Smith, 
Voorhees and Turpie, and all their many 
fellows, here and elsewhere, of high and 
low degree, let the public service alone. 
Whenever he shall justly earn his large 
salary by faithfully doing the work for 
which it pays; doing the whole of this work, 
and not a half or a hundredth part of it; do¬ 
ing it consistently and impartially, and 
not by fits and starts, now here, now 
there, on no intelligible principle of action 
or inaction, no one will recognize more 
gladly than we,not, indeed, that he isnec- 
essarily a saint, or a hero, or a patriot 
sage, but that he is an honest, conscien¬ 
tious man. 

Whatever we may think of him, how¬ 
ever, we shall always deal with him, and 
with every other public servant, as having 
a right, not to indulgence, but to fair treat¬ 
ment from his masters, and we therefore 
say now, what we believe every reasonably 
intelligent and well-informed person in 
the country thinks (although a few demo¬ 
cratic attorneys for trusts and a few hide¬ 
bound republican partisans pretend to 
think otherwise), that his recent interven¬ 
tion in legislation regarding the tarifi'was 
simply the fitting discharge of his evident 
duty. We know that some very worthy 
poople who have been and, we hope, are 
still good friends of the Chronicle, are 
grieved to see us apparently so skeptical, 
critical and, on the whole, indifi'erent as to 
the evils of the tariff and the attempts 
made to remedy them by the party in 
power. We must even plead guilty in 
some degree to the offense thus imputed 
to us, and confess to a lack of enthusiastic 
interest in the outcome of those tedious 


“conferences” which are dragging their 
slow length along while we write, although 
it may be hoped that ere this issue reaches 
our readers they will know whether the 
“Wilson bill” and the “Gorman-Brice” bill 
have followed the example, to share the 
fate of the Kilkenny cats, or, by a happy 
union, have presented the country with a 
hybrid measure of multiple paternity. It 
may be that after all these months of talk 
and tinker, of waiting and wrangling, bar¬ 
gaining and log-rolling, the tariff will re¬ 
main as it was when Harrison left the 
White House. It may be that their Gra¬ 
cious Majesties, the Trusts, will be per¬ 
suaded by arguments closely analogous to 
those found effective to the same end with 
the Plantagenets, to generously remit, say 
a tithe, of the benevolences they levy on 
rich and poor alike; in neither event shall 
we be thrilled with patriotic pride by the 
statesmanship of our dominant party, or 
enraptured at the golden future unveiled 
to the nation. 

But, while we think and feel thus, we 
can readily understand that the President 
may, and ought to, think and feel far other¬ 
wise. He is the successful candidate of a 
party which, abandoning for once in its 
public utterances the use of Platformese, 
pledged itself in the plainest English, to 
recast our entire system of import duties 
upon principles of revision so radical and 
far-reaching that their thoroughgoing and 
practical application would have worked 
little less than an economical revolution. 
He was nominated as the exponent and 
avowed champion of tariff reform, and 
ere this has doubtless persuaded himself, 
in perfect good faith, that he was elected 
because the people agreed with him; and 
not because they were nauseated with Gen¬ 
eral Harrison and all his surroundings, 
with transparent hypocrisy and Wanama- 
ker, with brazen corruption and Raum ; 
nor yet because four years of spoils- 
mongering had then honey-combed the 
republican party with disaffection ; just as 
a like course of political debauchery is 
now, before his eyes and with his conni¬ 
vance, fast undermining all discipline and 
spirit in his own party. Believing that 
his party was given by the people, not only 
full control of both branches of the national 
legislature and of the executive, but an 
explicit “mandate” as to its use of this 
power, he would be a far worse man than 
we think him, if he heard without indigna¬ 
tion a half-dozen senators, with Gorman of 
Maryland as their worthy spokesman, 
calmly announce that either the tariff 
would be changed to suit the little groups 
of very rich men, who almost undisguis. 
edly own them, or it would not be changed 
at all. Repudiation of platform promises 
after election is no new feature in Ameri¬ 
can politics; indeed, it requires no little 













152 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ingenuity (more, certainly, than we pre¬ 
tend to possess) to discover in the 
structure of the Wilson bill many 
splinters of the tarifl plank adopted at 
Chicago; but, after all, a little effort to¬ 
wards seeming consistency, a little show 
of public motives, some affectation of re¬ 
gard for the general interest, has usually 
cloaked with a faint semblance of decency 
even the clearest breach of trust. In this 
case the offenders were, at least at first, 
cynically shameless, one could almost— 

“Like the bearded Switzer, hear them say: 

•That cause is sacred which gives certain pay.’ ” 

They seemed anxious only to merit their 
own respective admissions on the ground- 
floor of the several Trusts they served ; un¬ 
til the President’s letter was read by Mr. 
Wilson, they were as though blind and 
deaf to the plain signs of popular anger 
and disgust gathering all about them. 
The silly outcry sought to be raised at the 
President’s attempt to “influence legisla¬ 
tion ” by his letter, although it has fallen 
too flat to need serious notice for itself, 
curiously illustrates the slovenly habits of 
thought tolerated and even cultivated by 
so many of those who speak or write re¬ 
garding public affairs. Mr. Cleveland is 
none the less an American citizen because 
he happens to be President of the United 
States; who is it that questions the right 
of an American citizen, however humble, 
or however prominent, to “influence leg¬ 
islation” by fair argument, admonition, or 
remonstrance, addressed to congressmen 
paid from the taxes he helps, directly or 
indirectly, to pay ? He is the first poli¬ 
tician of his party; must he alone be mute 
as to matters of political life or death to 
that party ? If any one says he must, let us 
be plainly told why. Finally, if his action 
had been official instead of personal, is 
there any constitutional duty more clearly 
imposed on the President than to give 
congress information, in his own discretion 
as to time or exigency, regarding the state 
of the Union ? and could there be any sea¬ 
son more opportune for discharging this 
duty than the present ? 

The mustard seed of truth hidden in the 
bulk of this absurd and hollow clamor is 
the fact that Mr. Cleveland has sought ever 
since his inauguration to “influence legis¬ 
lation,” not as in this instance, by the le¬ 
gitimate means contemplated and pre¬ 
scribed by the constitution, but, to speak 
plainly, by a system of wholesale bribery. 
The spectacle of Senator Gorman standing 
forth as the champion of “the Senate’s hon¬ 
or,” or, indeed, of anything more commend¬ 
able than lobbying or election frauds, is so 
strongly suggestive of opera houffe that one 
can scarcely treat it seriously, but when he 
urged his colleagues to resist firmly at¬ 
tempted dictation by one who disposed of 


300,000 offices, he would have discharged 
a patriotic duty had he meant dictation 
through the disposal of those offices. To 
“dictation” thus enforced, or, in other 
words, to the barter of places for votes, 
however, such confessors as he of legisla¬ 
tive independence, are very charitable; if 
they withstand it as to the tarifiF, this is 
only because, though, for them, patronage 
is sweet, “sugar,” or its equivalent, is 
sweeter. The form of dictation which 
they heartily hate and abjectly fear appeals 
for its sanction to an aroused and outraged 
public opinion; from that these worthies 
shrink as in the old southern days, a shirk¬ 
ing, pilfering “nigger” squirmed at the 
crack of the overseer’s whip, and for very 
similar reasons. 

Precisely because they thus regard it> 
through it, and not otherwise, can any 
President accomplish any worthy end with 
congress. It seems strange that Mr. 
Cleveland should still need to be told this; 
even a priori the proposition would seem, 
as the French say, to “leap into the eyes.” 
No doubt it is a “consideration” for Sen¬ 
ator Gorman to have his shiftless brother 
“Cal” supported at public expense, or to 
secure berths for “useful pensioners” like 
’Gene Higgins and Morris Thomas; but 
this may be outweighed by even cruder 
arguments on the part of the Sugar Trust, 
by the prospect of diminished dividends 
from those coal or railroad companies of 
Western Maryland and West Virginia for 
which the senator entertains a concern so 
notoriously “ altruistic,” by a regard for 
the welfare of some one among those many 
enterprises soliciting legislative recogni¬ 
tion in which, of course, he “ has no inter¬ 
est,” but “certain of his friends” occasion¬ 
ally may have some. In short, if Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland chooses to enter the auction 
mart for this human merchandise with 
white skins but black souls, he ought to 
understand that when he competes with 
wealthy and powerful interests he may 
well be outbidden. But, if he does not 
see this possibility, surely he can not be 
blind to the facts that all his eflorts to 
guide the action of congress through “con¬ 
ciliation ” and “recognition” and the vari¬ 
ous other euphemisms for this form of 
bribery have been simply dismal failures. 
Stewart and Allen might be talking against 
time yet for all the good it did to “pla¬ 
cate” Voorhees and his like; that the sil¬ 
ver bill became a law was due to no thim- 
ble-rigging with offices, but because the 
President at last spoke out like a man. 
The “placing” of post-offices and giving a 
free rein to Logan Carlisle has not saved 
him from the income tax, or a thousand 
incongruities in his tarifl bill; if he res¬ 
cues enough of this last to be willing to 
count it of kin, he will owe this to another 


belated spurt of manliness. Public opin¬ 
ion is certainly very kind to him; the peo¬ 
ple so long to see him prove worthy of his 
place and his fortune that they are ready 
to cheer him to the echo at the smallest 
excuse; unfortunately he gives them that 
excuse very, very seldom. 


THE REASON FOR THE GREAT 
DEFEAT. 

How are those who were the advocates 
or the apologists of the purchase of votes 
for tariff reform with offices pleased with 
the result of their bargain? Gorman and his 
fellow democratic corruptionists in the 
Senate have their henchmen in office, but 
what has become of tariff reform? The 
very men whom Mr. Cleveland appointed 
or allowed his subordinates to appoint at 
Mr. Gorman’s demand, are now support¬ 
ing the latter in his thus far successful 
fight against the administration. The 
Maryland tariff reform journals say that 
the only democratic newspapers in that 
state which have not declared themselves 
on the President’s side are those owned 
and edited by federal office-holders. Could 
feudal analogies go farther? The office- 
seekers for whom Senator Gorman secured 
places are his men; to him they owe suit, 
service, homage and allegiance. Upon 
their unquestioning support he and they 
both feel he has the right to rely even 
in a contest with their official superior; 
precisely as Henry the Lion or William 
of Normandy could count on the assist¬ 
ance of their vassals in their campaigns 
against the nominal sovereigns. Has Mr. 
Cleveland any right to complain of the po¬ 
sition in which he now flnds himself and 
of the humiliations to which he has been 
exposed? Had he in 1885 listened to the 
remonstrances of the Maryland reformers; 
had he removed Higgins twenty-four 
hours after that worthy’s real character 
had been made known to him; had he 
thenceforward refused to make a single 
appointment at Mr. Gorman’s demand, 
the latter would not have been able to 
crush the formidable opposition which 
then endeavored to make his re-election 
impossible. Mr. Cleveland, whether he 
likes it or not, must divide with the Mar}’- 
land democrats the discredit of having 
made Mr. Gorman’s present position and 
influence possible. Warned against him 
by the experience of his first term, well 
aware of the part Gorman played prior 
to and at the Chicago convention of 1892, 
there was no excuse for Mr. Cleveland’s 
failure to cut loose from him altogether; 
cut loose from him, however, the Presi¬ 
dent did not. Again, with the hope of 
preserving “harmony” in the party, and 
of advancing the cause of a sound cur¬ 
rency and a reformed tariff he surren- 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


153 


dered to Gorman all the federal patron¬ 
age in Maryland, except the postmaster at 
Baltimore and the district attorney. Mr. 
Gorman promptly had his friends con¬ 
firmed, and has now for months kept the 
nomination of the district attorney hung 
up in the senate. Disgraceful as has been 
the history of the Gorman bill, reeking 
with corruption as has been every stage 
of its progress, we can not pretend to feel 
any regret that the attempt to buy Gor¬ 
man and his pals with offices, and to keep 
them bought long enough to count them, 
has come to naught. Long usage has so 
blinded politicians and the people alike 
to the real character of the office-mon- 
gering deals, which have for the last sixty- 
five years been going on over the entire 
land, that men who would scorn to buy a 
vote with their own money, will, without 
hesitation, trade public offices for political 
support. In the transactions themselves 
there is no difference. 

The Sugar Trust is believed to have 
bought with money votes for the sugar 
schedule it wanted. Mr. Cleveland, his 
friends admit bought, or supposed he had 
bought with offices votes for the repeal of 
the Sherman act and the enactment of a 
tariff reform bill. The Sugar Trust used 
its own money. Mr. Cleveland used 
offices, which belong not to him, but to 
the American people; free coinage advo¬ 
cates as well as monometallists, protec¬ 
tionists, as well as tariff reformers, Mr. 
Cleveland trusted his ‘‘ffoaters” with the 
usual result. From the outcome it is 
probable that the Trust took no chances 
and made certain of the delivery of the 
goods before it paid the price. In no 
other respects do the bargains differ in 
essentials. One is every whit as bad as 
the other, whatever difference there may 
be in the character of the men concerned 
in them. 

AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

Office-holders are the agents of tlie peo¬ 
ple, not their masters. * * * They have 
no right, as office-holders, to dictate the 
political action of their party associates or 
to tlirottle freedom of action within party 
lines by metliods and practices wliich pre¬ 
vent every useful and justifiable purpose 
of party organization. The influence of tiie 
federal office-liolders siiould not be felt in 
file manipulation of political primary meet¬ 
ings and nominating conventions.— From 
President Cleveland's order, July 14, 1S86. Ap¬ 
proved by Postmaster-General Wanamaker, April 
25, 1890. Approved by Postmaster-General Bis- 
sell, July, 1894. 

“ I will protect You. The President can 
do nothing.” — Gorman. 

The Vermont and Michigan post-masters 
attended recent democratic state conventions! 


despite Postmaster-General Bissell’s order 
against offensive partisanship. 

« * * 

There were present at the meeting of the 
New York state democracy at the Cooper In¬ 
stitute three federal officeholders—Maurice J. 
Power, salary, |5,000; Deputy Collector 
Henry DeForrest Baldwin, salary, $3,500, and 
Chief Inspector of Immigration John J. 
Quinlan, who receives $8 per day. 

* * » 

The “Interstate Democratic Association” is 
made up to a considerablo extent of office¬ 
holders, among them Josephus Daniels, chief 
clerk of the interior department, D. J. Mur¬ 
phy, deputy commissioner of pensions, and is 
taking on the familiar airs of the bread-and- 
butter brigade. A few evenings ago it made 
an assault upon the civil service commission, 
and incidentally upon the merit system as op¬ 
posed to the spoils scramble. Its latest per¬ 
formance was to appoint a committee to wait 
upon Senators Brice, McPherson, Voorhees, 
A^est and Morgan, and inquire whether it is 
true, as reported, that they have been recom¬ 
mending the restoration of certain republi¬ 
cans dismissed from the government employ¬ 
ment. 

<1 * * 

Congressman Whiting, of Michigan, who is 
a candidate for the democratic nomination 
for governor, and is making war on the Don 
M. Dickinson faction of the Michigan democ¬ 
racy, called on Mr. Roosevelt Tuesday. He 
called the latter’s attention to the fact that 
the democratic postmaster of the suburb of 
Detroit, in which Mr. Dickinson lives, and 
who owes his appointment to the latter, had 
been elected a delegate to the democratic 
county convention. Mr. W’hiting says that 
that there are a large number of Mr. Dickin¬ 
son’s proteges among the postmasters in Mich¬ 
igan who are making an active part in the 
campaign, and whose names appear in the lists 
of delegates.— Washington dispatch, Indianapalis 
News, June 21. 

« « <1 

One Shelley, an ex-member of congress from 
Alabama, took a room in this city a few 
weeks ago and began sending out political as¬ 
sessment circulars to Alabamians wherever 
they could be found in the departments. He 
reminded them that all their interests lay 
with the success of Col. Oates and against 
Kolb. One negro clerk in the war depart¬ 
ment who neglected to pay his assessment was 
removed soon afterwards, and insisted that 
the removal was for no other cause than his 
unwillingness to put money into the democrat¬ 
ic campaign chest. The department sent out 
a prompt disclaimer, asserting that the clerk 
had been duly notified of the reasons for his 
dismissal, and that politics had nothing to do 
with them. 

Some months ago the President, against the 
most vigorous protests of the best people of 
the District of Columbia, imported a black 
professional politician from Kansas and made 
him recorder of deeds for the District of 
Columbia. The popular protest was based 


upon the fact that the recordership is a local 
office, and that the democratic national con¬ 
vention which named Mr. Cleveland for the 
presidency had declared itself for home rule 
in the territories and District of Columbia, 
and inferentially bound its candidate to that 
policy. The effort to prevent the nomination 
of Taylor failed, and the senate, after a long 
wait, confirmed it; most of the republicans 
who knew Taylor voted for confirmation on 
the ground that his appointment would be a 
serious blow to the party which made it. The 
District people might have made better head¬ 
way with their protest if they had dropped 
the home rule plea; with which the President 
evidently felt little sympathy, and looked up 
Taylor’s record. They should have set about 
collecting testimony to show that Taylor was 
a common office beggar—what is known in the 
political vocabulary as a “bummer”—who had 
no claims to his place on any pretense of be¬ 
ing a recognized representative of his race, 
and whose appointment would be sure,on per¬ 
sonal grounds, if on no other, to bring dis¬ 
credit upon the administration. 

This choice exotic from Kansas hardly gets 
rooted in his new place before he lays his 
plans for paying off to the democratic party 
obligation under which the party’s leader has 
laid him. He accordingly heads a nonde¬ 
script committee with the resonant title of 
“Advisory Board of the Afro American Bu¬ 
reau of Organization of the Democratic Con¬ 
gressional Committees” and joins in issuing a 
letter of which evtry negro who could be 
reached in any of the departments—clerk, 
messenger, or laborer—received a copy, and 
which invited them to a meeting. Among 
other things said: “It has been suggested that 
campaign committees be organized in the sev¬ 
eral divisions of the different departments 
which will act as a nuclues (sic) to the main 
organization.” This call was not responded 
to and after a month Taylor and his associates 
sent another letter as follows : 

Washington, D. C., July 28,1894. 

My Dear Sir—W e sent you a letter some time 
ago from which we have had no reply. The con¬ 
gressional committee needs the immediate assist¬ 
ance of all its friends. You will therefore please 
call and see us immediately, either at the above 
address until 5:30 p.m., at the committee rooms, 
Wormley’s Hotel, from 7 to 8 p. m., or at the head¬ 
quarters of the national negro democratic league. 
No. 338 Indiana avenue, from 8 to 10 p. m. 

Respectfully yours, 

R. G. Still, Chief. 

Now here is as plain a “stand-and-deliver” 
threat as was ever put forth. It frightened 
many of the negroes to whom it came, and 
they have been inquiring of their friends 
what they can do. If they go where they are 
told to, and contribute their money, they have 
no assurance that the money will ever reach 
the real party managers. Among the respecta¬ 
ble colored society of Washington Mr. Taylor 
is not held in high esteem, and a widely cir¬ 
culated story of his attempt to negotiate a 
note at a local bank managed by men of his 
race is not calculated to impress the dunned 
clerks and messengers with confidence.— ITasA- 
ington dispatch. New York Post, Aug. 6. 









154 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Seven members of the Maryland democratic 
state central committee are now in federal 
offices, and are holding their positions on the 
committee in practical dtfiance of President 
Cleveland’s well-known policy, if not in ex¬ 
press defiance of his orders. Among the num¬ 
ber are Barnes Compton, chairman of the 
committee, naval officer; Buchanan Schley, 
surveyor of the port, and Dr. Frank T. Shaw, 
collector of customs. President Cleveland 
told Dr, Shaw some time ago that he had bet¬ 
ter resign from the committee. 

It is known that Senator Gorman desires to 
continue his control of the committee and 
hopes to keep Barnes Compton at its helm. 
Should he resigu. Col. Buchanan Schley, who 
is not a follower of Gorman, would have the 
appointment of Mr. Compton’s successor in 
the chairmanship. The near approach of the 
time when the executive work of the fall 
campaign must begin has brought affairs to a 
crisis. It was stated to-day that Mr. Gorman 
had advised Mr. Compton not to resign, but 
to defy the President’s well known wishes. 
The same advice was sent to other federal offi¬ 
cials who happen to be members of the commit¬ 
tee. Mr. Gorman is quoted as saying: 

“You are now in office, you can’t be re¬ 
moved except for good cause, and it is not 
good cause for removal that you are members 
of the committee; so hold on and I will pro¬ 
tect you. The President can do nothing.”— 
Baltimore dispatch, New York Times, August 9. 
» * •» 

L. E. Lange, of Laurens, has bolted the in¬ 
dorsement of L. C. Baker, populist nominee 
for congress by democrats, and announces 
himself as a candidate. Lange is postmaster 
and publisher of a paper. As Baktr’s nomi¬ 
nation was made regular by the democratic 
convention, of which Lange was chairman, and 
as Lange could have had the nomination by 
asking for it, democrats look upon his action 
as a decided case of offensive partisanship, 
and say they will “make it warm” for him if 
he shall persist in remaining a candidate.— 
Foi t Bodge dispatch, New York Times, August 12. 
» * * 

The fight for the nomination of auditor still 
lies between Joseph T. Fanning and Joseph 
Reilly. Mr. Fanning has been the avowed 
candidate since Auditor Henderson an¬ 
nounced that he would not make the race 
again. He is the chief deputy of the auditor 
of state at present and is without doubt one of 
the best qualified men in the state. Mr. Reilly 
is the chief clerk under Pension Agent Spencer and 
is the secretary of the state central committee.— In¬ 
dianapolis Sentinel, August 1J. 

* * » 

The Hon. S. E. Morss, the editor of the Senti¬ 
nel and consul-general to Pans, has been drafted 
to write the platform for the democratic state 
convention.— Indianapolis Journal, August I4. 

^!t w flj 

Doivn in the thirteenth ward John L. Shiltges, of 
of the revenue service; Jacob Pox, a government in¬ 
spector at Kingan's, and John L. F. Sieeg, of the 
post-office, all of whose appointments are due to By- 
»mm, went to capture the delegation for their 
patron. The manner in which they stole the 
delegation would have put the old twenty- 


fifth ward methods to shame. They had 
twenty men with them, but the antis had over 
sixty. The primary was held in a little tin 
shop in the north end of the ward, which is 
fifteen blocks long. The antis claim the By¬ 
num men tried to steal the primary by hold¬ 
ing it so far away from the homes of the demo¬ 
crats in the ward. Shiltges called the meet¬ 
ing to order. The Bynumites namtd P. J, 
Kelly for chairman and the opposition se¬ 
lected John H. Mahoney. The antis asked 
that a ballot be taken. Shiltgts insisted on 
having a viva voce voice despite the protests. 

“All that are in favor of Mr. Kelley,” he 
shouted, “say aye.” 

There were about twenty voices in response. 

“Mr. Kelley is elected,” again shouted Shilt¬ 
ges, without even railing for a vote on the 
other candidate. 

There was a loud and lusty howl at this 
almost unheard-of procedure, but Shiltges 
went right ahead dispatching business. He 
rushed through his slate and adjourned. 
Sixty-five of the democrats present signed a 
resolution denouncing the affair. They will 
carry their grievance before the convention 
to-day and if their delegation is not seated 
there will be sixy-five votes against the demo¬ 
cratic candidate for congress in that ward on 
the next election day.— Indianapolis Journal, 
Aug. 14. 

* ■* * 

The national negro democratic league 
convention met to-day at 12 o’olock, in Ma¬ 
sonic Hall, and was called to order by the presi¬ 
dent,C. H. J. Taylor, recorder of deeds for the Dis¬ 
trict of Columbia. There were twenty-six del¬ 
egates in attendance.— Inianapolis News, Au¬ 
gust 14, 1895. 

* * * 

Voorhees’s internal revenue collector, Joshua 
Jump, from Terre Haute, is looking after the 
senator’s interests in the state democratic con¬ 
vention, now assembled at Indianapolis. 

CONGRESSIONAL PATRONAGE IS 

THE GREATEST OBSTACLE TO 

EVERY REFORM. 

The New York Post, of August 1st, has an 
interesting letter from its Washington corre¬ 
spondent, giving in detail the plan by which 
Assistant Commissioner Bowers, of the gen¬ 
eral land-office wanted to reform the public 
land service: 

As it is now, a petition from the settlers on 
unsurveyed land goes first to the local sur¬ 
veyor-general. By him, when he has got 
around to it, it is approved and forwarded to 
the general land-office at Washington. 
Here, again, it goes to the bottom of the 
docket; but when it is reached it is passed 
upon, and, if approved, is sent back with the 
requisite orders to the surveyor-general, who 
then puts the work out by contract to the 
deputy surveyors. The survey occupies a 
short or a long time, according to the char¬ 
acter of the country, the skill or the con¬ 
scientiousness of the contractors, who, when 
it is finished, forward their plat to the sur¬ 


veyor-general, who sends it to Washington, 
where it is turned over to the special exam¬ 
iners of surveys in the land-office. If there 
seems to be any demand for it, one of these 
officers, or some other employe designated to 
assist them, visits the spot and examines the 
survey to test its accuracy. This examina¬ 
tion necessarily costs a good deal. It may 
be as expensive as the original survey ; for, al¬ 
though with the lines of a fair survey 
already run, the retracing of them is some¬ 
what easier than the original work of laying 
them, yet all the same ground has to be gone 
over. If a dispute arises between the sur¬ 
veyor and the examiner, more time is con¬ 
sumed ; and sometimes a case is carried into 
court, and tedious and costly litigation en¬ 
sues, where the government has withheld 
the pay of a contractor, and he thinks he sees 
a chance to get it by a resort to legal process. 
These are only a part of the red-tape details, 
but they suffice to explain why, if the petition¬ 
ers have good luck, they may obtain their per¬ 
fected surveys in two years, but if not the mat¬ 
ter may drag along three years or more. And 
the time and money wasted are only a part 
of the harm done by the present system, for 
the practice of contracting has so many haz¬ 
ardous ins and outs that the best class of sur¬ 
veyors do not go into it, and the government 
pays full prices for second and third-class 
work. The maps are imperfect, and they are 
so hastily got up that the features of the top¬ 
ographical descriptions are only guessed at. 
Nor are the subsequent examinations always 
an improvement; for in cases where the land- 
office is mnch pressed, a part of the work of 
examining has to be turned over to the sur- 
eyors-general, who hire for the purpose prac- 
itcal surveyors living in the neighborhood. 
As the same man who is a deputy surveyor 
this year is liable to be an examiner next 
year, or vice versa, a practice of log-rolling 
has sprung up among the second-class survey¬ 
ors in the public-land states so that a survey 
made by one of the local contrators is rarely 
or never condemned by an examiner chosen 
from among the same set, and the govern¬ 
ment comes out of the job badly bitten on 
both sides. 

Mr. Bowers’s plan is to have all the work 
done by employes of the government attached 
to the geological survey, or under their direc¬ 
tion, instead of by contractors. As a result, 
the settlers would be in possession of their 
survey within a year of the approval of the 
petition, thus saving from one to two years’ 
delay and much uneasiness and suspense. On 
the other hand, the cost of the entire line sur¬ 
vey and topographical survey together would 
not, according to the best estimates, be near¬ 
ly so great as the cost of the present contract 
survey and examination, and the government 
would have two maps to show for its money 
instead of one. 

But, as will be seen, one effect of the pro¬ 
posed new system would be to do away with 
the surveyor-general’s offices, which are now, 
with their power of dispensing contracts, great 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


155 


strongholds of party patronage. And here was 
where the hitch came when Secretary Smith 
tried to induce congress to try the Bowers plan. 
The senate committee on public lands consists 
of Messrs. Berry, of Arkansas; Pasco, of 
Florida; Vilas, of Wisconsin; Martin, of Kan¬ 
sas, and McLaurin, of Mississippi, democrats; 
Allen, of Nebraska, populist, and Dolpb, of 
Oregon; Pettigrew, of South Dakota; Carey, of 
Wyoming; Power, of Montana, and Dubois, 
of Idaho, republicans. The five republicans 
were induced to attend the committee meet¬ 
ings and Pasco and Martin on the democratic 
side; the rest felt no particular interest in the 
matter and staid away while the scheme for 
the new survey system was under discussion. 

At the first suggestion of the amendment, 
Messrs. Dolph, Pettigrew, Carey and Power 
cried out in dismay that it must not be al¬ 
lowed to go upon the bill. “Why,” they ar¬ 
gued, “the contractors who have been in the 
habit of getting jobs from our surveyors-gen- 
eral would make an issue of it and fight our 
re-election !” So a little oil was poured upon 
the waters of their alarm by a further proviso: 

That such additional employes as may be 
necessary for the execution of the public land 
surveys for the geological survey shall be res¬ 
idents of the state or territory wherein said 
surveys are executed. 

Still they refused to be satisfied. It was one 
thing to let the surveyor general, a politician, 
pick the extra employes, but it would bequite 
another thing to let the director of the geolog¬ 
ical survey, a man of science, select them. 
The director would presumptively select 
bright, intelligent, educated men, making fit¬ 
ness for their work the only test, instead of 
using the “places” as political rewards or 
stimulents. No, they wonld have nothing 
of it. 

It was urged upon them in argument that 
the land oflSce was willing to take $75,000 for 
the coming year under the proposed new sys¬ 
tem, and make it do the work of $100,000 un¬ 
der the old system, with the probabilities fav¬ 
oring a surplus at the end of the year even 
then; it was pointed out that, at most, the ar¬ 
rangement proposed would be only experi¬ 
mental for the first year, and that, if they 
were notwell pleased with the result, they could 
go back to the old system the next year. 

No, they were too old birds to take any 
chances like that. They were evidently afraid 
that the new plan would work so well as to 
make a return to the old one impossible. 


Ex-Postmaster J. M. Ickes, of Newark, O., was 
indicted and fined recently |400 for withholding 
campaign assessments from the salaries of clerks 
and carriers during the last Cleveland-Harrison 
campaign. 

* * * 

Arrangements are being made in the Agricultur¬ 
al Department for the approaching examinations of 
persons who want to be put on the register as eli- 
gibles for appointments as inspectors under the 
meat-inspection law. These places have been but 
recently put within the scope of the civil service 
law, and sixty inspectors now holding positions 
under the law will be compelled to pass an exam¬ 
ination , showing their fitness for the positions they 
occupy. 


Upon invitation of the Rev. Henry Ward, pastor 
of the East Presbyterian Church, the Buffalo letter- 
carriers and the clerks in the post-office attended 
in a body the services at that church to listen to a 
discourse on a subject near their hearts, “Civil 
Service Reform.” A special programme, elaborate 
in character, had been prepared for the service, 
which proved exceptionally interesting to the 1« rge 
congregation that filled the church. 

fli <1 

Between 80 and 90 per cent, of the better class 
of positions in the consular service has boon 
changed. 

* * * 

Secretary Carlisle has made public the fol¬ 
lowing order: “The authority to nominate persons 
for appointment as keepers and assistant keepers 
of lights in the lighthouse service was taken from 
collectors of customs on June 6,1894, by order of 
the secretary, and transferred to the inspectors of 
the several lighthouse districts.” Capt. Evans, 
naval secretary of the lighthouse board, says that 
this action takes the lighthouse service out of poli¬ 
tics. All lighthouse inspectors are naval officers, 
and they will recommend only fit and proper per¬ 
sons for keepers and assistant keepers, regardless 
of political pressure. 


WANTON REMOVALS. 

George T. Buckingham, for four years a 
special agent of ihe UniUd States treasury de¬ 
partment connected with the New England 
agency and stationed at Boston, was removed 
by the treasury department to-day. His re¬ 
moval caused considerable surprise among the 
treasury officials in Boston, as he was consid¬ 
ered one of the most efficient special agents in 
the service, having worked on about all the 
principal smuggling cases which have been 
prosecuted by the deparlmeut in New En¬ 
gland. His latest and most important case 
was that against Nelson J. Q. Ratte, who was 
arrested a short time ago on the charge of 
smuggling furs into the United States. The 
case is now pending in the United States Dis¬ 
trict Court at Albany.— Boston dispatch, New 
York Times, June 25. 

There promises to be some commotion here 
over the recent removal of Assistant Ap¬ 
praiser Cyrus A. Stevens at the port of New 
York, apparently to make room for Henry 
W. Hart. Mr. Stevens has been in the cus¬ 
tom house some twenty years, and is repre¬ 
sented by art connoisseurs as an expert in the 
department of jewelry, precious stones, books, 
bric-a-brac, tapestries, ceramics, and the fine 
arts generally, whom it would be diflBcult, if 
not impossible to replace on short notice. 
This department of the appraiser’s oflice is 
one where a great deal of trickery is possible 
unless the assistant appraiser in charge under¬ 
stands his business thoroughly. Protests 
signed by leading importers, artists and art- 
dealers are understood to have been presented 
to Secretary Carlisle with a view to inducing 
him to reinstate Mr. Stevens.— Washington 
dispatch, New York Evening Post, April 19. 

“ASK SENATOR VORHEES.” 

There will be a shaking up at an early date 
among Indiana people who hold appointments 
in the government printing-office. There are 


ninety-five persons on the rolls credited to the 
state. About one-half of these were indorsed by 
Senator Voorhees. 

The Indiana delegation in the house has not 
secured much patronage from Public-Printer 
Benedict. About a w«ek ago they made a 
visit to the public printer, to ascertain why 
their requisitions for offices had not been 
honored. Congressmen Conn, Brown and 
Bretz recalled that they had not received a 
single appointment. Their call on Mr. Ben¬ 
edict resulted in their learning that Indiana 
had secured her full share of patronage. 
The natural inquiry was, “Where had the 
offices gone?” The answer came back, “Ask 
Senator Voorhees.” The result was that the 
public printer prepared a list, showing the 
name of every Indiana appointment and his 
indorser, and sent it to each member of the 
delegation. The fact was brought out that 
Senator Voorhees had secured nearly every 
new appointment made by the present admin¬ 
istration. It was found that a number of 
republicans also had been indorsed by him for 
retention. Naturally the democratic congress¬ 
men from Indiana showed some resentment at 
the showing, and called on Senator-Voorhees 
at his committee-room, and demanded an a ac¬ 
counting. One point they insisted upon was, 
the dismissal of Will M. Edmunds, who was 
recently appointed foreman of the second di¬ 
vision, on Voorhees’s recommendation. Ed¬ 
munds claims Terre Haute as his home, but it 
is asserted that he is not only a republican, 
but has never voted in Indiana. He is a rela¬ 
tive of ex Senator Edmunds, of Vermont. 
Senator Voorhets declined to consent to Ed- 
munds’s removal. It seems the latter’s father 
was an old-time friend of the Indiana Senator, 
and atone time edited a democratic newspaper 
in Indiana. Senator Voorhees consented to 
the dismissal of a large number of others now 
holding office by his indorsement, and their 
exit will speedily follow.— Washington dispatch, 
Indianapolis Neivs, June 27. 


THE MERIT SYSTEM UNDER TAM¬ 
MANY. 

Fkom the Recent Investigation. 

Morris Jacobs, the tailor applicant for ap¬ 
pointment on the police force, whose testi¬ 
mony made a sensation on Friday, was re¬ 
called and repeated some of his testimony im¬ 
plicating Sergeant Ryan. He added that he 
was informed that a policeman named Keat¬ 
ing had also been impersonated by “Dave” 
Brant before the civil service commissioners. 
John J. Ryan, Jacobs said, was a deputy street 
cleaning commissioner, and his principal busi¬ 
ness was “to get people out of trouble.” Jacobs 
said he was not told that anybody would im¬ 
personate him before the civil service com¬ 
missioners; all he was told was that his per¬ 
centage would be got for him. Jacobs then 
told how after he failed to “get his percent¬ 
age,” an officer called at his store and re¬ 
quested him to go to police headquarters and 










156 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


see Supt. Byrnes. He did so, and the superin¬ 
tendent asked him why he did not go up before 
the civil service commissioners himself. Jacobs 
told him that it was because he had been in¬ 
formed by Hasbrouck and Dwyer that it would 
be no good to do so because if he passed the 
examination the clerks would give his per¬ 
centage to some one else; that he could have 
passed the examination readily. Jacobs had 
a second interview with Supt. Byrnes and 
signed a statement containing the particulars. 
The superintendent told him that he wanted to 
get these scoundrels who had robbed him, Has¬ 
brouck and Dwyer, dismissed. Before he went 
to see Supt. Byrnes “Danny” Kyan called at 
his (witness’s) store, and told him he would 
be summoned to police headquarters; that 
Supt. Byrnes knew all about the matter and 
he had better tell the whole truth. Young 
Ryan admitted to him at the same time that 
Brant had also impersonated him before the 
civil service commissioners. Jacobs added 
that Supt. Byrnes knew of Sergt. Ryan’s 
connection with the transaction. All the 
facts in the case were also laid before the 
police commissioners, but no one was prose¬ 
cuted; all that was done was that Dwyer was 
dismissed and Hasbrouck resigned. “Danny” 
Ryan was subsequently appointed on the po¬ 
lice force. The witness made a new applica¬ 
tion for appointment and went up himself be¬ 
fore the civil service commissioners, obtaining 
a percentage of 87.50; that was a year after 
young Ryan was appointed, but although he 
was informed at the time he was before the 
commissioners that if he allowed the matter 
to rest for a while his previous experience 
would not be allowed to operate against him, 
he was not appointed. 

Later he saw a Mr. Stapleton, who told him 
that John J. Ryan would get him appointed, 
but that it would cost him $300. He got a 
certified check for $300, and then saw P. J. 
Ryan, a brother of John J. Ryan, who told 
him that the way for him to do was to sub¬ 
scribe the money to certain of the party’s 
clubs. Ryan told him of a meeting of a cer¬ 
tain club one night and directed him to sub¬ 
scribe $50 to it that night, and $50 to another 
club. He went to the meeting of the first 
club and put down his certified check for $300 
and received $250 in bills in change from 
John J. Ryan. The next day P. J. Ryan 
brought the check to him and said that his 
brother, John J. Ryan, wanted bills for it. 
He gave him bills for the check. He con¬ 
tributed to various clubs in this way, under 
John J. and P. J. Ryan’s directions, and had 
given money in sums of $20 and $25 each to 
J. J. Ryan until he had paid out altogether 
between $1,400 and $1,500. When he com¬ 
plained to friends of not getting his appoint¬ 
ment, Ryan said that he told him he should 
not go about complaining that Ryan had 
“turned him down” ; that the reason he had 
not been appointed was that he had not been 
included in the first batch of eligibles; but 
that as soon as his name was sent before the 
police commissioners he (Ryan) would have 
him appointed. 

An amusing part of the witness’s testimony 
in this connection was an alleged statement 
that some men had been appointed by mistake 
of the clerks giving them the percentage ob¬ 
tained by other applicants. When the mistake 
was discovered the men who passed were ap¬ 


pointed. Jacobs told Ryan he wished he would 
find a similar mistake in his case. 

Jacobs said he saw Commissioner Sheehan 
recently, and Sheehan told him that the reason 
some men who had low percentages were ap¬ 
pointed was that they were interceded for in 
time by some one having influence- Ryan, 
who was present at that interview, told Shee¬ 
han that he thought it would not do to appoint 
Jacobs then, because of the senate investigat¬ 
ing committee, or otherwise he wonld have 
spoken to him (Sheehan) in his behalf. Shee¬ 
han said that if the lists had all been com¬ 
pleted he would have been willing to appoint 
Jacobs. This interview took place in a private 
office. No. 156 Broadway, through the inter¬ 
vention of John J. Ryan. After telling about 
that interview, Jacobs said that last night 
Duffy, of boodle - alderman fame (called 
“Boodle Alderman Duffy” by the witness), 
sent for him, but he did not go. 

The cross-examination of Jacobs was under¬ 
taken by Mr. Ransom, Mr. Nicoll aiding him; 
or attempting to do so, by laughing loudly at 
intervals at the witness’s statements. Mr. 
Ransom attempted to break down Jacobs’s 
testimony by making fun of him, by asking 
him questions and then interrupting him in 
the middle of his replies and demanding of 
him if he was telling the truth, or intended 
to do so, when those replies were fair answers 
to the questions. The chairman had no need, 
however, to protect the witness, as he proved 
abundantly able to do so himself. The contest 
between him and Mr. Ransom was most amus¬ 
ing, and the only difficulty the chairman had 
was in preserving order in the court room. 
Jacobs insisted on telling all the facts, and 
could not be diverted. The cross examination 
merely strengthened the evidence given on the 
direct examination .—New York Evening Post, 
June 12. 

* * * 

Charles W. Miller, a salesman for an electric 
house, said he had been an applicant for ap¬ 
pointment on the force, and had made his ap¬ 
plication therefor through Police Commis¬ 
sioner McClave. He passed the civil service 
examination, obtaining a percentage of 81.40. 

Mr. Goff'—Did you pay any money for an 
appointment? 

The witness—Yes, sir ; $350. 

Mr. Goff'—To whom ? 

The witness—To the late Capt. Warts. 

Continuing his evidence, after an objection 
by Mr. Nicoll that Warts was dead had been 
overruled, the witness said that Capt. Warts 
told him that it was necessary for any one who 
wished to get on the force to pay $350. Three 
weeks afterwards he paid that sum to Capt. 
Warts in bills, borrowing part of the money 
for that purpose from an uncle, Benjamin 
Pine, of East Williston,L. I. Capt. Warts de¬ 
clined to take a check. When he gave the 
money to Capt. Warts the captain told him that 
he would hold the money until he (the witness) 
got his shield, and then he would see that it 
went to the right party. 

Mr. Miller said he had also seen George 
Richards, secretary for Police Commissioner 
McClave, at the time he got his application 
paper. Richards also told him that it wonld 
be necessary to put up $350 in order to get ap¬ 
pointed on the force. In further conversation 
Richards told the witness that a man with 
only one lung could pass provided he put up 
the $350. Richards also explained to the wit¬ 


ness the disposition of the $350. He said that 
$25 was retained by the man to whom the 
money was first paid, and also by the second 
man through whose hands it passed, $300 
finally reaching the commissioners. 

In further examination it 'appeared that 
the witness passed the necessary examination 
twice. The first time he did not put up any 
money, and his name did not reach the com¬ 
missioner. Mr. Grant, who was Mr. McClave’s 
private or principal secretary, told him that 
it would not be necessary to put up any money, 
as he had known Mr. McClave so long. Sub¬ 
sequently he learned from a man who said he 
came from police headqurters, and also Rich¬ 
ards, that it would be necessary to make a new 
application and put up $350. This he did 
a year after passing the examination the first 
time. After passing the second time he re¬ 
ceived a notice from Lee Phillips, secretary of 
the civil service board, to go to police head¬ 
quarters for an appointment. He went there 
and saw Commissioner McClave. The com¬ 
missioner told him that he was sorry he could 
not appoint him as he had already appointed 
all his share, and had had to leave off about 
thirty of his friends. “Besides,” said Mr. 
McClave, “you are a civil service man.” The 
witness demurred at this and explained that 
he had applied to the civil service commis¬ 
sion as directed to do so by Mr. Grant. Mr. 
McClave said that was all right, but he re¬ 
gretted that he could not appoint him, and the 
witness said he then left the room. As he 
left the office, however, an officer in uniform 
followed him out from the general suite of 
rooms in which Mr. McClave’s room was sit¬ 
uated and said to him: 

“Do you want that appointment very 
bad?” 

The witness said that he did, or he would 
not had taken the trouble he had to get it. 

“Have you got $150 in your clothes?” 
asked the officer. The witness said that he 
had not. 

“Can you get it to-day?” asked the officer. 

“I don’t know that I can,” replied Miller, 
“and, besides, I do not care to pay $500 
for it.” 

With that the witness said he left. The of¬ 
ficer did not express any 8ur])rise at the wit¬ 
ness’s remark about $500, or his intimation 
that he had already put up $350. 

Mr. Goff—Did you get any of your $350 
back ? 

The Witness—Yes, sir; all of it. I got it 
back from Capt. Warts. 

Mr. Goff—I am glad of that. Did the cap¬ 
tain say anything to you when he gave back 
your money ? 

** Ypr sir 

“Wh’at w’as it?” 

“That it was a damned shame that an 
American could not be appointed on the 
force when cripples and such like were ap¬ 
pointed .”—New York Evening Post, June 28. 


CORRESPONDENCE. 

We print the following extract from a let¬ 
ter of a Philadelphia reader of the Chron¬ 
icle: 

“ I read the Chronicle with much interest, 
and am glad that it takes so high and patri¬ 
otic a stand in regard to the civil service of 
the government. I was especially pleased 
with the address upon ‘ Independence in Poli¬ 
tics,’ printed in the last number (July). I 
gave my copy to a friend. W’ill you please 
send me another, and if you can spare several, 
I should like to distribute them. * * I eg. 
peciallj enjoyed Mr. Dewhurst’s sermon in a 
previous number.” 









The civil service chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering of the 
ship of state.— From Archbishop Ireland's address: The Duty and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II, No. 19. - INDIANAPOLIS, SEPTEMBER, 1894. teems 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N’ 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


The annual meeting of the National 
Civil Service Reform League will be held 
in Chicago, Wednesday and Thursday, Oc¬ 
tober 17 and 18. The annual address will 
be delivered by Carl Schurz,at the Central 
Music Hall, corner of State and Randolph 
streets, Wednesday evening at 8 o’clock. 
The headquarters of the League will be at 
the rooms of the Commerce Club in the 
Auditorium Building during the two days; 
a luncheon will be served there each day. 
A joint meeting of the general and execu¬ 
tive committees will be held Wednesday 
at 10:30 A. M. At 2:30 p. M. on Wednesday 
and Thursday meetings will be held in the 
Auditorium Recital Hall, where papers 
will be read by Charles J. Bonaparte, C. 
W. Walbridge, Charles B. Wilby, Herbert 
Welsh and Joseph Medill. At 7 p. m. 
Thursday there will be a dinner at the 
Union League Club. The Wednesday 
evening and both afternoon meetings will 
be open to the public. 

This is the first time that the national 
organization has ever held a meeting in 
the west. It has been a favorite saying 
that this reform has no foothold here, and 
it is to be hoped that the number of repre¬ 
sentatives from this section present at the 
coming meeting will prove the falsity of 
that assertion. There are plenty of re¬ 
formers in Indiana, for instance, who have 
made very little sacrifice for the cause. It 
is their duty now to go to the expense and 
trouble of attending this meeting. They 
will be so pleased with it that they will 
never miss another meeting. Every man 
who comes will be received and enrolled 
as a representative of his own community. 

Since the above was in print, we have 
received notice from the secretary of the 
National League that the time of the meet¬ 
ing has been changed to the middle of No¬ 
vember. The new date has not yet been 
determined upon. 

We have refrained from commenting 
upon the civil service rules adopted by the 
present Indianapolis city government for 
the reason that certain seeming loopholes 
were left in them when adopted, and we 
preferred to see what actual trial would 


bring forth. The rules provided for the 
appointment of a board to supervise their 
enforcement, and this board has been act¬ 
ive and efl&cient in its duties. The scheme 
aroused the bitter enmity of a gang of 
party hangers-on, who are frenzied at the 
proposal to give out public employment 
by competition and merit, instead of by fa¬ 
voritism. In the interest of these a suit 
was brought to have the civil service board 
declared illegal. The city attorney, John 
E. Scott, defended the rules stoutly and 
the circuit court. Judge Edgar A. Brown, 
presiding, has decided that the civil serv¬ 
ice scheme set up by the city government 
is in all respects legal. The hungry spoils¬ 
men will try an appeal to the supreme 
court; but there is no reason to expect that 
they will fare any better there. 


Mr. John H. Holliday, late editor and 
chief proprietor of the Indianapolis News, 
was, without his knowledge, nominated by 
the democratic convention of this county 
as a candidate for the legislature. In de¬ 
clining Mr. Holliday said: 

“I am not a democrat nor am I a republican, but 
an Independent voter, free to act with any party in 
support of any measure I favor. It is true that on 
the question of tariff reform I have acted with the 
democrats, and I have approved thoroughly of 
much of their state legislation, such as the elec¬ 
tion, tax and school-book laws, but I owe no alle¬ 
giance to that party any more than I do to the re¬ 
publicans, and should it follow certain tendencies 
—one, for example, in support of what I consider 
unsound money—I should feel at perfect liberty to 
vote against it. 

“I am a free-lance in politics—have been for over 
twenty years—and see no reason why I should not 
remain such as long as no supreme issue, such as 
the war Involved, exists. It would be incongruous 
then for me to don a party’badge.” 

This is the ground to be taken, as to 
party allegiance, by every man who wants 
to see better government in this country. 
Party organizations are not patriotic insti¬ 
tutions. They are at present men banded 
together for the purpose of some kind of 
personal profit. If they put a good prin¬ 
ciple into a platform it is because they 
think it will help carry an election. They 
would, and do without hesitation, for the 
same object, put in bad principles. They 
are to be treated at arm’s length. No vot¬ 
er should let them get a mortgage on him. 
They are to be used simply as instruments 
and to be given the victory according as it 
seems, for the time being, to promise most 
for the advancement of good government. 


This will have to continue until all spoil is 
taken away, and no man can hope for any 
personal profit after election for work done 
before election. Multitudes of voters are 
more and more taking this position to¬ 
ward parties. Witness the Indianapolis 
city elections. Witness the elections of 
1892, and witness also what will happen at 
the coming elections. 


The Methodist preachers in the La- 
Fayette conference met recently, and if 
reported correctly are in need of zealous 
ministrations of missionaries to keep them 
from relapsing into barbarism. One de¬ 
clared that the greatest political sin was 
to vote for a democrat and the next to that 
to vote the prohibition ticket; and an¬ 
other that the democratic party should be 
blown to hell with dynamite. Such parti¬ 
sanship from people claiming to be on 
the side of morality and decent govern¬ 
ment, makes them really more dangerous 
than the thugs of Gorman and Murphy. 
They are the stool-pigeons for any party 
machine, or any party act, and are obliv¬ 
ious of any and all corruption. Whenever 
Tammanyism or Quayism is in a life and 
death struggle with the forces that have 
never yet abandoned the hope and de¬ 
termination for a free government, these 
ministers, or their partisan likes, with the 
ample cloak of their respectable lives to 
cover all the foulness, begin to shout 
as they are bid, tbe false cries to distract 
public attention. 

Such are now busy throwing up fortifi¬ 
cations for Tammany. Mr. Parkhurst 
knows them. He recently said: 

“It is to me an incessant burden and a galling, 
burning aggravation, the way in which men with 
intelligence, with a seeming appreciation of the 
meaning of personal liberty and free institutions, 
will allow themselves to be led about and tricked, 
coaxed, and brow-beaten by self-constituted man¬ 
agers, whose only qualifications for control are 
their shrewdness and their impudent audacity, 
and their only motives of action the promotion of 
their own ends. 

The greatest political sin to-day is party 
partisanship, and we wish some one might 
devise a plan of convincing these Metho¬ 
dist brethren that they are really more to 
be dreaded than Tammany. But how can 
it be done? They will not read anything 
except of their kind; and deaf and blind, 
they bawl down any one disposed to en¬ 
lighten them by oral argument. 



















158 


THE CIVIL service CHRONICLE. 


Every few days we hear the assertion 
from some local or national spoilsman that 
party work must be paid for with offices, 
that party government would die out with¬ 
out patronage, that patronage is essential 
to maintain patriotism, that the merit sys¬ 
tem produces a life office-holding class, 
careless and inefficient, that the merit sys¬ 
tem produces bureaucracy, backward and 
full of officialism. Now Postmaster Day- 
ton of New York, a Tammany democrat 
of the better type who has used his un¬ 
classified service for political purposes, 
may certainly be relied upon as not a prej¬ 
udiced observer for the merit system. He 
has spent several weeks in a thorough ex¬ 
amination of the postal service of London. 
To show how utterly divorced that service 
is from politics we quote as follows: 

“ It is hard for an American to realize how com¬ 
pletely the notion of partisanship, offensive or de¬ 
fensive, has been eradicated from the civil service 
here. The postmaster-general is, of course, a poli¬ 
tician, who retires with a change of administra¬ 
tion. When he is an important public and party 
man, like Mr. Morley, he has a seat in the cabinet. 
But think of it! Out of the 1S5,000 men in the postal 
service of Great Britain, not to mention 16,000 women, 
he is positively the only individual whose tenure of 
place can be affected by any political change. 

“ I have devoted some time to investigating this 
particular question. I haven’t found a case in 
which any of the others seem to have any sharp po¬ 
litical opinions at all. Of course, they are perfectly 
free to hold party views, and I find some of my friends 
among them belonging to political clubs, equivalent to 
the Manhattan or Union League at home, but of ag¬ 
gressive partisanship I can’t discover a trace. It isn’t 
that they dissemble it; they simply don’t feel it— 
don’t know what it is.” 

Now everyone knows that nowhere on 
the face of the globe exists more vigorous 
party government than in England to-day, 
but if the Tammany postmaster is to be 
believed, it exists without patronage. 

Again he says: 

“They have here a much larger proportion of 
trained public servants in the executive and ad¬ 
ministrative sections of the imperial postal service 
who thoroughly know their business than we 
have.” 

And so employes who hold a position as 
long as they can do the work satisfactorily 
are better trained than under our spoils 
system. 

Again he says: 

“The officials were an earnest, accomplished, 
hard-working body of gentlemen without a sign of 
pretense or red-tape officialism about them. They 
were glad to give information, but they were just 
as eager to learn wherein our ways of doing things 
differed from theirs. Candidly I had not been pre¬ 
pared for either their excessive kindness to me 
personally, or the fine grasp of their work and its im¬ 
portance to all civilization, which they manifested.” 

And so the merit system is not a Chi¬ 
nese system after al!! 


The political progress of Postmaster 
Dayton again calls to mind the question 
how much longer the country must pay 
for this kind of education. Here was a 
man who had been a lawyer and a mem¬ 


ber of Tammany Hall. This was the sum 
of him. He was ignorant of public ad¬ 
ministration, and yet he was put at the 
head of the greatest post-office in this 
country, and one of the greatest in the 
world. He sets out with a declared pur¬ 
pose of “taking care” of Tammany Hall. 
After a year and a half he goes abroad and 
comes home announcing the discovery 
that public business and party politics 
have no legitimate connection. That prin¬ 
ciple was in the platform upon which Day¬ 
ton’s party went into power, and made it 
possible for him to become postmaster of 
New York. And yet here he is just an¬ 
nouncing his conversion to it. Thousands 
of men in the public service on the day he 
was appointed believed in that principle, 
and many of them had to boot a compara¬ 
tively vast amount of technical knowledge 
and experience, and any of them would 
have made, the first day, a better post¬ 
master than Dayton will make in four 
years. 


Seventy-five federal office-holders went 
from Washington to the Ashland district 
to help Congressman Breckinridge get a 
re-nomination. This fact brings to the 
front again in tlie most offensive manner 
the corrupt use of the public treasury by 
congressmen for their private ends which 
so generally prevails. In addition to the 
seventy-five from Washington practically 
all federal officers living in the Ashland 
district, amounting to hundreds, were for 
weeks working for this same Breckinridge. 
The majority of the people of his district 
did not want Breckinridge, to say nothing 
of the majority of his party. Yet a regi¬ 
ment of office-holders, paid by the coun¬ 
try, have worked day and night to force 
him upon his district. They have to a 
man left their places of official duty to do 
this. In view of the removal of Postmaster 
Thompson, of this city, for having gone to 
a republican convention, it is pertinent to 
ask how many office-holders will Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland remove for a like offense 
in the Ashland district? Not one. He 
could have stopped the activity of these 
hundreds of paid heelers by a word. How 
many words did he speak to stop it? Not 
one. Is it hypocrisy or is it not to remove 
an officer for “whooping up” a republican 
nomination and to stand dumb while a 
multitude of officers in plain sight are 
“whooping up” a democratic nomination? 
It is announced that about the middle of 
October the Indiana democratic office¬ 
holders in Washington will come home 
and “take off their coats” for the party. 
Let them come. For every vote made in 
this way ten will be lost. The bitter les¬ 
sons of past years do not seem to have been 
sufficient. They will go on until those 


who live politically by preying upon the 
public service either die or are driven out 
of public life. 

The President’s letter to Congressman 
Catchings is the last act of a struggle for a 
change in the tariflT—a struggle in which 
he has been very much interested. We 
do not find fault because he was interested 
in that struggle. It was in line with the 
platform upon which he was elected and 
it was proper for him to further the dec¬ 
laration of the platform in every constitu¬ 
tional way, keeping in mind also the busi¬ 
ness interests of the country. But there 
was another promise of the platform which 
was just as explicit, which was just as bind¬ 
ing upon him, which was of vastly greater 
importance, which it was in his power to 
keep, which depended upon him for its 
fulfillment, and which, the subject-matter 
being absolutely under his control, it was 
his first and highest duty to advance with 
all of his will, energy and power. This was 
the promise of civil service reform. He 
has not kept this promise nor has he dis¬ 
played any interest in keeping it. Except 
where the law stood in his way he has al¬ 
lowed the federal service to bo looted by 
congressmen. He has refused to profit by 
the bitterest experience. He has blindly 
pursued the same course and been bullied 
by the same buccaneer bosses that brought 
ruin to him and his party eight years ago, 
and that will bring ruin to him and his 
party now. When protest was made he 
impudently insulted the protestants in a 
public document. He now, in Catchings’s 
letter, defines his position as follows: 

“I love the principles of true democracy because 
they are founded in patriotism and upon justice 
and fairness toward all interests. I am proud of 
my party organization because it is conservatively 
sturdy and persistent in the enforcement of its 
principles.” 

Some of the renegade reformers who 
have sacrificed their principles for office 
or for social comfort and who have the ear 
of the President should advise him not to 
publish such statements. Judged by or¬ 
dinary standards, his party organization is 
a great collection of political rascals. For 
years Tammany Hall has been in the main 
its ideal. For years it has caused the break¬ 
down of the party promise to reform the 
civil service; it has been at the head of 
every movement to loot that service when 
its party was in power. If it had been 
“conservatively sturdy and persistent” in 
saying to Mr. Cleveland that the party’s 
promises must be kept and that no offices 
must be turned over to congressmen the 
President’s excusers would not now be urg¬ 
ing that “he can not resist his party.” Noth¬ 
ing is plainer than that if the democratic 
party is ever again to have and retain the 
confidence of the country it must have a 
party organization that is held together by 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


159 


something else than the hope and enjoy¬ 
ment of spoil. It must get rid not only of 
its Gormans and Brices but also of its Whit¬ 
neys, Hoke Smiths and Carlisles. 


With reference to the coming appoint¬ 
ment of a postmaster at Albany (N. Y.), 
Congressman Charles F. Tracy, of that dis¬ 
trict, says: 

“Shortly after the President was first approached 
about the appointment, he told me that he would 
consult Senator Hill’s wishes, as he believed that 
the senator should have a voice in the matter; 
therefore, I believe that Senator Hill will be per¬ 
fectly satisfied with the selection that the President 
makes.’’ 

This may not be true. Nevertheless 
things as strange as that happen even with 
Cleveland. His administration has fos¬ 
tered the preying of congressmen upon 
the public service as much as any admin¬ 
istration ever did; and no congressman is 
too mean or too corrupt to get his share. 
The only ones shut out are those who will 
not act as the President desires. 


THE RECKONING. 

Some voters, especially in Indiana, will 
be apt to take a very critical view of 
the democratic request for their votes this 
year. That party has been nearly two 
years in making its bed, and now, of 
course, it must lie upon it. Of its effort 
upon the tariff it is sufficient to say that 
the President would not sign its bill. 
Looking up from a reading of the sweep¬ 
ing promise of the party platform for 
civil service reform, there comes in view a 
looted service except where the law has 
acted as a drag. For a year, the President 
and his cabinet and the party congressmen 
were busy day and night dividing spoil. The 
Gormans and the Voorheeses of the party 
were given seats at the table far above the 
salt, although their Tammany political 
morals were well known. Congressmen 
have been allowed to divide fourth-class 
postmasterships among their watch-dogs 
at the rate of 30,000 a year. The consular 
service was turned over as spoil under 
circumstances of the basest treachery, and 
the President participated while the secre¬ 
tary of state looked calmly on. Patronage 
has been given to influence votes in con¬ 
gress, and this makes the blackest spot 
that has ever appeared on any adminis¬ 
tration. A great contribution to a cam¬ 
paign fund has been recognized as proper 
to be rewarded with office. The Indian 
service has been put under the control of 
spoilsmen. The Carlisles, father and son, 
have fought civil service reform with 
rare and reckless impudence and bad 
faith; and the father, the secretary of 
the treasury, with his sugar - trust con¬ 
nection added to this, is still retained 
by President Cleveland, while the son 


still pursues his work of driving the 
best employes out of their places, “no 
matter what the mugwumps say.” Indi¬ 
ana also, as eight years ago, has been com¬ 
pletely turned over to the Voorhees ele¬ 
ment, although that element is known 
everywhere to represent the lowest polit¬ 
ical level. It made a distillery attorney 
collector of internal revenue, and gave us 
the Donham post-office case in Terre Haute 
and the Rockhill case in Fort Wayne. 
Not a single Indiana democratic congress¬ 
man has attempted to stem the carnival of 
spoil, but to a man they have helped it on 
in every possible way. Some of them tried 
to cripple the law which is the only bul¬ 
wark against them. 

Voters here and throughout the coun¬ 
try are likely to be influenced by these 
matters, and are likely to make their votes 
weigh accordingly. Extensive changes 
will occur; among others the people of 
this district seem about to rid themselves 
of a thorough demagogue in Congressman 
Bynum. 

HUMBUG PENSION REFORM. 

At the beginning of the present admin¬ 
istration the The Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle did what it could to secure a just 
and business-like treatment of the pension 
question. It maintained that the fraudu¬ 
lent condition of the pension list was due 
to the corrupt influence of congressmen 
over the pension examining boards and 
other pension officers “named” by them; 
that there would be no pension reform 
unless all influence of congressmen over 
these boards and officers was absolutely de¬ 
stroyed; that the only business way to find 
out frauds in the pension list was to be¬ 
gin a system of re-examinations before 
boards as independent as boards of army 
and navy officers are, and that the justice 
and propriety of such a system the ex-sol¬ 
diers would be the first to recognize and 
applaud. These matters were in other 
ways very particularly brought to the per¬ 
sonal attention of President Cleveland. 
However little might be done, this was the 
true course to follow. 

No greater unfitness for government 
was ever shown than has been shown by 
this administration in its course actually 
pursued in the pension bureau. The for¬ 
mer pension boards were swept out and 
congressmen filled up the places with their 
heelers who are now quartered upon the 
country to the tune of $1,700,000 a year. 
The same influence of the congressmen re¬ 
mains. These boards have the confidence 
of nobody; they are viewed with contempt. 
Along with this sweep of the boards the 
administration began sending notices to 
pensioners that their pensions were 
stopped. Even a rascally pensioner is en¬ 


titled to a hearing. But many names thus 
dropped were restored again, thus show¬ 
ing that either the corrupt influence of 
congressmen was getting in its work or 
else the administration had made inexcus¬ 
able blunders and had unnecessarily caused 
many families the greatest pain and anxi¬ 
ety; probably both were true. 

In this manner was produced an im¬ 
pression of insolent arbitrariness, unfair¬ 
ness and favoritism which led to an exas¬ 
peration beyond anything which has been 
seen before in connection with pensions. 
Frightened congressmen, true to their 
cowardly instincts, attempted to set the 
matter right—not by advising a business 
course of dealing, but by declaring a pen¬ 
sion a vested right. And now the attempt 
is being made by the administration, not 
to show how much reform has been ac¬ 
complished, but how little. It is given out 
with a great flourish that the pension agent 
at Indianapolis, upon demand from the 
pension bureau at Washington, has sent 
forward the report that only 82 names 
have been dropped from the Indiana pen¬ 
sion roll, while 3,902 names have been 
added. Meanwhile the “old soldier” is not 
placated but is waiting for election day, 
with a grimness never witnessed before. 
Humbug pension reformers are likely to 
reap their reward. The administration can 
not expect to be regarded as sincere when 
it deliberately divides $1,700,000 worth 
of annual spoil among congressmen and 
thus shuts the door to any possible reform 
and then under the guise of reform floun¬ 
ders about like a bull in a china shop, reck¬ 
less of right or wrong, and with a result 
which commands nobody’s confidence, and 
which it is now attempting to hide. 


A WANTON REMOVAL. 

The New York Tribune says: The Hon. David 
A. Wells has an opportunity before him to at¬ 
test the sincerity of his professions of devo¬ 
tion to civil service reform and at the same 
time render his neighbors and townsmen a 
useful service. The term of office of the 
postmaster of Norwich, Conn., where Mr. 
Wells resides, has expired, and no appoint¬ 
ment has yet been made. There are two dem¬ 
ocratic applicants for the office, neither of 
whom has the slightest claim except that of 
party service, nor any knowledge of the du¬ 
ties except what could be gained by look¬ 
ing through the window at the sorting 
of mails. The present postmaster has held the 
position for four years, receiving it by promotion, 
having been a clerk for many years and assistant 
postmaster during Mr, Cleveland’s former admin¬ 
istration, serving under a democrat who was ap¬ 
pointed upon Mr. Wells’s recommendation. 
Through all the years of his service Mr. Ca- 
ruthers, the present incumbent, has dis¬ 
charged the duties of the several positions he 
has filled to the entire satisfaction of the com¬ 
munity, and under his administration during 
the last four years the office has attained the 
distinction of being among the two or three 
having the highest record for efficiency. There 
is no word of complaint against him, nor is 











160 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


there any desire for a change except for po¬ 
litical reasons. 

Mr. Wells is, as is well known, a distin¬ 
guished advocate of what is called revenue 
reform. He has made a specialty of the 
study of economic questions for many years, 
and is looked up to as possibly the highest 
authority in this country on the subject of 
the tariff by the theorists who are now in 
power and endeavoring to put their theories 
into practical operation. But he has, also, 
like most of the revenue reformers who left 
the republican party because of differences 
on the tariff question, professed equal devo¬ 
tion to the reform of the civil service, and es¬ 
pecially to that feature of the reform which 
is in opposition to the prostitution of public 
oflBce to partisan purposes. 

It is generally understood and no doubt true, that 
he has the appointment now, as he had eight years 
ago, absolutely within his gift. He can demon¬ 
strate the sincerity of his professions or he 
can show the hollowness of the pretense that 
public office is a public trust. 

Postmaster Caruthers has, if any other than 
his successful official record is needed, a most 
creditable record as a soldier, having served 
through the war and bearing now the scars 
of honorable wounds received in the service. 
It is difficult to believe that Mr, Wells can 
long hesitate as to his duty, but the last re¬ 
ports from the post-office department were 
to the effect that the appointment awaited 
his action and he had not yet made his 
choice. 

The whole story of the final removal of 
Mr. Caruthers is an ugly one, and discour¬ 
aging in more ways than the part played 
in it by David A. Wells, When such 
things were done under the Harrison ad¬ 
ministration they were recited from one 
end of the country to another by all the 
independent civil service reform papers, 
and there was no glozing over in the re¬ 
lation of the contemptible part played by 
any pseudo reformer. But this case re¬ 
ceived no exposure from the independ¬ 
ent reform press that we are aware of, and 
it has been a matter of difficulty to get de¬ 
tails of the facts. It is only another of 
the many moral sacrifices made by cer¬ 
tain reformers in the hope of tariff reform. 

It is a matter of open notoriety in Wash¬ 
ington that David A. Wells, of Norwich, 
Conn., a defeated candidate for congress^ 
had control of the patronage of his dis¬ 
trict, and that with one exception he was 
more persistent in his demands for pat¬ 
ronage than any other man in or out of 
congress, and that “he has handled the 
post-offices in his district in a way that 
would have delighted the hearts of Sena¬ 
tors Murphy and Hill,” Why has Mr. 
Wells, a professor of reform, been allowed 
to conduct himself as a common spoils¬ 
man, and not paid the penalty of public 
exposure and criticism? Have we forgot¬ 
ten how we pilloried the hypocrisy of Mr. 
Wanamaker? 

It was understood by the friends of Mr. 
Caruthers, the postmaster at Norwich, that 
his fate depended upon Mr. Wells, and the 
appeal was made to him to consider the 


services of an efficient man, an old 
soldier, and the public interests of the 
city, and the wish of the people irrespect¬ 
ive of party, and retain this employe. It 
was the understanding given by Mr. 
Wells that the postmaster would not be 
disturbed and it is now the impression of 
his townspeople that Mr. Wells played 
fast and loose with them, and indorsed 
the appointment of the present incum¬ 
bent, and that the files of the department 
will show this to be a fact. Mr. Wells in¬ 
sists that he had nothing to do with the 
appointment. If it is true that Mr. Wells 
has played the r61e of duplicity and lying 
usual to congressmen who distribute pat¬ 
ronage, it is doubtless one of the necessary 
compromises from his point of view ex¬ 
acted of him in his struggle for tariff" 
reform; and, of course, while it must 
be an odious and disagreeable r61e, it is no 
worse, morally, than selling or exchanging 
patronage for legislation. 

Of Mr. Caruthers we quote from a pri¬ 
vate letter: 

We thus lose the services of the best post¬ 
master Norwich has had in thirty years, in 
my judgment, and an absolutely green hand 
put in. 

Looked at from more than one point of view, 
it is one of the saddest cases that I have known 
of flagrant violation of the spirit of civil 
service reform. I have known its history but 
it would make too long a letter. Mr. Caruth¬ 
ers, who, since he was eighteen years old, has 
given nearly all his life to the service of his 
country, who was wounded four times defend¬ 
ing its flag, who rose by sheer merit from an 
humble position in the post-office to the post¬ 
mastership, now finds himself adrift with a 
large family dependent on him, poor, and al¬ 
most broken-hearted. 

In the effort of the Chronicle to get 
further details of this wanton removal and 
which, we freely admit, were much more 
desired after reading that the son of Mr. 
Wells had received an important consular 
appointment, one correspondent declined, 
saying: “If any good could be done by 
going into details at this time, the case 
would be somewhat different, but as the 
deed is done beyond recall, the only thing 
to do is to try to be patient and work for 
better things.” This view stands most in 
the way of stopping such things. Mr. 
Wells has done certain acts contrary to 
good morals, humanity, good government 
and his professions. He should taste the 
bitter fruit of publicity. We must not 
flinch because he has been our friend and 
co-worker, because he has had an honora¬ 
ble past and an unsullied reputation. Pub¬ 
licity will not give Mr. Caruthers his place 
again but the recital of his case will serve 
to keep some other worthy employe from 
being mercilessly turned adrift in the 
manipulation of patronage, and will put 
David A. Wells where he clearly belongs 
—in the same category with the Carlisles, 
Quincy, Voorhees and the rest. 


THE administration OF JUSTICE 
IN THE LARGEST CITY IN THE 
UNITED STATES IN 1894. 

A would-be Tammany mediator was sadly 
deceived to-day in the Yorkville Police Court 
and roundly scored by Justice Taintor. An 
insignificant discussion was in progress be¬ 
tween Helen Daniels and Ellen Smith, each of 
whom accused the other of kidnaping a child, 
and neither of whom would be satisfied unless 
the other were locked up. At this juncture, 
just as Justice Taintor was about to dismiss 
the case, a stout man came rushing into the 
court-room, and up the bridge, unaware, evi¬ 
dently, that he was about to address a republican of¬ 
ficial. 

“About this case, judge,” he puffed, as he 
tried to lean over the desk in the customary 
confidential manner, “one of those women 
wants to be held and punished. Tm a Tam¬ 
many man, name’s John J. Ward, belong to the 
Tammany organization in the seventeenth assembly 
district, I was sent over here to tell you the true 
in’ards of this case. I’m one of the boys, you know /” 
“Young man,” shouted Justice Taintor, as 
he glared at the red-faced Tammany man an¬ 
grily, “you get right straight down off this 
bridge, and out of court! I don’t care where 
you’re from or who you are. You get out, 
and get out quickly I” 

Then the judge ordered one of the court of¬ 
ficers to see that the member of the “organiza¬ 
tion of the seventeenth assembly district” did 
not loiter by the way, and quietly dismissed 
the case before him.— New York Evening Post 
August IS, 


One of the wretched victims of last night’s 
police raid in the Five Points district, a wo¬ 
man, was arraigned in the Tomhs Police 
Court to-day before Justice Bernard F. Mar¬ 
tin. She had been taken from her own room 
in a crowded tenement-house, and was ar¬ 
raigned on a charge of disorderly conduct by 
Perkins, a sixth precinct ward man, who said 
that he found the woman lying in bed in her 
own room. 

“Didn’t she have a right to do so in her own 
room, where she had been living with her 
husband for six years?” demanded the police- 
court lawyer who had “taken up” her case. 

“Oh, but she was only partly dressed,” ex¬ 
plained the ward-man, “ and I could see her 
when the door was open.” 

“ People have no right to run about in 
houses without their clothes on,” remarked 
Justice Martin, as he bent over his slips of 
commitment blanks pen in hand. The ward- 
man cast a triumphant glance at the woman, 
who leaned up against the bar wringing her 
hands. 

“It ain’t true, judge,” she said, “and if you 

would only bring my husband-.” But his 

honor was not listening to her. His colleague, 
Justice Joseph Koch, had entered and amiably 
slapped him on the back, receiving the cordial 
greeting, “Hello, judge 1” in reply. “Now 
what do you want?” added Justice Martin 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


161 


jovially, as with the poised pen still in his 
hand, he turned away from the prisoner. 
The lively conversation that followed, inter¬ 
spersed as it was with many smiles and 
ejaculations of good humor, was for the most 
part inaudible. Finally, the justice on the 
bench summoned one of his clerks and said: 
“Where did I sit on Wednesday, anyhow?” 
When the required information was given. 
Justice Marlin said: “Now, I want that to be 
clearly understood,” and Judge Koch, rising, 
answered, “All right. I am glad to know 
how that stands. Much obliged, judge.” 
With that he departed. Turning round once 
more. Justice Martin beheld with mild aston¬ 
ishment his prisoner still wringing her hands 
before him. 

“How about this, judge, er sergeant, er 
oflScer—oh, no—Counsellor Reilly?” he stam¬ 
mered. The lawyer repeated what he had 
said, that to lie abed at home was not disor¬ 
derly conduct. 

“Why, certainly not,” said the justice, now 
thoroughly good-humored, and beaming upon 
the ward-man he added: “Really Officer Per¬ 
kins, we are all apt to lie about in our rooms 
without many clothes on, sometimes.” 

Instead of a commitment paper a discharge 
blank was then hastily filled out, and the half- 
fainting woman prisoner was released .—New 
York Evening Post, August 27th. 


POLITICAL OBJECT LESSONS. 

“The republican clean sweep at the Ver¬ 
mont election is a fine object lesson of the 
powerlessness of party spoils of office to affect 
election results even to the slightest degree. 
There has been little scruple in giving the old 
democratic Green Mountain war-horses every 
available scrap of patronage there to build 
up their forlorn-hope battalion of voters. 
But it is proved in this election that, with a 
democratic administration to help the Ver¬ 
mont democracy by turning out all the re¬ 
publican office-holders who can be turned out, 
Vermont is more republican than almost ever 
before .”—Boston Transcript. 


One element in the overwhelming demo¬ 
cratic defeat in Maine ought not to be over¬ 
looked. This is the dissatisfaction and even 
disgust in the party caused by the distribution 
of the spoils since Mr, Cleveland began handing 
over the offices a year and a half ago. The 
business of apportioning the spoils has been in 
the hands of a ring known as “the Plum 
Trust,” and the Lewiston Journal, Congress¬ 
man Dingley’s newspaper, says that it has “no 
doubt that the dispensation of the Plum 
Trust lost several thousand votes for the 
Maine democracy ,”—New York Evening Post, 
September I4. 

The large number of recent changes in the 
war department has afforded an opportunity 
to compare the work of the men appointed 
under the merit system with that of those ap¬ 
pointed without examination. Of the 6,600 
employes in the departments in Washington 
subject to examination, 4,000 entered under 
the merit system; but for purposes of compar¬ 


ison it may be allowed that the employes in 
the war department are evenly divided be¬ 
tween the merit and patronage system. It is 
found in the record and pension office that, 
taken at random, out of 56 promotions 52 
were of the new men and only 4 of the old 
men. Sixty of the men removed were ap¬ 
pointed under the civil service rules and 91 
without examination. In the other bureaus 
19 removals were of men under the new sys¬ 
tem and 75 under the old. Four of the 
new men were reduced and 75 of the old. 
Of the two classes, those appointed through 
competitive examination solely with regard 
to their merit were likely to have the least 
influence or inclination to press upon the de¬ 
partment their promotion or retention in 
service. 

In the railway mail service the showing 
in the falling off in changes, due to the satis¬ 
factory character of the men appointed under 
the civil service rules, is worthy of note. 
This service affords the surest, test of the 
workings of the merit system. In the last 
twelve of the fourteen months ending June 
30, 1890, there were 1,400 appointments, 
whereas in the year last past there were only 
718 appointments, and this notwithstanding 
the fact that the service has grown 20 per 
cent, since 1890, This diminution has been 
gradual year by year. In the force of 600 
substitutes last year there were only twenty 
removals.— Washington dispatch, New York 
Times, August 26. 


AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

“ Base service was to plough the lord’s land, to 
make his hedge or carry out his dung.”— Blaekstone. 

Many of the clerks in the United States 
pension office attended the democratic con¬ 
vention, as Pension Agent Spencer issued a 
general leave of absence to all who cared to 
attend .—Indianapolis News, Aug. 15. 

• • « 

Wonder If Postmaster Brodle will be reported 
to Washington for attending the democratic state 
convention, by the same parties who reported Post¬ 
master Moroney, of Chesterton, for attending the 
Hammond convention and voting for Zimmerman. 
Chesterton Tribune. 

Adam S. Ebert, postmaster of Hammond, 
was elected vice-president from the tenth dis¬ 
trict at the recent democratic state conven¬ 
tion, and he accepted.— Winamac [Ind.], Dem¬ 
ocrat-Journal, August 25. 

* ♦ * 

When you say Cooper is the choice of a 
convention you talk about something of 
which you are ignorant. I was here and know 
how the delegate from the state farm was 
chosen. So do the rest of the Plainfield 
democrats. Holton, the postmaster here, sent 
invitations out on the sly and called the meeting at 
his house. One farmer, knowing I was district 
committeeman, brought an invitation he had re¬ 
ceived to me to know what it meant, and at Hol¬ 
ton's home, on the sly, the state farm gang appointed 
one of themselves as a delegate to nominate Cooper, 
and Holton, the postmoLster, attended that same 
convention. 


Possibly you have heard how the conven¬ 
tion that nominated Cooper was run; possibly 
you read some of the democratic newspaper 
comments on it—well, I did. 

Postmaster Thompson, of Indianapolis, was 
removed from office for attending the Min¬ 
neapolis convention —From Thomas S. Pollard's 
letter' to Indianapolis Sentinel, August 21. 

» * * 

John Hennessy, who is generally sergeant- 
at-arms at democratic conventions here, is 
somewhat confused as to the manner in which 
civil service rules are made to apply in some 
cases, and the manner in which they do not 
apply in other cases. “Some time before the 
state convention came on,” said Mr. Hennessy, 
“I looked around to find men to act as ushers. 
There was no money in it and I thought it would 
be no more than right that men holding govern¬ 
ment positions, to whom loss of time would cost 
nothing, could serve. Among others I called on 
Austin H. Brown, in the office of collector of 
customs, and asked if there were not two or 
three men there who could be spared. What 
did Mr. Brown do but draw a printed list of 
civil service rules showing it could not 
be done. I went away satisfied, but what was 
my astonishment when the congressional con¬ 
vention came along to see Mr. Brown himself 
pop up in that convention as chairman of the 
committee on resolutions. It’s queer, don’t 
you see, how these rules fail to operate in 
some cases .”—Indianapolis News, August 22. 

» * * 

Sanford Grayson, Holman's postmaster at West 
Point, and others were appointed to prepare 
resolutions. * * The Holman concern is a 
close corporation. Men of the rank and file 
who have grown gray voting for Holman will 
be expected to continue their disinterested 
services in the future /or the office-holding class 
in the party that has been nurtured and educated 
into a power that defies the ordinary kicker. 

The solemn protest of thousands of demo¬ 
crats weary of the Holman oligarchy against 
the renomination of the old objector was 
treated with the same contempt in the conven¬ 
tion that it got among the clique in private. 
Is it indeed true, we ask, if free-born Ameri¬ 
can citizens can or do by long subserviency to 
party aims and objects absolutely lose all 
power of individual thought and action and 
become putty in the hands of bosses, to be 
molded and used as plastic stuff for base and 
selfish ends ?—Brookville American, August SO. 
* » • 

He (Congressman McNagny) has dealt dis¬ 
honestly with the party in nearly every local¬ 
ity, and in a number of cases has squarely 
lied to and insulted the best men in the party. 
Why he did these things in this way is diffi¬ 
cult to tell. But a man who deals thus falsely 
with those who have honored him can not be 
retired too soon .—Auburn Courier. 

[Editor Barns, of Auburn, has been Keeping 
up a fire on McNagny on account of the out¬ 
come of the post-office fight at Auburn.] 












162 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


Ex-Governor Wilson, democratic candidate 
for the United States senate to succeed Cam¬ 
den, spoke here last evening. After Wilson 
had finished United States Marshal Vinson, who 
is a strong Camden man, attempted to address the 
croxod. There was hooting and yelling, and 
one of V'inson’s deputies fired a revolver. The 
firing then became general, three of the 
deputies joining in it, and it is charged, but 
denied, that Vinson fired several shots. Vin¬ 
son and his men jumped on their horses and 
fled. William Frygel, one of the Wilson sup¬ 
porters, was shot dead. Three other men 
were seriously wounded. There is intense in¬ 
dignation over the matter. It is alleged that 
United States Marshal Vinson himself fired 
the shot that killed Frygel. A posse is after 
Vinson and all his deputies, with warrants 
charging them with murder. Vinson’s friends 
claim that he is insane.— Wayne, W. Va., 
dispatch New York Times, September 5. 

* * • 

The democratic convention of Mahoning 
county, O., on Saturday adopted the following 
resolution, in spite of the fact that the Brite dele¬ 
gates, among whom were several federal office-hold¬ 
ers, fought hard to shelve it, 

[The resolution denounces Brice for his betrayal 
of a public trust.] 

—New York Evening Post, Sept. 17. 

In the state convention Mr. Brice’s hench¬ 
men were successful. 

* » » 

The Albany Journal, whose faction has 
been beaten in the county fight, is sore be¬ 
cause the delegates from Albany county are 
Roberts men. It charges that the patronage 
of the comptroller’s office was used to bring 
about the result. The Journal, however, has 
no rebuke for John Palmer, the secretary of 
state, who fought by his side in the Albany 
primaries and against his colleague. Comp¬ 
troller Roberts .—Buffalo Express, Sept. S. 

* » » 

Pursuant to the request of President Cleve¬ 
land, Dr. Frank T. Shaw, collector of customs 
at this port, will on Monday hand in his 
resignation as chairman of the Carroll county 
democratic committee, and Deputy Collector 
Diflenbaugh will also resign as secretary of 
the same committee. These resignations will 
be made in accordance with the wishes of 
President Cleveland, who is opposed to fed¬ 
eral officials holding posts in partisan com¬ 
mittees and taking active part in the manage¬ 
ment of political affairs. It was in conse¬ 
quence of this policy of the President that 
Naval Officer Barnes Compton resigned as 
chairman of the democratic state committee 
several days ago. Other federal officials will 
resign from the various political organizations 
to which they belong at the first meeting of 
the respective bodies .—Baltimore dispatch New 
York Times, August SO. 

* * » 

Mr. Gorman gets a certain number of his 
tools into federal office through the weakness 
or good nature of the President, and at the 


first opportunity, in spite of the President’s 
explicit orders to the contrary, and notwith¬ 
standing that they have been forced to resign their 
official places on the working committees of the ma¬ 
chine, these office-holders work party conventions in 
the sdfish interest of Senator Qorman, their patron. 
—Baltimore News. 

« * • 

Gorman and his lieutenant. Basin, who recently 
made a profession of throwing off the Gorman yoke, 
understand each other perfectly, and are work¬ 
ing together in managing the congressional 
conventions that are being held in Maryland. 
One of the best informed politicians in the 
state tells the News; “The people are getting 
the resolutions, the politicians are getting 
the nominees, and the old game is going on 
with its pristine strength and vigor. When 
the election is over, Gorman and Rasin w ill 
have the substantial end of the business in 
tbeir control, because they boss the fellows who hold 
down the offices. The people will have the rope 
of sand in the shape of a lot of empty resolu¬ 
tions .”—Baltimoi e News, about September 9. 

« * * 

The Madison county democrats held their 
county convention at Morrisville to-day. Yes¬ 
terday there was one of the bitterest fights ever 
made to secure control of the delegates from the 
town of Lenox, the fight for the state organi¬ 
zation being led by ex-sheriff Charles E. Rem- 
ick and that for the administration by Richard 
M. Baker, recently appointed postmaster there. It 
was won by the Hill people, and Postmaster-elect 
Baker led a bolt from the town convention. At the 
county convention to-day he was present and at¬ 
tempted to get delegates favorable to the federal ad¬ 
ministration, but was defeated, and a strong Hill 
delegation was chosen. 

The real contest was on the county commit¬ 
tee and county organization. Luke Mc¬ 
Henry, Hill’s right-hand man in this county, 
was a candidate for re-election as chairman, 
but was defeated by P. J. Kennedy, of Oneida. 
Kennedy was mads county committeeman yes¬ 
terday on the strength of his pledge to sup¬ 
port McHenry for chairman. Postmaster-elect 
Baker succeeded in getting him to enter as a candi¬ 
date for that position, rallied the post-office strength 
to his support, and after several ballots he was 
named. Kennedy has always heretofore been 
a strong Hill democrat, but in the fight yes¬ 
terday he was with those who left the town 
convention. What his attitude toward the 
state machine will be is rendered doubtful. 
It is a bitter disappointment to the Hill fol¬ 
lowers, who have lost control of the county 
organization.— Oneida, N. Y., dispatch. New 
York Times, September 19. 


SUBSIDIZtNG THE PRESS. 

Harry Hall, of the Recorder, postmaster at Cats- 
klll, N. Y. 

Edward P. Howe, editor of the Sun, postmaster a( 
Saratoga Springs, N. Y. 

John Macklin, of the Leader, postmaster at Sta¬ 
pleton, N, Y. 

J. G. P. Holden, editor of the Gazette, postmaster 
at Yonkers, N. Y. 

John B. Kessler, editor of the Herald, postmaster 
at Ottawa, Kan. 

Richard M. Baker, of the Democratic Union, post¬ 
master at Oneida, N. Y. 


Joseph F. Hall, of the Spirit of the Times, postmas¬ 
ter at Batavia, N. Y. 

Charles DeKay, on the staff of the New York 
Times, consul general to Berlin. 

Thomas Chalfant, of the Intelligencer, postmaster 
at Danville. Pa. 

John C. Neltnar, editor of the Democrat, postmas¬ 
ter at Turner, Ill. 

W. F. Hutton, editor of the Advance, postmaster 
at Holstein, la. 

Mrs. S. T. Lynch, of the Standard, postmaster at 
Leavenworth, Kan. 

S. W. Poe, editor of the Leader, postmaster at 
Grafton, W. Va. 

Barney O’Neill, of the Democrat, postmaster at 
Howard, S. Dak. 

Alfred L. Holman, editor of the Springville News, 
assistant cashier in the Buffalo (N. Y.) post-office. 

John P. Sweeney, of the Journal, postmaster at 
Lawrence, Mass. 

David L. Sollenberger, of the Dispatch, postmas¬ 
ter at Shamokin, Pa. 

T. D. Studebaker, of the Times, postmaster at Mc¬ 
Gregor, la. 


Alfred L. Holman, the editor and publisher 
of the Springville Local News has been ap¬ 
pointed assistant cashier in the Buffalo post- 
office by Postmaster Baker. During the last 
campaign he was a strong advocate of home 
rule and was a delegate to the anti-snap con¬ 
vention at Syracuse .—Springville dispatch, Buf¬ 
falo Express, August 17. 


PUNISHMENT FOR SERVICE REFUSED. 

Another upon whom the administration has 
declared war is Brice, of Ohio, and the nomi¬ 
nation of Robert B. Palmer to be postmaster at 
Washington Court-House, which was made on 
Thursday, is regarded as the first gun of the 
administration in the contest. Palmer was 
the stenographer of ex-Governor Campbell 
and was urged by the latter for this appoint¬ 
ment. Senator Brice indorsed the application 
of Michael Haggerty, and, in consequence, a 
deadlock ensued. Senator Brice gave notice 
that if Palmer was appointed that he should 
not be confirmed, and for this reason it is be¬ 
lieved the President delayed making this ap¬ 
pointment until after congress adjourned in or¬ 
der that the appointee might take hold of the 
office at once. Senator Brice will undoubtedly 
pool issues with the other anti-administration 
senators to secure the rejection of Palmer.— 
Washington dispatch, Buffalo Express, Septembers. 
* m » 

Before leaving this morning, the President 
made some appointments which are especially 
significant in that they reveal beyond dispute 
that from now he will dispose of the pat¬ 
ronage at his disposal in rewarding his 
friends, and punishing those who will not bow 
the knee to his mandates. All the New York 
postmasters and the collector of internal rev¬ 
enue for the first New York district, whom 
Senator Hill would not permit to be con¬ 
firmed, were given recess appointments and 
will now take charge. 

But one of the most significant appoint¬ 
ments to-day was that of Milton Welsh to 
be collector at Kansas City. About a year 
ago the Missouri delegates in both houses, 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


163 


with the exception of Mr. Cobb, of St. Louis, 
resolutely refused to favor the bill for tbe 
unconditional repeal of the Sherman law. As 
punishment the President shortly afterward 
hlled all the federal offices in Missouri, and 
Mr. Cobb was the only one recognized. For 
surveyor at Kansas City, Senators Cockrell 
and Vest and Representative Tarsney were 
ignored, and the place given to Scott Harri¬ 
son, the democratic brother of ex President 
Harrison. At the instance of the two Sena¬ 
tors, Mr. Harrison was rejected by the senate, 
and the fight was reopened. The senators re¬ 
indorsed their candidate but Mr. Tarsney 
became a cuckoo and was one of the two 
house democrats to denounce in the house 
the senate tariff bill. Having thus earned 
his reward, Mr. Tarsney was chaperoned to 
the White House by William L. Wilson, 
and the reconciliation was effected To day 
Mr. Tarsney’s candidate, Mr. Welsh, was ap¬ 
pointed, and the senators again ignored.— 
Washington dispatch, Buffalo Express, Aug. 20. 

« • « 

Public Printer Benedict discharged about three 
hundred employes from the government pi inting 
office to-day who had been appointed on the recom¬ 
mendation of Senator Oorman. These men were 
let out, it is said, on an order from the White 
House, and it is an incident of the war 
waging between the President and Senator 
Gorman, growing out of the tariff fight. 
Gorman, as chairman of the senate printing 
committee, has been dominating the public 
printing office. He was only a minority member 
of the committee under the Harrison administra¬ 
tion, but controlled nearly two hundred appoint¬ 
ments even then. As chairman of the commit¬ 
tee under the democratic senate he has been 
an autocrat. He refused to allow Benedict’s 
nominations to be confirmed until the latter 
had made him certain promises about patron¬ 
age. President Cleveland bas given orders to 
the public printer recently to cut off some of 
Gorman’s unlimited privileges.— Washington 
dispatch, Indianapolis News, Sept. 4 . 

* • • 

Senator Gibson, of Maryland, has received 
a decided setback. President Cleveland has 
appointed J. W. W. Woodford postmaster of 
Centerville, Md., and he will to-morrow re¬ 
ceive notification of his appointment. Cen¬ 
terville is Senator Gibson’s native town. He 
has a brother now living there. His father 
owned a fine estate on its suburbs. Mr. Gib¬ 
son recommended for the place John R. Emory, 
his brother-in-law, who, during President Cleve¬ 
land's former term, held a position in the Bal¬ 
timore custom-house, and who is now a clerk in the 
District building in this city. The junior senator 
from Maryland was deaf to all appeals from 
his friends in Queen Anne’s county not to rec¬ 
ommend Mr. Emory for the position. He 
insisted, however, that he should have it and 
left no stone unturned to carry out his de¬ 
termination. He frankly informed a delega¬ 
tion from Centerville, which recently called 
upon him at the senate in the interest of Mr. 


Woodford, that his brother-in-law should 
have the appointment if he could secure it for 
him. He paid several visits to the post-office 
department and urged upon Postmaster-Gen¬ 
eral Bissell the immediate appointment of 
Mr.*Emory. All papers bearing on the case 
were sent to President Cleveland a month ago, 
and at one time it seemed as though Mr. Em¬ 
ory’s appointment was a foregone conclusion. 
The papers, however, were returned" to the 
post-office department, and there they rested 
until yesterday, when President Cleveland se¬ 
lected Mr. Woodford.— Baltimore Sun, Aug. SO. 


THE KING AND THE BARONS. 

Edward Grosse, appointed by the P-esident on 
March 9 to be collector of internal revenue 
for the third district and who has been held up 
by Senators Murphy and Hill until now, was 
permitted to occupy the office for which he 
was selected. There does not appear to have 
been any good reason why he should not 
have been confirmed before. From all that 
can be learned, it was the presumptuous 
opinion of the senators from the Empire 
State that the men who secured his appoint¬ 
ment were not really anxious to have him 
confirmed. Joseph R. Jewell nominated 
June 12 to be Indian agent. New York 
agency, was also confirmed. In this case, 
too, there was no real objection to the man 
except that he had not been nominated at the 
suggestion of either of the senators. A third 
confirmation was that of John D. Brennan to 
be postmaster at Medina. He was nominated 
December 7, 1893. There is reason enough, 
in the estimation of the senior senator, for 
delaying this confirmation. Brennan, it 
seems, is a resident of the town in which 
James Hanlon, who is an active democrat, 
but not quite satisfactory to the Hill men, 
happens to live. Brennan is employed by 
Hanlon, and that seems to have been the ex¬ 
tent of his offending.— Washington dispatch 
New York Times August 24. 

* * * 

The New York Sun remarks that the appoint¬ 
ment by President Cleveland of John H. Mc¬ 
Carty to be United States marshal for the 
southern district of New York is, in its sig¬ 
nificant relation to municipal politics, the 
most important act of the present national 
administration. Closely following the ap¬ 
pointment and confirmation of John A. Sulli¬ 
van as internal revenue collector in the sec¬ 
ond district, and coupled with the nomination 
of J. C. McGuire, an organization man, as 
surveyor, says the Nun, it clinches the convic¬ 
tion in the mind of every New York politician 
that the influence of the administration, though 
patronage, will be cast with, and not against, Tam¬ 
many HcUl’a municipal ticket at this year’s election. 
—Buffalo Express^ July 12 . 

* • « 

James F. Connelly, <Ae candidate of Senator 
Smith for the collectorship of internal revenue 
for the northern district of New Jersey, the of¬ 
fice of which is at Newark, filed his formal 
application for appointment at the treasury 


department to-day. This is another move in the 
Smith-McPherson fight for the New Jersey federal 
patronage. Major Klotz, of Newark, Senator 
McPherson’s trusted political henchman, is 
the candidate of the senior senator. The de¬ 
lay in the filing of Mr. Connelly’s application, 
which is elaborately indorsed, is believed to 
be due to a scheme of the Smith contingent to 
get the appointment during Senator McPher¬ 
son’s absence in Europe.— Washington dispatch. 
New York Evening Post, September 6 . 

« » * 

In the July Chronicle were the details of 
the appointment by the President of Col. Par¬ 
ker as district attorney on the supposition that 
Senator McPherson’s letter of indorsement 
was a senatorial command and tbe President’s 
subsequent withdrawal of Col. Parker’s name 
upon a further senatorial command. He has 
since appointed Boss Miles Ross’s man. Sen¬ 
ator McPherson needs the support of Ross in 
his contest for re-election and so farms out his 
patronage. We quote from the New York 
Evening Post of July 30 concerning the man 
to whom the President gave the office: 

“Mr Beekman’s standing as a lawyer is not high, 
and his manner in court is not dignified. He was 
a member of the assembly for two years, in 1892 
and 1893, but made no marks there, and when the 
notorious race-track bill of 1893 was put through, 
his name was found among the list of the five who 
are marked ‘Absent and not voting.’ ’’ 

* * » 

It will be remembered that the President 
reserved the places of postmaster and district 
attorney and gave Gorman the rest. Of the 
President’s appointment to the district attor¬ 
neyship, the Baltimore American (Rep.) says : 

“ Mr. Marbury is able and he is capable. He 
stands well in the community, aud he is full of wit 
and substance. The people will admire him and 
the law-breakers will fear him.” 

We do not think it was greediness for all 
the patronage that impelled Gorman to “hang 
up” Mr. Marbury’s appointment; but Senator 
Gorman’s machine has a large element of the 
criminal class, and the senator’s past history 
shows how very inconvenient he will find a 
prosecuting attorney of Mr. Marbury’s stamp. 
In justice to his henchmen he could not con¬ 
sent to the appointment. But the President 
seems firm and has reappointed Mr. Marbury. 
« « « 

The Gorman democrats of this city and 
state are far from happy. Their attachment 
to the senior senator has consisted very large¬ 
ly in their confidence in his power to com¬ 
mand patronage. The faithful have depended 
upon it, and the party generally has looked 
to it for strength. Senator Gorman’s opposi¬ 
tion to the President has not only apparently 
closed the door upon future favors in all the 
departments, but Maryland congressmen who 
are attached to Gorman have found that their 
ability to get places is constantly growing 
weaker, and they are viewing the prospect 
with considerable alarm. 

On the top of it comes the action of the in¬ 
dependent democrat whom President Cleve¬ 
land made postmaster of this city—S. Davies 
Warfield. The patronage of the post office is 
the most important of all the federal offices. 









164 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


and the regulars have made extraordinary ef¬ 
forts to get Postmaster Warfield into line. 
Their failure amounts to a catastrophe. Not 
only has the new postmaster selected indepen¬ 
dent democrats and men of capacity and fit 
ness rather than of political experience, but 
he gave the crushing blow by refusing to ma¬ 
nipulate the civil service list and by appoint¬ 
ing ten republican letter carriers because there 
were ten vacancies and the republican names 
headed the list. It is the first time that such 


indigestion—that flit across the executive 
brow, and feel my heart sink as each shadow 
comes and goes. Not again will I be damned 
at country post-oflSces, upon village corners, 
as an ingrate who has given no offices to his 
friends.” 

Now that he has been released from all the troubles 
and complications involved in dispensing the spoils 
Mr. Vest says that he can '‘fight for my principle 
my party, my country.'' 


accounts division, and Millikin, of the records 
division. All three were eminently qualified 
for their positions and have been in the serv¬ 
ice many years.— Washington dispatch, Buffalo 
Express, September 5. 

» « » 

The places of the dismissed men will be 
filled by putting in chiefs of divisions in the 
controller’s oflSce, appointed by Secretary 
Carlisle, who have been legislated out of office by the 
Dockery treasury reorganization act, which will take 
effect October 1 .— Washington dispatch, New York 
Times, September 5. 

* *- » 

M. W. Wines was, until a few days ago, 
chief of a division in the coast and geodetic 
survey. There was a reorganization of the 
force under the direction of Secretary Carlisle, 
and Mr. Wines, who has held oflBce nearly a 
score of years, was dropped from the rolls. 
He had been drawing a salary of $2,200 a 
year. Something like twenty-two years ago 
he resided in Ft. Wayne. He is said to have 
been a democrat at that time. He was ap¬ 
pointed from Cincinnati, however, and on 
republican influence. 

Monday he called on Congressman Mc- 
Nagny with a letter from Senators Turpie and 
Voorhees. The senators demanded almost 
peremptorily that Congressman McNagny go 
to Secretary Carlisle and secure the reinstate¬ 
ment of Mr. Wines. But Mr. McNagny did 
not go. He suggested that Mr. Wines had 
lost his identity as a resident of Ft. Wayne, so 
much, in fact, that he had not seen fit to call 
on a representative from that district until 
there came an emergency in his aflTairs which 
demanded a political “ pull.” The twelfth 
district representative spoke rather sharply to 
Wines and sent him away very much crestfal¬ 
len. Some of the Indiana democrats here claim 
that Mr. Wines has been wavering in his 
political aflfections and unable to keep his 
mind fixed on any one political party for any 
long period of time.— Washington dispatch, 
Indianapolis News, August 29. 

* * * 

William H. Pugh, of Cincinnati, whose of¬ 
fice of commissioner of customs was abolished 
a few days ago, has been appointed acting 
chief of the coast and geodetic survey. This 
position requires a scientific man of the 
highest attainments. Pugh is a lawyer with¬ 
out any pretentions to being a scientific man. 
His present appointment is said to be only 
temporary. — Indianapolis Journal, July 16. 
[Our July issue contained the full account of 
the methods employed by the Carlisle family 
to drive out Professor Mendenhall.] 

* » * 

There was a wholesale discharge of em¬ 
ployes in the government printing office on 
Monday, over five hundred being let out. 
Several Indiana men were on the list, among 
them A. G. Defrees, of Indianapolis, son of 
ex-Public Printer John D. Defrees. He was 
one of the oldest employes in the office.— 
Washington dispatch, Indianapolis News, Aug. SO. 


a thing has ever been done in Baltimore. 
Postmaster Warfield says he will obey the let¬ 
ter as well as the spirit of the civil service 
law. Mr. Warfield is making a model post¬ 
master.— Baltimore dispatch. New York Times, 
September 19. 

* * * 

Senator Gorman delivered a characteristic 
threat against the civil service commission 
this morning. In introducing a resolution for 
the printing of the civil service commission’s 
report he intimated that the commission was 
responsible for “scandalous and libelous” 
statements in the press that the committee 
had unduly and intentionally delayed the 
printing of the report. 

After declaring the falsity of that report 
Mr. Gorman said: “I can only say that here¬ 
after it would be wise for the commission to 
see to it that they make their requests in 
respectful language, and that they keep out of 
the public press with their complaints as much as is 
possible.” 

As Mr. Gorman is practically the sole ar¬ 
biter of what shall and shall not be printed, 
runs the government printing office as a 
private patronage establishment, and has it in 
his power to prevent or delay publications 
which the civil service commission may de¬ 
sire to have issued, this timely warning is 
interesting and suggestive.— Washington dis¬ 
patch New York Evening Post, August 16. 

• ♦ * 

Another engagement in Senator Gorman’s 
family is that of his daughter Miss Madie to 
her cousin, Stephen Gambrill, Jr. Mr. Gam- 
brill is the son of Stephen Gambrill, of Laurel, 
who married Senator Gorman’s sister. Both 
the Oambrills, father and son, have positions in the 
departments at Washington.—Baltimore dispatch, 
August 20. 

“I wish to acknowledge, in the most public 
manner, my gratitude to the President for 
having relieved me from all responsibility in 
regard to appointments in Missouri. If there 
is anything in my public life which has af¬ 
forded me any pleasure, real and substantial, 
it has been the fact that the President, in the 
exercise of his constitutional right, of which I 
do not complain, informed me that he no longer 
desired my advice in regard to Missouri 
patronage. Not again during his administra¬ 
tion will I stand in a crowded ante-room look¬ 
ing into the anxious and haggard faces of ex¬ 
pectant office-holders. Not again will I be 
admitted in the august presence, nor will I 
watch the shadows—possibly produced by 


THE MACHINE OF MURPHY, SEN¬ 
ATOR OF THE UNITED STATES. 

Eugene E. McClure was sentenced to-day to 
five years in the state prison—the extreme 
penalty of the law—for receivingstolen goods. 
The jiroperty was stolen by Bat Shea, who is 
now supposedly awaiting electrocution for the 
murder of Robert Ross and his pal, John 
McGough, who is serving a sentence of 19 
years for shooting William Ross, at the elec¬ 
tion here last March. McClure had acted as 
a fence for the gang for years. He is 45 years 
old.— Troy dispatch Buffalo Express, Septem¬ 
ber 11. 

* * * 

In the court of sessions in this city, this 
morning, with County Judge Griffith presid¬ 
ing, Michael Pillion, convicted of repeating 
at the polls in several wards in this city at 
the election last spring, was sentenced to the 
Albany penitentiary for one year, and to pay 
a fine of $500, in default of which fine the 
prisoner is to be detained at the penitentiary 
for 500 days. Pillion’s conviction is the first in 
twenty years, that a jury in Rensselaer county has 
found in a case of election fraud. 

Immediately after the sentence of Pillion, 
District Attorney Kelly stated that he had 
nothing more with which to occupy the atten¬ 
tion of the court, whereupon Frank S. Black, 
counsel for the Troy committee of public safety, ad¬ 
dressed (he court, and read a list of indicted persons 
charged with election offenses who had not been 
brought to trial, and who had not been arrested. 
Mr. Black stated that the district attorney’s 
officers had not used proper diligence in en¬ 
deavoring to apprehend indicted persons, 
many of whom, he said, were in Troy at the 
present time. He also referred to the indictment 
against Officer William J. Butcher, of the Troy 
policeforce, who is charged with interfering with voters 
in the ward in which Robert Ross was shot last 
spring. Be said that the evidence against Butcher 
was in the possession of the district attorney, and 
that trial could be moved at once, if the district at¬ 
torney saw fit. 

Mr. Black declared that the district attor¬ 
ney should be “made to move or be removed.” 
The district attorney, in reply, said he did not 
have charge of the grand jury that found the 
indictments included in the list read by Mr. 
Black, as it was well known that the governor 
had directed that he should not be connected 
with the election cases. He said Butcher was 
the principal witness against four persons now 
in jail, and that he did not intend to place the 
officer on trial until the cases of those offend¬ 
ers had been disposed of. 

The court issued an order directing that all 
persons under indictment, and who have not 
given bail, be arrested on bench warrants, and 
the trial will occur at the October term of 
the court of sessions.— Troy dispatch New York 
Times, September IS. 


CARLISLEANA. 

Secretary Carlisle to-day dropped every 
republican in the office of the supervising 
architect. Those dismissed were Chiefs Lowe, 
of the draughting division; Garretson, of the 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corniptioii, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering of the 
Sllip of state, bromi Archbishop Ireland's address: 'The Duty and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


Vo L. II, N o. 20. _' . INDIANAPOLIS, OCTOBER, 1894. terms :.{ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N- 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


The annual meeting of the National 
Civil Service Reform League will be held 
in Chicago, Decomber 12th and 13th. 


In another part of this paper are the 
particulars of the wide-spread assessments 
of office holders, and the statement of Mr. 
Roosevelt as to their unusual frequency. 
The explanation is easy. Attorney-Gen¬ 
eral Olney construed the law, if honestly, 
ridiculously, and President Cleveland who 
could stop what Mr. Roosevelt fitly calls 
this foul blackmail, by a word, is silent, 
and by his silence really acquiesces. Sub¬ 
ordinates have correctly interpreted the 
situation. 


It is doubtful if there were many re¬ 
formers in the country who did not live in 
anxiety until it was certain that Hill had 
accepted the nomination for the governor¬ 
ship of New York. It seemed impossible 
that he would not get a respectable figure¬ 
head to take his place, but he did not, and 
at last Hill and Hillism are where they 
can be got at. A few days later their twin 
brothers, Tammany and Tammanyism, 
were surrounded by the reform German 
club, the committee of seventy organ¬ 
ization, the good government clubs, and 
the republicans who together are grinding 
them as the gods grind. This is a very 
surfeit of good things, and every true cit¬ 
izen regrets that this year he does not live 
in New York. The result is not doubtful- 
Righteousness is going to have a great tri¬ 
umph. Hill and Tammany are going to be 
overthrown. 


Of course there are some good men 
who can not bring themselve more than 
half-way in this matter. There always are. 
William R. Grace and Frederick R. Cou- 
dert, at the head of what is known as the 
Cleveland, or state democracy, are such. 
Tammany, the wholesale blackmailer, rob¬ 
ber, oppressor, and criminal, is to be 
stamped under foot; but Dave Hill, the 
devilish enemy of Cleveland and Cleve- 
landism, the receiver of thousands of dol¬ 
lars from a thieving contract, the brazen 
bluffer and the real principal in the May¬ 


nard crime, the chosen friend, the up- 
builder and the fellow of Tammany, is to be 
voted for. It is hard to find words to fitly 
characterize the stupidity or the selfishness 
of men who can say that Tammany should 
be defeated and Hill elected. 

It is well known that Hill is the most 
dangerous character in New York politics 
since Aaron Burr. His nomination has 
called forth expressions which indicate the 
widespread degradation of politics. The 
following are instances: 

Chicago Times: “New York could have no better 
executive.” 

St. Louis Republic: “The magnificent compli¬ 
ment paid to him Wednesday was a tribute to his 
superb mastery of New York politics.” 

Atlanta Constitution: “If any man can defeat the 
republican candidate in New York state this year, 
that man is David B, Hill.” 

Evansville Courier: “Thus the great democracy 
of New York comes together under the banner of 
Hill.” 

New York Herald: “Senator Hill is a veteran and 
a matchless campaigner. The issue is plain. The 
result is with the people.” 

Association of Southern Democrats in New York: 
“That we have witnessed with admiration the in¬ 
dependent political career of Senator David B. Hill, 
and regard him as the truthful exponent of the 
highest order of democratic principles, and per- 
sonally far beyond the control of influences which 
have been known to cause statesmen to swerve 
from their line of duty and patriotism, and we in¬ 
dorse his course in the United States senate.” 

In giving his reasons for abandoning the 
state democracy and returning to Hill and 
Tammany, E. Ellery Anderson beatifically 
says: 

The evils which afflict us are part of the infirmi¬ 
ties of our human nature. The battle for their 
suppression is a melodrama in many acts. The 
curtain was raised on the performance of this sing¬ 
ular play many ages ago, and it will not fall un¬ 
til the light of the eternal stars shall have burned 
to the last flicker as they die in their sockets. 
There is no short cut to the millenium. If there 
were, the occupation of the Almighty would he 
gone. He has assigned mankind to the perform¬ 
ance of this endless play for His own good pur¬ 
poses. 

While Mr. Anderson returns to his 
vomit and abandons himself to fate, in 
Everett P. Wheeler is ofiered the best can¬ 
didate for governor of New York that has 
appeared in many a day. His view of the 
purposes of the Almighty is radically and 
vigorously different from that of Mr. An¬ 
derson. 

When Mayor Denny, of this city, was 
elected, it was one of the puzzles how he 


proposed to have a reform administration 
and have Pres. Trusler as comptroller. 
When the civil service rules were under 
consideration that part prohibiting as¬ 
sessments upon oflBce-holders was on 
Trusler’s motion struck out and was 
one of the suspicious loopholes we men¬ 
tioned last month. The result has now 
come. The republican campaign com¬ 
mittee “appointed” Comptroller Trusler 
to collect assessments from members of 
the city administration. He says: “ I 
was ordered to collect two per cent, on 
all salaries over $1,000 and one per cent, 
on $1,000 and under.” He further says: 
“All appointive offices are political offices 
and the people who get them should pay 
for them.” He proceeded to make the as¬ 
sessment, and says: ‘The members of the 
police and fire departments have come in 
here and paid their political assessments 
to me.” When asked as to the report that 
those who did not pay would lose their 
places, he says: 

No threats have been made, nor has any one been 
told that if he does not pay his assessment that he 
will lose his job. So far as I am concerned I could 
not cause any one to lose his position if I wanted 
to. I am only one of the members of the city gov¬ 
ernment. 

We have here in the baldest shape a 
brazen and impudent levy upon the sal¬ 
aries of public officers to make up a fund 
for a party campaign. This is one of the 
most corrupt and dangerous evils in Amer¬ 
ican government. It was money raised in 
this way that ultimately taught 20,000 or 
30,000 voters in Indiana to sell their votes. 
Next to blackmailing private citizens it is 
the most corrupt form of Tammanyism. 
In the form of the disclaimer of a threat 
there is a threat. So great is this evil and 
so universal is the recognition of it that 
it is forbidden by the federal law. This 
matter has had great publicity, the Indian¬ 
apolis News having repeatedly given the 
facts. The Journal, the party organ, is 
silent. Mayor Denny is silent. He should 
kick this comptroller out of office. This is 
a matter which pertains to Mayor Denny 
and to this city, and in due time it will 
come home to him and to the party which 
so stupidly stultifies its professions of re¬ 
form. 


Among other desirable things which 
seem probable in the coming election is 
the defeat of Congressman Bynum of this 







































166 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


district. From the time when in the first 
Cleveland administration he ran into and 
kept in the public service such characters 
as Jim Dowling he has been simply a ma¬ 
nipulator of spoil. He has been the steady 
and malignant enemy of the civil service 
law and of civil service reform. The 
brassy hypocrisy of his character is shown 
in his introduction of a bill to restore to 
the service the railway mail clerks turned 
out by Wanamaker just before the civil 
service rules were allowed to take effect, 
while utterly ignoring the men turned out 
in post-offices throughout the country by 
the present administration under exactly 
the same circumstances. On the top of 
this pious solicitation for the merit system 
he tried to prevent an appropriation for 
the civil service commission. The bully¬ 
ing and possessory nature of his view of 
public office is shown by'the Irvington 
post-office matter. The great body of the 
people of that place wanted to keep their 
postmaster, and Mr. Julian, with great 
earnestness, urged the people’s wishes, and 
a democrat was sent to Washington so 
that the post-office department might sure¬ 
ly be informed. Bynum contemptuously 
brushed all this aside because he wanted 
to fix a henchman, and he fixed him. 
That he regards public office as a private 
snap is shown by his appointment of his 
son to be a cadet in the naval academy. A 
man who will do that in this age instead 
of throwing the place open to competition 
among the young men of the district, de¬ 
serves the contempt of all honorable men. 
The only excuse made for Bynum is that 
he is a free-trader or a tariff reformer. 
Perhaps he is, but there is a limit to tbe 
shiftiness which a voter can pass, even if 
he thinks free trade ought to be the first 
qualification of a congressman. 


At the Lake Mohonk conference Mr_ 
Hailman, superintendent of the Indian 
schools, is reported by the correspondent 
of the New York Evening Post as follows: 

He was told by the secretary of the interior, upon 
assuming the office, that it was the secretary’s earn¬ 
est wish to divorce the educational service from 
party politics. He found that his duties were 
wholly advisory. Later his duties were defined. 
He was warned, however, by subordinates in the 
department, that if he should try to exercise the 
authority given to him to the full extent, his place 
would be made so warm for him that he would be 
out of it before the 1st of July. He had not been 
forced out, however, but the limit of his authority 
had been restricted so that his power of selection 
and assignment of unclassified employes had been 
taken away. He believed that it would be best for 
the control of the superintendent of Indian schools 
to be transferred from the Indian bureau to the 
commission of education. 

We fear that Secretary Hoke Smith will 
think that Mr, Hailman’s candor shows a 
want of fitness almost disqualifying him 
for his position. Does not Mr. Hailman 
know that though it was the secretary’s 


earnest wish to take the Indian service out 
of politics theoretically, yet the govern¬ 
ment could not be run except as he por¬ 
tioned out Indian spoil among congress¬ 
men? The secretary doubtless wrings his 
hands in private over this state of things, 
and might naturally have expected that 
Mr. Hailman would have appeared before 
the conference dwelling on Secretary Hoke 
Smith’s keen suffering over the evil of the 
Indian service, in its unclassified portion, 
treated as spoil and insisting that the con¬ 
ference withhold criticism and thank the 
secretary for not having yielded as much 
as the wicked congressmen claimed. 


JosiAH Quincy must get very tired read¬ 
ing the opinions of experts upon the neces¬ 
sity and practicability of a reform in our 
consular service. Admiral Erben has a 
long and instructive interview in the 
New York Evening Bast of September 29ih. 
He has had forty-six years’ experience of 
active service in our navy, and in Presi¬ 
dent Arthur’s administration made a 
special investigation of the consular serv¬ 
ice, and he says: 

“To my mind, one of the first great reforms we 
need Is a reformation of our consular service. We 
need it in theinterestof trade, if for no other reason. 
There should be established a regular permanent 
service, with promotions from place to place accord¬ 
ing to the fitness of the men. Let young men work 
themselves along in the service. Have absolutely no 
politics in the matter at all. In that way we should 
soon have excellent consuls. At present the consul¬ 
ships are practically rewards for political service- 
Many of our consuls, as 1 have said, go abroad be¬ 
cause they have sick wives, or because they want to 
see the world.” 


A FEW people realize the necessity of 
intelligent management of the remaining 
forest area of this country. Attempts are 
made to awaken interest in this vital mat¬ 
ter. At the recent session of the American 
Association for the Advancement of Sci¬ 
ence, Prof. B. E. Fernow read a valuable 
paper on “The Battle of the Forest,” which 
ought to awaken us before it is too late. 
It is lamentable enough to stand by and 
watch the wanton destruction of forests 
by timber kings, but it is more lamentable 
to see a state like New York attempt to 
preserve some of the noble Adirondack 
forest lands by acquisition, and fail, be¬ 
cause its governor uses its state forest 
commission as the reward for henchmen- 
Comptroller Roberts has been making an 
investigation, and finds that 

The timber on state lands not only has been ruth¬ 
lessly cut, but that the undergrowth has been de¬ 
stroyed, thus leaving the lands sterile wastes. In 
addition to this, he has obtained evidence, he says, 
that certain state foresters have received from timber 
thieves and lumber men anywhere from 35 cents up 
for every tree that has been cut down. 


The department of agriculture is also a 
part of the New York state machine, and 


its patronage is managed on the Hill and 
Murphy plan: 

The Rural New Yorker alleges that in Oswego 
county “a saloon-keeper has been appointed to 
this responsible position of tree Inspector, and 
this, too, in one of the most important fruit dis¬ 
tricts of the state, where there are a large number 
of Intelligent and practical men who have made a 
study of fruit-tree diseases and their remedies. 
Moreover, this is said to be only an aggravated il¬ 
lustration of what has come to be much the rule.” 

It is strange that since people think it 
well worth while to live even amidst un¬ 
wholesome and unlovely conditions made 
by a spoils government—dust laden air 
breathed, foul water drunk, adulterated 
food eaten, bad roads, nasty streets, no 
parks, or Tammany parks, denuded for¬ 
ests, Carlisle O’Rourke architecture and 
much more—if the struggle for exist¬ 
ence is worth while with alt these evil-', 
what would it be under conditions 
absolutely free from the contamination 
of spoil? Let us consider such an im¬ 
proved phase of life and determine whether 
any party insisting that spoils is necessary 
to its existence had not better die at 
once. 

INDEPENDENTS AS DEMOCRATS. 

After the elections of 1884 the inde¬ 
pendent voters, especially in Massachu¬ 
setts, had a distinct cleavage as to the best 
course to be followed in the future. There 
were those who argued that patronage and 
the effort to obtain it had debauched the 
organizations of both political parties, and 
that the most selfish, greedy and cor¬ 
rupt elements in both parties had com¬ 
plete control of the respective machines. 
Therefore, the quickest way to reform and 
the method by which to exert the greatest 
influence was to remain outside all party 
organizations, to be an uncertain voter, 
and to avoid all the silken chains of party 
fealty and thereby the dangers of apologiz¬ 
ing for acts that should be judged justly 
but severely. 

There were other independents who 
maintained that Mr. Cleveland must be 
helped by accepting office “ to carry out 
his ideas,” and that the way to quicken the 
aspirations of the new democratic party 
was to join it and gain the supremacy by 
wise counsels and disinterested work. 

Time enough has passed to judge fairly 
of the results of the two methods. What¬ 
ever may have been the case in the past or 
whatever may be the case in the future, 
we believe that at the present time when 
any man abandons his party organization 
because he believes it has no principles or 
not his principles,he weakens his capacity 
for reform by allying himself with any 
other party organization. The case of Dr. 
Everett is a case in point. He announced 
himself with enthusiasm to be a democrat, 
and his advice to other independents was 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


167 


to join the party and strengthen Mr. Cleve¬ 
land. We think it was the unconscious 
bias of this attitude that made a conscien¬ 
tious and patriotic man like Dr. Everett 
apparently impervious to facts that de¬ 
served severe censure under Mr. Cleve- 
lands’s first administration and so fertile 
and subtle in apologies for the shortcom¬ 
ings of that administration. 

In accordance with these views, Dr. Ev¬ 
erett was sent to congress as a democrat. 
He has tried being a congressman, and has 
recently withdrawn his name for renomi¬ 
nation. He says that his congressional 
career has convinced him that he can not 
act according to his convictions and sat¬ 
isfy his constituents at the same time. 
He opposed the income tax, but accepted 
it because he saw no chance of passing the 
Wilson bill without it. When the bill 
came back in its unrecognizable shape 
from the senate, however, he refused to 
vote for it, because it was in no sense a 
fulfillment of democratic pledges. He 
also found that, in violation of his notions 
of right, he was expected to use his posi¬ 
tion for the purpose of securing patronage 
for his constituents. He says regarding 
this: 

It is generally held to be the duty of a member 
of congress to solicit from a friendly administra¬ 
tion positions in the government service for his 
political supporters. I believe this congressional 
patronage to be a source of endless harm, with no 
counterbalancing good. I have tried to withdraw 
from it altogether. In a very few cases, where it 
seemed absolutely unavoidable for me to act as a 
medium between my distriet and the departments, 
I have confined my services strictly to bringing be¬ 
fore the appointing power such facts as I knew, 
and let the people speak for themselves, remem¬ 
bering, always, that I was not the representative 
of a party organization merely, but of an Integral 
district, every citizen of which had an equal claim 
to have his needs brought before the department 
which selects official servants. 

lu conclusion Dr. Everett says: 

A representative in the congress of the United 
States by the free choice of a free people holds as¬ 
suredly a great position; but, if that freedom does 
not extend to his own judgment, his own con- 
sience, his own honor, he holds it by a base tenure, 
unworthy of his ancient birthright of American 
liberty. 

In other words he felt himself so ham¬ 
pered and fettered, not, we think, as he 
politely states, by his constituents, but by 
his party machine, that he realized that all 
his efforts were in vain. This failure of 
well meant efforts is not all. The influ¬ 
ence of whatever criticism Dr. Everett may 
in the future offer will be artfully belittled 
by the party managers as the “pessimism of 
a disappointed man who has been piqued 
by his own failure.” Nor have such re¬ 
form acquisitions to the democratic party 
as Dr. Everett had any apparent influence 
in strengthening the President. Too often 
their r61e has been simply too listen to the 
President’s reasons for yielding to the 
spoilsmen of his party and then to pass 
out to dull the edge of just criticisms. 


A CASE OF POETIC JUSTICE. 

An occasional object leteon after the 
manner of Old Testament vengeance is 
beneficial to us even in these modern days, 
and while it is all right for the mills of the 
gods to grind slowly, it is excellent to be 
able occasionally to see them grind. 

The readers of the Chronicle may re¬ 
member that the war department of the 
United States servilely attempted to pla¬ 
cate a Kentucky congressman by the name 
of .Caruth by punishing Major Handbury, 
of the United States army because he had 
not been plastic enough about spoil. In 
its May number the Chronicle said : 

Congressman Caruth is engaged in crushing 
a rebellion in his district in Kentucky. The 
rebels, like those of Gorman’s, “are the very 
cream of the population politically, socially,- 
and in a business way.” Mr. Cleveland has 
popularly been supposed to represent this class 
of people, and these citizens of Kentucky 
spent money and time in the successful effort 
to crush the machinations against Mr. Cleve¬ 
land, of men like Mr. Caruth. It does not 
seem that it would be too much to expect that 
under these circumstances Caruth and his 
rebels should be left by this administration to 
wind up their war with no outside interfer¬ 
ence. This is not the case. The treasury de¬ 
partment, the post-office department, and the 
war department, have been called upon by 
Caruth, and they have responded. The crown¬ 
ing ignominy was recently made known by 
the Washington correspondent of the New 
York Evening Post. Major Handbury, of the 
United States engineers, was assigned to Louis¬ 
ville to take charge of the engineering work 
of the Ohio Falls canal. First Caruth secured 
the removal of Mr. Shaw, who has been assist¬ 
ant engineer for fifteen years; then he desig¬ 
nated the brother of his law partner for the 
place. Major Handbury thought if his com¬ 
petent assistant had to go, he would try to get 
along without anybody in his place. Mr. 
Caruth kept getting men dismissed, but Major 
Handbury kept on conducting his office on 
scientific and business principles. Secretary 
Lamont and the chief of engineers were the 
tools to execute Caruth’s orders. At the war 
department, says the Post, the only informa¬ 
tion given out about the matter is that the 
major had made himself very obnoxious to Mr. 
Caruth and some other citizens of Louisville 
by his persistent habit of “turning down” all 
their requests and suggestions. The climax 
of this odious work was that Major Handbury 
was transferred to Florida and was ordered to 
turn over his unfinished work to a subordinate 
officer and to leave at once. 

The Washington correspondent of 
the New York Times rebuked the Chron¬ 
icle for “ overzealousness,” and “ quer¬ 
ulousness,” and proceeded to condone 
the removal of an army officer of high 
standing from his unfinished work, be¬ 
cause “he is not a person of tact;” be¬ 
cause, after refusing to heed a recom¬ 
mendation of Congressman Caruth to 
quarter a henchman upon the treasury, 
he had not refrained from “discussing 
with unconcealed satisfaction, in more or 
less public places, the decision he had 
shown in jumping on a politician,” and 
thus “he had needlessly and undiplomati¬ 


cally provoked Mr. Caruth’s dislike.” The 
Chronicle further said in its June issue: 

Again, the Tinus’s dispatch asserts that Sec¬ 
retary Lamont made a minor appointment 
under Major Handbury, and that the latter 
notified the appointee, in writing, that he 
might not find the place comfortable, and 
thereupon the appointee declined it. Why 
are facts kept conceahd ? Who was this man? 
It has always been said that presidents and 
cabinet officers could not personally know 
men for subordinate places, but must rely 
upon recommendations. Who recommended 
this man? In the face of this studied con¬ 
cealment, fair-minded men will conclude that 
the man was a leech, a heeler, recommended 
by Caruth, and that Major Handbury knew 
the character of the man, and very properly 
w-trned him off, and thereby again showed 
himself a faithful and efficient officer. Upon 
the evidence, of his accusers the more this 
matter is sifted the more it appears that Major 
Handbury has been made the victim of an 
ignoble spite and sacrificed to a desire upon 
the part of the administration to mollify Ca¬ 
ruth whom he had angered. The fact that Ca¬ 
ruth did not know when the transfer was made 
only makes the matter worse. For Secretary 
Lamont or the President to attempt to give 
Caruth an agreeable surprise of this kind is 
only the more abject. 

The administration thus lent its aid to 
Caruth by sending Major Handbury to St. 
Augustine and by showers of federal pa¬ 
tronage to crush a rebellion against Car¬ 
uth led by rebels who were “ the very 
cream of the population politically, social¬ 
ly and in a business way.” The New York 
Evening Post of September 27 says: 

In the Louisville district Edward J. Mc¬ 
Dermott, a young lawyer of high standing, 
excellent character, and proved capacity for 
public affairs, was nominated over Congress¬ 
man Caruth and one other candidate by a 
plurality of nearly 2,500 votes. Mr. McDer¬ 
mott made his campaign for the nomination 
without the aid of a single daily newspaper 
and without the aid, also, of either spoils or 
friendship for the spoils doctrine, for he had 
a conspicuous record as a civil service reform¬ 
er. The defeat of Mr. Caruth was most sig¬ 
nificant in this respect, for almost his last act 
in the closing days of the late session was a 
bitter attack upon the civil service commis¬ 
sion. The vote polled at the primaries, which 
in Kentucky are conducted exactly like an 
election, was about seventy-five per cent, of 
the total registered democratic vote. Under 
the registry law every voter gives his politics 
when he registers his name, and is so desig¬ 
nated on the list. As the democratic majority 
in the Louisville district is from 5,000 to 
7.000, there is no doubt of Mr. McDermott’s 
election. 

We rejoice that the mills of the gods 
have ground very thoroughly and rather 
more speedily than usual. Caruth’s rebels 
have given the war department an admir¬ 
able moral object-lesson. Such a chastise¬ 
ment ought to humiliate the administra¬ 
tion into an understanding of the practical 
value of following good morals in dealing 
with its employes as well as with boss-rid¬ 
den communities. Since the war depart¬ 
ment has failed to receive the approval of 
the people, it can do no less than restore 
Major Handbury to the post from which it 
so unjustly removed him. 








168 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


DAVID A. WELLS AND CIVIL 
SERVICE REFORM. 

Noravich, Conn., Oct. 2, 1894. 

To the Editor Civil Service Chronicle: 

Sir —If the large amount of personal abuse 
i. e., accusations of corruption by British gold, 
hostility to American industries and working¬ 
men, falsification of economic data and the 
like—which, noAV for many years it has been 
my fortune to experience,, had not hardened 
my mental epidermis, I should feel a very 
large measure of indignation at your charging 
me, in the Civil Service Chronicle for Sep¬ 
tember, with having done certain acts in con¬ 
nection with the removal of Mr. Caruthers 
from the post-office in Norwich, Conn., “con¬ 
trary to good morals, good government and 
his [my] professions.” As it is, I will try and 
content myself Avith saying that there is not 
the first scintilla of truth in your statements 
and accusations in this matter. 

You commence your criticisms by quoting 
from the New York Tribune of some months 
past, that the appointment of the postmaster 
at Norwich “ was absolutely Avithin his [my] 
gift.” This statement—one of the loose kind 
which the Tribune is characteristically ready 
to make respecting those who politically dif¬ 
fer Avith it—Avas absolutely untrue. I fancy 
the smile that would have passed over the 
face of Postmaster-General Bissell ; of Hon. 
Carlos French of Connecticut, or of Mr. Clin¬ 
ton Davis, chairman of the democratic com¬ 
mittee of that state, if their attention was ever 
directed to this assertion. My opinion was 
never asked by the appointing power at Wash¬ 
ington respecting the office in question ; none 
Avas ever volunteered by me, and I have had 
abundant reason to believe that if I ever had 
expressed a Avish or opinion as to its disposi¬ 
tion, it would not have been regarded. 

At the commencement of President Cleve¬ 
land’s second term I mentally resoh'ed that I 
would have nothing whatever to do with the 
distribution of federal patronage, either in 
Connecticut or elsewhere. I must confess to 
have yielded in a very few instances to the 
importunities of personal friends and to have 
made recommendations for the appointment 
of persons to offices for which I believed them 
to be well qualified and entitled to seek. But 
my measure of success in this line may be in¬ 
ferred from the circumstance, that the only 
person whom I did specially recommend, in 
common with many good and leading citizens 
and democrats, Avho ever obtained anything, 
was a graduate of Yale, a gentleman of edu¬ 
cation and fine ability, Avho, seeking in the 
first instance the consulship at Liverpool, was 
finally appointed to a petty post in the West 
Indies, where any lengthened residence for an 
unacclimated individual was sure to be ter¬ 
minated by an attack of yellow fever. 

In respect to the post-office at Norwich, 
furthermore, I never signed the petition of 
any applicant for it, or made any recommend- 
tion to the post-office department, with a view 
of influencing its appointing policy in this 


particular. You assert that the files of this 
department will sustain your statements.. If 
the rules of the departments at Washington 
will permit, you have my full consent to hunt 
out, read, and publish, any, or all, of the cor¬ 
respondence I have ever had with them on 
the subject of patronage. 

You attempt to bolster up your case by stat¬ 
ing that my son has recently received an im¬ 
portant consular appointment ; and that this 
fact had made you especially desirous to ob¬ 
tain “further details of the wanton removal,” 
which you attribute to me; thus suggesting 
that there was some mystery disparaging to 
myself and hurtful to the cause of civil serv¬ 
ice reform, that might be revealed. I shall 
be only too happy to furnish you Avith any 
details with which I may be conversant. 

My son has not recently received “an im¬ 
portant consular appointment.” The Presi 
ident, however, did nominate him to be sec¬ 
ond secretary of the embassy of the United 
States at London, and the senate confirmed 
the nomination. The po.st is one which has 
little or no attraction for the ordinary office- 
seeker, for the reason that the expense attend¬ 
ant on filling this office creditably is two or 
three times in excess of the salary pertaining 
to it. I will further add that this appoint¬ 
ment Avas made without any solicitation on my 
part; and tbit I never exchanged a word 
with the President on this subject, except to 
write him a note after the appointment was 
made, acknowledging the compliment. 

I have been, from its first inception in this 
country, an advocate of civil service reform. 
I believe its recognition and adoption in the 
United States essential to the purity and effi¬ 
ciency of its governments—federal, state, and 
municipal. I have never concealed my sen¬ 
timents on this matter. I have contributed 
to the expenses of the present civil service 
organization. I have distributed its publica¬ 
tions; and never intentionally antagonized its 
principles. The question involved in the ad¬ 
vocacy of civil service is in a high degree a 
moral question. And if such is the case what 
claim can The Civil Service Chronicle 
have on the confidence of its readers or the 
public, when its editor, without any evidence, 
or reason, makes the untrue and brutal per¬ 
sonal attack that has found a place in its col¬ 
umns. 

In conclusion I would ask attention to some 
interesting points in connection with the re¬ 
cent Norwich post-office history that seem to 
have never been brought to the notice of The 
C iAHL Service Chronicle, or, if known by 
its managers, have been suppressed. Under 
President Cleveland’s first administration the 
Norwich postmaster, an honorable and effi¬ 
cient official, but an active republican par- 
tizan, was allowed to retain his office until the 
expiration of the term for which he was com¬ 
missioned, a period of over two years. A demo¬ 
crat, a representative of the working men, who 
commenced life as a fireman and engineer on 
the Long Island Sound steamers, and educated 
himself up to a good degree of business effi¬ 


ciency, was then appointed, Mr. Caruthers be¬ 
ing retained in his former place as deputy. 
Under the republican postmaster no democrat 
was ever alloAved to have a place in the office, 
either as clerk or letter carrier. Under the 
democratic postmaster the patronage of the 
office Avas equitably divided. Within sixty 
days after President Harrison Avas inaugu¬ 
rated the democratic postmaster Avas summa¬ 
rily removed, Avithout any charge of incapac¬ 
ity or malfeasance, and more than tAvo years 
before the expiration of his commission. Mr. 
Caruthers Avas appointed in his place, and 
within a very brief period thereafter every 
democratic clerk or letter carrier, Avith a sin¬ 
gle exception, was removed and republicans 
appointed in their places again. When Mr. 
Caruthers retired during the present year, on 
the expiration of his commission, out of nine¬ 
teen employes in his office—clerks and letter 
carriers—there was but one democrat. There 
is a legal maxim “that he Avho asks equity 
must be prepared to show that he has done 
equity.” The pertinancyof its application to 
Mr. Caruthers’s case does not seem to require 
demonstration. It also is not to be Avondered 
at that the democrats of NorAvicb, as a rule, 
do not have much faith in civil service re¬ 
form. I am yours, Daahd A. Wells. 

Mr. Wells accompanied the above letter 
with another to the editor, in which he 
makes certain threats in case the foregoing 
were not published; and he has written to 
others to the same effect. Mr. Wells’s let¬ 
ter is published, not in fear of his threats, 
but notwithstanding them, and in accord¬ 
ance with the uniform practice of the 
Chronicle. Mr. Caruthers is not ask¬ 
ing equity or anything else that we know 
of, but there is an old pleading in equity 
applicable to Mr. Wells’s letter, that it is 
very “uncertain, evasive, and insufficient.” 
He says there is not “the first scintilla of 
truth,” in the Chronicle’s statements and 
then gives facts which go far to sustain 
the Chronicle’s position, and do sustain 
it in the particular charge he complains 
of. On his own showing, he, a professed 
civil service reformer, was not only in 
sympathy with the removal of Caruthers, 
but he has under the two Cleveland ad¬ 
ministrations been engaged in and help¬ 
ing on the division of spoil and has re¬ 
ceived some of it in his own family. He 
is apparently discontented at his lack of 
success in the nefarious business of divid¬ 
ing oflfices as spoil for the gratification 
of personal friends. His “abundant rea¬ 
son to believe” that his wishes would not 
be regarded by the administration, must 
arise from a feeling of abundance of dis¬ 
appointment in securing favors asked not 
only “specially” but generally. He has 
been helping along the clean sweep which 
this administration has been making 
where not hampered by law, and which 
is the worst enemy to the progress of 
civil service reform. That is the end of 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


169 


the matter. Civil service reform is, as 
he says, a moral question. His course, 
as stated by himself, is exactly opposed to 
professions of civil service reform and to 
good government, and therefore, to good 
morals. Degree of offense cuts no figure. 
Garrison would not have been heard to 
say that he only bought and sold a few 
slaves, and that his ventures failed. 

With regard to the Norwich post-office, 
Mr. Wells says that his opinion was never 
asked ‘‘by the appointing power at Wash¬ 
ington,” and that none was volunteered by 
him. Mr. Wells may take it for granted 
that the Chronicle knows how those 
things are done. The “appointing power” 
is the President, who usually registers the 
decree of some boss, and he may or may 
not know who in a particular instance has 
influenced the boss. The question is, 
what did Mr. Wells do, in any manner, to 
help or prevent the continuance of Mr. 
Caruthers as postmaster at Norwich ? 

He further says : “In respect to the post- 
office at Norwich, furthermore, I never 
signed the petition of any applicant for it, 
or made any recommendation to the post- 
office department, with a view of influencing 
its appointing policy in this particular." The 
italics are ours. This language may not 
mean what it seems to mean. If it means 
that he has signed applications, or made 
recommendations, but not with a view of 
having them weigh anything, no comment 
is necessary. If it means that he has signed 
no applications, and has made no recom¬ 
mendations “ to the post-office depart¬ 
ment”—the question, what did he do, is 
still evaded. 

It is idle to refer the Chronicle to the 
files of the post-office department. Mr. 
Wells knows what he has written to help 
along the division of spoil. He may take 
it for granted also that the Chronicle 
knows that most spoil is divided without 
a word being written by the actual “in¬ 
fluence.” 

For some reason Mr. Wells thinks it is 
his duty to make out a bad case against 
Mr. Caruthers. Why does he not add to 
his statement the fact that the postmaster 
appointed under Mr. Cleveland’s first ad¬ 
ministration to succeed, as Mr. Wells says, 
an efficient official, kept a meat shop and 
was a working politician without fitness 
for the office and that his appointment 
was pure and unadulterated spoil ? We 
have been told that Mr. Wells helped him 
in. The “equitable” division of the patron¬ 
age, of which Mr. Wells speaks, consisted 
in the dismissal of four out of five clerks, 
and six out of eight carriers. The dis¬ 
missed men were experienced and in gen¬ 
eral very efficient. Their places were given 
to inexperienced men who were party 
workers. The result was to demoralize 


the work of the office. These “interesting 
points” are “suppressed” by Mr. Wells. 
Apparently even then the democrats of 
Norwich had little faith in civil service 
reform. 

Mr. Wells says that Mr. Caruthers was 
retained as deputy. Would it not have 
been more candid to state that Mr. Car¬ 
uthers was retained fora time [presumably 
to keep the office from being swamped], 
but was later dismissed [presumably as 
soon as the new postmaster felt he could 
stagger along without him]. We are reli¬ 
ably informed that charges of incapacity 
were made against this postmaster when 
he was removed. 

When Mr. Caruthers was made post¬ 
master there is no question but that he 
was the fittest man in Norwich for that 
position, and took the place of a man who 
ought never to have been appointed, and 
that he immediately improved the service. 
Mr. Wells does not state what is the fact, 
that Postmaster Caruthers reinstated, 
with a single exception, the dismissed em¬ 
ployes, and instead of one democrat, as 
Mr. Wells states, he retained three, and 
when he was removed there were four in 
the office. Mr. Wells would do well to 
compare this division with the “equitable” 
division under the first Cleveland post¬ 
master, which then satisfied his ideas of 
civil service reform. 

It is not denied that Mr. Caruthers was 
exceptionally fitted for the place. But Mr. 
Wells evidently takes the ground that he 
should have been turned out for displacing 
democrats with republicans. This has 
been the excuse of every spoilsman who 
has found the principles of civil service 
reform standing in his way. Wherever 
revenge and retaliation hold sway civil 
service reform is halted. Nothing is fur¬ 
ther from civil service reform than such a 
stand. The democrats of Norwich who 
“do not have much faith in civil service 
reform,” would have more reason to have 
faith in it if Mr. Wells had been in 
fact, instead of in theory, a civil service 
reformer. Taking the removal and ap. 
pointment of postmasters in Norwich 
since Mr. Cleveland’s first election, it is 
clear from Mr. Wells’s letter, that he is 
only shocked by republican partisanship. 
We feel bound to say further, that if Mr. 
Wells treats economic data after the man¬ 
ner of the above letter, there is ground 
for criticism of him as an economist. 


Political vs. Domestic Economy.—Friend— 
“How is it yeh ain’t got that position yet?” 
Lost yer pull?” Mr. Ward Heeler—“Oh, I’ve 
got the pull, plenty of pull. My application 
is signed by all ther political leaders in th’ 
party.” “Then wot’s ther matter?” “Can’t 
get any of ’em to go on me bond.”— Life. 


THE PROCESS OF BECOMING A 
BOSS. 

Mr. Norman E. Mack, editor of the Buffalo 
Times, is a member of the democratic state 
committee and a park commissioner of the 
city of Buffalo. 

Mr. Isaac H. Taggart, father-in-law to the 
aforesaid, is sheriff of the county of Erie. 

Captain S. E. Nichols, late editorial writer 
for the Times, is pension agent at Buffalo. 

Mr. .James C. Stark, recently city editor of 
the Times, is clerk to the superintendent of 
police. 


THE CORRUPTING POWER OF PA¬ 
TRONAGE. 

Up to 1890 the democratic party of Wiscon¬ 
sin was in the minority, and, having no pa¬ 
tronage to corrupt it, was reasonably honest. 
In that year it obtained power. Its first act 
was to set up a boss, and that boss, according 
to the democratic Chicago Times, has made a 
fortune of $200,000 while drawing a salary of 
but $3,000 a year. 

Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General Max¬ 
well has started in to contribute the usual 
amount of campaign aid expected of his office 
at critical moments by a savage attack on the 
republican hold over fourth-class postmasters 
in Kansas. The Kansas democrats are hav¬ 
ing a hot fight between the populists and re¬ 
publicans, and it was finally decided that the 
situation was sufficiently urgent to ask Mr. 
Maxwell to start the machinery of the post- 
office department at work as an effective cam¬ 
paign bureau. About twenty postmasters 
were dismissed yesterday, and twenty-three 
followed to-day. If removals continue at this 
rate for a few days longer, it is clear that the 
department will be able to render some very 
“practical” aid in the fall contest.— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, New York Evening Post, September 
£ 8 . 


Internal Revenue Collector Sullivan, having 
held the office long enough to measure the capacity 
of the present force, and finding it not indispensable, 
has decided upon a reorganization. With few 
exceptions, the thirty-five men now employed 
will be removed, and their places will be filled by 
a force calculated to improve the efficiency of the 
service. Changes Avere announced yesterday, 
when the following new appointments were 
announced: 

Other nominations have been sent to Wash¬ 
ington. It is expected that they will be con¬ 
firmed within a few days. All the new appoint¬ 
ees are democrats.—New York Times, October 7. 

Inspector Leadley found the civil service laws 
being ignored in the Madison, Ind.,post-office, and 
put them in force again. The appointment of a 
man as mailing clerk Avho had not taken the re¬ 
quired examination will be reported to Washing¬ 
ton. 













170 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


TTHEl PLEIDQEI. 

“ Public oillcc is a public trust. We re-aflinu tlie declaration of tlie dcmocralic national convention of 187G for the reform 
of the civil service, [Ileforni is necessary in the civil service. Experience proves that eflicient, economical conduct of the 
government business is not possible if its civil service be subject to change at every election, be a prize fought for at tlie ballot 
box, be a brief reward of party zeal, instead of posts of honor, assigned for proved competency and held for fidelity in the public 
employ; that the dispensing of patronage slumld neitber be a tax upon tlie time of all onr public men, nor the instrument of 
their ambition] and we call for the honest enforcement of all laws regulating the same. The nomination of a President, as in the 
recent republican convention by delegations composed largely of bis appointees, holding ollice at his pleasure, is a scandalous 
satire upon free popular institutions, and a startling illustration of the methods by which a President may gratify his ambition. 
We denounce a policy under which federal ollice-holders usurp control of party conventions in the states, and we pledge the dem¬ 
ocratic party to the reform of these and all other abuses which threaten individual liberty and local self-government.”— National 
Democratic Platform, 1892. 


BLACKMAILING EMPLOYES. 


From present indications the civil service 
commission will be busy with the investigation 
of cases of assessments for political purposes 
for some time to come. Speaking of the prev¬ 
alence of these charges, Commissioner Roose¬ 
velt said: 

“We have had more trouble on account of 
these cases this year than in any other year 
during which a presidential campaign oc¬ 
curred. I am glad to have a chance to say 
something about the matter now, as I always 
have before presidential campaigns. Under 
the decision of the attorney-general we can 
not proceed against those persons who solicit 
by letter. However, we shall publish broad¬ 
cast what is being done and guarantee the em¬ 
ployes that they need not pay one cent. If in 
any way molested we shall try to have crimi¬ 
nally prosecuted those who molest those em¬ 
ployes. We shall present the matter to con¬ 
gress and urge as strenuously as possible that 
legislation be had to punish solicitation by 
letter as well as in person. During the past 
month we have had two decisions favorable to 
our position—one in Ohio and the other in 
Kentucky—and both of the offenders have been 
heavily fined. If we can get at the offenders 
we will have them punished as rigorously as 
possible. I want to say that no man in office, 
whether democrat or republican, is under any 
obligation to contribute to a campaign fund 
and can not be molested in any way by his su¬ 
perior officers for refusing. This assessment 
business is mere foul blackmail and we intend 
to make war on it in every way possible. We 
intend to conduct a complete investigation of 
these cases.”— Washington dispatch, New York 
Times, October 10. 

♦ • * 

The San Francisco Chronicle says that all fed¬ 
eral employes in San Francisco have received 
a circular letter from the democratic cam¬ 
paign committee, stating that as office-holders 
they are presumed to desire the perpetuation of 
the present administration, and that the demo¬ 
cratic ticket may be successful, each office¬ 
holder is requested to contribute 2 per cent, of 
his yearly salary to the funds of the party.— 
October 4- 

» ♦ * 

The civil service commission is awaiting a 
reply from the Philadelphia Press to a letter 
sent asking information regarding charges of 


assessment of government employes in the 
Philadelphia mintfor political purposes,made 
in a recent editorial.— Washington dispatch, Oc¬ 
tober 10. 

« » * 

And this is not all. Government employes 
are being assessed heavily to help on in the 
good work, notwithstanding the civil service 
regulations. The assessments, as a rule, range 
from 10 to 25 per cent. It is known that in 
some instances the employes have been com¬ 
pelled to devote one month’s salary.— TFasA- 
ington dispatch, to Buffalo Pixpress, September 26. 

•Sp # 

The civil service commission has unearthed 
a number of flagrant violations of the law in 
Pittsburg, and Examiner Leadley is there 
making a thorough investigation. Under 
Postmaster O’Donnell there have been collu¬ 
sions in the examinations for appointment. 
Appointments have been made for janitors 
and watchmen who then were detailed as 
clerks. The employes have been assessed 2 
per cent, of their salaries by the democratic 
committee, and one republican at $50 a 
month was dismissed because he stated he 
would not pay it. This discipline caused the 
other republicans to decide to pay it last week 
Monday, but fortunately Examiner Leadley 
arrived there on Friday, and on his promise 
that the commission would protect them, the 
republicans reconsidered and did not walk up 
to the captain’s office. 

The most outrageous assessment and flagrant 
violation was in the office of Collector Kearns, 
of the internal revenue district, comprising 
the 24 counties in Western Pennsylvania. In 
1892, owing to republican dissensions and the 
Homesteael strike, the 24th congress district 
of Pennsylvania, with 4,000 republican ma¬ 
jority, elected William A. Sipe, democrat, to 
congress. Upon the advent of the Cleveland 
administration, Mr. Sipe managed to gather 
in this collectorship for one of his henchmen, 
Mr. Kearns, and therefore filled up the sub¬ 
ordinate positions with his friends. Mr. Sipe’s 
record in congress was not satisfactory to his 
constituents; but he tried to be re-elected to 
congress. As the anti-Sipe democrats con¬ 
trolled the committee of Allegheny county, 
and also the state, Mr. Sipe therefore could 
not expect any substantial aid from them. 
Therefore, the employes under Collector 
Kearns were assessed one month’s salary, to be 
paid in two installments, and they were told 
that dismissal would follow a refusal to pay. 
They all paid, and Mr. Sipe’s campaign man¬ 
ager raked in about $12,000. There are 130 
employes in the district, and the assessment 
averaged nearly $100 a man. Examiner 
Leadley is working on this violation, and it is 
possible that he may implicate Mr. Sipe, as 
the civil service law explicitly prohibits rep¬ 
resentatives from being concerned in any man¬ 
ner in assessments, subscriptions, or political 


contributions.— Washington dispatch, Buffalo Ex¬ 
press, October 17. 

BUSY HENCHMEN. 

District Attorney Frank Burke, of Indianapo¬ 
lis, addressed the democracy of Shelby county, 
speaking in the evening at Shelbyville.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, September 24. 

* • » 

United States District Attorney Frank B. Burke, 
of Indianapolis, delivered one of the most ar- 
gunientive democratic speeches at tlie court 
house in this city last night ever heard in cen¬ 
tral Indiana.— Noblesville dispatch, Indianapolis 
Sentinel, October 17, 

* * « 

The Hon. Frank B. Burke, of Indianapolis, 
addressed a large audience at the opera house 
to-night. He devoted hisspeech to the national 
issues. The people appreciated the address, 
and applauded it quite often.— Blufftoaidispaich, 
Indianapolis Sentinel, October 19. 

» » * 

Romeo DePuy [federal employe] will return 
to-morrow to Indianapolis to enter the cam¬ 
paign for awhile.— Washington dispatch, Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel, October 12 . 

♦ » ♦ 

Meanwhile Senator Rill was very busy at 
his hotel, and it was evident that the local 
situation was being carefully considered. Post¬ 
master Charles IF. Dayton was one of the gentlemen 
who spent some time with the senator.—New York 
Times, October 4- 

• » * 

It is said that Oswald Ottendorfer, Charles 
S. Fairchild and Frederick R. Coudert are op¬ 
posed to nominating an independent ticket. 
It is said, too, that Collector Kilbreth and most of 
the other federal office-holders take the same view ,— 

Neiv York Evening Post, October 1. 

» * * 

At all events Mr. Cleveland has practically 
given his approval in the support tendered to us 
by officials under him.—John Boyd Thatcher, Hill 

lieutenant. New York Evening Post, October 15. 

* » * 

One of the democratic contests that is likely 
to be the topic of much discussion at the com¬ 
ing state convention is that in Yates county. 
Though in many counties of Western New 
York, an effort was made by both the friends 
of the administration and the state machine to 
insure harmony, the representatives of the 
factions in Yates appear to regard their differ¬ 
ences as irreconcilable. 

The Hill faction, which is led by Calvin S 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


171 


Huson, formerly deputy controller and Tliomas 
Carmody, chief examiner of the state civil service 
commission, held its convention on September 
8th, and elected a delegation headed by Joel 
Lewis. This convention nominated a county 
ticket, on which for member of assembly ap¬ 
pears the name of Darius A. Ogden, an old 
democratic war-horse, who in his long public 
career of half a century has served as consul 
to Hawaii, canal appraiser, member of as¬ 
sembly, and as the last canal commissioner 
elected in the state previous to the abolition of 
that office. 

The administration element is led by M. A. 
Leary, a Penn Yan lawyer, whofor the past dozen 
years has been chairman of the county committee. 
At the Saratoga convention of last year, the 
Leary delegation was placed upon the prelim¬ 
inary roll, but the Huson men were admitted 
on the recommendation of the committee on 
contested seats. This gave the Huson organ¬ 
ization in Yates the stamp of regularity, but 
the old county committee of Yates county has 
never accepted the result, and under its call a 
convention was held last Saturday, at which a 
second delegation was elected, headed by 
Ernest R. Bordwell. Another county ticket 
was also placed in the field, with Evan J. Pot¬ 
ter as a candidate for the assembly. Since 
last year’s contest, il/r. Leary has become post¬ 
master of Penn Yan, having assumed that office 
December 1st last. His name was among the 
list of those unconfirmed at the recent adjourn¬ 
ment of congress, but a new commission was 
immediately issued to him by the President, 
at the same time when the other New York 
postmasters who remained unconfirmed were 
appointed.— Penn Yan dispatch. New York 
Times, September 


SALE OF PATRONAGE FOR LEG¬ 
ISLATION. 

The Nebraska correspondent of the New 
York Evening Post gives in the issue of October 
16 particulars of the consequences of Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland’s use of the patronage of that 
state to coerce legislation. Congressman Bry¬ 
an is fighting for the senatorship. The demo¬ 
cratic party since last year has changed front 
on the currency question, declaring for the 
free and unlimited coinage of gold and silver 
at the present ratio. Men are supporting Bry¬ 
an who do not believe in his principles. The 
Post’s correspondent says: 

But, undoubtedly, the very strongest cause 
of his success has been the attitude of the fed 
eral administration towards him. From the 
first it was learned that, because of Bi-yan’s position 
on silver, he would not be permitted to distribute any 
of the patronage. He was not recognized as a 
democrat, although the only democratic con¬ 
gressman from this state. This action was 
wholly unwise. It a.ssisled Bryan’s cause very 
much. In tlie first place, of course, the appli¬ 
cants for office deserted Bryan and fawned 
upon Secretary Morton. It is claimed by the 
Bryanites that the democratic state conven¬ 
tion last year was composed of these office- 
seekers and their friends. It was, indeed, proven 
that all candidates for office were given to understand 
that they must attend that convention, if possible, and 
support the administration’s silver policy. Accord- 


niany democrats who had been loud 
free-silver advocates voted against it for the 
sake of office at hand or expected. Of course 
this sort of enlightened opinion snd expres¬ 
sion could not last long. The offices did not 
“go around” to all the seekers. The patronage 
brokers could not extend this sort of deal 
another year, and the result was that nearly 
all the disappointed ones were anti-Clevelanrl 
and pro silver men after their disappointment. 
Even the chairman of last year’s convention, 
who made unjust rulings against Bryan’s 
friends and was a candidate for postmaster, 
became this year a leading free coinage dem¬ 
ocrat and attended a free-silver democrat con¬ 
ference in this city, and later was a promi¬ 
nent delegate to the state convention last 
month. He did not get the post office he 
sought. The bulk of the democrats were dis¬ 
gusted at this patronage deal at the state con¬ 
vention last year, and were inclined to take 
sides with the “under dog” on that occasion. 
They shared the general disgust with the acts 
of the President and congress, and thought best 
to rebuke him and congress by espousing the 
cause of tlie men most repugnant to them, es 
pecially as Mr. Bryan is known and esteemed 
in this state so very much more highly than the 
men who have obtained the federal offices. 

But, to assist Bryan’s silver schemes, the 
federal office-holders seemed to have labored 
fiercely in the primaries leading to the recent 
state convention. These federal office holders be¬ 
gan from the start a campaign against Bryan. 
Ihey were offensively in evidence on all occasions, 
deserting their offices to attend caucuses, primaries 
and meetings to defeat Bryan’s tickets. That they 
had received instructions of this sort from 
their masters is not proven, but their acts dis¬ 
gusted thousands of honest money democrats 
all over the state. In this city these office¬ 
holders did things which were dishonorable, 
such as forging Bryan’s signature to a primary 
ticket which was against Bryan and free sil¬ 
ver. The result was that the Bryan silver 
ticket carried this county by a majority of five 
to one. To illustrate how such things operate: 
a rector of an Episcopal parish, one of the 
most intellectual and loved men in Omaha, 
and an able opponent of free coinage, walked 
two miles to attend a democrat primary for 
the purpose of voting for the free-silver ticket 
He had never before attended a primary, but 
his vote was a rebuke to the dishonorable ac¬ 
tions against Bryan and a testimony to his be¬ 
lief in Mr. Bryan’s honesty. He could not 
see, he said, why office-holders considered it a 
part of the duties of their offices to interfere 
in politics, and become offensive and conspic¬ 
uous in attempting to defeat any candidate, 
especially by unfair means. This illustration 
explains why this county, which last year sent 
a solid delegation to the democratic state con¬ 
vention in favor of the repeal of the Sherman 
law, sent this year a solid delegation for free 
coinage. 

It is semi-officially stated here to-night that 
President Cleveland has appointed Samuel 
Klotz collector of internal revenue for the 
fifth district of New Jersey. Mr. Klotz held 
the office before, and is Senator McPherson’s 
candidate. His appointment means a big vic¬ 
tory for the senior senator over Senator Smith, 
who has tried hard to get the place for ex- 
Mayor Haynes or James F. Connolly, or any 
one to defeat McPherson’s candidate. Com¬ 
ing immediately after the removal of Super¬ 
visor O’Rourke, who was Senator Smith’s pro- 
teg<5, it is taken to indicate that Senator Smith, 
by his attitude on the tariff question, has lost 
favor with the administration .—Newark dis¬ 
patch, New York Times, September 20. 


SALE OF PATRONAGE FOR 
MONEY. 

There seems to be no doubt that such buy¬ 
ing and selling of places in the civil service 
has been going on in Iowa ever since tbe 
Cleveland administration began distributing 
the spoils. Specific charges of the disposal of 
particular offices for certain sums are made by 
a prominent German newspaper, the Iowa 
Staats Anzeiger, whose editor was an applicant 
for the Des Moines post office. He says in so 
many words that he would have got the place 
if he had felt disposed to offer $o00 a piece to 
“a certain congressman,” “a certain promi¬ 
nent official in Washington,” and two fowa 
democratic politicians, whom he names, and 
he quotes his successful rival as saying that 
“it cost him $5,000 to secure the office.” He 
affirms that he “saw a dispatch that an offer 
of $500 was made to a man in Washington 
for an office, and another dispatch wherein 
that offer was accepted;” and he mentions re¬ 
ports that the Marshalltown ))ost-office cost 
the successful applicant from $600 to $1,000, 
the Ottumwa office not less than $600, while 
in “fifty other cases” the delay about changes 
in the post-offices was not due to the settle¬ 
ment of difficulties, but appointments were 
held back by the members of the ring for 
some one of the various candidates to make 
them a bid for their indorsement and support. 
—New York Evening Post, October 5. 

Tlie treasury presented an appearance of 
mingled gloom and festivity this morning. 
The forty two clerks who received notice of 
dismissal two weeks ago arc bidding farewell 
to their friends, and leaving the building amid 
tearful exi)res«ions of regret. Red eyes were 
visible and voices were choked on every side in 
quarters where the reductions of force had 
been made. These upheavals are so disturb¬ 
ing to the steady progress of business that the 
chiefs of division in the reorganized bureaus 
are already looking forward with dreail to the 
exhaustion of the thirty thousand dollar a-i, 
propriation for temjmrary service, when the 
rest of the doomed clerks will be dismissed.— 
Washington dispatch, Neiv York Evening Post, 
October 1. 


PLATFORMS AND REPORTS. 

The constitutional convention of New York 
has adopted the following amendment for 
submission to the people, 40 out of 54 demo¬ 
crats and 57 out of 97 republicans voting for 
it: 

“Appointments and promotions in the civil 
service of the state and of cities shall be made 
according to merit and fitness, to be ascer¬ 
tained, so far as possible, by examinations, 
which shall be competitive. Honorably dis¬ 
charged Union soldiers and sailors who are 
not otherwise disqualified for such appoint¬ 
ment or promotion shall be exempt from the 
provisions of this section. Laws shall be 
made to provide for the enforcement of this 
section.” 

According to the Springfield Republican we 










172 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


are indebted to George Fred Williams for the 
straightforward and explicit statement of the 
Massachusetts state democratic convention 
upon civil service reform. It also says that 
the declaration was not read hy Josiah Quin¬ 
cy, and that he was not chairman of the com¬ 
mittee on resolutions, and in fact appeared as 
a lonely figure in the proceedings he so lately 
has been wont to engineer. The resolution is 
as follows: 

The scope of the national civil service sys¬ 
tem should he extended as fast as the civil 
service commission deems practicable, to the 
end that all federal position to which the 
merit system of appointment is applicable 
may he placed hy law upon a strictly non-po¬ 
litical basis. The administration should now 
formulate and recommend some plan by which 
the post-offices may be brought within the 
merit system, and the continued tenure of 
faithful officials be secured. 


The anti-Tammany and anti Hill democra¬ 
cy which has nominated Everett P. Wheeler 
for governor says in its platform : 

The public service should he manned 
throughout by honest men, selected for merit, 
fairly paid, giving the government a dollar’s 
worth of work for a dollar’s worth of pay, and, 
in places not political, secure tenure during 
good service. We demand an efficient enforce¬ 
ment of the civil service laws and an exten¬ 
sion of the classified service in state and na¬ 
tion. 

We favor home rule in cities, separate mu¬ 
nicipal elections, the suppression of bosses 
and rings, and the business administration of 
municipalities. 

The annual report of the Cambridge Civil 
Service Reform Association has been received. 
It says of the two papers published solely for 
the furtherance of civil service reform : 

During the past year the committee has contin¬ 
ued its support of Good Government hy subscribing 
iu behalf of every one of our active members. The 
value of Good Government can hardly he overesti¬ 
mated. The vigor and ability with which it is ed¬ 
ited have, if possible, increased from the start. 

The committee have also subscribed to ten copies 
of the Civil Service Chronicle, to be distributed 
among various reading rooms, etc., in Cambridge. 
It is to be desired that more of our members should 
take the Chronicle, which supplements Good Gov¬ 
ernment admirably, covering a comparatively lim¬ 
ited field with a directness of speech and a wealth 
of concrete instances which are Impossible for the 
national organ. A better object lesson than its 
columns can not de found. 

Of the administration it says: 

Mr. Cleveland has as yet made no extension of the 
rules. He has strengthened the civil service com¬ 
mission by a removal and an appointment, both of 
which were admirable. He has apparently notinter- 
fered with the members of his cabinet, but has al¬ 
lowed each one to adopt whatever attitude toward 
appointments he deemed best. The President has 
himself, on several occasions, administered to the 
office-seekers rebukes more direct than they have 
received from any of his recent predecessors. Ex¬ 
cept for special reasons which seemed to him suf¬ 
ficient, and except in the consular service, changes 
have not been made with quite the same rapidity 
as heretofore. Where they have been made, the 
same principle seems to have been followed as in 
his former administration: namely, to appoint 
civil service reformers in places where, as In Bos¬ 
ton, there was a developed public sentiment in fa¬ 
vor of the reform, and spoilsmen In states like In¬ 
diana. 


In two cases where the public interest, and per¬ 
haps even the public safety, seemed to him to de¬ 
mand imperatively the passage by congress of cer¬ 
tain measures (the repeal of the Sherman act and 
the change in the tariff). It is hardly open to doubt 
that he has used appointments to office, irrespect¬ 
ive of the fitness of the appointees, in orderto se¬ 
cure votes in favor of the legislation he deemed 
necessary. He has also done the same In the un¬ 
successful effort to secure the confirmation by the 
senate of two of his nominees to office—Messrs. 
Hornblower and Peckham. 

The report advocates a campaign of educa¬ 
tion such as the believers in a low larifif car¬ 
ried on in the years from 1888 to 1892 : 

This should be by constant agitation of the sub¬ 
ject whenever an opportunity occurs; by the use of 
the newspaper press, multiplied as this use may be 
by the collection and reproduction of clippings; 
by the constant search for extreme cases of the 
abuse of the spoils system, and their exposure; by 
the circulation of pamphlets and leaflets; and by 
public addresses wherever possible. It is needless 
to say that no such widespread propaganda of civil 
service reform has ever been possible; the work 
done has been almost wholly done irregularly and 
by volunteers, because the funds have never been 
forthcoming with which the National Lcaguecould 
maintain a permanent bureau and an adequate 
clerical force. Such work must be done, however, 
if the present halting progress of the reform is to 
be quickened. The National League is the body to 
take charge of the work, and is ready to do so if the 
money is provided. 


CORRESPONDENCE. 

To the Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle: 

I see you quote with approval Postmaster 
Dayton’s opinion that English post-office of¬ 
ficials had “not a sign of pretense or post- 
office officialism about them.” This is a natural 
expression of opinion for Mr. Dayton, who, 
having got into office under the spoils system, 
wishes to stay in under the merit system. But 
is it true ? Doubtless tbe higher officials were 
courteous to Mr. Dayton. He came accredited 
and they regarded him as their social iqual. 
I have repeatedly heard exactly the reverse 
of English officials. Over and over again, as 
a Washington correspondent, I have taken 
English travelers over the departments at 
Washington, and they have spoken with 
amazement of the complete absence, in the 
men whose offices we visited, of the sense of own¬ 
ership and proprietorship which pervades 
English offices like an atmosphere. I did 
not meet the higher English post-office of¬ 
ficials, but in a very short stay in England, 
four weeks of which were passed in a small 
country town twenty miles from London, and I 
longed for the readiness, the sense, the per¬ 
sonal interest in the public I would have 
found in a like American office. The clerks 
were in for life, the public opinion of their 
work was of no consequence, and I was 
treated with an official insolence which still 
makes me tingle. Take our consular service. 
It has its evils. I know them all; but if I 
were in trouble I would tenfold rather go to 
the American consul, who may not speak the 
language, but who does not look on his office 
as his personal property and a vested life in¬ 
terest than to the English consul, with his in¬ 
born sense of social superiority, and his con¬ 


sciousness that he is safe from all but serious 
criticism, can wholly disregard the poor man’s 
cry. Ten to twelve years ago, Mr. Mundella 
warned an American that we would inevitably 
find a permanent tenure bred a disregard of 
public opinion, such as in the English educa¬ 
tional department made reform difficult, and 
allied the office-holding class, as a whole, with 
Conservatism. I understand perfectly why 
my reforming friends with wealth, with social 
position and with acquaintance, find English 
officials in England and out, all they can ask. 
I know something of the poor, the friendless 
and the unknown, and the permanent official 
gives them a treatment which would modify 
many a reformer’s views. The oldest perma¬ 
nent civil force in this country is the New 
York police. Close to 40 years ago, its mem¬ 
bers were made removable only for cause. 
Look at the result! 

I have tbe honor to be, very respectfully 
yours, Talcott Williams. 

Thees hackneyed objections to civil serv¬ 
ice reform are given place only that both 
sides may be heard. The merit system pro¬ 
poses no life or permanent tenure. In¬ 
stant dismissal is, except under boss rule, 
and always will, and ought to be, the pen¬ 
alty of ofi&cial insolence. There is no 
way in which the merit system can be 
twisted to give any one reason to sup¬ 
pose that he has an ownership of an of¬ 
fice. The American people do not and 
never will brook official insolence. The 
oldest employes of the government are 
not tinctured with it. They are the most 
attentive, the most courteous, and the best 
liked by the people. The only officials 
who are insolent in this country are the 
heelers who get and hold their places 
through bosses and not through merit and 
efficiency; to these the rule of instant dis¬ 
missal can not, on account of boss influ¬ 
ence, be made to apply. To the citation of 
the Tammany police in New York as an 
instance of the merit system, we can only 
cite an answer to a man who last year 
calmly advocated the benefits of slavery, 
made by Mr. Julian whom it reminded of 
a mule that said it always tired him 
to kick at nothing. The observations of 
the service of foreign countries made by a 
man who soberly tells you that the condi¬ 
tion of the Tammany police is the result 
of a rule of removal for cause only, made 
forty years ago, are unreliable and value¬ 
less, whether from prejudice or lack of dis¬ 
cernment. 


A few soreheads, who failed to get the ap¬ 
pointments they desired, have been fighting 
Taylor all through his term of office, and have 
constantly failed to give him credit for what 
he has done. He turned out all the republican 
postmasters and had in democrats almost before any 
other congressman had begun the good work. — Ev- 
I ansville dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, September 
1 23 . 








The Civil service chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering^ of the 
ship of state. From Archbishop Ireland’s address: The Duly and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II, No. 21. . INDIANAPOLIS, NOVEMBER, 1894. terms 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N- 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Addres.s, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

The Civil Service Chronicle has re¬ 
ceived some complaints that the paper is 
not regularly received. Especially this 
seems to be the case with libraries and its 
exchange list. The request is made that 
all such cases be promptly reported. 

The annual meeting of the National 
Civil Service Reform League will be held 
in Chicago on December 12 and 13. The 
civil service reformers of the west should 
remember that there is a general impres¬ 
sion abroad that not much interest is taken 
in the objects of the League in this part of 
the countrj' and that this time there will 
be no excuse for a sparse attendance. All 
who expect to be at these meetings should 
notify William Potts, 54 William street, 
New York City. 


Readers of the Chronicle in Indiana 
may wish to be reminded of the fund to be 
raised in memory of George William Cur¬ 
tis and that the committee will welcome 
the interest evidenced by the smallest con¬ 
tributions. It is proposed to use a small 
part of the fund for the bust of Mr. Curtis, 
but most of it will be used to establish a 
lectureship for the purpose of disseminat¬ 
ing ideas of good government. Remit¬ 
tances should be made to William L. 
Trenholm, Treasurer, 160 Broadway, New 
York City. 


As The Chronicle predicted the people 
of this district finished with Congressman 
Bynum on election day. His opponent, 
Charles L. Henry, beat him by the great 
majority of 4,443 votes. There is on 
every hand a feeling of relief that we are 
rid of Bynum. He had few merits and 
many demerits. From the beginning of 
his career he has been on the side of the 
buccaneers in politics, openly and de¬ 
fiantly. Such a man can no longer hold 
the respect of this district,and we are very 
glad to be able to say so. Eight years ago 
his Barney Conroys and Jim Dowlings 
were notorious throughout the country, 
and he is now engaged in a characteristic 
escapade with ex-office seekers as is shown 
on another page, and in which he sets out 


how he withstood oflers of bribery. Or¬ 
dinarily offers of wholesale bribery by 
prominent citizens are denounced at once, 
but Mr. Bynum waited a year and until 
he was overwhelmingly defeated. If the 
people had known the full measure of his 
uprightness, it might have made some 
difierence with the votes. 

Bribery and oflers to bribe are the 
natural results of dividing offices as spoil. 
If a man can get an office for setting up a 
primary for a congressman, there is to his 
mind no reason why he should not have 
an office by paying his congressman 
money. If a boss is in payment for 
services allowed to control certain ap¬ 
pointments, he can see no reason why he 
should not receive cash for the places. 
This was Justice Paddy Divver’s view 
when he offered in return for services a 
place, a gold watch and a banner. These 
are his reputed words : 

As the leader of this district, I will give the cap¬ 
tain of the election district that polls the most 
votes for the democratic ticket a .$1,500 place. He 
can take the place himself or give it to one of his 
friends. [Most enthusiastic cheering.] To the 
captain of the district that polls the second largest 
number of votes I will give a gold watch and 
chain, and to the third largest I will give this silk 
banner. 

In Divver’s domain there were some 
election districts in which the returns 
under the above incentive did not show a 
single republican vote. We published 
last month an account of the sale of offices 
under the present administration in lowa^ 
and not many years back a regular system 
of sales came to light in Missouri. AH 
this goes to show that Tammanyism exists 
not only in New York but all over the 
country, and that Tammanyism and the 
spoils system are one. 

At the election m Cincinnati November 
6, the republicans carried the city by more 
than 20,000 majority. November 13, just 
one week later, at a special election for 
judge of the insolvency court, the republi¬ 
can candidate was beaten by 3,000 major¬ 
ity. He was put forward by the Cox ma¬ 
chine on the principle that the republican 
machine could do anything and still carry 
elections. The machine in Indiana had 
better take warning in time, before it gives 
way to its desire to loot the penal and be¬ 
nevolent institutions of the state. All the 
talk now going on about bi-partisan boards 


has no meaning in the mouths of the men 
who make it except to put in boards who 
can turn out democrats to make places for 
republicans. If it did not have this mean¬ 
ing, these men would not object to a sys¬ 
tem which would take these institutions 
absolutely out of politics. We repeat that 
there is no way to set this question at rest 
except by the introduction of the merit 
and the labor service systems. 


The order of the President, which ex¬ 
tends the classified service to custom 
houses having twenty employes and to 
many excepted places in the custom 
houses, in the departments in Washing¬ 
ton and in the post-oflBces can hardly be 
sufficiently praised. The stroke is one of 
the heaviest and most sweeping that has 
ever been delivered for the merit system. 
It is not in the great number of places, 
about 3,000 in all, but it is in their import¬ 
ance and in the number of gaps stopped, 
and more than all in the fact that the scan-, 
dal of going upon the street and picking 
up politicians, and placing them as heads 
of divisions over men a thousand times 
better fitted than themselves, is, let us hope, 
forever ended. In the Indianapolis post- 
office, the only spoil left is the assistant 
postmaster and two janitors. The rank and 
file in the service will now have a chance to 
compete for something higher and the ser¬ 
vice will be benefited beyond measure. It 
is proper to speak also of the civil service 
commission. The law could not be more 
fortunate in having a commission impar¬ 
tial, qualified, determined and fearless. It 
is a pleasure to know that Mr. Proctor has 
largely added to the commission in these 
respects. 

The order was received throughout the 
country either with praise or as a matter 
of course. There is nowhere that we have 
seen an objection or a criticism. This is 
a convincing proof that the reform has at 
last met general acceptation. We are not 
disposed to throw it up that the President 
oug'ht to have done this sooner. He has 
shown that he knows how to do it and can 
do it when he gets ready, and we are 
promised more in the near future. We 
are convinced that he missed a great op¬ 
portunity in not refusing to divide the 
fourth-class postmasterships and the pen¬ 
sion examiners among congressmen and in 
not forcing congress to legislate these places 


























174 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


out of politics or leave them in the hands 
of republicans. But with the rest of the 
service his opportunity is not gone. He 
has more than two years yet and by trans¬ 
fers to the classified service and by mak¬ 
ing and enforcing labor service rules he 
can so nearly destroy the spoils system as 
to make for the country and for himself 
more valuable history than in all the rest 
of his public service together. 

The civil service reform movement has 
often been hindered and made ashamed by 
actions of men nominally in its own ranks. 
It has had enrolled a considerable number 
of persons of local or national reputation, 
who have gone glibly through all the forms 
of profession, but who in practice have not 
been different from the ordinary spoilsmen. 
Gorman himself could not have been more 
thorough than Quincy was with the con¬ 
sulships. They have kept up a steady 
chorus of excuse for the failures of the re¬ 
spective administrations which they hap¬ 
pened to favor; and their excuses have 
been the more unctuous according as they 
have had the ear or the notice of any par¬ 
ticular administration. Some of them are 
open and above board in their recreancy 
and some attempt to be very secret about 
it. Some enter openly into the distribu¬ 
tion of patronage; others din the depart¬ 
ments or the President in person, while 
all the time looking in every direction to 
make sure that no one sees them. These 
work by a secret word or hint to apolitical 
boss, or a direct or roundabout word to the 
appointing power. We want it understood 
that The Civil Service Chronicle makes 
war upon all these men. The only excuse 
which can be offered for President Cleve¬ 
land is that they have misled him. No 
man who is claiming to help break up the 
spoils system can have anything to do, di¬ 
rectly or indirectly, with the distribution of 
spoils. Such men have been a curse to the 
reform movement. When found out, they 
and their followers set up a cry of “ cap¬ 
tious criticism.” No greater service to the 
reform can be rendered than to let the 
public know who they are and what they 
are doing. 


We desire the heelers, the ward bum¬ 
mers, the rounders, the wheel horses and 
the bosses, high and low, who for years 
have been glibly declaring that if the 
people once got a chance at the merit 
system, they would make short work of 
it, to take note that an election was held 
in the State of New York, November 6, 
at which the following amendment to the 
constitution was adopted by a great ma¬ 
jority: 

“ Appointments and promotions in the civil 
service of the state, and of all the civil divisions 
thereof. Including cities and villages, shall be 


made according to merit and fitness to be ascer¬ 
tained, so far as practicable, by examinations, 
which, so far as practicable, shall be competitive; 
provided, however, that honorably discharged 
soldiers and sailors from the army and navy of the 
United States in the late civil war, who are citizens 
and residents of this state, shall be entitled to pre¬ 
ference in appointment and promotion, without 
regard to their standing on any list from which 
such appointment or promotion may be made. 
Laws shall be made to provide for the enforcement 
of this section.” 

This is the end of the claim that the 
people are not in favor of this reform. 
As The Chronicle has always main¬ 
tained, the only persons opposed to it are 
those who, without regard to merit, de¬ 
sire to quarter themselves or their friends 
upon the public treasury. 

The natural result of Carlisleism in the 
treasury department has appeared in the 
bureau of engraving and printing. Two 
democratic congressmen asked to have 
one Smith given a job, and Carlisle 
promptly gave it, and just as promptly 
Smith began to steal postage stamps. 
Again, the smart chief of the bureau 
thought that, with the political mendi¬ 
cants under him, he could make postage 
stamps and save the government money 
over private contracts. He has now lost 
$1,000 by theft, and the country is “ stuck ” 
with many thousand dollars worth of 
stickless stamps, which must be recalled 
and destroyed. 

There were 69,809 post-offices in the 
United States, June 30, 1894. Of these, 
66,677 were fourth-class, and 3,428 were 
presidential. The total number of ap¬ 
pointments during the year was 23,166, 
and there were 8 966 classed as removals. 
In the railway mail service, during the 
year ending June 30,1893, there was one 
error to 7,144 pieces of mail matter han¬ 
dled. In the year ending June 30 last, 
the proportion was one error to 
7,832 pieces handled. In the classi¬ 
fied service like the railway mail serv¬ 
ice, the people can find out by the records 
kept what they are getting for their money. 
Here again is also shown the value and the 
steady progress which is due to the com¬ 
petitive system. Outside of the classified 
service, there is nothing by which to meas¬ 
ure the services of the host of new ap¬ 
pointees, their own self-sufficient declara¬ 
tions not being worthy of weight. It is 
impossible that any business which takes 
on 23,166 green hands in a single year 
can be run on principles of business and 
economy. Above all is this true of the 
presidential .post-ofl&ces, where the prac¬ 
tice of going out upon the street and pick¬ 
ing up a local politician and putting him 
at the head of a great business institution, 
with the workings of which he is not in 
the least familiar, is no longer short of the 
ridiculous. 


A GOOD illustration is the recent ap¬ 
pointment of James P. Willett postmaster 
at Washington. The President has per¬ 
haps done unusually well in this case un¬ 
der the system which he follows. Yet when 
we collate the facts as to fitness it is 
claimed that Mr. Willett is fifty years old, 
has been a steadfast friend of Mr. Cleve¬ 
land, is secretary and treasurer of the 
Woodmont rod and gun club, is a Knight 
Templar, has manifested public spirit on 
many occasions, has been one of the lead¬ 
ers of the district democracy and is a lead¬ 
ing hatter. There is not a single word 
about his knowledge of the postal business 
which no man without years of experience 
can acquire so as to fitly fill a place like 
the headship of the Washington post-office. 
This system would wreck any business 
which did not have the people to tax to 
make up for losses arising from mistakes 
or from forced idleness while subordinates 
do the work of which the postmasters are 
ignorant. This becomes vivid by the ex¬ 
act parallel of supposing the appointment 
as cashier of the largest Washington bank 
or as superintendent of a division of the 
Baltimore and Ohio railroad, running out 
of Washington, of a man fifty years old, a 
leading hatter, a prominent democrat, a 
steady supporter of the president of the cor¬ 
poration, a Knight Templar, a secretary of 
a gun club, and so on, but without any ex¬ 
perience in banking or railroad business. 
This whole system must go. Postmasters 
must disappear as local politicians. They 
must be officers in a division of the postal 
service who in the higher post-offices get 
their places in the line of promotion and 
who are subject to transfer as officers and 
employes of the railway mail service now 
are. 


WHAT DID IT? 

Explanations of the recent defeat go 
briskly on. The Indianapolis Journal has 
collated the following from democratic 
sources: 

Democratic explanations of how it happened are 
nearly all in, and they run about this way: 

It was the administration’s attitude on the silver 
question—and the offices. 

It was the Wilson bill—and the offices. 

It was the hard times—and the offices. 

It was Blount and the flag—and the offices. 

It was the sending of troops to Chicago—and the 
offices. 

It was the distribution of the oflSces. 

The notable feature of our elections is 
the tendency of great numbers of voters to 
overthrow the powers that be. Mr. By¬ 
num says, “that these sudden and over¬ 
whelming changes are evidences of a de¬ 
moralized, if not a diseased public mind.” 

The Indianapolis Sentinel thinks that the 
causes are not upon the surface but are 
down deep, meaning thereby, we suppose 
class oppression. It does not seem to The 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


175 


Civil Service Chronicle that it is neces¬ 
sary to go far for causes which have of 
late years produced election revolutions. 
VVe regard these changes, and the will and 
ability of the American people to make 
them, as exceedingly healthy. They come 
from the fact that nearly all the really able 
and at the same time honorable men in 
this country, are driven out of political 
life. The men we choose do not know 
how to bring about good government. As 
we have often said, they are largely of the 
ward politician type, who think that ward 
politics as they know it is the only essen¬ 
tial to government. Witness Secretary 
Carlisle and Mr. Morton’s coachman. The 
only lasting impression which our present 
democratic senators and representatives 
have made is in heading squads through the 
streets of Washington to the White House, 
running down spoil. For a year after the 
last election of President Cleveland, the 
majority in congress almost literally did 
nothing but divide offices. The people are 
not fools. That this clamoring crowd 
could have no capacity or desire for good 
government was plain to the plainest 
It is preposterous to suppose that a 
country can not be* governed without 
being racked as this has been for a year. 
The present set are not the first set, nor 
the second, whom the people have found 
out. It is not within the province of this 
journal to discuss general measures, but it 
can declare the one essential first step. 
Election revolutions will go on so long as 
primaries, conventions and party ma¬ 
chines are controlled by patronage, be¬ 
cause the product will be officials who live 
by patronage. The first step is to break 
up completely the patronage system. A 
congressman shall not have even a labor¬ 
er’s place to give away. Men who will 
make statesmen must be called into public 
life and when there, their sole business 
must be to master the principles of govern¬ 
ment and put them into operation. So 
long as we are ruled by bosses and hench¬ 
men, the “evidences of a demoralized, if 
not a diseased public mind,” will con¬ 
tinue. 


THE INDIANA PUBLIC INSTITU¬ 
TIONS. 

The republicans in this state are stunned 
by their victory. They have carried the 
state by about 45,000. Such an enormous 
change, after being disastrously defeated 
in 1892, is proof too overwhelming that 
party ties have gone to pieces, and that at 
the next election the republican machine 
may be overthrown. At last the republi¬ 
can managers realize that their hold upon 
the people will be according to their works. 
It is with them to decide whether they 
will destroy their great majority before 


the election of 1896. Already here and 
there appears an itching to spoil the be¬ 
nevolent and penal institutions. It is 
covered with careful phrases, but there is a 
noticeable avoidance of advocacy of the only 
measure that will take these institutions 
once for all out of the domain of party 
politics. The party can wreck itself upon 
this question in the sixty days during 
which the next general assembly will be in 
session. The Indianapolis Journal warns 
the party that there must be “no ignoring 
of the reforms which republicans have been 
advocating for years past.” This is the 
true stand to take. The first truth to be 
recognized is that merely making up 
boards from members of different parties 
is of itself valueless as a reform measure. 
Tammany Hall, in New York, nearly al 
ways had bi-partisan boards, and its police 
board now consists of two republicans and 
two democrats. It simply amounts to 
dividing the spoil between two sets of par¬ 
tisans. The suggestion that members of 
the boards should serve without pay is of 
great value. The governor should have 
the appointment of these boards, with 
full power of removal upon cause stated. 

But, however carefully the upper frame 
work of the administration of these insti¬ 
tutions may be arranged, they will be a 
source of political corruption, of public 
and private wrong, and of great party 
danger so long as there is any opportunity 
left for the exercise of favoritism in choos¬ 
ing employes. The sum of it is, that the 
merit-system of open competition, with¬ 
out regard to race, religion or politics, 
should be introduced for all the higher 
places, and what is known as the Boston 
labor system for the lower places. The 
first of these is found in its highest effi¬ 
ciency in the railway mail service, and the 
second is found in the city of Boston and 
in the navy-yards. These two systems 
are now so firmly rooted that it is recog. 
nized on every hand that they will soon 
revolutionize the conditions of public em¬ 
ployment in this country. Why should 
Indiana be behind? 

Since 1884 the republicans in this state 
have in conventions repeatedly declared 
for the merit system as it now exists in 
the federal service, and in the general as¬ 
sembly they have repeatedly voted unani¬ 
mously for bills designed to introduce that 
system into the state service. The last of 
those bills was the Magee bill in 1891, 
which received the vote of every republi¬ 
can senator. There is absolutely no other 
way of finally settling the benevolent and 
penal institution question in this state. 
The republicans should stand by their re¬ 
iterated professions in this matter. Now 
that they have the power, they can not 
dodge or adopt a subterfuge. 


INDEPENDENT VOTING IN 
BALTIMORE. 

The defeat of Charles G. Kerr, the “regular” 
candidate for associate judge of the supreme 
bench of Baltimore, shows that even in that 
ring-ridden city it is possible to beat a bad 
candidate if the people really want to do it. 
The bosses in Baltimore had no question of 
their ability to elect their man. Time and 
again they had re elected him as states attor¬ 
ney in the face of the repeated censures of his 
administration by numerous grand juries. In 
his several campaigns for re-election he had 
beaten, by many thousands of votes, some of 
the ablest, best known and most respected law¬ 
yers at the Baltimore bar. Whether a repub¬ 
lican or an independent demgcrat was opposed 
to him, apparently made little difference. 
Every time he came before the people his ma¬ 
jorities became larger, although every year 
added more and more convincing demonstra¬ 
tion of his utter unfitness for his place, and of 
the dangers to public morality which resulted 
therefrom. 

This year a judge was to be elected. “Son¬ 
ny” Mahon, who represents the gambling and 
whisky-selling elements of the dominant par- 
tv, insisted on Mr. Kerr being nominated for 
the place. The other leaders preferred some 
one else. Many of the “regular” democrats 
prominent at the bar or in the business com¬ 
munity, privately protested against the nomi¬ 
nation, but the “pull” of the criminal and 
semi-criminal classes prevailed, and Mr. Kerr 
was nominated for judge unanimously, with¬ 
out a single other name being as much as 
mentioned in the convention. There was no 
organized independent movement in opposi¬ 
tion to him, as there so often had been in the 
past. The republican candidate, although a 
well trained lawyer of excellent character, 
who had been, as a member of the executive 
committee of the civil service reform asso¬ 
ciation and a member of the reform league, 
an earnest but not conspicuous worker in the 
cause of good government, was not very wide¬ 
ly known. 

The prohibitionists moreover divided the 
moral forces which it might have been sup¬ 
posed would have been united in their support 
of Mr. Dobler, the republican candidate, by 
placing a nominee of their own in the field. 
Mr. Wallis, the clearest minded and most 
single purposed of all the Maryland indepen¬ 
dents, was dead. Mr. Cowen, their most vigor¬ 
ous fighter, had accepted the regular demo¬ 
cratic nomination for congress, and was night¬ 
ly speaking at meetings held in support of 
Cowen and Kerr, although it is believed that 
Mr. Cowen himself was careful to say nothing 
upon the judgeship. 

Every newspaper in town predicted Mr. 
Kerr’s election. The republican party organ 
made only a perfunctory opposition to him. 
Only the News, an independent democratic 
evening paper, vigorously urged his unfitness 
for the bench. Even it, however, did not ex¬ 
pect to defeat him. The Baltimore reform 
league published in all the newspapers and 








176 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


circulated throughout the city its protest 
against his election, and the reasons upon 
which their protests were based. The good 
citizenship committee of the union of Chris¬ 
tian Endeavor societies actively but quietly 
exerted themselves to compass his defeat. 
Still at four o’clock on election afternoon, 
the News, which had done such good service 
against him, conceded his election by a ma¬ 
jority of thousands, expressing the opinion 
that he was running ahead of his ticket. 
When the ballots were counted, it was found 
that he had been beaten by a plurality of 
more than 3,500 votes. 

NEWLY CLASSIFIED INDIANA 
POST-OFFICES. 

An investigation of the newly classified 
post-offices in Indiana has been made with a 
view to determining what the postmasters 
have been doing with the places under 
them. The following is a summary of 
information, which shows in general the 
acts of the present Indiana postmasters under 
this administration up to July 31, 1894. We 
have treated all separations from the service, 
except by death, as removals. There are un¬ 
doubtedly a very few genuine resignations, but 
we know from experience the great bulk of 
those so reported are forced and are, in effect, 
removals. The dates indicate the time when 
the present postmaster took charge, or when 
the office was classified. 

Anderson—D. J. Critteuberger, postmaster, 
dem. May 6,1893. Had 2 spoil and 13 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 6 competitive removals. 

Columbus—Thomas A. Rush, postmaster, 
dem. August, 1893. Had 1 spoil and 8 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 1 spoil removal and 5 
competitive. 

Connersville—John M. Higgs, postmaster, 
dem. April 17, 1894. Had 1 spoil and 6 
competitive places. Made no removals. 

Crawfordsville—Ed Voris, postmaster, dem. 
September 28, 1893. Had 2 spoil and 6 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 2 spoil and 4 competi¬ 
tive removals. 

Elkhart—E. A. Carpenter, postmaster, dem. 
February 16, 1894. Had 2 spoil and 11 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 2 spoil and 2 competi¬ 
tive removals. 

Evansville — John J. Nolan, postmaster, 
dem. June 17, 1893. Had 16 spoil and 35 
competitive places. Made 7 spoil and 24 com¬ 
petitive removals. 

Fort Wayne—W. W. Rockhill, postmaster, 
dem. July 20, 1893. Had 7 spoil and 29 
competitive places. Made 8 spoil and 19 com¬ 
petitive removals. 

Frankfort—T. J. Smith, postmaster, dem. 
May 9, 1894. Had 1 spoil and 7 competitive 
places. Made 1 spoil and 1 competitive re¬ 
moval. 

Goshen—J. A. Beane, postmaster, dem. De¬ 
cember 11, 1893. Had 1 spoil and 8 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 1 spoil and 6 competi¬ 
tive removals. 


Huntington—J. F. Fulton, postmaster, dem. 
November 20, 1893. Had 1 spoil and 7 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 1 spoil and 4 compet¬ 
itive removals. 

Jeffersonville—Patrick C. Donovan, post¬ 
master, dem. Dfcember 11, 1893. Had 2 
spoil and 7 competitive places. Made 3 com¬ 
petitive removals. 

Kokomo—C. H. Leach, postmaster, dem. 
November 20, 1893. Had 1 spoil and 7 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 1 spoil and 7 competi¬ 
tive removals. 

Lafayette—Michael H. Kennedy, post¬ 
master, dem. September 28, 1893. Had 13 
spoil and 19 competitive places. Made 4 spoil 
and 6 competitive removals. 

A REMOVAL FOR “CAUSE.” 

John McGrath, mail-carrier at Lafayette, set his 
heavily-filled mail pouch on the steps leading to 
the residence of John F. McHugh, while he de¬ 
livered a letter to Mrs. McHugh. The walk was 
very slippery and the footing insecure. A young 
man named Will Evans [whose brother, we are in¬ 
formed, is an applicant for position of carrier—E d. 
ChronicleJ captured the pouch and threw it into 
his sleigh, and although several citizens attempted 
to head him off, he drove rapidly to the post-office, 
where he preferred a charge against McGrath of 
abandoning his mail, and exhibited the pouch in 
proof. The postmaster promptly suspended Mc¬ 
Grath, whose politics are oft-color.—Indianapolis 
News, Feb. 21,1S9U. 

La Porte—S. E. Grover, postmaster, dem. 
September 28, 1893. Had 1 spoil and 8 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 1 spoil and 5 competi¬ 
tive removals. 

Logansport—V. C. Hunawalt, postmaster, 
dem. January 31, 1894. Had 2 spoil and 14 
competitive places. Made 1 spoil and 12 com¬ 
petitive removals. 

Madison—E. G. Niklaus, postmaster, dem. 
March 21, 1894. Had 2 spoil and 9 competi¬ 
tive places. Made 1 spoil and 2 competitive 
removals. 

Marion—C. M. Hawkins, postmaster, dem. 
May 6, 1893. Had 2 spoil and 13 competitive 
places. Made 9 competitive removals. 

Michigan City—H. R. Harris, postmaster, 
dem. March 20, 1894. Had three spoil and 
7 competitive places. Made 1 spoil removal. 

Muncie—Frank Ellis, postmaster, rep. May 
6, 1893. Had 2 spoil and 11 competitive 
places. Made one spoil and one competitive 
removal. 

New Albany—C. W. Schindler, postmaster, 
dem. September 28, 1893. Had 2 spoil and 
15 competitive places. Made 2 spoil and 8 
competitive nemovals. 

Peru—John M. Jackson, postmaster, dem. 
December 19, 1893. Had one spoil and 7 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 1 spoil removal. 

Richmond—John G. Schwegman, postmas¬ 
ter, dem. January 18, 1894. Had 3 spoil and 
15 competitive places. Made 3 spoil and 3 
competitive removals. 

Shelbyville—E. A. Major, postmaster, dem. 
February 16, 1894. Had 1 spoil and 6 compet¬ 
itive places. Made 1 spoil and 1 competitive 
removal. 

South Bend—Walter Harrigan, postmaster. 


I 

dem. March 9, 1894. Had 5 spoil and 17 
competitive places. Made 5 spoil removals 
and 1 competitive. 

Terre Haute—A. H. Donham, postmaster, 
dem. May 13, 1893. Had 7 spoil and 25 com¬ 
petitive places. Made 8 spoil and 13 compet¬ 
itive removals. 

Valparaiso—John Brodie, postmaster, dem. 
March 20, 1894. Had 1 spoil and 5 competi¬ 
tive places. Made 1 spoil and 2 competitive 
removals. 

Vincennes—Royal E. Purcell, postmaster, 
dem. May 27, 1893. Had 2 spoil and 7 
competitive places. Made 1 spoil and 6 com¬ 
petitive removals. 

AMERICAN FEUDALISM. 

A spoils episode, showing how the chief fools 
his henchmen, and their retaliation, and illustrat¬ 
ing the treachery and moral degradation that go 
along with public offices farmed out to congress¬ 
men and by them to their henchmen. 

BEFORE THE ELECTION. 

A bogie that is haunting Congressman By¬ 
num is the office of collector of customs in 
this city. The charge has been made for 
months that in appointing a man to the po¬ 
sition, he violated a number of promises, 
which, like chickens, have now come home to 
roost. 

One of the stanchest of his friends was the 
late John A. Reaiime, who stood by him dur¬ 
ing the time of the bolt, when Leon Bailey 
wanted to go to Congress. The friends of 
Reaume say that on several occasions Bynum 
assured them that at any time he could be of 
service to them he could be counted on. One 
day, the story goes, he stopped into Reaume’s 
store and told him that he felt as if he would 
like to do something for him. He suggested 
that Reaume apply for the position of col¬ 
lector of customs at this port. So Mr. Reaume 
made the application when the proper time 
came, and went on to Washington to see By¬ 
num. His friends say that he had a solemn 
promise of the place, and, until another man 
got the office, he was confident that he would 
be appointed. 

While Reaume and his friends were so con¬ 
fident, there were others who felt just as sure. 
Among them was Maurice Donnelly. The 
friends of Donnelly say that they were assured 
that he should be appointed. Two of them 
were ready to make affidavit that they were 
given to understand that there was no ques¬ 
tion but he should have the place. Donnelly 
did a good deal of “ hustling,” and felt reason¬ 
ably certain that he was to be the happy man. 
But there were other forces at work. It was 
asserted that what one faction of the local 
democracy called the “court-house crowd,” 
had a candidate for the place in John Rail, of 
the fifteenth ward, who has been with the 
water company for many years. 

It is claimed that on a Sunday before Mr, 
Bynum started for Washington, there was a 
meeting at the Spencer House. At that con¬ 
ference there were present Bynum, Thomas 
Taggart, Sterling R. Holt, John R. Wilson 
and James L. Keach. It was the latter who 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


177 


was the sponsor of Rail. At that meeting 
the doom of Donnelly was sealed, and a prom¬ 
ise given that Rail should be appointed. 
Bynum suggested that it would be a good idea to have 
three or four letters sent him by the friends of Don¬ 
nelly, to the effect that as there was no show for Don¬ 
nelly's appointment, and Rail would give satisfac¬ 
tion to Donnelly's friends. Keach undertook to 
get the letters. He showed Rail's application in 
Bynum's handwriting to several of Donnelly's 
friends, but they did not fall over each other to 
write the asked-for letters. On the contrary, 
several missives in any thing but compliment¬ 
ary terms concerning Rail were sent to By¬ 
num. But Rail’s frinds were confident, and it 
is told that he was requested to go to the cus¬ 
tom-house to become acquainted with the 
duties that he would soon be called upon to 
perform. Rail waited. Meantime other can¬ 
didates entered the field. Thomas Madden 
was told that he stood a first-class show, and he 
went to Washington to see about it. On his 
return his friends were jubilant. “Captain 
Tom” had positive assurance that he was the 
man who would eat the plum. Then it was 
claimed that Daniel Burton had been made the 
man by the machinations of John E. Sullivan. 
There was not a happier man in town than Bur¬ 
ton. And while he was enjoying his new-found 
happiness, Charles Bridges was not going 
around with a heavy heart. The collector- 
ship, he thought, was within his grasp. In all 
there were some fifteen or sixteen persons who thought 
they had a promise of the place. But none of 
them got it. The prize went to George Tan¬ 
ner, an “unknown” in the race. 

In this connection the friends of Rail are 
telling an anti-convention story. Charles 
Bolster has always been a strong Bynum man. 
Tanner has always been against anything that 
Bolster and his crowd favored. Bolster and 
Tanner live in the same ward. When the 
convention met in that ward to select dele¬ 
gates to the congressional convention, there 
was an agreement, it is said, that, when Bol¬ 
ster called the meeting to order, he was to 
recognize no one but Tanner on the calls for 
permanent chairman. Tanner was to nomi¬ 
nate Thomas Taggart and Bolster would see 
that the election of Taggart was assured. 
This arrangement was carried out. Tanner 
nominated Taggart for chairman; he was 
elected without opposition and named the 
Bynum delegates to the congressional conven¬ 
tion. The friend of Rail says that the meet¬ 
ing was not held, as reported, at the No. 1 
engine-house, but in the oyster-house attached 
to Bolster’s saloon. 

Sterling R. Holt was asked concerning the 
meeting at the Spencer House. 

“I heard that Bynum was at the Spencer 
House, but I did not see him there. I never 
had any direct communication with any one 
one who was at that meeting. 

“What do you know about Mr. Bynum’s 
promise to Rail?” 

“ I only know that he promised the place to 
Rail if he could get it for him.” 


Thomas Taggart was more inclined to fur- 
ish information on the subject. 

“I was present at that meeting, and Mr. 
Bynum did promise Mr. Rail that he would 
recommend him for the place on the strength 
of the recommendations that had been fur¬ 
nished Mr. Bynum. The rea.sou that Mr. 
Rail was not appointed was because certain 
persons here sent to the Bresident protesting 
against the appointment on the grounds of 
Mr. Rail’s illiteracy, and with the protests 
they sent some resolutions introduced in the 
board of aldermen by Mr. Rail to show that 
his education was not such as fitted him for 
the position. Mr. Bynum was loyal to Mr. 
Rail until the Bresident informed him that 
he could not appoint Mr. Rail to the place.”— 
Indianapolis News. 

* m 

AFTER THE ELECTION. 

Congressman Bynum's charge that three of the, 
candidates for the office of surveyor o) customs offered 
him bribes for the appointment is beginning to 
bring out expressions from some of the appli¬ 
cants. One of them is dead. Several others 
express themselves. 

Thomas Madden writes the following open 
letter to Mr. Bynum : 

"'The Hon. W. D. Bynum: 

“Dear Sir —Your published interview in 
the Indianapolis Neius of the 7th inst. charges 
applicants for the office of surveyor of customs 
in this city with attempts to bribe you in sums 
of 20 per cent, of the receipts of the office to 
$5,000 cash in hand. As my name was men*, 
tinned at one time in connection with that of¬ 
fice, I think it but just and fair to all that you 
name the would-be bribers. And you are at 
liberty to publish any correspondence that we 
have had. Very respectfully, 

“Thomas Madden.” 

Maurice Donnelly, whose name was men¬ 
tioned among the applicants, says to The News: 

“ In your issue of Wednesday, in an inter¬ 
view with Mr. Bynum, he was quoted as ap. 
plying some very ungentlemanly epithets to 
the applicants for surveyor of customs of this 
port. He thought fit to give the parting kick 
to the many men who made personal sacrifices 
in order that he might be launched into prom¬ 
inence. If Mr. Bynum is sincere in what he 
states about the considerations offered him, 
why should he not publish the names of the 
persons who made him the offers, and not cast 
odium upon all who went to Washington to 
attend the inauguration of Grover Cleveland. 

“I can confidently state that I was too poor 
to take $5,000 along to give Mr. Bynum for 
the position of collector. I felt satisfied from 
what I heard from several sources that such a 
position could only be obtained by such means 
as he now feels disposed to condemn.” * * * 
—Indianapolis News, November 10. 

» * * 

Mr. Madden says: 

“ Bractically the surveyorship was offered 
me by Mr. Bynum. It came about in this 
way: One evening in August, 1893, Austin 
H. Brown, one of my particular friends, came 


to my house and told me that I had better see 
Bynum. ‘Mr. Bynum wants to see you. He 
is at the Grand Hotel, and I think you had 
better go down to-night,’ were the exact words 
used by Mr. Brown. I clearly understood 
that Mr. Bynum wanted to see me about the 
office of surveyor of customs, but the hour was 
late and I decided to wait until morning be¬ 
fore going to the hotel. Monday morning I 
called at the Grand Hotel, and was told that 
Mr. Bynum had left the night before for 
Washington. Two days later I took the ad¬ 
vice of my friends and started to Washington. 
I was there just two hours and a half, and saw 
no one but Congressman Bynum. I found 
him at his house and abruptly told him I had 
understood he wanted to see me about the col- 
lectorship. ‘Yes, that is true,’ he said. We 
talked for an hour about the matter. At the 
outset I said : 

“ ‘Mr. Bynum, I have understood that Mau¬ 
rice Donnelly and John Rail are both appli¬ 
cants for this place. I want to know about 
this, and will not permit my name to be used 
until this is made clear. I also want to be 
sure about my appointment before my name 
is presented to the Bresident.’ 

“‘You may understand, Mr. Madden,’ said 
the congressman, ‘ that the Bresident will 
never entertain the applications of Messrs. 
Donnelly and Rail. If Bresident Cleveland 
was in the city at this time your name would 
be gazetted before you return to Indianapolis.’ 

“ This concluded the conversation between 
Mr. Bynum and myself,” continued Mr. Mad¬ 
den, “and I returned home at once with the 
understanding that as soon as I forwarded my 
list of letters, my name would at once be 
placed before the Bresident. I have since 
learned that my name at no time came before 
the Bresident, and I am positive that the 
names of Maurice Donnelly and John Rail 
shared the same fate. Within a few weeks 
after my return to Indianapolis I secured a 
number of letters from well-known gentlemen, 
one of which was given me by Mr. Tanner, the 
present surveyor of customs. I forwarded 
them all to Mr. Bynum, and received an ac¬ 
knowledgment from him. That was the last 
I heard of my appointment until November, 
when I received a letter from Mr. Bynum. He 
wrote at length and said a great many things. 
One of his statements was ‘that there was a 
time’ when he could have done certain things 
for me. I understood by his letter that I 
would not receive the appointment. I wrote 
a reply, in which I said that the democratic 
party would not lose a single vote on account 
of the turn affairs had taken. Before posting 
the letter I was told that some charges had 
been made against my character in Washing¬ 
ton. I did not understand this, and instead of 
sending the reply I had written, I went to 
Washington. I saw Mr. Bynum and went to 
the theater with him. There he denied that 
my character had been assailed, but used this 
expression : ‘It is said in Indianapolis, 
Mr. Madden, that there has been a bargain 
and sale between you and me.’ I resented 








178 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


this, of course, and told Mr. Bynum that it 
was untrue; that I was above corruption in 
the matter, and had never entertained such an 
idea. • • * On my first visit to Washing¬ 
ton, Mr. Bynum asked me what I thought 
his chances would be in the next congres¬ 
sional race. I told him plainly that it would 
not be possible to elect any democrat to con¬ 
gress from this district. Although I was 
friendly to him then, I told him that Mr. 
Henry would be the republican nominee, and 
that he would be elected. I further said to 
Mr. Bynum that it would cost him (Bynum) 
$20,000 to make the race; that it would re¬ 
quire that much to fix the ‘heelers.’ ” * * 

Maurice Donnelly said last night that he 
was anxious for Congressman Bynum to pro¬ 
duce the names of the alleged bribers. He had 
seen the Washington interview with Mr. By¬ 
num, in which the latter had said he would 
reply to the Donnelly-Madden card as soon as 
he had seen it. 

“Until he does this,” said Mr. Donnelly, 
“I haven’t much to say. I don’t like this 
thing of having ‘bribery’ flaunted in my face. 
It stings. I never made any sucb overtures to 
Mr. Bynum. I only applied for the position 
of surveyor of customs, because it was the un¬ 
derstanding that the positions were to be given 
out to representative men of the different 
nationalities. The post-oflBce was to go to a 
German and the surveyorship of customs to an 
Irishman. I did not get the office for reasons 
which I could not talk of intelligently at this 
time. It looked, however, as if the office was 
to go to the highest bidder.” 

“ Do you mean to impute corruption or 
bribery to Mr. Tanner?” was asked. 

“ No ; I haven’t anything to say about Mr. 
Tanner. I know nothing of his relations with 
Mr. Bynum.”— Indianapolis Journal, Nov. 12, 

« « « 

CONGEESSMAN BYNUM’S LETTER. 

Mr. Thomas Madden, Indianapolis, Jnd.: 

Dear Sir —I am in receipt of a copy of 
the Indianapolis News of Saturday last contain¬ 
ing an open letter addressed to me by you. 
In answer to the same I wish to say the 
original interview with me, of which you 
complain, as it appeared in the News, was not 
correctly reported. 

I was reported to have said “that a party 
had drawn out of bank $o,000 and had come 
to Washington and offered the same to me if 
I would secure his appointment as surveyor 
of the port of Indianapolis.” What I did say 
was that I had been informed by a credible 
person that a party had drawn out of bank a 
large sum and stated that he was going to 
Washington to secure the appointment; that 
the only person who came here and personally 
sought my indorsement never received it. 

Whether the party who was said to have 
drawn the money and intimated his intention 
of trying to purchase the office was yourself 
I do not pretend to say, as no name was given 
to me. All I know is that you came to Wash¬ 
ington and personally sought the position; 


that during our conversation you spoke of 
your successful business during the previous 
year, that the compensation of the office was 
not an important matter with you, and that 
if you should secure the same you could and 
would make very generous contributions for 
campaign purposes. I replied to you that my 
recommendation carried no such obligations, 
that the only assurance I desired was that 
whoever should be appointed should faithfully 
and honestly discharge the duties. I am 
frank to say to you that at the time I did not 
think you intended to make an immoral pro¬ 
position, but only to give assurance that in 
case of your appointment you would not be 
inclined to shirk a legitimate party obliga¬ 
tion. It was not until I returned home for 
the campaign and was advised of your in¬ 
famous and false insinuations that I had in¬ 
timated to you that you could have my 
indorsement for a consideration, and of the 
further facts that some one had come to Wash¬ 
ington with the avowed intention of trying to 
secure the position by improper methods, that 
I viewed with suspicion jour proposition for 
liberal contributions for campaign purposes 
and became impressed with the belief that it 
was only made as a “feeler” and that you 
were ready to make a much bolder one upon 
the slightest encouragement. So far as your 
letters, written to me after your visit, there is 
nothing in them but the most honorable state¬ 
ments, especially of yourself, and expressions 
of the appreciation of the courteous treatment 
you had received from myself. 

I desire to add that after the President had 
expressed a disinclination to appoint Mr. Rail, 
the contest between his and Mr. Donnelly’s 
friends became so bitter that I deemed it best 
to recommend some one not seriously involved 
in the controversy. I practically made up 
my mind to recommend your appointment. I 
had the highest opinion of your abilities and 
character, and expressed myself to two of your 
friends as willing to overlook your opposition 
in 1886, when you did everything in your 
power to defeat me. I so informed you when 
you came to Washington, but at the same 
time cautioned you that you could not suc¬ 
ceed by becoming an avowed applicant; that 
so long as there was the least hope for Mr. 
Rail’s appointment I intended to stand by 
him. Instead of pursuing the course I indi¬ 
cated and returning and remaining perfectly 
passive, you at once openly became an appli¬ 
cant by securing indorsements and publishing 
the fact in the News. This, as I told you at 
Indianapolis when there attending the city 
election, gave your opponents an opportunity 
to attack your party fealty, which they did in 
such a vigorous manner that I felt I could not 
stem the opposition. After this generous ac¬ 
tion upon my part you can imagine my sur¬ 
prise to learn, when I returned home, that one 
in whom I had placed so much confidence, 
and of whom I entertained such high opin¬ 
ions, was not only opposing my election by 
caucusing almost nightly with others to aid 
in my defeat, but was endeavoring, by the 
most willful, malicious and false insinuations. 


to injure me in the estimation of those who 
had so often honored me. 

While I may have done injustice to some of 
the honorable gentlemen who desired the place 
by going entirely outside for a candidate, I 
congratulate myself that I escaped the odium 
of recommending one whose character was so 
fully impregnated with ingratitude, treachery 
and perfidy. As you are interested only in so 
far as my interview cast a reflection upon 
yourself, I deem this all the information to 
which you are entitled. 

W. D. Bynum. 

Washington, D. C, Nov. 12. 

til * * 

It was Wednesday afternoon of last week 
at the Grand Hotel that Congressman Bynum, 
within a short time of his leaving for Wash¬ 
ington, voluntarily made a remark that led 
to his statement given in The News of that 
afternoon concerning offers of money having 
come to him if he would recommend certain 
men for appointment as collector of customs 
of this port. The initiatory remark to The 
News reporter was : “ If any one says I made 
him a promise or promised to recommend any 
one for office and did not fulfill it, he is a 
d—d liar.” Mr. Bynum then denounced the 
men—without naming them—who had sought 
his favor for appointment to office, and not 
receiving it had opposed his re election. He 
used the word rascal several times, and his 
profanity was somewhat robust. 

“One man,” he continued, “offered me, 
and I have it in writing, 20 per cent, of the 
proceeds of the office of collector of customs 
if I would recommend him for appointment 
to that office.” 

Chairman Taggart, of the democratic state 
central committee, and Attorney-General- 
elect Ketcham then joined the congressman 
and reporters. The congressman repeated 
the remark quoted, and, continuing, said : 
“Another man offered me $5,000 cash and 
another drew $5,000 from bank and went to 
Washington to see me.” 

“Can I use that?” asked the reporter. 

“Yes,” said Mr. Bynum, “but leave out 
the cuss words.” 

That there should be no mistake about the 
matter, the reporter asked Mr. Bynum as to 
the material points of his voluntary state¬ 
ment, and in less than fifteen minutes had the 
interview written as it was repeated. 

Mr. Bynum’s statement that ‘‘ another drew 
$5,000 from bank” was direct. It was not 
qualified by “his having learned it” since he 
had been here, but was given as a transaction 
of which he and the applicant alone had 
knowledge. “I became so disgusted with the 
rascals,” said he, “that I wrote to Mr. Tanner, 
asking him for permission to use his name, in 
recommending an appointment for the office. 
Before that I had no communication of any 
kind with Mr. Tanner. I had not thought of 
him in that connection. His appointment oc¬ 
curred to me as the shortest and best way out 
of the disreputable and disgusting struggle. 
The letter I wrote him and his reply were all 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


179 


that passed between us in regard to the ap¬ 
pointment.” 

“ Will you let me have the letter containing 
the 20 per cent, offer for the office ?” the re¬ 
porter asked Mr. Bynum, when he and tlie re¬ 
porter were again alone. 

“ I would rather not give thatout for publi¬ 
cation. It would serve no good purpose. The 
writer is dead.” 

“As to the two other offers?” 

“ I do not care to name them.” It will be 
time enough for that, if they think proper to 
say anything. I am ready for them.” 

A man from out of town then approached 
Mr. Bynum, and, talking with him a few min¬ 
utes, left with no satisfactory replies from the 
congressman. “It has been my experience,” 
said Mr. Bynum, turning again to the re¬ 
porter, “ that when you have an office to fill 
and there are thirteen applicants, you make 
twelve enemies and one ingrate.”— Indianap¬ 
olis News, November IS. 

* » * 

Maurice Donnelly this morning received a 
letter from Congressman Bynum. The letter 
came by registered mail, and in it Mr. Bynum 
said that as to the charges he made of an at¬ 
tempt to purchase federal appointment, he 
wished to exonerate Mr. Donnelly and his 
friends from any corrupt implication. He 
added that if Mr. Donnelly had said that he 
understood that such methods would procure 
the office, basing his remarks on anything that 
Mr. Bynum had said or done, it was a ma¬ 
licious falsehood. 

In regard to the letter, Mr. Donnelly said: 
“I shall reply to Mr. Bynum and let him 
make the reply public if he wants to. I did 
not say I understood that such methods would 
procure the office, and he equivocates when 
he says this. I did say that it was common talk 
among members of his own party in this congres¬ 
sional district that such means would procure the 
appointment.—Indianapolis News, November 15. 

DEFIANCE OF THE PRESIDENT’S 
ORDER. 

Joseph C. Nichols, chief law clerk of the 
auditor’s office of the treasury department, 
will leave to-morrow for Indiana, where he 
will plunge into the campaign. Washington 
dispatch Indianapolis Sentinel, October 24. 

* * » 

Judge Lewis Jordan, chief of the miscella¬ 
neous bureau of the treasury department at 
Washington, has returned home to spend his 
annual vacation. While here he will take an 
active part in the state campaign.— Indianapo¬ 
lis Sentinel, October 22. 

[Jordan spoke at Camden, Cynthiana, New 

Harmony, Spencer, Boonville.] 

* * » 

Sam Myer of Rockport, document clerk of 
the government printing office, and Capt. Ben 
Johnson and James Compton of Indianapolis, 
left for home this afternoon to take part in 
the campaign.— Washington dispatch Indianap¬ 
olis Sentinel, November 1. 

# * ♦ 

Deputies in the state offices for several days 
have been addressing envelopes for the demo¬ 
cratic state committee. To the complaint | 


that state employes should not be allowed to 
do work for the political parties, the explana¬ 
tion was made that it is customary. Some of 
the deputies are required to go to the commit¬ 
tee-rooms at night to address envelopes.— Indi¬ 
anapolis News, October 22. 

* » * 

Complaint is made that Joseph L. Reiley 
chief clerk in the local pension office, violates 
President Cleveland’s rule governing the 
political activity of federal office-holders in 
acting as secretary of the state democratic 
committee. 

Mr. Reiley was found to-day in the demo¬ 
cratic committee rooms. When asked about 
the charge that he has violated the federal 
rules, he said : 

“I have never read Mr. Cleveland’s rule 
and it cuts no figure in my case, I think. 
The President’s letter is not necessarily bind¬ 
ing. Work in the pension office is light at 
this time ; and my committee duties are not 
interfering with my supervision of the pension 
clerks.” 

Pension .\gent Spencer said : “ Mr. Reiley 
is not occupied in the committee work but a 
part of his time. His work in the office is 
done first. I do not think he is violating the 
President’s rule. My aim in this ofiee is to obey 
the law, and for this reason I have not made speeches 
in the present campaign.”—Indianapolis News, 
October 26. 

[October 26, District-Attorney Burke spoke 
at Patriot.] 

» » » 

Walter H. Bunn, who is United States ap¬ 
praiser, was hard at work at headquarters last 
night. James H. Grier, Corresponding Sec¬ 
retary of the Granite Cutters’ National Union 
of New York City, sent.a letter to Senator 
Hill yesterday, informing him that the local 
branch of the order had unanimously in¬ 
dorsed him on account of his attitude toward 
organized labor.— New York Times, October 31. 
• * » 

Senator Hill had a busy day. Beside seeing 
ex-Mayor William R. Grace, Francis M. 
Scott, Mayor Gilroy, James J. Martin, and 
Senator Faulkner on the congressional busi¬ 
ness, he also saw many democrats of promi¬ 
nence from up the state One of these was 
William A. Poucher, of Oswego, United States dis¬ 
trict attorney for the northei-n district of New York. 
Speaking of the canvass, Mr. Poucher said: 

“The democratic outlook in Oswego county, 

and the northern tier of counties, was never 

better.”— New York Times, Oct. 24. 

•* » * 

Internal Revenue Collector Edward Grosse 
may have charges preferred against him for 
“pernicious activity” during the late political 
campaign. 

The offense that he is alleged to have com¬ 
mitted was in assailing Senator Hill at public 
meetings, and in refussng to allow public 
speakers to address meetings under his man¬ 
agement until they had promised not to men¬ 
tion Senator Hill’s name.— New York Times, 
Nov. 11. 

« « « 

Adam Bede, United States marshal of Min¬ 
nesota, resigned because he wanted to pitch 


into campaign work. Attorney general Olney 
says in his letter of reply: 

“I have just been obliged to call for the res¬ 
ignation of a United States marshal who, be¬ 
ginning a political campaign with speech¬ 
making, ended by shooting, and is now under 
indictment for murder. From the tone and 
temper of your letter, it would not be surpris¬ 
ing to find you in the like predicament, should 
you undertake to be a political worker and 
United States marshal at the same time. Un¬ 
due excitement and recklessness are almost in¬ 
evitable when to ordinary political partisan¬ 
ship is added the personal interest inseparable 
from office-holding.” 

TRUE TO THEIR KIND. 

A Washington paper says: “Secretary 
Carlisle regrets as much as any one that he 
was compelled by public business to decline 
invitations to speak in New York this week. 
He is thoroughly in sympathy with the dem¬ 
ocrats in the Empire State, and it is his earn¬ 
est wish that the party meet with success on 
election day. 

“The secretary said yesterday that he earn¬ 
estly desired to see not only Senator Hill, but 
the entire democratic ticket, elected. He said 
that democrats in New York especially should 
sink their personal feelings, and give loyal 
support to the democratic ticket, as the elec¬ 
tion in New York would have an important 
bearing on the presidential election in 1896. 

“ He believed that, if every democrat did 
his duty, and voted the straight ticket, there 
would be no question as to the result next 
Tuesday. 

“As Senator Hill has always been successful 
heretofore, the secretary believed that victory 
would again perch on the Senator’s banner 
this year.” —Washington dispatch New York 
Times, October 31. 

* » • 

Assistant Secretary of the Navy McAdoo 
left Washington to-night to help Senator Hill 
in New York. He will speak to-morrow night 
at Cohoes and Friday night at Peekskill. He 
expects to talk at Wilmington, Del., Satur¬ 
day night, and on Monday he will make sev¬ 
eral speeches in Hoboken and Jersey City.— 
Washington dispatch New Ycrrk Times, Oct. 31. 
* » * 

Public Printer Benedict is very hopeful of 
democratic success in New York. He is in 
very close touch with the democracy of the 
state, and is in constant correspondence with 
the leaders. His letters assure him that the 
party is united and enthusiastic, and as soon as 
possible he will start for home to assist in se¬ 
curing the victory which he expects. He says 
the Wheeler ticket has no strength outside of 
Kings, New York, and Erie counties.— Wash¬ 
ington dispatch New York Times, October 31. 

He only is the despicable one 
Who lightly sells his honor as a shield 

For fawning knaves to hide them from the sun. 
Too nice for crime, yet, coward, he doth yield 

For crime a shelter—swift to Paradise, 

The contrite thief, not Judas with his price. 

Richard IVatson Gilder. 











180 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


THE RECENT BLACKMAILING. 

October 24, Postmaster-General Bissell ad¬ 
dressed a circular letter to all free delivery 
offices, citing the law, and saying: 

It also must be clearly understood that no clerk, 
carrier or other employe of your oflice will be jeop¬ 
ardized in his position for a refusal to comply with 
a request for a political contribution. Upon re¬ 
ceipt of this letter you will prepare a number of 
copies thereof and post same conspicuously in each 
division of your office. 

» » » 

In the August number of this paper were 
the details of the “stand and deliver” assess¬ 
ment of Taylor, Recorder of deeds for the Dis¬ 
trict of Columbia, and the Shelley circular to 
the Alabamians in the departments. Mr. 
Roosevelt, in a recent interview, says: 

The commission recently had before it the case 
of the Recorder of deeds, Taylor, and during the in¬ 
vestigation it was proved that wherever the civil 
service law did not obtain in Washington a condi¬ 
tion of actual terror existed in the public service, 
and that janitors, porters and all other employes 
were forced to pay politicians for places and pay to 
retain them. Anything more degrading, more ser¬ 
vile, more vicious can not be imagined. 

a » 

In the October number were mentioned the 
the reports of the blackmailing of federal em¬ 
ployes at San Francisco, the Philadelphia 
mint, and at Pittsburgh. We give the follow¬ 
ing regarding the San Francisco assessments: 

It appears that the campaign assessor in San 
Francisco is one Lee D. Craig. The form of his let¬ 
ter to the federal employes in that city recalls the 
familiar Jay Hubbell circular of 1881, in the frank¬ 
ness with which it names even the amounts which 
the clerk is expected to put up. It reads: 

Sir ; Feeling that as an office-holder, you are de¬ 
sirous of seeing the present administration 'per¬ 
petuated, and to that end are anxious that the dem¬ 
ocratic ticket be successful at the coming election, 
you are advised that it has been decided to ask of 
you a subscription towards defraying the expe^'ses 
of the coming campaign. It is suggested that an 
amount equal to two (2) per cent, of your yearly 
salary woul i be about the sum you should sub¬ 
scribe, and it is trusted that your patriotic senti¬ 
ments and sound democracy will prompt you to 
respond without delay. Please call on Mr. Lee D. 
Craig, notary public, at No. 316 Montgomery street, 
who is authorized to receive this subscription and 
give receipts for same. Respectfully, 

Lee D. Craig. 

If this man were strictly an “ outsider,” and con¬ 
trived to keep within the terms of Attorney-General 
Olney’s curious Interpretation of the law, by ad¬ 
dressing his victims only by letter, he might not 
come within so easy reach of the secretary’s hand. 
But it seems that he is a notary public, and, by 
grace of a permit from Mr. Carlisle, is given the 
privilege of keeping his desk in the custom-house. 
He has a large sign hung prominently in the build¬ 
ing, advertising his business, and the employes 
who have to swear to vouchers for services, do so 
before him, paying him twenty-five cents every 
time he signs his name to a Washington dis¬ 

patch New York Evening Post, October 29. 

* «■ << 

The civil service commission investigated 
the Pittsburgh assessments, and found as re¬ 
ported in the New York Evening Post, of Octo¬ 
ber 25: 

Postmaster O’Donnell has levied no assess¬ 
ments himself and has neither advised nor 
directed the political action of any clerk or 
carrier, so far as can be learned. But on the 
other hand he was aware that assessments 


vrere being levied right and left, and does not 
appear to have done anything to prevent it. 
The treasurer of the local democratic com¬ 
mittee, a man named Fleming, has come down 
upon every clerk and carrier in the post-office 
for a campaign contribution. His mode of 
procedure was the customary one—first, a let¬ 
ter sent to the victim, requesting him to call at 
a certain address; when the victim responded, 
a stand-and-deliver demand. The amount 
called for was about 2 per cent, of the em¬ 
ploye’s salary. Mr. Fleming sheltered him¬ 
self behind the opinion recently given by At¬ 
torney-General Olney, that solicitation within 
a government building is not solicitation, so 
tong as it is made by letter ami not orally. 
The success which attended this scheme 
stamps it as political blackmail pure and sim¬ 
ple, since the republicans in the force were 
frightened at the prospect of losing their 
places if they did not hand over their money. 
Some of them did so at once, and the others 
were about to do so when the commission 
stepped in and interfered. 

In the internal revenue office matters are in 
a still more offensive condition, though the 
law has not been violated. The internal rev¬ 
enue district embraces several congressional 
districts, including those of Representatives 
Sipe and Sibley. Mr. Sipe, being in favor with 
the administration, has enjoyed by far the 
largest amount of patronage of any one in the 
district. It was at his instance that the col¬ 
lector, Mr. Kearns, was appointed, and Kearns 
returns the compliment by giving Sipe pretty 
nearly anything he wants in the collector’s of¬ 
fice. Sibley, with his heterodox views on sil¬ 
ver and the tariff, has been frowned on in 
Washington, and has got very few appoint¬ 
ments, even of those properly pertaining to the 
district, the majority being made on the rec¬ 
ommendation of the local party bosses. The 
effect of this arrangement is, of course, to fill up 
the collector’s office with active ward workers, 
the sort of fellows who manage things at the 
primaries and the polls. They have not been 
blackmailed, for the very simple reason that 
it is not necessary to blackmail them. Edu¬ 
cated by their experience in practical politics 
to recognize in an appointment to office noth¬ 
ing but a purchase and sale, they have been 
honest in carrying out tbeir share of the trans¬ 
action, and, for value received, have handed 
over to the treasurer of the campaign fund va¬ 
rious sums, ranging all the way from $35 to 
$150 apiece, or making an aggregate of some 
six or seven thousand dollars. 

Kearns, as the readers of the Evening Post 
may remember, was the spoilsman who made 
the most consistent record of any of equal 
authority in the country in the year 1893. 
Secretary Carlisle made him custodian of the 
public building at Pittsburgh, and the first 
thing he did after taking charge was to call 
for the pay-roll. He found there twenty-one 
employes of both sexes. He discharged every 
one of them on twelve days’ notice, and pro¬ 
ceeded to fill their places without more ado. 
The women were cleaners, getting three hun¬ 
dred dollars a year, and Kearns frankly ad¬ 
mitted that they earned it all; the men were 
engineers and stokers, elevator conductors, 
hallmen, doorkeepers, watchmen, and the like. 
Most of them were democrats, ajipointed dur¬ 
ing the former Cleveland administration, who 
had been retained by the republicans because 
they gave satisfactory service. When a dem¬ 
ocrat ventured to inquire why he included 
men of his own party in his sweep, Kearns 
answered : 

“These employes received their notice of 
dismissal last November. It is a mistake to 
say that there are any good democrats among 
them. Every one of them held office under a 
republican administration, and that wipes out 
all the democracy they ever possessed. Why, 


if I had found my own brother here when I 
came, and he had been drawing a salary un¬ 
der a republican administration for one day, 
I would have fired him at once. That’s the 
kind of democrat I am! The people de¬ 
manded a change last November—not only a 
change in the heads of the government and 
departments, but a change clear down to the 
charwomen, and that is the kind of a change 
it is my sacred duty to give them, as far as is 
in my power. Some of the discharged em¬ 
ployes are good people, I know, but they are 
not good democrats.” 

* » * 

The civil service commission has received 
from a postmaster in Washington state a copy 
of a circular from the democratic committee 
levying an assessment of $5 on each post¬ 
master. It has the heading of the committee 
and is signed by Charles De France, secretary. 
It states that “The committee having had 
under consideration the necessity and ways 
and means of raising funds for the campaign, 
has concluded that those who are enjoying 
the benefits of democratic success in the past 
should contribute to the expenses of the pre¬ 
sent campaign. The committee has, there¬ 
fore, assessed you $5.” 

* » » 

The commission discovered, early in the 
campaign, that in certain Indiana towns the 
democratic county committees were soliciting 
campaign contributions from officeholders. 
The commission accordingly issued a circular 
explaining to officeholders that they need not 
contribute anywhere, and this was hung up in 
public buildings wherever practicable. An 
attempt to collect assessments was made in 
Boston, but was checked by the action of the 
collector of customs himself. There were 
efforts to collect assessments also in Illinois 
and Kansas. All the persons implicated were 
careful to shield themselves behind the 
attorney-general’s opinion, and the commis¬ 
sion could do nothing save give publicity to 
what was going on and explain to the persons 
from whom money was sought that they need 
not pay a cent. Mr. Olney’s interpretation of 
the law appears to have given the blackmail¬ 
ing crowd more solid comfort than anything 
that has happened since Jay Hubbell was 
pitched out of public life. —Good Government 
for November. 


CURRENT SPOIL. 

President Cleveland to-day nominated James 
W. Burgess as postmaster at Dunkirk. Itivas 
made on the recommendation of Co7igressman Mar¬ 
tin, who sought to have the appointment made before 
congress adjoui ned, and asked for the removal of 
the republican incumbent .— Washington dispatch 
Indianapolis News, October 27. 

» * * 

An illustration of the Tammany tactics was 
given the other day when Mike Lawler, for¬ 
merly chief of police, now keeping a grocery 
with saloon attachment, asked John E. Lamb 
for a position in the revenue office. Lamb asked 
him where he bought whisky and beer for his 
saloon. Lawler said he bought whisky from 
Indianapolis and his beer from the Indianapo¬ 
lis Brewing Company. Lamb retorted: “If you 
would buy your whisky of Hulman & Beggs 
and your beer of the Terre Haute brewery 
there might be a chance of your getting a 
place .”—Indianapolis Journal, November 4- 










The civil service Chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering’ of the 
ship of state.— From Archbishop Ireland’s address: The Duty and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


JOL.U, No. 22. ■_ INDIANAPOLIS, DECEMBER, 1894 . terms 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


The advantages to the public service of an 
adherence to the principles of civil service re¬ 
form are constantly more apparent, and noth¬ 
ing is so encouraging to those in official life 
who honestly desire good government as the 
increasing appreciation by our people of these 
advantages. A vast majority of the voters of 
the land are ready to insist that the time and 
attention of those they select to perform for 
them important public duties should not be 
distracted by doling out minor offices, and 
they are growing to be unanimous in regard¬ 
ing party organization as something that 
should be used in establishing party princi¬ 
ples instead of dictating the distribution of 
public places as rewards for partisan activity. 
—From the President’s Message. 

The meeting of the National Civil Service 
Reform League, in Chicago, December 12 
and 13, was the most vigorous held by 
the league for years. The efiect of the rapid 
spread of the reform was shown in the ap¬ 
pearance of new men from all directions. 
The address of Mr. Schurz was of the 
highest order and was the equal of any¬ 
thing he has ever written. The signs indi¬ 
cate that there is to be almost a race on every 
hand in states and cities to establish the 
meritand the labor service systems; Illinois 
for instance, is almost certain to do so this 
winter, and bills are all ready for many leg¬ 
islatures. Open opposition to the reform has 
for the present at least ceased. The fellow 
who fears the Chinese system, or an aris¬ 
tocracy of office-holders, is still here, but 
the people are no longer interested in him. 
The reform has become popular. The 
original," way-back ” civil service reformer 
is rising up everywhere and he is welcome; 
no one will dispute any claim he may 
make if he has now got ready to stand up 
and lay about him and help get laws 
through his legislature. 

Referring again to the league meeting, 
the speech of Mr. Schurz is published in 
full in the New York Evening Post, of De¬ 
cember 13, and the full proceedings of the 
meetings will be published in the organ of 
the league. Good Government, for Decem¬ 
ber. 

The National Letter Carriers’ Associa¬ 
tion sent delegates to the league meeting. 


and they asked the meeting to indorse a 
bill of their association which provides 
that carriers and other large classes of fed¬ 
eral employes shall not be dismissed, unless 
indicted for crime, until charges have 
been filed against them, under rules fixed 
by the head of the department, and they 
have had a chance to be heard. The senti¬ 
ment of the league seemed nearly unani¬ 
mous in favor of their bill, but the 
matter was referred to the executive com¬ 
mittee with discretionary power to act. 
It is a question of the greatest importance 
and both sides should be well considered. 
Would such a law legislate reform into a 
rut? There is no question but that there 
has all along been an enormous abuse of 
the power of dismissal and that wrong with¬ 
out limit has been committed by it. There 
is also no doubt but that such a law would 
bring a quicker remedy than will other¬ 
wise be reached and that it would afford 
a decided present reform. On the other 
side is to be considered whether the same 
end will not within a reasonable time be 
reached by executive order and public 
opinion. We think this has already 
been attained in the railway mail service 
and with letter carriers by an order of 
Postmaster-General Bissell. The matter 
goes to the question of discipline and effi¬ 
ciency, and whether the same words in a 
law of congress will not tend to make the 
subordinate less careful of his duty than if 
they are embodied in an executive or¬ 
der or in effect in a public sentiment which 
makes it odious for any officer to abuse the 
power of dismissal. 


Don’t let us have any mistake about 
"bi-partisan” boards, if we do have them, 
and try to saddle them off on the state of 
Indiana as reform. Let there be no theo¬ 
ries about each stern Roman on his bi¬ 
partisan board watching the other party to 
see that his colleague is doing full duty to 
the tax payers; each bi-partisan has an eye 
single to getting an equitable division of 
spoil. Should it come to any attack on 
the spoil itself the bi-partisan board ceases 
to know any party distinctions. The way 
these boards work in practice is illustrated 
by the following from the New York Even¬ 
ing Pbst of April 25, regarding the New 
Haven Board of Public Works and street 
patronage : 

“The scheme has created general dissatisfaction. 


for 1 am looking out for the republicans, and they 
have not received a fair share of the distribution of 
the work,” said Commissioner Johnson. “If Com¬ 
missioner Brown does not care for the patronage, 
it should go to Commissioner Bishop and myself, 
the two other republicans of this board.” 

“You ought to be thankful to get as much as you 
do,” retorted Commissioner McGann amid a gen¬ 
eral laugh. 

The mayor then asked Commissioner Johnson if 
he would like to put an A.P. A. man at work on the 
streets. 

“Ido not know whether my men are A. P. A.’s or 
not. but I can not sit here without protesting 
against the unequal division of the work,” said 
Commissioner Johnson in reply to this serious in¬ 
quiry. The democrats have ten teams on the streets, 
while we have only four. This matter can be adjusted 
outside this meeting, and the subject dropped.” 

Since the last issue of the Chronicle 
the President has put under the classified 
service the employes of the geological sur¬ 
vey, numbering about 150 places. This 
was done at the request of Secretary 
Smith. He has also put the internal reve¬ 
nue service under the law, some 2,471 
employes. The dispatches say this was 
done after a consultation with Secretary 
Carlisle and it perhaps explains why the 
appointees for the collection of the income 
tax are not included as they certainly 
should have been. There has been no 
greater scandal than the internal revenue 
service engaged for weeks in setting up 
pins for the renomination of their con¬ 
gressmen ; and after it got them nomi¬ 
nated engaging in a violent struggle to get 
them elected. In many parts of the coun¬ 
try it was an unpleasant realization of be¬ 
ing ruled by an office-holding class. 

In the Chronicle for June, 1893, was 
given an account of how Bynum and Tur- 
pie had determined that none but "good 
sound democrats,” male or female, could 
be trusted to inspect meat for export, and 
had made a clean sweep in that depart¬ 
ment at Indianapolis. In November fol¬ 
lowing was given an account of how By¬ 
num had set up another bureau to inspect 
meat for home consumption and had filled 
the places also with “good sound demo¬ 
crats.” He appointed as meat inspectors 
Fox, the shoemaker, Wampner, the car¬ 
penter, and Peggs, the teamster, and for 
taggers he named Quinn, Clegg and Kil¬ 
lian. Months passed and the recent elec¬ 
tion came and went. Now the head of the 
bureau. Dr. E. H. Pritchard, begins to find 
the persons foisted upon him wholly in¬ 
competent, and a few days ago he dis- 

























182 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


charged Quinn, Clegg and Killian for that 
reason. But Congressman Bynum, although 
overwhelmingly discredited in his own dis¬ 
trict and knowing nothing of the fitness of 
the men, seemsyettohaveapull with Secre¬ 
tary Morton, and two of the men have been 
reinstated. Dr. Pritchard says in the In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, “ There is little for me 
to say further than that two of my men 
have been reinstated through the influence 
of Mr. Bynum, after I had reported them 
unfit for the positions.” There is reason 
to believe that Bynum’s pull will not last; 
at least Secretary Morton should under¬ 
stand that the people of this district have 
had enough of Tammanyism. 

The Voorhees crowd in Indiana are 
true blue to the last. Their openly- 
avowed plan of clearing out the Terre 
Haute post-ofifice in order to cheat the 
civil service law and the trouble it made 
are matters of history. Now, again the 
day before the rules are to take effect in 
the internal revenue service. Collector 
Joshua Jump, of the Terre Haute district, 
assisted, it is said, by Lamb and Voorhees 
at Washington, worked ten henchmen 
into places. Probably we must expect 
such expiring kicks from men who are 
upheld solely by the spoils system; but 
this picayune treachery to the reform pro¬ 
fessions of the administration should not 
be sanctioned by Jump’s superiors, and 
every one of these appointments should 
be revoked. 


The Indianapolis Nexvs has celebrated 
its twenty-fifth anniversary, and it is en¬ 
titled to the gratitude of every citizen 
who cares for the character of the state of 
Indiana. This state has a low political 
reputation; in fact it is higher than Ohio, 
Maryland, Pennsylvania, or even New 
York. Its dubious name continues be¬ 
cause Indiana was bigoted, hide-bound, 
moss-backed and chained to the party 
fetish. To the unswerving independence 
of the Indianapolis News, and its influence 
in favor of honest men, honest politics 
and honest government, for its hostility to 
spoils and spoilsmen, is largely due the 
fact that Indiana has outgrown its former 
condition. A great deal of this feeling for 
reform is yet inarticulate in the state. It 
votes but it does not talk. Its clergy, its 
school teachers, its colleges are still reticent 
and timid. The Civil Service Chronicle 
is sent to the reading rooms of many Chris¬ 
tian associations. It is doubtful whether 
it is yet put within the reach of readers 
in one-half of these. There is a leading 
college in the state which prints in its an¬ 
nual catalogue a list of the periodicals do¬ 
nated and purchased for its reading-room. 
The Chronicle has been sene for years, 
but its name is never mentioned. This is 


old Indiana, fearful of independent speak¬ 
ing. But a new Indiana is moving forward 
quietly and irresistibly. 


In the new life of Whittier, by Samuel 
J. Pickard, facts are candidly given which 
explain why we never saw a sympathetic 
word from the quaker abolitionist for the 
reform stand taken by Lowell and George 
William Curtis, fellow-abolitionists, upon 
the spoils system. We understand too 
why before every important election Whit¬ 
tier yielded to some sinister influence,and 
wrote a letter that in fact acted as a de¬ 
coy for the respectable partisans whose 
consciences had been a little troubled 
by party deeds but who were always quick 
to go back into the party fold upon such 
appeals of good men. Whittier was an 
abolitionist, but he was a partisan and pol¬ 
itician, and a “valiant henchman of Caleb 
Cushing.” A reviewer says: 

“Nor do these pages afford any evidence 
that he ever repented of his early doc¬ 
trine of the claim of the political victors 
on the spoils. If there is a hint of his de 
votion to or interest in civil service re¬ 
form, it has escaped our scrutiny.” 


An example of painful and positive mor¬ 
al debasement is the aged Frederick Doug¬ 
lass. Brave men of such lofty and unselfish 
patriotism have sacrificed themselves in 
behalf of him and his race that his stand 
seems shameful and indefensible. Hear 
him as reported by the Springfield Re¬ 
publican : 

Frederick Douglass has come out as a defender 
of the negro politician Astwood.who has flopped 
back into the republ can party because the demo¬ 
crats would not give him an office. Douglass says 
that Astwood has done rightly and thatthegrounds 
for his action are approved. Then he goes on to 
say that the only place for a negro who wants an 
office is in the republican party, and cites several 
instances to prove his assertion. George T. Down¬ 
ing is one; he left the republican party some years 
ago, “but he has goiten nothing.” “T. Thomas 
Fortune lef’^us also, but he was shrewd enough to 
see how things were going and he jumped back.” 
Douglass goes on at some length, in the interview 
from which these quotations are taken, to the same 
effect, the whole tendency of his talk going toshow 
that the average negro politician—himself included 
—is a mercenary whose only idea of party is a ma¬ 
chine for distributing offices, and whose only prin¬ 
ciples are those of the spoilsman. 

Another historic example ought to be 
studied by the earnest citizens of to-day. 
Who shall be the guide. Garrison, Quincy 
Lowell, Sumner and Giddings or the late 
Robert C. Winthrop ? The first, so burned 
with the wickedness of slavery that they 
were forced to plain and disagreeable 
speech, and no political party could ever 
bind their acts or their principles. Mr. 
Winthrop was of singularly lofty charac¬ 
ter, but first of all he was a whig. He rec¬ 
ognized the evils of slavery, but as a whig 
and as a gentleman his conscience only 
drove him to such protest as was always 


seemly. His was a noble type of Ameri¬ 
can, but so noble that it was almost a blot 
not to have been nobler. The abolition 
of spoils involves every sentiment involved 
in the abolition of slavery except the bod¬ 
ily stripes; it is as cruel, as spiritually de¬ 
basing as slavery, and it has been the 
cause of the moral deterioration of more 
men who started with worthy aspirations 
than ever slavery was. The great move¬ 
ment of our day should be studied by the 
candid examination of these leaders in the 
other great movement, and we believe 
every one must feel that the radical group 
was in closer touch with the great truths 
of reform and personal duty than was Mr. 
Winthrop. 


the reformer. 

Before the monstrous wrong he sets him down— 
One man against a stone-walled city of sin. 

For centuries those walls have been a-building; 
Smooth porphyry, they slope and coldly glass 
The flying storm and wheeling sun. No chink. 
No crevice lets the thinnest arrow in. 

He fights alone, and from the cloudy ramparts 
A thousand evil faces jibe and jeer him. 

Let him lie down and die; what is the right. 

And where is justice in a world like this? 

But by and by, earth shakes herself, impatient; 
And down, in one great roar of ruin, crash 
Watch-tower and citadel and battlements. 

When the red dust has cleared, the lonely soldier 
Stands with strange thoughts beneath the friendly 
stars. 

—E. R. Sill, 1887. 


The Chronicle has been so crowded that 
no notice has been given to the admirable 
address of Mr. A. T. Anderson, postmaster 
at Cleveland, O., before the fifth annual 
convention of the national association of 
letter carriers in that city, September 18. 
He is what all civil service reformers have 
claimed that a postmaster should be—the 
friend of this reform. Besides this, his 
address bears all signs of one whose knowl¬ 
edge of the merit system is well matured. 
He says: 

We now have civil service laws to get into 
the service, and your efforts should be in the 
direction of equally stringent laws to get you 
out of the service. There is no dout)t that 
ninety per cent, of our citizens are in favor of 
the principles embodied in what is known as 
the civil service law. The other ten per 
cent, are probably enthusiastic spoilsmen beat¬ 
ing their tom-toms in the congress of the 
United States, and upon the curb stones of our 
large cilie.“. * * * 

In 1871 a law was passed providing for the 
appointment of three commissioners to de¬ 
termine the fitness of persons entering the 
service, and in January, 1883, the present law 
was approved. At that time the law was con¬ 
sidered nearly perfect, as entrance into the 
service seemed to be well guarded, and it was 
supposed that faithful service gave security of 
tenure. But laws are slow to satisfy the fellow 
on the outside, with cold feet and his eyes on 
your ji)b. In some places an effort was made 
to establish the principle that a letter-carrier 
could not properly deliver mail if he belonged 
to a political party with which the postmaster 
did not affiliate. This principle carried to its 
logical conclusion would mean the removal of 
a carrier if the color of his hair did not please 
















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


183 


the esthetic tastes of some small individual 
clothed with brief authority. The men who de¬ 
claim loudest against the merit system are the 
most inconsistent. They never employ a shoe¬ 
maker to build a house, or a blacksmith to tune 
a piano. They always employ the best and 
most skillful tradesmen in the particular line 
of work they want done, thereby recognizing 
the merit system; and we say, if it is a good 
system in private affairs, it is equally good in 
public affairs. 

You should give to the civil service com¬ 
mission the moral support of your great or¬ 
ganization, for it is beneath their shield your 
safety is found. 

Some congressmen complain about the great 
expense of the civil service commission. 
Why! This commission costs the people 
about$44,000 a year, and protects about forty- 
four thousand employes, and would take in 
more if the same congressmen would pass the 
necessary laws. Think of it! The enormous 
tax of one dollar per capita, that the govern¬ 
ment employe may be fairly treated. No, it 
is not the expense that is the contention, but 
the opportunity to go into the political mar¬ 
ket places and auction ofif the forty-four thou¬ 
sand places for seats in congress. 


I 


It is impossible to understand how even 
partisan assurance can attempt to palm off 
upon the people of Indiana bi-partisan 
boards as a reform in our public institu¬ 
tions. Such a board has never been and 
never will be a reform. In this case it is 
meant to form them of republicans and 
democrats, ignoring every other party. 
When they take charge of the public insti¬ 
tutions, if the majority give all of the ap¬ 
pointments to their own party, it will not 
be different from the ordinary spoils favor¬ 
itism. If one-half or one-third are given 
to the minority, the places will be filled in 
part by republican favoritisn and in part 
by democratic favoritism. This is not re¬ 
form. Reform is to exclude favoritism and 
can only be done by adopting the reform 
methods of appointment which are now 
spreading over the country. A bi-parti¬ 
san board must work upon the plan of 
favors, concessions, deals, combinations 
and tricks. In a short time no member is 
in shape to attack his colleague. They are 
in the same boat and they work together. 
Examine the recent appointments of May¬ 
or Gilroy, of republicans, Jake Hess and 
Kearney, appointed sub-way commission¬ 
ers. A good authority says: 

“They are now expected to show gratitude for 
their appointments by working at Albany to save 
the democratic sub-way commissioner, Amos J. 
Cummings. Deuel is also expected to do all in his 
power to save the Tammany police justices by pre¬ 
venting the abolition of the board of police jus¬ 
tices.” 

Platt understands the value of bi-parti¬ 
san boards as a reform measure. Tam¬ 
many gave him two places on the police 
board. Tammany was about to be inves¬ 
tigated and Platt’s legislature was in dan¬ 
ger of responding to popular clamor. Platt 
limited the inquiry to the police depart¬ 
ment and put a harmless Rochester lawyer 
in charge. But even Platt has occasional¬ 
ly to bend before a storm and Goff’took 


the investigation in hand with what results 
we know. 

The New York Evening R)st says : 

“While the committee is thus adding to its abso¬ 
lute demonstration of the boundless evil of bi par¬ 
tisan control of the police force, Mr. Platt and his 
allies are working with might and main to prevent 
the abolition of such control. They are determined 
that the present system shall be maintained, and 
they will maintain it unless the public arouses 
itself to an irresistible demand for its abolition.” 

Of course bi-partisan boards in Indiana 
are not likely to produce such startling 
corruption as a Tammany-Platt board but 
the difference is simply of degree. 

We have received a letter from an en¬ 
raged reader who wants nothing more to 
do with us because we condemned Pres¬ 
ident Cleveland and in the same column 
denounced Hill, and therefore we mean 
“ republicanism.” We can not say that 
this wilt not occur again. President Cleve¬ 
land has frequently done things to which 
the Chronicle is diametrically opposed, 
and we do not yet regard him as wholly 
converted. Admonition in that direction 
may, therefore, continue to be a duty, and 
it is certainly the duty of everybody in the 
world to denounce Hill. We doubt if the 
“republicanism” of the Chronicle would 
pass much of a muster. It long ago be¬ 
came used to deep dissatisfaction when the 
other ox was gored. 


POSTMASTER-GENERAL BISSELL’S 
REPORT. 

It is refreshing to read the report of an 
officer which is written with an eye sin¬ 
gle to the business of his department. In 
such a report, Postmaster-General Bissell 
has set forth the postal affairs of the coun¬ 
try. In all matters with which the Chron¬ 
icle is particularly concerned, no such 
straightforward and even fearless report 
has been before written by any post¬ 
master-general. Mr. Bissell says with evi¬ 
dent pride that “ the civil service law is 
being strictly and successfully enforced 
throughout the free delivery service.” 
He issued an order, June 28, 1894, that 
letter carriers, before removal should 
have a hearing upon written charges, 
with opportunity to make defense, and 
points out that this cuts off frivolous 
charges by postmasters and also recog¬ 
nizes a new right. Some check in favor 
of other employes would be equally just. 
His recommendation that postmasters 
should with the approval of the post¬ 
master-general be allowed to suspend em¬ 
ployes for short periods in the way of 
minor punishment, calls for a measure 
which is much needed. The country has 
had to pay, or will have to pay, several 
hundred thousand dollars, on account of 
“ over-time ” claimed by letter carriers. 
We have always regarded this as little 


short of a wrong. Mr. Bissell dealt with 
the matter by simply issuing an order, 
directing carriers to perform their duties 
within legal hours, and they are doing it. 
When the railway mail service in 1889 
came under the protection of the civil 
service law, its errors were as 1 to 2 834. 
Its efficiency has risen, until in 1894 its 
errors are as 1 to 7,831. Mr. Bissell at¬ 
tacks the spoils system with great vigor 
and denounces it as the one hindrance 
which keeps the postmaster-general tied 
down a larger part of his time to con¬ 
troversies about appointments, to the ex¬ 
clusion of all other business, and he calls 
upon congress to do something to re¬ 
lieve the department of the incubus. Re¬ 
ferring to the bill providing for the ap¬ 
pointment of fourth-class postmasters by 
means of civil service inspectors, instead 
of by congressmen, Mr. Bissell says . 

I trust that congress, using the bill 
which is now before it as a basis, or sub¬ 
stituting one which it is satisfied is bet¬ 
ter, will lose as little time as possible in 
coming to the relief of the department. 

This ofl&cial declaration from the head 
of the department states what has been 
for many years a most glaring violation 
of the constitution—the coercion of the 
appointing power by congressmen, and 
the corrupt use by the latter of the fourth- 
class post-ofi&ces. The days of this among 
other evil things are numbered. Whether 
the present congress will break up this 
greatest single spoils practice or will pass 
it over in doltish ignorance of the spirit 
of the times remains to be seen. It is the 
greatest single reform of the civil service 
yet to be accomplished, and the results 
can hardly be estimated. The removal 
of these and a comparatively few other 
offices from the clutches of congressmen 
will lead to a great change in the char¬ 
acter of the latter. They will have to 
stand on their merits, and can not be 
helped out, and the new men will not 
want to be helped out by a watch-dog 
office-holder at every cross-roads. 


“SPURIOUS” REFORM. 

There is a good deal of agitation in cer¬ 
tain circles over “spurious” civil service 
reform. The complaint now is regarding 
the recent classification of chiefs of di¬ 
visions. Before, it was over President 
Harrison’s classification of the employes 
of free delivery post-offices and before 
that, over Mr. Cleveland’s putting the 
railway mail service under the merit sys¬ 
tem. The practice has been first to use 
the places so far as possible for political 
rewards, and then to cover them with 
the protection of the law. Civil sirvice re¬ 
formers used to worry a great deal about 
the necessity of first getting an ideal 
state of equity in the division of spoils 


















184 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


thea covering the places with the merit 
system, but experience has taught them 
that all this is comparatively a minor 
matter. A large proportion of spoils ap¬ 
pointees under the incentive of the merit 
system, for the sake of permanent em¬ 
ployment really become efficient, consci¬ 
entious employes, and a sturdy manhood 
asserts itself and they fall off as henchmen 
when they find a more manly way of sup¬ 
porting their families. Besides this, if any 
employe under the merit system is not a 
good man and an efficient employe, or if 
he is so persistent a partisan as to unfit 
him to properly do the work of the public, 
civil service reform sanctions a prompt 
dismissal. It does not sanction a sneaking 
dismissal, under secret and lying charges, 
nor a dismissal because of his political 
opinions. Civil service reformers will 
cheerfully accept every extension of the 
merit system, whether spurious or not, 
and they will see to it also that spoilsmen 
like Bynum do not succeed in correcting 
the spurious features which so lacerate 
their fine moral senses. 


THE “ISSUE” OF CIVIL SERVICE 
REFORM. 

Before the recent election the Indian¬ 
apolis Sentinel addressed the following to 
the Indianapolis News: 

But, says the News, Mr. Bynum is a “spoilsman.” 
Possibly. But he is no more a “spoilsman” than 
he has always been while the News was supporting 
him. And certainly the News will not pretend to 
say that there is any issue of civil service reform 
before the country, or that there is likely to be any 
very soon. 

We wish to call attention to that part of 
the paragraph which stated that no issue 
of civil service reform was before the 
country or was going to be very soon. It 
is quite true both party machines, in mak¬ 
ing up their platforms, avoided the subject 
whenever they dared, and when they did 
not dare, with some notable exceptions— 
as the Massachusetts democratic state plat¬ 
form—spoke in as vague and meaningless 
a manner as possible. Quite true also that 
political speakers, as a rule, did not con¬ 
sider it an “issue.” Yet, after the election, 
not only the people in this country who 
mean to crush the spoils system were 
agreed that an opportunity had been taken 
to punish a party that had been for nearly 
two years fighting and dickering and trad¬ 
ing over spoils; but the politicians say 
that the squabbles over offices was a potent 
cause of defeat, and it is to the losses from 
distributing patronage that many con¬ 
gressmen attribute their defeat. 

Now turn to slavery. That was never 
owned to be an issue. Platforms and speak¬ 
ers loathed the subject. Nobody was in¬ 
terested except a handful of wild aboli¬ 
tionists. Says Daniel Webster in 1850, 


“I shall support no agitations having a 
foundation in ghostlyabstraction.” Charles 
Sumner in Faneuil Hall said, “The public 
conscience will not allow a man who has 
trodden our streets as a free man to be 
dragged away as a slave.” President Fill¬ 
more’s mes^age considered the slavery 
question ended and “probed gently to dis¬ 
cover whether some change might not be 
made in the tariff, and political effort turned 
back into those more practical and profit¬ 
able channels which had once engaged our 
national discussion.” In 1857 President 
James Buchanan said, “Most happy will it 
be for the country when the public mind 
shall be diverted from this question to 
others of more pressing and practical im 
portance.” Yet in four years the storm 
burst which swept away slavery. And now, 
if signs mean anything, the destruction of 
the spoils system is first in the public 
mind and is in the near future. 


THE REPUBLICAN PLEDGES. 

We have watched carefully for some indica¬ 
tion of recollection by republicans of Indiana 
that their party has a record upon the subject 
of the management of the civil service of the 
state. This record is practically unbroken and 
it is one which they can not now ignore without 
self stultification. As we said last month there 
are two systems now thoroughly tried and 
proved,which successfully remove politicsfrom 
any public service to which they are applied. 
These are the merit system of open competi¬ 
tion for places requiring skill and the labor 
service system for unskilled labor. The first 
of these has been for twelve years in the fed¬ 
eral service and is referred to in the extracts 
given below. In 1885, two years after the 
adoption of the federal law, a bill embodying 
all of its principles was introduced into the 
upper house by Mr. Foulke and after being 
explained and debated at length every repub¬ 
lican voted for it. 

In 1886 the Indiana State Republican Con¬ 
vention adopted the following: 

We favor a thorough and honest enforce¬ 
ment of the civil service law and the exten¬ 
sion of its principles to the state administra¬ 
tion wherever it can be made practical to 
the end that the corruption and flagrant 
abuses that exist in the mismanagement of 
our public institutions may be done away 
with and they be liberated from partisan con¬ 
trol. 

In 1887 what was at that time regarded as 
the strongest and best civil service bill which 
had been written was introduced into the low¬ 
er house of the ge eral assembly by Mr. Grif¬ 
fiths, and after full debate and explanation the 
bill passed, receiving every republican vote. 
The deadlock between the two houses pre¬ 
vented a ^ote being reached in the upper 
house. 

In July, 1888, General Harrison, then a 
presidential nominee, in a speech before a re¬ 
publican convention called at Danville, Indi¬ 


ana, to choose delegates to a state convention 
said ; 

There are some questions that ought not to di¬ 
vide parties but upon which all good men ought 
to agree. I speak of only one; the great be¬ 
nevolent institutions—the fruit of our Chris¬ 
tian civilization, endowed by the bounty of 
the state, maintained by public taxes, and 
intended for the care and education of the 
disabled classes of our community—ought to 
be lifted above all parly influence, benefit or 
control. [Cheers.] I believe you can do 
nothing that will more greatly enhance the 
estimation in which the state of Indiana is 
held by her sister states than to see to it that 
a suitable, well regulated and strict civil serv¬ 
ice is provided for the administration of the 
benevolent and penal institutions of the state 
of Indiana. 

In 1891 a bill was introduced into the up¬ 
per house of the general assembly by Mr. 
Magee, embodying the best results of experi¬ 
ence up to that date, and covering both the 
merit and the labor service systems. This 
bill was fully debated and every republican 
voted for it. 

This is the record which the republicans of 
Indiana have themselves written. They have 
not been in a majority in the general assembly 
at any time since the foregoing attempts and 
declarations began. But if those acts mean 
anything, they mean a promise that at the 
first opportunity the republicans will carry 
out what they have been all these years seem¬ 
ing to try to bring about. To ignore this 
record is for the republicans to say that they 
did not mean these former attempts, and that 
in making them they were hypocrites and 
liars. It does not seem that they will so de¬ 
clare themselves, but rather that they have 
been honest and earnest, and will make their 
word good. They can not afford to do any¬ 
thing else. The spoils system is doomed, both 
in state and nation. It is daily going to the 
wall before the two reforms we have men¬ 
tioned. It is for the republicans to decide 
whether they will put this state in the front 
rank of civil progress or not. They will have 
an opportunity to do so. If this general as¬ 
sembly refuses, some other general assembly 
will do it. Reformers can wait, and this great 
reform can wait, for it is sure of its own in 
time. Can the republican party wait? Can it 
stand the rack of refusing to keep its prom¬ 
ises, and of the inevitable loot of our public 
institutions which will follow? 

HOW TO STOP THE ASSESSMENT 
SCANDAL. 

In an other part of this paper are the facts 
relating to the swinish greed of several recent¬ 
ly elected state oflBcers. They are surprisingly 
rapacious and brazen at the outset of their ca¬ 
reer, so much so that at last accounts the cul¬ 
prits all bore signs of party discipline. It will 
be noted that every man had in mind to re¬ 
coup himself for a campaign assessment that 
had been forced out of him, larger than hg 
could afford to pay. He felt that his party 
had made him pay for the oflBce and his chief 
thought was how to reimburse himself out of 
the public oflflce. The public can not afford 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


185 


to let this mercenary and venal conception of 
a public office continue. It will continue so 
long as these scandalous assessments continue 
and these will continue only so long as the 
spending of the money is huried in secrecy. 
This legislature should pass an act which 
should provide not only for a public itemized 
statement of the money spent by a candidate 
by himself but in his behalf by individuals and 
party committees. The amount that can be 
spent should also be limited. For all judicial 
offices the candidate should not be assessed 
and he should not be permitted to contribute. 
Tammany assessed judicial officers from $10,- 
000 to $20,000. This year Recorder Smythe 
swore that he gave Tammany Hall $35,000 for 
his nomination. Amos J. Cummings gave 
$2,500 for his nomination to congress and 
$2,200 beside. Nearly one year’s salary for 
an office of two years’ duration. As the Even¬ 
ing Post says, no corporation would venture to 
give $50,000 as a campaign fund if the fact 
were to be made public after election. 

We believe both parties would welcome such 
a law. It would relieve them of the leeches 
that bleed them, but which neither party 
dares kick out the door for fear the other will 
at once extend a welcome. The citizens of 
this country are ready to pay their campaign 
expenses if they can see the bills. With a 
good law all legitimate expenses will dwindle 
into a reasonable sum. Such expenses will 
not be one-fourth what election expenses are 
now. Private citizens now refuse to give, be¬ 
cause they largely regard the men who will 
handle the money as corrupt and thievish. 
This suspicion has good grounds. When the 
accounts are published, and the amounts ex¬ 
pended are greatly reduced, the practice of 
buying votes by giving a lot of worthless fel¬ 
lows “employment,” by paying rents and 
other debts, and by paying worthless cam¬ 
paign speakers, both expenses and wages will 
cease, and along with it will cease the nec¬ 
essity of blackmailing public employes by 
party assessments. 


CONSULAR REFORM. 

The Washington correspondent of the New 
York Evening Post, in an interesting letter to 
that paper, recalls that the present demand 
for consular reform is a revival. Some twenty 
years ago applicants for consulships had to 
pass an examination, particularly in the mod¬ 
ern languages. It was not a competitive test, 
but such as it was it gave this country a much 
higher average of quality in the lesser places 
of the service than it has had since. There is 
also given a copy of an examination pro¬ 
pounded in 1873, which we wish we might see 
tried upon Reformer Quincy’s selections. We 
read in the dispatches of the sudden recall of 
Chapman Coleman, secretary of the embassy 
at Berlin, after twenty years’ service, whose 
departure is regretted deeply by Ambassador 
Runyan and his colleagues; at the same time 
different commercial bodies of the country 
have taken the matter of our spoils consular 


service in hand, and are expressing themselves 
vigorously upon the shameful practice. 

The Denver (Colorado) chamber of com¬ 
merce says: 

That our senators and representatives in congress 
are hereby requested to aid in enacting such laws as 
will improve the consular service by appointment 
under the civil service rules, as adopted for other 
branches of the government; all consuls and vice- 
consuls. That all such appointments made shall be 
strict non-political, and only persons of eminent 
ability. That the appointee be required to speak 
fluently the language employed by the country to 
which he is about to be appointed, or be required 
within a reasonable time to acquire such language. 
That the appointee must possess a knowledge of the 
products and manufactures of this country, and 
its regulations governing imports and exports, and 
that they be instructed to keep in view at all times 
the importance of ever increasing the commerce 
between the United States and the countries to 
which they are appointed. That all consuls ap¬ 
pointed under civil-service rules, who discharge 
their duties in a loyal and efficient manner, may 
look hopefully forward to a continuance of their 
service, and held in line for promotion as their abil¬ 
ities justify. 

The president of the chamber of commerce 
of Portland, Ore., says that the subject of con¬ 
sular reform will be presented at their next 
meeting, and the president of the Providence, 
R. I., board of trade writes to the same effect. 
Mr. Lawrence W. Jones, late president of the 
Kansas City board of trade, says that the first 
step is to put our consular service on a busi¬ 
ness basis and banish the political hacks; 
that Kansas City handles annually more than 
$75,000,000 in live stock, and their packing 
houses turn out products more than $50,000,000 
in value, and consular reform is a practical 
matter to them. The St. Paul chamber of 
commerce says: 

“ That in our opinion the present system of ap' 
pointments for the consular service of the United 
States is injurious to the commercial interests of 
the country, appointments being made at the dic¬ 
tation of politicians and as a reward for party ad¬ 
herence, rather than with a view to the practical 
fitness of the person selected. 

‘•If this branch of the government service were 
entirely divorced from politics and placed under 
the civil service rules, appointments made solely 
with reference to special qualifications for the 
service, and promotions made upon merit alone, a 
regular permanent service would be established, 
which we believe would be of greater efficiency 
and materially aid in the extension of our foreign 
trade. 


A SPOILS EPISODE. 

The strained relations which have existed 
for months between Secretary Carlisle and Su¬ 
pervising Architect of the Treasury Jeremiah 
O’Rourke came to their logical end late this 
afternoon, when Mr. Carlisle demanded Mr. 
O’Rourke’s immediate resignation. 

Mr. O’Rourke was appointed on the recommenda¬ 
tion of the New Jersey senators early in 1893, suc¬ 
ceeding W. J. Edbrooke, of Chicago. Soon 
afterwards the employes of the office discov- 
tbat they had an irascible chief to deal with. 

The offense which induced Mr. Carlisle to 
demand his withdrawal is said to have been 
a “misunderstanding” with W. B. Fleming 
chief of the law and contract division of the 
office. Mr. Fleming happena to be a .strong 
personal friend of Mr. Carlisle. Recent re 
morals in Mr. O’Rourke's department, about which 
he was not consulted, are said to have been one 
of the immediate causes of the altercation 


which has led to his decapitation.— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, New York Times, September 17. 

• ♦ * 

This morning the secretary received a letter 
from Architect O’Rourke, in which he stated 
that he had received the demand for his res¬ 
ignation with “amazement.” He recalled the 
statement, which he said the secretary had 
made to him early in his administration, that, 
should any charges be made against him, as 
was not unusual in one occupying that posi¬ 
tion, he would have an opportunity to meet 
those charges before any action was taken by 
the head of the department. This, he alleged, 
had not been done. Mr. O’Rourke further 
stated that he had known for several months 
that a conspiracy existed in his own office to 
bring about his downfall, and he denounced 
the conspiracy in strong language.— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, New York Times, September 18. 

» * * 

Now that he has been compelled to dispense 
with the services of his supervising architect, 
the secretary of the treasury may have occa¬ 
sion to regret, among his other occasions for 
regret, that he allowed the official whom he now 
finds impossible to dictate the course of the depart¬ 
ment upon the bill for improving the public archi¬ 
tecture that congress had been induced to pass. The 
motive of Mr. O’Rourke for making difficulties 
and nullifying the law, appears to be that the 
architects who had interested themselves in 
trying to get the new law put into practice, 
urged that it should be enforced in a new pub¬ 
lic building for Buffalo, and that they unan¬ 
imously failed to admire a design prepared in 
the office of the supervising architect for that 
building .—New York Times, September 19. 

* * * 

Mr. O’Rourke, in conversation, said he had 
no apologies to make for his conduct of the 
office. He left it in better condition than it 
had ever been. What demoralization there 
was in it was caused by the action of his sub¬ 
ordinates. The conspiracy mentioned in hisletter 
to Secretary Carlisle, he added, rejerred to persistent 
misrepresentations by Mr. Logan Carlisle, Mr. 
Fleming, and Mr. Kemper, who never lost an op¬ 
portunity to prejudice the mind of the secretary 
against him. A delegation of his friends came 
to Washington to see the secretary and to fix 
the matter up. He told them that he did not 
wish them to intercede for him, and that it 
was not a question as to whether or not he 
would withdraw his resignation if asked to. 
He would only do it under one condition, and 
that was that the corrupt element in his office 
should be expelled, and that Logan Carlisle 
should have no authority to make appoint¬ 
ments or dismissals in the architect’s office 
without consultation and agreement with him. 
— Washington dispatch. New York Times, Septem¬ 
ber 32. 

* » • 

The reason for the forced resignation of Su¬ 
pervising Architect O’Rourke of the treasury 
department is said to be a quarrel between 
O’Rourke and Logan Carlisle over the distri¬ 
bution of spoils in the architect’s office. 
O’Rourke, so the story goes, objected to some 
proposed removals and wanted to be consulted 
about all changes to be made in his force, 
while Carlisle insisted upon making such re¬ 
movals and appointments as he chose. The 
outcome was so much unpleasantness that 
O’Rourke was ordered to resign upon pain of 
removal. It is not certain that the country 
will suffer seriously from the loss of O’Rourke’s 
services, for his seems to have been a political 
appointment, carrying the power to inflict 
architectural monstrosities upon the cities of 
the land that congress endows with public 
buildings, because his“influence” wasstronger 
than that of his competitors. He seems to 
have been a product of the system which has 











186 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


led to his undoing, a system whose natural 
tendencies are to fill public offices with in¬ 
competents, to a greater or less degree, who 
have a pull.— Springfield Republican, September 
38. 

* ♦ « 

O’Rourke was a political architect ap¬ 
pointed by President Cleveland as the man of 
the New Jersey senators. He was incom¬ 
petent, which was a minor matter. Sec¬ 
retary Carlisle evidently found acceptable 
his hostility to any plan whereby the pub¬ 
lic buildings of the United States might 
have the benefit of open competition and 
be the means of developing a great na¬ 
tional architecture. But when O’Rourke 
showed a want of tact and pliancy with Logan 
Carlisle and Carlisle favorites he had shown 
an “unfitness” for his position that merited 
instant and stern decapitation. His place will 
be filled by another political architect pos¬ 
sessed of a properly disciplined political tem¬ 
perament and the people will pay more mil¬ 
lions of dollars for more and more political 
architecture and on the top of this will con¬ 
tinue to be insulted by assurances that an ar¬ 
tistic architecture is only possible under aris¬ 
tocracies and monarchies. 

PUBLIC OFFICE A FAMILY SNAP. 
Party Assessments and What They Lead to. 

Bribery is said to have been brought to bear 
upon State Geologist Blatchley by men in the 
republican party. Money has been offered for 
the privilege of naming the assistant officers 
in the geologist’s department—the oil inspec 
tor and the gas inspector. Mr. Blatchley him¬ 
self was the author of the statement this morn¬ 
ing. He made it while contradicting the 
story that he had appointed Mr. Berry, of 
Terre Haute, to be oil inspector. 

“This report grows out of malice,” said the 
geologist. “It is an infernal lie. You may 
say that Mr. Berry neither has been nor will be 
made oil inspector. The story is altogether 
false that Mr. Berry has purchased the place 
from me. 

^'‘Republicans have come to me since I have been 
here in Indianapolis and have offered me money if 
I would allow them to name the men for the offices 
under me. I would entertain no such proposition.” 

“Who were the men who offered you the 
money?” 

“I do not care at this time to make them 
public.” 

“What amounts were offered as an induce¬ 
ment to you?” 

“As to that I will say nothing. But I want 
it understood that I am making my own ap¬ 
pointments, and that I am here to serve the 
people as best I can.” 

The placesof the oil and gas inspectors, about 
which Mr. Blatchley says that the bribery has 
been attempted, wilt not be vacant until 
March. For the two positions there are more 
than fifty applicants. 

Simon T. Yancey, of Fortville, who was 
appointed state oil inspector by Governor 
Hovey, and who was ousted from office by the 


supreme court, is an applicant for the posi¬ 
tion of oil inspector. At the Denison House 
this morning he declared that he spent a 
great deal of money in litigation over the 
office, and that he was entitled to the appoint¬ 
ment. He was indignant when he read in a 
paper that Mr. Blatchley had appointed Mr. 
Berry, of Terre Haute, oil inspector. "Mr. 
Blatchley has deceived me,” said he. "He prom¬ 
ised that place to me in a room in this hotel before 
the convention. He said to one of my friends in 
Ft. Wayne, one of them in Wabash, and to several 
others, that I should have the place. We got out 
and worked for him, and got the nomination for 
him. He could never have got it but for us. It 
was reported around this hotel yesterday that 
Mr. Blatchley wasselling the deputyships un¬ 
der him. I mentioned the story to a former 
member of the state committee, and he said 
that it might have grown out of what he said to 
Blatchley before election. He said that he had 
told Blatchley that he ought to select his deputies be¬ 
fore the election and make them pay his campaign 
assessment. If it is true that Blatchley is charging 
§800 apiece for each of his three appointments, he is 
more than getting back the amount he was assessed.” 
—Indianapolis News, November 32. 

» » * 

Previous to my nomination a man not a candi¬ 
date came to me and offered me a large sum of 
money to control my appointments, but this I re¬ 
fused in an emphatic way that I think he willso 
remember.— Indianapolis Sentinel, November 33. 
» » » 

Simon T. Yancey persists that Geologist 
Blatchley promised him the place of oil in¬ 
spector. Blatchley is emphatic in his denial. 
He says that Yancey will not be appointed. 
Yancey’s friends say that they propose to take 
Blatchley before the tribunal of the republi¬ 
can legislature. 

A state officer says that the oil inspector 
is one of the best paid men in the state’s 
employ. As he expressed it, the oil inspector 
makes “more than Greene Smith” did. 

Yancey says that it pays $4,000 a year; and 
Blatchley says that it does not pay more than 
$3,000. The office is of four years’ term.— 
Indianapolis News, November 30. 

* * * 

The scramble for the office of oil inspector 
and Geologist Blatchley’s delay in selecting 
the man, have led to the discovery that the 
office is one of the richest in the state. The 
inspector makes from $7,000 to $9,000 in fees, 
although Blatchley and Yancey say only $3,000 
or $4,000 a year. The Standard Oil Company 
pays 90 per cent, of the fees. The office was sup¬ 
posed, by those who did not know when they 
voted to create it, to be worth $1,500 a year. Now 
it is supposed to yield not only a big revenue 
to the man who holds it, but to the party in 
power. 

Numerous delegations of office-seekers have 
been laying siege at Blatchley’s door. Prom¬ 
inent republicans, who do not want office for 
themselves, have called upon the geologist. 
John K. Gowdy, chairman of the republican 
state committee, called upon Blatchley, and 


the two were in a lengthy conference. County 
Clerk J. W. Fesler also visited Blatchley. It 
is said that Blatchley has made Fesler his 
political confidant, and is taking his advice in 
the making of his appointments. 

Blatchley still declines to announce the 
name of the man he wilt appoint oil in¬ 
spector. Republicans say they have received in¬ 
formation that C. F. Hall, of Danville, will be ap¬ 
pointed to the place. Hall is an uncle of Blatchley. 
It was he who introduced Blatchley into politics. He 
managed Blalchley's campaign at the state conven¬ 
tion, and looked after his interests during the cam¬ 
paign. Hall was formerly postmaster at Dan¬ 
ville.— Indianapolis News, December 4. 

» * » 

Oil Inspector Hall is an uncle of the man 
who appointed him. The inspector is said to 
make from $7,000 to $9,000 a year in fees 
from the office, although Geologist Blatchley 
claims that the office will only pay from $3,- 
000 to $4,000.— Indianapolis Journal, December 5. 
* * * 

The report prevails in the state house that 
the four daughters of Alexander Hess, for¬ 
merly of Wabash, and now clerk of the su¬ 
preme court, are of office-holding age, and will 
be installed as his assistants. 

His neighbor across the way, Hervey D. 
Vories, has his wife and a nephew on the pay¬ 
roll. Mr. Hess has already appointed one of 
his family to a deputyship, and said to an 
employe in the building that “blood is thicker 
than water.” The report is current that he 
further added, “My family first, and the pub¬ 
lic afterward.” 

Not counting the members of the family 
whom he is to put upon the pay roll Hess re¬ 
ceives $3,000 a year from the state for his own 
possession; he also receives 10 per cent, of all 
collections he makes. 

As to the story that all the Hesses are to 
have a state position, there are some doubts, 
as there are but four places at Mr. Hess’s dis¬ 
posal, and one of these has already been given 
to Miss Mary Peacock. The work to which 
she has been assigned is that of chief clerk, or 
second deputy, for which the pay is $900 a 
year. Her help is a necessity to the new force. 
She has been in the clerk’s office since it was 
first established. 

One of the clerkships has already been dis¬ 
posed of to one of Hess’s younger daughters. 
She will receive $600 a year. Two places are 
yet to be filled, with three members of the 
family to hear from. These are the positions 
of clerk at $600 and of chief deputy at $1,500. 
The capital employes have concluded that he 
will bestow upon his own kin the fifteen-hun- 
dred-dollar position, in preference to the other 
place at $50 a month. This will make the 
salaries from the clerk’s office to the Hesses 
as follows: One clerk supreme court, $3,000, 
with fees of at least $1,000; one deputy clerk, 
$l,-500; one clerk, $600; one clerk, $600. The 
total will be $6,700. As the family will be in 
office four years, Hess and his will have re¬ 
ceived more than $25,000. 

When Hess came into the office of the clerk 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


187 


a few days ago, he informed his employes that 
they would be continued in place for some 
time. The inference was that they are to be 
retained until New Year’s at least. Hess said 
that he would give them due notice when he 
was ready to dismiss them. 

Yesterday he announced that his daughter 
had been appointed a clerk. At the same time 
he went to Miss Katharine Sweeney, who held 
a place under her brother in the former term, 
and told her that she would be released to¬ 
night. Hess is reported to have said at the 
time he discharged Miss Sweeney that he was 
not a candidate for re-election. He added that 
the republican party had made him pay about ^S,500 
for the office, and that he proposed to get all out of it 
that he could. 

“Is it true that a second daughter of yours 
has been appointed to a place under you?” 
Mr. Hess was asked, as he was leaving his office 
at noon. 

“It isn’t true,” said Mr. Hess. “I have a 
daughter in Chicago who is coming here in 
February to visit us, and I have told her that 
if she wants a place she can have it. She has 
been working at Chicago, and it would be nice 
if she could work here and be at home.” 

“How much did the republican party assess 
you for this job, Mr. Hess?” 

“Well, I wouldn’t like to say as to that. I 
will say, however, that with assessment and other ex¬ 
penses, it has cost me more than thirty five hun¬ 
dred." 

“And you propose to get everything out of 
it that you can?” 

“I am going to get all that the law allows 
me .”—Indianapolis News, November 28. 

» » • 

The income of the clerk of the supreme 
court has always been more or less in doubt, 
as he is not compelled to make any account¬ 
ing for his funds. It was said that A. M. 
Sweeney made $12,000 a year for four years. 
Hess says that Sweeney made $60,000 out of 
the office. The law was changed, and Hess is 
serving under a new fee and salary arrange¬ 
ment. It is commonly supposed that he does 
not receive as much as Sweeney did. Last 
night, however, Hess said, in speaking of the 
the$60,000 which Sweeny is said to have made 
out of the office: “I do not expect to make 
more than half of that amount out of it.” Mr. 
Hess denied that he had ever quoted the adage 
that blood is thicker than water; he said: “All 
this talk about blood being thicker than water, 
and my family first and the public afterward 
—there is nothing in it. I used no such ex¬ 
pression. I am devoted to my children; my 
daughters desire to work, and why should I not 
give them employment ?”—Indianapolis News, 
Nov. 29. 

» » « 

The official term of William S. Beck, M. D., 
who has been county coroner for two years, 
ended to-day. Coroner Wagner, the last re¬ 
publican, held the office from Nov. 20, 1886, 
to Nov. 20, 1890, and in four years the office 
cost the county $22,770.68. Dr. Manker, the 
democratic successor of Dr. Wagner, made 


the total for two years $13,861.10. Dr. Beck’s 
bills for two years will be about $22,500. 

From 1880 to 1885 the total costof the office 
was $11,771.22, an average of $2,354.25 a 
year. From 1885 to 1890 the expense was 
$24,436.99, an average a year of $4,887.39. In 
the last four years it has cost abou $40,000, an 
average of $10,000 a year. For the fiscal year 
ending June 1, 1893, seven-twelfths of which, 
perhaps, was Dr. Beck’s, the county paid $8,- 
808.30. From then to .Tune 1, 1894, Dr. Beck 
received $12,967.25. Since then, until the 1st 
of this month, he has drawn $5,529.40.— In¬ 
dianapolis News. 

^ ^ ^ 

“I was elected on a platform declaring for 
an economical management of public affairs, 
and I intend to stand on the platform to the 
letter. In making this statement I do not 
wish to convey the impression that the cost 
of administering the office of coroner will be 
reduced to what it was ten years ago, but it 
will not reach the exorbitant amounts which 
have been paid for the service in the past two 
years .”—Interview in Indianapolis Journal, No¬ 
vember 17, with Coroner Castor. 

• » * 

Coroner Castor filed his first bill with the 
county commissioners yesterday afternoon. It 
is for services rendered between November 17 
to December 1. With it were filed the bills 
of his clerk and constable and three post-mor¬ 
tem bills. The total for the fifteen days was 
$ 576 . 40 . During the fifteen days included in 
the bill filed by Dr. Castor, he had twenty 
cases. In no case was his charge less than 
$12.50. According to his bill he put in fifty-one 
days on the cases, although he had been in office only 
fifteen days. In each case mileage was taxed. 
Of the fifty-one days he received twenty “orig¬ 
inal” days (or days on which he viewed re¬ 
mains), and for which he received $200; for 
the thirty one other days he received $78.50; 
his mileage amounted to $7.60. The average 
length of time on a case was not quite two 
and a half days .—Indianapolis News, Dee. 4 . 

* * * 

In the coroner’s bill is a charge of $12.50 for 
holding an inquest in the case of the death of 
brakeman Myers, who was killed by a Big Four 
train in Shelby county. Yesterday the commis¬ 
sioner received a letter from W. P. Knapp, cor¬ 
oner of Shelby county, stating that he had held 
an inquest the day this man was killed and 
rendered a verdict in accordance with the facts. 
When the body was sent here for burial Coro¬ 
ner Castor held another inquest and examined 
all the witnesses in the case. At the time this 
inquest was held Coroner Castor was asked 
why he conducted it instead of allowing the 
coroner of the county in which the death oc¬ 
curred to make the investigation. He an¬ 
swered that it was the duty of the coroner in 
the county where the remains were buried to 
hold the inquest. Dr. Castor said last night, 
in speaking of the Myers case, that he held 
the inquest believing no previous inquest had 
been held.—Indianapolis Journal, December 6. 

« * * 

The office promises to cause me a financial loss at 


any rate, considering the expenses of the campaign 
and the interruption of my professional business .— 
Indianapolis News, December 6. 

* * * 

Miss Ray, who was the clerk and stenog¬ 
rapher of Coroner Beck, and who went from 
his office to that of Coroner Castor, will leave 
the coroner’s office this evening. She has ful¬ 
filled many of the duties of a deputy coroner. 
She has examined witnesses by herself, asking 
the questions and writing the answers. For 
this work the coroner is allowed a fee of $2.50 
a day. 

Her place is to be taken by Miss Edna Castor, a 
sister of the coroner. Dr. Castor has employed 
a young man named Harvey Meyer, but he 
says, “i let him go because I was satisfied that 
he had an ambition to be something higher 
than a clerk in a coroner’s office. I wanted 
some one whom I was sure would stay with 
me.” 

Harvey Meyer says that he was discharged, 
after a week’s employment, without cause. 

Coroner Castor says that his sister will get 
the fees of the office that usually go to the 
clerk .—Indianapolis News, December 11. 

* * * 

At least ten subordinate offices are held in 
the the state house by men and women re¬ 
lated to their chiefs. Two wives are deputies 
to their husbands; in one office a daughter has 
been made a clerk; in another the office¬ 
holder’s brother has a place. 

In the governor’s office Miss Callie Mc- 
Micken, a niece of Governor Matthews, is his 
private secretary. She was such, however; 
before he entered office, having been a mem¬ 
ber of his household for several years. 

In Superintendent Vories’s office Mrs. Vories 
continues as chief deputy at a salary of “more 
than $1,200” a year. John Vories, a nephew 
of the superintendent, has been made a clerk, 
although he is said to have had no previous 
experience in school work. 

In the auditor’s office Will F. Henderson, a 
brother of Auditor Henderson, has been a 
clerk. 

C. N. Metcalf is the secretary of the board 
of health, and his wife is one of his clerks. 

Clerk Hess has made Grace Hess, his daugh¬ 
ter, a clerk at a salary of $600 a year. He has 
promised a place to another daughter if she 
will take it. 

The reporter of the supreme court, Sydney R. 
Moon, has his son as an assistant, but the 
place is not paid from public appropriation. 

S.J.Thompson announced to-day thathisson, 
M. J. Thompson, would be his assistant in the 
state statistician’s office. The son has had ex¬ 
perience in newspaper work. 

Geologist Blatchley last night made known 
the appointment of his uncle, Chester F. Hall, 
of Danville, to be oil inspector, with an in¬ 
come which exceeds that of most other state 
officers .—Indianapolis News, December 5. 

« 

When Mr. Fesler was asked this afternoon 
regarding his payment of money to secure his 
nomination, he said no payment of any 
amount was required of him, with that under¬ 
standing. “There is not, nor has there been, 
any question of money in the matter,” he con¬ 
tinued. “I have paid my assessment, but that 







188 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


was not until several days after I was nom¬ 
inated by the committee. I gave no more 
than what Mr. Joyce had been assessed, and 
the money he had paid to the committee is to be 
returned to his estate. 1 do not think it proper 
to slate what I gave, but it was nothing near the 
amount which it is said I have paid. The 
nomination did not cost me a cent aside 
from this assessment .”—Indianapolis Netos, Oc¬ 
tober 


PATRONAGE A SOURCE OF PARTY 
WEAKNESS. 

Senator Murphy must have had sev¬ 
eral bad half hours since his triumphal 
appointment of the postmaster of Troy, 
because another follower of his has been 
pronounced guilty of the murder of Rob¬ 
ert Ross. It is the old story of an Ameri¬ 
can community in the grip of a boss, until 
it seems to the outsider to have lost all 
courage, all patriotism and all moral 
sense. [How it looked last summer.] 

* * * 

The 13th ward, Troy, where Robert Ross 
met his death, nobly tells the story of the suc¬ 
cess of the struggle against the Senator Mur¬ 
phy maehine. Last year it gave Molloy, ma¬ 
chine candidate for mayor, a majority of 343. 
This year it gave Mr. Black, republican can¬ 
didate for congress, 324 .—Troy Times, Nov. 10, 
» » » 

One of the peculiar things about the elec¬ 
tion in this state, yesterday, is the fact that 
the democratic counties which have secured 
the largest share of the federal offices have 
gone republican. Carroll county, which has 
the collector of customs, the best office in this 
state, the special deputy collector, and a large 
number of minor offices, went republican for 
tbe first time since 1866, and Harford county, 
which has the collector of internal revenue, 
and more minor places than any other county 
in the state, in spite of the usual large dem¬ 
ocratic majority, went republican. Senator 
Gibson’s county, Talbot, which has 18 men in 
good federal offices, also went republican.— 
Baltimore dispatch, Boston Journal, Nov. 8. 

* * » 

The latest returns available indicate that, of 
the eighty members of the house who voted 
last session to defeat the appropriation for the 
civil service commission, the following forty- 
five will stay at home after the fourth of next 
March: 

Alderson, W. Va.; Alexander, N. C.; Barnes, 
Wis.; Bland, Mo.; Bretz, Ind.; Bunn,N.C.: Caba- 
niss, Ga.; Capehart, W. Va.; Carnth, Ky.; Cock¬ 
rell, Tex.; Coffeen. Wyo.; Covert, N. Y.; Cum¬ 
mings. N. Y.; DeArmond, Mo.; Dunn, N. J.; Ed¬ 
munds, Va.; Ellis, Ky.; En'’lish, N. J.; Enloe, 
Tenn.; Epes, Va.; Forman. Ill.; Fyan. Md.; Gor¬ 
man. Mich.; Grady, N. C.; Hatch. Mo.; Heard,Mo.; 
Honk, Tenn.; Hunter, Ill.; Ikirt. 0.; Lane, Ill.; 
Layton. O.; Lynch, Wis.; Mallory, Fla.; Morgan, 
Mo.; O’Neil. Mo.; Paynter.Ky.; Pearson, O.: Pen¬ 
dleton, W. Va.; Shell, S. C.; Snodgrass, Tenn,; 
Stockdale, Miss.; Stone. Ky.; Taylor,Ind.; Wells, 
Wis.; Wise, Va .—November Good Government. 

» » * 

There is evidence that, as usual, many 
claims for pensions which have been pending 
for a long time, are being allowed on the eve 
of election. Several veterans in this city. 


who have had claims on file for two years or 
more, have received their pensions during the 
last two weeks. These men, most of whom are re¬ 
publicans, have been reminded that Congressman 
Bynum asked that the claims be allowed. After the 
pension had been allowed, the commissioner of 
pensions sends to the congressman a slip of pa¬ 
per, on which is the statement that a pension 
had been allowed, and there is a footnote 
saying that the congressman asked that this 
claim be allowed. This slip from the commis¬ 
sioner of pensions is remailed by the congress¬ 
man to the veteran who received the pension. 
—Indianapolis Journal, November Jf. 

# » » 

Congressman Bynum did not please the dem¬ 
ocrats of Haughville or North Indianapolis 
with the post-office appointments, and some of 
them are going to scratch him. The demo¬ 
crats of Haughville were divided at the time 
of the post office agitation. Bynum did not 
favor the candidate of the “reform element” 
of the party in the suburb, but named the can¬ 
didate of what was called the “clique.” In 
North Indianapolis he chose a man who was 
a comparative stranger in the suburb, as 
against democrats who had lived and worked 
for the party there many years. He also over¬ 
looked the candidature of a woman who was 
supported by a host of the suburban people.— 
Indianapolis News, November Jf. 

« * • 

Congressman Brookshire was given a cool 
reception last night. P. T. Jett, chairman of 
the democratic township committee, would 
not attend the speaking. Neither would he 
distribute the bills announcing the meeting. 
With the ushering in of the Cleveland admin¬ 
istration, Brookshire had pledged his support 
to Mr. Jett in his candidacy for postmaster. 
Soon after this Mr. Brookshire wrote a letter 
to one of the ring democrats here stating that 
he had recommended the editor of the Clay 
City Sentinel, W E. Naugle, for the position; 
and soon after wrote another letter stating 
that he had not made such recommendation. 
—Clay City dispatch, Indianapolis Journal, Sep¬ 
tember 27. 


OFFENSIVE PARTISANSHIP. 

In May, Postmaster-General Bissell sent out 
Mr. Cleveland’s executive order of July 14, 
1886, warning federal employes against po¬ 
litical activity. 

At the democratic legislative convention, 
held in June, eight employes of the Pittsburg 
post-office were elected delegates and served. 
When the news of this reached the postmaster- 
general, he rebuked the postmaster for per¬ 
mitting it, and warned him not to let it be re¬ 
peated ; yet, in defiance of Mr. Bissell’s au¬ 
thority, within two months afterwards, four of 
these men ran for delegates to another conven¬ 
tion, and a fifth was very active at his primary 
meeting, but was not a delegate. 

*- * * 

The civil service commission this afternoon 
gave Postmaster-General Bissell a hard nut to 
crack. It relates to the recent investigation at 


Pittsburg of violations of the civil service law. 
The main point brought out was that four 
employes of the Pittsburg post-office, includ¬ 
ing Financial Clerk Atwell, had participated 
as delegates to a democratic convention in 
August in the face of the warning issued by 
the postmaster general in May, forbidding 
such actions by the employes of the post-office. 
As the records of the commission show that 
Mr. Bissell approved the dismissal of four 
clerks in the railway mail service for being 
delegates to republican conventions the com¬ 
mission to-day sent him the names of the of¬ 
fending Pittsburgers, and at the same time 
called his attention to his previous action re¬ 
specting the republicans. 

In the meantime, the democrats of Pitts¬ 
burg are working to save Atwell, and Post¬ 
master O’Donnell, of Pittsburg, was here on 
that errand to-day.— Washington dispatch Buf¬ 
falo Express, October 24. 

CORRESPONDENCE. 

To the Editor of the Civil Service Chronicle : 

It was with some astonishment that I read 
in your issue for October the letter from Mr. 
Talcott Williams citing official insolence as 
an objection to civil service reform. Mr. 
Williams must have come to Philadelphia 
after the leaven of reform had begun to work, 
or perhaps he has not had much experience of 
our public offices; otherwise he would never 
have suggested that “many a reformer’s views” 
would be modified by the better treatment ac¬ 
corded to plain citizens by officials holding of¬ 
fice under the spoils system than by those un¬ 
der the merit system. The condition of near¬ 
ly all the city and county offices prior to the 
spasm of virtue which attacked the citizens of 
Philadelphia early in the eighties is a suffi¬ 
cient refutation of his entire argument. The 
reforms then instituted have not as yet en¬ 
tirely lost their good effect, but as they failed 
to go to the root of the matter by putting these 
offices on a business-like footing, that is by es¬ 
tablishing the merit system, we are gradually 
drifting back to our old evil condition. As 
evidence to this effect I inclose the following 
letter to the Public Ledger of this city, the au¬ 
thorship unknown to me, which I read in that 
paper a few days after reading Mr. Williams’s 
communication to you: 

“insolence of office.” 

To the Editor of the Public Ledger : 

I had occasion to call at the prothonotary’s 
office to-day to take out first papers. In an¬ 
swer to usual questions from a clerk who tem¬ 
porarily occupied the place of Mr. Smith, the 
gentleman in charge of the department, I told 
him my name and that I was a native of Ire¬ 
land. He immediately called out to the other 
clerks, “Here’s another from Ireland, Charlie; 
blow him in,” etc. He imitated what I pre¬ 
sume he meant to be Irish brogue, and his 
manner was altogether offensive and insulting. 
The gentleman who accompanied me, a native 
of this country and a republican in politics, 
expressed his astonishment that a clerk in a 
public office should treat any one going there 
on business in such an outrageous way. I do 
not know why any discrimination should be 
made in the case of “natives of Ireland.” Cer¬ 
tainly it is not the intention of the govern¬ 
ment that they should be gratuitously insult¬ 
ed. W. F. McP. 

October 23, 1894. 

R. Francis Wood. 

Philadelphia, November 14,1894. 









The Civil service chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering of the 
sliip of state.— From Archbishop Ireland’s address: The Duty and Value oj Patriotism^ before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II, No. 23. INDIANAPOLIS, JANUARY, 1895. terms 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


It is not to the credit of Governor Mat¬ 
thews that in his long message to the gen¬ 
eral assembly of Indiana the other day he 
found no room to advocate the abolition 
of the spoils system in Indiana. Political¬ 
ly he displayed a surprising lack of per¬ 
spicacity. His message is a voluminous 
statement of the commonplace matters of 
the state. But a statesman is a leader. 
He sees the coming tide and takes advan¬ 
tage of it. The rising tide now is for the 
abolition of Tammany methods, but Gov¬ 
ernor Matthews seems not to have seen it. 


The republicans in this state are still 
keeping up some show of talk about bi¬ 
partisan boards for the public institutions 
as though it were a great reform. It is 
not a reform at all. The Tammany police 
board of New York has two republicans 
and two democrats, and Platt wants to 
keep it so because he likes Tam many ism, 
and this in the face of nearly all of the peo¬ 
ple in the city of New York. The repub¬ 
licans of Indiana should not copy Plattism. 
If they have been honest all these years, 
they will pass a civil service law. 


The law of the state puts the election of 
the state librarian in the general assembly. 
It would be difficult to find a more stupid 
method. Some seventy persons tried to 
get the place. To send them before a 
board where they might compete for the 
place would be so simple and efiective and 
just that not to do it is per se venal. As it 
was, days of time were taken up in strife, 
and when the nomination by the majority 
party came on not the slightest attention 
was paid or was pretended to be paid to 
securing the best qualified person among 
the applicants. The only one of them who 
was fitted by experience in library work 
and the only one who was in fact qualified 
for the position was the daughter of the 
late ex-Governor Baker. She lived, how¬ 
ever, in Marion county and therefore could 
not be given the place. The supporters of 
three other persons combined and selected 
one for the office upon the promise that 
she would make the other two her assist¬ 
ants. It is now said that she refuses to be 


bound by this promise. Could anything 
more belittle a great state than for its gen¬ 
eral assembly to be engaged in such work. 


Rev. G. a. Carstensen, rector of St. 
Paul’s in this city, at the Jackson dinner, 
January 8th, eulogized the late Thomas A. 
Hendricks. He said that the latter be¬ 
lieved “ that reforms were to be accom¬ 
plished by parties and not by individuals; 
least of all by individuals assuming to be 
better than their party. He was in the 
best sense a practical politician. He never 
went wool-gathering in a mugwump 
Utopia.” Mr. Hendricks was certainly not 
a mugwump. He was always in favor of 
any amount of reform in the abstract, but 
of concrete reform his record is bare. It 
is true also, that he did not take to indi¬ 
vidual reformers of any kind whether they 
assumed to better than their party or not. 
Mr. Carstensen might also have added that 
the bond of friendship and admiration be¬ 
tween Mr. Hendricks and Tammany Hall 
was strong and mutual, and never shaken 
by any circumstance of any nature. He 
was the most polished and gentlemanly of 
those Indiana democratic leaders who 
have made this state a by-word through¬ 
out the country. Their party made no 
progress until it began to get from under 
their influence. 


Andrew Jackson rendered great mili¬ 
tary services to his country, and on this 
account his name is illustrious. But as 
President he did a wrong which can not 
be adequately set out in words. Yet it is 
not for his military services that demo¬ 
crats every year on the 8th of January 
meet together and celebrate his memory. 
Not one democrat in ten thousand if he 
told the truth would give any other reason 
than that Jackson “ was a good sound hick¬ 
ory democrat, who took in the boys with 
cold toes.” This statement of the case will 
stir the affirmative enthusiasm of every 
“Jacksonian democrat ” who reads it. At 
all such meetings we should therefore nat¬ 
urally expect sounding brass and we get 
it. “ The democratic party is the party of 
the constitution, the party of Jefierson, 
Madison and Jackson. The party that is 
destined to live as long as this government 
shall indure” (sic), said Minister Isaac P. 
Gray, at the Jackson dinner. “ Whatever 
is good and grand and true in the progress 


of the United States is due to the demo¬ 
cratic party and to her alone,” said Charles 
Duffin. “ I challenge contradiction when I 
affirm that a democrat is a man who is an 
adherent or advocate of democracy,” said 
W. R. Myers. “Our patron saint, Andrew 
Jackson, naturally comes first, and may 
it never be wholly forgotten that he origin¬ 
ated the phrase now sometimes tabooed, 
yet not altogether unwholesome, that ‘to 
the victors belong the spoils,’ ” said ex- 
Governor James E. Campbell, the Ohio 
spoilsman. 

The only man at the dinner who dis¬ 
played any political grasp of the times was 
Charles L. Jewett. Party wreck and ruin 
has had its efiect upon him. No one can 
read the history of this country for thirty 
years preceding the rebellion, without 
realizing that in spite of the bank, the 
tariff'and the dozen other questions which 
were crowded to the front, the one 
question which was making history and 
was destroying and undermining parties, 
was the question of slavery. And as we 
have often said, in spite of the currency 
and the tariff and the dozen other ques¬ 
tions which are crowded to the front, the 
one question which is now making history 
is the [question of spoils in public office 
and business; it is the question of Tam¬ 
many methods, not in any one locality but 
everywhere wherever there are public of¬ 
fices and wherever there is public busi¬ 
ness—town, city, county, state or nation¬ 
al. Mr. Jewett recognized this, and as we 
show by his remarks, printed elsewhere, 
cried out in bitterness of soul that he 
repented. 


The civil service commission in its last 
report gave high praise to Postmaster 
Sahm of this city. The Chronicle is glad 
to be able to add something more. The 
supreme test of the competitive system 
has always been known to be the question 
whether competitors of opposite politics 
from the appointing officer would be 
cheated out of their rights, when they 
reached the top of the eligible list. In the 
face of serious obstacles, the principle of 
fair play has constantly asserted itself and 
has had its effect upon the appointing offi¬ 
cers. We believe the question is settled 
finally in the Indianapolis post-office. Mr. 
Sahm is a democrat, but republican after 
republican comes to the top of the list and 




















190 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


receives his appointment because he has 
won it by fair competition, and without 
any regard to his politics or to the politics 
of the other two men who are certified 
with him. 


It may be hoped that the last post-oflBce 
contest under the spoils system in this 
state has recently been enacted at Mun- 
cie. The last presidential postmaster has 
been removed and the customary broils 
and intrigue have been rending the party 
at Muncie and at Washington. The sena¬ 
tors had selected Editor McKillip, of the 
Herald, but the elections of last November 
have not left them with suflBcient vitality 
to contest with their former autocratic 
spirit post-ofl5ce patronage and they yield¬ 
ed with a great show of respect for democ¬ 
racy to a vote of the democratic patrons 
of the office who selected Edward Tuhey. 
Editor McKillip protested against an elec¬ 
tion and one Kirkwood went on to Wash¬ 
ington and claimed that Tuhey’s election 
was secured by fraud; nevertheless he was 
appointed. The curtain now drops in In¬ 
diana over three years of demoralizing 
post-office brawls. When it next rises, we 
believe, the state will be divided into 
postal districts and the postmasters will be 
selected solely with a view to an efficient 
public service and they will not be the 
watch-dogs or the henchmen of Indiana 
congressmen. 

When the democrats were in control 
of this city, they had for inspector of sweep¬ 
ing and sprinkling one of those life office¬ 
holders who believe in rotation in office 
provided the rotation is from one office to 
another, and they paid him $100 a month. 
Then came the reform administration of 
Mayor Denny, and in pursuance of its pro¬ 
fessions, the pay of this office was reduced 
to $60 a month, which considering the work 
to be performed is enough. The new board 
of public works then appointed a republi¬ 
can rotator, and dated his appointment 
back of the reducing ordinance and gave 
him $100 a month. Perhaps most any¬ 
thing may be expected from an adminis¬ 
tration which permits a blackmailing po¬ 
litical assessment upon its employes upon 
the publicly stated theory that they should 
pay for their places and where the mayor 
publicly declares that he sees nothing 
wrong in the transaction. 


January 4 the President made another 
extension of the civil service rules by an 
order which includes 122 superintendents 
of carrier stations. These stations are sub- 
post-offices in large cities and in fact 122 
large post-offices have been withdrawn 
from the field of politics and placed upon 
principles which govern the ordinary busi¬ 
ness of the world. The change is of great 


importance. One of the hardest struggles 
the civil service law has had has been in 
the injustice of picking up politicians from 
the street and placing them over large 
numbers of men, each of much wider ex¬ 
perience and nearly all more capable of 
filling the place than the new appointee. 
Added to this has been the smart trick¬ 
ery which many new appointees felt it 
their duty to attempt. It should never be 
forgotten that this same reason applies 
not alone to sub-stations but to all post¬ 
masters throughout the country. They 
should not be mere local politicians but 
members of a permanent, highly-skilled 
service subject to transfer, promotion, dis¬ 
cipline or dismissal without any regard to 
politics. 

The Buflalo Express is very much in 
point when it says that since the first state 
civil service commission appointed by 
Governor Cleveland, there has never been 
one which when appointed believed in the 
reform. Several have been converted by 
proximity to the work of the merit sys¬ 
tem, but the Express goes on to say, “the 
custom has been for a governor to get rid 
of a commission as soon as it developed a 
desire to enforce the law, and again to put 
the reform out to nurse with its enemies.” 

Not only friends of the merit system liv¬ 
ing in new York but all over the country 
feel an anxiety over the action of Govern¬ 
or Morton with regard to the commission. 
There ought to be a clean and prompt 
sweeping out of the present members. 
They have shown apathy and feebleness 
for doing all proper work, but great alac¬ 
rity in assisting Governor Flower to make 
the law no hindrance to spoils and spoils¬ 
men. There are disquieting reports that 
Governor Morton will retain the Water- 
town editor because he is a fellow-towns¬ 
man of the late governor. It was Editor 
McKinstry who, in the recent investiga¬ 
tion of the operations of the New York 
civil service commission, showed his unfit¬ 
ness in the following testimony: 

I have never made a careful study of the civil 
service rules. I have always acted on the belief 
that the commission was subordinate to the govern¬ 
or. I do not know why, in our report to the legis¬ 
lature, the designations showing what positions 
were in the competitive and other schedules were 
omitted. 

It is also rumored that Morton will fill 
out the commission by appointing W. A. 
Cobb, editor of the Lockport Journal, a 
man who has only been heard of in parti¬ 
san politics, and E. L. Adams, editor of the 
Elmira Advertiser, who is backed by J. 
Sloat Fasset. Since the above was written 
Cobb, described as the only Platt editor 
west of Rochester, has been appointed, and 
the New York Civil Service Association is 
protesting at Albany. 

Charles A. Schieren, mayor of Brook¬ 


lyn, in a speech before the Union League 
club of Chicago, on January 8, declared 
that Brooklyn was the first city to eflect a 
radical change and smash its ring of cor¬ 
rupt politicians, and he declared as the 
first necessity that absolute civil service 
reform in its most rigid form was the 
prime requisite. Another important mat¬ 
ter was the absolute divorce of politics 
from the police and fire departments. 

Such explicit and straightforward recog¬ 
nition that the spoils system must be 
crushed before we can advance any in the 
solution of municipal questions, is what 
we want, and it is within a comparatively 
recent time that this vital necessity has 
been widely recognized. How a city be¬ 
comes debauched when from top to bottom 
spoils control, is well illustrated by the 
following from a Chicago paper, deploring 
the recent attempt to suppress gambling 
in that city: 

“ Probably as many as 10,000 persons in the city 
—men, women and children—were dependent on 
the gambling ‘business.’ In each of the resorts a 
considerable number of men were employed as at¬ 
tendants, watchmen, operators, ‘cappers,’ ‘plug- 
gers,’and so forth. Many of these drew regular 
w'ages and supported their families out of the 
money they took in. All of this class, besides the 
professionals, are thrown out of work.” 

The Union League club has at hand a 
considerable work, and it is satisfactory to 
see that it recognizes its responsibility 
when it asks the views of men like Mayor 
Schieren. 


The governor of New York has named 5 
George W. Aldridge superintendent of I 
public works. About all is known that \ 
need be in the one fact that he is a Platt ■ 
man. The Erie canal has for years been I 
one of the powerful instruments for build- < 
ing up a political machine. Large patron- 1 
age is involved, and from Albany to Buf- \ 
falo it aflords a chance to distribute every g 
few miles nuclei of “workers.” Mr. Al- ft 
dridge is reputed to have said that he will ft 
“make the canal republican from the lock- Z 
tenders up.” Thus Mr. Platt endeavors to m 
hold together his machine. To be sure S 
the constitutional amendment adopted in A 
New York will put the canal employes A 
under the merit system. But with the fl 
usual civil service commission appointed y 
in New York City and in the state, Tam- ^ 
many and Hill and Flower have found the 
law rather an agreeable diversion; so may fl 
Platt now. All these matters are not of IQ 
local interest. They are of vital concern £ 

to the whole country. lH 

—T ii 

Secretary Morton is complaining that -W 

foreign governments have spies watching 
his meat inspectors in this country. We 
do not know of anything that would be 
productive of more good. When Mr. 5 
Morton turns over meat inspectorships to 
be filled by such men as Congressman 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


191 


Bynum, with teamsters, shoemakers and 
other electioneering agents, he need not 
expect any one to have any confidence 
in their work. Every lesson of this kind 
which teaches “practical politicians” that 
the foreign trade does not want democratic 
meat or republican meat, but wholesome 
meat, is of great benefit. 

Late years have afforded many instances 
of parties coming triumphantly into power 
and then proceeding by a series of con¬ 
ceited blunders to destroy their majority. 
The republican party in New York is al¬ 
ready well along in the process of wearing 
down its 150,000 majority. Of course that 
majority was in a large measure due to the 
absolute necessity of defeating Hill, but 
along with that always went the hope that 
Hillism was not to be succeeded by Platt- 
ism. That hope does not appear to have 
been well founded. Governor Morton has 
appointed Aldridge, of Rochester, to be 
superintendent of public works, a posi¬ 
tion which if corruptly used may prosti¬ 
tute a large number of public offices and 
places into “patronage.” Aldridge goes to 
New York and “sees Platt” and then de¬ 
clares that “the canals shall be republican 
from the lock tenders up.” The state civil 
service commissioners under Flower let 
the law go to the dogs; but Morton, in¬ 
stead of appointing commissioners who 
understand the law and want to see it 
enforced, seems likely to retain one of 
Flower’s men and has chosen a Lockport 
editor, who is simply a politician, for an¬ 
other place on the board, and everything 
looks to a continuation of Flower methods. 
The assembly elected Ham Fish speaker, 
and he thereupon immediately took a trip 
to New York and “saw Platt,” and brazen¬ 
ly confessed that it was for the purpose of 
getting Platt’s opinion about his commit¬ 
tees. Platt is a man who lives up in the 
center of the state and is in the express busi¬ 
ness in New York. He has no public office 
of any kind yet at present he controls the 
government of the state of New York, both 
executive and legislative, as surely and as 
effectively as the czar controls Russia. He 
accomplishes it all by means of a political 
machine which he keeps in working order 
by the distribution of spoil. This is not 
free government; it is the most odious 
form of despotism. It was hoped that the 
republicans of New Y'ork had learned that 
this kind of government was coming to an 
end in this country; but it seems not. The 
people of New York will next have to deal 
with Plattism at the polls. If the republi¬ 
cans behind their 150,000 majority think 
they are safe no matter what they do they 
will find that they are mistaken. 


Every day brings further corroboration 
of the triumph of Plattism. The New York 


Evening Post, oi January 16th, gives the fol¬ 
lowing; 

It is clearly the purpose of Mr. Platt to give 
the people of this city opportunity to decide 
whether or not they desire to have him for 
their ruler. He ostentatiously took charge of 
the legislature yesterday as boss, going to Al¬ 
bany in company with Governor Morton, and 
quite publicly assuming the right to direct 
the course of the republican majority in leg¬ 
islation affecting this city. He held a confer¬ 
ence with the Lexow committee and in¬ 
structed them as to the report which they 
should present. He granted audiences to the 
members of the legislature and to the report¬ 
ers, and openly declared his wishes and inten¬ 
tions as to pending and proposed legislative 
measures. “What do you think of Dr. Park- 
hurst’s plan for a single-headed police com¬ 
mission?” asked a legislator. “I don’t think 
we are quite ready yet for a revolution,” re¬ 
plied the boss. “Then the board of four mem¬ 
bers is to remain as it is?” said the inquirer. 
“Yes, if we are going to haxe any police legislation 
this winter," said the boss. 

No one pretends that Platt represents 
the people in this impudent assumption of 
authority. He does not represent one in 
ten thousand of the people; as stated else¬ 
where, he simply controls a political ma¬ 
chine made up of henchmen whom he 
pays out of the public treasury by assign¬ 
ing offices or by other means of profit. 
Through this machine he controls conven¬ 
tions and nominations, and in this manner 
gets a senile tool like Morton at the head 
of the ticket. It was a great victory to 
sweep out Hillism; it will be equally great 
to sweep out Plattism. The people of New 
York will hardly submit tamely; their po¬ 
litical morality is not so low that it is ex¬ 
hausted by a single struggle. 


MR. CARDWILL’S CIVIL SERVICE 
BILL. 

We favor a thorough and honest enforcement of 
the civil service law and the extension of its prin¬ 
ciples to the state administration wherever it can 
be made practical, to the end that the corruption 
and flagrant abuses that exist in the mismanage¬ 
ment of our public Institutions may be done away 
with, and they be liberated from partisan control.— 
Indiana Slate Republican Platform, 1SS6. 

There are some questions that ought not to divide 
parties but upon which all good men ought to 
agree. I speak of only one: the great benevolent 
institutions—the fruit of our Christian civilization, 
endowed by the bounty of the state, maintained by 
public taxes, and Intended for the care and educa¬ 
tion of the disabled classes of our community- 
ought to be lifted above all party Influence, benefit 
or control. [Cheers.] I believe you can do nothing 
that will more greatly enhance the estimation in 
which the state of Indianais held by her sister states 
than to see to it that a suitable, well-regulated and 
strict civil service is provided for the adminstra- 
tiou of the benevolent and penal institutions of 
the state of Indiana.—Gettcrof Harrison at Danville, 
July, ms. 


In 1885, bill introduced by Mr. Foulke, in the 
upper house and every republican voted for it. 

In 1887, bill introduced by Mr. Griffiths in the 
lower house and every republican voted for It. 


In 1891, bill introduced by Mr. Magee in the up¬ 
per house and every republican voted for it. 


A COMPREHENSIVE civil service bill,which 
is printed elsewhere, has been introduced 
into the house by Representative George 
B. Cardwill, of New Albany. The bill 
provides for three commissioners who are 
to serve without pay. It applies the merit 
system of competitive examination, open 
to all, to the state service. It also requires the 
adoption of the labor service system which 
has been found in the federal navy yards 
and in Massachusetts to effectively exclude 
politics in the employment of unskilled 
labor. Any city may place the whole or 
any part of its service under the law by a 
vote of its common council and a like step 
may be taken by the county commissioners 
and trustees of towns. The bill embodies 
the ideas which in practice have for years 
been found to work best. The republican 
party in Indiana has now an opportunity to 
keep the promises which for so many 
years it has been making. The subject is 
no longer visionary. Over and over again 
the merit and labor service systems have 
proved their absolute superiority over all 
other methods of distributing public em¬ 
ployment; this is no longer argued, it is 
admitted on every hand. The man who 
sneered at “snivil service reform” is silent. 
The man who claimed that the examina¬ 
tion was upon the height of the mountains 
of the moon, although there never was 
such an examination, no longer finds a 
listener. In Indiana it is simply reduced to 
the question whether the republican party 
leaders, including the Indianapolis Journal, 
Ex-President Harrison and Charles W. 
Fairbanks, who is anxious to become a 
United States senator, and others, are 
going to let the republican party keep its 
promises. So far we have looked in vain 
for any indication from them that the 
party ever made any promises of this 
nature. 


SCHOOL COMMENCEMENTS AND 
CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 

School Commissioner Charles C. Wehrum, to 
whom Tammany Hall through Mayor Gilroy yes¬ 
terday refused a reappointment, was one of the old¬ 
est and well known to be one of the most useful 
members of the board. Having retired with a for¬ 
tune from business, Mr. Wehrum found in the 
schools the chief field of his interest and activ¬ 
ity. No other member of the board was so free, 
and none more anxious, to give his thought and 
time to the service of the city’s educational sys¬ 
tem. There was not a public school in the 
whole city which he had not visited and extended 
his personal interest to, something, it is said, which 
no other commissioner has ever done. During the 
summers, when most men of leisure and means 
leave the city and its institutions to take care of 
themselves, Mr. Wehrum has looked after the ex¬ 
tensive repairs to the school-houses which are 
made at that time. 

The reasons for not reappointing Jfr. Wehrum are 
perfectly patent. Tammany Hall wants all it can 
get during its brief remainder of power. It wants 
the presidency of the board for the ensuing year, 
and the division in the board between Tammany 
and its enemies is uncomfortably close. One or 















192 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


two of the commissioners last appointed as friends 
of Tammany Hall have shown some signs of revolt. 
Mr. Wehrum had to make way, therefore, for a 
commissioner whose vote can he better counted 
upon to re-elect Mr. Knox. Mr. Wehrum opposed 
Mr. Knox’s candidacy at the last election and voted 
against him. A third reason for the latter’s “turn¬ 
ing down’’ no doubt is that he was too vigilant and 
interested, kept himself too well informed of all 
that was going on throughout the school system 
and was at the same time independent, honest and 
incorruptible. 

The above, from the New York Evening Post, 
is only a single instance of the baleful in¬ 
fluence of spoils upon the public schools of 
New York. Incompetent teachers given po¬ 
sitions because they are the dependents of 
henchmen, incompetents retained in the face 
of facts for the same reason, and the paralyzing 
influence upon good work of insecure tenure 
where there is no political pull, thousands of 
children running in the streets of New York 
because there are insufficient accommodations, 
school buildings dark and foul with the 
stenches of garbage and bad plumbing—these 
are only a few of the wretched conditions 
springing out of the spoils system. And while 
New York may be the most wretched instance 
of the results of the spoils system, there are 
many other cities almost as bad and there are 
few public schools in the towns or the villages 
of this country where upon close inspection 
the trail of the spoils serpent may not be dis¬ 
covered. 

For nearly twenty years we have watched 
at the commencement season the subjects of 
the graduating speeches and essays. Teachers 
belong tc the thoughtful class. They wield a 
a great moral influence. They are supposed 
to understand the value and necessity of pa¬ 
triotism and courage in dealing with pub¬ 
lic questions in this country. Certainly dur¬ 
ing this time influential papers like the New 
York Nation, the Evening Post, the New York 
Times, have spoken in season and out that the 
system must be destroyed or the country could 
not survive. Some of the greatest men have 
protested against the long train of evils inher¬ 
ent in this system. But the boys and the girls, 
the young men and the young women, have 
to the slightest extent only been influenced to 
examine and write of a system at their very 
doors, if we may judge from these commence¬ 
ment subjects. That is probably the reason. 
The way that spoils have come to be inter¬ 
woven with the decent life of a town has made 
cowards of teachers and others who felt that 
by its intrigue and malice it would be only 
too easy a matter to take away their own 
bread and butter. 

But now that the politicians through bitter 
experience are shouting from the house tops 
and even at Jacksonian banquets that the 
spoils must, as a matter of good policy, be 
taken away from a political party, let the 
teachers over the country take courage and 
start the young people in the schools to an 
examination of the system. Particularly let 
them be encouraged to make a study of the 
effects of spoils in the schools of the many 
cities of the country. May we not hear 
fewer biographies of old Greek and Roman 


and middle-age heroes and more studies of 
living bosses. Let us hear less of patriotism 
in the abstract and more of the moral and 
material benefits that would result from the 
abolition of spoils in municipal affairs. Let 
us get a spirit in the youth of this country 
that would cause the callow demagogue who 
in this day and age pronounces the senti¬ 
ment, “to the victor belongs the spoils,” to be 
hissed down—of course in a gentlemanly and 
decorous manner. 

PHILADELPHIA BOSSES AND 
SPOILS. 

We have read that Philadelphia’s moral 
sense has been shocked by the nude in art and 
by Trilby. But when it comes to those pecu¬ 
liar and intricate relations between business 
and politics, it has a moral digestion as all- 
embracing as the digestion of the ostrich is 
reputed to be. Mr. Herbert Welsh, whose 
heart has not yet failed after many efforts to in¬ 
duce his fellow-citizens to forget partisanship 
and to trample down bosses and spoils, said 
recently, in a public address in Minneapolis: 

AVe of Philadelphia, where nearly the entire 
press of the city is either in open alliance or covert 
sympathy with the machine and the evil inflnences 
that cluster about it, are at present greatly hin¬ 
dered in our efforts to reach the ear of the public. 
AVe have no organ through which we can utter 
facts and arguments that we wish to lay before the 
voters. 

Then he went home to do what he could to 
assist those who were trying to beat Quay’s 
candidate for the nomination for mayor. Dave 
Martin, of whom the Chronicle readers may 
refresh their memories by consulting the 
index of its first volume, is the power to whom 
the committee of ninety-five made a vain 
protest against this nomination. The mayor 
has great power in Philadelphia. He ap¬ 
points the head of the police department and 
the head of the public works department. 
The New York Times, in its issue of January 
9, says, if Penrose, Quay’s candidate, should 
be nominated: 

Politicians who are ambitious to trade away 
public places for personal advancement will be 
equally glad. Corporations which own the city 
councils now, and only need to own the mayor to 
have such a grasp upon the city that they may be 
fairly said to own that, will expect to see their 
stocks advanced if Penrose is nominated. It is 
the common expectation that the councils will 
give the traction company, by the passage of a new 
ordinance, the ninty-odd miles of streets in the 
suburban districts, and that Mr. Penrose will help 
italong by allowing the ordinance to become a law. 
The members of council who are members of the 
electric lighting companies, or have established re¬ 
lations with these companies, or who are members 
of private firms which sell the city large quanti¬ 
ties of gas, under diretions from councils, will also 
he glad. 

But now arises that curious Philadelphia 
press, moved by secret and unknown springs, 
when a boss is almost brought to his knees. 
The Times (democratic), in its issue of Jan¬ 
uary 8th, forgets all partisanship and nobly 
rushes in to defend the man whom Quay and 
Dave Martin want to nominate. 

“It was not the churches, nor was it the moral 
sentiment of the community that started the op¬ 


position to Senator Penrose. It came from the 
jobbers, the contractors, the slums of political 
strife, and in the sensitive condition of the public 
mind carefully-invented scandals were welcomed 
by many good citizens without inquiring thesource 
from whence they came. There has not been an 
assault upon the character of Senator Penrose that 
was not invented and systematically diffused by 
the worst political elements of the city. AVhen they 
were presented to the public, every reputable 
newspaper of this city carefully Investigated them g 
and found them to be unwarranted.’’ 

And the Times added in conclusion: “AVe have 
but one purpose, hut one interest, but one desire, 
and that is to secure the most upright, the most 
capable and the most courageous man within the i 

range of selection for the office of mayor of Phil- 1 

adelphia. That man is Senator Boies Penrose.’’ 1 

The Buffalo Express's pertinent comments j 

is— 3 

“That is a pretty strong indorsement to come from j 
the enemy, and the remarkable fact about it is that j 
it is many times stronger than any indorsement ” 
given to him by any of the papers of his own party.’’ 

It is usually best not to interfere with any 
nomination a boss wants to make. The moral 
effect of a defeat at the polls is much greater 
than a caucus defeat. If Quay decides to fol¬ 
low the advice of the Philadelphia Times, 
and nominate that most “upright,” “capable,” i 

and “courageous” man, Penrose, a greater vic¬ 
tory can be won over him by Mr. Welsh and 
the reformers at the polls. If Quay is as as- ’ 
tute as he is reputed to be, he will break the 
force of the reform movement by nominating j 
one of those most respectable dummies—the 
helpless tool of bosses, high and low—that is i 
always at hand. 

Since the above was written, Dave Martin 
has defied Quay and refused to nominate 
Quay’s man. It is said that Chris Magee, 
who has before met Quay, and has been de- ! 
feated, is behind Martin. And now it stands 
that the reformers have made it possible to | 
defeat Quay’s candidate, and his rebelling w 
henchman has nominated a man who, the ij 
New York Times says, 11 

“Has been for much of his life an office holder, f* 
more or less in touch with the men who were re¬ 
buked yesterday, though not of them. AVe have 
had such mayors in New York, and they have not 
been reforming or satisfactory mayors. The com¬ 
mittee of ninety-five have confidence enough 
in Mr. AA’arwick to refrain from opposing him. 

They will accept and support him—some of them 
probably with misgivings.’’ 


A PRACTICAL POLITICIAN WHO 
HAS HAD ENOUGH. 

[From the speech of Charles L. Jewett at the 
Jackson dinner, January 8, 1895.] 

Never in the history of the party might one 
more truly say that he was proud to be a demo¬ 
crat than during the campaign that has just 
closed. Then, why these disasters? You know 
me for a partisan, one who has ever been an 
unyielding, zealous, blind partisan. While 
neither wanting nor seeking federal office my¬ 
self, my keenest wish has been to see every 
post of honor and profit in all these states 
filled by a sound, earnest, deserving democrat. 
And you are also partisans. After all the 
years of toil, privation and defeat through 
which we marched to our first real victory 
in 1884, what words were so sweet to our ears 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


193 


as those attributed to the great Marcy, “To 
the victors belong the spoils.” And did we 
not, when we entered upon the cares of gov¬ 
ernment, frequently declare as a profound po¬ 
litical truth that the party charged with the 
responsibility of the government ought to have 
all the power? Was not much grandiloquent 
talk indulged about “the boys in the trenches” 
and all that sort of thing, by which was 
simply meant that when our man secured the 
presidency the offices and public employes 
should all be vacated by our opponents, and 
we, the true believers, the salt of the earth, at 
once enjoy all the contents of all the flesh pots? 
It is a beautiful theory. I held to it a long 
time, and it hurt my pride greatly to find it 
hollow, but the fact is this very fine theory 
has proved horribly disappointing in practice. 
Now, every man will admit, who is willing to 
admit the truth, that party patronage under 
existing conditions and as now distributed is 
a fatal source of party weakness. Its mere 
possession is a handicap, and its exercise in¬ 
vites disaster. Witness the result of the ef¬ 
fort to enact democratic policies into laws 
during the last eighteen months. Observe how 
united a party, assembled at Washington, 
soon after the last inauguration, and pro¬ 
ceeded to redeem one of the pledges upon 
which the election had been won by the re¬ 
peal of a financial monstrosity called the 
Sherman act. And then note the hatred, jeal¬ 
ousies and heart-burnings, which a year later 
resulted in the President being openly at¬ 
tacked on the floor of the senate, divided our 
leaders into factions, filled our newspapers 
with bold and bitter criticism of those in au¬ 
thority and brought anger and sorrow to the 
great mass of democratic voters everywhere. 
The cause of this is not to be found in any 
change of principle. It is not because of any 
change of men. Why were great senators 
exiled from the White House, and why did 
they, in turn, desert and baffle democratic 
measures and confuse and dishearten demo¬ 
crats everywhere? Simply because of the dis¬ 
appointments, jealousies and hatreds, arising 
out of the distribution of the party patronage. 
Instances might be multiplied, but what need 
to prove that there is no party advantage to 
be gained from a system so wretched that it 
drove the accomplished Conkling from the 
senate and sent the murdered Garfield to his 
bloody grave. 

Let us see about the other false pretense 
by which the managers of the spoils system 
have pulled the wool over people’s eyes. How 
about the “ boys in the trenches?” How about 
those “victors” that demagogues glibly declare 
shall receive the spoils? Of all political lies 
and shams this is the meanest. It may well 
be denounced as a contemptible cheat, a con¬ 
fidence game which has been played on the 
masses of both parties until the limit of pa¬ 
tience has been reached. The spoils do not 
go to the “victors,” if by that term you intend 
to designate the great mass of working, earn¬ 
est, worthy, modest democrats. On the con¬ 
trary, these places are, as a rule, given to the 


crafty, the persistent, the brazen ; to depend¬ 
ents and incapables. With some honorable 
exceptions, men elected to congress by the 
dominant party act as if the simple fact of their 
elevation to the office of senator or representa¬ 
tive gives them the absolute right to bestow 
all other places. And they proceed to do so, 
but how? Do they seek out the capable, 
worthy, deserving, working democrats ? By 
no means. One cl ass of these thrifty politicians 
fill these places with their favorites, relatives 
and flatterers. Another class bestows the 
places on such as have a “pull,” such as have 
exercised or may have influence in precinct, 
county or congressional conventions. 

All these office brokers agree to one thing, 
and that is that public office is a private per¬ 
quisite. If you complain they whisper to you 
in great confidence that the President is act¬ 
ing very badly toward the party. If you seek 
an appointment, and can get the proper assist¬ 
ance from the great man who represents your 
district or state in one of the halls of congress, 
you will succeed, no matter how little you de¬ 
serve from the party. On the other hand, if 
after years of faithful, earnest, modest work 
for the party you seek a place, you may as 
well throw your party service to the winds, for 
you must succeed by other methods. You 
must find favor in the eye of your master, this 
congressional middle man, or you will surely 
fail, no matter how long you have been getting 
cold and wet doingduty with the other “boys 
in the trenches.” True, under this system it 
sometimes happens that an office is worthily 
bestowed. There have been admirable ap¬ 
pointments made in our own state, but in the 
great'majority of cases the most deserving ap¬ 
plicant did not succeed, and some of the ap¬ 
pointments are bad. Since then there is 
neither party strength nor justice to the indi¬ 
vidual in this system, ought the party and the 
President to longer endure its evil and odium? 
The position of President does greatly suf¬ 
fer in strength and dignity from the vexations 
incident to the struggle of rival politicians 
from the loss of support to his policy and ad¬ 
ministration, and from the scandalous clamor 
and abuse of the disappointed and vindictive. 
Few men have endured more in this regard 
than the great American who is now President 
of the United States and through no fault of 

his. - 

SPOIL. 

A new congressman-elect in Ohio sent this 
dispatch to the fourth assistant postmaster- 
general : “Stop all appointments in this dis¬ 
trict until I can see you. I am elected.” 

* * * 

The department is in receipt of your com¬ 
munication of the 22d inst., requesting that a 
lot of flower and garden seeds be sent to you 
for distribution among the women of your 
county, in order to influence the result of the 
election to be held next month, in reply to 
which I would say that the appropriation 
for the purchase of seeds, made to this depart¬ 
ment by the government, was not intended for 
any such purpose. To act upon your suggestions 


would be to violate law and public decency. 
The democratic party was placed in power by 
the people on the assumption that it would 
act honestly and justly toward all the people, 
irrespective of political or religious beliefs, 
and if one were to choose some method for the 
destruction of the democratic party, I do not 
think that he could devise a scheme which, if 
carried out in detail, would more efiectually 
do it than to listen to your suggestion.— Letter 
of Agricultural Department to a Candidate for 
Congress, Washington dispatch, New York Times, 
October 22. 

« ♦ » 

The new republican governor of Iowa has 
just given an example of civil service reform 
by removing the state librarian, Mrs. Mary 
Miller. Mrs. Miller is a republican, and was 
appointed to oflSce by Governor Martin. She 
performed her duties so acceptably that when 
Governor Boise came into oflice he retained her 
in her position. Now Governor Jackson re¬ 
moves her to make a place for the wife of a 
political friend who knows nothing whatever 
about library work.— Indianapolis Sentinel, 
May 16, 1894. 

* * * 

The collector of internal revenue for the 
district is Ben Johnson, a shrewd and able 
politician. Mr. Johnson is no mugwump, 
and announced, directly after his appoint¬ 
ment, that an ax wouldn’t be fast enough 
for him to cut oflP the heads of the republican 
office-holders in his district; he would use a 
guillotine. 

The day after President Cleveland promul¬ 
gated the order putting gaugers and store¬ 
keepers under the protection of the civil 
service laws, Mr. Johnson took the local news¬ 
papers into his confidence about his plan for 
evading the ruling. He said that as soon as 
he learned the rule would be promulgated he 
discharged all his men, then notified them if 
they would write him out their resignations, 
to take effect when he desired, he would re¬ 
appoint them. They did so. The story was 
published with his knowledge and consent.— 
Louisville {Ky.) dispatch Buffalo Express, Decem¬ 
ber 17. 

* * » 

Serious scandal has been disclosed in con¬ 
nection with the post-office at Stony Creek, east 
of this city. In last April, Richard Howd, a 
farmer, was made postmaster and has since 
been removed, though a remonstrance against 
his removal was extensively signed. Howd 
now claims that he gave by check a local politician 
f50for Representative Pigott to secure the appoint¬ 
ment, and that after it was obtained he was 
made drunk just at the time a postal inspector 
was brought to town, and as a result his suc¬ 
cessor was appointed. Representative Pigott 
denies absolutely that he was a party to the 
alleged conspiracy, and has asked the post- 
office department for an investigation.— New 
Haven dispatch, Netv York Evening Post, Jan¬ 
uary 12. 

^ ^ 

The Leader (rep.) here announces to-day as 
a new phase of the long and acrimonious fight 










194 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


over the New Haven collectorship of customs, 
that Representative Pigott has indorsed for 
the place H. H. Babcock, a , widely known 
Yale graduate living here. Mr. Pigott first 
indorsed James McGaun, who was rejected by 
President Cleveland because he was a saloon 
keeper. J. Rice Winchell, the present repub¬ 
lican collector, was asked by Secretary Car¬ 
lisle to resign before the expiration of his 
term, but has persistently refused .—New Ha¬ 
ven dispatch, New York Evening Post, November 9. 
* « » 

The President to-day appointed James F. 
Connelly, of New Jersey, collector of internal 
revenue for the fifth New Jersey district. Mr. 
Connelly teas appointed on Senator Smith’s indorse¬ 
ment. His appointment is the sixty-third ap¬ 
pointment of an internal revenue collector 
since the incoming of the Cleveland adminis¬ 
tration. All the collectors now are democrats .— 
Washington dispatch, Neiv York Times, Novem¬ 
ber 1. 

* * * 

First Assistant Postmaster General Jones 
and Civil Service Commissioner Roosevelt, 
who have been investigating the alleged viola¬ 
tions of the civil service law at the Lancaster 
post-office, ended their inquiry this afternoon. 
They found considerable conflicting testimony 
and they therefore decided to accept the situ¬ 
ation in the office as it is at present, with¬ 
drawing all charges. No employes in the future 
will be disturbed on account of their political affil¬ 
iations, and the postal and civil service laws will be 
strictly enforced. — Lancaster, Pa., dispatch, New 
York Times, August SI. 

^ * * * 

The agencies of the Pabst and Anheuser- 
Busch brewing companies at Terre Haute are 
making serious charges, in effect that the Terre 
Haute Brewing Company has a “pull” with 
the police, and that the police are warning 
saloon-keepers that if they do not handle 
Terre Haute beer their poker rooms will be 
raided. Fred Seidentopf, manager of the An¬ 
heuser-Busch agency, is very plain-spoken in 
these charges, he claiming that even the ill- 
resorts, which handle only bottled beer, and 
which have not even a government license 
warranting them to sell intoxicants to be drank 
on the premises, through fear of police inter¬ 
ference are barred from handling the St. Louis 
and Milwaukee products .—Indianapolis News, 
February 21. 

THE CARDWILL CIVIL SERVICE 
BILL. 

A Bill for an act to improve and regulate 
the employment of officers and persons in 
the service of the slate and of the several 
counties, cities, and towns thereof. 

Section 1. Beit enacted by the General Assem¬ 
bly of the State of Indiana, That the governor shall 
appoint, by and with the advice and consent of 
the senate, three persons to be commissioners 
of the civil service, who shall hold office for the 
term of four years from the date of commis¬ 
sion, and until their respective successors 
shall have been appointed andshall havequali- 
fied. All appointments, both original and to 
fill any vacancy which may occur in the of¬ 
fice of commissioner, shall be so made that at 
least one commissioner shall be appointed from 


each of the two political parties casting the 
highest number of votes at the last preceding 
general election. The governor shall have 
power to remove any commissioner for cause 
stated by him in writing. The commission¬ 
ers shall serve without pay except traveling 
and other expenses necessary to the discharge 
of their official duties. 

Sec. 2. It shall be the duty of said commis¬ 
sioners to prepare rules consistent with the 
provisions of this act, and adapted to carry 
out the purposes thereof, for the selection of 
officers and persons to be employed in the service 
of the state and of the several counties, cities, 
and towns thereof; and said commissioners 
shall supervise the administration of the rules 
so established. 

Sec. 3. The said commissioners shall ap¬ 
point a chief examiner, removable by them 
for cause stated in writing, who shall, under 
their direction, si/perintend any examination 
held under this act, and shall perform such 
other duties as they may prescribe. Such 
chief examiner shall receive a salary of 
$2,500 a year, and shall be paid his necessary 
traveling and other expenses incurred in the 
discharge of his official duty. They may also 
employ upon competitive examinations clerks 
and other assistants at a compensation to be 
fixed by them but not to exceed in all the sum of 
$2,000 per annum. Every examination held 
shall be attended by the chief examiner or by 
some person authorized to attend the same un¬ 
der the rules of the commission. And said com¬ 
missioners shall have power to make investiga¬ 
tions regarding all matters necessary to the 
efficient execution of this act, and to issue and 
serve subpoenas, administer oaths, and exam¬ 
ine witnesses, in all such investigations. The 
attendance of witnesses in such investigations 
shall be compelled when necessary, by order 
of the circuit court of the county in which 
said investigation is held, as in cases in said 
court. 

Sec. 4. The rules mentioned in section 2 of 
this act may be made from time to time, and 
they shall provide among other things: 

First. For the classification of the positions 
and employments to be filled. 

Second. For open and competitive examina¬ 
tions by which to test applicants touching 
their practical fitness to discharge the duties 
of the positions which they desire to fill. 

Third. For the selections of officers and per¬ 
sons for positions in said services in accord¬ 
ance with the results of said examinations. 

Fourth. For promotion on the basis of merit 
previously ascertained by competition. 

Fifth. For a period of probation before per¬ 
manent appointment or employment. 

Sixth. For reports to be given in writing by 
the appointing power to said commissioners of 
the person or persons appointed or employed, 
of rejections after probation, of transfers, 
resignations, suspensions and removals, and 
the dates thereof, and in the case of suspen¬ 
sion or removal, of the cause thereof. 

Seventh. For the transfer of officers and em¬ 
ployes from any position in the service of the 


state, or of any of the counties, cities or 
towns thereof, to any other position of the 
same grade in the service of the state, or of 
the county, city or town, in which such officers 
or persons may respectively be employed. 

Eighth. For determining the moral, and 
where necessary, the physical fitness of appli¬ 
cants for examination. 

Sec. 5. The said commissioners may ap¬ 
point, and in their discretion remove, local 
examiners in places where examinations are 
to be held, who shall serve without pay. 

Sec. 6. The said commissioners shall grade 
the competitors in the various examinations 
in the respective classes for which they are 
examined, make lists of the same accordingly, 
ranging from the highest downward, and shall 
re-arrange such lists after each examination- 
No name shall be retained in said lists longer 
than one year from the time of examination. 

Sec. 7. Within three months after this act 
shall take effect the said commissioners shall, 
for the purpose of the examination herein 
provided for, arrange in one or more classes 
the offices and places of employment under 
the state, within the scope of this act. And 
at the end of said three months no person 
shall be appointed or promoted to any such 
office or place so classified until he shall have 
passed an examination in conformity here¬ 
with. 

Sec. 8. The said commissioners, with the 
consent of the board of county commissioners, 
of any county in the state, shall, for the pur¬ 
pose of the examination herein provided for, 
arrange in one of more classes the whole or’ 
any part of the offices and places of employ¬ 
ment in the service of any such county, with¬ 
in the scope of this act. And after such classi¬ 
fication no person shall be appointed or ad¬ 
mitted or promoted to any such office until he 
shall have passed an examination in conform¬ 
ity therewith. 

Sec. 9. The said commissioners, with the 
consent of the common council of any city or 
of the board of trustees of any town in the 
state, shall, for the purposes of the exami¬ 
nation herein provided for, arrange in one 
or more classes the whole or any part of the 
offices and places of employment in the serv¬ 
ice of such city or town within the scope of 
this act. And after such classification no per¬ 
son shall he appointed or admitted or pro¬ 
moted to any such office or place so classified 
until he shall have passed an examination in 
conformity therewith. 

Sec. 10. Wherever an appointment is to be 
made in said classified service, the appointing 
power shall give notice of the same under the 
rules of the commissioners, and thereupon un¬ 
der said rules the three highest names from 
the corresponding list of examined persons, 
with their respective ratings, shall be certified 
to said appointing power, and one of said per¬ 
sons shall receive said appointment. If the 
appointment shall be given to any except to 
the person standing highest in the list the ap¬ 
pointing power shall file with the commission 
the reason why the highest was not chosen. 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


195 


Sec. 11. No question in any examination 
under the aforesaid rules shall relate to politi¬ 
cal opinions, and no appointment, suspension, 
or dismissal shall be affected by political rea¬ 
sons, influence, or affiliations. Examinations 
shall be practical and shall relate to matters 
which will fairly test the relative fitness of the 
applicants. The commissioners shall openly 
publish in all notices of examinations to be 
held that the competition is impartial to all, 
without regard to political opinions or affilia¬ 
tion. 

Sec. 12. No recommendation or statement 
concerning any person applying for office or 
place under this act, except as to the charac¬ 
ter of the applicant, shall be received or con¬ 
sidered by any person concerned in holding 
any examination or making any appointment 
under this act; and said recommendations or 
statements as to character shall be in writing. 

Sec. 13. Elective or judicial officers, heads 
of any benevolent, penal or corrective institu¬ 
tions or of any of the principal departments 
of the state, or of any of the several counties, 
cities or towns thereof, teachers of the public 
schools, the private secretary of the governor 
or of the mayor of any city, and laborers shall 
not be affected as to their election or selection 
by any rules made as aforesaid. 

Sec. 14. The said commissioners shall make 
a separate classification of the labor service 
under the state, and shall keep registers of de¬ 
serving applicants for places in said labor ser¬ 
vice, and shall make rules for determining 
what applicants are entitled to have their 
names entered upon such registers. Such 
rules should guard against political or 
other favoritism in securing entry of names 
upon said register; but for meritorious rea¬ 
sons, such as having families to support, or 
where special qualifications are required, they 
may provide for preference for employment 
among those registered ; otherwise laborers 
shall be employed in the order in which they 
stand on the respective registers. No laborer 
shall be discharged from said labor service for 
political reasons. The said commissioners 
shall in like manner classify the labor service 
of any county, city or town of the state with 
the consent of the board of commissioners of 
such county, or of the common council of such 
city, or of the trustees of such town. 

Sec. 15. All notices and reports required 
herein, all recommendations concerning char¬ 
acter, all lists of persons examined, with their 
respective ratings, all records of examinations, 
all examination papers, with the rating given 
to each answer marked thereon, and all rec¬ 
ords of said commissioners shall be open to 
public inspection. 

Sec. 16. All expenses necessary to carry out 
this act shall be certified by the civil service 
commissioners and shall be paid by the treas¬ 
urer of state upop an order from the auditor 
of state. 

Sec. 17. The said commissioners shall be 
provided, under the direction of the governor, 
with an office, properly furnished, heated and 
lighted, in the state house, suitable for the 


performance of the duties imposed by this 
act; and the county commissioners of coun¬ 
ties, and the mayors of cities, and trustees of 
towns, where examinations are to be held, 
shall provide suitable places for holding the 
same. 

Sec. 18. The said commissioners shall an¬ 
nually prepare and submit to the governor for 
transmission to the legislature, a report of all 
proceedings and expenses nnder this act, with 
their recommendations, for the printing of 
which report, for traveling expenses, and for 
stationery and necessary incidentals, they may 
incur an expense not exceeding $2,500. 

Sec. 19. The sum of $7,000 is hereby annu¬ 
ally appropriated out of any funds not other¬ 
wise appropriated for the payment of all ex¬ 
penses made necessary by this act. 

Sec. 20. No senator, representative, aider- 
man, councilman, town trustee, or any officer 
or employe of either of said bodies, and no 
executive or judicial officer of the state, and 
no clerk or employe of any department or 
branch of the government of the state, and no 
executive officer, clerk or employe of any de¬ 
partment of any county, city or town govern¬ 
ment, shall personally, directly or indirectly, 
solicit or receive, or be in any manner con¬ 
cerned in soliciting or receiving, any assess¬ 
ment, subscription or contribution for any 
political purpose whatever : but this shall not 
be construed to forbid such persons to be mem¬ 
bers of political organizations or committees. 

Sec. 21. No person shall, in any room or 
building occupied for the discharge of official 
duties by any officer or employe of the state, 
or any county, city or town thereof, solicit in 
any manner whatever, or receive any contri¬ 
bution of money or any other thing of value 
for any political purpose whatever. 

Sec. 22. No officer or employe of the state, 
or any county, city, or town thereof, shall dis¬ 
charge, or promote, or degrade, or in any man¬ 
ner change the official rank or compensation 
of any other officer or employe, or promise or 
threaten to do so, for giving or withholding or 
neglecting to give or withhold any contribu¬ 
tion of money or other valuable thing for any 
political purpose, nor for any other political 
reason whatever. 

Sec. 23. No person shall solicit or be con¬ 
cerned in soliciting any contribution for any 
political purpose from any officer or employe 
of the state or of any county, city, or town 
therein, nor shall any such officer or employe 
solicit any such contribution from any person 
whatever. 

Sec. 24. Whoever willfully violates or at¬ 
tempts to violate any of the provisions of this 
act or any of the rules lawfully established in 
pursuance thereof shall be deemed guilty of 
a misdemeanor and upon conviction shall be 
liable to a fine of not less than $100 nor more 
than $1,000, or to imprisonment of not less 
than six days nor more than two months. 

SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 

Of Secretary Smith’s recommendation that 
the civil service rules be extended to the sci¬ 


entific bureau of the interior department, the 
Chattanooga Times (dem.)says: “Let the good 
work proceed. Whatever else is happening 
about now to the democratic party, it is still 
in position to round out a magnificent work 
for the honor of the country, that it began in 
1882, when it passed through congress a prac¬ 
tical law for the taking of patronage away 
from the power of cheap, nasty politicians, 
and putting the servants of the people beyond 
the control of those who used them as mere 
stock in trade.” 

* * » 

The spoils politician will object strenuously 
to the recommendation that fourth-class post¬ 
masters be brought under the civil service 
regulations. The postmaster-general, however, 
says that if postmasters of that class were re¬ 
moved for cause only the result would be a 
vast improvement in the post-officfe service, 
and there is no doubt that the statement is 
correct. It is difficult to get competent men 
to accept the little post-offices that pay $50 to 
$100 a year, and when a competent man gets 
one of those offices he ought to be allowed to 
hold it as long as he wants it. The good of 
the service should be aimed at. The wishes 
and interests of the spoilsmen should not have 
any weight.— Savanna {Ga.) News {dem.). 

» * * 

Rebuking the St. Louis Republic (dem.) for 
its persistent attacks on the civil service law, 
the Atlanta Journal (dem.) says : “ The ten¬ 
dency is not towards the repeal of the civil 
service law, but towards its extension. There 
is no doubt (hat it will before long include 
the consular service and probably other de¬ 
partments not now under its rules. No politi¬ 
cal party will ever be foolish enough to go to 
the country as the avowed enemy of this law. 
It has come to stay and all efforts to repeal it 
will be as futile as commands to the waves of 
the sea.”— New York Evening Post, January 9. 

» » » 

R. E. Bliss, of Sherman, is probably the 
oldest man in the railway mail service in 
Western New York, if , not in the State. He 
completed his Slst year on April 23, and on account 
of his great efficiency in the Service, he has steadily 
maintained his position, except for one year un¬ 
der President Cleveland’s former administra¬ 
tion, ever since he entered the service in 1873. 
Mr. Bliss’s present run is with the fast mail be¬ 
tween Cleveland and Chicago.— Buffalo Ex- 
press. May 7, 1894. 

THE CHURCH AND GOOD CITIZEN¬ 
SHIP. 

It [the church] hasn’t given sufficient atten¬ 
tion to its civic duties; it has failed to assert 
itself in the domain of politics and become a 
leader in the reform movements of the day, 
and in this double negligence it must plead 
guilty of a shameful lack of patriotism and 
public spirit. * » * And right here I 
wish to controvert the stupid notion that min. 
isters should not preach politics, and should 
keep quiet on all subjects not technically 
known as spiritual. My candid opinion is 
that a more pestilential doctrine never en- 









196 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONILCE. 


tered the church, and has done incalculable 
damage to society by sealing the lips of the 
ministry and retarding the progress of various 
reforms. In these days the press is the coadju¬ 
tor of the pulpit, whenever the preacher 
really has something to say.— Bev. John L. 
Scudder, of Jersey City, before the Maryland 
Convention of Christian Endeavorers, October ^5, 
1894. 

* * * 

Kev. Thomas J. Ducey, Rector of St. Leo’s 
Roman Catholic Church, in a signed state¬ 
ment as to the great victory of the reform 
movement at last Tuesday’s election, says; 

“I have been asked to say something in re¬ 
view of the victory gained last Tuesday by 
truth, honesty, honor and religion over the 
fraudulent, impure and gross methods of 
Tammany Hall. 

“Until Tuesday last this hall was the tyrant 
and disgrace of our city, and by its methods 
was poisoning the life of the country. 1 can 
not refuse to give my expression of thanks 
for the good work done by the press of the 
country. Their news columns and editorial 
pages have been most powerful factors in 
bringing about the emancipation of New 
York from the slavery of Tammany’s cor¬ 
rupt methods. ‘I am a democrat,’ but for 
the first time in my life I voted the straight 
state republican and reform ballot, as I believed 
it the only way to cofiin corruption and wrong 
in this great city of New York.”—New York 
Times, November 11,1894. 

» » * 

“No cry about religious liberty from the 
principal of the Maynard theft can make the 
people forget that now before them stands 
that principal awaiting his punishment. Was 
it not this theft, rewarded as it was with a 
seat in the United States senate, that inspired 
and encouraged the members of his organiza¬ 
tion to the carnival of crime against the suf¬ 
frage which swept over the State last fall, fill¬ 
ing the prisons from Gravesend and lower 
New York, brutally murdering the citizen in 
Troy, debauching the ballot in all the cities 
under their control? Pretended imaginary 
dangers of religious liberty can not make the 
people forget the shame of Gravesend, New 
York, Troy and Buflfalo. 

“ When infamous corruption so seizes upon 
a municipality that the knowledge of the facts 
come into the possession of every citizen, it 
would be sad in the extreme if the great body 
of Catholic churchmen must be forced to stand 
by this corruption. To-day no man, high or 
low, can plead ignorance of the foulness dis¬ 
closed by the Lexow committee’s revelation 
of Tammany’s rule of New York City. 

“Nameless vices and beastialities have been 
carefully cherished and tenderly protected by 
this organization; the merchant has been 
blackmailed, the unfortunate has been robbed, 
the very poor have been brutally outraged and 
humiliated in every possible manner. To-day 
is there any one standing between this organ¬ 
ization and overwhelming, ignominious de¬ 
feat? Is there any man or set of men so 


blind, so infatuated as not to foresee the ter¬ 
rible outburst of public wrath that will meet 
any effort to thwart the righteous indignation 
of the aroused citizens ? 

“ Catholics surely can not afford to connect 
their religion with such infamies. Catholics, 
because of their religion, must help wipe out 
such rotten associations. They can not follow 
the men who have done all this wrong if they 
love the republic and mean to live here in the 
confidence and respect of patriotic citizens.”— 
Rev. Sylvester Malone, Catholic divine and regent 
of the State University of New York, November 2, 
1894. 

* ♦ » 

It is somewhat remarkable that while other 
religious bodies have recognized and indorsed 
Dr. Parkhurst’s efforts in behalf of political 
reform in New York, the first effort to obtain 
such an indorsement from the church of which 
he is a member should have failed. In the 
New York Presbytery, on Monday, a member 
proposed that a committee be appointed to 
draw up suitable resolutions on the subject. 
“What’s that?” asked a reverend objector. 
When informed that it was a proposed recog¬ 
nition of Dr. Parkhurst’s work for reform he 
at once declared his opposition to the motion. 
He said that inasmuch as Christ did not en¬ 
ter into social reform movements and the 
whole business of Christ’s ministry was preach¬ 
ing the gospel he should feel that he had not 
discharged his duty if he did not say that the 
presbytery had no more right to take notice of 
what Dr. Parkhurst was doing than it had to 
take notice of what any other good citizen 
was doing, outside of the work of the minis¬ 
try. The objecting brother evidently forgot 
that even Christ once suspended his preaching 
long enough to drive the money-changers and 
hucksters out of the temple and overthrow 
their tables. [The resolution has since been 
passed in a recent meeting.] 

THE BROTHERHOOD OF LOOTERS. 

Two years ago there sat in a room in East 
Fourteenth street a gentleman who, though 
only a private citizen holdingno public office, 
was recognized as the real ruler of this city 
and state. * * * At the same time there sat in 
the office of a business corporation, on lower 
Broadway, another private citizen ; private 
citizen and voter of Tioga county, doing busi¬ 
ness in this town. His power was not so large 
as Mr. Croker’s, for his party was in the mi¬ 
nority in both city and state, but he had an 
intimate knowledge of and acquaintance with 
the active managing politicians of both par¬ 
ties throughout the state, and had made the 
infinitesimal details of political management 
an unceasing, sleepless study. He, too, sat 
beside a button and a bell. He talked rather 
more than Croker, for, unlike, Croker, he en¬ 
joyed intensely, beyond the mere sense of 
power, the intoxication of the footlights, and 
the consciousness of the index finger of the 
public. But he listened as well. He listened 
to candidates for office, to ambitious young 
men who gave promise of future usefulness, 


and to the older politicians who had attained 
prominence and influence, and were already 
factors of consequence in the game of politics. 
If they wanted nominations he touched his 
button and communicated his wishes to his 
lieutenants—for he, too, had gathered round 
himself a well-disciplined corps of followers, 
whom a common aim and common purpose 
had cemented together without any machin¬ 
ery of organization such as Croker had—and 
the thing was done. If they were already in 
nomination and ivanted money to carry on their 
campaign, he rang his bell and called down some 
wealthy corporation for a contribution, with an 
understanding, express or implied, that the 
consideration for the same was a mortgage on 
the candidate. And he did it always with a 
sweet graciousness which invariably height¬ 
ened the sense of obligation, allusion to which 
was carefully avoided. And whenever it was 
deemed necessary in his own or the interest of 
his followers to have an understanding with the 
other cool, clear-headed leader in East Four¬ 
teenth street, he touched the button and they 
came together. That, too, was an enormous 
power; little less than Croker’s. On the 6th 
of the present month the voters of this city 
and state—more especially of this city—gave 
concrete expression to their hostility, not to 
the two men who have been its most conspic¬ 
uous exponents, but to the system itself, of 
bossism. It was in the nature of a political ' 
revolution. The voters astonished themselves 
by its magnitude. But they are not so much 
astonished that they fail to comprehend its 
meaning. And they will not be balked in the 
fulfillment of their purpose.— New York Tri¬ 
bune {rep.) in November. 

* * » 

The whispering to which we have referred 
relates, it is believed, to some as yet undevel¬ 
oped scheme by which to defeat the determi¬ 
nation of the voting citizens of this town to 
drive out of office and off from the pay-rolls, 
every official who holds his place directly from 
Tammany, or through any deal or dicker with 
its leaders. Current rumor connects the name 
of ex-Senator Thomas C. Platt with this as yet 
undeveloped scheme. * * If any such nego¬ 
tiations as those hinted at are in progress, or 
if in any quarter there is the remotest possi¬ 
bility of their being entered into, for any pur¬ 
pose whatever—and unfortunately, Mr. Platt’s 
reputation as a political trader, who has pre¬ 
viously had mysterious secret understandings 
with Tammany leaders, gives color to the sus¬ 
picion—it is best that the matter be thorough¬ 
ly discussed at the earliest moment. * * The 
temper of the voters will not permit any favor 
to be shown or any quarter to be given either 
to'the rogues who have ruled the town or the 
trading politicians who have had commerce 
with them. Mr. Platt has made it necessary 
to discuss freely his relations to politics and 
parties by his constant assumption of leader¬ 
ship, and the persistence with which he thrusts 
himself into prominence, as well as by the bad 
eminence he has attained as a trading politi¬ 
cian.— New York Tribune (rep.) in November, 















The civil service Chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering of the 
sllip of state.— From Archbishop Ireland's address: The Duty and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II, No. 24. INDIANAPOLIS, FEBRUARY, 1895.' terms 


Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


The Civil Service Chronicle is one of 
the beneficiaries of the public spirit that 
prompted Mr. Louis D. Brandeis, of Bos¬ 
ton, to devote to public purposes the 
money which he received in connection 
with the investigation of the public insti¬ 
tutions. 


There is no chance for mistake as to 
what is best, and as to what is the only cor¬ 
rect method in dealing with the benevolent 
and penal institutions of this state. The 
merit and labor service systems as prac¬ 
ticed in the federal service, have proven 
themselves infinitely above all other sys¬ 
tems and as the only systems now known 
which can eradicate politics in the transac¬ 
tion of public business. No half-way ap¬ 
plication of these methods, such as a gen¬ 
eral direction to the different boards to 
apply them, will be worth anything. This 
will be understood to be a mere trick to 
beat these reforms under the pretense, of 
adopting them. To show the futility of 
such a direction, suppose the federal law 
had instructed each postmaster to apply 
these methods. The result would have 
been a travesty. The right system is a 
thorough and honest system, that compre¬ 
hends the whole state service, and leaves 
no room for republican bosses to work in 
their henchmen, and that is what this re¬ 
publican legislature, notwithstanding the 
volume of republican promises, does not 
mean to adopt if it can help it. This 
comprehensive system will finally, how¬ 
ever, be adopted in Indiana. 

The republican party of Indiana is un¬ 
dergoing a test of which it does not seem 
to realize the importance. We have, 
month after month, set out some of the 
party’s reform promises and have sent the 
Chronicle to every member of the gem 
eral assembly. The party has in that body 
a large majority and can do anything it 
wants to do. The members have not been 
button-holed or coaxed by reformers. They 
have been told in a straightforward man¬ 
ner what the party has promised, and it 
now rests with them to say whether those 
promises were made to be kept or whether 
the party representatives in the general 


assembly are a mere band of mercenaries. 
It must be confessed that the proceedings 
in the senate on February 15, when the 
bill forbidding railroads to give passes was 
defeated, goes far to prove that the mem¬ 
bers are a band of mercenaries. The au¬ 
thor of the bill had to promise not to ask 
for a roll-call on the vote in order to get 
his bill reported at all by the committee. 
When brought forward in the senate it 
was literally howled out of existence, and 
Lieutenant-Governor Nye seemed to lend 
a helping-hand. Many legislators before 
have thought that the people cared noth¬ 
ing for bribery and corruption and have 
found themselves mistaken. Every rail¬ 
road pass given to any public officer, in 
whatever office, is either a bribe or it is 
blackmail, and no amount of casuistry, 
subterfuge or bluster, can make anything 

else of it. - 

If the party is the reform party it has 
claimed to be, it will pass a corrupt prac¬ 
tice act which will require a record of 
every cent spent in a campaign, whether 
for nomination or election, and will make 
it a public record. There is no other single 
blow which would strike out so much cor¬ 
ruption. For more than a month the 
party has had before it in the general as¬ 
sembly a bill introduced by Mr. Cardwill 
which embodies the best methods now 
known for civil service management; yet 
it has never been reported by the commit¬ 
tee. Instead, the party has met in caucus 
and has resolved to “ take possession ” of 
the benevolent and penal institutions of 
the state. The full meaning of this is that 
the party means to loot the two or three 
thousand places in these institutions for 
the benefit of the members of the general 
assembly, and of other party bosses. A 
man whom they call “ Jack ” Gowdy, who 
is chairman of the party state committee, 
and therefore at the head of the party ma¬ 
chine, is doing his utmost to bring the 
party to this act of treachery. In the 
Chronicle for October, 1892, will be found 
a circular put forth by Gowdy, addressed 
to government employes, calling for money 
and containing this threat, “ The success 
of the ticket is involved, as well as the 
pleasant conditions about you. * * * 
We confidently expect you to give gener¬ 
ous assistance.” Gowdy is a fit leader in 
this mercenary onslaught which proposes 
to disregard the welfare of the powerless 


prisoner, the feeble-minded, the soldiers’ 
orphan children, and the insane. Ex- 
President Harrison has openly declared 
himself against the proposed course and 
for a civil service law. The Indianapolis 
Journal is doing what it can to stem the 
tide. Mr. Fairbanks and other prominent 
leaders have not been publicly heard from. 
The result means much for the republican 
party in Indiana. While the loot of the 
public institutions goes on, if it does go on, 
there will not be wanting those who will 
keep all the facts before the people. 


One phase of the situation, when the 
party in power is cursed as now in New 
York and in Indiana by pirates and 
adventurers, is that these men are in¬ 
capable of regeneration. They are numer¬ 
ous, they are powerful, they control the 
party machine and therefore the party ac¬ 
tions and just now they are insolent with 
victory. Moreover, they care nothing for 
success under other conditions than that 
the spoils shall be divided. Patriotism, 
honest administration and political prin¬ 
ciples are nothing to them. If the party 
can not succeed in their way and then fol¬ 
low their plan of a loot of the public treas¬ 
ury, they want the party to fail. The re¬ 
publican party to-day is loaded down with 
such men. It will have to put them under 
or go down with them. 

The furious frenzy over spoil is illus¬ 
trated by the visit of Thomas Taggart, 
of the state democratic committee, and 
George Shanklin, to Washington, to get 
the Mexican mission for Editor Shanklin. 
While Minister Gray’s dead body is being 
brought from Mexico, there is this un¬ 
seemly jostling for the place of a political 
associate. Says the Indianapolis Sentinel 
naively: “Mr. Taggart will present the 
petition of the Indiana democrats urging 
Mr. Shanklin’s appointment, during the 
week, and will return previous to the time 
of the funeral of the dead minister.” 

In the issue of February 21, the Sentinel's 
Washington correspondent goes on to say 
thatVoorhees and Turpie and Congress¬ 
men Taylor and Brown, Chairman Taggart 
and Tax Commissioner Allen called at the 
White House on the 20th. That “the pe¬ 
tition for the appointment of Mr. Shank¬ 
lin was not presented out of respect for 
the memory of Minister Gray.” Then fol- 



















198 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


lows this curious information, which must 
be regarded as the new etiquette of the In¬ 
diana democratic court ceremonial. “It was 
understood,” the Sentinel says,- “that the 
visit was one of ceremony on the part of 
those who made it to show the President 
the respect of the democracy for its dead 
leader.” After “expressions of sorrow” 
had been passed “on either side,” this cere¬ 
monial committee of Indiana pirates com¬ 
posed their faces and got down to business 
and informed the President that the In¬ 
diana democrats “would present a man,” 
and then they proceeded to “mention Mr. 
Shanklin.” The Sentinel says the “Presi¬ 
dent showed flattering respect for the 
opinions of the visitors.” As the Chronicle 
always means to be fair, it is bound to add 
that the Indianapolis Journal’s Washing¬ 
ton correspondent says that Private Secre¬ 
tary Thurber “was at no pains to conceal 
his indignation,” and that Mr. Cleveland 
“greeted the delegation very coldly,” and 
promptly informed Taggart “that he 
knew all he wanted to know about Mr. 
Shanklin.” In fact, according to the 
Journal account, the President nearly 
kicked the delegation out of doors. We 
doubt very much, however, whether the 
Indiana democrats will perceive anything 
comic or indecent in the occurrence. 


Senator William F. Vilas, of Wiscon¬ 
sin, is at his old tricks again. Congress¬ 
man Bynum, whom the people of this dis¬ 
trict lately so unmercifully disposed of, got 
a bill through the house reinstating a set 
of discharged democrats in the railway 
mail service. It was a measure of the 
worst kind with a viciousness of the usual 
Bynum stripe. Vilas took charge of the 
bill in the senate and the other day quiet¬ 
ly asked the unanimous consent for its 
consideration, describing it as a “ short 
bill unanimously reported by the commit¬ 
tee.” Nobody paid any attention, but as 
the clerk was rattling the bill off. Senator 
Lodge, busy with other matters, caught 
the words “civil service commission,” and 
instantly objected, and Vilas’s snap move¬ 
ment came to an end. Vilas is an old and 
steadfast friend of the enemies of civil 
service reform. In his famous secret cir¬ 
cular opening up the system of secret 
charges for the removal of fourth-class 
postmasters, in 1885, he dealt the first 
Cleveland administration, of which he was 
a cabinet member, its first and ugliest blow 
and he has since made his acts square with 
that act. 


The civil service commission has just 
made public its letter to Secretary Car¬ 
lisle calling his attention to the fact that 
since July 1, 1893, he had removed 88 
women who had obtained their places by 
competition. Seventy of these were col¬ 


ored women. All were printers’ assist¬ 
ants, of whom the entire number is 367. 
Also that in the year preceding June 30, 
1894,45 women, including 10 colored wom¬ 
en, were passed over upon certification 
without selection. In the p'receding ad¬ 
ministration appointments were made 
from the highest on the list, and in five 
years they were only 18 dismissals of 
women. At present there are only 8 
colored women remaining, and of those 
dismissed there was no charge of miscon¬ 
duct. The Carlisles seem to be at their 
usual congenial business. But it is a very 
dirty business. 

At the late election it was known in 
every corner of the country that the people 
of New York City had deliberately gone 
outside of party machines and had nomi¬ 
nated and elected a man for mayor with 
the sole object of eliminating politics, par- 
tyism, bossism and an enormous load of 
corruption from their city government. 
Mayor Strong, to carry out this idea, has 
lately made some very important appoint¬ 
ments and has chosen men who seemingly 
will do what the people intended. This 
was the most natural thing in the world 
to do, and any other course would have 
convicted Mayor Strong of infamous 
treachery. Yet on account of these ap¬ 
pointments, Tom Platt, Judge Jake Patter¬ 
son, Wicked Gibbs, Abe Gruber, Charley 
Hackett, chairman of the republican state 
committee, and the whole crowd of Platt’s 
members of the state legislature are 
“sick.” For several days in the legislature 
scarcely any business could be done, but 
the members gathered in groups and 
talked as though a crushing public calamity 
had come. This is a good measure of the 
work which has yet to be done. The peo¬ 
ple are not dissatisfied; they are greatly 
pleased. But the republican machine, 
made up of Platt men and completely in 
Platt’s grip, is dissatisfied to exasperation, 
and it has great power for harm. The be¬ 
lief is yet prevalent through all the rotten 
highways and by-ways of the city govern¬ 
ment that Plattism will yet triumph and 
that politics, with all the accompaniments 
which the late investigation brought to 
light, will resume its sway. There is only 
one course for voters to pursue. Plattism 
must be killed everywhere, or the republi¬ 
can party organization must be destroyed. 
That organization now thinks it is invinci¬ 
ble, but if it continues to espouse Platt¬ 
ism, citizens without organization may and 
will fearlessly invite the contest. 


Mayor Strong, of New York, has given 
the Chronicle a great vindication. It 
strenuously maintained at the beginning 
of President Cleveland’s present term, 
that if he would notify congressmen that 


there were no fourth-class post-oflSces to be 
divided as spoil, nor any reorganization of 
those offices to be made until congress, by 
legislation, had provided for taking them 
out of politics and would then sit down, the 
people would see to it that congress enact¬ 
ed the legislation. The opportunity was 
let to pass as seemingly not worth a 
thought. Mayor Strong came into office 
with a city government full of Tammany 
officials, and of everything which the 
whole world now understands by Tamma- 
nyism. To accomplish any reform here, 
also, legislation was necessary, and Platt 
controlled the legislature. The mayor 
refused to dicker, or make promises, or 
enter into deals. The Platt machine 
waited, and made excuses, and tried tricks 
until at last, whipped along by the threat¬ 
ening attitude of the people, it had to pass 
a power of removal bill, giving the mayor 
the full authority which he is now exer¬ 
cising to their infinite disgust. As Mayor 
Strong triumphed. President Cleveland 
might have triumphed. 

Few things have done more to belittle 
successive Presidents and reduce them to 
the level of smart politicians than the re¬ 
peated practice of extending the civil 
service rules over groups of offices after 
they have filled them with their partisans. 
There has heretofore been the excuse that 
other offices were filled with partisans of 
the other party. But that can not be urged 
no.w in excuse of President Cleveland’s 
failure to extend the rules over the three 
hundred new deputy collectorships before 
the places were filled. It was supposed, 
and it had been given out from Washing¬ 
ton, that the spoils system was done for. 
Yet there is now going on a bare-faced and 
disgraceful loot of three hundred places of 
the highest importance. This is politics 
of the most offensive form. The compet¬ 
itive system would have been an ideal 
method of filling these places. The new 
officials are to manage the income tax, 
which is odious in every feature. It was 
of the first importance that the men who 
were to collect it should be free from the 
suspicion of being anybody’s or any par¬ 
ty’s men. Instead, we are to have the 
usual crop of tools of political bosses, with 
enemies to punish and friends to reward. 
The following dispatch from Lexington, 
Ky., shows how these offices are being 
filled : 

Desha Breckinridge, son of Representative W. C. 
P. Breckinridge, has been appointed income-tax 
collector of the Lexington (Ky.) district hy Col¬ 
lector Shelby, father of Col. Breckinridge’s law 
partner. Young Breckinridge made himself noto¬ 
rious during the electioneering canvass inthe Ash¬ 
land (Ky.) district, which resulted in the defeat of 
his father for renomination, by William C. Owen. 
Among the men with whom Desha Breckinridge 
quarreled was ex-Judge George Kincaid, a support¬ 
er of Owen on whom he drew a knife, on the streets 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


199 


of Lexington. He was disarmed before he could do 
any damage. Col. Shelby, the son of the collector, 
who has named young Breckinridge as one of his 
assistants, has also been concerned in an affray, 
since the celebrated Ashland canvass, and during 
thePollard-Breckinridge trial at Washington, he 
was mixed up in a discreditable court scene, and 
was rebuked by the presiding judge. 

The civil service reformers "of Buffalo 
are refreshingly straightforward and plain- 
spoken, and this same candor may be 
found in the utterances of the Buffalo Ex¬ 
press, which is a republican paper and an 
anti-spoils paper. It does not flinch from 
rebuking the republican mayor. Mr. Jew¬ 
ett won his election on his pledge that 
“municipal government is business, not 
politics.” Like too many men of high so¬ 
cial and business standing introduced into 
new and close political relations with 
clever bosses, he appears to be falling by 
the wayside. He removed Harbormaster 
Doyle, an efficient man, a democrat, and 
put in his place an inexperienced man, a 
republican, although marine-men protest¬ 
ed against the removal. He removed 
twelve democratic bridge tenders and then 
filled their places with republican politi¬ 
cians, certifying that there was no eligible 
list instead of waiting for an eligible list. 
This looks very like a trick. Instead of 
excusing Mayor Jewett on the ground of 
“tremendous pressure” and that he has 
been “ misled by bad advisers,” a speaker 
at a recent meeting said, “ If what Mayor 
Jewett is quoted in the newspapers as say¬ 
ing in defense of his appointments is cor¬ 
rect, and I have every reason to believe it 

is, then he and the good government clubs 
are at war, and no disguise should be 
made of the fact. No armed truce should 
be maintained. Our position should be 
pronounced and strong.” 

This is the way to talk. We must have 
a high standard for our public men, and 
when they fall short they must be told of 

it, no matter how much it hurts us to be 
disagreeable and them to hear us. 

When President Harrison was paying 
the political committeemen with ofifices, 
there were, if we remember correctly, loud 
protests and innuendoes about the Indiana 
way of doing things. Massachusetts ap¬ 
pears to have even surpassed the Indiana 
way. Within a few days we read how 
Daniel F. Buckley, for years secretary of 
the democratic state committee and latter¬ 
ly chairman of the executive committee, 
gets the surveyorship of the port of Bos¬ 
ton. Mr. Robinson, who succeeded Mr. 
Buckley as secretary, has been selected by 
United States Marshal Swift as one of his 
deputies, and so the democratic state com¬ 
mittee will have to be equipped with a 
new secretary and chairman of its execu¬ 
tive committee. 

Moreover Massachusetts has further ret¬ 


rograded. No faithful federal officers ap¬ 
pear to be re-appointed. We used to hear 
in Indiana a good deal about local option 
in civil service reform, and Massachusetts 
explained her better condition as owing to 
a more enlightened and exacting public 
opinion. The shock of President Har¬ 
rison’s failure to continue General Corse 
in the Boston post-oflfice, and Colonel Rice 
in the Springfield office, bore out this 
view; but week after week we have read 
of faithful officers being displaced in that 
state, and untried politicians appointed 
over faithful subordinates. Recently the 
competent assistant postmaster of Chicopee, 
who had practically run the office for years, 
was not promoted, but so bad an appoint¬ 
ment was made that the disgusted citizens 
have called upon the senate to reject the 
appointment. The “faithful incumbent” 
of the office of surveyor, at Springfield, 
had to make way for anew man, “indorsed 
by John E. Russell,” and a retiring county 
treasurer will succeed to a new office as 
the surveyor’s deputy. The root of the 
matter is, that the good appointments and 
general care for Massachusetts, in Mr. 
Cleveland’s first administration, and these 
bad political appointments for the dem¬ 
ocratic machine in his last administration, 
are based on the same radically vicious 
plan—appointments made upon private 
recommendations. It is the same bad 
principle, whether John E. Russell or 
the late George M. Stearns make recom¬ 
mendations, carefully thinking of the 
whole democratic party, or whether Jo- 
siah Quincy selects with a view only 
to strengthening the machine. 

The republican mayor of Boston, Mr. 
Curtis, selected an able civil engineer for 
superintendent of streets and an experi¬ 
enced business man for fire commissioner, 
and he re-appointed the city auditor, engi¬ 
neer, treasurer, and collector, capable 
men, but democrats. He also ordered 
heads of departments to notify him of va¬ 
cancies before filling them, interpreted by 
the Boston Journal as meaning that “spoil- 
ism will not be permitted anywhere.” 
A blunt and frank spoilsman, Jesse M. 
Gove, rebuked this order of things at a re¬ 
cent political banquet. “From the man 
who picks in the sewer, to the head of the 
greatest department, you must have men 
in sympathy with you, to have a success¬ 
ful administration,” he said. The Boston 
Journal, a strong partisan republican news¬ 
paper, tells him he is a “survival,” that the 
“species to which he belongs is by no 
means extinct, but among republicans it is 
fast becoming so.” But is not the Jesse 
Gove type less dangerous than the Olney 
type? Gove would feel no repugnance to 
the job of using the political axe himself 
on the men in the sewers and upwards. 


The attorney-general appears to shun 
the commonness of a personal contact 
with patronage, but we find no civil serv¬ 
ice reformer who feels any confidence 
in his technical and unfriendly inter¬ 
pretations of the civil service law, a mis¬ 
trust possibly intensified by the fact that 
he can remain an active director of a rail¬ 
road upon which, as attorney-general, he 
might be required to enforce the provis- 
sions of the federal inter-state commerce 
law. Men like Gove have been frank allies 
of the spoils system, but the shifting of par¬ 
ties since 1884 has brought out a number 
of conspicuous theoretical anti-spoilsmen 
like Attorney-General Olney, who appear 
to be compelled to stab civil service re. 
form upon contact. 


In the fact that congressmen hate to 
forego the power and authority of allotting 
spoil, the Indianapolis News recently gave 
the real reason why they continue to be 
hostile to all reform legislation, though 
they fully realize the danger and weakness 
it is to a party as well as to themselves. 
The smaller the man of course the more 
he loves to have his fellow-men fawn and 
cringe and serve to buy his favor. This 
pride and vanity is the sort of madness the 
gods bestow before they destroy a man, as 
Josiah Quincy will sadly learn. He has 
felt the satisfaction of having strings of 
followers in his ante-room patiently wait¬ 
ing their turn to present their claims for 
recognition. With so much power that 
he can place his men in offices over the 
protests of a majority of his own party 
personally interested in any office, why 
should he not swell with triumph ? Every 
one else knows that Massachusetts will 
surely in time gather herself together to 
chastise severely any boss, but most se¬ 
verely will she chastise the boss evolved 
from a reformer. 

Why does not some friend of civil serv¬ 
ice reform reprint in pamphlet form “The 
Office Seeker,” by Bret Harte; “The Plum 
Idiot,” by Octave Thanet; “A Fourth-class 
Post-office,” by Margaret Deland and 
“Brooks: A Story of the Civil Service,” by 
Julia Schayer; and that charming story of 
Mr. Chaplin’s about the Italian colony 
and the Boston custom house, the name 
of which we can not recall? There should 
be a short preface emphasizing the base¬ 
ness of the spoils system as revealed truth¬ 
fully in these stories, and there should be 
an appeal to the reader to join the Anti- 
Spoils League. These tracts should be 
sent north and south, east and west, 
among ministers and school teachers 
and high school students, and we might 
rest assured we could have no more effect¬ 
ive missionaries in the field. There has 
been far too little of the work that appeals 














200 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


to the emotions in the fight for the merit 
and competitive systems. The money 
raised has for years been the generous of¬ 
fering of the same friends of the reform. 
Is there no one who can raise among the 
more recent friends of good government 
enough money for a more wide-spread 
propaganda ? 


We have received the abstract of the 
monthly report of the secretary of the New 
York Civil Service Reform Association 
containing many interesting facts. In the 
federal service the recent orders of the 
President add to the competitive list 8,- 
167 places, including four chiefs of divis¬ 
ions. When the 300 additional deputy 
collectors are appointed there will be in 
all 1,213 ofl&ces of this grade in the inter¬ 
nal revenue department and all of them 
spoils. The boards of trade of nearly all 
of the large cities of the country have re¬ 
solved in favor of putting the consular 
service out of politics. There are about 
200,000 persons in the civil service of the 
United States. Civil service bills are now 
pending in the legislatures of Illinois, In¬ 
diana and Minnesota. 

Persons interested in the subject will 
find much in these monthly reports which 
they can receive by forwarding their names 
to the secretary, George McAneny,54 Will¬ 
iam street. New York. 


It seems to be generally taken as a mat¬ 
ter of fact that Comptroller Trusler, of 
this city, is laying his plans to run as the 
successor of Mayor Denny. Just what man¬ 
ner of boss the community may, in the 
event of his election, live under is illus¬ 
trated from the following from the Indian¬ 
apolis News of September 2,1891. Trusler, 
when a member of the common council, 
demanded that a captain twenty-two years 
in the fire department be dismissed: 

“ Isn’t he a good republican?” asked Chief 
Dougherty. 

“ Yes.” 

“ Isn’t he a good fireman?” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Well, why should he be dismissed?” 

“ Because he is no friend of mine.” 

This was the exalted plan under which the 
department was run when Trusler was boss 
and when he was perfecting a scheme to have 
the appointing power taken from the chief and 
absolutely lodged in himself—or his board, 
which he dominated. 


COMMUNISM OF SPOIL. 

The New York Tribune, purified by a 
late conversion from Plattism, continues 
to warn its readers how close has been the 
connection of Tom Platt with Tammany. 
For years other people have been trying 
in vain to convince the patriotic partisans 
of this connection. The following from 
the New York Times of October 7,1891, il¬ 


lustrates the fraternity of Platt and Tam¬ 
many ; 

T. C. Platt, of Tioga, who runs the republi¬ 
can party in the city of New York as well as 
in the state, announced yesterday that it hud 
been determined that the republicans should nomi¬ 
nate a straight ticket locally. 

Platt’s announcement that there is to be a 
straight local republican ticket means a walk¬ 
over for Tammany in local aflPairs, and no one 
knows this better than Mr. Platt of Tioga, 
whose orators are making the fight against 
Tammany in the state. Platt says that “the 
republican party is perfectly sincere in its de¬ 
sire to rout Tammany out of ofiice and depose 
it from power both in city and state.” 

“There are some very funny things in poli¬ 
tics,” said an observer yesterday when he read 
this declaration of Mr. Platt’s. “Let me see, 
how long is it since T. C. Platt stopped mak¬ 
ing deals with Tammany? Not more than 
two years, is it? How was it that the bill in¬ 
creasing the number of police justices in 1889 
was passed? Wasn’t Mr. Taintor appointed 
a police justice as a result of the deal on this 
bill, and wasn’t Mr. Platt the man who made 
that deal with Tammany in behalf of the re¬ 
publicans? I don’t say that Taintor was 
Platt’s man, but Platt expected to get three 
police justices out of the deal and he was par¬ 
ticularly strenuous in his eflfort to get Mayor 
Grant to reappoint Police Justice Jacob M. 
Patterson. 

“ Why, it is not two years since Mr. Platt 
was in the mayor’s private office laboring 
with the mayor to reappoint Patterson. Mr. 
Grant wouldn’t do it. Some of the Tammany 
people thought that the mayor should yield 
the point. Mr. Platt cried out that faith was 
not being kept with him by Tammany and the 
mayor. Even this cry did not save Patterson. 
He was not reappointed. 

“ The result of the mayor’s refusal to name Mr. 
Patterson tvas rather curious. It was not long after 
Mr. Platt’s last visit to the mayor's office that the 
senate committee on cities was made up and care 
was taken to put Senator J. Sloat Fassett upon it. 
It was not long after that that the republican senate 
resolved that its committee on cities should investi¬ 
gate all the cities in the stale. It never visited any 
city but the city of New York, did it f ” 

The collusion of bosses of the different 
political parties is one of the common¬ 
places of politics and yet they can always 
fool the bulk of respectable men who have 
ordinary shrewdness regarding questions 
outside of politics. Steve—now Senator— 
Elkins and Gorman have been for years 
in close association. The following from 
the New York Evening Post illustrates the 
same intimacy of bosses in San Francisco: 

“Chris” Buckley, who controls the demo¬ 
cratic machine, is notable as the “blind boss,” 
the loss of his eyesight not having injured his 
capacity for pulling wires and laying pipes. 
The republican boss is “Colonel” Burns (with 
the “Colonel” always put in quotation marks), 
who was once clerk of an interior county, 


and went out leaving a deficit for his bonds¬ 
men to make up, and was afterward secretary 
of state, with the result of losing the state 
$31,000. The courts failed to determine who 
committed the theft, but the San Francisco 
Bulletin, a republican newspaper, says that 
“there is no doubt on the outside about it.” 
The blind boss of the democrats and the de¬ 
faulting boss of the republicans are hand in 
glove, and the honest men in both parties are 
trying to secure their overthrow by a non¬ 
partisan movement. 

FOOLS AND THEIR FOLLY. 

Indiana is now in the full enjoyment of 
rare specimens of public wisdom. Gover¬ 
nor Matthews says that if he appoints the 
boards for the public institutions, he will 
put two democrats and one republican 
upon each, as though the quality of the 
political opinions of members of these 
boards should have something to do with 
their treatment of the criminal, the insane 
and the feeble-minded. The republican 
members of the general assembly in caucus 
declare that the plain meaning of the 
words “non-partisan boards” in their plat¬ 
form last fall is that such boards must have 
two republican partisans and one demo¬ 
cratic partisan, and they are evidently go¬ 
ing to enact this meaning into a law. If 
they had anything but the worst political 
motives, they would not care what the 
politics of the boards were, but would en¬ 
act a law which would prevent the boards 
from using the state service as spoil. 

They propose also to postpone the time 
of the election of the county superintend¬ 
ents of schools to a date when the new town¬ 
ship trustees largely republican who elect 
by counties will be in office and can select 
republican superintendents. When this 
proposition was debated in the state senate. 
Senator “Al” Wishard, from this county, 
said: 

“You are talking to the wind. You 
know what we intend to do. We have the 
power, and we will use it. There are sev¬ 
enty-three county superintendents whom 
we can elect, and we propose to have them. 
Ours is the party in power. The people 
will hold us responsible for the conduct of 
the schools, and we will have our way, 
if we are responsible.” 

“Doyou mean to say that it is the inten¬ 
tion of the majority of this senate to make 
the public schools of this state political ?” 

“ To this extent, we do.” 

Who shall answer these fools accord¬ 
ing their folly? Such fools have been an¬ 
swered before, and will be again. In the 
meantime the situation illustrates how we 
are governed. There is not a thing on the 
part of the republicans in these controver¬ 
sies except a struggle for opportunities to 
work henchmen into the public employ. 
The weight of the republican press of the 
state is heavily against these unworthy 
and treacherous representatives of the peo- 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


201 


le; but they do not care for that; they 
are “in politics for what there is in it.” 
It is not the first time that the people 
have been cheated in choosing repesenta- 
tives. This instance affords a new over¬ 
whelming argument that a voter should 
hold himself absolutely independent of any 
party machine. Successive defeats will fi¬ 
nally drive out of public life the men who 
now control these machines. 


POLITICAL ARCHITECTURE. 

The Chronicle has before called attention 
to the spoils architecture of this country, in¬ 
volving an enormous waste of public funds, 
and bringing into existence a lot of pub¬ 
lic monstrosities. The architects of the coun¬ 
try have been protesting against the abuse, 
and the McKaig bill, leaving the admin¬ 
istrative portion of the public architecture 
in the department and dividing and en¬ 
trusting the artistic part of the work to the 
best architects of the country, represent their 
views. They find that somebody at Washing¬ 
ton has thwarted their plans. Logan Carlisle 
appears to be the object of their suspicion. 
We had the Raum boys, and then we had 
young Carlisle; and it seems probable that 
we shall have to bear this upstart spoilsman 
two years longer, for he is a bigger man than 
his father, too big apparently for the Presi¬ 
dent to kick out of the department he has 
scandalized. Possibly for two years more 
this large and generous country will freely 
provide funds for this bullying spoils mon¬ 
ger’s architecture. 

Says Montgomery Schuyler in the July 
Forum : 

The architect who has for forty years had the 
spending of two millions and a half a year, and 
with it the unchallenged power to play any pranks 
he chose with the public architecture, and to de 
bauch the taste of the American public from 
Maine to California, has been the successor and 
representative of the clerk-of-works of the treasury 
building. With an Influence much beyond that of 
any European ministry of public works, he is a 
clerk, holding office at the pleasure of the secre¬ 
tary of the treasury, unrecognized by law except 
in the annual appropriations, and with no guaran¬ 
tee whatever of his professional competency, ex¬ 
cept that the secretary of the treasury has seen fit 
to appoint him. 

The position of supervising architect was 
offered to John M. Carrere, and two hundred 
architects urged him to accept the position. 
He made a thorough investigation of the pos¬ 
sibilities of the position, and felt obliged to 
decline it on the ground that under the pres¬ 
ent conditions nothing could be accomplislied. 
The following is an extract from his letter to 
Secretary Carlisle, and shows how shameful is 
the abuse of a great opportunity: 

The work of this department, irrespective 
of its present organization, or of any improve¬ 
ment that could be made in the same, com¬ 
prises a staff of about 150 employes, their du¬ 
ties comprising (1) a legal department having 
charge of all contracts, purchases of sites, 
deeds, interpretation of laws, classification of 
the same, and other legal matters relating 
specifically to this department; 12) an exten¬ 


sive system of accounting, burdened by the 
vast number of small accounts, resulting from 
the maintenance and repairs of buildings, and 
needing a very great amount of detail; (3) 
the technical or drafting division, in which 
all computations of quantities and cost of 
work are made, auditing of all accounts, all 
original designs and working drawings; speci¬ 
fications and calculations comprising both 
the artistic and practical work, and in¬ 
volving sanitary heating, elevator, lighting, 
ventilating, and other plants of a purely 
technical nature; also, the superintendence, 
supervision and inspection of all these works. 
The work itself is scattered over the entire 
United States, and is absolutely beyond the 
reach of any one man except by proxy, and 
practically beyond his control. 

The number of buildings now in course of 
construction—some of them w'ell advanced, 
others hardly started, and many of them still 
untouched—is 115, ranging from marine hos¬ 
pitals, the appropriation for which is only 
about $2,000, but involving much trouble¬ 
some detail and waste of lime, up to build¬ 
ings like the San Francisco post-office, the ap¬ 
propriation for which is about $2,000,000; 
Buffalo post-office, about $5,100,000; Kansas 
City post-office, about $1,000,000; the New 
York appraisers’ stores, $2,000,000; these being 
the most important buildings, the others 
ranging all the way from $500,000 to $50,000 
and under. In addition to this, eight build¬ 
ings are now about to be appropriated for, 
ranging from $100,000 up to $4,000,000 for the 
Chicago post-office, the latter to be constructed 
within a period which I understand is not to 
exceed two years. 

In addition to the above, congress appro¬ 
priates about $200,000 a year for the mainte¬ 
nance of over 250 buildings; most of the 
money is spent in small amounts ranging 
from fifty cents upwards, for repairs, etc., in¬ 
volving indefinite trouble and drudgery, and 
demanding much time and attention. 

The present condition of this work is in such a 
disorganized state that it would take the best part of 
any man’s time to reorganize the work itself, irre¬ 
spective of the department. The accumulated waste 
of money is beyond belief. The department, in 
the main, seems to be well organized, though 
cumbersome. The personnel is efficient in a 
measure, but ill adapted to the class of work 
which the country expects of our government, 
and absolutely deficient in artistic worth. The 
tenure of the office is controlled either by civil 
service rules or by political influence, and with 
this state of affairs the office of supervising 
architect, legally, is merely that of the clerk 
of the department appointed by the secretary 
of the treasury; and though his responsibility 
is supposed to cover all of the above work, his 
authority is absolutely dependent on the sec¬ 
retary of the treasury, and much of it is di¬ 
vided with the heads of departments. 

Any man, no matter what his ability or his 
power for work and concentration, and no mat¬ 
ter what conditions might be offered to him, 
even those of absolute responsibility with ab¬ 
solute authority, would have to devote him¬ 
self either to managingthe office, allowingthe 
designing to be done by draftsmen, as at pres¬ 
ent, or to designing, allowing the office to be 
managed by heads of departments, as at pres¬ 
ent; and no man of ability with a reputation 
to lose as an artist would be presumptuous 
enough to accept the office, even if his duties 
were to be confined to designing, irrespective 
of any other work or responsibility, because it 
is absolutely beyond the grasp and ability of 
any one man who has ever lived to imprint 
his personality upon this much work, and 
much less to design it and study it himself. 

After all these years and after the expendi¬ 
ture of all these millions, the country has 
scarcely a single beautiful or noble structure. 


The Court of Honor proved conclusively what 
American architects can do. They can ac¬ 
complish unexcelled architectural beauty and 
grandeur. The existing United States archi¬ 
tecture proves conclusively all that a long 
line of political bosses, ending with the 
present weak Covington politician, can ac¬ 
complish. 

THE BUFFALO PLAN 

Of Improving Citizenship Through the 
Public Schools. 

The Chronicle has received from Mr. 
Emerson, the superintendent of the public 
schools of Buffalo, the following interesting 
letter, which it prints in full : 

I was interested in reading an article in 
your issue of January, 1895, on the subject of 
school commencements and civil service re¬ 
form. For ten years I was a teacher in the 
high school of this city and afterwards was 
principal ten years. I have observed how re¬ 
luctant teachers are to advocate the princi¬ 
ples of good government in our public schools. 
It seems to me supreme folly to spend millions 
of dollars for public schools without making 
any attempt to point out to the boys who are 
soon to be voters the duty of good citizenship. 
While I was principal of the high school I 
took occasion at least once a year to explain 
to the assembled school, numbering 700 or 800 
boys and girls, the claims of the principles 
represented in the merit system, and did 
much, I believe, to remove the prejudices 
which so commonly exist against it. 

Since becoming superintendent of the city 
schools I have introduced a system of civic 
training, extending from the third year of the 
primary through the grammar grades. I 
send you a copy of our course of study (under 
separate cover) that you may see what the 
plan is. I do not think that a similar at¬ 
tempt has been made in any other city in the 
country. It is only a first attempt and will 
doubtless be perfected as time goes on. We 
have tried in years past the plan of having a 
text-book for a year or two, but this made the 
work mechanical and it was not a success. 
By this method of oral instruction I am sure 
the boys and girls will leave the grammar 
schools with a good general knowledge of the 
institutions under which they live, and of the 
dangers which beset them. Yours truly, 

Henry P. Emerson. 

Buffalo, Feb. 5, 1895. , 

The course referred to by Mr. Emerson is as 
follows: 

THIRD GRADE. 

The meaning of government, its neces^ty and 
uses, should be developed. In connection with 
the geography of Buffalo, the word mayor should 
be explained and his name given. The necessity 
for money to carry on the government should be 
shown. How are the public schools supported? 
The fire department? The police? Why, then, do 
we pay taxes? Consult Fisk, pp. 5-7; Townsend, 
pp. 1-2; Peterman, pp. 17-21, 57-63, 157, 158, 201-204_ 

FOURTH GRADE. 

While teaching the geography of Erie county, 
show that a county is made up of towns, with 
sometimes one or more villages and cities. Show 
by a diagram how a village is formed in a town 
and why; how a village becomes a city and why. 
How many towns in Erie county? How many 
counties in the state? Name two villages in our 
county; name one city. Teach the duties of sheriff 
and give his name; the same of governor and pres¬ 
ident. Bring out the relative size of this state; the 
population of Buffalo and New York state (approxi¬ 
mately). Peterman, pp. 51, 56-59,85. Flske, pp. 79, 
116-130. 










202 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONILCE 


FIFTH GRADE. 

As the lessons in geography leave the United 
States to take up other countries of the world, the 
different kinds of government should be touched 
upon, as monarchy, absolute and limited (or con¬ 
stitutional); republic, etc.; such words as repre¬ 
sentative, hereditary, elective, should be explained 
and illustrated. Review what has gone before in 
the third, fourth and fifth grades. Amplify the 
ideas as you review them. Show that we live under 
three governments, local (city), state and national. 
Illustrate: Schools, police and fire protection, 
pavements, sewers and park system, paid for by 
local government; insane asylum,canals, buildiog 
of Capitol at Albany, by state; Fort Porter, the 
breakwater, light houses, i> 08 t-office and letter car¬ 
riers, by United States. Why is this so in each 
case? Townsend, pp.4-(); Peterman, 159; Fiske,274. 

SIXTH GRADE. 

The city, county and state government should be 
taken up more in detail. Use the supplementary 
circular on this subject prepared by the superin¬ 
tendent. Present no more than yon can make in 
teresting. Fiske, 48, 79, 100, 107-172; also Northam. 

SEVENTH GRADE. 

[Refers especially to United States history, and is 
therefore omitted.] 

EIGHTH GRADE. 

Review from the beginning. Then take up the 
federal constitution, the full text of which is given 
in the history. Emphasize the three branches o 
government: (1) Congress; the two houses; how 
elected and length of term; what congress has 
power to do, and what it may not do; special pow¬ 
ers of each house; restrictions on the general gov¬ 
ernment; restrictions on the states. (2) The exec¬ 
utive; how elected; inauguration; his duties and 
powers; messages; his cabinet; principal duties of 
each department; the diplomatic and consular serv¬ 
ice. (3) The supreme court; its jurisdiction. 

NINTH GRADE. 

This grade should be reserved for a general re¬ 
view of the subject and the consideration of mat 
ters of importance to us as a city. Our city govern¬ 
ment when first organized; our present charter, 
when adopted; how it may be changed; the com¬ 
mon council; powers of the mayor; important ap¬ 
pointments; the city departments; elective or ap¬ 
pointive heads. (Sec chart prepared by the sujter- 
Intendent.) 

Legal qualifications for voting; the duty of vot 
ing; the Australian ballot; the New York system, 
is it the best? the voting machine. Fiske, 347. 

Difficulties in the May of good government in 
large cities; municipal extravagance. Fiske, 116-13G. 

Bribery and fraud in elections; the corrupt prac¬ 
tices act. Fiske, 342. The “spoils system;” civil 
service reform. 

Parties and party machinery: The caucus (pri¬ 
mary); conventions; platforms, nominating candi¬ 
dates. 

Revenue: Direct and indirect taxation: tariff 
duties; free trade and protection; arguments for 
and against. 

We have studied the above excellent pro¬ 
gramme with great interest. Just as it is, it 
is a valuable training, but if it is intended to 
be a factor in good citizenship it is incom¬ 
plete. Whatever hints to good citizenship are 
given are left until the ninth grade as if they 
were something separate and apart from the 
other instruction. If a child is told in the 
third grade, as he should be, that public 
schools, the fire department, and the police 
department, are supported by money collected 
of all the people, then is also the time to be¬ 
gin to impress the fact that taxes are trust 
funds. By apt illustration a very young 
child will grasp the moral principle that 
trust funds must be spent more carefully than 
one would spend private funds. It is not too 
soon to show by simple but specific illustra¬ 


tions that what the city has paid for must be 
managed for the city, and not for the selfish 
interests of a few. So in the fourth grade 
where the facts are given of the duties of a 
sheriff, the governor, and the president, in¬ 
separable from the formal facts of the func¬ 
tions pertaining to those offices, are the facts 
that they must use their offices as a public 
trust. All this may be done in the most ele¬ 
mentary way, but the fact that a public office 
is a trust is inexorable, and it should be 
taught. As early as attention is called to the 
formation of the village and the city, should 
begin to be taught the necessity for the city or 
the village to be clean, healthful and beauti¬ 
ful, and how this is effected by water, pave¬ 
ments, sewers and parks, and the sin of squan¬ 
dering the people’s money by bad work. 
Here, too, is the time to impress the individ¬ 
ual duty of everybody, even children, to aid 
in securing a clean city. 

In short, step by step, the wrong of any 
abuse of public money, the stern obligations 
of public office over private interest, the un¬ 
deniable facts that no bribery or fraud can be 
tolerated in our public business must be spe¬ 
cifically and persistently illustrated and a high 
standard of public duty be demanded along 
with the understanding of the mere functions 
of government. Ways and means of attain¬ 
ing these ends differ, and are proper subjects 
for discussion, and are, therefore, to be sim¬ 
ply explained. The Australian ballot sys¬ 
tem, free trade and protection, the merit or 
competitive system, belong to this latter class 
and are properly left until children are more 
mature, but that every office exists solely for 
the benefit of the public, and never for the 
benefit of an individual or a party, that it is 
wrong to use offices to pay men for party 
work, that it is wrong to increase the public 
pay-roll in view of an approaching election, 
or for an appointing officer to quarter his rel¬ 
atives upon the public, or for a congressman 
to use the fourth-class postmasters to work up 
his primaries, as well as the wrong of a mul¬ 
titude of other improper uses of public offi¬ 
ces must be taught. The very class Mr. Emer¬ 
son most hopes to reach are those who not 
only live amidst great ignorance of the func¬ 
tions of national, state, and city government, 
but they are even more ignorant of the moral 
principles and duties of citizenship. We can 
easliy conceive that the lads in the neighbor¬ 
hood of Canal street would recite the facts of 
this course as stated with glib intelligence, and 
yet be perfect miniature Taramanyites in the 
belief that public funds exist in order to be 
filched by people smart enough to learn the 
ropes. 


CURRENT SPOIL. 

Franklin W. Joplin was appointed post¬ 
master at Elizabethtown, Ky., vice Mrs. Ben¬ 
jamin Helm. The circumstances surrounding 
the case makes itoneof unusual interest. Gen. 
Ben Hardin Helm, the husband of Mrs. 
Helm, was one of the most gallant soldiers of 
the confederate army. He was the com¬ 


mander of the famous orphan’s brigade, and 
was killed at the battle of Chickamauga. 
Mrs. Helm, the postmistress who M as removed 
to-day, was a younger sister of Mrs. Abraham 
Lincoln, who was a Tod. Col. Robert Lincoln 
was her nephew, and when he was appointed 
secretary of war by President Garfield, he se¬ 
cured bis aunt’s appointment as postmistress 
of Elizabethtown. That position she has 
held through three administrations—Arthur’s, 
Cleveland’s and Harrison’s. Although an 
effort was made to have Mrs. Helm removed 
during Mr. Cleveland’s first term it M’as not 
urgently pressed and was unsuccessful. The 
appointment of Franklin W. Joplin to-day was 
made on the recommendation of Representative 
Montgomery .— Washington dispatch, Indianapolis 
Sentinel, Janua'ry 16. 

» * » 

A movement has been begun here to secure 
the removal of E. P. Kearns, collector of in¬ 
ternal revenue for the twenty-four counties in 
Western Pennsylvania. Representatives Sib¬ 
ley and Kribbs, two of the three democratic 
members in that revenue district, are engineer¬ 
ing the move. The trouble can be traced back to 
the patronage involved. All of the trio had 
candidates for thecollectorship, but Represent¬ 
ative Sipe carried off the prize and Mr. Kearns 
was appointed. It was agreed, however, that the 
other representatives should name the appointments 
to be made in their districts. Collector Kearns 
failed to keep the agreement and when cornered gave 
various excuses, the principal one against Mr. 
Sibley being that he recommended populists 
only. Messrs. Sibley and Kribbs appealed to 
Mr. Sipe to see to it that the agreement w'as 
kept, but to their surprise Mr. Sipe told them 
that as they had not supported Mr. Kearns for 
the appointment they had no right to attempt 
to dictate his appointments. Now all three 
statesmen will be out of jobs after March 4th. 
* * But the principal charge is said to come 

from influential business men of Pittsburg and 
vicinity. They do not desire that Mr. Kearns be 
in control when the time arrives to collect the income 
tax. They fear, it is said, that private information 
secured through the inquisitorial features of that 
law would not be kept inviolate if he remains in 
charge, and their fear was aroused by his course in 
collecting the other taxes. 

As Collector Kearns has a good record with 
the internal revenue bureau, and the officials 
will not allow party politics to control, the 
impression prevails that he will hold on. He 
is here on the ground ready for the fight and 
is sustained by Mr. Sipe. As he will have 
four or five income tax agents or deputies to 
appoint, it is hinted that the charges are sim¬ 
ply a bluff to compel him to make a divvy with 
the kickers. The places have salaries rang¬ 
ing from $1,440 to $2,000 per annum.— Wash¬ 
ington dispatch, Buffalo Express, December 19. 

* * u 

The principal charges are in sworn affidavits 
by J. S. Bryner and W. W. Graham. They 
allege general mismanagement; that the em¬ 
ployes were assessed a full month’s salary to 
aid in the attempt to re-elect Representive 
Sipe; that numerous other employes holding 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


203 


responsible positions were permitted to leave 
distilleries unguarded to work in behalf of 
Mr. Sipe; that several of the employes were 
drunkards and incompetents, and that one was 
retained because his brother was one of the 
collector’s bondsmen. But the most serious 
charge was that the collector would levy con¬ 
tributions of wine, whisky and cigars upon the 
whisky men and others in his district, with 
the intention of not paying for them, and that 
he did not pay for them. The gaugers were 
required to make these levies until they grew 
ashamed of the dirty work, and one of them is 
alleged to have said he could not perform his 
official duty exactly towards these victims 
while this was going on.— Washington dispatch, 
Buffalo Express, January 8. 

» * * 

Postmaster Frank Lalor, of this city, who 
was appointed hy President Cleveland about 
a year ago, is severely criticised for recom¬ 
mending the discharge of a letter-carrier. 
Michael Stahovski is an intelligent Pole who 
was appointed hy Postmaster Yard, the repub¬ 
lican who preceded Mr. Lalor, and was con¬ 
sidered by Mr. Yard one of his most efficient 
men. He was first appointed a substitute car¬ 
rier in July, 1892, and was made a regular car¬ 
rier in February following. He had passed 
an excellent examination under the civil-serv¬ 
ice rules, and was selected because he stood 
at the top of the class examined with him. 

Stahovski says he had not the faintest idea 
of any trouble until December 18, last, when 
he received a letter from First Assistant 
Postmaster-General Jones, informing him that 
charges had been preferred against him of 
offensive partisanship, visiting a liquor-saloon 
while on duty, and drinking, working for the 
republican ticket on November 8, 1892, and 
intoxication while on duty. Stahovski re¬ 
plied promptly, denying each charge specifi¬ 
cally, except the third. In regard to that he 
said, that at the time of the election he was 
still only a substitute carrier, and on election 
day was not on duty at all. Being inter 
ested in the election, he exercised his right as an 
American citizen, and worked for his favorite 
candidates. After his appointment as a reg¬ 
ular carrier he never took part in political af¬ 
fairs. Stahovski asked for a trial, at which 
he could prove his denials. The department 
was silent until January 23, when he received 
the following: 

After a careful consideration of the charges 
made by the postmaster against you as car¬ 
rier, I have decided to approve the postmas¬ 
ter’s recommendation for your removal, and 
he has been instructed to nominate your suc¬ 
cessor. 

About two weeks prior to receiving this 
summary letter, Stahovski says he was asked 
by Postmaster Lalor if he had yet heard from 
Washington, to which he replied in the nega¬ 
tive, and made a similar inquiry from the 
postmaster. Mr. Lalor said he had not, and 
then Stahovski asserted that the charges were 
untrue. The postmaster replied: 

You have bitter enemies and I do not know 


that I can do anything for you in the matter, 
as I am a democrat and you are a republi¬ 
can. 

After receiving the letter of January 23, 
Stahosvki asked of Mr. Lalor a hearing to dis¬ 
prove the charges, but was told that nothing 
could be done for him. “Everything in 
Washington is one sided,” said the postmaster. 
“The department looks up the last charge 
against a republican and tries to remove him, 
and would like to get all republicans out if it 
could .”—Trenton dispatch, New York Evening 
Post, January SI. 

* » » 

Postmaster Lalor celebrated his appoint¬ 
ment to office by writing a letter to Senator 
Smith, of New Jersey, saying that he had in¬ 
herited a number of republicans on his force 
whom he would like to get rid of, and inquir¬ 
ing by what means he could go about it with¬ 
out rendering himself liable to punishment 
under the civil service law. Senator Smith 
turned Mr. Lalor’s letter over to the civil 
service commission; but the commission sent 
a copy of the postmaster’s letter to the post- 
office department, with a suggestion that the 
department might be interested in knowing 
his point of view when it became necessary to 
act upon his recommendations. — 
dispatch. New York Evening Post, February 1, 


TAMMANY REPUBLICANISM. 

It is related of the late Judge George Shea that 
when he retired from the marine court judgeship in 
1882, he did so because Tammany Hall demanded as 
the price of his re-election a year’s salary of the of¬ 
fice, jSlSfiOO. To this he answered, with true Bo- 
man scorn, that if his services to the city had not 
been such as to warrant his re-election on his own 
merits, he did not desire the ofiice. 


A story is told concerning City-Judge Cow¬ 
ing of the court of general sessions which, if 
true, forms an interesting commentary upon 
his assertion to the grand jury that in the 
Kobertson General Sessions bill, politics for 
the first time entered that court, and makes 
also a valuable exhibit to be attached to the 
statement of reasons Recorder Goff has given 
why he should be empowered to reorganize the 
force of employes. The story comes from a 
usually trustworthy source, and in substance is 
as follows : 

When Judge Cowing was nominated in 1892, 
by Tammany Hall, after being renominated 
by the republicans, a condition said to have 
been imposed either directly or indirect¬ 
ly, by express agreement or tacit under¬ 
standing, was that he should pay a large con¬ 
tribution into the Tammany Hall cam¬ 
paign fund, and should give his patronage as 
judge to that organization. It is matter of 
public knowledge that the judge paid over 
$10,000 to the Tammany campaign committee, 
and that he defended his action in the news¬ 
papers. The attendants whom he had origi¬ 


nally appointed as republicans seem to have 
been confronted by the alternative of going 
over to Tammany or of resigning to make 
way for Tammany men. Four men who now 
belong to Tammany Hall remained in enjoy¬ 
ment of their salaries; the rest, who are still 
republicans, were discharged. One of the 
four was John J. Phillips, who was at first 
dismissed, having failed apparently to per¬ 
ceive unaided what he must do to be saved. 
With his notice of dimissal in his hand, he 
went to ex-Coroner John K. Nugent, whom 
he had been accustomed to look up to as his 
republican district leader. The coroner opened 
Phillip’s eyes. “Join Tammany Hall at 
once, as I have done,” advised the ex-cor¬ 
oner. So did Phillips with all expedition. 
Then came a summons from John F. Carroll, 
clerk of the court. “Have you your notice of 
dismissal?” said Carroll, “Yes,”said Phillips. 
“Give it me,” said Carroll. In a moment it 
was torn in bits. “You are reinstated be¬ 
cause you are a veteran,” said Carroll. Never 
before had Phillips suspected how valuable 
it was to be veteran. Among the attendants 
appointed by Judge Cowing to fill the vacan¬ 
cies he had created was Michael Quinn, keep¬ 
er of a lodging-house and barroom in Pell 
street, and William T. Devlin, a henchman of 
John C. Sheehan, and keeper of a saloon in 
West Twenty-fourth street, connecting with 
tha Grand Opera House. 

When the main facts of this story were re¬ 
lated to Judge Cowing, he said : “ It is ut¬ 
terly untrue that there wa.s any agreement or 
understanding between Tammany Hall and 
myself. What I did I did voluntarily.” It 
was then attempted to ask Judge Cowing to 
specify the things he had done voluntarily, 
but he refused to listen to any further ques¬ 
tions. 

The story was told to Phillips. He said 
some of it was true and some false, hut refused 
to separate the accurate from the inaccurate 
explicitly and in detail. He admitted, how¬ 
ever, that he had been dismissed after Judge 
Cowing’s re-election, without any reason being 
assigned to him; that he presumed the dis¬ 
missal was at the request of Judge Cowing, j s 
he was on that Judge’s list; that he did con¬ 
sult with some of his friends about his dis¬ 
charge, and that he was reinstated because he 
was a veteran. He declined to say whether 
or not he joined Tammany Hall in the inter¬ 
val between his discharge and reinstatement; 
“ a man’s politics,” he said, “ is like his re¬ 
ligion ; he has a right to keep it to himself, 
and to refuse to answer questions about it.” 

It is well known that ex-Coroner John E. 
Nugent, after having been republican leader 
in his district, joined Tammany Hall and 
served under his old antagonist, John Riley, 
the Tammany leader. 

After'obtaining the above statements, the 
follo-wing letter was received this morning ; 

To the Editor of the Evening Post: 

Sir: Judge Cowing, in his charge to the 
grand jury, stated that “for the first time 








204 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


politics has invaded the citadel of justice.” 
Let me state how politics invaded the citadel 
of justice when Judge Cowing sought and re¬ 
ceived the nomination of Tammany Hall for 
his second term, and at the dictation of Tam¬ 
many Hall turned out court officers who had 
served for years and whose only offense was 
that they were members of the republican 
party. 

I was appointed court attendant of the court 
of general sessions by Judge Cowing, on the 
first day of February, 1882, and such appoint¬ 
ment wasgiven to me on the recommendation of 
the republican organization of my assembly 
district. I am a veteran of the late war, and 
past commander of Adam Goss post, G. A. R. 
For nearly eleven years I served as such court 
attendant, and during that period of time, 
with the knowledge and approbation of Judge 
Cowing, I was an active member of the repub¬ 
lican party. Frequently I served as a mem¬ 
ber of the county committee, and also as a 
delegate or alternate to conventions. On all 
of those occasions, when I desired leave of ab¬ 
sence, Judge Cowing always permitted me to 
go, because he knew of and was interested in 
the object of my absence. During this period 
of years I served on election day, at every con¬ 
gressional election, as chief deputy marshal 
in the fourth assembly district. The fact that 
I was appointed and served as such was well 
known to Judge Cowing, and no objection 
was made by him. 

In the month of July, 1892, ex-Coroner 
John Nugent, in conversation with me at the 
barge office, told me that it was all arranged 
that Judge Cowing was to get the Tammany 
Hall nomination that fall, and that he had 
agreed to turn the republicar s out of his court, 
and give the places to Tammany Hall. In 
the early part of October of the same year. 
Judge Cowing called me up to the bench one 
day, and told me he had been on the outing 
of a democratic association on the east side 
the preceding day, and that he.had met many 
friends there who told him how hard I was 
working for him. He said, “Pat, keep up the 
good work for my election, and if Tammany 
Hall does not nominate me I will man every 
district in the city.” 

Judge Cowing received the Tammany Hall 
nomination, and in the republican county 
convention, of which I was a member, there 
was a bitter opposition to Judge Cowing re¬ 
ceiving the republican nomination, on the 
ground that he was in league with Tammany 
Hall. 

On the 31st of October, 1892, John F, Car- 
roll, the then newly appointed clerk of the 
court from Tammany Hall, sent for me and 
asked me if I was a United States deputy mar¬ 
shal. I told him yes; he said, “I can not cer¬ 
tify this pay-roll with your name on it.” I 
asked him why, saying that I had served as 
such every year since I had been a court offi¬ 
cer, and that Judge Cowing knew it. He 
said he would not certify to it any way. 

On November 2,1892,1 received the follow¬ 
ing letter; 


New York, November 2, 1892. 

To P. J. O'Brien: 

Dear Sir —If convenient, will you come to 
the Tammany Club Room, No. 218 East Broad¬ 
way, on Friday evening, November 4, 1892, at 
nine o’clock? I desire to see you relative to 
election district matters. Do net fail to call. 

Respectfully yours, 

E. T. Fitzpatrick, 
Chairman of General Committee. 

I did not call at the Tammany club rooms, 
and took no notice of the letter. On election 
day I served, as usual, as chief deputy United 
States marshal. Election day being a holi¬ 
day, no court was held, consequently I lost no 
time from court. 

I continued to serve as court officer until 
the 21st of November, when I called upon 
Judge Cowing in his chambers. I said to 
him, “ What is there about Mr. Carroll send¬ 
ing for me?” He said : “O’Brien, I think the 
corporation counsel has got you techuical- 
ly.” I said: “In what respect?” He said: 
“In reference to being a deputy marshal.” I 
said to him : “ Why, you knew that I was a 
deputy marshal ever since I have been a court 
officer, every alternate year, when the republi¬ 
can party desired my services, and you never 
objected to it.” He replied : “ I am very sor¬ 
ry.” He also said : “ My wife said to me this 
morning that it was better to be born lucky 
than rich. If I did not get the Tammany 
Hall nomination, you see I would have gone 
down with the ship.” I said: “Is that all the 
notification I get?” He said : “ I don’t know 
of any other,” and I bade him good day. 

On the next day I receive the following 
notice: 

New York, Nov. 21, 1892. 

To Mr. Patrick J. O'Brien : 

You are hereby notified that your services 
as an officer or attendant of the court of gen¬ 
eral sessions of the peace will not be further 
required on and after the 1st day of Decem¬ 
ber, 1892. 

(Signed) James Fitzgerald, 

Judge General Sessions. 

Rufus B. Cowing, City Judge. 

Frederick SiMYTH, Recorder. 

The judges who signed this notice were the 
judges who were understood by all the court 
officers as the judical combine that ran the 
court. 

My salary was refused for the month of No¬ 
vember, and I had to sue for it. In that suit 
in the supreme court, the question was raised, 
that because I had acted as a United States 
deputy marshal, I had forfeited my right to 
the salary, and the judge threw the defense 
out of court, and directed a verdict in my fa¬ 
vor. That case was appealed to the general 
term, and the general term has affirmed the 
judgment. 

I was not the only republican discharged 
by Judge Cowing on account of his nomina¬ 
tion by Tammany Hall, and to makeplaces for 
Tammany Hall men. There were six others. 
I was discharged to make room for Pat Div- 
ver’s man, Michael Quinn, who kept a five- 
cent lodging house, at the corner of Pell and 
Mott streets, and who now keeps a liquor- 
saloon at the same place, and who boasts that 
he sells a glass of beer as large as a plug hat. 


This is the man who assaulted a good govern¬ 
ment club delegate at the polling-place of his 
district, on one of the registration days at last 
election, and charges were preferred against 
him to the grand jury, but by some means an 
indictment was prevented. 

John Miller, a veteran, and a thirteenth 
assembly district republican, was discharged 
by Judge Cowing, to make room for Billy 
Devlin, a protege of Police Commissioner 
Sheehan, and keeper of the bar in the grand 
opera-house. 

Pete Seaman, another appointee of Judge 
Cowing’s, kept a liquor store right opposite the 
court, and within a few days was told by 
Judge Cowing that he would have to get out 
of it or resign his place in the court, as things 
were getting too hot. 

One of the republicans dischargsd by Judge 
Cowing about the time I was discharged was 
named John Phillips. He had been originally 
appointed by Judge Cowing on the recommen¬ 
dation of the republican district organization 
of which ex-Coroner Nugent was the leader. 
When Phillips received his notice of dismissal, 
he ran to John Nugent with it. John Nugent, 
in the meantime, had jumped into Tam¬ 
many Hall, and he told Phillips to do the 
same. Phillips did join the Tammany Asso¬ 
ciation in John Reilly’s district, and in a 
week or so Mr. Carroll, the chief clerk, sent 
for him and asked him if he had his notice of 
removal in his pocket. Phillips produced it, 
and Carroll told him he was reinstated be¬ 
cause he was a veteran. Up to that time no 
question had been raised about his being a 
veteran; he simply had joined Tammany Hall. 
Had I complied with the notification to join 
Tammany Hall I would also have been rein¬ 
stated. 

This transaction will show the extent of 
Judge Cowiug’s truth and honesty when he 
said to the grand jury, “I believe you will find 
that in this court politics has never had any 
sway.” As a matter of fact, every appoint¬ 
ment that was made during my time was based 
on politics, and it is a notorious fact that the 
politicians who are seeking favors for their 
friends under indictment, accused of crime, 
thronged the court-rooms and corridors and 
even the judge’s rooms. 

Since Mr. Carroll has been there it has been 
a rendezvous for Tammany Hall politicians. 
There never was a morning that district 
leader Jimmy Boyle was not flitting between 
the clerk’s office, the judge’s rooms, and the 
district attorney’s office. When Judge Cowing 
says that politics never had any sway he flies 
in the teeth of his own acts and what has 
taken place under his eye for years. 

A word as to the attendants: there never 
has been either order or discipline among 
them; every man is boss, comes and goes when 
he pleases, and the work has always fallen 
upon a few men who had not as much pull or 
were not favorites. Patrick J. O’Brien. 

224 Madison Street, New York. 

—From the New York Evening Post, Febinary, 
1895. 








The Civil service Chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering of the 
ship of state, i'rom Archbishop Ireland's address: The Duty and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. II, No. 25. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 

The republican majority in the late In¬ 
diana general assembly came into office on 
the great reform wave which swept the 
country in 1894. On coming up to Indian¬ 
apolis they found the one pressing work 
before them to be the removal of politics 
from the state service and the placing it 
upon a purely business basis. The meth¬ 
ods were at hand in the shape of the merit 
system and the labor service system. 
There were hundreds of great examples 
where these methods had been proved 
with brilliant success. None but fools or 
knaves would think of trying any other 
methods. A bill embodying the results of 
these wide experiences was prepared and 
introduced. It never got out of the com¬ 
mittee. The party promise, years old and 
repeated in every form, was not forgotten, 
because it was constantly held before the 
face of every member of the general as¬ 
sembly. With stolid indifference they 
broke the promise. They were wild with 
a wolfish desire to get at the places in the 
insane hospitals, the institution for feeble¬ 
minded children, the prisons, and so on. 
And yet they were afraid of the public 
vengeance. For the benevolent institu¬ 
tions they finally passed a bill providing 
that the members of the six boards should 
be divided in politics. Of all the humbugs 
with which knavish politicians dodge re¬ 
form, this is the greatest. When they 
came to the penal institutions their wolf¬ 
ishness got beyond control and they en¬ 
acted that those be seized as spoils, pure 
and simple. 

The republican majority in the general 
assembly thoroughly rounded out its 
worthless career, and it disgraced the state 
as it has not been disgraced in this genera¬ 
tion. It turned its mighty mind to the 
custodian of the state house, and the 
twenty employes under him, all of whom 
have satisfactorily performed their duties, 
which consist principally in cleaning the 
tobacco juice of the members of the gen¬ 
eral assembly from the tiled floors. A bill 
was passed to legislate these employes out 
of office, and to turn the state house over 
to a republican superintendent. Thrifty 
Mike Caip, the engineer, had kept a jug of 


INDIANAPOLIS, MARCH, 1895. 


whisky in the basement, and he seems 
to have bought enough members with 
enough drinks, for he was expressly 
exempted from the operations of 
the bill. The measure went to the 
governor, who, under the constitution, 
might keep it until three minutes before 
the general assembly expired by law. If 
then returned with his veto, the two 
houses could not pass it in three minutes. 
The governor decided to so return it, and 
at about ten minutes before midnight his 
private secretary started with it to the 
lower house on the next floor. The repub¬ 
licans had been watching for him. They 
had nailed up all of the doors of the gal¬ 
lery, and they now waylaid him and at¬ 
tempted to keep him in the elevator, where 
a desperate struggle took place, in which 
in its mad flight up and down a woman 
was nearly crushed and a rib of the private 
secretary broken, and a man hanging on 
the side of the elevator just escaped being 
cut in two. The private secretary says: 
“ The elevator still continued running, and 
while I was on my knees I reached out 
and touched the spring on one of the 
gates as we passed it. I got the door open, 
and the next time we came to it I made a 
jump and got out. I was six feet from the 
floor and fell to the ground with a crash.” 

A riot followed, in which the spittoons 
of the members of the general assembly 
and other missiles were thrown. The pri¬ 
vate secretary, with help which had come, 
forced his way to the door of the house, 
and through the door, and announced the 
message from the governor within the 
time. The speaker had, however, declared 
the house adjourned. The republican 
leader was a member named Adams, an 
ex-school teacher, a sort of Scholar in Poli¬ 
tics. So redoubtable is he that when he 
used to play foot-ball, four men were 
always detailed to tackle him. The repub¬ 
lican majority now say that the bill re¬ 
moving the scrubbers and spittoon clean¬ 
ers of the state house became a law be¬ 
cause the governor failed to return it 
within the prescribed time. 


The Chronicle especially recommends 
the story of Mr. Warfield, the reform post¬ 
master of Baltimore, to its spoils readers 
—it trusts that it has a goodly number. It 
is only just that spoilsmen should have this 
merry reading showing that civil service 


One dol'ar per annum. 

10 cents percopy. 

reformers are no better than they should 
be when put to the actual test. This pa¬ 
per can not resent the large list of un¬ 
pleasant epithets expressive of the con¬ 
tempt that spoilsmen bestow upon civil 
service reformers, for the reason that there 
is a considerable truth at bottom of them. 
It is the weakness, vacillation, and the 
taint of spoils politics shown by civil serv¬ 
ice reformers themselves that have been a 
shame upon a great cause. It was reform¬ 
ers who condoned the breaking down and 
evasion of the civil service law in the In¬ 
dianapolis post-oflfice in 1884 on the ground 
that we must expect only democrats to ap¬ 
ply for examination under a democratic 
administration, and so on. It has been 
reformers who have succumbed to the 
pride of controlling patronage. It has 
been reformers who have justified the sale 
of offices to secure legislation. We must 
admit that we all have lost clearness of 
moral vision from long contact with a vi¬ 
cious system. And while all reformers 
must speak out plainly about poor Mr. 
Warfield, who tried to be a cunning poli¬ 
tician for reform purposes, and left there¬ 
by the straight and narrow road, it may be 
frankly admitted that the last ten years 
have put him into a notable company of 
like sinners. 


The Baltimore postmaster recommend¬ 
ed the removal of seven employes, and the 
appointment of seven political followers 
who had been his election assistants. Be¬ 
fore the recommendation was approved, 
the President put the places under the 
civil service rules. Then the post-office 
department declined to approve the post¬ 
master’s changes. Of course, legally, this 
ended the matter. The authority of the 
department is absolute; if it declines to 
approve a removal, the removal is not 
made, and that is all there is of it. The 
postmaster gave it up, and appointed his 
seven men as watchmen, and immediately 
promoted them to the positions sought. 
Then he backed out of this swindle, and 
decided to regard the original appoint¬ 
ments good. He probably knew his man. 
Attorney-General Olney comes briskly 
forward, and says that the men may legally 
hold their first appointments. It takes a 
great man to be the attorney of sixty-five 
millions of people and of a great railroad 
corporation at the same time. Only some 




















206 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


such man would be equal to Olney’s civil 
service opinions. Mr. Bissell’s incurable 
weakness is illustrated in this silly refer¬ 
ence to Olney for decision. What with 
Olney and the Carlisles and Quincy, Mr. 
Cleveland’s second administration will not 
lack for offensive notoriety. 


The great struggle now going on be¬ 
tween Platt and the people of New York is 
one of the most important that has ever 
occurred as regards wholesome politics. 
The people defeated Tammany Hall by a 
tremendous majority, with the sole object 
of getting rid of bossism, and the worst 
kind of corruption. Now comes Tom 
Platt and declares that the object of de¬ 
feating Tammany shall not be gained, but 
that the only result shall be that he shall 
be substituted in Tammany’s place. This 
does not seem to be mere brag, for it is 
not certain that Platt does not have the 
power to accomplish his object. Depend¬ 
ing on the uncontradicted statements of 
such papers as the New York 'tribune, it 
may be said that Platt has been in the 
habit of collecting large amounts of money 
from corporations and individuals, and 
this money he has sent out to candidates 
throughout the state as aid to them in 
their campaigns. The result is that the 
leading men in the legislature, including 
the heads of the important committees, are 
Platt henchmen rendering absolute obedi¬ 
ence to him. The result is that bills for 
reorganizing the corruption out of the 
government of the city of New York are 
held up because they give no power to 
Platt, while bills which make him virtually 
the dictator of New York are threatened. 
This is a development of American practi¬ 
cal politics no less dangerous than the Tam¬ 
many Hall development. It ought to be 
studied and understood by everybody, and 
especially by that large class of excellent 
citizens who regard it as the highest polit¬ 
ical duty to stick by the party machine, 
right or wrong. 


Governor Morton committed the blun¬ 
der of leaving on the civil service commis¬ 
sion Mr. McKinstry, who had helped to 
make the law the laughing-stock of Tam¬ 
many. He then appointed Editor Cobb, 
of whose appointment a republican paper 
said: 

“We are gratified at the appointment of Willard 
A. Cobb, editor of the Lockport Journal, as a mem¬ 
ber of the civil service commission. Mr. Cobb is a 
practical politician, not a snivel service man, and 
so long as this un-American law is in force it can 
best be administered by those who are opposed to 
its execution in detail.” 

As a corrective of the deliberate blow at 
the reform law in the appointment of Cobb 
he put on the commission one trueand tried 
friend of the merit system, Silas W. Burt, 
and after a painful struggle, the Platt leg¬ 


islature saw fit to confirm the nomination. 
We may be sure that if Mr. Burt can do no 
more, secret evasions of the law will end. 

It is not diflBcult to ‘size up” Postmaster- 
General Bissell. He has capacity and ex¬ 
ecutive ability. But, as Good Government 
says, he lacks aggressive courage on 
broad lines. He has in a general way 
sound ideas of administrative reform but 
he founders upon the rock which has pre¬ 
vented Mr. Cleveland from being a great 
President—he believes that the offices 
must be so distributed as not to disrupt the 
party. No man practicing this belief will 
in our time reach greatness in ofl&ce. Mr. 
Bissell has done a good many things for 
reform and he is entitled to the thanks of 
the country. Indeed, when we see a man 
of so much ability and with full compre¬ 
hension of reform ideas, and with all the 
party wreck and ruin of the Cleveland 
and Harrison distribution of spoils before 
him, we are filled with astonishment that 
he should have missed the opportunity of 
stolid, unyielding refusal to divide the 
fourth-class post-offices as party plunder. 
He missed his object; as Harper's Weekly 
says, the spoils politicians of his own par¬ 
ty were incensed at him for doing so 
much for civil service reform, and the civil 
service reformers are dissatisfied because 
he failed to come up to the standard 
which was entirely feasible. His party is 
effectually disrupted. Nevertheless we 
regret that he has resigned, because it 
makes the future uncertain. Mr. Wilson 
may be better and he may be worse. His 
professions are satisfactory, but we hope he 
will not be that worst pest in office—the new 
incumbent with no exact knowledge, and no 
practical experience who thinks he knows 
short cuts which will put in practice re¬ 
form ideas, and satisfy and unite the re¬ 
formers and the politicians. He should 
understand that there is an impassible 
gulf between spoils politicians and reform 
methods. 

The Chronicle has elsewhere com¬ 
piled, mostly from the New York Evening 
Post, a month of the efforts being made by 
a large number of citizens to restore to 
New York city free government. It must 
not be forgotten that for years past a small 
group of patriotic people and papers have, 
in season and out of season, warned their 
fellow-citizens of the chains being forged 
by the united efforts of the Platt-Tam- 
many combination. It must not be for¬ 
gotten that a minister’s dogged will finally 
fired the inert mass of apathetic citizen¬ 
ship with a moral purpose to probe to the 
very bottom of the corruption. Then 
came those shocking revelations of the 
poor and weak blackmailed, honest men 
corrupted, and criminals acting upon the 


knowledge that there were only dishon- J 
esty, injustice and foulness in the admin- j 
istration of the government of the city, j 
and that all this dishonesty, injustice and 1 
foulness, were known and tacitly acqui¬ 
esced in by large numbers of men no- j 
table for their fair names. When this was j 
realized the conscience of the American ] 
people awoke and Tammany was appar- j 
ently engulphed. Reform work was not | 
abandoned. The keenest and busiest men J 
of New York laid aside private duties and 1 
united to prepare legislation absolutely ,1 
necessary for any real reform or for any J 
permanent abolition of Tammany, or kin¬ 
dred bossism. Then that other boss—the 
nether Tammany, Tom Platt, began his ], 
work. Sometimes sly as when he sends .j] 
lying statements for his henchmen edit- ' 
ors throughout the state to print as their J 
own; again bold as when for nine weeks a j 
legislature at his beck holds up all re- i 
form legislation; but whether sly or bold, j 
this boss is unwearied. He trusts to his j 
large experience, that in these movements * 
people get selfish and lose courage, and fi- | 
nally the high-spirited leaders yield to ma¬ 
terial interests and become cravens. 


The Chicago Record says that six ministers , 
of the gospel appear in the roster of the West i \ 
Virginia legislature, and they all voted to send * 

Stephen B. Elkins to the United States senate. | 

Such mental or moral strabismus at first , ^ 

thought seems to support the theory of those 
who claim that the clergy should never enter , i 
political life, nor be drawn into any move- ; I 
ments for political reform, because they are ^ 
sure to disgrace themselves or the reform be- > 
fore they get through. ; , 


At Cornell University, the Curtis debating 
clubs observed the birthday anniversary of 
George William Curtis. 

Addresses were made on “ Curtis’s Connection 
witn Cornell,” by Prof. B. G. Wilder, and on “Cur¬ 
tis and Civil Service Reform,” by Prof. B. I 
Wheeler. Papers were also presented giving a 
“Sketch of Curtis’s Life,” by N. Lyon, ’97; on I | 
“ Curtis as an Orator,” by F. P. Ufford, ’96, and on < i 
“ Curtis as a Writer,’ by A. J. Sperry,’96. On ac¬ 
count of Curtis’s intimate connection with the uni- J ; 
versity in its early days, an attempt will be made J 
to secure for Cornell a share in the Curtis memorial 
lectureship, which is soon to be established, pro- ' i' 
viding for courses of lectures on citizenship to be i 
given in several colleges. [ 


It is reported that the committee in charge 
of the fund has decided to establish a revolv¬ 
ing lectureship, the incumbent of which shall 
deliver lectures in Yale, Harvard, Columbia, 
and perhaps Amherst and Brown colleges. 
Certainly, Chicago University and Michigan 
University should ask to be included. In this 
connection, we refer all of our readers to the 
excellent life of Mr. Curtis by Edward Cary, 
with the further suggestion that there is no 
better subject for commencement than the 
facts and lessons of Mr, Curtis’s biography. 




f. ^ ■ 

' 4 


















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


207 


Cincinnati is to be congratulatefi because 
Theodore Roosevelt has roused the civil serv¬ 
ice reformers of that city to revive their asso¬ 
ciation formed in 1881. but we respectfully ex¬ 
tend condolences that it has a press so apa¬ 
thetic and behind the times that it attracts 
attention because the Tribune gives a little 
over a column to an account of the address. 
Indiana civil service reformers owe much to a 
few enlightened and liberal papers. Judge 
William H. Taft, of the United States Circuit 
Court, was elected President of the Cincinnati 
association, and made a vigorous address. 

The South West, a civil service reform paper 
says: 

Mr. Roosevelt began by a reference to a little 
editorial remark in the Commercial Gazette, that 
contained, as far as we are able to judge, rath¬ 
er the thoughts of George B. Cox, translated 
into polite English, than any independent ed¬ 
itorial opinion. Later on, referring again to 
the same paper, he said: 

“I saw to-day in another column of the 
same friendly paper (Laughter), a statement 
that they were quite confident 1 would not 
go into any wicked scheme to include a large 
« number of democrats now in office under the 
classified service, and the republicans would 
not probably get in. They can just bet that 
I will go in for any scheme of that kind. 
(Laughter.) I shall do my best to get the 
classified service put over every branch of the 
public service that it is capable of being put 
over. (Applause.) And 1 shall do it, any¬ 
how, without any regard to party, merely be¬ 
cause I claim to be an American citizen, and 
wish well to the commonwealth. (Applause.) 
And if I were sure that my party was to get in 
to-morrow, I would try to have it done to¬ 
night, because I know that nothing weakens a 
party more than the division of patronage. 
That there is absolutely no form of a faction 
fight quite so damaging and quite so degrad¬ 
ing as a quarrel over the spoils. (Laughter.) 

“If the party to which I belong can not wife 
except upon a basis of paying the captains of 
tens and the captains of hundreds with fourth- 
class post-offices and jobs here and there, I 
don’t wish it to win. (Laughter and ap¬ 
plause.) » * * 

“People are afraid, they say, of having a 
governing class in this country. There again 
it is a little bit difficult to argue seriously. Do 
they really think that a country of 75,000,000 
people is in danger of being tyranized over 
by 8,000 government clerks? Have they ever 
seen government clerks? I wish they would 
walk through the post-office to-morrow and 
look at your letter-carrier when he comes 
around, and see if you see anything sinister 
about him, and if you really think that the fact 
that that carrier has probably staid there in 
the service five or six years, and will probably 
stay there six more, if he behaves himself, if 
you really think that that in some hidden way 
jeopardizes your liberty—think of that se¬ 
riously, and ask yourself if you have to give 
an answer to that question. * * * 

“The governing class that is a danger is the 
class that is after public patronage; is the 
class who is the heeler, the ward boss, the 
ward rough, the man who is present at the 
polls, to cheat; the bully, to lie, to carry the 
election somehow, because he is to be paid for 
it. He is the danger, and he is not the man 
to be in the classified service.” (Applause.) 


Mr. Roosevelt says that Postmaster Zum- 
stein’s administration of the office has been 
most satisfactory. Eighty-two per cent, of the 
carriers who were employed when Mr. Zum- 


stein took charge of the office are still there, 
and there has been but eighteen per cent, of 
changes, and these were by reason of bona 
fide resignations, deaths, and removals. The 
workings of the examining board at the post- 
office is also highly satisfactory, and he re¬ 
gards it as one of the model boards. 

And yet this posjmaster, who has obeyed 
the law and has begun to learn his business, 
is to be removed and a green hand appointed. 
We quote the following from the South West 
as illustrative of the barbarous practice in 
vogue: 

The Commercial-Gazette mentions 3. Marshall 
Smedes and Wm. J. O’Neil instead of J. W. 
Harper and A. W. Houston, and gives its five 
candidates handsome editorial send-offs, each 
of which concludes with the stereotyped as¬ 
sertion that the respective applicant ‘‘ would 
make a fine postmaster, with Muller in the 
outside room.” There is a great, deep truth 
in this bit of pleasant sarcasm. It tells near¬ 
ly the whole story of the utter unreasonable¬ 
ness of our civil service system, as it was and 
it now is. Before the enactment of the civil 
•service reform law of 1883 there were really 
two postmasters needed in Cincinnati and afl 
other larger cities. One had to give his time 
and energy to the business of collecting, for¬ 
warding and distributing the mails, and so 
forth. His duties and services were clearly 
defined, and his salary was therefore moderate. 
He was the real postmaster with the title and 
salary of first assistant. The other man, who 
had the title of postmaster, was not expected 
to meddle with the mails, but to see to it that 
his county and district conventions were prop¬ 
erly packed in the interest of the man who re¬ 
tained him as his personal political servant 
at the expense of the United States treasury. 
His services were of a very uncertain nature, 
and hence his salary rather large. It is easy 
enough to understand that under the old sys¬ 
tem there was really need for two men for 
each office, but since tbe patronage has been 
taken away from the heads of such offices 
there is no longer any need for two postmas¬ 
ters in Cincinnati. There was but little need 
for Mr. Riley when Mr. Muller was his co¬ 
postmaster; there was less need for Mr. Zum- 
stein, who bas been Mr. Muller’s co-postmas¬ 
ter, as was his predecessor, Mr. Whitfield. 

Why could not Mr. Bissell have realized 
how he would have added to his own good 
name and to his party’s to insist that if men 
like Zumstein were to be removed because 
they were recently political appointments, 
faithful subordinates like Muller should be 
promoted. 

BALTIMORE’S REFORM POSTMAS- 
TER. 

Mr. S. Davies Warfield is the postmaster at 
Baltimore. Mr. Warfield has been for years 
an independent democrat. His father, Henry 
M. Warfield, was the independent candidate 
in 1875 against Mayor Latrobe, the present 
incumbent. It has never been questioned, 
that in that contest Mr. Latrobe was really 
defeated, but was counted in. 

It was in connection with the state election, 
which took place a few days after this munic¬ 
ipal election of 1875, that Eugene Higgins 
entered the court-house by night and burned 
the ballots. 

Mr. Warfield, in 1889, was the chairman of 
the independent democratic city committee) 


and as such he labored hard to elect the fu¬ 
sion ticket, headed by Major Alexander Shaw, 
the republican nominee for mayor. 

In 1891 Mr. Warfield was himself the fu¬ 
sion candidate for mayor against Mr. Latrobe, 
but was badly beaten. 

In all these campaigns, civil service reform 
was a prominent issue, and the party with 
which Mr. Warfield acted laid special em¬ 
phasis upon it. 

Mr. Warfield has always been a devoted 
follower and personal friend of Mr. John K. 
Cowen, the general counsel of the Baltimore 
and Ohio Railroad Company, a vice-president 
of the civil service reform association, and 
fora number of years the fighting leader of 
the independent democrats of Baltimore. 

In 1893 some sort of an arrangement was 
made between I. Freeman Rasin, the Balti¬ 
more city “boss,” and Mr. Cowen. Mr. Cowen 
had repeatedly and fiercely attacked Rasin 
from the stump, and in the columns of the 
press; saying nothing about him, however, 
which was not admittedly true, but which, if 
true, proved him a person with whom it is 
difficult to understand how any clear-headed 
man, anxious for honest government, could 
have any alliances. 

It was stated in the Baltimore Sun at the 
time, and has been since repeated by Mr. Ra¬ 
sin and his friends, that the arrangements re¬ 
ferred to was entered into by Mr. Rasin at 
the special personal request of President Cleve¬ 
land. 

The terms of the plan as then announced 
were, that Mr. Cleveland would appoint Mr. 
Warfield postmaster, and Mr. William L. 
Marbury district attorney. Mr. Marbury is 
a very able young lawyer, who had taken an 
active part in all reform campaigns in Mary¬ 
land, for a number of years past. He ac¬ 
companied Mr. Cowen into the republican state 
convention, in 1887, and there followed Mr. 
Cowen’s example in pledging his support to 
the republican state ticket, on the ground 
that the defeat of the democratic machine in 
this state was necessary'if the state was to be 
honestly governed. 

Mr. Rasin agreed that, as his contribution 
to harmony, he would place upon the regular 
legislative ticket, in the second legislative 
district, four independents, namely : Mr. W. 
Cabell Bruce, who had long been an especially 
earnest advocate of civil service reform ; Mr. 
Thomas S. Baer, secretary of the Baltimore 
reform league; Mr. John Helmsley Johnson, 
for a number of years editor of the Civil Ser¬ 
vice Itejormer, and Mr. Archibald H. Taylor. 
These gentlemen, it is understood, were not 
asked to make any pledges, and in point of 
fact are said not to have made any. These 
gentlemen and Mr. Cowen had, however, in 
past campaigns, opposed Mr. Latrobe bitterly. 
He was in 1893 again a candidate, but they 
were necessarily silent. 

The late Mr. S. Teakle Wallis, however, than 
whom no more disinterested reformer ever 
lived, thought that these gentlemen could con¬ 
sistently take the nomination, and ought to. 












208 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


It is believed, however, that a large number 
of reformers, who in national politics were 
democrats, disapproved of the whole business, 
as did the republicans. There was no ques¬ 
tion, of course, that these independents were 
nominated simply and solely because Mr. 
Rasin said they should be, and that their 
nomination was in itself the clearest evidence 
of the thoroughness of Mr. Rasin’s power 
over the machinery of the democratic party. 

It was claimed by some who defended the 
scheme that, as a result of this alliance, prac¬ 
tical measures of reform could and would be 
gotten through the legislature, and that in 
particular a civil service reform law would be 
enacted. 

Senator Bruce, when he got to Annapolis, 
introduced such a bill, and for awhile it was 
given out that it would pass. Of course it did 
not, nor did any other reform measure in the 
line of those long demanded by the reform or¬ 
ganizations in Baltimore. Not a single im¬ 
provement was made in the election laws, nor 
did the reformers elected apparently make 
any special effort to secure the enactment of 
any of the bills which the Reform League 
prepared and sent to them. 

Such was the situation when upon the ex¬ 
piration of the four years’ term of Postmaster 
Johnson, President Cleveland nominated Mr. 
Warfield as postmaster of Baltimore. Mr. 
Gorman hung this nomination up in the sen¬ 
ate for some time, but it was finally confirmed. 

When Mr. Warfield took oflice, he made a 
little speech to the employes, in which he told 
them that he purposed to enforce the civil 
service reform law rigidly in the classified 
service. He also declared in substance that 
Mr. Cleveland was the greatest civil service 
reformer who had ever lived. The pledge then 
made, in so far as it related to the positions 
within the classified service at the time Mr. 
Warfield took charge of the office, has been 
faithfully fulfilled. The number of removals 
among the several hundred classified clerks 
and carriers has been very small; probably 
not exceeding three or four, and those all for 
cause. 

Mr. Warfield never said, or intimated, that 
he would treat tbe unclassified places as in¬ 
cluded within the spirit of the civil service 
regulations. For some months after he came 
in, however, he made very few changes. He 
allowed a number of the republican, ward 
politicians, with whom Postmaster Johnson 
had filled the non-classified places, to retain 
their offices, although he would have been 
amply justified in removing them promptly. 

During these first few months in office the 
only indication that there might be trouble to 
come was found in the political biographies 
of every new appointee in the unclassified 
service regularly given out by somebody. These 
people were always described as Cleveland 
democrats. Thecandidales for whom they had 
voted in the last three or four municipal cam¬ 
paigns were, as a rule, also stated. It ap¬ 
peared from these biographical notices that 
they had almost without exception in those 
campaigns supported the tickets the election 


of which had been advocated by Mr. War- 
field. 

There were not many such appointments 
made, however, and things moved along very 
smoothly until to words fall, when Mr. War- 
field conceived the plan of having Mr. Cowen 
nominated in the fourtji congressional dis¬ 
trict to succeed Mr. Rayner, who had declined 
to be a candidate for renomination. Mr. 
Cowen did not live in the fourth district, but 
did live in the second, of which Mr. Talbot 
was the representative. 

According to Maryland political traditions 
this non-residence in the district was a more 
important matter than it would seem to be 
to any one not familiar with them. Mr. Cowen 
is very able, has long been an avowed free 
trader, and an aggressive anti-Gorman man. 
He is a warm friend of Postmaster-General 
Wilson, and it is believed of Mr. Cleveland 
as well. 

Mr. Rasin’s friends say that the President 
himself requested Mr. Rasin to have Mr. 
Cowen nominated. Mr. Rasin agreed, and 
then Mr. Warfield had a paper circulated 
among the leading democrats of independent 
proclivities in Baltimore, asking Mr. Cowen 
to run. This paper was extensively signed by 
many gentlemen who had not approved of the 
legislative alliance of the year before, but 
who were warmly interested in the tariff con- 
troversey, and who believed that Mr. Cowen 
would be an exceedingly valuable supporter 
of the President’s policy. 

This letter, so signed^ was put in the news¬ 
papers simultaneously, or nearly so, with the 
announcement that Mr. Cowen would be the 
regular democratic nominee. Many of the 
regular democrats, including a number of 
those who regarded themselves as closer to 
Mr. Gorman than to Mr. Rasin, publicly ex¬ 
pressed their opposition. It is very probable 
that a large majority of the rank and file of 
the democratic party in the fourth district, 
either because they could not get over the 
prejudices which had been instilled into them 
by their leaders and newspapers during the 
series of campaigns in which Mr. Cowen so 
bitterly fought the democratic machine, or 
because they were opposed to the nomination 
for congress of a railroad attorney, or because 
they did not like electing a man who did not 
live in the district, would very much have 
preferred not to have Mr. Cowen the nomi¬ 
nee. So strict is the discipline, so absolute 
the control of Mr. Rasin over the democratic 
party machinery here, that Mr. Cowen was 
unanimously nominated. 

During the succeeding campaign he made 
an exceedingly vigorous and able canvass, ar¬ 
guing the tariff question from the administra¬ 
tion standpoint in a series of speeches of great 
power. Mr. Warfield was intensely interested 
in this campaign. It appears probable that 
he had before this time promised appoint¬ 
ments in the unclassified service to a number 
of persons who had been known as independ¬ 
ent democrats. He knew there was a great 
deal of dissatisfaction with the Cowen nomi¬ 
nation in the ranks of the regulars, and that 


in spite of the apparent unanimity with which 
the convention acted, there was considerable 
danger that the ticket would be badly cut 
at the polls. Under these circumstances he 
feared to appoint any more independents to 
post-office places. He accordingly made up his 
mind to let the republican incumbents re¬ 
main in place until after the election. 

He was a practical minded man, however, 
and was anxious to make use of the men 
whom he proposed to appoint to office, as well 
as of some of those already in the government 
service. He did not altogether trust the 
loyalty of the regular democratic organiza¬ 
tions, and thought it just as well to have a 
little outside organization of his own. He ac¬ 
cordingly set up a more or less secret election 
bureau, under the charge of one Harley, a 
clerk in the mailing division of the post-office 
and a member of the local post-office civil ser¬ 
vice examining hoard. This bureau was 
largely if not exclusively manned by appli¬ 
cants for places in the post-office. It has been 
alleged in the newspapers that some part of 
the stationery used in this office was paid for 
by the government and brought from the post- 
office. 

On the 2d of November, Mr. Cleveland, 
without warning Mr. Warfield, amended the 
civil service rules so as to include within the 
classified service a large number of hitherto 
exempted places in the postal service, includ¬ 
ing most of the offices which Mr. Warfield had 
promised to his campaign clerks. Mr. War- 
field was naturally considerably embarrassed. 
Just what he did, if anything, in the matter 
before election, it is hard to gather from the 
fragmentary and somewhat contradictory 
statements which have been given out. It ap¬ 
pears, probably, that Mr. Warfield had some 
sort of a conversation with some of the assist¬ 
ants of the postmaster general, or with the 
chief clerk of the post-office department, in 
the course of which he gave them more or less 
definite information that he proposed to make 
some changes, and what the changes were, and 
perhaps the names of the persons whom he 
proposed to appoint. 

These conversations or statements Mr. 
Warfield claims were made on or before No¬ 
vember the Ist; that is to say, one or more 
days prior to the inclusion of the places 
within the classified service. He wrote a 
letter to the post-office department, dated 
November 1st, but which the newspapers 
say the department alleges it did not re¬ 
ceive until November the 8th, formally 
and officially notifying the department of the 
appointment of his election assistants to 
the places he had promised them. He seems 
then to have been informed by the depart¬ 
ment that these places were now within the 
classified service and could not be filled ex¬ 
cept from the eligible registries. Whereupon 
he went to the civil service commission and 
had an interview with Messrs. Proctor and 
Lyman, Mr. Roosevelt not being at the office 
the day he called. Just what occurred 
there the public does not know. Mr. Warfield 
says, or Mr. Warfield’s confidential friends 











THE CIVIL^SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


209 


say for him, that he explained to the commis¬ 
sion the circumstances and asked them if he 
could not appoint his political followers 
watchmen, detail them to clerical duties, 
have the watchmen places classified, and 
then, having the men within the classified 
service, promote them to other positions in it, 
and that the commission advised him he 
could do so. On the other hand, it is under¬ 
stood that the commission says that all Mr. 
Warfield asked them was two hypothetical 
questions; first, whether he could classify per¬ 
sons who, while nominally filling positions as 
watchmen, were actually performing clerical 
duties, and second, whether a person holding 
one position in the classified service in the 
post-office could be promoted without a new ex¬ 
amination to any other place in the classified 
service in the same office, and that the com¬ 
mission answered both questions in the affirm¬ 
ative. 

Mr. Warfield went back to Baltimore, ap¬ 
pointed the men watchmen, and had the 
watchmen’s places classified, and thereupon 
immediately promoted the men to the posi¬ 
tions for which he had intended them. They 
never served a day as watchmen. When the 
facts came to the attention of the commission, 
as they very speedily did, it of course set aside 
this whole performance. Mr. Warfield there¬ 
upon fell back upon his original contention, 
claiming that these appointments had been 
validly made prior to the President’s exten¬ 
sion of the rules. He relied upon various 
prior rulings of the department, especially 
that made under the advice of Attorney-Gen¬ 
eral Miller in connection with the appoint¬ 
ments made in the spring of 1889 by the Har¬ 
rison administration to the positions in the 
railway mail service then classified, and on 
various decisions of the courts. One of the 
difficulties of sustaining this contention under 
the circumstances of this case is, that at the 
time the so-called appointments were made, 
there were no vacancies to which the persons 
could be appointed. 

It is not denied that the first notice the for¬ 
mer republican incumbents had of their re¬ 
moval was from one to two weeks subsequent 
to the President’s extension of the rules. Post¬ 
master Warfield then asked them for their 
resignations, which they declined to give. In 
so asking, the postmaster himself was appar¬ 
ently guilty of a violation of the postal regu¬ 
lation promulgated some time since by Post¬ 
master General Bissell, which forbids the 
postmaster to ask for the resignation of any 
person in the classified postal service. 

All these things took place last November. 
Nothing has yet been apparenty decided in 
the case. The civil service commission has 
notified the postmaster-general that, in its 
judgment, Mr. Warfield’s new appointments 
are illegal, and has asked, it is understood, 
for the decision of the postmaster-general upon 
the question. 

Having been unable to obtain such decision, 
it has been reported in the papers that the 
commission has requested the treasury de¬ 
partment to refuse to pay the salaries of Mr. 


Warfield’s new appointees. It is understood 
that the postmaster-general has finally re¬ 
ferred the whole matter to Attorney-General 
Olney for his decision and the matter there 
rests. 

Meanwhile public opinion is practically 
unanimous in its conclusions. The demo¬ 
cratic spoilsmen and the republican spoils¬ 
men are laughing at the postmaster, and sar¬ 
castically commenting upon the performances 
of reformers in office. 

The general amusement is increased by the 
fact that Warfield was indiscreet enough to 
explain to the republican officials whom he 
removed, that he would have removed them 
before, but that he did not dare to make his 
new appointments prior to the election for 
fear the regular democrats would cut Cowen 
to pieces. 

The civil service reformers feel that Mr. 
Warfield apparently does not understand what 
civil service reform means, that he has not 
grasped the idea that it is not his place as 
postmaster to manage politics, and that he 
believes that he has the .right to use all the 
positions in the office, not included in the 
classified service, in the furtherance of his polit¬ 
ical ends. So feeling, he promised men places 
in return for political services rendered, and 
when a change in the regulations rendered 
it impracticable for him to carry out his 
bargains without resorting to tricks and eva¬ 
sions, to tricks and evasions he resorted. 

Meanwhile the civil service commission 
has, as it would seem, concluded that Mr. War- 
field is a man who will be none the worse for 
some watching. It has accordingly removed 
the old local civil service board of examin¬ 
ers, including Mr. Harley, who was the head 
of the post-office election bureau during the 
Cowen campaign, and has constituted a new 
board; two of whose members are not in the 
postal service at all, one of them being an 
experienced official of the United States sub¬ 
treasury, and one of the oldest members of 
the Maryland civil service reform association, 
and the other a clerk in the office of the United 
States engineers here. 

THE GRAPPLE OF REFORM WITH 
PLATTISM, 

A MONTH’S RECORD. 

It is an open secret in this town that in 
several election campaigns—we will not under¬ 
take to say how many—republican committees, na¬ 
tional, state, and county, when they have asked for 
contributions to campaign funds from wealthy indi¬ 
viduals connected with great corporations, have been 
met in many instances with the answer that while 
these individuals were willing, and expected to make 
subscriptions for the purpose named, they would pre¬ 
fer to make payment to that well-known and trusted 
leader, Mr. Thomas C. Platt. It is an open secret, 
that this condition has been assented to in a majority 
of cases, if not all. In is an open secret that the 
money so paid to Mr. Platt has been disbursed by 
means of his own checks as his personal contribu 
tions to the campaign expenses of republican candi 
dates for the senate and assembly, and other official 


positions throughout the state. It is an open secret 
that Mr. Platt has not consicUred it worth his while 
to make any accounting to the committees named of 
his disbursements. It is an open secret that many 
of the corporations contributing in this indirect way 
to campaign funds to be used — legitimately, of 
course—for the election of senators and assemblymen 
have large interests at stake, which may be depended 
upon securing or defeating legislation at Albany. 
It is an open secret that in some instances legislation 
at Albany affecting corporation sin this city has been 
held in committee, or otherwise delayed, until Mr. 
Ptatl was assured of a contribution to the republican 
campaign fund.—New York Tribune, March IS. 

THREE GREAT REFORMS. 

There are now awaiting action by the legis¬ 
lature three measures which may be said to 
embody the wishes of the people of this city 
as expressed in the anti-Tammany victory at 
the polls last November. These are: 

The Public School Bill. 

The City Magistrates’ Bill, 

The Police Reorganization Bill or Bills. 
* • * 

February 20— Albany. 

Ex Senator Platt left for New York city 
early this afternoon. Some of his friends 
urged him to stay over for the legislative re¬ 
ception at the executive mansion to-night, 
but he begged to be excused on the plea of 
business engagements. When he left he pro¬ 
fessed to be well satisfied with the results of 
his visit. 

All the more prominent republican machine legis¬ 
lators have been summoned before him to give an ac¬ 
counting of the situation, and the republican 
heads of the state departments also have had 
to contribute their quota of information and 
support. Gov. Morton had Mr. Platt with 
him for several hours early last evening at 
the executive mansion. » * » 

It may be stated that Mr. Platt started 
down the river this afternoon with the belief 
that there are at least eighty-five men in the 
assembly who may be relied upon by him to 
view men and measures from his standpoint. 
These figures are. those of men who knew Mr. 
Platt’s mind after he had received and talked 
last night with the many who called upon and 
advised him. 

« » * 

February 21— Albany. 

While no one may speak authoritatively for 
Governor Morton, it may be stated that yes¬ 
terday’s tide of Platt’s political influences did 
not wash him away from his anchorage. He 
did not assure Mr. Platt that any New York 
bills in any form passed by the legislature 
would receive executive approval. 

» « * 

February 21— New York. 

Platt assured the three republican police 
justices, who are on the bench with twelve 
Tammany justices, when he returned to the 
city yesterday, that they would not be dis- 
turbi d, since the bill abolishing that bench and cre¬ 
ating a city magistrates' bench would n ver become 
a law. 









210 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONILCE. 


February 22—New York. 

Only a small portion of the usual crowd of 
Platt legislators came down from Albany to¬ 
day to spend the last days of the week in re¬ 
ceiving orders from the boss. Among these 
were the faithful O’Connor of Binghamton 
and Lexow of Nyack. They were at the Fifth 
Avenue Hotel early this morning, and after 
looking about vainly for some of their associ¬ 
ates, they started for the headquarters in the 
United States Express building. Neither they 
nor the few local Platt men who were at the 
hotel had anything to say about the war pro¬ 
gramme which was prepared last Sunday. 
Harmony has become their watchword since 
it became apparent that Mayor Strong could 
not be frightened by threats of annoying legis¬ 
lation. 

• * • 

February 23—New York. 

Governor Morton was in town to-day, and 
the politicians surmised that he had come to 
help to bring about hjirmony in local republi¬ 
can circles. The governor arrived at the 
Hotel Renaissance in West Forty-third street 
last night and had a conference with Platt 
almost immediately after his arrival. 

The Platt men have entirely abandoned 
their threatening attitude. Just a week ago 
they were filling the air with threats about 
what they would do if the mayor failed to 
come to terms. Now they are begging for 
peace on almost any terms. The governor, it 
is well known, refused to join in a war against 
Mayor Strong, but it is said that he promised 
to do all he could to induce the mayor to give 
some patronage to the Platt men, and it ap¬ 
pears that he is not in town for the purpose of 
carrying out his promise. Most of Platt’s 
lieutenant’s are in the city, anxiou'-ly await¬ 
ing the result of the governor’s efforts. 

* * ♦ 

February 25—New York. 

The corridor outside the mayor’s office was 
crowded with politicians before eleven o’clock. 
When they were told that they would have to 
wait another hour, some of them said that 
they had brought their lunches along and 
were prepared for a siege. Then they resumed 
discussion of the probable effect of Gov. Mor¬ 
ton’s conference with Mayor Strong last Satur¬ 
day. The Platt men professed to he confident that 
Police Commissioners Kerwin and Murray would 
be retained, and that Platt would get recogni¬ 
tion in the dock and fire boards, anyhow. 
At noon there were about 200 politicians in 
the anteroom and in the corridor. A dozen 
of them were in a crush against the door of 
the Mayor’s office, and had the door been 
opened suddenly they would probably have 
fallen in a heap in the office. At 12:05 o’clock 
the door was still locked, and a loud growl 
went up. Three minutes later, the mayor’s 
big messenger, Daniel, came out through a 
side door and shouted: “ The mayor won’t 

let anybody in till one o’clock. He has im- 
portapt business on hand. Now you might as 
well take a walk around the block and cool 
off.” ♦ * » 


No reform expectation is greeted by the po¬ 
lice with more scepticism than that of a non¬ 
political administration of the police depart¬ 
ment. Among the men particularly there is a 
fixed faith in the ultimate triumph of poli¬ 
tics. They admit that changes are imminent; 
they believe there will be a reorganization 
which will affect many of them, even in the 
lower ranks, and they concede the honesty of 
Mayor Strong’s purposes. But in the end they 
say the politicians will reach and influence the force 
and the individual fortunes of every policeman. 
This is all patent to those who hear the men 
talk among themselves at police headquarters, 
and to reporter they show their minds freely, 
if whatthey say is notforpublication. * * * 
It is clearly the purpose of Platt to get even 
with Mayor Strong and the reformers, by de¬ 
feating all reform measures for this city 
through delay in the senate. He has a very 
strong grip upon that body because of its nar¬ 
row republican majority, the balance of power 
resting in the hands of the two or three sen¬ 
ators who have no other object in public life 
than to do his bidding. These senators have 
made little concealment of their purpose to 
prevent the passage of any bill thoroughly re¬ 
forming either the police department,or the 
police justice bench, or the department of ed¬ 
ucation. They have, from the first (we speak 
now especially of Lexow and O’Connor), de¬ 
clared that the Platt police board bills, which 
perpetuate the * bi-partisan evil, are the only, 
measures of the kind which shall be allowed 
to pass the senate. They have had these made 
caucus measures, and say that this approval 
bars out all change in their character. They 
are “holding up” the police justice abolition 
bill, and mean to defeat it unless they can get 
assurances from Mayor Strong as to the men 
whom he will appoint under its provisions. 
They are less open in their opposition to the 
public school bill, but their purpose is to kill 
that also unless they can get terms. 

» » » 

February 26— Albany. 

Viewed from the standpoint of the followers 
of Thomas C. Platt, the legislative situation 
is growing continually more exasperating. 
Governor Morton in his statement yesterday 
placed himself on record as heartily in ac¬ 
cord with the policy of Mayor Strong. 

* » • 

February 27— New York. 

In accordance with previous announcement, 
a special meeting of the chamber of commerce 
was held to-day at 12:30 o’clock for the pur¬ 
pose, as stated in the call, of ^'petitioning the 
legislature to pass without further delay a bill for 
the removal of the police justices of this city, and the 
reorganization of that branch of our criminal pro¬ 
cedure." 

[“It is a question not of politics, not even of 
business, but of morality, of humanity, even 
of religion. These are the present police jus¬ 
tices: William H. Burke. Joseph M. Deuel, 
Patrick Divver, Thomas L. Feitner, Thomas 
F. Grady, Edward Hogan, Joseph Koch, Ber¬ 
nard F. Martin, Clarence W. Meade, Daniel 
F. McMahon, John J. Ryan, Charles E. | 


Simms, Jr., Charles N, Taintor, John R. 
Voorhis, Charles Welde. What they are can 
be best understood by a brief comment on 
some of them taken from a publication of the 
Evening Post, which appeared many years 
since, and which statements have not been 
challenged : 

“ Bernard F. Martin was in business as liquor- 
dealer, in partnership with‘Red Leary’and Kate, 
his wife. ‘Red Leary’ wa.s one of the most notorious 
burglars in the country, and Kate probably one of 
the most famous pickpockets in the world. His sa¬ 
loon was the resort of the most disreputable and 
criminal classes in the community. As order 
of arrest clerk, he was indicted for accepting bribes 
on March 17, 1890, and escaped trial only or^a tech¬ 
nicality in the law. As the result of his efforts to 
roll up a big vote as a Tammany leader in the May¬ 
nard campaign, eight of his lieutenants were in¬ 
dicted for violation of the election laws, found 
guilty, and sent to prison. 

“ Patrick Divver at the time of his appointment 
was the proprietor of or had interests in several 
liquor-saloons. He is an ex-member of the board 
of aldermen, a race-track frequenter, and a friend 
and companion of gamblers. His activity for May¬ 
nard got him into even greater trouble. When the 
returns came in it was discovered that one election 
district had 363 votes for Maynard to none for any 
opposition candidate. Another showed 371 for 
Maynard to none for any other, and the third 
showed 267 to none for any other. There 
had been such obvious fraud that evidence 
was collected and presented to the grand jury, 
upon which indictments were found against 
many of Divver’s workers, eighteen of whom were 
tried, found guilty, and either suffered fine or im¬ 
prisonment or fled from justice. It has been 
shown that Divver has had among his Intimates for 
many years not less than forty men who were 
among the most disreputable in New York city. 
The Lexow committee brought out the fact that at 
one time the Divver saloon was the headquarters of 
a gang of bunco steerers. 

“Thomas F. Grady. His conduct on the bench 
has been so bad that a presentment was made 
against him by the grand jury in March, 1893. as 
follows: On November 14, 1892, Justice Taintor, 
sitting in the Yorkville Police Court, sentenced to 
the workhouse for six months each, eight disorder¬ 
ly women, and on the following day Justice 
Grady at the Tombs Police Court, signed a requisi¬ 
tion for the discharge of these eight vagrants, and 
their discharge was secured on this recommenda¬ 
tion, he acting on the recommendation made to 
him by Conrad Smyth, clerk of the Yorkville 
Court. The grand jury feels that while Justice 
Grady has violated no law in the discharge of the 
offenders, his action on November 15 defeated the 
ends of justice. 

“Joseph Koch. His record as excise commis¬ 
sioner was summed up as follows: Together with 
Commissioner Fitzpatrick he voted for licensing 
saloons near schools and churches, and in purely 
residential neighborhoods, without regard to the 
protestsof school trustees,clergymen, and property- 
owners. He was Indicted for willful neglect of duty 
as excise commissioner, and finally escaped only 
by a special act which was passed by the legisla¬ 
ture repealing the law under which he had been 
indicted. Concerning this law. Judge Ingraham 
said, ‘I regret to see that the legislature has thus 
provided a new avenue of escape of punishment 
for crime.’ 

“John J. Ryan. About whom it is said that he 
came prominently into notice about two years ago 
by taking part in a row in McKeever’s saloon. 
Fourteenth street and Sixth avenue. 

“Edward Hogan. About whom it is said that 
ever since he has been on the bench he has been 
known as the friend and protector of saloon-keep¬ 
ers.’’ ] 

» * * 

March 1—New York. 

The advance guard of the Platt faction in 
I the legislature is already in this city, prepar- 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


211 


ing for the regular weekly conference with the 
“boss.” Senator O’Connor arrived last night, 
and other members of the legislature followed 
to day. 

One of the closest personal and political 
friends of Commissioner Brookfield said of 
the gathering : 

“It will be a disappointed crowd. Lauter- 
bach will have to report failure, fo*r yesterday 
he asked the commissioner for a share of the 
spoils and has been denied. Mr. Brookfield 
says he is for peace and harmony, but he has 
no use for the Platt crowd.” 

* ♦ * 

March 4—New York. 

The members of the committee of seventy, 
to whom has been given the special charge of 
watching the course adopted by the Platt leg¬ 
islators at Albany, are following their work 
with interest, prepared to order demonstra¬ 
tions the moment they believe the people’s in¬ 
terests are to be put aside for partisan gain. 
R. Fulton Cutting, chairman of the commit¬ 
tee appointed to continue the work begun at 
the recent anti-Platt mass-meeting, said to¬ 
day : 

“The action of the committee will depend 
wholly on the developments of this week at 
Albany. As soon as we are convinced that 
the legislators do not intend to pass the bills 
of the committee of seventy in the form in 
which they were introduced, we shall have a 
demonstration of some sort.” 

» » » 

March 5—Albany. 

The situation of the New York police re¬ 
organization bills was more problematical 
than ever this morning. The meeting of the 
Lexow committee, which was to have been 
held to-day, has been postponed. 

The republican senators are in conference 
this afternoon, to determine whether they 
would agree among themselves to be bound 
by caucus rule. The anti-Platt senators finally 
consented to abide by such a rule. This is 
construed by outsiders to mean that, if Platt 
so wills it, the independent senators will have 
no alternative but to vote for his schemes, inas- 
much as he controls a majority of the repub¬ 
lican senators. 

* * * 

March 8—Albany. 

Most of the Platt senators and assembly- 
men will be in New York city to-night, to 
confer with their boss about the existing 
political situation. They are in an ugly 
mood, and are chafing over the delay in set¬ 
ting in motion retaliatory legislation against 
Mayor Strong and “the gangs of reformers.” 
This delay is due to Mr. Platt, who would 
like to begin to “get square” with the mayor 
in this way, but is afraid the conditions are 
not auspicious yet. 

Tht animosity of the Platt faction towards the 
supporters of Mayor Strong is exemplified well in 
the ease of Assemblyman Pavey {rep., New York), 
who was largely instrumental in drafting and hav¬ 
ing signed by eleven of the nineteen New York city 
republican psserpblyTnen the testimonial upholding 


the mayor's course in the matter of appointments. 
In consequence of his attitude on this subject, Mr. 
Pavey's important bills are “held up" by the Platt 
committees. 

* * * 

March 8—Albany. 

It is a very moving spectacle to see Tim¬ 
othy Dry-Dollar Sullivan and O’Connor, of 
Binghamton, joining hands in the state senate 
for an assault upon Col. Waring, on the 
ground that he is an extravagant and incom¬ 
petent oflScial. The real trouble is not stated 
in Sullivan’s resolutions, but is given freely 
to the reporters, and is that Col. Waring “ not 
only refuses to grant favors to the senators, but is 
churlish in dealing with them." One of these of¬ 
fended statesmen, whether O’Connor or not is 
concealed, says that “ Col. Waring is doing 
more to bring discredit upon Mayor Strong’s 
administration than all the other appoint¬ 
ments the mayor has made.” 

* * * 

March 9—New York. 

The usual crowd of Platt legislators came 
to this city last night and to-day to talk with 
the boss before beginning next week’s work in 
Albany. All of them who were seen this 
morning were agreed upon one point, namely, 
that the police-reorganization commission 
would be eliminated from the Lexow hill, and 
that the work of reorganizing the police force would 
be intrusted to a bi partisan police commission to 
be appointed by the mayor. 

The combination of Jimmy Martin with 
Charley Murray and Mike Kerwin, in the 
police board against the reformatory resolu¬ 
tions of the third commissioner, Mr. Andrews, 
ought to cause no surprise. It is the familiar 
union of Platt and Tammany which has been in op¬ 
eration at Albany for nine weeks, and which is 
always ready to spring into existence when an 
assault is made upon a corrupt political sys¬ 
tem. The excuses which the two Platt com¬ 
missioners and the Tammany commissioner 
make for their conduct are not worth consider¬ 
ing. The real reason of their action is the 
same one which is so powerful at Albany, 
namely, Platt’s orders to “ hold up ” all re¬ 
forms until he can get terms from Mayor 
Strong. 

» * * 

March 11—New York. 

The committee of seventy’s bill proposes a 
scientific system of school administration 
which, if made law, will, during the three 
years of Mayor Strong’s administration put 
our schools upon a basis so far removed from 
political influences that they can never be 
brought back to their present level. From the 
moment this bill appeared, the corrupt influences 
which, under the present system, are centered in the 
trustees, have been moving hea ven and earth to “beat 
it." They tried to do this with the Bell bill, 
but did not succeed. Now they have con¬ 
cocted a third bill, which is to be put forward 
as a compromise, and which, among various 
plausible and some desirable features, retains 
the trustees with their pestilential powers 
practically undiminished. This is a deadly 
blow at the seventy’s bill, which deprives the 


trustees of all powers save those of visitation 
and inspection. If the trustees be allowed to 
retain the power of selecting or nominating 
teachers, the whole scientific system proposed 
in the seventy’s bill will be nullified, the 
present political “pulls” will be perpetuated, 
and reform will degenerate into a farce. 

* • * 

March 14—Albany. 

It is possible for the boss to form an alliance 
with the Tammany legislators to fix the mag¬ 
istrates bill to si/it his own views. While it 
is doubtful whether he would enter into such 
a compact in the face of existing public senti¬ 
ment toward the magistrates bill, t< is sti’W just 
as well for the anti-machine members to resist being 
lulled into security by the pacific talk of the Platt 
men. 

* » » 

March 16. 

The obstructing members of the police 
board (Platt’s men) refused yesterday at the 
board meeting to take any action toward fill¬ 
ing the 281 vacancies that exist in the police 
force, and strove to throw the responsibility 
for their action on Mayor Strong. 

[Commissioner Andrews desired to carry into ef¬ 
fect new civil service rules that would result in ap* 
pointments upon merit and competition instead of 
the former rules that were no bar to the appoint¬ 
ment of Tammany henchmen.] 

• • * 

March 18—Albany. 

Senator Cuthburt W. Pound appears of late 
to have surrendered his prerogatives as a sena¬ 
tor to Thomas C. Platt. Mr. Pound must be¬ 
lieve that his only road to a renomination is 
to obey whatever orders Mr. Platt may choose 
to issue, for that is the only explanation which 
can be given of his recent actions in the sen¬ 
ate in behalf of Platt and Platt’s followers. 
He signed to-day the report of the Lexow in¬ 
vestigating committee in favor of these New 
York police bills. Moreover, as chairman of 
the committee on prisons he reported favora¬ 
bly bills which have been introduced to give 
William Barnes, Jr., the Platt boss of Albany 
county, the patronage of the Albany peniten¬ 
tiary. 

• ♦ * 

March 18—New York. 

This state within the last few days has been 
flooded with a pamphlet, evidently sent out 
with the intention of annoying the Rev. Dr. 
Charles H. Parkhurst, and, if possible, turning 
the countrg people and politicians from supporting 
him. It contains, without any comment what¬ 
ever, a printed copy of the testimony which Dr. 
Parkhurst gave before Judge Fitzgerald and 
a jury, in the trial of Hattie Adams. It starts 
with the story which made such a sensation 
when published in the newspapers of Dr. Park- 
hurst’s visit, with two of his agents, to Hattie 
Adams’s disorderly house, and its first pages 
contain his direct testimony as to the scenes he 
witnessed there. A copy of this pamphlet 
was shown to a reporter for The New York 
Times, yesterday, by a man who said it was 
given to him in Albany. It was said that a 
copy had been received by nearly every mem¬ 
ber of the legislature, during the last two or 






212 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


three days, and that they had been mailed to 
the editors of many country newspapers. 

It was also said that its typographical appearance 
was such as to indicate that it had come from the 
same publication office as had another pamphlet, 
which is made up of newspaper comments on the 
good work of ex-Senator Thomas C. Platt. It 
looked as if it were a part of the literature of the 
Platt literary bureau. 


CURRENT FACTS. 

The Boston chamber of commerce has adop¬ 
ted the following resolution : “ That the 

President of the United States be earnestly re¬ 
quested to extend the civil service rules to the 
consular service, and request congress to adopt 
without delay such legislation as will improve 
this important branch of our national service, 
and place the interests of this country, as they 
are represented abroad in our consular service, 
on a sound business basis, and that there shall 
be thoroughly eliminated from appointments 
to the consular service the consideration of re¬ 
ward for political services.” 


At the meeting of the state board of trade at 
Norwich, Conn., upon motion of Gen. Aiken 
the efforts of Henry Cabot Lodge to improve 
the diplomatic service were approved of. 


The New York chamber of commerce on 
February 7 adopted the following : 

Wher ■eas, This chamber has recorded its 
opinion that appointees to the consular service 
of the United States should be selected by an 
adequate civil service examination, and that 
the efficiency of this service demands perma¬ 
nency of tenure and promotion from the less 
to the more desirable places ; and. 

Whereas, There are now pending in the sen¬ 
ate of the United States two bills, introduced 
by Senators Morgan and Lodge, to provide for 
the reorganization of the consular and diplo¬ 
matic service, which fulfill the essential condi¬ 
tions considered by this chamber necessary to 
secure efficient and creditable service ; 

Resolved, That the chamber of commerce of 
the state of New York heartily approves of 
the essential features of said bills, and recom¬ 
mends the early passage by both houses of 
congress of a consular reform bill. 


On February 4, at the regular monthly, 
meeting of the Indianapolis board of trade 
governors, the recommendation supporting 
the Lodge consular bill was passed. 


Governor Morton has appointed Col. Rich¬ 
ard G. Lay superintendent of the western di¬ 
vision of the Erie canal. Colonel Lay is not 
a canal man but he was the brother of Gov¬ 
ernor Morton’s first wife. 


A New York carrier named Janicke was 
run over by a delivery wagon ou Park Row 
about two weeks ago and narrowly escaped 
death. He refused to be taken to the Hudson 
Street Hospital until his bag and mail had 
been safely delivered to another carrier. And 


yet have we not heard that under the competi¬ 
tive system we could never secure faithful 
employes? 

Collector Kilbreth has promoted, two repub¬ 
lican employes because of long and satisfac¬ 
tory performance of their duties in the New 
York custom house. This is a considerable 
reform step in Tammany-Platt New York. 

The federal grand jury at Louisville, Ky., 
has indicted A. R. Carothers, the assistant 
custodian at the custom house, and Isaac F. 
Middleton, one of his subordinates, charging 
them with being unlawfully concerned in so¬ 
liciting money for political purposes from 
the employes of the government. The amounts 
collected, as .charged by the indictments, range 
from $5 to $15, the money being used to aid 
in the campaign of Montgomery, in the fourth 
District. 

Congressman Taylor has been having a 
merry whirl with the officers of the supervis¬ 
ing architect of the treasury department. In 
accordance with the protest of the union lab¬ 
orers of Evansville against the importation of 
non-union men from Ft. Wayne to do the nec¬ 
essary painting and repairing on the custom 
house and post office he saw the supervising 
architect and had a long conference with him. 
Of course the conservatism of all the govern¬ 
ment departments is against any interference 
whatever between union and non-union work¬ 
men, and the supervising architect was loth to 
to break precedents by making a rule in this 
case. However, Mr. Taylor persevered and 
has come off with laurels. He has not ob¬ 
tained a pledge that union labor and home 
labor in Evansville shall obtain a preference, 
hut it is promised that a special inspector shall be 
sent out and judgments on the bids will be deferred 
until he makes his report. Mr. Taylor thinks that 
once he can have the inspector safe in Evansville the 
rest of the journey will be plain sailing .— Washing¬ 
ton dispatch, Indianapolis Sentinel, February 18. 

The appointment, Wednesday, of George 
Cotton as postmaster at Elmira, N. Y., is a 
complete surprise to the politicians. The 
sentiment at Elmira is, that this recognition 
of Senator Hill’s lieutenant is the first overt 
act of friendship between President Cleveland 
and Senator Hill.- Cotton has been a bitter 
enemy of President Cleveland.— February 28. 

Democrats of Bayonne want a successor to 
Postmaster Frederick Boorman. Mr. Boor¬ 
man is a republican and a veteran. His 
term expired Jan. 9, last. There are several 
applicants for the position, some of whom 
have good backing, and have worked faith¬ 
fully for the interests of their party. The 
term of John T. Dunn, of Elizabeth, has ex¬ 
pired as a member of Congress, and Senator 
James Smith, Jr., is now considering the situation. 
* * * Editor Harry C. Page, publisher of 
The Bayonne Herald, entered the race at a late 
day as a compromise candidate, and is not 
worrying about the outcome.— Bayonne, N. J., 
dispatch, New York Times, March 9. 


The nomination by the President, to day, 
of James E. Conley, to be postmaster at 
Brockport, N. Y., marks the close of one of 
the keenest post office contests that have come 
to the notice of the administration. In Mr. 
Cleveland’s first term John C. Collins was 
chosen postmaster, and he made a most ac¬ 
ceptable official. As soon as Mr. Cleveland 
returned to the White House, Mr. Collins filed 
his papers for reappointment. He has been 
seeking the office ever since. In his first 
struggle for appointment, Collins was backed 
by John Owens, a prominent Monroe county 
democrat, but in 1893 Owens transferred his 
influence to Mr. Conley, and has since worked 
in his interest. Valentine Fleckenstein, col- 
lecter of internal revenue for the Rochester 
and Buffalo district, in which Brockport is sit¬ 
uated, originally supported Collins, but a few 
months ago he went over to Conley. 

The Brockport post-office in the last three 
years has had two postmasters, both of whom 
have been removed because of defalcations. 
The New York senators have not decided 
whether they will delay the confirmation of 
Conley, who is known to them as a Cleveland 
democrat. — Washington dispatch. New York 
Times, February 26. 

By the appointment to-day of John B. Pat¬ 
terson to be postmaster at Corry, the post¬ 
master-general settled an amusing contest. 
There were originally thirteen candidates for 
the place, and all were hustling to secure the 
support of Representative Sibley. But after 
Mr. Sibley made his speech in the house at¬ 
tacking the President, none of the candidates 
cared to have it kown that they had ever spoken 
to Honest Joe. Mr. Sibley, of course, real¬ 
ized that by his gpeech he was persona non 
gratia to Mr. Bissell, and he declined, there¬ 
fore, to recommend anyone for this appoint¬ 
ment, unless Mr. Bissell requested him to do 
so.— Washington dispatch, Buffalo Express, March 
2 . 


It is hard to understand what purpose moved 
the President after his experience with Gen. 
Armstrong as assistant commissioner of In¬ 
dian affairs, to allow Armstrong practically to 
name his successor. Thomas P. Smith, of 
New York, nominated for assistant commis- 
soner yesterday, was an inspector in the field 
when Armstrong announced his intention to 
retire, but came to Washington at Armstrong’s 
instance, and has been, apparently, busy with 
his own canvass ever since. From all that 
can be learned about Mr. Smith, he is as ex¬ 
treme a political partisan as Armstrong was. 
As an inspector, common report credits him 
with going about from agency to agency and 
school to school, looking lor republicans in 
“unprotected” places, who could be put out of 
the way to make room for democrats. If this 
is the fact. Secretary Smith appears to have 
broken faith with the friends of the Indian to 
to whom he promised that Armstrong’s suc¬ 
cessor should be as good a civil service re¬ 
former as he could find, and a man thoroughly 
abreast of (he progress of the day on the In¬ 
dian question.— Washington dispatch, New York 
Evening Post, January Id, 



















The Civil service chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corrnptioii, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering’ of the 
ship of state. From Archbishop Ireland's address: The Duty and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


VoL. J[I, No^26. . INDIANAPOLIS, APRIL, 1895. teems : ^ ?o“cen?8pL%y““““ 


Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind. 


The civil service reformers and the re¬ 
publican leaders, and the citizens gen¬ 
erally, of Illinois, are deserving of the 
warmest congratulations; the civil service 
reformers because, after years of patient 
work, they have now a splendid success as 
their reward, the republican leaders for 
their astuteness in understanding that the 
day has gone by for spoils to be anything 
but a hindrance to party success, and the 
citizens of Illinois, that they have taken 
the one greatest step toward the realization 
of an actually free and democratic govern¬ 
ment. The Illinois legislature recently 
passed, by an overwhelming majority, the 
measure giving to cities the power to put 
the several departments of the govern¬ 
ments under civil service rules, to be ad¬ 
ministered by a commission. Governor 
Altgeld promptly signed the bill. The 
civic federation of Chicago originated the 
bill. It would bring, if adopted in Chi¬ 
cago, the 15,000 employes of the city under 
the merit system, and remove from the 
mayor this immense patronage. The local 
political leaders commended the measure. 
The republican leaders had the political 
foresight to do this, in the face of the fact 
that they knew that their success at the 
coming city election was almost certain, 
that the democratic mayor had packed the 
ofiBces with democrats, and that the law, 
if passed, would, from the start, take all 
this immense patronage from the hands of 
a republican mayor. 

Whether the law as passed by the Illi¬ 
nois legislature should apply to the city of 
Chicago was subjected to a popular vote 
on April 2. The republican mayor. Swift, 
was elected by a plurality of 41,110, but the 
civil service law was carried by the major¬ 
ity of 45,670. Twice now a civil service law 
has been subjected to a vote of the people 
at the polls, in New York and in Illinois, 
and twice the people have shown how sick 
and disgusted they are with the whole 
spoils business, and that whenever given 
the chance, they will lay rough hands on 
it. And yet, probably, petty bosses will 
continue to write the papers that “ civil 
service” is unpopular among the people, 
un-American and aristocratic, and only ad¬ 


vocated by a little group of canting holier- 
than-thou hypocrites. 


And in this connection how do the In¬ 
diana republican leaders regard their late 
fulfillment of party pledges to end the 
spoils treatment of public places? There 
has been in Indiana a more active warfare 
against spoils than in Illinois. The plain 
people of the state, who pay their taxes 
and vote withqut expecting to be paid for 
it, are quite as anxious to benefit, by the 
economy, eflficiency and justice of the 
merit system as were the people of Illinois. 
An excellent bill was introduced, and it 
was buried because the republican leaders 
were true to the bourbon political reputa¬ 
tion of the state. Its republican leaders 
have forgotten nothing and learned noth¬ 
ing. They are bigoted, hide-bound and 
moss backed, and the aspirants among the 
young men for leadership, if anything, 
surpass their elders in these particulars. 
It has been a republican custom to make 
merry over these qualities manifested by 
the Hoosier democracy. But that party 
had a leader, Mr. Jewett, bold enough and 
and astute enough, to announce at a Jack- 
son dinner, last January, that while his 
heart beat as true as ever to spoils, it sim¬ 
ply wouldn’t work, and hadn’t worked in 
practice, and meant the destruction of the 
political party adhering to it. But the 
republican legislature forgot all the bitter 
lessons of experience, and regarded the 
welfare of their party as they smelled the 
spoil, and almost felt the crunching of it 
between their teeth, about as the bull¬ 
dog regards the kitten in its jaws. Their 
party organ protested against such a be¬ 
trayal of party pledges. General Harrison 
protested. We used to search the papers 
for the protest of candidate-elect for the 
senate, Fairbanks, but never found it. 

The Chronicle has preferred to take the 
view that the republican leaders sacrificed 
their party from stupidity. Among poli¬ 
ticians, stupidity is the deadliest sin, and 
unpardonable. 

In the city there has been the same in¬ 
capacity to understand the trend of the 
times. Mayor Denny realized that the 
time had come when aside from all other 
reasons, considered purely as a wise party 
move, merit should rule in all city appoint¬ 
ments. But unfortunately for himself and 


for the city, he also felt that P. C. Trusler 
must be given something good, and he 
gave him the place of controller. And 
Trusler and his small fry followers have 
ever since been hostile to the mayor’s ef¬ 
forts to reform the civil service of the city. 
The excellent and thorough rules submit¬ 
ted to the mayor and considered by him 
and his “ cabinet,” had when adopted some 
large gaps where reform had been, and 
the consequence was Trusler’s successful 
assessment of city employes, discreditable 
to those concerned in it and short sighted 
and stupid on the part of professedly 
clever politicians and which the party will 
have to pay dearly for. 


What is called party government still 
affords an astonishing spectacle in New 
York. The great victory of the people at 
the election against the worst corruption 
ever known in this country gave the repub¬ 
licans a great majority. The legislature 
met, it was supposed, to take steps to rid 
the people of the corrupt officials, and to 
so legislate as to prevent, so far as legisla¬ 
tive ingenuity could, the recurrence of the 
evils. But a man, in the express business on 
Broad way, named Tom Platt, who had been 
all along assigning places and campaign 
money to republican heelers, determined 
that nothing should be done which would 
interfere with his party perquisites. At a 
sign from him matters came to a standstill. 
He talks with Mayor Strong and Strong 
with him. He talks with Governor Morton 
and Morton with him. These are instances 
of the dignified and honest officials who 
hesitate and falter in the presence of this 
ill-favored expressman. Tammany police 
justices remain in office, and the rascally 
bi-partisan board system seems likely to 
share the same fortune. As an illustration 
of what Platt can do, take the request of 
Mayor Strong, that an amendnientbe made 
to a pending bill. “ His wishes, in that 
respect,” says Lauterbeck, a Platt hench¬ 
man, “ having been communicated by Mr. 
Platt to the republican members of the 
senate, the amendment was promptly 
made.” 

Attorney-General OLNEY(whose Penn¬ 
sylvania railroad pass the papers report as 
having been picked up in the White House 
grounds a few days since), has made a 
characteristic decision in the case of Post- 






















214 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


master Warfield of Baltimore. The case 
was fully gone into in the Chronicle of 
last month. The postmaster failed to 
work in some new men before the Presi¬ 
dent’s order including new places in the 
classified service. First he tried to get 
them in as watchmen, then classify them 
and then slip them in where he wanted 
them. The civil service commission de¬ 
clined thus to beat the law. Then the 
postmaster claimed that he had in fact 
made the new appointments on Novem¬ 
ber 1, the day before the President’s order 
although the post-ofl&ce department did 
not receive official notice of the removals 
until November 7, nor of the appointments 
until November 8. Attorney-General 01- 
ney held the appointments to have been 
legal, and cited the decision of Attorney- 
General Miller in the case of the railway 
mail clerks claimed to have been appoint¬ 
ed prior to May 1,1889, the date of the 
classification of the railway mail service. 
That opinion was denounced by the demo¬ 
cratic press as aiding and abetting the 
attempt to beat the law. What did Attor¬ 
ney-General Olney say of it at the time? 


The congressional boodle character is 
well illustrated by the case of Bartlett ver¬ 
sus Cofleen in a Wyoming court. Coffeen 
was a congressman and Bartlett was his 
private secretary. After both were out of 
office Bartlett sued Coffeen, alleging that 
the latter held back S20 to $30 per month 
of the secretary’s salary which the con¬ 
gressman turned over to his daughter and 
nephew for alleged services but who were 
in fact attending school. Bartlett further 
alleged that Coffeen compelled him to 
contribute five to ten dollars a month to 
office rent and the hire of a typewriter 
machine. The ex-secretary was given by 
the jury $202.50. This is the latest demon¬ 
stration of the principle, illustrated by a 
long line of notorious precedents, that 
public office is a family snap. 

Readers of the Chronicle may re¬ 
member that in the December number, 
considerable space was given to accounts 
of the furious onslaught of the incoming 
republican state officers, on the public 
treasury especially, in the way of working 
in relatives. At the same time it was 
shown that several were simply trying to 
recoup themselves for the large assess¬ 
ments levied on them by their party 
machine. There was Geologist Blatchley 
with three important appointments, one 
of which he gave to his uncle, who had, 
it was stated, got his nomination for him 
and steered his campaign. Then there 
was Coroner Castor, whose greediness 
was such that his own party had to check 
it; he turned out two employes to give his 
sister their job. Then there was Supreme 


Clerk Hess, whose naive plans, as re¬ 
ported, filled the newspapers with delight. 
His place cost him more than $3,500, and 
he gave jobs to several of his family. It 
was to be expected that he should regard 
a public office as a famHy perquisite. 
But there was considerable public clamor 
over the want of reserve and decency, in 
the onslaught of relatives; and for this or 
some other reason, one of Hess’s daughters 
was not provided for. We are now glad 
to chronicle that in March, he turned off 
the woman stenographer, because he 
wanted the place for this heretofore un¬ 
provided for daughter. Although we all 
have to pay for it, we hope that the 
supreme clerk and family, by this thrift, 
can recover the assessment. 

Ex-Congressman Bynum before retire, 
ment had his son appointed to West Point 
or the naval academy at Annapolis, we do 
not recall which. Mr. Henry, his successor, 
has thrown these appointments within his 
gift open to competition. This means 
that lads of republican or democratic par¬ 
entage, Catholic, or Baptist, or Presby¬ 
terian; German, or Irish, or English, or 
Puritan, rich or poor, populist, union or 
non-union, free silver or gold monometal¬ 
ist, may compete, and the lad standing the 
best test for physical and mental qualifica¬ 
tions will win. Is not this plan just and 
respectable and democratic? 

The Indianapolis Journal speaks of Miss 
Ahern, the state librarian just displaced by 
the republican legislature after six years 
of service, as “ courteous ” and “ efficient,” 
having “ developed a fitness for the work 
which makes her retirement a matter for 
regret.” Of the new incumbent it adds 
that she “ will doubtless be equally efficient 
should she serve an equal length of time.” 
One of the interesting features of the can¬ 
didacy of the successful candidate was the 
promise to farm out the several subordi¬ 
nate places in order to get certain votes 
and the reproaches and criminations that 
after the votes were got the pledges were 
broken. Senator Boyd, however, secured 
a place for his daughter. The legislature 
finally took a short step towards reform, 
placing the appointment hereafter with 
the state board of education. 

One of the encouraging signs of the 
times is, that when a post-office employe is 
removed apparently without cause, it is 
made public by a home newspaper, and 
whether or not he gets a fair hearing in 
Washington, he gets one in his own com¬ 
munity. There is no way by which the 
spoils system can be trampled down 
sooner. The Evening Herald, of Hunting- 
ton, Indiana, in its issue of March 18, gives 
two columns to the case of Wilson S. Bell, 
a veteran soldier, where, in spite of the ap¬ 


pearance of fairness in naming the reason 
for dismissal and the names of the com¬ 
plainants, there are all the ear-marks of 
the same old trick of trumped-up charges 
to get an employe out of the service. 
County Recorder Nave complained in 
Washington that Bell had failed to deliver 
his mail properly; but Bell states that Nave 
had never mentioned the matter to him. 
Attorney Kaufman said he saw Bell on 
December 28 stop while on his route, and 
in response to an inquiry as to whether 
there was any mail for the person, search 
through his “pouch two or three times to 
find the mail for this person, occupying in 
the conversation and search eleven min¬ 
utes.” Bell denies this charge, and gives 
the names of fifty-four people on his route 
who desired his retention, as a satisfactory 
carrier. Then last March the postmaster 
increased Bell’s territory, and he writes to 
Washington that substitutes have lowered 
Bell’s record twenty to twenty five min¬ 
utes. We can not undertake to judge 
Postmaster Fulton’s conduct on this point, 
but the ‘ substitute trick” has been very 
popular, and, we are bound to add, very 
successful in Indiana, since the offices were 
put under the civil service rules. One 
plan is for the substitute to hire an assist¬ 
ant until he has made the needed record 
for the charges. In this case we suppose 
he made a “ spurt ” for the occasion, 
and he may have been aided by an 
especially light mail. The post-office in¬ 
spector, also, plays the r6!e he has played 
before in Indiana. Bell, in his letter of 
dismissal, is told that he has been given a 
hearing by the post-office inspector during 
his investigation of the case, thus comply¬ 
ing with the portmaster-general’s order; 
but Bell says he was never notified of In¬ 
spector Leatherman’s presence, nor was 
he given any hearing. 

Whether or not Bell was a fit subject for 
dismissal, the Herald has performed a pub¬ 
lic service in giving him a hearing. 

Judge Henry H. Bates and Rufus S. B. 
Clarke, chief examiners in the patent of¬ 
fice, have resigned by request. Judge 
Bates received his appointment in 1868. 
It is not worth while to go into the details 
of his great fitness for the place, because 
Commissioner Seymour assured him that 
his record was clear, hut he wanted his place. 
A minor brutality of the event was the re¬ 
quest for his resignation as he lay on a 
sick bed. All the particulars of these re¬ 
movals were given in the Washington dis¬ 
patches of at least one New York paper. 
Patent lawyers protested, but President 
Cleveland never corrects an unjust remov¬ 
al nor resents the basest meanness of his 
own subordinates in effecting these remov¬ 
als. The hardships and ingratitude con¬ 
nected with such cases appear never to 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


215 


awaken an emotion of sympathy in him. 
He has always seemed to have an attitude 
of pitiless stolidity. We all have enough 
brutishness that familiarity with suffering 
breeds callousness. Von Moltke, at the 
first spectacle of a bull fight, turned sick 
as the gored horse was forced along in the 
ring after it had stumbled, caught in its 
own entrails, but the habituated. ladies and 
gentlemen of the audience fluttered and 
chatted and smiled and saw nothing un¬ 
seemly. An American President and the 
ladies and gentlemen who can see un¬ 
moved these wanton removals of eflScient 
and devoted employes, after years of pub¬ 
lic service, show the coarse brutality and 
indifference of those other ladies and gen¬ 
tlemen. — 

BOGUS REFORMS. 

Mayor Strong’s blunder, which now has the 
appearance of a fatal blunder, has been in 
his belief that his pledge to give New York 
city a non-partisan administration was to 
divide the places among the different organiz¬ 
ations that supported him. This belief has 
resulted in some appointments, where fitness 
was the sole test as in the appoin-tment of 
Colonel AVaring, as street commissioner, and 
in other appointments where the unfitness 
was as glaring. Mayor Strong appointed 
three excise commissioners for New York 
The responsibilities, the temptations and the 
difficulties of those positions need no com¬ 
ment. He should have selected men whose 
characters had been subjected to as great tests 
as these positions will bring and who had 
come out of the ordeal unblemished. Mayor 
Strong did this in other in.stances, and he is 
not to be excused when he failed here. One 
position was given to Julius Harburger, as 
due the Steckler organization for their serv¬ 
ices in the campaign for municipal reform. 
Harburger’s training for his present position 
has been— 


Clerk in passementerie store.4 years 

Proprietor of tailors’ trimmings store.20 years 

Clerk of fourth district court.10 years 

Another appointment was to Joseph Mur¬ 
ray, whose business career has been— 

Ship-calker. 1 year 

Drummer-boy (18 years old). 1 year 

Boat-hirer and builder. 18 years 

Post-office clerk. 5 years 

“Contractor”. 1 year 

Appraiser’s clerk. 1 year 

Keeper of Castle Garden lunch-counter.4% j ears 

Builder and building superintendent. 2 years 

Custom house custodian. 1 year 

Superintendent of Chauncey property. 2 year 

"Real estate”. 1 year 


To thrust men whose careers have been in 
such petty lines into the enormous responsi¬ 
bilities, and to stand up against the enormous 
pressure of their new positions, was not re¬ 
form, and it was unpardonable. The third 
appointment to Mr. Woodman was generally 
commended. 

It is interesting to follow the course of 
the new officers. Harburger and Murray, as 
a first step, made thirty-five arbitrary remov¬ 
als, giving the impression that their colleague, 
Mr. Woodman, sanctioned them. Mr. Wood¬ 
man protested against such precipitate whole¬ 


sale changes, which would cripple the depart¬ 
ment. When Murray was asked whether he 
believed in appointing as many new men as 
possible, he said : “ Don’t you think that any 
man would want to get as much patronage as 
possible? I guess you would if you were in 
my place.” 

The second suggestive episode is the stand 
of the different commissioners on the attempt 
to put the appointments under an open com 
petitive test. Mr. Woodman was earnestly in 
in favor of it. In a public interview he calls 
attention to the kind of men secured by the 
old system of favoritism, under the ridiculous 
farce of a pass examination. But his fellow- 
commissioners united against him. Mayor 
Strong has shown himself entirely clear¬ 
headed ; did he know that Mr. Woodman 
would be from the start the one reform mem¬ 
ber of the board perfectly helpless as a minor¬ 
ity member? 

It is such an admirable object-lesson in the 
way spoilsmen work that we give below the 
grave and frank scruples against the dan¬ 
gers of the competitive system as expressed 
by Harburger and Murray, and following 
that, extracts showing the sort of men, when 
left to themselves, they choose for the “confi¬ 
dential position” of excise inspector: 

I am directed by the board to say that they con¬ 
sider such a step [open competitive examinations] 
detrimental to the most efficient service. The po¬ 
sition of excise inspector is largely a confidential po¬ 
sition to the heads of the board, as the commissioners 
depend vpon the reports made by the inspectors for 
the information to guide their judgment in the grant¬ 
ing or refusing licenses and renewals thereof. It is 
absolutely necessary that there should be on the one 
side a feeling of confidence in the integrity and fidel¬ 
ity of the inspector, and on the other, loyalty and a per¬ 
sonal interest in, and responsibility for, a successful 
administration of the department. These feelings 
can not be fostered and the confidential relations 
established, were the inspectors chosen by your 
commission solely on the ground of the ability of 
the candidates to successfully answer the ques¬ 
tions contained in the examination papers. The 
presentsystem [passexamination; f.e.,favoritism] 
allowing this board to select the candidate in the 
first instance and your commission to ascertain his 
qualification by an examination, will produce the 
best possible results, ai;^ lead, we believe, to a 
better administration of the department than could 
be obtained by selection of inspectors in the man¬ 
ner you suggest. - 

THE RESULTS. 

No. 1 was Baker, real estate, on the bond of 
Commissioner Murray. 

He was reasonably incorruptible, modestly ad¬ 
mitting thatevery man had his price, buthe omitted 
to state his. He did not need to accept a bribe, be. 
ing, as he said, “well fixed” himself, and as a cigar 
manufacturer occupied one of his houses, he could 
get all the cigars he wanted. So he was almost ab¬ 
solutely unapproachable. He took the place, he 
said, though not asked why, because Mr. Murray 
wanted him to do so. Of his duties as inspector he 
had no definite knowledge.—From report of pass ex¬ 
amination . 

No. 2 was Evers, expressman, in 1879 pro¬ 
prietor of an oyster saloon, taking out a li¬ 
cense, later porter for republican collector of 
the port; in 1894 had a clerkship with repub¬ 
lican reorganization committee. 

He smokes, chews and drinks, but whether he 
ever gets drunk or not “depends on your definition 
of‘drunk.’ ” He is never “helplessor unconscious,” 
though sometimes he “ feels good and sociable.” 


Beer is his beverage; liquor is only medicine to 
him. He considers himself beyond temptation. 
That a bribe of money might ever be offered him 
never occurred to him till after a severe cross-ex¬ 
amination. Cigars, drinks, or presents of cases of 
wine, etc., he will refuse indignantly. The mere 
suggestion offended him. Of his duties as inspec¬ 
tor he had no definite idea,.—From report of pass 
examination. 

No. 3, Callaghan described himself as clerk, 
messenger, man of all work, and confidential 
man for the Jesse Hoyt estate. His employers 
liked him so well they have kept him always 
by them, hating to discharge him, though, as 
he said, he had been a kind of a burden to them 
for three years. 

He has known excise Inspectors, and from their 
talk he obtaine • a very definite notion of the work 
they had to do, how they go about it, and some¬ 
thing of the temptations they have to resist. But 
he will face all without fear. ■ He smokes and 
drinks, but does not chew. Sometimes he goes 
without touching a drop for weeks; then again he 
takes half a dozen drinks a day. Beer is h’s pref¬ 
erence, buthe accepts liquor when the company is 
such that the influence of good-fellowship is irre¬ 
sistible. At such times be gets to feeling good, 
“what you would say was havin’ a little aboard 
but never did he lose an hour from business on ac¬ 
count of drink, and only once was he spoken to 
about his condition. That was last April, two years 
ago, when he drank two glasses of English ale. De 
spite this iuclination to moderate self-indulgence, 
he was sure he could stand off temptation. He 
would not refuse a saloon-keeper’s invitation to 
smoke or drink; he never refused to take a drink 
or cigar “off any one.” This was his first an¬ 
swer. Under cross-examination he decided that he 
would take nothing whatever from any liquor deal¬ 
er. It would be better not to be “under a compli¬ 
ment” to any of them, was his reflection. He had 
a fight once. It was not due to liquor, though. He 
was a deputy United States marshal at an election. 
The poll clerk ordered him out, but was unable to 
put him out, and a policeman was called. The po¬ 
liceman was carried out himself, but he arrested 
Callaghan, who was not released until after the 
count.— From report of pass examination. 

No. 4 was Smith. After learning his trade 
he worked at it for the Ingersoll Rock-Drill 
Company (Wm. R. Grace, he mentioned 
twice, is the president of that company). After 
seven or eight years there was a—well, a kind 
of a strike; it wasn’t exactly a strike. The 
company increased the hours and reduced the 
pay. Smith was a “ shining light” in a little 
—er—strike. They won that strike, anyhow, 
and Smith was idle for a few months. He 
went into the milk business then, but sold out 
to his partner. (His partner married a rich 
girl afterwards and hasn’t been to see Smith 
since.) Smith has a blank space in his biogra¬ 
phy along here, but he remembers getting em¬ 
ployment with the Ball Electric Light Com¬ 
pany, which has kept him steady for eight 
years. He is considered a good practical ma¬ 
chinist, constructing, running, stationary, dy¬ 
namos—“most anything in the trade, you 
know.” 

Of excise inspecting ? Well, he knew an inspector 
once, but “as him and Smith differed ” (in some¬ 
thing not specified). Smith did not like to ask about 
the business. He got some idea from the Lexow 
investigations and such. Of course, he knew what 
sort of temptations he would have to resist, and 
was ready to meet them. He drinks now and then, 
and might havethoughtbimself undertheinfluence 
at times, but he wasn’t; he never lost conscious¬ 
ness. So he will be all right on that score. Hewill 





















216 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


not drinkat all in his own district (excise, not po 
lltical). If he were “ asked to have a glass of beer,” 
he would resent it as an attempt to dictate whal he 
should drink.— From report of pass examination. 

No. 5, Graham, made a creditable appear¬ 
ance, showed an appreciation of the duties of 
inspector and expressed himself in correct 
language, although he has been self-support¬ 
ing since he was ten years old. 

No. 6, Clayton, has been seven years in the 
civil service, as consul at Callao, Peru. 
When he was removed by a change of admin¬ 
istration, he returned to Washington, where 
he “laid around” again for a year, having a 
good time with plenty of money. Then fol¬ 
lowed seven years more in the civil service, 
as consul at Para, Brazil, and another season 
of “laying around,” etc. His appointments 
were made from Georgia, where he had po¬ 
litical influence, though he lived here. Any¬ 
way, they were accredited to that state and 
pegged out. • * * Pfe drinks when he 

wants to, but is not a hard drinker. He likes 
a glass of beer at night, now and then, some¬ 
times takes whisky, when he has a cold, for 
instance. Other things he has drunk at “par¬ 
ties,” and though he never was what you 
would call intoxicated, he has had “a jag on,” 
you know. When a fellow (at a party) gets 
to drinking champagne, claret, and all that, a 
“mixture up,” most anyone would be knocked 
out of course. Yes, he has lived pretty high 
at times, but there are no more temptations in 
the excise business than in any other walk of 
life, and he thinks the low salary, .$1,200 a 
year, would not lay him open to those temp¬ 
tations. He didn’t know what they were. 
They were nothing to him, but for other in¬ 
spectors, he could imagine where they might 
be and described them pretty well. He would 
drink with saloon-keepers, if he knew them; 
otherwise, he would pay for his drinks. He 
might take a drink from Mr. Stokes, for in¬ 
stance, if he knew him. 

He wanted the position for the salary. His 
long service in the prime of his life at the 
consulates had left him unfitted for any busi¬ 
ness, and while he had many friends among 
business men, they could not very well employ 
him themselves. He is out of employment 
now, and does really desire very much to be 
passed.— From report of pass examination. 

No. 7. Steinberger, a traveling salesman, 
was voluble and quite indescribable in the 
space we can give. He thinks that having 
talked and criticised, and found fault as a 
reformer with the city government as hereto¬ 
fore administered, he should now take an ac¬ 
tive part in the reform administration. 

No. 8. Franklin, a barber, has maintained 
a shop for fourteen years, and unless a man 
who thinks of buying him out comes down 
with his price, he will keep the shop going 
under his eye, even when an inspector. 

Nobody never seen him under the influence [of 
liquor]; nobody can claim he ever was. So there 
are no dangers or temptations in the business 
"that he supposes of." A man who would take a 
bribe is unfit, in his opinion, to be an excise inspec¬ 
tor, and an offer of even a cigar, manifestly intend¬ 
ed "to make him feel good to the saloon-keeper,” 
would be refused by Franklin, who at first could not 


imagine why bribes should be offered a man in the 
position he aspires to.—From report of pass examina¬ 
tion. 

No. 9. Commissioner Murray sent tothe local 
examining boardof the stalecivil service com¬ 
mission, yesterday, a man who had to be re¬ 
fused an examination under thb rule excluding 
all persons connected with the liquor business 
within two years. The candidate told the reporter 
that he had talked his case over with Mr. Murray, 
and that they had agreed he might get through. 

No. 10, Schulz, a brickmason, twelve years 
with one firm. 

Of the excise he knew almost nothing, only 
what he had picked up, such as a liquor-dealer 
can’t sell to mino's and children under age or to 
drunkards who have too much aboard. He him¬ 
self doesn’t drink only a glass of beer now and 
then, never anything stronger, because of sick¬ 
ness. He was never under the influence or had too 
much. So the temptations of the excise business 
can’t tempt him in any shape, manner, or form. 
He is not aware of there being any temptations in 
the business particular except what he has read in 
the papers. He has read of bribe-taking by bribe¬ 
takers, but he will refuse anything but a cigar and 
he won’t take a cigar either. Why anything should 
be offered him he couldn’t see.— From report of 
jmss examination. 

No. 11, Dryer, Commissioner Harburger’s 
candidate made such voluble disclosures as 
must have given the commissioner an irritat¬ 
ing half hour, as he read the summary of the 
evidence. ♦ » * Is now in the United 
States weigher’s office. More light came, 
however, from a statement he began without 
invitation and was not permitted to finish ; it 
was to the effect that he had worked hard in 

the late election in his district for -. 

Besides that, he is a laborer in the weigher’s 
office at customs and acts as tally-keeper, 
keeps tab on things, you know. He can make 
a living there at $2.50 a day when he works, 
but he wants to have a rainy day some time, 
you see. So Mr. Harburger thought this (in¬ 
spectorship) was just the thing—yes, sirree. 
Mr. Harburger told him about the duties; 
Dryer wasn’t agoing to go it blind—no,sirree. 
And he got a little book, too, so he was pre¬ 
pared for the examination, though if you put 
it another way he ha(J not prepared or con- 
sulteel anybody, except that he didn’t want to 
go it blind—no, sirree, no, sir. He got some 
points from a saloon keeper friend of his—an 
acquaintance, that is, you know. But really 
as for that he didn’t need to ask. He is 
pretty quick to see a thing; he can tell a man 
when he is lying to him, for instance, pretty 
near every time. Yes, sirree, he is well 
posted ; well, in fact, he has looked up the 
majority of subjects. Say, he had a stationery 
store uptown, and do you know, he read so 
much in his own books he failed ? that is— 
well, yes, he failed. But it was partly be¬ 
cause he hadn’t enough capital and went out 
a good deal. Judgments? One from that 
time, nine years ago. That was a wrong; he 
had some ink in the store down in the base¬ 
ment and it froze, and you know what frozen 
ink is—well, it froze and was no good any¬ 
how, all water, and Dryer offered to com¬ 
promise on it. Drink? No, sirree. It don’t 
agree with him—no, sirree. If he drunk a 


glass of whisky, he would think that he was 
the king of Germany or something. Once he 
did ; but he wasn’t drunk, he was sick ; that 
was at a wedding. Of beer he drinks a pint, 
about, a night. It’s the same as whisky, 
with pea soup ; he can’t go pea soup, neither 
—never could; his daddy is the same way. 
A cigar he enjoys at all stages, you bet. 
Temptations? Well, there may be some for a 
jackass, but for him? No, sirree, sure. Could 
he get any other work? His daddy would 
give him a job at this minute, but in his busi¬ 
ness there is too much work.— From report of 
pass examination. 

No. 12, Kinn, a street car conductor, an¬ 
other candidate of Commissioner Harburger: 

o * That companion to him got him to leave 
there and they both went to work for the New 
York Elevated Road. (Here he gave some his¬ 
tory of elevated railroads.) He was store-keeper 
and operator for the road, till the consolidation, 
when he lost his place. The companion to i im 
went with M. H. King, who was (all about Mr. 
King), to the south to work on the Gulf and some¬ 
thing road. (Here a short history about the road.) 
Well, that companion is a manager down there, and 
he wanted Rinn to go when they started off. No, 
he didn’t, that’s so. He became a ticket-seller 
and operator for the “L,” four or five years, and 
then got a hankering for to be telegraphing again, 
as the saying is. You see, when a man has done a 
thing onct, he—well, he—as the saying is—. To tell 
the truth, yes, he was discharged Just once, it 
was at the time he got to hankering for the, as the 
saying is—the time when he left the “ L.” He was 
discharged on the grounds of sticking to a man. It 
was this way: One night after being quite wild, 
there (on the station) the gateman come on intoxi¬ 
cated. Rinn, who was ticket-seller (this was after 
the roads was consolidated), thinks, thinks he, he 
could do the man a kindly act, and so he helped 
him along. The gateman, drunk, as the saying is, 
was layint on the bench, when he (Rinn) seen the 
inspector coming. Rinn attempted to warn the gate- 
man and to get him upoff’n the bench,but him and 
Rinn had a little scuflie, and the inspector seen it, 
and asked Rinn if the man was drunk, and Rinn 
said, ‘No.’’ It was a He, but it was said in kind¬ 
ness. Anyhow, Colonel Hain asked the gateman 
if he wasn’t drunk, and he said yes; and then 
Rinn was asked, and, not knowing what the gate- 
man had said, he told the Colonel no, and he fired 
him. That was the story of Rinn’s life, and he told 
it all frankly after he was started on it.—From re¬ 
port of pass examination. 

No. 13. Not reported. 

No. 14, Levine, a law clerk: He had no 
knowledge whatever of his duties as an excise 
inspector, expecting to find out afterwards. 
» » There are no temptations for him in the 
excise business accordingly, not even money 
or cigars. He was positive because he would 
not run the risk of being caught. He would 
not like to run the risk of dismissal, or be 
under a saloon-keeper’s obligations, because 
the saloon-keeper could report him to the 
commissioner.— From report of pass examination. 

No. 15. Feldman, born in Koumania, a 
real estate broker: 

He don’t prepare for this examination; why 
should he? Humph! it is anon-competitive 
examination, isn’t it? Why should he pre¬ 
pare for? He has been studying up the law 
good, being closely attached to his brother-in- 
law, who is a lawyer with a law office and a 
law business for some time. Um, hum. He 
has a good memory, but he relies chiefly on his 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


217 


great good sense and his good sound judgment. 
No, he don’t remember what judge naturalized 
him, but it was in 1887. He came here in 
1879, seventeen years after he was born in 
1860. Isn’t it more than seventeen years? 
What? What did the examiners mean? 
Humph, lie told them once it was seventeen 
years, and that’s right. But if he was born in 
1860 and arrived here in 1879, wouldn’t he 
have been nineteen years old when—? Ach ! 
No, sir; why? He told them how it was the 
right way, his way was right, humph i * ♦ » 

When he resumes the office of inspector will 
be time enough to know anything about the 
duties. Why should he inquire about them 
now? He won’t have to be told much. He 
educated a man already once in business, 
and has during the course of his education 
learned to rely on his own dictations, his own 
senses, and his good, sound judgment, which 
knows what the duties will be. His duty as 
as an inspector is to fulfill his duties so as to 
make a good official. He understands the ex¬ 
cise department has been run at a disreput¬ 
able name, run very corrupt. Blackmail is 
outrageous; in fact, it is very bad, very, very, 
very bad to take bribes. They would knock 
him out from fulfilling his duties in his good 
judgment. Yet he spoke only as to his own 
personality to whom it would be no entice¬ 
ment. There may be temptations for others, 
may be, may be so. He don’t drink never. 
He has been out with high merchants who 
drank, but he did not drink. If anybody of¬ 
fered him a cigar it would be because he would 
resiprosikate, and he wouldn’t. He has treated 
a man when he has sold him a line of goods 
what will do him a benefit to buy. But not 
in this business, if he passes to it, no, sir.— 
From report of pass examination. 

No. 16, Maddox, a book-keeper, furnished 
nothing in his examination upon which a 
fair ji/dgment of his qualifications could be 
based. 

No. 17, Gibney, as described, was a healthy, 
clear-eyed and modest, and honest appearing, 
trackman, but his illiteracy was such as 
should bar him from the position. 

No. 18, 19, 20 and 21 are stated to have been 
interesting, but the New York Evening Post 
was unable to report them. 

No. 22, Glover, a floor-walker, “could think 
of no temptations in the excise business.” 
Whence he came and why he sought the posi¬ 
tion the examiners did not ask. 

No. 20, H. B. McAllister, one of the appli¬ 
cants for an inspectorship under the new ex¬ 
cise board, whose original examination was 
not reported in the Evening Post, was recalled 
by the local examining board to answer a few 
supplementary questions. The opportunity 
was favorable for a glimpse at another man 
whom Commissioner Murray has traveled 
much between here and Albany to have saved 
from competitive examinations. They cer¬ 
tainly would work a hardship to such men as 
No. 20. He “never had no perticklar trouble 
with spelling in letters,” but at school he did. 
He was always nervous and couldn’t spell 


words he knew. That was probably the 
reason he made some peculiar blunders in his 
recent examination. Being reassured and 
given another chance, he spelled adjutant, 
which he had written “edjerton,” a-j-, no, 
a-d-j-t n-t. Yes, he had been in the army, 
with the Ninetieth Pennsylvania Volunteers 
and knew what an adjutant was. Curiosity 
he lettered curisty, or to try again, q-u-r-i- 
s-t-y, no, c-u-r i-o-s-t-y. Eligible he made 
with more assurance e-l-i-d-g-a-b-l-e, but he 
was given the word in syllables and corrected 
it to e-l-i g-a-b-l-e. Gallery, according to 
McAllister, is either g-a-l-a-r-y, or g-a 1- 
e-r-r-y. He is nervous about definitions, too; 
indictment means untouched, corrected, and 
asked for indict, he said it meant a person 
guilty of a crime. 

The candidate was born at Philadelphia, 
December 21, 1839, but is only fifty four 
years, in his written statement, unless there is 
some misspelling somewhere. His address is 
No. 354 East One Hundred and Twenty-first 
street, and he is a salesman by occupation. 
They cut down commissions in his business 
here lately, so it don’t pay, so he wants a 
change. 

THE RECENT MAYORALTY ELEC¬ 
TION IN PHILADELPHIA. 

No great city in the United States opens to 
the student of the cognate problems of civil 
service reform and good city government, a 
richer field for research than Philadelphia. 
Such students should make our city of 
Brotherly Love, at least a temporary resting 
place, as the scientist would the coast of Zan¬ 
zibar, if that distant and desolate region 
furnished peculiar or unique advantages for 
observing a planetary transit, or a total 
eclipse of the sun. Philadelphia has just ex¬ 
perienced what to a superficial observer 
might be considered a total eclipse of these 
principles which reformers hold to be “gener¬ 
ally necessary” to “political salvation.” The 
results of the recent election have been such 
that some of us ruefully rub our heads and 
ask “where are we at?” But our keen 
scientific spirit can not be blinded to the fact 
that the collision, whatever harm we have 
suffered by it, has strewn the ground with the 
richest kind of specimens. These we propose 
to pick up and analyze for our own future 
enlightenment, and for the present edification 
of reformers whose educational opportunities 
are less liberal than ours. 

It has been a running fight for reform all 
winter, and a careful examination of its vari¬ 
ous phases during the whole season will, I 
believe, show more gain than might at first 
appear to one who stares simply at the 61,000 
machine majority which the official returns 
have announced as the result of the mayoralty 
election. 

The republican machine, which has so long 
controlled Pennsylvania and Philadelphia, is 
a very perfect machine after its kind, and one 
which has steadily increased its power of late 
years, owing to the practical belief of many 


of our “ best citizens ” that the Ten Command¬ 
ments and the Golden Rule should not be 
allowed to interfere seriously with personal 
financial gains, and that municipal should be 
rendered subservient to national interests. 
Consequently an appeal to moral standards 
has been answered at the polls, especially 
those in the city of Philadelphia, with a dis¬ 
tinct negative. Senator Quay, with his moral 
conviction of speculation with state treasury 
funds, Charles A. Porter, whose great fortune 
has dated from the time he began to monop¬ 
olize city contracts,*Bnd David Martin, whose 
skill as a defrauder of the ballot and as a 
corporation lobbyist has made him in his 
sphere pre eminent, are the most powerful 
and conspicuous machine leaders. The finan¬ 
cial disasters that have been felt all over the 
country, and most severely in this manufact¬ 
uring community, have had immense influ¬ 
ence in tightening the grip of the machine. 
Morals must go by the board if the slightest 
yielding to them means lee-way for the 
wicked democrats. The bosses were not slow 
to see and to seize their opportunity—the 
tidal wave majority of 80,000 at the autumnal 
elections promised all needed margin. Quay 
had his own candidate for mayor to whom he 
had promised Philadelphia—Mr. Boies Pen¬ 
rose, a young and able man, a graduate with 
high honors of Harvard, but schooled wholly 
in Quay methods, and whose personal course 
was reputed to be contrary to good morals. 
The bosses. Porter and Martin, were opposed 
to his nomination, for his backer. Magistrate 
Durham, was a rising star who presaged their 
decline. Quay, Penrose and Durham be¬ 
lieved that they could carry their point with¬ 
out serious trouble, as they almost wholly 
controlled by one influence or another the 
newspaper press with the exception of the 
Philadelphia Ledger and the Call. The muni¬ 
cipal league openly opposed Penrose on his 
public record, which they showed to be that 
of a Quay lieutenant. But this fact would 
have had small weight in all probability, as 
the community’s conscience does not seriously 
trouble it on that score of Quay politics. 
But a very serious undercurrent of opposition 
that grew swiftly lava-hot began running on 
the personal morality question. Whether 
this really burnt into the quick of our Phila¬ 
delphia conscience, it is hard to say—so non- 
reverberant has that monitor become when it 
fears an unwary palpitation may reduce the 
bank account—probably it did, but under 
any circumstances it alarmed the rival bosses, 
or they cunningly aflected to be alarmed, so 
that they dropped the slated candidate, taking 
at the last moment on the eve of the conven¬ 
tion Mr. Charles F. W’arwick, the city solici¬ 
tor. And hereby hangs a tale, or a trap. 
Mr. Warwick’s name was among a dozen 
others published on yellow posters by a few 
reformers when the Penrose opposition was at 
its height, as good names to substitute for the 
objectionable candidate. Many reformers 
signed this circular, and many did not. 
Most of the proposed candidates’ names on the 










218 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


circular were very strong; some were thought 
by the knowing ones to be very weak. War¬ 
wick was among the latter. His selection as 
the mayoralty candidate by Porter and Mar¬ 
tin, and his imposition upon a convention 
which the night before stood ready to give 
Penrose a large majority, produced intense ir¬ 
ritation among the Quay-Penrose faction of 
the machine. Quay publicly denounced 
Martin for his treachery on the floor of the 
United States Senate, as the lobbyist of a 
great corporation, who had defended his 
action on the ground that his masters had 
forced him to it. It was intimated that War¬ 
wick would be knifed at the polls—a threat 
that was not fulfilled—and that an investiga¬ 
tion of corruptions in Philadelphia which 
would destroy his political sponsors—Porter 
and Martin, would be instituted by the state 
senate—mere play of summer lightning 
which brightened the political horizon for an 
hour and made it ominous with distant 
thunder mutterings; but no real electric 
flashes followed since, as the rival bosses per¬ 
tinently explained, bolts of that kind might 
run zigzag back and forth tearing uncon¬ 
trollably other reputations than those aimed 
at. The reformers were divided ; some were 
in a strait between the steep rock of the yellow 
poster, to which in haste they had given their 
names, on the one side, and the steep rock of 
the tariflf on the other. But what was the 
real objection to Warwick, if any could be 
alleged ? The other wing of the reformers, 
some of whom were in sincere doubt for a 
time what course to pursue, took the ground 
that while they brought no specific charges 
against Mr. Warwick personally, he was too 
closely associated personally and politically 
with two dangerous men—Porter and Martin 
—to be capable of destroying their power and 
of exposing the ramifications of corruption 
which were known to exist throughout the 
city government. He belonged to that class 
of candidates who are especially to be feared, 
whose freedom from too obviously objectiona¬ 
ble points, accompanied by a virtual ac 
quiescence in machine rule makes them a 
safe screen for the bosses to work behind. 
The most apparent public need of the city at 
this juncture was investigation, exposure, the 
complete destruction of that life-centre of 
bossdom which creates and more or less com¬ 
pletely controls the entire machinery of the 
city, from the ward-heeler in the most obscure 
corner of a division, to some judges upon the 
bench. 

The democratic party offered Philadelphia 
a candidate who, individually considered, is 
the strongest man in political life to be found 
in the state — ex-Governor Pattison — the 
strongest in purity of public and personal 
character in the measure of service he has 
rendered both the city and the commonwealth, 
and in his grasp of public questions. He 
served Philadelphia twice as controller, in¬ 
stituting reforms of which the benefits still 
linger; the state twice as governor, protecting 
the treasury and other public interests man¬ 


fully against the surreptitious or open at¬ 
tacks of spoilsmen, who, emboldened by the 
almost unbroken and unlimited power of the 
majority party which spawned them, needed 
the restraint of a strong hand. Governor 
Pattison’s letter of acceptance upon receiv¬ 
ing the mayorality nomination, was per¬ 
haps the boldest and most satisfactory civil 
service and municipal reform utterance that 
any candidate has offered any American city. 
The sincerity of his promises was generally 
believed by his enemies as by his friends, for 
his character and record were their guarantee. 
It was this very belief that he would do what 
he said, and give a non-partisan administra 
tion—rewarding every man according to his 
work that made the opposition to him so bit¬ 
ter. The democratic leaders, however, were 
clearly warned by some of the reformers most 
favorable to Governor Pattison, that in their 
belief republican party feeling was so intense, 
owing to business depression, that he could not 
be elected. It was suggested that either an 
independent republican must be nominated 
on a non-partisan basis, or at least a democratic 
business man. The advice was not acted upon. 
Possibly the result would have been the same 
had it been. What were the causes of the 
overwhelming defeat which the reform cause 
received? Many causes conspired to produce 
it, but the essential one, to the minds of 
thoughtful and experienced men, were not far 
to seek. The campaign was fought with spirit 
and along the lines of legitimate argument 
and appeal to public policy by the Pattison 
camp. The corruption of the city councils— 
a claim admitted by all—the domination of 
the department of public works by corrupt 
contractors (the stench of the great scandals 
of the Queen Lane reservoir was at the time 
poisoning the air); the enormous increase in 
the city’s expenditure with continuance of 
inefficient city work; the police and fire de¬ 
partments used as political machines—these 
and similar matters were dwelt upon as evi¬ 
dences of the need of a complete change. The 
republican machine attempted practically 
nothing in rebuttal, but appealed constantly 
to party prejudice and passion. Their argu¬ 
ment in substance was, elect Pattison mayor of 
Philadelphia, and all over the country will go 
the disastrous news, “The democratic party 
has carried the stronghold of protection!” 
In vain was it urged, on the other hand, 
national and city affairs must be divided if 
you would purge your city of the thieves that 
are devouring it, and if you would free your 
national party of the corruptions that weaken 
it. In vain were citizens urged to follow the 
example of New York. The party passions 
and fears were too strong to be resisted. The 
ring controlled nearly all the newspapers of 
the city, whose columns joined in attack upon 
Mr. Pattison and his associates, which in 
mendacity and indecency went beyond any 
thing which the city has witnessed for years. 
But the evidences of interest manifested in the 
reform cause during the campaign were so 
great, the attendance of meetings was so 


large and of so thoughtful a character, that, 
as the campaign drew to a close, the reform¬ 
ers thought their chances of winning were 
fair, and many well-informed regular repub¬ 
licans admitted that the election would be a 
close one. The announcement that the ma¬ 
chine ticket had won by 61,000 was a pro¬ 
found surprise to both sides in the contest. 

There is one very significant point which 
should be noted : David Martin, the republi¬ 
can boss who managed the campaign for War¬ 
wick, boasted on the morning of election, that 
he would give his candidate 60,000 majority. 
His prophecy was fulfilled almost to the letter. 
Under some circumstances prophecy is easy. 
There can be no doubt that fraud played a 
large part in the result. Martin’s methods 
are known to be wholly unscrupulous. The 
Philadelphia Ledger accredits him with having 
raised $60,000 from assessments upon employes 
of the city departments. The election ma¬ 
chine was largely in his hands; the lower or¬ 
der of regular democrats are extremely venal; 
among the negroes and foreigners in the lower 
part of the city repeating is known to have 
been rampant and unchecked all day long. 
The indifference of our “best citizens,” in 
such dangerous abuses when they aid their 
side in a contest is a discouraging though nat¬ 
ural feature of the situation. But some of 
these are a little nervous over the unwieldy 
bulk of their success. They wish their vic¬ 
tory had not been so decisive. All the worst 
councilmen from whose hands the stains of 
corruption will “not out,” were triumphantly 
elected. One of them, whose personal life 
had been so shamelessly indecent that clergy¬ 
men and good women made a special effort to 
defeat him, found his desk loaded with lilies 
of the valley and maiden-hair fern, a floral 
tribute which his admirers bestowed upon 
him, apparently oblivious of the keen satire 
upon his feelings which its delicate purity 
suggested ! Then, too, our immense unused 
and unusable Queen Lane reservoir—a sug¬ 
gestive monument to corruption, for which 
the city has paid $1,000,000, and in the con¬ 
struction of which, it is claimed, she will lose 
at the least $250,000—remains. It is our 
Philadelphia Sphinx, which, if interrogated 
rightly, may reveal much that is of public 
interest. 

The civil service provisions contained in 
the city charter here have been rendered al¬ 
most wholly nugatory by the manipulations 
of the politicians. This they have not found 
it hard to do, since the rules formulated by 
the authorities charged with the execution of 
the laws have been contrary to the spirit and 
intention of the act. 

But notwithstanding the overwhelming 
reform defeat, which in our opinion was 
mainly due to the belief of our people that | 
national interests rendered it unsafe to give i 
the slightest aid and comfort to the demo- j 
cratic party, “ the end is not yet.” ; j 

Since the election the Civil Service Reform I 
Association has taken vigorous steps toward J 
the prosecution of cases involving the polit- i 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


219 


ical assessment of office-holders. Two of the 
defendants in these cases are republicans and 
one a democrat—a fortunate defense to the 
association against the charge of partisan 
bias, which would doubtless have been made 
had all the accused belonged to the dominant 
parly. The defendants in the hearing before 
the magistrate were bound over to appear be¬ 
fore the higher court. The evidence is con¬ 
sidered to be strong against them. 

If the reformers’ view of the real situation 
in Philadelphia is proved by events to be the 
true one, the great victory of the machine 
will prove its calamity in the end. The 
present moment is not wholly encouraging 
for reformers, but, as was suggested in the be¬ 
ginning, it is a fruitful time for research and 
observation. Let us possess • our souls in 
patience. Spectator. 

HOW THE SPOILS SYSTEM DEFEATS 
THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE. 

BY REV. W. H. KAUFMAN, HULL, IOWA. 

Probably the greatest bar to “ a government 
of the people, by the people and for the peo¬ 
ple,” is the present system of the distribution 
of offices as rewards for party services. 

The first thought is apt to be that this sys¬ 
tem afiFects only, or at least mainly, the ap¬ 
pointive offices. A moment’s consideration, 
however, will show that the blasting effects of 
the spoils system fall chiefly on the people 
through the elective officer. The primaries 
are the vital organs of the body politic. Let 
us see how they fare under the spoils system. 

A preliminary canvass for nomination is 
going on. The people pay very little atten¬ 
tion to this, ^he candidates for nomination 
and their personal friends are the sole movers. 
To secure a nomination at a congressional or 
state legislative convention, a candidaite must 
have his friends out at all the primaries 
and secure the right “ delegation.” The really 
honest man, who will neither take nor give a 
bribe, who will get nothing from the office but 
the bare salary, can afford to spend very little 
in “ fixing ” the primaries. Not so with the 
spoilsman. Being corrupt, he is willing to 
spend, if need be, in hope of a bountiful har¬ 
vest from the corporations which he will pluck 
once he goes to the legislature. But really, he 
needs to spend very little, except his traveling 
expenses. He comes to our city, “sees” the edi¬ 
tor and says, “ Now, of course, I don’t ex¬ 
pect you to work for me for nothing; but 
when we elect our president, I will see that 
you are appointed postmaster.” He “sees” 
another influential worker and says, “ If you 
will help me out, when I get to Washington 
I will see that you are appointed collector of 
internal revenue for this district.” To another 
he promises his support for a consulship, etc. 
I have known a specially unscrupulous candi¬ 
date to promise the same office to several per¬ 
sons—“After us the deluge.” In this way he 
visits every city and town,of his district, “fix¬ 
ing all the faithful.” All the papers that are 
corruptible are suddenly filled with the 


praises of Candidate Spoilsmonger, and the 
“boom” is “on.” The people are indeed 
somewhat surprised that so great and good a 
man should have lived so long in the district 
without being better known. His virtues 
(many and great, as all the papers aver) do 
seem to have the marks of the tailor’s goose, 
as though they were fresh from the shop, and 
not marred by long usage; but is there not a 
worker or two in every neighborhood, inter¬ 
ested, unknown to the people, in securing the 
nomination of Candidate Spoilsmonger, more 
espeeially, this also unknown to the people, 
in securing thereby the appointment of Uncle 
John or Brother Will or Cousin Joe, as post¬ 
master or consul or bank examiner. 

Now how much on an average does a con¬ 
gressman have to distribute in this way? 
There are over 250,000 offices in the national 
civil service. About 47,000 are filled by com¬ 
petitive examination, leaving some 200,000 as 
“spoils” for defeating the popular will. If each 
office draws on an average $750 salary, we have 
$150,000,000 annually as a corruption fund 
wrung from the people but used in defeating 
the will of the very persons who pay it out of 
their hard and scant earnings. Setting aside 
$50,000,000 per annum as the perquisites of the 
President and senators we have $100,000,000 for 
the 356 congressmen. Of course it is not di¬ 
vided equally, for the party that wins the 
presidency gels all. This party may or 
may not have a majority in the house. Last 
fall there were elected 244 republicans, 104 
democrats and 8 populists. Of the 356 con¬ 
gressmen, therefore, only 104 will be distribu¬ 
tors of spoils. Of even these there are quite a 
goodly number who are at “outs” with the 
President over his financial policy and so get 
no patronage. Probably not to exceed 80 
congressmen distribute the $100,000,000 an¬ 
nual corruption fund. This is an exceptional 
case. Perhaps 150 congressmen will be about 
the average. This will give each congress¬ 
man of the dominant party $666,666.66 official 
salaries to be given at his will each year. The 
uncertainty amounts to very little, for every 
one who has had anything to do with fighting 
the lottery vice knows that the average man’s 
decision is governed vastly more by the size 
of the prize than by a calculation of his 
chance of winning it. For instance, the Louis¬ 
iana Lottery Company advertises“$1,000,000in 
tickets will draw (specifying the various prizes) 
a total of $535,000.” Yet otherwise sensible 
men do, by the thousand, put up their money 
knowing by the very advertisement before 
their eyes that the chances are two to one 
against them. So that to win this prize of 
$666,666 60 the partisans put up vast sums 
out of their own private property. Many men 
will take an office as reward for personal serv¬ 
ice who would be above taking cash, and as a 
men will work for a $2,000 office as hard as for 
$2,000 cash we have Candidate Spoilsmonger 
going about our district with (for his two 
years) $1,333,33333 of public money in 
his pocket to divert the course of public 
opinion to his own advantage. 


Is it any wonder that the corrupt man is 
usually elected? Would it not be a wonder if 
the more corrupt should fail of election? Is 
Is it any wonder that Candidate Bribegiver is 
suddenly transformed into Congressman Bribe¬ 
taker? Is it any wonder that congressmen get 
suddenly rich on a salary of $5,000 a year? Is 
it any wonder that the third house, the lob¬ 
by, is really stronger than either of those 
elected by the people? 

“What is the remedy?” “It is nigh thee, 
even in thy mouth and in thy heart; that is the 
word of faith which we preach.” Take all 
these offices out of the hands of the spoilsman 
and fill them by open, competitive examina¬ 
tion. 

We have done this with reference to some 
47,000 offices. We must finish the work so well 
begun. There is no other nation in Christen¬ 
dom which spends such vast sums in enslav¬ 
ing itself. Till 1853 England was as bad or 
even worse, but to-day only some twenty ap¬ 
pointive offices are dependent on legislative 
elections. 

Not only are our congressional elections cor¬ 
rupted by this vicious spoils system, but our 
state elections at well. 

This may be made perfectly plain in a very 
few words. 

At each presidential election there are put 
up, as grand prizes, offices whose salaries 
amount during the four years to $600,000,000. 
Some idea of the vastness of this sum may be 
had from the fact that it is $100,000,000 more 
than the total assessed value of the personal 
and real property of the state of Iowa in 
1887! To secure this vast sum but one thing 
is needful—the election of our “candidate” as 
President of the United States. With so vast 
a stake the campaign never ceases. “The 
king is dead. Long live the king,” is anti¬ 
quated. Now the cry is, “the republicans 
will carry the next election; but we must car¬ 
ry the one six years hence.” What means 
the constant change from one party to the 
other and back again, only that the people 
feel that neither one truly represents them? To 
carry the presidential election there must be 
complete organization. Not only the states, 
but every county, city, ward and precinct, 
must be thoroughly organized, and kept or¬ 
ganized. Eight hundred men voting “wrong” 
in New York state a few years ago, turned the 
$600,000,000 from one set of vampires to an¬ 
other. “Patriotism?” Pshaw! Spoils. 

Now this perfect organization can be had 
only by carrying all the local elections pos¬ 
sible. The spoils system feeds on offices as 
the jackal , feeds on offal. Tammany could 
not live a month without several thousands 
offices, and half as many million dollars in 
salaries. Besides there are the United States 
senatorships, and all the state offices. These 
of themselves would not suffice to keep up the 
organization, but they help along the cam¬ 
paign, which needs to be kept up in order to 
win the $600,000,000 national offices. So we 
find that in the pettiest local issues of road- 
master, pound-keeper, and pig-driver, we 








220 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


have to fight this horrible contagion of brib¬ 
ery and oflScial corruption. For must not these 
little men be kept in line, and “helped out” 
between-whiles if they are to fight for their 
over-lords at the quadrennial elections? No 
feudal lord could hold his retainers faithful 
if he deserted them in their little quarrels af¬ 
ter they had fought hard for him in his great 
battles. So the “machine” grows till it “fills 
the earth.” “To the victors belong the spoils”— 
among brigands and American politicians! 

That we have not drawn the picture too 
dark, hear Senator Ingalls, late president of 
the United States senate: “The purification of 
politics is an iridescent dream. Government 
is force. Politics is a battle for supremacy. 
Parties are the armies. The decalogue and 
the golden rule have no place in a political 
campaign. The object is success. To defeat 
the antagonist and expel the party in power, 
is the purpose. This modern cant about the 
corruption of politics is fatiguing in the ex¬ 
treme. There are men in Kansas who would 
get up at midnight and ride forty miles to do 
me a favor, and I want to give them some of 
the good things we have won.” 

A free and independent press is to day a 
necessity in a republic. Daniel Webster said 
that, in destroying a free press, golden chains 
were as potent as shackles of iron. Yet I 
have a list of 450 editors who were appointed 
to office as postmasters by President Harrison. 
Besides these, a large number of editors were 
given lucrative and hitherto honorable posi¬ 
tions as ministers and consuls. I have not 
kept a record of this administration. 

It is idle for members of the reform par¬ 
ties to hope that their candidate will do better. 
The fault is in the system. Under this system, 
more and more, the worst man will be elected. 
We have simply the choice of either destroy¬ 
ing the system, root and brach, or else having 
two immense Tammanies under whose tyran¬ 
nies we will eke out a miserable existence. It 
places a premium on corruption. Thecandidate 
who makes most profuse use of offices will be 
nominated and elected. 

No man, not even our multiple-millionaires, 
can afford to put $600,000,000 into a campaign. 
Yet we, the people, do, every presidential elec¬ 
tion, put up this vast, almost inconceivable 
sum, and practically offer it to the most un¬ 
scrupulous candidate for our own enslave¬ 
ment. How, then, can we pretend to be sur¬ 
prised that American politics is such a dirty 
pool that the man in the moon holds his nose 
as he passes over it. 

Is it any wonder that American politics is 
a by-word and a hissing among the nations of 
the earth? Our local and state governments 
spend about $500,000,000 annually, and they 
are all drawn into line and used by the omni¬ 
present “machine.” Reformers and independ¬ 
ents may carry an election here and there, 
but the bulk of the salaries of all local offices 
goes to one or the other of the great ma¬ 
chines. This is the tap-root of the intense 
partisan feeling which every reformer has to 
fight. 


To get “our man” in as President, and “me” 
in to help him distribute spoils, seem the 
highest ambition of the “practical politician.” 

UNITED STATES SENATOR MUR¬ 
PHY’S MACHINE. 

It is the exemplified work of a desperate 
and hitherto resistless political machine, so 
adjusted, organized, and run as to enable in¬ 
dividuals in the name of the democratic party 
and in defiance of law to overthrow govern¬ 
ment and thwart the rights of suffrage. This 
machine is an organization composed of pro¬ 
fessional politicians, having a recognized, ac- 
knowleged and responsible head, and ope¬ 
rates through democratic election officers and 
other outlaws supported by a police depart¬ 
ment and a police force obedient to its dicta¬ 
tion. This organization known as the “Mur¬ 
phy machine,” approves, rewards, and pro¬ 
tects its tools, and thus perpetuates its power. 

The process known as “repeating” is ac¬ 
complished by persons not entitled to vote, 
going through the city singly, or in bands, 
voting in the various districts on the names 
of legally registered voters. A sergeant of 
police, an ex-president of the common coun¬ 
cil, a member of the detective force, are sam¬ 
ples of the official positions held by those who 
escorted and guarded those criminals in the 
commission of their crimes. In rare instances 
those aiding the repealers claimed to be republicans, 
but they are what is known as “Murphy republi¬ 
cans,'' a class as much distrusted in Troy as the 
Murphy democrats themselves. They are on the 
board of police commissioners, on the police force, 
and in other stales, an abject submission to Murphy 
is the apparent price of their appointment. 
Their chief value lies in their pretended af¬ 
filiation with the republican party, for demo¬ 
crats can be found in abundance to commit 
crimes; the need is to find men who will do 
vile service, and at the same time, by profess¬ 
ing republicanism, place part of the odium 
upon the republican party. 

The cause of this revolting condition in 
Troy is what is known as Murphyism. Decen¬ 
cy in politics seems not to have been known in 
recent years in that city. Under this machine 
a system so degraded and rotten has been cre¬ 
ated and fostered that no person who has not 
actually heard the testimony could believe 
that a condition so appalling and corrupt 
could exist in a civilized and decent commu¬ 
nity. The republican party is in no way re¬ 
sponsible for this condition, but some individ¬ 
ual members of that party are responsible. 
Year after year Murphyism has gained 
strength. One republican has surrendered him¬ 
self for office, another for business advantage, anoth¬ 
er through fear of cajollery, unlit scores of promi¬ 
nent republicans who were willing to trade their prin¬ 
ciples for personal advantage arenow serving as Mur¬ 
phy republicans.—From majority report special sen¬ 
ate committee to investigate Troy elections, March 6 
1S95. - 

The most appalling danger threatening the 
church, the community, and the individual is 
that of the permanent division of religion, 
patriotism, and morality.— Bishop Potter. 


POLITICAL REMOVALS. 

The appointment of John Desmond to be 
collector of customs for the port of Fall 
River caused some surprise when the news 
came to-day, though it had been given out 
that the President would appoint by 
April 1. 

Mr. Desmond was visited by a number of 
friends who offered him congratulations. 

Mr. Desmond succeeds Capt. James Brady, Jr., 
who, if he had served until July 31 next, would have 
held the office 30 years. 

Capt. Brady was first appointed by Presi¬ 
dent Andrew Johnson on July 31, 1865. 
Capt. Brady is 64 years of age. He served as 
lieutenant and captain in the late war and at 
Winchester lost a leg. A few years ago he 
was removed from the custodianship of the 
custom hou.se, which office w'as given to ex- 
Postmaster Whitehead, and when Daniel D. 
Sullivan succeeded Mr. Whitehead, the cus¬ 
todianship was added to the postmastership. 
A year ago. Secretary Carlisle called for 
Capt. Brady’s resignation. The captain’s 
term of office expired Sept. 10, 1894. 

Mr. Desmond was backed by ex-Mayor Coughlin 
and Postmaster Sullivan and Hon. John W. Cum¬ 
mings and his application was indorsed by Josiah 
Quincy. 

When asked about his appointment to-day 
Mr. Desmond said : 

“ I have been feeling indifferent about the 
matter. I knew that Capt. Brady’s resigna¬ 
tion had been called for and (bat an appoint¬ 
ment would have to be made and permitted 
my name to be used as a candidate for the 
place.” 

Capt. Brady learned the first news of his success¬ 
or's appointment from The Boston Herald cor¬ 
respondent. He had nothing to say for pub¬ 
lication. 

Mr. Desmond will have the appointment of 
a deputy collector, with a salary of $1,600, an 
inspector at $1,200 and a boatman at $300. 
The collector’s salary ranges from $2,500 to 
$3,000.— Fall River dispatch, Boston Herald, 
March 21, 1895. 

The fight over the appointment of post¬ 
master at Elizabethtown, Ky., was settled to¬ 
day by the President appointing F. M. Joplin 
to succeed Mrs. Emily Todd Helm. The re¬ 
tiring postmistress is a sister of Mrs. Abraham 
Lincoln and was appointed by President Ar¬ 
thur twelve years ago. Congressman Mont¬ 
gomery has been active in the fight, and before 
congress adjourned succeeded in securing the 
appointment of Mr. Joplin, but the senate re¬ 
fused to confirm the nomination. Since then 
efforts to remove Mr's. Helm have been made and 
charges of misappropriating fuel and other things 
intended for the use of the post-office to the amount of 
$100 have been made against her, and a post-office 
inspector named Arringtoy, visited Elizabethtown 
and made an investigation. He reported to the 
department, but the oflacials having charge of 
the matter refused to divulge the contents of 
his report.— Washington dispatch. New York 
Times, April 8. 










The Civil service chronicle. 


The spoils system inevitably leads to public corruption, treacherous and unsafe administration, and the ultimate foundering of the 
snip or state, rrom Archbishop Ireland's address: The Duty and Value of Patriotism, before the Loyal Legion April, 1894. 


INDIANAPOLIS, MAY, 1895. 


T'T?T>»yr<a « J dollar per annum. 
Xiljxviuo . 10 cents per copy. 


VoL. II, No. 27 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind, 


President Cleveland has made anoth¬ 
er important transfer of places to the classi¬ 
fied service. This order embraces the 
eighteen chiefs of division of the depart¬ 
ment of agriculture, the employes of the 
bureau of animal industry, except tempo¬ 
rary laborers, and it also embraces statis¬ 
tical agents and messengers in the weather 
bureau outside of Washington. The ex¬ 
tension includes over five hundred places. 

The reform system in the federal service 
may be regarded as thoroughly established; 
it can not be overthrown, and with the 
labor service system and the fourth-class 
postmaster system, will finally embrace all 
the subordinate places. Contention had 
practically been reduced to fighting Car¬ 
lisle and Olney who, although with present 
powers of harm, are rather small beer. In 
view of the great opportunity and great 
need of Mr Koosevelt in New York, it was 
time for him to leave the commission. In 
New York he is hampered as no man ever 
was by Platt-Tammany laws. The country 
is watching to see what he will accom¬ 
plish. 

The reorganized civil service commis¬ 
sion now consists of Mr. Proctor, of the 
late commission, and two new appointees. 
It is well known that Mr. Roosevelt gave 
unstinted praise to his colleague, Mr. 
Proctor, and Good Government in a position 
to know the workings of the commission 
thoroughly, says he is of unflinching cour¬ 
age, and has Mr. Roosevelt’s own frank¬ 
ness and is as pronounced and sound in his 
views. The other members are Colonel 
William G. Rice, of Albany, N. Y., who was 
once private secretary to David B. Hill, 
and who is reported to have said: 

“President Cleveland has always had my 
support in his determined efforts to improve 
the government service. In common with 
every thoughtful citizen I recognized the im¬ 
portance of the work, and I am in heartiest 
accord with all intelligent endeavors to pro¬ 
mote a just, courteous and skillful transaction 
of public business.” 

We shall very soon have opportunity to 
discover what Commissioner Rice means 
by “intelligent endeavors to promote a 
just, courteous and skillful transaction of 


public business.” The third appointee is 
a republican. Major John M. Harlow. He 
has been connected with the postal service 
for thirty years, beginning as a postal 
clerk. He was promoted to be the post¬ 
master at St. Louis by President Harrison 
and stood at the top as an admirable and 
efficient officer. President Cleveland, in 
spite of his fine record and fitness, did not 
retain him. The selection can hardly fail 
to be excellent. 


The Washington correspondent of the 
New York Evening Post says: 

One of the best tributes that could be paid to a 
retired postmaster was once paid to Major Harlow 
by a prominent democratic officer of the post-office 
department, in the hearing of the present writer. 
Said he: “Not only did Postmaster Harlow do more 
with the money given him than any other post¬ 
master who served simultaneously with him—as 
the books of the department will show—but when 
he recommended a carrier for dismissal, every one 
knew that the man must go, for Harlow would not 
have marked him for discharge unless there had 
been the best of reasons. Of course, when the 
present democratic administration came in, every 
act of his in this line was most rigidly scrutinized. 
But it was found that, no matter what were the 
politics of the accused employe, Harlow was abso¬ 
lutely fair and knew just what he was doing. If 
proofs were wanted, they were always forthcoming 
on demand, and perfectly sustained each other. 
Several attempts were made to procure the rein¬ 
statement of men whom Harlow had turned out 
for drunkenness, disobedience, dishonesty, or 
something of that sort ; but so invariably did 
the cases prove Harlow’s justice and good sense, 
that it was not deemed necessary to examine the 
papers in such cases any more—they were simply 
dismissed as not worth wasting time upon.” 


The reference elsewhere in this paper 
to a Massachusetts bill making it obliga¬ 
tory to give soldiers places regardless of 
fitness brings up the question which most 
people i^sk themselves, but do not dare to 
ask publicly, how much further this sold¬ 
ier demagogy is to be carried? Were the 
services rendered in the war which ended 
thirty years ago a matter of patriotism 
sold and not paid for? If so, when will 
the payment be complete? We venture to 
say from actual knowledge that it was not 
a sale of patriotism. Commencing years 
after the war, a scheme of bribery and cor¬ 
ruption has been worked out which origi¬ 
nated with political demagogues and a 
class of soldiers known everywhere in the 
army as “dead beats.” Sound and healthy 
principles in the granting of pensions have 
been departed from and disregarded until 
the fact of drawing a pension is in the 


public mind no evidence of disability or 
even of faithful service. In the same 
manner all sound principles of preference 
for public employment are constantly 
sought to be disregarded. A preference 
after competition showing a standard of 
merit is the utmost admissible extent. 
But such preference as is now proposed in 
Massachusetts is degrading to the soldiers 
and is corrupting and demoralizing to the 
last degree. 


Platt’s best thoughts: “ Strong I know 
very little about; he was president of a bank; 
he has broken promises all around. If he 
were to run for mayor this fall he would 
have a big defeat. Morton has not satisfied 
me. Quigg was almost mutually brought 
up by me and by the Tribune newspaper. 
President Harrison, like many men I 
have had an understanding with, did not 
keep his word. My luck in sustaining 
public men has often been adverse. I ex¬ 
pect to control the next state convention.” 

The Chronicle continues to give much 
space to New York. This is because that 
place is just now the center of the fight 
against the spoils system. Nowhere else 
at present can such useful lessons be 
learned, whether of the insolent impudence 
of the boss or of the pitiable weakness of 
the respectable citizen elected to office, or 
of the irresistible march of reform, 
though hampered on every side, when in 
the hands of a capable officer, who knows 
only the law and the public interest. 

Mrs. Davidson, the state librarian, elect¬ 
ed by the late general assembly by a com¬ 
bination in which votes were given for 
promises of under places, is about to make 
another move. She has notified the jan¬ 
itor, Michael O’Brien, who has held the 
place since the new capitol was finished, 
to leave June 1. She will give the place, 
which pays $60 a month, to her son. 
Truly, when we look at the doings of the 
chosen, who came into office in Indiana 
on the great republican reform wave of 
1894, it seems that public office is a family 
snap. 

The late Congressman Bynum at the 
end of his term nominated a young man 
for the naval academy. His candidate failed 
in the physical examination. Mr. Bynum, 
however, although out of office, has induced 


































222 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the naval authorities to override the re¬ 
port of the physical-examining board and 
the disqualification has been waived. It 
would be difficult to find a more vicious 
exercise of a pull. It saps the very foun¬ 
dation of army and navy discipline. Words 
can hardly be found to fitly condemn a sec¬ 
retary of the navy who permits such a cheat 
upon the public service. He should un¬ 
derstand that this district got rid of this 
unspeakable demagogue for just such work 
as this. In sharp and healthy contrast with 
this is the action of Congressman Henry, 
of this district, and Congressman Johnson, 
of the Richmond district, in opening all 
such places to competition. 


Carrier Ambrose Hamlyn, of this city, 
was arrested for larceny, and was held on 
his own recognizance, giving a bond for 
one thousand dollars, which he has for¬ 
feited. Hamlyn’s case- is an interesting 
illustration of “politics” in the adminis¬ 
tration of the civil service law. He came 
in under the civil service rules, six years 
ago. Postmaster Wallace found him a 
substitute, and promoted him to be a reg¬ 
ular carrier, ignorant, he stated, of his bad 
character. But after this was made known 
to the postmaster Hamlyn was not dis¬ 
missed. His pull was that he was the son 
of the most active republican leader and 
manager in his township. His case was 
mentioned in the Chronicle of June and 
July, 1889. 

It is stated that an employe of the public 
printing office at Washington has been dis¬ 
missed for writing and publishing in an Ar¬ 
kansas paper, over his own name, an article 
advocating free silver in which he called the 
President “ a grand old rascal,” and said “ he 
is as full of perfidy as a snowball is of water.” 

The Administration has doggedly for 
years now been appointing such fellows as 
these to public office through favoritism, 
in spite of protest because they were the 
men of certain congressmen. Since it has 
followed this course, it would naturally be 
expected to bear as much from them as 
their fellow-citizens have had to bear in 
such appointments. 


Mayor Swift, of Chicago, said at the 
dinner to celebrate their great civil service 
reform victory, that 

“ Eminent citizens of the city of Chicago 
importune me daily to take care of their 
father-in-law or a brother-in-law or a son-in- 
law who is not worth a dash or something else. 
Every day since I was sworn in I have had 
from 700 to 800 and perhaps 900 people at my 
office on one errand—patronage.” 

There is nothing more unaccountable 
and disgusting in the whole shameless 
spoils business than the notorious fact that 
rich people and distinguished people be¬ 
come as common and vulgar as the begging 
tramp at your back door in their quest for 


places for needy relatives. They haunt 
the offices, write letters, they beg the in¬ 
fluence of their friends, and they are not 
ashamed as they pass their hat for alms. 
It would not be strange if those whose 
hard struggle to live had coarsened them 
should bring themselves to the mortifying 
necessity of asking the public to assist 
them in the support of their needy and 
helpless relatives; but when well-to-do 
people do so it is a sure sign of loss of per¬ 
sonal dignity and of patriotism. 


Philadelphia is to have an unmuzzled 
paper, Citj/ and State, published weekly, by 
Mr. Herbert Welsh. A modest weekly, 
even with a moderate circulation, but 
which, without fail, week after week, prints 
the facts concerning the bosses, their 
henchmen, their jobs and their secret re¬ 
spectable backers, will finally leaven the 
great lump of boss-ridden, conscience- 
ridden Pennsylvania. 


The printer’s employed in the postoffice 
branch of the Government printing office 
have petitioned the national civil service 
commission to place them under the rules. 
There is no question more vital to working 
men than the one of the merit system. It 
means not only honorable employment 
honorably obtained for a large number of 
them; but it means even more to their 
children. 


The Buffalo Express, in reciting why the 
superintendent of the New York state 
prisons should be removed, says Danne- 
raora was given to a henchman of Boss 
Murphy, whose incompetence was notor¬ 
ious, and cites the scandal connected with 
the escape of Bunco-Steerer Tom O’Brien; 
the warden at Sing Sing was a Hill poli¬ 
tician whose drunkenness became such a 
scandal that he was forced to resign. 
Warden Durston, of Auburn, later of Sing 
Sing, had a record of taking the prison 
guards from their duties to attend Hill 
caucuses, which they ruled by brute force, 
throwing out bodily the anti-Hill demo¬ 
crats who sought to vote. While Durston 
was engaged in this political work, a revolt 
occurred among the convicts, who had 
been left insufficiently guarded, and sev¬ 
eral escaped. The superintendent of 
prisons took no notice of this conduct, 
except to promote soon afterward the 
warden who had been guilty of it. 

The above is an illustration of spoils 
politics. It would seem no manifestation 
of mental crankiness to say that such a 
system was to be abolished in any honor¬ 
able wfy; and that to clever-minded con¬ 
victs reasoning upon their condition the 
irony of being under such influences must 
be considerable. 


But hear now the shallow pates in high 
places. Ex-Postmaster General James, 
whose son-in-law. Postmaster Pearson, of 
New York, was killed by the cabals and 
tricks of spoilsmen, is reported in an in¬ 
terview in the Cincinnati Tribune of May 
17, as saying that Robert Lincoln should 
be the next republican candidate for presi¬ 
dent. He goes on to say: 

“ I saw Bob Lincoln in London, and sug¬ 
gested the presidency to him, but he smiled 
and said he was not a candidate, but, of course, 
that was modesty, and he would accept. I 
remember that, as he said farewell, as we were 
starting for home, he put his hand on the car¬ 
riage, shook hands all around, and then ex¬ 
claimed: ‘ Good-bye, God bless you all, and 

d-n a mugwump.’ That was a sentiment, 

roughly expressed, which alone ought to elect 
Bob Lincoln.” 

A civil service reform mugwump, the 
only sort in the province of The Chronicle, 
is a man who says, for one thing, that pris¬ 
ons maintained as roosting places for the 
henchmen of bosses is so indecent that his 
immediate duty is to do what he can to 
stop it, and in his opinion his best way is 
to so vote or not vote as to make the tenure 
of bosses of whatever party name unstable. 
When Robert Lincoln damns this sort of 
man, however courteously, he indicates his 
own unfitness for any important part in 
these times. If we remember correctly 
it was Minister Lincoln who, in response 
to the orders of the boss as an humble 
party man, wrote at a critical time a letter 
for Boss Quay’s candidate for governor, 
Delemater, whose defeat hastened his finan¬ 
cial collapse with the blemish on his repu¬ 
tation. 

Last month The Chronicle gave a long 
description of the sort of men, as shown 
by themselves, the excise commissioners 
selected for their pass examinations for 
inspectorships. The commissioners were 
very solicitious and fearful of the harm to 
the public service should these places be 
left open to competition. Mayor Strong 
appointed a working majority of Platt 
commissioners, and Platt inspectors fol¬ 
lowed. The state civil service commission, 
which also has two good Platt men on it, 
waited till the positions were filled and 
then applied the rules. 


A republican comptroller in Brooklyn, 
N.Y., said, not long ago, at a public dinner: 
“As a partisan in my office said, I say now: 
To the victors belong the chestnuts, and 

if they do not take them they are-fools.” 

He was defiant and jocular, but he has 
already come to grief and anger and there 
are many interested spectators of the 
comptroller whose chestnuts have become 
too warm to handle comfortably. He no 
sooner got into his office than he removed 
twenty old clerks, most of them experts; 
five had been in office fourteen years, two 



















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


223 


for seven and six years respectively; for 
these places he took twenty-three green 
men. In another class he removed eight 
out of eleven men who had obtained their 
places through competition. Then he dis¬ 
missed the clerks of the board of audit; of 
these four were veteran firemen. He was 
as busy at Albany in trying to obstruct the 
civil service law as he was at home. He 
ran his course for four months. Judge 
Herrick has now decided that a long list 
of his appointments since January 1 have 
been irregular. He will now have a busy 
period trying to collect salaries for his 
irregular appointees. 

The Newton Civil Service Reform As¬ 
sociation of 310 members has held its an¬ 
nual meeting, and in the course of its 
summary says that Secretary Carlisle alone, 
in the cabinet, seems to willfully trample 
upon the rights of the people by the fre¬ 
quent appointment of notoriously unfit 
persons to positions of high responsibility 
in recognition of party work. This is a 
mild statement of the situation. 


At the recent meeting of the Washing¬ 
ton Civil Service Reform Association, 
Comptroller Eckels in his speech heartily 
indorsed the civil service reform idea, and 
characterized it as the enforcement in 
public business of the rules that govern in 
private affairs. The old idea was that pub¬ 
lic office was public plunder, and a man 
who obtained a position believed that he 
was to forget the tenets of common honesty. 
Civil service reform had made its way into 
the affections of the people, and was now 
a definite principle in practical politics. 
Mr. Eckels instanced the recent election 
results in New York and Chicago, where 
cleanliness in politics as applied to the 
candidates was the chief consideration. 
The people of the former city,he declared, 
had been disappointed, the man whom 
they elected to preside over municipal 
affairs having officially approved a measure 
which the men who elected him did not 
believe should prevail. Mr. Eckels said 
he personally had known senators and 
representatives to recommend lately for 
important positions men whom they would 
not intrust with their own financial affairs. 


As FURTHER illustrating the point stated 
in The Chronicle last month that the far¬ 
sighted politicians everywhere were de¬ 
manding civil service reform as of para¬ 
mount necessity for the preservation of 
their party, a recent protest from Buffalo 
to the New York legislature against a bill 
introduced to cripple and kill the civil 
service law, contained the following officials 
and heads of departments of that city: 

“Edgar B. Jewett, mayor; James E. Curtiss, 
police commissioner; Charles A. Rupp, police 


commissioner; W. S. Bull, superintendent police; 
G. F. Zeller, fire commissioner; William N. Smith, 
fire commissioner; Jacob Davis, lire commissioner; 
George 8. Gatchell, commissioner public works; 
James Mooney, commissioner public works; 
Charles G. Pankow, commissioner public works; 
Mark S. Hubbell, city clerk; S. J. Fields, chief 
engineer, bureau of engineering; Ernest Wende, 
health commissioner; Frank C. Laughlln, corpora¬ 
tion counsel; Philip (t. Meyers, superintendent of 
building; Peter Drexelius, water superintendent; 
Erastus C. Knight, comptroller; Thomas F. Crow¬ 
ley, city assessor; A. H. Beyer, city assessor; E. P. 
Murphy, assistant chief of fire department, Adam 
Rehm, superintendent of poor; John S. O’Shea, 
superintendent of streets; Charles B. Wheeler, 
chairman civil service commission. I concur in 
the representations made in the above original. 
Charles F. Bishop, ex-mayor. 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT. 

In these later times it has fallen to the 
lot of few men to render their country 
such important services as those rendered 
by Mr. Roosevelt as a federal civil service 
commissioner, which place he has recently 
vacated. His entrance into the commis¬ 
sion marks the turning point between 
doubt and certainty as to whether the 
great modern methods of administrative 
reform were to endure for this generation, 
or were to be broken down and left for the 
indefinite future to revive. Public morals 
had become so thoroughly corrupt that it 
was taken on every hand as proper to ex 
pect the most flagrant and stupendous 
perversion of the public service to per¬ 
sonal and party profit. The original reform¬ 
ers planned well. The federal civil service 
act of 1883 will always be a monument of 
statesmanlike sureness aud simplicity of 
remedy for one of the greatest evils that 
ever existed in any government. But 
when the remedy came to be applied, 
grave mistakes were made. Part of the 
early commissioners were small politi¬ 
cians, while the reformers on the commis¬ 
sion committed the fatal blunder of stand¬ 
ing hat in hand and with obsequious at¬ 
titude in the presence of insolent Ger¬ 
manism and blustering Voorheesism. The 
critical moment came with the first elec¬ 
tion of Mr. Cleveland, when the law was 
shaken to its foundations in the determin¬ 
ation to wreck it. The long struggle 
which followed is well remembered. The 
reformers of Indiana and Maryland seemed 
to stand alone in sounding the alarm; and 
it may be said without boasting that in 
the four years of steady defeats, without 
a single victory, they never once lowered 
their arm. In the election which fol¬ 
lowed, treachery to the law had its weight. 
Then came Theodore Roosevelt, a man 
who knew the value of a blow between 
the eyes. Order began to appear out of 
chaos. The commission was no longer 
afraid. Publicity took the place of se¬ 
crecy. Fair play to competitors, regard¬ 
less of politics, was made the first princi¬ 
ple. Senators and representatives went 
staggering from a contact with the com¬ 
mission, and the tricks of heads of offices 
to cheat the law were dragged into the 


daylight. The people like a man who is 
not afraid. They watched the brave con¬ 
tention and the merits of the cause ap¬ 
peared to them, and an educational 
process spread over the country, the re¬ 
sult of which is seen in the present gen¬ 
eral desire among the people for the re¬ 
form system in all public business, na¬ 
tional, state and municipal. This is what 
Theodore Roosevelt has done for his coun¬ 
try. He is the only man of the Harrison 
administration who has won permanent 
national fame and the value of his work 
will grow in estimation the further we get 
away from the system of transacting public 
business upon the principle of “addition, 
division and silence,” which prevailed for 
generations. 


LATE NEW YORK HISTORY. 

It has been the purpose of this paper to use 
the facts scattered here and there of boss gov¬ 
ernment, to mass them, to arrange them so as 
to convince as far as facts will convince, what 
a degrading bondage it is, and of what infi¬ 
nite variety are the fetters manipulated by 
these bosses to suit the particular weaknesses 
of the people whose help they need. Nobody 
who has skimmed the facts can doubt that the 
partisan bigotry of the men who call them¬ 
selves good citizens is the main bulwark of 
the boss. 

New York city is an object lesson on an 
immense scale of every phase of the bondage 
of a band of bosses. As was happily said, 
for their purposes they wear nommea de guerre. 
Croker and his band are called Tammany, 
and Platt and his band call themselves repub¬ 
licans. In respect to booty they are rivals, 
sometimes outwardly foes, but always ready 
for private understandings and deals. If the 
existence of either is menaced, for each is es¬ 
sential to the other, they combine in their un¬ 
derground work, and so far they have been in¬ 
vincible. Any amount of space is worth 
while to chronicle what they do, how they 
work and the efforts put forth from time to 
time to get from under their yoke. 

Since the last issue ot the Chronicle a 
turning point in the last and greatest struggle 
was met, and nothing can be gained by con¬ 
cealing that the elements for good govern¬ 
ment suffered a Bull Run. 

The struggle centered in Mayor Strong. 
He met the critical moment of his career and 
of the city’s, and succumbed. He had a great 
opportunity to redeem a city that had made 
a noble efifort to free itself, and he betrayed 
the trust. It is an imputation upon his ca¬ 
pacity to believe that he did not fully under¬ 
stand his action. It was the old story of sac¬ 
rificing the municipality on the plea of the 
necessities of national politics. 

As has been stated in this paper, on the au¬ 
thority of a leading republican organ not only 
of New York but of the country, the New 
York Tribune, Platt owns the legislature. 
They went down to New York weekly and 












224 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


received their orders from this czar masquer¬ 
ading in plain clothes and in a humble ex¬ 
press business. The governor of the state met 
him in an effort to gain his consent for legis¬ 
lation. The following is a specimen news 
item : 

The next caller was Warner Miller. He 
spent a half-hour with the governor. After¬ 
wards he said : “ I don’t know what the pros¬ 
pects for harmony are, but I hope they are 
brighter.” 

No one doubts for an instant that Platt 
never intended that Tammany should be 
crushed; their fundamental objects are iden¬ 
tical. The reform legislation mapped out as 
vital in any plan to free New York from dem¬ 
ocratic Tammany would also free New York 
from republican Tammany or Platt. This 
legislation Platt at the very start said they 
should not have. He had to meet and break 
down a foe formidable from numbers, charac¬ 
ter and professional, business and social dis¬ 
tinction, and behind them a public sentiment 
united and enthusiastic. The Committee of 
Seventy prepared the needed bills. They ad¬ 
vocated them at great mass meetings. They 
had as champions a large part of the press. 
Bosses like Platt always work under cover. 
The work is stealthy, unwearying and dirty. 
Platt began by using his subsidized state press; 
covert attacks on Dr. Parkhurst, to discredit 
him in the state and weaken the sympathy for 
his work; appeals to local prejudice that the 
efforts of the Committee of Seventy in New 
York were factional fights to split the repub¬ 
lican party; criticisms of the reform bills and 
the cunning introduction of substitute and ut¬ 
terly inadequate bills to divert and divide 
public opinion; endless sly tricks of Platt 
dummies in the legislature; delays, threats, 
punishments of any member who gave signs 
of breaking loose; a perfect understanding 
with Tammany members always in reserve to 
vote under Platt’s directions in an emergency. 
This has been Platt’s fight for four months. 
His vital point was a bi-partisan police bill to 
undermine the reform bill, which repudiated 
the bi-partisan features. Platt’s bill was re¬ 
cently passed by his legislature, signed by 
Mayor Strong and Governor Morton. It only 
tightens the fetters already on the city. It 
makes the bi-partisan feature compulsory. Of 
it, one fearless and unfettered member of the 
assembly, Pavey, said: 

A bi-partisan board means, of necessity a 
government by deals and mutual concessions 
between the men who compose the board. It 
has always been so, and must always be so. 
Every appointment, promotion, trial, or dis¬ 
charge will have some political complexion. 
Every man on the force knows that he is on 
the force, and will be kept on it and promoted 
only if he has “influence,” or “pull,” or “back¬ 
ing”; or, in other words, if he is an unscrupu¬ 
lous and serviceable partisan tool of some 
small politician. From the time of his ap¬ 
pointment to the end of his term of service he 
has continual notice that he must serve the 
political power which appointed him or incur 
its displeasure and be punished and degraded 
therefor. 

And of the flimsy excuse which Mayor 
Strong gave as his reason for signing the bill, 


that the bi-partisan feature is necessary to 
prevent fraud at elections, he said : 

It has been charged, with good reason, that 
elections have been dishonest in the city of 
New York. But the fault has not been in the 
control of the police department. We have 
had, for years, at least one republican mem¬ 
ber upon that board, and it is a matter of 
common knowledge and public record that his 
career was as bad as that of any of his Tam¬ 
many colleagues, and that he was no more to 
be trusted with the task of securing honest 
elections for the republicans of the city and 
county of New York than the worst represent¬ 
ative of Tammany Hall on that board. There 
can be no explanation of this except that he 
had found it to his personal or political ad¬ 
vantage to make a deal with the Tammany 
police commissioners and carry out their 
plans. But attention should not be diverted 
from another situation, and that is this : No 
man doubts that if in a given election district 
there was one honest, conscientious, and cour¬ 
ageous republican inspector of elections, that 
the election could and would be conducted 
honestly and the result correctly counted. 

The method of appointing inspectors of 
election has been and is as follows: The re¬ 
publican leader of an election district sends 
to the republican county committee the names 
of men proposed as republican inspectors, bal¬ 
lot clerks, and poll clerks for that election 
district. These names are submitted to the 
board of police commissioners by the repub¬ 
lican county committee, and the men thus 
named are appointed by the police commis¬ 
sioners as such election officers. The men thus 
named and appointed have qualified and 
served, and the illegal registration, the illegal 
voting, and the false counting have gone on 
under their eyes, have met with their approval, 
and the returns have received their signatures. 

This has been so from the simple reason 
that in certain districts the leaders of the re¬ 
publican party who were in command of the 
machinery of the party in those districts, and 
who proposed the names to the county com¬ 
mittee, and through the county committee to 
the board of police commissioners, had made 
their bargains and deals with Tammany Hall 
and nominated only men whom they knew they 
could rely upon to carry out those deals ; and 
yet it is these very leaders with whom Mr. 
Platt has chosen to ally himself to control the 
party machinery of New York city. These 
are the leaders who unite with him in the cry 
to the republican voters of the state that their 
majorities can only be protected by the preser¬ 
vation of bi-partisanship in the police depart¬ 
ment. There is where the responsibility has 
rested in the past, and will rest in the future 
if the proposed Lexow bills are passed. 

Public opinion beat vainly against Platt’s 
legislature as against a mountain of rock. Up 
to the last Mayor Strong was looked to to 
save the results of a contest so desperate that 
it had finally touched the best of American cit¬ 
izenship. Public opinion then beat upon him. 
At the hearing before him required before he 
should sign or veto the measure, Joseph La- 
rocque spoke for the Committee of Seventy; 
Seth Low, president of Columbia College, 
spoke for the Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion; Dr. Parkhurst, for the Society for the 
Prevention of Crime; J. H. C. Nevius, for the 
Confederated Good Government Clubs; Geo. 
L. Rives, for the City Club; Theodore Sutro, 
for the German-American Reform Union; L. 
J. Callamen, for Good Government Clubs. 
Civil Service Commissioner Watson, said the 


bill under consideration violated the pledges 
of the Committee of Seventy and its candi¬ 
dates with reference to civil service reform. 
Mr. Hallett spoke on behalf of the religious 
press. 

“Mr. Low reminded the mayor of the meet¬ 
ing of the citizens of New York to protest 
against the proposed legislation. Three is¬ 
sues were presented. The question of good 
faith was first. They demanded that all posi¬ 
tions in the city should be under the civil 
service. That was the demand of 154,000 vo¬ 
ters last November, who placed the present 
mayor in the chair. The pending bill as it 
affected the police department in taking away 
true civil service reform was in absolute opposi¬ 
tion to the platform of the committee of seventy 
which these 154,000 people voted for. The 
second question was that of good local gov¬ 
ernment. No law could be for the benefit 
of good government the opponents of which 
had twice filled Cooper Union. Any bill 
which pretended to give good government to 
the city of New York could scarcely be effect¬ 
ive in that direction unless it had the support 
of the citizens. 

“The other question was the message from 
the city of New York to all over the coun¬ 
try. Was it bi-partisanship? That was no 
new thing. The message should be that New 
York was willing to return to the first princi¬ 
ples of the national government, when the 
fathers of the republic decided to place one 
man at the head of every department and thus 
place the responsibility upon him. 

“Mr. Low then went into the history of bi¬ 
partisanship, and declared that good govern¬ 
ment could not be maintained unless politics 
was absolutely divorced from the police de¬ 
partment. 

“In conclusion President Low said that so 
long as the bi-partisan board existed Tam¬ 
many easily had control, but just as soon as 
Tammany had absolute control of thecity then 
came the overturn, and not because of, but in 
spite of, a bi partisan police board.” 

Dr. Parkhurst said: 

“When it comes, however, to the matter of 
the principles that are involved, we do not 
consider that you are free. I say it as courte¬ 
ously as emphatically, that the matter of de¬ 
ciding upon the principles which shall deter¬ 
mine your action does not lie within the 
jurisdiction of your own choice. I am not 
here to burden your attention, or complicate 
the question by the discussion of technical¬ 
ities; but there are certain governing consid¬ 
erations that stand forth very conspicuously 
in the public mind, and that worked with 
great potency in the animated months of last 
autumn. 

“ You can neither make nor repeal those 
considerations ; those considerations made you 
—that is, they made you mayor. I am not 
obliged to theorize upon the matter. It is 
not presumption in me to say that I know 
what was in the minds of the voting citizens 
on the 6th of last November. I know what 
motives and expectations constrained them to 
give you their suffrage. I am speaking now 
of the people. I don’t know what the poli¬ 
ticians thought. W’e didn’t hear anything 
from them until the votes had been cast. 
Nothing but plunder in sight can reach the 
springs of their eloquence. But the people 
were borne upon a tide of intense and intel¬ 
ligent opinion. They wanted you to be mayor, 
and they knew why they wanted you to be 
mayor. We were all tired of partisan politics. 
The city had been politics-ridden. The city 
was wearied ana nauseated with it, and had 
risen up in revolt against it. The evils which 
the society for the prevention of crime had 
been unearthing, and which the investigating 
committee from Albany had brought out still 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


225 


further into the light, had had their roots in 
partisan politics, bi-partisan politics, just such 
bi-partisan politics as a non-partisan mayor 
is now asked to indorse, and add the dignity 
and authority of his official name to; just 
such bi-partisan politics as whole halls full 
of native Americans, Germans, Hebrews, Bo¬ 
hemians, Italians and Poles were concertedly 
scorning six months ago. 

“ All that was needed to arouse such audi¬ 
ences to tumultuous applause was to tell them 
that what we needed in New York was a city 
government that would wash its hands clean 
of republicanism and democracy, and that 
you, sir, was the man that would do it. That 
was the argument that we used in your behalf. 
That was the plea that we trumpeted from the 
Battery and the Hook to Harlem. That was 
was the conspicuous plank in the platform you 
were elected upon. * • » 

“When they voted for you they believed they 
were voting for a man that would lead them 
out of the wilderness of political complica¬ 
tions and partisan bargaining, and who would 
show toward that whole nefarious business a 
face of flinty uncompromise. 

“For you to approve the bill in question 
would so far forth be a recognition and an ac¬ 
ceptance of the principle which your election 
disowns, and which your constituency dissents 
from and abhors. • * •But when the 'people 

elected you they meant by it that yoti were going to 
stem as with giant hand the tide of dickering poli¬ 
tics with which for so many years we have been in¬ 
undated, and that your own administration was 
going to be an unflinching protest against the intru¬ 
sion of national issues into municipal concerns. * * 
“Bi-partisan means partisan twice over. If 
you set one republican partisan over against 
one democratic partisan you do not rub parti¬ 
sanship out, you rub it in. And that is why 
the advocates of this measure want it. 

“The object of this peculiar kink in the bill 
is not to get rid of partisanship, but to furnish 
soil for as big a crop of it as possible. That is 
why they have put the bi-partisanship into the 
police commission, instead of separating the 
election bureau from the police department 
and putting the bi-partisanship into that. 
They dodge the issue and attempt to disguise 
their small trick by dressing it up in the mil¬ 
linery of fair play. ♦ * * 

“But, furthermore, any action of yours 
looking to the establishment of national issues 
as a fixed and necessary ingredient in our 
municipal life is not only out of joint with 
the platform upon which our campaign last 
autumn was conducted, and in seeming dis¬ 
cord with the spirit of your October letter 
and of subsequent spoken utterances of yours, 
but it would be just as plainly outof place with 
the present movement of the popular mind. 

“There is, not only in this city, but through¬ 
out our American cities generally, a strength¬ 
ening appreciation of the fact that the intru¬ 
sion of national issues and party discrimina¬ 
tions into municipal administration is a nu¬ 
isance and an impertinence. That feeling is 
coming well to the front. Our own city has 
been making a tremendous contribution to 
that result. Men of national reputation in 
both parties, and who are as distinctly parti¬ 
san in national interests as they are the re¬ 
verse in municipal ones, have by their recent 
pronounced utterances in this city, exerted a 
pressure in the direction of municipal eman¬ 
cipation that we should be disappointed and 
pained to have you do anything to neutralize.” 

Against all this the only speaker for the bill 
was Platt’s man, Lauterbach—Lauterbach, 
who on April 4th issued a manifesto for Platt 
in which he accused Mayor Strong of having 
broken pledges to Platt. We quote a small 
portion of that very remarkable document, 


which admits among other things Platt’s own¬ 
ership of the legislature, to show the fetters 
that Platt says he riveted upon Mr. Strong 
before allowing the republican county com¬ 
mittee to support him. Mayor Strong has al¬ 
ways declared that he was a free man, only 
pledged by his public utterances and by the 
platform which he has since betrayed : 

At the conclusion of the interview [with Platt em- 
isarles] ohe of the gentlemen remarked: “Col. 
Strong, you are a gentleman, an honorable man, 
and would accept no favors at the hands of anyone 
without realizing the obligation you are under,and 
we will trust you as a man of honor to treat us fair¬ 
ly and honorably after you are elected.” He said : 
"That is correct; you can trust me; Twill not forget 
my obligations." 

It was then agreed that, if his name was pre¬ 
sented by the Committee of Seventy, the republican 
county committee would accept and recommend it 
to the county convention. 

These interviews, which, in their detail, go to 
even a greater extent in their expressions of loyalty 
and their promises of co-operation than are here 
indicated, were immediately reduced to writing by 
Messrs. Murray and Patterson, and their correct¬ 
ness certified to by Mr. Phillips who was present. 

U'pon the strength of these assurances and pledges, 
Messrs. Murray and Patterson, with their associates, 
at once went to work to put the organization in line 
for his nomination, which could not have been accom¬ 
plished under any other circumstances. 

Everybody in New York except Mayor 
Strong recognizes his surrender. Tlie most 
lenient supposition is that Platt, through his 
subsidized press and bought legislature, final¬ 
ly convinced the mayor that the republican 
party of the state demanded that the sacrifice 
of the city of New York was necessary for na¬ 
tional purposes. It is an old story, but it is, 
all the same, worth hearing again in all its 
particulars. 


We will briefly allude to the fate of'two 
more bills. From time to time this paper has 
collated facts regarding the more notorious 
biographies of the police magistrates of New 
York, with specimens of the justice dispensed 
by them. All who have kept at all informed 
of the facts revealed hy the investigations and 
the newspapers, must have realized that to 
put the helpless poor and criminal under such 
judges was to inflict shocking injustice. One 
of the reform hills introduced into the legis¬ 
lature was to give the mayor the power to re¬ 
move these men. There were fifteen, and of 
these twelve were Tammany men. Mayor 
Gilroy’s last important appointment was that 
of Deuel, a Platt republican, and it was gen¬ 
erally believed to be the result of a deal with 
Platt. The criminal records of several of 
these justices had been printed in daily pa¬ 
pers; several were the associates of thieves 
and green goods men; more were ex-saloon 
keepers with shady associations. Platt and 
his legislature delayed and maneuvered to 
kill this bill unless Mayor Strong should 
pledge himself to Platt as to the vacancies. 
Not until Governor Morton’s special message 
to the legislature, saying if they failed to pass 
the bill they would violate the pledges upon 
which they were elected, did they weaken. 
Then these Platt henchmen, not disguising 


their disgust and chagrin, and reviling the 
'bill, passed it. 

There was another reform hill to purify 
the school system of New York. Assembly- 
man Pavey, whose plain speech against the 
bi-partisan police bill is elsewhere quoted in 
part, was the champion of this bill. Tam¬ 
many gathered itself together for defense. It 
mustered its Tammany teachers, who hooted 
and yelled down the speakers attempting to 
explain the reform bill. In the legislature 
Platt’s men gleefully punished Pavey for dar¬ 
ing to oppose their boss. On Tuesday be de¬ 
nounced Boss Platt’s bi-partisan bill; on 
Wednesday Platt’s man, Lauterbach, put the 
knife into the bill by having enough republi¬ 
cans unite with the Tammany members to kill 
it. 

No one can be indifferent to this spectacle 
in New York. Its condition is only the perfect 
flower of the spoils system under perfect con¬ 
ditions for its development. The effort to free 
itself through a struggle on so large a scale as 
to be set down as a great historical event, is 
like other struggles to be freed of bosses. The 
rise and fall of its mayor, though deplorable 
for its paralyzing influence on the fight, is the 
rise and fall of many a man who has seemed 
the one to lead a people out of the wilderness. 
The one question now is, will the Committee 
of Seventy be able to maintain its lofty pur¬ 
pose, to hold fast the enthusiam and patriotism 
and carry on the struggle for another two 
years ? 

PAYN—LOBBYIST AND PLATT 
HENCHMAN. 

Mr. Louis F. Payn, in a snuff-colored sack 
suit, a silk hat and with a clean-shaven face, 
save for a white chin whisker, walked in the 
senate chamber at 10 minutes to 8 o’clock. 
His hands were shoved down in his coat 
pockets, his cigar tilted up an angle of 40 de¬ 
grees, and his patent-leather shoes finished a 
conspicuous make-up. 

Then he sat down in a corner, and very 
soon Senators Coggeshall and Mullin were in 
close conversation with him. When Chair¬ 
man O’Connor came in, he walked up, shook 
hnnds with Payn and said, “How are you, 
Lou?” * * *- 

Mr. Payn, with his cigar still lighted, and 
with a grim smile on his face, next took the 
stand. He was asked if he knew of the fire¬ 
men’s bill and the exempt firemen’s bill. He 
said in response: “The bills came to my no¬ 
tice through Captain Burns, who said he rep¬ 
resented Chief Bonner and wanted the pension 
bill defeated. After the bill was defeated, 
Capt. Burns offered me $1,500 or $2,000 for 
my services and expenses; but I refused 
it.” ♦ • * 

“What has been your business for the last 
25 years?” was asked by Mr. Baines. 

“Paper making, brick making and tin 
making, and I regret to say I own a news¬ 
paper.” 

“Did yon ever take any interest in politics 
and in legislation?” 














226 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


“Oh, yes; I have been interested in elections 
for 25 years, and in election of speakers, sen-* 
ators and that sort of thing.” (Laughter). 

“Have you been interested in political ma¬ 
chines?” 

“Yes; if you call them that now.” (Re¬ 
newed laughter). 

“You were interested in a machine in your 
own district?” 

“Well,-I have been charged with it.’> 

(Laughter). 

Mr. Raines then went into the charges 
made against Mr. Payn in 1869, and Payn de¬ 
clared that one Van Valkenberg had re¬ 
tracted his statements made then and hostile 
to Mr. Payn, and on his affidavit the commit¬ 
tee that convicted him had retracted their 
decision of conviction for bribery and that he 
was, therefore, exonerated. 

These papers were filed at Washington 
when he had applied for the position of 
United States Marshal, and he had been 
after them for several days to present them 
at this investigation. They would be filed 
with the committee. The then President, U. 
S. Grant, had considered the affidavits, and 
he had been appointed United States Marshal 
at the instance of such men as Roscoe Conk- 
ling, Gov. Fenton and others. 

“Every prominent republican in New 
York,” he said, “that I thought worth hav¬ 
ing, indorsed me. There were no mugwumps 
or goo-goos in those day.” There was a roar 
of laughter at this, but Payn never smiled, 
though Mr. Quigg and Mr. Root laughed 
heartily. 

He detailed his friendly relations with 
Conkling from the day Conkling had him 
appointed and confirmed, until the day Conk¬ 
ling died. 

Asked if he ever belonged to the Platt 
wing of the party, he said: “The charge has 
been made, and I never denied it.” 

“How has Mr. Quigg been known?” 

“Until recently he was with the same side 
as I am on, but lately he has tried to break 
down the party.” 

Explaining his presence at Albany, he said 
that at no time or place did he have any 
money transactions connected with legisla¬ 
tion. But he was employed by corporations and 
others, and had also watched political legislation 
closely. 

Then, during the rustle of anticipation in the 
audience, Mr. Root took the witness in hand, 
and the first question he asked was: 

“Do you have a house here?” 

“Yes, at No. 228 State street. I have lived 
there since the Delavan burned.” 

Witness said he had been coming to the legisla¬ 
ture more or less for SO years. He stated that he 
teas present at the legislature during 1868 in the 
interest of Jay Gould. 

“ What corporations do you serve here?” asked 
Mr. Root, sharply. 

“/ decline to answer," he said quietly. 

“ What sums of money do you receive from these 
corporations?" 

“1 decline to answer." 


"How much money do you get for a retainer?" 
questioned Mr. Root. 

“/ refuse to answer,'^ said Mr. Payn once more. 

“I appeal to the committee to compel the 
witness to answer,” said Mr. Root. 

“The committee,” said Senator O’Connor, 
after a pause, “thinks Mr. Payn must answer.” 

“With all respect,” said Mr. Payn, “I re¬ 
fuse to answer.” 

“The stenographer will note this refusal, 
and the committee will report Mr. Payn’s 
attitude to the senate,” said Chairman 
O’Connor. 

Mr. Payn was next asked about his bank 
account, but he showed great ignorance, and 
did not know whether his firm had a bank 
account or not. 

Witness said he owned about $60,000 of 
stock in the Hudson River Broken Stone 
Company, but he never saw their checks and 
did not know about their bank account. He 
had not received any dividends from any of the en¬ 
terprises he was in. 

"How have you lived, then?" asked Mr. Root 
sharply. 

"Oh, I have my income from corporations," an¬ 
swered Mr. Payn with a smile. 

"Bid you ever get $10,000 from one corpora¬ 
tion?" asked Mr. Root. 

“ Yes; from Mr. Gould," replied Mr. Payn. 

Witness said that of the $10,000 he got 
$5,000 from Mr. Thompson in New York and 
$5,000 from Mr. Gould at Albany. 

Mr. Root then read from testimony- before the 
senate committee that inquired into the relations of 
Mr. Payn with the passage of the so-called Erie bill 
in 1868. In this connection Mr. Root said: 
" What was your business then?" 

"I was harbor-master in New York and my sal¬ 
ary ivas about ^'350 a month." 

“What other business had you?” 

“Well,” drawled Mr. Payn, “I was playing 
the street pretty high, if you call that a busi¬ 
ness,” and there was great laughter. 

Asked how he served his clients, he said 
that he talked with senators or assemblymen 
on pending measures from his view-point, 
pointing out the merits or demerits of the 
bills. 

Payn finally said that he received eight or ten 
regular annual salaries, but declined to say from 
whom. 

In answer to questions about politics, he 
said: “I am engaged in politics in my own 
county and in Mr. Root’s also.” 

“What part do you take in New York 
politics?” 

“Well, I advised against the nomination 
of Strong.” (Laughter). 

When the cross-examination was over, Mr. 
Payn volunteered the statement that Mr. 
Gould came to him after the investigation 
was over and apologized for his testimony 
and gave him an additional check of $10,000, 
and ever afterward was his personal friend. 
“In 1881 he told me to buy Western Union 
stock,” said Mr. Payn, “and it netted me quite 
a sum of money .”—Albany dispatch Buffalo 
Expj'ess, May 9. 


EDITOR GRENELL’S CIVIL SERVICE 
EXAMINATION. 

In the May issue of Good Government 
may be read in detail a modern instance 
of one of Mr. Roosevelt’s neatest Sayings. 
Editor Grenell, of the Detroit Evening 
News, thought he would take a civil service 
examination and then “expose” the com¬ 
mission, the questions and the system 
generally. He unfortunately chose to 
compete for the position of assistant statis¬ 
tician for the department of agriculture, 
and his standing was a fraction less than 
forty-four, which was really a very excel¬ 
lent record for a newspaper man to attain 
in a technical service entirely dissimilar 
from his own work. 

Mr. Grenell was satisfied with his mark¬ 
ing, but for the purposes we have indicated 
he wanted the markings of the other can¬ 
didates. The civil service commission 
supposing he was a bona fide candidate 
under their rules declined at first to give 
the other standings, and in the course of 
the correspondence Editor Grenell rushes ■ 
wildly into rash statements, in answer to 
which Mr. Roosevelt has many times be¬ 
fore demolished the loud and ignorant foes 
of the merit system. 

A part of Mr. Roosevelt’s reply to Mr. 
Grenell, which so far as we know the latter 
has not yet printed, entertaining as it 
is, in his paper, is as follows: 

You say that “ a glance at the papers pre¬ 
pared for the examination proved the impos¬ 
sibility of my (your) attaining a sufficiently 
high average to pass. Indeed, I (you) feel 
sure the civil service commissioners them¬ 
selves could not pass, and I (you) know that 
two thirds of the present members of the 
President’s cabinet would ‘fall down’ in the 
attempt.” Evidently you do not understand 
the purpose of holding special examinations 
for special places. When we hold an exami¬ 
nation for assistant statistician our aim is to 
get a man who is an assistant statistician, not 
one who is a civil service commissioner or a 
cabinet officer. It would be a proof of the 
incompetency of the commission if it framed 
an examination for assistant statistician with 
a view of having cabinet officers and civil 
service commissioners pass it. The commis¬ 
sion holds examinations for all kinds of 
positions. For instance, we hold them for 
the position of assistant astronomer. Do you 
mean seriously to imply that when we hold 
an examination for astronomer we should 
make that examination one which the average 
cabinet officer could pass? It would be a 
mere chance if any member of any cabinet 
was fit to be an astronomer, or, for that matter, 
an assistant statistician. I do not suppose 
that any member of the present cabinet, or of 
the cabinet of Mr. Harrison, would be fit fc'^ '• 
either of these positions. I know that n y 
member of either cabinet would be as fit for -V 
statistician as the man who was appointe iB 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


227 


under the assistant statistician examination. 
In your own case, as you bring the matter up, 
your examination showed that you were en¬ 
tirely unfit to hold the office you sought. 
Doubtless you are an admirable newspaper 
editor, and you may be fit for much higher 
work than that of an assistant statistician, but 
you are not fit for that particular work, and 
the commission would have been to blame if 
it had framed an examination which would 
not have emphasized the difference between 
the man who was competent to be an assistant 
statistician and one who was not competent} 
no matter how good this latter individual 
might be in some other line of work. 

You say the questions are not practical, and 
instance one of the questions in reference to a 
geometrical problem as having no relation to 
the subject-matter in hand. This shows that 
you do not understand what the work of an 
assistant statistician really is. As a matter of 
fact, many statistics are illustrated by geomet¬ 
rical figures and problems. This is the case 
with the work now actually performed by the 
assistant statistician in the department of 
agriculture. So you see that the question was 
all right. It was your lack of understanding 
of the subject which was to blame. 

You say that a boy fresh from a high school 
could get 80 to 90 to his credit, and that any 
one could cram him up so as to pass after a 
fortnight’s work. Again you are completely 
in error. The average age of those passing 
our examination is 27 years. Instead of being 
fresh from the high schools, the men have 
been out of them at least ten years on the 
average. The man who stood at the head of 
the list in the examination you took, and who 
received the appointment, was 43 years old 
and was already a computer in the United States 
coast survey. Remember that you are only 
theorizing on the subject, while I am speaking 
from a thorough acquaintance with the facts 
of the case. As a matter of fact the persons 
who get office under us stand higher in every 
way than those appointed under the old 
methods^ and form an exceptionally intelli¬ 
gent, honest and able class of employes. In 
our own bureau we have more than fifty men 
employed. They all came in under our own 
examinations, standing at the head of the 
lists, and it would be impossible to get, in 
public or private employment, a better corps 
of men than they are. 

None of the men who were coached for this 
[assistant statistician] examination passed. I 
have given you the particulars about the man 
who stood highest. The man who stood second 
was 38 years old, and had been a statistician 
in the census bureau. The man who stood 
third was 26 years old, a post-graduate student 
of Cornell University, and afterwards private 
secretary to a member of congress. The man 
who stood fourth was 24 years old, and was a 
Fellow in Political Economy and Sociology 
of the Chicago University. The man who 
stood fifth was 29, and was an accountant in 
New York. He had formerly been an in¬ 
structor in statistics in the University of 
Chicago. * * * 


It may interest you to know that the secre¬ 
tary of agriculture chose the highest man on 
the list, and informs us that he is the most 
satisfactory man in statistical work that he 
ever had, and that after the appointment had 
been made he received a letter from Mr. Ed¬ 
ward Atkinson vouching for the remarkable 
capacity of the man in the very lines upon 
which we tested him, and for the very business 
in which he was to be employed. The secre¬ 
tary of agriculture said he thought he was the 
best man in the United States for the position. 
You thus see that in this very examination of 
which you complain, the man who passed the 
highest was the best man that could have been 
found anywhere for the position. The ex¬ 
amination was eminently practical in char¬ 
acter, and no man who failed to pass it could 
be considered competent for the position. 

The next time JEditor Grenell tackles 
Theodore Roosevelthe should spend more 
time in preparation and he should not 
elect to compete for the place of assistant 
statistician in the agricultural department. 

Detroit has for years been conspic¬ 
uously lethargic in any apparent under¬ 
standing of the evils of the spoils system 
or any feeling that it should be crushed. 
It has had no reform spirit in its press nor 
among its citizens. This is the more singu¬ 
lar, as it would naturally be influenced by 
the proximity of the great state univer¬ 
sity. We take it for granted that the pro¬ 
fessors of Michigan University are as alive 
to the dangers threatening American in¬ 
stitutions and American character through 
the spoils system as are those of Harvard 
and Yale. The course of their opposition 
to the corrupt and degrading influences of 
patronage may be widely traced in and out 
of those institutions. Not so, in Detroit, 
well filled with Michigan University 
alumni. We have been told by a person 
who has a wide social acquaintance among 
the intelligent people of that city that to 
bring up the question of civil service re¬ 
form is to introduce a topic that has vague 
and abstract interest only, quite foreign to 
their usual topics and productive only of 
languor. We believe that they have in the 
last year or so organized a civic federa¬ 
tion, and it is a fact that Rev. Donald Mac- 
Laurin, at the coming meeting of the 
Municipal League at Cleveland, will dis¬ 
cuss Detroit’s municipal condition. Pos¬ 
sibly his paper will throw light on this 
question. 

QUAY’S PENNSYLVANIA. 

Matt Quay has just furnished the state of 
Pennsylvania as striking an illustration of 
the ownership of a legislature by an outside 
boss as Tom Platt has repeatedly given the 
people of this state in the case of the New 
York legislature during the last four months. 
Platt sits in an office on lower Broadway, and 
issues his orders to his tools 


Albany through legislative errand boys, or, 
when time presses, by the long-distance tele¬ 
phone. Quay has been spending the last few 
weeks in Washington, where he has made up 
his mind at his leisure what policy should be 
pursued by his tools at Harrisburg. A prop¬ 
osition for an investigation of the city gov¬ 
ernment of Philadelphia was recently intro¬ 
duced in the legislature. Powerful interests 
had strong reasons for desiring its defeat. 
Theoretically the way for them to secure that 
end would have been to bring influence to 
bear upon the senators and representatives at 
the state capital. Practically their only hope 
was to appeal to the man in Washington who 
controlled the dummies at Harrisburg. What 
occurred is thus described by a republican 
organ, the Philadelphia Inquirer: 

“When Senator Quay arrived in Washing¬ 
ton from Florida to find that Penrose had in¬ 
troduced the resolution, he was beseiged. It 
would surprise the people of Phildelphia to 
learn of the men who have made pilgrimages 
to Washington. Some of them pass for mill¬ 
ionaires and stand high in the community, 
and yet most of them have had interests in 
one or more of the companies that have ben¬ 
efited through ordinances passed by councils. 
It was very well understood that should Sen¬ 
ator Quay declare against the policy of 
adopting the resolution it would fail.” 

The boss at Washington took time to make 
up his mind, and the state of Pennsylvania 
awaited his decision. At last he decided to 
permit the investigation, and the resolution 
was immediately adopted by an overwhelm¬ 
ing majority. The incident merits attention 
for the perfect frankness with which the city 
of Philadelphia recognized the ownership of 
the Pennsylvania legislature by an outside 
boss .—New York Evening Post, May 13. 


We described yesterday the manner in which 
Matt Quay has been governing the state of 
Pennsylvania from Washington, receiving 
there delegations of prominent Philadelphians 
who went to ask him to prevent a threatened 
investigation of the city government, because, 
as the Philadelphia Inquirer, a republican or¬ 
gan, put it, “it was very well understood that 
should Senator Quay declare against the pol¬ 
icy of adopting the resolution it would fail.” 
Now that the end of the session is approach¬ 
ing, the boss has concluded that it will be 
more convenient to go to the state capitol and 
issue his orders on the spot. “Senator Quay 
is expected here Tuesday night or Wednesday 
morning,” says the Harrisburg correspondent 
of the Philadelphia Ledger, independent re¬ 
publican, “and it is believed his presence will 
determine the fate of several measures which 
are hanging up in both houses awaiting his 
approval or disapproval.” One important 
measure, which has been much discussed in 
the legislature and by the press, is a bill pro¬ 
viding for the retirement of judges upon a 
pension at the age of seventy. It has passed 
one branch, and strong arguments upon public 
grounds have been urged for its passage by 
the other. “The fate of the judicial-retire¬ 
ment bill rests with Senator Quay,” says the 
correspondent. Another bill now 


in the capitol at | Ledger's 










228 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


pending proposes the establishment of an ap¬ 
pellate court, which is favored by the supreme 
court as a needed means of relief for that tri¬ 
bunal. “The appellate-court bill will also be 
a subject for Senator Quay’s consideration 
when he arrives,” says the authority from 
whom we quote. There is no question of par¬ 
tisan prejudice in these frank confessions of 
Quay’s absolute control of legislation in Penn¬ 
sylvania, as he is a republican, and both the 
Inquirer And Ledger ax e republican newspapers. 
The fact is so notorious that nobody longer af¬ 
fects to disparage the power of the boss.— New 
York Evening Post, May I 4 . 


The ruler of the state of Pennsylvania has 
changed his plans. For some weeks Matt 
Quay has governed from the national capital, 
enjoying the delights of the Washington 
spring and receiving there delegations of cit¬ 
izens who wished him to order passed or de¬ 
feated various bills which had been introduced 
in the legislature. On Monday it was an¬ 
nounced that he would go to Harrisburg this 
week, to “determine the fate of several meas¬ 
ures which are hanging up in both houses 
awaiting his approval or disapproval.” Yes¬ 
terday, however, it was given out that he had 
gone to his home in Beaver, would not be seen 
at the capital this week, and might not visit 
Harrisburg at all. The reason is a regard for 
the personal convenience of the dictator. It 
is thus explained in a dispatch to the Phila¬ 
delphia Ledger from its Harrisburg corre¬ 
spondent : 

“It is believed that the senator desires to es¬ 
cape the importunities of friends who would 
seek his influence for certain legislation of an 
unimportant character which he has no wish 
to interfere in, and that that legislation he wants 
he can secure from a distance just as well as if he 
was on the ground. It is therefore thought that 
he is absenting himself to avoid beeoming in¬ 
volved in the success or defeat of measures 
which result in making him enemies.”— New 
Y(yrk Evening Post, May 15. 


THEODORE ROOSEVELT ON AS¬ 
SESSMENT BLACKMAILING IN 
PHILADELPHIA. 

“Nevertheless, the condition of the force at 
this office (Philadelphia) is by no means as 
satisfactory as in the other ofifices of the same 
size. The political tone of the community is largely 
to blame for this. (Italics ours). Under Post¬ 
master Field it appears that only Republicans 
received appointments, and under Postmaster 
Carr only Democrats. This was largely be¬ 
cause the men of the opposite party would not 
enter the examinations, but undoubtedly the 
custom of keeping letters of recommendation 
for eligibles from politicians and other per¬ 
sons on file, both by Postmaster Carr and by 
his predecessor, has been partly instrumental 
in bringing about this undesirable result.” 

Mr. Roosevelt condemns this practice as 
tending to introduce political influences in 
making appointments. He admits that he 


found no proof that the law forbidding polit¬ 
ical assessments had been violated, and that 
he found that the postmaster has placarded 
the office and sub-stations with copies of the 
Postmaster-General’s proclamation, in which 
he informed the carriers that they need not 
contribute unless they wished, and that they 
would not be jeopardized by refusing to con¬ 
tribute. “In the great majority of cases the 
employes unquestionably contributed without 
being solicited by any person in the government 
sei'vice.” (Italics ours). 

Now here comes the kernel of Mr. Roose¬ 
velt’s report: 

“But although there has been little actual 
violation of the law, there has been what is 
virtually a very heavy assessment of the pos¬ 
tal employes. Before the congressional elec¬ 
tion last fall, and before the municipal elec¬ 
tion this spring, they were all repeatedly 
solicited by letter for political contributions 
by the democratic campaign committees. A 
few’ of them did not respond, but most all paid 
three per cent, last fall and two per cent, this 
spring. The republicans were not assessed. 
This heavy assessment amounted to fifty dol¬ 
lars out of every one thousand dollar salary, 
and was by most of the employes regarded as 
a great burden, and was paid merely because 
they feared ill consequences if they did not 
pay. A few might have contributed as much 
unasked, but the great majority, as many of 
them testified to me, paid the money simply 
as an insurance against trouble. One of them 
stated that he would not have paid it if the 
civil service commission had been located in 
Philadelphia, and he could go to somebody 
for protection in case he got into a scrape.” 
Mr. Roosevelt gives as another reason why 
this assessment blackmail—for it is nothing 
short of that—is imposed on federal office¬ 
holders here is to be found in the fact that 
“the habit seems to be universal in Philadel¬ 
phia, so much so that the office-holder has 
come to regard it as the natural order of 
things.” 

Mr. Roosevelt asserts that plenty of evi¬ 
dence was ofiered to him concerning the as¬ 
sessments which was said had been levied by 
the republican campaign committees among 
the city and state officials, and certain of the 
circulars were shown him: “One of these 
cireulars was written with unconscious humor. 
It requested from the recipient a ‘voluntary’ 
contribution of one day’s pay, and explained 
that if the ‘voluntary’ contribution was not 
made the name of the refractory man w’ould 
be forwarded to the head of his office with a 
request for his dismissal.”— Fiom City and 
State, May 9. 

VETERANS’ OFFICE-HOLDING 
PRIVILEGES. 

The following resolutions were unanimously 
adopted at the annual meeting of the Cambridge 
(Mass.) Civil Service Reform Association: 

Resolved, That the Cambridge Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association heartily approves of the action of 
the executive committee in protesting against the 
passage of the Soldiers’ Exemption Bill (being 
House Bill No, 1040). 


Resolved, That the members of this association 
desire to make a still stronger remonstrance against 
any extension of the principle on which this bill is 
based, namely, that one class in the community 
should have greater privileges than others. 

Resolved, That while the association is heartily in 
favor of every legitimate recognition of the services 
of the genuine veterans of’the late war, they call 
upon these veterans themselves to show their in¬ 
telligence, independence and patriotism, byoppos- 
ing every measure which may tend to degrade the 
civil service of the nation, the state, or the city, by 
promoting the appointment of any person to public 
office without due regard to his qualifications for 
the discharge of public duty. 

The passage of the proposed veteran exemp¬ 
tion bill in its present form is a severe blow 
at civil service reform. By the existing con¬ 
ditions of the civil service act veterans are 
given a very absolute preference over all other 
applicants for public office, a pass examina¬ 
tion being all that is obligatory for veterans, 
and even that is not required where they are 
applied for by appointing officers. But under 
the new bill, which went booming through 
the house, the appointment of a veteran is ob¬ 
ligatory, upon his own oath that he considers 
himself competent to the duties of the desired 
office, accompanied by the vouchers of two 
friends. We have failed, as yet, to find a vet¬ 
eran of any repute who does not think that 
this is going too far in the creation of a privi¬ 
leged class. And, speaking as a veteran, we 
honestly believe the passage of the proposed 
bill will be a serious injury to the cause of the 
G. A. R., in giving color to the accusations 
which are just now being made that it is an 
organization maintained for the purpose of 
obtaining pensions and offices for worthy or 
unworthy members alike. Those who have 
the honor of the veterans nearest at heart 
seem to be unanimously opposed to this new 
bill.— Cambridge, Mass., Exchange. 


The following was unanimously passed at the reg¬ 
ular meeting of Post 30, May 16: 

Resolved, That W. H. Smart Post £0, G. A. R., 
heartily indorses the bill which has passed the 
house of representatives, and which gives to vet¬ 
erans preference in employment in the public serv¬ 
ice of the commonwealth and the cities thereof, 
and that'we earnestly request our senators to assist 
in the passage of the bill through the state senate. 
We regret to find that the Civil Service Reform 
Club of Cambridge has been doing everything in 
its power tp defeat the bill, and we condemn its ac 
tion in the matter as unwarrantable and unpatri¬ 
otic. 

—Speaking of the adoption of civil service 
reform in Chicago, the St. Paul Pioneer Press 
(Rep.) says: “There is not a particle of doubt 
that a similar law applied to state employ¬ 
ments in Minnesota, if submitted to the peo¬ 
ple, would receive an overwhelming majority 
of the popular vote.”— May 8. 

* * * 

—The Minneapolis Journal scores Governor 
Clough, of Minnesota, for vetoing a bill provid¬ 
ing for the application of the civil service rules 
in appointments and promotions in the depart¬ 
ment of grain inspection. The bill passed 
both houses of the legislature without a dis¬ 
senting vote, : 












The civil service chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 28. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolit, Ind, 


The formation of the national municipal 
league and of the good government clubs 
which held their annual conference at 
Cleveland, May 29, 30 and 31, has brought 
a great number of new and earnest men 
and women into the field of governmental 
improvement. The rapidity with which 
all classes of citizens have thronged into 
these organizations is an unerring indica¬ 
tion that there is in the public mind a 
deep-seated determination that there must 
be an improvement. The meeting at 
Cleveland was a conference at which was 
heard for two days and a half the story of 
the government of the cities of this coun¬ 
try. No formal resolutions or statement 
of principles were adopted, but with prac¬ 
tical unanimity the enemies of good gov¬ 
ernment were recognized to be the boss, 
the boodler, the trimming party leader, 
and the indifferent or blindly partisan good 
citizen. There was the same unanimous 
opinion that complete success will never 
be reached until municipal government is 
divorced from party considerations of 
every kind and nature. There was a wide 
difference as to remedies. With one it 
was sufficient to arouse the activities of 
good citizens, with another to make better 
laws, with another to elect good men to 
office, and so on. Later on the members 
of these organizations will recognize that 
there is no one specific for bad city govern¬ 
ment; nor is there any order in which 
remedies must be tried. Whatever can be 
got first, whether good laws or good offi¬ 
cers or the activity of good citizens must 
be taken as it can be had, and all must be 
carried on together. Later on also it will 
be more fully recognized that the pirates 
who prey upon municipal government will 
disappear when there is no booty to be 
captured; and that the greatest remedies 
discovered in modern times for the re¬ 
moval of governmental booty are the merit 
and labor service systems. In this respect 
a good many members are groping in the 
dark. The conference was of great value. 


In making Mr. Olney secretary of state 
the President has bestowed upon him a 
very marked promotion. This act has 


INDIANAPOLIS, JUNE, 1895. 

been generally praised by the public press, 
the leading papers of both parties heartily 
joining therein. The Chronicle has often 
differed in such matters and it differs now. 
Mr.Olney is undoubtedly a good lawyer,but 
he is not a great lawyer. He has probably 
performed the routine duties of the attor¬ 
ney-general’s office well enough; it does 
not take a great lawyer to do that. 
Whether he has looked after the highest 
duties of his office with commendable zeal 
and fidelity, the people do not and can not 
yet know. He certainly has not made a 
mark for such zeal and fidelity, and he 
committed the gross impropriety of re¬ 
taining his position as counsel of a great 
railroad corporation. Viewed as a political 
leader, his opinions, with a single excep¬ 
tion, are unknown to the country, and in 
the excepted case they are known by his 
being viciously negative. On every hand, 
in the city, the county, the state, the na¬ 
tion, there is a great struggle for better 
government—for freedom from the grip 
of bosses and bummers and thieves. It is 
the one great cause in which a man may 
render his country a permanent service. 
No man should occupy a position in the 
cabinet who is not in active sympathy with 
this cause, and Mr. Olney’s attitude to¬ 
wards it has been one of cynical indiffer¬ 
ence, to put the matter very mildly. 


The Civil Service Reform Association 
of Maryland has just performed one of 
those unpleasant duties from which civil 
service reformers have too frequently 
flinched. It has been obliged to censure a 
professor of civil service reform and a 
member of its own association for practic¬ 
ing the spoils methods of spoilsmen. 
When Mr. Bissell was postmaster-general 
he complained of the importunities of a 
prominent professor of civil service reform 
for patronage as the worst he had to bear 
with the exception of a single congress¬ 
man. Some of President Cleveland’s most 
fatal deviations from the principles of civil 
service reform he has stated were upon the 
counsel of apostles of reform. Josiah 
Quincy was a reformer of this sort. Gor¬ 
man and Quay are less dangerous. Their 
acts hrace up reformers but to condone 
Quincy and Postmaster Warfield strikes 
at the very life of reform. Mr. Bonaparte 
put it finely, when he said : 

In a professed reformer, “practical poli- 


One dollar per annum. 

10 cents percopy. 

tics” are not “practical.” When a man’s end 
is to advance his own interest, without re¬ 
gard to that of the public, the practices of 
our professional politicians are judicious 
means to that end, just as the artifices of a 
“ bunco steerer ” or a “ green goods man ” are 
well devised to efi'ect his purposes; but a 
preacher of the gospel who used these artifices 
to awaken souls to righteousness would gain 
little for either the kingdom of heaven or his 
own consideration among God-fearing folk; 
and it is no less futile for any one appealing 
to the people’s conscience against wrong-doing 
by public men to vary the monotony of his 
exhortations by intimate association with the 
men he denounces and apparent imitation of 
their ways of life. Nothing is so certainly 
fatal to one who would guide public opinion 
as the appearance of duplicity. To attempt 
to reform politics by a “tactful” distribution 
of patronage, or even by arousing unfounded 
hopes of future “spoils” is, after all, like try¬ 
ing to lift one’s self from the ground by one’s 
own boot-straps, or to inclose a space between 
two parallel lines. It is giving great effort of 
mind to make two and two equal to five. 

Chauncey M.Depew, in a recent address 
at Vanderbilt -University, deplored rings 
and bosses and put forward this stirring 
war-cry for all good citizens: 

Protection and free trade can wait; they have 
waited and wavered for a century. All other ques¬ 
tions can wait as they have waited and wavered for 
a generation. Thieves are in possession of the state 
house, robbers are intrenched in the city hall. 
Unite, discard party, disregard cries, shibboleths, 
and phrases, and so rescue the state and the city. 

To prove the resistless power of a com¬ 
bination of independent voters he cited 
the triumph of the committee of seventy 
in New York and the committee of one 
hundred in Brooklyn and of civil service 
reform in Chicago. Mr. Depew did not ex¬ 
plain how a man holding such sentiments 
could entertain Tom Platt at dinner. 

When Governor Morton, of New York, 
appointed Platt’s man, George W. Al¬ 
dridge, commissioner of public works, he 
followed a long line of precedents, in 
which respectable appointing officers have 
for political reasons put the merest ma¬ 
chine politicians into places of trust. Al¬ 
dridge started out with the declaration 
consistent with his well-known character 
that the canals would be republican from 
the lock-tenders up. He briskly proceeded 
to make this declaration good, and in the 
course thereof he appointed a certain fifty- 




















230 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


one Platt republicans to important posi¬ 
tions. There was no effective way of pre¬ 
venting these Plattites from occupying 
the places, but when they came to draw 
their pay that was another matter. The 
state civil service commission overhauled 
Aldridge and reported to the governor 
that these fifty-one persons had been ap¬ 
pointed in violation of the civil service 
law, and the governor promptly approved 
the report. Aldridge squirmed and coun¬ 
selled with Platt, and had himself inter¬ 
viewed, and argued that the places were 
not within the law, but all to no purpose. 
The fifty-one Plattites will have to step 
out, and Aldridge will have to take fifty- 
one men from the despised eligible list, to 
the great diminution of his value to Platt, 
and to his own personal mortification. To 
have to make fifty-one appointments upon 
the canals by a system of open competition 
and with the probability that there is not 
a single Platt man among them, will cer¬ 
tainly fill Aldridge’s cup of bitterness to 
the full. 

In minor matters few of the universities 
have so much reason for congratulation 
as Cornell has, from the fact that it is rid 
of Charles A. Collin, who has held a posi¬ 
tion in its law school. Collin, while hold¬ 
ing this position, was the “ counsel ” of 
Dave Hill and Flower, and Cornell had to 
see him writing legal apologies for those 
worthies; as, for instance, when Hill 
wanted to defeat ballot reform, and Flower 
wanteddo defeat the appropriation for the 
Lexow investigation. The scholar in ma¬ 
chine politics always cuts a humiliating 
figure, and few have had a sorrier appear¬ 
ance than Collin. In his partnership formed 
with Blue-Eyed Billy Sheehan,with whom 
he is about to open a law oflSce,in NewYork, 
things have followed in their natural se¬ 
quence. Collin is spoken of as a “ practi¬ 
cal,” as opposed to a “ theoretical,” or 
“ bookish ” lawyer. This may or may not 
be a virtue. Wherever the name of Shee¬ 
han is concerned, there is such a sugges¬ 
tion of all sorts of pulls, that a bookish 
lawyer might be the more wholesome 
spectacle, although his practice might be 
less profitable. Sheehan is advertised as a 
democrat, and Collin as a republican; but 
there is a singular brotherhood among 
this stripe of New York politicians, no 
matter what the party name, and they pull 
together in a very “practical ” manner. 

It is fair, however, to give both sides a 
hearing. Mr. James. P. Harrold has writ¬ 
ten to the New York Evening ibs<, saying 
that Professor Collin is an “invaluable in¬ 
structor, a profound scholar, an able teach¬ 
er and a man of the highest integrity.” To 
take the last word we repeat that he is the 
apologist of Dave Hill and Flower and 
the partner of Blue-eyed Billy Sheeham 


the brother and supporter of John C‘ 
Sheehan, formerly of Buffalo and late po¬ 
lice commissioner of New York. It is un¬ 
fortunate that any one at Cornell can think 
that Mr. Harrold’s eulogy and these facts 
can possibly go together. Mr. Harrold de¬ 
clines to defend Collin’s “ political ideas.” 
Are we to understand that integrity is to 
be put in one pocket and political ideas in 
another? 


This is a good time to study the old les¬ 
son of “issues.” Some years ago we were 
told that we ought to keep quiet about 
civil service reform until the tariff ques¬ 
tion was settled. We pointed out that the 
tariff question did not differ from the 
same question in the forties, nor was it 
likely to differ from the same question in 
the hundred and twenties. A tariff re¬ 
form bill has been passed and yet some¬ 
how the question is not settled. Another 
question also has become acute—the cur¬ 
rency question, and we notice that the Re¬ 
form Club of New York is bending all its 
energies to that subject. Is civil service 
reform to wait until it is settled whether 
or not we are to have free coinage of sil¬ 
ver? Some other question will at once 
follow the silver question and if the pro¬ 
posal were agreed to for a moment there 
would never be an end to waiting. The 
tariff and the currency questions are the 
happy hunting grounds of the bosses and 
the heelers; if the people’s attention can 
be confined to those questions the game 
can be bagged. The cool calculation 
with which issues are chosen for a cam¬ 
paign was never more patent than now. 
Quay, who is in serious danger of being 
upset as the boss of Pennsylvania, says 
that the issue next year should be upon 
the tariff. He can excite Pennsylvania 
by shouting danger to protection, and it 
will submit to him for another term. 
The people of Pennsylvania will follow 
any kind of a criminal if he leads on to 
protection. On the other hand a large 
body of the republican bosses think that 
free coinage should be the issue, not with 
any view whatever to the welfare of the 
country, but solely because they believe 
that the party can succeed. The object of 
all these deliberations is to find some way 
by which Platt can again divide the fede¬ 
ral offices in New York, and Quay the fed¬ 
eral offices in Pennsylvania, and all the 
other party bosses all the other federal of¬ 
fices. Civil service reform has not in the 
past waited the pleasure of the likes of 
these and it will not in the future. 

It is probable that a century from now 
there will be a tariff question and a cur¬ 
rency question and other routine ques¬ 
tions, whose discussion will ebb and flow 
with financial changes. What President 


Cleveland did in those matters will 
not attract greater attention than is 
now attracted to what President Polk 
did fifty years ago in kindred mat¬ 
ters. But there will be no spoils ques¬ 
tion. Undoubtedly the next twenty-five 
years will complete the change now going 
on to such an extent that public business, 
including the contract system and the 
employment and discharge of employes 
and the manner in which they perform 
their duties, will be devoid of the corrup¬ 
tion and of the party considerations which 
now so heavily weigh it down. The whole¬ 
someness of this change will always attract 
to the process the closest attention of his¬ 
tory. The great strides, therefore, which 
President Cleveland is repeatedly taking 
in this direction will more than all else he 
does give him a place in history. The trans¬ 
fer of the government printing office to the 
classified service is one of the greatest 
blows which has ever been struck for the 
reform and indicates the headway it has 
gained, as well as what a President can do 
if he will. This office has been a national 
disgrace. On account of “ politics,” this, 
the most powerful nation in the world, has 
been afraid to introduce labor-saving ma¬ 
chinery into its printing office. The place 
has been regularly looted by the scalawag 
politicians whom we send to congress. 
Over all this organized labor has attempted 
to keep a supervision. Such a place was a 
curse to laboring men, for it is a place 
where thousands sought but only one ob¬ 
tained good pay without rendering ade¬ 
quate service. All this will be changed. Skill 
will have its reward. Politics will disap¬ 
pear, and a fair day’s pay will be given for 
a fair day’s work. It is one of the greatest 
triumphs of the merit system that labor¬ 
ing men themselves both in and out of this 
office asked to have it applied there. Per¬ 
haps the greatest sufferer will be Senator 
Arthur Pue Gorman,for whose Maryland 
rounders the government printing office 
was a sure and never exhausted refuge; 
and this was true, whether the times were 
republican or democratic. 

We have received the eleventh report of 
the federal civil service commission cover¬ 
ing the ground to June 30,1894. It is the 
most valuable report yet issued and its 
chief virtue is that it is not afraid to name 
names and publish the facts of its investi¬ 
gations. The stories of the attempts to 
trick the civil service law are retold with 
great effect, and nothing so well indicates 
the thorough understanding of its duties. 
The plain statement concerning the Indi¬ 
ana post-offices and that, with the single ex¬ 
ception of those of Mississippi, they are 
the most deeply branded with marks of 
trickery, points out another disgrace in¬ 
flicted upon this state by politics. It is all 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


231 


the worse that the postmasters concerned 
were left unpunished. It should be re¬ 
membered that these things happened 
more than a year ago, since which time 
the repeated triumphs of civil service re¬ 
form have had a sobering influence even 
upon Voorheesism. 

There is no question but that the thor¬ 
ough venality which pervades American 
state legislatures is a grave public calamity. 
The late reform, rib-breaking, prison loot¬ 
ing general assembly of Indiana, the Penn¬ 
sylvania legislature, under the absolute 
control of a notorious thief, the New York 
body under the control of Platt, and the 
Massachusetts legislature passing over the 
governor’s veto, with but two dissenting 
votes, a law to debauch the soldiers of the 
rebellion, are instances of this all but uni¬ 
versal legislative corruption. The cause 
is the character of the members. Clerks as 
a class will not cheat or defraud, or try 
to cheat or defraud, their employers; 
they believe it to be wrong and would lis¬ 
ten to no plan which contemplated such 
action. This is true of all classes of private 
employes. But it is not true of the mem¬ 
bers of state legislatures; they readily 
cheat and defraud their employers, and 
call it “ politics.” They vote for any kind 
of a law which will help the party ma¬ 
chine, they legislate so as to loot a public 
institution solely to pay party-heelers, and 
a large proportion of them sell their votes 
for money. There is no permanent cure 
except to get men into the legislatures 
who are at least ordinarily honest, and 
who look upon public business as they 
do private business. This will be a slow 
process, but it is a part of the great move¬ 
ment now going on for better govern¬ 
ment. The next generation will look 
upon us as we now look upon Walpole’s 
time. 

The meeting of the national republican 
league at Cleveland this month was un¬ 
usually well attended in the matter of del¬ 
egates, which is a sure indication that the 
prospects of party success next year are 
considered good. This league is a delegate 
meeting of republican clubs, and the re¬ 
publican clubs, like all other party clubs, 
are kept alive and controlled by party 
workers. When the promise of success is 
good they turn out in great numbers and 
“whoop ’er up” at every meeting. When 
asked what they stand for, they have only 
one reply: “The principles of the party.” 
If asked to state these principles they be¬ 
come wary and in fact feel entirely sure 
of only one which is, to quote Mr. Robert 
Lincoln, “Damn a mugwump.” The Cleve¬ 
land meeting was no exception. After a 
long struggle it plainly admitted that it did 
not know what republican principles are, 


whether upon the tariff or the currency or 
anything else. This meeting was composed 
of the younger men of the party. Among 
them, if anywhere, one would expect to 
find some appreciation of the great reform 
in civil affairs which is being worked out 
in the United States, and there would also 
be expected a strong sympathy with this 
revolution of the benefit of which there can 
not be two opinions, and a desire to help 
it along. Yet to this Cleveland meeting 
and to its individual members this whole 
matter was a sealed book. For the repre¬ 
sentatives of “the party of progress” and 
“the God and morality party,” this has a 
strange look. 

Inspector McLaughlin, convicted of 
extortion, was sentenced to two and one- 
half years imprisonment in Sing Sing 
prison. He is forty nine years old, and 
for twenty-five years has been in the po¬ 
lice department of New York city. In 
sentencing this officer of high rank, and in 
many respects honorable record, the judge 
said he had nothing in his heart but re¬ 
gret for a wrecked life. With the court, 
we may all feel pity for McLaughlin, and 
yet he was guilty and should be punished. 
But others, more responsible, unfortun¬ 
ately will not be punished, too. The New 
York Times states well where the responsi¬ 
bility for McLaughlin’s wrecked life lies: 

Extortion of money as the price of immu¬ 
nity for illegal acts, or of exemption from the 
enforcement of the law, or of freedom from 
annoyance and expense, was general in the 
police department, and was in complete har¬ 
mony with the views and practices of the 
politicians who controlled the city government. 
These men, mostly Tammany leaders, but 
some of them republican leaders who were in 
deals with the others, regarded all public 
trusts as opportunities for more or less pri¬ 
vate gain. It was an accepted principle with 
them, which many of them never even ques¬ 
tioned, that the possessors of official authority 
should be paid for using or refraining from 
using it by those to whom either the use or its 
neglect would be advantageous. * * * Un¬ 
doubtedly in this sen.se and to the degree in¬ 
dicated McLauglin was the victim of the sys¬ 
tem of which he was a part and in which he 
knew that admission and promotion must be 
paid for. * * * It is a great pity that the 
men immediately responsible for this system 
can not join the convicted inspector in prison. 
But the final reponsibility is not with them. 
It is with the respectable citizens who, blinded 
by partisanship or indifference to the de¬ 
mands of principle in the performance of po¬ 
litical duties, have allowed themselves to be 
driven as cattle are driven. The absolute de¬ 
pendence of every corrupt political leader in 
any party is on the unthinking support of the 
honest men of that party. Platt has com¬ 
manded it from republicans as Tammany has 
commanded it from democrats. When it is 
withdrawn and citizens iutelligent enough to 
know what is right in politics have the cour¬ 
age and sense to do it, the system that rests 
on the sale of public trusts will come to an 
end. 

Harper's Weekly has perhaps been the 
most outspoken of all independent papers 


as to the responsibility ol Mayor Strong 
in his failure to keep his pledges. It could 
not excuse his interpretation of his pledge 
for non-partisan appointments into multi¬ 
partisan appointments, and especially, it 
condemned his approval of Platt’s bi-par- 
tisan police board, however excellent the 
mayor’s appointments. Mayor Strong’s 
policy, as outlined by himself for publica¬ 
tion in the New York World, indicates 
that Harper's Weekly has only erred on the 
side of leniency. The mayor says that no 
consideration should outweigh the one 
great question of fitness, but then proceeds 
to show how he made his appointments, 
which have not borne the test of conspicu¬ 
ous fitness. It would be physically im¬ 
possible to have fitness the prominent 
test and then require the offices to be 
fairly apportioned according to further 
religious and factional tests, as the mayor 
reports himself as doing. He says: 

“I discussed the question of appointments with 
myself and asked myself, ‘What is my duty?’ After 
mature reflection I decided that I would give one- 
third of the offices to the democratic organizations 
that had supported the reform movement and 
helped to elect me, and two-thirds of the offices to 
the republicans. I have adhered to this. I calcu¬ 
lated the vote as well as I could, and decided that 
I had got about 100,000 votes from the republicans 
and about 50,000 votes from the democrats, and 
therefore the apportionment of offices at the rate of 
one for democrats and two for republicans seemed 
fair and just.” 

The mayor, according to the interview, then told 
in detail how he had carried out his plan of divid¬ 
ing the offices. He said he had appointed some 
men because they were Roman Catholics and others 
because they were Hebrews, so as to give all denom¬ 
inations a show. 

Mayor Strong also says that he has but 
two mugwumps in his administration 
and that it is right to reward political serv¬ 
ices with offices. In this painfully humil¬ 
iating interview the mayor admits every¬ 
thing of which he has been charged or 
suspected. He shows himself to be a cal¬ 
culating traitor to the trust which was 
confided to him. His declaration that fit¬ 
ness first and party next should control in 
appointments has been the declaration of 
every rascally boss since Aaron Burr. 

City and State is on the right road for 
genuine reform when it gives such facts 
and details as it does regarding an offer of 
a land company to sell the city of Phila¬ 
delphia 82^ acres of wild land a mile from 
the nearest street railway for .$250,000, as¬ 
sessed for taxation at $78,000, for a munic¬ 
ipal hospital. One of the most prominent 
spirits of this land company is one Pow¬ 
ers, a professional office-holder, the recog¬ 
nized republican leader of the twenty- 
fifth ward, and a member of the republi¬ 
can city committee. As deputy coroner 
under Coroner Ashbridge, naval officer 
under Collector Cooper, and assistant high¬ 
way commissioner under Chief Bullock, 
he has long fed at the public crib. His 













232 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


present position gives him a salary of 
$1,800 per year. 

A coroner, an assistant highway com¬ 
missioner, a police captain, two council- 
men and four politicians of local note, are 
mentioned as owning stock. This is one 
way of being in politics for what there is 
in it. 

Secretary Hoke Smith has recently 
re-appointed two faithful and efficient In¬ 
dian agents who were republicans, but in 
no sense politicians, J. George Wright, at 
Rosebud, and George Steele, at the Black- 
foot agency. The secretary of the interior 
has only performed a simple and obvious 
duty to the Indians and to two worthy of¬ 
ficers ; but the failure to do these obvious 
duties has been so glaring for so many 
years that performance finally becomes 
an act of great merit. 


This city has its next election in Octo¬ 
ber, the time being distinct from all other 
elections. The process of evolving candi¬ 
dates for mayor is interesting. Under our 
charter with a dishonest mayor or with a 
respectable but weak one under the con¬ 
trol of bosses, a pretty general slaughter 
may be made of the city business without 
any adequate means of prevention. The 
party workers all know this and so far 
they seem to be the only ones taking part 
in finding candidates for mayor. They 
will undoubtedly control the nominations 
and will do their best to Tammanyize the 
city. The only candidates they talk of so 
far are men who are in politics for what 
there is in it, and who would treat the boys 
accordingly. There is not the least sug¬ 
gestion of choosing a man who will ex¬ 
clude party politics and will transact the 
city business upon business principles. As 
the time for nominations draws near, fear 
will begin to get in its work. The boys do 
not want to be defeated, and they will 
remember that there is an unusually large 
independent vote here which has no parti¬ 
san bowels of compassion. Then will fol¬ 
low the process of trimming to secure a 
respectable candidate who will be a figure¬ 
head, and this is for the welfare of Indian¬ 
apolis, the most dangerous part of the busi¬ 
ness. 


There is a republican club in the south 
part of the city, which by summons or 
otherwise is bringing before it various 
candidates for the party nominations to 
the city offices and is examining them. 
The examination is very simple, and con¬ 
sists of the one question, “ How do you 
stand on civil service ?” It should be ex¬ 
plained that the southern part of the city 
is heavily democratic, and it is claimed 
that to encourage one to be a republican 
down there requires something more than 


mere principle. How can there be any¬ 
thing more, says this club, if this- 

- civil service is to prevail? We 

frankly answer that “we do not know; but 
we are very sure that “ civil service ” is 
going to prevail everywhere, and even in 
Indianapolis. The truth is these are sad 
times for the enemies of “ civil service.” 
Here is our old friend, the Brookville 
American, exclaiming in sack-cloth, “ The 
government printing office at Washington 
has been placed under snivil-service rules, 
adopted and administered by the mug¬ 
wumps of this country. What does this 
mean?” The meaning is plain. The rising 
tide of civil service reform is overwhelm¬ 
ing the heelers, the bosses and the entire 
multitude who have for years tried to eke 
out an existence in politics by preying 
upon the public business. 


Among other interesting civic phe¬ 
nomena, may be counted the fact that this 
city pays a dollar and forty cents for eight 
hours of common labor, while all private 
business in the city pays a dollar and 
twenty-five cents for ten hours of the same 
kind of labor. On this basis the city pays 
seventeen and a half cents an hour for the 
same kind of labor that costs private em¬ 
ployers but twelve and a half cents an 
hour. This is more interesting when 
coupled with the fact that within a month 
the board of public works has called the 
street commissioner before them and noti¬ 
fied him that the time of traveling to and 
from the job must not be counted as part 
of the eight hours, but that the men must 
actually work the eight hours, with noth¬ 
ing out for going and coming time. We 
decline to regard this as a question whether 
laborers shall receive high or low wages. 
The question is whether this city is a 
charitable institution or a business cor¬ 
poration which is entitled to have its 
streets and sidewalks built and kept clean 
on the same terms obtainable by the trans¬ 
actors of any other kind of business. The 
city is not a charitable institution. The 
price it should pay for anything should be 
the market price and no more. We are 
aware that politics and all kinds of ven¬ 
geance interfere with the application or 
advocacy of this perfectly just principle. 
The knaves and demagogues, however, 
who oppose this application, must sooner 
or later be fought down and it is time to 
begin. The commercial club and the 
board of trade should lead off. 


POSTMASTER WARFIELD. 

In the Chronicle for March we gave a 
long account of the doings of Postmaster 
Warfield of Baltimore. The executive 
committee of the Maryland civil service 
reform association, after going over the 


ground, made a report censuring Mr. War- 
field. His friends in the association itself 
contested the report, but after debating 
the matter many hours for two evenings, 
and after hearing Mr. Warfield’s statement, 
the association sustained the executive 
committee. Mr. Warfield has sent us his 
statement with various editorial comments 
and a note calling attention to the injustice 
done him. 

The question is whether Mr. Warfield 
has acted improperly as postmaster of Balti¬ 
more. November 2, last, the President 
transferred certain positions in the Balti¬ 
more post-office to the classified service. 
These positions were not then vacant but 
were occupied by appointees of Mr. War¬ 
field’s predecessor. These appointees con¬ 
tinued to hold the places and draw the pay 
for more than a week after November 2, 
and then they were asked to resign, and 
having properly refused to do so they were 
removed. Mr. Warfield then tried an old 
and very disgraceful trick to beat the civil 
service law. He put in certain men as 
watchmen and then, without their having 
served an hour as watchmen, he promoted 
them to the above places. This action was 
blocked by the civil service commission 
and the Warfield men went out. Mr. War- 
field then claimed that he had appointed 
the same men to the same positions before 
November 2. The failure of this excuse 
is that the postmaster appoints nobody; 
that is done by the department, and the 
department never appointed these men 
before November 2. It is true that Attor¬ 
ney-General Olney decided that the men 
were legally appointed before the classifica¬ 
tion ; but that as we have often pointed out 
only classifies Mr. Olney with Mr. War- 
field. Mr. Warfield has been very care¬ 
ful not to assist the investigators to a 
sight at the record in the department, al¬ 
though a simple request from him would 
have been sufficient. What that record 
shows nobody knows. He repeatedly falls 
back upon the statement that the mat¬ 
ter was decided in his favor by the 
highest authority. We can tell him 
plainly that such a decision is worth 
nothing any more than it was in the 
Aquilla Jones case, or in the Eugene Hig¬ 
gins case, or in the Rockhill case, or in 
the dozens of cases where political pulls 
have beaten honesty and fairness. The 
decision in his case was simply politics 
and Olney. Mere naming of men by a 
postmaster who has no appointing power 
is not of the slightest legal force. It is no 
part of an appointment, because the post¬ 
master is no part of the appointing power. 
These places were not vacated and these 
appointments were not made until after 
the law had provided a diflerent method 
of making them. The department simply 
overrode the law, and Mr. Warfield was a 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


233 


party to it. He admits that he withheld 
action in vacating and filling these places 
for political reasons affecting the election 
of his friend John K. Cowen to congress. 
Nothing could be more improper in a 
postmaster. 

QUAY AND HIS PROVINCE. 

Quay’s under boss, Martin, became ambi¬ 
tious, insolent and rebellious when Quay was 
in some straits in his last mayoralty cam¬ 
paign, and Quay was stung into saying in the 
United States Senate that a certain “republi¬ 
can national committeeman” had given as a 
reason why he “could not preserve plighted 
faith,” and “do what ought to be done,” in 
regard to an important nomination, “that he 
had been under a heavy salary from a great 
corporation for the last three years,” and “that 
he was compelled to do what the corporation 
wished him to do.” This referred to Dave 
Martin who, as the readers of the Chronicle 
already know, has been Quay’s useful creature 
for his peculiar work at home and has even 
been sent to aid Boss Platt in New York. The 
Public Ledger recently gave a circumstantial 
account of some $100,000 worth of real estate 
acquired in the last few years by Martin. Alto¬ 
gether, as the Ledger said, “Mr. Martin can now 
afford to accept revolution.” An “investiga¬ 
tion” has always been the favorite thumbscrew 
of bosses. Platt has used it to discipline Tam¬ 
many and bring it to terms for deals and so 
Quay concluded to allow the Penrose commit¬ 
tee to look over Philadelphia’s municipal af. 
fairs and incidently put the screws on Martin 
and bring his insubordinate henchman to 
terms. Magee, the Pittsburgh boss and Quay’s 
formidable rival, and Martin fought the ap¬ 
propriation for the investigations. In the 
house they were in the supremacy and after a 
bitter contest the senate surrendered. Mean¬ 
while those respectable people of Philadelphia 
of whom there seems to be so many, allied by 
the cords of business interests with the things 
to be investigated, journeyed up to Quay to 
intercede against any municipal probing. 
But Quay decided that the investigation 
should begin. At what point it will end will 
be his future pleasure. But an investigation, 
whatever its motive, is what Philadelphia 
should have and the executive committee of 
the Citizens’ Municipal Association of Phila. 
delphia has decided to raise $20,000 to defray 
the expenses. Before undertaking to raise the 
money, however, the committee desires to have 
a letter from the investigating committee con¬ 
firming private assurances “that the broad in¬ 
terests of the public would be held solely in 
view throughout the proceedings.” The Mu¬ 
nicipal Association also desires to be repre¬ 
sented at the hearing of the committee by 
counsel, with power to produce evidence and 
to examine and cross-examine witnesses. 

How Quay will profit by an investigation 
was indicated by a Quay retainer when he 
said ; 

“If Dave doesn’t look out he may not be In a po¬ 
sition to make a fight when the time comes to 


choose the state delegates. He may have his hands 
full with other matters if the senatorial commit¬ 
tee should happen to be in session about that 
time.” 

How interesting would an investigation be 
that should reveal all the people that have di¬ 
rectly and indirectly realized substantial prof¬ 
its out of the worthless reservoirs that cost 
$2,000,000, and for which an appropriation of 
$250,000 more has just been made. 

A bill is before the Philadelphia council for 
a subway under any of the streets of that city. It 
renders possible an absolute monopoly. Yet 
nobody professes to know about the company 
that asks these privileges. The councilman 
who introduced the measure declared that he 
knew nothing about the ordinance nor about 
the company. One Front street wool mer¬ 
chant handed him the bill. The wool mer¬ 
chant received it from “a man with iron-gray 
hair,” who thrust it into his hand and asked 
him to hand it to the councilman. Such men 
as Martin engineer such franchises as these; 
attend to the stealthy aud dirty work of get¬ 
ting them, and then they let in those respect¬ 
able citizens seeking lucrative investments 
on the ground floor. In the network of the 
intrigue by which these corporate bodies have 
.come into being and live, the good citizens be¬ 
come fatally compromised and thus it happens 
that though Quay has been a defaulter, and 
though no one would claim that he has not 
dragged the republican party of Pennsylva¬ 
nia through the mud, yet says the Philadel¬ 
phia Ledger: 

“One of the moat distinguished members of the 
general assembly recently stated, when requested 
to use his influence to secure the passage of an Im¬ 
portant public measure, wholly unpartiaanin char¬ 
acter, that he could do nothing in the premises, as 
Senator Quay was opposed to its passage, and he 
added that no bill to which Mr. Quay was antago¬ 
nistic, or the passage of which he did not approve, 
could be passed by the present general assem¬ 
bly.” 

And this power of Quay’s has been unbrok¬ 
en because the lips of those who should have 
fought him to the bitter end have been sealed 
by business interests. And though his power 
to-day is menaced, his danger lies in thestrug. 
gle of rivals for the bosship. 


STORIES OF INDIAN SERVICE 
SPOIL.* 

HARNESS-MAKER CONNELL. 

It is only with shame that one can see 
changes made every few years in offices which 
have no more to do with politics than with 
the price of stocks or the eclipses of the 
moon. If the whole miserable business were 
not so vicious in principle, it would sometimes 
be positively comical. Take, for example, the 
case of a man named Connell, who was ap¬ 
pointed a harness-maker under McGillicuddy, 
although personally a democrat—the explana¬ 
tion being, without doubt, that he was so good 
at his trade, and so useful that McGillicuddy 

*[From an address of Francis E. Leupp at Phila¬ 
delphia.] 


ignored all secondary considerations. It so 
happened that among the papers recommend¬ 
ing Connell’s appointment the only letter bear¬ 
ing a well-known signature was one from a very 
prominent republican, who was then in con¬ 
gress and has since been given a seat on the 
bench. When the democratic commissioner of 
Indian affairs took hold in 1885, Connell’s pa¬ 
pers were scrutinized in the office at Washing¬ 
ton, and he was promptly removed. He could 
not understand why this was done, and visited 
the commissioner to inquire about it. He was 
informed that there were no charges or com¬ 
plaints against him, but that he was removed 
because he was a republican. It then turned 
out that the only reason the commissioner 
supposed him to belong to the obnoxious party 
was because of the letter of recommendation 
from the conspicuous republican already men¬ 
tioned. Connell at once proceeded to summon 
witnesses from his old home, who testified to 
the commissioner’s satisfaction, not that their 
friend was a good harness-maker, or that he 
had a faculty for training young Indians at a 
trade, or that he was especially useful and ef¬ 
ficient as a helper about the agency, but that be 
was never guilty of the crime of voting a re¬ 
publican ticket ! Upon the strength of these 
assurances the commissioner re-instated him. 

ROTATING PROSECUTORS. 

The execution of an enlightened Indian 
policy demands, however, the application of 
the same principles to other branches of the 
public service. Indeed, in a general way, it 
may be said that the various parts of the 
great organism which we call our national 
government are so intertwined and corelated 
that there are very few important principles 
applicable to one which are not applicable in 
equal measure to all the rest—the only points 
of essential difference being matters of detail. 

I do not know how I can better illustrate 
my proposition than by citing an actual case 
which has recently come under the notice of 
some of those present here this evening, and 
which has impressed me, more than anything 
else I have encountered in a long time, with 
the importance to the Indian service, and to a 
progressive Indian administration, of extend¬ 
ing the merit system to the civil service gen¬ 
erally. 

In the spring of 1893, a squaw-man named 
Fielder, living near the Cheyenne river 
agency in South Dakota, and known to be a 
drunkard and of violent temper, beat his In¬ 
dian wife into a state of insensibility. Her only 
offense was a refusal to give him some money 
which she owned in her own right, but which 
he wanted to buy drink or pay his debts. She 
dragged herself, bleeding and miserable, to 
the agency, and the agent, Mr. Lillihridge, 
sent some of his Indian police with a message 
to Fielder, and tried to induce him to come 
in peaceably and submit to be locked in 
the guard house till he could be turned over 
to the judicial authorities on a charge of as¬ 
sault. Fielder at first seemed disposed to sur¬ 
render himself, but changed his mind; and 













234 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


when at last it was obvious that he intended 
to keep out of the agent’s way altogether, the 
latter sent a small squad of the police, pick¬ 
ing out the most obedient and trusworthy men 
in the force, with instructions to arrest the 
culprit and bring him in. Fielder not only 
shut himself in his cabin and refused to let 
the police in, but, when they attempted to 
force an entrance, ran out at them with an 
ax, and would have killed one or more of 
them if they had not used their pistols in self- 
defense. Fielder was killed in the struggle, 
though there was nothing to indicate that un¬ 
necessary violence had been used. When the 
agent reported the facts to the Indian bureau 
in Washington the bureau referred his com¬ 
munication to the department of justice, un¬ 
der whose instructions the district attorney 
for South Dakota had the Indians arrested and 
brought before a grand jury at Pierre. The 
grand jury sifted the case thoroughly, having 
the advantage of sitting near the spot where the 
homicide occurred, which enabled them to sum¬ 
mon witnesses promptly and at little expense. 
After a careful investgation they reported that 
there was no ground for indicting the Indians, 
and the latter were set at liberty. Nothing 
more was heard or thought of the matter for 
nearly two years. Meanwhile, the agent at 
Cheyenne river had been changed and a new 
district attorney appointed. Suddenly the 
new district attorney, a local politician, dis¬ 
covered that it was his duty to re-open the Field¬ 
er homicide case; and with a half breed witness 
of bad or doubtful character, he went before a 
grand jury sitting at Deadwood—the most 
distant point in the state where a United 
States court is held—and procured an indict¬ 
ment of seven of the Indian policemen; he 
then had them arrested and dragged all the 
way across the state, of course to the profit of 
the deputy marshals who handled the job, 
and who will have fat bills for mileage, living 
expenses, and per diem compensation to turn 
in to the government. A sensational trial of 
a batch of Indians was a godsend, moreover, 
to the jaded appetites of those Deadwood 
hoodlums who were ready to accept as a fore¬ 
gone conclusion that to try an Indian for his 
life meant to hang him. Undoubtedly the 
whole operation is good for a big double¬ 
handful of votes whenever this enterprising 
district attorney becomes a candidate for any 
elective office. 

The commissioner of Indian affairs. Judge 
Browning, was naturally very much exercised 
over this turn of affairs. He wrote to the new 
agent at Cheyenne river, Mr. Couchman, for a 
detailed report of the case in its later phases. 
This he referred, through the secretary of 
the interior, in a most repectful and cour¬ 
teous manner, to the attorney-general, asking 
that instructions might be sent to the district 
attorney to enter a nolle prosequi. He took pains 
to represent, not only the inherent injustice of 
the proposed prosecution, but the inxepediency 
of giving the Indian police and the Indians 
generally an impression that, when they were 
acting under orders of an agent and it became 


necessary to use force with a white man, they 
were liable to be put in jeopardy of their lives 
as a reward for doing their duty. 

The attorney general, instead of accepting 
this in the spirit in which it was offered as a 
suggestion which might save him from mak¬ 
ing a serious mistake, resented it as an inter¬ 
ference with his prerogative. All he was will¬ 
ing to do was to write to the district attorney 
and ask for his side of the case. The district 
attorney responded with a report which show¬ 
ed that he either did not know anything about 
the facts or was willing to distort them, and 
on the strength of this the attorney-general 
telegraphed him to “go ahead.” 

The sequel may he briefly told. There was 
a tedious and expensive trial, which cost the 
prisoners every penny they had in the world, 
and in which the counsel fees for their de¬ 
fense had to be guaranteed by the Indian 
Rights Association as the only apparent means 
of j'reventing the poor fellows from being 
convicted by default, for the Indian bureau 
was powerless under the law to contribute any¬ 
thing. Five of the prisoners were acquitted 
outright. The remaining two were found guilty 
of “assault with intent to do great bodily 
harm,” an offense for which there seems to be 
no definition in the laws of South Dakota, 
and for which it will therefore be impractic¬ 
able to hold them. 

This may seem a long way around to the 
very direct point which I wish to make; but 
you will see the application when I call your 
attention to a few condensed propositions. 

First. The trial proved that there was no 
ground whatever for prosecuting the Indians. 

Second. If this unrighteous prosecution had 
gone against the prisoners through lack of a 
proper defense,discipline on the Indian reser¬ 
vations in the northwest would not have been 
worth a rush from that day forward, and the 
fruits of a quarter century of humane effort 
would have been scattered to the winds. 

Third. The re-opening of the case would 
never have occurred if the district attorney 
who first investigated it had remained in of¬ 
fice. 

Fourth. That district-attorney was retired 
to private life, not because he was an unsatis¬ 
factory officer, but because he was a republi¬ 
can; and another man who did not know his 
business, or was willing to subordinate his 
duty to considerations of personal advantage, 
was put into his place, merely because he was 
a democrat. 

To sum up: An obviously useless prosecu¬ 
tion was pressed, which involved a large ex¬ 
pense to the govenment; which impoverished 
seven worthy and deserving Indians; which 
might have ended in taking several human 
lives; and which in that event would un¬ 
doubtedly have been followed by another 
bloody Indian war and given abacksetof twen¬ 
ty years to frontiercivilization. And all this is 
traceable directly to the fact that district at¬ 
torneyships, like Indian agencies, are still 
treated as spoils. 

Can there be any doubt that all hope of the 


future for the reform of our Indian adminis¬ 
tration is bound up with the prospects of civil 
service reform, not only in the Indian service, 
but in every one of the co-related and interde¬ 
pendent branches of our governmental organ¬ 
ization? 

BOSS RULE IN CINCINNATI. 

In the police department under the law of 
1886 the mayor makes all appointments, sub¬ 
ject to the approval of the commissioners, who 
alone may make vacancies upon finding good 
cause after full investigation at which the ac¬ 
cused has a right to be heard. 

Not having the power of appointment, the 
police board has not been tempted to make 
vacancies without sufficient reason,and though 
the appointments made by the mayor are undoubtedly 
dictated by his superior, who rules Cincinnati from 
behind the throne, still as the mayor has no 
chance to make vacancies, he is only able to 
make the few appointments which are the re- 
suit of death and resignation. 1 

The law provides that all positions of higher { 
grades in the force shall be filled by promo¬ 
tion from the ranks, and as a basis for these 
promotions written and oral examinations are 
held. These, together with the physical and 
other examinations which have been estab- 
lished by the board for ascertaining the fitness ■ 
of candidates for appointment before confirm¬ 
ing them, have had the effect of improving i 
the character of the force until it is probably 
in its rank and file one of the best in the 
country. 

To sum it up, the administration of the gov¬ 
ernment of Cincinnati by the system of bi¬ 
partisan boards, to which, with the mayor, are 
entrusted its municipal powers, has been pri¬ 
marily satisfactory in most particulars. The 
evil of this system, however, consists in the fact that 
it puts the city, more completely than is possible 
under any other system, into the power of its un¬ 
official ruler. By means of the patronage of the 
bi-partisan boards, whose members from both parties 
are appointed by his servant, the mayor, he is able 
to control the nominees of both parties. 

If the nominees on his own party ticket are 
very bad, he can make the others worse if nec¬ 
essary. Having a well established majority 
under normal conditions, he is able to thwart 
the designs of municipal reformers by this 
trust which he has formed with the hungry 
manager of the minority party through the 
aid of the municipal spoils and the bi parti- 
san system, the result being that the offices are 
filled, except in rare instances, by men much 
below the proper standard. 

One of the latest appointments to this board 
excites apprehension among those who 
wish to see our police force retain its pres¬ 
ent high standard, because of the indi¬ 
cations that his appointment was dictated 
by that power to which I have referred, 
which absolutely controls all appointments 
made in Hamilton county. Should it ever 
happen that the same influence should domi¬ 
nate both the mayor and the police board so 
as to cause them to make vacancies and ap- 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


235 


poiutmeuts to suit their mutual political 
needs, then the end of the efBciency of the 
system will be near. 

[From the paper of Charles B. Wilby, at the Na¬ 
tional Municipal League, at Cleveland, May 30, 
1895.J 

THE VULTURES AT THE CARCASS 
OF COLUMBUS—OHIO. 

“There is a law in force in the state which 
requires the managers of the penitentiary to 
apjtortion the one hundred or more guards of 
that institution among the several counties of 
the state in jjroportion to the population, in¬ 
cluding Indians not taxed, or something of 
that kind. The enforcement of this law re¬ 
sults in bringing to the capital city a new 
force of guards whenever there is a change in 
the state administration. The old force hangs 
around for two or three years hunting for jobs 
in the police or fire departments of the city, 
or as campaign hustlers pensioned upon the 
political executive committees. They wait 
patiently about, hoping that the whirligig of 
politics will speedily restore their party to 
power and themselves to position. This law 
should have been entitled “An act to increase 
the number of politicians in cities of the first 
grade of the second class.” 

The state officers, members of the legisla¬ 
ture their clerks and employes, after living 
for a short time among our people, gradually 
come to know what life really is. They have 
their eyes opened to its beauties, its pleasures. 
They stop singing, “ I’m But a Pilgrim Here.” 
They grow more cheerful and soon begin to 
look around for a home where they can enjoy 
for the rest of their lives their suddenly ac¬ 
quired wealth. Life in the remote counties of 
the state loses its charm. They love to be near 
the throne, the seat of government. It used to 
be a serious question with the peopleof Colum¬ 
bus what disposition should be made of the 
ex-convict when discharged from the Ohio 
penitentiary. Repeatedly bills were intro¬ 
duced in the legislature, at the earnest solicita¬ 
tions of our people, requiring the convicts, 
upon expiration of their terms, to be sent back 
to the counties from which they hailed, which 
they had the honor to represent. 

The members of the legislature from the 
distant counties of the state, fearing competi¬ 
tion for their seats in the next general assem¬ 
bly, would almost unanimously oppose the 
measure. Those of them who were afraid to 
face their constituents and had determined to 
live in the capital, would vote against the 
measure possibly for the reason that they de¬ 
sired congenial society in their new home. 
Notwithstanding this opposition the measure 
did finally pass, and now a detective is always 
at hand when a convict is discharged to see 
that the law is enforced and the county en¬ 
titled to an increase of the population gets it. 

It has been suggested that the foregoing 
were not the real reasons why this measure 
was opposed so vigorously by the average 
member of the legislature. It is intimated 
that they look upon it simply as an entering 
wedge to be followed by another law that 


would require members of their own body, 
state officers and employes, to be sent back to 
face their constituents upon the expiration of 
their terms of service. This reform lies in 
the immediate future. This turning loose 
upon our city every year of a large body of 
state officials and employes, members of the 
legislature, clerks and penitentiary guards, 
with no provision for sending them back to 
their counties from whence they came will 
have to be changed. In the earlier reform the 
obstacles were not insurmountable. The ex¬ 
convicts were reasonably sure of a welcome 
home. They were at least not afraid to go 
home. The impending reform may not be so 
easily accomplished. A compromise might be 
eS’ected by which the ex-official would not be 
required to go back to his constituents pro¬ 
vided he would leave the state. 

Until some provision is made our city will 
continue to be a city of office-holders and ex¬ 
office-holders, of statesmen and retired states¬ 
men, of citizens who are liable at any moment 
to break out with their old disease of itch for 
ofiSce. It will continue to be infested with an 
excess of professional politicians, who go about 
seeking for something political to devour, 
such as state, county or municipal office. Be¬ 
ing in the habit of attending to the business 
of the public, it is difficult for them to attend 
to matters of private concern. They naturally 
and instinctively turn their attention to mat¬ 
ters of state. They are ready and willing at 
all times to render public service for a consid¬ 
eration. 

We do not wish to be understood as saying 
that there are not some very respectable, law- 
abiding ex-convicts residing in the city of Co¬ 
lumbus, men who have reformed and become 
good citizens. We can say as much also for 
some ex-state oflficials, ex-members of the leg¬ 
islature, and ex-employes of state institutions. 
Some of these have reformed and are actually 
received in so-called good society. They are 
even trusted and employed by well-meaning 
citizens of a philanthropic disposition. The 
removal of some of them from our city would 
be a serious and irreparable loss. 

The foregoing facts would lead one to infer 
that the death rate of our city is low. Vital 
statistics show that it is the most healthy city 
of its size in the entire country. The fact that 
very few office holders die has probably as 
much to do with its good showing in this mat¬ 
ter of mortality as cleanliness of the streets. 
There being no demand for politicians and 
office holders in either of the other worlds, 
they are permitted to remain and become 
standing advertisements of the state capital as 
a health resort.” 

[From the paper of D. E. Williams at the Cleve¬ 
land meeting of the National Municipal League.] 

On one pay roll of Chicago, under the Alt- 
geld administration, 212 names of men ap¬ 
peared, some of whom could not be found at 
the streets and numbers given, while those 
who were found swore that they were not in 
the employ of the city during the period cov¬ 
ered, and did not receive the money set against 
their names. 


THE MARYLAND ANNUAL MEET¬ 
ING. 

From Mr. Bonaparte’s address. 

It is now some five years since Mr. John S. 
Clarkson, then a prominent politician, in a 
speech widely published, predicted that if 
what he called “the claim of the mugwump,” 
namely, that the people favored civil serv¬ 
ice reform, could be submitted to the peo¬ 
ple themselves, “it would be rejected by ten 
millions of votes.” The year which has 
elapsed since our last meeting has seen this 
experiment tried. The people of the state of 
New York, the people of the city of Chicago 
have had submitted to them “the claim of the 
mugwump,” and have indorsed it, the former 
by more than one hundred thousand, the lat¬ 
ter by nearly fifty thousand, majority. What 
Mr. Clarkson thinks of these facts I do not 
know, nor is it a matter of much consequence, 
but they are fraught with great moment to all 
those who believe, as I do, that a self-govern¬ 
ing community will always, sooner or later, 
have as good a government as it deserves, but 
no better. If the people of the United States 
really were what this man supposed, he and 
his like would be our fit rulers. The result 
when Aig “claim” was tested, as he wished that 
it might be, shows that his and their days of 
power and prosperty, if not ended, are num¬ 
bered. 

I believe that these days are numbered; but, 
unfortunately, their number is probably large. 
The work which we undertook when this asso¬ 
ciation was formed will undoubtedly last our 
time. If any among our members fear lest we 
may run short of wrongs to be righted, I can 
safely bid them dismisssuch fears. The supply 
of abuses and scandals in the conduct of our 
public business promises to be ample, and their 
quality shows little sign of deterioration. * * 

At the last meeting of this association I 
said that, whilst I well knew, and was fully 
prepared to say, what I thought of the ap¬ 
pointments of Mr. Murray Vandiver, Mr. 
Barnes Compton, Mr. Hammond and others 
then recently chosen by Mr. Cleveland as fed¬ 
eral officers in Maryland, I did not yet know 
what to think of his simultaneous choice of 
Mr. S. Davies Warfield as postmaster, and 
must wait until I did before commenting 
either upon this selection or the incumbent’s 
administration of his office. The time for such 
comment has now come. 

Mr. Warfield is the fifth postmaster of Bal¬ 
timore since the enactment of the Pendleton 
bill. He is the first whose action has indi¬ 
cated, to my mind, at least, that he regarded 
the faithful enforcement of the statute accord¬ 
ing to its true and obvious intendment, as a 
part of his official duty, or as covered by his 
official oath. He has never, so far as I am 
informed, or have any reason to believe, dis¬ 
criminated for or against any one among those 
certified as eligible for employment in the class¬ 
ified service for any reason which he could not 
avow publicly and justify under the law,and he 
has not countenanced the infamous, but very 
common, practice of trumping up false or frivo- 













236 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Ions charges of misconduct against classified 
clerks or carriers merely to make vacancies. 
Moreover, he has recently introduced a sys¬ 
tem of examinations and marking to deter¬ 
mine relative rank, and compensation in the 
classified service which may, perhaps, here¬ 
after admit of improvement as the fruit of 
practical experience, but serves, meantime, as 
a protest against an odious and paltry abuse, 
namely, diminishing the salary or reducing 
the grade of public servants whom their chief 
officer wishes, but can find no pretext, to de¬ 
prive of their means of subsistence that he 
may gratify his political or personal preju¬ 
dices—an abuse which has been particularly 
prevalent in the treasury department under 
its present family management. Had the en¬ 
tire force of the Baltimore post-office been in¬ 
cluded in the classified service when Mr. War- 
field became postmaster, there is every reason 
to believe that I might justly close what I 
have to say of him, with a compliment to 
President Cleveland, fairly earned in the opin¬ 
ion of some who have found much to criticize in 
the Maryland appointments made during both 
his terms of office, for having, at least in one, 
and a conspicuous instance, put the right man 
in the right place, and one to himself, which 
ought not not be much of a compliment, but 
has been, unfortunately, deserved by a small 
minority of those in like positions of public 
trust during the past twelve years, for having 
honestly obeyed the law. But, I am sorry to 
say, there is another side to the shield. 

The unclassified service of the post-office 
was made up, when Mr. Warfield was ap¬ 
pointed, of republican politicians, as it had 
been when Col. Adreon had retired, and for 
the same reasons which had caused it to be 
made up of democratic politicians under 
Messrs. Veazey and Brown. I am quite ready 
to believe that among them were many fit can- 
dates for prompt removal, and I fully recog¬ 
nize the sufficiency of “offensive partisanship,” 
and “pernicious political activity,” as grounds 
of removal for these as for any other ministe¬ 
rial public officers. Indeed, it should be re¬ 
membered that the principles of civil service 
reform require no less imperatively and em¬ 
phatically the immediate dismissal of an un¬ 
faithful or an unprofitable servant than his 
retention while competent, honest and zealous. 
It is, therefore, no fair ground of censure for 
me that the postmaster made many removals. 
I should have been as well satisfied had he 
made more, and much better satisfied had he 
made those he did make with less delay; but if 
he asks that reformers should assume that his 
removals were made for the good of the serv¬ 
ice only, it is pertinent to inquire how he has 
filled the vacancies. It is the doctrine of this 
association, and it should be that of all right- 
thinking men, that every American citizen of 
creditable antecedents, fair reputation and 
regular life, who desires public employment, 
is entitled to a fair consideration by the ap¬ 
pointing power of his qualifications for the 
post to be filled, and that, whenever political 
opinions or party affiliations have no legiti¬ 


mate connection with its duties, to discrimi¬ 
nate against him because he is a republican or 
a democrat is no less unjust, both to him and 
the government, than it would be to hold him 
disqualified because he were a protestant, or a 
catholic, or a Hebrew. When, therefore, the 
public perceived that the postmaster chose his 
new appointees exclusively, or nearly so, from 
his own party, and exclusively, or nearly so, 
from one,* and numerically a weak, faction of 
that party, it became hard for even the most 
charitable to believe that the desire to find 
employment for the more needy adherents of 
that faction had nothing to do with the dis¬ 
missals he had made; and although, on the 
whole, I think it is but fair to say that these 
appointees, so far as I have been able to learn, 
compare rather favorably than otherwise with 
those of his immediate predecessors, some 
among them were such men as not to render 
this belief the easier. 

I have said that, in my opinion, there 
would be less ground for legitimate criticism 
of Mr. Warfield if he had made his removals 
more promptly; in fact, there was something 
more than mere delay to awaken suspicion in 
this connection. In common with many of 
our own number, and with others among our 
best citizens, he very earnestly and notoriously 
desired the nomination and election of Mr. 
John K. Cowen to congress. Mr. Cowen has 
been for many years vice-president of this as¬ 
sociation, a position to which you have just 
re-elected him. He has always been an out¬ 
spoken advocate of civil service reform, and 
he made, when nominated, a declaration which 
would have been satisfactory to his friends 
under any circumstances, and was more par¬ 
ticularly satisfactory in view of the circum¬ 
stances under which it was made. No one 
could possibly think the worse of Mr. Warfield 
for wishing well to his candidacy, but a rumor 
soon become widely current that the patron¬ 
age of the post-office would be surrendered to 
a boss who was said to have secured Mr. Cow- 
en’s nomination, and that the consummation 
of this edifying arrangement was postponed 
until after the election only to make sure that 
the statesman in question might not forget to 
deliver the goods after receiving the agreed 
price. The denouement showed that this rumor 
did Mr. Warfield injustice, but it did not re¬ 
lieve him of the imputation that he had, at 
least, so timed his official action that selfish and 
unscrupulous political intriguers might enter¬ 
tain and act upon hopes of his complicity in 
their own corruption. I need not dwell upon his 
singularly inconsistent action, and the humil¬ 
iating and ludicrous position he occupied, in 
consequence of the President’s unexpected ex¬ 
tension of the classified service on the eve of 
the election. 

TWO OPINIONS. 

BEFORE. 

William Brookfield, commissioner of pub¬ 
lic works, declared to-day that he was going 
to take care of the old district leaders who 
supported the committee of thirty element of 


the republican party, no matter how much 
he might be criticised for so doing. 

“John Simpson, John Collins, Martin Hea¬ 
ley and William Henkel adhered tons through 
thick and thin,” said Mr. Brookfield, “and I 
am not going back on them now. I have ap¬ 
pointed Henkel superintendent of the bureau 
of encumbrances, and I am going to give 
places to Simpson, Collins and Healey. I 
don’t know what places yet, but I am going 
to appoint them to some offices in my depart¬ 
ment. 

“I know I shall be criticised, but I don’t 
care. If it had not been for the loyalty of 
these men. Colonel Strong would not be mayor 
and I would not be commissioner of public 
works. When our county convention was 
held last fall, a large element of it wanted a 
straight republican ticket. My friends were 
in favor of a combination, and we would have 
been beaten if Simpson, Collins, Henkel and 
Healey had not stood by us. They stood by 
us, too, when it looked as if we would lose. 
They defied Platt, and their action resulted 
in the nomination of Mr. Strong. They de¬ 
serve well of their party, and I am not going 
to forget them now .”—New York Times, March 
12 . 

AFTER. 

“I have been in office long enough to be 
convinced that civil service is a vital neces¬ 
sity of our form of government. I believe in 
it as I believe in religion, and so long as I 
am in office, I shall adhere to it strictly. I 
don’t say that the present civil service system 
is perfect, but I do say that the theory is right. 
I believe that the question of patronage should, 
to a large extent, be eliminated from politics. 
It will be better for both parties. The only 
way to do that is through the civil service. 
The sooner such patronage is out of the hands 
of both parties the better. I believe that the 
present civil service commissioners are sin¬ 
cere, faithful and honest men. They believe 
in the theory they work on, and they shall 
get all possible aid from the department of 
public works. 

“Office-getting and office-filling is not the 
underlying principle of republicanism. If it 
was, if that is all that the republican party 
stood for, I should leave it to-morrow. 

“All the troubles of the administration have 
arisen out of the question of patronage. The 
way to solve that problem, in my opinion, is to 
turn all the offices, or nearly all of them, over 
to the civil service commission. That com¬ 
mission is now made up of men who can he 
thoroughly trusted—men who believe in their 
own theories and practice their belief—and if 
they had the disposal of the offices, the best 
available men would be selected, and the 
mayor and the heads of departments would be 
relieved of this trouble. 

“There are 100,000 republican voters in this 
city. Perhaps five or six thousand want 
offices, and when they don’t get them they 
raise a cry against the administration. But 
what do the other 95,000 republicans care 
who get the offices so long as they go to 
good men? The great mass of republicans do 
not want offices .—New York Times, June 21. 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


VoL. II, No. 29. INDIANAPOLIS, JULY, 1895. terms : ^ ®o“cen?rpM^copy““““ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

IndianapulU, Ind 


The Chronicle gives space this month 
to the current history of Police Commis¬ 
sioner Roosevelt and his colleagues’ efforts 
to enforce the excise law. The cursory 
reader of the late Lexow investigation 
knows that thatlaw was used by Tammany 
for astounding blackmail and corruption. 
Any attempt to bring New York city out 
of the pit of corruption into which it has 
sunk, any effort to purify the police force, 
any hope of a clean and upright police 
judiciary would fail miserably and dis¬ 
gracefully if Mr, Roosevelt and his col¬ 
leagues violated their oaths of office. They 
have found the law and they are to execute 
the law. The legislature of New York is 
to decide whether or not it will change 
the law. This fight of the police commis¬ 
sioners is such a lesson in courageous 
statemanship; it is being conducted with 
such wit and cleverness and uprightness; 
public sentiment has so promptly en¬ 
dorsed the utterances of men who declare 
they will not violate their oaths of office, 
let the consequences be what they may, 
that the Chronicle hopes that its collec¬ 
tion of facts may be an inspiration in the 
future to some of the younger men who 
enter political life. The nineteenth cen 
tury in the United StaUiS has no use for 
the crafty, evasive, compromise style of 
statemanship. In his career as civil 
service commissioner and thus far in New 
York, Theodore Roosevelt may be said to 
embody the ideal of the American people. 

The monthly record of the doings of 
bosses is more than usually stirring. In 
Maryland, there was a great fight against 
Gorman, but as usual he came off victor¬ 
ious. This is likely to continue so long as 
the people of Maryland lack the spirit to 
defeat Gorman’s party at the polls for hav¬ 
ing such a boss, or for that matter, any 
boss. It is idle to say that the republicans 
would be just as bad. There is nothing 
like a succession of alternate defeats to 
bring parties to their senses; and nothing 
could be worse than to let a fellow like 
Gorman have the reward of constant vic¬ 
tory. In Pennsylvania, Quay seems to 
have been defeated by a combination of 
smaller bosses. Any kind of a defeat for 
him is a victory for the people; but the 
smaller bosses will have to be dealt with 
in turn. In the Quay contest there were 
many illustrations of the practice to which 
we have often referred of utterly ignoring 
the real qualities and purposes of a boss by 


raising a cry about danger to cherished 
tenets and each cry is adapted to the 
prejudices of the particular community. 
In this line one of Quay’s counties adopted 
the following: 

Whereas, In view of ihe coming presidential con* 
test in 1896, it is to the best interests of the republi¬ 
can citizens of this commonwealth that the helm 
of the party should be in the hands of one whose 
record shows that be is in favor of full and ade¬ 
quate protection to American labor and industries, 
and whose superior skill as a statesman, brilliant 
organizing ability and acknowledged capacity in 
directing campaign work place him at the head of 
the party leaders of the union, and enabled him to 
marshal the republican party to victory in 1888. 

Resolved, That the Delaware County Republican 
Executive Committee heartily indorse the candi¬ 
dacy of Hon. Matthew Stanley Quay for chairman 
of the state republican executive committee. 


The postoffice department has instituted 
the practice of sending its men todifferent 
cities to find out how the letter carriers 
are performing their duties, and this is 
done without consultation with or the 
knowledge of the postmaster. This is a 
wide departure from the method which 
was followed for years and even into the 
early part of the present administration 
when matters relating to the civil service 
law were to be looked into. Then the 
postmaster was the first man consulted 
and his word was usually taken in the face 
of any amount of overwhelming evidence. 
The two above methods mark the differ¬ 
ence between wanting to find the facts and 
not wanting to find them. The civil service 
commission is expressly excepted from this 
criticism both as to motive and practice 
since the beginning of Harrison’s term. 
Under the present method with the car¬ 
riers, a good many delinquencies have 
been found such as creep into any force 
not closely inspected. The carriers com¬ 
plain but there is no good ground for it. 
The government is extremely liberal with 
the carriers. The pay is good and is above 
what is paid in private business for the 
same amount of intelligence and physical 
effort. The work is only eight hours a 
day. The position is during good behav¬ 
ior and the pay is the same through good 
times and bad which is an immerse ad¬ 
vantage over private employment. The 
government therefore is not asking too 
much when it insists that a carrier shall 
give his undivided attention and incessant 
effort to his duties during the eight hours 
which constitue his day’s work. The 


postmasters concerned are inclined to crit¬ 
icise the department and this does not 
tend to good discipline; they should rather 
increase their own vigilance. 

The hundreds of thousands of dollars 
which the government has been obliged 
to pay for overtime work has not in¬ 
creased the esteem of the people for the 
employes who insisted upon it. Those 
claims were not morally due; and the spec¬ 
tacle of the government having to protect 
itself against similar claims in the future 
by forbidding employes to enter their 
place of employment until the actual be¬ 
ginning of the eight hours is not pleasant. 
One of the tendencies which will have to 
be guarded against in the future is the 
disposition of classes of employes to band 
together and get more advantages. When 
we see the rascally acts which congressmen 
of all parties do in the pension department 
for the sake of votes, it is clear that they 
would not hesitate for the same reason to 
debauch classes of civil service employes. 
An instance of the demands which may be 
possible is that of the national association 
of letter carriers, for some sort of a trial 
before dismissal. After consideration we 
are fully of the opinion that no such law 
should ever be passsd. The discipline of 
any civil service force requires that the 
power of prompt dismissal shall rest some¬ 
where. Every day gives indication that 
within the classified service this power in 
the face of public opinion can not be abused 
with impunity. We are in favor of trust¬ 
ing public opinion. 

Secretary Herbert has “settled” an¬ 
other crew who looked upon the civil 
service rules as a joke. It will be remem¬ 
bered that Secretary Tracy introduced the 
labor service system into the navy yards, 
but it seems that in Brooklyn, under the 
present administration, the rules have not 
been taken earnestly. This came to the 
ears of Secretary Herbert who transferred 
the two officers who were at fault and gave 
the whole yard a wholesome lecture. He 
has made it understood that the labor 
service rules are to be observed the same 
as any other law. It takes a good while to 
convince some people that you can not 
build modern ships with the Mikes and 
Jakes of the New York and Brooklyn 
ward associations. 

The march of civil service reform has 
become so steady that it no longer attracts 
unusual attention. Nor has there appeared 



















238 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


any evidence whatever of that sleeping 
hostility to the reform which the politi¬ 
cians have always declared the people had. 
Under former administrations the transfer 
of the railway mail service and the free 
delivery post-offices and so on to the classi¬ 
fied service did not awaken that hostility. 
Under the present administration the in¬ 
ternal revenue service, the bureau of 
engraving and printing, the government 
printing office, the whole agricultural de¬ 
partment and other great additions were 
made and yet the hostility slept on. Now 
follow within the month the geological 
survey with 125 places and the employes 
of pension agencies amounting to some 
five hundred. In all these years every 
transfer has met with unqualified public 
approval and the claim of hostility on the 
part of the people was a myth desperately 
clung to by a class of men who wanted to 
live off of the public treasury without de¬ 
serving to do so. The transfer of the 
pension agencies removes one of the 
greatest scandals in the public service 
where the places were literally bargained 
and sold as political rewards. The present 
agent at Indianapolis publicly stated that 
he promised the places in this office to the 
legislators who got him his own appoint¬ 
ment. In addition to these promises he 
has managed to give some relatives some 
good pickings out of the contingent fund 
and otherwise. 

Governor Altgeld has announced no 
new discovery in his statement that 
certain members of the Illinois general 
assembly sold their votes for or against 
proposed measures. The evidence is 
practically conclusive that this is done in 
nearly every state legislature in the 
country. It is a part of the spoils system. 
Mediocre but sharp men procure them¬ 
selves to be elected to the legislature be¬ 
cause they are “on the make.” Taking 
bribes for votes in such a place is not 
looked upon as any other crime is. The 
late Indiana general assembly in effect 
brazenly declared that it would have rail¬ 
road passes and it got them; yet the 
public is not greatly shocked. Many a 
legislator who is known well enough to 
have feathered his nest with hard cash is 
not socially ostracized when he returns 
home, but his entertainments paid for 
with the same cash are gladly partaken of 
by the “best people.” 


Chicago has lately afforded a curious 
spectacle. The new civil service rules 
have just gone into effect, but ever since 
Mayor Swift went into office there has 
been going on a division of booty as open 
and bare faced as that ever made by any 
band of pirates after a rich capture. The 
city being republican the division there 
was to republican looters; while the 
county being democratic there was a rapid 
re-division there for the benefit of the 
more powerful democratic looters. Both 
machines worked with all their might up 
to the last minute and the division was 
made not from business principles but 
solely with regard to partisan or personal 
services, the object being to settle into 
good places as many workers as possible. 
Any honest desire to benefit the public 
service would have caused a delay of all 
removals until the rules went into effect, 
when the vacancies could have been filed 
by open competition. 


It is said that Mr. James W. French will 
be appointed warden of the federal prison 
at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. The pros¬ 
pective appointment is praised on every 
hand, the republican papers especially de¬ 
claring that “the appointment will vindi¬ 
cate itself.” We believe this to be true. 
Mr. French was for five years warden of the 
Indiana state prison at Michigan City and 
in the course of his service made great 
progress in the line of his duties and be¬ 
came an efficient warden, grasping and 
knowing how to put into use the best ideas 
of prison management, and he was re¬ 
spected and liked by the prisoners. He 
had become a valuable officer to the 
state and to outsiders it might seem 
strange that the state should willingly lose 
his services. Yet the state does so, acting 
through its late rib-breaking,railroad-pass¬ 
grabbing, prison-looting general assembly. 
That august body, with the design of hav¬ 
ing Mr. French removed, made a new 
prison board and Mr. French was accord¬ 
ingly dismissed and the wardenship given 
to a new and inexperienced man named 
Harley. The sole /eason was that Mr. 
French was a democrat. For the forty 
places as guards seven hundred party heel¬ 
ers are now scrambling. Harley’s view of 
public business is indicated in his remark, 
“I shall not remove men until the new 
men learn their business.” That is, for the 
accommodation of political bosses who 
want to pay some henchmen for personal 
services by quartering them upon the 
state, a school is to be kept by the state 
until these raw henchmen learn something 
and then the efficient and experienced em 
ployes who as Harley says have been in 
the service “from two to twenty-five years,” 
are to be turned out. This whole opera- 
ation is a heartless outrage inflicted upon 
defenseless prisoners by callous minded 
party bosses for the sake of personal ben¬ 
efit. 

CIVIL SERVICE REFORM AND ITS 
BEARINGS UPON THE INTER¬ 
ESTS OF LABOR. 

[From the lecture of Herbert Welsh at the Ply¬ 
mouth School of Ethics, July 12, 1895.J 

The question which civil service reform pre¬ 
sents to the people of the United States is 
pre-eminently one of morals. It is not funda¬ 
mentally a question of examining boards and 
of averages, of appointment and dismisssal, 
but whether the executive branch of the gov¬ 
ernment shall be conducted honestly or dis¬ 
honestly; whether the immense patronage at 
our disposal compri.sed in our civil serviceshall 
be used directly in the public interest, or dis¬ 
honestly and fraudulently for the increase of 
party power for securing private ends, or the 
amassing of private plunder. This is the vital 
question at issue and none other. It is un¬ 


fortunate that we should be obliged to use so 
dry and technical a name as “civil service re¬ 
form” for a thing so charged with more than 
national well-being, fora principle which is as 
necessary to the preservation of American in¬ 
stitutions as was the extinction of negro 
slavery. The American republic contemplates 
agovernment thecontrolling thoughtof which 
can not be better expressed than by Lincoln’s 
famous Gettysburg definition, “A government 
of the people, by the people, for the people.” 
The foundations of this ideal were laid by the 
fathers, but they can only have suitable and 
enduring superstructure built upon them by 
our jealous and exacting care. That we have 
been to a high degree negligent of our duty in 
this respect would seem to be only too evident 
from a glance at the present workings of any 
department of our goverment. Whether we 
look at our great cities in their executive or 
legislative functions, at our state legislatures 
or even at that once august body, the senate 
of the United States, we find the same general 
conditions. Everywhere is to be found an 
amount of mismanagement, of inefficiency, 
and in many instances of glaring fraud and of 
dishonesty which are not truly representative 
of us as a people of aver.age intelligence and 
of our average moral standards. We may 
claim unhestitatingly that at the close of 
the first century of American independence, 
notwithstanding the splendid achievements, 
of our people in the sphere of material well¬ 
being and advancement, their great progress 
in the line of popular education, their grow¬ 
ing distinction in the world of letters and 
of the fine arts, that in their political institu¬ 
tions they have failed to develop fruit which 
should have been their natural product and 
which the world had a right to expect. If the 
causes of disturbances be not accurately ascer¬ 
tained and promptly removed, they present a 
serious menace for the future. No one, who 
has studied with care the developments of 
American politics within the last twenty-five 
years, will claim that this indictment is too 
severe. The words of'a distinguished senator 
from Massachusetts furnish a weighty testi¬ 
mony to support it. Said Mr. Hoar, during 
the trial of William K. Belknap: 

My own public life has been a very brief 
and insignificant one, extending little beyond 
the duration of a single term of senatorial of¬ 
fice. But in that brief period I have seen five 
judges of a high court of the United States 
driven from office by threats of impeachment 
for corruption or maladministration. I have 
heard the taunt from friendliest lips that 
when the United States presented herself in 
the East to take part with the civilized world 
in generous competition in the arts of life, the 
only product, of her institutions in which she 
surpassed all others beyond question was her 
corruption. I have seen in the state of the 
union foremost in power and wealth four judges 
of her courts impeached for corruption, and 
the political condition of her chief city become 
a disgrace and byword throughout the world. 
I have seen the chairman of the committee on 
military affairs, now a distinguished member 
of this court, arise in his place and demand 
the expulsion of four of his associates for 
making sale of their official privilege of se¬ 
lecting youths to be educated in our great 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


239 


military school. When the greatest railroad 
of the world • ♦ * was finished, I have 
seen our national triumph and exultation 
turned to bitterness and shame by the unani¬ 
mous report of three committees of congress 
* * * that every step of that enterprise 

had been taken in fraud. I have heard in high¬ 
est places the shameless doctrine, avowed by 
men grown old in public office, that the true 
way by which power should be gained in the 
republic is to bribe the people with the offices 
created for their service, and the true end for 
which it should be used, when gained, is the 
promotion of selfish ambition and the gratifi¬ 
cation of personal revenge. * * * These 

things have passed into history. 

I am well aware that these terrible words 
were spoken nearly twenty years ago, and that^ 
thanks to the heroic labors of that most dis¬ 
tinguished and unselfish American patriot, 
George William Curtis, and the little band of 
devcted reformers who supported his efforts, in 
many directions great and substantial ad¬ 
vances have been made in the cause of re¬ 
form. By the well directed attacks of these 
men, the spoils system, the most conspicuous 
source of the corruption depicted so power¬ 
fully by Senator Hoar, has been driven from 
its strongest intrenchments in the federal ser¬ 
vice. For a long while the reform advanced 
by slow, and to the popular eye, scarcely per¬ 
ceptible steps; but within the past year the 
President of the United States has, by execu¬ 
tive order, added no less than eight thousand 
places to the classified service; places taken 
from the bribery chest of the politician and 
restored to the honest service of the people. 
This number is almost equal to that included 
by the original Pendleton act. Chicago, also, 
and the state of Illinois are to be congratu¬ 
lated, and through them the country, upon 
having enacted during the past winter the ad¬ 
mirable civil service statute. Once aroused 
to a sense of danger from the riotous outbreaks 
of last summer, and the necessity for fun¬ 
damental reform as a remedy, the most 
vigorous city of the continent leaped fully 
armed into the conflict, and by one astonish¬ 
ing effort put herself at the head of the re¬ 
form ranks. Let an exigent public senti¬ 
ment now demand the thorough enforcement 
of this law. 

Why is it that American politics have by 
universal acknowledgment in moral tone and 
dignity sunk to a level far below the stand¬ 
ards of the American people? It would be a 
mistake to assign any single cause, in a reply 
to so large a question. But there are two 
causes which may be assigned, of vital impor 
tance, which we as a nation, and especially at 
this moment, should seriously consider: First, 
a certain buoyant, careless optimism, charac¬ 
teristic of us as a nation, which lies at the root 
of many of our most troublesome national short¬ 
comings. The time has come for us to be re¬ 
minded that we are no longer boy but man. We 
must now know or be prepared to suffer still 
more keenly for our ignorance of the simple 
truth that institutions, no matter how admir¬ 
ably contrived they may be, have no breath of 
life; they are so much iron or brass,unless guided 
by the hand of wise and patient men; without 


a clear national mind and pure national mor¬ 
ality to direct them, they will become danger¬ 
ous or dead things, and it is the nation, not a 
few men only, that must know and act upon 
this. We must look for our safety in the fut¬ 
ure to a widely diffused sense of responsibil¬ 
ity, based on a more exact and highly trained 
political knowledge among our people. 

Second—Nothing would seem to be more 
pertinent to this growing popular conscious¬ 
ness of the necessity of a clear understanding 
of what are the necessary features of good gov¬ 
ernment than a knowledge of civil service re¬ 
form and an uncompromising application of 
its spirit to our entire political system. Poli¬ 
tics have become alarmingly debauched, and 
in their turn have debauched the nation by al¬ 
lowing the spoils system to gain control of 
them. What seemed at the outset a trivial 
lapse in public virtue—a use of the civil serv¬ 
ice which was not strictly honest—has devel¬ 
oped a system of politics which is inconceiv¬ 
ably removed from that which the founders of 
the republic designed, in which the free and 
intelligent voter finds himself powerless in the 
clutch of the machine, where the honorable 
leader is displaced by the unscrupulous boss, 
and where a public career becomes less and 
less a possibility for men of character and of 
independent convictions. 

One of the most striking symptoms of the 
disordered condition of our politics is mani¬ 
fest in our great cities. It is the alliance 
formed between the corrupt political machine, 
which regards public affairs only as a money¬ 
making concern, and unscrupulous capital, 
which finds in the machine a convenient tool 
for the advancement of its financial schemes. 
Such attempts as railroads, street railways, 
electric lighting, and other corporations are 
now making upon the executive and legis¬ 
lative branches of our great cities, would be 
harmless had not the whole fabric of our pol¬ 
itics been so weakened by the dry rot of spoils 
as to be unable to bear the strain. 

Far more alarming than the hideous union 
of Tammany with crime of the vulgar sort, 
which the recent political revolution in New 
York city brought so vividly to public view, 
is this alliance between the machine and great 
corporations, which have at least the appear¬ 
ance of respectability. The startling anom¬ 
aly is presented of the management of great 
corporations, including men of the greatest 
religious and financial prominence, with those 
who form part of the machine, and are known 
to control political action by corrupt means. 
Perhaps in no city of the country is this alli¬ 
ance more conspicuous and more perfected, 
and more lamentable in its outcome, than in 
the city of Philadelphia—though by no means 
is it confined to Philadelphia. 

While such a union between corrupt ele¬ 
ments of the community is a burden and a 
loss to all, that burden and loss must ultimate¬ 
ly be felt especially by wage-earners and their 
families. The great corporations in Philadel¬ 
phia have been the great corrupters of our city 
councils, where for many years they have 


maintained a working majority in both 
branches entirely subservient to their wishes. 
Their lobbyists, who at the same time hold 
prominent positions in local politics, openly 
appear on the floor of both chambers controll¬ 
ing legislation in the interests of their respect¬ 
ive companies. Franchises of enormous value, 
which, if properly managed, would yield a 
revenue of millions of dollars to the city an¬ 
nually are in this way lost to the public, and 
yield great fortunes to those who secure them. 
One of the most prominent and influential of 
our politicians was during the past winter 
publicly denounced on the floor of the United 
States Senate by the most powerful politician 
of the state, for being in the pay of a great 
corporation, under whose orders his accuser 
alleged he had been obliged to break his 
promise to support in the convention the slated 
mayoralty nominee. This charge was never 
denied, and the public did not doubt its cor¬ 
rectness. But what was the gravamen of this 
charge? That the local boss referred to was a 
lobbyist, paid to corrupt tho councils of the 
city, and thereby to secure legislation which 
the corporation desired; that the candidate 
whom he had promised to support was one 
distasteful to the corporation, and that it had 
power to control the lobbyist’s actions. This 
same local boss was shown by a leading news¬ 
paper of the city to have purchased during 
the last year more than $100,000 worth of real 
estate, although engaged in no ostensible busi¬ 
ness. Philadelphia has recently built by con¬ 
tract a great reservoir, which cost her $1,500,- 
000, and which, when finished, it was discov. 
ered, would not hold water. The city is now 
called upon to pay $250,000 additional to put 
it in condition to serve its purpose. It is even 
likely that a much larger sum will be re¬ 
quired. The city is in urgent need of a purer 
and larger water supply than she now has. No 
help in this important matter can be obtained 
from official sources, and so a committee of 
public-spirited citizens comes forward with a 
donation of many months of unpaid toil. They 
propose to erect a filtering plant which shall 
bring us the boon of pure water. And why 
were there no public funds? Because every 
kind of abuse and corruption, the result of 
half a century of the spoils system and of blind 
unreasoning partisanship, which has obliged 
loyal party adherents to accept the leadership 
of even known thieves and tricksters, have 
squandered the ample revenues of the city. 

The story of New York and of Philadelphia 
is in substance the story of Baltimore, of Cin¬ 
cinnati, of Chicago, of San Francisco, of New 
Orleans, of nearly all the great cities of the 
country. It presents to us the twin problems 
of civil service reform and of municipal re¬ 
form, and not only as local necessities but as na¬ 
tional needs—problems which are the personal 
concern of every tax-payer who must bear their 
weight financially, but more especially, I pre¬ 
fer to think, of every citizen and patriot who 
must bear before the world the deep di.sgrace 
of failure to solve them. But if there be any 
one part of our whole people above another 
who have a vital interest in driving the spoils 
system from American politics and corruption 
from American cities, it is those whom we call, 
for want of a better title, laboring men and 
wage-earners. 





240 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


THE STRUGGLE FOR REFORM IN NEW YORK. 

First and foremost, that question is one of police reform. If the commissioners are not bound in lionor and by their oaths to 
effect that reform, then they have no bounden duty w hatever. Remember that an opportunity to reorganize the force by a gen¬ 
eral law passed for that purpose w'as wickedly denied them by a combination of the powers of darkness in control of the legisla¬ 
ture. Remember that the partial, the bliickmailing, the terrorizing enforcement of the excise law was one of the chief engines 
of police corruption and demoralization. Remember that the old force is to-day practically intact. A few intriguers-in-chief 
have been put off it, but the mass of the old men are still there. Have they lost their itching palms? Have they forgotten how 
to threaten, to intimidate? Are they not still acquainted with the devious ways that connect the Sunday salooji with tlie head¬ 
quarters of political power and favoritism, and with wholesale bribery and extortion ? Being what they are, knowing what they do, 
no more sure and deadly device could be thought of to prevent a change of spirit and of method in the police force than a relapse into 
the old haphazard, iniquitous way of enforcing, or failing to enforce, the excise law'. Simply as executive ofticers, charged with the 
solemn duty of making the New York police a body of honest and trusty men, the police commissioners could do no otlier than they have 
done. Have the people of New York so soon forgot the pit of shame whence they were digged last November? Do they no longer 
remember those horrible disclosures of crime by the guardians of the city against crime, wliich made the metropolis a hissing and 
a by-word ? No part of those revelations, which were so pitiless and pelting that tiiey brought a blush even to the brazen face of 
the Sun, and set it to mumbling hypocritically for one day about the need of reform—no part of those revelations was more com¬ 
plete and crushing than the showing up of the intimate connection of the Sun’s precious excise law' with police corruption. A 
“dead-letter” law, indeed! It w.as rather a Tammanyized lettre de cachet, the ready and purchased instrument of the greed, the 
lust, the revenge of the harpies who made the law their sport and tool. It was the very symbol and embodiment of arbitrary dis¬ 
crimination between man and man, between class and class, of oppression and exaction, of chicane and treachery, of bought immu¬ 
nity and of blood-money.— New York Evening Post, July 15. 


That the existing excise laws are to be rig¬ 
orously enforced was made evident by Mayor 
Strong and President Roosevelt in the mayor’s 
office yesterday, when the delegation of the 
United Societies for Liberal Sunday Laws 
called to urge a less stringent course. 

Internal Revenue Collector Edward Grosse 
and Ex-Assemblyman Otto Kempner did most 
of the talking for the liberal Sunday laws 
men. 

In the crowd that was in the mayor’s office 
were delegates from the German-American 
Reform Union. The substance of what the 
mayor’s visitors wanted was a disregard of the 
excise laws on Sunday. 

“If I had it in my power,” said Mayor 
Strong to the delegates, “I would allow the 
sale of beer on Sunday. I am ready to co-op¬ 
erate with you at the next session of the legis¬ 
lature in securing more liberal legislation on 
that point. I shall be criticised for this, but 
I can’t help it. 

“But I want to say that so long as the pres¬ 
ent law exists it must be enforced. It is the 
only way.” 

That was the only placatory statement of 
the mayor. 

In the course of Kempner’s tirade, he threat¬ 
ened President Roosevelt with political an¬ 
nihilation. Mr. Roosevelt, with clenched fist, 
declared that he was not working for office. 
He was only doing his duty, he added. 

Not since Mayor Strong took office has there 
been such a stormy gathering of citizens in his 
office to vent their views. The mayor received 
his visitors graciously and everything went 
smoothly until Otto Kempner, Internal Reve¬ 
nue Collector Edward Grosse, and Sheriff 
Tamsen began to say hard things about reform 
and the present administration. Then the may¬ 
or looked angry. He did not mince words, but 
told those present he did not fear a political 
death, and that he would close every saloon. 


The feature of the meeting, however, was an 
altercation between President Roosevelt and 
Internal Revenue Collector Grosse. Mr. 
Grosse began by asking the mayor quietly if 
he could not have the law enforced less se¬ 
verely. The mayor leaned against his desk, 
and replied: 

“I tell you, boys, as long as the law is on 
the statute books, it has to be enforced. There 
is no getting over that fact. Now you know 
the best way to get rid of an obnoxious law is 
to enforce it, and when the legislature meets, 
why it can be repealed. I believe in a, quiet 
drinking resort, where a man can take his 
family, but it is beyond me to say, ‘You must 
close this place and leave that one open,’ 
which is what you practically ask me to do. 
Then, again, even saloon-keepers want Sunday 
for rest.” 

Then Sheriff Tamsen made this novel prop¬ 
osition: 

“Mr. Mayor, while you are about it, you 
should stop the street cars and close the stores. 
That is what the law means.” 

Mr. Grosse interrupted and said that the 
present administration was becoming despotic, 
and using drastic measures, and that its course 
was impolitic, He prophesied that at the 
next election the people would rise up and 
sweep the party that the commissioner and the 
mayor belonged to from power. He said that 
if the people had known how strictly the law 
was going to be enforced. President Roosevelt 
would not be commissioner of police, and that 
Mayor Strong would not be in the mayor’s 
chair. He said that President Roosevelt was 
running the risk of being consigned to politi¬ 
cal oblivion. 

President Roosevelt stepped forward and 
said: 

“Just let me answer that argument. He has 
defined the issues, and I will meet them 
squarely, and face to face.” 


“Hold on,” said Otto Kempner, who also 
had been interrupting Mr. Grosse, “ I want a 
chance to speak.” 

“We’ll hear you later,” said the mayor. 

“No, I want to be heard now,” said Mr. 
Kempner. I want President Roosevelt to an¬ 
swer my arguments.” 

“ With pleasure,” said President Roose¬ 
velt.” 

“Mr. Chairman,” began Otto Kempner; “ex¬ 
cuse me—Mr. Mayor—are we to understand 
that the law is to be enforced? Are the people 
to be deprived of their rights? Do you know 
that you are playing into the hands of Tam¬ 
many Hall?” Mr. Kempner said this with 
a grand rhetorical flourish, and looked at 
his honor as if it would be unwise to say no, 
but that is just what his honor did. 

“Mr. Kempner, I mean to enforce the laws. 
I have sworn to do so,” replied the mayor. “I 
will do so. You might as well understand it. 
I will, I will,” repeated the mayor emphati¬ 
cally. 

Mr. Kempner was not prepared for such a 
decided answer, but he went on: 

“Then, 3Ir. Mayor, Tammany Hall, that we 
thought we had crushed to the ground, vnll rise 
again, and the people will put it in power. Why, 
the citizens that voted for you thought that they would 
not be deprived of Sunday beer, and —” 

“Hold on!” said the mayor. “The people 
who voted for me made the mistake of their 
lives, if they thought that I would not enforce 
the laws.” 

Then Mr. Kempner said something that 
made the mayor very angry. 

“It’s an asinine exercise of official author¬ 
ity. It’s puritanical. Only bigots would en¬ 
force such laws,” was the remark. 

“What occasion is there for suddenly en¬ 
forcing this law? Has crime become rampant? 
No! Then why, oh! why, have you deprived 
us of our rights?” asked Kempner. 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


241 


“This is the first time that I knew that I 
was responsible for the last legislature,” said 
the mayor, sarcastically. 

“This is a democratic republic,” broke in 
Grosse, “and when the laws are not upheld by 
popular sentiment, they should not be en¬ 
forced.” 

“Indeed!” said the mayor. “Well, as long 
as I am at the city hall they will be enforced, 
and enforced to the letter, too.” 

President Roosevelt then took the floor, 
and directed his remarks to Collector Grosse 
and Otto Kempner. 

“You have threatened that it means politi¬ 
cal disaster to me,” he said. “Now listen If 
it meant a hundred political deaths for me to 
do my duty, I would do it. I would not budge 
an inch. Nothing can swerve me. I may 
never be heard of again, but I will have kept 
my oath of oflBce. You, Mr. Grosse and Mr. 
Kempner, stand here as the champions of a 
vicious and corrupt system of the lax enforce¬ 
ment of the law—” 

“I object to such statements. It is not true,” 
interrupted Mr. Grosse. 

“No, no, it’s not so. He does not,” chorused 
part of those present. 

President Roosevelt tried to raise his voice 
above the tumult, but could not, and became 
angry at the failure to show him the courtesy 
that he had exhibited toward them when they 
attacked him and the mayor. 

Finally the noise subsided, and President 
Roosevelt continued. He said that while Mr. 
Grosse and Mr. Kempler might be sincere per¬ 
sonally they represented a vicious system 
nevertheless; at which repetition of the state¬ 
ment the tumult broke forth afresh. 

President Roosevelt said that to enforce the 
law laxly was to favor the big man with a 
pull, and be harsh on the small one without 
a pull. He said that he would betray his trust 
if he attempted to discriminate .—New York 
Timea, June 30. 

» * » 

“Gen.” James S. Clarkson has been in this 
city oflf and on the last few days. He is stay, 
ing at Long Branch, and runs up to town al¬ 
most every day. Mr. Clarkson is the repub¬ 
lican national committeeman from Iowa. He 
believes this fact qualifies him to criticise the 
action of New York republicans, especially 
Mayor Strong and President Roose^elt of the 
police department. Mr. Clarkson, of Iowa, ob¬ 
jects to the way President Roosevelt is enforc¬ 
ing the excise laws,which he says at leasteighty 
or ninety per cent, of the people are opposed 
to, and which for a number of years have been 
a dead letter. He also objects because he hears 
many young men who voted the republican 
ticket saying they can not get their beer on 
Sunday, and that for that reason they 
do not want to vote the republican ticket 
again. He hears these things on the boat 
coming up from Long Branch. 

» ♦ * 

The excise law they did not dig up out of a 
refuse heap. They found it dating only from 
1892, a law passed by the men who now shriek 


loudest against its enforcement, a law accepted 
by the chosen representatives of this city, a 
law corruptly used for the basest personal and 
political ends, and they said: “That law we 
will enforce without fear or favor. No man shall 
escape from its sweep by bribei'y or favoritism; no 
policeman shall profit by winking at its disregard} 
either in place or pocket. Our highest duty is to 
make the police a body above reproach or suspicion. 
To that end we will strike utterly down this part of 
the system which has been synonymous with conniv¬ 
ance and fraud and oppression." 

There is a fine and high moral note about 
this to which it is discouraging to find the 
press and the public so little responsive. We 
are so used to shufliing in office that we seem 
not to know clear straightforwardness and 
courage when we see them. When we got our 
present police board, we were congratulating 
ourselves on having such fine-fibered public 
servants. Yet when their fine fiber shows 
itself, we are astonished, almost alarmed. 
Why do men like Mr. Roosevelt take office ex¬ 
cept toshow the trimmers and the trucklers what 
an honest gentleman will do in their place? 
We mention him only because he is the official 
head of the board, only because he peculiarly 
represents the scholar and thegentleman in pol¬ 
itics. Happily, the board is a unit with him on 
this question. All the members we are glad to 
believe, are as ready as he to put the clamor of 
the politicians aside, to swear to their own hurt 
and change not, to do what they conceive to 
be their simple duty and let the consequences 
take care of themselves. W’hatever may be 
the outcome of the agitation—and that it will 
lead to an immense change for the better in 
our present intolerable condition we can not 
doubt—the display of high-mindedness and 
convinced courage which our police commis¬ 
sioners have given us will not be lost to the 
city. It means a higher standard of civic 
duty, which it will not be easy to forget even if 
others lapse from it, and it will long serve to 
rebuke and reassure us when we are tempted 
to say that public officials of fearless and un¬ 
flinching integrity are no more .—New York 
Evening Post. 

The board of managers of the United Soci¬ 
eties for Liberal Sunday Laws met last night 
at Terrace Garden, and decided, in view of the 
determination of Mayor Strong and President 
Roosevelt of the police department to enforce 
the excise laws, that relief must be obtained 
from the legislature. Many prominent Ger¬ 
man societies were represented. John B. 
Pannes presided, and it was decided to at¬ 
tempt to secure more liberal Sunday excise 
laws by legislative action, preceded by agita¬ 
tion throughout the state, as shown by the 
following resolutions; 

The undersigned citizens of New York are of the 
opinion that the mitigation of the so-called Sunday 
law is In a high degree desirable, and In the inter 
est of public harmony and of popular respect for 
the laws, even necessary. But we arealso convinced 
that this mitigation depends upon the legislative 
power and not upon the arbitrary pleasure of the 
executive officers of municipalities; that such offi¬ 
cers are bound by their official oath to enforce to 


the full extent of their power the laws as they find 
them,Irrespective of persons or of their own opinions 
concerning the desirability of those laws, and that 
even if any laws should in the long run prove in¬ 
capable of enforcement, the officers are constrained 
by their duty at least to make an honest effort to en¬ 
force them. 

We consider it, therefore, a great wrong to make 
the conscientious execution of the laws on the part 
of these officers a matter of reproach, no matter 
whether the law in question be ever so unpopular, 
for it does not lie in their discretion to determine 
which law is to be enforced and w-hich is not to be. 

On the contrary, all good citizens have reason to 
rejoice, thatafter a period of shameful corruption, 
oppressive tyranny, and robbery, which was made 
possible only by an arbitrary disregard of the laws, 
the government of law, the foundation of public 
orderandbonestadministration,has been restored, 
and that we have once more officers who take their 
duties seriously; for, did they not do that, did they 
permit themselves now to be induced to leave any 
laws at pleasure unexecuted, this would lead 
to a restoration of the old corrupt and lawless con¬ 
dition. 

When the people sufftr under the effect of im¬ 
proper laws, the remedy is to be sought in the ab¬ 
rogation or amendment of such laws by the legis¬ 
lature, and not in the demoralization of municipal 
officers through efforts to seduce them from the 
performance of their sworn duties. In the present 
case, all those who, with regard to the Sunday law, 
are of the same mind with us, should, without dis¬ 
tinction of party, unite their efforts in an endeavor 
to obtain from the legislature to be elected next 
fall the submission of this question of the local 
option of the municipalities concerned. 

C. SCHURZ, 

A. V. Briesen, 

Gustav H. Schwab, 

Jacob H.Schiff, 
Percival Knauth, 

N. CiLLIS, 

John B. Pannes. 

* * * 

ROOSEVELT BEFORE GOOD GOV¬ 
ERNMENT CLUB G, JULY II. 

First—As police commissioners we propose 
to act, not as republicans or democrats, pro- 
Uctionists or free-traders, but simply as cus¬ 
todians of the law in the interests of all de¬ 
cent citizens. And we have ignored every 
question except the question of enforcing the 
law and standing by the men who have acted 
rightly. 

The other day we recognized a policeman 
who had been on the force only two months 
and who <lid his duty. A noted fellow citizen, 
the Hon Michael Callahan, had a big saloon. 
(Michael J. Callahan (Tam.).—Keeps two 
saloons; is known as a “tough;” one of his 
assaults was committed two weeks ago upon a 
respectable citizen; his “pull” with Police- 
Justice Divver saved him from punishment. 
— N. Y. Evening Post’s Voters’ Directory, 1893.) 
He was a big man. We could not touch 
him, it was said, for he had a “pull.” But 
we did touch him. This policeman arrested 
him and took him to the police station, and 
on the way Callahan’s compatriots knocked 
the policeman down and stamped on him. 
And some of them got arrested to. 

The next morning we saw arrayed in court 
against one another, the simple policeman, 
without a “ pull,” and the big man, the local 
politician, who had brought to court with 
him one congressman, one state senator, and 









242 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


one alderman—a sample of each kind—and 
others, whose word supplanted the law twelve 
months ago in this city. Twelve months ago 
there would have been no doubt of the issue 
of this case. The policeman would have 
been rebuked, and would have learned that 
we had in this city an aristocracy that could 
not be touched. And there is no doubt now, 
except that now it is dead certain to go the 
other way. 

It will help every man on the force when 
he disregards the “pull” and stands up for his 
duty as he sees it. 

We have to make certain promotions. Un¬ 
der the old methods the least objectionable way 
was through the “ward boss” and “ward 
heeler;” the most objectionable way was by 
purchase outright. 

The last three promotions were made with¬ 
out a knowledge on my part of the men’s 
politics or religion, and I do not care what 
they are. One rescued a woman from drown¬ 
ing, and on looking up his record, we found 
he had saved twenty-five lives, without receiv¬ 
ing recognition from his superiors. But 
congress twice recognized his services. We pro¬ 
moted him on probation. If he has no execu¬ 
tive ability, no amount of heroism will keep 
him there; if he has, he will stick. 

The second man ran down two burglars one 
day and the next week he jumped into the 
railroad tunnel and captured another. We’ve 
put him up. He will keep his position on his 
merits, because we think it the decent thing 
to do. 

The third was a patrolman who killed a 
man in self-defense. A laborer ran amuck 
with a knife and tried to murder his “boss,” a 
contractor, and then he turned upon the po¬ 
liceman, who had to shoot him. The con¬ 
tractor sent the policeman $100 for saving his 
life, but the policeman returned it, and asked 
the contractor to send it to the widow of the 
man be killed. 

We have established the rule in the force 
that corrupt or inefficient men, no matter what 
friends they have, or what influence, must go. 
On the other hand, he who shows himself to 
be efficient and capable of those higher deeds 
which are grouped as heroism, is going to re¬ 
ceive the recognition his merits demand. 
And we feel sure that in this way we can 
bring the force up to the highest standard 
and make it an object of rightful pride to the 
whole city. 

The one thing more corrupting and debas¬ 
ing than anything else is the political “pull.” 

» * » 

Government by blackmail is the kind of 
government that Tammany Hall provided for 
us, for how long a time there is no means of 
knowing. The facts were notorious for many 
years, but were not distinctly proven until the 
Lexow investigation took place. Then came a 
perfect flood of testimony, and it isstill flowing. 
That of the editor of the fVine and Spirit Gazette 
is not the least interesting. He says that the 
police levied blackmail on the saloon keepers, 
using the Sunday laws as the instrument of 


extortion. The blackmail was paid until the 
amount became excessive. Then 

“ A committee of the central association of 
liquor-dealers took up the matter and called upon 
Police Commissioner Martin. An agreement was 
then made between the leaders of Tammany Hall 
and the liquor-dealers, according to which the 
monetary blackmail paid to the police should be 
discontinued in return for political support. In 
other words, the retail dealers should bind them¬ 
selves to solidly support the Tammany ticket in 
consideration of the discontinuance of the mone¬ 
tary blackmail by the police. This agreement was 
carried out. Now, what was the consequence? If 
the liquor-dealer, after the monetary blackmail 
ceased, showed any signs of independence, the 
Tammany Hall district leader would give the tip 
to the police captain, and that man would be 
‘pulled,’ and arrested on the following Sunday.”— 
New York Evening Post. 

* * * 

A police surgeon of many years’ experience 
assures us that the morale of the police force 
has been remarkably improved by the course 
pursued by the police board. He saysthatthe 
men have discovered that the “pull” has 
ceased to be the controlling power in the de¬ 
partment, and that merit is now the only basis 
for good standing or advancement. The con¬ 
duct of the commissioners in not only sustain¬ 
ing members of the force who do their duty 
fearlessly, without regard to political or other 
considerations, but in commending them pub¬ 
licly is having an excellent effect. The best 
members of the force are rejoiced at the new 
order of things, for all that they have ever de¬ 
sired is to be judged according to their deserts, 
and the poorer members are conscious that the 
only way by which they can be certain of re- 
mainingupon the force is by mendingtheircon- 
duct. Every one who takes the trouble to sound 
public opinion on the present vigorous effort to 
enforce the Sunday excise laws must be struck 
with the growing sentiment in support of the 
police board’s action. There are plenty of 
people to be found who speak contemptuously 
of the law, but few of these take the ground 
that in enforcing the law the police board is 
is to be censured. There is a growing opinion 
also that if the city were to vote on the ques¬ 
tion of Sunday selling, under a local option 
law, it is by no means certain that a majority 
would be found in the affirmative. It is to be 
borne in mind that the Catholic and Protest¬ 
ant churches w'ould be united against Sunday 
selling, which would be a very powerful com¬ 
bination. Then, too, any one who has sounded 
sentiment among the poorer classes is awareof 
the fact that thousands of them would beglad 
to vote to have the saloons closed and kept 
closed on Sunday. Finally, there is nothing so 
popular in this community as pluck and cour¬ 
age and fearless performance of duty by police 
officials, and the police commissioners are win¬ 
ning that kind of support now, and are mak¬ 
ing converts to the cau.se of law and order.— 
New York Evening Post, July 8. 

* * * 

Talk of Tammany reorganization is not 
half so significant of the reviving spirit of the 
enemy of honest government as is the current 
misrepresentation of the efforts of the police 
to maintain law and order. It is a mode of 


attack too characteristic to be mistaken. Last 
Sunday 138 arrests were made for selling 
liquor. On Sunday, January 14, 1894, when 
Jimmy Martin and John C. Sheehan were 
the master spirits of the police force, the record 
was 150 arrests for the same offense, while un¬ 
der the Platt-Tammany Commissioners. Mur¬ 
ray and Kerwin, the returns were 291 arrests 
for feunday, January 20, 1895. Yet we are 
told that President Eoosevelt and his col¬ 
leagues are arrogantly enforcing a law which 
public sentiment made a dead letter. When 
did it die? Certainly not in Tammany times. 

Wh at was the Pantata? A high police officer 
under Tammany commissioners, to whom an ^ 
association of Bohemian saloon-keepers paid 
$125 a month for being allowed to evade the 
law by selling liquor on Sunday, while their 
less shrewd or more honest fellows kept their 
bars closed or suffered arrest. Was it a dead 
law that filled the pigeon-holes of the Tam¬ 
many district-attorney’s office with thousands 
of indictments against liquor-dealers who 
did not pay tax to Tammany and were caught ■ 
doing business on Sunday? Now because 
there is no one to collect blackmail for im- ’ 
munity from the law there is an outcry against 
“Puritan despotism.” 

The hue and cry against the action of the 
police commissioners finds its most practical 
explanation in such sentences as these: “How 
the brewers are affected; loss each Sunday over 
$165,000.”— New York Evening Post, July 18. 

» * • 

“Commissioner Faure, of the department of 
charities and corrections, for instance, yester¬ 
day simply acted as a good citizen,” said Mr. 
Roosevelt. “He brought to our attention a fla¬ 
grant violation of the law in a certain precinct ‘ 
by a wealthy and influential saloon keeper. 

The circumstances, as he detailed them, show 
that the policeman on the beat must have » 
known of this violation of the law, and that 
the acting captain of the precinct either did 
know or ought to have known. W^e shall 
reduce the acting captain, try the patrolman 
and see that the saloon is closed.” 

From the impressive manner in which Mr. 
Roosevelt uttered this statement there is no 
doubt that severe punishment will be meted 
out to these negligent members of the police 
force. 

“Where men will assist the police as effectu¬ 
ally as Commissioner Faure,” continued Mr. 
Roosevelt, “they can be of the utmost service, 
but a mere general statement that the law is 
not being observed, or that half of the saloons 
are not shut, does not amount to anything. 

It is presumably untrue and always useless. ' 
The persons, moreover, who send anonymous 
communications are wasting their time ninety- 
nine times out of a hundred. On the other 
hand, the work by a responsible individual 
who gives us dates, facts and figures is invalu- ‘ 
able. 

“One or two of the branches of the city , 
vigilance league, for instance, have already 
excellently prepared statistics of violations, 
or seeming violations, of the law in certain 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


243 


precincts, which form the basis of investiga¬ 
tions which I am at this moment carrying 
on .”—New York Times, July 2^. 

* » 

ROOSEVELT BEFORE GOOD GOV¬ 
ERNMENT CLUB I (GERMAN). 

Mr. Roosevelt began his speecli by saying: 
“I care nothing for the birthplace of those 
whom I address, because I speak as an Ameri¬ 
can to fellow-Americans.” Taking up the al¬ 
legation that crime has increased under the 
new administration of the police department, 
he said: 

The last few days certain statements have 
appeared in some of the papers to the effect 
that under the new administration of the po¬ 
lice department crimes in this city have in¬ 
creased. These statements are absolutely 
false. I hold in my hand the official figures 
giving the total number of felonies reported 
at the station-houses and the total number of 
arrests for felonies during the first three 
months of the present year, when the old or 
ganization of the department was still undis¬ 
turbed, as compared with the last six weeks, 
during which time the force has been abso¬ 
lutely under the new direction. The total 
number of felonies reported during .January, 
February and March was 759. During the 
month of June and the first half of July the 
total number was 313, an average of less than 
seven a day, as against an average of eight 
and a half for the first three months of the 
year. 

The arrests for felonies cover a large num¬ 
ber of felonies not reported at the station- 
houses. When an oflficer sees a felony com¬ 
mitted he makes an arrest and reports it as an 
arrest and not a felony. For the first three 
months of the year the total arrests for felo¬ 
nies was 912, while for the past six weeks the 
total has been 481. In other words, under the 
old regime arrests averaged a trifle over ten 
per day but in the last six weeks, owing to 
greater activity and zeal on the part of the 
police, the arrests for felony have averaged 
nearly eleven a day. 

Replying to Senator Hill’s letters on the en¬ 
forcement of the excise laws, Mr. Roosevelt 
said : 

Senator Hill has done me the honor to take 
me as the antitype of his political methods 
and political views, and has singled me out 
for attack in connection with the excise law. 
Senator Hill’s complaint is that I honestly en¬ 
force the law, which he and Tammany put 
upon the statute book, with the full belief 
and intention that it would not be honestly 
enforced. I do not usually ascribe motives, 
and I would ordinarily hesitate, in speaking 
of a United States senator, to say that his 
governor and his legislature (for he con¬ 
trolled them both absolutely) deliberately en¬ 
acted a law which they deliberately intended 
to be dishonestly executed ; but I do not have 
to ascribe motives in this case, for Senator 
Hill’s letter is in effect a frank avowal that 
these were the motives which actuated the 
Tammany legislature that passed the present 
law. 

This law is being honestly enforced, and 
Senator Hill’s assault upon that honest en¬ 
forcement is tantamount to the admission, in 
the first place, that it never has been honestly 
enforced before, and in the next place that 
he had never expected it to be honestly en¬ 
forced. He kept silent while the law which 
the people had put in the statute books was 
contemptuously violated in the interest of 
corruption. He clamors now that it is admin¬ 
istered by officers who pay no heed to money 


or political influence, and who deal equal 
justice to the poor and rich alike. 

A more humiliating position was never 
taken by a public man than this position 
which has been taken by Senator Hill. It is 
but natural that he and Tammany should grow 
wild with anger at the honest enforcement of 
the law, for it was a law which was intended 
to be the most potent weapon in keeping the 
saloons subservient allies of Mr. Hill’s ma¬ 
chine. 

This Sunday excise law has never been a 
dead letter. It has always been enforced 
against the man without money and without 
political influence. It was passed with the 
deliberate purpose of keeping a sword over 
the neck of every saloon-keeper who did not 
render abjectly faithful service to Tammany 
Hall, and to the state machine which Tam¬ 
many Hall served. 

I do not wonder that Senator Hill raists 
an outcry against its enforcement. It was not 
meant to be honestly enforced. It was meant 
to be used to blackmail and browbeat the sa¬ 
loon-keepers who were not the slaves of Tam¬ 
many Hall; while the big Tammany Hall bosses 
who owned saloons were allowed to violate 
the law with impunity and to corrupt the po 
lice force at will. With a law such as this 
enforced only against the poor or the honest 
man, and violated with impunity by every 
rich scoundrel and every corrupt politician, 
the machine did indeed seem to have its yoke 
on the neck of the people. But we threw off 
that yoke; and no special pleading of Senator 
Hill can avail to make us put it on. 

But it is a shame and disgrace to the state 
that one of its United States senators should 
venture openly to appear as a champion of the 
dishonest enforcement of law; for that is all 
that is meant by this outcry in favor of en¬ 
forcing the laws liberally, exactly as Tammany 
Hall enforced them. Remember, this law 
was no dead letter. It was alwavs enforced 
against some people. During the year before 
I came into office something like 5,000 arrests 
were made for violation of the Sunday excise 
law. Think of that—5,000 arrests! Our arrests 
have only been a little more numerous propor¬ 
tionately. But, whereas in the old days men 
with a “pull” went scot free, we, on the con¬ 
trary, have taken particular pains to see that 
it was the man with a “pull” whose store was 
closed. Every honest liquor-dealer owes a debt 
of gratitude for rescuing him from bondage. 
Under the old system, he either had to keep 
open by bribery of some sort, or else he had 
to be closed and see his less honest rival gather 
in his trade. Under the new system we treat 
all alike, and the honest man no longer sees 
the premium paid for dishonesty. 

In the true spirit of the demagogue. Sena¬ 
tor Hill, with utter disregard of the facts, as¬ 
serts that this is a discrimination against the 
poor man and in favor of the rich, and draws 
a contrast between me taking a champagne 
dinner on Sunday at the Union League Club 
and the poor man, to whom I deny his Sun¬ 
day beer. As to me, his statement is false, 
and is made out of the whole cloth. This isso 
unimportant that I merely allude to it in 
passing as offering a fair gauge by which to 
test the truthfulness of a man who, in talking 
to an antagonist, is content to make assertions 
based on the idlest and most vapid newspaper 
chatter, but it is important to point out the 
falsity of Senator Hill’s main charge that we 
discriminate against the poor. 

On the contrary, the discrimination against 
the poor was under the old system of corrup¬ 
tion. Where justice is bought, where favor is 
the price of money or political influence, the 
rich man had his own and the poor man went 
to the wall. Now all are treated exactly alike. 
As a matter of fact, we, members of the police 
hoard, have attacked the richest organization 


in New York. The brewers and liquor-sellers 
represent more combined capital, and capital 
which is more often lavished in controlling 
elections, than is the case with any other 
organization. 

The honest brew'er and the honest liquor- 
seller have no cause of quarrel with us; but 
the dishonest, the men who approved of cor¬ 
ruption and throve under it, they see their 
dishonest gains taken away. They see the 
hold which they have had over the police 
force removed, and as that police force is 
made honest, their wrath is naturally as bitter 
as it is unscrupulous. I do not wonder at the 
ferocity, I do not wonder at the venom of 
their higher allies in the newspaper press; I 
do not wonder that Senator Hill has come 
promptly to their support. 

But if I do not wonder, still less do I care. 
It is a matter of absolute indifference to me 
what they say. The laws will be enforced by 
the police exactly as we are enforcing them 
now. All honest and law-abiding citizens are 
in honor bound to give us their support; but 
whether they do or do not give it we shall not 
refrain from doing our duty. 

United States Senator Hill speaks euphe¬ 
mistically, and carefully avoids saying in so 
many words that he wishes us to violate the 
law; but one of his supporters. State Senator 
Cantor, is less mealy-mouthed and comes out 
boldly, insisting that the officers appointed to 
enforce all laws should connive at the viola¬ 
tion of this law. Yet this same Mr. Cantor, 
who openly advocates having the executive 
officers connive at the violation of the laws 
they have sworn to enforce, is actually talked 
about for a high judicial position. It would 
surely be a strange spectacle to see in New 
York elected to a judicial office a man capa¬ 
ble of defending so shameful a prostitution of 
justice. 

The question is merely. Are the laws to be 
honestly enforced? This question is to me so 
simple, so easily answered, that I can hardly 
understand how any man who is both honest 
and intelligent can fail to give us his support. 
There are, of course, plenty of scoundrels to 
raise a hue and cry against us; and I am sorry 
to say they are backed by some weak men who 
do not understand the situation, by some hon¬ 
est men of muddled minds, and by some who 
are contented to announce, in the language of 
the Scripture, “that their god is their belly,” 
and that they would much rather see dishon¬ 
esty crowned king and corruption flourish than 
obey the law when they think it interferes 
with their appetites. 

Nothing is worse for a community than to 
have on the statute-books laws which are but 
partially enforced, and to encourage the law¬ 
makers to enact legislation which shall re¬ 
main a dead letter. Every honest officer 
ought to enforce the law, and I earnestly hope 
that one result of the enforcement of the law 
by the police will be to show our legislators, 
both at Albany and in the board of aldermen, 
that they must not put or leave on the statute- 
books a single law which they do not think 
ought to be enforced. 

The demagogue has dared to complain that 
we were favoring the rich against the poor, 
The fact is that these demagogues know well 
that it is they themselves who are champions 
of a powerful and, until our advent, an illegal, 
favoi-ed class—the class of rich brewers and 
the rich liquor-sellers who made money with 
greater ease than any others in the commun¬ 
ity, and who are furious because their illegal 
gains have at last been stopped by officers 
who can neither be threatened nor bought into 
connivance at wrongdoing. 

The illegal sale of liquor, especially on 
Sunday, has been in the past a source of cor¬ 
ruption. It is something we are bound to 
root out. In the interests of decency and 







244 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


morality we shall enforce all laws so far as 
we have the physical power. That is what 
we are here for. 

We are not a legislative body, and, as I 
said, I think one effect of our action will be 
to prevent the legislature from passing laws 
which are not meant to be enforced, and to 
persuade it hereafter to exercise care in the 
laws it leaves on the statute-books. 

^ 

“As long,” continued the victim of police 
proscription [Harry Hill], “as the present law 
exists, and it is not heartily and impartially 
enforced, just so long will it be used by poli¬ 
ticians to attain their ends, and by the police 
to levy tribute or gratify revenge—I speak ‘by 
the card.’ 

“Because I would not submit to be classified 
and booked for so much a week for police 
tribute, the order was given that I was not to 
be allowed to live in New York, and the order 
wascarriefl out. They tried to harm me even 
after they had convinced me that I was a 
marked man; but to their credit, be it said, 
the Brooklyn police were not influenced by 
what my enemies on the other side of the East 
river said about me. 

“In speaking of Mr. Roosevelt’s dealing with 
the excise question, I speak admiringly but 
regretfully. I am. as a publican, in hearty 
sympathy with the saloon-keepers who suffer, 
while I know of the evils that come of not en¬ 
forcing a law properly, but of using it as a 
club against men obnoxious to politicians or 
grasping police officials. 

“And I w’on’t bar any political party either, 
republican though I am. There were times 
when both the democratic and republican par¬ 
ties could have changed the law’, but it was 
too valuable a factor in their schemes.” 

You say you do not expect any remedy from 
the legislature ; I deem it by no means im¬ 
possible under existing circumstances. You 
predict only that the Germans of New York 
will at any price drive out the present muni¬ 
cipal administration, and put in its place one 
favorable to Sunday liberty, of whatever ele¬ 
ments it may otherwise be composed. I have 
a better opinion of the Germans of New York. 
If your agitation, as at present conducted, 
were to be successful, it would inevitably lead 
to the restoration of Tammany rule. I as¬ 
sume, of course, that this is not your purpose, 
although your prediction might have had 
more the character of a warning than of an 
incitement. In any event, I am convinced 
that a large majority of the Germans of New 
Y^ork will at no price consent to lend a help¬ 
ing hand to such a betrayal of the common 
weal as the restoration of Tammany rule 
would be. 

* * * 

During nearly forty years I have been more 
or less active in public life, and I have always 
had the honor of the German name in Ameri¬ 
ca at heart. Often have I had to repel the as¬ 
persion that, good people as Germans may be, 
they are apt to forget everything else soon as 
their beer is touched. I have always treated 
this as a revolting calumny. A comparatively 
small number of reckless and noisy shouters 
may sometimes have given color to this accu¬ 
sation, but the overwhelming majority of the 
Germans looked at the rights and duties of 
American citizenship from a much higher 
standpoint. 

The Germans of New York are no excep¬ 
tion to the rule. They will, in this emergen¬ 
cy, surely do what is right and worthy of the 
German name. VVhile ever as much in favor 
of a more liberal Sunday law, they will re¬ 
member that this is neither the only nor the 
most valuable object of their endeavors. Al¬ 
though the recent struggle for good municipal 
government may not have yielded all the fruit 


they desired, yet, as good citizens, they recog¬ 
nize it as their duty to preserve and develop 
all the good results it did yield . 

The corruption of the police was the most 
dangerous evil afflicting the community. 
Whoever furnishes the city an efficient, incor¬ 
ruptible and dutiful police will confer upon 
it an inestimable benefaction and deserve the 
gratitude of every decent citizen. The men 
now at the head of the department are hon¬ 
estly endeavoring to do this, and the Germans 
will not imperil the success of that endeavor 
by demanding that the old demoralizing busi¬ 
ness of selling permission for violating the 
Sunday law be continued. They wish to 
attain the desired Sunday liberty, not by a 
demoralizing circumvention of the law, but 
by an orderly change of the law. 

If this change does not come as quickly as 
they would have it, they will certainly not 
raise the alternative, ‘"Either Sunday beer or 
Tammany.” They will not forget that the 
accomplishment of reforms in a democratic 
community usually requires patience, and 
that he who means to be a good citizen of a 
republic must cultivate that patience. They 
will remember that the liberal current which 
has given us of late years public Sunday con¬ 
certs and open museums, promises soon to 
loosen other unreasonable restraints. They 
will, with calm perseverance and in a lawful 
manner, continue their efforts until the Sun¬ 
day question is submitted in the spirit of 
home rule to the local option of the people of 
New York city. And thus they will reach 
their aim, remaining true to the cause of good 
government and preserving the respect and 
confidence of their fellow-citizens.— Carl 
Schurz, in the Staals Zeitung. 

» * * 

GUSTAV H. SCHWAB. 

My position is like that taken by Mr. Schurz. 
He spoke the sentiment prevailing among our 
German citizens. The Germans are an order- 
loving people. They believe in the observ¬ 
ance of law. Laws on the statute books 
should be enforced. Mr. Roosevelt’s action 
is entirely right. If laws are obnoxious, a 
remedy for them should be sought in the 
proper way—by legislative repeal or by local 
option provisions, so that the city authorities 
might,deal with the matter. There can be 
not only no possible sense or justification in 
the evasion of existing laws, but it is the 
sworn duty of public officers to enforce them. 
The public should commend officers who per¬ 
form this duty. 

* * * 

Everett P. Wheeler, when asked what he 
thought about the policy of the police board, 
said: “It is one of those delicate questions 
upon which I do not care to express an opin¬ 
ion. I can not without giving the matter 
more thought than I have at present, nor can 
I say whether I approve or disapprove of Mr. 
Roo.sevelt’8 course.” 

* » * 

Simon Sterne said: “Every enforcement of 
the law, of course, benefits tbe community; 
but if you ask me whether we are not likely to 
pay a fearful penalty for any very rigid en¬ 
forcement of the excise law, I should be 
tempted to say that in all probability we will 
have to pay that penalty.” 

“In what way?” asked the reporter. 

“By the reinstatement of Tammany,” re¬ 
plied Mr. Sterne. “The law was passed to 
keep the liquor element in the city of New 
York in terror of the powers that be. Any 
man can complain of the commissioners, who 
are simply carrying out the law from a sense 
of duty, very much like the sheriff'who has 
got an execution against a runaway loco¬ 
motive. It is dangerous work for the sheriff 


and his posse to serve such an execution. 
They are doing their duty, but the locomotive 
may hurt them.” 

» » * 

The New Y^ork Slaats-Zeitung, a German 
newspaper of of high character, sees fit to in¬ 
dulge in lamentations because the New York 
Germans—meaning American citizens of the 
metropolis of German birth or extraction— 
are not a unit in condemning the zeal with 
which the reform administration is trying to 
enforce the excise laws, especially that provis¬ 
ion which forbids the sale of stimulating 
drinks on Sunday. 

* » » 

All laws are to be enforced, bwl in the order of 
their importance; all crimes will be punished, but in 
the order of their serious7iess; and those who think 
they can divei't the labors of the board oj police 
from putting out the conflagration by pointing to 
bo7ifires are foes of good government, allies of the 
lawless, and ctre clamoring in vain. 

This is the gist of a statement made by 
President Roosevelt to-day. He did not want 
to say anything. The board of police wanted 
to act without a word of explanation. But 
the president could not resist the temptation 
to be plainly understood. So he spoke. He 
said: 

“No effort,direct or indirect, to distract our 
attention from important crimes and law¬ 
breakers to unimportant ■ crimes and law¬ 
breakers will succeed. The excise law is go¬ 
ing to be enforced right up to the handle, and 
all the allies of corruption in the depart¬ 
ment who are desirous of seeing that corrup¬ 
tion remain, by trying to befog the main essay, 
may just as well abandon their efforts. The 
course of the police commission won’t deviate 
one hand’s brea<lth from the path it has hith¬ 
erto pursued. We shall enforce all the laws 
so far as our force will enable us to enforce 
them. Ultimately we will have them all 
obeyed, and meanwhile, it is a waste of time 
for the criminal classes and their allies to try 
to prevent us from enforcing the vital laws by 
raising a clamor that we are not enforcing 
others of less importance. 

“I would not allow a policeman to neglect 
to arrest a burglar on the plea that he was 
preventing a violation of the Sunday excise 
law, and so I will not allow a policeman to 
have a chance to allow the saloon of some 
man with a pull to violate the law, on the plea 
that he is looking after a soda-water fountain. 

“We will enforce all the laws, however, and 
I hope that one effect of our efforts will he to 
make the legislature and the board of alder- 
nien understand that when the police force is 
both honest and efficient they do not want to 
put or leave on the statute books any laws 
which they do not expect to see enforced. 
The most corrupting and demoralizing thing 
for the whole community, as well as for the 
police force, is to have laws on the statute 
books that are only partially enforced—that 
are only enforced against the man without a 
pull. And in the end all decent citizens will 
see this, no matter how loud, for the minute, 
may be the clamor of the champions of cor¬ 
ruption and disorder .”—New York Evening Post, 
July 15. 

* * » 

—Says the Atlanta Journal (Dem.): “Only 
a few years ago civil service reform was gen¬ 
erally regarded in this country only as the 
hobby of a few Arcadian politicians. Hardly 
anybody expected to see it become more than 
a theory. Now it is an accomplished fact. 
It has come to stay. Its scope and its hold on 
the popular mind are constantly increasing.’ 
May 15. 








THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


VoL. II, No. 30. 


INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST, 1895. 


'rTi'T>ibra . J dollnr per annum. 

10 cents per copy. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind. 

Scribner’s Magazine for August has a 
characteristic article from Theodore Roose¬ 
velt, entitled “Six Years of Civil Service 
Reform.” The article treats of a new phase 
of the struggle, by going behind the cur¬ 
tain and showing the obstacles met every 
day by those who have in hand the actual 
operation of the law. The spite, hatred 
and disappointed rage at the law, leading 
fellows like Vilas and Bynum to a con¬ 
stant guerrilla warfare upon it, and how 
their movements are checkmated by men 
like Henry Cabot Lodge, are described in 
a manner entirely interesting. The fight 
against the spoils system is the history¬ 
making struggle of this period, and every 
man should have the honor or disgrace to 
which his acts in that struggle entitle him. 


President Polk in his own handwrit¬ 
ing has clinched the evidence of his own 
lack of manliness and statesmanship. In 
his diary brought out in the August At 
lantic he says, March 4, 1846 : 

“A year gone and the pressure for office has not 
abated. Will this pressure never cease? I most 
sincerely wish I had no offices to bestow. If I had 
not it would add much to the happiness and com¬ 
fort of my position. As it is, I have no offices to be¬ 
stow without turning out better men than a large 
majority of those who seek their places.” 

In May of the following year he writes: 

“Almost the whole of my embarrassment in ad¬ 
ministering tbe government grows out of the pub¬ 
lic patronage which it is my duty to dispense.” 

He had the whole matter in his own 
hands. The pressure was, as now, applied 
through congressmen. The constitution 
and his oath of office required Polk, as 
they require the President now, to beat oflF 
and utterly disregard the men making the 
assault. There have been many cowardly 
failures since Polk, but none has been 
more cowardly or more helpless than his. 
He was a mere puppet in the hands of his 
party machine. 


In the line of the Chronicle’s appre¬ 
hension, last month, the report comes 
from Washington that congressmen will 
inquire into the recent “spying” of the 
post-office department upon the conduct 
of its carriers. This is altogether prob¬ 


able. A congressman will do most any¬ 
thing to get control of votes, no matter 
how much harm it may do to the public 
service or to the public welfare generally. 
Many congressmen take to such work 
naturally. It is this corrupt tendency of 
congressmen which makes us doubt the 
wisdom of allowing classes of public em¬ 
ployes to band together in any kind of an 
association. Their dependence must not 
be upon congressmen, but upon their su¬ 
periors in the executive department, and 
the people must be trusted to deal with 
those superiors for any misuse of power. 
There have been too many examples for it 
to be any longer doubted that the people 
will overthrow any administration which 
debauches or abuses the public service. In 
such a case as the one in hand congress¬ 
men have no legitimate power whatever. 
All they can do when their favorites are 
made uncomfortable is to vote to cut down 
the appropriation. Thiestand-and-deliver 
practice has made a coward of many a cab¬ 
inet officer, but we hope it will not do so 
much longer. 


The restiveness of the carriers at being 
watched is not a good sign. It would be 
better for them to mend their ways. The 
carrier reported from this city as not tak¬ 
ing a paper from the outside of the letter¬ 
box was guilty of a species of disobliging¬ 
ness not uncommon. It is the spirit of do¬ 
ing no more than the law literally requires, 
added to a disposition to display indepen¬ 
dence and have it understood that one who 
works for the government is not to be dic¬ 
tated to. This is all a mistake. Public serv¬ 
ants do not work for the government but 
for the people, and the people do not and 
will not feel timid toward their employes. It 
is true that an employe may for a time cause 
single persons discomfort and annoyance 
by being disobliging but his ways will find 
him out and the same public opinion that 
protects him against injustice will force 
him to the wall. Carriers and all others 
would do well to adopt the rule of doing 
more—much more—than the law or their 
superiors require. It will be bread scat¬ 
tered upon the waters. In the meantime 
it is the duty of the people to uphold the 
department in its efforts to secure a full 
eight hours’ work for the liberal eight 
hours’ pay. 


Tammany has been going through the 
process of registering the decrees of its 
bosses as to what committeemen and lead¬ 
ers it shall have next 3 ear. The signs are 
universal that it is “the same old Tam¬ 
many.” Of course, in the interest of good 
government and of honesty and of every¬ 
thing else that is decent and respectable, 
this organization ought to be broken up. 
For fifty years it has been a public breed¬ 
er of blackmail and law-breaking and all 
manner of immorality. The welfare of 
the entire country demands the destruc¬ 
tion of this organization. Every good cit¬ 
izen should work to this end, but all good 
citizens do not. We can understand in a 
measure why ex Governor Campbell of 
Ohio should strike hands with Tammany 
and be glad of a chance to show his sym¬ 
pathy with it, but why President Cleveland 
should write this public enemy a letter 
and thus join in its “celebration” of the 
day of the Declaration of Independence, is 
beyond our comprehension. The charac¬ 
ter of the letter had nothing to do with the 
matter. 

Exasperation with that form of organ¬ 
ized dishonesty, called municipal govern¬ 
ment, continues to break out in different 
forms on every hand. In Kansas City a 
civic federation has been organized, with 
the determination “to separate municipal 
and state affairs, and place competent and 
trustworthy men in office without respect 
to party lines.” In Omaha, politicians and 
members of the city government were 
systematically looting the city treasury by 
having a pull with the treasurer, and bor¬ 
rowing upon their I. O. U’s. Threatened 
with discovery, the treasurer fled, leaving 
a note saying that he had gone to commit 
suicide. He got, however, no further than a 
road-house,and he had such a pull that not 
only would the council not remove him, 
but he was not arrested, and held on a week 
before he resigned. At this home thrust 
into their pockets, the scales fell from the 
eyes of Omaha citizens, and one thousand 
of them, “regardless of party feelings,” 
issued a proclamation calling for the or¬ 
ganization of a movement for “the intro¬ 
duction of business methods in the city 
government.” In Denver, the water com¬ 
pany, as usual, had a pull. Lower rates 
or an independent water service was an 
issue of the election last spring, and was 





















246 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


supposed to have been gained. When, 
however, the ordinance came up, the pull 
of the water company was found all- 
sufficient. Citizens with a rope as the em¬ 
blem of the hangman, confronted the 
board of aldermen for eight hours, with fifty 
policemen between them. But it did not 
avail; the average alderman will face con¬ 
siderable danger rather than not yield to 
his pull, and the ordinance was passed. 
Meanwhile, by a vote of seventeen to one, 
the common council of West Superior, 
Wis., have impeached the mayor of that 
city on a charge of extorting money from 
firemen and policemen. 

The Chronicle hasendeavored,without 
malice or fear or prejudice, to show the 
spoils acts and opinions of a number of 
prominent reformers, and while the task 
is ungracious and the assault of reformers 
themselves is often bitter, it means to go 
on because the work is necessary. 

When the Indianapolis charter was 
passed, the Chronicle pointed out that a 
Tammany mayor could and would give us 
Tammany government. Both party ma¬ 
chines have at last fully grasped this fact, 
and they seem disposed to risk the attempt 
to Tammanyize the city. The charter 
should have provided an iron-clad labor- 
service and merit-system, to the end that 
a Tammany mayor would have been with¬ 
out power to loot the city service. It is 
not that there are no civil service provis¬ 
ions in the charter which an honest mayor 
would observe, for there are some broad 
general provisions; but if a mayor is dis¬ 
honest and ignores them, there is no ade¬ 
quate remedy. Then we have the fool 
provision that in the police and fire forces 
the places shall be “equally divided polit¬ 
ically.” Be that as it may, the devil seems 
more determined than ever to play fast 
and loose with the affairs of Indianapolis. 
The time has come to form a good govern¬ 
ment club, whose sole object shall be to 
take the government of this city out of 
politics. 

In view of the great advances which 
this national administration has been 
making, a recent occurrence at Wabash in 
this state seems a survival of a past age. 
For some delinquency the department 
determined to remove Postmaster Hoover 
of that place. If a bank or a railroad, 
or any private enterprise had been go¬ 
ing to displace an important official, 
the business principles upon which it 
would have selected his successor are 
well known; and politics would have been 
unheard of and unthought of in the mat¬ 
ter. But the greatest government on 
earth, with unlimited means of investi¬ 
gation, for a purely business position of 


high importance calls upon the chairman 
of the democi'atic county committee to 
“name” the man. This brings back the 
abject administrative weakness and in¬ 
competency under which we have strug¬ 
gled for so many years. But the “call” be¬ 
came public, and the Hoover democratic 
faction at Wabash gathered themselves up 
and made an onslaught upon the depart¬ 
ment and swore that Hoover should be 
kept, right or wrong, competent or incom 
petent, honest or dishonest. And the de¬ 
partment in abject humiliation backed 
down. Perhaps the people of Wabash can 
worry along with a postmaster whom the 
department thought ought to be removed; 
but that “the trouble has caused consider¬ 
able bitterness in local democratic ranks,” 
can not be endured, and for that the de¬ 
partment must be severely censured. 


OUR NEXT MAYOR. 

The republicans have nominated our old 
friend Pres. Trusler, the present city comp¬ 
troller, as their candidate for mayor. It can 
not be said that the honor was unsought as 
Trusler for months has pursued it like a small 
Quay or Platt. It is true also that not one- 
tenth of the party went to the primaries, but 
the party must and should feel responsible 
for him and will enjoy all the glory which he 
may cast upon it. 

Trusler is in some respects an interesting 
man. He came up here from Connersville 
and had a place in the post-ofl5ce. Off and on 
he was in the city council, where, if our rec¬ 
ollection serves us right, his conservative na¬ 
ture hesitated at departing from the old and 
safe method of lighting the city by gas, to the 
new fangled notion of electricity. We think 
there is a remark of his somewhere on record, 
made not many years ago, to the effect that it 
had not been shown that a town could be 
lighted by electricity. He has been earnest 
in politics even to the point of physical risk; 
for, if our recollection again serves us right, 
he once had a personal rencounter, or 6ght, 
with one Browder, a fellow-partisan, but of 
the merits of that controversey or on rvhich 
side victory perched, we do not pretend to de. 
cide. 

As a member of the council he took an ac¬ 
tive interest in the fire department and among 
other things required the chief, Mr. Webster, 
to turn out the dozen democrats among the 
eighty-two firemen. Being refused he led the 
movement which resulted in the displace¬ 
ment of the chief. True, that transaction 
caused a great scandal and shook insurance 
circles from center to circumference, and had 
much to do with the overwhelming defeat of 
the republicans which followed and Chief 
Webster had to be re-instated ; but that has 
all blown over. Trusler has stood by his 
guns, and the boys have no reason to suppose 
that if he is elected, Mr. Webster wTll not 
again go instanter, and that the police and 
fire departments will not have a shaking up 


such as has not been seen in many a day, and 
“republicans” will find there that pleasant 
and profitable quartering upon the city treas¬ 
ury which their efforts in heeling, shouting, 
setting up primaries, and fixing things for 
Trusler, merit. Possibly this may raise the 
rate of insurance, but is a small matter like 
that to stand in the way of putting down 
monarchical tendencies such as “ civil service?” 

We can not notice at this time all of Trus- 
ler’s principles, but there is one which will 
give eminent satisfaction to the men who bear 
the heat and burden of the day. Trusler be¬ 
lieves in the sinews of war, and that there 
shall be no shilly-shallying about raising 
them. We all remember the brilliant bold¬ 
ness with which from his comptroller’s office 
lately he notified policemen and firemen to 
call and come down with a fixed per cent, of 
their pay. And when some milksop taxed 
him about it he laid down this immortal 
principle: “All appointive oflSces are political 
offices and should he paid for by those who 
get them.” There is no gainsaying this and 
no part of his administration will he more 
edifying than the thorough and business-like 
manner in which that principle will be car¬ 
ried out. 

As to “civil service,” while there is some little 
squinting in its favor in the platform, Trus¬ 
ler was not present when it was read and no 
one need hesitate to vote for him fearing that 
he might feel bound. The fragments of the 
very considerable system which Mayor Denny 
has inaugurated can already in the mind’s eye 
be seen flying in all directions. No one need 
fear that there will be any civil service non¬ 
sense about Trusler. The boys in the trenches 
are going to be taken care of. 

We do not feel that any exhortation is neces¬ 
sary, for there is a good deal of enthusiasm. 
The Indianapolis Journalis already treating us 
to the thousand phases of Trusler’s exploit in 
refunding some bonds when every money¬ 
lender was hunting high and low for a good 
investment. It has not yet noted how he saved 
the city money hy refusing to allow |8 for 
tree planting at the city hospital. Cal Dar¬ 
nell, who, when in the council, had thirty 
henchmen quartered upon the city, is hoping 
for happy times again when Trusler comes in. 
All the hoys are for Trusler. Every heeler, 
every striker, every shouter, every political 
dead beat and every political scalawag is 
happy and hopeful and full of enthusiasm. 
To be sure, progress in directions exactly op¬ 
posite to Truslerism has been almost a tidal- 
wave in municipal affairs in this country the 
past year; but Indianapolis wants none of that; 
she wants to writhe in the grip of bosses 
and ward heelers. 

To this end one can not doubt that the man 
and the hour have arrived. At one fire sta¬ 
tion there was once a single democrat. Trus¬ 
ler demanded his dismissal on the ground that 
he was a “disturbing element.” At another 
time Trusler demanded the dismissal of a 
captain who had been twenty-two years in the 
fire department; 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


247 


“ Isn’t he a good republican?” was asked. 

“ Yes.” 

“ Isn’t he a good fireman?” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Well, why should he be dismissed?” 

“ Because,” said Trusler, “ he is no friend of 
mine.” 

No one can fail to be impressed with the 
promptness and vigor of this administrator as 
well as with the cogent reasoning which directs 
his movements in reducing the affairs of the 
city of Indianapolis to a business basis. It is 
only some Miss Nancy who will say that a 
boss shouldn’t own a town, and drive men out 
of employment whenever his feelings happen 
to be rutiled. 


THE INTEREST OF WAGE EARN¬ 
ERS IN CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 

BY HERBERT WELSH. 

Those with few resources standing be¬ 
tween them and want are the first to feel 
the evils of bad government, are the first to 
feel the weight of increased taxation, and 
are the most helpeless sufferers from it. 
The machine, the boss, and all other poi¬ 
sonous fruit of the spoils system, have their 
hands in the pockets of us all, but deepest and 
most ruinously in those of the workingman. 
Legislation for the betterment of the condition 
of the working-man or working-woman, for the 
protection of life and limb of themselves and 
their children in workshop and factory, can 
only be expected to have just treatment from 
members of state or city legislatures who are 
really representative of the people. Whatcan 
be expected of those who hold their seat as paid 
representatives of unscrupulous capital, nom¬ 
inated and elected to their offices by boss lead¬ 
ers, who, as Senator Quay said of David Martin, 
are in receipt of a corporation salary large 
enough to support themselves and their fami¬ 
lies? What sort of workingmen’s friends will 
such men as they are prove to be? 

For a typical spoils system legislature, look 
at that of Pennsylvania during the last ses¬ 
sion. Refused to grant money for needed har¬ 
bor improvements in the Delaware river, re¬ 
sulting already in the transfer of two large 
steamships to another port; no money for a 
system of forest management which would 
have resulted in saving ultimately millions 
to the state, but large numbers of new places, 
with large salaries attached, created for the 
benefit of spoils camp followers; an educa¬ 
tional bill killed, which would have brought 
Philadelphia’s school system from the village 
to the municipal epoch, and have placed it on 
a level with the progressive educational sys¬ 
tems of the country. An oil pipe line bill, 
framed wholly in the interest of the monop¬ 
oly, and confessedly deadly to public interests. 
This, and much more legislation of the same 
sort, is the direct fruit of spoils and machine 
politics, and these are the outgrowth, natural 
and inevitable, of the spoils system. The 
spoils system can only be destroyed by the 
rigid and widespread application of civil- 


service reform. The boss’s strength lies in his 
ability to bribe with office. The application 
of the merit system alone can deprive him of 
his bribery fund. Take that from him and 
his whole fabric of power topples and 
falls to ruin, and with it venal legislatures 
and city councils, or boards of aldermen. The 
rich soil that the corporation lobbyist works 
to such abundant fruit has become, for cap¬ 
ital without conscience, a sterile field. Can 
not all sincere, intelligent labor leaders see 
this truth plainly, and can they not see that 
it is the very first step along the path to bet¬ 
ter things? Let them be assured that among 
the so-called capitalistic class there are thou¬ 
sands of earne.'it men and women who are 
willing and anxious to join hands with them 
in redressing whatever real grievances they 
suffer, and in aiding them to attain a fuller 
participation in the varied fruits of this rich 
American land, and of this teeming modern civ¬ 
ilization. It is quite certain that there is much 
strong ground as yet unoccupied which may 
be jointly held by the laboring man and this 
class of his friends with manifest advantage to 
both parties. It is also clear that the direct road 
leading to this common territory is the reform 
of thecivil service, which will bringhonester,if 
not wholly honest, politics and the reform of 
great cities—after all but a branch of civil ser¬ 
vice reform—which will at once furnish a bet¬ 
ter, more economical, morecommodious, and in 
every way more fitting home for all of us, but 
more especially for the laboring man. In this 
latter great problem, not only must there be 
eliminated what direct losses he suffers 
through dishonest or inefficient management of 
city affairs, but also those which he suffers 
through failure to receive the fruits of wisely 
expended revenues, a thousand privileges and 
opportunities of nobler and richer living 
which might be his were the coming higher 
ideals of municipal life and municipal func¬ 
tions realized, and were the now squandered 
city resources wisely husbanded to obtain 
them. 


HOW THE MERIT SYSTEM IS MOV¬ 
ING ON. 

Col. Silas W. Burt, who established his 
loyalty to civil service reform when naval 
officer of the port of New York, and is 
now one of New York state’s civil service 
commissioners, sums up the late advances 
as follows: 

Civil service reform is making more rapid 
strides than ever. It is winning victories and 
gaining ground in nearly every direction. 
Look at Secretary Herbert’s action, confirm 
ing Secretary Tracy’s courageous order ex¬ 
tending the system in the navy yards. He has 
transferred an officer who failed properly to 
enforce the regulations, and has put another 
in his place who will enforce them. Look at 
the action of the commissioners of the District 
of Columbia, voluntarily seeking the exten¬ 
sion of the reform in their department. Look 
at the action of Public Printer Benedict, join¬ 
ing with his subordinates in asking that his 
office be brought under the rules of the civil 
service hoard. Look at Secretary Carlisle, at 
last manifesting an interest in the reform. 


and permitting the internal revenue depart¬ 
ment to come under its influence. Look at 
Secretary Morton putting the agricultural de¬ 
partment in close touch with the civil service 
system. Look at the rapid extension of the 
scope of examinations in this state and city. 
Witness the remarkable conversion of Public 
Works Commissioner Brookfield, who wants 
all the offices put under the civil service rules. 
Only in Massachusetts has the cause met with 
a defeat. There the legislature has passed 
over the governor’s veto a bill practically 
giving every veteran an office who brings a 
certificate of good character from two citizens, 
an act absolutely subversive of civil service 
reform and proffiictive of bad government. 
Everywhere else the reform is growing. There 
has been no reaction against it, and there is 
no prospect of any. I believe that by the end 
of his term President Cleveland will have 
put under civil service rules every office which 
it is possible with the present law to subject 
to the system. 

THE BATTLE OF THE BOSSES. 

“/ am a candidate for the chairmanship of the 
republican state committee, and I will feel greatly ob¬ 
liged to you if you will aid in sending friendly del¬ 
egates fratn your county to the ajyproaching state 
convention. If your delegates are elected, please do 
me the favor personally to see them and request them 
to co-operate with me in the convention. Any as¬ 
sistance you may render in this matter will be fully 
appreciated. 1 trust I may see you in Harrisburg 
a day or two prior to August S8, when I will have 
the opportunity to meet you personally. 

Thine very truly, 

“M. S. QUAY." 

Quay has challenged the republican party 
of Pennsylvania to an open contest as to 
whether he shall be recognized as its absolute 
dictator. Having bossed the legislature, he 
now announces his candidacy for chairman of 
the state committee. The present incumbent 
has made an excellent record, and is entitled 
to re-election. But he is a member of Gov. 
Hastings’s administration, anfl as Quay has 
quarrelled with the executive, the boss insists 
that the governor’s supporter must be “turned 
down.” The issue is made as sharply and 
clearly as possible. It is simply whether 
Quay shall be invested with supreme control 
of the organization. The opponents of the 
boss show more readiness to fight than usual, 
and they seem stronger than ever before. In¬ 
deed, the surface indications at the start are 
most unfavorable to Quay. But he has won¬ 
derful resources for such a struggle, and he 
has won more than once when public senti¬ 
ment in his party was strongly against him. 
Hitherto, however, he has usually kept more 
or less under cover, and he loses certain ad¬ 
vantages when he makes the contest in an 
open field. If he does succeed, in the face of all 
the disadvantages that confront him, his vic¬ 
tory will mark the lowest depth that Pennsyl¬ 
vania politics has reached.— New York Even¬ 
ing Post. 

“One of the most striking and suggestive 
features of the present contest in this state,” 
says the Philadelphia Press (rep.), “is the ex¬ 
traordinary zeal with which the democratic 
papers have espoused the case of Senator 











248 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Quay. They are unanimous, earnest and un¬ 
tiring on his behalf. They are his ablest and 
most eager champions, and both their edito¬ 
rial and news columns are devoted every day 
to promoting his success.” 

Unexpected opposition has developed at 
Wilkes-Barre, Pa., against Senator Quay. The 
two leading republican dailies—the Record 
and Times —came out in strong articles yester¬ 
day against him. 

The meekness with which so intelligent a 
constituency as the republicans of Pennsylva¬ 
nia have long submitted to the dictator¬ 
ship of men like Cameron and Quay has been 
a mystery to the country at large. That they 
retain their power is due to the strength of 
the party machine which has long existed in 
Pennsylvania. Describing the operations of 
this machine, the Philadelphia Evening Tele¬ 
graph says: 

‘‘In Pennsylvania the system of practical 
politics has been established in every county 
and in every election district. The humblest 
political worker at each point knows what is 
expected of him. Every atom of official spoil is 
kept for distribution where it will do the most good. 
A laborer can not secure the whitewashing of a 
school-house fence without giving allegiance to the 
local representative of a higher political power. 
Men can not be elected to the smallest office until 
they have signed away their liberty and given 
solemn pledges that they will support those tvho assume 
to direct in all siich matters. School directors, poor 
directors, and township, county and borough officers 
are all thus kept in line. No man thinks of 
making a successful effort to reach the legisla¬ 
ture until he has received indorsement as a 
candidate. So it is all the way through, the 
people meanwhile going through the perform¬ 
ance of their duties at the primary and gen¬ 
eral elections in a perfunctory way.” 

Quay’s system of politics has been founded 
on a purely commercial basis. He deals m a 
wholesale way with men who can control large num¬ 
bers of men or large sections of territory. He intro¬ 
duced the principles of the trust or combine into 
politics. He did not, like the Camerons, build 
up a personal following. He purchased the 
support of the leaders or bosses of cities and 
counties, and as long as the funds of spoils, 
patronage, and privileges held out his leader¬ 
ship was never seriously disputed. 

* * * 

Senator Quay had undisputed control in the 
recently adjourned legislature, and he used it 
to increase salaries and offices to an extent un¬ 
paralleled in our history, little thinking that 
he was thereby placing powerful weapons in 
the hands of those who would use them for his 
undoing. When these plans on the state treasury 
were being put through, the senator and governor 
were on good terms. Some of the more flagrant 
instances of this extravagant and uncalled 
increase are to be found in the creation of a 
superior court with seven justices at $7,500 
per annum each; the new department of pub¬ 
lic grounds, with a superintendent at $3,000 a 


year, and a number of new assistants, taking 
the place of a small body of men who had effi¬ 
ciently looked after the capitol grounds for a 
comparatively small outlay. Now we have a 
new department of agriculture, which will 
take $98,000 to run for two years. The Aud¬ 
itor-general had to have a new deputy at 
$3,000 not because he required more help, but 
because a place was needed for a politically 
useful man. The secretary of internal affairs 
secured a new deputy at $3,000 a year. Con¬ 
trary to the constitution (which is said not to 
count between friends “on the hill”), the ad¬ 
jutant-general’s salary was increased from 
$2,500 to $4,000 a year. And so we could go 
down the list until an increase of a million 
dollars in appropriations for two years could 
be accounted for. 

Among the beneficiaries of this prodigality 
was B. F. Gilkeson, who had been state chair¬ 
man for several years, and was generally re¬ 
garded as a loyal Quay man, inasmuch as he 
had been a persistent office-holder by the grace 
of Quay. Now we find him pitted against his 
benefactor, who has become a candidate for 
for his position as state chairman. All the men 
placed in office by the governor under the authority 
of these various bills, all of tvhich received his execu¬ 
tive approval, have with few exceptions come out on 
the governor's side, he having just entered on his 
his four years' term, and having that many years of 
power and favors before him. The governor has 
been making the most of his exalted position and ex¬ 
tensive powers, and, guided by the adroit Magee 
of Pittsburgh and Martin of Philadelphia, has 
opened a warfare upon Quay and his control that 
bids fair to be sticcessful. 

Philadelphia and Pittsburgh will send prac¬ 
tically unanimous administration or anti- 
Quay delegates to the convention. Bank-Ex¬ 
aminer Gilkeson is expected to deliver Bucks 
county; Adjutant-General Stewart, Montgom¬ 
ery county; Adjutant-General McCormick, 
Lycoming county and some of the neighbor¬ 
ing counties. Superior Court Justices (just ap¬ 
pointed) Rice, Willard, Orlady and Reeder 
mean Luzerne, Lackawanna, Huntingdon, and 
Northampton counties in the administration 
column, and so we could go on down the list and 
show how every gubernatorial appointee has 
been brought into line and received orders for 
the delivery of the needed delegates. 

Quay is handicapped in that he has no fed¬ 
eral, state or municipal patronage at his dis¬ 
posal. He has only his great experience, 
prestige, and undoubted power as an organ¬ 
izer to rely upon, and his strength among the 
protected manufacturers.— Philadelphia dispatch 
New York Evening Post, July 4- 


Boss Quay’s telegram concerning the con¬ 
duct of an ex state senator, who had long fol¬ 
lowed in the Quay procession, is an apt expres¬ 
sion of his sense of what is due to a boss. This 
state senator, having decided to support cer¬ 
tain candidates before the next republican con¬ 
vention who are not supported by Quay, wrote 
a very friendly note to the latter announcing 
the fact. On receiving it. Quay was so shocked 


at this exhibition of human depravity that he 
immediately telegraphed: “This is the coldest- 
blooded mercenary stab I have encountered 
in this campaign of assassination.” Accord¬ 
ing to Quay’s ideas this man was disloyal. It 
is rank disloyalty to disobey a superior to 
whom allegiance is due. Quay considers him¬ 
self the superior, and all other Pennsylvanians 
who are not democrats his vassals. 

When Mayor Warwick declared that he 
was with Governor Hastings in the contest 
against Senator Quay he evidently meant 
that he would give the anti-Quay people 
more than mere passive support. The mayor 
has been active in politics for nearly a score 
of years, and he knows if a leader in a fight 
does not use all the influence at his command 
his opponents will, and he will run the risk of 
defeat. 

In summing up the standing of the various 
wards in the contest between Quay and his 
opponents the twenty-third and thirty fifth 
wards, which form the twenty-third district, 
have by some been placed in the doubtful 
column. Yesterday Select Councilman Byram, 
of the twenty-third ward, said he met David Martin 
and Mayor Warwick in the latter’s office by ap¬ 
pointment. According to his story, he told tdiem that 
if they expected the delegates from that district to the 
state convention to oppose Quay he would have to be 
recognized as the leader of the twenty-third district, 
and his ward committee recognized by the city com¬ 
mittee, and he should hereafter distribute the patron¬ 
age. 

He said Mr. Martin, speaking for the or¬ 
ganization, promised him the first two de¬ 
mands, and Mayor Warwick assured him that 
no appointments would be made from the 
twenty-third ward without his approval. This 
was satisfactory to Mr. Byram, who named 
as delegates from the twenty-third himself 
and Dr. Samuel Bolton, and he said that 
George A. Castor, of the thirty-fifth ward, 
could name the third delegate, who will be Se¬ 
lect Councilman Joseph H. Brown. Shortly 
afterward the mayor approved the appoint¬ 
ments of Assistant Foreman John Duffield as 
foreman of engine No. 14, and Thomas Dyson, 
hoseman, to succeed Duffield as assistant fore¬ 
man. “7 have been trying to get these appointments 
since January,” said Mr. Byram after they wei'e 
announced, “but I have them now. I would not 
deal with any one else but the mayor-.''—City and 
State, July 4- 

Quay is looking to the national convention 
and that is why he is so anxious to get con¬ 
trol of the party machinery. Hastings and 
those back of him also have an eye on the 
next presidential race, and that’s the milk in 
the cocoanut. Each is playing for higher 
stakes than the petty chairmanship of a state 
committee. 

There has been a great deal said during the 
present struggle about the ingratitude of Gov¬ 
ernor Hastings toward Senator Quay. This sort 
of talk emanates from sources ignorant of the 
political history of the 1 ast decade,or so blinded 
by zeal in the Quay cause as to be unable to 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


249 


see the facts as they stand out on the record of 
the times. No man in politics in Pennsylva¬ 
nia is less indebted to Quay than the govern¬ 
or. Previous to the Delamater disaster (which 
thousands of republicans have a habit of re¬ 
calling) Quay played fast and loose with Hast¬ 
ings, and gave him to understand that he 
(Quay) had no preference, and that Delama¬ 
ter had no more claim to the nomination 
than Hastings. Thus encouraged, the Belle- 
fonte man went vigorously into the canvass, 
and secured the popular indorsement for the 
high and honorable office which he now fills. 
In the meantime, however. Quay was plan¬ 
ning to “ow'n a governor,” and the forced 
nomination of Delamater was the result. Sub¬ 
sequent history is too recent to need recount¬ 
ing. Last year the nomination and election of 
Hastings could not have been prevented by a 
hundred Quays, but the followers of the Bea¬ 
ver man would have the thoughtless citizen 
believe that it was all due to the favor of their 
political idol. As soon as Hastings was elected 
the fawning of his enemies commenced that 
thrift might follow. In the bigness of his heart 
he overlooked their transgressions and per¬ 
mitted them to enter the land which their 
deeds should have forever excluded them from 
They were given of the fat of the land, but the 
Quayites were not content. They wanted the 
earth. In their minds Hastings was not wor¬ 
thy to be mentioned in the same breath as the 
great man from Beaver, and so they plotted to 
dethrone the governor who was placed over 
them by the largest popular vote in the history 
of the state. For several weeks and months 
they conspired together to bring odium upon 
the official head of the party, and neither day 
nor night did they cease their plotting. Fin¬ 
ally they became bold in their scheming, and 
the investigation of the alleged wrongs of Phil¬ 
adelphia was agreed upon as a clever way to 
attack the administration through its support¬ 
ers in the metropolis. 

Frank Willing Leach’s resignation of a six- 
thousand-dollar position in order that he 
might be free to help Senator Quay is com¬ 
mendable. His example is not being emu¬ 
lated with that alacrity that one might ex¬ 
pect to see by the Quay appointees of the gov¬ 
ernor at the capitol. On the contrary, the 
Quay politicians who owe their political jobs 
to the governor are holding on and secretly 
doing all they can to discredit the administra¬ 
tion. Of course, there is no ingratitude in 
this! It has been suggested here that Mr. 
Leach’s anxiety to engage in the fight against 
the governor comes from his failure to land 
in the position now filled by Secretary Reeder. 
—City and Stale, July 18. 


Reviewing the Quay-Hastings conflict, the 
Philadelphia Press (rep.) says: “The results up 
to date are decisive. The campain has gone 
overwhelmingly for Governor Hastings. Since 
the announcement of Senator Quay’s candi¬ 
dacy for chairman every delegate elected has 
been against him.” 


District-Attorney Graham is a much over¬ 
worked man, according to his own account, 
for whenever he is criticised for delaying the 
prosecution of criminals who have influential 
political friends, he excuses his remissness by 
pleading the pressure of work in the district- 
attorney’s office. But he is never too bu.sy 
about public business to prevent his under¬ 
taking any private practice that offers profit. 
While he may not have time to discover long- 
suspended indictments in the capacious pigeon¬ 
holes of his office, he has had abundant time 
to attend to the receivership of the Iron Hall, 
an office whose fees are greater than many 
leading lawyers can earn, and within the past 
ten days he has not found his official duties 
too onerous to prevent him from giving very 
influential assistance to the Pennsylvania 
Steam Heat, Light, and Power Company in 
obtaining exceedingly valuable franchises 
from the city without cost. Perhaps it was 
this addition to the demands upon his time 
that prevented him from finding time to take 
up the DeCamp matter until he found himself 
forced to it by citizens who felt that they had 
some rights as well as the politicians. Dis¬ 
trict-Attorney Graham is a man of singularly 
diversified abilities. He is equally able to ad¬ 
dress a sunday-school or nominate a ring can¬ 
didate in a political convention; he can prose¬ 
cute an obscure criminal as skillfully as he 
can pigeon hole the indictments against those 
whose political friends are known to him, and 
he can make a rousing speech against corrupt 
municipal governmrtit as effectively as he can 
lobby for a franchise-grabbing corporation. 
Lest the people of Philadelphia should fear 
the loss of such an accomplished public offi¬ 
cial, it is well to mention that Mr. Graham 
has already announced himself as a candidate 
for re election upon the expiration of his pres¬ 
ent term in January next .—City and State 
June 27. 


Philadelphia’s experience in lighting its 
streets by electricity has been thoroughly 
typical of current American methods of 
dealing with important municipal problems. 
From time to time, important and valuable 
franchises have been granted to various local 
electric lighting companies and extensive 
contracts given to them for public lighting- 
Then these companies have since combined 
and formed a trust for their mutual aid and 
protection, which trust controls all the elec¬ 
tric lighting in the city and charges Phila¬ 
delphia a higher price for its electric lights 
than is paid in any other city in the country. 

While nominally and ostensibly these com¬ 
panies are independent of each other, actually 
they have reached an agreement or under¬ 
standing by which no one company will bid 
in the territory of any other company, its 
territory in turn not being invaded by any of 
the others. 

It may be interesting to the readers of City 
and Slate to study the personnel of these com¬ 
panies and see to what extent bosses and ben¬ 
eficiaries control them. The following facts 


are from the last volume of Pennsylvania 
Securities, a standard work published from 
year to year, giving such detailed informa¬ 
tion regarding the various corporations doing 
business in the state of Pennsylvania as can 
be obtained. 

The principal electric lighting corporations 
of the city are The Manufacturers,’ The 
Southern, The Powelton, The Diamond, The 
Northern, The West End, The Surburban, 
The Columbia, The German-town and The 
Wissahickon. 

The president'of the Manufacturers’ Company, 
according to our authority, is James Work, assistant 
commissioner of highways. The secretary is William 
J. Roney, receiver of taxes. The board of directors 
is composed of James Work, William Emsley, David 
Martin, Charles A. Porter, James Richie, Jr., Will¬ 
iam Bardsley and James McCormick. 

The personnel of the officers and directors of the 
Diamond Electric Company is Interesting. It has 
for its president Hon. Charles A. Porter, state sena' 
tor and contractor-in-chief of the city of Philadelphia 
and, until recently, chairman of the republican city 
campaign committee. Mr. Porter enjoys with David 
Martin the distinction of being a potent influence, if 
not the most potent influence at present in Philadel¬ 
phia politics, and during the past few years he has 
been so successful in bidding for public contracts that 
nearly %i>,000,000 of work has been awarded him within 
that time. Associated with Mr. Porter on the board 
of directors of this company are William J. Latta, 
the Pennsylvania Railroad legislative agent, and in 
whose offices the conferences about the Pennsyl¬ 
vania Steam Heat and Power Company ordinances 
were held; George A. Castor, the thirty-fifth wardpo- 
litical leader, and aspirant for congressional hon¬ 
ors, and David Martin, who during the last five or 
six years, without any known occupation other than 
politics, has had transferred to him $1,50,000 worth of 
real estate. How much personalty he has acquired 
within this period we are not informed and have 
no means of ascertaining. Henry J.McCarthy, just 
appointed to the superior court bench by Governor 
Hastings, is also a director in this company. 

The Powelton Electric Company is officered by 
William J. Latta as president and John B. Stauffer 
as secretary and treasurer, Mr. Stauffer holding a 
similar position with the Diamond Electric Com¬ 
pany. Among the other directors of this company 
Senator Porter, State Representative Samuel Crothers, 
William S. Kimball, C. H. Clark, Jr. 

Select Councilman Henry Clay, who is also a lead¬ 
ing member of the Electrical Com mittee of Councils, 
is president of the Northern Electric Light and 
Power Company, and Charles O. Kruger, who is the 
treasurer of the Electric Trust, is the transfer agent 
of this company. This company’s forces in addi¬ 
tion to these officers is managed by a board com¬ 
posed of Henry Lewis, Peter A. B. Widener, A. J. 
DeCamp, John Lowber Welsh and S. Y. Hotchkiss. 

About the Germantown and Wissahickon com¬ 
panies our authority. The Pennsylvania Securities, 
gives us no information and but very little about 
the Southern Electric Light Company, further than 
its president is James Mack, the well-known con¬ 
tractor. 

After giving the name of Thomas Dolan as its 
president, and A. J. DeCamp as general manager of 
the Brush Electric Light Company, our authority 
says: 

“The board of directors in 1881 was as follows; 
Henry Lewis, William Wood, J. N. Williamson, J. 
B. Altemus, John Lowber Welsh, John Wanamaker, 
Thomas Dolan, A. J. Juillard, A. G. Payne and 
William Arrott, the names of the later boards hav¬ 
ing been refused.’’ 

The president of the West End Electric Company 
is Albert Baltz, and its secretary ex-Common Coun¬ 
cilman John Q. Taxis. Senator Porter is a member 
of the hoard of directors of this company. 

Common Councilman Peter E. Costello is president 
of the Surburban Electric Company. Associated 










250 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


with him on the board of directors we find Magis¬ 
trate T. W. South, Editor Hugh A. Mullen, of the 
Sunday World, Hamilton Disston, Senator Porter 
and William J. Latta. 

A.J. DeCamp’s office, &t the southwest corner of 
Tenth and Chestnut streets, is the headquarters of 
the electric lighting Interests of the city, for we 
find located here the offices of the following com¬ 
panies: The United States Electric Light and 
Power Company, The Penn Electric Light Com¬ 
pany, The Brush Electric Light Company, The 
Philadelphia Electric Light Company, The Under¬ 
ground Electric Conduit Company and The Under¬ 
ground Electric Light and Power Company, 

Concerning the first-named, our authority says: 
“Its capital is 11,000,000, with $100,000 paid In,” and 
that “A.J.DeCamp is general manager,” all other 
information being refused. It isgenerally believed 
that the Penn Electric Light Company, of which 
A. J. DeCamp is president, is controlled by the 
Electric Trust. On its board of directors are Select 
Councilman Henry Clay, Common Councilman A. J. 
De Camp, twentieth ward leader, and traction agent, 
David H. Lane, James McManes, William D. Marks, 
president of the Edison Electric Light Company, 
and Amos R. Little. This company owns the elec¬ 
tric conduits used by the Electric Trust. The state¬ 
ment for June 29,1892, shows a deficit of $34,934 after 
the deduction of all available assets. 

All we can learn about the Philadelphia Electric 
Light Company is that Its capital is $200,000, all 
paid in, and that its president is W. S. Pettit; its 
treasurer, Clement Newbold, and its general mana¬ 
ger A. J. DeCamp. Concerning the Underground 
Electric Company and the Underground Electric 
Light and Power Company, all information is re¬ 
fused. 

In looking over the boards of these various com¬ 
panies we find that Senator Charles .4. Porter ispres- 
ident of the Diamond Electric Company, and a director 
in the Suburban, Powelton, Manufacturers' and West 
End Electric Companies. William J. Latta is presi¬ 
dent of the Powelton Electric Light Company, and a 
director in the Diamond and Suburban Companies. 
David Martin is a director in the Diamond and Manu¬ 
facturers' Electric Companies. 

Councilman A.J.DeCamp is general manager of 
the Brush Electric Light Company, general manager 
of the United States Electric Light and Power Com¬ 
pany, director in the Northern Electric lAght and 
Power Company, president and director of the Penn 
Electric Light Company, general manager of the Phila¬ 
delphia Electric Light Company.—City and State, 
July 11. 


PLATT’S MACHINE. 

According to the announcements of appoint¬ 
ments made recently by the capitol commis¬ 
sion, two architects, two time-keepers, and one 
clerk have been given office in violation of 
the civil service law.— Albany Dispatch, N. Y. 
Evening Post, June 24. 

* ♦ • 

With a brief intermission for luncheon, the 
capitol commission held a session lasting from 
9:30 o’clock this morning until 7 o’clock this 
evening. The time was given up to scrutiniz¬ 
ing the names of persons urged for appoint¬ 
ment on the capitol construction, under the 
$400,000 which the Aldridge republican ma¬ 
chine has to expend before the contract work 
goes into effect. Never have the reins been drawn 
so tightly, even laborers and tool-boys being required 
to have strong political indorsement of the right 
stainp. As a result of to-day’s labors, 175 men 
were appointed, swelling the total to 600. 

Action was also taken to divest ex-Commis- 
sioner Perry of every bit of power. Under 
the laiv he is to continue as superintendent. 
Nothing is said of a deputy, so, to get around the law. 


Hariy Stevens, one of Superintendent Aldndge's 
Syracuse workers, was appointed general foreman. 
To further hamper Mr. Perry, Col. L. V. S. 
Matteson, of Oswego, was made foreman of 
laborers. It was Col. Matteson who proved to 
be so valuable a witness against Mr. Perry at 
the investigations by the republican legisla¬ 
ture last winter. 

The state canals, the capitol construction, and the 
capitol maintenance departments are all now in com¬ 
plete control of the Platt machine.—Albany Dis¬ 
patch, New York Times, July IS. 

* * * 

The first hand-to-hand tussle between the 
Platt and anti-Platt forces inside the republi¬ 
can party, which has come off in the prelimi¬ 
nary campaign for the control of the next re¬ 
publican state convention, resulted in a Platt 
defeat. It occurred in Washington county a 
few days ago. Both sides fought nobly, the 
Platt forces having the assistance of a special 
force of deputy sheriffs sworn in for the occa¬ 
sion. Several leaders on both sides, one weigh¬ 
ing 265 pounds, were tumbled off the plat¬ 
form in the convention hall during the open¬ 
ing exercises, in the eagerness of the two 
sides to obtain possession of the chair; and 
when the table which was to serve as the 
chairman’s desk was smashed, the deputy 
sheriffs promply seized the legs thereof and 
wielded them vigorously on the heads of the 
anti-Platt forces as symbols of their office. 
One man’s hair and whiskers were plucked 
freely from him, and one leader who “lit on 
his head” from the platform was taken out 
for medical aid. This opening scrimmage was 
brought on by the conduct of the leader of the 
Platt forces who was holding the hat in which 
the ballots for chairman were to be depos¬ 
ited. He attempted to keep the hat be¬ 
hind him when an anti-Platt delegate 
sought to deposit a ballot, and to hold it 
in front of him when a Platt delegate ap¬ 
proached. This method of “regulating the 
count” was not allowed to succeed. After a 
struggle of many hours a vote was finally re¬ 
corded, when it appeared that the anti-Platt 
faction had a majority of 6 votes in a total 
of 120. An anti-Platt delegation was chosen 
to the state convention, and with tattered 
clothing and bandaged heads the convention 
adjourned. The Platt forces fought nobly, 
and the boss ought to reward them for their 
pluck and ingenuity in holding high the ban¬ 
ner against numerical odds.— New York Evening 
Post, June 22. 

* * * 

One of the politicians who called on Ex- 
Senator Platt at the Oriental Hotel yesterday 
was State Committeeman William Barnes, of 
Albany. Mr. Barnes had encouraging news for 
the Tioga man, for he thinks the republican 
factional troubles in Albany have been settled, 
and settled in such a way as to leave the Platt 
men in control of the political situation 
there. In bringing about this situation, it became 
necessary to give the supenntendency of the Albany 
penitentiary to a man who had formerly been op¬ 
posed to the Barnes element, but this was done on a 


canipromise basis, by which the Platt men get the 
patronage—about 200 places.—New York Times, 
July 15. 

♦ * • 

Supreme Court Judge Herrick to-day denied 
the motion of John W. McClelland for a man¬ 
damus compelling the comptroller to pay his 
salary as clerk in the canal collector’s office. 
McClelland was an appointee of Superintend¬ 
ent of Public Works Aldridge. When he ap¬ 
plied for his first month’s pay Controller Rob¬ 
erts refused it upon the ground that he had not 
complied with civil service rules and had 
failed to pass an examination. The manda¬ 
mus was then applied for. Justice Herrick 
holds that the employes in the department of 
public works, the state prison department, and 
also clerks of the prisons, who are appointed 
by the state controller, come within the pro¬ 
visions of the civil service laws.— New York 
Times, July IS. 

FAMILY REVELATIONS. 

Milholland. —“Who is Jake Patterson, this 
so-called republican? Jake’s record is closely 
allied to that of Tammany. Why, I could 
specify things in his career which every one 
who knows anything about politics would rec¬ 
ognize as familiar. His name is a sufficient 
by-word not to descend to sickening details. 
In this matter of fighting the major, Jake has 
shown his characteristic cunning and effront¬ 
ery. As I said, his record stands out boldly 
and conjointly with Tammany’s.” 

» *- » 

The Buffalo E.rpress (republican) of the 
Platt Fassett contest in Chemung county : 

It will show to what extent Platt’s dem¬ 
ocratic allies are able to help him in his ef¬ 
forts to disrupt the republican party. Help 
from these Hill-Tammany sources is the di¬ 
rect result of Platt’s course last winter in aid¬ 
ing the Tammany democrats in an unsuccess¬ 
ful attempt to prevent the confirmation of 
Silas W. Burt, an anti-Tammany democrat, 
as state civil-service commissioner. It ex¬ 
plains why Platt brought discredit upon the 
republican legislature in order to defeat the 
police-magistrates bill, because his Tammany 
friends didn't want it. It explains why he 
tried to have a new election in the Greater 
New York next fall, so that Mayor Strong 
would be legislated out of office, and Tam¬ 
many would have a chance to get control 
again two years sooner. It explains why 
Platt’s puppets in the senate helped the Tam¬ 
many men to kill the bill which took from 
the Tammany surrogate of New York some 
important appointments which properly be¬ 
longed with the state controller. It explains 
why police reorganization was prevented by a 
combination of Platt and Tammany senators. 
It explains why the Tammany district attor¬ 
ney, John R. Fellows, was given the appoint¬ 
ment of two more assistants, at $7,500 a year 
each, so Colonel Fellows would have more 
time to repair Tammany fences. 

» » ♦ 

Cornelius N. Bliss, Chairman Republican 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


251 


State Committee.—The present methods of 
government of the party in the Empire State 
practically prohibit any voice to the great 
body of republicans in party councils. The 
private party man is expected to contribute 
to campaign funds, to vote for candidates as¬ 
signed for his support by prearranged conven¬ 
tions, and otherwise to hold his peace. There 
is no mistaking the sentiment which now pre¬ 
vails, i. e., that republicans demand fair and 
open discussion within party lines; the elec¬ 
tion of representative conventions; and the 
nomination of proper candidates, who shall be 
free from the control of individual bosses. 
The indefensible action of certain members of 
the state senate, who are known to have been 
under such control during the last session of 
the legislature, has given emphasis to the de¬ 
mand of the masses. 

» » * 

From Address to Republicans by State Re¬ 
publican Club, July 31.—Party control con¬ 
fined to a few individuals creates an oligarchy. 
When that control is reduced still further to 
the will of a single person, it is simply an au¬ 
tocracy. Neither of these has any place in 
our system and form of government, and both 
are in deadly hostility to the spirit and pur¬ 
pose of the republican party. Under the re¬ 
strictions imposed by such leadership and 
control patriotic enthusiasm dies away in in¬ 
difference, and, instead of healthy growth and 
a widening area of influence, the party falls 
into corruption and decay. 

It is because this tendency to the centraliza¬ 
tion and concentration of power in a few 
hands is a constant factor in all political or¬ 
ganizations; because in the republican party 
it grows and develops only as the voting masses 
are indifferent to the details of party manage¬ 
ment, and because it can be checked and re¬ 
pressed only by the awakening of the voters 
from such indifierence, that the Republican 
Slate Club of the state of New York has been 
organized upon a permanent foundation with 
the single view of enlisting the interest of the 
great body of voters in everything that con¬ 
cerns the welfare of the party or the adminis¬ 
tration of its affairs. 

With the whole parly so interested, with a common 
cause and a common meeting-ground for republi¬ 
cans from all parts of the stale, there will be neither 
oligarchy nor autocracy; no deals nor dickers with 
the enemy for corrupt purposes or personal aggrand¬ 
izement; no usurpation of the party’s prestige nor 

prostitxilion of its power. 

♦ ^ ♦ 

Commissioner of Public Works Brookfield. 
—A single Incident during the closing days of 
the canvass indicated to me the tremendous 
enthusiasm the state organization, as repre¬ 
sented at the Fifth Avenue hotel, had for the 
success of the county ticket. It occurred when, 
in my capacity as president of the county 
committee, I called upon the chairman of the 
state committee and asked for assistance. His 
reply was: “Oh, Grace has control of this whole 
situation.” 

“That is the situation of affairs, is it?” I 
asked. “Then you have no money for us?” 


“Not a cent,” said he. 

I then said: “Hackett, we will elect this 
county ticket and give the candidate for gov¬ 
ernor the largest vote ever polled for a repub¬ 
lican in this county, and we will not owe any¬ 
thing to the state committee, either, will we?” 

From this view he did not dissent, and my 
visit ended. 

I have also read several times that Mr. 
Platt “consented” to the nomination of Mayor 
Strong. This would be ridiculous if it were 
not impudent. I was president of the repub¬ 
lican county committee at the time, and feel 
that I know something about the circum¬ 
stances that led up to the union movement and 
the nomination of Col. Strong. In my judg¬ 
ment there was no time when Mr. Platt and 
his followers could have defeated the nomina¬ 
tion of any one recommended by the commit¬ 
tee of seventy. At the first general confer¬ 
ence an effort was made by those allied with 
Mr. Platt to break up the conference. It did 
not succeed. This fact can be testified to by at 
least twenty-five men who were present. 

» * * 

Although no caucuses have yet been held in 
Monroe county the politicians of both parties 
have been on the alert for weeks, and mid¬ 
summer sensations have not been lacking. 

The coming contest will be of state as well 
as of local interest, because it loill be the first seri¬ 
ous effort of the opponents of Superintendent of Pub¬ 
lic IFoJ'As Aldndge to wrest from him the leader¬ 
ship of the republicans of Monroe, over whom 
he held an almost undisputed sway for half a dozen 
years before Mr. Platt promoted him to be dispenser 
of canal patronage at Albany. 

It is worth noting that this fight against 
Boss Aldridge is not confined to the republi¬ 
can ranks This issue will be largely the 
same in tbe democratic caucuses, where the 
younger members of the party, united in the 
Flower City democracy, are preparing to make 
another effort to gain control of the parly organiza¬ 
tion, which has too often been used as an aid to Mr. 
Aldridge's own machine. * * With this state 

of affairs, the interesting rumor is gain¬ 
ing circulation that Mr. Aldridge expects 
his democratic friends to win their caucus 
battle and nominate J. Miller Kelly for 
mayor. In this event it is believed by 
many that Aldridge might secretly throw his 
strength to Kelly, who has always been an 
Aldridge democrat, receiving in return for 
his treachery to Lewis continued control of 
the executive board, to which two out of three 
members are to be elected. Both Aldermen 
Tracy and Kelly represent democratic wards, 
and their wards gave Aldridge handsome ma¬ 
jorities for mayor over Col. Greenleaf at the 
spring election of 1894. This betrayal of 
Greenleaf was abundantly rewarded when Su¬ 
perintendent Aldridge appointed the Roches¬ 
ter bridge tenders and other canal employes 
this spring, for a dozen of the democratic 
henchmen of Tracy and Kelly were re-ap¬ 
pointed in preference to republicans who were 
clamoring for jobs .—Rochester Dispatch, New 
York Times, July 28. 


The warfare in the republican ranks in 
New York county is growing more bitter as 
the time for the selection of delegates to the 
state convention approaches. 

The machinery for calling the primaries, 
for selecting election day oflScers, and for do¬ 
ing the great bulk of the other work of the 
county committee is in the hands of the Platt 
men .—New York Times, July 14. 

» * * 

It is evident that Platt and his followers 
are now devoting themselves to controlling 
nominations, and are paying no attention to 
the mass of voters, who will be called upon to 
support candidates. They are assuming that 
if the candidates are theirs, they can command 
the party vote, which will be suflBcient for 
their purpose. There seems to be no hope of 
a defeat of Platt’s bossism through opposition 
in his own party. That opposition is vigorous 
only in spots; elsewhere it is timid and time¬ 
serving. In sentiment it probably includes a 
a majority of the party, but it is the inactive 
majority, while the active and aggressive mi¬ 
nority runs the organization and makes nomi¬ 
nations, and when these are made tbe major¬ 
ity is expected to lapse into “loyal” acqui¬ 
escence .—New York Times, July 30. 


TWEED AND HIS RING. 

The history of the bold and unscrupulous 
municipal robber and Tammany ringmaster 
who died in disgrace in Ludlow Street jail, 
this city, about twenty years ago, is reverted 
to by Mr. E. J. Edwards in an article, in Mc¬ 
Clure’s for July, on “The Rise and Overthrow 
of the Tweed Ring.” Mr. Edwards has grouped 
in this sketch all the scoundrels and all the 
appalling incidents of that villainous reign of 
corruption with dramatic effect, tracing the 
life of the execrably famous “boss” from the 
early fifties, when he was a loafer in the en¬ 
gine house of one of the old volunteer fire 
companies, where he first learned the tricks 
of the primary and came to know what could 
be accomplished with a gang of roughs in 
what was called “politics,” until, a fugitive 
from justice, he was captured in Spain and 
brought back to his prison cell. 

Tweed made office “pay” from the very 
start. In 1863 he was a poor man. In 1868 
he was a millionaire; and this was before the 
formation of the Tweed ring. He was then a 
member of the board of supervisors, which had 
the power of auditing accounts, and he was 
thus able to secure privileges which were 
frauds upon the city. Mr. Edwards thus re¬ 
counts some of his acts : 

“He got control of a little newspaper, and 
he secured the passage of a bill by the legisla¬ 
ture making this obscure sheet the official or¬ 
gan of the city government, and it received 
over a million dollars a year for simply print¬ 
ing the proceedings of the common council. 
He established a printing company, whose 
main business was the printing of blank forms 
and vouchers, for which in one year two mil¬ 
lion eight hundred thousand dollars was 










252 THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


charged. Another item was a stationer’s com¬ 
pany, which furnished all the stationery used 
in the public institutions and departments, 
and this company alone received some three 
millions a year. On an order for six reams of 
cap paper, the same amount of letter paper, 
two reams of note paper, two dozen pen-hold¬ 
ers, four small ink-bottles, and a few other ar¬ 
ticles, all worth not more than fifty dollars, a 
bill of ten thousand dollars was rendered and 
paid. Tweed employed certain persons as the 
executive heads of these companies who were 
also upon the city pay-rolls, some receiving 
money for work never done.” 

The Tweed ring was formed in 1869, and 
that it immediately began operations was made 
evident by the subsequent celebrated investi¬ 
gation. The earliest in the list of county 
warrants bearing indication of fraud bore 
date.Ianuary 11, 1869; and of eleven million 
two hundred and fifty thousand dollars of 
fraudulent warrants afterward discovered, 
three million eight hundred thousand dollars 
were issued in the year 1869. 

Under the sub heading of “the Americus 
club,” Mr. Edwards writes as follows: 

“Tweed and his associates were now living, 
with vulgar display, in the most princely fash¬ 
ion. Tweed himself maintained two costly 
houses in Fifth avenue, and kept expensive 
stables. He had organized within Tammany 
hall, for social purposes, what was called the 
Americus club. A summer home for the club 
was established on Long Island sound, at 
Greenwich, Conn., and money was spent like 
water in building and furnishing. Tweed 
ordered from Belgium a great carpet, all 
woven in one piece, of exquisite design and 
workmanship, so perfectly made, that after 
twenty years, and under the tread of thou¬ 
sands of feet, it is scarcely worn. For it was 
paid the highest price the Belgian manufac¬ 
turers ever received for a single product of 
their looms. One of Tweed’s followers, a man 
who a few years earlier had been a laborer upon 
the streets, said, as he walked upon it, ‘Why, 
it is as thick as a beefsteak.’ In this club 
house feasts, costing thousands of dollars, 
were held, the wines, the most necessary item, 
being the choicest to be found in the markets 
of the world. * * * 

“In another part of the town of Greenwich, 
Tweed discovered what he regarded as a per¬ 
fect place for a summer home for his family. 
But the owner had no disposition to sell. A 
fair price for the property would have been 
five thousand dollars. Tweed offered three 
times that, and still was refused. Tweed said 
to his friends that he proposed to have the 
place even if it became necessary for him to 
buy up the whole Connecticut legislature, a 
body in which his influence was already felt. 
One day he met the owner and said to him, 
‘Why do you object to selling me that place?’ 
‘Because it seems like selling myself out of 
house and home.’ ‘But if I give you enough 
for it, you can buy yourself another home.’ 
‘But you won’t give me enough for me to do 
that.’ ‘How much do you call enough?’ ‘I’ll 


name a figure so big that it will scare you 
away, and that will be the end of it.’ ‘Name 
your figure, and let’s see whether it will,’ said 
Tweed. ‘Well, suppose I say sixty thousand 
dollars?’ ‘Would you take sixty thousand for 
it?’ demanded Tweed. ‘Nobody would be 
crazy enough to give it.’ ‘Well, we’ll see 
about that,’ said Tweed. He took out a pen¬ 
cil and made a memorandum, setting forth 
that the man agreed, within thirty days, to 
give a title to that property upon the payment 
of sixty thousand dollars; and then, handing 
the paper to the man, said, ‘I’ll give you a 
dollar if you sign that.’ It was an easy way 
of getting a dollar, the owner thought. He 
signed, and took the money, and within the 
month Tweed compelled him to live up to the 
memorandum, and thus became the owner of 
the place.” 

It is said to be impossible to make an accu¬ 
rate estimate of the total amount of money 
stolen by the ring. Fourteen millian dollars 
is believed to be an under estimate. The 
fraudulent accounts published footed up eleven 
and a quarter millions, and Mr, Tilden be¬ 
came satisfied during the investigation that 
the ring had in near prospect some eighteen 
millions more. The frauds upon which the 
conviction of Tweed was obtained consisted in 
the payment of enormously increased bills to 
mechanics, architects, furniture makers, and, 
in some instances, to unknown persons for 
supplies and services. It was the expectation 
that an honest bill would be raised all the 
way from sixty to ninety percent, in the first 
months of the ring’s stealing the increase was 
about sixty per cent. Some of the bills were 
increased by as much as ninety per cent., but 
the average increase was such as to make it 
possible to give sixty seven per cent, to the 
ring, the confederates being allowed to keep 
thirty-three per cent., and of that thirty- 
three per cent, probably at least one-half was 
a fraudulent increase. 

After Tweed was brought back from Spain 
and returned to jail, he never wentforth again 
alive except on one occasion, when he was 
taken to court as a witness in a case in which 
testimony as to the ring frauds was necessary. 
For six days he was examined in great detail 
Mr. Edwards says: 

“It was evident at this hearing that Tweed’s 
health was shattered, and that he had prob¬ 
ably but a short time to live. He failed rap¬ 
idly after the hearing, and a few nontbs later 
died in prison. He had been in power less 
than six years. He had enjoyed wealth less 
than ten. In his last days, when reviewing his 
career, he said that he teas satisfied of one thing; that 
until the officers of the city of New York, meaning 
the great body of subordinate employes, were pro¬ 
tected by some sort of civil service system, so that 
they would not be the creatures of political favor, 
there xvould be corruption in the administration of 
the city govei-nment. ‘Human nature,’ said he 
‘can not resist such temptations as are offered to 
men who are in power here, so long as they have the 
disposition of the offices of the city at their com¬ 
mand.’”—Literary Digest, Jidy IS. 


LATER DAY TWEEDISM IN CHI¬ 
CAGO. 

Thirteen alleged membersof the city hall pay¬ 
roll stuffing crowd were indicted by the grand 
jury to-day, for defrauding the city of $100,000. 
Their indictment was secured on the testi¬ 
mony of detectives, and of persons whose 
names apf)eared on the pay-roll who never 
worked for the city, and who were not aware 
that their names had been used in the con¬ 
spiracy until after the recent investigation 
had been started. The men under indictment 
were employed as foremen and timekeepers in 
the water pipe extension and streets and alleys 
departments of the city. 

MR. TILDEN AS A REFORMER. 

The story of Mr. Tilden’s career in the field 
of reform is admirably told and of thrilling 
interest. He grasped the whole problem of 
reform, municipal, legislative and judicial, 
while the sagacity and energy he had dis¬ 
played as a lawyer were here brought into full 
play. With a view to the accomplishment of 
his great work he accepted the chairmanship 
of the state democratic committee in 1866 
and was elected to the constitutional conven¬ 
tion the year following. In 1869 he took the 
lead in organizing the bar association of New 
York, which became a formidable auxiliary 
in the great cause, and in 1871 he was elected 
to the legislature. In speaking of the action 
of the state convention that year Mr. Tilden 
said: 

“It is but fair to admit that what I asked 
the convention to do was more than any party 
was ever found able to venture upon. It was 
to totally cut off and cast out from party asso¬ 
ciation a local organization which held the 
influence growing out of the employment of 
twelve thousand persons and the disbursement 
of $30,000,000 yearly, which had possession of 
all the machinery of local government, domi¬ 
nated the judiciary and police and swayed 
the officers of election. I still think that, on 
such an occasion, the greatest audacity in the 
right would have been the highest wisdom, 
and, in the long run, the most consummate pru¬ 
dence. If the convention could not reach 
that breadth and elevation of action, it never¬ 
theless did help to break the prestige by which 
the organization expected to enthrall the local 
masses. For myself, I at no time hesitated 
to avow as my conviction of duty and my rule 
of action that a million of people were not to 
be given over to pillage to serve any party ex¬ 
pediency, or to advance any views of state or 
national politics.” 

This was the spirit in which Mr. Tilden 
waged his warfare against the Tweed ring. 
He rose above party and directed his blows at 
the rogues of the state without the slightest 
discrimination as to their political affiliations. 
The result was the arrest, imprisonment or 
flight of the thieves who only a few years be¬ 
fore seemed to hold the wealth and power of 
the state in the hollow of their hands. His 
fight against the canal ring a few years later 
when governor, was equally unsparing and 
vigorous. The odds seemed to be hopelessly 
against him, but he never faltered in the con¬ 
flict, because he had thoroughly studied the 
character and methods of his enemies and be¬ 
lieved in the power of his ideas and the hon¬ 
esty of the people. For sixteen months he 
surrendered his private business, gave his days 
and nights to the most exhausting labors and 
expended considerable sums of his own money; 
and it is not strange that his magnificent tri¬ 
umph made him the leader and the hero of 
people.— From the review of Bigelow’s Tilden by 
George W. Julian, Indianapolis Sentinel, June 19. 







THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

II, No. 31. INDIANAPOLIS, SEPTEMBER, 1895. terms llroenupeTcopV: 


VOL. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind. 


In this city the street commissioner’s 
clerk examined the list of registered la¬ 
borers in the office of the clerk of the 
civil service board and he picked out 
certain names not in the regular order and 
wanted those certified for employment. 
Being promptly refused, no requisition 
was made for laborers. Mayor Denny can 
not afford to let this transaction go by 
without investigation. If the street de¬ 
partment is in the hands of sharpers who 
are trying to beat the law, it is time it was 
got out of such hands. The clerk who 
tried to get a dishonest certification should 
be dismissed from the city service, and if 
the street commissioner knew of the trans¬ 
action he should be dealt with in the same 
manner. The board of public works should 
check-up the street commissioner by re¬ 
quiring proof that every laborer has been 
duly appointed under the rules before ap¬ 
proving the pay-roll. 


There has since been an investiga¬ 
tion of the street commissioner, one 
Fisher, of this city. Some months ago he 
was overhauled and given a warning. 
Later, as is noted in the Chronicle, his 
clerk went to the secretary of the civil serv¬ 
ice board and tried to get particular 
names certified for employment, which 
was refused. Fisher evidently feels that 
he is a “ biger man” than the mayor, for 
he went ahead and employed men without 
regard to the rules. When recently 
brought up for this he brazenly confessed 
it. If Mayor Denny wants to have any 
reputation left, it is about time that he 
began to display some executive back-bone. 
He should have punished Trusler by dis¬ 
missing him for sending that assessment 
circular, but he was afraid of Trusler. 
Ever since the civil service rules have been 
adopted they have been honey-combed 
with violations, but no one has been pun¬ 
ished. Mayor Denny does not seem to 
understand that in an administrative re¬ 
form there is no room for conciliation. 
An officer who undertakes it must do so 
with all his might, and without asking or 
giving quarter. He will then be obeyed, 
and he will be respected by the community. 


and in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred 
his reform will be successful. The mayor 
can do something toward showing his sin¬ 
cerity by now removing Fisher. We 
ought not to omit to state that the labor 
service system, which has been found in 
practice to be perhaps the greatest single 
administrative improvement of this gen¬ 
eration, has been discovered by Fisher to 
be a nuisance. It is a nuisance to men of 
the Fisher stripe, and this and other re¬ 
forms will happily drive them out of pub¬ 
lic place. 

From present appearances the approach¬ 
ing election in this city will afford no 
indication of the temper of the people 
upon any leading public question. Al¬ 
though the republicans had plenty of good 
men, yet they nominated a man who as 
comptroller of the city openly opposed 
the adoption of the present civil service 
rules, and whenever he has declared him¬ 
self since it has been along the same line. 
The inference is irresistible that if elected 
he will ignore these rules. From his 
comptroller’s office he sent out an assess¬ 
ment circular to policemen and firemen 
demanding a certain percentage of their 
pay to be used in a state campaign. Men 
getting $1,200 were asked to pay $24, a 
most inordinate and outrageous demand 
in any view. In this connection he de¬ 
clared that all appointive offices should be 
paid for by those who get them. There is 
every reason to suppose that in case of his 
election the assessment evil, in its worst 
form, would flourish openly. As comptrol¬ 
ler he has had the appearance of harrying 
offices held by democrats with an appear¬ 
ance of vindictiveness,and hisown repeated 
declarations make it clear that instead of 
working the city business out of politics 
he would do his utmost to work it in. It 
is undoubted that he was the chief mover, 
some years ago, in securing the dismissal 
of a most efficient chief of the fire depart¬ 
ment, and that the real reason was that the 
chief had refused to dismiss the dozen or 
so democrats left in the department. The 
dismissed officer, in answer to a public de¬ 
mand, was afterward restored by the 
democrats,and is now in that position. It 
seems certain that if the republican candi¬ 
date is successful there will be a repetition 
of the decapitation, with all of its attend¬ 
ant dangers and evils and under decapita¬ 


tions. The only thing which the republi¬ 
cans claim for their man is that he has 
been an extraordinary comptroller. His 
technical record as comptroller in that office 
is only fair, and his accompanying con¬ 
duct has been most reprehensible. It is 
impossible to tell what such a man will do, 
in any given case, as mayor. If we turn 
to his record as councilman, only discour¬ 
agement is added. If a man can be judged 
by his acts, he was there the tool of a gas 
corporation. 


Turning to the democrats, they have 
nominated the chairman of their state 
committee, a man who has held office 
until the emoluments have made him, for 
Indianapolis, rich. He is an exceeding 
good fellow, and very popular. We do not 
believe that he has any serious political 
convictions. He does not claim to know 
anything of administrative reform, and 
with all the great influence which he has 
had in this state, in patronage matters, he 
has never been known to do an act to help 
that reform forward. He believes in as¬ 
sessing office holders for campaign expen¬ 
ses. It seems probable that he would, if 
elected,ignore the civil service rules. His 
party, for a long time, debated whether, in 
convention, it would declare for civil serv¬ 
ice reform; and it even considered try¬ 
ing to have a non-political judge, but it 
concluded that it could get control with¬ 
out making any such display of virtue. 

In view of these considerations, as mat¬ 
ters now stand, the coming election will be 
neither a sanction nor a condemnation of 
the present city administration. The 
struggle is simply that of two party ma¬ 
chines grasping for the extensive patron¬ 
age which they believe that the city offices 
will afford, and where it is hoped to quar¬ 
ter favorites and henchmen. There is no 
enthusiasm, whatever, nor is there likely 
to be. City government is universally ad¬ 
mitted to be the worst government in this 
country, and in common with other cities 
the people of Indianapolis would like to 
share in administrative reform. The root 
of the evil is partyism, and these nomina¬ 
tions give us partyism in its worst form. 
How can voters be enthusiastic when 
either case offers only retyogradation ? To 
vote for either candidate is to vote into the 
mud. 






















254 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The misfortune of being what a dis¬ 
gusted letter-writer in the Indianapolis 
Sentinel recently called The Chronicle, 
“ a little 8 by 10 paper,” is the reason why 
its space is not equal to the demands upon 
it in the recent battles of the bosses. The 
boss of bosses, Quay, has been crowded 
out. There has been nothing more illumi¬ 
nating for years than the revelations of 
the processes of his boss-ship—the bribery, 
the thugs, the knavery which Quay and 
his former henchman, Martin, let out in 
their br'ef lifting of the lid of their strong 
box of political history. Now it is again 
closed, the late warring braves both hold¬ 
ing it down, the queer Philadelphia press 
again muzzled and likewise the queer 
Philadelphia conscience. 


Will the good citizen who despises the 
mugwump and who always “reforms with¬ 
in the party” and between elections com¬ 
pel himself to read the records of the ways 
these bosses, named for convenience demo¬ 
cratic and republican, have been work¬ 
ing? Will they particularly note that a 
cornered republican boss has democratic 
assistance in his primary and vice versa? 
That a defeated little boss “bolts” and 
“knifes” and later can return to the party 
and to his old post, even as a favorite son. 
It is otherwise when a man leaves party 
for conscience’s sake. Only the other day 
a good minister was turning over the 
leaves of Lowell’s Letters in an Indianap¬ 
olis bookstore and his pitying comment 
was, “I can not understand how a man like 
Lowell could have been a turncoat.” Think 
of it, American citizens, Lowell called 
by a presumably moral minister of the 
gospel, a turncoat, and Mike Dady, a pa¬ 
triot still, returns to the Brooklyn re¬ 
publican bosom as the late reform waves 
recede. How to penetrate the rhinoceros 
hide of stupidity that encases the besotted 
partisan good citizen the Chronicle con¬ 
fesses itself entirely at sea. If it had riches 
it would offer prizes for suggestions as to 
ways and means to compel the reading of 
the facts of the brotherhood of bosses. It 
would begin with the clergymen of the 
Methodist church. 


What politics and pulls will do for the 
public is again illustrated by the discover¬ 
ies now being made in New York. Some 
two thousand indictments and one thou¬ 
sand police court complaints have been 
found snugly stowed away in the attic of 
the court house. Enough is known of the 
way business was done in New York to 
make it certain that every one of these 
papers was hidden for a consideration pro¬ 
portioned to the crime. The story seems 
well authenticated that under a former chief 
clerk of the district attorney’s office there 
was a regular price for the “loss” of each 


paper, the average rate being $300. When 
that clerk died a number of his friends 
went to his house and there burned up 
some five thousand lost indictments and 
complaints. 


In the New York democratic state con¬ 
vention just held, the committee on cre¬ 
dentials, whose action was later approved 
by the convention,adopted the following: 

“Tammany Hall is entitled to recognition in all 
future conventions as the regular organization, and 
its delegates are to be placed upon the preliminary 
and other rolls thereof, and in the appointment 
of Inspectors of elections, the use of the party em¬ 
blems, and in every other way in which the ques¬ 
tion of party organization may arise, said Tam¬ 
many hall organization shall be recognized as the 
regular organization of the party in New York 
county, but in the interest of harmony, at this 
time, the committee recommends, subject to the 
aforesaid conditions, that the sitting delegates, as 
well as the delegates known as the state democracy, 
be admitted to the convention, with one-fifth of a 
vote to each state democracy delegate and four- 
fifth of a vote to each Tammany hall delegation.” 

The party which thus exalts Tammany 
Hall knows that it is largely an organiza¬ 
tion of thieves and plunderers, and that 
it has protected robbers, blackmailers, 
counterfeiters, and all sorts and conditions 
of criminals, in carrying on their opera¬ 
tions for years in New York. This is not 
mere assertion,but it is a statement known 
to the whole world to have been conclu¬ 
sively proved. The organization should 
be ostracized and unrecognized, and 
hounded to destruction by every demo¬ 
crat and democratic paper. Yet it is made 
the corner-stone of democracy. 

The President has just made a curious 
order relating to the consular service. Un¬ 
der this order all offices in that serv¬ 
ice where the compensation ranges from 
$1,000 to $2,500 shall hereafter in case of 
vacancy be filled in one of the three follow¬ 
ing methods: 

(a) By a transfer or promotion from some other 
position under the department of state of a char¬ 
acter tending to qualify the incumbent for the 
position to be filled; or (b) by appointment of a 
person not under the department of state, but hav¬ 
ing previously served thereunder to its satisfaction 
in a capacity tending to qualify him for the posi¬ 
tion to be filled; or (c) by the appointment of a 
person who, having furnished the customary evi¬ 
dence of character, responsibility and capacity, 
and being thereupon selected by the President for 
examination, is found upon such examination to 
be qualified for the position. 

Under the first rule the appointing 
power may select at will any one in the 
state department, under the second any 
one who has ever been in the state depart¬ 
ment, and under the third the appointing 
power may name the persons who shall be 
examined. Any place may be filled under 
any one of the rules which the appointing 
power desires to make use of. If these 
rules in any manner hinder the Gormans 
andQuaysand Josiah Quincys from getting 
in their work, we should like to have some 


one point it out. We were dumbfounded 
that the President, after a succession of 
orders which stamp his name permanent¬ 
ly on a great and lasting reform, should 
makesuchan order as this until we learned 
that it was Secretary Olney’s plan. Olney’s 
reasons for this plan are “that the President 
may protect the service to some extent 
from the dangers sure to follow absolute 
reliance upon purely academic tests.” This 
is the sum of Olney’s knowledge. It is the 
same talk that went on among Cleveland 
mugwumps in the early part of Mr. Cleve¬ 
land’s first administration. Everybody but 
Mr. Olney has grown out of it. He knew 
nothing about administrative reform, but, 
like other new officeholders, he thought he 
could teach upon that subject. He came 
upon an old and exploded rule of 1873, 
and puts that forward as the sum of expe¬ 
rience in this reform. It failed utterly 
twenty years ago and will fail again 
now. There is now known but one good 
way of filling consular places, and that is by 
open competition to the lowest places, suc¬ 
ceeded by competition within the service 
step by step to the top, allowing in the 
highest places more latitude for the dis¬ 
cretion of the appointing power. Olney’s 
method will put in democratic favorites 
when the democrats are in power, and re¬ 
publican favorites when republicans are in 
power, and that is all there is of it. The 
Springfield Republican's candidate for the 
Presidency makes a sorry appearance. 


That there should be talk of the feasi¬ 
bility of removing the fourth-class post-of¬ 
fices from politics without an act of con¬ 
gress shows how easy it is for a public 
oflBcer to find a way when he desires to do 
so. We are not familiar with the proposed 
plan, but the administration seems to have 
no doubt but that it would work. Mr. 
Cleveland hesitates, it is said, lest he should 
be criticised for removing these oflBces 
from politics after they have been 
filled with his partisans. There is no ques¬ 
tion about that. It will seem very unfair; 
and it does not help the matter that this 
condition of aflairs is utterly inexcusable. 
That the fourth-class post-offices so late 
as the beginning of the present adminis¬ 
tration should have been allowed to be 
looted by congressmen is irrefutable testi¬ 
mony to the statesmanic shortness of both 
Mr. Cleveland and Mr. Bissell,* and no fair 
man can view their action without just 
anger. If a definite plan for removing 
these places from politics had been ma¬ 
tured, a rough preliminary equalization of 
them among parties would have com¬ 
mended itself as fair, even if done on the 
spoils plan. Mr. Cleveland ought to be 
I statesman enough to make that equaliza- 
I tion now, but he will probably not do it. 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


255 


It becomes a question then whether this 
last great work in the reform of the federal 
service shall be left undone because the 
offices are filled mostly with democrats. 
Because Mr. Cleveland did a bad act in this 
respect is no reason why he should not do 
a good act now. It is true that his order 
by the exasperation it would cause would 
put the hardest possible strain upon the 
reform. But the reform has always had to 
bear that strain. No president has seemed 
to think that he could place an office under 
the civil service rules until he has filled 
that office with his partisans. Much trick¬ 
ery, dishonesty and law breaking have re¬ 
sulted when the opposite party came in, 
but the reform has withstood them all and 
it can and will withstand them in the fourth 
class post-offices. . 

Upon this phase of the question the In¬ 
dianapolis News says: 

The fact that the men now liolding these 
positions are partisans, appointed for partisan 
reasons, is not a valid argument against the 
reform. This will always be the case. The 
only question is whetliei democratic or repub¬ 
lican partisans shall be protected. If the old 
system continues, tlie next i)resident, if he be a 
republican, will doubtless fill the offices with 
men of his own political faith, and there will 
then be the same argument against his making 
the change as there is now against Mr. Cleve¬ 
land’s making it. In a word, it is impossible 
to redeem any branch of the public service 
from the spoilsmen without benefiting the 
men who happen to be in office at the time. 
If we are to wait until the fourth-class post¬ 
masterships are filled with non-partisans be¬ 
fore we extend the civil service rules to them, 
we shall wait forever. The present officers 
are, of course, entitled to no consideration. 
But they cut a very small figure in the case. 
The main party in interest is the general pub¬ 
lic. 

It is said that the republicans will oppose 
the proposed change, and that their national 
convention will adopt a plank pledging their 
candidates to the revocation of all civil service 
proclamations placing under that service 
officers who have been put there while holding 
offices solely as a reward for political services. 
We do not believe that any president whom 
the republicans are likely to elect would con 
sent to be bound by such a pledge. There are 
hardly any places now under civil service rules 
which were not put there while filled by men 
“holding offices solely as a reward for political 
services.” The railway mail service is a nota¬ 
ble illustration of this truth. When Mr. 
Cleveland went into office in 1885 he found 
the railway mail service filled with re[)ub- 
licans. By the close of his administration the 
service had been almost totally recast, where¬ 
upon he extended the civil service rules to 
cover the new men. Mr. Harrison postponed 
the date for the taking effect of Mr. Cleveland’s 
order, so as to give ample time to replace the 
democratic clerks with republicans. If, there¬ 
fore, the republicans propose to revoke all 
orders which have had the effect of protecting 
partisans in their places, they will have to 
turn the railway mail service over to the 
spoilsmen, for it was placed under the civil 
service law when it was filled with partisans. 


Taken all together Chicago probably 
has the best and most advanced civil 
service rules in the country. The revo-1 


lution in the manner of obtaining public 
employment is complete. It was not to be 
expected that such an improvement would 
be let to pass without assaults from the 
leeches who see themselves cut off from 
the public treasury. These assaults have 
begun. The county attorney has decided 
that more than half of the county service 
is not within the civil service law, which 
opinion is understood when it is remem¬ 
bered that any kind of an opinion can be 
obtained from a political attorney. An¬ 
other assault has been made in the shape 
of a unanimous vote of the common coun¬ 
cil, declaring that it alone may decide how 
the offices shall be filled and appointing a 
committee to inquire “what is necessary 
to enable all citizens of Chicago to apply 
for and receive appointments.” To the 
ordinary mind the answer is that nothing 
in the world could be better than the pres¬ 
ent competitive system. This suggestion, 
however, drives the average councilman 
wild. What is to become of “pulls” or 
“influence,” or the thousand other coun- 
cilmanic resorts to grease the wheels? 
Chicago reformers are now called upon to 
show what they are made of. 


In the course of an article published in 
the Grand Army R'cord of Boston, intend¬ 
ing to appeal to the self-respect of the sol¬ 
diers of the rebellion in relation to the 
exemption bill recently passed by the 
Massachusetts legislature, Mr. Richard H. 
Dana, says: 

The veterans’ exemption bill passed by the last 
legislature puts the great bulk of appointments 
under the “spoils” system. When several veterans 
apply for the same place there are no established 
means of making impartial selections. It is all left 
as a matter of political favoritism and the veteran 
must be subservient to the political boss to get the 
position. 

Besides this main objection there is another, 
which to my mind however, though important, is 
quite secondary to theone I have named. It is that 
the veteran has not to show his fitness by any tests 
or even by sat sfying the appointing officer. He 
has only to take his own affidavit of fitness and file 
the certificate of three reputable citizens that he is 
capable of performing the duties of the position 
sought. Any one acquainted with practical politics, 
knows that under the “spoils” system very incom¬ 
petent and unfit persons have been able to get end¬ 
less recommendations.from influential politicians, 
and in the ordinary affairs of life experience shows 
the more unfit a man is the less he appreciates his 
want of ability to do any important work. Who 
would think of compelling railroads to employ as 
an engineer any man who thought he was fit with¬ 
out any proof of experience, and yet there are po¬ 
sitions covered by this new law which are quite as 
Important to the health and lives of our fellow- 
citizens, as that of locomotive engineers. 

We should say that the place to appeal 
to the self respect of ex-soldiers is not 
in the papers usually published in their 
name aud we do not think the Record is 
an exception. In its rather flippant, not 
to say vulgar^ comment upon Mr. Dana’s 
letterj'it says: 

What-patriotic citizens in Massachussetts desire 
to have practically crystallized into the statutes of 


Massachussetts is this: That if an honorably dis¬ 
charged soldier or sailor of the great rebellion is both 
mentally and morally capable of performing the re- 
(juired duties of any civil office in the commonwealth, 
then he shall be appointed to that office on his applica¬ 
tion therefor. The Union soldiers and their surviving 
friends only ask that. 

There ought to be some way of disgrac¬ 
ing the writer of such sentiments in his 
position as an ex-soldier. When the war 
began the pay was $11 a month; but if it 
had been $5 a month not a man less would 
have gone. The pay was soon raised to $13 
a month, but it was done without any re¬ 
quest whatever from the soldiers, and 
they would have viewed a reduction of $2 
a month with the utmost indifference. 
The reason was that it was a man’s duty to 
serve his country without any regard to 
reward, and the soldiers of that time so 
understood it. They did their simple duty 
and they neither asked, nor expected, nor 
thought to be made a specially privileged 
class. They have been all the time more 
than liberally dealt with. Beyond that 
liberal dealing we shall never believe that 
the ex-soldiers have become so debauched 
that they now claim that the patriotism of 
1861 must be paid for and that too at the 
risk of wrecking the public business. 

THE TRIUMPH OF THE BOSSES. 

We have given much space this month 
to the remarkable triumphs of the bosses. 
We mean to do them full justice and to 
omit nothing whiph will add to the glory 
of their victories. In these curious phe¬ 
nomena, the most marked characteristic 
is the absence of what are known as polit¬ 
ical principles. There has been no man¬ 
ner of question whether certain policies 
should be pursued or certain principles 
advocated. The one question has been 
whether Platt and Quay, and Gorman and 
Brice and all the lesser bosses should dic¬ 
tate the platform and name the nominees 
and appoint the official members of the 
party machine. Without exception we 
believe the decision has been in favor of 
the boss. It will seem to many that very 
much had to be sacrificed in aid of the 
successful end. Considering Brice and the 
Wilson tariff bill, the sacrifice in Ohio was 
ridiculous and contemptible. The like ap¬ 
plies to Gorman and Maryland, but to this 
is to be added all the years during which 
he has already deprived Maryland of free 
government. For years in New York 
Platt has had a system of collecting money 
from corporations and others and binding 
politicians and party workers to him by 
dividing it among them. In Pennsyl¬ 
vania Quay has been repeatedly charged 
by great newspapers of undoubted finan¬ 
cial responsibility with robbing the public 
treasury, and his conduct under this 
charge leaves no reasonable doubt of its 
truth; and Pennsylvania also for years has 











256 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


had no free government, Quay having been 
her absolute dictator. 

All this is not hard to understand, nor 
when it is understood is this wave of boss- 
ism invincible. Term after term brought 
about a clean sweep in the federal service. 
People deprecated this but shook their 
heads and said it would always be so; it 
was politics. Yet the clean sweep in the 
federal service is to-day on its last legs. 
Wherever these bosses have triumphed 
there has long prevailed a system of re¬ 
wards, and the recipients have made up 
the party machines in their respective lo- 
calites. They largely compose and abso¬ 
lutely control the primaries and conven¬ 
tions. Most of them have faith that the 
Quays and Platts can continue the system 
of rewards, and those who have doubts, 
work on the rule or ruin plan; they want 
no party success which is not to be fol¬ 
lowed by addition, division and silence. 
Under such circumstances it is easy for a 
boss to control delegates. This will be so 
while a system of rewards is possible. 
When that is broken up part of the heel¬ 
ers will turn into decent citizens and the 
rest will take no interest in politics. It 
will be broken up, and more surprising 
things have happened than that this over¬ 
whelming victory of mere buccaneers 
should be but the darkness before the day¬ 
light. 

THE BATTLES OF THE BOSSES 
AND THEIR TRIUMPHS. 

“Well, I tell you, the crowd whooped it 
up for Quay and Platt iii a way that shook 
the rafters. The applause their names re¬ 
ceived made that which was given the 
names of Lincoln, Urant, and Blaine seem 
like a period of comparative silence.” — In¬ 
terview of Otto Irving Wise regarding National 
League Convention of Republican Clubs at Cleve¬ 
land, June 24 , 1S95, New York Times. 

We shall not he safe, whether the author¬ 
ities are in Tammany or out of Tammany, 
until the entire system of boss-rule is torn 
up. In order that that may he done we 
must conscientiously avoid the elevation 
to position of oflicial trust of any man of 
wlmtever political complexion who will 
consent to serve a boss. The existence of 
tools as well as of bosses is a disgrace to 
American citi/enshi]). — Dr. Parkhurst, Sept. 
19. 

Before Boss Platt’s Victory. —Mr. "War¬ 
ner Miller has never done a better service to 
his party than in his outspoken letter protest¬ 
ing against the renomination of Senator 
Coggeshall. Of that legislator’s character and 
record he writes with refreshing directness and 
offensive particularity and personality.— New 
York Evening Post. 

After Boss Platt’s Victory.—A s every¬ 
body anticipated, Warner Miller’s trumpet- 


blast for reform within the party and rebell¬ 
ion against Platt dies away into a pitiful 
squeak about harmony. “One man claims to 
be a Platt man,” he says, “and another says 
he is anti-Platt, but they all support the ticket 
once it is nominated.” That is the true way 
to fling defiance at an odious boss.— New York 
Eiening Post. 

Platt Punishes His Disobedient Hench¬ 
man. 

W’hoever is elected to succeed Henry J. 
Coggeshall as senator from the Oneida dis¬ 
trict, the party at large has a right to expect 
a full investigation into the bribery charges 
so much heard last week. If any representative 
of Senator Coggeshall, authorized or not, attempted 
to bribe a delegate to the senate convention, he should 
be exposed and prosecuted.—Buffalo Express. 

Coggeshall was supported by “ Tom" Wheeler, and 
every one of the canal employes. It was not until 
the last two or three days that they have come out 
openly for him, and it was expected yesterday that 
they had succeeded in stampeding the county in 
Coggeshall’8 interest .— Utica dispatch, August 10. 

Senator Coggeshall to-day bolted the regular 
republican convention. Platt is said to have 
directed that no compromise be considered and 
that Coggeshall be killed off effectually and 
forever.— Rome dispatch, August 17. 

The. trouble is likely to remain in Oneida 
county, and be a serious thing for the party, 
because of the notoriety into which Coggeshall 
came last winter. The fact that he was made 
to figure prominently in the scandal in con¬ 
nection with the New York firemen’s bill will 
be kept before the public just so long as he 
stays in the race. His general record, as a 
senator, for the last ten years is being over¬ 
hauled by the supporters of Mr. Weaver in 
their attempts to defeat him. 

Weaver’s friends apparently forget that 
Coggeshall, whatever may have been his rec¬ 
ord, was the republican representative of that 
senatorial district term after term, that it was 
well known and thcrroughly understood that he was 
one of Thomas C. Platt's lieutenants, and that how¬ 
ever unscrupulous he may have been, his course was 
indorsed by them time and again.—New York Times, 
September 17. 

Platt’s Subservient Henchman Wins. 

It is a tooth and nail fight that Senator 
Raines has on for renomination. As for Wayne, 
the Raines people claim that they have an under¬ 
standing with Dunwell of Lyons, candidate for the 
republican nomination for supreme court judge, by 
which Wayne receiving that nomination the On¬ 
tario delegates are to be allowed to name the candi¬ 
date for senator. It looks, therefoix, as if Raines 
will cany the day.—Canandaigua dispatch, .Im- 
gust 9. 

As foreshadowed in the New York T’imes 
two weeks ago, the contest in this senatorial 
district has ended in a victory for John Raines. 
In spite of his high-sounding fulminations 
against Raines, Lieutenant-Governor Saxten 
absented himself from the convention, and 
allowed three Raines men to be substituted as 
delegates from his own town of Galen. 


For his subserviency in the last few days of 
the canvass, the lieutenant-governor is permit¬ 
ted to head the Wayne delegation to Saratoga, 
composed exclusively of Platt’s supporters. 

In Little Seneca the old Platt-Mongin crowd 
is now in full control, the Patterson faction 
having laid down its arms after many years of 
unsuccessful fighting in party conventions and 
the courts.— Geneva dispatch, Aug. 19. 

As it was, the machine held the caucuses 
five weeks before the state convention, and at 
a time when many republican voters were un¬ 
able to participate because of the harvests. 
Their places were taken in many instances by 
machine democrats, who were glad of an op¬ 
portunity to help out fellow machinists in dis¬ 
tress. 

Over in Phelps the other day a couple of local 
democrats met in a store. “ Did you stand by 
Raines in the caucus ? ” No. 1 asked. 

“ Yes," said democrat No. 2. 

Before the caucuses last month Senator 
Raines was very liberal in his promises of 
oflSce to those who would support him. As 
one man said today: “Raines promised 
offices for the next twenty-five years to some 
of those who stood by him, and he seems to 
have promised each office to at least twenty- 
five men.”— Buffalo Express, Sept. 4- 

Platt Uses Canal Patronage. 

“ Jake ” Snell bargained to deliver enough votes 
to nominate Platt’s man. He is the supenntendent 
of Section 3 of the canal.—Amsterdam dispatch, 
Sept. 10. 

Tom Platt’s whipper-in, Frank Seeley 
(canal), came up from Albany yesterday carry¬ 
ing a long lash in his pocket. Superintendent 
Seeley had learned that there were wars and 
rumors of war in Albion, and he came up to 
straighten things out to the satisfaction of his 
master.— Albion dispatch, Sept. 10. 

Congressman Rowland B. Mahany, the 
leader of the Platt forces, failed by sixty votes 
to carry his own ward. The only rcard which 
went for Platt was the Thirteenth, where John 
Kraft, deputy superintendent of canals, was elected 
witho^U opposition.—Buffalo dispatch, Sept. 9. 

Mr. Mahany is said to have received $1,000 
from the Platt machine last fall, when he was mak¬ 
ing his canvass for congress, and he proceeded to 
even up the account by talking.—Buffalo Express, 
Sept. 15. 

Commenting on the reported dismissal of 
William Carberry, committeeman from the fifth 
ward of this city, from his place on the canal by 
Capt. Kraft because he refused to join the Mahany 
crusade, the Albany Argus observes. “Yet Gov. 
Morton was elected upon a platform which 
expressly condemned politics on the canals in 
hypocritical but high-sounding terms, and 
Gov. Morton’s near relative is assistant super¬ 
intendent tor the BufiTalo division. 

The first ward will have three delegates in 
the first assembly district convention, and ex- 
Ald. John White, Jeremiah J. Donavan and 
Thomas Delehanty have been selected to make 
the race for the regulars. Thtyare <pposed by 
the district committeemen, James Burke, John De- 
vine, James F. Loftus and Michael" Hughes. It 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


257 


seems that in the first ward the canal machine has 
secured a family annex to its outfit, the family annex 
being supplied by the four distinct committeemen. 

Going into the details of the opposition to 
the regular organization in his ward, the ex¬ 
alderman said that Committeemen Devine, 
Loftus, Burke and Hughes went to the general 
committee two months ago and asked the priv¬ 
ilege of naming the caucus inspectors, the 
election inspectors, the registrars and the 
places for the district caucuses. The general 
committee decided that Messrs. Devine, Loftus, 
Burke and Hughes already had received their 
share of favors from the party, and agreed 
with ex-Ald. White that it would be better to 
retain the old inspectors, who were experienced 
and had proved trustworthy. Mr. While .said 
that four of the Devine and four of the Burke fam¬ 
ily are provided with places through the party, and 
that the Hughes family is indebted to it for three 
places, and the Loftus family, which still has one 
place left, until recently had three. When the 
general committee declined to allow them 
everything in sight, according to the ex-alder¬ 
man, they went over to the enemy, and that is 
why they are now trying to deliver the first 
ward into the hands of the Plattites. 

It is in the fifth ward that William Quirk 
(canal) of the Aldridge brigade has undertaken 
thecontract of bossing things. Quirk has been 
walking the ward, threatening all sorts of 
things. Quirk already has discharged one 
man employed on canal work because he at¬ 
tended a republican gathering on Seneca street 
last week and refused to turn against the or¬ 
ganization. The Plattites had a spotter at that 
meeting, and other canal employes are being 
threatened with loss of their jobs if they do not 
step quickly to the music of the machine and 
help to down the organization .—Buffalo Ex¬ 
press. 

Platt’s Henchman, Aldridge, Superintend¬ 
ent of Public Works. 

Commenting upon a proposal to conduct the 
city government of Bochester on business 
principles, the Rochester Herald (Dem.),says: 
“Two things must he done before that com¬ 
mendable project can be carried out. One is 
the overthrow of Mr. Aldridge. As is well 
known, he is the uncrowned ruler of this city. 
Although he has become superintendent of 
public works, he has a grip on us as unrelent¬ 
ing and merciless as when chairman of the 
executive board or the occupant of the may¬ 
or’s chair. Nothing is done without consult¬ 
ing him. He dictates all appointments; he 
controls the action of the common council.” 

On a current of water and rum “Boss” Al¬ 
dridge has floated to the republican citadel in 
this county and captured it. The water is in 
the canals, which the ex-mayor as superin¬ 
tendent of public works has “worked” for all 
they are worth. The rum is sold by saloon 
keepers, who, to keep in the good graces of Mr. 
Aldridge when he was mayor, gave support to 
him politically .—Rochester dispatch, Septem¬ 
ber 7. 

“To fully understand the situation there it 
must be remembered that Aldridge built up 


his power by the aid of his control of the execu¬ 
tive board. This board of three members has 
long had more power than the mayor or any 
other county or municipal officer. It had full 
control of the appointment of employes of 
streets, gas, sewers, fire department, and water. 
The mayor’s powers and prerogatives along¬ 
side of this aggregation are insignificant. One 
of its three members must be of opposite poli¬ 
tics to the majority, but he has long been a 
creature of Aldridge and simply did his bid¬ 
ding. 

Yesterday The Express told an interesting 
story of the way in which George W. Aldridge, 
the Platt boss of Rochester, bolsters his wan¬ 
ing power by making deals with Hill demo¬ 
crats. Yesterday also the Courier had a special 
dispatch from New York giving an interview 
with ex-Representative Van Voorhis, one of 
the Rochester republicans who are trying to 
overthrow Boss Aldridge. Mr. Van Voorhis 
made these startling charges as to the way in 
which the Aldridge men carried a primary 
recently; 

. It is well known just how much money was paid 
for votes, and there is no secret about it whatever. 
The caucus was held in the town of Perringlon, and it 
was disgraceful and shameful the wag Aldridge car¬ 
ried it by 80 majority. He did it in grand style, I must 
admit. His superintendent in that section, James K. 
Burlingham, had all the barges, floats, boats, mud- 
scows and all manner of craft landed at Fairport, 
which is a part of Perrington, and all this was done 
for effect. Then the shameless vote-buying commenced 
on the present Aldridge crowd. The price of votes 
ranged from $3 to $5 apiece, and the buying wenl on 
almost openly. It has been established that $1,600 were 
spent to carry the caucus. One other caucus has been 
held, and the boss lost it. These caucuses are to name 
delegates to the state convention, and the assembly 
and senatorial district conventions. Aldridge is 
now holding hack the caucuses through the ward 
men whom he controls. These ward men can be 
and have been bought for $100 each and some have 
demanded in bulk .$600. These are the men that 
Boss Aldridge controls.—BuffaloE.rpress, Augusts^. 

Aldridge Uses Democrats 

The attempt of Martin J. Calihan, chairman of 
the republican committee and “ king ” of the second 
ward, to capture the democratic county committee, 
proved a singularly fortunate thing for the democ¬ 
racy. So evenly were the factions divided that 
the balance of power was held by two men 
known to be friendly to Calihan and Aldridge. 
One of these men holds his place as the repre¬ 
sentative of Caliban’s own ward through the 
active interference of Calihan, whose demo¬ 
cratic followers captured the second ward 
caucus from both the regular factions. The 
other Calihan democrat was Felix O’Hara, a 
bar-keeper in an Exchange street saloon, who 
demanded the chairmanship of the committee 
as the price of his support. Through the refusal 
of both Frederick W. Smith and William C. 
Page, leaders of rival factions, to dicker with 
O’Hara, the HinkUy suh-oommittee of the 
state committee was able to defeat this out¬ 
rageous deal and the chairmanship was given 
to an outsider, Henry D. McNaughton.— Ro¬ 
chester dispatch, Aug. 31. 

The republican caucuses for Monroe county 
were held on Saturday, and George W. Ald¬ 
ridge, Platt’s local agent, won out. He carried 


every assembly district, and will succeed him¬ 
self as state committeeman.— Sept. 2. 

The Rochester papers, for reasons not difii- 
cult to guess, have been very wary in telling 
of last week’s caucuses. It was to Boss Ald¬ 
ridge’s interest that the facts be suppressed. 
In the twentieth ward the friends of ex-Mayor 
Curran won the preliminary fight against the 
machine by electing J. J. Hayes as chairman 
of the caucus. This defeat so angered the 
Aldridge men that they resolved to carry the 
ward by hook or crook. The republican 
voters showed so decided a preference for Cur¬ 
ran ballots that the machine gang finally took 
Chairman Hayes and threw him out of the 
window. Hayes, desiring to act as chairman 
inside rather than from a distance, returned 
to his post, only to be again put out through 
the window by the Aldridge men. Schwing is 
also suspected of having had a part in the 
theft of the ballot-box, which followed soon 
after the regular chairman had been thrown 
out .—Rochester dispatch. Sept. 3. 

Jimmy Laird, who gets $4 a day from the 
state through a job Superintendent Aldridge 
gavei him, was chairman of the caucus in the 
fourth ward. Among his other accomplish¬ 
ments, Laird is so versatile in politics that he 
is said to have voted at the recent democratic 
caucuses here, besides bossing the republican 
affairs in his ward. Laird is charged with 
deliberately tearing up Curran ballots and 
seeing that but few machine tickets got into the 
box. The machine here had formed a long 
line of adherents, among them being numer¬ 
ous democrats. Whenever an Aldridge re¬ 
publican appeared he would be shoved into 
some democrat’s place in the fore part of the 
line, while anti-Aldridge voters were com¬ 
pelled to fall in at the rear and stand in line so 
long that many were thus kept from the bal¬ 
lot box until the hour for closing the caucus 
came .—Rochester dispatch. Sept. 3. 

Platt Selects His Judges. 

There is no more interesting political con¬ 
test now going on in Western New York than 
that in the eighth judicial district. Un¬ 
fortunately the republican party has fallen of 
late into the bad habit of awarding places on 
the bench to men who have acquired more 
reputation as manipulators of caucuses than 
as students of the law. The fruits of such a 
policy are already evident in the fifth, 
seventh and eighth districts, in which are, 
respectively, the important cities of Syracuse, 
Rochester and Buffalo. The use of money in 
large sums in the canvasses for delegates to the re¬ 
publican judicial conventions of these districts is an 
admitted evil, and one that is severely con¬ 
demned by right-minded lawyers of Central 
and Western New York .—Albion dispatch, 
Aug. 26. 

The people of the Seventh judicial district are 
about to be given an instructive object lesson 
in the way judges are made by Thomas C. 
Platt. The republican judicial convention is 
called to meet in this city to-morrow to nom¬ 
inate two justices of the supreme court. Time 
was when such a convention was composed of 







258 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the best lawyers of the district, intent upon 
securing capable men for the supreme bench, 
but all this is changed now, and the rural 
counties will simply send wire-pullers to Rochester, 
men selected by Platt’s local lieutenants to make the 
selections desired by him.—Rochester dispatch, 
Sept. 6. 

There has been a scurrying all day among 
the friends of four or five men, each of whom 
wants to be the candidate for the place on the 
court of appeals bench. This has been the only 
place for which any canvass has been made. Mr. 
Platt’s candidate. Judge Martin, has a big 
staflT of workers. They are headed by State 
Committeeman George W. Dunn, of Bing¬ 
hamton, and the list includes a squad of 
Broome county politicians who are expert at 
the business and are all strong Platt men.— 
Saratoga dispatch, Sept. 16. 

Platt’s Primaries in New York. 

Thomas C. Platt walked leisurely up Broad¬ 
way about 8:30 last night in a full dress suit. 
He looked as cool as any man on Broadway. 
At the same hour, in various assembly districts 
in the city, Platt followers were sweltering in 
cellars and small halls, struggling and fight¬ 
ing in the ugliest, liveliest, and altogether 
most exciting assembly district conventions 
ever held. 

The conventions were held in all the thirty- 
five assembly districts for the purpose of elect¬ 
ing delegates to the republican state conven¬ 
tion and to the republican county convention. 
As was indicated by the primaries of Tuesday 
night Platt won a decisive victory last night. 

Perhaps the hottest fight of all was that in 
the twenty-fifth assembly district, where the 
friends of the mayors secretary. Job E. Hedges, 
tried to secure control against the Platt forces, 
headed by Thurlow Weed Barnes and James 
W. Auten. This convention was held in the 
basement of the “Chimney Corner,” at Twenty- 
fifth street and Sixth avenue. The meeting 
room was at about the temperature of a Turk¬ 
ish bath. 

Delegates were hauled and mauled from side 
to side, until they scarcely knew where they 
stood. This was all before the convention 
met, and so when it did meet the excitement 
was at the highest pitch. 

In the over-heated basement the delegates 
gathered about 8 o’clock, and were at first, ap¬ 
parently, peaceful and quiet. Nothing unu¬ 
sual happened until Delegate Ludwig sud¬ 
denly jumped to the table, rapped upon it 
with his cane, and tried to call the meeting to 
order. Immediately John C. O’Conor, repre¬ 
senting the anti-Platt forces, and Michael J. 
McCann, the Platt forces, made for the table. 
Their adherents tried to push them on top of 
the board. The language used is not printa¬ 
ble. A Tammany primary was never so inde¬ 
cent in its use of expletives. 

Ludwig was thrown about from right to left. 
Now and then his body seemed to be passing 
through the air over the heads of the crowd. 
McCann gained the top of the table and tried 
to make a speech. 


“Come down out of that! ” yelled an anti- 
Platt man.’ 

“Let him speak! Let him speak!” yelled 
the Platt men. 

McCann was hauled down. All was then 
confusion. It was just like a college rush, 
only more bad language was used. There 
was apparently no striking of blows, but the 
feeling ran about as high as if there had 
been. 

“Clear the room! Clear the room!” 

There was only four policemen present at 
the beginning of the row. Sergt. Corry, who 
was in charge, telephoned for the reserves to 
the Thirtieth street station. They came. 
Capt. Pickett in citizen’s clothes came with 
them. They quickly cleared the hall of all 
but the reporters. Then the delegates were 
allowed to return, and when the place was 
pretty well filled again Mr. McCann wrapped 
for order, and said he was authorized as a 
member of the county committee to call the 
meeting to order. Then came another hub¬ 
bub .—New Ym k Times, Sept. IS. 

Nearly all the old district leaders who now 
follow Platt won in their districts, however. 
The methods they employed were the same as 
those that prevailed at the Tammany prima¬ 
ries. According to the statements of the Brookfield 
men, the Platt leaders voted dead men, democrats, 
and republicans who lived outside of the districts in 
which they voted. It is alleged, too, that Tammany 
men, in considerable numbers, helped their old al¬ 
lies at the polls. In the old days the Tammany 
leaders used to send batches of men regularly to the 
republican primaries to assist republican leaders, 
who in return helped Tammany on election day, 
and now, it appears, the old days have come again. 
A Brookfield leader said to-day that some men 
might go to jail in consequence of their voting 
last night. The primaries w'ere held under 
the primary election law, and offenses against 
this law are punishable in the same way as 
offenses against the election laws. The great¬ 
est frauds, it is alleged, were perpetrated in 
the Twenty-fifth district, where the Platt men 
made a mighty effort to defeat Mr. Hedges. 
He says that in the thirty-seventh election 
district 105 men were enrolled, and that of 
this number two are dead, and forty-eight do 
not live in the district .—Neiv York Evening 
Post, Sept. 14 . 

Platt Tries to Punish a Former Lieuten¬ 
ant, Fassett. 

J. Sloat Fassett, in his fight against Platt 
in Chemung county, is hampered somewhat as 
Coggeshall was hampered in Oneida, by the 
selfish personal element in the contest. Fas¬ 
sett has by no means the unsavory record of 
Coggeshall, but he employed what are known 
as “ machine methods,” and was subservient 
to the bossism of Platt so long as it served his 
own ends. He was the Platt candidate for 
governor in 1891, and his fierce antipathy to 
the “boss” springs from his failure to retain his 
support for the nomination last year .—New 
York Times. 

Tom Platt, boss, showed his full hand in his 
game against ex-Senator J. Sloat Fassett in 


Chemung county at the meeting of the appel¬ 
late committee this morning. The names of 
men known to be favorable to Fassett have not 
been allowed upon the enrollment books. 
And where, after the day of registry, it was 
suspected that the name of a Fassett man had 
been placed upon the books, it was stricken off 
and a card sent notifying him of the fact and 
referring him to the appellate committee of 
the county committee. This morning the ap¬ 
pellate committee met in star chamber session. 
The committee organized in secret and went 
into secret session. Had not the straight re¬ 
publicans of Chemung county got onto the 
fact on time, the committee would have 
adjourned without listening to a single case 
on appeal. However, when it was made 
known that the committee was in session, the 
Fassett republicans whose names had been 
stricken from the enrollment books flocked to 
the committee room in great numbers. 

No case was settled. The story of the 
maneuvering of Platt’s men in stuffing the en¬ 
rollment books discloses one of the most high¬ 
handed pieces of rascality in the political his¬ 
tory of the state .—Elmira dispatch Buffalo Ex¬ 
press, Sept. 6. 

Fassett Lets Out Some Facts About the 
Boss. 

Who has been since 1881 the greatest “mis¬ 
chief maker” in the republican party ? Who 
resigned from the United States senate the 
fatal year Garfield was shot? Who precipi¬ 
tated upon the party for merely personal ends 
the bitterest factional fight this state has ever 
known? Who was identified with forged proxy 
scandals and the awful Folger campaign? Who 
stood in the pathway of long-promised reform legis¬ 
lation at Albany all last winter? And lastly, who 
has imperiled republican success in the state 
and made democratic success in New York 
City inevitable this fall by his vicious assaults 
upon Mayor Strong for attempting to honestly 
carry out his ante-election promises? 

To ask these questions is to answer them. 
There is but one name which comes at once to 
the lips of every intelligent republican, and 
that name is Thomas C. Platt .—From the El¬ 
mira Daily Advertiser. 

Caucuses are to be held Thursday night in 
many parts of the city, and it would cause no 
surprise if broken heads were one of the re¬ 
sults. It is charged by the anti-Platt men that the 
republican machine is spending money tvilh lavish 
hands, and they say the only question now in the 
fight is, “How much is to be sent here ?” 

“If they make it $20,000 they will win. If 
the figure is $15,000 the chances are even. If 
it is limited to $10,000 they are defeated,” said 
one of the most prominent republicans in the 
county to a correspondent of the New York 
Times. “All decency has been abandoned by 
the machine. It is a question of dollars and 
cents with them.” 

Mr. Fassett is devoting his entire time to the 
canvass .—Elmira dispatch, Sept. 9. 

The republicans of the city of Elmira and 
the county of Chemung achieved a notable 
victory to-night. Despite all the powers the 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


259 


Platt-Flood-Tammany alliance could bringto 
bear against the solid, honest-minded repub¬ 
licans of the county, the party, as represented 
by ex-Senator J. Sloat Fassett, won a decisive 
and significant victory.— Elmira dispatch, Sept. 
12 . 

The Brotherhood of Boss Platt, Repub¬ 
lican, and Boss Murphy, Democrat. 

The regular organizat ion is being fought in Troy 
bitterly as it was here. The chairman of the county 
committee is Frank S. Black, who was a leader in 
the committee of safely, organized after the Boss 
murder, and who was elected to congress last fall. 
The delectable method of attack upon him by the re¬ 
publican allies of Murphyism and Bat-Sheaism 
may be Judged by the following from the Troy Tele¬ 
gram, Platt organ: “ Why, this Black was nom¬ 
inated as a joke. There was not a republican 
in the whole district who believed that he 
could be elected; he would never have come 
within ten miles of a nomination if success 
had been thought possible. In the words of 
Lou Payn, a yellow dog could have been 
elected last fall. But whether yellow or 
Black, this district did elect a dog, a sneak¬ 
ing, worthless, ungrateful cur.” 

* » * 

Mike Dady, one of the old-time republican 
“boys” in Brooklyn, who deserted his party 
when it nominated a reformer for mayor two 
years ago, is back again, now that the ma¬ 
chine element is on top, and, as one of Jake 
Worth’s lieutenants (Platt’s man), is once 

more installed as boss of his ward. 

« * « 

Mr. Lauterbach, like his master, Platt, 
makes his political influence serve his busi¬ 
ness interest. He has just secured the adop¬ 
tion by the New York board of aldermen of a 
resolution giving a street railroad in which 
he is interested a valuable extension of route. 

He did it with the aid of the lammany members, too. 
♦ ♦ ♦ 

The Sham Convention. 

Few men of importance came to the city to¬ 
day. Trains were infrequent. Those who came 
last night, however, were a busy lot. Mr. 
Platt’s rooms were occupied all day by men 
prominent in the party, who came to wind up 
what he wanted done. Every one, almost, who 
had had a little difference with him went over 
to his qu arters and took a bit of an olive branch 
which hung over his door.— Saratoga dispatch, 
September 15. 

* * * 

At 12:20 o’clock Mr. Platt entered the hall 
and there was an uproar that was^astonishing, 
men standing on the seats and cheering vocif¬ 
erously while the band played “Hail to the 
Chief.” 

♦ ♦ ♦ 

Mr. Platt is not working covertly or through 
emissaries this year. The only question in re¬ 
gard to delegates in the preliminary canvass 
was whether they were Platt or anti-Platt men, 
and he promptly claimed his own as fast as 
they were chosen. He has gone to Saratoga with 
the distinct understanding on the part of everybody 
that to-morrow’s convention is his and will do his 
bidding, and he lakes no pains to conceal his own as¬ 
surance of the fact .— Neiv York Times. 


BOSS SHEEHAN. 

Wm. H. Cuddeback, the new chairman of 
the democratic general committee of Erie 
county, is a Sheehan man. Charles N. Bray- 
ton, the new treasurer, was a Sheehan man in 
the last days of his term as county clerk. 
Frank T. Reynolds, the “new” secretary, is 
the same old Reynolds, the reputed author of 
the infamous Reynolds rules, Mr. Sheehan’s 
most willing tool and one of his principal ben¬ 
eficiaries. A majority of the members of the 
advisory committee are Sheehanites. This is 
the old gang under new names. 

BOSS BRICE. 

Cuyahoga county is entitled to 59 votes in 
the demoratic state convention at Springfield. 
Twice that number will apply for admission on 
Tuesday as a result of the exciting convention 
held here to-day at which the Brice men re¬ 
volted against the action of their opponents, 
and set up a convention of their own. The 
contest between the two factions began early 
in the session, when Alfred Whittaker, a pro¬ 
nounced free silver man, was elected chairman 
over ex-Attorney-General Lawrence, a Brice 
leader, by 227 to 189. This victory on the part 
of the anti-Brice leaders led to the appoint¬ 
ment of a committee of three to select dele¬ 
gates to the state convention. The Brice men 
opposed this motion, and a stormy scene fol¬ 
lowed. Personal collisions were frequent, and 
all manner of epithets were applied to the 
chairman. Chairman Whittaker was struck 
in the face with a hard ball manufactured by 
an enemy out of a newspaper. 

J. J. Greeves mounted a chair and shouted: 
“ All in favor of an honest convention come 
this way! ” He led the way, followed by the 
Brice delegates. A possession was formed, and 
the Brice people marched out to hold a con¬ 
vention by themselves.— Cleveland dispatch New 
York Times, August 17. 

Col. Kilbourne received a letter from Sena¬ 
tor Brice yesterday, urging him to be a candi¬ 
date and assuring him that he could be nomi¬ 
nated by acclamation and unanimously. 
There is no doubt that the senatorwill control 
the convention. The Chicago coinage plank 
will be indorsed with some opposition. The 
anti-Brice element is likely to make a fight 
upon him, but no resolution hostile to him 
can be adopted. 

L. P. Ohliger, revenue collector at Cleveland and 
a friend of Senator Brice, is here to-night, on his 
way to Springfield. He says the Brice delegates 
from Cuyahoga will be seated in the state conven¬ 
tion.—New York Times, Aug. 19. 

* • « 

Warner Miller: “Senator Brice has again 
shown that he has control of the Ohio democ¬ 
racy. I’m glad of it, very glad.” And the 
ex-senator rubbed his hands as though he 
wished there were Brices all over the land. 

« « « 

It seems that Senator Brice has won a great 
victory in the struggle for the control of the 
democratic convention of Ohio. He has con¬ 
trol of the organization and of all the im¬ 


portant committees as well as a majority of 
the delegates. This means an indorsement of 
the administration and of Brice, and the 
adoption of a sound money platform. It is 
not often that the Ohio senator succeeds in 
getting his name identified with a good cause, 
and if he must win,it is some comfort to know 
that his triumph involves something more 
than his own personal fortunes. But after all 
is said, we think the country could have stood 
a free silver convention better than it can 
stand another six years of Calvin S. Brice in 
the United States senate.— Indianapolis News. 

* * * 

Seldom, if ever, has the convention of a 
great party been more completely owned by a 
single man than was the democratic conven¬ 
tion in Ohio, which adjourned yesterday. And 
the most remarkable thing about it all is that. 
the sole force which this man represents in 
politics is money. Calvin S. Brice entered 
politics as a millionaire who had plenty of 
money and was willing to spend it. He was 
and is a New York business man, having only 
a nominal residence in Ohio. Yet the Ohio 
democrats not only have honored him with 
one of the highest offices in the gift of the peo¬ 
ple of any state, but have finally placed them¬ 
selves completely at his disposal, allowing 
him both to write their platform and pick out 
their candidate. It is true Brice has done all 
this by the active aid of the administration at 
Washington and in its'name. In congress he 
was considered a very lukewarm administra¬ 
tion man. During the pendency of the Wil¬ 
son bill he made a speech reflecting severely 
on the President, charging him, among other 
things, with being responsible for the infa¬ 
mous sugar schedule.— Buffalo Express, August 
22 . 


BOSS GORMAN. 

The fact that Gorman retains the whip hand in 
Maryland democratic politics is ascribed largely to 
his success in weaning Boss Basin away from his 
alliance with Governor Brown and the independents 
under the leadership of Bepresentative-elect J. K 
Cowen. The independents a short time ago 
were working openly together to overturn Gor¬ 
man and capture the state convention. They 
were operating in every part of the state, and 
actually had succeeded in carrying the coun¬ 
ties of Garrett, Alleghany and Dorchester, and 
were in a fair way to win in other strongholds 
of Gormanism when the return of Mr. Rasin to 
his former alliance with the senator put a new 
face on matters, and the fight practically was 
given up.— New York Times, July SO. 

* * * 

Frauds are alleged in balloting at the pri¬ 
maries in the Sixth district, St. Mary’s county, 
Md., last Saturday. One ballot was challenged 
and a pin was stuck through the paper as a 
marker. When the box was opened three Gor¬ 
man ballots were found folded in one. Other 
similar evidence of fraud was found, and the 
number of ballots cast exceeded the number of 
names on the check-list. 










260 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


There is lively anxiety to know what Sena¬ 
tor Gorman will do at the democratic state 
convention on Wednesday next. Nobody 
knows, and many even doubt whether the 
senator has yet made up his mind, although 
the majority of the newspapers insist that he 
will nominate State Senator Thomas G. Hayes 
for governor and will make an unequivocal 
declaration in favor of reassessment. 

It is one of the tightest places he has been 
in during his political career. He controls 
“ the machine,” but the people and the papers 
are against him. 

But, uncertain as everything is, the senator 
is calm and unruffled. He came to Baltimore 
this week and dictated the delegates to be voted 
for at the primaries, but the vote was a keen 
disappointment to his supporters,/or of the 55,- 
000 democratic voters of the city only 8,567 took the 
trouble to go to the polls. In no convention have 
the senator’s friends attempted to offer a 
resolution indorsing his course, and it is an¬ 
nounced that no eflbrt of that kind will be 
made at the state convention. The fear, of 
course, is that it would be rejected. On the 
other hand, resolutions indorsing President 
Cleveland are passed at all the conventions, 
and they never fail to bring forth earnest en¬ 
thusiasm. 

It may be that at the last moment Senator Gor¬ 
man may do as he has done in other tight places — 
turn around and nominate an anti Gorman man, 
so as to placate his enemies .— Baltimore dispatch 
New York Times, July 27. 

Hi * * 

In trying to avoid Scylla, Boss Gorman of 
Maryland seems to have plunged into Charyb- 
dis. He turned down the candidate with 
whom he had won the primaries, Senator 
Thomas Hayes, and took up a dark horse, in 
the hope of mollifying the Cleveland men. 

« « « 

It was a Gorman-Rasin victory. 

These two men agreed upon the candidates 
and then they issued orders to their followers 
in the city and counties to fall in line. 

Many personal pledges had to be broken, 
but, like a thoroughly disciplined army, most 
of the delegates obeyed the commands and 
carried them out with such machine-like 
precision that even the old-timers had to 
smile. 

Here is the way the nomination for gov¬ 
ernor came about: 

Senator Gorman had said in effect to Mr. 
Rasin: “I will not accept as a candidate 
Governor Brown, Judge Robinson or Judge 
Fisher.” 

Mr. Rasin had said in effect to Senator Gor¬ 
man : “I will not accept as a candidate 
Thomas G. Hayes, Spencer C. Jones or John 
Walter Smith.” 

Then came the question : “ On whom can 
we unite?” 

Several gentlemen were considered and 
finally Mr. Hurst was decided upon. Friends 
of Mr. Rasin and friends of Senator Gorman 
were sent to Mr. Hurst separately, so as to 


make the offer of the governorship look like a 
spontaneous movement. Mr. Hurst consented. 
Gorman and Raisn did the rest. 

At a gathering of State Senator Hayes’s 
friends at the Carrollton hotel there was ap¬ 
parent the bitterest feeling against Senator 
Gorman for his treatment of Senator Hayes. 
The presence of Mr. Gorman would no doubt 
have precipitated a scene which would have 
been not very pleasant to him. 

One of Senator Hayes's friends, in speaking 
of his candidacy, said that “Senator Hayes 
was induced to enter the contest at Mr. Gor¬ 
man’s suggestion. The reason assigned by him 
Was that he was the only available* candi¬ 
date, because re-assessment was the only issue 
which could unite the party and that a pro¬ 
vision in the platform without Senator 
Hayes’s candidacy would be mistrusted by the 
people.” 

Continuing, he said: “ There is no baser 

treachery on record than Gorman’s to Hayes. Mr. 
Gorman led Senator Hayes and his friends up to 
two hours befoi'e the convention met to believe that he 
luas to be nominated. The delegates to the convention 
were elected in many counties without opposition, be¬ 
cause they were told they were to vote for Hayes.” 

The discussion then led to the famous inter¬ 
view at 10 o’clock yesterday morning between 
Gorman and Hayes, and one of the gentlemen 
present from southeren Maryland said he had 
tried to get the facts from Senator Hayes but 
failed, as Mr. Hayes declined to discuss the 
scene. Another said he had a version of the 
interview from a member of the city delega¬ 
tion who was in an adjoining room and over¬ 
heard it. As given by this delegate the inter¬ 
view was opened by Senator Hayes saying to 
Senator Gorman : “ I now discover your base¬ 
ness. What the people of this state believe of 
you is all true. You have posed as in favor 
of re-assessment and have used me for your 
base purposes. If you had given me a few 
more hours to expose your nefarious schemes 
I should have let the people of Maryland know 
of your deception. I despise your methods 
and do not fear you or your henchmen. I am 
determined that if I can prevent it that your 
grip on the democratic party shall end with 
your nomination of Hurst.” 

Senator Hayes then, taking up his hat, left, 
saying as he opened the door; “ We this day 
part forever and my life’s work shall be to 
help dethrone you from the dictatorship now 
held by you over the party.” It is said Mr. 
Hayes shook his fist in Mr. Gorman’s face. 

Throughout the interview Gorman remained 
silent. He did not say a word.— Baltimore Sun, 
August 1. 

* * * 

The Revolt. 

The republican state convention at Cam¬ 
bridge yesterday nominated probably the 
strongest ticket that it could have put in the 
field. Personally the nominees are above 
criticism. They are all gentlemen of high 
standing and of undoubted character and 
worth. Mr. Lowndes, the nominee for gov¬ 
ernor, is a man of fine business ability and 


varied practical experience, thoroughly con¬ 
versant with the needs and resources of the 
state. 

There is another point upon which the re¬ 
publican party has the right to congratulate 
itself in connection with the ticket nominated 
at Cambridge yesterday, and that is that it 
was nominated by the republican voters of the 
state, and not by bosses or machines. There 
was a spirited and earnest rivalry between the 
friends of the aspirants for the gubernatorial 
nomination, but it was a contest of the people 
and among the people. The primaries were 
fair, free and unfettered, and the will of the 
people as recorded at them was expressed in 
the convention. No boss undertook to step in 
and override the popular will, or to force the 
convention to drop the candidates the people 
wanted and nominate those he had determined 
upon. 

Besides pledging itself to re-assessment, the 
platform pronounces in favor of annual regis¬ 
tration in Baltimore, of giving places on the 
official ballot to independent nominees as well 
as to those of regular party organizations; of 
making the supervisory powers of courts 
over registers effective. * * * 

Another plank in the platform is one which 
is especially worthy of commendation. It is 
as follows: “That all public offices exist for 
the good of the people only, and it is the right 
of the people to have them administered with 
an eye single to the public interests; and we 
therefore pledge ourselves to the enactment of 
such legislation as shall permit the people of 
the several counties and municipalities of the 
state to decide for themselves by popular vote 
whether appointments to the police, fire and all 
other departments of public service shall be in ac¬ 
cordance with the principles of the merit sys¬ 
tem.” 

The Sun has advocated the application of 
the civil service system to state and munici¬ 
pal administration for many years, and it is 
glad to see that it has at last secured the in¬ 
dorsement of two political parties in this state— 
the republicans and the prohibitionists.— Bal¬ 
timore Sun, Aug. 16. 

» » ♦ 

Mr. Lowndes, republican candidate for gov¬ 
ernor : 

“ I have read with interest the platform 
adopted. It is clear enough for everyone to 
understand, and broad enough, not only for 
republican but for independent voters to stand 
upon. It speaks in no uncertain terms as to 
re-assessment, registration, fair elections and 
public schools. It comes out boldly for the 
merit system, and civil service, by the way, is 
here to stay. 

“ Wherever it has been honestly tried the 
people have sustained it. Chicago adopted it 
by an overwhelming popular vote, and I be¬ 
lieve it has given satisfaction to everyone ex¬ 
cept those who seek office for the spoils. 

“I believe that when my party comes into 
power it will fulfill the pledges made at Cam¬ 
bridge yesterday.” 






THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


VoL. II, No. 32. 


INDIANAPOLIS, OCTOBER, 1895. teems ?o“cenCer"co7r““ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolii, Ind. 


The methods of Boss Gorman in the 
desperate fight he is making to retain his 
supremacy are indicated by the following 
from a correspondent exceptionally well- 
informed and dispassionate: 

“We are in the midst of an extraordina¬ 
rily active and interesting campaign, and 
are doing all that we can to prevent our 
senator and his satellites from simply 
stealing the state again, as they did in 1875, 
and as they stole the city in 1885, such be¬ 
ing, beyond all question, their present in¬ 
tention. 


The republican party of Indianapolis is 
entitled to the great weight of the con¬ 
gratulations upon the result of the city 
election of October 8. Its candidate, Trus- 
ler, as we have often stated, had an un¬ 
satisfactory record in the city council, 
which he capped by being the leader in 
the movement forcing the fire chief out 
of his place, because the latter would not 
dismiss a few democrats. As comptroller, 
he levied an assessment upon policemen 
and firemen and boldly declared that all 
appointive offices were political ofi&ces Sud 
should be paid for by those who received 
them. On his motion the rule forbidding 
assessments was stricken out of the civil 
service rules and he was openly opposed 
to adopting any civil service rules what¬ 
ever, although the charter plainly requires 
it. He went about securing the nomina¬ 
tion in the most approved boss style, hav¬ 
ing his captains of tens and captains of 
hundreds. His nomination was forced by 
his party machine avowedly because he 
was the kind of man he was and particu¬ 
larly because he was opposed to “civil ser¬ 
vice.” That such a man can not command 
the votes of the republican party of this 
city, but, on the other hand, thathe should 
go headlong to defeat must redound to the 
credit of that party. It is the stronger and 
better to-day because of this defeat. It 
had any number of men who would make 
good mayors of this city and and if it had 
nominated one such, there would have 
been no difficulty in electing him. There 
is a great movement throughout the coun¬ 
try for better municipal government and 
the republican party of Indianapolis will 
have to join in that movement if it wants 
to govern this city. 


The democrats now have all the rope 
there is and it is for them to decide wheth¬ 
er they will, as usual, hang themselves. 
They were beaten by 3,000 two years ago; 
they have gained by 3,700 now and can 
just as easily be beaten by any number of 
thousands two years from now. Happily 
that is the way the voters of this town are 
constituted. The demand of the times is 
to exclude party politics from city affairs, 
and to this end the merit and labor serv¬ 
ice systems are the first indispensible steps. 
The democrats will find already in force a 
set of rules covering both of these systems 
and in the main good. A rule forbidding 
assessments should be added and there 
should be some further slight modification 
in the way of excluding favoritism. These 
rules have been adopted under the charter 
and are a part of the law of this city. The 
people want them strictly enforced. The 
pensioners upon the democratic party will 
be violently opposed to them and there 
will be presented the most important prob¬ 
lem with which the new mayor will have 
to deal. It will be very bad for his party 
should he decide that Indianapolis can go 
without municipal reform. 

In his final report which Mayor Denny 
made a few days ago, while he congratu¬ 
lates himself upon having secured the 
adoption of civil service rules for this 
city and takes it for granted that they are 
permanent additions to our methods 
of city government, he nevertheless says 
that their working has not been entirely 
satisfactory. Of course not. When a may¬ 
or permits a rule forbidding assessments 
to be struck out on the suggestion of his 
comptroller and then permits the comp¬ 
troller to make a bold, barefaced assess¬ 
ment upon policemen and firemen, and 
when he sees all through his administra¬ 
tion repeated violations of the rules and 
punishes nobody because he is afraid, he 
can not expect such working of rules to be 
satisfactory nor can he expect to enhance 
the good opinion of himself in the public 
mind. Mayor Denny made the fatal mis¬ 
take of wanting to be a reformer without 
having the nerve to carry his reform to a 
complete victory. He has fallen between 
two stools. 


Even Secretary Carlisle is beginning 
to reap his reward. Congressman Ma¬ 
guire, of California, is in Washington 
pressing complaints against Superintend¬ 
ent Daggett of the San Francisco mint. 
Maguire charges that Daggett has used the 


patronage of the mint for his own private 
ends, namely, to help his election to the 
United States Senate. That he has boasted 
of having used the patronage to control 
the last democratic state convention. That 
he has been absent from his post twelve 
months out of the last eighteen. That he 
has, while in office, organized a mining 
company and sold the stock at a dollar a 
share, to to the employes of the mint, and 
admits that he has collected thereby $2,400. 
This Carlislean office holder is best under¬ 
stood when his own words are quoted, as 
is shown by the following from the San 
Francisco Call, of April 8th, in which he is 
referring to his senatorial candidacy: 

“Senators BIggey, Fay, and Gessford, came to me 
and made a strong plea for the laundry work in the 
mint for Biggey’s brother, and in return for this fa¬ 
vor Biggey promised to vote for me. Gessford 
promised the same, and I gave his sister a place in 
the mint. She is out of it now. Senator Fay se¬ 
cured his brother’s appointment through promises 
of doing the same thing. Well, he did not do it, 
Of course, I am going to discharge Biggey’s brother, 
and Fay’s brother, too. I do this in justice to the 
democratic party, which I consider has been bun¬ 
coed out of patronage.” 


The entire misunderstanding which the 
country has obtained concerning the new 
consular rules is proved by the fact that 
applicants, believing the opportunity to 
be competitive, have swarmed forward, 
asking a chance to compete in such num¬ 
bers that the state department has been 
obliged to notify the public in effect that 
there is no open competition, but that 
the new system is still the rankest kind of 
a spoils system, with a few by-laws. Even 
Josiah Quincy’s explanation before the 
Massachusetts state democratic convention 
the other day leaves the system as lame as 
ever. Quincy is evidently very sore over 
the universal public reprobation of his 
disgraceful loot of the consular service and 
he has good reason to be. It is useless for 
him to try to explain—just as useless as it 
would be to try to explain his connection 
with that bureau of engraving and print¬ 
ing contract. 

It is gratifying to see that the good 
sense and honor of the post-office em¬ 
ployes at large have recognized that the 
recent secret investigation of them could 
do no injury to those who were conscien¬ 
tious and capable. At the late national 
association of letter carriers, Postmaster- 
General Wilson carefully explained what 
had been done and how and why it had 
been done, and there was a general expres¬ 
sion of approval. In Philadelphia where 




















262 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the civil service law was for years tricked 
and where pulls and politics have domi¬ 
nated, one hundred men have been dis¬ 
missed. One instance given by the Wash¬ 
ington correspondent of the New York 
Evening Post, illustrates what this paper has 
claimed, that while every employe should 
be certain of his tenure if he is competent 
and faithful, he must be held to the most 
exacting standard: 

“One of the best-backed men who has been 
brought to book and discharged from the service 
is a veteran soldier who has been in the govern, 
ment employ twenty-six years. When the first re¬ 
port came in about him,it seemed too bad to be 
true, and his route-card was turned over to an¬ 
other pair of agents, who were strangers to the 
whole matter. The first report had described him 
as loitering so many minutes in so many saloons, 
in each of which he drank a glass of beer or spirits. 
The second described him as not only repeating 
this round of visits and drinks, but of stopping 
in the street, throwing his bag of letters on the 
sidewalk, and watching a circus procession for 
nineteen minutes. When called to account, the 
man admitted that he had t<iken one drink as a 
remedy for an attack of the cramps, but denied all 
the rest of the indictment, and produced affidavits 
from various barkeepers on his route that they had 
not served him with anything. Then the Grand 
Army of the Republic took up his fight; but when 
minutely detailed evidence produced by the secret 
agents had been not only carefully sifted but sol* 
emnly sworn to by the agents themselves, the de¬ 
fense had to surrender at discretion, and the car¬ 
rier went out.” 

As an indication of the way the investi¬ 
gation was carried on, the same paper gives 
the following instance: 

“A generally efficient carrier was threatened 
with suspension for remaining ten minutes in one 
office where he went to deliver mail, seven minutes 
in another, and so on. He came forward at once 
and met the charge with an admission that it was 
entirely true. But he then produced his registered- 
letter book to show that in one office he had had to 
wait for something like 100 signatures by the clerk 
whose duty it was to receive the registered mail, 
and in another for sixty-odd signatures, and so on. 
The date and hour agreed precisely in every in¬ 
stance with the report of the secret agents, and the 
carrier was exonerated on the spot. The depart¬ 
ment derived much satisfaction from the fact that 
the very evidence which cleared the record of the 
carrier proved also the correctness of the secret 
agents’ statements. 

In the October North American Review, 
Dr. Henry Smith Williams has an article 
on “ Politics and the Insane,” which goes 
straight to the mark. He points out that 
from Kansas to New York the almost uni¬ 
versal rule of treating the insane is to 
turn them over to the tender mercies of 
politicians and heelers. It is one of the 
most disgraceful facts of American civili¬ 
zation. New York city is a typical in¬ 
stance. The state cares for its insane and 
cares for them well. It was proposed to 
bring under the state care the six thou¬ 
sand insane patients of the city, now 
housed in accommodations for about four 
thousand, a large share being very unfit 
accommodations. To this end the State 
would tax the city $750,000 a year in ad¬ 
dition to the present tax. But the plan, if 


carried out, would have taken the spoil of 
the institutions from Tammany. There¬ 
fore Tammany compromised with the 
legislature by letting the city be taxed the 
extra $760,000, which all goes into the state 
treasury, and in return the city kept its 
insane, to be continued to be spoiled by 
the spoiler. It seems incredible that 
Americans will submit to such a barbarous 
travesty of government; but they do sub¬ 
mit to it. In Kansas, the populist reform¬ 
ers displayed their entirely mercenary 
character by looting the Topeka hospital 
for the insane, from cellar to garret, in 
which Dr, Williams says they were headed 
by a woman. Then this band of freeboot¬ 
ers fell to quarreling among themselves^ 
until at the end of the year they had such 
a pandemonium that they were obliged to 
re-call the old superintendent. 

City and State is a paper forced into pub¬ 
lication because Philadelphia reformers 
found themselves unable to get facts be¬ 
fore the people through the regular press. 
While it calls a spade a spade, it performs 
this office in what may be called a very 
gentlemanly manner, too gentlemanly the 
Chronicle thinks for the ruffianism it has 
to deal with. It has been for some months 
giving its readers facts concerning Boss 
Quay’s “Fight for His Life.” But since 
the boss’s victory it has evidently been 
taken to task by a lot of reformer apolo¬ 
gists for its attack on Quay, and for not 
taking seriously Quay’s reform platform 
at which his henchmen in convention 
openly laughed. This peculiar condition 
of Pennsylvania reformers themselves in¬ 
fected with Quayism is what outside of 
that state is a marvel to the country. 
Some years ago in one of the revolts against 
Quay, several men from other states were 
invited to address a great audience of re¬ 
formers in Philadelphia, New York pa 
pers of financial responsibility had been 
boldly printing the facts of Quay’s infam¬ 
ous career, and in particular the instance 
of his embezzlement and of his rescue 
from a felon’s penalty by Cameron, who 
replaced the stolen money out of his own 
pocket. Quay had been silent under these 
repeated charges. Surely a reformer ad¬ 
dressing reformers might mention such 
facts in plain English and expect a ringing 
response. When one speaker thus spoke 
of Quay that evening, he instantly felt in 
the anti-Quay audience a chill of disap¬ 
proval. His speech fell on disapproving 
reformers’ ears. It seemed curious to him 
then that over such a career, and such a 
man, one must tread softly. He did not 
then know of those silken fetters, of intri¬ 
cate business interests, that have so many 
times laid curious meshes around and 
about the reformers of that great, historic, 
rich, and boss-ridden state. 


It is the duty of City and State at what¬ 
ever cost of disapproval to continue to 
print names and facts; it is its duty to ex¬ 
pose to public view all Quayized reformers. 
It is entirely possible that as City and State 
has no financial interests to be stabbed, 
certain reformers may decline to read its 
facts. It must then speak the truth for the 
rest, and surely the regeneration of Penn¬ 
sylvania will finally come from its humil¬ 
iating and degraded position before the 
bar of an inexorable public opinion, out¬ 
side the state. Free government must be 
restored to Pennsylvania. How abject its 
condition is indicated by the following: 

“To-night Senator Quay is the hero, as well as 
the Idol of Pennsylvania politicians of all degrees 
of prominence. His rooms at the Lochiel Hotel 
have been constantly besieged since the convention 
ended, by men anxious to pay homage to his 
matchless leadership. The senator takes all of the 
praise and congratulations that are being showered 
upon him with his usual stoicism, and so far as 
outward appearances go, his demeanor is just the 
same as when the fight seemed to be going against 
him.” 

The signal success of Senator Quay in the politi¬ 
cal field this year has suggested to the people of 
Dillsburg, this county, where he was horn in a log 
cabin, sixty-two years ago, that they ought to cele¬ 
brate the anniversary of that event on the 30th of 
this month. 

And most astounding of all is this obei¬ 
sance of the highly respectable Ledger 
that had opposed Quay, Referring to 
Quay’s chairmanship, it says: 

“Noexception can properly betaken to this,even 
by those who do not like Senator Quay nor his 
methods; there is something gained in having the 
real and nominal leader one and the same man.” 


TWO VIEWS OF THE CONSULAR 
REFORM RULES. 

President Cleveland is certainly deserving of 
great credit for the steady advance which he has 
made in the inclusion under the classified service 
of federal offices, which have hitherto been within 
the grasp of spoilsmen; hut all the newspapers, 
even of the republican party, seem to have been 
misled as to the praise due the administration for 
the recent executive order intended to reform the 
consular service. Mr. Olney’s plan, for it is pecu¬ 
liarly his—instead of requiring a free competitive 
examination open to all applicants, and, as nat¬ 
urally would have been the case, to be conducted 
under the civil service commission, is only the 
long-discarded, pass-examination system in dis¬ 
guise. This never has succeeded and never will 
succeed in getting the sound practical results aimed 
at by civil service reform, as has been abundantly 
proved in England and in this country. Under 
Mr. Olney’s plans, the secretary of state, who is 
the appointing officer, first chooses his man and 
then examines him, not on a basis of competition, 
which insures fairness to all and opens appoint¬ 
ment to the best man, but by a standard which he 
fixes, which, if disposed to favoritism and partisan¬ 
ship, he can arrange to suit the capabilities of per¬ 
sons whom he has determined upon for appoint¬ 
ment. In a word, Mr. Olney’s plan of pass-exam¬ 
inations puts no real restraints upon the had pur¬ 
poses of a partisan appointing officer, and does 
not afford free competition, two things which it is 
the primary purpose of genuine reform to secure. 
It leaves the whole machinery of examination in 
the hands of the appointing officer who is the 










THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


263 


very man from whom they should be completely 
removed. Sooner or later the inadequacy of Mr, 
Olney’s plan will be demonstrated to the public, 
as it is now to every civil service reformer who has 
examined it. Mr. Olney, like all other wise men, 
who refuse to avail themselves of the garnered 
wisdom of experience, might readily have avoided 
the error into which he has fallen. But he wanted 
to have a reform which was of his own peculiar 
manufacture, and so has repeated an old mistake. 
We must look for any real relief from the grave 
abuses under which our consular service has long 
suffered to the passage through congress of the 
Lodge or Morgan bill.—Ci<)/ andState, September 26. 

The above is the moderate expres¬ 
sion of what every moderately informed 
civil service reformer would be supposed 
to think of Mr. Olney’s consular reform. 
On the face it lacks every fundamental 
principle of reform, because it leaves un¬ 
touched the key-stone of the arch of the 
present spoils system—favoritism. It is 
still favoritism that may and will guide 
Secretary Olney and his commission made 
up of his own subordinates. The regular 
civil service commission is ignored. Sec¬ 
retary Olney’s plan will be of material as¬ 
sistance in relieving himself from unde¬ 
sirable democratic pressure. That is all. 
Otherwise it is really worse than no reform, 
because it is in fact a bogus reform that 
will act as a deterrent to the real reform 
that was covered by the Lodge or Mor¬ 
gan bills. Congress seeking excuses to 
retain spoil will inquire why interfere 
with the measures adopted by the Mas- 
sichusetts reformer, the secretary of 
state ? 


In the first administration of Mr. Cleve¬ 
land, civil service reformers in certain 
parts of the country were for a time un¬ 
certain whether or not they had gone mad. 
They saw what seemed as gross acts of 
spoils vandals as had ever occurred. But 
there arose among distinguished Massa¬ 
chusetts reformers such curious apologies 
and explanations, such paralysis of eyes 
and ears, that for a time it was pertinent 
to inquire who were the sane, and who had 
the normal organs of sight and hearing. 
Those were days when the reform ship 
was perilously near the rocks, and driven 
there by its own pilots. Later, in the 
present administration we had the spec¬ 
tacle of the barter of offices to secure cer¬ 
tain legislation. Nothing seemed plainer 
than that such a course attacked the foun¬ 
dations of free government, and that it 
was in all respects as immoral as to sell 
the offices for money which might be de¬ 
voted to the best of purposes. Again from 
Massachusetts arose distinguished defense. 
The Chronicle has never doubted the 
moral sincerity of those who have taken 
what has seemed these most preposterous 
reform positions. Now comes the latest 
instances of this interesting reform stra¬ 
bismus in the Springfield Republican's view 
of Olney’s consular reform. The Chron¬ 


icle desires to emphasize its belief that 
the Springfield Republican has always been 
a hater of all spoil in public life, an unre¬ 
mitting worker to break down that sys¬ 
tem, that no paper knows better what con¬ 
stitutes real reform, and that it conscien¬ 
tiously believes its course in lauding Olney 
will in some devious, mysterious way, as¬ 
sist reform. We print the following ex¬ 
tract from its comments as a most inter¬ 
esting study in modern casuistry: 

“The administration of the United States con¬ 
sular service on the spoils basis has long been a 
scandal and a serious detriment to the nation. It 
is difficult, therefore, to overrate the importance of 
the step just taken by President Cleveland in lift, 
ing more than one-half of these oflBces out of the 
mire of politics. It will be seen by the President’s 
order that hereafter persons are to be selected for 
the specified posts from among those occupying or 
who have occupied places in the state department 
calculated to qualify them for consulate service, 
and others whose qualifications have been deter¬ 
mined by non-competitive examination's conducted 
by a special board of the state department. 

“This step has been taken under the general laws 
of the United States, without a special act of con¬ 
gress. Congress has fiddled over the question for 
some time without making any progress or giving 
sign of doing much of anything. The last congress 
took up the matter, and the senate committee on 
foreign relations made a report strongly criticising 
the present system of appointment to the service 
as a reward for party work, but nothing more came 
of it. Now the President has gone ahead without 
congress, finding its laws previously enacted and 
in precedents established under Grant’s adminis¬ 
tration, abundant authority for the departure. * * 

“And now we are to have some measure of this 
reform. It is primarily Secretary of State Olney’s 
work. He is the one who has studied out the way 
of meeting the demands of the situation without a 
special act of congress, and to the sympathy of the 
President with civil service reform and his cour¬ 
age in giving it practical expression is due to the 
promulgation of Mr. Olney’s plan. We have further 
proof in this of the existence of a man in the dem¬ 
ocratic party fitted to succeed Mr. Cleveland if the 
party and the country want such a man.” 


Happily we have a distinguished exam¬ 
ple of a reformer who follows a diametric¬ 
ally opposite plan. It is the plan of pur¬ 
suing reform by a perfectly direct and 
simple course and courageously trusting 
the future consequences to the common 
sense and moral sense of the American 
people. Since Theodore Roosevelt became 
a civil service commissioner down to the 
present time he has not deviated from this 
apparently simple course. He has attained 
his ends always by direct, uncompromis¬ 
ing, straightforward means. To see straight 
first and then to possess the courage to go 
as he sees, never to shift and wobble, or be 
smitten with panic, constitute his political 
greatness. For Theodore Roosevelt has 
been so tried and tested that even the skep¬ 
tical must feel sure not only of his absolute 
sincerity and courage, but of his states¬ 
manship. His plan of reform by the direct 
method is suited to the American people 
and to the age we live in. Since the war 
we have had no man in public life so like 
the Charles Sumner type. His directness, 


his courage and his candor ought to be an 
inspiration to other young men entering 
public life. There is nothing better to be 
said of it than that it has noticeably affected 
the standard of manliness in a police force 
besotted with Tammanyism. 


EX-BOSS MAHONE. 

Kecollections of his methods as a political 
boss are recounted at every gathering of poli¬ 
ticians in this city. He used to swing party 
patronage with a long arm in the early eighties. 
He used to leave lying on bistable, as a means 
of impressing the casual visitor of the sense of 
his power, in his palmy days, a printed blank 
reading in this way: 

[Form No. 5.] 

Washington, D. C.,-, 188—. 

General : Please appoint-postmaster at 

-, In the county of-, Virginia. 

This is at the request of those Interested in the 
oflice, and for the good of the service, as I am ad¬ 
vised and believe. Yours truly. 

William Mahone. 

To the first assistant postmaster-general, post-office 

department. 

This document was indorsed, also in print, 
in this way: 

Senator Mahone,-, 188—, recommends the 

appointment of-for postmaster at-in 

-county, Virginia. 

Mahone worked diligently in conjunction 
with Jay Hubbell, assessing all the federal 
office-holders within reach. Once in a while 
his mechanical methods brought him to grief. 
The story is told of a democrat who had de¬ 
serted his party and done a great deal of work 
for Gen. Mahone in one of the southwestern 
counties of Virginia, and had received a coun¬ 
try post-oflSce in return. The neighborhood 
was not thickly settled, or the people very 
much given to letter-writing; and the result 
was that during the first month of his oflSce- 
holding the postmaster took in only four cents 
in cash—the price of one three-cent postage 
stamp and one postal-card. A campaign was 
just coming on, and the postmaster had hard¬ 
ly time to figure up his profits from his oflSce 
when a circular arrived from Hubbell de¬ 
manding 5 per cent, of his official income for 
campaign purposes. This was quickly followed 
by one from Mahone calling on him for 10 
per cent, of the some same income. The post¬ 
master concluded that, after handing over 5 
per cent, and then 10, the remainder of the 
four cents was not likely to lay the founda¬ 
tions of a fortune, so he threw up the post-office 
and his membership in the readjuster party at 
the same time, and went back to his old love 
among the democrats. 

Mahone could be very small in certain ways 
when he had vengeance to gratify. An old 
negro, who had been a servant in President 
Madison’s family, had received an appoint¬ 
ment as an employe of the United States Sen¬ 
ate at the instance of Ben Hill, of Georgia. 
The place was worth only a few hundred dol¬ 
lars a year, and the old man was abundantly 
able to perform its duties in spite of his ad¬ 
vanced age. He was a favorite with all the 
senators who came in contact with him. Ma¬ 
hone wanted a place for one of his bankrupt 















264 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


heelers, and, learning that the negro had been 
appointed through the influence of Hill, who 
had recently given him a terrible drubbing in 
a speech in the senate, he went to the sergeant- 
at-arms and said: 

“I want that nigger’s place !” 

“Why,” remonstrated the sergeant-at-arms, 
“that is Robert Steward. He was one of Presi¬ 
dent Madison’s servants. He has been here—” 

“Yes, yes, I know; but you might as well 
make him out one of Washington’s servants 
while you are about it. Perhaps that would 
help him to get another position. I want his 
place!” 

As the senator insisted, the sergeant-at-arms 
complied, for that was the period when the 
readjuster chief held the balance of power in 
the senate. 

In 1884 a commander who had been in the 
navy twenty-three years was superintendent 
of the fifth lighthouse district. He dismissed 
a notoriously incompetent negro who had been 
appointed by order of Mahone. The senator 
ordered his henchman back again. The com¬ 
mander refused to obey. The senator went to 
Washington and demanded that the com¬ 
mander be disciplined. It took the secretary 
of the navy four weeks to bring himself around 
to the point of carrying out this behest, and 
then the officer was put on waiting orders with 
the reduced pay incidental to that condition. 
—From the New York Evening Post. 

ANOTHER REPUBLICAN EX-BOSS— 
STEVE DORSEY. 

“I remember,” said a territory official, “that 
one time when court was in session at South Las 
Fe( 7 as,Senator Dorsey invited us out to his place 
to stay over Sunday. Naturally, ive all accepted, 
and in the party was Judge Vincent, whom Presi¬ 
dent Cleveland summarily, and, as we all 
thought, unjustly, removed for appointing 
Dorsey one of the jury commissioners of the 
county. 

“The senator received us in the dining¬ 
room. I will never forget that banquet. 
There wasn’t a drop of whisky on the place. 
Not a glass of beer was to be had. But cham¬ 
pagne of the costliest brands was pressed upon 
us. Champagne was good enough for Wash¬ 
ington, but it wasn’t the right thing for a New- 
Mexican crowd, and one after the other of us 
slipped away from the table and got out of 
doors. I can remember to this day how 
thirsty we were and how we longed for a little 
of the whisky to which we were accustomed. 
And all of the time the fresh bottles of cham¬ 
pagne were coming on the table to mock us. 
The senator was prodigal. He wouldn’t let 
the bottles stay to be emptied. A single glass, 
perhaps, would be poured out. In a few mo¬ 
ments the senator would waive the open bottles 
away and order fresh, saying the wine was flat. 
I wouldn’t pretend to say how many bottles 
came on that night. As soon as we could we 
got out of doors, all of us but one of our 
party, and the senator. They remained at the 
table engaged in a political argument. The 
senator was suave. His opponent was em-j 


phatic. I slipped back to the door and lis¬ 
tened. 

“‘Now let us consider this question calmly,’ 
I would hear the senator say. And then he 
would add, ‘by the way, my friend, your wine 
is flat. Waiter, here, bring us a fresh bottle.’ 

“And so it went on until our representative 
suddenly lurched and slid off his chair liter¬ 
ally under the table. He didn’t arise. I saw 
Dorsey look steadily toward the vacant chair 
and heard him say to himself: 

“ ‘Where is my adversary? He seems to have 
fallen early in the combat.’” From Santa Fe 
{N. M.) Letter to the St. Louis Globe-Democrat. 

THE CINCINNATI REPUBLICAN 
BOSS—COX. 

Without condemning him for adversities of 
fortune or disadvantages arising from his cir¬ 
cumstances, it has been shown that his school¬ 
ing was limited ; that his business career was 
brief and not at 'all brilliant; that when he 
entered politics he was comparatively poor; 
that he is now worth over $400,000 ; that his 
alleged successful “speculations” did not be¬ 
gin until he became a power in ward politics; 
that he has stock interests in the chief con¬ 
cerns which ask rights, franchises and favors 
of the boards he appoints by proxy, and that 
all “his” companies get what they want 
without trouble or friction. 

His public record is public history. His 
control of primaries and conventions; his de¬ 
feat of good men because they would not 
blindly bind themselves to obey his orders; 
his wasteful administration, through officials 
elected by him, of the affairs of the city and 
county; the inauguration of a constant espi¬ 
onage of each other by his lieutenants; the re¬ 
moval of the real seat of city and county 
government to an over-the-Rhine resort; the 
necessity of “seeing Cox” before attempting 
to secure any oflBce, be it that of garbage- 
wagon tender or congressman ; the creation of 
new, high-salaried and unnecessary offices to 
satisfy the demands of his hungry henchmen, 
and the constant cry for “more”—more 
money to spend—more power—more patron¬ 
age ; these things have been freely published 
in the news columns of the Post.—From the 
Cincinnati Post. 

* 

The county convention was held last week, 
and the Tribune, a republican newspaper, says 
that Cox “dictated every nomination that was 
made, controlled the vote of every delegation 
present, and the convention itself simply rati¬ 
fied the ticket which the supreme dictator of 
the parly carried in his pocket when he en¬ 
tered the hall where his servants were assem¬ 
bled.” The Cincinnati boss does not keep in 
the background, as is the habit of McLaugh¬ 
lin of Brooklyn, but attends conventions him¬ 
self, and the Tribune ssiys that in last week’s 
gathering “from his usual place upon the floor 
at the right of the platform, where he could 
command the eyes of every delegate, this man, 
whom not a precinct in Hamilton county 
would have elected a member of the conven¬ 


tion, dominated the entire proceedings and 
awed into silence every protest against the 
slate .”—New York Evening Post, Sept. SO. 


“QUAY TAU(4HT THOSE PENNSYL- 
VANIA POLITICIANS ALL THEY KNOW 
ABOUT POLITICS, BUT IT IS (^UITE 
E V 11) E N T THAT HE HAS NOT YET 
TAUGHT THEM ALL HE KNOW S.” 

—Boss Gorman. 

WIIAT HE TAUGHT HIS FORMER HENCHMEN. 

“ I have been hearing instances of attempted 
bribery of delegates friendly to me all day. 
As the facts come to light they fully justify 
my warning to my friends, telling them every¬ 
thing is over, except explanations. The com¬ 
bine is making a last desperate charge all 
along the line. They are offering sums rang¬ 
ing from $7 to $3,000, for delegate votes. This 
is not true of any particular local territory, 
but appears in all parts of the state. A care¬ 
ful watch is being maintained in every 
county by my friends, and I am promptly ad¬ 
vised of whatever occurs of this nature. No 
briber}'can be successfully consummated with¬ 
out my full knowledge immediately, and I 
shall make a full investigation into each case 
and lay the facts before the public. Delegates 
have been met with offers of money in some 
instances and positions in others. These are 
not idle rumors, but are fully substantiated 
by facts .”—Quay at Harrisburg, September S5, 


The Hastings Quay contest has done more 
to debauch the politics of the state than any 
campaign in its history. It is estimated that 
not less than a million dollars was spent in the 
primary elections and in the corruption of dele¬ 
gates. Both sides were well supplied with 
money, and it was expended liberally wher¬ 
ever it was thought its use would accomplish 
results. One of the stories since the conven¬ 
tion is that, as soon as the fight was declared 
on, a prominent Western Pennsylvania steel 
company contributed a check of $25,000 as a 
nucleus for the campaign fund which the 
manufacturers of the state rolled up for the 
man from Beaver .—City and State, September IS. 

Brief extracts of an account in the Pennsyl¬ 
vania Methodist, given by its editor, the Rev. 
Dr. Swallow, who is also pastor of a promi¬ 
nent Harrisburg church, of the recent Quay- 
anti-Quay convention which met in that city, 
are herewith given: 

“The first advantage was gained by the 
Hastings faction buying out an opera com¬ 
pany, billed for a show at the opera house on 
the night preceding the convention, and plac¬ 
ing therein—nearly twenty-four hours in ad¬ 
vance of the convention—over a hundred 
thugs, most of whom weighed from one hun¬ 
dred and eighty to two hundred and fifty 
pounds each. They certainly had the appear¬ 
ance of ‘hard hitters.’ Soon beer by the keg 
and whisky by the demijohn began to be car¬ 
ried in to supply their thirst, and better equip 
them for the work they were expected to do. 
They garrisoned the building from that time 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


265 


until the meeting of the convention next day, 
and could now admit if they chose only the 
‘rounders and heelers’ of those who had em¬ 
ployed them, and so it seemed as if Quay stood 
a poor chance of dominating the convention 
by the force of numbers. 

“Property-owners near the opera house spent 
a sleepless night, some of them being on watch 
till the morning of Wednesday dawned, not 
knowing at what moment deeds of violence 
might lead to the destruction of their proper¬ 
ty. Nearly all night the places where liquor 
was sold were crowded with a drunken, smok¬ 
ing, swearing, vulgar crowd, who staggered 
from one saloon to another, making the night 
hideous with their yells and curses mingled 
with street dancing and snatches of lewd songs. 
This continued most of Wednesday. For two 
days it was considered unsafe for a decent 
woman to attempt to make her way alone for 
single square in the vicinity of either Third, 
Fourth, or Market streets. Many who did so 
were openly insulted in broad daylight by 
drunken strangers. » » * All the stores 

except those dealing in food and drink and 
tobacco were nearly abandoned. TKe popu¬ 
lar shopping places reported the smallest sales 
in their knowledge and accounted for it by 
saying ‘women are afraid to venture from 
their homes, and we fear to go to ours, even 
for our meals.’ 

“Wednesday morning found the situation 
relieved by the reports of the compromise hav¬ 
ing taken place during the night, which was 
simply a surrender of the Hastings faction 
and a yielding of everything that had been at 
any time seriously demanded by Quay * * 

These men were ready and willing to do the 
bidding of the men who had hired them to do 
their slugging, and a riot would probably have 
given them more satisfaction than the an¬ 
nouncement that a truce had been declared. 
But ready as they were for a fight, they were not 
aware that over their heads, ready to drop on 
them at any moment, were the heelers of the 
Quay people, who had been smuggled into the 
building by a secret roof entrance and who had 
a great advantage by reason of their position. 
Cily and Stale, September 19. 

As an echo of the hotly contested republican 
primaries of Tuesday night Wade Auday, 
William Ware and Frank McDermott were 
arraigned before Magistrate South to-day on 
the charge of intimidating voters. The accmed 
and henchmen in the first ward of Magistrate Ful¬ 
mer, one of Senator Quay’s lieutenants, and, in ad¬ 
dition to the alleged intimidation, McDer¬ 
mott was also charged with assaulting Ed¬ 
ward Lutz, a judge of election. The accused 
were held in $500 bail each for court. Magis¬ 
trate Fulmer became their surety.—Philadelphia 
dispatch, Neiv York Times, August 23. 


The latest news from Harrisburg is tinged 
with prospective riot. Whether blood will 
flow or not is uncertain, but some of the cool¬ 
est-headed observers say it may, and the mayor 
of the city, expecting a fight, is swearing in , 


extra policemen. Congressman Kobinson 
says he shall not be surprised to see the “worst 
kind of a row on the floor,” when the conven¬ 
tion meets to-morrow; that “both sets of dele¬ 
gates will insist upon going upon the prelimi¬ 
nary roll, and somebody is going to get hurt.” 
The war fever grew steadily all day yester¬ 
day, and both Quay and anti-Quay factions 
slept on their arms last night. When the 
record of developments closed on the previous 
night. Quay was resolved to bring the Oilkeson 
faction to terms by “having the law” on Oilkeson. 
He was going to apply for a mandamus compelling 
Oilkeson, as chairman of the state committee, to 
produce his accounts and show what he had done with 
$90,000 said to have been contributed to party funds 
last fall. As a means of arousing interest in this 
mandamus proceeding Quay had a lot of orange- 
colored badges prepared, with the inscription, 
in bold, plain text, “What Did He Do With 
It?” These were swung out on the breasts of 
the Quay delegates yesterday morning, and 
the oflect upon the Gilkeson faction was natur¬ 
ally irritating.— Neiv York Evening Post, Au¬ 
gust 27. 

In Philadelphia in each election division 
the registration is made by a single election officer, 
called an assessor, who is always of the party domi¬ 
nant in his district and generally an active local 
politician. Personal registration is not required, 
and the assessor makes up his voting list six months 
before the election, the day for “correction” being 
two months before the election. The same officer 
who does the original registering adds or removes 
names. Then if any one appears at the polls 
who is not registered, he is allowed to vote on 
swearing to his qualifications. 

That such a system is open to almost un¬ 
checked fraud is evident. Suppose a single 
Tammany officer, or a single representative of 
any political organization in this city, had 
the making up of the voting list in each elec¬ 
tion district, without the personal appearance 
of the voters being necessary, what would be 
the chance of an honest registration? What 
we know of Dave Martin and his methods 
does not lead one to believe that local politi¬ 
cians can be any more trusted in the conduct 
of elections in Philadelphia than in New 
York. There is a hint of the grotesqueness of 
the Philadelphia system in the statement that 
in a “correction” of the registration lists last 
fall, 3,000 names were struck ofiT, “merely as a 
matter of agreement between party leaders. 
One of the names registered happened to be 
that of a pug dog.” How many were those 
of non-residents or deceasjd persons, and how 
many such remained on the lists, there was 
no means of knowing.— New York Times, Au¬ 
gust 19. — 

BOSS GORMAN. 

A Trying Ordeal. 

Mr. Bernard Carter nominated Mr. Hurst, 
and his position from the time he began to 
speak until the close of his remarks was a most 
unenviable one. He was constantly interrupted 
by the democrats in the galleries, and all sorts 
of terminations were put upon his sentences. 


“ I present to you,” said Mr. Carter, “ the 
name of one who, by his unimpeachable integ¬ 
rity, by his excellent business capacity, by his 
untiring patience, by the firmness and decision 
of hischaracter and by his honorable and kind¬ 
ly bearing toward all men, has won the high¬ 
est respect and the warmest esteem of all who 
know him. [‘Particularly Gorman,’cried a 
voice.] Those qualities have placed him at 
the head of a commercial house which, for its 
success and for the extent of its business rela¬ 
tions with all those parts of this great country 
with which Baltimore has business relations, 
stands second to none in this city.” 

“ OH, MY ! OH ! OH ! ” 

“ The same qualities which have made Mr. 
Hurst what he is and what those who know 
him know him to be eminently qualify him for 
the high position of the chief executive of this 
state, and while bearing friendly and honor¬ 
able relations to all the eminent public men 
of this state, with hostility in his heart to 
none, under no obligations of any kind to any 
one”—— 

“ But Gorman,” yelled the crowd, putting a 
termination upon Mr. Carter’s sentence that 
he had not intended and creating a great deal 
of laughter. And then the crowd broke loose 
again, and cries of “Come off, come off,” “Oh, 
my!” “Oh! Oh!! Oh!!!” The hubbub continued 
for some time. 

“Now, gentlemen of the galleries,” resumed 
Mr. Carter as soon as he could be heard, “no 
matter what you may think of Mr. Gorman, 
you ought to be gentlemen in this assembly 
and not interrupt the speaker on the floor. [ A p- 
plause.] 

“ I repeat it, bearing friendly and honor¬ 
able relations to all the public men of this 
state, under no obligations to any man”- 

“ But Gorman,” broke in the same voices 
again, and the cries of “Gorman’s man,” “Gor¬ 
man’s man,” were resumed, together with 
groans and hisses. 

Mr. Preston, the acting chairman, rapped 
vigorously for order and threatened to have 
the police clear the galleries. This annouce- 
inent was greeted with cries of derision and of 
“Sit down, Preston.” 

Mr. Carter, resuming, said; “I say without 
fear of contradiction that if he is elected chief 
magistrate of this state, he will be in the full¬ 
est import of the word”- 

“Gorman’s man,” sung out a voice. 

“The governor of the state himself,” con¬ 
tinued Mr. Carter, not heeding the interrup¬ 
tion. More applause and more groans fol¬ 
lowed this statement, and cries of “He can’t 
be, for he can’t be elected.” 

“ And while, like all other sensible people,” 
continued Mr. Carter, “he will at all times be 
ready to listen and weigh the views presented 
to him”-[“By Gorman,” shouted his tor¬ 

mentors again.] “When they have presented 
conclusion Mr. Evans says: “ The traditional 

policy of the democratic party is for Wash¬ 
ington to keep hands off and let people man¬ 
age their own affairs, whether at the polls or 
in their conventions. I believe in your infeg- 










266 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


rily, Mr. President, and that you earnestly de¬ 
sire civil service reform; that you will not 
and weighed he will then be”- 

“Gorman’s man, Gorman’s man, Arthur P. 
Gorman’s man,” sung out several voices in the 
galleries, while others cried, “He stabbed the 
administration.” 

Mr. Preston again declared that he would 
have the galleries cleared if the interruptions 
did not cease, but it had no effect. 

“ I repeat,” resumed Mr. Carter, “that while, 
like all sensible people, he will listen to and 
weigh the views of others, when he has listened 
to them and weighed them he will exercise his 
own untrammeled and independent judgment 
with manly courage and fidelity to”- 

“Gorman, Gorman, Gorman!” cried the 
men in the gallery.— Baltimore Sun, August 1. 

if. if if 

The chief objective point of our fight against 
bossism has been to get Baltimore’s govern¬ 
ment permanently established on a business 
basis. The A’eu.’S has kept a watchful eye on 
the city hall, as well as other departments of 
government, and its exposures of abuses as 
they were practiced have done much to arouse 
public sentiment and make it effective in the 
affairs of Baltimore. 

It is a notorious Jact that the present election ma¬ 
chinery was framed to perpetuate the Gorman-Basin 
ring and to prevent a free expression of the public 
will. The republicans pledge themselves to 
the enactment of a fair election law, and they 
say that registration .shall be “annual in 
Baltimore city, and quadrennial, with annual 
revision, in the counties; the supervisory 
powers of the courts over the action of the 
registers made effective and not illusory, and 
the right to places on the official ballots se¬ 
cured to the nominees of independent citizens 
as well as to those of the regular party organi¬ 
zations.” 

The civil service reform plank, we believe, 
will prove the strongest in the platform.— 
Baltimore News, Aug. 11. 


The Brotherhood of Bosses. 

.\ characteristic story of Gorman, illustrat¬ 
ing the methods of this consummate politi¬ 
cian, is told here. "When Harrison was Pres¬ 
ident, Gorman walked one day into the office 
of the first assistant postmaster-general. 
“Clarkson,” said he, “I want to ask a favor 
of you. I want to control the appointment of 
postmaster in my town of Laurel, Md.” The 
audacity of this request, coming from a dem¬ 
ocrat, astonished Clarkson, but one thorough¬ 
bred likes another, and he looked his visitor 
in the face a moment or two and replied: 
“You shall do it.” 

Of course, Clarkson kept his word, and, of 
course, there was an awful row about it. The 
republicans of Maryland discovered their 
democre.tic enemy was controlling the ap¬ 
pointment of an important office, and they de¬ 
scended on the capital by train-loads. They 
appealed to Wanamaker and soon had that 
gentleman crazy. Then they went to Harri-I 
son. Clarkson was called to the White House. 


“Is it possible, Mr. Clarkson, you have prom¬ 
ised Senator Gorman this office?” 

“ Yes, it is his home town. He is a United 
States senator, and some courtesy is due him. 
Besides, Mr. President, an administration can 
well afford to have a friendly senator in the 
opposition.” 

But Harrison was not appeased. He said it 
would not do to permit Gorman to control the 
appointment. “Then you will have to get 
a new postmaster-general,” said Clarkson 
quietly. 

“ Do you mean to say you will resign be¬ 
cause of a little postmastership?” asked Har¬ 
rison. 

“No, but I will resign rather than break my 
word,” said Clarkson. 

Gorman’s man was appointed. 

It is strange how one thing leads to another 
in this world. So it proved in this case. Some 
time later President Harrison was in distress 
about the collectorship at New Orleans. He 
wanted Warmoth to take it, and that gentle¬ 
man demurred. Harrison asked Clarkson to 
help him out. Clarkson telegraphed for War- 
moth and succeeded in coaxing him into ac¬ 
ceptance. His name was sent to the senate. 
That business appeared to be nicely settled. 
But it was not. They had forgotten John 
Sherman, the big man with many little re¬ 
venges to wreak. 

THOUGHT HE WAS RUINED. 

Late one night Warmoth rushed to Clark¬ 
son’s house. His eyes were ablaze and his 
tongue thick. 

“I’m ruined,” he exclaimed. “They are 
going to defeat my confirmation. John Sher¬ 
man is after me to settle an old score. Defeat 
will ruin me, disgrace me. It will cost me 
my home. I will never dare live in Louisiana 
again. What in God’s name shall I do?” 

Clarkson calmed Warmoth’s fears. “ Go to 
bed and sleep. I promise you you shall be 
confirmed.” 

Early next morning a messenger from 
Clarkson was on his way to West Virginia, 
where Senator Gorman was on business of 
great importance. The messenger told (he 
senator he was needed back in Washington 
the next day, when the judiciary committee 
was to meet. Sherman, Hoar and their friends 
had all arrangements made for rejecting War¬ 
moth. 

“But it is impossible for me to go,” Gor¬ 
man declared. “If I leave here now I will 
have to sacrifice $50,000 or $60,000, and I 
can’t afford it.” 

“Well, Mr. Clarkson will be much disap¬ 
pointed if you don’t help him out,” said the 
messenger, sadly. 

“Did Mr. Clarkson send you to me?” asked 
Gorman of the messenger. 

“ Yes.” 

“ Why did you not say so in the first place? 
That makes quite a difference. You go back 
and tell Clarkson I’ll be at the committee 
meeting to-morrow. You tell him for every 
vote John Sherman gets against Warmoth I’ll 
get two democratic votes for him, and, if nec¬ 


essary, wilt throw the whole democratic 
strength in executive session.” 

Gorman kept his word. He saved the ad¬ 
ministration from defeat at the hands of re¬ 
vengeful John Sherman, averted the humilia¬ 
tion which Warmoth had bitterly declared 
would cost him his home, and paid a political 
debt at very great financial sacrifice to him¬ 
self.— Washington cor. Chicago Times-Herald. 

OFFENSIVE PARTISANSHIP OF 
OFFICEHOLDERS. 

DEMOCRATS. 

Office-holders at the democratic convention 
at Syracuse, September 24: Valentine Fleck- 
enstein, collector of internal revenue for the 
Buffalo-Rochester district. Assistant District 
Attorney John F. McIntyre, one of the Tam¬ 
many delegates, said he was against admitting 
the state democracy to the convention. Fol¬ 
lowing him closely was George W. Meeks, 
the natty superintendent-in-general of the 
post-office delivery, coatless and vestless, wear¬ 
ing a high silk hat, his trousers turned up at 
the bottom. Then came Dr. Senner, the com¬ 
missioner of immigration, and after him was 
Internal Revenue Collector Edward Grosse. 
The Erie county delegates professed, at a late 
hour, to be as hopeful as ever regarding Mr. 
Scheu’s chances. Gen. Peter C. Doyle, col¬ 
lector of the port of Buffalo, reached the city 
this afternoon, and to-night he is doing his 
best to advance Scheu’ candidacy. 

♦ * » 

The Wayne county democratic county con¬ 
vention held here this afternoon was one of 
the most turbulent political assemblages ever 
convened in this county. The democratieparty i 
here has been all split up into factions. | 

The convention reached such a stage at one 
time that Postmaster Delaney Stew of Clyde 
took the floor in the interest, as he said, of 
decency and harmony and demanded, “Are 
we men or are we lice?” ^ 

A prominent Hill delegate, when ap¬ 
proached by Postmaster Daniel V. Teller of 
Lyons, jumped upon a seat as a woman would 
when a mouse is near, and shouted out: “Go 
away, you are too dirty to associate with; I 
repudiate men of your caliber morally and 
politically.”— Lyons dispatch Buffalo Express, 
September 20. 

if if 

At the conclusion of the reading of the ad¬ 
dress postmaster Dayton said: “TAe republican 
party has always seemed to be a party of hypocrisy, 
audit is well to show plainly and distinctly what its * 
late actions have been. The power that the re¬ 
publican party now has will be taken from it 
nt its polls this fall if the people are properly 
informed of the manner in which it has legis-y 
lated for its own interests, and not for those of i 
the people.” 

Collector John A. Sullivan seconded Mr. Day- 
ton’s remarks.— New York Times, Aug. 1. 

Strictly speaking, it is no longer a Cleve- 4 
land-Hill fight, but rather a battle in which { 
the “old war horses” are nearly all arrayed [ 
on one side against the robust young Flower I M 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


267 


City democracy, which they can not control. 
Thus men like George Raines and William 
Purcell, Thomas Brown, jr., and William H. 
Tracy, J. Miller Kelly and Collector of 
Customs George H. Houck, some of whom have 
been bitter enemies in years past, are banded 
together to defeat the men who have supported 
the Cleveland administration and fought Ald¬ 
ridge through thick and thin. Against them, 
however, is a well-drilled and coherent body of en¬ 
ergetic workers, led by Collector of Internal Revenue 
Valentine Fleckenstein, Frederick W. Smith, 
James S, Havens, George P. Decker, George F. 
Slocum, Postmaster George H. Perkins, Editor 
John B. Howe, and L. M. Antisdale, of The 
Herald, and other well-known democrats.— Fac¬ 
tional fight in Rochester {N. Y.) Dispatch, July 2S, 

* ♦ Ne 

S. B. Evans, President Cleveland’s postmas¬ 
ter here in his first term, and who was ap¬ 
pointed by Mr. Cleveland consul to Nicara¬ 
gua, is out in an open letter to the President, 
saying that “over 100 of these Federal officers, 
including revenue collectors, United States 
attorneys, marshals and postmasters,” were in 
attendance as delegates in the convention, and 
were most perniciously active in securing the 
defeat of the free silver men. He reminds the 
President of his former orders in regard to the 
participation of officeholders in political meet¬ 
ings, and asks him to make a public expres¬ 
sion of his disapproval of such actions. In 
approve of the indecency of the men who, at 
Marshalltown, armed with your commissions, 
took advantage of their places, triumphed 
over their fellow democrats, and then, in 
stinging words, taunted them with the humilia¬ 
tion of defeat. This letter is made public be¬ 
cause the subject is of public concern, and 
with the hope that your disapproval of such 
methods will be so expressed as to prove a 
lesson to those who, temporarily clothed in 
authority, would make your administration 
rules a farce and democracy a sham in the 
sight of decent men.”— Ottumwa, Iowa, dispatch, 
Aug. 12. 

* » » 

“Will Tom Taggart be nominated?” said 
Mail Clerk Tom Hedian, yesterday, in speak¬ 
ing of the democratic candidates for mayor* 
“ Well, I should say. He’s as good as nom¬ 
inated now. Nothing too good for Tom.” 

Mr. Hedian is the chief of the Taggart ‘'push,” 
and is working for him with all his powers. He 
has a supreme disregard for the rules govern¬ 
ing the civil service. When asked about the 
matter he said : 

“If I haven't influence enough to hold my 
job at the depot, why the government can 
have it. But maybe I will hear from Cleve¬ 
land about it yet.” — Indianapolis Journal, 
June 26. 


They Did Not Gore the Right Ox. 

W. T. Lyon, presidential postmaster at 
Selma, Cal., was removed yesterday because 
he recently published in his paper, the Irriga¬ 
tor, an article reflecting on President Cleve¬ 
land. Lyon was a democrat, and was ap¬ 


pointed about a year ago.— Washington dis¬ 
patch, Aug. 21. 

* * * 

Leonard B. Plumlee, national bank exam¬ 
iner for Tennessee, has been asked to resign by 
the treasury department by order of the Pres¬ 
ident, because he dared to have currency views 
differing from those of Mr. Cleveland.— Buffalo 
Express, September 21. 

* » » 

John L. Parker, deputy internal revenue 
collector for the district of Marblehead, was 
dismissed, last week, from his position, and 
the reason assigned was “offensive partisan¬ 
ship.” He is the publisher of a Lynn daily 
paper, which recently criticised the adminis¬ 
tration.— Adams Freeman. 


Bosses, Platt and Anti-Platt, Bully New 
York Officeholders. 

The republican caucuses to elect delegates 
to the eight assembly and judicial conventions 
will be held to-night, in the city from 6 to 
8:30 o’clock, and in the towns from 7:30 to 9 
o’clock. Despite the activity of the canal ring, an 
anti-Platt victory all along the line is likely. — Buf¬ 
falo Express, Sept. 9. 

* * * 

Abraham Gruber, a Platt republican and 
one of the first lieutenants of the Tioga chief¬ 
tain, has a “ rod in pickle ” for the department 
of public works, as it is conducted by Commis¬ 
sioner Brookfield. 

Mr. Gruber said that he had a story about 
the department of public works that might in¬ 
terest the reporters. He said that a great cor¬ 
poration had been obliged to permit an official 
in the department to distribute its labor tick¬ 
ets before it could get any permits to open the 
streets. 

“ Why,” said Mr. Gruber, “ Tammany, when 
in control of the department, never did any¬ 
thing as bad as that.” 

“What company do you refer to?” Mr. 
Gruber was asked. 

“ It is the subway company—the Metropol¬ 
itan Telephone and Telegraph company. Ge^i. 
0. H. T. Coliis, the deputy commissioner of public 
works, is giving out the company’s labor tickets 
through his friends.”—New York Times, June 25. 
* * * 

Edward Gro.sse, collector of internal reve¬ 
nue for the Third District, actively opposing 
the enforcement of the laws by Mr. Roosevelt 
and his colleagues, is thus set off in a letter 
from Dr. Parkhurst, in Switzerland, to A. W. 
Abbott, secretary of the City Vigilance 
League: 

He is said to have declared before the members 
of the Columbia Club: “For my part, I don’t con¬ 
sider the selling of a glass of beer behind a curtain 
and behind a closed door a crime, although 
the law says it is a crime.’’ If this “Grosse” orator 
understands the words he uses, he knows that a 
crime is a crime because the law makes it such and 
determines it to be such. What Grosse thinks, or 
any other man like him, has no bearing on the 
question. He says, in effect, that his opinion is 
above law. In other words, he spits upon the law, 
grinds his heel into the statute, and gives the Co¬ 
lumbia Club and the New York public to under¬ 
stand that to respect the ordinances of the state 


in-Mcates a stage of puerility that he, Grosse, has 
outgrown. 

And he is a federal officer! Some of the pressure 
of the dignity of our country resis upon Grosse’s 
shoulders. Some of the hope of the perpetuity of 
American institutions is staked in this ranting, 
treason-spitting Grosse. The federal government 
would honor itself by promptly removing him to 
the ranks. 

♦ ♦ ♦ 

Complaint is made in this week’s Wine and 
Spirit Gazette that the liquor dealers in the old 
eleventh assembly district were forced to buy 
tickets for the picnic of the Blaine Club, 
which occurred last Wednesday. Job E. 
Hedges, the chief man of this club, is Mayor Strong’s 
private secretary, and the treasurer of the club, 
William H. Coyle, is seci'elary of the excise board. 
* * And now the republican section of the 
board is imitating the old Tammany methods. 
The excise department is a pest hole of cor¬ 
ruption. Its total abolition is the first step in the 
direction of taking the saloon out of politics 
and a most important move in the interest of 
true reform. 

» • » 

The jolliest row in the republican ranks in 
this city is in the old eleventh district, where 
Mayor Strong’s private secretary. Job E. 
Hedges, is accused of working his position to 
establish himself as a “ petty boss.” 

The letter which was sent to the mayor reads 
as follows: 

The Hon. William L. Strong, Mayor of the City of 
New York: 

Dear Sir— We, the undersigned, republicans and 
voters in the eleventh assembly district (new 
twenty-fifth). New York City, beg to call your at¬ 
tention to the partisan activity of your private sec¬ 
retary, Mr. Job E. Hedges, Vho has made himself 
obnoxious in that he has interfered in the distribu¬ 
tion of patronage, rewarding his particular politi¬ 
cal friends with places, and making promises him¬ 
self, or through his agents, and in many ways using 
his position of private secretary as a means of con¬ 
trolling and distributing patronage in this assem¬ 
bly district in a manner that is thoroughly partisan. 
In his machine methods and practice he far ex 
ceedsthe old machine in its palmiest days, ev 
dently with the purpose of trying to establish 
himself as a petty boss. We believe that his undi¬ 
vided attention to the duties of his office, which 
the taxpayers of this city pay him for, would be 
more conducive to better government for all, and 
would be in strict accordance with your pro¬ 
fessedly non-partisan administration. 

Yours respectfully, 

James W. Autbn, 

122 West Thirty-fourth street. 

J. J. Spies, 

102 West Thirty-fourth street. 
Edward S. Flow, 

129 West Twenty-seventh street. 
George C. LaGrange, 

128 West Thirty-fourth street. 

* * • 

Several members of the PhoenixClub charged 
Gen. Coliis yesterday with threatening to dis¬ 
miss from the service of the city members of 
the club who are office holders in the public 
works department if they did not cast their 
votes in club matters in accordance with his 
instructions. * * 

“Why did you and Gen. Coliis fall out?” 
was asked. 

“Well,” said one of the members, who had 
not previously spoken, “ we expected some pa¬ 
tronage, and we did not get it.” The General 
















268 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


thought he carried the club in his waistcoat 
pocket and did not find out his mistake until 
he wanted us for the primaries. All he suc¬ 
ceeded in doing was to lose a member on the 
county committee. 

» * * 

“It used to be three Platt men against two 
Brookfield men. Now he has only his own son 
to keep up his end on the county committee- 
He lost the Hell Gate Club about a month ago, 
and he is sure to lose the Yorkville Club. When 
you promise patronage it is a good thing to be 
a man of your word.”— New York I'imes, Au- 
gust 7. 


THE COMPLAINT. 

The life tenure of office under the civil serv¬ 
ice law is not the end of the outrage along this 
line upon the people of the country. The office¬ 
holding class, once secure in their positions, 
will soon be clamoring for pensions, and the 
peojde who are debarred from any choice or 
participation in the government will be sub¬ 
jected to additional taxation to pay these pen¬ 
sions. Already the letter carriers have agreed 
upon a pension bill, which is to be presented 
to the approaching session of congress. Gov¬ 
ernment of the people, by the people and for 
the people will soon be at an end in this coun¬ 
try if this thing keeps on, and government by 
a mugwump board substituted. Are the peo¬ 
ple willing that the principles of this govern- 
mentshall thusbesubverted?— Brookville (Ind.) 
American, September 12. 


The Answer. 

The Kokomo Tribune charges Center town¬ 
ship assessor, Alvin Coffin, with extorting 
from his thirteen assistants 25 per cent, of 
their legal salary of $2 per day. It is said 
that Coffin hired his deputies on the express 
condition that they give him a “royalty” of 50 
cents a day, and that after the county com¬ 
missioners allowed the men the full legal 
compensation, the latter gave the assessor a- 
“rake off” of 50 cents a day each, for the sixty 
days’ service, a total squeeze of $261 out of an 
allowance of $1,044. Besides the grab of 
$261, Coffin received his regular salary of $120 
for the sixty days’ work, making him a salary 
of $6.33 per day, while the assistants received 
but $1.50, whereas the statute provides that 
the assessor and helpers shall receive the same 
pay—2 per day. Coffin, whose term expired to¬ 
day, admits that the charges against him are true, 
but pleads '‘customs of the country," alleging that 
his predecessors did the same thing.—Kokomo dis¬ 
patch, Indianapolis News, August 5. 

^ ilP 

Mrs. Fisher was murdered by spoils pol¬ 
itics. She had given eighteen years of faith¬ 
ful, devoted and able service to the Oakland 
public schools. In all that time she had never 
missed a day. She loved her work and identi¬ 
fied herself so completely with theschools that 
she could not think of herself as separated from 
them. One day the board of education dropped 
her from the roll. Nobody pretended that 


there was any cause for complaint in her work, 
but her place was wanted for a friend of one 
of the members of the board. Paralysis fol¬ 
lowed the shock, and now she is dead. * * 

The corruption of the spoils system is gen¬ 
erally understood, but the people who amiably 
tolerate that feature of it do not realize its 
heartlessness. Every stroke of the “guillotine” 
means the wanton infliction of unhappiness 
on some family, without any corresponding 
benefit to anybody else. Even the winner of 
a place under the spoils system gets little satis¬ 
faction from it, because he knows that he may 
be compelled at a moment’s warning and with¬ 
out any fault of his own to give it up. Under 
any civilized government the tenure of a sub¬ 
ordinate public employe ought to depend en¬ 
tirely upon merit. Once in the service he 
ought to have an assurance of remaining as 
long as his duties were faithfully performed. 
With such an understanding the public would 
get the work for which it pays, but which is 
now more profitably given to the politicians 
who control the distribution of “patronage.”— 
San Francisco Examiner. 

• * * 

Mr. Stroup, of Arkansas, has unwittingly 
made a “ten-strike” for the cause of civil serv¬ 
ice reform in his discourses concerning Mr. 
Spofford’s management. Our honorable legis¬ 
lators are very jealous of their rights of super¬ 
vision of the great stack of books, and as a 
result no attempt has been made to put the 
assistant librarians into the classified service. 
Mr. Stroup, of Arkansas, had been delegated 
by officials in that commonwealth to convey 
a certain convict to Sing Sing. On his way 
back he decided to get off at Washington.“to 
see the town,” and like all tourists was capti¬ 
vated with its beautiful avenues and urban 
attractions, and was loath to go back to Ar¬ 
kansas “any more.” Stroup discovered that an 
appropriation had gone through for additional help 
in the library, and he accordingly persuaded Senator 
Jones of his state to secure for him an appointment 
there. This it was not difficult to do. What better 
preparation for library work could be desired 
than experience in transporting convicts? 

* * » 

One hundred library workers in the great 
national library must then be employed and 
the argument seems useless to show that these 
places should be filled through examinations 
and not to please congressmen, who are will¬ 
ing in return to “help along” library appro¬ 
priations. The work of cataloguing and ar¬ 
ranging books has in recent years become a 
good deal of a science, and the latest librarian 
employed in the departmental service, fresh 
from a training school of library workers, was 
selected through a competitive examination 
with very satisfactory results. So badly have 
some of the branch libraries been run that in 
one department a recent investigation showed 
in certain instancesfive or six copies of a single 
book, the result of sending outside to buy when¬ 
ever the librarian could find no trace of the de¬ 
sired volume. 


After fifty years of valuable scientific serv¬ 
ice for the national government, Prof. David¬ 
son, at the age of 70 years, has been ignomin- 
iously dismissed, without cause and with no 

recognition of his able services.— July 5. 

* • «- 


The undersigned astronomers of the Lick 
observatory respectfully call your attention to 
an act of great injustice done to one of the 
most active and efficient of our government 
employes, Prof. George Davidson, for many 
years connected with the United States coast 
survey, who has been removed from his posi¬ 
tion. Recently published scientific records 
demonstrate that he is still one of the most 
active workers in the survey. It would be an 
act of simple justice to re-instate him. We 
earnestly request you to cause this to be done. 

The telegram is signed by E. S. Holden, J. 
M. Schaeberle, E. E. Barnard and W. W. 
Campbell. 

* • * 

The chamber of commerce yesterday passed 
resolutions requesting the senators and repre¬ 
sentatives from the Pacific coast states to ex¬ 
ert their influence and best endeavors with the 
President and secretary of the treasury of the 
United States for the re iustatement of Prof. 
George Davidson, late of the United States 
coast and goedetic survey, believing that such 
re-instatement would best serve and protect 
the public welfare and shipping interests of 
this coast. 

* * » 


A sensation was created in Greene county 
(Ohio) democratic convention last Saturday, 
when a resolution was introduced calling upon 
the post-office department at Washington to in¬ 
vestigate the alleged purchase of the Xenia 
post-office by L. H.Whiteman. It was charged 
that Postmaster Whiteman had paid $500 for 
securing Senator Brice’s influence, but rumor 
was not so definite in saying who got the 
money. 

It is now declared that an insurance firm of 
this city—Frank Raymond and W. Clifton 
Long—got the $500. Long came originally 
from Xenia. When the appointment of a 
postmaster for that place was under consider¬ 
ation, he, being an intimate friend of Senator 
Brice’s secretary, was questioned as to the 
qualifications of the several candidates. It is^ 
alleged that Long, when he learned that Sen- , 
ator Brice was going to name a candidate, in-, 
formed Whiteman that he could secure the 
place for him for a money consideration. Sub-,- 
sequently a contract was made between the 
two and it was stipulated that Long should 
receive $500. ^ 

Whiteman was appointed postmaster. Lasti 
February, six months after the appointment! 
of W’hiteman, a complaint was made to Sena¬ 
tor Brice that he or his secretary had sold the 
office for $500. An investigation was made^ 
and Whiteman denied emphatically that he; 
had entered into any contract. At the same. 
time he was advised that if it were true that^ 
he had made a payment and had given his J 
note for a balance, he had better cancel the^ 
deal, for it was a fraudulent one. Upon that; 
advice, Whiteman declined to make further! 
payments. Long placed the account in the'! 
hands of a lawyer of Xenia, who induced. 
Whiteman to pay the balance of the claim, 
$400, a day or two before the Greene county 
convention was called. 

Clifford Long admitted to-day that White-^ 
man had paid him the money according to 
contract, on account of services rendered as 
an agent during the post-office fight. He ex¬ 
onerates Senator Brice and his secretary from 
any knowledge of the transaction prior to thej 
appointment.— Washington Dispatch, Aug. 12.\ 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


VoL. II, No. 33. 


INDIANAPOLIS, NOVEMBER, 1895. 


TEEMS :{ 


One dollar per annum. 
10 cents per copy. 


Published monthly. Publicfttion office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind. 




( 

1 


We give elsewhere in full the report 
made hy a committee of the Indiana Civil 
Service Reform Association of their in¬ 
vestigation of the present management of 
the civil service of Indianapolis. There is 
not a chance for a doubt but that the char¬ 
ter of this city directs the introduction of 
the merit and labor service system. Al¬ 
though it provides no penalties for dis¬ 
obedience of this command, yet no honor¬ 
able office-holder would for a moment 
think of disregarding it. As a matter of 
fact it was disregarded through the entire 
first administration, under the charter,and 
through some months of the second when 
Mayor Denny caused a fairly good set of 
rules to be adopted. These rules were not 
always followed, but neither that nor the 
lateness of their adoption affords the least 
excuse for the conduct of the present ad¬ 
ministration. Mayor Taggart attempts to 
lean upon those props. On the same prin¬ 
ciple, if Mayor Denny had robbed the city 
treasury it would be a justification for him 
to do the same. Mayor Taggart’s action 
has been brazen in the extreme. When he 
came into office he found a set of rules 
adopted under the plain direction of the 
charter, and because adopted under that 
direction they were absolutely the law of 
the city. He has completely disregarded 
them and has vacated and filled a large 
number of places upon the purely spoils 
plan of using the public offices for personal 
and partisan purposes. This is a very 
grave offense which he attempts to carry 
off in an airy, happy go-lucky manner. 
Possibly he may succeed, but he would do 
well to remember that many a greater 
spoilsman than he is has been rolled in 
the dust. If the offense were not so grave, 
if there had been no rules, his course 
would still deserve everybody’s contemp*. 
These are not the times of distributing 
offices as personal and party rewards. All 
over the country there is a movement to 
rid the public service of the heeler and 
the striker. It seems that Indianapolis is 
not to remain in that advance because Tom 
Taggart wants to use her public offices for 
personal and party rewards. If there had 
been no rules, and if he were not a gross 


violator of law, his course will still mark 
him, not as a progressive citizen having in 
mind the welfare of his own city, but as 
the cheap politician which he is. He has 
how in the city service a long list of men 
who are not there legally, and to whom no 
city officer has a right to pay wages. It is 
the duty of the tax payers to stop this mis¬ 
use of the public funds. 

A COMMITTEE of ladies representing one 
of the charitable organizations have in¬ 
spected our city hospital and found it an 
abomination. The high standing of the 
ladies and the reliability of their report are 
beyond question, and, indeed, are admitted 
by the superintendent of the hospital. The 
only explanation given or attempted to be 
given by the committee or by the authori¬ 
ties is “politics.” The superintendent 
must be a democratic doctor or a republi¬ 
can doctor according to the party in con¬ 
trol, and the welfare of the hospital must 
bend to that. The superintendents are 
changed about once in two years, a practice 
which would wreck any hospital. Receiv¬ 
ing their places as a reward for partisan 
politics, they are not free agents, and they 
do not dare to inform the public of the 
true condition of affairs. The party lead¬ 
ers begrudge money to the hospital, be¬ 
cause money there buys fewer voters than 
money spent anywhere else ; it is there¬ 
fore a good place to display a niggardly 
economy and keep the tax rate down. This 
has been the practice in Indianapolis under 
all administrations. People have known 
nothing of the real condition of affairs. It 
was the duty of the superintendents, if they 
found that their reports to the health board 
were of no avail, to appeal to the people 
through the medical societies or the public 
prints. The first step is to get rid of poli¬ 
tics, but tbe prospect is not favorable. The 
preceding superintendent who had become 
most efficient was displaced for politics. 
The president of the health board. Dr. F. 
A. Morrison, highly praises the present 
superintendent, who is, nevertheless, to be 
succeeded January Jst, on account of poli¬ 
tics. Dr. Morrison’s stripe is indicated by 
the fact that, having discharged all but one 
of the sanitary officers without any right 
to do so, he went to work, on discovering 
his blunder, and hunted up excuses upon 
which to attempt legal dismissals, and such 
excuses are now called “morrisons.” The 


health board expressed the highest appre¬ 
ciation of the sanitarian. Dr. Wynn, and 
the following circumstances are interest¬ 
ing: 

Dr. Wynn submitted a letter of resignation, leav¬ 
ing the board free to re-appoint him or another 
as it chose. He said, in addition, that he would 
hold the members in just as much esteem whether 
they appointed him or not. Dr. Morrison remarked 
that the resignation was made wholly without sug¬ 
gestion from the new members of the board, and 
Dr. Wynn assented to this. Dr. Morrison remarked 
that it would be well to make the appointment date 
from the beginning of a new term, and to last for 
two years, so that there could be no necessity for 
forcing a man to resign at the time of a change of 
administration. The board decided to accept the 
resignation, and consider the question of re-ap¬ 
pointment or the selection of a new man at another 
meeting within twenty-four hours. 

After going through the pretense of 
pondering the problem, a new man was 
appointed. 


For more than a year it has been appar¬ 
ent that the battle of civil service reform 
has been won. It has been a long struggle 
since Charles Sumner, in 1864, began it by 
the introduction into the senate of a bill 
embodying the main principles of the sys¬ 
tem which was destined by its very hon¬ 
esty and practicability and its commercial 
and moral superiority to overthrow the 
modern feudal system under which we 
had lived for generations. For thirty years 
the merit system, by its own inherent good 
qualities, has conquered its way against a 
vicious and utterly unprincipled opposi¬ 
tion which seemed unconquerable. Every 
day the completeness of the victory be¬ 
comes plainer. It is now a question of de¬ 
tail, and of the substitution of new and 
improved machinery in place of old. There 
will still be opposition. Many an expiring 
pirate has tried to kill some one out of re¬ 
venge. There are many states, cities and 
counties in whose local service the field 
is comparatively untouched, but it is only 
a question of time. Personal and party 
favoritism are to become unknown in the 
distribution of public employment. Those 
desiring places in the public service are to 
obtain their end not by setting up prima¬ 
ries and conventions, but by fair and open 
competition against all others. 


The greatest single step taken since the 
enactment of the civil service law, January 
16, 1883, was taken quietly November 8, 
















270 THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


1895, by President Cleveland in the follow¬ 
ing order: 

Sectiou 2 of postal rule 1 Is hereby amended by 
inserting after the word “thereto” in line 6, the 
following: “And whenever by order of the pos'.- 
master-general anj post-ollice shall be consolidated 
with and made a part of another post-ofllce where 
free delivery is established, all the employes of the 
olTlce thus consolidated whose names appear on 
the roster of said ofllce approved by the post-olilee 
department and including the postmaster thereof, 
shall from the date of said order be employes of 
said free delivery ofllce, and the person holding on 
the date of said order the position of postmaster 
at the office thus consolidated with said free deliv¬ 
ery office may be assigned to any position therein, 
and given any appropriate designation under the 
classification act w'hich the postmaster-general 
may direct.” 

The law gives the postmaster-general 
power to consolidate post ofl&ces, and every 
free delivery office is within the civil serv¬ 
ice rules. Any consolidation therefore, of 
even the smallest fourth-class post-office 
with a free delivery office, now takes the 
former out of the reach of spoilsmen by 
bringing it within the rules. The fourth- 
class post-office problem,which was the one 
difficult question left in the fight against 
the spoils system, seems to have been 
solved by a single stroke of the President’s 
pen. It is but another instance that where 
a great reform is in charge of its friends 
there is no difficulty in finding ways to carry 
it out. The plan devised indicates real 
statesmanship. It is not proposed to carry 
it into abrupt execution, but to proceed in 
a thorough and business-like manner until 
the entire readjustment is completed. The 
effect of the order when completely carried 
out will he to throw the post-office system 
of the country into divisions, with heads 
much nearer and easier to reach than 
the department at Washington. At pres¬ 
ent the department deals directly with the 
60,000 fourth-class postmasters, and the 
mails are burdened with errors and at¬ 
tempted corrections of errors and car-loads 
of irascible correspondence. A ruder and 
more expensive system of conducting pub¬ 
lic business conld hardly be devised. Under 
the new system the fourth-class postmaster 
will disappear as the watch dog of his con¬ 
gressman. The fourth-class post-offices will 
he supplanted by stations, and the em¬ 
ployes will be under the direction of a di¬ 
vision superintendent, probably the head 
of a post-office in a large city. The possibil¬ 
ities of free delivery to farmers and in 
small villages are greatly increased, espe¬ 
cially when the bicycle is remembered. 
The country is to be congratulated upon 
this great change. Inevitably there will 
come with it soon the disappearance of the 
practice of turning out trained postmasters 
in our large cities, who will be the heads 
of divisions, to make room for local poli¬ 
ticians. 

We do not know who the immediate 


mover of this change was, but we take it 
that the civil service commission, Post¬ 
master-General Wilson and the President 
jointly put their shoulders to the wheel, 
and we thank them accordingly. The sys¬ 
tem will have a struggle, but all the steps 
ever taken in civil service reform have 
been violently resisted, and this will suc¬ 
ceed as they succeeded. 

In this connection the current Harper’s 
Weekly sayK 

“lu our opinion this is the most important for¬ 
ward step lu civil service reform since the first in¬ 
troduction of the merit system in the national ser. 
vice. It boldly goes beyond the mere clerical 
positions and strikes at spoils politics lu the largest 
sense. The postolfice in the small town or village 
has been the omnipreseutembodimentof the spoils 
idea, it has been pre-eminently the prize fought 
for by the local politicians. It has done more than 
anything else to give party contests the character 
of scrambles for plunder. It has been the gather¬ 
ing-place of the party hacks and wire-pullers. It 
has more than anything else accustomed the popu¬ 
lar mind to the notion that a change of party in 
power necessarily means a partisan change lu the 
minor offices. A measure of reform tending to 
take a large majority of the post-ollices out of 
politics by putting them under the merit system 
thus strikes at the strongest bulwark of the spoils 
evil. We, therefore, most earnestly call upon 
friends of civil service reform all over the country 
to give this measure their attention, and to rally 
public opinion to a vigorous support of it. 

Any elections which defeat Campbell of 
Ohio by 100,000 majority and which drive 
Brice, Blackburn, Smith, Dave Hill and 
Gorman’s tool Gibson out of the Senate 
are a source of deep gratification. It is 
true that we have some republican bosses 
quite as offensive, and who seem to have 
been triumphant, but their triumph was 
rather in the primary than in the election. 
This is one of the events in the fight against 
bossism. It is hardly ever possible to dis¬ 
able the bosses on both sides in the same 
election ; but by taking them turn about 
they can eventually be so weakened that 
their own henchmen will no longer find 
it profitable to follow them in the prima¬ 
ries. If they can not carry elections and 
get spoils to divide, their following will 
melt away and their respective parties will 
drop them. We do not join in the expecta¬ 
tion that Gorman is permanently used up. 
He still controls the Maryland democratic 
machine, and will for a time at least con¬ 
trol its nominations. But the election is 
of inestimable value in showing that Mary¬ 
land democrats have the spirit to defeat 
him at the polls. This same spirit should 
impel them to keep Maryland a doubtful 
state. 


The result of the election in New York 
city is a seeming drawback to the satisfac¬ 
tion with the elections elsewhere. How 
this result came about is well understood. 
The city for the first time in generations 
had a police board which regarded the 


excise law as made to be enforced and their 
oath to see to the enforcement as an oath 
which they could not disregard. They 
thereupon enforced thislaw thoroughly and 
with absolute fairness. Nevertheless the 
triumph of Tammany was undoubtedly 
made possible by this action of the police 
board. This triumph interferes with the 
progress of municipal reform and in the 
same manner the excise question is likely 
to interfere with that progress in other 
cities. It is an overshadowing question 
and must be taken account of by reform¬ 
ers. There should be no excise laws upon 
the statute book which are not intended to 
be enforced. In many communities a 
prohibition of the sale of beer on Sunday 
can not be permanently enforced. Officers 
who temporarily enforce it will not be left 
in office, and those who will not enforce it 
will take their places, and the community 
will learn to look upon the non-enforce¬ 
ment of law as proper and unavoidable. 
Nothing is worse for public morals. The 
idea that one part of a community believ¬ 
ing it to be wrong may therefore make 
another part of the community stop 
drinking beer on Sunday will have to be 
given up. The Germans, for instance, for 
more than two thousand years, have drunk 
beer Sundays and week days as Americans 
for a lesser period have drunk tea and cof¬ 
fee, and the Germans do not believe it is 
wrong and can not be legislated into such 
a belief. Connected with the sale, how¬ 
ever, there are matters to be dealt with. A 
large class of persons engaged in that sale 
are but one remove from the worst ele¬ 
ments of the community, and some not 
even that far. Another class of seem¬ 
ingly respectable men have no respect for 
law, and encourage its open violation. A 
considerable percentage of the places of 
sale are nurseries of immorality and crime. 
These are the matters which ought to be 
dealt with by legislation. In a word, the 
effort should be not to make the sale dis¬ 
graceful, but to make it respectable. This 
is another way of saying that the sale 
should be regulated so as to maintain strin¬ 
gent public order, and to prevent every 
species of blackmail. In New York the 
mistake was undoubtedly made by the op¬ 
ponents of Tammany in not boldly and 
openly advocating an excise law which, 
under reasonable regulations,would permit 
Sunday sales. We do not diminish any¬ 
thing from our unqualified praise of Theo¬ 
dore Roosevelt, but we think that in talk- 
ing in churches, and to temperance organ¬ 
izations and elsewhere, he should, in 
addition to whathe did say, have advocated 
the change here suggested. Indianapolis 
has a lesson of this kind to learn. The 
signs seem unmistakable that the saloons 
are to be allowed to go in disregard of the 
law, after a period of strict enforcement. 


i 














THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


271 


It is every man’s duty to work for a prac¬ 
tical substitute for an excise system 
which leads to such a break down of pub¬ 
lic morals. 


The Chronicle will next month give in 
full, from the pen of an expert, the history 
of Gorman’s career, and how, after repeated 
efforts, he has at least temporarily been 
overwhelmed. 


The annual meeting of the national civil 
service reform league will be held at 
Washington, at the invitation of the civil 
service reform asssociation of the District 
of Columbia, Thursday and Friday, De¬ 
cember 12 and 13,1895. The rooms of the 
Cosmos club, Lafayette square, have been 
secured for the two days’ meetings. The 
morning sessions of each day will be de¬ 
voted as usual to the business of the 
league, and the afternoon sessions to the 
reading of papers. The annual address of 
the president will be delivered at Metze- 
rott’s hall, on F street, the evening of the 
12th, and the visiting delegates will be en¬ 
tertained by the local association the even¬ 
ing of the 13th. The printed invitation 
and detailed programme, together with 
available information regarding hotel ac¬ 
commodations, rates of railroad fare, etc., 
will be furnished as soon as prepared. 
Aside from the object of this meeting, the 
place chosen will make this in other re¬ 
spects a delightful and profitable trip. In¬ 
diana, however, could not win medals for 
interest in civil service reform, were she 
judged by attendance at the annual league 
meetings. Besides the annual address of 
Mr. Schurz, the president, the following 
papers will also be read : 

“The Recent Civil Service-Reform Movement in 
Chicago,” John W. Ela, of Chicago. 

“The Appointment and Tenure of Postmasters,” 
Richard Henry Dana, of Cambridge. 

“Superannuation in the Civil Service,” Wm. 
Dudley Foulke, of Indiana. 

“The Interest of the Workingman in Civil Service 
Reform,” Herbert Welsh, of Philadelphia. 

“The State of Civil Service Reform Sentiment in 
the South,” Herman Justi, of Nashville. 

“The Important Function of Civil Service Re¬ 
form,” F. L. Siddons, of Washington. 

“The Reign and Overthrow of Oflfice-holdlng 
Oligarchy,” Charles J. Bonaparte, of Baltimore. 

“The Necessity of Thorough and Permanent Re¬ 
form in the Consular Service,” Jonathan A. Lane, 
President of the Boston Merchants’ Association. 

To any one who has known enough of 
spoils system to understand its significance 
as a moral question the apathy of women 
in regard to it has been remarkable. So 
far as we know the first open alliance with 
the movement for civil service reform was 
the meeting of prominent New York 
women, at the residence of Bishop Potter, 
on November 20. They organized as the 
“Women’s Auxiliary to the New York 
Civil Service Reform Association” with 
the following officers : 


President, Mrs. William H. Schleffelln; vice 
president, Mrs. C. R. Lowell; secretary, Miss 
Chandler; treasurer, Mrs. Wlnthrop Cowdln; ex¬ 
ecutive committee, the officers and Mrs. F. H. Kin- 
nicut. Miss Schurz, and Miss Margaret Morgan. 

Among the women present were Mrs. Charles 
Haven Royce. Miss E. 0. Butler, Mrs. H. C. Potter, 
Miss Potter, Miss Bishop, Mrs. William Chandler 
Casey, Miss Eleanor Jay Schleffelln, Miss M. M. 
Morgan, Mrs. F. Nathan, Mrs. E. Fales Coward, 
Mrs. Griswold, Miss Louis L. Schuyler, Mrs. J. W. 
Brannan, Mrs. Ben All Haggin, Mis. Charles W. 
Watson, Mrs. K. W. Ward, Mrs. Reeves-Merrltt, 
Mrs. E. L. Godkin, Miss Alice Pine, Mrs. M. F. 
Johnson, Miss Ixiwell, Miss Frellnghuysen, Miss 
Sibyl Kent Kane, Miss Willard and Miss Harriet 
Rogers. 

One of the bright signs of the times 
was the recent completion of the decora¬ 
tion of the court of oyer and terminer in 
the new criminal courts building in New 
York. This decoration was the result of 
open competition, and a distinguished 
committee of New York artists and not 
Tammany were the judges. Following 
this comes the announcement from Phila¬ 
delphia that $5,000 has been appropriated 
to cover the expenses of a competition for 
sketches for mural and other decorative 
painting, in their new city hall. This com¬ 
petition is open to all American artists. 


Every friend of Michigan university 
must sincerely regret that in the lecture 
course of its students such an unblushing 
scoundrel as Dave Hill should be allowed 
to appear. It is true that the government 
of the university had no control over the 
matter, but the circumstance indicates an 
unhappily low grade of political taste 
among the students. The faculty is in 
some degree responsible for this. It is no 
satisfaction to know the fact that this in¬ 
stitution in political matters is not below 
its fellows. It emphasizes again the fact 
that politically the education of our col¬ 
leges is a lamentable failure. 

THE INDIANAPOLIS CIVIL SERVICE. 

To ihe Executive Committee of the Indiana Civil 

Service Reform Amociation: 

Your special committee, appointea to in¬ 
quire into the present condition of the classi¬ 
fied service of the city of Indianapolis, respect¬ 
fully report as follows: 

Section 45 of the city charter provides as 
follows: 

“It shall be the duty of the mayor to call together 
the heads of departments (except of assessment 
and collection) for consultation and advice upon 
the affairs of the city, at least once a month. * * * 
Records shall be kept of such meetings above pro¬ 
vided for and rules and regulations sAa(( be adopted 
thereat for the administration of the affairs of the 
said departments not inconsistent with any law or 
ordinance, which regulations shall prescribe a com¬ 
mon and systematic method of ascertaining the com¬ 
parative fitness of applicants for office, position and 
promotion and of selecting, appointing and promot¬ 
ing those found to be best fitted (except in the depart¬ 
ment of public safety) without regard to political 
opinions or services.” 

The heads of the departments of finance. 


law, public works, public safety and public 
health and charities constitute the so-called 
“cabinet” to he called together once a month, 
whose duty it is to establish these regulations 
for admission to the civil service. 

It will thus be seen that the city charter 
does not simply permit but it absolutely requires 
the adoption of regulations for admission. 
These regulations must prescribe a systematic 
method for ascertaining the comparative fitness 
of applicants. That is, the test must be com¬ 
petitive ; and the rules must provide for the 
appointment of those found to be best fitted 
without regard to political opinions or services. All 
appointments, therefore, on the ground of 
political opinions or services are in violation 
of the rules prescribed by the charter. Any 
regulations which would allow such appoint¬ 
ments or appointments without competition 
would be equally a violation of the charter. 
Section 48 provides in substance that no ap¬ 
pointments or removals shall be made incon¬ 
sistent with the civil service rules adopted by 
the cabinet. An additional check is made 
upon arbitrary removals by the provision that 
after the head of a department has been in 
office for thirty days, written reasons must be 
assigned for such removals. 

In pursuance of the provisions of this char¬ 
ter, the “cabinet” of the late administration 
of Mayor Denny adopted on February 13, 
1894, a series of rules classifying the civil 
service, providing for a board of examiners, 
for admission to the lower grades of the serv¬ 
ice by means of competitive examinations 
and for promotion to the higher grades by 
means of a comparative monthly record of 
conduct and efficiency. Clerks, engineers, as¬ 
sistants, inspectors, hospital internes and, in 
fact, all city employes, except laborers and 
teamsters, were to be selected in this way. 

All examinations were to be practical in 
their character, so as to test the relative ca¬ 
pacity and fitness of the persons to be exam¬ 
ined for the service which they sought to 
enter. Those examined were to be graded ac¬ 
cording to their excellence, and those whose 
standing was more than 65 per cent, were to 
be placed upon a list of eligibles, and the 
three highest names upon this list of eligibles 
were certified to the appointing officer when¬ 
ever a vacancy occurred which it was neces¬ 
sary to fill. 

Applicants for labor were to be registered 
in the order of their application by the secre¬ 
tary of the board of examiners. And when¬ 
ever laborers were needed, they took their 
turn in the order of registration. Soldiers, 
however, and those having the largest families 
dependent upon them were entitled to prefer¬ 
ence. If their service was satisfactory they 
might keep their places upon the register and 
be called upon again, if not they were to be 
dropped from the register. Any person in the 
service of the city who obstructed an applicant in 
his right of examination should forfeit his office. 

It will be seen that these rules if enforced 
would exclude all political reasons for ap¬ 
pointment to any place in the city service. 
















272 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


These rules were similar to those which have 
been satisfactorily applied for many years in 
the city of Boston, where they had done much 
toward the elimination of the more disgrace¬ 
ful features of ward politics. 

The legality of these rules was expressly 
passed upon by the supreme court of this state 
in the case of William C. Newcomb v. The 
City of Indianapolis, where the rules were held 
to be valid and made in pursuance of the re¬ 
quirements of the charter. 

It is clear that these rules are still in force 
and are part of the law governing the city of 
Indianapolis. Neither the statutes of a state 
nor the ordinances of a city become void be¬ 
cause a new administration comes into power. 
The mayor’s cabinet, for the purpose of mak¬ 
ing these rules, was invested with the same 
kind of power as a city council in respect to 
the making of ordinances authorized by the 
charter. The adoption of these rules was the 
corporate act of the city duly performed by 
those agents of the city who were authorized 
by its charter to do this very thing. They are 
therefore the law of the city, and neither the 
mayor nor any of the heads of departments 
had any more right to disregard them than to 
disregard the city ordinances or the provis¬ 
ions of the charter itself. 

The board of examiners was composed of 
the mayor as chairman, Mr. Herrick, secre¬ 
tary, and Mr. White, all officers of the city, 
and Mr. Daniels and Mr. Pickens, citizens of 
Indianapolis not in the city service. 

When Mr. Taggart became mayor, Mr. 
White, Mr. Pickens and Mr. Daniels resigned 
their places. Mr. Herrick, the secretary of 
the board, who has charge of the eligible lists 
still remains. If Mayor Taggart had been as 
anxious to carry out the provisions of section 
45 of the city charter, as he was to distribute 
the spoils of office among his political sup¬ 
porters, he would have filled these three vacan¬ 
cies just as he filled the vacancies in the heads 
of the various departments in the city. But 
he has not appointed a single person, and the 
board of examiners is therefore without a 
quorum. But even in this condition the eligi¬ 
ble lists remain and Mr. Herrick, the secretary 
of the board, could at any time furnish from 
these lists the records of persons duly qualified 
for appointment to most of the positions in 
which vacancies have occurred. No such ap¬ 
pointments, however, have been made. The 
secretary of the board has not been called 
upon to certify a single name. Large numbers 
of employes have been removed and others 
appointed without the slightest regard either 
to the rules or the charter. For example, in 
the city engineer’s office the field force num¬ 
bers about twenty-five. There have been 
twenty removals for which no reasons have 
been assigned and the vacancies have been 
filled by democrats. A considerable number 
of men have passed examinations and are still 
upon the eligible list for appointment to these 
positions. No requests whatever have been 
made for the certification of any of these 
men. 


The recklessness of the city’s welfare in 
these dismissals is shown in the case of John 
Owen, an inspector. He had performed his 
duties with such zeal that it brought an at¬ 
tack from a contractor’s men. For his course 
he was praised by Mayor Denny and was al¬ 
lowed police protection in the performance of 
his duties. He was dismissed as “incom¬ 
petent.” 

In this connection we submit an extract 
from a letter written to your committee by 
Thomas Winsor, of Indianapolis: 

“On or about the 10th day of last August, I 
made application for a position in the en¬ 
gineering department as an inspector, took 
the examination and succeeded in being placed 
on the eligible list. 

“October 1st, received an appointment, 
served in said appointment to the best of my 
ability and to the apparent satisfaction of my 
superiors. October 29th, received a letter 
from Acting Engineer Jeup, requesting me to 
call at his office at a stated time, to which 1 
responded. He informed me that my resigna¬ 
tion would be accepted, or if I was not dis¬ 
posed to resign that I would be discharged at 
the end of the month. I asked him the reason, 
and he said there was nothing whatever 
against me, but that he had been directed so 
to do by those in higher authority than him¬ 
self. 1 declined to resign under such circum 
stances, and on October 31st, received by 
special delivery mail a letter signed by the 
board of public works notifying me that after 
that date my services would no longer be 
needed. 

“The next morning I called on Acting En 
gineer Jeup for my warrant, and asked him 
whether or not there were any vacancies in 
the engineering force, to which he said there 
were not. He also told me that he would like 
to have just such men as myself, but that he 
had to do as he was directed. I will state that 
I have had over nine years’ experience in en¬ 
gineering work, and for three and one-half 
years was assistant engineer in a neighboring 
city. 

“ Being out of employment, took the exam¬ 
ination for inspector with a view (if success¬ 
ful) of getting on the force, so as to be in the 
line of promotion. But it seems that a man’s 
qualifications for work count for nothing with 
the present administration as long as his hair 
is not of the right political color. During my 
connection with the department I wholly re¬ 
frained from discussing politics and conducted 
myself in such a manner that no one could 
charge me with ‘offensive partisanship.’ ” 

Again, five hundred and eighty-nine names 
have been entered upon the labor register, and 
a considerable portion of that number is still 
available for any requisitions for workmen, 
yet no requisitions have been made, and the 
labor service of the city has been selected 
wholly without reference to the rules, and 
largely, as your committee is informed and 
believe, from political considerations. 

There are 143 laborers, including foremen, 
now in the service of the city, and all ap¬ 
pointed in disregard of the rules. October 19th 
the board of public works notified the new 
foreman of street repairs that for lack of 
money he would have to materially reduce his 
force. This notice was sent him two days 
before his appointment took effect. He seems 
to have reduced the pay-roll by ceasing to as¬ 
sign work to laborers in the city employ. He 
has since hired other laborers until his pay-roll 


has reached the dimensions which the board 
of public works regarded as quite inadmissi¬ 
ble for lack of funds. Of the laborers now on 
the city pay roll, Clerk Piercy F. Tall, in the 
office of foreman of street repairs, says: “They 
are all good<lemocrats, I guess ; if not, there’s 
been a mistake made.” 

The board of public safety, which has 
charge of the police and fire departments and 
the markets of the city, is governed by other 
provisions of the charter. Section 95 empow¬ 
ers the commissioners to make rules and regu¬ 
lations for the appointment of members of the 
police and fire forces, providing that these 
forces shall be equally divided politically, and 
that members shall not be dismissed except 
for cause. They may be removed for any cause 
other than politics, (section 96), and the written 
reasons for such removal shall be entered upon 
the records of the board. Section 97 provides 
that upon conviction of a member of the city 
fire or police forces for any criminal offense, or 
neglect of duty, or of violation of rules, or 
neglect or disobedience of orders, or incapac¬ 
ity, or absence without leave, or conduct in¬ 
jurious to the public peace or welfare, or im¬ 
moral conduct, or conduct not becoming an 
officer, or other breach of discipline, said com¬ 
missioners shall have power to punish the 
offending party by reprimand, suspension with¬ 
out pay, dismissal, or by reducing him to a 
lower grade and pay. Upon any investigation 
of the conduct of any member of the fire or 
police force, or upon the trial of any charge 
preferred against any member thereof, the 
commissioners may compel the attendance of 
witnesses,etc. 

The commissioners of public safety under 
the administration of Mayor Denny, in pur¬ 
suance of their power under the charter, 
adopted a series of rules providing for admis¬ 
sion to the police force and fire department by 
competitive examinations, which included 
reading, writing and arithmetic, together with 
such inquiries as would show the applicant’s 
past experience and knowledge of local mat¬ 
ters, and of the duties of the position sought. 
A physical examination by the police surgeon 
was also required. Eligible lists were made 
of those whose grading was not less than 65 
per cent, in general efficiency, and appoint¬ 
ments were made from the three highest on 
these lists. 

These rules have never been rescinded nor 
altered by the board of public safety, and are 
as much a part of the law of Indianapolis as 
the civil service rules adopted by the cabinet 
in reference to the other departments. 

Examinations were held under these rules 
and there are still a number of names upon 
the eligible lists of those who have passed 
examination. In order to comply with the 
provision that the police force should be half 
republican and half democratic, the eligible 
lists of each party are kept separate. 

After the present board of commissioners of 
public safety came into office there were two 
resignations in the police force and the board 
discharged twenty nine men. But although 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


273 


the charter required that the reasons for re¬ 
moval should be stated and made provisions 
for a trial of the charges against officers, yet 
these men were all discharged without other 
cause than the statement that the board found 
them to be “inefficient officers.” No notice 
was given to them of the character of the 
charges or the evidence against them. They 
had no opportunity to exonerate themselves 
or to prove the falsity of the accusations 
against them. Some of these removals may 
have been warranted but no means were af¬ 
forded of separating the innocent from the 
guilty, and your committee is satisfied that at 
least the spirit of the rule which requires 
these charges to be stated in writing has been 
wantonly disregarded. But even if the dis¬ 
charges of these men had been proper the ap¬ 
pointment of their successors was undoubtedly 
irregular and illegal. On the democratic 
eligible list were the names of the following 
men who had passed examination with an 
average of more than sixty-five per cent, and 
some of them at least were entitled to appoint¬ 
ments in case of vacancies: Chas. M. Hal¬ 
stead, Dan’l Donohue, Wm. E. Brooks, Chas. 
W. Quack, Martin Dougan, W. H. Bigger, 
Harlan B. Haskell, Augustus Hall, J. L. 
Byard. Not one of these men, however, wag 
certified or selected. But in their places 
eleven new men were chosen and five men who 
had been on the force before but had been dis¬ 
charged under the former administration, 
were reinstated. There were eight men upon 
the republican list. None of these men were 
called for or certified, but it so happens that 
four of them were selected without certifica¬ 
tion and eleven new men were chosen without 
competitive examination. There was a phys¬ 
ical inspection by the surgeon and the new 
men were required to write their names. 
This was all. According to this system a man 
may be appointed a policeman in Indianapolis 
who can not even read the warrant which he 
is to serve. 

The present commissioners of public safety 
appear to have totally disregarded the rules 
established for the purpose of securing effi¬ 
ciency and impartiality in appointment to the 
police force. 

Among the new appointees was one who had 
been dismissed from the police force under a 
charge of levying blackmail on fallen women; 
another who had been refused an appointment 
formerly on the ground that he had been run¬ 
ning a crap game, and who had once been in 
the police court for assault and battery; an¬ 
other who had been arrested for assault and 
battery; another who was known as a drunk¬ 
ard ; another who, while on the police force, 
had been charged with borrowing money from 
a keeper of a house of ill-fame, and who had 
afterwards been dismissed ; another who had 
been dismissed from the police force for insub¬ 
ordination and for leaving his post when on 
duty; another who had been dismissed for 
sleeping while on duty; another who is rup¬ 
tured and is physically unfit to be a patrol¬ 
man, and others still, the reasons for whose 
appointment can only be found in their having 


been active workers for the election of Mayor 
Taggart. One of the improper appointees is 
a relative of Police Commissioner Mack. 
Robert Campbell, a captain on the police force 
and regarded for many years as a capable and 
efficient officer, was forced to resign. Your 
committee has been unable to discover any 
reason for this action. Captain Quigley, a 
democrat, who, under the former administra¬ 
tion, had been conscientious in obeying his 
orders, was attacked by a degraded class of 
saloon-keepers and only kept his place by 
showing that he acted under strict instruc¬ 
tions. 

Another curious violation of the rules and 
the charter appears in the changes made 
among the sanitary inspectors all of whom 
obtained their places through open competi¬ 
tion. Four republican inspectors were re¬ 
moved and the only democratic inspector was 
retained. These removals were first made by 
Dr. Morrison, who had no possible authority 
to make them under the law. After discover¬ 
ing that his act was illegal he reported these 
men for removal to the board of public safety 
and they were removed upon various charges. 
James Shepherd was discharged upon the al¬ 
leged ground that he had applied several 
years ago for appointment as a patrolman 
and had been rejected on account of insuffi¬ 
cient height. The rules of the board of pub¬ 
lic safety require that the standard height 
for patrolmen shall be five feet nine inches, 
but this rule has no more reference to sanitary 
inspectors than it has to judges of the supreme 
court. Such a cause for removal is trifling 
and frivolous. M. W. Welling, undoubtedly 
a highly efficient officer, was removed on the 
alleged ground that he was over the age 
established by police rules. The police rules 
require that patrolmen shall not be more than 
forty years of age, but there is no such rule in 
regard to sanitary inspectors. It is to be noted 
that when vacancies are wanted the rules ap¬ 
pear in very large letters; but when appoint¬ 
ments are to be made, the page becomes totally 
blank. To fill the offices of the men so re¬ 
moved three men, Wesner, Champion and 
Kleine were appointed entirely without exam¬ 
ination, although there were four names on 
the eligible list of men who had passed the 
examination for sanitary inspectors; Frank 
Adams, Harry Patton, Wm. Kuster and E. A. 
Tousey. 

The foregoing facts do not cover all which 
your committee has discovered, but are illus¬ 
trative of the treatment which the city civil 
service has received and independent of the 
admission of Mayor Taggart, they show to 
your committee that the best interests of the 
city are being disregarded for the benefit of 
personal and partisan considerations. 

Your committee, through one of its mem¬ 
bers, made a personal inquiry of Mr. Taggart 
as to the reasons for removals and changes in 
the city administration, and for the failure to 
observe the rules regulating admission to the 
civil service. The mayor stated that he had 
never read the civil service rules at all; that 
he did not suppose that they were in force 


under his administration, and that the changes 
had been made (except in the police and fire 
departments) for 'political reasons. 

Your committee believe that these avowals 
show that there has been a systematic viola¬ 
tion by the mayor as well as by the heads of 
the different departments, under which these 
changes have taken place, of section 45 of the 
charter of Indianapolis and of the rules made 
in pursuance of that section. 

Your committee regard the conduct of the 
new administration in thus disregarding the 
organic law under which it exists as highly 
reprehensible. It signifies a return from the 
merit system to the spoils system, a retrograde 
movement from the reform which is every¬ 
where making headway throughout the cities 
of the country to the unclean and corrupt 
methods of Tammany hall. 

William Dudley Foulke, 
Demarchds C. Brown, 

Hugh Th. Miller, 

Frederic E. Dewhurst, 
Lucius B. Swift. 

Indianapolis, November 21, 1895. 


CLERICAL POLITICS. 

Mr. Davis, a presbyterian clergyman of No- 
blesville, this state, is reported in the Indian¬ 
apolis News, of October 27, as having preached 
upon “The value of partisanship,” and as 
saying: 

The most dangerous Instruments in American 
politics to-day are the independent newspapers and 
the independent voter. The doctrine that a man 
must eschew all parties and give allegiance to none 
is most dangerous and pernicious. Such a man is 
the most dangerous element in American politics. 
He is anchored nowhere, has no faith in anything, 
and is just drifting with the currents. They are 
mere expletives, mere ciphers, and the world is full 
of failures made out of just such timber. I admire a 
straight, clean, party man, and I love a devoted, 
consistent Christian, whether he belongs to my 
party and church or not. But I despise the man 
who tries to spread himself out overall parties and 
to absorb all the good out of all parties, and then 
sets himself up as the independent voter—so much 
better and nobler than his fellow-men. And I 
abhor the Christian who spreads himself out over 
the church and the world, and by compromising 
with evil tries to advance his political or business 
Interests. The independent paper is in the same 
category, and its policy and support of men and 
measures usually smells of filthy lucre. Nothing 
in this country is entitled to so much respect as 
“ party loyalty.” The most admirable spectacle in 
American politics was the solid, firm stand of the 
306 delegates in the Chicago convention for General 
Grant in 1880. Whether right or wrong, their faith 
in the great commander never faltered, and their 
support was true and unquestioned. 

We might, perhaps, leave Mr. Davis to the 
following comments of the republican paper, 
the Richmond Item: 

The Noblesville preacher who is appealing for 
more partisanship and less independence in both 
religion and politics is fighting against fate. He 
might as well pray that the corn should not ripen 
under the sun and rain, as to hope that man will not 
ripen under the benign influence of time and knowl¬ 
edge, and the more man ripens, the smaller does 
mere partisanship appear, whether political or reli¬ 
gious. The reverend gentleman must be either a 
bigot, a demagogue or an ignoramus. 

But while we do not apprehend that the 
man who glorifies the attempt to nominate 









274 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Grant for a third term is personally of par¬ 
ticular importance, nevertheless, his cloth is 
of importance, and we should like to present 
a few practical problems to this teacher of 
public and private morals. 

There is a considerable class of ministers 
whose party zeal gets the belter of their dis¬ 
cretion, and who enjoy the sounding flow of 
words of general* denunciation of men who 
decline under some circumstances to wear a 
party yoke. These ministers never give any 
facts, but declaim wholly in generalities. We 
now present to Mr. Davis a number of ques¬ 
tions to answer, which will require considera¬ 
ble historical knowledge, and we offer him 
space in The Chronicle to make his answer. 

Gorman in Maryland had literally seized 
the government, and for years had deprived 
that state of free institutions. The members 
of his party acting within the party were 
utterly powerless to restore free government 
and they tried abundantly. Was it their duty 
to submit their necks to the yoke or to vote 
temporarily with another party with the best 
candidates in order that Gorman might be 
overthrown? 

A condition quite similar exists under 
Quay in Pennsylvania. No law can be passed 
and scarcely any person can get an office in 
that state without Quay’s consent. He has 
many times and by papersof the highest finan¬ 
cial standing been branded as a thief who stole 
money from the public treasury and he has 
never dared take up the challenge to come 
into court and test the matter. The republi¬ 
cans of Pennsylvania acting with their party 
are powerless. Is it their duty to submit or 
by acting as independents make it impossible 
for Quay to carry elections and thus compass 
his downfall? 

There is a similar condition in the state of 
New York. The coming winter only such 
laws can be passed as Tom Platt, a private 
citizen doing an express business on Broad¬ 
way, in New York city, will consent to. No 
man can be put on any committee in the legis¬ 
lature, except as Platt allows it. This has 
been the case for years, when his party have 
been in power. For years he has collected 
money of corporations and distributed it 
among the workers of his party until they 
have become completely bound to him and 
through them he can control the party-ma¬ 
chine absolutely. The party atlarge although 
it has repeatedly tried can not shake him off. 
Is it the duty of republicans to submit or by 
voting independently make it impossible for 
Platt to carry elections, which failure will 
destroy any boss? 

Again, Tammany hall is, by its party action 
in state convention, recognized as the official 
party organization for New York city. It is a 
combination of thieves and blackmailers, and 
by a system of robbery and blackmail it has 
had the funds to build up the best disciplined 
party machine the country has ever seen. It 
controls its party’s action absolutely in New 
York city, and it desires to continue its 
career of robbery and blackmail. Individual 


democrats, acting within the party, are buf¬ 
feted as chips upon the waves. Are they to 
submit, or by voting independently make it 
impossible for Tammany to carry elections, 
and impossible for it to get its men into offices 
and places, and impossible for it to rob and 
blackmail, and therefore impossible for it to 
live ? 

An ignorant local party boss named Murphy 
is Dave Hill’s colleague in the senate from New 
York. Murphy is the boss of the city of Troy, 
and by the usual boss methods he has bound to 
him the worke s of his own party and a good 
sprinkling of republicans, who are know'n as 
Mur, hy republicans. One of Murphy’s hench¬ 
men, named “Bat” Shea, in his henchman 
zeal, committed a murder for which he is 
about to suffer the extreme penalty. The New 
York Evening Post, of October 11th, gives the 
following summary : 

The city of Troy has long been notorious 
for election frauds. A democratic machine 
has for years been in the habitof returning its 
candidates as successful at the polls, and has 
resorted to every device of rascality required 
to produce such a showing. The outrages 
perpetrated in Troy elections have long ren¬ 
dered that city notorious, but their full enor¬ 
mity was never officially set forth until the 
court of appeals found it necessary to sum¬ 
marize the facts concerning the contest in the 
thirteenth ward on the Gth of March, 1894. 
On that day a mayor was to be chosen, and 
also a board of aldermen and supervisors. 
The most lively canvass for nominations had 
been over the republican candidacy for aider- 
man in the thirteenth ward. At the party 
caucus in February the nomination had been 
vigorously contested for by Dunlop, a saloon¬ 
keeper who worked with the democratic ma¬ 
chine, and Hancox. Bartholomew Shea, com¬ 
monly known as “Bat,” a young fellow of 
twenty-three, a moulder by trade but not a 
steady worker, was a friend of Dunlop and 
used to tend bar for him when politics re¬ 
quired the absence from the saloon of the 
would be alderman. A disturbance occurred 
at the caucus, during which Shea broke into 
the meeting-room through a window, brand¬ 
ished a revolver, went to a mutual friend of 
himself and Dunlop, McGough, who was 
chairman, received from him the ballot-box, 
marched out of the room with it, and gave it 
back to McGough some distance from the poll¬ 
ing-place. Trouble then arose as to the regu¬ 
larity of the proceedings of the caucus, and 
Dunlop and Hancox both ran, each claiming 
to be the republican candidate for alderman. 

Excitement increased as election day ap¬ 
proached. On the evening before Shea pro¬ 
vided himself with a revolver, for the reason, 
as he said, that he always anticipated more or 
less of a row on election day. Shea, McGough, 
and one or two other particular friends of 
Dunlop were very greatly interested in the 
latter’s success, “and so far,” says the judicial 
summary of the matter, “did they carry their 
interest that during election day they carried 
on, as leaders and conductors of a ruffianism, 
the most open, shameless, and reckless system 
of fraudulent voting, by means of repeating 
and by false personation of legal voters, that 
has ever come to our notice.” These proceed¬ 
ings can not be more concisely or clearly 
described than in this passagefrom thecourt’s 
decision: 

“ Fraud as a means or measure of concealment 
was not resorted to. The names and residences of 
reputable and well-known citizens were openly 
taken, called out to the Inspectors of election, and 
voted on by these miscreants, while the citizens 


themselves whose names were thus taken were in 5 
the booths preparing their ballots, and in some in- j 
stances the citizen would come out of the booth to 1 
protest against his name being used by such per- * 
son, but no weight was given to the protest, and ’ 
when challenged these repeaters swore In their * 
votes under the names thus taken. A line ofi 
legal voters, formed for the purpose of voting in 
their proper form, would be broken, and thlsj 
‘bunch ’ of rascals would get to the polls and each 
deposit a ballot and retire, only to repeat the per¬ 
formance at the same poll in a short time. This was 
particularly the case at the first election district of 
the ward, and the defendant and friends acted as the 
captains and directorsof the men who were person¬ 
ally doing the repeating, conducting them to the 
polls from a saloon near by and gathering them 
again in time for another raid.” 

The conduct of Shea and his friend im¬ 
pressed the judges of the highest court as “ al¬ 
most beyond belief,” and the decision saysthai, 
were it not for the fact that it had been testi¬ 
fied to by numerous witnesses, who were repu¬ 
table business men and entitled to credit, they 
would have had great hesitation in accepting 
the narrative as true, since “the reckless au¬ 
dacity displayed in the commission of these 
offenses would of itself lead us to doubt whether 
any one would be willing to run such risks as 
to thus openly violate the law in the presence 
of so many reputable and decent men.” But 
the facts were established “ by evidence which 
is simply overwhelming.” 

Four brothers named Ross, all of them good 
citizens and engaged in the manufacturing 
business, had been deeply interested in this 
contest from the start. They represented the 
decent republican element in the ward, which 
opposed an alliance with the democratic ma¬ 
chine. They had supported Hancox in the 
disorderly caucus, and they resolved to do all 
that they could to secure his success on elec¬ 
tion day. Like Sliea, they expected trouble 
at the polls, and armed themselves with clubs, 
while some of their associates had pistols also. 
Early on election day the Ross brothers went 
to the polling place in the third district of the 
ward. During the forenoon Shea and some 
others of his party appeared, and on one occa¬ 
sion commenced to quarrel with one of the 
Ro-cs party, and struck one or two in the face, 
“but nothing serious then occurred.” About 
noon Shea, McGough. and half-a-dozen others 
returned, and on their w'ay were heard to utter 
threats to “do them,” that they were strong 
enough, and that they should “ come on,” “to 
hell with them,” and such expressions. One 
of the party passed into the room, assumed 
the name of William Armstro g, of No. 51 
Glen avenue, claimed the right to vote as such, 
while the real William Armstrong was pre¬ 
paring his ballot, and actually voted on that 
name. Other efforts to repeat were made by 
the Shea crowd, leading to an affray, during 
which McGough and William Ross came to¬ 
gether, and the former shot the latter. Robert 
Ross started in pyrsuit of McGough, overtook 
him, they both fell, and while Robert was 
bending over. Shea walked up behind, deliber¬ 
ately shot him in the back of the head, and 
then walked around and fired athim in front, 
the first shot causing instant death. 

These facts were conclusively established. 
The only defence was an obviously absurd 
claim that Boland, one of the Ross party, had 
fired the fatal shot at his friend, supported ! 
only by witnesses of whom some had served It 
in the penitentiary, “and not one seems to ^1 
have been a steady worker at anything other U 
than frequenting saloons and passing his time il 
in such pursuits as are usually followed there.” 
Shea ran away, but was soon caught. His Jl 
indictment for murder speedily followed. I 
The local prosecuting authorities being dis¬ 
trusted, the case was placed in charge of an .as¬ 
sistant district attorney, to assist whom an 
eminent lawyer was appointed. The jury 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


275 


• - - 

I found Shea guilty of murder. The case was 
I taken on appeal to the general term, which 
( sustained the trial court. Appeal was then 
taken to the highest court in the slate, which 
j has just overruled all the objections and 

] affirmed the verdict, so that the murderer 

' must now be executed. 

In the course of the decision Judge Peck- 
■ ham, who spoke for the court, said: 

, ' “It does not appear nor Is it important to know 

to what political party the defendant belonged. 
Such men have no politics. As the soldiers of for- 
* tune of a bygone age fought, so these repeaters vote 
1 for the candidate who pays them. The repeater is 
I 1 the modern pirate, an enemy of organized and civll- 
j Ized society, and it is the duty of all parties to 
assist the officers of the law in the prompt punlsh- 
ment of the guilty.’’ 

Are the citizens of Troy to continue their 
' ^ submission to Murphy or are they in disregard 
of party loyalty to vote to overthrow him? 

! Further, shall self-respecting citizens be 
asked to vote for the candidates for the New 


York legislature, whose biographies we reprint 
from the New York Evening Post, a paper of 

j financial standing; 

* Timothy D. Sullivan (Tam.)—Generally known 
as “Dry Dollar;’’ professional politician,formerly a 
liquor dealer; one of the very worst of Tammany’s 
legislative galaxy; was elected to the assembly 
seven times, and elected to the last senate; has been 
a preposterous legislator, being regarded as a noto¬ 
rious lobbyist and an introducer of “strike” meas 
ures; was recognized leader of the “Black horse 
cavalry;” in 1893 the most audacious colonization 
frauds were practised in his district; at his own poll¬ 
ing-place there were many warrants for repeaters; 
several were sentenced to prison for ballot frauds; 
Inspector Byrnes in 1889 charged that he was the 
associate ol thieves; has been engaged in street 
brawls, and has been described by the city reform 
club as “a typical New York tough.” 

I Alexander S. Williams (rep. and state dem.)— 
Ex-policeman, rising through the grades to an in¬ 
spectorship; was retired at a secret session of the 
board; is a man of brutal Instinct and known as 
“Clubber” Williams; was deeply smirched by the 
Lexow investigation; during his captaincy in the 
“tenderloin” precinct the system of police black¬ 
mail and protected vice, revealed by the investiga¬ 
tion, attained its rankest growth; during his in¬ 
spectorship, which gave him control of east side 
precincts, vice was never so open; during the in¬ 
vestigation Capt, Schmlttberger swore as follows: 
Q. “Did you give any part of 80 per cent, (blackmail 
money) to any one? A. I did. Q. To whom? A. 
To Inspector Williams. * * * l went to him and 
handed him the money. The first time it was $o0. 
I gave it to him at headquarters.” He stands as the 
ofiScial candidate of the state democracy through a 
“deal” made with “Jakey” Kuuzenman and “Fat¬ 
ty” Grote, but his candidacy has been repudiated by 
the state democracy. 

Charles Smith (Tam.)—Liquor-dealer; known as 
“Silver Dollar” Smith; has served several times in 
the assembly, being one of the worst men ever sent 
there; he has been arrested four times, three times 
for brutal assault, once for bribery; was Indicted 
for bribery, but escaped conviction by a disagree¬ 
ment of the jury; during the senate Inquiry it was 
shown that he was a trafficker in bail bonds, and 
that he “ran things” a‘ Essex market police court, 
having many poor victims at his mercy; was re¬ 
cently tried on a charge of wrecking a saloon of a 
rival and stabbing him, but was acquitted. 

William F. Grote (state dem. and rep.)—Liquor- 
dealer; known as “Fatty” Grote; a man of absolute 
unfitness; has been arrested no less than nineteen 
times for various offenses, beginning with his ar¬ 
rest and conviction for burglary in 1868, and rang¬ 
ing down to arrests for stealing, assault and disor¬ 
derly conduct; unsuccessful Tammsny candidate 
for alderman in 1889; state democracy candidate 
for alderman in 1891, and state democracy candi¬ 


date for assembly last year; made a “deal” for ex¬ 
change of support with ex-Inspector Williams, 
republican, but was compelled by his organization 
to repudiate it, although the ofidcial indorsement 
stands. 


THE GENTLEMAN IN POLITICS. 

Tammany has understood ihe necessity of 
putting up an occasional “ decoy ” in office. 
Here and there it has set up as judge or as a 
single member of a board some notable 6gure 
with the backing of an honorable family, so¬ 
cial distinction and great personal respecta¬ 
bility. This “gentleman in politics” they 
point to when obliged to meet any charges of 
malfeasance or corruption, as prima facie evi¬ 
dence that the charges must be malicious. 
This decoy also makes himself useful in an¬ 
swering charges. His education and his re 
spectability are extraordinarily valuable at 
these critical junctures. At a recent investi¬ 
gation of the late Tammany dock board the 
official stenographic records of their execu¬ 
tive sessions were disclosed. The board con¬ 
sisted of Andy White and the “gentleman,” 
Mr. Cram, the son of an eminent father, 
himself a graduate of Harvard college and a 
man of means, and “yet he has for two or three 
years been associating intimately, night and 
day, with a lot of thieves, cheats and ruffians. 
Moreover, whenever they were near being 
found out, they were in the habit of coming 
forward and saying, “ Look at Cram. Cram 
would not be with us if we were doing any¬ 
thing wrong.” 

As is stated, these stenographic reports give 
a life-like and authentic picture of these Tam¬ 
many worthies “at work” on the business of a 
great department of the municipal govern¬ 
ment. 

“ Session after session was given up mainly, 
not to a discussion of the best methods for 
caring for the water-front of a great city, but 
to wrangle about “pulls” and getting the 
“men” of Croker and other Tammany mag¬ 
nates upon the pay-rolls of the department. 
Mr. Cram, as the president of the board, was 
always the guiding mind in its deliberations. 
He declared under oath yesterday that “poli¬ 
tics never influenced him in the discharge of 
my (his) duties,” and that he was “perfectly 
satisfied” with his conduct in the board. He 
also remarked that he thought the citations 
from the records were “trivial,” and that the 
examination to which the commissioners sub¬ 
jected him was “very foolish.” Yet these 
trivial citations showed that Cram had no 
other idea of his position than to use it, abso¬ 
lutely without decency, for Tammany poli¬ 
tics. The key to his official conduct was 
given by himself at a meeting of the board on 
June 22, 1893, when the board was “discuss¬ 
ing” the usefulness of an employe named Den¬ 
nis O’Brien, in whose place it was proposed to 
appoint some else. The record reads : 

President Cram—Dennis O’Brien is my man. 
Why should you put on anybody? 

Engineer—He is a very bad man. 

President Cram—Ten days is all he will get; I 
don’t care If he is the devil. 

Engineer-Suppose we give him twenty days? 

President Cram—I appointed him for Richard 
Croker. 

On the same day a similar question arose 
about one Tracy, and the record proceeds: 

President Cram—Give him $15 a week; it simpli¬ 
fies the account. 


Engineer—A good-for-nothing fellow; I want to 
get rid of him as soon as I can. He is one of the 
poorest men I have out there. 

President Cram—I appointed him for Fox. Shall 
we lay it over a week ? 

Commissioner White—Yes. 

Perhaps the most notable achievement of 
Cram in behalf of anybody was performed in 
the case of Patrick McCann. On January 21, 
1893, the chief engineer formally recom¬ 
mended the discharge of McCann for “general 
inefficiency and worthlessness,” and at the 
executive session of February 9 following, the 
subjoined “debate” occurred ; 

Commissioner Phelan—What about Pat McCann ? 

President Cram—Reinstate him. 

Engineer—There isn’t any place for him. 

President Cram—Then you have got to find one. 

Engineer—He is the most useless whelp there is 
on the water-front. 

And at the executive session of November 
23 following, McCann reappeared as follows: 

Secretary—You won’t forget McCann? 

Commissioner Phelan—McCann? That Is the 
worst man in the department. 

Commissioner White—What is the matter with 
him? 

Commissioner Phelan—It would take too long; 
he does everything. 

Commissioner White—What did he do? 

Commissioner Phelan—He is a laborer in the 
eleventh district. 

Engineer—He used to get drunk and leave his 
gang, go up street and play policy; then you would 
have to hunt for him. We got so we could find him 
quick in the policy shops up street. 

Commissioner Phelan—He used to have an asso 
elation and compel all of his men to join and pay 
fifty cents a week to bis association; levied assess¬ 
ments on bis men. 

Engineer—Mr. Cram has kept him in here for 
years against everybody’s protest and everybody’s 
request, except Mr. Docharty’s. 

These are accurate specimens of the usual 
executive sessions, and a perfectly fair sample 
of Cram’s methods. He was always ready to 
recognize any Tammany man’s pull, from 
Croker down through Comptroller Fitch, Jos. 
J. O’Donohue and Sulzer, to Mike Daly. When 
a question arose on June 29, 1893, as to why 
an unsatisfactory man was retained. Cram an¬ 
swered: “He was appointed for Michael Daly,” 
and added that he had a “pull,” * * * 

* * * because “Daly is personally in¬ 

terested in him, and he is also in Dalton’s dis¬ 
trict.” At the same session Cram announced 
“frankly” that “Sulzer has brought into my 
room about 500 laborers,” and added: “I move 
that Frank M. Donohue be given $15 a week. 
He writes beautifully.” No man was treated 
with more deference by Cram than Scannell, 
the murderer. On August 7,1893, the records 
contain these passages: 

President Cram—I think we will have to dismiss 
all of the employes of the department from the 
eleventh assembly district unless they bring letters 
from Scannell. Hereafter you must have a letter 
from Scannell bef' re I will appoint anybody. I 
don’t know whether he wants John O’Brien—he 
wants two or three men discharged. I hate to dis¬ 
charge laborers, except for cause; butbe says that 
John O’Brien, who is a very decent old man, was 
appointed without his request. 

President Cram—Hereafter, I won’t appoint any 
one unless he brings a letter from Scannell. You 
can put Michael O’Keefe In place of John O’Brien. 

Another great power was Senator Plunkitt, 
to whom the board could refuse nothing. He 
appeared on October 27, 1892, and asked (he 
board to pay $180,000 for some properly whidi 
it was to take for the city. The manner in 










276 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


which the board reached a decision is very 
edifying: 

President Cram—I move, that the offer to sell he 
amended by making it $175,000, and then be ac¬ 
cepted. 

Senator Plunkitt—I think it is very cheap for the 
City of New York at $1^0,000,1 do. I have been in 
this section of the city all my life. 

Commissioner-What offer has been made 

by the department for that property ? 

Senator Plunkitt—No offer has been made. 
Commissioner Phelan—The matter was referred 
to you and me. So far as I am concerned I am 
willing to refe it back to the board without any 
report. 

President Cram—I move that the offer be ac¬ 
cepted, with that amendment, making it .$175,000. 

Commissioner-We ought to have the 

boundaries of the property, knowing exactly what 
and where it is. 

Senator Plunkitt—There is a map hei e, sir, which 
shows all of that grant. I think they ought to get 
$180,000. 

President Cram—Will you take $175,000? 

Senator Plunkitt—I think they ought to get $180,- 
000 upon my word; I don’t think your people ought 
to crowd them, gentlemen. 

President Cram—There is no use in asking more 
than the sinking fund will approve, and $175,00018 
a more symmetrical sum. I will have to go before 
the sinking fund and explain this, and where will 
we put the $5,000 in ? 

His own view of the condition of the serv¬ 
ice of the department was given with great 
frankness at a meeting on June 1, 1893, when 
the following conversation between him and 
his colleague, “ Judge ” Andy White, is re¬ 
corded ; 

President Cram—I tell you, really, judge, as I 
told Croker the other day, we have got about 
eight or ten masters who are neglecting their work 
—at least two-thirds. 

Commissioner White—I don’t think we have got 
but two or three of them in the whole lot that are 
worth a cent. 

A similar conversation occurred on July 
20, of the same year: 

President Cram—Peter Snedden is a very good 
man. 

Engineer—He won’t stay on his work, Mr. Cram. 
Commissioner White—I think you have got more 
statesmen in this department than anywhere I ever 
saw. 

President Cram—Snedden is a very fine man. 
Commissioner White—I gave you a very good 
man the other day, Foley. 

President Cram—I put him in place of one of my 
men; I got the man in for Charles Dayton; Snedden 
put him back. 

Engineer—He only watches Sunday; he is not a 
watchman. 

President Cram—There is no objection to that; 
he will stay on. You will have to try him. Put 
him back. He is one of the very best statesmen. 

We will close our extracts with the follow¬ 
ing samples of the general “tone” of Cram as 
the president of the board: 

September IS, 18fl4. President Cram—I am willing 
to compromise, but Farrell can not go unless 
Hughes too. I would like to give him another 
chance. It seems rather hard if they only took a 
drink on a wet day. 

Mr. Parker—They went off and left their work. 
Y'ou can’t depend on that Farrell; he has been laid 
off a dozen times; he is fonder of 
President Cram—That shows good taste; shows 
he is a gentleman by instinct. 

September 25, 1893. President Cram—What pull 
has he got? There is nobody there that we want. 

Engineer—We have looked over those men; they 
are all pretty good men; the best one is Murphy. 

President Cram—Well, who in hell is Murphy? 
He may be a republican for all I know. Let him 
go to McClellan. The first endorser is from Croton, 
N. Y. Tell him to bring a letter from Mr. Purroy 
and Mr. Docharty. I move that it be tabled. 


THE BROTHERHOOD OF BOSSES. 

The republican county convention was re¬ 
cently held, and among the nominations 
made was that of W. P. L. Stafford for county 
judge and surrogate. How he secured the 
nomination is told by the Albion Free Lance, 
a republican newspaper, u'AicA says that at the 
republican caucus in that town Stafford's lieuten- 
aiits brought in groups oj half a dozen democrats, 
guarded them up to the box, and saw that they 
cast Stafford ballots; that “ one of Stafford’s 
hardest workers and closest adherents ad¬ 
mitted to us that they were voting Democrats.” 

—New York Evening Post, October 9. 

* » » 

The appeal of Kentucky republicans to the 
party at large to lend assistance in a financial 
way for legitimate campaign expenses was 
heeded in Indiana and some money was for¬ 
warded from a number of counties to the 
treasurer of the Kentucky committee. Joseph 
I. Irwin, one of the rich men and one of the 
party leaders of Bartholomew county, car¬ 
ried, personally, to the treasurer $94, con¬ 
tributed in Columbus, by general subscription. 
Each donor received a lithograph receipt. Mr. 
Irwin says that when he handed over the 
money to the committee he was infoimed that 
Senator Quay, of Pennsylvania, had fonvarded 
$1,000 by personal check, but that he had asked that 
no part of the money be used to defeat Senator 

Blackburn .—Indianapolis Journal, November 8. 

« * * 

The evidence taken before the Oneida grand 
jury is said to indicate that money was sent 
by Henry D. Purroy of Tammany Hall to Dave 
Dishler, Hill leader, and Thomas Wheeler, Platt 
leader, to be used in securing the nomination 
of Henry J. Coggeshall, renegade, by the 
Oneida republicans. If such a pooling of in¬ 
terests between Hillites and Plattites should 
be proved, it would be something for republi¬ 
cans throughout the state to think over.— 

Buffalo Express, October 2S. 

* * * 

The Mail pointedly observes: The republican 
county committee is in the hands of incompe¬ 
tents, traders and self-seekers in politics. It 
does not now and, unless differently officered, 
never can command the confidence of the 
community .—Buffalo Express, November 18. 

THE GRIND, 

Warden Harley, of the Northern prison, 
says that his institution is now controlled al¬ 
most exclusively by republicans. At a meet¬ 
ing of the board of directors Tuesday night 
all of the democratic guards were let out and 
republicans appointed to the vacancies.— In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, September 6. 

* * * 

The Marion county institute passed resolu¬ 
tions this afternoon favoring the establish¬ 
ment of civil service rules governing the 
employment of teachers in the common schools. 
Superintendent Flick says that after many 
years’ experience in looking after schools, he 
is convinced that nothing would do more to 
elevate the common schools than the establish¬ 
ment of rules of civil service .—Indianapolis 
News, September, 


“To the Hon. A. H. Taylor, Petersburg, Ind.: 

“Dear Sir —Your communication of the — 
date, relative to the appointment of John Sur- 
rant as postmaster at Surrant, Pike county, 
Ind., has been received. On March 13, 1893, 
you recommended Felix G. Dearing, for post¬ 
master at Surrant, Ind. Will you kindly no¬ 
tify the department which of the candidates 
you prefer? Very respectfully, 

“R. O. Maxwell, 

“Fourth Assistant Postmaster-General. 

“ Washington, D. C., June 21,'' 

* * * 

The New York civil service commission has 
granted the request of Mayor Green of this city 
to place Jamestown in the list of civil service 
cities. All the appointive offices of the city 
will now be filled after an examination, ex¬ 
cept the heads of departments and clerks who 
have the handling of public funds.— Jamestown 
(N. Y.) Dispatch, August 30, 

• » * 

The state civil service commission has writ¬ 
ten to the board of supervisors of Kings county 
in approval of the board’s plan for providing 
a county civil service commission, to have ju¬ 
risdiction over employes on the public works 
of Kings county. Over $3,000,000 is to be ex¬ 
pended on county works beyond the jurisdic¬ 
tion of the Brooklyn civil service commission. 
This is the only board of supervisors in the 
state to take such action .—Albany dispatch. 
New York Times, July 31. 

» * * 

Thirty consecutive years in the service as a 
letter carrier and not one complaint in all 
that time, is the record of Wm. H. James, of 
Rochester, N. Y. 

He was appointed by Postmaster S. W. Up- 
dyke, on May 7, 1865, Rochester was a small 
city at that time, and but nine carriers were 
employed. Of that number Mr. James alone 
has withstood the ravages of time and re¬ 
moval, and can justly claim the title of being 
the oldest letter carrier in point of service in 
the United States. The fifty-eight years of a 
busy life rest lightly upon him, and there are 
few men in the Rochester post-office who answer 
more regularly to roll-call than he. Upright 
in character and of sterling integrity, Mr. 
James numbers his friends by the legion, and 
his pleasant home where he has lived for 
thirty-two years is filled with many interesting 
and valuable relics of Uncle Sam’s postal ser¬ 
vice. It is needless to say that the letter car¬ 
riers of Rochester are proud of him, proud of 
his record as a letter carrier and as a man, 
and sincerely hope that he may be granted 
many more years of life and usefulness.— 
Postal Record for May. 

* * * 

The printers of Columbia Typographical 
Union, No. 101, have expelled ex-President 
John L. Kennedy, for unbecoming conduct in 
writing an article for the Dayton, Ohio, Jour¬ 
nal, censuring public printer Benedict for the 
adoption of civil service rules in the govern¬ 
ment printing office. The vote on expulsion 
was 184 to 66.— Washington dispatch, Septem¬ 
ber 16.\ 























The civil Service chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 34. 


INDIANAPOLIS, DECEMBER, 1895. terms ;^fo“cen?rpL''copr““- 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind. 


The Taggart administration in this city 
has continued its disregard for law with 
characteristic impudence. It has contin¬ 
ued to quarter upon the public treasury a 
large number of men who are not legally in 
the employ of the city, and the payment 
of money to whom is an unlawful use of 
public funds. The quality of some of the 
men who are thus loaded upon the city 
was indicated in the following extract from 
the report of the committee of the Indi¬ 
ana Civil Service Reform Association,pub¬ 
lished in the Chronicle last month, the 
statements of which there has not been the 
least pretense of denying: 

“Among the new appointees was one 
who had been dismissed from the police 
force under a charge of levying blackmail 
on fallen women; another who had been 
refused an appointment formerly on the 
ground that he had been running a crap 
game, and who had once been in the po¬ 
lice court for assault and battery; another 
who had been arrested for assault and bat¬ 
tery; another who was known as a drunk¬ 
ard; another who, while on the police 
force, had been charged with borrowing 
money from a keeper of a house of ill- 
fame, and who had afterwards been dis¬ 
missed; another who had been dismissed 
from the police force for insubordination 
and for leaving his post when on duty; an¬ 
other who had been dismissed for sleep¬ 
ing while on duty; another who is rupt¬ 
ured and is physically unfit to be a patrol¬ 
man, and others still, the reasons for whose 
appointment can only be found in their 
having been active workers for the elec¬ 
tion of Mayor Taggart. One of the im¬ 
proper appointees is a relative of Police 
Commissioner Mack.” 

During the month Mayor Taggart and 
his heads of departments met together and 
repealed the civil service rules. Nothing 
was substituted therefor except a general 
reference of appointments to the heads of 
departments. It is but fair to say that these 
men did not regard the matter seriously. 
They are wholly ignorant of the wide¬ 
spread movement for a revolution in the 
conduct of municipal affairs, and they 


would not want to join such a movement 
if they knew of it. They regarded it as a 
good joke to kick all “civil service non¬ 
sense” out of the government of this city. 
There never was a more insolent and 
reckless disregard of law and public senti¬ 
ment. The law requires that the mayor 
and the heads of departments, meeting to¬ 
gether, shall adopt rules for the employ¬ 
ment of persons by the city, except in the 
fire and police departments, and that such 
rules shall be competitive. They meet to¬ 
gether and repeal a good set of rules then 
in force and substitute none in their place. 
There has been nothing like this since a 
member of the police board under a former 
democratic administration publicly de¬ 
clared for the toleration of open gambling- 
rooms because they brought business and 
gave a metropolitan air to Indianapolis. 
This action will doubtless help Taggart with 
the Indiana democratic machine in secur¬ 
ing the nomination for governor next year, 
as a similar attitude enabled P. C. Trusler 
recently to secure a republican nomination 
for mayor of this city, but the Trusler in¬ 
cident shows that the voters at the elec¬ 
tion may differ radically with the machine 
at the convention. 

When this matter is fully understood 
there is no occasion for surprise. The 
men in control of the democratic party in 
this city, with one or two exceptions, are, 
and have been, engaged in politics for the 
money which it directly or indirectly 
brings them. Mayor Taggart was a res¬ 
taurant keeper and was elected auditor of 
this county, and held the place until it 
made him, in a small way, rich. In his 
first canvass for election, he was the con¬ 
stant political companion of John E. Sul¬ 
livan, the candidate for county clerk, who 
was one of the most corrupt and corrupt¬ 
ing politicians that ever lived in Indian¬ 
apolis. 

During all the years Taggart held the 
office of auditor, he probably did not 
give an hour a week to the duties of his 
office, but did the work by deputies. The 
office was to him simply a source from 
which to draw emoluments. It is not to 
be expected that such a man would have 
very high political ideas, nor has he. A 
study of the men who have influence with 
Taggart as advisers, or who, for one rea¬ 
son or another, have a pull with him, 
shows that there is not a single one who 


has any desire for improved transaction of 
public business. Some of them have held 
good offices and made money out of them. 
Others have large financial interests which 
are affected by the way the laws are en¬ 
forced. Others are looking to offices in 
the future and want to quarter henchmen 
upon the city. These men are ready to 
sacrifice everything in the way of good ad¬ 
ministration of the city to the particular 
ends of their selfishness. What is said 
here of the city, is true also of the con- 
troling democratic elements of the state. 
They like the Voorhees stamp and do not 
want any better. There was a time when 
Mr. Mores first became owner of the Indi¬ 
anapolis Sentinel, when it seemed that un¬ 
der the leadership of that paper there was 
to be a decided elevation of democratic 
standards. But Mr. Morss received an of¬ 
fice and the paper has dropped back to a 
position little, if any, in advance of the old 
Sentinel, and views the treachery of Tag¬ 
gart in this city with complacency. Evi¬ 
dently, the democratic party in Indiana 
has not been drubbed enough. 

Indianapolis has had recently a number 
of serious fires which led the board of 
trade to appoint a committee to overhaul 
the fire department. The committee found 
a lack of discipline in the department and 
recommended that the board give the chief 
more power. The remedy to be of any use 
needs to go much deeper than that. We have 
a system by which a man must declare that 
he is either a republican or a democrat be¬ 
fore he can get employment. He then 
gets employment, not on his merits but by 
a pull. The system has loaded and loads 
the department with politicians and favor¬ 
ites and will continue to do so. If the 
board should make a rule giving the chief 
more power there would be a string to it, 
and the chief would not dare to exercise 
the power. Nothing may be expected of a 
city administration which brazenly and 
flippantly tramples the law under foot as 
the present one does. The committee 
should have recommended that the gen¬ 
eral assembly be asked to place the service 
of this city upon the merit system so that 
if any man desires employment in the 
fire department he may go and compete 
for it physically and mentally, and so that 
if he outstrip his competitors he may get 
his place without dependence upon the 





















278 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


petty politicians who now disgrace the 
government of this city. The law should 
further provide for the dismissal of any 
fireman by the chief for cause stated in 
writing, and by that is not meant a dis¬ 
honest and tricky evasion by stating “in¬ 
competent” as the cause, such as our same 
city officials now resort to. 

If the Springfield Republican wants 
the next democratic candidate for the 
Presidency taken from Mr. Cleveland’s 
cabinet, it would be much better for the 
public if it dropped Olney, and took up 
Postmaster-General Wilson. In the lat¬ 
ter’s recent report, he comes nearer to 
rock-bottom in stating the principles 
which should govern the postal service and 
regulate the transaction of public business 
and in carrying them out than any other 
man who has ever occupied his office. It 
begins to seem strange that it has required 
argument to convince the people that two 
of his assistants, each charged with ex¬ 
pending over forty millions annually, to¬ 
gether with the management and disci¬ 
pline of tens of thousands of employes, 
should have a tenure not depending 
upon Gorman Quay-Platt-Voorhees poli¬ 
tics, Speaking of the recent order pro¬ 
viding for the transfer of post-offices into 
the classified service, he says: 

The order * may be accepted as the begin¬ 
ning and foundation not only of a better postal 
service of the public, a better and more business¬ 
like accounting to this department, but also a wise 
extension of the civil service system to postmast¬ 
ers. It is my purpose to proceed under the author¬ 
ity of this order as discreetly as I can, and in the 
long run as far as experience will justify, so as to 
secure these commendable results. 

It has been easy enough in the past to 
make orders, but here is a high ex¬ 
ecutive officer intent upon execution. 
All this emphasizes what the Chroni¬ 
cle said last month, that the battle 
of civil service reform bas been won 
and it is now only a question of put¬ 
ting the methods into operation. The re¬ 
port of the secretary of the interior, 
Hoke Smith, sounds a similar note of 
progress in the flat recommendation that 
the tenure of office of an Indian agent 
“should be conditioned alone upon the 
faithful discharge of his duties,” and that 
“the classified service be extended over all 
the subordinate positions both at the 
agencies and at the schools,” In the same 
line are the acts of Secretary Morton in 
putting everything in the department of 
agriculture under the rules. Is it not 
about time that the democratic party of 
Indiana shook off its Voorheeses and 'Tag¬ 
garts and began to show some apprecia¬ 
tion of the progress which its national ad¬ 
ministration is making? 

Boston has just elected Josiah Quincy 
mayor by over 4,000 majority. Doubtless 


Boston would warmly resent the insinua¬ 
tion that this was to be taken as an indors- 
ment of Quincy’s loot of the consulships, 
or of his unfortunate connection with a 
printing contract while he was assistant 
secretary of state. He went out of that 
office wholly discredited and, as Mr. Dana 
Estes says, with a national reputation as a 
spoilsman. It is more than probable that 
there was a large element of forgiveness 
in his election as mayor and a disposition 
to give him another chance. What he will 
do with this chance is now to be seen. If 
he should return to the course which his 
name and his former professions gave ex¬ 
pectation of, he would radically disappoint 
the conference of Indiana democrats pre¬ 
sided over by Mayor Taggart of this city, 
who the other day telegraphed him con¬ 
gratulations upon his election. Whenever 
a democrat achieves an ignoble notoriety 
in politics, any success which seems to 
“vindicate” him is sure of the warmest 
congratulations of the controlling demo¬ 
cratic elements of Indiana. Their notion 
of a public official is one who goes in “for 
all there is in it” for himself and friends. 
If Quincy now honestly enforces the merit 
and labor service systems in the city of 
Boston, instead of deliberately breaking 
the law, as Taggart does, these Indiana 
democrats will say he is not the man they 
they took him for. 

In the Chautauquan for October there is a 
forcible illustration of the unhappy bar¬ 
renness of moral teachers as to political 
morality, a fact often pointed out by the 
Chronicle. The Chauiauquan has some 
pages of “Current History and Opinion,” 
for the reading of which it offers a reward. 
In October a page and a half of these was 
devoted to Quay and consisted in setting out 
a picture of him with an editorial insinu¬ 
ation that in his recent struggle he was 
fighting the battle of his life over “the 
burning question of reform in city gov¬ 
ernment.” It follows this with fourteen 
extracts from newspapers over the coun¬ 
try. These all give the impression that 
Quay is a patriot in the sense that George 
William Curtis was, and that added to this 
patriotism is a consummate skill as a po¬ 
litical manager. In fact he is known to 
all men as one of the most dangerous and 
corrupt men thatjever engaged in Ameri¬ 
can politics. He has repeatedly been ac¬ 
cused by newspapers of having stolen a 
large sum of money from the public treas¬ 
ury. These newspapers were of such finan¬ 
cial standing that they would have had to 
respond to any amount of damages as¬ 
sessed by the jury and they challenged 
Quay to a trial and he has never dared to 
take up the challenge. What do men of 
ordinary judgment say of such a set of 
facts? It is not easy to decide whether 


Quay or the clerical editor of these pages 
of the Chauiauquan deserves the greater 
public censure and contempt. 

THE FIFTEENTH ANNUAL MEET¬ 
ING OF THE NATIONAL LEAGUE. 

The fifteenth annual meeting of the Na¬ 
tional Civil Service Reform League was 
held in Washington the 12th and 13th of 
this month and shows greater strength and 
vigor than ever. In his address Mr. Schurz 
again reached his highest mark and set 
the boss before the American people in a 
lasting aspect. His address has an added 
interest because it follows his recent stand 
against Tammany Hall in New York—a 
stand which required the highest civic 
courage and was a triumph which fittingly 
ranges with a long line of similar civic 
triumphs in Mr. Schurz’s career. 

It is to be regretted that the limits of the 
Chronicle permit only excerpts. The res¬ 
olutions have not been received, but the 
Chronicle gives extracts from all of the 
papers which have reached it. 


THE BOSS, THE MONARCH OF THE 
REPUBLIC. 

1 From Mr. Schurz’s Address.] 

There has actually been such a monarchy 
on a small scale in existence among us. I 
have seen it in operation and so have many of 
my hearers. We have witnessed in the great¬ 
est city of the United States one man wielding 
the powers of municipal government like a 
monarch, in some respects like an absolute 
monarch, too. Standing at the head of a 
pretended political organization ruled by him 
with autocratic power, he made appoint¬ 
ments and dismissals in the public serv¬ 
ice of the city by merely issuing his orders. 
He determined what candidates for office 
should within his dominion be submitted to 
the popular vote, and his followers with 
prompt obedience enforced his pleasure. He 
gave audience to citizens having business with 
the municipal government, and either granted 
or refused their petitions like a sovereign. He 
ordered his agents in the legislature of the 
state to pass this bill or to defeat the other 
bill, and it was done. Citizens became accus¬ 
tomed to approach him as supplicants ap¬ 
proach a king. Aside from the public taxes 
for his municipal government he levied a sep¬ 
arate revenue, the payment of which could 
not be refused without danger—a sort of civil 
list, partly under the euphoneous title of 
“campaign funds,” partly without any eu¬ 
phony—for the use of which he never thought 
of accounting. He grew rich in a marvelously 
short time, and when a popular uprising 
against his rule broke out which threatened 
to become too formidable to resist, he abdi¬ 
cated and withdrew to his estates. 

This was monarchy—not, indeed, a mon¬ 
archy surrounded by the pomp of a court of 
nobles with ancient names, escutcheons, and 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


279 


gold lace, and ribbons, and stars, and crosses 
—rather a very vulgar sort of monarchy 
whose vassals and high dignitaries were a 
mayor and police commissioners and heads of 
municipal departments, and district leaders 
and ward politicians, with names and an¬ 
tecedents and manners and social standing 
anything but aristocratic—but a monarchy 
for all that with most of the essential attri¬ 
butes. To be sure the title of this monarch 
was not that of king, but that of “boss”—but 
a boss clad with regal power which he exer¬ 
cised with arbitrary authority until, like' 
some French kings, he had to yield to a popu¬ 
lar upheaval amounting to a revolution. Such 
things happened, as every one acquainted with 
the history of Tammany Hall knows, in this 
very republic; and if we speculate upon the 
manner in which monarchy, not in name, but 
in fact, may rise up among us, here is the 
living example. 

THE BOSS. 

The development of political bossism into 
something like actual monarchy is, to be sure, 
and extreme case. But all political bossism 
has a tendency in that direction. When in a 
political party the selfish element obtains con¬ 
trolling influence, it will, for mutual benefit, 
naturally seek to organize itself into what we 
call a machine; and machine rule will usually, 
for the more certain attainment of its selfish 
ends through united and well-regulated ac¬ 
tion, drift into more or less irresponsible one- 
man rule—the one man to rule the machine 
for its and his benefit, to rule through the ma¬ 
chine the party organization, and to rule 
' through the party organization, as the case 
may be, the municipality or the state. And 
this rule he does not exercise by bringing his 
fellow-citizens, through persuasion, to his 
own way of thinking, if indeed he have 
any, with regard to principles or policies, 

' or measures touching the public interest, 
but by distributing among the selfish poli¬ 
ticians composing his organized corps of mer¬ 
cenaries, in the true feudal fashion, as re¬ 
wards for services rendered, or as inducements 
for services to be rendered, things of value, 
such as public oflBces with their emoluments 
and opportunities, which things of value do 
not belong to him, but to the public, he doling 
I them out among his henchmen, not for the 
I benefit of the public, but for his and their 
' own. 

I How far the aspirations of bossism, thus 
established, are already reaching, found re¬ 
cently a curious illustration in the newspaper 
report that some of the state bosses, not con¬ 
tent with their local autocracy, met together 
in conference to agree upon certain persons 
to be put forward as candidates for the Presi¬ 
dency of the United States—just as in the old 
times of the German empire the princes wear¬ 
ing the high dignity and power of “electors” 
met together to agree upon a selection for the 
imperial crown. Equally striking was another 
piece of news going through the press, that 
when the boss of one state was hard pressed 
in an election by an uprising of citizens im¬ 



pudently wishing to govern themselves, the 
bossof another state, although not of-thesame 
party, but inspired by a feeling of common 
interest and of comradeship, sent a strong 
troop of his own experienced and fearless 
repeaters to aid the struggling brother boss 
at the polls—just as the czar of Kussia in 
1849, when the emperor of Austria was in 
danger from the Hungarian revolutionists, 
sent his hard-pressed brother-emperor a Rus¬ 
sian army to help him subdue the insurgent 
subjects and save the monarchical authority. 
Even if these stories had been wholly in¬ 
vented by newspaper reporters, yet it would 
be a significant sign of the times that they 
were generally believed as entirely natural oc¬ 
currences. And as to their naturalness, given 
the premises, there can be no doubt. 

THE CONGRESSMAN. 

In this manner weeks and weeks pass after 
the incoming of the new administration, and 
still our friend has on his hands a formidable 
number of pursuers to whom he has promised 
“something equally as good,” and others, too, 
to whom he has promised nothing, but whom 
he thinks he can not afford to offend by blunt 
refusals. Some have left Washington, but 
flood him with letters. Others have staid 
and indomitably dog his steps. Some owe 
boarding bills in Washington, and have no 
money left for the home journey. In his 
despair he pays their bills, and buys them 
their railroad tickets, to deliver himself of the 
insufferable infliction, promising to move 
heaven and earth for them in their absence. 
But there are a few who still have funds and 
will not go, and from them the wretched state- 
man, jaded and disgusted, at last runs away 
himself and hurries home. But there he finds 
no rest. Incessantly he is pestered by the re¬ 
proaches of the disappointed, and by the im¬ 
patience of those who are still expectants. He 
begins to doubt whether the patronage busi¬ 
ness has not made him more enemies than 
friends. Fortunate he is if he does not find 
himself forced to run away once more without 
leaving his address behind, into some solitude 
far from the madding crowd. And yet he 
may have to fear that quiet solitude more than 
the distracting bustle he has escaped ; for it 
will bring to him moments of self-contempla¬ 
tion, when memories will rise up before him 
of promises made to he broken, of confidence 
invited to be betrayed, and of honor and self- 
respect lost never to be retrieved. And yet, 
of the political debts which the spoils system 
seduced him to contract, only the most press¬ 
ing have been paid. 

So far he has gone only through the experi¬ 
ence of the first months after the incoming of 
the new administration while Congress was 
not in session. The time arrives for Congress 
to meet, and now he thinks he will atone for 
it all by giving his whole soul to that duty for 
the performance of which he really was elect¬ 
ed. But, alas! the old torment will not let him 
go. The men with claims who have not been 
provided for are still dogging his heels, or 
mercilessly pelting'him with letters, and like. 


an errand boy, they keep him running from 
department to department. Every new chance 
opening revives the pressure. The work is 
never, never done; and although it abates 
somewhat, it continues to trench most severe¬ 
ly on the time, working power, and good humor 
which should wholly belong to the legislator’s 
real duty. 

Well, our friend tries hard to do the best he 
can under the circumstances, and flatters him¬ 
self with the belief that he has at least this 
political home machine tolerably well ar¬ 
ranged. But new complications arise. One 
of the office-holders appointed upon his rec¬ 
ommendation so grossly misconducts himself 
as to make his removal imperative. There 
is no doubt as to the facts. But the delin¬ 
quent public servant calls upon his congres¬ 
sional patron for protection. Has he not a right 
to do so? Has he not been appointed simply 
by way of reward for services rendered to the 
member of congress? Has he ever been ex¬ 
pected by his patron to earn his salary by 
downright hard work for the public? Was he 
not rather to haye “a good time” while in 
office, and to make out of it what he could? 
And now because he did so he is to lose the 
reward he had earned, and to be disgraced by 
removal to boot? Will the congressional pa¬ 
tron leave his friend in the lurch? Our friend 
is a little puzzled at first. In spite of the 
many rebuffs it has suffered the old conscience 
speaks once more. Does his sense of duty 
permit him to endeavor to keep in office, to 
the evident detriment of the service and of 
the public interest, a man he knows to have 
proved himself unworthy? But there is also 
another voice speaking to him. Has not this 
unworthy public servant friends or relatives 
who exercise influence in his district? True, 
he ought never to have recommended this 
man for office, but can he now afford to make 
enemies of him and his clan? True, the in¬ 
tegrity of the service and the public interest 
are entitled to consideration; but can he af¬ 
ford that consideration when one of his ap¬ 
pointees is concerned, and he himself has so 
much at stake? Well, he seeks to have the 
removal recalled. He does not find a willing 
ear. He begs, he protests, he blusters, he 
threatens, he entreats, he implores the admin¬ 
istration to do a thing which he knows it can 
not do without being false to its public duty. 

But still other complications come to plague 
him. The administration follows some pol¬ 
icy which he feels himself in conscience 
bound to oppose; or vicious practices are dis¬ 
covered in some government department which 
his sense of duty commands him to denounce. 
His first impulse is to obey that command. 
But has he not appeared before the President 
and before the department chiefs, as a peti¬ 
tioner for favors in the shape of offices for his 
friends? Will he not have to solicit similar 
favors again, and if he criticises and opposes 
the administration, will it not have the power 
not only to refuse further favors needed by 
him, but even to remove the persons appointed 
upon his recommendation? Nay, may not thos 











280 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


very persons, his political retainers, the mem¬ 
bers of his home machine, if he opposes the 
administration, turn against him and de¬ 
nounce him as a mugwump and a renegade, 
for the purpose of winning the favor of the 
administration, and of thus saving their own 
necks? He keenly feels that here his moral 
independence as a legislator is at stake—that 
moral independence which, if he is to do his 
duty to his country, can never he surrendered. 
But can he afford to maintain it at the risk 
of losing all the dearly-bought results of 
the management of the patronage in his dis¬ 
trict, and even of turning his own handiwork 
against himself? No—unless there be in him 
some of the stuff of which martyrs are made, 
the moral independence of the legislator will 
die as a sacrifice at the shrine of that patron¬ 
age. And to many legislators making that 
sacrifice, it will hardly occur that it bears all 
the features of a bargain essentially corrupt. 
* • * » * » 

It was in a magazine article written by Gen. 
Jacob D. Cox, ex-secretary of the interior, 
that I first found a description of senators and 
members of the house of representatives 
personally introducing to a cabinet minister 
constituents of theirs as candidates for certain 
places, extolling the merits of those constitu¬ 
ents in the warmest language, and with appar¬ 
ently earnest eloquence urging their appoint¬ 
ment, while the cabinet minister had in his 
desk notes from the same statesmen caution¬ 
ing him not to pay any regard to their rec¬ 
ommendations. I must confess that this start¬ 
led me. Being at that time a member of the 
senate myself, I inquired of two cabinet min¬ 
isters then in office whether any instance of 
such duplicity had ever come to their own 
personal notice. The answer was that indeed 
they had, and they w'ere by no means infre¬ 
quent. But I have not to depend upon other 
men’s testimony; for a few years later I my¬ 
self, sitting behind my desk as secretary of the 
interior, looked into the eyes of senators and 
representatives who played before me the same 
ignoble trick, and into the eyes of their con¬ 
fiding victims—and I did not know whom to 
pity most, the deceiver or the deceived. If 
there is anything I have to be sorry for it is 
that I contented myself by disregarding their 
recommendations altogether instead of uncov¬ 
ering the dastardly fraud on the spot. 
»*•**»*» 

The post-offices scattered by thousands all 
over the land have done more than anything 
else to keep alive the spoils idea among our 
people. More than anything else they have 
been the prizes fought for in national contests 
by local politicians. More than anything else 
they have served to demoralize the public 
mind with the notion that a change of party 
in power must mean a partisan change in all 
the offices, and thus to turn our party contests 
into scrambles for plunder. It is no exagger¬ 
ation to say that the post-office used as party 
spoil has been the bane of American politics. 
It has especially been the curse of the member 
of congress, hounding, tormenting, and degrad¬ 


ing him every day of his official life. To be 
rid of that curse will be to him a true deliver¬ 
ance. Every post-office the disposal of which 
he loses will be so, much gain to his working 
power, to his freedom and moral independ¬ 
ence, to his usefulness and dignity as a legis- 
tor. He will, therefore not only do the utmost 
in his power to aid the postmaster-general in 
the work of reorganizing the postal service ac¬ 
cording to the President’s order, hut he will 
zealously promote the passage of a law bring¬ 
ing under effective civil service rules those 
post-offices which the President’s order can not 
reach. He will contribute to this result all 
the more gladly as, with the postal service 
taken out of party politics, the greatest citadel 
of the spoils system will have fallen. 

A year’s progress. 

At our last annual meeting, I spoke of the 
remarkable strength the civil-service reform 
movement had gained in public sentiment. 
I am happy to add now that the growth of 
that strength has continued. It wasstrikingly 
manifested by the overwhelming popular ma¬ 
jority by which the merit system was adopted 
for the municipal government of Chicago, and 
by its successful introduction. Efforts are be¬ 
ing made in various other places to follow 
this great example. We have, indeed, to de¬ 
plore two concurrences, which show that the 
spoils politicians have by no means given up 
the battle, but still strive to recover what 
they have lost. One of these occurrences is 
the passage by the legislature of Massachu¬ 
setts. in spite of the governor’s spirited re¬ 
sistance, of a law striking a vicious blow at 
the integrity of the merit system in the pub¬ 
lic service in that state, and at the same time 
to the honor and the true interests of the war 
veterans. And the other is the utterly law¬ 
less conduct of the mayor of Indianapolis, 
who has simply declared himself not bound 
by the provisions of the city charter prescrib¬ 
ing the introduction of the merit system in 
the municipal service. Such things admon¬ 
ish us that militant watchfulness must still 
be the order of the day in the reform camp. 
I am glad to say that in Massachusetts the 
constitutionality of the obnoxious law is ably 
contested in the courts; and we all know 
that the champions of civil-service reform 
in Indiana are of too militant a spirit to let 
the refractory mayor sleep on his spoils laurels 
in comfort. 

On the other hand, in the state of New 
York, and in its great cities, the reform system 
has made most cheering progress. The em¬ 
bodiment in the state constitution of the civil- 
service reform clause, and its faithful ob¬ 
servance by the governor, the mayors of the 
great municipalities, and the respective civil- 
service boards, have caused a very large ex¬ 
tension of civil-service rules and a vigorous 
enforcement of them. One of the most impor¬ 
tant features of that progress consists in the 
adoption and the successful operation in the 
large cities of the labor-registration system, 
which rescues the laboring men doing public 
work from the tyrannical control and the ra¬ 


pacity of political bosses and machines. And 1 
now in Maryland, too, the day of reform has J 
dawned with unexpected brilliancy, and I | 
trust that old state will step into the front rank 1 
of its champions. There are several others I 
that promise to follow her. 1 

THE APPOINTMENT AND TENURE I 

OF POSTMASTERS. i 

Richard H. Dana. 

It is a curious fact about our so-called a 
“American” spoils system in politics that we ^ 
.spoil not a distant enemy, nor even some other ^ 
race living in our midst as the Turks do the ■ 
Armenians, but we despoil ourselves in mak-.fl 
ing spoils of our own institutions. Nowhere 9 
is this better illustrated than in the postal 
service of the United States. j 

Our post-office department is the largest de- V 
partment in the country and on its efficient I 
management depends much of our material w 
and intellectual progress as well as our daily 3 
convenience, and yet we have been letting W 
our representatives strengthen their political .3 
fences by making frequent changes and unfit g 
appointments, in a way to ruin any busi- W 
ness exposed to open competition. As a re¬ 
sult we have the worst postal service of any 
civilized country in the world. In Tokio, Ja¬ 
pan, they have more frequent deliveries than 
in New York city and there are improve- 
ments adopted in England, France, Germany * 
and Italy twenty and thirty years ago which ~ 
we have not yet adopted at all or only partial- ^ 
ly and imperfectly. For example, in the large 
cities of those countries there are numerous 
branch offices, so numerous as to be for all prac¬ 
tical purposes as accessible as letter boxes with 
us.wherestamps or money orderscan be bought, > 
where parcels can be weighed and where mat- * 
ter can be mailed. When a note is dropped j 
into a letter box here it lies untouched for 
one, two or three hours until the collector 
takes it out and it is not assorted until the ' 
collector deposits it at the post-office. When, 
however, it is mailed in one of these branch ** 
offices it is immediately canceled and assorted * 
so that the time wasted in the letter box is - 
utilized and the note is ready for direct deliv- 1 
ery at the first call of the carrier. 

This expedites the local city delivery so that 
a note mailed at a branch office is delivered 
almost as quickly as if sent by a private spe¬ 
cial messenger, and this again so stimulates the i 
local use of the mails that the extra expense is ^ 
reported to be more than made up by the in- • 
creased sale of postage stamps. 

For some twenty years or more we did noth- 
ing towards adopting this plan and not only < 
was all the time lost while the mail was wait- ‘ 
ing in the letter boxes but a letter posted 
within a half mile of its destination often had " 
to be carried two, three or even four miles to ' 
the central office to be assorted and then j 
to travel all the way back, going over, perhaps, I 
eight miles to accomplish half a mile. We ? 
have very tardily adopted in some of our 
largest cities a few branch offices, but so few ' 
and far between that they do not half serve | 
their purpose. |i | 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


281 


This is only one of numerous instances 
that could be cited to illustrate how much our 
postal system has been spoiled. Not only in 
detail has it been thus spoiled, but so much 
have the postmasters-general and their assist¬ 
ants been occupied with the distribution of 
patronage that they have not had the time to 
attend to the organization of the department. 
For example, a business man appointed post¬ 
master-general writes to soire of the model 
postmasters to consult him on the business of 
the service. On account of the pressure of 
congressmen he is unable to fix a date before 
the June after his inauguration in March, but 
even then, these model postmasters get no 
further than his ante-room, where they vainly 
wait many valuable hours while applicants 
under the wing of members of congress pass 
in before them. At last, after about a week 
of waiting, one gets into the inner room and 
finds the postmaster-general engaged in a dis¬ 
cussion with a negro postmaster of a small 
town in the south, over the question whether 
the appointment should not be revoked, not 
on the ground of unfitness, but because of 
a rumor that this negro had once attended a 
democratic caucus. After some quarter of an 
hour consumed over this question, so vastly 
important to the postal service, the postmaster- 
general has a moment or two to shake hands 
and explain that the business consultation 
must be postponed till the next August, as he 
is overwhelmed with the pressure for places. 
This story I tell not as illustrating the work 
of any one man, but of the heretofore usual 
duties of this cabinet position in general. 

As a result the organization of the depart¬ 
ment is on the same basis that it was under 
Franklin, when there 75 post-offices in the 
country. When any ordinary business grows 
large it is subdivided. The express compa¬ 
nies, for example, are divided into districts, 
with a superintendent for each. So with the 
great railroads, and with the post-offices in 
Great Britain; so with an army. But in the 
United States postal service, there is nothing 
between the bureau at Washington and the 
postmasters. It is like an army with no ma¬ 
jors, no colonels, no brigadier-generals, in fact, 
with no officers between the general-in-chief 
with his staflT, and the captains of the compa¬ 
nies. 

All the questions relating to the wants of 
the various postmasters have practically to be 
passed on by two clerks at Washington who 
are too far off to be able to judge of the cir¬ 
cumstances. Apparently they have to decide 
by lot in most cases, granting one fourth or 
one-eighth of the requests, as it may be, in 
proportion to the appropriation. For ex¬ 
ample, from the Boston post-office is sent a re¬ 
quest for a New England Directory, price, 
$7.50. The request is denied. As a conse¬ 
quence a clerk at a salary of $750 a year has 
to be detailed to go out and look over the di¬ 
rectories belonging to some business men as a 
favor, and bring back the desired addresses, to 
the great loss of money to the office and delay 
to the re-addressed letters. 


Again, here are two towns, one twenty-five 
and the other twenty-nine miles from Boston, 
and about four miles apart, with railroad con¬ 
nection between them. The letters from one to 
the other are sent all the way to Boston, 
there to be assorted and sent back to the other 
town, taking on an average about a day and 
a half. There is much correspondence be¬ 
tween the two places. Who is to make the 
shortcut? The only persons officially charged 
with changing the routes are in Washington. 
They have no idea of the merits of the case. 
The postmasters of these two towns may 
write to Washington, but it is supererogation 
on their part if they do, and they are usually 
told in reply to attend to their own business. 
The only way to have the change made is for 
the prominent men of both towns to bring 
pressure to bear on the department and to 
make the life of their congressman miserable 
till, after perhaps two years of agitation, at a 
great personal sacrifice, the change is at last 
made. 

Indeed it is one of the greatest tributes pos¬ 
sible to the versatility and natural business 
talent of the American people that, amid all 
these frequent political changes of postmasters 
and this utter want of organization, the busi¬ 
ness of the department is carried on at all. 

That the people of the United States do not 
rise and demand a better service is because 
they have not seen any better and do not 
know of the possibilities of a really good 
post-office department. It is only a small por¬ 
tion of the small minority who travel abroad 
that have intelligently observed and compared 
our postal system and that of other civilized 
countries. 

[Mr. Dana then discusses the necessity of 
taking the postmasters out of politics, reach¬ 
ing the conclusion that the recent order of the 
President, supplemented by the Lodge bill, 
will accomplish the object.] 


SUPERANNUATION IN THE CIVIL 
SERVICE. 

William Dudley Foulke. 

John Wanamaker, late postmaster-general, 
of happy memory, once caused a circular let¬ 
ter to be written to a number of civil serv¬ 
ice reformers throughout the country, asking 
why both parties should not discard their in 
sincere professions for the law and have the 
patriotism to go back to the spoil system. 

The devil himself can sometimes put an ap¬ 
posite question and this letter inquired what 
answer reformers made to the objections that 
a civil pension list was the logical result 
of their system, and that the efficiency of 
the departments would be seriously inter¬ 
fered with in ten or fifteen years by the old 
age of clerks who could not be removed. It 
was easy to answer that these clerks ought to 
be dismissed when they ceased to be efficient. 
It was easy to say that when they accepted 
employment they knew that no pension await¬ 


ed them and that it was their duty to save in 
the days of their prosperity enough to support 
them in the infirmities of age. It is still true 
that permanency in office-holding, which the 
merit system encourages, makes even discre¬ 
tionary removals more difficult, and as men 
everywhere outlive their usefulness, this so- 
called tenure during good behavior does some¬ 
times fasten ‘‘barnacles” upon the service. I 
use the epithet of another high authority in 
the camp of our enemies, the late Mr. Porter, 
who conducted with such impartial and dis¬ 
interested fidelity the taking of the last cen¬ 
sus. 

The competitive plan has indeed removed 
one great temptation. Men are not dismissed 
for the mere purpose of appointing to the va¬ 
cant place a personal or partisan follower. But 
there are other temptations to retain the inef¬ 
ficient and some of these temptation spring 
from the best feelings of our nature. Men in 
prosperity do not always save up their earn¬ 
ings for the hour of need and the man who 
has served faithfully for twenty years may 
find himself when no longer able to perform 
his duties in a position where dismissal would 
make him an outcast and a pauper. We may 
say that the chief of the departmemt or bu¬ 
reau ought not to consider this; that his duty 
is wholly to the state; that he must keep the 
best men only, and that if a clerk through 
the weight of years or infirmities becomes 
inefficient, he must be discharged. We may 
preach this sort of morality till doomsday, but 
no man with a heart will do it under the 
present system. The government service will 
continue to be a refuge for the helpless where 
these have not forfeited their rights by any 
willful act of their own. Many of tnose who 
are aged and incompetent, but who can point 
to a record of past usefulness, will stay in place 
and besides drawing pay for work W'hich is not 
performed, they will injure the service in other 
ways. It was the old practitioner who most 
strenuously resisted the code. It is the old 
physician who is most reluctant to adopt the 
new methods recently revealed by science for 
the cure of disease and it is the old official 
who is often the greatest obstacle to renova¬ 
tion and reform in the public service. This 
proposition is too plain for argument. Fur¬ 
thermore, it is true that many a man, by mere 
length of service, comes to believe that he has 
an indefeasible right to his office. He becomes 
stubborn and opinionated. He is harder to 
manage than a new man. Even the judges of 
our federal courts sometimes become arbitrary 
and disagreeable largely on account of the life 
tenure upon which they hold their places. A 
certain insecurity in office is a great stimulus 
to urbanity. And politeness is an important 
virtue in public servants, especially in those 
with whom the people are brought into daily 
contact. [ M r. Foulke then discusses the feasi¬ 
bility of periodical examinations to be fol¬ 
lowed by promotions or reductions in accord¬ 
ance with the results.] 

The extract from Mr. Jonathan A. Lane’s 
paper will appear next month. 

















282 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


THE REIGN AND OVERTHROW OF 
AN OFFICE-HOLDING OLI¬ 
GARCHY. 

Charles J. Bonaparte. 

The Pendleton bill was reported to the sen 
ate on December 12, 1881, just fourteen years 
ago. In the debate which followed, Senator 
Brown, of Georgia, expressed grave appre¬ 
hensions regarding the effects of its enact¬ 
ment on our free institutions. His words 
were: 

“I say it is not compatible with our very form of 
government. It is one step in the direction of the 
establishment of an aristocracy in this country, 
the establishment of another privileged class. • • • 
It builds up a powerful class supported out of the 
treasury of the United States, out of the taxes of 
the people, and places in their hands the power, if 
they choose to exercise it—and there is a great deal of 
human nature in man, so that they probably would 
exercise it—the power to do much to control the 
future rulers and destinies of the government. 

“I am not very fresh from my reading of Roman 
history; but as I recollect it, there was a period in 
the history of that government when it became 
necessary to establish the praetorian guard to pro¬ 
tect the ruler against the populace. It would nat¬ 
urally enough have been claimed that that guard 
would take no part in the polities of Rome, and 
yet in the workings of time that praetorian guard 
became the master of Rome, and assumed control 
of the government. As they protected the sov¬ 
ereign, they dictated who should be the sovereign, 
and for a large enough amount of money they 
would displace one sovereign to make room for an¬ 
other. How do we know that we may not build up 
a similar class here, when we build up a life-time 
aristocracy in office, or when we establish a life¬ 
time tenure of office? It is contrary to the very 
genius and spirit of our government.” 

The fears thus expressed by this eminent 
statesman had haunted many others of our 
public men from the time when legislation 
looking towards civil service reform was first 
suggested by Mr. Jenckes, the “old war horse,” 
and “old wheel horses” who flourished in his 
day snorted suspicious defiance at a measure 
destined, in the language of one of the best 
known at that time of their number, “ to 
create a pampered aristocracy.” It is not my 
purpose to discuss how far these patriotic fore¬ 
bodings have been justified by the event; the 
dangers to onr liberty lurking in the insid¬ 
ious proposals of Jenckes and Pendleton, 
have had every opportunity to beeome visible 
since the senator from Georgia depicted them 
in prophecy. In one of the Ingoldsby leg¬ 
ends, the hero remarks: “I did not see my lit¬ 
tle friend, because he was not there.” Such 
blindness as we may exhibit to these perils 
admits, perhaps, of the same explanation. I 
have lived, however, for some twenty or twen¬ 
ty-five years under a government marked by 
not a few of the characteristics which these 
sages saw in vision defacing that of our na¬ 
tion. In Baltimore we have had a powerful 
class supported out of the taxes of the people 
holding “in their hands the power, if they 
choose to exercise it” (and they most undeni¬ 
ably did so choose) “ to do much to control the 
future rulers and destinies” of the city and 
state. We have had an organization by no 
means unlike a “praetorian guard” which 


“protected the sovereign,” at least the sover¬ 
eign de facto, "Irom the populace” when this 
“populace” endangered his safety or continued 
rule at the polls, and it “protected” him, on 
the whole, very effectually. Moreover, this 
“guard,” had occasion offered, would have 
readily “dictated who should be the sovereign,” 
and, “for a large enough sum of money, dis¬ 
placed one sovereign for another;” indeed, it 
actually did these things whenever, and in so 
far as it had the opportunity. 

In Baltimore that “first step towards the es¬ 
tablishment of a privileged class,” which Sen¬ 
ator Brown saw in the Pendleton bill, and a 
good many succeeding steps as well, had been 
taken a number of years before that bill was 
heard of, or its author heard of as a civil serv¬ 
ice reformer; it is, perhaps, doubtful whether 
the late rulers of my native city could appro¬ 
priately be called “pampered,” for the ad¬ 
jective at least suggests indolence, and to 
charge them with this fault would be certainly 
unjust; nevertheless, they no less certainly 
constituted a “privileged class” in every sense 
of the term—a class of men in many respects 
legibus soluti, privileged to do wrong (or what 
would be wrong for others) with impunity 
and even with profit, superior themselves to 
the laws as well as able to make the laws for 
those of inferior station. In my trespass on 
your attention this afternoon I shall depict a 
few features of their rule, and describe briefly 
some of the causes and incidents of their down¬ 
fall. * • • » 

Now the government which has lately fallen 
in Baltimore was distinctly monarchical, at 
least in its tendencies. Under it power was 
not always, indeed it was never, quite concen¬ 
trated in the hands of one man, but our rulers 
were never truly equal inter sese; their mutual 
relations rather resembled those of the several 
August! and Caesars of the later Roman em¬ 
pire—they always tended towards, and within 
the past eight years had well-nigh definitely 
settled into, the dominion of a single ruler 
surrounded by a group of more or less power¬ 
ful, sometimes more or less mutinous, but al¬ 
ways distinctly subordinate, lieutenants. There 
were, however, already indications that in this 
case, as in those of all other privileged classes 
known to history, there would have been in 
time developed a theory of hereditary right to 
public office, as the nobility of the Roman re¬ 
public was gradually formed of descendants 
of office-holders, claiming by custom a monop¬ 
oly of all posts of trust and honor. Thus, in 
the seventeenth ward of the city, there bore 
sway a magnate whose merits as a “praeto¬ 
rian” had been proven by an almost incredible 
number of assaults, arrests and indictments 
for crimes of violence, whilst his influence 
was no less clearly illustrated by his prompt 
acquittals and the steadiness with which, 
throughout his eventful career, he retained 
the apparently modest, but really important, 
position of superintendent of street-cleaning 
for his district. However useful as a drill 
master for recruits, advancing years and fre¬ 
quent wounds had, in a measure, impaired 


his personal prowess, but during the past year 
public attention has been called to three wor¬ 
thy sons, displaying at once their father’s de 
cided inclination toward public employment 
and his characteristic methods of deserving 
this. They “did good work” at the last elec¬ 
tion; unfortunately their services can hardly 
receive the recognition they expected, al¬ 
though it is not impossible that another may 
await them. * » * * 

To understand the system of government 
which has existed for nearly a generation in 
Baltimore, we may glance at three depart¬ 
ments only of the city’s public service, those 
headed in the book respectively, “City Com¬ 
missioner’s Office,” “General Superintendent 
of Lamps,” and “Superintendent of Streets 
and District Superintendents.” These were 
composed as follows: 


CITY COMMISSIONER’S OFFICE. 


One city commissioner. 

Three assistant city commissioners. 

One bridge engineer. 

One chief clerk. 

One assistant clerk. 

Five engineers, each. 

One clerk. 

Five engineers. 

Eighteen foremen of gangs. 

One sand inspector... 

Six draughtsmen, each. 

One clerk. . 

Eight rodsmen, each. 

Three rodsmen, each. 

One keeper Belair lot. 

Twelve watchmen, each. 

Two superintendents of annex, each. 

One superintendent of Light Street Bridge.. 
Six assistants at Light Street Bridge, each... 
Fourteen superintendents of cobblestone 

gangs. 

One paymaster. 

One assistant paymaster. 

Fifteen tally clerks, each. 

Twelve carpenters, each. 

Eighteen assistant foremen of gangs, each.. 
Two thousand laborers, and other minor po¬ 
sitions, when working full force, per week 


$4,000 

2,000 

2.400 
1,500 
1,200 
1,500 
1,200 
1,200 
1,200 
1,080 

900 

1,100 

900 

700 

800 

720 

1,000 

1,200 

600 

600 

1.400 
900 
750 
900 
600 

10 


GENERAL SUPERINTENDENT OF LAMPS. 


One general superintendent. $2,000 

One clerk. 1,000 

Two inspectors of electric lights, each. 900 

Two superintendents of repairs, each. 900 

Five general utility men, each. 520 

Five district superintendents for city, each.. 600 

Two district superintendents for annex, each 936 
Twenty-one lamplighters, western district, 

each.-.. 416 

Twenty-two lamplighters, northwestern dis¬ 
trict, each.... ■ 416 

Twenty-two lamplighters, southern district, 

each. 416 

Twenty-two lamplighters, northeastern dis¬ 
trict, each. 416 

Twenty-four lamplighters, eastern district, 

each. 416 

Thirty-four lamplighters, annex, each. 416 


SUPERINTENDENT OF STREETS AND DISTRICT SUPER¬ 
INTENDENTS. 


One general superintendent. $2,000 

One clerk. 1,000 

Seven district superintendents, each.: 1,000 

Four tally clerks at dumps, each. 600 

One foreman of street cleaning wagons, each 700 
Five drivers of street cleaning wagons, each. 560 

Twenty-seven drivers of street and garbage 

carts, first district, each. 935 

Thirty-seven drivers of street and garbage 

carts, second district, each. 935 

Twenty-seven drivers of street and garbage 

carts, third district, each. 935 

Thirty-seven drivers of street and garbage 

carts, fourth district, each. 935 

Thirty-six drivers of street and garbage carts, 

fifth district, each. 936 

Thirty-eight drivers of street and garbage 

carts, sixth district, each. 935 

Nineteen drivers of street and garbage carts, 

seventh district, each. 935 


In these three departments alone there were 
employed, when that of the city commissioner 
was “working full force,” and it is needless to 
say that such was always the case when elec- 



























































THE CIVIL' SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


283 


tions were held, and might be, if needful, at 
time of primaries, 2,540 men; 95 per cent, of 
these discharged functions for which any or¬ 
dinary laborer was qualified; all, except 
perhaps a dozen of those highest in rank, 
received a compensation greatly in excess 
of thai paid for similar services by private 
employers; and all of them, without excep¬ 
tion, were selected for reasons of political 
expedience or personal favoritism. ♦ » » 

I have said thus much of the special elec¬ 
tion of last March because, although other¬ 
wise of comparatively little importance, it 
serves to illustrate with special clearness one 
of the principal causes of the ring’s long 
lease of power in Maryland; this is simply 
that, through its absolute control of the state 
and municipal patronage, it was able to main¬ 
tain in Baltimore, at the people’s cost, a small 
standing army of experts in election frauds 
and professional ruffians, unreservedly subject 
to its orders, and prepared to furnish any rea¬ 
sonable majority which could be required for 
its safety under normal conditions; whilst it 
could likewise assure them almost certain im¬ 
munity from punishment for their crimes 
committed in its interest. But this alone 
would not have availed it much, even if we 
suppose the number of fraudulant votes cast 
at the special election to have been (as it very 
possibly may have been) twice as great as the 
reform league’s committee reported, still, at 
least four-fifths of those received by the ring’s 
candidate must have been legal votes, and 
with all its facilities for successful fraud, its 
reign would have been short-lived, but for its 
unqualified and, of late years, undisputed do¬ 
minion within the democratic party. Indeed, 
it fell at last, not because it either couldn’t or 
wouldn’t cheat, but because, although it 
would, it couldn’t cheat enough to overcome 
the widespread revolt within that party 
against its dominion. A few words then as to 
the instrumentalities which rendered that 
domination permanent and irresistible. 

The Venetian oligarchy maintained its rule 
through a council of ten, that of Baltimore may 
have been said to reign through one of nine, 
bearing the modest and outwardly innocent 
title of city members of the democratic state 
central committee. There was one marked 
difference, however, between the bodies: in 
Venice the doge was a figurehead and not a 
member of the council; in Baltimore his ana¬ 
logue, the reigning boss, was a member of the 
council, and very decidedly not a figurehead. 

THE STATE OF CIVIL SERVICE RE¬ 
FORM IN THE SOUTH. 

Herman Jusli. 

When the letter of your worthy, s nd zealous 
secretary was received, asking me to give “the 
status of civil service reform sentiment in the 
south,” my first impulse was to decline the 
task, for the field was not only vast, but 
seemed uninviting. When one of our local 
wags, some time ago, was asked for his opinion 
of the financial condition of the people of a 
certain section of the south, he replied: “Oue- 


half of the people are busted and the other 
half are insolvent.” I am an ardent believer 
in the merit system, and yet I, like many 
others, often grow impatient at the apathy 
and indifference of our people regarding this 
vital issue, and I was almost tempted, in a fit 
of momentary despondency, to answer Mr. Mc- 
Aneny’scourteous invitation, after the laconic 
style of my witty friend, with the simple state¬ 
ment that one half of our people are opposed 
to civil service reform and the other half are 
not for it. But this would be, I am happy to 
say on reflection, far from the truth. And 
yet, though the gains to the cause of civil serv¬ 
ice reform can not be easily specified, I feel 
certain that, whatever the casual observer 
may say to tbe contrary—whatever we may 
think in times of despondency—public opinion 
in the south is opposed to the spoils system. 
Strict party men and party leaderswill stoutly 
deny this, but it is nevertheless true; and since 
political parties are subject to that superior 
power, the will of the people, the politicians 
must ultimately yield. We are, as yet, badly 
organized,our demands are not clearly stated 
and we have taken hold of the issue in a way 
so half-hearted, that the friends of the “spoils 
system” continue very bold, even presump¬ 
tuous. As was so well said by the lamented 
George William Curtis,“ party machines no 
more favor civil service reform than kings 
favor the restriction of the royal prerogative.” 
Party leaders will not admit the growth of 
the civil service reform sentiment, because 
they try not to see it. They wish to ignore its 
growing power, because to admit it is to give 
it a tremendous sweep; but we must keep up 
the fight at every point and make everybody 
see that ultimate triumph is sure. ♦ » * 

The impression widely prevalent ^in the south 
south that civil service reform is designed to 
favor the highly educated and the wealthy 
is erroneous, and the encouragement to this 
belief comes entirely from spoilsmen. It is 
also not true that under its operations the 
south fares unequally with other sections. 
Through the operation of the reform law em¬ 
ployment in the civil service was thrown 
open to the people of the south for the first 
tim since the breaking out of the war of the 
rebellion. Poor men and men of limited edu¬ 
cation, but ambitious and resolved to learn, 
have risen to distinction in our civil service. 
It is well known that during Harrison’s ad¬ 
ministration Commissioner Roosevelt made it 
a special object to encourage young southern¬ 
ers to go into the examinations and to see, 
when appointments were made, the full quota 
of each southern state was allowed. It became 
something of a novelty for southern congress¬ 
men to meet young constituents on the streets 
of Washington and to learn that they were there 
under a republican administration. Nothing 
of this sort had been known for a generation. 
Thirteen southern states, including Maryland 
and Kentucky, are under the operation of the 
reform law, entitled to thirty per cent, of the 
offices in the civil service. Of the eleven civil 
service commissioners appointed up to Janu¬ 


ary 1, 1895, four were southern men, viz., 
William L. Trenholm, and Hugh S. Thomp¬ 
son, of South Carolina; George D. Johnson, of 
Louisiana, and John R. Proctor, of Kentucky. 
What more had we a right to ask? What 
fairer treatment could we expect? It should 
also be borne in mind that an appointment 
now in the civil service means an opportunity 
for an official career. This is impossible un¬ 
der the spoilssystem. As a plain business prop¬ 
osition, for government is only another name 
for business, what could be better for both the 
citizen than the honest, capable office-holder? 

The southern press is fast falling into line, 
and it is now definitely known that at least 
twenty-five daily papers, over one hundred 
weekly papers, and eight monthly publica¬ 
tions, are entirely friendly to the merit sys¬ 
tem, and are advocating its cause with a zeal 
and intelligence. In fact few southern news¬ 
papers now openly and enthusiastically sup¬ 
port the “spoil system,” a sure indication of 
the tendency of public opinion on that sub¬ 
ject, and as the advocates of the merit system, 
steadily increasing in numbers, are each year 
becoming more active and more aggressive, 
they must ultimately be the balance of power 
in determining the fate of candidates and of 
parties. 

As a southern man, both by the accident of 
birth and as the result of my deliberate choice, 
proud of the past of my beloved southland 
and confident of her future glory, I declare it 
to be my honest conviction, that the southern 
people are tired of the iniquities of a vicious 
public policy, which has always been con¬ 
demned by her wisest statesmen, who have 
ever taught that the greed of the spoilsman, 
the corrupter of elections, is the greatest dan¬ 
ger threatening the perpetuity of our govern¬ 
ment. Their words of warning were once 
heeded, and they are now again being driven 
home with telling force to the southern heart 
and mind, and he who seeks shall find unmis¬ 
takable evidences of an awakening patriot¬ 
ism, of a higher sense of public duty and of 
a healthier political life and spirit abroad in 
the land. 

CIVIL SERVICE REFORM IN ITS 
BEARINGS UPON THE INTER¬ 
ESTS OF WORKINGMEN. 

Herbert Welsh. 

When Mazzini, the great Italian patriot, ad¬ 
dressed the workingmen of his country in 1844 
he chose as the title of his essay “The Duties 
of Man,” in sharp antithesis to the great cry 
which heralded the French revolution—“The 
Rights of Man.” No reformer certainly was 
more sensitive to the rights of man, in the rec¬ 
ognition of which liberty was cradled, but 
with true religious intuition he perceived that 
rights were an empty possession even to the 
freest of us, unless the heart that rejoiced in 
them was alive to the obligations they con¬ 
ferred; unless the mind which discerned and 
demanded them, humbly recognized them as 
the mother of duties. Mazzini pointed out to 

















284 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


his fellow countrymen now barren to the 
world had been possession of rights gained 
by the revolution, where the advance was 
followed by no recognition of duties to one’s 
self and one’s fellows- The recognition 
of individual rights must be followed by 
a universal obligation. He appealed to his 
hearers with a breadth and simplicity 
which must have at once erased the line 
which separates the workingman from mao, 
and reached the hearts of his hearers, for 
the heart leaps artificial boundaries. “I 
intend to speak to you according to the dic¬ 
tates of my heart,” he said, “of the holiest 
things we know—of God, of humanity, of the 
fatherland, and the family.” And so in speak¬ 
ing to-day out through this audience to those 
workingmen whom I may be able to reach 
of the appeal which civil service reform 
should make to them, I do it with these four 
great human relationships which Mazzini 
enumerates, firm in my mind—God, humanity, 
the fatherland and family—and not so much 
to workingmen as men of a separate and dis¬ 
tinct class do I speak as to them as members of 
the great human family. But thisnobler point 
of view will not exclude the consideration of 
those especial points in which civil service re¬ 
form is of peculiar benefit to those whom we 
call wage-earners. 

The true American workingman, and the 
true American of whatever trade or work in 
life he be, are one in this: that both desire the 
full benefits of American institutions; both de¬ 
sire to see the government of these United 
States stand for liberty, for equal laws, under 
which men may not be tempted to change 
their conception of God, as a just and loving 
father, of humanity as the great family of 
mankind throughout whose extent some day 
may be realized the idea of universal broth¬ 
erhood; and under which the family may be 
made a holy and true relationship, the foun¬ 
tain of domestic virtue, the support of the 
state, which, I for one, believe that it was or¬ 
dained to be. We are one—workingman and 
other man—in desiring that America shall be 
a nation in which these ideas which appeal to 
all hearts shall be nurtured and have sway. 
I take it that the true American workingman 
will be quite content if the government un¬ 
der which we live be honest and true; if it 
will truly seek those great principles of lib¬ 
erty and justice to rich and poor alike, to ob¬ 
tain which its great founders gave their life, 
and to preserve its entirety and integrity, to 
prevent a rupture that would have been fatal 
to tbe realization of its ideals, its saviors or 
thirty years back shed their patriotic blood. 

If I mistake not, at the bottom of indus¬ 
trial discontent, whose mutterings and moan- 
ings create at times vague uneasiness and con¬ 
cern in the business of the country, which 
flashes out into revolt, showing fierce tooth 
and claw, as at Homestead or in Chicago, is 
the feeling, reasonable or unreasonable, that 
there exists to-day some dangerous dislocation 
between a real Christianity and American 
political ideals on the one hand, and practical. 


existing American Christianity and existing 
American politics on the other. A more or 
less vague idea exists in the minds of Ameri¬ 
can workingmen that capital and wealth have 
influence with the political machinery of the 
country, with legislatures and executives, that 
they do not possess; that monopolies and 
great corporations can, by corrupt and dis¬ 
honest methods, so control the conditions of 
wealth-getting that enormous and unjust 
profits accrue to them out of all proportion 
to their merits, with total disregard to the 
rights of those who are dependent upon their 
pleasure for daily bread. The workingman feels 
that more and more is the possibility increas¬ 
ing for capital to organize itself into trusts and 
monopolies by which the necessaries and the 
luxuries of life may be put at a price which 
will bring enormous wealth to the benefi¬ 
ciaries of the monoply, and a correspondingly 
heavy burden upon the people. Believing 
this, is it to be wondred at that the American 
workingmen organize in self-defense; that he 
forms trades-unions and labor organizations 
of various kinds for operations oflTensive and 
defensive, against those whom he believes to 
be hostile or indifferent to his liberties, his 
rights, his opportunities? Or, is it marvelous 
that the method by which he defends himself 
should often lack in wisdom, that it should be 
sometimes violent or even criminal, therein be¬ 
ing akin to the methods which have been more 
than once adopted by his opponents? Truly 
the workingman would be much less than hu¬ 
man if he never shared in human folly. * * * 
But civil service reform has another appli¬ 
cation which is only now beginning to be seri¬ 
ously considered. It is to the administration 
of our great American cities in which for vari¬ 
ous causes it is not necessary now to discuss, 
vast populations are centering; where wealth, 
intelligence, enterprise, commerce and manu¬ 
factures, the homes of the rich and the poor 
are focused. Here every question affecting 
human life and happiness—questions of sani¬ 
tation, of sewerage, of water supply, of trans¬ 
portation, of public parks and libraries, of 
taxation, of the care of the poor—assume ac¬ 
centuated importance. To deal intelligently, 
honestly and economically with these ques¬ 
tions requires intelligence, honesty and expe¬ 
rience on the part of the public men, the 
mayors and the heads of departments to whom 
they are committed. Every citizen’s interest, 
his health and happiness and of those near 
and dear to him are bound up in the right 
handling of those matters, but above all others 
will the workingman, the wage-earner, the 
man of slender means, of hand-to-mouth exist¬ 
ence, to be sensitive to the excellence or folly 
of the government of the great city in which he 
lives. A few cents difference in his car fare 
may be sufficient to unbalance his small ac¬ 
count at the end of the year. A very small 
rise in the rate of taxation, due to municipal 
extravagance or dishonesty, will be keenly felt 
by him, while public advantages such as free 
libraries, public parks, and the like, to the 
poor man mean much; while the man of am- 


; pie means is virtually independent of them. 

The sanitary conditions of the city, of 
■ which the rich man is measurably independ- 
! ent, by his ability to go elsewhere during the 
I summer, or to obtain at all times a protection 
, which is impossible to the poor man, to the 
latter are matters of vital import. But how 
is the city to be well governed if the boss and 
the machine control it, whose interests are sel¬ 
fish interests, who, by an invariable law of their 
being, will be as selfish and dishonest in their 
government of the city as the relative indiffer¬ 
ence and partisanship of its citizens will per¬ 
mit. How can the city be well governed, I 
ask intelligent workingmen, whose interest in 
this question'are the interest of us all, only 
double, trebly accentuated, if the 10,000 or 
15,000 or 20,000 offices of the city are to be 
filled by boss and machine, not on proved 
merit, and held not for faithful performances 
of duty, but as partisan rewards of the un¬ 
worthy, and so as to compel partisan service. 
How, I ask sensible working men, can any in¬ 
telligent and satisfactory city government be 
conducted on these corrupt lines? And for 
the folly of all this, for the pickings and steal¬ 
ings, the losses and blunders, for the costly, 
unfulfilled contracts, the man who pays most 
is the workingman. These were the principles 
which gave us the Tweed ring, in New York, 
with its $15,000,000 to $17,000,000 direct theft, 
its debauched judi iary, its carnival of spoils. 
It was the spoils system where there should 
have been civil service reform, which made 
Tweed and his fellow conspirators possible. 
This truth he himself confessed before he died 
in prison, that unless some way were found to 
remove the control of the patronage of a great 
city from the grasp of politicians there would 
be recurring scandals, such as his. 

Civil service reform is the narrow pass 
where the defenders of good government may 
mass their feeble strength so that it shall count 
in value out of all proportion to their num¬ 
bers. We must make this reform incur strug¬ 
gle for good city government the Thermopylae 
of the present crisis. 

Can not the workingmen of America see 
how for every good and honorable purpose 
which they have in view, their influence 
should be concentrated to establish this re¬ 
form in all its practical details in the admin¬ 
istrations of our great cities, in whose slums, 
in whose saloons, in whose brothels, in all those 
foes to family life and welfare, the roots of 
corrupt politics find their nourishment? Let 
them insist upon the passage of a good civil 
service law in every state legislature, if one 
does not already exist. Let them apply it to 
every city of the state, that every smallest 
office may be removed from the curse of boss 
patronage, and so that it shall be filled by 
suitable test. See that a state civil service 
commission exists in every state to superin¬ 
tend the practical application of the law; a 
commission with such men upon it as Theo¬ 
dore Roosevelt, and Col. Proctor, and Major 
Harlow have proved themselves to be on the 
federal commission; honest, experienced, cour¬ 
ageous men, who will see that under that law 
the humblest, least protected applicant gets 
his rights and a fair chance to show what is 
in him. See that every city of your state has 
the same great American principle of justice, 
and fair-play, as opposed to privilege applied 
to its labor service, just as to-day is in suc¬ 
cessful operation in the city of Boston, in 
Cambridge, and in New Bedford. The same 
labor system has won the approval of naval 
officers of high rank in the federal service. 

















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


VoL. II, No. 35. INDIANAPOLIS, JANUARY, 1896. terms : ^ 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

IndianapolU, Ind. 


The President’s order relating to fourth- 
class post-offices is beginning to be worked 
out. Twenty offices near Baltimore have 
been abolished, and in their stead stations 
of the Baltimore office have been estab 
fished, and the whole territory now be¬ 
comes a part of the latter office. The 
wholesome and salutary effect of this local 
application of this great reform scheme is 
apparent at a glance. Twenty petty post¬ 
masters cease to be watch-dogs of con¬ 
gressmen; they cease to be pestiferous 
centers of local politics; they spend their 
days in sober and industrious work under 
strict supervision without any regard to 
politics; twenty vexatious lines of corre¬ 
spondence with the department at Wash¬ 
ington are broken off, and the advantages 
of free delivery and infinitely improved 
service are extended to the people. There 
is around Indianapolis a ring of similar 
localities with ludicrously inefficient serv¬ 
ice, which it is to be hoped will not long 
escape the attention of the postmaster- 
general. 

The sounds from Maryland are strange¬ 
ly different from those which came the 
many years when Gorman held the state 
and every office and public place in it in 
the hollow of his hand. The new gover¬ 
nor, Llojd Lowndes, says there shall be no 
clean sweep. Further, “ We should heed 
the demand for civil service reform, and 
extend wherever practical in this state and 
in its principal cities the merit-system of 
appointments to office.” He further says, 
with reference to the charge that he is 
backing up a particular man for senator, 
“ I would not use the patronage of this 
office to advance my own personal ambi¬ 
tion or those of any other man in the 
state.” 


The Chicago Tribune says that the great 
reform of 1895, for that city, was the civil 
' service act. It then adds: “Whenever a 
vacancy occurs now it is filled by a man 
I appointed on his merits. The occupa¬ 
tion of the spoils huckster is gone. There 
is not a place on the pay-rolls which he 
' can dispose of. As compared with this 
■ time last year, the condition of the city is 
enviable.” 

i The full benefits of the law will not ap¬ 


pear at once, nor for a year or two. The 
attempts to break it down in the courts 
and the attempts of officers in charge of 
it, to cheat and trick it, have all to be 
fought down. This will have to be done, 
and confidence in absolute fair-play in 
competition for places, will have to be es¬ 
tablished among all parties, colors and 
sects, before the full advantages of the sys¬ 
tem will come into play. But the Tribune's 
remark shows the bent of public opinion. 
It is only in Indianapolis that city officials 
are petty and impudent enough to at¬ 
tempt to turn back the wheels of progress 
by repealing competitive rules and going 
back to Tammany methods. 


The combination between Platt and the 
venerable Governor Morton is evidently 
part of a plan of Platt, Quay and Clark¬ 
son to control the next presidential nomi¬ 
nation of their party. To be of any use, 
Platt must own the delegates from New 
York, and Governor Morton does not see 
what the whole country sees and laughs 
at, that Platt is cajoling him into throwing 
down the bars to spoil, by an impossible 
promise of the nomination. There is not 
the slightest danger of Morton, but if the 
republican party will rise to the occasion 
and defeat Quay and Platt and Clarkson, 
so that they are left high and dry, and so 
that they have no weight whatever in the 
choice of a candidate, it will accomplish a 
great work. 


Governor Morton has forced Mr. Mc- 
Kinstry out of his place of state civil serv¬ 
ice commissioner of New York and has 
nominated for the vacancy a man named 
George P. Lord. McKinstry was entirely 
competent and efficient and his influence 
was against political interference with the 
public service. The new man. Lord, is a 
chronic office seeker, a machine politician, 
and years ago voted for some of Tweed’s 
bills. He is simply a Platt man educated 
and fitted to be an efficient Platt tool. 
There will now be upon the commission 
two Platt men and Col. Burt. The indica¬ 
tions all point to a deal between Governor 
Morton and Platt by which Platt is to ob¬ 
tain control of the commission. This is all 
the more important because the state this 
year is to spend four millions upon the 
canals. The long battles which have been 
carried on throughout the country with 
tricky officers who had charge of the fed¬ 
eral civil service law have shown too well 
how such a law may be brought to nothing 


by such officers. That Governor Morton 
should make this and other similar ap¬ 
pointments recently made tends further 
to show what the Chronicle has always 
believed of him, that he is a highly respect¬ 
able rich man who makes now and then 
a show of reform tendencies but whom the 
bosses like to have in office because they 
know that under him they can come to 
their own. One who goes among ma¬ 
chine politicians in his state will find 
them openly avowing their esteem for him 
because he is a “sinews-of-war-man.” Hap¬ 
pily the matter is not to go in silence. The 
New York Tribune and other papers, the 
city club, and various reform organiza¬ 
tions are making it lively for the governor. 


The reformers within the party who 
are always crying that the remedy for 
slum politics is for good citizens to go to 
the primaries, have just had another prac¬ 
tical lesson in the city of New York. 
There never was a harder struggle made 
by the better element in any community 
to defeat its bad neighbors than was made 
in New York to defeat the expressman Tom 
Platt and his followers, and there never was 
a more signal failure. To vote in the prima¬ 
ries it is necessary to be enrolled before¬ 
hand, and Platt’s men ran the enrollment 
up to 70,000, in the meantime keeping the 
places of enrollment in the dark as long as 
possible. That the enrollment was fraud¬ 
ulent, and contained a large contingent of 
Tammany men there seems no reason to 
doubt. Not one-third of the number en¬ 
rolled appeared at the primaries. How 
Platt’s men managed the primaries is illus¬ 
trated in the district of which ex-Postraas- 
terVanCott is Platt’s sub-boss. In that 
district Alfred R. Conkling was an anti- 
Platt candidate, and he tells the following 
interesting story: 

“I am ashamed of the political pirates who com¬ 
pose the machine of the republican party In this 
city. I have long fought Tammany methods, and 
now I must fight for honest elections within the 
republican party. I do not Intend to leave the party 
in order to purify it, but will keep up a fight on the 
Inside. It Is necessary to strike at the root of the 
evil, the district leaders. I live in the district pre¬ 
sided over by Cornelius Van Cott, and this Is how 
he managed the primaries. In my election district 
voters were notified at the enrollment that they 
must come to No. 36 Clinton Place to vote at the pri¬ 
mary. The polling place was changed, and I 
learned of the change at five o’clock yesterday 
afternoon, I leftthe dinner-table, sent messengers to 
my friends to inform them of the change, and man¬ 
aged to get enough together to elect me by one 
vote. Men who were not legally enrolled in my 
district were afraid to vote last night. I had four- 
teen^^names} marked for challenge, and not one of 



















28G 


THE CIVIL SEIlVrCE CHRONICLE 




them appeared. If they had voted, the election 
district would have three delepates Instead of two. 
I had policemen in three election districts, ready to 
make arrests. If Mr. Van Cott is the leader next 
year, 1 shall see that policemen are placed in every 
election district. At the last election the fifth 
a8seml)ly district ftave the republican state ticket a 
majority of eighteen. 1 hope that those eighteen 
will not leave the party iu disgust with the ma¬ 
chine, and turn the district over to the democrats.” 

The comment of the New York Tribune 
also adds piquancy to the situation: 

"Tlio proceedings were part and parcel of the 
fraudulent and bogus enrollment. In many of the 
l,39g election districts, wliere no headquarters 
were opened and no voting was done, delegates 
sworn to perpetuate the I’latt-haiiterbach regime 
will be returned all the same, and will take part 
in the assembly district convention.” 

Wicked Gibbs, another of Platt’s bosses, 
touches ofl the situation as a “practical” 
politician: 

“Both sides are to blame in this matter. The 
Brookfielders as well as our people swelled the 
roils beyond reasonable proportions, and I am sur¬ 
prised that practical politicians should be guilty of 
such amateurish tricks. 1 am disgusted with them. 
As long as a leader controls a district, what is the 
difference whether lie does it with ;t0 or ,300 dele¬ 
gates? Aud, besides, large bodies of delegates are 
unwieldy aud liable to cause trouble.” 

The result of all this is that Platt is more 
of a boss than ever, and it seems that he 
will go to the republican national conven¬ 
tion next year able to “throw” the vote of 
the entire state of New York in such a 
manner as will best benefit not the repub¬ 
lican party but Platt the expressman. 


The career of Platt in New York con¬ 
tinues to be an interesting study. We 
have noted the struggle which good 
citizens of his party made in the recent 
primaries iu that city, and how Platt 
gained a complete victory. The good citi¬ 
zens were not satisfied and began an in¬ 
vestigation to find out how it was done, 
which has resulted in the arrest of seven 
Platt inspectors. At a meeting of the re¬ 
publican county committee of the county 
of New Y'ork, held January 16, a commit¬ 
tee attempted to read a report bearing 
upon the subject, but were prevented by 
Plattism. For the reason that the report 
is signed by a large number of men of 
national reputation, we give it in full. 
It should make a profound impression 
everywhere, because of its proof that 
even under our boasted free government, 
one man may become, except in the mat¬ 
ter of life and death, a dictator : 

To the Hepiihlh’an Counti/ Commiltef (uiil the lirjmb- 
lica» Parti/ iu the Citij of Xi w York: 

The undersigned committee of the republicans 
have been engaged for some time in an investiga¬ 
tion of the alleged frauds in the republican enroll¬ 
ment in this city and iu the recent primaries. 
After due consideration, and mindful of thegravlty 
of the situation iu view of the approaching national 
election, we deemed it essential to the welfare of 
the party that a thorough and impartial investiga¬ 
tion should be made by a committee consisting of 
Messrs, .lohn Sabine Smith. Paul D. Cravnth, Adal¬ 
bert II. Steele, Benjamin Oppeuheimer, and John 
S. Wise, who immediately undertook the task as¬ 


signed to them. The report, transmitting the 
statement of C. N. Jones, recently associate act¬ 
uary of the New York Life Insurance Company, 
whom they selected to conduct the investigation, 
is appended. We wish to emphasize our belief in 
the entire impartiality and sincerity of this inves¬ 
tigation. 

Notwithstanding the charges which have been 
fre(iuently made in the public press, we had no 
adequate conception of the magnitude and enorm¬ 
ity of the frauds and irregularities which have 
been perpetrated in connection with the republi¬ 
can enrollment and the recent primaries, until the 
Investigation of the enrollment in several of the 
assembly districts had been made and the results 
tabulated. 

In view of these results, there can be no escape 
from the conclusion that the.present enrollment Is 
rotten to a degree never before paralleled in the 
history of the party, aud that the primaries aud 
conventions in many assembly districts based 
upon it, by which delegates were elected to the 
county committee for 18%, are unworthy of serious 
consideration. 

An organization based upon such wholesale 
frauds can not command the confidence of the re¬ 
publican party, nor of the public. We, therefore, 
urge that the organization of the county committee 
for 18'.K) be not effected until reasonable time has 
been given to complete the investigation now in 
progress and to secure adequate relief. 

Primaries are the fountain-head of all representa¬ 
tive government, and the i)rimnrie8 necessarily 
spring from the enrollment. If the latter is fraudu¬ 
lent, the entire party structure is tainted, and un¬ 
worthy of confidence and respect. This is a subject 
in which every republican, whether his name be 
upon the rolls or not, is interested, for all look to 
the organization of the party to secure honest con¬ 
ventions and truly representative nominations. 

For the foregoing reasons, and In the Interest of 
the harmony and efliciency of the republican 
party, we earnestly request that no permanent or¬ 
ganization of the county committee he effected 
until the completion of this investigation. 


Joseph II. Choate, 
Samuel Tliomas, 

Anson G. McCook, 
Wager Swayne, 

H. G. Alexander, 

John C. O’Conor, 

Elias Goodman, 
Charles Stewart Smith, 
John K. Milholland, 
John Sabine Smith, 

E. W. Bloomingdale, 

S. V. K. Cruger, 


Cornelius N. Bliss, 
William Ifrookfleld, 
Benjamin Oppenheimer, 
Ellhu Root, 

Horace Porter, 

Isaac V. Brokaw, 

Edward Mitchell, 

John S. Wise, 

A. H. Steele, 

Joel B. Ehrhardt, 

Paul B. Cravath, 

John Proctor Clarke, 

Committee. 


The condition of things in New York 
will have to be dealt with by the national 
republican party. The favorite method of 
the Chronicle in fighting bossism is to 
defeat its candidates at the polls, and of 
this there is a long line of wholesome 
and gratifying examjdes. The situation 
in New York, however, is peculiar. Platt 
rides rough-shod over practically all of the 
respectable element of his party, led, as is 
shown by the protest printed elsewhere, 
by such republicans as Joseph H. Choate, 
Elihu Root and Cornelius N. Bliss. Submis¬ 
sion on their part can not be thought of; 
nor can they beat Platt at the primaries 
controlled by his patronage supported 
army. Seemingly they have no other 
course but to form a new organization on 
the ground that the Platt organization is 
not the republican organization, but, as the 
Netv York Tribune says, is a mere band of 


brazen banditti. This new organization 
should demand exclusive admission to the 
national convention, and let us see whether 
the republican party will put its neck un¬ 
der Platt’s heel. The discussion outside 
of the state can not be begun too soon. 


Mr. Roosevelt recently delivered an 
address in Philadelphia, and Mayor Swift, 
of Chicago, has lately spoken to the com¬ 
mercial club of thatcity. From both men 
we learn anew what respectable citizens 
do and will continue to do, so long as jiublic 
offices and places can be used as rewards 
to maintain the boss system, and thus 
force upon us councilmen and other offi¬ 
cers who can be bought and sold. Mr. 
Roosevelt said : 

"You would be astonished if I should tell you the 
names of men. standing high iu New York City, 
who came to me for some of the worst people that 
there were in that [the police] department, because 
It was a department in which money could accom¬ 
plish most anything; any man who had money, 
whether he was a law-abiding citizen or criminal, 
could buy protection and the services of the police 
if it was necessary for him to have them, and nat¬ 
urally he got efllclent services, for which he paid, 
and ho was not willing to receive merely the pro¬ 
tection (hat would be meted out to him exactly as 
to other citizens, rich or poor. He did not want the 
change which would deprive him of the advantage 
his money gave him in getting police protection.” 
Mayor Swift said: 

“Tho present mayor, within sixty days, has vetoed 
a half dozen ordinances, pa.ssed by your representa¬ 
tives, giving space in the streets to representative 
property owners, who came to the common council 
and asked for it. Who is it that comes into the 
common council aud asks for such privileges'? 
Who is it who are accused of offering bribes for 
such franchises'? It is just the same ones, the same 
prominent citizens that come into the same coun- 
cll’s chamber aud ask for the right to occupy space 
in your streets. 

“I tell you these questions come home. Talk 
about anarchy; talk about breeding the spirit of 
communism. What does it more than the repre¬ 
sentative citizens of Chicago; your high toned 
businessmen; your patriotic men? Your promi¬ 
nent citizens of Chicago are the men who knock at 
the doorof the council and ask for Illegal fran¬ 
chises. It is not tho common people. Who bribes 
the common council? Is it men in the common 
walks of life ? They are men iu your own walks of 
life, sitting hy your firesides at your clubs. Is it 
your men in the common walks of life that demand 
bribes aud who receive bribes at the hands of the 
legislative bodies or the common council ? No. It 
is your representative citizens, your capitalists 
your business men. When have they come to the 
front, either individually or collectively, and in¬ 
veighed against this manner of obtaining fran¬ 
chises '? When will they come to the front, individ¬ 
ually or collectively, and ask of the common coun. 
cll adequate remuneration for the city? Never, to 
my knowledge. 

"Who is responsible for the condition of affairs 
in the city of Chicago? Your representative busi¬ 
nessmen. If an assessor grows rich while in office, 
with whom does he divide? Not with the com. 
mon people. He divides with the man who tempts 
him to make a low assessment, not the man who 
has the humble little house, but the capitalist and 
the business man.” 

Every lest of the tie which binds the 
boss to politics gives the same result. No 
matter what takes aw’ay the plums, whether 
a civil service law or the longer arm of a 


■11 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


287 


rival boss, their removal destroys his inter- 
“ ost in public affairs. Josephus Yeakel is a 
^ late instance. For more than ten years 
> he was the republican boss of the twenty- 
first ward of Philadelphia. Some under¬ 
handed over-reach took away his spoil,and 
thereupon Josephus said: 

“I will resign from the city committee and the 
leadership of politics In the ward next Monday 
evening, unless the mayor makes amends for certain 
promises made and not kept. I was promised to be 
given the appointments that were to be made In the 
ward here, and had pledged positions to a number 
of ward workers, but since then the positions have 
been filled by men from other wards, one of whom 
has not even moved into the ward. I believe a 
leader becomes a nonenity when he Is unable to 
fulfill his pledges.” 

The “American ” system, as contrasted 
with what some are pleased to call the 
Chinese system, is now displaying its le¬ 
gitimate results in Philadelphia. For 
years Dive Martin has run the city govern¬ 
ment and has given boss principles their 
full development. If a man got a place in 
Philadelphia, great or small, there was 
some reason for it besides mere fitness, 
except as he fitted a place in the Martin 
machine, and helped to run politics in a 
way satisfactory to Martin. The results 
are a government debauched from top to 
bottom. The condition of things is un¬ 
speakable. Robbery, blackmail, and the 
wholesale marshaliug of law-breakers at 
the polls on condition of being permitted 
to break the law, are common character¬ 
istics. It seemed that tlie condition of 
political morals in boss-ridden Pennsyl¬ 
vania was as bad as it could be, but this 
makes it worse. 

In the recent division of places in the 
house of representatives, Indiana congress¬ 
men occupied a large place in the public 
eye. Day by day the dispatches noted the 
mighty efforts each one was making for 
his henchmen, and finally what each one 
“ got.” It is doubtful if they will again be 
so deeply interested in any object during 
their respective careers, but in fact their 
efforts in this struggle were about of the 
grade of a lot of old women absorbed in 
tending a small kitchen garden. The in¬ 
evitable result has followed that the ap¬ 
pointees put in through a “ combine ” of 
the mighty men who constitute congress, 
are largely good for nothing. The other 
day, one member asked if the reading 
clerks, foisted upon the house by the men 
“ who farm out the offices,” were to be re¬ 
tained, although they could not be heard 
on either side of the house. Henry U. 
Johnson, of the Richmond district, of this 
state, is the only one from Indiana who 
comes off with any sort of dignity, who in 
advocating the re-instatement of an em¬ 
ploye discharged after twenty years’ser¬ 
vice, denounced the discreditable proceed¬ 
ings of the combine. 


It is not often that any one can agree 
with the New York Sun, but the approval 
of its recent denunciation of Voorhees 
and Turpie, is all but unanimous. These 
two Indiana senators are about as near 
worthless as any two men in any position 
ever were. They do not represent the 
state on any public question. For years 
Voorhees has been simply a large bray, 
while Turpie has been nothing. Nothing 
makes more certain the hopelessness of 
hoping anything in the near future from 
the democratic party of Indiana than its 
reliance upon such men. It is to be said, 
however, that they are comparatively 
harmless, being looked upon with con¬ 
tempt by the entire country. Bad as they 
are, they are less dangerous than senators 
like Gorman, Brice and Murphy. 


There has been no change in the situa¬ 
tion in this city. The mayor. Tommy 
Taggart, pursues his way, evidently igno¬ 
rant that the tendency of the times is not 
backward to Tammany methods but for¬ 
ward to such methods as shall reform the 
Taggarts out of politics. The cjiarter of 
this city makes it the duty of the mayor 
to call together the heads of departments 
at least once a month for consultation and 
advice. The charter then proceeds: 

Records shall be kept of such meetings above 
provided for and rules and regulations shall be 
adopted thereat • • • which regulations shall 
prescribe a common and systematic method of as¬ 
certaining thecomparative fitness of applicants for 
olllce, position and promotion and of selecting, 
appointing and promoting those found to be best 
fitted, except in the department of public safety, 
without regard to political opinions or services. 

Of course this requires the introduction 
of open competition for places requiring 
skill, and the adoption of a system abso¬ 
lutely excluding politics in the employ¬ 
ment of laborers. The preceding admin¬ 
istration obeyed the charter by adopting a 
fairly good set of rules. Taggart’s meeting 
repealed those rules and has adopted none 
whatever in their place. The city is there¬ 
fore thrown back upon the Tammany sys¬ 
tem pure and simple. This will undoubted¬ 
ly help Taggart to get the nomination of 
his party for governor. His party machine 
in this state is made up of men of his 
stripe, and the indications now are that he 
will be nominated by acclamation. We 
hope he will. Let us see if the people of 
Indiana are prepared to turn over the 
benevolent institutions of this state to the 
calloused mercies of this ignorant dema¬ 
gogue. 

The first of the year Mayor Taggart’s 
administration took possession of the city 
hospital. It was immediately found that 
the policy of the administration in the 
manner of carrying messages could not 
be carried out except by a democratic or¬ 


derly, and one was immediately appointed. 
In like manner the democratic policy re¬ 
garding the removal of dirt would not be 
safe except in the hands of a democratic 
janitor, and one was chosen. There is a 
Taggart method also of carrying sick to 
the hospital which could only be carried 
out by a democratic ambulance driver, 
and a good democrat was given that place, 
and the Taggart style of cleaning and run¬ 
ning an engine, was made sure of by ap¬ 
pointing Lon Cox engineer. This is big 
business—in fact, about the biggest busi¬ 
ness engaged in by our present city gov¬ 
ernment, unless it is selecting out its crit¬ 
ics and requiring them to repair brick 
sidewalks in the middle of winter, omit¬ 
ting a like requirement of “good demo¬ 
crats” in the same half square. Taggart’s ad¬ 
ministration will find that the Indianapolis 
Tammany is neither so powerful nor so 
much feared as its New York model—nor, 
in fact, feared at all. 


MUNICIPAL REFORM. 

At the meeting of the American Economic 
Association and the Central States Political 
Science Association in joint session, held in 
Indianapolis in December, the subject of mu¬ 
nicipal reform received attention. There were 
upon the jirogramme two pa})er8 and four dis¬ 
cussions, but practically it amounted to five 
elaborate papers and one discussion. With the 
single excej)tion of the discussion by Professor 
J. W. Jenks, of Cornell University, we do not 
think any of the particii)ant8 grasped the im¬ 
mediate situation. Some of the papers had 
detailed plans, but all came to the conclusion 
that the one thing needful was an elevated 
sense of the duties of citizenship which must 
be cultivated in the inhabitants of every city. 
To deny that citizens will be brought to ap¬ 
preciate and practice in the most commend¬ 
able manner their duties as citizens is to tly in 
the face of history and human progress; but 
the Chronicle wants to see municipal reform 
not a huudreil years from now nor in the next 
generation, but now. If we are to depend upon 
the elevating process of preaching that all in¬ 
habitants of cities must be good, must not 
work worthless henchmen into the labor serv¬ 
ice and into the police and fire departments, 
that respectable men and church members 
must not bribe councilmen and must not work 
all manner of financial deviltry through ward 
heelers and bosses who control the city govern¬ 
ment, then we must bccontent to seethe bless¬ 
ings of municipal reform showered not upon 
us but perhaps upon our children’s children. 
Tlie key to the problem is in the distribution 
of places as laborers, clerks, firemen, police¬ 
men and so on among bosses who give them 
out to their henchmen, who through these con¬ 
trol primaries and conventions and who set 
up themselves or, at most, weak, respectable 
citizens for mayors and councilmen. This was 
the foundation of the power of Tammany Hall 
and it is the foundation of the boss system in 














288 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


all our cities. While this spoils system exists 
no amount of preaching a higher standard of 
citizenship will convert those who enjoy the 
fruits, nor will the election of good citizens 
to offices be anything more than spasmodic 
reform, for the reason that so long as the re¬ 
wards are in sight bands of local buccaneers 
will gather again and again to fight for them, 
and in nine cases out of ten will succeed. It 
is true that the removal of the spoil will not 
convert the heelers or the bosses but it will de¬ 
stroy their interest in public aflPairs. When 
they can get nothing out of politics they will 
leave politics alone, or let us hope many of 
them will settle down to be useful citizens. 
Now the merit and labor service systems 
honestly enforced will destroy the spoils 
system so thoroughly that the mayor can not 
appoint the spittoon cleaner of his office nor 
a councilman, a dog catctier—and yet the 
service of any city will be vastly improved 
and it is not an exaggeration to say that the 
people will get one-third more for their money 
than they now get. This condition would ele¬ 
vate citizenship, for it would obliterate the 
greedy and degrading aims which engross 
every effort in our city governments. There 
is no reason why we should not have munici¬ 
pal reform in five years instead of fifty. 


THE MUGWUMP. 

[From the paper of William Dudley Foulke be¬ 
fore the Tuesday Club of Richmond, January 7.] 

My theme to-night is “ The Independent 
in Politics.” I call him “The Mugwump.” 
This is the name given to him by his enemies: 
I like such names. Heretic, Roundhead, 
Quaker, Abolitionist (for that, too was once a 
word of contumely), all epithets that tell the 
story how man without just cause has sought 
to cast contempt upon his brother and has 
failed. “Friend” is a good word, but “Quak¬ 
er” is better, for it gives us a glimpse of the 
little band that trembled with deep feeling as 
they clung to their simple faith amid the 
laughter of a jeering world. “Yankee Doodle” 
inspires us because it records the barren mock¬ 
ery of the British regulars who at last showed 
their heels and their backs to the plain farmer 
boys whom they despised. And so I like the 
word “Mugwump,” which tells of the unprofit¬ 
able hatred which believers in worn-out polit¬ 
ical creeds have borne toward those who de¬ 
sired to act upon their own convictions rather 
than upon the line of conduct prescribed for 
them by the political organizations of the day. 

Independence in politics means simply 
this, that men shall believe that which their 
judgment dictates and shall speak and act ac¬ 
cording to their belief, no matter what the 
party may say. It stands for an honest expres¬ 
sion of political views by word and vote, for 
a refusal to be bound by the opinions of others. 
Nobody denies that in a republican govern¬ 
ment parties will always exist. The men who 
think alike will vote together. They will or¬ 
ganize to express their joint convictions. But 
the tendency of the custom is such that they 


often remain together long after they cease to 
have these common convictions. The mug¬ 
wump says that when they cease to think alike 
they ought to separate. The out-and-out party 
man says they should stay together whether 
they think alike or not. 

The proper object of all civic activity is the 
public good. A party is a combination of 
men organized for the purpose of obtaining 
this. It is not a political sovereignty like our 
country to which our allegiance is always due. 
And yet it has often happened that party 
spirit has been more intense than even patriot¬ 
ism itself. So it was when the declarations of 
the Hartford convention opposed the war of 
1812 and proposed to disregard the requisi¬ 
tions of the general government. So it was 
with the advocates of nullification in South 
Carolina, with the promoters of the secession 
movement in 1860, and with those who, like 
Jacob Thompson, proposed to invoke the aid 
of the British against their own countrymen 
in 1864. 

What said Washington of party spirit in 
his farewell address? These are his words: 

“In governments of a monarchical cast, pa¬ 
triotism may look with indulgence, if not with 
favor, upon the spirit of party. But, in those 
of a popular character, in governments pure¬ 
ly elective, it is a spirit not to be encour¬ 
aged. From their natural tendency it is cer¬ 
tain there will be always enough of that 
spirit for every salutary purpose; and there 
being constantly danger of excess, the effort 
ought to be, by force of public opinion, to 
mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be 
quenched, it demands uniform vigilance to 
prevent its bursting into a flame, lest instead 
of warming it should consume.” 

To those who have outgrown the wisdom 
and patriotism of Washington, it may be use¬ 
less to cite his words. But there are still 
those who believe them. In 1884, there were 
still enough of those who listened to call of 
their country and believed that it was higher 
than the claims of any party, to prevent the 
author of the Mulligan Letters from occupy¬ 
ing the chair which had been filled by the 
author of these declarations. 

Now what would be the result if there were 
no independents? Each party would be sure 
of its supporters, no matter how vile its can¬ 
didates or how detestable its principles. Each 
party man would remain a party man for¬ 
ever. That is the logic of it. “Once in grace 
always in grace,” and once condemned to per¬ 
dition, no power in heaven and earth could 
remove the interdict. 

Would parties nominate their best men or 
advocate things which are just, and pure, and 
wise, if they were thus in advance the recip¬ 
ients of a plenary indulgence to advocate bad 
principles and nominate bad men? The thing 
which drives each party to its duty is the 
knowledge that if it supports bad principles 
and bad men it will be hurled from power. 
Party government is only beneficial because 
there are mugwumps to repudiate it when it 
fails to do its duty. We may talk of “reform 


within the party” until doomsday. If re¬ 
form within the party accomplishes its work, 
it will also keep within the party those who 
are devoted to reform; but if it fails, then re¬ 
form without the party, and by the defeat 
of the party, is not only the most effective, 
but it is the last remaining remedy—and this 
remedy the Mugwump does not intend to re¬ 
linquish. 

Mugwumps are accused of inconsistency 
and vacillation. Yet it is not possible to fol¬ 
low the career of those who have adhered con¬ 
stantly to party during the past twenty-five 
years who has not done things more vacillat¬ 
ing and inconsistent. Whatever the party 
said these men were its obedient vassals. It 
was like the game of “Simon says thumbs up” 
—if Simon advised it, all thumbs were ele¬ 
vated. But if Simon did not say so not a 
thumb was raised. 

Let me illustrate. In 1876 the platform of 
the republican party in Indiana demanded 
the repeal of the resumption act which had 
just been enacted. But when, only a few 
months later, the national convention insisted 
that resumption should be carried out, the com¬ 
mand “right-about face” was given to every 
local republican in the state. The resump¬ 
tion keynote was struck by the leaders of the 
band and all the little filers and players upon 
French harps responded. It will perhaps 
hardly be believed that a republican platform 
in Indiana once declared in favor of a tariff 
for revenue, in which protection was only an 
incidental feature, but such is the fact. In 
the fullness of time this doctrine developed 
into the McKinley bill and every orthodox 
republican changed front accordingly. 

Far be it from me to say that men should 
not modify their belief by the light of expe¬ 
rience. The convictions of every man are 
subject to change, but when these convictions 
take new form in exact accordance with 
party platforms there is strong reason to sus¬ 
pect that the rank and file are obeying the 
commands of others rather than follow their 
individual judgment. 

In the democratic party the changes have 
been very violent. That party was the advo¬ 
cate of slavery, yet its members voted for 
Horace Greeley for President. It denied the 
power of the government to make greenbacks 
a legal tender and then demanded an unlim¬ 
ited issue of greenback currency for the pay¬ 
ment of the national debt. It declared the 
war a failure and the fourteenth and fifteenth 
amendments unconstitutionally adopted and 
then accepted the consequences of the four- 
years’ struggle and agreed to abide by the 
amendments. The orthodox democrat has un¬ 
dergone more changes in his belief than the 
phases of the moon. In view of these trans¬ 
formations, it is hardly becoming for either 
republicans or democrats to accuse the mug¬ 
wumps of vacillation. 

Every new dissent from the old order of 
things is a kind of mugwumpery. Every man 
was a mugwump who lifted his voice against 
the institution of slavery, and withdrew from 
















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


289 


existing organizations in the day when the 
whig party and the democratic party divided 
political power and maintained cowardly 
silence in regard to the burning iniquity 
which was destroying the life of our republic. 
The new party which declared that the infant 
territories should be consecrated to freedom, 
was itself composed of mugwumps of this de¬ 
scription. Had there been no independents in 
those days there would not be a republican to¬ 
day. Least of all does it lie in the mouth of 
any supporter of that party to belittle or re¬ 
vile an independent. His own political or¬ 
ganization would not have existed had it not 
been for the same spirit of independence 
in the past. The party which has stood so 
long for liberty ought to accord liberty to 
others. 

A man who sticks to his party through thick 
and thin is called a “stalwart.” The mug¬ 
wump who resists its dictations is considered 
a weakling. This is a curious instance where 
in social and moral questions it is deemed an 
evidence of greater moral strength to float 
with the tide than to swim against it. Obedi¬ 
ence to party dictation shows more power than 
resistance. By a strange paradox the slave 
is regarded as stronger and more courageous 
than the freeman. 

Our community is largely protestant, and 
protestants wonder how it is possible for a Ro¬ 
man catholic to submit his individual judg¬ 
ment in religious matters to the dogma of the 
Roman pontiff, or even to the declaration of 
the ecumenical council of the church. And 
yet strict party men, both republicans and 
democrats, are willing to declare in advance, 
and declare it the duty of others to agree in 
advance to support, not only the platform but 
all the nominees of a future party convention. 
In other words, they will agree to say that 
black is white if the convention shall so de¬ 
clare it. They will agree to support a public 
robber, as the purest and fittest man for the 
place if the con vention shall demand it. With 
what consistency can a protestant maintain 
the right of private judgment in the things 
ecclesiastical when he denies that right in 
things political? With what face can he crit¬ 
icise the catholic for submission to Rome 
when he himself agrees to submit unhesitat¬ 
ingly in advance to the decrees of theecumen 
ical council of his party? Those who stand 
for liberty of individual opinion in the affairs 
of the church, ought to be willing to encour¬ 
age liberty of individual opinion in the affairs 
of state. 

About two months ago one John M. Davies, 
D. D., suddenly flamed forth into such notori 
ety as is conferred by a special dispatch to an 
Indianapolis daily newspaper by a sermon at 
the First Presbyterian church of Noblesville, 
Indiana, on the “Value of Partisanship.” I 
profess the profoundest ignorance in regard to 
Dr. Davies. Who or what he may be I don’t 
know and I would not think of dragging him 
forth from the obscurity in which his life has 
no doubt been peacefully passed, and which 
he seems so excellently qualified to adorn, ex¬ 
cept for the fact that he seems to be a fair rep¬ 
resentative of a certain kind of public opinion. 


His expressions therefore serve as an appro¬ 
priate text. 

The worthy doctor of divinity thus sets forth 
his political creed: “I believe in partisan 
politics. I believe in the unflinching adher¬ 
ence to the principles of party and to the estab¬ 
lished tenets of the church. A strong, firm ad¬ 
herence to convictions of truth is fundamental 
to growth, success and happiness in any and all 
the walks of life. The great heroes and lead¬ 
ers of history are but shining monuments of 
the theory of believing something and ad¬ 
hering firmly and conscientiously to that faith. 
Luther, Calvin and Wesley accomplished their 
great work in the world because they taught 
and labored with intense faith and loyalty to 
their cause.” 

This is an illustration of just that sort of 
sloppy logic which has greatly weakened the 
hold upon the popular mind of the religion 
which such men represent. The reason that 
Luther, Calvin and Wesley accomplished 
their work was because they were true to their 
own convictions and not to the convictions 
imposed upon them by the religious organiza¬ 
tions in which they had grown up. If Luther, 
religiously speaking, had been a good parly 
man he would have lived and died a monk of 
the church of Rome. His name would have 
been unknown in history. Calvin and Wesley 
became the leaders of great churches because 
they were original and deep innovators, not 
because they trod the tried and beaten path. 
It would be just as logical to cite the works of 
Copernicus as an argument in favor of the 
Ptolemaic system as to speak of Luther, Calvin 
and Wesley as illustrations of the advantages 
of party loyalty. It is because these men were 
not loyal to their traditions that they were 
great. 

The reverend gentleman continued: “The 
most dangerous instrument in American poli¬ 
tics to-day is the independent voter. The doc¬ 
trine that a man must eschew all parties and 
give allegiance to none is most dangerous and 
pernicious. Such a man is the most dangerous 
element in American politics. He is anchored 
nowhere, has no faith in anything and is just 
drifting with the currents. They are mere 
expletives, mere ciphers and the world is full 
of failures made out of just such timber. 

Disregarding the mixed metaphors and 
grammatical blunders of these sentences it 
would be interesting to know who are the sup 
porters of his alleged doctrine that a man must 
eschew all parties and give allegiance to none. 
There are men, it is true, who perversely 
maintain that it is their duty to eschew a 
party whose principles they can not believe 
and whose candidates they are unwilling to 
support. There are men who insist that they 
do not owe allegiance to a corrupt organiza¬ 
tion of dishonest and unworthy politicians 
These men are anchored nowhere—except 
upon principle. They have no faith—in 
what they know to be wrong. As to drifting 
with the currents that is just the one thing 
they will not do. So far as a man may be an 
expletive (whatever that may mean), the rev¬ 
erend gentleman represents the possibility of 
such a thing far belter than any mugwump 
could pretend to do. If mugwumps are ci¬ 
phers they have the cipher’s power of adding 
tenfold to the value of the integer which to 
it is annexed. The good sense of the Ameri¬ 
can people has not seldom ratified their con¬ 
clusions. There are many independents in the 
country to-day who have not as yet cast a vote 
for a presidential candidate who has not been 
elected. It must be sad, indeed, for party 
men to feel that ciphers have such power 
and that the “failures out of just such tim¬ 
ber” have been so potent in their influence 
upon American politics. 

But the reverend critic is not yet done. “I 
despise,” he says, “the man who tries to 


spread himself out over all parties and to ab¬ 
sorb all the good out of all parties and then 
sets himself up as the independent voter so 
much better and nobler than his fellowmen.” 
It is refreshing to hear this doctrine from a 
minister of the gospel. He who denounces 
corruption, he who rebukes by his vote the 
man who acquires wealth by the plunder of the 
public, he who objects to the doctrine that pub¬ 
lic oflBces are personal or party pelf, the demo¬ 
crat who resists the criminal domination of 
Tammany in New York and the republican 
who repudiates the iniquitous rule of Quay in 
Pennsylvania, is to be despised because he 
sets himself up as better and nobler than his 
fellows. If men have no right to attack po¬ 
litical wrong doing what business have they 
to denounce wickedness of any sort? What 
right has the church to lift up its voice against 
sin? 

Mr. Davies further declares that the policy 
and support of the independent paper usually 
“smells of filthy lucre.” In his eyes the Indi¬ 
anapolis News, the New York Evening Post, the 
Springfield Republican are venal and corrupt 
while the mugwumpdenouncing Sun, the Cin¬ 
cinnati Enquirer or Commercial-Gazette are 
pure, sweet, clean and of good repute forever. 
The organs of Quay in Philadelphia and of 
Brice in Ohio are reliable guides to those who 
seek the truth! Their honest aspirations have 
never been tainted by the lust for gold ! It is 
only independent journalism which is defiled! 

The charge of the smell of filthy lucre is in¬ 
deed the best possible to those who have noth¬ 
ing else in the world to say. George William 
Curtis would not vote for Blaine lest he might 
lose a lucrative position with the Harpers. 
That was the logical explanation of the con¬ 
duct of as pure and upright a character as has 
ever illustrated our national life. It was just 
as plausible as the claim that the father of 
our country promoted the establishment of the 
city of Washington to improve the market 
value of Mt. Vernon. It was just as true as 
the slander that Henry Clay procured the 
election of John Quincy Adams in considera¬ 
tion of an agreement that he should be secre¬ 
tary of state. History sets these things right. 

But there are others more tolerant, who 
merely say that the mugwump is “misled.” 
Curtis was perhaps honest but was deluded. 
W^ho are they that sit in judgment on the delu¬ 
sion? Deluded! That was what men said of 
Garrison when he demanded emancipation, of 
Seward when he talked of the irrepressible 
conflict, of Lincoln when he declared that a 
house divided against itself could not stand. 
Yet our country rose on the wings of that de¬ 
lusion from the dark valley of the fugitive 
slave law to the white peak of universal suf¬ 
frage. It is the coming century which will 
best declare where the delusion lies. But even 
with our limited vision we may safely affirm 
that it does not lie at the doors of those who 
insist upon common honesty against the claims 
of party spirit and upon sound principles 
against the prejudices and the catch words of 
the hour. 

The chorus against the mugwumps has been 
long and loud, but it is inharmonious and un¬ 
impressive. The heelers of Tammany Hall 
despise a mugwump, the thugs who drove men 
from the polls at Gravesend have no words 
strong enough for their contempt. The men 
who organize voters in blocks of five are loud 
in their outcry. Those who raise and con¬ 
tribute fortunes to campaign funds, and 
then demand cabinet positions or foreign 
missions for their services, can see no useful 
purpose in mugwump existence. Postmas¬ 
ters and collectors who fill their offices with 
political freebooters abhor such emasculated 
politics. The policemen who levy blackmail 
upon the vices of great cities have infinite 
contempt for mugwump principles. Gorman, 







290 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


and Hill, and Croker, and Quay and Platt are 
well convinced that mugwumps are all phari¬ 
sees. The men who sully their hands with the 
gold of bribery kuow that they are hypocrites. 
Those who give over the insane to brutal at¬ 
tendants to carry the ward for the straight 
party ticket are filled with indignation at the 
mugwumpery of the men who expose their in¬ 
iquities. Yet still the mugwump survives, 
and increases and multiplies. Advocacy is 
hardly necessary when so much of the world 
is turning mugwump without it. So long as 
political scoundrels ply their trade the 
scourges for their chastisement shall not be 
put away. 

WANAMAKER REDIVIVUS. 

It is in accordance with the fitness of things 
that pious John Wanamaker should reappear 
in politics surrounded Avith a cloud of hum¬ 
bug and corruption. He is a candidate for 
the United Statessenatorship in Pennsylvania, 
and has scarcely taken the field before a 
charge is made that a systematic attempt is 
under way to subsidize the press in his inter¬ 
est. The editor of the chief republican pa¬ 
per of Lancaster county, charges that Wana- 
maker’s lieutenants are offering the publish¬ 
ers of country papers from $3 to $20 for edi¬ 
torial articles supporting Wanamaker, the 
rate being adjusted to the influence of the pa¬ 
per. Instead of being denied, this charge is 
admitted by C. C. Kauffman, a state senator, 
who publishes a card in which he says: 

“I wish to say that upon my oAvn responsibil¬ 
ity and without the knowledgeor consent of Mr. 
Wanamaker. I met some representatives of 
the country press and showed them articles 
which I wanted them to print in their papers, 
and for which I paid them, as I would for 
any other political matter, and just as I have 
paid both city and country papers for like 
services in the past. I believe in printer’s ink, 
and I appreciate what the neAvspapers did for 
me in my successful fight against Cameron in 
this senatorial district two years ago. This 
same thing is done in every preliminary cam¬ 
paign in this county. It was an open business 
transaction, with nothing secret or mysterious 
about it, and which I will do again if occasion 
justifies it. It is exactly what was done all 
over the state by both sides in the late contest 
for the chairmanship of the republican state 
committee, to influence public opinion for one 
side or the other, through the medium of the 
press. I have too high a regard for the in¬ 
tegrity and independence of the press of Lan¬ 
caster county to believe that it is venal, or 
that it could be subsidized in any cause, per¬ 
sonal or political.” 

The light which this throws upon political 
morality in Pennsylvania is too fully illumi¬ 
nating to need comment. Kauffman’s tribute 
to the “integrity and independence” of the 
press, which he says is regularly bought to 
“ influence public opinion,” is worthy of pious 
John himself. It is quite natural to find fol¬ 
lowing close upon this a declaration that so 
far as he (Kauffman) knows, “ Mr. Wana¬ 
maker has not contributed one dollar to pro¬ 
mote his candidacy,” and “has never consented 
to be a candidate .”—New York Evening Poet. 


Mr. Herbert Welsh’s Philadelphia paper, 
City and State, notes that “all of the great 
Philadelphia dailies, with the exception of 
brief items in the Times and Record,^' have 
“not made even a mention” of C. C. Kauff¬ 
man’s acknowledged purchase of editorial 
opinion in Pennsylvania in support of Wana- 
maker’s senatorial aspirations. “What news¬ 
paper,” it asks, “whose editor was in a normal 
condition of moral health, would not ring 
with indignant repudiation of this insult and 
wrong done the public and the press?” And, 
as to Wanamaker himself, “why has he not 
written to every paper in which the facts have 
been stated, and in which Kauffman’s humili¬ 
ating confession was made, disavowing all 
connection with him, and stating explicitly 
that Kauffman had no authority whatever to 
purchase editorial opinions advocating his 
candidacy. Such a disavowal from Mr. Wan¬ 
amaker is undoubtedly in order. It would 
be demanded by sound public opinion from 
any public man, it is still more urgently de¬ 
manded from one who has assumed Mr. Wan- 
amaker’s position as a moral and religious 
teacher.” 

sjt * * 

Wanamaker will make a strong candidate 
for the senatorial nomination. He is well 
known all over the state, and has a host of work¬ 
ers at his call in the shape of the postmasters 
appointed while he was postmaster-general, 
and who hope to regain their old places 
through his influence if elected. Through his 
wholesale place he comes into close touch 
with a large number of influential men 
throughout the state, who will be able to give 
very material assistance to his candidacy. 
There is no doubt that he has extensive busi¬ 
ness relations with country stores, which are 
usually centers of political activity, and the 
country newspapers will help him along both 
through the methods explained by Senator 
Kauffman and through the large amount of 
advertising which Mr. Wanamaker places 
from time to time. He has, if current report 
is true, gone into the newspaper business him¬ 
self, having purchased one of the Huntingdon 
locals. 

Wanamaker’s hold on the newspapers of 
Philadelphia is almost complete, and all on 
account of the page “ads” he frequently 
places, and the regular two and three columns 
of advertisements which appear as regularly 
in each morning and afternoon newspaper as 
the weather forecasts, with the exception here¬ 
after noted. He is never criticised in these 
papers. Neither his connection with the Key¬ 
stone bank failure nor the movement to have 
the embezzling City Treasurer Bardsley par¬ 
doned has been exploited, or his shortcomings 
as postmaster-general. 

About a year ago, when the petition for the 
appointment of a senatorial committee to in¬ 
vestigate Philadelphia affairs was under dis¬ 
cussion, one of the Philadelphia newspapers 
published as an item of news that Thomas 
Dolan and William H. Wanamaker were in 
Harrisburg to prevent affirmative action. The 


Wanamaker “ad” has not appeared in that 
paper since until a few weeks ago; and there 
are persons who allege that the two facts must 
go together as cause and effect. The paper 
in question, it is almost needless to remark, 
abstained from criticism during its period of 
probation .—Philadelphia dispatch New York 
Evening Post, Januai-y 10. 

THE CONSULAR SERVICE. 

Jonathan A. Lane. 

But, as I have already intimated, these views 
and conclusions are not entertained by every¬ 
body. A leading citizen of Boston, hearing 
that at the time being in Washington I had 
expressed to Mr. Olney satisfaction at so 
much of what the department had done as was 
then published, called my attention to an edi¬ 
torial in the New York Journal of Commerce — 
by no means a republican organ—which con¬ 
demned the whole scheme as insincere and 
worthless, which my friend approved as con¬ 
clusive and correct. 

The President of the United States by his high 
office inherits the privilege of these appoint¬ 
ments. Under no other limitations or restric¬ 
tions than his oath of office and the approval 
of that potential body, the senate, which very 
naturally has come into a sort of joint propri¬ 
etorship in this patronage, by virtue of its au¬ 
thority and power therein. At the “outset’ 
of Mr. Cleveland’s administration we may per¬ 
haps admit conditions were not favorable — 
the pressure upon the President was very 
great, and the department of stale was not 
manned as it is to-day. Therefore no such ac¬ 
tion as we are discussing did take place. Now, 
then, I would respectfully submit for the con¬ 
sideration of this body to what extent should 
the present incumbent of the presidential of¬ 
fice, under these circumstances, make rules 
and regulations concerning the consular serv¬ 
ice, which would seem to circumscribe and 
abridge the privileges and the inherited rights 
of his successor? Of course it is intended that 
this policy shall be transmitted to the next 
administration, otherwise it would not, or 
should not, have been entered upon—and upon 
that excellent rule, good in affairs both na¬ 
tional and personal, which in some sense 
here unite—“put yourself in his place.” 

Is Mr. Cleveland to be condemned by con¬ 
siderate, fair-minded men for going no fur¬ 
ther in these rules than he felt it was becoming 
and proper for his administration to do? He 
reserves consulships above the salary of $2,500 
for which this New York critic also condemns 
him. What limitation would this editor sug¬ 
gest, if any? And why not, with equal propri¬ 
ety, demand that he should have gone as far 
as the Morgan bill into a reformation of the 
consular and diplomatic service? Mr. Cleve¬ 
land has gone slow in this movement, which, 
it is to be confessed, is quite in contrast with 
the too rapid gait which characterized his 
changes in the consular service at the begin¬ 
ning of his administration. It remains for his 
successor, the incoming President, to show the 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


291 


S 


country that the opportunity reserved for him 
to make further extension of the civil service, 
and to do much more, and to do it better, will 
be eagerly embraced, and that Mr. Strauss’s 
admirable suggestion—that it be done at the 
outset of the succeeding administration—will 
not be forgotten. The party in power, which 
shall in this business take the most liberal non¬ 
partisan stand, will earn the lasting gratitude 
as well as admiration of the country. 

BOSSISM IS THE BANE OF 
MUNICIPAL POLITICS. 

[From the address of Joseph C, Butler, of Cincin¬ 
nati, before the Columbus Board of Trade, Jan. 7.] 

“Civil service is bound to come. Its prog 
ress is slow, but final success is inevitable. 

“Ten years hence, when the merit system 
shall have been introduced all over our coun¬ 
try, in municipal, state and federal offices, 
there w'ill be those who will regret having al¬ 
lied themselves with the opposition to this 
cause, the merit of which they, in their igno¬ 
rance, did not see, and others will feel the prick 
of conscience for having sacrificed their no¬ 
bler impulses for temporary partisan gain. 

“During the noble fight conducted by a few 
in England for civil service reform, against 
the very same conditions as exist in our coun¬ 
try to-day, there were many who fought the 
measure with the same wanton and futile ar¬ 
guments that are hurled at its introduction 
here. The politicians were the very last to 
accept it in England, the members of par¬ 
liament fought it, not seeing that it would ul¬ 
timately work to their advantage, and feeling 
that its introduction meant a serious loss of 
power to them. However, as soon as its fav¬ 
orable results became evident, the very same 
men became its champions and defenders. 

“We are the only first-class nation to-day 
that is saddled with the monarchical and ef¬ 
fete system of the past. The whole of Europe— 
Germany, England, France, Switzerland, Aus¬ 
tria, Spain, Belgium, Italy—administer their 
respective governments by officials and em¬ 
ployes chosen for their personal worth—the 
fitness of an applicant for the office he seeks 
once being established, his tenure does not de¬ 
pend upon favoritism, but is rendered secure 
by law. The same inducements that the busi¬ 
ness world offers are held out to the young 
man who eaters their service. They allow 
him to have the opportunity to rise by in¬ 
dustry and faithfulness to the highest posi¬ 
tion for which his abilities qualify him. This 
is sound policy and good business sense. This 
policy has made their governments all the 
more stable, by holding out sufficient induce¬ 
ments to young men in office to work and 
strive all the more earnestly for their own and 
their country’s interests. 

“All of this isof comparatively recent date. 
Our present spoils system was in vogue in En¬ 
gland at the time of the declaration of inde¬ 
pendence. 

“According to Edward Porritt, the Aberga¬ 
venny manuscripts and other papers covering 
the same period, taken in conjunction with | 


Donne’s letters of North and the Walpole cor¬ 
respondence, furnish full and excellent ma¬ 
terials for a study of the England against 
which America revolted, and of the methods 
which George III used in the management of 
the house of commons. They show that the 
system of political corruption and political 
management—‘bossism’ in politics, to use cur¬ 
rent political slang—was not invented in this 
country. George III was as keen and as act¬ 
ive a political ‘boss’ as any American politi¬ 
cian. Offices, great and small, were given 
solely as rewards for political service.*; men 
were broken and turned out of the army and 
the civil service on account of their votes in 
and out of parliament. A subsidized daily 
press upheld the policy of the king and ma¬ 
ligned the characters of men who dared op¬ 
pose him. 

‘‘To-day there is a wide-spread feeling of 
discontent with the existing state of afi'airs in 
all our large cities and towns. We hear a 
clamor against ‘bossism’ from every direction 
—from New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, 
Missouri, Minnesota, and from our own great 
state. Thinking people are greatly agitated 
over the situation. And pray, what is bring¬ 
ing the American public to its senses, what is 
causing the business men, even, to give it 
their attention? I will tell you. One of the 
chief reasons is that the burden of taxation 
is commencing to be felt more than ever. This 
is the club that is reaching out and striking 
many that heretofore have rested easily upon 
the ‘cushions of advantages.’ It is harder to 
pay our taxes than ever before; rents and 
pric«s of commodities all have fallen. The 
tax rate remains the same. This serious ques¬ 
tion of paying taxes is making the nation 
think. 

“The remedy which has been soeflTective in 
foreign countries will work here. Adopt civil 
service, and you destroy the power of levying 
assessments; stop assessments, and you take 
away the ability of organized gangs to exist. 
‘You take my life, when you do take the means 
whereby I live.’ 

“In all our large cities, men are awakening 
to the necessity of giving more earnest atten¬ 
tion to public affairs. This is a very healthy 
and promising sign for the nation, for once 
the American people are fully roused, we may 
expect to see the same great ability bestowed 
upon public affairs that has made the results of 
their private undertakings the wonder and ad¬ 
miration of the world. 

“From a business point of view I may state 
that if I could, by any efforts of mine, turn out 
of power our present political ‘boss’ in Cin¬ 
cinnati, I would not do so; in fact, I would do 
everything in ray power to allow him to re¬ 
main until such time as we have a change 
of system. What is the use of trying to turn 
one man out who has now grown rich and 
well supplied with this world’s effects, to al¬ 
low a lean one to come in to take his place? 

“Our ‘boss’ who was a very poor man a few 
years ago, is reputed to be worth three to four 
hundred thousand dollars. The question sug¬ 


gests itself, how much additional has been 
paid out to his lieutentants, or ward-heelers, 
of the money of the tax-payers, for you 
must recognize that however indirect it may 
be, that it is the fountain source of supply; 
again, how many hundreds of thousands of 
dollars have been lost by way of this element 
representing the city’s interest when a bargain 
is to be made for a franchise, etc.? If our city 
has lost hundreds of thousands, how much has 
the whole state lost? 

“While recently in Baltimore, just prior to 
the election, where they were making a vali¬ 
ant fight against ‘bossism,’ I saw this state¬ 
ment, that the city had spent of late years 
some twenty millions for improvements, and 
she has not to-day over seven or eight mil¬ 
lions in the way of assests to show for the ex¬ 
penditure. * * * 

“A short while ago, in Cincinnati, our real 
autocratic ruler called for an assessment. He 
got it, some sixty thousand dollars. How 
does he get it? Every man who is elected to 
office is, in the first place, under obligations 
to the boss for his nomination. Secondly, if 
he is not informed, he is supposed to know the 
conditions—they vary according to the indi¬ 
vidual and the requirements of the situation. 
If, however, the former feels his power is be¬ 
ing endangered or weakened, through the past 
extravagance of the administration of his 
automatons, or by those whom he has nomi¬ 
nated and sent to the legislature, whose ac¬ 
tions have not been satisfactory to the tax¬ 
payers, he immediately raises his standard of 
applicants for office, and in proportion as he 
does so, the conditions placed on the office¬ 
holders are less exacting, in many cases amount 
to nothing, except the little assessment for cam¬ 
paign purposes. Such is the case with our 
representatives recently elected in Hamilton 
county. The latter have now the power in 
their hands to help wipe out, for all time to 
come, the reign of ‘bossism’ and substitute that 
of the people, for they are under no obliga¬ 
tions to the ‘boss’ through whom they got 
their nominations. He was in desperate 
straits and was obliged to nominate good men 
to have his ticket elected. 

“The corrections of these evils, as I have 
said, lies in the adoption of the merit system. 

If it is not practical, it is not anything. Be¬ 
hold the bitter attacks made against the intro¬ 
duction of the merit system in England by 
the politicians, and the same weary fight at 
home. Many persons, judging from their re¬ 
marks, have shown a disposition to be dubious 
in regard to their belief in the efficacy of the 
merit system to strengthen our government 
and make it more stable, to bring about the puri¬ 
fication of politics, and downfall of ‘bossism.’ 
Allow me to endeavor to answer a few of these. 

“Soon after the burning of the court-house ' 
by the mob in my city, in 1884, a law embrac¬ 
ing the elements of the merit system was 
passed, placing our city police largely out of 
politics. What a transformation have I seen 
within the last ten years! From one of the 
worst to one of the finest body of men in the 
















292 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


land, all owing to the vision of the measure. 
This is a notable example, showing that one 
of the inherent qualities of the merit system 
is the productiveness of strength. * * • 

“When east last fall an eminent divine said: 
‘I am opposed to the civil service system, on 
the ground that it would create in time an of¬ 
fice-holding class. You know we do not desire 
any overbearing aristocracy of that kind, such 
a system would be un-American and un-dem- 
ocratic.’ I told him that he was not the first 
to express such idle fears. If he desired 
to take the time, he could read the little work 
of E. L. Godkin upon that subject, which would 
show him the fallacy of his position. If 
there ever was an aristocracy among public 
servants, it exists to-day. A man holds a po¬ 
sition by the will of his liege lord, the boss. 
His actions are only amenable to the aforesaid 
individual. What cares he for the public, just 
so he does not fall under the displeasure of his 
royal highness, the boss. 

“I desire to congratulate our President, Mr. 
Grover Cleveland, on his stand for civil service 
reform, especially do I wish to emphasize my 
congratulations on his recent act of placing 
many of our consuls under civil service rules. 
I know from my own personal and business 
friends’ experience, that many of our consuls 
have been and are a disgrace to our country. 
Consuls are purely commercial agents, their 
business is with the trade and commerce of the 
world. Still, while not congratulating Mr. 
Cleveland on taking this step in the right di¬ 
rection, I wish to say, that I regret exceed¬ 
ingly that he should have been swayed, as it is 
said, in this recent act through the influence 
of Secretary Olney, from the only true and 
practical method of civil service. The limited 
pass system, which is part of his scheme, is 
worn out and proven by the experience of the 
past to be thoroughly unreliable. * • * 

“But the civil service rule isgainingground, 
and must in the end be preferred to the spoils 
system, as surely as right must triumph over 
wrong. What are the grounds upon which I 
base my assertion that within ten years it will 
be the established system all over our country, 
and what is the present position and outlook 
of civil service in the various states? The 
grounds for my claim that the merit system 
will be the only mode of service in vogue all 
over our country within ten years are: First, 
the faith I have in my fellow-countrymen, 
their lack of prejudice and their possession of 
good sense; secondly, it is characteristic of my 
countrymen to adopt the best of anything, no 
matter where they find it; thirdly, it is only 
necessary to have an illustration of the supe¬ 
riority and efficacy of this system, such as the 
happy results obtained in Massachusetts, for 
it to be demanded by all other states. 

“One of the illustrious sons of Ohio was 
George H. Pendleton, the champion in the 
United States senate of civil service reform. 
His great measure became a law June I6th, 
1883. .4n agitation was at once commenced 

in the New York legislature looking towards 
the passage of a state act; such an act was 
passed and became a law May 4th, 1883. At 
the same time a movement was commenced in 
Massachusetts, and a state act there was ap¬ 
proved on June 3d, 1883. In New York, dur¬ 
ing the five years of the history of the first 
commission appointed under Grover Cleve¬ 
land, who was then governor, a great deal was 
accomplished in the arrangement of classifi¬ 
cations and the gradual extension of the com¬ 
petitive system, both in the state and the cities. 
In 1887, however, the first commission, of 
which John Jay had been chairman, was re¬ 


moved by Governor Hill, From that date 
until the close of 1894, under the blighting 
influence of this man, the law was imperfectly 
administered, and positions taken wholesale 
from the competitive schedules and placed in 
the non-competitive or exempt. An investiga¬ 
tion was made on behalf of the civil service 
reform association, and the facts discovered 
were reported to the legislature, together with 
a request that the condition of the service be 
investigated by a legislative committee. Such 
an investigation was held, and the charges of 
the association fully substantiated. Governor 
Flower and the then commission proceeded at 
once to repair a great deal of the damage. 
Governor Morton removed the majority mem¬ 
bers of the old commission, and appointed as 
their successors men thoroughly in sympathy 
with reform, and well qualified to give it real 
effect. Since then the great bulk of the posi¬ 
tions in the state service have been made com¬ 
petitive, and a general improvement effected. 
Experience has proven that the New York 
state act is peculiar in the degree to which its 
operations depfnd upon the good intent of its 
administrators. It is practicable under its 
provisions to carry the principles of civil serv¬ 
ice reform to the farthest extent; whereas, at 
the same time, in the hands of administrators 
who may be ill-disposed, it is possible to go 
just so far in the other direction. 

“The Massachusetts law differed from that of 
New York in that it allowed of a gradual ex¬ 
tension of the rules to the various branches of 
the state service, something similar to the 
Pendleton act for the United States service. 
Large classes have been brought in from time 
to time, until at present practically every one 
is covered, excepting, of course, the classes 
usually exempt, elective officers, heads of de¬ 
partments, etc. Everything there iscompetitve. 
The Massachusetts act permitted the estab 
lishment in Boston of a system of labor regis¬ 
tration, which has been in successful operation 
for ten years, and has recently been copied, 
with various modifications, in the navy yards 
of the United States, in New York city, and 
in Brooklyn. * » ♦ 

“And now, where shall stand the great state 
of Ohio in this movement to free ourselves 
from the serfdom of bossism? Will she allow 
her glorious record of the past to be broken 
on the greatest issue of to-day? Ohio has al¬ 
ways taken an equal, if not a greater, share in 
the defense of the right of every leading issue. 
Her voice has been prominent in the councils 
of the nation, and her might has been felt on 
the field of battle, for the love she cherishes 
for the Union. She has furnished the majority 
of the chief actors in the history of the past 
forty years, Salmon P, Chase, John Brown, 
Generals Grant, Shermon, Sheridan, Rose- 
crans. Presidents Harrison, Garfield and 
Hayes. 


In the municipal government of the city of 
Brooklyn only eighty places are exempt from 
civil service rules. 


Morton has approved of the resolution of 
Nov. 12 last, adopted by the state civil service 
commission, transferring the following named 
places from non-competitive to competitive 
places: The division engineers, special exam¬ 
iners in the insurance department; principals, 
professors and teachers in the normal schools; 
the clerks in the office of superintendent of 
state prisons; deputy inspectors and expert 
examiners in the office of factory inspec 
tor; the chemists in the agricultural experi¬ 
mental station; the geologists, botanists, ento¬ 
mologists and their assistants in the state mu¬ 


seum, and several other places have been re¬ 
deemed from spoil. 

The house committee on reform in the civil 
service will hold its first meeting under a call 
by Chairman Brosius, of Pennsylvania, next 
Friday morning. Mr. Brosius was chosen from 
among several former republican members of 
this comm ittee as the one most friendly to the re¬ 
form, and it is expected that several important 
measures will be reported to the house during 
the session. The two measures in which the re¬ 
formers feel the greatest interest at present are 
those which were favorably reported by Rep¬ 
resentative Andrew, of Boston, when he was 
chairman of the committee in the fifty-second 
congress. One of these gives authority to the 
civil service commission to prepare eligible 
lists of laborers on public works, in the navy 
yards and elsewhere, and requires appointing 
officers to make selections from these lists. 
The other bill relates to the classification of 
the fourth-class post-offices, and has been in¬ 
troduced in various forms for several years.— 
Wastkington dispatch New York Times, January I 4 . 


Commissioner George B. Forrester, of the 
department of police and excise, Brooklyn, is 
a disgusted man. He had a faithful follower 
whom he wanted placed on the police force. 
With his political influence he believed this 
was an easy matter. It might have been had 
it not been for the civil service examination. 
When the list of men who had passed the civil 
service examination was published a few days 
ago. Commissioner Forrester carelessly looked 
over the names. He missed the name of his 
political protege. He then put on his glasses, 
after wiping them carefully, and went over 
the list extremely carefully, but the name was 
not there. 

“ O, it’s only a mistake,” said he to him¬ 
self, “ the name has been left off accidentally.” 

The excise commissioner called on Commis¬ 
sioner Welles for an explanation. Mr. Welles 
simply referred Mr. Forrester to his protege’s 
examination papers. Here are some of the 
questions and answers : 

Q.—Who is the governor of New York 
state? A.—Grover Cleveland. 

Q.—Who is mayor of New York Cityy 
A.—Richard Croker. 

Q.—What is the northeastern state of the 
union ? A.—Africa. 

Q.—What states border on the Mississippi? 
A.—The Hudson. 

Q.—What is the usual process of dealing 
with a prisoner from the time of his arrest 
until his conviction? A.—One month. 

Q.—Who appoints the police commissioner? 
A.—Mr. Welles.— New York Times, Janvxxry 9, 


It is significant, the Buflalo Express (Rep.) 
thinks, “that Governor Morton’s appointee 
for inspector of gas meters, J. L. Stewart, 
was confirmed by the senate without reference, on mo¬ 
tion of the Tammany Senator Grady. Evidently 
Tammany is entirely satisfied with this selection of 
the Platt machine.'’ 














The civil service chronicle. 


INDIANAPOLIS, FEBRUARY, 1896. 


VoL. II, No. 36. 

Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind. 


■■ With this number the Civil Service 
Chronicle closes its seventh year. It is 
proud of the share it has taken in the 
great contest which has been carried on 
during that time. Its one single principle 
of action has been a steady onslaught upon 
officers in place for the time being who 
were practicing or in any manner aiding 
or abetting the spoils system. It has not 
omitted to praise any acts of officers which 
promoted administrative reform, but it 
has not overpraised such acts, nor has it 
regarded even notable reform acts as any 
excuse for indulging in carnivals of spoil. 
It has refused to recognize any occasion as 
inopportune, nor has it regaraed any sort 
of plain speaking as intemperate. It has 
let the sun go down every night upon its 
wrath. Its course has met with protest 
on every hand—from cabinet officers, from 
all manner of under-officers, from minis¬ 
ters of the gospel, from college professors, 
from good citizens whose party feelings 
were hurt. It has been ostracised from 
college libraries and religious reading 
rooms. Nevertheless, it knows that it has 
the respect of its enemies, and it has the 
approval of a wide circle throughout the 
country too eminent in the workings of 
government to leave any doubt. The men 
who have to be fought with in the struggle 
against the spoils system are too thick- 
skinned to heed innuendoes or fine 
phrases. The progress of administrative 
reform during the seven years has been 
enormous. When the Chronicle was 
started, the clippings of favorable discus¬ 
sion the country over would scarcely fill a 
page. Now hundreds of colums are the 
daily product. In short, the voice of the 
opponent has become dumb. His future 
recourse until his inevitable defeat will be 
to malicious trickery and a mulish refusal 
to move on 

The Civil Service Chronicle enjoys a 
vindication as well as anyone, and it has a 
vindication in the present aspect of the 
tarifi question. For a long time it had to 
struggle with the contention that the tariff' 
question must be settled first and that then 
civil service reform would have a chance. 
The Chronicle has never for a moment 
yielded to this claim. It steadily pointed 


out that the agitation under Mr. Cleveland 
was not different from the agitation under 
Polk and that the tariff question had been 
with us a hundred years and would be with 
us for another hundred. It took the ground 
that what the two parties most desired was 
to divide upon an economic question and 
obscure the question of the division of 
millions of spoil just as in the forties and 
fifties it desired by the same division to ob¬ 
scure the question of slavery. The Wilson 
bill was passed and the tariff question 
was pronounced settled. Yet what so far 
as can be judged by party organs and 
leaders is now dividing the parties? The 
tariff. On every hand and in every shape 
the republicans declare their one object in 
life to be “ the resumption of the Ameri¬ 
can policy of protection.” J^'ederal civil 
service reform has been accomplished in 
the midst of this tariff turmoil. Is the 
same reform in municipalities and states 
to wait until the republicans now “ settle” 
the tariff? The Chronicle’s answer is 
that in season and out of season, with reck¬ 
less indifference to the success of parties it 
intends to urge these reforms as the first 
political matter to which every citizen 
should give his attention. 


For the first time in a hundred years 
policemen in the city of New York are ap¬ 
pointed and promoted upon merit, and 
upon merit alone. There is no political 
pull, there is no church pull, there is no 
saloon pull, there is no gambling pull, 
there is no house of prostitution pull, there 
is no purchase and sale, there is no any¬ 
thing, except straightforward honest fit¬ 
ness for the position to be filled. Nothing 
in the world can take the place of this 
magnificent example of good government. 
No loss of privilege, which this has brought 
about is of the least weight compared with 
the benefit. Too rigid laws can be relaxed 
by legislation, but bargain and sale, black¬ 
mail and the pull system running through 
a city administration are death to public 
virtue. 

Kichard Croker, ex-chief of Tammany, 
was presented with a “loving cup” at a 
dinner given in his honor, February 8, in 
New York. The cup was of solid silver, 
thirteen and a half inches high, weighing 
210 ounces and holding two gallons. The 
dinner cost forty dollars a plate. John C. 
Sheehan, the Buffalo defaulter, presided, 
and on his right were Senator Edward 


T'B'U MO • J dollar per annum. 

iJlilvluo . lOcentB percopy. 

Murphy, Thomas J. Grady, ex-Mayor Hugh 
J. Grant, Judge Frederick Smythe, Jacob 
A. Cantor, Nathan Strauss and James Mar¬ 
tin. On his left were Croker, ex-Governor 
Roswell P. Flower, District-Attorney John 
R. Fellows, ex-Mayor Gilroy, Amos J. 
Cummings and Henry D. Purroy. Among 
other guests was a son of General McClel¬ 
lan, to say nothing of Paddy Divver and 
numerous criminals. It is worth while to 
preserve these few facts, for in time they 
will be curiosities in the history of politics. 
The government of robbery, murder and 
universal blackmail in the city of New 
York reached the zenith of its glory when 
the city government was Tammany and 
Tammany was ruled by Croker. When 
he went into Tammany Croker had little, 
now he has not only thousands and tens 
of thousands, but certainly hundreds of 
thousands and perhaps millions. It is a 
strange spectacle and has few parallels in 
the history of government. 

It begins to be doubtful if the republi¬ 
cans of Maryland are worthy of the great 
victory they recently gained over Gorman. 
If that victory was gained on any one 
ground, it was on the promise to institute 
civil service reform. The present aspect 
of the Maryland republicans is as though 
an army fighting for independence had 
held together until a victory was won, and 
then had at once broken up and devoted 
itself to plundering the enemy. The gov¬ 
ernor is overwhelmed with office-seekers, 
and it is said that half the members of the 
legislature want places. The promises to 
pass a civil service law are dodged or 
broken on every hand. It is but another 
proof of how selfish and dishonest and 
small the components of party machines 
are. In this case the enemy will rally and 
these ignoble victors will be defeated be¬ 
yond power of recuperation in any near 
future, except the power to form bogus re¬ 
publican clubs and prey upon the rem¬ 
nants of federal patronage. In other col¬ 
umns we have reproduced the situation 
extensively from the Baltimore Sun, and 
we ask a careful reading. Mr. Bonaparte’s 
denunciation is as withering and blasting 
as the scorn of the prophets. 


Platt’s war for the mastery of the city 
of New York goes merrily on. The pro¬ 
test of the most distinguished republicans 
in New York against the Platt primaries, 
published last month, will be remembered. 



























294 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


The rolls of the primaries have been found 
to contain 25,000 bogus names in a total 
enrollment of 77,000. The chairman of 
the protesting committee, John Sabine 
Smith, went to Albany and laid the whole 
matter before Governor Morton. The 
latter promptly referred the case to Platt’s 
chief henchman, Lauterbach, and the Platt 
crowd had a great time considering it. 
Platt was so exalted that at a dinner after¬ 
wards in Jake Patterson’s district he sang 
the stanza beginning 

In the beauty of the Itlles Christ was born 
across the sea. 

The protesting committee also appealed 
to the state republican committee. Now 
every man on that committee happens to 
belong to Platt and the following happy 
resolutions were unanimously passed : 

Resolved, That the proceedings of the republi¬ 
can organization of the county of New York ap¬ 
pear to be, and are regular and proper. 

Resolved, That the gentlemen who appeared 
before the state committee having conceded 
that the constitution of the republican organ¬ 
ization of the countyof New York needs amend¬ 
ment, that the state committee recommends 
that the republican organization of the county 
of New York be requested to amend such con¬ 
stitution; and 

Resolved, That the memorial filed, with all the 
papers, be referred to the republican organiza¬ 
tion of the county of New York for Its consider¬ 
ation. 

Verily the wheels of the Platt machine 
are well greased. Nothing like this has 
happened since the democratic state com¬ 
mittee in answer to an analogous protest 
from the honest men of its party declared 
Tammany Hall to be the “regular demo 
cratic organization” of New York city. 
The diflference between the Platt men and 
the Tammany men is that many of the lat 
ter have already served their time in 
prison, while, according to the following 
extract, a percentage of the former seem 
likely to: 

The grand Jury to-day found Indictments for 
misdemeanor against three election Inspectors 
of the fifteenth and thirty-third election dis¬ 
tricts. * * * 

Owens was the chairman of the board of In¬ 
spectors of the fifteenth election district, and 
besides being Indicted for violating the election 
law was Indicted for an assault on George H. 
Martin, an official watcher. 

Mr. Melville, who lives at No. 80 E. Washing¬ 
ton square. In his complaint alleges that he 
went to the polling-booth of his election dis¬ 
trict on the night of December 10, and was In¬ 
formed that forty-four votes had already been 
cast. Four votes were cast after he came. Of 
the forty-eight Mr. Melville charges forty-four were 
fraudulent, having been cast by Tammany men and 
Other persons In no wise connected with the 
republican party In that district. In spite of 
his pi’otest the two election Inspectors persisted 
in counting these votes In. Mr. Melville at 
once Informed Allred It. Conkllng, the former 
republican representative of that district, w’ho 
laid the matter before the grand Jury; and as a 
result of this these Indictments to-day were 
filed In court. 

At the Croker dinner which is described 
elsewhere, there was outspoken rebellion 
against John C. Sheehan’s elevation to the 


! chairmanship of the finance committee of 
Tammany Hall. This is the greatest and 
most envied position in latter-day piracy. 
The chairman handles all the money, 
keeps no accounts, performs his addition 
and division all by himself and keeps his 
own silence. After a time he can buy 
anything in the world that takes his fancy. 
To return to the subject, the insult to 
Sheehan at the dinner had to be repaired. 
The Tammany executive committee was 
therefore called together on the 14th, and 
the next day the Evening Post gives Shee¬ 
han’s vindication the following “send-ofl:” 

We presume there are few Christian capitals 
in which such an assemblage as the meeting 
of the Tammany executive committee last 
night would not be closely watched by the 
police, if not broken up. Its object was to 
pledge allegiance to John C. Sheehan as a 
leader, Sheehan being a thief, who made away 
with a large sum of money belonging to the 
city of Buffalo, and the owner of numerous 
bank accounts in New York on a salary of 
$5,000 a year. The selection of such a man 
for the head of an association would naturally 
put the authorities on the alert in any well- 
governed city. They would ask, what must 
be the objects of such a society? and would 
detail detectives to keep an eye on its activi- 
tits. Here it carries on its operations openly 
without the slightest fear, and even proposes 
itself for the government of the city. Has 
there ever been an odder thing since munic 
ipalities first took their rise? The apparent 
revolt against Sheehan at the Croker dinner 
was squelched at this meeting, and a resolu¬ 
tion passed declaring that they loved Sheehan 
“as a man,” and respected him as “a leader.” 
Sheehan then moved that Croker be made an 
honorary member of the committee, which was 
carried, and means that Croker will still be 
the real head of the organization, and that 
Sheehan will fill towards him a position which 
Mike Daly filled towards Gilroy. The ap¬ 
pointment of Sheehan, a notorious defaulter, 
is interesting as one more, and the most strik¬ 
ing illustration of the boldness of tbe Tam¬ 
many contempt for the morality of the com¬ 
munity. The organization is, we think, the 
first of a political nature in the western world 
to make no pretence of seeking to promote 
better government. All preceding ones have 
given out that they were in pursuit of a re¬ 
form of some kind. Tammany is the only 
one which has ever gone to the polls with the 
avowed object of making money by it. Similar 
organizations, like the Italian Camorra, do not 
vote. They levy blackmail secretly, and thus 
pay some homage to law and decency. The 
evolution of a voting Camorra by the country 
of Washington and Franklin is surely a strange 
phenomenon. 

In Harper's Weekly of February 8, Julian 
Ralph has an article headed “Poison in the 
Civil Service.” It bears upon undoubted 
evils and dangers. The effort to introduce 
the merit system in the federal service for 
many years had practically no help, nor 
even the approval of the employes them¬ 
selves. But there came a lime when the 
advantages of the system dawned upon 
them, and by classes according to employ¬ 
ment, they began to form associations of 
which the National Association of Letter 
Carriers is an example. The tendency of 
these associations is to go beyond the 


legitimate field of reform and to pass into 
the realm of selfishness, and to try to get 
special advantages. Two years ago the 
letter carriers came near getting the ap¬ 
proval of the National League to a bill 
granting them special privileges, such as 
trial before dismissal. Mr. Ralph sets out 
important examples of undoubted evils 
arising from this selfish struggle of classes 
of civil employes, national, state and muni¬ 
cipal. The danger is the menacing atti¬ 
tude they take toward congressmen and 
with state legislatures like New York, the 
corrupting influence of their money must 
be added. We all know the abject condi¬ 
tion to which the pension system has 
brought congressmen—so low that one 
demagogue from Indiana declared the 
other day in the house that he was there 
to vote for every pension bill introduced. 
Tbe alarm can not be taken too quickly to 
prevent great associations of public em¬ 
ployes reducing congressional and legisla¬ 
tive representatives to the same whipped- 
cur condition. 

The Civil Service Chronicle has 
hopes that the historian of the future will 
find in its ninety six numbers valuable and 
graphic material,and this material at least 
the Universities of Johns Hopkins, Wis¬ 
consin and Amherst College will have. It 
is for some student of the future that we 
complete the career of Bat Shea, who has 
suffered the penalty of death for a political 
murder, while the man actually respon¬ 
sible for him and his criminal career sits 
undisturbed and not dishonored or shun¬ 
ned by his fellows, a member of the senate 
of the United States. Senator Murphy’s 
henchman, after an extraordinary struggle 
for escape from the law, fell at last before 
it. It is not too much to say that a long 
outraged public opinion finally aroused 
in its might could not be stilled, and 
brought to naught all of Senator Murphy’s 
eflorts to save his victim. But the meth¬ 
ods to maintain the machine of Senator 
Murphy, tragic as they now seem, are the 
methods of several of his colleagues—Hill 
and Gorman and Quay and Brice and an 
ex-senator, Platt. All use intimidation, 
fraud and violence to maintain their boss- 
ship. The student of the future will be 
amazed as he glances at the accounts of 
great social functions at the capitol to find 
that most of these men are not social out¬ 
casts, but mingle on terms of intimacy 
with people of distinction, and that Platt 
sits at the governor and Mrs. Morton’s 
table an honored guest. If the student is 
of foreign extraction, he will be positive 
he has fallen upon the rottenness of Rome 
before her fall. If he is an American 
student, he will understand that his coun¬ 
try was very far from moral collapse, 
shocking as it appears in these annals. 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


295 


The civil service of Rochester, New 
York, appears to be honeycombed with 
favorites who were given their places in 
violation of the civil service rules—adopted* 
mind you, under a preceding administra¬ 
tion in pursuance of a state statute. The 
new mayor was mindful of his oath of 
office, and he gave notice that he would 
veto the salary item of every placeholder 
not appointed in accordance with the 
rules. He began his lessons in respect for 
law by striking out the salaries of the city 
sealer and six city physicians whom the 
common council had appointed on the 
“cold toes” plan. The moment an honest 
man was found to be in the office of mayor 
a change came like magic. More than 
three hundred applicants are about to take 
the competitive examination, and among 
them are fifty now holding places illegally. 
The occupation of the spoilsman in 
Rochester is destroyed with one blow by a 
determined man. He will be justly hon¬ 
ored and praised by the whole country. 
For any other course he would have been 
despised by the country and applauded by 
a ring of party workers. But any other 
course would have been grossly dishonest, 
contemptibly dishonorable, unmindful of 
the oath of office and treacherous to the 
interests of the people. 


The executive committee of the New 
York Civil Service Reform Association at 
a meeting, February 12, passed the follow¬ 
ing resolutions emphasizing the manner 
in which Governor Morton recently de¬ 
livered himself and tried to deliver the 
civil service law of his state into the hands 
of Platt: 

Whereas, The annual report of the State 
Civil Service Commissioners for the year 1895 
affords gratifying evidence of the benefits to 
the state government from the application of 
the civil service laws, which have been In sub¬ 
stance embodied In the constitution of this 
state by an overwhelming popular vote; and. 

Whereas, It Is equally obvious that these re¬ 
sults, so advantageous to the public Inrerests 
of the people of the whole state, have been as¬ 
sured by the faithful performance of their 
duties by the State Civil Service Commission as 
It was constituted during the past year; and. 

Whereas, The experience of previous years 
has demonstrated that such public benefits 
from the execution of the civil service law may 
be wholly prevented by hostile sentiment and 
action on the part of the state executive authorl - 
ties, especially by the appointment of officers 
who are not In sympathy wMth the principles of 
civil service reform, and who are Ignorant of 
the duties to be performed In Its administration, 

Resolved, That the Civil Service Reform Asso¬ 
ciation reaffirms Its disapproval of the change 
In the membership of the State Civil Service 
Commission made lately by Governor Morton 
as a step calculated to shake the confidence of 
the people In the strength of his purpose to 
promote honesty and efficiency In the public 
service when other Interest are arrayed against 
such a course on his part. 


The general assembly of Ohio seems 
likely to pass a corrupt practices act drawn 


by Mr. Cushing, of Cleveland, and a bill 
for the application of the merit system to 
cities prepared by the Cincinnati Civil 
Service Reform Association. Ohio has 
always been classed with Indiana as being 
thoroughly debauched by the use of money 
in campaigns, and that such bills should 
come anywhere near passing shows the 
irresistible onward march of administra¬ 
tive reform. Even our Indiana politicians 
will yield or be brushed aside in time. 


From Chicago comes the news that 
Frank Lawler is dead. He carried to 
Washington in a telescope trunk a petition 
with 60,000 signatures asking that he be 
made postmaster of Chicago. In the wait¬ 
ing-room of Postmaster General Bissell he 
exhibited to the editor of the Chronicle 
a condensation of his petition by classes, 
making a very effective showing, which 
he clinched with the remark that the Chi¬ 
cago postoffice had been managed by a 
Swallow-Tail and that it needed a Short- 
Hair. His last public act was as alderman 
to vote for a shady electric railway fran¬ 
chise. In the same city Judge Payne, of 
the superior court, charged the county 
commissioners with being open to pulls 
to secure their influence to corrupt grand 
jurors selected by them. Being challenged 
by the commissioners, the judge came 
promptly to the mark with a check for 
$300 indorsed by one commissioner. It 
is claimed that he got the money on this 
for a pull. In Chicago, also, a committee 
of one hundred citizens has been formed 
to undertake the work of removing city 
affairs from party politics. That Lyman 
J. Gage is chairman leaves no doubt of a 
determined and systematic effort by in¬ 
fluential men. 

The Lincoln League, of Indiana, which 
is a combination of republican clubs of 
this state, had a meeting here recently 
and claiming to be the bone and sinew of 
the party its resolutions may be looked to 
as indicating what it thinks should now 
engage a citizen’s political activities. Ac¬ 
cording to these resolutions the citizen 
should rely upon the republican party, 
should stand aghast that the country is 
borrowing money, should favor the re¬ 
sumption of the American policy of pro¬ 
tective tariff, should favor bi metalism 
and the Monroe doctrine, and so on. This 
is a very old and deep rut. A protec¬ 
tive tarifl has not been departed from, 
but, like the Monroe doctrine, it is safe to 
mouth about. To have declared the tariff 
not a matter for partisan strife would have 
been a patriotic and progressive action. 
The progressive question connected with 
the finances is whether the government 
shall be compelled to go on borrowing 
money to maintain gold payments or 


whether that burden shall be shifted to the 
banks and the government go out of the 
banking business. A declaration upon 
that point would at least have shown that 
the party had something genuine to work 
for. Bi-metalism in the sense of simulta¬ 
neous circulation upon equal terms is un¬ 
known in the history of American cur¬ 
rency; but that, too, is a safe party yell. 
There is one question which in far-reach¬ 
ing beneficial effect and importance to the 
greatest number is the first question of 
these times; that is the question of munic- 
pal reform. Yet these clubs seem never 
to have heard of it. It is not, however, an 
obscure subject, for no other is so gener¬ 
ally discussed among the citizens. The 
secret is that political clubs are not formed 
for the purposes of political progress. They 
would naturally be looked to as the lead¬ 
ers of public opinion and their decla¬ 
rations would naturally be even in advance 
of party principles as stated in regular 
convention platforms. But their declara¬ 
tions are mere platitudes. If the abolition 
of slavery had depended upon the agitation 
of political clubs, we should have been 
buying and selling slaves to-day. Civil 
service reform has been accomplished in 
the civil service of the United States; yet 
it is safe to say that in the thirty years it 
has taken to bring it about, not a dozen 
political clubs have declared in its favor. 

It seems that the gerrymander in In¬ 
diana has received its quietus. The su¬ 
preme court in an opinion by Judge How¬ 
ard has laid down such rules for the inter¬ 
pretation of apportionment laws as to ef¬ 
fectually block future attempts to cheat 
the people of this state out of a fair chance 
to govern themselves. The utterly whip¬ 
ped attitude of the party managers and 
legislators and ex-legislators who for a 
generation have been engaged in this ras¬ 
cally business is a wholesome sight, and 
there is no choice of parties. The repub¬ 
licans a year ago played the last trick, and 
now they are signing a written pledge that 
if the governor will call them together 
again, they will respect their oaths of office 
and pass an honest bill. Governor Mat¬ 
thews, however, does not seem disposed to 
do this, but is inclined to leave the state 
under an outrageous gerrymander fixed 
by his party in 1885. Governor Matthews 
will need a good deal of furbishing before 
he will make a Presidential candidate that 
will command much of the independent 
vote which decides elections in these 
times. He refused in his last message to 
recommend that the state institutions be 
put under the merit system, and he would 
do something to take himself out of ordi¬ 
nary hide-bound democracy by calling the 
legislature together to enact an honest ap¬ 
portionment law and at the same time by 












296 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


his recommendations rectify his blunder 
regarding the state institutions. 


The board of public safety of this city 
has been making a report to the mayor in 
which they say; “The board removed 
twenty-nine members of the police force 
for inefficiency in the discharge of their 
duties, and their places were filled by men 
carefully selected, whom we considered 
especially adapted for police service.” The 
board omits to say that it filled these places 
in impudent and reckless disregard of the 
law and set to the police force a flagrant 
example of law breaking. Nor did the 
board define its notion of the kind of a 
man “especially adapted for police serv¬ 
ice.” The report of the investigating com¬ 
mittee of the Indiana Civil Service Reform 
Association, the statements of which have 
never been in any manner questioned or 
denied, would seem to throw some light on 
that question. Referring to these twenty- 
nine new appointees the report said; 

Among the new appointees was one who had 
been dismissed from the police force under a 
charge of levying blackmail on fallen women; 
another who had been refused an appointment 
formerly on the ground that he had been 
running a crap game, and who had once been 
In the police court for assault and battery; an¬ 
other who had been arrested for assault and 
battery; another who was known as a drunk¬ 
ard; another who, while on the police force, 
had been charged with borrowing money from 
a keeper of a house of Ill-fame, and who had 
afterwards been dismissed; another who had 
been dismissed from the police force for Insub¬ 
ordination and for leaving his post when on 
duty; another who had been dismissed for 
sleeping while on duty; another who Is ruptured 
and Is physically unfit to be a patrolman, and 
others still, the reasons for whose appointment 
can only be found In their having been active 
workers for the election of Mayor Taggart. 
One of the Improper appointees Is a relative of 
Police Commissioner Mack. 

The prohibition party held a county 
convention in this city on the 9th, and 
chose twenty-three delegates to the party 
state convention to be held February 25. 
This party is organized as all other parties 
are, having township and ward committee¬ 
men and county and state committees. 
How is it, then, that under our statute re¬ 
quiring the policemen and firemen of this 
city to be “as nearly as possible equally di¬ 
vided politically,” this city administration 
only gives places to republicans and demo 
crats? The same question may be asked 
in behalf of the regularly organized popu¬ 
list party. The Chronicle is neither pro¬ 
hibitionist nor populist, but it believes in a 
fair and impartial enforcement of law, 
whether as to sidewalks, or saloons, or ap¬ 
pointing policemen and firemen. We 
know very well that, in answer to these 
questions. Mayor Taggart and the board 
of public safety w'ould say that they do not 
recognize the above organizations as par¬ 
ties. But they are parties; such an an¬ 


swer, however, would be of a kind with 
Taggart’s refusal to recognize as law civil 
service rules (which he had never read), 
adopted in obedience to a command of a 
state statute. 


A MONUMENT TO CORRUPTION. 

The capltol commission reported to the sen¬ 
ate finance committee to day that It wdll take 
$1,716,647.99 to complete the capltol—$1,356,.688.60 
for contract work, per bids submitted, and 
$.360,259.39 for day labor. No effort Is made by 
members of the legislature to conceal the fact 
that they are opposed to having the work on 
the capltol completed by contract. The adop¬ 
tion of that system would mean the loss of a 
good deal of patronage to senators and assem¬ 
blymen of both parties, whose Influence secures 
employment every winter for some of their 
constituents In the construction departments 
of the capltol. Few years go by when at least 
half a million dollars Is not spent on the work, 
and that sum represents plenty of patronage. 
— Alba7iy dispatch, New York Eveninn Post, February 
13. 


A correspondent who Is appalled at the cost 
of the state capltol nevertheless asks The Ex¬ 
press If we really mean that we would have the 
work on It stop where It Is, leaving the building 
In an unfinished state. Yes; we mean Just that. 
The capltol Is near enough to completion to be 
available for all the uses to which It would be 
put If entirely finished. The argument that It 
must be finished since It has been begun Is the 
one that has wheedled the people out of the 
millions that have already been spent on It. 
The great pile never will be finished while that 
argument will avail to get appropriations for 
continuing the work. Let It stand as It Is, with 
Its unfinished parts a monument to the corrup¬ 
tion that has built It. Let It so remain till the 
sight of It shames the state officials Into dealing 
with It honestly.—/iMjalo Express, February u. 

Next to the career of Tammany in New 
York City the building of the Albany Cap¬ 
itol is probably the greatest example of 
practical politics in the country. It was 
begun some thirty years ago under Tweed. 
The limit of the cost was to be three mil¬ 
lions and a half. But when that sum was 
spent the building was complete only to 
the water tables. Some twenty-one mill¬ 
ions in all have so far been spent. The 
work to show for it is comparatively of 
small value. It has been simply a genera¬ 
tion of appropriations drawn from the 
treasury by favorites given places by bosses 
who rendered little service in return. 
Successive party bosses have worked this 
gigantic scheme of robbery until a child 
born when the corner stone was laid is 
now well on toward middle age. 

In Harper's Weekly of February 15, we 
find the following description of two paint¬ 
ings by Elihu Vedder for the new congres¬ 
sional library which we give, with the re¬ 
mark that one should be spread upon the 
walls of the Albany senate as expressive of 
its spirit and the other in like manner upon 
the walls of the assembly ; 

To the left of the central panel Mr. Vedder 
places his allegory of corrupt legislation. A 
robust, beautiful figure, with an Ignoble face. 
Is seated carelessly upon a throne, of which the 


arms are painted to represent horns of plenty. 
But all the plenitude Is flowing tow-ard the 
woman herself. She bears a parody of the 
scales of Justice with a sliding weight. An old 
man of crafty countenance sits at her left In 
possesion of the law’, the ballot and riches. He 
places a bribe In the scales. On the other side 
a child stands showing a useless distaff, and 
apparently pleading In vain for work. The little 
Jar In which the child’s savings might have 
been hoarded lies broken at her feet. Behind 
her are smokeless chimneys, but In the back¬ 
ground beyond the rich briber the factories are 
seen In full operation, their chimneys eloquent 
of busy life below’. In the next panel the dire 
outcome of corruption Is portrayed. The paint¬ 
ing represents the brawny Goddess of Anarchy 
trampling the ruins of an arch. Her crown Is 
of serpents. In one hand she bears a lighted 
torch made of a scroll, and In the other she 
holds a cup. She Is spurning under her feet, 
and casting Into the ruin beneath her, symbols 
of religion, law, learning and the arts. She Is 
aided by a figure of Ignorance on her right,w’ho 
uses a surveyor’s staff for her fell purpose. Ig¬ 
norance Is kneeling on a millstone rendered 
useless by anarchy, and a broken and rusted 
cog-w’heel resting w’lth It among the thorns of 
desolation suggests Industry abandoned to ruin 
and decay. On the left of the central figure Is 
a muscular type of violence engaged In the re¬ 
moval of the corner-stone from a building. He 
has his eyes fixed on the cup of madness In the 
hand of the goddess. A lighted bomb In the 
foreground Is a reminder that anarchy contains 
w’lthln Itself the seed of Its own destruction. 

MURPHY AND SHEA. 

Boss Murphy, of Troy, otherwise known as 
Senator Murphy, of New York, stands by 
his heelers when they get into trouble. He 
pleaded with Governor Morton to commute 
the sentence of “ Bat ” Shea, who killed Rob¬ 
ert Ross, a republican election watcher at the 
polls, and who is to be executed next week. 
Murphy’s sou went to see the governor in 
Shea’s behalf, as his father’s representative, 
but the governor refused to interfere. It was 
the Murphy machine which prompted the 
row in which Ross was killed, and Murphy 
is warranted in feeling a little annoyed that 
his political methods should have cost two 
lives at one election.— Springfield Republican. 

♦ * » 

The confession of John McGough that he, 
and not Bartholomew Shea, was the murderer 
of Robert Ross, will fall on incredulous ears. 
His statement, however, makes necessary the 
postponement of Shea’s execution and a new 
trial. Just before Shea was respited by the 
governor in December, the Albany Argus 
printed a story hinting at some such develop¬ 
ment as this. Later the Troy Times asserted that 
the politicians who have befriended Shea from the 
first were planning to secure a confession from Mc¬ 
Gough in case all other steps to save Shea should 
fail. Matters have turned out exactly as fore¬ 
told. 

The evidence against Shea was of the most 
positive character. The murder was commit¬ 
ted in open daylight, and was seen by many 
persons. Witnesses who had no possible mo¬ 
tive for fixing the guilt on the wrong man, 
swore to having seen Shea fire the fatal shot. 
If now it could be proved that these witnesses 
were mistaken, there would be no possibility 
of ever establishing a case which could send 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


297 


anybody to the electric chair for Robert Ross’s 
murder. Even McGough’s own confession 
would not do it, for he would probably deny 
the truth of the confession on his own trial, 
after having secured the release of Shea, and 
no other testimony could be found against 
him which would stand under the light of 
the previous testimony given against Shea. 

Shea’s crime was one of the most infamous 
ever committed in this state. He was em¬ 
ployed by the democratic machine in Troy to 
intimidate republican voters. It has been evi¬ 
dent from the first that powerful political influence 
has been exerted to save him from the consequen¬ 
ces of his act. The public well remembers the 
scandalous blindness of the Troy police officials 
at the time of the murder. They first ar¬ 
rested one of the murdered man’s friends and 
openly asserted that they had a clear case against 
him, though numerous witnesses tvere coming for¬ 
ward voluntarily and declaring that Shea was the 
guilty man. It required poiverful pressure to secure 
Shea’s arrest at all. A day or two after the murder 
a statement defending him was issued to the public 
over the signatures of two high officials of the demo¬ 
cratic stale machine at Albany. The warden of 
Dannemora prison, in whose charge McQough now 
is, owes his appointment to Senator Murphy and is 
counted one of the active members of the Troy ma¬ 
chine. 

If McGough’s confession fails to stand the 
li^ht of examination in court, steps should be 
taken to see who the plotters are and to what 
extent they are interested in the crimes of Mc- 
Gough and Shea. The responsibility for 
Robert Ross’s death rests primarily on other 
souls than the wretch who fired the shot. 
There is no place in the state of New York 
for the politics which employs murder to gain 
its ends or upholds murder when a political 
tool has blundered into it.— Buffalo Express, 
January 6. 

* * * 

All the circumstances connected with the 
getting up of this confe.ssion point to it as a 
last desperate move of the Murphy ring to 
save their tool Shea. The warden of the 
prison from which McGough’s confession was 
given out was twenty years ago a compositor 
in a Troy newspaper office. He “got into poli¬ 
tics,” and finally, through Senator Murphy’s 
influence, secured the important position 
which he now holds at Dannemora.— Troy dis¬ 
patch, New York Evening Post, January 7. 

^ ^ ^ 

A mass meeting of the citizens of Troy was 
held this evening under the auspices of the 
committee of public safety. It was a very 
large and earnest gathering. An address to 
the public was adopted, reviewing the facts 
regarding the murder of Robert Ross on March 
6, 1894, and the trial, conviction, and sentence 
to death of Bartholomew Shea for the crime. 
It also quotes from the unanimous opinion of 
the court of appeals, written by Judge Peck- 
ham, sustaining the verdict, and expressing 
detestation of the practices which resulted in 
the tragedy. 

In conclusion, the address says: 


McGough’s so-called confession Is a part of a 
trick to enable McGough to save his partner In 
crime without Incurring additional punishment 
himself. It Is at variance with the facts es¬ 
tablished at the trial, and Is not worthy of 
serious consideration. It Is the unsupported 
word of a criminal; a thief, who served a term 
for burglary and larceny; a convict, w'ho is now 
serving a term for attempted murder; a self- 
confessed perjurer, who swore that he saw 
Boland shoot Ross, and who now says he did 
the shooting himself. We prefer to believe the 
testimony of the fifteen respectable men who 
saw the occurrence, and Identified Shea as the 
man who did the shooting. Mindful of this In¬ 
junction, we are here to-night to reassert our 
belief In the sanctity of the ballot, to express 
anew our detestation of the crime In resisting 
which Robert Ross met his death; to give voice 
to our Indignation at all Improper attempts to 
frustrate justice, to uphold the officers of the 
law in their efforts to bring the guilty to pun¬ 
ishment, and to ask for the co-operation and 
moral support of all good citizens throughout 
our republic. We are not actuated by any de¬ 
sire for revenge. We deplore the death of Rob¬ 
ert Ross, but his murderers were guilty of a 
still greater crime; for. In the murder of a citi¬ 
zen they were guilty of a crime against the re¬ 
public and against republican Institutions. If 
such a crime Is to go unpunished, ‘ ‘ government 
of the people, by the people, for the people,” 
must perish from the earth.—rroy dispatch. New 
York Times, January 14. 

» » » 

Osborne C. Lansing, one of the most impor¬ 
tant witnesses for the prosecution in the trial 
of “Bat” Shea, was attacked on the street by 
four men in this city last night. He was 
struck on the head and badly bruised. One 
of the assailants said, “You went to Schoharie 
to try to get in some testimony in the Shea 
case, didn’t you?” This is not the first time 
that Mr. Lansing has been assaulted since he 
gave testimony in the Shea trial.— Troy dis¬ 
patch, January SO. 

* * * 

Immediately, friends of the condemned cir¬ 
culated petitions asking the governor to com¬ 
mute the sentence to life imprisonment. Those 
who refused to sign were threatened. Several 
storekeepers were boycotted by the Shea fac¬ 
tion. The proprietor of a large concern was 
forced to take his advertisement out of a news 
paper that had kept up a constant fire against 
Shea. Senator Murphy, head of the famous polit¬ 
ical machine that bears his name, wrote a personal 
letter to the governor asking for commutation of the 
sentence. Other democrats of national and slate 
renown made the same request. The strongest polit¬ 
ical and personal influence was brought to bear upon 
Governor Morion to mollify the sentence. 

For two years the chair in electrocution 
chamber at Clinton prison has been waiting 
for Shea, and five distinct times has it been 
prepared to receive him, four occasions seeing 
the law temporarily cheated of its victim. 

The sensational episodes that have marked 
the case since the commission of the crime and 
down to the day of the execution will not be 
lacking to-morrow. It is a singular and rather 
horrible fact that Shea will be executed by his 
friends. Warden Thayer, who will read the 
death warrant to him, has known him from 
boyhood, living in the same city with him. 
Deputy Warden McKenna, who will lead the 


procession of death as a guard to the prisoner, 
is also from Troy and knew the convicted man 
well.— Buffalo Express. 

^ ^ 

The funeral of Bat Shea to day was made 
the occasion of a great demonstration by his 
friends and morbid sympathizers. Crowds of 
curious persons struggled until midnight last 
night to get into the house where the body 
lay, and the mass of people in front of the en¬ 
trance extended across the street so as to im¬ 
pede the passage of the cars. A squad of 
police tried to keep the crowd under control. 
At each of the collar shops yesterday funds 
were subscribed by the girl employes for the 
purchase of flowers and for the funeral ex¬ 
penses, $300 being raised in one shop. A great 
crowd assembled to see the funeral procession, 
and a reserve force of police was kept on duty. 
Although cold weather and a driving snow¬ 
storm prevailed, as early as seven o’clock the 
cars going toward the location of the church 
were jammed with persons anxious to get a 
good position in the church. The streets be¬ 
tween Shea’s home and the church, a distance 
of about a half-mile, were filled with specta¬ 
tors so that traffic was cut ofiF. At the house 
and at the church squads of police from the 
reserve force made attempts to keep the 
crowds in abeyance, but with poor effect. By 
nine o’clock the church was filled and fully 
10,000 persons crowded the thoroughfares.— 
Troy dispatch, February IS. 

« » « 

The last scheme of the machine was to pro¬ 
cure a new trial for Shea on the ground of 
newly discovered evidence in the form of a 
confession of a fellow-heeler, one McGough, 
who is in prison for complicity in Shea’s 
crime, but this effort has failed, and Shea 
went to the electric chair on Tuesday. It is 
to be hoped that the two New York senators, 
both of whom have encouraged and profited 
by the methods of electioneering which logic¬ 
ally resulted in the killing of Ross, and who 
are therefore — Murphy especially — morally 
responsible for Shea’s crime and its conse¬ 
quences, will give a thought to their victim. 
—Springfleld Republican, February I 4 . 

♦ ♦ ♦ 

Bossism in the government of a city reached 
its logical conclusion in the execution this 
morning of “Bat” Shea for the murder that he 
committed in Troy two years ago, in carrying 
out the orders of the machine to which he 
was attached. The man who has been put to 
death by the state to-day was in himself only 
an ordinary criminal, whose just punishment 
would invite no comment; but he was part of 
a system which extended from the ward poli¬ 
tics of his city to the capital of the nation, 
and which placed Edward Murphy in the sen¬ 
ate of the United States » * * 

Shea was poor and friendless. But he was 
defended upon his trial by lawyers of great 
ability, who always charge large fees for their 
services. No expense was spared to secure 
the best possible presentation of his case on 
each of the successive appeals to higher courts. 
When the McGough “confession” offered a 









298 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


loophole of escape through the meshwork of 
legal technicalities, legal ability was again at 
the wretched convict’s service. There was, of 
course, only one possible explanation of all 
this, as well as of the suspicious fact,that the 
“confession” was made to a prison official 
who was a protege of Murphy. The Troy 
machine was standing by its man all the way 
from the polling place where he led a gang of 
repeaters to cheat for it to the electric chair 
at Dannemora, from which it would have 
saved him if money could have found ability 
enough to circumvent the law. 

“Bat” Shea has been justly executed. A 
worthless brute, his crime was without defense 
or excuse. But Shea was not alone to blame 
that he is put to death at the age of twenty- 
five for a murder done in the course of “poli¬ 
tics,” as he understood it, instead of earning 
an honest living at his trade as a moulder. 
He was the mere tool of the machine which 
has long made Troy the worst governed city 
of its size in the Union. He would not have 
been “in politics,” he would not have been 
breaking up caucuses, be would not have 
been leading a gang of repeaters from one 
voting place to another, he would not have 
armed himself and would not have used his 
weapon on election day, if the machine organ¬ 
ized by Edward Murphy had not educated 
him to secure a majority for its candidate at 
any cost. 

Society has done its duty in the case of 
“Bat” Shea .so far as he is concerned. But its 
duty in the case is not done when he is exe¬ 
cuted. It should visit punishment upon the 
man who is morally responsible for his crime. 
The head of the democratic machine in Troy 
can not be convicted of murder in any court. 
But Edward Murphy is morally guilty of an 
attempt to murder a system of government 
that can only live when elections are honest. 
Public sentiment should serve notice on the 
United States senator from Troy that he is 
held responsible as a partner in the crime that 
was punished by the execution at Dannemora 
this morning.— New York Evening Post. 

MARYLAND REPUBLICANS AND 
CIVIL SERVICE REFORM. 

(From The Baltimore Sun.) 

An Absorbing Occupation. 

The leaders of the party are beginning to 
realize that too much time has been needlessly 
consumed without any result, and they have 
seen the necessity of curbing the rank spirit 
of spoils which is rampant everywhere. 

It is learned from the applications filed in 
the executive department, that nearly one- 
half the members of the legislature are after 
office for themselves, and in their pursuit of 
spoils, seem to wholly neglect the interest of 
constituencies. 

Nothing like it was ever known in a Mary¬ 
land legislature before. Up to date, only one 
bill has been passed by both houses, and that 
received the approval of the governor this 
morning. It was a bill sanctioning the sale 


and conveyance by John M. Glenn and Wm. 
L. Glenn of a lot of ground at the southwest 
corner of Preston and Chester streets in the 
city of Baltimore to the vestry of the Church 
of the Atonement. This is the first fruit of 
legislation. 

One-third of the session has elapsed and 
nothing in the way of legislation has been 
completed, except this private bill. The dif¬ 
ficulty of the situation seems to be not so 
much with the party leaders as with the 
members of the legislature, who are more en¬ 
grossed in the struggle over spoils than in the 
struggle for good government. 

Republican Clubs Sound The Alarm. 

At a meeting of the First Legislative Dis¬ 
trict Association of Republican Clubs, held 
at the Fairmount Republican Club of the third 
ward, George W. Golden, of the Active Club, 
presiding, and VV. A. Johnson, Jr., secretary 
pro tern., the following resolutions were adopted: 
“That we call upon our representatives in 
the house of delegates to use every honorable 
means to defeat the Bruce civil service law or sub¬ 
mit it to the vote of the people, and we would sug 
gest to all other republican clubs of the city 
to prevail upon their representatives to work to¬ 
gether to that end. That we indorse the manly 
and courageous stand taken by Senator Wil¬ 
kinson, of St. Mary’s county, and commend 
his action as an example for all republican 
members to follow.” 

At a meeting of the thirteenth ward regu¬ 
lar Republican Club, resolutions were adopted 
that: “We earnestly condemn the Bruce 

civil service bill as presented before the legis¬ 
lature, and demand that members of that 
body, elected by our votes, shall vigorously 
oppose it as being un-American, un-demo- 
cratic and un-republican, and in the interest 
of a privileged class, which would build up 
an office-holding aristocracy never intended 
by the founders of our government, and 
against which a vast majority will protest at 
the ballot-box if the opportunity be given 
them.” 

The following resolution was left at the<Swn 
office last night: 

“ The Iloyd Downs Republicons of the 16 
Ward do here by comden and oppose The 
passag of the Bruce Civles bill in the house of 
Legature.” 


Mr. Charles J. Bonaparte’s Answer. 

“Gentlemen of the association,” said Mr. 
Bonaparte, “the time has come to speak 
plainly. 

“A little more than a year ago, in an ad¬ 
dress to the Unit Club of the twelfth ward, I 
told the managers of the democratic party 
that in the choice of Judge Dobler, in the 
republican majority throughout the state at 
the election of 1894, the people of Maryland 
had given them ‘ a notice to quit,’ not, indeed, 
an absolute notice, but a fair warning, that 
unless they remedied abuses long since scandal¬ 
ous and discarded, leaders long since tried 
and found wanting within the year next to 


elapse, that year would see the end of their 
party’s rule. 

“ I say to-night to the leaders of the repub¬ 
lican party, that it will be driven from power 
before it has ruled as many months as its 
rival did years, unless they promptly rebuke 
the insolence and rapacity of its parasites, 
abandon at once and finally practices de¬ 
cisively condemned by public opinion, and 
satisfy far better than they have yet shown 
either ability or desire to satisfy the reason¬ 
able expectations of those through whose 
votes, labors and sacrifices power was given 
them. ' 

“I say to Governor Lowndes, that if he 
were a candidate for his present office at an 
election to be held to-morrow, thousands of 
votes which he received in November would 
be cast for his late or almost any other com¬ 
petitor, and thousands more would not be 
cast at all. He would be in grave danger of 
defeat, and I do not believe that in this city 
his vote would equal that of his party in 1894. 

“It is fair to say that the gathering storm 
of public indignation, whose mutterings may 
be drowned in the clamor of office-seekers 
and the wrangling of greedy factions for the 
governor and his advisers, but which grows 
daily louder and more threatening, is due to 
nothing which Governor Lowndes has himself 
said or done, and it isdue much less to what the 
general assembly has done or its members 
have said, at least in debate, than to what it 
has left undone, and to the impudent boasts 
of notorious political adventurers—boasts ap¬ 
parently but too well warranted—regarding 
its probable action and the motives and influ¬ 
ences which will determine this. 

“The typical ‘republican club’ is well-known 
in Baltimore politics. It is one of the many 
unhappy fruits of our proximity to Washing¬ 
ton and of the long control of federal patron¬ 
age by the party here in an evident minority. 
Its genesis is familiar to us all. A politician, 
booming himself for some office, ‘rounds up’ 
in a room he has hired over a grog shop, a 
herd of shabby loafers, buys for them on the 
instalment plan, a second hand table and 
chairs, guarantees them a reasonable credit at 
the bar down stairs, picks out one relatively 
sober as president and one not wholly illiterate 
as secretary, and, behold the Elijah Pogram 
Republican Club of the twenty-third ward, 
born on its brief life and ready to ‘resolute’ 
and ‘delegate’ in its owner’s interest. 

“When these gentry tell us that they detest 
civil service reform they give us no news. We 
are as ready to believe this as that they abhor 
cleanliness and sobriety and honest industry, 
and well nigh everything which makes man 
estimable, or life in civilized society a source 
of happiness. If the convicts in our peniten. 
tiary or the prisoners in our jail gravely re¬ 
solved that they didn’t like those laws which 
prevent or punish larceny, no one would ques¬ 
tion their sincerity. The Australian chorus 
was doubtless hearty: 

“ ‘We’ll damn that Jury, every man, 

“ ‘That sent him to Botany Bay.’ 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


299 


“One of the greatest blessings conferred by 
civil service reform upon a community which 
thoroughly and honestly adopts it is that it 
forces hundreds, even thousands, of men to 
work for their living who would otherwise 
grovel in penury, idleness and sordid vice, 
doing all sorts of political odd jobs in the 
hope that they may somehow, by hook or by 
crook, and usually the latter, pick up a tran¬ 
sient and precarious living at the tax-payers’ 
cost. No one who knows anything of degraded 
human nature will wonder that it is as odious 
to those it would thus transform as are soap 
and water to a tramp, and their clumsy ex¬ 
pression of the hatred they feel for it would 
not be worth mention were this not serious 
and menacing as a symptom—a symptom be¬ 
cause it shows the course which responsible 
politicians of the party, on which these men 
sponge, will take if they dare; the clubs are 
allowed, even encouraged, to ask them to defy 
public opinion, that they may judge whether 
such defiance will be safe. 

“Gentlemen of the association, you have 
been called together to aid in answering this 
question. When I say, as I do, without a 
moment’s doubt or hesitancy, that to put or 
keep in power such a party as theirs would 
then become I would not move a finger, spend 
a dollar, write or speak a word, would not 
even cast my vote or lend my name, it is, to 
them and to the public, a matter of small 
moment if I speak for myself alone. I be¬ 
lieve that in saying this I voice the thoughts 
of thousands of my fellow-citizens, just as I 
believed a year since that, as I then felt, so 
had a majority of the voters of Maryland 
come to feel. I ask you, gentlemen of the as¬ 
sociation, to say, as plainly as I have spoken, 
whether you think I am right.”—The Sun, 
February 5. 

Reply of The Malster Republican Club. 

“Mr. Charles J. Bonaparte has, with his 
disregard of truth, asserted in an address be¬ 
fore the civil service reform league that which 
is false and slanderous as to the republican 
clubs of this city,” and “ that theclub denounce 
his statements as infamously false and the 
ravings of a fanatic against which we call 
upon all the republican clubs to vigorously 
protest.” 

Another. 

At a meeting of the Wm. H. Schilling Re¬ 
publican Association of Baltimore the follow¬ 
ing resolutions were unamimously adopted: 

“We commend the action of all the mem¬ 
bers of the legislature who absented themselves 
from the meeting called for the 6th of Febru¬ 
ary by the reform league of Balto. City 
and addressed specially by Charles J. Bona¬ 
parte for the passage of the Bruce civil service 
bill at Annapolis. Many of these are active 
members of the republican clubs referred to in 
a former Speech by this Man Bonaparte And 
he justly deserves the censure of all good 
thinking Men. 

“We are Not of the Herd of Shabby Loafers 
of the New Territory Ward 23 referred to by 


Charles J. Bonaparte. We are American Citi¬ 
zens fully able to defend our Course against 
Civil Service. And We Consider the Source 
from whence Came Such foul and filthy I.an- 
guage Eminating from this Man Bonaparte 
Who on a previous occasion has Compared 
our public Schools as Common Soup house. 

“W’e are not disposed to rest under such 
Language and refections. We care not for 
the opinion of Bonaparte—our Characters for 
Cleanliness, Sobriety and honesty will compare 
with his. We do not Live over Liquor Stores 
or Lager Beer Saloons and our furniture is 
not of the make up he no doubt would Like 
it to be. one Second hand Table and Chair 
bought on the Installment plan. Not blessed 
perhaps as Bonaparte with the Silk Tapestry 
and Cushion Chair to Lounge upon But being 
Voters we can measure arms with you at the 
ballot box and this right we reserve to our¬ 
selves and Civil Service we will defeat if left 
to the Voice of the people whence it should 
rightfully and properly go. 

“We denounce all such unjust Legislation 
and will not forget those who are Endeavour¬ 
ing to make the Legislature believe that Civil 
Service was an issue in our Last Campaign. 
W’e deny that such was the Case—And it was 
not a part of the platform of the Republican 
party adopted at Cambridge—And we call 
upon our friends in the Lower house of our 
assembly to stand by us in our rights and de¬ 
feat the Bruce bill as we believe you will or 
send it to the people. 

“Chicago and New York were granted this 
privilege as argued by those who favor this 
bill. Now let the people of Maryland have 
the say also at the ballot box.” 

Mr. Bonaparte Closes. 

“ What they say about me will hurt no one— 
not even themselves—while their indorsement 
of the principles of civil service reform may 
do good to their party and to the community. 
Indeed, I should be pleased to see the Bruce 
bill amended by a clause disqualifying me 
for any state or city oflSce of trust or profit 
for the rest of my life if that would insure 
its immediate passage. Such a clause would 
not cost the republican party a single vote— 
at all events, would not cost it mine—while 
the bill’s defeat or its serious injury by amend¬ 
ment will, in my humble judgment, drive 
that party from power at the next general 
election with the approval and possibly the 
help of thousands of citizens who feel as I do. 
‘I am accustomed to displeasing politicians; 
pretty much all my connection with public 
affairs has consisted in treading on tender 
feet, and I am prepared for the usual sounds 
to follow. These are, after all, very harmless. 
If the republican party in Maryland prefers 
my room to my company I shall not insist 
upon staying where I am not wanted, and I 
hope to survive the separation.” 

Before The Legislature. 

“ I will endeavor by what I may say to re¬ 
deem some of my misdeeds, whether in the 
remote or near past, by one virtue—that of 


advocating a civil service reform bill,” said 
Mr. Charles J. Bonaparte. “We are here for 
two things. First, as to what we want, and 
second, to tell you that we want it very much. 
The last is the more important, and I think 
I speak for the whole of this large delegation 
when I say that we ask earnestly and unceas¬ 
ingly for this bill. 

“ It has been said that it is the desire of 
many delegates to submit the bill to the peo¬ 
ple. This experiment has been tried. In 
New York a similar law has been made part 
of the organic law of the state by popular 
vote. In Chicago the opportunity was offered 
lo vote on this question when no other issue 
was involved and it was adopted. 

“The time has passed to question whether 
or not the people of Baltimore want a merit 
system applied. A grave responsibility rests 
upon any legislative body which will longer 
keep open the door of the spoils system. We 
think we voice the sentiment of the people of 
Baltimore when we say we do want this bill. 

“ Public opinion asks this legislature to 
place itself on record in the application of 
the merit system to offices the incumbents 
of which are paid by the tax-payers of Balti¬ 
more city. On this question the public mind 
is made up.” 

Mr. Joseph Packard, Jr., who followed, ex¬ 
plained the features of the pending bill. 
Among other things, he said : “ Many demo¬ 

crats who voted against their party last elec¬ 
tion did so by reason of the pledge of the 
successful party that a civil service reform 
bill should be enacted. We are willing to 
accept it now as only applicable to Baltimore, 
for we remember the reform of the Australian 
ballot. This at first was not of general ap¬ 
plication, but after its good results had been 
demonstrated, the exempted counties were not 
only willing, but anxious to come in.” 

“ There seems as much sense in civil service 
reform to those who don’t know anything 
about it,” said John C. Rose, “ as there was in 
Mr. Bonaparte’s description of a typical re¬ 
publican club. Examinations for place may 
accomplish all that is claimed, and may not 
always produce the best results, but they will 
serve to keep notoriously unfit persons out of 
public positions. When a democratic senate 
has passed a civil service bill it is necessary 
for the republican house to go one better, and 
not only pass this bill, but all other reform 
measures as speedily as possible. By doing 
this we will carry out the governor’s promise 
and keep the state in line in 1896. The 
scramble for office will break up the republi¬ 
can party, and will only provoke further dis¬ 
graceful primary elections, of which the re¬ 
publicans of Baltimore have already given us 
a sample.” 

Mr. T. Wallis Blackistone said, he was one 
of the democrats who voted the republican 
ticket and who had induced other democrats 
to do so, because of the promises to pass this 
measure. “ If you do not do so,” he contin¬ 
ued, “ we will be taunted by those democrats 










300 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


who said we only aided in putting out one set 
of spoilsmen so that another might get in. I 
took your platform in good faith as did more 
than 10.000'democrats in Baltimore city who 
voted your ticket.” 

Mr. J. Frank Supplee, the last speaker, 
said he wanted to add his condemnation to 
the charge of Mr. Bonaparte, that republican 
club members were loafers and bums. It was 
unfair, he said, to attack all the clubs because 
a few had been unwise enough to repudiate 
this measure. 


Later, the Boys Have An Inning. 

President W. Cabell Bruce, of tue senate, the 
champion of civil service reform, as he sat in 
the space before the speaker’s desk in the hall 
of the house of delegates this morning, re¬ 
minded the spectators of Daniel in the den of 
lions. He was in the midst of the delegates 
from the republican clubs who had come down 
to have their say in opposition to civil service 
reform. They did not eat Mr. Bruce, but they 
roared at him extremely. 

Amid the hoots and jeers and laughter of a 
reform legislature he was denounced as a “pol¬ 
itical highwayman” and the “champion spoils¬ 
man of the time, who had put himself upon 
the bargain counter for sale to either of the 
parties who would take him.” And yet the 
champion of civil service reform was before a 
civil service reform committee and in the 
midst of people solemnly pledged to that 
measure. 

The members of the legislature from the city 
who had sullenly absented themselves from 
the reform meeting last week when Messrs. 
Bonaparte, Gaither, Smith and others spoke 
in favor of reform, gathered into this meeting 
and laughed and applauded and jeered and 
made merry in turn. It was a great contrast. 

Mr. Brnce stood his ground like a courage¬ 
ous man and compelled this reluctant crowd 
to give him a respectful hearing. They 
groaned and hissed when he mentioned Chas, 
J. Bonaparte’s name, but he even made them 
listen to him as he spoke of the honesty and 
courage of that gentleman. 

Major A. M. Hancock made a speech which 
created the wildest enthusiasm. He said it 
seems to be assumed, especially in Baltimore, 
that the house of delegates is incapable of do¬ 
ing its work and every civil service society 
and every reform society esteems it its duty to 
formulate bills and send them down here and 
demand their enactment. The house is de¬ 
nounced because they have not turned things 
upside down and made heaven of hell and in 
forty days wiped from the statute books the 
accumulated legislation of Basin and Lana- 
han for thirty years. 

Turning to President Bruce, who sat just in 
front of him, not ten feet away. Major Han¬ 
cock said: 

“I consider William Cabell Bruce the most 
unmitigated spoilsman in the United States. 
He is the only political highwayman. He 
has put himself upon the bargain counter to 
go to the highest bidder. When tie saw John 


Walter Smith going to the president’s chair 
in the senate he cried, ‘Stop! Give me that 
office or I will go over to the republicans.’ 
Such a spectacle has not been seen as that 
presented by Mr. Bruce when he tells a re¬ 
publican governor that his appointments must 
be satisfactory to him or they will all be held 
up. Is there no manhood in the republican 
party that we should stand this?” 

Then the Major turned his attention to Mr. 
Charles J. Bonaparte. He said Mr. Bonaparte 
is so light that he treads the upper air and 
does not get down to the earth. His Corsican 
blood makes him favor the vendetta. 

Mr. Thomas W. Blades followed in a speech 
of fifteen minutes. He considered the civil 
service bill a plot of the kid glove, silk-stock¬ 
ing gentry to create a monopoly to rule the 
country by an oligarchy. He honored Sena¬ 
tor Wilkinson because it had been said he 
could not do a sum in long division and could 
not take an examination which would entitle 
him to the place of screwman in a tobacco 
warehouse. “If you don’t intend to kill the 
bill,” Mr. Blades concluded, “give it to the 
people and they will kill it.” 

Mayor Hooper’s ideas of civil service re¬ 
form and economy, particularly the latter, 
have not made him very popular with mem¬ 
bers of the Log Oabin {republican) Club, on 
East Montgomery street. Members of the 
club think he is inclined to abolish too many 
officers, and to retain too many democrats in 
office. Last night members of the club turned 
his large picture to the wall, and then held a 
jollification meeting over it. The picture is a 
nicely framed crayon, which Mayor Hooper 
presented to the club during the late cam¬ 
paign .—Baltimore American, February 1. 

From The Sun Editorials. 

The republican party in Maryland has ar¬ 
rived, sooner, perhaps, than its members ex¬ 
pected, at the “parting of the ways,” when 
it must definitely decide which road it will 
take. Entrusted, provisionally and on proba¬ 
tion, with a measure of political power which 
it has never before enjoyed in this city and 
state, and may never enjoy again, it is brought 
face to face with its own pledges and promises, 
upon the faith and strength of which its candi¬ 
dates were elected last November, and it is 
called upon to say whether it means to keep 
those pledges or not. And when we speak of 
the republican party, we do not refer to a 
mere political entity, much less an abstrac¬ 
tion, we mean the republican governor, mem¬ 
bers of the legislature and city council, who 
but for their solemn promises of reform, would 
not to-day be occupying their present places. 
Mayor Hooper thus far stands almost alone in 
the readiness and determination he has ex¬ 
hibited to fulfill the pledges to which he owes 
his election. How about the rest—the other 
ninety-and-nine who have yet to show by their 
works that they have either recognition or re¬ 
membrance of the causes and influences which 
wafted them into power? 


Let them make no mistake. The healthy, 
honest indignation of the people, which was 
strong enough to crush the thirty-years’-old 
despotism of the democratic bosses, will 
trample out of existence the cockatrice’s eggs 
of republican misrule and corruption before 
the end of as many months. The loud¬ 
mouthed, shallow-pated republican politicians 
who are proclaiming their devotion to the 
spoils system will never be allowed to grow to 
the stature of “bosses.” They will die young 
—plucked up by the roots in their greenness 
and immaturity by the same hands which 
so mercilessly rooted out the weeds and tares 
in the democratic garden, even at the cost of 
laying the garden waste. In fact, there is and 
will be far less toleration of republican mis- 
government than there was of democratic. 
There are none of the associations, the habits 
and prejudices of long years, almost a lifetime, 
to plead in behalf of republican abuses and 
their authors. The old servant had abused 
his trust, had been warned and admonished 
year after year, and it cost an effort, a painful 
effort, afterward to dismiss and get rid of him. 
The new servant, who has no such old lies and 
associations to appeal to, if he shows himself 
worthless, impudent or dishonest, will be 
shown the door without hesitation or mercy. 


If the republican party shall follow in the 
footsteps of the democratic ring and show 
itself unworthy of the trust committed to it, it 
will meet the same fate. Whether it will sub¬ 
stantially redeem its promises und satisfy 
public expectations remains to be determined, 
but whether it does or not, the revolution of 
last fall can not fail to be productive of good 
results. If it accomplishes nothing else, the 
storm has at least partially purified the polit¬ 
ical atmosphere as far as the democratic parly j 
is concerned, and by freeing that party from* 
the malign influences that have disgraced its 
management has put it in a position to recover 
public confidence and support. The party 
can, of course, once more bow its neck to the 
yoke and put up its hands for the fetters of 
political serfdom, but for the present it is 
emancipated, and it can, if it chooses work 
out its own salvation and redemption. Above 
all and better than all, last year’s campaign 
has demonstrated the power of the people and 
sown the seeds of independent political thought 
and action so essential to free and pure gov¬ 
ernment; and we have made an incalculable 
gain in the emancipation of the manhood of 
the state from the political thraldom to which 
it had been subject so long, and in the perpet" 
ual warning which has been served upon bosses 
of both political parties. 

Secretary Morton, of the department of 
agriculture, has appointed John Nordhous, 
of Chicago, Ill., his private secretary. Mr. 
Nordhous entered the agricultural department 
in 1893, through the civil service, and his pro¬ 
motion is a recognition by Secretary Morton 
of the merit system. Mr. Nordhous, for the 
past year, has been acting as stenographer to 
the secretary. 






















The Civil service chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 37. 


INDIANAPOLIS, MARCH, 1896. terms 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

IndianapolU, Ind. 


Secretary Carlisle is being urged for 
the presidency in some very respectable 
quarters. The position in which Mr. 
Cleveland will leave the civil service 
makes the choice of the next president a 
matter of vast importance. He can not 
upset what Mr, Cleveland will do, but he 
can play tricks which will appreciably 
prolong the life of the spoils system. Now 
to be plain about the matter, the Civil 
Service Chronicle has steadily pub¬ 
lished facts which show that under Secre¬ 
tary Carlisle such tricks have been very 
common. Yet Civil Service Commissioner 
Rice, in a recent address in Boston, says: 
“Every member of the present cabinet 
believes thoroughly in the merit system 
and shows his belief by active co opera¬ 
tion with the commission in its enforce¬ 
ment.” Either the Chronicle has been 
mistaken, ©r Secretary Carlisle has been 
converted. What explanation can be made 
for the actions of Logan Carlisle? We can 
furnish an ugly list of facts, some of them 
of recent date, and none of them have 
ever been explained. Mr. Carlisle lately 
asked congress to provide for some money 
counters and not put them under the civil 
service law, though there is no better sub 
ject for competition. Will some one fur¬ 
nish a statement of the politics of the men 
actually appointed? The Chronicle is 
open to conviction, and it is the duty of 
those who are urging Mr. Carlisle’s nom¬ 
ination to show conclusively that the civil 
service would not be controlled by Logan 
Carlisle. 

The President is about to make a final 
order which will nearly dispose of the 
spoils system in the federal service. This 
justifies the confidence lately expressed by 
the Chronicle that the battle of civil serv¬ 
ice reform has been won. As we have also 
said, the tricksters who can yet do a good 
deal to beat the law have not all been dis¬ 
posed of, and they maybe expected to hang 
on for some time in a sort of guerrilla fash¬ 
ion and here and there give ground for the 
assertion that the reform is a failure. We 
may expect a good deal of this work should 
the republicans come back in 1897; but it 
will be the expiring kick. Deprived of 
spoil our congressmen will cease to be 


mere trimmers for votes and will put their 
minds to legislation upon business princi¬ 
ples. 

Now that the victory of civil service re¬ 
form has been won, we may soon expect 
“practical” politicians to sum the matter 
up after their manner of summing up the 
slavery question. Everybody knows that 
Garrison had nothing to do with the abo¬ 
lition of slavery except to hinder and re¬ 
tard it. It was the Cotton Whigs who 
deftly managed that transaction. So now 
it will soon begin to appear that George 
William Curtis was only a detriment to 
the advance of civil service reform and 
that the real reformers were the party 
bosses, like Quay, Clarkson, Platt, Brice 
and Gorman. 

It will be remembered that the oflBce of 
pension agent at Indianapolis was sold to 
the present incumbent, upon his promise 
to let Voorhees, Turpie and others name 
the incumbents who were to be quartered 
upon tbe treasury. We understand that 
the promise was largely carried out. Then 
came the order placing the office under 
the civil service law, which was smiled at 
by the local party bosses, who thought they 
knew a trick or two yet. The first vacancy 
was recently filled under the law, and the 
party bosses, the heelers and ward workers, 
were paralyzed at the sight. The opinion 
of no local boss was asked. Neither the 
agent nor his chief clerk, the democratic 
politician, Riley, was consulted. The new 
incumbent is neither a heeler nor a 
worker, and has never had the least part 
in setting up primaries and conventions in 
Indianapolis, nor in “whooping ’er up”for 
Voorhees or Turpie. She is a girl from 
Kentucky! 

There seems to be just a shadow of 
hesitation about nominating Tom Tag¬ 
gart, mayor of this city, as the democratic 
candidate for governor this year. The 
Chronicle believes that after considering 
all the facts there will be no hesitation. 
Taggart’s predecessor carried this city for 
the republicans by nearly three thousand; 
but last fall, two years later, Taggart swept 
it for the democrats by nearly four thou¬ 
sand. Where is there a democrat in these 
times with such a running record as that? 
Then there are the four hospitals for the 
insane, the school for the feeble-minded, 
the home for soldiers’ orphans, the prisons. 


and various other public institutions with 
some thousands of places, all of which may 
be looted, and there is proof to demon¬ 
strate that there is “no civil service non¬ 
sense” about Tom Taggart. Surely there 
will be no hesitation about nominating 
Taggart. He is a man after the machine’s 
own heart. 

The work-house of this county is run 
largely upon the plan of prisons and has a 
considerable number of employes. When 
the republicans got possession of the coun¬ 
ty last year, they adopted the vicious and 
corrupt plan of a clean sweep and filled 
the places with party henchmen and per¬ 
sonal favorites. The other day one of the 
prisoners refused to have his mustache cut 
off, and therefore one of the these new 
guards took out a pistol and shot at him,al¬ 
though the prisoner wore a ball and chain 
and the guard was not in danger. We refer 
to this to show the results of the system. 
The people little understand the amount of 
inhumanity and barbarism displayed to¬ 
ward prisoners in most prisons. The 
warden is usually a political boss arid a 
prominent “third house” man around the 
legislature. The under-employes are po¬ 
litical henchmen. In every dilemma the 
only resort they can think of is brute 
force. The prisoners can rarely make an 
effectual protest, and the party does not 
fear them. It is a curious fact that the 
late republican rib-breaking legislature 
dared to loot the two prisons of this state 
but did not dare to touch the other public 
institutions. Of course it is manifest to 
every humane person that those who deal 
with prisoners should have long experi¬ 
ence, permanence of tenure and be abso¬ 
lutely free from the reach of partisans. 
This would permit humanity to have a fair 
chance. The present system is cruel and 
selfish to the last degree. 

It is well known that the post-office de¬ 
partment has been trying to find out 
whether its letter-carriers do their duty. 
To this end it has sent agents to different 
cities to watch the carriers. There would 
seem to be nothing improper about this. 
A carrier only works eight hours a day, 
and compared with other employments he 
is well paid. If he keeps at his work in¬ 
dustriously during this time, as he 
should, he need not care how many men 
are watching him. Yet a great “howl” 
has been raised over it. Cowardly congrese- 


























302 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


led with it provisions making it almost be¬ 
yond doubt unconstitutional. Their crown- ^ 
ing act was in Baltimore where the mayor \ 
was disposed to carry out the party prom- k 
ises. The party jackals, finding that they 1. 
could not control him, put through the * 
common council an ordinance transferring 3 
the appointments from him to itself. When 
he vetoed this ordinance they passed it « 
over his head. An attempt was made to 5 
get the legislature to save the credit of the ■ 
party by a new law, but the wolves and ■ 
jackals were in complete control and pre- » 
vented legislation. The character of the B 
legislature is showm by the fact that more « 
than one-half of the members want some 
kind of a place. This outcome in Mary- 'j- 
land makes a record of party treachery ■ 
which has few parallels even in American f 
party history. It again shows how impera- I 
tive it is that parties must loosen the hold of T. 
their leeches. Necessary work before elec- f 
tions must be hired and paid for and with I 
that the connection of the party worker v 
with the party management must cease. At * 
present the men who run primaries and ? 
conventions and get paid for it before elec- ‘ 
tion take possession of the party after elec¬ 
tion and do their best to wreck it. In Mary- • 
land they have thoroughly succeeded. At . , 
the next election the party will be driven 
out. Yet we have great faith in Maryland. 

She has a large body of able and fearless- 
men who know what good government is 
and who will sooner or later bring its bless¬ 
ings home to their state and its munici¬ 
palities. 


There must be recorded for Platt a new 
triumph in the passage of the Raines ex¬ 
cise bill, in which the New York legisla- ' 
ture was as subservient as ever the Roman 
senate was to Caesar. The doors were 
locked, no one being allowed to leave, and 
at the ordained moment, the bill was 
passed. The bill is a curious and refined ■ 
scheme of tyranny, and of one-man power, 
and really fit to be classed with those by 
which governments in all ages have gone 
onto imperialism and absolutisma'nd final 
ruin. This bill was passed because it 
cj’eates a compact set of lucrative offices 
which it is proposed to fill through the 
chief excise commissioner acting under 
the direction of the boss. The yearly' 
emoluments amount to a quarter of a mill¬ 
ion. As a political machine it is admira¬ 
ble and the capabilities of taking financial 
interests by the throat on the stand-and- 
deliver plan are almost beyond estimate. 
The measure is now in the hands of Platt’s 
governor, Morton, who will do with it ex¬ 
actly as Platt dictates. 


men have made themselves hoarse de¬ 
nouncing the “spy system.” The other day, 
when the appropriation was under debate 
in the house, a committee of letter-carriers 
in uniform appeared in the gallery, ap¬ 
parently as a threat. The attempt of asso 
ciations of government employes to bully 
congressmen can not be met and defeated 
too soon. In the carriers’ case, the propos¬ 
al that local postmasters could do all nec¬ 
essary inspecting is worthless, and will 
continue to be worthless so long as local post¬ 
masters are politicians, and merely four- 
year men. No such man knows enough 
about his office to inspect anything, and 
many of them are not beyond local pulls. 
The Chronicle has always stood for fair 
play and open competition in getting into 
the service; it stands also for strict dis¬ 
cipline and a faithful performance of duty, 
and it knows that there is no way to secure 
this except by a rigid inspection free from 
local influences. What would be said if a 
committee of soldiers appeared in the gal¬ 
lery in uniform to see that members 
“talked right” in a debate on an army ap¬ 
propriation? 


The court of appeals of New York has 
long ranked as one of the great courts of 
the world, and nothing better entitles it to 
that rank than its recent decision inter¬ 
preting the civil service section of the 
new constitution. That section says: “Ap¬ 
pointments and promotions in the civil 
service of the state and of all the civil di¬ 
visions thereof, including cities and vil¬ 
lages, shall be made according to merit and 
fitness, to be ascertained, so far as prac¬ 
ticable, by examinations which, so far as 
practicable, shall be competitive.” The 
question arose under an attempt of Al¬ 
dridge, the head of the public works, to 
evade the law, in which attempt he was 
most disastrously defeated. Of the system 
itself and of the position of the judiciary 
the court says: 

Whatever doubt or distrust may exist with re¬ 
spect to the possibility of obtaining for the law an 
honest and fair execution, there is none and can be 
none, at least among thinkingmen, with respect to 
its ultimate beneficial effect upon the service. That 
it must, if fairly and honestly administered, go 
far to suppress very grave evils and abuses that 
have become peculiarly ripe and active in our po¬ 
litical system, few intelligent people who have 
given the subject much attention can doubt. In so 
far as its administration may depend upon an ac¬ 
tion of the judicial department, it is entitled to, and 
doubtless will receive, a fair and liberal construc¬ 
tion, not only according to its letter, but its true 
spirit and the general purpose of its enactment. 

But when the court turns to the consti¬ 
tution, it deals the heaviest blow which bad 
government has received in many a day. 
It says: 

The principle that all appointments in the civil 
service must be made according to merit and fit¬ 
ness, to be ascertained by competitive examina¬ 
tions, Is expressed in such broad and imperative 
language that in some respects It must be regarded 


as beyond the control of the legislature and secure 
from any more statutory changes. If the legislature 
should repeal all the statutes and regulations on 
the subject of appointments in the civil service, 
the mandate of the legislature would still remain, 
and would so far execute itself as to require the 
courts, in a proper case, to pronounce appoint¬ 
ments made without compliance with its require¬ 
ment illegal. 

The attention of the cheap politicians 
who compose the present city administra¬ 
tion of Indianapolis, and who are riding 
rough-shod over the law of the state, is 
called to the above opinion. An appoint¬ 
ment not made in accordance with the law 
is illegal. It is no matter whether the law 
is found in the constitution or in the stat¬ 
ute. Appointments in Indianapolis are 
not made as the law directs, and the city 
attorney will not risk his legal reputation 
by giving the mayor an opinion that they 
are. It is simply a case of willful, delib¬ 
erate law-breaking, to enable party heelers 
and favorites to draw money from the pub¬ 
lic treasury. That is all there is of it, and the 
men engaged in it should be looked upon 
by the community as any other rascally 
law-breakers are. 

The other day Theodore Roosevelt said: 

I say that the civil service law is not only 
practicable but it is the only system that is 
practicable. We have 600 appointments 
and over 100 promotions in the police de¬ 
partment, and in no single case have we 
paid the slightest heed to a man’s politics 
or creed. In not one single case have we 
considered the recommendation of any 
outsider. 

The change wrought in New York city 
is a change from practical politics in its 
fullest bloom to the merit system. Under 
practical politics, which immediately pre¬ 
ceded the present administration, the 380 
policemen appointed by the present board 
would have brought in $300 apiece. The 
20 roundsmen,$500 apiece, the 20 sergeants, 
$3,000 apiece, and the 16 vacancies for cap¬ 
taincies, $10,000 apiece. No wonder that 
the bosses and the boys despise civil service 
reform. 

There are few instances in the history 
of politics where the party machine has so 
thoroughly destroyed the fruits of victory 
as the republican machine has in Mary¬ 
land. As we have already shown, the cam¬ 
paign which resulted in Gorman’s over¬ 
whelming defeat last fall was conducted 
on the highest plane of administrative re¬ 
form and the election was won because the 
campaign was so conducted. The repub¬ 
licans had the governor, the legislature 
and the city government of Baltimore. 
But no sooner was the election over than 
the members of the party for revenue only 
began to swarm like wolves after every 
vestige of a place. Being in control of the 
machine they carried the party into the 
basest acts of treachery. They passed an 
act introducing the merit system butcoup- 


It continues to be the eighth wonder 
that Tom Platt should be able to control 
not only his party in the state of New York 
















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


303 


but the law-making power also. This state¬ 
ment is not to be taken as mildly as it 
seems. His control is absolute. It has often 
been stated where he gets the money and 
how he operates, but, hoping to bring home 
to good citizens the wretched condition of 
our party politics, we republish Plattism 
stated in a concise form from the New 
York Evening Post of February 27: 

Thomas C. Platt follows a trade which no one of 
whom we have yet heard denies the criminality. 
• * * For what are these “political burdens” 
which he says he has taken on himself ? Are they 
not the collection from rich men and corporations 
of money, by way of blackmail, for protection 
against “ striking ” legislation, or in aid of corrupt 
legislation—that is, either for protection from ex¬ 
tortion or assistance In evading lawful obligations ? 
And is not this money used systematically to cor¬ 
rupt legislators, by causing them to violate their 
oaths and cheat their constituents by voting, not in 
obedience to their consciences, but In obedience to 
another will than their own for ends which they 
dare not avow ? 

The ninth wonder is that such a man 
£8 Platt can find a place at any respectable 
man’s table. Yet at a recent dinner Gov¬ 
ernor Morton made the occasion notorious 
by inviting Platt. This matter is best 
pointed by Dr. Parkhurst: 

“ You can not excoriate to-day a man who is do¬ 
ing his best to suck the civic life blood of a com¬ 
munity or state—I say you can not excoriate such a 
one to-day and then clasp hands with him to¬ 
morrow on even social ground, even though that 
ground be the governor’s dinner table.” 

Dr. Parkhurst paused a moment and then said, 
slowly: 

“Friends, you know what I mean.” 


Mr. Henry A. Castle, for the last four 
years postmaster at St. Paul, recently de¬ 
livered a farewell address to the employes 
of his office. The most noticeable thing in 
it is his pride in having impartially en¬ 
forced the civil service law, and his thor¬ 
ough belief in the law itself. It is the great¬ 
est triumph of the merit system, that by its 
own demonstrated value, it has conquered 
its way. Mr. Castle also entirely grasps the 
possibilities of manliness and independ¬ 
ence which employes may enjoy under the 
law, and he also urges upon them to be¬ 
come active advocates of the system, not 
entirely for their selfish benefit, but for 
the great public good which the merit sys¬ 
tem can accomplish. He declares that this 
has but to be known to the people of Min¬ 
nesota to secure the application of the 
system to the state and its municipalities. 
The address is so good that we should like 
to publish it all. 


In the death of Governor Greenhalge of 
Massachusetts, sound government has lost 
an able and fearless advocate. Like many 
other men he grew and broadened with 
responsibility. He discerned the differ¬ 
ence between statesmanship and mere 
partisan politics and took his stand on the 
side of the former. A notable example 


was his veto of the veterans’ exemption 
act by which a contemptible and truck¬ 
ling legislature attempted to destroy the 
civil service law of Massachusetts. And 
after this the people overwhelmingly re¬ 
elected him. 

Mr. William G. Rice, one of the civil 
service commissioners in an address be¬ 
fore the Massachusetts Reform Club, March 
20, gave an interesting account of the con¬ 
duct and progress of his department dur¬ 
ing the last nine months. It is the prog¬ 
ress which might have been expected as 
soon as the administration turned its mind 
to a genuine and concerted effort to com¬ 
plete the introduction of the merit system. 
Many interesting facts are given, among 
which we note that to Commissioner Har¬ 
low, formerly postmaster at St. Louis, is 
due the admirable plan for the consolida¬ 
tion of post-offices and which congress, not 
by an increased appropriation, but by a 
slight change in wording, is now being 
asked to aid in carrying out. Mr. Rice’s 
remark that the law can not be successfully 
carried out in a spirit of antagonism to 
those who have in charge larger mat¬ 
ters of state may be misunderstood. There 
have been no larger matters of state 
since the war. The relation between 
the civil service commission and a cab¬ 
inet officer who wants to enforce the 
law should be one of friendly and courte¬ 
ous co-operation. But with a cabinet of¬ 
ficer who wants to trick and beat the law, 
the commission has a duty and that duty 
is to fight. The early commissions nearly 
ruined the law by courteous subserviency 
and Mr. Roosevelt literally rescued it out 
of the jaws of destruction. We have no 
doubt that there are those in official circles 
in Washington, who are yet sore under 
Roosevelt’s punishment; nevertheless it 
did both them and the law good. 


The settled habit of our congressmen to 
trim for votes at the expense of the treas¬ 
ury was never more aptly illustrated than 
in the seed contest. Secretary Morton re¬ 
fused to distribute seeds further, but con¬ 
gress promptly made a new appropriation 
and made his duty to spend it mandatory. 
He has now advertised for ten million 
packets of garden, field and flower seeds, 
beginning with asparagus and ending with 
wheat. Out of this each congressman will 
be allowed fifteen thousand packages with 
which to bribe voters. There never was a 
greater swindle perpetrated upon the peo¬ 
ple. If any one can find any distinction 
between this transaction and going into 
the mule market and buying ten million 
mules for congressmen to give to voters we 
should like to see it pointed out. It is pa¬ 
ternalism gone to seed. 


In case of another President from the 
republican party, his burden in respect to 
the distribution of offices will be wonder¬ 
fully lightened. There may not be fewer 
applicants, but the number of places, and 
therefore the number of decisions to be 
made, will be curtailed to an extent which 
will make the bosses and the boys think 
there is nothing worth living for. And 
there will be nothing worth the political 
existence which they have been leading; 
let us all hope that they will quit it. True, 
there are fat postmasterships and many 
headships of office&in the internal revenue, 
the customs department and other 
branches of the public service yet within 
reach of the mere spoilsman; and these 
will be fought over desperately to the 
detriment of the public service and the 
scandal of the American name. Many of 
these offices are large and are filled with 
highly-trained subordinates. More ridicu¬ 
lous than ever before will appear the 
seemingly inconceivable folly of going 
into the street and picking up a local 
politician without any special fitness what¬ 
ever, and making him postmaster of New 
York or Philadelphia or Cincinnati or In¬ 
dianapolis or Chicago, or in fact the head 
of any office. The system is, of course, 
doomed. That the local Toms, Mikes and 
Jakes will have to find other means of 
living than by getting these places as re¬ 
wards for valor in the service of bosses is 
only a question of time. The merit sys¬ 
tem of promotion by competition will 
grind the life out of this considerable 
remnant of the spoils system as surely 
and irresistibly as a glacier grinds down 
mountains. It is unfortunate that con¬ 
gressmen do not cheerfully bow to the in¬ 
evitable and by legislation make the way 
easy to the wholesome and most desirable 
end. 


With the destruction of the spoils sys¬ 
tem in the federal service, it can not long 
survive in states and cities. With federal 
public business conducted on the soundest 
principles at their very doors the people 
will not long submit to be swindled and 
cheated in the conduct of their local public 
business. The result will be of serious 
moment to party organizations. These or. 
ganizations will have to be kept up with¬ 
out offices and without money secured by 
direct or indirect assessment upon office¬ 
holders. Speed the day. If a party has no 
principles with life enough to draw volun¬ 
tary and unrewarded support to the party 
organization, then that party should die. 
There is not the least doubt but that the 
life of parties deserving to survive will be 
made wholesome by the disappearance of 
the hope of office as the great object of 
political activity. The natural liking of 
the American people to strive for particu- 













304 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


lar solutions of public questions will bring 
their political activities into healthy play. 
But no one should think that it will be 
possible to conduct campaigns without a 
considerable expenditure of money. The 
paid campaign speaker can be dispensed 
with. The man who wants his houlfe rent 
paid to avoid the loss of his vote by eject¬ 
ment can be let to move. The heeler who 
has to be paid wages on election day and 
for several days previous for imaginary 
work can be laid off and the corruption 
fund can in fact be dispensed with alto¬ 
gether. The advantage will come in hir¬ 
ing necessary party work done and paying 
for it as a business matter. Literature 
must be printed by printers and distrib¬ 
uted by clerks, the poll of the voters must 
be taken, agents must be employed for a 
variety of purposes and many other ex¬ 
penses must be incurred, but these will be 
paid for as for value received and that 
will end the matter; after the election the 
various employes will not come around 
and demand an office as an earned bonus. 
It will be the duty of every member of the 
party to contribute money to carry on the 
party campaign; that is a sacrifice every 
citizen will owe and the making of which 
will be a duty. It should also be a pride, 
for it will take away the excuse of turning 
for money to those who want legislation 
or have some other self-interest in view. 

Clinton Rogers Woodruff, secretary of 
the Municipal Reform League, has in the 
New York Evening Post ef March 14 a sum¬ 
mary of the encouraging progress of mu¬ 
nicipal reform in the South. 

MUNICIPAL SPOILS. 

I consider the question of pure or corrupt munici¬ 
pal government in the United States as the most 
far-reaching and important that can possibly en¬ 
gage the attention of all thinking men who believe in 
government by the people.—Charles Stewart Smith. 

IN BALTIMORE. 

Spoils-Mad. 

Revolution Proposed by the Crazed Coun- 
cilnien—Strip llie Mayor of Power and 
Vest it in Joint Convention of the Two 
Councils—Public Sentiment Stirred—In¬ 
dignant Protests from Friends of Good 
Government—Hooper Firm as a Rock- 
Will Fight it Out if it Takes all Summer 
—Reform League Issues a Call for a Mass- 
Meeting at Music Hall Next Tuesday 
Night to Voice the Universal Indigna¬ 
tion—Council Meets Again this Evening 
—Professor Woodrow Wilson’s Earnest 
Protest — Prominent Citizens Express 
Their Views—A Veritable Bombshell at 
Annapolis—Cunningham Alone Opposes 
the Mayor’s Stand—Three Republican 
Councilmen Will Stand by the Mayor— 
Mr. Hennighausen’s Ante-Election Prom¬ 


ises—How the Scheme was Put Through 

the Council.— Baltimore News, Februai'y 28. 

To Seize the Offices. 

City Council Makes a Bold Stroke Aimed at 
the Mayor—Change of Appointing Power 
—Ordinances Passed to Vest it in a Joint 
Convention of the Council Branches— 
Rushed Through to a vote—Then a Num¬ 
ber of Temporary Engrossing Clerks 
were Pressed into Service—Programme 
Well Executed — Caucuses Had Been 
•Held and the Members Did Their Work 
Like Soldiers—All Except Three “Kick¬ 
ers,” Messrs. Steffens, Hoffman and 
Smith, Voted with their Party Associates 
—The Democratic Members Departed in 
a Body and Left the Republicans to Fight 
it Out Among Themselves—Full Text of 
the General Measure on Which the Rad¬ 
ical Legislation is Based—A Determined 
Effort to Override the Mayor’s Veto 
When it is Sent in. 

The fight between Mayor Hooper and the 
city council reached a crisis Thursday night 
which may involve a revolution in the ma¬ 
chinery of the city government. 

Ordinances were enacted by the council 
which, if they become laws, will take from 
the mayor the power to appoint public of¬ 
ficers subject to confirmation, and will give 
that authority to the council absolutely.— Bal¬ 
timore Sun, February 29. 

* * * 

Accusations affecting the personal character 
and standing of two appointees for justices of 
the peace in Baltimore city were made to the 
governor Tuesday, which excited great in¬ 
dignation in his mind and caused him to ex¬ 
press himself very freely as well as to with¬ 
draw the nominations. He said : “ It is an 
outrage for me to be placed in this position. 
I refer to two nominations for justices of the 
peace in Baltimore city which I sent to the 
senate. I find that these are the charges— 
that one of them had been convicted in a 
criminal case of the charge of embezzlement 
and sentenced to jail for six months, while the 
other, according to the record furnished me, 
was indicted in 1881 as a common thief, 
though the case was settled. I want to state, 
and I think my position should be known to 
the public, that in making appointments the 
larger percentage of the people are unknown 
to me, and while this is the case I have to rely 
upon such recommendations as are filed 
with me and upon the representations of sena¬ 
tors and delegates. In these particular cases 
the usual course was followed. The wishes of 
the republican senators from Baltimore city 
and of the entire Baltimore city delegation in 
the house were consulted. A written recom¬ 
mendation is on file with the secretary of state, 
signed by Senators Strobridge and Dobler and 
the entire delegation in behalf of these ap¬ 
pointees, both of whom were so recommended. 
I think it is an outrage that such people 
should be recommended to me, as I have to 
rely upon their judgment and I want the pub¬ 
lic to understand my position. 


“ The appointments were not made from any 
personal knowledge or preference, but from 
reliance on the indorsement. Some one, how¬ 
ever, has been good enough to inform me, and 
they will not be confirmed, for I will recall 
the names.” 

Later in the day Delegate Cunningham and 
Senator Strobridge, who were understood to 
have especially championed the objectionable 
nominees, saw the governor and excused them¬ 
selves on the ground that they were not aware 
of any of the serious objections that had been 
brought to light. 

Governor Lowndes said he had felt so much 
indignation on account of the expose that he 
felt like withdrawing the names of every man 
he had sent in for justice of the peace and 
for some other oflSces in the city of Baltimore. 

Senator Strobridge asked him why he had 
thought of taking such a course. 

The governor replied that it was because so 
many protests had been sent in against the 
city appointments that it depressed him.— An¬ 
napolis dispatch Baltimore Smi, February 27. 

* • • 

PERCY C. HENNIGHAUSEN. 

Among the men guilty of an atrocious be¬ 
trayal of the cause of good government, there 
is one whose conduct, in view of his antece¬ 
dents, is peculiarly disgraceful. Mr. Percy C. 
Hennighausen stood most distinctly pledged 
to non-partisanship in city government. Both 
last year and the year before he obtained the 
support of the good government club of the 
twelfth ward—known in 1894as the Unit club 
—on the express promise that, if elected, he 
would stand for the principles of city govern¬ 
ment which the Unit club advocated. Upon 
the basis of that support, he was elected to the 
city council in 1894 by a plurality of 174, 
while the democrats carried the ward for con¬ 
gress by 163. It is plain that he owed his 
entrance into public life unmistakably to his 
solemn and emphatic professions of devotion 
to good government. Last year he renewed 
his declaration of allegiance to the cause. 

His conductin siding with thespoilsmen and 
joining them in their riotous opposition to the 
mayor will brand him with the condemnation 
and scorn of all honest men. For many of his fel¬ 
lows it may be pleaded that they don’t know any 
better, and that they were not particularly re¬ 
sponsible for the pledges of the representative 
men of their party. Mr. Hennighausen, being 
a man of education, must know better; but, 
what is even more important, he is a deserter 
from the cause of honest government, and 
hence deserves tenfold the censure of those 
who never made personal professions of being 
anything more than ordinary ward politicians. 
* * * 

Mr. Percy C. Hennighausen, president of the 
first branch, is one of the councilmen who en¬ 
gineered last night’s coup. 

On October 22 last, just before the election, 
Mr. Hennighausen wrote a letter to the Unit 
independent club of the twelfth ward, of 
which the following is an extract: 

“ If I am elected there will be but one con- 



















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


305 




sideration which will in any degree influence 
my vote, and that is the good of the whole 
people of Baltimore, whether democrat, repub¬ 
lican, prohibition or populist. I will know 
no party. I will fear no ‘ boss.’ 

“My ideal of a city councilman is a man 
who feels that he is one of the directors of a 
large corporation, who devotes his best thought 
and effort to the care of the business interests 
with which he is entrusted, and who recognizes 
no more ‘ polities’ in the business of a munici¬ 
pality than he would in the business of a 
bank .”—Baltimore News, February S8, 

* • * 

The republican members of the city coun¬ 
cil met again this afternoon and continued 
their fight with the mayor. They are attempt¬ 
ing to take out of his hands all the power of 
appointment, and they have already passed 
over twenty ordinances looking to that end. 

The cause of the war, as has been stated in 
the New York Times, is the refusal of Mayor 
Hooper to consult with them in appointments, 
and especially his refusal to appoint only re¬ 
publicans to office. The councilmen are after 
the spoils, and they will not be happy until 
they get them, but their fight is undoubtedly 
a losing one. The mayor says he will veto 
the ordinances, and the “kickers” have not 
the necessary three-fourths to pass the ordi¬ 
nances over the vetoes. Three of the council- 
men stand by the mayor. The “kickers” 
issued a statement this morning saying they 
were compelled reluctantly to take extreme 
action in order to assert their rights and to 
uphold their dignity. But the people do not 
look at it in this way, and a mass meeting is 
called for next week to protest against the 
spoilsmen and to uphold the mayor. The demo¬ 
cratic members of the city council are staying 
away and letting the republicans work their 
own destruction. 

It is freely said that as this is the first 
“dose” of general republicanism that Mary¬ 
land has had in thirty years, it will be thirty 
more before it shall be tried again. A lot of 
men whose election was not expected were 
swept into the legislature and the city coun¬ 
cil of Baltimore by the tidal wave, and just as 
soon as they felt their power they abandoned 
their non-partisan promises, and, in the lan¬ 
guage of one of their leaders, felt how good it 
was to “pull the grapes after they had been a 
quarter of a century getting into the vine¬ 
yard.” 

The gubernatorial patronage, which is 
larger in Maryland than in any other state in 
the Union, was used to elect Wellington United 
States senator, and Thomas J. Shryock was 
elected state treasnrer against the protest of the 
reform league and with serious charges hang¬ 
ing over him. The legislature practically has 
killed the civil service reform bill by adding 
the referendum, after the most explicit prom¬ 
ises to give the city and state the merit sys¬ 
tem. It has elected as police commissioner of 
Baltimore W. W. Johnson, whose administra¬ 
tion of the Baltimore post-office under the 
Harrison administration necessitated the at¬ 


tention of the civil service commissioners, 
with results that caused much unpleasant 
comment, although Johnson was not removed. 

In the midst of all the discouragement, 
especially at the weakness of Gov. Lowndes, 
the friends of good government have had one 
conspicuous consolation. The mayor is only 
about five feet in height, but he seems to be 
nearly all backbone. A favorite local car¬ 
toon is the cathode ray illustrating this idea. 
At first the council tried to defeat him by re¬ 
fusing to confirm an appointment because the 
appointee was a Catholic. The mayor him¬ 
self is one of the leading Methodists of the 
city, and gave $200,000 to the woman’s col¬ 
lege, a Methodist institution. He sent the 
Catholic’s name up again, and it went through. 
Several democrats were appointed, and they 
also got through. His latest batch of ap¬ 
pointments had democrats and republicans, 
and there was not a single politician named 
in the list. 

This brought on the revolt. The fighters 
rage. The little mayor calmly says it does 
not make any difference to him what they do. 
He will stand his ground, and he intends to 
win. The people are getting ready for an ex¬ 
plosion next week .—Baltimore dispatch, New 

York Times, March 1. 

* ♦ ♦ 

Five thousand persons crowded into music 
hall to-night in answer to a call of the reform 
league for a mass meeting “to protest against 
the unprecedented, dangerous and disgraceful 
attempt of the city council to seize the public 
offices of this city to gratify their appetite for 
spoils, and to uphold Mayor Hooper in his 
fight for good government.” 

Theodore Eoosevelt, of New York, was the 
“star” of the evening from an oratorical stand¬ 
point. He said, in part: 

“I hold that the man who serves his party 
best serves the state well. The man who has 
to be bribed with any office to serve his party 
is a curse to that party. Baltimore is not the 
only place that has had the trouble you are 
having here, and where the politicians have 
sought to turn victory to their own base uses. 
We have had the same trouble in New York, 
where, after the people overthrew one set of 
bosses, those who were elected thought they 
had been elected to do the same things that 
the others had been overthrown fordoing. 

“Your council will destroy the future of 
their party’s cause unless you let them under¬ 
stand that decent citizens will not tolerate 
their course. As a member of the New York 
legislature I was the author of the bill to 
place the power of appointment of New York 
city oflScers in the hands of the mayor, with 
out being subject to confirmation by the coun¬ 
cil. It gives general satisfaction. 

“As I understand the fight, it is that the 
council finds fault with the mayor because he 
has insisted on placing, in office some of the 
decent democrats who assisted them to win 
last fall; while the council itself, in order to 
defeat the mayor, is willing to make a‘deal’ 
with some of the ring democrats who tried to 
defeat them.” 

A number of local orators of all shades of 
political belief also addressed the meeting. 

Resolutions were adopted denouncing the 
action of the city council as a usurpation, de¬ 
claring that their action will throw the city 


government into confusion and calling upon 
the general assembly to prevent, by appro¬ 
priate legislation, the consummation of this 
scheme of spoliation. 

Mayor Hooper will veto the ordinances 
which passed the council last Thursday. At 
the sessions to-morrow evening the republicans 
of each branch will endeavor to pass the bills 
over the veto. If the three republican mem¬ 
bers who have indorsed the mayor remain 
steadfast, and the democratic members attend 
the meetings, the bills will fail of the neces¬ 
sary three-fourths majority. 

Meantime President Bruce’s bill, giving the 
mayor of Baltimore absolute power to make 
appointments, passed the state senate to-day 
by a vote of fifteen to five. Its fate in the re¬ 
publican house of delegates is uncertain.— 
Baltimore dispatch. New York Times, March S. 

Jic Jt: ^ 

One of the most notorious of the gang of 
colored repeaters who operated in various sec¬ 
tions of the city on the last election day was 
to day sentenced to two years in jail for the 
active part he took in the infamous work of 
the ring to maintain its power in this city. 
This man was James Boone, whose reputation 
is almost as black as his face, and who, at the 
head of a gang of repeaters, drawn from the 
lowest negro dives in the city, went through 
the ninth ward on last election day and, it is 
alleged, committed many outrages. 

The crime for which he was to-day sentenced 
to jail was for an assault upon William L. F. 
Miller, who was one of the reform league 
watchers.— Baltimore News, February SS. 

ELSEWHERE. 

DID BROOKLYN PAY TOO MUCH ? 

Commissioner Squier Bought Land for a 
Park from His Deputy’s Wife— P. H. 
Flinn Brings Su't 

—New York Times, September 19. 

It was learned yesterday that on Monday Frank 
Squier, the park commissioner, paid to Michael J. 
Dady, |29,000 for a piece of ground along the water 
front in Gravesend. The land reaches from East 
Eighty eighth street to East Ninety-second street, 
and from Skidmore avenue to the bulkhead line. 
It is said to consist of the most part of marsh. The 
site is destined by Commissioner Squier for one in 
his system of small parks.— September 25. 

GREANEY’S GRAVE CHARGE. 

He Was Forced, He Says, to Lend Money 
to Kings County Officials—Declares They 
Will Not Pay Him—While He made 
Loans He Got Good Contracts—His Re¬ 
ceiver Will Sue the Men Named by Him. 

—New York Times, September. 

HOWARD D. HERR AND JOHN M. 

DANAHY UNDER ARREST 

For Grand Larceny—Alleged They Padded 
Pay Rolls in the Street Department— 
Locked Up in the Freezer—The First 
Fruits of the Charges Against the De- 
par ment of Public Works—Now It Will 
be Clearer Why the Mayor Demands that 
the Aldermen and Councilmen Give Him 
the Authority to Investigate the Depart¬ 
ment of Public Works—A Third Man, 
Joseph Burke, Saloon-keeper and Former 












306 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Boss of a Gang of Street-cleaners, is also 
Held at Headquarte s—He is Charged 
With Being a Cons irator With Herr 
and Danahy in the D< frauding of the City. 

—Buffalo Express, October .9. 

BLED THEM. 

Ten Dollars a Team the Amount De 
manded by Ross—“Voluntary,” He Says 
—But Teamsters Who Paid are Very 
Sure It Was a Case of Force —One More 
Conspiracy Found—Another Way Fore¬ 
men and Team Owners Got Together 
and Defrauded the City. 

— Buffalo, October 24. 

• HERE IT IS. 

Byron Kring Tells of Political Assessments 
—All Hands Taxed — Barton Ross, 
O’Shea’s Clerk, Accused of Doing the 
Levying—Fisher’s Hard Day’s Work— 
His Examination of Kring Made Matters 
Worse for the Defense. 

— Buffalo, October 25. 

Leading Chicago citizens have formed a 
committee of 100 whose aim is to drive na¬ 
tional party lines out of the local elections 
and rescue the city from the clutch of the 
saloon gangs that ride into the control of the 
city council on the divisions of good citizens 
at the polls. It would seem to be high time 
for such an attempt. One night last week two 
leading aldermen were on the streets drunk 
and assaulted a policeman who, however, had 
the courage to run them in. That policeman 
would have lost his place under the old sys¬ 
tem, but the new civil service rules will pro¬ 
tect him now. Thus something has been 

gained.— Springfield Republican, February 21. 

* * * 

A meeting of 200 Chicago clergymen has 
unanimously voted to support the committee 
of one hundred and the civic federation in 
municipal reform, and to urge their congrega¬ 
tions to go into politics that the city govern- 
may be reformed.— Few York Evening Post, 
Februai'y 21. 

* • * 

There is plenty of work for the municipal 
reformers in Chicago. The Post of that city 
prints a list of 26 aldermen who are candi¬ 
dates for re-election, with what it calls their 
“disgraceful record.”— New Yoik Evening Post, 
February 22, 

• * * 

Ed. Murphy, city alderman, saloon-keeper 
and local political boss, was to-day found 
guilty of running a disorderly house, after a 
most sensational trial.— St. Paul (Minn.) dis¬ 
patch, March 7. 

* * * 

The city of Reading, Pa., has long been un¬ 
der republican control, but the democrats 
recently elected their candidate for mayor. 
The result had hardly become known before 
the mayor-elect had over 200 applications for 
the 60 offices in his gift, and he was soon so 
overrun with applicants for places that he had 
to flee from home in order to get a chance to 
eat and sleep.— New York Evening Post, Febru¬ 
ary 26. 


The mayor-elect of Reading, Pa , who ran 
away to escape the office seekers, has returned. 
So have the office-seekers. The mayor-elect’s 
door-bell has been pulled out, and the back 
fence broken down by the efforts of office- 
seekers to get in the rear way when no answer 
was returned to their knocks at the door.— 
Nev) York Evening Post, March 9. 

« « » 

“The proposition of the (Rochester) repub¬ 
lican aldermen to cut down the salary of 
Mayor Warner from f5,000 to $2,500 or $3,000 
a year is a striking indication,” the Rochester 
Herald says, “of the guerilla warfare that the 
official enemies of the public interests propose 
to wage on him. It has no other motive than the 
disgraceful and depraved one to turn him from his 
resolution to give an honest, efficient and economical 
government.—New York Evening Post, February 
21 . 

» * • 

For the first time in years politics has crept 
into the management of the school board. 
Unless all signs fail Boss Filley is not going to 
be able to whip self-respecting republicans 
into line, however, for the school board ticket 
he had nominated at the Harmonie Hall 
convention last week. Murmurings of dis¬ 
content from republican homes in every sec¬ 
tion of the city are heard, and though Col¬ 
lector Zeigenhein is exerting himself to the 
utmost in South St. Louis, it is considered 
hardly possible for him to carry the ticket 
through in that section. A sample of what 
the better class of republicans are saying about 
Filley is the following frank expression of a 
prominent official at the city hall; 

“Filley should not be allowed to brutalize 
our public schools by placing them under the 
domination of machine politics. Party bosses 
have no right to lay their hands upon the 
schools, and decent men of all political par¬ 
ties should call a halt to all such attempts. It 
will be a sad day for the parents and children 
of St. Louis when their public schools are run 
according to the dictates of a lot of ward- 
heelers and bum politicians. Filley should 
remember that he was thrown ignominiously 
out of the post-office in 1877 by President 
Hayes, because he tried to make Mr. Schweik- 
hardt, then a member of the school board, vote 
to oust a democrat from the post of secretary 
and treasurer of the board, which he had filled 
with satisfaction to all the people for many 
years.— St. Louis dispatch, New York Evening 
Post, February 24. 

THE USE OF MUNICIPAL SPOIL IN 
NATIONAL AND STATE POLITICS. 

Willis in Brooklyn, 

Theodore B. Willis, the new commissioner 
of city works in Brooklyn, to-day discharged 
eighty-six men in his department. This is 
said to be the largest number of simultaneous 
removals in the history of the city in a single 
department. In every instance the men are 
democrats who were retained by Commissioner 
White, with three exceptions. These three 
are Worth republicans. That Commissioner 
Willis would remove the democrats in his de¬ 


partment and fill the places with anti-Worth 
republicans, has been no secret since he as¬ 
sumed the duties of his office on February 1, 
but nobody expected that these removals would 
be made in such a wholesale fashion. Even 
after the conference of Commissioner Willis 
and his advisers last evening, the statement 
that probably forty men would be removed to¬ 
day was not credited, and consequently when 
the list containing the eighty-six names was 
given out, there was consternation among the 
office-holders. 

The corridors of the municipal building in 
which the offices of the city works department 
are located were thronged all the morning 
with office-holders and their friends, anxious 
for the list to make its appearance, and when it 
came there was a hasty scanning of it to ascer¬ 
tain who the unfortunates were. The salaries of 
the men who were removed ranged from $4,000 
to $1,000 a year. They include clerks, mes¬ 
sengers, engineers, foremen, inspectors, etc. 
The discharges take effect to-day .—New York 
Evening Post, February 29. 

* * * 

Commissioner Willis, of the department of city 
works, Brooklyn, recently dismissed eighty-five em- 
employes in the city works department and created 
eleven new offices, to which he appointed faithful 
Willis republicans. The civil service commis¬ 
sion and the civil service reform association 
objected to these appointments, as they claimed 
it was against the spirit of the civil service 
law, and Corporation Counsel Burr was called 
upon for an opinion. 

* * » 

Commissioner Willis, in speaking about the 
opinion, said that, while he had not had time 
to read the opinion very carefully, he believed 
that it was favorable to the position that he 
had taken. 

“It puts upon me,” said Mr. Willis, “the 
burden of showing that the new positions are 
dissimilar to the positions abolished or 
changed. Undoubtedly the major portion 
of the positions will all stand the legal test. 

Edward M. Grout yesterday obtained a 
writ of mandamus directing Commissioner 
Willis to show cause why the employes that 
he discharged on February 29 should not be 
reinstated. Mr. Grout claims that Commis¬ 
sioner Willis discharged the men without 
stating any cause for his act .—New York Times, 
March 10. 

» * * 

Thug rule was introduced last night by 
Sheriff Buttling, of Kings county, in the de¬ 
liberations of the republican county commit¬ 
tee. 

It was a fight between the Worth and Willis fac¬ 
tions, and was due to an effort on the part of the 
Worth men to capture the control of the committee 
by seating delegates of their faction in four wards 
where contests prevail. * * * 

It was declared in order by the chairman to 
fix the places for holding the congressional 
and assembly district conventions, and that 
was proceeded with. The delegates had got as 
far as the seventeenth assembly district when 
Jacob Brenner, of the tenth ward, made a 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


307 


motion to adjourn. Chairman Roberts put it, 
and declared it carried. 

Instantly the hall was in an uproar. Sheriff 
Buttling, surrounded by a number of his fol¬ 
lowers, forced his way to the front and de¬ 
clared that this action was outrageous. Shak¬ 
ing his fist in Chairman Roberts’s face, Sheriff 
Buttling shouted: 

“You call yourself a man, but you don’t act 
like one.” 

Everybody present crowded as near as they 
could get to the platform, and the delegates of 
the opposing factions shouted and cursed at 
each other. 

The sheriff attempted to seize the gavel, 
but Chairman Roberts, who had not spoken 
a word, took it from him. Then Sheriff Butt¬ 
ling demanded the gavel, and after a slight re¬ 
sistance, Chairman Roberts let him take it. 

The sheriff then jumped to the platform and 
rapped for order. Everybody was shouting, 
jeering, or applauding, and pandemonium 
reigned. Cries of “Chuck him out!” “Chuck 
him out!” were heard on the floor and in the 
gallery. 

Turning to the gallery, where a number of 
men were crowding on the stairway, Sheriff 
Buttling shook the gavel at them and said: 

“If you think you can put me out, come 
down here and try it. I’ll show you who is 
boss.” 

Benjamin F. Blair went up to Chairman 
Roberts and asked: 

“Are you chairman of this committee?” 

“Certainly,” Mr. Roberts said. 

“Then why don’t you assert yourself?” Mr. 
Blair asked. 

Mr. Roberts made no answer, but, taking 
up his hat and overcoat, walked out of the 
room. He was jeered at by the Worth dele¬ 
gates. 

Sheriff Buttling turned to Mr. Blair and 
said: 

“This is a meeting, and if we’ve got our 
fellows here, that’s no reason why you should 
snap an adjournment on us. I thought you 
believed in fair play, but it seems you don’t. 
You know there was not a majority in favor 
of adjournment.” 

The disorder was growing worse. Every¬ 
body was shouting. Sheriff’ Buttling kept 
rapping vigorously for order. The Willis 
delegates stood at one end of the room by 
themselves, while the Worth men proceeded to 
take their seats. 

Mr. Buttling announced that, as the chair¬ 
man had deserted his post, it was in order to 
elect a temporary chairman to continue the 
meeting. He was elected to preside when 
something like order had been restored. Mr. 
Buttling said that the roll should be called to 
ascertain how many were in favor of adjourn¬ 
ment. 

The Worth men only responded, the Willis 
men refusing to take part in the proceedings. 
The roll called showed sixty two in favor of 
continuing business. 

Coroner Nason of the seventeenth ward said 
that, as there were only 120 delegates present 


during the evening sixty two were a majority, 
and, therefore, the action of Sheriff’ Buttling 
was justified. He said that the committee 
should proceed with the business of seating 
delegates from the disputed wards. 

Sheriff Buttling made a speech recommend¬ 
ing adjournment because he did not think it 
wise to take advantage of their victory at 
that time. 

“We’ve shown them,” he said “that we 
were right. We don’t profess to be anything 
but machine men, but I tell you the machine 
don’t make mistakes. The machine gets there 
every time. The chairman who deserted us 
pretends to be a broad and liberal man. He’s 
a big man, but he’s not broad. He’s narrow. 
It’s a case of big head and little wit. We 
had a working majority at this meeting to¬ 
night and now we’ve proved it, and I think 
we had better adjourn and wait until the next 
meeting.” 

The sixty-two Worth men voted yea and 
the meeting broke up. 

During the fight up stairs there was a more 
serious one in the corridor on the first floor. 

William Griffith and another man got into 
a dispute over the offices in the twelfth ward. 
Griffith was kicked in the abdomen by the 
other man, who escaped. He was said to be a 
delegate named Simms. Griffith was so seri¬ 
ously injured that he had to be taken to the 

city hospital .—New York Times, March 11. 

* ♦ ♦ 

George B. Cox is the republican municipal 
boss of Cincinnati. He has the characteristics 
which have become familiar in municipal 
bosses everywhere. He could not be elected 
to any office himself, but he is a master in the 
art of setting up caucuses, calling snap con¬ 
ventions, making deals and distributing spoils. 
Thomas E. Major, the mayor of Toledo, is a 
man of similar type. Before the last state 
convention in Ohio a deal was arranged be¬ 
tween Cox, Major and others by which it was 
agreed that, in return for Major’s support of 
the machine candidate for governor, Bush- 
nell, the machine would use all its power to 
force through the legislature a bill practically 
deposing all the officials of Toledo and leaving 
Major to revel unrestrained in municipal 
spoils. That measure is the Ripper bill now 
pending in the Ohio legislature. It will turn 
2,000 officials in the city of -Toledo out of 
office without the consent and against the pro¬ 
tests of the people of that town. It is one of 
the most daring spoils raids ever attempted in 
this country. The opponents of the measure 
are the friends of ex-Governor McKinley. It 
is, therefore, held that McKinley’s fate as a 
presidential candidate will be seriously affected 
by the disposition of this measure. If it 
should develop that the Cox-Major crowd con- 
trol the state and that McKinley’s candidacy 
must be left to the mercy of such men, he 
will not be nominated by the efforts of Ohio, 
at least. Cox and Major were in New York 
not long ago and had a conference with Thos. 
C. Platt. It appears that the hand of the 
New York republican boss has been extended 
from Albany to Columbus.—Rw/a/o Express, 
January 28. 


CURRENT PLATTISM. 

THE RAINES BILL. 

OFFICES AND SALARIES. 

Slate commissioner of excise. $5,000 

Deputy commissioner. 4,000 

Secretary. 2,000 

Financial clerk. 1,800 

“Such clerical force as may be neces¬ 
sary,” say 50.Unlimited. 

Special deputy for New York county, 4,000 

Special deputy for Kings county. 3,000- 

Special deputy for Erie county. 2,000 

Sixty special agents, at $1,200. 72,000 

Sixty special attorneys, if desired. 
Compensation to be fixed by the 

commissioner.Unlimited. 

Number of possible employes.175 to 200 

Amount of possible salaries.$250,000 

All employes to be “ confidential ” and 
hence not subject to civil service regulations. 

APPOINTING OFFICER. 

Thomas C. Platt, No. 49 Broadway- 

■Jf ■» -St 

“ J have been offered the naming of a $1,200 con¬ 
fidential agent if I would vote for the Baines bill," 
said Assemblyman French, of New York, to¬ 
night. The man who made the offer claimed 
to have the ability to deliver the goods. I 
shall not vote for the Raines bill, and will do 
all I can can to beat it. This offer to me is 
only one of many such offers as are being made 
to many members of the assembly. I believe all 
the patronage under the bill has been already 
divided up among the senators, and has been 
promised ten times over to the members of the 
assembly.”— Albany dispatch, Buffalo Express, 
March 9. 

Ji« ♦ * 

The fisheries, game and forest commission, 
as re-organized by Mr. Platt, is already at log¬ 
gerheads with itself, and over the same old 
question, spoils. Some of the members who 
think they did not get their fair share are go¬ 
ing to the legislature for another re-organiza¬ 
tion.— Buffalo Express. 

* * * 

Republican leader Ellsworth to-night made 
a grab for the control of the Niagara reserva¬ 
tion. He presented a bill designed to transfer 
the control of that state property to the fish¬ 
eries, game and forestry commission. It is 
now under the control of the Niagara Reserva¬ 
tion Commission, of which Andrew H. Green, 
of New York city, for some years has been the 
president. The leading spirit of the forest, fish 
and game commission is Barnet H. Davis, a Platt 
politician from Wayne county, who is a member of 
the republican stale committee. There is consider¬ 
able patronage involved in the transfer. 
Doubtless some of Mr. Ellsworth’s lieutenants 
would get the place now held by Thomas V. 
'Welch, as superintendent of the park. He is 
a democrat. His salary is about $3,000 a 
year.— Albany Dispatch, March 9. 

• >t> » 

The new superintendent of the banking depart¬ 
ment, a Platt man, wants the places of assistant 
bank examiners taken from the competitive 



















308 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 



and placed in the non-competitive schedule. 
The state commission will have a chance to 
show where it stands with regard to civil serv¬ 
ice reform. These places were made competi¬ 
tive by Gov. Flower, a practical banker, in 
order to raise the standard of the service.— 
Buffalo Express, March 11. 

• * » 

'The tactics by which the Platt politicians 
sought to stifle the McKinley sentiment in 
Lockport were tried in Niagara Falls, too. 
Republicans there received intimations that if 
they joined the McKinley movement, legisla¬ 
tion which the city is seeking at Albany 
would come to a stop .—Buffalo Express, March 11. 

* * * 

“The Platt-Hendricks machine in Syracuse 

has resorted to tactics which must make the 
Lauterbach people in New York feel like 

mere amateurs,” the Buflfalo Express (rep.) 
says. The general committee has amended 
the rules to provide that no person shall be 
entitled to vote at the coming primaries who 
has voted the ticket of any opposition party 
since the last gubernatorial election. The 
rule, the Express points out, thrusts the 6,000 
republicans who supported Baldwin as an in¬ 
dependent candidate for mayor last fall out of 
the republican party .—New York Evening Post, 
February SI. 

* * » 

Another of the series of remarkable bills 
which have appeared recently from the office 
of the superintendent of public works was 
ofiered in the assembly to-day by Mr. Eldridge) 
chairman of the canals. It provides that the con¬ 
tracts for the $9,000,000 canal improvement may he 
let by the superintendent of public works, after he has 
advertised ten days in the state paper, “and 
in such other newspapers or journals, and for 
such period of time or number of insertions 
as the superintendent of public works may 
select or deem necessary.” 

This provision is to replace the present re¬ 
quirement that these bids shall be advertised 
. for six weeks, in papers in all parts of the 
state. Should the bill become a law the superin¬ 
dent could keep from the notice of 7nost of the con¬ 
tractors of the state the fact that these enormous con¬ 
tracts were about to he let. The bill further ex¬ 
tends the powers of the superintendent by 
providing that he shall let these contracts “to 
the lowest responsible bidder giving such 
security as the superintendent of public works 
may require and approve.” This places in the 
hands of Superintendent Aldridge the entire control 
of this vast patronage.—Albany Dispatch to Buffalo 
Express, February 19. 

* * * 

The better elements among the citizens of 
Albany are aroused over a bill now before the 
legislature, the real purpose of which is to convert 
the local police force into a political annex to the 
Albany county republican machine organization. 
The measure was inspired by T. C. Platt's slate 
committeeman from this district, William Barnes, 
Jr., who is the proprietor and publisher of the only 
republican newspaper in the city. It was intro¬ 
duced in both branches of the legislature 


simultaneously a week ago, and the scheme is 
to rush it ahead with all possible speed. 

Under the administration of mayor Oren 
E. Wilson, who was elected on the platform of 
the honest election party, the police depart¬ 
ment was re organized and placed on an excel¬ 
lent footing. There has been no change in its 
status since Mayor Thacher took office on Jan 
uary 1. The existing law gives the mayor the 
appointment of the four police commissioners, 
and makes the mayor a member, ex offcio, of 
the board. The bill which Mr. Barnes is seeking 
to have enacted into a law proposes to abolish the 
present police board and to remove the commissioners 
from office. It provides for another police commis¬ 
sion of four members, but deprives the mayor of the 
power to appoint them. He is only to preside at 
trials of officers, and has no voice in the proceedings 
of the board, noi' can he vote except in case of a tie. 
The appointment of the new police commis¬ 
sioners is to be vested in the common council, 
whose members must select for such officials 
two democrats and two republicans. The 
honest election party, which cast more than 
4,000 votes at the last election, is not given 
any recognition in the choice. 

The bill goes further, and practically legislates 
out the whole I'e-organized police force. A signifi¬ 
cant provision is the one which declares that 
the commissioners are to have the power to 
appoint the new chief, captains, sergeants and 
patrolmen only by the concurrent votes of 
three of their number. This means, of course, 
that in case the appointments are not of the 
sort the Platt-Barnes crowd want, their repre¬ 
sentatives in the police board will not concur 
in the action of the other two commissioners, 
and thus a deadlock will result. This contin¬ 
gency appears to have been looked for by the 
framers of the bill, for it provides that the senior 
captain of the present police force, who is a personal 
follower of Mr. Batmes and is the only member of 
the department not to be legislated out of office under 
the netv scheme of the politicians, is, in the event of 
a failure to re organize the force, to possess all the 
powers and to perform all the duties of the chief. 
He is to appoint the patrolmen and to designate the 
captains and the sergeants.—Albany Dispatch, New 
York Evening Post, February 3. 

CURRENT TOPICS. 

In Ohio a representative from Clinton coun¬ 
ty, in the lower branch, has just been exposed in 
asking a constituent for $300 to secure him an 
appointment as a guard in the state prison. 
The lawmaker admits the truth of the charge, 
and has announced his intention to resign. 
During the canvass last fall a candidate for 
the state senate on the republican ticket was 
found to have promised to vote for Brice for 
United States senator if the democratic man¬ 
agers would give him $500 for campaign ex¬ 
penses, and he was consequently forced to re¬ 
tire. A grand jury at the state capital is now 
investigating charges of corruption against 
members of the last legislature, and three 
members of the upper branch of that body 
were indicted last week. The worst feature of 
these three incidents is the fact that they have 


not shocked the people as such revelations 
about their lawmakers ought to do. The sur¬ 
prise is rather that the oflfenders have been 
caught than that men can be nominated and 
elected to the legislature who are capable of 
such offenses .—New York Evening Post, Jan- 
uary S7. 

^ mu nt 

Congressman-elect J. A. Hatch has been 
officially notified by the war department that 
there is a vacancy at West Point from this 
congressional district, and asking him to sup¬ 
ply it. His predecessor made several stren¬ 
uous attempts, but the young men whom he 
appointed at different times failed to pass ex¬ 
amination. Congressman Hatch has a num¬ 
ber of applications for the appointment, and 
has announced that he will name no one, but 
will throw the field open to the district. He 
states that neither politics, religion nor color 
will cut any figure. A competitive examina¬ 
tion will be had, probably in Logansport, the 
date to be hereafter fixed ,—Delphi dispatch 
Indianapolis News, July 8. 

* * * 

There was virtue enough in the senate to re¬ 
ject the scheme of Vilas and Elkins to give each 
senator the additional patronage of the ap¬ 
pointment of two cadets at West Point, which 
act of self-denial the country will appreciate. 
There is no necessity for any such increase in 
the number of cadets, because the army is 
already over oflficered, and it is difficult to find 
places for all the present graduates.— Spring- 
field Republican, February 21. 

* * 45 - 

Mayor Strong presided, January 24, at a 
meeting at Sherry’s in the interest of civil 
service reform. About 250 ladies were pres¬ 
ent. The meeting was held under the au¬ 
spices of the women’s auxiliary to the civil 
service reform association, of which the 
president is Mrs. Charles R. Lowell. There 
were five gentlemen announced in the pro¬ 
gramme to speak. They were President Seth 
Low, of Columbia College; E. Randolph Rob¬ 
inson, civil service commissioner; Colonel 
Waring, commissioner of street cleaning; IJer- 
bert Welsh, of Philadelphia, and Joseph H. 
Choate. Of these, Mr. Choate alone was 
absent. 

* * » 

Post-office clerk William H. Van Pelt, sev¬ 
enty years old, who has been in the service 
forty-six years, received from his associate em¬ 
ployes of the second division yesterday noon 
a gold watch, chain, and seal as a token of 
their regard. The presentation was made by 
postmaster Dayton .—NewYork Times, August23 

THE BROTHERHOOD OF PIRATES. 

Instead of transferring -its services for a 
consideration, to one party or the other, as 
usual, the John J. O’Brien Association of New 
York has this year adopted the thrifty expe¬ 
dient of dividing itself into two parts. One 
section is with Tammany, and the other, un¬ 
der the leadership of the redoubtable Barney 
Rourke, has indorsed the republican state 
ticket, Rourke was a Tammany district 
leader last fall. 










The civil service Chronicle. 


INDIANAPOLIS, APRIL, 1896. 


T’CDvra*.^ One dollar per annum. 

10 centa percopy. 


VoL. II, No. 38. 


Published monthly. Publication office. No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapoli*, Ind. 


The Chronicle has never contained 
more important matter than that printed 
in this issue describing the partition of 
Pennsylvania. The various drafts of agree¬ 
ments are still under discussion with a 
view to drawing them down to'one final 
agreement; but it seems that a contract of 
partition along the same lines, actually 
went into effect in 1890, and but lately ex¬ 
pired. Except that prominent rivals are 
not murdered, we can not see that the 
condition of the government of Pennsyl¬ 
vania is to day much different from the 
condition of the government of Rome af¬ 
ter Cfesar had overcome his rivals. The 
republican forms went on as always, but 
the one boss was Cajsar. The astounding 
thing is the craven and debauched spirit 
of the people and press of Pennsylvania. 
These indubitable proofs of the destruc¬ 
tion of free government do not create a 
ripple in that state. 


There is no more contemptible public 
figure to-day than Governor Morton of New 
York. The place he holds is one of the 
highest distinction and the holding should 
tempt even a mediocre man to the most 
conscientious performance of duty. But 
Mr. Morton’s acts have so stamped him as 
the tool of Platt that the mark can never 
be removed. His respectability makes the 
mark more disgraceful. Over the protest 
of every leader in administrative reform, 
he reorganized the state civil service com¬ 
mission so that the majority were Platt 
men, a measure which could have had no 
object except to further a Platt scheme. 
Then the excise bill was passed and a storm 
of opposition arose against its approval. 
Platt wrote a public letter in favor of it 
and then Governor Morton signed it. The 
expenditures under the bill will be about 
$275,000 annually, and the question arose 
as to the classification of the employes. 
The state constitution requires all appoint¬ 
ments to be competitive so far as practic¬ 
able. Platt’s civil service commission, over 
the protest of the one honest member. Col¬ 
onel Burt, promptly classified the employes 
as non-competitive and the governor ap¬ 
proved the classification on the ground 
that the law must be enforced at once 
and there was no eligible list. This excuse 


is worthy of the days of the civil service 
reform struggle along in the eighties and 
is the littlest thing which perhaps even 
Governor Morton has done. As chief ex¬ 
cise commissioner he appointed H. H. 
Lyman, who at once went to New York 
and had a long conference with Platt, and 
a few hours later his nomination was con¬ 
firmed by the legislature. From Platt he 
went to Hackett, chairman of the repub¬ 
lican state committee. Then he appointed 
a deputy for the city and county of New 
York, one George Hilliard, a Platt district 
leader, and seems well started in building 
up a great Platt excise machine. 

But a difficulty has arisen. The court of 
appeals has decided that the constitution 
is self-executing in its requirements as to 
admission into the state service and that it 
will be the duty of the court in any case 
brought before it to see that the constitu¬ 
tion is observed. It further holds that 
non-legislation can not nullify the consti¬ 
tution, Lyman was making ready to ap¬ 
point sixty agents which the legislature, in 
order to beat the constitution, termed 
“confidential.” But the state comptroller, 
Mr. Roberts, here arose and gave notice 
that he would not pay a single appointee 
who did not get his place by competition. 
This paralyzed the machine and Chairman 
Hackett telegraphed to Roberts: “Are you 
going to forget our friends who stood by 
you for renomination?” It is more than 
likely that Roberts will forget “our friends,” 
and the Platt men are now talking of hav¬ 
ing a law passed transferring the duty of 
the payment to Lyman. This will not help 
the matter; this whole Platt-Morton scheme 
is destined to an inglorious failure. Com¬ 
petition is practicable and the court will so 
hold. But in what a position is Morton, 
with his bogus respectabilty, bogus states¬ 
manship, bogus everything. This extend¬ 
ed instance is only one of a collection, 
among which is his sanction of a bill Platt- 
izing the Albany police, and another bill 
authorizing the payment of Aldridge’s il¬ 
legally appointed employes who were 
kicked out by the court of appeals. 

Mayor Warner, of Rochester, has fol¬ 
lowed up his proposal to enforce the civil 
service law by issuing a proclamation for- 
biding the city comptroller to issue any 
warrants for the pay of any person whose 
appointment has not been made in accord¬ 
ance with law and the rules. The hundred 
such now in the employ of the city are at 


last convinced and since most of them did 
not enter the recent competition their 
names are not on the eligible lists, and in 
a few days they will not only be payless 
but positionless. They too, talk of appeal¬ 
ing to Platt’s legislature; but here again 
the constitution stands as a barrier impass¬ 
able to the Broadway expressman. 

Is IT not about time that Mayor Taggart, 
of this city, began to heed passing events ? 
Here is the mayor of Rochester declaring 
that he will observe his oath and enforce 
the law. Here is the court of appeals de¬ 
claring, that when the constitution says 
that employment shall be given by compe¬ 
tition so far as practicable, it is self-execut¬ 
ing regardless of a dishonest legislature, 
and that the court will judge of the prac¬ 
ticability. Now, as late as March 16,1895^ 
the legislature of Indiana re-enacted a 
law, which had already for four years been 
the law of the state, requiring the mayor 
to call together the heads of departments, 
and adopt regulations which “shall pre¬ 
scribe a common and systematic method 
of ascertaining the comparative fitness of 
applicants for office, position and promo¬ 
tion, and of selecting, appointing and pro. 
moting those found to be best fitted, except 
in the department of public safety, without 
regard to political opinions or services.” 
Mayor Taggart put under his feet the rules 
adopted in accordance with this mandate, 
and after brazenly violating them, and al¬ 
lowing them to be violated to his heart’s 
content, he called his heads of depart¬ 
ments together, and the meeting went 
through the form of repealing the rules, 
but adopted none in their stead. Mayor 
Taggart has a'clergyman who takes a lively 
interest in his doings as a public officer, and 
we suggest that now is the time for a proper 
representation of the spiritual pains and 
penalties of perjury. 

A FRIEND has called our attention to the 
possibility that the remarks in the Chron¬ 
icle last month relating to Secretary Car¬ 
lisle were unjust—and we have been over 
the matter again. The statement was made 
by Commissioner Rice, in his Boston ad¬ 
dress, that Secretary Carlisle in appoint¬ 
ing money-counters had received only the 
applications of those formerly employed 
in like work and had selected those whose 
record was the highest in the former serv¬ 
ice; also that he had promoted a clerk af¬ 
ter twenty years’ service, who was not a 


























310 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


democrat, to a position not classified; also 
that he had recommended all chiefs of 
divisions to be transferred to the competi¬ 
tive lists. The Chronicle pointed out 
that Mr. Carlisle had asked congress not to 
put the money-counters under the civil 
service law, and that, coupled with his son 
Logan, he had a long and ofiensive career 
as an anti-civil service reformer. It asked 
also for the politics of the counters actu¬ 
ally appointed. This was no injustice. It 
is Mr. Carlisle’s fault that the counters are 
not removed from politics, and some of 
the greatest scandals have been connected 
with the places of the very chiefs of divi¬ 
sions which he now seeks to have classi¬ 
fied. If there is anything which Mr. Car¬ 
lisle has ever said in favor of the merit sys¬ 
tem, we shall be glad to print it. Judged 
by his career, he has been its steady ene¬ 
my. If he has become converted and is 
now its friend, it is easy enough to say so, 
and to dismiss Logan Carlisle; but we ob¬ 
ject to putting forward such comparatively 
petty facts as Mr. Rice mentioned as evi¬ 
dence that the old Adam is eradicated. 

The republicans of the senate have the 
distinction of being led to victory by Gor¬ 
man. It all arose out of Gorman’s solici¬ 
tude for “taking the country post-office 
away from the people.” The greatest pest 
in the federal service for many years has 
been the little country postmasters, by the 
fifty thousand or so acting as diligent elec¬ 
tioneering tools of fellows like Gorman. 
No one appreciates this service more than 
Gorman. The recent plan of the post¬ 
master-general for the gradual transfer of 
these offices to the classified service, if car¬ 
ried out, would render further usefulness 
to the Gormanites impossible; and it 
seems that a majority of the senators are 
Gormanites, and they forbade consoli¬ 
dation to run over the corporate limits 
of a city. The condemnation of this cor¬ 
rupt legislation has been all but universal, 
but it is not to be expected that any follow¬ 
ers of Gorman would be made ashamed, 
any more than a thief is ashamed to be 
called a thief. Gorman says that all this talk 
is putting the matter on a low plane, and 
one has to hear him describe the evils of 
taking offices away from “the people,” and 
explain how free he has been from inter¬ 
ference with the distribution of spoil to 
get a just idea of what a nice man he is. 

It seems to be taken for granted that 
President Cleveland is soon to issue an order 
completing the classification of the federal 
service and putting the destruction of the 
spoils system in that service upon the 
home stretch. In anticipation of the dire¬ 
ful future the Washington correspondent 
of the Indianapolis Journal says, April 16: 
“Indeed, I see no encouragement in the 


future fof a man to be a party worker. 
Every office in the nation which he might 
fill will be out of his reach.” How about 
the party principles? The party worker 
has never said, “Vote with my party be¬ 
cause I want to become a spittoon-cleaner.” 
The one reason which he has bawled un¬ 
ceasingly has been the salutary benefits of 
his party principles? Was this all a lie? 
It can not be; the Journal correspondent 
owes an apology to the party worker. And, 
then, the party principles; are they not 
worth working for? Must a man be paid 
to work for them? 

The Ohio senate recently passed a bill 
providing for the merit system in the city 
of Cincinnati. The bill had been endorsed 
by the Chamber of Commerce, the Commer¬ 
cial Club and other business associations 
of the city and was earnestly desired by 
the people. The party bosses, however, re¬ 
alizing that the progress of the merit sys¬ 
tem means that they must go to some hon¬ 
est labor, ordered the action of the legisla¬ 
ture reconsidered and it was done under 
the lead of a Cincinnati Senator named 
Shattuc. This undoubtedly ends the mat¬ 
ter for the present. The result is not sur¬ 
prising. The party machine and the men 
who control it live very largely upon the 
distribution of spoil, and the members of 
our legislatures are about of an average 
with the ordinary ward boss. They have 
the same political ideas, the same corrupt 
notions of government and all alike are in 
politics for what there is in it. It is not^ 
therefore, to be expected that in a state so 
thoroughly debauched as is Ohio political¬ 
ly, the party machine will advance the 
merit system except that as step by step 
it is kicked into it by public opinion. In 
these days, having in view the great tri¬ 
umphs which the merit system has won, 
its advocates know that its final success is 
certain even in Ohio. The party worker 
and the party boss are being crowded to 
the wall and like the rats and vermin in 
a ship under process of fumigation the 
only question is not whether they wdll sur¬ 
vive but how long they can stand the fumi¬ 
gation. 

We have received from Philadelphia an 
interesting account of the efforts of the 
Eighth Ward Association of the Municipal 
League to elect a member of the common 
council. There are sixteen divisions in the 
eighth ward. Of these the eight which 
pay nearly all the taxes gave the league 
candidate a majority while the eight which 
pay a small proportion of the taxes gave a 
heavy majority against him. It seems to 
have been a matter of dollars and cents 
and offers a good view of Pennsylvania 
politics. A few days before the election 
the secretary of the ward association was 


assured that the league candidate could 
easily be elected if he would “put up” $900. 
This, of course, was refused, and the regu¬ 
lar republican candidate was elected. 


While perhaps its object is not strictly 
within the scope of the Chronicle, yet we 
print below Mr. Foulke’s letter to all the 
editors of Indiana papers. It will be 
noted that the charge is that certain men 
are pushing themselves for the national 
senate who have no particular qualifica¬ 
tions for any public position, but who are 
possessed of great wealth, and are believed 
to have obtained and to be obtaining their 
present influence with the party workers 
and the possibly future legislators by 
heavy contributions of funds. The om¬ 
inous silence of the leading republican 
papers througout the state is commanding 
wide and fixed attention. The letter is as 
follows: 

Sib—I n other states we have seen men reaching 
the highest executive office, and even intruding 
themselves into the national senate, through the 
power of money alone, purchasing political influ¬ 
ence to secure their nomination and election to 
places for which they had no other qualifications. 
Indiana has been singularly free from this kind of 
corruption. Her governors and senators have been 
selected with little reference to pecuniary consid¬ 
erations. Morton, Hendricks, McDonald, Pratt, 
Voorhees, Harrison and Turple were chosen on ac¬ 
count of the political prominence of the men them¬ 
selves, and they honestly and fairly represented 
the respective parties to which they owed their 
election. But, in view of the supposed certainty 
of republican success next fall, the candidates who 
are now pushing their claims most loudly and 
eagerly are men without distinction or experience 
in public life, whose chief qualification is the pos¬ 
session of great wealth, which it is beleved they 
are willing to use, paying for the coveted honor by 
enormous contributions to the campaign fund as 
well as in other ways. 

The choice of any such men would simply mean 
that republican nominations in Indiana are for 
sale. It would involve greater injury to the honor 
of our state and to the national welfare than the 
mere success of either political party. No partisan 
victory is so precious that it will compensate lor 
the sapping of public virtue involved in the elec¬ 
tion of a candidate representing dollars and cents 
rather than political principles. Upon this dark 
pathway to inevitable ruin the republican party of 
Indiana with its splendid traditions of patriotic 
beneficence ought not to enter. Yours, 

Wm. Dudley Foulke. 

Richmond, Ind., April 7, 1896. 


THE PARTITION OF PENNSYLVANIA. 

DRAMATIS PERSONjE. 

Matt Quay — U. S. Senator and Over-Lord of 
Pennsylvania. 

Richard, Son oj the Above—Heir Apparent. 

Chris Magee—A restless and rebellious Under- 
Lord. 

Dave Martin—Another restless and rebellious Un¬ 
der-Lord. 

Walter—An Intermediary. 

Flinn, a State Senator, 

Broum, a Director of Public Safety, ) Henchmen, 


Anti-Quay 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


311 


INTERMEDIARY WALTER’S PROPOSITION. 

The correspondence which the Quay mana¬ 
ger in Pittsburg made public yesterday began 
with a preliminary statement by Parker L. 
Walter, formerly a newspaper man in the 
Smoky City, in which he asserted that Direct¬ 
or of Public Safety Joseph O. Brown, after 
consultation with Chris L. Magee and Senator 
Flinn, had authorized him to make a proposi¬ 
tion to Senator Quay, The proposition Mr. 
Walter made in a letter, which was as fol¬ 
lows : 

“Personal. 

“Hotel Duqdesne, 
“Pittsburg, Pa., U. S. A., 
“December 24, 9:30 p. m. 

“Dear Senator —Joe Brown sent for me 
at noon to-day and asked me if any terms 
could be made with you. I said nothing but 
a complete lay down. He kept me here until 
now. First he went over the situation with 
Flinn, then Flinn went to Magee and this is 
the result, and is their formal offer to you, 
known only to them, myself and you : 

“Magee will retire from national, state and 
city politics; Flinn will do the same after the 
February elections if you think best, and 
merely work along in harmony in the senate. 
He will step out of city chairmanship and let you 
name his successor. You are to name all delegates 
from Allegheny county to state convention. You 
are to name all members of legislature (house and 
senate) from the county; you are to name national 
delegates. 

'‘Larkin or other city nominees (except Guthrie, 
who is regarded as unsafe for you and other 
side also) to be elected under secret agreement. 
Gourley to be defeated, even if nominated. 

“Flinn to call down Martin and Porter and 
other Philadelphia leaders if so desired by you; 
they to give you legislature and national delegates. 

“Any man you may name to be supported for 
senate or President. 

“In return nothing suggested so far, except 
certain lines for investigation here. All bona 
fide wrong-doing of Brown, Flinn, Magee or 
others to be shown up. 

“Brown to meet you at my house in early 
morning alone. After talk with him Flinn 
to come and give such guarantees as you may 
ask for. 

“This is outline of matter. They say Hast¬ 
ings is with you and the game is up. 

“This must be arranged, they say, before 
the committee meets here, and must be abso¬ 
lutely a secret. 

“Wire me early, so I can tell Brown. 

“Write what you desire done to 117 Linden 
avenue. East Liberty, Pittsburg. 

“Yours, etc., 

“Parker L. Walter.” 

R. R. quay’s statement. 

Following this letter. Ex Kepresentative 
Richard R. Quay, Senator Quay’s son, made 
this statement concerning the correspondence: 

“About two weeks before J. O. Brown and 
Senator Flinn went to Washington I heard 
from outside sources that they were going to 
ask for an interview with father and were 


seeking a compromise. I went to Washington 
and protested against father’s even meet¬ 
ing them, saying to him at the time : ‘If you 
meet them we will have the same old cry of 
Quay and Martin that we had iu the hog com¬ 
bine fight of last summer.’ 

“He said to me: ‘Dick, you are entirely too 
bitter; it is my duty as chairman of the state 
committee to do all I honorably can to har¬ 
monize the different factions of the republican 
party. If they ask for a meeting I will re¬ 
ceive them as I would any other republicans.’ 

“Following out his ideas as expressed to me 
as to his duty as chairman, he wired Mr. 
Brown upon the receipt of Mr. Walter’s letter 
of the 24th of December, if he desired to see 
him to come to Washington. The next day 
Mr. Brown appeared in Washington, accom¬ 
panied by Mr. Flinn. At this time Mr. Flinn 
produced a memorandum written in pencil by 
himself, which was in striking contrast with 
the suggestions given through Mr. Brown to 
Mr. Walter. My father flatly refused to en¬ 
tertain the proposition. After this, and be¬ 
fore they left, he told them they might leave 
it with him, and that he would amend it. He 
then wrote to friends in Allegheny county, to 
whom previous to the state convention he had 
made pledges that he would carry out his re¬ 
form ideas in the manner enunciated in the 
state platform. 

“It became noised about Pittsburg that Mr. 
Brown and Mr. Flinn had gone to Washington 
to see father, and father, having been written 
to on the subject, wrote to his friends that no 
compromise would be made with which they 
were not entirely satisfied. 

“Several days after that Mr. Wright, father’s 
secretary, forwarded, by father’s direction, an 
unsigned typewritten suggestion which is 
dated January 1, and of which he retained a 
copy. This is the paper to which Senator 
Flinn has made so many mysterious refer¬ 
ences, and is the only paper that ever came 
from father in connection with this matter.” 

The memorandum agreement which was re¬ 
ferred to, was in Mr. Flinn’s handwriting, and 
was as follows: 

“Memorandum and agreement between M. 
S. Quay of the first part and J. O. Brown and 
William Flinn of the second part. The con¬ 
sideration of the agreement being the mutual po¬ 
litical and business advantage which may result 
therefrom.* 

♦Comptroller James A. Grier, in answer to 
the petition of Commissioners Mercer and 
Weir for a mandamus to compel him to ask 
for bids for tax receipts, has filed a reply stat¬ 
ing that the county commissioners in March, 
1893, advertised for proposals for the printing 
of tax receipts to be used in the collection of 
the taxes for that year for the county of Alle¬ 
gheny, specifying the character of the paper 
by a sample furnished by the American Bank 
Note Company, of New York, and limiting 
the same to the sample. On March 23,1893, a 
contract was made between the county com¬ 
missioners and Baird Reed for the tax receipts 


“First—The said M. S. Quay is to have the 
benefit of the influence in all matters in state 
and national politics of the said parties of the 
second part, the said parties agreeing that they 
will secure the election of delegates to the state and 
national convention, who will be guided in all mat¬ 
ters by the wishes of the said party of the first part, 
and who will also secure the election of members of 
the state senate from the forty-third, forty-fourth and 
forty-fifth senatorial districts, and also secure the 
election of members of the house of representatives 
south of the Monongahela and Ohio rivers in the 
county of Allegheny, who will be guided by the wishes 
and request of the said parly of the first part during 
the continuance of this agreement upon all political 
matters. The different candidates of the vari¬ 
ous positions mentioned shall be selected by 
the parties of the second part, and all the po¬ 
sitions of state and national appointments 
made in this territory mentioned shall be sat¬ 
isfactory to and secure the indorsement of the 
party of the second part, when the appoint¬ 
ment is made either by or through the party 
of the first part, or his friends or political 
associates. All legislation affecting the parties 
of the second part, affecting cities of the second 
class, shall receive the hearty co-operation and as¬ 
sistance of the party of the second part, and legis¬ 
lation which may affect their business shall like¬ 
wise reoeive the hearty co-operation and help of the 
party of the first part. 

“It being distinctly understood that at the 
approaching national convention, to be held 
at St. Louis, the delegates from the twenty- 
second congressional district shall neither by 
voice nor vote do other than what is satisfac¬ 
tory to the party of the first part. 

“The party of the first part agrees to use his 
influence and secure the support of his friends 
and political associates to support the repub¬ 
lican county and city ticket, when nominated, 
both in the city of Pittsburg and Allegheny, 
and the county of Allegheny, and that he will 


and supplies to be used by the county that 
year, the same to correspond with sample on 
file. This contract, he says, while purporting to 
have been made by James G. Weir and R. E. Mer¬ 
cer, was illegal, and an imposition, as it was really 
made by Christopher L. Magee, acting collusively 
with Weir and Mercer. 

The comptroller then states that the receipts 
furnished were printed on inferior paper, “on 
paper of a low cost price and within the con¬ 
trol of said Magee and others, and large num¬ 
bers of tax receipts were by them issued and used in 
subsequent county and city elections for illict pur¬ 
poses. This was easily arranged because they had 
control of the majority of the county commissioners, 
who acted and co-operated with them m this matter. 
And your respondent assigns this as one of 
the competent reasons for refusing to counte¬ 
nance measures of this character.” He also 
asserts: “That Senator William Flinn, chair¬ 
man of the republican committee of Pitts¬ 
burg, obtained blank tax receipts of this char¬ 
acter from a county official, and used them in 
the city elections for illegal purposes.” —Pi««- 
burg dispatch. New York Evening Post, April 7. 












312 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


discountenance the factional fighting by his 
friends and associates for county offices during 
the continuation of this agreement. 

“This agreement is not to be binding upon 
the parties of the second part when a candi¬ 
date for any office shall reside in Allegheny 
county and shall only be binding if the party 
of the first part is a candidate for United 
States senator to succeed himself so far as this 
office is concerned. 

“In the forty-third senatorial district a new 
senator shall be elected to succeed Senator 
Upperman. In the forty-fifth senatorial dis¬ 
trict the party of the first part shall secure the 
withdrawal of Dr. A. J. Barchfeld, and the 
parties of the second part shall withdraw as a 
candidate Senator Steel, and the parties of the 
second part shall secure the election of some 
party satisfactory to themselves. 

“In the twenty-second congressional district 
the candidates for congress shall be selected 
by the party of the second part. The term of 

this agreement to be for-years from the 

signing thereof, and shall be binding upon all 
parties when signed by C. L. Magee. 

WHAT QUAY PROPOSED. 

Senator Quay’s suggested agreement was 
typewritten and unsigned. It was as follows: 

Jan. 1, 1896. 

“ Until January 1, 1900, the following shall be 
the political conditions in Allegheny county: Mr. 
Quay is to have the absolute support of the 
signers hereof in state and national politics 
and is to sustain through his friends all regu¬ 
lar republican nominees and the straight re¬ 
publican organization. 

“If Mr. Quay is a candidate for the United 
States senate in 1899 he is to have the united 
support of the senators and members of the leg¬ 
islature from Allegheny county. In every other 
case his leadership is to be followed by a united sup¬ 
port in the legislature and in national and state con¬ 
ventions except where a bona fide candidate 
appears in Allegheny county. 

“In the national convention of 1896 the del¬ 
egates from the twenty-second congressional 
district shall sustain Senator Quay. Unless 
otherwise agreed hereafter, Mr. Magee shall 
not be a delegate to either the national or 
state conventions of 1896. 

“In the senatorial districts now represented 
by Steel and Upperman, the sitting senators 
shall retire and Senator Quay and his friends 
shall name the successors to Senator Steel. 
The other parties hereto shall name the suc¬ 
cessor to Senator Upperman. 

“For legislative and state convention for the 
year 1896, Senator Quay and his friends shall 
name the members and delegates from the first, 
second, sixth, seventh and eighth legislative 
districts. After 1896 the personnel of the dele¬ 
gates of the sixth and eighth districts shall be a mat¬ 
ter of conference between the parties hereto, and if 
no agreement be arrived at, shall be settled by arbi¬ 
tration. Senatorial appointments in the city 
of Pittsburg shall be first indorsed by the par¬ 
ties hereto residing there. 

‘'No legislation is to he had at Harrisburg or de¬ 


sired, the effect of which will be to inpire the charac¬ 
ter or business interests of the Pittsburg parties 
hereto. This, however, not to interfere with 
the general reform legislation outlined in the 
platform of the republican state convention of 
1895. 

“In the twenty-second congressional district 
the candidate for congress shall be named by 
the Pittsburg parties, and shall be, so far as 
the affair can be controlled, without opposi¬ 
tion for nomination or election. 

“All senators and members shall sustain 
Senator Quay in the organization of the legis¬ 
lature and in the election of a United States 
senator during the term of this agreement, ex¬ 
cept as hereinbefore provided.” 

SENATOR FLINN’s STATEMENT. 

It was late yesterday afternoon when Sena¬ 
tor Flinn learned that the foregoing corres¬ 
pondence had been made public. He and J. 
O. Brown were together at the Walton, and 
they had copies of the whole matter before 
them. Mr. Flinn was in a frame of mind to 
talk and after going over the two agreements 
he made this statement concerning them: 

“The two agreements, relating to the pro¬ 
posed agreements between Senator Quay and 
J. O. Brown and myself on the other part, are 
practically correct. The difference between 
the two agreements are very slight, being that 
the republican organization of Allegheny 
county should not interfere in the politics of 
the sixth and eighth legislative districts. Sen¬ 
ator Quay also demanding that he should 
name the successor to Senator Steel. He fur¬ 
ther demanding that C. L. Magee should not 
be permitted to go either to the national or 
state convention as a delegate. The agreement 
which Mr. Brown and myself submitted to 
him contained the provision that Mr. Magee 
should sign the agreement before it was bind¬ 
ing 

“ There was nothing startling in the agreement sub¬ 
mitted by Mr. Brown and myself, as it was a prac¬ 
tical reproduction of the agreement made in August 
of 1890, and signed by Senator Quay and N. P. 
Reed on one part, and Mr. J. 0. Brown and my¬ 
self on the other part. This agreement ran for a 
period of four years, and when it expired Senator 
Quay called Air. Brown and myself to a meeting at 
the Duquesne Hotel, when the agreement was de¬ 
stroyed. He complimented us on our fairness and 
integrity in the keeping of the agreement. 

SENT FOR MR. BROWN. 

“Senator Quay telegraphed to J. O. Brown 
to come to Washington and asked him to bring 
me with him, when he received a dispatch 
from him, announcing that he was ready to 
meet us. Senator Quay also instructed Mr. 
Brown to have us reproduce the agreement of 
1890, which I did with the exceptions that I 
have enumerated. I notified Senator Quay 
that while I was anxious to have harmony 
in the lines of the republican party that we 
would do nothing without a consultation with 
David Martin, of Philadelphia. Mr. Quay ob¬ 
jected strenuously to having Mr. Martin 
brought into the question at all, but I replied 


that Governor Hastings was our general and 
had gotten us into this fight with him; that Gov¬ 
ernor Hastings had made peace with him with¬ 
out notification to either the Philadelphians or 
ourselves, and that there was no reason why, if 
peace was made with the political interests of 
one municipality, both should not be included. 
I believe that the agreement would have been 
signed that day but for the provision relating 
to Mr. Martin which I insisted upon. I took 
the train to Philadelphia and notified Mr. 
Martin of my conversation with Senator Quay, 
and we both agreed that when peace was made 
it should be made with both municipalities at 
one time. 

“Senator Quay then sent for Mr. Martin and 
met him at Senator Cameron’s house. While 
Senator Quay is turning on the light, he might 
give the public the benefit of this interview. 
He again telegraphed Mr. Brown when he was 
ready to receive us, and we went to Washing¬ 
ton, to his residence. He told us that his 
friends in Allegheny county objected to the 
renewal of the agreement of 1890, and that we 
had better see Lieutenant-Governor Lyon. I 
replied that Lieutenant-Governor Lyon was 
in a conspiracy with the democratic party and 
the municipal league to defeat the the repub¬ 
lican city ticket, which was elected in Febru¬ 
ary, and I would have no meeting with him. 
He then verbally enumerated the proposition 
which he afterward mailed to Mr. Brown, and 
which is the copy which is in to-day’s Pitts¬ 
burg papers. 

THEATENED WITH THE EEXOW. 

“We told him at the time that we would 
not agree to the unnecessary humiliation of 
Mr. Magee. He replied then that it was not 
his intention that Mr. Magee should shine 
again in the future in state or national poli¬ 
tics. We reminded him of the fact that he 
did not live in Allegheny county, but upon 
this point he was obstinate and threatened us 
with the Lexow committee. We informed 
him that if the Lexow committee satin Pitts¬ 
burg and took the character of testimony 
they took in Philadelphia, there would be no 
agreement signed of any kind or character be¬ 
tween us. He telegraphed Senator Andrews to 
meet us in Philadelphia, which he did the 
same day. 

“If Senator Quay is still anxious to turn 
on the light he might inform the democratic 
party, or the municipal league of Pittsburg, 
why the Lexow committee only held one hear¬ 
ing, and why they conducted the line of ex¬ 
amination which they did, which was neither 
personal nor scandalous, and which did not 
suit the municipal league. The only differ¬ 
ence between the Senator Quay of 1890 and 
Senator Quay of 1896 is that he is a candidate 
for President; and while it may not be to the 
credit of a member of the state senate to en¬ 
gage in the political partitions of a county 
that he lives in, it might strike the public 
that it is far less creditable for a reform candi¬ 
date for President, who is a candidate for the 
greatest office of any people on earth, to be 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 


313 


engaged in a political partition of a commu¬ 
nity in a county where he does not live. 

“I think, in order to make the chapter com¬ 
plete, that Senator Quay might as well turn 
on the light regarding his anxiety to make a 
deal with Mr. Martin, of Philadelphia, and 
tell the result of the meeting in Senator Cam¬ 
eron’s residence, and tell the reformers of the 
municipal league why but one session of the 
Lexow committee was held in Pittsburg.” 

MR. brown’s statement. 

Director of Public Safety Brown, of Pitts¬ 
burg, speaking on the same subject, said: 

“In January I received a telegram from 
Senator Quay, asking me to come to Wash¬ 
ington. I did, and called upon the senator 
at his private residence, and he told me that 
he desired to discuss the propriety of a new 
political agreement of the same kind and 
character that was executed between N. P. 
Reed and himself on one part, and Senator 
Flinn and myself, of the other. He asked me 
to take a pencil and note down the main points 
of what he thought that agreement should be. 
This I did, and it was practically the agree¬ 
ment of 1890, and was to form the basis of 
a future discussion upon political matters 
therein set out; with the request that I take 
them to Pittsburg and submit them to Senator 
Flinn, and that Senator Flinn and myself 
should go over the main points of the agree¬ 
ment and return to Washington, which we 
did. 

“On cur way to Washington Senator Flinn 
wrote out and reproduced in writing prac¬ 
tically the agreement of 1890, a copy of 
which appears in the Pittsburg papers of to¬ 
day. We had a very lengthy discussion over 
the political situation of Allegheny county, 
but failed to reach an agreement, for the 
reason that Senator Quay stoutly insisted that 
C. L. Magee, of Pittsburg, should not attend 
any state or national convention, and that he. 
Senator Quay, should have the choice of state 
senator of Pennsylvania, instead of Senator 
Steel. As to this whole matter, I have Sen¬ 
ator Quay’s original telegrams and letters in 
my possession in Pittsburg, which I will pro¬ 
duce at any time. Senator Quay told me, in 
his own private library in Washington, that 
he did not desire Parker Walters should in 
any manner, shape or form have any part in 
these contemplated agreements.” 

SENATOR quay’s COMMENT. 

Senator Quay was shown the interviews 
with Senator Flinn and Director Brown, but 
he refused to discuss them. “Let all the news 
come from the seat of war,” he delared. ‘‘I 
have nothing to do with it. The people there 
have all the documents, papers and evidence, 
and they can publish them if they see fit.” 

He read the interview with Senator Flinn 
over carefully and occasionally would re¬ 
mark: “He tries to get away from the ques¬ 
tion;” then turning to the reporter, Mr. Quay 
would say: “The point is that they came to 
me, and he covers that part up with a mass of 
other matters. 

When he read Director Brown’s interview he 


said: “You will notice he begins with my tele¬ 
gram to him. He says nothing about the let¬ 
ter I first received.” 

When he had finished reading the inter¬ 
views, Mr. Quay said: “I must decline to dis¬ 
cuss the matter, preferring, as I have already 
remarked, to let the news come from the seat 
of war.” 

A DEBAUCHED AND MANACLED 
PRESS. 

{Philadelphia Press, March 17.) 

Quay and Flinn Here—They Were Both at 
the Same Hotel, But They Did Not Meet— 
Tlie Proposed Peace Terms—Flinn and 
Brown Drew Up One Agreement and 
Quay Prepared Another—Senator Flinn’s 
Statement—He Says Harmony Failed Be¬ 
cause He Insisted That David Martin 
Should Be Taken In—Senator Quay Is 
Reticent. 

United States Senator Quay and State Sena¬ 
tor Flinn, the Allegheny county republican 
leader who has been challenging Senator Quay 
for several days to cross-examine him upon 
certain political matters, were at the Walton 
last evening for about an hour and a half, but 
they did not meet. Mr. Flinn had arrived in 
Philadelphia early in the morning, having 
come east immediately after making public 
his letter of defiance to the Beaver Statesman, 
which was published in The Press yesterday. 
Mr. Quay reached the city about 7 o’clock in 
the evening, having come up from Washing¬ 
ton. 

The presence of both Senator Quay and 
State Senator Flinn was merely a coincidence, 
both gentlemen declared. Mr. Flinn said he 
had not seen Senator Quay and the latter said 
he did not know that Mr. Flinn was in the 
city until told by a Press reporter. 

Interest in the controversy between these re¬ 
publican leaders was heightened yesterday by 
the fact that Senator Quay’s son, R. R. Quay, 
made public in Pittsburg the correspondence 
and peace agreements which have been so 
much discussed during the past few days. 
These papers show that Senator Flinn and J. 
O. Brown made a proposition of peace to Sen¬ 
ator Quay, which was not acceptable to him 
and he in turn proposed terms of settlement to 
them which they would not agree to. 

QUAY-FLINN LETTERS—PITTSBURG POLITICIANS 
NOT MUCH SURPRISED—AN EDITO¬ 
RIAL INTERVIEW. 

Pittsburg, March 16.—The publication of 
the correspondence between Senator M. S. 
Quay and State Senator Flinn created consid¬ 
erable talk to-day. 

The News this afternoon, which represents 
C. L. Magee, says editorially, under the cap¬ 
tion, “A Little Political History:” 

“With regard to the published reports this 
morning concerning the relation between Sen- 
atar Quay and Senator Flinn, it is interesting 
to go back a little into history. In 1889, during 
the absence of C. L. Magee in Europe, Senator 
Quay entered into an arrangement with Senator 


Flinn and J. 0. Brown {the late N. P, Reed being 
a witness thereto), that in consideration of the sup¬ 
port of Messrs. Flinn and Brown, in harmony with 
Senator Quay’s wishes in state and national politics 
the charter of the city of Pittsburg, which Mr. Quay 
had threatened to destroy, should be preserved as it 
had been adopted by the legislature of 1887, under 
which Mr. Brown was then, as now, at the 
head of the department of public safety. The 
only exception in this agreement was in case 
there was a candidate from Allegheny county 
for any national or state position. This agree¬ 
ment was to cover a period of four years, 
which overlapped the next gubernatorial elec¬ 
tion, the next Presdential election and the 
election of Mr. Quay’s successor. It was kept 
iu good faith during the entire period. 

“In 1890, when it became necessary for the 
Republicans to nominate a candidate for gov¬ 
ernor, Allegheny county having its own can¬ 
didate in the person of Major E. A. Montooth, 
such of its delegates, including all those from 
the city of Pittsburg as were in sympathy 
with Messrs. Flinn and Brown, supported the 
Allegheny county candidate for governor and 
declined to vote for Mr. Quay’s man Delamater, 
although repeatedly urged by him to do so. 

“In 189S, in harmony with the agreement re¬ 
ferred to, and as showing Senator Quay’s confi¬ 
dence in Mr. Flinn, the latter was chosen a 
delegate-at-large to the republican national 
convention, and in that body he and Mr. Brown, 
who was a district delegate, voted for and supported 
the candidate advocated by Mr. Quay. 

“Coming down to the present diflSculty, 
when the recent municipal campaign was 
pending, Parker L. Walter, claiming to repre¬ 
sent Senator Quay, approached Mr. Brown 
and arranged for a meeting with Senator Quay 
with a view to securing harmony. This meeting 
was held at Washington, Senator Flinn being 
presen t. At that time Senator Quay agreed, as a basis 
of harmony, that there should be no interference with the 
charter of the city of Pittsburg, except as regarded 
the non-participation of police officials and other city 
employes in politics, as laid down by the republican 
stale platform of 1895, and he agreed that the Lexow 
committee, which at that time was to come to Pitts¬ 
burg, was, pending negotiations then under way, 
to confine its inquiries to such matters as should be 
covered by the system of government in vogue in this 
city. Any one familiar with the visit of that 
committee to Pittsburg will realize at once 
that they did just what the senator agreed, 
thus clearly indicating that the committee 
was at the beck and call of Senator Quay, 
and confirming the declaration made by Sen¬ 
ator Quay at the time of the organization of 
the committee, that it would be absolutely 
under his control, and was not intended to in¬ 
jure any one, but simply to be used as a po¬ 
litical club to compel the support of those 
who were not iu harmony with his views. 

“Subsequently Mr. Quay sent a typewritten 
proposition to Mr. Flinn, which is now in Mr. 
Flinn’s possession, and which laid down such 
conditions as could not be honorably accepted. 
That ended the negotiations. Senator Flinn 
is now out of the city, but it is probable that 












314 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


more light will be thrown upon Mr. Quay’s 
position upon Mr. Flinn’s return to Pitts¬ 
burg.”— Philadelphia Press, March 17. 

{Philadelphia Record, March 17.) 

Quay On His Bombsliell.—He is Here, and 
Talks About Senator Flinn’s Negotia¬ 
tions—Says It’s Allegheny’s Fight—Be¬ 
ing a Presidential Candidate He Deems 
it Improper to Comment on Convention 
Prospects or Magee’s War. 

The bombshell thrown by Senator Quay’s 
friends into the Magee Flinn ranks in Alle¬ 
gheny county by publishing the correspon¬ 
dence relating to a treaty of peace which 
Senator Flinn took steps to negotiate, was the 
all-absorbing topic in political circles yester¬ 
day. Senator Quay, accompanied by his sec¬ 
retary and Congressman Monroe H. Kulp, of 
Shamokin, arrived at the Hotel Walton, last 
night, from Washington, and when asked if 
his coming at the time when Senator Flinn 
and Public Safety Director J. O. Brown, of 
Pittsburg, were at the same hotel was merely 
a coincidence, he replied : 

“I am told they went away just as I ar¬ 
rived.” 

Senator Quay did not see Mr. Flinn. The 
latter arrived at the hotel about 7 o’clock in 
the morning, having traveled all night from 
Pittsburg. The presence of Mr. Brown, who 
figures in the published correspondence, was 
explained by the fact that Mrs. Brown has 
been staying iu the city for medical treatment. 
Mr. Flinn’s visit was a mystery to politicians, 
some of whom thought that, knowing that 
the publication was to be made yesterday 
morning in Pittsburg, he started east for the 
purposeof explaining matters to David Martin 
and Senator Porter, who would infer from the 
publication that the Pittsburg leaders, as long 
ago as last Christmas, were thinking of break¬ 
ing loose from the Philadelphia combine 
chieftains, unless the latter should join the 
westerners in the work of making everything 
lovely for Senator Quay. Mr. Flinn took the 
8.50 train for home last night. 

HOW LOCAL FACTIONS REGARD IT. 

The boomerang that has hit Magee and 
Flinn effects the “ administration ” element of 
of this city, because of the apparent intention 
which the Allegheny leaders had of forcing 
Messrs. Martin and Porter to offer the olive 
branch to the senator or of abandoning the 
Philadelphia combine chieftains to their fate, 
if they persisted in warring against the silent 
seducer of tarpon. The publication of the 
correspondence was regarded among both re¬ 
publican factions yesterday, as explaining 
why Mr. Martin had lately been acting and 
speaking, or rather not acting or speaking, 
without regard for Mr. Magee’s attitude, and 
why the Philadelphia leader had said, on 
Saturday, that he was not ready to declarefor 
or against Quay or anybody else for President 
and would not announce his preference until 
he should arrive at St. Louis. 

It was also thought among lieutenants of 
both factions, that the feelings which the Quay 


disclosure shows to have animated the Pitts¬ 
burg leaders last Christmas—about the time 
of the senatorial investigating committee’s 
visit to the smoky city—might have made 
Senator Porter weary of his share in the alli¬ 
ance with the western end of the combine, and 
had some bearing upon the announcement of 
his retirement from politics. 

{Philadelphia Times, March 17.) 

Quay and Flinn in Tovrn—It the Same Ho¬ 
tel in This City, But They Did Not Meet 
—Fliun’s Threat a Boomerang—Quay’s 
Friends Publish the Harmony Negotia¬ 
tions in Pittsburg—Combine Made the 
Overtures and the United States Senator 
demanded Magee’s Banishment from 
Politics, Stood Up for Reform Legisla¬ 
tion and Declined to Consider David 
Martin or the Situation iu This City—The 
Pittsburgers Were Evidently Afraid of 
the Senatorial Investigating Committee 
—Flinn and Director of Public Safety 
Brown, of Pittsburg, Make Interesting 
Statements, But They Admit the Authen¬ 
ticity of the Published Documents—Quay 
Reticent About Politics and the Contest 
for the Republican Presidential Nomina¬ 
tion. 

United States Senator Quay came to this 
city from Washington last evening and took 
rooms at the Hotel Walton. About the time 
of the arrival of the Beaver statesman and 
candidatefor President, State Senator William 
Flinn, of Pittsburg, who had been in the city 
all day, with J. O. Brown, the director of 
public works of Pittsburg, took his departure 
from the same hotel. It is needlesss to say 
that Senator Quay and Flinn did not have an 
engagement to meet, and they did not even get 
a glimpse of each other. 

Senator Quay said he came to Philadelphia 
on private business which might compel him to 
remain a couple of days, or may be completed 
in time for him to go back to Washington to¬ 
day. He did not care to discuss politics, es¬ 
pecially the situation regarding the contest 
for the republican presidential nomination. 
He was shown an estimate made by a New 
York newspaper, in which Major McKinleyi 
of Ohio, was given 565 votes, which would 
assure him of the nomination; but even this 
failed to draw out the candidate of the Key¬ 
stone state. He laughed as he glanced over 
the figures, to which, it was apparent by his 
manner, he attached no weight, and merely 
remarked: 

“Why don’t they give him all the rest?” 

THE PITTSBURG CONTROVERSY. 
Regarding the controversy between his sup¬ 
porters in Pittsburg and Senator Flinn, who 
is Chris Magee’s chief lieutenant in the anti- 
Quay combine. Colonel Quay declined to go 
into any discussion. He said that he did not 
consider that he was at all involved in the 
matter, and that it is entirely in the hands of 
his son Richard and Lieutentant-Governor 
Lyon, with whom Flinn raised the contro- 
versey. 


“Dick and Lyon had the correspondence on 
the subject,” he said, “to use as they saw fit. 
They deemed it proper to give it out for pub¬ 
lication, and I have nothing whatever to do 
with it.” 

The correspondence referred to caused con¬ 
siderable of a sensation in republican circles 
in this city. It was in the shape of an ex¬ 
posure by the friends of Senator Quay of all 
the documents attending the negotiations for 
peace between the leaders of the combine fac¬ 
tion of the party in Pittsburg and the senator 
himself. Senator Flinn had threatened to 
make public a letter which he had in his pos¬ 
session from Senator Quay, in which, accord¬ 
ing to Flinn, the senator sued for harmony. 
This was met by a flat denial on the part of 
Senator Quay, and his son Richard, after a 
trip to Washington, gave out in Pittsburg all 
the letters and written documents on the sub¬ 
ject. As a result, Flinn’s threat to publish 
the Quay letter has proven' considerable of a 
boomerang, since it is clearly shown by the 
latest developments that overtures for peace 
first came from the western combine. 

A SINGLE VOICE IN THE WILDER¬ 
NESS. 

POLITICAL ABSOLUTISM. 

{Philadelphia Public Ledger, March SO.) 

It has always been a popular belief—one 
strongly, clearly, and eloquently formulated, 
in President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address— 
that ours is a government of, for, and by the 
people. Undoubtedly that was what the wise, 
patriotic founders intended it to be, but with 
new lords come new governing methods and 
forces, and if President Lincoln were living 
to-day, and were to read the several agree¬ 
ments made respectively by certain Pittsburg 
politicans and Senator Quay, he would un- 
qustionably modify the language of his fa¬ 
mous memorial speech by excluding from its 
application the people of the state of Penn¬ 
sylvania. 

The intelligent citizens of this state can not 
have failed to perceive long ago that they 
were politically corralled, but, until the ex¬ 
ceedingly frank Pittsburg agreements were 
made public, they probably did not similarly 
see that they have been for years in the polit¬ 
ical shambles, hung up and sold outright to 
Senator Quay. That the Ledger is justified in 
saying that that as their political condition 
to-day is proved conclusively, we think, by 
the following correspondence, which we here¬ 
with republish at length without fear that its 
reproduction will be found tedious. 

» » » 

There is no intelligent citizen of Pennsyl¬ 
vania in whom there survives a single gleam 
of public spirit who can thoughtfully consider 
the above stated agreements and negotiations 
without the profoundest sense of humiliation, 
indignation and disgust. That the citizens of 
this great old commonwealth should be openly, 
recklessly, shamefully made the mere traffick¬ 
ing commodities of the political market, in 
which their most precious and sacred rights 











THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


315 


of citizenship are bargained and sold by the 
most corrupt and venal polititions, should 
arouse the honest resentment of every good 
citizen throughout the state. When we con¬ 
sider the vicious lives, the unenviable charac¬ 
ters, the smirched reputations of the practical 
politicians, both great and small, who at pres 
ent dominate the government of this state, 
there can be no other feeling than that of 
shame that the government of this grand old 
commonwealth can be in any manner or de¬ 
gree controlled by men whose very names are 
by-words and cast scorn upon their bearers. 
But it is fair to Senator Quay and his pliant, 
unscrupulous henchmen to say that not they, 
but the people themselves, are responsible for 
their arbitrary, blighting political rule. The 
people have given them the extraordinary 
power they exercise, to the deep humiliation 
of Pennsylvania. They are but the creatures 
of the criminal indifference of voters to their 
duties of citizenship, the first, greatest and 
most sacred of all their duties. It is upon this 
indifference that these trading politicians ex¬ 
ist and thrive. Replace it with popular polit¬ 
ical interest and energy, and our bosses, their 
“rounders” and “heelers” of all degrees, will, 
cease to be.— 

BOSS RULE IN PENNSYLVANIA. 

McKinley has taken from Quay two of the 
votes which Pennsylvania will cast in the St. 
Louis convention, and the men who will thus 
break the solid delegation are Magee and 
Flinn, the bosses of Pittsburg. In connection 
with the contest for the possession of these 
votes there has come to light documentary 
and other evidence of a very interesting 
character, showing how the legislation and 
public offices and the political affairs generally 
of a state containing nearly 6,000,000 people are 
controlled by three or four political dictators 
and made subject to their bargains with each 
other. 

The Pittsburg bosses are Magee and Flinn, 
the latter being a state senator and the chair¬ 
man of the republican city committee. Two or 
three weeks ago Lieut.-Gov. Lyon, represent¬ 
ing Quay, the state boss, in western Pennsyl¬ 
vania, remarked in public that Quay could 
have had the two Pittsburg delegates if he 
had been willing to make “a contract with the 
Pittsburg bosses.” Whereupon Flinn wrote 
to Lyon, saying that he had in his pocket a 
proposition from Quay which he had declined 
to accept, and offering to give testimony on 
this point before any tribunal. Three days 
later Quay’s son, who had asserted that no prop¬ 
osition had been made by his father to Flinn, 
caused to be published the proposition for a 
treaty of peace and division of spoils submit¬ 
ted to his father by Flinn and Magee, and 
also the counter proposition submitted by 
Quay to them. It is now admitted that a 
signed agreement or treaty between Quay 
and these men was in force from 1890 to 1894, 
when it expired by limitation. The proposi¬ 
tion submited by Flinn and Magee this year 
was practically a reproduction of it. 


The Pittsburg draft of the new treaty which 
would fill nearly a column of the Times was 
introduced as follows: * * * 

The Pittsburg bosses, who, to use a phrase 
with which men of their kind are familiar, 
“are not in politics for their health,” could re¬ 
gard with complacency “general reform” ap¬ 
proved by such a man as Quay. This shame¬ 
ful treaty, proposed by a candidate for the 
presidency, is regarded by his newspapers as 
proof that Quay is “a wise general and an 
honorable man!” 

Accounts differ as to the reason why Quay’s 
version of the treaty was not accepted. It 
provided that Magee should not be a delegate 
to any convention, and Flinn says he would 
not submit to such humiliation. Flinn in¬ 
sisted that “Dave” Martin, of Philadelphia, 
should be recognized as one of the treaty-mak¬ 
ing powers. “I believe,” he says, “that the 
agreement would have been signed that day 
but for the provision relating to Martin.” He 
asserts that Quay “threatened” him “with the 
‘Lexow’ committee,” but to no purpose. This 
committee, controlled by Quay, visited Pitts¬ 
burg while the negotiations were pending, and 
passed only one day there, making harmless in¬ 
quiries, Quay having agreed thus to muzzle 
it in order that the harmonizing process 
should not be disturbed. But Quay asked 
for too much, and as McKinley’s agents ap¬ 
peared at the right time with inducements the 
treaty was not signed and the disgraceful truth 
began to come out. 

The republican press of Pennsylvania is un¬ 
able, so far as we can learn, to see anything 
objectionable in these negotiations for what 
Flinn calls “ the partition of a community,” 
or in the shameful agreement which was in 
force for four years. The Quay papers regard 
his proposition as an “honorable” one; the 
Magee papers hold that the terms of the Pitts¬ 
burg bosses were strictly in accord with the 
rules of morality in politics. And yet here 
were proposed agreements providing for the 
absolute control, not only in conventions, 
nominations, and appointments, but also of 
the legislation of a great state—control divid¬ 
ed between the bosses of two factions, it is 
true, but still confirmed to them jointly. No 
reference was made to the people. Why 
should any have been made? The sub¬ 
servience of the republican rank and file in 
Pennsylvania to these bosses is notorious. 

What a revelation the documents and 
charges brought out by this quarrel make as 
to the forces and purposes controlling repre¬ 
sentation and legislation, both municipal and 
state, in that old commonwealth of nearly 
6,000,000 souls!— Netv York Times, March Zl. 


The Massachusetts house rejected the bill 
to extend the civil service rules to the em¬ 
ployes of counties. 


Euclid Martin, postmaster at Omaha, is 
chairman of the state democratic committee. 


MUNICIPAL SPOILS. 

/ consider the question of pure or corrupt munici¬ 
pal government in the United States as the most 
far-reaching and important that can possibly en¬ 
gage the attention of all thinking men who believe in 
government by the people.—Charles Stewart Smith. 

HOW TO GO AT IT. 

OUR AIM—THE WELFARE OF ALBANY. OUR 

MEANS—AN AROUSED CIVIC SPIRIT. OUR 

TIME—NOW. 

Albany, N. Y., April 2, 1896. 

To the Citizens of Albany: 

Mr. James Bryce, in his celebrated work, 
“The American Commonwealth,” speaks of 
municipal government as the one “conspicu¬ 
ous failure of the United States.” President 
White of Cornell University asserts that “the 
city governments of the United States are the 
worst in Christendom—the most expensive, 
the most inefficient, and the most corrupt.” 
All writers on municipal reform agree that a 
prime cause of our municipal evils is the con¬ 
fusion of state and national with municipal 
politics. The prosperity of Albany depends 
upon the honesty and efficiency of its gov¬ 
ernment by enlightened methods and upon 
business principles. We are entitled to and 
should have the most improved system of 
taxes, of street paving, of lighting, of water, 
of drainage, of schools, of transit, and all 
other public necessities and conveniences. To 
secure these results there must, on the part of 
good citizens, be organization and earnest, in¬ 
cessant and systematic political activity. 
Spasmodic effort for a few weeks before elec¬ 
tion is fruitless—twelve months of disciplined 
energy means success. 

There is to be formed at once in Albany an 
organization with these objects : 

To promote the absolute separation of our munic¬ 
ipal from state and national politics. 

To advocate the extension and maintenance of 
practical civil service reform in all municipal de¬ 
partments. 

To demand a rigid observance of all the statutes 
of the state and the laws and ordinances of the 
city. 

To compel fair elections. 

To insist upon the honest and economical ex¬ 
penditure of the taxpayers’ money. 

To watch the conduct of the city’s servants in 
every branch of the municipal service. 

To commend and uphold oflicials whose intelli¬ 
gence and devotion to duty merit approval. 

To criticise and reprove where ignorance and 
negligence is found, and to condemn and prosecute 
criminal and unworthy ollicials. 

Its special object will be to make a thorough and 
sclentiffc investigation of the correct principles of 
local self-government as adapted to this munici¬ 
pality, and to collect and publish all appropriate 
information resulting from such study. While the 
members of this organization may belong to differ¬ 
ent national or state parties, all will unite to obtain 
the best government for our city, and the wisest ex¬ 
penditure of the people’s money, to advance the 
material growth of the municipality and stimulate 
that spirit of progress in our citizens which will se¬ 
cure for them and their descendants the largest 
measure of domestic comfort and commercial pros¬ 
perity. A meeting of those thus interested in Al¬ 
bany’s welfare will be called at an early date to 
formally organize. If you are in sympathy with 
this movement and desire to Identify yourself with 













316 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


It, kiadly notify any of the undersigned. The 
blank appended can be used for this purpose. 

Committee: Matthew Hale, Grange Sard, Sam¬ 
uel B. Ward, J. De Witt Peltz, Charles R. Knowles, 
David A. Thompson, Sumuel S. Hatt, Dudley Ol- 
cott, Abraham V. De Witt. Amasa J. Parker, jr., 
Daniel Leonard, Douw H. Fonda, Albert Rathbone, 
William B. Van Rensselaer, W. Howard Brown, 
George E. Gorham. Edward G. Selden. Peter Kin- 
near, John F. Montlgnani, Oren E. Wilson, Rob 
ert Shaw Oliver, George Douglas Miller, Will¬ 
iam M. Brundage. John E. McElroy, J. Townsend 
Lansing, Porter Hooghkeck, Marcus T. Hun. Abra¬ 
ham Lansing, Henry A. Peckham, William W. Bat- 
tershall, Charles H. Mills, Edward N. McKinney, 
Henry P. Warren, John W. McHarg, and other. 

♦ * » 

The fourth national conference for good city 
government of the national municipal league 
will be held in Baltimore, May 6, 7, and 8. 
Charter reform will be an important topic, 
and one whole session will be taken up with 
its discussion. 

The description of the municipal conditions 
of the principal American cities, which have 
been a feature of former conferences, will be 
continued, special attention being given to 
these of the southern tier—Richmond, Charles¬ 
ton, Atlanta, Nashville, Memphis and Galves¬ 
ton. 

Among the speakers will be Samuel B. Ca- 
pen and John A. Butler, presidents of the 
Boston and Milwaukee municipal leagues, 
repectively ; James W. Pryor, secretary of the 
city club of New York ; Henry W. Williams, 
of Baltimore reform league ; George A. Deni¬ 
son, of The Springfield Republican; Mayor John 
Boyd Thacher, of Albany, N. Y.; George W. 
Guthrie, of Pittsburg; Charles Morris How¬ 
ard, secretary of the Baltimore reform league; 
Merritt Starr, of Chicago; Col. George E. 
Waring; Hazen S. Pingree, mayor of De¬ 
troit; Charles Richardson, one of the vice- 
presidents of the league; William M. Salter, 
and P. J. Maguire, general secretary of the 
united brotherhood of carpenters and joiners 
of America. 

Invitations have also been extended to Mag¬ 
istrate John Primrose and Councilor Craw¬ 
ford, of Glasgow, Scotland, to be present at 
the conference, and describe the excellent mu 
nicipal government of that city, and the 
methods adopted to secure it. 


IN CHICAGO. 

“The second ward is not cleaned according 
to specifications. It is not cleaned at all. 
There are plenty of alleys in that ward 
which have not been cleaned in six months. 
There are some that have not been cleaned in 
a year. There are several that have not been 
swept in two years. There are important street 
corners in the ward where the garbage boxes 
have not been emptied in months. There is more 
than one corner where the garbage is heaped 
up on the sidewalks, making a pile three or 
four feet high, and eight or ten feet long, ren¬ 
dering them almost impassable. The second 
ward of Chicago is the dirtiest, filthiest spot 
in the city, as the city is the dirtiest, filthiest 
spot in the world .”—Chicago Tribune. 

■» » » 

The board of election commissioners to day 
declared that 45,000 of the 370,000 voters reg¬ 


istered for’ the coming spring election were 
fraudulent. The commissioners have been at 
work for a week, and discovered wholesale 
registration frauds in nearly every ward in 
the city. The 45,000 names declared fraud¬ 
ulently registered, have been stricken from 
the poll list. The commissioners say the num¬ 
ber of names thus stricken from the lists is 
greater than the total votecast in the states of 
Montana, North Dakota, Delaware, Florida 
and Nevada .—Chicago dispatch, March 31. 

» » » 

Bloodshed was a prominent feature of the 
election to day, in which the aldermanic 
“gang” was defeated pretty generally, twenty- 
six of the thirty-four alderman-elect being 
representatives of the respectable element of 
the community. 

The “levee” section of the first ward pro¬ 
vided its usual quota of brawls, with fists, 
rocks, and clubs as weapons, and whisky as 
the accessory in every case. 

There were disturbances among the Italians 
of the nineteenth ward, where aldermanic 
contestants strove, with beer, whisky, and 
money, to influence the voting. 

Fist-fights and ejections of tresspassers from 
the polling places by the police were reported 
in the second, eighteenth and twenty second 
wards. 

The open violation of the law against sa¬ 
loons selling liquor during the voting hours, 
made most of the trouble for the police. 

The most serious outbreak occurred in the 
“levee” district. Joseph Grogan, a clerk for 
the Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad, 
who was not in any way connected with the 
rioters, was shot in the leg. He was going to 
his office when a gang of colored and white 
men engaged in a fight, and half a thousand 
of the same class of men were quickly on the 
spot. An unknown colored man fired six bul¬ 
lets into the mob, one of them striking Gro¬ 
gan. 

At the same place the factions working for 
“Bathhouse John” Coughlin, the present al¬ 
derman, and George H. Williams his oppo¬ 
nent, came in conflict with fists and revolvers. 
Numerous arrests were made. 

Close upon this disturbance came another 
in the same part of the ward. “Sol” Van 
Praag, a deputy United States marshal was 
attacked by a gang of Coughlin “heelers,” 
and a Williams crowd rushed to the rescue, 
precipitating a free fight, in which shots were 
fired. No one was hit, and the police captured 
two of the shooters. 

At 192 Washington street, William Martin, 
a Williams worker, shot William Hickey, a 
Coughlin man, in the arm, and the trouble led 
to a small riot. The police arrested Hickey, 
and a gang of imported thugs tried to rescue 
him. The prisoner was being taken away 
when a riot call brought a force of detectives 
from the city hall, and the mob was beaten 
back. 

For town oflBcers the republicans carried all 
of the seven towns by majorities ranging from 
1 to 4,000. 


The campaign for aldermen was not on 
party lines, being more of an eflPort on the 
part of the reputable citizen, regardless of 
politics, to oust the clique which has con¬ 
trolled the council. 

Of the thirty-four aldermen elected to-day, 
only eight are men who were opposed by the 
municipal voters’ league. The remaining 
twenty-six may be said to fairly represent the 
respectable element. 

Of the old council “gang,” the following 
twelve were up for election: John Coughlin, 
Charles Martin, Frederick Rhode, F. W. Stan- 
wood, Michael Ryan, M. M. O’Connor, Will¬ 
iam J. Mahoney, John Powers, John H. Col¬ 
vin, Daniel Ackerman, Robert Mulcahy, and 
Cyrus Howell. Of these, Coughlin, Martin, 
Powers, Ackerman, Mulcahy, and Howell will 
return to the council. These six will still 
have company in the council chamber, as out 
of the thirty-four present aldermen, whose 
terms will not expire until next year, there 
are a number of alleged “boodlers.” The 
election to day will severely cripple them, but 
yet will leave them with a majority of two or 
three in the council. Heretofore they have 
had a two-thirds majority, which enabled 
them to pass at will ordinances over the may¬ 
or’s veto. This they can no longer do. Of 
the successful contestants, thirteen are dem¬ 
ocrats, eighteen republicans, and three inde¬ 
pendents. The most bitter contest was in the 
first ward, between “ Bathhouse ” John 
Coughlin and George H. Williams. Cough- 
jin will have a majority of over 1,200. In 
this ward there were six candidates—one dem¬ 
ocrat, two republicans, one people’s party, 
and two independent. The two republicans 
came within 1,200 of reaching the vote of the 
democrat, but the highest vote for any one of 
the other three candidates will not reach 200. 
Extra precaution was taken with the ballot- 
boxes. Every box was taken from its booth 
to the city hall after the votes closed. No 
box was guarded by fewer than two police¬ 
men .—Chicago dispatch New York Times, April 7. 

• » « 

The entire board of county commissioners 
of Chicago were subpoenaed to appear before 
the grand jury last week, on the ground of 
discovered irregularities and frauds connected 
with the letting of coal contracts, with the 
result that certain of the contractors were in¬ 
dicted. Though the principal witnesses were 
the drivers of the coal wagons, who were privy 
to the short-weight scheme that had been ar¬ 
ranged, whereby the county paid for about 
forty tons a month more than they received, 
yet there seemed evidence of an understand¬ 
ing between some of the commissioners and 
these fraudulent contractors. A movement is 
begun to probe this and other dark things on 
the part ef the commissioners to the bottom.— 
City and State, April 9. 

* * * 

Matter for more than three pages of the 
Chronicle and relating to municipal spoil 
was printed but crowded out of this issue. 










The Civil Service Chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 39. 


INDIANAPOLIS, MAY, 1896. terms : ^ 


Published monthly. Publication ofiSce, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

IndianapolU, Ind. 


The new order of the President trans¬ 
ferring some 30,000 additional places to 
the classified service well-nigh completes 
his work. The reform in the federal serv¬ 
ice is not completed, but it has reached a 
stage where it will go on to the end by 
reason of its own now understood merit. 
When another party succeeds the present 
party in power there will be a struggle 
over the final pickings, and there will be 
many attempts to beat and trick the law. 
That struggle will be the last, and from 
that time the federal service will be con¬ 
ducted upon the merit and labor service 
systems honestly enforced to the upbuilding 
of political morals and the improvement 
of public administration. The order con¬ 
solidating post-oflBces now blocked by Gor¬ 
man and other birds of like feather will 
be carried out and fourth-class postmasters 
will disappear to be succeeded by trained 
employes under the sub-station system. 

The victory has come suddenly, but that 
it is a victory is accepted on every hand, 
though in some quarters with bad grace. 
The agitators of the last thirty years have 
lived to see the fruits of their labor and 
they have the right to modestly congratu¬ 
late themselves. Destroying the spoils 
system in states and municipalities should 
now command their attention. It seems 
that here too the merit and labor service 
systems are to sweep the country. 

There is no work which President 
Cleveland has done which will in any 
manner compare with his work in finally 
taking this reform almost bodily and with 
his well-known strength and courage forc¬ 
ing it through. He has done other single 
acts as Grant did and Hayes did, for in¬ 
stance, in relation to the currency, which 
were courageous and statesmanlike, but 
after all, they were but the routine work 
which comes to every President. The 
same conditions are apt to recur. But in 
destroying the spoils system the work is 
done once for all; it will never come back. 
When done so much history has been 
made, and it will always redound to the 
glory of the maker. 


Party organs, unhappy at the triumph 
of the merit system, are passing around 
the statement that one of the evil results 


predicted has come to pass. A bureau¬ 
cracy has been formed. Place-holders are 
protected by the civil service law from dis¬ 
missal and they have banded together and 
coerced congressmen. These are the same 
congressmen who fought the extension of 
the law at every step, but have been over¬ 
powered; and now they are so helpless and 
cowardly that they can not resist coercion. 
If it had been said that they are working 
for the votes of place-holders in the same 
recklessly corrupt manner that they pass 
rascally individual pension bills to get the 
soldier vote the truth would have been 
better expressed. There is a fatal defect 
in this pious “I told you so.” The civil 
service law does not protect civil service 
employes from dismissal. They may be 
dismissed instantly, and one of the best 
reasons for dismissal would be an act 
which looked to the coercion of congress. 
This unhampered power of removal is the 
key to the reform system and should 
never be given up. 


Mr. Dominic I. Murphy has just been 
promoted to be commissioner of pensions. 
He entered the service under the com¬ 
petitive system and has steadily made his 
way successfully through a line of posi¬ 
tions, special examiner, supervising ex¬ 
aminer, chief clerk, president of the board 
of review and first deputy commissioner. 
He is said to know more of the work of 
the pension office than any other man. 
This is the way to do public business. The 
man who is best fitted for the place gets it 
without regard to his politics, religion or 
color. This promotion meets with uni¬ 
versal approval. Why not follow the same 
practice in the presidential postoffices? 
Every one of these offices has subordi¬ 
nates a thousand times better fitted for the 
headship than the politicians who are 
picked up on the streets and put in there. 


The Massachusetts supreme court, in de¬ 
ciding that a law providing for preference 
in favor of ex-soldiers in appointments to 
office is unconstitutional, has made a de¬ 
cision which was inevitable. It requires 
but a moment’s thought to determine that 
such a distinction is a class distinction, 
and to say that the opportunity for public 
employment is not equally open to all 
undermines the foundations of republican 
government. If preference can be given 
for service in the army, it can be given for 


property or for descent, and so on to any 
number of classes. Service in the army is 
under certain rules recompensed by pen¬ 
sions, and this is the only legal preference 
permissible under our government. The 
decision is undoubtedly a good thing for 
public business. Where that business is 
transacted is no place for any kind of 
charity. The people are always entitled 
to the highest skill and to the best energy, 
and this is not obtainable if any class has a 
preference. In the light of this decision 
the silly law that the places of firemen and 
policemen in this city “shall be equally di¬ 
vided politically” is sillier than ever and 
would not stand the constitutional test for 
a moment. It is a wonder that some pop¬ 
ulist or prohibitionist does not attack it. 

The Civil Service Reform Club of Cor¬ 
nell University was recently addressed by 
J. Sloat Fassett on “The Citizen and the 
State.” Now Mr. Fassett is one of the rich 
young men of this republic who upon 
leaving college aspired to public life, in it¬ 
self an entirely laudable ambition; and he 
also set out to be a “practical politician,” 
which is a path beset with peculiar dan¬ 
gers for the gentleman and scholar in 
politics. Mr. Fassett was unfortunate 
enough to live in the state of New York, 
and as he belonged to the republican party 
he could command the local machine and 
get office only as a henchman of the boss, 
Tom Platt, His public career therefore 
has appeared to be one of alternate sub¬ 
serviency to and revolt against his boss, 
and the general impression is that his boss 
has really played very scurvy tricks with 
him. If Mr. Fassett had given a minute 
history of his wars and truces and their 
causes, but especially of his and Platt’s 
methods, it would not only have been edi¬ 
fying but instructive to the young citizens 
he addressed. They could then determine 
exactly what by his acts a practical politi¬ 
cian is, and whether “politics is not war;” 
but Mr. Fassett, like many other public 
speakers, shunned the facts with which 
he was thoroughly equipped and senti¬ 
mentalized very prettily upon theoretical 
politics as follows: “Every citizen should 
be a practical politician, not a voter, nor 
simply an intelligent voter. If every citi¬ 
zen would discharge his duty there would 
be no need of civil service reform. The 
erroneous idea is held by many that poli¬ 
tics is war. But politics is not war; it is 
the divine law applied to human govern- 





























318 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ment. Its lifeblood is honesty; its main¬ 
spring, liberty.” 

Next year the people of Maryland are 
to have submitted to popular vote an 
amendment to their constitution regulat¬ 
ing admission into their civil service in 
substantially the terms of the New York 
constitution. There is no question but 
that it is a gauntlet thrown down by the 
republican and democratic Gormanites of 
Maryland to the political moral sentiment 
of the state. We think the moral senti¬ 
ment of the state should take it up, and in 
the opinion of the Chkonicle it does not 
often fall to the lot of men to wage a battle 
with more relish and satisfaction than can 
now be done by the reformers of Mary¬ 
land. As we have often said, that state has 
an unusual number of active, educated and 
high-minded men of both parties who are 
in favor of sound government. They have, 
moreover, an able, sincere and free press 
led by the Baltimore News and the Balti¬ 
more Sun. The result is only a question 
of education, and every corner of Mary¬ 
land can be reached. Let it be understood 
that it is a battle of the henchmen on one 
side who desire to live out of the public 
treasury against the citizens who want 
public business transacted on the right 
principles and who want to stop the whole¬ 
sale cheating and bribery which for years 
have made the name of Maryland a by¬ 
word, and who further desire to give every 
man an equal chance for public employ¬ 
ment without making it a condition that 
he shall unman himself to get it. Every 
honest agency in Maryland should be set 
to work. Every labor organization, every 
turnverein, every good government club, 
every teacher, every preacher, every priest 
should be got to work on the right side of 
this question. Let it be shown how small 
is the army of the henchmen and how 
large is the opposing army of the people. 


It is impossible to withdraw the gaze 
from Quay and Pennsylvania. They pre¬ 
sent the most astounding development of 
party politics the country has produced. 
The state has about six million inhabit¬ 
ants, with excellent schools, and with re¬ 
finement and culture everywhere prevail¬ 
ing, and with an intelligence above the 
average. It is always and overwhelmingly 
republican. The republican state conven¬ 
tion has just adopted the following: 

The time has come -when the state which has so 
long and faithfully led the republican column may 
justly and pioperly submit its own preference for 
the republican nomination for the presidency. In 
the presentation of the Hon. Matthew Stanley Quay 
the republicans, not alone of Pennsylvania, but of 
the entire Union, will recognize one of their fore¬ 
most leaders—wise in counsel and brilliant and 
able in action; at once the type of the American 
citizen, scholar, soldier and statesman. 

Now Quay has a history which is known 


to all the world, for it has been published 
in the most responsible papers, with every 
opportunity to him to make corrections 
and to make large sums of money out of 
the papers if the history was false—and 
Quay is not the man to lose a chance to 
make money. We pass over a long list of 
shortcomings and note the following; 

In 1879 Quay, with Cashier Walters of 
the state treasury, took $260,000 of the 
state’s money and lost it in Wall street. 
Walters killed himself. Don Cameron and 
another republican furnished the money 
to make the loss good and took Quay’s 
notes. 

Again in 1885 Quay was state treasurer. 
He took $400,000 of the state’s money and 
with it bought bonds of a Chicago street 
railway. Along with the bonds he got 
shares of stock for nothing, which he sold 
for $300,000 and pocketed the money. He 
turned the bonds over to the state in the 
place of the money stolen. 

Under the circumstances we repeat that 
Quay and Pennsylvania transfix the gaze 
of the world. The wonder is what they 
will do next. 

After thirty-nine years of service, the 
deputy comptroller in the finance depart¬ 
ment of New York city, Richard A. Storrs, 
died a few days since at the age of sixty- 
six years. It is stated that about once in 
twelve years he took a little vacation and 
that during the blizzard of 1888 he was the 
only man in the department at his desk 
every day. Nominally he was a democrat* 
but he stayed in office through all political 
changes because his consummate knowl¬ 
edge of the department made him neces¬ 
sary. The Evening Post says: 

“At the meetings of the board of esti¬ 
mate and apportionment, the most im¬ 
portant of the city boards, Mr. Storrs was 
an influential figure for many years. He 
said little, but he really directed the ma¬ 
chinery of business. New mayors, comp¬ 
trollers, presidents of the board of aider- 
men and of the tax department, came into 
oflSce unfamiliar with the duties of the 
board, and they all looked to Mr. Storrs 
for points on the method of distributing 
the city’s money and other necessary in¬ 
formation. Mr. Storrs prepared all the 
resolutions providing for appropriations, 
and as each resolution names the law under 
which the particular appropriation is made, 
he had to be well posted in legislation. Mr. 
Storrs was a veritable encyclopaedia of in¬ 
formation about the city. Heads of depart¬ 
ments went to him daily for information 
and he always had it ready. No man in 
the service of the city would probably be 
more missed than he will be.” 

Even Tweeds and Crokers were com¬ 
pelled to recognize the necessity for the 
training and knowledge that come to a 


public oflBcial from years of service. Mr. 
Storrs’s death has called forth many trib¬ 
utes, but we hear nothing of the dangers 
to free institutions from an office-holding 
aristocracy as illustrated by him, nor of 
the wreck of free government because he 
got so bound up in his work that he was 
only nominally a party man. 


Primaries and conventions, where we 
are told good citizens ought to go to coun¬ 
teract the efforts of bad citizens, go merrily 
on. At the Georgia republican convention, 
which met at Atlanta April 29, Colonel 
Buck, the chairman of the state committee, 
and a McKinleyite acted as doorkeeper 
and admitted only those having tickets 
signed by himself. A party of Reedites 
charged the door and forced their way in 
with shouts. Delegates were placed in 
nomination and the method of voting was 
by rushing forward to the stage yelling 
and shaking fists at the chairman. Police 
cleared the stage, and the report concludes: 

But the tumult continued, and as soon as 
the bluecoats disappeared the mob surged 
again about the chair and Mr. Wright again 
mounted the stand. Chairman Johnson caught 
him by the leg and tried to pull him down. 
He was about to fall and threw his hand back 
to steady himself. It caught in the chair¬ 
man’s collar. Ten or more black hands shot 
out from in front of the stand and pulled 
Wright to his feet and he resumed his speech 
while the chairman tried to free himself. The 
stand was partially cleared again and the 
chair received a motion to elect the four dele¬ 
gates named, put the motion and declared it 
carried. He then left the stand. 

Suddenly a portly man forced an opening 
between the negroes, snatched the gavel and 
in a very excited manner called the conven¬ 
tion to order. Then, in the midst of the din, 
he nominated Rev. K. Love for chairman of a 
new convention. Love was declared elected. 
He made a speech, but on account of the noise 
it was heard only by those within six feet of 
him. It was decided to call the roll for the 
purpose of electing Wright in place of John¬ 
son. A list of counties was obtained and a 
man started with it to the stand, when he was 
attacked by one of Pledger’s followers and, af¬ 
ter a spirited fight, the roll was stuffed into 
the pocket of Pledger’s man and he disap¬ 
peared in the crowd. No other list of coun¬ 
ties could be found, so a committee was ap¬ 
pointed, one from each congressional district, 
to nominate four delegates from the state at 
large. Another committee was appointed to 
report a platform and then the delegates, who 
had howled themselves tired, lapsed into quiet 
to wait for the report of the committees. The 
committee on selecting delegates followed the 
lead of the convention and split. On return¬ 
ing, this committee presented two sets of dele¬ 
gates, one made up of A. E. Buck, R. R. 
Wright, J. Prather and K. Deveaux. The 
other was made up of Josiah Gordon and J. 
E. Herrington. 

Another equally interesting place for 
good citizens was in Pittsburgh, of which 
we quote the following thrilling account: 

A.meeting of the Afro-American League 
was held here to-day with the objeet of in¬ 
dorsing Quay. The Union League Republi¬ 
can Association (colored), who favor McKin¬ 
ley, attempted to break up the meeting and 
prevent the carrying out of its object. When 





















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


319 




the obnoxious men had forced their way into 
the hall trouble began. Sergeant-at-arms Mills 
got into a “scrap” with Attorney J. H. Holmes, 
a McKinleyite, and there was a free fight in a 
second. Men rushed into the midst of the 
melee as the two rolled over the floor. Coats 
were torn, limbs were bruised and oaths could 
be heard escaping from the pit of riot like 
sulphur fumes from a laboratory. Newspaper 
men fled for refuge to the more dangerous 
yard, where, perched on a platform, they saw 
the “center rush” through the narrow window. 
The policemen rushed in, and with drawn 
billies joined in the encounter. Such a strug¬ 
gling mass of men in a rough-and-tumble 
fight has never been seen in any convention. 
Blood flowed from cracked heads, and clothes 
lost all nattiness. After some further rioting 
the meeting adjourned until to-morrow morn¬ 
ing. 

The republican primaries and their cul¬ 
mination, the state convention held here 
this month, presented perhaps unusual 
aggregations of knavery and trickery. For 
instance, this county had a candidate in 
Mr. John L. Griffiths whose nomination 
would have been in every way progressive 
and admirable. It was important, of 
course, that he should have the entire vote 
of his county. To prevent this, twenty- 
three democrats were brought into one 
primary, which gave the opposition a 
seeming majority. The local committee 
corrected the matter, but by some pull in 
the state convention the delegates chosen 
by the democrats did all the voting. There 
were a dozen or so candidates for gover¬ 
nor, and a portion of them carried Tam¬ 
many methods with a high hand. It is 
fair to say that the majority of the dele¬ 
gates were determined that not one of the 
Tammany candidates should be nomi¬ 
nated; and the moment that one who had 
not used such methods took the lead, the 
counties literally trooped to him. The re¬ 
sult is another proof of what has been 
thousands of times proved, that no matter 
how well the primaries are attended the 
“good citizens” can not prevail against 
trained heelers. In the second ward of 
this city, which is five to one republican 
and which pre-eminently contains the 
local share of God and morality, the at¬ 
tendance was en masse, but the heelers 
easily won by having eight “slates” with 
the names of their men scattered through 
each. Trickery and dishonesty in pri¬ 
maries and conventions are so common 
that no man, however respectable, loses 
caste with his party by resorting to them. 
After the struggle is over it is all hushed 
up and the cheats and the cheated “stand 
shoulder to shoulder.” Primary politics 
makes strange bed-fellows, as for instance 
when Mr. Robert Martindale and that life¬ 
long Sim Coy democrat. Goose Eden, 
buckle to for Doxey. 

The following letter was sent to the city 
engineer of Mayor Taggart’s “business” ad,- 
ministration: 


“ Mr. B. J. F. T. Jeup: 

“ Dear Sir—The bearer of this letter, Mr. Albert 
Judd, is a gentleman that I cheerfully recommend 
for a position under you as an inspector. He is a 
party worker and was a committeeman in the sixth 
precinct of the fifth ward. He is a gentleman of 
good habits, and will make you a good inspector. 
You will confer a favor on me by placing him. 
Yours respectfully, F. E. Wolcott, 

“Councilman Fifth Ward.” 

This letter is a happy illustration of the 
feudalistic notions yet remaining among 
politicians. First, the man was a party 
worker; second, he was a committeeman; 
third, he has good habits, and a favor will 
be conferred on the councilman by “plac¬ 
ing” the man. It is not often that the pro¬ 
posal to pay party workers out of the pub¬ 
lic treasury comes in bolder shape. It 
must be admitted that Taggart’s adminis. 
tration is conducted on this plan. There 
are few more important places than an in¬ 
spectorship under the engineer, and when 
Taggart came in there was a system which 
sifted out the heelers and henchmen and 
dead-beats, and enabled the city by com¬ 
petition to get men who understood their 
business, but Taggart kicked that all out 
and went back to the good old plan of 
making places for the boys, and the public 
interests be damned. We can illustrate 
this from the case of John Owen, an in¬ 
spector who was dismissed early in Tag¬ 
gart’s administration. The facts are from 
an entirely reliable report: “He was so 
earnest in his attention to duty that he had 
to have police protection. He had a fight 
with some of the men that worked for the 
contractors and was praised by Mayor 
Denny for his conduct. He was dismissed 
as ‘incompetent.’” 

Government by cheap-jack politicians is 
well illustrated in this city. Since 1891 we 
have been constructing improved streets, 
sidewalks, sewers and so on at an expense 
of millions of dollars. The city engineer, 
the inspectors and the board of public 
works must be of the mayor’s politics. 
To all but the political mercenaries who 
prey upon American cities, it seems that 
a city engineer should hold his place be¬ 
cause he is a skilled engineer, widely ex¬ 
perienced and informed in every kind of 
public improvement. He should be abso¬ 
lutely impenetrable to political considera¬ 
tions, open to no pull and courageous and 
merciless with contractors. The value of 
such a man as a permanent official to keep 
the greenhorns on the board of public 
works in check would be incalculable. 

Every two years we get a new board 
wholly ignorant of its business, and being 
appointed for political considerations, it 
always has an eye to the party. The third 
member from the opposite party is either 
a nonentity or he gets some share for his 
party and is quiet. There is never any 
protest from him. With the confidence of 


ignorance each board starts out to astonish 
the city by doing great things in public 
improvements. At one time graveled 
streets are the only streets, then it is as¬ 
phalt, then brick, just now it iscreosote. The 
board has been to Galveston and comes 
back with the knowledge never before 
known in the world that creosoted blocks 
are the only fit thing for a street. And 
there you are. In the meantime the tax¬ 
payers are paying enormously for govern¬ 
ment by greenhorn politicians. They ought 
to pay; they can drive politics out of the 
engineer’s office and out of every other de¬ 
partment of city government whenever 
they choose. 


A TAMMANY STREET-GANG. 

In 1885 and 1886 when the experienced 
and competent employes of the Indianap¬ 
olis post-office were being ruthlessly turned 
out to make room for party workers, it 
did not need a wise man to predict the 
whirlwind. Robbery, operating gambling 
rooms and other evil tendencies, together 
with the grossest inefficiency followed 
each other in rapid succession. Analogous 
results may be expected wherever the 
public service is abused in a similar man¬ 
ner. The Tammany methods employed 
by Mayor Taggart have all along been 
making their returns. He ignored the 
civil service rules and finally had them 
repealed and made vacancies and filled 
them on the principle of party and per¬ 
sonal loot. Twenty-nine policemen, for 
instance, were turned out and twenty-nine 
favorites put in their places. There has 
been a steady procession of drunken po¬ 
licemen. The excellent labor service rules 
were abolished with the rest, and the 
board of public works ostentatiously noti¬ 
fied the street commissioner, a man named 
Herpick, that he must reduce his force in 
the interest of economy. He reduced it 
by discharging every man. Then he turned 
around and hired democrats only. This 
is the Tammany style. A true Tammany 
result has just been reached in one of Her- 
pick’s foremen padding the pay-rolls. The 
city is full of inspectors of every grade 
and kind, yet Herpick had no checking 
system nor any way of discovering that 
the city was being robbed, nor was it 
known until a man whose name was con¬ 
cerned told of it. Collier, who is in jail 
charged with the padding, says to the In¬ 
dianapolis News: 

“It Is true that I allowed old man Keefe a week’s 
work when he was sick and helpless. He was In 
bad circumstances and I gave him the time, but I 
never got a cent from him, nor did I ever ask it. I 
understand that he has made an affidavit that I de¬ 
manded money from him. If he has, he has sworn 
to something that is not true.” 

“How about Lyons?” 

“•Lyons worked every day for which he received 
pay, and when the time comes I will be able to 














320 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


show that to be true. I never took a cent from any 
one in my life, but it has been offered me more 
than once. A man named Kelly came to me and 
offered me 50 cents if I would not dock him for a 
half day’s work. He was drunk, and I told him to 
go on about his business and put the money in his 
pocket. He had worked half a day and then got 
drunk.” 

“Did you dock him for the half day he did not 
work?” 

“No. His time was made up in the morning, and 
I forgot about it.” « * <• 

“It is charged also that there is considerable 
drinking among the street laborers, and that they 
slight their work in consequence.” 

“Some, but not all of the men, drink. There are 
just as good men working on the streets as can be 
found anywhere. There are others who spend most 
of their time in the saloons when they ought to be 
at work. I never permitted anything of that kind 
in my gang, and that was one of the reasons the 
fellows had it in for me.” 

“Do you know of any of the other foremen allow¬ 
ing men pay when they did not work?” 

“I understand that one of the foremen allowed 
his brother-in-law a week’s pay when he did not 
work at all. and that the fact became known at the 
office and the brother-in-law was put under an¬ 
other foreman. I did not see this, and all I know 
is what w'as told me.” 

Herpick says that Collier was only a 
temporary foreman in place of one Irwin> 
who is part owner of a ten-cent circus, and 
this being the show season Irwin is off 
with his circus on leave of absence. On 
his return he will resume his foreman- 
ship. This is Herpick reform. Herpick 
says he will adopt a new system and that 
the pay-rolls shall not be padded any more. 
This is well. Tax-payers can stand lying 
around the saloons half the time, but they 
draw the line at padding the rolls. 


THE BROTHERHOOD OF BOSSES. 

The strongest proof yet seen of the deal between 
Platt and Tammany on the greater New York ques~ 
tion developed in the assembly to-day, when 
the house substitute for the Lexow bill 
came up on second reading. The significant 
vote of the day was on Mr. Forrester’s 
motion for resubmission. This was lost 77 
to 29. The roll-call showed twenty-nine demo¬ 
crats voting with the Platt men. All but five of 
these were from New York and Brooklyn, the rep¬ 
resentatives of Tammany and the McLaughlin 
machines. If they had followed the democratic 
leader, Mr. Stanchfield, in favoring resubmis¬ 
sion the Platt consolidation scheme would 
have been killed to-day. The result then 
would have been the adoption of a resubmis¬ 
sion amendment by a vote of 58 to 48. The 
action of the Tammany men in coming to the rescue 
of the Plattites was the only thing that saved the 
bill.—Albany disjmtch, Bufialo Express, March ii 

The Lexow Greater New York bill is likely 
to pass in the assembly to-morrow over the 
vetoes of two republican mayors. William F. 
Sheehan and John C. Sheehan want the Brooklyn 
surface railroads to have an equal chance with the 
elevated roads to run their cars across the Brooklyn 
bridge without change. Edward Lauterbach wants 
the privilege exclusively for the elevated companies 
he represents. Tammany Hall is willing to do 


anything to defeat the compromise school bill, 
which takes the schools of the metropolis out 
of Tammany’s control. The Tammany men 
found that they had Mr. Platt on the hip, and 
they made exorbitant demands for saving his 
pet bill. They have killed Lauterbach’s bridge 
bill, for the Sheehans have promises of places 
on the Greater New York commission and 
more promises that the school bill will not be 
passed over Mayor Strong’s veto if it should 
be returned on Thursday with his disapprov¬ 
al, which is expected .—Albany dispatch, Buffalo 
Express, April 21. 

% % Ht 

Platt and Tammany combined repassed the 
Greater New York bill in the senate yesterday 
over the vetoes of Mayors Strong and Wurster. 
The Platt men had not enough votes of their 
own to pass the bill and it would have been 
defeated but for the Tammany support. It 
will be defeated in the assembly to-day unless 
Tammany rallies to its aid as was done in the 
senate. 

How long are honest republicans going to 
permit this democratic-republican alliance at 
Albany to exist? When Sheehan was running 
the democratic machine there, he was able to 
call on a sufficient number of republicans to 
pass any spoils grab that might be endangered 
by the opposition of the more honest members 
of his own party. Now that Platt has the 
majority, he calls on Tammany to help him 
out whenever the members of his own party 
become restive .—Buffalo Express. 

$ » * 

The vote by which the greater New York 
bill passed the assembly showed the power of 
Platt as a boss and the shrewdness with which 
he is capable of using that power. He had 
only two votes to spare, and he had just two Tam¬ 
many recruits. It is said that these two came 
from “Purroy’s men,” who are antagonistic to 
Sheehan’s leadership of Tammany, but, be that 
as it may, two votes in addition to those of 
his machine were all that Platt desired, and 
he contrived to get them. We have not the 
slightest doubt that he could have had more 
had they been necessary to pass the bill. 
Tammany’s change of front on the measure is 
open to suspicion. Its contingent in the sen¬ 
ate voted for the bill twice in that body, and 
its contingent in the assembly voted for it 
there once. That Tammany is in favor of 
greater New York is notorious, and the pre¬ 
tense of opposition is made now probably for 
the purpose of giving the bill a more respect¬ 
able standing before the governor, and mak¬ 
ing it easier for him to fulfill Platt’s assur¬ 
ance that he will sign it .—New York Evening 
Post. 

» • * 

Senator Timothy “Dry Dollar” Sullivan 
pulled Thomas C. Platt’s chestnuts out of the 
fire in the senate to-day. Through a com¬ 
bination between the ultra-Platt men and 
Sullivan, Platt was just able to squeeze 
through the resolution reviving the Lexow 
sub-committee of the senate and assembly so 
that it may act as a whip over the head of the 
greater New-York commission during the 


summer and fall. So stout was the resistance 
made to this bit of jobbery by several of the 
republican senators and all of the democrats 
except Sullivan, that ivhen it came to a filial vote 
on the resolution, the Plait rejmblicans found it was 
impossible for them to pass it without the vote of 
Sullivan. And they got it.—Albany Dispatch, 
New York Times, April 28. 

* * * 

The thin disguise placed over the Platt- 
Sheehan “deal” on Greater New York legisla¬ 
tion was removed yesterday, when it came out 
Senator Tim Sullivan’s vole in favor of the Lexow 
committee bill had been paid for by the retention in 
ihe state excise bureau of a lot of Tammany em¬ 
ployes who had served under the old board of excise 
in this city. Mr. Lyman, state excise commis¬ 
sioner, is said to have ordered the transfer of 
these men from the old system to the new, the 
advantage of a transfer being that it avoids 
the requirement of competitive examination. 
The men transferred are not Tim Sullivan’s 
men, but Tammany men, and they are re¬ 
tained in the service as part of the reward 
which Platt agreed to pay Sheehan for such 
votes as were necessary to get his Greater 
New York bills passed. The defeat of the 
Brooklyn bridge bill, to which Billy Sheehan 
was opposed, was another part of the reward. 
The pretence of wrath by Johnny Sheehan 
over Sullivan’s vote contrary to Sheehan’s 
orders was what is known in politics and jour¬ 
nalism as a “fake” designed to deceive un¬ 
sophisticated persons. The Sheehans and 
Platt had no end of fun in putting forth the 
“ fake .”—New York Evening Post. 

« « « 

The local organization of the Democratic 
party has nothing to fear from this greater 
city. It can do naught but strengthen our power 
here. At the first election after it goes into 
effect we will gain at least 75,000 votes over 
the republicans. They have simply cut off 
their own noses to spite their faces. Why 
they should advocate the passage of this bill 
I do not know. We wanted it all the time, know¬ 
ing that it would be sure to benefit us. Our op¬ 
position to it was a game of politics, pure and sim¬ 
ple. Of course, the fact of the greater New 
York is too far off, January 1, 1898, for me or 
any one else to particularize as to its effects, 
but it is safe to generalize and say that Tam¬ 
many Hall will only be more powerful and 
more popular than it ever was. We expect 
to get the next governor and the next legisla¬ 
ture, and then the glory and credit of the 
greater city, if any there be of either, will 
accrue to us and to no one else. We will 
have it in our power to accept or reject the 
greater city, and it may never become a fact. 
We are certainly glad that the republicans 
have done as we wanted them to in this mat¬ 
ter .—John C. Sheehan in Morning Journal, May 
12 . 

* * * 

There was some comment to-day over Sena¬ 
tor’s Guy’s bill increasing the salary of A. C. 
Lauterbach from $3,000 to $7,500. In ihe dis¬ 
trict attorney’s office where Mr. Lauterbach is an 













THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


321 


assistant, he is considered an amiable young 
man, to whom all are glad to show some con¬ 
sideration by reason of his parentage.—J/6ant/ 
dispatch, New York Evening Post. 

» • » 

Mr. Platt’s legislature in its last hours 
passed a bill raising the salary of a brother of 
Mr. Croker, who is a court clerk in New York. 
These little courtesies between bosses do much 
to relieve the sternness of political strife.— 
Buffalo Express. 

BOSS PLATT’S FAMILY PICKINGS. 

It turns out that Mr. Platt’s interest in the 
Baines bill is not altogether political. The 
personal element enters into it also. Mr. 
Platt’s son, Henry B. Platt, is the New York 
agent of the Fidelity and Deposit company of 
Maryland, which, by a special law enacted by 
the last legislature at the instance of Mr. 
Platt from purely patriotic motives, of course, 
is allowed to do business in this state. The 
Raines bill requires that every liquor dealer 
who takes out a license must give bonds for 
twice the amount of the tax. It also permits 
a “duly authorized corporation’’to act as such 
surety. It further provides that blank bonds 
shall be distributed through the state by the 
state commissioner. He would be a very blind 
dealer, indeed, who should receive a blank 
bond from the state commissioner with a no¬ 
tice that the surety of a duly authorized corp¬ 
oration would be acceptable and, in the same 
mail, an advertisement saying that the Fidel¬ 
ity and Deposit Company of Maryland, man¬ 
aged by a son of Thomas C. Platt, was pre¬ 
pared to furnish such bonds, if he should not 
at once see that it would be best for his inter¬ 
est to turn the business over to Mr. Platt’s son. 
—Buffalo Express, March S2. 

* % * 

There seems to be little doubt that the 
sons of Tom Platt and Senator Baines had a 
“straight tip” a considerable time in advance 
to the effect that some snug business for a 
surety company could be found when the 
Baines liquor tax law should go into opera¬ 
tion. Whether they did or not, they were 
lucky enough to have their company all ready 
for business when the law was passed, and were 
lucky enough to get the state excise commissioner to 
give notice that his appointees must get a surety 
company to furnish their bonds. The liquor deal¬ 
ers must also have bonds, and, curiously 
enough, they are getting the idea that a surety 
company with Boss Platt’s son ns manager is 
undoubtedly the best source to go to for them. 
The rascals really think that in this way they 
may establish a “pull” not only on the Boss 
but on the excise department, which will be 
useful in enabling them to “beat the law” in 
various ways and escape the consequences. It 
is a wicked world, and our liquor dealers have 
been educated to believe that a “pull” is the 
basis of our system of government. Their de¬ 
lusion is likely to prove of great business ad¬ 
vantage to young Platt and young Baines, 
who, of course, suspected no such fortuitous 
aid when they set up their surety company. 


They would not mix politics and business for 
anything in the world; neither would their 
fathers permit them to do such a thing. But 
how surprised they must be at their wonder¬ 
ful luck !— New York Evening Post, April 7. 

* * # 

Commissianer Lyman has receeded a bit from 
his position that only the bonds of surety com¬ 
panies will be accepted from applicants for tax 
certificates. He now says he will accept bonds 
with two reliable persons as sureties.— Albany 
dispatch, Buffalo Express, April 7. 

* * * 

A Dunkirk dispatch to the Enquirer tells this 
interesting little story : “ Squire W’hite of 
Fredonia, who claims to be the authorized 
agent of the Fidelity and Deposit Company 
of Maryland, of which Henry B. Platt of New 
York, son of T. C. Platt, is the managing di¬ 
rector for the state of New York, is in the city 
working up business among the saloon keepers. 
Mr. White claims to have been the confiden¬ 
tial agent of Thomas C. Platt in this district 
for the last twenty years, and intimates that it 
will be rather hard for persons in this city to 
secure liquor-tax certificates from the special 
agents, unless they are secured by the bonds 
of the company which he represents. He even 
goes as far as to claim that tax certificates 
will be granted only to those who have the 
company which he represents as their bonds¬ 
men.” That looks as if the elder Platt were 
mixed up in the bond business and bent on 
turning an honest penny out of his great “re¬ 
form ” measure.— Buffalo Express, April 9. 

^ ^ 

The clerks employed by the Fidelity and 
Deposit Company of Maryland, with which 
the sons of T. C. Platt and Senator Raines are 
connected, were busy yesterday (Sunday) in 
the company’s offices, in the Metropolitan Life 
Insurance Company’s building, at Madison 
avenue and Twenty-third street. A reporter 
for the New York Times climbed to the eighth 
floor about five o’clock yesterday afternoon 
and found Mr. Platt’s clerks working in shirt 
sleeves. Spread out on tables before them 
were stacks of applications and bonds issued 
to saloon keepers. 

“This has been a busy day,” said one of the 
clerks to the reporter, “and we won’t get away 
from here till late. We worked here until 
midnight every night last week, and we will 
keep up the pace for some time to come. We 
are deluged with applications for bonds, and 
are going security for saloon keepers not only 
in this city, but in Brooklyn, Long Island 
City, Long Island and all over the state.” 

The reporter noticed several bundles of ap¬ 
plications in wrappers bearing the names of 
prominent brewers. 

“Are brewers getting bonds for saloon keep¬ 
ers ?” asked the reporter. 

“Yes.” “No,” said two clerks together. 

Then there was an awkward pause. 

“That is to say,” said the first clerk, “some 
brewers are acting as agents for saloon keep¬ 
ers as a matter of convenience; but of course 
no brewer is paying us for bonding saloon 


keepers. Our fees come from the saloon keep¬ 
ers, not the brewers. 

The Fidelity and Deposit Company’s offices 
are on the floor below those of Deputy Excise 
Commissioner Hilliard. From one office to 
the other is but a few steps, and saloon keep¬ 
ers find the juxtaposition convenient. 

“Our place yesterday,” said one of Mr. 
Platt’s clerks, “was so crowded with appli¬ 
cants for bonds that we hadn’t room to do our 
work. We’re doing a great business here.” 

There is a feeling among saloon keepers that 
persons who are bonded by the Platt-Baines 
company will stand a better chance of being 
unmolested in business than those whose bonds 
are not furnished by that company, and con¬ 
sequently there is a rush to that office. Saloon 
keepers reason that republican excise inspect¬ 
ors, who owe their positions to ex-Senator Platt 
and the author of the Baines law, will not be 
liable to report violators of the Baines law 
who are bonded by Messrs. Platt and Baines 
when convictions will result in financial loss 
to the latter.— New York Times, April 27. 

* * « 

The alliance between the Platt influence and 
the Fidelity and Deposit Company of Mary¬ 
land has become more apparent since the ex¬ 
cise board went out of office. That this com¬ 
pany is issuing excise bonds and trading on 
the name and power of Platt seems to be 
openly admitted. As is well known, it got 
into the state on equal terms with domestic 
surety companies through a general act spe¬ 
cially passed by the Platt legislature; the 
legislation was openly sought by Frank Platt, 
one son of the boss, and Henry B. Platt, an¬ 
other son, became the titular local head of the 
concern. The latter readily avowed in an in¬ 
terview in these columns not long ago that he 
was after the business of issuing excise bonds 
to liquor dealers, and that his duty to his 
company required him to make every exertion. 

As soon as the offices of the new excise de¬ 
partment were established in the Metropolitan 
Life Insurance building, the Platt company 
engaged commodious quarters on the floor be¬ 
low. Two glass doors were painted with the 
name of the company and with the name of 
the managing director, but the latter is the 
largest and most conspicuous part of the le¬ 
gend. The door which one naturally first comes 
to on descending from the excise department 
on the floor above contains more than this; 
it contains a large index hand pointing di¬ 
rectly at the words, “Henry B. Platt, Manag¬ 
ing Director.” The index hand ostensibly in¬ 
dicates words designating the next door .is 
entrance, but these words are in letters so dis¬ 
proportionately small that what really strikes 
the eye is the pointing, almost commanding 
hand, and the large name: “Henry B. Platt” 
—so placed as to be the direct aim of the 
finger, 

An ample force of clerks was engaged, a 
dozen desks were put in, Henry B. Platt, man¬ 
aging director, took personal charge, emissa¬ 
ries of the company were posted at all the ap¬ 
proaches and exits of the excise office, business 
















322 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


cards were disseminated, even finding their way to 
the desk of an application clerk in the excise depart¬ 
ment, and the son of the boss stood prepared 
to discharge his duty to the company and 
“hustle” for this business. Upon observing 
the Fidelity and Deposit Company attach it¬ 
self to the excise department in this intimate 
\vay, the American Surety Company of this 
city hired one small room adjoining the Platt 
offices. Its name, too, was painted on the 
door, and the name of the president, Mr. Tren- 
holm, was also given, but in letters quite 
modest and entirely subordinate to the rest of 
the inscription; the index hand was likewise 
omitted. 

Forsexieral days the rush has been on, culminating 
on Thursday night. The Platt company charged 
one per cent, for its bonds, making $10 on a store¬ 
keeper's bond, and $16 on a saloon, restaurant, or 
hotel-keeper's bond. The American Surety Com¬ 
pany charged $5 and $10. The Platt company has 
been in the field here a little over a year and in ex¬ 
istence only a few years; the other company is domes¬ 
tic and “ old and established." The Platt company 
has a capital of $700,000; the other company a paid- 
up capital of nearly $2,500,000. The Platt com¬ 
pany’s net premiums received last year were 
$313,093; the other company’s,$1,013,343. It 
is said on good authority that upon the larger 
number of risks the American Surety Company 
commands appreciably higher rates than the 
Piatt company. But on excise bonds the posi¬ 
tions of the two companies are reversed: the 
Platt company fixes its own rates, and the other 
company is constrained to offer the guarantee 
of its vastly greater wealth, experience, and 
prestige at very much lower figures. But 
despite every intrinsic advantage whieh the 
latter seemed to possess over its rival, the 
licensees trooped past the door of the Ameri¬ 
can Surety Company’s office to the door bear¬ 
ing the significant index hand and the signifi¬ 
cant name, and beyond that to the entrance 
door, into which they filed.— New York Even¬ 
ing Post, May 2. 

* * * 

The people of this state might learn an im¬ 
pressive lesson if they could visit the legisla¬ 
tive halls and closely watch the process of 
legislation. They would see that the measures 
which are dealt with by the lawmakers are in 
the hands of a few individuals, and those in¬ 
dividuals bear the stamp of approval of 
Thomas C. Platt. It h as come to a pass 
where, in checking the minor scandals after the 
method outlined, Mr. Platt has brought the 
entire legislature to the very edge of scandal 
by allowing members of his own family and 
his political lieutenants to assume a promi¬ 
nence greater than all other combined influ¬ 
ences. The first and most important question 
asked by many legislators as they begin con¬ 
sideration of a pending measure is, “ Does it 
have the backing of Tracy, Boardman <£• Platt f " 
The last is the son of the ex-senator, and his law 
firm represents the family end of Mr. Platt's snydi- 
cate. 

The second question asked is, “ Does Ed Lauter- 
bach favor the bill f " He is Mr. Platt’s political 


representative. The measures now pending in 
which one or both are not interested are 
hardly worth mentioning. It is said, never 
in the history of the state has there been such 
a notoriously open-handed style of bringing the 
political power of Mr. Platt to bear on purely 
business legislation. The firm of whieh Mr. 
Platt's son is a member is the respresentative here 
of corporations whose aggregate capital is up into 
the hundreds of millions. Whatever they say for 
or against a measure has more weight than the 
u'ords of any or all combined opposition. They be¬ 
gin their work when a bill is introduced, follow it 
through the committee rooms, are admitted to the 
floors of both houses - in plain and flagrant viola¬ 
tion of the senate rules—and when the measure has 
passed they invade the governor's office. 

Mr. Boardman and Frank Platt are the ac¬ 
tive agents here. Day after day Mr. Boardman 
has been on the senate floor when measures in 
which his firm is interested have been under 
consideration, and in many instances he has 
bound the senators by the mention of Platt’s 
name as if a party caucus had bound them. 

Frank Platt has been here less frequently, 
though often. 

Louis F. Payn, who is one of Mr. Platt's most 
notorious and powerfid agents, sits in the senate li¬ 
brary and sends for senators. A procession of these 
representatives of the upper house to Mr. Payn's 
chair may be seen any day. They go like the 
most abject slaves to a throne room. 

The powerful aid which Mr. Platt is able to 
give to corporations rich enough to employ 
the services of the firm of which his son is a 
member has been illustrated in several in¬ 
stances. 

Here are some of the measures in which the 
firm has been interested : 

The Albany police bill—The firm filed a 
brief in favor of it with the governor, suc¬ 
ceeded in preventing a veto, and is now in 
part responsible for holding the legislature in 
session long enough to repass it over Mayor 
Thatcher’s coming veto. 

The Erie reorganization bill—It was passed 
in the senate last Tuesday night, and came to 
the assembly yesterday with some amendments. 
Not a dozen members knew what the bill 
meant. Mr. Kinne objected to consideration 
of tbe amendments, and the bill was therefore 
ordered again to committee. Mr. Kinne is a 
democrat. He was induced to withdraw his 
objection, and went to Speaker Fish and so 
stated. Before the members of the railroad 
committee knew that the bill had been taken 
out of their hands the assembly had passed it. 

There is a well-authenticated story here that 
the passage of a bill similar to this was put 
through the New .Jersey legislature this year 
at an expense of $20,000. 

The anti-coal trust bill—Tracy, Boardman 
& Platt sought to kill the bill in committee, 
then tried to do it by amendments, and it was 
only when the senators for the first time broke 
from the firm’s orders that it was passed. Once 
in the governor’s room the bill had another 
narrow escape from a veto. Tracy, Boardman 
& Platt “ laid down” on the governor. 


The Acetylene gas bill—Tracy, Boardman 
and Platt appeared on one side of this fight, 
while Mr. Lauterbach opposed them. It was 
like the famous bear trap, that would “cotch 
’em cornin’, and cotch ’em goin’.” 

The Greater New York bills were to be pre¬ 
pared by this firm providing for the govern¬ 
ment by commissions, if the governor had not 
put a stop to that proposed legislation. 

The interference of the family of Mr. Platt 
in legislation has become notorious. It is so 
plainly evident and openly carried on that the 
legislators are talking of it. Constant refer¬ 
ence to it is made as the disgrace of the legis¬ 
lature. Estimates are made as to the amount 
of profits the firm of which Platt’s son is a 
member will reap. One member of the as¬ 
sembly told a Times correspondent that he be¬ 
lieved $250,000 for the winter would not be 
00 high a figure. 

One assemblyman, commenting on the fa¬ 
cility with which the Platt firm is able to pass 
or kill bills, said: “We might as well refer 
the calendars to this firm and adjourn. They 
will do what they please with them anyhow.” 
—Albany dispatch, New York Times, April 19. 

MUNICIPAL SPOILS. 

“ The root of the whole trouble in municipal mis- 
government is the close alliance between the leaders 
of stale and national parties, and the manipulators 
of local cliques or rings, and the true line of action 
to be taken by the friends of good government should 
he to banish—absolutely banish — fi'om state and na¬ 
tional politics the whole subject of municipal govern¬ 
ment.—President James C. Carter before the Mu¬ 
nicipal League at Baltimore. 

There is one thing which is worse than corrup. 
tion. It is acquiescence in corruption. No feature 
of American life strikes a stranger so powerfully as 
the extraordinary indifference, partly cynicism and 
partly good nature, with which notorious frauds 
and notorious corruption in the sphere of politics 
are viewed by American public opinion. There is 
nothing, I think, altogether like this to bo found in 
any other great country. It is something wholly 
different from the political torpor which is common 
in half-developed nations and corrupt despotisms, 
and it is curiously unlike the state of feeling which 
exists in the French republic.—From Lecky’s De¬ 
mocracy and Liberty. 


IN BUFFALO. 

Schlotzer, the keeper of the Bufialo alms¬ 
house and county hospital, and the spoils sys¬ 
tem in these public charities. 

Schlotzer admitted the almshouse and the 
hospital were infested with bedbugs. 

Schlotzer admitted his wife draws over $66 
a month as general matron. 

Schlotzer admitted his daughter draws $20 
a month as an attendant. 

Schlotzer admitted his son draws $40 a month 
as a clerk. 

Schlotzer admitted his brother-in-law 
draws over $83 a month as deputy keeper. 

Schlotzer admitted that Kate Duffy, who 
nurses the little Schlotzers, draws over $13 a 
month as an hospital nurse. 

Schlotzer admitted that his family of 10 












THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


323 


children, and his brother-in-law’s family live 
at the county’s expense. 

Schlotzer admitted that two young men, 
friends of supervisors, had lived at the coun¬ 
ty’s expense at the almshouse, while they were 
said to be medical students. 

Schlotzer admitted that one student is there 
now. This student hails from Hamburg. The 
county pays the bill. 

Schlotzer admitted that he does the buy¬ 
ing. 

Schlotzer admitted that his wife does the 
condemning. 

Schlotzer admitted that he kept no record 
of pickings from condemned stuff sold. 

Schlotzer admitted that no credit had been 
made to the county for such things, save for a 
load of bones. 

Schlotzer admitted that his table was open 
to those who come to see him, and that the 
county paid the bill. 

Schlotzer said he had no power or influence 
in the board of supervisors. 

Schlotzer said he had influence with super¬ 
visors. * * 

“Have you no influence in the board of su¬ 
pervisors?” 

“No. I have nothing to do over them,” 
said Schlotzer 

“Is Supervisor Dedo’s father working here?” 

“Yes, his father is here.” 

“Is William McCarthy?” 

• “Yes, he is here.” 

“And are there not a lot more you appointed 
for supervisors?” 

“Oh, supervisors may have recommended 
them.” 

“You obliged them, or, rather, you oblige 
each other?” 

“Oh, in a way, they indorsed them,” said 
Schlotzer. 

“And you appointed them all?” 

“Most all,” said Schlotzer. 

“They report to you?” 

“Yes.” 

“You are the head?” 

“Yes.” 

“You alone are head and in full charge and 
familiar with the whole institution?” 

“Yes.”— Buffalo Express, April S. 

* » • 

Dr. E. J. Gilray was appointed superintend¬ 
ent of the county hospital on the recommend¬ 
ation of the medical staff. He was thought 
to be a good man for the place. He protests 
that he is an honest man, and no facts have 
yet come to light to show that he is not. Yet 
this medical superintendent, who ought to be 
free from political influences, if any man in 
Buffalo Plains can be, has evidently fallen 
under the domination of Schlotzer, and is 
more interested in keeping his job than in 
anything else. He admits that politics, in¬ 
stead of discipline, rules in the hospital, but 
he is evidently afraid to protest. He is not 
satisfied with his assistants, but he can make 
no headway against Schlotzer.— Buffalo Ex¬ 
press, April 6. 


The volunteer medical staff of the Erie 
county hospital have been removed because 
they did their duty. That is, the half-dozen 
physicians who have been most prominent in 
the fight to keep politics and spoils out of the 
hospital have been removed by the board of 
supervisors at the order of Keeper Schlotzer. 
The purpose is plainly confessed. Schlotzer’s 
communication to the board demands the 
removal of the staff because “ there have been 
complaints, unjust criticisms, and charges of 
inefficiency made against my administration 
as keeper of the Almshouse by various mem¬ 
bers of the medical staff” who have been 
serving without pay. The resolution offered 
by Supervisor Gilkinson recites that “Whereas, 
There appears to be some discord and disa¬ 
greement between some of the physicians 
and surgeons so appointed and the board of 
supervisors, as well as with the keeper of the 
Almshouse,” etc. 

So it stands on the record that these faith¬ 
ful physicians may not give their services to 
the people of Erie county free of charge, be¬ 
cause their consciences will not allow them to 
wink at maladministration. 

It is an infamous system which puts skilled 
professional men at the mercy of an ignorant 
ward politician. But the system will not be 
changed until the people change it. The new 
staff is distinguished and competent enough, 
but if it dares to do its duty, it likewise will 
be summarily kicked out by Schlotzer and his 
hired men in the board of supervisors. It 
should be remembered, moreover, that, how¬ 
ever competent the new staff may be, the old 
staff was removed simply and solely because 
it did its duty. Schlotzer’s control of the 
board is so absolute that only thirteen super¬ 
visors voted against this outrage on public 
decency.— Buffalo Express, May 19. 

IN BALTIMORE. 

The new state board of health will, at its 
meeting for organization on May 1, consider 
the question of the election of a secretary to 
the board. This position, which pays $2,000 a 
year, is now held by Dr. James A. Steuart, 
who maintains that the position is independ¬ 
ent of political control, the “secretary holding 
his office so long as he shall faithfully dis¬ 
charge the duties thereof.” An effort will be 
made to remove Dr. Steuart, as there is oppo¬ 
sition to him in the board. There are a num¬ 
ber of republican physicians who are appli¬ 
cants for the place.— Baltimore Sun, April 8. 

» ♦ ♦ 

The first clash between the new republican 
members of the school board and their dem¬ 
ocratic colleagues occurred at the board’s 
meeting last night. It was caused by an at¬ 
tempt of Mr. Adolph P. Schuch to remove 
janitresses and firemen from the schools. 
These removals, it was alleged, were at¬ 
tempted for political reasons. Mr. Schuch is 
the republican member from the sixth ward, 
appointed to succeed Mr. John T. Ochs. One 
of those who were notified to quit by Mr_ 
Schuch was Mrs. Barbara Mooney, janitress 


at No. 7 English-German school. The pre¬ 
amble to the resolutions recites that Mrs. 
Mooney was removed “without cause, and 
merely to subserve a partisan political pur¬ 
pose,” and that “the principals and teachers 
of the school have certified that she has been 
an efficient and painstaking janitress; that 
she has a family of four small children de¬ 
pending upon her for support, and that it is 
understood she has been removed to make 
place for another person at the instigation of 
a certain well known politician in order to fa¬ 
vor another political party.” 

The resolutions called on the board to rein¬ 
state Mrs. Mooney and to condemn the re¬ 
moval of persons who have given efficient 
service when the removal is made in order 
to make room for others on some political 
pretext.— Baltimore Sun, April 8. 

IN ST. LOUIS. 

The taxpayers’ league has brought suit to 
restrain Mayor Cyrus P. VValbridge from col¬ 
lecting the salary which accumulates while he 
is absent from the city. The injunction is 
asked on the ground that Mayor Walbridge 
has during the past year repeatedly absented 
himself and has drawn $1,100 for the time so 
wasted. The month of March is specified in 
the injunction because during that month the 
mayor has, it is said, been busy attending po¬ 
litical gatherings in various sections of the 
state, but has demanded his salary as usual. 

— St. Louis Dispatch, April 1. 

» • • 

The following is an extract from a private 
letter from St. Louis, under date of February 
27, last: 

“A circumstance has recently happened 
here which, though slight in itself, possesses 
in my opinion much significance. The Mis¬ 
souri division of the league of American 
wheelmen has appointed a committee on city 
streets. I am a member of it, and several of 
its members are men of about my age. But 
the majority of them are younger—men of 
from 25 to 35 years of age. They very soon 
found from practical experience that little could be 
done in the way of improving the streets of our city, 
so long as the positions in the street department were 
filled by dispensation of political patronage. The 
result has been that nearly all of the commit¬ 
tee have joined the local Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association.”— Good Government, March, 
1896. 

* » * 

St. Louis may be the next large city to ex¬ 
perience a campaign for municipal reform. A 
recent meeting of 800 earnest citizens requested 
the civic federation to call in conference rep¬ 
resentatives of the various prominent social, 
educational, philanthropical, business, and 
labor organizations of the city, “ to originate, 
if practicable, a non-partisan, non-political, 
and non-sectarian movement, in which all 
good citizens can unite to secure an honest, 
efficient, and economical administration of 
city affairs.” The conference will be held 
within fifteen days. The present plan is to 
appoint a campaign committee of one hundred. 













324 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


IN CINCINNATI. 

The meeting of the Manufacturers’ Club 
took on a decidedly partisan turn after the 
banquet at the Queen City Club last night, at 
which Governor Bushnell was the guest of 
honor. • » » 

The next thing in the order of business 
stirred things up to a livelier state than is cus¬ 
tomary in the Manufacturers’ Club. J. C. 
Butler read a paper on the merit system in 
business, and civil service as applied to munic¬ 
ipal affairs in Ohio. The attitude of the club 
on this very question had been made a special 
order for consideration last night. A resolu¬ 
tion indorsing the bill now pending in the 
senate, which provides for the appointment of 
a commission of three to appoint and control 
municipal officers in the cities of Ohio, had 
been introduced at the last meeting of the 
club, but its consideration was postponed un¬ 
til last night. ♦ » * 

As soon as President Egan announced the 
proposition to be considered. Colonel W. B. 
Melish, who sat at his side, arose and moved 
to further postpone consideration of the res¬ 
olution until next Friday night. He said 
that the Manufacturers’ Club had been in the 
habit of indorsing everything that any “good 
fellow” in the club wanted indorsed, but the 
matter under consideration was important, 
and he wanted the members of the club to 
have an opportunity to debate on the question, 
and have the whole matter thoroughly ex¬ 
plained. 

Colonel Melish’s motion did not make much 
of a hit, but Colonel Chas. B. Wing, who sat 
next to him, seconded it heartily. 

One could breathe the refreshing air of the 
approaching storm, and it came when Presi¬ 
dent M. E. Ingalls arose. He said that the 
method of postponement was the weapon used 
by some people to kill undesirable measures, 
and he thought that Mr. Melish’s motion was 
made with that very purpose. Mr. Ingalls re¬ 
minded the gentlemen that a copy of the bill 
now pending in the senate had been mailed to 
every member of the club four weeks ago. 
He thought they were perfectly familiar with 
it, and that they were qualified to vote intel¬ 
ligently upon the matter under consideration, 
as well last night as they would be next Fri¬ 
day night, or six weeks or six months hence. 
Continuing, Mr. Ingalls said : 

“You gentlemen know, and know well, that 
there will be up before this club for considera¬ 
tion next Friday night an important matter 
that will consume nearly the entire evening in 
its discussion. There will be no time for dis 
cussion of this matter then. Gentlemen, 
there was once a man who used to turn back 
the hands of the clock to gain time, but you 
can not do it now. We must keep abreast 
with the march of progress, and there is no 
longer any doubt of the worth of civil service 
as applied to the control of municipal affairs. 
We do not want any further delay in this im¬ 
portant matter. I would like to know what 
member of the club is not ready to vote upon 
it. I am ready, and I am ready to vote now.” 
Mr. Ingalls also said that in his management 
of 20,000 employes he found the merit system 
to be succesiful, and why not the same result 
in the control of municipal employes? 

Mr. Ingalls’ speech was of the tobasco sauce 
order, and he was applauded heartily. When 
the rising vote was demanded, only four voted 
nay, and the motion to indorse the civil serv¬ 
ice bill was overwhelmingly carried.— Cinein- 
nati Tribune, March 15. 

* » » 

“Do you suppose that if our county affairs 
were under civil service rules the county 
commissioners would make the disgraceful 


showing that they do to-day? What chance 
would there be for their re-election, when it 
came to be understood it cost the county about 
160,000 to manage the court-house for the 
same service and material that is furnished 
our government building for$24,000—a build¬ 
ing almost twice as large.”— Mr.Butler before 
Cincinnati Manufacturers' Association. 

IN THE STATE OF NEW YORK. 

At a meeting of the Business Men’s Associa¬ 
tion, of Syracuse, New York, held last Thurs¬ 
day evening, the mayor of the city, James K. 
McGuire,announced himself as a convert to the 
doctrine of non-partisanship in municipal af¬ 
fairs. Syracuse is one of thecities of this coun¬ 
try where that question has been brought con¬ 
spicuously and boldly to the fore. * * Mr. 

McGuire was elected as a republican. He says: 
“When one reflects, how absurd it is to gauge 
the fitness of a candidate for public office by 
his opinions on bimetalism or the tariff ques¬ 
tion? What have national issues to do with 
the problems of our municipal life? Absolute¬ 
ly nothing. As a successful party candidate 
I am appointing men from my party to public 
office, having been elected as a party candi¬ 
date. Most of the candidates for appointive 
offices ask for places as a reward for party 
services or political services rendered me. 
Fitness, which alone should be the discrimi¬ 
nating test, is seldom mentioned. The theories 
of non-partisanship in municipal affairs are 
ideal and practical, and independence is be¬ 
coming widespread and general in our local 
politics. It is a spirit which has come to stay, 
mark me.” 

♦ >f« * 

The great change that has come over the 
people of this city as to what constitutes fit¬ 
ness for municipal service since the advent of 
the good government administration is shown 
by ths results of the series of civil service ex¬ 
aminations just brought to a close. During 
the three years preceding the election of Mayor War¬ 
ner only 350 pei'sons presented themselves for exami¬ 
nation to the cixil service commission. The reason 
for this small number was the well known fact that 
however good an examination a man might pass, he 
could not get an appointment without the approval of 
George W. Aldridge, then the chairman of the exec¬ 
utive board and the boss of the republican party of 
the city. During the period of less than three 
months that Mayor Warner has been in office 
more than 700 persons have presented them¬ 
selves for examination. Now there exists a 
a genuine eligible list for every municipal of¬ 
fice that comes under the operation of the civil 
service law .—Rochester dispatch New York Even¬ 
ing Post, March 21. 

* * • 

R. Fulton Cutting, in behalf of the New 
York trade schools, at the request of the local 
civil service board, this week has offered the 
use of the Auchmuty trade school’s rooms and 
facilities for a new civil service test which the 
board has recently decided upon. This is to 
afford a more adequate trial of the many ap¬ 
plicants who present themselves as skilled me¬ 


chanics for positions in the city’s service. 
The civil service board has never had the fa¬ 
cilities for such a test, even if an adequate 
one had been devised. Therefore it was de¬ 
cided to turn all such applicants over to the 
teachers at the New York trade schools to be 
examined as to their mechanical skill in their 
own peculiar trades. Thus a carpenter will 
be required to show what he can do upon be¬ 
ing presented with a saw, with other necessary 
tools, and with different kinds of wood. A 
cabinetmaker, in the same manner, will be 
asked to construct a piece of furniture, and on 
this piece of work his eligibility to a public 
place will be decided. 

The applicants who are thus to be examined 
come under the following classes: Male and 
female bath attendants, carpenters, cabinet¬ 
makers, laboratory attendants, bricklayers, 
cement workers, horseshoers, blacksmiths, 
housesmiths, janitors, mates, masons, painters^ 
pipe-fitters, saw-filers, stonecutteas, pipe-tap¬ 
pers, varnishers and weighmasters. 

Mere mechanical skill, however, will not be 
wholly sufficient, for in order to provide for 
another test of fitness the civil service board^ 
after resolving upon this new departure, 
passed the following additional resolution: 

“That it shall be within the discretion of the 
examining board to require, in addition to the 
usual test, as to the character of applicants, 
letters of recommendation from late employ¬ 
ers as to the character and ability of the ap¬ 
plicant to fill the position sought for .”—New 
York Evening Post, March 22. 

* * * 

The trial of Michael Considine, the Italian 
saloon-keeper, who is charged with the mur¬ 
der of John J. Malone, a broker, on February 
8, 1895, was began this afternoon before Judge 
Newburger, in general sessions. This is the 
trial which, at the district attorney's request, was 
transferred from court to court no less than nine 
times, and in which unsuccessful attempts to submit 
a plea of guilty for a minor offence were made no 
less than four times, until Recorder- Goff put a stop 
to both practices. — New York Evening Post, 
April 9. 


Seattle and Tacoma are getting ready to 
amend their city charters by adopting the 
Illinois civil service law for the control of ap¬ 
pointments under the municipal government. 
» * » 

Inspired by its success in the Chicago mu¬ 
nicipal election, the civic federation of that 
city has invited every club in the city and 
every organization of a semi-political nature, 
or having good government as one of its prin¬ 
ciples, to join in a concerted movement look¬ 
ing to the enactment of reform measures by 
the next legislature. 


FROM AN EDITOR. 

“I trust that you will continue to send your 
valued paper. I have cut your March issue 
all to pieces, and used at least a dozen ex¬ 
tracts. 

“The only trouble is that when I clip on one 
side I lose something equally good, on reverse 
page. 

“It seems to me that your work can not fail 
to bring good results. In this city we have 
rings within rings, and “merit” counts for 
naught. A good “pull” is all that is needed 
here, and the plums then proceed to drop, and 
all into the hands of the party workers. One 
party is just as bad as the other.” 











The civil service chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 40. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind. 


Professor Henry W. Farnam, 43 Hill- 
house avenue, New Haven, Conn., will pay 
a liberal price for No. 5, Vol. 1 (July, 1889), 
of the Civil Service Chronicle to com¬ 
plete his file. 


At St. Louis the republicans declared as 
follows in relation to the civil service: 

The civil service law was placed on the statute 
books by the republican party, which has always 
sustained it, and we renew our repeated declara¬ 
tions that it shall be thoroughly and honestly en¬ 
forced and extended wherever practicable. 

Leaving as it does no room for dishon¬ 
esty, equivocation or trickery, it is entirely 
satisfactory. Civil service reform is ac¬ 
cepted as established. Without treachery 
it would be impossible to disturb for spoils 
purposes the service where it is covered 
by the rules. It is to be expected that the 
supplanting of the fourth class post-offices 
by sub-stations will be promptly carried 
out and also that a plan will be adopted by 
which we shall cease picking up local pol¬ 
iticians and making them postmasters of 
great cities. The republicans in the past 
widely neglected their opportunities to ex¬ 
tend this reform, but there is a chance to 
gain a good deal of glory yet. 

This generation has not before seen a 
national campaign in which the contest 
was so much upon a difference of view of 
public questions and so little over a divi¬ 
sion of plunder as the reward of success at 
the polls as it is in the approaching cam¬ 
paign. The plunder has not all disap¬ 
peared, but the great bulk of it is gone, 
and it is recognized that it is gone forever. 
This is the condition which the Chronicle 
from its foundation has prophesied would 
come with the overthrow of the spoils sys¬ 
tem. But this is the first campaign in 
which the condition has actually been 
present. Another new thing not before 
within the memory of this generation is a 
national convention where the delegates 
in the face of the leaders of the majority 
candidate force a principle into the plat¬ 
form, as was done at St. Louis when the 
gold standard declaration was adopted. 
Here, too, it is remembered that in Gen¬ 
eral Lew Wallace, Indiana was represented 
by a man who insisted that the delegation 
and not two or three bosses should choose 


INDIANAPOLIS, JUNE, 1896. 


him for the committee on resolutions if 
it wanted him, and who being chosen with 
an intimation that he must not favor the 
mention of gold in the platform, promptly 
refused the place with such a stipulation, 
and was rechosen. An additional sign of 
the times is that for the first time in a re¬ 
publican convention since 1880 the name 
of Webster Flanagan was not quoted with 
applause. 

Governor Matthews of Indiana seems 
to have been indulging in an interview on 
“civil service ” in which he is reported to 
have said: “ The civil service idea is a 
good one; good to test the efficiency of 
republicans when there are no competent 
democrats to appoint to office.” We think 
this fairly indicates Governor Matthews’s 
real opinion. He simply belongs to the 
lower grade of democrats, and has the in¬ 
stincts and range of view of a ward poli¬ 
tician. Ever since he has been governor, 
wherever the law allowed him to do so, he 
has run the state service to build up a 
political machine. In spite of our unhap¬ 
py past experience under the spoils system 
he refused to recommend to the general 
assembly the establishment of the merit 
system. He is not a man whom any one 
in favor of administrative reform could 
think of supporting for any office. It is 
fortunate that he has declared himself for 
now there can be no question as to where 
he stands. It is possible that he may be 
chosen by the Chicago convention as the 
candidate of his party, but he will not be 
chosen President, nor will he carry the 
state of Indiana. In these times a man 
never appears smaller than when he is de¬ 
nouncing the merit system. 


The low plane upon which the present 
Indiana democrat goes through life is well 
illustrated by the proposed action in rela¬ 
tion to Governor Matthews. A large 
minority are in favor of the gold standard; 
yet to a man they propose “to do what 
they can” to make Matthews the nominee 
of their party for the Presidency. Now 
Matthews, as one of the most reliable of 
these democrats remarked, “would give 
his boots for any kind of a nomination, 
and would take it on any kind of a plat¬ 
form.” He is for the free coinage of silver. 
This, to a man in favor of a gold standard, 
means death to national prosperity and 
disgrace to the national honor. Yet the 
gold democrats of Indiana propose to 


One dollar per annum. 

10cents percopy. 

swallow it all and “ whoop ’er up” for Mat¬ 
thews. Who can have any respect for such 
a crowd or have any feeling except a de¬ 
sire to see the party and the men who 
represent such cowardice and dishonor 
whipped out of public office? 


The board of aldermen of Detroit, by 
refusing appropriations, forced a reduc¬ 
tion of the salaries of the city teachers. It 
might be thought that this was only an un- 
happy necessity to which careful custodi¬ 
ans of the city’s welfare were driven, and 
that the same high sense of duty con¬ 
trolled all their acts. The following trans¬ 
action, however, set out in the Detroit 
News ol June 6 tells more than could be 
told in volumes: 

The republican aldermen drew lots last night for 
the June appointments, which furnish $17,761.26 
worth of patronage. The two assistant city hall 
engineers were included in the drawing, although 
they were provided for in the controller’s estimate 
and may fall to Mayor Pingree’s portion. The al¬ 
dermen drawing these two took chances. 

Aldermen Scovel and Ashley drew blanks. A 
number of trades were made and more will follow. 
Alderman DeGaw got a municipal engineer when 
he wanted a janitress. Alderman Patterson wanted 
a western market clerkship for his brother, but 
drew an assistant city hall janitor. Alderman 
Batchelder always likes to draw the elevator con¬ 
ductors so that he can reappoint the cripples hold¬ 
ing the positions in the city hall, but he drew a 
janitress. Alderman Klein drew the chief janitor 
of the city ball and talks about having sons he ought 
to take care of. Alderman Stevenson traded his 
drawing of an assistant municipal engineer at 
$860.75 for the messenger of the council at $3 a ses¬ 
sion, as he had a boy just the right size for the 
place. After all the swapping the places were dis¬ 
tributed as follows; 

City hall offices—Janitor, Alderman Klein; as¬ 
sistant janitor, Alderman Goeschel; assistant jan¬ 
itor (attic), Alderman Bleil; assistant janitor (base¬ 
ment), Alderman Harpfer; assistant janitor (men’s 
toilet, etc.), Alderman Patterson; janitress (ladies’ 
toilet), Alderman Batchelder: elevator conductor, 
Alderman Hanes; elevator conductor, Alderman 
Welton; assistant engineer, Alderman Wild; as¬ 
sistant engineer, Alderman Richert. 

General appointments—Clerk of market, eastern 
district, Alderman Conus; clerk of market, west¬ 
ern district, Alderman Beamer; welghmaster, east¬ 
ern district, Alderman Coots; welghmaster, west¬ 
ern district, Alderman Grunow; poundmaster, 
eastern district, Alderman Stahl; poundmaster, 
western district, Alderman Reves; messenger com¬ 
mon council, Alderman Stevenson. 

Municipal building—Engineer, Alderman De¬ 
Gaw; assistant engineer, Alderman Marx; elevator 
conductor, Alderman Gerecke; janitor, Alderman 
Sumner; assistant janitor, Alderman Beck. 


We do not hear so much as we did of 
“educational tests,” yet there is a consid¬ 
erable class extending from Abe Gruber 
up to the owlishly doubtful but highly re¬ 
spectable opponent who still carp about it. 





























326 


THE CIVIJ. SERVICE CHRONICLE 


BOARD OF ESTIMATE AND AFPORTIONMENT. 

Clerk. 3,000 

CIVIL'SERVICE SUPERVISORY AND EXAMINING 
BOARDS. 

Secretary.— 2,600 

Chief Clerk. 1,«00 

Chief Examiner. 3,600 

Examiners, a day. 10 

BOARD OF ALDERMEN. 

Clerk.-VOO 

Deputy Clerk. 2,500 

Engrossing Clerk (3), each... 1,0(X) 

Librarian. 1,000 

Messenger (2). 000 

Sergeant-at-Arms. 000 

SUPERINTENDENT OF MAINTENANCE OF DEPART¬ 
MENT STREET IMPROVEMENTS. 

23d and 24th Wards. 2,750 

DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC CHARITIES. 

Purchasing agent.3,000 

General storekeeper. 1,S00 

Superintendent of Hospitals and Alms-houses 2,.500 
Superintendent of Outdoor Poor Department. 3,600 

Chief of Staff of Hospitals. 2,000 

Superintendent of Hospitals. 2,500 

DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTION. 

Purchasing agent. 2,000j 

General storekeeper. 1,200* 

Wardens of prisons and work-houses (2) 2,000 & 2,500 
Deputy wardens (2).1,350 & 1,0001 


It would be unfair not to give both sides J 
a hearing upon this transfer by Mayor 
Strong. Alderman Wund is a fair repre¬ 
sentative of Tammany and the republican 
boys. He says : 

“ This means the beginning of the end of govern¬ 
ment by the people in this country. Popular gov¬ 
ernment can not exist without parties, and parties 
can not exist without rewards in the way of offices. 
Take away the offices, and what motive will a man 
have for working for his party? He will lose all 
interest in his party and in his country, and what 
will be the consequence? Things will go to the bad. 

“ Now, to come down to my own position. What 
is the use of being an alderman if you can’t do any¬ 
thing for your friends ? And how are you going to 
have any friends, or keep them, if you ean’t do any¬ 
thing for them ? Why, if this civil service scheme 
is earried out, a man who hasn’t turned a hand for 
his party or contributed a dollar to help it along 
can go and pass an examination and get a job, while 
the men who have given their time and their money 
and their labor to their party will be left out in the 
cold. If this thing is kept up, do you think men 
will work for their parties any more or take any 
interest in the government? No; they will not. 

“ Just to think,” continued the alderman mourn¬ 
fully, “they are coming in here and trying to take 
our few clerks away from us! We haven’t got much 
power left, and if they take away our little appoint¬ 
ments, why who would A'ant to be an alderman, 
anyhow? Not I, anyhow. It is a shame, an out¬ 
rage, a—a—a—-everything that is outrageous, to at¬ 
tack the board of aldermen in this way. And (in a 
solemn whisper) let me tell you that this is an at¬ 
tack not only on the board of aldermen, but on 
government by the people too.” 


Such now almost daily occurrences as the 
competition of over sixty sergeants for the 
place of precinct commander in New York 
have no effect upon them. The highest 
examination could only give the competit¬ 
ors 35 per cent. The remaining 65 per 
cent, or any part of it was to be gained by 
their records for meritorious service and 
efficiency. In the course of the examina¬ 
tion each was to write a report of an actual 
or imaginary case. Says the account: 

Sergt. Thomas H. Mangin of the Wall street 
branch of the Detective Bureau chose as his sub¬ 
ject, “How O’Brien Protects Bankers;” Oliver 
Timms wrote his version of the “ Riot on Eighth 
Avenue July 12, 1871;” Edward F. Walling told of 
the abduction of Charlie Ross; George McCluskey 
wrote of the Eglau murder mystery; John R. Groo 
told in detail of the murder of Policeman Burns 
in the eighth ward, twenty-two years ago, and new 
versions of old and unsolved crimes were written 
by Stephen Brown, George Brennan, George Titus, 
and the rest of the candidates for promotion. 

The rest of the examination consisted in answer¬ 
ing questions as to state laws, corporation ordi¬ 
nances, regulations of the police department, and 
matters pertaining to the driliing of men. 

It will be remembered that in its lately 
enacted excise law the legislature of New 
York undertook to save the appointments 
from the merit system by declaring them 
confidential and Platt’s man Aldridge, the 
head of the public works, began to run 
henchmen into the non-competitive ex¬ 
aminations where a large proportion of 
them ingloriously failed. Meanwhile dark 
clouds appeared on the horizon. It was 
questioned whether an office could be 
made confidential by fiat any more than 
paper can be made money by fiat. Opin¬ 
ion after opinion in the negative came 
from lawyers of the highest standing. The 
state comptroller refused to pay men who 
had not received their appointments un¬ 
der open competition. Finally instead of 
waiting for the courts to overthrow it the 
whole Platt scheme broke down—slowly 
and with creakings and groanings but 
surely. In the last ditch stood Cobb and 
Lord, Platt’s majority of the civil service 
commission, holding back the notices for 
the competitive examination; but even 
they could not override the constitution, 
and the whole list finally went by the 
board pell-mell under the merit system. 
This changes the entire character of the 
excise law and it may result in being a 
great improvement over the pernicious 
system it supplanted. 

One of Platt’s moves in the state of New 
York was to have his legislature make a 
law by which his machine could seize the 
Albany police, and the usual bi-partisan 
board was set up. The supreme court de¬ 
clared the bill unconstitutional and the 
appellate division has affirmed the de¬ 
cision. The point in brief is that there 
can be no political qualifications for office. 
To say that one place shall be filled by‘a 


democrat is to deprive a man who is not a 
democrat of the privilege of holding that 
office. Thus one by one the courts are 
clearing the atmosphere of the clouds with 
which cheap-jack politicians have obscured 
the sky. The sunlight will reach Indiana 
by and by, covered as it is with humbug 
bi-partisan boards. 


Mayor Strong, of New York, by an or¬ 
der made June 5, transferred 140 positions 
in the civil service of that city with salar¬ 
ies amounting to $318,000 a year to the 
competitive lists. This means that hereaf¬ 
ter any vacancies must be filled by open 
competition. These offices are the very 
cream of the higher places in the city serv¬ 
ice and their removal from the present or 
future grasp of Tammany or the Platt boys 
has led to such a gnashing of teeth that it 
is plain that these patriots never had a 
more severe paroxysm. The list is s© im¬ 
portant that it is given in full that our 
readers may more fully realize the tre¬ 
mendous strides the merit system is now 


taking: 

mayor’s office. 

Salnri/. 

Warrant and Bond Clerk.!f:2,5b9 

Marshal. 2,800 

FINANCE DEPARTMENT. 

General Bookkeeper.4,000 

Paymaster’s Clerks (10).$1,200 to 1,300 

Assistant Cashiers (2). 1,600 

Clerks of Markets.$1,500 to 3,000 

Deputy Collectors of City Revenue (8) $1,200 to 1,800 

Paymaster’s Messenger. 950 

STREET-CLEANING DEPARTMENT. 

Chief Clerk. 2,800 

department OF PUBLIC WORKS. 

Chief Clerk. 4,000 

Water Purveyor. 4,000 

Superintendent of Street Improvements .. .. 2,750 

Superintendent of Lamps and Gas. 2,750 

Superintendent of Repairs and Supplies. 2,750 

Superintendent of Incumbrances.2.750 

Superintendent of Streets . 2,750 

Examiner of Complaints.. 

FIRE DEPARTMENT. 

Assistant Secretary. 2,500 

Bookkeeper.3,500 

Secretary of Relief Fund..1,800 

Inspector of Combustibles.3,000 

Fire Marshal. 3,000 

HEALTH DEPARTMENT. 

Sanitary Superintendent. 4,000 

Register of Records. 4,000 

Secretary. 1,800 

Attorney and Counsel.4,000 

Assistant Counsel. 2,'00 

Assistant Sanitary Superintendent. .. 3,000 

PARK DEPARTMENT. 

Engineer of Construction. 3,500 

Topographical Engineer.. 2,400 

General Inspector. 2.500 

Superintendent. 4,000 

STREET IMPROVEMENTS, 23D AND 24TH WARDS. 

Superintendent of Maintenance. . 

General Inspector and Foreman. 2,750 

DEPARTMENT OF DOCKS. 

Clerk to the Treasurer. 2,000 

Collector. i^goo 

Superintendent of Docks. s’soo 

Dock-master . 2,100 

Assistant Dock-masters (12), each. 2,100 

DEPARTMENT OF TAXES AND ASSESSMENTS. 

Deputy Commissioners (18), each.$2,700 to 3,500 

Assessors (4), each.3,000 

BOARD OF CITY RECORD. 

Supervisor of City Record .,5,000 

Deputy Supervisor and Accountant.2,500 

Private Secretary.. 


BOARD OF ELECTRICAL CONTROL. 

Engineer... 

Electrical expert.. 

Assistant Secretary. 2,400 

COMMISSIONERS OF ACCOUNTS. 

Assistant examiners ( 8 ); per month.... $100 to 133 
Clerks, per month. 70 


The Massachusetts legislature has again 
begun tinkering the laws to find some way 
to give preference to classes in public em¬ 
ployment notwithstanding the decision of 
the supreme court. The state attorney- 
general seems to be working along the 
same lines. It is doubtful if these busy 
demagogues will have any permanent suc¬ 
cess. It is too plain that whether a man 
shovels dirt, or acts as policeman or super¬ 
intends public works, if the employment 
is by the public, one class can not consti¬ 
tutionally be given any advantage over 
another in obtaining it. Three cities in 
Massachusetts, Boston, Cambridge and New 
Bedford, have the labor service system and 























































































THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


327 


an appropriation has just been made to ex¬ 
tend the system to other cities. Meanwhile 
Indianapolis, the largest city in Indiana, 
and the largest inland city in the country, 
has a system of labor by pulls put through 
by Tom Taggart in plain and brazen vio¬ 
lation of the law. 


The Tacoma Civil Service League edit a 
column in the Sunday Morning Union. 
Among the articles of their constitution 
are these: 

Art. II. Object. To assist in the complete aboli¬ 
tion of the spoiis system from all branches of the 
public service, and especially to secure the honest 
and efficient enforcement of the civil service pro¬ 
visions of the city charter. 

Art. III. Methods. The league seeks to accom¬ 
plish these objects by agitation, by the enforcement 
of present laws, by securing further legislation and 
by directing the moral influence of the community. 


MR. McKinley and civil service 
REFORM. 

In April, 1890, occurred the most vicious 
and dangerous onslaught upon the federal 
civil service law that has ever been made. 
It was an attempt in the house to defeat 
the appropriations, and for a time it ap¬ 
peared that the attempt might succeed. 
At the critical moment Mr. McKinley, then 
the republican leader of the house, said : 

“Mr. Chairman, if the republican party of 
this country is pledged to any one thing more 
than another it is the maintenance of the civil 
service law and to its efficient execution—not 
only that, but to its enlargement and its fur¬ 
ther application to the public service. 

“The law that stands upon our statute books 
to-day was put there by republican vot?8. It 
was a republican measure. Every national 
platform of the republican party, since its en¬ 
actment, has declared not only in favor of its 
continuance in full vigor, but in favor of its 
enlargement so as to apply more generally to 
the public service. And this, Mr. Chairman, 
is not alone the declaration and purpose of 
the republican party, but it is in accordance 
with its highest and best sentiment—aye, 
more, it is sustained by the best sentiment of 
the whole country, republican and demo¬ 
cratic alike. And there is not a man on this 
floor who does not know that no party in this 
country, democratic or republican, will have 
the courage to wipe it from the statute book 
or amend it, save in the direction of its im¬ 
provement. 

“Look at our situation to day. When this 
party of ours has control of all the branches 
of the government it is proposed to annul this 
law by withholding appropriations for its 
execution, when for four years under a demo¬ 
cratic administration nobody on this side of 
the house had the temerity to rise in his place 
and make a motion similar to the one now 
pending for the nullification of this law. We 
thought it was good then, good enough for a 
democratic administration; and I say to my 
republican associates, it is good enough for a 


republican administration; it is good and 
wholesome for the whole country. If the law 
is not administered in letter and spirit im¬ 
partially, the President can and will supply 
the remedy. Mr. Chairman, the republican 
party must take no backward step. The merit 
system is here, and it is here to stay, and we 
may just as well understand and accept it 
now, and give our attention to correcting the 
abuses, if any exist, and improving the law 
wherever it can be done to the advantage of 
the public service.” 

The attack was routed by a vote of 120 
to 61. On May 16th following, the Indiana 
Civil Service Reform Association, at its 
annual meeting, adopted the following: 

We thank our western congressmen, McKinley 
and Butterworth, and those who joined with them, 
for their able and successful resistance in beating 
back the recent attack upon the civil service law. 

THE CONFERENCE OF CHARITIES 
AND CORRECTIONS. 

At the National Conference of Charities 
and Corrections, which began at Grand 
Rapids June 4, there was a very full dis¬ 
cussion of the merit system in connection 
with the various institutions which are in 
the line of the objects of the association. 
Several pipers were read, and these were 
followed by general discussions in which 
every minute was occupied. The greatest 
drawback to the introduction of the merit 
system is the mental condition of the heads 
of the institutions themselves and of other 
active members of the conference. There 
were some notable exceptions, like the 
warden of the Minnesota state prison and 
the state factory inspector of Illinois, who 
understood the system and were unequiv¬ 
ocal and straightforward in its favor. Oth¬ 
erwise there were all kinds of opinions 
varying in rawness. One superintendent 
thought that the system was not even ap¬ 
plicable to the appointment of clerks, be¬ 
cause they were so closely connected with 
the other workings of the institutions. 
Another declared, with great emphasis, 
that the only true merit system was the 
superintendent’s unhampered action in 
appointments and removals, although all 
but universally the superintendent’s action 
has never been, is not now, nor ever would 
be unhampered, and this is one of the evils 
the merit system will correct. Another re¬ 
hashed the long exploded homily about 
peculiar fitness and nice adjustment of 
nerves which competition and a probation¬ 
ary period can not determine, although a 
superintendent under a political board by 
talking with an applicant can. This same 
superintendent also declared that a clean 
sweep removed a good many barnacles, 
and that the stray officers who were kept 
were really the only ones deserving to be 
kept. This was in the face of the hundreds 
of thousands of capable officers who have 
not been kept, and of a like number of 


barnacles removed under the spoils sys¬ 
tem only to be succeeded by barnacles. It 
was patronizingly stated that the merit 
system would, however, be given a fair 
trial. A member of the Ohio state board 
of charities, after revealing the utterly 
corrupt condition of that state in the mat¬ 
ter of appointments, said that the merit 
system in the federal civil service would 
probably remain only until “our people 
get in and change it.” In his paper Mr, 
Philip C. Garrett gave some distressing in¬ 
stances of abuses of inmates of charitable 
institutions, due wholly to the spoils sys¬ 
tem. In the course of some remarks later 
Mr. Loch, of England, said that he had been 
surprised at the practice in America of 
running politics into all phases of these 
institutions, but he thought it was a matter 
which the American people would correct. 
Mr, Frank Sanborn, of Concord, said that 
for the benefit of Mr. Loch he would say 
that all this talk reminded him of the old 
deacon who was in every way an exemplary 
man except that he would sometimes 
swear, and that instances of killing were 
rather exceptional. 

Evidently the conference needs to edu¬ 
cate itself. It would be well for the heads 
of the various institutions to examine the 
workings of the merit system and to learn 
better where it would apply and what ob¬ 
jections to it have long been overthrown, 
and what its tests really are. They will 
not then iterate and reiterate as was done 
here that a purely educational test is not 
adapted to selecting employes for state 
institutions. We notice a letter reviewing 
the conference in the New York Evening 
B)st contained no mention whatever of this 
the most important subject before it, pre¬ 
sented by five papers and two lengthy pub¬ 
lic discussions. It mentions a discussion 
of the use of criminal and tramp dialect in 
juvenile reformatories which is a reminder 
that the superintendents without excep¬ 
tion declared that their greatest obstacle 
was to prevent their teachers from de¬ 
scending to the use of the same dialect. 
There could be no louder commentary on 
the results of the present system of ap¬ 
pointments, The plan by which the sup¬ 
erintendent and the board converse with 
an applicant and then appoint upon the 
pull system or by shaking up the offices in 
a hat as was shown by Mrs. Flower’s pa¬ 
per, evidently bas its drawbacks. As to 
Mr. Sanborn’s rather flippant and happy- 
go-lucky attitude we quote the following 
from Professor Henderson’s powerful pa¬ 
per : 

They tell us with just pride of the Michigan sys¬ 
tem of child-saving. But they can not boast of 
many of our county jails, city lock-ups and neg¬ 
lected poor-houses. They are ashamed to explain 
to the expert public servants in the Institutions 
of Bremen, Hamburg and Dresden.'how our clerks 
get their places, and on what dishonorable and an- 
















328 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


noying terms they keep them. But these scandals 
are well known in Europe, and they are often sup¬ 
posed to Indicate a deep seated and universal de¬ 
pravity among the people who can tolerate such 
abuses without efficient protest. The fact that we 
have general suffrage makes the case all the blacker 
for us. 

DANGERS OF THE SPOILS SYSTEM 
IN STATE INSTITUTIONS. 

[A paper read by Lucius B. Swift before the Na¬ 
tional Association of Charities and Corrections, at 
Grand Rapids, June 5, 1896.] 

Some years ago the general assembly of In¬ 
diana was the scene of a busy struggle to se¬ 
cure the reorganization of the benevolent in¬ 
stitutions of the state. No demand of public 
business nor any condition of the institutions 
themselves called for the change. The attack¬ 
ing force was a well organized band, a faction 
of the party already in possession; its object 
was the capture of the places. The bill be¬ 
came a law and its promoters who had for 
weeks constituted the “third house” of the 
general assembly gave a dinner in celebration 
and then as members of boards, superintend¬ 
ents, stewards and so on went into enjoyment 
of the captured spoil. 

Some four years later it fell to me to assist 
in an investigation of the state hospital for 
the insane at Indianapolis, made by a house 
committee of the general assembly. The in¬ 
vestigation occupied three weeks. 

This hospital was beautifully situated, with 
male and female departments in great separ¬ 
ate buildings standing in ample and shady 
grounds. Its board had the disposal of about 
$300,000 a year. Yet in this modern environ¬ 
ment, with ample funds which made possible 
the application of the most humane and en¬ 
lightened principles of the nineteenth century, 
the place was honejcombed with medieval 
notions and practices—unsympathetic, cruel, 
barbarous and corrupt. Every employe, the 
doctor, the ward attendant, the clerk, the car¬ 
penter, the washerwoman, must not only bear 
the party stamp, but must be of the faction 
which had captured the hospital; and so 
fierce was the demand for a share, that in the 
350 places we found there had been 648 
changes in four years. Along the same line, 
the contracts for supplies, with few exceptions, 
had been let to those who had helped in the 
capture or who had obtained some later hold 
upon the board. As might have been ex¬ 
pected, we found an untold amount of misery- 
inflicted upon the thousand helpless inmates 
by this aggregation of inexperience and knav¬ 
ery. Not one of the employes had an incent¬ 
ive to do well, for the place was not secured 
by merit nor held by efficiency. Physical 
force not infrequently assisted by blows, some¬ 
times with tbe club, was the quick resort of 
inexperience and inefficiency, and in cases, 
was carried to extreme cruelty. Contracts 
were made and prices were paid for the best 
articles; yet through the steward’s office there 
was an endless procession of supplies foreign 
to the contracts, decayed meats, decayed but¬ 
ter, decayed vegetables, hogs infected with 
cholera, shelf-worn goods and so on. The 
whirlwind had been thoroughly reaped. 


This hospital was a full development. Per¬ 
haps nowhere in the country among hospitals 
does such a case exist to-day; but it is not 
certain that there may not be one to-morrow. 
This was a natural and legitimate outcome of 
the spoils system, a system which is never 
asleep, and whose restless and unscrupulous 
activity has given of late years an increasing 
number of full fruitions. There was this hos¬ 
pital. There is Tammany Hall which robbed 
and blackmailed the people of New York. 
There is the state of New York where no law 
can be passed without the consent of Platt. 
There is Pennsylvania in which free govern¬ 
ment has reached a like suspended condition 
under Quay. There is Senator Murphy’s city 
of Troy which classes Bat Shea among the 
saints. And wherever good government has 
been laid waste, the cause in always the same 
—favoritism moved by a thousand motives, 
the spoils system with its one doctrine, that 
every item of public transactions is to be 
given a twist for personal or party benefit, 
and practiced in so many governmental func¬ 
tions that every rising generation imbibes the 
idea that public business is not as private 
business; that it does not call for the same 
abstention from deceit and peculation, but 
that every thing is fair in politics. 

Now, it is not only true in experience, but 
it is true as an axiom that the presence of 
favoritism in the conduct of any public busi¬ 
ness is detrimental. There is no human na¬ 
ture the world knows of which can stand the 
test of its exercise, or which can stand the 
test of the opportunity of its exercise. There 
is no public institution in whose management 
favoritism is an element in which progress is 
not retarded or is at a standstill, and which 
is not in danger of a development as rank and 
unhappy as the Indiana hospital I have de¬ 
scribed. Now, if one says that he is an excep¬ 
tion or that his board is an exception, that 
they have the power but they resist the temp¬ 
tation I shall not dispute the statement, but I 
shall doubt their knowledge of them.selves, 
and I shall answer that if they have this al¬ 
most unknown virtue, their successors in oflSce 
will not have it. We find every grade of 
favoritism, but still it is favoritism. Where 
ordinary favoritism exists the condition is 
not creditable, but the public is used to it. 
At any moment, however, the develoj)ing 
power of a boss may send any institution so 
far down that the cry of misery becomes loud 
enough to be heard, and then the common¬ 
wealth feels its shame and disgrace. 

I do not wish however, to confine myself to 
extreme dangers. Take the average state in¬ 
stitutions, benevolent, penal or reformatory, 
and they do not fix the attention at all or 
they fix it because of things which are dis¬ 
agreeable. The impression made is of com- 
mon-placeness, of mediocrity, of powerle.ssness 
to advance. 

We are always in hopeless waiting either 
for the new set just in to become skilled or for 
some turn which will get rid of the old set of 
incapable and worthless favorites. 


If you visit a prison you find the employes 
working in narrow lines. From lack of dis¬ 
position or capability there is not enough of 
the play of honest human nature upon dis¬ 
honest human nature to make it better. If 
you ask a warden, who has been some time in 
place and has become interested in his work, 
if there is no way to give natural manhood a 
better chance he will tell you privately that 
the insuperable obstacle is lack of permanency 
in place and the foisting upon him of employ¬ 
es by one pull or another. He can keep the 
prisoners within the walls, he can keep them 
in order, and he can keep the cost of main¬ 
tenance within a proper figure, but to carry 
out extensively a system based upon the pos¬ 
sibility that the prisoner can be made better 
is impossible under the present method of em¬ 
ployment. If yon get into his confidence he 
lays before you the full action of this method 
with its aggregation of pulls; the party pull,j 
which is the blanket mortgage over all, the 
party-faction pull, the church pull, the lodge 
pull, the family pull, and so on. 

I am not a specialist, but I do not need to 
be told that the best treatment of prisoners 
can be had only through employes of intelli¬ 
gence determined by test, of fitness determined 
by trial, of experience obtained by long serv¬ 
ice, and tenure depending solely upon faithful¬ 
ness anl efficiency. I know that still more is 
this true of physicians and attendants in care 
of the insane or teachers of the deaf and dumb 
and tbe blind. The time has passed for argu¬ 
ment with those who say that equally suita¬ 
ble or better employes are those who get their 
places at the arbitrary discretion of the au¬ 
thority which is “responsible” for the par¬ 
ticular institution, but who get them in fact 
primarily, one because he is a relative of a 
member of the board, one to pay a legislator 
for his vole, one because a prominent politi¬ 
cian requests it, one because the governor is 
building up a machine, and so on through the 
endless list of pulls. Such a contention says 
that there is nothing in the treatment of pris¬ 
oners but to keep them within the four walls, 
in silence, in stripes, and walking in the lock- 
step; there is nothing in the care of the insane 
but to keep a mad-house, to prevent escapes 
and the infliction of bodily harm, and keep 
down the cost of maintenance. 


I 


The country is familiar w'ith the Indian 
Rights Association of which Mr. Herbert 
Welsh has so long been the secretary. Its ob¬ 
ject has been not only to prevent the Indians ' 
from being plundered and murdered, but to 
raise them to the level of self-supporting, civ¬ 
ilized people. The object was entirely feasi¬ 
ble. The process was the practice of common 
honesty in dealing, and by industrial and com¬ 
mon education. The men and women nnited' 
in this association for years spent large sums 
of money and wherever there was a lull in po¬ 
litical activity made noticeable progress. In¬ 
termittently but inevitably came the swoop of 
the spoiler and at his demand experienced Jj 
agents, trained teachers and faithful employes- 
of all kinds were swept out and their places^ 
















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


329 


taken by those who had “whooped 'er up” in 
the last campaign. For years from the sub¬ 
jects discussed .at their conference the associ¬ 
ation did not appear to realize the funda¬ 
mental difficulty. Finally Mr. Welsh rose to 
the situation and declaring that the good ac¬ 
complished would be destroyed as fast as ac¬ 
complished while the spoils system existed, he 
took his place in the front rank of the national 
civil service reform league and helped carry 
its cause on to the great victory which has 
been won. And the spoils system has been 
destroyed in the Indian service. Having a 
clean instrument to work with in a civil serv¬ 
ice where tenure depends solely upon faith¬ 
fulness and efficiency the way is clear to solve 
unhampered the great problems of Indian 
civilization. 

A great wave of municipal reform is sweep¬ 
ing over the country. It has had the happy 
result of enlisting thousands of men who never 
before entered a reform movement. So far, 
unless its recent meeting was an exception, its 
league has laid its stress upon higher indi¬ 
vidual citizenship as the solution of the colos¬ 
sal difficulties presented by municipal govern¬ 
ment. The advance of that reform has been 
in the line of modern charters. The man who 
drew such a charter adopted by one of the 
finest cities in the west told me that he knew 
nothing about civil service reform. While 
these charters are an improvement, municipal 
reform will not be accomplished under them, 
nor will it be accomplished at all while any 
appointing officer may fill the places of po¬ 
licemen and firemen upon the pull system, or 
while the street gang may be made an alms- 
hou.se where the local bosses quarter their 
followers. It is true that public morals are 
debauched, that indivinual citizenship is at a 
low grade and that it must be elevated, and 
that it is the final object of all reform ; but 
leaving the power of appointment by favorit¬ 
ism untouched if we wait for municipal re¬ 
form until this elevation takes place and the 
good citizens go to the primaries and there 
contend with and overthrow the bos.ses, it will 
not come in our time. It is the spoils system 
more than all other things combined which 
has debauched public morals and they will 
remain debauched while that system exists. 

And so it is with state charitable and cor¬ 
rectional institutions. I have looked over 
some years of the proceedings of this confer¬ 
ence and have noted the wide range of the 
subjects discussed and the reports of progress 
in the various states. I do not wish to min¬ 
imize the great good which has been accom¬ 
plished and the great influence which those 
interested in subjects germane to this as.socia- 
tion have had in causing an advance of public 
opinion ; but it seems to me that in the failure 
to deal with the subject of the service in these 
institutions, the effects of the various causes 
which lead to appointment, retention, or re¬ 
moval, there is a fundamental failure 
to grapple with an obstacle which blocks 
your further progress. The processes of char¬ 
ities and corrections have been made ripe by 


these discussions for the widest and most ben¬ 
eficent development. What can be accom¬ 
plished amounts to a revolution. Why is it 
so hard to make headway ? I take the case of 
the Michigan City prison. It had a warden 
who had obtained his place by political in¬ 
fluence. He was, however, an honest and cap¬ 
able man and had become interested in his 
work. The prison was loaded with appointees 
made at the dictation of various pulls, but in 
the courseof fouryears the warden had brought 
them into some sort of order and discipline 
and both himself and most of them had reached 
the point where they might be said to have 
obtained, at the expense of the state, .an ele¬ 
mentary knowledge and some years of ex|>e- 
rience in the treatment of prisoners. The 
warden particularly was at the point where 
he might be expected to become a most useful 
man to the commonwealth, but at that point 
there was a party revolution in the general 
assembly. Adequate legislation was put 
through providing for the erection of a new 
board which took the right view of the tariff 
question, and this board at once put into that 
prison from the warden down, men whose 
views on the tariff were also sound, allowing, 
however, within that limit the widest latitude 
for pulls, the new warden being a member of 
the party state committee. Let us grant that 
the new men are in themselves fair subjects 
for tutelage. In a few years they will have 
learned something at the expense of the stale, 
but by that time it is more than likely that 
the necessities of the tariff’ or the currency 
will demand their dismissal. In tlie mean¬ 
time this conference will go on meeting and 
will find this prison on the same plane it has 
been for years. It is true that in many states 
the party wheels do not turn backward and 
forward so frequently as in Indiana. I know 
that where a party remains many years in 
power the .service becomes in a manner settled 
and efficient as was the case in the railway 
mail service in 1885. But no party remains 
forever in power, even in Pennsylvania, and 
there is, therefore, the standing menace that at 
any time the improvement of years may be 
destroyed. 

Wherever the germs of the spoils system 
are there is constant danger of a ruinous de¬ 
velopment at the hands of politics. That 
system exists in general to-d.ay, and the ideas 
which this conference .advocates and hopes to 
see adopted will not take permanent root. 
I may be contradicted, but I shall remain in 
the confidence of foreordination that while 
that system lasts the institutions concerned 
will be found on the crude lines where they 
are. I shall also remain in an equally firm 
but more serene confidence that the system is 
doomejd. 

Within this generation two fundamental 
improvements have been made in civil admin¬ 
istration; one is the merit system where pub¬ 
lic employment and promotion are granted 
upon impartial tests to those to whom the 
competition open to all has determined best 
fitted. In unskilled employment the labor 


service system of registration has barred out 
politics and all kinds of favoritism in that 
department. These two systems are now on 
their conquering way agaimst the combined 
power of party machines; against every kind 
of treachery, against ridicule, and denuncia¬ 
tion they have pursued their irresistible 
march until the voice of the opponent is 
dumb. Eighty-five thousand places in the 
federal service have been wrenched from the 
spoiler, and already in states and cities the 
forward movement has begun. There is no 
question as to the result. The heathen may 
rage again and miiy again imagine a multi¬ 
tude of vain things, but politics and favor¬ 
itism are to go out of the management of 
state institutions. Even party machines can 
not resist the inevitable. These institutions 
will be filled with employes beholden to noth¬ 
ing but their own merit for appointment and 
who need look to nothing but faithfulness and 
efficiency for tenure. I do not claim that the 
introduction of any scheme of appointment, 
however good, will of itself clear public life 
of its dishonesty and inefficiency. The state 
of New York has for a number of years had a 
civil service law and has lately incorporated 
the principle into its constitution, yet Platt’s 
legislature has just passed and Platt’s gover¬ 
nor has just signed a bill vacating the boards 
of eleven state hospitals, places filled for 
years by men and women serving disinterest¬ 
edly and conscientiously without pay. New 
York city has for the same time had a civil 
service law, yet Tammany ran riot in every 
form. But what is it that is wresting from 
Platt step by step the spoils upon which his 
political life depends? It is the civil service 
amendment backed up by the power of the 
courts. What is it that enables Theodore 
Roosevelt and Colonel Waring to build up 
the police and street departments of New 
York until their improvement attracts the 
attention of the whole country? It is the 
civil service law and rules, and by these and 
these alone will Tammany Hall and Platt 
finally be broken. The high civilization 
which this conference advocates will, under 
such a system, have a clean instrument to do 
its work. Its ideas will not be inculcated one 
ye.ar to be uprooted the next, but in the grasp 
of those who believe in them and who desire 
to work them out, their benefits will increase 
from year to year and from generation to 
generation. 

THE MERIT SYSTEM IN PUBLIC 
INSTITUTIONS. 

[A paper by Lucy L. Flower, read at the National 
Conference of Charities and Corrections at Grand 
Rapids, June C, 18ft6.] 

Cook county is governed by a board of fif¬ 
teen commissioners elected by the people. 
Formerly five members were elected each year 
to serve three years, so that the new members 
coming on to the board were powerless to 
make changes until, through one year’s expe¬ 
rience, they had learned something of the 
needs of the institutions, and of the compe¬ 
tency of the employes. Under this system the 














330 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE, 


employes were not changed very frequently; 
but, at the time of the far-famed boodle board, 
the members of the citizen’s committee cl aimed 
that collusions, for the purpose of fraud, ex¬ 
isted that could not be possible if members 
did not hold over; and, as a result, influence 
was brought to bear upon the members of the 
legislature and the law was changed so as to 
provide for the election of the whole fifteen 
each year. This resulted in a complete change 
in the management every year and the ap¬ 
pointment of an entirely new staff of officials 
throughout the county, and was so disastrous 
in its effects that the law was again changed 
two years ago and the term made two years 
instead of one, though the whole fifteen are 
still elected at one time. 

In December, 1894, a new board of county 
commissioners was elected under this new law, 
and within a few weeks of the organization of 
the board a statement appeared in the news¬ 
papers that, after a long wrangle over the of¬ 
fices, the matter had been at last amicably 
adjusted by the following plan : 

A list of all the offices in the county, many 
hundred in number, was made, with the sal¬ 
aries attached to each. These were divided 
into fifteen parts, each containing an equal 
number of positions and of as nearly equal 
pecuniary value as possible. These fifteen 
lists were then put into a hat and each com¬ 
missioner drew one and was then entitled to 
fill the positions on his list as he chose, with 
only such reference to fitness as he might be 
pleased to consider. 

So much a matter of course had the filling 
of all public places by political appointees ir¬ 
respective of merit become that the public 
statement in every Chicago paper of this hat 
scheme, created not a ripple of astonishment 
and almost no comment. 

The following June the kicking to death of 
an insane patient, a harmless and quiet man, 
who had only been in the asylum one night, 
by an attendant whose- previous occupation 
had been that of a butcher, created a public 
scandal that finally culminated in the ap¬ 
pointment, by the president of the county 
board, of an investigating committee. This 
committee consisted of the members of the 
county board, two labor men, four persons in¬ 
directly connected with the county board. 
Miss Jane Addams, of Hull House, and my¬ 
self. Miss Addams and I consented to serve 
on the committee at the request of some per¬ 
sons interested, who desired us to be present 
and report if an investigation by the state 
board of charities was desirable. 

On the stand during this investigation one 
of the commissioners under oath, testified, 
that it was perfectly true that all the posi¬ 
tions in their gift had been filled by the hat 
schemb which I have just described, and to 
the question, “Could the superintendent re¬ 
move incompetent employes when thus as¬ 
signed by the commissioners,” he replied, 
“ No.” And to the further question, “ Did 
not the board pass a resolution that the heads 
of departments were empowered to remove an 


incompetent employe no matter by whom ap¬ 
pointed,” he replied, “Oh, yes, but that was 
only done for outside effect, they could not 
really remove any one.” 

The investigation, which may be readily 
seen from its constitution, was superficial in 
the extreme, developed certain facts, however. 

First, That absolutely no attention was 
paid in the appointments to the fitness of the 
appointees for the places to which they were 
assigned, and that competent employes could 
only be retained by some commissioner plac¬ 
ing them on his list of appointments. This 
of course was done in many instances, espe¬ 
cially by the commissioners from country dis¬ 
tricts, whose constituents were not struggling 
for places and who were not compelled to 
pledge all positions within their control in 
order to secure their election. At the head of 
Cook County Insane Asylum with 1,200 pa¬ 
tients, was a young mao whose only experi¬ 
ence in a medical way had been as an interne 
for a year and a half in Cook County Hospital, 
and who had had absolutely no experience 
with the insane. Ills assistant was a young 
woman of about the same experience and 
these physicians testified that they had no au¬ 
thority whatever over the attendants, who 
were under the control of appointees called 
supervisors, ordinary and ignorant men and 
women who knew absolutely nothing about 
the proper care of the insane. 

The attendants themselves were drawn from 
all classes, butchers, saloonkeepers, car driv¬ 
ers, etc., being among the number. Evidently 
the refuse of the appointments, as pay being 
small and the life disagreeable, only the hard¬ 
est up and lowest down on the list would take 
the.se places. 

Bad as conditions were, neither Miss Ad¬ 
dams nor I, felt it advisable to call for an in¬ 
vestigation by the state board, for the reason 
that eight years before, on a similar occasion, 
the state board had been called upon by the 
Woman’s Club, a most thorough investigation 
made, with the result that just the same con 
ditions as existed last July, where found to 
exist then; and as nothing had been accom¬ 
plished before, we felt sure nothing would be 
now; simply because the fault lies, not with 
the particular commissioners, or the individ¬ 
ual employes, but with the system; and no 
investigation, no arraignment of individuals, 
nothing will do any permanent good so long 
as the spoils system remains. Just as long as 
it is recognized as legitimate for a man to 
compensate individuals for personal services 
to himself in ward caucuses, by appointments 
to public position, just so long will public in¬ 
stitutions be run, not for the benefit of the in¬ 
mates, but to further personal ends, and the 
unfortunate poor, sick and insane, will be the 
victims of brutal, ignorant and untrained 
oflBcials. 

One of the commissioners with whom I 
talked, a really well inteniioned man, voiced 
the usual way a commissioner looks at the 
matter. He said, “ My friends worked for 
me to get this position, and it is only right I 


should pay them, the only way I can, by ap¬ 
pointing them to any places I can control.” 
This assumes that all public offices are indi¬ 
vidual spoils, in place of being public trusts, 
that a man is elected for his own benefit only 
and not to serve the public; and as long as 
the general public are content to so consider 
all official positions, no reform is possible. It 
must be the work of these conferences to 
arouse a public sentiment that will demand 
that at least all our charitable institutions, 
shall be governed under civil service rules, 
which will give some permanence to the em¬ 
ployes, insuring their retention if satisfactory, 
and their removal if incompetent or unfaith¬ 
ful. At present, the manner in which the 
employe performs his duties is almost the last 
consideration, which inlluences his appoint¬ 
ment or retention in office. 

COL. WARING’S REFORM IN NEW 
YORK. 

Col. Waring paid this tribute to-day to a 
faithful officer in the street-cleaning depart¬ 
ment, whose death was recently announced: 

“This department has sustained an almost 
irreparable loss in the death of Mr. Auguste 
Bohn, jr., district superintendent in charge of 
the district west of Central Park. He insisted 
on working on the 20th intt., in spite of a se¬ 
vere cold and bad weather. lie was taken to 
the hospital later in the day, and on the even¬ 
ing of the 26th inst. he died of pneumonia. 
Mr. Bohn was born in New Orleans, and was 
twenty-nine years old when he came into the 
department, January 18, 1895, as a ‘detailed 
sweeper.’ It was he who, with Mr. Stearns, a 
young graduate of the Massachusetts Institute 
of Technology, took charge of the first effort 
for the removal of trucks and for the reforma¬ 
tion of the very foul and disorderly condition 
of the streets of the Five Points region. In 
February, in addition to these duties, they were 
most active in connection with the snow re¬ 
moval. They worked day after day, and night 
after night, as only ambitious and faithful 
young men could work. The successful reor¬ 
ganization of the department was largely due 
to their resolute efforts at this, in the most 
difficult part of the city. 

“Mr. Bohn earned rapid promotion and held 
several important positions. Early in Novem¬ 
ber last he was made district superintendent, 
which is the highest position outside of the de¬ 
partment headquarters. Here he secured the 
confidence of his superiors, the respect of his 
subordinates, and the complete satisfaction of 
the people of his district. Mr. Bohn was a 
gentleman by birth, education, and lifelong 
association, and he coupled with this the fidel¬ 
ity and tireless industry of a trained work¬ 
ingman. He has fallen a victim to these qual¬ 
ities, which caused him to disregard the sug¬ 
gestions of ordinary prudence, and to stick to 
work which he thought must be done until 
compelled by pain and weakness to give it up. 
While the death of such a man for such a 
reason is almost the saddest of all deaths, it 
has its value in the example it sets of faithful 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


331 


and persistent devotion to duty. His friends 
will at least have the poor consolation of know¬ 
ing that every man and woman in the depart¬ 
ment who knew him is his sincere mourner to¬ 
day .”—New York Evening Post. 

* » * 

Mr. Bohn was one of the number of college- 
bred young men whom Col. Waring gathered 
about him when he took charge of the depart¬ 
ment, a year ago last January. With the 
idea that well-educated young men would be¬ 
come in time his most efficient aides, he 
brought several of them to this eity, and 
started them at the lowest rung of the ladder 
as “detailed sweepers,” a sort of assistant 
foremen. Mr. Bohn was born and reared in 
New Orleans, and was for two years a student 
at Harvard. Leaving Cambridge at the end 
of his sophomore year, he went into mining 
in the west. The mines in which he was em¬ 
ployed were closed at the time Col. Waring 
took charge of the street-cleaning depart¬ 
ment, and he applied to the colonel for a place. 
Col. Waring told him to come to New York, 
and eventually set him to cleaning up the Five 
Points district. With him was associated F. 
L. Stearns, from the Boston Institnte of Tech¬ 
nology, another “detailed sweeper.” Five 
Points, with the surrounding neighborhood, 
Mott, Pell, Doyer, Mulberry, Bayard and 
Baxter streets, constituted as filthy a district 
as there was in the city. Eefuse of all kinds 
cluttered up the streets, trucks and push-carts 
blocked the way, and the residents of the dis¬ 
trict looked on the street-cleaner as their 
natural foe. So bitter was the feeling that 
Bohn and Stearns were accompanied for days 
by two policemen. Tact and forcefulness con¬ 
quered, and in a few weeks the streets were 
clean, and Mr. Bohn was the most popular man 
in the district .—New York Sun, March 30. 
mm* 

The most astonishing thing in Col. War- 
ing’s tribute, the other day, to the memory of 
Mr. Auguste Bohn, jr., who fell a victim to 
pneumonia, caught in a resolute performance 
of his duty in the street-cleaning department, 
was the statement that he was “a gentleman 
by birth, education, and lifelong association.” 
It was to his tireless activity, vigilance, and 
courage that we owed the removal of the 
trucks from the streets—a feat which a score 
of mayors had pronounced impossible—and 
also the reformation of the foul and disorderly 
Five Points region. In this work his chief 
assistant was Mr. Stearns, a young graduate 
of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 
There are turned out from institutions of 
learning every year hundreds, if not thou¬ 
sands, of men who would bring to the public 
service just as much trained enthusiasm as 
Mr. Bohn, if they got a chance. But under 
the rule of the vile creatures to whom our 
cities have so long been delivered over, they 
had no chance of employment whatever. They 
might do anything with the education they 
got from our schools and colleges except use 
it in the service of the public. Drunken, 
shiftless, illiterate, “deadbeats” and bum¬ 


mers, the Jakes, Mikes, Barneys, who have 
blown our shame around the world, and light¬ 
ened our alleys with the ends of their noses, 
always had the udvantage of them. Not by 
any means the least of the services which Col. 
Waring is rendering to the city is the intro¬ 
duction of the class to which Bohn and Stearns 
bolonged, to the truly holy work of making 
the city a more wholesome nnd more comfort¬ 
able and a more improving dwelling-place for 
all, and especially for the poor .—Neiv York 
Evening Post. 

mm* 

Col. George E. Waring, commissioner of 
street cleaning, was busily occupied yesterday 
morning bn decorating the most efficient male 
members of the two juvenile street cleaning 
aid associations with special badges and in 
giving them certificates which entitled them 
to the “due consideration and respect” of all 
“superintendents, foremen, detailed men, 
sweepers, and drivers of the department.” 

There were fifty-seven of these boys, nearly 
all Hebrew children from the east side, dressed 
in their best clothes. They were assembled in 
one of the old courtrooms in the brownstone 
building in city hall park shortly before 
noon. 

After the badges were all distributed, Isidor 
Finkel was brought up to receive the special 
approbation of Col. Waring for having called 
last Sunday on “Silver Dollar” Smith’s bar¬ 
keeper to remove a barrel of ashes which he 
had illegally placed on the sidewalk that day. 

“You are a good boy,” said the colonel, 
“and have done well. What did the bar¬ 
keeper say to you?” 

“He asked me what business it was of mine, 
and I told him that I was a volunteer aid to 
the street cleaning department and showed 
him my certificate. He didn’t do anything, 
so I reported him and told the newspapers.” 

The boy was very small and did not look 
strong. What ex-Alderman and ex-Assem- 
blyman Charles Smith would have done had 
the boy drawn a certificate upon him for hav¬ 
ing his ash barrel on the sidewalk was a 
shuddering possibility to contemplate. 

After young Finkel had been complimented, 
he turned to the reporters present and asked: 

“What papers will this be in?” 

A reporter replied that it would be in all of 
them, and the boy seemed much gratified. 

Col. Waring’s volunteer aid leagues will 
take part in the street cleaning department’s 
parade next Tuesday. The boys will walk in 
the procession, while trucks will be provided 
for the girls .—New York Times, May 34. 

* * * 

The first parade of the street-cleaning de¬ 
partment down Fifth Avenue yesterday after¬ 
noon was witnessed by a crowd that completely 
blocked the sidewalks and occupied every point 
of observation on the line of march, which was 
from Central Park to Madison Square. The 
feeling of curiosity which had doubtless drawn 
most of the spectators was changed, first to in¬ 
terest and then to enthusiasm, which extended 
from the young and noisy friends of the or¬ 


ganized juvenile helpers from the east side, 
bringing up the rear of the line, to the adult 
citizens who in numerous instances were heard 
to remark that never before had they any ad¬ 
equate conception of the numerical force, 
equipment, or discipline of the department. 
The entire force, headed by Commissioner 
Waring, took part in the parade, which em¬ 
braced about 2,000 men on foot, 750 horses and 
vehicles with their drivers, great roller sweep¬ 
ers, hose carts for flushing, and various other 
adjuncts of the department. Nearly twenty 
bands were interspersed among the marching 
division. 

The sweepers were all clad in their uniforms 
of duck cloth, spotlessly white, each wearing 
a rose fastened behind his brass numberplate. 
The carts were all washed clean and bright 
and were covered with white canvas. Alto¬ 
gether the marching white columns, broken by 
the hundreds of heavy carls rumbling over the 
pavement like pieces of artillery, presented a 
novel spectacle. The men marched erect and 
with admirable precision. Tney were reviewed 
by Mayor Strong and various city officials.— 
New York Evening Post. 

mm* 

For it is to be borne in mind that the force 
which the Mayor reviewed yesterday was 
composed, in the great majority, of the same 
men who belonged to the department of street 
cleaning when it could not have appealed to 
any human being as a proper object of muni¬ 
cipal pride. Something like 80 per cent, of 
the rank and file are the same men who used 
in Tammany times to be seen talking politics 
over an inactive broom or betaking them¬ 
selves for rest and refreshment to the nearest 
groggery. An equally large proportion of 
the subordinate officials of the department 
holds over from the same bad times. That is 
to.say, they were appointed for reasons with 
which their fitness for their work had nothing 
to do, and they were retained for reasons with 
with which their efficiency in their work had 
nothing to do. The change is not in the men 
so much as in the methods, not in the rank 
and file, but at the top. It is in the tenure 
by which the men hold their places. Every 
man on the force now understands that nothing can 
harm him if he does his work, and that nothing can 
save him if he fails to do it. Col. Waring has 
not found it necessary to make more than a 
few conspicuous examples in order to bring 
this notion into the head of every sweeper and 
every driver on the force. It is now univer¬ 
sally understood, and the result is that the 
work of the department has been converted 
from a disgrace and a nuisance to a model 
service and a source of municipalpride .—New 
Yoi'k Times, May 27. 

m m m 

Col. Waring is a scholar, a student of his¬ 
tory, and a man of the world. When he put 
his street cleaners in white duck suits he was 
applying a wide and keen observation to hu¬ 
man nature. He wanted to create a new spirit 
in workingmen of this elementary class 
—a sense of being representative of a great 
city, of always bearing evidence in their pres- 











332 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


ence of the constant activity of the govern¬ 
ment of the people. Of course he never said 
just this to the laborers, but they felt it little 
by little. The uniform gave them dignity; it 
set them apart and showed their place; it cre¬ 
ated finally an esprit du corps —a capital senti¬ 
ment, of the greatest value, as was shown in 
the recent parade of his‘‘white-winged angels,” 
when they had the air of soldiers instead of 
that of the trash of the streets.— Sprmgfield Re¬ 
publican. 

MUNICIPAL REFORM. 

The persistence of the aqueduct contract¬ 
ors in seeking to make this city hear the ex¬ 
pense which they were put to in order to make 
their own defective work good is extraordinary. 
The courts have decided against them in¬ 
variably, but each year they go to the legis 
tature and seek from it what the courts refuse. 
They ask now, as they have asked in former 
years, fora commission to hear and determine 
all clams against the city arising from the 
aqueduct work. They have nine million dol¬ 
lars of such claims, all of which are for 
money which they were forced by the aque¬ 
duct commission to spend to make good, ac¬ 
cording to contract, the poor work which they 
sought to palm off upon the city. This work 
was done under the old commission which was ap¬ 
pointed through a “deal" ivith Oov. Hill-and the 
repiMicans, and which was removed from office after 
its digracejul doings had been exposed. The new 
commission, appointed by Mayor Hewitt, com¬ 
pelled the contractors to bring their work up to 
the requirements of their contracts, thus giv¬ 
ing the city full and fair return for its money. 
It was a fortunate circumstance for the city 
that, when the contracts for that work were 
drawn, Mr., now Judge, Lacombe was corpora¬ 
tion counsel, for he framed the contracts with 
such care and with jealous consideration of the 
city’s interests that they have withstood all ef- 
orts of the contractors to getaway from their ob¬ 
ligations. The courts have held that under 
those contracts the contractors are not entitled 
to a cent of the money which they claim.— New 
York Evening Post, April 1. 

• * » 

A bill has been introduced, and carried 
to a third reading in both branches of the 
legislature, without reference to a committee, 
and is being “jammed through” by the speak¬ 
er of the assembly, which provides for the es¬ 
tablishment of a commission to pass once more 
on the claims of these very contractors, with¬ 
out regard to the terms of the contract, the 
law of the land or the decisions of the courts. 
* * * There is not a single thing to be said in 
favor of legislative interference in the matter, 
except that the contractors are out of pocket. 
Even if they are innocent men, who had 
found, after an honest effort to fulfill their 
obligations, that they had miscalculated the 
cost, the establishment, in a boss-ridden state, 
of a commission to set aside a written con¬ 
tract, and overrule the decisions of the courts, 
would be a precedent of enormous danger. 
But think of a commission to save fraudulent 


contractors^ from the consequences of their 
own dishonesty, framed in a hurry by the 
state legislature, and called for by four judges 
of the court of last resort, without other 
reason than that they had lost money through 
the failure of their own fraud. If any one 
can send us the particulars of a transaction 
like this occurring in the worst times of any 
free and civilized country in the world, we 
shall publish it carefully so as to show that 
we are really not so badly ofi’ after all; that, 
as the Hungarian said when the devil was 
carrying him off, we might be worse off, for 
there might be a state of things in which the 
legislature would vote the contractors their 
money without the intervention of a commis¬ 
sion.— Nev) York Evening Post, April 2. 

• * * 

The democrats are no sooner installed in 
power than the rush for the spoils begins. 
There are a half-dozen appointive offices at 
the disposal of Mayor Peterson and the demo¬ 
cratic aldermen, and these officials are notgiven 
a moment’s peace by the men who are after 
the plums. The struggle promises to be very 
bitter and by fall it is safe to predict the 
party will have dissipated the slight advant¬ 
age gained by the result of the city election. 
For superintendent of streets there are at least 
twenty candidates.— Lockport dispatch, Buffalo 
Express, April 16. 

* ♦ ♦ 

The common council chamber was crowded 
to-night to witness the clean sweep which it 
was understood the new democratic adminis¬ 
tration would make. After the transaction of 
routine business the matter of appointments 
was taken up. A resolution to appoint War¬ 
ren Welsh superintendent of lamps and gas 
was laid on the table. Augustus Morris, U. H. 
Woods and G. W. Lyons were nominated by Mayor 
Peterson for civil sendee commissioners and were 
confirmed. — Lockport dispatch, Buffalo Express, 
April 20. 

» * * 

The fight for municipal reform in New Or¬ 
leans is against big odds. It matters little how 
many votes the citizens’ league succeeds in get¬ 
ting into the boxes if it can not supervise the 
countingof them. There are two sets of election 
commissioners, three in each set, with a clerk 
and six of these eight places have been given to 
the democrats by the board of supervisors, 
leaving one commissioner for the league and 
another for the fusion ists. As the New Or¬ 
leans Picayune (dem.) says, it is a turning over 
of the city elections “to the political man¬ 
agers who are responsible for the present boodl 
government of New Orleans.” 

» « « 

One of the fruits of the victory won by the 
Citizens’ League, the municipal reform asso¬ 
ciation which carried New Orleans at the 
election last month, will be a brand-new city 
charter, different from anything ever seen 
here before, “ up to date,” and of a radically 
reform type. One of the most novel and 
striking features, which will go into operation 
at once, is the introduction of the civil service 
rules for all city offices, save a few confiden¬ 


tial ones. In no city in this country has the 
spoils system been more brutal than in New 
Orleans, and nobody can predict what will be 
the effects of this innovation. The Citizens’ 
League finds the civil service system absolute¬ 
ly essential to municipal reform, as it has 
very nearly been wrecked on the shoals of 
office-seeking. Out of 18,000 white men who 
voted for “reform,” over 3,500, or one in five, 
asked for office as a reward for their services— 
and there were only a few offices to give out. 
This is probably below the average in Louis¬ 
iana, where one in every forty white men 
holds public office, and where one in every 
four is a standing candidate for it.— Harper's 
Weekly, May 23. 

* «■ * 

Probably no county in Pennsylvania is more 
boss-ridden than the county of Dauphin, in 
which the capital of the state is located. For 
years the people have had little to say in the 
selection of their candidates for county offices. 
The bosses have had their own way and so 
bold have they become that they now attempt 
to invade the school system with their polit¬ 
ical trickery. At the convention of .school 
directors for the election of a county superin¬ 
tendent the other day, George Mcllhenny, a 
son of the recognized boss of the county, was 
chosen over one who has held the office for 
several terms and given entire satisfaction to 
the people. R. M. McNeal held the resjiect 
of the patrons of the schools and the citizens 
generally, but he was compelled to retire to 
make room for a member of a family that is 
practically supported by the voters of the 
county. The father is a county prison inspector, 
one son is deputy register and is understood to be 
slated for register, when the wheel turns round 
once more; another son recently retired as register; 
a daughter is a matron at the county almshouse, a 
son-in law is a director of the poor, and so on. 
There is much complaint and the storm will 
break when it is least expected. Boss Mcll¬ 
henny is an uncouth farmer, whose influence 
is exerted among the ignorant yeomanry of 
the county. He attempted to have McNeal 
displaced by his son three years ago, but as 
the son had just emerged from a court trial on 
a very serious charge it was impossible to 
overcome public sentiment sufficiently to ac¬ 
complish his purpose. But from that hour 
the boss and his henchmen got to work and 
wherever possible a school director favorable 
to the ring was put in position to be played 
later.— City and State, May 21. 

♦ ♦ jH 

The state board of health has received a 
letter from Secretary Dewey, acting for the 
executive committee of the state board of re¬ 
gents, complaining of the unsanitary condi¬ 
tion of the Capitol Building. Disagreeable 
odors in the corridors, it is stated, are caused 
by wretched plumbing conditions, and endan¬ 
ger the health of the 100 clerks in the regents’ 
department, most of whom are young women. 
—Albany Dispatch, June 15. 

9tc ♦ * 

It is hard to get the schoolhouses of Boston 
put in proper sanitary condition because there 
is patronage for somebody in it, and who that 
somebody shall be is the rub. Politics is get¬ 
ting to a pretty pass when it disregards the 
health and physical welfare of little children. 
—Boston Times, May 31. 














The civil service chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 41. 


INDIANAPOLIS, JULY, 1896. 


MO . J O"® dollar per annum, 
i CiKiUO . JO cents per copy. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N. 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolu, Ind. 


WE ARE OPPOSED TO LIFE TENURE 
IN THE PUBLIC SERVICE. WE FAVOR 
APPOINTMENTS BASED UPON MERIT, 
FIXED TERMS OF OFFICE, AND vUCH 
AN ADMINISTRATION OF THE CIVIL 
SERVICE LAWS AS WILL AFFORD 
EI^UAL OPPORTUNITIES TO ALL CIT¬ 
IZENS OF ASCERTAINED FITNESS.— 
Platform, National Convention of Looters, Chicago, 
July, 1896. 


WHAT WE OPPOSE IN THAT PLANK 
IS THE LIFE TENURE WHICH IS BE¬ 
ING BUILT UP AT WASHINGTON, 
WHICH EXCLUDES FROM PARTY REP¬ 
RESENTATION IN THE BENEFITS THE 
HUMBLER MEMBERS OF OUR SOCIETY. 
— Bryan’s Interpretation. 


THE CIVIL SERVICE LAW' WAS 
PLACED ON THE STATUTE BOOKS BY 
THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, WHICH HAS 
ALW AYS SUSTAINED IT, AND WE RE¬ 
NEW OUR REPEATED DECLARATIONS 
THAT IT SHALL BE THOROUGHLY AND 
HONESTLY ENFORCED AND EXTENDED 
WHEREVER PRACTICABLE. — i^row the 
Republican Platform, 1896. 


“MR, CH.AIRMAN, IF THE REPUB¬ 
LICAN PARTY OF THIS COUNTRY IS 
PLEDGED TO ANY ONE THING MORE 
THAN ANOTHER, IT IS THE MAINTEN¬ 
ANCE OF THE CIVIL SERVICE LAW 
AND TO ITS EFFICIENT EXECUTION— 
NOT ONLY THAT, BUT TO ITS EN¬ 
LARGEMENT AND ITS FURTHER AP¬ 
PLICATION TO THE PUBLIC SERVICE. 

“THE LAW THAT STANDS UPON OUR 
STATUTE BOOKS TO-DAY WAS PUT 
THERE BY REPUBLICAN VOTES. IT 
WAS A REPUBLICAN MEASURE. EVERY 
NATIONAL PLATFORM OF THE RE¬ 
PUBLICAN PARTY, SINCE ITS ENACT¬ 
MENT, HAS DECLARED NOT ONLY IN 
FAVOR OF ITS CONTINUANCE IN FULL 
VIGOR, BUT IN FAVOR OF ITS EN¬ 
LARGEMENT SO AS TO APPLY MORE 
GENERALLY TO THE PUBLIC SERVICE. 
AND THIS, xMR. CHAIRMAN, IS NOT 
ALONE THE DECLARATION AND PUR¬ 
POSE OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, 
BUT IT IS IN ACCORDANCE W ITH ITS 
HIGHEST AND BEST SENTIMENT—AYE, 
MORE, IT IS SUSTAINED BY THE BEST 
SENTIMENT OF THE WHOLE COUNTRY, 


REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRATIC 

ALIKE.”— Mr. McKinley in Congress, April, 
1890. 

The meeting of looters held at Chicago 
this month which assumed the name of 
the national democratic convention, in¬ 
cluded, among its other schemes of rob¬ 
bery, the looting of the public service. 
Their platform opposes a life tenure of 
office and Bryan defines it to mean such a 
life tenure as is being built up at Wash¬ 
ington which this demagogue says “ex¬ 
cludes from party representation in the 
benefits the humbler members of our so¬ 
ciety.” With the crowd before him any 
kind of a lie would pass, and he showed 
himself a glib and comprehensive liar. 
There is no life tenure being built up at 
Washington nor any where else in this coun¬ 
try for the reason that executive officers 
have the power of instant dismissal. The 
humbler members of society never had an 
opportunity for public employment except 
at a sacrifice of manhood until the system 
of competition open to all known as civil 
service reform was introduced. The ten¬ 
ure which Bryan wants is the tenure lim¬ 
ited by the interest and will of the silver 
mine and Altgeld anarchists and by the 
“ bumbler members of our society,” he 
means the pensioners of the owners of 
silver mines whom the latter expect to 
unload upon the public offices, and the 
Altgeld rabble who want a change from 
rioting out of office to rioting in office. 

It is not too much to say that since 1860 
there has been no such onslaught upon 
government and law and order, and the 
same duty arises now that arose then. 
There is no question of parties. It is the 
duty of every man who respects law and 
order and the rights of individuals and 
public honor, and who seeks for good gov¬ 
ernment, and who wants business pros¬ 
perity, to turn to and help inflict upon 
these incendiaries a crushing defeat. That 
there will be a defeat and that it will be 
crushing, there is no manner of doubt. It 
would be a shame if Indiana did not lead 
in the victory. Now is the time to rescue 
her out of the hands of Voorheesism which 
has preyed upon her so long. In Indiana 
Altgeldism will be defeated, and the defeat 
must be overwhelming. The people of 
this state want it understood that capital 
invested here is as safe as if invested in 
Holland. If it is not so understood, they 
mean that this election shall make it so. 


The enemies of administrative reform 
have many times made combinations to 
defeat that reform. They sometimes at¬ 
tempted to defeat the appropriation in con¬ 
gress, notably when in 1890 they were baf¬ 
fled under the leadership of Mr. McKinley. 
Clubs have been formed like the Anti-Civil 
Service Democratic Reform Club of In¬ 
dianapolis, and like that other club of this 
city which called itself the Farwell Club be¬ 
cause Senator Farwell was the only man 
“who had the sand to oppose civil service;” 
but Farwell refused the honor and the club 
was sold out by the constable for $36.41. 
But until the recent Chicago gathering 
never before have the political rapscallions 
been able to form a national organization, 
including in its comprehensive scheme of 
destruction the overthrow of civil service 
reform. The advocates of that reform do 
not shrink from the contest. They will 
throughout the country be united to a 
man and their opponents will be cast 
headlong. 


George Fred Williams is a showy man 
anxious to show cff. All his life he has 
been on the side of public order and par¬ 
ticularly on the side of civil service reform. 
He sold himself for a poor mess of pottage, 
and after he had delivered himself bound 
hand and foot he failed to get the pottage. 
He might claim that there was no consid¬ 
eration for the sale, but the other party 
might claim that too. Whatever of un¬ 
happiness a barren future has in store for 
him he has this sweet morsel of com¬ 
mendation from Altgeld; “There is a 
great deal in that youth from Massachu¬ 
setts, and he had better be cultivated.” 


It is hard that Massachusetts should lose 
two of her leading young men in a single 
month, for George Fred Williams is lost 
to all that has constituted Massachusetts 
since 1776. But William E. Russell died 
on the eve of a great struggle, vitally in¬ 
volving the honor and welfare of his coun¬ 
try with his last public utterance a mes¬ 
sage of patriotism. Manly in presence, 
manly in heart, courageous in spirit, the 
embodiment of personal and civic nobility, 
he died honored and mourned as Warren 
died at Bunker Hill. 


Day by day Bryan unfolds his dema¬ 
gogic soul to the country. At Salem July 
14 he said that if elected he hoped to bring 










































334 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


back to the people a government which 
“like heaven shall treat all alike.” The 
government of which he is seeking to get 
possession has nearly 100,000 employments 
which are open on exactly equal terms to 
rich and poor, white and black alike. The 
system under which these employments 
are awarded is the greatest boon to the 
self-respecting wage-earner that was ever 
afforded in civil government. Yet Bryan 
in his platform as expounded by himself 
before his nomination, proposes to over¬ 
throw this system and restore again the 
piratical system of over-bosses and under¬ 
bosses and heelers and henchmen, which 
it has taken so many years to expel from 
the public service. We can not too 
strongly urge the gravity of the situation. 
If during the thirty years in which the 
battle of civil service reform has been 
fought out to what has lately seemed a 
decisive victory, any man or woman has 
made any effort in its favor that effort 
should now be repeated a hundred fold to 
beat back this horde which comes like an 
invasion of Tartars upon civilization. 


The methods which the Bryanites would 
pursue with the federal service are easily 
divined. If strong enough they would 
amend the law so as to retain a show of 
reform, but the amendments would, in 
fact, destroy the merit system. If not 
strong enough to legislate, we should be 
treated to a tricky civil service commis¬ 
sion under whom the system would be 
thoroughly Tammanyized. 

The fitness of Bryan for this purpose 
is shown out of his own mouth. In a 
speech in Chicago after his nomination he 
told a story of a man who, when asked 
why he walked the floor, said he had a 
note for $10,000 coming due in a week and 
it was time to walk the floor. A friend 
said, “Why don’t you sleep and let the 
other man walk the floor ? ” A presiden¬ 
tial nominee in sympathy with beating 
creditors would not stick at beating a law. 

Further, look at the men who are lead¬ 
ing in this great movement for all kinds 
of spoil. The onslaught for spoil would 
be a prolonged Chicago convention over 
again so long as a vestige was left. This 
is not in any respect an over statement 
Those leaders, local and national, are well 
known. They are wild for something 
which belongs to some body else and com¬ 
pared with what they would do the old 
transactions of “ pie ” and “ plums ” and 
“cold toes” and “carrying out the policy 
of the administration ” would appear con¬ 
servative and decent. All who do not wish 
to see the work of George William Curtis 
undone should stand together against this 
onslaught. 


Papers both east and west are publish¬ 
ing cautions against speaking sharply of 
the populist-Altgeld combination which is 
now endeavoring to get control of the gov¬ 
ernment. The Chronicle does not ex¬ 
actly sympathize with the caution. When 
men get together and with whoop and yell 
propose to loot the public service we do 
not perceive that they are entitled to soft 
spoken admonitions. They know what 
they are about. For thirty years the ar¬ 
gument for taking the federal service out 
of the clutches of spoilsmen has been pub¬ 
licly made and acted upon and every man 
in the Chicago convention knew the dif¬ 
ference between the spoils system and the 
merit system. Yet with deliberation they 
propose to destroy the merit system and 
turn the victor loose upon the public serv¬ 
ice. It is the spirit and practice of the pi¬ 
rate and the buccaneer, and that is all there 
is of it. This is in the platform under 
some smoky phrases and it is in the hearts 
and minds of the men who made the plat¬ 
form. 


The Chronicle has criticised President 
Cleveland in every case where it believed 
he was at fault; and looking back now it 
believes that at times he was seriously at 
fault. But the summing up of his career 
will leave him among the great Americans. 
He stands to-day immovable between pub¬ 
lic honesty and order and all kinds of so¬ 
cial and business disorder, and he will con¬ 
tinue so to the end of his term. It is a 
curious irony of fate that the horde which 
at critical moments he tried to appease, 
we think improperly, now turn against 
him like wolves and try to rend him. 


It will be remembered that soon after 
the present city administration was in¬ 
stalled the state civil service reform asso¬ 
ciation carefully examined its various acts 
and found it in the matter of appoint¬ 
ments proceeding in reckless and impu¬ 
dent disregard of law. An administration 
so conducted could have but one outcome 
in its civil service and elsewhere is given 
a partial recital of the various results 
which have accrued by using the public 
service for personal and party ends. We 
have not by any means all of the instances 
of insubordination, drunkenness, dishon¬ 
esty and other misdoings which have hap¬ 
pened. But enough are given to show that 
nowhere in the service does there exist a 
feeling that employment is obtained by fit¬ 
ness and held by faithfulness or efficiency. 
There is no pride in any service such as 
Colonel Waring has evolved out of his 
Tammany sweepers in New York. The 
prevailing spirit is that appointments are 
obtained and held by a pull. The infalli¬ 
ble test of this is the acts of the appointees 


themselves. The record is a disgrace to 
the city. 

The county administration does not 
appear any better. This county has a 
work-house of considerable importance. 
It is under the control of the board of 
county commissioners, consisting of three 
members, who are practically never over¬ 
hauled in their doings, except as the public 
prints now and then do so. There was a 
change of parties in the board last fall, 
and the new board made a clean sweep at 
the work-house. The record of the results 
which is given elsewhere was what might 
have been expected. It does not appear 
that the new superintendent has any qual¬ 
ifications for the place. He was the per¬ 
sonal favorite of one of the commissioners. 
He has had no voice in appointment or 
dismissal of the under-employes, he him¬ 
self saying that he has no power to dismiss 
any one. The employes throughout are 
loaded upon the county treasury without 
any regard to their fitness, but they simply 
receive the places as plums at the hands 
of the commissioners. In the few months 
which have elapsed, among other things 
one guard shot at a prisoner without the 
least excuse, sixteen prisoners have es¬ 
caped and some of their escapes can not 
be explained except through connivance 
of employes. The matter became such a 
scandal that the grand jury has just made 
a scathing report upon the affairs of the 
work-house and properly lays the whole 
blame upon the method of appointment. 


We have never over estimated the real 
emancipation which has come to public 
employes wherever the merit system has 
been applied. On every hand the result 
is the same. The latest instance is the 
labor service of New York city which is 
heard across the continent. Forty-one 
sweepers and drivers called upon Col. 
Waring and invited him to a public cele¬ 
bration in honor of the way in which he 
had bettered their condition. Speaking 
of his fellow-men the leader said, “You 
have raised them out of a state of political 
slavery which you found them in when 
you assumed office. Heretofore to get em¬ 
ployment in this department a man had 
to be a slave to the liquor dealer.” 


In a statement issued by the executive com¬ 
mittee of the sound-money democrats of Illi- 
nios, to explain why their state is ostensibly 
committed to free silver in the national con¬ 
vention, the efforts of the Cook county sound- 
money democrats to secure fair primaries are 
rehearsed. Their proposition was rejected by 
the central committee, 6S of the 14 votes in op¬ 
position being “cast by the appointees to office of 
Governor Altgeld, or their appointees^’—New York 
Evening Post, July 8. 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


335 


INDIANAPOLIS AND MARION 
COUNTY GOVERNMENT. 

James B. Curtis, chairman of the executive 
committee, which made the nomination for 
mayor, is city attorney; Joseph E. Bell, mem¬ 
ber of the committee from the sixth ward, is 
assistant city attorney ; Michael Laughin, 
member from the fifth ward, is an inspector 
in the engineer’s office; E. M. Goeble, mem¬ 
ber from the first ward, is market master. 
Nearly every employe of the city was either a 
delegate to the last democratic convention or 
has relations with those who were. All who 
are mentioned were in the convention. Pierce 
Norton is one of the bondsmen of the superin¬ 
tendent of police. William Ripley is clerk of 
the board of health. John Manning is license 
inspector. Oscar Pfiumm is employed in the 
engineer’s office. H. A. Mansfield was ap¬ 
pointed city engineer, but was allowed to re¬ 
sign. Dare A. MacBeth was appointed to the 
city comptroller’s office and resigned. Jerry 
Foley had a place in the assessment bureau 
and resigned. John Costello is an inspector 
in the engineer’s office, and so is Charles A. 
Brown. Whit Byfield was a delegate, and his 
nephew was made clerk in the comptroller’s 
office. E. A. Bryant, father-in-law of Mayor 
Taggart, is a clerk in the comptroller’s office. 
John Shine is a foreman of a street gang. 
Jerry Shea has an appointment in the fire de¬ 
partment. Bert Parker is clerk of the board 
of public works. John P. Brennan is clerk 
of the street commissioner’s department, and, 
with Michael Burns, has the hiring of the 
men and teams employed on the city work. 
Burns is assistant foreman of street repairs, 
and is a candidate for school commissioner. 
Charles Adam, school commissioner, is chief 
clerk in the comptroller’s office. He is back¬ 
ing Burns and has succeeded in securing the 
appointment of several firemen and police¬ 
men. In signing their applications he writes 
himself down as “a city passenger agent” (a 
position he formerly held). John Lucid is cus¬ 
todian of the city yards. Thomas W. Palmer 
is in the bureau of assessment. Michael Gant- 
ner is head janitor in the basement of the 
court-house. Larry Brennan and John Bern- 
hauer are assistant janitors. John Kiley, al¬ 
ways committeeman or a delegate, is custodian 
of Tomlinson hall. Joe Wagner is assistant 
market-master .—Indianapolis Journal, June IS. 

Hfi Hi ^ 

Four-fifths of the men given employment on 
the streets were either delegates themselves to 
the last city democratic convention or they 
“fixed” delegations for certain candidates. 
Those who always go as delegates have been 
given permanent positions .—Indianapolis News, 
May SI. 

THE FIRE DEPARTMENT. 

Present indications are that J. H. Web¬ 
ster will be retired as chief fire engineer within 
thirty days. The plan is to make “.Jim” 
George chief in his stead. The administra¬ 
tion does not want a republican at the head 
of any department. The reason assigned for 


the change is that Webster has no discipline 
in the department, and can not handle the 
men. The friends of Webster say that he is not 
allowed to place the men, and even his suggestions 
as to the appointment of a captain is ignored. They 
say that Richard Herrick, clerk of the board 
of public safety, is using his influence with 
the board to have Webster displaced. They 
assert that Webster’s clerk, who is of opposite 
politics, was forced upon him by the board. 
They declare that if there is a lack of disci¬ 
pline in the department the board is to blame 
for it, because it has made Webster a mere 
figurehead, and that if he is consulted at all 
it is only in a perfunctory way. It is charged 
by Webster's friends that the fire department has 
become a political machine, that men are appointed 
regardless of their qualifications as firemen, a7id only 
because of their ability to control primaries; that 
there are members of the force who are doing out¬ 
side work and engaged in other business. — Indian¬ 
apolis News, Feb. 25. 

* * * 

Fireman D. R. Foor was before the board 
of safety yesterday on a charge of insubordi¬ 
nation, preferred by Acting Captain Hunt, of 
chemical company No. 2. He admitted his 
guilt and was fined six days’ pay and repri¬ 
manded. He was absent from duty without 
permission for a number of days.— Indianapo¬ 
lis News, Feb. 25. 

* « * 

The board of public safety met yesterday 
afternoon and dismissed Matt Rodgers, driver 
of the engine at house No. 6, for drunkenness. 
He declined to give up his badge and defied any 
one to take it from him.— Indianapolis News, 
Feb. 20. 

♦ ♦ * 

John Fanning, a brother of Joseph Fanning, 
who was deputy auditor of state under J. O. 
Henderson, was appointed to the fire depart¬ 
ment and assigned to duty as a lineman.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, March 17. 

» • ♦ 

John Fox, captain of fire department com¬ 
pany, No. 5, was charged by Chief Webster 
with incompetency and neglect of duty. The 
hearing was set for 4 o’clock this afternoon. 
The specific complaint against him was that 
in answering a call from box 131 his com¬ 
pany was the first company to arrive at a 
burning barn in North Alabama street, but 
that he failed to have a line of hose laid out, 
and allowed three other companies, arriving 
later—Nos. 9, 13 and 1—to get water on the 
fire before his company .—Indianapolis News, 
April 28. 

* * * 

Yesterday John Fox, captain of fire company 
No. 5, was acquitted of the charge of ineompetency 
by the board of safety. Chief Webster reached 
a barn fire early and found that Fox’s com¬ 
pany was the first to arrive, but that two oth¬ 
er companies got water on the fire before he 
did. Fox’s explanation was that he had only 
two men and that his driver was a new man 
and drove past the water plug. Before he 
could return to it another company had at¬ 
tached to it. He then assisted another com¬ 
pany. 


Albert Rees was ordered to appear before 
the board and answer to his failure to comply 
with the order of the board that he pay $25 a 
month on certain debts owing by him. He 
had been ordered to pay this amount each 
month on bills amounting to about $150, and 
failed to do so .—Indianapolis News, April 29. 

* * » 

James Taylor, a fireman, connected with 
Hose Company No. 7, appeared before the 
board with a blackened eye. He was charged 
with drunkenness and disorderly conduct. It 
was shown that Taylor, while off duty, was 
drinking beer with a friend at his own home. 
Mrs. Riley is his neighbor, and Mrs. Jacob 
Kashman, living next door, 312 West Merrill 
street, called on Mrs. Riley. The Taylors 
and others have been at outs for some time on 
account of the children, and Taylor heard a 
remark at which he took offense. He rushed 
over to the house of Riley and announced 
that he was after no one but Mrs. Kashman* 
whom he denounced vigorously. Mrs. Riley 
admitted that she struck at Taylor with a 
broom, but did not hit him. Then Taylor 
went to.the place where Mrs. Kashman’s hus¬ 
band is at work, and insisted that the keep 
his wife quiet. 

“ Just tell my husband what you called me,” 
said Mrs. Kashman, according to the testi¬ 
mony. Taylor repeated the epithets, and 
Kashman punched him in the face. Mr. Ma- 
quire remarked that Kashman did right. It 
was shown that Taylor, who had been on the 
fire force for nine months, had a good reputa¬ 
tion as a fireman. “And a good free silver man?’ 
asked Mr. Maguire, to which the defendant bowed. 
The board decided that he was not drunk and 
that he should consider himself reprimanded, 
and suggested that he move out of the neigh¬ 
borhood, which he agreed to do .—Indianapolis 
News, June 24. 

THE POLICE DEPARTMENT. 

It was remarked at the office of the board of 
safety to-day that demoralization seemed to 
have struck the police force after a period of 
comparatively smooth sailing. One of the 
members of the board said that he had just 
begun bragging about the good conduct of the 
force. This forenoon five patrolmen were up 
on charges of conduct unbecoming officers. 
Mr. Morse, of the board, was absent. 

It was charged that B. R. Stevens had play¬ 
ed cards with women of bad character in a 
North Indianapolis saloon in the Michigan 
road. Testimony showed that Patrolmen Stev. 
ens and Kitzmiller had gone to the place un¬ 
der general instructions to keep a watch on 
the women. Two women were sitting at a 
table in a room back of the bar, one of them 
playing “solitaire.” She asked the patrol¬ 
man to take a hand at “seven-up,” and threw 
down six cards a piece for them. Kitzmiller 
said he couldn’t play, but Stevens took up the 
hand dealt him, carelessly played out the six 
cards, while still standing and talking, and 
then left the table to go away from the saloon. 
The officers were in the saloon a short time 











33G 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Kitzmiller said fifteen minutes, Stevens and 
other said five. They did not drink. Stevens 
said that he had taken up the cards unthought- 
edly and without realizing that his conduct 
was improper, but that he had since reflected 
on its impropriety. It was his first offense. 
The board fined him ten days’ pay.— Indiana¬ 
polis Journal, March 19. 

* * * 

Sergeant John Lowe found Patrolmen Con¬ 
rad Houser and Edward Wheeler asleep in the 
flagman’s watch-house at the railroad crossing 
at Noble and Washington streets, yesterday 
morning, at 2:45 o’clock. They pleaded guilty 
to the charge of being found asleep on duty. 
Lowe said that they had not been drinking, 
but had evidently gone into the place to dry 
themselves at the fire, as it was a wet and 
stormy night. Houser, a young man of about 
a month’s experience, had nothing to say in 
his defense, he said. Wheeler, who has been 
on the force five years, spoke of the charge as 
the first brought against them. He recognized 
the gravity of the offense, but explained that 
their feet had become very wet, and they had 
gone into the place to dry themselves, and 
had drowsed away in the warmth. They had 
not been there more than twenty minutes, he 
said, and the step of the sergeant awakened 
them immediately. The board retired to con 
sider the case, and then announced that, in 
view of the fact that both men were up for 
the first time, and that both the sergeant and su¬ 
perintent had spoken well of their general be¬ 
havior, they would be fined thirty days’ pay, 
instead of being dismis.sed from the force. 
Had either man had a previous charge against 
him. President McGuire said, he would have 
been dismissed. 

Charles Ware and Charles Leubking were 
charged with drinking and acting in a boister¬ 
ous manner with women and men in a house 
while on duty. Ware did not appear at the 
board’s office, and as it was considered advisa¬ 
ble to try both men at the same time, the trial 
was postponed to Wednesday morning at 8:30 
o’clock. 

A charge against Newton Jackson of using 
profanity and acting in an unbelieving man¬ 
ner in arresting a North Indianapolis barber 
was referred to the superintendent.— Indianap¬ 
olis News, March 17. 

♦ » * 

The resignation of Patrolman Henry Du 
shong was not accepted by the board of pub¬ 
lic safety last night, but the record was made 
to show that he was dismissed for neglect of 
duty. Superintendent Colbert reported that 
Dushong had been ordered to appear at the 
Chandler & Taylor company shops at 4:30 
o’clock Saturday afternoon, and had failed to 
appear either there or at 6 o’clock roll call, 
his excuse being that he had made an arrest 
and was “hunting witnesses.” The superin¬ 
tendent had suggested that obeying orders was 
more important than “hunting witnesses,” and 
said that Dushong had better not appear be¬ 
fore the board whereupon the man resigned. 

Simon J. Guntz, democrat, was appointed to 


fill the place of Dushong, also a democrat. 
Guntz was among the patrolmen appointed 
under the Denny administration, who were 
dismissed for “inefficiency” when Mayor Tag¬ 
gart assumed charge. President Maguire 
murmured something last night about Guntz’s 
dismissal being a “mistake;” that he was 
“really a very good officer, let go by an over¬ 
sight more than anything else.” He was 
“reinstated.” The records at the board’s of- 
fine show that, among other patrolman dis¬ 
missed for “inefficiency” on October 29, were 
George Tomlinson and Timothy Mackessy. 
These men were ordered on February 7 to re¬ 
port to the superintendent, and in the month 
Tomlinson worked nineteen days and Mackessy 
nine days. No great noise was made about it at 
the time. The superintendent says they were 
employed temporarily when extra men were 
needed, on account of burglaries. 

Patrolman Kiefer was on trial last night 
charged with being drunk while on duty. 
Superintendent Colbert said tbat at about 7 
o’clock on the night following St. Patrick’s 
day it had been reported to him that Kiefer 
was seen to stagger and fall in front of the 
Commercial block, at Kentucky avenue and 
Washington street. Captain Dawson and Ser¬ 
geant Schwab were sent to the block where 
Kiefer rooms to investigate. They arrived at 
about 8 o’clock, and found him stupid from 
intoxication. Kiefer had been sent that day 
to escort the Chandler & Taylor men home, 
and was o9’ duty at 6 o’clock. He brought 
four witnesses—John Meadows, George W. 
Budd, Thomas Mack and Thomas Long —to 
show that he had not been intoxicated while 
on duty. They all saw him at 5 o’clock, and 
shortly after, and said that he was perfectly 
sober. It was a wet, snowy day. His defense 
was that he had slipped on the snow. His 
feet were wet, he said, and after reaching his 
room he had taken two glasses of whisky and 
some quinine to prevent taking a cold. He 
denied drinking any during the day. Presi¬ 
dent Maguire said that the board was inclined 
to believe him to some extent, and fined him 
ten days’ pay. 

One of Kiefer’s witnesses, it chanced, was 
Thomas Long, a striking molder, undercharge 
of conspiracy in the Saturday night riot, and 
released on $2,000 bond. He had seen Kiefer 
escorting the non-union men on Wednesday 
night. 

“What is your occupation?” asked Presi¬ 
dent Maguire. 

“I’m not working now; I’m a striker,” 
said Long. 

Mr. Maguire laughed. “ I suppose you 
were watching Kiefer escorting your friends. 
I suppose you call them your friends.” 

“Oh, yes, they are my friends,” replied 
Long. 

“ You were not in the riot Saturday night ? ” 

“ Well, I was there,” replied Long with a 
laugh, “ but I wasn’t taking part. I tried to 
keep the men back.” 

“Just a peaceful citizen trying to prevent 
trouble,” suggested Maguire. 


“Yes, sir; just a peaceful citizen,” replied 
Long.— Indianapolis News, March 

» * » 

Patrolman Henry Kiefer was dismissed from 
the police force by the board of safety last 
night for sleeping when he should have been 
on duty. Last Saturday Kiefer did not ap¬ 
pear at the corner of Washington and Illinois 
streets to relieve crossing Patrolman Lund at 
the noon hour. Sergeant Lowe, by instruc¬ 
tions of Superintendent Colbert, hunted for 
Kiefer, and found him sleeping in his room. 
He pleaded guilty, and permission was grant¬ 
ed him to speak. He said it was his habit to 
go to his room to read the paper while he was 
resting at noon. He unintentionally fell 
asleep while reading last Saturday. The 
records of the board showed that Kiefer had 
been charged with lapse of duty twice before, 
once last August, when he failed to report to 
the police station by telephone, and again last 
March, when he was charged by the superin¬ 
tendent with being drunk. He was fined three 
days’ pay for the first and ten days’ for the 
last offense.— Indianapolis Journal, June 18. 

* * * 

The board of safety yesterday came to the 
conclusion that ex-Superintendent Powell did 
not recommend the discharge of members of 
the police force simply for political reasons. 
While Mr. Powell was stipei-inteiideiil he recom¬ 
mended that George H. Thomas, a democrat, he 
discharged because he dixmk too much liquot' for a 
policeman. Shortly after the present board 
came in power Thomas was reappointed, but 
now it has been discovered that the action of 
the other board was taken for good reasons, 
and on the recommendation of Superintendent 
Colbert and the certificate of the police sur¬ 
geon, that Thomas is suffering from alcohol¬ 
ism, he was dismissed. 

Timothy Mackessey, a democrat, who was 
dismissed from the force, was reappointed. 

N. J. Hoflbauer, John Johnson, James Re- 
cer, M. Mahoney, W. L. Cox, N. Jackson and 
D. B. Keplinger, patrolmen, were notified to 
appear before the board to-morrow afternoon 
at 4 o’clock. The board very delicately 
worded the notice. It states that those men 
who are given to an overindulgence in the 
fiery fluid and other indiscretions, which are 
not specifically set out, shall appear to be cau¬ 
tioned agaist allowing their appetites and in¬ 
clinations to carry them too rapidly in the 
pace that kills. In this connection it was 
also ordered that in the future when patrol¬ 
men are reported sick by the police surgeon 
and the illness was not caused by the dis¬ 
charge of their duties, or, as more specifically 
stated by the board, when members are re¬ 
ported off duty on account of dissipation, they 
shall receive no pay during the time they are 
off. 

Some time ago Patrolman Mulhall was tried 
on the charge of intoxication. He claimed to 
have been sick at the time and not drunk. 
Yesterday the board decided to dismiss the 
case, after having had it under advisement 
since the trial.— Indianapolis Journal, April 















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


337 


The board of public safety met last night 
and disposed of a variety of business. Charges 
in two different cases against Patrolman 
George Dills were disposed of. In the first 
case David Fesler, a McCarty street saloon 
keeper charged Dills with intoxication. He 
stated on the stand that Dilts was in the 
habit of drinking in his saloon, and that 
on one occasion he had come in the place 
badly under the influence of liquor. On an¬ 
other occasion Dilts had caused him to open 
the saloon on Sunday night in order that he 
(Dilts) might be given a drink. This testi¬ 
mony in regard to the specific case of Dilts’s 
intoxication was corroborated by Leo Cor¬ 
nett, a bookkeeper for the Indianapolis Gas 
Company. Superiniendent Colbert testified that 
Dilts had the reputation of being overfond of liquor, 
but that he had never seen him under the in¬ 
fluence. 

In behalf of Dilts several sergeants and pa¬ 
trolmen who were well acquainted with him 
stated that they had never seen him under the 
influence of liquor, and his superior officers 
gave him the best of reputation as an officer. 
It also developed that there might have been 
more or less spite work in the charges. Dilts 
had reported Fesler to the superintendent for 
allowing card playing in the saloon, and from 
that time Fesler had tried to have Dilts re¬ 
moved from that beat, and a short time ago 
Dilts was removed. The board concluded 
that on account of the enmity that Fesler 
seemed to have for Dilts the charges could 
not be given full weight, although it was appar¬ 
ent that Dilts was too free with drinking. He was 
cautioned not to let such a thing occur again. 
He was also discharged in the other case with 
a caution.— Indianapolis Journal, May 21. 

♦ * * 

Sergeant Jas. O. Mefford yesterday pleaded 
guilty to the charge of intoxication while in 
full uniform and the board of safety allowed 
him to resign and then dropped the case 
against him. The^charges were preferred by 
Captain Quigley, who is acting superintendent 
in the absence of Mr. Colbert. Mefford had 
been on tbe police force seven years, and this 
is only the second time charges of any kind 
were ever preferred against him. He was 
charged with drunkenness by Superintendent 
Powell, but the charges were not sustained. 
Some time ago another officer appeared in an 
intoxicated condition at the police station. 
He was not hauled before the board. He is a 
democrat. 

This leaves a vacancy to be filled by a re¬ 
publican. During the conversation as to the 
qualifications of the men on the force and the 
time they had been on, Captain Quigley men¬ 
tioned the fact that Michael Rafferty is the 
oldest man on the force and during his twenty 
years’ service had never been charged with a 
single infraction of the rules of the depart¬ 
ment, even of the smallest degree. He was 
also spoken of as a man who never takes a 
drink of any kind of liquor under any cir¬ 
cumstances. The board looked with favor 
upon him as a successor to Sergeant Mefford, 


but decided to wait until Superintendent Col¬ 
bert returns before making an appointment. 
All persons were unanimous in expressing 
their belief that Rafferty should be the new 
sergeant.— Indianapolis Journal, May IS, 

* » » 

(The board appointed William Scheigert as 
police sergeant to fill the vacancy occasioned 
by the resignation of Sergeant Mefford.) 

» * * 

The board of public safety this morning 
restored ex-Sergeant James O. Mefford, who 
was permitted to resign May 12, to a position 
on the police force in the ranks. It was the 
feeling that Mefford’s fall was entirely out of 
harmony with his general gentlemanly bear¬ 
ing and due to an unfortunate circumstance. 
He was appointed to fill the vacany caused by 
the dismissal of patrolman Kiefer. 

Timothy O’Connor was severely reprimand¬ 
ed for sundry little breaches of discipline as 
a patrolman. He left his district without 
leave recently. He pleaded guilty, but ex¬ 
plained that he was hunting witnesses.— In¬ 
dianapolis News, June 5, 

» * • 

Superintendent Colbert has sent the board 
of safety a communication preferring charges 
of neglect of duty against officers Joseph 
Beatty and Louis Sheridan, both of whom 
were found asleep in the West Washington 
street engine-house yesterday morning at 3 
o’clock by Sergeant Crane.— Indianapolis Jour¬ 
nal, June 8. 

* » * 

Superintendent Colbert yesterday suspended 
Patrolman D. B. Caplinger for leaving his 
district without permission. Caplinger has 
been running the eleventh district. Satur¬ 
day he made his telephone call twice from 
telephones outside his district.— Indianapolis 
Journal, June 13. 

» * * 

Charles Bunnell, patrolman, handed in his 
resignation this morning. Bunnell took this 
action on account of charges of cowardice that 
had been preferred against him, and which 
were to have been investigated by the board. 
It is alleged that a man named George Ship- 
man got into a fight with another man Wednes¬ 
day night, and Bunnell was sent for. He was 
told to arrest Shipman, but when he started 
toward him, Shipman threatened to lick him 
if he came too near, and said : “ You’d better 
sneak out of this.— Indianapolis News, July 18, 
1896. 

THE STREET DEPARTMENT. 

Some of the republicans who have not been 
able, they say, to secure work on the streets 
for themselves and teams are insisting that 
the man without a “ pull ” stands a poor show 
of getting employment. This Street Commis¬ 
sioner Herpick denies. He says he never asks 
a man’s politics. He only insists that the 
man shall be able to do the work for which 
he is paid, and that he live in this city. 

“ I have pul men on at the request of Mr. Burns, 
at the request of Mr. Brennan, at the request of Mr. 
Stuckmeyer, Councilman Cooper (who is a republi¬ 


can) and at the request of some of the other council¬ 
man, but the whole number is small.—Indianapolis 
News, May 22. 

* * » 

A glance at the pay rolls of the street de¬ 
partment for the last three months and then a 
glance at the streets of the city seems to point 
to the fact that the city will really lose noth¬ 
ing by giving the employes in the street de¬ 
partment a half holiday on Saturday, or, for 
that matter, a whole holiday every day in the 
week. 

There are enought men on the rolls and 
they draw enough money to keep the streets 
in a good conditition at all times. Many of 
the streets which were cleaned (?), according 
to the ideas of the ward heelers who have the 
work in charge, during the last month now 
look as if they had not seen a scraper in seven¬ 
teen years. There has been almost twice as 
much money spent in this department since 
February 1 this year as was spent last year in 
tbe same time. The weekly pay rolls of the 
street department for labor for the same 
period of both years, as recorded in the office 
of the board of works, are as follows; 



1896. 


1895. 

February 7. 

... $558 

February 8. 

... $10 

February 14.... 

... 238 

February 15.... 

16 

February 21..., 

.... 173 

February 22.... 

15 


.... 142 

March 1. 

57 

March 6. 

... 319 

March 9. 

... 173 

March 13. 

... 481 

March 23. 

... 149 

March 20. 

... 162 

March 30. 

... 417 

March 27. 

,... 457 

April 6. 

... 679 

April 3. 

... 1,380 

April 13. 

... 844 

April 10. 

... 1,386 

April 20. 

... 976 

April 17. 

... 2,137 

April 27. 

,.. 1,114 

April 24. 

... 2,040 . 



Total. 

... $8,473 

Total. 

....$4,4,50 


In this table the week ending March 16, 
1895, has been missed in copying the amounts 
from the records, but the week before the pay 
roll amounted to $173, and the week follow¬ 
ing it had dropped to $149, so that even if 
$175 were added to the total for 1895 it would 
make only $4,625 for the three months, which 
is a little more than half what was paid this 
year for the same time, and there are few peo¬ 
ple who find their streets in as good condition 
as they were a year ago.— Indianapolis Journal, 
April 29. 

* ^ ^ 

Thomas Collier, a foreman on a street re¬ 
pair gang in the employ of the city, was ar¬ 
rested yesterday on the charge of embezzle¬ 
ment. The charge was preferred by Street 
Commissioner Herpick, after an investigation 
held in the mayor’s office. It seems that John 
Keefe, one of the laborers under Collier, in¬ 
formed Mayor Taggart that his name had 
been used to *‘ pad ” the pay roll, and that he 
had divided the money thus received with 
Collier. 

Keefe was called to the mayor’s office yes¬ 
terday morning and he made a full confession 
of his part in the transaction and put it in 
the form of an affidavit. He says that he was 
in the employ of Collier and that last week he 
was sick and did not work for three and a 
half days ; that he was placed on the pay roll 
for a full week’s time, and when he drew the 
$4.90 which he had not earned he gave Col¬ 
lier $1.50. 





































338 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


Information was received that Wm. Lyons 
was also used as a means of drawing upon the 
city treasury, and he was sent for. He denied 
all charges, however. The street commissioner 
believes he has three or four other instances 
where Collier padded the rolls in this manner, 
and that the evidence will he forthcoming at 
the proper time to convict him. Instances 
during the past three weeks are cited, though 
without any specific statement as to the amount 
of the peculations. 

The fact that it was possible for a person 
occupying the subordinate position of that 
held by Collier to open such a pipe line as 
he may have opened to the city treasury was 
commented on with considerable surprise by 
persons who have been familiar with the af¬ 
fairs of the city during the past few years. It 
seemed strange that a foreman of a street 
repair gang should have the opportunity to 
make out a pay roll which should go to the 
comptroller for payment without any sort of 
auditing or checking by the street commis¬ 
sioner that would detect padding. Under 
an ordinarily safe and conservative method of 
business, it was believed, the street commis¬ 
sioner should have discovered any fraud that 
might have been perpetrated. — Indianapolis 
Journal, May 19. 

Hf Hf 

Thomas Collier, ex-foreman of the demo¬ 
cratic street-repair gang, was bound over to 
the grand jury by Justice Nickerson yester¬ 
day for presenting a fraudulent claim to the 
city controller. He was unable to furnish a 
bond for $500 and was sent to jail. Lyons, 
the principal witness against Collier, could 
not be found, and Justice Nickerson was in¬ 
formed that he left this city for St. Louis 
Sunday night. James Moriarity, a subfore¬ 
man under Collier, gave the most damaging 
testimony. He cited a number of instances 
in which Collier had allowed Lyons and John 
Keefe full time when they were not working. 
One week early in May the gang was sent to 
do work at the Ray street bridge. Before 
anything was done the entire gang, Lyons and 
Keefe among the others, were laid off. The 
next day Moriarity and two other men worked 
spreading gravel. Lyons and Keefe did no 
work, but received the regular pay. On the 
cross-examination conducted by Collier’s at¬ 
torney, Moriarity testified that he was posi¬ 
tive that neither man worked, as they were 
both in his gang under him as subforeman. 

John Keefe testified that he worked nine 
hours during the week ending May 14. For 
this work he received $4.90 from the con¬ 
troller upon a voucher issued by Collier, wit¬ 
ness said. Keefe sought to screen Collier, 
saying that the latter had allowed him pay 
for days he had not worked through chari¬ 
table motives. Keefe said that he was sick 
and was in destitute circumstance. In the 
next breath, in answer to a question pro¬ 
pounded by the prosecutor, Keefe admitted 
that he had given $2 of the $4.90 to Collier. 
When asked if he had ever given Collier 
money before that time Keefe replied that he 
gave him $1 once. 


“What did you give it to him for?” asked 
the prosecutor. 

“Well, Collier was a good friend of mine. 
He and I went into a saloon to get a drink. 
I was flush that day and gave him $1. He 
did not ask me for it.” 

No evidence was introduced in Collier’s de¬ 
fense. A large contingent of his democratic 
friends and supporters from Irish hill were in 
the court room, clamoring for his release on 
his own recognizance. Collier and his friends 
claim that subforeman .Tames Moriarity was 
an applicant for Collier’s place, and that he 
had been actuated by spite and jealousy in 
making the charges against his superior.— In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, May SS. 

THE WORK-HOUSE. 

The fight for places at the disposal of the 
county commissioners has assumed such pro¬ 
portions that in some inst.ances considerable 
ill feeling has been engendered. There is al¬ 
most a mob about the offices all the time, and 
when the place hunters make room it is to 
give their friends a chance to speak in their 
behalf. The “old guard ” is camping on the 
grounds early and late. It is charged that 
some of them do not go home to dinner and 
have their suppers sent to them. The “ heel¬ 
ers ” and “ pullers ” who are seen at all the 
primaries and in the conventions are there 
holding up plates for anything that will fall 
into them. When a stranger appears there is 
a rush for him, and the question “ What are 
you after?” is hurled at him. 

The struggles which Mayor Denny passed 
through when he took his office the last time 
is no more to be compared with the present 
struggle than is a game of lawn tennis to be 
compared with a foot-ball contest. 

The commissioners have different views. 
Geer wants Hany Wheatley appointed superin¬ 
tendent of the work-house, and some of Wheatley's 
opponents declare that it was because Geer and 
Wheatley were in the army together, and not be¬ 
cause of any fitness on the part of Wheatley for the 
position. J, W. Hess, who was the principal hacker 
of Geer in the convention declares Wheatley not fit 
for the place, and insists that Fisher, street commis¬ 
sioner under the Denny administration, must have 
the appointment. Opponents of both men are 
talking about “fossils,” and insisting that 
younger men who will maintain discipline 
at the institution be appointed.— hidianapolis 
Netvs, Nov. S9. 

♦ * ♦ 

The board of county commissioners, with 
County Attorney Hovey, yesterday investi¬ 
gated the work-house affray. The investiga¬ 
tion revealed the fact that Graham, in shoot¬ 
ing at Adams exceeded his authority at least 
in one particular. The rules of the institution 
require the guards to report the disobedience 
of a prisoner to the superintendent. Guards 
are not expected to take the authority of pun¬ 
ishment upon themselves. Graham admits 
that he went into Adams’s cell on his own 
authority, and without consulting the super¬ 
intendent. All of those who had anything to 


do with the trouble were examined by the 
board. 

Taylor Johns, a cell boss, was an eye-witness 
to the affair and told what he knew. He said 
that Adams refused to get into the barber 
chair, and he informed guard Graham, who 
went to the cell-house and ordered Adams to 
obey. The latter came out of his cell, and the 
gaurd pushed him toward the chair. Adams 
turned on Graham and the latter struck him 
twice with his mace. Graham then drew his 
revolver and shot as Adams continued to ad¬ 
vance. Adams tried to get hold of a piece of 
gas pipe as Graham shot. Johns said the 
guard lowered the muzzle of the pistol before 
he fired. 

Graham testified that the prisoner tried to 
strike him. He drew his revolver as a bluff, 
but Adams continued to come toward him, 
and he shot to scare the prisoner. After the 
shooting Adams got into the barber’s chair, 
but insisted that he had been shot. 

Adams, the victim, said that when he was 
brought back to the workhouse after his es¬ 
cape, the first of the month, he was wearing 
heavy clothing. When he exchanged his gar¬ 
ments for the prison garb he took a heavy 
cold. All last week he was sick, and for two 
days prior to last Friday he was not eating 
anything. He refused to have his mustache 
taken off because there were other prisoners 
who were not clean-shaven. Graham, he said, 
called him out of hU cell, and, with an oath, 
struck him half a dozen times with his mace. 
Graham declared he would show him who was 
boss and would break him in if he had to shoot 
him. Graham then told Kinney, the barber, 
to step aside, and then he fired. The ball 
passed through Adams’s trousers, but did not 
enter the flesh. 

At noon yesterday, when the prisoners 
marched into the dining room, there were 
fourteen men with mustaches in line. As¬ 
sistant Superintendent Schooley said that 
since the shooting he had discontinued the 
shaving in cases where prisoners were un¬ 
willing to submit to it.— Indianapolis News, 
March 18. 

Hfi ^ Hfi 

Charles F. Adams, footpad and desperado, 
sentenced to one year in the work-house on 
December 24, 1895, escaped from there on the 
night of February 20. He was captured in 
Pittsburg and returned on March 10. Now 
he has again escaped. He has been gone 
since last Friday, but the news of tbe escape 
has been suppressed. The prisoner bore the 
reputation of being a desperate man. His 
first escape was effected by sawing through 
his cell and also through the outer windows, 
through which he and his companion made 
their escape by means of ropes woven out of 
the prison blankets. After his return, Adams 
refused to work, and was unruly. During 
his sojourn in Pittsburg he had grown a mus¬ 
tache, which he refused to allow the prison 
barber to shave off. Edward Graham, a guard, 
went to the prisoner’s cell, and finding his 
orders disobeyed, after some talk drew his re¬ 
volver and shot at the prisoner. The work- 

















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


339 


house authorities tried to suppress the facts in 
this case, but they came to light, and, after 
an investigation, the guard, Graham, was dis¬ 
charged. 

Information that Adams had again escaped 
came to the News this morning. A reporter 
went to the work-house, saw Superintendent 
Wheatley, and asked to see the prisoner, 
Charles F. Adams. 

“Now look here,” said Mr. Wheatley, “I 
want to tell you—Adams had escaped—you 
know that don’t you ?” 

"How did he escape?” 

“Well, it was through the negligence of one 
of the guards.” 

“Which guard ?” 

"I don’t want to say.” 

“Is he still employed here?” 

“ Yes, you see I have not the power to discharge 
him even if I wanted to. I’ll tell you, I reported 
this whole matter to the county commission¬ 
ers and to the police, and the superintendent 
of police told me to keep it quiet so that they 
might have a chance to catch the man. It’s 
my opinion that he’ll be a difficult man to 
catch again. I thought that if we kept it 
quiet we might have a better chance.” 

“ When did he escape, and how ?” 

“I’ll tell you all about it. It was on Fri¬ 
day, at the noon hour. He had two balls and 
a chain on him, for we knew him to be a des¬ 
perate man. He was working with the gang 
in the stone shed. There was about fifty men 
there, I guess. It seems that he had found 
some way in getting rid of his manacles, and 
when the men were lined up for dinner Adams 
got behind a screen in the stone shed and the 
guard marched off and left him there.” 

“How many guards are there in the stone 
shed ? ” 

“ Two.” 

“ Who are they ? ” 

“ Charles Barr and A1 Kerr. One of the 
guards goes outside the shed with a gun when 
the men are lined up for dinner, the other one 
lines the men up and marches them in.” 

"Does he count the men under his charge?” 

“ He is supposed to.” 

“ Who was the inside guard?” 

“Charles Barr. He is the one that is re¬ 
sponsible for the escape. Of course we did 
not know he was gone until we came back 
after diner, and then we found the balls and 
chains behind the screen. I hope the news 
papers won’t be too hard on me. I was in no 
way responsible for this. It was all the neg¬ 
ligence of the guard. If he’d have used ordi¬ 
nary care and counted his men it could never 
have happened. 

“Are you not able to maintain discipline 
out here?” 

“ Well, I try to, but a man can’t be every¬ 
where at once.” 

“What about the prisoner who was released 
Sunday, June 21, and for whom you swore out 
a warrant on Monday ? ” 

“ Oh, you’ve heard of that, have you ? Well, 
he was John Davis, a colored prisoner. He 
was discharged last Sunday after serving a \ 


sentence of twenty-five days. I made him a 
‘trusty’ and he was hall boy. It seems that 
he got down through a grating here in the 
hall and got into the clothes room. He stole 
a good suit of clothes belonging to another 
prisoner named Harry West. It seems that 
Davis took the clothes and hid them. Then 
when he was discharged he went and got them 
and carried them away. As you know, I swore 
out a warrant for his arrest, and I bought the 
prisoner, Harry West, a brand new suit of 
clothes, as good or better than the ones he 
lost. 

“Have you had any more prisoners escape 
lately ? ” 

“No— 0 - 0 , not escaped. There was a man 
tried to get away the week before last. His 
name was Fred Williams. I was walking 
around on the outside of the fence when Will¬ 
iams broke and ran. He ran up to within ten 
feet of me, and then I pulled my gun and 
halted him and made him climb over the 
fence. He didn’t get away, though.” 

“ How is it that none of these facts about 
the institution and its management have be¬ 
come known?” 

"I don’t known. I reckon we didn’t think 
it would do any good to tell ’em around.”— 
Indianapolis News, June 22. 

* * » 

James Ward, a pickpocket, who was serving 
a long sentence in the work-house for snatch¬ 
ing a woman’s pocket-book at the Schnull fire, 
has been gone from the institution since April. 
He is No. 9 of the known escaped list. Ward 
was at work whitewashing. When his day’s 
work was done he hid behind a pile of lumber 
and forgot to return to his cell, and the guards 
forgot to see whether he was there. It is ar¬ 
gued that there are still some prisoners at the 
work-house, for the telephone is generally an¬ 
swered by a voice which says, “I’m one of the 
prisoners.” 

A News reporter called at the county com¬ 
missioners’court to-day to make the announce¬ 
ment that a prisoner had escaped from the 
work-house, and to ask what they intended to 
do about it. The commissioners were absent, 
but Superintendent Wheatley of the work- 
house, happened to be present. 

“Oh yes,” said the superintendent, cheer¬ 
fully, “you want to ask about Jimmy Ward, 
the pickpocket who got away. That’s no new 
case. You had that a month ago. You news¬ 
papers want to make out that a good many 
prisoners get away from us, and only three 
have got away in a month.” 

“Didn’t two women get away the other day? 
Haven’t you lost nine prisoners in the last 
three Aveeks?” 

“Yes, two women got away. I wasn’t think¬ 
ing of the women. Do I know how many 
prisoners are there now? Yes, I do; there 
are 138."—Indianapolis News, July S. 

♦ ♦ ♦ 

Sixteen is the number of escapes from the 
workhouse since January 22. In this number 
one man—Adams—is counted twice, but he 
escaped twice. Another one is a crazy man 


who simply ran away while in charge of As¬ 
sistant Superintendent Schooley. He only 
had one day to serve. The full list of escaped 
prisoners, as brought out in the testimony be¬ 
fore the county commissioner yesterday, is as 
follows, an asterisk folloAving the name indi¬ 
cating that they were recaptured : James 
Kirby (crazy), January 22; Otto Williams,* 
February 18; Charles Adams* and Harry 
Williams,* February 20; James Ward, April 
22; George Miller, May 10; Edward John¬ 
son, May 17; William Hamilton, May 24; 
Andrew Allen,* May 24; Joseph Collins, June 
4; Joseph Hagen, June 7; George Bogert, 
June 10; Charles Adams, June 19; Arthur 
Boyd,* June 21; Eliza Allen* and Nina Far- 
ington,* July 4. This is sixteen escapes, with 
nine of them still at large. 

’ Yesterday afternoon the county commission¬ 
ers made an investigation of the numerous 
escapes. It seems quite evident from the 
testimony taken, and this is the opinion of 
Commissioner Keinecke and possibly of Com¬ 
missioner Harding, that in at least one case there 
must have been some connivance by those in charge, 
either a trusty or a guard, or the escape would 
have been impossible. This is the case of 
Bogert .—Indianapolis News, July 10. 

* * * 

After considering the evidence taken Thurs¬ 
day at the work-house in regard to the escape 
of prisoners, the board of county commission¬ 
ers yesterday made the following entry on 
their records: 

“ Having heard the evidence of the various 
witnesses relative to the recent escapes from 
the Avork-house, and being advised in the 
premises, the board finds that the affairs of 
that institution have been honestly conducted 
by the officers in charge; and that, in the 
main, the officers have been vigilant and care¬ 
ful in guarding against escapes from the in¬ 
stitution. The board, however, finds that in 
the cases of Adams and Williams bad judg¬ 
ment was exercised in making them cell-bosses 
and thereby furnishing them the opportunity 
of which they took advantage to make their 
escape. In the case of Ward poor judgment 
was exercised in making him a trusty for out¬ 
side work. As to the other escapes, the board 
finds the officers of the institution blameless, 
and as to the two or three other cases of es¬ 
capes of prisoners other than trusties the board 
finds that whatever carelessness may be attributed to 
any one must be attributed to the guards having 
charge of such prisoners. In accordance with 
this, there will be some reprimands and the 
matter will end .—Indianapoli News, July 11. 

THE JAIL. 

Whit Starr escaped from the Marion county 
jail some time during Thursday night. His 
escape was so carefully planned and the work 
necessary to accomplish it so successfully car¬ 
ried out that he was not missed until yester¬ 
day morning when the prisoners were let out 
of their cells for exercise in the corridor with¬ 
in the cage. It was then noticed that Starr 
was not among the number, and an investiga¬ 
tion disclosed that he was gone and that he 















340 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


might have been gone long enough to have 
got entirely out of the state. 

Sheriff Womack said last evening that 
Starr’s escape was due wholly to the careless¬ 
ness of jailer Mounts. “ I give instructions 
repeatedly that the doors are to be opened 
only one at a time, and when the trusties go 
in to sweep they are supposed to be locked in 
until they finish one department and then ad¬ 
mitted to another. If this is done the jailer 
sees every door opened and closed and knows 
just who goes through them. 

Then if anybody escapes he must go through 
barriers that it is simply impossible for any¬ 
body to go through.’.’ 

“ Will you discharge Mounts?” 

“ I can’t say yet. I intend to investigate 
further and lay the blame where it belongs.” 

Mr. Womack continued : “ If I had had my 
way about Starr he would have been in Mich¬ 
igan City long ago. He was sentenced June 
8 or 9, and I intended taking him to prison 
the same day, but was instructed by Judge 
McCray to keep him here until Governor 
Matthews could act on a petition to have him 
sent to Jeffersonville instead of Michigan 
City. His friends made a plea that he was 
suffering with consumption and that he would 
die if sent to Michigan City. I held him, 
and then Corriden, one of Starr’s pals, was 
convicted, and I wanted to take Starr north 
with him, but Judge McCray said to hold 
him a while longer. The Judge assured me 
that I would not have to hold him longer 
than the 25th, and it seems that the Judge 
was right, for it was the 25th that Starr left. 
—Indianapolis Journal, June S7, 

» » * 

Sheriff Womack has made the suspension 
of jailor Harry Mounts permanent and has 
appointed in his place Harry Earp. Mr. 
Womack said he had made a thorough invest¬ 
igation of the escape of Whit Starr and could 
find nothing but the carelessness of Mounts 
to account for it. “If he had used common 
care or had followed instructions the escape 
could never have been effected, said Womack. 
“ It is an offense for which no excuse can be 
offered and for which there is no atonement.” 

Concerning other charges which have been 
made against Mounts, Mr. Womack had 
nothing to say. He did not make the charges 
himself and does not believe there is any 
truth in them.— June SO. 

* * » 

Mrs. Charles Genther has been appointed 
matron of the county jail. The appointment 
is made by Sheriff Womack, who will pay her 
a salary of $10 a week out of his own pocket. 
He has been trying for a long time to induce 
the county commissioners to make the ap¬ 
pointment, but never succeeded. The import¬ 
ance of having a matron at the jail has been 
emphasized recently by complaints which 
have been made by women confined in the jail. 
The new matron will have charge of the keys 
to the women’s department, and no one will be 
permitted to enter unless she is present.— In¬ 
dianapolis Journal, June SO, 


Colonel Weaver, Whit Star’s partner, said: 
“If you want to know the truth about it. I’ll 
tell you. Star sneaked out when the door 
was left open for the sweepers. He was hid¬ 
ing in the machinery box and was not in the 
cage at all. After he had got one bar sawed, 
he came out of the corridor and came up 
here. If he had not been able to get out of 
the window he would have rapped Harry 
Mounts on the head with a hammer, and he’d 
have got the keys and have taken me out too. 
I’m only sorry that I wasn’t down there with 
him. I’d be gone now.” Weaver laughed at 
the sheriff, and made fun of the escape, say¬ 
ing: “You’ll catch him, I bet! Why you 
fellows couldn’t catch a bad cold in winter 
time ! ”— Indianapolis News, June 36. 


A JUDGE. 

The Rev. Dr. C. H. Parkhurst is dissatisfied 
with the outcome of the trial of Cornelius B. 
Parker, who has been called “the policy king.” 
The case was tried last week before City Judge 
Rufus B. Cowing in the court of general ses¬ 
sions. Thejtidge discharged the jury, which stood 
ten to two for conviction after it had considered a 
verdict for two hours. 

The Society for the Prevention of Crime, of 
which Dr. Parkhurst is president, was much 
interested in the trial of Parker, against whose 
system of policy shops its agents had accumu¬ 
lated much evidence. During the trial of 
Parker, Chief Detective Dennett of the society 
keenly watched the proceedings, and it ap¬ 
pears that his reports to Dr. Parkhurst 
prompted the clergyman to criticise Judge 
Cowing’s methods. 

At the trial two agents of the Society for 
the Prevention of Crime were ordered from 
the court, and Dr. Parkhurst maintains that 
they were orderly, and that what was done to 
them was simply smiting the society. Excep¬ 
tion is taken to the action of the court in 
shortening the plea for the people by Assistant 
District Attorney O’Hare, and Dr. Parkhurst 
is of the opinion that Judge Cowing should 
have endeavored to compel a unanimous and 
satisfactory verdict by the jury, especially as 
one of the two who favored acquittal was 
wavering.— New York Times, May 5. 

» « » 

Judge Cowing’s recent appointment of his 
son to a snug berth in the court in which he 
is judge, and his dismissal of three old and 
tried court attendants in order to make room 
for his son, are denounced even by Judge 
Cowing’s Tammany friends as one of the worst 
cases of nepotism that has yet occurred in 
those courts.— New York Evening Post, May 5. 
♦ » » 

It is most unfortunate for Judge Cowing 
that his unusual course in discharging the 
jury in the Parker case should have been fol¬ 
lowed so quickly by a plea of guilty from 
Parker. He discharged the jury after it had 
been in consultation only two hours, and when 
it stood eleven to one for conviction, taking 
the ground that the evidence was not such as 
to make an agreement for conviction probable. 
When Parker was asked to plead to a similar 
indictment before another judge, he pleaded 


guilty, and was let off’with a fine of $500. He 
was known as the “policy king,” and his 
business was the backing of policy gambling 
houses, an occupation which has for years 
been intimately associated with politics, and 
hence, under tile old police regime, was 
strongly protected by “pulls.”— New York Ev¬ 
ening Post. 


MUNICIPAL REFORM. 

Mr. Albert Shaw’s study of the city govern¬ 
ment of St. Louis is especially opportune in the 
June Century. He had already shown in his two 
volumes how far British and continental cities 
have advanced beyond us in the solution of 
the problem how to make life in a city decent 
and attractive. He now shows how far St. 
Louis has gone ahead of other American cities 
in the achievement of home rule, in the em¬ 
ployment of experts in certain city offices, and 
in a phenomenal freedom from charges of of¬ 
ficial corruption. Particularly is St. Louis to 
be congratulated on having partially, at least, 
thrown off' the shackles of ward representa¬ 
tion. There are, however, some features of 
the corporate life of St. Louis which prove 
that its citizens have not yet altogether 
emerged from the national stupidity and su¬ 
pineness in the treatment of civic affairs. 
They still, for instance, accept a clean sweep 
in offices with each change of administration 
as part of the providential order of human 
affairs. 

* * » 

I want to say something about the offices of 
county commissioner and township trustee. 
There is need of a radical change in the laws 
governing those offices. These offices are not 
supposed to pay much, but men bribe voters 
and pack conventions to get them. When the 
commissioner once gets in he is hard to dis¬ 
lodge, if he is devoid of scruples. He uses his 
office to perpetuate his hold. One of his main levers 
is the free gravel roads. He has the appointment of 
superintendents to take care of the roads. These 
superintendents are told if they want to hold their 
job that they must hustle for' votes. They tell others 
that if they will go to the primaries and work for 
the incumbent they will get their share of the gravel 
hauling. “No vote, no work.” This species 
of bribery should cease. These men, after re¬ 
peated success, become intolerant, indolent 
and impudent, and conclude they are abso¬ 
lutely boss. 

When one bridge company gets all the con¬ 
tracts for ten years, is this fact not suspicious? 
On the 20th of this month the commissioners 
of this county were to get a job of masonry, 
costing about $2,500, and a bridge costing 
anywhere from $900 to $1,000. A young man 
who had learned his trade, and could give 
any bond required, wanted to bid on the ma¬ 
sonry and excavation. Bui he was informed, 
with much vehemence, that it was too small a 
business to be let in two contracts; that it 
would be let as a whole, and that while it was 
supposed that two feet helow the bed of the 
stream would be sufficient for a starting point, 
whoever did the work would have to guess at 
the dirt to be moved and the stone necessary, 
and no stone was to be laid till a clay was 
reached, if it was two or twenty feet; that it 
would not be let by the yard or perch. 

The young man could not make an honest, 
square bid because he was not rich enough to 
own a bridge foundry, and not willing to 
gamble with the county on the amount of dirt 
he would have to move or the stone it would 
require. It was hinted by the bridge and 
stone men who had come to bid on this work 
that the cause of this unreasonable and ab¬ 
surd demand was that a favorite bridge com¬ 
pany had been to see about it.— Cartersburg 
{Ind.) Letter to Indianapolis News. 















The civil service chronicle. 


VoL. II, N o. 42. INDIANAPOLIS, AUGUST, 1896. terms 


1 do not believe that at the time when the agitation for civil service reform began there was any evil or abuse in the government an attack on 
which seemed so hopeless, and yet this evil has disappeared, within one generation. I cite it as an illustration of the danger of error of treating any 
democratic failure as permanent or hopeless, or denying to any democratic society the capacity and determination to remedy its own defects in some di¬ 
rection or other by some means or other. No society in our time is willing to deterioi'ate openly, or ever does so long, without struggling for salva¬ 
tion ”— Mr. Godkin, in the Atlantic Monthly for July. 


Published monthly. Publication office, No. 23 N 
Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, 

THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 

Indianapolis, Ind. 


WE ARE OPPOSED TO LIFE TENURE 
IN THE PUBLIC SERVICE. WE FAVOR 
APPOINTMENTS BASED UPON MERIT, 
FIXED TERMS OF OFFICE, AND SUCH 
AN ADMINISTRATION OF THE CIVIL 
SERVICE LAWS AS WILL AFFORD 
EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES TO ALL CIT¬ 
IZENS OF ASCERTAINED FITNESS.— 
Platform, National Convention of Looters, Chicago, 
July, 1896. 


WHAT WE OPPOSE IN THAT PLANK 
IS THE LIFE TENURE WHICH IS BE¬ 
ING BUILT UP AT WASHINGTON, 
WHICH EXCLUDES FROM PARTY REP¬ 
RESENTATION IN THE BENEFITS THE 
HUMBLER MEMBERS OF OUR SOCIETY. 
— Bryan's Interpretation. 


W. W. Durbin, chairman of the State committee, 
who had boarded the train at Lima, insisted on Mr. 
Bryan saying a few words at Ada, where he deliv¬ 
ered the commencement oration at the Normai 
university last year. He left his breakfast and 
Prof. H. 8. Lehr, president of the university, intro¬ 
duced the candidate as the next president. Mr. 
Bryan was received with cheers and said : 

Lndips nd Geiillpmeii—While I have not 
been .speaking' miieh on thi trip I can not 
withstand the temptation to say a word 
here. The words so kindly spoken by 
Prof. Lehr, you will remeinher, are not 
thought of since the nomination. He is 
one of the original Bryan men. When I 
was here a year ago he was a Bryan man. 
I think he wanted you to become ac¬ 
quainted with me, so if you wanted post- 
offices you would know where to come to 
get them. I am not distributing postoffices 
yet, but I hope to be before very long. 
(Applause.) I remember with a great deal 
of pleasure this city and the students here 
of the university, and I hope they will be¬ 
come stuilents of the money question and 
be prepared to take their part in this tight. 
I thank you. (Great applause.) — Mr. Bryan, 
at Ada, August 10. 

It assails the independence of the judi¬ 
ciary by the covert threat to reorganize 
tie courts whenever their decisions con¬ 
travene the decrees of the party caucus. 
It seeks to allure office-seekers and spoils¬ 
men to its support by attacking ihe exist¬ 
ing civil service laws, which good men of 
all parties have labored so long to estab¬ 
lish, and to extend to all departments of I 


the public service.— From the call of the Na¬ 
tional Democratic party, Chicago, August 17. 

THE CIVIL SERVICE LAW WAS 
PLACED ON THE STATUTE BOOKS BY 
THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, WHICH HAS 
ALWAYS SUSTAINED IT, AND WE RE¬ 
NEW OUR REPEATED DECLARATIONS 
THAT IT SHALL BE THOROUGHLY AND 
HONESTLY ENFORCED AND EXTENDED 
WHEREVER PRACTICABLE. — F’m/i the 
Republican Platform, 1896. 


“MR. CHAIRMAN, IF THE REPUB¬ 
LICAN PARTY OF THIS COUNTRY IS 
PLEDGED TO ANY ONE THING MORE 
THAN ANOTHER, IT IS THE MAINTE¬ 
NANCE OF THE CIVIL SERVICE LAW 
AND TO ITS EFFICIENT EXECUTION— 
NOT ONLY THAT, BUT TO ITS EN¬ 
LARGEMENT AND ITS FURTHER AP 
PLICATION TO THE PUBLIC SERVICE. 

“THE LAW THAT STANDS UPON OUR 
STATUTE BOOKS TO-DAY WAS PUT 
THERE BY REPUBLICAN VOTES. IT 
WAS A REPUBLICAN MEASURE. EVERY 
NATIONAL PLATFORM OF THE RE¬ 
PUBLICAN PARTY, SINCE ITS ENACT¬ 
MENT, HAS DECLARED NOT ONLY IN 
FAVOR OF ITS CONTINUANCE IN FULL 
VIGOR, BUT IN FAVOR OF ITS EN¬ 
LARGEMENT SO AS TO APPLY MORE 
GENERALLY TO THE PUBLIC SERVICE. 
AND THIS, MR. CHAIRMAN, IS NOT 
ALONE THE DECLARATION AND PUR¬ 
POSE OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, 
BUT IT IS IN ACCORDANCE WITH ITS 
HIGHEST AND BEST SENTIMENT—AYE, 
MORE, IT IS SUSTAINED BY THE BEST 
SENTIMENT OF THE WHOLE COUNTRY, 
REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRATIC 
ALIKE.” — Mr. McKinley in Congress, April, 
1890. 


“ The pledge of the republican national 
convention that our civil service laws shall 
be sustained and thoroughly and lionestly 
enforced and extended wherever practica¬ 
ble is in keeping with Ihe position of the 
party for the past twenty-four years and 
will be faithfully observed. Our opponents 
decry these reforms. They appear to be 
willingtoabandon allthe advantages gained 
after so many years’ agitation and effort. 
They encourage a return to methods of par¬ 
ty favoritism, which both parties have often 
denounced, that experience has condemned 
and that the people have repeatedly disap¬ 
proved. The republican party earnestly 


opposes this reactionary and entirely un- 
Juslillable policy. It will take no backward 
step on this question. It will seek to im¬ 
prove, but never degrade the public serv¬ 
ice.— From Mr. McKinley's Letter of Acceptance, 
August 27. 

The Civil Service Chronicle greatly 
desires any numbers of the July issue not 
needed by the recipients. 

What we said of Mr. Bryan last month 
is fully borne out by later events. Scarcely 
any man in American public life has shown 
such contempt for the moral sentiment of 
the people. The stupidest politician in the 
country would not have stood up before a 
crowd and said, “I am not distributing 
postoffices now, but I expect to be before 
long.” He seems to be on a big moral 
drunk. There is no other way of account¬ 
ing for his wild financial vagaries and his 
attempts to form classes and array them 
against other classes and to set section 
against section. 


With regard to the civil service Bryan’s 
attitude is unmistakable. He means to 
treat it in the same spirit in which Ald¬ 
ridge has treated the New York service. 
Everything that he has ever said about it 
is on the lowest plane. Before he was a 
candidate he wrote that “ to discriminate 
against a portion of the party * * * is 
as indefensible as it would be to appoint 
members of another party to offices to 
which party is entitled.” As we said last 
month, he has produced a grave situation. 
A reckless and unprincipled president can 
do an immense amount to wreck the sys¬ 
tem which it has taken more than twenty- 
five years to build up. He ought not to 
receive the vote of any civil service re¬ 
former in the United States. He is pan¬ 
dering to the coarsest spoilsmen and to 
every evil element. Let him have such 
votes and no others. 


Mr. McKinley in his letter of accept¬ 
ance is in the matter of the civil service 
fully up to the mark of the platform and 
even with his former record in congress. 
There is scarcely a shadow of doubt but 
that his election will lead to the complete 
and final development of the merit system. 
The full headway which that system now 
has will, under friendly guidance, carry it 


t 








































342 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CIIRONICLE. 


money is greatly depreciated. The moral in¬ 
fluence of such a system is wholly bad, not 
only upon the community, but on every part 
of school work and on every person connected 
with it. It hurts the pupils most of all. The 
difference between a good and a fairly good 
teacher, to say nothing of a bad one, is incal¬ 
culable, but, like all things of the soul, inap¬ 
preciable to the general public. There are 
schools in my city, and other cities in my 
state, where I should prefer two years of 
schooling for a child of mine to four years in 
another school, where the public makes little 
or no discrimination.” 


to the end. We may expect te see the 
fourth-class postoflSces taken out of politics 
and a system established by which the 
higher postofl&ces shall come to be filled 
by promotions and transfers after the man¬ 
ner of the higher places in the railway 
mail service ; and the same improvement 
will embrace the heads of other oflBces. 
Thus practically the entire federal service 
with its hundreds of thousands of places 
of all kinds will finally be transferred from 
the field of politics to the field of the wage 
earner. That means permanence of em¬ 
ployment, fair pay, acquirement of homes, 
support of families, and education of chil¬ 
dren in a vast field and to a vast number 
where heretofore there has been only de¬ 
meaning political service rewarded by 
places with the most uncertain tenure, 
subject to a rapid rotation and aflording 
none of the benefits which are the reward 
of labor where labor has to depend only 
upon its faithfulness and efldciency. With 
Mr. Bryan all this would be changed again 
if we are to go by his platform and his 
words. The magnificent work of years 
would be wrecked and the whole service 
would be swept from the field of the wage- 
earner back to the field of spoils politics. 
He intends to do that. Will the American 
people let him? We do not believe it; 
but we say again there never was a time 
when every American who loves his coun¬ 
try had more need to do his duty than he 
has now. 


It is fitting that at this time there should 
be a memorial meeting of George William 
Curtis, such as has just been held at Ash- 
field, where Mr. Norton’s address, printed 
in part elsewhere, was delivered. It will 
tend to make more stubborn the resistance 
to the attack upon the great work which 
Curtis did. It will help to unite all who 
worked under his leadership and all who 
now see or reap the benefits of that work. 
It will make them stand where they ought 
to stand, all on one side against the vicious 
and desperate onslaught which is being 
made on good government and public and 
private honor. 

Every member of the classified service 
would do well to “ size up ”Mr. Bryan. He 
means them in his false reference to “ life 
tenure,” and he offers to them a defiance 
which they can not safely ignore. They 
now hold their places by the most demo¬ 
cratic method of distribution known. 
That method, coupled with faithfulness 
and efficiency, means steady employment 
and good pay. A candidate for the high¬ 
est office in a nation, whose talk and plat¬ 
form show him to be an all-round bucca¬ 
neer now threatens them with loss of em¬ 
ployment, of family support and of peace 
of mind. The way to avert such a disas¬ 


ter is by defeat at the polls. We notice 
that a few government clerks at Washing¬ 
ton, in hopes of appeasing this vulgar 
and coarse spoilsman, go to his committee 
rooms and fold Bryan documents after 
their working hours. It will not avail. 
Service under the present administration 
is sure to bring down the Bryan revenge. 

It is stated that in the recent dreadful 
heat in New York city the deaths among 
the little children were fewer than hereto¬ 
fore in a heated term. This was directly 
due to the clean streets made possible by 
Colonel Waring’s taking that work out of 
politics. 

On August 17 Mr. Roosevelt, of the po¬ 
lice board, invited young men to compete 
for 800 places in the police force of New 
York. We commend to Mayor Taggart 
what he says in the invitation to compete 
and suggest that Indianapolis should not 
follow the methods of Tammany longer, 
and that,such an open competition for 
place to be given to the fittest would lessen 
the number of trials of policemen for sleep¬ 
ing on duty, drunkenness and other im¬ 
proper conduct so demoralizing to the In¬ 
dianapolis force. Mr. Roosevelt says; 

We need strong, intelligent young men of good 
character for the force. We have not sufficient ap¬ 
plicants, and in order to fill the vacancies we should 
have at least twice as many as we are now getting. 
There probably never has been such a chance of¬ 
fered in New York for the employment of young 
men of good intelligence, of bodily vigor, and of 
good character. We desire all such to enter our 
examinations. If they pass them they will be ad¬ 
mitted strictiy on their merits and without regard 
to personal or political Influence of any kind. 

It must be remembered that not only residents of 
the city, but residents of the whole state, can apply 
if they wish. Skilled mechanics, clerks, laborers, 
hired men on farms, young fellows who have just 
left high school or academy and are better athletes 
than scholars, all these can come forward. The 
mental examinations are such that any man who 
has gone through our public schools can readily 
pass them. But we wish no man who has not a 
good character, and no man can pass the surgeons 
unless he Is sound physically. 

Elsewhere in the Chronicle are a 
number of extracts bearing upon politics 
in the schools of this country and the stand 
that should be taken by teachers and col¬ 
lege men in the vital question of civil serv¬ 
ice reform. The Atlantic Monthly has had 
a notable series of articles on politics in 
the public schools. Dr. G. Stanley Hall 
thus sums up the result of the inquiry: 

“ Nowhere has there ever been, to my know¬ 
ledge, so clear and forceful a presentation of 
the evils of subjecting schools to political offi¬ 
cers who are nearly lowest in the scale of po¬ 
litical preferment. It is worst of all when 
not only city and state superintendents, but 
even normal-school principals, must look to 
politics for a continuance in office. As long 
as this lasts appointment can not be wisely 
made, tenure is not by merit, and the value 
to the community of every dollar of school 


Platt’s officer, Aldridge, did not suc¬ 
ceed in getting the nomination for gover¬ 
nor in spite of his prostitution of his office, 
and in spite of the yells of his canal hench¬ 
men at the convention. Abe Gruber, who 
has been conducting a great “ anti civil 
service” struggle without conspicuous suc¬ 
cess showed a clever understanding of 
Aldridge’s backing in his story that Wicked 
Gibbs broke up an Aldridge procession at 
Saratoga by shouting “ l©w bridge,” “ locks 
open ” and the canalmen all broke ranks. 

We greatly hope that the Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association will continue its dis¬ 
closures of Aldridge’s work and his jail¬ 
bird appointees. 

These must be mortifying days for Gov¬ 
ernor Morton. He was not blind when he 
made his Platt appointments. He delib¬ 
erately sacrificed himself to practical poli¬ 
tics, but all the same he must wince under 
the nasty disclosures regarding the man i 
into whose hands he put the large sums ' 
entrusted to the superintendent of public^^: 
works of the great state of New York. 

And Mayor Strong should be feeling i 
some of the picks of an uneasy conscience J 
when he sees Mr. Roosevelt needlessly ll 
baffled and hindered in the struggle to S 

thoroughly purge the police force by a 1 

politician on the same board given his 1 
place as a political reward. When will the | 
good men in office learn that it not only is j 
bad morals but bad politics to think to get i 
on by appointments like Colonel Waring’s, - 
mixed in with Aldridge and his like. * 


A GREAT BOSS AND A GREAT ROLE. 


All readers of the Chronicle must have 
become curious over Pennsylvania. Two dy¬ 
nasties of bosses, the Camerons and Quay, 
seem to have paralyzed her moral forces and 
she has presented the strange spectacle of 
being passive and unresisting in the coils of 
these pythons. It seems a long while ago, so 
intent has been the interest in another strug¬ 
gle, that Quay’s candidacy for the presidential 
nomination was soberly considered by the 
press of Pennsylvania and Judge, formerly 
Governor Beaver, soberly said in a New York 
interview that the republicans of Pennsyl- 


' » 


ii 




















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


343 


vania would support Quay for president 
heartily: 

“ As a Judge,” he said, “I have no incli¬ 
nation and no time to indulge in political 
discussions. Senator Quay is a very much 
misunderstood man. It is generally supposed 
that he is merely a political organizer and 
manipulator, and cares for nothing else. On 
the contrary, he is a man of refinement, and is 
fond of literature and books. He has a fine 
library, and he would rather read a delight¬ 
ful book than attend a caucus. His devotion 
to Isaac Walton is exemplified in his pisca¬ 
torial visits to the best fishing waters in the 
country. He is a clear and cogent writer, 
having once been the editor of a newspaper. 
True, he is not a great orator, but on any sub¬ 
ject that he discusses he shows an intimate 
knowledge that interests and convinces.” 

* * » 

It will be remembered that Quay had to 
suppress last year a formidable revolt insti¬ 
gated among others by his chief henchman 
Martin, boss of Philadelphia. The strength 
of this under-boss is indicated by the follow¬ 
ing: 

The patronage of Philadelphia is something 
wonderful to contemplate. Mayor Warwick, 
who was nominated through the machinations 
of Dave Martin, over Quay’s candidate, State 
Senator Penrose, has control of 16,000 appoint¬ 
ments, a larger number, it is said, than is now 
at the disposal of the president of the United 
States since the general application of civil 
service that was made recently. “Dare” 
Martin, through Mayor Warwick, controls the street 
railway and other franchises of Philadelphia, which 
are valued at several millions every year. 

Among other dogs of war let loose by Quay 
upon Martin, was the well-known device of a 
senate investigating committee. That is at 
first sight it seemed a dog of war, but later 
signs were that it was nothing but Quay’s old 
dog Tray giving an occasional twitch and growl 
in his dreams. However, Quay crushed the 
revolt. But there are recent signs that he has 
not finished with the Philadelphia recreant 
henchman. We quote from Oity and State of 
August 13. 

The testimony brought out by the inquiry of the 
senate investigating committee into the Mutual 
Automatic Telephone scandal, places two of the 
most influential political leaders of Philadelphia 
in a trying position. Mr. David Martin, who, after 
Mr. Quay, may be considered the most skillful re¬ 
publican politician of the state, who is supposed to 
have controlled at least 300 delegates at the con¬ 
vention which nominated Mayor Warwick, whose 
“ matchless leadership ” was declared by some to 
have played a very influential part in creating the 
enormous majority which made that gentleman 
our chief executive, who collects assessments at 
will from our city employes, and whose character 
has stood so high that no account of his steward¬ 
ship in this regard has ever been required of him— 
is said, in the testimony of three sworn witnesses, 
to have been the holder of 1,525 shares of Automatic 
stock, and to have had a potent voice in the man¬ 
agement of the company. This, notwithstanding 
the fact that Mr. Martin formerly testified under 
oath that the shares had been transferred to his 
name without his knowledge, and in spite of his 
refusal to subscribe for the stock. 

* * » 

Julian C. Gale, secretary to John B. Persch, pro¬ 
moter of the Mutual Automatic Telephone Com¬ 
pany, was the most Important witness wanted by 
the councilmanic committee, but heard for the 
first time before the senatorial committee. George 
A. Persch and William A. Persch, brothers of the 
promoter, also took the stand, giving important 


evidence and confirming the testimony of Secre¬ 
tary Gale. It was sworn that David Martin had the 
handling of the 6,000 shares of the company’s stock 
which was alleged to have been used to bribe councils 
and secure the passage of the Mutual Automatic fran¬ 
chise. Gale testified that Mr. Martin had personal 
possession of the stock and returned it to the office, 
giving Gale instructions to divide it in smaller 
blocks. Of these blocks 1,525 shares were made out 
in the names of David Martin and Charles A. Porter 
personally, and,in addition,there were four blocks 
of 500 shares each, 25 blocks of 20 shares each, and 
75 blocks of 6 shares each. These latter blocks were 
made out in Gale’s name subject to hie in¬ 
dorsement. He also swore that Mr. Martin re¬ 
ceived these blocks of shares in person after they 
had been registered by the Guarantee Trust Com¬ 
pany. Later, two of the blocks, 500 shares each, 
were sent back to the office and divided into 50 
blocks of 20 shares each. Gale said these were de¬ 
livered to Mr. Martin in the republican city com¬ 
mittee rooms. He also told how he and John P. 
Persch kept away from Philadelphia during the 
investigation. George A. Persch, who was em¬ 
ployed in his brother’s office, corroborated Gale’s 
testimony and swore that David Martin paid him 
several sums of money at different times, varying 
in amounts from $17 to $40, to keep him away from 
Philadelphia during the councils’ committee’s in¬ 
vestigation. These sums of money, Persch swore, 
were given to him by Mr. Martin at his residence 
or sent to him at New York through other parties. 
Charles E. Persch swore positively that David Mar¬ 
tin had numerous Interviews and was in constant 
communication with John P. Persch after the lat¬ 
ter had fled from the city to escape the council- 
manic investigation. He stated that Mr. Martin 
and John P. Persch had an interview in Trenton 
the day before Martin went on the witness stand. 
This testimony was in flat contradiction to Mr. 
Martin’s sworn statement before councils’ commit¬ 
tee that he had not seen John P. Persch for several 
weeks and did not know where he was. A man 
named Atcheson told how he had been sent by 
Senator Porter to get a certificate for six shares of 
stock from the widow of Common Councilman 
White, who died about the time of the investiga¬ 
tion. Outside of the testimony that Martin and 
Porter each received 1,525 shares of stock, there has 
been no evidence to show who were the persons 
who received the remainder of the 6,000 shares. It 
is believed that the blocks of six shares were In¬ 
tended for distribution in common council and the 
blocks of 20 in select. However, the committee 
adjourned without eliciting anything else of im¬ 
portance, and their work would have been of little 
actual effect if David Martin had not struck back 
as severe a blow as he himself received. 

* » * 

So far Quay has only appeared in the fa¬ 
miliar role of a big boss, disciplining his 
henchmen, but there are signs that he medi¬ 
tates a great r61e that will place him high up 
among the grim humorists of all ages. He is 
apparently going to take Pennsylvania, stran¬ 
gled into helplessness and nervelessness by 
him and the Camerons, and thrust upon her a 
series of radical, vigorous and genuine reforms 
and then retire! Could any irony be more 
finished? He has announced his proposed re 
tirement, and the Washington correspondent 
of the Buffalo Express says : 

It is also Senator Quay’s intention to have 
his reforms in state and municipal politics 
enacted into laws before he retires from the 
arena. He is deeply in earnest on this point, 
and when the legislature meets next winter, 
bills to carry out the reforms will be present¬ 
ed and enacted into laws. 

The Chronicle has always had the fullest 
appreciation of the intellectual abilities of 
the great bosses, but Quay’s plan, if carried 


out, will deserve another Milton to fittingly 
portray a companion to one of the greatest 
characters in Paradise Lost. 

NEW YORK’S SPOILS AND SPOILS¬ 
MEN. 

The assault made yesterday afternoon upon 
John S. Bronk, chairman of the democratic 
county committee by William Kenneally, 
member of the committee from the second 
ward, illustrates the means by which State Superin¬ 
tendent of public works George W. Aldridge, the re¬ 
publican candidate for governor, has in the past con¬ 
trolled and now seeks to control the democratic or¬ 
ganization of this city and county. Kenneally, 
who is an employee of the republican executive 
board, is one of the bullies that Aldridge 
depends upon to manipulate democratic cau¬ 
cuses in his interest. The occasion of the as¬ 
sault was the introduction of a resolution to 
prevent the interference of the Aldridge ma¬ 
chine in the coming caucuses. Seeing the ob¬ 
ject of the resolution, Kenneally sprang to his 
feet, rushed up toBronk, snatched the resolution 
from his hand, and gave him a savage blow in 
the face. Upon the motion of State Committee¬ 
man Smith, he was immediately expelled from 
the committee, against the protests of ex-State 
Committeeman William H. Tracy, one of Al¬ 
dridge’s henchmen, and about a dozen other 
of the superintendent’s democratic followers 
in the committee .—Rochester dispatch. Evening 
Post August 6. 

* * • 

On the gubernatorial situation among the 
republicans, the thing which strikes the aver¬ 
age observer of political affairs is the whole¬ 
sale way in which George W. Aldridge, superm- 
tendent of public works, has been gathering in dele¬ 
gates. Mr. Aldridge is an expert in so managing 
the affairs of the canals as to strengthen himself 
among the machine politicians. He has several 
million dollars to spend in improving the canal sys¬ 
tem of the state, and, according to reports from “up 
the state," about every town within hailing distance 
of a canal holds Aldridge caucuses.—New York 
Times, August 9. 

* » » 

A letter, published yesterday, from the edi¬ 
tor of the Friendship Register, tells something 
of the methods by which the defeat of the 
Hon. Fred A. Robbins for renomination to 
the assembly was brought about and the in¬ 
tense indignation among the republicans of 
Allegany County in consequence. It was a 
game of treachery throughout. Not daring 
openly to oppose Robbins, since that would 
have meant certain defeat for the machine, 
Glenn and the other agents of the state ma¬ 
chine pretended that they were conceding his 
nomination. Their care was to get machine 
delegates elected to the county convention, 
with or without Robbins instructions. Hav¬ 
ing thus got their men chosen to the conven¬ 
tion, the mask was dropped, instructions were 
cast to the winds and Robbins was turned 
down. 

It is worth while to recall the record of this 
man Robbins. He w as chairman of the judic¬ 
iary committee in the last assembly. As such 









344 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


he was given charge of the bills prepared in 
the attorney-general’s office to increase the 
power of the attorney-general to curb trusts. 
Naturally, the trusts were somewhat excited. 
But it soon became apparent that, the boss of the 
legislature intended the anti-trust bills only for bun¬ 
combe. They were to deceive the people into 
thinking the powers at Albany were really 
working in their interests against the trusts. 
But they were to be killed and the blame was 
to be thrown on individual members. If there 
bad been a pliable man at the head of the 
judiciary committee this plan would have 
worked, as it frequently has in telephone leg¬ 
islation. But Fred A. Robbins was too honest 
to be a party to that sort of politics. Against 
all manner of secret pressure, he pushed the 
bills through, forcing them forward where 
every man who opposed them must go on rec¬ 
ord openly. After one of these bills—the most 
offensive one to the trusts—had reached the 
governor, Robbins received a direction from 
the executive office to recall it. He refused. 
He was determined that the governor himself 
must go on record as vetoing the bill, if he 
was unwilling it should become a law. The 
bill was not vetoed. But Robbins, from the 
hour of that resistance to machine cfrders, has 
been a marked man. 

This was not his only offense, however. 
When the Greater New York bill came up, 
Robbins, realizing, as did all of the more in¬ 
dependent country members, that it was very 
distasteful to the people of Brooklyn, assumed 
the leadership iny)pposing it. So well did he 
gather together the few grains of independence 
which existed in that boss-ridden legislature 
that he forced Platt to disclose the influences back of 
the bill by calling on Tammany members to make up 
the majority necessary to pass it. This exposure be¬ 
fore vhe people of the whole state of the deal between 
Platt and Tammany teas an unforgivable crime .— 
Buffalo Express, August 11. 

* * * 

The Platt men were a trifle premature in 
boasting that they had beaten Warner Miller 
in his own county. There was probably 
method in their haste, however, Warner Mil¬ 
ler was not beaten. The result is close, but 
he has a majority. The majority is large 
enough, moreover, to prevent the re-election 
of Charles W. Hackett to the state committee. 

The course of the state machine in this 
•Herkimer contest is one of the most scanda¬ 
lous in the history of politics in this state. It 
is said $100,000 of the slate's money has been ex¬ 
pended in creating jobs merely to enlist the support 
of heelers against Miller. One canal job has been 
cited at which six men have been hired to do the 
work which was performed by one under a demo¬ 
cratic superintendent. That is what machine 
rule by the power of patronage means for the 
tax-payers.— Buffalo Express, August 15. 

* » » 

The canvass for the republican state con¬ 
vention is closing amid charges and counter¬ 
charges of fraud and corruption, on the part 
of the various factions and of the rival candi¬ 
dates for governor, which seem to be well 


founded. A more disgraceful prostitution of 
the civil service of the state to political and 
personal ends has never been seen than the 
open and shameless manner in which Super¬ 
intendent Aldridge of the public works de¬ 
partment is using the canal force to elect 
delegates in favor of his nomination as gover¬ 
nor. The squabble on Saturday over the con¬ 
trol of the convention in Warner Miller’s 
county was most disgraceful. As regards the 
state at large, the Platt machine has evidently 
secured an overwhelming majority of the 
delegates, as was to have been expected. A 
report is current that Miller, Milholland, and 
some of their allies will nominate another re¬ 
publican state ticket if the Platt men shall 
control the convention. But even Miller and 
Milholland are hardly capable of such a per¬ 
formance. A bolt, in order to amount to any¬ 
thing, must have some character and principle 
behind it. The fact that the bolters did not 
succeed in electing as many delegates as they 
think they ought to have had is not enough. 
—New York Evening Post, Augusi 17. 

* * * 

By the day’s proceedings Platt secures abso¬ 
lute control of the county machine, he gets a 
solid Platt delegation to the state convention, 
Wadsworth gets a solid delegation to the con¬ 
gress convention, and the independent Repub¬ 
licans of Genesee county are pushed aside to 
make way for the boss. But while Sanders 
gets control of the machine, he does not get 
control of the votes. 

How the game is said to have been worked 
was stated in detail in the convention. Judge 
North hurled the charge that money was 
freely used with which to get the caucuses at 
the henchmen of the boss who writhed and 
hesitated in their weak replies. They made 
no specific denials. There were bluster and 
howls and bravado, but after tbe convention 
Sanders himself would not deny it when 
asked to do so by The Express. 

“ I will say that I had no part in any such 
acts,” said Mr. Sanders. “I did not know of 
them if they were done. I do not know all 
that others did to aid me in my fight.” 

Said Judge North: 

“And there are in Genesee county about 
40 postoffices, each with a constituency of 
box-holders and patrons. How do you like it 
in the four corners of the county to have it 
given out as it has been that Mr. Sanders is 
to control all the postoffices and that you who 
live there may meekly walk up and get your 
mails, but that you shall have nothing to say 
as to who among you is to be selected as post¬ 
master, because, forsooth, everything must 
yield to his overweening ambition to get votes 
for himself.— Batavia dispatch, Rochester Ex¬ 
press, August 17. 

* * * 

Thomas Collier Platt is out with the follow¬ 
ing original signed statement thereanent: “ J 
have made no promises, nor indicated by even so 
much as a nod or wink, any leaning toward the 
candidacy of any republican whose name is now be- 

ng canmssed for the gubernatorial nomination, 
i 


That has been my position. 1 will take no part in 
the matter until I arrive on the ground at the Sara¬ 
toga convention. When I get there I will look the 
situation over and try to form a judgment as to what 
is best to be done. All the interest I have is 
that the nominee shall be a republican of 
loyalty and courage. As to my estimates 
upon the relative strength of candidates, I 
consider them pure guesswork.”— New York 
dispatch, Buffalo Express, August 17. 


\ J I 


i 


* * * 

The secretary of the civil service reform as¬ 
sociation, George McAneny, to-day made 
orally some additions to his published state- ^ 
ment and some remarks about the probable 
action on it. “We have had under considera¬ 
tion for some time,” he said, “the matter of 
the violations of the constitution in the de- 
partment of public works. The evidence cited 
in the statement is merely culled from that ; 
we have secured to instance the various ways 
in which the constitutional provisions regard- ^ 
ing the civil service have been subverted. ' 
The evidence generally is of such a nature 
that the association, I am satisfied, will feel 
called upon to present the charges to the gov¬ 
ernor. The executive committee, from which 
any formal action must come, will not meet 
until September 9. 

“In our opinion this complaint is a very se¬ 
rious one. Mr. Aldridge’s personal views as 
to the merits of the civil service provisions do 
not make them any less binding upon him. 

To violate in a systematic and flagrant man¬ 
ner one of the most important provisions of 
the fundamental law is an offense which in 
our opinion neither the governor nor the 
courts can allow to pass unpunished. The 
employes of the department of public works 
number approximately 1,700, or more than a 
quarter of the total service of the state. The 
course followed by the superintendent has 
served practically to remove this entire body 
from the merit system. 

“The evidence which we have shows, not 
only that the provisions requiring appoint¬ 
ments, after competitive examinations have 
been set aside, but that the constitutional oh- 
ligalion to appoint for ‘merit and fitness,’ ir 
respective of the requirement of examination, 
has been violated very seriously in the charac 
ters of many of the appointments made. We 
have information regarding perhaps one hun¬ 
dred such cases, some of which are cited in 
the statement. A great deal of this evidence 
will go to show that the cost of administra¬ 
tion has increased in proportion to the growth 
of the patronage abuse. 

“We also have information in regard to a 
case in which the contract for a piece of work 
was assigned, without advertisement as re¬ 
quired by law, for $3,000, and evidence of en¬ 
gineers to the effect that the same work might 
be very practically done for $1,500. Although 
this is not exactly pertinent to the matter of 
the application of the civil service rules, it 
throws some light upon the general method 
of administration. An investigation ordered 
by the governor or the courts may be carried 


I \ 

















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


345 


on even more effectively than ours, and any 
ordered, I have no doubt, will uncover a state 
of affairs even more serious than we are pre¬ 
pared to show.” 

. Mr. McAneny remarked also that the asso¬ 
ciation believed the present an opportune time 
for the public consideration of these facts; 
that while it is proposed to invest Mr. Al¬ 
dridge with greater executive authority, the 
character of the appointments made by him 
in his present position should be kept in mind, 
as, if similar appointments were made by him 
in the executive office, the results would be 
disastrous. 

The association’s formal statement shows 
how Superintendent Aldridge, in his adminis¬ 
tration of the state department of public 
works, has grossly and flagrantly violated the 
civil service section of the constitution, and 
promises a further exposure of the serious 
waste of public funds thereby occasioned. The 
section in question requires that “ appoint¬ 
ments and promotions . . . shall be made 
according to merit and fitness, to be ascer¬ 
tained, so far as practicable, by examinations, 
which, so far as practicable, shall be competi¬ 
tive.” The association recalls that on April 
15, 1895, Governor Morton promulgated a new 
classification of the department by virtue of 
which certain officers were placed in the ex¬ 
empt schedule, A, and non competititive sched¬ 
ule, D, respectively, while others were classed 
as workmen, and as such exempted from ex¬ 
amination, and all positions not specifically 
designated in either of these three divisions 
were placed in the competitive schedule, B. 
It adds: 

Both before and after the classification by 
Gov. Morton, Superintendent Aldridge resist¬ 
ed in every way possible the application of 
the rules to his employes, and insisted on ap¬ 
pointing large numbers of clerks and other 
officers to competitive positions without ex¬ 
amination of any sort. The history of these 
appointments, and the subsequent court pro¬ 
ceedings, ending in the defeat of Superinten¬ 
dent Aldridge, is well known. There is no 
doubt that, even though the question of clas¬ 
sification remain for a while in doubt, the 
superintendent personally violated the con¬ 
stitution. There are, however, graver viola¬ 
tions than this with which he will be charged. 

The association has been informed that the 
superintendent has appointed a large number 
of other persons without examinations to posi¬ 
tions, the duties of which are the duties re¬ 
quired to be filled as the result of competitive 
examinations, and that in order to permit 
this the positions in questions have been desig¬ 
nated by titles not fitting the duties perform¬ 
ed. Many of the clerks whose appointments 
were declared void by the court of appeals 
have been reappointed in this manner as 
“foremen” and under other designations. So 
successful have been the various methods of 
evasion adopted that in a total of approxi¬ 
mately 1,500 appointments made since Janu¬ 
ary 1, 1895, only 38 have been after competi¬ 
tive examination. 


Evidence has also been secured showing ^ 
that persons have been appointed to positions 
classified in the labor service who have ren¬ 
dered little or no service in return for the sa¬ 
laries paid them; that other persons employed 
in such positions have been assigned to unnec¬ 
essary labor, and that owing in part to these 
conditions the cost of maintaining the canals 
has been greatly increased. In spite of the 
constitutional obligation of the superinten¬ 
dent to appoint all of his employes for “ merit 
and fitness,” many of these appointees have 
been persons who have been convicted of crimes 
and confined in the state prisons, or who are 
of otherwise notoriously bad character, while 
others have been and are engaged in private 
business of a nature unfitting them for satis¬ 
factory public service. A few specimen cases 
of this character reported to the association, 
taken from Oneida county alone, are as fol¬ 
lows : 

Thomas Wheeler —Superintendent of the 
middle division of the canals; is an active 
local politician; was formerly proprietor of a 
faro-bank and the partner of David Dishler; 
afterwards ran a gambling-room for three 
years. The authorities, it is said, feared to 
interfere with this business because of the in¬ 
fluence he possessed. His name appears, how¬ 
ever, on the police records many times; he 
was arrested at one time for assaulting a 
clergyman on the street and sentenced to the 
penitentiary for six months; was subsequently 
indicted for petit larceny and fined; was in¬ 
dicted for a burglary committed in Albany, 
some of the proceeds of which were found in 
his possession; has been the principal manip¬ 
ulator of the canal patronage in the middle 
counties, and has secured the appointment of 
many of his former associates to various 
minor positions. 

A. D. Barber —Son of the lobbyist, A. D. 
Barber; supposed to be employed as a fore¬ 
man; he has no men under him, and, it is re¬ 
ported, spends his time fishing about the 
woods. 

John Mulligan —Appointed as a team¬ 
ster; is a democratic alderman in Utica; is an 
ex-saloon-keeper, and has served a term in 
the penitentiary; has one team employed at 
$75 per month and one by the day. 

D. Hughs —Foreman; a democrat, and an 
ex-saloon-keeper; appointed through the in¬ 
fluence of ex-Alderman Hackett. 

J. Mullen —Assistant foreman at Loft 
Bridge; has served a term in the Auburn 
prison for highway robbery, and another 
term at Sing Sing; is too heavy to work, and, 
it is reported, hires a substitute; was impris¬ 
oned at Sing Sing under the name of Mitchell 
for a robbery committed in New York. 

E. G. Grosmeyer —Foreman; is proprietor 
of a liquor saloon and grocery store; is re¬ 
ported to have stated that his sole duty is to 
draw his pay. 

James Hackett —On the payrolls as a fore¬ 
man, but says he is an “emergency inspector;” 
is the proprietor of a saloon, to which he de¬ 
votes the principal part of his time; reports at 
the power-house for a brief portion of each 
day. 

J. B. Doherty —Foreman at Lock No. 46; 
has served six months in the Albany peni¬ 
tentiary, and has been indicted for robbery 
and other offenses at other times; acted as 
teller at the ninth ward (Utica) caucus. 

Charles Walsh— Alias “Cooky,” alias 
“Pussy”; assistant foreman at Lock No. 46; 
is an ex-saloon-keeper and a notorious char¬ 
acter. 

F. Koelbel—L aborer; his father is pro¬ 


prietor of the saloon over which Wheeler & 
Dishler conducted their faro bank; is not 
supposed to perform any work. 

J. Hinklestone— Laborer; has been a 
member of the democratic city committee for 
three or four years. 

E. A. Hutchinson —Laborer; ex letter- 
carrier; discharged from the government serv¬ 
ice for drunkenness. 

Karl Harper —Bank-watchman; is a 
member of the Utica board of aldermen. 

Max Robinson —Assistant foreman at Lock 
No. 46; proprietor of a liquor saloon. On July 
31 he passed the greater part of the day in 
court, attending to the naturalization of a 
number of Hebrews. 

Seymour Van Valkenburg —Clerk; sup¬ 
posed to be employed actually in Wheeler’s 
coal office. 

G. H. Thom —Clerk; keeps a clothing store, 
and is reported to do no work. 

E. A. Klock —Reservoir tender at North 
Lake; occupies a house built by the stale and 
keeps summer boarders; has a bar room sep¬ 
arated by a narrow passage from the state 
building. Three men are employed at this 
point to raise the water gates when necessary, 
although the same work was formerly done 
by one. 

I. N. Hayes —Foreman; is proprietor of a 
grocery store at Boonville; presided at the 
local convention on the 17th inst. 

Hiram Waite— Inspector at South Lake 
on a piece of contract work being done by a 
man named Nelson; was not seen about the 
work for ten days prior to the 19th inst., and 
was reported to be engaged in securing votes 
for the caucuses. 

Benjamin Thomas — Foreman; works at 
cutting stone for Nelson at thirty cents per 
hour, while drawing pay from the state. 

Arthur O’Brien — Laborer; an active 
worker in the caucuses at Forestport; reported 
to have stood behind the ballot-box with 
money in his hand, offering bets that his fac¬ 
tion would win. 


GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS. 

Ashfield, Mass., Aug. 12.—One of the great 
memories of Ashfield is that of George William 
Curtis, who was so deeply interested in the com¬ 
munity, and whose place at the annual dinner is 
still vacant. His name is held in honor by the 
Curtis cluh, which to-night paid the first formal 
and permanent tribute to his connection with the 
town in the form of a handsome tablet erected in 
the Town Hall. The tablet is of brass with letters 
in black. The inscription upon the tablet reads; 


In Grateful and Affectionate Remembrance 
of 

GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS, 
and as a 

Memorial of His Presence and Speech on many 
occasions in this Hall this Tablet is set 
up by 

THE CURTIS CLUB OF ASHFIELD. 
MDCCCXCVI. 


From the Address of Prof. Charles Elliotl Norton: 

“Of all the blessings which can befall a 
community, there is none greater than the 
choice of it by a good man for his home, for 
the example of such a man sets a standard of 
conduct, and his influence, unconsciously not 
less than consciously exerted, tends to lift 
those who come within its circle to his own 
level. In the quiet annals of this little town 
there are many incidents of local and personal 
interest, but the incidents of chief importance 
to its inhabitants of this generation and of 












346 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


coming times was its selection in 1865 by 
George William Cnrtis for his summer home. 
Hither for twenty-seven summers he came to 
find refreshment among these hills and woods, 
to show himself the best of neighbors, and to 
exhibit those social virtues and charms which 
would have made him beloved and admired 
by any society which he might have chosen to 
adorn. 

♦ ♦ * 

“In August, 1856, just forty years ago, at 
the height of the struggle between the forces 
of freedom and those of slavery before the 
war, Mr. Curtis, then thirty-two years old, 
delivered at Wesleyan University, at Middle- 
town, Conn., an oration on ‘The Duty of the 
American Scholar.’ It was at once a profes¬ 
sion of faith and an appeal to the young 
scholars of the land to be true to those moral 
principles which in a period of material pros¬ 
perity are apt to be subordinated to mere 
temporary interests. It was the first of that 
long series of speeches which secured to Mr. 
Curtis a place in the front rank of orators. 
He had spoken often before in public, but on 
this occasion he found and manifested his un¬ 
equivocal vocation as a great master of the 
art of persuasive and powerful eloquence. To 
all her other gifts to him, Nature had added 
those of the orator. He was of a fine presence 
and easy grace of carriage, tall of stature, of 
strongly marked and expressive features, with 
the masculine nose and long upper lip that 
mark the born public speaker. His voice (it 
still echoes in our ears) was of wide compass, 
sweet, and full of tone, perfectly under con¬ 
trol, and in perfect harmony with his aspect. 
Not often has a finer instrument of speech 
been vouchsafed to a man. 

“From the date of his oration to the end of 
his life Mr. Curtis never put off the harness or 
relinquished the arms of public service. He 
took an active part in the local politics of the 
county in which he lived, he became a promi¬ 
nent figure in the politics of the State of New 
York, he exercised a powerful influence by 
voice and by pen in shaping the policy of the 
republican party and of the national adminis¬ 
tration. When the war came, that war which 
to the generation born since its close seems so 
remote, but which to us who lived through it 
is in a sense always present, giving poignancy 
to the disappointment of many of the highly 
raised hopes of that heroic time—when the 
war came Curtis threw himself into the con¬ 
test with passionate zeal, passionate but not 
blind or irrational. In the bitter sacrifices of 
the war he shared. In 1862 one of his younger 
brothers fell dead at Fredericksburg at the 
head of his regiment, thus gloriously ending 
a stainless life of twenty-six years. His 
brother-in-law, the fair young Col. Robert 
Shaw, dying at the head of his black regi¬ 
ment in the assault on Fort Wagner and 
buried with his niggers, became the immortal 
type to all generations of Americans of the 
ideal hero of human brotherhood. Of the 
work which had to be done at home no less 
essential than that in the field, no man did 
more, or more effectively, than Curtis. 


“Of all the many public questions of im¬ 
portance which claimed attention in the years 
following the war, none was of greater con¬ 
cern than the reform of the civil service. The 
‘ spoils system ’ had become rooted in the prac¬ 
tice of the government, both local and nation¬ 
al, and in the popular theory of its adminis¬ 
tration. This system by which public office 
was held to be not a place of trust to be 
awarded only to such as were competent by 
character and intelligence to discharge its 
duties, but a place of emolument given as re¬ 
ward or incentive for partisan or personal 
services—this debasing and corrupting system 
had in the course of years become the source 
of evils which threatened the very foundation 
of our institutions. One of the least of these 
evils was the lowering of the quality of the 
public service and the degradation of the char¬ 
acter of the public servant. To hold public 
office was no longer a badge of honor, but a 
token of loss of personal independence and a 
badge of servitude to a patron. The system 
poisoned the moral springs of political effort 
and action; it perverted the nature and the 
results of elections; it fostered corruption in 
every department of the government, and 
tended to vitiate the popular conception of the 
duty of a citizen in a republic and of the very 
ends for which the government exists. To 
contend against this .system, intrenched as it 
was behind the lines of long custom, defended 
by the host of selfish, unprincipled, and igno¬ 
rant politicians, and openly supported by both 
the great parties alike, seemed an almost hope¬ 
less task. 

“But Mr. Curtis did not shrink from the 
contest. He had faith in the good sense of 
the mass of the people if once they could be 
roused from their temper of optimistic indif¬ 
ference. The fight had already begun when 
he entered it, but he had scarcely entered it 
before he became its leader. 

“In 1871 he was appointed by Gen. Grant 
upon the commission to form rules for admis¬ 
sion to the public service and regulations to 
promote its efficiency. He was made chair¬ 
man of the commission, and their report—the 
basis of all that has since been done in the 
establishment of the reform—was mainly his 
work. But the opposition to the project of 
reform was strenuous, was persistent. The 
aims of the reformers were often baffled, often 
defeated. But they were not disheartened. 
In 1880 the New York Civil Service Reform 
Association was founded, in 1881 the National 
association for the same end, and of both was 
Mr. Curtis chosen president. In both he held 
this office till his death. The duties were ar¬ 
duous, and were performed by him with con¬ 
summate fidelity and ability. He was a mag¬ 
nificent standard bearer. Slowly but steadily 
the cause advanced. He did not live to see 
its triumph, but he never doubted that it 
would win the victory. It has triumphed, 
and for this triumph, with all its far-reaching, 
benificent results, the honor is mainly due to 
Mr. Curtis, as well as the gratitude of his 


country for her rescue from a grave peril and 
a great disgrace. 

» ♦ 

“Four years have passed since Mr. Curtis’s 
death. The sense of personal bereavement 
and of public loss does not grow less as time 
goes on. The great cause of civil service re¬ 
form has won its triumph more speedily than 
he hoped, but vigilance and activity will long 
be needed to defend its position. New ques¬ 
tions have arisen and new perils threaten us. 
The times have grown darker. No lover of 
his country can look forward without anxiety. 
At this moment of popular delusion, of confu¬ 
sion, of parties, of excited passions, at this 
moment, when only a choice of evils seems to 
be before us, we long to hear—alas! that we 
should long in vain—that clear voice of pru¬ 
dent and sagacious council to which we were 
wont to listen for instruction and guidance. 
Never was there greater need than at this 
moment of enforcing upon the intelligence 
and the conscience of the people the truth 
that national safety and prosperity rest se¬ 
curely only upon the foundation of moral rec¬ 
titude, of clearing away the sophistries by 
which the popular mind is confused and be¬ 
trayed; of exposing the fallacies and stem¬ 
ming the passion of partizan zeal; of appeal¬ 
ing to the true motives which should guide 
individuals in their political action. This 
was his work while he lived, and, following 
his example, this is our work now. The dan¬ 
gers and exigencies of the time are new. The 
perils that confront us are not transient, nor 
to be quenched or suppressed by spasmodic ef¬ 
fort and the result of an election. The infu¬ 
riate clamor for war, the eager cry for free 
silver and fiat money, the demand for subsidy 
under the name of protection, may be sup¬ 
pressed, but they are only the symptoms of 
disease, and to suppress them is no more a 
remedy for the disease than to check a fit of 
coughing by an opiate is a remedy for con¬ 
sumption. The diseases is the ignorance and 
the consequent lack of public morality of a 
large part of the people of our republic. To 
contend with this ignorance, to enlighten it, 
is our task. It is a long, a difficult, an uncer¬ 
tain fight that lies before us. It is the fight 
of civilization against barbarism in America. 
It is the new form of the old good fight, fought 
ever in different ages under different names. 

“I was wrong just now in saying that we 
could not hear the voice of Curtis. He 
speaks: ‘Whatever in human nature is hope¬ 
ful, generous, aspiring—the love of God and 
trust in man—is arrayed on one side.’ On 
that side he stood. On that side let us stand.” 

PSEUDO-PATRIOTISM. 

Counterfeits of True Patriotism—The De¬ 
mands of Real Patriotism 

[Baccalaureate sermon delivered by the Rev. 
William De Witte Hyde, D. D., president of Bow- 
doin College, before the graduating class at Bruns¬ 
wick, Me., June, 1896.] 

Another point on which true patriotism is 
called for is the civil service. Sneered at and 









THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


347 


betrayed and starved and decried by politi¬ 
cians, the reform of the civil service has gone 
steadily forward until at length, after thirty 
years of agitation, 85,200 places, or substan¬ 
tially the entire national service, is brought 
under the rules. Much remains to be done to 
establish the reform and to extend it in states 
and municipalities; but the principle has at 
last achieved a permanent and substantial 
victory in the field of national politics. By 
this reform, offices cease to be party spoils and 
become opportunities for public service. This 
is the grandest triumph of true patriotism that 
has been accomplished in our day. 

DEMOCRACY AND EDUCATION. 

[Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler, of Columbia College, 

before National Council of Education at Buffalo, 

July, 1896.] 

THE UNDEMOCRATIC SPOILS SYSTEM. 

“ Much of the disinclination to engage in 
active political life that is noticeable among 
a large portion of our people is due, I believe, 
to the evil effects upon political standards 
and methods that flow from the debasing and 
degrading system of treating public office as a 
reward for partisan activity, that has gained 
so strong a hold in the United States. The 
spoils system is utterly undemocratic and 
utterly unworthy of toleration by an intelli¬ 
gent people. Suppose that it ruled the schools, 
as it rules so many other departments of pub¬ 
lic administration; then we should expect to 
see the election of a mayor in Boston, Chicago, 
New Orleans or San Francisco, followed by 
hundreds of changes among the public school 
teachers, made solely for political reasons. 
How long do you suppose that this associa¬ 
tion would permit that to go on without a pro¬ 
test that would be heard from Maine to Texas? 
Why should we, as good citizens, be more 
tolerant of such an abuse in other departments 
of the government? We have all noted with 
gratification the progress that is making to¬ 
wards the elimination of this evil. A deter¬ 
mined band of men have kept the issue before 
the public for nearly a generation, and now 
they have the satisfaction of seeing a great 
portion of the national service wrested from 
the defiling hand of the spoils hunter. In the 
state of New York the people have put into 
their new constitution an emphatic declaration 
on the subject. The full effect of this declara¬ 
tion, splendidly upheld and broadly inter¬ 
preted by the courts, is just beginning to dawn 
upon the foes of a reformed and efficient pub 
lie service. 

LOW IDEALS OF PUBLIC SERVICE. 

“ From this advance of sound sentiment and 
honest policy we may take every encourage¬ 
ment. But much remains to he done. Public 
sentiment must be first interested, then edu¬ 
cated. Efficient public service is a mark of 
civilization. To turn over the care of great 
public undertakings to the self-seeking camp 
followers of some political potentate is bar¬ 
baric. We teachers are the first to insist that 
incompetent and untrained persons shall not 
be allowed in the service of the schools. Why, 
then, should we tolerate the sight of a house 


painter instead of an engineer supervising the 
streets and roadways of a city of one hundred 
thousand inhabitants, or that of an illiterate 
hanger-on presiding over the public work of 
a great metropolis? These instances, drawn 
at random from recent political history, are 
typical of conditions that will be widely dif¬ 
fused throughout our public service. Those 
conditions exist because of bad citizenship, 
low ideals of public service, and wretchedly 
inadequate moral vision. They will not be 
remedied until each one of us assumes his 
share of the task. 

“ It is instructive, too, to note that the 
spoils system has diverted public interest in 
great measure from choice between policies 
to choice between men. Two hundred years 
ago men would have made great sacrifices for 
an opportunity to share in the making of the 
laws by which they were governed. Yet, when 
in 1894, the people of this state were called 
upon to vote, at one and the same election, 
for a governor and for or against a new con¬ 
stitution, containing many important and 
some novel propositions, more than a million 
and a quarter men voted for a candidate for 
governor, while less than three-quarters of a 
million expressed themselves regarding the 
proposed constitution. And this is by no 
means a solitary instance of the tendency that 
it illustrates. A rational and intelligent de¬ 
mocracy will first discuss questions of princi¬ 
ple and then select agents in accordance with 
their earlier determination. To fix our in¬ 
terest solely on individuals and to overlook or 
neglect the principles for which they stand is 
not intelligent.” 

The public-school system in Milwaukee is 
suffering from the familiar trouble of too much 
politics. The city has had an excellent and 
every way acceptable superintendent, who has 
just resigned his position because he can no 
longer endure the conditions under which he 
has suffered. “I enjoy greatly the work of 
the school board and would be glad to keep it 
up,” he says, “ but the responsibility and power 
are not commensurate, and I doubt if I can do 
it.” The radical diflBculty is that the super¬ 
intendent, while nominally responsible for the 
management of the schools, is not allowed any 
latitude in his action, but is made the mere 
creature of the school commissioners. He can 
not even appoint or displace a teacher except 
the board approve, and the board, while in 
form acting as a body, in fact act in each case 
as is determined by the commissioner of the 
ward. “The result is,” says the Sentinel, that 
“the charge of the schools and the authority 
that belongs to their superintendence are not 
vested in the superintendent, but in reality 
are held and exercised by eighteen petty ward 
sovereigns, holding office under appointment 
of ward aldermen, who are governed, in most 
cases, by considerations of politics and not by 
the best interests of the schools.”— New York 
Evening Post, July 8. 

The Chicago Post is making a systematic 
effort to get at a clear understanding of the 


workings and condition of the public schools 
of that city, and to that end has addressed a 
series of letters to teachers and principals 
asking them to reply to the questions therein, 
assurance being given that their names shall 
not be disclosed under any circumstances. 
The schools there are under political domination, 
and one purpose of the investigation is to learn the 
extent to which improper appointments are made 
and incompetent teachers retained. So great is 
the timidity of the teachers and their fear 
that their identity will become known to the 
school authorities that many have sent in 
their communications without signature, but 
they show a remarkable agreement in their 
figures. The principals estimate that from 12 
to 15 per cent, of the teachers in the schools 
are unfit for their positions and should be 
dropped. Many of them have been reported 
by principals from time to tinah as incompe¬ 
tent, but, owing to political influence, have 
retained their places and have even been pro¬ 
moted. One principal would drop 40 per 
cent, of the teachers for the good of the schools 
if she had the power.— Indianapolis Journal, 
June S8. 


The first regular meeting of the school as¬ 
sociation was held in the Buffalo library 
building May 19, The president, Henry A. 
Richmond, in a short address, referred to the 
fact that for many years the school system 
had been in a very unsatisfactory condition, 
the nomination of superintendents being the 
result of political deals, and the appointment 
of teachers the reward of political service. 
With the advent of the new charter, which 
provided for a board of examiners and the 
application of the principles of civil service 
reform to the appointment of teachers, a new 
day had dawned, and already, under the vig¬ 
orous impulse given by the present superin¬ 
tendent, the schools had begun the upward 
way.— Buffalo Courier, June 14. 

SPOILS. 

“As a general rule the southern (populist) 
delegates were not a creditable class. They 
practically admitted while in St. Louis that they 
were out for nothing but spoils. They said that 
there was nothing in it for them to indorse 
democratic nominees, and the same spirit will 
probably dominate their actions in the future. 
— Jones, Chairman Democratic-Populist Committee, 
Washington Interview, August 3. 

* * ss 

Ex-Mayor Hewitt, in an interview published 
in the Times, has expressed the belief that 
Tammany indorsed the Chicago nominations 
“for the sake of greater spoils should Bryan 
win.” 

This adds a darker horror to the prospect 
of 16 to 1. Free coinage and free riot are bad 
enough; repudiation and national dishonor 
are shocking to men of moral sensibility. But 
Purroy as postmaster, John C. Sheehan collec¬ 
tor of the Port and Sulzer, United States Dis¬ 
trict Attorney—these things as the prospective 
fruit of regularity would kindle the fires of 















348 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


revolt in the bosom of Kichard Croker him¬ 
self and make an enthusiastic bolter out of the 
most unflinching Andrew Jackson democrat. 

Spread the news that Tammany is out for 
the Federal spoils ! It will be a most eflfective 
sound-money campaign cry.— New York Times, 
August s' 

* » * 

The annual salaries of the senators aggre¬ 
gate $440,000, while the majority in control of 
the senate may distribute patronage worth $360,9IS 
each year. This sum is divided among 255 people 
of all grades of work and remuneration, mak¬ 
ing an average of $1,431. The patronage 
ranges all the way from the secretary of the 
senate, who gets more than a senator, $5,396, 
down to laborers at $50 a month. It includes 
clerks to committees, pages, messengers, watch¬ 
men, clerks, mail-carriers, folders, firemen and 
engineers, and all branches of service. As 
nearly as possible the patronage is divided up 
among the senators according to a fixed rule, 
and a careful tab is kept on the lists of ap¬ 
pointments and removals. The smaller the 
salary the more unstable the place. The range 
of salaries is high. Even in the more menial 
positions is this shown. The senators are gen¬ 
erous in their distribution of the funds, and 
spare no opportunity to increase the budget of 
domestic expenses. Two years ago the demo¬ 
crats secured control of the senate by a deal 
with several of the populists, and there was a 
clean sweep. Every republican employe was dis¬ 
missed and democrats and populists installed in their 
places. This distribution gave to each member of 
the combine about $11,000 worth of patronage for 
their friends .— Washington dispatch, Buffalo Ex¬ 
press. 

» * * 

The Kings county grand jury yesterday 
handed to Judge Aspinwall a presentment in 
which they state the penitentiary is in first- 
class order, but in reference to the jail they 
say: “ We found the straw in the beds of the wo¬ 
men's prison very dirty and the bathtubs and wash- 
tubs in very poor condition and not clean. The 
sanitary conditions were useless, and the corridor 
under the female prison was full of garbage and 
other refuse, which should be removed. We 
would reeommend that a shower bath be 
placed in the frame building in the jail yard. 
We further recommend that a better quality 
of food be furnished the prisoners. We found 
the females detained as witnesses were com¬ 
pelled to mingle with other prisoners. We 
would recommend that a proper place be pro¬ 
vided for such witnesses.— New York Times, 
May 30. 

MERIT. 

An investigation of the New York letter 
carrier service was begun last April. Thirty 
inspectors who had been doing similar work 
in western cities were ordered to New York. 
The result of their work was that out of 1,346 
carriers charges were preferred by the inspec¬ 
tors against only fifteen of them. In no case 
was the oflense of a serious nature, and one 
of the men was able to exonerate himself. > 


The movements of the inspectors were kept 
secret. No **post-ofBce employe was supposed 
to be aware of their presence in the city. Each 
inspector was assigned to a particular district. 
His duties were to watch the movements of 
certain letter-carriers from the time they left 
the oflBce with mail for delivery until they re¬ 
turned to headquarters. 

This system was practiced upon each of the 
1,346 carriers, and occupied upwards of ten 
weeks. Four carriers were caught loitering 
along their routes. Five carriers stopped at 
their homes to eat meals while on duty. Five 
others were caught drinking while on duty- 
One of the carriers charged with loitering ex¬ 
plained that he had stopped at his home to 
see his sick wife. He was exonerated. For 
these offenses suspensions of a few days were 
imposed. Postmaster Dayton is quoUd as 
saying of the report: “We are conducting no 
dress-parade administration here. The entire 
post-office force will be gratified that the re¬ 
sult of the investigation should be made public, 
showing the high degree of discipline that 
prevails. I have had no fear of the result 
from the beginning. The cause of our success 
is due almost entirely to the co operation of 
Superintendent Morgan and others and the 
men themselves.”— New York Evening Post, 
July 3. 

» » * 

At the last general meeting of the committee 
the civil service commitee brought forward 
the following petition to President Cleveland, 
which was heartily indorsed : 

To the President: 

The Civic Club of Philadelpia, representing 
over five hundred women, whose object is to 
“promote by education and active co-opera¬ 
tion a higher public spirit and a better social 
order,” believing that faithful attention to 
duty deserves such recognition, respectfully 
presents for your consideration the following 
petition: That the women employed in the 
Philadelphia mint be placed under civil serv¬ 
ice regulations. 

* • * 

“We have been able to do an immense 
amount, indeed, I think I may justly say an 
almost incredible amount, in cleaning up 
the police department, in giving it an entirely 
new spirit, and in teaching the men, once for 
all, that laws can be enforced and must be 
obeyed even in New York city; and that the 
elementary principles of honesty and morality 
and the old common-sense methods of admin¬ 
istering the department w'ith business ef¬ 
ficiency can be applied just as well to the 
police department as to any other branch of 
our government. But with the law as it now is, 
it is absolutely impossible for any one or two men to 
make the police department all that it ought to 
be. * * * 

“The legislature, however, to its lasting dis¬ 
credit, not only refused to pass the power-of- 
removal bill, and therefore refused to give us 
the means of weeding out the scoundrels from 
the force; but also passed the so-called bi-par¬ 
tisan police bill, as thoroughly vicious and 


pernicious a measure as could well be im¬ 
agined. This bi-partisan police bill not only 
I)erpetuated the four-headed commission, but 
further divided the power and responsibility, 
instead of centering them. * * * 

“With a four-headed board it is necessary 
that three should act as a upit in order that 
good work may be done; there is always a 
chance that three will work together, but the 
sapient legislature provided against this 
chance by actually making it necessary that 
the four should be unanimous when it came 
to discharging one of their most important 
functions, that of promotion. Furthermore, 
they took away from the board the power of 
making transfers and details, giving it as an 
independent power to their subordinate, the 
chief, who is irremovable, save for some cause 
which will stand the test of a trial in the 
courts, and who can not be disciplined in any 
way, save by due legal process. * * * 

“Nevertheless, within certain limitations 
the board has some power, and by sheer force 
of will, and by resolute insistence upon the 
right, it can do and has done a very great 
deal. We can not guarantee, under the pres¬ 
ent law, no matter what may be our confi¬ 
dence in our subordinates, to suppress all 
forms of hidden corruption ; but the immense 
mass of it we have completely cut away. We 
can not guarantee that some individuals here 
or there are not allowed to violate the law ; 
but once for all we have put a complete stop 
to the custom of permitting the violation of 
the law by entire classes of privileged law¬ 
breakers. Indeed, the very completeness of 
our success in this direction almost causes 
people to forget what has been done. A year 
and a half ago it was accepted as a truism 
that the excise law could not be enforced in 
New York city; now, nobody for a moment 
questions that it can be enforced and is en¬ 
forced. There is no justifiable complaint 
whatever about the way the police are en¬ 
forcing the Eaines law. The difficulties that 
do exist as regards its enforcement must be 
laid at other doors. So it has been with dis¬ 
orderly houses; the comptroller, Mr. A. P. 
Fitch, has been able to cause great loss and 
inconvenience to the different police officers 
from the chief down to the patrolmen by his 
discreditable course of conduct in trying to 
hamper the department in its effort to enforce 
the law as to disorderly-house keepers in pre¬ 
cisely the same way that it enforces the law 
as to every other grade of law-breakers; but 
the comptroller has not succeeded, and will 
not succeed, in his effort to make us relent in 
our warfare against this class of criminals, 
the class of insidiously vicious who furnish so 
rich a harvest of blackmail in time past to 
the political organization of which the comp¬ 
troller is now the chief representative in our 
public life. * • * 

“We have made the police feel that they 
are the servants of the public and not their 
masters, and we have striven to make every 
citizen feel that if he is wronged by a police¬ 
man, his wrongs will be promptly righted if 
they will come before the commissioners with 
their complaint. We have made it evident 
that laws can and will be enforced, and we 
have shown that it is perfectly practicable to 
manage the police department on a basis of 
strict honesty and efficiency, without the 
slightest regard to politics, and to promote 
and appoint men with an eye single to their 
qualities and to the interest of the public at 
large.”— From interview of Theodore Roosevelt, 
New York Post, July 27. 










The civil service chronicle. 


VoL. II, No. 43. 

INDIANAPOLIS, SEPTEMBER, 1896. 

'T<'C'r> ATQ • J dollar per annum. 

XJliiAluS . 10 cents percopy. 

Published monthly. 

Publication office. No. 23 N. Meridian St., Indianapolis, Ind. Address, THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. Indianapolit, Ind. 


WE ARE OPPOSED TO LIFE TENURE 
IN THE PUBLIC SERVICE. WE FAVOR 
APPOINTMENTS BASED UPON MERIT, 
FIXED TERMS OP OFFICE, AND SUCH 
AN ADMINISTRATION OF THE CIVIL 
SERVICE LAWS AS WILL AFFORD 
EI^UAL OPPORTUNITIES TO ALL CIT- 
IZENS OF ASCERTAINED FITNESS.— 
Platform, National Convention of Looters, Chicago, 
July, 1896. 


WHAT WE OPPOSE IN THAT PLANK 
IS THE LIFE TENURE WHICH IS BE¬ 
ING BUILT UP AT WASHINGTON, 
WHICH EXCLUDES FROM PARTY REP- 


The Civil Service Chronicle greatly 
desires any numbers of the July and Au¬ 
gust numbers not needed by the recipients. 


Through the fault of the publishing of¬ 
fice some of those on the Chronicle’s mail¬ 
ing list have not received the July and 
August numbers. If those who are keep¬ 
ing a file of the paper will notify this oflBice, 
the missing numbers will as far as possible 
be supplied. 

With the defeat of Bryan the publica¬ 
tion of the Civil Service Chronicle will 
cease. It was begun nearly eight years 
ago in the midst of the struggle for the 
establishment and maintenance of the 
merit system in the federal service and 
the burden of its work has been in that 
struggle. By the far-seeing and states¬ 
manlike measures of Mr. Cleveland dur¬ 
ing his present administration the victory 
has been completed. It is not that there 
is not yet much to be done, but the forces 
to accomplish it are abundant and united. 
The federal employes themselves have at 
last espoused the reform, and on every 
hand they rise up and demand its enforce¬ 
ment and extension. The country has ac¬ 
cepted it and it regards with aversion and 
distrust any man who threatens to over¬ 
throw it. In state, county and city fields 
the merit system has made little more 
than a beginning. It is, however, only a 
question of time. Neither Tammany Hall 
nor the present city administration of In¬ 
dianapolis can much longer resist the 
crushing influence with which the merits 
of the merit system now make their way. 
The examples of the federal service now 
found throughout the United States are a 
daily lesson to the whole people of the 
wisdom of transferring routine public 


RESENTATION IN THE BENEFITS THE 
HUMBLER MEMBERS OF OUR SOCIETY. 

— Bryan’s Interpretation. 

W. W. Durbin, chairman of the State committee, 
who had boarded the train at Lima, insisted on Mr. 
Bryan saying a few words at Ada, where he deliv¬ 
ered the commencement oration at the Normal 
university last year. He left his breakfast and 
Prof. H. S. Lehr, president of the university, intro¬ 
duced the candidate as the next president. Mr. 
Bryan was received with cheers and said: 

Ladies and Gentlemen—While I have not 
been speaking much on thii trip I can not 
withstand the temptation to say a word 
here. The words so kindly spoken by 
Prof. Lehr, yon will remember, are not 


business from the field of politics to the 
field of the wage earner. It is true, how¬ 
ever, that the cause still needs public agi¬ 
tation; but the press of the country has 
come over to the right side. There are 
notable cases of the press which have al¬ 
ways been on the right side, and these give 
greatly increased space and time to the 
subject, while the press generally has 
changed from active or silent opposition 
to open advocacy. The newspaper which 
now advocates the spoils system is some¬ 
thing of a rarity. The situation is believed 
to be a sufficient reason for tbe discontin¬ 
uance of the Civil Service Chronicle. 

We take Bryan’s defeat as a matter be¬ 
yond question. His beginning was dema¬ 
gogic enough but he has dropped now to 
even a cheaper grade. His proposal to 
destroy the merit system was proof of how 
little knowledge he had of the American 
people. This people by a vast majority 
are favorable to that system, and his decla¬ 
ration lost him instantly the votes of all 
civil service reformers and of all but a 
fraction of the federal employes. Bryan 
proved further that his knowledge of the 
true principles of civil administration is 
of the same half-baked, wild-eyed nature 
as his rolling declarations upon finance 
show his knowledge of that subject to be¬ 
lt is all of the sand-lot order and when¬ 
ever the American people have had a 
chance to get at such a man they have 
never failed to put him down, and they 
will not fail now. The fact that he pro¬ 
poses to destroy the greatest work which 
has been done for this nation since the 
abolition of slavery and that he proposes 
to reach the position of a destroyer by 
stirring up hatred between classes and 
sections will but serve to unite the great 


thought of since the nomination. He is 
one of the original Bryan men. When I 
was here a year ago he was a Bryan man. 
I think he wanted you to become ac¬ 
quainted with me, so if you wanted post- 
offices you would know where to come to 
get them. I am not distributing postolfices 
yet, hut I hope to be before very long. 
(Applause.) I remember with a great deal 
of pleasure this city and the students here 
of the university, and I hope they will be¬ 
come students of the money question and 
be prepared to take their part in this fight. 
I thank you. (Great applause.)— Mr. Bryan, 
at Ada, August 10. 


body of the people the more firmly against 
him. His defeat will clear the atmosphere 
as it has not been cleared in many years. 
In declaring his defeat beforehand, it is 
assumed that there will not be the least 
relaxation of the effort against him. There 
can not be, or the ruin will fall upon us. 
We repeat that if any man has ever done 
any thing for the merit system, he should 
repeat that effort by a thousand times- 
And the effort must grow more intense 
and more prolonged as the election ap¬ 
proaches. Private business and private 
interests are nothing. The time has come 
when every citizen should go to work for 
the republic. Bryan must not receive the 
vote of a single patriotic citizen. Let them 
be all on one side, and let Bryan and Tam¬ 
many Hall,and the likes of Tammany Hall 
everywhere, be on the other. 

Particularly noteworthy Is the fact that the 
employes in the postal service handled during the 
last fiscal year 13,851,000 pieces of registered mail 
with the loss of only one piece in every 16,254.—Frohi 
Mr. Maxwell's report. 

It is difficult to treat Mr. Bryan’s utter¬ 
ances on “ life tenure ” and “ a fixed term 
in appointive offices” as the sincere ex¬ 
pressions of an ignorant man. The Chron¬ 
icle believes that his talk on the civil serv¬ 
ice is but another “ bid ” for a support from 
those whose passions for a loot he believes 
he can thus inflame. But will not those 
reform papers who see in him only the 
passionate and sincere advocate of mis¬ 
taken principles ask him to explain how, 
for instance, in the four years of his single 
term in addition to purging this country 
of syndicates, monopolies, trusts, money 
changers, corrupt judges and juries, as he 
has laid out to do, he will also introduce 
into the railway mail service those “hum¬ 
bler classes of our citizens” for a “fixed 





























350 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


It assails the independence of the jndi- 
ciary by the covert threat to reorganize 
tfie courts whenever their decisions con¬ 
travene the decrees of the party cancns. 
It seeks to allure ollice-seekers and spoils¬ 
men to its support by attacking ihe exist¬ 
ing civil service laws, which good men of 
ali parties have labored so long to estab¬ 
lish, and to extend to all departments of 
the public service.— From the call of the Na¬ 
tional Democratic party, Chicago, August 17. 


term without impairing its efl&ciency.” 
Green hands handling 13,851,000 pieces of 
registered mail with the loss of only one 
piece in every 16,254 would indeed be a 
glory to his administration. 

The declarations of Mr. Bryan and his 
various conventions for overturning the 
merit system built up by years of the un¬ 
remitting toil of many unselfish and noble 
men, has brought the usual pitiful spec¬ 
tacle of public employes cravenly trying 
to mollify the wrath of the spoils Jugger¬ 
naut. Last month it was the Washington 
clerks, who folded documents for the com¬ 
mittee after working hours. This month 
it is the group of postal clerk delegates 
who called on Mr. Bryan at Lincoln and 
promised him their support. Further, 
the “fifteen white roses presented by the 
lady clerks of the New Albany post-office 
to our next president,” would have been 
more symbolic of their own sure decapita¬ 
tion had they been red. 

The impropriety of any federal employe 
taking any public part in a political cam¬ 
paign is apparent. His time and strength 
belong to the government which pays him. 
He has no right to make himself oflFensive 
to the tax-payer who is taxed for his salary. 
This in no wise deprives him of the rights 
of suffrage. If he feels the call for an ac¬ 
tive campaign, he should quit the public 
service. But the insolent public servant 
who flaunts his opposition to the adminis¬ 
tration should be promptly kicked out of 
office. We particularly mean Baldwin, 
auditor of the treasury, and Bell, deputy 
commissioner of pensions, who have for 
weeks been making Bryan speeches, and 
discussing the bond issues of the adminis¬ 
tration “with fearlessness.” 


The Tacoma (Washington) Morning 
Union has been, says the writer of the fol¬ 
lowing refreshing letter to that paper, a 
consistent and courageous champion of 
civil service reform, both in Tacoma and 
in the National government, and has 
recognized it as a reform of fundamental 
and vital importance. He goes on to say: 

There are those in the community who believe 
that the cause of civil service reform, standing as 


THE CLVIL SERVICE LAW WAS 
PLACED ON THE STATUTE BOOKS BY 
THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, WHICH HAS 
ALWAYS SUSTAINED IT, AND WE RE¬ 
NEW OUR REPEATED DECLARATIONS 
THAT IT SHALL BE THOROUGHLY AND 
HONESTLY ENFORCED AND EXTENDED 
WHEREVER PRACTICABLE. —F/<wi the 
Republican Platform, 1896. 


“MR. CHAIRMAN, IF THE REPUB¬ 
LICAN PARTY OF THIS COUNTRY IS 
PLEDGED TO ANY ONE THING MORE 


it does for honesty in the administration of the 
government, is of equal importance with the free 
coinage of silver. 

Let me call your attention to the fact that the 
Chicago platform practically declares against the 
principles of ci%dl service reform and pledges Itself 
to the adoption of what is at best only a modifica¬ 
tion of the “ spoils system.” It “ opposes,” in the 
words of Mr. Bryan, “the life tenure which is be¬ 
ing built up at Washington, which excludes from 
participation in the benefits the humbler members 
of our society.” There are two palpable untruths 
in this short sentence which are unworthy of a man 
of Mr. Bryan’s moral and religious pretensions. 
Tenure of ofiSce during good behavior is not “ life 
tenure,” and no one knows this better than -Mr. 
Bryan. An employe in the classified civil service 
has no more secure hold upon his position than any 
employe in a private business house has. Why 
could not the Chicago convention and Mr. Bryan 
say what they meant, viz: That they opposed ten¬ 
ure of oflice during good behavior? Evidently be¬ 
cause it was necessary to arouse an unworthy 
prejudice against the legitimate beneficiaries of the 
civil service in order to champion the claims of the 
illegitimate would-be beneficiaries. 

The second untruth in the above quotation is the 
assertion that the civil service “excludes from 
party representation in the benefits the humbler 
members of society.” This is directly contrary to 
the facts. The civil service is the only system by 
which a “ humble member of society ” can obtain 
government employment without loss of self-re¬ 
spect. It may let in members of other parties, but 
it does not “ exclude ” any member of the prevail¬ 
ing party who is worthy. 

“ Fixed terms of office,” which is the recom¬ 
mendation of the Chicago platform, means simply 
a periodical redistribution of the spoils which will 
give the party in power an opportunity to replace 
the incumbents of the opposite party with their own | 
followers, as the foorth-class postmasters are now 
replaced under the reprehensible four years’term 
law. This is not civil service reform. It is the 
“other thing.” 

To this sound and straight forward argu¬ 
ment, the Morning Union works out a pretty 
lame and curious answer, part of which is 
that “Anti-spoils” is a good citizen, who 
nevertheless is partisan ; 

“It is the failing of partisanship to cover 
up and hide the defects of partisans. 
‘Anti spoils’ is a republican. He picks 
at, in another column, a side issue in the 
Chicago platform, wWcA side issue, from the 
standpoint of practical politics, was judiciously 
handled by the framers of that document. 
As the matter stands, the main issue is the 
securing of bimetallism for this country, 
which has been growing worse and worse 
under the present gold standard. * * * 

“We do not defend the civil service plank 
of the Chicago platform. * * • 

“We are not partisan. We aim to be 
honest and fair always.” 


THAN ANOTHER, IT IS THE MAINTE¬ 
NANCE OF THE CIYIL SERYICE LAW 
AND TO ITS EFFICIENT EXECUTION— 
NOT ONLY THAT, BUT TO ITS EN¬ 
LARGEMENT AND ITS FURTHER AP¬ 
PLICATION TO THE PUBLIC SERYICE. 

“THE LAW THAT STANDS UPON OUR 
STATUTE BOOKS TO-DAY WAS PUT 
THERE BY REPUBLICAN YOTES. IT 
WAS A REPUBLICAN MEASURE. EYERY 
NATIONAL PLATFORM OF THE RE¬ 
PUBLICAN PARTY, SINCE ITS ENACT- 
MENT, HAS DECLARED NOT ONLY IN 


Recently an address on sound money 
was given in Anderson, Ind., to a railway 
men’s club. The speaker afterwards re¬ 
ceived a letter, part of which we gladly 
print: 

I, however, wish to refer to that portion of 
your address in reference to the civil service. 
* * * I am a civil service reformer. I 

believe in it. It is one of the greatest bless¬ 
ings that has come to our country, and it took 
the blood of the noble Garfield to bring it 
about. One of its essential features is per¬ 
manency of tenure. This is alike beneficial to 
the government and to the individual holding 
office. I notice that Mr. Bryan is opposed to 
what he calls the life-tenure, and I am con¬ 
vinced that should he succeed he will lend all 
his eflTorts to the rewarding of his followers 
and the destruction of civil service reform. I 
do not think sufficient attention has been given 
to this feature, and you ought to dwell on it 
more largely in your addresses. 

The 250,000 employes in the federal 
service who are receiving assessment let¬ 
ters and are being otherwise “coerced” to 
provide funds to elect Mr. Bryan should 
remember to take advantage of the secret 
ballot, and by that ballot protect them¬ 
selves, their wives and children and their 
livelihood. We do not, however, counsel 
them to lose their manhood by adapting 
to their situation that further adviee of this 
presidential nominee for the greatest office 
of a great country given to workingmen 
to wear a McKinley button, put up a Mc¬ 
Kinley picture, join a McKinley club, pay 
an assessment, but to use the secret ballot 
to vote for Bryan. 

He will suiter defeat. In our opinion, as surely as 
the sun rises; and, deserved as that defeat may be, 
we can not deny him the credit of being an earnest, 
sincere, honest man and a patriot who is working 
with all his might for what he deems the best inter¬ 
ests and the true glory of his country. 

This is the opinion of Mr. Bryan given 
by the Springfield Repiihlican, known 
everywhere as a professed hater of spoils 
government. What a foe to everything 
clean and honest in government Tammany 
has been; what a tremendous power for 
evil it has been; what it has taken of 
strength, and time and money to expose it 
and to partially crush it is also known 
everywhere. And to Tammany Hall Mr. 
Bryan last week spoke and to Mr. Bryan 
Tammany Hall gave an ovation such as it 
never gave before. “ The roar of applause 



















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


351 


FAVOR OF ITS CONTINUANCE IN FULL 
YIOOR, BUT IN FAVOR OF ITS EN¬ 
LARGEMENT SO AS TO APPLY MORE 
GENERALLY TO THE PUBLIC SERVICE. 
AND THIS, MR. CHAIRMAN, IS NOT 
ALONE THE DECLARATION AND PUR¬ 
POSE OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, 
BUT IT IS IN ACCORDANCE WITH ITS 
HIGHEST AND BEST SENTIMENT—AYE, 
MORE, IT IS SUSTAINED BY THE BEST 
SENTLMENT OF THE WHOLE COUNTRY, 
REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRATIC 

I 


ALIKE.’’ — Mr. McKinley in Congress, April, 
1890. 


“ The pledge of the republican uationnl 
convention that our civil service laws shall 
be sustained and thoroughly and honestly 
enforced and extended wherever practica¬ 
ble is in keeping with the position of the 
party for the past twenty-four years and 
will be faithfully observed. Our opponents 
decry these reforms. They appear to be 
willing to abandon all the advantages gained 


after so many years’ agitation and effort. 
They encourage a return to methods of par¬ 
ty favoritism, which both parties have often 
denounced, that experience has condemned 
and tliat the people have repeatedly disap¬ 
proved. The republican party earnestly 
opposes tills reactionary and entirely un- 
j ustifiable policy. It will take no backward 
step on this question. It will seek to im¬ 
prove, but never degrade the public serv¬ 
ice.— From Mr. McKinley's Letter of Acceptance, 
August 27. 


democratic ex-congressman is declared to have 
written letters to various applicants for office 
saying that he would file their petitions free of 
charge, but adding, significantly, that if he 
were expected to “ brief” the case, he should 
expect a fee. The Des Moines Leader, the 
democratic newspaper at the state capital, 
appears to believe these stories, and declares 
that “ the matter should be probed to the bot¬ 
tom, and no matter what the social or political 
standing of the men concerned, full punish¬ 
ment should be meted out.” It says plainly 
that “ the democratic party must purify itself 
of such rottenness,” since “ no party can pros¬ 
per with such jackals preying on it.” 

This illustrates what will happen on a 
great scale if Mr. Bryan has the opportun¬ 
ity he so eagerly awaifed in his Ada speech: 
“ I am not distributing post-offices yet,but 
I hope to be before very long.” 


Governor Altgeld is a more dangerous 
man because he is a very shrewd man who 
knows how to run an administration so as 
to secure the commendation of the large 
number of business men who look no 
further than that in certain lines his ad¬ 
ministration is economically administered. 
He recently held his Cook county conven¬ 
tion, and his real character is shown by an 
analysis of the convention made by Henry 
F. Donovan in the Eagle, as follows: 


Of the delegates there have been on trial for 

murder. 17 

Sentenced to the penitentiary for murder or 

manslaughter and served sentence. 7 

Served terms in the penitentiary for burglary.. 36 
Seived terms in the penitentiary for picking 

pockets. 2 

Served term in the penitentiary for arson. 1 

Ex-bridewell and jail-birds. Identified by de¬ 
tectives . 84 

Keepers of gambling houses. 7 

Keepers of houses of ill-fame. 2 

Convicted of mayhem. 3 

Ex-prizefighters. 11 

Poolroom proprietors. 2 

Saloon keepers. 265 

Lawyers. 14 

Physicians. 3 

Grain dealers. 2 

Political employes . 148 

Hatter.;. 1 

Stationer. 1 

Contractors. 4 

Grocer . 1 

Butcher.. 1 

Druggist. 1 

Furniture supplies. 1 

Commission merchants..;. 2 

Ex-policemen. 15 

Dentist. 1 

Speculators. 2 

Justices of the peace. 2 

Ex-constable. 1 

Farmers. 6 

Undertakers. 3 

No occupation . 71 

Total delegates. 723 


In face of the above, the following from 


shook the building.” “The cheering did not 
come in waves, but in a steady prolonged 
roar.” Why did Tammany Hall go mad 
over Mr. Bryan as he stood “ smiling and 
happy ” before them ? It was the scent 
of spoil. They knew their man. If this 
republic has reached the point where this 
Tammany idol is a “patriot” “working 
with all his might for what he deems the 
best interests and the true glory of his 
country,” Heaven save our country 


A SMALL number of influential papers 
keep up the maudlin sentiment of Bryan’s 
“honesty” and “sincerity.” This is in 
face of such repeated declarations as 
that syndicates control our government, 
prosperity never followed the gold stan¬ 
dard, dropping the silver dollar from the 
coinage was done secretly, and so on 
through a long list, every one of which is 
a palpable falsehood and must be known 
to be so by Bryan. In addition we have 
him daily talking about aristocrats and 
the rich robbing the poor. The poor in 
this country work for wages and wages 
rose fourteen per cent, in gold between 
1873 and 1891; yet this man of sincerity 
and honesty spends half of his time trying 
to stir up the hatred of wage-earners 
against their employers. His whole daily 
course since his nomination has been a 
blazing falsehood. It is an axiom that 
wage-earners in this country are the best 
rewarded in the world, and their reward 
has been upon a rising scale for fifty 
years. They are a credit to American 
civilization. They have not been robbed 
by their employers and they do not feel 
that they have been robbed. There is a 
constant competition between labor and 
capital, but labor has no reason to feel dis¬ 
satisfied with the way it has come off. 
Since 1893 a very large body of wage-earn¬ 
ers have suffered the keenest anxiety for 
want of employment; but their course has 
not been one of bitterness and hatred of 
any other set of men. It has been patient 
and manly and an honor to them as citi¬ 
zens. In the meantime it would be well 
for respectable papers to stop talking 
about Bryan’s honesty and sincerity. 


W HEN Mr. McKinley becomes President, 
a determined onslaught will be made on 
him for offices. There is yet a consider¬ 
able list which will be claimed as spoils, 
and the republicans have now active in the 
campaign many familiar personages who 
will go, after it is over, and demand pay. 
We do not know what Mr. McKinley in¬ 
tends to do about this, but we do know 
that there is no necessity of giving a single 
place as a reward for services. With the 
understanding that the vancancie8,whether 
in fourth-class post-offices or in higher 
positions,are to be filled by a system which 
absolutely excludes politics, and by com¬ 
petitive tests whenever such tests are ap¬ 
plicable, we are ready to admit that there 
are offices which have been seized by 
democrats merely as spoil, and which are 
not now under the civil service rules 
that might be vacated to make room for 
the new system. For instance, to vacate 
the Indianapolis postmastership to make 
room for a republican politician picked up 
on the street would be a gross and scandal¬ 
ous abuse of a President’s power and a 
violation of the spirit of the republican 
platform and of Mr. McKinley’s letter of 
acceptanee. But to vacate that place for 
the purpose of filling it by competitive 
promotion open to assistant postmasters of 
other cities would be an entirely proper 
proceeding, and a great advance in admin¬ 
istrative reform. 


The New York Evening Pbst of September 
11, says: 

The recent defalcation of an Iowa postmaster 
has brought to light a shocking development 
of the spoils system in that state. The offend¬ 
er’s story is that his downfall dates from the 
time when money was extorted from him by 
democratic politicians as the price of their 
support for his office. He says that he was 
forced to give a note for $500 to the chairman 
of the democratic county committee, and vari¬ 
ous amounts, aggregating $400 more, to an¬ 
other prominent democratic politician, who 
! has been a member of the legislature, for al- 
i leged services in going to Washington in his 
behalf. The defaulter’s story seems to be uni¬ 
versally credited, and it does not surprise the 
public as much as it ought, because ever since 
the redistribution of post-offices began in 1893 
ugly rumors have been continuously in circu¬ 
lation in regard to democratic committeemen 
and others supposed to have “pulls” selling 
their influence to the highest bidder. One 

















































352 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


the Springfield Republican of October 2, is in¬ 
teresting : 

We have never believed him to be as black as his 
enemies have painted him, and feel that the country 
will have to revise its first Impetuous condemna¬ 
tion of the man as an anarch and intentional foe of 
law and order. 

His methods and his “blackness” are of 
the same sort as those of Platt and Gorman, 
and Quay and Tammany, with certain 
other attributes considered by many dan¬ 
gerous in a republican form of govern¬ 
ment. 

When Mayor Strong came into office he 
appointed three fire commissioners. One 
appointment was for fitness, and the other 
two were in the nature of political returns 
to organizations that had supported him. 
The mayor at that time apparently defined 
a non-partisan administration as one which 
“recognized” all the organizations of in¬ 
fluence which had supported him. The 
natural results followed. Politics still did 
their bad work in the board, and Mr. Shef¬ 
field’s efforts were nullified. Through the 
death of Commissioner Ford, the mayor has 
again been obliged to fill the office, which 
he has done this time entirely with refer¬ 
ence to fitness. Says the New York Evening 
Post, “a more suitable selection could not 
have been made.” The regeneration of 
New York city is surely coming. If the 
next legislature will undo the work of 
Platt and Tammany in tying up the hands 
of the police board, the greatest step will 
be taken. Meanwhile let us rejoice that 
Colonel Waring’s street cleaning force ap¬ 
preciate a man who runs his department 
strictly upon the merit system. They 
mean to celebrate his return from Europe 
by a grand reception. 

The influence of New York for munici¬ 
pal reform over the whole country is well 
put by The Indianapolis News in its refer¬ 
ence to Col. Waring’s work. It says: 

We venture the prediction that, no matter 
who may be in power in New York in future, 
Tammany Hall or any other party, New York 
will hereafter have clean streets. Col. Waring 
has demonstrated that the streets can be kept 
clean ; the people have had experience of clean 
streets, and appreciate what they mean ; they 
will never consent to go back to the old way. 

Moreover, Nesv York will now be a model 
in this respect for all other cities. People 
from all other cities of the country are con¬ 
stantly visiting New York. They return home 
to ask why their streets can not be cared for 
as those of New York are. Little by little 
their asking will become louder, till it will 
have to be answered in the right way. 

The Chronicle is in receipt of the fol¬ 
lowing letter, which is not written by some 
foreign student of our affairs residing in 
Lapland, but comes from a student in a 
considerable town in Illinois in the 
autumn of 1896: 

Would you please give me the address and 
name of some work (if any can be had) fav¬ 
oring “ civil service.” 


I would very much like to get a copy of a 
book devoted to this subject, or if you can let 
me know where I can secure copies of speeches 
made on this subject I would be greatly 
obliged. 

My object for wishing same is I have the 
negative side of the following question in a 
debate at school, “ Should offices be used as 
the spoils of political victory ? ” 

What can the writer have been reading 
for the past eight years? Certainly not 
the newspapers. There has not been, we 
believe, a leading paper that has not had 
every day facts or comments illustrating 
the spoils system or the merit system or 
both. The newspapers have made many 
“ books devoted to this subject.” 

The letter of Attorney-General Harmon 
to a Virginia district attorney who had 
been acting as chairman of a campaign 
committee and whose resignation he ac¬ 
cepted is so excellent that we give it in 
full: 

“ Whatever rule may prevail in other de¬ 
partments, it is well settled in this, as stated 
in my letter, that there is an impropriety in 
officers like you acting as committeemen to 
manage and conduct political campaigns. 
The reasons are so manifest that they should 
not require more than a mere suggestion. As 
United States attorney you determine whom 
to prosecute and whom not to prosecute. You 
conduct or recommend the discontinuance of 
prosecutions already commenced. You have 
admission to the grand jury rooms, and in¬ 
dictments are found or refused largely upon 
your advice. 

“If I concede that you are, as you to-day 
claimed to be, one of those rare men who are 
beyond the reach of the unconscious operation 
of feeling of personal favor or disfavor, as I 
am sure you are beyond reach of the conscious 
operation of such feelings, still the general 
confidence of the community in your conduct 
as a public officer of justice is at least at risk, 
if, while holding that office, you so engaged in 
the exciting and often bitter political cam¬ 
paigns in which the entire community is 
ranged on one side or the other. Your polit¬ 
ical work necessarily brings you in direct con¬ 
tact with people of all classes whose assistance 
you seek to gain or whose opposition you seek 
to overcome. It is impossible for you to have 
done the work which devolves on members of 
a campaign committee, especially in times of 
high feeling and great excitement, without 
gathering a crop of friendly and unfriendly 
feelings which, as common experience teaches, 
very often have an unconscious influence on 
thought and action. 

“It is more than likely that some of the 
persons with whom your political action so 
brings you in contact will be involved in your 
future official action. You may be able, as 
you think you are, to escape or repress in what 
you do as an officer all effect of the recollec¬ 
tions of your campaign work, but you will be 
utterly unable, especially in cases where your 
action may appear to coincide with your sup¬ 
posed inclination, to make the community be¬ 


lieve that your action has not been in any de¬ 
gree so affected. And, as has often been said 
by those who have established and maintained 
the high standing of our tribunals of justice, 
it is not only necessary that their officers should 
be in fact fair and impartial, but also that 
they should avoid all circumstances likely to 
give rise to suspicion that they are or may be 
otherwise. 

“ The rule which I have mentioned is not 
new. It has been often enforced both by my 
predecessors and by myself. I now report that 
your case comes plainly within it.” 

The Buffalo Express suggests that Will¬ 
iam F. Mackey, assistant United States 
district attorney for the northern district 
of New York, and one of the principal 
local free silver leaders, take note of the 
recent letter of Attorney General Harmon. 

Mr. Roosevelt sends a letter to the Buf¬ 
falo Express stating that eight hundred more 
patrolmen must be appointed in New York 
City within the next four months, and 
that the opportunity for good men,who have 
lived one year in the state, to secure work at 
good wages is open to all without regard to 
politics or religion. Mr. Roosevelt has said 
recently that of late the class of men who 
have presented themselves for examination 
has not been as high as it should be. There 
has prevailed of late the suspicion that, 
after all, pulls were necessary to secure ap¬ 
pointments. This is because of the polit¬ 
ical tactics of the political commissioner, 
Parker. This must give Mayor Strong 
many peace-destroying twinges. 

Civil service reformers owe it as a duty 
to make a careful study of the methods of 
conducting campaigns and elections. An 
agitation which arouses in every citizen a 
healthy interest in the questions involved 
in the campaigns is highly beneficial. Just 
how much needs to be done to arouse this 
healthy interest can not be told, but regu¬ 
larly organized machinery for use in cam¬ 
paigns will always be necessary. In Indi¬ 
ana and some other states the extent and 
reach of this machinery and the amount 
of time given by individuals during a cam¬ 
paign is surprising. The problem is this: 
that heretofore, as a general rule, such in¬ 
dividuals, in case of victory, have demand¬ 
ed and have received the public offices in 
payment of the services so rendered. But 
these offices are now very largely cut off" 
and in the near future will be entirely so. 
Those who have heretofore worked for 
offices and who will not hereafter work 
without them can be spared. As a matter 
of fact a very large number of them have 
been paid actual wages for the work they 
have done in campaigns, and their clamor 
for further pay of any kind has been with¬ 
out reason. We expect to see the charac¬ 
ter of party committees somewhat changed. 



















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


353 


Now they are usually made up of politi¬ 
cians who “ want something.” When there 
is nothing to give, we expect to see their 
places taken by substantial citizens from 
patriotic motives entirely who will have 
executive agents selected for their peculiar 
fitness and paid adequately. This system 
is already springing up in Indiana. Much 
of the work of taking the poll, which is 
done ninety, sixty and thirty days before 
national elections, is paid for, and in some 
instances county chairmen, whose time is 
incessantly occupied, receive regular 
wages. The change from paying with of¬ 
fices to paying with wages would be an 
improvement of the healthiest kind. The 
efficiency of the workers will be incompar¬ 
ably improved, and it is doubtful if the 
new system will cost so much money as 
the old, because the funds will be handled 
by men of business instead of by politi¬ 
cians. 

The grand jury in its recent report says 
of the poor farm in this city : 

We found In this institution the same spoils sys¬ 
tem which we found in the county workhouse. All 
of the appointments, from superintendent down, 
are made hy the county commissioners. Some of 
the appointees are aged and most of them have had 
no experience in the line of the duties imposed 
upon them. 

The jury most earnestly recommended that this 
institution he placed in the hands of a man who is 
an expert; that he may be charged with the selec¬ 
tion of his subordinates and held responsible for 
their conduct, and that a superintendent should 
not be removed except for cause. 

We must go farther. The superinten¬ 
dent must be an expert and must not be 
removed except for cause, but he must not 
be charged with the “selection” of his sub¬ 
ordinates. He must be charged with their 
dismissal for cause. These places must be 
open to be publicly competed for by any 
one, and those best fitted for the places 
must have them. If, after their proba¬ 
tion, they are found to be qualified for 
their work, they must be kept so long as 
they do the work satisfactorily. Is it not 
strange that a community so highly civil¬ 
ized as is this, so deeply interested in social 
problems, should sit still and let its helpless 
old men and women, its blind and insane 
and idiot paupers be at the mercy of the 
appointees of political workers who if not 
the typical heelers have no fitness for these 
positions? It is barbarous. 

When our politician mayor, Mr. Tag¬ 
gart, broke down the merit system inau¬ 
gurated by his predecessor and compul¬ 
sory under the city charter, he probably 
did not foresee for how many humiliations 
he was preparing himself. The latest ac¬ 
count we take from the Indianapolis News 
of September 29: 

Charges of drunkenness and action unbe¬ 
coming an officer have been preferred against 
Patrolman Timothy O’Connor, who will ^ he 
suspended this evening at roll-call awaiting 


his trial by the board of safety. Superinten¬ 
dent Colbert has been investigating recent 
complaints against O’Connor, who has been 
stationed at the tunnel. It is charged that 
O’Connor was drunk Sunday morning. As 
John Leaman, of 238 South West street, was 
going to his work at an early hour he en¬ 
countered O’Connor coming home staggering, 
so it is charged. O’Connor objected to Lea- 
man looking at him, and grabbing him, 
threatened to send him to police headcpiarters. 
Witnesses say that O’Connor drew his club, 
threatening to arrest Mrs. Leiiman, at the same 
time striking toward her. Leaman then gave 
O’Connor a severe thrashing and sent him 
home. 

O’Connor was dismissed by the last admin¬ 
istration for inefficiency. He was before the 
present board for leaving his district and was 
6ned. He has been the standing joke of two 
administrations. Many stories are in circula¬ 
tion of his wit and prowess. Il is told how he 
captured a primary for Mr. Taggart by pulling his 
mace, and, after threatening to send the opposition 
to the station, declared the Taggart delegation 
elected. 

We commend, for reflection, the ac¬ 
count in another column of the recent 
suspension of two republican appointees of 
November last year and May this year for 
cowardice and worse so that at roll-call, the 
superintendent says their comrades fell 
away from them and would not speak to 
them. Whose pull secured these men their 
appointments? 

Our present police administration de¬ 
serves a place in municipal history. A po¬ 
liceman during a period of weeks repeat¬ 
edly left his beat for immoral purposes. 
He was finally suspended, and with his 
suspension a report of his sergeant was 
handed in stating the reasons. The sus¬ 
pended officer treated the matter very 
lightly and freely boasted that nothing 
worse would happen to him than a further 
suspension. His confidence in his pull 
was well founded. The board looked into 
the matter and suspended him for thirty 
days, and by order of President Maguire 
of the board, the charges although an of¬ 
ficial record were destroyed. The facts, 
however, were known to too many people, 
and some very black clouds began to gath 
er in the municipal horizon. At the first 
appearance of these there was a hurrying 
to and fro in the city administration. If 
the matter could have been hushed up 
this policeman with a pull would have 
been back on the force today; but the 
minute there was a sign that it might be 
dragged into daylight, the cowardly and 
corrupt oflScials who had had a hand in it 
caused the offending policeman “to re¬ 
sign.” 

BRYAN IN WASHINGTON ON THE 
CENTENNIAL OF WASHING¬ 
TON’S FAREWELL 
ADDRESS. 

The 19th of September, the centennial of 
Washington’s farewell address, as it was 
marked in this city by a political meeting in 


the interest of William J. Bryan, who aspires 
to the seat of Washington, Jefferson, and Lin¬ 
coln, was a day of humiliation to persons who 
prize the country’s honor. The patriotic mes¬ 
sage of Washington was read in full, and Mr. 
Bryan presumed to take from it texts with 
which to close his harangue. One hundred 
years from Washington to Bryan! A century 
from the farewell address to the Chicago plat¬ 
form! At the Bryan meeting, A. A. Lipscomb, 
an eloquent spellbinder, referred in glowing 
phrase to a long list of ancient worthies, call¬ 
ing each by name, and his audience made no 
response. When he got down to Andrew Jack- 
son, however, and the crowd scented a name 
they had heard before, the applause was 
enough to make up for the silence which had 
been accorded to the unknown orators of the 
ancient world. 

An earnest advocate of the civil service re¬ 
form movement called at the congressional 
headquarters of the Bryan democracy a week 
or more ago, and requested that it should be 
suggested to the presidential candidate, who 
had been advertised to speak here, that no 
more appropriate topic for the time and place 
could be found than the spoils plank of the 
Chicago platform. This is the city where the 
greater part of the administrative force of the 
government are employed, and the centennial 
of Washington’s farewell was certainly a fit¬ 
ting time to discuss a subject so vitally related 
to the federal government as the public serv¬ 
ice. Mr. Bryan took the hint, and of the two 
sections of the Chicago platform which he de¬ 
clared to be of especial interest to this city, 
one was the plank against a “life tenure in the 
public service.” While he said nothing that 
he has not said before, his plan avowal on 
this occasion of his belief in the old spoils 
system, and his desire to reestablish it, was 
one of the saddest features of the whole spec¬ 
tacle. 

Mr. Bryan wants the government employes 
to have a fixed term, so that when appointed 
they will know how long they have got to 
stay and when they are to go out, and with no 
prospect of “ a life position in the public 
service.” It has been often pointed out that 
the average length of service of those who 
come into clerkships through the civil service 
examinations is less than that of those who 
entered under the old spoils regime, and so if 
the length of time that a man’s name remains 
on the pay-roll is really the vital point, the 
present system should be less objectionable 
than that which Mr. Bryan seeks to restore. 
It may safely be set down, however, that the 
Bryanite objection to civil service reform on 
the ground of life-tenure is a “ bluff” designed 
to cover the spoilsman’s ordinary aims. Gov¬ 
ernment salaries on the fixed-term principle, 
and distributed among the “humbler classes 
of our citizens,” as Mr. Bryan proposed in his 
celebrated Chicago convention speech, would 
mean just so much prize money for party 
workers. Not ten per cent, of the money thus 
paid need ever get for the taxpayer any legiti¬ 
mate return, while the civil service system 
means an approach to those business methods 












354 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


by which every taxpayer’s dollar shall secure 
one dollar’s worth of public service honorably 
performed. 

It is unnecessary to discuss the two systems. 
The spoils plan is entirely discredited on every 
side, and yet here was a candidate for the 
presidency boldly cbampioning theold system 
with pious fervor after reading Washington’s 
farewell address. One would mistake entirely 
the temper of Mr. Bryan’s audience if one 
should assert that the speaker failed to carry 
his hearers on that point. There were no gov¬ 
ernment clerks at the Bryan meeting, and 
Washington is divided on the civil service re¬ 
form idea between the “ins” and the “outs.” 
The latter are all “ ag’in’ it,” and it was most¬ 
ly the outs who attended the Bryan meeting, 
and no doubt his promise to treat the public 
service as so much plunder and spoil of war 
materially strengthens the ardor of his sup¬ 
porters. 

It is probable that in the presence of the 
great financial issue this question of civil 
service reform may be neglected. Certainly, 
if the Chicago platform had agreed substan¬ 
tially with that at St. Louis, except in this 
particular, the friends of good government 
throughout the land would have made a vig¬ 
orous campaign upon this one issue alone. In 
the presence of other, and perhaps larger dan¬ 
gers, this ominous threat may be compara¬ 
tively overlooked.— Washington letter to New 
York Evening Post, September 21. 

NEW YORK BRYAN-POPOCRATIC 
CONVENTION AT BUFFALO. 

Senator Thomas F. Grady had been selected 
as temporary chairman. In his speech he said : 

We are opposed to civil service reform as 
now interpreted and enforced, under which, 
while pretending to prescribe no other test 
than that of merit, in its present application 
exacts a collegiate and technical education as 
a requisite for employment in the public serv¬ 
ice. We recognize the fact that a vast majority 
of the youth of the country are now compelled 
to engage as wage-earners and bread-winners 
without any opportunity for advanced techni¬ 
cal education, and we insist that honesty of 
character and the ability to discharge the du¬ 
ties of the position for which they apply, or to 
which they may be appointed, shall be the 
only test of fitness to which they shall be re¬ 
quired to submit. 

THE BROTHERHOOD OF 
SPOILSMEN. 

What Mr. Black’s candidacy seems to prom¬ 
ise is the breaking up of the “ combine ” be¬ 
tween the political rascals of the two great 
parties which has been in force, to a greater 
or less degree, at Albany since the advent of 
Hill to the governorship in 1885. Under this 
combine the rascals stood together for mutual 
protection when either set of them was as¬ 
saulted. They united in the old aqueduct 
“deal,” with Mr. Fish as one of the manipula¬ 
tors and beneficiaries, and they have stood to¬ 
gether pretty steadily ever since. The reason 
why Mr. Fish can not abide Mr. Black is because 


the latter exposed and denounced him in his hidden 
efforts as speaker to protect the Murphy gang in 
Troy against hostile legislation. Fish learned in 
that experience that, however much of a re¬ 
publican partisan Mr. Black might be, he 
was not the kind of a republican partisan who 
was willing to “stand in” with the political 
rascals of the democratic party; he might be 
a member of Mr. Platt’s machine, and might 
believe in machine politics, but he was inca¬ 
pable of accepting and wearing a set of dia¬ 
mond shirt-studs from Tammany legislators 
in return for services rendered, and was inca¬ 
pable also of accepting a $5,000 oflSce from 
Gov. Hill in payment of services rendered in 
lobbying an infamous “ deal ” bill through 
the legislature, It is for reasons of this kind 
that Mr. Black’s nomination is at once dis¬ 
couraging to the Hill democrats and so dis¬ 
tasteful to Mr. Fish that he thinks of leaving 
the country, two effects which constitute ex¬ 
cellent reasons why honest men of all parties 
should vote for Mr. Black in confident belief 
that he will make a good governor.— New York 
Post, September 11, 

* * » 

Michael J. Dady, who left the republican 
party several years ago and joined the demo¬ 
crats, and wbo only last year returned to the 
republican ranks, is now one of the leaders in 
that party, and on Saturday night was selected 
as a member of the republican state committee 
from the third district. Mr. Dady has made 
considerable money in the contracting busi- 
ne.ss. While John Y. McKane was running 
things at Coney Island Dady was his favorite 
contractor and secured many of the paying 
jobs at that place. He had an office with Mc¬ 
Kane at 44 Court street, Brooklyn. 

He expects to secure the republican nom¬ 
ination for the assembly from the first district 
of Brooklyn. He is also anxious to become a 
colonel on the staff of the next governor if a 
republican be elected. 

Is it not curious that this sort of “mug¬ 
wump” is always in good standing with the 
machine; is never gibed and sneered at, and 
finally gets his political office or job? 

THE BRYAN SORT OF “COERCION” 
AND “INTIMIDATION,” 

A letter is being circulated among letter 
carriers, custom house employes, and other of¬ 
ficials in federal employ, asking for funds to 
help elect Bryan and Sewall. Such solicita¬ 
tion is against the spirit and the letter of the 
law.— Philadelphia Record, 

* * » 

The Bryan campaign committee is sending 
under date of September 12, a letter to the 
postmasters of the country for help. We quote 
a part: 

Will you oblige me by sending as soon as 
possible a list of 100 or more democrats in 
your state whom you consider likely contribu¬ 
tors to our funds? I desire to address them 
urgent letters soliciting their assistance at 
this time. 

• Knowing the burdens that must fall upon 
you during the campaign, I hesitate to ad¬ 
dress you as to aiding us directly, but if you 
could make some pledge at this time on behalf 
of your state it would be exceedingly helpful. 


You can see the importance of knowing what 
we can depend on at as early a date as possi¬ 
ble. 

I enclose you herewith a blank pledge of 
contribution. If you find it impracticable to 
give direct assurance of assistance could you 
undertake to circulate a number of these 
pledges? 

Thanking you in advance for your interest 
and the assistance I am confident you will 
render to the effort to secure funds, I am faith¬ 
fully yours, Daniel J. Campau, 

Chairman democratic campaign committee. 

The Chicago Times-Herald is authority 
for the statement “ that Gov, Altgeld this 
week ordered an assessment of $5 each 
upon the employes of the Southern Illinois 
Hospital for the Insane at Anna, the money 
to be used for campaign purposes. The 
order applies to both male and female at¬ 
tendants at that institution. Many of the 
persons so assessed made vigorous pro¬ 
tests, but they were informed very plainly 
that if the money was not forthcoming 
there would be several vacancies in Dr. 
Lentz’s corps of assistants. They were 
further told that this contribution was not 
all that was expected, and that if the exi¬ 
gencies of the campaign demanded it, 
more money would be collected.” 

NO COERCION IN BALTIMORE. 

When Mr. Hopkins, the collector of taxes, 
presented the monthly draft for the salaries of 
his department to Mayor Hooper last week, 
there were embarrassing consequences. The 
custom of the collector is to retain the money 
out of his collections, and afterward to have 
the draft signed in the regular form as matter 
of record. On Tuesday the salaries were paid, 
while the check was not signed for several 
days. The delay was owing to certain inquir¬ 
ies of Mayor Hooper, and the incident is im¬ 
portant as illustrating the decaying system of 
campaign assessments. 

When the check came before Mayor Hooper 
he asked the collector if it called for the full 
amount of the salaries, and represented the 
money that had been paid to the employes. 
The collector at once admitted that the usual cam¬ 
paign assessment had been retained by him out of 
the salaries, but added that it had been done with 
the approval of the men. He insisted that no one 
had been forced to contribute. The delicious 
part of his explanation was that, as there were 
both democratic and republican employes in 
the department, care would be taken to send 
the contributions proportionately to the dem¬ 
ocratic and republican committees. 

Mayor Hooper firmly declined to sign the check 
until the assessments were refunded to the men by 
the collector. All the week the contention ivent on, 
but it ended in the refunding of the money, after 
which the mayor signed the check. 

It was in Baltimore that George William 
Curtis make his last public address. It was 
on civil service reform, before the Civil Service 
Reform Association. At that time Baltimore 

















THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


355 


and Maryland were somewhat notorious for 
their anti-civil service reform records. The 
federal offices in the city were regarded with 
suspicion, and the post-office was the object of 
official inquiry by the civil service board. 
Gorman was apparently intrenched in power 
beyond any hope of dislodgment, and the most 
practical kind of practical politics ruled in 
the city and state. Civil service reform was 
treated with open derision and contempt. 

And yet in these few years changes have 
come beyond the furthest expectations of Mr. 
Curtis’s address. Gorman and Kasin have 
been overthrown. There is in the City Hall 
a mayor who practices as' well as preaches 
civil service reform. And there has not been 
the slightest infringement of the civil service 
law in any of the federal offices. The post- 
office, which was formerly the cause of so 
much concern to the civil service reformers, 
is resting absolutely on the merit system, 
with the result of a wonderfully improved 
service. 

The republicans, who carried the state last 
fall, won their fight largely on the plank in 
their platform calling for the merit system in 
all state and local offices. They had such a 
big majority in the legislature that the spoils¬ 
men of the party, led by the delegate who 
achieved local fame by the sentiment, “Let 
us not despoil the vineyard before we get some 
of the grapes,” began a fight against any civil 
service legislation. Twice the bill was de¬ 
feated, but the contest waged, and at the last 
moment a bill was passed submitting the 
question to the popular vote at the next gen¬ 
eral election. That election will come next 
year. This bill was not satisfactory to the 
friends of reform, but as it was the best they 
could get, they will make the contest at the 
polls. The spoilsmen declare they will win, 
but while they are boasting the merit sys¬ 
tem is making its way firmly in the public 
mind, and is gaining steadily by the object 
lessons such as are daily evident to the people. 

Resolute Mayor Hooper has killed the sys¬ 
tem of extortion that has been for twenty 
years the financial reliance of such men as 
Gorman and Rasin. “ I do not deny the right 
of any city employe to make a political cam¬ 
paign contribution,” he says, “but I am op¬ 
posed to coercion.” 

The city government of Baltimore remains 
in the same curious condition. While the 
heads of the departments, with a few excep¬ 
tions, are republicans, almost all the employes 
are democrats. This is due to the quarrel be¬ 
tween the mayor and the city council. Mayor 
Hooper at the beginning of the year did not 
please the councilmen in his appointments. 
They especially objected to a republican 
mayor appointing democrats. The mayor 
held out, and the councilmen combined and 
rejected his appointments. They went further 
than that. They passed ordinances taking 
from the mayor the power of appointment in 
all the important offices of the city. The 
mayor vetoed the ordinances, and they were 
passed over his objections by a margin of one 


vote. This necessary two-thirds was secured 
by getting two of the democratic members to 
leave the chamber while the vote was cast. 
The council made its appointments, and when 
the new tax collector appeared before the 
mayor the mayor refused to swear him in. 
Then the matter was taken to the courts. The 
main question was whether a vote of two- 
thirds meant two-thirds of all the members or 
only two-thirds of the quorum present. The 
lower courts have had the case for six months, 
and it will reach the court of appeals next 
month. 

Mr. Hopkins, the collector of taxes, is a 
democrat holding over until the decision is 
reached. —Baltimore dispatch New York Times, 
September 7. 

IS THIS WORK TO BE DESTROYED ? 

A small application of civil service prin¬ 
ciples to the navy is indicated in an order 
made by the President placing ship writers in 
line of promotion to the grade of chief yeo¬ 
man, whose compensation is $60 per month. 
This was done by simply designating the first, 
second and third-class writers as yeomen of 
similar classes, and hereafter vacancies in the 
grade of chief yeoman will be filled from the 
men of first-class grade, who formerly found 
it impossible to rise above the rank of first- 
class writers. The order is expected to stimu¬ 
late the zeal of these officers, who have here¬ 
tofore been subject to degradation at the whim 
of the commanding officers by making them 
permanent members of an established corps. 
— Washington Dispatch, October 3. 

♦ • * 

Ten thousand employes of the war depart¬ 
ment were classified in the civil service yes¬ 
terday, in accordance with the order of the 
President of May 6 last, which extended the 
operations of the law to practically all gov¬ 
ernment employes except those laborers whose 
work does not require technical skill, or in¬ 
telligence above an ordinary degree. The or¬ 
der has been interpreted by Secretary Lament 
to include even laborers who perform duties 
requiring a comparatively mediocre intelli¬ 
gence, and in his own office but two persons, 
the confidential clerks of himself and Assis¬ 
tant Secretary Doe, remain outside the classi¬ 
fied lists. The chief clerk of the department 
and all the heads of divisions are included in 
the lists.— Washington dispatch, September 3. 

MR. BRYAN, YOU SHALL NOT 
COERCE PUBLIC EMPLOYES. 

Official circulars were posted in the various 
departments of the custom house yesterday, in 
which Secretary Carlisle directs that all cus¬ 
toms officers shall use every possible means to 
call the attention of employes to the provisions 
all the civil service law, so far as they relate to 
contributions of money for political campaign 
purposes. In pursuance of this order, Col¬ 
lector Kilbreth issued the following notice: 

“ All employes connected with this district 
are hereby notified that they are under no ob¬ 
ligations whatsoever to make subscriptions for 
political or other purposes, and that they will 


not be molested or in any way discriminated 
against for failure to so subscribe.” 

The notice was posted in the office of each 
deputy collector, the attention of the clerks 
was called to it, and each clerk was requested 
to affix his signature or initials to the notice 
as evidence that he had read it.— New York 
Times, September 1. 

THE COMPETITION SYSTEM WINS 
ITS WAY. 

The world moves. The application of Gen. 
Collis of the department of public works to 
have the inspectors of streets in his department 
selected by competitive examinations under 
the civil service rules is a sign of it. It is 
not many months since the exemption of these 
offices from the rules was regarded as one of 
the choicest privileges of the department. 
They are peculiarly suited for use as “patron¬ 
age,” being well paid and carrying considera¬ 
ble “influence,” if used after the old political 
fashion. But Gen. Collis very shrewdly sees 
that the duties of the offices require the best 
men and that competitive examinations secure 
the best men. If he has any desire to get po¬ 
litical advantage, he perceives that honest and 
efficient work in his department will give him 
more and better political advantage than the 
employment of politicians as inspectors. — 
New York Times, September 7. 

ALTGELD’S VERSION OF PUBLIC 
OFFICE IS A PUBLIC TRUST. 

He has spurned the charges of Mr. For¬ 
man but he appears to be sending out at 
the state’s expense his explanation of how 
he comes to be requiring gold leases. 

The jailor of Sangamon county has re¬ 
ceived a circular from the state board of 
charities inviting him to attend a confer¬ 
ence of officials interested in charitable 
work, to be held in this city November 17 
and 18. This circular was dated Septem¬ 
ber 1, nearly three months ahead of the 
date of the proposed conference. It came 
by mail in an envelope bearing the official 
imprint of the state board, and with it was 
inclosed the gold rent explanation. 

BROOKLYN ALDERMAN TRY TO 

CRIPPLE THE MERIT SYSTEM. 

Here are three facts as to civil service re¬ 
form in Brooklyn: (1) The commission of 
which Mr. Alexander E. Orr—a citizen of the 
very highest character and of sound judg¬ 
ment—is the president, asked for an appropri¬ 
ation of $25,000 for its work for the year. 
That is a moderate sum ; considering the ex¬ 
tensive and permanent benefits conferred on 
the city by the work of the commission, it is a 
very small sum. (2) The board of estimate 
and apportionment, for reasons to which they 
probably yielded in good faith, but which, in 
view of what the civil service commission’s 
work is really worth, were inadequate, fixed 
the appropriation at $15,000, a cut of 40 per 
cent. (3) The board of aldermen, in a spirit 
of pure spite, ignoring the real interests of the 
city and their obligations to protect those in- 
















356 


THE CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE. 


terests, cut the appropriation down to the 
merely nominal sum of $5,000. The commis¬ 
sion appealed to the courts, but Justice Dickey 
of the supreme court finds no authority to 
compel the common council to do its duty. 
He declares that the commission needs the 
money, but if the common council refuse it is 
an abuse of legal discretion that can not be 
prevented.— New York Times. 

[The aldermen backed down and allowed 
$15,000 on the advice of party leaders that it 
would be “bad politics” to cripple the com¬ 
mission.—Ed. Chronicle.] 

THE MERIT SYSTEM IN MIL¬ 
WAUKEE. 

The city ciiil service law, under the provisions of 
which the method of employment of all the clerical 
force and all skilled and unskilled labor of the city 
was entirely changed, has now been in force four¬ 
teen months. Its system has proven so well 
adapted to the needs of the public service and 
promotive of a higher standard of proficiency 
that, in spite of defects in its executive ad¬ 
ministration, which have been recently cor¬ 
rected, the operation of the law may be now 
regarded as generally acceptable and its prin¬ 
ciples permanently engrafted on the civic sys¬ 
tem. 

Even those who at first were loath to aban¬ 
don the long prevailing practice of investing 
elective ofifices and political party committees 
with paramount influence in the distribution 
of appointments have become convinced that 
the plan of non-partisan selection and perma¬ 
nent tenure during good behavior will pro¬ 
mote the efficiency of the public service, and 
moreover that reputable party organization 
will thrive better on principle than on pat¬ 
ronage.— Milwaukee Sentinel, September. 

BOSS MARTIN’S SHERIFF. 

Of James Miles, nominated for sheriff in 
Philadelphia, the Municipal League of that 
city says : “ His conduct in public oflfice has 

been such as to justly earn for him the dis¬ 
trust of every friend of honest government 
and the confidence of its enemies.” “If such 
a man,” the Philadelphia Times (Ind. Dem.) 
says, “can be elected sheriff of Philadelphia, 
at the dictation of Lobbyist Martin, and that 
at a time when his own as well as Martin’s 
connection with corrupt legislation in the city 
councils is fresh in the public mind, the hard¬ 
est things that have been said by the critics 
of American politics would be justified.” 

THE REFORM SYSTEM IN ROCH¬ 
ESTER. 

Should the new rules that have been pre¬ 
pared by the secretary of the civil service 
board of this city receive the approval of 
Mayor Warner and the state civil service 
commission, the cause of civil service reform 
here will take a great step forward. Under 
the new rules, all municipal employes will be 
divided into three classes. Those belonging 
to schedule A are exempt from civil service 
examination and include the superintendent 
of schools, the overseer of the poor, the cor¬ 


poration counsel, the three police commission¬ 
ers, and the three city assessors. All those 
subject to competitive examination belong to 
schedule B, which includes the city clerk, the 
fire marshal, the city sealer, etc. Schedule C 
includes all those obliged to take non-competi¬ 
tive examinations; but they must pass at a 
standing of eighty-five to secure appointment. 
To this class belong the assistants of the cor¬ 
poration counsel, who shall retain his charter 
right to appoint them from a certified list. 
No person included in the competitive class 
will be certified that stands on examination 
under 75 per cent. 

All the appointees of the board of education 
except the superintendent of the public schools 
and the teachers will have to submit to the 
examinations of the civil service board. The 
appointment of teachers will also be subject 
to regulations. Candidates for such appoint¬ 
ments will have to present regents’ certificates 
of their proficiency. When the board of edu¬ 
cation wishes to appoint any teachers, the civil 
service commissioners will submit a certified 
list arranged according to the standing on the 
regents’ examination. From this list, and not 
from the names presented by political friends, 
all teachers must be selected. 

Two important provisions of the new rules 
relate to the registration of laborers and to the 
prohibition of political activity on the part of 
municipal employes. Hereafter all persons 
seeking work as laborers must register their 
names with the civil service commissioners. 
The appointments made by the several depart¬ 
ments requiring laborers will be made in the 
following order: Veterans with families, 
veterans without families, others with families, 
others without families. It is believed that 
this provision will put an end to complaints 
to the mayor that persons not veterans have 
been able, in consequence of their political in¬ 
fluence, to get more work than veterans them¬ 
selves. The other provision prohibits the 
solicitation of votes at polls or elsewhere, the 
collection of campaign funds, and all inter¬ 
ference with the political rights of any citizen. 
The penalty attached to this provision is dis 
missal from office. 

There is no doubt that the rules will be ap¬ 
proved by Mayor Warner. They were pre¬ 
pared by a commission of his own appoint¬ 
ment, and they are taken to represent his own 
views. Their adoption and enforcement in 
this city depends, therefore, upon the state 
civil service board. Whether George Al¬ 
dridge, who would find his power much cur¬ 
tailed by them, has sufficient influence with 
the board to secure their rejection remains to 
be seen.— Rochester dispatch New York Post, Sep¬ 
tember 25. 

SPECIMEN POLICEMEN UNDER 
THE PULL SYSTEM. 

Patrolmen Ernest W. Smith and E. O. Mar¬ 
quette have been suspended by Superintend¬ 
ent Colbert, pending an investigation into 
charges against them. The charges comprise 
cowardice, neglect of duty and conduct unbe¬ 
coming officers. 


The suspensions grow out of the failure to 
arrest Edward Hathaway, wanted for burglary 
and grand larceny. Monday night at roll- 
call the superintendent informed all the 
patrolmen that Hathaway was wanted, that a 
warrant was held for his arrest, and he in¬ 
structed all the men that if they saw him they 
must arrest him at once. Smith and Mar¬ 
quette went into the drug store of E. E. Stew¬ 
art at Senate avenue and Twelfth street about 
8:30 o’clock that night. Hathaway was there. 
He had been using the telephone. Marquette 
knew him, and shook hands with him. Smith, 
after some talk, walked to the rear of the store, 
and then the proprietor told Smith that the 
man talking to Marquette was Hathaway. 
Marquette and Hathaway went outside and 
Hathaway showed the patrolman his revolver. 
Then Marquette and Hathaway walked away. 
Afterward Marquette asked Smith why he had 
not followed them and helped him to arrest 
Hathaway. The policemen went to Hath¬ 
away’s house in Highland Place and failed to 
find him there, although Marquette had con¬ 
ducted him to the frontdoor and had told him 
to go in and go to bed. Later Marquette saw 
Hathaway on the rear end of a street car going 
down town. He boarded the car, and, accord¬ 
ing to Frank Wyatt, the conductor of the car, 
he placed his hand on Hathaway’s shoulder 
and said : “ Ed, I’ve got to arrest you. If 
you don’t make any resistence I’ll make it all 
right with you.” 

Hathaway got off the car and Marquette 
followed him. Then the two men, standing 
not ten feet from each other, drew their re¬ 
volvers and fired, mostly in the air. Then 
Hathaway fled. It is not known what became 
of Marquette. 

Persons who were in Stewart’s drug store at 
the time Hathaway and the two policemen 
were talking, say that Hathaway said to Mar¬ 
quette : “ You are a public servant, carry my 

valise.” Marquette took the valise and carried 
it about. Hathaway and the patrolman had 
some talk on the sidewalk and Hathaway 
seemed to be serene and in full control of the 
situation.— Indianapolis News, September 23. 

TILLMAN SPOILS. 

Add to this the scandals of his administra¬ 
tion, with the bond deal in which it is 
charged and generally believed that he shared 
the commission of the Augusta broker, Rhind, 
in refunding the state debt; the scandal of 
the state liquor dispensary when under his 
sole management, about which there have 
lingered many suspicions, and as to which he 
himself, in the last hours of a heated canvass, 
made damaging disclosures, which as gover¬ 
nor he had concealed from the people for 
nearly a year, in breach of his public trust • 
his open and shameless employment of the army of 
dispensary officials and constabulary as his political 
emissaries throughout the whole state ; and the re¬ 
peated charge and general belief that the 
state liquor dispensary had also become utter¬ 
ly corrupt by the taking of rebates by the 
state officers for liquors purchased by the 
state, and the bribes alleged to be given for 
special liquor privileges granted by state offi¬ 
cials—these and many other scandals were 
heaped upon the reform administration and 
its leader by reformers themselves, and par¬ 
ticularly by John T. Duncan, the reform op¬ 
ponent of Gov. Evans on the stump, who, 
though heretofore unknown, and personally 
standing no chance of election, in every joint 
debate repeated these charges at length and in 
detail to the people.— Charleston, S. G., letter to 
New York Evening Post, September 17. 
















CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 

LUCIUS B. SWIFT, Editor. 


Volume I, 

Hakrisox’s Administration, March, 1889, to March, 1893. 


INDEX 

By CHARLES ALLEN LEWIS. 


Abbott, P, S., civil service reformer of Cambridge, 
Mass., 204. 

Abbott, R. T. F., clerk in Indiana senate, 408. 

Abies, postmaster of St. Joe Station, Indiana polit¬ 
ical worker, 379, 380. 

Acceptance, letter of President Harrison of, strongly 
favoring civil service reform, 27. 

Active Club [republican]. See Baltimore investiga¬ 
tion, 267. 

Adams and Vincennes post-office. See Chambers, 37. 

Adams, —, candidate for alderman. See Buffalo, 
N. Y., 197. 

Adams. SeeTammany, 318. 

Adams, Pres. C. K., favors clerical recognition of 
civil service reform, 48. 

Adams [congressman] and Chicago post-office, 22. 

Adams, £. P., federal employe, levies political as¬ 
sessments. See Kentucky. 

Adams, H., uses influence for appointment of 
Throop, 59. 

Adams, J.,on party spirit, 394. 

Adams, J. Q., president, 325. 

Adams, N. S., journalise, postmaster at Scott, Kan., 
149. 

Adame, T. M., reports to Mayor Grant on street 
cleaning in New York: advises merit system, 
220 221 . 

Adams’, VV. W., appointed postmaster at Quincy, 
Mass., through Congressman Morse; vice 
Speare, removed, 100 ; a political worker. 162. 

Addison, la.. Postmaster Cruikshankof, apolitical 
worker, 260. , , , 

Addison, Joseph, inspector for men of merit in 
public life, 235. 

Addison, N. Y., Roberts, postmaster of, a political 
\^orkcr 2G6 

Address of G. W. Curtis (1892), distributed in In- 
diank; 338; inaugural of President W. H Har¬ 
rison, the public press and spoils, 17; inau¬ 
gural of President B. Harrison, reform pledges 
in 367; of mayor of Baltimore, Md., to Gorman, 
236; to the citizens of Pennsylvania, against 
“Quayism,” 249.251,2-52; issued by Pennsy 1 vania 
republicans against Quay, extract from, 270. 


.ddresses, on civil service reform, merit system, 
spoils system, etc., etc. See Church and Civil 
Service Reform; also (name.s) J. E. Campbell; 
8 S Parr; H. Briggs; R. H. Dabney:C.Schurz; 

Donell: Lowell, J. R.; Roosevelt; R. H. Dana; 
G. W. Julian: C. B. Wllby; T. F. Bayard; 
Welsh; G. F. Williams; Johnson. J. H.; Swift, 
L B ; Curtis. G. W.; Everett, W.; Bonaparte. 

C. J.; H. C. Lodge; Rogers, S.S.; Warner. C. 

D. ; Sprague, H.; Sherman (senator); Civil 
Service Record; Foulke; Lambert. Rev. H.; 
Storey. M. ; F. A. Walker; C. C. Allen ; Collin; 
L. H. Gibson; D. C. Brown; C. T. Lane; Thurs¬ 
ton; Niblack; Wort; McKain, A. A. 

.del, Iowa, Journalist Hotchkiss appointed post- 
. master at, 141. . , , . , , ^ 

.der, representative in. Indiana legislature, and 
spoils methods in. 407. . , j , 

.din. Cal., Editor Wilson appointed postmaster 


Et 141. 

dkin’s, s! D., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Freeport, Ill., 126. 

dministrative reform. See Andrews, 
dreon. Cal., and appointment of Sears in post- 
office at Baltimore, 277. r- 11 XT V o 

gar. W. F.. postmaster at Mahopac Falls, N, Y., a 
political worker, 162. 
gnew, S., on English census service, 292. 
gnus, F., editor and politician, 363. 
hesrn. D.. removed on suspicion of being disloyal 
to Harrison, 300. 

iken J M.. clerk in Indiana senate. 408. 

ikin 'w. A., praises Civil Service Chronicle. 110. 
irey.’ United States marshal at Baltimore, 
worker. See Baltimore Investigation, 267, 328, 
357, 372. 


Alta, Buena Vista county, Ia„ Pickering, postmas¬ 
ter of, a political worker, 260. 

Abbot, Rev. L. and Indian, appointments; favors 
clerical recognition of civil service reform, 48. 

Akron, Col., Journalist Irwin appointed postmaster 
at, 126. 

Akron, Ind., Editor Noyes appointed postmaster 
at 126, 377. 

Akron, O., postmaster of, appointed through influ¬ 
ence of Sherman, 340. 

Alabama. See Clay, removal of; R. A. Mosely, Jr., 
politician, appointed collector of internal rev¬ 
enue for district of, 56; federal office-holders 
in, active politicians, 143, 348, 355; delegation 
to Minneapolis convention, fights in, 346; po¬ 
litical assessments levied on federal office¬ 
holders in, 391. 

Alaska, O. T. Porter appointed United States Mar¬ 
shal for. 39; vote of for Harrison at Minneapo¬ 
lis; political activity of federal officers, 347. 

Albany, N. Y., O’Leary, postmaster at, 136; per 
cent.of removals in classified and unclassified 
service in post-office at, 185; Tammany steals 
in, 317; Warner spoken of as postmaster of, 46; 
Warner, postmaster of, enforces civil service 
law, 51, 136; Warner, postmaster of, in New 
York convention, 335. 

Albany Journal [republican] against civil service 
reform, 49. 

Albert Lea, Minn., Harkness, postmaster at, re¬ 
moved lor cause by Cleveland, Stacy appoint¬ 
ed; efficient. Removed and Harkness reap¬ 
pointed by Harrison. See also Dunnell, 39. 

Albion, Ill., Editor Colyer appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Albion, Ind.. Editor Prickett appointed postmaster 
at, 126, 377. 

Albright, A., low politician. See Philadelphia. 

Alderman, E. R., editor, postmaster at Marietta, O., 
301. 

Alderson, J. D., congressman, on house committee, 
on civil service, 86; on census service in West 
Virginia. 293. 

Aldrich, C. H., favors civil service reform, 229. 

Aldrich, senator, at Minneapolis convention. 344. 

Alexander, state senator of Pennsylvania, 133. 

Alexander, Mrs. C. M., appointed stenographer In 
Indiana legislature, 40L 

Alexander, D. S., United States district attorney in 
New York, political worker at Minneapolis, 342, 
343. 

Alexandria, La., Barrett, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Alger, General, more popular than Harrison, 240. 
Spoken of for presidency, 299, .348. 

Allan, S. W., federal employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Allard, C. A. See Baltimore investigation, 320, 326, 
327. 

Allegheny Co., N. Y., postmasters’ association, lev¬ 
ies political assessments, 384. 

Allegheny, Pa., patronage in, 47; Gilliland, post¬ 
master of. worker for Bayne, 135; supporter of 
Quay, suspected by Harrison, 299. 

Allen, ex-congressman, levies political assess¬ 
ments. 322. 332. 

Allen. “The.” low politician of New York City, 
historv of. See also New York City. 249. 

Allen, C. C.. at Baltimore conference, 1889, 2. 

In report of, to civil service reform association 
of Missouri on civil service commission, 136. 
Prefers bureaucracy to spoils system, 308. 

Allen county, Ind., only office-holders in, for Har¬ 
rison. 240. 

Allen. Ethan, protests against removal of Milhol- 
land. as federal Interference. 333. 

Allen. Edgar, federal court officer, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Allen, F. B.. negro journalist, opposes Harrison, 
wants offices for negroes, 244. 


Allen, J. B., congressman, secures appointment of 
Marse as postmaster at Colfax, Wash., 166. 

Allen, S. B., deputy collector internal revenue, 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Alley, F., political worker against Chase, 353. 

Allison, A., editor, supported by Congressman 
Cooper for postmaster of Nashville, Ind., 398. 

Allison, senator, and D. B. Eaton, 111; secures ap- • 
pointment of Osborn, 334. 

Almy, candidate of Platt, at Ithaca, N. Y., 264. 

Almy, F., secretary Buffalo civil service reform as¬ 
sociation, 200, 387. 

Altgeld, governor of Illinois, flees from office-seek¬ 
ers, 415. 

Alton, Pa., Postmaster Beaumont of, worker for 
Delamater, 134. 

Altoona. Kan., Journalist Rhea, postmaster at, 148. 

American Horse, Indian chief and rising at Pine 
Ridge, S. D.,218. 

American Protective League, requests lists of 
voters from postmasters, 330; seeks to assess 
postmasters, 382. 

Americus Club. See <^ay and Clarkson. 

Ames, J. B.. civil service reformer of Cambridge, 
Mass., 204. 

Anderson, A. T., appointed postmaster at Cleve¬ 
land, 0., 216. 

Anderson, C. W., federal employe in New York 
convention, 335. 

Anderson, Ind., spoils system in town government 
at, 331. 

Anderson, J. A., deputy sheriff, inefficient, 315. 

Anderson, W. G., Sr., police examiner at Brooklyn, 

N. Y., 222. 

Andrews, C. C., address on administrative reform, 
23. 

Andrews, E. L. See Seneca county, N. Y., 260. 

Andrews, G. W., postmaster at Murphrysboro, Ill., 
forced to resign, 165. 

Andrews, Ind.. Coutts, postmaster of, father of Ed¬ 
itor Coutts, 316. 

Andrew, J. E., opposed to civil service reform,'ac- 
cordingtoGro8venor,204; chairmanhousecivil 
service committee, extensions proposed by, 305, 
306; bili of, introducing merit system in labor 
service, commended, 321; and appointments 
under civil service rules, 350; and political ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders in Alabama, 355; 
chairman of house civil service committee, 86, 
358: bill of, for reform in labor service, com¬ 
mended by workingmen, 331; bill of, to regu¬ 
late appointments of fourth class postmasters; 
and to Introduce Boston labor service system, 
359, 388,397; Secretary C. Foster, 330; opposed to 
congres.sional patronage system, 405. 

Andrews, W. H., chairman state republican com¬ 
mittee of Pennsylvania, corrupt politician, 1,33, 
134; political agent of Senator Quay, 38. 260. 

Angler, E. A., assistant United States district attor¬ 
ney, delegate to Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Annapolis, Md., appointment to naval academy 
at. See Turner, 100; Tucker, postmaster of, in 
Maryland convention. 335. 

Antl-Cobden club, of Philadelphia, resolutions of, 
demanding repeal of civil service law. 49. 

Appeal, to President, against civil service commis¬ 
sion, threatened. See Indianapolis, investiga. 
tion of post office of, 28. 

Appointees, unworthy, at various places, 39. 

Appointing power, resides in executive officers 
alone, 263. 

Appointments, from eligible lists, year 1889-90,185. 
Internal revenue; squabble between Senators 
May and Sherman, 17. 

Applegafth, Rev. H. C.. advocates civil service re¬ 
form. 83. 

Apple River, to Daviess county. Ill., applicants for 
postmastership at, 109. 

Applicants, for office under spoils and merit sys¬ 
tems, 185. 


I 
















11 


INDEX. 


Areola, lud., Rockhill, postmaster of, removed 
througti iutlueuce of Postmaster Uiggins; Mc- 
(ioogle appuiuted, 302. 

Arkalou, Kau., Journalist Stoufer appointed post¬ 
master at, 148. 

Arkansas, patronage of, controlled by Clayton, 188. 
Political activity of federnl officers in, 347, 348. 

Armour, H. O., political worker lor Platt, 333. 

At Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Armstrong. See Baltimore investigation, 826. 

Armstrong, consul-general Rio Janeiro, removed 
by Harrison for poiitical reasons, 54. 

Armstrong, G. C., journalist, postmaster at Moline, 
Kan., 1-19. 

Arthur, C. A., tool of “Tom” Murphy, controls 
Xsew York custom house, 191. 

Arthur, President, and Pendleton act, 10; and 
Postmaster Pearson, 12; and office-seekers, 24; 
Senator Harrison demands patronage in Indi¬ 
ana from, 31; removes Naval Officer Burt to 
make room ior politician. See Burt, 52; Par¬ 
dons E. S. Ransdall, 80; nominates M. Garri- 
gus, corrupt politician, 88; appoints Langsdale 
postmaster at Greencastle, Ind., 89,159 ; classi- 
lles departmental service, 185, 215; controls 
patronage, but fails of renomination, 262; 
appoints 1). B. Eaton chairman civil service 
commission, 271, 272; denounces spoils system, 
275; signs Pendleton bill, makes classification, 
etc., 276; appoints Isabella I)e La Hunt post¬ 
mistress at Cauneiton, lud., 868, 374. 

Asay, “Jim,” disreputable politician, appointed 
through Congressman Hitt, 160. 

Asbury Park, N. Y., E. G. Harrison appointed post¬ 
master of, 386. 

Ashton,!. H., post office employe. See Baltimore 
investigation, 267, 296. 

Aspiuwall, J., New York state senator, political 
worker for Nathan, 264, 371. 

Assessments, political, bee Baltimore investiga¬ 
tion; see Indiana, IVashington (city). South 
Carolina, West Virginia, Ohio, New York, Ala¬ 
bama, Maryland, Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylva 
nie,; see Indianapolis News; committee oi ua 
tiouai league (see) to investigate 1892; see Tam¬ 
many Hall; see Old Dominion Rt publican 
League, 70; see Ginn, 72; in New York; see 
Roosevelt, Burt, Magone, Beattie, 97; see Quay, 
134; see Curry, 160; see Grosvenor, Roosevelt, 
161; in State and feueral offices in Indiana, 
those levied on corporations, 171; under Harri¬ 
son, 173; under Harrison and (jleveland, 255; 
advocated, see Stratton and Grosvenor, 178, 
179; federal employes from Ohio Subjected 
to, 179; see Dudley, 180: levied on federal em¬ 
ployes from Indiana, 181; in federal and other 
offices in Connecticut, 183; in Virginia, made 
by republicans, 226; made by Iowa lepublican 
central committee, 240; denounced by Presi¬ 
dent Hayes, 265; in Ohio, by state republican 
executive committee, 272, 280; in New York, 
Pennsylvania and Ohio; see Pendleton, Ac 
ton, 279, 280; under Harrison, see Mahoue 
blackmailers, see Mahoue, 281; in state offices 
at Albany, N. Y., 180; see Mahone, 305; in New 
York, Pennsylvania, Ohio. 282: condemned in 
Ohio, Pennsylvania, 286; see Wagner, 287; cor¬ 
respondence of Pennsylvania civil service re¬ 
form association, regarding, 289; by Postmaster 
Higgins of Ft. Wayne, Ind. 302; bill of Conk 
ling preventing, in New York, 318.321; see Mor¬ 
ton. O.T., and Allen. 322,332; see Kentucky. 330; 
money got by, used by Platt against Harrison, 
347; warning against, by civil service commis¬ 
sion, 358; levied In North Carolina, 362; in In¬ 
diana and New York. 363; see W. H. Harrison, 
370, 373, 375,382.385; of Indiana office-holders in 
Washington, 377; in post office at. Indianapolis, 
403.411, 412; in Ohio, and in Washington de¬ 
partments, by Old Dominion Republican Club, 
412; see Zollinger.414. — 

Associations; see also civil service reform asso¬ 
ciations ; business men’s republican, and spoils. 
234; Indian Rights. 9. 42; twenty-first district 
republican, of New York City, invited to in 
vestigate custom house service in, 236; Ohio 
republican and printing office. 234. 

* Astor. W. W.. and politics in New York, 173, 285. 

Atchison, editor and Winimac. Ind.. post office, 88. 

Atkins, postmaster at Freeport, Ill., active poli¬ 
tician. 143. 

Atkins, Indian commissioner under President 
Cleveland, 217. 

Atkins. S . local politician opposed to Congress¬ 
man Hitt, 109. 

Atkinson, G. W., levies political assessments, 390. 

Atlanta, Ga., census of 1890 well conducted in, 292. 

Atlantic Monthly, for February, 1891, “An Object 
Lesson in Civil Service Reform,” by Roose¬ 
velt, 192. • 

Atwood, Kan., Greason, journalist, appointed post¬ 
master at, 148. 

Auburn, Ind., Garden, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379, 380. 

Auburn, N. Y., Knapp, postmaster of, worker for 
Platt. 143. 

Auditor, removals in office of sixth, 55. 

Augu.sta, Ga., census service in, inefficient, 295. 

Augusta. Me., postmaster at, removed ; place given 
to “Joe” Manley, 38; Manley, postmaster of, a 
political worker, 135, 1.50; Manley, postmaster 
of. congressional candidate opposing Burleigh, 
and non-dellverv in Augusta of papers advo¬ 
cating Burleigh,'364; Stinsou, nephew of Mrs. 
Blaine, appointed postmaster at, 371. 


Augustine, *Kau., Juumulisi Feustemaker. ap¬ 
pointed postmaster at, 148. 

Aurelia, la.,Marsh postmasterof,apolitical worker, 
260. 

Aurora, Ill., Journalist Hudder appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 126. 

Austen,Cal. See Tammany, 318. 

Austin, C. K., editor, appointed postmaster at Line- 
ville, Iowa, 142. 

Austin, H. C., New Y'ork police officer given federal 
offices, 216. 

Austin, Tex., DeGress, chairman Texas republican 
state committee, appointed postmaster at, 71. 

Australia, civil service reform in. 111. 

Australian ballot system, opposed by Boutelle; 
Reed.T. B.; Blaine, Gorman, 228. 

Avery, supported by Congressman Hitt for assistant 
treasurer, 110. 

Axton, L. H., and political assessments. See Ken¬ 
tucky. 

Ayers, 1., special treasury agent, pays political as¬ 
sessments, 279. 

Bachelder, G. E., post office inspector on removal 
of Postmaster Bundy, 176. 

Bachman, postmaster of Carruna, Ind., 379; politi¬ 
cal worker, 380. 

Backus, county treasurer at Indianapolis, 403; per¬ 
suades Dunn, post-office employe at, to solicit 
political contributions, 411, 412. 

Bacon, Rev. B.W., sermon on evils of spoils sys¬ 
tem, 102 

Bacon, D., journalist, postmaster at Nampa, Idaho, 
155. 

Bacon, F., mayor of Oregon, Ill., politician, 109. 

Bacon, T., address annual meeting National League, 
noticed. 269. 

Bad Axe, Mich., Journalist Maywood postmaster at, 
149. 

Bagby, low negro politician, appointed to railway 
mail service; unfit, 10, 21,25, 27, 34,35, 54,94,96, 
112,173. 

Bagby, B., political worker for Harrison, 302. 

Bailey. J. J., protests against Martin as internal 
revenue collector in Pennsylvania, 232, 374. 

Bailey, J. M., candidate of Barnes faction for sur- 
veyorship of Albany district, 46; colleetorat Al¬ 
bany. political worker. 890. 

Bailey, L. 0., ward politician, city attorney for In¬ 
dianapolis, opposes bill for new charter of,212; 
deputy attorney general of Indiana, 3I5. 

Bailey, M. H., and political assessments, 384. 

Bailev, T., applicant for postmaster of Portland, 
Ind.. 88. 

Bailey, W. A., Harrison delegate from North Caro¬ 
lina, 334. 

Bain, congressman, on house committee of civil 
service, 86. 

Bain Faction, in St. Louis, 304. 

Bain. See Senator Harrison, 81. 

Baird, postmaster at Ogdensburg, N. Y’., removed, 
P26. 

Baird, Colonel, politician, offered Brooklyn, N. Y., 
postmsstership, 131. 

Bairdstown, O., Journalist Grimes postmaster at 
149. 

Baker Ballot Reform Bill, ruined by Quay and Mar¬ 
tin, federal office, 228,229, 252. or 254. 

Baker. D., postmaster at Mobile, Ala., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Baker, I. V. See Tammany, 319. 

Baker, Judge, at Minneapolis convention, 343. 

Baker, W. H., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son , 334. 

Baldwin, post-office employe of Austin, Ind., at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Baldwin, editor, appointed to position in govern¬ 
ment printing office. 126. 

Baldwin. See Woodruff, 106. 

Baldwin. C., editor, given office by Governor Fora- 
ker. 301. 

Baldwin, C. A., journalist, postmaster at Vicks¬ 
burg, Mich., 149. 

Baldwin, D. A., political worker, 182,183; see also 
Kings county. New Y’ork,.S71. 

Bales, E. L.,journalist, postmaster at Bloomington, 
S. Dak., 155. 

Balk, W. A., post office employe, see Indianapolis 
investigation. 411. 

Ball, Col., controls part of patronage in North Da¬ 
kota. 216. 

Ball, G. H., clerk in Indiana senate. 408. 

Ballot, secret, good results of in Indiana, 389. 

Ballantlne. J.. opposes political activity of federal 
office holders in New York, 336. 

Ballantyne. R. C., appointed postmaster at Brack- 
ettsville, Tex., vice Gildea, removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons, 186. 

Balmaceda, Pres..usurper In Chile, 261,281.364, 387; 
course of United States government with, 282. 

Baltimore, Md., federal office holders interfere in 
primaries at, 219.225,226; investigation by Roose¬ 
velt. Rose and Bonaparte of interference of fed 
eralofficersin elections at. 261,267. 268; alsofed- 
eral interference in primaries, 277,278; also of po¬ 
litical activity of federal employes in primaries 
at. 287; also of political activity of federal officers 
in primaries at. 295. 296. 312,320,326,329,330; also 
of violations of law by federal employes at. 321, 
.322; also of political activity of federal office¬ 
holders in. 396; Roosevelt’s report of investiga¬ 
tion, 254, 255; political activity of federal office¬ 
holders at, 372. 373, 376; investigation, etc., 412; 
Wanamaker shields post-office employes for in¬ 
terference in elections, 350; conference, reso¬ 
lutions for publicity of examination papers. 


10; resolutions of Tippecanoe Club, 49; cus¬ 
tom house at, removals in, 53; evil effects of pa¬ 
tronage on schools of, 211; public meeting of, 
condemns Gorman, 214; mayor of and Gorman 
testimonial, 236; Raisin, low politician, ap¬ 
pointed naval officer at, through influence of 
Gorman, 237; Raisin, “boss” in, 251; violations 
of civil service law at, 366; federal officers at 
under Cleveland, 376; political assessments 
permitted by internal revenue collector, see 
W udd and Coffin, 162; personel of examiners at, 
186; and state of politics, 283; customs district 
of, classified 1883. 276; Brown and Veazy post¬ 
masters of, and Sears, post-office employe at, 
277: civil service in post-office at, 95; effect of 
secret eligible lists in post-office at, 63; conflict 
over control of post-office at, 84; Postmaster 
Veazy of, removals under, 53; Postmaster 
Brown of, spoilsman, 53; Johnson, postmaster 
at, conducts factional fight at, 121; removes em¬ 
ployes without cause, 137; makes clean sweep, 
189; makes clean sweep, testimony of before 
Roosevelt, 254. 255; in Maryland convention,* 
335; works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 337, .347; 
political assessment circular of civil service 
commission, 363; as a campaign fund raiser, 
370. 

Baltimore American [Repub.] advocates civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 65. 

Banbury, J. W., journalist, postmaster at Britton, 
S. Dak., 165. 

Bancroft, postmaster at Concord, Mass., to be re¬ 
appointed, 91. 

Bancroft: see Hillism, .309; 

Bangor, Me., census of 1890; well conducted in, 
292. 

Bangor, S. Dak., Journalist Griffers, postmaster at, 
155. 

Banks, a negro, opposes Harrison; wants offices for 
negroes. 244. 

Banks, congressman advocates appointment of J. 
J. McCarthy in payment of poiitical debts, 31; 
falls to obtain office for political worker, 39; 
aids spoils methods of Pension Commissioner 
Raum. 130. 

Bannon. A., patronage of, 134. 

Barbadoes, consul at, 66, 

Bardsley, tool of Quay. 250. 

Bardsley; see Quay, 305; embezzler, 352. 

Bargae, P., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
834. 

Bario. efficient post-office inspector, removal for 
political reasons. 298. 

Barker. Wharton, protests against Quay 95; letter 
to Harrison protesting against giving patronage 
to Quay. 104. 

Barker, “Billy,” low politician, 311. 

Barnard, Judge, and Dutchess county, N. Y., frauds, 
.306. 

Barnes, appointed consul at Chemnitz vice Merritt, 
removed for political reasons, 371. 

Barnes, justice of peace, a pollticial worker, 162. 

Barnes, representative in Indiana legislature, 
spoilsman. 407. 

Barnes. C. B.. negro, federal employe, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Barnes. J. M., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention. 848. 

Barnes. W., factional leader in Albany, N. Y., con¬ 
sults with Harrison over patronage, 46. 

Barnett, I. O. G. federal employe, and political as¬ 
sessments. See Kentucky. 

Barnett, J., door-keeper in Indiana senate, 408. 

Barnett. J. S., federal employe, and political as¬ 
sessments. See Kentucky. 

Barneveld, Wis., Journalist Jones postmaster at, 
155. 

Barnstable (Mass.), collector of, appointed. See 
Goss, 46. 

Barnnm, collector, resignation asked, 22. 

Barnum. J. S., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Princeville, Ill.. 141. 

Barrett. E. J., postmaster at Alexandria, La., dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Barrett, W. E.. signs petition for larger appropria¬ 
tion for civil service commission, 102. 

Barrow. C. A., secretary Kings county republican 
committee. 121; secretary general committee, 
political worker for Woodruff, 197. 

Barrow. H. A., politician appointed deputy naval 
officer at New York. 

Barrv, P. M.. term expires as postmaster at Oswe¬ 
go. N. Y., 126. 

Bartholdt. R., office-seeker, 14. 

Bartlett. E. B.. 311; delegate at Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 345. 

Batavia, N. Y., candidate for postmaster at. See 
Sawyer, 47. 

Batcbelder. General, federal officer, works for re- 
nomination of Harrison. 348. 

Batcheller, assistant secretary of the treasury, 371. 

Bates, W. R.. requests poll of voters from Postmas¬ 
ter Daniels. .383. 

Baxter, assessor, apolitical worker, 162. 

Baxter. A. E.. 259; U. S. marshal in New York, a 
political worker for Fassett, 265, 266, 269, 279,280, 
287. 

Baxter, D., mayor of Rochell, Ill., politician, 109. 

Baxter, F. K., political worker, to be appointed 
New York state railroad commissioner vice 
Spencer, removed, 356. 

Bayard, T. F., secretary, favors civil service re¬ 
form, 82; ex-secretary, and spoils system, 145. 

Bayard, ex-secretary, extract from address be- 


















INDEX. 


fore alumni students of Ann Arbor Law School, 
on spoils system, 257. 

Bayard, secreiary, Jewett claim, 290; and Elkins’s 
claim against Brazil, 369. 

Bayfield, VVis , Journalist Bell postmaster at, 155. 

Baylis, 111., Journalist Donley appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 141. 

Bayne, T. M., congressman, advocates application 
of civil service reform to certain* postmasters, 
100; patronage of, 133; post-ottices in his dis¬ 
trict used for his nomination, 135; and post¬ 
master Gilleland, 299. 

Beach, D., journalist, postmaster at Valley Center, 
149. 

Beal, U. S. minister to Persia, resigns to do politi¬ 
cal work, 332. 

Beallsville, O., Editor Keepers appointed postmas¬ 
ter of. 301. 

Beallsville, Pa., Journalist Robison postmaster at, 
149. 

Beard, A. W., supported by Massachusetts senators 
for Boston coliectorship, 22; appointed collector 
at Boston, vice Saltonsiall removed, 129; signs 
petition for larger appropriation for civil serv¬ 
ice commission, 102; gives oflice to Journalist 
John L. Swift, 108; political worker, 162 , 179 , 
269, 288, 334; removes democrats in custom 
house, 245; removals under, 322. 

Beardsley, railroad commissioner in New York, 
356. 

Bearss, post-office inspector at Peru, Ind., at Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 379. 

Bearss, A. C., worker for Harrison, appointed chief 
clerk in railroad mail service, 377. 

Beaty, J. W., worker for Harrison, 355. 

Beatiie, surveyor, political assessments under, 
197. 

Beattie, W. J., political worker. See Kings Co., 
New York. 

Beaumont, postmaster at Alton, Pa., worker for 
Delamater, 134 

Beck, state senator of Indiana, son of, appointed 
page, 408. 

Beebe, E. R., journalist, postmaster at Princeton, 
Wis., 155. 

Beers, T. H., appointed supervisor of census, 301. 

Belden, congressman, and Syracuse, N. Y., post- 
mastership, 46,71; secures appointment of Ed¬ 
itor Von Bergman, 132; opposed by Postmaster 
C. E. Smith, and Collector F. Hendricks, 386. 

Belknap; see Rochester, N. Y.. 305. 

Bell, appointed by President Harrison, 27; second 
assistant postmaster-general, reinstates incom¬ 
petent clerk in Massachusetts; removes com¬ 
petent clerk in Illinois, 30; candidate for gov¬ 
ernor of Texas, 159. 

Bell, C. G., journalist, postmaster at Bayfield, Wis., 
155. 

Bell, J., a political worker, 160. 

Bell, J. A., post office employe; see Baltimore in¬ 
vestigation, 312, 320, 326, 328. 

Bell, J. L., superintendent of railway mail service, 
tool of Clarkson, 21; superintendent railway 
mail service, refuses access to records of re¬ 
movals, etc., 163. 

Bell, T., politician appointed to look after office- 

Bellamy, W. H., political worker, 287; secretary re¬ 
publican county committee, at Minneapolis 
convention, 344. 

Benedict, G. G., editor, appointed collector of dis¬ 
trict of Burlington, Vt., 126. 

Benedict, R. D..defeated by ward politician Nathan, 
121; candidate for congress, aided by Secretary 
Tracy, 135; defeated candidate controls patron¬ 
age in New York, 142; congressional candidate 
opposes Nathan, 143. 

Benedict, Kansas, Journalist McMullln postmaster 
at. 148. , 

Benjamin, Capt., federal employe, pays political 
a'<sessments, 279. 

Benjamin, J., politician in Brooklyn, denounces 
Nathan, 304; ward politician in New lork, 804; 
federal employe in New York convention, 335; ; 
political worker. 371. . 

Bennett. S., political worker, appointed postmaster 
at Evansville, Ind., see Posey, 46,153,158, 87*. 

Bennett, postmaster at Hartford. Conn, ^moval of 
Bario, efficient post office inspector, 298. 

Bennett, postmaster at Warsaw, Ind., 316; political 
worker,378, .380. .. t- xt v 

Bennett, F., journalist, postmaster at Fulton, N. Y., 
155. 

Bennett. J., postmaster at Kent, N. Y., a political 

Benron,*^in.,V. E. Lamed, son of editor, appointed 
postmaster at. editor, deputy postmaster. 148. 

Benton county, Mo., applicants for post-ofl&ces in, 
by, see Upton. 55. , , 

Berg, Dr., on Indiana State Board of Health, ineffi¬ 
cient, 316. , J A*T 

Berks County, Pa., control of P^^ronage in, 47. 

Bernard,disreputable democratic politician In Cm 

Bernard?*^c’.^M., Harrison delegate from North Car- 

Berne.Tnd!^j. N. Sullivan appointed postmaster 
at and removed; political-worker Wagoner ap- 

Bernhamerlcorrupt politician of Indianapolis,con¬ 
victed of tally-sheet forgery, see Indianapolis. 

Berri, E. D., ward politician. See Kings Co., N. Y. 

Berry, schemes for postmastership at Colfax, 
Wash., 165. 


Berryman, W., deputy collector at New York city, 
a political worker, 265. 

Bertram, S., given place in Indiana legislature 
406. 

Besancon, H. O.. journalist, postmaster at Harold 
South Dakota, 155. 

Beshore, S. S., politician, census supervisor 6th In¬ 
diana district, 104. 

Best, E. T. journalist, postmaster at Niligh, Neb. 
149. 

Beverly, Mass., Postmaster Odell of, a political 
worker, 162. 

Beyerle, L. H., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Goshen, lud., 30, 126, 316. 377, 878. 

Bickford, political worker, 134. 

Bickham, editor, relatives of, hold federal offices, 
301. 

BIcknell, postmaster of Garrett, Ind., political 
worker, 379, 380. 

Biddieman, deputy United States marshal, collects 
political assessments, 372. 

Bldwell J. E., recommends O’Donnell, 59. 

Bigelow, W. H.. appointed division superintendent 
of railroad mail service, 22, 186. 

Biggs, congressman, opposes civil service reform, 
125. 

Biglin, B., employs democrats, 311, 312; baggage 
contractor at Castle Garden, a political worker, 
265; cartage bid of for NewYork custom-house, 
to be accepted for poiitical reasons, 216; gets 
po»ition for his brother in New York custom¬ 
house, 258; political worker in New York con¬ 
vention, 335; cartage contractor,368. 

Biglin, J.C., brother of "Barney” Biglin, gets of 
flee through him ; promised Appraiser Cooper’s 
place in Rew York custom-house, 258. 

Bingham, J. H., federal officer, delegate to Minne 
apolis convention, 348. 

Binghamton Republican [republican]. Roosevelt 
must npt appear in earnest. 49; Dunn, postmas¬ 
ter of, & political worker, 266; Dunn, postmas¬ 
ter of, secures removal of pension examiner 
Van Alstyne, 304. 

Binkley, W., political worker for Foraker, charges 
federal interference as cause of his defeat. 301. 

Birchs, J., applicant for postmaster at Greencastle, 
Ind., 89. 

Birkett, chairman republican general committee, 
and appointments in Brooklyn Navy Yard, 45; 
distributor of patronage in Brooklyn Navy 
Yard, 55; state senator of New York, supports 
Congressman Wallace, 142; opposed by Na¬ 
than, 265: treasurer Kings county, N. Y., cen¬ 
tral republican committee, 198; ward poli¬ 
tician in New York, 304; politician of Brook¬ 
lyn, 106. 

Birmingham, Ala., Houston, postmaster of, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Birmingham, Eng., city government of, 284. 

Bishop, mayor of Buffalo, N. Y., extends operation 
of civil service law in city offices, 200. 

Bishop, sheriff of Ogle county, Illinois, politician, 
109. 

Bismark, builds up German empire, 244. 

Blackford, E. G.. fish commissioner of NewYork, 
removed; Hackney, politician worker, ap¬ 
pointed by Hill, 310. 

Blackford. L. M.. on “Morals of Civil Service Re¬ 
form,” 130, 186. 

Blackford, W. T., federal employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention. 348. 

Black, pension commissioner, attempts to remove 
Miss Sweet, 107. 

Black, J., and Petroff, 152. 

Black, R. A., republican “boss,” see Greenfield, 
Ind.. 89. 

“Blacklisting.” See Stratton and Grosvenor. 

Blackwell, J.. ward politician of Indianapolis. See 
Parnell Hall. 

Blaine. E., wonks for Blaine at Minneapolis, 345. 

Blaine J. G., secretary, and recommendations from 
General Brown, of office-seekers, 7: views on 
civil service reform in “ Twenty Years of Con¬ 
gress,” 9: defeat of, attributed to Pearson, post¬ 
master at New York, 13: and “Joe” Manley, 
38: and consulship at Barbadoes. 56; uses influ¬ 
ence to secure family Appointments. 71; and 
posimapterphip at Wasbinpton, Pa , 100; candi- 
dates of superseded by those of Quay, 112; 
on tariff, 169; subject to Quay, 173; begged 
to speak, 180; applicants for consulships 
under. 185: opposes Australian ballot system, 
228: and Harrison, 240: and Harrison, 241; 
promises “fealty” to_ Harrison, 250; 
ates reform element in 1884. 255; knifed 
by Nathan in 1884 , 264; and Elkins. 290; Quay’s 
candidate for presidency. 299; nomination of, 
favored bvQuav.300; workers for in Indiana. 
302, 303; and Nathan. 304: supporters Iji 1876 in 
Maryland convention, 835, 337; a candidate at 
Indianapolis, 839, 340, 341, 342; at Minneapolis 
convention, 343; and Minneapolis convention, 
344, .345, 846. 347. 348: and Elkins’s claim against 

Brazil. 369; iul8.S4. 376. 

Blaine. Jr.. J. G., son of Secretary Blaine, given of¬ 
fice, 108; given office through Congressman Hitt, 

Blaine' R. G., brother of Secretary Blaine, given 
o flfi 00 108 

Blair, representative in Indiana legislature and 
spoils methods in, 406.407. 

Blair. United States marshal and Monroeville post- 
office, 88. , , T 

Blair, A. C., postmaster in Jackson county, Iowa, 
a political worker, 260. 


iii 


f Blair, T., Indian agent, 217, 

Blair, J.C., editor, postmaster at Newell, Iowa, a 
political worker, 260. 

Blair, senator, civil service reform a humbug; 
opposed to it, 45,49, 50. 65; and Eaves, 159. 

Bland, delegate to Minneapolis convention; oppos¬ 
ing Harrison, 346. 

Blaukenburg, R., letter to Quay, 157. 

Bliss, C. N., and request of postmasters for list of 
voters, 330; political worker for Harrison, see 
New York, 333; treasurer national republican 
committee, 363. 

Bliss, J. W., journalist, postmaster at Greenleaf, 
Kansas, 149. 

Bloomfield, la., Postmaster Evans of, removed on 
secret charges, 175. 

Bloomington, Ind., branch of Indiana Civil Serv¬ 
ice Kefoim Association, meeting of, addressed 
by T. Roosevelt, 1890, 108; branch of Indiana 
Civil Reform Association, officers of, 182; census 
service, turned over to spoils, enumerators 
make lists of voters, 293; MePheeters, post¬ 
master of, at Minneapolis convention, 3b0. 

Bloomington, S. Dak., Journalist Bales, postmaster 
at, 155. 

Blount, A. R., federal employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 848. 

Blunt, ex-postmaster appointed customs surveyor, 
150. 

Board, local examining at Indianapolis, efficiency 
of, 18, 42. 120; local examining at Indianapo¬ 
lis, 25, 26, 94; local civil service at Indianapo¬ 
lis, appointments to, 34. 

Boards, examining for civil service should be inde¬ 
pendent, 17; examining; see, also, examiners, 
186; pension examining, appointed through in¬ 
fluence of Senator Cullom, 30. 

Boatuer, congressman on house committee on civil ‘ 
service, 86; upholds civil service commission, 
204; Secretary C. Foster, 330. 

Bode, la.. Postmaster Passing of, a political worker, 
260. 

Bogardus, E., whose son holds federal office, politi¬ 
cal worker for Hiscock, 265. 

Bogemann, Rev. E. C., favors civil service reform, 
229. 

Boise City, Idaho, assay office. Wild, removed 
without cause by President Harrison, Place 
given to spoilsmen, 30. 

Bolton, J. A., soldier, a political worker, 159. 

Bonaparte, C. J., at Baltimore conference 1889, 2; 
address of, upon civil service reform, 25; duty of 
the President, 26; on spoils, heading to July 
number, 1889, Civil Service Chronicle, 32; 
address of, before National League, 1889, on 
civil service reform as a moral question, 59, 60, 
61; annual address of, before reform associa¬ 
tions of Maryland, 1889, 62; spoils system im¬ 
moral, 69; to examine management of civil 
service, 77; address of, before Catholic Club of 
Baltimore, on catholics and citizenship, 97; to 
address Indiana Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion, 108; to address annual meeting, 1890, of 
Indiana Civil Service Reform Association, 111; 
committeeman, report on congressional pa¬ 
tronage, 113, 114, 115; address of, before Indi¬ 
ana Civil Service Reform Association, 1890, on 
“Scope and Difficulties of Civil Service Re¬ 
form,” 119,126, 127, 128; on committee investi¬ 
gating patent office, report of, 139, 140, 141; on 
relations of civil service reform to other re¬ 
forms, 153; on Gorman, 161; on Committee of 
National League, investigating presidential 
post-offices, 162,163, 164,165, 166; address before 
annual meeting National League, 1890, 169, 170; 
on committee of National League reporting on 
removals on secret charges, 175, 176, 177; on 
on committee of National League, reports on 
political changes in presidential post-offices, 
188; assists in investigation of Interference of 
federal officers in elections, at Baltimore. 261, 
266. 267, 291, 295; address of, before annual 
meeting National League, noticed, 269; on spe¬ 
cial committee of National League investiga¬ 
ting census service, 291.295: on political cor¬ 
ruption in Maryland, 317, 324; on committee of 
publication of Good Government, 357; on Judge 
Bradley and Assistant Attorney-General Tvner. 
357, 358. 

Bond, see Baltimore investigation, 328. 

Bone, postmaster at Shelby ville, Indiana, removed 
on secret charges, 177. 

Bonge, appointed postmaster at Cumberland, Indi¬ 
ana, 89. 

Boody, congressional candidate, 183. 

Boody, D. A., democratic candidate for mayor of 
Brooklyn, New York, 287. 

Boone. Cal., superintendent work-house at Indian¬ 
apolis. 205. 206. 

Boonvllle, Ind.. editor apponted postmaster at, 37; 
Postmaster Hammond of, political worker, 380, 
Pate, postmaster of, political worker, 380. 

Booth, A. R., employe in navy yard, in New’ York 
convention, 835. 

Booth, W. C . promised place in Brooklyn. See 
V\'flllflO0 T2 

Borden, supported by Massachusetts congressmen 
for Boston coliectorship, 22. 

Borin. C., journalist, postmaster at Oberlin, Kan., 
149. 

Boslei* J 291* 

Boston Advertiser (republican), on Civil Service 
Chronicle, 285. 

Boston Journal (republican), on civil service re¬ 
form , 65, 66, 



















INDEX. 


iv 


Boston Post (democrat), opposed to spoils system, 
86 ;accoums of spoils fights in treasury depart¬ 
ment and Indian service, 216,217; on feudalism 
revived, in New York City and Brooklyn, 263. 

Boston Transcript (republican), on civil service 
reform, 65; attributes republican defeat of 1889 
to patronage system, 76. 

Boston,Mass., municipal service in; a field for re¬ 
form, 285; civil service system in,68; competitive 
tests in police force of, 104; fire service in, 120; 
merit system in city ottices of, 172; civil serv¬ 
ice methods used at, for laborers, 181; merit 
system in labor service of, 204; civil service re¬ 
form in city offices in, 212; merit system in use 
in city departments of, 220, 221; merit methods 
of employing laborers commended; applied to 
navy yards, see Tracy, 221,222; examination in 
use for police force of, 223,224; merit system for 
laborers, 228; labor employment system of ad¬ 
vocated for Indianapolis, 243; physical exam¬ 
inations for fire and police services of Boston, 
Mass., 243,246,247,248, 249; civil service methods 
employed in city departments of, 273; city 
government of, 284; labor service system 
of, 317; labor system of commended, 349; 
labor service of, 357; no appointive officer at, 
allowed to work politically, 858; labor system 
advocated for federal service by Andrews, 359; 
labor service system of, bill of Andrews to in¬ 
troduce into federal service, 388; civil service 
reform association of; resolutions of on Post¬ 
master Pearson, 23; civil service reform in cus¬ 
tom house of, under Saltonstall, 71; removals 
without cause in custom house at, for relative of 
Secretary Blaine, 71; address before civil serv- 
ive reform association, by J. R. Lowell, 77; 
civil service reformers of, 93; employes in cus¬ 
tom house at, political workers, 179; removal 
of Corse, postmaster of, for political reasons, 
213,215,237; Collector Beard at, removes demo¬ 
crats in custom house, 245; ex-postmaster Corse 
of, entertained by Massachusetts Reform Club, 
Hart, new incumbent, commended by Corse, 
251; Beard, collector of, a political worker, 269; 
customs, district of, classified, 1883, 276; Corse 
postmaster of, Saltonstall collector at removed, 
282; Beard, collector at, a political worker, 288; 
removals under Beard, collector at, 822; Hart, 
postmaster at. Beard collector, and other feder¬ 
al officers, political workers, 334; Corse, post¬ 
master of, removed for political reasons, 367; 
removal for political reasons of Corse postmaster 
of, 376; civil service reform association of, 415. 

Bosworth, T., applicant for postmaster at Portland, 
Ind., 

Botty, H. C., political worker for ex-Alderman 
Rathwell, New York City, 199. 

Boulden, J. W. See Baltimore investigaton, 278. 

Bourke, B., ward politician in New York City, 263. 

Boutelle, congressman, interview on patronage in 
Maine, 157; opposes Australian ballot system, 
228. 

Bowden, congressman, controls spoil in Norfolk 
navy yard, 153; a political worker, 162. 

Bowles, F. T., naval officer, on board to examine 
applicants for positions in navy yard at Brook¬ 
lyn, N. Y., 222. 

Boyd, state senator, and Noblesville, Ind., post- 
office, 89. 

Boyd, H., post-office employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention. 348. 

Boyd, S. H., office-seeker, 14. 

Boyer, C. R., favors civil service reform, 229. 

Boyer, H. K., supported by Senator Quay for state 
'treasurer of Pennsylvania, 38. 

Boyle, A., political worker, foreman in navy yard 
at Brooklyn, 142; political worker for Congress¬ 
man Wallace, 183. 

Boyles, G. F.. negro delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 344, 348. 

Boynton, General, and scramble for offices, 24. 

Boynton. H. V., on Cincinnati Tammany, 301,302. 

Brackett, governor of Massachusetts, signs petition 
for larger appropriation for civil service com¬ 
mission. 102. 

Brackettsvllle, Tex., Postmaster Gildea removed 
for political reasons, Ballantyne appointed, 186. 

Brackston, uses Influence for appointment of 
Throop. 59. 

Bradbury, W. F., civil service reformer of Cam¬ 
bridge. Mass., 204. 

Bradford, Pa., postmaster at, see Flenniken, 99. 

Bradley, ward politician, see Buffalo, N. Y., 196. 

Bradley, Cal., and Blaine “boom,” .344. 

Bradley, Justice, and Mahone “blackmailers.” 305- 
charge of to jury in Mahone “blackmailers” 
case, condemned, 321; and Mahone “black; 
mailers.” 357, 358. 

Brady, and Elkins, 374. 

Brady, opponent of Mahone, 52. 

Brady. A., postmaster at Charlotte, N. C., Harrison 
delegate to Minneapolis, 334, .348. 

Brady, J. D., appointed collector at Norfolk, Va., 
52; collector internal revenue, political worker, 
.370. 

Braine, Admiral, warns Boyle, 142. 

Brandt, postmaster of Des Moines, political worker 
at Minneapolis convention, 846. 

Brant, police captain in Elizabeth, N. J., given fed- | 
eral office. 216. i 

Brattleboro. Vt., Postmaster Childs endorsed for 
re-appointment, 100; caucus on question of re¬ 
appointment of Postmaster Childs of, 108. 

Brav. Representative, opposed to Congressman 
Hitt, 109. 


Bray, L. T., defeated candidate,opposes Hitt, 136. 

Brayton, sed Collier. 

Brayton, E. M., politician in South Carolina, op¬ 
posing Harrison, 382. 

Breckenridge, Judge, civil service reformer of 
Missouri, 239. 

Breen, J. M., editor, appointed postmaster at Flan¬ 
agan, 111., 141. 

Brenner, J., political worker, see Kings county, 
N. Y., also, 371. 

Breslau, Journalist Dunlap appointed consul to, 
126. 

Bretz, congressman, patronage of, 411, 419, 421, 422. 

Brewer, congressman, asks resignation of Cowan, 
postmaster at Ovid, Mich., 165. 

Brewer, postmaster at Vineland, N. J., removal of 
for political reasons, see Vineland, 39. 

Brewster, attorney-general, and Postmaster Pear¬ 
son, b 12. 

Bribery of voters, see Kercheval, 83; in offices and 
money, see Collier, 162; in Pennsylvania, 151; 
in elections advised to aid Republicans in In¬ 
diana, 190,191; in republican caucuses in Cort¬ 
land county, N. Y., by Hiseock, also Jefferson 
county, 264; for Harrison delegates in Indiana, 
378. 

Brice, C. S.. senator, and Gorman, 307. 

Bridgeport. Conn., removal of postmaster at, toglve 
place to spoilsmen, 29. 

Briggs, cartage contractor at New York custom¬ 
house, spoilsman, 332; cartage contractor, and 
Collector Erhardt, 358; cartage contractor at 
New York custom-house, 371. 

Briggs, H., part of address of at annual meeting 
of Indiana civil service reform association 1889, 
8 . 

Briggs, H.G., appointed postmaster at Portland, 
Me., through influence of Speaker Reed, 150. 

Briggs, T. A., cartage bid of for New York custom¬ 
house, not accepted for political reasons, 216. 

Brimberry, B. F., negro, postmaster, delegate to 
Minneapolis connention, 348. 

Brinsmade, A. T., federal office-holder, political 
worker, 280. 

Bristol, Postmaster Montgomery of. See Slmond, 
91. 

Bristow, Henry, politician appointed to look after 
office-seekers, 46. 

Britton, M., treasury Inspector, removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons, 332. 

Britton, S. Dak., Journalist Banbury postmaster at, 
155. 

Broadhead, comptroller, secures reinstatement of 
thief Weeks, in Kittery navy yard, 147. 

Brock, S. G., president Missouri state republican 
association, 383. 

Brocket, chief clerk, spoilsman, 24. 

Brockmeier, H., ward politician, see New York 
City. 

Brodsky, J. E, corrupt politician, 234; political 
worker, 268. 

Brogan, captain of police in New York City, 319. 

Bronson, B. H., signal officer, secret charges 
against, 312. 

Bronson, O. H., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at New Richland, Kan., 126. 

Brooke, General, and Indian rising at Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak, 218. 

Brookfield, N. Y., Journalist Spooner postmaster 
at, 155. 

Brookfield, W., supports Lee for place in New York 
custom house, 259; chairmau republican state 
committee of New York, 279; at Minneapolis, 
344; chairman New York state republican com¬ 
mittee, 363; chairman, etc. 371. 

Brookline, Massachusetts Civil Service Reform As¬ 
sociation of, and Commissioner Roosevelt, sen¬ 
timent in favor of civil service reform, 36. 

Brooklyn, Ind.. retention of Gamble postmaster at 
asked, see Cooper, 112. 

Brooklyn (N. Y.) Times (republican), patronage a 
source of weakness, 65. 

Brooklyn, N. Y., places in navy yard at, at disposal 
of “The” Allen,see; spoils “committee”’at, 24; 
appointments in navy yard at, how made, 45; 
navy yard at, control of patronage in, 55; ap 
pointments in custom-house at, 72; removal 
sought of Postmaster Hendricks of, 72; polit¬ 
ical workers of, get office through Congressman 
Wallace, 72; examination in fire department of, 
93; fire service in, 120; Postmaster Hendrix re¬ 
moved, place offered to politician, 131; Collins 
spokenof forpostmasterof,seeWillis,135; spoils 
system in navy yard at, 142; navy yard at, spoils 
system in. 148;' abuses and spoils system in navy 
yard at, under Secretary Whitney, 148; exam¬ 
ination questions used in police service at, 152; 
navy yard at, given up as spoil by Tracy, 153; 
removals in navy yard at under Cleveland and 
Harrison. 155; republican factional fights for 
control of machine in, 197,198; merit system in 
use in city offices at, 220; examinations for posi¬ 
tions in, 221; examination in use for police 
force of. 222, 223; examinations instituted by 
Secretary Tracy in navy yard at, statement of 
examining board, 2.36, civil service commission 
of commended, 239; feudalism revived in, 263; 
factional fights in among republicans, at prim¬ 
aries. 264; armory frauds at, see Tammany, 318, 
319; Collins, postmaster of, political worker for 
Harrison. 336; Nathan and anti-Nathan factions 
in, 352; Page, chief of ordnance departmental 
navy yard at removed, 3.55; prize fighter ap¬ 
pointed at policeman in, .3.55; Collins, postmas¬ 
ter of. spoilsman, .360. 


Brooks, J. M., civil service reformer of Cambridge, 
Mass., 204. 

Brooks, W. H., appointed internal revenue collect¬ 
or at Philadelphia vice Martin resigned. See 
Quay and Harmer, 241; collector Internal reve¬ 
nue, suspected by Harrison as supporter of 
Quay, 300. 

Brookshire, congressman, patronage of, 393, 410, 
413, 419; allows Voorhees to name postmaster 
of Terre Haute Ind., 405. 

Brophy, J. C., doorkeeper in Indiana senate, 408. 

Brosins, congressman and post-offices in his dis¬ 
trict, 72. 

Brovard, J., doorkeeper in Indiana senate, 408. 

Brower, congressman, fights successfully for con¬ 
trol of patronage in North Carolina, 47. 

Browne, General, and office-seekers, 6, 7,14; and 
Hyat, officer in house of representatives, 

Browne, postmaster at Clay City, Ind., removed, 
89. 

Brown, politician, 134. 

Brown, state senator of New York, and Tammany 
bridge scandal, 317. 

Brown, political worker, 334. 

Brown, postmaster of Franklin, Ind., asked to re¬ 
sign, 377. 

Brown, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in 407. 

Brown. A. H., removed from office and political 
worker appointed, 79. 

Brown. A. H., physician, physical examiner for 
police and fire services of New York and Bos¬ 
ton, 246. j 

Brown, C. G., worker for Hiscock, 386. | 

Brown, D. C., address of on school and civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 23, 24. 

Brown, E., see Hillism, 809. 

Brown, F., postmaster at Baltimore and Sears P. 
O., employe at, 277; postmaster at Baltimore, 
189; postmaster at Baltimore, spoilsman, 53. 

Brown, F. W., editor, postmaster at Dysart, Iowa, 

142. 

Brown, Capt. G. L. R., Indian agent at Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak., exposes political assessment scheme, 
384. 

Brown, G. N., politician of N. Carolina, 109. 

Brown, H. U., officer Indiana Civil Service Reform 
Association, 108. 

Brown, H. U., of Indianapolis News, favors civil 
service reform, 227, 229. 

Browne, T., congressman, opposes civil service re¬ 
form, an advocate of congressional patronage, 
35, 49,112; opposes appointment of Cravens, 84; 
secures appointment of Marsh as postmaster 
at Portland, Ind., 89; controls post-office of 
Knightstown, Ind., 118; given patronage bv Har¬ 
rison, 240; patronage of,410, 411,419,420.421,422; 
and postmastership of Madison, Ind., 393. 

Brown, J. B., editor opposed to Congressman Hitt. 
110 . 

Brown. J.D., postmaster in Harrison county, la., 
a political w'orker, 260. 

Brown, L. H., journalist, postmaster atHammonds- 
port, N. Y.. 155. 

Brown, L. W., United States consul to Glasgow, po¬ 
litical worker, 390. 

Browne, W., postmaster at Russellville, Ind., re¬ 
moved. 89. 

Brown, R. B., editor, given office by Governor For- 
aker. 301. 

Brown. T. H., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 834. 

Brown, V. H., Cunard agent in New York City, 
surety for Collector Fassett, 258. 

Brown, W., warden of Sing Sing prison, worker for 
Hill, 309. 

Brown, W. L., state senator (N. Y.), recommends 
“Paddy” Divver for police justice, 184. 

Brown, W. L., and Fassett, collector at New York 
City. 258. 

Brown, W. W.. railroad mail qmploye, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Brown, Z.. praises Civil Service Chronicle. 110. 

Brownsville. Texas, Customs Collector Rentfrow 
at, a political worker, 150; custom house at not 
classified, number of employes in, 277. 

Bruce. B. K.. negro, register of deeds in District of 
Columbia, works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 
3.37.344,345; political worker, 362, 382, 389. 

Bruder, C. F.. at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Brugman, Dr. A. F., 355. 

Brules, Indians, rising at Pine Ridge. S. Dak., 218. 

Bruner, E.. sells city offices in San Francisco. 215. 

Brunt, J. R., postmaster at Osage Mission, Kan., 
removed after four years’ service, second com¬ 
mission unexpired ; Park appointed. 187, 188. 

Brush, W. T., advises bribery to aid republicans in 
Indiana. 190,191. 21.3. 

Bryant, M. B., at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Bryant, W, C., political worker, see Kings county, 
N. Y. 

Brydia, C. S., editor, appointed postmaster at Sau- 
nemin. Ill., 141. 

Brynildsen. J., journalist, postmaster at Graceville, 
Minn.. 149. 

Bryson, Commodore, testimony of regarding Kit¬ 
tery navy yard, 147. 

Buchanan,United States marshal, active politician, 

143. 

Buchannan, C. N., solicits political assessments.' 
see Kentucky. 

Buchanan, G., navy yard employe, in New York 
convention. 335. 

Buchanan, G. A., special treasury agent, political 
worker in New York, 336. 


/ 














INDEX. 


V 


Buchanan, G. N., deputy collector internal reve¬ 
nue in Mississippi, delegate for Harrison at 
Minneapolis. 344, 348. 

Buchanan, J., President, civil service under, 124; 
spoils system under, 405. 

Bucher, G. F., postmaster at Carroll, Ill., works for 
Hitt, 136. 

Buck, applicant for postmaster of Portland, Ind., 
88 . 


Buck, A. E., United States marshal, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Bucyrus, O., Journalist Hailey postmaster at, 
through Senator Sherman, 149, 301. 

Budd, J. B , federal employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention. 348. 

Bueman, pension examiner in Indiana, political 
worker, 380. 

Buffalo, N. Y., addresses by Loomis and Shephard 
before Central Labor Union of, 44; common 
council of disregards New York civil service 
law, 161; account of caucuses in. 196,1»7; nine- 
tenths of city offices outside of educational de¬ 
partment covered by New York civil service 
act, 200; Civil service reform in city offices in, 
212 ; merit system in use in city offices at, 220; 
labor organizations of support civil service re¬ 
form, 228; Morgan, customs collector at, a po¬ 
litical worker, 265; civil service reform victo¬ 
ries in city service of, 273; custom house at 
not classified, number of employes in, 277; 
civil service reform established In, 286; civil 
service law in city departments of upheld, 281; 
census of 1890 not well conducted at, 293; post¬ 
master and post-officeemployesof paypolitical 
assessments, 391; memorial of G. W. Curtis 
adopted by civil service reform association 
of, 394; civil service reform afsociation of 
gives aid to Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle, eighth annual meeting, 32; civil 
service reform association of. annual meeting 
1890,137, active,161; addressof Rogers,president, 
list of officers of, 189, 200; annual meeting, 1891, 
thanks Secretary Tracy and Congressman 
Lodge, city government of applies merit sys¬ 
tem, 238; 'Express objects to patronage and 
spoils system, 66; Sunday Truth (labor) favors 
civil service reform, 84; Commercial (republi¬ 
can), civil service reform a humbug, 92. 

Bull. Sitting, see Indian service, 182. 

Bunce, F. M., naval officer, on board to examine 
applicants for positions in navy yard at Brook¬ 
lyn, N. Y., 222. 

Bundy, H. E., postmaster at Oneonta, N. Y., re¬ 
moved on secret charges, 176. 

Burchell, United States marshal, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 344. 

Burchett, D. J.. United States marshal, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Burchinsl, W. D., surveyor of port of Baltimore, in 
Maryland convention, 3.35. 

Burden, H., fish commissioner of New York, re¬ 
signs, 310. 

Burdett, J. O., chairman Massachusetts republican 
state committee, signs petition for larger appro¬ 
priation for civil service commission, 102. 

Burdick, S., and political assessments, 884. 

Burgess, A., office-seeker, 15. 

Burgess. C. A., candidate for postmaster at New- 
tonville. Mass., 100. 

Burgess, H., political worker, 280. 

Burit, J., federal employe, at Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 344. . ^ t „ 

Burkdall, coiner of New Orleans mint, refuses to 
allow political assessments to be made in his 
department, 383 , 384. 

Burke. C. J., editor, appointed postmaster at Olln, 


Iowa, 142. , „ ,, , 

Jurke, D. F., assistant appraiser at New York, 
sisted at dinner to Clarkson, 245; federal offi¬ 
cial, political worker, 287; internal revenue 
collector, in New York convention. 335; assist¬ 
ant appraiser at New York City, at Minneapolis 
convention, 343. . 

lurke, state senator of Indiana, votes against bill 
for non-partisan control of state charitable in¬ 
stitutions, see Magee. 201; low politician and 
SDoilsman. see, also, Magee, 212; candidate for 
U. S. district attorney of Indiana, spoilsman, 
unfit. 414. , . 1 . Anr 

lurke.J., page in Indiana legislature, 406. 

lurke, J. F.. candidate for alderman, see Buffalo, 
N. Y. 197. 

iurke. Penn, postmaster at, see Brosius. 72. 

lurleigh, governor, of Maine, congressional can¬ 
didate. opposing Manley, 364 

lurleigh. H. J., congressman, 3.54. , . 

lurlington Hawkeye, advocates repeal of civil 
8 ©i*vic© 49. 

lurlington. Kansas, Lockwood, postmaster at, re¬ 
moved, Lane appointed, see Kelly. i88- 

lurlington. Vt., customs district of, classified 1883, 


fnette, W.S.R.. postmaster in Jackson county, 
owa. a political worker. 260. 

18 . councilman of Indianapolis, supports Fire- 
Is.'c.S^mpioye^ia naval office, see Baltimore 

mlW^i^ostm’aster at Plymouth, Massachusetts, 
0 be removed for 

A., spoils system attributed to, 262. 

’ C A deputy collector at New York City, 
’ayspolitical assessments, 279; political worker. 

eli, O. B., clerk in Indiana senate, 403. 


Burris, 8. P., protectionist democrat, appointed 

postmaster at Talladega, Alabama, vice-, 

removed for political reasons, 186. 

Burroughs, G., journalist, postmaster at Hope, Kan¬ 
sas, 149. 

Burroughs, J. C., congressman, 279, 362. 

Burrows, L. G., editor, applicant for postmaster¬ 
ship of Lanark, Carroll county, Illinois, 109. 

Burt, naval officer at New York, favors merit sys¬ 
tem, removed by Arthur, re appointed by Cleve¬ 
land, removed by Harrison, 52; removal of, 68, 
94, 106,107, 173, 237,282; cessation of political as¬ 
sessments under, 97; naval officer at New York 
removed for political reasons through influence 
of Platt. 868. 

Burtin, J. S., United States marshal, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 844,348. 

Burton, J., journalist, postmaster at Jamestown, 
Kan., 149. 

Buser, E. W., journalist, postmaster at Dawson, 
Neb., 149. 

Bush, C. C., heavily endorsed political worker, ap¬ 
pointed postmaster at Reading, Cal., 186.187. 

Bush, speaker, coirupt politician of New York, 318. 

Bushnel, A. S., political worker in Ohio. 280. 

Bushnell, Rev. H., opposes spoils system. 77. 

Bushong, deputy city clerk at Indianapolis, 207. 

Buskirk, low police justice at Indianapolis. 814. 

Buskirk, given place of page in Indiana legislature, 
406. 


Bussey, C., assistant secretary of interior, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 279, 370. 

Butler, comptioller, confidence of, and W. P. Mon¬ 
tague, 56. 

Butler, politician, see Brooklyn navy yard, 45. 

Butler, appointed postmaster at Weeping Water, 
Neb., vice Ratnour removed. 175. 

Butler, unfit consul-general to Egypt under Grant, 
191. 

Butler, Dr. C.S., civil service reformer of Buffalo, 
N. Y., 200. 

Butler, Itid., Jones, postmaster of, political worker, 
379, 380. 

Butler, J. M., and Plattism. 281. 

Butler, N. C., member local examining board at In¬ 
dianapolis, 18, 42, 120, 129, 186; officer Indiana 
civil service reform association, 108; clerk 
United States courtat Indianspolis, favors civil 
service reform, speech of at Roosevelt dinner, 
227, 229, 230. 

Butler, R. R.. recommended for commissioner of 
Indian affairs, unfit, 14. 

Butler, S., bond of office of, secured by convicted 
briber Kemble, 152. 

Butler, senator, favors civil service reform, 120. 


Butler, T., editor, appointed postmaster at Hunt¬ 
ington, Ind.. resigns, 126, 377. 

Butterfield, A. H., editor, given federal office, 126. 

Butterworth,congressman, spoilsman, 15,24 ; mem¬ 
ber house committeeon civil service, 86; favors 
civil service reform, 119, 120, 124, 204, 211; on 
tariff, 169. 

Buttling, W. J., political worker, 182,183. 

Buttrick. postmaster at Concord, Mass., recom¬ 
mended for re-appointment, 100. 

Byerly, see VVarmouth, 105. 

Bynum, W. D., congressman spoilsman, 108; spoils¬ 
man, able and unscrupulous. 171; patronage of, 
892, 405. 410, 418,419, 420,421, 422. 

Byrnes, police inspector in New York City, 249; po¬ 
lice inspector in New York City recognizee 
thieves among census enumerators, 294. 

Caberton. W. B., naval officer, on board to examine 
applicants for positions in navy yard at Brook¬ 
lyn. N. Y., 222. 

Cabinet, and office-seekers, 6; President Harri¬ 
son, composed entirely of spoilsmen, 27. 

Cable, postmaster of Hartford City, Ind., political 
worker. 379. 

Cable, postmaster at Oswego, N. Y.. removed, li. 

Caddy, C. B., editor, appointed postmaster at Pen¬ 
dleton, Ind., 126, 377. I T,T 

Cadmus. W. H. N., political worker for Nathan; 
see Kings county, N. Y.; political worker, 
183. 304. ,, 

Cad wall ad er, R. H., journalist, postmaster at Louls- 
burg, Kan., 149. 

Cady, J. R.. judge, in New York convention, 33o. 

Cain, P., postmaster at Fort Dodge, Iowa, asked to 
resign, 165. 

Caldwell, congressman, sroilsman, 15, 24. 

Calhoun, see Illinois Senators Farwell and Cul- 

California, republican platform, 1884, demands 
civil service reform, 50. , j 

Calkins W. H., Gresham supporter, appointed 
United States judge in Washington territory, 
240 377 

Call, senator, on examinations for civil service, 
118 

Callan, N, prize-fighter, appointed on police force 

CallowTv°.”Neb.,’journali8t Mair postmaster at, 149. 

Cambria'Co , Pa., purchase of, by republicans, ip. 

CambHdge. Mass.; Civil Service Reiorm Associa- 
“ion- resolutions of, on removal of Postmaster 
Pearson, 23; address befo^ civil ser^vice re^ 
form association of, by J. R. 
aprvlre reform association and President Hsr- 
dsonron lnXn and other service, 202, 204,205; 
civil service reform association 
ecutlve committee of, on circulation of Civil 
Service Record, 1891, 239; civil service reform 
association urges ex^nsion of 
Indian service, 273; Aierit system in city offices 


of, 172; no appointive officer at, allowed to work 
politically, 358. 

Cambridge, Ohio, brother of Editor Taylor, post¬ 
master at, 301. 

Cameron, senator, influence of destroyed by Sen¬ 
ator Quay, 30; controls patronage in Pennsyl¬ 
vania, superseded by Senator Quay, 34; and 
patronage in Pennsylvania, 47, 72, 133, 162, 329; 
and Quay, 105, 245, 252, 305; confers with In¬ 
ternational Revenue Collector Martin, 183; en¬ 
dorses Martin, low politician, for collector in¬ 
ternal revenuein Pennsylvania, 233; supporter 
of Blaine, 344; spoilsman, 413; spoilsman con¬ 
trolled patronage of Pennsylvania, 34. 

Campaign of 1884, objection to scholars in politics 
in, see addiess of Parr, Prof. S. S., 8; residen¬ 
tial, effect of on civil service reform in Indian¬ 
apolis fire department, 13. 

Campbell, correspondence with Congressman 
Banks, 31. 

Campbell, and collectorshlp of customs at Chicago, 
47; candidate of Senator Farwell for Chicago 
collectorshlp, 9.5. 

Campbell, B. F., political worker for Harrison, 260. 

Campbell. F., New York state controller, spoils¬ 
man, 356. 

Campbell. J. E., ex-governor of Ohio, and Steven¬ 
son, 375; ex governor of Ohio favors a clean 
sweep, 396,408. 

Campbell, W. H., receiver of political assessments, 
391. 

Campbell, W. J., chairman republican national 
committee and Harrison, 854. 

Campbell, W. P., promotion of, 136. 

Cauaday, sergeaut-at-arms, opposes Quay’s wishes, 
removes Mann, a page, 160. 

Canandaigua, N. Y., Journalist Milliken, postmas¬ 
ter at, 155. 

Candler,congressman and post-office at South Farm¬ 
ington, Mass., 99; ex-congressman works for re¬ 
appointment of democrat Morgan, postmaster 
at Newton, Mass., 224. 

Cannelton, Ind , post-office, 25; editor appointed 
postmaster at, 37; post-office at, see Clarkson, 54; 
Isabella De La Hunt appointed postmaster of 
by Arthur, removed by Cleveland, office given 
to editor; President Harrison refuses to re-ap¬ 
point. 368; Zimmerman, postmaster of, political 
worker, 380. 

Cannon, congressman, and the second audltorship, 
6 ; contest of with Illinois senators over ap¬ 
pointment of Wilcox, 31; opposed to civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 30. 35,49, 202, 204, 211; obtains reduc¬ 
tion of salaries of democratic clerks opposed 
to him, 39; controls delegates for renomina¬ 
tion, 160; forces of Catherwood, postmaster at 
Hoopeston, 111.. 165; a machine candidate. 179. 

Cannon. J. A., candidate for postmaster at Kings¬ 
ton, Mo., 132. 

Canton, Conn., postmaster at, to be reappointed, 91. 

Canton, Kan., Journalist Davis appointed, 148. 

Cape Vincent, N. Y.. Morse customs collector of, a 
political worker, see, also, Jefferson county, 
N. Y., 266; number employes in customhouse 
at, not classified. 277 

Capen, S. B., defends Cleveland’s management of 
Indian service. 219. 

Cappeler. W. S., editor, given office by Governor 
Foraker, 301. 

Carbondale, Kan., Journalist Playford postmaster 
at, 148. 

Cardozo. Judge, see Hill, 306. 

Curdwill. G B., favors civil service reform. 229. 

Carl. F. M., journalist, postmaster at Navarre, O., 
149. 

Carmer, W’illiam, see Cannon, .39. 

Carmonche, L. B.. federal employe, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Carnahan. Gen. J. R., misrepresents civil service 
examinations, 79. 

Carpenter, postmaster, removed for political rea¬ 
sons, 22. 

Carpenter, postmaster at Flushing, L. I., removed 
for refusing to become a spoilsman, 91. 

Carpenter, A. H. W., postmaster at New Bedford. 
Mass., removed without investigation of secret 
charges. 175, 176. 

Carpenter. C. C.. postmaster at Fort Dodge, Iowa, 
a political worker. 260. 

Carpenter, M., and Petraff. 152. 

Carr, Archie,special agent for interior department, 
worker for Filly machine. 150. 

Carr. B., worker for Harrison. 240; works for Har¬ 
rison at Minneapolis. 343, ,379. 

Carr, C. E., minister to Denmark, calls on Chair¬ 
man Carter, 361; United States minister to Den¬ 
mark, political worker, .382. 

Carr, J. P.. editor, appointed postmaster at Oxford. 
Ind., 126. 377. 

Carriers, questions used in examination for, at 
Indianapolis, August 6,18*9, 56, 57, 58. 

Carroll. Co., Ind., see Fawcett, letter of, 98. 

Carroll, F. J., ward politician, see New York City. 

Carroll, Ill., Postmaster Bucher of, works for Hitt, 
136. 

Carroll, Iowa, Journalist Hungerford appointed 
postmaster at, 141. 

Carroll, J., low politician,see Hudson county. New' 
York. , _ 

Carroll, L., candidate for postmaster of Concord, 
Ind , supported bv State Senator Chandler, op¬ 
posed by State Senator Corning, 72. 

Carrollton, Ill., Postmaster Smith of, removed 
through influence of Senator Cullom, 188. 















VI 


INDEX. 


Carrollton, Ohio, son of Editor Tripp, postmaster 
at, 301. 

Carruua, Ind., Bachman postmaster of, political 
worker, 37y, 380. 

Carson, J. M., on Martin, low politician, see. 

Carson, F., ward politician of Indianapolis, see 
Parnell Hall. 

Carson, F. S., 89. 

Carter J.S., Mtchener’s candidate, 144, 377; land 
commissioner, works for Harrison at Minneap¬ 
olis. 337,339,342.344; worker for Harrison, 354 ; 
chairman republiean national committee, con¬ 
fers with Flatt, 359. 360, 361; gets list.s of federal 
employes for assessment purposes, 363; chair¬ 
man republican national committee, and politi¬ 
cal assessments, 382; chairman, etc., confers 
with Quay, 390, 406. 

Carthage, lud., Editor Charles appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 126, 377. 

Cartwright. C. M., journalist, postmaster at Hun¬ 
ter, N. Y., 155. 

Carver, opponent of Mahone. 52. 

Cary. E., address of before annual meeting nation¬ 
al league, noticed, 269; on committee of nation¬ 
al league to iiiv.'stigate interference of office¬ 
holders, 319,320, 338; on committee of publica¬ 
tion of Good Government, 357. 

Case, F. P., political worker for Dazell, 299. 

Casebee, J., journalist, postmaster at Casper, Wyo., 
155. 

Casey, brother-in law of President Grant, a federal 
officer at New Orleans, 191. 

Casey, Iowa. Martha Cowman, wife of Editor Cow¬ 
man, appointed postmaster at. 142. 

Casper, Wyo., Journalist Casebee postmaster at, 
155. 

Cass, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in, 407. 

Catherwood, J. S., postmaster at Hoopeston, Ill., 
forced to resign, 165. 

Catholics and citizenship, see also church, 97. 

Catterson, R., on committee of public safety at In¬ 
dianapolis, see equally divided politically, 212, 
220 . 

Cavauaugh, employe in post-office at Pittsburgh, 
dismissed without cause. 133. 

Cavanaugh, deputy sergeant-at arms in house of 
representatives, removed for political reasons, 
250. 

Cavanaugh, J. P., recommends O’Donnell, 59. 

Cavour. builds up Italy. 244. 

Cedar Rapids. la., Daniels, postmaster at. 262; Lin¬ 
coln, postmaster of, political worker. 370. 

Cedar Rapids, la . Gazette, civil service reform 
honesty in politics. 92; on using postmasters as 
political agents, 262. 

Census of 1890, not trustworthy, 173; act providing 
for requires selection of supervisors with refer¬ 
ence to fitness and not to party affiliations, 292; 
civil service reform in, 19; no examination nec¬ 
essary, 49; disposal of offices in, see Porter. 72; 
made common spoil, 94; filled by republicans, 
112; appointments to in Indianapolis made 
by Moores. 129; places in given as spoil. 131; 
spoils methods allowed by Superintendent For 
ter in, 157 ; in England, absence of spoils meth- 
odsin.157; appointment8defended.l82. appoint 
ments to. discord over, 183; examinations for 
clerkships in. alleged to be-hebt, 190; investi¬ 
gation oi feared by Superintendent Porter, 233. 
234; corruption and apoilssystem in,260; turned 
over to spoil, 288; investigation of reform in. 
by official committee of national league, 291. 
29); enumeraters used to get lists of voters. 
293: refuses request for recount of New York 
city, 294; civil service reform in under Harri¬ 
son, 372. 

Central Labor Union of Buffalo. N. Y., addresses 
before, see Loomis and Shepard. 44. 

Central Park, N. Y., “race course” bill, 320. 

“Century of dishonor, a.” in Indian service, 182. 

Certificates of good character abolished. 34. 

Chadron, Neb., removal on secret charges of Wil¬ 
son, postmaster at, 175. 

Chadwick. Rev. J. W., advocates civil service re¬ 
form. 48, 82. 

Chadwick, F. E., naval officer on board to exam¬ 
ine applicants for positions in navy yard at 
Brooklyn, New York, 222. 

Challis, F. H.. editor, disappointed candidate for 
deputy collectorshlp. 84. 

Chambers, L. C., journalist, postmaster at Liberty, 
Texas, 155. 

Chambers, Smiley N., reasons for appointing as 
United States district attorney, 7; appointed 
United States district attorney for Indiana, 14; 
and post office at Vincennes. Ind., 37: uses in¬ 
fluence for appointment of Throop, .59; and W. 
W. Dudley. 78. 374; case of, 94; speech of, re¬ 
garding bribery, 154; a political worker; ex¬ 
tracts from speech of, on democratic corrup¬ 
tion. 1-58, 219; an active politician. 162; worker 
for Harrison. 316. 317. 334; works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 3:37, 343; political worker, 353, 362; 
370, 377, 378, 380, 381. 389. 

Champaign. Ill., Spaulding appointed postmaster 
at, 38 

Chance, M., United States inspector of immigra¬ 
tion, at convention republican league, 259. 

Chandler. C., reports to Mavor Grant on street 
cleaning in New Y'ork, advises merit system, 
220 . 221 . 

Chandler, state senator, and Concord, Ind., post- 
mastership, 72. 


Chandler, state senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 407, 
408. 

Chandler, congressman, civil service reform a 
fraud, 73. 

Chandler, and re-appointment of Turner as post¬ 
master at NewtonVIlie. Mass , 100. 

Chandler, senator, works for J. B. bmith, 143. 

Chandler, senator, controls patronage ot navy yard 
at Kittery, Maine, 148; spoi sman, 160 supports 
Blaine, 1892, 340; controls patronage of New 
Hampshire, 340. 

Chandler, W., candidate for constable; see Buf¬ 
falo, N. Y., 197. 

Chapin, mayor of Brooklyn, and civil service re¬ 
form, 82. 

Chapin, A. C., and Hill, 356. 

Chapin, E. B., editor, appointed postmaster at To- 
lona. 111., 141. 

Chapin, L. F., applicant for postmaster at Green- 
castle, Ind , 89. 

Chapin, ex-mayor of Brooklyn, N. Y’., opposes 
McLaughlin, 318, 319. 

Chapman, B. 8., postmaster at Derby, la., a politi¬ 
cal worker, ;200. 

Chardon, O., Editor Converse appointed postmaster 
at, 301. 

Charity Organization of Indianapolis, 111. 

Charles, E., editor, appointed postmaster at Car¬ 
thage, Ind., 126, 377. 

Charlestown, navy yard at, patronageof, controlled 
by Congressman Lodge, 69; clean sweep in 
navy yard at by President Cleveland, 69; navy 
yard at, conduct of Tracy in, 153: state legisla 
lure urges legislation to secure merit system to 
navy yard at and elsewhere. 274. 

Charleston, S. C., Crum, negro, nominated as post¬ 
master at for vote at Minneapolis, not con¬ 
firmed, 363. 

Charlotte, N. C., Brady postmaster at, Harrison 
delegate, 334; Brady, postmaster of delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Charlton, T. .1., 399. 

Charter, of Indianapolis, requires application of 
merit system to all city departments except 
fire and police, 243. 

Chase, secretary, opinion of civil service reform, 
39. 

Chase, appointment of condemned, 51. 

Chase, D. C , federal officer in Hamilton county, 
la., a political worker. 260. 

Chase, 1. J.. see Russellville, Ind.. 89. 

Chase, I., favored by Harrison for governor of In¬ 
diana. 343, 347. 

Chase, governor, candidate for re-election, of In¬ 
diana, and Ransdell, 352, 353: a candidate for 
governor of Indiana, and administration, 320, 
379; opposed by United States District Attorney 
Chambers and his assistant Cockium. 381. 

Chase. Kan.. Journalist Lomau postmaster at. 148. 

Chase, R. H, journalist,postmaster at Ludell, Kan., 
149 

Chase, S. H., ex-judge, a political worker for Harri¬ 
son, 260. 

Chatham, J. J., journalist, postmaster at Nogales, 
Ariz., 155. 

Cheadle, congressman and candidates for postmas- 
master at Noblesville. Ind , appoints Royer, 
47, 89; spoilsman. 55.85.92, 145; applicants for 
postmaster at Lafayette. Ind., 71, 84; endeavors 
to repeal civil service law. 77.112; recommends 
MacDonald, 84; secures appointment of D. V\. 
Fleming,84; opposes appointment of Cravens, 
84; supports Garrigus, coirupt politician, 88; 
opposes civjl service commission. 119; against 
civil service reform 122; defeat o-f for renominn- 
tion, 129; and post-offlee at New Hall, Ind., 149; 
opposed to civil service law, 153; snubbed by- 
Harrison when asks for patronage, 240; opposes 
Harrison, 317; denied patronage in Indiana,377. 

Cheatham, congressman, secures nomination to 
office for Young, ward politician. 183. 

Cheatham, H. P., negro, worker for Harrison in N. 
Carolina, 334. 

Cheek, J. A., Harrison delegate from N. Carolina, 
334. 

Chelsea, Mass., Gazette, denounces civil service re¬ 
form as claptrap, 364. 

Chemung Co., N Y., republican convention of to 
nominate delegates, fights against Fassett and 
Platt, 259; factional fights in. 304; canal rob¬ 
bery. see Hill. 306; factional republican quar¬ 
rels in. Collector Fassett and. 374. 

Cheney, ex-governor of New Hampshire, 143. 

Cheney, pension agent, active politician, 143. 

Chester. A., candidate of Draper faction at Al¬ 
bany, N. Y., see Draper, 46. 

Cheney, 291. 

Cheney, J. C.. political worker. 354; president In¬ 
diana republican club at Washington, com¬ 
posed of federal employes, 382. 

Cheney, N. M., journalist, postmaster at La Porte, 
Pa., 149. 

Cheney, O A., journalist, postmaster at Pitrodle, S. 
Dak., 15i5. 

Cheraw. S. C., disreputable character appointed 
postmaster at. 55. 

Chester county. Pa., applicants for post-offices in 
subservient to their congressman, 55; defeat of 
Delamater in. 134. 

Chestnut Level, Pa., post-office at. see Brosius, 72. 

Chicago. 111., collectorshlp of customs at, see Nix¬ 
on, 47; civil service in post-office at, 95; per cent, 
removals in classified and unclassified serrvice 
in post-office at, 185; customs district of, class¬ 
ified 1883,276; convention, 356. 


Chicago Standard, advocates civil service reform, 
evils oi patronage system, 80. 

Chicago Tribune [republican], advises Harrison to 
pay no attention to office seekers, 65. 

Chicago News, on corrupt politics and politicians 
of Indianapolis, see also Indianapolis. 206. 

Child, S. M, postmaster in Harrison post-office, la., 
a political worker, 260. 

Child, T. A. prt-miuent Ohio republican, and dis¬ 
missals from government printing office. 234. 

Childs, postmaster at Brattleboro, Vt.. endorsed 
lor reappointment, 100; caucus on question of 
reappointment, 108. 

Chile, see Balmaceda, 282. 

Chittenden, opposed to spoils system, 251. 

Chiviugton, Col., Journalist Liggett appointed 
postmaster at, 141. 

Choate, R., and Webster, 324. 

Chrisman, aided by Senator Farwell for collector- 
' ship of Chicago, 14. 

Christian Leader, and Pearson, postmaster at New 
York, advocates civil service reform, 30. 

Christian Union, on Postmaster Pearson of New 
York, 43; objects to “Quayism” and Clarkson, 
267. 

Chubb, H. S., federal officer, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Church. Dr. S., police examiner at Brooklyn, N. 
Y., 222. 

Churchill, F., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 
brother of postmaster, c348. 

Church, and politics, see, also, Crosby, 155,156, 257; 
ana civil service relorm, see Lambert; see 
names of clergymen; appeal to clergy to 
preach on, see Welsh, 40; and civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 48, 56, 65, 73, 74, 102, 190, 193; see 
Learned, Kaufman, Hickok, Richmond, Weath- 
erby, McKnight. McDuffy and Applegarth, 81; 
see Nelson, Smyth, Dix, Collyer, Chadwick, 
Huntington, Tuttle, Nickols. Rhodes, Holland, 
Snyder. Noble, Wilson, Prudden, Hall, Rev.H., 
81; see Roosevelt, dinner to, at Indianapolis, 
227. 229; see minister as citizen, 239. 

Church, Catholic, opposed to appointment of In¬ 
dian Commissioner Morgan,79; and civil serv¬ 
ice reform. 137. 

Cincinnati, Ohio, municipal patronageof. control 
by Governor F’oraker, 71; meeting at. of league 
ot republican clubs: election of Clarkson as 
president, 219; spoils system must be kept out 
of new charter for. 235; Smith, customs collec¬ 
tor at, political worker for Sherman. 249; merit 
system in post-office at.257. 3-55; Zumstein, post¬ 
master of, carries out spirit of civil service law, 
257; custom house -at. not classified, number of 
employes in. 277; Tammany against Sherman, 
297; Tammany. 301, 302; postmaster and collec¬ 
tor at, political w’orktrs for Sherman, 302; re¬ 
formers in.optosed by united republican and 
democratic machines. :152. 

Cincinnati Commercial-Gazette [republican], re¬ 
joices in rate of removals, 49; attributes defeat 
to patronage. 65. 

Cincinnati Times-Star [republican], on civil serv¬ 
ice reform. 92. 

Circleville, Ohio, editor, appointed postmaster at. 
301. 

Civil service, congress,.and, 86; federal report on, 
in Indiana, 3886. 87; statistics given by Moore, 
M. C.. regarding. 123. 

Civil service commission of Brooklyn, report of for 
3889, 352; examination questions commended, 
239; of Massachusetts, examinations of, 74; ex¬ 
amines applicants for e'erkships in census serv¬ 
ice,190; reportof,ii2; sixth annual report of. 152; 
seventh report of. showingprogressof reform in 
Massachusetts. 204; eighth report, 317; of New 
York City, 225; not very commendable. 2.39; of 
New York State, see Sickles, 34: report of. 92; 
seventh annual report of. 152: annual report of 
1890: statemtnt regarding extensions to state 
hospitals, 200; not very commendable, 239; 
Riley, chief examiner of, removed by Tam¬ 
many ; commission powerless to act, 414. 

Civil Service Commission, United States, 10; at 
Indianapolis, 25; Investigates at Indianapolis, 
25; investigates post-office at Indianapolis, 27; 
investigates custom bouse at New York City, 
and Trfiy (N. Y.) post-office. 29; Roosevelt and 
Sixth Auditor Coulter, 34; orders Tousey dis¬ 
missed from Indianapolis post-office, .34; keeps 
secret names of signers’ certificates, 34; secre¬ 
tary of investigates and makes umavorable 
report on post-office at Milw aukee, July. 3888; 
refuses request for special examination "of Col¬ 
lector Geer, of Port Huron, 86; should have 
authority to call and swear witnesses. 36; and 
New Y'ork custom house, Troy,N.Y., post-office, 
railroad mail service at Gra'nd Rapids. Mich., 
36; and Postmaster Van Cott. of New York, 42; 
and N. C. Butler and W. P. Fishback to local 
board at Indianapolis, 42; and Census Bureau, 
see Harrison,President. 42; permit publication 
of examinations questions, 53. 56. 57, ,58; of, 
appointed by Harrison, especiallv good, 59; ad¬ 
mirable. 65; endorsed, 66; and political assess¬ 
ments, 70; examinations under for vear ending 
June 30. 1888, 74; a humbug, 77; report of, 77; 
see Harrison. President. 81; and the .civil ser¬ 
vice, 86; and Mahone. 86; and eligible list, 93; 
petition for appropriation for, 93; petition for 
larger appropriation for started bv Massachu¬ 
setts Civil Service Reform Association, 102: in¬ 
vestigation of by congress, 3 33; report of on 
conduct of Milwaukee post-office by postmas- 










INDEX. 


Vll 


ter Paul, 103; undemocratic, see Cummings 
and Vance, lltj; debate over appropriation lur 
in douse of representatives, liy; investigation 
by congressional committee, 119; praised, see 
resolutions oi Indiana Civil Service Keiorm As¬ 
sociation, l.i0; Harrison requests aid for, 122; 
commended, see Missouri, civiJ service reform 
association of, lob; cbarges against, see Grosve- 
nor, Houk., and Koosevelt, Ho, IIG; investigates 
post-office at Pbiladelpbia, li4; 7tli auunal re¬ 
port OI, 184, 185, 18(5; cbarges of Wanamaker 
against, 185; examinations held in year 1889- 
9u by, appointments, 185 ; inefficient meib- 
ods of alleged, see Wanamaker, 193 ; oppo¬ 
sition to and cbarges against, see Cannon, 
Plumb, Grosveuor, 2 U 2 , 203, 204; treasury super¬ 
vising architect not obliged to accept subordi¬ 
nates provided through, out does, 224; poiiiics 
of applicants foroffice passing examinations of, 
unknown to, 224; exposes methods of Kaum, Jr., 
228; threatened by congress, 229; attacked by 
Clarkson, 230, 231; and prosecution of Kaum, 
238; attacked and defended, 250,251; examina¬ 
tions of ordered for promotions in VVashingtou 
offices, 254, 2(51; charges of favoritism of denied 
by Roosevelt, publicity of all documents and 
books Of promised, 2(5(5,2(57; under Presidents 
Arthur, Cleveland and Harrison, see also Grant 
and Hayes, 271, 272,273,274,275; first report 1884, 
extent of classiliecl service, 276; and violations 
of law in Omaha, Neb., post-office, 281; neces¬ 
sity of more money for, 282, 287, 288; eighth 
report of, 289; asks Harrison to order com¬ 
petitive examinations for census service, 292; 
requires physical examination in railway mail 
service, 305; praised by National league, 321; 
gives in ormation regarding political assess¬ 
ments to United States District Attorney Jolly, 
330; warning of, against political assessments, 
358; under Harrison, proposes extensions, 372; 
of House of Representatives and Baltimore in¬ 
vestigation, 373; discovers political assess¬ 
ments, 375, 383, 385; praised, 370; report of for 
1891-92, 396, 397. 

Civil service examinations, see examinations; de¬ 
fects in system of local boards, 1; publicity of 
examination papers and records urged, 1; ex 
aminatiousof little value, 69; for Brooklyn and 
New Vork City police lorce, worthless, 355, 356. 

Civil service commissioners, see Roosevelt Lyman. 
Thompson, Johnson, etc. 

Civil service law of States; of New York, Massa¬ 
chusetts and Pennsylvania, decisions and 
opinions of courts on, 44, 281; of New York 
disregarded by common council of Buffalo, N. 
Y., 161; of New York held valid by New York 
courts, 200; of Massachusetts, some features of, 
204; evasion of in New York City service, 319, 
320; of United States, see also Pendleton act; 
plan to evade, see Grosveuor, violations oi, 
see violations, 25; violations of in Milwaukee 
post-office, see Paul, postmaster, 36; and cen¬ 
sus bureau, see Harrison, President, 42; opin¬ 
ions of courts, 44; see Kwart, 47; obj-ction 
to by Congressman Hall, 47; opinions on, 
see Chandler, Reagan, Paysou, Cutchins. 
Dolph, Hitt, Simmonds, 73; see Pendleton 
and ttaton, 79; Senator Gorman opposed to, 79; 
broken at Milwaukee by postmaster under 
Cleveland, 103; opposed by Browne, 112; up¬ 
held, see Lodge, favored by Cleveland, 122; up¬ 
held, see Henderson, 122; opposed, see Cheadle 
and Grosveuor, 153: supported by Lodge and 
McKinley, M. G., 168, 169; rigidly observed in 
post-office at Indianapolis, 186; Raum attempts 
to override, 203; commended by Secretary 
Tracy, 221; Wanamaker’s evasion of defended 
by Gorman, 228; G. B. Raum, Jr.,sells privilege 
of selection under, 238; to be relaxed, to allow 
federal officers to work for Harrison, 240; and 
National League, 271; and the courts, 281; vio¬ 
lated in Alabama, 355; construed favoiably to 
Baltimore office-holders, politically active, 357, 
358; as construed by Judge Bradley, and As¬ 
sistant Attorney-General Tyner. 357, 358; Har¬ 
rison claims vigorous enforcement of, 306; 
should be extended, 5; not extended in appli¬ 
cation by Harrison, despite platform pledges, 
189 ; extension of, urged upon President Harri¬ 
son by Massachusetts republicans, see Lodge. 
Roosevelt. Rogers, Wolcott, 192: order of Presi¬ 
dent Harrison, extending it to part of Indian 
service. 221; President Harrison should put 
navy yards under, 222; extended by Cleveland 
to railway mail service, 224; extended by Haj 
rison to Indian service,2130: somewhatextended 
bv Harrison, 237; application of, only to federal 
offices having 50 employes, condemned, 238: 
extension of to all free delivery cities, requested 
by national convention oi letter carriers. 253; 
should be extended to post-office and navy de¬ 
partments. 257; extended to fish commission by 
Harrison. 332; extensions under Harrison, 371. 
372; extensions of. under Cleveland and Harri¬ 
son, 376; proposal to extend under Harrison, 
387: extended to all free delivery post-offices, 
and weather bureau service, 403; should be ex¬ 
tended wherever applicable. 413. 

Civil service law. repeal of, demanded, 49; attempt 
at, see Cheadle, 77; proposed by Senator Far- 
well and opposed, see Columbus Republican, 
83; unwise, see South Bend Times. 83; bill of 
Senator Paddock to withdraw railroad mall 
service from operation of, 92; desired, see Rich¬ 


ardson, 96: repeal of sought after, see Cheadle, 
congressman, 112; bills of republicans for, 358; 
bills for under Harrison, 388; bill of De Armond 
to suspend for first year of every president's 
term, 404. 

Civil service reform, and the public school, see 
Curtis,C. T. Lane, D. C. Brown, duty of teach¬ 
ers to enter polities, see address of Purr, Piof. 
S. 8.; relation of to other reforms, address by 

C. J. Bonaparte beioreauuual meeting National 
League 1890; ol prime importance, see bt. Louis 
Republic; favored by Massachusetts legisla¬ 
ture, see Boston and Cambridge; all other re¬ 
forms should be subordinated to, see bwift; 
morals of, see Blackford; advocated, see De¬ 
land; see Wirt, senator, addresses of;-news¬ 
papers devoted to, see good government. Civil 
bervice Record. Civin bERViCE Chronicle, 
Civil Service Reformer; see also patronage; see 
convention and platform; see press; and 
church, see church; see also address; in In¬ 
diana under Cleveland's first administration, 1; 
pledges of republican party of, see Foulke, W. 

D. , 4; how it can be accomplished (see address 
of Dabney, R. H.), 7; reasons for (see address 
of McKaiu, A. A.), 8; attitude of democratic 
party in Indiana to, see address of H. Briggs, 
8; movement for, if successful must be within 
party lines (see address oi Lane, C. R.), 8; and 
teachers, 11; in Indianapolis fire department, 
13; advocated by a proiessor, 16; advocated 
by a Clergyman, 16; and Postmaster General 
Dickinson, 18; opinions of, 18; and the post- 
offices, 18; and census bureau, 19; and Sen¬ 
ator Ingalls, 22; and the schools, by Brown, D. 
G., 23; movement for, stronger than ever, 
27; status of, 28; progress in extending in 
federal service, number of places covert d, 
examinations, persons examined, success¬ 
ful competitor, 32; under State laws, in 
New York, in Massachusetts, 32; Con¬ 
gressman Perkins opposed to, 35; opposed 
by Browne, Perkins, Cannon, Taylor, Houk, 35; 
objections to by Congressman Browne, 35; ob¬ 
jections to considered, 35; Congressman Can¬ 
non opposed to, .35; sentiment in favor of at 
Brookline, Mass., 36; necessary to improve 
condition of Indians, see Welsh, 39; opinion of, 
held by ex-becieiary Chase,39; see Hoar,43; con¬ 
troversy over, between Loomis and Buffalo 
Evening News, 44;objections to by Hall,Ewart, 
Taylor, Blair,Ingalls, Houk, Shearman,Evans, 
Cannon, Browne, Perkins,49;generalopposition 
to, resolution and newspaper condemnation 
of, 49; objections to by S. R. Stratton and fed¬ 
eration of republican clubs of 3d Maryland 
District, 49; favored by President Hayes, 50; 
pledges that President Harrison and cabinet 
to reform, 52; see Houk. Darlington, Evans, 
Shearman, Plumb, Harrison, Cleveland, 55; 
as a moral question, see Bonaparte. 59; ad¬ 
dress on by Lucius B. -'wift, 137; advocated 
by St. Louis Republic. 138; disregarded by ad¬ 
ministration of Harrison, see Pennsylvania, 
156; action of Harrison s administration in re¬ 
gard to condemned, 1.56; result of 1890 elections 
in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania strengthen 
cause of, 173; antagonism to, responsible for 
republican defeat of 1890, 173: election of 1890 
in New York, disastrous to, 170; advocated by 
Everett. 174; growth of sentiment for, sketched, 
174; circular letter of Cushing on. 174; hostility 
to of Clarkson and Wanamaker. 177; opposed by 
Houk, advocated by Senator Sherman. 177. 178; 
opposed, see Grosvenor, 178: see Cleveland. 
181; opposed by Clarkson and Wanamaker, 188; 
opposnd by Raum. commissioner of pensions. 
190; opposed by editorof Delphi Journal, a post¬ 
master, 191; (iisregarded by President Grant, 
191; an object lesson in, see Roosevelt. 192; 
President Harrison deserves some credit for. 
59; a necessity and a prime importance. 59; as 
a moral question, see Bonaparte. 60, 61: con¬ 
sidered a humbug by Ohio republicans. 62; de¬ 
nounced by republicans of West ‘Virginia, 62; 
Harrison not bound to enforce spirit of accord¬ 
ing to New York republicans. 62; denounced by 
Iowa republicans. 62; Neither party cares about 
it. see Indiana, 62; denounced in New Hamp¬ 
shire by republicans. 62; denounced as a sham 
by Pennsylvania republicans. 62; Maryland 
republican clubs denounce. 63: denounced by 
republican central committees in New York, 
63; in Massachusetts and Maryland under 
Cleveland, 63; disregarded by Harrison’s 
administration, 64: in Homiletic Re 
view for October, 1889, 65; advocated, 65; 
opinions on by republican papers, 65; opinions 
on, republican party pledged to, 66; plan for 
agitation of before National League, annual 
meeting, 1889.'66; opinion of Foraker on, 68; 
violation of Harrison’s promises of leads to re¬ 
publican defeat of 1889. 68: in Boston city 
service, 68; see Lodge. 69; in fire department 
at Indianapolis. 69; and fight against Gorman, 
in Maryland, State of. 70; not responsible for 
republican defeat of 1889. bnt patronage sys¬ 
tem. see Boston Transcript. 76; advocated by 
newspapers, 76; lecture on before students of 
Hanover College. Indiana, see Done]l,77; sup¬ 
ported by Pendleton. Willis. Cleveland. Bayard, 
Endicott, Whitney. Grace, Hewitt. Grant, Chap¬ 
in, O’Brien, 82; advocated, see Marion Chroni¬ 
cle, 83; advocated, see Logansport Journal, 83; 


favored by Indiana State republican press, 83; 
favored by Buffalo Sunday Truth, Labor, 84; 
"some popular objections to,” see Morton, 85; 
sham bills for, see Rosecraus, 85; favored, see 
Sperry, 91; and republican press, 92; session of 
bouse committee on, 96; methods used in East¬ 
ern Dispensary, New York City, 101; advocated, 
see Crooker, 102, advocated, see Bacon and 
Strong. 102; attitude of reformers to, see letter 
of G.W. Curtis, 103; sentiment favoring at In¬ 
diana State University and Franklin (Ind.) Col¬ 
lege, 108; sentiment favoring in Utah. Ill; some 
popular objections to, see Morton, 111, 115,116, 
117, 118, 119; growth of sentiment favoring, 119; 
advocated, see Butler, 120; opposed, see Perk¬ 
ins, Cheadle, Spinola, Grosvenor, 122, 123; 
advocated, see President Hayes. Moore, Green- 
halge. Hill. 123; opposed by Houk, Coleman, 
Duunell. Biggs, 1‘24, 125; advocated by Cutch- 
eon, Tracey. Butter worth, McKinley, McComas, 
124, 125; victory for in house of representatives, 
see Curtis. 125; ‘‘the scope and difficulties of,” 
see Bonaparte, 126, 127, 1*28; “morals of,” see 
Blackford, i:30; its later aspects, by W. D. 
Foulke. Economic Tract No. XXXI, 200; great 
progress of in citi< s of Massachusetts, 204; un¬ 
der Harrison and Cleveland compared, diverse 
opinions of Harper’s Weekly and Civil Serv¬ 
ice Chronicle, further funds for commission 
refused, 2ll; favored by Dawes, Butterworth 
and others, opposed by Cannon, 21i; in Massa¬ 
chusetts and New York cities, 212; all other re¬ 
forms should be subordinate to, 213.214; Thurs¬ 
ton, president league of republican clu bs speaks 
in favor of, 219; recognized as the leading 
issue by Massachusetts republicans. 219:-si- 
lence regarding, see Cleveland and Harrison, 
220; methods, use of advised in street cleaning 
department of New York and Indianapolis, 
see equally divided politically, 220. 221; Sec¬ 
retary of Navy VVhiiney secretly opposes, 222; 
in Washington, D C., in letters in Civil Service 
Record for Apiil, 1891. 224; op'postd by ana- 
maker, 224; popular in Indiana, federal, state 
officers, and citizens favoring. ‘227, 229; support¬ 
ed by labor organizations of Buffalo, New York, 
228: all other reforms should be subordinaied 
to, 228; favored, see Wilby. 235; pupils in Indi¬ 
ana schools know nothing about. ‘236; attitudes 
of Cleveland and Harrison toward.'-, compeared, 
237; the main issue, ‘244: favored by Chitten¬ 
den, 251; favored by Harrington, appointed 
chief of weather bureau, 253; favored by na¬ 
tional convention of fire superintendents, 253; 
advocated by Lowell. Jones, 254; present 
status of, by Rev. H. Lambert, criticised, 255: 
■advocated by M. Storey; ex-Secretary Bayard, 
257; D. B. Eaton, on, 257; pledges of republi¬ 
can party “not good after election,” 260; see 
address of Lambert, ‘261; as an issue, 261; 
address of Foulke on, before social science 
congress at Saratoga, 1891, 262. 263; practicabil¬ 
ity of conceded by highest public officers, 271; 
in Buffalo, N. Y. city offices. *273; advtcated in 
republican national platforms 1884, 1888. 275; 
praised by Cleveland, message 1886, by Win- 
dom, annual report 1889,276; status of, 282; un¬ 
der Harrison and Cleveland, 282, 283; in census 
service, see report, of National League act. 291, 
295; opposed by (‘ensus Superintendent Porter, 
‘292; favored by Public Service, 306; prize for 
essay on offered by W. G. Law. 308; bureau¬ 
cracy objection to compared to spoils system, 
308; opposed by Beard, collector at Boston, 322; 
favored by laborers, see Andrew.". 331; in re¬ 
publican national platform, 1892.337; Cleveland 
and Harrison compared,in regard to.338; in na¬ 
tional democratic platform 1888,1892, in Indiana 
statedemocraticand republican plattorme,1892, 
349: pledges of by Harrison, silence regaidiug 
in 1892, 357; under Cleveland and Harrison, 
strength of popular dislike for. 364; the 
real issue, 865; address on by G. W. Julian, 
365. 367, 370. 376; see Welsh. 366; under Cleve¬ 
land atid Harrison. 367,370; in letter of accept¬ 
ance of Cleveland 1892,375; under Harrison and 
Cleveland. 376; propects for under democratic 
administration, 388; under Hairison and Presi¬ 
dent-elect Cleveland, ;i89; O. T. Morion on, 396; 
in 1892, annual message of Harrison, 397; 
change of popular feeling regarding, 403. 

Civil service reform associations, see national 
league of. Cambridge. Boston. Indiana, Mary¬ 
land. New Haven, ^Massachusetts. New York, 
Buffalo. Brooklyn. Missouri. New ton. Pennsyl¬ 
vania. Bloomington, Philadelphia, Brookline, 
Milwaukee, civil service refotm association of; 
see also Malden, Geneva, N. Y .Lawrence. Kan. 

Civil Service Chronicle, opinions of by Indiana 
newspapers. 13; non-partisan, intends to advo¬ 
cate only civil service reform. 42; opinions of, 
110; sent to college libraries. 192; policy of, 235. 

Civil Service Record, Boston, March, 1889, 2; for 
April. 1889, plan for treatment of foutth-class 
postmasters, 18: articles in on civil service re¬ 
form in Boston police force, 1(4; D B. Eaton 
in, on removal of Saltonstall, 105; and growth 
of sentiment favoring merit system, 119; and 
Brooklyn, N. Y., navy yard under Secretary 
Whitney, 148; Illustrates civil service labor ex¬ 
aminations, 152; for October, 1890, contains 
speeches before National League meeting, 
1890, 162; exposes methods of Porter, superin¬ 
tendent of census. 190; on reform bill intro¬ 
duced in Pennsylvania legislature, 204; on 




















viii 


Flower’s condemnation of congressional pat¬ 
ronage, 204; condemns removal of Corse, post¬ 
master at Boston, 215; prints examination pa¬ 
pers of national census bureau and of Massa¬ 
chusetts census department for employes, 
April, 1891, 219,220; for April, 1891, contains let¬ 
ters on merit system in Washington, D. C., 224; 
ou examination questions used in navy yard at 
Brooklyn, N. Y.,under Tracy, 236; commended, 
completes tenth year, E. B. Greene makes in¬ 
dex for, 237; circulation of, 1891, 239; on 

“bosses,” 251; on spoils system, 201; merges 
with Civil Service Reformer into Good Govern¬ 
ment, 357. 

Civil Service Reformer, Baltimore, March 1889,2; 
article in advocating clerical advocacy of civil 
service reform, 30; on political assessments at 
Baltimore, 162; prints specimen applications 
for ollice of those failing to pass examinations, 
ou abuse of census service, 204; ou evil effects 
of patronage ou schools of Baltimore, 211; for 
March, 1891, exposes Gorman, 214; for March, 
1891,ou corruption in politics, 214, 215; ou Gor¬ 
man, 219; on common cause among spoilsmen, 
228; commended,237; merges with Civil Service 
Record into Good Government, 357. 

Clahiu, W., ex-Goveruor of Massachusetts, signs 
petition for larger appropriation for civil serv¬ 
ice committee. 102 . 

Clapp. A. M., and political assessments, 287. 

Clarion, Iowa, Editor Harwood appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 141. 

Clarion, Ba., Journalist Patrick, postmaster at, 149. 

Clark, Alderman, of Indianapolis, supports Fire- 
Chief W'ebsier, 208. 

Clark, collector at Chicago, 95. 

Clark, ex-collector of customs at El Paso, Tex., 266. 

Clark, Hr., New-Y^ork assemblyman, introduces 
bill for municipal reform in Oswego, N. Y.,415. 

Clark, A. B., otiicer Indiana civil service reform 
association, 108. 

Clark, A. B., editor, disappointed office-seeker, op¬ 
poses Sherman, 301. 

Clark, E. P., on Jacksonian “rotation” scheme, in 
August, 1891, Forum, 257. 

Clark, G. W., politician, and post-office at Rochelle, 
Ill.. 109. 

Clark, H.. ward politician, see Buffalo, N. Y.; see 
Hill, 307. 

Clark, J., candidate as second auditor, 6. 

Clark, J. H., political worker, 160. 

Clark, M. H., in New York convention, 335. 

Clarkson, C., private secretary to J. S. Clarkson, 175. 

Clarkson, J. S., editor, appointed first assistant 
postmaster-general, 14; number, etc., of re¬ 
movals and “resignations” under, 22, 27, 35, 39, 
41. 49. 62. 75, 76. 77, 91, 94, 130, 131, 149,164, 173, 188, 
253,261,376,8eeai8o removals; and office seekers, 
14; and railroad mail service,21; and office-seek¬ 
ers, 24; and Isabella De La Hunt, postmaster at 
Caunfeiton, Ind.,26; “the unspeakable,” 27; tries 
to help Love, accused of selling offices, despite 
contrary evidence declares him innocent, 32; 
and post-offices, 37; appoints L. D. Levan, a dis¬ 
reputable character, postmaster at Wilson, N. 
Y.. 39; spoilsman, 43; appointments in Iowa 
under, 46; and Syracuse post-office, 46; nego¬ 
tiates with Mahone, 52; and post-office at Can- 
nelton, Ind., and at Long Island City, 54; ap¬ 
points postmasters, 55; removes postmaster at 
Strawberry Point, Iowa, appoints political 
worker, resolutions by residents denounce 
this action, 55; condemned by Milwaukee 
Sentinel [lepublican], 66; largely responsible 
for republican defeat in Iowa in 1889, 67; 
and postmaster at Lawrenceville, Va., 74; 
spoilsman. 92; appoints J. H. Flenniken post¬ 
master at Bradford, Penn.,99; investigates case 
of Love, 99; postmaster-general, 103; and post- 
office at Rochelle, Ill., 110; letter to from 
Cooper regarding postmasterat Freedom. Owen 
county, Ind..112; banquetted at Boston, 119; and 
Harrison, 121; condemned. 125; thinks national 
sentiment againstcivil service reform, 12 h; and 
civil service reformers, 130; speech of at Boston 
before Norfolk club, 130.131; gives patronage 
in Missouri to Filley, 132; condemned, see C. T. 
Russell. Jr., 136; correspondence of with R. H. 
Dana, 144; gives office to hiscousin, 150; retires, 
laudation of, 154; and Dana, 154; and Postmaster 
McKenna of Long Island City. N. Y., 175; letter 
regarding removal of Evans, on secret charges, 
175; and Greenhow, postmaster at Hornells- 
ville, N. Y., 176; hostile to civil service reform, 
177; removes postmasters “upon expiration of 
four years’ service, and second commission not 
yet expired,” 189; opponent of civil service re¬ 
form. 188; spoilsman, 191; denounced, 193. 194; 
attacks civil service commission. 230, 231; ad¬ 
vice of to young republicans on plan of cam¬ 
paign, 235, 236; dinner to, 245; appointment 
of. hurts civil service reform, 255. 256; 

takes place of Quay on National Republican 
Committee, condemned. 257; and Platt. 260; in¬ 
jures civil service reform, see Lambert. 261.269; 
on mugwump. 269; spoilsman. 272; and civil 
service reform. 274; on “bosses,” 278.281,282, 
314 . 317; and voung republicans. 329; and post- 
office in saloon building. 331; deserts Harrison. 
832; deserts Harrison. 337, 341, 342. .345, 346, 
347. 3-50; eulogizes Quay and Dudley, 3-56; 
placated, 353, 354; works for Harrison, 3.59; 
on national republican committee. 363; 
general, 373; on post-offices as a factor In poll- 


INDEX. 


tics, 364, 369; member national committee, etc., 
confers with Quay, 390. 

Clarkson, N. C., cousin of assistant postmaster- 
general appointed postmaster at Hamilton, 
Mo., 150. 

Classification, once ordered can not be post¬ 
poned, postponement not necessary, act of bad 
faith, 10. 

Classified service, ought the to be increased, ad¬ 
dress, see Rogers; extensions of Cleveland 
and Harrison, 275; extent of in 1884. 276; exten¬ 
sion of under Harrison, 366; civil service com¬ 
mission recommends extensions of, 397. 

Clay, H., opposes spoils system, 274. 

Clay, Rev. J. H., negro, opposes Harrison, wants 
offices for negroes, 244. 

Clay, Mary L., postmasterat Huntsville (Ala.) re¬ 
moved by President Harrison on report of 
special agent, without cause, 29. 

Clay City, Ind., objections to appointment of Mrs. 
Wilber as postmistress at, 89. 

Clayton, B. S., appointed postmaster at Columbia, 
8 . C., vice Gibbes, removed, 74. 

Clayton county, Iowa, resolutions of veterans of, 
denouncing Clarkson, 55. 

Clayton, Powell, obtains appointment of True as 
postmaster at Eureka Springs, Ark., dispenser of 
patronage, 55; controls patronage in Arkansas, 
188. 

Clear Lake, la., fight over post-office at, 121. 

Clearwater. A. T., judge, a political worker for 
Platt, 265. 

Clements, congressman and civil service law, 123. 

Clements, E. M., introduces bill in Virginia legis¬ 
lature for non-partisan police and fire service, 
87. 

Clements, I., politician, appointed pension agent 
at Chicago, 107. 

Clements, J. W., office-seeker, 24. 

Clerks, questions used in examination for, at Indi¬ 
anapolis, August 6, 1889, 56, 57, 58. 

Cleveland, E., removed from post-office at Quincy, 
Ill., for political reasons, 148. 

Cleveland, Grover, as governor, civil service law of 
New York due largely to, appoints good com¬ 
mission. 271. 

Cleveland, President, extensions of civil service 
law under, see also civil service law; order of 
that railway mail service be classified, 10, 21, 
22,29,81, 224,372. 403; retains republican post¬ 
masterat Norwich, Conn., beyond four years, 
see Norwich, Conn.; and the Indianapolis post- 
office, 3; and the spoilsmen, 5; and civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 10; and Postmaster Pearson, 12, 
20; number of appointments, April, 1889, 16; 
and Missouri offices, 24; and Thomas, and 
Dowling, 25; and Higgins, 25; removes Isabella 
De La Hunt, postmaster at Canuelton, Ind., for 
“offensive partisanship,” 26; and Troy, N. Y., 
post-office, 29; allows republican postmaster at 
Bridgeport, Conn., to serve out term, 29; re¬ 
tained postmaster at Jersey Ciiy until end of 
term, 29; retains republican postmasterat Nor¬ 
wich, Conn., over his term, 29; at suggestion 
of Congressman Matson appoints, H. G. Doug¬ 
las, editor, postmaster at Plainfield. Ind.. 80; 
removes Hankiicss, postmaster at Albert Lea, 
Minn., for cause, appoints Stacy, 39; promises 
of and their fulfillment in Indiana, 41; civil 
service refo'm, promises of, 43; abuse of civil 
service law by administration of, 49; re-instates 
Naval Officer Burt, see Burt, 52; and Kansas 
post-offices. 55; civil service reform under, see 
Eliot. 60; and civil service reform in Massa¬ 
chusetts. and Maryland, 03; patronage largely 
resronsible for his defeat. 65; see Lea. 68; 
makes clean sweep in Charleston navy yard, 
69; see Lodge, 69; gives patronage of Mary¬ 
land to Senator Gorman. 70; appoints ed¬ 
itor postmaster at Syracuse, N. Y., 71; re¬ 
moves four-year office-holders in Maine, 73; 
attitude of toward civil service reform, 82; 
weakened by patronage. 83: and Indian Rights 
Association appoints Oberly Indian commis¬ 
sioner. 86; appoints Spear postmaster at Quincy. 
Massachusetts. 86; removes Luke, postmaster 
at Jeffersonville. Indiana. 88; allows office¬ 
holders to be political workers. 88; secret 
charges under. 96; on civil service reform. 98; 
appoints Turner postmaster at Newtonville, 
Massachusetts, and Childs postmaster at Brat- 
tleboro. Vermont, 100; appoints Pyle postmaster 
at West Chester. Pennsylvania. 101: abuse of 
Indian service under, 102; appoints Mrs. Mulli¬ 
gan to succeed Miss Sweet, 107; gives pa¬ 
tronage of Maryland to Gorman, 111; crit¬ 
icised by Senator Harrison regarding civil 
service, 119; favors civil service law, 122; 
and fourth class post-offices, 124; talk with 
Biggs, see Biggs. 128; circular of. warning em- 
ploves in government offices against political 
working. 135; appoints Montgomery patent 
commissioner, appoints politician assistant 
commissioner, removes Montgomery, appoints 
B. J. Hall, 139. 140; accused of bribingthe press, 
144; abuses in Norfolk (Va.) navy yard under, 
147; bribery of press under, see Harrison, sena¬ 
tor. 149; brother in-law of, an office-holder. 1.50; 
appoints Ross postmaster at Washington. D C., 
153; removes employes in Brooklyn navy yard, 
1.55; antagonized by party machine, because of 
civil service views, 171; object of tariff message 
of, 172; civil service reform and. 173; removes 
Fortune postmaster at Bloomfield, la., 175; 


and secret charges, 177; gives office to Higgins, ^ 
disreputable politician, see Gorman, 181; ap- * 
points Vaudever Indian agent, 181; on necessi- j 
ty of civil service reform, 181; and department- 
al service, 185; number applicants for office in 
Washington under, 185; removals under, 185; 
makes clean sweep of postmasters, 189; spoils 
system responsible for defeat of, 210; civil 
service commission under criticised, 211; i 
removals in Indian service under, 217; 
makes almost clean sweep in Indian service, ,''i 
219; silent regarding civil service reform, 220; /! 

appoints Morgan postmaster at Newton, Mass., y 
224; gives patronage to Quay and Voorhees, 235; 
loses by comparison with Harrison in respect ' I 
to civil service reform, 237; Indian service un- i 
der, given over to spoils, 239; appoints son -.V 
of Senator Vest, to diplomatic service, totally 
unfit, 242; disaffection of Maryland under, gives s 
patronage of to Gorman, 254; controls patronage '» 
but fails of re-election, 262; administration of, 

266; honestly supports civil service commission, ' 
272; message on civil service reform, 1886, 276; 
violations of law in post-office at Omaha under, 

281; and Harrison, 282, 283; president appoints 
capable woman postmistress at Olneyville, 

R. I., 288; promotes Stearns, secretary, 288; and 
removals on secret charges, 297; clean sweep of 
Indian agents under, made, 308. on federal pa- 
patronage, 316; and reform. 325, 326; present po¬ 
litical assessments under, in Baltimore federal 
officers, 328; compared to Harrison, as to civil 
service reform, 338; ex-federal officers under ; 
work for at Chicago convention, post-office at _ 
Philadelphia under a scandal, 350; opposed at ■ 
Chicago convention because favored by “mug- * 
wumps,” 351; and regular democratic organi- , 
zatlons in New York, 855; Kings county. N.Y. i ; 
democratic leaders promise support to, 356; and i 
spoils system, 358, 359; and Harrison, compari¬ 
son regarding civil service reform, 364; and 
civil service reform, 367. .369; Cleveland, civil 
service reform under, 372, 374: civil service 
reform in letter of acceptance, 1892.375; in 1884, 

1888, 376; civil service reform under, 376; dur¬ 
ing the war, 381,385,386; President-elect, vic¬ 
tory not a license to revel in spoils, 387; and ex¬ 
tension of civil service law. 388; and civil serv- i 

ice reform, .389; war record of, 389; applicants ! 

for office in Indiana during second term, 392, 

894; refused while candidate to promise spoil 
to Sheehan, 395; address of,on issues, 895.396; 
civil service commission under, first term, 
should reappoint Roosevelt, 397; endorsed for 
denunciation of spoils system, 398; obliga¬ 
tions of, 404; opposes election of Murphy as 
senator from New York. 404; and congression¬ 
al patronage, 405; applicants for office in , 
Indiana, for second term, 409, 411 ; since j 

election, 413; applicants for office in Indiana, ^ 

under fsecond term], 415, 422. 

Cleveland, Ohio, Anderson appointed postmaster 
at, 216; custom-house at not classified, number 
of employes in, 277. 

Cleveland Leader [republican], civil service re¬ 
form advocated, 92. 

Cleveland, Rev. Dr., favors civil service reform, 73; 
favors civil service reform, 227, 229. 

Cleveland, W. J., philanthropist, on Indian troubles 
at Pine Ridge, S. Dakota, 211, 217. 218. 

Clinton. Iowa, Editor Mahin appointed postmaster 
at, 126. 

Clinton, J., low politician of Indianapolis, 207. 

Club, Young Men’s Republican, of Des Moines, 

Iowa, Clarkson advice to, on plan of campaign. 

285, 236. 6 - 

Clugage, J. P., editor, applicant for postmastership 
at Sullivan, Indiana, 88; appointed postmaster 
at Sullivan. Indiana, 377. 

Cockran. B., Tammany politician, levies assess¬ 
ments for personal use. 184; opposes nomina¬ 
tion of Cleveland because favored by “mug¬ 
wumps.”351. 

Cockrell, and patronage in census bureau, 2.34. 

Cockrum, J. B.. assistant United States district at¬ 
torney for Indiana. 14; declares charges against 
Dudley nor founded on fact, 41; a political 
worker, 158, 162. 219. 260. 35.3, 354, 370. 377. 378,379, 

380. .381. 389; worker for Harrison. 316.317; works ' 
for Harrison at Minneapolis. 343. 379. 

Coffey, acting mayor of Brooklyn, N. Y., and Na- ' 
than, 352. 

■Coffey, T. J., letter to from Kemble, 270. 

Coffin, senator, levies political assessments on fed¬ 
eral office-holders in Baltimore, Md., 162. 

Coffin. C. B., republican politician, works for reap¬ 
pointment of Morgan, democrat, postmaster at 
Newton, Mass., 224. 

Cogswell, general, desires removal of Stearns in 
favor of Dodge. 250. 

Cogswell, W.. congressman, letter of to Johnson, 
postmaster of Manchester, Mass.. 187; secures 
removal of Stearns for political reasons, and ap¬ 
pointment of Dodge. 288. 

Colbert, captain Indianapolis police, arrests Moore, 
gambler and post-office employe, is asked to call 
arrest a put-up job. see Moore; and office seek¬ 
ers, see equally divided politicallv. 213. 

Cole, H . negro, Harrison delegate from N. Caroli¬ 
na. 334. 

Cole. T.. on eligible list of N. Y. police force, in¬ 
duced to try to buy immediate position, is 
fleeced, see ’Tammany, 224, 225. 













1 N 1) E X . 


IX 


Coleman, congressman, controls patronage of Lou¬ 
isiana, 71; opposes civil service reform, 124. 

Coleman, C. E., negro, R. R. mail employe, dele* 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Colfax, Wash., Postmaster La Rue of, forced to re¬ 
sign, Kw. 

Collators of internal revenue, editors appointed. 

College graduates, young and civil service exam¬ 
inations, 2ii. 

Colieges, and duties of citizenship, 404. 

Collier, Dr., federal officer, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Collier, surveyor of port, deiegate to .Minneapolis 
convention, 344. 

Collier, W. H.. republican committee chairman, 
attempted bribery of, 162. 

Collin, professor in Cornell University, defends 
Hill, 305; defended for defense of Hill, 313. 

Collins,representative in Indiana legislature,spoils¬ 
man, 407. 

Collins, C., cierk In Indiana senate, 408. 

Collins, C. C., relative of Mrs. K.Croker, appointed 
police captain. :S56. 

Collins, Edith, in charge of examination for police 
matron at New York, see Maloney. 

Collins, F. W., U. S. Marshal, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, :344, 318. 

Collins, G. J., spoken of for Brooklyn, N. Y., post- 
office, 135; postmaster at Brooklyn, N. Y., po¬ 
litical worker for Harrison, 336; spoilsman,360. 

Collins, .1., deputy collector in'N. Y. custom house, 
a political worker, 265,279; low politician, de¬ 
sires clean sweep of democrats, 311; in New 
York convention, 334; at Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 344. 

Collins, P. A., signs petition for larger appropria¬ 
tion for civil service commission, 102. 

Collyer, Rev. R., advocates civil service reform, 82. 

Columbia Club,republican organization at Indian¬ 
apolis, 332; and spoils system, 338. 

Columbia, District of, D. M. Ransdall, politician, 
appointed marshal of, 31; central republican 
committee of favors sroils system, 63; Ransdall 
appointed marshal for. 68; clerk of committee 
of removed by Senator Ingalls, who appoints 
his own son, 215; Ransdall, U. S. marshal for, 
gets offices for relatives, 244; civil service com¬ 
mission recommends extension of classified 
service to all employes in, 397. 

Columbia, Pa., post-office at, see Brosius, 72. 

Columbia. S. C., B. S. Clayton appointed postmas¬ 
ter of, vice Gibbes, removed, 74. 

Columbus, Ind., dissatisfaction among applicants 
for postmaster of, 89; Hartman, postmaster of, 
at Minneapolis convention, 379; Finney sup¬ 
ported for postmaster of by Congressman 
Cooper, 398. 

Columbus, Neb., Postmaster Hensley, of, forced to 
resign, 166. 

Columbus, Ohio, applicants for post-office of and 
Senator Sherman, 67; spoils system in asylum 
at, 304. 

Columbus Republican opposes repeal of civil serv¬ 
ice law, 83. 

Colville, W. W., federal office-holder, supporter of 
Quay, suspected by Harrison, 299. 

Colyer, W., editor, appointed postmaster at Albion, 
Ill., 141. 

Commercial Club, of Boston, address before on in¬ 
iquity of spoils system by Roosevelt, 194. 

Commission, civil service, see civil service com¬ 
mission. 


Commission, Indian, controversy about, 22. 

Committee, national republican, offended by Har¬ 
rison, 240; eulogizes Quay and Dudley, 257. 

Conaty.J. B., dishonest juror and bondsman for 
Sullivan, corrupt politician, see Indianapolis. 

Concord, Ind., fight ov’er postmastership at, 72. 

Concord, Mass., reappointment of postmaster at, 
see Bancroft. 91; Buttrick recommended for re¬ 
appointment at, 100. 

Concord, N. Hampshire, Postmaster Robinson of, 
active politician, 143. 

Condit, E. M., politician, favored by administra¬ 
tion, 180. 

Conference, civil service reformers at Baltimore, 
1889 2 

Conger,’U. S. minister to Brazil, political worker. 


Conger, Col., speech of against Harrison. 240. 

Conger, A. L., patronage of, works for Blaine, 310, 
341, 345; political worker, 389. 

Conger, S., appointed census supervisor 3d Indiana 
district, gives patronage to M. Moores at Indi¬ 
anapolis; politician, 104,132; lets politicians ap¬ 
point enumerators, 182, 190; turns service over 
to spoil. 298. 

Cougregationalist, on Collector Erhardt, and decent 
politics, 267. 

Congress, members of harrassed by office-seekers, 6. 

Congressional Patronage, see Patronage, Congres¬ 


sional. 


Congressmen, and internal revenue collectorships, 
14; 140 recommend Butler, R. R. as commis¬ 
sioner of Indian affairs. 14; of Penn, control 
patronage of, after Senators Cameron and 
Quay, 72. 

Conklin, supt. Central Park menageries, 320. 

Conkling, A. R., bill of, preventing political assess¬ 
ments in New York, 318. 

Conkling, R.. Senator, and President Garfield, 14, 
361; spoilsman, 413. 


Conn, Congressman-elect, 392; patronage of, 410; 
patronage of, 420, 422. 

Connecticut, republican platform 1872 and IS-Il, ad¬ 
vocates civil service reform, -50; political assess¬ 
ments of federal and other offices in, 183; requi¬ 
sition of forger from, refused by Gov. Hill of 
New York for political reasons, 214; schemes of 
Hill in, 309; postmasters in and else where,com¬ 
pelled to give list of voters, 330. 

Connell, Congressman, and Lincoln, Neb., post- 
office, 72,108. 

Conner,!. T., editor, appointed postmaster at To¬ 
ledo, Ill., 141. 

Connersville, Ind., Fearis, postmaster of, at Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 380. 

Connett, Alderman, and Indianapolis fire depart¬ 
ment, 13; obtains removal of Fire Chief Webster, 
tlO; spoilsman and low politician, 207; Blaine 
supporter, bribed by Harrison with office, 362; 
politician at Indianapolis, given office as bribe, 
366. 

Connolly, postmaster, Scranton, Penn., 101. 

Conroy, F., Indian machinist, refused employment 
to give place to white man, 218. 

Conroy, P., appointed postmaster at Watkins, N. 
Y., see Hlscock and Flood, 150. 

Conroy, W., murderer, low politician, pardoned by 
Gov. Hill, 320. 

Consul, Swiss, and charges of corruption, 24. 

Consulships, great number of applications, 16; ap¬ 
plicants for, 24; Editor A. Reed appointed to, at 
Dublin, 30; R. Spooner appointed to Prague 
through influence of Senator Spooner, 30; ap¬ 
plications for, 75; number of applicants for 
under Harrison, 185. 

Convention, see also platform; national demo¬ 
cratic, 1892, at Chicago, see Chicago; national 
republican at Minneapolis, 1892, see Minneapo¬ 
lis; republican national, 1888, D. McLean, dele¬ 
gate to rewarded, .30; republican national con¬ 
vention at Chicago, 1888, 121; Indiana demo¬ 
cratic, July, 1890, denounces abandonment of 
civil service reform, 180; Ohio republican, 
June, 1891, condemns spoils methods of demo¬ 
cratic governor, 257; state democratic of Mary¬ 
land, July, 1891, condemns spoils methods of 
Harrison administration, 257; of republican 
league at Syracuse, August, 1891, federal office¬ 
holders at, 2-59; republican, Seneca county. N. 
Y., factional fights in, August, 1391, 259, 260; 
Iowa state, 1891, federal officers at, 260; repub¬ 
lican state of Alabama, 1892, charges political 
activity of federal office-holders in, ;356. 

Converse, J. O., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Chardon, O., 301. 

Conway, E., deputy U. S. marshal in Indiana, 
ward politician, 108; worker for Harrison, 302, 
317, 379; political worker in Indiana, 144,353, 
377, 378. 

Cook, Mrs., letter of to Indian Commissioner Mor¬ 
gan, showing abuses of Indian service in S. 
Dakota, 202. 

Cook, C. A., U. S. dist. att’y. Harrison delegate 
from N. Carolina to Minneapolis convention, 
334, 348. 

Cook. J. W., letter to H. Welsh on Indian service, 
79. 

Cook, Major, federal officer, a political worker, 162. 

Cooley, W. B., chief clerk P. O. department, letter 
of Postmaster Smith, 188. 

Coolidge, T. J., appointed minister to France for 
political reasons, 382. 

Coombs. W. J., candidate for congress, 178; oppos¬ 
ing Wallace, 374. 

Cooper, state senator of Penn., 133. 

Cooper, ward politician of Indianapolis, supports 
Fire Chief Webster, 208. 

Cooper. E. H., negro editor, opposes Harrison, 
wants offices for negroes, 243, 244. 

Cooper, G. W., favors keeping reform promises, is 
prevented from active work in Ohio campaign 
In 1889, 68; asks for retention of postmasters at 
Freedom and Brooklyn, Ind., 112, 174; and in¬ 
vestigation of Pension Commissioner Raum, 
190 , 238 , 373; patronage of, 398, 399, 409, 411,416, 
422. 

Cooper, H. J., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Tampa, Fla., 141. 

Cooper, H. M., internal revenue collector, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Cooper, M. W., appraiser at New York Custom 
House, and Platt, 258. 

Cooper, T. V., editor and political worker, appoint¬ 
ed through influence of Sen. Quay, see Quay, 
39; Collector at Philadelphia, spoilsman, 85; 
works for Senator Cameron,162; defendsQuay, 
2t9; a political worker with Quay, 260,270, 280; 
political worker for Harrison, 29!), 300; confers 
with Quay, Reid and Carter, 3)il. 362, 390; and 
political assessment circular to raise campaign 
funds in Pennsylvania. 363. 

Corbaley. chief deputy sheriff at Indianapolis, 315. 

Corboy, P. J., recommends O’Donnell, 60. 

Cornell, ex-governor of New York, 311, 319. 

Cornell University library, 3.50. 

Cornan, C., postmaster at Ovid, Mich., forced to re¬ 
sign, 165. 

Corning, state senator.applicant for postmastership 
at Concord, Ind.. 72. 

Corning,!. W., deputy surveyor at N. Y. city, pays 
political assessments, 279. 


Corpus Christl, Tex., custom-house at not classi¬ 
fied; number of employees in, 277. 

Corsa,W.H., federal employe in New York con¬ 
vention, 334. 

Corse, Gen’l, postmaster at Boston, removed for 
politial reasons, 203, 215, 237; entertained by 
Massachusetts reform club, 251; removed for 
political reasons, 282,367, 376. 

Corsicana, Tex., Politician Zadek, appointed post¬ 
master at, 187. 

Corydon, Ind., Hudson, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379, ;iS2. 

Cotton, E. S., candidate for postmaster at Newton- 
ville. Mass., 100. 

Coulter, J. M., president Indiana state university, 
favors civil service reform, 227, 229. 

Coulter, T. B., sixth auditor, interpretation of re¬ 
publican promises, his proceeding stopped by 
Roosevelt, 34; removes subordinates for politi¬ 
cal reasons, 39; removes Smith, 45; spoilsman, 
47; intends clean sweep, 55; member of Ohio 
Republican Association, 234. 

Council Bluffs, la., Treyuor, postmaster, political 
worker, 260. 

Coutis, J. A., journalist, father of federal office¬ 
holder, worker for Harrison, 316. 

Covill, L. W., federal employe, asked to pay politi¬ 
cal assessments, 391, 392. 

Covington, Ind., Editor Vogt appointed postmaster 
at, 126, 377. 

Covington (Ind.) Friend, condemns opposition to 
Magee bill, see also Magee, 209. 

Covode, investigation, 121. 

Cowen, J. K., writes history of Gorman regime,237. 

Cowie, J. A., ward politician and Gibbs faction, 
see also New York City, 241, 242 , 265. 

Cowing, Judge, convicts Conroy, murderer par¬ 
doned by Governor Hill for political reasons, 
320. 

Cowman,Martha,wifeof Editor Cowman,appointed 
postmaster at Casey, Iowa, 142. 

Cox, Secretary, and Maxwell land grant, 369. 

Cox. G. B., low politician in Cincinnati, worker for 
Foraker, 302; allied with Foraker, 336; disrepu¬ 
table republican politician in Cincinnati, 352. 

Coy, “Sim,” corrupt politician of Indianapolis, 
career of, see Indianapolis, forges tally-sheets, 
sent to penitentiary, pardoned by Harrison; 
and Stuart, R. S., 17; effect of pardon of, on city 
election, 59; disreputable politician of Indian¬ 
apolis, 203; opposes passage of bill for new 
charter of Indianapolis,212; adherent of elected 
president city council at Indianapolis, 221, 228; 
low politician, aids republicans in Indianapo¬ 
lis, 269; Elkins compared to, 289; like Hill, 306, 
307; and tally-sheet frauds, 313. 

Craft, G.T., postmaster of Maplewood, N.H., dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention,348. 

Craft, R., federal office-holder, political worker for 
Harrison, 302. 

Craft,\V. II., career as R. R. mail substitute clerk, 

12 . 

Craft, sup’t of carriers at Indianapolis, political 
worker, 378. 

Cramer, brother-in-law of Pres. Grant, given office, 
191. 

Crane, postmaster of Sedan, Ind., political worker. 
379, 380. 

Crane, W. J , candidate for alderman, see Buffalo, 
N. Y., 197. 

Cratsenberg. A. J., postmaster in Winneshiek Co., 
la., a political worker, 2i;0. 

Cravens, representative in Indiana legislature, 
opposes spoils methods in, 40)), 407. 

Cravens, J. O., appointed collector of internal 
revenue, spoilsman, 35, 38, 41; removals by, 51, 
53; opposed by congressmen of Indiana, 84; 
internal revenue collector in Indiana, political 
worker for Harrison. 302, 303, 316; gives office to 
anti-Harrison man, 347; collector and deputies 
in Indiana, political workers, 378, 379. 

Crawford, A., low politician, see Philadelphia, 233. 

Crawford, D., see Hillism, 309. 

Crawford, Mrs. R. A., charges of favoritism re¬ 
garding appointment of denied by Roosevelt, 
266, 267. 

Crawley, chief clerk of Indiana house of repre¬ 
sentatives and office-seekers, 406,407. 

Creighton, W., negro, delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 344. 

Creigmyer, -, indorsed for postmaster at La 

Fayette, Ind., by Cheadle, 84. 

Crescent Club, low democratic organization in 
Baltimore, Md., 308. 

Cresco. Iowa, Editor Webster appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Creswell, ex-postmaster-general, office-seeker, 24. 

Crisp, Speaker, election of. 289. 

Crockett, postmaster of South Bend, Indiana, a 
political worker, 1.53, 158; political worker for 
Harrison, 316, 377, 378. 

Croker, R., Tammany boss, and McLaughlin, 245; 
defends Tammany. 305, 322; Tammany leader, 
298; supporter of disreputable politicians, 309, 
317, 414; his patronage, :il9, 3:33. 

Croker. Mrs. R., relative of appointed police cap¬ 
tain in .Vew York, 356. 

Cronin, Father, supports civil service reform, 137. 

Cronkite, Major, federal official, pays political as¬ 
sessments. 279. ,, , ,, . 

Crocker, Rev. T. H., on evils of spoils system, 102. 










X 


N 1) E X . 


Croper, H. M., political worker, appointed collector 
of Internal revenue for Arkansas, 39. 

Crosby, A. D., deputy collector Internal revenue, 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Cross, n. G., journalist, postmaster at Petersburg, 
Neb., 119. 

Crounze, .\.S8istant-Secretary, spoilsman, tries to 
get office for his son, 2ii3 , 254; to resign to enter 
political work, 370. 

Crouse, state senator of Penn., political worker for 
Guay, 280. 

Crouse, G. N., supported for congress by Collector 
Hendricks and Postmaster C. E. Smith, 386. 

Croussore, J. W., appointment and removal of as 
postmaster at Oakford, Ind., 96. 

Crowley, R., ex-congressman, opposes Hiscock,259. 

Crown Point, Ind., Editor Wheeler postmaster at, 
302, 377. 

Cruger, S. V. R., political worker for Harrison in 
New York, 3.32. 

Cruikshank, G. L., postmaster at Addison, la., a 
political worker, 260. 

Crum, W. D., negro, nomination of for postmaster 
at Charleston as political reward, withdrawn, 
363. 

Crutcher, G., and political assessments, see Ken¬ 
tucky. 

Cuba, N. Y., Journalist Glenn, postmaster at, 155; 
in N. Y. convention, 335. 

Cullman, Ala., Parker, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Cullom. Senator, and Cook Co. (Ill.) offices, 6; 
spoilsman, 21, 25; obtains appointment 

fourth-class postmasters, and examining 
pension boards, 30; and a]>polntments in 

111., 31; and Farwell demand that commission 
of Wilcox be withheld because they were not 
consulted, 31; and office-seekers, 37; spoilsman, 
79, 95, 107; and post-office at Lanark, Carroll Co., 

111.. 109; obtainsremoval oj Smith, postmaster at 
Carrollton, Ill., and appointment of successor, 
1.S8; works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 342; 
supporter of Blaine, 344. 

Cullom, H., employed in N. Y. City government, 
assessed for political purposes, pays twice, re¬ 
fuses third time, removed, commits suicide, 45. 

Cullop, spoilsman in Indiana legislature, 406,407. 

Cummings, A. J., congressman, civil service com¬ 
mission is undemocratic, 116; speech on spoils 
system in navy yards, 146; and navy yard at 
Kittery, Me., 146. 

Cummings, councilman of Indianapolis, receives 
street railway bribing check, 207. 

Cuneo, P., editor, postmaster at Upper Sandusky, 
O., 301. 

Cuney, N. W., negro, and collector of customs at 
Galveston, Texas, political worker, 150,158,159; 
given patronage of Texas, 173; disreputable 
politician, 180, 266; and Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 346, 348. 

Cunningham, appointed head of assay office at 
Boise City, Idaho, upon removal of former in¬ 
cumbent, makes clean sweep, 30. 

Cunningham, chief of division, removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons, see Coulter, 55. 

Cunningham, G. I., U.S. marshal,offers bribes, 162; 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Cunningham, Kan., Journalist Smith, postmaster 
fit 149 

Cunningham, W. S., and Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle, 308. 

Curran, M. P., removed without cause from Boston 
custom-house, place given to L. A. Dodge, rela¬ 
tive of Secretary Blaine, 71. 

Curran, W. R., postmaster at Hoboken, N. J., re¬ 
moved for political reasons, 54. 

Currier, F. D., naval officer at Boston, a political 
worker, 143; an active politician, 160,179. • 

Curry, W. W., makes political assessments for In¬ 
diana, 153,377; circular letter of making politi¬ 
cal assessments, 160; spoilsman, 181; political 
worker, 389. 

Curtin, Gov., and Quay, 105. 

Curtis case, 281. 

Curtis, Dr., disgraceful physician, in Central In¬ 
sane Hospital of Indiana, 211. 

Curtis, G. W., address before N. Y. Civil Serv. Ref. 
Ass’n, 23; an “Imposter,” 49; address of before 
annual meeting of National League 1889,59,61; 
rep. journals favor civil service principles of, 
76, 86; letter on attitude of civil serv. reformers 
on reform, 103; on absurdity of spoils system, 
120; and civil service law. 125; on victory in 
house of representatives for civil service re¬ 
form, 125; speech at laying corner-stone of 
Washington Arch 1890, 129;-accuses Cleveland 
of subsidizing the press, 144; president Nation¬ 
al Civil Service Reform League. 153; before an¬ 
nual meeting National Civil Service Reform 
League, 161, 166,167, 168, 169,172; address before 
annual meeting National League 1890, 166, 167, 
16.8, 169, 172; to address public schools of Phila¬ 
delphia on public school and civil service re¬ 
form,‘205; address of before department of su¬ 
perintendence of national educational associa¬ 
tion on "The Public School and Civil Service 
Reform,” 211; address of before annual meet¬ 
ing National League of Civil Service Reform 
Associations 1891, ‘261; address of before annual 
meeting National League 1.891, ‘269,275; writes 
civil service clause in republican national plat¬ 
form 1888 , ‘281; correspondence of with Secre¬ 


tary Foster and Wanamaker over political ac- 
ticity of Van Cott and Hendricks, ‘289; address 
of before National League annual meeting 1892, 
on party and patronage, 321, 3‘26, 329; on com¬ 
mittee of publication of Good Government, :i.')7; 
career of, :i66, :j67; memorial, adopted by Buffa¬ 
lo Civil Service Reform Association, :;94. 

Curtis, J., speaker of Indiana house of representa¬ 
tives, patronage of, 406, 107. 

Curtis, J. E., physician at Indiana Central Insane 
Hospital, extorts fee for death certificate, 311. 

Curtis, N. W., congressman, :!54. 

Cushing, M., circular letter of on civil service re¬ 
form, 174; agent for Wanamaker, letter to civil 
service reformers, 188. 

Cushing, W. E., praises Civil Service Chronicle, 

no. 

Cushman, postmaster at Newburg, Ind., political 
worker, ;>80. 

Custer, Gen’Lsee Indian service, 182. 

Customs, ‘22; deputy collectorship of at Port Towns¬ 
end given to relative of Pres. Harrison, 30; col¬ 
lectors of, applicants for position as under Har¬ 
rison, 185; house at N. Y., applications for, po¬ 
sition in, 75; house N. Y., employes in become 
political workers, 108; at St. Louis, Mo., em¬ 
ployes in workers for Filley machine, 1.50; house 
at Lockport, N. Y., patronage of controlled by 
Hiscock,259; houses, and extension of merit 
system, 275; houses, should be classified, 403; 
service, examinations for, 1891-92, 396. 

Cutchins, congressman, and civil service law, 73. 

Cutcheon, Congressman, stands by civil service 
law, 124. 

Dabney, Prof. R. H., part of address at annual 
meetingof IndianaCiv. Serv. Ref. Assoc., 1889,7. 

Dabozy, D. B., office-seeker, 15. 

Dady, Mike J., spoilsman; see also Kings Co., N. 
York, 24; promised federal office in N. Y.; see 
Wallace, 72; corrupt politician of Brooklyn, N. 
Y.; career of, 106, 3:i6; Worker for Nathan, 354. 

Daggett, “Al,” corrupt politician of Brooklyn, N. 
Y., career of; see also Brooklyn, N. Y., 106. 

Dailey’s ranch, cowboys kill Indian boy at, and 
precipitate trouble, 218. 

Daily, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods, 406. 

Dakota, Delegate Mathews of, dictates appoint¬ 
ments in, 30. 

Dallam, journalist, appointed deputy U.S. revenue 
collector, 148. 

Dalton, O., Journalist Scott postmaster at, 149. 

Dalton, W. J., deputy street-cleaning commissioner 
in N. Y. City, ward politician, ‘291. 

Daly, M. J., political worker, 371. 

Dalzell, gives way to Senator Quay, 30; controversy 
with Sen. Quay over Pittsburg, Pa., post- 
office, 87. 90,112; opposed to Quay, 133, 280; and 
Quay. ‘299. 

Dana, police commissioner of N. Y. City, a Croker 
tool, helps in boosting Collins by beating Civ. 
Ser. law, 356. 

Dana, Ill., Editor Pritchett appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Dana, R. H., at Balt, conference, 1889,2; address of, 
before National League, 1889, on taking 4th 
class post-offices out of politics, 67, 68, 74; to ex¬ 
amine management of civ. service, 77; commit¬ 
teeman report on congressional patronage, 113, 
114,115; on committee investigating patent of¬ 
fice, report of, 139, 140, 141; correspondence of, 
with Clarkson, assistant postmaster-general, 
144; and Clarkson, 154; on committee of Nation¬ 
al League, investigatingpresidential post-offices, 
162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 17‘2; on committee of Nat. 
League reporting on removals on secret 
charges, 175, 176,177; on committee of National 
League, reports on political changes in presi¬ 
dential post-offices, 188;on special committee of 
National League investigating census service, 
291. 295; on commmittee of publication of 
“Good Government,” 357. 

Dancy, J. C., negro, customs coll, at Wilmington, 
N. C., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Danforth, state treasurer (N. Y.), receives political 
contributions, 180. 

Daniel, L. M., federal officer, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention. 348. 

Daniels, postmaster at Cedar Rapids, la., 262. 

Daniels, G. B., postmaster of Withey, Mich., asked 
for poll of voters. :183. 

Danville, 111., Editor Jewell appointed postmaster 
at, 141; Postmaster Jewell of, a political worker, 
160. 

Danville, Ind., Editor King supported by Congress¬ 
man Cooper for postmaster of, 398, 399. 

Dany, J. C., negro, collector of customs at Wil¬ 
mington, N. C., delegate for Harrison, 334. 

Darby, W., P. O. employe, see Indianapolis investi¬ 
gation, 411. 

Dargan, on house committee on civil service, 86. 

Darling, E.. postmaster in Crawford county, la., a 
political worker, ‘260. 

Darlington, S., congressman, opposed to civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 37, 54. 

Darnall, S. A., federal employe, delegate to .Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Darnell, councilman, and Indianapolis fire depart¬ 
ment, 13; controls patronage in city offices, 104; 
and street railway bribery, 207. 

Daugherty, chairman Allen county (Ind.) repub¬ 
lican committee, opposes Harrison, 30;;. i 


Dans, R. L., worker for McLaughlin, see Tammany, 
318, 319. 

Davenport. I., candidate for governor of New York, 
1880, 351. 

Davenport. “Johnny,” chief supervisor of elec¬ 
tions at New York, 21; makes tool of “The” 
Allen, see also, 249; letter of questioning rights 
of voters, 387. 

Davidson, A. .1., deputy pension commissioner, a 
political worker, 279. 

Davis, ballot-box stuffer, see Hudson county, N. Y. 

Davis, senator, spoilsman, 21; opposes E.G. Hay,84. 

Davis, fireman in Indianapolis fire service, 36. 

Davis, “Bill,” councilman and low politician of 
Indianapolis, 207. 

Davis, “Bill,” P.O. employe at Indianapolis, politi¬ 
cal worker for Harrison, 802. 

Davis, C., political worker for Platt and Hiscock, 
265. 

Davis, C. F., offer of Eubanks to sell office to, 99. 

Davis, D. P., father of Journalist Davis, postmaster 
at Harrison, Neb., 149. 

Davis, I., appointed postmaster at Greenffeld, Ind., 
89. 

Davis, Ill., Editor Potter appointed postmaster at, 
141. 

Davis, “Jim,” see also Indianapolis, 207. 

Davis, Rev. J. A., negro, opposes Harrison; wants 
oflices for negroes, 244. 

Davis, J. B., applicant for postmastership of Mon¬ 
roeville, Ind., given office in Indian Service, 
88 . 

Davis, M., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Davis, S. P., applicant for postmaster at Cumber¬ 
land, Ind., 89. 

Davis, W., postmaster at Kane, Pa., worker for Del- 
amater, 134. 

Davis, W. R., journalist, postmaster at Canton, 
Kan., 148. 

Davison, J. T., see Hiscock, 259. 

Dawes, Sen., letter to, from Congressman Banks, 
advocating appointment of J. J. IMcCarthy, 31; 
and Boston custom-house, 71; and Collector 
Saltonstall, 94,105; controls census patronage 
in Mass.,104; favorable to civil service reform, 
211; requests retention of Corse, postmaster at 
Boston, 367. 

Dawson, Neb., journalist Buser, postmaster at, 149. 

Dawson, T., soldier,given place in Indiana senate, 
408. 

Dawson, AVm., chairman W. Virginia republican 
state committee, levies political assessments, 
:490. 

Day, deputy sheriff, a political worker, 162. 

Dayton Journal, (rep.), spoils system a necessity, 
49. 

Dea, and Braltlebro, Mass., postmastership, 100. 

Deane, G. B., custom-house contractor, in New 
York convention, 334; and cartage contract at 
N. Y. custom-house, 358. 

Deane, W. G., given place by Collector Erhardt, for 
political services, 150. 

De Armond, congressman, bill of, to suspend civil 
service law, during first year of every presi¬ 
dent’s term, 404. 

Deas, E. H., deputy coll. int. rev., delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, ;348. 

Decatur, Ind., editor appointed postmaster at, 37; 
Quinn, postmaster of, political worker, 379. 

Decker, O. H., appointed consul-general Rio de Ja¬ 
neiro through influence of his relative. Judge 
Settle, 47. 

Deen, H. W., journalist, postmaster at Jackson 
Court House, W. Va., 155. 

Deery, E. H., given place in Indiana legislature, 
406. 

De Freest, clerk of N. Y. house of representatives 
and patronage, 215. 

De Grass, J. C., appointed postmaster at Austin, 
Texas; local politician, 71 

Degress, politician of Texas, 159. 

De Haven, J. D., congressman, indorses Bush, po¬ 
litical worker, 187. 

De Kalb Co., Ind., postmasters in, political work¬ 
ers, 380. 

De La Hunt, Isabella, appointed postmistress at 
Canneltou, Ind., by Arthur, on recommenda¬ 
tion of Sen. Harrison, removed for political 
reasons by Cleveland, Harrison refuses to re¬ 
appoint, 25, 177, 368. 

Delamater, state senator of Pa., charged with brib¬ 
ery, career of, 133, i:i4,1:55, 1.38, 299, 353; candi¬ 
date for governor of Pennsylvania, 143; opposi¬ 
tion to in Pennsylvania. 161; defeated candi¬ 
date for governor of Pa., financial ruin of, 183, 
233; forced on Quay, 249; tool of Quay, ‘250. 

De Land, J. L., federal examiner, on merit system, 
8:5; on examinations in treasury department, 
152; friend of civil service reform, report of on 
workings of merit system, 200; devises rules for 
promotion in treasury department, 298. 

Delaney, J., postmaster at Orlando, Fla., removed 
on secret charges, Fletcher appointed, 176. 

Delano, congressman, and post-offices in N. Y., 
makes changes in, 47. 

Delaware, repub. platform 1882 advocates civil serv¬ 
ice reform, .50; political activity of federal of¬ 
fice holders in, 3:i4; vote of for Harrison and 
others at Minneapolis.: m 17 ; political activity of 
federal officers in, attempted bribery by, 347, 
348, 389, 401, 402. 










1 N I) !•: X . 


X] 


Delaware, Ohio, Gazette, eon of editor of, federal 
ofnce holder, ;^01. 

Del^mas, B., sec’y republican committee of Ala- 

r. levies political assessments, 891 . 

Della Plain, Tex., Journalist McLain postmaster 
at, 15o. 

Delmar, Ala., ignorant negro appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 4/. 


Delphi, Ind., Journal [repub.], editorof givenoffice 
through, 85,97; advocated republican bribery in 
elections as only means to win, opposes civil 
service reform, 191; condemns civil service ex¬ 
amination system, because democrats get of¬ 
fices, 248; charges favoritism on part of civil 
service commission, 206, 267. 

Democrats, list of, voting in Indiana senate on Ma- 
^ “on-partisan control of state chari¬ 
table institutions, majority against, 201. 

Democratic platforms, see platformsk 

DeMotte, postmaster at Valparaiso, Ind., a political 
worker, 153, 377. 378; worker for Harrison, 816" 
works for Harrison at Minneapolls,343,379. 

Dennis, Rev. H. D., applicant for postmastership at 
Lanark, Carroll Co., Ill., 109; defeated applicant 
for postmastership of Lanark, Ill., 136. 

Denny, C., mayor of Indianapolis, charges against, 
207; ex-mayor of Indianapolis, on the mug¬ 
wump, 269. 

Denton,/. S., see Chemung Co., N. Y., 259. 

Denver, Colo., percent, of removals in classified 
and unclassified service in post-oflice at. 185. 

Den^ver, Ind., Fite postmaster of, political worker, 

Departmental service, classified by Pres. Arthur, 
185. 

Departments, heads of, and congressional patron¬ 
age, 47; proposal of Congressman Andrews to 
extend civil service law to heads of divisions 
in, 306. 

DePauw, family uses inlluence for appointment of 
Throop, 59. 

DePauw, N. T., worker for Harrison, 316. 

Depew, C. M., Interview on spoils system, 88; on 
evils of patronage, 75; address at Pittsburgh on 
promotion among railway emploves, 189; works 
for Harrison at Minneapolis, 341, .342, 34.3, 344; 
and Collector Hendricks at head of republican 
party in New York, 348; worker for Harrison at 
Minneapolis convention, 379. 

Derby, la.. Postmaster Chapman of, a political 
worker, 260. 

Derby, Dr. R. H., resigns from N. Y. City health 
dep’t, because it becomes a political machine, 
856. 

DeRulter, street commissioner of Indianapolis, see 
Indianapolis. 

Des Moines, la., advice of Clarkson to young men’s 
republican club of, on plan of campaign, 2.35, 
2.36; Brandt, postmaster of, political worker at 
Minneapolis convention, 346. 

Despo. candidate for alderman at Indianapolis, 208. 

Detroit, Mich., customs district of, classified 1883, 
276. 

Deveraux, J.. able ass’t superintendent city deliv¬ 
ery at St. Louis, 131. 

Devreux, J. H., negro, federal employe, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 848. 

Dewey, J. F., journalist, given office in Chicago 
custom house. 126. 

Dice,-, post-office Inspector, apolitical worker, 

179. 

Dick. G. N.. federal employe, in New York conven¬ 
tion, 335. 

Dick, W. F., chairman Ohio republican state com¬ 
mittee, levies political assessments, 390, 391. 

Dickey, J. M., anti-Platt political worker, 260. 

Dickinson, postmaster general under Cleveland, 
averse to civil service reform, 18 , 20; gives 
spoils in Michigan to democrats. 45; and con¬ 
tributions to party funds, 100; and civil service 
reform, 274. 

Dimmick, D. A., appointed consul at Barbadoes 
through influence of Secretary Blaine, 56. 

Dimond, General W. H., chairman republican state 
committee of California, endorses Bush, politi¬ 
cal worker, 1.S7, 

Dingley, congressman, supports civil service com¬ 
mission, 205. 

Dissron, F., negro, post-office employe, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Dlsston, H., political worker for Quay, 280. 

Ditney. Ind., Ketcham, postmaster of, solicited for 
political contributions, 387, 392. 

Divver, P., low politician, appointed police justice 
by Mayor Grant, well recommended, 184; ap¬ 
pointed to judgeship by Governor Hill of New 
York, 212, see Tammany, 317. 

Dix, Rev. M., D. D., favors clerical recognition of 
civil service reform, 48; advocates civil service 
reform, 82. 

Dobbins, P. B., receiver of political assessments, 
390. 

Doble, A. K., and pardon of Petroff and Kemble, 
152. 

Dobson, H. A., federal employe, asked to pay po¬ 
litical assessments, 391, .392. 

Dockery, congressman, upholds civil service com¬ 
mission, 204. 

Dodd, assistant postmaster at Indianapolis, and 
those eleglble for appointment, 9. 

Dodd, faction, see New York City. 

Dodge, F. L., editor, appointed postmaster at Han¬ 
ford, Cal., 126. 


Dodge, L. A., relative of Secretary Blaine appointed 
an appraiser in Boston custom house, 71; suc¬ 
ceeds Stearns, appraiser in Boston custom 
house removed for political reasons, 250, 288; 
appraiser at Boston, political worker. 334. 

Dodson, C., deputy revenue collector, in Maryland 
convention, 335. 

Doerbaum, J. F., employe in post-office at St. 
Louis, Mo., worker for Filly machine, 150. 

Dolliver, J. P., congressman, requests resignation 
of Postmaster Cain, see Cain, 165. 

Dolph, Congressman, and civil service law, 73. 

Donaldson, La., Weber appointed postmaster of, on 
request of Collector Warmouth, 241. 

Donato, J. G., federal employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Donavan, C., unsuccessful candidate for congress, 
ward politician, see New York City, 199. 

Donavan, E. J., signs petition for larger appropria¬ 
tion for Civil Serv. Com., 102. 

Donley, D. E., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Baylis, lll.,141. 

Donnell, J.T., address of at Hanover College, Ind., 
upon civil service reform, 77. 

Donnelly, J. B., U. S. marshal, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 848. 

Doran, T. T., see Cannon, 39. 

Dorchester,commissioner of Indian schools,creates 
office for benefit of his wife,38; removals under 
in Indian service, 79. 

Doremus, recommended for census service, 121. 

Dorsey, S. W., and star route scandals, 291; and 
Elkins, 281, .369. 

Doty, E. A., at Baltimore conference, 1889, 2. 

Dougall, A. H., candidate for postmaster at Ft. 
Wayne, Ind., 45. 

Dougherty, chief of division, removed by Coulter 
for political reasons, 55. 

Dougherty, fire chief at Indianapolis to succeed 
Webster,removed for political reasons, removed 
and Webster reappointed, 120, 207, 208. 

Douglass, F., ex-U. S. minister, works for Harrison 
at Minneapolis, 345, 346. 

Douglas, G., applicant for Winamac, Ind., postmas¬ 
tership, 88. 

Douglas, H. G., editor appointed under Cleveland 
postmaster at Plainfield, Ind., 30. 

Douglass, S. J., census supervisor, asks political 
work of subordinates, 298. 

Dow. F. N., for collector of customs at Portland, 
Me., 22. 

Dowling, low politician, and Cleveland adminis¬ 
tration, 28, 35,94. 

Dowling, labor commissioner of New York, spoils¬ 
man, removals under, civil service rules sus¬ 
pended for, 414. 

Downing, J. H., discharged from navy yard at Nor¬ 
folk, Va., by Sec’y Whitney, 147. 

Downing, J., confesses to bribery, 151. 

Doyle, sec’y civil service commission, investigates 
political assessment cases. 392. 

Doyle, H., page in Indiana legislature, 406. 

Doyle, M. J.. postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Draper, leader republican faction at Albany, N. Y., 
supports A. Chester for surveyorship of Albany 
district, 45. 

Drapo, J. F., indorsed by Sen. Quay, 100. 

Draper, pension examiner in Indiana, political 
worker, 379. 

Drummond, S. A., journalist, appointed postmaster 
atLancaster,Cal..l41.' 

Dry den. postmaster of Martinsville, Ind., political 
worker, 380. 

Dublin, Editor A. Reed, appointed consul at, 80. 

Du Bols. delegate from Idaho Terr., spoilsmen, 
uses influence; see Wild, 30; senator, supporter 
of Blaine, 344. 

Ducey, Rev. Father, and attempt to purify politics 
in N. Y. City, 130. 

Ducy, W. A., succeeded by Deane, appointed by 
Collector Erhardt at New York, 1.50. 

Dudley, W. W., obtaining offices for adherents, 2, 7; 
and offices, 189, 192, 214 , 227, 256, 281. 282. 305, 373. 
414,24, 92. 154, 160; letter of, called “Blocks of 
Five” letter, 41. 78; negotiates with Mahone, 52; 
uses influence for appointment of Throop, 59; 
case of, see Edmunds, Sen., 87; and Harrison. 
121; levies political assessments. 180; condemned 
by young men’s republican club of Massachu¬ 
setts, 219; desires indorsement of his “political 
activity,” 244; eulogized by National Repub¬ 
lican Committee. 257; Elkins compared to, 289; 
eulogv of by Clarkson, 359; and republican lead¬ 
ers, 354; and “blocks of five,” 368; and Miche- 
ner, 377; and S. N. Chambers. 380; warrant for 
not issued by U. S. Dlst. Att’y Chambers, 380. 

Duer, E. F., postmaster of Princess Anne, Md., re¬ 
moved for political reasons, Lankford appoint¬ 
ed, 408. . ... 

Dufalo, F. F., consul at Havre, Harrison petitioned 
to retain, by K. Y. cotton exchange. 54. 

Duffy, T. L., laborer, given office by Gold, township 
trustee at Indianapolis, 256. 

Dugan, I., treasury inspector, removed for political 
r6&sOD8« 332» 

Duhurst, F. G.. 335; receiver of political assess¬ 
ments for Maryland, 391. 

Dunbar, J. G., congressional candidate, and Raum, 
373. 

Duncan, H. C.. letter to from Cooper (M. C.) asking 
retention of postmasters at Freedom and Brook¬ 
lyn, Ind., 112. 


Duncan, J., applicant for postmastership of Mar¬ 
tinsville, Ind., :199. 

Dunham, federal employe, political worker at Bos¬ 
ton, 334. 

Dunlap, H. J., journalist, appointed consul to Bres¬ 
lau, 84, 126. 

Dunlap, W. L., U, S. marshal for Indiana and civil 
serv. reform, 10. 14, 96, 108; asks Postmaster 
Browne of Franklin, Ind., to resign, 87, 877; a 
political worker, 144; worker for Harrison, 310, 
820,337,343,353; and republican clubs in Indi- 
- anapolis, 362; worker for Harrison, 377, 378, .379, 
880,381; appoints “floaters” as deputies, 387,389. 

Dunn, councilman of Indianapolis, spoilsman and 
low politician, 207. 

Dunn, postmaster at Stanberry, Mo., 121. 

Dunn, C. J., P. O. employe at Indianapolis, at in¬ 
stance of democratic committeeman Backus, 
solicits political contributions, removed, 403, 
411, 412, 

Dunn, G. W., postmaster at Binghamton, N. Y., a 
political worker, 266: secures removal of pen¬ 
sion examiner Van Alstyne, ;!04. 

Dunn, I., deputy coroner at Indianapolis, shaves 
witness fees, 314, 315. 

Dunnell, obtains removal of Stacy, postmaster at 
Albert Lea, Minn., and reappointment of Hark- 
ness, political worker, previously removed for 
cause, 39; opposes civil service examinations, 
124. 

Dunning, F. H., journalist, postmaster at San- 
bright, Tenn., 155. 

Dunton, A. G., appointed postmaster at Hunter- 
town, Ind.. vice Latham removed through in¬ 
fluence of Postmaster Higgins, 362. 

Dunvell, C. J., political worker for Nathan, 264. 

Durbin, W., see Cannon, 39. 

Durbin, W. T., and office-seekers, 37; uses influ¬ 
ence for appointment of Throop, 59; politician, 
secures some appointments, 71,84. 

Durham, Judge,removed from comptrollership, 21. 

Duryee, S. W., chief clerk in patent office under 
Pres. Arthur, removed; re-appointed, 140. 

Dutchess county, N. Y., election frauds in, com¬ 
mitted by Hill, 306. 

Dwight, J. W., uses influence for appointment of 
Robinson, postmaster at Ithaca, N. Y., 264; N. 
Y. delegate to Minneapolis convention, and 
supports Blaine, 344, 345. 

Dysart, Iowa, Editor Brown appointed, 142. 

Eagle, Edward, editor, worker for Delamater, etc., 
134. 

Eagle Park, Idaho, Journalist Wheeler postmaster 
at, 155. 

Eagle Pass, Tex., custom house at not classified; 
number of employes in, 277. 

Eastern Dispensary of New York City, civil service 
methods in, 101. 

Eastman, A., journalist, given office In Internal 
revenue service, 126 . 

Eastman, R. B., supervising architect of Brooklyn, 
N. Y., to be removed for mal-administration, 
234. 

Easton, D. J., journalist, postmaster at Union City, 
Mich., 149. 

Easton, Md., Mulliken, postmaster of, in state con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Eaton, postmaster at New Orleans, pays political 
assessments, 383. 

Eaton, D. B., memorial on Postmaster Pearson be¬ 
fore N. Y. Civil Service Reform Association, 23; 
draws bill for present civil service law, 75, 79; 
advocates civil service reform, 82; on removal 
of Saltonstall, 105; praises Civil Service 
Chronicle, 110; letters to Senator Allison; 
letters replying to Senator Hoar, 111; and civil 
service law, 125; on civil service reform, in 
June, 1891, North American Review, 257; stud¬ 
ies English civil service, at invitation of Hayes; 
appointed chairman civil service commission 

. under Arthur, 271; on Tammany, 317. 

Eaves, J. B., nomination of rejected by senate, 150; 
disappointed office-seeker, a political worker, 
159; in N. Carolina, 334 ; stamp clerk at States¬ 
ville. N. C., resigns; levies political assess¬ 
ments; sons of given office, 362. 

Eden, “Billy,” easy-going place-holder, 315. 

Editor-appointed consul at Palermo. Italy, 240. 

Editors, rewarding of for political services, see 
Press, 30. 

Edmunds, evils of patronage, 25; and Investigation 
of case of W. W. Dudley, 87. 

Edsall, I. W., removal of by Flower, 319. 

Edwards, A. J., ass’t postmaster at Pittsburgh, 
Pa., supporter of Quay, suspected by Harrison, 
299. 

Edwards, Miss., negro Perkins, postmaster of, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Edwards, R., federal employe, worker for Har¬ 
rison, 334. 

Edson, C. H.,8ee Harlow, postmaster, 100. 

Edson, Dr. C., appointed sanitary supt. at N. Y. 
City vice Ewing, removed by Tammany, iiai. 

Egan, P., appointed minister to Chile as political 
reward, 282; U. S. minister to Chile, political 
worker, 382, 389. 

Egger, C.. ward politician,see Indianapolis, 15*6. 

Ehlert, H., low politician, flees from creditors, 226. 

Eidman, F., internal revenue collector in New 
York, a political worker, 265, 287; at Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 344. 

Eiter, ex-postmaster, political worker, 870. 















I X I) E X . 


xii 


Elbert, Dr. S. A., negro, opposes Harrison, wants 
offices for negroes, 213. 

Eligibles, list of civil service commission orders 
posting of, at Indianapolis, 25; at Indianapolis 
post-office. June, 1889,29; in Indianapolis post- 
office, list of, 48; publicity of lists of, opposed 
by ex-Commissioner Oberly, -53; list of, and civil 
service commission, '.'3; made public, gives sat¬ 
isfaction, 186. 

l-lliot, C. W. (Pres. Harvard Univer.), address of be¬ 
fore Bay State Club comparing administration 
of civil service under Cleveland and Harrison, 
60; Pres. Harvard I'niversity, civil service re¬ 
former, 204. 

Elizabeth, N. J., federal patronage in, see Kean, 
216. 

Elizabeth, Pa., wife of Journalist Wiley postmaster 
at, 149. 

Elkham, W. Va.. Journalist Greenawalt postmas¬ 
ter at, 15-5. 

Elkins. “Steve,” and Kerens, “Dick,” 22; wants 
larger share of patronage in West Virginia, 71; 
and Platt, scheme to defraud the government, 
258; appointed sec’y of war, corrupt politician, 
career of, 289,290.291; appointment of as sec’y 
of war, unjustifiable, 298; political worker for 

■ Harrison, 336; and Minneapolis convention, 
338 , 3:!9; confers with New, 310; sec’y of war, ca¬ 
reer of, 354,368,369,374 ; appointed to alienate from 
Blaine, 376; confers with ,7. C. New, :779; sec’y, 
etc., poiitlcal worker, 387, iWO. 

Eliart, S., inspector in N. Y. custom house, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 108. 

Elletsville, Ind., Sharp, postmaster of, political 
worker, 380. 

Elliott, councilman of Indianapolis, spoilsman and 
low politician, 207. 

Elliott, Congressman, 162. 

Elliott, B. K.. judge Indiana supreme court, favors 
civil service reform, 227,229; mentioned as can¬ 
didate for governor of Indiana, 353,381. 

Elliott, D. W., clerk in post-office at Ind’p’l’s, 25. 

Elliott. G. F., political worker, see Kings Co., N. Y. 

Elliott, G. L., appointed postmaster at Reelsvllle, 
Ind., removed, 89. 

Ellis, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons, see Coulter, 55. 

Ellis, F., mayor, appointed postmaster at Muncie, 
Ind., 217; political worker for Harrison, 316, 
362, .370,378. 

Ellis, W. P., appointed postmaster at Washington, 
Ind., despite sale of office to Sefrits, 121. 

Ellison, state senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 408. 

Elmira, N. Y., postmaster at named by Congress¬ 
man Flood, 53; Flood, postmaster of, a politi¬ 
cal worker, opposes Platt and Fassett, factional 
fights at, 259; a political worker. 2(i5. 266; re¬ 
moved for political reasons. 297, .303. 304; Rath- 
bun appointed, removed, 303, 304, 305; removed 
on secret charges, Rathbun appointed, 312; re¬ 
moval of through influence of Fassett, 331. 

Elmwood, Neb., Journalist Mayfield postmaster at, 
149. 

El Paso, Tex., forty-nine applicants for collector- 
ship of customs at. 45; Flanagan, political 
worker, appointed customs collector at, 266,2^); 
custom house at not classified, number of em¬ 
ployes in, 277. 

Emans, corrupt political worker for Hill. 306. 

Emerson, E. W., ward politician, tired of factional¬ 
ism, see Kings Co., N. Y. 

Emery, L., ex-state senator, charges Delamater with 
bribery, 1.34, 1.35. 

Emmert, P. W., journalist, postmaster at Erwin, 
Tenn., 155. 

Emmetsburg, Iowa, Editor Utter appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Employes, federal, in Massachusetts active politic¬ 
ally, 179; at Washington, number of compelled 
to go home to vote, 179. 

Emporium, Pa., Journalist Gould postmaster at, 149. 

Encinitas, Cal., Editor Smith appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Endicott, Sec., favors civ. service reform. 82. 

England, competitive tests in civil and military 
service of, 118. 

England, methods used in census service of, 291, 
292. 

England, G., a Nathan henchman, .3(11. 

English, postmaster at New Haven, removed, 96. 

English, A. M., journalist, postmaster at Fontana, 
Kan., 149. 

English, J., low politician, see Hudson Co., N. Y. 

English, W., low politician, see Hudson Co., N. Y. 

Engraving and Printing, conduct under E. O. 
Graves, 45. 

Enochs, Congressman, on federal interference in 
election of Sherman, 301. 

Ensley, N., appointment as pension agt. at Indian¬ 
apolis opposed, 89, 96; pension agent in Indiana 
appoints his son chief clerk in pension office, 
vice J. L. Riley, 108; worker for Harrison, .303. 
316; at Minneapolis. .337, .343, 379; and political 
assessments, 363; political worker, 378. 

Ensley, O. R., given office by his father, pension 
agent, 108. 

Ensor. J. F., deputy coll. int. rev., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Ensor, J. F., U. S. diet, att’y, and political activity 
of federal office-holders' in Maryland, 3.35; dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 


Enyart, M.*L., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Macy, Ind., 126, 377. 

Ephrata, Penn., democratic postmaster of removed; 
republican appointed, 72. 

Episcopal Church, pastoral letter of House of 
Bishops of, favoring clerical advocacy of civil 
service reform, see Church, 73. 

“Equally Divided Politically,” proviso in charter 
that offices in city service of Indianapolis be, 
212, 213, 220, 222, 228, 2;35. 


Erhardt, J. B., collector at New York, and office- 
seekers, :i8; deputies of, active politicians, 108; 
spoilsman, see Deane, 150; discontent of office- 
seekers with, 174; removals under, 183; and 
fraudulent cartage bids, 21(;; “resigns.” Fassett 
appointed, 255; resignation of, 257; and Platt, 
258; “frozen out” by Platt, 260; and office-seek¬ 
ers recommended by Platt and Gibbs, 26t,205; 
and Platt, :150; forced to resign for adherence 
to civil service reform methods, 3.58; and cart¬ 
age bids, 371; forced to resign for resisting 
spoilsmen, 373. 

Ernst, J. A., editor, appointed postmaster at St. 
Genevieve, .Mo., 126. 

Erwin, representative in Indiana legislature, and 
spoils methods in, 407. 

Erwin, Tenn., journalist Emmert, postmaster at. 
155. 

Eskridge, Kan., journalist Melrose, postmaster at, 
149. 

Estee, M. M., indorses Bush, political worker, 187, 
291. 

Estey, and Brattleboro, Mass., postmastership, 100. 

Eubanks, A. C., candidate, letter of, 23; and sale 
of offices, 99. 

Eugharth, E. E., postmaster at Rodney. Miss., del¬ 
egate to Minneapolis convention, :i44. 

Eureka Springs, Ark., appointmentof True us post¬ 
master of, denounced by republicans of, .55. 

Eustace, A. (j., N. Y. civil service commissioner, 
. worker for Hill, .309. 

Eustls, delegate to Minneapolis convention, sup¬ 
ports Blaine, :i44. 

Evans, G. O., fiscal agent for Penn., corrupt politi¬ 
cian. 270. 

Evans, H. C., postmaster at Bloomfield, Iowa, re¬ 
moved on secret charges. 175. 

Evans, H. C., congressman, opposed to civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 49; opposed to civil service law, 55; 
secures appointment of politician Park, as cen¬ 
sus enumerator, 293. 

Evansville, Ind., Postmaster Bennett of, politician, 
see also Posey, 46; Postmaster Bennett of, a po¬ 
litical worker, 1.53 1.58, :i77; republicans favor 
Gresham, 240. 

Evansville, Ind., Courier, condemns opposition to 
Magee bill, see, also, Magee, 210. 

Evansville, Ind., Journal [republican], 49; opposes 
Harrison. 378. 

Evansville, Minn., Journalist Lawrence postmaster 
at, 149, 

Evarts, W. M., Fassett deserts at suggestion of Platt, 
259 ; .lewett claim, 290, 353. 

Everett, W., civil service reformer, 174. 

Ewart. H. G., congressman, opposed to civil serv¬ 
ice law, 47; objects to civil service reform, 49; 
supports politician Pritchard, 1.59, 161; levies 
political assessments in South Carolina, 390. 

Ewing, W., endorsed by his relative. Secretary 
Blaine, for collector at Pittsburg, 100. 

Ewing, Dr. W. A., removed from New York City 
health department for political reasons, 3.56. 

Examinations, civil service, general. 

Examinations, specimen papers of those failing 
in, see Civil Service Record; of civil service 
commission, assaults against and defense of, see 
Roosevelt; examination questions, 3; for ap¬ 
pointment should be made public, 10; for civil 
service, objections to, considered, 11; special or¬ 
dered for post-oftice at Indianapolis, 18; age of 
competitors in, at Bloomington, Ill., 26; civil 
service, a farce at Troy (N. Y.) post-office and 
New York custom house, 29; number of em¬ 
ployes in New York and Indianapolis post- 
offices exempt from, 42; for civil service, said 
to be not pertinent questions asked in, 49; pa¬ 
pers should be opened to public inspection, 53; 
questions used in for clerks and carriers at In¬ 
dianapolis, August 6, 1889, 51, .56, 57. 58, see 
Call, 118; for positions in patent office, 141; 
in treasury department, see De Land, 152; 
paper used at Baltimore, 157; by civil serv¬ 
ice commission, number of persons exam¬ 
ined, year 1.889-90, appointments, 185; dur¬ 
ing 1889-90 for various branches of civil serv¬ 
ice, unsuccessful and successful applicants, 
see report civil service com., 188(t-90, 1.85; cen¬ 
tral board of, suggestions as, see civ. service 
com. annual report, 1,889-90, 185, 186; papers 
marked in, for civil service, made public, 186; 
census Superintendent Porter alleges, for clerk¬ 
ships, 190; “pass’’discredited, 192; for various 
departments of service need improvement, see 
Wanamaker, 193; and elegibles for position 
as clerks and carriers at Indianapolis, 218; 
used in national and Massachusetts state cen¬ 
sus service, 219,220; to be required for promo¬ 
tion from unclassified to classified service, 221; 
civil service. Instituted for positions in navy 
yards by Sec’y Tracy, 221, 222; employes under 
treasury supervising architect, selected by, 
although not required by law, 224; of civil 
service commission, 230,231; questions used in. 


at Brooklyn, N.Y., navy yard, 236); civil service, 
evasion of under G. B. Raum,jr., 238; C. W. 
Watson, chairman, committee on, of N. Y. 
civil service reform association, 239; for Indi¬ 
anapolis post-office to be held August, 1891, 243; 
for clerks and carriers for Indianapolis post- 
office, number of applicants, 2,53; competitive 
under civil service commission, ordered for 
promotions in Washington offices, 254; compet¬ 
itive for candidates for West Point, instituted 
by Congressman Warwick, does not accept re¬ 
sult,see McKinley, 251,262; competitive, Wana¬ 
maker establishes promotion by, in P. O. de¬ 
partment, 2.5(), 257; civil service, prejudice 
against hard to dispel, 257; system and civil 
service commission, prejudice against in the 
south. 273; promotion by competitive, 286; com¬ 
petitive for census service of England, Ireland 
and Scotland, and U. S. A., 292; competitive for 
promotfon. Introduced by Wanamaker in de¬ 
partment offices, and post-offices. 297, 298; 
physical required for employes in R. R. mail 
service, 305; of August, 1892, in Indianapolis’ 
post-office, results of, 366; under civil service 
commission, 1.891-92, in various departments, 
396, 397. 

Examinations, civil service, municipal; questions 
used in for Buffalo police service. 44; No. of 
held. Mass, civil service commission. 74; ques¬ 
tions used in, fire dept, at Brooklyn. N. Y., 93; 
questions used in, for Brooklyn police service, 
152; for labor service see Civil Service Record, 
152; for positions in police service at Indianap¬ 
olis, Boston, and Brooklyneompared, see equal¬ 
ly divided politically. 222. 223, 224; competl-. 
tive and civil service methods should be instl-l 
tuted in city service at Indianapolis,seeequal-: 
ly divided politically, 228; physical, for fire"; 
and police services of Boston, Mass., 243, 24(; 
247, 248, 249; in Indianapolis, for physicians in 
city hospital, 322; under N. Y. City civil service 
board for police matron, a complete failure, 
Mrs. Maloney, beggar, appointed, 404. 

Examiner (chief), investigates violations of civil 
service law in post-oliice at Milwaukee, Wis., 
Sept., 1888,36. 

Examiners, local boards of, suggestions as to, see 
civil service com. annual report 18,89-90.1.85,186; 
local board of. personel of at Baltimore and In¬ 
dianapolis, 186. 

Fahsel, on local examining board at Jilllwaukee, 

• 103. 


Falling, A. H., applicant for postmastership at Os¬ 
wego. N. Y., 126. ; 

Fairbanks, C. W., republican politician in Indiana, 
on business methods in politics. 137. ' 

Fairbanks, Crawford, Terre Haute distiller, 346,419. i 
Fairchild, ex secretary of treasury, 169; on tariff .. 
message of Pres. Cleveland, 172; anpoints May- ■ 
nard ass’t sec’y of treasury, 310. 

Fairfax, commander of Kittery navy yard, testifies * 
as to abuses, 147. 

Falrmount Club, see Baltimore investigation, 295. 
Farlow, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in, 407. I 

Farmer, S. C., postmaster in Wright Co., la., a po- , 

litlcal worker, 260. I 

Farmington, Me., Pratt, postmaster at, removed on J 
secret charges, 175. ■ 

Farnum. H. S., postmaster at Uxbridge, Mass., re- A 
moved on secret charges; C.T. Scott appointed, J 
175. m 

Farragut, Iowa, Journalist Notson appointed post- ■ 
master at, 142. 

Farrell, commissioner, spoilsman, 315. 

Farrington, J. M., ward politician, see Kings Co., 

N. Y.; opposing Nathan, 304. ' 

Farwell, senator, and Cook co. (Ill.) offices, 6; and 
applicants for Chicago offices, 14; spoilsman, 

17, 21, 25, 79, 92; and Sexton, postmaster at Chi¬ 
cago, 22; and Senator Cullom, 31; and office- ' 
seekers, 37; recommends O’Donnell, 59; pro¬ 
poses to repeal civil service law. .83; and Far- , 
well Club of Indianapolis, .85.92,269; on control ’ 
of Illinois patronage, and Clark, customs col¬ 
lector at Chicago, 95; Indorses Hartong for 
postmaster at Rochelle, Ill., 109; Indorses ap¬ 
plication of Scanlan, political worker, 132. 

Farwell Club, of Indianapolis, 79, 83, 86, 112,119; 
end of, 85. 

“Fassett” report, on effect of civil service law in 
New York City and elsewhere, 219. 

Fassett, A. D.. editor, given office by Governor 
Foraker, 301. 

Fassett, J. S.. undertakes to name postmaster for 
Elmira, N. Y., 53; appointed collector at N. Y. 

City to make clean sweep, vice Erhardt. “re¬ 
signed,” 2.55; methods of, political worker for 
Harrison, 2.58, 259; political worker, 26.5-6,269; 
appointment of condemned. 272, 373, .374; candi¬ 
date for governor of New York, aided by cus¬ 
tom house employes in N. Y. City, 278; cam¬ 
paign of, 279, 280,287,288; and removal of Flood, 
postmaster at Elmira, N. Y.,297. 303,;}04, ,331; at¬ 
tempts removal of Postmaster Van Duzen, 331; 
and Harrison, 345. 346, 352, 353, 337, 342, ;J44. 



Faulkner, C. R., member Indiana legislature, illit¬ 
erate politician, gets federal office through con¬ 
gressmen and Senator Voorhees, 222. 

Fawcett, letter of to Civil Service Chronicle on 
Delphi Journal and Owen, 97. 

Fay, H. H., appointed postmaster at Newport, R. I., 
see Rhode Island, senators of, 150. 

















I X 1) E X . 


Xlll 


Fearls, postmaster of Union, Ind., worker for Har¬ 
rison. 316, 378. 

Fearis, J. H., postmaster of Connersville, Ind., at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Federal office-holders, political activity of, see 
states, cities, Minneapolis convention. 

Feland, J., internal revenue collector in Kentucky, 
political assessments under, .330; delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, :}44,348. 

Fellows, J R.. low politician, see Hlllism, 199 , 309. 

Felton, Senator, supporter of Blaine, 344, 359. 

Fensley, W., federal office-holder, see Baltimore 
investigation, 328. 

Fenstemaker, W., journalist, postmaster at Augus¬ 
tine, Kan., 148. 

Ferguson, C. E., and Orlando, Fla., post-office, 176. 

Ferris, G. C., whose sou holds federal office, a po¬ 
litical worker for Hiscock, 265. 

Fessenden, S.. 354,359. 

Feudalism revived, account of in N. Y. City and 
Brooklyn, by Boston Post, 263. 

Field, John, as postmaster of Philadelphia, 15, 300; 
suggested by Senator Quay for postmaster at 
Philadelphia, 22; withdraws resignation, 310. 

Fielding, R. \V., candidate for U. S. marshal, de¬ 
feated, 132. 

Filer, C. W.. federal office-holder and political 
worker, 179. 

Filley,C. I., office-seeker, 14, 24,131; spoilsman,de¬ 
feated applicant for St. Louis postmastership, 
controls 4th class post-offices in Missouri, see 
also Spirely, 132.1501 to work for Harrison, 226; 
opposed to Harrison in Missouri, 336; delegate 
at Minneapolis convention, for Blaine or Har¬ 
rison, 345, 386. 

Finch, councilman and Indianapolis fire depart¬ 
ment, 13; spoilsman, 207. 

Findling,-, removed from fire service at Indian¬ 

apolis, see Equally divided politically, 235. 

Finkenhauer.G., federal employe, worker for Har¬ 
rison, 333. 

Finney, G. E., supported^by Congressman Cooper 
for postmaster of Columbus, Ind., 39S. 

Fippen, F., page in Indiana legislature, 406, 408. 

Flppen, J. M., representative in Indiana legisla¬ 
ture, spoilsman, son of appointed page, 408. 

Fire service in N. Y. City and Indianapolis. 36. 

Fire superintendents, national convention of, con¬ 
demns spoils system in fire services, 2-53. 

Firethunder, E., Indiana blacksmith, defrauded, 
218. 

Fischer, C. B., on inefficient census service in N. 
Y. City, 294. 

Fischer, I. F., political worker, see also Kings Co., 
N. Y.; politician aiding Woodruff, 106; navy 
yard patronage at New York, 182,183; worker 
for Nathan and Platt, 304,3.36; may “deal in leg¬ 
islative privileges” at Albany, 311. 

Fischer, J. H., federal employe, in N.Y. conven¬ 
tion, 335. 

Fish commission, U. S.. placed under civil serv- 
ive law, 332; of New York, Hill makes machine 
of, 310. 

Fish, H., Jr., and Gibbs. 288; corrupt politician in 
N. Y. legislature, and Hill, 307. 

Flshback, W. P., 18; added to local examining 
board at Indianapolis, 25; hitch in appoint¬ 
ment of on local civil service board of Indian¬ 
apolis, 34; member local examining board at 
Indianapolis, 42, 120, 129, 186; U. S. master in 
chancery, favors civil service reform, speech 
of at Roosevelt dinner, 227, 229, 282. 

Fisher, G. P.. corrupt politician appointed first au¬ 
ditor of the treasury, 32. 38, 374. 

Fisher, R. J., promoted to be assistant patent com¬ 
missioner, efficient, 140. 

Fitch, A. B., see Chemung Co.. N. Y., 2-59. 

Fitch, C. E., editor, appointed collector of internal 
revenue at Buffalo. N. Y., 108; at convention 
republican league. ^59: apolitical worker, 265; 
in N. Y. convention. 335. 

Fitch, C. P., census officer, apolitical worker, 160. 

Fite, postmaster at Denver, Ind., political worker, 
379. 

Fitler, mayor of Philadelphia, 30, 143. 

Fitzgerald, J. E.. signs petition for larger appro¬ 
priation for civil service commission, 102. 

Fitzpatrick, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 
opposing Harrison, 346. 

Fitzwllliams, E., customs inspector at Boston, a 
political worker. 179. 

Flagler, B., political worker for law collector at 
Suspension Bidge, N. Y , 259. 

Flanagan, custom house employe, active politi¬ 
cian, 179. 

Flanagan, Ill., Editor Breen appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Flanagan, W., political worker in Texas, 159; spoils¬ 
man. 245; appointed customs collector at El 
Paso. Texas, vice Clark, worker for Harrison, 
266,282. 286, supports Harrison at Minneapolis, 
.345, 346. 374,396. 

Fleming, D. W., recommended for office byChea- 
dle. 84. „ ^ 

Fleuniken, J. H., appointed postmaster at Brad¬ 
ford, Pa., on recommendation of Ray, removed 
on protest of H.C. Frick, 99. 

Fletcher, P. O. employe at Frankfort, Ind., political 
worker. 380. 

Fletcher, E. B., postmaster at Morris, Ill., political 
worker and editor, 126,186. , r., 

Fletcher, I., appointed postmaster at Orlando, Fla., 
vice Delaney, removed on secret charges, 176. 


Fletcher, J., candidate for supervisor, see Buffalo, 
N. Y. 

Fllckinger, 8. J., editor, secures federal office for 
his brother, 301. 

Flynn, E. H. journalist, postmaster at Spencer, W. 
Va., 155. 

Flitten, A., political worker under Postmaster 
Johnson, in Maryland, 8.35. 

Floaters, numbers of in Indiana, 78,171. 

Flood, H., postmaster at Elmira, N. Y., 4, 53; polit¬ 
ical worker, opposes Platt and Fassett, 259; a 
political worker, 265, 266; removed for political 
reasons, denied permission to hear real charges, 
297,303, 304; removed, Rathbun appointed, :303, 
304, 305; secret charges against, Rathbun ap¬ 
pointed, 312 ; removed through influence of 
Fassett, 331. 

Flood, T. S.. congressman, quarrels with Corporal 
Tanner over spoils, 54; names his brother post¬ 
master at Elmira, N. Y., .54; obtains appoint- 
ent of Conroy as postmaster at Watkins, N. Y., 
150; opposes Fassett, 259, 303. 

Flora, Ill., Editor Reed appointed postmaster at, 
141. 

Florence, Ind., Langsdale, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379. 

Florence, S. C., negro Wilson postmaster of, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Florida, chairman republican state committee of, 
rewarded. 30; political activity of federal offi¬ 
cers in, .347, 34.S. 

Flow. E. 8., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 


Flower, R. P., as congressman, condemns congres¬ 
sional patronage, 204; candidate of Croker, 
Tammany “boss,” for governor of New York, 
245; governor of New York, worker for Hill, ap¬ 
points Maynard judge, 309. 310; and Tammany, 
319; removes Leaycraft, 332: votes for, as gov¬ 
ernor of New York, 3.52; and fish protection in 
New York, 356; suspends civil service rules in 
New York, 414. 


Floyd, low politician of Indianapolis, 207. 

Flushing. L. I., Carpenter, postmaster at, removed 
for political reasons. 91. 

Flynn, M. B., see Hill, 307. 

Foley, state senator of Indiana, votes against bill 
for non-partisan control of state charitable in¬ 
stitutions, 201; spoilsman, opposes new charter 
for Indianapolis, see also Magee, 212. 

Folger, Commodore, praises merit system in Wash¬ 
ington, D. C., navy yard, -331. 

Follett, J. E., address on civil serv. ref., 23; praises 
Civil Service Chronicle, 110. 

Fontana, Kan., journalist, English postmaster at, 
149. 

Fontanelle, Iowa, Editor Rany appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142. 

Foraker, Governor, and Ohio offices, 24, 3.36; civil 
service reform “all rot,” 68; controls patronage 
in Cincinnati, 71; defeated. 75; and Senator 
Sherman, 249; opponent of Sherman, 297; 
charges federal Interference in election of 
Sherman, 301, 302; and Ohio delegation at Min¬ 
neapolis, 343. 


Forbes, C. S., journalist, appointed deputy internal 
revenue collector, 84,126.' 

Ford, candidate for postmaster of Pittsburgh, 91. 

Ford. T., see Hillism, 309. 

Fordham, C. H., negro, deputy coll. int. rev., dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, .348. 

Foreign service, see also consulships, .30. 

Forrester, G. B., politician, see Brooklyn, N. Y., 197. 

Fort Dodge. la.. Postmaster Cain of forced to re¬ 
sign, 165; Carpenter, postmaster at, a political 
■ worker, 260. „ , ^ ^ 

Fortune. A. H., postmaster at Bloomfield, la., re¬ 
moved, 175. 

Fort Wayne (Indiana), civil service reform senti¬ 
ment at. 16; candidates for postmaster of, 45; 
should have civ. service law applied to local 
federal offices. 85; Postmaster Kaough of, under 
Cleveland, political worker, 88. 


Higgins, postraasterof, a political worker, 88,153, 
15S, 362,377,378; and his deputy, political work¬ 
ers, 162; ordered to levy political assessments, 
302; political worker for Harrison. 316; 
works for Harrison at Minneapolis. .342, 379; 
has poll of taken by P. O. employes, 380. 

Gazette, opposes Harrison. 378. , -o 

oster, political worker, aided by Sen. Moody, i8. 

oster, C., ex-gov., and Fostoria, O., post- 9 ffice, 91, 
secretary of treasury, so-called resignations 
under of Macgregor, 216 ; ex-congressmen apply 
for office in treasury department under, patron¬ 
age to be given only to republicans, 217; mem¬ 
ber Ohio Republican Association, 23-1; given 
patronage to turn Ohio from Blaine to Harri¬ 
son, 240; and spoilsmen, 250, 2.53, 254, 290; and 
Platt, 2.58; favors Platt, 264; advises 
Ohio office-holders to do “their duty,” 
280- defends Hendricks. collector, at 
N ’ Y. City, 289; establishes rules for 
promotion in treasury department. 298; sus¬ 
pends employes suspected of disloyalty to Har¬ 
rison. :300; said to be interested in Toledo Com¬ 
mercial. 301; asked to remove democrats. 311, 
312; and political assessments by federal office¬ 
holders in Kentucky and Baltimore, 3:30; and 
removal of Milholland and Murray, supporters 
of Platt, 332,334; political worker for Harrison 
in Ohio; permits political activity of federal 
employes in Maryland convention, 3.35; and 


delegate from Utah; works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 337,338,339.345; political worker, 
354; political worker for Harrison, .3-59, .360; and 
Baltimore Investigation, 372. 

Foster, E., journalist, postmaster at Gladwin, 
Mich., 149. 

Foster, J. Ellen, husband of, rewarded with office, 
56. 


Foulke, W. D., at Baltimore conference, 1889; ad¬ 
dress of on reform promises of republican par¬ 
ty, 2, 4; declaration of impartiality of, 16; to ex¬ 
amine management of federal civ. service,77; 
address before Commonwealth Club, Dec. 16, 
1.889,80; chairman investigating committee ap¬ 
pointed by National League, 85; on Wanamak- 
er’s course in Shidy case, 103,104; officer Indi¬ 
ana Civil Service Reform Association, 108; 
chairman’s report on congressional patronage, 
113,114, 115; on committee investigating patent 
office, report of, 139, 140,141; chairman commit¬ 
tee of National League, on presidential post-of¬ 
fices, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 186, 188; work of, for 
good government, 173; chairman committee of 
National League reporting on removals on se¬ 
cret charges, 175, 176,177; exposes evasive meth¬ 
ods of Wanamaker. 190; address of, on civil 
service reform, “Its Later Aspects,” 200; be¬ 
comes president of Swarthmore College, 201; 
elected president Indiana Civil Service Reform 
Association, 289; address of, on civil service re¬ 
form before Social Science Congress at Saratoga, 
1.891,262,263; on secret executive sessions of the 
senate, 261, 269; address of before annual meet¬ 
ing National League, 1891,269; chairman special 
committee of National League investigating 
census service, 291, 295; before Boston Reform 
Club on broken republican pledges, :!6.5, :»71,374; 
in 1884, 376, 3.85. 


Fountain, G. W., editor, appointed postmaster at 
New Carlisle, Ind., 126, :577. 

Four year term, bill of Martin, to limit all federal 
employes to, 404. 

Fowler. E. C., acting 1st asst. p. m. genl., letter of 
conditionally denying Information regarding 
postmasters. 277, 297. 

Fox, E. P., efficient superintendent postal station 
at St. Louis, 131. 

Fox, R. L., chief clerk republican state committee 
of New York, 279. 


Frank, N., congressman, aiding office-seekers, 15; 
and Niedringhaus, correspondence over spoils, 
22; says Harrison has ignored real workers and 
disorganized his party, 68. 

Frankfort, Ind., P.O. employes Irvin and Fletcher 
of, political workers, 380. 

Frankfort, S. Dak., Journalist Tapley postmaster 
at, 155. 

Frank Leslie’s [repub.] advocates civ. service re¬ 
form, 65. 

Franklin, Ind., Postmaster Browne asked to re¬ 
sign. 37, 377; opposition to postmaster appointed 
at, 88; Harris supported for postmaster of by 
Congressman Cooper, :J98. 

Franklin (Ind.) College, sentiment favoring civil 
service reform at, 108. 

Franklyn Falls, N. H., Moore,republican congress¬ 
man, recommends re appointment of demo¬ 
cratic postmaster, 100. 

Frazee, W. D., ass’t U. S. dist. att’y, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, .344, :348. 

Freeburg, Pa., Journalist Magee postmaster at. 149. 

Freedom, Ind., Suffall postmaster at removed for 
political reasons. Watts appointed, see also 
Cooper and Michener, 112,377. 

Freeman, of Indianapolis, on secret charges sys¬ 
tem, 177. 

Freeport, Ill., Journalist Atkins appointed post¬ 
master at, 126; active politician, 143. 

Frelinghuysen, sec’y, and Jewett claim. 290. 

French, collector internal revenue in New Hamp¬ 
shire, political worker. 14;t. 371. 

French, state senator of Indiana, relative of ap¬ 
pointed page, 408. 

French, S. B., ward politician, see N. Y. City, 198, 
199 ; ex-police commissioner, in N. Y. City, 
“The” Allen works for, 249. 


Frick, H. C., secures appointment of Patterson as 
postmaster at Uniontown, Pa., 99. 

Friedman, asst, secretary Indiana senate, 408. 

Friedsam, D., at Minneapolis convention, :344. 

Friel, P. H., political worker. 1:14. 

Frost, aided by patronage at navy yard at Kittery, 
Me, 147. 

Frothingham, E. G., customs examiner, active pol¬ 
itician, 179. 

Fry, senator, keeps more employes In Portland, 
Me., custom house than necessary, 242. 

Frybarger. J., not to be postmaster at Noblesville, 
Ind., 47. 

Fulk, state senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 407. 

Fuller, J. C., appointed in Brooklyn custom house, 
72: political worker for Nathan, see Kings Co., 
N. Y. 


Fuller, J. M., political worker for Harrison, 304. 
Fullerton, and postmastership at Colfax, Wash., 


165. 

Fulmer, L.. ward politician of Indianapolis. 205,207. 
Fulton, J. M., Inefficient census enumerator in N. 
City, 294. 

Fulton, M. K., candidate for postmaster at Bucy- 


rus, 0.,149. 

Fulton, N. Y., Journalist Bennett postmaster at 


155. 











XIV 


I N I) E X . 


Furlong, postmaster at Rochelle, Ill., 109. 

Furst, low political worker in Cincinnati, O., 352. 
Gabriel, “Bill,” federal office-holder, political 
worker, 230. 

Gallegher, -, disreputable politician, 181. 

Gallagher, brutal policeman, see Tammany, 318. 
Gallagher, C. H., given federal office through in- 
Hiience of Higgins, .^34. 

Gallagher, Major, an Indian rising at Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak., 218. 

Gallinger, senator, supporter of Blaine, 314. 

Gallup, police commissioner of N. Y. citv, a Croker 
tool, 356. 

Galveston, Texas, Delegate Rentfro, appointed col¬ 
lector of customs at, 46; Cuney, customs collec¬ 
tor at, a political worker, 159; Cuney, customs 
collector at, 266; custom-house at, not classified, 
number of employes in, 277. 

Gamble, L. H., postmaster at Brooklyn, Ind., re¬ 
tention of asked, see Cooper, 112. 

(tandy, J. P., journalist, postmaster at Gandv, Neb., 
149. -• . 

Gandy, Neb., Journalist Gandy postmaster at, 149 . 
Gano, deputy collector at N. Y. city, pays political 
assessments, 279. 

Gans, VV. A., opponent to police justice Smith; see 
New York City, 198, 199. 

Gant, J. A., postmaster of Marion, Ind., at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 3'<0. 

Gapen, P., treasurer insane hospital board at In¬ 
dianapolis. corrupt politician, 20’i. 

Gardiner, postmaster at Troy, Ind., political work¬ 
er, 380. 

Gardiner, R. H,. republican politician, works for 
re-appointment of democrat Morgan, postmast¬ 
er at Newton, Mass., 224, 

Gardner, postmaster at Rochelle, Ill., succeeded 
by Furlong, 109. 

Gardner, W. E., journalist, given office, 84. 

Garfield, president, and Senator Conkling, 14, 88, 
369; address of, before president at Williams 
College on congressional patronage, and article 
on spoils system in Atlantic Monthly, July, 
1877, 114; murdered by disappointed office- 
seeker, 129; spoils system responsible for death 
of. 204; against patronage system in census 
service, 291; and Senator Conkling, 361; ap¬ 
points Pearson postmaster at N. Y. city, vice 
James, appointed p. m. general, :i67. 

Garland, attorney-general, 177. 

Garrett. Ind.. Bicknell, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379, 380. 

Garret, J.J., negro, delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 344. 

Garrigus, M., corrupt politician, works for Pres, 
Harrison, but gets no office despite Cheadle, 
88 . 

Gaskin, appointed postmaster at Reelsville, Ind., 
89. 

Gasper, P Joe,” councilman and low politician of ! 

Indianapolis, see also Indianapolis, 207. j 

Gasper, J. P., postmaster at Kingsley, la., forced to 
resign, 165. 

Gates, E. M., postmaster at Watertown, N. Y., fur- | 
nishes political information. .392. 

Gates, M. E., president Amherst College, chairman | 
Indian commissioners, urges reform methods. 
205,273. ! 

Gauss. C., ward politiican of Indianapolis, see 
Parnell Hall. 194,195. i 

Gavisk. Father, favors eivll service reform, 73. ! 

Gaylord, Kan., Journalist Headly postmaster at. ' 
149. 

Gee, editor, opposes Harrison in Alabama, 346. | 

Geer, collector of Port Huron, Mich., spoilsman, | 
asks for special examination, refused, 36. i 

Geneva, N. Y., civil service reform association of, 
239. 

Genoa, Ill.. Editor Hartman appointed postmaster 
at.l41. I 

Georgia, federal officers in, candidates for congress, 1 
162; political activity of federal officers in. .348. | 
Gerard and Meyer, attempt to vote under false : 

names of, see New York City. j 

Gere, C. H.. editor, applicant for postmastership at; 
Lincoln, Neb., 72; appointed postmaster at 
Lincoln. Neb., 108; delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Gerrard. J., political worker, candidate for postmas- ; 

tershlp of Muncie, Ind., 217. , 

Gest, obtains appointment of unworthy applicant 
as postmaster at Plymouth, Ill., 47. I 

Gibbes, W’. H., removed from postmastership at Co¬ 
lumbia. S. C.. 7i. 

Gibbs, F. S., ward politician, see New’ York City, ' 
199; notorious politician, and republican prima- ! 
rles,241, 242; political worker opposed by Platt, \ 
places given to friends in of N.Y. federal offices, | 
265; notorious politician, Platt supports him by j 
use of federal patronage, 287. I 

Gibbs, W. B., postmaster of Jackson, Miss., active ' 
politician, 47. 348; delegate for Harrison at 
Minneapolis. 344. 

Gibson, L. H., address of, on “Relation of civil 
service tocomfortable living in cities,” 366. 

“Gift of offices.” address on. by L. B. Swift, 145. 
Gilbert, C. H., commends Civil. Service Chroni¬ 
cle, 364. 

Gilbert, J. M., defeated candidate of Senator His- 
cock. 132. 

Gildea, C. A., postmaster at Brackettsville. Tex., I 
removed for political reasons; Ballantyne ap-1 
pointed, 1.S6. I 


Gilkeson, B. F., Senator Quay speaks for, 17; 
Quay’s h*enchman appointed second comp¬ 
troller of the treasury, 30; removes WL P. Mon¬ 
tague for political reasons, 56; appointment of, 
241; political worker for Quay, 270, 280. 


Gill, representative in Indiana legislature, opposes 
spoils methods in, 407. 

Gillette, A. B., candidate for postmaster of Hart- 
lordt Conn., favored by politicians, 84. 

Gilliland, J. A., postmaster at Allegheny, worker 
for Congressman Bayne, 135; supporter of 
Quay, suspected by Harrison, 299. 

Gillycuddy, Dr., and Indian rising at Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak..218. 


Gilpin, L. L., applicant for postmaster at Portland, 
Ind., 88. 


Ginn, S. _P., refuses office rather than agree to pay 
political assessments or be subject to Mabone, 
1 72. 

i Gladfelter, L. E., P. O. employe, see Baltimore in¬ 
vestigation, 278, 312. 

Gladstone. W. E., and Irish home-rule, 228, 230, 244. 
Gladwin, Mich., Journalist Foster, postmaster at, 


Glasgow, Scotland, city government of, 283, 284. 
Glass, H., P. O. employe, see Baltimore investiga¬ 
tion, 268, 277, 295. 

j Glazebrook, doorkeeper of Indiana house of rep- 
I resentatives, and subordinates, 406, 407. 

I Gleason, political w’orker, see Pine Ridge Indian 
' agency, 218. 


Gleason, H., at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Glen Hall, Ind., Mustard appointed postmaster at, 
vice Stepp, “resigned,” 149. 

Glenn, postmaster at Cuba, N. Y., in N. Y. con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Glenn, J. C., U. S. marshal, a political Avorker, 160. 

Glenn, J., appointed U. S. marshal through influ¬ 
ence of Judge Settle, his relative, 47. 

Glenn, W'. J., journalist, postmaster at Cuba, N. Y., 
155. 

Gloucester, Mass., Mansfield, postmaster of, 362. 

Godfrey, appointed postmaster at New Albany, 
Ind., makes a clean sweep, 45; works for Miche- 
ner, 144; political worker for Harrison, 316; at 
Minneapolis convention, 377, 378, 380. 

Godkin, E. L., editor, at Baltimore conference, 
1889, 2; arrested through Tammany. 314. 

Goesling, H. H., candidate, makes spoils promises, 
. 260. 

Goff, ex-representative, controls much patronage in 
West Virginia, 71. 

Gold, S.N., township trustee at Indianapolis, should 
refuse to remove F. W'right, 111; removes valua¬ 
ble officers, 146; defends his spoils methods; 
criticism of, 256. 

Golson, L., journalist, postmaster at Llano, Tex., 
155. 

Gooch, aided by patronage of navy yard at Kittery, 
Maine, 147. 

Good Government, formed by merging Civil Serv¬ 
ice Record and Civil Service Reformer, 357. 

Goodale. Miss, friend of the Indians. 217, 218. 

Goode,-, city marahal, ward politician, see New 

York City. 

Goode, M., requests patronage, 311, 312; at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 344. 

Goodland, Ind., editor appointed postmaster at. 37. 

Goodland, Kan., Journalist Tait postmaster at, 149. 

Goodman, C., disreputable political worker for 
Gorman, career of, 307, 308. 

Goodrich. J. C., efficient postmaster at Short Hills, 
N. Jersey, removed; Grocer Kessler appointed, 
.386. 


Goodrich, W. W., political Avorker, see Kings Co., 
N. Y.; loAV political Avorker for Nathan, 288,304. 
chairman Kings Co., N. Y., republican com¬ 
mittee, 371. 

Gordon, postmaster of Auburn. Ind., political 
worker, 379, 380. 

Gore, of Boston, qualifications of office-holders ac¬ 
cording to. 45. 


Gorman, senator, and Maryland reformers, 2, 
3. 5, 21, ’28, .35, 43, 45. 68, 80; spoilsman, 92, 119, 
170,171,175; “system” of in Maryland, 15,161; se¬ 
cures appoiutmen t of democrat as postmaster at 
Laurel, Md., although a republican had been 
named, Wanamaker allowing Gorman’s claim 
to control the place,38; compared with Mahone, 
67; would have lost control of Maryland but 
for Cleveland. 70; opposed to civil service law, 
79; and ballot reform in Maryland, 87; controls 
patronage in Maryland, 93, 111; “boss” in Mary¬ 
land, 172; secures office for Higgins, disreputa¬ 
ble character. 181; spoilsman, and disreputable 
politician, 413, 281, 289, 298, 329, 213, 214, 245, 256; 
“appreciation” of in Maryland, 219; dreads 
office-holding aristocracy, 227; defends spoils 
system of Wanamaker; opposes Australian bal¬ 
lot system, 228; and patronage in census bu¬ 
reau; conspires Avith Mahone, 2.34; and Cleve¬ 
land; as presidential candidate, 235; presiden¬ 
tial candidate: gets office for Ioav political work¬ 
ers, 236, 237; attacks civil service commission, 
2.50, 251; and Raisin. 251; controls federal and 
state patronage of Maryland, 254; boss in Mary¬ 
land. 278; and his political worker, Goodman, 
307, 308. 

Goshen, Ind.. Editor Beyerle appointed postmaster 
at, 30, 126; Beyerle, postmaster of, political 
AVorker for Harrison, 316; Beyerle, postmaster 
at, 377; political Avorker, 378. 

Goss, editor, appointed collector of Barnstable, 46. 


Gostonia, N. C., Jenkins postmaster of, Harrison 
delegate, 334. 

Gould, C. B., journalist, postmaster at Emporium, 
Pa., 149. 

Gould, Jay, gives bribes, 171. 

GoAvdy, J. K., political Avorker for Harrison in In¬ 
diana, 302, 303; chairman Indiana republican 
state committee, and Halford, 360, ;362; cam¬ 
paign fund circular of, 382; confers with U. S. 
Treasurer Nebeker, 370. 

Goyles, G. W., negro, Harrison delegate at Min¬ 
neapolis, 344. 

Grace, mayor of New York City, and civil service 
reform, 82; obtains removal of Squire, see Hill, 
307. 

Graceville, Minn., Journalist Brynildsen postmas¬ 
ter at, 149. 

Graham, political worker for Quay, 300. 

Graham, W., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

Grand Army Post at Woodhull, Ill., denunciation 
of Congressman Henderson. 

Grand Rapids, Mich., civil service commission at, 
:36. 

Grand View, Ind., Editor Knight appointed post¬ 
master at, 126, 377. 

Grant, mayor, see NeAv York City, and civil service 
reform, 82; tool of B. Cockran, 184; supported 
by Gorman, 214; of N. York on street cleaning, 
220, 273; and Wllmer, 290; and Staats Zeitung, 
317, 318. 

Grant, C. W., employe in Indian service, asked for 
political contributions, 385. 

Grant, President, indorsed for selection of commis¬ 
sioners under civil service act, 50; and Indian 
service, 182; accused of nepotism, uses offices as 
as bribes, 191; as general, 231; and charges 
against officials, 238; executive order of, insti¬ 
tuting reform methods, 271, 274; and Fisher, 374, 
yields to spoilsmen, 186, 308, 414. 

Graves, E. O., civil service reform under in bureau 
of printing and engraving, .32, 45; removed by 
Pres. Harrison, 52, 94.173, 237, 282, .368, 376. 

Gravesend, N. Y., ruled by “Boss” McKane, 352. 

Gray. F., journalist, postmaster at Ivanhoe, Kan., 
149. 

Gray, I. P., ex-governor of Indiana, 206; spoils¬ 
man, mentioned for presidency, 235, 244; as ap¬ 
plicant for various offices. 396. 

Grayson, Ky., Journalist Littlejohn, postmaster at, 
149. 

Greacen, R. A., supports Lee for place in N. Y. cus¬ 
tom-house, 2.59: requests patronage, 311,312. 

Greason, J. D., journalist, postmaster at Atwood. 
Kan., 148. 

Greaves, M. A., on selection of census enumerators 
in N. Y. City, 294. 

Green, F. V., reports to Mayor Grant on street¬ 
cleaning in New York; advises merit system, 
220 , 221 . 

Green, G., supervisor of Brooklyn, N. Y., rendered 
insane by office-seekers, 45. 

Greenawalt, J. R., journalist, postmaster at Elk- 
horn, W. Va., 1.55. 

Greencastle, Ind., applicants for postmaster of, 
squabble among. Hays appointed, 7, 89. 

Greene. E. B., makes index for Civil Service Re¬ 
cord, 237. 

Greene, J. M., tries to collect political assessments 
of employes in Indian service, 384. 

Greenfield, Ind.. I. Davis, appointed postmaster at, 
vice Howard, removed, 89. 

Greenfield. Iowa. Editor Hunt appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142. 

Greenhalge, onhousecommitteeon civil service,86; 
recommends re-appointment of Bancroft, post¬ 
master at Concord, Mass.. 91; favors civil serv¬ 
ice reform, see also Buttrick, 100, 123; upholds 
civil service commission, 204. 

GreenhOAv, W. H., postmaster at HornellsA ille, N. 
Y.. removed on secret charges, 176. 

Greenleaf, Kan., Journalist Bliss, postmaster at, 149. 

Greensburg, Ind., Hendricks, postmaster of, worker 
for Harrison, 316, 378. 

Greenwood, S. Dak., physician at Indian agency 
at. leaves duty to engage in political Avork at 
times of sickness, 202. 

Greiner, postmaster at Terre Haute, a political 
Avorker, 153,1.58; political Avorker for Harrison, 
316,377.378; at Minneapolis, .342 , 343, ;I46, .379; 
political worker, 379. 

Gresham, Neb., journalist Rhodes, postmaster at, 
149. 

Gresham. O., sonofW.Q.. favors civil service re¬ 
form, 227,2‘29: defeated as republican delegate, 
302. 

Gresham, W. Q., supported at Chicago convention 
by Illinois, 7: letter of to Postmaster Pearson, 
referring to secret charges, 12; p. m. general 
under Arthur, removes Vandervoort, 215, 216, 
2’20; more popular than Harrison with republi¬ 
cans, 240, 302; and Harrison, 370; popularity of, 
in Indiana, 370, 377. 

Griffen, F. D., journalist, postmaster at Bangor, S. 
Dak., 155. 

Griffin, C. F., and political assessments in Indi¬ 
ana. 36)3; political Avorker for Harrison in Indi¬ 
anapolis, 379. 

Griffin, T., and janitors in Indiana legislature, 406. 

Griffith, president Indiana senate, spoilsman, 408. 

Griggs, S. I., federal officer, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 348. 

Grimes.G. G., journalist, postmaster at Balrdstown, 
Ohio, 149. 















1 X I) !•: X 


XV 


Groesbeck, L., U. S. bank examiner, a political 
worker, 260. 

Grogan, S., able superintendent of city delivery at 
St. Louis, 131. 

Groner, V. D., federal officer, delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention, 318. 

Grosvenor, congressman, spoilsman, 08 , 10 l; against 
civil service reform, 123, 178, 253; charges of, 
against civil service commission. 145,146,202, 
203, 204; opposed to civil serivce law, 153, 178; 
and Roosevelt, 102 . 

Grosvenor, C. H., editor, given federal office, 301. 

Grosvenor, D., makes political assessments, 161; 
federal office-holder and spoilsman, 178, 179; 
spoilsman, rewarded by Harrison, 237. 

Gunby, E. R., collector at Tampa, Florida, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Gundlock, P., henchman of Filly, postmaster at 
Station A, St. Louis, 150. 

Gunkle, F. W., deputy U. S. marshal in Iowa, a po¬ 
litical worker, 260. 


Gunner, J. H., active politician, appointed deputy 
of Collector Erhardt, 108; deputy collector in 
N. Y. custom house, a political worker, 268, 311; 
in New York convention, 335; at Minneapolis 
convention, 344. 

Gwin, superintendent, and Craft, W. H., 12. 

Habberton, J., address on “The Ideal Citizen,” 98. 

Habercorn, L. W., newspaper correspondent, ap¬ 
pointed fifth auditor of the treas., 30. 

Habernel, J. F., postmaster of Indiana House of 
Representatives, 406. 

Hack, postal clerk, political worker, 144. 

Hack, P. O. employe, political worker, 377. 

Hackett, C. W., worker for Platt, chairman N. Y. 
state republican executive committee, 360, .361, 
371, 388; requests lists of republicans from post¬ 
masters, 370; and political assessments, 382. 

Hackney, D. G., worker for Hill, appointed fish 
commissioner of New York, vice Blackford re¬ 
moved, 310. 

Hackney, W. P., disgust of with Kansas congress¬ 
men and senators, 15. 

Haddam, Kan., Journalist Tarsel, postmaster at, 
149. 

Hagerstown (Md.), Herald [repub.], civil service 
reform advocated, 92. 

Hahn, M., see Tammany, 318. 

Hahn, W. M., chairman republican state executive 
committee, Ohio, asks political contributions, 
280. 

Haines. G. B., and stock fraudulently issued to 
Wanamaker,240. 

Haines, Wm., relative of Pres. Harrison, given 
office, 30. 

Hale, Annie, wife of Journalist Hale, postmaster at 
Spring Valley, O., 149. 

Hale, senator, controls patronage in Maine; keeps 
more employes in Portland (Me.), custom house 
than necessary, 242. 


Halford, E. W., journalist, private secretary to 
Pres. Harrison, and applications for office, 6, 
14,163, 176, 282; and office-seekers, 37; secures 
appointment of brother-in-law and others, 38; 
goes home to vote, 180; and printing office, 234; 
brother of editor of Youngstown, O., Tele¬ 
graph, supporting Sherman, 301; at Indianapo¬ 
lis, 360; political worker, 339 , 340, 343, 377, 379, 
382, 389; appointed paymaster in army, 414. 

Halifax, N. C., Hannan, negro, postmaster of, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Hall (M. C.) denounces civil service law, 47, 40. 

Hall, B. J., appointed patent commissioner, effi¬ 
cient. 140. 

Hall, D. S., federal employe, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 348. 

Hall, M. F., journalist, postmaster at Phillippi, W. 
Va., 155,180. 

Hall, T. A., subscribes for Civil Service Chrois-- 
ICLE for Y. M. C. A. of Illinois, 350. 

Hallett, C. W., and Long Island City post-office, 100. 

Halstead, M., nominated minister to Germany, 
editor of Cincinnati Commercial-Gazette, 14; 
on force bill, 169. 

Hamilton. Gail, obtains appointment of E. A. 
Dimmick, consul to Barbadoes, 56. 

Hamilton, Mo.. Clarkson, N. C., appointed post¬ 
master at, 150. 

Hamlin, carrier, see Indianapolis post office, in¬ 
vestigation of, 28,34. 

Hammell. M. A., journalist, postmaster at Mullen, 
Neb., 149. 

Hammond, postmaster of Booneville, Ind., polit¬ 
ical worker, 380. 

Hammond, A. G., appointed postmaster at Wyom¬ 
ing, Ill., vice,-, removed for political reasons. 

176. 

Hammond, F.. see Baltimore investigation, 267,296. 

Hammond, Ind.,postmaster at, inefficient, 90. 

Hammond, T., congressman, patronage of, 410,416, 

Ilammondsport, N- Y., Journalist Brown, postmas¬ 
ter at, 155. 

Hampton, W., governor, pardons Smalls, convicted 
of bribery, 39, 104; senator, letter to Wana- 
maker on removal of Gibbes, postmaster at 
Columbia, S. C., 74,190. 

Hancock Co., Ind., appointments from, 71. 

Hancock, T. R., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Neoga, Ill., 141. . 

Hanford. Cal., postmaster at removed. Editor Dodge 
appointed, 126, 


HaiHou, M. A., treasury inspector, political worker, 

Hanna, federal officer, political worker for Harri¬ 
son, 297. 

Hannon, J. H., negro, postmaster at Halifax. N. C.. 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, ;!48, 

Hansbrough, patronage pledges of to secure elec¬ 
tion as senator from N. Dakota, 216; senator, 
supporter of Blaine, 344 , 345. 

Hanscom,!., and navy yard at Kittery, Me., 147. 

Hardsou, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons, 55. 

Hare, Bishop and Rosebud, agency. Dak.,48; denies 
charges against Indian Agent McChesney, IW; 
alleges Indian abuses, 202. 

Harig, “ Bill,” ward politician of Baltimore, 308. 

Harlem, N. Y., Tammany street railroad scandal 
in, 317. 

Harley, C., politician, census supervisor 5th Indi¬ 
ana district, 101. 

Harlow, postmaster at Whitman, Mai^s., recom¬ 
mended for reappointment, 100. 

Harlow, H.. applicant for postmastership at Ply¬ 
mouth, Mass., 189. 


Harlow, J. B., appointed postmaster of St. Louis, 
88, 131; institutes reform methods, 136; con¬ 
spiracy to remove, 226; ordered to give office to 
political worker for Harrison, 304. 

Harmer, congressman and Quay, 241. 

Harmon, G. W., promised place in Brooklyn cus¬ 
tom house, see Wallace. 

Harmony, acting secretary of navy, and Ports¬ 
mouth, N. H., navy yard, 147. 

Harn, G. V., editor, appointed sugar inspector, 301. 

Harald.S. Dak., Journalist Besancon, postmaster 
at, 155. 

Harper, G. W., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Robinson,Ill., 141. 

Harper’s Weekly, civil service commission under 
Harrison and Cleveland compared, 211; com¬ 
parison of Cleveland and Harrison in regard to 
civil service reform, 338; on what to expect of 
Cleveland, 358, 359. 


Harrigan, appraiser, resignation asked, 22. 

Harrigan, sergeant at-arms in N. Y. legislature; 
his patronage, 215. 

Harrington, G. W., democrat, postmaster at Mon- 
son, Mass., recommended for reappointment, 
188. 

Harrington, Prof. M. W., appointed head of weather 
bureau,245; favors civil service reform, 253. 

Harris, A. W., customs inspector, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Harris, H. E., journalist, postmaster at Utica, O., 
149. 

Harris, Rev. J. A., at Baltimore conference, 1889, 2; 
favors clerical recognition of civil service re¬ 
form, 48. 

Harris, O.T., federal officer, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 348. , . 

Harris, R. H., see Baltimore investigation, 267, 268. 

Harris, S., supported by Congressman Cooper for 
postmaster of Franklin, Ind., 398. 

Harrisburg Telegraph [rep.], civ. service reform a 
sham, 49. 


larrison. Pres., removes postmaster at Norwich 
(Conn.), without cause and appoints spoilsman, 
see Norwich, Conn.; nominates Wallace, spoils¬ 
man, to be postmaster at Indianapolis, 2, 3; and 
civil serv. ref., in letter of acceptance. 1,4,9,69; 
and civ. serv. ref., has not made promises, 5,10; 
appoints S. N. Chambers U. S. dist. att’y in 
Indiana, 7; as senator, remarks on evils of 
patronage, 9; inaugural address and civil serv. 
ref ,9; order of, postponing classification of R. 
R. mail service, 10; and Postmaster Pearson, 13, 
44; disputes with senators over patronage, 14; 
number of appointments to April, 1889,16, over¬ 
run with office-seekers. 16 ; congressmen dic¬ 
tate appointments, 17, 93; civil serv. commis- 
sion appointed by, 17; “public duties of, dis¬ 
pensing patronage, 18; census bureau under 
and civil serv. law, 19; and spoils system, 20; 
and Pearson, postmaster at Nety York, 20, and 
nepotism,21,30,84; and R.R. mail service, 21,22; 
cabinet of formed according to Senator May s 
demands, 22; gives patronage of Missouri to 
Kerens, 22, applicants to be treated with con¬ 
sideration, 24; and Vanderyoort and Bagby, 25, 
34 “’ll; not keeping promises in Indianapolis 
post-office, 26; gives patronage of N. York to T. 
Platt, 27; hastily removes foreign ministers, 27; 
gives patronage of Pennsylvania to Senator 
Quay, 27, 47, 135, 138; inability to satisfy spoils¬ 
man 27; removes Indian commissioner 
Oberly, 27; cabinet of composed entirely 
of spoilsmen, 27; removes Strauss, minis¬ 
ter to Turkey; appoints “Sol Hirsch. 29; 
removes postmaster at Jersey City without 
cause,29; removes Postmaster Clark, of Jack¬ 
sonville, Florida, for political reasons, 29; re¬ 
moves postmaster at Bridgeport beftwe term 
exnired, 29; removes Postmistress Clay, at 
Huntsville. Ala., without cause, 29; appoints 
Editor J.B. Stone collector internal revenue 
first Michigan district, 30; removes without 
cause head of assay office at Boise City, Idaho, 
appoints spoilsman,.30; rewards political work- 
ers: declares he will not cease appointments 
until offices are exhausted, 30; and Senator 
Cullom, 31; appoints G. P. Fisher, disreputable 
politician, first auditor of the treasury. 32 ; ap¬ 
points D. M. Ransdall m arsh al District of Colum¬ 


bia, 34, 80; “discrimipating test” of, 35,36,100; 
appoints White, editor and spoilsman, internal 
revenue collector, :37; appoints Robert Smalls, 
a convicted criminal. In face oi well-known 
record and strong protest, 39; makes spoil of 
offices, 41; refusal of to have anything to do 
with Dudley, 41; searching examination of 
management of civil service by, promised, 41; 
refuses request of civil service commission to 
place census bureau under civil service law, 42, 
88,131; treatment of Indians by administration 
of, 42; civil service reform promises of,43,52,61, 
62, 63, 65,292; rules of for appointment, 44; re¬ 
movals oi postmasters under, 45; and collector- 
ship of customs at Chicago, 47; and Con¬ 
gressman Brower, 47; and postmasters, 49; 
removes Naval Officer Burt, 52; gives patron¬ 
age of Virginia to Mahone, 27 , 52, 70; rewards 
Tanner lor services, and later removes him, 53; 
uses offices to affect elections in Louisiana, 54; 
appealed to by MacCourt, 54; removes Post¬ 
master Curran of Hoboken, N. J., for political 
reasons, 54; gives office to T. B. Willis as a po¬ 
litical rewara, 55; appoints E. Nathan, low pol¬ 
itician, collector Int. rev. for Brooklyn (N. Y.) 
district, appoints Lyon surveyor of port, 56; 
not enough credit given to, for administration 
of civil service law, 59; appoints Throop, po¬ 
litical worker, collector of Terre Haute (Ind.) 
district, -59; congratulated on appointments by 
Mass, republican convention, 63; administra¬ 
tion tramples civil serv. rei. under foot, 64; 
denounced for violation of pledges, by national 
league, 1889, 66; appoints J. N. Huston U. S. 
treasurer, objects to giving him Indiana pat¬ 
ronage, gives it to Michener, 67; denounced for 
abuse of civ. service, by 11. C. Lea, 68, 111; can 
stop political assessments, 70; gives patronage 
of Louisiana to Congressman Coleman, 71; re¬ 
moves postmaster at Syracuse, N. Y., for polit¬ 
ical reason, 71; and postmaster at La Fayette, 
Ind., 71; and appointment of postmasters, 
74; responsibility of, 75; as senator and spoils 
in Indiana, 75; attributes defeat in 1889 to 
disappointed office-seekers, 75; and dis¬ 
tribution of patronage in New York, 75; 
letter to General Manson, 77; extract 
from message on civil service commission; 
postpones execution of order classliying R. 
R. mail service, 80,81; as Sen., criticises Pres. 
Cleveland for bribing the press, 81; weakened 
by patronage, 83; must stand by the platform 
(see Winchester Herald), 83; appoints E. G. 
Hay, a friend, U. 8. district attorney, 84; re¬ 
wards A. D. Shaw, 84; unsatisfactory to repub¬ 
licans so far as patronage is concerned, 84; and 
civ. service law. 86; his test for office; postmas¬ 
ters at Springfield and Quincy, Mass., 86; and 
W. W. Dudley, 87; and Wlnamac, Ind., postmas¬ 
tership, 88; promotes J. B. Harlow to be post¬ 
master at St. Louis, 88; as Sen. and Pres., and 
Garrigus, 88; and Mitchell, Ind. postmastership, 
89; and Greencastle, Ind., postmastership, 89; 
criticised at Noblesville, Ind., 89; discontent 
with, 89; and post-office at Hammond, Ind., 90; 
and Baltimore postmastership, 90; and Massa¬ 
chusetts civ. service reform association, 92; 
memorial to from civ. service reform ass’n of 
Philadelphia, 92; civ. service reform in first 
year of, 94; and Collector Saltonstall, 94; and R. 
Williams, 95; appoints Clark collector at Chi¬ 
cago, 95; secret charges under, 96, 175; appoints 
Kinney postmaster at Hartford, Conn., 99; re¬ 
appoints Lyman civil serv. commissioner, 103; 
letter to from W. Barker, protesting against 
Quay, 104; appoints Warmouth, ruffianly politi¬ 
cian, collector at New Orleans, 105; nomination 
of, see Quay, 106; appoints Clements, political 
worker, pension agent at Chicago vice Mrs. 
Mulligan, 107; and appointment of examiners 
for pension office, 108; appoints Editor Fitch 
collector of internal revenue at Buffalo, N. Y., 
108; conference with Congressman Hitt over 
post-office at Rochelle, Ill., 110; as senator, crit¬ 
icises Cleveland’s course with regard to civil 
service, 119; and congressmen, 120; and patron¬ 
age system, 76,120,173; spollspledgesof,121; and 
postmastership of Stanberry, Mo., 121; requests 
aid for civil service commission, 122; and Gar¬ 
field, 129, 130; removes Hendrix, postmaster 
at Brooklyn, N. Y.; offers place to political 
worker, 131; appoints Editor Von Bergman, 132; 
claims on, 132; condemned by Maryland Civil 
Serv. Ref. issoc. for giving patronage to Quay, 
136; appoints Mitchell patentcommissioner, 140; 
abuses in Brooklyn navy yard under adminis¬ 
tration of, 142; complaints to of Warmouth, 
143,144; nominates Eaves; gives patronage of N. 
Carolina, 150; censured, 153; promotes Sher¬ 
wood to be postmaster at Washington to suc¬ 
ceed Ross, transferred, 153; and U. S. Attorney 
Chambers, 154; removes employes in Brooklyn 
navy yard, 155; praised; civil service methods 
advocated, see Indiana republican platform, 
1890, 156: condemned for disregard of civil 
service law, see Pennsylvania, Indiana and 
New Hampshire platforms, 1890, 156; nomi¬ 
nates democrat, Kirkpatrick, postmaster at 
North Hadley Falls, Mass., 157; nominates 
Eaves, a corrupt politician, 159; removals un¬ 
der; spoils system under, 159, 188, 269; gives 
patronage of Texas to Collector Cuney, 159; 
correspondence of with Foulke, W. D., over 
presidential post-offices, see also post offices, 
presidential, 163; good appointments of, 169; 










XVI 


1X1) E X . 


gives oflices as rewards for party service, 171; a 
greater spoilsman than any predecessor, 174; as 
senator, speech in senate on iniquity of secret 
charges system; see Shelbyvllle. Freeman, De 
La Hunt, 176,177; gives patronage to Sewell, 180; 
and McFarland, disreputable politician, 181; 
gives patronage of navy yard at New York 
to Fischer, 182; uses olflces to gain renomina¬ 
tion, 183; and customs offices; Washington 
offices, 185; advised to appoint AVery postmas¬ 
ter at Plymouth, Mass., 187; removals under 
for cause, according to Clarkson, 188; secures 
control of Indiana republican state committee, 
189; striving for renomination, 192; course of 
in Indian affairs: letter to Cambridge Civil 
Service Reform Association regarding, 86, 98, 
102,182,202,204,205,217,219,239; removes U. S. 
district attorney at Washington, D. C.,211; and 
Delphi (Ind.) Journal. 213; nominates W. R. 
Leeds, disreputable politician, as U. S. marshal 
in Penn., 216; appoints Mayor Ellis postmaster 
at Muncie, Ind., 217; silent regarding civil 
service reform, 220; order of putting part of 
Indian service under civil service law; forbids 
promotion without examination from unclassi¬ 
fied to classified service, 221, 230, 2.3i; should 
put navy yards under civil service law, 222; re¬ 
appoints democrat, Sherlin. postmaster at 
Sandwich, Mass.; democrat, Morgan, at New¬ 
ton, Mass., 224; federal office-holders interfere 
in primaries at Baltimore in behalf of. 225, 226; 
“Boss” Filley, of Missouri, works for, 226; and 
G. B. Raum, Jr., 228; Martin, appointed col¬ 
lector internal revenue, aids Quay to ruin bal¬ 
lot bill in Penn., 228, 229, 232, 2:53; and Roose¬ 
velt, civil service commissioner, 232; makes 
terms with Quay, 235; promotes Thompson, as¬ 
sistant postmaster at Indianapolis, to be post¬ 
master; consequent promotions, 235; renomi¬ 
nation of, reasons for and against; course re¬ 
garding civil service reform, 2:37,240, 2;i8, 287; 
republican opposition to, workers for. 240; ap 
points W. H. Brooks collector internal revenue 
in Pa., vice Martin, resigned, 241; negroes do 
not get patronage under, 24:3, 244; gives patron¬ 
age of New York to Platt. 245; workers for, 219; 
removes Stearns for political reasons, 2-50; 
reasons of for removal of Corse, postmaster at 
Boston, 251; patronage as used by, and party 
platform, 1888,2.5:3; orders promotions in Wash¬ 
ington offices made on competitive examina¬ 
tions under civil service commission, gives 
patronage of Maryland to republican machine. 
2.51; accepts “resignation ” of Erhardt, collector 
atN. Y. City, appoints Fassett to make clean 
sweep, 255; betrays civil service reform, 2ti0, 
282, .319; extensions of civil service reform un¬ 
der, compared to Dictator Balmaceda, 261; con¬ 
trols patronage, but it is a source of weakness, 
262; appoints Flanagan, political worker, col¬ 
lector of customs at El Paso, 266; civil service 
commission is good under, 271, 272; precise 
scope of extension of civil service law in Indian 
service, under, 273; and R. R. mail service, ex¬ 
tends civil service law to certain employes in 
Indian service, 275; and violations of law in 
Omaha post-office, 281; rewards Flanagan, 286; 
uses patronage in Indiana for renomination, 
297,316, 317; uses federal patronage in Pennsyl¬ 
vania and elsewhere to secure renomination, 
removes supporters of Quay, 298, 299, :501; and 
and removal of Flood, postmaster at Elmira, 
N. Y., 303, :(05; and Mahone “blackmailers,” 
305; compelled to give patronage. 311, :(12; and 
independents, 313; commended and cen¬ 
sured by National League, 321; political ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders under, 88, :i-50; 
and appointment of Martin, 351; gives patron¬ 
age to Boss McKane, 352; and candidacy of 
Chase for governor of Indiana, 353, 3 4, 3.55; 
“ceaseless activity of,” 357; not opposed to po¬ 
litical assessments, 181, 358, 359, :360, 361, 362; 
seeks to reward Delegate Crum, negro, with 
postmastership of Charleston, S. C., 363; Senator 
Sawyer, chairman senate committee on post- 
offices, aids nomination of, 364; Julian on abuse 
of civil service under, 865; enforces civil serv¬ 
ice law “with vigor and impartiality,” 366; ap¬ 
points Leaycraft. political worker. ;371; civil 
service reform under, SO, 371, 872, 373. .374; and 
Minneapolis convention, 375, 376; civil service 
reform under; should be defeated, 376, 389; and 
political activity of federal office-holders in 
Indiana. 376, 381, .‘ISS, 385, 386; buys renomina¬ 
tion with offices, 387, 408; and extensions of 
civil service law, 888. 390; opposes appointment 
of Hanlon, 393, 395; civil service reform in an¬ 
nual message 1892 of, 397; extension of classi¬ 
fied service under welcomed, 398, 402; classifies 
all free-delivery post-offices, and weather bu¬ 
reau service, 403; merit system under, 404; ex¬ 
tension of civil service reform under, not urged 
by republicans, 405; administration of ruined 
by spoils system, 413, 414; appoints Private Sec’y 
Halford paymaster in army, 414; accused of 
bribing the press, 144. 

Harrison, Carter, appointed V. S. marshal by Pres. 
Harrison, his brother, 21, 30, 369. 

Harrison, E. G., appointed postmaster at Asbury 
Park, N. Y., vice Toland, 3.86. 

Harrison, Rev. H., Thanksgiving sermon of de¬ 
nouncing Clarkson, 193,194. 

Harrison. II,, commends Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle, 364. 


Harrison, J. C., father of Journalist H. Harrison, 
postmaster.at Smithfleld, O., 149. 

Harrison, J. P., postmaster at Lu Verne, la., a po¬ 
litical worker, 260. 

Harrison, J. S., brother of Pres. Harrison, works 
for Harrison at Minneapolis, ;i39. 

Harrison, Neb., father of Journalist Davis, post¬ 
master at, 149. 

Harrison, Russell, son of Pres. Harrison, influence 
of used for office-seekers. 38; political worker 
for his father, 189, 059, 378; solicits campaign 
funds for Pres. Harrison, 240; assists at dinner 
to Clarkson, 245; and Elkins, 290. 

Harrison, Dr. T. H., president of state benevolent 
boards of Indiana, a spoilsman, 206. 

Harrison, President W. H., the public press and 
spoils (in inaugural address), 17. 

Harrison. W. H., Pres., forbids political assess¬ 
ments and political activity of federal office¬ 
holders, 370. 

Harrison, W. H., Pres., on bribery of press, 376. 

Harrity and Phila. post-office, 53. 

Harrodsburgh, Ind., Woodard, postmaster of, po¬ 
litical worker, ;{S0. 

Hart, H., alderman of Netv York City, see sale of 
offices under Tammany, 224,225. 

Hart. M. L., journalist, postmaster at Ravenna, 
Kan., 149. 

Hart, T. N.. mayor, Boston,signs petition for larger 
appropriation for civil serv. com., 102; ex¬ 
mayor, Boston, appointed postmaster at Bos¬ 
ton, vice Corse, removed, 215; commended by 
Corse, his predecessor, 251. 

Hart. W. D., appointed postmaster at Meriden, 
Neb., vice McGinness. forced to resign, 166. 

Ilart.W. H., third auditor, uses influence for ap¬ 
pointment of Throop, 59; federal employe and 
printing office. 2;i4: goes home "for rest,” :!62; 
political worker, 382; spoilsman, 112; and re¬ 
moval of Suffall, 377. 

Hartford, Conn., Kinney and Gillette, applicants 
for postmastership of. M, !«•; Bennett, postmas¬ 
ter of, and removal of Bario, efficient 1’. O. in¬ 
spector, 298. 

Hartford City. Ind., Cable, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379. 

Hartley, A. H., appointed in post-office at Scranton, 
Pa., removed for political reasons, appointed to 
place in K. R. mail service, removed by Harri¬ 
son, 101. 

Hartman, A., applicant for postmaster of Colum¬ 
bus, Ind., 89; postmaster of Columbus, Ind., at 
Minneapolis convention, 379. 

Hartman, D. W., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Genoa, Ill., 111. 

Hartong. A. W., druggist, candidate for postmaster 
at Rochelle, Ill., 109; postmaster at Rochelle, 
Ill., works for Hitt, 136. 

Hartshorn, S. N., political worker for Major McKin¬ 
ley, rewarded, 52. 

Hartwig, defeated congressional candidate, de¬ 
mands patronage, 9ii. 

Harvey, G., political worker for Harrison, deputy 
coll. iut. rev. in Indiana, 302, 303, 316, 378. 

Harvey, J. W., appointed postmaster at Kusselville, 
Ind., 89. 

Harwood, J. C., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Clarion, Iowa, 141. 

Hassler, Aug. E., journalist, postmaster at Pawnee 
City, Neb., 149. 

Hastings, General, opposes Delamater, 134. 113; 
candidate for governor of Pa., 249; political 
worker for Quay, 280. 

Hathaway, postmaster of house of representatives, 
makes removals at suggestion of congressmen, 
methods of, 242. 

Hatton, F., editor of Washington Post, and scram¬ 
ble for offices. 5, 76, 79, 92, 96, 161; spoilsman 
abuses Commissioner Roosevelt, 52; charges of 
against Commissioner Roosevelt, 101; and inves¬ 
tigation of civil serv. com., 103. 

Havre, consul at, see Dufals, 54. 

Hawes, J. W., and factional fights in N. Y., see New 
York, 241, 242. 

Hawkins, U. S. marshal for Indiana district, oppres¬ 
sion by, 9. 

Hawley, Sen., supports Kinney as postmaster of 
Hartford, Conn., 84 , 99. 

Hawley, Pa., Langham, postmaster at, removed on 
secret charges, 176. 

Hawthorne, Nat’l, removed from office, -16. 

Hay. E. G., friend of Harrison, recommended by 
Sen. Washburn, appointed U. S. dist. att’y for 
Minnesota, 84. 

Hayes, Pres., declaration in favor of civ. service 
reform, 59; letter of acceptance of, in favor of 
civ. service reform, 50; and loyalty, 75; pardons 
brother of D. Ransdell, 244; on evils of political 
assessment and political activity of federal 
officers, 265, 816; friendly to civil service reform ; 
executive order of, instituting, 123, 271. 

Hayes, W. J., congressman, refused knowledge of 
reasons for removal of Evans, postmaster at 
Bloomfield, la., 175. 

Hayes, W. M., postmaster at Kingston, N. Y., polit¬ 
ical worker, 280. 

Haynes, -, attempts fraudulent voting in pri¬ 

maries, see New York City. 

Haynes, R. A., relative Pres. Harrison, given of¬ 
fice, 38. 

Hays. J. M.. appointed postmaster at Greencastle, 
Ind., 89. 


Headington, N., applicant for postmaster at Port¬ 
land, Ind., 88. 

Headley, L. C., journalist, po.'^tmaster at Gaylord, 
Kan., 149. 

Healy, M. J., requests patronage, 311, 312. 

Heath, Rev. J. W., candidate for postmastership of 
Muncie, Ind., 217. 

Hebbard, C. A., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Roseville, 111., 141. 

Hebring, H., customs collector at Geneseo, N. Y., 
at convention republican league, 2.59. 

Hecksler, removed on suspicion of being disloyal 
to Harrison, .300. 

Hedden, collector at New York, removals under, 
183. 

Hedges, C., appointed chief of postal division of 
sixth auditor’s office. Associated Press agt., 47. 

Heerman, C. A., and Mahone, 52. 

Helntz, L. J., street commissioner in N. Y. City,234. 

Hellen, Mrs., appointed stamp clerk at Winston, N. 
C., through influence of Judge Settle, her rela- 
tiv© 47. 

Hemingford, Neb., Journalist Paradis, postmaster 
at, 149. 

Hench, representative in Indiana legislature, and 
spoils system in, 407. 

Henderson, congressman, upolds civil service law, 
122, 125. 

Henderson, J. J., congressman, and postmaster of 
Woodhull, 111., 47. 

Henderson, W., leader in tally sheet (see) prosecu¬ 
tion at Inoianapolis, favors civil service re¬ 
form, 227.229. 

Henderson, W., a leader in factional fight at Balti¬ 
more, 121; faction of, see Baltimore investiga¬ 
tion, 268, 267, 277, 295; and Stone faction at Bal¬ 
timore, 372. 

Henderson, W. E., political worker for Eaves, 159. 

Henderson, W. T., disappointed office-seeker, 144. 

Hendricks, delegate to Minneapolis convention 
from Alabama, opposing Harrison, 346. 

Hendricks, postmaster at Greensburgh, Ind., 
worker for Harrison, 316, 378. 

Hendricks. A. H., P. O. employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Hendricks, republican politician and spoilsman, 
and Gov. Hill of New York, 211; supporter of 
Senator Hiscock, 216; political worker for His- 
cock and Platt; appointed collector at N. Y. 
City, 264, 266, 269; collector at N.Y. City; polit¬ 
ical worker, 279, 287, :5.54, 357; defended by bec’y 
Foster (assessment case). 289; works lor Harri¬ 
son at Minneapolis, 359, 360, 337, 343, 344; to lead 
campaign in New York, 347 , 348; management 
of custom house by, 358; opposes Congressman 
Belden, 386. 

Hendricks, T. A., ex-vice-president, his place in 
politics. 244. 

Hendrix, efficient postmaster at Brooklyn, removed, 
Baird, politician, refuses appointment, 72, 131. 

Henkel, W., at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Henry, J. A., journalist, postmaster at Jonesville, 
Minn., 149. 

Henry, J. J., republican, condemns removal for 
political reasons 01 Corse, postmaster at Boston, 
see also Civil Service Record, 213. 

Hensley, W. N., postmaster at Columbus, Neb., 
forced to resign, 166. 

Hepburn, solicitor of treasury, calls on Chairman 



reucv. oil. 

Hepburn, W. P., federal office holder in Washing¬ 
ton Co., la., a political worker, 260. 

Herbert, congressman, and political activity of fed¬ 
eral office-holders in Alabama, 355. 

Herndon, Kan., Journalist Rathbone, postmaster 
at. 149. 

Herod, W. W., candidate for mayor of Indianapo¬ 
lis; declares himself one of the “boys,” 269. 

Hess, J. W., worker for Harrison, 316: promises 
offices if elected, 378. 

Hewitt, mayor of New York City, and civil service 
reform,*82. 

Hicklln, councilman, and appointments to fire 
service of Indianapolis, 12o; ward politician 
and spoilsman, 203; supports Fire Chief Web¬ 
ster, 207, 208. 

Hickok, Rev. Dr., on civil service reform, 83. 

Hicks, J., editor, office-holder, 14. 

Higbee, representative in Indiana legislature, op- 
posesspollsmethod8in.407; and spoils methods 
in,406. 

Higgins,A., Sen., appoints Hinchman postmaster at 
Bridgeville, Del., 38; obtains appointment of 
Fisher as first auditor of treasury, of Knowles 
as consulto Bordeaux, 38; political manipula¬ 
tor,.160; at Minneapolis convention, 344; aided 
by Cooper, collector at Philadelphia, 363; at¬ 
tempts bribery, 397, 401,402. 

Higgins, E., and Cleveland administration.25; ap- 
ointmentof condemned, 51; ex-office holder, 
enchman of Gorman, disreputable character, 
181i 237, 314, 364. 

Higgins, E. R., candidate for postmaster at Ft. 
Wayne, Ind., 45; postmaster at Ft. Wayne, Ind., 
apolitical worker, 163,158; ordered to levy po¬ 
litical assessments, 302; political worker for 
Harrison, 316; works for Harrison at Minne¬ 
apolis, 342, 379; political worker, 3':2, 377,378; 
orders P. O. employes to take poll of Ft. W., 380. 

Higginson, J. W., signs petition for larger appro¬ 
priation for civil serv.com., 102. 







I N D E X . 


xvii 


High, dictation of in Berks county, Penn., 47. 

Hildebrand, J. M., appointed surveyor of customs 
at Indianapolis, 38; a political worker, 144; de- 
nouced for political inactivity, 308; worker at 
Minneapolis convention, 379. 

Hill, representative in Indiana legislature, and 
spoils methods in, 406. 

Hill, congressman, favors civil service reform, 123. 

Hill, D. B., governor of New York, see Feudalism 
Revived; opposed to civil service reform, 82, 
239,261,289; tools of, 19ii, 211; appoints ‘‘Paddy” 
Divver to a judgeship, 212; refuses requisition 
of Connecticut forger for political reasons, 214, 
215; makes spoils bargains with Senator His- 
cock, 216; workers for, oppose Fassett, by 
corrupt methods, 239; supporters of “knife” 
Cleveland, 282; Tammany leader, 298; career 
of, and Hillism, 305, 307, 309, 310, 311,351,396; 
defense of by Professor Collin, steals N. Y. leg¬ 
islature, 313; and Tammany, 317, 320; senator, 
gives Brooklyn bridge patronage to McLaugh¬ 
lin, ;150; and fish protection at Lake Keuka, 
appoints saloon keeper Sheridan keeper at, 
356; Kings CO., N. Y., democrats, 35(); imitators 
of in Indiana, 414; Sheehan, worker for, 415. 

Hill, F. B., negro, deputy collector internal reve¬ 
nue, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344, 
348. 

Hill, J., negro, postmaster at Vicksburg, Miss., 
worker at Minneapolis, 343, .348. 

Hill, J. C., federal officer, resigns to do political 
work, 362. 

Hilliard, G., calls on Fassett, collector at N. Y. 
city, 2.58; at Minneapolis convention, 344; and 
cartage contract at N. Y. custom house, 3.58. 

Hills, W. C., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Smithland, Iowa, 142. 

Hines, G. A., candidate for postmaster at Brattle- 
boro. Mass., 100. 

Illrsch, L., editor, given office by Governor Fora- 
ker, 301. 

Hirsch, “Sol,” the “Tom Platt” of Oregon, ap¬ 
pointed minister to Turkey, 29. 

Hlscock, C., appointed through Influence of Sen¬ 
ator Hiscock, his brother, to office, vice L. D. 
Monery. 1-50; political worker for him, 264. 

Hiscock,F., Sen., spoilsman, 43,353, 354, 360, 386; and 
postmaster at Syracuse, 46; obtains appoint¬ 
ment of Smith, editor, as postmaster at Syra¬ 
cuse, N. Y., 71; notoriously corrupt, 71; and 
appointment of Von Bergman, 132; opposes 
appointment of Conroy, postmaster at Wat¬ 
kins, N. Y., 150; controls patronage in N. Y., 
gets office for his brother, C. Hiscock, 150; on 
performance of party pledges, 168; supports 
Merritt for postmaster of Lockport, N. Y., bar¬ 
gains for spoils with Hill, 216; recommends 
appointment of Wheeler, 241; patronage of, 
and factional fights against, 259; patronage of, 
secures office for brother, gives bribes, ‘264, 265, 
266; indorses Payn, 312; supporter of Blaine, 
344. 


Hitch, C. P., Harrison worker at Chicago conven¬ 
tion, appointed U. S. marshal southern district 
of Ill., 30; political worker, 179. 

Hitt, congressman on civ. service law, 73; and his 
struggles in distributing patronage, see also 
Rochelle (Ill.), post-office at. 109; renomination 
of, !:«>; nominated, 137, 143; secures appoint¬ 
ment of Asay, disreputable politician, 160. 

Hoar, Judge, recommends Bancroft postmaster at 
Concord, Mass., for reappointment, 91; indorses 
Postmaster Buttrick, 100. 


Hoar, Sen., letter to from Congressman Banks, ask¬ 
ing aid for J. J. McCarthy, 31; letter of to Civil 
Service Record, declaring American people to 
be not yet aware of worth of civ. serv. ref., 
43, 60; and Boston custom house, 71; and 
Collector Saltonstall, 94; controls census pa¬ 
tronage in Mass., 104; thinks customs collectors 
should be in political harmony with president, 
104; and removal of Saltonstall, 10-5; and Eaton, 
D. B., Ill; on collectorshlp at Boston, 129; 
transmits letter of Cambridge Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association to President Harrison, 205; 
and Corse, postmaster at Boston, 213, 3-57; re¬ 
quests retention of Corse, postmaster at Bos¬ 
ton, 367, . , - 

Hoar, S., opposed to civil service reform, accord¬ 
ing to Grosvenor, 203. 

Hobart, supporters of and Blunt. 150. 

Hobart, A., at Balt, conference. 1889, 2; and resolu¬ 
tions of Mass. Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tions, 1892, 398. - 17 ., 

Hobart. G. A., politician, surety for Fassett, col¬ 
lector at New York City, 258. 

Hobbs, purchases postmastership at Mitchell,incl., 
see also sale of offices, 89. 

Hobbs, pension examiner in Indiana, political 

worker, .3^. , ttj „ m v 

Hobbs E. H., political worker, see Kings Co., N. Y. 
Hoboken, N. j!. Postmaster Curran at, removed for 
political reasons, 54. ha 

Hodson, J. H.. disappointed ofhce-seeker, 144 
Hoffman, F. N., given place in Indiana legislature, 

Hogan, D., gains office through influence of Con¬ 
gressman Smith, .38; collector of internal rev- 

HogMi! M^C.Tu. S^.^supervisor of elections in New 

HohJL^wV^^.. politician, see Indianapolis, see also 

Holco^b,^Bt?te senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 108. 


Holderman, superintendent of fire telegraph at 
Indianapolis, refuses to teach Intended sup- 
planter, 235, 243. 

Hollowell, Me., removal of postmaster at, on secret 
charges, 39. 

Holman, congressman, renomination of, 87; con¬ 
gressman, patronage of, 393, 400, 411, 417,419,421, 
4‘22. 

Holman, bank examiner in Indiana, at Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 380. 

Holmes, A. J., sergeant-at-arms of house of repre¬ 
sentatives, removes his deputy, Cavanaugh, for 
political reasons, 250. 

Holmes, L., republican member New Bedford 
(Mass.) city committee, seeks retention of 
democratic postmaster; correspondence with 
Wanamaker, 29, 176. 

Holt, S. R., politician of Indianapolis, opposes bill 
for new charter of; officer of new city govern¬ 
ment, see equally divided politically, 212,213; 
on positions in city service being “equally di¬ 
vided politically,” 220; examinations for police 
force under, 222; and city service, 228; appoints 
nnder “equally divided politically” rule, 235. 

Holton, I., supported by Congressman Cooper for 
postmaster at Plainfield, 399. 

Holyrood, Kan., Journalist Woodmansee, postmas¬ 
ter at, 149. 

Homilectic Review, October, 1889, and civil service 
reform, 65. 

Hooker, G. 5V., spoilsman, and Brattleboro, Mass., 
postmastership. 100. 

Hoopeston, Ill., Editor Warner, appointed post¬ 
master at, 141; Postmaster Catherwood of, 
forced to resign, 165. 

Hope. Kan., Journalist Burroughs, postmaster at, 
149. 

Hopkins (M. C.) on house committee on civil ser¬ 
vice, 86; indorses Hartong for postmaster at Ro¬ 
chelle, Ill., 109. 


Hopley, J., jonrnalist, postmaster at Bucyrus, 0., 
149,301. 

Hopper, F., nominee for council, see Indianapolis, 
see Parnell Hall. 

Hord, F., representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses gerrymander of 1893,414. 

Horn. C. W., journalist, postmaster at Plain City, 
O., 149. 

Hornellsvllle, N. Y., removal of Greenbow, post¬ 
master at, on secret charges, 176. 

Horr, J. F., collector at Key W'est, Fla., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Horseheads, N.Y., factional struggles against Platt 
and Fassett at, see Chemung Co.; Van Duzer, 
postmaster of, a political worker, 265; Postmas¬ 
ter Van Duzer of, and removal of Flood, 304; 
Chemung county democratic convention at, 
run by Hill workers, 309. 

Hotchkiss. A. C., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at Adel, Iowa, 141. 


Houk, L. F., congressman, of Tennessee, opposed 
to civ. service reform, 35, 49, 54, 161; spoilsman, 
secures office for his son, 84; opposes civil serv¬ 
ice commission and reform, 124; charges of 
against civil service commission, 145, 140: op¬ 
posed to civil service reform; sees evils of 
spoils system, 177, 178. 

Houk, J. C.. appointed through influence of his 
{8idl0F 84 

House of Representatives, Hathaway, postmaster 
of, spoilsman, removals under, 242. 

Houston. R. L . postmaster of Birmingham, Ala., 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Hovey. A., governor, of Indiana, 17; of Indiana, 
appoints farmer as mine inspector, 192; on in¬ 
vestigating insane hospital scandals at Indian¬ 
apolis, 206. 

Ilovey, C. J., son of Gov. Hovey, appointed post¬ 
master at Mt. Vernon, Ind., 71; postmaster, etc,, 
at Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Howard, Gen , on Indian abuses, 182. 

Howard, J., ward politician, see Indianapolis, 196, 

Howard, N. P., postmaster at Greenfield, Ind., re¬ 
moved, 89. 

Howard, R., signs petition for larger appropriation 
for civil service commission, 102. 

Howard City, Mich., Journalist Lowrey postmaster 
at, 149. 

Howarth,—, journalist, appointed census enumer¬ 
ator. 142. 

Howe, H. II., federal employe, pays political as¬ 
sessments. 279. 

Howell, chief-of division, removed for political 
reasons, 55. , ^ ^ 

Howell, J. C., commandant navy-yard at Kittery, 


Me. 147. 

Howeli'w. A., nominated to be postmaster at Mil¬ 
waukee, vice Paul, resigned. 47. 

Howell, W. C.. relative of President Harrison 
given office, 90. . * . . 

Howells. J. J., editor, appointed postmaster at Jef¬ 
ferson, Ohio, 301. ,, , , It 

Howland, W., candidate, charges political activity 
of federal employes, 179. t i- 

Hovsradt, state senator of New York, corrupt poli¬ 
tician, see Hill, 307. 

FTovt. eovernor of Pennsylvania subject to Quay, 


151 

ivt, "w. E., brother-in law of President Cleve- 
land holds office* 150. 

ibbell, J.. congressional campaign, 188-. 2i2; com- 
paign and Curtis. 366; and political assess¬ 
ments, 373, 390. 


Huber, Pa., postmaster at, see Broslus, 72. 

Hudder, J. U., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Aurora, Ill, 1'26. 

Hudson, state senator of Indiana, votes against 
bill for non-partisan control of state charitable 
institutions, 201; low politician and spoilsman, 
opposes new charter of Indianapolis, see, also, 
Magee, 211. 

Hudson, postmaster of Corydon, Ind., political 
worker, 379, 382. 

Hudson, J. S., delegate to republican national 
convention, secures removal of Duer, postmas¬ 
ter at Princess Anne, Md., and appointment of 
Lankford, 408. 

Hudson Co., N. Y., factional democratic fights in 
police aid Davie faction, 199,‘200. 

Huey, lawyer, and stock fraudulently issued to 
Wanamaker, ‘246. 

Huffer, S. W., candidate for postmastership at 
Muncle, Ind., 217. 

Hughes, asst, postmaster of Philadelphia, political 
worker for Quay, 270, 280. 

Hughes, A. M., leads Tennessee delegation for Har- 
ripon, 341. 

Hughes, E. N., applicant for W’lnamac, Ind., post- 
mastership, 88. 

Hughsou, J.,given office through Influence of Priv. 
Sec. Halford, 38. 

Hugiuir, appointed postmaster at Newport, Minne¬ 
sota, 21. 

Hugo, V., on America, 210. 

Huiett, W. L., doorkeeper in Indiana senate, 408. 

Humphrey, mayor of Concord, N. H., 143. 

Hungerford, J. B., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at Carroll, Iowa, 141; a political worker, ‘260. 

Hunt, and office-seekers, 38. 

Hunt, police judge of Manchester, active politi¬ 
cian, 143. 

Hunt, C. B., editor, appointed postmaster at Green¬ 
field, Iowa, 142. 

Hunt, W. L., editor, appointed postmaster at St. 
Clairsville, 0., 301. 

Hunter, commissioner, spoilsman, 315. 

Hunter, J. T., asks for financial “suggestions,” 383. 

Hunter, N. Y., Journalist Casteright postmaster of, 
1.55. 

Hunter, R. H., internal revenue collector in New 
York, a political worker, 265. 

Huntertown, Ind., Latham, postmaster at, removed 
through influence of Postmaster Higgins, Dun- 
ton appointed, 362. 

Huntington, Bishop, advocates civ. service reform, 
40. 82. 

Huntington, Ind., Editor Butler, appointed post¬ 
master at, 126, 377; Rogers, postmaster of, at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Huntsville, Ala., Clay, Mary, postmaster at, re¬ 
moved without cause. 

Hurst, S. H., editor, given office by Governor For- 
aker, 301. 

Husted, speaker, secures nomination of Pentreath 
for postmaster of YTonkers, N. Y., 150; chairman 
republican executive committee of New York, 
279; corrupt politician, see Hill, 307. 

Huston, G. N., 7, 78, 85, 96; treas. of U. S., 14; chair¬ 
man Indiana republican state committee; con¬ 
trols patronage of Indiana, 67, 112, 121, 154; ob¬ 
tains office for Scanlon, for political services, 
132; of national republican committee, 359; 
worker for Harrison, and distributer of patron¬ 
age, 377; and political assessments, 382, 383. 

Hyat, J., efficient officer in house of representa¬ 
tives, removed for political reasons through in¬ 
fluence of McPherson, 84. 

Iches, editor, appointed postmaster at Newark, 
O.,301. 

Idaho., governor of officially compliments man¬ 
agement of assay office at Boise City, whose 
chief removed without cause by Harrison, 30; 
Boise City, head of assay office at removed 
without cause, 30. 

Idding, pension examiner in Indiana, political 
worker, 380. . 

Ide, C. E.. defeated candidate, 132; politician, :386. 

Illig, police commissioner at Buffalo, works for 
Trautmann; uses intimidation, see Buffalo, N. 
Y., 197. ^ , 

Illinois, see also convention, platform. 

Illinois, congressmen of and offices, 6; senators of 
and President Harrison, 6; delegation and the 
offices, 7; congressmen and offices, 15; delega¬ 
tion from, favoring appointment of Asa 
Matthews as first comptroller, 21; congressmen 
of and Chicago post-office, 22; removals in, 22; 
Bloomington, examination at, ‘26; postmasters 
In democratic congressional districts appointed 
through influence of Sen. Cullom, 30; Harrison 
worker appointed U. S. marshal for southern 
district of, 30; Congressman Cannon of, spoils¬ 
man, 30; Senators Cullom and Farwell and 
Wilcox matter, 31; congressmen and senators of 
refused control of patronage by Harrison, 240: 
political activity of federal office holders in, 
335, 336, 344; CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE to be 
sent to Y. M. C. A. of, 350: Governor Altgeld of 
flees from office-seekers, 415. 

Impeachment, Presldentllable to, for abuse of civil 
service, 17. 

Independent, on resignation of Quay as chairman 
National Republican Committee, 257. 

Indian commissioner, Butler, low politician, rec¬ 
ommended by congressmen for, 14; Oberly re¬ 
moved by Pres. Harrison,27; Morgan, 38; Mor¬ 
gan favorable to civil service reform, asks re- 








> 


xviii 


INDEX. 


tentiouof his predecessor, 44; Morgan upholds 
Harrison’s Indian policy, 202. 

Indian commissioners deciare Indian service in 
better condition than ever before, 205. 

Indian Rights Association, 42; and abuse of Indian 
service, 86; seventh annual report of on Indian 
service, 102; refused knowledge of cause of re¬ 
moval of Vandever, 181; efforts of, 182; confer¬ 
ence 1891 favors application of civil service re¬ 
form methods to Indian service, 288; report of 
commissioners condemning spoils system In 
Indian service, 308. 

Indian schools, Dorchester, commissioner of, 38. 

Indian service, extension of civil service law to, 
advocated, 10; Junkin, W. W., appointed in¬ 
spector in, 14; congressional patronage and, 36; 
rules of Commissioner Morgan concerning ten¬ 
ure of office in, 44; letter of Welsh favoring civil 
service reform in, 47; evils in, 86; spoils system 
in, 94,173,192, 308; “home rule system of Pres. 
Harrison, 102; disgrace of. Pres. Grant and, see 
A Century of Dishonor, 182; gross abuses in, 
correspondence regarding, see Morgan-, Har¬ 
rison, Cook, Cambridge Civil Service Reform 
Association, 202, 204,205; in better condition 
than ever before, see Indian commissioners, 
proposal to extend civil service law to agency 
clerks and employes in, 205; removals in under 
Cleveland and Harrison, 217; places in given as 
spoil, see Pine Ridge,218; H. Welsh on removals 
in, Capen on removals in under Cleveland, 219; 
partially put under civil service law by Pres. 
Harrison, 221, 273 , 372; evils of spoils system in, 
H. Welsh on, in Scribner’s magazine for April, 
1891,224; used as spoils by Sec. Noble, 226; merit 
system introduced in, 230, 251, 289, 321; de¬ 
bauched by Harrison, 237,376; spoils system in, 
H. Welsh on, 239; extension of merit system to 
commended, 286; thorough application of re¬ 
form to demanded, 288; political assessments 
levied on employes in, 375 , 384, 38;3, 383; exam¬ 
iners for 1891-92, 397. 

Indiana, see also Convention, Platform. 

Indiana, civil service reform in under Cleveland’s 
first administration, 1; democratic party in, 
civil service reform, 8; nnmber of postmasters 
appointed in, from March 4 till July 20, inclu¬ 
sive, 1889, 34; rotation in office in, 45; moral 
republican organ of thinks neither parly cares 
about civil service reform, 62; fourth class 
post-offices used to strengthen republican ma¬ 
chine in, 67: Huston chairman republican state 
committee, 1888, 67; federal offices in, used to 
make a machine, 68; reform sentiment in, 93; 
state university of, civil service reform senti¬ 
ment at, 108; distribution of spoil in causes 
republican defeat. 111; republican congress¬ 
men of, and spoils, 112; status of merit system 
in, 119; state civil service in, devoted to spoils, 
137; 20,000 floaters in, 171; patronage of given 
to Mtchener, 173; republican club, for spoils, 
see Curry, 181; republican factions fight over 
chairmanship of state committee, 189; bribery 
by republicans advised in, 190, 191; farmer ap¬ 
pointed mine Inspector of, by Governor Hovey, 
192; state federation of trade and labor unions 
of, demand non-partisan control of state in¬ 
stitutions, see Magee, 201; foundation of state 
board of charities of, opposed by State Senator 
Burke for not being partisan, 201; Magee bill 
for non-partisan control of state charitable in¬ 
stitutions, defeated, 201, 202, 208, 209, 210; Dr. 
Harrison, president of state benevolent boards 
of, a spoilsman, 206; text of Magee bill author¬ 
izing board of state charities to regulate em¬ 
ployment of officers of benevolent Institutions 
of, according to merit system, 208, 209; illegal 
and spoils appointments made in state senate, 
spoils system and scandals in hospitals of, 211; 
212; Magee bill for non-partisan control of 
state charitable institutions discussed, 214, 215; 
“boss” ridden, 219; civil service reform popu¬ 
lar in, federal, state officers and citizens, favor¬ 
ing, 227; school children of, never speak on 
questions of public policy. 236; opposition to 
Harrison in, 240; federal officers in, political 
workers for Harrison, 260; under Cleveland 
given over to spoils, 282; federal patronage in, 
297; federal patronage used in, for re nomina¬ 
tion of Harrison, 302, 303; central and southern 
hospitals for insane, evils of spoils system in, 
315; Harrison uses federal patronage in, for re¬ 
nomination, 316, 317; spoils system in, civil 
service reform the proper issue, 322; political 
activity of federal office-holders in, 334, .337, 340, 
343, 344, 345, .346, 347, 352, 353, 3.54, 362. 370,'374, 375, 
382, 387, 389, 390; Chase, favored by Harrison for 
governor of, 343; Hill men of, defeated at Chi¬ 
cago convention, 350; state republican com¬ 
mittee assesses candidates for office, also pen¬ 
sion office at Indianapolis. 363; democratic 
politicians of, spoilsmen, 365, 3t)6; report to 
committee of National League, on political ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders in, 375 , 381; re¬ 
publican state committee of, levies political 
assessments. .387, 392; democrats aspiring to 
office, 387, 392, 395; good results of secret ballot 
in, 389; applicants for office in, under Cleve¬ 
land [2d term], 392, 394, 399, 401; spoils system 
in, legislature of 1893 under, 405, 408, 414; appli¬ 
cants for office in, under Cleveland [2d term], 
409, 411; applicants for office in, under Cleve¬ 
land [2d term], 415, 422. 


Indiana, civil service reform association ot, 67, 88; 
membership of, 4, 9,17,25, 41; annual addresses 
at, 7; membership of, 41; announcement of 
annual meeting 1890, 85; annual meeting of 
1890, list of officers, 108; notice of annual meet¬ 
ing, 111; annual meeting 1890, address of Bona¬ 
parte, C. J., 119,120,126,127,128; and Clarkson, 
131; work of, 178; Bloomington branch of, 182; 
exposes scandals of partisan management of 
state charitable institntions, 214; annual meet¬ 
ing 1891; W. D. Foulke elected president of, 227, 
289. 

Indiana School Journal and Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle, 13. 

Indiana Co., Penn., political fights in, 138. 

Indianapolis, municipal service in, 2; post-office at, 
2,9,18, 34; post-office at under Cleveland, 5; 
civil service reform in fire department 
of, 13; Wallace, postmaster of, violates civil 
service law, 28 , 73; post-office at. spoils sys¬ 
tem in, 26; post-office, investigation of by 
civil service commission, 27; list of eligibles at 
post-office at, 29; Fire Chief Websterof removed 
for political reasons, 36, 69; Hildebrand ap¬ 
pointed collector of customs at, 38, 68; composi¬ 
tion of local examining board at, examination 
at, 42; employees in post-office at exempt from 
examination, 42; Postmaster Wallace at and 
local board, 43, 48; post-office at under Post¬ 
master Jones,45,51,53,80; Commissioner Roose¬ 
velt at, 46; agent of associated press at given 
office, 47; list of eligiblesfor post office of, 48; 
questions used in examination at, August 6, 
1889,51,56,58; city election influenced by re¬ 
moval of Fire Chief Webster, 59; civil service 
commission and post office of, 59; non-partisan 
appointments in post-office at, 87; post-office at, 
no removals in except for cause, fairness of ex 
amination in, 94; examinations for physicians 
in city' hospitals, 107; deputies in custom house 
as political workers, 108; civil service reform 
in township trustee’s office at. Ill; charity or¬ 
ganization of. 111; excellence of examining 
board at, 120; vacancies in fire depart¬ 
ment of, civil service methods advocated 
for, 120; appointments to census serv¬ 
ice in made through M. Moores, 129; in 
efficient census enumeration at, 132; 
control of offices in fire service at, 137; Post¬ 
master Wallace of, secretly a political worker, 
144; Township Trustee Gold removes efficient 
officers, 146; examinations for postal service 
in, passed by negro, 146; federal office-holders 
at, state convention at, 153, 1.58; spoils system 
in, township embracing, 171; spoils system in, 
for city laborers, 181; per cent, of removals in, 
classified and unclassified service in, post-office 
at, 185; personnel of examiners at, civil serv¬ 
ice law observed rigidly in post-office at, 186; 
commercial club of, and proposed charter of, 
Indianapolis, 104, 189, 190; methods used in, 
“primaries” in, 192; patronage of state insane 
hospitals at, controlled by Markey, ward poli¬ 
tician of Indianapolis, 195; Social Turn-Verein 
of indorses Magee bill for non-partisan con¬ 
trol of state charitable institutions, 201, 209; 
efforts against spoils system in city depart¬ 
ments, 202, 203; local politics and career of cor¬ 
rupt politicians in, tally-sheet forgeries in, 205; 
206, 207, 208; bribery by street railway 

company of, 206, 207; fire service at, ef¬ 
forts to turn over to spoils, 207, 208, 
235; wholesale removals of employes in fire 
and police service of, see equally divided 
politically. 212, 213; new charter for gov¬ 
ernment of. its passage, provisions and faults, 
new officers under, see equally divided polit¬ 
ically, 212, 213; examinations for clerks and 
carriers in post-office at, 218; death of Postmas¬ 
ter Wallace of, a loss to the public service, 219; 
trouble arising from positions in city service be¬ 
ing ‘ equally divided politically,” street clean¬ 
ing service of, 220, 221; city assumption of vari¬ 
ous important functions condemned while 
spoils system exists, see equally divided politi¬ 
cally, 220; system of appointment to police 
force of, compared with those of Brooklyn, N. 
Y., and Boston, Mass., see equally divided po¬ 
litically, 222, 22:1, 224; Thompson acting post¬ 
master at. favors civil service reform, 227.229; 
need of examinations and civil service reform 
in city service at, see equally divided politi¬ 
cally, 228; adherent of Coy, disreputable 
politician elected president of council of, 
228: post-office under merit system, 230; 
promotion of Thompson ass’t postmaster at to 
be postmaster, and consequent promotions, 235; 
spoils system in city government of, merit sys¬ 
tem required for all city departments except 
police and fire, see charter, 243; examination 
for places in post office at, to be held August, 
1891, 243; number of applicants at examina¬ 
tions held August. 1891, for carriers and clerks 
in post-office at, 253; Gold, township trustee at, 
defends himself for spoils methods, criticism 
of, 256; election of Sullivan as mayor of, over 
Herod, by independent votes, board of public 
works and controller of, commended, 269; citv 
services in turned over to spoils, 289; Phipps, 
efficient employe in city service of. re¬ 
moved for political reasons, 297: Postmaster 
Thompson of, and other federal officers at, po¬ 
litical workers, 302,316, .317, 320, 378, .382; tally 
sheet frauds in, 313; spoils in city and county 


offices at, 314, 315; board of public safety of, 
317; examinations for physicians for city hos¬ 
pital, .322; Thompson, postmaster of. subordi¬ 
nates work for Harrison at Minneapolis, :337,343, 
:379; need of Boston labor service in, 357; 
Moores, republican politician, attempts to co¬ 
erce Thompson, postmaster at, 366; Dunn, P. O. 
employe at, removed for soliciting political 
contributions of other employes at instance of 
Democratic Committeman Backus, 403, 411, 412; 
Congressman Bynum allows Turpie to name 
postmaster of, 405. 

Indianapolis, Catholic Record advocates civil 
service reform, 76. 

Indianapolis Journal (rep.) on Indianapolis post-of¬ 
fice, 9; declares civil service reform not a moral 
question, 56; strongly advocates civil service 
reform, 65; interview in on political ingratitude, 
181, 182; defends census appointments, 182; 
and bribery by republicans in Indiana, 191; on 
corrupt politics and politicians of Indianapolis, 
see also Indianapolis, 205, 206, 207; accounts of 
spoils fights in various places, 217; on Roose¬ 
velt dinner, see at Indianapolis, 232; on inde¬ 
pendents, .313; on use of patronage to secure 
re-election of a President,.348; on use of patron¬ 
age by Harrison to secure renomination; by 
Cleveland. 2,50. 

Indianapolis News (independent), and civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 11; and Civil Service Chronicle, 
13; attributes republican defeat of 1889 largely 
to patronage system. 76; on Clarkson and Mary¬ 
land republican clubs, 154; on political assess¬ 
ments. 183; account of nominating caucus, see 
Parnell Hall, 194,195; on corrupt politics and 
politicians of Indianapolis, 205, 206, 207, 208; on 
rush for otiice under new city government of 
Indianapolis, see equally divided politically, 
213; an independent journal, opposes spoils 
system, 331; on the “mugwump,” .351. 

Indianapolis Sentinel (dem.) and Civil Service 
Chronicle, 13; complaints against violations 
of civil service law in Indianapolis post-office, 
27; supports Magee bill for non-partisan con¬ 
trol of state charitable institutions, 201, 202,209, 
210; on corrupt politics and politicians of In¬ 
dianapolis, 207, 208; condemns democratic an¬ 
tagonism to Magee bill for non-partisan control 
of state charitable institutions, 215; accounts of 
spoils fights in various places. 217; on Roose- 
veltdinnerat Indianapolis, 232; commended. 
269; favors civil service methods in Indiana 
state institutions, 350; on what to expect of 
Cleveland, 358. 

Indianapolis Taglicber Telegraph, condemns oppo¬ 
sition to Magee bill, see also Magee, 209. 

Ingalls, Senator, spoilsman, 5, 17, 27, 43,65,85, 161, 
192,211; Kansas and office seekers, 6; senator 
and President Harrison confer over offices, 22; 
correspondence with H. Welsh over Indian 
commissioner, 22; opposed to civil service re¬ 
form, 49; and civil service law, 51; on purity in 
politics, 119, i;30, 145; retracts statements on 
.purity in politics, 190; guilty of nepotism in 
District of Columbia offices, 215. 

Ingraham, Judge, and Dutchess co., N. Y.,election 
frauds, 306. 

Inspectors, post-office, requirements of, 193. 

Interior Dept., and request for census recount in 
N. Y. City,294. 

Iowa, number of appointments in by Clarkson, 45; 
Editor WeinsteiI appointed collector of fourth 
district of, 56; republicans of denounce civil 
service latv and demand its repeal, 62; spoils 
system in given full swing with disastrous re¬ 
sults, 67; reform in. Ill; political assessments 
made by republican state central committee of, 
240; federal officers at state republican conven¬ 
tion 1891, 260; becoming democratic, 281; politi¬ 
cal activity of federal office-holders in, 346. 382. 

Iowa State Register and Junkin, W. W., 14; Clark¬ 
son’s paper and examinations, 49. 

Irvin, P. O. employe at Frankfort, Ind., political 
worker, 380. 

Irvin, jndge, and “tally-sheet” forgeries at Indian¬ 
apolis, see Indianapolis. 

Irwin, uses influence for appointment of Throop, 
59. « 

Irwin, D. W., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Akron, Cal., 126. 

Issues, permanence of, other reforms should be 
subordinate to civil service reform, 214, 220. 

Ithaca, N. Y.. Robinson postmaster of, political 
worker for Platt, 264. 

Ivanhoe, Kan., Journalist Gray postmaster at, 149. 

Ives, H. S., see Hillism, 309. 

Ivins, W. M., exposes methods of Hill, 307. 

“J. S.,” advertisement of, offering to buy office, 22. 

Jackson, President, and bribery of press, 17; spoils¬ 
man, 20,43,105; and postmasters, 49; cabinet 
of, 63; offices under, a perquisite of the Execu¬ 
tive, 115; and the civil service, 125; spoils system 
attributed to. 262 ; Webster condemns spoils 
system under. 270.271. 

Jackson. J.. ass’t U. S. att’y, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis. 348. 

Jackson, Miss . Gibbs postmaster at. 47; Gibbs post¬ 
master of, Harrison delegate to Minneapolis, 
344, 348. 

Jackson, 0, L., votes for, bought away, 151. 

Jackson Court House, W. Va., Journalist Deen post¬ 
master at, 155. 

Jacksonian rotation, see Clark, 257. 











INDEX. 


XIX 


Jacksonville, Florida, Postmaster Clark of, re¬ 
moved by Pres. Harrison, 29. 

Jacobi, Dr. A., withdraws from N. Y. City health 
dep’t, because it becomes political machine.SSt;. 

Jacobs, J.L., federal employe, political worker in 
New York, 336. 

Jacobs, L., and cartage contract of N. Y. custom 
house, 858. 

Jacobus, J. W., U. S. marshal, assists at dinner to 
Clarkson, 245: a political worker, 266; in New 
York convention, .3.34, 370; appoints “ floaters ” 
as deputies, 387. 

James, postmaster at New York. 82; ex-postmaster- 
general testifles to worth of Postmaster Hendrix 
at Brooklyn, N. Y., 131; postmaster at New 
York appointed P. M. gen’l by Garfield, 367. 

James, C. G., employe in N. Y. post-office, a politi¬ 
cal worker. 265. 

James, J., applicant for Winamac, Ind., postmas¬ 
tership, 88. 

Jamestown, Kan., Journalist Barton postmaster at, 
149. 

Janeway, Dr., resigns from N. Y. City health de¬ 
partment because it becomes political machine, 
:!56. 

Jasper, Minn., Journalist King postmaster at, 149. 

Jefferson Co., N. Y., factional fights in republican 
primaries of, political activity of federal office¬ 
holders, 264; postmasters and other federal em¬ 
ployes in, political assessments levied on, 391, 
392. 

Jefferson Co., Pa., bribery in, by republicans, 1.33. 

Jefferson, O., Editor Howells appointed postmaster 
at, 301. 


Jefferson, T., “four-year” law on, 45, 46; on nepot¬ 
ism, 46; and the civil service, 125. 

Jeffersonville, Ind., the civil service in, see New Al¬ 
bany Tribune, 83; Postmaster Lnke of, 88; anti- 
Harrison worker appointed internal revenue 
collector for, 302. 

Jeffersonville (Ind.) News, on Magee bill for non¬ 
partisan control of state charitable institutions, 
215. 

Jenckes, of Rhode Island, see Eaton, 105. 

Jenckes, Rev. Dr., favors civil service reform, 73, 
227,229; a partisan, 137, 188. 

Jenkins, L. L., postmaster at Gastonia, N. Carolina, 
delegate for Harrison, 334. 

Jenkinson, I., editor, appointed postmaster at Rich¬ 
mond, Ind., 126, 377; works for Harrison, 249. 

Jenks, corporation connsel at Brooklyn, N. Y., ex- 
•poses methods of McLaughlin, 318. 

Jenks, J. W., Prof., civil service reformer, 182. 

Jennings, C. E. M., editor, disappointed office seek¬ 
er, opposes Sherman, 301. 

Jersey City, N. J., postmaster at removed without 
cause, 29; per cent, of removals in classified 
and unclassified service in post-office at, 185. 

Jessup, 51. K., reports to Mayor Grant on street 
cleaning in New York, advises merit system, 
220,221. 


Jewell, W. R., editor, appointed postmaster at Dan¬ 
ville, Ill., 141; political worker, 160. 

Jewett, appointed postmaster at Oregon, Ill., see 
Hitt, 109. 

Jewett claim, and Elkins, 290. 

Jewett, C. W., employe in Indian service, asked 
for political contributions, 385. 

Johnson, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons by Coulter, 55. 

Johnson, postmaster at San Antonio, a political 
worker, 159. . „ 

Johnson, Congressman, patronage of, 419. 

Johnson, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in, 407. „ 

.Tohnson, Pres. Andrew, and scramble for offices, 
24; appoints Elkins U. S. dist. att’y in N. Mexico, 
368; spoils since. 413, 414. , * 

Johnson, C. F., editor, appointed consul-gen-1 to 
Frankfort-on-the-Main, 301. _ _ 

Johnson* C. H,* see Baltimore investigation, 2t>^, 

Johnson, E. A., negro, Harrison delegate from N. 


Carolina, 334. 

ohnson, F. W., sale of office to by Porter, D. E , 154. 
ohnson, G. W., P. O. employe, see Baltimore inves¬ 


tigation, 296. . , 

ohnson, H. C., letter advocating civil service re- 
form to Postmaster Richensteen at L. I. City, 


nson, H. U., congressman elect, distributes pa- 

nTon.^U.I^.!’district attorney at N. York, takes 
part in political squabbles, 106,198,3-52, 3/1. 
nson. J., U. S. district attorney, works for re¬ 
tention of Boyle. 142; U. S. dist. att y at Brook¬ 
lyn N Y., a political worker, 265, U. 8. dist. 
att’y in New York convention. 335. 
nson, J. B.. on local examining board at Mil- 

^s^*ig^-'h^.* on “The Merit System of Appoint- 

Ifso^^J.^l^rcinditionally refused access to 
records of removals in postal service. 163 
nson, J. H., distributes Curtis address of 1892, 


Johnson, J. L.. passes civil service examinations 
for incapable applicant, 238. 

Johnson, Kan., Journalist Webster postmaster at, 

Johnson, M., revenue collector, bets on Harrison, 

Johnson, R. M., efficient postal employe at St. 
Louis, 131. 


Johnson, T. B., collector at Charleston, 8. C., dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Johnson, W. J., postmaster at Manchester, Mass., 
removed after four years service, second com¬ 
mission unexpired, 187. 

Johnson, W. W., politician, appointed postmaster 
at Baltimore, Md., 90; conducts factional fights, 
121; removals under wdthout cause, charges 
against filed. 137; political worker, 144, 357, 372, 
373; W'orks for Harrison in primaries at Balti¬ 
more, Md., 226, 226; makes clean sweep, testi¬ 
mony of before Roosevelt. 189. 254. 255; see Bal¬ 
timore Investigation, 267. 268, 277, 278,296; John¬ 
son faction at Baltimore, see Baltimore investi¬ 
gation, 295; in Maryland convention, 335: works 
for Harrison at Minneapolis, 337, 347; and po¬ 
litical assessment circular of civil service com¬ 
mission, 363; as a campaign fund raiser, 370. 

Johnston, councilman of Indianapolis, supports 
Fire Chief Webster, 208. 

Johnston, G. D.. civil service commissioner, and 
political assessments, 358. 

Johnston. G. D., civil service commissioner, and 
duties of federal employes, 384; does not favor 
rapid extension of classified service. .397. 

Johnston, N. Y., Postmaster 5Iurray of. fighting for 
good service in, 72. 

Jones, Senator, supporter of Blaine, 344. 

Jones, postmaster of Butler, Ind., political worker, 
379, .380. 

Jones, postmaster at Scranton. Pa., through influ¬ 
ence of Congressman Scranton, 101. 

Jones. A., postmaster at Indianapolis, 1; interview 
on giving up office, 5; removal deserved, 9; and 
special exam, at Indpls, spoilsman, 18; remov¬ 
als under, and Moore, gambler, 28: opposed to 
civ. service reform, 80; appointment of, con 
demned, 51. 

Jones, G., proprietor N. Y. Times, enemy of spoils 
system, 254. 

Jones, I. A., see Chemung Co., N. Y., 259. 

Jones, J.W., journalist, postmaster at Barneveld, 
Wis., 155. 

Jones, J. W., low politician; his “reforms,” 183; 
journalist, postmaster at Oelrichs, S. Dak., 155. 

Jones, “ Long,” works for Harrison at Minneapo¬ 
lis, 342. 

Jonesville, Minn., Journalist Henry postmaster at, 
149. 

Jolley, G. W., U. S. dist. att’y in Kentucky, prose¬ 
cutes federal office-holders for levying political 
assessments, 330. 

Judson, postmaster of Prattsville, N. Y., insane 
through fear of loss of office, 415. 

Julian, G. W., address of on civil service reform, 
366, 367, 370, ;375, 376; opposing Harrison. 386. 

Justice, H., civil service reformer, closes his sub¬ 
scription to Civil Service Chronicle, 350. 

Kane, Pa., Postmaster Davis of, worker for Dela 
Tn p-t'.PT*. 134, 

Kannett Square. Chester Co., Pa., applicants for 
postmaster of, 55. 

Kansas, office-seekers in, 6; discontent over 
spoils, 15; Congressman Perkins of opposed to 
civil service reform, 35; changes in post-offices 
in. under Harrison and Cleveland, -55; political 
activity of federal officers in, 348, 382; political 
assessments in Indian service in, 384, .385. 

Kansas City, Mo., postmaster of appoints relative 
Pres. Harrison his deputy, 84; per cent, of re¬ 
movals In classified and unclassified service in 
post-office at, 185. 

Kaontz, postmaster at Lafayette Corners, Pa., work¬ 
er for Delamater, 1.34. 

Kaough, postmaster at Ft. Wayne, Ind., under 
Cleveland, political worker, 88. 

Kaufman, Rev. W. H., on civil service reform, 83; 
on sentiment favoring civil service reform in 
Utah, 111, 317. 

Kawanna, Ind., Editor Newton appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 126. , , ^ 

Keagh, T. B., Harrison delegate from N. Carolina, 
334. , ^ 

Kean, ex-Congressman, gets federal offices for po¬ 
lice officers. 216. 

Keating, J. P., disreputable politician, gets office 
through R. Croker, 309. 

Keegan, G., fraudulent votlngname, see New York 


City. . , 

eeller H.. customs Inspector, pays political assess¬ 
ments, 279. 

eenan, J., see Hill, 307. 

eepers, G. A., editor, postmaster at Beallsville, 

eh^e,^M., treasury agent, Harrison delegate to 
Minneapolis, 344. „ , v* n, 

eisburg, J., appointed to office by Township Trus¬ 
tee Gold at Indianapolis, 146, 2-56. 
eith, P., postmaster at Strawberry Point. Iowa, 
veteran soldier, removed see Clarkson, 55. 
eller, J., custom house einploye at Philadelphia, 
political worker for Harrison, 301. 
elley. councilman of Indianapolis, supports fire- 
chief Webster, 208. , , , 

elley, C., emigrant Inspector, political workerlor 
Harrison, 302. , j, i- 

elley, Pat., ward politician of Indianapolis, see 
Parnell Hall. ^ ,, 

eller, R., ward politician, see Indianapolis, 195. 
ellogg. L. E., journalist.postmasteratWaterville, 
Wftsti 

elloff. W. P., Coleman supersedes him in con¬ 
trol of patronage in Louisiana, 71. 304; opPoses 
HarrlsOn at Minneapolis, 344. .346; and War- 
mouth in Louisiana, 374. 


Kelly, Miss, daughter of Congressman Kelly, 
given office in Burlington, Kan., post-office, 
188. 

Kelly, H., Congressman, secures removal of Lock- 
wood, postmaster at Burlington, Kan., and ap¬ 
pointment of successor. Lane, 188. 

Kemble, W. H.. corrupt politician, see Quay, 106, 
152; ally of Quay, and convicted, 270. 

Kendallvllle, Ind., Standard (repub.), favors civil 
service reform, 83. 

Kenealy, M. E., journalist, postmaster, at Sitka, 
Alaska, 155. 

Kennedy, Congressman, condemns Quay, 156, 157. 

Kennedy, C., railway mail clerk, in Iowa, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 260. 

Kennedy, E. K., w'ard politician, see Kings Co., 
N. Y. 

Kennett, Pa., Advance (repub.), the way to get of¬ 
fice, 55. 

Kenny,-, and census enumeration of New York 

City, 294. 

Kent, N. Y., Postmaster Bennett of, a political 
worker, 162. 

Kentucky, office-holders in, allowed to serve out 
terms, 73; Jolley, U. S. Dist. Att’y in, prosecutes 
federal office-holders, for levying political as¬ 
sessments, 3:30. 

Kenyon, J. S., sec’y republican state committee of 
of New York, 279; at Minneapolis, 344. 

Keata, Iowa, Editor Smock, appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Kercheval, S. A., corrupt politician rewarded with 
office, 83; worker for Harrison, 240. 

Kerens, and Russell Harrison, 359; member of na¬ 
tional republican committee. 363. 

Kerens, R. C., and offices in Missouri, his influ¬ 
ence, 22; and clients, 24; political workers for 
Harrison, 304. 

Kern, J., state senator of Indiana, and spoils meth¬ 
ods, 408. 

Kerns, postmaster at Smethport, Pa., worker for 
Delamater, 134. 

Kerr, state att’y, of Maryland, and political frauds 
in, 335. 

Kerwin, M., editor, appointed collector internal 
revenue 2d New York district. 126; assisted at 
dinner to Clarkson, 245; collector in New York, 
a political worker, 265, 279; Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 344. 

Kessler, grocer, appointed postmaster at Short 
Hills, N. J., vice Goodrich, removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons, 386. , 

Kessler, J. B., journalist, postmaster at Ottawa, 
Kan., 149. 

Ketcham,C. K., postmaster at Ditney,Ind., solicited 
for political contributions, 387, 392. 

Kewanna, Ind., Editor Newton appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 377. 

Key West, Fla., custom-house at not classified; 
number of employes in, 277. 

Keyes, Miss L. C., postmaster at Yonkers, N. Y., 
succeeded by politician, 150. 

Keyes, W. R., journalist, postmaster at Mountain 
City, Tenn., 155. 

Kidd, J. H., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Kinzle, C. H., statistics collector, a political 
worker, 160. 

Kiernan, J., inefficient census enumerator in N. Y. 
City, 294. 

Kilsheimer, J. B., employed In N. Y. custom¬ 
house, political worker, 108. 

Kimball, see Baltimore Investigation, .327, 328. 

Kimmell, Louis, editor, appointed deputy U. S. 
marshal. 126. 

King, sheriff, inefficient, at Indianapolis, 315. 

King, A. E., and post-office at Baltimore, Mary¬ 
land, 84. 

King, D. H., reports to Mayor Grant on street- 
cleaning in New York; advises merit system, 
220 , 221 . 

King, S., efficient employe in township trustee’s 
office at Indianapolis removed, 145, 256. 

King, S. S.. journalist, postmaster at Jasper, Minn., 
149. 

King, W., editor, supported by Congressman Cooper 
for postmaster of Danville, Ind., 398. 

Kings Co., N. Y., republican general committee, 
account of fights over, 197, 198, 304; factional 
fight in among republicans at primaries, 264; 
political assessments made by chairman of re¬ 
publican committee of, 287; Nathan republican 
boss of, .352; and Harrison, Nathan controls, 
354. 

Kingsley, la.. Postmaster Gasper of forced to re¬ 
sign, 165. 

Kingston, Mo., Editor Spirely appointed postmaster 
at, 132. 

Kingston, N. Y., Hayes postmaster at, a political 
worker, 280; Woolren, postmaster of, political 
worker in New York, 336. 

Kinley, E., ward politician, see New York City, 

Kinmundy, Ill., Editor Lawson appointed post¬ 
master at, 141. 

Kinney, J. C., appointed postmaster at Hartford, 
Conn., through infiuence of Senator Hawley, 
84, 99. 

Kinsey, W. M., congressman aiding office-seekers, 
15 

Kirkpatrick, J., democrat, nominated for postmas¬ 
ter at South Hadley Falls, Mass., through Con¬ 
gressman Wallace, 157. 

Klrkus, Rev. W., favors clerical advocacy of civil 
service reform, .30,48. 










XX 


r X 1) E X . 


Kirwin, J., federal employe, worker for Harrisou, 
334. 

Klsael, J., navy yard employe, in New York con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Kittery, Me., spoils system in navy yard at, 145,148; 
navy yard at, see Tracy and Reed, 153: work on 
war ships in navy yard at, for political reasons, 
217. 

Klemme, W. H., postmaster in Winneshiek Co.,la., 
a political worker, 250. 

Knapp, J. N., postmaster at Auburn, N. Y., worker 
for Platt, 143; chairman New York State Repub¬ 
lican Committee, on Platt, 258; in N. Y. con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Knight, ex-Senator G. A., endorses Bush, political 
worker, 187. 

Knight. W. E., editor appointed postmaster at 
Grand View, Ind, 126, 377. 

Knightstown, Ind., Postmaster Sample resigns, see 
Congressman Browne. 118. 

Kniseley, worker for Harrison, appointed internal 
revenue collector, 377. 

Knowles, political worker, rewarded, see Higgins, 
Sen., 38. 

Kramer, C., appointed postmaster at Columbus, 
Neb., vice Hensley, forced to resign, 166. 

Kramer, W., candidate for sheriff, 179,180. 

Kuhn, A., ward politician, see Indianapolis, 195. 

Kunzemann, J., disreputable politician, alderman 
New York City, 184. 

Labor, organizations of Buffalo, N. Y., support 
civil service reform, 228. 

Labor, and civil service reform, see Andrew, 331. 

Labor, and trades-unions of Indiana, demand non¬ 
partisan control of state charitable institu¬ 
tions, 201. 

Labor Signal favors non-partisan control of state 
charitable institutions, see Magee, 209, 215. 

Lacey, E. P., applicant for postmaster at Sullivan, 
Ind., 88. 

Lacey, S., wife of Editor Lacey appointed postmas¬ 
ter at Westcllffe, Colo., 148. 

LaCyge, Kan., Journalist Lane postmaster at, 149. 

Lafayette, Ind., Candidate Throckmorton for post¬ 
master of, and Congressman Cheadle, 71; ap 
pllcants for postmaster of, 84: Postmaster Smith 
of aids Michener and La Follette, 144; Post¬ 
master Smith of a political worker, 153,158, 377, 
378; republican delegation of, and Harrison, 
favors Gresham, 240; worker for Harrison, 316; 
works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 342, 379; 
P. O. employes of distribute campaign docu¬ 
ments, 389. 

La Fayette, Ind., Courier (rep.) condemns spoils 
system, 76; opposed to congressional patronage, 
83. 

Lafayette Corners, Pa., Postmaster Koontz at, 
worker for Delamater, 184. 

La Follette, candidate for congressman, defeated, 
129; controls census service patronage, 293; 
candidate for congress, supported by Michener, 
144, 377. 

La Grange, Ind., Editor Rerick appointed post¬ 
master at, 126, 377. 

La Grange, Ind., Standard (repub.), patronage an 
evil, 83. 

Laird, A. J., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Lake, David, corrupt politician, working for Con¬ 
gressman Wallace, nominated for U. 8. Mar¬ 
shal, 132. 

Lamb, Ind., Simpson, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379. 

Lamb, W. H., old employe, appointed supt. of 
mails in St. Louis, 136. 

Lambert, Rev. H., pres, civil service reform asso¬ 
ciation of Newton, Mass., 136; views of on 
present status of civil service reform criticised. 
255; address of on influence of Clarkson and 
Wanamaker on civil service reform, 261. 

Lamont, candidate for postmaster at Ipple River, 
Jo Daviess Co., Ill., 109. 

Lanark, Ill., candidates for postmaster of. Root 
given place, 109,136. 

Lancaster, Cal., Journalist Drummond appointed 
postmaster at, 141. 

Lancaster, Pa., post-oflSce at, see Brosius, 72. 

Lancaster Co., Pa., Sen. Cameron “accorded” col- 
lectorship of Internal revenue in, 47. 

Lander, Wyoming, Journalist Wynn,postmaster at, 
155. 

Lane, C. R., part of address of at annual meeting 
of Indiana Civil S. Ref. Assoc., 1889,8; sec. In¬ 
diana Civil Service Reform Association, 108; on 
census enumeration in Indianapolis, 293. 

Lane, C. T., address of on school and civil service 
reform, 23. 

Lane, D. H., political worker for Quay, 299. 

Lane, E. C., journalist, postmaster at La Cyge, Kan., 
149. 

Lane, J. A., signs petition for larger appropriation 
for civil serv. com., 102. 

Lane, J. L., federal employe, and political assess¬ 
ments, see Kentucky, 

Lane, S. M., appointed postmaster at Burlington, 
Kan., through influence of Congressman Kelly, 
vice Lockwood, removed, 188. 

Langdon, Gen., see Chemung Co., N. Y., 259. 

Langdon, C. J., letter to by Walcott on removal of 
Postmaster Flood, 312. 

Langham, chairman Indiana Co., Pa., republican 
committee, 133. 

Langham, P. J., postmaster at Hawley, Pa., re¬ 
moved on secret charges, 176. 


Langsdale, Appointed postmaster at Greencastle, 
Ind., by President Arthur, 89. 

Langsdale, postmaster at Florence, Ind., political 
worker, 379. 

Langston, ex-congressman, reconciliation of with 
Mahone, in interest of Harrison, 240, 241. 

Langston, see Bowden, 162. 

Langston, ex-minister, supports Blaine, 340, 345. 

Lanpton, J. M., and Mahone. 52. 

Lanier, C., barber at White House, goes home to 
vote, 180. 

Lankford, W. F., appointed postmaster at Princess 
Anne, Md., vice Duer, removed for political 
reasons, 408. 

Lansdon, B. C., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Nebo, Ill., 141. 

Lansing, A. W., journalist, postmaster at Platts¬ 
burgh, N. Y., 1.55. 

La Porte, Pa., Journalist Cheney, postmaster at, 149. 

Larke, F. D., journalist, postmaster at Rogers City, 
Mich., 149. 

Larkin, T., see New York, factional fights in, 241. 

La Rue, postmaster at Colfax, Wash., forced to re¬ 
sign, 165. 

Latham, R., postmaster at Hunterstown, Ind., re¬ 
moved through influence of Postmaster Hig¬ 
gins; Dunton appointed, 362. 

Latz, chemist for Indianapolis board of health, 314. 

Laurel, Del., Smith, postmaster of, attempts bribery, 
397, 401, 402.- 

Laurel, Md.. postmaster at, see Gorman, 38. 

Laurence, A. C., journalist, postmaster at Evans¬ 
ville, Minn., 149. 

Law, civil serv., and its friends exemplified in 
Indianapolis post-office, 26. 

Lawler, fellows in district of, made application 
for O’Donnell, 60. 

Lawler, T., local politician, opposed to Congress¬ 
man Hitt, 109. 

Lawler, T. G., postmaster at Rockford, Ill., works 
for Hitt, 143. 

Lawrence Co. (Indiana), applicants from, 16. 

Lawrence, Kan., civil service reform association of, 
239. 

Lawrenceburg, Ind., Lucas, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379. 

Lawrenceburg, Tenn., Journalist Schrader post¬ 
master at, 155. 

Lawrenceville. Va., postmaster at removed through 
influence of Mahone, despite promise to con¬ 
trary, 74. 

Lawshe, A. L., editor appointed postmaster at 
Xenia, Ind., 71, 120, 377; political worker, 379. 

Lawson, J. D., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 
344. 

Lawson, R. F., editor, appointed postmaster at Kin- 
mundy. Ill., 141. 

Lea, H. C., on patronage, 387; advocates civil serv¬ 
ice reform, denounces President Harrison’s 
course with the civil service, 68; on pledges of 
reform of republican party, 92; opposed to 
Senator Quay, 95; open letter to President Har¬ 
rison protesting against patronage of Quay, 111, 
112; appeal of to voters against Quay and Dela¬ 
mater, 138. 

Leach, chief of division, removed for political rea¬ 
sons. see Coulter, 55. 

Leach, F. W., receiver of campaign levies, 134; re¬ 
publican politician in Pennsylvania. 361. 

League, National, of civil service reform associa¬ 
tions, see National League. 

League.republican.convention at Syracuse, August, 
1891, federal officeholders at,2.59. 

Learned, F. E., son of editor, appointed postmaster 
at Benson, Ill., 148. 

Leaycraft, W. H., political worker Candidate Ben 
edict, 142; port warden at New York, political 
worker for Woodruff, 198; calls on Fassett, col¬ 
lector at N. Y. City, ’258; political worker, 304; 
political “boss,” 311; office-seeker, 332; “boss,” 
given office by Harrison, 355, 871. 

Lebanon, N. H., brother of Churchill postmaster 
of, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Lee, E. C., “pull” of in N. Y. custom house, sup¬ 
ported by Platt, appointed janitor, 2.58, 259; at 
Minneapolis convention, 343. 

Lee, J.E., negro, collector at Jacksonville, Fla., 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Lee, L. W., postmaster at Neodesha, Kan., removed 
after four years’ service, second commission 
unexpired, 187. 

Lee, M. C., inspector in N. Y. custom-house, polit¬ 
ical worker, 108. 

Leech, D., employed in N. Y. custom-house, polit¬ 
ical worker, 108. 

Leech, E. O., director of mint, works for Harrison 
at Minneapolis, 344. 

Leeds, J. W., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 834. 

Leeds, W. R., disreputable politician, nominated 
by Harrison for U. S. marshal in Pa.. 216, 374; 
political worker for Quay, 270, 2.S0; political 
worker for Harrison, 299, 300. 

Leet, “boss” in N. Y. custom-house, 191. 

Leffson, F., and Fassett, 205. 

Lehigh Co., Pa., control of patronage in, 47. 

Ijchighton, Pa., J.P. Smith postmaster at, removed 
for political reasons, 39. 

Lehlbach, Congressman, on house committee of 
civil service, 86; politician favored by adminis¬ 
tration, 180. 

Leibhardt, P., superintendent dead letter office, 
political worker, 382. 


Leland, C. Jr., federal officer, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Lemcke, state treasurer of Indiana and Sullivan, 
corrupt county clerk of Marlon Co. (Indianapo¬ 
lis), 206. 

Lemon, G. E., pension claim agent and Raum, 1.30. 

Lena, Ill., Journalist Lewis appointed postmaster 
at, 126. 

Lenox, Iowa, Editor Van Houten appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Leonard, Editor, political worker for Blaine, 302. 

Leonard, A. H., republican in Louisiana and War- 
mouth, 362. 

Leonard, J. R., 96; appointment as deputy, see 
Ransdall, 80; relative of Ransdell gets office un¬ 
der, 244; federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
.362,382. 

Leonard, W., federal oflice-holder, political worker 
for Harrison, 302, 378. 

Letter carriers, national convention of at Detroit, 
requests extension of civil service law to all 
free delivery cities, 253. 

Leupp, F. E., editor Good Government, 3-57. 

Levan, L. D., appointed postmaster at Wilson, N. 
Y.. 39; removal of, 45. 

Leverett, G. V., civil service reformerof Cambridge, 
Mass., 204. 

Levy, Indian agent at Yankton, removed, 98. 

Levy, B. A., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

Lewis, assemblyman 21st district in New York City, 

Lewis, C. A., distributes Curtis address (1892) in 
Indiana, 388. 

Lewis, C. S., officer Indiana Civil Service Reform 
Association, 108. 

Lewis, E.B., journalist, postmaster at New Hol¬ 
land, O., 149. 

Lewis, F. A., asst. supt. of Society for Prevention of 
Crime in N. Y. City, see Tammany, 317. 

Lewis, J., customs inspector, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Lewis, J. A., applicant for postmastership at Mar¬ 
tinsville, Ind., 399. 

I>ewis. M. M., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Lena. Ill., 126. 

Liberty, Tex., Journalist Chambers, postmaster at, 
155. 

Lieber, Albert, ward politician, see Indianapolis, 
195. 

Liggett, C. F.. journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Chivington, Col., 141. 

Lincoln, Abraham, Pres., on evils of spoils system, 
25; gives Cameron secretaryship of war in re¬ 
turn for political aid ; dismisses him, 34, 64; and 
civ. service reform, 76; see Welsh, 161; opposed 
to removals to make place for friends (1846), 
211; promisesof to the soldiers, 220,274; endan¬ 
gers of the spoils system, 56, 329, 367. 

Lincoln, G., postmaster at Cedar Rapids, la., po¬ 
litical worker, 370. 

Lincoln Independent Republican committee of 
Pennsylvania condemns Quay and Delamater 
1.56, 161. ’ 

Lincoln, Neb., Gere, editor, appointed postmaster 
at, 108 ; Gere, postmaster of, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, :348. 

Lincoln, R. T., 15; and anti-Quay republicans, see 
Welsh, 161; not a candidate in 1892, 340; U S 
minister to England, political worker, 382, 389 

Lind, congressman, on house committee on civ" 
service, 86. 

Lindemuth, representative in Indiana legislature 
opposes spoils methods, 407. ’ 

Lind ley, pension examiner in Indiana, at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 380. 

Lindsey, T., political worker for Harrison, 299. 

Lindsley, J. G., ex-congressman, political worker 
for Platt, 265. 

Lingenfelter, H., see Baltimore investigation. 326 
.327, 328. 

Linevllle, Iowa, Editor Austin appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142. 

Linton (Ind.) Call condemns opposition to Magee 
bill, see also Magee, ’209. 

Llppincott, Judge, trying fraudulent election offi¬ 
cers, see also Hudson Co., N. Y., 200. 

Lipscomb, P., son of journalist, postmaster at St. 
George, W. Va., 155. 

List of eligibles, seeEligibles. 48. 

Litchman, C. H., political worker, rewarded, 39; 
treasury agent, a political worker, 179. 

Lltitz, Pa., post-oflice at, see Brosius, 72. 

Little Bat, Indian chief, and rising at Pine Ridge 
S. Dak., 218. 

Little Wound, Indian chief, and Indian rising at 
Pine Ridge. S. Dak., 218. 

Littlejohn, G. W., journalist,postmaster at Grayson, 
Ky.. 149. 

Llano, Tex., Journalist Galson, postmaster at, 1.55. 

Loane, see Baltimore investigation, 278. 

Lock, R. D., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 848. 

Lockport, N. Y'., twenty federal offices in Niagara 
Co. filled with republicans, 30; Mayor Oliver 
of, spoilsman, and N. Y. civil service commis¬ 
sion, 34; rival candidates for postmaster of; 
Ward, editor, and Politician Merritt, supported 
by Senator Hiscock, 216; federal offices of con¬ 
trolled by Hiscock. 2.59. 

Lockwood, E. M., postmaster at Burlington, Kan., 
removed through Influence of Congressman, 
Kelly, 188. 








INDEX. 


XXI 


Editor Weaver appointed postmaster at, 

Lodge, H. C., congressman, spoilsman, 30; obtains 
office for political worker, 31); evils of patronage 
system, un-American, speech at Lowell, July 4‘ 
1879, 39; evil of patronage; heading to Civil 
Service Chronicle, Aug., 1889, li; letter of to. 
Civ. Service Record on civ. service reform, (11); 
controls patronage of Charleston navy yard, 6ii; 
and Boston custom house, 71; bill of regulating 
appointments of fourth-class postmasters, 115; 
votes aid to civil service commission. Ill); bill 
of to regulate appointment of fourth-class post¬ 
masters, 120; and spoils in navy yard at 
Charleston, 153; supports civil service law, 122, 
168,169; urges extension of civil service reform, 
192; upholds civil service commission; ex)>oses 
Grosvenor, 203 , 201; bill of for selection of 
fourth-class postmasters on basis of merit, 238; 
bill of providing for non-iiartisan appointment 
of fourth-class postmasters, commended, 321; 
on civil-service reform under Harrison and 
Cleveland, 376. 


Logan, Senator, spoilsman, 413. 

Logan, O., Journalist Pursell postmaster at, 119, 
301. 

Logan, R. W., Harrison delegate from N. Carolina, 
334. 

Logansport, Ind., D. W.Tomlinson recommended 
as postmaster of, 88; Postmaster Tomlinson of, 
a political worker, 15:3,158, 260, 377; federal of¬ 
ficers work for Harrison at, 316. 

Logansport, Ind., Journal favors civ. service re¬ 
form,83; Journal bought by supporters of Har¬ 
rison, including Postmaster Tomlinson, 260. 

Logansport (Ind.) Pharos, condemns opposition to 
Magee bill, see also Mageb, 209. 

Loman, G. W., journalist, postmaster at Chase, 
Kan., 148. 

Long, deputy postmaster of Vevay, Ind., political 
worker, 379. 

Long, member national republican committee, and 
political assessments, 382, 383. 

Loesch, John, political worker, see Karr, DiO. 

Long, G. I., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Manson, Iowa, 142, 

Long, J. D., ex-gov. Mass., signs petition for larger 
appropriation for civil serv. com., 102. 

Long, W., councilman of Indianapolis, low politi¬ 
cian, 206. 

Long Island City. N. Y., Postmaster McKenna of, 
removed for political reasons, 45; removal of 
McKenna, postmaster of, Richensteen appoint¬ 
ed, 54; Postmaster Richenstien of, 100; Post¬ 
master McKenna of, removed on secret charges. 


175. 

Loomis, F. M., address of Central Labor Union, of 
Buffalo, N. Y., controversy with Buffalo Even¬ 
ing News on civil service reform, 44; weaken¬ 
ing influence of office holding, 75. 

Lorenz, P.O. employe at Indianapolis, see Indian 
apolis investigation, 411. 

Lorimer, “Billy,’’ recommends O’Donnell, 59. 

Louisburg, Kan., Journalist Cadwallader postmas 
ter at, 149. 

Louisiana, see Warinouth, patronage of, conflict 
over, see Kellogg, 71; patronage of given to 
Warmouth, collector at New Orleans,241; fed¬ 
eral patronage in used for re-nomination of 
Harrison, 304; political activity of federal ofli 
cers in, 345, 346,348, )157, :383, 384; political as¬ 
sessments in, 383. 

louisville Commercial (repub.), civ. service re 
form beneficial to party discipline, 65. 

Lourie, postmaster at Portland, Ind., removed, 46. 

Loutham, C. M., deputy int. rev, coll., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Love J , candidate, views of on patronage; office 
brokerage, 23; defeated candidate and sale of 
offices, see “Sale of Offices,” 3‘2, 99. 

Love, J. W., employed in N. Y. custom-house, a 
political worker, 108. 

Loveland, state senator of Indiana, opposes spoils 
methods, 408. 

loving, J. T., postmaster at Richmond, Va., re- 
^ moved for political reasons, 21. 

Tow ex-gov.. Indorses Bush, political worker, 187. 

Low’ E B political worker, appointed postmaster 
a’t Westport. N. Y., through influence of Con¬ 
gressman Wever, 249. W V 

T.OW J.. collector at Suspension Bridge, N. Y , 
through influence of Hiscock.259; customs col 
lector at Suspension Bridge, N. Y., a political 
worker, 265. .... 

Low, W. G., offers prize for essay on civil service 

reform, 308. . , . j 

Towe renresentative in Indiana legislature, and 
sn’oils methods in, 407. 

T owe C P. O. employe, political worker, 302, 378. 

T oweil J R., on evils of spoils system, in address 
of Cambridge and Boston Civil Service Reform 
AssoSoni, 77; civil service reformer, 204; 

opposed to spoils system, 2.54. 

LoweW, Mrs. J. S., in charge of examination for 
police matron at N. York, see Maloney. 

Lowell (Mass.) Courier (rep.) declares Sen. Blair, 
of New Hampshire, not a good republican for 

denouncing civil service reform, 65. 

Imwery, Judge, levies political a^essmeuts, 287. 

I>owesJ. E., political worker in Ohio, 280. 

Lowrey, B. J., journalist, postmaster at Howard 

T ow^ev ’ J asks political contributions from 

^ (5hio employes in Washington departments, 280. 


Lowry, postmaster at Portland, Ind., removed; 
Marsh appointed through influence of Browne. 
88 . 

Lowry, congressman, nomination of, 37. 

Lowry, federal employe, and printing office, 231. 

Lozier, chaplain, political worker, 889. 

Lucas, Rev., thinks civ. service reform a hum¬ 
bug, 73. 

Lucas, postmaster of Lawrenceburg, Ind., political 
worker, ,379. 

Lucas, bank president, gambles in stocks with 
Wanamaker, 246. 

Ludell, Kan., Journalist Chase postmaster at, 149. 

Luke, A. M., postmaster at Jeffersonville, Ind.. re¬ 
moved by Cleveland, reappointed by Harrison, 
88 . 

Lush, R., ward politician, see New York City. 

Lush, R. M., at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Lusk, 'V.S., political worker for Harrison iu North 
Carolina, 334. 

Lu Verne, la.. Postmaster Harrison of a political 
worker, 260. 

Lyford.book commissioner for New Hampshire, 
143. 

Lyman, civil service commissioner and special ex¬ 
aminer at Indianapolis, 18, 49, 81, 372; and R. 
R. mail service, 21; unfit, allows postmaster at 
Milwaukee to ignore civil service law', 103; and 
political assessments, :358; and duties of em¬ 
ployes, 884; report of, 397. 

Lynch, A. F., see Quay, 106. 

Lynch, J. R., negro, 4th auditor of treasury, politi¬ 
cal worker, 47; 4th auditor of the treasury, dele¬ 
gate for Harrison at Minneapolis, 337, 339, 343, 
344, 345. 

Lynch, T. M., worker for Flower, appointed port 
warden, career of, 319. 

Lyon, C. D., editor, appointed postmaster at Milo, 
Iowa, 142. 

Lyon, G. W., appointed by Pres. Harrison surveyor 
of Port of Brooklyn, N.Y.. 55; supports Platt 
faction, 183; and Fassett, collector at, 258; in 
New York convention, 334; works for Harrison 
at Minneapolis, 343. 

Lyon, W., U. S. attorney, active politician, works 
for Delamater, 143; supporter of Quay, suspected 
by Harrison, 299. 

Lyon, W. C., editor, formerly postmaster at Newark, 
O., 301. 

MacCourt, P. C., removed by Sec'y Windom, ap¬ 
peals to Pres. Harrison, .54. 

MacDowald, W. A., recommended by Congressman 
Cheadle, 84. 

Mac Duffy, Rev. M. ’V., on civil service reform, 83. 

MacGovern, supports Gillette for postmaster at 
Hartford, Conn., 84. 

MacGovern,“Pat,” and Hartford,Conn., postmaster- 
ship, 99. 

MacGowan, Capt. A. B., denies charges against In¬ 
dian Agent McChesney, 1.30. 

MacGregor, Capt. J. G., so-called resignation of, 216. 

MacKnlght, Rev. Dr.W. J., on civil service reform, 
83. 

MacNeal, street car company and ordinance, brib¬ 
ery used against, 207. 

MacVeagh, W., ex-attorney general, on yiahone in 
Virginia. 31; to examine management of civil 
service, 77; on committee of National League to 
investigate congressional patronage, 115; on 
committee of National League to investigate 
patent office, 139, 140,141; on committee of Na¬ 
tional League, investigating presidential post- 
offices, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166; on committee of 
National League, reporting on removals on se¬ 
cret charges, 175,176,177; on committee of Na¬ 
tional League, reports on political changes in 
presidential post-offices, 188; and Quay, 245; 
and defalcation made by Quay, 252; on official 
committee of National League Investigating 
census service, 291, 295. 

Macauley, “Dan” treasury employe, political work¬ 
er, 362. 

Macauley, T., Lord, 228. 

Macdonough, A. R., on committee investigating N. 
Y. City civil service, 319, 320. 

Mace, J. A., editor, appointed postmaster at Say- 
brook. Ill., 141. 

Mack, chairman Iowa State Republican Commit¬ 
tee. makes political assessments, 240. 

Macy, Ind., Editor Euyart appointed postmaster at, 
126, 377. 

Madison, James, on abuse of civil service by Presi¬ 
dents, 17,29; letter to, from Thomas Jefferson 
opposing spoils system, 45,46; advises impeach¬ 
ment of any President making removals for po¬ 
litical reasons, 62; on removals. 115. 

Madison, Ind., spoils system in town government 
of, 331. 

Madison Co., Ind., appointments from, 71. 

Madison, Wis., census of 1890 not well conducted 
in, postmaster of controls census patronage, 
293. 

Magee, C. L , opposed to Quay, 280 , 853; allies with 
Quay, 299; and Quay reconciled, 361, 363. 

Magee. J. H., and Civil Service Chronicle, 110, 
.356. 

Magee, R-, favors civ. service reform, 80; state sen¬ 
ator of Indiana, bill of, for non-partisan control 
of state charitable institutions, opposition to 
and support of, defeated, 201, 202, 208, 209, 210, 
214,215; speech of, at dinner to Roosevelt, 227, 
229; and spoils methods, 408. 

Magone, collector and office-seekers, 38; political 
assessments under, 97; secures appointment of 


Ducy as head of custom civ. service at New 
York, 150; removals under, 183. 

Mahan, John, editor, appointed postmaster at Mus 
catlne, 46. 

Mahany, R. B., U. S. minister to Ecuador, political 
worker, 382. 

Mahin, F., editor, appointed postmaster at Clinton, 
Iowa, 126. 

Mahone, W., a spoilsman, 5,35,43,45,171, 211,227, 289, 
350, 369, 376, :!87, 413; patronage of Virginia given 
to by Pres. Harrison, 27, 28, 41, 52, 56, 67, 72, 94, 
111,1:38,172,173,174; history of political career of, 
31; secures appointment of J. G. IVatts as U. S. 
marshal, 38; assisted by republican national 
committee, gets control of Virginia patronage, 
3s; exercised patronage of Virginia with disas¬ 
trous effects, 67 , 68; and election in Virginia, 
70; and postmastership at Lawrencevllle, Va., 
74; methods of condemned. 75; and civil serv¬ 
ice commission, 86; controls Petersburg, Va., 
1882,87,111,138; blackmailing system of, 228; con¬ 
spires with Gorman,231; Pres. Harrison responsi¬ 
ble i or failure to prosecute, 2;>7; reconciliation of 
with ex-Congressmau Langston, in interest of 
Harrison, 240, 241; course of prosecution against 
agents of, for political assessments, 281, 282; 
“blackmailers,” trial and acquittal of, 305, 876; 
deserts Harrison, 332; “blackmailers,” and’ 
Judge Bradley, 357, 358; and election of Harri¬ 
son, 370. 413. 

Mahoney, Tom, ward politician of Indianapolis 
see Parnell Hall. ’ 

Mahopac Falls, N. Y., Postmaster Agar of, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 162. 

Mail service, railway, see railw ay mail service. 

Maine, senators fight over spoils, 22; democrats 
holding four-year offices being retained, 73; 
patronage of, see Boutelle, 157; political activ¬ 
ity of federal office-holders in, 364. 

Mair, G. B., journalist, postmaster at Callowav 
Neb., 149. 

Malden, Mass., civil service reform association of 
239. 

Malone speech of Pres. Harrison, :357. 

Malone, M., worker for ex-Judge Rooney and Con¬ 
gressman 'Wallace, given office, 143. 

Maloney, J., employe in Indianapolis Insane hos¬ 
pital, low character, 314. 

Mamer, collector, political worker in Illinois, 335. 

Manchester, Mass., Postmaster Johnson of, re¬ 
moved after four years’ service; second com¬ 
mission unexpired, 187. 

Manchester, N. H., Postmaster Piper of, active pol¬ 
itician, 143. 

Manchester (N. H.), Republican, civil service re¬ 
form a humbug, 50. 

Manchester, Vt., Journalist Slmonds postmaster 
at, 155. 

Manderson, Senator, and applicants from Nebras¬ 
ka, 6; and Lincoln, Neb., post-office, 72; secures 
appointment of Gere, editor, as postmaster at 
Lincoln, Neb., 108. 

Maneely, W.. fraudulent voter, see Martin. 

Manker, Coroner, at Indianapolis, 314, ;315. 

Manley, J., appointed postmaster at Augusta. Me., 
38; chairman state republican committee, 15o'; 
congressional candidate opposing Burleigh, and 
non-delivery of papers advocating Burleigh, 
3)'>4; resigns, :371; confers with Quay, 390. 

Mann,-, census supervisor in West Virginia, 

spoilsman, 293. 

Mann, G. H., appointed through Quay, removed 
1 ) 10 . 

Mannfleld, Fla., Editor Miles appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Mannheim, Pa., politician appointed postmaster 
at. 12, 72. 

Manning, ward politician, see Buffalo, N. Y. 

Manning, D.. Sec’y, promotes MacGregor, removed 
by Sec’y Foster, 216; and Maynard, 310; recom¬ 
mends appointment of Graves as chief of bu¬ 
reau of printing and engraving, 368. 

Mansfield, postmaster at Gloucester, Mass., 362. 

Manson, Iowa, Journalist Long, appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Manson. M. D.. efficient internal revenue collector 
in Indiana, removed for political reasons, 59; 
letter of President Harrison to, 77; removal of 
94. 

Maplewood, N. H., Craft, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, ;448. 

Marche, T., acting supt. free delivery service, let¬ 
ter to, from Murray postmaster at Johnston, N 
Y., 72. 

Marcy, Governor, and the civil service, 125; 
“spoils,” 270. 274. 

Mare Island, Cal., navy yard at, patronage of given 
to ward bosses, 226. 

Marietta, O., Editor Alderman postmaster of, 801. 

Marietta, Pa., post office at. see Brosius, 72. 

Marine, S. A., editor, appointed pension agent, 126. 

Marine, W. M., collector at Baltimore, see Balti¬ 
more investigation. 326, 327, .328; political work¬ 
er, 354, 389. 

Marion, Ind., Gant, postmaster of, at Minneapolis 
convention, 380. 

Marion, Ind., Chronicle [repub.], favors civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 83. 

Marion, Ohio, Independent, son of editor of gets 
federal office, 301. 

Marlon Club [repub.], of Indianapolis,362. 

Marion Co., Ind., local politics and career of cor¬ 
rupt politicians in, see Indianapolis; office- 
seekers in rewarded, 88; 50 applicants for jani- 









xxii 


r N D E X . 


torshipof court-house of, 186; medical society 
condemns appolutment of Dr. Elbert as pension 
examiner vice Stone removed, 192; medical so¬ 
ciety of endorses Magee bill for non partisan 
control of state charitable institutions, see Ma¬ 
gee, 201, 210. 

Markey, T., councilman of Indianapolis, low 
politician, methods of, 53,195, 19(), 20i;, 316; sup¬ 
ports Fire Chief Webster, 208. 

Marlatt, W. P., P. O. employe, see Indianapolis in¬ 
vestigation, 411. 

Marriott, J. H., see Baltimore investigation,278. 

Marsh, P. O. employe, of New Albany, Ind., at 
•Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Marsh, bank president, and stock fraudulently is¬ 
sued to Wanamaker, 246. 

Marsh, C. T., postmaster at Oregon, Ill., removed 
after four years’ service, second commission 
unexpired, 187. 

Marsh, E. J., editor, appointed postmaster at Port¬ 
land, Ind., 46, 88, 126 ; political worker, 377, 380. 

Marsh, W. C., postmaster at Aurelia, la., a political 
worker, 260. 

Marshall, T., government contractor, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Martin, editor, postmaster at Port Clinton, O., 301. 

Martin, Congressman, favors selection of postmas¬ 
ters by vote, 399; bill of to limit term of federal 
employes to four years, 404; patronage of, 411, 
419, 420. 

Martin, C., political worker against Chase, 363. 

Martin, D., low politician. Sen. Quay obtains ap¬ 
pointment of, as collector internal revenue, .30, 
351; agt. of Sen. Quay, resolutions, 49; confers 
with Quay, 183; aids Quay to ruin ballot reform 
bill in Pa. legislature, 228 , 229; political free¬ 
booter, 232, 233, 2-39, 364, 370, 3S8; resigns inter¬ 
nal revenue collectorship at Philadelphia, 241; 
political worker for Quay, 2.S0, 299, 300, 861, 374; 
member for Pennsylvania of republican na¬ 
tional committee, 347. 

Martin, D. W., postmaster at Oakford, Ind., suc¬ 
ceeded by Cronsore, latter removed, Martin re¬ 
appointed, 90. 

Martin, H., post-ofBce employe in Baltimore inves¬ 
tigation, 268, 277, 295, 296. 

Martin, J., politician, see Tammany, 318, 319. 

Martinsville, Ind., Dryden postmaster of, political 
worker, 380; J. A. Lewis and J. Duncan appli¬ 
cants for postmastership of, 399. 

Marvin, U. S. commissioner, testifies to worth of 
Bario, removed P. O. inspector, 298. 

Maryland, see also Platforms, Conventions; Sena¬ 
tor Quay in, 28; civ. service in under Cleveland, 
15, 63; federation of republican clubs in 3d dis¬ 
trict of, and reform pledges of republican plat¬ 
form, 63 ; effort to loosen Sen. Gorman’s hold on, 
meets with some success, 70; statistics of elec¬ 
tion of’89 in, 70; ballotreform in,seeGorman,87; 
patronage of, given to Gorman, 93, 111,236, 237; 
Roosevelt before civil service reform associa¬ 
tion of, 132; republican clubs and Clarkson, 
154; republicn factions in, 189; boss-ridden, 
219; state and federal patronage of controlled 
by Gorman under Cleveland, by republican 
machine under Harrison, 254; 1890cen8us well 
conducted in part of, 292; under Cleveland given 
over to spoils, 282; spoil given to Higgins in, 
314; Bonaparte on political corruption in, 317, 
324; political activity of, federal oflicers in,335, 
337, 347, 348, .363,370; political assessments lev¬ 
ied on federal office-holders from, 391. 

Maryland, civil service reform association of, let¬ 
ter to by G. W. Curtis, 103; resolutions of con¬ 
demning congressional patronage, 1.36; request¬ 
ed to investigate political activity of federal of¬ 
ficers, 219. 

Mason, ex-mayor of Vineland, N.J., refutes charges 
against Brewerly, removed postmaster at Vine 
land, 39. 

Mason, Congressman, and Chicago post-office, 22. 

Mason, A. B., on committee Investigating N. Y. 
City civil service, 319, 320. 

Mason, G. H., P. O. employe in N. Y. convention, 
335. 

Mason,.I. W., commissioner of internal revenue, 
and the offices, 21; active politician, 1-59, 180. 

Maspeth, L. I., postmaster at, removed to make 
room for politician, see Mooney, 39. 

Mass, J., federal employe, in N. Y. convention, 335. 

Massachusetts, civil service commission of, see 
Civil service commission of; see also Platforms, 
Conventions; civ. service law of. see Civ. 
service law; merit system in, 45, 52; civil serv¬ 
ice reform in, under Cleveland, 63; congress¬ 
men of, and congressional patronage, 93; peti¬ 
tion circulated in for larger appropriation for 
civil service commission, 93; legislature of 
favors civil service reform in navy yards, 93, 
274; result of elections of 1890, to strengthen 
civil service reform cause, 173; civil service re¬ 
form in use in state and city offices in, 212; 
young men’s republican club of recognize 
civil service reform as leading issue, 219; re¬ 
form club of H. Welsh speaks before,on Indian 
service removals, 219; examination papers 
used in state census service of. 219, 220; reform 
club of gives dinner to Corse, 251; methods used 
by state of, in collecting statistics, 291; 1890 
census well conducted in, 25»2; labor service 
system recommended by Congressman An¬ 
drew 306; labor service" in, 321; political 
activity of federal office-holders in, 334 , 362; 
congressmen of request retention of Corse post¬ 
master at Boston, 367. 


Massachusetts Civ. Service Reform Ass’n and Pres. 
Harrison, 92; starts petition for larger appropri 
ation for civil serv.commission, 102; condemns 
removal of Corse, postmaster at Boston, see also 
Civil Service Record, 213; resolutions of, 1892, 
398. 

Massey, G. V., federal officer, delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention, 348. 

Mastln, J., editor, appointed postmaster at Shan¬ 
non, Ill., 141. 

Mathers, deputy U. S. marshal in Indiana, political 
worker, :380. 

Mathews, delegate from Dakota dictates appoint¬ 
ments in his territory, 30. 

Mathias, J., P. O. employe, see Indianapolis inves¬ 
tigation, 411. 

Matson, congressman, secures appointment of post¬ 
master at Plainfield, Ind., 30; in document No. 
2 of Ind. Civil Service Reform Association, 30; 
henchmen work for renomination, 37. 

Matthews, A., praises Civil Sera’ice Chronicle, 
110 . 

Matthews, Asa, appointed first comptrollership of 
the treasury, 21; and printing office. 284; politi¬ 
cal worker in Illinois, 335. 

Matthews, A. L., P. O. employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Matthews, C., governor-elect of Indiana, and office- 
seekers, 405. 

Matthews, “Johnny,” gambler, friend of police 
justice Divver, 184. 

Matthews, S. S., deputy postmaster at Winona, 
Miss., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344, 
348. 

Matthews, T. B., deputy coll.int. rev., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Matthews, W. H., negro, deputy collector internal 
revenue in Georgia, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Matthews, W. S., sec’y state republican executive 
committee, Ohio, and political assessments, 280. 

Maxwell land grant, and Elkins, 290, 369. 

May, Colonel, politician,and post-office at Rochelle, 
Ill., 109. 

May, Pa., postmaster at, see Brosius, 72. 

May, Rev. J.. spoils system, immoral, 85; on Quay- 
ism, 162. 

Mayers, J. T., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 334. 

Mayfield, A. W., journalist, postmaster at Elmwood, 
Neb., 149. 

Maynard, J. H., deputy att’y-gen. of New York, and 
Dutchess Co., N. Y., election frauds, 306; cor¬ 
rupt worker for Hill, appointed appellate judge 
by Flower; career of, 309, 310. 

Mayo, Commodore, commandant navy yard at Nor¬ 
folk, Va., 147. 

Mayors, of cities of N. Y., and N. Y. civil service 
commission, 34. 

Mayse, W., authorized to receive political subscrip¬ 
tions. 179. 

Maywood. J., journalist, postmaster at Bad Axe, 
Mich., 149. 

Me Adam, Judge, buys nomination of Tammany, 184. 

McAlister, R , political worker and briber, 134. 

McAlpin, E A., appointed postmaster at Sing Sing* 
N. York, in reward of party services, 108; at 
convention republican league, 259; president of 
N. Y. state league of republican clubs, at Min¬ 
neapolis convention, .344. 

McCain, G. W., efficient officer, removed from po¬ 
lice service at Indianapolis, see Equally di¬ 
vided politically, 220,228. 

McCarren, P. H.. ward politician of Brooklyn, N. 
Y., 263; East River Bridge, bill of scandal of, 317. 

McCarthy, J. J., customs Inspector, active politi¬ 
cian, 179. 

McCarthy, J.. nominee of Congressman Banks, su¬ 
perseded by nominee of Congressman Lodge,39. 

McCauley, J. C., postmaster at Searcy. Ark., re¬ 
moved after four years’ service, second com¬ 
mission unexpired, Rogers appointed. 187. 

McCaull, P. H., int. rev. coll., delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention. 348. 

McChesney, Dr. C. E., Indian agent, false charges 
against, 130, 218. 

McClellan, Congressman, patronage of, 422. 

McClellan. L., office-seeker in Indiana Senate, 407. 

McClelland, councilman of Indianapolis, spoils¬ 
man and low politician, 207. 

McClung, D. W., relative of Pres. Harrison, ap¬ 
pointed collector internal revenue First Ohio 
district, 30. 

McClure, C. M., appointment of, charges of favorit¬ 
ism regarding, refuted by Roosevelt. 266, 267. 

McClure, D., recommends “Paddy” Divver for 
police justice, 184. 

McComas. Congressman, upholds civil service 
law, 125; upholds civil service commission, 203. 

MCComas. member of national republican com¬ 
mittee. 363. 

McConnelsville (0.) Herald, editor of appointed to 
federal office, 301. 

McCoy, S. M.,political worker for Cuney, 159. 

McCreery. C., given office by Gold, township trus¬ 
tee at Indianapolis, 256. 

McCulloch. Rev. O. C.,an independent, 313. 

McDaniel. Lock, political Avorker for Cuney, 159. 

McDonald, fish commissioner, gets civil service 
law extended to fish commission, ,332. 

McDonald, Ex-Senator, on permanence of political 
Issues, 214; his place in politics, 244. 

McDonald, Kan., Journalist SedgAvick postmaster 
at, 149. 


McDonald, R. T., opposed to Harrison,303; appeals 
to Clarkson against political activity of federal 
officers, 317, 362; on political activity of federal 
office-holders in Indiana, 379. 

McDonough, C., ward politician, see Buffalo, N. Y., 
196, 

McDougal, C., ex-U. S. marshal in N. Y., calls on 
Fassett, collector at N. Y. City, 258. 

McDowell, congressional candidate bribes, 151. 

McElvaine, W. J., editor, giv'en office by Governor 
Foraker, 301. 

McFarlane, lOAV politician, 54,94,96,112. 

McFarland, H., appointed in government printing- 
office, totally unfit, 84; henchman, 35; disrep¬ 
utable politician, 138, 173, 181; federal office¬ 
holder, a political worker, 269, 378, 382. 

McGill, J., worker at Minneapolis convention, 343. 

McGinnesSi W. T., postmaster at Minden, Neb., 
forced to resign, 166. 

McGoogle, Dr., appointed postmaster at Areola, 
Ind., vice Rockhill, removed through influence 
of Postmaster Higgins, 362. 

McGreu', federal employe and printing office, 234. 

McGroarty, J.. port Avarden of Brooklyn, N. Y., 
career of. 319, 

McGroarty, N., anti-Harrison man “placated,” 347. 

McHenry, Ill., Editor Van Slyke appointed post¬ 
master at, 141. 

McHugh, State Senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 408. 

McIntosh, J.. letter to regarding Kingsley, la., post- 
office, see Gasper, 165. 

McIntyre, representative in Indiana legislature, 
opposes spoils methods, 407. 

McKain, A. A., part of address at annual meeting 
of Indiana Civil S. Ref. Assoc.. 1889, 8. 

McKane, J. Y.. corrupt politician working for Con¬ 
gressman Wallace, 132; loAV politician in New 
York, given patronage, 352. 

McKay, N., presents “San Domingo” cutlass to 
Fassett, collector at N. Y. City, “to be used in 
beheading democrats.” 258. 

McKean, appointed postmaster at Pittsburg, Pa., 
through influence of Quay, 90; spoilsman, 133. 

McKee, F., relative of Pres. Harrison appointed 
deputy collector of customs at Port ToAvn- 
send, 30. 

McKelvev, state senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 
407, 408. 

McKenna. Congressman J., secures removal of Mrs. 
McKinley, 90. 

McKenna, J. A., postmaster at Long Island City, 
removed despite protests and petitions, 45,54; 
remoA'ed on secret charges, 175. 

McKenzie, A.,controls patronage in N. Dakota, 216. 

McKinley, Mrs. L. W.,postmistress at Winters, Cal., 
removed through influence of McKenna, 90. 

McKinley, W., political Avorkers of rewarded, 52; 
platform of, 105; favors civil service commis¬ 
sion, 119; thanked by Indiana Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association, 120; supports civil service 
law. 124, 168, 169; fulfillment of party pledges, 
168: holds competitive examinations for candi¬ 
dates for West Point, 261, 262; candidate for 
governor of Ohio. 280; political assessments 
for, 287; vote for in Minneapolis convention, 
340, 343; tariff bill of in Louisiana, 345. 

McKnight bill, passage of, see Tammany, 317. 

McLain, J. R., journalist, postmaster at Della 
Plain, Tex., 155 

McLaughlin, applicant for postmastership at 
Franklin, Ind., 88. 

McLaughlin. Inspector in police department, ex¬ 
aminer of police at Brooklyn. N. Y., 222. 

McLaughlin, political boss, 132, 818,319,414; patron¬ 
age of in N. Y. state offices, 215; boss of 
Brooklyn, N. Y., and Croker. 245; and Hill, 309, 
356; Hill gives Brooklyn bridge patronage to, 
350; deals Avith Nathan, 352. 

McLean, A., given office by Tammany: career of. 
355. 

McLean, D., politician, delegate to republican na¬ 
tional convention, appointed general appraiser 
port of N.Y.,30; becomes political worker, 108. 

McMackin, J., custom-house employe in N. Y. 
City, a political Avorker, 279. 

“McMains” charges against Elkins, 291. 

McManes, J., 80; and appointment of Martin, dis¬ 
reputable politician, as collector of internal 
revenue in Penn., 232, 233, 241, 351, 374. 

McMillan, Senator, controls federal office-holders 
In Michigan. 835: supporter of Blaine, 344, 346, 

McMillln, Congressman, and civil service law, 124. 

McMullen, representative in Indiana legislature, 
and spoils methods in, 407. 

McMullin, C. A., journalist, postmaster at Bene¬ 
dict, Kan., 148. 

McNagney, Congressman, patronage of, 410, 422. 

McNeAv, J.. clerk in Indiana Senate, 408. 

McNulta, Gen’l, attributes republican demoraliza¬ 
tion in Illinois to Harrison’s use of patronage, 
240. 

McNutt. A., P. O. employe, see Indianapolis inves¬ 
tigation, 411. 

MePheeters, postmaster of Bloomington, Ind., at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

McPherson, controls patronage in Penn.,84. 

McQulnn, B., postmaster in Benton Co., la., a po¬ 
litical worker. 260. 

McVickar, Rev. W. M., favors clerical recognition 
of civ. service reform, 40. 

MeWhinnev, T. A., political Avorker in Ncav York, 
264. 

Meacham, F. L., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at Plainview, Miss., 126. 














INDEX. 


xxiii 


Meade, C. W., police justice, in New York conven¬ 
tion, 334. 

Melrose, W. H., journalist, postmaster at Eskridge, 
Kan., 149. 

Memphis, Tenu., census of 1890 well conducted in, 
292; Patterson, postmaster of, celebrates re¬ 
nomination of Harrison, 347. 

Merit system, in fighting trim,‘25; and individual 
manhood, 256. 

Merrill, Col., endorsed by Harrison’s regiment, 89. 

Merritt, H. F., consul, removed for political rea¬ 
sons, 371. 

Merritt, J. A., politician, supported by Senator, 
Hiscock for postmaster at Lockport, N. Y., 210. 

Merser, G. A., on committee of National League to 
investigate political assessments, 338. 

Meschert, removed on suspicion of being disloyal 
to Harrison, 300. 

Messerne, C. F., officer in Indian service, asked for 
political contribution, 385. 

Metcalf, Dr., of Indiana State Board of Health, in¬ 
efficient, 315, 310. 

Metcalfe, appraiser at port of St. Louis, active poli¬ 
tician, 143. 

Metzger, R., republican politician, on political ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders in Indianapolis, 
378. 

Meyer, H. A., Nathan’s candidate for mayor of 
Brooklyn, 287. 

Michener, L.T.,chairman Indiana Republican State 
Committee, uses 4th class post offices to make 
republican machine, 07; obtains removal of 
Suffall, postmaster at Freedom, Ind., and ap¬ 
pointment of Watts, 112; and Harrison, 121, 354; 
attorney-general of Indiana, controls federal 
patronage of, 144, 173, 377, 378; politician, part¬ 
ner of Dudley, 189; worker for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 337, .340, 342, :>45. 

Michigan, Editor J. B. Stone appointed collector 
internal revenue 1st district of, 30; distribution 
of spoils in, by the democrats, results in defeat, 
45; political activity of federal office-holders 
in, 335,348, 390. 

Middlefield, 0., Journalist Murdock postmaster 
at, 149. 

Middleton, A. R., negro, Harrison delegate from 
N. Carolina, 334. 

Middleton, D. C., chairman Jefferson Co., N. Y., 
republican committee levies political assess¬ 
ments, 392. 

Middleton, J. H., postmaster at West Hoboken, N. 
J., removed and no reasons given, Klumpp ap¬ 
pointed, 176. 

Miles, Genl., on Indian abuses, 182; and Indian 
rising at Pine Ridge, S. Dak., 218. 

Miles, G. E., editor, appointed postmaster at Mann- 
field, Fla.,141. , .... 

Milholland. J.E., chief inspector of immigration 
at New York, assists at dinner to Clarkson, ‘245; 
at convention of Republican League,‘259; polit¬ 
ical worker, 265; federal employe, removed for 
political activity, 3:32,334. 

Miller, A. J., office-holder, a political worker, 162. 

Miller, J., postmaster at Utica, N.Y., a political 
worker, 266. , . n,.,. 

Miller, S.D., son of att y-general, gets office,242, 
works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 339 , 346. 

Miller, T., congressional candidate, offers bribes. 


162. 

MiHer,T. A., postmaster at Tuscaloosa, Ala., dele 
gate to Minneapolis convention, M8. 

Miller T. C., physician, son of and competitive 
examinations for West Point,see Warwick. 

Miller. Warner, heads political faction, /5, 2()-l,303 
354; faction of, opposed to Platt. 2M, 260; and 
Harrison, 337, 347; “placation” of.360, 361. 

Miller, Attorney-Gen., appointees mimt be good 
men and republicans, 25, 35; and office-seekers, 
37- rules of for appointment, 44; Innuendo of 
Delphi Journal, 85; goes home to vote, 180; an 
independent in 1872; denounces Pres. Gram, 
191, 192; and fraudulent car^ge bids a* N- t_. 
custom house, 216; and G. B. Raum, Jr.,228; and 
printing office, 234; and Raum investigation, 
^38; solicits campaign funds for Harrison, .40, 
Invites criticism, 310; and Baltimore investiga¬ 
tion, 329, 330; estimates Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 345. 338; and Baltimore Investigation. 372; 
and removal of Justice Sandford. 374; and po¬ 
litical assessments, 387, 391, 392, political 

worker, 291, 389. 

Mlllersburg, O., editor appointed postmaster at, 301 

Milligan, Congressman, civ. service reform, state 
of civ. service in his district, 73. 

Millikan F. M., sec’y Indiana republican state 
^ committee, asks for political coiMributions, 387. 

Milliken W. F., supported by T. Reed (Me.) for 
customs collector, 22; and J. Manley in Maine, 


Milffken. N. J., journalist, postmaster at Canandai- 

Mllo.'Hi^a.^ditor Lyon appointed postmaster at. 

Milwaukee, Wis., investigation of post-office a.t hy 
civ. service commission adverse to postmaster, 
36 58; Paul, postmaster of resigns, 44, 47, 103, 
104; Editor Watrous appointed collector 

mer incumbent removed without cause, n clv^ 

service reform in post-office at, 95, postmas^r 
Paul of removes Shidy, witness against bim 
101.103; per cent, of removals in classified and 

unclassified service in ciark- 

Mllwaukee Sentinel [repub.]. condemns Liaric 

son, 66. 


Minden, Neb., Postmaster McGinness of, forced to 
resign, 166. 

Ministers, see also church. 

Minister as citizen, from address of Congressman 
G. F. Williams, 239. 

Ministers, duty of to advocate civ. service re¬ 
form, 74. 

Ministers, foreign, haste in removing, by Pres. 
Harrison, 27. 

Minneapolis, republican national convention at 
1892; federal ottice-holders of delegates to, 337, 
348, 357; nominations of, indorsed by Indiana 
federal office-holders at Washington, 354; In¬ 
diana delegates to refuse to pay assessments, 
1363; political activity of federal oflice-holders 
at, 349, 350, 364, 365, 370, 375, :379, 382; selection of 
delegates for, and political activity in, of 
federal office-holders in Indiana, :378, 380. 

Minneapolis Journal (rep.), denounces Harrison’s 
surrender to spoils system, 177. 

Minnesota, senators of, at war over spoils, 30; po¬ 
litical activity of federal office holders in, 344, 
348. 

Mississippi, appointees to Indian service from, 
under Cleveland, 219; political activity of 
federal officers in, 348,339, 3-15, 344, 343, 3:57, :382. 

Missouri, removals in, ‘22; patronage in, 24, 52; 
spoils system in, 51; control of patronage in 
Sixth district of, 55; republicans of, think 
Clarkson too slow, 62; sale of offices in, 93; 
patronage in, given to Filley, political 
activity of federal office-holders in. 3:56, :i45, 346; 
Kerens for Harrison, chosen committeeman of 
delegation of, to Minneapolis convention; ;i46; 
political assessment of federal employes from, 
:i83. 


Missouri, civil service reform association of, an¬ 
nual meeting of, 38; and removals in postal 
service, 92; report to on the civil service, 13ii; an¬ 
nual meeting, 1891; proceedings, ‘239. 

Mitchell, Sen., controls patronage in Oregon, :32; 
and Indians, 42. 

Mitchell, U. S. district att’y, and proposed prose¬ 
cution of Van Cott and Hendricks, 287. 

jMitchell, B., federal employe, political worker in 
Indiana, 353. 

Mitchell, C. H., appointed patent commissioner by 
Harrison; efficient, 140. 

Mitchell, Ind., sale of postmastership at, see Wood 
and Hobbs, 89. 

Mitchell, W. A., P. O. employe, see Baltimore in 
vestigation, ‘268, 277, 296. 

Mizell, J. R.. U. S. marshal, letter to C. 0. Kirk, 90. 

Mizer, J. R., chairman Florida republican state 
committee, appointed U. S. marshal, :50. 

Moberly, Missouri, postmaster at, uses census enu¬ 
merators as political workers, 131. 


Mobile, Ala., Baker, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, :548. 

Mohler, O. E., editor, “no Harrison republicans 
outside of office-holding ring,” 240; on support¬ 
ers of Harrison, ;578. 

Moline, Kan., Journalist Armstrong postmaster at, 
149. 

Molloy, J. K., sec’y Ohio republican state commit¬ 
tee, levies political assessments, 390, 891. 

Moloney, Mrs. L., beggar, placed at top of eligible 
list for police matron of N. Y. City through po¬ 
litical influence, 404. 

Monaghan, W., chairman Ohio republican state 
committee, given office, 46. 

Monahan. State Senator J.. uses influence for 
O’Donnell, 59. . 

Moncrief, Prof., 11; letter on ministers and civil 
service reform, 15. 

Money. J , chairman Tennessee delegation to re¬ 
publican national convention, 1888, appointed 
U. Si minister, 39. 

Monroe. la.. Editor Vandermast appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Monson, Mass., reappointment of democrat Har¬ 
rington postmaster at. recommended by Con¬ 
gressman Rockwell, 188. 

Montague, removal of for political reasons. 56. 

Montana, political activity of federal office-holders 
in, 3:57, 3:59, 342, :544. 

Montgomery, patent commissioner, spoilsman, 139, 
140. 

Montgomery, postmaster at Bristol, Conn., recom¬ 
mended for re-appointment by Congressman 
Simonds. 91. « t or. 

Montgomery, Editor, see Greenfield, Ind., 89. 

Montgomery, J. A., appointed superintendent in 
Chicago post-office, 14. 

Moody, Sen., and Indian service, opposes Morgan, 
Indian commissioner, 79; appoints his son-to 
office, 84; and Yankton Indian agency, 86; con¬ 
trols patronage in Indian service, 218. 

Montoux. representative in Indiana legislature, 

opposes spoils methods in,407. 

Moony, Miss., postmaster at Maspeth, L. I., removed 
on secret charges, place given to politiciam 39. 

Moore, congressman and postmaster at Nashua, 
N H. 73; favors civil service reform, 100,123. 

Moore, e'h., gambler, discharged by Postmaster 
Jones, re-appointed by Postmaste^Vallace. at 
Indianapolis, 18.25; defended by Wallace and 
Asst. Postmaster Thompson, 28. 

Moore A , deputy U. 8. marshal and political 
v^orker in Indiana. .302, .353. 370, 375, 379. 

Moore, G. E., editor, appointed postmaster at Nara 
Springs, Iowa, 142. 


Moores, M., low political worker, controls patron¬ 
age under Census Supervisor Conger, 129,182; 
controls patronage in census service at Indian¬ 
apolis, gets lists of voters of enumerators, 293; 
believes in political assessments, 332; chairman 
Republican County Committee at Indianapolis, 
attempts to bully Postmaster Thompson, 366. 

“Morals of Civil Service Reform,” by L. M. Black¬ 
ford, 136. 

Morey, Congressman, spoilsman, 15, 24. 

Morgan, state senator of Indiana, and spoils meth¬ 
ods, 408. 

Morgan, editor and oftice-seeker, 16. 

Morgan, Indian commissioner, appoints his wife 
his private sec’y, 38; rules governing tenure of 
office in Indian service, 44; opposition to ap¬ 
pointment of, 78; removals under in Indian 
service, 78, 79; and congressional barons, 86; 
not responsible for home rule policy, 98; up¬ 
holds Harrison’s Indian policy, 202; does not 
control appointments, 217. 

Morgan, G. H., democrat, re appointed postmaster 
at Newton, Mass., 224. 

Morgan, W. B., customs collector at Buffalo, N. Y., 
a political worker, ‘265, 390. 

Morley, John, on slavery, 116. 

Morning Star (Baptist), advocates civil service re¬ 
form, 30. 

Morris, alderman, political worker for Harrison in 
New York, 332. 

Morris, Ill., Journalist Fletcher appointed posmas- 
ter at, political worker, 126,186. 

Morris, S. V., brother-in-law of Pres. Harrison, 
given office, 108. 

Morrison, D., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

Morse, E. A., opposed to retention of Spear, post¬ 
master at Springfield, Mass., 86; and Postmas- 
masier Harlow at Whitman, 100; secures appoint¬ 
ment of Adams, postmaster at Quincy, Mass., 
100; gets office for his nephew, 108; correspond¬ 
ence of regarding postmastership of Plymouth, 
Mass., 187. 

Morse, F.C., appointed postmaster at Colfax, Wash., 
vice La Rue, forced to resign, 165. 

Morse, H. E.. customs collector at Cape Vincent, 
N. Y., a political worker, see also Jefferson Co , 
N.Y., 266. 

Morse, S. B., negro federal employe, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, :548. 

Morss, S. E., of Indianapolis Sentinel, favors civil 
service reform, ‘227, ‘2‘29; supporter of Cleveland 
at Chicago convention, 350. 

Morton, C. B., politician in Brooklyn, opposing 
Nathan, 304, 371. 

Morton, Vice-President, opposes appointment of 
Ritchie, postmaster at Saratoga, N. Y., 1‘26; 
surety for f'assett, collector at N. Y. City,‘258; 
Fassett favors at suggestion of Platt, ‘259; confers 
with Quay, 390. 

Morton, O. T.,on popular objections to civil service 
reform. 85, 111, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119; attends 
dinner at Indianapolis to Roosevelt, speech of, 
227, 2‘29, 2.31; and levying of political assess¬ 
ments by Allen, 322,33i; on civil service reform, 
396. 

Mosley, R. A., politician, appointed collector inter¬ 
nal revenue in Alabama, 56; faction of, works 
for Harrison at Minneapolis, 346; in Alabama, 
leader of Harrison faction, 348. 

Mott, J. J.. opposes Eaves, 150,159. 

Moulton, W, P., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Stuart, Iowa, 142. 

Mt. Morris, Ill., F. Tice appointed postmaster at, 
see Hitt, 109. 

Mt. Vernon, Ind., editor, son of Governor Hovey, 
appointed postmaster at, 37, 71; postmaster at 
and Sen. Harrison, 96; Hovey, postmaster of, at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Mountain City, Tenn., Journalist Keyes postmaster 
at 155. 

Mounts, H., deputy collector at_ Indianapolis, 
worker against Chase, 352, :353, :579. 

Mowry, L. D., removed by Von Landberg, Hiscock 
appointed. 150. 

Moyer, H. B., journalist, postmaster at Freeburgh, 
Pa., 149. 

Mudd, S. E., congressman, political worker, 144; 
candidate, and political assessments, 162; ex¬ 
congressman, demands removal of Roosevelt, 
22() 254. 

Mugwump defense of in Indianapolis News, 351; 
abuse of by republicans, 405 

Mullen, Neb., Journalist Hammell postmaster at, 
149. 

Mulligan, Mrs., appointed pension agent at Chi¬ 
cago, to succeed Miss Sweet, 107. 

Mulligan letters, 365. 

Mulliken, postmaster at Easton, Ind., in state con- 
tlon,:535, , • ■ 

Multnomah Co., Oregon, census service in, ineffi¬ 
cient,‘295. . ■ J- r 

Miincle. Ind.. political situation in, discontent of 
office-seekers. 88; applicants for postmastership 
of. Ellis appointed, 217; Ellis postmaster of, 
political worker for Harrison, :316, :36‘2,370, :378. 

Mundelle. R. B., discharged by Jones, postmaster 
at Indianapolis, reinstated by Wallace, post- 
mas'er at Indianaiiolis, 27, 34. 

Munroeville, Iiid.. Stewart appointed postmaster 
of, resigns; G. Webster appointed; applicant 

Davis given another position, 88. 

Munson, A., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 334. 












XXIV 


INDEX. 


Murchison letter, 92. 

Murdock, C. B., journnll.st, postmaster at Middle- 
field, O., 149. 

Murphysborough, Ill., Postmaster Andrews of 
forced to resign, 1G5. 

Murphy E., mayor of Troy, Tammany chief, patron¬ 
age of In N. Y. state offices, 215; corrupt poli¬ 
tician, SOT, S9r>; given office, 319; and prison 
patronage, 330; opposes mugwumps, 351; and 
nomination of Cleveland, 355; Cleveland re¬ 
fuses, while candidate, to pledge spoils to, 395; 
Cleveland opposes election of, as senator from 
New York, 404; obtains suspension of civil 
service rules in New York for benefit of worker 
Sternberg, 414; Sheehan worker for, 415. 

Murphy, M. C., appointed warden port by Gov. 
Flower, 319. 

Murphy, “Tom,” controls N. Y. custom-house, 191. 

Murray, postmaster at Johnston, N. Y., and post- 
office department at Washington, 72. 

Murray, C. F., requests patronage, 311, 812. 

Murray, C. H., spoils circular of, for places in cen¬ 
sus service, 157; spoilsman, appointed census 
supervisor in N. Y. City, 294; supporter of Platt, 
removed, 333, 334; political worker in New 
York convention, 334; federal employe, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Murray, J., supt. custom-house at N. Y. City, re¬ 
signs, 258. 

Muscatine, John Mahon, editor, appointed post¬ 
master at, 40. 

Mustard, J., appointed postmaster at Glen Hall, 
Ind., vice Stepp, “resigned,” 149. 

Muzzy, L. R., journalist, postmaster at Pulaski, N. 
Y., 155. 

Nampa, Idaho, Journalist Bacon,postmaster at, 155. 

Nashua, New Hamp., postmaster at, 73. 

Nashville, Ind., Allison, supported by Congress¬ 
man Cooper for postmaster of, 398. 

Nathan, E.. political worker, appointed collector 
internal revenue of Brooklyn (N. Y.) district, 
by Harrison, 55,170,191; wins fight in 2.3d ward 
In New York City, 121; political worker, for 
Congressman Wallace, 142, 150; backed by 
Platt, 143; uses power of office to intimidate 
voters, 178; trades votes for Wallace, 179, 
180; engages in factional fights in Brook¬ 
lyn and New York, 197, 198; corrupt politi¬ 
cal worker and boss, 204, 265, 304, 311, 332, 
350, 371; political worker for Fassett, 287; in 
N. Y. convention, 335; worker for Platt,again8t 
against Willis, worker for Harrison, 33i); boss 
in Kings Co., N. Y.; deals with McLaughlin, 
352; controls machine in Kings Co., N. Y.; 
worker for Platt, 354, 355; uses office as political 
weapon, 374. 

National Baptist, on political status, as regards 
civil service reform, 257. 

National League of Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tions; speeches before annual meeting of, 
1890, see Civil Service Record; annual meeting 
at Philadelphia, Oct. 1-2, 51; annual meeting, 
1889; resolutions of on agitating civil service 
reform, 66; appoints committee to investigate 
management of federal civil service, 77; in¬ 
vestigating committee of,85; special committee 
of, investigates patent office, 1.39, 140, 141; an¬ 
nual meeting of 1890; proceedings; report on 
presidential post-offices, 145,153, 161, 172; inves¬ 
tigation by special committee of, upon removals 
upon secret charges, 175, 176 177; report of 
special committee of, on political changes In 
presidential post-offices, 186, 187, 188; resolu¬ 
tions of requesting Maryland Civ. Serv. Ref. 
Assoc, to investigate political activity of fed¬ 
eral officers, 219; circular of executive commit¬ 
tee of on status of civil service reform, 282; 
resolutions of at annual meeting, 1891, 286, 287; 
investigation of census service by special com¬ 
mittee of, 291, 295; address before annual meet¬ 
ing on “Party and Patronage,” by Curtis; also 
resolutions of, 321, 326, 329; committees ap¬ 
pointed to investigate political assessments and 
political interference of federal office-holders, 
338; report to committee of, investigating po¬ 
litical activity of federal employes in Indiana, 
375, 381. 

Nattinger, E. A., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at Ottawa, Ill., 126. 

Navarre, O., Journalist Carl, postmaster at. 149. 

Navy yard, at Brooklyn, N. Y., see Brooklyn,45; at 
Brooklyn, N. Y., clean sweep in, see Dady, 196; 
at KIttery, Me., spoils system at under Sec’y 
Tracy, 145; at Brooklyn, N. Y., examinations 
under Sec’y Tracy at, statement of examining 
board, 236; at Norfolk, Va., and Portsmouth,N. 
H., merit system introduced in by Tracy, 2-51; 
introduction of merit system into requested by 
Mass, legislature, see Tracy, 274 , 276; applica¬ 
tion merit system to commended, 286; Sec’y 
Tracv institutes merit system in, 221, 222, 230, 
298, ;{06,321, 326; at Brooklyn, N.Y., employes in 
ordered to work for renomination of Harrison, 
336; at Brooklyn, Page, chief of ordnance dept., 
removed, 355; Sec’y Tracy introduces Boston 
labor system in, .331, 357,376. 

Neal. U. S. attorney, active politician. 143. 

Nebeker. U. S. treasurer, spoilsman, tries to get of¬ 
fice for his son, 253, 254; political worker, .370, 
882 

Nebo, ill.. Editor Lansdon appointed postmaster at, 
141. 

Nebraska, office-seekers in, 6; political activity of 


federal officers in, 348,370; political assessments 
in Indian servicaiu, 384, 385. 

Neely, C. F. W., editor, applicant for postmaster¬ 
ship of Muncie, Ind., 217. 

Neff, J. I., recommended by Illinois senators and 
congressmen for assistant treasurer, 110. 

Negroes, desire “representation,” 243, 244. 

Nelson, I. D. G., condemns democrats for defeating 
Magee bill for non-partisan control of Indiana 
state charitable institutions, 215. 

Neodesha, Kan., Postmaster Lee of, removed after 
four years’ service, second commission unex¬ 
pired, 187. 

Neoga, III., Editor Hancock appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Nepotism, see aisoThomas Jefferson on, Cleveland. 

Nepotism, under Harrison, 21,30, 253, 282, .369. 

Nettleton, acting secretary of treasury, and so- 
called resignation of Maegregor, 216. 

New. J. C., Editor, distributor of patronage in In¬ 
diana, 7,85; appointed consul-general to Lon¬ 
don, 14; and Harrison, 121; works forre-nomi- 
nation of Harrison, .334,837, 340, 342, 344, 345, 357, 
377, 379. 

New Albany, Ind., postmaster Godfrey at, spoils¬ 
man, 45, 393; works for Michener, 144; political 
worker for Harrison, 316; at Minneapolis con¬ 
vention. .377, 378.380; Marsh, P. ©.employe at, 
political worker, 380. 

New Albany Evening Tribune (rep.) and Civil 
Service Chronicle, 13; advocates civil service 
reform, 83. 

New Bedford, Mass., carpenter, postmaster at, re¬ 
moved on secret charges without investigation, 
29, 175, 176. 

New Carlisle, Ind., Editor Fountain appointed 
postmaster at, 126,377. 

New Castle, Ind., W. F. Shelley, dentist, appointed 
postmaster at, 132. 

New Castle, Ind., Courier (rep.), advocates civil 
service reform, 76. 

New Hampshire, administration organ denounces 
civil service reform, 62; patronage of given to 
Chandler, 340; political activity of federal offi 
cers in, 348, 371. 

New Haven, Conn., Sperry, postmaster at, favors 
civil service reform, 91; removal of English, 
postmaster at, 96; per cent, of removals in classi¬ 
fied and unclassified service in post-office at, 
185; Sperry, postmaster of. testifies to worth of 
Bario, P.O. inspector removed. 298; civil service 
reform association of and post-office at, 96. 

New Holland, O., Journalist Lewis po.stmaster at, 
149, 

New Holland, Pa., postmaster at removed through 
influence Brosius, 72. 

New Jersey, political activity of federal office hold¬ 
ers in, ;347. 

New Mexico, vote of for Harrison at Minneapolis, 
347. 

New Milford, Pa., Journalist Vail, postmaster at, 
149. 

New Orleans collector at, Ex-Gov. Warmouth ap¬ 
pointed, 44; Collector Warmouth of, obtains ap¬ 
pointment of Weber as postmaster at Donald¬ 
son, La., 241; customs district of, classified 1883, 
276; and state politics, 283; relative of Harrison 
appointed naval officer at, 369; Eaton, postmas¬ 
ter of, pays political assessments, 383. 

New Richland, Kan., Journalist Bronson appoint¬ 
ed postmaster at, 126. 

New Sharon, Iowa, Editor Vail apointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142, 

New York City, see Pearson, postmaster at, and Van 
Cott, postmasterat.placesof federal officesin, at 
disposal of “The” Allen, see post-office at, 12, 45; 
given over to spoilsmen, 28; custom-house at, 
civil serv. com. investigates, 29; post-office at, 
saving by merit system in, 35; Fire Chief Shay, 
retired on pension, 36; custom-house at, civ, 
service commission investigates, 36; Ru.ssell 
Harrison secures appointment for friend as 
postal stampasst. at,38; reform club of, work of, 
against tariff, 42; sixth assembly district of, 
resolutions of against civ. service reform, 49. 

New York Custom-House at, removals in, .54; 
applications for position in custom-house 
at. 75; effect of patronage in twenty-first as¬ 
sembly district of, 75; custom-house employes 
at, aid politicians and go on committees, 108; 
fire service in, 120; attempt to purify politics 
in, 130; per cent, of removals in, classified and 
unclassified service in post-office at, 185; Wil. 
Us, naval officer at, a spoilsman, 191; custom¬ 
house at, controlled by “Tom” Murphy, C. A. 
Arthur. Leet, and Stocking, 191; account of fac¬ 
tional fights for control of party machine in, 
198,199,241,242; custom house at, cartage frauds 
practiced at, 216; street-cleaning department 
should be under merit system, 220, 221; custom¬ 
house at, Roosevelt invites 21st district republi¬ 
can association of New York City to investigate 
custom-house service at, 2:(6; removal of Burt, 
n aval officer at, for political reasons, 63, 237; civ¬ 
il service commission, not very commendable, 
239; employes in custom-house of, appointed 
through influence of Platt; Collector Erhardt 
“resigns,” Fassett appointed. 255, 258, 259, 260, 
261; Feudalism revived in, 263; Erhardt,collector 
of. and office-seekers recommended by Platt. 
264;IIendricks, political worker for Hisebekand 
Platt, succeeds Fassett as collector of, 264, 266, 
269; James, P.O. employe at, and others, federal 


employes, political workers, 265; customs dis¬ 
trict of, classified 1883, 276; customshouse em¬ 
ployes in political workers for Fassett, 278; gov¬ 
ernment of, 28-1, 285; Tammany methods in, 291; 
census service in inefficient, 294 ; thefts of 
Hill in, 306, .307; “sugar frauds” in custom 
house at, see Hillism, 310; state of politics in 
Brooklyn and, 350; Tammany makes political 
machine of health department of, 356; Bos¬ 
ton labor system used for street work at, 357; 
employes in sub-treasury at ordered to vote 
republican ticket, 390; civil service board of 
(Tammany) and fraudulent appointment of 
Mrs. Maloney, 404. 

New York Herald, on “Paddy” Divver, 184. 

New York Evening Post, attributes republican de¬ 
feat of 1889, chiefly to spoils system, 76; on civil 
service law, 92; on progess in civil service meth¬ 
ods, 224; exposes corrupting influences of Tam¬ 
many, 289, 290. 

New York Press (rep.), declares republican party 
favors extension of civil service law, 65. • 

New York Sun, for spoils, 93. 

New York Times, account of caucus in Buffalo, N. 
Y., 196; accounts of spoils lights In several 
states, 215, 216, 217; on Raum and Harrison, 238. 

New York Tribune, on Postmaster Pearson, 12; 
supports Mahone,53; advocates civ. service re¬ 
form, 65; on “Paddy” Divver, 184: defends 
Platt against Erhardt, 2-55; silent regarding civil 
service pledges of Harrison in 1892, 357; subsid¬ 
ized by Harrison, .369. 

New York World, charges of against Senator Quay, 
112; on “Paddy” Divver, 184. 

New York State, see civil service commission of, 
platform, convention; delegation from and its 
demands, 21; patronage of given to T. Platt by 
President Harrison, 27, 52, 56, 68,173, 245,258, 
259, 261, 282, 332, 368, 376; delegate to Republican 
National Convention appointed general ap¬ 
praiser at port of, ,30; Niagara Co., removals in 
federal offices of, 30; congressional patronage 
in (see Quackenbush), 32; post-offices in (see 
Delano), 47; competitive system in, 52; republi¬ 
cans in think President Harrison not bound to 
keep reform pledges, 62; rejiublican com¬ 
mittees of denounce civil service reform, 63; 
weakening influence of office-holding in, 75; 
clergymen of, oppose impure political methods, 
1.55: disregard of civil service law of, 161; state 
courts of, uphold N. Y. civil service law, 161, 
200,281,286; elections of 1890 in, disastrous to 
civil service reform, 173; postmasters in, ap¬ 
pointed by Congressman Sherman, 180; quar¬ 
rels over patronage in legislature of, 215; eva¬ 
sion of civil service law in cities In, reform asso¬ 
ciations of New York and Brooklyn are to blame, 
219; R. P. Flower .candidate of Croker,Tammany 
“boss” for governor of, 245, 261; corruption In, 
281; political assessments in, 180,282, 28t), 287,391, 
392; Hillism in, 309; legislature of stolen by 
Hill and Tammany, 306 , 313,314; political cor¬ 
ruption long-seated in, appointing council of, 
325; political activity of federal office-holders in, 
272. ;i.32, 3:54,335, .3,36, 3:57, :542, 348, 359, 360, 361, 371, 
:384, ,385, :387, :J90, 391; republican discord in, ,351, 
3,52; nomination of Cleveland and democratic 
regular organizations in, 355; republican asso¬ 
ciation requests lists for assessment purposes, 
:363; Riley, chief examiner of civil service com¬ 
mission of, removed byTammany, 414. 

N.Y. Civil Service Reform Association, annual elec¬ 
tion,23; annual meeting 1891, report of executive 
committee on efficiency of N. Y. state and vari¬ 
ous city civil service commissions, 239; corres¬ 
pondence with treasury and P. O. departments 
over political activity of Van Cott and Hen¬ 
dricks, 289; committee of. Investigates civil 
service examination in N. Y. City service. 319, 
:520; and prison appointments, 331. 

Newark, N. J., per cent, of removals in classified 
and unclassified service in post-office at, 185. 

Newark, 0.. Iches, editor, postmaster at, 301. 

Newaygo, Mich., Journalist Shaw postmaster at, 
149, 

Newberry, General, confirmed as postmaster at 
Chicago, 6. 

Newburgh, Ind., Cushman, postmaster of, political 
worker, 3,80. 

Newburg, N. Y., Taggart, postmaster of, i»olitical 
worker for Platt. 260; census of 1890 well con¬ 
ducted in, 292; primaries at, run by workers for 
Hill, 309. 

Newcomb, J.. postmaster, a political worker, 159. 

Newell. la.. Editor Blair, postmaster at, a political 
worker. 

Newins. politician in Brooklyn, N. Y., opposing 
Nathan, 304. 

Newport, R. I., Fay appointed postmaster at, 1,50. 

Newton, C. E., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Kawanna, Ind., 126, 377. 

Newton, Mass., Democrat Morgan appointed post¬ 
master at, 224; civil service reform association 
of, address before, on Influence of Clarkson 
and Wanamaker. by Rev. H. Lambert, i;36, 261. 

Newtonville, Mass., Turner indorsed for reappoint- 
men, 100. 

Niblack, Judge, votes against Pendleton act; ad¬ 
dress of on civil service reform, 138, 139; ex¬ 
judge Indiana supreme court, favors civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 227, 229. 

Nichols, trades votes in behalf of Congressman 
Wallace, 179. 








INDEX. 


XXV 


NIcholls, E. T., commandant of navy yard at Kit- 
tery, Me., 147. 

Nichols, J., treasury chief of division, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 334, 348. 

Nicholls, J. A., quarantine commissioner, supports 
Congressman Wallace, 142; corrupt politician, 

X # 

Nicholson, M., of Indianapolis News, favors civil 
service reform, 227, 229. 

Nlcoll, dist. attorney, and Rev. Dr. Parkhurst, 319 . 

Niedringhaus, F.G., and Harrison, 14; aiding office- 
seekers, 15; and federal appointments in Mis¬ 
souri, 22, 

Nillgh, Neb., Journalist Best postmaster at, 149. 

Nipher, Prof. F. E., supposed telegram to by Secre¬ 
tary Rusk and reply, 244, 245, 253. 

Nithey, Mich., poll of voters asked of Daniels, post¬ 
master of, 383. 

Nixon, editor and collectorship of customs at Chi¬ 
cago, 47. 

Nixon, deputy controller of currency, political 
worker, 389. 

Noble, Rev. Dr., on parties and government, 82. 

Noble, Secretary, on putting census bureau under 
civil service law, 19; accedes to wishes of Sen¬ 
ator Mitchell regarding patronage of Oregon,32; 
and Indian agents Rosebud agency, Dakota, 48; 
refuses to state causes of removal of Vandever, 
181; spoilsman, 70,191, 291; to blame for Harri¬ 
son’s Indian i>oIicy, 202; spoilsman and Indian 
service, 98, 221,220; on Raum scandals, 237; es 
tablishes rules for promotion In interior de¬ 
partment, 298: and federal patronage in St. 
Louis, 304; requests removal of Collector Wen- 
necker, of Missouri, 336; and political assess¬ 
ments in Indian service, 375. 

Noblesville, Ind., postmaster at appointed, 47; 
Cheadle recommends Frybarger, afterwards 
Royer, for postmaster at, 89; Royer, postmaster 
of, political worker, 380. 

Nogales, Arizona, Journalist Chatham postmaster 
at, 155. 

Nolan, E., federal employe, political worker, 302,375. 

Nora Springs, Iowa, Editor Moore appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Norfolk Republican Club of Boston and Clarkson, 
119,131. 

Norkfolk, Va., Brady appointed collector at, 52; 
navy yard at, repairs in, for JMahone’s benefit, 
59; navy yard at, spoils system in, 147, 153; 
merit system Introduced in navy yard at by 
Tracy, 251. 

Norris, C. O., P. O. employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 


N. Carolina, patronage of given away by Harrison, 
150; negroes of demand spoils, 159; political 
situation and fights in, 159; secret charges in, 
312; political activity of federal office-holders in, 
3:i4 . 362 , 373; political assessments levied in 
by Eaves, 362. 

N. Dakota, patronage of, given to A. McKenzie,also 
to Ball, 216; political activity of federal officers 
in, il48. 

Northrop, editor Syracuse Courier, postmaster at, 
see Syracuse, 46. 

Norton, C. E., pres. Cambridge Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association, and Harrison, 204, 205. 

Norton, M., letter to from Davenport questioning 
right to vote, 387. 

Norwich, Conn., post-office at under Cleveland, re¬ 
moval of postmaster of by Harrison, 29; census 
of 1890 not well conducted at, 293. 

Notson, J. T., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Farragut, Iowa. 142. 

Nowland, custom-house deputy at Indianapolis, 
political worker, 108. 

Nowlin, E., republican politician, census super¬ 
visor 2d Indiana district, 100. 

Noyes, L. M., editor, appointed postmaster at Ak¬ 
ron, Ind., 126, 377. 

Nugent, J. R., food contractor in barge office at New 
York, requests patronage, 311, 312; food con¬ 
tractor in barge office, in New York convention, 
334 ; at Minneapolis convention, 344. 


O'Brien, 330, 331. 

O’Brien, E. C., federal employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 345, 348. 

O’Brien, H., mayor of Boston, and civ. service re¬ 
form, 82. 

O’Brien, J., corrupt politician, and Hill, 307. 

O'Brien, J. J., spoilsman and bribe-taker, 170,171. 

O'Connell, police surgeon, and examiner at Brook¬ 
lyn, N. Y., •2‘22. 

O’Connor, councilman of Indianapolis, supports 
Fire Chief Webster, 208. 

O’Day, D.. supports Delamater on behalf of Stand¬ 
ard Oil Company, 134. . 

O’Donnell, groom of G. B. Raum, Jr., employed in 
pension office, 190. , 

O’Donnell, J.. jury-briber, given office through in¬ 
fluence of Senator Farwell and others, 69. 

O’Donohue, J. J.,recommends “Paddy” Divver for 
police justice, 184. 

O’Dwyer, Dr. J., resigns from N. Y. City Health 
Dept., because it becomes political machine, 

O’Mara, J., violates health laws, given office by 
board of health at Indianapolis, 316. 

O’Neill, ex-Congressman, and his political assess¬ 
ment, 160. 

O’Neill, C., naval officer on board to examine ap¬ 
plicants for positions in navy yard at Brooklyn, 

O’Rourke, J., appointed foreman in Brooklyn navy 


yard, efficient, 142; appointed master boiler¬ 
maker in Brooklyn navy yard under Cleveland, 
removed under Harrison, gets back on exami¬ 
nation, 2.36.'* 

Oakford, Ind., postmaster at, see Martin and Crous- 
sore, 96. 

Oberlin, Kan., Journalist Barin postmaster at, 149. 

Oberly, Indian commissioner, 9, 48, 86; and Sena¬ 
tor Ingalls,22; removed by President Harrison, 
27, 44; ex-commissioner opposes publicity of 
eligible lists, 63. 

Odell, postmaster at Beverly, Mass., a political 
worker, 162. 

Odell, B. B., Jr., political worker for Platt, 260. 

Oeh, P. O. employe, see Baltimore investigation, 
295, 326, 327. 

Oelrichs, S. Dak., Journalist Jones, postmaster at, 
155. 

“Offensive Partisanship,” removals for, see report 
special committee Nat. League, 1889-90, 188. 

Office, scramble for, 3.6. 

Office-brokerage, see Eubanks; also sale of offices, 
23. 

Office-holders, republican, leave Washington to 
vote, 162. 

Ogden, Ind., postmaster of, distributes campaign 
documents, 390. 

Ogdensburg, N. Y., Postmaster Baird removed. Ed¬ 
itor Smith appointed. 126; custom-house at,not 
classified, number of employes in, 277. 

Ohio, and spoils, 16; Darke Co. postmaster in, re¬ 
moved, 23; republicans of and Gov.Foraker, 
24; republicans of, think civ. service reform a 
humbug, 62; compalgn of 1889 in, run by Con¬ 
gressman Grosvenor, spoilsman, 68; status of 
merit system in, hopeful, 119; political assess¬ 
ments of federal employes from, 179; republi¬ 
can association of, and printing-office, 234; pat¬ 
ronage of given to Sherman, 240; defeat of Fora- 
ker for governor of,owing touse of patronage,240; 
political assessments in, 272, 280, 282, '287, 390, 
412; federal patronage used by Harrison in, for 
re-election of Sherman. 297, 800, 301, 302; politi¬ 
cal activity of federal office-holders in, 835, ^6, 
346; vote of at Minneapolis divided between 
Blaine, Harrison and McKinley,340,343;patron- 
age of given to Sherman, 340; relative of Harri¬ 
son appointed collector of internal revenue in, 
369. 

Olathe, Kan., Journalist Perkins appointed post¬ 
master at, 126. 

Old Dominion Republican League, attempts to aid 
Mahone by political assessments, frustrated by 
civil service commission, 70; political assess¬ 
ments by, in Washington departments, 412. 

Oler, C. H., efficient railway mail clerk, 224. 

Olin, Iowa, Editor Burke appointed postmaster at 
142. 

Oliver, mayor of Lockport, N. Y., and Sickles, N. 
.Y. civil service commissioner, :J4. 

Olneyville, R. I., postmistress of, removed for polit¬ 
ical reasons, 288. 

Olsen, ward politician of Indianapolis, supports 
Fire-Chief Webster, 208. 

Omaha, Neb., Vandervoort, disreputable poli¬ 
tician. appointed mail superintendent at, 215, 
216; violations of law by postmaster of, 281. 

Omaha Republican (rep.), on curse of office-seek¬ 
ing, 65. 

Oneonta, N. Y., Postmaster Bundy of, removed on 
secret charges, 176. 

Onondaga Co.. N. Y., factional fights at, republican 
caucuses in, political activity of federal office¬ 
holders, 264, 265. 

Orcutt, F. E.. collector internal revenue, apolitical 
worker, 160, 162, 179. 

Oregon, “Sol” Hlrsch, the “'Tom Platt” of, 29; 
patronage of Sen. Mitchell in, 32. 

Oregon, Ill., Jewett appointed postmaster at, see 
Hitt, 109; Postmaster Marsh of, removed after 
four years’ service, second commission unex¬ 
pired, 187. 

Orlando, Fla., Delaney, postmaster at, removed 
on secret charges, I. Fletcher appointed, 17f’). 

Osage Mission, Kan., Postmaster Brunt of, remov¬ 
ed, after four years service, second commis¬ 
sion unexplred. Park appointed. 187,188. 

Osborn, S. C., federal employe, worker for Allison, 
:>34. 

Osborne. United States Minister, in Brazil and Jew¬ 
ett claims, 290. 

Osborne, Judge, grants writ of mandamus against 
Nathan, for corrupt practices, 265. 

Osborne, Congressman, obtains office for his son, 
84. 

Osborne, J. B., given office through influence of 
Congressman Osborne, 84. 

Oskaloosa, Kan., Journalist Roberts postmaster at, 
149. 

Osseo, Wis., Journalist Thomas, postmaster at, 
155. 

Ostendorf, J. H., deputy collector, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Oswego, N. Y., Editor Place, spoilsman, appointed 
postmaster at, 126; custom house at not classi- 
fid, number of employes in, 277; Clark, N. Y.- 
aesembly man introduces bill for municipal re- 
fsorm in, 415. 

Otis, E.L., applicant for postmastership at Roch¬ 
elle, Ill, 109. , ^ „ 

Otis, W. F., federal employe, congratulates Pres. 
Harrison, 347. 


Ottawa, Ill., Journalist Nottlnger appointed pos- 
master at, 126. 

Ottawa, Kan., Journalist Kessler postmaster at, 149. 

Overin, G. D., federal employe, political worker for 
Harrison, 334. 

Overstreet, H. G., and political assessments, see 
Kentucky. 

Ovid, Mich., Postmaster Cowan of, forced to re¬ 
sign, 165. 

Owen, Congressman, and office-seekers, 14; spoils¬ 
man, 21, 30, 85, 90; suggests postmasters, 55; op¬ 
poses appointment of Cravens, 84; recommends 
appointment of Tomlinson as postmaster at 
Logansport, Ind., 88; and WInamac, Ind., post¬ 
mastership, 88; secures appointment of ineffi¬ 
cient postmaster at Hammond, Ind., 90; and 
editor of Delphi Journal, 97; given patronage 
by Harrison, 240. 

Owen, W. D., superintendent immigration, 39; 
political worker, 382, 390. 

Owings, W., low politician and murderer, gets office 
through Gorman, 237. 

Oxford Co., Pa., applicants for postmaster of, 55. 

Oxford, Ind., Editor Carr appointed postmaster at, 
126, 377, 

Pacific Unitarian Conference, resolution of, that 
ministers should officially advocate civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 65. 

Paddock, Sen., and Lincoln, Neb., post-office, 72; 
attempt of to withdraw railway mail service 
from civil service law, 92; secures appointment 
of Editor Gere as postmaster at Lincoln, Neb., 
108. 

Page, E. F., chief of ordnance dept. In Brooklyn 
navy yard, removed, 855. 

Palnesville, 0., editor of Telegraph appointed post¬ 
master at, 301. 

Palermo, Italy, editor appointed consul at, 240. 

Palmer, as presidential possibility, 235. 

Palmer, public printer and applications for office, 37. 

Palmer, F. W., and pardon of Petroff and Kemble, 
152. 

Palo Pinto, Mo., Postmaster Trollington buys in¬ 
fluence of Upton and gets office, 55. 

Paoli, Ind., editor appointed postmaster at, 37. 
Paradis, J. F., journalist, postmaster at Hemingford, 
Neb., 149. 

Park, politician, appointed census enumerator 
through Congressman Evans, 294. 

Park. E. B., appointed postmaster at Osageilission, 
Kan., vice Blunt, removed after four years’ 
service, second commission unexpired, 187,188. 

Parker, Lieutenant, relative of Pres. Harrison, 
given office. 30. 

Parker, A. X., U. S. deputy atty., a political worker, 
279. 

Parker, J., politician, and post-office at Rochelle, 
Ill., 109. 

Parker, M. F.. postmaster at Cullman, Ala., delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Parkhurst, Rev. C. H., on purity in politics, 119; ex¬ 
poses immoralities of 'Tammany rule, 819. 

Parkinson, councilman of Indianapolis, supports 
Fire Chief Webster, 208. 

Parks, W. R., editor, appointed postmaster at Pet- 
ersburgh. Ill., 141. 

Parnell Hall, nominating caucus for city officers of 
Indianapolis, account of, 194, 195. 

Parr, Prof. S. S., part of address of at annual meet¬ 
ing of Indiana Civil Service Ref. Ass’n, 1889, 8. 

Parsons, U. S. marshal, works for Harrison at Min¬ 
neapolis. 345. 

Parsons, G. D., ex-mayor of Elmira. N. Y., dis¬ 
missed from U. S. Express Company for politi¬ 
cal reasons, 259. 

Parton James, on civil service reform, 18. 

Party, evils of strict adherence to, 236. 

Party and patronage, address, see Curtis. 

“Party Boss,” political advice of, 194. 

Passage, representative in Indiana legislature, 
spoilsman, 407. 

Pate, postmaster of Boonville, Ind., political work¬ 
er, 380. 

Patent office, investigation of civil service in by 
committee of National League. 139,140, 141; ex¬ 
aminations and classified positions in, 141. 

Patrick, J. B., journalist, postmaster at Clarion, 
Pa., 149. 

Patronage a source of weakness, see Foulke, Brook¬ 
lyn Ferries, 65,68; party and, addresses, see 
Curtis; troubling republican party, 6; evils of, 
25, 30,41; evils oil distribution of public. Sena¬ 
tor Harrison on, 46; Depew on, 75; Wilmington 
Morning News (rep.) on, 75; La Grange Stand¬ 
ard on,83; evils of, see Platt, Boston Transcript, 
Indianapolis News, St. Louis Globe-Democrat, 
Philadelphia North American, N. Y. Evening 
Post, Philadelphia American, 76; source of 
weakness to Cleveland and Harrison, 83; sys¬ 
tem denounced by republicans of Wayne Co., 
N.Y.,156: evil effeotsof on schools of Baltimore, 
211; condemned in state charitable Institutions 
as barbarous by Indianapolis Sentinel, 202; 
evils of, in England, 270; system condemned, 
271; system, in census service, bill of Garfield 
against, 291; system not according to organic 
law, 305; abuse of by Harrison, see National 
League, resolutions 1892, 321; and the constitu¬ 
tion, 828; use of by a president to secure a re- 
election impossible, see Indianapolis Journal, 
848. 

Patronage, federal, see also patronage, congres- 











XXVI 


INDEX. 


sional; see Towner; see Sewell; of patent 
oflice, 139, 140; of treasury department used 
by Foster to turn Ohio from Blaine to Harrison, 
240; meager distribution of to negroes, 248, 244; 
given to negro Langston, 340; used by Harrison 
to secure renomination, 298; of Indiana used 
by various people, 38, 84, 144,173, 297, 310, 317, 
370; of Maine, navy yard at Kittery, Me., used 
for Gooch and Frost, 147; of Missouri, see also 
Filley, 52; New York, given to Platt, 27,52, 60, 
08, 94, 121, 142, 173, 241. 255, 259, 203-200, 281, 282, 
288, 370, see also W. Barnes; see Birkett, 55, 
Woodruff, 100, Lake and McKane, 1.32; of New 
York custom-house, disposal of, 216; of navy 
yard at Mare Island given to ward bosses, 
220; of N. Carolina, 47, 150; of Ohio used by 
Sec’y Foster, 91; of Pennsylvania, that of Col¬ 
lector Cooper iu, see Cooper; of Pennsylvania, 
used by Harrison to secure renomination, 299, 
301; of Texas, given to Cuney, 173; Virginia, 
given to Mahone, 27, 81, 38, 41, 52,50, 67, 08,70, 
74, 94, 376. 

Patronage, state and local; in oflices at Indian¬ 
apolis, see Markey; in fire service, 187; to be 
controlled by mayor, 190; municipal at Cin¬ 
cinnati controlled by Gov. Foraker,71; quarrels 
over in legislature of New York, see Sheehan, 
De Freest, Webster, Murphy and McLaughlin, 
215; In New York state affairs, use of, 210; of 
Brooklyn, New York, bridge, quarrel over, see 
Croker, 215; in New York and Tammany, 318. 

Patronage, congressional, R. R. mail service open 
to, 27; see Cin. Commercial Gazette, 05; evil of, 
60; as practiced in U. S. Senate, 72; see report of 
committee of National League on, see also Gar¬ 
field, 113, 114, 115, 188; is doomed, 120; con¬ 
demned by resolutions of Maryland Civil Ser¬ 
vice Reform Association, 136; see letter of Wan- 
araaker to Postmaster Marsh, 187; see Indian 
service, 30, 42, 192, 219; in postal service, 
193; in census service, see also Porter, 
234 , 292; Allison, 334; Andrew, 405; Banks, 
31, 89; Bayne, 133, 135, 299; Beldeu, 40, 71, 
132; Bowden, 153; Bretz, 409-411, 419, 421, 422; 
Brookshire, 393, 405, 409-411, 413, 419; Brosius, 
72; in N. Carolina, BrOAver. 47; Brown, 240, 393, 
409-411, 419-422; advocated by Congressman 
Brown, 35, 84, 89, 118; Bynum, .392, 405, 409-411, 
418-422; Sen. D. Cameron, 72, 133,102, 329; Can¬ 
dler, 99, 224; in Cannelton, Ind.,post-office, 20; 
Canuon, 30, 31, 34, 35, 39, 100, 179 ; Chandler, 100, 
148, .340; Cheadle, 47. 55, 71, 77, 84, 85, 88. 89,129, 
149,240,377; Cheatham; in Chester Co., Pa., 55; 
Clarkson, 331; Cockrell, 234; Coggswell, 187, 
288; Coleman, 71; Conn, 409-411, 420, 422; Con¬ 
nell, 72,108; Cooper, 112, 39.S-400, 405, 409-411,416. 
422; Sen. Cnllom, 30,31,37,9-5,109,188: Dalzell, 30, 
87, 90, 112, 133, 299; Darlington, .54. 55; Sen. 
Davis, 84; Sen. Dawes, 71,104; De HavLUi, 187: 
Delano, 47; Du Bois, delegate from Idaho, 30; 
Dunnell,39; Eubanks, 99; Evans, 55, 294; of N. 
Carolina, see Ewart,* 17,159; Farwell, 31, 37.00, 
83,95, 109; Flood, 54, 150, 250; condemned, see 
Flower, 201; Fry. 242; Gest, 47; of W. Va., see 
Goff,71: Gorman,3,5,13,38,70,9:3,181.234,235,2:37; 
Greenhalge, 100; Grosvenor. 204,205; Sen. Hale, 
242; Hammond, 409, 411,410,417,422; Sen. Hamp¬ 
ton,74; nansbrough,216; Harmer,241; Harrison 
and Massachusetts offices, 9.3 ; Hart wig, 99; 
Hathaway, 242; Sen. Hawley, 84, 99; Sen. Hig¬ 
gins. :J8, 3:i4; Sen. Hiscock.40. 71,1:32,1.50,216,241, 
259, 312; Hitt, i:j0. 143, 160; Sen. Hoar, 71, 104; 
Holman, 39,393,:399, 400,409,411, 417. 419, 421, 422; 
Hopkins, 109; Houk, :15, 54, 55, 84; Illinois 
congressman, 240; Ingalls, 22. 151 ; John¬ 
son, 419; Kean, 210; Kellogg, 71, Kelly, 188; 
Lafayette Courier, 83: Lafollette, 293; Lodge, 
30 , 39 , 41, 69,71; Love, 99; Lowry, 39; Sen. Man- 
derson, 72,108; Martin, 399, 100, 109, 411, 419,420; 
in Massachusetts, 93; see Mathews,delegate from 
Dakota, 30; Matson,30, 31; McClellan, 422; Mc¬ 
Kenna, McNagney, 409, 411,422; McPherson, 81; 
Miller,'!'., .Minnesota,senators of. 30; in Misson- , 
ri, 51; Monaghan, 59; Moody, 84, 80, 218; Moore, 
100; Morse. 80.100, 108, 1,87; Norfolk, Va.. 2.51; | 
Osborne, 81; Owen, 14,21, .30, .55. .81, 85, .88, 90. 98, } 

• 240; Sen. Paddock, 72. 108; Paysou, 73, 188; 

Perkins,:55: Pettigrew, 131, 218; Sen. Plumb, | 
55; Pope, 52; Posey. 10, 59; Postgate, 99; 
Quackenbush, 32, 54, 242: tinay, 6, 15, 17. 22, 27, I 
28. 30, 38, 39. 47, 52, 50, 08. 72, 87, 90. 94, 95, 100, 104, i 
111, 112. 118, 13;!, 135, 151, 160, 17.3. 210, 235, 241, 249, j 
203, 270. 280, 282. 299-301. :329. :132.:374, .370; Raines; 
Randall, 2<i, ‘224 ; Ray, 99, lOO, 118, 133; Reed, T. j 
B., 91, 150, 1.53, 212; In Rhode Island, 150, Rock- , 
W'ell, 188; Roosevelt, 39, 194; Sanders, 100: San- j 
ford. 126; Sawyer. 57; Scranton, 101; Shearman, 
.54, 55; Sherman, 67, 149, 240, 249, :!01. ;!40: Shive- | 
ley, 421; Simmonds, 73; Smith, :iS; Smith G. W.; i 
Spooner, 30; Steele. 240; Stockbrldge, 84; Strou- | 
Die: Sweeney, 121; Taylor. :!5, 75, 419, 421;] 
Thompson. 55; Turner, lOO; 'furpie, 40.5, 409- 
411, 413, 418-422; Upton, 55, 99; Van Schaick, | 
44, 47, 55; Vaudervoort, 215; Vest, 242, Voor- , 
hees, 222, 235, 393, 405, 409-411, 413, -118-422; 
Walker; Wallace, 55, 72.132,142, 143; Sen.Wash¬ 
burn, 84; Watrous,71; Waugh, 419; Wever, 249; 
Wood, 1.^. , 

Patterson, postmaster of Memphis. Tenn., celebrates 
nomination of Harrison, 347. 

Patterson, A. M., political worker for Miller, 259, 
200 . 

Patterson, J. B.. federal office-holder iu Boone Co., 
Iowa, political worker, 200. 1 


Patterson, J. M., ward politician, see New York 
City; requests patronage, 311, 312; office-seeker, 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344, 348; 
political worker for Harrison, 389,360. 

Patterson, W., appointed superintendent of Indpls 
post-office, unfit, 19, 21,27, 34; political worker 
for Harrison, 302, 337-343, 353, 370. 375, 379, '6s9. 

Pattison, candidate for governor opposing Delama- 
ter in Pennsylvania, 135, 101; of Pensylvanla, 
and Quay, 280. 

Pattison, governor of Nebraska, and Vaudervoort, 
disreputable politician, 216. 

Patton, president of Princeton College, and poli¬ 
tics, 396, 404. 

Patton, C. O., Harrison elector, and postmastership 
at Stanberry, Mo., 121. 

Paul, postmaster at Milwaukee, spoilsman, civil 
service commission reports adversely to, :!0, 
104; and IVanamaker, 44 ; resigns, 47; spoils¬ 
man, removes Shidy who testifies against him, 
101,108. 

Paul, H. S., and appointment of McKean postmas¬ 
ter of Pittsburgh, 91. 

Paul, R. H., ballot stuffer, appointed U. S. marshal 
in Arizona. 374. 

Pawnee City, Neb., Journalist Hassler postmaster 
at, 149. 

Paxton, Ill., Editor Stevens appointed postmaster 
at, 12(). 

Payn, L. F., 312; supporter of Blaine, opposed to 
Harrison, :147; worker for Platt, :iti0. 

Payson, Congressman, spoilsman, 22, 73; demands 
removal of Reno, postmaster of Pontiac, Ill., 
for “offensive partisanship,” 188; chairman of 
house during debate over civil service commis¬ 
sion, 204, 205. 

Peairs, H. B., employe in Indian service, asked for 
political contributions, 385. 

Pearson, H. G., postmaster at New York and the 
post-office, 12, 17, 20, 32, 38. 43, 108,109, memorial 
on, 23; removed by Pres. Harrison for political 
reasons, 27, flO, 52. 03 04. 68, 94, 173, 237, 282, :i07, 
376; the civil service in post-ottice of, under, 42. 

Peddie, A., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

Peele, S. J., worker for Harrifon, appointed judge 
of court of claims. 378. 379. 

Peetrey, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons, 55. 

Pendleton, G.H.. civ. service law due to him and 
D. B. Eaton, 79. 82, 125. 

Pendleton, Ind., Editor Caddy appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 120, 377. 

Pendleton act (civil service law), 75,118, 119,128, 
271. 276; provides penalties forpublic employes 
soliciting political contributions, 279. 

Pennsylvania, senators of, and spoils, 15, 313, 314, 
329; patronage of, given by Pres. Harrison to 
Senator Quay, 27, ‘28, 38, 52, 50, 68, 72, 87, !t0, 91, 95, 
111, 112, 135, 173, 370; Senator tjuay displaces 
Sen. Cameron as spoils distributer, 30; Sen. 
Cameron controlled patronage in. :!4; distrac¬ 
tions in, resulting from distribution of spoils, 
influence of Senators (juay and Cameron, 17; 
republican ass’u of, see Stratton. 49; republicans 
of denounce civ. service reform asasham, r.2; 
status of affairs before election, 13 n; condemna¬ 
tion of Quay and Delamater by Lincoln repub¬ 
lican committee of Pennsylvania,150 ;republican 
convention 1890 commends course of Quay, 150; 
political situation in, revolt against Quay. see. 
also. Quay, 101. 162; defeat of Quay in elections 
of 1890, 17.3; ballot reform bill in legislature of 
ruined t)vQuav,aided bv Martin, federal officer, 
228. 229; “Quayism” in, 245, 240, 2-19, 2.50, 251, 252; 
address to the citizens of, against “Quayism," 
249,251,252; federal officers eulogize Quay, 200; 
Quay wins in. 281; political assessments in, 2.S2, 
286; patronagetogivento Quay; ‘degradation of 
pollticsin,” see Welsh.2.'<2; removals from office 
in of supporters of Quay, 2ii9. 300.301; delegation 
to national convention controlled by tjuay; 
Baialsley frauds, 310; political corruption in, 
:-!23. 324; patronage of given to Quay, deserts 
Harrison, 332: vote of at Minneapolis, 340; 1). 
Martin of, made member of republican national 
committee for, 317: political activity of federal 
oftice-holders in, ;!01, :!()3,390; Cooper, collector at 
Philadelnhia.toraisecampaign fundsin,363; citi¬ 
zens of protest against appointment of Martin. 
:!74; re-election of tjuay iu, 404. 

Pennsylvania Civil Service Reform Association of, 
introduces reform bill in legislature, faulty 
provisioqs of, 204; correspondence of regarding 
political assessments. 289; of annual meeting, 
1891, address of II. Welsh before on Indian serv¬ 
ice, 238, 239. 

Pennsylvania R. R. Co. employs merit system, 285. 

Pension Commissioner, Tanner, 27. 38, 51: Browne 
and clerks iu the service, 71; Raum and Harri¬ 
son, 2;i7. 

Pension boards, removed by Tanner, 27. 

Pension office at Indianapolis, attempt to collect 
money of employes in contrary to law, :!0; ex¬ 
amining boards, 30. 

Pension Examiner Stone removed, negro Dr. El¬ 
bert appointed, 192. 

Pension bureau, removals in, 55; bill providing for 
appointment of new examiners for, 107; remov¬ 
als in under Commissioner Tanner, 54. 

Peoria, Ill., census of 1890 well conducted in, 292. 

Percival, J. A., federal employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Perkins, congressman, opposed to civil service re¬ 


form, 35, 49, 122; letter of to Brunt, postmaster, 
regarding removal, 188. 

Perkins, E. E., negro, postmaster at Edwards, 
Miss., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Perkins, H. A., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Olathe, Kan., 126. 

Peru. Ind., Stevens, postmaster of, political worker, 
379. 

Petersburgh, Ill., Editor Parks appointed post¬ 
master at, 141. 

Petersburgh, Neb., Journalist Cross postmaster at, 
149. 

Petersburg. Virginia, political history of, 87. 

Peterson, O. B., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Story City, Iowa, 142. 

Petroff. E.. worker for Quay, 106; convicted of bri- 
-bery, shielded by Quay, 151,152. 

Pettigrew, Senator, and Indian service, 130; Sena¬ 
tor Pettigrew opposes Indian Agent McChes- 
ney, 131; controls patronage in Indian service, 
218; and Harrison, :537; opposed to Harrison, 
342. 

Petty. W., Blaine supporter, bribed by Harrison 
with office, 362. 

Pew, collector at Gloucester, Mass., and subordi¬ 
nates, political workers, 362. 


Philadelphia. Pa., post-office at, 14,15; conflict over 
spoils in, :!0; Collector Cooper of and Quay, :19; 
and spoilsman. 85; and office-seekers, 37; de¬ 
fends Quay,‘249, 260; works for Quay, 280; pat¬ 
ronage in, 47; removals in post-office at, 53; civ. 
service reform in post-office at, 95; recordership 
of and Quay, 100; Investigation of post-office at, 
174; per cent, of removals in classified and un¬ 
classified service In post office at. 185; citizens’ 
municipal league, appointment of Martin, dis¬ 
reputable politician, as Internal revenue col¬ 
lector, low politicians of, 232; Thompson, con¬ 
troller at, makes removals for political reasons, 
2.39; young republican club of, speech before 
by Cooper, collector at, defends Quay. 241; Asst. 
Postmaster Hughes of, political worker for 
Quay. 270,280; customs district of. classified 1883, 
270; Field, postmaster at. :!00; Witherow’s res¬ 
ignation, 310; post-office at, a scandal under 
Cleveland, ;350; combination of low politicians 
of both parties against reformers at, 352. 


Philadelphia, Civil .Service Reform Ass’u of, memo¬ 
rial of, on railway mail service. 92. 

Philadelphia American [repnb.], attributes repub¬ 
lican defeat of 1889 to spoils system, 70. 

Philadelphia Bulletin [repub.], favorscivil service 
reform, 70; condemns Platt, 2i;o. 

Philadelphia North American [repub.], on Quay, 
270. 


Philadelphia Press [repub.], removals of Clarkson 
obeying a “wholesome policy of reform,” 49; 
republican party thoroughly committed to civ. 
service reform, 65; favors civ. service reform, 
92. 

Philadelphia Public Ledger [repub.], on Quay, 270. 

Philadelphia Record (rep.), on civil servicereform, 
92. 


Phillippi. W. Va., Journalist Hall, postmaster at 
155. 

Phipps, W. C., efficient employe in Indianapolis 
city service removed for political reasons, 297. 

Phu-nix, N. Y., Journalist IVilliams postmaster at 
155. 

Pickering, J. E., postmaster at Alta, Iowa, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 200. 

Pierce, Captain, appointed Indian agent at Pine 
Ridge vice Roger removed, 192. 


Pierce, A. G., negro, deputy collector internal reve¬ 
nue, delegate to Minneapolis convention. 344 
348. 

Pierce, President, spoils system under, 405. 

Pierce, Neb., Journalist Sharab postmaster at. 149. 

Pierre, S. Dak., physician of Indian agency at 
Greenwood, S.Dsk., engages in political work 
at, shirking duty, 202. 

Pilgrim,-, federal office-holder, political worker 

102 . 

Pilot, on Quay, Dudley, Wanamaker, and decent 
politics, 257. 

Pine Ridge, S. Dak., Roger, a political worker ap¬ 
pointed Indian agent at, 192; causes of Indian 
trouble at, 217,218. 

Piper, postmaster at Manchester, N. H., active po¬ 
litician, 143. 

Piper, F. T., editor, appointed postmaster at Shel¬ 
don, Iowa, 142. 

Pitkin, U. S, minister to Argentina, political work¬ 
er, :!82. 

Pitrodie, S. Dak., Journalist Cheny, postmaster of, 
155. 

Pittsburg, Pa., post office at, controversy between 
Congressman Dalzell and Sen. Quay over, 87, 
112; McKean appointed postmaster at through 
influence of Sen. Quay, 90; surveyorship of cus¬ 
toms at, candidate of Quay appointed, 112; Post¬ 
master McKean of. spoilsman, 133; per cent, of 
removals in classified and unclassified service 
iu post office at, 185; (Ass't) Postmaster Ed¬ 
wards of. supporter of Quay, suspected by Har¬ 
rison. 299. 

Pittsburg Dispatch (repub.), patronage an evil, 75; 
on “Chinese civ. service,” 92. 

Place, J. A., editor, spoilsman, appointed postmas¬ 
ter at Oswego, N. Y., P20. 

Plain City, O., Journalist Horn postmaster at, 149. 

Plainfield, Ind., postmaster at, appointed through 
influence of Congressman Matson, :;0; Hatton 








1 N I) E X . 


XXV] 1 


supported by Congressman Cooper for postmas- ' 
ter of, 39'J. 

Plainfield, N. Y., Postmaster Pope of favors reform 
methods, but appoints his son ass’t postmaster, 
157. 

Plainvlew, Miss., Meacham, journalist, appointed 
postmaster at, 126. 

Plainvlew, Neb., Journalist Stevens, postmaster at, 
149. I 

Platforms, national, see also Conventions; of dif¬ 
ferent parties support civil service reform, 229. 

Platforms, republican; national, 1X72, 1876, 1880, 
1884, 1888, 1892, favor civ. serv. Ref., 9, 27, 50, 73, 
275, 291, 337. 

Platform, democratic; national, 1888,1892, on civil 
serv. ref., 349,365. 

Platforms, state, see also Conventions; republican ; 
1884,1887, favor civil serv. ref., 122; California, 

1884, demands civ. service reform, 50; Connect¬ 
icut, 1872,1874, advocates civil serv. reform, 50; 
Delaware, 1882, advocates civil serv. reform, .50: 
Georgia, 1871, advocates civ. service reform, 50; 
Illinois, 1872, 1882, 1890, advocate civ. serv. re¬ 
form, 50, 156; Indiana, 1876,1886, 1890, favors civ. 
service ref., 50, 51, 156; Iowa, 1874, 1884, advo¬ 
cates civ. ser. ref., 50, i6; Maryland, 1871, ad¬ 
vocates civ. serv. ref., 50; Massachusetts, 1877, 

1885, 1890, advocates civ. serv. ref., 50, 51, 180; 
Minnesota, 1872, 1884, advocates civ. serv. ref., 
50; Missouri, 1872, advocates civ. serv. ref., 60; 
New Hampshire, 1872,advocates civil serv. ref., 
50; New Jersey, 1871,1872, advocates civ. serv. re 
form, 50; New York, 1872, 1877, 1885, 1887, 1891, 
advocate civ. serv. ref., 50, 51, 288; Ohio, 1871, 
1877,1886, on civil serv. ref.,50,51; Peunsylvani.a 
1882,1883, 1884,1885, 1887, 1888, advocate civ. ser. 
ref., 51; West Virginia, 1872, advocates civ. serv. 
ref., 50. 

Platform, democratic, Delaware, 1890, silentregard- 
ing civ. serv. ref., 145; Indiana, 1890, 1892, de¬ 
nounces Harrison’s administration of the civil 
service, 156,349; Massachusetts, 1890,1891, on civ. 
serv. reform and Harrison’s abuse of it. 180,288; 
Michigan, 1890, on abandonment of civ. serv. 
ref. by republicans, 180; New Hampshire, 1890, 
denouncesHarrisou’s administration of the civil 
service, 150; Ohio, 1891, silent on subject of civil 
ser.ref.,288; Pennsylvania, 1890,1891, denounces 
tiuay and republican party for abuse of the civ. 
service, 156, 288; Wisconsin, 1890, denounces 
Harrison’s administration of the civ. service, 
156. 

Plait, deputy collector in Indiana, at Minneapolis 
convention, :i!80. 

Platt, senator, compels postmasters in Connecticut 
to give list of voters. 330. 

Platt, F., gets office through his father, 255; and 
Fassett, 258; and proposed prosecution of Van 
Cott, and Hendricks, 287. 

Platt, J. I., editor and postmaster at Poughkeepsie, 
N.Y., in N. Y. convention, 335; inefficient, re¬ 
moves Deputy S. Smith, 386. 

Platt, T. C., ex-senator in New York on civil serv. 
ref., 18; politici-ins like,‘22; patronage of New 

ir _K,. Muvrionn 07 .SO .Sfi KS lU 


373,374,387,388,405; names postmaster foi’Elmira, 
N.Y., 53; and postmastership at.Oswego, N. Y., 
71; and Hiscocit, Seu , and Syracuse post-oflScc, 
71; attributes defeat of 1889 partly to disappoint- 
mentof office-seekers,76,77; arranges forcensus 
appointments in New York. 121; and Harrison, 
121; candidate for U 8. senator, 143; faction of, 
‘ and its opposition, 183; and Police Justice Smith, 
see New York Citv, 198,199; recommends ap¬ 
pointment of Wheeler, ‘241; gives dinner to 
Clarkson. 245; controls patronage of custom 
house in New York city, gets office for 
his son, 2-55, 256; “freezes out” Erhardt, col¬ 
lector at New York city, 258. ‘259, ‘260, 3.50; 
inspires issuing of call for political contribu¬ 
tions. 279; defended,-281; and Fassett campaign, 
287,288; and removal of Flood, postmaster at 
Elmira, N. Y., ‘297. 303; endorses Payne, 312; 
deserts Harrison, 332; supporters of removed, 
3.32, 334; and re-nomination of Harrison, 334, 3.3.), 
3i‘(6; given patronage, criticises Harrison,337, 
.339 , 3-il, :U4, :’.40, 347; “placated,” 353, 354, .357, 
.359. 360, 361, .362; secures removal of Burt, naval 
officer at New York, :!t'>8; and confers with Reid 
and Harrison. 371. 

Plattsburgh, N. Y., Journalist Lansing postmaster 
at, 155. , .£. j 

Plattsburg, Vt., custom-house at not classified, 
number of employes in, 277. 

Playford, R. S., journalist, postmaster at Carbon- 
dale, Kan., 148. 

Pledger, W. A., negro, railway mail employe, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Plumb, Sen., and changes in post offices in Kan., 
55; on tariff. 16)9: spoilsman, andcensusbureau, 
203‘ allied with Gorman, 214,228; attacks civil 
service commission, 250, 251; custom employe, 
see investigation, 327. 

Plunkitt, state senator of New \ork, bill of for 

race course in Central Park, 320. . . , _ , 

Plymouth, Ind., Editor Siders appointed post¬ 
master at, 126,377. , 

Plymouth, Mass, Postmaster Burns of, to be re- 
^ moved for political reasons, applicants for po¬ 
sition favored by E. A. Morse, 187. 

Political activity of federal office-holders, see Har¬ 
rison, W. H., also names of states, 336, .3(0. 


Political assessments, see Curry, also names of 
slates, 153. 

Political corruption in Maryland, Bonaparte on, 
817, 324. 

“Political ingratitude,” see Indianapolis Journal, 
181,182. 

Politics, divorce of municipal business from, by M. 
Storey, 261, ‘283, ‘286. 

Polk, Pres., for revenue tariff, 214, ‘244. 

Pontiac, Ill., removal of Reno, postmaster of, de¬ 
manded by Congressman Payson, for “offensive 
partisanship,” 188. 

Poormnn,C. L., editor, given federal office, 301. 

Pope, actor, recites Sheridan’s Ride at Chicago 
convention, appointed consul to Toronto, 56. 

Pope, E. R., postmaster at Plainfield, N. Y., favors 
reform methods, but appoints his son assistant 
postmaster, 157. 

Pope, Gen. J., advocates congressional appoint¬ 
ment of federal office holders,52. 

Port Clinton. O., Editor Martin postmaster at, 301. 

Port Huron, Mich., Collector. Geer of, spoilsman, 
asks for special examination, denied, :16; cus¬ 
toms district of classified, 1883, 276. 

Port Townsend, relative of Pres. Harrison appointed 
deputy collector of customs at, 30, 369; custom¬ 
house at not classified, number of employes in, 
‘277. 

Porter, A. G., spoken for mi.ssion to Rome, 7, 14. 85; 
worker for Harrison, 377; U. S. minister to 
Rome resigns to do political work, :182. 

Porter, D. E., sells offices, 104. 

Porter, O. T., editor, given office, 39. 

Porter, R P., editor, census supt., and Roosevelt, 
see Civil Service Reformer; appointed, 14; civil 
serv. law, 19; gives patronage to Senators Quay 
and Cameron. 72; gives Shidy office at request 
of Roosevelt, 101,103; spoilsman, 104; and cen¬ 
sus service in New York, 121; overrun with 
office-seekers, 88,131; Congressman Dalzell,133; 
permits spoils methods in census service, 
157; and Foulke, 173; defends appointments, 182; 
claims held examinations for clerks, 190; exami¬ 
nation papers used in census services by ,‘219,2‘20; 
office under given to Weigel, worker for Bos- 
Filley, ‘226; fears investigation of census bu¬ 
reau, ‘233,334; at convention republican league, 
259; opposition of to civil service reform, ‘292, 
294. 

Porter Co., Ind., Vidette [repub.], on “Farwell 
Club,” 83. 

Portland, Ind., Lowry, postmaster at, removed. Ed¬ 
itor Marsh appointed through influence of 
Browne, 88,116,1‘26; political worker, 377, 380. 

Portland, Me,, changes In offices In, 22; Briggs, 
politician, appointed postmaster at, 150; em¬ 
ployes in exceed requirements, see Reed, 242; 
customs district of classified in 1883, employes 
in, ‘276i, 277. 

Portland, Oregon, custom-house at not classified, 
number of employes in, ‘277. 

Portsmouth, N. H., navy yard at, see also Kittery, 
Me.; work on war ships, in navy yard at, for 
political reasons, 217; merit system introduced 
in navy yard at by Tracy, ‘251. 

Posey, Congressman, and office-seekers, 14; secures 
appointment of henchman in place of Isabella 
De La Hunt, 26; obtains appointment of worker 
as ostmaster at Evansville, Ind., 46; uses in¬ 
fluence for appointment of Throop, collector at 
Terre Haute, Ind., .59. 

Postal divisions, superintendents of, proposal of 
Congressman Andrew to extend civil service 
law to, 306. 

Postmaster, editors and publishers appointed; 
cases and lists of, .30, 37, 46, 71, 108, 126, 132, 141, 
142, 118, 149, 155, 186, ‘26)0. 301, 302, 316, 377; scram¬ 
bles for places of, 47. 72, 84. 88, 89, 109, 121, 216; 
recommended for re-appointment, S8. 91, 100; 
wanton removals, cases and lists of, ‘29 , 39 , 45, 
47, 54, 55, 71, 90. 91, 101, 11‘2, 118, 149, 165, 176, 186, 
187, 282, 2,S8, 362, 377, 386, 408; remova ls on secret 
charges, cases and lists of, 39, 175,176,177; ieuda- 
listic appointments, 108, 134, 135, i:56, 143,144,1.50, 
153, 158. 1.59, 160.162,186,187, ‘241, ‘249, 340; heneh- 
mau, service of, cases and lists of cases of, 134, 



47. 54, 55. 90; special cases at Syracuse, N. Y.; El¬ 
mira, N. Y.: Terre Haute, Ind.; Valparaiso, 
Ind.; South Bend, Ind.; Muncie, Ind.; New Al¬ 
bany, Ind.; Indianapolis, New York, Baltimore, 
St. Louis, Boston, Philadelphia, Milwaukee, Ft. 
Wayne, Ind.; Pittsburgh. Augusta. Me.; La Fa¬ 
yette, Ind.; see same; removed and appointed 
by Brosius at Mav, Huber, Burke, Chestnut 
Level, New Holland, Lancaster, Columbia, 
51annheim. Marietta, Strasburg, Litltz, Eu- 
phrata, Mt. Joy, 72; Judsou, of Prattsville, 
N. Y., insane through fear of loss of office, 415; 
at Mt. Vernon, Ind., and Sen. Harrison, 96; 
Childs, of Brattleboro, Vt.. caucus on question 
of reappointment of, 108; Harrington, at Mon- 
son, Mass., reappointment of recommended, re¬ 
fused by Wanamaker, 188; at Newton, Mass., 
democrat Morgan reappointed, ‘2‘24; at Sand¬ 
wich (Mass.), democrat Shevlin reappointed, 
224; at Washington. D. C., Sherwood promoted 
to be, 153 ;Warner, Albany, N. Y., favors civ. serv. 
reform, 51, enforces law, 136; Sperry, at New 
Haven, Conn., favors civ. service reform, 91: 
Ketcham, of Ditney, Ind.. solicited for political 


contributions, 387, 392; of Ogden, Ind., distrib¬ 
utes campaign documents, 390; Terry, of Terry- 
ville, N. Y., removed lor reiusing to pay po¬ 
litical assessments, 391; and P. O. employes in 
Buffalo. N. Y., pay political assessments, 391; 
Gates, of Waterton, N. Y., furnishes political in¬ 
formation, 392; Smith, of Laurel, Del., attempts 
bribery, 397, 401, 402; Daniels, ol Wiihey, Mich., 
poll of voters asked ol,383; Eaton, of New Or¬ 
leans, pays political assessments, 383; at Oma¬ 
ha, Neb., under Cleveland and Harrison, vio¬ 
lates law, 281; at Moberly, Mo., uses census 
enumerators as political workers, 131; Crum, 
negro, nominated for, at Charleston, S. C., for 
vote at ilinneapolis, not confirmed, :J63; Mill- 
ken, of Waiervilie, Me., and non delivery of pa¬ 
pers advocating Burleigh, congressional candi¬ 
date opposing Manley, 364; Isabella De LaHunt, 
at Cannelion, Ind.; appointed upon recom¬ 
mendation of Sen. Harrison, by Pres. Arthur, 
removed hy Cleveland, Pres. Harrison refuses 
to reappoint, 368; of Madison, Wis., controls 
places in census service, 293; Bennett, of Hart, 
for(J, Conn., removal of liario, efficient P. O. in¬ 
spector,‘298; Sperry, of New Haven, testifies to 
worth of Bario, removed P. O. inspector, ‘298; 
Gilleland, of Allegheny, Pa., supporter of Quay, 
suspected by Harrison, ‘299; at Bradford, Pa., 
Flennicken appointed, but removed on protest 
of H. C. Frick, 99; Hendrix, of Brooklyn, N. Y., 
removed and place offered to politician, 131; 
Pope, at Plainfield, N. Y., favors reform meth¬ 
ods, but appoints his son ass’t postmaster, 157; 
Zumstein, of Cincinnati, O., carries out spirit 
of civil service law,‘257; Richensteen at L. I. 
City, letter to, advocating reform methods, 100; 
Wooster, of Fostoria, 0., compelled by Washing¬ 
ton authorities to turn over office to spoils, 91; 
at Richmond, Ind., the “party,” 183; at Mt.Ver¬ 
non, Ind., son of Gov. Hovey appointed, 71; at 
Austin, Texas, chairman republican state com¬ 
mittee appointed, 71; at Hamilton, Mo., N. C. 
Clarkson appointed, 150; at Kansas City ap¬ 
points relative of Pres. Harrison his deputy, 84; 
Rice, of Springfield, Mass., case of, 87; at South 
Hadley Falls, Mass., democrat Kirkpatrick 
nominated, see Wallace and Harrison, 157; Van 
Duzer, of Horseheads, N. Y., attempted remov¬ 
al of by Fassett, 831; Van Duzer, of Horseheads, 
N. Y., and removal of Flood, 304; Dunn, of 
Binghamton, N. Y., and removal of pension ex¬ 
aminer Dr. Van Alstyne, 304; at Wyoming, Ill., 
removed because appointed through “political 
intrigue,” Hammond appointed, 176; Reno, of 
Pontiac, Ill., removal of demanded by Congress¬ 
man Payson, for “offensive partisanship,” 1.88; 
Smith, of Carrollton, Ill., removed through in¬ 
fluence of Senator Cullom, 188; at Laurel, Md., 
democrat appointed to please Gorman, 38; at 
Poughkeepsie, N. Y., Editor Platt appointed, 
inefficient, removes deputy S. Smith, 386; Hath¬ 
away, of house of representatives, spoilsman, 
methods of, 242; Sefrits buys appointment as, at 
Washington, Ind., 121; at Mitchell, Ind., Wood 
purchases position is appointed, 89; at Wina- 
mac, Ind., applicants for position of, bargain¬ 
ing for, 88; at Palo Pinto, Mo., buys office, see 
also Trollington and Upton, 55. 

Postmaster-general, see Wanamaker. 

Postmaster-general, first assistant, see Clarkson. 

Postmasters, arbitrary removals of, see resolutions 
of National League, 1890; regulation of, ap¬ 
pointment of advocated, 100; many democratic 
ordered out, 16; presidential, many removals 
and appointments of, 27, 29; fourth-class, ap¬ 
pointed through influence of Sen. Cullom, 30; 
number of appointed in Indiana from March 
4th to July ‘20 inclusive, 1X89, :44; editors ap¬ 
pointed, 37; removals of fourth-class, 39, 62; 
comparison of changes of for first five months 
of Pres. Harrison and Cleveland’s terms, 45; 
15,000 removed by Postmaster Gen’l Clarkson 
up to Sept., 1889,49; removals of, for political 
reasons, 54,1x6; appointed through influence of 
Congressman Owen and Sen. Plumb, 55; fourth- 
class in Indiana, see Michener, 67; meeting of 
in Washington. 69; removal of 30.000 fourth-class 
without cause. 70; fourth-class, objections to 
removal of, see Simond, 91; removalsof fourth- 
class in Washington Co.. Ind., 91; forced resig¬ 
nations of. Ill; bill of H. C. Lodge, M. C., re¬ 
garding appointments of fourth-class, 115, 238; 
removals up to May. 1890, 120; of fourth-class 
and Cleveland, 1‘24; fourth-class in Missouri, 
control of given to Filley, 132; become political 
workers, 160; removalsof upon secret charges 
investigations of by committee of National 
League, 175, 176, 177 ; presidential, number 
of who are political workers, 186; Cleve¬ 
land makes clean sweep. 187; forth class, bill of 
Lodge for select ion of on basisof merit,238.fourth- 
clasH, allowed to work politically for Harrison, 
240; in Indiana,workers for Harrison ,‘260; fourth- 
class, removal of under Clarkson. 261; sons 
of. political workers for Hiscock, 265; fourth- 
class, bill to regulate appointment of. opposed 
by Wanamaker, 29x; in Indiana, work for Har¬ 
rison, 302; paper on appointment of, by Wood, 
before annual meeting. National League, 1892, 
;!29; asked for list of voters by American Pro¬ 
tective League..330; in New York,asked for llstsof 
republicans, 370; in Michigan, asked for lists of 
voters. .375; in DeKalb Co.. Ind., political work¬ 
ers, 380; assessment of by American Protective 









xxviii 


Tariff League, 382; Allegheny Co., association 
of,leviespolitical assessments,384; fourth-class, 
bill of Congressman Andrew to regulate ap¬ 
pointments of, recommended by civil service 
commission, 359,388,397; in Jefferson Co., N. Y., 
political assessments levied against, 391; appli 
cants for positions as, supported by Congress¬ 
man Cooper, 398, 399. 

Post-office at Indianapolis, Baltimore, St. I,ouis, 
Milwaukee, N. Y. City, Pittsburgh, Philadel¬ 
phia, Syracuse, N. Y.; at Norwich, Conn., re¬ 
moval of, place given to spoilsmen, see Nor¬ 
wich (Conn.): at Troy, N. Y., and Indianapolis, 
investigate by civ. service commission, 36; 
at Vincennes, Ind. (see Chambers), 37; at Can- 
nelton, Ind., see Clarkson, and 54; at Warsaw, 
Mo., sold by Upton, see Upton, 55; at Columbus, 
O., applicants for and Sen. Sherman, 67; at 
Lincoln, Neb., controlled by Connell, appli¬ 
cants for postmastership, 72; per cent, of re¬ 
movals in classified and unclassified service in, 
atNew Haven, Conn., 185; at Jersey City,N. J., 
185; at Kansas City, Mo., 185; at Denver, Colo., 
185; at Chicago, 185; at Albany, N. Y., 185; at 
Cincinnati, merit system in, 257'; atLockport, N. 
Y,, controlled by Hiscock, 259; at Cincinnati, 
O., merit system in, 358; at St. Joseph, Mo., 

F olitical assessments in, 383; at Lafayette, 
nd., employes in distribute campaign docu¬ 
ments, 389. 

Post-office department, Wanamaker establishes 
board of promotion by competltiveexaminatlon 
in, 256, 257. 

Post-offices, fourth-class changes in, see Delano, 47; 
applicants for in Chester Co., Pa., see Chester 
Co., 55; changes in, by Pres. Harrison in Kan., 
55; taking the fourth-class out of politics, plan 
of R. H. Dana for, 68, 74; presidential, report 
on, by committee of National League, 162, 163, 
164, 165,166; presidential, turned over to spoils, 
211; given to editors by Harrison, 240; see also 
press; having less than 50 employes, 277; infor¬ 
mation regarding, refused to Rogers by P. O. 
department, 297; of 25 employes, proposal to 
classify by Andrew, 305; all free delivery class¬ 
ified by Harrison, beads of divisions in should 
be classified, 403; Roosevelt on benefits of class¬ 
ification of free delivery, 415. 

Post-office department, number of classified em¬ 
ployes in total service of, 193; relative of Harri¬ 
son appointed law clerk in, 369; examinations 
for applicants for position in service of, 396. 
Post-office employe does detective work for Harri¬ 
son at Minneapolis convention, 346. 

Potter, worker for Internal Revenue Collector Hill 
in Maryland convention, 335. 

Potter, Bishop, and civ. serv. ref., 28, 80; and at¬ 
tempt to purify politics in New York City, 130; 
address of on political dangers, 1890,145. 

Potter, J., editor, appointed postmaster at Davis, 
Ill., 141. 

Potts, W., at Baltimore conference, 1889, 2, 42,44; 
refused access to records of removals in postal 
service, 163; on committee of publication of 
Good Government, 3-57. 

Poughkeepsie. N. Y., Editor Platt postmaster of, 
in New York convention, 3.35; inefficient, re¬ 
moves Deputy S. Smith, 386. 

Pousland, federal employe, political worker at 
Boston, 334. 

Powers, H. C., collector internal revenue, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 344, 348; levies po¬ 
litical assessments, 384. 

Powers. J., naval officer at Philadelphia, worker 
for Harrison, 300. 

Pratt, D. W., postmaster at Farmington, Me., re¬ 
moved on secret charges, 175. 

Pratt, E. W., asst, appraiser at N. Y. City, pays po¬ 
litical assessments, 279. 

Prattsville, N. Y., Judson postmaster of, insane 
through fear of loss of office, 415. 

Prentice, Counselor, removed from N. Y. City 
health dept.. 356. 

Present Status of Civil Service Reform, by Rev.H. 

Lambert, criticised, 255. 

Presidency, Hill sells, 307. 

President, appointing power of. 6; duties of, in re¬ 
gard to the civil service, under the constitution, 
271. 

Press, and civ. service reform, 83; [repub.] on civ. 
service reform, 92 

Press, bribery of. Pres. W. H. Harrison on, 17; see 
King, A. Allison, Habercorn. Beyerle, Reed, 
Stone, White, Douglass, Rice, Hicks, New, Rob¬ 
erts, Junkin. Halstead, Clarkson. Porter R. P.; 
under Cleveland, see Plainfield, Ind., 30,81,149, 
,366,368,369; by Quay in Pennsylvania. 151; in 
Indiana, 240, 378; under President Harrison, 
30, 31, 36, 39, 46, 47, 56, 67, 80, 85. 88 . 90. 94, 97, 
100, 121, 126, 132. 141, 142, 148, 149. 1-50, 151, 1.53, 
154,155, 186, 187. 240. 249, 260, 266, 299, 301, 302, 316, 
368,369,377,386; Editor Porter given office, 39; 
see Rahway, N. Jersey, Smyth, Watrous, Law- 
she. Smith, 71; see speech of Harrison, Sen., 81; 
condemned by Daniel Webster, 81; see Dunlap, 
Gardner, Forbes, Whitney, Challis, Kinney, 84. 
Prlckett, J. P., editor, appointed postmaster at Al¬ 
bion, Ind., 126, 377. 

Pride, chief clerk under Cunningham in assay of¬ 
fice at Boise City, Idaho, politician, 30. 

Princess Anne, Md., Duer, postmaster, of, removed 
for political reasons, Lankford appointed, 408. 
Princeton, Ind., Tichner, postmaster of political 
worker, 310, 378. 


INDEX. 


Princeton, N. J., Theo. Seminary professors in,and 
civil service reform, 40. 

Princeton, Wis., Journalist Bebee postmaster at, 
155. 

Princeville, Ill., Editor Barnum appointed post¬ 
master at, 141. 

Printing and engraving, bureau of, status of re¬ 
form in, 32; employes in, political workers, 179; 
dismissals in for lack of appropriation, 234; 
Gorman secures place in for low politician, 237; 
bureau of, under Cleveland and Harrison, 368. 

Pritchard, J. C., 159; Harrison delegate from N. 
Carolina, 334. 

Pritchett, R. M., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Dana, Ill., 141. 

Proctor, N., discharged by Sec’y Whitney from 
navy yard at Norfolk, Va , 147. 

Proctor, R., Sec’y, 242; Senator, 362. 

Professions, the, and civil service reform, see 
Roosevelt, dinner to at Indianapolis, 227, 229. 

Promises, of democratic party, 397,398. 

Promotion, of Thompson, asst, postmaster at In¬ 
dianapolis, to be postmaster, and consequent 
promotions, 235; by voluntary competition, in¬ 
troduced in departments at Washington by 
Harrison, 274; without examination, stopped 
by Harrison, 275; by competitive examinations, 
286; in departments at Washington, rules gov¬ 
erning, 289; on merit, under Wanamaker, by 
examination, 297,298; on merit system,introduc¬ 
tion of, in Washington departments, 321; should 
fill places below presidential offices, 413. 

Proner, postmaster of Spencerville, Ind., political 
worker. 379, 380. 

Protestant Episcopal Church and civil service re¬ 
form, see Church. 

Prudden, Dr. T. M., withdraws from N. Y. City 
Health Dept, because it becomes political ma¬ 
chine, 356. 

Pryor, federal office-holder, political worker, 287. 

Public school, and civil service reform, see Curtis, 
205. 

Public Service, journal, 306. 

Publicity of eligibles, ordered by civil serv. com¬ 
mission at Indianapolis, 25. 

Pulaski, N. Y., Journalist Muzzy postmaster at, 155. 

“Purity in Politics,” see Van Anda, 137. 

Purity in Politics, see Ingalls, 190. 

Purroy, Fire Commlsslonerof N. Y. City, 234. 

Pursell, F. S., journalist, postmaster at Logan, O., 
149, 301. 

Pursell, J., policeman of New York tries to defraud 
by pretending to sell office, 224, 225. 

Putnam (Indiana), Democrat, and Civil Sfhvice 
Chronicle, 13; advocates civil service reform, 
76. 

Putnam. Judge A. A., letter of to Wanamaker re¬ 
garding removal of Farnum, unanswered, 175. 

Putnam, R. P., federal employe, henchmen for 
Grosvenor, 204, 205. 

Quackenbush, congressman, obtains appointment 
of G. H. Stevens, disreputable character, as 
postmaster at Shushan, N. Y., 32, 54; urges ap¬ 
pointment of O’Brien in postal serviceof house 
representatives, 242; elect, political worker, 
279. 

Quay, senator, spoilsman, 5,35,43, 45, 93, 119,174,175, 
192, 214,227, 2.56, 261, 263, 281, 350, 361, 373, 387, 388. 
390,404,405,412,415, 422; and the offices, 6; and 
post-office at Philadelphia, 15; and spoils, 17; 
and Postmaster-Gen’l Wanamaker, 22; and 
Pennsylvania legislature, 22; and office-seekers, 
24; dictates appointment of Postmaster-Gen¬ 
eral Wanamaker. 27; conflict with Wanamaker 
over Philadelphia spoils, 30; supersedes Don. 
Cameron in control of patronage in Pa., 34; 
secures the appointment of Cooper as collector 
of customs at Philadelphia, 39; patronage of 
Pa. given to by Pres. Harrison, 28, 38, 47. 56, 68, 
70. 72, 77, 85, 94, 95, 137, 138, 282, 329, 382, 337, 341, 
376; agent of organizes machine, urges adop¬ 
tion of resolution demanding repeal of civil 
service law, 49; negotiates with Mahone, 52; 
controversy of with Dalzell over Pittsburgh post- 
office, secures appointment of postmaster, 87; 
secures appointment of McKean as postmaster 
at Pittsburgh, 90; endorses Sturgis for post¬ 
master at Uniontown, Pa.. 99; endorsesDrapo 
for collectorshlp at Pittsburgh, 100, 104; 

political history of, 105; obligations of Pres. 
Harrison to. 111; protest of Lea against patron¬ 
age of, 112; and appointments, 118; and Harri¬ 
son, 121, 353; methods of, 130, 181; career of, 133, 
184, 135, 151, 152; condemned by Maryland 
Civil Service Reform Association, 136; and U. S. 
Utorney Lyon, 143; opposition to in Pennsyl¬ 
vania. 153; condemned by Lincoln Indepehd- 
Republican committee. 156 ; oppose.s Canadav, 
160; revolt against rule of. 161, 162. 170. 171; 
“boss” in Pennsylvania, 172; and election in 
1890 in Pa., 178; confers with Internal Revenue 
Collector Martin. 183; supports Leeds, disrepu¬ 
table politician,216;condemned by Young Men’s 
Republican Club of Massachusetts, 219; ruins 
ballot reform bill of Pennsvlvania, aided by 
Federal Officer Martin, 228, 229; Pres. Harrison 
makes terms with, 2:15; Harrison combines 
with, 237; and appointment of Martin, disre¬ 
putable politician, internal revnue collector in 
Pa.. 282, 233; defended by Cooper, collector at 
Philadelphia, Pa., reconciled with Harrison,241; 
in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, 245, 246, 249,250, 
251,252,256: eulogy of by nat. rep. committee, 2.57; 
eulogized by federal officers in Pennsylvania, 


260; and Amerlcus Club, 269; revolt against in 
Pennsylvania, 270; supported by federal office¬ 
holders ill convention at Scranton, Pa., and 
elsewhere, 280; denounced by Pennsylvania 
democrats, 288, 289; republican leader in Penn¬ 
sylvania, 298; supporters of, removed from 
office by Harrison, 299, 301; wins libel suits 
against, 305; controls Pennsylvania delegation, 
310; in Pennsylvania, 313, 314; supporter of 
Blaine, 344,345; at Minneapolis convention, 347; 
eulogy of by Clarkson, 351; “placated,” 357, 361, 
362; asks for appointment of Wanamaker as re¬ 
ward for raising campaign fund, 368; secures 
appointment of Martin, 374; imitators of in In¬ 
diana. 414; deserts Harrison, 337, 341. 

Quay, R. R., 361. 

Quimby, H. B., relative of federal employe, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Quincy, Ill., C. A. Wilcox, editor, appointed post¬ 
master at, removals at for political reasons,141, 
148. 

Quincy, Joslah, 69; secy. Massachusetts state dem¬ 
ocratic committee, signs petition for larger ap¬ 
propriation for civil service commission, 102; 
on spoils system, 308. 

Quincy, Mass., removal of Speare, postmaster of, 
desired by Morse, 86; Adams appointed post¬ 
master at, vice Speare, removed, 100; a political 
worker, 162. 

Quinn,postmaster at Decatur,Ind., political worker, 
379. 

Rahway, N. J., editor, appointed postmaster at, 
71. 

Rail, J., ward politician of Indianapolis, see Par¬ 
nell Hall, 194,195; supports fire-chief Webster, 
208. 

Railway Mail Service,condition of, 53,68; removals 
in, 66, 94; necessity for reform in, 69; removal 
of hundreds of clerksin,under Wanamaker, 70; 
brought under civ. service law by Cleve¬ 
land, 81; bill of Sen. Paddock to withdraw 
from civ. service law, 92; eligible lists in, 
111; applicant for position before put 
under civil service law, see Lodge, 122; 
superintendent of condemned, 125; employes 
in getting “in line,” 162; examinations for, 
should be more difficult, suggestions of Wana¬ 
maker, 193; Pres. Cleveland extends civil serv¬ 
ice law to, 224; in Iowa, political assessments 
levied In, 240; civil service law extended to, 
under Cleveland, action under his orders post¬ 
poned at request of commission, by Harrison, 
275, 403; employes in must pass physical exam¬ 
ination, 305, 372; turned over to spoils under 
Harrison, 376; examinations for 1891-92, 396; 
prize offered for best clerk in, by Wanamaker, 
won by H. P. Swift, 415. 

Raines, J., Congressman, uses census patronage for 
his own benefit, letter of, requesting list of vot¬ 
ers. 293. 

Raisin, I. F.. low politician, appointed naval offi¬ 
cer at Baltimore, through influence of Gorman. 
237, 245; career of, 251. 

Randall, C. S., Congressman, recomends unwar¬ 
ranted removal of Carpenter, postmaster at 
New Bedford, Mass., 29,175,176; secures re-ap- 
pointment of Shevlin as ]>ostmater at Sand¬ 
wich, 224. 

Ransdell, D., 7; appointed marshal District of Co¬ 
lumbia. political worker, 34, 68. 77, 84. 85, 96 
112, 126, 173, 181; and office-seekers, 37; uses 
influence for appointment of Throop, 59 ; 
makes unfit appointments. 80; and print¬ 
ing office, 2.34; gets offices for relatives, 244 • 
works for Harrison at Minneapolis and else¬ 
where, 297, 302, 337, 342, 343 , 344, 345, :146, 347, 878, 
.379; and Chase, candidate for Governor of 
Indiana, 352. 

Ransdell, E. S., convicted of theft, gets office 
through influence of Marshal Ransdall, 80, 244 

Ransom, Senator and Eaves, 159. 

Rany, M. A., editor, appointed postmaster at Fon- 
lanelle, Iowa, 142. 

Rarlck, J. H., editor, appointed postmaster, at La 
Grange, Ind., 377. 

Rathbone. E. G., resigns as mall inspector, ap¬ 
pointed 4th Asst. P. M. General, 241; works for 
Harrison at Minneapolis. 337, 344, 345, .346• con¬ 
fers with New. :340,,379; refuses to give reasons 
for removal of Terry, 391. 

Rathbone. E. H.. journalist, postmaster at Hern¬ 
don, Kan., 149. 

Rathbun, L G., appointed postmaster at Elmira. N. 
Y.. vice Flood, removed on secret charges, 303." 
304, 312. 

Ratnour, E., postmaster at Weeping Water, Neb., 
removed on secret charges, Butler appointed! 
175. 

Raum, G. B., pension commissioner and clerks in 
pension service, 71; spoilsman, 108,129,130; be¬ 
lieved to be dishonest, 173, 190; attempts to over¬ 
ride civil service law, 203; and Harrison, career 
of, 237, 238; uses office for political purposes, 373- 
political worker, 370, .382, 389. 

Raum, Jr., G. B., appointed by his father, pension 
commissioner, to office in pension bureau, 130, 
227,254; before congressional committee, 190- 
sells offices, etc.. 287,238; removed from pen¬ 
sion service for dishonesty, 228. 

Ravenna, Kan., Journalist Hart postmaster at, 149. 

Ray, Congressman, recommends Flenniken for 
postmaster at Bradford, Pa., 99; secures ap¬ 
pointment of Underwood as postmaster at 







INDEX. 


XXIX 


Washington, Pa., 100; on Senator Quay, 118; pa¬ 
tronage of, 133. 

Ray, federal appointee, admits attempt to bribe 
member of legislature, 39. 

Ray, C. H., federal office-holder, political worker, 
see also Baltimore luvestigatiou, 320,320, 327. 

Raymond, F., politician, aided by custom-house 
employes, 108; political boss, aud appciutments 
to census service, 121; deputy collector at N. Y. 
City, political worker, 279; controlled selection 
of census enumerators in N. Y. City. 294; in 
New York convention, 335; Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 343, 344. 

Reading, Cal., Busb, political worker, appointed 
postmaster at, 180,187. 

Reagan, Congressman, not much good to come of 
civ. service law, 73. 

Rector, J. W., politician of Texas, 159; internal 
revenue collector, delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 348. 

Reed, Judge, aud congressman, opposed to patron¬ 
age system, 91. 

Reed, A., editor, appointed consul at Dublin, 30. 

Reed, A. H., appointed postmaster at Flora, ill., 
141. 

Reed, J., employe in Baltimore custom bouse, tes¬ 
timony of on interference of federal officers in 
primaries at, 254. 


Reed, T., and spoils, 22,220; as speaker, house com¬ 
mittee on civ. service, appointed by,86; bribery 
of voters for, 145; secures appointment of Briggs 
as postmasterat Portland,Me., 150; desiresspoil 
of Kittery, Me., navy yard, 148.153; hampered 
by refusal of spoil, 157; on fultillment of party 
pledges, 168; “boom”of, 178; opposes Australian 
ballot system, 228; keeps more employes in 
Portland (Me.) custom house than necessary, 
242. 

Reeder, F., Genl., political worker for Quay, 280, 
361. 

Reeds, W. H., member of Cowie faction, see New 
York, 241. 

Reelsville, Ind., Elliott, postmaster at removed, 
Gaskin appointed, 89. 

Reform Club at N. Y.,see N. Y., 42. 

Reid, W., editor New York Tribune, appointed min¬ 
ister to France, 14, 869, 371, 381, 382. 389; republi¬ 
can candidate for vice-president, 1892, 354; and 
Platt, 360, 361. 

Reiley, W. H., postmaster in Washington Co., la., a 
political worker, 260. 

Reiley, J., employed in N. Y. custom-house, politi¬ 
cal worker, 108, 334. 

Reslnger, editor, sell out to Andrews, W. H., 134. 

“Relation of the civil service to comfortable living 
in cities,” see Gibson, 366. 


Removals, general, unwarranted, James Madison 
on, see Madison; in various departments, for 
year from July 1, 1889, see civil service com., 
7th annual report; of postmasters upon secret 
charges, see secret charges; arbitrary, of post¬ 
masters, see Nat. League resolutions of 1890: 
of presidential postmasters, numerous, 27; of 
members of pension boards, by Tanner, 27; of 
foreign ministers by Pres. Harrison, 27; rate of 
under Asst. Postmaster-General Clarkson, 27; at 
Indianapolis post-office under Postmaster J ones, 
easily made, see Moore, 28; in treasury depart¬ 
ment, 29; of 16 R. R. mail clerks for political rea- 
sona,276 removals in the 10th division,29; to week 
ending June 6,1889, of presidential post offices, 
29; in federal offices in Niagara Co., N. Y., 80; 
of subordinates in treas. dep’t, see Coulter, 39; 
under Tanner, commissioner of pensions, 51, 
54; under Cravens, collector. 51; in custom 
house at Baltimore, in post-office at Philadel¬ 
phia, 53; of postmasters for political reasons, 
54, 120; in pension and sixth auditor’s offices, 
see also Roosevelt, 55; in Brooklyn navy yard, 
55,155; by Clarkson, 39, 41, 62.75, 76, 154,173, 261; 
unjustifiable, 63; in R. R. mail service and 
post-offices, 66; of employes in Charlestown 
navy yard by Pres. Cleveland, 69; in fire dep’t 
at Indianapolis. 69; in postal service under 
Wanamaker, 70; In Boston custom house under 
Saltonstall for good cause, 71; in district of 
Rockport, Ill., 73; under Cleveland, of office¬ 
holders in Maine, 73; in Indian service. 
79; of fourth-class postmasters objected to, 
see Simond, 91; of fourth-class postmast¬ 
ers in Washington Co., Ind., 91; in j>ostal 
service. Pres. Harrison asked to check, 
92" under Cleveland and Harrison, 96; 
and “resignations” under Clarkson. 131; for 
political reasons under Postmaster McKean at 
Pittsburgh, 133; under Postmaster Johnson at 
Baltimore, for political reasons. 137; by Von 
Sandberg, 150; under Harrison.45.159,266; secret 
charges, 173; under collectors Erhardt, Hed- 
den and Magone, at New York, 183, causes of 
should be made public, see civil service com. 
annual report, 1889-90,185; in classified service 
in various post-offices, 185; of presiden¬ 
tial postmasters for political reasons, 164, 
186; under Clarkson of postmasters upon 
expiration of four years’ service,^ and 
second commission not yet expired. 187, 
“offensive partisanship,” 188; under Harrison, 
for cause only, 188; to make place for friends 
opposed by Lincoln. 211; wholesale, of employes 
in fire and police service at Indianapolis, see 
Equally divided politically, 212, 213; for politi¬ 
cal reasons, made by Controller Thompson at 
Philadelphia, 2.39; under Beard, collector at 


Boston, 245, 322; more than 100,000 under Harri¬ 
son, 253; in classified and unclassified service 
under Johnson, postmaster at Baltimore, his 
testimony before Roosevelt, 254,255; for cause 
only under Zumstein, postmaster at Cincinnati, 
O., 257; in departments at Washington, D. C.. 
almost wholly for cause, 273; of efficient offi¬ 
cials condemned, 286; of supporters of Quay in 
Pennsylvania by Harrison, 299-301; under May¬ 
nard at N. Y, custom-house, on false charges, 
310; in navy yards, see Tracy, 311; in postal 
service for political reasons condemned, bills 
of Hoar (S.) and Lodge regulating, 821. 

Removal of Burt, Saltonstall, Pearson, Graves, 
Corse, see Burt, etc.; of De La Hunt, postmaster 
at Cannelton, Indiana, by Pres. Cleveland, for 
“offensive partisanship,” 25; of Indian Com 
missioner Oberly and others, 27; on secret 
charges, cases and lists of, 45, 54, 175, 176,177, 
312; for political reasons, cases and lists of, 29, 
30, 39 , 45, 46, 47 , 51. 54, 55. 56, 59 , 71, 72, 74 , 84 , 87, 
88, 89. 91. 94, 96, 100, 136, 142, 146, 147, 186, 187, 250, 
266,288, 297, 298, 303, 304, 319, 362, 3tV8, 371, 374, 377, 
386, 408; without cause, cases aud lists of, 29, 39, 
45, 176, 181, 228, 371, 374, 386; to make places for 
henchmen, cases and lists of, 29, 72, 90, 98. 101, 
112, 126, 131, 140, 148, 188, 310, 331, ,371; after four 
years’ service, second commission, unexpired, 
187, 188; of Royer, political worker and Indian 
agent at Pine Ridge, 192; of Dr. Stone pension ex¬ 
aminer, and appointment of Dr. Elbert, con¬ 
demned, 192; of Dougherty, fire-chief at Indian¬ 
apolis, Webster re-appointed,207,208; of U. S.dis¬ 
trict attorneyat Washington, D.C.,2ll:of Royer, 
worthless Indian agent at Pine Ridge, S. Dak., 
211, 217, 218; by Senator Ingalls of clerk of com¬ 
mittee of District of Columbia, he appoints his 
own son, 215; of Vandervoort from R. R. mail 
service by P. M. Gen’l Gresham, 215, 216; of 
Roosevelt, civil service commlsioner, possible, 
for watching interference of federal office-hold¬ 
ers in primaries at Baltimore, Md., 225,226, 2,50, 
311, 312; plots for, of Harlow, postmaster at St. 
Louis, Mo., 226; of Ryder, criminal, appointed 
to Indian service, 226; of Eastman, supervising 
architect of Brooklyn. N. Y.. for maladminis 
tration, 234; under Hathaway, postmaster in 
house of representatives, 242; and re-instate- 
meut of Sears, P. O. employe at Baltimore, 277; 
in violation of law, under Cleveland and 
Harrison, in Omaha. Neb., post-office, 281; 
of Pension Examiner Dr. Van Alstyne, through 
Postmaster Dunn, 304; of Squires, corrupt pub¬ 
lic officer, see Hill. 307; of Leaycraft by Gov. 
Flower, 332; of Milholland, federal employe, 
for political activity, 332, 334; of Wimberly, in¬ 
ternal revenue collector in Mississippi for lot¬ 
tery connections, 343. :348; of Erhardt, collector 
atN. Y. City, 3f0; of N. Y. R. R. Commissioner 
Spencer, 355; of Ewing, Prentice, from N. Y. 
health dept., by Tammany, .356; of P. C. Mac- 
Court by Sec. Windon, 54: of Sharp, postmaster 
at Leadhill, Ark., and Stevens, postmaster at 
Shushan, N. Y.. 54; of Reuttler, Downing and 
Wlgg, by Sec. Whitney, 147; of Tanner, com¬ 
missioner of pensions, 53; of Nat’l Hawthorne, 
46; of Flenniker, postmaster at Bradford, Pa., 
on protest of H. C. Frick, 99; of Terry, postmas¬ 
ter of Terry ville, N. Y.,for refusing to pay politi¬ 
cal assessments, 391; by Postmaster Thompson 
of Indianapolis, of Carrier Dunn, for soliciting 
political contributions, 403; of postmaster at 
Wyoming, Ill, for having been appointed 
through political intrigue, Hammond ap¬ 
pointed, 176. 

Reno, M. A., postmaster at Pontiac, Ill., removal 
demanded by Congressman Payson for “offen¬ 
sive partisanship,” 188. 

Rentfro, R. B., Harrison delegate to republican 
nat’l convention, appointed collector of cus¬ 
toms at Brownsville, Texas, 46, 1,59. 

Report to Pres. Harrison by Roosevelt on interfer¬ 
ence of federal office holders in primaries at 
Baltimore, 254. 2.55. 

Republicans in Indiana legislature oppose bill for 
non partisan control of state institutions, 201, 
202, 414. 

Republican clubs, league of, meeting at Cincinnati, 
election of Clarkson as president, 219. 

Rerick, J. H., editor, appointed postmaster at La 
Grange, Ind., 126. 

Resignations, forced in postal service, see National 
League, report of on presidential post-offices; 
under Clarkson, 149; in postal service, 164 ; cases 
and lists of. 165, 166, 216; of Erhardt, collector at 
N. Y. City, Fassett appointed to make clean 
sweep, 255. 

Resolutions of republicans of 6th assembly district, 
N. Y. City against civil service reform, 49; 
passed at annual meeting. 1890, Indiana Civil 
Service Reform Association, 120: of National 
League at annual meeting, 1890, 172; of annual 
meeting, 1892, of National League on status of 
civil service reform, .321. 

Reutfie, A. B., collector at port of Brownsville, 
'Tex., a political worker, 1-59. 

Reuttler, C. P., discharged by Sec’y Whitney from 
navy yard at Norfolk, Va., 147. 

Rebyburn, Congressman, and Quay, 280. 

Reynolds, U. S. diet, att’y, political worker, and 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 143. .346. 

Reynolds, Gen’l, postmaster of Rochester, N. Y., a 
political worker, 266. 


Rhea, M. A., journalist, postmaster at Altoona, 
Kan., 148. 

Rhinehart, sheriff, 107; and Brigg’s cartage con¬ 
tract, 332. 

Rhode Island, senators and representatives of, 
secure appointment of Fay as postmaster at 
New port, 150. 

Rhodes, S. R., journalift, postmaster at Gresham, 
Neb., 149. 

Rice, A. T., editor, office-holder, 14. 

Rice, F., sec’y of state for New York, worker for 
Hill, 309; enumeration of 1892, 317. 

Rice, G. A., post-office inspector, political worker, 
160. 

Rice, J. L., postmaster at Springfield, Mass., 
thoroughly efficient, removal desired. 87. 

Richards, D. J., editor, postmaster at Zanesville 
O., 301. 

Richards, S. T., postmaster in Clayton Co . la., a 
political worker, 260. 

Richardson, member of Maryland legislature, 
moves for repeal of civil service law, 96, 

Richardson, E. S., negro, R. R. mail employe, del¬ 
egate to Minneapolis convention, ;348. 

Richardson, R. H., negro, postmaster at Wedge- 
field, S. C., delegate to Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 348. 

Richensteen, W., appointed postmaster at Long 
Island City, N. Y., .54; letter to, from H. C. 
Johnson favoring civil service reform. 100. 

Richie, R.M., postmaster at Saratoga Springs, N. 
Y., a political worker, 266. 

Richmond, H. A., civil service reformer at Balt, 
conference. 1889, 2; address before Y. M. A. of 
Buffalo, March 24, 1889,16, 32, 67, 85, 172, 200; on 
Curtis, 394. 

Richmond. Ind., should have civ. service law ap¬ 
plied to local offices; Editor Jenkinson ap¬ 
pointed postmaster at, 126, 377; postmaster of 
is the local “party,” 183; works for Harrison, 
249. 

Richmond, Ind., Sunday Register (Rep.) opposes 
political methods of Frank Hatton, 76. 

Richmond, Va.. embezzler Russell appointed post¬ 
master at, 374. 

Ricker, C., and political assessments, 384. 

Rickets, C. H., see Cannon, 39. 

Ricketts, V. L., editor, advocates repeal ol civ. serv¬ 
ice law, is given office, 85, 86, 90, 213. 

Ridland, postmaster at Scottsburg, Ind., political 
worker, 144. 377. 

Rilej’, J., appointed to fire service at Indianapolis 
vice White, and Findling removed under 
“equally divided politically” rule, 235,243. 

Riley, J. B.,' chief examiner N. Y. civil service com¬ 
mission, removed by Tammany, 414. 

Riley, J. L., succeeded by O. P. Ensley as chief 
clerk in pension office (Indiana), 108. 

Rinewalt, A. L., journalist, postmaster at Williams- 
ville, N. Y.. 155. 

Rio Janeiro, Consul-General Armstrong at, re¬ 
moved for political reasons. 54. 

Ritchie, D. F.. editor, appointed postmaster at Sar¬ 
atoga, N. Y., 126. 

Roark, N. S., and political assessments, see Ken¬ 
tucky. 

Roberts, A., postmaster of Addison, N. Y., a politi¬ 
cal worker, 266. 

Roberts, E. H., asst, treasurer, political worker, 
3.54. 

Roberts, F. H., journalist, postmaster at Oskaloosa, 
Kan., 149. 

Roberts, G. M., political w'orker for Harrison, rela¬ 
tive of Collector Cravens, of Indiana. 379. 

Roberts, W. T., receiver of political assessments for 
Maryland, ,391. 

Robertson, Utah commissioner, political worker at 
Minneapolis convention. 380. 

Robertson. Col., political worker for Harr’son, 302. 

Robertson,T. W.. employed in custom-house (N.Y.), 
political worker, 108. 

Robertson, secy, of navy, orders re instatement of 
thief Weeks, at request of Broadhead, at Kittery 
navy yard, 147. 

Robinson, postmaster at Concord, N. H., active 
politician. 143. 

Robinson, E. E., postmaster at Ithaca, N. Y., a po¬ 
litical worker for Platt, 264. 

Robinson, H. C.. inspector in N. Y. custom-house, 
apolitical worker, 108. 

Robinson. H. C , journalist, postmaster at Washing¬ 
ton, Kan., 149. 

Robinson. Ill., Editor Harper appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 141. 

Robinson, Congressman-elect, supported by Quay, 
280; STipported by Collector Cooper to succeed 
Quay. 299. 

Robison, W. E., journalist, postmaster at Bealsvllle, 
Pa.. 149. 

Rochelle, Ill., Postmaster Gardner of succeeded by 
Hartong, 109; Postmaster Hartong of works for 
Hitt, 186. 

Rochelle. 111., Herald, letter to regarding Congress¬ 
man Hitt’s course in the distribution of spoil, 
110 . 

Rochester, N. Y.. Reynolds, postmaster of a politi¬ 
cal w’orker, 266; Tarbox, postmaster of a politi¬ 
cal worker, 280; state civil service law enforced 
in city service, Belknap case, 305; Hilllsm at, 
309. 

Rockford, Ill., applicants for positions in census 
service in district of, 104; Postmaster Lawler of, 
political worker for Congressman Hitt, 143, 





XXX 


T N I) EIX . 


Rockhill, W., postmabter at Areola, Ind., removed 
tlirongh iulluence of Postmaster lliggius, Me- 
Google appointed, 

Rockport, III., removals in district of, 73. 

Rockport, Ill., Register irepub ), on civil service 
reform, 9‘J. 

Rockweli, Congressman, recommends re-appoint¬ 
ment of democrat Harrington, postmaster at 
Monson, 188. 

Rodebaugh, representative in Indiana legislatnre, 
spoilsman, 400. 

Rodney, Miss., Postmaster Engharth of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 341. 

Rogers, postmaster of Huntington, Ind., at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 380. 

Rogers, R. J., political worker, appointed post¬ 
master, at Searcy, Ark., 180. 

Rogers, S. S., civil service reformer, 08, 172, 405; to 
examine management civil service, 77; report 
on congressional patronage to National League, 
113, 114, 115; on committee investigating patent 
oilice. report of. 139, 140, 141; upholds civil 
service law of New York, liil; on committee of 
National League, luvestiKating presidential 
post-offices. 102, 103, 104, 105, 100, 1«8: on com- 
mitteeof Nat. League, reporting on removals on 
secret charges, 175, 176, 177; president Buffalo 
Civil Service Reform Association, address of, 
to citizens of Buffalo, 189, 200; urges extension 
of civil service law, 192; address of, before 
annual meeting National League, 1891, on ex¬ 
tension of classified service, 261. 275.277; on 
special committee of National League, investi¬ 
gating census service, 291, 295; request of, for 
information refused by P. O. department, 297; 
on G.W. Curtis. 394. 

Rogers City, Mich., Journalist Larke, postmaster 
at, 149. 

Roggen, E. P., candidate for postmaster at Lincoln, 
Neb., 72, 108. 

Rokestraw, disreputable character, postmaster at 
Cheraw, S. Carolina, 55. 

Rollins, collector, and Eaves, 362. 

Rome, Ga., postmaster of, candidate for congress, 
162. 

Ronner, J. H. V., deputy commissioner of street 
improvements, on Tammany methods, 2:34. 

Roosevelt, T., and Census Supt. Porter, see Civil 
Service Reformer; at Baltimore conference, 
1889, 2; appointed civil service commissioner 
by Harrison, 17, 86,95, 96, 103, 168, 174, 275, 405; 
investigates Indianapolis post-office and cen¬ 
sures its management, 28; applies to Sec. of the 
Treas. and stops Coulter’s proceedings, 34; and 
civil service reform association of Brookline, 
Mass., :36; on congressional patronage, 39; si¬ 
lences ridiculous arguments against civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 46; performances oi fill republicans 
with disgust, 49; abuse of,52; charges of against 
heads of pension and 6th auditor’s offices for re¬ 
movals for political reasons, 55; appointment of 
especially good. 59; address of before Boston and 
Cambridge civil service reform associations, 77; 
reasons for removal should be public; exami¬ 
nation questions under, 79; investigates office 
of Collector Cooper, of Philadelphia, 85; charges 
of Hatton against, Shidy case, 101; and Shidy 
case, 104; addresses Bloomington branch Indi¬ 
ana Civil Service Reform Association, 1890,108; 
before congressional committee. 119; reports 
favorably on Indianapolis post-ofiice, 120; com¬ 
mended, 125, 136; address of before civil serv. 
reform association of Maryland, 1890, on spoils 
in post offices, 132; and Postmaster Johnson, of 
Baltimore, 137; and Grosvenor, 146, 204, 205, 
statement of before congressional committee; 
see also Grosvenor, 162; statement of as to scope 
of civil service reform, 172; address in Indiana, 
182; before select committee of house of repre¬ 
sentatives, 188; and Wanamaker, 190, 298; urges 
extension of civil service reform, see also “An 
Object Lesson in Civil Service Reform,” in At¬ 
lantic Monthly, Feb., 1891,192; extract from ad¬ 
dress of before Commercial Clnbin Boston, 1890, 
on spoils “iniquity,” 194; Gorman defends 
Wanamaker against. 214; investigates interfer¬ 
ence of federal office-holders in primaries at 
Baltimore, Md., his removal possible, 225 , 226, 
254, 255, 261, 267, 268. 277. 278. 321, 322. 329, 3:i0, 350, 
366, 372, :{73: speech of at dinner to at Indianap¬ 
olis, list of assistants, and regrets, 227, 229. 230, 
231; invites 21st district republican association, 
of N. Y. Citv to investigate civil service re¬ 
form as applied in N. Y. custom-house. 2:36; 
answers attacks of Gorman, Plumb and Stew¬ 
art. 2-50, 251: praised by Mr. Storey. 257; de¬ 
nies charges of favoritism on part of civil 
service commission, 266, 267; on work of the 
civil service commission. 273; thanked, 287; 
removal of, desired by politicians. 311, 312; in¬ 
formed of political activity of federal employes, 
334; against Wanamaker and Clarkson, .349; and 
Johnson, postmaster at Baltimore. 363. ;i72: and 
political assessments, 70,97.161. ;1.58, 375, 383. 385, 
:)90, :i92; and dutiesof federal employes, .383..384; 
report of. :!97; resignation of. would be a loss to 
reform, :i98; on extensions of classified service, 
415. 

Root, G. A.. Major, appointed postmaster at Lanark, 
Ill., through influence of Congressman Hitt, 
109, 136. 

Rose, federal office-holder, political worker, 287. 

Rose, J. C.. civil service reformer, at Baltimore 
conference, 1889, 2; on local examining board 


at Baltimore, 137,186; investigates interference 
of federal office-holders at Baltimore, 22-5, 226, 
261; on committee of National League to inves¬ 
tigate interference of office-holders and politi¬ 
cal assessments, 3:J8. 

Rosecraus, Gen’l, proposes that congressmen have 
absolute control of offices, 8,5. 

Roseville, Ill., Editor Hebbard appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 141. 



Ross, M., editor of Indianapolis News, favors civil 
service reform, speech of at Roosevelt dinner, 
227, 229, 231, 232. 

Rossiug, L. A., postmaster at Bode, la., a political 
worker. 2r>o. 

Rotation, in office in Indiana. 45: Jacksonian, 257. 

Rothwell.T., ex-alderman New York City, lot? pol¬ 
itician. 199. 

Royer, political worker, appointed Indian agent at 
Pine Ridge, 192,202; removed, seeks re-appoint¬ 
ment, 211, 217, 218. 

Royer, N., appointed postmaster at Noblesvllle. 
Ind., through influence of Cheadle, 47,89; polit¬ 
ical w’orker. 380. 

Rubens, fireman at Indianapolis, political woiker 
for Trusler, 208. 

Bunnell, ward politician, seeking collectorship 
customs at Wilmington. N. C.. 1.S3. 

Rusk, Sec., gives R. G. Blaine an office, 108; and 
Quay. 118; telegram of to Prof. Nipher an<l re¬ 
ply, 244, 245; supposed telegram of to Prof. 
Nipher never sent, 2.53, 290,:154. 

Russell. Jr., C. T., condemns Clarkson, 1:36. 

Russell, O. II., embezzler, appointed postmaster at 
Richmond, Va., 374. 

Rutherford, N. J., removal of Van Riper, postmas¬ 
ter of, on secret charges, 175. 

Ryan, efficient employe in R. R.mail service, pro¬ 
moted, i:36. 

Ryan, U. S. minister to Mexico, political worker, 
:382. 

Ryan, J. J., political worker, appointed police jus¬ 
tice by Mayor Grant, 184. 

Ryan, T., federal office-holder, returns home to 
vote. 162: removed for cause by Cleveland, re¬ 
appointed by Harrison, 79. 

Ryan, W. S.. vice-president Kings Co.. N. Y., central 
republican committee, 198, 304. 

Ryder, W. D.. convicted criminal, appointed to In¬ 
dian service, but removed. 226. 

Sage. S. L., journalist, postmaster at St. Lawrence, 
S. Dak., 155. 

Sahm, A., ward politician at Indianapolis, 315; ap¬ 
plicant for postmastership of Indianapolis, see 
Indianapolis investigation, 411, 412. 

Sale of offices, by defeated candidate Love of Mis¬ 
souri. testimony of sale. 82, 55,93,99; elsewhere. 
104.121; in police service of San Francisco, 215; 
under Tammany, 224, 225; in pension bureau, 
by G. B. Raum, Jr., 238. 

Salem, Ind., Ward, postmaster of, political worker, 
880. 

Saltonstall, collector at Boston applies civil service 
methods successfully. 71; correspondence with 
Windom and Harrison, removal of. 94; signs pe- 
tlon for larger appropriation for civil serv. com., 
102; removal of through influence of Hoar and 
Dawes, senators. Beard appointed, 105, 129, 
168, 173, 179. 245, 282,367, 376. 

Samoan commission, relative of Harrison appoint¬ 
ed naval attache to, 369. 

San Antonio, Tex., Johnson, postmaster of, politi¬ 
cal worker, 159. 

San Carlos, Indian agency at, and Commissioner 
Oberly, 48. 

San Francisco, Cal., the “blind white devil of,” 28; 
police positions sold in by Bruner, 215: customs 
district of, classified 1883, 276. 

Sanders, Senator, patronage of, 160. 

Sandford, E.. appointed by Cleveland chief justice 
of Ctah supreme court, removed for political 
reasons, 374. 

Sandwich (Mass.) democrat Shevlin reappointed 
postmaster at, 224. 

Sanford, congressman, helps Editor Ritchie to be 
postmaster at Snrataga, N. Y., 126; on house 
committee of civ. service, 86. 

Sangatuck, Mich . Journalist Wade, postmaster at, 
149. 

Saratoga, N. Y., Editor Ritchie appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, although op 3 >osed by Vice-Pres. Morton. 
126; Ritchie, postmaster of. a political worker, 
266. 

Saulcy, E., political worker, career of, 1.38; deputy 
collector at Indianapolis, 144; political worker 
in Indiana. 302, :i53. :375. 377.379. 

Saunemin, Ill., Editor Brydia appointed postmaster 
at. 141. 

Sawyer, offered bribes for influence in behalf of 
candidate for Batavia, N. Y., postmastership, 
47. 

Sawyer, Senator, favorably disposed to office-seek¬ 
ers, 6; chairman seiia'c committee on post- 
offices aids nomination of Harrison.364. 

Saxton, N. Y. state senator, calls on Fassett, col¬ 
lector at N. Y. City. 25s. 

Say brook. Ill.. Editor Mace appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Sayre. W. G.. Indian land commissioner, federal 
office-holder, political worker for Harrison, 189, 
297,316, 853, 378, :i79. 8S9. 

Scanlan, J. F.,political worker,given oflice through 
influence of Huston, 1:12. 


Scheusser, J. J., federal employe, in New York con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Schmester, R., employe in post-office at St. Louis, 
worker for Tilly machine, 150. 

Schmidt. F., custom-house deputy at Indianapolis 
political worker, 108. 144, 377. 

Scholar in Politics,see Roosevelt, dinner at Indian¬ 
apolis, 227, 229. 

Schultz, F., census supervisor 6th Indiana district, 
politician, 104. 

School and civil service reform, see Civ. S. Ref. 

Schrader. Jr., J., journalist, postmaster at Lawrence- 
burg, Tenn.. 1.55. 

Scbreekenga.st, A. F., journalist, appointed census 
enumerator, 142. 

Schrieber, postmaster of Tell City, Ind., political 
worker. :380. 

Schuarte contest, 226. 

Schurz, Carl, an “imposter,” 49; Sec. of Inter or 
under Arther, obtains reappointment of liL.'-s 
Sweet. 107, 321; address of, favoring refoim 
methods, .396. 

Scott, C. T., appointed postmaster at Axbridge, 
Mass., vice Farnum removed on secret charges, 
175. 

Scott, J. N.. brother-in law of Harrison, given of¬ 
fice, 21, :30, :369. 

Scott, Kan., Journalist Adams postmaster at. 149. 

Scott, N. B., member national republican commit¬ 
tee, levies political assessments, .390. 

Scott, W.C., journalist, postmaster at Dalton O., 
149. 

Scottsburgh, Ind., Postmaster Ridland of, com¬ 
pelled to aid Michener, 144; Ridland, postmas¬ 
ter of, political worker, 377. 

Scranton, Congressman, postmaster of Scranton, 
Pa., 101. 

Scranton, Pa., Hartley, P. O. employe at, under 
Postmasters Slocum and Connelly, 101; federal 
officer-holders political workers for Quay in 
convention at. 230. 

St "uggs, J. P., deputy collector Int. rev.,delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Scenlock, G. C.. negro, Harrison delegate from N. 
Carolina, 3:44. 

Seaman, L. L., protests against removal of Milhol- 
land, as federal interference, 333. 

Searcy, Ark., Postmaster McCauley of, removed 
after four years’ service, second commission 
unexpired, Rogers appointed. 186,187. 

Sears. G. W., P. 0. employe, see Baltimore Investi¬ 
gation, removal of, 277, 29(;. 

Secret charges, removal on, of McKenna, postmas¬ 
ter of Long Island City, N. Y.. 175; removal of 
Wilson, postmaster at Chadron, Neb., on, 175; 
removal of Ratnour, postmaster at Weeping 
Water, Neb., on, Butler appointed. 175; remov¬ 
als upon. Investigatian into by committee of 
National League 1890. 175, 176, 177; rules of post¬ 
al department on, as interpreted by Clarkson, 
176; should not be allowed, 415. 

Sedan, Ind., Crane, postmaster of, political worker, 
:379. 380. 

Sedgwick, “Bob,” political worker for Woodruff, 
see Kings Co.. N. Y. 

Sedgwick, J. R., journalist, postmaster at McDon¬ 
ald, Kan., 149. 

Sefrits, L. D., buys post-office at Washington, Dav¬ 
iess Co., Ind., 121. 

Senate, secret executive sessions of, see Foulke. 

Senate, patronage evil iu, 72. 

Seneca, Co., N. Y., republican convention of Aug., 
1891, factional flghts-ln. 2.59, 260. 

Service,diplomatic, necessity for reform in, 3; civil, 
federal, number of offices in. 10. 

Serviss, candidate for po-stmaster at Apple River. 
Jo Daviess Co., Ill., 109. 

Settle, widow of Judge, set aside through influence 
of Congressman Brower. 47. 

Settle, Judge, relations of in office. 47. 

Sewell, Geu’l. patronage of. 180, :i86. 

Sexton, Colonel, aided by Senator Farwell for post¬ 
mastership of Chicago, 14; postmaster at Chi¬ 
cago, spoilsman, 22. 

Seymour (Ind.) Democrat, condemns opposition to 
Magee bill, see also Magee, 209. 

Shackleford, Gen’l. appointment of as judge in In¬ 
dian Territory, 240. 

Shaffer, J.. pres, street railway company, is accused 
of bribing and intimidating voters, 207. 

Shangreau, L., and Indian rising at Pine Ridge, S. 
Dak., 218. 

Shannon, postm aster, delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention. 344. 

Shannon. Ill., Editor Mastin appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Sharob, J. B., journalist, postmaster at Pierce, Neb., 
149. 

Sharp, postmaster of Ellettsville, Ind., political 
worker. :380. 

Sharp, H. E., convicted criminal, appointed ])Ost- 
master at Leadhill, Arkansas. 39; removed, 54. 

Sharp. B. C., given office through influence of 
Judge Settle, his relative, 47. 

Sharpe, G. II.. political worker for Platt and Hls- 
cock, given federal office, 265; anti-Platt work¬ 
er, 280; father of federal employe S. B. Sharpe, 
political worker for Harrison in New York, 336; 
federal employe, delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, ;M8. 

Shaw, postmaster at Vevav, Ind.. political worker, 
:i79. 








INDEX. 


XXXI 




Shaw, A. D., appointed deputy third-auditor of 
treasury for political services, 71,84; a political 
worker, 162, 269, 352, 353, 354 , 363, 378,379,382. 

Shaw, E. O., journalist postmaster at Newaygo, 
Mich., 189. 

Shay, flre-chief at N. Y. City retired on pension, 
36. 

Shea, D., active politician appointed deputy of Col¬ 
lector Erhardt, 108; a political worker, 265, 334, 
343, 344. 

Shearman, congressman, opposed to civ. service 
reform, 49, 54,180. 

Shearman, J. G., and refusal of Cleveland while 
candidate to pledge spoil to Sheehan, 395. 

Sheehan, T. C., 317, 318. 

Sheehan, W. F., low politician of Buffalo, N. Y., 
196,197; speaker of N. Y. assembly and patron¬ 
age, 215; lieutenant-governor of New York, 
corrupt politicion, 310; and school patronage in 
New York, 818, 319; Cleveland refuses, while 
candidate, to pledge spoil to, 395; obtains sus¬ 
pension of civil service rules in, for benefit of 
workers, 414; and bill for municipal reform in 
Oswego, N. Y., 415. 

Shelbyville, Ind., Bone, postmaster at, removed on 
secret charges, 177. 

Shelbyville (Ind.) Republican (rep.), advocates 
civ. service reform, 76; on Magee bill for non¬ 
partisan control of state charitable institu¬ 
tions, 215. 

Sheldon, Iowa, Editor Piper appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Shelley, J. J., foreman on park board at New York 
City, defrauds Cole on pretense of selling of¬ 
fice, 224, 225. * 

Shelley, W. F., dentist, appointed postmaster at 
New Castle, Ind., 132. 

Shepard, E. M., on examinations in character, 153. 

Shepard, W. J., address by. before Central Labor 
Union of Buffalo, on civ. service reform, 44; 
civil service reformer of Buffalo, N. Y., 200. 


Shepardson, S. W., employe in railway mail ser¬ 
vice promoted, 136. 

Sheppard, J. T., federal employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Sherer, Dr., in appraiser’s oilice at New York, re¬ 
moved on false charges, see "sugar frauds,’’ 
203. 

Sheridan, Gen. G. A., patronage defeated republi¬ 
cans in Ohio, 75. 


Sheridan,.!., saloon-keeper and fish protection at 
Lake Keuka. N. Y., 356. 

Sherman, Senator, spoilsman, 15,17; on evils of pa¬ 
tronage, 2-5, 67, 177; at war with Quay, 56: se 
cures appointment of Hopley postmaster at Bu- 
cyrus, 0., 149; controls patronage of Ohio, 240, 
;U0; and election controversy of 1877 in Louisi¬ 
ana. accused of bribery, 241; obtains office for 
Smith, political worker. 219; re-election due to 
federal patronage, 297. :I0L 302. 

Sherman, Mich., .Tournallst Wheeler postmaster at, 
119. 

Sherwood, II., promoted to be postmaster at Wash¬ 


ington. 153. 

Shevlin, J.. democrat, reappointed postmaster at 
Sandwich, Mass., 221. 

Shidy, P. O. employe at Milwaukee, compelled by 
Postmaster Paul to manipulate records, testifies 
against Paul, removed by him, given another 
place by Roosevelt. 101.103. 

Shiel. K. R., works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 
343,379; candidate for office, aided by federal 
office-holders, 370. 

Shipman, Judge, and removal of Bario, efficient P. 
O. inspector. 298. 

Shipsey. “Jake,’’gambler, friend of police justice 
Divver. 181. 

.Shivelev, Congressman, patronage of, 421. 

Shook. S., supports Lee for place in N. Y. custom¬ 
house. 2.59. . . , 

Short Hills. N.J., Kessler, grocer, appointed post 
master of. vice Goodrich removed for political 
reasons. 386. 

Shore, tax-clerk, a political worker. Ib2. 

Shrayer, A. R., a political worker for Harrison, 2i>0. 

Shryack. C. V.. editor, given office by Governor 

Foraker. 301. i., , . 

Shushan. N. Y., Stevens, disreputable character 
appointed postmaster at, through influence of 
Congressman Quackenbnsh, .>2, 

Sickles, General, of N. Y.civil service commission, 
a friend to civil service reform. 34. 

Seiders. J. W.. editor, appointed postmaster at Ply 
mouth. Ind.. 126,377. . , „ , ^ 

Sidney, Ohio, editor appointed postmaster at, ..01. 

Sill. U. S. attorney, testifies to worth of Bario, P. 

b. inspector removed,-298. 

Sills, A. K., worker for Harrison, appointed swamp 

SimmondsTe^xtension of civil service law advocated 

Simm^ons.’ J. E.. bank president, recommends 
"Paddy” Divver for police justice. 184. 

Simms, C., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334 

Simond, Congressman, civil service reformer, 91. 

Simonds. D. K., journalist, postmaster at Manches 


Simpson, postmaster at Lamb, Ind., political work- 
Simpson,'J.,and Fassett, 258; requests patronage. 


311, 312; federal employe, in New York conven¬ 
tion, 334. 

Sing Sing, N. Y., E. A. McAlpin appointed post¬ 
master at as reward for party services, 108; at 
convention of republican leagues, 259. 

Sinks, G. W.. treas. state republican executive com¬ 
mittee, Ohio, and political assessments, 280. 

Sissel, Rev. G. A., opposes Harrison, wants offices 
for negroes, 244. 

Sitka, Alaska, Journalist Kenealy postmaster at, 
1.55. 

Sitting Bull, “kidnapping” of, 192. 

Skerritt, Commodore, opposes abuses in Klttery 
navy yard, 148. 

'■'lee, J. D. F., 2.59; accusses Fassett of corrupt po¬ 
litical methods, see also Chemung. N. Y., 266. 

Sleicher, J. A., N. Y. civil service commissioner, at 
Minneapolis convention, 346, 354. 

" Slick Six,” in Indianapolis, 230. 

Sloan, S. C., on inefficient census enumeration in 
N. Y. City, 294. 

Small, J. K., federal employe, delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention, 348. 

Smalls, Robert, convicted criminal appointed by 
Harrison, 39. 

Smethport, Pa.. Postmaster Kerns of, worker for 
Delamater, 134. 

Smith, buys office in pension bureau from G. B. 
Raum, Jr., secures promotion by fraud, 238. 

Smith, politician, succeeding Miss Moody, 39. 

Smith, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in, 407. 

Smith, postmaster at Laurel, Del., attempts brib¬ 
ery, ;I97, 401,402. 

Smith, Alderman, of Indianapolis, spoilsman and 
low politician, 207. 

Smith, A., ex-mayor of Cincinnati,office-seeker, 24; 
customs collector at Cincinnati, through influ¬ 
ence of Sherman, works for, 249; political work¬ 
er in Ohio, 336. 

Smith, A. A., editor and politician, appointed post¬ 
master at Ogdensburg, N. Y., vice Baird, re¬ 
moved, 126. 

Smith, A. G.. attornej'-gen’l of Indiana, spoilsman, 
;il5, 355. 


Smith, B. W , uses Influence tor appointment of 
Throop, 59; applicant for postmastership at La¬ 
fayette, Ind., 84; postmaster at La Fayette. Ind., 
aids Mlchener and La Follette. 144; a political 
worker, 153,1.58, 316, 339, :}42, .377, 379. 

Smith, C . sou of federal officer, favorite of Platt at 
convention republican league, 259. 

Smith, C. E., candidate of Sen. Hiscock for post¬ 
master at Syracuse, 46; editor, appointed post¬ 
master at Syracuse, N. Y., vice editor removed, 
moved. 81; a political worker, 266, 3:J5. 347, 386. 

Smith, C. E., editor, appointed minister to Russia. 
100.133; worker at Minneapolis convention. 382. 

Smith, D.. naval oliicer. on board applicants for po¬ 
sitions in navy yard at Brooklyn, N. Y., 222. 

Smith. E .postmaster at < arrollton. Ill., removed 
through influence of Senator Cullom. 188. 

Smith, E. M., and political assessments in Alabama, 
391. 

Smith, F. 0., editor, appointed deptity collector at 
St. Albans. 126. 

Smith, G. A., political boss in Brooklyn. N. 5'., ac¬ 
cepts bribes. 106. 

Smith, G. W., congressman, forces resignation of 
Andrews, postmaster at Miirphrysboro. 111.. 16-5 

Smith, H. 0.. successful competitor, given office. 
1884, removed by Auditor ( oulter. 45. 

Smith, J. C. H., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 334. 

Smith, J. E., naval office employe in N. con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Smith, J.E., U. S. asst.dist. atty. in New York, a po¬ 
litical worker. 265. 

Smith, J. G.. journalist, postmaster at ('nunIngham, 
Kan., 149. 

Smith, S.B., anti-Platt republican, police justice 
and ward politician, see N. Y. City. 198, 199. 

Smith, S. E., negro. P. O. clerk delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Smith, S.F.. editor, appointed postmaster at En¬ 
cinitas. Cal., 141. 

Smith, T. G., civil service reformer of Buffalo, N. 
Y., 200; on Curtis. 391. 

Smith, W. H., federal officer, delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention. 348. 

Smith, Dr.W. M., health officer of portof New York, 
favorite of Platt, 259. 

Sraithfleld, O., father of Journalist If. Harrison 
postmaster at, 149. 

Smithland, Iowa, Journalist Hills appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Smock, F. M., journalist, appointed imstmaster at 
Keota. Iowa, 142. 

Smyth, Recorder, recommeuds “Paddy Divver 
'for police justice. 184. 

Smyth, A.W ,supt. New (irlcaus mint, pays politi¬ 
cal assessments, 383. 


myth, W.. editor, appointed postmaster at Oswe¬ 
go, N. 5’., 71. ., , , , 

mythe.supt.of New Orleans mint, political work- 

uyder. H. R., journalist, postmaster at Waverly, 

oale.’w . politician, census supervisor, 4th Indi¬ 
ana district, spoilsman, 104.131,18'.^. 

Solid South,” vote of for Harrison and others at 
Minneapolis. 341. 

ortwell, federal officer, political worker, 3Bt. 


South Bend, Ind.. Posimaster Crockett of, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 153, 158, 316, 377, 378. 

South Bend, Ind., Times (rep.), against repeal ol 
civil service law, 83. 

S. Carolina, political activity of federal officers in, 
:U7. 348, 382, 390. 

South Dakota, political assessments in Indian serv¬ 
ice iu. 384 , 385. 

South Hadley Falls, Mass., democrat Kirkpatrick 
nominated, see Wallace and Harrison, 1-57. 

Spalding appointed postmaster at Champaign, 111., 
through influence of Prlv. Sec. Halford, 38. 

Sparta, Ill., Editor Tavlor appointed postmaster at, 
141. 

Spatz. Louis, Inspector in N. Y. custom-house, po¬ 
litical worker, 108. 

Speare, appointed postmaster at Quincy, Mass., by 
Cleveland, removal of sought by Morse, 86; re¬ 
moved, 100. 

Speed, H.,U. S. dis. atty., works for Harrison at 
Minnea|)Olis convention, 346. 

Spencer.T. \V., N. Y. state R. R. inspector, asked to 
resign,:)55. 356. 

Spencer, W. Va., Journalist Flinn postmaster at, 
155. 

Spencerville, Ind.. Proner postmaster of, political 
worker. 379, 380. 

Sperry, postmaster at New Haven, Conn., civ. serv¬ 
ice reformer. 91, 258; testifies to worth of Bario, 
removed P. 6. inspector, 298. 

Spldle, J., journalist, postmaster at Wilmot, O., 
1-19. 

Spiuola, congressman, against civil service re¬ 
form, 122, 125. 

Spirely, L. M., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Kingston, Mo., throngh influence of Fillev, 
132. 

Spoils system for paying the workers in this cotin- 
try and England, 19; evils of, see Lincoln; evils 
of. Pres. W. H. Harrison on, 3(): opposed by 
Thomas Jefferson, 46; eviks of, see Strong. Rev. 
S..102: evilsof.see Senator Sherman, also Houk, 
177. 

Spooner, senator of Wisconsin, obtains appoint¬ 
ment of Bro. R. Spooner as consul at Prague, 
30,354. 

Spooner, H.L., journalist,postmasterat Brookfield, 
N. Y., 155. 

Spooner, R., appointed consul at Prague through 
influence of Sen. Spooner, 30. 

Sprague. E. C., address of before annual meeting of 
National Lea.gue noticed, 2i)9. 

Sprague, H. H., at Balt. Conference, 1889. 2; signs 
petition for larger appropriation for civil serv. 
com., 102. 172; speech of on Roosevelt. 415. 

.Sprague. II. L.. ward politician, see also New York 
■ City. 241. 242. 

Spring Valley, O., wife of Journalist Hale postmas¬ 
ter at, 149. 

Springer, Congressman, and star route scandals, 
291. 

Springfield, Mass., case of Postmaster Rice, 87. 

Squire, R. M.. corrupt commissioner of public 
works, N. Y. City, see Hill..:40fi, 307. 

St. Charles. Iowa, Editor Wood appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142. 

St. Clairsville. O., Editor Hunt appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 301, 

St. Genevieve. Mo., Editor Ernst appointed post¬ 
master at. 126. 

St. George, W. Va., Lipscomb, son of journalist, 
postmaster at. 155. 

St. Joe Station. Ind., Postmaster Abies of, political 
worker. 379, 380. 

St. Joseph, Mo., political assessments of P. O. em¬ 
ployes at. 333. 

St. Lawrence, S. Dak., Journalist Sage postmaster 
at, 155. 

St. Louis, disposal of patronage at. see Kerens; ap¬ 
plicants for postnuKstership of, 24; J. B. Harlow 
appointed postmaster of. 88. 131; introduces re¬ 
form methods i:i6: plots to remove, 226; negro 
politicians of demand spoil. 1 16 ; post-office em¬ 
ployes at supporters of Filley machine, 1.50; 
custom-house at not classified, inimber of em¬ 
ployes in, 277; census service in. inefficient, 
295; Postmaster Harlow of ordered to give office 
to political worker Rnndstadtler, federal pa¬ 
tronage is used for Harrison’s renomination, 
304. 

St. Louis Globe-Democrat (rep.), patronage brings 
weakness. 76: on repeal civ. service law. 92. 

St. Louis Republic Idem.) favors good administra¬ 
tion, 51; considers civil service reform as of 
prime importance, .59; on lesson of Garfield’s 
assassination. 129: advocates civil service re¬ 
form. 138; on Filley machine, 150. 

St. Paul Pioneer-Press (repub.), civ.service reform 
not abandoned. 65: favors civil service reform, 
accountability of Harrison, 75. 

Stacy, postmaster at Albert Lea, Minn., removed 
for political reasons. ;i9. 

Stamp. A. II., federal employe, asked to pay politi¬ 
cal assessments, 391. 3!r2. 

Stnnberry, 5lo , fight over postmastership at, 121. 

“Star Route” ring, 28; scandals and Elkins, 290, 369, 
374. 

,8tarr, collector, i>olitical worker In Illinois, 335. 

Staubach, J. B., on merit system in post-office at 
Cincinnati. O.. 257. 

Stearns, appraiser in Boston custom-house re¬ 
moved through Congressman Cogswell. Dodge 
appointed, 250, 2s,s. 









XXXll 


INDEX. 


Stearns, J. T., custom-house auctioneer, in New 
York convention, 335. 

Steele, Congressman, given control of patronage by 
Harrison, 240. 

Steele, G., at Minneapolis convention, 346. 

Steele, Richard, in the Tattler, on absurdities of 
English spoils system, see Curtis, 120. 

Steele, W. T., governor of Oklahoma, political 
worker for Harrison. 189, 878. 

Stemen, pension examiner in Indiana, political 
worker, 380. 

Stepp, J. M., postmaster at Glen Hall, Ind., “re¬ 
signs,” 149. 

Sternberg, worker for Murphy, gets office through 
suspension of civil service rules in New York, 
414. 

Steuben, Ind., Republican [repub.], advocates 
civ. service reform, 76. 

Stevens, postmaster of Peru, Ind., political worker, 
379. 

Stevens, postmaster atShushan, N.Y., removed, 54. 

Stevens. E. N., editor, appointed postmaster at Pax¬ 
ton, Ill, 126. 

Stevens, J. L., journalist, postmaster at Plainview, 
Neb., 149. 

Stevens, W. H , employe in custom-house at St. 
Louis, Mo., worker for Filley machine, 150. 

Stevens, W. J., opposes Harrison in Alabama, 346; 
republican politician in Alabama, charges po¬ 
litical activity of federal office-holders in, 355. 

Stevenson, Congressman, on house committee, on 
civil service, 86. 

Stevenson, A. E., as presidential possibility, 235; 
ass’t P. M. gen’l under Cleveland, spoilsman, 
255,350,375 , 376 , 386, 408; democratic candidate 
for vice-president, 1892, 349; and Knights of the 
Golden Circle, 381, 389; vice-president elect, 388. 

Stevenson, R. B., endeavors to levy political assess¬ 
ments in Indian service in Kansas, 385. 

Stewart, senator of New York, and Fassett, collector 
at N. Y. City, 258. 

Stewart, Senator, attacks civil service commission, 
2-50,251. 

Stewart, D. F., postmaster at Wilmington, Del., po¬ 
litical worker, 334. 

Stewart. H., resignation of as postmaster at Mun- 
roeville, Ind., given office in Washington. 88. 

Stieb, P., employed in New York custom-house, a 
political worker. 108. 

Stiinson. Dr. D. M.. resigns from N. Y. City health 
dept., because it becomes political machine, 
356. 

Stinson, W. D., nephew of Mrs. Blaine, appointed 
postmaster at Augusta. Me., 321. 

Stockbridge. Congressman, controls post-office at 
Baltimore, Md., 84. 

Stockbridge, Senator, in Michigan convention, .335; 
supporter of Blaine, 344. 345. 

Stocking, S. W., promoted in patent office,efficient, 
140. 

Stockton, A. R , republican politician and post- 
mastership at Stanberry, Mo., 121. 

Stoddard, inspector in postal service, and removal 
of Farnum on secret charges, 175. 

Stokely, mayor, and Martin, disreputable politi¬ 
cian of Philadelphia. 233. 

Stokely, S., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

Stone, congressman, on house committee on civ. 
service, 86. 

Stone, collector and appointment of O’Donnell, 60. 

Stone, supporters of, bought by Delamater, 134. 

Stone. C. W., and pardon of Petroff and Kemble, 
152. 

Stone, F. C., internal rev. collector in Michigan, 
political worker, 390. 

Stone, Editor!. B., appointed collector internal rev¬ 
enue first Michigan district 30. 

Stone. Dr. R. F., pension examiner, removed. Dr. 
Elbert, negro, appointed, 192. 

Storer, ex-representative, opposed to Congressman 
Hitt, 109. 

Storey, M., praises Civil Service Chronicle, llO; 
on responsibility, 219; on Roosevelt clvil serv. 
ice reform, 2-57; on divorce of municipal busi¬ 
ness from politics, 261, 283. 286; on committee of 
National League to investigate political inter¬ 
ference of office-holders, 3:!8; chairman com¬ 
mittee Nat. League investigating political ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders under Harrison, 
report to by L. B. Swift, 375-381. 

Story City, Iowa, Editor Peterson appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Stoufer, A. K., journalist, postmaster at Arkalon, 
Kan., 148. 

Stover, representative in Indiana legislature, and 
spoils methods in, 407. 

Stratton, S. R., pres. Pa. republican ass’n, advo¬ 
cates clean sweep, 49; and office-seekers, 88; 
advocates political assessments and intimida¬ 
tion, 178, 179. 

Strawbery Point, la.. Postmaster Keith of, removed, 
see Clarkson, 55. 

Strong, M.. negro, unable to read or write, appoint¬ 
ed postmaster at Delmar, Ala., 47. 

Strong, Rev. Sidney, on evils of spoils system, 102. 

Strouser, I. R., compares Cleveland and Harrison, 
364. 

Strouther, P. W., deputy int. rev. coll., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention,348. 

Struble, I, S., congressman, forces resignation of 
Jasper, postmaster at Kingsley, la., 165, 


Stuart, P. O. inspector, at Minneapolis convention, 
344. 

Stuart, Iowa, Editor Moulton appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Stuart, R. S., inspector, dismissed of, 17. 

Studebaker, E. H., requested by R. Harrison to 
persuade Blaine delegate to vote for Harrison, 
337. 

Sturgis, O. T., editor, endorsed by Sen. Quay for 
postmaster at Uniontown, Pa., 99. 

Stutesman, auditing att’y at Peru, Ind., at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 379. 

Suffall, veteran, efficient postmaster at Freedom, 
Ind., removed for political reasons. Watts ap ¬ 
pointed through influence of Michener, 112, 
377. 

“Sugar frauds,” at New York, false charges against 
Dr. Sherer, in appraiser’s office at, 203. 

Sullivan, Ind., applicants for postmastershipat,88; 
Editor Clugage appointed postmaster at, 108, 
126, 377. 

Sullivan, J. E., county clerk of Marion Co , Ind., 
embezzels county funds, see Indianapolis. 

Sullivan. J. N., appointed postmaster at Berne, 
Ind., removed, 88. 

Sullivan, T., mayor of Indianapolis, should insti¬ 
tute civil service reform methods in city offices, 
as in Boston, Buffalo and Brooklyn, see equal¬ 
ly divided politically, 220; should introduce 
merit system in city service, 235; can at will 
apply merit system to every city department, 
243; elected twice by independent votes, 269. 

Sulzer, M. L., special Indian agent, worker for Har¬ 
rison. 316; opposed to Harrison, bribed with of- 
. flee, 377; political worker,389. 

Sultzer, deputy U. S. marshal, collects political as¬ 
sessments, 372. 

Sunhrlght, Tenn., Journalist Dunning postmaster 
at, 155. 

Sunner, J. H.. deputy collector at N. Y. City, at 
Minneapolis convention, 343. 

Suspension Bridge, N. Y., Low, customs collector 
at, a political worker, 265 ; custom-house at not 
classified, number of employes in, 277. 

Sutton, John, politician, appointed to look after 
office seekers, 46. 

Sylvanus, P. O. employe, political worker, in Dela¬ 
ware, 334. 

Syracuse, N. Y., candidates for postmastership at, 
incumbent favored by Belden, 46; editor ap¬ 
pointed postmaster at by Pres. Cleveland, 71; 
per cent of removals in classified and unclassi¬ 
fied service in post-office at, 185; Editor Smith, 
postmaster of, a political worker,.266, 335, 347, 
386. 

Syracuse, N. Y.. Standard (repuh.), on civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 92. 

Swain, councilman of Indianapolis, spoilsman and 
low politician, 207. 

Swalm, A W.. editor, postmaster in Mahaska Co., 
la., a political worker, 260. 

Swartout. ex-collector of port of New York, spoils¬ 
man. 272. 

Swayzee, G. S., employe in custom house at New 
Orleans, works for lottery, 143. 

Sweeney, Congressman, and post-office at Clear 
Lake, la., 121. 

Sweeney. State Senator of Indiana, votes against 
bill for non-partisan control of state charitable 
institutions, 201, 212; spoilsman, 408. 

Sweet, Miss, pension agent at Chicago, re-appoint¬ 
ed. Commissioner Black attempts to remove, 
serves full term, Mrs. Mulligan succeeds, 107. 

Sweet, E. R., removal of, 88. 

Sweet. W. L., political worker for Platt, 259, 260. 

Sweetland, H.. negro, councilman and low politi¬ 
cian of Indianapolis, 207. 

Swift, H.P., wins prize offered by Wanamaker in 
'R. R. service, 416. 

Swift, J. L.. journalist, given office by Collector 
Beard, 108; a political worker, 179. 

Swift, L. B , at Baltimore conference, 1889 . 2; let 
ter of Nov. 28, 1888, to editor Civil 8. Record, 
necessity for reform associations to be alert. 5; 
address of, before annual meeting Indiana 
Civil Service Reform Assoc., 108; address of, on 
civil service reform, 137; address of, on “gift of 
offices.” 145; on all other reforms should he 
subordinated to civil service reform, 1,53; ad¬ 
dress before annual meeting National League 
1890, 170.171, 172; letter to, from Roosevelt, re¬ 
futing charges of favoritism on part of civil 
service commission, 266, 267; address of, before 
annual meeting National League, noticed, 269; 
on committee of Nat. League investigating po¬ 
litical assessments, and political interference of 
federal office-holders. 338; on committee of 
Nat. League, to investigate political activity of 
federal office-holders underHarrison, report of, 
375-381. 

Tackett, M. D., appointed special land agent in re¬ 
ward for political services. 234, 377. 

Taft, editor, worker for Sherman, brother of U. S. 
solicitor-general, 301. 

Taggart, T., ward politician at Indianapolis, 315; 
chairman Indiana state democratic committee, 
on Gray, 396; patronage of, 400. 401; chairman 
Indiana state democratic committee. 407. 

Taggart. W. G., postmaster of Newburg, N. Y,, po¬ 
litical worker for Platt, 260. 

Tait. J. H., journalist, postmaster at Goodland, 
Kan., 149. 


Talladega, Ala., postmaster of removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons, protectionist democrat appointed, 
186. 

Tallentlre, fire-foreman at Indianapolis, a political 
worker, 208. 

“Tally-sheet” frauds at Indianapolis, see Indianap¬ 
olis. 

Tama, Iowa, Editor Wonser appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Tammany Hall, see Feudalism revived : opposed to 
civil service reform, 128; rule of in New York 
City, 130, 230, 262, 274, 298, 311, 313, 314; controls 
patronage of Brooklyn navy yard, under Sec’y 
Whitney, 148; political assessments levied by, 
estimates of, 183,184; uses “pass” examinaiions, 
192; primaries of and republican primaries, 198, 
199; supported by Gorman, 214; continued ex¬ 
posure of evils of, will defeat, 219; methods of, 
224,225,234; R. Croker “boss” of, and McLaugh¬ 
lin, 245,309; rules New York, 283, 284; and Platt, 
288; corrupting Influences of, 289, 290; of Cin¬ 
cinnati, O., opposes Sherman. 297; defended by 

R. Croker, 305, 323; evils of rule of, 317, 320, 333, 
356 , 385, 390; and nomination of Stevenson. 349; 
and N. Y. republican machine, .352; and N. Y. 
City, streets, 357; allied with Platt, 376; fears of 
under Cleveland, 388; and appointment of Mrs. 
Maloney as police matron, 404; need of civil 
service reform paper to oppose, 414. 

Tampa, Fla., Editor Cooper appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Tanner, “Corporal,” appointed by Pres. Harrison as 
superintendent of pensions, 27; appoints his 
daughter his private sec., 38; spoilsman, 51; 
removals by, for political reasons, 53, 54. 

Tanner, J., U. S. sub treasurer, political worker in 
Illinois, 335. 

Tanner, J., asst, treasurer, at Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 344. 

Tansel, A., journalist, postmaster at Haddam, Kan., 
149. 

Tafley, Wm. B., journalist, postmaster at Frankfort, 

S. Dak., 155. 

Taffer, police commissioner of N. Y. City, Tam¬ 
many tool, 356. 

Tarbox, postmaster at Rochester, N. Y., a political 
Avorker, 280. 

Tarleton, T. P., dep. col. int. rev., delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Tarrow, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons by Coulter, 55. 

Tate, confesses to accepting bribes, 151. 

Taylor, river commissioner, at Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 379, 380. 

Taylor, Judge, political worker for Harrison, 302, 
343. 

Taylor, (.Illinois) Congressman, and Chicago post- 
office, 22. 

Taylor (Ohio), congressman of Ohio, opposed to 
civil service reform system, 35, 49; congressman 
and office-seeker in Ohio, 75. 

Taylor (Indiana), congressman, patronage of, 419, 
421. 

Taylor, Col., special treasury agent, active politi¬ 
cal worker. 108. 

Taylor, D. D., editor,brother of postmaster at Cam¬ 
bridge, O., 301. 

Taylor, H. A., edltorandpolitician, appointed com¬ 
missioner of railroads, 39,108. 

Taylor, S.J.,editor, appointed postmaster at Sparta, 
Ill., 141. 

Tell City, Ind., Schrieber postmaster of, political 
worker, 380. 

Teller, Senator, supporter of Blaine, 844 , 346. 

Tennessee, appointees to Indian service from, under 
Cleveland, 219; political activity of federal 
office-holders in, 337, 339, 346, 347. 

Tenure law for four years, condemned by National 
League, 321. 

Terre Haute, Ind., Manson, efficient collector at, 
removed by Harrison, Throop appointed, 59; 
should have civil service law applied to local 
offices, 85; Greiner postmaster of, political 
worker, 153, 1.58, 316, 342, 313 . 346, 377, 378, 379; 
Congressman Brookshire allows Voorhees to 
name postmaster of,405. 

Terre Haute Mail [repuh.], opposed to spoils sys¬ 
tem, 83. 

Terrell, asst. U. S. attorney in Texas, a political 
worker, 159. 

Terrell, E. H., minister to Belgium, 14; 

Terry, P. E., postmaster at Terryvllle N. Y.. re¬ 
moved for refusing to pay political assessments, 
391. 

Terry. S. S., on committee investigating N. Y.City 
civil service. 319, 320. 

Terryville, N. Y., Terry, postmaster of, removed 
for refusing to pay political assessments, 391. 

Tests, competitive, objections to, 26. 

Texas, republicans of, headed by Customs Collector 
Cuney, 150; patronage of given to Collector 
Cuney, factions of, 158.159,173; political activity 
of federal officers in, 345, 346, 347, 848; political 
assessments in, 383. 

Thalman, low politician, councilman, and Indpls. 
fire department, 13; spoilsman, 69, 207. 

Theopolis, R . federal office holder and political 
worker, 179. 

Thieme, A. B., census enumerator on inefficiency of 
the service. 294. 

Thomas, U. S. marshal, a political worker,bargains 
with Karr, 160. 







INDEX. 


XXXlll 


Thomas, state senator of Penn., political worker for 
(iuay, 2»0. 

Thomas, and Cleveland administration, 2o, 51. 

Thomas, A. U., librarian of Haverford College, letter 
ot, 412, 422. 

Thomas, B. F , journalist, postmaster at Wymore 
Neb., 149. 

Thomas, T. F., P. O.employe at Baltimore, political 
worker, 267 , 296, 635. 

Thomas, M. A., low politician, appointed Indian 
agent through influence of Gorman, 237. 

Thomas, S., levies political assessments in New 
York, 391, 392. 

Thomas, W. C., journalist, postmaster at Osseo 
Wis., 155. 

Thompson, controller at Philadelphia, makes re 
movals for political reasons, 239. 

Thompson, secy, of state for New Hampshire, 143. 

Thompson, threatens office-holders, 55. 

Thompson, Dr., state senator, advocate of spoils 
system in state charitable institutions of Indi¬ 
ana, opposes new charter for Indianapolis, see 
also, Magee, 201,212. 

Thompson, E. P., asst, postmaster at Indpls., rein 
stated, 9; and Moore,25; tries to secure special ex 
aminatiou, 26; and fraudulent appointments of 
Wheat and Tousey,2S; recommends Van Buren, 
spoilsman, for local civil service board, asks 
for special examination, 34; acting postmaster 
at Indianapolis, favors civil service reform,227 
229; promoted to be postmaster, consequent 
promotions, 235; political worker; and subor 
dlnates, work for Harrison at Minneapolis, 337, 
343; attempt to coerce by Merrill Moores, small 
republican boss, 366; political worker, 302, 316 
320,37s ,379,382; removes carrier Dunn for solicit 


ing political contributions, 403. 

Thompson, H. S., civil service commissioner ap¬ 
pointed by President Harrison, 17; and political 
assessments, 70; and Shidy case, 101; before 
congressional committee, 119; commended, 
125; resigns, 322; and Attorney-General Miller, 
330, 372. 


Thompson, O., postmaster in Winneshiek Co., la., 
a political worker, 260. 

Thornton, B., negro detective, used for Harrison at 
Minneapolis convention, 345. 

Thornton, G. E., day director in navy causes un¬ 
warranted removal of Carpenter, postmaster at 
New Bedford, Mass., 175, 176. 

Thockmorton, D. I., candidate for postmaster of La 
Fayette, Ind., 71, 84. 


Throop, J. P., appointment of, condemned, 51; po¬ 
litical worker, appointed collector internal rev¬ 
enue, 59; political worker, 362,380. 

Thurber, F. B., recommends “Paddy” Divver for 
police justice, 184. 


Thurston, J. M., president league of republican 
clubs, speaks in favor of civil service reform, 
219. 

Tice, F., appointed postmaster at Mt. Morris, Ill., 
see Hitt, 109. 

Tlchner, postmaster of Princeton, Ind., political 
worker, .316, 378. 

Tildeu, Governor of New York, exposes Chemung 
canal robbery, see Hill, 306; civil service re¬ 
form a democratic principle under, 397. 

Tilton, R. L., postmaster in Wapello Co., Iowa, a 
political worker, 260. 

“Tin Horns,” low republican politicians, see Indi¬ 
anapolis, corrupt politics, etc., at. 

Tindolph, postmaster of Vincennes, Ind., at Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 380. 

Tippecanoe Club, of Baltimore, resolutions of, de¬ 
nounce civil service reform and the commis¬ 
sion, 49. 

Tissue Ballot System, in the South, 29. 

Tittman, Prof., of U. S. coast survey, in " sugar 
frauds” investigation, 203. 

Todd, J. S., removed on suspicion of being disloyal 
to Harrison, 300. 

Toland, G. R., postmaster at Aabury Park, N. Y., 
under Cleveland, 386. 

Toledo, III., Editor Conner appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Toledo Blade (rep.), spoilsmen must go 92. 

Tolona. Ill., Editor Chapin appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Tomblin, AI., opposes appointment of Williams as 
postmaster at Stanberry, Mo., 121. 

Tomlinson, D. W., recommended by Owen for 
postmaster of Logansport, Ind., 88; postmaster 
of Logansport, Ind., a political worker, 153,158, 
260, 377. 

Tompkins, ease of, 94. 

Toomey, M.. ward politician, see Indianapolis, 196. 

Tousey, W. E.. ward politician, not on eligible list, 
re-instated in Indianapolis post-office after ab¬ 
sence of years. 26, 27; dismissed by civil service 
commission, 34. 

Tousey, same, alderman of Indianapolis, spoils¬ 
man and low politician, 207. 

Towner, R. B., and Flower, 287. 

Townsend, congressman, nomination secured by 
bribery, 151. 

Tracy, congressman, and civil service law, 122; on 
civil service failures of Harrison, favors civil 
service Iftw, 125. 

Tracy, U. S. marshal, active politician, 113. 

Tracy, sec. of navy, and offices in Brooklyn navy- 
yard, 55; and repairs at Norfolk navy-yard, 56; 
recommends Captain Folger to succeed Com. j 
Slcard, 100; favors W. G. Taylor, 1.35; course of 


in Brooklyn navy-yard, 142; opposes Nathan, 
ward politician, 143; gives navy-yards up as 
spoils, see Kittery, 145; and spoils system in 
navy-yard at Portsmouth, N. H. (Kittery), 148; 
conduct of in Brooklyn, Kittery, Norfolk and 
Charleston navy-yards, 158, 170; introduces re¬ 
form methods in navy-yards, commends civil 
service law, 219, 221, 222, 274, 276, 298,306, 321, 
372, 376; holds Feaster responsible for bad 
work by henchmen at Mare Island navy-yard, 
226; introduces merit system in navy-yards, 
230, 236 , 2,38, 251; should institute examina¬ 
tions under civil service commission for pro¬ 
motions in navy department, 254, 257; com¬ 
mended, 287, 290; and removalsfor political 
reasons in navy yards, 34; on Improvements in 
navy yard management, 326; supports Rhine- 
hart, 332; removes supporters of Platt, 334; po¬ 
litical worker for Harrison in New York, .3.36, 
339, 347; “placates” Platt, 353; removes Page, 
chief of ordnance dept, in Brooklyn navy yard, 
355; introduces Boston labor system in navy 
yards, 3.57; and Nathan, 371. 

Traitteur, treasurer inspector, pays political assess¬ 
ments, 279. 

Treadwell, W. S., sec’y Kings Co., N. Y., central re¬ 
publican committee, worker for Nathan, 198, 
304. 

Treasury department, offices in, 24; removals of la¬ 
borers in, 29; examinations for, see De Land, 
1.52; employes under supervising architect of, 
selected by civil service examinations, though 
not required by law, 224. 

Trevelyan, Sir G. O., on competitive tests in En¬ 
glish civil and military service, 118. 

Treynor, I. M., postmaster at Council Bluffs, la., a 
political worker, 260. 

Tripp, editor, son of appointed postmaster at Car¬ 
rollton, O., 301. 

Tripp, T. H., supporter of Platt in N. Y. conven¬ 
tion, 335. 

Tripp, O.H., works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 
343, 379. 

Trollope, A., opposed to merit system of England, 
227. 

Trollington, J. H., postmaster at Palo Pinto, Mo., 
buys office, 55. 

Troy, Ind., Gardiner, postmaster of, political work¬ 
er, 380. 

Troy. N. Y., post-office at, investigated by civil serv. 
com., spoils system in, 29. 

True, T.W., postmaster at Eureka Springs, Ark., 
denounced by republicans, 55. 

Trusler, P. C., and Indianapolis fire department, 
13; award boss, councilman of Indianapolis, 
obtains removal of Fire Chief Webster, 36; 
spoilsman, see Indianapolis, 69, 380; candidate, 
162; tries to turn fire service at over to spoils, 
207, 208. 

Trust, G., low politician and murderer, gets office 
through Gorman, 237. 

Truxton, Commodore, commandant navy yard at 
Norfolk, Va.. 147. 

Tucker, postmaster at Annapolis, in Maryland con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Tugwell, A. P., ex-collector, a political worker, 159. 

Turner, postmaster at Newtonvllle, Mass., indorsed 
for re appointment, 100. 

Turner, Congressman, favors civ. service reform 
100 . 

Turpie, Senator, 3i)3, 404; patronage of, 405, 410, 413, 
418, 419, 420, 421, 122. 

Tuscaloosa, Ala., Miller, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Tweed,“B 088 ,” 28 , 190, 211,212; allied with Hill, 306. 

Tyner, “Jim,” ass’t att’y-gen’l for P. O. dep’t, con¬ 
strues civil service law in favor of Baltimore 
federal employes, politically active, 357, 858. 

Tyrrell, W. A., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Waverly, Iowa, 142. 

Underwood. W.. appointed postmaster at Washing¬ 
ton, Penn., 100. 

Union, Ind., Fearis, postmaster of, political work¬ 
er, 816, 378. 

Union City, Mich., Journalist Easton, postma-ster 
at, 149. 

Union League Club, and Platt, 333. 

Uniontown, Pa., Patterson appointed postmaster at 
through influence of Frick,99. 

U. S. Supreme Bench, considered as spoils, 24. 

Upper Sandusky, O., Editor Cuneo postmaster at, 
301. 

Upton, J. D., defeated candidate, sale of offices by 
in Missouri, 55, 99. 

Urwitz, M., sec’y central republican exec, commit¬ 
tee, Texas, denounces Cuney, ISO. 

Utah, relative of Pres. Harrison given position in, 
30, 369; sentiment favoring civil service reform 
in, 111; political activity of office-holders in, 
339, 345, 347; vote of for Harrison at Minneapo¬ 
lis, 347. 

Utica, O., Journalist Harris postmaster at, 149. 

Utica, N. Y., Miller, postmaster of, a political 
worker, 266. 

Utter, A. W., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Emmettsburg. Iowa, 142. 

Uxbridge. Mass., Postmaster Farnum of. removed 
on secret charges, Scott appointed, 175. 

Vail, D., editor, appointe i postmaster at New 
Sharon, Iowa, 142. 

Vail, J. M., journalist, postmaster at. New Milford, 
Pa. 149. 

Valley Center, Journalist Beach postmaster at, 149. 


Valley Virginian [repiib.], opposed to Mahone,58. 

Valparaiso, Ind., Postmaster De Motte of, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 153, 377, 378; works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 316, 343; at Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 379. 

Van Alstyne, J. L., physician, pension examiner, 
removed through Postmaster Dunn, 304. 

Van Auda, Rev. A. C., address of on “Purity in 
Politics,” 137. 

Van Buren, M., Pres., spoils system attributed to, 
262. 

Van Buren, W. A., recommended for appointment 
to local service board at Indianapolis, spoils¬ 
man, 34, 78; attends dinner to Roosevelt (see), 
227, 229. 

Van Cliff, M. E., commissioner (U. S.) circuit court 
in New York, a political worker, 266. 

Van Cott, appointed postmaster at New York, for 
party services. 13, 20; and civil service commis¬ 
sion, 42; appointed at dictation of Platt, 22, 44; 
appoints his son cashier of post-office, 108; as¬ 
sists at dinner to Clarkson, 245; calls on Fas- 
sett, collector at. 2.58; gives offices to supporters 
of Gibbs, political worker, 265, 269; political 
worker, 279, 287; defended by Wanamaker, 289; 
and political workers, 311; works for Harrison 
at Minneapolis, wants Hendricks to lead in 
New York, 337,344, .347, 396. 

Van Duzer, ex-assemblyman of New York, opposes 
Platt and Fassett, 259; postmaster at Horse- 
heads. N. Y.. a political worker, 265; andremov- 
al of Flood, 304; attempted removal of by Fas¬ 
sett, 3.31. 

Van Horn, R. T., controlling patronage of Missouri, 
24. 

Van Houten, editor, appointed postmaster at Lenox, 
Iowa, 142. 

Van Riper, J., postmaster at Rutherford, N. J., re¬ 
moved on secret charges, 175. 

Van Schaick, Congressman, and Postmaster Paul of 
Milwaukee, 44, 47; his “prerogative,” 55. 

Van Slyke, J., editor, appointed postmaster at Mc¬ 
Henry, Ill., 141. 

Van Voorhis, J. R., Tammany man, career of 318. 

Vance, Senator, on civil service reform, 117; and 
Eaves, 159. 

Vandermost, J., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Monroe, la., 142. 

Vandervoort, P., chief clerk R. R. service, 1883, in¬ 
capable, discharged, and reappointed at sugges¬ 
tion of Nebraska congressmen, 17; and Harri¬ 
son administration, 25; henchman, 21, 34, 35, 54; 
supt. of mails at Omaha, Neb., disreputable 
politician and spoilsman, 211; career of, 215, 
216, 220,357. 

Vaudevere, C. E., appointed by Cleveland, Indian 
agent, efficient, but removed. 181. 

Vesey, postmaster at Baltimore, spoilsman, re¬ 
movals under, 53; and Sears, P. O. employe at, 
277. 

Vest. Senator, a spoilsman, 6,43,45; Arthur’s admin¬ 
istration, 24; secures appointment for son, to- 
taily unlit, under Cleveland, 242; on the issue, 
37-5. 

Vest, G., son of Senator Vest, appointed to diplo¬ 
matic service under Cleveland, totally unfit, 
242. 

Vevay, Postmaster Shaw and Deputy Long, of Ve- 
vay, Ind.. political workers, 379. 

Vicksburgh, Mich., Journalist Baldwin postmaster 
at, 149. 

Vicksburg, Miss., Hill, negro, postmaster of, worker 
at Minneapolis, 343. 348. 

Vigneaux, J., U. S. marshal, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, :J48. 

Vilas, W. F., senator and ex-P. M. Geul., spoilsman. 
20, 21; removals under, 96; compelled to let 
Faulkner stay in office by Voorhees, 222; under 
Cleveland, spoilsman, 255; and civil service re¬ 
form, 274 ; under Cleveland, spoilsman, 364. 

Vincennes, Indiana, letter from corre.spondenf at, 
16; post-office at, 37; Tindolph, postmaster of, at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Vineland, N. J., postmaster at. removed on false 
charge, really for political reasons, 39. 

Virginia, patronage of given by Pres. Harrison to 
Mahone, 27. 28, 31, 38, 41, -51, 52, 56. 67, 6.S, 70, 111, 
282,332.376; political assessments in, made by 
republicans, 226; political activity of federal 
office-holders in, supports Blaine, 348, 345, 370. 

Vogel, “Gus,” federal office-holder at St. Louis, 
worker for Filley machine, 150. 

Voght, F., molder, appointed in office of Gold, 
township trustee, at Indianapolis, 2-56. 

Voght, W. P., editor, appointed postmaster at Cov¬ 
ington, In<l., 126.377. 

Von Bergman. A., editor, given office through Con¬ 
gressman Belden, 132. 

Von Laudberg. A., editor, internal revenue col¬ 
lector. removals by, 150. 

Voorhees. Senator, a spoilsman, 5, 43, 45, 177, 244, 
381, 404; opposed to civil service reform, 8o; 
political turn-coat. 171; secures place for Faulk¬ 
ner, illiterate politician, 222; and Cleveland, 
235; favors Gorman for president. 236; supports 
Hanlon for internal revenue collector at New 
Albany. Ind., 393; allowed by Brookshire to 
name postmaster at Terre Haute. Ind., 405; 
patronage of, 409, 410, 413, 418, 419, 420, 421, 422. 

Wade, F., journalist, postmaster at Sanguatuck, 
Mich., 149. 

Wade, of Missouri, and office-seekers, 6,15. 

Waddick, ballot-box stuffer, see Hudson Co., N. Y. 











XXXIV 


1 N D I-: X . 


Wadsworth, J. W., congressman-elect, calls for po¬ 
litical assessments, 279, HiA. 

Wagner, chairman Kings Co. (N. Y.) republican 
committee, levies political assessments, 287. 

Wakeman, W. F., sec’y American Protective Tariff 
League, at Minneapolis convention, 314; cir¬ 
cular letter of, to postmasters, 382. 

Walker, congressman, secures appointment of 
Scott as postmaster at Uxbridge, Mass., 175. 

Walker, internal revenue collector, assists at din¬ 
ner to Clarkson, 245. 

Walker, B. W., U. S. marshal in Alabama, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Walker, F. A,, and censuses of 1870 and 1880, 291; on 
selection of census enumerators, 294; on census 
of 1870,1880, 1890, 295. 

Walker, O. D., physician, employed in Indian serv¬ 
ice, asked for political contribution, 386. 

Walker, W. B., defeated applicant indorsed gener¬ 
ally for postmaster at Hamilton, Mo., 150. 

Wallace, helped by Quay, 135. 

Wallace, deputy postmaster at Indiauai)olis, a po¬ 
litical worker. 144. 

Wallace, D., P. O. employe at Indianapolis, works 
for Harrison, 302, 337, 343, 377, 378,379. 

Wallace, Gen. L., obtains postmastersbip at Indi¬ 
anapolis for brother, for services to Harrison at 
Chicago convention, 26. 

Wallace. S., inspector in N. Y. custom-house, a po¬ 
litical worker, 108. 

Wallace, postmaster at Indianapolis directed by 
civil service commission to remove Moore, 
gambler, 27, 28; views of civil s. ref., 2,9,18; law 
violated by, 25; appointed at request of General 
L. Wallace, cares little for success of civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 26; re-instates R. B. Mundelle, dis¬ 
charged by Jones, i) 08 tmaster, 27; and Hamlin, 
bad character, keeps him in office, 34; and local 
board, 43, 48, 73; secretly a political worker, 144; 
death of. a loss to the public service, 2i9. 

Wallace, W. C., Congressman, obtains appointment 
of 200 henchmen in Brooklyn navy yard, 55, 72; 
aided by ward politician. Nathan, 121,150; and 
• Dan” Lake, 132; opposed by Benedict and 
Seo’y Tracy, 135; controls patronage in New 
York, 142; secures appointment of M. Malone, 
143; secures nomination of postmaster Kirk¬ 
patrick, 157; candidate for congress, re-nomi¬ 
nated, see Nathan, 178, 374; trading in behalf 
of, by Nathan, federal employe, 179,180; Boyle, 
navy employe, political worker for, 183. 

Walser, Z. V., federal employe, Harrison delegate 
from N. Carolina, .334. 

Walter, P. L., accuses Delamater of bribery, 134. 

Walters, J., political worker under Postmaster 
Johnson in Maryland, 335. 

Walters, N., politician, candidate for postmaster at 
Rochelle, Ill., 109. 

Walton, T., beaten by ballot frauds, see Martin, low 
politician. 

Wanamaker, P. M. Gen’l., endorses Martin, low pol- 
tician,for collector internal revenue, see 239; 
and W. W. Dudley. 2; rules for employes, con¬ 
cerning applicants, 14,16; and the postmaster- 
ship of Philadelphia, 15, 22; at dictation of Sen¬ 
ator Quay, 27; removes postmaster at New 
Bedford (Mass.), despite protests, and without 
cause or hearing, 29; in conflict with Senator 
Quay over Philadelphia spoils, 30; and civ. 
service commission, 36; favors Gorman, 38; re¬ 
moves postmaster at Vineland, N. J., for politi¬ 
cal reasons on false charges, 39; spoilsman, 43, 
174, 290; and Van Cott, postmaster at N.Y. City, 
41; and Postmaster Paul, of Milwaukee, 44; ac¬ 
cepts nominations of Brower, congressman, 47; 
to be blamed for patronage scandal, 55; and 
postmaster at Cheraw, S. C.,55; protest against 
tflarkson sent to, 55; on necessity of reform in 
railway mail service, 69; career of in politics, and 
removals of postmasters by. 70; and Sen. Wade 
Ham pton, concerning post-office at Columbia.S. 
C.,74; and postmaster at Laurencevllle, Va., 74; 
circular letter of Marshall Cushing, private sec’y 
to. 80; gives disposal of postmastersbip at Balti¬ 
more to Stockbridge, 84; see Russellville. Ind., 
89; gives post-office at Pittsburgh to Sen. Quay, 
90; and re-appointment of Montgomery as post¬ 
master at Bristol, Conn..91,92; removals under, 
96 ; and English, postmaster at New Haven, 
Conn., 96; and Frick, 99‘ and removal of Hart¬ 
ley, 101; course of in Shidy case, 103. 104; and 
post office at Rochelle, Ill., 110; tool of Quay, 
112, 1.33,138, 161,173; letter to from Cooper re¬ 
garding postmasters at Freedom and Brooklyn, 
Ind., 112; condemned, 125; testifies to worth of 
Postmaster Hendrix of Brooklyn, N. Y.. 131; 
removals under McKean, postmaster at Pitts¬ 
burgh, 133; approves Pres. Cleveland’s circular 
warning federal employes against undue politi¬ 
cal activity, 135; and use of post-offices for politi¬ 
cal purposes. 135; and Quay. 161; refuses access 
to records of removals, etc,, 163; report of for 1889, 
pastof, 163,164; suggests assessments on corpor¬ 
ations, 171; and Foulke, 173; on secret charges, 
175; hostile to civil service reform, 177; charges 
of agalnstcivil service commission. 185; letter of 
to Postmaster Marsh alleging congressional in¬ 
fluence for removal, letters of to others.removed, 
187; letter of to McCauley regarding removal, 187; 
refuses to re-appoint democratic postmaster 
Harrington, 188; and Baltimore post-office, 189; 
evasive course of, 190,191; charges of Inefficiency 
agalnstcivil service commission met, 193; and 


railway mail’ service, 203; Mail Superintendent 
Vaudervoort, disreputable politician and spoils- 
man,safe with,211 ;aud Delphi (Iud.)Journal,213; 
defendeii by Gorman against Roosevelt, 214; 
Leeds, corrupt politician, 216; a “pious fraud,” 
see Vandervoort, 220; objects to civil serv¬ 
ice reform, gives prize to Oler for efficiency 
in mail service. 224; rule of to re-appoint only 
republicans violated, 224; backs Quay, 2‘2S; 
defended for spoils methods by Gorman, 228; 
gets office as political reward, 237’; obligations of 
Harrison to, 240; collects campaign funds, gam¬ 
bles in stocks with Lucas, countenances fraudu¬ 
lent issues of stock, 245, 246; and appointment 
of Low,249; and smalloffice-8eekers.251; should 
institute examinations under civil service com¬ 
mission for promotions in his department, 254; 
appointment of hurts civil service reform, 255, 
2-36; establishes board of promotion by com¬ 
petitive examination in P. 0. department, 256, 
2-57; injures civil service reform, see Lambert, 
261; uses postmasters as political agents, 262; 
and civil service reform, 274; letter to Sears, 
giving inefficiency as cause of removal, 277; ob¬ 
jects to political assessments In P. ©.depart¬ 
ment, 280; and violations of law in Omaha post- 
office, 281; defends Van Cott, postmaster at New 
York, 289; refuses to tell Flood alleged reasons 
for removal,promotion scheme of ,297,298,303,304; 
introduced promotion by competition in P.O. de¬ 
partment, 321; and Baltimore investigation, 829, 
3;10,372, 373, 396; political worker for Harrison, 
299; and attempted removal of Postmaster Van 
Duzer, 331, 339, 340, 349; and political activity 
of federal employes at Baltimore, 335, 350, 357, 
358; refuses list of employes for assessment pur¬ 
poses, 363, 364; appointed in return for raising 
campaign fund. ;>68.374,376; and political activ¬ 
ity of postmasters, 375, 389; and removal for po¬ 
litical reasons of Duer, postmaster at Princess 
Anne, Md., 408; gives prize to Swift, efficient R. 
R. postal clerk, 415. 

Wanmaker, G. W., low politician in New York, 
311; and cartage contract at N. Y. custom-house, 
358. 

Ward, postmaster at Salem, Ind., political worker, 
380. 

War^d, carrier at Indianapolis post office, removed. 

Ward. C., and attempted bribery by Sen. Higgins 
and Postmaster Smith, in Delaware, 402. 

Ward, J. A., editor, candidate for postmaster at 
Lockport, N. Y.,216. 

Ward, W. J., affidavit of on sale of offices bv J. 
Love, 99. 

Warmcastle, S. D., revenue collector, begs Blaine 
to speak, 18U; political worker for Quay, 270; 
280; supporter of Quay, removed by Harrison, 
299. 

Warmouth, H. C., ex-Gov., appointed collector at 
New Orleans, 44,52; ruffianly politician, 105; aids 
lottery, 143,191; secures appointment of Weber 
as postmaster at Donaldson, La.. 241; worker for 
Harrison in Louisiana, 304; supports Harrison 
at Minneapolis, .345 , 346; worker for Harrison, 
348, 357, 362, 374; pays political assessments, 
o83. 

Warner, C. D., address of on spoils system atlndian- 
opolis, 415. 

Warner, C. W., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Hoopeston, Ill., 141,1(>5. 

Warner, J. M., spoken of as postmaster for Albany, 
N. Y., 46; postmaster at Albany, N. Y., favors 
civil service reform, 51; enforces civil service 
law. 136; delegate to N. Y. convention, 335. 

Warsaw, Ind., Bennett, postmaster of. political 
worker for Hairisou, 316, 378, 380. 

Warsaw, Mo., post-office at sold by Upton, 55. 

Warwick, Congressman, institutes competitive ex¬ 
amination for candidates for West Point, does 
not accept result, 254, 262. 

Washburn, Senator, patronage a source of weak¬ 
ness, 25: indorses E. G. Hay, 81; supporter of 
Blaine, .344, 345. 

Washington (state), political activity of federal of¬ 
fice-holders in, 357. 

Washington. D. C., Sherwood promoted to be post¬ 
master at. 1.53; proportion of applicants to of¬ 
fices in, under Harrison and Cleveland, 185; 
Harrison removes U. S. district attorney at, 211; 
rnerit system in departments at, 224; competi¬ 
tive examinations under civil service commis¬ 
sion order for promotions in departments at, 
2.54: Harrison makes rules for promotion in de¬ 
partments at, 261; department offices and the 
examinations, 273: political contributions asked 
in P. O. department by Watres, 280; merit sys¬ 
tem for laborers in navy yard at, instituted at 
and commended, 331: political assessments in 
departments at. ;!90, 392; examinations for de¬ 
partments at, 1891-92. .396; political assessments 
levied by Old Dominion republican club in de¬ 
partments at, 412. 

Washington Post, civil service reform a snare and 
a sham, 49. 

Washington Star (repub.), advocates civil service 
reform, 92. 

Washington, George, 116; on political duty, see head¬ 
line to Civil Service Chronicle for June, 
1890,129; Harrison compared with, 1-59; on evils 
of strict adherence to party, 236, 274; on evils of 
parties, 323, 394. 

Washington, Ind., Ellis appointed postmaster at, 
despite sale of office to Sefrits, 121. 


Washington, Kan., Journalist Robinson postmaster 
at, 119. 

Washington, Pa., Underwood appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 100. 

Washington Co., Ind., removals and appointments 
in,91. 

Waters, state senator of Pa., 1.33. 

Watertown, N. Y., Gates, postmaster of, furnishes 
political information, 392. 

Waterville, Me., Millican, postmaster of, and non¬ 
delivery of papers advocating Burleigh, con¬ 
gressional canoidate opi osing Manley, 364. 

Waterville, Wash., Journalist Kellogg, pjstmaster 
at, 155. 

Watkins, politician, and appointments in Brooklyn 
navy yard, 45. 

Watkins, N. Y.. P. Conroy appointed postmaster at, 
150. 

Watres, L. A., republican political worker for Quay, 
asks political contributions in P. O. department 
at Washington, D. C., 280. 

Watrous, J. W., editor, appointed customs collector 
at Milwaukee, through influence of Wisconsin 
congressmen, 71,126. 

Watson, “Billy,” ward politician, see also Kings 
Co.. N. Y., 182, 18:4, 302. 

Watson, C. W., chairman committee of N. Y. civ. 
service reform association, on civil service ex¬ 
aminations, 239, 319,320; on committee.National 
League, to investigate political assessments, 
338. 

Watts, F., appointed postmaster at Freedom, Ind., 
vice Suffall, removed for political reasons, :477. 

Waugh, congressman, patronage of, 419. 

Waverly, Iowa, Editor Tyrrell, appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142. 

Waverly, O., Journalist Snyder, postmaster at, 149, 
301. 

Wayne Co. (N. Y.) republicans, resolutions, of de¬ 
nouncing patronage system of republican 
party, 156. 

Weather bureau, merit system in, 253; service 
classified by Pres. Harrison, 403. 

Weatherby, Rev. S. S., on civ. service reform, 83. 

Weaver, postmaster at-, a political worker, 179. 

Weaver, J.M., congressman, obtains appointment 
of Low, political worker, as postmaster of West- 
port, N. Y., 249 , 3-54.. 

Weaver, V., editor, appointed postmaster at Loda, 
111., 141. 

Webb, constructor at Kittery (Me.), navy yard, ex¬ 
amination of, 147. 

Webb, W. E., census supervisor, pledges of to 
spoilsmen, 131. 

Weber, federal officer, appoints anti-Platt men,334. 

Weber, E. M., appointed postmaster at Donaldson, 
La., upon request of Collector Warmouth, 241. 

Webster, federal employes compelled to vote for, 
162. 

Webster, Daniel, address to Massachusetts whigs 
in 1832, public press and spoils, 17; on bribery of 
press,81,141,154,155,369, 376; spoils system under 
Jackson, 270, 324; sec’y of state under W. H. 
Harrison, circular of against political assess¬ 
ments and political activity of federal office¬ 
holders, 320. 

Webster, E. A., negro, coll. int. rev., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 848, .382. 

Webster, Col. G. P., patronage of in N. Y. legisla¬ 
ture, guilty of nepotism, 215. 

Webster, J. A., journalist, postmaster at Johnson, 
Kan., 149. 

Webster, J. H., chief of Indianapolis fire depart¬ 
ment. 13, 69; removed for political reasons, 86; 
influence of removal on city elections, 59; 
against spoils system. 203; effort to force him to 
turn fire service over to spoils; removal and re- 
pointment of, 207, 208. 

Webster, W. B., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Cresco, Iowa, 142. 

Wedgefield, S. C., Negro Richardson, postmaster 
of, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Weed, S., Tammany “boss,” and prison patronage, 
331. 

Weeks, thief, ordered to be employed in Kittery 
navy yard, see Robeson and Broadhead, 147. 

Weeping Water, Neb., removal of Postmaster Rat- 
nour of on secret charges, Butler appointed, 

1 m. 

Weigel, E. F., political worker for “Boss” Filley, 
given office by Sec’y Noble, 226. 

Weinsteil, L., editor, appointed collector fourth la. 
district, 56. 

Welling, stamp clerk at Indianapolis, 9. 

Wellington. G. L.. U. S. sub-treasurer, in Maryland 
convention, 335. 

Wells, A. J., veteran, discharged and reinstated by 
Jones, postmaster at Ind’pls, 9. 

Welsh H.. at Baltimore conference, 1889, 2; reap¬ 
pointment of Oberly, 9; controversy with Sen¬ 
ator Ingalls over Indian commissioner, 22; little 
progress in bettering condition of Indians due 
to spoils system. 39; circular letter of to clergy 
asking for clerical advocacy of civil service re¬ 
form, see, also, Church, 40; letter on treatment 
of Indians by administration of Pres. Harrison, 
42, 79; letter of to Boston Transcript on Indian 
service, 47; and clerical advocacy of civ. service 
reform, 65,73; letterof to Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle on Indian service. 98; denies charges 
against Indian Agent McChesney, 130; letterof 
to R. Lincoln, 161; and causes of Indian rising 









I N I) E X . 


XXXV 


at Pine Ridge, 192, 202, 217; on removals in In¬ 
dian service, 219; in Scribner’s Magazine for 
April, 1891, on evils of spoils system in Indian 
service, 224; before civil service reform asso¬ 
ciation of Penn., on Indian service, 239; on 
“Degradation of Politics in "Pennsylvania.” in 
Forum, Nov., 1891, 282, 324; on committee of Na¬ 
tional League, to investigate political inter¬ 
ference of otlice holders, 338; on committee of 
publication of Good Government, 357 ; on pub¬ 
licity as cure for political corruption, StUi. 

Wemple, controller, receives political contribu¬ 
tions, 180. 

Weuueker^internal revenue collector at St. Louis, 
and negro spoilsman, 14('); political worker, re¬ 
moval of requested by Secy. Noble, 3:to. 

West Grove, Chester Co., Pa., applicants as post¬ 
master of, 55. 

West Hoboken, N. J., postmaster Middleton of re¬ 
removed, no cause assigned, Klumpp appointed, 
176. 


West Point, Congressman Warwick institutes com¬ 
petitive examinations for candidates for, does 
not accept result, see McKinley, 264, 262. 

West Virginia, A. B. White, newspaper proprietor, 
appointed collector internal revenue, 30; asst, 
district attorney of, sued for embezzlement, 39; 
U. S. deputy marshal in. Indicted for bribery, 
39; republicans of believe in spoils, 62; conflict 
over patronage of, 71; census service in run 
after spoils system, 293; political activity of 
federal office-holders in, 348; political assess¬ 
ments levied on federal office holders from, ac¬ 
tivity of federal employes in, 390. 

Westchester, Pa., removal of Postmaster Pyle at, 
for political reasons, 101. 

WestcliiTe, Colo.,S. Lacey, wifeof editor,appointed 
postmaster at, 148. 

Westport, N. Y., political worker Low appointed 
postmaster at. 249. 

Wetherill, J. R., political worker under Postmaster 
Johnson, in Maryland, 335. 

Wheat, J.C., not on eligible list, re-instated In In¬ 
dianapolis post-office after absence of years, 
26, 27. 

Wheeler, inspector in mail service, recommended 
by Hiscock and Platt, for inspector in charge of 
mails, vice Rathbone resigned, 241. 

Wheeler, custom-house employe at N. Y. City, at 
Minneapolis convention, 343. 

Wheeler, editor, to be postmaster at Crown Point, 
Ind., 302. 

Wheeler, E. P., plan of, for agitation of civil serv¬ 
ice reform before Nat. League, 1889,66,172; civil 
service reformer in New York, 239; address of, 
before annual meeting of National League, no¬ 
ticed, 269. 

Wheeler, E. W., journalist, postmaster at Sherman, 
Mich., 149. 

Wheeler, J. J., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Crown Point, Ind., 377. 

Wheeler, W. E., journalist, postmaster at Eagle 
Park, Idaho, 155. 

White. ex Congressman, opposes Harrison, 317. 

White, collector internal revenue in Texas, a po¬ 
litical worker, 159. 

While. A. B., editor, appointed collector internal 
revenue for W. Virginia, 30, 37. 

White, A. D., candidate for governor of New York, 
supported by Platt and Nathan,265; works for 
Fassett, 280; appointed U. S. minister to Rus¬ 
sia, 382. 

White, E., ward politician, appointed deputy post¬ 
master at Poughkeepsie, N. Y., vice Smith re¬ 
moved, 386. 

White, E. A., internal rev. coll, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 334, 348. 

White. G., republican, removed from fire service 
at Indianapolis, see equally divided political¬ 
ly. 2.35. 

White, H., editor, political worker, 354. 

White H. G., politician opposing Hiscock in Onan- 
daga Co., N. Y., 264. 

White, Prof. H. S., praises Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle, 110. 

White. Prof. T. C.,brotherof U.S.marshal,delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

White Clay, Indian chief, andrisiugat Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak., 218. , 

Whitehead, special treasury agent, at Brooklyn, 

Whiteman, W. H.. appointed to supreme bench of 


N. Mexico, 24. 

Whitefield, asst, to Wanamaker, and appointment 
of Weber, 241; and appointment of Low, 249. 

Whlthorne, congressional investigating committee 
on Kittery navy yard, 147. 

Whitman, Mass., Harlow, postmaster at recom¬ 
mended for re appointment, 100. _ 

Whitney. F. M.. editor, appointed deputy internal 
revenue collector. 84,126. 

Whitney, J. A., political worker under Postmaster 
Johnson in Maryland, 3.35. 

Whitney. Sec’y. 82; gives navy yards up as spoil, 
145,147,148,222. 

Widney, J. A., soldier, postmaster at Woodhull, 
Ill., removed through influence of Cong. Hen¬ 


derson, 47. ^ ... .... 

Wigs, S.. discharged from navy yarn at Norfolk, 
Va., by Sec’y Whitney, 147. 

Wilber. Mrs., appointed postmaster at Clay city, 
Ind.. inefficient, 89. „ 

Wilbv, C. B., letter to Civil Service Chrcwicle. 
92; on proposed charter for Cincinnati, O., 23a, 
address of, on G. W. Curtis, 394. 


Wilcox, appointed collector at Springfield, Ill., 
through influence of Cannon, 31. 

Wilcox, C. A., editor, appointed postmaster at Quin¬ 
cy. Ill., 141, 148. 

Wilcox, I. S., revenue collector, a political worker, 
160. 

Wilcox, Dr. J. A., Harrison delegate from N. Caro¬ 
lina, 334. 

Wildman. J. F., editor and Harrison “boomer,” ap¬ 
plicant for postmastersbip of Muncie, Ind., 217. 

Wiley, E., wife of Journalist Wiley, postmaster at 
Elizabeth, Pa., 149. 

Williams, G. F., opposed to civil service reform, 
according to Grosvenor, 204; as congressman 
on minister as citizen, 239. 

Williams, J. M., journalist, postmaster at Phoenix, 
N. Y., 155. 

Williams, O., steward at Marion Co. (Ind.) poor- 
house, neglects duty, see also Indianapolis, cor¬ 
rupt politics, etc., at, 207. 

Williams, R., editor, works for Harrison, tries for 
office, disappointed, 95. 

Williams, S,, federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

Williams, V. T., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Stanberry, Mo., appointment recalled on polit¬ 
ical opposition. 121. 

Williamsville, N. Y., Journalist Rinewalt postmas¬ 
ter at, 155. 

Willis, Rev. J. S.. republican candidate for con¬ 
gress, offers bribes, 402. 

Willis, L. W., receiver of political assessments in 
Alabama, 391. 

Willis, T. B., appointed naval officer at New York, 
as reward for party services, scandalous parti¬ 
san, 55,106, 121, 132, 182,183, 191, 198, 304, 350, 355; 
appoints Politician Barrow his deputy, 108; and 
Brooklyn, N. Y., post-office, 135; political activ¬ 
ity of his employes, 265; opposes Nathan, 332; 
in New York convention, 334, 335; worker for 
renomination of Harrison, against Nathan, 
worker for Platt, 33(); works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 337,343, 344, 345; secures N.Y. dele¬ 
gation for Harrison, 348; and Nathan, 352,354,371. 

Wilmer, and corrupting influence of Tammany, 
289,290. 

Wilmington Morning News [repub.], attributes de¬ 
feat of 1889 to Mahonism, 75. 

Wilmington, O, federal office-holder political 
worker for Harrison, 302. 

Wilmington, O. M., dismissed by Jones,postmaster 
at Indianapolis, reinstated by Postmaster Wal¬ 
lace, 34. 

Wilmington, Del., Stewart, postmaster of, political 
worker, 334. 

Wilmington, N. C., Young nominated collector of, 
ward politician, 183. 

Wilmot, O., Journalist Spidle postmaster at, 149. 

Wilson, councilman of Indianapolis, spoilsman 
and low politician, 207. 

Wilson, representatative in Indiana legislature, 
spoilsman, 406; opposes gerrymander of 1893, 
414. 

Wilson, “Doc,” negro, political worker in Indian¬ 
apolis, 378, 879. 

Wilson, E., brother of editor, given office by Gov¬ 
ernor Foraker, .301. 

Wilson, E. M., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Adln, Cal., 141. 

Wilson, G. W., mayor of Ft. Wayne, Ind., opposes 
Harrison, 302. 

Wilson, J. E., negro, postmaster at Florence, S. C., 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Wilson, Mrs. K.. wife of political worker, candi¬ 
date for postmaster at Muncie, Ind., 217. 

Wilson, N. Y., Le Van appointed postmaster at, 39, 
45. 

Wilson, W., postmaster at Chadron, Neb., removed 
on secret charges, 175. 

Wilson, Rev. W. M., on Civ. Service Reform, 83. 

Wimberly, internal revenue collector in Louisiana, 
political worker, 304. 

Wimberley, A. F., removed federal employe, 
worker at Indianapolis, 343, 348. 

Wlmbusb, C. C., negro, federal employe, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Winchester (Ind.) Herald [repub.], republicans 
must stand for civ. service reform, 88. 

Windom, Secretary, and office-seekers, 16, 37, 159; 
and Sturgeon. 22; and Wild, head of assay office 
at Boise City, Idaho, accepts resignation of, 30; 
at request of Roosevelt, stops Coulter’s pro¬ 
ceedings, 34; appoints political worker to office, 
51; removes P.C. MacCourt, of N. Y. custom¬ 
house, 54: on the civ. service, 81; and Saltonstall, 
94; and Platt. 2f)4; praises merit system, see an¬ 
nual report, 1889, 276. 

Winamac, Ind., applicants for postmaster of, bar¬ 
gaining for position, 88. 

Winona, Miss.. Matthews, deputy postmaster of, 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344, 348. _ 

Winters, Cal., Moody, postmaster of, resigns, his 
successor removed for cause, Mrs. McKinley 
appointed, removed for political reasons, 90. 

Winters, W. H., given place in Indiana legislature, 

Wirt*^J S., Senator, civil service reformer, address 
of before alumni of St. John’s College, Mary¬ 
land, 137. , 

Wolcott, Senator, and Harrison, 337; supporter of 
Blaine. 344, 345, 346.363. , . t-., j » 

Wolcott, E. O.. letter of on removal of Flood, post- 
nisBt6r Et Elmirfi, N. Y., on secret cbErges, 31-. 


Wolcott, R., president of young men’s republican 
club of Massachusetts, civil service reformer, 
192, 219; opposed to Quay, 241. 

Wood, Consul, political worker in New Hampshire, 
371. 

Wood, purchases postmastership at Mitchell, Ind., 
appointed, 89. 

Wood, appointed census supervisor through influ¬ 
ence of Sherman, 301. 

Wood, A. L., editor, appointed postmaster at St. 
Charles, Iowa, 142. 

Wood, H. C., federal officer, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 348. 

Wood, J., defeated candidate for congress, secures 
appointment of Pentreath, 150. 

Wood, R. F., civil service reformer, 172; on ap¬ 
pointment of postmasters before annual meet¬ 
ing National League, 1.892, 329. 

Woodard, postmaster of Harrodsburgh, Ind., polit¬ 
ical worker, 380. 

Woodard, S., federal office-holder, political worker 
for Harrison, 302, 378; works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 337, 343, 379. 

Woodford, S. L., candidate of Nathan for governor 
of New York, 265. 

Woodhull, Ill., soldier and postmaster at. removed 
and civilian appointed, through influence of 
Henderson, G. A. R. post denounces Hender¬ 
son, 47, 

Woodmansee, M. G., journalist, postmaster at Holy- 
rood. Kan., 149. 

Woodruff, F., chairman Kings county republican 
committee controls patronage, 106,132; politi¬ 
cal worker, 121, 182, 183; enters factional fights 
in Brooklyn and New York, 197, 198. 

Woodruff, J., testified against R. Smalls, 39. 

Woodruff, T. L., political worker for Boody, cong. 
candidate, 183. 

Woods, M. C., given place In Indianapolis post- 
office, as spoils, 18, 27, 34; political worker, 302. 
378. 

Woollen. W. W., controller of Indianapolis, com¬ 
mended, 269. 

Woolren, N., postmaster of Kingston, N.Y., political 
worker in New York, 336. 

Worcester Spy [repub.], civ. service reform a cer¬ 
tainty, 92. 

Workers, political, paid-enough without additional 
remuneration in form of office, 30. 

Workman, J. B., clerk in Indiana senate, 408. 

Works, “Charlie,” worker for congressman Hitt, 
110 . 

Wooster, L., postmaster at Fostoria, O., compelled 
to appoint partisans, 91. 

Wooten, J. T., attempted bribery of, by Sen. Higgins 
and Postmaster Smith, 401,402. 

Wouser.C. J.,editor, appointed postmaster atTama, 
Iowa, 142. 

Wrav, state senator of Indiana and spoils methods, 
408. 

Wright, C.D., and civil service reform in census 
service, 291. 

Wright, F., refusal of Trustee Gold to remove. 111; 
removed, 146, 256. 

Wright, P., broker, at custom-house at N. Orleans, 
tlelegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Wyman, Jr., M., at Baltimore conference 1889 . 2; 
sec’y Cambridge Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion, 205. 

Wymore, Neb., Journalist Thomas postmaster at, 
149. 

Wynn, I. C., journalist, postmaster at Lander, Wyo., 
155. 

Wyoming, Ill., postmaster at removed for having 
been appointed, through “intrigue,” Hammond 
appointed, 176. 

Xenia, Ind., Editor Lawshe appointed postmaster 
at, 71,126, 377; political worker, 379. 

Yakim, Ore., excellent appointments reversed at 
bidding of Senator Mitchell, .32. 

Yakima Co., Wash., leading postmaster in, and other 
federal employes political workers, 362. 

Yale, office-holder, a politician, 162. 

Yankton, Dak., Indian agency at, and Sen. Moody, 

86 . 

Yeager, J., applicant for postmastership at La¬ 
nark, Carroll Co., Ill., 109. 

Yonkers, N. Y., Postmaster Keyes succeeded by 
politician Pentreath, 150. 

Young, Captain, testimony of regarding Kittery 
navy yard, 147. 

Young, A., treasury agent, active politically, 143. 

Young, D., federal employe, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 348; collects political assess¬ 
ments, 384. 

Young, J. C., testimony of before Judge Lippincott 
as to election frauds, see also Hudson Co., N. 
Y., 200. 

Young, J. H., negro, ward politician, appointed 
collector at Wilmington N. C., 183; federal em¬ 
ploye, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 
334,348. 

Zadek, A., postmaster of Corsicana, Tex., politi¬ 
cian, 187. 

Zanesville, 0., Editor Richards postmaster at, 301. 

Ziegenheim, collector at St. Louis, supports Filley 
machine, 150. 

Zimmerman, postmaster of Cannelton, Ind., op- 
litical worker, :i80. 

Zollinger, C. A., applicant for office under Cleveland 
(2d term), 392; pension agent under Cleveland, 
levies political assessments, 414. 

Zumstein postmaster at Cincinnati, O., carries out 
spirit of civil service law, 257. 








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THE 


CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE 

LUCIUS B. SWIFT, EDITOR. 


Volume I, 

Harki.sos’s Admixistration, M.\RC'n, 1889, TO March, 1893. 


INDEX 

By CHARLES ALLEN LEWIS. 


Abbott, P. S., civil service reformer of Cambridge, 
Mass., 201. 

Abbott, R. T. F., clerk in Indiana senate, 408. 

Abies, postmaster of St. Joe Station, Indiana polit¬ 
ical worker, 379, 380. 

Acceptance, letter of President Harrison of, strongly 
favoring civil service reform, 27. 

Active Club [republican]. See Baltimore investiga¬ 
tion, 267. 

Adams and Vincennes post-office. See Chambers, 37. 

Adams. —, candidate for alderman. See Buffalo, 
N. Y., 197. 

Adams. SeeTammany, 318. 

Adams, Pres. C. K., favors clerical recognition of 
civil service reform, 48. 

Adams [congressman] and Chicago post-office, 22. 

Adams, E. P., federal employe, levies political as¬ 
sessments. See Kentucky. 

Adams, H., uses influence for appointment of 
Throop, 59. 

Adams, J., on party spirit, 394. 

Adams. J. Q., president, 325. 

Adams, N. S., journalist, postmaster at Scott, Kan., 
149. 

Adams, T. M., reports to Mayor Grant on street 
cleaning in New York: advises merit system, ; 
220 , 221 . 

Adams, VV. W., appointed postmaster at Quincy, 
Mass., through Congressman Morse; vice 
Speare, removed, 100 ; a political worker, 162. 

Addison, la.. Postmaster Cruikshankof, apolitical 
worker, 260. 

Addison, Joseph, inspector for men of merit in 
public life, 235. , 

Addison, N. Y., Roberts, postmaster of, a political 
. worker, 266. 

Address, of G. W. Curtis (1892), distributed in In¬ 
diana, 338; inaugural of President W. H. Har¬ 
rison, the public press and spoils, 17; inau¬ 
gural of President B. Harrison, reform pledges 
in, 367; of mayor of Baltimore, Md., to Gorman, 
336; to the citizens of Pennsylvania, against 
“Quayism,” 249,251,2.52; issued by Pennsy 1 vania 
republicans against Quay, extract from, 270. 

Addresses, on civil service reform, merit system, 
spoils system, etc., etc. See Church and Civil 
Service Reform; also (names) J. E. Campbell; 
S. S. Parr; H. Briggs; R. H. Dabney; C. Schurz; 
Donell; Lowell, J. R.; Roosevelt; R. H. Dana;' 
G. W. Julian; C. B. Wilby; T. F. Bayard; 
Welsh;G.F. Williams; Johnson, J. H.; Swift, i 
L B.; Curtis, G. W.; Everett, W.; Bonaparte. | 

C. J.; H. C. Lodge; Rogers, S. S.; Warner. C. 

D. ; Sprague. H.; Sherman (senator); Civil 

Service Record; Foulke; Lambert. Rev. H.; 
Storey, M.; F. A. Walker; C. C. Allen; Collin; 
L. H. Gibson; D. C. Brown; C. T. Lane; Thurs¬ 
ton; Niblack; Wort; McKain, A. A. I 

Adel, Iowa, Journalist Hotchkiss appointed post¬ 
master at, 141. , . , , 

Ader, representative in Indiana legislature, and 
spoils methods in. 407. 

Adln, Cal., Editor Wilson appointed postmaster 
ftt 141. 

Adkins, s! D., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Freeport, Ill., 126. 

Administrative reform. See Andrews. 

Adreon, Cal., and appointment of Sears in post- 
office at Baltimore, 277. r- 11 vr V o 

Agar, W. F., postmaster at Mahopac Falls, N. Y., a 
political worker, 162. 

Agnew, S., on English census service, 292. 

Agnus, F., editor and politician, 363. 

Ahesm. D.. removed on suspicion of being disloyal 


to Harrison, 300. 

Aiken, J. M., clerk in Indiana senate. 408. 

Alkln, W. A., praises Civil Service Chronicle, 110. 
Airey. United States marshal at Bal timore, PoHtical 
worker. See Baltimore Investigation, 267, 328, 


857, 379. 


Alta, Buena Vista county, Ia„ Pickering, postmas¬ 
ter of. a political worker, 260. 

Abbot, Rev. L. and Indian, appointments; favors 
clerical recognition of civil service reform, 48. 

Akron, Col., Journalist Irwin appointed postmaster 
at, 126. 

Akron, Ind., Editor Noyes appointed postmaster 
at 126, 377. 

Akron, O., postmaster of, appointed through influ¬ 
ence of Sherman, 340. 

Alabama. See Clay, removal of; R. A. Mosely, Jr., 
politician, appointed collector of internal rev¬ 
enue for district of, 56; federal office-holders 
in, active politicians, 143, 348, 355; delegation 
to Minneapolis convention, fights in, 346; po¬ 
litical assessments levied on federal office¬ 
holders in, 391. 

Alaska, O. T. Porter appointed United States Mar¬ 
shal for, 39; vote of for Harrison at Minneapo¬ 
lis; political activity of federal officers, 347. 

Albany, N. Y., O’Leary, postmaster at, 136; per 
cent.of removals in classified and unclassified 
service in post-office at, 185; Tammany steals 
in, 317; Warner spoken of as postmaster of, 46; 
Warner, postmaster of, enforces civil service 
law, 51, 136; Warner, postmaster of, in New 
York convention, 335. 

Albany Journal [republican] against civil service 
reform, 49. 

Albert Lea, Minn., Harkness, postmaster at, re¬ 
moved for cause by Cleveland, Stacy appoint¬ 
ed; efficient. Removed and Harkness reap¬ 
pointed by Harrison. See also Dunnell, 39. 

Albion. Ill., Editor Colyer appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Albion. Ind., Editor Prickett appointed postmaster 
at, 126, 377. 

Albright, A., low politician. See Philadelphia. 

Alderman, E. R., editor, postmaster at Marietta, O., 
801. 

Alderson, J. D., congressman, on house committee, 
on civil service, 86; on census service in West 
Virginia. 293. 

Aldrich, C. H., favors civil service reform, 229. 

Aldrich, senator, at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Alexander, state senator of Pennsylvania, 133. 

Alexander, Mrs. C. M., appointed stenographer in 
Indiana legislature, 406. 

Alexander, D. S., United States district attorney in 
New York, political worker at Minneapolis, 342, 
343. 

Alexandria, La., Barrett, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Alger, General, more popular than Harrison, 240. 
Spoken of for presidency, 299, .348. 

Allan, S. W., federal employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Allard, C. A. See Baltimore Investigation, .320, 326, 
327. 

Allegheny Co., N. Y., postmasters’ association, lev¬ 
ies political assessments, 384. 

Allegheny, Pa., patronage in, 47; Gilliland, post¬ 
master of, worker for Bayne, 135; supporter of 
Quay, suspected by Harrison, 299. 

Allen, ex-congressman, levies political assess¬ 
ments. 322, 332. 

Allen, “The.” low politician of New York City, 
historv of. See also New York City, 249. 

Allen, C. C.. at Baltimore conference, 1889, 2. 

In report of, to civil service reform association 
of Missouri on civil service commission, 136. 
Prefers bureaucracy to spoils system, 308. 

Allen county, Ind., only office-holders in, for Har¬ 
rison, 240. 

Allen. Ethan, protests against removal of Milhol- 
land. as federal Interference. a33. 

Allen. Edgar, federal court officer, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Allen, F. B.. negro journalist, opposes Harrison, 
wants offices for negroes, 244. 


Allen, J. B., congressman, secures appointment of 
Marse as postmaster at Colfax, Wash., 166. 

Allen, S. B., deputy collector Internal revenue, 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Alley. F., political worker against Chase, 353. 

Allison, A., editor, supported by Congressman 
Cooper for postmaster of Nashville, Ind., 398. 

Allison, senator, and D. B. Eaton, 111; secures ap¬ 
pointment of Osborn, 334. 

Almy, candidate of Platt, at Ithaca, N. Y., 264 

Almy, F., secretary Buffalo civil service reform as¬ 
sociation, 200, 387. 

Altgeld. governor of Illinois, flees from office-seek¬ 
ers, 415. 

Alton, Pa., Postmaster Beaumont of, worker for 
Delamater, 134. 

Altoona. Kan., Journalist Rhea, postmaster at, 148. 

American Horse. Indian chief and rising at Pine 
Ridge, S. D., 218. 

American Protective League, requests lists of 
voters from postmasters, 330; seeks to assess 
postmasters, 382. 

Amerlcus Club. See ^ay and Clarkson. 

Ames, J; B.. civil service reformer of Cambridge. 
Mass., 204. 

Anderson, A. T., appointed postmaster at Cleve¬ 
land, O., 216. 

Anderson, C. W., federal employe in New York 
convention, 335. 

Anderson, Ind., spoils system in town government 
at, 331. 

Anderson, J. A., deputy sheriff, inefficient, 315. 

Anderson. W. G., Sr., police examiner at Brooklyn. 
N. Y., 222. 

Andrews, C. C., address on administrative reform. 
23. 

Andrews, E. L. See Seneca county, N. Y.. 260. 

Andrews, G. W., postmaster at Murphrysboro, Ill., 
forced to resign, 165. 

Andrews, Ind.. Coutts, postmaster of, father of Ed¬ 
itor Coutts, 316. 

Andrew, J. F., opposed to civil service reform, ac¬ 
cording to Grosvenor, 204; chairman house civil 
service committee, extensions proposed by, 305, 
.306; bill of, introducing merit system in labor 
service, commended, 321; and appointments 
under civil service rules, 350; and political ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders in Alabama, 355; 
chairman of house civil service committee, 86, 
358: bill of, for reform in labor service, com¬ 
mended by workingmen, 331; bill of, to regu¬ 
late appointments of fourth class postmasters; 
and to Introduce Boston labor service system, 
359, 388,897; Secretary C. Foster, 880; opposed to 
congressional patronage syStem, 405. 

Andrews, W. H., chairman state republican com¬ 
mittee of Pennsylvania, corrupt politician, 133, 
134; political agent of Senator Quav, 38. 260. 

Angler, E. A., assistant United States district attor¬ 
ney, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Annapolis, Md., appointment to naval academy 
at. See Turner, 100; Tucker, postmaster of, in 
Maryland convention. 335. 

Antl-Cobden club, of Philadelphia, resolutions of, 
demanding repeal of civil service law, 49. 

Appeal, to President, against civil service commis¬ 
sion, threatened. See Indianapolis, investiga. 
tion of post office of, 28. 

Appointees, unworthy, at various places, 39. 

Appointing power, resides in executive officers 
alone, 263. 

Appointments, from eligible lists, year 1889-90,185. 
Internal revenue; squabble between Senators 
May and Sherman, 17. 

Applegafth, Rev. H. C.. advocates civil service re¬ 
form. 83. 

Apple River, to Daviess county. III., applicants for 
postraastership at, 109. 

Applicants, for office under spoils and merit sys¬ 
tems, 185. 















ii 


INDEX. 


Areola, Ind., Rockbill, postmaster of, removed 
through iuilueuce of Postmaster Higgins; Mc- 
(aoogle appointed, 362. 

Arkaiou, Kan., Journalist Stoufer appointed post¬ 
master at, 143. 

Arkansas, patronage of, controlled by Clayton, 188. 
Political activity of federal officers in, 347, 348. 

Armour, H. O., political worker lor Platt, 333. 

At Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Armstrong, bee Baltimore investigation,3‘26. 

Armstrong, consul-general Rio Janeiro, removed 
by Harrison for political reasons, 54. 

Armstrong, H. C., journalist, postmaster at Moline, 
Kan., 149. 

Arthur, U. A., tool of “Tom” Murphy, controls 
Rew York custom house, 191. 

Arthur, President, and Pendleton act, 10; and 
Postmaster Pearson, 12; and office-seekers, 24; 
Senator Harrison demands patiouage in Indi¬ 
ana from, 31; removes Naval Officer Burt to 
make room for politician. See Burt, 52; Par¬ 
dons £. S. Ransdall, 80; nominates M. Oarri- 
gus, corrupt politician, 88; appoints Langsdale 
postmaster at Oreencastle, Ind., 89,159; classi¬ 
fies departmental service, 185, ‘215; controls 
patronage, but fails of reuomiuation, 262; 
appoints D. B. Eaton chairman civil service 
commission, 271, 272; denounces spoils system, 
275; signs Pendleton bill, makes classification, 
etc., 276; appoints Isabella De La Hunt post¬ 
mistress at Oannelton, lud., 368, 374. 

Asay, “Jim,” disreputable politician, appointed 
through Congressman Hitt, 160. 

Asbury Park, N. Y., E. G. Harrison appointed post¬ 
master of, 386. 

Ashton, J. H., post office employe. See Baltimore 
investigation, 267, 296. 

Aspiuw’all, J., New York state senator, political 
worker for Nathan, 264, 371. 

Assessments, political. See Baltimore investiga¬ 
tion; see Indiana, Washington (cityj. South 
Carolina, West Virginia, Ohio, New Y’ork, Ala¬ 
bama, Maryland, Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylva¬ 
nia; see Indianapolis News; committee oi na 
tional league (see) to investigate 1892; see Tam¬ 
many Hall; see Old Dominion Rtpublican 
League, 7u; see Ginn, 72; in New York; see 
Roosevelt, Burt, Magoue, Beattie, 97; see Quay, 
134; see Curry, 160; see Grosvenor, Roosevelt, 
161; in State and federal offices in Indiana, 
those levied on corporations, 171; under Harri¬ 
son, 173; under Harrison and Cleveland, 255; 
advocated, see Stratton and Grosvenor, 178, 
179: federal employes from Ohio Subjected 
to, 179; see Dudley, 180; levied on federal em¬ 
ployes from Indiana, 181; in federal and other 
offices in Connecticut, 183; in Virginia, niade 
by republicans, 226; made by Iowa lepublican 
central committee, ‘240; denounced by Presi¬ 
dent Hayes. ‘265; in Ohio, by state republican 
executive committee, 272, 280; in New York. 
Pennsylvania and Ohio; see Pendleton, Ac 
ton, ‘279. ‘280; under Harrison, see Mahoue 
blackmailers, see Mahone, 281; in state offices 
at Albany, N. Y^., 180; see Mahone. 305; in New 
Y'ork, Pennsylvania, Ohio. ‘282: condemned in 
Ohio, Pennsylvania, 286; see Wagner. ‘287; cor¬ 
respondence of Pennsylvania civil service re¬ 
form association, regarding, 289; by Postmaster 
Higgins of Ft. Wayne, Ind. 302; bill of Conk 
ling preventing.iu New York, 318.321; see Mor¬ 
ton. O.T., and Allen. 322, 332; see Kentucky. 330; 
money got by, used by Platt against Harrison. 
347; W’arning against, by civil service commis¬ 
sion. 358; levied in North Carolina, 362; in In¬ 
diana and New York, 363; see W. H. Harrison, 
370. 373, 375,382.385; of Indiana office-holders in 
Washington. 377; in post office ai Indianapolis. 
403,411, 412; in Ohio, and in Washington de¬ 
partments, by Old Dominion Republican Club, 
412; see Zollinger, 414. 

Associations: see also civil service reform asso¬ 
ciations; business men’s republican, and spoils. 
234; Indian Rights. 9. 42; twenty-first district 
republican, of New York City, invited to in 
vestigate custom house service in, 236; Ohio 
republican and printing office. 234. 

Astor, W. W.. and politics in New York, 173. 285. 

Atchison, editor and Winimac. Ind.. post office. 88. 

Atkins, postmaster at Freeport, Ill., active poli¬ 
tician. 143. 

Atkins, Indian commissioner under President 
Cleveland, 217. 

Atkins, S . local politician opposed to Congress¬ 
man Hitt, 109. 

Atkinson, G. W., levies political assessments, 390. 

Atlanta. Ga., census of 1890 well conducted in, 292. 

Atlantic Monthly, for February, 1891, "An Object 
Lesson in Civil Service Reform,” by Roose¬ 
velt, 192. 

Atwood, Kan., Greason, journalist, appointed post¬ 
master at, 148. 

Auburn, Ind , Garden, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379, 380. 

Auburn, N. Y:, Knapp, postmaster of, worker for 
Platt. 143. 

Auditor, removals in office of sixth. 55. 

Augusta, Ga., census service in, inefficient, 295. 

Augusta. Me., postmaster at, removed ; place given 
to “Joe” Manley, 38; Manley, postmaster of, a 
political worker, 135, 150; Mauley, postmaster 
of. congressional candidate opposing Burleigh, 
and non delivery in Augusta of papers advo¬ 
cating Burleigh, 364; Stinson, nephew of Mrs. 
Blaine, appointed postmaster at, 871. 


Augustine, Kan., Journalist Fenstemaker. ap¬ 
pointed postmaster at, 148. 

Aurelia, la.. Marsh postmaster of,a political worker, 
260. 

Aurora, Ill., Journalist Hudder appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 126. 

Austen, Cal. See Tammany. 318. 

Austin. C. K., editor, appointed postmaster at Line- 
ville. Iowa, 142. 

Austin, H. C.. New Y'orkpoliceoffleer given federal 
offices, 216. 

Austin, Tex., DeGress, chairman Texas republican 
state committee, appointed postmaster at, 71. 

Australia, civil service reform in. 111. 

Australian ballot system, opposed by Boutelle; 
Reed,T. B.; Blaine, Gorman, 228. 

Avery, supported by Congressman Hitt for assistant 
treasurer, 110. 

Axton, L. H., and political assessments. See Ken¬ 
tucky. 

Ayers,!., special treasury agent, pays political as¬ 
sessments, 279. 

Bachelder, G. E., post office inspector on removal 
of Postmaster Bundy. 176. 

Bachman, postmaster of Carruna, Ind., 379; politi¬ 
cal worker, 380. 

Backus, county treasurer at Indianapolis. 403; per¬ 
suades Dunn, post-office employe at, to solicit 
political contributions, 411, 412. 

Bacon, Rev. B. W., sermon on evils of spoils sys¬ 
tem, 102 

Bacon, D., journalist, postmaster at Nampa, Idaho, 
155. 

Bacon, F., mayor of Oregon, Ill., politician, 109. 

Bacon, T., address annual meeting National League, 
noticed. 269. 

Bad Axe, Mich., Journalist Maywood postmaster at, 
149. 

Bagby, low negro politician, appointed to railway 
mail service; unfit, 10, 21,‘ii5, 27, 34,35, 54,94,96, 
112,173. 

Bagby, B., political worker for Harrison, 302. 

Bailey, J. J., protests against Martin as internal 
• revenue collector in Pennsylvania, 232, 374. 

Bailey, J. M., candidate of Barnes faction for sur- 
veyorshipof Albany district, 46; collector at Al¬ 
bany. political worker. 390. 

Bailey, L. O., ward politician, city attorney for In¬ 
dianapolis, opposes bill for new charter of,212; 
deputy attorney general of Indiana, 3i5. 

Bailey, M. H., and political assessments, 384. 

Bailev, T., applicant for postmaster of Portland, 
irid.. 88. 

Bailey, W. A., Harrison delegate from North Caro¬ 
lina, 334. 

Bain, congressman, on house committee of civil 
service.86. 

Bain Faction, in St. Louis, 304. 

Bain. See Senator Harrison. 81. 

Baird, postmaster at Ogdensburg, N. Y’., removed, 
126. 

Baird, Colonel, politician, offered Brooklyn, N. Y., 
postmsstership, 131. 

Bairdstown, O., Journalist Grimes postmaster at 
149. 

Baker Ballot Reform Bill, ruined by Quay and Mar¬ 
lin, federal office, ‘228,229, 252. or 254. 

Baker. D., postmaster at Mobile, Ala., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Baker, I. V. See Tammany, 319. 

Baker, Judge, at Minneapolis convention, 343. 

Baker, W. H., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 334. 

Baldwin, post-office employe of Austin, Ind., at 
Minneapolis convention. 380. 

Baldwin, editor, appointed to position in govern¬ 
ment printing office. 126. 

Baldwin. See Woodruff, 106. 

Baldwin, C., editor, given office by Governor Fora- 
ker. 301. 

Baldwin, C. A., journalist, postmaster at Vicks- 
•burg, Mich., 149. 

Baldwin, D. A., political worker, 182,183; see also 
Kings county. New Y’ork. 371. 

Bales. E. L., journalist, postmaster at Bloomington, 
S. Dak., 155, 

Balk, W. A., post office employe, see Indianapolis 
investigation. 411. 

Ball, Col., controls part of patronage in North Da¬ 
kota, 216. 

Ball, G. H., clerk in Indiana senate. 408. 

Ballot, secret, good results of in Indiana. 389. 

Ballantine. J., opposes political activity of federal 
office holders in New York, 336. 

Ballantyne, R. C., appointed postmaster at Brack- 
ettsville, Tex., vice Gildea, removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons. 186. 

Balmaceda, Pres..usurper in Chile, 261,281.364, 387; 
course of United States government with. 282. 

Baltimore, Md.. federal office holders interfere in 
primaries at. 219.225.226; investigation by Roose¬ 
velt. Rose and Bonaparte of interference of fed 
eralofficersin elections at,261.267, 268; alsofed- 
eralinterferencein primaries.277,278; alsoof po¬ 
litical activity of federal employes in primaries 
at, 287: also of political activity of federal officers 
in primaries at. 295. 296. 312.320,326,3‘29,330; also 
of violations of law by federal employes at. 321, 
3‘22: also of political activity of federal office¬ 
holders in. 396; Roosevelt’s report of investiga¬ 
tion, 254. 255; political activity of federal office¬ 
holders at, 372. 373, 376; Investigation, etc.. 412; 
Wanamaker shields post-office employes for in¬ 
terference in elections. 350; conference, reso¬ 
lutions for publicity of examination papers. 


10; resolutions of Tippecanoe Club, 49: cus¬ 
tom house at, removals in, 53; evil effects of pa¬ 
tronage on schools of, 211; public meeting of, 
condemns Gorman, 214; mayor of and Gorman 
testimonial, 236; Raisin, low politician, ap¬ 
pointed naval officer at, through Influence of 
Gorman, 237; Raisin, "boss” in, 251; violations 
of civil service law at, 366; federal officers at 
under Cleveland, 376; political assessments 
permitted by internal revenue collector, see 
Mudd and Coffin,162: personelof examiners at, 
186; and state of politics, 283; customs district 
of. classified 1883. 276; Brown and Veszy post¬ 
masters of, and Sears, post-office employe at, 
277: civil service in post-office at, 95; effect of 
secret eligible lists in post-office at, 6:4: conflict 
over control of post-office at, 84; Postmaster 
Veazy of, removals under, 53; Postmaster 
Brown of, spoilsman, 53; Johnson, postmaster 
at, conducts factional fight at, 121; removes em¬ 
ployee without cause, 137; makes clean sweep, 
189; makes clean sweep, testimony of before 
Roosevelt, 254 . 255; in Maryland convention, 
336; works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 837,347; 
political assessment circular of civil service 
commission, 363; as a campaign fund raiser, 
370. 

Baltimore American [Repub.] advocates civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 65. 

Banbury. J. W., journalist, postmaster at Britton, 
S. Dak., 155. 

Bancroft, postmaster at Concord, Mass., to be re¬ 
appointed. 91. 

Bancroft: see Hillism. .309. 

Bangor, Me., census of 1890; well conducted in, 
292. 

Bangor, S. Dak., Journalist Griffers, postmaster at, 
155. 

Banks, a negro, opposes Harrison; wants offices for 
negroes, 244. 

Banks, congressman advocates appointment of J. 
J. McCarthy in payment of political debts, 31; 
fails to obtain office for political worker, 39; 
aids spoils methods of Pension Commissioner 
Raum, 130. 

Bannon. A., patronage of, 134. 

Barbadoes, consul at, 56, 

Bardsley. tool of Quay. 250. 

Bardsley; see Quay,305; embezzler,352. 

Bargae, P., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
834. 

Barlo. efficient post-office Inspector, removal for 
political reasons. 298. 

Barlier. Wharton, protests against Quay 95; letter 
to Harrison protesting against giving patronage 
to Quay. 104. 

Barker, “Billy,” low politician, 311. 

Barnard, Judge,and Dutchesscounty, N. Y’., frauds, 
.306. 

Barnes, appointed consul at Chemnitz vice Merritt, 
removed for political reasons, 371. 

Barnes, justice of peace, a politlcial worker. 162. 

Barnes, representative in Indiana legislature, 
spoilsman. 407. 

Barnes. C. B., negro, federal employe, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Barnes. J. M., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Barnes. W.. factional leader In Albany, N. Y’., con¬ 
sults with Harrison over patronage, 46. 

Barnett, I. O. G. federal employe, and political as¬ 
sessments. See Kentucky. 

Barnett, J., door-keeper in Indiana senate. 408. 

Barnett. J. S., federal employe, and political as¬ 
sessments. See Kentucky. 

Barneveld, Wls., Journalist Jones postmaster at, 
155. 

Barnstable (Mass.), collector of, appointed. See 
Goss, 46. 

Barnum, collector, resignation asked, 22. 

Barnum. J. S., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Prlnceville, Ill.. 141. 

Barrett. E. J.. postmaster at Alexandria, La., dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Barrett, W. E., signs petition for larger appropria¬ 
tion for civil service commission, 102. 

Barrow. C. A., secretary Kings county republican 
committee. 121; secretary general committee, 
political worker for Woodruff, 197. 

Barrow, H. A., politician appointed deputy naval 
officer at New Y’ork. 

Barrv, P. M., term expires as postmaster at Oswe¬ 
go. N. Y’., 1-26. 

Banholdt. R., office-seeker, 14. 

Bartlett. E. B., 311; delegate at Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 345. 

Batavia, N. Y., candidate for postmaster at. See 
Sawyer, 47. 

Batchelder. General, federal officer, works for re¬ 
nomination of Harrison. 348. 

Batcheller, assistant secretary of the treasury, 371. 

Bates, W. R.. requests poll of voters from Postmas¬ 
ter Daniels. 383. 

Baxter, assessor, a political worker, 162. 

Baxter. A. E.. 2-59; U. S. marshal in New Y’ork. a 
political worker for Fassett, 265, 266, 269, ‘279, ‘280, 
287. 

Baxter, D., mayor of Rochell, Ill., politician, 109. 

Baxter, F. K., political worker, to be appointed 
New Y’ork state railroad commissioner vice 
Spencer, removed, 356. 

Bayard, T. F., secretary, favors civil service re¬ 
form, 82; ex-secretary, and spoils system, 145, 

Bayard, ex-secretary, extract from address be- 











INDEX. 


iii 


fore alumni students of Ann Arbor Law School, 
on spoils system, 257. 

Bayard, secretary, Jewett claim, 290; and Elkins’s 
claim against Brazil, 369. 

Bayfield, VVis , Journalist Bell postmaster at, 155. 

Baylis, 111., Journalist Donley appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 141. 

Bayne, T. M., congressman, advocates application 
of civil service reform to certain postmasters, 
100; patronage of, 133; post-oflices in his dis¬ 
trict used for his nomination, 135; and post¬ 
master Gilleland, 299. 

Beach, D., journalist, postmaster at Valley Center. 
149. 

Beal, U. S. minister to Persia, resigns to do politi¬ 
cal work, 382. 

Beallsville, O., Editor Keepers appointed postmas¬ 
ter of. 301. 

Beallsville, Pa., Journalist Robison postmaster at, 
149. 

Beard, A. W., supported by Massachusetts senators 
for Boston eolleciorship, 22; appointed collector 
at Boston, vice Saltonstali removed, 129; signs 
petition for larger appropriation for civil serv¬ 
ice commission, 102; gives office to Journalist 
John L. Swift, 108; political worker, 162, 179, 
269, 288, 334; removes democrats in custom 
house, 245; removals under, 322. 

Beardsley, railroad commissioner in New York, 
356. 

Bearss, post-office inspector at Peru, Ind., at Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 879. 

Bearss. A. C., worker for Harrison, appointed chief 
clerk in railroad mail service, 377. 

Beaty, J. \V., worker for Harrison. 355. 

Beanie, surveyor, political assessments under, 
197. 

Beattie, W. J., political worker. See Kings Co., 
New York. 

Beaumont, postmaster at Alton, Pa., worker for 
Delamater, 134 

Beck, state senator of Indiana, son of, appointed 
page, 408. 

Beebe, E. R., journalist, postmaster at Princeton, 
Wis., 155. 

Beers, T. H., appointed supervisor of census, 301. 


Belden, congressman, and Syracuse, N. Y., post- 
mastership, 46,71; secures appointment of Ed¬ 
itor Von Bergman, 132; opposed by Postmaster 
C. E. Smith, and Collector F. Hendricks, 386. 

Belknap; see Rochester, N. Y.. 805. 

Bell, appointed by President Harrison, 27; second 
assistant postmaster-general, reinstates incom¬ 
petent clerk in Massachusetts; removes com¬ 
petent clerk in Illinois, 30; candidate for gov¬ 
ernor of Texas, 159. 

Bell. C. G., journalist, postmaster at Bayfield, Wis., 
155. 

Bell, J., a political worker, 160. 

Bell. J. A., post office employe; see Baltimore in¬ 
vestigation, 312, 320, 326, 328. 

Bell, J. L., superintendent of railway mail service, 
tool of Clarkson, 21; superintendent railway 
mail service, refuses access to records of re¬ 
movals, etc., 163. 

Bell, T., politician appointed to look after office- 

Bellamy, W. H., political worker, 287; secretary re¬ 
publican county committee, at Minneapolis 
convention, 344. 

Benedict, G. G., editor, appointed collector of dis¬ 
trict of Burlington. Vt., 126. 

Benedict,R. D.,defeaied by ward politician Nathan, 
121; candidate for congress, aided by Secretary 
Tracy. 135; defeated candidate controls patron¬ 
age in New York, 142; congressional candidate 
opposes Nathan, 143. 

Benedict, Kansas, Journalist McMullIn postmaster 
at, 148. , , 

Benjamin, Capt., federal employe, pays political 
assessments, 279. 

BenjatniDy J.* politician in Brooklyn, denounces 
Nathan, 304: ward politician in New 'iork. 804; 
federal employe in New York convention, 335; 
political worker. 371. . , , 

Bennett. S., political worker, appointed postmaster 
at Evansville, Ind., see Posey, 46,153, lo8, 37i. 

Bennett, postmaster at Hartford, Conn, removal of 
Bario, efficient post office inspector, 298. 

Bennett, postmaster at Warsaw, Ind., 316; political 
worker, 378,380. -c i, vr v 

Bennett, F., journalist,postmaster at Fulton, N. Y., 
155 

Bennett, J., postmaster at Kent, N. Y., a political 


worker, 162. _ 

Benson, Ill., F. E. Lamed, son of editor, appointed 
postmaster at, editor, deputy postmast^, 148. 
Benton county. Mo., applicants for post-offices in, 

Berg,^br,%n^^ndia^na State Board of Health, ineffi¬ 
cient, 316. , , ^ ^ An 

Berks County. Pa., control of patronage in, 47. 
Bernard, disreputable democratic politician in Cln- 


Bernard? c’.^M.’, Harrison delegate from North Car- 

Berne°In(f.^j. N. Sullivan appointed postmaster 
at knd removed; political-worker Wagoner ap- 

BerShlmer’Corrupt politician of Indianapolis, con- 
®®'vict”d of tany-shLt forgery, see Indianapolis. 
Berri, E. D., ward politician. See Kings Co., N. Y. 
Berry, schemes for postmastership at Colfax, 
Wash., 165. 


Berryman, W., deputy collector at New York city, 
a political worker, 265. 

Bertram, S., given place in Indiana legislature 
406. 

Besancon, H. 0.. journalist, postmaster at Harold, 
South Dakota. 155. 

Besbore, S. S., politician, census supervisor 6th In¬ 
diana district, 104. 

Best, E. T. journalist, postmaster at l^illgh. Neb., 
149. 

Beverly, Mass., Postmaster Odell of, a political 
worker, 162, 

Beyerle, L. H., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Goshen, Ind., 80,126, 316, 377, 378. 

Bickford, political worker, 134. 

Bickham, editor, relatives of, hold federal offices, 
301. 

Blcknell, postmaster of Garrett, Ind., political 
worker, 379, 380. 

Biddleman, deputy United States marshal, collects 
political assessments, 372. 

Bldwell J. E., recommends O’Donnell, 59. 

Bigelow, W. H., appointed division superintendent 
of railroad mail service. 22, 186. 

Biggs, congressman, opposes civil service reform, 
125. 

Biglin, B., employs democrats, 311, 312; baggage 
contractor at Castle Garden, a political worker, 
265; cartage bid of for NewYork custom-house, 
to be accepted for political reasons, 216; gets 

g osition for his brother in New York custom- 
ouse, 258; political worker in New York con¬ 
vention, 3%; cartage contractor, 358. 

Biglin, J. C., brother of “Barney” Biglin, gets of¬ 
fice through him ; promised Appraiser Cooper’s 
place in ^ew York custom-house, 258. 
Bingham, J. H., federal officer, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Binghamton Republican [republican]. Roosevelt 
must no* appear in earnest. 49; Dunn, postmas¬ 
ter of, A political worker, 266; Dunn, postmas¬ 
ter of, secures removal of pension examiner 
Van Alstyne, 304. 

Binkley, W., political worker for Foraker, charges 
federal interference as cause of his defeat, 301. 
Birchs, J., applicant for postmaster at Greencastle, 
Ind., 89. 

Birkett, chairman republican general committee, 
and appointments in Brooklyn Navy Yard, 45; 
distributor of patronage in Brooklyn Navy 
Yard, 55; state senator of New York, supports 
Congressman Wallace, 142; opposed by Na¬ 
than, 265: treasurer Kings county, N. Y., cen¬ 
tral republican committee, 198; ward poli¬ 
tician in New York, 304; politician of Brook- 
Ivn, 106. 

Birmingham, Ala., Houston, postmaster of, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 
Birmingham, Eng., city government of, 284. 

Bishop, mayor of Buffalo, N. Y., extends operation 
of civil service law in city offices, 200. 

Bishop, sheriff of Ogle county. Illinois, politician, 
109. 

Bismark, builds up German empire, 244. 

Blackford, E. G.. fish commissioner of NewYork, 
removed; Hackney, politician worker, ap¬ 
pointed by Hill, 310. 

Blackford. L. M.. on “Morals of Civil Service Re¬ 
form,” 130,136. 

Blackford, W. T., federal employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention. 348. 

Black, pension commissioner, attempts to remove 
Miss Sweet. 107. 

Black, J., and Petroff, 152. 

Black, R. A., republican “boss, see Greenfield, 
Ind.. 89. 

“Blacklisting.” See Stratton and Grosvenor. 
Blackwell, J.. ward politician of Indianapolis. See 
Parnell Hall. , 

Blaine. E., wonks for Blaine at Minneapolis, 345. 
Blaine J G., secretary, and recommendations from 
General Brown, of office-seekers, 7: views on 
civil service reform in “ Twenty Years of Con¬ 
gress,” 9 ; defeat of. attributed to Pearson, post¬ 
master at New York. 13; and “Joe” Manley, 
38: and consulship at Barbadoes. 56; uses influ¬ 
ence to secure family appointments. 71; and 
postmastership at Washington, Pa , 100; candi¬ 
dates of superseded by those of Quay, 112: 
on tariff, 169; subject to Quay, 173; begged 
to speak, 180; applicants for consulships 
under 1^: opposes Australian ballot system, 
228: and Harrison, 240: and Harrison, 241; 
promises “fealty” to Harrison, 250; alien¬ 
ates reform element in 

by Nathan in 1884. 264; and Elkins. 290: Quay s 
candidate for presidency. 299; nomination of, 
favored bv Quav. 300: workers for in Indiana. 
302,303; and Nathan. 304: supporters in 18<6 in 
Maryland convention, 385, 337; a candidate at 
Indianapolis. 339, 340, .341, 312; at Minneapolis 
convention, 343: and Minneapolis convention, 
344 .345, 846. .347. 348: and Elkins’s claim against 
Brazil. 369: in 1884. 376. . 

Blaine. Jr.. J. G.. son of Secretary Blame, given of¬ 
fice, 108; given office through Congressman Hitt, 

Blame’, R. G., brother of Secretary Blaine, given 

Blafr?^ representative in Indiana legislature and 
spoils methods in, 406. 407. 

Blair. United States marshal and Monroevillepost- 

BlafreA?bepostmaster in Jackson county, Iowa, 
a political worker, 260. 


f Blair, T., Indian agent, 217. 

Blair, J. C., editor, postmaster at Newell, Iowa, a 
political worker, 260. 

Blair, senator, civil service reform a humbug; 
opposed to it, 45, 49, 50. 65; and Eaves, 159. 

Blaud, delegate to Minneapolis convention; oppos¬ 
ing Harrison, 346. 

Blankenburg, R., letter to Quay, 157. 

Bliss, C. N., and request of postmasters for list of 
voters, 330; political worker for Harrison, see 
New York, 333; treasurer national republican 
committee, 368. 

Bliss, J. W., journalist, postmaster at Greenleaf, 
Kansas, 149. 

Bloomfield, la.. Postmaster Evans of, removed on 
secret chargee, 175. 

Bloomington, Ind., branch of Indiana Civil Serv¬ 
ice Reform Association, meeting of, addressed 
by T. Roosevelt, 1890, 108; branch of Indiana 
Civil Reform Association, officers of, 182; census 
service, turned over to spoils, enumerators 
make lists of voters, 293; McPheeters, post¬ 
master of, at Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Bloomington, S. Dak., Journalist Bales, postmaster 
at, 155. 

Blount, A. R., federal employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Blunt, ex-postmaster appointed customs surveyor, 
150. 

Board, local examining at Indianapolis, efficiency 
of, 18, 42. 120; local examining at Indianapo¬ 
lis, 25, 26, 94; local civil service at Indianapo¬ 
lis, appointments to, 34. 

Boards, examining for civil service should be inde¬ 
pendent, 17; examining; see, also, examiners, 
186 ; pension examining, appointed through in¬ 
fluence of Senator Cullom, 30. 

Boatner, congressman on bouse committee on civil 
service, 86; upholds civil service commission, 
204; Secretary C. Foster, 330. 

Bode, la,, Postmaster Rassing of, a political worker, 
260. 

Bogardus, E., whose son holds federal office, politi¬ 
cal worker for Hiscock, 265. 

Bogemann, Rev. E. C., favors civil service reform, 
229. 

Boise City, Idaho, assay office. Wild, removed 
without cause by President Harrison. Place 
given to spoilsmen, 30. 

Bolton, J. A., soldier, a political worker, 159. 

Bonaparte, C. J., at Baltimore conference 1889, 2; 
address of, upon civil service reform, 25 ; duty of 
the President, 26; on spoils, heading to July 
number, 1889, Civil Service Chronicle, 32; 
address of, before National League, 1889, on 
civil service reform as a moral question, 59, 60, 
61; annual address of, before reform associa¬ 
tions of Maryland, 1889, 62; spoils system im¬ 
moral, 69; to examine management of civil 
service, 77; address of, before Gatholic Club of 
Baltimore, on catholics and citizenship, 97; to 
address Indiana Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion, 108; to address annual meeting, 1890, of 
Indiana Civil Service Reform Association, 111; 
committeeman, report on congressional pa¬ 
tronage, 113, 114, 115; address of, before Indi¬ 
ana Civil Service Reform Association, 1890, on 
“Scope and Difficulties of Civil Service Re¬ 
form,” 119, 126, 127, 128; on committee investi¬ 
gating patent office, report of, 139, 140, 141 ; on 
relations of civil service reform to other re¬ 
forms, 153; on Gorman, 161; on Committee of 
National League, investigating presidential 
post-offices, 162,163, 164,165, 166; address before 
annual meeting National League, 1890, 169,170: 
on committee of National League reporting on 
removals on secret charges, 175, 176, 177; on 
on committee of National League, reports on 
political changes in presidential post-offices, 
188; assists in investigation of interference of 
federal officers in elections, at Baltimore, 261. 
266. 267, 291, 295; address of, before annual 
meeting National League, noticed. 269; on spe¬ 
cial committee of National League investiga¬ 
ting census service, 291.295: on political cor¬ 
ruption in Marvland. 317. 324; on committee of 
publication of Good Government, 357; on Judge 
Bradley and Assistant Attorney-General Tyner. 
357, 358. 

Bond, see Baltimore investigation, 328. 

Bone, postmaster at Shelby ville, Indiana, removed 
on secret charges. 177. 

Bonge, appointed postmaster at Cumberland, Indi¬ 
ana. 89. 

Boody, congressional candidate, 183. 

Boody, D. A., democratic candidate for mayor of 
Brooklyn, New York, 287. 

Boone. Cal., superintendent work-house at Indian¬ 
apolis. 205. 206. 

Boonvllle, Ind., editor apponted postmaster at, 37; 
Postmaster Hammond of, political worker, 380, 
Pate, postmaster of, political worker. 380. 

Booth, A. R., employe in navy yard, in New York 
convention, 385. 

Booth, W. C , promised place in Brooklyn. See 
Wallace, 72. 

Borden, supported by Massachusetts congressmen 
for Boston collectorship, 22. 

Borin. C., journalist, postmaster at Oberlin, Kan., 
149. 

Bosler, J. W., 291. 

Boston Advertiser (republican), on Civil Service 
Chronicle. 285. 

Boston Journal (republican), on civil service re¬ 
form. 65. 66, 











iv 


INDEX. 


Boston Post (democrat), opposed to spoils system, 
85 ;accouni8 of spoils lights in treasury depart¬ 
ment and Indian service, 21G, 217; on feudalism 
revived, in New York City and Brooklyn, 2G3. 
Boston Transcript (republican), on civil service 
reform, 65; attributes republican defeat of 1889 
to patronage system, 76. 

Boston,Mass., municipal service in; a field for re¬ 
form, 235; civil service system in,68; competitive 
tests in police force of, 104; fire service in, 120; 
merit system in city offices of, 172; civil serv¬ 
ice methods used at, for laborers, 181; merit 
system in labor service of, 204; civil service re¬ 
form in city offices in, 212; merit system in use 
in city departments of, 220, 221; merit methods 
of employing laborers commended; applied to 
navy yards, see Tracy, 221,222; examination in 
use for police force of, 223,224; merit system for 
laborers, 228; labor employment system of ad¬ 
vocated for Indianapolis, 243; physical exam¬ 
inations for fire and police services of Boston, 
Mass., 243,246, 247,248, 249; civil service methods 
employed in city departments of, 273; city 
government of, 284; labor service system 
of, 317; labor system of commended, 349; 
labor service of, 357; no appointive officer at, 
allowed to work politically, 358; labor system 
advocated for federal service by Andrews, 359; 
labor service system of, bill of Andrews to in¬ 
troduce into federal service, 888; civil service 
reform association of; resolutions of on Post¬ 
master Pearson, 23; eivll service reform in cusr 
tom bouse of, under Saltonstall, 71; removals 
without cause in custom house at, for relative of 
Secretary Blaine, 71; address before civil serv- 
ive reform association, by J. R. Lowell, 77; 
civil service reformers of, 93; employes incus- 
tom house at, political workers, 179; removal 
of Corse, postmaster of, for political reasons, 
213, 215 , 237; Collector Beard at, removes demo¬ 
crats in custom house, 245; ex-postmaster Corse 
of, entertained by Massachusetts Reform Club, 
Hart, new incumbent, commended by Corse, 
251; Beard, collector of, a political worker, 269; 
customs, district of, classified, 1883, 276; Corse 
postmaster of, Saltonstall collector at removed, 
282; Beard, collector at, a political worker, 288; 
removals under Beard, collector at, 322; Hart, 
postmaster at. Beard collector, and other feder¬ 
al officers, political workers, 334; Corse, post¬ 
master of, removed for political reasons, 367; 
removal for political reasonsof Corse postmaster 
of, 376; civil service reform association of, 415. 
Bosworth, T., applicant for postmaster at Portland, 
Ind., 88. 

Botty, H. C., political worker for ex-Alderman 
Ratbwell, New York City, 199. 

Boulden, J. W. See Baltimore investigaton, 278. 
Bourke, B., ward politician in New York City, 263. 
Boutelle, congressman, interview on patronage in 
Maine, 157; opposes Australian ballot system, 
228. 

Bowden, congressman, controls spoil in Norfolk 
navy yard, 153; a political worker, 162. 

Bowles, F. T., naval officer, on board to examine 
applicants for positions in navy yard at Brook¬ 
lyn, N. Y., 222. 

Boyd, state senator, and Noblesville, Ind., post- 
office, 89. 

Boyd, H., post-office employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention. 348. 

Boyd, S. H., office-seeker, 14. 

Boyer, C. R., favors civil service reform, 229. 

Boyer, H. K., supported by Senator Quay for state 
treasurer of Pennsylvania, 38. 

Boyle, A., political worker, foreman in navy yard 
at Brooklyn, 142; political worker for Congress¬ 
man Wallace, 183. 

Boyles, G. F.. negro delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 344, 348. 

Boynton, General, and scramble for offices, 24. 
Boynton, H. V., on Cincinnati Tammany, 301,302. j 
Brackett, governor of Massachusetts, signs petition | 
for larger appropriation for civil service com¬ 
mission, 102. I 

Brackettsville, Tex., Postmaster Glldea removed 
for political reasons, Ballantyne appointed, 186. i 
Brackston, uses influence for appointment of 
Throop. 59. 

Bradbury, W. F., civil service reformer of Cam¬ 
bridge. Mass., 204. j 

Bradford, Pa., postmaster at, see Flenniken, 99. 
Bradley, ward politician, see Buffalo, N. Y., 196. I 
Bradley, Cal., and Blaine “boom,” 344. i 

Bradley, Justice, and Mahone “blackmailers.” 305- 
charge of to jury in Mahone “blackmailers” 
case, condemned, 321; and Mahone “black; 
mailers,” 357, 358. i 

Brady, and Elkins, 374. j 

Brady, opponent of Mahone, 52. i 

Brady. A., postmaster at Charlotte, N. C., Harrison 
delegate to Minneapolis, 334, 348. i 

Brady, J. D., appointed collector at Norfolk, Va., 
52; collector internal revenue, political worker, ' 
370. 

Braine, Admiral, warns Boyle, 142. i 

Brandt, postmaster of Des Moines, political worker i 
at Minneapolis convention, 846. 

Brant, police captain in Elizabeth, N. J., given fed- j 
eral office, 216. ! 

Brattleboro, Vt., Postmaster Childs endorsed for 
re-appointment, 100; caucus on question of re- , 
appointment of Postmaster Childs of, 108. i 

Brav. Representative, opposed to Congressman 
Hitt, 109. I 


Bray. L. T., defeated candidate, opposes Hitt, 136. 

Brayton, see Collier. 

Brayton, E. M., politician in South Carolina, op¬ 
posing Harrison, 382. 

Breckenridge, Judge, civil service reformer of 
Missouri, 239. 

Breen, J. M., editor, appointed postmaster at Plan- 
agan, 111.^ 141. 

Brenner, J., political worker, see Kings county, 
N. Y., also, 371. 

Breslau, Journalist Dunlap appointed consul to, 
126. 

Bretz, congressman, patronage of, 411, 419, 421, 422. 

Brewer, congressman, asks resignation of Cowan, 
postmaster at Ovid, klich., 165. 

Brewer, postmaster at Vineland, N. J., removal of 
for political reasons, see Vineland, 39. 

Brewster, attorney-general, and Postmaster Pear¬ 
son, b 12. 

Bribery of voters, see Kercheval, 83; in offices and 
money, see Collier, 162; in Pennsylvania, 151; 
in elections advised to aid Republicans in In¬ 
diana, 190,191; in republican caucuses in Cort¬ 
land county, N. Y., by Hiscock, also Jefferson 
county, 264; for Harrison delegates in Indiana, 
378. 

Brice, C. S., senator, and Gorman, 307, 

Bridgeport, Conn., removal of postmaster at, to give 
place to spoilsmen, 29. 

Briggs, cartage contractor at New York custom¬ 
house, spoilsman. 332; cartage contractor, and 
Collector Erhardt, 358; cartage contractor at 
New York custom-house, 371. 

Briggs, H., part of address of at annual meeting 
of Indiana civil service reform association 1889, 
8 . 

Briggs, H. G., appointed postmaster at Portland, 
Me., through influence of Speaker Reed, 150. 

Briggs, T. A., cartage bid of for New York custom¬ 
house, not accepted for political reasons, 216. 

Brimberry, B. F., negro, postmaster, delegate to 
Minneapolis connention, 348. 

Brinsmade, A. T., federal office-holder, political 
worker, 280. 

Bristol, Postmaster Montgomery of. See Simond, 
91. 

Bristow, Henry, politician appointed to look after 
office-seekers, 46. 

Britton, M., treasury inspeetor, removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons, 332. 

Britton, S. Dak., Journalist Banbury postmaster at, 
155. 

Broadhead, comptroller, secures reinstatement of 
thief Weeks, in Kittery navy yard, 147. 

Brock, S. G., president Missouri state republican 
association, 383. 

Brocket, chief clerk, spoilsman, 24. 

Brockmeier, H., ward politician, see New York 
City. 

Brodsky, J. E , corrupt politician, 234; political 
worker, 268. 

Brogan, captain of police in New York City, 319. 

Bronson, B. H., signal officer, secret charges 
against, 312. 

Bronson, O. H., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at New Richland, Kan., 126. 

Brooke, General, and Indian rising at Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak, 218. 

Brookfield, N. Y., Journalist Spooner postmaster 
at, 155. 

Brookfield, W., supports Lee for place in New York 
eustom house, 259; chairman republican state 
committee of New York, 279; at Minneapolis, 
344; chairman New York state republican com¬ 
mittee, 363; chairman, etc. 371. 

Brookline, Massachusetts Civil Service Reform As¬ 
sociation of. and Commissioner Roosevelt, sen¬ 
timent in favor of, civil service reform, 36. 

Brooklyn, Ind., retention of Gamble postmaster at 
asked, see Cooper, 112. 

Brooklyn (N. Y.) Times (republican), patronage a 
source of weakness, 65. 

Brooklyn. N. Y., places in navy yard at, at disposal 
of “The” Allen,see; spoils “committee”’at, 24; 
appointments in navy yard at, how made, 45; 
navy yard at, control of patronage in, 55; ap 
pointments in custom house at, 72; removal 
sought of Postmaster Hendricks of, 72; polit¬ 
ical workers of, get office through Congressman 
Wallace, 72; examination in flredepartment of, 
93; fire service in, 120; Postmaster Hendrix re¬ 
moved, place offered to politician. 131; Collins 
spoken of for postmaster of, see Willis, 135; spoils 
system in navy yard at, 142; navy yard at. spoils 
system in, 148; abuses and spoils system in navy 
yard at, under Secretary Whitney, 148; exam¬ 
ination questions used in police service at, 1.52; 
navy yard at, given up as spoil by Tracy, 153; 
removals in navy yard at under Cleveland and 
Harrison. 155; republican factional fights for 
control of machine in, 197, 198; merit system in 
use in city offices at, 220; examinations'for posi¬ 
tions in, 221; examination in use for police 
force of, 222, 223; examinations instituted by 
Secretary Tracy in navy yard at, statement of 
examining board, 236, civil service commission 
of commended, 239; feudalism revived in, 203; 
factional fights in among republicans, at prim¬ 
aries. 264; armory frauds at. see Tammany. 318, 
319; Collins, postmaster of, political worker for 
Harrison, 836; Nathan and anti-Nathan factions 
in, 352; Page, chief of ordnance department at 
navy yard at removed, 855; prize fighter ap¬ 
pointed at policeman in, 355; Collins, postmas¬ 
ter of, spoilsman, 360. 


Brooks, J, M., civil service reformer of Cambridge, 
Mass., 204. 

Brooks, W. H., appointed Internal revenue collect¬ 
or at Philadelphia vice Martin resigned. See 
Quay and Harmer, 241; collector Internal reve¬ 
nue, suspected by Harrison as supporter of 
Quay, 300. 

Brookshire, congressman, patronage of, 893, 410, 
413,419; allows Voorhees to name postmaster 
of Terre Haute Ind , 405. 

Brophy, J. C., doorkeeper in Indiana senate, 408. 

Brosins, congressman and post-offices in his dis¬ 
trict, 72. 

Brovard, J., doorkeeper in Indiana senate, 408. 

Brower, congressman, fights successfully for con¬ 
trol of patronage in North Carolina, 47. 

Browne, General, and office-seekers, 6, 7,14; and 
Hyat, officer in house of representatives, 84, 

Browne, postmaster at Clay City, Ind., removed, 
89. 

Brown, politician, 134. 

Brown, state senator of New York, and Tammany 
bridge scandal, 317. 

Brown, political worker, 334. 

Brown, postmaster of Franklin, Ind., asked to re¬ 
sign, 877. 

Brown, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in 407. 

Brown, A. H., removed from office-and political 
worker appointed, 79. 

Brown. A. H., physician, physical examiner for 
police and fire services of New York and Bos¬ 
ton, 246. 

Brown, C. G., worker for Hiscock, 386. 

Browu, D. C., address of on school and civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 23, 24. 

Brown, E., see Hillism, 309. 

Brown, F., postmaster at Baltimore and Sears P. 
O., employe at, 277; postmaster at Baltimore, 
189; postmaster at Baltimore, spoilsman, 53. 

Brown, F.W., editor, postmaster at Dysart, Iowa, 

142. 

Brown. Capt. G. L. R., Indian agent at Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak., exposes political assessment scheme. 
384. 

Brown, G. N., politieian of N. Carolina. 109. 

Brow n, H. U., officer Indiana Civil Service Reform 
Association, 108. 

Brown, H. U., of Indianapolis News, favors civil 
service reform, 227, 229. 

Browne, T., congressman, opposes civil service re¬ 
-form, an advocate of congressional patronage, 
‘35,49,112; opposes appointment of Cravens, 84; 
secures appointment of Marsh as postmaster 
at Portland, Ind., 89; controls post-office of 
Knightstown, Ind., 118;given patronage bv Har¬ 
rison, 240; patronage of,410, 411,419,420.421,422; 
and postmastership of Madison, Ind., 393. 

Brown, J. B., editor opposed to Congressman Hitt. 
110 . 

Brown, J, D., postmaster in Harrison county, la., 
a political worker, 260. 

Brown, L. H., journalist, postmaster atHammonds- 
port, N. Y.. 155. 

Brown, L. W., United States consul to Glasgow, po¬ 
litical worker, 390. 

Browne, W., postmaster at Russellville, Ind., re¬ 
moved. 89. 

Brown, R. B., editor, given office by Governor For- 
aker. 301. 

Brown. T. H., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 334. 

Brown. V. H., Cunard agent in New York City, 
surety for Collector Fassett. 258. 

Brown, W.. warden of Sing Sing prison, worker for 
Hill, .309. 

Brown, W. L., state senator (N. Y.), recommends 
“Paddy” Dlvver for police justice, 184. 

Brown. W. L., and Fassett, collector at New York 
City. 258. 

Brown. W. W.. railroad mail employe, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Brown, Z.. praises Civil Service Chronicle, lio 

Brownsville. Texas, Customs Collector Rentfrow 
at, a political w'orker, 150; custom house at not 
elassified, number of employes in. 277. 

Bruce. B. K.. negro, register of deeds in District of 
Columbia, works for Harrison at Minneapolis 
337,344,345; political worker, 362, 382, 389. 

Bi nder, C. F.. at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Brugman. Dr. A. F.. 355. 

Brules, Indians, rising at Pine Ridge, S. Dak., 218. 

Bruner, E.. sells city offices in San Francisco. 215. 

Brunt. J. R., postmaster at Osage Mission, Kan., 
removed after four years’ service, second com¬ 
mission unexpired ; Park appointed. 187, 188. 

Brush. W. T.. advises bribery to aid republicans in 
Indiana. 190, 191. 213. 

Bryant, M. B., at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Bryant,. W, C., political worker, see Kings county, 
N. Y. 

Brydia, C. S.. editor, appointed postmaster at Sau- 
nemin. Ill., 141. 

Brynildsen. J., journalist, postmaster at Graceville, 
Minn.. 149. 

Bryson, Commodore, testimony of regarding Kit¬ 
tery navy yard, 147. 

Buchanan,United States marshal, active politician, 

143. 

Buchannan, C. N., solicits political assessments, 
see Kentucky. 

Buchanan, G., navy yard employe, in New York 
convention, 335. 

Buchanan, G. A , special treasury agent, political 
worker in New York, 336. 











INDEX. 


V 


Buchanan, G. N., deputy collector Internal reve¬ 
nue in Mississippi, delegate for Harrison at 
Minneapolis. 344, 34S. 

Buchanan, J., President, civil service under, 124; 
spoils system under, 405. 

Bucher, G. F., postmaster at Carroll, Ill., works for 
Hitt, 13G. 

Buck, applicant for.postmaster of Portland, Ind., 
88 . 

Buck, A. E., United States marshal, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Bucyrus, O., Journalist Halley postmaster at, 
through Senator Sherman, 149, 301. 

Budd, J. B., federal employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention. 348. 

Bueman, pension examiner in Indiana, political 
worker, 380. 

Buffalo, N. Y., addresses by Loomis and Shephard 
before Central Labor Union'of, 44; common 
council of disregards New York civil service 
law, 161; account of caucuses in. 196,1M7; nine- 
tentbs of city offices outside of educational de¬ 
partment covered by New York civil service 
act, 200 ; civil service reform in city offices in, 
212 ; merit system in use in city offices at, 220 ; 
labor organizations of support civil service re¬ 
form,'228; Morgan, customs collector at, a po¬ 
litical worker, 265; civil service reform victo¬ 
ries in city service of, 273; custom house at 
not classihed, number of employes in, 277; 
civil service reform established in, 286; civil 
service law in city departments of upheld, 281; 
census of 1890 not well conducted at, 293; post¬ 
master and post-officeemployesof pay political 
assessments, 391; memorial of G. W. Curtis 
adopted by civil service reform association 
of, 394; civil service reform association of 
gives aid to Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle, eighth annual meeting, 32; civil 
service reform association of. annual meeting 
1890,137. active,161; addressof Rogers,president, 
list of officers of, 189, 200; annual meeting, 1891, 
thanks Secretary Tracy and Congressman 
Lodge, city government of applies merit sys¬ 
tem, 238; Express objects to patronage and 
spoils system, 66 : Sunday Truth (labor) favors 
civil service reform, 84; Commercial (republi¬ 
can), civil service reform a humbug, 92. 

Bull. Sitting, see Indian service, 182. 


Bunce, F. M., naval officer, on board to examine 
applicants for positions in navy yard at Brook¬ 
lyn, N.Y., 222. 

Bundy, H. E., postmaster at Oneonta, N. Y., re¬ 
moved on secret charges, 176. 

Burchell, United States marshal, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 344. 

Burchett, D. J., United States marshal, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Burchlnsl, \V. D., surveyor of port of Baltimore, in 
Maryland convention, 335. 

Burden, H., fish commissioner of New York, re¬ 
signs, 310. 

Burdett, J. O., chairman Massachusetts republican 
state committee, signs petition for larger appro¬ 
priation for civil service commission. 102 . 

Burdick, S., and political assessments, 38i. 

Burgess, A., office-seeker, 15. 

Burgess. A., candidate for postmaster at New 
tonville. Mass., 100. 

Burgess, H., political worker, 280. 

Burit, J., federal employe, at Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 344. • * f » 

Burkdall, coiner of New Orleans mint, refuses to 
allow political assessments to be made in his 
department, 383 , 384. 

Burke. C. J., editor, appointed postmaster at Olin, 
Iowa, 142. , ..r 1 

Burke, D. F., assistant appraiser at New York, 
sisted at dinner to Clarkson, 245; federal offi¬ 
cial, political worker, 287; internal revenue 
collector, in New York convention. 335; assist¬ 
ant appraiser at New York City, at Minneapolis 
convention, 343. . .,,,, 

Burke, state senator of Indiana, votes against bill 
for non-partisan control of state charitable in¬ 
stitutions, see Magee, 201; low politician and 
spoilsman, see, also, Magee, 212; candidate for 
U. S. district attorney of Indiana, spoilsman, 
unfit, 414. , , . 1 * Af\o 

Burke, J., page in Indiana legislature, 406. 

Burke, J. F., candidate for alderman, see Buffalo, 

n/y.,197. 

Burke, Penn, postmaster at, see Brosius. 72. 

Burleigh, governor, of Maine, congressional can¬ 
didate, opposing Mauley. 364 

Burleigh, H. J., congressman, 3,14. 

Burlington Hawkeye, advocates repeal of civil 
sprvice law, 49, 

Burlington, Kansas, Lockwood, postmaster at, re¬ 
moved, Lane appointed, see Kelly. 188- 

Burlington, Vt., customs district of, classified 1883, 

Burnnkte. W. S. R.. postmaster in Jackson county. 

Burn^srcouncilman o'f Vdianapolis, supports Fire- 

BurS.'c. 8 .!Soye in naval office, see Baltimore 

Burns'^ W*!^ 08 tm’a 8 ter at Plymouth, Massachusetts, 
to be removed for Poll‘\oal reasons. 18i. 

Burr, A., spoils system attributed to, 262 

Hnrr G A deputy collector at New York City, 
p’ays'politlcaFassessments, 279; political worker, 

Burrell, 0, B., clerk in Indiana senate, 40,8. 


Burris, S. P., protectionist democrat, appointed 

postmaster at Talladega, Alabama, vice-, 

removed for political reasons, 186. 

Burroughs, G., journalist, postmaster at Hope, Kan¬ 
sas, 149. 

Burroughs, J. C., congressman, 279, 362. 

Burrows, L. G., editor, applicant for postmaster¬ 
ship of Lanark. Carroll county, Illinois, 109. 

Burt, naval oflicer at New York, favors merit sys¬ 
tem, removed by Arthur, re appointed by Cleve¬ 
land, removed by Harrison, 52; removal of, 68 , 
94, 106, 107, 173, 2.17,282; cessation of political as¬ 
sessments under. 97; naval officer at New York 
removed for political reasons through influence 
of Platt, 368. 

Burtin, J. S., United States marshal, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 344,348. 

Burton, J., journalist, postmaster at Jamestown, 
Kan., 149. 

Buser, E. VV., journalist, postmaster at Dawson, 
Neb., 149. 

Bush, C. C., heavily endorsed political worker, ap¬ 
pointed postmaster at Reading. Cal., 186.187. 

Bush, speaker, coirupt politician of New York,318. 

Bushnel, A. S., political worker in Ohio. 280. 

Bushnell, Rev. H., opposes spoils system. 77, 

Bushong, deputy city clerk at Indianapolis, 207. 

Buskirk, low police justice at Indianapolis. 314. 

Buskirk, given place of page in Indiana legislature, 
406. 


Bussey, C., assistant secretary of interior, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 279, 370. 

Butler, comptioiler, confidence of, and W. P. Mon¬ 
tague, 56. 

Butler, politician, see Brooklyn navy yard, 45. 

Butler, appointed postmaster at IVeeping Water, 
Neb., vice Ratnour removed, 175. 

Butler, unfit consul-general to Egypt under Grant, 
191. 

Butler, Dr. C. S., civil service reformer of Buffalo, 

• N.Y., 200. 

Butler, Ind., Jones, postmaster of, political worker, 
379, 380. 

Butler, J. M., and Plattism. 281. 

Butler, N. C., member local examining board at In¬ 
dianapolis, 18, 42, 120, 129, 186; officer Indiana 
civil service reform association, 108. clerk 
United States court at Indianapolis, favors civil 
service reform, speech of at Roosevelt dinner, 
227, 229, 230. 

Butler, R. R.. recommended for commissioner of 
Indian affairs, unfit, 14. 

Butler, S., bond of office of, secured by convicted 
briber Kemble, 152. 

Butler, senator, favors civil service reform, 120 . 

Butler, T., editor, appointed postmaster at Hunt¬ 
ington, Ind.. resigns, 126, 377. 

Butterfield, A. H., editor, given federal office, 126. 

Butterworth,congressman, spoilsman, 15,24; mem¬ 
ber bouse committeeon civil service," 86 ; favors 
civil service reform, 119, 120, 124, 204, 211; on 
tariff, 169. 

Buttling, W. J., political worker, 182, 183. 

Buttrick. postmaster at Concord, Mass., recom¬ 
mended for re-appointment, 100 . 

Byerly, see Warmouih. 105. 

Bynum, W. D., congressman spoilsman, 108: spoils¬ 
man, able and unscrupulous. 171; patronage of, 
392, 405. 410, 418,419, 420,421, 422. 

Byrnes, police inspector in New York City, 249;. po¬ 
lice inspector in New York City recognizes 
thieves among census enumerators, 294. 

Caberton. W. B., naval officer, on board to examine 
applicants for positions in navy yard at Brook¬ 
lyn. N. Y., 222. r, • 

Cabinet, and office-seekers. 6 ; President Harri¬ 
son, composed entirely of spoilsmen, 27. 

Cable, postmaster of Hartford City, Ind., political 
worker. 379. „ 

Cable, postmaster at Oswego, N. Y.. removed, il. 

Caddy, C. B , editor, appointed postmaster at Pen¬ 
dleton. Ind., 126, 377. t XT 

Cadmus, W. H. N., political worker for Nathan; 
see Kings county, N. Y.; political worker, 
1S3 304 

Cadwallader.R. H., journalist,postmaster at Louis- 
burg, Kan., 149. 

Cady. i. R.. judge. In New York convention, 33o. 

Cain, P., postmaster at Fort Dodge, Iowa, asked to 
resign, 165. .r o.( 

Caldwell, congressman, 8 p,,. 

Calhoun, see Illinois Senators Fanvell and Cul- 

CalHonliaV republican platform, 1884, demands 
civil service reform, 50. 

Calkins W H., Gresham supporter, appointed 
United States judge in Washington territory, 
240 377 

Call, senator, on examinations for civil service, 

Callan'. N, prize-fighter, appointed on police force 

Callow®ay?Nib°,’ Journalist M air postmaster at, 149. 

Cambria Co , Pa., purchase of, by i^publlcans, 133. 

cImbHdge Mass.; Civil Service Reform Associa- 
Hon; resolutions of, on removal of Postmaster 
Pearson. 23; address before civil service re¬ 
form asiocimion of. by J. R. 77: civil 

service reform association and President Har¬ 
rison, on Indian and other service, 202. 204, 205; 
civil service reform association of, report of ex¬ 
ecutive committee of, on circulation of Civil 
Service Record. 1891, 2.39; civil service reform 
association urges extension of merit system to 
Indian service, 273; merit system in city offices 


of, 172; no appointive officer at, allowed to work 
politically, 368. 

Cambridge, Ohio, brother of Editor Taylor, post¬ 
master at, 301. 

Cameron, senator. Influence of destroyed by Sen¬ 
ator Quay, 30; controls patronage in Pennsyl¬ 
vania, superseded by Senator Quay, 34; and 
patronage in Pennsylvania, 47, 72, 133, 162, 329; 
and Quay, 105 , 245, 252, 305; confers with In¬ 
ternational Revenue Collector Martin, 183; en¬ 
dorses Martin, low politician, for collector in¬ 
ternal revenue in Pennsylvania. 233; supporter 
of Blaine, 344 ; spoilsman, 413; spoilsman con¬ 
trolled patronage of Pennsylvania, 34. 

Campaign of 1884, objection to scholars in politics 
in, see address of Parr, Prof. 8 . S., 8 ; residen¬ 
tial, effect of on civil service reform in Indian¬ 
apolis fire department, 13. 

Campbell, correspondence with Congressman 
Banks, 31. 

Campbell, and collectorship of customs at Chicago, 
47; candidate of Senator Farwell for Chicago 
collectorship, 9.6. 

Campbell, B. F.. political worker for Harrison, 260. 

Campbell. F., New York state controller, spoils¬ 
man, 356. 

Campbell. J. E., ex-governor of Ohio, and Steven¬ 
son, 375; ex governor of Ohio favors a clean 
sweep, 396,408. 

Campbell, W. H., receiver of political assessments, 
391. 

Campbell, W. J., chairman republican national 
committee and Harrison, 854. 

Campbell, W. P., promotion of, 136. 

Cauaday, sergeant-at-arms, opposes Quay’s wishes, 
removes Mann, a page, 160. 

Canandaigua, N. Y., Journalist Milliken, postmas¬ 
ter at, 155. 

Candler, congressman and post-office at South Farm¬ 
ington, Mass., 99; ex-congressman works for re¬ 
appointment of democrat Morgan, postmaster 
at Newton, Mass., 224. 

Cannelton, Ind , post-office, 25; editor appointed 
postmaster at, 37; post-office at, see Clarkson, 54; 
Isabella De La Hunt appointed postmaster of 
by Arthur, removed by Cleveland, office given 
to editor; President Harrison refuses to re-ap¬ 
point, 368; Zimmerman, postmaster of, political 
worker, 380. 

Cannon, congressman, and the second auditorshlp, 
6 ; contest of with Illinois senators over ap¬ 
pointment of Wilcox, 31; opposed to civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 30. 35,49, 202, 204,211; obtains reduc¬ 
tion of salaries of democratic clerks opposed 
to him. 39; controls delegates for renomina¬ 
tion, 160; forces of Catherwood, postmaster at 
Hoopeston, Ill.. 165; a machinecandidate. 179. 

Cannon. J. A., candidate for postmaster at Kings¬ 
ton, Mo., 132. 

Canton, Conn., postmaster at, to be reappointed,91. 

Canton, Kan., Journalist Davis appointed, 148. 

Cape Vincent, N. Y.. Morse customs collector of, a 
political worker, see, also, Jefferson county, 
N.Y..266; number employes in customhouse 
at, not classified. 277. 

Capen, S. B., defends Cleveland’s management of 
Indian service. 219. 

Cappeler, W. S., editor, given office by Governor 
Foraker, 301. 

Carbondale, Kan., Journalist Playford postmaster 
at. 148. 

Cardozo. Judge, see Hill, 306, 

Cardwill. G B., favors civil service reform, 229, 

Carl. F. M., journalist, postmaster at Navarre, O., 
149. 

Carmer, William, see Cannon, 39. 

Carmonche, L. B.. federal employe, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Carnahan. Gen. J. R., misrepresents civil service 
examinations, 79. 

Carpenter, postmaster, removed for political rea¬ 
sons, 22 . 

Carpenter, postmaster at Flushing, L. I., removed 
for refusing to become a spoilsman, 91. 

Carpenter, A. 11. W., postmaster at New Bedford, 
Mass., removed without investigation of secret 
charges. 175, 176. 

Carpenter. C. C.. postmaster at Fort Dodge, Iowa, 
a political worker, 260 

Carpenter, M., and Petraff, 152. 

Carr. Archie,special agent for interior department, 
worker for Filly machine, 150. 

Carr. B., worker for Harrison. 240; w’orks for Har¬ 
rison at Minneapolis. 843, 379. 

Carr, C. E., minister to Denmark, calls on Chair¬ 
man Carter, 361; United States minister to Den¬ 
mark, political worker, 382. 

Carr. J. P.. editor, appointed postmaster at Oxford, 
Ind., 126. 377. 

Carriers, questions used In examination for, at 
Indianapolis, August 6 , 1889, 56, 57, 58. 

Carroll, Co., Ind., see Fawcett, letter of, 98. 

Carroll, F. J.. ward politician, see New York City. 

Carroll, Ill., Postmaster Bucher of, works for Hitt, 
136. 

Carroll, low-a, Journalist Hungerford appointed 
postmaster at, 141. 

Carroll, J., low politician,see Hudson county. New 
York. , ^ 

Carroll, L., candidate for postmaster of Concord, 
Ind . supported bv State Senator Chandler, op¬ 
posed by State Senator Corning, 72. 

Carrollton. Ill., Postmaster Smith of, removed 
through Influence of Senator Cullom, 188. 









VI 


INDEX. 


Carrollton, Ohio, son of Editor Tripp, postmaster 
at, 3U1. 

Carruua, Ind., Bachman postmaster of, political 
Worker, 37y, 380. 

Carson, J. M., on Martin, low politician, see. 

Carson, P., ward poiiiician of Indianapolis, see 
Parnell Hall. 

Carson, P. S., 89. 

Carter J.S., Michener’s candidate, 144, 377; land 
commissioner, works for Harrison at Minneap¬ 
olis, 337,339, 342, 344; worker for Harrison, 354; 
chairman republican national committee, con¬ 
fers with Platt, 359, 300, 301; gets iist.s of federal 
employes for assessment purposes, 303; chair¬ 
man republican national committee, and politi¬ 
cal assessments, 382; chairman, etc., confers 
with Quay, 390, 400. 

Carthage, Ind., Editor Charles appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 120, 377. 

Cartwright. C. M., journalist, postmaster at Hun¬ 
ter, N. Y., 155. 

Carver, opponent of Mahone. 52. 

Cary. E., address of before annual meeting nation¬ 
al league, noticed, 209; on committee of nation¬ 
al league to Invt^stigate interference of office¬ 
holders, 319,320, 338; on committee of publica¬ 
tion of Good Government, 357. 

Case, F. P., political worker for Dazell, 299. 

Casebee, J., journalist, postmaster at Casper, Wyo., 
155. 

Casey, brother-in law of President Grant, a federal 
officer at New Orleans, 191. 

Casey, Iowa. Martha Cowman, wife of Editor Cow¬ 
man, appointed postmaster at. 142. 

Casper, Wyo., Journalist Casebee postmaster at, 
155. 

Cass, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in, 407. 

Catherwood, J. S., postmaster at Hoopeston, Ill., 
forced to resign, 105. 

Catholics aud citizenship, see also church, 97. 

Catterson, R., on committee of public safety at In¬ 
dianapolis, see equally divided politically, 212, 
220 . 

Cavanaugh, employe in post-office at Pittsburgh, 
dismissed without cause, 133. 

Cavauaugh, deputy sergeant-at arms in house of 
representatives, removed for political reasons, 
250. 

Cavauaugh, J. P., recommends O’Donnell, 59. 

Cavour. builds up Italy. 244. 

Cedar Rapids. la., Uauiels, postmaster at. 202; Lin¬ 
coln. postmaster of, political worker. 370. 

Cedar Rapids, la. Gazette, civil service reform 
honesty in politics, 92; on using postmasters as 
political agents, 262. 

Census of 1890, not trustworthy, 173; act providing 
for requires selection of supervisors with refer¬ 
ence to fitness aud not to party affiliations, 292; 
civil service reform in, 19; no examination nec¬ 
essary, 49; disposal of offices in, see Porter. 72; 
made common spoil, 94; filled by republicans, 
112 ; appointments to in Indianapolis made 
by Moores. 129; places in given as spoil. 131; 
spoils methods allowed by Superintendent Por 
ter in, 157; in England, absence of spoils meth¬ 
ods iu. 157; appointments defended. 182, appoint 
meuts to. discord over, 183; examinations for 
clerkships in. alleged to be hebt.ign; iuvesti- 
gatiou of feared by Superintendent Porter, 233. 
234; corruption and spoils system in.260; turned 
over to spoil, 288; investigation of reform In. 
by official committee of uadonal league. 291. 
29); euumeraters used to get lists of voters. 
293: refuses request for recount of New York 
city, 294; civil service reform in under Harri¬ 
son, 372. 

Central Labor Union of Buffalo, N. Y., addresses 
before, see Loomis and Shepard. 44. 

Central Park, N. Y., “race course" bill. 320. 

“Century of dishonor, a.” in Indian service, 182. 

Certificates of good character abolished. 34. 

Chadrou, Neb., removal on secret charges of Wil¬ 
son, postmaster at, 175. 

Chadwick. Rev. J. W., advocates civil service re¬ 
form. 48. 82. 

Chadwick, F. E., naval officer on board to exam¬ 
ine applicants for positions in navy yard at 
Brooklyn. New York, 222. 

Chains, F. H.. editor, disappointed candidate for 
deputy collectorship. 84. 

Chambers. L. C., journalist, postmaster at Liberty, 
Texas, 155. 

Chambers, Smiley N., reasons for appointing as 
United States district attorney, 7; appointed 
United States district attorney for Indiana, 14; 
and post office at Vincennes. Ind., 37; uses in¬ 
fluence for appointment of Throop, .59: and W. 
W. Dudley, 78. 874; case of, 94; speech of, re¬ 
garding bribery, 1.54; a political worker: ex¬ 
tracts from speech of, on democratic corrup¬ 
tion. 1.58, 219; an active politician, 162; worker 
for Harrison. 316. 317. 334; works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 337, 343; political worker, 853, 362; 
370, 377, 378, 380, 381, 389. 

Champaign. Ill., Spaulding appointed postmaster 
at, 38. 

Chance, M., United States inspector of immigra¬ 
tion, at convention republican league, 259. 

Chandler, C., reports to Mayor Grant on street 
cleaning in New York, advises merit system, 
220 . 221 . 

Chandler, state senator, and Concord, Ind., post- 
mastership, 72. 


Chandler, state senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 407, 
408. 

Chandler, congressman, civil service reform a 
fraud, 73. 

Chandler, aud re-appointment of Turner as post¬ 
master at Newtonville, Mass , 100. 

Chandler, senator, works for J. B. Smith, 143. 

Chandler, senator, controls patronage of navy yard 
at Kittery, Maine, 148; spoi sman, 160 supports 
Blaine, 1892, 340; controls patronage of New 
Hampshire, 340. 

Chandler, W., candidate for constable; see Buf¬ 
falo, N. Y., 197. 

Chapin, mayor of Brooklyn, and civil service re¬ 
form, 82. 

Chapin, A. C., and Hill, 356. 

Chapin, E. B., editor, appointed postmaster at To- 
ioua. 111., 141. 

Chapin, L. P., applicant for postmaster at Green- 
castle, Ind , 89. 

Chapin, ex-mayor of Brooklyn, N. Y., opposes 
McLaughlin, 318, 319. 

Chapman, B. 8., postmaster at Derby, la., a politi¬ 
cal worker, 260. 

Chardon, O., Editor Converse appointed postmaster 
at, 301. 

Charity Organization of Indianapolis, 111. 

Charles, E., editor, appointed postmaster at Car¬ 
thage, lud., 126, 377. 

Charlestown, navy yard at, patronageof, controlled 
by Congressman Lodge, 69; clean sweep in 
navy yard at by President Cleveland, 69; navy 
yard at, conduct of Tracy in, 153; state legisla 
ture urges legislation to secure merit system to 
navy yard at and elsewhere, 274. 

Charleston, S. C., Crum, negro, nominated as post¬ 
master at for vote at Minneapolis, not con¬ 
firmed, 363. 

Charlotte, N. C., Brady postmaster at, Harrison 
delegate, 334: Brady, postmaster of delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Charlton, T. J., 399. 

Charter, of Indianapolis, requires application of 
merit system to all city departments except 
fire and police, 243.»» 

Chase, secretary, opinion of civil service reform, 
39. 

Chase, appointment of condemned, 51. 

Chase, D. C , federal officer iu Hamilton county, 
la., a political worker. 260. 

Chase, 1. J.. see Ru.ssellville, Ind.. 89. 

Chase, I., favored by Harrison for governor of In¬ 
diana, 343, 347. 

Chase, governor, candidate for re-election, of In¬ 
diana, aud Rausdell, 352. 353; a candidate for 
governor of Indiana, and administration, 320, 
379; opposed by United States District Attorney 
Chambers and his as.vistant Cock lum. 381. 

Chase. Kan.. Journalist i.oman postmaster at. 148. 

Chase. R. H, journalist,postmaster at LudelLKan., 
149 

Chase, S. H., ex-judge, a political worker for Harri¬ 
son, 200. 

Chatham, J. J., journalist, postmaster at Nogales, 
Ariz., 155. 

Cheadle, congressman and candidates for postmas- 
master at Noblesville. Ind., appoints Royer, 
47, 89; spoilsmati, 55.85.92, 145; appilicauis for 
postmaster at Lafaiette, Ind., 71, 84; endeavors 
to repeal civil service law. 77.112; recommends 
MacDonald, 84; secures appointment of D. W . 
Fleming,84; opposes appointment of Cravens, 
84; supports Garrigus, corrupt politician, 88; 
opposes civil service commission. 119; against 
civil service reform 122; defeat of for renomina- 
tlon, 129; aud post-office at New Hall. Ind., 149; 
opposed to civil service law. 153; snubbed by 
Harrison when asks for patronage, 2-10; opposes 
Harrison, 317; denied patronage in Indiana,377. 

Cheatham, congressman, secures nomination to 
office for Young, ward politician. 183. 

Cheatham, H. P., negro, worker for Harrison in N. 
Carolina, 334. 

Cheek, J. A., Harrison delegate from N. Carolina, 
334. 

Chelsea, Mass.. Gazette, denounces civil service re¬ 
form as claptrap, 364. 

Chemung Co., N Y., republican convention of to 
nominate delegates, fights against Fassett and 
Platt, 259; factional fights in. 304; canal rob¬ 
bery, see Hill. .306; factional republican quar¬ 
rels in. Collector Fassett and. 374. 

Cheney, ex-governor of New Hampshire, 143. 

Cheney, pension agent, active politician. 143. 

Chester, A., candidate of Draper faction at Al¬ 
bany, N. Y’., see Draper. 46. 

Cheney, 291. 

Cheney, J. C.. political worker. 354; president In¬ 
diana republican club at Washington, com¬ 
posed of federal employes, 382. 

Cheney, N . M., journalist, postmaster at La Porte, 
Pa , 149. 

Cheney, O A., journalist, postmaster at Pitrodie, S. 
Dak., 1.55. 

Cheraw. S. C., disreputable character appointed 
postmaster at. 55. 

Chester county. Pa., applicants for post-offices in 
subservient to their congressman, 55; defeat of 
Delamater in. 184. 

Chestnut Level, Pa., post-office at. see Brosius, 72. 

Chicago. 111., collectorship of customs at, see Nix¬ 
on. 47; civil service inpost-officeat,9.5; percent, 
removals in classified and unclassified serrvice 
in post-office at. 185; customs district of, class¬ 
ified 1883,276; convention, 356. 


Chicago Standard, advocates civil service reform, 
evils 01 patronage system, 80. 

Chicago Tribune [republican], advises Harrison to 
pay no attention to office seekers, 65. 

Chicago News, on corrupt politics and politicians 
of Indianapolis, see also Indianapolis. 2t'6. 

Child, S. M, postmaster in Harrison post-office, Ia„ 
a political worker, 260. 

Child, T. A. prominent Ohio republican, and dis¬ 
missals from government printing office, 234. 

Childs, postmaster at Brattleboro, Vt., endorsed 
lor reappointment, 100; caucus on question of 
reappointment, 108. 

Chile, see Balmaceda,282. 

Chittenden, opposed to spoils system, 251. 

Chivington, Col., Journalist Liggett appointed 
postmaster at, 141. 

Choate, R., and Webster, 324. 

Chrisman, aided by Senator Farwell for collector- 
ship of Chicago, 14. 

Christian Leader, and Pearson, postmaster at New 
York, advocates civil service reform, 30. 

Christian Union, on Postmaster Pearson of New 
York, 43; objects to “Quayism” and Clarkson, 
257. 

Chubb, H. S., federal officer, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Church. Dr. S., police examiner at Brooklyn, N. 
Y., 222. 

Churchill, F., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 
brother of postmaster, c348. 

Church, aud politics, see, also, Crosby, 155,156, 257; 
ana civil service reform, see Lambert; see 
names of clergymen; appeal to clergy to 
preach on, see Welsh, 49; and civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 48, 56, 65, 73, 74, 102, 190, 193; see 
Learned, Kaufman, Hickok, Richmond, Weath- 
erby, McKnight. McDuffyand Appleganh, 81; 
see Nelson, Smyth, Dix, Colljer, Chadwick, 
Huntington, Tuttle, Nickols. Rhodes, Holland, 
Snyder. Noble, Wilson, Prudden, Hall, Rev. H., 
81; see Roosevelt, dinner to, at Indianapolis, 
227. 229; see minister as citizen. 239. 

Church, Catholic, opposed to appointment of In¬ 
dian Commissioner Morgan,79; and civil serv¬ 
ice reform. 137. 

Cincinnati, Ohio, municipal patronageof. control 
by Governor F’craker, 71; meeting at. of league 
of republican clubs; election of Clarkson as 
president, 219; spoils system must be kept out 
of new charter for. 235; Smith, customs collec¬ 
tor at, political worker fiT Sherman. 249; merit 
system iu post-office at.257. 3-55; Zumstein, post¬ 
master of, carries out spirit of civil service law, 
257; custom house at. not classified, number of 
employes in. 277; Tammany against Sherman, 
297; Tammany. 801, 302; postmaster and collec¬ 
tor at. political workers for Sherman, 302; re¬ 
formers in,opTOi-ed by united republican and 
democratic machines. 352. 

Cincinnati Commercial-Gazette [republican], re¬ 
joices in rate of removals, 49; attributes defeat 
to patronage. 65. 

Cincinnati Times-Star [republican], on civil serv¬ 
ice reform. 92. 

Circleville, Ohio, editor, appointed postmaster at. 
301. 

Civil service, congress, and, 86; federal report on, 
in Indiana, 1886. 87: statistics given by Moore, 
M. C.. regarding, 128. 

Civil service commission of Brooklyn, report of for 
1889, 152; examination questions commended, 
239; of Massachusetts, examinations of, 74; ex¬ 
amines applicants for e'erkships in census serv¬ 
ice. 190; reportof,!'2: sixth annnalreportof. 152; 
sevt-ntli report of. showingprogressof reform in 
Massachusetts. 204; eighth report. 317; of New 
York City, 225; not very commendable, 2.39; of 
New York State, see Sickles, 34: report of. 92; 
seventh annual report of. 152: annual report of 
1890: stateminc regarding extensions to state 
hospitals. 200: not very commendable, 239; 
Riley, chief examiner of, removed by Tam¬ 
many ; commission powerless to act. 414. 

Civil Service Commission, United States, 10; at 
Indianapolis, 25; investigates at Indianapolis, 
25; investigates post-office at Indianapolis, 27; 
investigates custom house at New York City, 
and Troy (N. Y.) post-office. 29; Roosevelt and 
Sixth Auditor Coulter, ,34; orders Tousey dis¬ 
missed from Indianapolis post-office. .34; keeps 
secret names of signers’ certificates, 34; secre¬ 
tary of investigates and makes uniavorable 
report on post-office at Milwaukee, July, 1888; 
refuses request for special examination of Col¬ 
lector Geer, of Port Huron, 36; should have 
authority to call and swear witnesses. 36; and 
New York custom house, Troy, N. Y., post-office, 
railroad mail service at Grand Rapids. Mich., 
36; and Postmaster Van Cott. of New York, 42; 
and N. 0. Butler and W. P. Fishback to local 
board at Indianapolis. 42; and Census Bureau, 
see Harrison,President. 42; permit publication 
of examinations questions, 51. 56. 57, ,58; of, 
appointed by Harrison, especially good, 69; ad¬ 
mirable. 65; endorsed, 66; and political assess¬ 
ments, 70; examinations under for year ending 
June .30, 1888, 74; a humbug, 77; report of, 77; 
see Harrison. President. 81; and the civil ser¬ 
vice, 86; and Mahone. 86; and eligible list, 93; 
petition for appropriation for, 93; petition for 
larger appropriation for started bv Massachu¬ 
setts Civil Service Reform Association, 102; in¬ 
vestigation of by congress, 133; report of on 
conduct of Milwaukee post-office by postmas- 







ter Paul, 103; undemocratic, see Cummings 
and Vance, 110; debate over appropriaiiuu lor 
in bouse ul represeuDaiives, lia; investigation 
by congressional committee, lia; praised, see 
resolutions oi Indiana Civil tService Keiorm As¬ 
sociation, 120; Harrison requests aid for, 122; 
commended, see Missouri, civil service reiorm 
association of, 130; cUarges against, see (jrosve- 
nor, Houit,aud Koosevelt, H5, 140; investigates 
post-office at Pbiiudeipbia, 1<4; 7tn annual re¬ 
port oi, 184, 185, 180; charges of Wanamaker 
against, 185; examinations held in year 1889- 
9u by, appointments, 185 ; inefficient meth¬ 
ods of alleged, see Wanamaker, 193 ; oppo- 
sit^ion to and charges against, see Cannon, 
Plumb, Grosveuor, 2 U 2 , 203, 204; treasury super¬ 
vising architect not obliged to accept subordi¬ 
nates provided through, out dues, 224; politics 
of applicants foroffice passing examinations of, 
unknown to, 224; exposes methods of Kaum, Jr., 
228; threatened by congress, 229; attacked by 
Clarkson, 230, 231; and prosecution of Kaum, 
238; attacked and defended, 250,251; examina¬ 
tions of ordered for promotions in Washington 
offices, 254, 201; charges of favoritism of denied 
by Roosevelt, publicity of all documents and 
books Of promised, 200,207; under Presidents 
Arthur, Cleveland and Harrison, see also Grant 
and Hayes, 271, 272,273,274,275; first report 1884, 
extent of classified service, 270; and violations 
of law in Omaha, Neb., post-office, 281; neces¬ 
sity of more money for, 282, 287, 288; eighth 
report of, 289; asks Harrison to order com¬ 
petitive examinations for census service, 292; 
requires physical examination in railway mail 
service, 305; praised by National league, 321; 
gives in ormatiuu regarding political assess¬ 
ments to United States District Attorney Jolly, 
330; warning of, against political assessments, 
358; under Harrison, proposes extensions, 372; 
of House of Representatives and Baltimore in¬ 
vestigation, 373; discovers political assess¬ 
ments, 375, 383, 385; praised, 376; report of for 
1891-92, 396, 397. 

Civil service examinations, see examinations; de¬ 
fects in system of local boards, 1; publicity of 
examination papers and records urged, 1; ex 
aminationsof little value, 69; for Brooklyn and 
New York City police lorce, worthless, 355 , 356. 

Civil service commissioners, see Roosevelt Lyman. 
Thompson, Johnson, etc. 

Civil service law of States; of New York, Massa¬ 
chusetts and Pennsylvania, decisions and 
opinions of courts on, 44, 281; of New York 
disregarded by common council of Buffalo, N. 
Y., 161; of New York held valid by New York 
courts, 200; of Massachusetts, some features of, 
204; evasion of in New York City service, 319, 
820; of United States, see also Pendleton act; 
plan to evade, see Grosveuor, violations oi, 
see violations, 25; violations of in Milwaukee 
post-office, see Paul, postmaster, 36; aud cen¬ 
sus bureau, see Harrison, President, 42; opin¬ 
ions of courts, 44; see Ewart, 47; obj-ction 
to by Congressman Hall, 47; opinions on, 
see Chandler, Reagan, Payson, Cutchius, 
Dolph, Hitt, Simmonds, 73; see Pendleton 
and Eaton, 79; Senator Gorman opposed to, 79; 
broken at Milwaukee by postmaster under 
Cleveland, 103; opposed by Browne, 112; up¬ 
held, see Lodge, favored by Cleveland, 122; up¬ 
held, see Henderson, 122; opposed, see Cheadie 
aud Grosveuor, 153; supported by Lodge aud 
McKinley, M. C., 168, 169; rigidly observed In 
post-office at Indianapolis, 186; Ruum attempts 
to override, 203; commended by Secretary 
Tracy, 221; Wanamaker’s evasion of defended 
by Gorman, 228; G. B. Raum, Jr.,sells privilege 
of selection under, 238; to be relaxed, to allow 
federal officers to work for Harrison, 240; aud 
National League, 271; and the courts, 281; vio¬ 
lated in Alabama, 355; construed favoiably to 
Baltimore office-holders, politically active, 357, 
358; as construed by Judge Bradley, and As¬ 
sistant Attorney-General Tyner, 357, 358; Har¬ 
rison claims vigorous enforcement of, 366; 
should be extended, 5; not extended in appli¬ 
cation by Harrison, despite platform pledges, 
189; extension of, urged upon President Harri¬ 
son by Massachusetts republicans, see Lodge. 
Roosevelt, Rogers, Wolcott, 192; order of Presi¬ 
dent Harrison, extending it to part of Indian 
service, 221; President Harrison should put 
navy yards under, 222; extended by Cleveland 
to railway mail service. 224; extended by Har¬ 
rison to Indian service,2.30; somewhatextended 
by Harrison, 237; application of. only to federal 
offices having 50 employes, condemned. 238: 
extension of to all free delivery cities, requested 
by national convention oi letter carriers, 253; 
should be extended to post-office and navy de¬ 
partments. 257; extended to fish commission by 
Harrison, 332; extensions under Harrison. 371. 
372; extensions of. under Cleveland and Harri¬ 
son, 376; proposal to extend under Harrison, 
387: extended to all free delivery post-offices, 
and weather bureau service, 403; should be ex¬ 
tended wherever applicable. 413. 

Civil service law. repeal of, demanded,49; attempt 
at, see Cheadie, 77; proposed by Senator Far- 
well and opposed, see Columbus Republican, 
83; unwise, see South Bend Times. 83; bill o: 
Senator Paddock to withdraw railroad mail 
service from operation of, 92; desired, seeRlch- 


INDEX. 


Vll 


ardson, 96; repeal of sought after, see Cheadie, 
congressman, 112; bills of republicans for, 358; 
bills for under Harrison, 388; bill of De Armoud 
to suspend for first year of every president’s 
term, 404. 

Civil service reform, and the public school, see 
Curtis, C. T. Lane, D. C. Brown, duty ol teach¬ 
ers to enter politics, see address of Parr, Prof. 
S. S.; relation of to other reforms, address by 

C. J. Bonaparte beioreaunual meeting National 
League 1890; of prime importance, see bt. Louis 
Republic; favored by Massachusetts legisla¬ 
ture, see Boston and Cambridge; all other re¬ 
forms should be subordinated to, see bwift; 
murals of, see Blackford; advocated, see Be¬ 
laud; see Wirt, benaior, addresses of; news¬ 
papers devoted to, see good government. Civil 
Service Record. Civil Service Chronicle, 
Civil Service Reformer; see also patronage; see 
convention and platform; see press; and 
church, see church; see also address; in In¬ 
diana under Cleveland's first administration, 1; 
pledges of republican party of, see Foulke, W. 

D. , 4; how it can be accomplished (see address 
of Dabney, R. H.), 7; reasons for (see address 
of McKain, A. A.), 8; altitude of democratic 
party in Indiana to, see address of H. Briggs, 
8; movement for, if successful must be within 
party lines (see address of Lane, C. R.), 8; aud 
teachers, 11; in Indianapolis fire depanment, 
13; advocated by a proiessor, 16; advocated 
by a clergyman, 16; aud Postmaster General 
Dickinson, 18; opinions of, 18; aud the post- 
offices, 18; aud census bureau, 19; and Sen¬ 
ator Ingalls, 22; aud the schools, by Brown, D. 
C., 23; movement for, stronger than ever, 
27; status of, 28; progress in extending in 
federal service, number of places covertd, 
examinations, persons examined, success¬ 
ful competitor, 32; under State laws, in 
New York, in Massachusetts, 32; Con¬ 
gressman Perkins opposed to, 35; opposed 
by Browne, Perkins, Cannon, Taylor, Hou’k, 35; 
objections to by Congressman Brow ne, 35; ob¬ 
jections to considered, 35; Congressman Can¬ 
non opposed to, 35; sentiment in favor of at 
Brookline, Mass., 36; necessary to improve 
condition of Indians, see Welsh, 39; opinion of, 
held by ex-Secietarj Chase,39; see Hoar,43; con¬ 
troversy over, between Loomis aud Buffalo 
EveniugNews, 44;objectlou6 to by Hall,Ewart, 
Taylor, Blair, Ingalls, Houk, Shearman, Evans, 
Cannon, Browne, Perkins,49;geueraloppo6ltiou 
to, resolution and newspaper condemnation 
of, 49; objections to by S. R. Stratton and fed¬ 
eration of republican clubs of 3d Maryland 
District, 49; favored by President Hayes, 50; 
pledges that President Harrison and cabinet 
to reform, 52; see Houk, Darlington, Evans, 
Shearman, Plumb, Harrison, Cleveland, 55; 
as a moral question, see Bonaparte. 59; ad¬ 
dress on by Lucius B. >wift. 137; advocated 
by St. Louis Republic. 138; disregarded by ad¬ 
ministration of Harrison, see Pennsylvania, 
156; action of Harrison's administration in re¬ 
gard to condemned, 156; result of 1890 elections 
in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania strengthen 
cause of, 173; antagonism to. responsible for 
republican defeat of 1890, 173: election of 1890 
in New York, disastrous to. 173; advocated by 
Everett. 174; growth of sentiment for. sketched, 
174; circular letter of Cushing on. 174; hostility 
to of Clarkson and Wanamaker. 177; opposed by 
Houk, advocated by Senator Sherman. 177. 178'; 
opposed, see Grosvenor, 178; see Cleveland. 
181; opposed by Clarkson and Wanamaker, 188; 
opposed by Raum. commissioner of pensions. 
190; opposed by editorof Delphi Journal, a post¬ 
master. 191; disregarded by President Grant. 
191; an object lesson in, see Roosevelt. 192; 
President Harrison deserves some credit for. 
59; a necessity and a prime importance. 59; as 
a moral question, see Bonaparte. 60, 61: con¬ 
sidered a humbug by Ohio reptiblicans, 62; de¬ 
nounced by republicans of West Virginia. 62: 
Harrison not bound to enforce spirit of accord¬ 
ing to New York republicans. 62; denounced by 
Iowa republicans. 62; Neither party cares about 
It, see Indiana, 62; denounced in New Hamp¬ 
shire by republicans. 62; denounced as a sham 
by Pennsylvania republicans. 62; Maryland 
republican clubs denounce. 63; denounced by 
republican central committees in New York, 
63; in Massachusetts and Maryland under 
Cleveland, 63; disregarded by Harrison’s 
administration, 64; in Homiletic Re 
view for October, 1889, 65; advocated, 65; 
opinions on by republican papers, 65; opinions 
on. republican party pledged to, 66; plan for 
agitation of before National League, annual 
meeting, 1889. 66; opinion of Foraker on, 68; 
violation of Harrison’s promises of leads to re¬ 
publican defeat of 1889. 68: in Boston city 
service, 68; see Lodge, 69; in fire department 
at Indianapolis. 69; and fight against Gorman, 
in Maryland. State of. 70; not responsible for 
republican defeat of 1889. but patronage sys¬ 
tem, see Boston Transcript. 76; advocated by 
newspapers, 76; lecture on before students of 
Hanover College, Indiana, see Donell,77: sup¬ 
ported by Pendleton, Willis. Cleveland. Bayard, 
Endfeott, Whitney. Grace, Hewitt. Grant, Chap- 

I in,O’Brien, 82; advocated, see Marlon Chroni¬ 
cle, 83; advocated, see Logansport Journal, 83; 


- - - 

favored by Indiana State republican press, 88; 
favored by Buffalo Sunday Truth, Labor, 84; 
“some popular objections to,” see Morton, 85; 
sham bills for, see Rosecrans, 85; favored, see 
Sperry, 91; and republican press, 92; session of 
house committee on, 96; methods used in East¬ 
ern Dispensary, New York City, 101; advocated, 
see Crooker, 102; advocated, see Bacon and 
Strong. 102; attitude of reformers to, see letter 
of G. W. Curtis, 103; sentiment favoring at In¬ 
diana State University aud Franklin (Ind.) Col¬ 
lege, 108; sentiment favoring in Utah, 111; some 
popular objections to, see Morton, 111, 115,116, 
117, 118, 119; growth of sentiment favoring, 119; 
advocated, see Butler, 120; opposed, see Perk¬ 
ins, Cheadie, Spinola, Grosvenor, 122, 123; 
advocated, see President Hayes, Moore, Green- 
halge. Hill. 1'23; opposed by Houk, Coleman, 
Dunnell. Biggs, 1‘24, 125; advocated by Cuich- 
eon,Tracey. Butterworih, McKinley, McComas. 
124, r25; victory for in house of representatives, 
see Curtis, 125; “the scope and difficulties of,” 
see Bonaparte, 126, 127, 128; “morals of.” see 
Blackford, 130; its later aspects, by W. D. 
Foulke, Economic Tract No. XXXI, 200; great 
progress of in cltits of Massachusetts. 204; un¬ 
der Harrison and Cleveland compared, diverse 
opinions of Harper’s Weekly and Civil Serv¬ 
ice Chronicle, further funds for commission 
refused, 211; favored by Dawes, Butterworih 
and others, opposed by Cannon, 21i; in Massa¬ 
chusetts aud New York cities, 212; all other re¬ 
forms should be subordinate to, 213.214; Thurs¬ 
ton, president league of republican clubs sipeaks 
in favor of, 219; recognized as the leading 
issue by Massachusetts republicans. 219; si¬ 
lence regarding, see Cleveland and Harrison, 
220; methods, use of advised in street cleaning 
department of New Y’ork and Indianapolis, 
see equally divided politically, 220. 221; Sec¬ 
retary of Navy Whitney secretly opposes, 222; 
in Washington, D C., in letters in Civil Service 
Record for April, 1891, 224; opposed by Wana- 
maker, 224; popular in Indiana, federal, state 
officers, and citizens favoring. 227, 229; support¬ 
ed by labor organizations of Buffalo, New York, 
228: all other reforms should be subordinated 
to, 228; favored, see Wilby, 2:15; pupils in Indi¬ 
ana schools know nothing about. 236; attitudes 
of Cleveland aud Harrison towards, compared, 
237; the main issue, 244; favored by Chitten¬ 
den, 251; favored by Harrington, appointed 
chief of weather bureau, 253; favored by na¬ 
tional convention of fire superintendents, 253; 
advocated by Lowell. Jones, 254; present 
status of, by Rev. H. Lambert, criticised, 255: 
advocated by M. Storey: ex-Secretary Bayard, 
257; D, B. Eaton, on, 257; pledges of republi¬ 
can party “not good after election,” 260; see 
addiess of Lambert, 261; as an issue, 261; 
address of Foulke on, before social science 
congress at Saratoga, 1891, 262. 263; practicabil¬ 
ity of conceded by highest public officers, 271; 
in Buffalo, N. Y. city offices. 273; advocated in 
republican national platfoims 1884, 1888. 275; 
praised by Cleveland, message 1886, by Y\in- 
dom. annual report 1889, 276; status of, 282; un¬ 
der Harrison and Cleveland, 282, 283; in census 
service, see report, of National League act, 291, 
295; opposed by Census Superintendent Porter, 
292; favored by Public Service, 306; prize for 
essay on offered by YV. G. Law. 308; bureau¬ 
cracy objection to compared to spoils system, 
.308; opposed by Beard, collector at Boston, 322; 
favored by laborers, see Andrews. 831; in re¬ 
publican national platform, 1892.837; Cleveland 
aud Harrison compared,in regard to. 338; in na¬ 
tional democratic platform 18^, 1892, in Indiana 
state democraticand republican platforms, 1892, 
349; pledges of by Harrison, silence regaidiug 
in 1892, 357; under ( leveland and Harrison, 
strength of popular dislike for. 364; the 
real issue, 865; address on bv G. W. Julian, 
365,867,370. 376; see Welsh, 866; under Cleve¬ 
land and Harrison. ;367,870; in letter of accept¬ 
ance of Cleveland 1892, 375; under Harrison and 
Cleveland. 376; propects for under democratic 
administration, 388; under Hairison and Presi¬ 
dent-elect Cleveland, 389; O. T. Morton on, 896; 
in 1892, annual message of Harrison, 397; 
change of popular feeling regarding, 403. 

Civil service reform associations, see national 
league of. Cambridge. Boston, Indiana, Mary¬ 
land. New Haven, Massachusetts, New York, 
Buffalo. Brooklyn. Missouri, New ton. Pennsyl¬ 
vania. Bloomington. Philadelphia, Brookline, 
Milwaukee, civil service refotm association of; 
see also Malden, Geneva, N. Y .Lawrence. Kan. 

Civil Service Chronicle, opinions of by Indiana 
newspapers, 13; non partisan, intends to advo¬ 
cate only civil service reform. 42; opinions of, 
110; sent to college libraries. 192; policy of. 235. 

Civil Service Record, Boston, March, 1889, 2; for 
April, 1889, plan for treatment of fouith-class 
postmasters. 18; articles in on civil service re¬ 
form in Boston police force, 104; D B. Eaton 
in, on removal of Saltonstall, 105; and growth 
of sentiment favoring merit system, 119; and 
Brooklyn, N. Y’., navy yard tinder Secretary 
Whitney, 148; illustrates civil service labor ex¬ 
aminations, 152; for October, 1890, contains 
speeches before National I.eague meeting, 
1890, 162; exposes methods of Porter, superin¬ 
tendent of census. 190; on reform bill intro¬ 
duced in Pennsylvania legislature, 204; on 















INDEX. 


viii 


Flower’s condemnation of congressional pat¬ 
ronage, 204; condemns removal of Corse, post¬ 
master at iSoston, 215; prints examination pa¬ 
pers of national census bureau and of Massa¬ 
chusetts census department for employes, 
April, 1891, 219, 220; for April, 1891, contains let¬ 
ters on merit system in Washington, D. C., 224; 
ou examination questions used m navy yard at 
Brooklyn, N. Y.,under Tracy, 236; commended, 
completes tenth year, E. B. Greene makes in¬ 
dex for, 237; circulation of, 1891, 239; on 

“bosses,” 251; on spoils system, 201; merges 
with Civil Service Reformer into Good Govern¬ 
ment, 357. 

Civil Service Reformer, Baltimore, March 1889, 2; 
article in advocating clerical advocacy of civil 
service reform, 30; ou political assessments at 
Baltimore, 162; prints specimen applications 
for otiice of those failing to pass examinations, 
on abuse of census service, 204; on evil effects 
of patronage on schools of Baltimore, 211; for 
March, 1891, exposes Gorman, 214; for March, 
1891,on corruption in politics, 214, 215; ou Gor¬ 
man, 219; ou common cause among spoilsmen, 
228; commended,2:37; merges with Civil Service 
Record into Good Government, 357. 

Claflin, W., ex-Goveruor of Massachusetts, signs 
petition for larger appropriation for civil serv¬ 
ice committee. 102. 

Clapp. A. M., and political assessments, 287. 

Clarion, Iowa, Editor Harwood appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 141. 

Clarion, Ba., Journalist Patrick, postmaster at, 149. 

Clark, Alderman, of Indianapolis, supports Fire- 
Chief Webster, 208. 

Clark, collector at Chicago, 95. 

Clark, ex-collector of customs at El Paso, Tex., 266. 

Clark, I)r., New York assemhlyman, introduces 
bill for municipal reform in Oswego, N. Y.,415. 

Clark, A. B.. ollicer Indiana civil service reform 
association. 108. 

Clark, A. B., editor, disappointed office-seeker, op¬ 
poses Sherman, 301. 

Clark, E. P., on Jacksonian “rotation” scheme, in 
August. 1891. Forum, 257. 

Clark. G. W., politician, and post-oflSce at Rochelle, 
Ill.. 109. 

Clark, H.. ward politician, see Buffalo, N.Y’.; see 
Hill, 307. 

Clark, J., candidate as second auditor, 6. 

Clark, J. H., political worker, 160. 

Clark, M. H., in New York convention, 335. 

Clarkson, C., private secretary to J. S. Clarkson, 175. 

Clarkson, J. S., editor, appointed first assistant 
postmaster-general, 14; number, etc., of re¬ 
movals and ‘Tesiguatious” under, 22, 27, 35, 39, 
41, 49. 62, 75, 76. 77, 91, 94, 130, 131, 149,164, 173, 188, 
2 . 53 , 261 ,376,see also removals; andotfiee seekers, 
14; and railroad mail service,21; and office-seek¬ 
ers, 24; and Isabella De La Hunt, postmaster at 
Cauneiton, Iud.,26; “the unspeakable,” 27; tries 
to help Love, accused of selling offices, despite 
contrary evidence declares him innocent, 32; 
and post-offices, 37; appoints L. I). Levan, a dis¬ 
reputable character, postmaster at Wilson, N. 
Y.. 39; spoilsman, 43; appointments in Iowa 
under, 46; and Syracuse post-office, 46; nego¬ 
tiates with Mahoue, 52; and post-office at Can- 
neltou, Ind., and at Long Island City, 54; ap¬ 
points postmasters, 55: removes postmaster at 
Strawberry Point, Iowa, appoints political 
worker, resolutions by residents denounce 
this action, 55; condemned by Milwaukee 
Sentinel [lepublican], 66; largely responsible 
for republican defeat in Iowa in 1889, 67; 
and postmaster at Lawrenceville, Va., 74; 
spoilsman, 92; appoints J. H. Fleuniken post¬ 
master at Bradford, Penn.,99; inveNtigatescase 
of Love, 99; postmaster-general, 103; and post- 
office at Rochelle, 111.. 110; letter to from 
Cooper regarding postmaster at Freedom. Owen 
county, Ind..112; banquetted at Boston, 119; and 
Harrison, 121; condemned. 125; thinks national 
sentiment againstcivil service reform, 128; and 
civil service reformers, 130; speech of at Boston 
before Norfolk club, 1:30.131; gives patronage 
in Missouri to Filley, 1.32; condemned, see C. T. 
Russell. Jr., 136; correspondence of with R. H. 
Dana, 144; gives office to hiscousin, 1,50; retires, 
laudation of, 154; and Dana, 154; and Postmaster 
McKenna of Long Island City. N. Y., 175; letter 
regarding removal of Evans, on secret charges, 
175; and Greenhow, postmaster at Hornells- 
ville, N. Y., 176; hostile to civil service reform, 
177; removes postmasters “upon expiration of 
four years’ service, and second commission not 
yet expired.” 189; opponent of civil service re¬ 
form, 188; spoilsman, 191; denounced, 19.3, 194; 
attacks civil service commission. 230, 231; ad¬ 
vice of to young republicans on plan of cam¬ 
paign, 2.35, 236; dinner to, 245; appointment 
of. hurts civil service reform, 255. 256; 

takes place of Quay on National Republican 
Committee, condemned. 2.57; and Platt. 260; in¬ 
jures civil service reform, see Lambert. 261.269; 
on mugwump, 269; spoilsman, 272; and civil 
service reform. 274; on “bosses.” 278. 281.282, 
314 . 317; and voting republicans. 329; and post- 
office in saloon building. :331; deserts Harrison. 
832; deserts Harrison. .337, 341, .342. 345, .346, 
347. 3-50; eulogizes Quay and Dudley, 3-56; 
placated. .353, 354; works for Harrison, 3.59; 
on national republican committee. 36.3; 
general, 373; on post-offices as a factor in poli¬ 


tics, 364, 369; member national committee, etc., 
confers with Quay, 390, 

Clarkson, N. C., cousin of assistant postmaster- 
general appointed postmaster at Hamilton, 
Mo., 150. 

Classification, once ordered can not be post¬ 
poned, postponement not necessary, act of bad 
laitb, 10. 

Classified service, ought the to be increased, ad¬ 
dress, see Rogers; extensions of Cleveland 
and Harrison, 275; extent of in 1884. 276; exten¬ 
sion of under Harrison, 366; civil service com¬ 
mission recommends extensions of, 397. 

Clay, H., opposes spoils system, 274. 

Clay, Rev. J. H., negro, opposes Harrison, wants 
offices for negroes, 244. 

Clay, Mary L., postmaster at Huntsville (Ala.) re¬ 
moved by President Harrison on report of 
special agent, without cause, 29. 

Clay City, Ind., objections to appointment of Mrs. 
Wilber as postmistress at, 89. 

Clayton, B. S., appointed postmaster at Columbia, 
S. C., vice Gibbes, removed, 74. 

Clayton county, Iowa, resolutions of veterans of, 
denouncing Clarkson, 55. 

Clayton, Powell, obtains appointment of True as 
postmaster atEurekaSprings, Ark., dlspenserof 
patronage, 55; controls patronage in Arkansas, 
188. 

Clear Lake, la., fight over post-office at, 121. 

Clearwater, A. T., judge, a political worker for 
Platt, 265. 

Clemente, congressman and civil service law, 123. 

Clements, E. M., introduces bill in Virginia legis¬ 
lature for non-partisan police and fire service, 
87. 

Clements, I., politician, appointed pension agent 
at Chicago, 107. 

Clements, J. W., office seeker, 24. 

Clerks, questions used in examination for, at Indi¬ 
anapolis, August 6, 1889, 56, 57, 58. 

Cleveland, E., removed from post-office at Quincy, 
Ill., for political reasons, 148. 

Cleveland, Grover, as governor, civil service law of 
New York due largely to, appoints good com¬ 
mission. 271. 

Cleveland, President, extensions of civil service 
law under, see also civil service law; order of 
that railway mail service be classified, 10, 21, 
22,29, 81, 224.372. 403; retains republican post¬ 
master at Norwich, Conn., beyond four years, 
see Norwich, Conn.; and the Indianapolis post- 
office. 3; and the spoilsmen, 5; and civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 10; and Postmaster Pearson, 12, 
20; number of appointments, April, 1889, 16; 
and Missouri offices, 24; and Thomas, and 
Dowling, 25; and Higgins, 25; removes Isabella 
De La Hunt, postmaster at Cannelton, Ind., for 
“offensive partisanship,” 26; and Troy. N. Y., 
post-office, 29: allows republicati postmaster at 
Bridgeport, Conn., to serve out term, 29; re¬ 
tained postmaster at Jersey City until end of 
term, 29; retains republican postmaster at Nor¬ 
wich, Conn., over his term, 29; at suggestion 
of Congressman Matson appoints, H. G. Doug¬ 
las, editor, postmaster at Plainfield, Ind., 30; 
removes Hankness, postmaster at Albert Lea, 
Minn., for cause, appoints Stacy, 39; promises 
of and their fulfillment in Indiana, 41; civil 
service refotm. promises of. 43; abuse of civil 
service law by administration of. 49; re-insiate.s 
Naval Officer Burt, see Burt, 52; and Kansas 
post-offices. 55; civil service reform under, see 
Eliot, 60; and civil sc vice reform in Massa¬ 
chusetts. and Maryland. 63; patronage largely 
responsible for his defeat. 65; see Lea. 68; 
makes clean sweep in Charleston navy yard, 
69; see Lodge, 69; gives patronage of Mary¬ 
land to Senator Gorman. 70; appoints ed¬ 
itor postmaster at Syracuse, N. Y., 71; re¬ 
moves four-year office-holders in Maine. 73; 
attitude of toward civil service reform. 82; 
weakened by patronage. 83: and Indian Rights 
Association appoints Oberly Indian commis¬ 
sioner,86; appoints Spear postmaster at Quincy. 
Massachusetts. 86; removes Luke, postmaster 
at Jeffersonville. Indiana, 88; allows office¬ 
holders to be political workers. 88; secret 
charges under. 96; on civil service reform. 98; 
appoints Turner postmaster at Newtonville, 
Massachusetts, and Childs postmaster at Brat- 
tleboro. Vermont, 100; appoints Pyle postmaster 
at West Chester, Pennsylvania. 101: abuse of 
Indian service under, 102; appoints Mrs. Mulli¬ 
gan to succeed Miss Sweet, 107; gives pa¬ 
tronage of Maryland to Gorman, 111; crit¬ 
icised by Senator Harrison regarding civil 
service, 119; favors civil service law, 122; 
and fourth class post-offices, 124; talk with 
Biggs, see Biggs. 128; circular of. warning em- 
plovea in government offices against political 
working. 135; appoints Montgomery patent 
commissioner, appoints politician assistant 
commissioner, removes Montgomery, appoints 
B. J. Hall, i:t9. 140; accused of briblngthe press, 
144; abuses in Norfolk (Va.) navy yard under, 
147; bribery of press under, see Harrison, sena¬ 
tor. 149; brother in-law of, an office-holder. 1.50; 
appoints Ross postmaster at Washington. D C., 
153; removes employes in Brooklyn navy yard, 
155; antagonized by party machine, because of 
civil service views. 171; object of tariff message 
of, 172; civil service reform and. 173; removes 
Fortune postmaster at Bloomfield, la., 175; 


and secret charges, 177; gives office to Higgins, 
disreputable politician, see Gorman, 181; ap¬ 
points Vandever Indian agent, 181; on necessi¬ 
ty of civil service reform, 181; and department¬ 
al service, 185; number applicants for office in 
Washington under, 185; removals under, 185; 
makes clean sweep of postmasters, 189; spoils 
system responsible for defeat of, 210; civil 
service commission under criticised, 211; 
removals in Indian service under, 217; 
makes almost clean sweep in Indian service, 
219; silent regarding civil service reform, 220; 
appoints Morgan postmaster at Newton, Mass., 
224; gives patronage to Quay and Voorhees, 235; 
loses by comparison with Harrison in respect 
to civil service reform, 287; Indian service un¬ 
der, given over to spoils, 239; appoints son 
of Senator Vest, to diplomatic service, totally 
unfit, 242; disaffection of Maryland under, gives 
atronage of to Gorman, 254; controls patronage 
ut fails of re-election, 262; administration of, 
266; honestly supports civil service commission, 
272; message on civil service reform, 1886, 276; 
violations of law in post-office at Omaha under, 
281; and Harrison, 282, 283; president appoints 
capable woman postmistress at Olneyvllle, 
R. I., 288; promotes Stearns, secretary, 288; and 
removals on secret charges, 297; clean sweep of 
Indian agents under, made, 308. on federal pa- 
patronage, 316; and reform. 325, 826; present po¬ 
litical assessments under, in Baltimore federal 
officers, 828; compared to Harrison, as to civil 
service reform. 838; ex-federal officers under 
work for at Chicago convention, post-office at 
Philadelphia under a scandal, &50; opposed at 
Chicago convention because favored by “mug¬ 
wumps,” 351; and regular democratic organi¬ 
zations in New Y’ork, 355; Kings county. N.Y. 
democratic leadeis promise support to. 356; and 
spoils system, 358, 359; and Harrison, compari¬ 
son regarding civil service reform, .364; and 
civil service reform, 367. 369; Cleveland, civil 
service reform under, 372, 374; civil service 
reform in letter of acceptance, 1892.375; in 1884, 
1888, 376; civil service reform under. 376: dur¬ 
ing the war, 381. 885,386; President-elect, vic¬ 
tory not a license to revel in spoils, 387; and ex¬ 
tension of civil service law. 388; and civil serv¬ 
ice reform. 3H9; war record of, .389; applicants 
for office in Indiana during second term, 392, 
394; refused while candidate to promise spoil 
to Sheehan, 395; address of, on issues, 395.396; 
civil service commission under, first term, 
should reappoint Roosevelt. 397; endorsed for 
denunciation of spoils system, 398; obliga¬ 
tions of, 404; opposes election of Murphy as 
senator from New York.404; and congression¬ 
al patronage, 405; applicants for office in 
Indiana, for second term, 409, 411 ; since 
election, 41.3: applicants for office in Indiana, 
under (second term],415,422. 

Cleveland, Ohio, Anderson appointed postmaster 
at, 216; custom-house at not classified, number 
of employes in, 277. 

Cleveland Leader [republican], civil service re¬ 
form advocated, 92. 

Cleveland, Rev. Dr., favors civil service reform, 73; 
favors civil service reform, 227, 229. 

Cleveland, W. J., philanthropist, on Indian troubles 
at Pine Ridge, S. Dakota. 211, 217. 218. 

Clinton. Iowa, Editor Mahin appointed postmaster 
at, 126. 

Clinton. J., low politician of Indianapolis, 207. 

Club, Y'oung Men’s Republican, of Des Moines, 
Iowa, Clarkson advice to, on plan of campaign. 
235, 2.36. 

Clugage, J. P., editor, applicant for postmastership 
at Sullivan, Indiana, 88; appointed postmaster 
at Sullivan. Indiana, 377. 

Cockran, B., Tammany politician, levies assess¬ 
ments for personal use. 184; opposes nomina¬ 
tion of Cleveland because favored by “mug¬ 
wumps.” 351. 

Cockrell, and patronage in census bureau. 234. 

Cockrum, J. B.. assistant United States district at¬ 
torney for Indiana. 14; declares charges against 
Dudley not founded on fact, 41; a political 
worker, 1.58, 162. 219. 260. .353, 354, 370. .377. 378,379, 
380, 381, 389; worker for Harrison. 316.317; works 
for Harrison at Minneapolis, 343. 379. 

Coffey, acting mayor of Brooklyn, N. Y., and Na¬ 
than, 352. 

Coffey, T. J., letter to from Kemble, 270. 

Coffin, senator, levies political assessments on fed¬ 
eral office-holders in Baltimore, Md., 162. 

Coffin. C. B., republican politician, works for reap¬ 
pointment of Morgan, democrat, postmaster at 
Newton, Mass., 224. 

Cogswell, general, desires removal of Stearns In 
favor of Dodge. 250. 

Cogswell, W., congressman, letter of to Johnson, 
postmaster of Manchester, Mass.. 187; secures 
removal of Stearns for political reasons, and ap¬ 
pointment of Dodge. 288. 

Colbert, captain Indianapolis police, arrests Moore, 
gambler and post-office employe, is asked to call 
arrest a put-up job. see Moore; and office seek¬ 
ers, see equally divided politicallv. 213. 

Cole, H , negro, Harrison delegate from N. Caroli¬ 
na. 334. 

Cole. T., on eligible list of N. Y. police force, in¬ 
duced to try to buy immediate position, is 
fleeced, see Tammany, 224, 225. 













i X j) E X . 


IX 


Coleman, congressman, controls patronage of Lou- 
Isiana, 7^1; opposes civil service reform, 124. 

Coleman, C. E., negro, R. R. mail employe, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Colfax, Wash., Postina8ter*fja Rue of, forced to re¬ 
sign, l{)5. 

Collectors of Internal revenue, editors appointed, 

College graduates, young and civil service exam¬ 
inations, 2(1. 

Colleges, and duties of citizenship, 104. 

Collier, Dr., federal oHicer, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Collier, surveyor of port, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 344. 

Collier, W. II., republican committee chairman, 
attempted bribery of, 102. , 

Collin, professor in Cornell University, defends 
Hill, 305; deiended for defense of Hilt, 313 . 

Collius.representative in Indiana legislature,spoils¬ 
man, 107. 

Collins, C., clerk in Indiana senate, 408. 

Collins, C. C., relative of Mrs. K. Croker, appointed 
police captain, .'ioG. 

Collins, Edith, in charge of examination for police 
matron at New York, see Maloney. 

Collins, F. \V.,U.S. Marshal, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, :144, 3is. 

Collins, G. J., spoken of for Brooklyn, N. Y., post- 
ollice, 135; postmaster at Brooklyn, N. Y., po¬ 
litical worker for Harrison, 33(i; spoilsman. 360. 

Collins, .1., deputy collector in N. Y. custom house, 
a political worker, 2(k5, 279; low politician, de¬ 
sires clean sweep of democrats, 311; in New 
York convention, 334; at Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, ;!44. 

Collins, P. A., signs petition for larger appropria¬ 
tion for civil service commission, 102. 

Collyer, Rev. R., advocates civil service reform, 82. 

Columbia Club, republican organization at Indian¬ 
apolis, 332; and spoils system, 338. 

Columbia, District of, D. M. Ransdall, politician, 
appointed marshal of, 31; central republican 
committee of favors spoils system, 03; Ransdall 
appointed marshal for, 68; clerk of committee 
of removed by Senator Ingalls, who appoints 
his own son, 215; Ransdall, U. S. marshal for, 
gets oHices for relatives, 244; civil service com¬ 
mission recommends extension of classified 
service to all employes in, 397. 

Columbia, Pa., post-office at, see Brosius, 72. 

Columbia, S. C., B. S. Clayton appointed postmas¬ 
ter of, vice Gibbes, removed, 71. 

Columbus, Ind., dissatisfaction among applicants 
for postmaster of, 89; Hartman, postmaster of, 
at -Minneapolis convention, 379; Finney sup¬ 
ported for postmaster of by Congressman 
Cooper, 398". 

Columbus, Neb., Postmaster Hensley, of, forced to 
resign, 166. 

Columbus, Ohio, applicants for post-oflice of and 
Senator Sherman, 67; spoils system in asylum 
at, .304. 

Columbus Republican opposes repeal of civil serv¬ 
ice law, 83. 

Colville, VV. W., federal olfice-holder, supporter of 
Quay, suspected by Harrison, 299. 

Colyer, W., editor, appointed postmaster at Albion, 
Ill., 141. 

Commercial Club, of Boston, address before on in¬ 
iquity of spoils system by Roosevelt, 194. 

Commission, civil service, see civil service com¬ 
mission. 

Commission, Indian, controversy about, 22. 

Committee, national republican, offended by Har¬ 
rison, 240; eulogizes (Juay and Dudley, 237. 

Conaty, J. B., dishonest juror and bondsman for 
Sullivan, corrupt politician, see Indianapolis. 

Concord, Ind., fight over postmastership at, 72. 

Concord, iMass., reappointment of postmaster at, 
see Bancroft, 91; Buttrick recommended for re¬ 
appointment at, 100. 

Concord, N. Hampshire. Postmaster Robinson of, 
active politician, 143. 

Condit, E. M., politician, favored by administra¬ 
tion, 180. 

Conference, civil service reformers at Baltimore, 
1889, 2. 

Conger, U. S. minister to Brazil, political worker, 
382. 

Conger. Col., speech of against Harrison. 240. 

Conger, A. L., patronage of, works for Blaine, 310, 
311, .345; political worker, 389. 

Conger, S., appointed census supervisor .3d Indiana 
district, gives patronage to M. Moores at Indi¬ 
anapolis; politician, 104,132; lets politicians ap¬ 
point enumerators, 182, 190; turns service over 
to spoil. 293. 

Congregationalist,on Collector Erhardt,and decent 
politics, 257. 

Congress, members of harrassed by office-seekers, 6. 

Congressional Patronage, see Patronage, Congres¬ 
sional. 

Congressmen, and internal revenue collectorships, 
14; 140 recommend Butler, R. R. as commis¬ 
sioner of Indian affairs. 11; of Penn, control 
patronage of, after Senators Cameron and 
Quay, 72. 

Conklin, supt. Central Park menageries, .320. 

Conkling, A. R., bill of, preventing political assess¬ 
ments in New York, 318. 

Conkling, R.. Senator, and President Garfield, 14, 
361; spoilsman, 413. 


Conn, Congressman-elect, 392; patronage of, 410; 
patronage of, 420, 422. 

Connecticut, republican platform 1872 and 1871, ad¬ 
vocates civil service reform, 50; political assess¬ 
ments of federal and other offices in, 183; requi¬ 
sition of forger from, refused by Gov. Hill of 
New York for political reasons, 214; schemes of 
Hill in, 309; postmasters in and elsewhere,com¬ 
pelled to give list of voters, 330. 

Connell, Congressman, and Lincoln, Neb., post- 
ollice, 72,108. 

Conner,!. T., editor, appointed postmaster at To¬ 
ledo, Ill., 141. 

Connersville, Ind., Fearis, postmaster of, at Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 380. 

Connett, Alderman, and Indianapolis fire depart¬ 
ment, 13; obtains removal of Fire Chief Webster, 
36; spoilsman and low politician, 207; Blaine 
supporter, bribed by Harrison with office, 362; 
politician at Indianapolis, given office as bribe, 
366. 

Connolly, postmaster, Scranton, Penn., 101. 

Conroy, F.. Indian machinist, refused employment 
to give place to white man, 218. 

Conroy, P., appointed postmaster at Watkins, N. 
Y., see Hiscock and Flood, 150. 

Conroy, W., murderer, low politician, pardoned by 
Gov. Hill, 820. 

Consul, Swiss, and charges of corruption, 21. 

Consulships, great number of applications, 16; ap¬ 
plicants for, 24; Editor A. Reed appointed to, at 
Dublin, 30; R. Spooner appointed to Prague 
through Influence of Senator Spooner, .30; ap¬ 
plications for, 75; number of applicants for 
under Harrison, 185. 

Convention, see also platform; national demo¬ 
cratic, 1892, at Chicago, see Chicago; national 
republican at Minneapolis, 1892, see Minneapo¬ 
lis; republican national, 1888, D. McLean, dele¬ 
gate to rewarded, 30; republican national con¬ 
vention at Chicago, 1888, 121; Indiana demo¬ 
cratic, .luly, 1890, denounces abandonment of 
civil service reform, 180; Ohio republican, 
June, 1891, condemns spoils methods of demo¬ 
cratic governor, 257; state democratic of Mary¬ 
land, July, 1891, condemns spoils methods of 
Harrison administration, 2-37; of republican 
league at Syracuse, August, 1891, federal office¬ 
holders at, 259; republican, Seneca county. N. 
Y., factional fights in, August, 1S91. 259, 260; 
Iowa state, 1891, federal officers at, 260; repub¬ 
lican state of Alabama, 1892, charges political 
activity of federal office-holders in, 3.35. 

Converse, J. O., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Chardon, O., 801. 

Conway, E., deputy U. S. marshal in Indiana, 
ward politician, 108; worker for Harrison, 302, 
817, 379; political worker in Indiana, 144, .353, 
377, 378. 

Cook, Mrs., letter of to Indian Commissioner Mor¬ 
gan, showing abuses of Indian service in S. 
Dakota, 202. 

Cook, C. A., U. S. dist. att’y, Harrison delegate 
from N. Carolina to Minneapolis convention, 
334, 348. 

Cook. J. W., letter to H. Welsh on Indian service, 
79. 

Cook, Major, federal officer, a political worker, 162. 

Cooley. W. B., chief clerk P. O. department, letter 
of Postmaster Smith. 188. 

Coolidge, T. J., appointed minister to France for 
political reasons, 382. 

Coombs. W. J., candidate for congress, 178; oppos¬ 
ing Wallace, 374. 

Cooper, state senator of Penn., 1.33. 

Cooper, ward politician of Indianapolis, supports 
Fire Chief Webster, 208. 

Cooper. E. II., negro editor, opposes Harrison, 
wants ofiices for negroes, 243, 214. 

Cooper, G. W., favors keeping reform promises, is 
prevented from active work in Ohio campaign 
in 18,89,1’tS: asks for retention of postmasters at 
Freedom and Brooklyn, Ind., 112, J71: and in¬ 
vestigation of Pension Commissioner Raum, 
190, 238,373; patronage of, 398, 399, 409, 411,416, 
422. 

Cooper, H. J., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Tampa, Fla., 141. 

Cooper, H. M., internal revenue collector, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Cooper, M. W., appraiser at New York Custom 
House, and Platt, 2.38. 

Cooper, T. V., editor and political worker, appoint¬ 
ed through inlluence of Sen. Quay, see Quay, 
39; Collector at Philadelphia, spoilsman. 85; 
works for Senator Cameron, 162; defends Quay, 
219; a political worker with Quay, 260,270, 2.80; 
political worker for Harrison, 299, 300; confers 
with Quay, Reid and Carter, 361. 362, 390; and 
political assessment circular to raise campaign 
funds in Pennsylvania. 363. 

Corbaley. chief deputy sheriff at Indianapolis, 315. 

Corboy,"P. J., recommends O’Donnell. 60. 

Cornell, ex-governor of New York, 311, ,319. 

Cornell University library, :i.30. 

Cornan, C., postmaster at Ovid, Mich., forced to re¬ 
sign, 165. '' 

Corning, state senator.applicant for postmastership 
at Concord, Ind.. 72. 

Corning, J. W., deputy surveyor at N. Y. city, pays 
political assessments, 279. 


Corpus Christ!, Tex., custom-house at not classi¬ 
fied ; number of employees in, 277. 

Corsa,W. H., federal employe in New York con¬ 
vention, 334. 

Corse, Gen’I, postmaster at Boston, removed for 
politial reasons, 203, 215, 237; entertained by 
Massachusetts reform club, 251; removed for 
political reasons. 282,367, 370. 

Corsicana, Tex., Politician Zadek, appointed post¬ 
master at, 187. 

Corydon, Ind., Hudson, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379, .382. 

Cotton, E. S., candidate for postmaster at Newton- 
ville. Mass., 100. 

Coulter,!. M., president Indiana state university, 
favors civil service reform, 227, 229. 

Coulter, T. B., sixth auditor, interpretation of re¬ 
publican promises, his proceeding stopped by 
Roosevelt, 34; removes subordinates for politi¬ 
cal reasons, 39; removes Smith,-15; spoilsman, 
47; intends clean sweep, 55; member of Ohio 
Republican Association, 234. 

Council Bluffs, Ia.,Treynor, postmaster, political 
worker, 260 . 

Coutts, J. A., journalist, father of federal office¬ 
holder, worker for Harrison, 316. 

Covill, L. W., federal employe, asked to pay politi¬ 
cal assessments, 391, 892. 

Covington, Ind., Editor Vogt appointed postmaster 
at, 126, 377. 

Covington (Ind.) Friend, condemns opposition to 
Magee bill, see also Magee, 209. 

Covode, investigation, 121. 

Cowen, J. K., writes history of Gorman regime,237. 

Cowie, J. A., ward politician and Gibbs faction, 
see also New York City, 241, 242, 265. 

Cowing, Judge, convicts Conroy, murderer par¬ 
doned by Governor Hill for political reasons, 
320. 

Cowman, Martha,wifeof Editor Cowman,appointed 
postmaster at Casey, Iowa, 142. 

Cox, Secretary, and Ma.xwell land grant, .369. 

Cox. G. B., low politician in Cincinnati, worker for 
Foraker, 302; allied with Foraker, 336; disrepu- 
talde republican politician in Cincinnati, 352. 

Coy, “Sim,” corrupt politician of Indianapolis, 
career of, see Indianapolis, forges tally-sheets, 
sent to penitentiary, pardoned by Harrison; 
and Stuart, R. S., 17; effect of pardon of, on city 
election, 59; disreputable politician of Indian¬ 
apolis, 203; opposes passage of bill for new 
charter of Indianapolis,212; adherent of elected 
president city council at Indianapolis, 221, 228; 
low politician, aids republicans in Indianapo¬ 
lis, 269; Elkins compared to, 289; like Hill, 306, 
;!07; and tally-sheet frauds, 313. 

Craft, G. T., postmaster of Maplewood, N. II., dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention,348. 

Cralt, R., federal office-holder, political worker for 
Harrison, 302. 

Craft, W. H., career as R. R. mail substitute clerk, 

12 . 

Craft, sup’t of carriers at Indianapolis, political 
worker, 378. 

Cramer, brother-in-law of Pres. Grant, given office, 
191. 

’Crane, postmaster of Sedan, Ind., political worker, 
379, ;3.80. 

Crane. \V. J , candidate for alderman, see Buffalo, 
N. Y., 197. 

Cratsenberg. A. !., postmaster in Winneshiek Co., 
la., a political worker, 2i;0. 

Cravens, representative in Indiana legislature, 
opposes spoils methods in, 406, 407. 

Cravens, J. O., appointed collector of internal 
revenue, spoilsman, 35, 38. 41; removals by, 51, 
53; opposed by congressmen of Indiana, 84; 
internal revenue collector in Indiana, political 
worker for Harrison, 302, 303, 316; gives office to 
anti-Harrison man, 347; collector and deputies 
in Indiana, political workers, 378, 379. 

Crawford, A., low politician, see Philadelphia, 233. 

Crawford, D., see Hillism, .309. 

Crawford, Mrs. R. A., charges of favoritism re¬ 
garding appointment of denied by Roosevelt, 
266, 267. 

Crawley, chief clerk of Indiana house of repre¬ 
sentatives and office-seekers, 406, 407. 

Creighton, W., negi;o, delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 344. 

Creigmyer, -, indorsed for postmaster at La 

Fayette, Ind., by Cheadle, 84. 

Crescent Club, low democratic organization in 
Baltimore, Md.,308. 

Cresco. Iowa, Editor Webster appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Creswell, ex-postmaster-general, office-seeker, 24. 

Crisp, Speaker, election of. 289. 

Crockett, postmaster of South Bend, Indiana, a 
political worker, 153, 1,58; political worker for 
Harrison, 316, .377, 378. 

Croker, R., Tammany boss, and McLaughlin, 245; 
defends Tammany. 305,322: Tammany leader, 
298; supporter of disreputable politicians, 309, 
317, 414; his patronage, 319, 333. 

Croker, Mrs. R., relative, of appointed police cap¬ 
tain in New York, 356. 

Cronin, Father, supports civil service reform. 137. 

Cronkite, Major, federal official, pays political as¬ 
sessments, 279. 

Crocker, Rev. T. II.. on evil.s of spoils system, 102. 










X 


I X 1) E X . 


Croper, H. M., political worker, appointed collector 
of Internal revenue for Arkansas, 39. 

Crosby, A. D., deputy collector internal revenue, 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Cross, H. G., journalist, postmaster at Petersburg, 
fleb.,149. 

Crounze, Assistant-Secretary, spoilsman, tries to 
get office for his son, 253 , 25-1; to resign to enter 
political work, 370. 

Crouse, state senator of Penn., political worker for 
Quay, 280. 

Grouse, G. N., supported for congress by Collector 
Hendricks and Postmaster C. E. Smith, 386. 

Croussore, J. W., appointment and removal of as 
postmaster at Oakford, Ind., 96. 

Crowley, R., ex-congressman, opposes Hiscock,259. 

Crown Point, Ind., Editor Wheeler postmaster at, 
302, 377. 

Cruger, S. V. R., political worker for Harrison in 
New York, 332. 

Cruikshank, G. L., postmaster at Addison, la., a 
political worker, 260. 

Crum, W. D., negro, nomination of for postmaster 
at Charleston as political reward, withdrawn, 
363. 

Crutcher, G., and political assessments, see Ken¬ 
tucky. 

Cuba, N. Y., Journalist Glenn, postmaster at, 155; 
in N. Y. convention, 335. 

Cullman, Ala., Parker, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Cullom, Senator, and Cook Co. (Ill.) offices, 0; 
spoilsman, 21, 25; obtains appointment 

fourth-class postmasters, and examining 
pension boards, 30; and appointments in 
Ill., 31; and Farwell demand that commission 
of Wilcox be withheld because they were not 
consulted, 31; and office-seekers, 37; spoilsman, 
79,95, 107; and post-office at Lanark, Carroll Co., 
Ill., 109; obtains removal of Smith, postmaster at 
Carrollton, Ill., and appointment of successor, 
188; works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 342; 
supporter of Blaine, 344. 

Cullom, H., employed in N. Y. City government, 
assessed for political purposes, pays twice, re¬ 
fuses third time, removed, commits suicide, 45. 

Cullop. spoilsman in Indiana legislature, 406,407. 

Cummings, A. J., congressman, civil service com¬ 
mission is undemocratic, 116; speech on spoils 
system in navy yards, 145; and navy yard at 
Kittery, Me., 140. 

Cummings, councilman of Indianapolis, receives 
street railway bribing check, 207. 

Cuneo, P., editor, postmaster at Upper Sandusky, 
O., 301. 

Cuney, N.W., negro, and collector of customs at 
Galveston, Texas, political worker, 150,158,159; 
given patronage of Texas, 173; disreputable 
politician, 180, 266; and Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 346, 348. 

Cunningham, appointed head of assay office at 
Boise City, Idaho, upon removal of former in¬ 
cumbent, makes clean sweep, 30. 

Cunningham, chief of division, removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons, see Coulter, 55. 

Cunningham, G. I., U.S. marshal,offers bribes, 162; 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Cunningham, Kan., Journalist Smith, postmaster 
at 149. 

Cunningham, W. S., and Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle, 308. 

Curran, M. P., removed without cause from Boston 
custom-house, place given to L. A. Dodge, rela¬ 
tive of Secretary Blaine, 71. 

Curran, W, R., postmaster at Hoboken, N. J., re¬ 
moved for political reasons, 54. 

Currier, F. D.. naval officer at Boston, a political 
worker, 143; an active politician, 160, 179. 

Curry, W. W., makes political assessments for In¬ 
diana, 153, 377; circular letter of making politi¬ 
cal assessments, 160; spoilsman, 181; political 
worker, 389. 

Curtin, Gov., and Quay, 105. 

Curtis case, 281. 

Curtis, Dr., disgraceful physician, in Central In¬ 
sane Hospital of Indiana, 211. 

Curtis, G. W., address before N. Y. Civil Serv. Ref. 
Ass’n,23; an “imposter,” 49; address of before 
annual meeting of National League 1889, 59, 61; 
rep. journals favor civil service principles of, 
76,86; letter on attitude of civil serv. reformers 
on reform, 103; on absurdity of spoils system, 
120; and civil service law. 125; on victory in 
house of representatives for civil service re¬ 
form, 125; speech at laying corner-stone of 
Washington Arch 1890, 129; accuses Cleveland 
of subsidizing the press, 144; president Nation¬ 
al Civil Service Reform League, 153: before an¬ 
nual meeting National Civil Service Reform 
League, 161, 166,167, 168, 169,172; address before 
annual meeting National League 1890, 166, 167, 
168, 169,172; to address public schoolsof Phila¬ 
delphia on public school and civil service re¬ 
form, 205; address of before department of su¬ 
perintendence of national educational associa¬ 
tion on “The Public School and Civil Service 
Reform,” 211; address of before annual meet¬ 
ing National League of Civil Service Reform 
Associations 1891, 261; address of before annual 
meeting National League 1891, 269,275; writes 
civil service clause in republican national plat¬ 
form 1888,281; correspondence of with Secre¬ 


tary Foster and Wanamaker over political ac- 
ticity of Van Cott and Hendricks, 289; address 
of before National League annual meeting 1892, 
on party and patronage, 321,326,329; on com¬ 
mittee of publication of Good Government, 357; 
career of, 366, 367; memorial, adopted by Buffa¬ 
lo Civil Service Reform Association, 394. 

Curtis, J., speaker of Indiana bouse of representa¬ 
tives, patronage of, 406, -107. 

Curtis, J. E., physician at Indiana Central Insane 
Hospital, extorts fee for death certificate, 314. 

Curtis, N. W., congressman, .354. 

Cushing, M., circular letter of on civil service re¬ 
form, 174; agent for W'anamaker, letter to civil 
service reformers, 188. 

Cushing, W. E., praises Civil Service Chronicle, 

no. 

Cushman, postmaster at Newburg, Ind., political 
worker, 380. 

Custer, GenT,8ee Indian service, 182. 

Customs, 22; deputy collectorship of at Port Towns¬ 
end given to relative of Pres. Harrison, 30; col¬ 
lectors of, applicants for position as under Har¬ 
rison, 185; house at N. Y., applications for, po¬ 
sition in, 75; house N. Y., employes in become 
political workers, 108; at St. Louis, Mo., em¬ 
ployes in workers for Filley machine, 150; house 
at Lockport, N. Y., patronage of controlled by 
Hlscock,259; houses, and extension of merit 
system, 275; houses, should be classified, 403; 
service, examinations for, 1891-92, 396. 

Cutchius, congressman, and civil service law, 73. 

Cutcheon, Congressman, stands by civil service 
law, 124. 

Dabney, Prof. R. 11., part of address at annual 
meetingof IndianaCiv. Serv. Ref. Assoc., 1889,7. 

Dabozy. D. B., office-seeker, 15. 

Dady, Mike J., spoilsman; see also Kings Co., N. 
York, 24; promised federal office in N. Y.; see 
Wallace, 72; corrupt politician of Brooklyn, N. 
Y.; career of, 106, 336; Worker for Nathan, 354. 

Daggett, “Al,” corrupt politician of Brooklyn, N. 
Y., career of; see also Brooklyn, N. Y., 106. 

Dailey’s ranch, cowboys kill Indian boy at, and 
precipitate trouble, 218. 

Daily, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods, 406. 

Dakota, Delegate Mathews of, dictates appoint¬ 
ments in, 30. 

Dallam, journalist, appointed deputy U.S. revenue 
collector, 148. 

Dalton, O., Journalist Scott postmaster at, 149. 

Dalton, W. J., deputy street-cleaning commissioner 
in N. Y. City, ward politician, 291. 

Daly, M. J., political worker, 371. 

Dalzell, gives way to Senator Quay, 30; controversy 
with Sen. Quay over Pittsburg, Pa., post- 
office, 87, 90,112; opposed to Quay, 133, 280; and 
Quay. 299. 

Dana, police commissioner of N. Y. City, a Croker 
tool, helps in boosting Collins by beating Civ. 
Ser. law, 356. 

Dana, Ill., Editor Pritchett appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Dana, R. H., at Balt, conference, 1889, 2; address of, 
before National League, 1889, on taking 4th 
class post-offices out of politics, 67, 68, 74; to ex¬ 
amine management of civ. service, 77; commit¬ 
teeman report on congressional patronage, 113, 
114,115; on committee investigating patent of¬ 
fice, report of, 139, 140, 141; correspondence of, 
with Clarkson, assistant postmaster-general, 
144 : and Clarkson, 154; on committee of Nation¬ 
al League, investigatingpresidential post-offices, 
162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 172; on committee of Nat. 
League reporting on removals on secret 
charges, 175, 176, 177; on committee of National 
League, reimrts on political changes in presi¬ 
dential post-offices, 188; on special committee of 
National League investigating census service, 
291. 295; on commmittee of publication of 
“Good Government,” 357. 

Dancy, J. C., negro, customs coll, at Wilmington, 
N. C., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Danforth, state treasurer (N. Y.), receives political 
contributions, 180. 

Daniel, L. M., federal officer, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Daniels, postmaster at Cedar Rapids, la., 262. 

Daniels, G. B., postmaster of Withey, Mich., asked 
for poll of voters, 383. 

Danville, Ill., Editor Jewell appointed postmaster 
at. 141; Postmaster Jewell of, apolitical worker, 
160. 

Danville, Ind., Editor King supported by Congress¬ 
man Cooper for postmaster of, 398, 399. 

Dany, J. C., negro, collector of customs at Wil¬ 
mington, N. C., delegate for Harrison, 334. 

Darby, WL, P. O. employe, see Indianapolis investi¬ 
gation, 411. 

Dargan, on house committee on civil service, 86. 

Darling, E., postmaster in Crawford county, la., a 
political worker, 260. 

Darlington, S., congressman, opposed to civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 37, 54. 

Darnall, S. A., federal employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Darnell, councilman, and Indianapolis fire depart¬ 
ment, 13; controls patronage in city offices, 104; 
and street railway bribery, 207. 

Daugherty, chairman Allen county (Ind.) repub¬ 
lican committee, opposes Harrison, 303. » 


Daus, R. L., worker for McLaughlin, see Tammany, 
818, 819. 

Davenport. I., candidate for governor of New York, 
1885, 351. 

Davenport, “Johnny,” chief supervisor of elec¬ 
tions at New York, 21; makes tool of “The” 
Allen, see also, 249; letter of questioning rights 
of voters, 387. 

Davidson, A. J., deputy pension commissioner, a 
political worker, 279. 

Davis, ballot-box stuffer, see Hudson county, N. Y. 

Davis, senator,spoilsman, 21; opposes E.G. Hay,84. 

Davis, fireman in Indianapolis fire service, 36. 

Davis, “Bill,” councilman and low politician of 
Indianapolis, 207. 

Davis, “Bill,” P. O. employe at Indianapolis, politi¬ 
cal worker for Harrison, 802. 

Davis, C., political worker for Platt and Hiscock, 
265. 

Davis, C. F., offer of Eubanks to sell office to, 99. 

Davis, D. P., father of Journalist Davis, postmaster 
at Harrison, Neb., 149. 

Davis, I., appointed postmaster at Greenfield, Ind., 
89. 

Davis. Ill., Editor Potter appointed postmaster at, 
141. 

Davis, “Jim,” see also Indianapolis, 207. 

Davis, Rev. J. A., negro, opposes Harrison; wants 
offices for negroes, 244. 

Davis, J. B., applicant for postmastership of Mon¬ 
roeville, Ind., given office in Indian Service, 
88 . 

Davis, M., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Davis, S. P., applicant for postmaster at Cumber¬ 
land, Ind., 89. 

Davis, W., postmaster at Kane, Pa., worker for Del- 
amater, 134. 

Davis, W. R., journalist, postmaster at Canton, 
Kan., 148. 

Davison, J. T., see Hiscock, 259. 

Dawes, Sen., letter to, from Congressman Banks, 
advocating appointment of J. J. McCarthy, 31; 
and Boston custom-house. 71; and Collector 
Saltonstall, 94,105; controls census patronage 
in Mass., 104; favorable to civil service reform, 
211; requests retention of Corse, postmaster at 
Boston, 867. 

Dawson, Neb., journalist Buser, postmaster at, 149. 

Dawson, T., soldier,given place in Indiana senate, 
-108. 

Dawson, Wm., chairman W. Virginia republican 
state committee, levies political assessments, 
390. 

Day, deputy sheriff, a political worker, 762. 

Dayton .Journal, (rep.), spoils system a necessity, 
49. 

Dea, and Brattlebro, Mass., postmastership, lOO. 

Deane, G. B., custom-house contractor, in New 
York convention, 334; and cartage contract at 
N. Y. custom-house, 358. 

Deane, W. G., given place by Collector Erhardt, for 
political services, 150. 

De Armond, congressman, bill of, to suspend civil 
service law, during first year of every presi¬ 
dent’s term, 404. 

Deas, E. H., deputy coll. int. rev., delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Decatur, Ind., editor appointed postmaster at, :i7; 
Quinn, postmaster of, political worker, 379. 

Decker, O. H., appointed consul-general Rio de Ja¬ 
neiro through influence of his relative. Judge 
Settle, 47. 

Deen, H. W., journalist, postmaster at Jackson 
Court House. W. Va., 155. 

Deery. E. H., given place in Indiana legislature, 
406. 

De Freest, clerk of N. Y. house of representatives 
and patronage, 215. 

De Grass, J. C., appointed postmaster at Austin, 
Texas; local politician, 71 

Degress, politician of Texas, 159. 

De Haven, J. D., congressman, indorses Bush, po¬ 
litical worker, 187. 

De Kalb Co., Ind., postmasters in, political work¬ 
ers, 380. 

De La Hunt, Isabella, appointed postmistress at 
Canneltou, Ind., by Arthur, on recommenda¬ 
tion of Sen. Harrison, removed for political 
reasons by Cleveland, Harrison refuses to re¬ 
appoint, 25, 177, .‘168. 

Delamater, state senator of Pa., charged with brib¬ 
ery, career of, 133, 134, 135, i;i8, 299, 353; candi¬ 
date for governor of Pennsylvania, 143; opposi¬ 
tion to in Pennsylvania. 161; defeated candi¬ 
date for governor of Pa., financial ruin of, 183, 
233; forced on Quay, 249; tool of Quay, 250. 

De Land, J. L., federal examiner, on merit system, 
83; on examinations in treasury department, 
152; friend of civil service reform, report of on 
workings of merit system, 200; devises rules for 
promotion in treasury department, 298. 

Delaney, J., postmaster at Orlando, Fla., removed 
on secret charges, Fletcher appointed, 176. 

Delano, congressman, and post-offices in N. Y., 
makes changes in, 47. 

Delaware, repub. platform 1882 advocates civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 50; political activity of federal of¬ 
fice holders in, 334; vote of for Harrison and 
others at Minneapolis.347; political activity of 
federal officers in, attempted bribery by, 347, 
348, 389, 401, 402. 





1 X 1) E X . 


XI 


Delaware, Ohio, Gazette, son of editor of, federal 
office holder, :J0l. 

DeLemas, B., sec’y republican committee of Ala- 
11 political assessments, 391. 

Della Plain, Tex., .Journalist McLain postmaster 
at, lof). 

Delmar, Ala., ignorant negro appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 47. 

Delphi, Ind., Journal [repub.], editorofgivenoffice 
through, 85,97; advocated republican bribery in 
eleetions as only means to win, opposes civil 
service reform, 191; condemns civil service ex¬ 
amination system, liecause democrats get of- 
nees. 213; charges favoritism on part of civil 
service commission, 2('>t), 2(57. 

Democrats, list of, voting in Indiana senate on Ma¬ 
gee bill for non-partisan control of state chari¬ 
table institutions, majority against, 201. 

Democratic platforms, see platforms. 

DeMotte, postmaster at Valparaiso, Ind., a political 
worker, 153, 377. 378; worker for Harrison, 31G; 
works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 343, 379. 

Dennis, Rev. H. D., applicant for postmastcrshio at 
Lanark. Carroll Co.,111., 109; defeated applicant 
for postmastership of Lanark, Ill., 130. 

Denny, C., mayor of Indianapolis, charges against, 
207; ex-mayor of Indianapolis, on the mug¬ 
wump, 209. 

Denton,.).S., see Chemung Co., N. Y., 259. 

Denver, Colo., per cent, of removals in classified 
and unclassified service in post-office at. 185. 

Denver, Ind.. Fite postmaster of, political worker. 

Departmental service, classified by Pres. Arthur, 
185. 

Departments, heads of, and congressional patron¬ 
age, 47; proposal of Congressman Andrews to 
extend civil service law to heads of divisions 
in, 306. 

DePauw, family uses inJluence for appointment of 
Throop, 5!i. 

DePauw, N. T., worker for Harrison, 310. 

Depew, C. M., interview on spoils system, 38; on 
evils of patronage, 75; address at Pittsburgh on 
promotion among railway employes. 189: works 
for Harrison at Minneapolis, 3-41, .342, 343, ;i44; 
and Collector Hendricks at head of republican 
party in New York, 348; worker for Harrison at 
Minneapolis convention, 379. 

Derby, la.. Postmaster Chapman of, a political 
worker, 260. 

Derby, Dr. R. H., resigns from N. Y. City health 
dep’t, because it becomes a political machine, 
356. 

DeRuiter, street commissioner of Indianapolis, see 
Indianapolis. 

Des Moines, la., advice of Clarkson to young men’s 
republican club of, on plan of campaign, 235, 
230; Brandt, postmaster of, political worker at 
Minneapolis convention, 346. 

Despo. candidate for alderman at Indianapolis. 208. 

Detroit, Mich., customs district of, classified 1883, 
276. 

Deveraux, J., able ass’t superintendent city deliv¬ 
ery at St. Louis, 1:31. 

Devreux, J. H., negro, federal employe, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Dewey, J. F., journalist, given office in Chicago 
custom house. 126. 

Dice,-, post-office inspector, apolitical worker, 

179. 

Dick, G. N.. federal employe, in New York conven¬ 
tion, 335. 

Dick, W. F.. chairman Ohio republican state com¬ 
mittee, levies political assessments, .390, .391. 

Dickey, J. >1., anti-Platt political worker, 260. 

Dickinson, postmaster general under Cleveland, 
averse to civil service reform, 18. 20; gives 
spoils in Michigan to democrats. 45; and con¬ 
tributions to party funds, 100; and civil service 
reform, 274. 

Dimmick, D. A., appointed consul at Barbadoes 
through influence of Secretary Blaine, 56. 

Dimond, General W.H., chairman republican state 
committee of California, endorses Bush, politi¬ 
cal worker, 187. 

Dingley, congressman, supports civil service com¬ 
mission, 205. 

Dissron, F., negro, post-office employe, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Disston, H., political worker for Quay. 280. 

Ditney. Ind., Retcham, postmaster of, solicited for 
political contributions, 387, 392. 

Divver. P., low politician, appointed police justice 
by Mayor Grant, well recommended, 184; ap¬ 
pointed to judgeship by Governor Hill of New 
York, 212. see Tammany, 317- 

Dix, Rev. M., D. D., favors clerical recognition of 
civil service reform, 48; advocates civil service 
reform, 82. . , 

Dobbins, P. B., receiver of political assessments, 
.390 

Doble, A. K., and pardon of Petroff and Kemble, 
1.52. 

Dobson. H. A., federal employe, asked to pay po¬ 
litical assessments, .391, .392. 

Dockery, congressman, upholds civil service com¬ 
mission, 204. 

Dodd, assistant postmaster at Indianapolis, and 
those elegible for appointment, 9. 

Dodd, faction, see New York City. 

Dodge, F. L., editor, appointed postmaster at Han¬ 
ford, Cal., 126. 


Dodge, L. A., relative of Secretary Blaine appointed 
an appraiser in Boston custom house, 71; suc¬ 
ceeds Stearns, appraiser in Boston custom 
house removed for political reasons, 250, 288; 
appraiser at Boston, political worker, 334. 

Dodson, C., deputy revenue collector, in Maryland 
convention, 3:i5. 

Doerbaum, J. F., employe in post-office at St. 
Louis, Mo., worker for Filly machine, 150. 

Dolliver, J. P., congressman, requests resignation 
of Postmaster Cain, see Cain, 165. 

Dolph. Congressman, and civil service law, 73. 

Donaldson, La., Weber appointed postmaster of, on 
requestof Collector Warmouth, 241. 

Donato, J. G., federal employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, ;348. 

Donavan, C., unsuccessful candidate for congress, 
ward politician, see New York City, 199. 

Donavan, E. J., signs petition for larger appropria¬ 
tion for Civil Serv. Com., 102. 

Donley, D. E., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Baylis. ill., 141. 

Donnell, J. T., address of at Hanover College, Ind., 
upon civil service reform, 77. 

Donnelly, J. B., U. S. marshal, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Doran, T. T., see Cannon, 39. 

Dorchester,commissioner of Indian schools,creates 
office for benefit of his wife,.38; removals under 
in Indian service, 79. 

Doremus, recommended for census service, 121. 

Dorsey, S. W., and star route scandals, 291; and 
Elkins, 281, 369. 

Doty, E. A., at Baltimore conference, 1889 , 2. 

Dougall, A. H., candidate for postmaster at Ft. 
Wayne, Ind., 45. 

Dougherty, chief of division, removed by Coulter 
for political reasons, 55. 


Dougherty, fire chief at Indianapolis to succeed 
Webster,removedfor political reasons, removed 
and Webster reappointed, 120, 207, 208. 

Douglass, F., ex-r. S. minister, works for Harrison 
at Minneapolis, 345, 346. 

Douglas, G., applicant for Wiuamac, Ind., postmas¬ 
tership, 88. 

Douglas, H. G., editor appointed under Cleveland 
postmaster at Plainfield, Ind., 30. 

Douglass, S. J., census supervisor, asks political 
work of subordinates, 293. 

Dow. F. N., for collector of customs at Portland, 
Me., 22. 


Dowling, low politician, and Cleveland adminis¬ 
tration, 28, 35, 94. 

Dowling, labor commissioner of New York, spoils¬ 
man, removals under, civil service rules sus¬ 
pended for, 414. 

Downing. J. H., discharged from navy yard at Nor¬ 
folk, Va., by Sec’y Whitney, 147. 

Downing, J., confesses to bribery, 151. 

Doyle, sec’y civil service commission, investigates 
political assessment cases, 392. 

Doyle, H., page in Indiana legislature, 406. 

Doyle, M. J.. postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention. 348. 

Draper, leader republican faction at Albany, N. Y., 
supports A. Chester for surveyorship of Albany 
district, 45. 

Drapo, J. F., indorsed by Sen. Quay, 100. 

Draper, pension examiner in Indiana, political 
worker, 379. 

Drummond. S. A., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at Lancaster. Cal.. 141. 

Dry den. postmaster of Martinsville, Ind., political 
worker, 380. 

Dublin. Editor A. Reed, appointed consul at, 30. 

Dll Bois. delegate from Idaho Terr., spoilsmen, 
uses influence; see Wild, 30; senator, supporter 
of Blaine. 344. 

Ducey, Rev. Father, and attempt to purify politics 
in N. Y. City, 130. . 

Ducy, W. A., succeeded by Deane, appointed by 
Collector Erhardt at New York, 150. 

Dudley, W. W., obtaining offices for adherents. 2, 7; 
and offices, 189, 192, 214 , 227, 256, 281, 282. 305, 373, 
414,24 , 92, 154, 100; letter of, called ‘'Blocks of 
Five” letter, 41, 78; negotiates with Mahone, 52; 
uses influence for appointment of Throop, 59; 
case of, see Edmunds, Sen., 87; and Harrison, 
121; levies political assessments, 180; condemned 
by young men’s republican club of [Massachu¬ 
setts, 219; desires indorsement of his •‘political 
activity,” 244; eulogized by National Repub¬ 
lican Committee. 2.57; Elkins compared to. ‘289; 
eulogy of by Clark,son,359; and republican lead¬ 
ers, 354; and‘‘blocks of five,” 3C>8; and Miche- 
ner 377; and S. N. Chambers. 380; warrant for 
not issued by U. S. Dist. Att’y Chambers, 380. 

Duer, E. F., postmaster ofPrincess Anne, Md., re¬ 
moved for political reasons, Lankford appoint¬ 
ed, 408. „ „ . ,... , 

Dufalo, F. F., consul at Havre, Harrison petitioned 
to retain, by N. Y. cotton exchange. 54. 

Duffy, T. L., laborer, given office by Gold, township 

trustee at Indianapolis,‘250. 

Dugan, I., treasury inspector, removed for political 
reasons. .332. , 

Duhurst, F. G., 3:15; receiver of political, assess¬ 
ments for Maryland, :f91. 

Dunbar, J. G., congressional candidate, and Kaum, 
.373. 

Duncan, H. C.. letter to from Cooper (M. C.) a^sklng 
retention of postmasters at Freedom and Brook¬ 
lyn, Ind., 112. 


Duncan, J., applicant for postmastership of Mar¬ 
tinsville, Ind., 399. 

Dunham, federal employe, political worker at Bos¬ 
ton, 3.34. 

Dunlap, H. J., journalist, appointed consul to Bres¬ 
lau, 84, 1‘26. 

Dunlap, W. L., U. S. marshal for Indiana and civil 
serv. reform, 10. 14, 96, 108; asks Postmaster 
Browne of Franklin, Ind., to resign, 37, 377; a 
political worker, 144; worker for Harrison, 316, 
:i20, 337, 343, 353; and republican clubs in Indi¬ 
anapolis, :362; worker for Harrison, 377, 378, 379, 
380,381; appoints “floaters” as deputies, 387,389. 

Dunn, councilman of Indianapolis, spoilsman and 
low politician, 207. 

Dunn, postmaster at Stanberry, Mo., 121. 

Dunn, C. J., P. 0. employe at Indianapolis, at in¬ 
stance of democratic committeeman Backus, 
solicits political contributions, removed, 403, 
411,412, 

Dunn, G. W., postmaster at Binghamton, N. Y., a 
political worker, 266; secures removal of pen¬ 
sion examiner Van Alstyne, :J04. 

Dunn. I., deputy coroner at Indianapolis, shaves 
witness fees, 314, 315. 

Dunnell, obtains removal of Stacy, postmaster at 
Albert Lea, Minn., and reappointment of Hark- 
ness, political worker, previously removed for 
cause, 39; opposes civil service examinations, 
124. 

Dunning, F. H., journalist, postmaster at San- 
bright, Tenn., 155. 

Dunton, A. G., appointed postmaster at Hunter- 
town, Ind., vice Latham removed through in¬ 
fluence of Postmaster Higgins, 362. 

Dunvell, C. J., political worker for Nathan. 264. 

Durbin, W., see Cannon, 39. 

Durbin, W. T., and office-seekers, 37; uses influ¬ 
ence for appointment of Throop, 59; politician, 
secures some appointments, 71, 84. 

Durham, Judge,removed from comptrollership, 21. 

Duryee, S. W., chief clerk in patent office under 
Pres. Arthur, removed; re-appointed, 140. 

Dutchess county, N. Y., election frauds in, com¬ 
mitted by Hill, 306. 

Dwight, J. W., uses Influence for appointment of 
Robinson, postmaster at Ithaca, N. Y., 264; N. 
Y. delegate to Minneapolis convention, and 
supports Blaine, .344, 345. 

Dysart, Iowa, Editor Brown appointed, 142. 

Eagle, Edward, editor, worker for Delamater, etc., 
i:34. 

Eagle Park, Idaho, Journalist Wheeler postmaster 
at, 155. 

Eagle Pass, Tex., custom house at not classified; 
number of employes in, 277. 

Eastern Dispensary of New York City, civil service 
methods in, 101. 

Eastman, A., journalist, given office in Internal 
revenue service, 126. 

Eastman, R. B., supervising architect of Brooklyn, 
N. Y., to be removed for mal-administration, 
234. 

Easton, D. J., journalist, postmaster at Union City, 
Mich., 149. 

Easton, Md., Mulliken, postmaster of, in state con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Eaton, postmaster at New Orleans, pays political 
assessments, 383. 

Eaton, D. B., memorial on Postmaster Pearson be¬ 
fore N. Y. Civil Service Reform Association, 23; 
draws bill for present civil service law, 75, 79; 
advocates civil service reform, 82; on removal 
of Saltonstall, 105; praises Civil Seevick 
Chronicle, 110; -letters to Senator Allison; 
letters replying to Senator Hoar, 111; and civil 
service law, 125; on civil service reform, in 
June, 1891, North American Review, 267; stud¬ 
ies English civil service, at invitation of Hayes; 
appointed chairman civil service commission 
under Arthur, 271; on Tammany, 317. 

Eaves, J. B., nomination of rejected by senate, 150; 
disappointed office-seeker, a political worker, 
159; in N. Carolina, 334; stamp clerk at States¬ 
ville, N. C., resigns; levies political assess¬ 
ments; sons of given office, 362. 

Eden, “ Billy,” easy-going place-holder, 315. 

Editor-appointed consul at Palermo, Italy, 240. 

Editors, rewarding of for political services, see 
Press, 30. 

Edmunds, evils of patronage, 25; and investigation 
of case of W. W. Dudley,87. 

Edsall, I. W., removal of by Flower, 319. 

Edwards, A. J., ass’t postmaster at Pittsburgh, 
Pa., supporter of Quay, suspected by Harrison, 
299. 

Edwards, Miss., negro Perkins, postmaster of, dele- 
• gate to Minneapolis convention, .344. 

Edwards, R., federal employe, worker for Har¬ 
rison, 334. 

Edson, C. H.,see Harlow, postmaster, 100. 

Edson, Dr. C., appointed sanitary supt. at N. Y. 
City vice Ewing, removed by Tammany, :1.56. 

Egan, P., appointed minister to Chile as political 
reward,‘2<S2; U. 8. minister to Chile, political 
worker, 382, 389. 

Egger, C., ward politician,see Indianapolis, 196. 

Ehlert, H.,low politician, flees from creditors, ■2-26. 

Eidman, F., internal revenue collector in New 
York, a political worker, 265, 287; at Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, .344. 

Elter, ex-postmaster, political worker, :(70. 









xii 


Elbert, Dr. S. A., negro, opposes Harrison, wants 
offices for negroes, 243. 

Eligibles, list of civil service commission orders 
posting of, at Indianapolis, 25; at Indianapolis 
post-office. June, 1889, 29; in Indianapolis post- 
office, list of, 48; publicity of lists of, opposed 
by ex-Commissioner Oberly.53; list of, and civil 
service commission, 9.3; made public, gives sat¬ 
isfaction, 186. 

Eliot, C.W. (Pres. Harvard Univer.), address of be¬ 
fore Bay State Club comparing administration 
of civil service under Cleveland and Harrison, 
69; Pres. Harvard I niversity, civil service re¬ 
former, 204. 

Elizabeth, N. J., federal patronage in, see Kean, 
216. 

Elizabeth, Pa., wife of .lournalist Wiley postmaster 
at, 149. 

Elkham, W. Va., Journalist Greenawalt postmas¬ 
ter at, 15-5. 

Elkins. “Steve,” and Kerens. “Dick,” 22; wants 
larger share of patronage in West Virginia, 71; 
and Platt, scheme to defraud the government, 
258; appointed sec’y of war, corrupt politician, 
career of, 289, 290, 291; appointment of as sec’y 
of war, unjustifiable, 298; political worker for 
Harrison, 336; and Minneapolis convention, 
.338, 339; confers with New, 340; sec’y of war. ca¬ 
reer of, 8.54,368,369,374; appointed to alienate from 
Blaine, 376; confers with J. C. New, ;:79; sec’y, 
etc., political worker, 387, 390. 

Ellart, S., inspector in N. Y. custom house, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 108. 

Elletsville, Ind., Sharp, postmaster of, political 
worker, 380. 

Elliott, councilmanof Indianapolis, spoilsman and 
low politician, 207. 

Elliott, Congressman, 162. 

Elliott, B. K., judge Indiana supreme court, favors 
civil service reform, 227,229; mentioned as can¬ 
didate for governor of Indiana, 353, 381. 

Elliott, D. W., clerk in post-office at Ind’p’l’s, 25. 

Elliott. G. F., political worker, see Kings Co., N. Y. 

Elliott, G. L., appointed postmaster at Reelsville, 
Ind., removed, 89. 

Ellis, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons, see Coulter, 55. 

Ellis, P., mayor, appointed postmaster at Muncie, 
Ind., 217; political worker for Harrison, 316, 
362. 370,378. 

Ellis, W. P., appointed postmaster at Washington, 
Ind., despite sale of office to Sefrlts, 121. 

Ellison, state senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 408. 

Elmira, N. Y., postmaster at named by Congress¬ 
man Flood, 53; Flood, postmaster of, a politi¬ 
cal worker, opposes Platt and Fassett, factional 
fights at, 2.59; a political worker. 265, 266; re¬ 
moved for political reasons. 297, .303. 304; Rath- 
bun appointed, removed, 303. 304, 305; removed 
on secret charges, Rathbun appointed, 312; re¬ 
moval of through influence of Fassett, .331. 

Elmwood, Neb., Journalist Mayfield postmaster at, 
149. 

El Paso, Tex , forty-nine applicants for collector- 
ship of customs at, 45; Flanagan, political 
worker, appointed customs collector at, 266, 286; 
custom house at not classified, number of em¬ 
ployes in, 277. 

Emans, corrupt political worker for Hill. .306. 

Emerson, L. W., ward politician, tired of factional¬ 
ism, see Kings Co., N. Y. 

Emery, L., ex-state senator, charges Delamater with 
bribery, 1,34, 135. 

Emmert, P. W., journalist, postmaster at Erwin, 
Tenn., 1.55. 

Emmetsburg, Iowa, Editor Utter appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Employes, federal, in Massachusetts active politic¬ 
ally, 179; at Washington, number of compelled 
to go home to vote, 179. 

Emporium, Pa., Journalist Gould postmaster at, 149. 

Encinitas, Cal., Editor Smith appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Endicott, Sec., favors civ. service reform. 82. 

England, competitive tests in civil and military 
service of, 118. 

England, methods used in census service of, 291, 
292. 

England. G., a Nathan henchman, 304. 

English, postmaster at New Haven, removed, 96. 

English, A. M., journalist, postmaster at Fontana. 
Kan., 149. 

English, J., low politician, see Hudson Co., N. Y. 

English, W., low politician, see Hudson Co., N. Y. 

Engraving and Printing, conduct under E. O. 
Graves, 45. 

Enochs, Congressman, on federal interference in 
election of Sherman, 301. 

Ensley. N., appointment as pension agt. at Indian¬ 
apolis opposed, 89, 96; pension agent in Indiana 
, appoints his son chief clerk in pension office, 
vice J. L. Riley, 108; worker for Harrison. 303. 
316; at Minneapolis. .337, 343, 379; and political 
assessments, 363; political worker, 378. 

Ensley, O. R., given office by his father, pension 
agent, 108. 

Ensor, J. F., deputy coll. int. rev., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Ensor, J. F.. U. S. dist. att’y, and political activity 
of federal office-holders' in Maryland, 3.3.5; dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 


1 N I) E X . 


Enyart, M. L., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Macy, Ind., 126, 377. 

Ephrata, Penn., democratic postmaster of removed; 
republican appointed, 72. 

Episcopal Church, pastoral letter of House of 
Bishops of, favoring clerical advocacy of civil 
service reform, see Church, 73. 

“Equally Divided Politically,” proviso in charter 
that offices in city service of Indianapolis be, 
212, 213, 220, 222, 228, 235. 

Erhardt, J. B., collector at New York, and office- 
seekers, 38; deputies of, active politicians, 108; 
spoilsman, see Deane, 150; discontent of office- 
seekers with, 171; removals under, 183; and 
fraudulent cartage bids, 216; “resigns.” Fassett 
appointed, 25-5; resignation of, 2-57; and Platt, 
268; “frozen out” by Platt, 260; and office-seek¬ 
ers recommended by Platt and Gibbs, 261,265; 
and Platt, 350; forced to resign for adherence 
to civil .service reform methods. 358; and cart¬ 
age bids. 371; forced to resign for resisting 
spoilsmen, 373. 

Ernst, J. A., editor, appointed postmaster at St. 
Genevieve, Mo., 12(;. 

Erwin, representative in Indiana legislature, and 
spoils methods in, 407. 

Erwin, Tenn., journalist Emmert, postmaster at, 
155. 

Eskridge, Kan., journalist Melrose, postmaster at, 
149. 

Estee, M. M., indorses Bush, political worker, 187, 
291. 

Estey, and Brattleboro, Mass., postmastership, 100. 

Eubanks, A. C., candidate, letter of, 23; and sale 
of offices, 99. 

Eugharth, E. E., postmaster at Rodney, Miss., del¬ 
egate to Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Eureka Springs, Ark., appointmentof True as post¬ 
master of, denounced by republicans of, 5-5. 

Eustace, A. C., N. Y. civil service commissioner, 
worker for Hill, 309. 

Eustls, delegate to Minneapolis convention, sup¬ 
ports Blaine, 344. 

Evans, G. O., fiscal agent for Penn., corrupt politi¬ 
cian. 270. 

Evans, H. C., postmaster at Bloomfield, Iowa, re¬ 
moved on secret charges. 175. 

Evans, H. C., congressman, opposed to civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 49; opposed to civil service law, .55; 
secures appointment of politician Park, as cen¬ 
sus enumerator, 293. 

Evansville, Ind., Postmaster Bennett of, politician, 
see also Posey, 46; Postmaster Bennett of, a po¬ 
litical worker, 1,53 1.58, 377; republicans favor 
Gresham, 240. 

Evansville, Ind., Courier, condemns opposition to 
Magee bill, see, also, Magee, 210. 

Evansville, Ind., Journal [republican],49; opposes 
Harrison, 378. 

Evansville, Minn., Journalist Lawrence postmaster 
at, 149, 

Evarts, W. M.. Fassett deserts at suggestion of Platt, 
259 ; Jewett claim, 290, 353. 

Everett, W., civil service reformer, 174. 

Ewart. H. G., congressman, opposed to civil serv¬ 
ice law, 47; objects to civil service reform, 49; 
supports politician Pritchard, 159, 161; levies 
political assessments in South Carolina, 390. 

Ewing, W., endorsed by his relative. Secretary 
Blaine, for collector at Pittsburg, 100. 

Ewing, Dr. W. A., removed from New York City 
health department for political reasons, 3,56. 

Examinations, civil service, general. 

Examinations, specimen papers of those failing 
in, see Civil Service Record; of civil service 
commission, assaults against and defense of, see 
Roosevelt; examination questions, 3; for ap¬ 
pointment should be made public, 10; for civil 
ser vice, objections to, considered, 11; special or¬ 
dered for post-oflice at Indianapolis, 18; age of 
competitors in, at Bloomington, Ill.. 26; civil 
service, a farce at Troy (N. Y.) post-office and 
New York custom house, 29; number of em¬ 
ployes in New York and Indianapolis post- 
offices exempt from, 42; for civil service, said 
to be not pertinent questions asked in, 49; pa¬ 
pers should be opened to public inspection, 53; 
questions used in for clerks and carriers at In¬ 
dianapolis, August 6, 1889, 51, 56, 57. 68, see 
Call, 118; for positions in patent office, 141; 
In treasury department, see De Land, 152; 
paper used at Baltimore. 157; by civil serv¬ 
ice commission, number of persons exam¬ 
ined, year 1.8,89-90, appointments, 185; dur¬ 
ing 1889-90 for various branches of civil serv¬ 
ice, unsuccessful and successful applicants, 
see report civil service com., 1889-90, 1,85; cen¬ 
tral board of, suggestions as, see civ. service 
com. annual report, 1.889-<K), 185, 186; papers 
marked in, for civil service, made public, 186; 
census Superintendent Porter alleges, for clerk¬ 
ships, 190; “pass’’discredited, 192; for various 
departments of service need improvement, see 
Wanamaker, 193; and elegibles for position 
as clerks and carriers at Indianapolis, 218; 
used in national and Massachusetts state cen¬ 
sus service, 219,220; to be required for promo¬ 
tion from unclassified to classified^ service, 221; 
civil service, instituted for positions in navy 
yards by Sec’y Tracy, 221, 222; employes under 
treasury supervising architect, selected by, 
although not required by law, 224; of civil 
service commission, 230,231; questions used in. 


at Brooklyn, N.Y., navy yard, 236; civil service, 
evasion of under G. B. Raum,jr., 238; C. W. 
Watson, chairman, committee on, of N. Y. 
civil service reform association, 239; for Indi¬ 
anapolis post-office to be held August, 1891, 248; 
for clerks and carriers for Indianapolis post- 
office, number of applicants, 253; competitive 
under civil service commission, ordered for 
promotions in Washington offices, 254; compet¬ 
itive for candidates for West Point, instituted 
by Congressman Warwick, does not accept re¬ 
sult,see McKinley, 254,262; competitive, Wana¬ 
maker establishes promotion by, in P. O. de¬ 
partment, 256, 257; civil service, prejudice 
against hard to dispel, 257: system and civil 
service commission, prejudice against in the 
south, 273; promotion by competitive. 286; com¬ 
petitive for census service of England, Ireland 
and Scotland, and U. S. A., 292; competitive for 
promotion. Introduced by Wanamaker in de¬ 
partment offices, and post-offices, 297, 298; 
physical required for employes in R. R. mail 
service, 305; of August, 1892, in Indianapolis 
post-office, results of, 366; under civil service 
commission, 1.891-92, in various departments, 
396, 397. 

Examinations, civil service, municipal; questions 
used in for Buffalo police service, 44; No. of 
held. Mass, civil service commission. 74; ques¬ 
tions used in, fire dept, at Brooklyn. N. Y., 93; 
questions used in, for Brooklyn police service, 
152; for labor service see Civil Service Record, 
1,52; for positions in police service at Indianap¬ 
olis. Boston, and Brooklyn compared, see equal¬ 
ly divided politically, 222, 223, 224; competi¬ 
tive and civil service methods should be insti¬ 
tuted in city service at Indianapolis, seeequal- 
ly divided politically. 228; physical, for fire 
and police services of Boston, Mass., 243, 24(), 
247,248, 249; in Indianapolis, for physicians in 
city hospital, 322; under N. Y. City civil service 
board for police matron, a complete failure, 
Mrs. Maloney, beggar, appointed, 404. 

Examiner (chief), investigates violations of civil 
service law in post-office at Milwaukee, Wis., 
Sept., 1888, 36. 

Examiners, local boards of, suggestions as to, see 
civil service com. annual report ]S.8S)-90.1.85, 186; 
local board of, personal of at Baltimore and In¬ 
dianapolis, 1.86. 

Fahsel, on local examining board at Milwaukee, 
103. 

Failing, A. H., applicant for postmastership at Os¬ 
wego. N. Y.. 126. 

Fairbanks. C. W.. republican politician in Indiana, 
on business methods in polities. 137. 

Fairbanks, Crawford, Terre Ilante distiller, 346,419. 

Fairchild, ex-secretary of treasury, 169; on tariff 
message of Pres. Cleveland, 172; appoints May¬ 
nard ass’t sec’y of treasury, 310. 

Fairfax, commander of Kittery navy yard, testifies 
as to abuses, 147. 

Fairmount Club, see Baltimore investigation, 295. 

Farlow, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in, 407. 

Farmer, S. C., postmaster in Wright Co., la., a po¬ 
litical worker, 26>0. 

Farmington, Me., Pratt, postmaster at, removed on 
secret charges, 175. 

Farnum, H. S., postmaster at Uxbridge, Mass., re¬ 
moved on secret charges; C.T. Scottappointed, 
175. 

Farragut, Iowa. Journalist Notson appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Farrell, commissioner, spoilsman, 315. 

Farrington, J. M.. ward politician, see Kings Co., 
N. Y.; opposing Nathan, 304. 

Farwell. senator, and Cook co. (Ill.) offices, 6; and 
applicants for Chicago offices, 14; spoilsman, 
17, 21, 25, 79, 92; and Sexton, postmaster at Chi¬ 
cago, 22; and Senator Cullom, 31; and office- 
seekers, 37; recommends O’Donnell, 59; pro¬ 
poses to repeal civil service law, 83; and Far- 
well Club of Indianapolis. 85. 92, 269; on control 
of Illinois patronage, and Clark, customs col¬ 
lector at Chicago, 95; indorses Hartong for 
postmaster at Rochelle, Ill., 109; indorses ap¬ 
plication of Scanlan, political worker, 132. 

Farwell Club, of Indianapolis, 79, .83, 86, 112, 119; 
end of, 85. 

“Fassett” report, on effect of civil service law in 
New York City and elsewhere, 21;[». 

Fassett, A. D.. editor, given office by Governor 
Poraker, 301. 

Fassett, J. S.. undertakes to name postmaster for 
Elmira, N. Y., 53; appointed collector at N. Y. 
City to make clean sweep, vice Erhardt, “re¬ 
signed,” 255; methods of, political worker for 
Harrison, 2:58, 259; political worker. 265-6,269; 
appointment of condemned. 272, 373,374; candi¬ 
date for governor of New York, aided by cus¬ 
tom house employes in N. Y. City, 278; cam¬ 
paign of, 279, 280,287,288; and removal of Flood, 
postmaster at Elmira, N. Y.,297, 303,304, 331; at¬ 
tempts removal of Postmaster Van Dnzen, 331; 
and Harrison, 345. 846, 352, 3.53, 337, 342, 344. 

Faulkner, C.^R., member Indiana legislature, illit¬ 
erate politician, gets federal office through con¬ 
gressmen and Senator Voorhees, 222. 

Fawcett, letter of to Civil Service Chronicle on 
Delphi Journal and Owen, 97. 

Fay, H. H., appointed postmaster at Newport, R. I., 
see Rhode Island, senators of, 1,50. 









X I) E X . 


XllI 


Fearls, postmaster of Union, Ind., worker for Har¬ 
rison, 310, 378. 

Fearis, J. H., postmaster of Connersville, Ind., at 
Minne^olis convention, 380. 

Federal omce-holders, political activity of, see 
states, cities, Minneapolis convention. 

Feland, J., internal revenue collector in Kentucky, 
political assessments under, 330; delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, :(44, 348. 

Fellows, J - II., low politician, see Hillism, 190, 309. 

Felton, Senator, supporter of Blaine, 344, ,359. 

Fensley, W., federal office-holder, see Baltimore 
investigation, 328. 

Fenstemaker, W., journalist, postmaster at Augus¬ 
tine, Kan., 148. 

Ferguson, C. E., and Orlando, Fla., post-office, 176. 

Ferris, G. C., whose son holds federal office, a po¬ 
litical worker for Hiscock, 265. 

Fessenden, S., 3.54,359. 

Feudalism revived, account of in N. Y. City and 
Brooklyn, hy Boston Post, 263. 

Field, John, as postmaster of Philadelphia, 15, 300: 
suggested by Senator Quay for postmaster at 
Philadelphia, 22; withdraws resignation, 310. 

Fielding, R. \V., candidate for U. S. marshal, de¬ 
feated, 132. 

Filer, C. W.. federal office-holder and political 
worker, 179. 

Filley, C. I., office-seeker, 14, 24, 131; spoilsman, de¬ 
feated applicant for St. Louis postmastership, 
controls 4th class post-offices in Missouri, see 
also Spirely. 132,150; to work for Harrison, 226; 
opposed to Harrison in Missouri. 336; delegate 
at Minneapolis convention, for Blaine or Har¬ 
rison, ,345, 38il. 

Finch, councilman and Indianapolis fire depart¬ 
ment, 13: spoilsman, 207. 

Findling,-, removed from fire service at Indian¬ 

apolis, see Equally divided politically, 2.35. 

Flnkenhauer, G., federal employe, worker for Har¬ 
rison. .3-33. 

Finney, G. E., supported by Congressman Cooper 
for postmaster of Columbus, Ind., 398. 

Fippen, F., page in Indiana legislature, lOiJ, 408. 

Flppen, J. M., representative in Indiana legisla¬ 
ture, spoilsman, son of appointed page, 408. 

Fire service in N. Y. City and Indianapolis. :iii. 

Fire superintendents, national convention of, con¬ 
demns spoils system in fire services, 2-53. 

Firethunder, E., Indiana blacksmith, defrauded, 
218. 

Fischer. C. B., on inefiicient census service in N. 
Y. City, 294. 

Fischer, I. F., political worker, see also Kings Co., 
N. Y.; politician aiding Woodruff, 106; navy 
yard patronage at New York, 182,18:;; worker 
for Nathan and Platt, :«>1,336; may “deal in leg¬ 
islative privileges” at Albany, 311. 

Fischer, J. H., federal employe, in N.Y. conven¬ 
tion, 335. 

Fish commission, U. S.. placed under civil serv- 
ive law, 3,32; of New York, Hill makes machine 
of, .310. 

Fish. II., Jr., and Gibbs. 288: corrupt politician in 
N. Y. legislature, and Hill, 307. 

Fishhack, W. P., 18; added to local examining 
board at Indianapolis, 25; hitch in appoint¬ 
ment of on local civil service board of Indian¬ 
apolis, SI; member local examining board at 
Indianapolis, 42, 120, 129. 186; U. S. master in 
chancery, favors civil service reform, speech 
of at Roosevelt dinner, 227, 229, 2:32. 

Fisher, G. P.. corrupt politician appointed first au¬ 
ditor of the treasury, .32, .38, 374. 

Fisher, R. J., promoted to be assistant patent com¬ 
missioner, efficient. 140. 

Fitch, A. B., see Chemung Co.. N. Y., 2-59. 

Fitch, C. E., editor, appointed collector of internal 
revenue at Buffalo. N. Y., 108; at convention 
republican league, 259: apolitical worker, 265; 
in N. Y. convention, ,335. 

Fitch, C. P., census officer, a political worker, 160. 

Fite, postmaster at Denver, Ind., political worker, 
.379. 

Fitler, mayor of Philadelphia, 30, 143. 

Fitzgerald. J. E.. signs petition for larger appro¬ 
priation for civil service commission, 102. 

Fitzpatrick, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 
opposing Harrison, 346. 

Fitzwilliams, E.. customs inspector at Boston, a 
political worker. 179. 

Flagler, B.. political worker for law collector at 
Suspension Bi.dge, N. Y ,259. 

Flanagan, custom house employe, active politi¬ 
cian, 179. 

Flanagan, Ill., Editor Breen appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Flanagan, W., political worker in Texas, 159; spoils¬ 
man, 245; appointed customs collector at El 
Paso, Texas, vice Clark, worker for Harrison, 
266,282. 286, supports Harrison at Minneapolis, 
345, .346,374,396. „ 

Fleming, D. W., recommended for office byChea- 
dle, 84. , T, 

Fleuniken, J. H., appointed postmaster at Brad¬ 
ford, Pa., on recommendation of Ray, removed 
on protest of H.C. Frick,99. , 

Fletcher, P. O. employe at Frankfort, Ind., political 
worker. 380. 

Fletcher, E. B., postmaster at Morris, Ill., political 
worker and editor, 126,186. , 

Fletcher. I., appointed postmaster at Orlando, 8 la., 
vice Delaney, removed on secret charges, 176. 


Fletcher. J 
N. Y. 


., candidate for supervisor, see Buffalo, 


Flicklnger, S. J., editor, secures federal office for 
his brother, 301. 

Flynn, E. H. journalist, postmaster at Spencer, W. 
V a., 155. 


Flitten, A., political worker under Postmaster 
Johnson, iu Maryland, 3;f5. 

Floaters, numbers of in Indiana, 78,171. 

Flood, H., postmaster at Elmira, N. Y., 4, 53; polit¬ 
ical worker, opposes Platt and Fassett, 259; a 
political worker, 265,266; removed for political 
reasons, denied permission to hear real charges, 
297,303. 304; removed, Rathbun appointed, :!03, 
;!04 , 305; secret charges against, Rathbun ap¬ 
pointed, 312 ; removed through influence of 
Fassett, ;}31. 

Flood, T. S.. congressman, quarrels with Corporal 
Tanner over spoils, 54; names his brother post¬ 
master at Elmira, N. Y.,-51; obtains appoint- 
ent of Conroy as postmaster at Watkins, N. Y.. 
1-50; opposes Fassett, 2-59, 303. 

Flora, Ill., Editor Reed appointed postmaster at, 
141. 

Florence, Ind., Langsdale, postmaster of, political 
worker, :{79. 

Florence. S. €., negro IVilson postmaster of, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Florida, chairman republican state committee of, 
rewarded. .30; political activity of federal offi¬ 
cers in, :;i7. :!48. 

Flow. E. S., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
;!34. 


Flower, R. P., as congressman, condemns congres¬ 
sional patronage, 204; candidate of Croker, 
Tammany “boss,” for governor of New York, 
245; governor of New York, worker for Hill, ap¬ 
points Maynard judge. 309. 310; and Tammany, 
319; removes Leaycraft, 3:i2: votes for, as gov¬ 
ernor of New York, .352; and fish protection in 
New York, a56; suspends civil service rules in 
New York.414. 


Floyd, low politician of Indianapolis, 207. 

Flushing. L. I.. Carpenter, postmaster at, removed 
for political reasons, 91. 

Flynn, M. B., see Hill. .307. 

Foley, state senator of Indiana, votes against bill 
for non-partisan control of state charitable in¬ 
stitutions, 201: spoilsman, opposes new charter 
for Indianapolis, see also Magee, 212. 

Folger. Commodore, praises merit system in Wash¬ 
ington, D. C., navy yard. 331. 

Follett, J. E., address on civil serv. ref., 23; praises 
Civil Service Chronicle, ho. 

Fontana, Kan., journalist, English postmaster at, 
149. 

Fontanelle, Iowa, Editor Rany appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142. 

Foraker. Governor, and Ohio oflices, 24, 3:36; civil 
service reform “all rot,” 68; controls patronage 
in Cincinnati, 71; defeated. 75; and Senator 
Sherman, 249; opponent of Sherman, 297; 
charges federal interference in election of 
Sherman, .301, :!02; and Ohio delegation at Min¬ 
neapolis, 343. 

Forbes, C. S., journalist, appointed deputy internal 
revenue collector, 84.126. 

Ford, candidate for postmaster of Pittsburgh, 91. 

Ford. T., see Hillism, ;!09. 

Fordham, C. H., negro,deputy coll. Int. rev., dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, :!48. 

Foreign service, see also consulships, 30. 

Forrester, G. B., politician, see Brooklyn, N. Y., 197. 

Fort Dodge. la.. Postmaster Cain of forced to re¬ 
sign. 165: Carpenter, postmaster at, a political 
worker, 260. 

Fortune. A. H., postmaster at Bloomfield, la., re¬ 
moved, 17-5. 

Fort Wayne .Indiana), civil service reform senti¬ 
ment at. 16; candidates for postmaster of. 4:); 
should have civ. service law applied to local 
federal offices. 85; Postmaster Kaough of. under 
Cleveland, political worker, 88. 


Hi 


io'gins. postmaster of, a political worker, 88,1.53, 
1 ,") 8 , ;; 6 - 2 , ;;77.378; and his deputy, political work¬ 
ers, 162; ordered to levy political assessments, 
;;02; political worker for Harrison, 316; 
works for Harrison at Minneapolis. 342, 379; 
has poll of taken by P. O. employes, ::80. 

iazette. opposes Harrison. 378. -o 

ster, political worker, aided hySen. Moody, <8. 
ster. C., ex-gov., and Fostoria, O., post-office. 91, 
secretary of treasury, so-called resignations 
under of Macgregor, 216; ex congressmen apply 
for office in treasury department under, patron¬ 
age to be given only to republicans, 21 1 ; rnem- 
ber Ohio Republican Association, 234; giveii 
i>atroua 26 to turn Ohio from Blaino to Harri- 
son. 240; and spoilsmen. 2.50, 2.53, 254, 290; and 
Platt. 2.58; favors Platt, 264: advises 
Ohio office-holders to do “their duty, 
280; defends Hendricks. collector, at 
N y City, 289; establishes rules for 
promotion in treasury department. 29.s; sus¬ 
pends employes suspected of disloyalty'to Ilar- 
rison. :!00; said to be interested in Toledo Com¬ 
mercial, :i01; asked to remove democrats. 311, 
.312; and political assessments by federal oflice- 
holders in Kentucky and Baltimore. and 
removal of Milholland and Murray, supporters 
of Platt, 3:i2, 334; political worker for Harrison 
in Ohio; permits political activity of federal 
employes in Maryland convention, 33.i; and 


delegate from Utah; works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 337, 338, 3.39. 3-15; political worker, 
ilol; political worker for Harrison, .3.59, 360; and 
Baltimore investigation, 372. 

Foster, E., journalist, postmaster at Gladwin, 
.Mich., 149. 

Foster, J. Ellen, husband of, rewarded with office, 
•56. 

Foulke, W. D., at Baltimore conference, 1889; ad¬ 
dress of on reform promises of republican par¬ 
ty, 2, 4; declaration of impartiality of, 16; to ex¬ 
amine management of federal civ. service, 77; 
address before Commonwealth Club, Dec. 16, 
1889, .80; chairman investigating committee ap¬ 
pointed by National League. 85; on Wauamak- 
er’s course iu Shidy case, 103,104; ollicer Indi¬ 
ana Civil Service Reform Association, 108; 
chairman’s report on congressional patronage, 
11.3, lit, 115; on committee investigating patent 
office, report of, 1.39. 140,141; chairman commit¬ 
tee of National League, on presidential post-of¬ 
fices, 162, 163.164,165, 166, 186, 188; work of, for 
good government, 173; chairman committee of 
National League reporting on removals on se¬ 
cret charges, 175,17i>, 177; exposes evasive meth¬ 
ods of Wanamaker. 190; address of, on civil 
service reform, “Its Later Aspects,” 200; be¬ 
comes president of Swarthmore College, 201; 
elected president Indiana Civil Service Reform 
Association, 239; address of, on civil service re¬ 
form before Social Science Congress at Saratoga. 
1891,262,263; on secret executive sessions of the 
senate. 261, 269; address of before annual meet¬ 
ing National League, 1891,269: chairman special 
committee of National League investigating 
census service, 291, 295; before Boston Reform 
Club on broken republican pledges, :16.5,371,374; 
iu 1884, 376, 3,s5. 

Fountain, G. W,, editor, appointed postmaster at 
New Carlisle. Ind., 126, :!77. 

Four year term, bill of Martin, to limit all federal 
employes to, 464. 

Fowler. E. C., acting 1st asst. p. m. genl., letter of 
conditionally denying information regarding 
postmasters, 277, 297. 

Fox, E. P.. efficient superintendent postal station 
at St. Louis, 131. 

Fox, R. L., chief clerk republican state committee 
of New York, 279. 

Frank, N., congressman, aiding office-seekers, 15; 
and Niedringhaus, correspondence over spoils, 
22; says Harrison has ignored real workers and 
disorganized hie party, 68. 

Frankfort. Ind., P.O. employes Irvin and Fletcher 
of, political workers, 380. 

Frankfort, S. Dak., Journalist Tapley postmaster 
at, 155. 

Frank Leslie’s [repub.] advocates civ. service re¬ 
form, 6-5. 

Franklin. Ind., Postmaster Browne asked to re¬ 
sign, :J7.377; opposition to postmaster appointed 
at. 88; Harris supported for postmaster of by 
Congressman Cooper, 398. 

Franklin (Ind.) College, sentiment favoring civil 
service reform at, 108. 

Franklyn Falls, N. H.. Moore.republican congress¬ 
man, recommends re appointment of demo¬ 
cratic postmaster, 100. 

Frazee, W. D., ass’t U. S. dlst. att’y, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, :344, .348. 

Freeburg, Pa., Journalist Magee postmaster at, 149. 

Freedom, Ind., Suffall postmaster at removed for 
political reasons. Watts appointed, see also 
Cooper and Michener. 112,377. 

Freeman, of Indianapolis, on secret charges sys¬ 
tem, 177. 

Freeport, Ill., .lournalist Atkins appointed post¬ 
master at. 126; active politician. 143. 

Frelinghuysen, sec’y, and Jewett claim. 290. 

French, collector internal revenue in New Hamp¬ 
shire, political worker. 143,371. 

French, state senator of Indiana, relative of ap¬ 
pointed page, 408. 

French, S. B., ward politician, see N. Y. City, 198, 
199 ; ex-police commissioner, in N. Y. City, 
“The” Allen works for, 249. 

Frick. H. C., secures appointment of Patterson as 
postmaster at I niontowu, Pa., 99. 

Friedman, asst, secretary Indiana senate, 408. 

Friedsam, D.,at Minneapolis convention, :!44. 

Friel, P. H., political worker, 134. 

Frost, aided by patronage at navy yard at Kittery, 
Me, 117. 

Frothingham. E. customs examiner, active pol¬ 
itician, 179. 

Fry, senator, keeps more employes in Portland, 
Me., custom house than necessary, 242. 

Frybarger. J., not to be postmaster at Noblesville, 
Ind., 47. 

Fulk, state senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 407. 

Fuller, J. C., appointed in Brooklyn custom house, 
72; political worker for Nathan, see Kings Co., 
N. Y. 

Fuller, J. M., political worker for Harrison, :!04. 

Fullerton, and postmastership at Colfax, Wash., 
165. 

Fulmer, L.. ward politician of Indianapolis. 205,207. 

Fulton, J. M., inefficient census enumerator in N. 
City, 294. 

Fulton, M. K.. candidate for postmaster at Bucy- 
rus, O., 149. 

Fulton, N. Y., Journalist Bennett postma.ster at 
1.55. 






XIV 


I N I) E X . 


Furlong, postmaster at Rochelle, Ill., 109, 

Furst, low political worker in Cincinnati, O., 352. 

Gabriel, ‘•Bill,” federal office-holder, political 
worker, 280. 

Gallegher, -, disreputable politician, 181. 

Gallagher, brutal policeman, see Tammany, 318. 

Gallagher, C. H., given federal office through iu- 
fluence of Higgins, ,334. 

Gallagher, Major, an Indian rising at Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak., 218. 

Gallinger, senator, supporter of Blaine, 314. 

Gallup, police commissioner of N. Y. city, a Croker 
tool, 356. 

Galveston, Texas, Delegate Rentfro, appointed col¬ 
lector of customs at, 40; Cuney, customs collec¬ 
tor at, a political worker, 159; Cuney, customs 
collector at, '2C(i; custom-house at, uotclassified, 
number of employes in, 277. 

Gamble. L. II., postmaster at Brooklyn. Ind., re¬ 
tention of asked, see Cooper, 112. 

Gandy, ,1. P., journalist, postmaster at Gandy, Neb., 
149. 

Gandy, Neb., Journalist Gandy postmaster at, 119. 

(■ano, deputy collector at N.Y. city, pays political 
assessments, 279. 

Gans, W. A., opponent to police justice Smith; see 
New York City, 198, 199. 

Gant, J. A., postmaster of Marion, Ind., at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 880. 

Gapen, P., treasurer insane hospital board at In¬ 
dianapolis, corrupt politician. 206. 

Gardiner, postmaster at Troy, Ind., political work¬ 
er, 380. 

Gardiner. R. H,. republican politician, works for 
re-appointment of democrat Morgan, postmast¬ 
er at Newton, Mass., 221, 

Gardner, postmaster at Rochelle, Ill., succeeded 
by Furlong, 109. 

Gardner, W. R., journalist, given office, 84. 

Garfield, president, and Senator Conkling, 14, 88, 
369; address of, before president at Williams 
College on congressional patronage, and article 
on spoils system in Atlantic Monthly, July, 
1877, 114; murdered by disappointed office- 
seeker, 129; spoils system responsible for death 
of. 204; against patronage system in census 
service, 291; and Senator Conkling. .‘iOl; ap¬ 
points Pearson postmaster at N. Y. city, vice 
James, appointed p. m. general, 367. 

Garland, attorney-general, 177. 

Garrett, Ind.. Bickuell, postmaster of, political 
worker. 379, 380. 

Garret, J.J., negro, delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention. 344. 

Garrigus, M., corrupt politician, works for Pres, 
Harrison, but gets no office despite Cheadle, 
88 . 

Gaskin, appointed postmaster at Reelsville, Ind., 
89. 

Gasper,‘‘Joe,” councilman and low politician of 
Indianapolis, see also Indianapolis, 207. 

Gasper, J. P., postmaster at Kingsley, la., forced to 
resign, 165. 

Gates, E. M., postmaster at Watertown, N. Y., fur¬ 
nishes political information, 392. 

Gates. M. E., president Amherst College, chairman 
Indian commissioners, urges reform methods, 
205, 273. 

Gauss, C.. ward politiican of Indianapolis, see 
Parnell Hall, 194, 195. 

Gavisk, Father, favors civil service reform, 73. 

Gaylord, Kan., Journalist Ileadly postmaster at, 
149. 

Gee, editor, opposes Harrison in Alabama, 346. 

Geer, collector of Port Huron, Mich., spoilsman, 
asks for special examination, refused, 36. 

Geneva, N. Y., civil service reform association of, 
239. 

Genoa, Ill., Editor Hartman appointed postmaster 
at.l41. 

Georgia, federal officers in, candidates for congress, 
162; political activity of federal officers in. 348. 

Gerard and Meyer, attempt to vote under false 
names of, see New York City. 

Gere, C. H., editor, applicant for postmastership at 
Lincoln, Neb., 72; appointed postmaster at 
Lincoln. Neb., 108; delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Gerrard. J., political worker, candidate for postmas¬ 
tership of Muncie, Ind., 217. 

Gest, obtains appointment of unworthy applicant 
as postmaster at Plymouth, Ill., 47. 

Gibbes, W. H., removed from postmastership at Co¬ 
lumbia. S. C., 71. 

Gibbs, F. S., ward politician, see New York City, 
199; notorious politicia'n, and republican prima¬ 
ries,241, 242; political worker opposed by Platt, 
places given to friends in of N.Y. federal offices, 
265; notorious politician, Platt supports him by 
use of fedejal patronage, 287. 

Gibbs. W. B., postmaster of Jackson, Miss., active 
politician, 47, 318; delegate for Harrison at 
Minneapolis. 344. 

Gibson, L. H., addressof, on ‘‘Relation of civil 
service tocomfortable living in cities,” 366. 

‘‘Gift of offices.” address on, by L. B. Swift, 145. 

Gilbert, C. H., commends Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle, 364. 

Gilbert, J. M., defeated candidate of Senator His- 
cock. 132. 

Gildea, C. A., postmaster at Brackettsville, Tex., 
removed for political reasons; Ballantyne ap¬ 
pointed, 186. 


Gilkeson, B. F., Senator Quay speaks for, 17; 
Quay's henchman appointed second comp¬ 
troller of the_ treasury, 30; removes W. P. Mon¬ 
tague for political reasons, .56; appointment of, 
211; political worker for Quay, 270, 280. 

Gill, representative in Indiana legislature, opposes 
spoils methods in, 407. 

Gillette, A. B., candidate for postmaster of Hart- 
ford. Conn., favored by politicians, 84. 

Gilliland. J. A., postmaster at Allegheny, worker 
for Congressman Bavne, 135; supporter of 
Quay, suspected by Harrison, 299. 

Gillycuddy, Dr., and Indian rising at Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak., 218. 

Gilpin, L. L., applicant for postmaster at Portland, 
Ind., 88. 

Ginn, S. P., refuses office rather than agree to pay 
political assessments or be subject to Mahone, 

Gladfelter, L. E., P. O. employe, see Baltimore in¬ 
vestigation, 278, 312. 

Gladstone,-W. E., and Irish home-rule, 228, 230, 244. 

Gladwin, Mich., Journalist Foster, postmaster at, 
149. 

Glasgow, Scotland, city government of, 283, 284. 

Glass, H., P. O. employe, see Baltimore investiga¬ 
tion, 268, 277, 295. 

Glazebrook, doorkeeper of Indiana house of rep¬ 
resentatives, and subordinates, 406, 407. 

Gleason, political worker, see Pine Ridge Indian 

I agency, 218. 

I Gleason, H., at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Glen Hall, Ind., Mustard appointed postmaster at, 
vice Stepp, “resigned,” 149. 

Glenn, postmaster at Cuba, N. Y., in N. Y. con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Glenn, J. C., U. S. marshal, a political worker, 160. 

Glenn, J., appointed U. S. marshal through Influ¬ 
ence of Judge Settle, his relative, 47. 

Glenn, W. J.. journalist, postmaster at Cuba, N. Y., 
155. 

Gloucester, Mass., Mansfield, postmaster of, 362. 

Godfrey, appointed postmaster at New Albany, 
Ind., makes a clean sweep, 45; works for Miche- 
ner, 144; political worker for Harrison, 316; at 
Minneapolis convention, 377. 378, 380. 

Godkin, E. L., editor, at Baltimore conference, 
1889, 2; arrested through Tammany, 314. 

Goesling, H. H., candidate, makes spoils promises, 
260. 

Goff, ex-representative,controls much patronage in 
West Virginia, 71. 

Gold, S.N., township trustee at Indianapolis,should 
refuse to remove F. Wright, 111; removes valua¬ 
ble officers, 146; defends his spoils methods; 
criticism of, 256. 

Golson, \V. L., journalist, postmaster at Llano, Tex., 
155. 

Gooch, aided by patronage of navy yard at Kittery, 
Maine, 147. 

Good Government, formed by merging Civil Serv¬ 
ice Record and Civil Service Reformer, 357. 

Goodale. Miss, friend of the Indians, 217, 218. 

Goode,-, city marahal, ward politician, see New 

York City. 

Goode, M., requests patronage, 311, 312; at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 344. 

Goodland, Ind., editor appointed postmaster at, 37. 

Goodland, Kan., Journalist Tait postmaster at, 149. 

Goodman, C., disreputable political worker for 
Gorman, career of, 307, 308. 

Goodrich, J. C., efficient postmaster at Short Hills, 
N. Jersey, removed; Grocer Kessler appointed, 
386. 

Goodrich, W. W., political worker, see Kings Co., 
N. Y.; low political worker for Nathan, 288,304. 
chairman Kings Co., N. Y., republican com¬ 
mittee, 371. 

Gordon, postmaster of Auburn, Ind., political 
worker, 379, 380. 

Gore, of Boston, qualifications of office-holders ac¬ 
cording to. 45. 

Gorman, senator, and Maryland reformers, 2, 

3. 5, 21, 28, .35, 43, 45, 68, 80; spoilsman, 92, 119, 
170,171,175; “system”of in Maryland, 15,161; se¬ 
cures appoiutmen t of democrat as postmaster at 
Laurel, Md., although a republican had been 
named, Wanamaker allowing Gorman’s claim 
to control the place, 38; compared with Mahone, 
67; would have lost control of Maryland but 
for Cleveland, 70; opposed to civil service law, 
79; and ballot reform in Maryland, 87; controls 
patronage in Maryland, 93, 111; “boss” in Mary¬ 
land, 172; secures office for Higgins, disreputa¬ 
ble character. 181; spoilsman, and disreputable 
politician, 413, 281. 289, 298, 329, 21.3, 214, 245, 250; 
“appreciation” of in Maryland, 219; dreads 
office-holding aristocracy, 227; defends spoils 
system of Wanamaker; opposes Australian bal¬ 
lot system, 228; and patronage in census bu¬ 
reau; conspires with Mahone, 234; and Cleve¬ 
land; as presidential candidate, 235; presiden¬ 
tial candidate; getsoffice for low political work¬ 
ers, 236, 237; attacks civil service commission, 
250. 251; and Raisin. 251; controls federal and 
state patronage of Maryland, 254; boss in Mary¬ 
land. 278; and his political worker, Goodman, 
307, 308. 

Goshen, Ind., Editor Beyerle appointed postmaster 
at, 30, 126; Beyerle, postmaster of, political 
worker for Harrison, 316; Beyerle, postmaster 
at, 377; political worker, 378. 

Goss, editor, appointed collector of Barnstable, 46. 


Gostonia, N. C., Jenkins postmaster of, Harrison 
delegate, 334. 

Gould, C. B., journalist, postmaster at Emporium, 
Pa., 149. 

Gould, Jay, gives bribes, 171. 

Gowdy, J. K., political worker for Harrison in In¬ 
diana, 302, 303; chairman Indiana republican 
state committee, and Halford, 360, .362; cam¬ 
paign fund circular of, 382; confers with U. S. 
Treasurer Nebeker, 370. 

Goyles, G. W., negro, Harrison delegate at Min¬ 
neapolis, 344. 

Grace, mayor of New York City, and civil service 
reform, 82; obtains removal of Squire, see Hill, 
307. 

Graceville, Minn., Journalist Brynildsen postmas¬ 
ter at, 149. 

Graham, political worker for Quay, 300. 

Graham, W., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

Grand Army Post at Woodhull, Ill., denunciation 
of Congressman Henderson. 

Grand Rapids, Mich., civil service commission at, 

36. 

Grand View, Ind., Editor Knight appointed post¬ 
master at, 126, 377. 

Grant, mayor, see New York City, and civil service 
reform, 82; tool of B. Cockran, 184; supported 
by Gorman, 214; of N. York on street cleaning, 
220, 27.3; and Wllmer, 290; and Staats Zeitung, 
317, 318. 

Grant, C. W., employe in Indian service, asked for 
political contributions, 385. 

Grant, President, indorsed for selection of commis¬ 
sioners under civil service act, 50; and Indian 
service, 182; accused of nepotism, uses offices as 
as bribes, 191; as general, 231; and charges 
against officials, 238; executive order of, insti¬ 
tuting reform methods,271, 274; and Fisher, 374, 
yields to spoilsmen, 186, 308, 414. 

Graves, E. O., civil service reform under in bureau 
of printing and engraving, .32, 45; removed by 
Pres. Harrison, 52, 94.173, 237, 282, 368, 376. 

Gravesend, N. Y., ruled by “Boss” McKane, 362. 

Gray, F., journalist, postmaster at Ivanhoe, Kan., 
149. 

Gray, I, P., ex-governor of Indiana, 206; spoils¬ 
man, mentioned for presidency, 235 , 244; as ap¬ 
plicant for various offices, .396.' 

Grayson, Ky., Journalist Littlejohn, postmaster at, 
149. 

Greacen, R. A., supports Lee for place in N. Y. cus¬ 
tom-house, 2.59; requests patronage, 311, 312. 

Greason, J. D., journalist, postmaster at Atwood. 
Kan., 148. 

Greaves, M. A., on selection of census enumerators 
in N. Y. City, 294. 

Green, F. V., reports to Mayor Grant on street¬ 
cleaning in New York; advises merit system, 
220 , 221 . 

Green, G., supervisor of Brooklyn, N. Y., rendered 
insane by office-seekers, 45. 

Greenawalt, J. R., journalist, postmaster at Elk- 
horn, W. Va., 1.55. 

Greencastle, Ind., applicants for postmaster of, 
squabble among. Hays appointed, 7, 89. 

Greene, E. B., makes index for Civil Service Re¬ 
cord, 237. 

Greene, J. M., tries to collect political assessments 
of employes in Indian service, 384. 

Greenfield, Ind., I. Davis, appointed postmaster at, 
vice Howard, removed, 89. 

Greenfield, Iowa, Editor Hunt appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142. 

Greenhalge, onhousecommitteeon civil service, 86; 
recommends re-appointment of Bancroft, post¬ 
master at Concord, Mass., 91; favors civil serv¬ 
ice reform, see also Buttrick, 100, 123; upholds 
civil service commission, 204. 

Greenhow, W. H., postmaster at Hornellsville, N. 
Y.. removed on secret charges, 176. 

Greenleaf. Kan., Journalist Bliss, postmaster at, 149. 

Greensburg, Ind., Hendricks, postmaster of, worker 
for Harrison, 316, 378. 

Greenwood, S. Dak., physician at Indian agency 

• at. leaves duty to engage in political work at 
times of sickness, 202. 

Greiner, postmaster at Terre Haute, a political 
worker, 153,158; political worker for Harrison, 
316,377,378; at Minneapolis, 342, 343, 346, 379; 
political worker, .379. 

Gresham, Neb., journalist Rhodes, postmaster at, 
149. 

Gresham, O., sonof W.Q., favors civil service re¬ 
form, 227, 229; defeated as republican delegate, 
302. 

Gresham, W. Q., supported at Chicago convention 
by Illinois, 7; letter of to Postmaster Pearson, 
referring to secret charges, 12; p. m. general 
under Arthur, removes Vandervoort, 215, 216, 
2'20; more popular than Harrison with republi¬ 
cans, 240, 302; and Harrison, 370; popularity of, 
in Indiana, 376, 377. 

Grlffen,F. D., journalist, postmaster at Bangor, S. 
Dak., 155. 

Griffin, C. F., and political assessments in Indi¬ 
ana, 363; political worker for Harrison in Indi¬ 
anapolis, 379. 

Griffin, T., and janitors in Indiana legislature, 406. 

Griffith, president Indiana senate, spoilsman, 408. 

Griggs, S. I., federal officer, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 348. 

Grimes,G. G., journalist, postmaster at Balrdstown, 
Ohio, 149. 











1 N I) K X 


XV 


Groesbeck, L., U. S. bank examiner, a political 
worker, 260. 

Grogan, S., able superintendent of city delivery at 
St. Louis, 131. 

Groner.V.D., federal officer, delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention, 348. 

Grosvenor, congressman, spoilsman,08,101; agaiust 
civil service reform, 123.178, 253; charges of, 
against civil service commission. 145, 140,202, 
203, 204; opposed to civil serivce law, 153, 178; 
and Roosevelt, 102. 

Grosvenor, C. H., editor, given federal office, 3oi. 

Grosvenor, D., makes political assessments, 161; 
federal office holder and spoilsman, 178, 170; 
spoilsman, rewarded by Harrison, 237. 

Gunby, E. R., collector at Tampa. Florida, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Gundlock, P., henchman of Filly, postmaster at 
Station A, St. Louis, 150. 

Gunkle, F. W.. deputy U. S. marshal In Iowa, a po¬ 
litical worker, 200. 

Gunner, J. H., active politician, appointed deputy 
of Collector Erhardt, 108; deputy collector in 
N. Y. custom house, a political worker, 268, :{ll; 
in New York convention, 335; at Minneapolis 
convention, 344. 

Gwin, superintendent, and Craft, W. H., 12. 

Habberton, J., address on “The Ideal Citizen,” 98. 

Habercorn, L. W., newspaper correspondent, ap¬ 
pointed fifth auditor of the treas., 30. 

Habernel, J. F., postmaster of Indiana House of 
Representatives, 406. 

Hack, postal clerk, political worker, 144. 

Hack, P. 0. employe, political worker, 377. 

Hackett, C. W., worker for Platt, chairman N. Y. 
state republican executive committee, 300, 361, 
371, 388; requests lists of republicans from post¬ 
masters, 370; and political assessments, 382. 

Hackney, D. G., worker for Hill, appointed fish 
commissioner of New York, vice Blackford re¬ 
moved. 310. 

Hackney, W. P., disgust of with Kansas congress¬ 
men and senators, 15. 

Haddam, Kan.. Journalist Tarsel, postmaster at, 
.149. 

Hagerstown (Md.), Herald [repub.], civil service 
reform advocated, 92. 

Hahn, M.. see Tammany, 318. 

Hahn, W. M., chairman republican state executive 
committee, Ohio, asks political contributions, 
280. 

Haines, G. B., and stock fraudulently issued to 
Wanamaker,246. 

Haines, \Vm., relative of Pres. Harrison, given 
office, 30. 

Hale, Annie, wife of Journalist Hale, postmaster at 
Spring Valley, O., 149. 

Hale, senator, controls patronage in Maine; keeps 
more employes in Portland (Me.), custom bouse 
than necessary, 242. 


Halford, E. W., journalist, private secretary to i 
Pres. Harrison, and applications for office, 6 , | 
14.163, 175, 282; and office-seekers, 37; secures , 
appointment of brother-in-law and others, 38; ! 
goes home to vote, 180; and printing office. 234; 
brother of editor of Youngstown, O., Tele¬ 
graph, supporting Sherman, 301; at Indianapo¬ 
lis, 360; political worker, 339 , 340, 343, .377 , 379, 
.382, 389; appointed paymaster in army, 414. 


Halifax, N. C., Hannan, negro, postmaster of, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Hall (M. C.) denounces civil service law, 47, 49. 

Hall, B. J., appointed patent commissioner, effi¬ 
cient. 140. 

Hall, D. S., federal employe, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 348. 

Hall. M. F., journalist, postmaster at Phillippi, W. 
Va., 155, ISO. 

Hall, T. A., subscribes for Civil Sekvice Chron¬ 
icle for Y. M. C. A. of Illinois, 350. 

Hallett, C. W., and Long Island City post-office, 100. 

Halstead, M., nominated minister to Germany, 
editor of Cincinnati Commercial-Gazette, 14; 
on force bill, 169. 

Hamilton. Gail, obtains appointment of E. A. 
Dimmick, consul to Barbadoes, 56. 

Hamilton, Mo.. Clarkson, N. C., appointed post¬ 
master at, 150. . 

Hamlin, carrier, see Indianapolis post-office, in¬ 
vestigation of, 28,34. 11 

Hammell, M. A., journalist, postmaster at Mullen, 

Hammond, postmaster of Booneville, lud., polit¬ 
ical worker, 380. , . . „t 

Hammond, A. (3., appointed postmaster at Wyom¬ 
ing, Ill., vice,-, removed for political reasons. 

176.' 


Hammond, F.. see Baltimore investigation, 2ii7,29(>. 

Hammond, Ind., postmaster at, inefficient, 90. 

Hammond, T., congressman, patronage of, 410, 416, 
^ 17 , 422 . , ^ ^ 

Hammondsport, N. 5.., Journalist Brown, postmas¬ 
ter at, 155. 

Hampton, W., governor, pardons Smalls, convicted 
of bribery, 39, 104; senator, letter to M ana- 
maker on removal of Gibbes, postmaster at 
(Columbia, S. C., 74,190. 


Hancock Co., Ind., appointments from, 71. 
Hancock, T. R.. editor, appointed postmaster at 


Ill 141» 

Hanford, (jaL. postmasteratremoved, Editor Dodge 
appointed, 126, 


Hanlon, M. A., treasury inspector, political worker, 
287. 

Hanna, federal officer, political worker for Harri¬ 
son, 297. 

Hannon, J. H., negro, postmaster at Halifax, N. C.. 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, :!48, 

Hansbrough, patronage pledges of to secure elec¬ 
tion as senator from N. Dakota, 216; senator, 
supporter of Blaine, 344, 345. 

Hanscom,!., and navy yard at Kittery, Me., 147. 

Hardsou, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons, 55. 

Hare, Bishop and Rosebud, agency. Dak., 48; denies 
charges against Indian Agent McChesney, i;J0; 
alleges Indian abuses, 202. 

Harig, “ Bill,” ward politician of Baltimore, ;t08. 

Harlem, N.Y., Tammany street railroad scandal 
in,317. 


Harley, C., politician, census supervisor 5th Indi¬ 
ana district, 101. 

Harlow, postmaster at Whitman. Ma^s., recom¬ 
mended for reappointment. 100. 

Harlow, H., applicant for postmastership at Ply¬ 
mouth, Mass., 189. 

Harlow, J. B., appointed postmaster of St. Louis, 
88, 131; institutes reform methods, 136; con¬ 
spiracy to remove, 226 ; ordered to give ollice to 
political worker for Harrison, 304. 

Harmer, congressman and Quay, 241. 

Harmon, (i. W., promised place in Brooklyn cus¬ 
tom house, see Wallace. 

Harmony, acting secretary of navy, and Ports¬ 
mouth, N. H., navy yard, 147. 

Harn, G. V., editor, appointed sugar inspector, JK)]. 

Harald.S. Dak., Journalist Besancon, postmaster 
at, 155. 

Harper, G. W.. editor, appointed postmaster at 
Robinson,Ill., 141. 

Harper’s Weekly, civil service commission under 
Harrison and Cleveland compared, 211; com¬ 
parison of Cleveland and Harrison in regard to 
civil service reform, 338; on what to expect of 
Cleveland, 358, 359. 


Harrigan, appraiser, resignation asked, 22. 

Harrigan, sergeant at arms in N. Y. legislature; 
his patronage, 215. 

Harrington, G. W., democrat, postmaster at Mou- 
son, Mass., recommended for reappointment, 
188. 

Harrington, Prof. M. W.,appointed head of weather 
bureau,245; favors civil service reform, 253. 

Harris. A. W., customs inspector, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Harris, H. E., journalist, postmaster at Utica, O., 
141) 

Harris, Rev. J. A., at Baltimore conference, 1889, 2; 
favors clerical recognition of civil service re¬ 
form, 48. 

Harris, O. T., federal officer, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 348. _ 

Harris, R.H., see Baltimore investigation, 26/, 268. 

Harris, S., supported by Congressman Cooper for 
postmaster of Franklin, lud., 398. 

Harrisburg Telegraph [rep.], civ. service reform a 
sham, 49. 


arrison. Pres., removes postmaster at Norwich 
(Conn.), without cause and appoints spoilsman, 
see Norwich, Conn.; nominates Wallace, spoils¬ 
man, to be postmaster at Indianapolis, 2, 3; and 
civil serv.ref., in letter of acceptance, 1,4,9,69; 
and civ. serv. ref., has not made promises, 5,10; 
appoints 8 . N. Chambers U. S. dist. ati’y in 
Indiana, 7; as senator, remarks on evils of 
patronage, 9 ; inaugural address and civil serv 
ref 9 ; order of, postponing classification of R 
R. mail service, lO; and Postmaster Pearson, 13 
44; disputes with senators over patronage, 14 
number of appointments to April, 1889,16; over 
run with office-seekers, 16 ; congressmen die 
tate appointments, 17, 93; civil serv. commis 
Sion appointed by, 17; "public duties of, dis 
peusing patronage, 18; census bureau under 
and civil serv. law, 19; and spoiffi sjstem, 20, 
and Pearson, postmaster at Neiy York, 20, and 
nepotism,21,30,84; and R.R. mail service, j-L 22; 
cabinet of formed according to Senator May s 
demands. 22; gives patronage of Missouri to 
Kerens, 22, applicants to be treated with con- 



posi-oiiice, iio, gives patronage 
Platt, 27; hastily removes foreign ministers, 2/; 
gives patronage of Pennsylvania to Senator 
Quay, 27,47, 135,138; inability to satisfy spoils¬ 
man, 27; removes Indian commissioner 
Oberly, 27; cabinet of composed entirely 
of spoilsmen, 27; removes Strauss, niinis- 
ter to Turkey; appoints “Sol Hirsch, 
removes postmaster at Jersey City without 
cause, 29; removes Postmaster Clark, of Jack¬ 
sonville, Florida, for political reasons, ^9 : re¬ 
moves postmaster at Bridgeport before term 
exnlred, 29; removes Postmistress Clay, at 
Huntsville. Ala., without cause, 29; appoints 
Editor J. B. Stone collector internal revenue 
first Michigan district, 30; removes wUhout 
cause head of assay office at Boise City, Id«Lo, 
aDDoiuts spoilsman,30; rewards political work- 
ers; declares he will not cease appolmments 
until offices are exhausted, 30; and Senator 
Cullom, 31; appoints G. P. I'isher, disreputable 
politician, first auditor of [be treasury 32 ; ap¬ 
points D. M. Ransdall marshal District of Colum¬ 


bia, 34,80; “discriminating test” of, 35, 36, 100; 
appoluis White, editor and spoilsman. Internal 
revenue collector, 37; appoints Robert Smalls, 
a convicted criminal, in face oi well-known 
record and strong protest, 39; makes spoil of 
offices, 41; refusal of to have anything to do 
with Dudley, 41; searching examination of 
management of civil service by, promised, 41; 
refuses request of civil service commission to 
place census bureau under civil service law, 42, 
88,131; treatment of Indians by administration 
01, 42; civil service relorm promises01,43,52,61, 
()2, 63,65,292; rules of for appointment, 44; re¬ 
movals 01 postmasters under, 45; and collector- 
ship 01 customs at Chicago, 47; and Con¬ 
gressman Brower, 47; and postmasters, 49; 
removes Naval Officer Burt, 52; gives patron¬ 
age of I'irginia to Mahoue, 27,52, 70; rewards 
Tanner for services, and later removes him, 53; 
uses offices to affect elections in Louisiana, 54; 
appealed to by MacCourt, .54; removes Post¬ 
master Curran of Hoboken, N. J., for political 
reasons, 54 ; gives office to T. B. Willis as a po¬ 
litical reward, .55; appoints E. Nathan, low pol¬ 
itician, collector iut. rev. for Brooklyn (N. Y.) 
district, appoints Lyon surveyor of port, 55; 
not enough credit given to, for administration 
of civil service law, 59; appoints Throop, po¬ 
litical worker, collector of Terre Haute (Ind.) 
district, .59; congratulated 011 appointments by 
Mass, republican convention, 63; administra¬ 
tion tramples civil serv. ret. under foot, 64; 
denounced for violation 01 pledges, by national 
league, 1889, 66; appoints J. N. Hustou U. S. 
treasurer, objects to giving him Indiana pat¬ 
ronage, gives it to Michener, 67; denounced for 
abuse of civ. service, by H. C. Lea, 68, 111; can 
stop political assessments, 70; gives patronage 
of Louisiana to Congressman Coleman, 71; re¬ 
moves postmaster at Syracuse, N. Y., for polit¬ 
ical reason, 71; and postmaster at La Fayette, 
Ind., 71; and appointment of postmasters, 
74; responsibility of, 75; as senator and spoils 
in Indiana, 75; attributes defeat in 1889 to 
disappointed office-seekers, 75; and dis¬ 
tribution of patronage in New York, 75; 
letter to General Macson, 77; extract 
from message on civil service commission; 
postpones execution of order ciassiiying. R. 
R. mail service, 80,81; as Sen., criticises Free. 
Cleveland for bribing the press, 81; weakened 
by patronage, 83; must stand by the platform 
(see Winchester Herald), 83; appoints E. G. 
Hay, a friend, U. 8. district attorney, 84; re¬ 
wards A. D. Shaw, .84; unsatisfactory to repub¬ 
licans so far as patronage is concerned, 84; and 
civ. service law, 86; his test for office; postmas¬ 
ters at Springfield and Quincy, Mass., 86; and 
W. W. Dudley, 87; and Winamac, Ind., postmas¬ 
tership, 88; promotes J. B. Harlow to be post¬ 
master at St. Louis, 88; as Sen. and Pres., and 
Garrigus, 88; and Mitchell, Ind. postmastership, 
89; and Greencastle, Ind., postmastership, 89; 
criticised at Nobiesville, Ind., 89; discontent 
with, 89; and post offlee at Hammond, Ind., 90; 
and Baltimore postmastership, 90; and Massa¬ 
chusetts civ. service reform association, 92; 
memorial to from civ. service reform ass’n of 
Philadelphia, 92; civ. service reform in first 
year of, 94; and Collector Saltonstall, 94; and R. 
Vvilliams, 95; appoints Clark collector at Chi¬ 
cago. 95; secret charges under, 96, 175; appoints 
Kinney postmaster at Hartford, Conn., 99; re¬ 
appoints Lyman civil serv. commissioner, 103; 
letter to from W. Barker, protesting against 
Quay, 104; appoints Warmouth, ruflianly politi¬ 
cian, collector at New Orleans, 105; nomination 
of, see Quay, 106; appoints Clements, political 
worker, pension agent at Chicago vice Mrs. 
Mulligan, 107; and appointment of examiners 
for pension office, 108; appoints Editor Fitch 
collector of internal revenue at Buffalo, N. Y.. 
108; conference with Congressman Hitt over 
post-office at Rochelle, Ill., 110; as senator, crit¬ 
icises Cleveland’s conrse with regard to civil 
service, 119; and congressmen, 120; and patron¬ 
age system,76,120,173; spoils pledges of, 121; and 
postmastership of Stanberry. Mo., 121; requests 
aid for civil service commission, 122; and Gar¬ 
field, 129, 130; removes Hendrix, postmaster 
at Brooklyn, N. Y.; offers place to political 
worker, 131; appoints Editor Von Bergman, 132; 
claims on, 132; condemned by Maryland Civil 
Serv. Ref. issoc. for giving patronage to Quay, 
136; appoints Mitchell patent commissioner, 140; 
abuses in Brooklyn navy yard under adminis¬ 
tration of, 142; complaints to of Warmouth, 
143,144; nominates Eaves; gives patronage of N. 
Carolina, 1-50; censured, 153; promotes Sher¬ 
wood to be postmaster at Washington to suc¬ 
ceed Ross, transferred, 153; and U. S. Attorney 
Chambers, 154; removes employes in Brooklyn 
navy yard, 155; praised; civil service methods 
advocated, see Indiana republican platform, 
1890, 156: condemned for disregard of civil 
service law, see Pennsylvania, Indiana and 
New Hampshire platforms, 1880, 1.56; nomi¬ 
nates democrat. Kirkpatrick, postmaster at 
North Hadley Falls, Mass., 157; nominates 
Eaves, a corrupt politician, 1.59; removals un¬ 
der; spoils system under, 159. 188, 269; gives 
patronage of Texas to Collector Cuney, 159; 
correspondence of with Foulke. W. D., over 
presidential post-oflices, see also post offices, 
presidential, 163; good appointments of, 169; 




















XVI 


I N 1) E X . 


gives ollices as rewards for party service, 171; a 
greater spoilsman than any predecessor, 174; as 
senator, speech in senate on iniquity of secret 
charges system; see Shelbyville. Freeman, De 
La Hunt, 170,177; gives patronage to Sewell, 180; 
and McFarland, disreputable politician, 181; 
gives patronage of navy yard at New York 
to Fischer, 182; uses ollices to gain renomina¬ 
tion, 183; and customs offices; Washington 
offices, 185; advised to appoint Avery postmas¬ 
ter at Plymouth, Mass., 187: removals under 
for cause, according to (Uarkson, 188; secures 
control of Indiana republican state committee, 
189; striving for reuomination, 192; course of 
ill Indian affairs: letter to Cambridge Civil 
Service Reform Association regarding, SfJ, 98, 
102, 182, 202,204, 205,217,219, 239; removes U. S. 
district attorney at Washington, D. C.,211; and 
Delphi (lud.) Journal, 213; nominates W. R. 
Leeds, disreputable politician, as U. S. marshal 
in Penn., 210; appoints Mayor Ellis postmaster 
at Muucie, lud., 217; silent regarding civil 
service reform, 220; order of putting part of 
Indian service under civil service law; forbids 
promotion without examination from unclassi¬ 
fied to classified service, 221, 230, 231; should 
put navy yards under civil service law, 222; re¬ 
appoints democrat, Sherlin, postmaster at 
Sandwich, Mass.; democrat, Morgan, at New¬ 
ton, Mass., 224; federal office-holders interfere 
in primaries at Baltimore in behalf of. 225, 220; 
“Boss” Filley, of Missouri, works for, 220; and 
G. B. Raum, Jr., 228; Martin, appointed col¬ 
lector internal revenue, aids Quay to ruin bal¬ 
lot bill in Penn., 228, 229,2.32,2:13; and Roose¬ 
velt, civil service commissioner, 232; makes 
terms with Quay, 235; promotes Thompson, as¬ 
sistant postmaster at Indianapolis, to be post¬ 
master; consequent promotions, 2:35; renomi- 
uation of, reasons for and against; course re¬ 
garding civil service reform, 237, 240, 2;'>8, 287; 
republican opposition to, workers for. 240; ap 
points W. H. Brooks collector internal revenue 
in Pa., vice Martin, resigned, 241; negroes do 
not get patronage under, 24:3, 244; gives patron¬ 
age of New York to Platt, 245; workers for, 249; 
removes Stearns for political reasons, 2-50; 
reasons of for removal of Corse, postmaster at 
.Boston, 251; patronage as used by, and party 
'platform, 1888,2-53; orders promotions in Wash¬ 
ington offices made on competitive examina¬ 
tions under civil service commission, gives 
patronage of Maryland to republican machine, 
2.51; accepts “resignation ” of Erhardt, collector 
atN. Y. City, appoints Fassett to make clean 
sweep, 2-55; betrays civil service reform, 2(>0, 
282, ;349; extensions of civil service reform un¬ 
der, compared to Dictator Balmaceda, 261; con¬ 
trols patronage, but it is a source of weakness, 
262; appoints Flanagan, political worker, col¬ 
lector of customs at El Paso, 266; civil service 
commission is good under, 271, 272; precise 
scope of extension of civil service law in Indian 
service, under, 27;i; and R. R. mail service, ex¬ 
tends civil service law to certain employes in 
Indian service, 275; and violations of law in 
Omaha post-office, 281; rewards Flanagan, 286; 
uses patronage in Indiana for renomination, 
297,316, 317; uses federal patronage in Pennsyl 
vania and elsewhere to secure renomination, 
removes supporters of Quay, 298, 299, :301; and 
and removal of Flood, postmaster at Elmira, 
N.Y., 303, :{05; and Mahone “blackmailers,” 
.305; compelled to give patronage, 311, :!12; and 
independents, 313; commended and cen¬ 
sured by National League, 321; political ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders under, 88, 350; 
and appointment of Martin, 351; gives patron¬ 
age to Boss McKaue, .352; and candidacy of 
Chase for governor of Indiana, 353, 3 4, 355; 
“ceaseless activity of,” 357: not opposed to po¬ 
litical assessments, 181, 358, 359, 360, 361, 362; 
seeks to reward Delegate Crum, negro, with 
postmastership of Charleston, S. C., 363; Senator 
Sawyer, chairman senate committee on post- 
offices, aids nomination of, 364; Julian on abuse 
of civil service under, 365; enforces civil serv¬ 
ice law “with vigor and impartiality,” 366; ap¬ 
points Leaycraft, political worker. :J71; civil 
service reform under, 80, 371, 372, :373. .374; and 
Minneapolis convention, 375, 376; civil service 
reform under; shouid be defeated, 376, 389; and 
political activity of federal office-holders in 
Indiana. 376. 381, ;i83, 385, 386; buys renomina¬ 
tion with offices, .387, 408; and extensions of 
civil service law, 388, :390; opposes appointment 
of Hanlon, 393,395; civil service reform in an¬ 
nual message 1892 of, 397; extension of classi¬ 
fied service under welcomed, ;398, 402; classifies 
all free-delivery post-offices, and weather bu¬ 
reau service, 403; merit system under, 404; ex¬ 
tension of civil service reform under, noturged 
by republicans, 40-5; administration of ruined 
by spoiis system, 413, 414; appoints Private Sec’y 
Halford paymaster in army, 414; accused of 
bribing the press, 144. 

Harrison, Carter, appointed T'. S. marshal by Pres. 
Harrison, his brother, 21, 30, :369. 

Harrison, E. G., appointed postmaster at Asbury 
Park, N. Y., vice Toland, 386. 

Harrison, Rev. H., Thanksgiving sermon of de¬ 
nouncing Clarkson, 193. 194. 

Harrison. IT., commends Civil Service Chroni¬ 
cle, 361. 


Harrison, J. 0., father of Journalist H. Harrison, 
postmaster at Smithfleld, O., 149. 

Harrison, J. P., postmaster at Lu Verne, la., a po¬ 
litical worker, 260. 

Harrison, J. S., brother of Pres. Harrison, works 
for Harrison at Minneapolis, :t39. 

Harrison, Neb., father of Journalist Davis, post¬ 
master at, 149. 

Harrison, Russell, son of Pres. Harrison, influence 
of used for office-seekers, 38; political worker 
for his father, 189, ;>59, :378; solicits campaign 
tunds for Pres. Harrison, 240: assists at dinner 
to Clarkson, 215; and Elkins, 290. 

Harrison, Dr. T. H., president of state benevolent 
boards of Indiana, a spoilsman, 206. 

Harrison, President W. 11., the public press and 
spoils (in inaugural address), 17. 

Harrison. W. H., Pres., forbids political assess¬ 
ments and political activity of federal office¬ 
holders, 370. 

Harrison, W. H.. Pres., on bribery of press, 376. 

Ilarrlty and Phila. post-office, 53. 

Harrodsburgh, Ind., Woodard, postmaster of, po¬ 
litical worker, ;iS0. 

Hart, H.. alderman of New York City, see sale of 
offices under Tammany, 224,225. 

Hart. M. L., journalist, postmaster at Ravenna, 
Kan., 149. 

Hart, T. N.. mayor, Boston,signs petition for larger 
appropriation for civil serv. com., 102; ex¬ 
mayor, Boston, appointed postmaster at Bos¬ 
ton, vice Corse, removed, 215; commended by 
Corse, his predecessor, 251. 

Hart. W. D., appointed postmaster at Meriden, 
Neb., vice McGinness, forced to resign, 166. 

Ilart.W. H., third auditor, uses influence for ap¬ 
pointment of Throop, 59; federal employe and 
printing office. 2;il: goes home “for rest,” :>62; 
political worker, 382; spoilsman, 112; and re¬ 
moval of Suffall, 377. 

Hartford, Conn., Kinney and Gillette, applicants 
for postmastetship of. 84, 9;>; Bennett, postmas¬ 
ter of, and removal of Bario, efficient 1'. O. in¬ 
spector, 298. 

Hartford City, Ind., Cable, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379. 

Hartley, A. H., appointed in post-office at Scranton, 
Pa., removed for political reasons, appointed to 
place in K. R. mail service, removed by Harri¬ 
son, 101. 

Hartman, A., applicant for postmaster of Colum¬ 
bus, Ind., 89; postmaster of Columbus, Ind., at 
Minneapolis convention, 379. 

Hartman, D. W., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Genoa, Ill., 141. 

Ilartong. A. W., druggist, candidate for postmaster 
at Rochelle, Ill., lOtt; postmaster at Rochelle, 
Ill., works for Hitt, 136. 

Hartshorn, S. N., political worker for Major McKin¬ 
ley, rewarded, 52. 

Hartwig. defeated congressional candidate, de¬ 
mands patronage, 99. 

Harvey, G., political worker for Harrison, deputy 
coll. int. rev. in Indiana, ;502, 303, 316, 378. 

Harvey, J. W., appointed postmaster at Kusselville, 
Ind., 89. 

Harwood, J. C., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Clarion, Iowa. 141. 

Hassler, Aug. E., journalist, postmaster at Pawnee 
City, Neb., 149. 

Hastings, General, opposes De'amater, 134. 143; 
candidate for governor of Pa., 249; political 
worker for Quay, 280. 

Hathaway, postmaster of house of representatives, 
makes removals at suggestion of congressmen, 
methods of, 242. 

Hatton, F., editor of Washington Post, and scram- 
Ijle for offices. 5, 76, 79, 92, 96, 161; spoilsman 
abuses Commissioner Roosevelt, 52; charges of 
against Commissioner Roosevelt, 101; and inves¬ 
tigation of civil serv. com., 103. 

Havre, consul at, see Dufals, 54. 

Hawes, J. W., and factional fights in N. Y., see New 
Y’ork, 241, 242. 

Hawkins, U.S. marshal for Indianadistrict, oppres¬ 
sion by, 9. 

Hawley, Sen., supports Kinney as postmaster of 
Hartford, Conn., 84, 99. 

Hawley, Pa., Langham, postmaster at, removed on 
secret charges, 176. 

Hawthorne, NatT, removed from office, 46. 

Hay, E. G., friend of Harrison, recommended by 
Sen. Washburn, appointed U. S. dist. att’y for 
Minnesota, 84. 

Hayes, Pres., declaration in favor of civ. service 
'reform, 50; letter of acceptance of, in favor of 
civ. service reform, 50; and loyalty, 75; pardons 
brother of D. Ransdell, 244; on evils of political 
assessment and political activity of federal 
officers, 265, 316; friendly to civil service reform ; 
executive order of. Instituting, 123, 271. 

Hayes, W. J., congressman, refused knowledge of 
reasons for removal of Evans, postmaster at 
Bloomfield, la., 175. 

Hayes, W. M., postmaster at Kingston, N. Y., polit¬ 
ical worker, 280. 

Haynes, -, attempts fraudulent voting in pri¬ 

maries, see New York City. 

Haynes, R. A., relative Pres. Harrison, given of¬ 
fice, 38. 

Ha vs. J. M., appointed postmaster at Greencastle, 
Ind., 89. 


Headington, N., applicant for postmaster at Port¬ 
land, Ind., 88. 

Headley, L. C., journalist, po.stmaster at Gaylord, 
Kan., 149. 

Healy, M. J., requests patronage, 311, 312. 

Heath, Rev. J. W., candidate for postmastership of 
Muncie, Ind., 217. 

Hebbard, C. A., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Roseville, 111., 141. 

Ilebring, H., customs collector at Geneseo, N. Y., 

. at convention republican league, 259. 

Hecksler, removed on suspicion of being disloyal 
to Harrison, :iU0. 

Hedden, collector at New' York, removals under, 
183. 

Hedges, C., appointed chief of postai division of 
sixth auditor’s office. Associated Press agt,, 47. 

Heerman, G. A., and Mahone, 52. 

Heiutz, L. J., street commissioner in N. Y. City,234. 

Hellen, Mrs., appointed stamp clerk at Winston, N. 
C., through influence of Judge Settle, her rela- 
tivc 47. 

Hemtngford, Neb., Journalist Paradis, postmaster 
at, 149. 

Hench, representative in Indiana legislature, and 
spoils system in, 407. 

Henderson, congressman, upolds civil service law, 
122, 125. 

Henderson, J. J., congressman, and postmaster of 
Woodhull, 111., 47. 

Henderson, W., leader in tally sheet (see) prosecu¬ 
tion at Inuianapolis, favors civil seivice re¬ 
form, 227,229. 

Henderson, W., a leader in factional fight at Balti¬ 
more, 121; faction of, see Baliimore investiga¬ 
tion, 268, 267, 277, 2i)5; and Stone faction at Bal¬ 
timore, 372. 

Henderson, W. E., political worker for Eaves, 159. 

Henderson, W. T., disappointed office-seeker, 144. 

Hendricks, delegate to Minneapolis contention 
from Alabama, opposing Harrison, 346. 

Hendricks, postmaster at Greensbuigh, Ind., 
worker for Harrison, 316, ;;78. 

Hendricks, A. H., P. O. employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Hendricks, republican politician and spoilsman, 
and Gov. Hill of New York, 211; supported of 
Senator Hlscock, 216; political worker for His- 
cock and Platt; appointed collector at N. Y. 
City, 264, 266, 269; collector at N. Y. City; polit¬ 
ical worker, 27ii, 287, :354 , 357; defended by Sec’y 
Foster (assessment case). 289; works lor Harri¬ 
son at Minneapolis. 359, 360, 337, 343, 344 ; to lead 
campaign in New York, 347, 348; management 
of custom house by, 358; opposes Congressman 
Belden, 386. 

Hendricks, T. A., ex-vice-president, his place in 
politics, 244. 

Hendrix, efficient postmaster at Brooklyn, removed, 
Baird, politician, refuses appointment, 72, 131. 

Henkel, W., at Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Henry, J. A., journalist, postmaster at Jonesville, 
Minn., 149. 

Henry, J. J., republican, condemns removal for 
political reasons 01 Corse, postmaster at Boston, 
see also Civil Service Record, 213. 

Hensley, W. N., postmaster at Columbus, Neb., 
forced to resign, 166. 

Hepburn, solicitor of treasury, calls on Chairman 
Carter, 361. 

Hepburn. A. B., appointed controller of the cur¬ 
rency. 371. 

Hepburn, W. P., federal officeholder in Washing¬ 
ton Co., la., a political w orker, 260. 

Herbert, congressman, and political activity of fed¬ 
eral office-holders in Alabama, 355. 

Herndon, Kan., Journalist Rathbone, postmaster 
at, 149. 

Herod, W. W., candidate for mayor of Indianapo¬ 
lis; declares himself one of the “boys,” 269. 

Hess, J.W., worker for Harrison, 316; promises 
offices if elected, 378. 

Hewitt, mayor of New York City, and civil service 
reform, 82. 

Hicklin, councilman, and appointments to fire 
service of Indianapolis, 120; ward politician 
and spoilsman, 203; supports Fire Chief Web¬ 
ster, 207, 208. 

Hickok, Rev. Dr., on civil service reform, 83. 

Hicks, J., editor, office-holder, 14. 

Higbee, representative in Indiana legislature, op- 
posesspoilsmethodsin,407; and spoils methods 
in, 406. 

Higgins, A., Sen., appoints Hinchman postmaster at 
Bridgeville, Del., 38; obtains appointment of 
Fisher as first auditor of treasury, of Knowles 
as consul to Bordeaux, 38; political manipula¬ 
tor, 160; at Minneapolis convention, 344; aided 
by Cooper, collector at Philadelphia, 363; at¬ 
tempts bribery. 397. 401,402. 

Higgins, E., and Cleveland administration,25; ap¬ 
pointment of condemned, 51; ex-office holder, 
henchman of Gorman, disreputable character, 
181, 237, 314, 364. 

Higgins, E. R., candidate for postmaster at Ff. 
Wayne, Ind., 45; postmaster at Ft. Wayne, Ind., 
apolitical w'orker, 163, 168; ordered to levy po¬ 
litical assessments, 302; political worker for 
Harrison, 316; works for Harrison at Minne¬ 
apolis, 342, 379; political worker, 3"2, 377,378; 
orders P. 0. employes to take poll of Ft. W., 380. 

Higginson, J. W., signs petition for larger appro¬ 
priation for civil serv.com., 102. 






I N 1) E X . 


X V]1 


High, dictation of in Berks county, Penn., 47. 

Hildebrand, J. M., appointed surveyor of customs 
at Indianapolis, 38; a political worker, 144; de- 
nouced for political inactivity, 303; worker at 
Minneapolis convention, .379. 

Hill, representative in Indiana legislature, and 
spoils methods in, 406. 

Hjll, congressman, favors civil service reform, 123. 

Hill, D. B., governor of New York, see Feudalism 
Revived; opposed to civil service reform, 82, 
2;39, 261,289; tools of, 196, 211; appoints ‘‘Paddy” 
Divvertoa judgeship, 212; refuses requisition 
of Connecticut forger for political reasons, 214, 
215; makes spoils bargains with Senator His- 
cock, 210; workers for, oppose Fassett, by 
corrupt methods, 259; supporters of “knife” 
Cleveland, 282; Tammany leader, 298; career 
of, and Hillism, 305, :507, 309, 310, 311, 351, 390; 
defense of by Professor Collin, steals N. Y. leg¬ 
islature, 31.3; and Tammany, 317, 320; senator, 
gives Brooklyn bridge patronage to McLaugh¬ 
lin, ;i.50; and fish protection at Lake Keuka, 
appoints saloon keeper Sheridan keeper at, 
356; Kings co., N. Y., democrats, 356; imitators 
of in Indiana, 414: Sheehan, worker for, 415. 

Hill, F. B., negro, deputy collector internal reve¬ 
nue, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344, 
348. 

Hill, J., negro, postmaster at Vicksburg, Miss., 
worker at Minneapolis, 343, ;148. 

Hill, J. C., federal officer, resigns to do political 
work, 362. 

Hilliard, G., calls on Fassett, collector at N. Y. 
city, 2,58; at Minneapolis convention, 344; and 
cartage contract at N. Y. custom house, 358. 

Hills, W. C., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Smithland, Iowa, 142. 

nines, G. A., candidate for postmaster at Brattle- 
boro, Mass., 100. 

Hirsch, L., editor, given office by Governor Fora- 
ker, 301. 

Hirsch, “Sol,” the “Tom Platt” of Oregon, ap¬ 
pointed minister to Turkey, 29. 

Hlscock, C., appointed through Influence of Sen¬ 
ator Hiscock, his brother, to office, vice L. D. 
Monery, 1.50; political worker for him, 264. 

Hiscock,F.,Sen.,spoilsman,43,353, 3-54, 360, 386; and 
postmaster at Syracuse, 46; obtains appoint¬ 
ment of Smith, editor, as postmaster at Syra¬ 
cuse, N. Y., 71; notoriously corrupt, 71; and 
appointment of Von Bergman, 132; opposes 
appointment of Conroy, postmaster at Wat¬ 
kins, N. Y., 1-50; controls patronage in N. Y., 
gets office for his brother, C. Hlscock, 150; on 
performance of party pledges, 168; supports 
Merritt for postmaster of Lockport, N. Y., bar¬ 
gains for spoils with Hill, 210; recommends 
appointment of Wheeler, 241; patronage of, 
and factional fights against, 259; patronage of, 
secures office for brother, gives bribes, 264, 265, 
266; Indorses Payn, 312; supporter of Blaine, 
344. 


Hitch, C. P., Harrison worker at Chicago conven¬ 
tion, appointed U. S. marshal southern district 
• of Ill , 30; political worker, 179. 

Hitt, congressman on civ. service law, 73; and his 
struggles in distributing patronage, see also 
Rochelle (Ill.), post-office at. 109; renomination 
of, 136; nominated, 137, 143; secures appoint¬ 
ment of Asay, disreputable politician, 160. 

Hoar, Judge, recommends Bancroft postmaster at 
Concord, Mass., for reappointment.91; indorses 
Postmaster Buttrick, 100. 

Hoar, Sen., letter to from Congressman Banks.ask- 
ing aid for J.J. McCarthy, 31; letter of to Civil 
Service Record, declaring American people to 
be not yet aware of worth of civ. serv. ref., 
43, 60; and Boston custom house, 71; and 
Collector Saltonstall, 94; controls census pa¬ 
tronage In Mass., 104; thinks customs collectors 
should be in political harmony with president, 
104; and removal of Saltonstall, 105; and Eaton, 
D. B., Ill; on collectorshlp at Boston, 129; 
transmits letter of Cambridge Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association to President Harrison, 205; 
and Corse, postmaster at Boston, 213, 357! re¬ 
quests retention of Corse, postmaster at Bos¬ 
ton, 367. , , , 

Hoar, S., opposed to civil service reform, accord¬ 
ing to Grosvenor, ‘203. 

Hobart, supporters of and Blunt. 150. 

Hobart, A., at Balt, conference. 1889. 2; and resolu¬ 
tions of Mass. Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tions. 1892, 398. , - 

Hobart. G. A., politician, surety for Fassett, col¬ 
lector at New York City, 258. 

Hobbs, purchases postmastership at Mitchell,infi., 
see also sale of offices, 89. 

Hobbs, pension examiner in Indiana, political 

Hobbs^E^.*^^.?politIcal worker, see Kings Co., N. Y. 

Hoboken, N. j!. Postmaster Curran at. removed for 
political reasons, 51. 

Hodson J H , disappointed office-seeker, 144, 

Hoffman, F. N., given place in Indiana legislature, 

Ilog^an. D.. gains office through 

Vessman Smith. :58; collector of internal rev- 

Hog^a^*! M^C.° U. S^.^supervisor of elections in New 

HolHt!^W.^:^., politician, see Indianapolis, see also 

Holcomb,'state senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 408. 


Holderman, superintendent of fire telegraph at 
Indianapolis, refuses to teach intended sup- 
planter, 235, 243. 

Hollowell, Me., removal of postmaster at, on secret 
charges, 39. 

Holman, congressman, renoniination of. 37; con¬ 
gressman, patronage of, 393, 400, 411, 417,419,421, 
4‘22. 

Holman, bank examiner in Indiana, at Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 380. 

Holmes, A. J., sergeant-at-arms of house of repre¬ 
sentatives, removes his deputy, Cavanaugh, for 
political reasons, 260. 

Holmes, L., republican member New Bedford 
(Mass.) city committee, seeks retention of 
democratic postmaster; correspondence with 
Wanamaker, 29,176. 


Holt, S. R., politician of Indianapolis, opposes bill 
for new charter of; officer of new city govern¬ 
ment, see equally divided politically, 212,213; 
on positions in city service being “equally di¬ 
vided politically,” 2‘20; examinations for police 
force under, 222; and city service, 228; appoints 
under “equally divided politically” rule, 235. 

Holton, I., supported by Congressman Cooper for 
postmaster at Plainfield, 399. 

Holyrood, Kan.. Journalist Woodmansee, postmas¬ 
ter at, 149. 

Homilectic Review, October, 1889, and civil service 
reform, 65. 

Hooker, G. W., spoilsman, and Brattleboro, Mass., 
postmastership. 100. 

Hoopeston, Ill., Editor Warner, appointed post¬ 
master at, 141; Postmaster Catherwood of, 
forced to resign, 165. 

Hope, Kan., Journalist Burroughs, postmaster at, 
149. 

Hopkins (M. C.) on house committee on civil ser¬ 
vice, 86; Indorses Hartong for postmaster at Ro¬ 
chelle, Ill., 109. 

Hopley, J., journalist, postmaster at Bucyrus, O., 
149,301. 

Hopper. F., nominee for council, see Indianapolis, 
see Parnell Hall. 

Hord, F., representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses gerrymander of 1893, 414. 

Horn. C. W., journalist, postmaster at Plain City, 
O., 149. 

Hornellsville, N. Y., removal of Greenbow, post¬ 
master at, on secret charges, 176. 

Horr, J. F., collector at Key West, Fla., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Horseheads, N. Y., factional struggles against Platt 
and Fassett at, see Chemung Co.; Van Duzer, 
postmaster of, a political worker, 265; Postmas¬ 
ter Van Duzer of, and removal of Flood, 304; 
Chemung county democratic convention at, 
run by Hill workers, 309. 

Hotchkiss. A. C., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at Adel, Iowa, 141. 

Houk, L. F., congressman, of Tennessee, opposed 
to civ. service reform, 35, 49, 54, 161; spoilsman, 
secures office for his son, 84 : opposes civil serv¬ 
ice commission and reform, 124; charges of 
against civil service commission, 145, 146; op¬ 
posed to civil service reform; sees evils of 
spoils system, 177,178. 

Houk, J. C.. appointed through influence of his 
father, 84. 

House of Representatives, Hathaway, postmaster 
of, spoilsman, removals under. 242. 

Houston, R. L , postmaster of Birmingham, Ala., 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Hovey. A., governor, of Indiana, 17; of Indiana, 
appoints farmer as mine inspector, 192; on in¬ 
vestigating insane hospital scandals at Indian¬ 
apolis, 2(N>. 

Hovev, C. J., sou of Gov. Hovey, appointed post¬ 
master at Mt. Vernon, Ind., 71; postmaster, etc,, 
at Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Howard, Gen , on Indian abuses, 182. 

Howard, J., ward politician, see Indianapolis, 196. 

Howard, N. P., postmaster at Greenfield, Ind., re¬ 
moved, 89. . 

Howard, R., signs petition for larger appropriation 
for civil service commission. 102. 

Howard City, Mich., Journalist Lowrey postmaster 
ftit 149, 

Howarth. —, journalist, appointed census enumer- 
fttor 142. 

Howe, H. li., federal employe, pays political as¬ 
sessments, 279. 

Howell, chief of division, removed for political 


reasons, 55. , ^ 

Howell, J.C., commandant navy-yard at Kittery, 


Me 147. 

aoweli w. A., nominated to be postmaster at Mil¬ 
waukee, vice Paul, resigned, 47. 

Sowell, W. C.. relative of President Harrison 
given office, 90. . . , t 

Sowells, J. J., editor, appointed postmaster at Jef- 

Sowlan(L’w.,mIndidate, charges political activity 
of federal employes, 179. . u 

Sovsradt, state senator of New York, corrupt poli¬ 
tician, see Hill, 307. » 

FTovf. ernvernor of Pennsylvania subject to Quay, 


Soy'^' w. E.. brother-in law of President Cleve¬ 
land holds office, 150. 1 QO.-, O-.T. 

Subbell, J., congressional campaign, 1^2.2i 2, com- 

paign and Curtis, 366; and political assess¬ 
ments, 373, 890. 


Huber, Pa., postmaster at, see Brosius, 72. 

Hudder, J. H., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Aurora, Ill, 1'26'. 

Hudson, state senator of Indiana, votes against 
bill for non-partisan control of state charitable 
institutions, 201; low politician and spoilsman, 
opposes new charter of Indianapolis, see, also, 
Magee, 211. 

Hudson, postmaster of Corydon, Ind., political 
worker, 379, 382. 

Hudson, J. S., delegate to republican national 
convention, secures removal of Duer, postmas¬ 
ter at Princess Anne, Md., and appointment of 
Lankford, 408. 

Hudson Co., N. Y., factional democratic fights in 
police aid Davis faction, 199,200. 

Huey, lawyer, and stock fraudulently issued to 
Wanamaker, 246. 

Huffer, S. W., candidate for postmastership at 
Muncie, Ind., 217. 

Hughes, asst, postmaster of Philadelphia,political 
worker for Quay, 270, 280. 

Hughes, A. M., leads Tennessee delegation for Har¬ 
rison, 341. 

Hughes, E. N., applicant for Winamac, Ind., post¬ 
mastership, 88. 

Hughson, J., given office through influence of Priv. 
Sec. Halford, 38. 

Huginir, appointed postmaster at Newport, Minne¬ 
sota, 21. 

Hugo, V., on America, 210. 

Hulett, W. L., doorkeeper in Indiana senate, 408. 

Humphrey, mayor of Concord, N. H., 143. 

Hungerford, J.B., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at Carroll, Iowa, 141; a political worker, ‘260. 

Hunt, and office-seekers, 38. 

Hunt, police judge of Manchester, active politi¬ 
cian, 143. 

Hunt, C. B., editor, appointed postmaster at Green¬ 
field, Iowa, 142. 

Hunt, W. L., editor, appointed postmaster at St. 
Clairsville, O., 301. 

Hunter, commissioner, spoilsman, 315. 

Hunter, J. T., asks for financial “suggestions,” 383. 

Hunter, N. Y., Journalist Casteright postmaster of, 
155. 

Hunter, R. H., internal revenue collector in New 
York, a political worker, 265. 

Kuntertown, Ind., Latham, postmaster at, removed 
through influence of Postmaster Higgins, Dun- 
ton appointed, 362. 

Huntington, Bishop, advocates civ. service reform, 
40, 82. 

Huntington. Ind., Editor Butler, appointed post¬ 
master at, 1‘26, 377; Rogers, postma.ster of, at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Huntsville, Ala., Clay, Mary, postmaster at, re¬ 
moved without cause. 

Hurst, S. H., editor, given office by Governor For- 
aker, 301. , • , „ 

Husted, speaker, secures nomination of Pentreath 
for postmaster of Yonkers, N. Y., 150; chairman 
republican executive committee of New York, 
279; corrupt politician, see Hill, 307. 

Huston, G. N., 7, 78, 85,96; treas. of U. S., 14; chair¬ 
man Indiana republican state committee; con¬ 
trols patronage of Indiana, 67, 112, 121, 154; ob¬ 
tains office for Scanlon, for political services, 
132; of national republican committee, 359; 
worker for Harrison, and distributer of patron¬ 
age, 377; and political assessments, 382, 383. 

Hyat, J., efficient officer in house of representa¬ 
tives, removed for political reasons through in¬ 
fluence of McPherson, 84. 

Iches, editor, appointed postmaster at Newark, 
O.,301. 

Idaho., governor of officially compliments man¬ 
agement of assay office at Boise City, whose 
chief removed without cause by Harrison, .30; 
Boise City, head of assay office at removed 
without cause, 30. 

Idding, pension examiner in Indiana, political 
worker, 380. , 

Ide, C. E.. defeated candidate, 132; politician, 386. 

Illig, police commissioner at Buffalo, works for 
Trautmann; uses intimidation, see Buffalo, N. 
Y.. 197. . , ^ 

Illinois, see also convention, platform. 

Illinois, congressmen of and offices, 6; senators of 
and President Harrison, 6; delegation and the 
offices, 7; congressmen and offices, 15; delega¬ 
tion from, favoring appointment of Asa 
Matthews as first comptroller, 21; congressmen 
of and Chicago post-office, 22; removals in, 22; 
Bloomington, examination at, 26; postmasters 
In democratic congressional districts appointed 
through influence of Sen. Cullom, 30; Harrison 
worker appointed U. S. marshal for southern 
district of, 30; Congressman Cannon of. spoils¬ 
man, 30; Senators Cullom and Far well and 
Wilcox matter, 31; congressmen and senators of 
refused control of patronage by Harrison, 240: 
political activity of federal officeholders in, 
335, 3.36, 344; CIVIL SERVICE CHRONICLE to be 
sent to Y. M. C. A. of, 350; Governor Altgeld of 
flees from office-seekers, 415. 

Impeachment, Presldentllableto, for abuse of civil 
service, 17. , , ^ , 

Independent, on resignation of Quay as chairman 
National Republican Committee, 257. 

Indian commissioner, Butler, low politician, rec¬ 
ommended by congressmen for, 14; Oberly re¬ 
moved by Pres. Harrison,‘27; Morgan, :38; Mor¬ 
gan favorable to civil service reform, asks re- 








xviii 


INDEX. 


tentioaof his predecessor, 44; Morgan upholds 
Harrison’s Indian policy, 202. 

Indian commissioners declare Indian service in 
better condition than ever before, 205. 

Indian Rights Association, 42; and abuse of Indian 
service, 86; seventh annual report of on Indian 
service, 102; refused knowledge of cause of re¬ 
moval of Vandever, 181; efforts of, 182; confer¬ 
ence 1891 favors application of civil service re¬ 
form methods to Indian service, 288; report of 
commissioners condemning spoils system in 
Indian service, 308. 

Indian schools, Dorchester, commissioner of, 38. 

Indian service, extension of civil service law to, 
advocated, 10; Junkin, W. W., appointed in¬ 
spector in, 14; congressional patronage and, 36; 
rules of Commissioner Morgan concerning ten¬ 
ure of office in, 44; letter of Welsh favoring civil 
service reform in, 47; evils in, 86; spoils system 
in, 94,173,192, 308; “home rule system of Pres. 
Harrison, 102; disgrace of. Pres. Grant and, see 
A Century of Dishonor, 182; gross abuses in, 
correspondence regarding, see Morgan, Har¬ 
rison, Cook, Cambridge Civil Service Reform 
Association, 202, 204, 205; in better condition 
than ever before, see Indian commissioners, 
proposal to extend civil service law to agency 
clerks and employes in, 205; removals in under 
Cleveland and Harrison, 217; places in given as 
spoil, see Pine Ridge,218; H. Welsh on removals 
in, Capen on removals in under Cleveland, 219; 
partially put under civil service law by Pres. 
Harrison, 221, 273, 372; evils of spoils system in, 
H. Welsh on, in Scribner’s magazine for April, 
1891,224; used as spoils by Sec. Noble, 226; merit 
system introduced in, 230, 251, 289 , 321; de¬ 
bauched by Harrison, 237,376; spoils system in, 
H. Welsh on, 239; extension of merit system to 
commended, 286; thorough application of re¬ 
form to demanded, 288; political assessments 
levied on employes in, 375, 384, 385, 383; exam¬ 
iners for 1891-92, 397. 

Indiana, see also Convention, Platform. 

Indiana, civil service reform in under Cleveland’s 
first administration, 1; democratic party in, 
civil service reform, 8; number of postmasters 
appointed in, from March 4 till July 20, inclu¬ 
sive, 1889, 34; rotation in office in, 45; moral 
republican organ of thinks neither parly cares 
about civil service reform, 62; fourth class 
post-offices used to strengthen republican ma¬ 
chine in, 67; Huston chairman republican state 
committee, 1888, 67; federal offices in, used to 
make a machine, 68; reform sentiment in, 93; 
state university of, civil service reform senti¬ 
ment at, 108; distribution of spoil in causes 
republican defeat, 111; republican congress¬ 
men of, and spoils, 112: status of merit system 
in, 119; state civil service in, devoted to spoils, 
137; 20,000 floaters in, 171; patronage of given 
to Michener, 173; republican club, for spoils, 
see Curry, 181; republican factions fight over 
chairmanship of state committee, 189; bribery 
by republicans advised in, 190, 191; farmer ap¬ 
pointed mine inspector of, by Governor Hovey, 
192; state federation of trade and labor unions 
of, demand non-partisan control of state in¬ 
stitutions, see Magee, 201; foundation of state 
board of charities of, opposed by State Senator 
Burke for not being partisan, 201; Magee bill 
for non-partisan control of state charitable in¬ 
stitutions, defeated, 201, 202, 208, 209, 210; Dr. 
Harrison, president of state benevolent boards 
of, a spoilsman, 206; text of Magee bill author¬ 
izing board of state charities to regulate em¬ 
ployment of officers of benevolent institutions 
of, according to merit system, 208, 209; illegal 
and spoils appointments made in state senate, 
spoils system and scandals in hospitals of, 211; 
212; Magee bill for non-partisan control of 
state charitable institutions discussed, 214, 215; 
“boss” ridden, 219; civil service reform popu¬ 
lar in, federal, state officers and citizens, favor¬ 
ing, 227; school children of, never speak on 
questions of public policy, 236; opposition to 
Harrison in, 240; federal officers in, political 
workers for Harrison, 260; under Cleveland 
given over to spoils, 282; federal patronage in, 
297; federal patronage used in, for re nomina¬ 
tion of Harrison, 302, 303; central and southern 
hospitals for insane, evils of spoils system in, 
315; Harrison uses federal patronage in, for re- 
nomination, 810, 317; spoils system in, civil 
service reform the proper issue, 322; political 
activity of federal office-holders in, 334, 337, 340, 
343, 344, 345, 346, 347, 352, 353, 354, 362, 370,'374, 375, 
382, 387, 389, 890; Chase, favored by Harrison for 
governor of, 343; Hill men of, defeated at Chi¬ 
cago convention, 350; state republican com¬ 
mittee assesses candidates for office, also pen¬ 
sion office at Indianapolis, 363; democratic 
politicians of. spoilsmen, 365, 366; report to 
committee of National League, on political ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders in, 375, 381; re¬ 
publican state committee of, levies political 
assessments. 387, 392; democrats aspiring to 
office, 387, 392, 395; good results of secret ballot 
in, 389; applicants for office in, under Cleve¬ 
land [2d term], 392, 394, 399 , 401; spoils system 
in, legislature of 1893 under, 405, 408, 414; appli¬ 
cants for office in, under Cleveland [2d term], 
409 , 411; applicants for office in, under Cleve¬ 
land [2d term], 415, 422, 


Indiana, civil service reform association ol, 67,88; 
membership of, 4, 9,17,25,41; annual addresses 
at, 7; membership of, 41; announcement of 
annual meeting 1890, 85; annual meeting of 

1890, list of officers, 108; notice of annual meet¬ 
ing, 111; annual meeting 1890, address of Bona¬ 
parte, C. J., 119, 120, 126,127, 128; and Clarkson, 
131; work of, 178; Bloomington branch of, 182; 
exposes scandals of partisan management of 
state charitable institutions, 214; annual meet¬ 
ing 1891; W. D. Foulke elected president of, 227, 
239. 

Indiana School Journal and Civil Service Chron¬ 
icle, 13. 

Indiana Co., Penn., political fights in, 133. 

Indianapolis, municipal service in, 2; post-office at, 
2, 9,18, 34; post-office at under Cleveland, 5; 
civil service reform in fire department 
of, 13; Wallace, postmaster of, violates civil 
service law, 28 , 73; post-office at, spoils sys¬ 
tem in, 26; post-office, investigation of by 
civil service commission, 27; list of eligibles at 
post-office at, 29; Fire Chief Websterof removed 
for political reasons, 36, 69; Hildebrand ap¬ 
pointed collector of customs at, 38, 68; composi¬ 
tion of local examining board at, examination 
at, 42; employees in post-office at exempt from 
examination, 42; Postmaster Wallace at and 
local board, 43, 48; post-office at under Post¬ 
master Jones,45,51,53,80; Commissioner Roose¬ 
velt at, 46; agent of associated press at given 
office, 47; list of eligiblesfor post office of, 48; 
questions used in examination at, August 6, 
1889,51,56,58; city election influenced by re¬ 
moval of Fire Chief Webster, 59; civil service 
commission and post-office of, 59; non-partisan 
appointments in post-office at, 87; post-office at, 
no removals in except for cause, fairness of ex¬ 
amination in, 94; examinations for physicians 
in city hospitals, 107; deputies in custom house 
as political workers, 108; civil service reform 
in township trustee’s office at. Ill; charity or¬ 
ganization of. 111; excellence of examining 
board at, 120; vacancies in fire depart¬ 
ment of, civil service methods advocated 
for, 120; appointments to census serv¬ 
ice in made through M. Moores, 129; in 
efficient census enumeration at, 132; 
control of offices in fire service at, 137; Post¬ 
master Wallace of, secretly a political worker, 
14-4; Township Trustee Gold removes efficient 
officers, 146; examinations for postal service 
in, passed by negro, 146; federal office-holders 
at, state convention at, 153, 158; spoils system 
in, township embracing, 171; spoils system in, 
for city laborers, 181; per cent, of removals in, 
classified and unclassified service in, post-office 
at, 185; personnel of examiners at, civil serv¬ 
ice law observed rigidly in post-office at, 186; 
commercial club of, and proposed charter of, 
Indianapolis, 104, 189, 190; methods used in, 
“primaries” in, 192; patronage of state insane 
hospitals at, controlled by Markey, ward poli¬ 
tician of Indianapolis, 195; Social Turn-Verein 
of indorses Magee bill for non-partisan con- 
troi of state charitable institutions, 201, 209; 
efforts against spoils system in city depart¬ 
ments, 202, 203; local politics and career of cor¬ 
rupt politicians in, tally-sheet forgeries in, 205; 
206, 207, 208; bribery by street railway 

company of, 206, 207; fire service at, ef¬ 
forts to turn over to spoils, 207, 208, 
235; wholesale removals of employes in fire 
and police service of, see equally divided 
politically. 212, 213; new charter for gov¬ 
ernment of, its passage, provisions and faults, 
new officers under, see equally divided polit¬ 
ically, 212, 213; examinations for clerks and 
carriers in post-office at, 218; death of Postmas¬ 
ter Wallace of, a loss to the public service, 219; 
trouble arising from positions in city service be¬ 
ing “equally divided politically,” street clean¬ 
ing service of, 220, 221; city assumption of vari¬ 
ous important functions condemned while 
spoils system exists, see equally divided politi¬ 
cally, 220; system of appointment to police 
force of, compared with those of Brooklyn, N. 
Y., and Boston, Mass., see equally divided po¬ 
litically, 222, 223, 224; Thompson acting post¬ 
master at, favors civil service reform, 227, 229; 
need of examinations and civil service reform 
in city service at, see equally divided politi¬ 
cally, 228; adherent of Coy. disreputable 
politician elected president of council of, 
228; post-office under merit svstem, 230; 
promotion of Thompson ass’t postmaster at to 
be postmaster, and consequent promotions, 235; 
spoils system in city government of, merit sys¬ 
tem required for all city departments except 
police and fire, see charter, 243; examination 
for places in post office at, to be held August, 

1891, 243; number of applicants at examina¬ 
tions held August. 1891, for carriers and clerks 
in post-office at, 253: Gold, township trustee at, 
defends himself for spoils methods, criticism 
of, 256; election of Sullivan as mavor of, over 
Herod, by independent votes, board of public 
works and controller of, commended, 269; city 
services in turned over to spoils, 289; Phipps, 
efficient employe in city service of, re¬ 
moved for political reasons, 297: Postmaster 
Thompson of, and other federal officers at, po¬ 
litical workers, 302,316, 317, 320,378,382; tally 
sheet frauds in, 313; spoils in city and county 


offices at, 314, 315; board of public safety of, 
317; examinations for physicians for city hos¬ 
pital, 322; Thompson, postmaster of, subordi¬ 
nates work for Harrison at Minneapolis, 337,343, 
379; need of Boston labor service in, 357; 
Moores, republican politician, attempts to co¬ 
erce Thompson, postmaster at, 366 ; Dunn, P. O. 
employe at, removed for soliciting political 
contributions of other employes at instance of 
Democratic Committeman Backus, 403, 411, 412; 
Congressman Bynum allows Turpie to name 
postmaster of, 405. 

Indianapolis, Catholic Record advocates civil 
service reform, 76. 

Indianapolis Journal (rep.) on Indianapolis post-of¬ 
fice, 9: declares civil service reform not a moral 
question, 66; strongly advocates civil service 
reform, 66; interview in on political ingratitude, 
181, 182; defends census appointments, 182; 
and bribery by republicans in Indiana, 191; on 
corrupt politics and politicians of Indianapolis, 
see also Indianapolis, 205, 206, 207; accounts of 
spoils fights in various places, 217; on Roose¬ 
velt dinner, see at Indianapolis, 232; on inde¬ 
pendents, 313; on use of patronage to secure 
re-election of a President, 348; on use of patron¬ 
age by Harrison to secure renomination; by 
Cleveland, 250. 

Indianapolis News (independent), and civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 11; and Civil Service Chronicle, 
13; attributes republican defeat of 1889 largely 
to patronage system. 76; on Clarkson and Mary¬ 
land republican clubs, 154; on political assess¬ 
ments, 183; account of nominating caucus, see 
Parnell Hall, 194,195; on corrupt politics and 
politicians of Indianapolis, 205, 206, 207, 208; on 
rush for office under new city government of 
Indianapolis, see equally divided politically, 
213; an independent journal, opposes spoils 
system, 331; on the “mugwump,” 361. 

Indianapolis Sentinel (dem.) and Civil Service 
Chronicle, 13; complaints against violations 
of civil service law in Indianapolis post-office, 
27; supports Magee bill for non-partisan con¬ 
trol of state charitable institutions, 201, 202, 209, 
210; on corrupt politics and politicians of In¬ 
dianapolis, 207, 208; condemns democratic an¬ 
tagonism to Magee bill for non-partisan control 
of state charitable institutions, 215; accounts of 
spoils fights in various places. 217; on Roose¬ 
velt dinner at Indianapolis, 232; commended. 
269; favors civil service methods in Indiana 
state institutions, 350; on what to expect of 
Cleveland, 358. 

Indianapolis Taglicher Telegraph, condemns oppo¬ 
sition to Magee bill, see also Magee, 209. 

Ingalls, Senator, spoilsman, 5, 17,27, 43,65,85,101, 
192,211; Kansas and office seekers, 6; senator 
and President Harrison confer over offices, 22; 
correspondence with H. Welsh over Indian 
commissioner, 22; opposed to civil service-xe- 
form, 49; and civil service law, 51; on purity in 
polities, 119, 1.30, 145; retracts statements on 
pnrity in politics, 190; guilty of nepotism in 
District of Columbia offices, 215. 

Ingraham, Judge, and Dutchess co., N. Y., election 
frauds, 306. 

Inspectors, post-office, requirements of, 193. 

Interior Dept., and request for census recount in 
N. Y. City, 294. 

Iowa, number of appointments in by Clarkson, 45; 
Editor Weinsteil appointed collector of fourth 
district of, 56; republicans of denounce civil 
service law and demand Its repeal, 62; spoils 
system in given fnll swing with disastrous re¬ 
sults, 67; reform in. Ill; political assessments 
made by republican state central committee of, 
240; federal officers at state republican conven¬ 
tion 1891, 260; becoming democratic, 281; politi¬ 
cal activity of federal office-holders in, 346, 382. 

Iowa State Register and Junkin, W. W., 14; Clark¬ 
son’s paper and examinations, 49. 

Irvin, P. O. employe at Frankfort, Ind., political 
worker, 380. 

Irvin, judge, and “tally-sheet” forgeries at Indian¬ 
apolis, see Indianapolis. 

Irwin, uses influence for appointment of Throop, 
59. 

Irwin, D. W., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Akron, Cal., 126. 

Issues, permanence of, other reforms should be 
subordinate to civil service reform, 214, 220. 

Ithaca, N. Y., Robinson postmaster of, political 
worker for Platt, 264. 

Ivanhoe, Kan., Journalist Gray postmaster at. 149. 

Ives, H. S., see Hillism, 309. 

Ivins, W. yi., exposes methods of Hill, 307. 

“J. S.,” advertlsenjent of, offering to buy office, 22. 

Jackson, President, and bribery of press, 17; spoils¬ 
man, 20,43, 105; and postmasters, 49; cabinet 
of, 68; offices under, a perquisite of the Execu¬ 
tive, 115; and the civil service, 125; spoils system 
attributed to. 262 : Webster condemns spoils 
system under. 270, 271. 

Jackson. J., ass’t U. S. att’y, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis, 348. 

Jackson, Miss . Gibbs postmaster at.47; Gibbs post¬ 
master of, Harrison delegate to Minneapolis, 
344 , 348. 

Jackson, O. L., votes for, bought away, 151 

Jackson Court House, W. Va., Journalist Deen post¬ 
master at, 155. 

Jacksonian rotation, see Clark, 2.57. 








INDEX. 


XIX 


Jacksonville, Florida, Postmaster Clark of, re¬ 
moved by Pres. Harrison, 29. 

Jacobi, Dr. A., withdraws from N. Y. City health 
dep’t, because it becomes political machine,35(>. 

Jacobs, J.L., federal employe, political worker in 
New York, 33C. 

Jacobs, L., and cartage contract of N.Y. custom 
house, 358. 

Jacobus, J. W., U. S. marshal, assists at dinner to 
Clarkson, 245: a political worker, 205; in New 
York convention, 334 , 370; appoints “ floaters ” 
as deputies, 3.S7. 

James, postmaster at New York. 32; ex-postmaster- 
general testifies to worth of Postmaster Hendrix 
at Brooklyn, N. Y., 131; postmaster at New 
York appointed P. M. gen’l by Garfield, ,307. 

James, C. G., employe in N. Y. post-office, a politi¬ 
cal worker. 265. 

James, J., applicant for Winamac, Ind., postmas- 
tership, 88. 

Jamestown, Kan., Journalist Barton postmaster at, 
149. 

Janeway, Dr., resigns from N. Y. City health de¬ 
partment because it becomes political machine, 
:156. 

Jay)er, Minn., Journalist King postmaster at, 149. 

Jefierson Co., N. Y., factional fights in republican 
primaries of, political activity of federal office¬ 
holders, 204; postmasters and other federal em¬ 
ployes in, political assessments levied on, 391, 
392. 

Jefferson Co., Pa., bribery in, by republicans, 133. 

Jefferson, O.. Editor Howells appointed postmaster 
at, 301. 


Jefferson, T., “four-year” law on, 45, 46; on nepot¬ 
ism, 40; and the civil service, 125. 

Jeffersonville, Ind., the civil servicein, see New Al¬ 
bany Tribune, 83; Postmaster Luke of, 88; anti- 
Harrison worker appointed internal revenue 
collector for, 302. 

Jeffersonville (Ind.) News, on Magee bill for non¬ 
partisan control of state charitable institutions, 
215. 

Jenckes, of Rhode Island, see Eaton, 105. 

Jenckes. Rev. Dr., favors civil service reform, 73, 
227, 229; a partisan, 187, 188. 

Jenkins, L. L., postmaster at Gastonia, N. Carolina, 
delegate for Harrison, 334. 

Jenkinson, I., editor, appointed postmaster at Rich¬ 
mond, Ind., 126. 377; works for Harrison, 249. 

Jenks, corporation counsel at Brooklyn, N. Y., ex¬ 
poses methods of McLaughlin, 318. 

Jenks, J. W., Prof., civil service reformer, 182. 

Jennings, C. E. M., editor, disappointed office seek¬ 
er, opposes Sherman, 301. 

Jersey City, N. J., postmaster at removed without 
cause, 29; per cent, of removals in classified 
and unclassified service in post-office at, 185. 

Jessup, M. K., reports to Mayor Grant on street 
cleaning in New York, advises merit system, 
220,221. 

Jewell, W. R., editor, appointed postmaster at Dan¬ 
ville, Ill., 141; political worker, 160. 

Jewett, appointed postmaster at Oregon, Ill., see 


Hitt, 109. 

Jewett claim, and Elkins, 290. _ 

Jewett, C. W., employe in Indian service, asked 

for political contributions, 386. 

Johnson, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons by Coulter, 55. 

Johnson, postmaster at San Antonio, a political 
worker, 159. 

Johnson, Congressman, patronage of, 419. 

Johnson, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in, 407. ,, , „ 

Johnson, Pres. Andrew, and scranible for offices, 
24; appoints Elkins U. S. dist. att y in N. Mexico, 
368; spoils since, 413, 414. , „ 

Johnson. C. F., editor, appointed consul-gen 1 to 
Frankfort-on-the-Maln,301. 

Johnson, C. H., see Baltimore investigation, 2f)7, 


268 

Johnson, E. A., negro, Harrison delegate from N. 

Carolina, 334. t, T^ x- 

Johnson, F. W., sale of office to by Porter, D. E , 154. 
Johnson, G. W., P. O. employe, see Baltimore inves¬ 


tigation, 296. . , , 

Johnson, H. C., letter advocating civil service re- 
form to Postmaster Richensteen at L. I. City, 

Johnson, H. U., congressman elect, distributes pa- 

JohnTn?U.S.!'di8trict attorney at N. York, takes 
part in political squabbles, 106,198,3-i2, 3/1. 

Johnson, J., U. S. district attorney, works for re- 
tiution of Boyle. 142; U. S-dist. att’y at Brook¬ 
lyn. N. Y.. a political worker, 265, U. S. dist. 
att’y in New York convention, 335. 

Johnson, J. B., on local examining board at Mil- 

,IohZon?J.’H.!on “The Merit System of Appoint- 

John“son,“.L^Hl?'cinditlonally refused access to 
records of removals in postal service. 163 

Johnson, J. H., distributes Curtis address of 1892, 


Johnson®fj. L., passes civil service examinations 
for incapable applicant, 238. 

Johnson, Kan., Journalist Webster postmaster at, 

Johrmon, M., revenue collector, bets on Harrison, 


Johnson, R. M., efficient postal employe at St. 
Louis, 181. 


Johnson, T. B., collector at Charleston, S. C., dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Johnson, W. J., postmaster at Manchester, Mass., 
removed after four years service, second com¬ 
mission unexpired, 187. 

Johnson, W. W., politician, appointed postmaster 
at Baltimore, Md., 90; conducts factional fights, 
121; removals under without cause, charges 
against filed, 137; political worker, 144, 857, .372, 
373; works for Harrison in primaries at Balti¬ 
more, Md., 225, 220; makes clean sweep, testi¬ 
mony of before Roosevelt. 189, 2.54.255; see Bal¬ 
timore investigation, 267, 208, 277, 278,296; John¬ 
son faction at Baltimore, see Baltimore investi¬ 
gation, 295; in Maryland convention. :335: works 
for Harrison at Minneapolis, 337, 347; and po¬ 
litical assessment circular of civil service com¬ 
mission, 363; as a campaign fund raiser, :370. 

Johnston, councilman of Indianapolis, supports 
Fire Chief Webster, 208. 

Johnston, G. D.. civil service commissioner, and 
political assessments, 358. 

Johnston, G. D.. civil service commissioner, and 
duties of federal employes, :!84; does not favor 
rapid extension of classified service, 397. 

Johnston, N. Y., Postmaster Murray of, fighting for 
good service in, 72. 

Jones, Senator, supporter of Blaine, 344. 

Jones, postmaster of Butler, Ind., political worker, 
379, 380. 

.lones, postmaster at Scranton, Pa., through infiu- 
ence of Congressman Scranton, 101. 

Jones. A., postmaster at Indianapolis. 1; interview 
on giving up office, 5; removai deserved, 9; and 
special exam, at Indpls, spoilsman, 18; remov¬ 
als under, and Moore, gambler, 28; opposed to 
civ. service reform, 80; appointment of, con 
demned.51. 

Jones, G., proprietor N. Y. Times, enemy of spoils 
system, 2,54. 

Jones, I. A., see Chemung Co., N. Y., 2.59. 

Jones, J.W., journalist, postmaster at Barneveld, 
Wis., 155. 

Jones, J. W., low politician; his “reforms,” 183; 
journalist, postmaster at Oelrichs, S. Dak., 155. 

Jones, “ Long,” works for Harrison at Minneapo¬ 
lis, 342. 

Jonesvllle, Minn., Journalist Henry postmaster at, 
149. 

Jolley, G. W., IT. S. dist. att’y in Kentucky, prose¬ 
cutes federal office-holders for levying political 
assessments, 330. 

Judson, postmaster of Prattsville, N. Y., Insane 
through fear of loss of office, 415. 

Julian, G. W., address of on civil service reform, 
365, 367, 370, 375, 376; opposing Harrison, 386. 

Justice, H., civil service reformer, closes his sub¬ 
scription to Civil Service Chronicle, 350. 

Kane, Pa., Postmaster Davis of, worker for Dela 
mater. 134. 

Kannett Square. Chester Co., Pa., applicants for 
postmaster of, 55. 

Kansas, office-seekers In, 6; discontent over 
spoils, 15; Congressman Perkins of opposed to 
civil service reform, 35; changes In post-offices 
in, under Harrison and Cleveland, 55; political 
activity of federal officers In, 348, 382; political 
assessments in Indian service in, 384, 385. 

Kansas City, Mo., postmaster of appoints relative 
Pres. Harrison his deputy, 84; per cent, of re¬ 
movals in classified and unclassified service in 
post-office at, 185. 

Kaontz. postmaster at Lafayette Corners, Pa., work¬ 
er for Delamater, 134. 

Kaough, postmaster at Ft. Wayne, Ind., under 
Cleveland, political worker, 88. 

Kaufman, Rev. W. H., on civil service reform, 83; 
on sentiment favoring civil service reform in 
Utah, 111, 817. 

Kawanna, Ind., Editor Newton appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 126. XT r. 1 ! 

Keagh, T. B., Harrison delegate from N. Carolina, 


334. 

ean, ex-Congressman, gets federal offices for po¬ 
lice officers, 216. . 

eating, J. P., disreputable politician, gets office 
through R. Croker, 309. 

eegan, G., fraudulent votlngname, see New i ork 
City. , 

eeller H.. customs inspector, pays political assess¬ 
ments, 279. 

eenan, J., see Hill, 307. . t> n jn 

eepers, G. A., editor, postmaster at Beallsvllle, 

0-.861. ’ TT . 1 , , 

ehoe, M., treasury agent, Harrison delegate to 
Minneapolis, 344. m xi t, 

eisburg. J., appointed to oftice by Township Trus¬ 
tee Gold at Indianapolis, 14(h 250. 
eith, P., postmaster at Strawberry Point. Iowa. 

veteran soldier, removed see Clarkson. 65. 
eller, J., custom house employe at Philadelphia, 
political worker for Harrison. 301. 
elloy councilinfl'n of Indianapolis, supports fire* 
chief Webster, 208. , r 

elley, C., emigrant inspector, political workerfor 

elley!^ Pat., ward politician of Indianapolis, see 

elfe^^R.^^wd politician, see Indianapolis, 195. 
ellogg. L. E., journali8t,po8tma8teratWatervllle, 
Wash 165 

pll/ifr W P . Coleman supersedes him in con¬ 
trol of patronage in Louisiana, 71, 304; opposes 
Harrison at Minneapolis, 344. 346; and War- 
mouth in Louisiana, 374. 


Kelly, Miss, daughter of Congressman Kelly, 
given office in Burlington, Kan., post-office, 
188. 

Kelly, H., Congressman, secures removal of Lock- 
wood, postmaster at Burlington, Kan., and ap¬ 
pointment of successor. Lane, 188. 

Kemble, W. H., corrupt politician, see Quay, 106, 
152; ally of Quay, and convicted, 270. 

Kendallville, Ind., Standard (repub.), favors civil 
service reform, 83. 

Kenealy, M. E., journalist, postmaster, at Sitka, 
Alaska, 155. 

Kennedy, Congressman,condemns Quay, 150,157. 

Kennedy, C., railway mail clerk, in Iowa, a politi¬ 
cal worker. 200. 

Kennedy, E. K., ward politician, see Kings Co., 
N. Y. 

Kennett, Pa., Advance (repub.), the way to get of¬ 
fice, 55. 

Kenny,-, and census enumeration of New York 

City, 294. 

Kent, N. Y., Postmaster Bennett of, a political 
worker, 102. 

Kentucky, office-holders in, allowed to serve out 
terms, 73; Jolley, U. S. Dist. Att’y in, prosecutes 
federal office-holders, for levying political as¬ 
sessments, 3:10. 

Kenyon, J. S., sbc’y republican state committee of 
of New York, 279; at Minneapolis, 344. 

Keata, Iowa, Editor Smock, appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Kercheval, S. A., corrupt politician rewarded with 
office, ; worker for Harrison, 240. 

Kerens, and Russell Harrison, 359; member of na¬ 
tional republican committee, 363. 

Kerens, R. C., and offices in Missouri, his influ¬ 
ence, 22; and clients, 24; political workers for 
Harrison, :i04. 

Kern, J., state senator of Indiana, and spoils meth¬ 
ods, 408. 

Kerns, postmaster at Smethport, Pa., worker for 
Delamater, 134. 

Kerr, state att’y, of Maryland, and political frauds 
in, 335. 

Kerwin, M., editor, appointed collector internal 
revenue 2d New York district, 120; assisted at 
dinner to Clarkson, 245; collector in New York, 
a political worker, 265, 279; Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 344. 

Kessler, grocer, appointed postmaster at Short 
Hills, N. J., vice Goodrich, removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons, 386. 

Kessler, J. B., journalist, postmaster at Ottawa, 
Kan., 149. 

Ketcham,C. K.,postmaster at Ditney,Ind., solicited 
for political contributions, 387, .392. 

Kewanna, Ind., Editor Newton appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 377. 

Key West, Fla., custom-house at not classified; 
number of employes in, 277. 

Keyes, Miss L. C., postmaster at Yonkers, N. Y., 
succeeded by politician, 150. 

Keyes, W.R., journalist, postmaster at Mountain 
City, Tenn., 155. 

Kidd, J. H., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Kinzle, C. H., statistics collector, a political 
worker, 100. 

Kiernan, J., inefficient census enumerator in N. Y. 
Citv, 294. 

Kilsheimer, J. B., employed In N. Y. custom¬ 
house, political worker, 108. 

Kimball, see Baltimore investigation, 327, 328. 

Kimmell, Louis, editor, appointed deputy U. S. 
marshal, 126. 

King, sheriff, inefficient, at Indianapolis, 315. 

King, A. E., and post-office at Baltimore, Mary¬ 
land, 84. 

King, D. H., reports to Mayor Grant on street¬ 
cleaning in New York; advises merit system, 
220 221. 

King, ’s., efficient employe in township trustee’s 
office at Indianapolis removed, 145, 256. 

King, S. S.. journalist, postmaster at Jasper, Minn., 
149. 

King, W., editor, supported by Congressman Cooper 
for postmaster of Danville, Ind., 398. 

Kings Co., N. Y., republican general committee, 
account of fights over, 197, 198, 304; factional 
fight in among republicans at primaries, 264; 
political assessments made by chairman of re¬ 
publican committee of, 287; Nathan republican 
boss of, 352; and Harrison, Nathan controls, 
354. 

Kingsley, la.. Postmaster Gasper of forced to re¬ 
sign, 165. 

Kingston, Mo., Editor Spirely appointed postmaster 
at, 132. , , 

Kingston, N. Y., Hayes postmaster at, a political 
worker, 280; Woolren, postmaster of, political 
worker in New York, .3.36. 

Kinley, E., ward politician, see New York City. 

Kinmundy, Ill., Editor Lawson appointed post¬ 
master at, 141. TT . 

Kinney, J.C., appointed postmaster at Hartford, 
Conn., through influence of Senator Hawley, 

Kinsey, W. M., congressman aiding office-seekers, 
15 

Kirkpatrick, J., democrat, nominated for postmas¬ 
ter at South Hadley Falls, Mass., through Con¬ 
gressman Wallace, 157. . . 

Kirkus, Rev. W., favors clerical advocacy of civil 
service reform, 30,48. 









XX 


T N 1) K X . 


Kirwin, J., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

KIsiel, J., navy yard employe. In New York con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Kittery, Me., spoils system In navy yard at, 145,148; 
navy yard at, see Tracy and Reed, 153: work on 
war ships in navy yard at, for political reasons, 
217. 

Klemme, W. H., postmaster in Winneshiek Co., la., 
a political worker, ‘iOO. 

Knapp, J. N., postmaster at Auburn, N. Y., worker 
for Platt, 143; chairman New York State Repub¬ 
lican Committee, on Platt, 258; in N. Y. con¬ 
vention, .335. 

Knight, ex-Senator G. A., endorses Bush, political 
worker, 187. 

Knight, W. E., editor appointed postmaster at 
Grand View, Ind, 126, 377. 

Knightstown, Ind., Postmaster Sample resigns, see 
Congressman Browne, 118. 

Kniseley, worker for Harrison, appointed internal 
revenue collector, 377. 

Knowles, political worker, rewarded, see Higgins, 
Sen., 38. 

Kramer, C., appointed postmaster at Columbus, 
Neb., vice Hensley, forced to resign, 166. 

Kramer, W., candidate for sheriff, 179,180. 

Kuhn, A., ward politician, see Indianapolis, 195. 

Kunzemann, J., disreputable politician, alderman 
New York City, 184. 

Labor, organizations of Buffalo, N. Y., support 
civil service reform, 228. 

Labor, and civil service reform, see Andrew, 331. 

Labor, and trades-unions of Indiana, demand non¬ 
partisan control of state charitable institu¬ 
tions, 201. 

Labor Signal favors non-partisan control of state 
charitable institutions, see Magee, 209, 215. 

Lacey, E. P., applicant for postmaster at Sullivan, 
Ind., 88. 

Lacey, S., wife of Editor Lacey appointed postmas¬ 
ter at Westcliffe, Colo., 148. 

LaCyge, Kan., Journalist Lane postmaster at, 149. 

Lafayette, Ind., Candidate Throckmorton for post¬ 
master of, and Congressman Cheadle, 71; ap 
plicants for postmaster of, 84; Postmaster Smith 
of aids Mlchener and La Follette, 144; Post¬ 
master Smith of a political worker, 163, l58, 377, 
378; republican delegation of, and Harrison, 
favors Gresham, 240; worker for Harrison, 316; 
works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 342, 379; 
P. O. employes of distribute campaign docu¬ 
ments, 389. 

La Fayette, Ind., Courier (rep.) condemns spoils 
system, 76; opposed to congressional patronage, 
83. 

Lafayette Corners, Pa., Postmaster Koontz at, 
worker for Delamater, 184. 

La Follette, candidate for congressman, defeated, 
129; controls census service patronage, 293; 
candidate for congress, supported by Michener, 
144, 377. 

La Grange, Ind., Editor Rerick appointed post¬ 
master at, 126, 377. 

La Grange, Ind., Standard (repub.), patronage an 
evil, 83. 

Laird, A. J., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Lake, David, corrupt politician, working for Con¬ 
gressman Wallace, nominated for U. S. Mar¬ 
shal, 132. 

Lamb, Ind., Simpson, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379. 

Lamb, W. H., old employe, appointed supt. of 
mails in St. Louis, 136. 

Lambert, Rev. H., pres, civil service reform asso¬ 
ciation of Newton, Mass., 136; views of on 
present status of civil service, reform criticised, 
255; address of on influence of Clarkson and 
Wanamaker on civil service reform, 261. 

Lamont, candidate for postmaster at Vpple River, 
Jo Daviess Co., Ill., 109. 

Lanark, Ill., candidates for postmaster of. Root 
given place, 109, 136. 

Lancaster, Cal., Journalist Drummond appointed 
postmaster at, 141. 

Lancaster, Pa., post-ofl&ce at, see Brosius, 72. 

Lancaster Co., Pa., Sen. Cameron “accorded” col- 
lectorshlp of internal revenue in, 47. 

Lander, Wyoming, Journalist Wynn,postmaster at, 
155. 

Lane, C. R., part of address of at annual meeting 
of Indiana Civil S. Ref. Assoc., 1889, 8; sec. In¬ 
diana Civil Service Reform Association, 108; on 
census enumeration in Indianapolis, 293. 

Lane, C. T., address of on school and civil service 
reform, 23. 

Lane, D. H., political worker for Quay, 299. 

Lane, E. C., journalist,postmaster at La Cyge, Kan., 
149. 

Lane, J. A., signs petition for larger appropriation 
for civil serv. com., 102. 

Lane, J. L., federal employe, and political assess¬ 
ments, see Kentucky, 

Lane, S. M., appointed postmaster at Burlington, 
Kan., through influence of Congressman Kelly, 
vice Lockwood, removed, 188. 

Langdon, Gen., see Chemung Co., N. Y., 259. 

Langdon, C. J., letter to by Walcott on removal of 
Postmaster Flood, 312. 

Langham, chairman Indiana Co., Pa., republican 
committee, 133. 

Langham, P. J., postmaster at Hawley, Pa., re¬ 
moved on secret charges, 176, 


Langsdale, appointed postmaster at Greencastle, 
Ind., by President Arthur, 89. 

Langsdale, postmaster at Florence, Ind., political 
worker, 379. 

Langston, ex-congressman, reconciliation of with 
Mahone, in interest of Harrison, 240, 241. 

Langston, see Bowden, 162. 

Langston, ex-minister, supports Blaine, 340, 345. 

Langston, J. M., and Mahone, 62. 

Lanier, C., barber at White House, goes home to 
vote, 180. 

Lankford, W. F., appointed postmaster at Princess 
Anne, Md., vice Duer, removed for political 
reasons, 408. 

Lansdon, B. C., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Nebo, Ill., 141. 

Lansing, A. W., journalist, postmaster at Platts¬ 
burgh, N. Y., 155. 

La Porte, Pa., Journalist Cheney, postm aster at, 149. 

Larke, F. D., journalist, postmaster at Rogers City, 
Mich., 149. 

Larkin, T., see New York, factional fights in, 241. 

La Rue, postmaster at Colfax, Wash., forced to re¬ 
sign, 165. 

Latham, R., postmaster at Hunterstown, Ind., re¬ 
moved through Influence of Postmaster Hig¬ 
gins; Dunton appointed, 362. 

Latz, chemist for Indianapolis board of health, 314. 

Laurel, Del., Smith, postmaster of, attempts bribery, 
397, 401, 402. 

Laurel, Md., postmaster at, see Gorman, 38. 

Laurence, A. C., journalist, postmaster at Evans¬ 
ville, Minn., 149. 

Law, civil serv., and its friends exemplified in 
Indianapolis post-office, 26. 

Lawler, fellows in district of, made application 
for O’Donnell, 60. 

Lawler, T., local politician, opposed to Congress¬ 
man Hitt, 109. 

Lawler, T. G., postmaster at Rockford, Ill., works 
for Hitt, 143. 

Lawrence Co. (Indiana), applicants from, 16. 

Lawrence, Kan., civil service reform association of, 
239. 

Lawrenceburg, Ind., Lucas, postmaster of, political 
worker, 379. 

Lawrenceburg, Tenn., Journalist Schrader post¬ 
master at, 155. 

Lawrenceville.Va., postmaster at removed through 
influence of Mahone, despite promise to con¬ 
trary, 74. 

Lawshe, A. L., editor appointed postmaster at 
Xenia, Ind., 71, 126, 377; political worker, 379. 

Lawson, J. D., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 
344. 

Lawson, R. F., editor, appointed postmaster at Kin- 
mundy. Ill., 141. 

Lea, H. C., on patronage, 387; advocates civil serv¬ 
ice reform, denounces President Harrison's 
course with the civil service, 68; on pledges of 
reform of republican party, 92; opposed to 
Senator Quay, 95; oi)en letter to President Har¬ 
rison protesting against patronage of Quay, 111, 
112; appeal of to voters against Quay and Dela¬ 
mater, 1-38. 

Leach, chief of division, removed for political rea¬ 
sons, see Coulter, 65. 

Leach, F. W., receiver of campaign levies, 134; re¬ 
publican politician in Pennsylvania, 361. 

League, National, of civil service reform associa¬ 
tions, see National League. 

League, republican,convention at Syracuse, August, 
1891, federal officeholders at,259. 

Learned, F. E., son of editor, appointed postmaster 
at Benson, Ill., 148. 

Leaycraft, W. H., political worker Candidate Ben 
edict, 142; port warden at New York, political 
worker for Woodruff, 198; calls on Fassett, col¬ 
lector at N. Y. City, 258; political worker, 304; 
political “boss,” 311; office-seeker, 332; “boss,” 
given office by Harrison, 355, 371. 

Lebanon, N. H., brother of Churchill postmaster 
of, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Lee, E. C., “pull” of in N. Y. custom house, sup¬ 
ported by Platt, appointed janitor, 258, 259 ; at 
Minneapolis convention, 343. 

Lee, J.E., negro, coliector at Jacksonviile, Fla., 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Lee, L. 'W., postmaster at Neodesha, Kan., removed 
after four years’ service, second commission 
unexpired, 187. 

Lee, M. C., Inspector in N. Y. custom-house, polit¬ 
ical worker, 108. 

Leech, D., employed in N. Y. custom house, polit¬ 
ical worker, 108. 

Leech, E. O., director of mint, works for Harrison 
at Minneapolis, .344. 

Leeds, J. W., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 3il4. 

Leeds, W. R., disreputable politician, nominated 
by Harrison for D. S. marshal in Pa., 216, 374; 
political worker for Quay, 270, 280; political 
worker for Harrison, 299, 300. 

Leet, “boss” in N. Y. custom-house, 191. 

Leffson, F., and Fassett, 265. 

Lehigh Co., Pa., control of patronage in, 47. 

Lehigh ton. Pa., J.P. Smith postmaster at, removed 
for political reasons, 39. 

Lehlbach, Congressman, on house committee of 
civil service, 86; politician favored by adminis¬ 
tration, 180. 

Leibhardt, P., superintendent dead letter office, 
political worker, 382. 


Leland, C. Jr., federal officer, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Lemcke, state treasurer of Indiana and Sullivan, 
corrupt county clerk of Marlon Co. (Indianapo¬ 
lis), 206. 

Lemon, G. E., pension claim agent and Raum, 1,30. 

Lena, Ill., Journalist Lewis appointed postmaster 
at, 126. 

Lenox, Iowa, Editor 'Van Houten appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Leonard, Editor, political worker for Blaine, 302. 

Leonard, A. H., republican in Louisiana and War- 
mouth, 862. 

Leonard, J. R., 96; appointment as deputy, see 
Ransdall, 80; relative of Ransdell gets office un¬ 
der, 244; federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
362,382. 

Leonard, W., federal office-holder, political worker 
for Harrison, 302, 378. 

Letter carriers, national convention of at Detroit, 
requests extension of civil service law to all 
free delivery cities, 2.53. 

Leupp, F. E., editor Good Government, 357. 

Levan, L. D., appointed postmaster at Wilson, N. 
Y., 39; removal of, 45. 

Leverett, G. V., civil service reformer of Cambridge, 
Mass., 204. 

Levy, Indian agent at Yankton, removed, 98. 

Levy, B. A., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

Lewis, assemblyman 21st district in New York City, 
75. 

Lewis, C. A., distributes Curtis address (1892) in 
Indiana, 388. 

Lewis, C. S., officer Indiana Civil Service Reform 
Association, 108. 

Lewis. E.B., journalist, postmaster at New Hol¬ 
land, O., 149. 

I^ewis, F. A., asst. supt. of Society for Prevention of 
Crime in N. Y. City, see Tammany, 317. 

Lewis, J., customs inspector, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Lewis, J. A., applicant for postmastership at Mar¬ 
tinsville, Ind., .399. 

Lewis, M. M., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Lena. Ill., 126. 

Liberty, Tex., Journalist Chambers, postmaster at, 
155. 

Lieber, Albert, ward politician, see Indianapolis, 
195. 

Liggett, C. F., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Chlvlngton, Col., 141. 

Lincoln, Abraham, Pres., on evils of spoils system, 
25; gives Cameron secretaryship of war in re¬ 
turn for political aid ; dismisses him, 34, 64; and 
civ. service reform, 76; see Welsh, 161; opposed 
to removals to make place for friends (1846), 
211; promises of to the soldiers, 220.274; endan¬ 
gers of the spoils system, 56, 329, 367. 

Lincoln, G., postmaster at Cedar Rapids, la., po¬ 
litical worker, 370. 

Lincoln Independent Republican committee of 
Pennsylvania condemns Quay and Delamater. 
156,161. 

Lincoln, Neb., Gere, editor, appointed postmaster 
at, 108 ; Gere, postmaster of, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Lincoln, R. T., 15; and anti-Quay republicans, see 
Welsh, 161; not a candidate in 1892, 340; U. S- 
minister to England, political worker, 382, 389! 

Lind, congressman, on house committee on civ 
service, 86. 

Lindemuth, representative in Indiana legislature 
opposes spoils methods, 407. ’ 

Lindley, pension examiner in Indiana, at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 380. 

Lindsey, T., political worker for Harrison, 299. 

Lindsley, J. G., ex-congressman, political worker 
for Platt,265. 

Lingenfelter, H., see Baltimore investigation. 326 
.327,328. p , , 

Linevllle, Iowa, Editor Austin appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142. 

Linton (Ind.) Call condemns opposition to Magee 
bill, see also Magee, 209. 

Llppincott, Judge, trying fraudulent election offi¬ 
cers, see also Hudson Co., N. Y., 200. 

Lipscomb, P., son of journalist, postmaster at St. 
George, W. 'Va., 155. 

List of eligibles, see Eligibles, 48. 

Litchman, C. H., political worker, rewarded, 39; 
treasury agent, a political worker, 179. 

Lititz, Pa., post-office at, see Brosius, 72. 

Little Bat, Indian chief, and rising at Pine Ridge 
S. Dak., 218. 

Little Wound, Indian chief, and Indian rising at 
Pine Ridge, S. Dak., 218. 

Littlejohn, G. W., journalist, postmaster at Grayson, 
Ky., 149. 

Llano, Tex., Journalist Galson, postmaster at, 156. 

Loane, see Baltimore investigation, 278. 

Lock, R. D., postmaster, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Lockport, N. Y.. twenty federal offices in Niagara 
Co. filled with republicans, 30; Mayor Oliver 
of, spoilsman, and N.Y. civil service commis¬ 
sion, 34; rival candidates for postmaster of; 
Ward, editor, and Politician Merritt, supported 
by Senator Hiscock, 216; federal offices of con¬ 
trolled by Hiscock, 259. 

Lockwood, E. M., postmaster at Burlington, Kan., 
removed through Influence of Congressman, 
Kelly, 188. 








INDEX. 


XXI 


Loda, Ill., Editor Weaver appointed postmaster at 
141 


1 * 11 . 

Lodge, H.C., congressman, spoilsman, 30;obtains 
office for political worker, 3!i; evils of pa tronage 
system, un-American, speech at Lov/ell, July 4‘ 
1879, 39; evil of patronage; heading to Civil 
Service Chronicle, Aug., 1889, 41; letter of to. 
Civ. Service Record on civ. service reform, 09; 
controls patronage of Charleston navy yard, 09; 
and Boston custom house, 71; bill of regulating 
appointments of fourth-class postmasters, 115; 
votes aid to civil service commission, 119; bill 
of to regulate appointment of fourth-class post¬ 
masters, 120; and spoils in navy yard at 
Charleston, 153; supports civil service law, 122, 
168,109; urges extension of civil service reform, 
192; upholds civil service commission; exposes 
Grosvenor, 203 , 204; bill of for selection of 
fourth-class postmasters on basis of merit, 238 ; 
bill of providing for non-partisan appointment 
of fourth-class postmasters, commended, 321; 
on civil-service reform under Harrison and 
Cleveland, 370. 

Logan, Senator, spoilsman,413. 

Logan, O., Journalist Pursell postmaster at, 149, 
301. 

Logan, R, W., Harrison delegate from N. Carolina, 
334. 

Logansport, Ind., D. W.Tomlinson recommended 
as postmaster of, 88; Postmaster Tomlinson of 
a political worker, 153,158, 260, 377; federal of 
fleers work for Harrison at, 316. 

Logansport, Ind., Journal favors civ. service re 
form, 83; Journal bought by supporters of Har 
rison, including Postmaster Tomlinson, 260. 
Logansport (Ind.) Pharos, condemns opposition to 
Magee bill, see also Magee, 209. 

Loman, G. W., journalist, postmaster at Chase 
Kan., 148. , 

Long, deputy postmaster of Vevay, Ind., political 
worker, 379. 

Long, member national republican committee, and 
political assessments, 382, 383. 

Loesch, John, political worker, see Karr, 160. 

Long, G. I., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Manson, Iowa, 142, 

Long, J. D., ex-gov.Mass., signs petition for larger 
appropriation for civil serv. com.. 102. 

Long, W., councilman of Indianapolis, low politi 
cian, 206. 

Long Island City. N. Y., Postmaster McKenna of, 
removed for political reasons, 45; removal of 
McKenna, postmaster of, Richensteen appoint 
ed 54; Postmaster Richenstlen of, 100; Post 
master McKenna of, removed on secret charges 

Loomis, F.M., address of Central Labor Union, of 
Buffalo, N. Y., controversy with Buffalo Even¬ 
ing News on civil service reform, 44; weaken¬ 
ing influence of office holding, 75. 

Lorenz, P.O. employe at Indianapolis, see Indian¬ 
apolis investigation, 411. 

T.orimer, "Billy,” recommends O Donnell, o9. 
Louisburg, Kan., Journalist Cadwallader postmas¬ 
ter at, 149. 

Tniiisiana, see IVarmouth, patronage of, conflict 
over, see Kellogg, 71; patronage of given to 
Warmouth, collector at New Orleans,241; fed¬ 
eral patronage in used for re-nomination of 
Harrison, 304; political activity of federal offi 
cers in, 345, 346.348, :157, .383, 384; political as 
Rcssments in, 383. 

Tonisville Commercial (repub.), civ. service re 
form benefleial to party discipline, 65. 
i onrie postmaster at Portland, Ind., removed, 46. 
Tnntham,C.M., deputy int. rev. coll., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Tove J candidate, views of on patronage; ottice^ 
brokerage, 23; defeated candidate and sale of 
Ses, see “Sale of Offices,” 32, 99 ^ 

T.nvp J W., employed in N. \. custom-house, a 
political worker, 108. 

Loveland, state senator of Indiana, opposes spoils 
r ovlng*"^JT , postmaster at Richmond, Va., re- 

moW for political reasons, 21. 

T.AW ex-gov.. Indorses Bush, political worker, 187. 
t^wE B. political worker, appointed postmaster 
^ at Westport, N. Y., through influence of Con- 

I»,fj“TollSo7'«"s».pe».lo« Bridge, N. Y 
^ through influence of Hiscock. 2.59; customs col 

lector at Suspension Bridge, N. Y., a political 

LowTw^G^’, offers prize for essay on civil service 
Lowl,^®ep^Sntatiye in Indiana legislature, and 
r ® p ®o'emffio’ye.^Political worker, .302, 878. 

Lowe, C..P.O.emp oye.p m, 

^°Tf Cambridge and Lston Civil Service Reform 
As 80 c“aUonl, 77; civil service reformer, 204; 

wJl?”Mrs**^J^'^s\^fn%hargeof examination for 
Lowell, Mrs. J. a.. yorkfsee Maloney. 

1 Courier (rep ) declares Sen. Blair, 
good republic... for 

Lowery, Judge, levies 280. 

LowreyfB^ J?, journalist, postmaster at Howard 
City, Mich., contributions from 

^""^(Dhii Employes in ?Vashington departments, 280 


lOwry, postmaster at Portland, Ind., removed; 
Marsh appointed through influence of Browne, 
88 . 

Lowry, congressman, nomination of, .37. 

Lowry, federal employe, and printing office, 231. 

Lozier, chaplain, political worker, 389. 

Lucas, Rev., thinks civ. service reform a hum¬ 
bug, 73. 

lUcas, postmaster of Lawrenceburg, Ind., political 
worker, 379. 

Lucas, bank president, gambles in stocks with 
Wanamaker, 246. 

lUdell, Kan., Journalist Chase postmaster at, 149. 

mke, A. M., postmaster at Jeffersonville, Ind., re¬ 
moved by Cleveland, reappointed by Harrison, 
88 . 

jiish, R., ward politician, see New York City. 

jush, R. M., at Minneapolis convention, 314. 

.usk, V. S., political worker for Harrison in North 
Carolina, 334. 

Lu Verne, la.. Postmaster Harrison of a political 
worker, 260. 

Lyford, book commissioner for New Hampshire, 
143. 

Lyman, civil service commissioner and special ex¬ 
aminer at Indianapolis, 18, 49, 81, 372; and R. 
R. mail service, 21 ; unfit, allows postmaster at 
Milwaukee to ignore civil service law, 103; and 
political assessments, 358; and duties of em¬ 
ployes, 384; report of, 397. 

Lynch, A. F., see Quay, 106. 

Lynch, J. R., negro, 4th auditor of treasury, politi¬ 
cal worker, 47; 4th auditor of the treasury, dele¬ 
gate for Harrison at Minneapolis, 337, 339,343, 
344, 345. 

Lynch, T. M., worker for Flower, appointed port 
warden, career of, 319. 

Lyon, C. D., editor, appointed postmaster at Milo, 
Iowa, 142. 

Lyon, G. W., appointed by Pres. Harrison surveyor 
of Port of Brooklyn, N.Y., 55; supports Platt 
faction, 183; and Fassett, collector at, 258; in 
New York convention, 334; works for Harrison 
at Minneapolis, 343. 

Lyon,W., U.S. attorney, active politician, works 
for Delamater, 143; supporter of Quay, suspected 
by Harrison, 299. 

Lyon, W. C., editor, formerly postmaster at Newark, 
O., 301. 

MacCourt, P. C., removed by Sec’y Windom, ap¬ 
peals to Pres. Harrison, 54. 

MacDowald, W. A., recommended by Congressman 
Cheadle, 84. 

MacDuffy, Rev. M. V., on civil service reform, 83. 

MacGovern, supports Gillette for postmaster at 
Hartford, Conn., 84. 

Mac Govern,"Pat,” and Hartford,Conn., postmaster¬ 
ship, 99. 

MacGowan, Capt. A. B., denies charges against In¬ 
dian Agent McChesney, 130. 

MacGregor, Capt. J. G., so-called resignation of, 216. 

MacKnight, Rev. Dr.W. J., on civil service reform, 
83. 

MacNeal, street car company and ordinance, brib¬ 
ery used against, 207. 

MaeVeagh, W., ex-attorney general, on Mahone in 
Virginia, 31; to examine management of civil 
service, 77; on committee of National League to 
investigate congressional patronage, 115; on 
committee of National League to investigate 
patent office, 139,-140,141; on committee of Na¬ 
tional League, investigating presidential post- 
offices, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166; on committee of 
National League, reporting on removals on se¬ 
cret charges, 175, 176,177; on committee of Na¬ 
tional League, reports on political changes in 
presidential post-offices, 188; and Quay. 245; 
and defalcation made by Quay, 2-52; on official 
committee of National League investigating 
census service, 291, 295. 

Macauley, "Dan” treasury employe, political work¬ 
er, 362. 

.Macauley, T., Lord, 228. . , 

Macdonough, A. R.. on committee investigating N. 
Y. City civil service, 319, 320. 

Mace, J. A., editor, appointed postmaster at Say- 
brook. Ill., 141. , ,, ^ 

Mack, chairman Iowa State Republican Commit¬ 
tee, makes political assessments, 240. 

Macy, Ind., Editor Enyart appointed postmaster at, 

Madfs^on! James, on abuse of civiFservice by Presi¬ 
dents, 17, 29; letter to, from Thomas Jefferson 
opposing spoils system, 45,46; advises iifipeach- 
nient of any President making removals for po¬ 
litical reasons, 62; on removals. 115. 

Madison, Ind., spoils system in town government 
of, 331. 

Madison Co., Ind., appointments from, a. 

Madison, Wis., census of 1890 not well conducted 
In, postmaster of controls census patronage 
20 '^ 

Macee! C. L., opposed to Quay. 280 . 853; allies with 
Quav, 299; and Quay reconciled. 361. 363. 

Magee, J. H., and Civil Service Chronicle, 110, 
3.56. 

Maeee R , favors civ. service reform, 80; state sew 
ato’r of Indiana,.bill of, for non-partisan control 
of state charitable institutions, opposition to 
and support of, defeated, 201, 202, 208, 209, 210, 
214,215; speech of. at dinner to Roosevelt, 227, 
229 ’; and spoils methods, 408. 

Magone, collector and office-seekers, 08 ; political 
assessments under, 97; secures appointment of 


Ducy as head of custom civ. service at New 
York, 150; removals under, 183. 

Mahan, John, editor, appointed postmaster at Mus 
C&tiu 6 « 46. 

Mahany, R. B., U. S. minister to Ecuador, political 
worker, 382. 

Mahin, F., editor, appointed postmaster at Clinton, 
Iowa, 126. 

Mahone, W., a spoilsman, 5,35,43,45,171, 211,227, 289, 
350, 369, 376, 387, 413; patronage of Virginia given 
to by Pres. Harrison, 27, 28, 41, 52, 56, 67, 72, 94, 
111, 138,172, 173,174; history of political career of, 
31; secures appointment of J. G. Watts as U. S. 
marshal, 38; assisted by republican national 
committee, gets control of Virginia patronage, 
38; exercised patronage of Virginia with disas¬ 
trous effects, 67, 68 ; and election in Virginia, 
70; and postmastership at Lawreucevllle, Va., 
74; methods of condemned, 75; and civil serv¬ 
ice commission, 86 ; controls Petersburg, Va.,- 
1882,87, 111, 138; blackmailing system of, 228; con¬ 
spires with Gorman, 234; Pres. Harrison responsi¬ 
ble I or failure to prosecute, 237; reconciliation of 
with ex-Congressman Langston, in interest of 
Harrison, 240, 241; course of prosecution against 
agents of, for political assessments, 281, 282; 
“blaekmailers,” trial and acquittal of, 305, 376; 
deserts Harrison, 332; “blackmailers,” and 
Judge Bradley, 857, 358; and election of Harri¬ 
son, 370.413. 

Mahoney, Tom, ward politician of Indianapolis, 
see Parnell Hall. 

Mahopac Falls, N. Y., Postmaster Agar of, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 162. 

Mail service, railway, see railway mail service. 

Maine, senators fight over spoils, 22; democrats 
holding four-year offices being retained, 73 ; 
patronage of, see Boutelle, 157; political activ¬ 
ity of federal office-holders in, 364. 

Mair, G. B., journalist, postmaster at Calloway, 
Neb., 149. 

Malden, Mass., civil service reform association of, 
239. 

Malone speech of Pres. Harrison, 357. 

Malone, M., worker for ex-Judge Rooney and Con¬ 
gressman Wallace, given office, 143. 

Maloney, J., employe in Indianapolis insane hos¬ 
pital, low character, 314. 

Mamer, collector, political worker in Illinois, 335. 

Manchester, Mass., Postmaster Johnson of, re¬ 
moved after four years’ service; second com¬ 
mission unexpIred, 187. 

Manchester, N. H., Postmaster Piper of, active pol¬ 
itician, 143. 

Manchester (N. H.), Republican, civil service re¬ 
form a humbug, 50. 

Manchester, Vt., Journalist Simonds postmaster 
at, 155. 

Manderson, Senator, and applicants from Nebras¬ 
ka, 6 ; and Lincoln, Neb., post-office, 72; secures 
appointment of Gere, editor, as postmaster at 
Lincoln, Neb., 108. 

Maneely, W., fraudulent voter, see Martin. 

Manker, Coroner, at Indianapolis, 314, 315. 

Manley, J., appointed postmaster at Augusta. Me., 
38; chairman state republican committee, 150; 
congressional candidate opposing Burleigh, and 
non-delivery of papers advocating Burleigh, 
364; resigns, 371; confers with Quay, 390. 

Mann,-, census supervisor in West Virginia, 

spoilsman, 293. 

Mann, G. H., appointed through Quay, removed, 
160. 

Mannfleld, Fla., Editor Miles appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Mannheim, Pa., politician appointed postmaster 
at. 12, 72. 

Manning, ward politician, see Buffalo. N. Y. 

Manning, D., Sec’y, promotes MacGregor, removed 
by Sec’y Foster, 216; and Maynard, 310; recom¬ 
mends appointment of Graves as chief of bu¬ 
reau of printing and engraving, 368. 

Mansfield, postmaster at Gloucester, Mass., 362. 

Manson, Iowa, Journalist Long, appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Manson, M. D.. efficient internal revenue collector 
in Indiana, removed for political reasons, 59; 
letter of President Harrison to, 77; removal of, 
94. 

Maplewood, N. H., Craft, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Marche, T., acting supt. free delivery service, let¬ 
ter to, from Murray postmaster at Johnston, N. 
Y., 72. 

Marcy, Governor, and the civil service, 12.5; 
"spoils,” 270, 274. 

Mare Island, Cal., navy yard at, patronage of given 
to ward bosses, 226. 

Marietta, O., Editor Alderman postmaster of, 301. 

Marietta, Pa., post office at, see Brosius, 72. 

Marine, S. A., editor, appointed pension agent, 126. 

Marine, W. M., collector at Baltimore, see Balti¬ 
more investigation. .326, 327, 328; political work¬ 
er, 354, 389. 

Marion, Ind , Gant, postmaster of, at Minneapolis 
convention. 380. 

Marion, Ind., Chronicle [repub.], favors civil serv¬ 
ice reform. 83. 

Marlon, Ohio. Independent, son of editor of gets 
federal office, 301. 

Marion Club [repub.], of Indianapolis,862. 

Marion Co., Ind., local politics and career of cor¬ 
rupt politicians in, see Indianapolis; office- 
seekers In rewarded, 88 ; 50 applicants for jani- 









xxii 


INDEX. 


torship of court-house of, 185; medical society 
condemns appointment of Dr. Elbert as pension 
examiner vice Stone removed, 192; medical so¬ 
ciety of endorses Magee bill for non partisan 
control of state charitable institutions, see Ma¬ 
gee, 201, 210. 

Markey, T., councilman of Indianapolis, low 
politician, methods of, 53, 19-5, 19(), 200, 310; sup¬ 
ports Fire Chief Webster, 208. 

Marlatt, W. P., P. O. employe, see Indianapolis in¬ 
vestigation, 411. 

Marriott, J. H., see Baltimore investigation,278. 

Marsh, P. O. employe, of New Albany, lud., at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Marsh, bank president, and stock fraudulently is¬ 
sued to Wanamaker, 240. 

Marsh, C. T., postmaster at Oregon, Ill., removed 
after four years’ service, second commission 
unexpired, 187. 

• Marsh, E. J., editor, appointed postmaster at Port¬ 
land, Ind., 46, 88, 126; political worker, 377, ;180. 

Marsh, W. C., postmaster at Aurelia, la., a political 
worker, 260. 

Marshall, T., government contractor, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Martin, editor, postmaster at Port Clinton, O., 301. 

Martin, Congressman, favors selection of postmas¬ 
ters by vote, 399; bill of to limit term of federal 
employes to four years, 404; patronage of, 411, 
419, 420. 

INIartin, C.,political worker against Chase, 353. 

Martin, D., low politician. Sen. Quay obtains ap¬ 
pointment or,'as collector internal revenue, 30, 
351; agt. of Sen. Quay, resolutions, 49; confers 
with Quay, 183; aids Quay to ruin ballot reform 
bill in Pa. legislature, 228 , 229; political free¬ 
booter, 232, 233 , 239, 364, 370, 388; resigns inter¬ 
nal revenue collectorship at Philadelphia, 241; 
political worker for Quay, 280, 299, 300, 361, 374; 
member for Pennsylvania of republican na¬ 
tional committee, 347. 

Martin, D. W., postmaster at Oakford, Ind., suc¬ 
ceeded by Cronsore, latter removed, Martin re¬ 
appointed, 96. 

Martin, H., post-office employe in Baltimore inves¬ 
tigation, 268, 277, 295, 296. 

Martin, J., politician, see Tammany, 318, 319. 

Martinsville, Ind., Dryden postmaster of, political 
worker, 380; J. A. Lewis and J. Duncan appli¬ 
cants for postmastership of, 399. 

Marvin, U. S. commissioner, testifies to worth of 
Bario, removed P. O. inspector, 298. 

Maryland, see also Platforms, Conventions; Sena¬ 
tor Quay in, 28; civ. service in under Cleveland, 
15, 63; federation of republican clubs in 3d dis¬ 
trict of, and reform pledges of republican plat¬ 
form, 63 ; effort to loosen Sen. Gorman’s hold on, 
meets with some success, 70; statistics of elec¬ 
tion of ’89 in, 70; ballot reform in, see Gorman,87; 
patronage of, given to Gorman, 93, 111, 236, 237; 
Roosevelt before civil service reform associa¬ 
tion of, 132; republican clubs and Clarkson, 
154; republicn factions in, 189; boss-ridden, 
219; state and federal patronage of controlled 
by Gorman under Cleveland, by republican 
machine under Harrison, 254; 1890cen8us well 
conducted in part of, 292; under Cleveland given 
over to spoils, 282; spoil given to Higgins in, 
314; Bonaparte on political corruption in, 317, 
324; political activity of, federal officers in,335, 
337, 347, 348, .363, 370; political assessments lev¬ 
ied on federal office-holders from, 391. 

Maryland, civil service reform association of, let¬ 
ter to by G. W^ Curtis, 103; resolutions of con¬ 
demning congressional patronage, 136; request¬ 
ed to investigate political activity of federal of¬ 
ficers, 219. 

Mason, ex-mayor of Vineland, N. J., refutes charges 
against Brewerly, removed postmaster at Vine 
land, 39. 

Mason, Congressman, and Chicago post-office, 22. 

Mason, A. B., on committee investigating N. Y. 
City civil service, 319, 320. 

Mason, G. H.. P. O. employe in N. Y. convention, 
335. 

Mason, J. W., commissioner of Internal revenue, 
and the offices, 21; active politician, 159,180. 

Maspeth, L. I., postmaster at, removed to make 
room for politician, see Mooney, 39. 

Mass, J., federal employe, inN. Y. convention, .335. 

Massachusetts, civil service commission of, see 
Civil service commission of; see also Platforms, 
Conventions; civ. service law of, see Civ. 
service law; merit system in, 45, <52; civil serv¬ 
ice reform in, under Cleveland, 63; congress¬ 
men of, and congressional patronage, 93; peti¬ 
tion circulated in for larger appropriation for 
civil service commission, 9.3; legislature of 
favors civil service reform in navy yards, 93, 
274; result of elections of 1890, to strengthen 
civil service reform cause, 173; civil service re¬ 
form in use in state and city offices in, 212; 
young men’s republican club of recognize 
civil service reform as leading issue, 219; re¬ 
form club of H. Welsh speaks before,on Indian 
service removals, 219; examination papers 
used in state census service of. 219, 220; reform 
club of gives dinner to Corse. 251; methods used 
by state of, in collecting statistics, 291; 1890 
census well conducted in, 292; labor service 
system recommended by Congressman An¬ 
drew 306; labor service' in, 321; political 
activity of federal office-holders in, 334, 362; 
congressmen of request retention of Corse post¬ 
master at Boston, 867. 


Massachusetts Civ. Service Reform Ass’n and Pres. 
Harrison, 92; starts petition for larger appropri 
ation for civil serv. commission, 102; condemns 
removal of Corse, postmaster at Boston, see also 
Civil Service Record, 213; resolutions of, 1892, 
898. 

Massey, G. V., federal officer, delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention, 348. 

Mastin, J., editor, appointed postmaster at Shan¬ 
non, Ill., 141. 

Mathers, deputy U. S. marshal in Indiana, political 
worker, 3.S0. 

Mathews, delegate from Dakota dictates appoint¬ 
ments in his territory, 30. 

Mathias, J., P. 0. employe, see Indianapolis inves¬ 
tigation, 411. 

Matson, congressman, secures appointment of post¬ 
master at Plainfield, Ind., 30; in document No. 
2 of Ind. Civil Service Reform Association, 30; 
henchmen work for renomination, 37. 

Matthews, A., praises Civil Service Chronicle, 

110 . 

Matthews, Asa, appointed first comptrollership of 
the treasury, 21: and printing office, 284; politi¬ 
cal worker in Illinois, 335. 

Matthews, A. L., P. O; employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Matthews, C., governor-elect of Indiana, and office- 
seekers, 405. 

Matthews, “Johnny,” gambler, friend of police 
justice Divver, 184. 

Matthews, S. S., deputy postmaster at Winona, 
Miss., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344, 
348. 

Matthews, T. B., deputy coll.int. rev., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Matthews, W. H., negro, deputy collector internal 
revenue in Georgia, delegate to Minneapolis 
convention, 348. 

Matthews, W. S., sec’y state republican executive 
committee, Ohio, and political assessments, 280. 

Maxwell land grant, and Elkins, 290, 369. 

May, Colonel, politician, and post-office at Rochelle, 
Ill., 109. 

May, Pa., postmaster at, see Brosius, 72. 

May, Rev. J., spoils system, immoral, 85; on Quay- 
ism, 162. 

Mayers, J. T., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 334. 

Mayfield, A. W., journalist, postmaster at Elmwood, 
Neb., 149. 

Maynard, J. H., deputy att’y-gen. of New York, and 
Dutchess Co., N. Y., election frauds, 306; cor¬ 
rupt worker for Hill, appointed appellate judge 
by Flower; career of, 309, 310. 

Mayo, Commodore, commandant navy yard at Nor¬ 
folk, Va., 147. 

Mayors, of cities of N. Y., and N. Y. civil service 
commission, 84. 

Mayse, W., authorized to receive political subscrip¬ 
tions. 179. 

Maywood, J., journalist, postmaster at Bad Axe, 
Mich., 149. 

McAdam, Judge, buysnomination of Tammany, 184. 

McAlister, R , political worker and briber, 134. 

McAlpin, E. A., appointed postmaster at Siug Singi 
N. York, in reward of party services, 108; at 
convention republican league, 259; president of 
N. Y. state league of republican clubs, at Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 344. 

McCain, G. W., efficient officer, removed from po¬ 
lice service at Indianapolis, see Equally di¬ 
vided politically, 220, 228. 

McCarren, P. H., ward politician of Brooklyn, N. 
Y.,263; East River Bridge, bill of scandal of, 317. 

McCarthy, J. J., customs inspector, active politi¬ 
cian, 179. 

McCarthy, J.. nominee of Congressman Banks, su¬ 
perseded by nominee of Congressman Lodge, 39. 

McCauley, J. C., postmaster at Searcy. Ark., re¬ 
moved after four years’ service, second com¬ 
mission unexpired, Rogers appointed, 187. 

McCaull, P. H., int. rev. coll., delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention, 348. 

McChesney, Dr. C. E., Indian agent, false charges 
against, 130, 218. 

McClellan, Congressman, patronage of, 422. 

McClellan, L., office-seeker in Indiana Senate, 407 

McClelland, councilman of Indianapolis, spoils¬ 
man and low politician, 207. 

McClung, D. W., relative of Pres. Harrison, ap¬ 
pointed collector internal revenue First Ohio 
district, 30. 

McClure, C. M., appointment of, charges of favorit¬ 
ism regarding, refuted by Roosevelt, 266, 267. 

McClure, D., recommends “Paddy” Divver for 
police justice, 184. 

McComas, Congressman, upholds civil service 
law, 125; upholds civil service commission, 203. 

McComas, member of national republican com¬ 
mittee, 363. 

McConnelsville (O.) Herald, editor of appointed to 
federal office, 301. 

McCoy, S. M.,political worker for Cuney, 159. 

McCreery. C., given office by Gold, township trus¬ 
tee at Indianapolis, 256. 

McCulloch. Rev. O. C.,an independent, 313. 

McDaniel, Lock, political worker for Cuney, 159. 

McDonald, fish commissioner, gets civil service 
law extended to fish commission, 332. 

McDonald, Ex-Senator, on permanence of political 
issues, 214; his place in politics, 244. 

McDonald, Kan., Journalist Sedgwick postmaster 
at, 149. 


McDonald, R. T., opposed to Harrison,303; appeals 
to Clarkson against political activity of federal 
officers, 317, 362; on political activity of federal 
office-holders in Indiana, .379. 

McDonough, C., ward politician, see Buffalo, N. Y., 
196, 

McDougal, C., ex-U. S. marshal in N. Y., calls on 
Fassett, collector at N. Y. City, 258. 

McDowell, congressional candidate bribes, 151. 

McElvaine, W. J., editor, given office by Governor 
Foraker, 301. 

McFarlane, low politician, 54, 94, 96, 112. 

McFarland, H., appointed ingovernment printing- 
office, totally unfit, 34; henchman, 35; disrep¬ 
utable politician, 138, 173, 181; federal office¬ 
holder, a political worker, 269, 378, 382. 

McGill, J., worker at Minneapolis convention, 343. 

McGinness, W. T., postmaster at Mlnden, Neb., 
forced to resign, 166. 

McGoogle, Dr., appointed postmaster at Areola, 
Ind., vice Rockhill, removed through influence 
of Postmaster Higgins, 362. 

McGrew, federal employe and printing office, 234. 

McGroarty, J.. port warden of Brooklyn, N. Y., 
career of, 319. 

McGroarty, N., anti-Harrison man “placated,” 347. 

McHenry, Ill., Editor Van Slyke appointed post¬ 
master at,141. 

McHugh, State Senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 408. 

McIntosh, J., letter to regarding Kingsley, la., post- 
office, see Gasper, 165. 

McIntyre, representative in Indiana legislature, 
opposes spoils methods, 407. 

McKain, A. A., part of address at annual meeting 
of Indiana Civil S. Ref. Assoc., 1889, 8. 

McKane, J. Y., corrupt politician working for Con¬ 
gressman Wallace, 132; low politician In New 
York, given patronage, 3.52. 

McKay, N., presents “San Domingo” cutlass to 
Fassett, collector at N. Y. City, “to be used in 
beheading democrats.” 2.58. 

McKean, appointed postmaster at Pittsburg, Pa., 
through influence of Quay, 90; spoilsman, 133. 

McKee, F., relative of Pres. Harrison appointed 
deputy collector of customs at Port Town¬ 
send, 30. 

McKelvey, state senator of Indiana, spoilsman, 
407, 408. 

McKenna, Congressman J., secures removal of Mrs. 
McKinley, 90. 

McKenna, J. A., postmaster at Long Island City, 
removed despite protests and petitions, 45,54; 
removed on secret charges, 175. 

McKenzie, A.,controls patronage in N. Dakota, 216. 

McKinley, Mrs. L. W.,postmistress at Winters, Cal., 
removed through influence of McKenna, 90. 

McKinley, W., political workers of rewarded, 52; 
platform of, 105; favors civil service commis¬ 
sion, 119; thanked by Indiana Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association, 120; supports civil service 
law, 124, 168, 169; fulfillment of party pledges, 
168; holds competitive examinations for candi¬ 
dates for West Point, 254, 262; candidate for 
governor of Ohio, 280; political assessments 
for, 287; vote for in Minneapolis convention, 
340, 343; tariff bill of in Louisiana, 345. 

McKnight bill, passage of, see Tammany, 317. 

McLain, J. R., journalist, postmaster at Della 
Plain, Tex., 155. 

McLaughlin, applicant for postmastership at 
Franklin, Ind., 88. 

McLaughlin, inspector in police department, ex¬ 
aminer of police at Brooklyn, N. Y., 222. 

McLaughlin, political boss, 132, 318,319,414; patron¬ 
age of in N. Y. state offices, 215; boss of 
Brooklyn, N. Y., and Croker, 245; and Hill, 309, 
356; Hill gives Brooklyn bridge patronage to, 
350; deals with Nathan, 352. 

McLean, A., given office by Tammany; career of. 
355. 

McLean, D., politician, delegate to republican na¬ 
tional convention, appointed general appraiser 
port of N. Y., 30; becomes political worker, 108. 

McMaekin, J., custom-house employe in N. Y. 
City, a political worker, 279. 

“McMains” charges against Elkins, 291. 

McManes, J., 80; and appointment of Martin, dis¬ 
reputable politician, as collector of internal 
revenue in Penn., 232, 233, 241, 351, 374. 

McMillan, Senator, controls federal office-holders 
in Michigan, 335; supporter of Blaine, 344, 346, 

McMillin, Congressman, and civil service law, 124. 

McMullen, representative in Indiana legislature, 
and spoils methods in, 407. 

McMullin. C. A., journalist, postmaster at Bene-_ 
diet, Kan., 148. 

McNagney, Congressman, patronage of, 410, 422. 

McNew, J., clerk in Indiana Senate, 408. 

McNulta, Gen’l, attributes republican demoraliza¬ 
tion in Illinois to Harrison’s use of patronage, 
240. 

McNutt, A., P. O. employe, see Indianapolis inves¬ 
tigation, 411. 

MePheeters, postmaster of Bloomington, Ind., at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

McPherson, controls patronage in Penn., 84. 

McQuinn, B., postmaster in Benton Co., la., a po¬ 
litical worker. 260. 

McVickar, Rev. W. M., favors clerical recognition 
of civ. service reform, 40. 

MeWhInney, T. A., political worker in New York, 
264. 

Meacham, F. L., journalist, appointed postmaster 
at Plainview, Miss., 126. 











INDEX. 


XXlll 


Meade, C. W., police justice, in New York conven¬ 
tion, 334. 

Melrose, W. H., journalist, postmaster at Eskridge, 
Kan., 149. 

Memphis, Tenn., census ol 1890 well conducted in, 
292; Patterson, postmaster of, celebrates re¬ 
nomination of Harrison, 347. 

Merit system, in fighting trim, 25; and individual 
manhood, 256. 

Merrill, Col., endorsed by Harrison’s regiment, 89. 

Merritt, H. F., consul, removed for political rea¬ 
sons, 371. 

Merritt, J. A., politician, supported by Senator, 
Hiscock for postmaster at Lockport, N. Y., 216. 

Merser, G. A., on committee of National League to 
investigate political assessments, 338. 

Meschert, removed on suspicion of being disloyal 
to Harrison, 300. 

Messerne, C. F., officer in Indian service, asked for 
political contribution, 385. 

Metcalf, Dr., of Indiana State Board of Health, in¬ 
efficient, 315,316. 

Metcalfe, appraiser at port of St. Louis, active poli¬ 
tician, 143. 

Metzger, R., republican politician, on political ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders in Indianapolis, 
378. 

Meyer, H. A., Nathan’s candidate for mayor of 
Brooklyn, 287. 

Michener, L.T..chairman Indiana Republican State 
Committee, uses 4th class post-offices to make 
republican machine, 67; obtains removal of 
Suflall, postmaster at Freedom, Ind., and ap¬ 
pointment of Watts, 112; and Harrison, 121, 354; 
attorney-general of Indiana, controls federal 
patronage of, 144,173, 377, 378; politician, part¬ 
ner of Dudley, 189; worker for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 337, .340, 342, 345. 

Michigan, Editor J. B. Stone appointed collector 
internal revenue Ist district of, 30; distribution 
of spoils in, by the democrats, results in defeat, 
45; political activity of federal office-holders 
in, 335,348, 390. 

MIddlefield, O., Journalist Murdock postmaster 
at, 149. 

Middleton, A. R., negro, Harrison delegate from 
N. Carolina, 334. 

Middleton, D. C., chairman Jefferson Co., N. Y., 
republican committee levies political assess¬ 
ments, 392. 

Middleton, J. H., postmaster at West Hoboken, N. 
J., removed and no reasons given, Klumpp ap¬ 
pointed, 176. 

Miles, Genl., on Indian abuses, 182; and Indian 
rising at Pine Ridge, S. Dak., 218. 

Miles, G. E., editor,appointed postmaster at Mann- 


fleld, Fla..l41. 

Mllholland, J.E., chief inspector of immigration 
at New A’ork, assists at dinner to Clarkson, 245; 
at convention of Republican League, 259; polit¬ 
ical worker, 265; federal employe, removed for 
political activity, 3.32, 334. 

Miller, A. J.,office-holder, a political worker, 162. 

Miller, J., postmaster at Utica, N.Y., a political 
worker, 266. 

Miller, S.D., son of att’y-general, gets office,242; 
works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 339, 346. 

Miller, T., congressional candidate, offers bribes, 

Miller,T. A., postmaster at Tuscaloosa, Ala., dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Miller T C., physician, son of and competitive 
examinations for West Point, see Warwick. 

Miller. Warner, heads political faction, 75, 264,353 
8.54; faction of, opposed to Platt, 259, 260; and 
Harrison, 337, 347; “placation” of.360, 361. 

Miller, Attorney-Gen., appointees mimt be good 
men and republicans, 25, 35 j and office-seekers, 
37- rules of for appointment, 44; innuendo of 
De’lphi Journal, 85; goes home to vote, 180; an 
independent in 1872; denounces Pres. Gram, 
191, 192; and fraudulent cartage bids at N. y. 
custom house, 216; and G. B. Raum, Jr.,228; and 
printing office, 234; and Raum mvestigation, 
238; solicits campaign funds for Harrison, 240: 
Invites criticism, 310; and Baltimore investiga 
tion, 329 , 380; estimates Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 345, 338; and Baltimore investigation. 372; 
and removal of Justice Sandford. 374; and po¬ 
litical assessments, 387, 391, 392; political 


worker, 291, 389. 

Mlllersburg, O., editor appointed postmaster at, 30L 
Milligan, Congressman, civ. service reform, state 

of civ. service in his district, 73. 

Millikan. F. M., sec’y Indiana republican state 
committee, asks for Political comributions, 3W^ 
Milliken. W. F., supported by T. Reed (Me.) for 
customs collector, 22; and J. Manley in Maine, 


Milliken, N. J., journalist, postmaster at Canandai- 
Milm'lowa,Editor Lyon appointed postmaster at, 


142. 

Afilwaukee Wls., investigation of post-office at by 
^ ^civ. service commission adverse to postmaster, 
^6 53* Paul» postmaster of resigns, 44, 4i, 103, 

104; Editor Watrous 7 ^ Si' 

mer incumbent removed without cause, 71, civ^ 
service reform in post-office at, 95, Postmas^r 
Paul of removes Shidy, witness 
101,103; per cent, of removals in classified a 
unclassified service in Posf-offlce at, 185 
Milwaukee Sentinel [repub.], condemns ciarx 
son, 66 . 


Minden, Neb., Postmaster McGlnness of, forced to 
resign, 166, 

Ministers, see also church. 

Minister as citizen, from address of Congressman 
G. F. Williams, 239. 

Ministers, duty of to advocate civ. service re¬ 
form, 74. 

Ministers, foreign, baste in removing, by Pres. 
Harrison, 27. 

Minneapolis, republican national convention at 
1892; federal office-holders of delegates to, 837, 
348, 357; nominations of, indorsed by Indiana 
federal office-holders at Washington, :i54: In¬ 
diana delegates to refuse to pay assessments, 
363; political activity of federal office-holders 
at, 349, 350, 364, 365, 370, 375, 379, 382; .selection of 
delegates for, and political activity in, of 
federal office-holders in Indiana, 378, 380. 

Minneapolis Journal (rep.), denounces Harrison’s 
surrender to spoils system, 177. 

Minnesota, senators of, at war over spoils, 30; po¬ 
litical activity of federal office-holders in, 344, 
348. 

Mississippi, appointees to Indian service from, 
under Cleveland, 219; political activity of 
federal officers in, 348,339 , 315, 344, 343, 337, 382. 

Missouri, removals in, 22; patronage in, 24, 52; 
spoils system in, 51; control of patronage in 
Sixth district of, 55; republicans of, think 
Clarkson too slow, 62; sale of offices in, 93; 
patronage in, given to Filley, 226; political 
activity of federal office-holders in, 336, 345, 346; 
Kerens for Harrison, chosen committeeman of 
delegation of, to Minneapolis convention; 346; 
political assessment of federal employes from, 
383. 

Missouri, civil service reform association of, an¬ 
nual meeting of, 38; and removals in postal 
service, 92; report to on thecivil service, 136; an¬ 
nual meeting, 1891; proceedings. 239. 

Mitchell, Sen., controls patronage in Oregon, 32; 
and Indians, 42. 

Mitchell, U. S. district att’y, and proposed prose¬ 
cution of Van Cott and Hendricks, 287. 

Mitchell, B., federal employe, political worker in 
Indiana, 8,53. 

Mitchell, C. H., appointed patent commissioner by 
Harrison; efficient, 140. 

Mitchell, Ind., sale of postmastership at, see Wood 
and Hobbs, 89. 

Mitchell, W. A., P. O. employe, see Baltimore in¬ 
vestigation, 268, 277, 296. 

Mizell, J. R., U. S. marshal, letter to C. C. Kirk, 90. 

Mizer, J. R., chairman Florida republican state 
committee, appointed U. S. marshal. 30. 

Moberly, Missouri, postmaster at, uses census enu¬ 
merators as political workers, 1,31. 


Mobile, Ala., Baker, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Mohler, O. E., editor, “no Harrison republicans 
outside of office-holding ring,” 240; on support¬ 
ers of Harrison, 378. 

Moline, Kan., Journalist Armstrong postmaster atj 
149. 

Molloy, J. R., sec’y Ohio republican state commit¬ 
tee, levies political assessments, 390, 391. 

Moloney, Mrs. L., beggar, placed at top of eligible 
list for police matron of N. Y. City through po¬ 
litical influence, 404. 

Monaghan, W., chairman Ohio republican state 
committee, given office, 46. 

Monahan, State Senator J., uses Influence for 
O’Donnell, 59. 

Moncrief, Prof., 11; letter on ministers and civil 
service reform, 15. 

Money. J , chairman Tennessee delegation to re¬ 
publican national convention, 1888, appointed 
U. S. minister, 39. 

Monroe, la.. Editor Vandermast appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Monson. Mass., reappointment of democrat Har¬ 
rington postmaster at, recommended by Con¬ 
gressman Rockwell, 188. 

Montague, removal of for political reasons, 5b. 

Montana, political activity of federal office-holders 
in, 837, 339, 342, 344. 

Montgomery, patent commissioner, spoilsman, 139, 
140. 

Montgomery, postmaster at Bristol, Conn., recom¬ 
mended for re-appointment by Congressman 

Simonds. 91. on 

Montgomery, Editor, see Greenfield, Ind., 89. 

Montgomery, J. A., appointed superintendent in 
Chicago post-office, 14. 

Moody, Sen., and Indian service,opposes Morgan, 
Indian commissioner, 79; appoints his son to 
office, 84; and Yankton Indian agency, 86 ; con¬ 
trols patronage in Indian service, 218. 

Montoux, representative in Indiana legislature, 

opposes spoils methods in, 407. 

Moony , Miss., postmaster at Maspeth, L. I., removed 
on secret charges, place given to politician. 39. 

Moore, congressman and postmaster at Nashua, 
N H.,73; favors civil service reform, lOO, 123. 

Moore, E.H., gambler, discharged by Postmaster 
Jones, re-appointed by Postmaster Wallace, at 
SanapX, 18.25; defended by Wallace and 

Asst. Postmaster Thompson, 28. 

Moore A , deputy U. S. marshal aud political 
worker irindiana, 302, 358, 370, 375, 379. 

Moore, G. E., editor, appointed postmaster at Nara 
Springs, Iowa, 142. 


Moores, M., low political worker, controls patron¬ 
age under Census Supervisor Conger, 129,182; 
controls patronage in census service at Indian¬ 
apolis, gets lists of voters of enumerators. 293; 
believes in political assessments, 332; chairman 
Republican County Committee at Indianapolis, 
attempts to bully Postmaster Thompson, 366. 

“Morals of Civil Service Reform,” by L. M. Black¬ 
ford, 136. 

Morey, Congressman, spoilsman, 15, 24. 

Morgan, state senator of Indiana, and spoils meth¬ 
ods, 4U8. 

Morgan, editor and office-seeker, 16. 

Morgan, Indian commissioner, appoints his wife 
his private sec’y, 38; rules governing tennre of 
office in Indian service, 44; opposition to ap¬ 
pointment of, 78; removals under in Indian 
service, 78, 79; and congressional barons, 86 ; 
not responsible for home rule policy, 98; up¬ 
holds Harrison’s Indian policy, 202; does not 
control appointments, 217. 

Morgan, G. H., democrat, re-appointed postmaster 
at Newton, Mass., 224. 

Morgan, W. B., customs collector at Buffalo, N. Y., 
a political worker, 265, 390. 

Morley, John, on slavery, 116. 

Morning Star (Baptist), advocates civil service re¬ 
form, 30. 


Morris, alderman, political worker for Harrison in 
New York, 332. 

Morris, Ill., Journalist Fletcher appointed posmas- 
ter at, political worker, 126, 186. 

Morris, S. V., brother-in-law of Pres. Harrison, 
given office, 108. 

Morrison, D., federal employe,workerfor Harrison, 
334. 


Morse, E. A., opposed to retention of Spear, post¬ 
master at Springfield, Mass., 86 ; and Postmas- 
masier Harlow at Whitman, 100; secures appoint¬ 
ment of Adams, postmaster at Quincy, Mass., 
100 ; gets office for his nephew, 108; correspond¬ 
ence of regarding postmastership of Plymouth, 
Mass., 187. 

Morse, F. C., appointed postmaster at Colfax, Wash., 
vice La Rue, forced to resign, 165. 

Morse, fcl. E., customs collector at Cape Vincent, 
N. Y., a political worker, see also Jefferson Co., 
N.Y., 266. 

Morse, S. B., negro federal employe, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Morss, S. E., of Indianapolis Sentinel, favors civil 
service reform, 227, 229; supporter of Cleveland 
at Chicago convention, 350. 

Morton, C. B., politician in Brooklyn, opposing 
Nathan, 304, 371. 

Morton, Vice-President, opposes appointment of 
Ritchie, postmaster at Saratoga, N. Y., 126; 
surety for Fassett, collector at N. Y. City, 258; 
Fassett favors at suggestion of PI att, 259; con fers 
with Quay, 390. 

Morton, O. T.,on popular objections to civil service 
reform, 85, 111, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119; attends 
dinner at Indianapolis to Roosevelt, speech of, 
227, 229, 231; and levying of political assess¬ 
ments by Allen, 322,331; on civil service reform, 
396. , 

Mosley, R. A., politician, appointed collector inter¬ 
nal revenue in Alabama, 56; faction of, works 
for Harrison at Minneapolis, 346; in Alabama, 
leader of Harrison faction, 348. 

Mott, J. J.. opposes Eaves, 150,159. 

Moulton, W. P., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Stuart, Iowa, 142. 

Mt. Morris, Ill., F. Tice appointed postmaster at, 
see Hitt, 109. 

Mt. Vernon, Ind., editor, son of Governor Hovey, 
appointed postmaster at, 37, 71; postmaster at 
and Sen. Harrison, 96; Hovey, postmaster of, at 
Minneapolis convention, 380. 

Mountain City, Tenn., Journalist Keyes postmaster 
at, 155. 

Mounts, H., deputy collector at_ Indianapolis, 
worker against Chase, 3,52, 353, 379, 

Mowry, L. D., removed by Von Landberg, Hiscock 
appointed, 150. 

Moyer, H. B., journalist, postmaster at Freeburgh, 
Pa 149. 

Mudd,’s. E., congressman, political worker, 144; 
candidate, and political assessments, 162; ex¬ 
congressman, demands removal of Roosevelt, 


226, 254. 

Mugwump, defense of In Indianapolis News, 351; 

abuse of by republicans, 405 
Mullen. Neb., Journalist Hammell postmaster at. 


Mulligan, Mrs., appointed pension agent at Chi¬ 
cago, to succeed Miss Sweet, 107. 

Mulligan letters, 365. _ 

Mulliken, postmaster at Easton, Ind., in state con- 
tion,335, . . . ~ 

Multnomah Co., Oregon, census service in, ineffi¬ 
cient, 295. . J. 

Muncle, Ind.. political situation in, discontent of 
office-seekers, 88 ; applicants for postmastership 
of. Ellis apiiointed, 217; Ellis postmaster of, 
political worker for Harrison, 316, 362,370, 378. 

Mundelle, R. B., discharged by Jones, postmaster 
at Indianapolis, reinstated by Wallace, post- 
masier at Indianaviolis, 27, 34. 

MunroGvillc^ Iud.» St 6 Wfl.i‘t appointGcl postniEstor 
of, resigns; G. Webster appointed; applicant 

Davis given another position, 88 . 

Munson. A., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 384. 












XXIV 


INDEX. 


Murchison letter, 92. 

Murdock, C. B., jouruiiHst, postmaster at Middle- 
field, O., 119. 

Murphyaborough, Ill., Postmaster Andrews of 
forced to resign, 165. 

Murphy E., mayor of Troy, Tammany chief, patron¬ 
age of in N. Y. state offices, 215; corrupt poli¬ 
tician, 307, 396; given office, 319; and prison 
patronage, ;130; opposes mugwumps, .351; and 
nomination of Cleveland, 355; Cleveland re¬ 
fuses, while candidate, to pledge spoils to, 395; 
Cleveland opposes election of, as senator from 
New York, 101; obtains suspension of civil 
service rules in New York for benefit of worker 
Sternberg, 111; Sheehan worker for, 415. 

Murphy, M. C., appointed warden port by Gov. 
Flower, 319. 

Murphy, “Tom,” controls N. Y. custom-house, 191. 

Murray, postmaster at Johnston, N. Y., and post- 
office department at Washington, 72. 

Murray, C. F., requests patronage, 311, 312. 

Murray, C. H., spoils circular of, for places in cen¬ 
sus service, 157; spoilsman, appointed census 
supervisor in N. Y. City, 294; supporter of Platt, 
removed, 333, 334; political worker in New' 
York convention, 331; federal employe, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Murray, J., supt. custom-hou.se at N. Y’^. City, re¬ 
signs, 258. 

Muscatine, John Mahon, editor, appointed post¬ 
master at, 46. 

Mustard, J., appointed postmaster at Glen Hall, 
Ind., vice Stepp, “resigned,” 149. 

Muzzy, L. R., journalist, postmaster at Pulaski, N. 
Y., 155. 

Nampa, Idaho, Journalist Bacon, postmaster at, 155. 

Nashua, New Hamp., postmaster at, 73. 

Nashville, Ind., Allison, supported by Congress¬ 
man Cooper for postmaster of, 398. 

Nathan, E., political worker, appointed collector 
internal revenue of Brooklyn (N. Y.) district, 
by Harrison, 55, 170,191; wins fight in 23d ward 
in New York City. 121; political worker, for 
Congressman Wallace, 142, 150; backed by 
Platt, 143; uses power of office to intimidate 
voters, 178; trades votes for Wallace, 179, 
180; engages in factional fights in Brook¬ 
lyn and New York, 197, 198; corrupt politi¬ 
cal worker and boss, 264, 265, 304 , 311, 332, 
350, 371; political worker for Fassett, 287; in 
N. Y. convention, 3Sf5; worker for Platt,against 
against Willis, worker for Harrison, 336; boss 
in Kings Co., N. Y.; deals with McLaughlin, 
352; controls machine in Kings Co., N. Y.; 
worker for Platt, 354, 3-55; uses office as political 
weapon, 374. 

National Baptist, on political status, as regards 
civil service reform, 257. 

National League of Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tions; speeches before annual meeting of, 
1890, see Civil Service Record; annual meeting 
at Philadelphia, Oct. 1-2, 51; annual meeting, 
1889; resolutions of on agitating civil service 
reform, 66; appoints committee to investigate 
management of federal civil service, 77; in¬ 
vestigating committee of, 85; special Committee 
of, investigates patent office, 1-39, 140, 141; an¬ 
nual meeting of 1890; proceedings; report on 
presidential post-offices, 145,153, 161,172; inves¬ 
tigation by special committee of, upon removals 
upon secret charges, 175, 176 177; report of 
special committee of, on political changes in 
presidential post-offices, 186, 187, 188; resolu¬ 
tions of requesting Maryland Civ. Serv. Ret. 
Assoc, to investigate political activity of fed¬ 
eral officers. 219; circular of executive commit¬ 
tee of on status of civil service reform, 282; 
resolutions of at annual meeting, 1891, 286,287; 
investigation of census service by special com¬ 
mittee of. 291, 295; address before annual meet¬ 
ing on “Party and Patronage,” by Curtis; also 
resolutions of, 321, 326, 329; committees ap¬ 
pointed to investigate political assessmentsand 
political interference of federal office-holders, 
3:58; report to committee of, investigatiUK po¬ 
litical activity of federal employes in Indiana, 
375,381. 

Nattinger, E. A., journalist, appointed rostmaster 
at Ottawa, Ill., 126. 

Navarre, 0., Journalist Carl, postmaster at, 149. 

Navy yard, at Brooklyn, N. Y., see Brooklyn.45; at 
Brooklyn, N. Y., clean sweep in, see Dady. 106; 
at Kittery, Me., spoils system at under Sec’y 
Tracy, 145; at Brooklyn, N. Y., examinations 
under Sec’y Tracy at, statement of examining 
board, 236; at Norfolk, Va., and Portsmouth,N. 
H., merit system introduced in by Tracy. 251; 
introduction of merit system into requested by 
Mass, legislature, see Tracy, 274, 276; applica¬ 
tion merit system to commended. 286; Sec’y 
Tracv institutes merit system in, 221, 222, 2-30, 
298, 306. 321, .326; at Brooklyn, N. Y., employes in 
ordered to work for renomination of Harrison, 
:336; at Brooklyn, Page, chief of ordnance dept., 
removed, 355; Sec’y Tracy introduces Boston 
labor system in, 331, 857, 376. 

Neal. U, S. attorney, active politician. 143. 

Nebeker. U. S. treasurer, spoilsman, tries to get of¬ 
fice for his son, 2.53, 254; political worker, 370, 
882 

Nebo, ill.. Editor Lansdon appointed postmaster at, 
141. 

Nebraska, office-seekers in, 6; political activity of 


federal officers in, 348,370; political assessments 
in Indian service in, 384, 385. 

Neely, C. F. W., editor, applicant for postmaster¬ 
ship of Muucie, Ind.. 217, 

Neff, J. I., recommended by Illinois senators and 
congressmen for assistant treasurer, 110. 

Negroes, desire “representation,” 243, 244. 

Nelson, I. D. G., condemns democrats for defeating 
Magee bill for non-partisan control of Indiana 
state charitable institutions, 215. 

Neodesha, Kan., Postmaster Lee of, removed after 
four years’ service, second commission unex¬ 
pired, 187. 

Neoga, Ill., Editor Hancock appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Nepotism, see alsoThomasJeflersou on,Cleveland. 

Nepotism, under Harrison, 21,30, 263, 282, ;f69. 

Nettleton, acting secretary of treasury, and so- 
called resignation of Maegregor, 216. 

New. J. C., Editor, distributor of patronage in In¬ 
diana, 7,85; appointed consul-general to Lon¬ 
don, 14; and Harrison, 121; works forre-nomi- 
nation of Harrison, :j34, 887, 340, 342, 344, 345, 357, 
377, 379. 

New Albany, Ind., postmaster Godfrey at, spoils¬ 
man, 45, 393; works for Michener, 144; political 
worker for Harrison, 316; at Minneapolis con¬ 
vention. 377, 378,380; Marsh, P. O. employe at, 
political worker, 380. 

New Albany Evening Tribune (rgp.) and Civil 
Service Chronicle, 13; advocates civil service 
reform, 83. 

New Bedford, Mass., carpenter, postmaster at, re¬ 
moved on secret charges without investigation, 
29, 175, 176. 

New Carlisle, Ind., Editor Fountain appointed 
postmaster at, 126, 377. 

New Castle, Ind., W. F. Shelley, dentist, appointed 
postmaster at, 132. 

New Castle, Ind., Courier (rep.), advocates civil 
service reform, 76. 

New Hampshire, administration organ denounces 
civil service reform, 62; patronage of given to 
Chandler, 340; political activity of federal oifi 
cers in, 348, 371. 

New Haven, Conn., Sperry, postmaster at, favors 
civil service reform, 91; removal of English, 
postmaster at, 96; per cent, of removals in classi¬ 
fied and unclassified service in post-office at, 
185; Sperry, postmaster of. testifies to worth of 
Bario, P.O. inspector removed. 298 ; civil service 
reform association of and post-office at, 96. 

New Holland, O., Journalist Lewis postmaster at, 
149. 

New Holland, Pa., postmaster at removed through 
influence Brosius, 72. 

New Jersey, political activity of federal office hold¬ 
ers in, :347. 

New Mexico, vote of for Harrison at Minneapolis, 
.347. 

New Milford, Pa., Journalist Vail, postmaster at, 
149. 

New Orleans collector at, Ex-Gov. Warmouth ap¬ 
pointed, 44; Collector Warmouth of, obtains ap¬ 
pointment of Weber as postmaster at Donald¬ 
son, La., 241; customs district of. classified 1883, 
276; and state politics, 283; relative of Harrison 
appointed naval officer at, 369; Eaton, postmas¬ 
ter of, pays political assessments. 383. 

New Richland, Kan., Journalist Bronson appoint¬ 
ed postmaster at, 126. 

New Sharon, Iowa. Editor Vail apoiuted postmas¬ 
ter at, 142, 

New York City, see Pearson, postmaster at, and Van 
Cott, postmaster at,places of federal offices in, at 
disposalof “The” Allen,see post-oflice at, 12, 45; 
given over to spoilsmen, 28; custom-house at, 
civil serv. com. investigates, 29; post-office at, 
saving by merit system in, .35; Fire Chief Shay, 
retired on pension, 36; custom-house at, civ, 
service commission investigates, 36; Russell 
Harrison secures appointment for friend as 
postal stampasst. at,38; reform club of, work of, 
against tariff, 42; sixth assembly district of, 
resolutions of against civ. service reform, 49. 

New York Custom-House at, removals in, 54; 
applications for y)Osition in custom-house 
at. 75; effect of patronage in twenty-first as¬ 
sembly district of, 75; custom-house employes 
at, aid politicians and go on committees, 108; 
fire service in, 120; attempt to purify politics 
in, 130; per cent, of removals in, classified and 
unclassified service in post-office at, 185; Wil. 
lis, naval officer at, a spoilsman, 191; custom¬ 
house at. controlled by “Tom” Murphy, C. A. 
Arthur. Leet, and Stocking, 191; account of fac¬ 
tional fights for control of party machine in, 
198,199,241,242; custom-house at, cartage frauds 
practiced at, 216; street-cleaning department 
should be under merit system. 220, 221; custom¬ 
house at, Roosevelt invites 21st district republi¬ 
can association of New York City to investigate 
custom-house service at, 236; removal of Burt, 
naval officer at, for political reasons, 63, 237; civ¬ 
il service commission, not very commendable, 
239; employes in custom-house of, appointed 
through influence of Platt; Collector Erhardt 
“resigns,” Fassett appointed. 2.55. 258. 259,260, 
261; Feudalism revived in, 263; Erhardt,collector 
of. and office-seekers recommended by Platt. 
264;Hendricks. political worker for Hisc’oekand 
Platt, succeeds Fassett as collector of, 264, 266, 
269; James, P. O. employe at, and others, federal 


employes, political workers, 265; customs dis¬ 
trict of, classified 1883, 276; customs house em¬ 
ployes in political workers for Fassett, 278; gov¬ 
ernment of, 284, 285; Tammany methods in, 291; 
census service in inefficient, 294 ; thefts of 
Hill in, 306, .307; “sugar frauds” in custom 
house at, see Ilillism, 310; state of politics in 
Brooklyn and, 350; Tammany makes political 
machine of health department of, 356; Bos¬ 
ton labor system used for street work at, 357; 
employes in sub-treasury at ordered to vote 
republican ticket, .390; civil service board of 
(Tammany) and fraudulent appointment of 
Mrs. Maloney, 404. 

New York Herald, on “Paddy” Divver, 184. 

New Y’ork Evening Post, attributes republican de¬ 
feat of 18.89, chiefly to spoils system, 76; on civil 
service law, 92; on progess in civil service meth¬ 
ods, 224; exposes corrupting influences of Tam¬ 
many, 289, 290. 

New York Press (rep.), declares republican party 
favors extension of civil service law, 65. 

New York Sun, for spoils, 93. 

New York Times, account of caucus in Buffalo, N. 
Y’., IfKJ; accounts of spoils fights In several 
states, 215, 216, 217; on Raum and Harrison, 238. 

New Y’ork Tribune, on Postmaster Pearson, 12; 
supports Mahone, 53; advocates civ. service re¬ 
form, 65; on “Paddy” Divver, 184; defends 
Platt against Erhardt, 255; silent regarding civil 
service pledges of Harrison in 1892,357; subsid¬ 
ized by Harrison, 369. 

New York World, charges of against Senator Quay, 
112; on “Paddy” Divver, 184. 

New Y'ork State, see civil service commission of, 
platform, convention; delegation from and its 
demands, 21; patronage of given to T. Platt by 
President Harrison, 27, 52, 56 , 68,173 , 245,258, 
259, 261, 282. 332, 368, 376; delegate to Republican 
National Convention appointed general ap¬ 
praiser at port of, 30; Niagara Co., removals in 
federal offices of, 30; congressional patronage 
in (see Quackenbush), 32; post-offices in (see 
Delano), 47; competitive system in, 52; republi¬ 
cans in think President Harrison not bound to 
keep reform pledges, 62; republican com¬ 
mittees of denounce civil service reform, 63; 
weakening influence of office-holding in, 75; 
clergymen of, oppose impure political methods, 
1-55; disregard of civil service law of, 161; state 
courts of, uphold N. Y'. civil service law, 161, 
200,281,286; elections of 1890 in, disastrous to 
civil service reform, 173; postmasters in, ap¬ 
pointed by Congressman Sherman, 180; quar¬ 
rels over patronage in legislature of, 215; eva¬ 
sion of civil service law in cities in, reform asso¬ 
ciations of New Y’ork and Brooklyn are to blame, 
219; R. P. Flower,candidate of Croker,Tammany 
“boss” for governor of, 245. 261; corruption in, 
281; political assessments in, 180,282, 286, 287,391, 
392; Hillism In, 309; legislature of stolen by 
Hill and Tammany, 306 . 313,314; political cor¬ 
ruption long-seated in, appointing council of, 
32-5; political activity of federal office-holders in, 
272. :i.32, :5:i4,335, 3;36, 3:17, 342, 348, a59, 360, 361,371, 
:i84, .385, .387, :i90, ;391; republican discord in, .351, 
352; nomination of Cleveland and democratic 
regular organizations in, :155; republican asso¬ 
ciation requests lists for assessment purposes, 
:163; Riley, chief examiner of civil service com¬ 
mission of, removed by Tammany, 414. 

N. Y. Civil Service Reform Association, annual elec¬ 
tion . 23; annual meeting 1891, report of executive 
committee on efficiency of N. Y’. state and vari¬ 
ous city civil service commissions, 239; corres¬ 
pondence with treasury and P. O. departments 
over political activity of Van Cott and Hen¬ 
dricks. 289; committee of, investigates civil 
service examination in N. Y. City service. 319, 
:f20; and prison appointments, 331. 

Newark, N. J., per cent, of removals in classified 
and unclassified service in post office at, 185. 

Newark, O.. Iches, editor, postmaster at, .301. 

Newaygo, Mich., Journalist Shaw postmaster at, 
149, 

Newberry, General, confirmed as postmaster at 
Chicago, 6. 

Newburgh, Ind., Cushman, postmaster of, political 
worker. 380. 

Newbnrg, N. Y.. Taggart, postmaster of, i>olitical 
worker for Platt, 260; census of 1890 well con¬ 
ducted in, 292; primaries at, run by workers for 
Hill, 309. 

Newcomb, J.. postmaster, a political worker, 1.59. 

Newell. la.. Editor Blair, postmaster at, apolitical 
worker. 

Newins, politician in Brooklyn, N. Y., opposing 
Nathan, .304. 

Newport, R. I., Fay appointed postmaster at, 1.50. 

Newton, C. E., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Kawanna, Ind., 126, 377. 

Newton, Mess., Democrat Morgan appointed post¬ 
master at, 224; civil service reform association 
of, address before, on influence of Clarkson 
and Wanamaker. by Rev. H. Lambert, 1.36,261. 

Newtonville, Mass., Turner indorsed for reappoint- 
men, 100. 

Niblack, Judge, votes against Pendleton act; ad¬ 
dress of on civil service reform, i:38, 139; ex¬ 
judge Indiana supreme court, favors civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 227, 229. 

Nicbols, trades votes in behalf of Congressman 
Wallace, 179. 


« 









I N T) E X . 


XXV 


Nicholls, E. T., commandant of navy yard at Kit- 
tery, Me., 147. 

•Nichols, J., treasury chief of division, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 334 , 348. 

Nicholls, J. A., quarantine commissioner, supports 
Congressman Wallace, 142; corrupt politician, 

dll. 

Nicholson, M., of Indianapolis News, favors civil 
service reform, 227, 229. 

Nlcoll, dist. attorney, and Rev. Dr. Parkhurst, 319. 

Niedringhaus, F.G., and Harrison, 14; aiding office- 
seekers, 15; and federal appointments in Mis¬ 
souri, 22, 

Niligh, Neb., Journalist Best postmaster at, 119. 

Nipher, Prof. F. E., supposed telegram to bv Secre¬ 
tary Rusk and reply, 244, 245, 253. 

Nithey, Mich., poll of voters asked of Daniels, post¬ 
master of, 383. 

Nixon, editor and collectorship of customs at Chi¬ 
cago, 47. 

Nixon, deputy controller of currency, political 
worker, 389. 

Noble, Rev. Dr., on parties and government, 82. 

Noble, Secretary, on putting census bureau under 
civil service law, 19; accedes to wishes of Sen¬ 
ator Mitchell regarding patronage of Oregon,32; 
and Indian agents Rosebud agency, Dakota, 48; 
refuses to state causes of removal of Vandever, 
181; spoilsman, 70, 191, 291; to blame for Harri¬ 
son’s Indian i>o!icy, 202; spoilsman and Indian 
service, 98, 221,220; on Raum scandals, 237; es 
tablishes rules for promotion in interior de¬ 
partment, 298: and federal patronage in St. 
Louis, 304; requests removal of Collector Wen- 
necker, of Missouri, 336; and political assess¬ 
ments in Indian service, 375. 

Noblesville, Ind., postmaster at appointed, 47; 
Cbeadle recommends Frybarger, afterwards 
Royer, for postmaster at, 89; Royer, postmaster 
of, political worker, 380. 

Nogales, Arizona, Journalist Chatham postmaster 
at, 155. 

Nolan, E., federal employe, political worker, ;i02,375. 

Nora Springs, Iowa, Editor Moore appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Norfolk Republican Club of Boston and Clarkson, 
119,131. 

Norkfolk, Va., Brady appointed collector at, 52; 
navy yard at, repairs in, for Mahone’s benefit, 
59; navy yard at, spoils system in, 147, 153; 
merit system introduced in navy yard at by 
Tracy, 251. 

Norris, C. O., P. O. employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

N. Carolina, patronage of given aw'ay by Harrison, 
150; negroes of demand spoils, 1.59; political 
situation and fights in, 159; secret charges in, 
312; political activity of federal office-holders in, 
3 : 54 . 862, 373; political assessments levied in 
by Eaves, 362. 

N. Dakota, patronage of, given to A. McKenzie,also 
to Ball, 216; political activity of federal officers 
in, 348. 

Northrop, editor Syracuse Courier, postmaster at, 
see Syracuse, 46. 

Norton, 0 . E., pres. Cambridge Civil Service Re¬ 
form Association, and Harrison, 204, 205. 

Norton, M., letter to from Davenport questioning 
right to vote, 387. 

Norwich, Conn., post-office at under Cleveland, re¬ 
moval of postmaster of by Harrison,29; census 
of 1890 not well conducted at, 293. 

Notson, J. T., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Farragut, Iowa. 142. 

Nowland, custom-house deputy at Indianapolis, 
political worker, 108. 

Nowlin, E., republican politician, census super¬ 
visor 2d Indiana district, 100. 

Noyes, L. M., editor, appointed postmaster at Ak¬ 
ron, Ind., 126, ;>77. 

Nugent, J. R., food contractor in barge office at New 
York, requests patronage, 311, 312; food con¬ 
tractor in barge office, in New York convention, 
334; at Minneapolis convention, :!44. 

<i’Brien, ,330, 331. 

O'Brien, E. C., federal employe, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 345, 348. 

O’Brien, II., mayor of Boston, and civ. service re¬ 
form, 82. 

O’Brien, J., corrupt politician, and Hill, 307. 

O'Brien, J. J., spoilsman and bribe taker, 170,171. 

O'Connell, police surgeon, and examiner at Brook¬ 
lyn, N. Y., 222. 

O'Connor, councilman of Indianapolis, supports 
Fire Chief Webster, 208. 

O’Day. D., supports Delamater on behalf of .Stand¬ 
ard Oil Company, 134. 

O’Donnell, groom of G. B. Raum, Jr., employed in 
pension office. 190. 

O’Donnell, J., jury-briber, given office through in¬ 
fluence of Senator Farwell and others, 59. 

O’Donohue, J. J., recommends “Paddy’' Divver for 
police justice, 184. 

O’Dwyer, Dr. J., resigns from N. Y. City Health 
Dept., because it becomes political machine, 

O’Mara. J., violates health laws, given office by 
board of health at Indianapolis, 316. 

O’Neill, ex-Congressman, and his political assess¬ 
ment, 150. 

O’Neill, C., naval officer on board to examine ap¬ 
plicants for positions in navy yard at Brooklyn, 
N. Y., 221. 

O’Koiirke. J., appointed foreman in Brooklyn nayy I 


yard, efficient, 142; appointed master boiler¬ 
maker In Brooklyn navy yard under Cleveland, 
removed under Harrison, gets back on exami¬ 
nation, 2:t6. 

Oakford, Ind., postmaster at, see Martin and Crous- 
sore, 96. 

Oberlin, Kan., Journalist Barin postmaster at, 149. 

Oberly, Indian commissioner, 9, 48, 86; and Sena¬ 
tor Ingalls,22; removed by President Harrison, 
27, 44; ex-commissioner opposes publicity of 
eligible lists, 53. 

Odell, postmaster at Beverly, Mass., a political 
worker, 162. 

Odell, B. B., Jr., political worker for Piatt, 260. 

Oeh, P. O. employe, see Baltimore investigati’on, 
295, 326, :!27. 

Oelrichs, S. Dak., Journalist .tones, postmaster at, 
155. 

“Offensive Partisanship,” removals for, see report 
special committee Nat. League, 188!t-90,188. 

Office, scramble for, 3.6. 

Office-brokerage, see Eubanks; also sale of offices, 
23. 

Office-holders, republican, leave Washington to 
vote, 162. 

Ogden, Ind., postmaster of, distributes campaign 
documents, :190. 

Ogdensburg, N. Y., Postmaster Baird removed. Ed¬ 
itor Smith appointed, 126; custom-house at,not 
classified, number of employes in, ‘277. 

Ohio, and spoils, 15; Darke Co. postmaster in, re¬ 
moved, 23; republicans of and Gov. Foraker, 
21; republicans of, think civ. service reform a 
humbug, 62; compalgu of 1889 in, run by Con¬ 
gressman Grosvenor, spoilsman, 68; status of 
merit system in, hopeful, 119; political assess¬ 
ments of federal employes from, 179; republi¬ 
can association of, and printing-office, 2.34; pat¬ 
ronage of given to Sherman, 240; defeat of Fora¬ 
ker for governor of,owing to use of patronage,240; 
political assessments In, 272, 280, 282, 287, 390, 
412; federal patronage used by Harrison in, for 
re-election of Sherman, '297, 300, 301, iJ02; politi¬ 
cal activity of federal office-holders in, 3:35, 336, 
346; vote of at Minneapolis divided between 
Blaine, Harrison and McKinley.340,343;patron- 
age of given to Sherman, 840; relative of Harri¬ 
son appointed collector of internal revenue in, 
:i69. 

Olathe, Kan., Journalist Perkins appointed post¬ 
master at, 126. 

Old Dominion Republican League, attempts to aid 
Mahone by political assessments, frustrated by | 
civil service commission, 70; political assess- | 
ments by, in Washington departments, 412. 

Oler, C. H., efficient railway mail clerk, 224. ■ 

Olin, Iowa, Editor Burke appointed postmaster at 
142. 

Oliver, mayor of Lockport, N. Y., and Sickles, N. 
Y". civil service commissioner, ;J4. 

Olney ville, R. I., postmistress of, removed for polit¬ 
ical reasons. 288. 

Olsen, ward politician of Indianapolis, supports j 
Fire-Chief Webster. 208. ; 

Omaha, Neb., Vandervoort, disreputable poli- ! 
tician. appointed mail superintendent at, 215, 
216; violations of law by postmaster of, 281. ! 

Omaha Republican (rep.), on curse of office-seek- j 
ing, 65. 

Oneonta, N. Y.. Postmaster Bundy of, removed on 
secret charges, 176. 

Onondaga Co.. N. Y., factional fights at, republican 
caucuses in, political activity of federal office¬ 
holders, ‘264, 265. 

Orcutt, F. E.. collector internal revenue, a political 
worker, 160, 162, 179. 

Oregon, “Sol” Hlrsch, the “'Tom Platt” of, ‘29; 
patronage of Sen. Mitchell in, 32. 

Oregon, Ill., Jewett appointed postmaster at, see 
Hitt, 109; Postmaster .Marsh of, removed after j 
four years’ service, second commission unex¬ 
pired, 187. 

Orlando, Fla., Delaney, postmaster at, removed 
on secret charges, I. Fletcher appointed, 17ii. 

Osage .Mission, Kan., Postmaster Brunt of, remov¬ 
ed, after four years service, second commis¬ 
sion unexpired, Park appointed. 187,188. 

Osborn, S.C., federal employe, worker for Allison, 
.334. I 

Osborne. United States Minister, in Brazil and Jew- | 
ett claims,‘290. 1 

Osborne, Judge, grants writ of mandamus against 
Nathan, for corrupt practices, 265. | 

Osborne, Congressman, obtains office for bis son, [ 

84 

Osborne, J. B., given office through influence of 
Congressman Osborne, 84. 

Oskaloosa, Kan., Journalist Roberts postmaster at, 
149. 

Osseo, Wis., Journalist Thomas, postmaster at, 

15 ”, 

Ostendorf, J. H., deputy collector, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, :!48. 

Oswego, N. Y., Editor Place, spoilsman, appointed 
postmaster at, 126; custom house at not cla^i- 
fld, number of employes in. 277; Clark, N. Y.- 
aesembly man introduces bill for municipal re- 
fsorm in, 415. 

Otis, K.L.. applicant for postmastership at Roch¬ 
elle, Ill, 109. ' , . n 

Otis, W. F., federal employe, congratulates Pres. 
Harrison, .347. 


Ottawa, Ill., Journalist Nottinger appointed pos- 
master at, 126. 

Ottawa, Kan., Journalist Kessler postmaster at, 149. 

Overin, G. D., federal employe, political worker for 
Harrison, 334. 

Overstreet, H. G., and political assessments, see 
Kentucky. 

Ovid, Mich., Postmaster Cowan of, forced to re¬ 
sign, 165. 

Owen, Congressman, and office-seekers, 14; spoils¬ 
man, 21, 30, 85,90; suggests postmasters, 55; op¬ 
poses appointment of Cravens, 84; recommends 
appointment of Tomlinson as postmaster at 
Logansport, Ind., 88; and Winamac, Ind., post¬ 
mastership, 88; secures appointment of ineffi¬ 
cient postmaster at Hammond, Ind., 90; and 
editor of Delphi Journal, 97; given patronage 
by Harrison, 240. 

Owen, W. D., superintendent Immigration, 39; 
political worker, 382, 390. 

Owlngs, W., low politician and murderer, gets office 
through Gorman, 237. 

Oxford Co., Pa., applicants for postmaster of, 55. 

Oxford, Ind., Editor Carr appointed postmaster at, 
126, 377. 

Pacific Unitarian Conference, resolution of, that 
ministers should officially advocate civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 65. 

Paddock, Sen., and Lincoln, Neb., post-office, 72; 
attempt of to withdraw railway mail service 
from civil service law, 92; secures appointment 
of Editor Gere as postmaster at Lincoln, Neb., 
108. 

Page, E. F., chief of ordnance dept, in Brooklvn 
navy yard, removed, :365. 

Painesville, O., editor of Telegraph appointed post¬ 
master at, 301. 

Palermo, Italy, editor appointed consul at, ‘240. 

Palmer, as presidential possibility, 235. 

Palmer, public printer and applications for office, 37. 

Palmer, F. W., and pardon of Petroff and Kemble, 
152. 

Palo Pinto, Mo., I’ostmaster Trollington buys in¬ 
fluence of Upton and gets office, 55. 

Paoli, Ind., editor appointed poMmaster at, 37. 

Paradis, J. F., journalist,postmasteral Hemingford, 
Neb., 149. 

Park, politician, appointed census enumerator 
through Congicssman Evans, ‘294. 

Park, E. B., appointed postmaster at Osage Mission, 
Kan., vice Blunt, removed after four years’ 
servhe, second commission unexpired, 187,188. 

Parker, Lieutenant, relative of Pres. Harrison, 
given office. 30. 

Parker, A. X., U. S. deputy atty., a political worker, 
279. 

Parker. J., politician, and post-office at Rochelle, 
Ill., 109. 

Parker. M. F., postmaster at Cullman, Ala., delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Parkhurst, Rev. C. H.,on purity in politics, 119; ex¬ 
poses immoralities of Tammany rule, 319. 

I’aikinson, councilman of Indianapolis, supports 
Fire Chief Webster, -208. 

Parks, W. IK. editor, appointed postmaster at Pet- 
ersburgh. Ill., 141. 

Parnell Hall, nominating caucus for city officers of 
IndianapoUs, acedunt of. 194, 195. 

Parr, Prof. S. .S., part of address of at annual meet¬ 
ing of Indiana Civil Service Kef. Ass’n, 1889, 8. 

Parsons, U. S. marshal, works for Harrison at Min¬ 
neapolis. ;U5. 

Parsons, G D., ex-mayor of Elmira. N. Y., dis¬ 
missed from r. S. Express Company for politi¬ 
cal reasons, 259. 

Parton .lames, on civil service reform, 18. 

Party, evils of strict adherence to, ‘236. 

Partyand patronage, address, see Curtis. 

“Party Boss,” political advice of. 194. 

Passage, representative in Indiana legislature, 
spoilsman, 407. 

Pate, postmaster of Boonville. Ind., political work¬ 
er, :;s0. 

Patent office, investigation of civil service in by 
committee of National League. i:'.9,140,141; ex¬ 
aminations and classified positions in, 141. 

Patrick, J. B.. journalist, postmaster at Clarion, 
Pa., 149. 

Patronages source of weakness, see Foulke, Brook¬ 
lyn Ferries, 65,68; party and, addresses, see 
Curtis; troubling republican party, 6; evils of, 
25, 80,41; evils of distribution of public. Sena¬ 
tor Harrison on,-16; Depew on, 75; Wilmington 
Morning News (rep.) on, 75; La Grange Stand¬ 
ard on,83; evils of, see Platt, Boston Transcript, 
Indianapolis News. St. Louis Globe-Democrat, 
Philadelphia North American, N. Y. Evening 
Post, Philadelphia American, 76; source of 
weakness to Cleveland and Harrison, 83; sys¬ 
tem denounced by republicans of Wayne Co., 
N.Y.,156: evil effectsof on schools of Baltimore, 
211; condemned in state charitable institutions 
as barbarous by Indianapolis Sentinel, 202; 
evils of, in England,270; system condemned, 
•271; system, in census service, bill of Garfield 
against,‘291; system not according to organic 
law, 305; abuse of bv Harrison, see National 
League, resolutions 1892, 3‘21; and the constitu¬ 
tion, 3‘23; use of by a president to secure a re- 
election impossible, see Indianapolis Journal, 
318. 

j Patronage, federal, see also patronage, congres- 














xxvi 


T N D F. X . 


slonal; see Towner; see Sewell; of patent 
• office, 139, 140; of treasury department used 
by Foster to turn Ohio from Blaine to Harrison, 
240; meager distribution of to negroes, 243,244; 
given to negro Langston, 340; used by Harrison 
to secure renomination, 298; of Indiana used 
by various people, 38, 84, 144,173, 297,816, 317, 
376; of Maine, navy yard at Kittery, Me., used 
for Gooch and Frost, 147; of Missouri, see also 
Filley, 52; New York, given to Platt, 27, 52, 56, 
68, 94, 121,142, 173,241, 255,259,263-266, 281, 282, 
288, 376, see also W. Barnes; see Blrkett, 55, 
Woodruff, 106, Lake and McKane, 132; of New 
York custom-house, disposal of, 216; of navy 
yard at Mare Island given to ward bosses, 
226; of N. Carolina, 47, 150; of Ohio used by 
Sec’y Foster, 91; of Pennsylvania, that of Col¬ 
lector Cooper in, see Cooper; of Pennsylvania, 
used by Harrison to secure renomination, 299, 
301; of Texas, given to Cuney, 173; Virginia, 
given to Mahone, 27, 31, 38, 41, 52, 56, 67, 68, 70, 
74, 94, 376. 

Patronage, state and local; in offices at Indian¬ 
apolis, see Markey; in fire service, 137; to be 
controlled by mayor, 190; municipal at Cin¬ 
cinnati controlled by Gov. Foraker, 71; quarrels 
over in legislature of New York, see Sheehan, 
De Freest, Webster, Murphy and McLaughlin, 
215; In New York state affairs, use of, 216; of 
Brooklyn, New York, bridge, quarrel over, see 
Croker, 245; in New York and Tammany, 318. 

Patronage, congressional, R. R. mail service open 
to, 27; see Cin. Commercial Gazette, 65; evil of, 
66; as practiced in U. S. Senate,72; see report of 
committee of National League on, see also Gar¬ 
field, 113, 114, 115, 188; is doomed, 120; con¬ 
demned by resolutions of Maryland Civil Ser¬ 
vice Reform Association, 136; see letter of Wan- 
amaker to Postmaster Marsh, 187; see Indian 
service, 36, 42, 192, 219; in postal service, 
193; in census service, see also Porter, 
234, 292; Allison, 334; Andrew, 405; Banks, 
31, 89; Bayne, 133, 135, 299; Belden, 46, 71, 
132; Bowden, 153; Bretz, 409-411, 419, 421, 422; 
Brookshire, 393, 405, 409-411, 413, 419; Broslus, 
72; in N. Carolina, Brower. 47; Brown, 240, 393, 
409-411, 419-422; advocated by Congressman 
Brown, 35,84,89, 118; Bynum, .392, 405, 409-411, 
418-422; Sen. D. Cameron, 72, 133, 162, 329; Can¬ 
dler, 99, 224; in Cannelton, Ind.,post-office, 26; 
Cannon, 30, 31, 34, 35. 39, 160, 179; Chandler, 100, 
148, 340; Cheadle, 47, 55, 71, 77, 84, 85, 88, 89, 129, 
149,240,377; Cheatham; in Chester Co., Pa.,55; 
Clarkson, 331; Cockrell, 234; Coggswell, 187, 
288; Coleman, 71; Conn, 409-411, 420, 422; Con¬ 
nell, 72, 108; Cooper, 112, 398-400, 405, 409-411,416. 
422; Sen. Cullom, 30,31,37,95,109,188; Dalzell, 30, 
87, 90, 112, 133, 299; Darlington, 54, 55; Sen. 
Davis, 84; Sen. Dawes, 71,104; De Haven, 187; 
Delano, 47; Du Bois, delegate from Idaho, 30; 
Dunnell,39; Eubanks, 99; Evans, 55, 294; of N. 
Carolina, see Ewart. 47, 159; Farwell, 81, 37, 60, - 
83,95,109; Flood, 54, 150, 259; condemned, see I 
Flower, 204; Fry, 242; Gest, 47; of W. Va., see 
Goff, 71: Gorman, 3,6,15,38,70,93,181, 234,235,237; 
Greenhalge, 100; Grosvenor, 204,205; Sen. Hale, 
242; Hammond,409, 411,416,417,422; Sen. Hamp¬ 
ton, 74; Hansbrough, 216; Harmer,241; Harrison 
and Massachusetts offices, 93 ; Hart wig, 99; 
Hathaway, 242; Sen. Hawley, 84,- 99; Sen. Hig¬ 
gins.-38, 334; Sen. Hiscock,46. 71,132,1.50,216,241, 
259,312; Hitt, 136. 143, 160; Sen. Hoar, 71, 104; 
Holman, 39, 393,399, 400,409, 411, 417,419, 421, 422; 
Hopkins, 109; Honk, 33, 54, 55, 84; Illinois 
congressman, 240 ; Ingalls, 22. 154 ; John¬ 
son, 419; Kean, 216; Kellogg, 71, Kelly, 188; 
Lafayette Courier, 83; Lafollette, 293; Lodge, 
30,89,41,69.71; Love, 99; Lowry. 89; Sen. Man- 
derson,72,108; Martin, 399, 400, 409, 411, 419,420; | 
in Massachusetts, 93; see Mathews.delegate from : 
Dakota, 30; Matson,80, 81; McClellan, 422; Mc¬ 
Kenna, McNagney. 409, 411,422; McPherson, 84; { 
Miller, T., Minnesota, senators of. 30; in Missou¬ 
ri, 51: Monaghan, 59; Moody, 84, 86. 218; Moore, j 
100; Morse. 86,100, 108, 187; Norfolk, Va., 251; i 
Osborne, 84; Owen, 14,21, 30, 55.84,85,88.90.98. i 
240; Sen. Paddock, 72, 108: Payson, 73, 18S; ; 
Perkins, :35; Pettigrew, 131, 218; Sen. Plumb, | 
65; Pope, 52; Posey. 46, 59; Postgate, 99; 
Quackenbush, :32, 54, 242; Quay, 6, 15. 17. 22, 27, 
28. 30, 38, 39. 47, 52, 56, 68. 72, 87, 90. 94, 95, 100, 104, 
111, 112, 118, 133, 135, 1.54, 160. 173, 216, 2.35, 241, 249, 
268, 270. 280, 282. 299-301, 329, 332..374, 376; Raines; 
Randall, 29.224; Ray. 99, 100, 118, 1.33; Reed, T. 
B., 91,150,153, 242; in Rhode Island, 150, Rock¬ 
well, 188; Roosevelt, 39, 191; Sanders. 160; San¬ 
ford, 126; Sawyer. 57; Scranton, 101; Shearman, 
54, 55; Sherman, 67, 149, 240, 249, 301, 340; Shive- 
ley,421; Simmonds,73; Smith. 38; Smith G. W.; 
Spooner, 30; Steele, 240; Stockbrldge, 84; Strou- 
Dle; Sweeney, 121; Taylor, 35, 75, 419, 421; 
Thompson. 55; Turner, 100; Turple, 405, 409- 
411, 413, 418-422; Upton, 55, 99; Van Schaick, 
44, 47, 55; Vandervoort, 215; Vest, 242, Voor- 
hees, 222, 235. 393, 405, 409-411, 413, 418-422; 
Walker; Wallace, 55, 72.132,142,143; Sen.Wash¬ 
burn, 84; Watrous,71: Waugh, 419; Wever, 249; 
Wood, l-W. 

Patterson, postmaster of Memphis, Tenn., celebrates 
nomination of Harrison, 347. 

Patterson, A. M., political worker for Miller, 259, 
260. 

Patterson, J. B., federal office-holder in Boone Co., 
Iowa, political worker, 260. 


Patterson, J. M., ward politician, see New York 
City; requests patronage, 311, 312; office-seeker, 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344 , 348; 
political w'orker for Harrison, 359,360. 

Patterson, W., appointed superintendent of Indpls 
post-office, unfit, 19,21, 27, 34; political worker 
for Harrison, 302, 337-343, 353, 370, 375, 379, 389. 

Pattlson, candidate for governor opposing Delama- 
ter in Pennsylvania, 135, 161; of Pensylvania, 
and Quay, 280. 

Pattlson, governor of Nebraska, and Vandervoort, 
disreputable politician, 216. 

Patton,president of Princeton College, and poli¬ 
tics, 896, 404. 

Patton, C. O., Harrison elector, and postmastership 
at Stanberry, Mo., 121. 

Paul, postmaster at Milwaukee, spoilsman, civil 
service commission reports adversely to, 36, 
104; and Wanamaker, 44; resigns, 47; spoils¬ 
man, removes Shidy who testifies against him, 
101,103. 

Paul, H. S., and appointment of McKean postmas¬ 
ter of Pittsburgh, 91. 

Paul, R. H., ballot stuffer, appointed U. S. marshal 
in Arizona, 874. 

Pawnee City, Neb., Journalist Hassler postmaster 
at, 149. 

Paxton, Ill., Editor Stevens appointed postmaster 
at, 126. 

Payn, L. F., 312; supporter of Blaine, opposed to 
Harrison, 347; worker for Platt, 360. 

Payson, Congressman, spoilsman, 22, 73; demands 
removal of Reno, postmaster of Pontiac, Ill., 
for “offensive partisanship,” 188; chairman of 
house during debate over civil service commis¬ 
sion, 204, 205. 

Peairs, H. B., employe in Indian service, asked for 
political contributions, 385. 

Pearson, H. G., postmaster at New York and the 
post-office, 12.17, 20, 32, 38. 48, 168,169, memorial 
on, 23; removed by Pres. Harrison for political 
reasons, 27, 30,52, 63. 64. 68, 94, 173, 237, 282, 367, 
376; the civil service in post-oflice of, under, -42. 

Peddie, A., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
384. 

Peele, S. J., worker for Harrifon, appointed judge 
of court of claims, 378, 379. 

Peetrey, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons, 55. 

Pendleton, G. H.. civ. service law due to him and 
D. B. Eaton, 79. 82,125. 

Pendleton, Ind., Editor Caddy appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 126, 377. 

Pendleton act (civil service law), 75,118, 119,128, 
271, 276; provides penalties for public employes 
soliciting political contributions, 279. 

Pennsylvania, senators of, and spoils, 15, 313, 314, 
.329; patronage of, given by Pres. Harrison to 
Senator Quay, 27, 28, 38, 52,56, 68, 72, 87, 90, 94, 95, 
111, 112, 135, 173, 376; Senator Quay displaces 
Sen. Cameron as spoils distributer, 30; Sen. 
Cameron controlled patronage in, 34; distrac¬ 
tions in, resulting from distribution of spoils, 
influence of Senators Quay and Cameron, 47; 
republican ass’n of, see Stratton, 49; republicans 
of denounce civ. service reform as a sham, 62; 
status of affairs before election, IS.s; condemna¬ 
tion of Quay and Delamater by Lincoln repub¬ 
lican committeeof Pennsylvauia,156;republicau 
convention 1890 commends course of Quay, 156; 
political situation in, revolt against Quay, see, 
also. Quay, 161, 162; defeat of Quay in elections 
of 1890, 173; ballot reform bill in legislature of 
ruined byQuay.aided by Martin, federal officer, 
228, 229; “Quaylsm” in, 245, 246, 249, 250, 251, 252; 
address to the citizens of, against “Quayism,” 
249, 251, 252; federal officers evilogize Quay, 260; 
Quay wins in, 281; political assessments in, 282, 
286; patronagetogivento Quay; “degradation of 
pollticsin,” see Welsh,282; removals from office 
in of supporters of Quay, 299, 300.301; delegation 
to national convention controlled by Quay; 
Bardsley frauds, 310; political corruption in, 
;323, 324; patronage of given to Quay, deserts 
Harrison, 332: vote of at Minneapolis, 340; D. 
Martin of, made member of republican national 
committee for, 847; political activity of federal 
office-holders in, 361, .363,390; Cooper, collector at 
Philadelnhia,to raise campaign fundsin,363; citi¬ 
zens of protest against appointment of Martin, 
374; re-election of Quay in, 404. 

Pennsylvania Civil Service Reform Association of, 
introduces reform bill in legislature, faulty 
provisions of, 204; correspondence of regarding 
political assessments. 289; of annual meeting, 
1891, address of H. Welsh before on Indian serv¬ 
ice, 238, 239. 

Pennsylvania R. R. Co. employs merit system, 285. 

Pension Commissioner, Tanner, 27. .38, 51; Browne 
and clerks in the service, 71; Raum and Harri¬ 
son, 237. 

Pension boards, removed by Tanner, 27. 

Pension office at Indianapolis, attempt to collect 
money of employes in contrary to law, 36; ex¬ 
amining boards, 30. 

Pension Examiner Stone removed, negro Dr. El¬ 
bert appointed, 192. 

Pension bureau,removals in, 55; bill providing for 
appointment of new examiners for, 107; remov¬ 
als in under Commissioner Tanner. 54. 

Peoria, Ill., census of 1890 well conducted in, 292. 

Perclval, J. A., federal employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

j Perkins, congressman, opposed to civil service re¬ 


form, 35, 49,122; letter of to Brunt, postmaster, 
regarding removal, 188. 

Perkins, E. E., negro, postmaster at Edwards, 
Miss., delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Perkins, H. A., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Olathe, Kan., 126. 

Peru. Ind., Stevens, postmaster of, political worker, 
379. 

Petersburgh, Ill., Editor Parks appointed post¬ 
master at, 141. 

Petersburgh, Neb., Journalist Cross postmaster at, 
149. 

Petersburg, Virginia, political history of, 87. 

Peterson, O. B., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Story City, Iowa, 142. 

Petroff, E.. worker for Quay, 106; convicted of bri¬ 
bery, shielded by Quay, 151,152. 

Pettigrew. Senator, and Indian service, 130; Sena¬ 
tor Pettigrew opposes Indian Agent McChes- 
ney, 131; controls patronage in Indian service, 
218; and Harrison, 3.37; opposed to Harrison, 
342. 

Petty, W.. Blaine supporter, bribed by Harrison 
with office, 362. 

Pew, collector at Gloucester, Mass., and subordi¬ 
nates, political workers, 362. 

Philadelphia, Pa., post-office at, 14,16; conflict over 
spoils in, .30; Collector Cooper of and Quay, 39; 
and spoilsman, 85; and office-seekers, 37; de¬ 
fends Quay. 249, 260; Works for Quay, 280; pat¬ 
ronage In, 47; removals in post office at, 53; civ. 
service reform in post-office at, 95; recordership 
of and Quay, 106; investigation of post-office at, 
174; per cent, of removals in classified and un¬ 
classified service in post office at. 185; citizens’ 
municipal league, appointment of Martin, dis¬ 
reputable politician, as internal revenue col¬ 
lector, low politicians of. 2.32; Thompson, con¬ 
troller at, makes removals for political reasons, 
2.39; young republican club of. speech before 
by Cooper, collector at, defends Quay, 241; Asst. 
Postmaster Hughes of. political worker for 
Quay. 270,280; customs district of. classified 1883, 
276; Field, postmaster at, .300; Witherow’s res¬ 
ignation, 310; post-office at, a scandal under 
Cleveland. 3.50; combination of low politicians 
of both parties against reformers at, 352. 

Philadelphia. Civil Service Reform Ass’n of, memo¬ 
rial of. on railway mall service, 92. 

Philadelphia American [repub.], attributes repub¬ 
lican defeat of 1889 to spoils system, 76. 

Philadelphia Bulletin [repub.], favorscivil service 
reform, 76; condemns Platt. 260. 

Philadelphia North American [repub.], on Quay, 
270. 

Philadelphia Press [repub.], removals of Clarkson 
obeying a “wholesome policy of reform,” 49; 
republican party thoroughly committed to civ. 
service reform, 65; favors civ. service reform, 
92. 

Philadelphia Public Ledger [repub.], on Quay, 270. 

Philadelphia Record (rep.), on civil servicereform, 
92. 

Phlllippi.W. Va., Journalist Hall, postmaster at, 
155. 

Phipps, W. C., efficient employe in Indianapolis 
city service removed for political reasons, 297. 

Phmnlx, N. Y., Journalist Williams postmaster at, 
155. 

Pickering, J. E., postmaster at Alta, low'a, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 260. 

Pierce. Captain, appointed Indian agent at Pine 
Ridge vice Roger removed, 192. 

Pierce, A. G., negro, deputy collector internal reve¬ 
nue, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344. 
348. 

Pierce, President, spoils system under, 405. 

Pierce, Neb., Journalist Sharab postmaster at. 149. 

Pierre, S. Dak., physician of Indian agency at 
Greenwood. S.Dak., engages in political work 
at, shirking duty. 202. 

Pilgrim,-, federal office-holder, political worker, 

162. 

Pilot, on Quay, Dudley, Wanamaker, and decent 
politics, 257. 

Pine Ridge, S. Dak., Roger, a political worker ap¬ 
pointed Indian agent at, 192; causes of Indian 
trouble at, 217,218. 

Piper, postmaster at Manchester, N. H., active po¬ 
litician, 143. 

Piper, F. T., editor, appointed postmaster at Shel¬ 
don, Iowa, 142. 

Pitkin, U. S, minister to Argentina, political work¬ 
er. :J82. 

Pitrodie, S. Dak., Journalist Cheny, postmaster of, 
155. 

Pittsburg, Pa., post office at, controversy between 
Congressman Dalzell and Sen. Quay over. 87, 
112; McKean appointed postmaster at through 
Influence of Sen. Quay,96; surveyorship of cus¬ 
toms at, candidate of Quay appointed, 112; Post¬ 
master McKean of. spoilsman, 133; per cent, of 
removals in classified and unclassified service 
in post office at, 185: (Ass’t) Postmaster Ed¬ 
wards of. supporter of Quay, suspected by Har¬ 
rison, 299. 

Pittsburg Dispatch (repub.), patronage an evil, 75; 
on “Chinese civ. service,” 92. 

Place, J. A., editor, spoilsman, appointed postmas¬ 
ter at Oswego, N. Y., 126. 

Plain City, O., Journalist Horn postmaster at, 149. 

Plainfield, Ind., postmaster at, appointed through 
Influence of Congressman Matson, .30; Hatton 













INDEX 


XXVll 


supported by Congressman Cooper for postmas¬ 
ter of, 399. 

Plainfield, N. Y., Postmaster Pope of favors reform 
methods, but appoints his son ass’t postmaster, 
157. 

Plainview, Miss., Meacham, journalist, appointed 
postmaster at, 126. 

Plainview, Neb., Journalist Stevens, postmaster at, 
149. 

Platforms, national, see also Conventions; of dif¬ 
ferent parties support civil service reform, 229. 

Platforms, republican; national, 1872, 1876, 1880, 
1884,1888, 1892, favor civ. serv. Ref., 9, 27, 50, 73, 
275, 291, 337. 

Platform, democratic; national, 1888,1892, on civil 
serv. ref., 349, 365. 

Platforms, state, see also Conventions; republican; 
1884,1887, favor civil serv. ref., 122; California, 

1884, demands civ. service reform, 50; Connect¬ 
icut, 1872,1874, advocates civil serv. reform, 50; 
Delaware, 1882, advocates civil serv. reform, 50: 
Georgia, 1871, advocates civ. service reform, 50; 
Illinois, 1872, 1882, 1890, advocate civ. serv. re¬ 
form, 50, 156; Indiana, 1876,1886,1890, favors civ. 
service ref., 60, 51, 156; Iowa, 1874, 1884, advo¬ 
cates civ. ser. ref., 50, oO; Maryland, 1871, ad¬ 
vocates CIV. serv. ref., 50; Massachusetts, 1877, 

1885, 1890, advocates civ. serv. ref., 50, 51, 180; 
Minnesota, 1872, 1884, advocates civ. serv. ref., 
50; Missouri, 1872, advocates civ. serv. ref., 60; 
New Hampshire, 1872, advocates civil serv. ref., 
60; New Jersey, 1871,1872, advocates civ. serv. re 
form. 50; New York, 1872, 1877, 1885, 1887, 1891, 
advocate civ. serv. ref., 50, 51, 288; Ohio, 1871, 
1877,1886, on civil serv. ref .,50, 51; Pennsylvani,a 
1882,1883, 1884,1885, 1887, 1888, advocate civ. ser. 
ref., 51; West Virginia, 1872, advocates civ. serv. 
ref., 50. 

Platform, democratic, Delaware, 1890, sllentregard- 
ing civ. serv. ref., 145; Indiana, 1890, 1892, de¬ 
nounces Harrison’s administration of the civil 
service, 156,349; Massachusetts, 1890,1891, on civ. 
serv. reform and Harrison’s abuse of it, 180,288; 
Michigan, 1890, on abandonment of civ. serv. 
ref. by republicans, 180; New Hampshire, 1890, 
denouncesHarrison’s administration of the civil 
service, 156; Ohio, 1891, silent on subject of civil 
ser.ref.,288; Pennsylvania, 1890,1891, denounces 
Quay and republican party for abuse of the civ. 
service, 156, 288; Wisconsin, 1890, denounces 
Harrison’s administration of the civ. service, 
156. 


Plait, deputy collector in Indiana, at Minneapolis 
convention, 380. 

Platt, senator, compels postmasters in Connecticut 
to give list of voters. 330. 

Platt, F., gets office through his father, 255; and 
Fassett, 258; and proposed prosecution of Van 
Cott, and Hendricks, 287. 

Platt, J. I., editor and postmaster at Poughkeepsie, 
N. Y., in N. Y. convention, 335; inefficient, re¬ 
moves Deputy S. Smith, 386. 

Platt, T. C., ex senator in New York on civil serv. 
ref., 18; politicians like, 22; patronage of New 
York given to by Pres. Harrison, 27, 52,56, 68,94, 
142, 173. 263, 264, ’265, 266, 282, 376 ; spoilsman, 35, 
43, 45, 65. 77, 112.172, 269, 289, 298, 311, 329, 355,369, 
373,374,387,388.405; names postmaster for Elmira, 
N.Y., 53; and postmastership ai.Oswego, N. Y., 
71; and Hiscoca, Sen , and Syracuse post-ofllce, 
71; attributes defeat of 1889 partly to disappoint¬ 
ment of office-seekers, 76,77; arranges for census 
appointments in New York. 121; and Harrison, 
121; candidate for U. 8. senator, 143; faction of, 
and its opposition, 183; and Police J ustice Smith, 
see New York City, 198,199; recommends ap¬ 
pointment of Wheeler, 241; gives dinner to 
Clarkson. 245; controls patronage of custom 
house in New York city, gets office for 
his son, 255, 256; “freezes out” Erhardt, col¬ 
lector at New York city, 258. 259, 260, 350; 
inspires issuing of call for political contribu¬ 
tions. 279; defended, 28l; and Fassett campaign, 
287,2.88; and removal of Flood, postmaster at 
Elmira, N. Y., 297, 303; endorses Payne, 312; 
deserts Harrison, 332; supporters of removed, 
332, 334; and re-nomination of Harrison, 334, 835, 
366; given patronage, criticises Harrison, 337, 
339 , 341, 344 , 346 , 347; “placated,” 3.53, 354, 357, 
359. 360, 361, 362; secures removal of Burt, naval 
ofificer at New York, 368; and confers with Reid 


and Harrison. .371. 

Plattsburgh, N. Y., Journalist Lansing postmaster 

PlaWs'burg, Vt., custom-house at not classified, 
number of employes in, 277. 

Playford, R. S., journalist, postmaster at Carbon- 
dale, Kan., 148. -1 1 „ 

Pledger, W. A., negro, railway mail employe, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Plumb, Sen., and changes in post offices in Ran., 
55; on tariff, 169: spoilsman, and census bureau, 
203: allied with Gorman, 214,228; attacks civil 
service commission, 250, 251; custom employe, 
see investigation, 327. 

Plunkitt, state senator of New York, bill of for 

racecourse in Central Park, 320. _ 

Plymouth, Ind., Editor Siders appointed post- 

Plymouth! MassVpostmaster Burns of, Jo re¬ 
moved for political reasons, applicants for po- 
fiition. fflVorGd by E. A. MorsGf .— 

Political activity of federal office-holders, see Har¬ 
rison, W. H., also names of states, 336, 37u. 


Political assessments, see Curry, also names of 
states, 153. 

Political corruption In Maryland, Bonaparte on, 
317, 324. 

“Political ingratitude,” see Indianapolis Journal, 
181, 182. 

Politics, uivorce of municipal business from, by M. 
Storey, 261, 283, 286. 

Polk, Pres., for revenue tariff, 214, 244. 

Pontiac, Ill., removal of Reno, postmaster of, de¬ 
manded by Congressman Payson, for “offensive 
partisanship,” 188. 

Poorman,C. L., editor, given federal office, SOI. 

Pope, actor, recites Sheridan’s Ride at Chicago 
convention, appointed consul to Toronto, 56. 

Pope, E. R., postmaster at Plainfield, N. Y., favors 
reform methods, but appoints his son assistant 
postmaster, 157. 

Pope, Gen. J., advocates congressional appoint¬ 
ment of federal office holders, 52. 

Port Clinton, O., Editor Martin postmaster at, 301. 

Port Huron, Mich., Collector, Geer of, spoilsman, 
asks for special examination, denied, 36; cus¬ 
toms district of classified, 1883, 276. 

Port Townsend, relative of Pres. Harrison appointed 
deputy collector of customs at, 30, 369; custom¬ 
house at not classified, number of employes in, 
277. 

Porter, A. G., spoken for mission to Rome, 7, 14, 85; 
worker for Harrison, 377; U. 8. minister to 
Rome resigns to do political work, 382. 

Porter, D. E., sells offices, 104. 

Porter, O. T., editor, given office, 39. 

Porter, R P., editor, census supt., and Roosevelt, 
see Civil Service Reformer; appointed, 14; civil 
serv. law, 19; gives patronage to Senators Quay 
and Cameron, 72; gives Shidy office at request 
of Roosevelt, 101,103; spoilsman, 104; and cen¬ 
sus service in New York, 121; overrun with 
office-seekers, 88,131; Congressman Dalzell,133; 
permits spoils methods in census service, 
157; and Foulke, 173; defends appointments, 182; 
claims held examinations for cierks, 190; exami¬ 
nation papers used in census services by ,219,220; 
office under given to Weigel, worker for Bos- 
Filley, 226; fears investigation of census bu¬ 
reau, 233,334; at convention republican league, 
259; opposition of to civil service reform, 292, 
294. 


Porter Co., Ind., Vidette [repub.], on “Farwell 
Club,” 83. 

Portland, Ind., Lowry, postmaster at, removed. Ed¬ 
itor Marsh appointed through influence of 
Browne, 88, 116,126; political worker, 877, 380. 

Portland, Me., changes in offices in, 22; Briggs, 
politician, appointed postmaster at, 150; em¬ 
ployes in exceed requirements, see Reed, 242; 
customs district of classified in 1883, employes 
in, 276, 277. 

Portland, Oregon, custom-house at not classified, 
number of employes in, 277. 

Portsmouth, N. H., navy yard at, see also Kittery, 
Me.; work on war ships, in navy yard at, for 
political reasons, 217; merit system introduced 
in navy yard at by Tracy, ‘251. 

Posey, Congressman, and office-seekers, 14; secures 
appointment of henchman in place of Isabella 
De La Hunt, 26; obtains appointment of worker 
as , ostmaster at Evansville, Ind., 46; uses in¬ 
fluence for appointment of Throop, collector at 
Terre Haute, Ind., 59. 

Postal divisions, superintendents of, proposal of 
Congressman Andrew to extend civil service 
law to, 306. 


I’ostmaster, editors and publishers appointed 
cases and lists of, 30, 37, 46, 71, 108, 126, 132, 141 
142, 148, 149, 155, 186, 260, 301, 302, 316, 377; scram 
bles for places of, 47, 72, 84, 88, 89, 109, 12L, 210 
recommended for re-appointment, S8. 91, 100 
wanton removals, cases and lists of, 29, 39, 45 
47, 54, 55 , 71, 90. 91. 101, 112, 118, 149, 165, 176, 186 
187, 282, 288, 362, 377, 386, 408; removals on secre 
charges, cases and lists of, 39,175,176,177; leuda 
listlc appointments, 108, 134, 135, 136, 143,144,150 
153, 158, 159, 160,162, 180,187, 241, ‘249, 340; bench 
man, service of, cases and lists of cases of, 134 
135, 136, 143, 144, 159, 160, 162, 186, 249, 259, ‘260, 262 
264, 265. 266, 280. 287, 302, 310, 334 , 335, 336, 342, 343 
344 , 346; 347, 348, 360, 362, 370, 377, 378, 379, :180. 382 
:J86; bad appointments, cases and lists of, 32, 39 
47, 54, 55. 90 ; special cases at Syracuse, N. Y.; El 
mira, N. Y.; Terre Haute, Ind.; Valparaiso 
Ind.; South Bend, Ind.; Muncie, Ind.; New A1 
banv, Ind.; Indianapolis,New York,Baltimore 
St. Louis, Boston, Philadelphia, Milwaukee, Ft 
Wayne, Ind.;Pittsburgh, Augusta. Me.; La Fa^ 
yette, Ind.; see same; removed and appointed 
by Brosius at May, Huber, Burke, Chestnut 
Level, New Holland, Lancaster, Columbia, 
Mannheim, Marietta, Strasburg, Litltz, _Eu- 
phrata, Mt. Joy, 72; Judson, of Pra^ttsville, 
N. Y., insane through fear of loss of office, 415; 
at Mt. Vernon, Ind., and Sen. Harrison, 96; 
Childs, of Brattleboro, Vt., caucus on question 
of reappointment of, 108; Harrington, at Mon- 
son, Mass., reappointment of recommended, re¬ 
fused by Wanamaker, 188; at Newton, Mass., 
democrat Morgan reappointed, 224; at Sand¬ 
wich (Mass.), democrat Shevlin reappointed, 
224; at Washington. D. C., Sherwood promoted 
to be, 163 ;Warner, Albany, N. Y., favors civ. serv. 
reform, 51, enforces law, 186; Sperry, at New 
Haven. Conn., favors civ. service reform. 91; 
Ketcham, of Ditney, Ind.. solicited for political 


contributions, 387, 392; of Ogden, Ind., distrib¬ 
utes campaign Oocumenis, 390; Terry, of Terry- 
vllle, N. Y., removed lor refusing to pay po¬ 
litical assessments, 391; and P. O, employes in 
Buffalo, N. Y., pay political assessments, 391; 
Gates, Of Waterton, N. Y., furnishes political in¬ 
formation, 392; Smith, of Laurel, Del., attempts 
bribery, 397, 401,402; Daniels, oi Withey, Mich., 
poll of voters asked of, 383; Eaton, of New Or¬ 
leans, pays political assessments, 383; at Oma¬ 
ha, Neb., under Cleveland and Harrison, vio¬ 
lates law, 281; at Moberly, Mo., uses census 
enumerators as political workers, 131; Crum, 
negro, nominated lor, at Charleston, S. C., for 
vote at Minneapolis, not confirmed, 363; Mill- 
ken, of Waterville, Me., and non delivery of pa¬ 
pers advocating Burleigh, congressional candi- 
dateopposing Manley,364; IsabellaDeLaHunt, 
at Canneltou, Ind.; appointed upon recom¬ 
mendation of Sen. Harrison, by Pres. Arthur, 
removed by Cleveland, Pres. Harrison refuses 
to reappoint, 368; of Madison, Wis., controls 
places in census service, ‘293; Bennett, of Hart, 
ford. Conn., removal of Bario, efficient P. O. in¬ 
spector, 298; Sperry, of New Haven, testifies to 
worth of Bario, removed P. O. inspector, ‘298; 
Gilleland,of Allegheny, Pa., supporter of Quay, 
suspected by Harrison, 299; at Bradford, Pa., 
Fleunicken appointed, but removed on protest 
of H. C. Frick, 99; Hendrix, of Brooklyn, N. Y., 
removed and place offered to politician, 131; 
Pope, at Plainfield, N. Y., favors reform meth¬ 
ods, but appoints his son ass’t postmaster, 157; 
Zumstein, of Cincinnati, O., carries out spirit 
of civil service law, 257; Richensteen at L. I. 
City, letter to, advocating reform methods, 100; 
Wooster,of Fostoria, O.,compelled by Washing¬ 
ton authorities to turn over office to spoils, 91; 
at Richmond, Ind., the “party,” 183; at Mt.Ver- 
non, Ind., son of Gov. Hovey appointed, 71; at 
Austin, Texas, chairman republican state com¬ 
mittee appointed, 71; at Hamilton, Mo., N.C. 
Clarkson appointed, 150; at Kansas City ap¬ 
points relative of Pres. Harrison his deputy, 84; 
Rico, of Springfield, Mass., case of, 87; at South 
Hadley Falls, Mass., democrat Kirkpatrick 
nominated, see Wallace and Harrison, 157; Van 
Duzer, of Horseheads, N. Y., attempted remov¬ 
al of by Fassett, 331; Van Duzer, of Horseheads, 
N. Y., and removal of Flood, 304; Dunn, of 
Binghamton, N. Y., and removal of pension ex¬ 
aminer Dr. Van Alstyne, 304; at Wyoming, Ill., 
removed because appointed through “political 
intrigue,” Hammond appointed, 176; Reno, of 
Pontiac, Ill., removal of demanded by Congress¬ 
man Payson, for “offensive partisanship,” 188; 
Smith, of Carrollton, Ill., removed through in¬ 
fluence of Senator Cullom, 188; at Laurel, Md., 
democrat appointed to please Gorman, 38; at 
Poughkeepsie, N. Y., Editor Platt appointed, 
inefficient, removes deputy S. Smith,386; Hath¬ 
away, of house of representatives, spoilsman, 
methods of, 242; Sefrits buys appointment as, at 
Washington, Ind., 121; at Mitchell, Ind., Wood 
purchases position is appointed, 89; at Wina- 
mac, Ind., applicants for position of, bargain¬ 
ing for, 88; at Palo Pinto, JIo., buys office, see 
also Trolllngton and Upton, 55. 

Postmaster-general, see Wanamaker. 

Postmaster-general, first assistant, see Clarkson. 

Postmasters, arbitrary removals of, see resolutions 
of National League, 1890; regulation of, ap¬ 
pointment of advocated, 100; many democratic 
ordered out, 16; presidential, many removals 
and appointments of, 27, 29; fourth-class, ap¬ 
pointed through influence of Sen. Cullom, 80; 
number of appointed in Indiana from March 
4th to July ‘20 inclusive, 1889, 34; editors ap¬ 
pointed, 37; removals of fourth-class, 89, 62; 
comparison of changes of for first five months 
of Pres. Harrison and Cleveland’s terms, 45; 
15,000 removed by Postmaster Gen’l Clarkson 
up to Sept., 1889,49; removals of, for political 
reasons, 54, isO; appointed through Influence of 
Congressman Owen and Sen. Plumb, 55; fourth- 
class in Indiana, see Michener, 67; meeting of 
in W’ashingtou, 69; removal of 30,000 fourth-class 
without cause. 70; fourth-class, objections to 
removal of, see Simond, 91; removals of fourth- 
class in W’ashington Co., Ind., 91; forced resig¬ 
nations of. 111; bill of H.C, Lodge, M. C., re¬ 
garding appointments of fourth-class, 115, 238; 
removals up to May, 1890, 120; of fourth-class 
and Cleveland, 124; fourth-class in Missouri, 
control of given to Filley, 132; become political 
workers, 160; removals of upon secret charges 
investigations of by committee of National 
League, 175, 176, 177 ; presidential, number 
of who are political workers, 186; Cleve¬ 
land makes clean sweep, 187; forth class, bill of 
Lodge forselection of on basisof merit,238;fourtb- 
clasa, allowed to work politically for Harrison, 
240; in Indiana,workers for Harrisou,260; fourth- 
class, removal of under Clarkson, ‘261; sons 
of, political workers for Hiscock, 265; fourth- 
class, bill to regulate appointment of, opposed 
by W'anamaker, 298; in Indiana, work for Har¬ 
rison, 302; paper on appointment of, by Wood, 
before annual meeting. National League, 1892, 
329; asked for list of voters by American Pro¬ 
tective League.330; in New York,asked for listsof 
republicans, 370; in Michigan, asked for listsof 
voters, 375; In DeKalb Co., Ind., political work¬ 
ers, 380; assessment of by American Protective 









INDEX. 


xxviii 


Tariff League, 382; Allegheuy Co., association 
of, leviespolitical assessments,3S4; foiirtli-class, 
bill of Congressman Andrew to regulate ap- 
l)ointment8 of, recommended by civil service 
commission, 3.'i9,:}88, 397; in Jefferson Co.,N.Y., 
political assessments levied against, 391; appli 
cants for positions ns, supported by Congress¬ 
man Cooper, 398, 3i>9. 

Post-oflBce at Indianapolis, Baltimore, St. Louis, 
Milwaukee, N. Y. City, Pittsburgh, Philadel¬ 
phia, Syracuse, N. Y.; at Norwich, Conn., re¬ 
moval of, place given to spoilsmen, see Nor¬ 
wich (Conn.); at Troy, N. Y., and Indianapolis, 
investigate by civ. service commission, ;t6; 
at Vincennes, Ind. (see Chambers), 37; at Can- 
nelton, Ind., see Ciarkson, and S4; at Warsaw, 
Mo., sold by Upton, see Uigon,.^; at Columbus, 
O., applicants for and Sen. Sherman, 67; at 
Lincoln, Neb., controlled by Connell, appli¬ 
cants for postmastership, 72; per cent, of re¬ 
movals in classified and unclassified service in, 
atNew Haven, Conn., 185; at Jersey Clty,N. J., 
185; at Kansas City, Mo., 185; at Denver, Colo., 
185; at Chicago, i85; at Albany, N. Y., 185; at 
Cincinnati,merit system in, 257'; at Lockport, N. 
Y., controlled by Hiscock, 259; at Cincinnati, 
O., merit system in, 358; at St. Joseph, Mo., 

F olitlcal assessments in, 3.8;i; at Lafayette, 
nd., employes in distribute campaign docu¬ 
ments, 389. 

Post office department, Wanamaker establishes 
board of promotion by competitiveexamination 
in, 256, 257. 

Post-offices, fourth-class changes in, see Delano, 47; 
applicants for in Chester Co., Pa., see Chester 
Co., 55; changes in, by Pres. Harrison in Kan., 
.55; taking the fourth-class out of politics, plan 
of R. H. Dana for, 68, 74; presidential, report 
on, by committee of National League, 162, 163, 
164,165,166; presidential, turned over to spoils, 
211; given to editors by Harrison, 240; see also 
press; having less than 50 employes, 277; infor¬ 
mation regarding, refused to Rogers by P. O. 
department, 297; of 25 employes, proposal to 
classify by Andrew, 305; all free delivery class¬ 
ified by Harrison, beads of divisions in should 
be classified, 403; Roosevelt on benefits of class¬ 
ification of free delivery,415. 

Post-office department, number of classified em¬ 
ployes in total service of, 193; relative of Harri¬ 
son appointed law clerk in, 369; examinations 
for applicants for position in service of, 396. 
Post-office employe does detective work for Harri¬ 
son at Minneapolis convention. 346. 

Potter, worker for Internal Revenue Collector Hill 
in Maryland convention, :i:i5. 

Potter, Bishop, and civ. serv. ref., 28, 30; and at¬ 
tempt to purify politics in New York City, i:i0; 
address of on political dangers, 1890,145. 

Potter, J.. editor, appointed postmaster at Davis, 
Ill., 141. 

Potts, W., at Baltimore conference, 1889, 2, 42, 44 ; 
refused access to records of removals in postal 
service, 163; on committee of publication of 
Good Government, :{57. 

Poughkeepsie. N. Y., Editor Platt postmaster of, 
in New York convention. :i;i3; inefficient, re¬ 
moves Deputy S. Smith, ,386. 

Pousland, federal employe, political worker at 
Boston, 334. 

Powers, H. C., collector internal revenue, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 314, 318; levies po¬ 
litical assessments, 384. 

Powers. J.. naval officer at Philadelphia, worker 
for Ilarrison, 300. 

Pratt, D. W., postmaster at Farmington, Me., re¬ 
moved on secret charges, 175. 

Pratt, E. W., asst, appraiser at N. Y. City, pays po¬ 
litical assessments, 279. 

Prattsville, N. Y., Judson postmaster of, insane 
through fear of loss of office, 415. 

Prentice. Counselor, removed from X. Y. City 
health dept.. 356. 

Present Status of Civil Service Reform, by Rev. H. 

Lambert, criticised, 255. 

Presidency, Hill sells, .307. 

President, appointing power of, 6; duties of. in re¬ 
gard to the civil service, under the constitution, 
271. 

Press, and civ. service reform, 83; [repub.] on civ. 
service reform, 92 

Press, bribery of. Pres. W. H. Harrison on, 17; see 
King, A. Allison, Habercorn. Beyerle, Reed, 
Stone, White, Douglass, Rice, Hicks, New. Rob¬ 
erts, Junkin, Halstead, Clarkson. Porter R. P.; 
under Cleveland, see Plainfield, Ind., 30,81.149, 
366,868,369; by Quay in Pennsylvania, 151; in 
Indiana, 240, 378; under President Harrison, 
30, 31. 36, ,39. 46, 47, 56, 67, .80, 85, 88 90. 94, 97, 
100, 121, 126, 132, 141, 142. 148, 149. 1.50, 151, 153, 
154,155, 186, 187. 240. 249, 260, 266, 299, 301, 302, .316, 
.368,369,377,386; Editor Porter given office, .39; 
see Rahway. N. Jersey, Smyth, Watrous, Law- 
she. Smith, 71; see speech of Harrison,Sen.. 81; 
condemned by Daniel Webster, 81; see Dunlap. 
Gardner, Forbes, Whitney, Challis, Kinney, 84. 
Prickett, J. P., editor, appointed postmaster at Al¬ 
bion, Ind.. 126, 377. 

Pride, chief clerk under Cunningham in assay of¬ 
fice at Boise City, Idaho, politician, 30. 

Princess Anne, Md., Duer, postmaster, of, removed 
for political reasons, Lankford appointed. 408. 
Princeton, Ind., Tichner, postmaster of political 
worker, 316, 378. 


Princeton, N. .1., Theo. Seminary professors in, and 
civil service reform, 40. 

Princeton, Wis., Journalist Bebee postmaster at, 
155. 

Princeville, Ill., Editor Barnum appointed post¬ 
master at, 141. 

Printing and engraving, bureau of, status of re¬ 
form in, 32; employes in, political workers, 179; 
dismissals in for lack of appropriation, 234; 
Gorman secures place in for low politician, 237; 
bureau of, under Cleveland and Harrison, 368. 

Pritchard, J. C., 159; Harrison delegate from N. 
Carolina, 3;i4. 

Pritchett, R. M., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Dana, Ill., 141. 

Proctor, N., discharged by Sec y Whitney from 
navy yard at Norfolk, Va , 147. 

Proctor, R., Sec’y, 242; Senator,362. 

Professions, the, and civil service reform, see 
Roosevelt, dinner-to at Indianapolis, 227, 229. 

Promises, of democratic party, 397,398. 

Promotion, of Thompson, asst, postmaster at In¬ 
dianapolis, to be postmaster, and consequent 
promotions, 235; by voluntary competition, in¬ 
troduced in departments at Washington by 
Harrison, 274; without examination, stopped 
by Harrison,275; by competitive examinations, 
286; in departments at Washington, rules gov¬ 
erning, 289; on merit, under Wanamaker, by 
examination, 297,298; on merit system, introduc¬ 
tion of, in Washington departments, 321; should 
fill places below presidential offices, 413. 

Proner. postmaster of Spencerville, Ind., political 
worker, 379, :180. 

Protestant Episcopal Church and civil service re¬ 
form, see Church. 

Prudden, Dr. T. M., withdraws from N. Y. City 
Health Dept, because it becomes political ma¬ 
chine. 3.56. 

Pryor, federal office holder, political worker, 287. 

Public school, and civil service reform, see Curtis. 
205. 

Public Service, journal, :J06. 

Publicity of eligibles, ordered by civil serv. com¬ 
mission at Indianapolis, 25. 

Pulaski, N. Y., Journalist Muzzy postmaster at. 155. 

“Purity in Politics,” see Van Anda, 137. 

Purity’in Politics, see Ingalls, 190. 

Purroy, Fire Commissionerof N. Y. City, 234. 

Pursell, F. S., journalist, postmaster at Logan, ()., 
149, 301. 

Pursell, J., policeman of New York tries to defraud 
by pretending to sell office, 224, 225. 

Putnam (Indiana), Democrat, and Civil Sfrvice 
Chronicle, 13; advocates civil service reform, 
76. 

Putnam, .ludge A. A., letter of to Wanamaker re¬ 
garding removal of Farnum, unanswered, 175. 

Putnam, R. P., federal employe, henchmen for 
Grosvenor. 204, 205. 

Quackenbush, congressman, obtains appointment 
of G. H. Stevens, disreputable character, as 
postmaster at Shushan, N. Y., 32, 54; urges ap¬ 
pointment of O’Brien in postal serviceof house 
representatives, 242; elect, political worker, 
279. 

Quay, senator, spoilsman, 5,35,43, 45, 93,119,174,175, 
192, 214.227, 256. 261, 263, 281, 3.50, 361, 373, .387, 888. 
390,404, 405, 412,415,422; and the offices, 6; and 
post-oflice at Philadelphia, 15; and spoils, 17; 
and Postmaster-Gen’l Wanamaker, 22; and 
Pennsylvania legislature, 22; and office-seekers, 
21; dietates appointment of Postmaster-Gen¬ 
eral Wanamaker, 27; conflict with Wanamaker 
over Philadelphia spoils, 30; supersedes Don. 
Cameron in control of patronage in Pa., 34; 
secures the appointment of Cooper as collector 
of customs at Philadelphia, 89; patronage of 
Pa. given to by Pres. Harrison, 28, 38, 47. 56, 68. 
70. 72, 77, 85, 94, 9.5, 137, 138, 282. ,329, :382, 3.37, 341, 
376; agent of organizes machine, urges adop¬ 
tion of resolution demanding repeal of civil 
service law, 49; negotiates with Mahone, 52; 
controversy of with Dalzell over Pittsburgh post- 
office. secures appointment of postmaster, 87; 
secures appointment of McKean as postmaster 
at Pittsburgh, 90; endorses Sturgis for post¬ 
master at Uniontown, Pa.. 99; endorsesDrapo 
for collectorshlp at Pittsburgh. 100. 104; 

political history of, 105; obligations of Pres. 
Harrison to. Ill; protest of Lea against patron¬ 
age of. 112; and appointments, 118; and Harri¬ 
son, 121, :J53; methods of, 130,181; career of. 1.33, 
131, 135, 151, 152 ; condemned by Maryland 
Civil Service Reform Association, 1.36; and U. S. 
attorney Lyon, 143; opposition to in Pennsyl¬ 
vania, 153; condemned by Lincoln Indepeiid- 
Republican committee. 1.50 ; opposes Canaday, 
160; revolt against rule of. 161, 162. 170. 171; 
“boss” in Pennsylvania, 172; and election in 
1890 in Pa,, 173; confers with Internal Revenue 
Collector Martin, 183; supports Leeds, disrepu¬ 
table politician, 216 ;condemned by Young Men’s 
Republican Club of Massachusetts. 219; ruins 
ballot reform bill of Pennsylvania, aided by 
Federal Officer Martin, 228, 229; Pres. Harrison 
makes terms with, 235; Harrison combines 
with. 237; and appointment of Martin, disre¬ 
putable politician, internal revnue collector in 
Pa.. 232, 2.3:3; defended by Cooper, collector at 
Philadelphia, Pa., reconciled with Harrison,241; 
in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, 245, 246, 249,250, 
251,2.52,2.56; eulogy of by nat. ren. committee, 2.57; 
. eulogized by federal officers in Pennsylvania, 


260; and Amerlcus Club, 269; revolt against in 
Pennsylvania, 270; supported by federal office¬ 
holders ill convention at Scranton, Pa., and 
elsewhere, 280; denounced by Pennsylvania 
democrats, 288, 289; republican leader in Penn¬ 
sylvania, 298; supporters of, removed from 
office by Harrison, 299, JiOl; wins libel suits 
against, 305; controls Pennsylvania delegation, 
310; In Pennsylvania, 313, 314; supporter of 
Blaine, 344, :3J5; at Minneapolis convention, 347; 
eulogy of by Clarkson, ,351; “placated,” 3.57, 361, 
362; asks for appointment of Wanamaker as re¬ 
ward for raising campaign fund, 368; secures 
appointment of Martin,374; imitators of in In¬ 
diana. 414; deserts Harrison, :3:37, 341. 

Quay, R. R., 361. 

Quimby, H. B , relative of federal employe, dele¬ 
gate to Minneapolis convention, :548. 

Quincy, Ill., C. A. Wilcox, editor, appointed post¬ 
master at, removal^ at for political reasons, 141, 

Quincy, Josiah, 69; secy. Massachusetts state dem¬ 
ocratic committee, signs petition for larger ap¬ 
propriation for civil service commission, 102; 
on spoils system, 308. 

Quincy, Mass., removal of Speare, postmaster of, 
desired by Morse, .86; Adams appointed post¬ 
master at, vice Speare, removed, 100; a political 
worker, 162. 

Quinn,post master at Decatur,Ind., political worker, 
379. 

Rahway, N. J., editor, appointed postmaster at, 
71. 

Rail, J., ward politician of Indianapolis, see Par¬ 
nell Hall, 194, 195; supports fire-chief Webster, 
208. 

Railway Mail Service,condition of, 53,68; removals 
in, 66, 94; necessity lor reform in, 69; removal 
of hundreds of clerks in, under Wanamaker, 70; 
brought under civ. service law by Cleve¬ 
land, 81; bill of Sen. Paddock to withdraw 
from civ. service law, 92; eligible lists in, 
111; applicant for position before put 
under civil service law, see Ixidge, 122; 
superintendent of condemned, 125; employes 
in getting “in line,” 162; examinations for, 
should be more difficult, suggestions of Wana- 
niaker, 193; Pres. Cleveland extends civil serv¬ 
ice law to, 224; in Iowa, political assessments 
levied in, 240; civil service law extended to, 
under Cleveland, action under his orders post¬ 
poned at req^uestof commission, by Harrison, 
275, 403; employes in must pass physical exam¬ 
ination, :305, 372; turned over to spoils under 
Harrison, 376; examinations for 1891-92, 396; 
prize offered for best clerk in, by Wanamaker, 
won by H. P. Swift, 415. 

Raines, J., Congressman, uses census patronage for 
his own benefit, letter of, requesting list of vot¬ 
ers. 293. 

Raisin, I. F.. low politician, appointed naval offi¬ 
cer at Baltimore, through Influence of Gorman. 
237. 245; career of, 251. 

Randall, C. S., Congressman, recomends unwar¬ 
ranted removal of Carpenter, postmaster at 
New Bedford, Mass., 29.175, 176: secures re-ap¬ 
pointment of Shevlin as postmater at Sand¬ 
wich, 2’24. 

Ransdell, D., 7; appointed marshal District of Co¬ 
lumbia, political worker. 84 , 68. 77, 84. 85, 96, 
112, 126, 173, 181; and office-seekers, 37; uses 
influence for appointment of Throop, .59; 
makes unfit appointments. 80; and print¬ 
ing office, 234; gets offices for relatives, 244 ; 
works for Harrison at Minneapolis and else¬ 
where, 297, .302, 337, 342, 34.3, 344, 345. 346, :347, 378, 
.379; and Chase, candidate for Governor of 
Indiana, 352. 

Ransdell, E. S., convicted of theft, gets office 
through influence of Marshal Ransdall, 80, 244 

Ransom, Senator and Eaves. 159. 

Rany. M. A., editor, appointed postmaster at Fon- 
lanelle, Iowa, 142. 

Rarick, J. H., editor, appointed postmaster, at La 
Grange, Ind., 377. 

Rathbone. E. G., resigns as mall inspector, ap¬ 
pointed 4th Asst. P. M. General. 241; works for 
Harrison at Minneapolis, :!37, 344, 345, .346- con¬ 
fers with New. ;340.379; refuses to give reasons 
for removal of Terry, 391. 

Rathbone. E. H.. journalist, postmaster at Hern¬ 
don, Kan., 149. 

Rathbun, L G., appointed postmaster at Elmira. N 
304 312^ Flood, removed on secret charges, 303, 

Ratnour, E., postmaster at Weeping Water, Neb., 
removed on secret charges, Butler appointed! 
175. 


Raum, G. B., pension commissioner and clerks in 
pension service. 71; spoilsman, 108, 129,130; be¬ 
lieved to be dishonest. 173.190; attempts to over- 
rldecivil servicelaw, 203; and Harrison, career 
of. 237, 2:58; usesotfice for political purposes.373- 
political worker, 370, 382, 3.S9. ' 


Raum, Jr., G. B., appointed by his father, pension 
commissioner, to office in pension bureau, 130, 
227,254; before congressional committee, 19o’ 
sells offices, etc.. 2.37,2.38; removed from pen¬ 
sion service for dishonesty, 228. 

Ravenna, Kan., Journalist Hart postmaster at, 149 
Ray, Congressman, recommends Flenniken for 
postmaster at Bradford. Pa., 99; secures ap¬ 
pointment of Underwood as postmaster at 






INDEX. 


XXIX 


Washington, Pa., 100; on Senator Quay, IIS; pa¬ 
tronage of, 13;i. 

Ray, federal appointee, admits attempt to bribe 
member of legislature, !W, 

Ray,C. H., federal office-holder, political worker, 
see also Baltimore investigation, 3^0, 320, 327. 

Raymond, 1<\, politician, aided by custom-house 
employes, 108; political boss, and app( iiuments 
to census service, 121 ; deputy coiiector at N. Y. 
City, political worker, 270; controlled selection 
of census enumerators in N. Y. City. 204; iu 
New York convention, 335; Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 313, 344. 

Reading, Cal., Bush, political worker, apjointed 
postmaster at, 180,187. 

Reagan, Congressman, not much good to come of 
civ. service law, 73. 

Rector, J. W., politician of Texas, 150; internal 
■revenue collector, delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 348. 

Reed, Judge, and congressman, opposed to patron¬ 
age system, 01. 

Reed, A., editor, appointed consul at Dublin, 30. 

Reed, A. II., appointed postmaster at Flora, Ill., 
141. 

Reed, J., employe in Baltimore custom house, tes¬ 
timony of on interference of federal officers in 
primaries at, 231. 


Reed, T., and spoils, 22,22t); as speaker, house com¬ 
mittee on civ. service, appointed by,8(); bribery 
of voters for, 145; secures appoiutnient of Briggs 
as postmaster at Portland, Me., 150; desires spoil 
of Kittery, Me., navy yard, 148.153; hampereel 
by refusal of spoil, 157; on fultillment of party 
pledges, 108; ‘•l)Oom”of, 178; opposes Australian 
ballot system, 228; keeps more employes in 
Portland (Me.) custom house than uecessarv, 
242. 

Reeder, F., Genl., political worker for Quav, 280, 
361. 

Reeds, W. H., member of Cowie faction, see New 
York, 241. 

Reelsvilie, lud., Elliott, postmaster at removed, 
Gaskin appointed, 89. 

Reform Club at N. Y.,see N. Y., 42. 

Reid, W., editor New York Tribune, appointed min¬ 
ister to France, 14, 309, 371, 381, 382,389; republi¬ 
can candidate for vice-president, 1892, 354; and 
Platt, 300, 301. 

Reiley, W. II., postmaster iu Washington Co., la., a 
political worker, 260. 

Reiley, J., employed iu N. Y. custom-house, politi¬ 
cal worker, 108, 334. 

Reslnger, editor, sell out to Andrews, W. H., 134. 

“Relation of the civil service to comfortable living 
iu cities,” see Gibson, 3()0. 


Removals, general, unwarranted, James Madison 
on, see Madison; In various departments, for 
vear from July 1, 1889, see civil service com., 
7th annual report; of postmasters upon secret 
charges, see secret charges; arbitrary, of post¬ 
masters, see Nat. League resolutions of 1890: 
of presidential postmasters, numerous, 27; of 
members of pension boards, by Tanner, 27; of 
foreign ministers by Pres. Harrison, 27; rate of 
under Asst. Postmaster-General Clarkson, 27; at 
Indianapolis post-office under Postmaster Jones, 
easily made, see Moore, 28; in treasury depart¬ 
ment, 29; of 16 R. R. mail clerks for political rea- 
8ons,276 removals in the 10th divislon,29; to week 
ending June 6, 1889, of presidential post offices. 
29; in federal offices in Niagara Co., N. Y., 80; 
of subordinates in treas. dep’t, see Coulter, 39; 
under Tanner, commissioner of pensions, 51, 
54; under Cravens, collector, 51; in custom 
house at Baltimore, in post office at Philadel¬ 
phia, 53; of postmasters for political reasons, 
51, 120; in pension and sixth auditor’s offices, 
see also Roosevelt, 55; in Brooklyn navy yard, 
55, 1-55; by Clarkson, 39. 41,62, 75, 76, 154, 1 /3, 261; 
unjustifiable, 63; in R. R. mail service and 
post-oflices, 66; of employes in Charlestown 
navy yard by Pres. Cleveland, 69; in fire dep’t 
at Indianapolis. 69; in postal service under 
Wanamaker, 70; in Boston custom house under 
Saltonstall for good cause, 71; in district of 
Rockport, Ill.. 73; under Cleveland, of oflice- 
holders in Maine. 73; iu Indian service. 
79 - of fourth-class postmasters objected to, 
see Simond. 91; of fourth-class postmast¬ 
ers in Washington Co., Ind., 91; in postal 
service. Pres. Harrison asked to check, 
92; under Cleveland and Harrison, 96; 
and “resignations” under Clarkson, 131; for 
political reasons under Postmaster McKean at 
Dttsburgh, 133; under Postmaster Johnson at 
Baltimore, for political reasons. 137; by Von 
Sandberg, 150; u nder Harrison. 45.159,2(>6; secret 
charges, 173; under collectors Erhardt, Hed- 
den and Magone, at New York, 183; causes of 
should be made public, see civil service com. 
annual report, 1889-90.185; in classified service 
in various post-offices, 185; of presiden¬ 
tial postmasters for political reasons. 164, 
186’ und6r Clarkson of postmasters upon 
expiration of four years’ service,^ and 
second commission not yet expired. 187, 
“offensive partisanship,” 188; under Harrison, 
for cause only, 188; to make place for friends 
opposed by Lincoln. 211; wholesale, of employes 
in fire and police service at Indianapolis, see 
Siuallv divided politically, 212, 213; for politi- 
caT realons, made Controller Thompson at 
Philadelphia, 239; under Beard, collector at 


Boston, 245, 322; more than 1110,600 under Harri¬ 
son, 253; in classified and unclassified service 
under Johnson, postmaster at Baltimore, his 
testimony before Roosevelt, 254,255; for cause 
only under Zumsteiu, postmaster at Cincinnati, 
O., 257; in departments at Washington. D. C.. 
almost wholly for cause,273; of efficient offi¬ 
cials condemned, 286; of supporters of Quay In 
Pennsylvania by Harrison, 299-301; under May¬ 
nard at N. Y. custom-house, on false charges, 
310; in navy yaras, see Tracy, 311; in postal 
service for political reasons condemned, bills 
of Hoar (S.) and Lodge regulating, 321. 

Removal of Burt, Saltonstall, Pearson, Graves, 
Corse, see Burt, etc.; of De La Hunt, postmaster 
at Cannelton, Indiana, by Pres. Cleveland, for 
“offensive partisanship,” 25; of Indian Com 
missioner Oberly and others, 27; on secret 
charges, cases and lists of, 45, 54, 175, 176, 177, 
312; for political reasons, cases and lists of, 29, 
30, ;39, 45, 46, 47, 51. 5-1, 55, 56, 59, 71. 72, 74, 84, 87, 
88, 89, 91. 94, 96, 100, i:36, 142, 146, 147, 186, 187, 250, 
256,288, 297, 298, 303, ;!04 , 319, 362, 868, 371,374, 377, 
386, 408; without cause, cases and lists of. 29, ::9, 
45, 176, 181, 228, :I71, 874, 386; to make places for 
henchmen, cases and lists of, 29, 72, 90, 98,101, 
112,126, 131, 140, 148, 188, 310, 331, 371; after four 
years’ service, second commission, unexpired, 
187,188; of Royer, political worker and Indian 
agent at PineRidge, 192; of Dr. Stone pension ex¬ 
aminer, and appointment of Dr. Elbert, con¬ 
demned, 192; of Dougherty, fire-chief at Indian¬ 
apolis, Webster re-appointed,207,208; of U. S.dis¬ 
trict attorney at Washington, D.C., 211; of Royer, 
worthless Indian agent at Pine Ridge, S. Dak., 
211, 217, 218; by Senator Ingalls of clerk of com¬ 
mittee of District of Columbia, he appoints his 
own son, 215; of Vandervoort from R. R. mall 
service by P. M. Gen’l Gresham, 215, 216; of 
Roosevelt, civil service commisloner, possible, 
for watching interference of federal office-hold¬ 
ers in primaries at Baltimore, Md., 225,226. 250, 
311,312; plots for, of Harlow, postmaster at St. 
Louis, Mo., 226; of Ryder, criminal, appointed 
to Indian service, 226; of Eastman, supervising 
architect of Brooklyn. N. Y., for maladminis 
tration, 234; under Hathaway, postmaster in 
house of representatives, 242; and re-instate¬ 
ment of Sears. P. O. employe at Baltimore, 277; 
in violation of law, under Cleveland and 
Harrison, in Omaha, Neb., post-oflice, 281; 
of Pension Examiner Dr. Van Alstyne, through 
Postmaster Dunn, 304; of Squires, corrupt pub¬ 
lic officer, see Hill. 307; of Leaycraft by Gov. 
Flower, 332; of Milholland, federal employe, 
for political activity. 331, ,334; of W’imberly, in¬ 
ternal revenue collector in Mississippi for lot¬ 
tery connections, ,343. .348; of Erharat, collector 
atN. Y.City,3cO; of N. Y. R. R. Commissioner 
Spencer, 355; of Ewing. Prentice, from N. Y. 
health dept., by Tammany, .356; of P. C. -Mac- 
Court by Sec. W’indon, 54; of Sharp, postmaster 
at Leadhill, Ark , and Stevens, postmaster at 
Shushan, N.Y., 54;of Reuttler, Downing and 
Wigg. by Sec. Whitney, 147; of Tanner, com¬ 
missioner of pensions, 53; of Nat’l Hawthorne. 
46; of Flenniker. postmaster at Bradford, Pa., 
on protest of H. C. Frick, 99; of Terry, postmas¬ 
ter of Terryville, N. Y , for refusing to pay politi¬ 
cal assessments, 391; by Postmaster Thompson 
of Indianapolis, of Carrier Dunn, for soliciting 
political contributions, 403; of postmaster at 
Wyoming, Ill, for having been appointed 
through political intrigue, Hammond ap¬ 
pointed, 176. 

Reno, M. A., postmaster at Pontiac. Ill., removal 
demanded by Congressman Payson for “offen¬ 
sive partisanship,” 188. 

Rentfro, R. B., Harrison delegate to republican 
nat’l convention, appointed collector of cus¬ 
toms at Brownsville, Texas, 46, 159. 

Report to Pres. Harrison by Roosevelt on interfer¬ 
ence of federal office holders in primaries at 
Baltimore, 251. 2.55. 

Republicans in Indiana legislature oppose bill for 
non partisan control of state institutions, 201, 
202 , 414 . 

Republican clubs, league of. meeting at Cincinnati, 
election of Clarkson as president, 219. 

Rerick, J. H., editor, appointed postmaster at La 
Grange, Ind., 126. 

Resignations, forced in postal service, see National 
League, report of on presidential post-offices; 
under Clarkson, 149; in postal service. 164; cases 
and lists of. 165. 166. 216; of Erhardt, collector at 
N. Y'. City, Fassett appointed to make clean 
sweep, 2,55. 

Resolutions of republicans of 6th assembly district. 
N. Y. City against civil service reform. 49; 
passed at annual meeting. 1890. Indiana Civil 
Service Reform Association, 120; of National 
League at annual meeting, 1890, 172; of annual 
meeting. 1892, of National League on status of 
civil service reform, 321. 

Reutfie, A. B., collector at port of Brownsville, 
Tex., a political worker, 1-59. 

Reuttler, C. P., discharged by Sec’y Whitney from 
navy yard at Norfolk, Va., 147. 

Rebyburn, Congressman, and Quay, 280. 

Reynolds, U. S. dlst. att’y, political worker, and 
delegate to Minneapolis convention. 143. 346. 

Reynolds, Gen’l. postmaster of Rochester, N. Y., a 
political worker, 266. 


Rhea, M. A., journalist, postmaster at Altoona, 
Kan., 148. 

Rliiuehart, sherilT, 107; and Brigg’s cartage con¬ 
tract, ;!32. 

Rhode Island, senators and representatives of, 
secure appointment of Fay as postmaster at 
Newport, 150. 

Rhodes, S. R., journalist, postmaster at Gresham, 
Neb., 149. 

Rice, A. T., editor, office-holder, 14. 

Rice, F., sec’y of state for New Y’ork, worker for 
Hill, 309; enumeration of 1892, 317. 

Rice, G. A., post-office inspector, political worker, 
160. 

Rice, J. L., postmaster at Springfield, Mass., 
thoroughly efficient, removal desired. 87. 

Richards, D. J., editor, postmaster at Zanesville 
O., :!01. 

Richaids, S. T., postmaster in Clayton Co, la., a 
political worker, 260. 

Richardson, member of Maryland legislature, 
moves for repeal of civil service law. 96, 

Richardson. E. S., negro, R. R. mail employe, del¬ 
egate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Richardson, R. H., negro, postmaster at Wedge- 
field, S. C., delegate to Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 348. 

Richensteen, W., appointed postmaster at I.ong 
Island City, N. Y'., 54; letter to, from H. C. 
Johnson favoring civil service reform, 100. 

Richie, R. M., postmaster at Saratoga Springs, N. 
Y., a political worker, 266. 

Richmond, H. A., civil service reformer at Balt, 
conference, 1889 , 2; address before Y. M. A. of 
Buffalo, March 24,1889,16, 32, 67, 85, 172, 200; on 
Curtis, 394. 

Richmond. Ind., should have civ. service law ap¬ 
plied to local offices; Editor Jenklnson ap¬ 
pointed postmaster at, 126, .377; postmaster of 
is the local “party,” 183; works for Harrison, 
249. 

Richmond, Ind., Sunday Register (Rep.) opposes 
politicaLmethods of Frank Hatton, 76. 

Richmond, Va.. embezzler Russell appointed post¬ 
master at, 374. 

Ricker, C., and political assessments, 384. 

Rickets, C. H., see Cannon, 39. 

Ricketts, V. L., editor, advocates repeal oi civ. serv¬ 
ice law, is given office, 85, 86, 90, 213. 

Ridland. postmaster at Scottsburg, Ind., political 
worker, 144. 377. 

Riley, J., appointed to fire service at Indianapolis 
vice White, and Findliug removed under 
“equally divided politically” rule, 235,243. 

Riley. J. B.,’ chief examiner N. Y. civil service com¬ 
mission, removed by Tammany. 414. 

Riley, J. L., succeeded by O. P. Ensley as chief 
clerk in pension office (Indiana), 108. 

Rinewalt, A. L., journalist, postmaster at Williams- 
ville. N. Y., 155. 

Rio Janeiro, Consul-General Armstrong at, re¬ 
moved for political rea.sons. 54. 

Ritchie, D. F.. editor, appointed postmaster at Sar¬ 
atoga, N. Y., 126. 

Roark, N. S., and political assessments, see Ken¬ 
tucky. 

Roberts, A., postmaster of Addison, N. Y'., a politi¬ 
cal worker, 266. 

Roberts, E. 11., asst, treasurer, political worker, 
3.54. 

Roberts, P’. H., journalist, postmaster at Oskaloosa. 
Kan., 149. 

Roberts. G. M., political worker for Harrison, rela¬ 
tive of Collector Cravens, of Indiana. 379. 

Roberts. W. T., receiver of political assessments for 
Maryland. 391. 

Robertson, Utah commissioner, political worker at 
Minneapolis convention. 380. 

Robertson, Col., political worker for Hsrr'son, .302. 

Robertson,T. W.. employed in custom-house (N.Y.), 
political worker, 108. 

Robertson, secy, of navy, orders re-inttatement of 
thief Weeks, at request of Broudhead, at Kittery 
navy yard, 147. 

Robinson, postmaster at Concord, N. H., active 
politician. 143. 

Robinson, E. E., postmaster at Ithaca, N. Y’., a po¬ 
litical worker for Platt, 264. 

Robinson, H. C.. inspector in N. Y. custom-house, 
a political w'ovker, 108. 

Robinson. H. C , journalist, postmaster at Washing¬ 
ton, Kan., 149. 

Robinson. Ill., Editor Harper appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 141. 

Robinson. Congressman-elect, supported by Quay, 
280; supported by Collector Cooper to succeed 
Quay. 299. 

Robison, W. E., journalist, postmaster at Bealsville, 
Pa.. 149. 

Rochelle, Ill.. Postmaster Gardner of succeeded by 
Hartong, 109; Postmaster Hartong of works for 
Hitt, 186. 

Rochelle. 111., Herald, letter to regarding Congress¬ 
man Hitt’s course in the distribution of spoil, 

no. 

Rochester, N. Y.. Reynolds, postmaster of a politi¬ 
cal worker, 266; Tarbox, postmaster of a politi¬ 
cal worker. 280; state civil service law enforced 
in city service, Belknap case, 305; Hilllsm at, 
309. 

Rockford, Ill., applicants for positions in census 
service in district of, 104; Postmaster Lawler of, 
political worker for Congressman Hitt, 143. 







XXX 


INDEX. 


Rockhill, \V., postmaster at Areola, Ind., removed 
through Influence of Postmaster Higgins, Me- 
Google appointed, 302. 

Rockporc, III., removals in district of, 73. 

Rockport, 111., Register (repub ), on civil service 
reform, 92. 

Rockwell, Congressman, recommends re-appoint- 
ment oP democrat Harrington, postmaster at 
Monson, 188. 

Rodebaugh, representative in Indiana legislature, 
spoilsman, 406. 

Rodney, Miss., Postmaster Engharth of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 344. 

Rogers, postmaster of Huntington, Ind., at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 380. 

Rogers, R. J., political worker, appointed post¬ 
master, at Searcy, Ark., 186. 

Rogers, S. S., civil service reformer, 68,172,405; to 
examine management civil service, 77; report 
on congressional patronage to National League, 
113,114,115; on committee investigating patent 
office, report of, 139, 140, 141; upholds civil 
service law of New York, 161; on committee of 
National League, investigating presidential 
post-offices. 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 188: on com¬ 
mittee of Nat. League, reporting on removals on 
secret charges, 176, 176, 177; president Buffalo 
Civil Service Reform Association, address of, 
to citizens of Buffalo, 189, 200; urges extension 
of civil service law, 192; address of, before 
annual meeting National League, 1891, on ex¬ 
tension of classified service, 261. 275.277; on 
special committee of National League, investi¬ 
gating census service, 291, 295; request of, for 
information refused by P. O. department, 297; 
on G. W. Curtis, 394. 

Rogers City, Mich., Journalist Larke, postmaster 
at, 149. 

Roggen, E. P., candidate for postmaster at Lincoln, 
Neb., 72,108. 

Rokestraw, disreputable character, postmaster at 
Cheraw, S. Carolina, 65. 

Rollins, collector, and Eaves, 362. 

Rome, Ga., postmaster of, candidate lor congress, 
162. 

Ronner, J. H.V., deputy commissioner of street 
improvements, on Tammany methods, 234. 

Roosevelt, T., and Census Supt. Porter, see Civil 
Service Reformer; at Baltimore conference, 
1889, 2; appointed civil service commissioner 
by Harrison, 17, 86, 95 , 96, 103, 168, 174, 275, 405; 
investigates Indianapolis post-office and cen¬ 
sures its management, 28; applies to Sec. of the 
Treas. and stops Coulter’s proceedings, 34; and 
civil service reform association of Brookline, 
Mass., 36; on congressional patronage, 39; si¬ 
lences ridiculous arguments against civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 46; performances oi fill republicans 
with disgust, 49; abuse of,52; charges of against 
heads of pension and 6th auditor’s offices for re¬ 
movals for political reasons, 55; appointment of 
especially good, 59; address of before Boston and 
Cambridge civil service reform associations, 77; 
reasons for removal should be public; exami¬ 
nation questions under, 79; investigates office 
of Collector Cooper, of Philadelphia, 85; charges 
of Hatton against, Shidy case, 101; and Shidy 
case, 104; addresses Bloomington branch Indi¬ 
ana Civil Service Reform Association, 1890,108; 
before congressional committee. 119; reports 
favorably on Indianapolis post-office, 120; com¬ 
mended, 125,136; address of before civil serv. 
reform association of Maryland, 1890, on spoils 
in post offices, 132; and Postmaster Johnson, of 
Baltimore, 137; and Grosvenor, 146, 204_, 205, 
statement of before congressional committee; 
see also Grosvenor, 162; statement of as to scope 
of civil service reform, 172; address in Indiana, 
182; before select committee of house of repre¬ 
sentatives, 188; and Wanamaker, 190, 298; urges 
extension of civil service reform, see also “An 
Object Lesson in Civil Service Reform,’’in At¬ 
lantic Monthly, Feb., 1891,192; extract from ad¬ 
dress of before Commercial Club in Boston, 1890, 
on spoils “iniquity,” 194; Gorman defends 
Wanamaker against, 214; investigates interfer¬ 
ence of federal office-holders in primaries at 
Baltimore, Md., his removal possible, 225 , 226, 
254, 255, 261, 267, 268, 277, 278, 321, 322. 329, 330, 350, 
366, 372, 373; speech of at dinner to at Indianap¬ 
olis, list of assistants, and regrets, 227, 229, 230, 
231; invites 21st district republican association, 
of N. Y’. City to investigate civil service re¬ 
form as applied in N. Y. custom-house. 236; 
answers attacks of Gorman, Plumb and Stew¬ 
art, 2-50, 251: praised by Mr. Storey, 257; de¬ 
nies charges of favoritism on part of civil 
service commission, 266, 267; on work of the 
civil service commission, 273; thanked, 287; 
removal of, desired by politicians, 311, 312; in¬ 
formed of political activity of federal employes, 
3.34; against Wanamaker and Clarkson, 349 ; and 
Johnson, postmaster at Baltimore, 363, 372; and 
political assessments, 70.97, 161, 3.58, 375, 383, 385, 
.390,392; and duties of federal employes, 38.3,384; 
report of. 397; resignation of. would be a loss to 
reform, 398; on extensions of classified service, 
415. 

Root, G. A., Major, appointed postmaster at Lanark, 
Ill., through influence of Congressman Hitt, 
109,136. 

Rose, federal office-holder, political worker, 287. 

Rose, J. C., civil service reformer, at Baltimore 
conference, 1889, 2; on local examining board 


at Baltimore, 137, 186; investigates interference 
of federal office-holders at Baltimore, 226, 226, 
261; on committee of National League to inves¬ 
tigate interference of office-holders and politi¬ 
cal assessmeuts, 838. 

Rosecrans, Gen’l, proposes that congressmen have 
absolute control of offices, 85. 

Roseville, Ill., Editor Hebbard appointed postmas¬ 
ter at. 141. 

Ross, postmaster at Washington, D. C., transferred, 
15'>. 

Ross, M., editor of Indianapolis News, favors civil 
service reform, speech of at Roosevelt dinner, 
227,229,231,232. 

Rossing, L. A., postmaster at Bode, la., a political 
worker, 260. 

Rotation, in office in Indiana, 45: Jacksonian, 267. 

Rothwell.T., ex-alderman New York City, low pol¬ 
itician. 199. 

Royer, political worker, appointed Indian agent at 
Pine Ridge, 192,202; removed, seeks re-appoint¬ 
ment, 211, 217, 218. 

Royer, N., appointed postmaster at Noblesville, 
Ind., through influence of Cheadle, 47,89; polit¬ 
ical worker, 380. 

Rubens, fireman at Indianapolis, political worker 
for Trusler,208. 

Runnell, ward politician, seeking collectorship 
customs at Wilmington, N. C., 183. 

Rusk, Sec., gives R. G. Blaine an office, 108; and 
Quay, 118; telegram of to Prof. Nipher and re¬ 
ply, 244, 245; supposed telegram of to Prof. 
N ipher never sent, 253, 290,354. 

Russell. Jr., C. T., condemns Clarkson, 136. 

Russell, O. H., embezzler, appointed postmaster at 
Richmond, Va., 374. 

Rutherford, N. J., removal of Van Riper, postmas¬ 
ter of, on secret charges, 175. 

Ryan, efficient employe in R. R.mail service, pro¬ 
moted, 136. 

Ryan, U. S. minister to Mexico, political worker, 
382. 

Ryan, J. J., political worker, appointed police jus¬ 
tice by Mayor Grant, 184. 

Ryan, T., federal office-holder, returns home to 
vote, 162; removed for cause by Cleveland, re¬ 
appointed by Harrison, 79. 

Ryan, W. S., vice-president Kings Co., N. Y., central 
republican committee, 198, ,304. 

Ryder, W. D., convicted criminal, appointed to In¬ 
dian service, but removed, 226. 

Sage, S. L., journalist, postmaster at St. Lawrence, 
S. Dak., 155. 

Sahm, A., ward politician at Indianapolis, 315; ap¬ 
plicant for postmastership of Indianapolis, see 
Indianapolis Investigation, 411,412. 

Sale of offices, by defeated candidate Love of Mis¬ 
souri. testimony of sale, 32, 55,93,99; elsewhere, 
104,121; in police service of San Francisco, 215; 
under Tammany, 224, 225; in pension bureau, 
by G. B. Raum, Jr., 238. 

Salem, Ind., Ward, postmaster of, political worker, 
380. 

Saltonstall, collector at Boston applies civil service 
methods successfully, 71; correspondence with 
Windom and Harrison, removal of. 94; signs pe- 
tion for larger appropriation for civil serv. com., 
102; removal of through influence of Hoar and 
Dawes, senators. Beard appointed, 105, 129, 
168, 173, 179, 245, 282,367, 876. 

Samoan commission, relative of Harrison appoint¬ 
ed naval attache to, 369. 

San Antonio, Tex., Johnson, postmaster of, politi¬ 
cal worker, 159. 

San Carlos, Indian agency at, and Commissioner 
Oberly, 48. 

San Francisco, Cal., the “blind white devii of,” 28; 
police positions soidin by Bruner, 215: customs 
district of, classified 1883, 276. 

Sanders, Senator, patronage of, 160. 

Sandford, E., appointed by Cleveland chief justice 
of Dtah supreme court, removed for political 
reasons, 374. 

Sandwich (Mass.) democrat Shevlin reappointed 
postmaster at, 224. 

Sanford, congressman, helps Editor Ritchie to be 
postmaster at Sarataga, N. Y., 126; on house 
committee of civ. service, 86. 

Sangatuck, Mich., Journalist Wade, postmaster at, 
149. 

Saratoga, N. Y., Editor Ritchie appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, although opposed by Vice-Pres. Morton, 
126; Ritchie, postmaster of, a political worker, 
266. 

Saulcy, E., political worker, career of, 138; deputy 
collector at Indianapolis, 144; political worker 
in Indiana, 302, 353, 375, 377.379. 

Saunemin, Ill., Editor Brydia appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Sawyer, offered bribes for influence in behalf of 
candidate for Batavia, N. Y., postmastership, 
47. 

Sawyer, Senator, favorably disposed to office-seek¬ 
ers, 6; chairman sena'c committee on post- 
offices aids nomination of Harrison,364. 

Saxton, N. Y. state senator, calls on Fassett, col¬ 
lector at N. Y. City. 258. 

Saybrook, 111., Editor Mace appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Sayre, W. G., Indian land commissioner, federal 
office-holder, political worker for Harrison,-189, 
297, 316, a53, 378, 379, .389. 

Scanlan, J. F.,political worker, given office through 
Influence of Huston, 1.32. 


Scheusser, J. J., federal employee, in New York con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Schmester, R., employe in post-office at St. Louis, 
worker for Tilly machine, 150. 

Schmidt, F., custom-house deputy at Indianapolis 
political worker, 108, 144, 377. 

Scholar in Politics, see Roosevelt, dinner at Indian¬ 
apolis, 227, 229. 

Schultz, F., census supervisor 6th Indiana district, 
politician, 104. 

School and civil service reform, see Civ. S. Ref. 

Schrader, Jr., J., journalist, postmaster at La wrence- 
burg, Tenn., 155. 

Schreckengast, A. F., journalist, appointed census 
enumerator, 142. 

Schrieber, postmaster of Tell City, Ind., political 
worker, 380. 

Schuarte contest, 226. 

Schurz, Carl, an “imposter,” 49; Sec. of Interior 
under Arther, obtains reappointment of Miss 
Sweet, 107, 321; address of, favoring refoim 
methods, 396. 

Scott, C. T., appointed postmaster at Axbridge, 
Mass., vice Farnum removed on secret charges, 
175. 

Scott, J. N., brother-in law of Harrison, given of¬ 
fice. 21, 30, 369. 

Scott, Kan., Journalist Adams postmaster at, 149. 

Scott, N. B., member national republican commit¬ 
tee, ievies political assessments, .390. 

Scott, W. C., journalist, postmaster at Dalton 0., 
149. 

Scottsburgh, Ind., Postmaster Ridland of, com¬ 
pelled to aid Michener, 144; Ridland, postmas¬ 
ter of, political worker, 377. 

Scranton, Congressman, postmaster of Scranton, 
Pa., 101. 

Scranton, Pa., Hartley, P. O. employe at, under 
Postmasters Slocum and Connelly, 101; federal 
officer-holders political workers for Quay in 
convention at. 230. 

St'•uggs, J. P., deputy collector int. rev., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Scenlock, G. C., negro, Harrison delegate from N. 
Carolina, 334. 

Seaman, L. L., protests against removal of Milhol- 
land, as federal interference, 333. 

Searcy, Ark., Postmaster McCauley of, removed 
after four years’ service, second commission 
unexpired, Rogers appointed, 186,187. 

Sears, G. W., P. O. employe, see Baltimore investi¬ 
gation, removal oi, 277, 296. 

Secret charges, removal on, of McKenna, postmas¬ 
ter of Long Island City, N. Y., 175; removal of 
Wilson, postmaster at Chadron, Neb., on, 175; 
removal of Ratnour, postmaster at Weeping 
Water, Neb., on, Butler appointed, 175; remov¬ 
als upon, investigatian into by committee of 
National League 1890, 175, 176, 177; rules of post¬ 
al department on, as interpreted by Clarkson, 
176; should not be allowed, 415. 

Sedan, Ind., Crane, postmaster of, political worker. 
379, 380. 

Sedgwick, “Bob,” political worker for Woodruff, 
see Kings Co., N. Y. 

Sedgwick, J. R., journalist, postmaster at McDon¬ 
ald, Kan., 149. 

Sefrits, L. D., buys post-office at Washington, Dav¬ 
iess Co., Ind., 121. 

Senate, secret executive sessions of, see Foulke. 

Senate, patronage evil in, 72. 

Seneca, Co., N. Y., republican conveution of Aug., 
1891, factional fights in, 259, 260. 

Service,diplomatic, necessity for reform in,3; civil, 
federal, number of offices in, 10. 

Serviss, candidate for postmaster at Apple River, 
Jo Daviess Co., Ill., 109. 

Settle, widow of Judge, set aside through influence 
of Congressman Brower, 47. 

Settle, Judge, relations of in office, 47. 

Sewell, Gen’l, patronage of. 180, 386. 

Sexton, Colonel, aided by Senator Farwell for post¬ 
mastership of Chicago, 14; postmaster at Chi¬ 
cago, spoilsman, 22. 

Seymour (Ind.) Democrat, condemns opposition to 
Magee bill, see also Magee, 209. 

Shackleford, Gen’l, appointment of as judge in In¬ 
dian Territory, 240. 

Shaffer, J., pres, street railway company, is accused 
of bribing and Intimidating voters, 207. 

Shangreau, L., and Indian rising at Pine Ridge. S. 
Dak., 218. 

Shannon, postmaster,delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention. 344. 

Shannon, Ill., Editor Mastin appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Sharob, J. B., journalist, postmaster at Pierce, Neb., 
149. 

Sharp, postmaster of Ellettsville, Ind., political 
worker. 380. 

Sharp, H.E., convicted criminal, appointed post¬ 
master at Leadhlll, Arkansas. 39; removed, 54. 

Sharp, B. C., given office through influence of 
Judge Settle, his relative, 47. 

Sharpe, G. H., political worker for Platt and Hls- 
cock, given federal office, 265; anti-Platt work¬ 
er, 280; father of federal employe S. B. Sharpe, 
political w’orker for Harrison in New York, 336; 
federal employe, delegate to Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, ;148. 

Shaw, postmaster at Vevav, Ind., political worker, 
379. 








INDEX. 


XXXI 


Shaw, A. D., appointed deputy third-auditor of 
treasury for political services, 71,84; a political 
worker, 162, 269, 352, 353, 354, 363, 878, 379, 382. 

Shaw, E. O., journalist postmaster at Newaygo, 
Mich., 189. 

Shay, fire-chief at N. Y. City retired on pension, 
36. 

Shea, D., active politician appointed deputy of Col¬ 
lector Erhardt, 108; a political worker, 265, 331, 
343, 344. 

Shearman, congressman, opposed to civ. service 
reform, 49, 54,180. 

Shearman, J. G., and refusal of Cleveland while 
candidate to pledge spoil to Sheehan, 395. 

Sheehan, T. C., 317, 318. 


Sheehan, W. E., low politician of Buffalo, N. Y., 
196,197; speaker of N. Y. assembly and patron¬ 
age, 215; lieutenant-governor of New York, 
corrupt politicion. 310; and school patronage in 
New York, 318, 319; Cleveland refuses, while 
candidate, to pledge spoil to, 395; obtains sus¬ 
pension of civil service rules in, for benefit of 
workers, 414; and bill for municipal reform in 
Oswego, N. Y., 415. 

Shelbyville, Ind., Bone, postmaster at, removed on 
secret charges, 177. 

Shelbyville (Ind.) Republican (rep.), advocates 
civ. service reform, 76; on Magee bill for non¬ 
partisan control of state charitable institu¬ 
tions, 215. 

Sheldon, Iowa, Editor Piper appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Shelley, J. J., foreman on park board at New York 
City, defrauds Cole on pretense of selling of¬ 
fice, 224, 225. 


Shelley, W. F., dentist, appointed postmaster at 
New Castle, Ind., 132. 

Shepard, E. M., on examinations in character, 153. 

Shepard, W. J., address by. before Central Labor 
Union of Buffalo, on civ. service reform, 44; 
civil service reformer of Buffalo, N. Y.. 200. 

Shepardson, S. W., employe in railway mail ser¬ 
vice promoted, 136. 

Sheppard, J. T., federal employe, delegate to Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Sherer, Dr., in appraiser’s office at New York, re¬ 
moved on false charges, see “sugar frauds," 


203. 

Sheridan, Gen. G. A., patronage defeated republi¬ 
cans in Ohio, 75. 

Sheridan,!., saloon-keeper and fish protection at 
Lake Keuka, N. Y., 356. 

Sherman, Senator, spoilsman, 15,17; on evils of pa¬ 
tronage, 25, 67, 177; at war with Quay, 56: se 
cures appointment of Hopley postmaster at Bu- 
cyrus, O., 149; controls patronage of Ohio, 240, 
:M0; and election controversy of 1877 in Louisi¬ 
ana, accused of bribery, 241; obtains office for 
Smith, political worker. 249; re-election due to 
federal patronage, 297, 301. 302. 

Sherman, Mich., Journalist Wheeler postmaster at, 
149. 

Sherwood, H., promoted to be postmaster at Wash¬ 
ington, 153. 

Shevlin, J., democrat, reappointed postmaster at 
Sandwich, Mass., 224. 

Shidy, P. O. employe at Milwaukee, compelled by 
Postmaster Paul to manipulate records, testifies 
against Paul, removed by him, given another 
place by Roosevelt, 101,103. 

Shlel. R. R., works for Harrison at Minneapolis. 
343,379; candidate for office, aided by federal 
office-holders, 370. , 

Shipman, Judge, and removal of Bano, efficient P. 
O. inspector, 298. . 

Shlpsey, “Jake,” gambler, friend of police justice 
Divver, 184. 

Shivelev, Congressman, patronage of, 421. 

Shook. S., supports Lee for place in N.Y. custom¬ 


house, 259. , , J , 

ShortHills.N.J., Kessler, grocer, appointed post 
master of. vice Goodrich removed for political 
reasons. :386. 

Shore, tax-clerk, a political worker. 162. 

Shrayer, A. R., a political worker for Harrison, 200. 
Shryack. C. V.. editor, given office by Governor 
Foraker, 301. , 

Shushan N Y., Stevens, disreputable character, 
appointed postmaster at, through influence of 
Congressman Quackenbush, 32. 

Sickles, General, of N. Y. civil service commission, 
a friend to civil service reform , :34. 

Seiders. J. W., editor, appointed postmaster at Ply¬ 
mouth. Ind.. 126, 377. Oftl 

Sidney, Ohio, editor appointed postmaster at, 301. 
Sill, U. S. attorney, testifies to worth of Bario, P. 

b. insitector removed, 298. 

Sills, A. K., worker for Harrison, appointed swamp 
land agent, 30,377. . , j 

Simmonds, extension of civil service law advocated 


Simm^ons.’ J. E.. bank President, recommends 
“Paddy” Divver for police justice. 184. 

Simms, C., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 

Sim^nd, Congressman, civil service reformer, 91. 
Simonds. D. K., journalist, postmaster at Manches 

Sim^soiL postmaster at Lamb, Ind., political work 
Ar ^7^) 

Simpson, j.,aud Fassett, 258; requests patronage. 


311,312; federal employe, in New York conven¬ 
tion, 334. 

Sing Sing, N. Y., E. A. McAlpin appointed post¬ 
master at as reward for party services, 108; at 
convention of republican leagues, 259. 

Sinks, G. W., treas. state republican executive com¬ 
mittee, Ohio, and political assessments, 280. 

Sissel, Rev. G. A., opposes Harrison, wants offices 
for negroes, 244. 

Sitka, Alaska, Journalist Kenealy postmaster at, 
155. 

Sitting Bull, “kidnapping” of, 192. 

Skerritt, Commodore, opposes abuses in Kittery 
navy yard, 148. 

Slee, J. D. F., 259; accusses Fassett of corrupt po¬ 
litical methods, see also Chemung. N. Y.. 266. 

Sleicher, J. A., N. Y. civil service commissioner,at 
Minneapolis convention. 346. 354. 

“ Slick Six,” in Indianapolis, 230. 

Sloan, S. C., on inefficient census enumeration in 
N. Y. City, 294. 

Small, J. K., federal employe, delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention, 348. 

Smalls, Robert, convicted criminal appointed by 
Harrison, 39. 

Smethport, Pa.. Postmaster Kerns of, worker for 
Delamater, 134. 

Smith, buys office in pension bureau from G. B. 
Raum, Jr., secures promotion by fraud, 2,38. 

Smith, politician, succeeding Miss Moody, 39. 

Smith, representative in Indiana legislature, op¬ 
poses spoils methods in, 407. 

Smith, postmaster at Laurel, Del., attempts brib¬ 
ery, 397, 401, 402. 

Smith, Alderman, of Indianapolis, spoilsman and 
low politician, 207. 

Smith, A., ex-mayorof Cincinnati,office-seeker, 24; 
customs collector at Cincinnati, through influ¬ 
ence of Sherman, works for, 249; political work¬ 
er in Ohio, 336. 

Smith, A. A., editor and politician, appointed post¬ 
master at Ogdensburg, N. Y., vice Baird, re¬ 
moved, 126. 

Smith, A. G.. attorney-gen’l of Indiana, spoilsman, 
315, 355. 

Smith, B. W , uses influence for appointment of 
Throop, 59; applicant for postmastership at La¬ 
fayette, Ind., 84; postmaster at La Fayette. Ind., 
aids Michener and La Follette, 144; a political 
worker, 153, 158, 316, 339, 342, 377, 379. 

Smith, C , son of federal officer, favorite of Platt at 
convention republican league, 259. 


Smith, C. E., candidate of Sen. Hiscock for post¬ 
master at Syracuse, 46; editor, appointed post¬ 
master at Syracuse, N. Y., vice editor removed, 
moved, 81; a political worker, 266, 335, 347, .386. 

Smith, C. E., editor, appointed minister to Russia, 
100, 133; worker at Minneapolis convention, 382. 

Smith, D., naval officer, on board applicants for po¬ 
sitions in navy yard at Brooklyn, N. Y., 222. 

Smith, E , postmaster at Carrollton, Ill., removed 
through influence of Senator Cullom, 188. 

Smith. E. M., and political assessments in Alabama, 
.391. 

Smith, F. 0., editor, appointed deputy collector at 
St. Albans, 126. 

Smith, G. A., political boss in Brooklyn, N. Y., ac¬ 
cepts bribes, 106. 

Smith, G. W., congressman, forces resignation of 
Andrews, postmaster at Murphrysboro, 111.. 165. 

Smith, H. C.. successful competitor, given office, 
1884, removed by Auditor coulter, 45. 

Smith, J. C. H., federal employe, worker for Harri¬ 
son, 334. 

Smith, J. E., naval office employe in N. Y. con¬ 
vention, 335. 

Smith,!. E., U. S. asst.dlst. atty. in New York, a po¬ 
litical worker, 265. 

Smith, J. G.. journalist, postmaster at Cunningham, 
Kan., 149. 

Smith, S.B., anti-Platt republican, police justice 
aud ward politician, see N. Y. City, 198, 199. 

Smith, S. E., negro, P. O. clerk delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 348. 

Smith. S.F.. editor, appointed postmaster at En¬ 
cinitas. Cal., 141. ~ 1 XT 

Smith, T. G., civil service reformer of Buffalo, N. 
Y., 200; on Curtis, 394. 

Smith, W. H., federal officer, delegate to Minneap¬ 
olis convention. 348. 

Smith, Dr. W. M., health oflicer of portof New \ork, 
favorite of Platt, 259. „ tt 

Smlthfield, O., father of Journalist H. Harrison 
postmaster at, 149. 

Smithland, Iowa, Journalist Hills appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Smock, F. M., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Keota. Iowa, 142. „ ,, 

Smyth, Recorder, recommends “Paddy Divver 
for police justice, 184. 

Smyth, A. W ,supt. New Orleans mint, pays politi¬ 
cal assessments, 383. 


Smyth, W.. editor, appointed postmaster at Oswe¬ 
go, N.Y., 71. . , 

Sniythe.supt.of New Orleans mint, political work¬ 
er, 304. , 

Snyder. H. R., journalist, postmaster at Waverly, 
O., 149. , . T .1. 

Soale, W , politician, census supervisor, 4th Indi¬ 
ana district, spoilsman, 104.131,182. 

“Solid South,” vote of for Harrison and others at 
Minneapolis, 347. ,, , , , 

Sortwell, federal officer, political worker, 379. 


South Bend, Ind., Postmaster Crockett of, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 153, 158, 316, 377, 378. 

South Bend, Ind., Times (rep.), against repeal ol 
civil service law, 83. 

S. Carolina, political activity of federal officers in, 
347, 348, 382, 390. 

South Dakota, political assessments in Indian serv¬ 
ice in, .384, 385. 

South Hadley Falls, Mass., democrat Kirkpatrick 
nominated, see Wallace and Harrison, 157. 

Spalding appointed postmaster at Champaign, Ill., 
through Influence of Priv. Sec. Halford, 38. 

Sparta, Ill.,Editor Taylor appointed postmaster at, 
141. 

Spatz, Louis, inspector in N. Y. custom-house, po¬ 
litical worker, 108. 

Speare, appointed postmaster at Quincy, Mass., by 
Cleveland, removal of sought by Morse, 86; re¬ 
moved, 100. 

Speed, H.,U. S. dis. atty., works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis convention, 346. 

Spencer, T. W., N. Y. state R. R. inspector, asked to 
resign, 355, .356. 

Spencer, W. Va., Journalist Flinn postmaster at, 
155. 

Spencerville, Ind., Proner postmaster of, political 
worker. 379, 380. 

Sperry, postmaster at New Haven, Conn., civ. serv¬ 
ice reformer, 91, 258; testifies to worth of Bario, 
removed P. O. inspector, 298. 

Spldle, J., journalist, postmaster at Wilmot, O., 
149. 

Spinola, congressman, against civil service re¬ 
form, 122, 125. 

Spirely, L. M., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Kingston, Mo., through influence of Filley, 
132. 

Spoils system for paying the workers in this coun¬ 
try and England, 19; evils of, see Lincoln; evils 
of. Pres. W. H. Harrison on, 36: opposed by 
Thomas Jefferson, 46; evils of, see Strong, Rev. 
S.,102; evilsof, see Senator Sherman, also Houk, 
177. 

Spooner, senator of Wisconsin, obtains appoint¬ 
ment of Bro. R. Spooner’ as consul at Prague, 
30,354. 

Spooner, H.L., journalist, postmaster at Brookfield, 
N.Y.,155. 

Spooner, R., appointed consul at Prague through 
influence of Sen. Spooner, 30. 

Sprague, E. C., address of before annual meeting of 
National League noticed, 269. 

Sprague, H. H., at Balt. Conference, 1889, 2; signs 
petition for larger appropriation for civil serv. 
com., 102.172; speech of on Roosevelt. 415. 

Sprague, H. L., ward politician, see also New York 
City. 241. 242. 

Spring Valley, O., wife of Journalist Hale postmas¬ 
ter at, 149. 

Springer, Congressman, and star route scandals, 
291. 

Springfield, Mass., case of Postmaster Rice, 87. 

Squire, R. M.. corrupt commissioner of public 
works, N. Y. City, see Hill. 306, 307. 

St. Charles, Iowa, Editor Wood appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 142. 

St. Clairsville, 0., Editor Hunt appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 301, 

St. Genevieve, Mo., Editor Ernst appointed post¬ 
master at. 126. 

St. George, W. Va., Lipscomb, son of journalist, 
postmaster at, 155. 

St. Joe Station. Ind., Postmaster Abies of, political 
worker, 379, 380. 

St. Joseph, Mo., political assessments of P. O. em¬ 
ployes at. 383. 

St. Lawrence, S. Dak., Journalist Sage postmaster 
at, 155. 

St. Louis, disposal of patronage at, see Kerens: ap¬ 
plicants for postmastership of. 24; J. B. Harlow 
appointed postmaster of. 88.131; introduces re¬ 
form methods 136; plots to remove, 226; negro 
politicians of demand spoil. 146; post-office em¬ 
ployes at supporters of Filley machine, 1.50: 
custom-house at not classified, number of em¬ 
ployes in, 277; census service in. inefficient, 
295; Postmaster Harlow of ordered to giveoflice 
to political worker Rundstadtler, federal pa¬ 
tronage is used for Harrison’s renomination, 
304. 

St. Louis Globe-Democrat (rep.), patronage brings 
weakness, 76: on repeal civ. service law. 92. 

St. Louis Republic (dem.) favors good administra¬ 
tion, 51: considers civil service reform as of 
prime importance. 59; on lesson of Garfield’s 
assassination. 129: advocates civil service re¬ 
form. 138; on Filley machine. 1.50. 

St. Paul Pioneer-Press (repub.), civ. service reform 
not abandoned, 65; favors civil service reform, 
accountability of Harrison. 75. 

Stacy, postmaster at Albert Lea, Minn., removed 
for political reasons, 39. 

Stamp. A. H., federal employe, a.sked to pay politi¬ 
cal assessments. 391, 392. 

Stanberrv, Mo., fight over postmastership at, 121. 

“Star Route” ring, 28; scandals and Elkins, 290, 369, 
374. 

Starr, collector, political worker in Illinois, .3,35. 

Staubach, J. B., on merit system in post-office at 
Cincinnati, O., 2-57. 

Stearns, appraiser in Boston custom-house re¬ 
moved through rongressman Cogswell, Dodge 
appointed, 250, 288. 





xxxii 


Stearns, J. T., custom-house auctioneer, in New 
York convention, 335. 

Steele, Congressman, given controlof patronage by 
Harrison, 240. 

Steele, G., at Minneapolis convention, 340. 

Steele, Richard, in the Tattler, on absurdities of 
English spoils system, see Curtis, T20. 

Steele, VV. T., governor of Oklahoma, political 
worker for Harrison. 180, 378. 

Stemen, pension examiner in Indiana, political 
worker, ;580. 

Stepp, J. M., postmaster at Glen Hall, Ind., “re¬ 
signs,” 140. 

Sternberg, worker for Murphy, gets office through 
suspension of civil service rules in New York, 
411. 

Steuben, Ind., Republican [repub.], advocates 
civ. service reform, TO. 

Stevens, postmaster of Peru, Ind., political worker, 
379. 

Stevens, postmaster atShusbau, N.Y., removed, ,54. 

Stevens, E. N., editor, appointed postmaster at Pax¬ 
ton, Ill, 126. 

Stevens, J. L., journalist, postmaster at Plainview, 
Neb., 149. 

Stevens, W. H , employe In custom-house at St. 
Louis, Mo., worker for Eilley machine, 150 

Stevens, W. J., opposes Harrison in Alabama, 346; 
republican politician in Alabama, charges po¬ 
litical activity of federal office-holders in, 855. 

Stevenson, Congressman, on house committee, on 
civil service, 86. 

Stevenson, A. E., as presidential possibility, 235; 
ass’t P. M. gen’l under Cleveland, spoilsman, 
255, :550, 375, 376, 386, 108; democratic candidate 
for vice-president, 1892, .349; and Knights of the 
Golden (Urcle, 381. 389; vice-president elect, 388. 

Stevenson, R. B., endeavors to levy political assess¬ 
ments in Indian service in Kansas. .385. 

Stewart, senator of New York, and Fassett, collector 
at N. Y. City, 258. 

Stewart, Senator, attacks civil service commission, 
250.251. 

Stewart, D. F., postmaster at Wilmington, Del., po¬ 
litical worker, 334. 

Stewart. H., resignation of as postmaster at Mun- 
roeville, Ind., given office in Washington. 88. 

Stieb, P., employed in New York custom-house, a 
political worker. 108. 

Stimsou. Dr. D. M., resigns from N. Y. City health 
dept., because it becomes political machine, 
3-5(>. 

Stiuson, W. D., nephew of Mrs. Blaine, appointed 
postmaster at Augusta. Me., 321. 

Stockbridge. Congre.ssman, controls post-office at 
Baltimore, Md., 84. 

Stockbridge, Senator, in Michigan convention, 335; 
supporter of Blaine, 341. 345. 

Stocking, S. W., promoted in ptteiit office, efficient, 
140. 

Stockton, A. R , republican politician and post¬ 
mastership at Stanberry, Mo., 121. 

Stoddard, inspector in postal service, and removal 
of Farnum on secret charges. 175. 

Stokely. mayor, and Martin, disreputable politi¬ 
cian of Philadelphia. 233. 

Stokelv, S., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
331'. 

Stone, congressman, on house committee on civ. 
service, 86. 

Stone, collector and appointment of O’Donnell, 60. 

Stone, supporters of, bought by Delamater, i:i4. 

Stoue. C.W., and pardon of PetrofT and Kemble, 
1-52. 

Scone, F. C., internal rev. collector in Michigan, 
political worker. 390. 

Stone, Editor J. B., appointed collector internal rev¬ 
enue first Michigan district 30. 

Stone. Dr. R.F., pension examiner, remo\ ed. Dr. 
Elbert, negro, appointed, 192. 

Storer, ex-reprcsentati ve. oiiposcd to Congressman 
Hitt, 109. 

Storey, M., praises Civil Service Chronicle, 110 ; 
on responsibility, 219; on Roosevelt clvil serv. 
ice reform, 257; on divorce of municipal busi¬ 
ness from politics, 261, 233. 286; on committee of 
National League to investigate political inter¬ 
ference of office-holders. 3:!S: chairman com¬ 
mittee Nat. League investigating politicuil ac¬ 
tivity of federal office-holders under Harrison, 
report to by L. B. Swift, 375-381. 

Story City, Iowa, Editor Peterson appointed post¬ 
master at, 142. 

Stoufer, A. K., journalist, postmaster at Arkalon, 
Kan., 148. 

Stover, representative In Indiana legislature, and 
spoils methods in, 407. 

Stratton, S. R., pres. Pa. republican ass’n, advo¬ 
cates clean sweep, 49; and office-seekers. 88; 
advocates political assessments and intimida¬ 
tion,178. 179. 

Strawbery Point, la , Postmaster Keith of, removed, 
see Clarkson, .55. 

Strong, M.. negro, unable to read or write, appoint¬ 
ed postmaster at Delmar, Ala., 47. 

Strong, Rev. Sidney, on evils of spoils system, 102. 

Strouser, I. R., compares Cleveland and Harrison, 
364. 

Strouther. P. W., deputy int. rev. coll., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention,318. 

Struble, I, S., congressman, forces resignation of 
Jasper, postmaster at Kingsley, la., 165. 


INDEX. 


Stuart, P. 0. inspector, at Minneapolis convention, 
344. 

Stuart, Iowa,Editor Moulton appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Stuart, R. S., inspector, dismissed of, 17. 

Studebaker, E. H., requested by R. Harrison to 
persuade Blaine delegate to vote for Harrison, 
337. 

Sturgis. O. T., editor, endorsed by Sen. Quay for 
postmaster at Uniontown. Pa., 99. 

Stutesman. auditing att’y at Peru, Ind., at Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 379. 

Suffall, veteran, efficient postmaster at Freedom, 
Ind., removed for political reasons. Watts ap¬ 
pointed through Influence of Michener, 112, 
377. 

“Sugar frauds,” at New York, false charges against 
Dr. Sherer, in appraiser’s office at, 203. 

Sullivan, Ind., applicants for postmastership at, 88; 
Editor Clugage appointed postmaster at, 108, 
126, 377. 

Sullivan, J. E., county clerk of Marlon Co , Ind., 
embezzels county funds, see Indianapolis. 

Sullivan. J. N,, appointed postmaster at Berne, 
Ind., removed, 88. 

Sullivan, T., mayor of Indianapolis, should insti¬ 
tute civil service reform methods in city offices, 
as in Boston, Buffalo and Brooklyn, see equal¬ 
ly divided politically, 220; should introduce 
merit system in city service, 235; can at will 
apply merit system to every city department, 
243; elected twice by independent votes, 209. 

Sulzer, M. L., special Indian agent, worker for Har¬ 
rison, 316; opposed to Harrison, bribed with of¬ 
fice, 377; political worker,389. 

Sultzer, deputy U. S. marshal, collects political as¬ 
sessments, 372. 

Sunbright, Tenn., Journalist Dunning postmaster 
at, 155. 

Sunner, J. H.. deputy collector at N. Y. City, at 
Minneapolis convention, 343. 

Suspension Bridge, N. Y., Low, customs collector 
at, a political worker, 265 ; custom-house at not 
classified, number of employes in, 277. 

Sutton, John, politician, appointed to look after 
office seekers, 46. 

Sylvanus, P. O. employe, political worker, in Dela 
ware, 334. 

Syracuse, N. Y., candidates for postmastership at, 
incumbent favored by Belden, 46; editor ap¬ 
pointed postmaster at by Pres. Cleveland, 71; 
per cent of removals in classified and unclassi¬ 
fied service in post-office at. 185; Editor Smith, 
postmaster of, a political worker, 266, 335, 347, 
•,iS6. 

Syracuse, N. Y., Standard (repub.), on civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 92. 

Swain, councilman of Indianapolis,spoilsman and 
low politician, 207. 

Swalm, A W.. editor, postmaster in Mahaska Co., 
la., a political worker, 260. 

Swariout. ex-collector of port of New York, spoils¬ 
man. 272. 

Swayzee, G. S., employe in custom house at New 
Orleans, works for lottery, 143. 

Sweeney, Congressman, and post-office at Clear 
Lake, la., 121. 

Sweeney, State Senator of Indiana, votes against 
bill for non-partisan control of state charitable 
institutions, 201, 212; spoilsman, 408. 

Sweet, Miss, pension agent at Chicago, re-appoint¬ 
ed, Commissioner Black attempts to remove, 
serves full term, Mrs. Mulligan succeeds, 107. 

Sweet, E. R., removal of, 88. 

Sweet, W. L., political worker for Platt, 259, 260. 

Sweetland, H.. negro, councilman and low politi¬ 
cian of Indianapolis, 207. 

Swift, H.P., wins prize offered by Wanamaker in 
R. R. service, 415. 

Swift, J. L . journalist, given office by Collector 
Beard, 108; a political worker, 179. 

Swift, L. B , at Baltimore conference, 1889 . 2; let 
ter of Nov. 28,1888, to editor Civil S. Record, 
necessity for reform associations to be alert. 5; 
address of, before annual meeting Indiana 
Civil Service Reform Assoc., 108; address oL on 
civil service reform, 1.37; address of. on “gift of 
offices,” 145; on all other reforms should be 
subordinated to civil service reform, 153; ad¬ 
dress before annual meeting National League 
1890, 170.171, 172; letter to, from Roosevelt, re¬ 
futing charges of favoritism on part of civil 
service commission, 266, 267; address of, before 
annual meeting National League, noticed. 269; 
on committee of Nat. League Investigating po¬ 
litical assessments, and political interference of 
federal office-holders, 338; on committee of 
Nat. League, to investigate political activity of 
federal office-holders under Harrison, report of, 
375-381. 

Tackett, M. D.. appointed special land agent in re¬ 
ward for political services. 234. 377. 

Taft, editor, worker for Sherman, brother of U. S. 
solicitor-general, 301. 

Taggart. T.. ward politician at Indianapolis. 315; 
chairman Indiana state democratic committee, 
on Gray, 396; patronage of. 400. 401; chairman 
Indiana state democratic committee. 407. 

Taggart. \V. G., postmaster of Newburg, N. 5',, po¬ 
litical worker for Platt, 260. 

Tait. J. H., journalist, postmaster at - Goodland, 
Kan., 119. 


Talladega, Ala., postmaster of removed for politi¬ 
cal reasons, protectionist democrat appointed, 
186. 

Tallentire, fire-foreman at Indianapolis, a political 
worker, 208. 

“Tally-sheet” frauds at Indianapolis, see Indianap¬ 
olis. 

Tama, Iowa, Editor Wonser appointed postmaster 
at, 142. 

Tammany Hall, see Feudalism revived: opposed to 
civil service reform, 128; rule of in New York 
City, 130, 230, 262 , 274, 298, 311, 313, 314; controls 
patronage of Brooklyn navy yard, under Sec’y 
Whitney, 148; political assessments levied by, 
estimates of, 183,184; uses “pass” examinations, 
192; primaries of and republican primaries, 198, 
199; supported by Gorman, 214; continued ex¬ 
posure of evils of, will defeat, 219; methods of, 
224,225,234; R. Croker “boss” of, and McLaugh¬ 
lin, 245,309; rules New York, 28;J, 284; and Platt, 
288; corrupting influences of, 289, 290; of Cin¬ 
cinnati, O., opposes Sherman. 297; defended by 

R. Croker, 305, 323; evils of rule of,317, 320, 333, 
856, 385, 390; and nomination of Stevenson. 349; 
and N. Y. republican machine, 352; andN.Y. 
City, streets, 857; allied with Platt, 376; fears of 
under Cleveland, 388; and appointment of Mrs. 
Maloney as police matron, 404; need of civil 
service reform paper to oppose, 414. 

Tampa, Fla., Editor Cooper appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Tanner, “Corporal,” appointed by Pres. Harrison as 
superintendent of pensions, 27; appoints his 
daughter his private sec., 88; spoilsman, 51; 
removals by, for political reasons, 53, 54. 

Tanner, J., U. S. sub treasurer, political worker in 
Illinois, 335. 

Tanner, J., asst, treasurer, at Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, 344. 

Tansel, A., journalist, postmaster at Haddam, Kan., 
149. 

Tafley, Wm. B., journalist, postmaster at Frankfort, 

S. Dak., 155. 

Taffer, police commissioner of N. Y. City, Tam¬ 
many tool, 856. 

Tarbox, postmaster at Rochester, N. Y., a political 
worker, 280. 

Tarleton, T. P., dep. col. int. rev., delegate to Jlin- 
neapolis convention, 348. 

Tarrow, chief of division, removed for political 
reasons by Coulter, 55. 

Tate, confesses to accepting bribes, 151. 

Taylor, river commissioner, at Minneapolis con¬ 
vention, 379, 380. 

Taylor, Judge, political worker for Harrison, 302, 
343. 

Taylor, (Illinois) Congressman, and Chicago post- 
office, 22. 

Taylor (Ohio), congressman of Ohio, opposed to 
civil service reform system. !}5, 49; congressman 
and office-seeker in Ohio, 75. 

Taylor (Indiana), congressman, patronage of, 419, 
421. 

Taylor, Col., special treasury agent, active politi¬ 
cal worker. 108. 

Taylor, D. D., editor,brother of postmaster at Cam¬ 
bridge, O., 301. 

Taylor, H. A., editorandpolitician, appointed com¬ 
missioner of railroads, 39, 108. 

Taylor, S. J.,editor, appointed postmaster at Sparta, 
Ill., 141. 

Tell City, Ind., Schrieber postmaster of, political 
worker, 380. 

Teller, Senator, supporter of Blaine, 344, 346. 

Tennessee, appointees to Indian service from, under 
Cleveland, 219; political activity of federal 
office-holders in, :J37, 339, 846, 347. 

Tenure law for four years, condemned by National 
League, 321. 

Terre Haute, Ind., Manson, efficient collector at, 
removed by Harrison, 'Throop appointed, .59; 
should have civil service law applied to local 
offices, 85; Greiner postmaster of, political 
worker, 153, 1-58, 816, 342, 343, 846, .377, 378, 379; 
Congressman Brookshire allows Voorhees to 
name postmaster of, 405. 

Terre Haute Mail [repub.], opposed to spoils sys¬ 
tem , 83. 

Terrell, asst. U. S. attorney in Texas, a political 
worker, 159. 

Terrell, E. H., minister to Belgium, 14; 

Terry, P. E., postmaster at Terryville N. Y.. re¬ 
moved for refusing to pay political assessments, 
391. 

Terry. S. S., on committee investigating N. Y. City 
civil service. 319, 320. 

Terryville, N. Y., Terry, postmaster of, removed 
for refusing to pay political assessments, 391. 

Tests, competitive, objections to, 26. 

Texas, republicans of, headed by Customs Collector 
Cuney, 150; patronage of given to Collector 
Cuney, factions of, 1.58.159.173; political activltv 
of federal officers in, 345, 346, 847, 348; political 
assessments in, !{S3. 

Tbalman.low politician, councilman, and Indpls. 
fire department, 13; spoilsman, 69, 207. 

Theopolis, R . federal office holder and political 
worker, 179. 

Thienie, A. B.,census enumerator on Inefficiency of 
the service. 294. 

Thomas, U. S. marshal, a political worker,bargains 
with Karr, 160. 









INDEX. 


xxxiii 


Thomas, state senator of Penn., political worker for 
(iuay, 280. 

Thomas, and Cleveland administration, 25, 51. 

Thomas, A. C., librarian of Haverford College, letter 
01,412, 422. 

Thomas, B. F , journalist, postmaster at Wymore, 
Neb., 149. 

Thomas, T. F., P. ©.employe at Baltimore, political 
worker, 267, 296, 035. 

Thomas, M. A., low politician, appointed Indian 
agent through influence of Gorman, 237. 

Thomas, S., levies political assessments in New 
York, 391, 392. 

Thomas, W. C., journalist, postmaster at Osseo, 
Wis., 1-55. 

Thompson, controller at Philadelphia, makes re¬ 
movals for political reasons, 239. 

Thompson, secy, of state for New Hampshire, 143. 

Thompson, threatens ollice-holders, 55. 

Thompson, Dr., state .senator, advocate of spoils 
system in state charitable institutions of Indi¬ 
ana, opposes new charter lot Indianapolis, see, 
also, Magee, 201,212. 

Thompson, E. P., asst, postmaster at Indpls., rein¬ 
stated,9; and Moore,25; tries to securespecial ex¬ 
amination, 26; and fraudulent appointments of 
Wheat and Tou8ey,28; recommends Van Buren. 
spoilsman, for local civil service board, asks 
for special examination, 34; acting postmaster 
at Indianapolis, favors civil service reform, 227, 
229; promoted to be postmaster, consequent 
promotions, 235; political worker; and subor¬ 
dinates, work for Harrison at Minneapolis, 337, 
:$43; attempt to coerce by Merrill Moores, small 
republican boss, 366; .political worker, 302, 316, 
320,378,379,:$S2; removescarrier Dunn for solicit¬ 
ing political contributions, 403. 

Thompson, H. S., civil service commissioner ap¬ 
pointed by President Harrison, 17; and political 
assessments, 70; and Shidy case, 101; before 
congressional committee, 119; commended, 
12^5; resigns, 322; and Attorney-General Miller, 
330, 372. 

Thompson, O., postmaster in Winneshiek Co., la., 
a political worker, 260. 

Thornton, B., negro detective, used for Harrison at 
Minneapolis convention, 345. 

Thornton, G. E., day director in navy causes un¬ 
warranted removal of Carpenter, postmaster at 
New Bedford, Mass., 175, 176. 

Thockmorton, D. I., candidate for postmaster of La 
Fayette, Ind., 71, 84. 

Throop, J. P., appointment of, condemned, 51; po¬ 
litical worker, appointed collector internal rev¬ 
enue, 59; political worker, 362,380. 

Thurber. F. B., recommends “Paddy” Dlvver for 
police justice, 184. 

Thurston, J. M., president league of republican 
clubs, speaks in favor of civil service reform, 
219. 

Tice, F., appointed postmaster at Mt. Morris, Ill., 
see Hitt, 109. 

Tichner, postmaster of Princeton, Ind., political 
worker. 316, 378. 

Tilden, Governor of New York, exposes Chemung 
canal robbery, see Hill, 306; civil service re¬ 
form a democratic principle under, 397. 

Tilton, R. L., postmaster in Wapello Co., Iowa, a 
political worker, 260. 

“Tin Horns,” low republican politicians, see Indi¬ 
anapolis, corrupt politics, etc., at. 

Tlndolph, postmaster of Vincennes, Ind., at Min¬ 
neapolis convention, 380. 

Tippecanoe Club, of Baltimore, resolutions of, de¬ 
nounce civil service reform and the commis¬ 
sion. 49. 

Tissue Ballot System, in the South, 29. 

Tittman, Prof., of U. S. coast survey, in “ sugar 
frauds” investigation, 203. 

Todd, J. S., removed on suspicion of being disloyal 
to Harrison, 300. 

Toland, G. R., postmaster at Asbury Park, N. Y., 
under Cleveland, 386. 

Toledo, Ill., Editor Conner appointed postmaster 
at. 141. 

Toledo Blade (rep.), spoilsmen must go 92. 

Tolona. Ill., Editor Chapin appointed postmaster 
at, 141. 

Tomblin, Al., opposes appointment of Williams as 

postmaster at Stanberry, Mo., 121. 

Tomlinson, D. W., recommended by Owen for 
postmaster of Logan sport, Ind., 88; postmaster 
of Logansport, Ind., a political worker, 153, 158, 
260, 377. 

Tompkins, case of, 94. 

Toomey, M.. ward politician, .see Indianapolis, 196. 

Tousey. W. E.. ward politician, not on eligible list, 
re-instated in Indianapolis post-office after ab¬ 
sence of years. 26, 27; dismissed by civil service 
commission, 34. . 

Tousey, same, alderman of Indianapolis, spoils¬ 
man and low politician. 207. 

Towner, R. B., and Flower, 287 

Townsend, congressman, nomination secureu ny 
bribery, 151. . 

Tracy, congressman, and civil service law, 122 ; on 
civil service failures of Harrison, favors civil 
service law. 125. ,. . . , ,,, 

Tracy, U. S. marshal, active politician, 143. 

Tracy, sec. of navy, and offices in Brooklyn navy- 
yard, 55; and repairs at Norfolk navy-yard, 56; 
recommends Captain Folger to succeed Com | 
Slcard, 100; favors W. G. Taylor, 135; course of 


in Brooklyn navy-yard, 142; opposes Nathan, 
ward politician, 143; gives navy-yards up as 
spoils, see Kittery, 145; and spoils system in 
navy-yard at Portsmouth, N. H. (Kittery), 148; 
conduct of in Brooklyn, Kittery, Norfolk and 
Charleston navy-yards. 153, 170; Introduces re¬ 
form methods in navy-yards, commends civil 
service law, 219, 221, 222, 274, 276. 298, 306, 321, 
372, 376; holds Feaster responsible for ba<l 
work by henchmen at Mare Island navy-yard, 
226; introduces merit system In navy-yards, 
230, 236, 238, 251; should institute examina¬ 
tions under civil service commission for pro¬ 
motions in navy department, 2.54, 257; com¬ 
mended, 287, 290; and removals for political 
reasons in navy yards, 34; on improvements in 
navy yard management, 326; supports Rhine- 
hart, 332; removes supporters of Platt, 334; po¬ 
litical worker for Harrison In New York, 336, 
339, 347; “placates” Platt, 353; removes Page, 
chief of ordnance dept, in Brooklyn navy yard, 
355; introduces Boston labor system in navy 
yards, :!57; and Nathan, 371. 

Traitteur, treasurer inspector, pays political assess¬ 
ments, 279. 

Treadwell, W. S., sec’y Kings Co., N. Y., central re¬ 
publican committee, worker for Nathan, 198, 
304. 


Treasury department, offices in, 24; removals of la¬ 
borers in,29; examinations for, see'DeLand, 
1.52; employes under supervising architect of, 
selected by civil service examinations, though 
not required by law, 224. 

Trevelyan, Sir G. 0-. on competitive tests in En¬ 
glish civil and military service, 118. 

Treynor, I. M., postmaster at Council Bluffs, la., a 
political worker, 260. 

Tripp, editor, son of appointed postmaster at Car¬ 
rollton, O., 301. 

Tripp, T. H., supporter of Platt in N. Y. conven¬ 
tion, ;i35. 

Tripp, O.H., works for Harrison at Minneapolis, 
343, 379. 

Trollope, A., opposed to merit system of England, 
227. 

Trollington, J. H., postmaster at Palo Pinto, Mo., 
buys office, 55. 

Troy, Ind., Gardiner, postmaster of, political work¬ 
er, 380. 

Troy, N. Y., post-office at, investigated by civil serv. 
com., spoils system in, 29. 

True, T. W., postmaster at Eureka Springs, Ark., 
denounced by republicans, 55. 

Trusler, P. C., and Indianapolis fire department, 
13; award boss, councilman of Indianapolis, 
obtains removal of Fire Chief Webster, 36; 
spoilsman, see Indianapolis, 69, 380; candidate, 
162; tries to turn fire service at over to spoils, 
207, 208. 

Trust, G., low politician and murderer, gets office 
through Gorman, 2:57. 

Truxton, Commodore, commandant navy yard at 
Norfolk, Va., 147. 

Tucker, postmaster at Annapolis, In Maryland con¬ 
vention, :535. 

Tugwell, A. P., ex-collector, a political worker, 159. 

Turner, postmaster at Newtonvllle, Mass., indorsed 
for re-appointment, 100. 

Turner, Congressman, favors civ. service reform 

100 . 

Turpie, Senator, :593, 404; patronage of, 405, 410, 41:4, 
418, 419, 420, 421. 422. 

Tuscaloosa, Ala., Miller, postmaster of, delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Tweed,“B 088 ,” 28 , 190,211,212; allied with Hill, 306. 

Tyner, “Jim,” ass’t att’y-genT for P. O. dep’t, con¬ 
strues civil service law in favor of Baltimore 
federal employes, politically active, :457, 358. 

Tyrrell, W. A., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Waverly, Iowa, 112. 

Underwood. W., appointed postmaster at Washing¬ 
ton, Penn., 100. .... 

Union, Ind.. Fearis, postmaster of, political work¬ 
er, 316, 378. 

Union City, Mich., Journalist Easton, postmaster 
8>t> 14«^ 

Union League Club, and Platt, 333. 

Uniontown, Pa., Patterson appointed postmaster at 
through influence of Frick,99. 

U. S. Supreme Bench, considered as spoils, 24. 

Upper Sandusky, O., Editor Cuneo postmaster at, 
301. 

Upton, J. D., defeated candidate, sale of offices by 
in Missouri. 55, 99. 

Urwitz, M., sec’y central republican exec, commit¬ 
tee, Texas, denounces Cuney, 180. 

Utah, relative of Pres. Harrison given position in, 
;50, .369; sentiment favoring civil service reform 
in. 111; political activity of office-holders in, 
339, 345, 347; vote of for Harrison at Minneapo¬ 
lis, .347. 

Utica, O., Journalist Harris postma.ster at, 149. 

Utica, N. Y., Miller, postmaster of, a political 
worker, 266. 

Utter, A. W., journalist, appointed postmaster at 
Emmettsburg, Iowa, 142. 

Uxbridge. Mass., Postmaster Farnum of. removed 
on secret charges, Scott appointed, 175. 

Vail, D., editor, appointe i postmaster at New 
Sharon, Iowa, 142. 

Vail. J. M., journalist, postmaster at New Milford, 
Pa. 149. 

Valley Center, Journalist Beach postmaster at, 149. 


Valley Virginian [repub.], opposed to Mahone,53. 

Valparaiso. Ind., Postmaster De Motte of, a politi¬ 
cal worker, 153, 377, 878; works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 316, 343; at Minneapolis conven¬ 
tion, .379. 

VanAlstyne, J. L., physician, pension examiner, 
removed through Postmaster Dunn, .304. 

Van Auda, Rev. A. C., address of on “Purity in 
Politics,” 137. 

Van Buren, M., Pres., spoils system attributed to, 
262. 

Van Buren, W. A., recommended for appointment 
to local service board at Indianapolis, spoils¬ 
man, 34, 78; attends dinner to Roosevelt (see), 
227, 229. 

Van Cliff, M. E., commissioner (U. S.) circuit court 
in New York, a political worker, 266. 

Van Cott, appointed postmaster at New York, for 
party services, 13, 20; and civil service commis¬ 
sion, 42; appointed at dictation of Platt, 22, 44; 
appoints his son cashier of post-office, 108; as¬ 
sists at dinner to Clarkson, 245; calls on Fas- 
sett, collector at. 2.58; gives offices to supporters 
of Gibbs, political worker, 265, 269; political 
worker, 279, 287; defended by Wanamaker, 2,89; 
and political workers, 311; works for Harrison 
at Minneapolis, wants Hendricks to lead in 
New York, 337,344, .347, 396. 

Van Duzer, ex-assemblyman of New York, opposes 
Platt and Fassett, 259; postmaster at Horse- 
heads. N. Y.. a political worker, 265; andremov- 
al of Flood, 304; attempted removal of by Fas¬ 
sett, .331. 

Van Horn, R. T., controlling patronage of Missouri, 
24. 

Van Houten, editor, appointed postmaster atl^enox, 
Iowa, 142. 

Van Riper, J., postmaster at Rutherford, N. J., re¬ 
moved on secret charges, 175. 

Van Schaick, Congressman, and Postmaster Paul of 
Milwaukee, 44, 47; his “prerogative,” 55. 

Van Slyke, J., editor, appointed postmaster at Mc¬ 
Henry, Ill., 141. 

Van Voorhis, J. R., Tammany man, career of 818. 

Vance, Senator, on civil service reform, 117; and 
Eaves, 159. 

Vandermost, J., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Monroe, la., 142. 

Vandervoort, P., chief clerk R. R. service, 1883, In¬ 
capable, discharged, and reappointed at sugges¬ 
tion of Nebraska congressmen, 17; and Harri¬ 
son administration, 25; henchman, 21,34, 35, .54; 
supt. of mails at Omaha, Neb., disreputable 
politician and spoilsman, 211; career of, 215, 
216, 220,357. 

Vandevere, C. E., appointed by Cleveland, Indian 
agent, efficient, but removed, 181. 

Vesey, postmaster at Baltimore, spoilsman, re¬ 
movals under, 53; and Sears, P. O. employe at, 
277. 

Vest, .Senator, a spoilsman, 5,43,45; Arthur’s admin¬ 
istration, 24; secures appointment for son, to¬ 
tally unfit, under Cleveland, 242; on the issue, 
375. 

Vest, G., son of Senator Vest, appointed to diplo¬ 
matic service under Cleveland, totally unfit, 
242. 

Vevay, Postmaster Shaw and Deputy Long, of Ve- 
vay, Ind.. political workers, :579. 

Vicksburgh, Mich., Journalist Baldwin postmaster 
at. 149. 

Vicksljurg, Miss.,Hill, negro, postmaster of, worker 
at Minneapolis, 343. :54S. 

Vigneaux, J., U. S. marshal, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, :i48. 

Vilas, W. F., senator and ex-P. M. Genl., spoilsman. 
20, 21; removals under, 96; compelled to let 
Faulkner stay in office by Voorhees, 222; under 
Cleveland, spoilsman, 255; and civil service re¬ 
form, 274; under Cleveland, spoilsman, :164. 

Vincennes, Indiana, letter from correspondent at, 
16 ; post-office at, :17; Tindolph, postmaster of, at 
Minneapolis convention, 3.S(). 

Vineland, N. J., postmaster at, removed on false 
charge, really for political reasons, ;}9. 

Virginia, patronage of given by Pres. Harrison to 
Mahone, 27, 2.8, :31, :48, 41, .51, .52, 56, 67, 68, 70, 111, 
282, .332, 376; political assessments in, made by 
republicans, 226; political activity of federal 
ollice-holders in, supports Blaine, :i48, 315, 370. 

Vogel, “Gus,” federal office-holder at St. Louis, 
worker for Filley machine, 1,50. 

Voght, F., mohier, appointed in office of Gold, 
townshi]) trustee, at Indianapolis, 2-56. 

Voght, W. F., editor, appointed postmaster at Cov¬ 
ington, Inil., 126.377. 

Von Bergman. A., editor, given office Ihrotigh Con¬ 
gressman Belden, 132. 

Von Landberg. A., editor, internal revenue col¬ 
lector, removals by, 1.50. 

Voorhees. Senator, a spoilsman, 5, 43, 45, 177, 244, 
381, 404; opposed to civil service reform, 80; 
political turn-coat. 171; secures place for Faulk¬ 
ner, illiterate politician. 222; and Cleveland, 
235; favors Gorman for president. 236; supports 
Hanlon for Internal revenue collector at New 
Albany, Ind., 393; allowed by Brookshire to 
name postmaster at Terre Haute. Ind., 405; 
patronage of, 409, 410, 413, 418, 419, 420, 421, 422. 

Wade, F., journalist, postmaster at Sanguatuck, 
Mich., 149. 

Wade, of Missouri, and office-seekers, 6,15. 

Waddick, ballot-box stuffer, see Hudson Co., N. Y. 










XXX iv 


Wadsworth, J. W., congressman-elect, calls for po¬ 
litical assessments, 279, 354. 

Wagner, chairman Kings (Jo. (N. Y.) republican 
committee, levies political assessments, 287. 

Wakeinau, W. F.. sec’y American Protective Tariff 
League, at Minneapolis convention, 314; cir¬ 
cular letter of, to postmasters, 382. 

Walker, congressman, secures appointment of 
Scott as postmaster at Uxbridge, Mass., 175. 

Walker, internal revenue collector, assists at din¬ 
ner to Clarkson, 245. 

Walker, B. W., U. S. marshal in Alabama, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Walker, F. A., and censuses of 1870 and 1880, 291; on 
selection of census enumerators, 294; on census 
of 1870, 1880, 1890, 295. 

Walker, O. D., physician, employed in Indian serv¬ 
ice, asked for political contribution, 385. 

Walker, W. B., defeated applicant indorsed gener¬ 
ally for postmaster at Hamilton, Mo., 150. 

Wallace, helped by Quay, 135. 

Wallace, deputy postmaster at Indianapolis, a po¬ 
litical worker. 144. 

Wallace, D., P. O. employe at Indianapolis, works 
for Harrison, 302, 337, 343, 377, 378,379. 

Wallace, Gen.L., obtains postmastership at Indi¬ 
anapolis for brother, for services to Harrison at 
Chicago convention, 26. 

Wallace. S., inspector in N. Y. custom-house, a po¬ 
litical worker, 108. 

Wallace, postmaster at Indianapolis directed by 
civil service commission to remove Moore, 
gambler<.27, 28; views of civil s. ref., 2,9,18; law 
violated lii'i^l appointed at request of General 
1<. Wallace.'cares little for success of civil serv¬ 
ice reform, 26; re-instates K. B. Mundelle, dis¬ 
charged by Jones, postmaster, 27; and Hamlin, 
bad character, keeps him in office, 34; and locai 
board, 43, 48, 78; secretly a political worker, 144; 
death of, a loss to the public service, 219. 

Wallace, W. C., Congressman, obtainsappointment 
of 200 henchmen in Brooklyn navy yard, 55, 72; 
aided by ward politician, Nathan. 121,150; and 
‘ Dan” Lake, 132; opposed by Benedict and 
.Seo’y Tracy, 135; controls patronage in New 
York, 142; secures appointment of M. Malone, 
143; secures nomination of postmaster Kirk¬ 
patrick, 157; candidate for congress, re-nomi- 
uated, see Nathan, 178, 374; trading in behalf 
of, by Nathan, federal employe, 179,180; Boyle, 
navy employe, political worker for, 183. 

Walser, Z. V., federal employe, Harrison delegate 
from N. Carolina, 334. 

Walter, P. L., accuses Delamater of bribery, 1.34. 

Walters, J., political worker under Postmaster 
Johnson in Maryland, 335. 

W'alters, N., politician, candidate for postmaster at 
Rochelle, 111., 109. 

Walton, T., beaten by ballot frauds, see Martin, low 
politician. 

Wanamaker, P. M. Gen’L, endorses Martin,low pol- 
tician.for collector internal revenue, see 239; 
and W. W. Dudley, 2; rules for employes, con¬ 
cerning applicants, 14,16; and the postmaster- 
ship of Philadelphia. 15, 22; at dictation of Sen¬ 
ator Quay, 27; removes postmaster at New 
Bedford (Mass.), despite protests, and without 
cause or hearing, 29; in conflict with Senator 
Quay over Philadelphia spoils, 80; and civ. 
service commission, 36; favors Gorman. 38; re¬ 
moves postmaster at Vineland. N. J., for politi¬ 
cal reasons on false charges. 39; spoilsman, 43, 
174, 290; and Van Cott, postmaster at N.Y. City, 
44 ; and Postmaster Paul, of Milwaukee, 44; ac¬ 
cepts nominations of Brower, congressman, 47; 
to be blamed for patronage scandal, 55; and 
postmaster at Cheraw, S. C., 55; protest against 
Llarkson sent to, 55; on necessity of reform in 
railway mai 1 service, 69; career of in politics, and 
removals of postmasters by, 70; and Sen. Wade 
Hampton, concerning post-office at Columbia, S. 
C.,74; and postmaster at Laurenceville, Va., 74; 
circular letter of Marshall Cushing, private sec’y 
to. 80; gives disposal of postmastership at Balti¬ 
more to Stockbridge, 84; see Russellville. Ind., 
89; gives post-office at Pittsburgh to Sen. Quay, 
90; and re-appointment of Montgomery as post¬ 
master at Bristoi, Conn.,91,92; removals under, 
96 ; and English, postmaster at New Haven, 
Conn., 96; and Frick, 99; and removal of Hart¬ 
ley, 101; course of in Shidy case, 103. 104; and 
post office at Rochelle, Ill., 110; tool of <3uay, 
112, 133, 138, 161, 173; letter to from Cooper re¬ 
garding postmasters at Freedom and Brooklyn, 
Ind., 112; condemned, 125; testifies to worth of 
Postmaster Hendrix of Brooklyn, N. Y.. 131; 
removals under McKean, postmaster at Pitts¬ 
burgh, 133; approves Pres. Cleveland’s circular 
warning federal employes against undue politi¬ 
cal activity, 135; and use of post-offices for politi¬ 
cal purposes. 135; and Quay. 161; refuses access 
to records of removals, etc,, 163; report of for 1889, 
past of, 163, 164; suggests assessments oncorpor- 
■ atlons, 171; and Foulke, 173; on secret charges, 
175; hostile to civil service reform, 177; charges 
of against civil service commission, 185; letter of 
to Postmaster Marsh alleging congressional in¬ 
fluence for removal, letters of to others,removed, 
187: letter of to McCauley regarding removal, 187; 
refuses to re-appoint democratic postmaster 
Harrington, 188; and Baltimore post-office. 189; 
evasive course of, 190,191; charges of Inefficiency 
against civil service commission met, 193; and 


1 N J) E X . 


railway mail service,203; Mail Superintendent 
Vaudervoort, disreputable politician and spoils- 
may,safe with,211 ;aud Delphi (Ind.)JournaI,213: 
defended by Gorman against Roosevelt, 214; 
Leeds, corrupt politician, 216; a "pious fraud,” 
see Vaudervoort, 220; objects to civil serv¬ 
ice reform, gives prize to Oler for efficiency 
in mail service. 224; rule of to re-appoint only 
republicans violated, 224; backs (juay, 228; 
defended for spoils methods by Gorman, 228; 
gets office as political reward. 237'; oldigations of 
Harrison to, 240; collects campaign funds, gam¬ 
bles in stocks with Lucas, countenances fraudu¬ 
lent issues of stock, 245, 246; and appointment 
of Low',249; and small office-seekers.251; should 
institute examinations under civil service com¬ 
mission for promotions in his department, 254; 
appointment of hurts civil service reform, 255, 
256; establishes board of promotion by ciom- 
petuive examination in P. O. department, 256, 
257; injures civil service reform, see Lambert, 
261; uses postmasters as political agents, 262; 
and civil service reiorm, 274; letter to Sears, 
giving inefficiency as cause of removal, 277; ob¬ 
jects to political assessments In P. ©.depart¬ 
ment, 280; and violations of law in Omaha post- 
office, 281; defends Van Cott, postmaster at New 
York, 289; refuses to tell Flood alleged reasons 
for removal .promotion scheme of ,297,2ii8,303,304; 
introduced promotion by competition in P.O. de¬ 
partment, 321; and Baltimore investigation, 329, 
330, 372, 373, 396; political worker for Harrison, 
299; and attempted removal of Postmaster Van 
Duzer, 331, 339, 340, 349; and political activity 
of federal employes at Baltimore, 3.35, ;150, 357, 
358; refuses list of employes for assessment pur¬ 
poses, 363, 364; appointed in return for raising 
campaign fund. ;368.374,376; and political activ¬ 
ity of postmasters, 375, 389; and removal for po¬ 
litical reasons of Duer, postmaster at Princess 
Anne, Md., 408; gives prize to Swift, efficient R. 
R, postal clerk, 415. 

Wanmaker, G. W , low politician in New York, 
311; and cartage contract at N. Y. custom-house, 
358. 

Ward, postmaster at Salem, Ind., political worker, 
380. 

War^d, carrier at Indianapolis post office, removed. 

Ward, C., and attempted bribery by Sen. Higgins 
and Postmaster Smith, in Delaware, 402. 

Ward, J. A., editor, candidate for postmaster at 
Lockport, N. Y.,216. 

Ward, W. J., affidavit of on sale of offices bv J. 
Love, 99. 

Warmcastle, S. D., revenue collector, begs Blaine 
to speak, 180; political worker for Quay, 270; 
280; supporter of Quay, removed by Harrison, 
299. 

Warmouth, H. C., ex-Gov., appointed collector at 
New Orleans, 44,52; ruffianlypolitician,105; aids 
lottery, 143.191; secures appointment of Weber 
as postmaster at Donaldson, La.. 241; worker for 
Harrison in Louisiana, 304; supports Harrison 
at Mlnjieapolis, 345, 346; worker for Harrison, 
348, 357, 362, 374; pays political assessments, 
383. 

Warner, C. D., address of on spoils system at Indian- 
opolis, 415. 

Warner, C. W., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Hoopeston, Ill., 141,165. 

Warner, J. M., spoken of as postmaster for Albany, 
N. Y., 46; postmaster at Albany, N. Y., favors 
civil service reform, 51; enforces civil service 
law, 136; delegate to N. Y. convention, 335. 

Warsaw, Ind., Bennett, postmaster of, political 
worker for Harrison, 316, 378, :!S0. 

Warsaw, Mo., post-office at sold by Upton, 55. 

Warwick, Congressman, institutes competitive ex¬ 
amination for candidates for West Point, does 
not accept result, 254, 262. 

Washburn^ Senator, patronage a source of weak¬ 
ness, 25: indorses E. G. Hay, 84; supporter of 
Blaine, .344, 345. 

Washington (state), political activity of federal of¬ 
fice-holders in, 357. 

Washington, I). C., Sherwood promoted to be post¬ 
master at, 153; proportion of applicants to of¬ 
fices in, under Harrison and Cleveland, 185; 
Harrison removes U. S. district attorney at, 211; 
merit system in departments at, 224; competi¬ 
tive examinations under civil service commis¬ 
sion order for promotions in departments at, 
254; Harrison makes rules for promotion in de¬ 
partments at, 261: department offices and the 
examinations, 273; political contributions asked 
in P. O. department by Watres, 280: merit sys¬ 
tem for laborers in navy yard at. Instituted at 
and commended, 331: political assessments in 
departments at. 390, 392; examinations for de¬ 
partments at, 1891-92, 396; political assessments 
levied by Old Dominion republican club in de¬ 
partments at, 412. 

Washington Post, civil service reform a snare and 
a sham, 49. 

Washington Star (repub.), advocates civil service 
reform, 92. 

Washington, George, 116: on political duty, see head¬ 
line to Civil Service Chronicle for June, 
1890,129; Harrison compared with, 1-59: on evils 
of strict adherence to party, 236, 274; on evils of 
parties, 323, .394. 

Washington, Ind., Ellis appointed postmaster at, 
despite sale of office to Sefrits, 121 . 


Washington, Kan., Journalist Robinson postmaster 
at, 119. 

Washington, Pa., Underwood appointed postmas¬ 
ter at, 100. 

Washington Co., Ind., removals and appointments 
in,91. 

Waters, state senator of Pa., 133. 

Watertown, N. Y., Gates, postmaster of, furnishes 
political information, 392. 

Watervllle, Me., Millicau, postmaster of, and non¬ 
delivery of papers advocating Burleigh, con¬ 
gressional candidate opposing Manley, 364. 

Waterville, Wash., Journalist Kellogg, postmaster 
at, 1 d5 . 

Watkins, politician, and appointments in Brooklyn 
navy yard, 45. 

Watkins, N. Y., P. Conroy appointed postmaster at, 
1.50. 

Watres,L. A., republican political worker for Quay, 
asks political contributions in P. O. department 
at Washington, D. C., 2,8ft. 

Watrous, J. W., editor, appointed customs collector 
at Milwaukee, through Influence of Wisconsin 
congressmen, 71,126. 

Watson, "Billy,” w'ard politician, see also Kings 
Co., N. Y., 182, 183, 302, 

Watson, C. W., chairman committee of N. Y. civ. 
service reform association, on civil service ex¬ 
aminations, 239, 319,320; on committee National 
League, to investigate political a6seBements< 
338. 

Watts, F., appointed postmaster at Freedom, Ind., 
vice Suffall, removed for political reasons, 377. 

Waugh, congressman, patronage of, 419. 

Waverly, Iowa, Editor Tyrrell, appointed i>ostmas- 
ter at, 142. 

Waverly, O., Journalist Snyder, postmaster at, 149, 
301. 

Wayne Co. (N.Y.) republicans, resolutions, of de¬ 
nouncing patronage system of republican 
party, 156. 

W'eather bureau, merit system in, 253; service 
classified by Pres. Harrison, 403. 

Weatherby, Rev. S. S., on civ. service reform, 83. 

Weaver, postmaster at-, a political worker, 179. 

Weaver, J.M., congressman, obtains appointment 
of Lows political worker, as postmaster of West- 
port, N. Y., 249, 354.. 

Weaver, V., editor, appointed postmaster at Loda, 
111., 141. 

Webb, constructor at Klttery (Me.), navy yard, ex¬ 
amination of, 147. 

Webb, W. E., census supervisor, pledges of to 
spoilsmen, 131. 

Weber, federal officer, appoints anti-Platt men,334. 

Weber, E. M., appointed postmaster at Donaldson, 
La., upon request of Collector Warmouth, 241. 

Webster, federal employes compelled to vote for, 
162. 

Webster, Daniel, address to Massachusetts w'higs 
in 1832, public press and spoils, 17; on bribery of 
press,81,141.1-54,155,369,376; spoils system under 
Jackson, 270, 324; sec’y of state under W. H. 
Harrison, circular of against political assess¬ 
ments and political activity of federal office¬ 
holders, 320. 

Webster, E. A., negro, coll. int. rev., delegate to 
Minneapolis convention, 348, 382. 

Webster, Col. G. P., patronage of in N. Y. legisla¬ 
ture, guilty of nepotism, 215. 

Webster, J. A., journalist, postmaster at Johnson, 
Kan., 149. 

Webster, J. H., chief of Indianapolis fire depart¬ 
ment, 13,69; removed for political reasons, 36; 
influence of removal on city elections, 59; 
against spoils system, 203; effort to force him to 
turn fire service over to spoils; removal and re- 
pointment of, 207, 208. 

Webster, W. B., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Cresco, low'a, 142. 

Wedgefield, S. C., Negro Richardson, postmaster 
of, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Weed, S., Tammany “boss,” and prison patronage, 
331. 

Weeks, thief, ordered to be employed in Kittery 
navy yard, see Robeson and Broadhead, 147. 

IVeeping Water, Neb., removal of Postmaster Rat- 
nour of on secret charges, Butler appointed, 
175. 

Weigel, E. F., political worker for “Boss” Filley, 
given office by Sec’y Noble. 226. 

Weinsteil, L., editor, appointed collector fourth la. 
district, 56. 

Welling, stamp clerk at Indianapolis, 9. 

Wellington, G. L.. U. S. sub-treasurer, in Maryland 
convention, 335. 

Wells, A. J., veteran, discharged and reinstated by 
Jones, postmaster at Ind’pls, 9. 

Welsh H., at Baltimore conference, 1889 , 2; reap¬ 
pointment of Oberly, 9; controversv with Sen¬ 
ator Ingalls over Indian commisslon'er, 22; little 
progress In bettering condition of Indians due 
to spoils system, 39; circular letter of to clergy 
asking for clerical advocacy of civil service re¬ 
form, see, also. Church, 40; letter on treatment 
of Indians by administration of Pres. Harrison, 
42, 79; letter of to Boston Transcript on Indian 
service, 47; and clerical advocacy of civ. service 
reform, 65,73; letterof to Civil S'ervice Chron¬ 
icle on Indian service, 98; denies charges 
against Indian Agent McChesney, 130; letterof 
to R. Lincoln, 161; and causes of Indian rising 














INDEX. 


XXXV 


at Pine Ridge, 192, 202, 217; on removals in In¬ 
dian service, 219; in Scribner’s Magazine for 
April, 1891, on evils of spoils system in Indian 
service, 224; before civil service reform asso¬ 
ciation of Penn., on Indian service, 239; on 
“Degradation of Politics in Pennsylvania,” in 
Forum, Nov., 1891, 282, 324; on committee of Na¬ 
tional League, to investigate political inter¬ 
ference of office-holders, 338; on committee of 
publication of Good Government, 357; on pub- 
' licityascure for political corruption, 3Gii. 

Wemple, controller, receives political contribu¬ 
tions, 180. 

Wenueker, internal revenue collector at St. Louis, 
and negro spoilsman, 140; political worker, re¬ 
moval of requested by Secy. Noble, 330. 

West Grove, Chester Co., Pa., applicants as post¬ 
master of, 55. 

West Hoboken, N. J., postmaster Middleton of re- 
re moved, no cause assigned, Klumpp appointed, 
176. 

West Point, Congressman Warwick institutes com¬ 
petitive examinations for candidates for, does 
not accept result, see McKinley, 254, 262. 

West Virginia, A. B. White, newspaper proprietor, 
appointed collector internal revenue, 30; asst, 
district attorney of, sued for embezzlement, 39; 
U. S. deputy marshal in, indicted for bribery, 
:19; republicans of believe in spoils, 62; conflict 
over patronage of. 71; census service in run 
after spoils system, 293; political activity of 
federal office-holders in, 348; political assess¬ 
ments levied on federal office holders from, ac¬ 
tivity of federal employes in, 390. 


Westchester, Pa., removal of Postmaster Pyle at, 
for political reasons, 101. 

Westclifle, Colo., S. Lacey, wife of editor, appointed 
postmaster at, 148. 

Westport, N. Y., political worker Low appointed 
postmaster at. 249. 

Wetherlll, J. R., political worker under Postmaster 
Johnson, in Maryland, 335. 

Wheat, J. C., not on eligible list, re-instated in In¬ 
dianapolis post-office after absence of years, 
26, 27. 

Wheeler, inspector in mail service, recommended 
by Hiscock and Platt, for inspector in charge of 
mails, vice Rathhone resigned. 241. 

Wheeler, custom-house employe at N. Y. City, at 
Minneapolis convention, 343. 

Wheeler, editor, to be postmaster at Crown Point, 
Ind., 302. 

Wheeler, E. P., plan of, for agitation of civil serv¬ 
ice reform before Nat. League, 1889,66.172; civil 
service reformer in New York, 239: address of, 
before annual meeting of National League, no¬ 
ticed, 269. 

Wheeler, E. W., journalist, postmaster at Sherman, 
Mich., 149. 

Wheeler, J. J., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Crown Point, Ind., 377. 

Wheeler, W. E., journalist, postmaster at Eagle 
Park, Idaho, 155 

White, ex Congressman, opposes Harrison, 317. 

White, collector Internal revenue in Texas, a po- 
worker lo9« 

While. A. B., editor, appointed collector internal 
revenue for W. Virginia, 30, 37^ 

White, A. D., candidate for governor of New York, 
supported by Platt and Nathan, 265; works for 
Fassett, 280; appointed U. S. minister to Rus¬ 
sia, 382. 

White. E., ward politician, appointed deputy post¬ 
master at Poughkeepsie, N. Y., vice Smith re¬ 
moved, 386. , , 

White, E. A., internal rev. coll, delegate to Minne¬ 
apolis convention, 334, 348. 

White. G., republican, removed from fire service 
at Indianapolis, see equally divided political¬ 
ly. 235. 

White, H., editor, political worker, 354. 

White H. G., politician opposing Hiscock in Onan- 
daga Co., N. Y., 264. 

WhiterProf. H. S., praises Civil Service Chroni- 
O T G 110 

White, Prof. T.C., brother of U.S. marshal, delegate 
to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

White Clay, Indian chief, and rising at Pine Ridge, 
S. Dak., 218. ^ , , 

Whitehead, special treasury agent, at Brooklyn, 


Whiteman, W. H.. appointed to supreme bench of 
N. Mexico, 24. 

Whitefleld, asst, to Wanamaker, and appointment 
of Weber, 241; and appointment of Low. 249. 

Whithoroe, congressional investigating committee 
on Kittery navy yard, 147. 

Whitman, Mass., Harlow, postmaster at recom¬ 
mended for re appointment, 100. 

Whitney, F. M.. editor, appointed deputy Internal 

revenue collector, 84,126. j t> 

Whitney, J.A.. political worker under Postmaster 
Johnson in Maryland, 335. 

Whitnev. Sec’y. 82; gives navy yards up as spoil. 
145, 147, 148,222. 

WIdney, J. A., soldier, postmaster at Moodhull, 
Ill., removed through influence of Cong. Hen¬ 
derson, 47. . 

Wigff. S., discharged from navy yarn at Norfolk, 
Va., by Sec’y Whitney, 147. c'Uv 

Wilber, Mrs., appointed postmaster at Clay Lity, 

Wilbvfc.^ B^.,*letter’to ‘Civil 

92; on proposed charter for Cincinnati, O., -3o, 
address of, on G. W. Curtis, 394. 


Wilcox, appointed collector at Springfield, Ill., 
through influence of Cannon, 31. 

Wilcox, C. A., editor, appointed postmaster at Quin¬ 
cy, III., 141,148. 

Wilcox, I. S., revenue collector, a political worker, 
160. 

Wilcox, Dr. J. A.. Harrison delegate from N. Caro¬ 
lina, 334. 

Wildmau, J. F., editor and Harrison “boomer,” ap¬ 
plicant for postmastership of Muncie, Ind., 217. 

Wiley, E., wife of Journalist Wiley, postmaster at 
Elizabeth, Pa., 149. 


Williams, G. F., opposed to civil service reform, 
according to Grosvenor, 204; as congressman 
on minister as citizen, 239. 

Williams, J. M., journalist, postmaster at Phoenix, 
N. Y., 155. 

Williams, O., steward at Marion Co. (Ind.) poor- 
house, neglects duty, see also Indlauapolis, cor¬ 
rupt politics, etc., at, 207. 

Williams, R., editor, works for Harrison, tries for 
office, disappointed, 95. 

Williams, S., federal employe, worker for Harrison, 
334. 

Williams, V. T., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Stanberry, Mo., appointment recalled on polit¬ 
ical opposition, 121. 

Williamsville, N. Y., Journalist Rlnewalt postmas¬ 
ter at, 155. 

Willie, Rev. J. S.. republican candidate for con¬ 
gress, offers bribes, 402. 

Willis, L.W., receiver of political assessments in 
Alabama, 391. 


Willis, T. B., appointed naval officer at New York, 
as reward for party services, scandalous parti¬ 
san, 55,106, 121, 132, 182,183, 191, 198, 304, 850, 355; 
appoints Politician Barrow his deputy,108; and 
Brooklyn, N. Y., post-office, 135; political activ¬ 
ity of his employes, 265; opposes Nathan, 332; 
in New York convention, 334, 335; worker for 
renomination of Harrison, against Nathan, 
worker for Platt, 336; works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 337,343, M4, 345; secures N.Y. dele¬ 
gation for Harrison, 348; and Nathan, 352,354,371. 

Wilmer, and corrupting influence of Tammany, 
289,290. 

Wilmington Morning News [repub.], attributes de¬ 
feat of 1889 to Mahonism, 75. 

Wilmington, O , federal office-holder political 
worker for Harrison, 302. 

Wilmington, O. M., dismissed by Jones,postmaster 
at Indianapolis, reinstated by Postmaster Wal¬ 
lace, 34. 

Wilmington, Del., Stewart, postmaster of, political 
worker, 334. 

Wilmington, N. C., Young nominated collector of, 
ward politician, 183. 

Wilmot, O., Journalist Spidle postmaster at, 149. 

Wilson, councilman of Indianapolis, spoilsman 
and low politician, 207. 

Wilson, representatative in Indiana legislature, 
spoilsman, 406; opposes gerrymander of 1893, 
414. 

Wilson, “Doc,” negro, political worker in Indian¬ 
apolis, 378, 379. 

Wilson, E., brother of editor, given office by Gov¬ 
ernor Foraker, .301. 


Vilson, E. M., editor, appointed postmaster at 
Adin, Cal., 141. 

Vilson, G. W., mayor of Ft. Wayne, Ind., opposes 
Harrison, 302. 

Vilson, J. E., negro, postmaster at Florence, S. C., 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 348. 

Vilson, Mrs. K., wife of political worker, candi¬ 
date for postmaster at Muncie, Ind., 217. 

Vilson, N. Y., Le Van appointed postmaster at, 39, 
45 

Vilson, W'., postmaster at Chadron, Neb., removed 
on secret charges, 175. 

Vilson, Rev. W. M., on Civ. Service Reform, 83. 

Vimberly. internal revenue collector in Louisiana, 
political worker, 304. ^ , , 

Vimberley, A. F., removed federal employe, 
worker at Indianapolis, 343,348. “ 

Vimbush, C. C., negro, federal employe, delegate 

to Minneapolis convention. 348. 

Vinchester (Ind.) Herald [repub.], republicans 
must stand for civ. service reform, 83. 

Vindom, Secretary, and office-seekers, 16, 37, 159; 
and Sturgeon, 22; and W’ild, head of assay office 
at Boise City, Idaho, accepts resignation of, .30; 
at request of Roosevelt, stops Coulter s Pro¬ 
ceedings, 34; appoints political worker to office, 
51; removes P.C. MacCourt, of N. Y. custom¬ 
house, 54; on the civ.service, 81; and Saltonstall, 
94: and Platt. 264; praises merit system, see an¬ 
nual report, 1889, 276. 

Vinamac, Ind., applicants for postmaster of, bar¬ 
gaining for position, 88. . . r 

Vinoua, Miss.. Matthews, deputy postmaster of, 
delegate to Minneapolis convention, 344, 348. 

Vinters, Cal., Moody, postmaster of. resigns, his 
successor removed for cause, Mrs. McKinley 
appointed, removed for political reasons, 90. 

Vinters, W. H., given place in Indiana legislature, 

Vlrt^J S.. Senator, civil service reformer, address 
o'f before alumni of St. John’s College, Mary- 

Vohfott.’Senator, and Harrison, 337; supporter of 

Volcott, E. O.. letter of on removal of Flood, post¬ 
master at Elmira, N. Y., on secret charges, 312. 


Wolcott, R., president of young men’s republican 
club of Massachusetts, civil service reformer, 
192, 219; opposed to Quay, 241. 

Wood, Consul, political worker in New Hampshire, 
371. 

Wood, purchases postmastership at Mitchell, Ind., 
appointed, 89. 

Wood, appointed census supervisor through influ¬ 
ence of Sherman, 301. 

Wood, A. L., editor, appolutad postmaster at St. 
Charles, Iowa, 142. 

Wood, H. C., federal officer, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, 348. 

Wood, J., defeated candidate for congress, secures 
appointment of Pentreath, 150. 

Wood, R. F., civil service reformer, 172; on ap¬ 
pointment of postmasters before annual meet¬ 
ing National League, 1892, 329. 

Woodard, postmaster of Harrodsburgh, Ind., polit¬ 
ical worker, 380. 

Woodard, S., federal office-holder, political worker 
for Harrison, 302, 378; works for Harrison at 
Minneapolis, 337, 343, 379. 

Woodford, S. L., candidate of Nathan for governor 
of New York, 265. 

Woodhull, 111., soldier and postmaster at, removed 
and civilian appointed, through influence of 
Henderson, G. A. R. post denounces Hender¬ 
son, 47, 

Woodmansee, M. G., journalist, postmaster at Holy- 
rood. Kan., 149. 

Woodruff, F., chairman Kings county republican 
committee controls patronage, 106.1,32; politi¬ 
cal worker, 121, 182,183; enters factional fights 
in Brooklyn and New York, 197, 198. 

AVoodriilT, J., testified against R. Smalls, 39. 

Woodruff, T. L., political worker for Boody, cong. 
candidate, 183. 

Woods, M. C., given place in Indianapolis post- 
office, as spoils, 18, 27, 34; political worker, ;!02. 
378. 

Woollen. W. W., controller of Indianapolis, com¬ 
mended, 269. 

Woolren, N., postmaster of Kingston, N.Y., political 
worker in New York, 336. 

Worcester Spy [repub.], civ. service reform a cer¬ 
tainty, 92. 

Workers, political, paid enough without additional 
remuneration in form of office, 30. 


Workman, J. B., clerk in Indiana senate, 408. 

Works, “Charlie,” worker for congressman Hitt, 
110 . 

Wooster, L., postmaster at Fostorla. 0., compelled 
to appoint partisans, 91. 

Wooten, J. T., attempted bribery of, by Sen. Higgins 
and Postmaster Smith, 401,402. 

Wouser,C. J., editor, appointed postmaster at Tama, 
Iowa, 142. 

Wray, state senator of Indiana and spoils methods, 
408. 

Wright, C. D., and civil service reform in census 
service, 291. 

Wright, F., refusal of Trustee Gold to remove. 111; 
removed, 146, 256. 

Wright. P., broker, at custom-house at N. Orleans, 
delegate to Minneapolis cohvention, .348. 

Wyman, Jr., M., at Baltimore conference 1889. 2; 
sec’y Cambridge Civil Service Reform Associa¬ 
tion, 205. 

Wymore, Neb., Journalist Thomas postmaster at, 
149. 

Wynn, I. C., journalist, postmaster at Lander, Wyo., 
155. 

Wyoming, Ill., postmaster at removed for having 
been appointed, through “Intrigue,” Hammond 
appointed, 176. 

Xenia, Ind., Editor Lawshe appointed postmaster 
at, 71,126, 377; political worker, 379. 


Yakiin, Ore., excellent appointments reversed at 
bidding of Senator Mitchell, 32 . 

Yakima Co., Wash., leadingpostmaster in. and other 
federal employes political workers, 362. 

Yale, office-holder, a politician, 162. 

Yankton, Dak., Indian agency at, and Sen. Moody, 
86 . 

Yeager, J., applicant for postmastership at La¬ 
nark, Carroll Co., Ill., 109. 

Yonkers, N. Y., Postmaster Keyes succeeded by 
politician Pentreath, 150. 

Young, Captain, testimony of regarding Kittery 
navy yard, 147. 

Young, A., treasury agent, active politically, 143. 

Young, D., federal employe, delegate to Minneapo¬ 
lis convention, :J48; collects political assess¬ 


ments, 384. 

Young, J. C., testimony of before Judge Lippincott 
as to election frauds, see also Hudson Co.. N. 
Y., 200. 

Young, J. II., negro, ward politician, appointed 
collector at Wilmington N. C., 183; federal em¬ 
ploye, delegate to Minneapolis convention, 
:334 , 348. 

Zadek, A., postmaster of Corsicana, Tex., politi¬ 
cian, 187. 

Zanesville, O., Editor Richards postmaster at. .301. 

Ziegenheim, collector at St. Louis, supports Filley 
machine, 150. 

Zimmerman, postmaster of Cannelton, Ind., op- 
lltical worker, 380. 

Zollinger, C. A..applicant for office under Cleveland 
(2d term), 892: pension agent under Cleveland, 
levies political assessments, 414. 

Zumstein postmaster at Cincinnati, 0., carries out 
spirit of civil service law, 2.57. 











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